Seth Meyers is Ready for Some Hometown Standup on Aug. 7

A  dad is doing one for the kids.

Bedford-raised Seth Meyers will perform a standup show in New Hampshire for the first time in three years, returning to SNHU Arena on Aug. 7 to raise money for CASA of New Hampshire and the Granite State Children’s Alliance.

The “Saturday Night Live” alumnus has hosted “Late Night with Seth Meyers” since 2014, logging more than 1,800 episodes of a show whose popularity is fueled by the news commentary he mastered as the anchor of SNL’s “Weekend Update.”

With his brother, Josh, Meyers also co-hosts “Family Trips with the Meyers Brothers,” a podcast they launched in 2023 that features celebrity guests recounting their childhood vacations and anecdotes about the Meyers brothers’ misadventures with their parents, Larry and Hilary. (Meyers also hosts the “The Lonely Island and Seth Meyers Podcast” with his former SNL buddies.)

These days, Meyers and his wife, Alexi Ashe, a human rights attorney, are busy raising their three children, Ashe, 10, Axel, 8, and Adelaide, 4, who made their “Late Night” debut Nov. 27 on a Thanksgiving episode.

We recently caught up with Meyers to talk about his life as a dad and TV host and the upcoming standup show.

New Hampshire Magazine: You’re coming to Manchester to once again raise money for CASA of New Hampshire and the Granite State Children’s Alliance. As a father of three young children and the husband of a human rights attorney, what do their missions mean to you?     

Seth Meyers will perform a standup show at SNHU Arena on Aug. 7 to raise money for CASA of New Hampshire and the Granite State
Children’s Alliance. Photo Courtesy NBC Universal

Seth Meyers:  It’s twofold. One, I just think so much respect has to be paid for people who look out for children that aren’t their own, and obviously the advocates that work with Granite State Children’s Alliance are doing that. I think it speaks to what makes New Hampshire such a great state that people look out for one another, and then of course anything you can do to help these kids I’m happy to do. I’m lucky to have parents of my own who put their hearts into raising my brother and I, and at the same time they appreciate the need to make sure that you’re looking out for other kids as well.

NHM: Your children made their “Late Night” debut in November, during which your daughter, Adelaide, stole the show, though her brothers showed off their dance moves. If you Google “The subway smells like diarrhea” the topped ranked video is a clip of your daughter posted to Instagram.

SM: It’s amazing. It seems like that was there for the taking, certainly an assessment that I don’t feel like she was necessarily the first to make, but she certainly made it the most adorable. And it’s actually pretty good branding for the subway because she didn’t seem that put off by it.

NHM: Did your kids surprise you or did you pretty much know where their antics might lead?

SM: The opposite is true, which is I surprised my kids. They were in the building taking their Christmas card photo. I was aware that were I to tell them they were going to be on my show, they would get in their heads about it. I just had my wife bring them to the stage door, and we put microphones on them and I told them, “You’re going to come out and do daddy’s show.” They were surprised that they were going to be on my show, and based on the fact that we had not discussed anything ahead of time, I was of course shocked and delighted by their answers.  

NHM: They all seemed to be pretty much having a lot of fun out there, unfiltered. 

SM: They were also the truest versions of themselves. That was my favorite part of it. It’s not as though the bright lights made them cosplay as different kids than they are. My wife made the best observation, that they all were immediately like the rest of my family in that my son Axel sat and took up all the room like my dad. Addie was just smiling and laughing like my mom. And my oldest son Ashe was like my brother Josh, just trying to wrangle the other two. 

NHM: It’s summer vacation time. When you go on trips now, do your kids wonder whether they might end up in your “Family Trips” podcast?

SM: I think they might be banking their best stories for a return to “Late Night.” They respect the podcast format, but they really love national television. 

NHM: Do you ever find yourself in a situation on a family trip where you realize you’re lapsing into the kind of dad behavior you learned from your father?

SM: All the time. Although I’ve pointed out there’s something when my dad got mad at my brother and I, that we were genuinely intimidated by it. Somehow, I’ve inherited his ability to lose his temper, and yet I have an impotent rage that does not scare my children at all. I mostly look like a clown who is also not even getting what I want. 

NHM: “Late Night” has reached season 13 and you’ve logged more than 1,800 shows. What’s the single thing that inspires you to keep going? Do any bucket list guests remain?

SM: I don’t really have any bucket list guests. Conan (O’Brien) was the last one who was really important just to have everyone on who’d done this show before me, and that was wonderful. What really gets me in the door every day is the fact that I just still love doing it. I love the people I work with. I love the challenge of pulling a show together every day. It flies by when you actually are doing the recording itself. I feel so lucky that I have a job that I literally can’t get enough of. 

NHM: You returned from a two-week break in June, telling the audience that “nothing’s happening” before leading into a rapid-fire catalog of Trump activity. I counted 19 items, though I might have lost count because they were flying by so fast. Were there any that didn’t make it in? 

Seth Meyers’ children Ashe, Adelaide and Axel hamming it up on their dad’s show. photo Courtesy NBC Universal

SM: I’m sad to report that, of course, there are days where 19 things happen that you can’t fit in, so two weeks I would say if we did 19, we cut a great deal of them. We’re about to take a longer summer hiatus, so I would just say buckle up for the first Monday back after that one. If past is prologue, there will be plenty that we will have missed.

NHM: A fan on social media said that segment was worthy of a Peabody Award, despite the large pockets on your shirt. Are those pockets for function or fashion?

SM: I mean obviously this one really stinks. I just put the shirts on that they give me, you know what I mean? I hate to point fingers, but I will say I like having a large pocket on the front of a shirt. I think it’s underrated as a place to put your hands. One of the reasons I do my monologue at a desk now instead of standing is my hands go flying everywhere. I talk with my hands, and so having a pocket to put them is actually very helpful to me and helpful for the people on either side of me because I will hit them in the face if I gesticulate. 

NHM: Your show is very structured. How does that compare with doing standup? What do you look forward to when you get back before an arena full of people?

SM: The thing about the show is every day is its own show, and then you have to kind of throw it in the trash bin and move on. The nice thing about standup is over the course of a year, you’re just refining jokes. You’re adding jokes. You take out the ones that you can’t figure out how to crack, and so it is this thing that you are polishing in the hopes that one day you’ll get it exactly the way you want it. 

If that doesn’t happen, at least you get it closer than the last time you did it. I was up last night at the Beacon (Theatre in New York) with John Oliver, and I think I probably have four or five more shows before I do the gig at SNHU.

NHM: The last time you performed at SNHU, you had a bit about having a nightmare where you are performing at SNHU because you never made it out of New Hampshire. What it is like to come back and perform there?

SM: It means all the more for the fact that my parents still call it home and are still an active part of the community. So many of the people I grew up with, so many of the best people I met in my life in New Hampshire, are still living in New Hampshire. I think it’s a great place full of exceptional people, and certainly anybody who shows up for a show like the one we’re going to be doing, which is to raise money, I have an incredible amount of gratitude to them for spending an evening with us and giving their money to the right causes. 

NHM: We’ve come full circle. Anything we haven’t talked about that you’d love to get
out there? 

SM: I’m trying to think if I can burn my parents, but I feel like since it’s their local press, I’m going to let them get off scot-free this time. But I will promise for anybody who comes to the show, I do burn them in my act, but I also want you to know they’ve seen the jokes, and they’ve signed off. They think they’re fair hits.