Melissa McCarthy met David Spade dressed as Chris Farley ‘SNL’ character

Melissa McCarthy and David Spade met in a van down by the river.

Well, not exactly, but the Bridesmaids star was dressed as Matt Foley — the absurd, iconic motivational speaker played by Chris Farley on Saturday Night Live — when she first encountered Spade and Dana Carvey.

“Do you remember how you were dressed when I met you?” Carvey asked her on a new episode of Fly on the Wall, the podcast he hosts with Spade.

“I do,” McCarthy replied. “When I first met both of you, I had Chris’ jacket on.”

The SNL alums met McCarthy during the show’s 40th-anniversary celebration in 2015, when she paid tribute to Farley’s character during its “Weekend Update” segment. “I think we were wondering, ‘Is that the real jacket?'” Spade recalled. 

McCarthy confirmed that she was indeed wearing Farley’s original Matt Foley jacket. “I was dressed as his ‘down by the river’ guy that I did the news in,” she said. “Because that was really his jacket, I got pretty choked up because [Chris] was someone — I waited on him when I worked at Starbucks once, and I was so shaky that I was like, ‘Just don’t spill it on him.'”

The actress’ fond memories of the late comedian, who died in 1997, made her anxious to honor his legacy on SNL. “He seemed so nice, and to do that, it was the most nervous I think I’ve ever been in any performance,” she said. “I was rocking back and forth, and the sweet stage manager, because I’d been there a bunch of times, he’s like, ‘Honey, are you okay?’ I was like, ‘I don’t know.'”

McCarthy also recalled advice she received from her husband, Ben Falcone. “Ben had said, ‘Don’t pull back, because [Chris] wouldn’t have,'” she recalled. “‘Get in there and f—ing burn it down, because that’s what he would have done.’ That’s the last thing I thought of, and I just was so nervous to do someone that I literally watched. I have a drawing of him. I adored his humor and how vulnerable he was.”

Carvey responded, “We know now he’s a singularity, and the vulnerability and then the power together and the sweetness — it’s just a magic human. One of David’s very close friends.”

McCarthy went on to compliment Spade’s work with Farley. “You two were just… you guys were magic together.”

Listen to the full Fly on the Wall episode with McCarthy above.

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