Molly Shannon knows a thing or two about comedy. She’s been delighting audiences for nearly three decades with her outlandish, over-the-top characters from “superstar” Catholic schoolgirl Mary Catherine Gallagher on Saturday Night Live to Pat Dubek, the Midwestern mom turned daytime television superstar on Max's The Other Two. 

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“Conan O'Brien said a great thing once,” Shannon said while appearing on VF's Little Gold Men podcast (listen below). “He said that all comedy is like music. That there's a rhythm to it, how it builds, and then releases. He said that most comedians are also musical, and I think that's really true.”

Whether she's playing Pat Dubek or returning to her old SNL stomping grounds to host the show, as she did on April 9, Shannon is finding the rhythm in the comedy. “I think of it like an orchestra, you know what I mean?" she says. “I'm thinking of it with a beat.” While the comedy world has certainly changed since Shannon joined the cast of Saturday Night Live in 1995, her approach to comedy has remained steadfast. “It's still the same,” she says. "I feel it's still exactly the same.”

Shannon dropped by Little Gold Men to chat about her absurd and surprisingly emotional turn on The Other Two, as well as how she's been able to stay so darn funny for so many years.  

Vanity Fair:  In season two, Pat Dubek sort of becomes Ellen Degeneres. And then in season three she kind of transforms into Oprah Winfrey,  the most famous woman on the planet. Were you prepared for that arc? 

Molly Shannon: I wasn't prepared. I have total trust in Chris Kelly and Sarah Schneider, our brilliant showrunners. I don't even ask them. I just wait till the scripts come out and then I'm just excited and surprised. They are just so talented. 

I've never played a character like that before, ever in my life. Like somebody that rich with beautiful clothes and a giant house and a screening room. And so it was really fun. It was just a total surprise to see that turn because she starts off as a mother moving to New York City from Ohio. Like a Kate Gosselin type—a very Midwestern mom, bringing her son to New York City to make it big. She's really changed and grown, so it was so fun to play.

I have to wonder because you've been in the industry for so long and you've been famous for many years now: Is fame really a prison? 

That's so funny. No, not at all. I'm a very outgoing person and so I really love to talk to people. You meet so many strangers, people come up to you. But no, I love it. I think, I guess if you were, like, a very introverted person and you got really famous, that probably would be hard. But I'm extroverted so I get energy from that. 

Having kids was hard when they were little because I would go about my normal day as a mom and you're kind of doing double duty, saying hi to the fans and taking care of your kids. So that part's a little harder, but no it doesn't feel like a prison at all. But sometimes people will go like, ‘Hi Molly!’ like they know me and I'm like, ‘Do I know you?’ and all that, kind of friendly. And then they're like, 'No, you don't know me.' So that part's a little weird. 

I remember when I first started Saturday Night Live, they would kind of recognize me. Then Adam Sandler told me—because he had been on the show before me and we had gone to NYU Drama school together—he goes, ‘Just wait.’ He goes, 'Soon they're gonna know your name. They'll call out Molly.' And I couldn't believe it. And then that did happen, of course, but no, it, it's really not, not a problem.

I think what The Other Two does so well is that it gets at the intricacies and nuances of the entertainment industry and how simple tasks like going for a walk, or getting brunch with your kids, or just having dinner at Applebee's can be incredibly hard and absurd when you're at a certain level of fame.

Exactly. Well, [Pat Dubek] has like alien level fame, like Oprah fame. There's fame, then there's like alien level, like the superstars. So it is hard for her to just do a normal thing, like go to Applebee's and have dinner with her family without being bothered. So she she feels lonely and a little disillusioned, not knowing that this is what it would be like, you know?

In episode seven, you have breakdown because everyone around you is lying to you and making it seem like you're at a normal restaurant when really it's a big elaborate smoke and mirrors operation. Can you walk me through what filming that episode was like? 

Oh sure, Chris. I can't believe you saw that episode. Did you like it?

I was obsessed with it. It's so meta theatrical.

Okay, great. So I always wanted to be in a horror movie. I told Chris Kelly and he was like, ‘This is it, baby.’ [laughs] It felt like it was. It felt crazy to shoot too, because in all honesty, there's all these extras and I have to perform with them. They got a kick out of it, believe me, because I'm a very spontaneous performer and I like to play around with the other performers and really use the room and improvise a little bit within the parameters of the script, of course.

It felt surreal. It felt like we were in an Applebee's because they recreated the set so perfectly. It was crazy. And so shooting it, you know how you say it was like meta? Like this on top of this, on top of this? That's what it felt like shooting it because it was so strange being in this Applebee's. It's a sound stage that we were in, but it felt like we were in an actual Applebee's. So, I felt the way the character felt, but it was just really fun to shoot and very technical. Cause you had to do it all in, like, pieces, but it was really fun. I just love the way they write. It's crazy and scary and then it's emotional and she's, like, heartbroken. It's just the most challenging as an actor to play, you know?

This interview has been edited and condensed.