Amy Poehler Recalls Rapping: 'I Was Just Trying To Not Give Birth'

Much of America delighted in seeing Amy Poehler balance her burgeoning belly as she rapped the highly publicized Sarah Palin tribute on Saturday Night Live, and the 37-year-old comedian tells National Public Radio’s Fresh Air that she couldn’t help but get a bit of a power rush from the whole situation. “It was fun to be really pregnant and to be leaning over a desk and shooting a moose and screaming, ‘You’re dead because I’m an animal and I’m bigger than you,'” she laughs. Noting that she could have quite possibly “given birth that moment,” Amy admits she had no shame in poking fun at the governor of Alaska who was sitting only feet away, as she was too busy concentrating her efforts on keeping her delivery off camera!

“I was so pregnant that I was just trying to not give birth — that was my goal. So whoever was seated next to me, I wasn’t really paying attention to that at the time.”

The adrenaline rush that came along with being nine months pregnant and filming a live show each week was one that Amy quite enjoyed on a daily basis. “Just to be able to … wake up and say, ‘Am I going to be on TV or not?’ was exciting,” she says. Her excitement, however, did not come without its fair share of frustration, as Amy and the other writers found themselves with limited material for her scenes. The feelings were short-lived, however, as the actress — recalling the experience as “frankly liberating” — embraced her bump. “[I said], ‘I’m just going to have to just enjoy how big I am and how much space I take up,'” she shares.

“It was really nice for a small person like myself to take up a lot of space. It was nice for people to kind of have to get out of my way.”

Having left SNL soon after delivering her baby boy Archibald ‘Archie’ William Emerson, now 6 months, Amy has moved on to playing Leslie Knope on her new show, Parks and Recreation. While her baby belly may be gone, the new mama laughs that a few extra pounds are still looming. “The first six episodes that we shot are … a slow motion of me trying to lose my baby weight,” she explains. “There’s a lot of Spanx going on, there’s a lot of undergarments, a lot of shots of me sitting at a desk.” Although the extra “softness” of Amy gave her the ability to relate to her onscreen character, she jokes that enough is enough.

“Enough of that. I need to get skinny again.”

After all, according to Amy, she has it easier than most working moms. Not only do “most people have to go back to work six weeks after they give birth,” the majority do not have “craft services to make them sandwiches,” she laughs.

Archie is the first child for Amy and her husband, actor Will Arnett.

Source: Fresh Air

— Anya