Laura Benanti and Keegan-Michael Key Talk Smart and Silly About Their Hilarious Broadway Pairing in Meteor Shower

As Laura and Gerald, a wild couple that shakes up the lives of a more straight-laced married pair, Tony Award winner Laura Benanti and Emmy winner Keegan-Michael Key are having a blast in the new comedy Meteor Shower. At an exclusive Broadway.com photo shoot, the funny duo sits down to wonder if playwright Steve Martin knows who they are, talk about embracing the shadows in life and debate what the feck fecund means anyway.

Did you two immediately hit it off?

Keegan-Michael: We did. I met her on a television set six, seven years ago.

Laura: No, longer than that. Nine years ago, maybe.

Keegan-Michael: Maybe nine. Eli Stone with Jonny Lee Miller. And part of why I wanted to do this show was because of her. Because I think she's just really just an outstanding performer, and just as outstanding a human being.

Laura: Oh man.

Keegan-Michael: A very good mother.

Laura: Aww, thank you Keegan. I don't even have joke for that because I just feel so happy you said it.

Keegan-Michael: I'm going to knock all the jokes out by being sincere.

Laura: Oh, great. Boring! And I'm just a big fan of his, and I was thrilled to hear that he was coming on because I was like, “He's perfect.”

There are a ton of funny people in this show. Was there a lot of one-upping in the rehearsal room?

Laura: I don't think so.

Keegan-Michael: When we started… Amy [Schumer]… her humor is non-stop, it's perpetual and very disarming. And it makes for a nice rehearsal room. So, everybody—the director, the assistant stage manager and the assistant director—everybody is laughing all the time.

Laura: She does a lot of singing.

Keegan-Michael: She sings and does spins and tells anecdotes. But it's intrinsic to Amy's nature and character. She's not even trying. And it's unbelievable. I don't even know if we have the ability to top her in that regard. So, I don't even try because it's just delightful to watch.

Laura: She’s just playing, you know. It feels like you're playing with your friends. For me, it feels like when I was a child. There’s not a sense of competition when you're a kid. It's just a sense of collaborative play where everybody is making each other laugh, and you're not doing it to be the funniest person in the room, you're doing it because it's fun. And I think that translates on stage as well, where, as Jerry [Zaks, the director] would say, we're all passing that ball. I don't know what that means because I don't care about sports, but I'm assuming it's good.

Keegan-Michael: You just had to say that.

Laura: I gotta get a dig in about sports. F-U sports! Take that! All the sports fans watching Broadway.com, they're like, Wait! They're up in arms.

Keegan-Michael: They're like, This is ridiculous! I'm not going to see that show! They're not getting my money!... I do like sports.

Laura: Yeah. He's big into lacrosse.

Keegan-Michael: I love major league lacrosse, guys.

Laura: Yeah, no, it's so good. [Eyeroll.]

Keegan-Michael: MLL. That's what my jam is.

Laura: Dave Matthews Band.

Keegan-Michael: Dave Matthews Band, lacrosse, all the white stuff. [Laughs.]

Laura: White stuff!

Obligatory Steve Martin question: Does it blow your mind that he knows who you are?

Keegan-Michael: Every day. Every single day.

Laura: I'm not convinced he knows who I am. I think he's like, just name the character Laura, this way I'll like know.

Keegan-Michael: I won't screw that up, no!

Laura: I won't screw it up.

Keegan-Michael: Part of the joy of this experience has been watching the delight in his eyes. Watching him watch it come together. It's been lovely.

Laura: I can't look at him, so I don't know. I get too nervous. And every time I say something, he's like, “What?” I feel like he can't hear me, so then I get even more [Whispers.] And he's like, “Get away from me.” But I'm such a huge fan of his. It makes me so nervous when I see him. And then I try to be cool where I'm like, “Oh, hey, Steve!” And I'm perpetually awkward. I'm like forever awkward. That's going to be the name of my album. [Singing.] Forever Awkward.

Keegan-Michael: But he's really a real craftsman. The cogs never stop turning because he's going, “You know what would be good?” Or, he'll go, “I gotta work on that.”

Laura: He's also a true renaissance man. He does so many things and he actually does them well. And that's what's fascinating to me. He's an actor, he's a writer, he's a comedian, he's an author, he's a playwright, he's an art collector. He's so many things.

Keegan-Michael: A musician.

