Episode 1004 - Rob Lowe
Marc:Lock the gates!
Marc:Alright, let's do this.
Marc:How are you, what the fuckers?
Marc:What the fuck, buddies?
Marc:What the fucksters?
Marc:What's happening?
Marc:It's Mark Maron.
Marc:This is my podcast, WTF.
Marc:Welcome.
Marc:Welcome to it.
Marc:Welcome back.
Marc:Hey, it's you again.
Marc:What's happening?
Marc:I am, as you can tell, perhaps, maybe you can hear the difference.
Marc:I am doing this from, what do we call it?
Marc:I'm on the road.
Marc:I've got my Zoom rig and my Beta 58s and my little cords, and I'm in a hotel room in Boulder, Colorado.
Marc:I'm recording this on Sunday before the Monday that most of you will hear this.
Marc:Maybe the people in the next room will hear it before you.
Marc:Perhaps the people in the hallway.
Marc:I heard some of them out there.
Marc:I don't know.
Marc:It seems okay.
Marc:Sound seems okay.
Marc:Today on the show, I talked to Rob Lowe.
Marc:He came by the new situation over at the house, came upstairs, walked past the bedrooms into the back second bedroom there, and we tucked in and did the thing.
Marc:He was actually the first person that I interviewed in that environment, and I think it went pretty well.
Marc:Pretty together fella, that Rob Lowe.
Marc:Good talk.
Marc:Nice to meet him.
Marc:Yeah, solid dude.
Marc:But I was in Aspen, and if you were following my story and my panic and my apprehension about my shows in Aspen, I can tell you it turned out better than anticipated.
Marc:And I learned some things, too.
Marc:I learned that...
Marc:The fears that I talked about on the last show were there.
Marc:You know, certainly the PTSD from several sort of strained, difficult shows over the years at the Aspen Comedy Festival.
Marc:But I actually realized it went deeper.
Marc:It went deeper, and I think I might have touched on this a little bit, but the PTSD from my childhood and ski vacations with my family, I think, was more at the core of it.
Marc:And I didn't realize that until driving in.
Marc:Just the only time my family would really get together and spend any time together for any period of time was on those ski vacations.
Marc:And we didn't know each other that well.
Marc:We were all in the same house, but kind of self-absorbed into our own thing.
Marc:And when we all got together in the car, it could get pretty gnarly.
Marc:Yeah, we'd listen to fun music.
Marc:You know, my dad had eight tracks.
Marc:He had Hocus Pocus.
Marc:He had Abbey Road.
Marc:He had the soundtrack of American Graffiti.
Marc:He had Buddy Holly's greatest hits.
Marc:That was all pretty good.
Marc:But when it really got down to it, in a hotel room, four people don't know each other that well.
Marc:A couple of younger people that really have to defer to the older people who are also nuts and selfish.
Marc:It could get a little ugly.
Marc:And I think I had forgotten just...
Marc:How bad those vacations were.
Marc:Most of the days were ruined around a glove or perhaps a hat or why didn't we bring those socks that I like.
Marc:My dad would go crazy over things like that.
Marc:Usually before the ski day started, at least one of us was crying, whether it be my mother, my brother, or me.
Marc:Maybe all of us were crying, and then he'd find the socks, or he'd find the hat, or he'd get past it, and we'd hit the slopes.
Marc:But not great memories.
Marc:I do remember one ski trip where, I don't know, me and my brother wasn't on it for some reason, and it was me and my mother and father, and I declared that I wish they were more like my friend Eric's parents, and
Marc:Then my dad yelled, maybe you should go fucking live with Eric.
Marc:And then my mom was crying.
Marc:My dad was crying.
Marc:I was crying.
Marc:And I'm not sure that ever resolved itself now that I think about it.
Marc:But that was a ski trip.
Marc:But I'm OK.
Marc:I got to Aspen and I eventually made my way into town.
Marc:Walked around and realized what a ridiculous fantasy land it is.
Marc:Just the class strata of Aspen is kind of, I wouldn't say disturbing, but extreme.
Marc:I mean, you literally have some of the richest people in the world that have houses there that they visit maybe six days a year.
Marc:So they're around.
Marc:And then you have some of the richest people in the world who go there to ski.
Marc:And then you have locals and then you have, you know, kind of normal people that go there to ski.
Marc:But the business, it is reasonably priced is not something that you hear in Aspen very much.
Marc:It's like nine dollars for a Clif Bar.
Marc:Everything you buy, even if it's breakfast, is twenty dollars.
Marc:Again, not cheap, just noticing things.
Marc:Oh, here's the other thing.
Marc:I actually was walking down the street in Aspen.
Marc:There was just a guy sitting in front of an office on the main street there where the the bricked in area is.
Marc:And I walked by him.
Marc:And as I'm walking by, he goes, you want to buy a house?
Marc:He said that he was a real estate agent on the street like a drug dealer.
Marc:And I turned to him and I said, is that really an impulse buy?
Marc:And he goes, hey, sometimes, sometimes it's an emotional moment.
Marc:You never know.
Marc:You might it might happen.
