Clown makeup masked actor’s unfunny flu

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This article was published 06/01/2020 (2434 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

After five seasons starring on HBO’s Ballers opposite Dwayne Johnson, Rob Corddry has segued over to The Unicorn on CBS playing the sweet knucklehead of a best friend to Walton Goggins’ widower, who is clumsily re-entering the world of dating with the help of his best pals.

Corddry is also the creator and one of the stars (always in clown makeup) of the cult hit Adult Swim comedy series Childrens Hospital, and he has a spinoff coming out on Netflix in January called Medical Police.

Corddry’s career has hit many high points, including his time as a correspondent on The Daily Show. When it came to narrowing down a worst moment, though, he had this to say: “First of all, I was so happy to be asked this question because it is really the worst day of my professional career.

“It’s not hard, what we do, it really isn’t — actors like to say that it’s hard because in general we feel guilty that it’s so easy to say other people’s words believably. But it ain’t diggin’ holes, is what I’m saying.

“But sometimes it gets really close to digging holes. And this was one of those days.”

My worst moment…

“My MO on Childrens Hospital was to gather up the funniest people who I love the most in the whole entire world and basically have a summer camp. I was in a power position where I was able to make decisions, which were based entirely on whether the cast and crew were going to have fun.

“But Season 5 (in 2013) was a very troubled season. And it started with, we weren’t able to find a hospital to shoot in. So what we decided was — and this was very much (fellow writer and producer) David Wain’s idea, he was like: ‘Listen, we might be doing the one show of our careers where we can do anything we want. So let’s find a totally different space and we’ll say that the team at Childrens Hospital has been hired to live on a U.S. army base in Japan for a year and tend to the families of soldiers working there.’

“And that’s what we did. And it became the hardest season I’ve ever had to produce.

“The whole season was really fraught, and we were always behind on writing. It was a very, very stressful situation and not the way to make good television. I had, like, five jobs on that show and I really thought, ‘I can’t do this anymore —I’m done.’ I was living like an insane person when we made that season.

“And this all culminated when we were shooting the finale. On the last day there were going to be all these explosions and squibs, people getting shot, lots of running, a lot of screaming. And a lot of slow-motion and a lot of heroics.

“So there I am — in full clown makeup — the day before and I’m writing a scene (for the last day of filming) and sending it up to David Wain to edit. And then, while I’m waiting for his notes, I’m writing jokes for the scene that was being shot in the room next door and having my assistant run them over. And as I’m doing that, I start to feel a tickle in the back of my throat. Now keep in mind, the next day I was going to have to do all that running and dodging explosives and pyrotechnics.

“So I finally got home that night and went to bed. And I woke up the next morning sicker than I have ever felt in my life — and I am not exaggerating. I woke up with a fever of 103. I had every reason to go to the hospital, but I knew that if I didn’t work that day we would have lost hundreds of thousands of dollars. It’s not the best business model, but that’s why actors cannot take a sick day. And my wife understood — she’s the one that got me out of bed and dressed me. My assistant came and picked me up because there was no way I could drive, I was just falling asleep.

“So I shot the entire day with 103 fever. The best I felt was actually when I was on camera and trying to pretend that I didn’t feel like I was dying.

“The medic on set, God bless him, this dude was highly trained but he looked at me that day and was like, ‘Pffft, I don’t know man.’ (Laughs) I missed that whole boat of the days where you could go to the prop truck and get cocaine, you know? They don’t have a Dr. Feelgood come to set and shoot people up with ‘vitamins’ anymore; that just doesn’t happen.

“The only way I got through that day was after every take — luckily we were on a hospital set — I would sort of drag myself over to a gurney and sleep for five or six minutes. And then someone would whisper in my ear, ‘Rob, sorry, man, but we’re ready.’

“It’s a pretty good episode looking back on it now from a safe place of health. Probably the best compliment I’ve ever gotten is that people who have seen the episode telling me they couldn’t tell I was sick.”

Ironically the clown makeup probably covered some of Corddry’s sickly pallor that day.

“I appreciate you making some lemonade out of this, absolutely! And the clown makeup definitely covered up the dark circles under my eyes — they were deep that season.

“Apparently I had a lung infection of some kind (rueful laugh) — which was the end to my smoking career, thank God — and it turned into either the full-blown flu or I believe now that I probably had some grade of pneumonia. I thought I was dying. I mean, it got dark. I spent at least the next week in bed and I’m sure I must have gone to the doctor, but to tell you the truth my brain was kind of boiled — I don’t remember a lot of it.

“You know, it’s so cathartic, I’m finding, to be able to tell this story. I never really told it in full before, officially. Only the people who were there really know about it.”

— Chicago Tribune