Q 1

PLAYBOY: Your new comedy, Anchorman, is set in the freewheeling 1970s. What's your disco-era time-travel fantasy?

Christina Applegate: Studio 54. I never got to go because, well, I was six years old. I'd get wasted and dance and watch people have sex. How cool would that be? Of course, most of those people ended up dead or in rehab, but it would be fun to go once just to see the debauchery. It doesn't happen anymore. Or maybe it does, but I have no clue where they're holding that particular party.

Q 2

PLAYBOY: You play an ambitious TV reporter fighting Will Ferrell's male chauvinist pig broadcaster. Do you think Barbara Walters got her fanny slapped back in the day?

Christina Applegate: Well, Jessica Savitch was one of the first female anchors, in the 1970s in Philadelphia. There are these incredible tapes of when they would leave the camera running between segments. They're all smiles, and then the newscast goes off and you can feel the pecking order. You can feel that she was the low figure on the totem pole and wasn't going to win with these men.

Q 3

PLAYBOY: When you travel to different cities, do you tune in to local news?

Christina Applegate: Oh yeah. It's hysterical. It's like a time warp. They think everything they're saying is really charming and funny, and it's so sad. But they definitely have less entertainment value than our news in Los Angeles. Here the top story is "Pamela Anderson got another boob job! She took out her implants and then put 'em back in! All in one weekend!"

Q 4

PLAYBOY: Does Will Ferrell, to crib his line from Zoolander, take crazy pills?

Christina Applegate: I don't think he takes crazy pills as much as he has an incredible imagination. He goes beyond what you think a character should be thinking and into the whole spectrum of what the character could possibly think in six lifetimes. His improvs are so out there, you go, "How the fuck did you come up with that?" That's why you watch Old School 50 times--because you're just trying to get to the Will Ferrell parts. I think he's a genius.

Q 5

PLAYBOY: And yet he doesn't seem like the typical tortured comedian.

Christina Applegate: Not at all. The difference with tortured comedians is that you can tell they're not connecting with other actors. All they want is for you to look at them--"Look at me! Look at me! Look at me!"