Marc:And I'm like, yeah, look, I don't I don't have my checkbook, pal.
Marc:Thanks for the offer.
Marc:I wish you the best.
Marc:I hope you sell a house here on the street this afternoon.
Marc:But the show.
Marc:Turns out it was good.
Marc:It was pretty fucking good, folks.
Marc:It was, you know, I'd forgotten, as I always do, that however I freak myself out, once I get to sound check and I stand on that stage in whatever theater it is, part of me is like, oh, yeah, of course this is what I do.
Marc:This is where I live.
Marc:This is it.
Marc:There was some good press on me in Aspen.
Marc:I mean, a guy for the Aspen Times...
Marc:Actually, you know, things have been written about me here and there, but this guy kind of did a good job.
Marc:He did a good job, this guy, Andrew Travers.
Marc:I talked to him, and you never know, but I was on the cover of The Weekend section, and in Aspen, you know, 19 people live there, so it actually means something.
Marc:And the article was good, but still, they told me there was a big walk-up crowd in the Wheeler Opera House where I was performing, which I had performed in before different incarnations of myself.
Marc:over the years at the festivals.
Marc:It's a beautiful little old theater built in the 1800s.
Marc:It's got about 400 seats and it's sweet.
Marc:And I had only sold about half day before the show, but they said there's a lot of walk up and ended up selling 75, 80%.
Marc:And it just turns out I get a text the day I got there that a comic I know was in town because he saw the article.
Marc:He texted me.
Marc:I was going to go up cold and just blow through an hour, 20, hour and a half on my own.
Marc:But Ahmed Ahmed was in town.
Marc:So I said, what are you up to, man?
Marc:You want to do 10 before me?
Marc:kind of kind of get him into shape he said sure so that was kind of a nice coincidence and the show was uh it was great in a lot of ways the altitude was kind of fucked up it kind of screwed with me a little bit kind of gets your brain a little screwy did i say screwy twice you want to buy a house
Marc:uh but uh yeah but everything kind of clicked along you're always sort of out of breath there even if you're just walking up but two three stairs and i couldn't sleep that night because the altitude because you kind of feel like you're mildly drowning and you kind of wake up every 20 minutes so yeah yeah but dreams man the dreams
Marc:It was like having a remote that you were flipping through, man.
Marc:I traveled, man.
Marc:I learned a lot about things that were percolating in the back of my brain, boy.
Marc:Things were coming up.
Marc:It's sort of nice whether you have a fever or whether you're having trouble breathing because you're at an inhumane altitude.
Marc:that you get the opportunity to get a closer look at just what's teeming about in the old id, what's kicking around in the lizard brain and attaching itself to your regular life.
Marc:Where are we at there?
Marc:And if you can remember, make some notes for when you get back.
Marc:But the show, all good.
Marc:Got up there, killing, killing.
Marc:Went into some political stuff.
Marc:Got one or two people.
Marc:One guy's like, what happened to the jokes?
Marc:I'm like, these are the jokes.
Marc:And you're kind of, you know, everyone's laughing but you.
Marc:But you're the only one talking.
Marc:Another guy goes, yeah, you're funny before the political stuff.
Marc:And I was probably more diplomatic than I should have been.
Marc:I said, look, you know.
Marc:It's going to be done in a minute.
Marc:You can leave if you want.
Marc:I'll give you your money back because I got to tell you in about a half hour into the set, it's going to get pretty gnarly for you.
Marc:You know, it's going to get a little harder later in the show.
Marc:I'm going to mix it up, but it's going to get a little rough.
Marc:I'll give you a heads up to let you know because I don't want to offend your delicate sensibility or your sort of faux victimness.
Marc:But no one left.
Marc:They just wanted to make it known that they were there and have everybody be not uncomfortable because right when they opened their mouth, there was sort of a chorus like, no, boo.
Marc:And I'm like, no, let's not make that happen.
Marc:I can manage this.
Marc:I can bridge this gap.
Marc:And we did, and I did a nice hour and 25-minute set, left, went back to the hotel, couldn't sleep for about four hours, watched American Sniper with commercials until the very end, which I don't enjoy, but I like when he kills the other sniper.
Marc:Yeah, finally got to sleep.
Marc:It was a good show.
Marc:So all that bellyaching on my behalf to you the other day, though it was true and the fear was real.
Marc:It worked out.
Marc:You want to buy a house?
Marc:Huh?
Marc:How about a house?
Marc:So now, now I'm in Boulder.
Marc:I'm in Boulder, Colorado.
Marc:It was quite an interesting drive.
Marc:Beautiful, beautiful drive.
Marc:But there was a couple of things that made it even more compelling.
Marc:But let me just lay a couple emails on you.
Marc:Here we go.
Marc:This is just from a guy named Ed.
Marc:Subject line.
Marc:I never thought of contacting you until dot, dot, dot.
Marc:Please don't get dark.
Marc:please don't get dark like you just did on that episode with tall wilkenfeld you scare the shit out of me dude don't please don't do anything stupid your show keeps me positive dude please don't get down please don't stop doing what you do please ed relax i wasn't that down you're kind of an empath because i knew it was under there during that uh monologue i knew there was a little tugging sadness but i wasn't i wasn't spiraling pal and i'll i'll try to keep out of a tailspin for you ed just
Marc:Just relax, Ed, please, relax.
