4 min read
Everyone has a favorite David Spade movie. The stand-up comic and former Saturday Night Live cast member says he’s recognized in daily life because of movies like Tommy Boy and Joe Dirt, which appeal to adults, and movies like The Emperor’s New Groove that charm the kiddos. In a new installment of Esquire’s “What I’ve Learned” video series, Spade reflects on politics in comedy, losing family and friends—like Chris Farley and sister-in-law Kate Spade—and where he stands with Eddie Murphy.
“I would say that the top ones are Joe Dirt, Tommy Boy, The Emperor’s New Groove, which is up there, and then it’s sitcom reruns,” Spade says to Esquire editor in chief Michael Sebastian. “I just like to hit different areas.”
The Emmy- and Golden Globe–nominated actor says that being in showbiz ultimately amounts to working to “just stay alive.” He brings up that his 2020 Netflix film The Wrong Missy renewed his stardom, but a friend reminded him of the fickle nature of fame. “Even Chris Rock says, ‘Spade, it buys you six months. That’s it.’ It’s kinda true. It’s a tricky business to kind of stay in the mix. But if you can be out there at all, it’s fun.”
Thankfully, 2026 is a busy year for Spade. This year, the actor can be found in two new movies: Outcome, a black comedy directed by Jonah Hill, and Busboys, in which he costars with Theo Von. (Spade also cowrote and coproduced Busboys.) Both films are out now. Last year, he released his stand-up special Dandelion for Prime Video.
Elsewhere in his chat with Sebastian, Spade opens up about his personal life, from the hilarious to the traumatic. On becoming a father—he and former Playboy Playmate Jillian Grace have a daughter—Spade says he’s trying to be “very understanding” and “not so quick-tempered or sharp.”
“My dad was a little more hot off the handle, getting mad about stuff,” Spade says. He offers advice. “Make sure they know you care. Make sure they know you’re around. My friends are like, ‘I’ve never missed a game in six years.’ I’m like, Jesus, if my dad was at three games a year, it would have been a different story.”
Spade also recalls how he lost his virginity in college to a girl who thought his ambitions in comedy made him different and sexy. “She saw me in a freaking comedy contest at ASU,” Spade recalls. “She was so impressed that I was in this thing with my crummy act. We wound up dating a little bit. [She was like] ‘I just like that you’re trying to do something so weird and so different.’ I was trying to be the same as everyone else, but it was better to be a little different. It took me a while to figure that one out.”
You can watch the full “What I’ve Learned” above.
After recalling with Sebastian the impact of “Buh-Bye,” born out of a 1994 SNL sketch that made airlines adopt “Thank you” as a PR-friendly farewell to passengers, Spade recalls how his comedy style gave him an edge while creating a few enemies—like Eddie Murphy. In December 1995, for an installment of the sketch series “Spade in America,” Spade poked fun at Murphy’s then-recent string of box-office bombs with the punchline, “Look children, it’s a falling star. Make a wish.”
“I started off, safely, on the wrong foot,” Spade tells Sebastian. “[He] didn’t know me, didn’t know about me, hated in one day. Chris Rock actually got on the phone with me when I had to call him, and it did not go well. It was worse than imagined.”
But while Spade’s segments on SNL became a vehicle for the writers to go knives out at whoever was on their hit list, it was unexpected job security because the segments had one important fan: Lorne Michaels. “I was getting attention like, ‘You’re almost getting fired.’ And then Lorne going, ‘Do that again.’ Oh, fuck yeah, you like this? And I’m on the show? I do it again next week. The formula was make it clever. Try to make a clever joke that’s not just a mean one. If it was too mean, take it out. … It would help me then, and it kept my job.”
While Spade took down big names in brutal fashion, like Downtown Julie Brown, he says he had one jab at Jim Carrey that bombed in rehearsals. “I was like, He’s too beloved. Even by me.” Eventually the tables turned when Spade left SNL and he felt the sting back. “Once I left SNL, they did a sketch about me, and I did not like it. I was like, The body’s not even cold, and they’re already feasting. That’s where it gets tricky, where I realized that careers [are] so fleeting and so fragile.”
While it took years for the heat between them to cool, Spade says he’s now “patched up” with Murphy. He says he once met Murphy by chance on the street in Beverly Hills. “He drove by, rolled down the window. He goes, ‘Hey man.’ I go, ‘Oh, hey! I hear we’re good?’ He goes, ‘Yeah, we’re good.’ And we shake hands.”
Spade says that if he can mend fences with Murphy, maybe the factions in a politically divided America can too. When asked about his friend Rob Schneider’s right-wing politics, Spade credits his Arizona background with his being apolitical. “Ten years, 20 years ago, it’s fine. I don’t know if anyone’s Republican or Democrat. I was on SNL writing for Bill Clinton like, ‘Which one is he?’ This is not my forte,” he says. “I’m writing on a sort of left political show, and I don’t even know it. I’m just trying to think of what’s funny. What’s the scenario, and what’s funny about it? That’s kind of how I still do it.”
He adds, “That’s everyone’s conversation all over the country. I would like that to be tamped down a bit so we can get back to talking about normal things.”
