Henry Winkler has a reputation for being one of the kindest individuals in Hollywood, and 'Late Night With Seth Meyers' writer Amber Ruffin confirms this, especially based on her initial meeting with him, during which he gave her a delightful – albeit amusingly incorrect – compliment.
In a new oral history of 'Late Night,' celebrating the 10th anniversary of the show, Ruffin and fellow writer Jenny Hagel provide a detailed account of how the 'Jokes Seth Can't Tell' segment came to be.
“Once, I was in the makeup room, just having a good time,” Ruffin recalled. “And Henry Winkler walks in! He says 'Hi, you’re Amber' and then 'I’m Henry.' I'm like, 'I know who you are, who doesn’t know who you are!' He says, 'You never know, you never know.' And then he goes, 'I just wanted to say that I love you on Black vs. Lesbian.'”
Ruffin finds the memory hysterical, appreciating the fact that Winkler was actually referring to 'Jokes Seth Can't Tell.' She quickly clarified that no offense was intended or taken, as that is the core concept of the segment.
“I was laughing so hard!” Ruffin exclaimed. “I thought, well, that’s not not the name for it. It might not be the name for it, but that is what it is. But it made me laugh so hard.”
For those unfamiliar, 'Jokes Seth Can't Tell' is a segment where Meyers sets up jokes about Black people or lesbians, and Ruffin and Hagel deliver the punchlines respectively, based on the joke's category. At the end, they “convince” Meyers that the punchline is acceptable for him to say, then scold him when he actually says it.
You can see a hilarious example of this in a clip. here.
