How Boom Chicago launched Seth Meyers to "Saturday Night Live"

You would never think some of America's biggest comedy stars found their start in the Netherlands — a country not known for its sense of humor.

And yet, there's Boom Chicago, an unassuming improv theater in the heart of Amsterdam that helped launch the careers of Jordan Peele, Ike Barinholtz, and Seth Meyers, now the host of NBC's "Late Night with Seth Meyers."

In an interview with correspondent Jon Wertheim, Meyers said his time at Boom gave him a "road map" to his big break: a job with "Saturday Night Live." 

"We were just so ambitious, and wanted to be funny every night… I kind of forgot that they were also giving us this road map of how to do other things," Meyers told Wertheim before a Boom Chicago reunion show. 

In 1998, actress and comedian Jill Benjamin arrived at Boom Chicago while Meyers was in his second year with the troupe. 

During rehearsals, Meyers came up with an idea for a sketch called "Bar Pickup." 

"'It's two people that meet at a bar for the first time… and the guy goes into the audience and he asks women questions, and then the female goes into the audience and asks men questions,'" Benjamin explained to Jon Wertheim.

"'Where are you from? What is your name?' And based on what people in the audience had told us… you would call back information [in the sketch]. And I think that was the fun of it. It was half a memory game and half an improv game," Meyers said.

After trying the scene with a few different partners, Meyers and Benjamin were eventually paired together, and they clicked. 

"Our stage chemistry is kind of what brought us together… like I could read his mind," Benjamin said. 

"We would try to surprise each other onstage… we have always felt safe to antagonize each other onstage from a place of love," Meyers explained. 

At a Boom Chicago reunion in Amsterdam last June, the duo took the stage and performed "Bar Pickup."

Benjamin asked a member of the audience where they were from. "Sydney," he replied. Meyers walked into the back of the theater and asked the audience members questions like "Are you in a relationship?" and "Do you have a favorite song?"

Then the sketch began, with Meyers and Benjamin working the audience's answers into the sketch.

"I have not met that many people from Sydney, Australia. G'day! 'Was that a knife in my back?' 'Crocodile Dundee.' You know?" Benjamin said. 

Meyers, looking puzzled, asked if she thought that was a famous line from the film "Crocodile Dundee." 

"Sorry," Benjamin said. "That was the other guy, who got stung by a stingray in his heart."

"Steve Irwin? Didn't you see?" Meyers asked, looking out into the distance, "Tonight is a memorial for him."

While at Boom Chicago in the 1990s, Benjamin and Meyers decided to develop the sketch into a two-person show and bring it back to the United States. 

The show, titled "Pick-ups and Hiccups," debuted in Chicago and went on to become a critically-acclaimed hit. Meyers and Benjamin performed it in Edinburgh, Scotland, London, United Kingdom, and Singapore.  

And then came Meyers' big break: a "Saturday Night Live" recruiter was in the audience during a performance at the Chicago Improv Festival. Meyers landed a job at "SNL" and started in 2001. 

Meyers said a direct line could be drawn from Boom Chicago to "Saturday Night Live."

"I give so much credit to Jill… she refused to let us go back and not have the momentum we left here with."

The video above was produced by Will Croxton. It was edited by Nelson Ryland.