Laura: Yeah, an incredible musician. I mean it's the banjo, but... I'm totally kidding. Actually, funny story about my daughter. She loves his new album. I put it on every morning. She crawls over to her toy box and she gets out her rattle, and she shakes along to it. It's so cute.

Favorite Steve Martin comedies from the past?

Laura: I mean, Three Amigos. It's my family's favorite movie. Like, the night before my wedding, my sister and I stayed at a hotel and we watched Three Amigos and we ate licorice because that's what we did as children. He has been such a part of our lives. I could quote that entire movie to you.

Keegan-Michael: When I was a child and he was on SNL…

Laura: I'm so much younger, I never saw him on SNL.

Keegan-Michael: She didn't see him on SNL. She was not yet born.

Laura: No.

Keegan-Michael: But, his King Tut stuff blew my mind. I have a friend who they wore out their 45. A 45 is…

Laura: I don't know because I'm too young.

Keegan-Michael: …a piece of media that's commonly known as a record. [Laughs.]

Laura: Sorry.

Keegan-Michael: And then the other thing is when I was in high school, seeing him in Dirty Rotten Scoundrels. Him and Michael Caine. I didn't know, there were things I couldn't understand about comedy at the time that blew my mind.

Laura: Ruprecht? Was that the name?

Keegan-Michael: Ruprecht the monkey boy.

Laura: Yes, and then on his fork he's got the wine stopper.

Keegan-Michael: He's got the cork, and he's like, “May I go to the bathroom?” [Laughs.] So good.

Do you make him laugh in rehearsals? Is that like getting Sondheim to applaud when you sing one of his songs, Laura?

Laura: I can't look at him. I don't know if he laughs at me.

Keegan-Michael: He does laugh at her. He laughs at her. He giggles incessantly.

Laura: He does? Alright.

Keegan-Michael: Yes, honey. He does. He loves you.

Laura: I can't look.

We know Meteor Shower is about two couples. And we've seen two-couple plays before. Is it safe to say you guys are like the Nick and Honey of the show?

Keegan-Michael: No, if anything we're the George and Martha and they're the Nick and Honey. But that's all I can say without ruining the play. It's a very absurdist [Who’s Afraid of] Virginia Woolf.

Laura: Yes, that's the word.

Keegan-Michael: Or an absurdist A Delicate Balance. It's an absurdist Albee. [Laughs.] Pick an Albee, and it's the absurdist version of that.

Laura: You just sounded so smart.

Keegan-Michael: [Laughs.] Thank you, honey. Thank you.

Laura: I mean, I know you're really smart, but you just sounded very theater-y.

Keegan-Michael: So, yeah, we're definitely the George and Martha. But in this play, the George and Martha are visiting Nick and Honey. It's a flip.

So is booze the fifth character in this show?

Laura: No.

Keegan-Michael: It is not. Trepidation is the fifth character. Or uncertainty is the fifth character in this one.

Laura: I feel like we're sort of the id of their characters. The parts of them that they don't allow to live in the world, we embody. So, we aren't confined by social mores and norms.

Keegan-Michael: So they're kind of the super ego of themselves, and we're the id of them. So, the clash is, in a manner of speaking, internal. So, it's interesting. It's a very kind of studied Virginia Woolf. Psychological Virginia Woolf.

Laura: And it's not linear. It's really about human behavior and how we interact with each other, and it's very, very funny. Audiences are really enjoying it. Do you like how I'm like Audiences are enjoying it. Where I'm like hypnotizing them? Audiences are enjoying it.

Keegan-Michael: That play was good.

What are your characters of Laura and Gerald like? You guys are sort of like the firecrackers?

Laura: We're wild, yeah. We're wild and free.

Keegan-Michael: Yeah, I think that they have decided that the best way to keep their relationship fertile and exciting and fecund with opportunity…

Laura: Jesus Christ! Google fecund…

Keegan-Michael: …is to try to keep everything as open.

Laura: It's not a real word. I just Googled on my hand and it's not a real word.

Keegan-Michael: It's f-e-c-u-n-d. So, exploration and experimentation is kind of the experience du jour for them. That's how they keep their relationship going, it’s the fuel.

You guys sound like trouble.

Laura: I feel like you're speaking another language.

Keegan-Michael: What am I doing?! [Laughs.]

