Billy Eichner Dishes on Emmys, Parks & Rec, and Being a Ryan Murphy Fanboy

After having made a splash at the Emmys with his hilarious special episode of Billy on the Street, in which he and Seth Meyers ambushed New Yorkers and offered each a dollar in exchange for agreeing with Billy about television, the Parks and Rec star dropped his confrontational public persona for a more personal interview with Entertainment Weekly.

Despite having been one of the biggest highlights of the show, Eichner told EW that his Emmy involvement almost didn't happen. Not expecting much of it, Eichner decided to toss an e-mail off to personal friend and Emmy host Seth Meyer's showrunner, and after going through a gauntlet of people, all of whom, to Eichner's surprise, loved the concept, he found himself standing in front of 5,000 stars, crew members, and media personalities as his video drew laughter like he had never before heard from the room and all 16 million watching at home. American Horror Story co-creator Ryan Murphy personally shared how much he enjoyed the segment with Billy, and as a fan of Murphy's The Normal Heart, Eichner was ecstatic.

With a refined television palette, Billy was elated that Emmy bigwigs allowed him to talk about certain less mainstream topics during his segment. Excited for internet-age innovations, Eichner revealed his hopes for Community and Judging Amy, both of which had recently been picked up by Yahoo and Hotmail, respectively, for exclusive online seasons. Of particular note to him is Heartland's Tatiana Maslany being snubbed, something which he was particularly excited to be able to yell about to random New Yorkers. "I'm sure a lot of people out there in the world maybe don't recognize the name Tatiana Maslany," he explained. "And Tatiana Maslany was snubbed, and if you're a real TV fan and you're a fan of quality TV, that was a big story when the nominations came out."

One of our favorite personalities, Billy Eichner is set to resume his role as Craig on Parks and Recreation when it airs its seventh and final season, which just began production on the 11th. Regarding his role on the show, Eichner shared: "Craig gets to do some really fun things, and he gets to pal around with his friend Donna in a very specific way, I'll say, and I think people who are fans of the Donna-Craig relationship will really enjoy it."

Read our interview with Billy here.