LOS ANGELES — Martin Mull’s new Fox comedy series, “The Cool Kids,” has him playing a member of a group of friends at a retirement community who have deemed themselves to be the top clique on the senior circuit. What unites the four is the strong belief they’re not done living yet. The cast also includes Leslie Jordan, David Alan Grier and Vicki Lawrence.
Mull’s playing a cool kid now, but he will be the first to tell you, he’s not always been cool.
“Let me just tell you that in high school, I wasn’t the star quarterback,” Mull says. “I was a pole vaulter. I had the school record in pole vaulting, but it was still not the coolest thing to do.”
It wasn’t until he graduated from high school that Mull, 75, began to develop the persona that would land him acting roles from “Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman” to “Two and a Half Men.”
Mull’s latest series is from creator Charlie Day, who admits to being a big fan of “The Golden Girls.” That’s why he has cast veteran actors but is not going to weigh the comedy down with jokes about what it’s like to be old.
Before Mull got in front of a camera, he started his career as a songwriter and throughout the ’70s was known for his musical comedy.
“I never planned on being an actor. What happened was that while I was doing my live act — comedy on the road with music — I got tired of the road. It’s exhausting,” Mull says. “So I had a connection who knew Norman Lear and I wanted to get a job as a writer on ‘Mary Hartman.’ I thought I could do that.”
Mull met with Lear for an hour and then the legendary producer told him there were no openings for writers. Six months later, Lear called Mull and asked him to read for a role on the show. He was terrified because he had never acted before. The audition went better than he had hoped and Mull landed the role that launched an acting career of more than four decades.
Working on “Mary Hartman” was perfect for Mull because the show was a dark and twisted look at daytime drama. That meant the humor fit his own unorthodox style of comedy. What made the job so difficult was Mull’s character was a wife abuser, and no matter how he looked at the role, there was just nothing funny to be played. His solution was to just portray the character in as serious a fashion as possible, and that helped him deal with the acting challenge.
Being cast as a senior citizen in “The Cool Kids” has been a much easier role.
“I AM a senior citizen. The way I look at this is that I’ve EARNED this,” Mull says. “I feel about this show like I have been working at Sears selling refrigerators for 50 years and now they are retiring me by giving me a gold watch.
“This show is my gold watch. To work on a show with these actors that’s 20 minutes from my house, my God this is like a thank-you note for sticking around in the business for 50 years.”
The main thing Mull stresses is while he’s 75 and playing a senior citizen, he doesn’t feel old. The way he looks at the character — and his own life — is he’s a young person who just happens to have older skin. The only difference he feels from when he was 35 is back then, it was easier for him to put on his shoes.
That’s why he wants “The Cool Kids” to be seen as a show about people who have been around a few more years. During those years, those people have just been able to experience more life.
“What is the coolest part about being old? You do gather a little bit of wisdom. And it’s not wisdom like you’re smart. It’s like you’ve made all these mistakes that you can now account for,” Mull says. “So you have what kind of becomes a little bit of wisdom and your body still will get across the room.
“When you have that little balance there while you can still get out of the chair and remember why, that’s gold.”
