Late Night Clip: Watch Men Try, Fail to Prove Themselves to Emma Thompson

In this exclusive new clip from the Mindy Kaling movie, a group of men do their best to kiss the ring of a shrewd late-night host played by Thompson.

In the upcoming comedy Late Night, Emma Thompson plays Katherine Newbury, a shrewd late-night TV host who strikes fear in the hearts of all of her employees. She does as she pleases—until an exec pulls her aside and warns her that her show is coming to an end. Salvation arrives in the form of a new writer, Molly (played by Mindy Kaling, who also wrote Late Night), who infuses the show with a fresh sense of relevancy and self-awareness.

But in an exclusive new clip from the film, we see how things are going for Katherine before Molly arrives. In the clip, the late-night host is sitting down for an awkward meeting with her all-white, all-male writing staff. It quickly becomes clear that Katherine, who’s worked with some members of this writing staff for years, has no idea who any of them are—no matter how hard they try to position themselves on her good side. Take Tom (Veep alum Reid Scott), her monologue writer, who tries desperately to impress Katherine by noting that he’s “actually the youngest monologue writer in the history of the show.” Katherine’s blunt response? “Don’t care.”

Her solution to all of these men trying to kiss the ring is to . . . knock them down one more peg by calling them by numbers instead of their actual names. She literally goes around the room, forbidding them from calling each other their real names instead of their numbers whilst in her presence.

The writing staff on the show within the film is full of familiar faces even aside from Kaling, including John Early, Denis O’Hare, Hugh Dancy, and Paul Walter Hauser. Though Dancy’s character, Charlie, doesn’t get much play in this exclusive clip, it’s been revealed in the film’s charming full trailer that he is Molly’s love interest.

Late Night, directed by Nisha Ganatra, debuted earlier this year at the Sundance Film Festival, where critics gave it warm reviews. Thompson in particular earned raves, with Vanity Fair’s own Richard Lawson touting Katherine Newbury as one of the actor’s best roles in years. Afterward, Amazon quickly snapped up the comedy for a hefty sum, a strong vote of confidence for its future box-office potential. Late Night hits theaters on June 7.

Watch the clip HERE.