Andy Samberg Sets Tone for HBO's Filthy Tennis Mockumentary '7 Days in Hell': 'We Think Wangs Are Funny'

Sex, drugs, accidental shootings, sports prodigies, career rises and falls, comebacks, endorsements, mullets, male nudity, and Taiwanese animation re-enactments of Swedish prison sex parties… HBO’s new sports mockumentary 7 Days in Hell, premiering July 11, has it all.

The movie — starring Brooklyn Nine-Nine Golden Globe winner and Saturday Night Live Emmy winner Andy Samberg as Andre Agassi-ish bad boy tennis star Aaron Williams and Game of Thrones star Kit Harington as his rival, dimwitted tennis prodigy Charles Poole — hits all the clichés sports doc fans have come to expect from series like ESPN’s 30 for 30, with all the over-the-top humor you’d expect when those docs get spoofed by an all-star cast, in an anything-goes venue like HBO.

Samberg, who returns for a third season of Brooklyn Nine-Nine on Sept. 27 and hosts his first Emmy telecast on Sept. 20, talks to Yahoo TV about his favorite funny moments from the movie, how the movie flips the script on full-frontal nudity, and gathering a cast that also includes Michael Sheen, Mary Steenburgen, Fred Armisen, Will Forte, Serena Williams, John McEnroe, June Squibb, Lena Dunham, Howie Mandel, Jim Lampley, David Copperfield, Soledad O’Brien, Chris Evert, and Karen Gillan.

He also shares the biggest perk of making the sports-themed project: free classic Nikes.

Related: ‘7 Days in Hell’ Trailer: Andy Samberg Battles Jon Snow on the Tennis Court

You’ve said you wanted to write a tennis comedy, and the three-day John Isner-Nicolas Mahut match from Wimbledon in 2010 was an inspiration, but are you also a fan of 30 for 30 and other sports documentaries?
First, I should clarify… me and Murray Miller are both executive producers. He is the sole writer, but we sort of brainstormed it all together. I don’t want to take away his writing credit. We’d been buddies since summer camp and then lived together in New York, and were friends in L.A., and now he’s a writer on Girls. We had had this idea, and then sort of revised the idea after the Isner-Mahut match lasted three days, to say, “What if a match just never ended?” For a long time it was just called, The Never-Ending Match. That was the pitch. When he got an overall deal at HBO, I called him and I said, “What if we adjusted this, and made it sort of like an HBO sports documentary, or a 30 for 30” — because, yes indeed, we both do love those, and watch all of them — “and then do it at HBO?” He loved that idea; so we brainstormed a bunch of stuff and he wrote this really incredible outline. We went in, pitched it to them, and they totally dug it, and he wrote it up and then we re-wrote it, and that was it.

Is it true that you shot it in three days? The shoot lasted about the length of the Isner-Mahut match?
[Laughs.] We shot all of the tennis in three days. All of Kit Harington’s stuff was shot over a three-day period. Most of it was shot in Palm Desert, and it was 122 degrees, and it was miserable. Then after that, I’d say there were probably like seven more days of pick-ups, getting people to do talking head stuff here and there. I think in the end, it ended up being an 11- or 12-day shoot total.

7 Days in Hell hits pretty much every sports documentary cliché. Was there something in particular that you were excited to spoof?
Oh, a lot of stuff. Getting to have John McEnroe and Chris Evert and Jim Lampley doing the color commentary… anytime you have them, completely straight-facedly talking about these insane things that are happening on the court, it just tickles me. It gives it that authenticity that we were really hoping for. There’s these certain moments that sort of all congeal, where we shot on these old cameras, because our director, Jake Szymanski, wanted to shoot with old cameras so it really felt vintage, and you have [these athletes and announcers] commenting on it, and the court looks real, and you feel like you’re at Centre Court at Wimbledon. And then when that level of authenticity comes together in support of the dumbest joke we could think of, that for me feels like the payoff of wanting to make this.

McEnroe is so deadpan funny. Did anyone surprise you with how funny he or she was in the movie?
Yeah. [McEnroe’s] a homerun. I knew he was really funny because I had met him a bunch, and he’d been in a couple of digital shorts at SNL. He really sold it. Again, that’s the beauty of using real tennis legends, like him and Chris Evert and Serena Williams. They just lend such authenticity to it. To me it just makes the whole thing funnier.

Did you have a wish list of people you wanted for 7 Days in Hell?
Yes, and we pretty much got everybody. It’s a crazy cast. We couldn’t believe how many people were into it. Everyone just read the script and said, “Yes.” I’ve never had that easy of a time. It was really smooth sailing. The fact that we got Kit straight out of the gate was so huge. We were such massive Game of Thrones and Jon Snow fans. He was so game, and so funny. We knew that we had a great beginning as soon as that came together. It was easy from that point forward. We went and shot with David Copperfield, and all these incredible people. It was really fun.

