FEY AND POEHLER GO EDITORIAL: Tina Fey and Amy Poehler have a new title to add to their growing list of accomplishments — editor. The comedians, who will be hosting the Golden Globes in January, guest edited the upcoming issue of Entertainment Weekly. Appearing on newsstands Friday, the issue, which will feature the duo on the cover along with a Q&A with EW’s Dan Snierson, includes an editor’s letter by Fey and Poehler, as well as several sidebars and other small items.
“We promised them that no writing would be involved but then we sprung the letter from the editor on them,” said EW editor Jess Cagle, who promised the stars that the whole process would be “really easy.”
Cagle and staff wound up pulling Fey and Poehler in to write the magazine’s “Must List” and “Bull’s Eye” columns, in addition to tasking them with assigning all the features and writers for the issue.
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“They had to assign and write everything. They were pretty taken aback by that,” said Cagle. “We kept thinking of more things for them to do.”
Fey and Poehler echoed Cagle’s sentiment in the magazine, writing: “Please enjoy how hard we have worked on this issue and how much love and care we put into it, even though we were told there would be no actual writing involved and then they sprang this ‘Letters from the Editors’ thing on us.”
The former “Saturday Night Live” cast mates wound up tapping some industry contacts for the issue’s features. For instance, Fey assigned “Mad Men” actor Jon Hamm a story on Ellie Kemper, whom Fey just cast in a new fall 2014 sitcom that she wrote and produced. Hamm, who guest starred on Fey’s “30 Rock,” used to be Kemper’s high school drama teacher in St. Louis before he became a star in his own right.
For one of her picks, Poehler, who is a fan of Netflix’s “Orange Is the New Black,” tapped EW staff writer Jessica Shaw to pen a story on Natasha Lyonne, who has a recurring spot on the show.
Cagle said this was the first time EW ever conscripted guest editors.
“Tina and Amy did the whole issue in about two or three weeks. It was a pretty quick turnaround,” Cagle said, joking that he can already imagine readers demanding that the duo come onboard full time.
“Luckily for me, we can’t afford them,” he said.
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