Marc:And thank you for your concern and your email.
Marc:I appreciate it.
Marc:So I'm getting ready to perform here in Boulder at the Boulder Theater.
Marc:It was a beautiful drive, beautiful drive.
Marc:But my buddy, Matt Sweeney, hit me to this, like there was a link to an NPR thing of a record.
Marc:There's a link, and I don't know if I'm pronouncing his name right.
Marc:M-D-O-U is his first name.
Marc:Mokhtar is the second name.
Marc:And the album is called Ilana, the creator.
Marc:And this is, it's like some sort of Saharan psychedelia.
Marc:So like I hooked up the link on my phone and it's just music, man.
Marc:It's just, it's like, it's like a rock album, but it's, uh,
Marc:I guess the guy plays something called a Toreg style guitar.
Marc:It's a Saharan style of music.
Marc:It's almost trance like, but it's definitely got a rock sensibility.
Marc:And it's just, you know, it's so rare that you hear something that kind of bends your sense.
Marc:of what electric guitar is of what you know can or can't be rock music if it is rock music but uh i didn't know anything about it but the element of the saharan kind of space so i'm driving through the rocky mountains man and i got you know snow covered mountains all over all around me i'm going through tunnels and mountains
Marc:And I'm just listening to this kind of trancy like I don't understand the language.
Marc:The guy's from Niger and I don't know anything about him.
Marc:But just driving through those mountains, it was sort of not counterintuitive, but ironic that I'm listening to Saharan kind of riffage, you know, in the elevated snow covered Rockies.
Marc:But space is space, man.
Marc:And when you get into that poetic space where shit just stretches out because of a groove or of a sort of riff that repeats itself, it's almost meditative, just moving in my rented Chevy Equinox through the Rocky Mountains, listening to music from a cat who's from a small village in central Niger, just on fire with his tarig guitar sound, bringing the Saharan...
Marc:desert to my car as i move through my own poetic mental state through the rocky mountains is pretty great and i think actually i you know it could work as a commercial for a chevy equinox but that's not really where i was going it did contain what was happening though and it did keep us all moving so that was my experience heading into boulder so now here i am in the room talking to you you want to buy a house
Marc:So, Rob Lowe, think what you will.
Marc:Have your ideas.
Marc:Have your sense of him.
Marc:But I was pleasantly surprised.
Marc:He's currently hosting Mental Samurai on Fox, Tuesday nights on Fox.
Marc:He's got a one-man show he tours around that I didn't know about.
Marc:Of course, I didn't know about his books.
Marc:But, yeah, he tells me.
Marc:He tells me.
Marc:I actually had a nice time talking to him.
Marc:This is me talking to Rob Lowe.
Marc:You want to wear cans?
Guest:Yeah, oh yeah.
Guest:It makes me sound so much sexier.
Guest:I'm already like it's a total difference.
Marc:Yeah, right?
Guest:Fuck yeah.
Marc:Oh, it sounds pretty dead.
Marc:You're the first guy I've talked to in this setup.
Guest:It's like a 1970s...
Guest:It is just dead.
Guest:You feel it, right?
Guest:Oh, there's no presence at all.
Marc:That's crazy.
Marc:It took a while.
Marc:It took a lot of these platforms, a lot of these whatever you call them, speaker walls.
Marc:We could be doing a Steely Dan album.
Marc:You know, it's funny you bring that up.
Marc:Are you a Steely Dan fan?
Marc:Huge.
Marc:Really?
Marc:Yeah, huge.
Marc:I know a lot of people don't get it.
Marc:I just, I didn't.
Marc:Forever.
Marc:And now, for some reason, I'm 55, and I put it on, and I was like, that's kind of...
Guest:You listen to Hey 19 at your age and you're like, yeah, I get that.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Young girl, really hot.
Guest:I have nothing in common with.
Guest:But all of it is very clean sounding.
Guest:It sounds like they recorded it in space.
Marc:Yeah, exactly.
Marc:No one can hear you scream.
Guest:It's kind of relieving, you know?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:It's funny.
Guest:I saw this interview with Springsteen.
Guest:He goes, I hate those 70s songs.
Guest:It's like the silence in them just makes me want to vomit.
Guest:He said that?
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:Recently?
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:He likes room, as they call it in the trade.
Marc:Well, that's right.
Marc:And I think that those guys were anti-room.
Marc:Very anti-room.
Guest:Very anti-room.
Guest:The clash of those guys.
Guest:They went here like fucking spoons banging the commissary.
Marc:Yeah, yeah.
Marc:I like that, though.
Marc:Not for you.
Marc:Give me the deadened... Sterile environment.
Marc:Sterile environment of Fleetwood Mac.
Marc:Sure.
Marc:Well, that, I mean, I can definitely get on board with Fleetwood Mac.
Marc:So what happened?
Marc:You came down here from Orange County?
Marc:Santa Barbara.
Marc:That's where you live?
