Mike Myers looks back fondly on the days when Chris Farley would secretly follow him to an NBC shower, jump in after him, and press his body into Myers’ while declaring his love for his Saturday Night Live cast mate.
Myers recalled Farley’s running joke on an episode of the Fly on the Wall podcast, with Dana Carvey and David Spade. Over two wonderful episodes stretching across five hours, they welcomed guests including Myers, Adam Sandler and Chris Farley’s mother and brother as they honored Farley, their friend who died 25 years ago at age 33.
Also Read: Bill Murray ‘Hated’ Chris Farley and Adam Sandler, Rob Schneider Says
Farley’s shower behavior wasn’t exactly consensual, but Myers wasn’t exactly angry. He detailed the shower prank while making a point about the difference between comedians who are funny as a career and those who are just funny for the sake of fun. He said Farley would do the shower routine when they were both at Saturday Night Live in the 1990s, and carefully plotted it out, week after week.
Myers explained that he used to have a careful pre-show ritual on Saturdays that included a late afternoon shower. “I’d have my shower at exactly 4:17 or something. And Farley would always come to my shower completely naked, with his big giant body, and he’d press me against the wall, going, ‘Oh Mike, I’ve always loved you! Give me just one kiss.’ I’d beat on him. I’d go ‘Farley, get the f— out of here! Get the f— out!’ I couldn’t hit him very hard because it was so funny,” Myers recalled.
“Every week I forgot — you’d think you’d remember every week,” he added. The reason he didn’t remember, Myers explained, was that he was so distracted by the work involved in the show.
Myers said he would shower in a communal bathroom on the 9th floor of NBC’s 30 Rock, upstairs from Studio 8H, where Saturday Night Live is filmed. He chose the location for its privacy — to no avail.
“I found that the time when nobody was was there,” Mike Myers said. “I had pretty much everything laid out so the shower was literally like 11 seconds long.”
“So he was stalking you,” Carvey joked. “He was checking the time as well. He was ready for you.”
Besides working with Myers, Carvey and Spade on Saturday Night Live, Farley also appeared with Myers in the Wayne’s World films, and Spade in Tommy Boy and Black Sheep. Myers and Farley’s friendship predated SNL — Myers recalled on the podcast that he and Farley also did improv together at the Second City Theatre in Chicago while Myers, who was Canadian, waited for his American visa.
Farley was also the original voice of Shrek, but was replaced by Myers after his death on Dec. 18, 1997, of a drug overdose. Myers praises him on the podcast as a comic genius who you couldn’t stop watching.
“He was always very, very nice to me, and I know this is going to sound super corny, but he was super, super nice to my mom, and that always meant a lot to me,” Myers said.
You can listen to the full interviews about Farley on Fly on the Wall here.
Main image: Mike Myers and Chris Farley in the “Japanese Game Show” sketch on Saturday Night Live.
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