Paula Pell On 'Wine Country', 'Saturday Night Live' & 'Bridesmaids'
(CBS Local)-- Paula Pell was built for a career in comedy.
The co-star of the new Netflix movie "Wine Country" with Amy Poehler, Maya Rudolph, and Tina Fey grew up recording episodes of "Saturday Night Live" on her tape recorder. Pell ended up writing at SNL for over a decade and became a writer that Poehler, Rudolph, and Fey all relied on during their days in New York.
"The first time I really felt solid in my employment there was doing recurring characters," said Pell in an interview with CBS Local. "In that day and era, recurring characters were solid gold. If you could come up with a recurring character that was funny and relatable, the audience would lose their minds."
Pell came up with famous SNL skits like the Spartan cheerleaders and Bobbi & Marty. In addition to her time at SNL, Pell has also appeared on shows like "30 Rock" and "Parks and Recreation." She's also become a script doctor that comes in and improves projects. Pell was called in to add some jokes for Kristen Wiig and Judd Apatow in "Bridesmaids."
"It was already so ungodly funny. Kristen is otherworldly funny and Maya is otherworldly funny," said Pell. "I got to know Annie Mumolo, who co-wrote it with Kristen. It was really fun and that is when I got to know Melissa McCarthy. We just met around then. That was when I first worked with Judd and that was a tremendous thing for me. I was such a rewriter at SNL and that was one of my little crowns that I was proud of. I could think of a different take that was funnier. That's really now one of the big parts of my career."
While Pell's made a career of writing for others, she's finally taking more opportunities in front of the camera. She's enjoying the ride and thinks fans of her other projects will laugh throughout "Wine Country." The movie tells the story of a group of friends that take a trip to Napa Valley for a 50th birthday celebration.
"It was a very surreal thing. You shoot a movie and then you got this giant amount of time until it comes out," said Pell. "It was so surreal during it because we were being approximations of ourselves and were laughing with each other like we laugh with each other. It was really weird and fun. It was really fun to watch Amy direct because it was masterful. She was so good at it and so prepared and so peaceful. We caught up on that shoot."
"Wine Country" is now available to stream on Netflix