‘Difficult People’: Julie Klausner Previews Season 2's New and Returning Guest Stars

(All Photos: Hulu)

When you’re making a TV show called Difficult People, it’s probably a given that you’re going to encounter some… well, difficulties along the way. That’s certainly the position creator Julie Klausner found herself in after realizing she had a mere six weeks to prepare for writing, producing, and acting in the eight-episode first season of her Hulu series. “My producing partner, Scott King, and I had to figure out what the show was and write each script with no time at all,” Klausner remembers now, adding that executive producer Amy Poehler was on hand to offer some helpful advice. “Amy told us that extra time never helps comedy, which I think there’s some truth to. But she was also just trying to make me feel better about having such a short turnaround.”

Related: ‘Difficult People’ Celebrity Insult Quiz: Can You Guess the Diss?

Fortunately for Klausner, whatever difficulties resulted from that rushed pre-production schedule didn’t manifest themselves in the finished product. Debuting last August, Difficult People quickly became a buzzy series for its mixture of snarky celebrity disses and perfect put-downs, delivered with expert panache by Klausner and her co-star, Billy Eichner. Playing more hostile, less successful versions of their own selves, the two stars roam the streets of New York, complaining about the many, many faults and failings of everyone in the world who’s not named Billy and Julie.

That kvetching will continue into the show’s 10-episode second season, which premieres July 12 on Hulu (the first two half-hours are streaming now). This time around, Klausner says that she had more than enough time to prepare. Although, naturally, the sophomore year wasn’t without its own difficulties. “We had the same amount of time and money to shoot 10 episodes rather than eight,” she says, chuckling. We asked Klausner about the secret to her and Eichner’s comic chemistry and which big-name guest stars will appear in Season 2.

Related: Ken Tucker Reviews Season 2 of ‘Difficult People’: 2 Losers Who Are Winners

Last season ended with you turning to Billy and asking, “What are we going to complain about now?” So… what will you be complaining about in Season 2?
I think that line is a perfect demonstration of the lack of self-awareness my character has! [Laughs] No matter what success she has, she’ll always find something wrong with it. That does give us room to play with the small victories we do give these characters, while still keeping them in this low-status place. We watch as they either screw up those opportunities — or if they do work out, there’s compromise that comes with them that they don’t have the maturity to deal with! So they’re screwed either way.

You recruited a great roster of guest stars for the first season. Did Amy Poehler help with that?
When people hear Amy is producing the series, they’re more excited about doing it. But in no way were we like, “Hey Amy, open your Rolodex!” That really came from Billy and I pounding the pavement and asking people who we’d heard were fans of ours. For example, it was Billy’s idea to have Seth Meyers play a prostitute. And God bless him, because I wouldn’t have pitched that to Seth! [Laughs] As far as this season is concerned, it helps that we’re a real show now so that people know what to expect of us tonally. We’re able to retain the irreverence we’ve had the whole time without sparing any celebrities who want to be involved. The nice thing about funny people, at least the cool ones, is that they want to make fun of themselves. We have that this season in the form of Nathan Lane, who is going to do something I’m not going to spoil [in the second episode]. But it’s one of those things where you’re like, “I never expected him to do that!”

Eichner, Klausner and Method Man

What guest stars and storylines can you tease for Season 2?
There are lots of great storylines involving guest stars. We have a story where Method Man helps us pitch a show to a bunch of different cable networks, and another story where Joel McHale plays Billy’s new trainer, but there’s something off about him and it’s kind of horrifying when we reveal what that is. Billy does a lot of dating this season, and [in the premiere] he dates a character played by John Mulaney who dresses and acts like an old-timey person. Amy Sedaris and Debbie Harry will be reprising their roles as Kiki and Rita, who are roommates, but turns out they are domestic partners. Rachel Dratch, who was in the very first episode, is returning; Fred Armisen is returning as Billy’s brother; and Christina Gausas plays another casting director. We kind of decided that every time there’s a casting director, Christina is going to play her. Because when you audition, you never remember who you audition for and they never remember you, so logically it makes sense!

Are you writing every episode again this season?
Scott King, who is the showrunner, is also very much my writing partner. We break every script together, and we’re lucky enough to have other writers come in on a guest basis. Like Cole Escola, who plays Matthew on the show, hung out in the writers’ room for a couple of weeks. And [transgender actress] Shakina Nayfack, who plays Lola this season, was a consultant. I like to say that Lola is the first transgender 9/11 Truther on television, so we talked to Shakina about throughlines for the character and had her help us navigate the personal identity politics. And because this is such a joke-heavy show, we have Jake Fogelnest and Alex Scordelis punching up every script and pitching jokes. Ultimately, the voice of the show is strong enough that I don’t think it can be diluted.

Will you be directing any episodes?
Oh god no! [Laughs] My blood pressure is already as high as it can possibly be. I have no idea how Lena Dunham can write, direct, and star in her own show. Just thinking about that makes me want to take three naps at the same time. No, Jeffrey Walker directed every episode again this year. His personality and his creative vision has been such a major part of what the show is. He’s very literate in the language of television, when he’s doing things that are completely new and exciting.

Eichner and Seth Meyers from Season 1

The relationship between you and Billy drives so much of the comedy. Did you guys feel even sharper heading into this second year?
It’s nice to be able to have as much trust as we do with each other. Last year, we were going into a new show, and you never know in those situations. But the thing I appreciate about Billy is that even though we have very strong comic voices of our own, we trust each other as far as knowing what’s funny. And he trusts me to put words in his mouth, which is a giant trust fall. There was this one day where we couldn’t stop laughing, and that’s never happened before. We were improvising with a girl who is playing our intern and we’re just bullying and yelling at her. We’re usually very serious when it comes to making comedy, but I could not stop laughing, so we had to move on. That was really nice, though — having that trust in place to just be silly together. I’m very lucky to have Billy in my life.

The show also creates a distinct version of New York City that’s a lot of fun to spend time in.
We’re very careful to have our own version of what New York City is like, and I think it’s different than the New York of Broad City or the New York of Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt. Because we shoot on location, there’s a realism to the way the city looks. And New York is very much in line with the outlook of our two leads, which is to say that it’s really hard, and nothing is fair, and things are dirty and stupid and the people who are rich shouldn’t be, and there’s always people doing worse than you, but you don’t want to look at them because it’ll bum you out too much! Our characters are miserable, but they like being miserable, because it’s their way of saying, “This is who I am.” And that’s also what I like about living in New York. People don’t have time for your bulls–t, and neither do Billy and Julie.

Now I want to see a Marvel Universe-style event where your New York crosses over into Broad City and Kimmy Schmidt.
If anybody does write crossover fan fiction, just make my character very erotic. That’s all I ask! [Laughs]

Season 2 of Difficult People premieres July 12 on Hulu.