Laura: I don't know, but it's so smart. Yeah, so I think we come in and we are there to be the flip side of who they are. We are there to...

Keegan-Michael: Press their buttons.

Laura: Yes, exactly, and I don't want to give anything away, but our relationship is not based on, like, hearing each other politely.

Keegan-Michael: Yes, yes.

Laura: Our relationship is based on fire.

Keegan-Michael: It's a mutual respect of putting each other down. It's an oxymoron.

Laura: Strike first!

You've both done very well with political comedy, Laura with playing Melania Trump on Colbert and Keegan-Michael, with playing Obama’s anger translator, Luther. Is there anything state-of-our-world about Meteor Shower?

Laura: No. It's set in 1993. And that's what I think is kind of nice about it because right now, it might be nice for people to come into the theater and go back in time to a gentler time in our nation's history, and not have to think about politics for 90 minutes. It's more about our interpersonal relationships. But, I will say that I think the state that we find ourselves in is based on how we treat each other interpersonally, and so I think you can glean messaging from the play that's not necessarily political as in left or right, but just in terms of human behavior and how we treat each other. And the effects of that.

Keegan-Michael: I think it is relevant in that regard. Definitely relevant in that regard. Very wise people have said we get the leaders we deserve…

Laura: Oh, wow.

Keegan-Michael: …as a society. And I think that this play does, as she said, peripherally speaks to that. Which is, is that a sad state of affairs?

Laura: Yes.

Keegan-Michael: Well, it allows us to learn.

Laura: We get the leaders we deserve. Oh, man. That's brutal. We must have been very bad. Like if Santa brought us Trump?

Keegan-Michael: But also, the 90s are a time of surplus and excess and I think we all thought, “Yeah, we shouldn't have regulations on things! And we shouldn't worry about these rules so much, and we should indulge the id and not the super ego.”

Laura: It was very epicurean. [Laughs.] Who's smart now?

Keegan-Michael: You are.

Laura: Me.

Keegan-Michael: [Laughs.] I don't know what happened to me today.

Laura: You’re like an encyclopedia of knowledge.

Keegan-Michael: Yes, both epicurean and Dionysian.

Laura: Oh, Jesus.

Are their lessons to be learned by this show?

Laura: Sure.

Keegan-Michael: Oh, definitely. That one should always strive for balance in their life. And that feeling of, I should enjoy myself, but am I thinking about others? Am I putting your needs ahead of mine? if so, what am I getting out of that? Should I be getting something out of that? All of that is being explored in the play.

Laura: Also embracing your shadow self a little bit. I think that if you sublimate the shadow part of you, it can come out in ways that you don't intend, so it’s better to integrate that. The light and the dark, the yin and the yan? Yang?

Keegan-Michael: Yang. Yes, yin and yang. The anima and the animus.

Laura: Oh, Jesus. You always have to go one thing further than me.

Keegan-Michael: Now I'm just being a dick. [Laughs.] There’s a line that Amy says in the first scene and we always discuss it backstage. I hope that when people leave the theater, even if it’s three days later, they’re thinking, “I wonder if that’s true!” Does that phenomenon exist? And why is that? Because Laura’s right, part of that shadow self is that we’re animals. We have instincts like other animals and are hardwired to do certain things but yet we were also given this other component of conscious, sentient thought.

Laura: I hope the audience leaves saying Laura Benanti looks beautiful.

Keegan-Michael: Honey, they do. I guarantee you they do.

Laura: That's what I want them to leave with. She had a baby?! That's what I want them to say.

Keegan-Michael: Yeah. They should say that. She's stunning on stage.

Laura: Only eight months ago?! And then also all that stuff you just said.

Keegan-Michael: [Laughs.]

Laura: But later. The first thing they should be thinking is She had a baby?!

Keegan-Michael: The next: She's gorgeous.

Laura: Where'd that baby go? And then animus, animal, ego, id.

Keegan-Michael: Fred! You're going off the road!... I was thinking about Laura Benanti! I was blinded. I'm sorry. I just almost caused an accident on the turnpike.

Laura: Yeah, don't cause accidents.

Keegan-Michael: Going home to Clifton.

Laura: Clifton! I have family in Clifton.

Keegan-Michael: I know you do.

That's everything I need.

Laura: And more.

Photos: Caitlin McNaney | Styling: Heather Newberger | Makeup: Rachel Estabrook | Hair: Paul Warren