Zach Woods Explains How 'In the Know' Combined Real-Life Celebrity Interviews With Stop-Motion Humor (Exclusive)

Zach Woods is revealing the secret to In the Know's hilarious and surprisingly heartfelt celebrity interviews as Peacock's comedic new take on public radio mixes live-action stars with stop-motion animated characters. Prior to the Jan. 25 premiere of Peacock's unique new comedy, Woods opened up to PopCulture.com about how he turned his fictional NPR host character Lauren Caspian into a bonafide celebrity interviewer. 

Woods, whose appreciation for NPR spawned In the Know with longtime collaborator Brandon Gardner and comedy legend Mike Judge, stars as Caspian in the series, "NPR's third most popular host" and a stop-motion puppet. In each episode, Woods interviews live-action celebrities including Kaia Gerber, Jonathan Van Ness, Finn Wolfhard and Mike Tyson as the audience follows along with the making of Caspian's show In the Know.

"The way it would work is, before we did an interview, [the celebrity guests] would only see Brandon [Gardner] and Brandon would say, 'This is going to be an interview with Lauren Caspian. He's this NPR public radio host, and you can just act as though it's a real NPR interview,'" Woods explained of the interview process. "'You don't need to pretend to be offended if you're not. You can laugh if something makes you laugh. You can give sincere answers. Just treat it like a real interview. The only thing we ask is please don't mention that he's a puppet.'"

From there, a picture of Caspian would appear on the celebs' Zoom screens, and Woods would improvise the interview with them off-camera using both questions submitted by the show's writers ahead of time as well as notes Gardner would share live via his iPad. "It was really, really fun," Woods said of the experience. "People were so game and ... a kind of surprising, and for me, very disarming, combination of funny and sincere."

The Silicon Valley alum continued, "I think because the people we interviewed have been interviewed so many times, there's a way in which you can get your press talking points and just become a human Teddy Ruxpin where you're saying the same thing again and again and again. I think something about the format of speaking to a fictional puppet NPR host knocks people off-course of their established lines, and you get into more uncharted territories with them, and you get really interesting aspects of them coming to the fore that you might not otherwise see."

Woods was especially surprised with the course of Caspian's interview with Tyson, whom he called a "very interesting, complicated, smart person" whose interview was a "perfect example of saying really funny things and playing really well off Lauren, saying really silly things to him, but also saying incredibly insightful things that almost miraculously fit with what we had planned for that episode. And it would be easy, I think, for a viewer to be like, 'Well, they had to have scripted that because it fit together so well,' [but] it was just magic where he just happened to say something that made the whole episode work."

Other standouts included pop duo Tegan and Sara. "They were so funny and cool," Woods gushed. "I think Brandon and I hope to be reincarnated as Tegan and Sara in another life but I'm not holding my breath." 

Other celebrity interviewees on In the Know include Ken Burns, Norah Jones, Nicole Byer, Roxane Gay, Jorge Masvidal and Hugh Laurie.  In the Know also stars Caitlin Reilly (Loot, Hacks), Charlie Bushnell (Diary of a Future President, Percy Jackson and The Olympians), J. Smith-Cameron (Succession, Rectify), and Carl Tart (Grand Crew). In the Know streams on Peacock on Jan. 25.