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:And you've been there for 25 years.
Guest:Now, yeah, do you have a large expanse?
Guest:I do.
Guest:It's my only extravagance in life, really, is living way beyond my means in my home.
Guest:Is that what...
Marc:So, let's start here, though, because I watched the trailer for Mental Samurai, and I know that's what you're here promoting, and I don't usually pay much mind to promoting things.
Marc:I like to do a longer interview.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:But I'm just saying, you get the offer for that.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:And what's the deliberation there?
Guest:What happens is, I get the offer, and over the years I've had offers to do game shows, or as they like to call them now, what do they call them?
Guest:Competition series.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:That's a little more dignified, I guess.
Guest:It's a little more dignified.
Guest:It's like when they didn't call sitcoms sitcoms for a really long time.
Guest:What did they call them?
Guest:Half-hour comedies.
Guest:Oh, of course.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I live for euphemisms.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I think they're genius.
Marc:Most of them are put in place, so you'll do them.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:It doesn't sound so bad.
Guest:Like, do you want to-
Guest:um, randomly end this person's life expectancy.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Murder them.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Right.
Marc:Um, I wonder, well, that's the thing about that fucking show.
Marc:I mean, uh, they may not be the game shows that we used to know because of the apparatuses involved.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:It's an amusement park ride, dude.
Guest:You've got people winging around in a machine.
Guest:And the arm cost four and a half million dollars.
Marc:And it's a ride, right?
Marc:That's part of it.
Marc:You could get sick and it's not fun if you don't like rides.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Well, I mean, because to your question, the pitch was, we're the people who make American Ninja Warrior.
Guest:I'm like, I'm so down.
Guest:I love that show.
Marc:You do?
Guest:It's great.
Guest:Love it.
Guest:That's the one where they obstacle courses?
Guest:Correct.
Guest:Right.
Guest:So like, well, we want to do an obstacle course for the mind.
Guest:Ninja Warriors for the physical.
Guest:Sure.
Guest:This will be for the mind.
Guest:Right.
Guest:What does that look like?
Guest:So I was involved in developing the whole concept with them.
Guest:Really?
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:So you were there on the ground floor when they were talking about the arm.
Marc:Yeah, 100%.
Marc:The ball that flies around that people are in.
Guest:Totally.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Because I'm a producer on the show as well.
Guest:So that's how it works.
Guest:So that's how it works.
Guest:And- You got a steak.
Guest:I got a steak, baby.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And I'd also seen some of my pals like-
Guest:Alec Baldwin doing Match Game or Mike Myers doing his thing or Amy Poehler doing her thing.
Guest:And they all seem to be having so much fun.
Guest:Alec Baldwin did Match Game?
Guest:Alec Baldwin's been hosting Match Game for three years.
Guest:Come on, Mark.
Guest:Are you serious?
Guest:Come on.
Guest:I'm sorry, man.
Marc:Come on, bro.
Marc:You got to get out of this.
Guest:Cat house.
Marc:I know.
Marc:But deadened room.
Marc:Have you talked to him about how he feels about it?
Guest:I mean, you're saying that they're having a great time, but he's- Alec says it's the most fun he has.
Guest:Really?
Guest:And by the way, it was everything I thought.
Guest:It's so fun.
Guest:The set, at least my set.
Guest:His is, Match Game is very retro 70s.
Guest:He's got the long microphone that Gene Rayburn- There's a campiness to it.
Guest:Yeah, our thing is like this big, amazing world.
Guest:And to walk on that set and get the butterflies of the LED towers and to see people.
Guest:It's like going to Times Square.
Guest:It's Times Square and it's yours.
Marc:But for me, I hosted a game show once years ago and I was not into it at all.
Marc:I had integrity, I was mad, but I was broke.
Marc:You're just laughing at the idea of integrity?
Guest:Yes, I'm laughing at the idea of...
Guest:How dare you?
Guest:You're in show business and you had integrity?
Guest:I still do.
Guest:Look where I'm doing my job.
Guest:I'm at home.
Marc:You're not working for the man.
Marc:I'm not really, not here.
Marc:No, you're not.
Marc:No, it's true.
Marc:But there was a lot of lean years though.
Marc:There's a price to pay when you don't work for the man.
Marc:I know.
Marc:I was fortunate that the man didn't want to hire me anyway, so I did all right.
Marc:It's perfect.
Marc:But I could not wrap my brain around the fucking rules of the game.
Marc:So I knew I was playing a game and that I had teams, but there was no stakes in this game.
Marc:It was an improv game.
Marc:So it wasn't a money game.
Marc:Right.
Marc:And so the rules had a little play to them.
Marc:But your game, answer the question, don't answer the question, you lost the money.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:That's it.
Guest:And under a time constraint.
Marc:And in a machine.
Guest:And under a machine that's trying to kill you.
Marc:So you're excited about it.
Guest:Listen, at this point in my life, there are fewer and fewer things that I haven't done.
Guest:So when I get to do something that's really new where I literally don't know anything, and I say this with all humility.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:A lot of times on a set, I'm the smartest guy in the room.
Guest:Just could have been doing it forever.
