What would MacGruber do if he were The Last Man on Earth?
“He would die almost immediately,” says Will Forte, who has played the self-exploding parody of ultimate handyman MacGyver, and stars in Last Man, the new Fox comedy airing Sunday (9:30 p.m. ET/PT).
The former Saturday Night Live star doesn’t think he would fare much better in Last Man‘s world as the (almost) lone survivor of a humanity-killing virus.
“I wouldn’t know how to do anything. I don’t know how plumbing works, how you get electricity going,” he says.
His Phil Miller — combining the names of fellow executive producers Phil Lord and Chris Miller (The Lego Movie, 22 Jump Street) — doesn’t seem to know much, either. When Phil isn’t trashing the McMansion he occupies in Tucson, he withstands the onslaught of a tennis-ball machine by wearing a suit of armor, uses aquarium tanks as pin set-ups for parking-lot bowling and blows up one car by rolling another one into it.
In an upcoming episode, “I get to shoot a flamethrower at a bunch of different things,” Forte says. “There are a lot of wish-fulfillment elements to the show.”
Part of Phil’s challenge is “figuring out how you do everything that you just take for granted. What’s the bathroom situation? We found a fun fix.”
That would be the toilet pool, a place where Phil relieves himself after indoor plumbing fails. Nearby is the margarita pool, where he submerges himself in tequila.
And now, lonely Phil must contemplate the post-apocalyptic dating pool, populated by Carol (Kristen Schaal), a woman he meets just as he is about to end it all.
“The only thing he wants is for human interaction. If that could be a woman, it would be awesome,” Forte says, describing Phil’s pre-Carol days. “Be careful what you wish for.”
If Phil has his own hallucinatory vision of the perfect woman, “Phil is not Carol’s ideal man at all,” says Schaal, who voices Louise on another Sunday Fox show, the animated comedy Bob’s Burgers.
Compared with Phil’s slovenly resignation, Carol is “so strong. She’s survived in the same situation as Phil, but she’s better in a lot of ways. She’s healthier. She can see the goodness in Phil before he can see it. … I think America’s going to fall in love with Carol,” Schaal says, laughing.
Carol also is extremely regimented, asking Phil to obey stop signs and avoid parking in a handicapped spot, despite the absence of other drivers.
Although Phil and Carol seem to engage in mutual annoyance, “There is a sweetness they identify in each other,” Schaal says, acknowledging Phil’s effort to clean up his act a bit after her arrival. “There’s an interesting power play going on. When you’re the last two people on earth and you’re starting over completely fresh, who’s going to be calling the shots?”
Their end-of-the-world blind date carries heavy ramifications, including the responsibility to repopulate the world. “That’s a lot of pressure to put on somebody.” Forte says.
Last Man performed surprisingly well in its two-episode premiere, topping all of Sunday’s broadcast shows among young adults and averaging 5.8 million viewers despite the producers’ reluctance to discuss details, including whether Phil was the only character.
Other actors will join Last Man, including Mad Men‘s January Jones, Mary Steenburgen, Cleopatra Coleman and Mel Rodriguez, although Forte doesn’t want to describe their characters or future episodes. He thinks that might spoil the show.
“I remember my dad told me what Rosebud was before I watched Citizen Kane, not that I’m equating this show to Citizen Kane. I still really liked Citizen Kane, but I always wonder how much more I would have liked it if I had found out on my own … instead of my dad being a jerk,” he says. “Thank God I didn’t see The Sixth Sense with him.”
Forte says he would be helpless "Last Man"
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