BTJ: Jon Hamm is in episode 3, which is called Hamm on Toast. That’s a heck of a scoop.
MB: He is definitely the focal point of the episode, which is hilarious. I’d met him a few times and I knew that he liked the show so it wasn’t a thing to ask out of the blue. I met him at the Emmys last year. He came over especially for it. He would have been in it for tuppence.
BTJ: What’s the storyline?
MB: He’s in town being himself and I’m not interested because I’ve never heard of him, but previously I’ve fallen and hit my head. I see him in the club and I immediately fall under his spell. It’s just a silly way to get him in there.
http://www.beyondthejoke.co.uk/content/2250/interview-matt-Berry
Mad Men star Jon Hamm is such a big fan of Channel 4 comedy Toast of London that he gatecrashed the wrap party for the last series, the comedy’s star (and friend of Hamm) Matt Berry tells us.
“He just fancied it," said Berry of the event at a swanky West End private member's club. "He was downstairs and I said come up. Free booze will entice anyone, whether they have a million pounds in the bank or not.”
Hamm, who is due to appear in the Christmas special of Charlie Brooker's dystopian satire Black Mirror on Channel 4 this year, is apparently a big big fan of British comedy in general and a good pal of Berry’s. “He knows everyone’s work and quotes it,” says Berry.
As well as winning the BAFTA for Best Male Comedy Performance earlier this year, Berry has managed to attract Mad Men actor Jon Hamm – a noted fan of British comedy – to Toast of London’s third series.
“
He’s brilliant, you know?” Berry says of Hamm.
I first met him at Saturday Night Live in New York, and then we met in London a few times. And I met him in Los Angeles the year before he won his Emmy – and then he came and did Toast and won his Emmy the week later.”
Could it be that Hamm’s time with Berry spurred him on to win the award?
“
I sent him a picture of me winning the BAFTA and said, ‘no pressure’ underneath it,” Berry deadpans, before cracking: “No I didn’t.”
http://www.standard.co.uk/stayingin/tvfilm/matt-berry-toast-of-london-interview-jon-hamm-did-toast-
review
As puns go, Hamm On Toast – the title of the latest episode of the new series of Toast of London (Channel 4) – is pretty good. So good, in fact, could it be that Matt Berry, the creator and star of the surreal comedy that has made critics gush, came up with it before he’d even persuaded Jon Hamm to appear?
Hamm, best known for starring as Don Draper in Mad Men, is famed for his charisma. It seems as if Hamm himself doesn’t give a hoot that it’s now essentially his USP since, in many of his recent roles, he’s very much Hammed it up (for instance, he recently played a beardy weirdy religious cult leader in the brilliant Netflix comedy, Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt). Here, he very much played himself, and his smooth, twinkly charm was the running joke of the whole episode. Turns out Jon Hamm is pretty good at playing Jon Hamm; he does cool, casual and ever so slightly baffled (as one would be when encountering a man like Steven Toast) better than, well, Don Draper.
“I’ve never met anyone with charisma ever, it’s a complete myth,” said eccentric struggling actor Steven Toast (Berry) when his long-suffering agent Jane Plough (Doon Mackichan) offered to introduce him to Hamm, who was in town on business. But, after an unfortunate bump on the head due to the stairs collapsing in his shabby flat, Toast found himself bizarrely obsessed with his fellow thesp (“He’s got this charisma, it’s like black magic, it draws everyone in!”).
Soon his crush spiralled out of control; he found himself dressing as Don Draper, drinking his signature cocktail, the Old Fashioned, and making mix tapes for him. He even brushed off the advances of a beautiful young actress and model in favour of man-dates with his new obsession. As ever, the episode’s musical interlude was one of the funniest parts, with Toast singing incredulously, “I got myself into a terrible jam, I hit my head and now I fancy a man!”
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/tvandradio/tv-and-radio-reviews/12029253/Toast-of-London
With the curtain having fallen on the latest series of Matt Berry and Arthur Mathews’ thespian satire Toast of London, Jon Hamm’s brilliantly subversive cameo unfortunately shines the spotlight on a format in need of a more suitable showcase for its headline act’s talents.
“A crush on Jon Hamm? You couldn’t be more wide of the mark!” So insists Steven Toast, somewhat unconvincingly in a true belter of an episode, more than living up to the greatness of its inevitable Hamm on Toast title.
Now three series in, the cameo provides welcome respite from an over-reliance on repetition and catchphrase (yes, I can hear you Clem Fandango – we can all hear you), taking what was once welcome novelty to often law-of-diminishing-returns weariness in an unwelcome parallel trajectory to Toast’s faded career.
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