Guest:Right.
Guest:In terms of acting.
Guest:And all of it.
Guest:All of it.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And so to go to a place where I literally know nothing.
Guest:Right.
Guest:That's fun.
Guest:Is really fun.
Marc:I guess that's true.
Marc:Because I was looking at the career arc here.
Marc:And I mean, you really have not stopped working.
Marc:No.
Marc:Since the 80s.
Guest:Oh, since 1979.
Guest:When I was 15 years old, I did my first sitcom or half hour comedy.
Guest:Really?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:A new kind of family.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:ABC.
Guest:I'm 15 years old.
Guest:I got the David Cassidy hair going.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:And that was really the beginning.
Marc:Oh, so that, yeah.
Marc:Okay.
Marc:There it is.
Marc:79.
Marc:Frightening.
Marc:You were 15.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:We're like the same age-ish?
Marc:You 55?
Marc:I'm 55 this last weekend.
Yeah.
Marc:Yeah, I turned 55 in September.
Marc:But you didn't grow up here, right?
Marc:No, I grew up in Ohio.
Marc:Really?
Marc:In which part of Ohio?
Marc:Dayton.
Marc:That's the whole time that you grew up in Dayton?
Marc:Yep.
Marc:Till 15?
Marc:Till 13.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:And then what happened?
Guest:My parents divorced.
Guest:When you were 13?
Guest:My mom divorced twice.
Guest:Once when I was five from my father and then from my stepfather when I was 13.
Guest:And then she came out to move us all out to L.A.
Guest:And I was like any 13 year old didn't want to go.
Marc:It was just you and your brother, Chad.
Marc:Yep.
Marc:And now like your your real dad.
Marc:Was he is he totally out of the picture?
Guest:No, he's still in our lives, but he's still in Dayton, still practicing law at 80 years old.
Marc:Really?
Marc:So both exes are in Dayton?
Marc:Both of your moms, your stepdad and your dad are in Dayton?
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:And you like both of them?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:All good?
Guest:All good.
Guest:I've been very blessed in that way.
Guest:Are they both lawyers?
Guest:No.
Guest:My dad is a lawyer.
Guest:My stepdad is long since retired.
Guest:What did he do?
Guest:he literally invested in the earliest um like what was it called photo you know when you used to take your pictures to like a photo map a photo like a photo map yeah he was one of the early investors in photo mat and just took that money and like and that was it that's it so he made his killing then he just yeah and he knows how to live life yeah he's unbelievably cheap and
Guest:And, you know, he's utilitarian and Spartan.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:So he's made it go a long way.
Marc:Oh, well, that's good.
Marc:So your mom's like, she had enough of that.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:And she's like, I'm fucking going to L.A.
Guest:Coming to L.A., I did not want to, even though I wanted to be an actor.
Guest:What was her plan?
Guest:Her plan was she wanted to go somewhere.
Guest:I mean, she was done.
Guest:Done with the Midwest.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Right.
Guest:She's still around?
Guest:No.
Guest:She died young.
Marc:Sorry.
Guest:64.
Guest:Thank you.
Guest:So the L.A.
Guest:for me was like a mixed bag.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:Because I missed my friends.
Guest:13's a hard year to leave anywhere when, you know, it's beginning of adolescence.
Guest:What part of the town were you in?
Guest:We moved to Point Doom in Malibu, which my mom chose because it had the cleanest air quality in all of Southern California.
Guest:That's way out there, man.
Guest:Way out.
Guest:And in those days, living in Malibu in the mid-70s was like being in the ice storm meets Lord of the Flies meets Boogie Nights, but directed by people on blow.
Yeah.
Marc:So you're just out there.
Marc:It's all like, it's just you and Bob Dylan and the people that are- Bob Dylan was secretly buying all of the tract homes when I moved out there.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And then knocked them all down and built his mansion with like an- The dome?
Guest:An-
Guest:With an onion on the dome.
Marc:On the dome.
Guest:Yeah, exactly.
Guest:So did you see Bob Dylan around?
Guest:Bob Dylan would come to my brother's soccer games.
Marc:Because he had a kid in the game?
Marc:Yep.
Marc:Jacob or the other one?
Marc:It was Jacob.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:So you just see Bob Dylan sitting there?
Guest:You'd see Bob Dylan there smoking a joint.
Guest:You'd see David Carradine from Kung Fu on acid walking the Pacific Coast Highway.
Guest:Hanging around?
Guest:You'd see Mick Fleetwood at the Trankus Bar.
Yeah.
Guest:That was the community?
Guest:And then like firefighters and like dentists and accountants and like really sort of upper middle class working people.
Marc:So you're stranded there with your brother and Bob Dylan and Mick Fleetwood.
Marc:Are you older or younger?
Marc:I'm the oldest.
Marc:Right.
Marc:And you're depressed?
Yeah.
Guest:And slowly getting over it, because let's face it, it's Southern California and it's gorgeous and the ocean's there.
Guest:And I think I was probably happy to be there within a year.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And you wanted to be an actor from early on?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I think I did my first community theater.
Guest:I was eight.
Guest:Oh, yeah?
