Why Tina Fey says she doesn't consider herself an actress
"I don't have my 'Danish Girl,'" Fey joked after being asked about her toughest movie during a Q&A at the Tribeca Film Festival in New York City on Tuesday.
Asked by her childhood friend, TV Guide's Damian Holbrook, if she considers herself an actress, Fey explained, "I feel like most actors are sort of just working with what they have. And there are very few people in the world who are virtuoso, can really transform themselves, and most people are just trying to get through the day."
For example, Fey said that she didn't get on "Saturday Night Live" with her acting. As a member of Chicago improv group Second City, she was seen by "SNL" scouts who visited to find new cast members, and she was always passed up. It wasn't until she applied as a writer for the NBC sketch show that she finally got hired.
In fact, Fey said that she was registered as a writer with the Television Academy, the organization that gives out the Emmys, for a decade. That only changed recently, though, after Fey watched FX's hit true-crime drama "The People v. O.J. Simpson."
"I really was very into 'The People v. O.J. Simpson.' I thought that was so well-written," she explained. "It's my favorite thing, things that get into those kind of issues through a story. For the first time in 10 years, I went and called the Television Academy to rejigger my [membership], so I can vote in the acting. I was always entered as a writer. I did it just so I could vote for Sterling K. Brown and Sarah Paulson."