Did you know Kit could be this funny? Most of us know him from Game of Thrones and haven’t seen how really talented he is with the physical comedy.
Yes, for sure. And he’s got a really funny deadpan, too. When I first met with him, he told me that he’d actually done some sketch comedy stuff in college, and he said, “This part is perfect for me, because I always would play the sort of thick character, you know, who doesn’t understand that he’s not intelligent.” I said, “Oh my God! This is perfect.” He was really enthusiastic. There was no me-selling-him on it. He just read the script and thought it was hilarious, and said he wanted to do it. He’s just a lovely, funny, smart guy.

As a self-proclaimed “Thrones-head,” was it a little weird to be playing opposite Jon Snow in this comedy?
I thought it was going to be, and then he shaved, and he looked so different. He looks so much more gentle and young. Also, he’s just a funny, cool dude. We kind of hit it off and buddied up pretty quickly. Getting him to walk out onto the BBC sports show hosted by Michael Sheen’s character [in the movie] and saying he was 16, it really looks like he’s 16. It’s insane. He’s got a baby face under the beard.

Do you play tennis? The tennis scenes look authentic.
Well, I’d say we know just enough that we could edit it well. I played a little bit growing up. My mom is a big tennis fan and player. She plays a lot. I used to play with her when I was a kid and a teenager. Every once in a blue moon I’ll play. Murray, who wrote the thing, he’s actually quite good at tennis.

Has your mom seen the movie yet?
She has not seen it yet. I’ve warned her that it’s very filthy. She assures me that she is unshockable; so we’ll see.

Speaking of that, there’s much more male nudity in the movie, versus female nudity — which is the opposite of what shows like Game of Thrones have been criticized for. Was that intentional?
I would be lying if I said it was not intentional. It was very intentional. We talked about it and, a) we thought it was really funny, just because people are so squeamish about that. Hilarious in itself. Also, just because we were on HBO and there’s so much “reverse cowgirl,” as I like to put it, on HBO. Last time I checked, that is not as popular a position as HBO might have you believe. So yeah, we just thought it was hilarious to turn it on its head. We’re childish. We think wangs are funny.

OK, we have to mention the Aaron Williams hair, the kind of Flock of Seagulls-y mullet, complete with neon headbands. It’s not really even exaggerated… that is straight off an Andre Agassi poster. Was there any thought to having him be a part of the movie?
We keep being asked that, and I feel like such a fool. We should have called him first. And then by the time it occurred to us, we were already kind of done. It’s my one real regret. I’m a huge, huge Agassi fan. If for no other reason, just so I could have met him. I want to know him. I keep telling people, “You know, the biggest payoff of this whole thing for me has been that we requested the original Agassi cross-trainer Nikes that he used to wear, and Nike gave us some.” I now have those bright orange high-tops he used to wear, and I wear them in my everyday life. By the way, people have not forgotten about those shoes. When I wear them out, guys stop me on the street and they go, “Oh s–t, are those Agassis?” I go, “You know it, bro.”

Could this continue, become a new series of sports mockumentaries with different sports?
We hope so. This one, we gave it a banner title, called “Legends of Sport.” Hopefully we’ll do more Legends of Sport installments after this.

You also have Emmy-hosting duties coming up later this summer. What will be your approach to hosting the Emmys?
I’ve been knocking around some ideas, but I think it really kicks into high gear once they announce the nominees, because then you know what you’re focusing on a little more. There’s so many damn shows now, I think it’s going to be a very interesting process in trying to hone in on any one trend or theme for the year, but I’m really, really excited about it. I love doing award shows. I’ve had a lot of fun hosting them in the past, and this is by far the biggest one I’ll have done. I think it’s going to be a big challenge, and hopefully we’re going to make it as silly and weird as possible.

I expect to see Brooklyn Nine-Nine among the nominees. There has yet to be a bad episode of the show.
Thank you! The nomination thing is really tough, but I’m very hopeful at least for Andre [Braugher]. He seems to be like Emmy gold in terms of getting nominated. He’s our sure bet, I think. I don’t want to jinx it, but people love the Braugher.

Speaking of people who surprised us with how funny they can be…
Oh, yeah. Coming from SNL and doing all the digital shorts, where we would use celebrity cameos in an unexpected way, it’s definitely become something that is one of my favorite parts of what I do for a living, bringing people in that you maybe wouldn’t think of as funny and getting really funny performances out of them by putting them in a specific context. I have to give credit to [Brooklyn Nine-Nine co-creators] Dan Goor and Mike Schur on Andre Braugher. That was their idea, and they f–king nailed it. Every line out of his mouth on that show makes me so happy.

7 Days in Hell premieres July 11 at 10 p.m. on HBO.