When Lamorne Morris landed his breakout role on New Girl, he had a clear goal: to appear on a nighttime talk show. Despite starring on a hit sitcom, however, the actor and stand-up comic couldn’t get a single booking for years. “I wanted so bad to be on late-night talk shows as a guest, just to feel validated a little bit, to be honest,” he says. “And I couldn’t get on one to save my life.” Cut to a decade-plus later, and Morris has just finished a stint hosting ABC’s Jimmy Kimmel Live!, as one of the summer fill-ins for the show’s eponymous emcee. He still has the desk placard with his name on it. Morris presents it in his Zoom window with a wide, proud smile.
That late-night milestone stands out in a year of firsts for Morris. He is meeting—exceeding—the expectations he’d set for himself as a young, rising Hollywood actor. Not only did he finally get a plum role on a prestige TV show, playing a main character in the fifth installment of FX’s Fargo, but he also got his first Emmy nomination for the part. Not only is he starting to work with Oscar-nominated filmmakers like Jason Reitman, but he’s playing the groundbreaking Garrett Morris in Reitman’s buzzy fall release, Saturday Night. And not only is he starting production on the big-ticket Spider-Noir superhero series, but he’s also acting opposite Nicolas Cage. (Yes, Morris already has stories about his costar.)
In conversation with Vanity Fair, Morris candidly acknowledges that he’s been working to get to this level for a long time—and gamely reflects on the bumpy road he’s traveled on the way.
Vanity Fair: You’ve always been a busy guy, but every project you’ve got going on right now seems especially high-profile. Does this moment feel different to you?
Lamorne Morris: It does, honestly. It’s directors, actors, producers, people who operate in a different space I’ve been working with lately, and it’s refreshing. There used to be a time where you would do a project with people of this ilk that could really bring the life out of you, and then you’d go a year doing other things here and there, and then you’d get another one. This particular season in my life has been a blessing. I’m learning from every single person I’m working with, and everyone that I’m working with has this senior level of ability over me that I need to learn from and that I’m absorbing.
Even just getting the call to be in something like Fargo, I would imagine, is pretty exciting. Have you been wanting to do more dramatic TV work?
Oh yeah, it’s like you’ve been on the outside looking in at all these cool things that happened in TV. Don’t get me wrong, New Girl was an epic show—but post-that, you wait for some of these invites and you read for certain things here and there, and certain things you’re just not considered for because people assume that you’re not capable of doing these things. I thank God for Noah [Hawley] that he gave me an opportunity to showcase an ability that I have. Obviously, it’s working out. [Laughs] The Emmy nomination is a lovely thing, but it just takes a director or producers or an exec or someone to give an actor an opportunity to showcase that, and I’m very glad he did.
Fargo.
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Was there a time when you did feel on the outside looking in, as you put it, and it felt particularly frustrating trying to get into some of those rooms?
Absolutely. When I first started on New Girl, I’d hit that pilot season with a big splash. I had done a ton of commercials and didn’t have theatrical representation. Finally, when I broke through on this show, it all seemed like it was happening so fast. I came from out of nowhere. I had a few offers that pilot season, but I was an unknown actor, then I got on a show—one of the more coveted ones for that year—and so other folks were on the outside looking in. They’re like, “Man, you made it!” But for me, the conversations that I was having with my team were, “Well, this casting director won’t see you. They’re only going after certain names.”
Did it feel like rejection?