Guest:Do you remember it?
Guest:Yeah, it was Oliver.
Guest:Oh, really?
Guest:With all the little kids in it.
Guest:Were you Oliver?
Guest:Hell no, I couldn't get the lead yet.
Guest:It's my first thing.
Guest:One of the kids with a bowl?
Guest:Please, sir, I want some more, whatever it was.
Guest:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:My accent is still bad.
Guest:Yeah, you can't do that one, I guess.
Marc:No, no.
Marc:You can do a lot of other things.
Marc:Yeah, but that's not in the card.
Marc:English accents.
Guest:No accents for you.
Guest:No, I've thrown down some accents in the past, but English accents are scary.
Guest:There's a lot of different kinds.
Guest:That's the problem.
Guest:Like what kind of accents have you done?
Guest:Well, when I did Kennedy, I did Kennedy.
Marc:Oh, that's right.
Guest:And that was one of the big ones because everybody, that's such an iconic accent.
Guest:Did you get flack?
Guest:No, I got a Screen Actors Guild Award for that baby.
Guest:Oh, that's- So that one went really well, but- Because that's a tough one.
Guest:That's an easy one to- You'll end up sounding like you're on The Simpsons.
Marc:Right.
Marc:It's an easy one to mangle.
Marc:The, how are you?
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:Well, go get the car, you know.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:So did you have to study with a coach or did you just like walk in?
Guest:What's great about the internet is there's so much footage available of a public figure.
Guest:I just listened to hours and hours and hours and hours of him speaking.
Guest:Did you learn things?
Guest:I learned so much.
Guest:How are you still a Republican after that?
Guest:He would have been a Republican today.
Guest:I don't know.
Guest:Dude, John Kennedy today, 100% his politics.
Guest:He would have been a Democrat.
Guest:What's happening?
Marc:You think he would have been a Republican?
Guest:What is the word I'm looking for?
Guest:Mentally, spiritually, morally, he would have stayed a Democrat, but his policies today, absolutely Republican.
Marc:His fiscal policies and his military policies.
Guest:And even, listen, he was not Johnny on the spot with civil rights.
Guest:That took him- No one was.
Guest:But to my thing of like Democrat, Republican, it took him a while to get there.
Guest:Sure.
Guest:But I learned a lot about Kennedy.
Guest:And little things, here's my pet peeve when critics talk about accents.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Or people are like, I thought it was inconsistent.
Guest:All right.
Guest:Meanwhile, John Kennedy said the word decade two different ways in his own life.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:So John Kennedy was inconsistent with this one.
Guest:We will go to the moon within the decade.
Guest:Yeah.
Yeah.
Marc:maybe and then he would say decade yeah so it was decade decade well maybe it was just a bad day had a little brain fart i know meanwhile you got to pick one way to say it when you're playing them maybe you didn't have two opportunities to say decade no you could have said both ways right but when how did you get in how what was the first sort of uh how do you enter acting did your mom take you to auditions was it that kind of thing
Guest:I saw a play.
Guest:I don't remember which one it was.
Guest:And there were kids in it.
Guest:And I told my mom I wanted to do that.
Marc:Oh, that was back in Ohio.
Guest:And that was back in Ohio.
Guest:And she was like, okay.
Guest:And I think, I'm sure she thought it was no different than a kid saying, you know, I'd like to go to baseball camp this summer.
Guest:Right.
Guest:But-
Guest:The difference was I was deadly serious about it and meant it from day one.
Guest:I don't know what to attribute it to.
Guest:And my parents were, I think, the sort of perfect mix of really supportive, but also not in any way stage parents.
Marc:Right.
Marc:They were just sort of drop them off, fuck it.
Guest:Yeah, totally.
Guest:Take the bus.
Guest:Well, from Malibu, you know how far.
Guest:I would take the bus.
Marc:Hit this.
Guest:Come on, man.
Guest:That's so far.
Guest:At 13, I would take the bus from Malibu into Hollywood and Vine.
Guest:They just let us do that shit when we were kids.
Guest:To audition, 100%.
Guest:They were like, just take the bus.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:To think of it today.
Marc:So that's like three hours, and then you're walking into Sodom.
Guest:Yeah, you're walking into some guy who's like, hmm, hi.
Guest:No.
Guest:Yeah, and you do the scene.
Guest:Did you have to deal with that?
Guest:No.
Guest:Yes and no.
Guest:I mean, it was like, Hollywood is full of fucking creepy dudes and creepy girls, creepy people.
Marc:I think you had a window there where you were considered one of them.
Guest:Yeah, listen.
Guest:Listen, if you don't do your time in the barrel, you don't have a long career.
Marc:Oh, the time in the barrel joke.
Marc:Oh, boy.
Marc:Yeah, everyone's afraid of their time in the barrel.
Marc:It's coming for everyone.
Marc:Oh, no.
Marc:Yes.
Marc:Come on.
Marc:Yes.
Marc:All right, so you're 13, and you're taking the bus to Hollywood from Malibu, but no one's teaching you acting.
Marc:No one's doing nothing.
Marc:You're just going out on what, casting calls?
Marc:You have no agent?
Guest:I got an agent, a really tiny commercial agent.
Guest:Their big other client was Vince Ferragamo, good-looking quarterback guy.
Guest:And it was just you and him?
Yeah.
Guest:And a young 13-year-old girl who originated the role of Annie named Sarah Jessica Parker.
Guest:Wow.
Guest:We were the big clients.
Marc:And you're about the same age?
Marc:Exactly.
Marc:Oh, wow.
Marc:So she came out.
Marc:So she was the big star he had.
Marc:Big.
Marc:How did you get the agent?
Guest:Through my dad had represented someone in a divorce.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:Out here.
Guest:In Dayton.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Who had come to Hollywood and become an agent.
Guest:And he cold called her and she said, yeah, I'll meet Rob.
Guest:And one thing led to another and it was sort of a fluke.
Guest:but you didn't get her you got someone she knew i got that agent oh she she was working for an agent yeah yeah oh that's wild yeah and he just started sending you out didn't get you set up with classes or anything um no and the other thing is i wouldn't because i was a you know i was 13 i wouldn't have really living in malibu i wouldn't have really had the time to come all the way in for
Guest:I moved to school, school and auditions.
Guest:And I'm pretty much 100% self-taught.
Guest:I mean, I studied in the sort of middle of my career.
Guest:My wife said to me, you know, you might want to think about acting lessons.
Guest:I was like, oh, great.
Guest:Thank you.
Guest:That's really- Was this a few years ago?
Guest:That's wonderful.
Guest:In 2002 or something?
Guest:But it literally was like in the 90s, like the middle of my career.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And I thought, you know, fuck it.
Guest:I've never I've never taken a proper acting class.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And I'll do it.
Guest:And it was great.
Guest:I really I learned a lot.
Guest:I was I was playing a deaf mute in Stephen King's The Stand.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:It's a sort of really renowned book and a renowned part.
Guest:And I'll never forget going at the plague book.
Guest:Yes.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Which incidentally they're remaking.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:And I'm deaf in one ear anyway.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:How did that happen?
Guest:They think I had the mumps when I was a kid and totally undiagnosed.
Guest:So as long as I can remember.
Marc:Okay.
Guest:So my idea was to do something with the ear that I could hear with.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:To really, you know, go methody, whatever.
Guest:And then I met this acting coach and he was like, yeah, sure, you could do that.
Guest:But if you want to work with me, what you need to realize is you do hear and you can talk.
Guest:So you need to play the character as a person who can hear and can talk and fools everybody into thinking that they can't.
Guest:I was like, well, wait, I'm sorry, what?
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:He's like...
Guest:The less lying you're doing as an actor, the better you'll be.
Guest:Isn't it all lying?
Guest:It's all lying.
Guest:Like he said, he says, I represent the guy who plays the dead body in, what was the first Quentin Tarantino movie?
Guest:Reservoir Dogs.
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Guest:So in Reservoir Dogs, they kill a guy and his body lies in the background.
Guest:Right.
Guest:That was his big client.
Guest:He goes, and I told him, you will be alive.
Guest:You're not dead.
Guest:You can't play dead.
Guest:That's impossible.
Guest:So what you have to play is a man pretending to play dead in this movie.
Marc:I was like, okay.
Marc:That doesn't even make sense.
Marc:It defeats the guy's original argument.
Marc:The less pretending you're doing.
Marc:But he's alive.
Marc:Right.
Marc:You can't pretend he's dead.
Marc:Okay.
Guest:So that was the exception?
Guest:And he said he actually got reviewed as a dead body.
Guest:Come on.
Guest:It's fucking amazing.
Marc:So he wouldn't let you stick something in your ear?
Marc:No.
Marc:Wouldn't have it.
Marc:And you didn't do it?
Marc:You didn't end up doing that?
Marc:You didn't end up sticking something in your ear?
Marc:I did not.
Marc:I took his advice for that role.
Marc:And did it pay off?
Marc:I got really good reviews.
Marc:So when you start getting the movies that you're known for, like, I don't even, I can't even, like, The Outsiders was the big one, right?
Guest:Yeah, probably.
Guest:I mean, it was Coppola who at that time was probably the most famous and infamous director around.
Marc:Why was he infamous, you think?
Guest:He was infamous because he was coming off of a moment where he was the first director to buy his own studio.
Guest:Oh, yeah, that's right.
Guest:So he's doing that weird Technicolor thing.
Guest:And he's also doing the movie One from the Heart, which was on the cover of Time.
Marc:And Rumblefish, right?
Guest:That was after Outsiders.
Guest:Right.
Guest:But so he went Godfather I, Godfather II, Conversation, all of these great movies, and then One from the Heart, which was sort of one of the big boondoggles.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:And so he was very controversial.
Marc:Right, it was this big idea and it failed.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:To do it all on the soundstage.
Marc:Right, right.
Marc:And he was the first guy to be able to edit on the spot because he had TV monitors hooked up.
Marc:100%.
Marc:Right, so he could see the shots over again immediately.
Guest:100%.
Guest:First video monitor hookup I ever saw was the auditions for The Outsiders.
Marc:But that was really kind of defined that, you know, the whole generation of you guys.
Guest:Totally.
Marc:Like you were all in it kind of.
Guest:Totally and spoiled us for... I thought all movies were going to be made the way Francis made The Outsiders.
Guest:Why was it great?
Guest:Because he's Francis Ford Coppola and he does it his way and he's...
Guest:He had a vision.
Guest:He's a true auteur.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:I mean, he won an Oscar for writing Patton.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:So he's a real auteur.
Guest:And there really aren't that many auteurs in our business anymore.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:There's Chris Nolan.
Marc:There's a couple.
Marc:I mean, there's a lot of indie auteurs, but big movies, they seem to be less about the auteurs.
Marc:Right.
Marc:But there are definitely a few around.
Guest:They're still around.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:But in those days, everybody wanted to be.
Marc:Right, well, he was one of the guys, right?
Marc:He was one of the new generation of hotshots.
Marc:But so working with, like, I just want to look at that, hold on, that cast real quick.
Guest:Yeah, yeah.
Marc:So it's C. Thomas Howell, Matt Dillon, Ralph Macchio, Patrick Swayze, you, Diane Lane, Estevez, Cruz, and Leif Garrett.
Marc:Leif Garrett.
Guest:Leif Garrett, right there.
Guest:Teen Idol.
Guest:They literally, I found it later, they literally cast...
Guest:A lot of it by who was on the cover of Tiger Beat magazine.
Guest:Is that true?
Guest:I just found this out a few years ago.
Guest:Had you been yet?
Guest:In an autobiography.
Guest:I had been from A New Kind of Family.
Guest:How many episodes did you do of that?
Marc:Was that a long-running show, A New Kind of Family?
Guest:We did 13.
Guest:It was opposite 60 minutes.
Guest:Literally, it was a death slot.
Guest:Sunday night.
Guest:Sunday night.
Guest:I remember there were 62 episodes.
Guest:shows on the schedule because we were always 62nd.
Guest:We were literally the lowest rated show on network television.
Guest:But you learned some tricks.
Guest:Oh, are you kidding me?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I learned the whole thing.
Guest:And then, you know, the outsiders came along and the rest was history.
Guest:And you were friends with those guys.
Guest:Yeah, really close with all of them.
Guest:Like when I see, you know, if I see Tom Cruise, we're like, it's like running into a fraternity brother.
Guest:You know, like it doesn't matter how much time's gone by.
Guest:You immediately know them on a level that very few people do.
Marc:So like all you guys, I mean, specifically, well, see Thomas Howell, Dylan, Ralph.
Marc:Well, Swayze was a little older, right?
Guest:He was substantially older.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:And Tom, you're all sort of on the same trajectory.
Marc:That was the momentum.
Marc:And then you started doing the big, what became defined as those Brat Pack movies.
Marc:Now, was like, were you just out of control?
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:I mean, class.
Marc:I remember class.
Marc:That's the other guy.
Marc:What's that?
Marc:What was that guy's name?
Marc:Andrew McCarthy.
Marc:Yeah, what happened to that guy?
Guest:He is around.
Guest:I think he does a lot of writing of travel writing or something.
Guest:Somebody was telling me.
Guest:Isn't it weird that, you know, how people make do and it doesn't quite work out?
Marc:Listen, everybody's got to hustle.
Marc:It's true, right?
Marc:For everybody.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:But you had a pretty amazing run there of movies.
Marc:The Glass was good.
Marc:That was, what, Jacqueline Bessette, right?
Marc:Mm-hmm.
Marc:Hotel New Hampshire.
Marc:Who was in that one?
Marc:Jodie Foster.
Marc:Wow.
Guest:Nastassia Kinski at her most beautiful.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:Directed by Tony Richardson.
Guest:Right.
Guest:The great director.
Guest:And Beau Bridges.
Guest:Wilford Brimley.
Guest:Wilford Brimley was the best.
Guest:I remember meeting him.
Guest:We were driving to the set.
Guest:And it was the first time I'd ever met a real true character actor, like a ringer.
Guest:And I'll never forget, he's like, son, what do they call you in this movie?
Guest:I said, what do you mean?
Guest:What do they call my character?
Guest:He goes, yeah.
Guest:Well, they call me Jono.
Guest:He goes, well, then that's what I'll call you.
Guest:And I realized he'd only read his part.
Guest:Right.
Guest:And he dies like 30 pages into the movie.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And I remember thinking, and now I'm now fast forward X amount of years later.
Guest:I get an offer.
Guest:I only read my part.
Guest:Fuck it.
Marc:You do.
Marc:I think we were up for the same part.
Marc:You're kidding.
Marc:No, it's a rumor.
Marc:I guess we could put it to rest right now.
Marc:Tell me this rumor.
Marc:I play the manager in Glow, the gorgeous ladies of wrestling.
Guest:Oh.
Marc:And I was told that they didn't know who they were gonna go with, but they were thinking you.
Marc:Did it make it to you?
Marc:It did not.
Marc:Ah.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Damn.
Marc:It would have been a spicier conversation.
Guest:