Adam Scott is reflecting on a time he seriously bombed on TV — but luckily for the Severance actor, it didn’t air.
On Monday’s episode of Conan O’Brien’s podcast, Conan O’Brien Needs A Friend, Scott was a guest and opened up about the time when he visited O’Brien’s show to promote Big Little Lies season two and explained a bit he loosely prepared — which included Scott comparing his fellow castmembers to an 80s supergroup — that turned out to be “one of the most deeply embarrassing moments” he’s had.
“The way I saw it going is like us talking and you being like, ‘Wow, Big Little [Lies] the cast is amazing. It’s all legendary actresses. It’s like the Traveling Wilburys of legendary actresses,’” Scott recalled. “So, what I had done is, I thought that saying the Traveling Wilburys of actresses and equating Big Little Lies with the Traveling Wilburys would be this comedy explosion.”
The Traveling Wilburys‘ members consisted of Bob Dylan, George Harrison, Jeff Lynne, Roy Orbison, Tom Petty, Dhani Harrison, Roy Orbison and Jim Keltner.
“I had mocked up the album cover with, instead of the Traveling Wilburys, the actress’s faces on their bodies,” he continued before noting how he switched out Big Little Lies stars like Reese Witherspoon and Nicole Kidman for Dylan and George Harrison. But Scott quickly realized, “Nobody under 50 knows who the fuck the Traveling Wilburys are.”
The crowd apparently didn’t find the joke comical and remained silent. “You could hear the air condenser,” O’Brien said.
For those who do remember the group, Scott joked that they “don’t give a fuck.”
Scott said he “begged” for it not to be aired, and it wasn’t, but O’Brien said he remembers out of the celebrities that have bombed on his show over the years.
HBO’s Big Little Lies went on for two seasons from 2017 to 2019 and featured a star-studded cast including Witherspoon, Kidman, Shailene Woodley, Zoë Kravitz, Laura Dern and Meryl Streep. The series won eight primetime Emmys and four Golden Globes.
Kidman and Witherspoon said last year that they were “moving fast and furious” on it’s highly anticipated third season together.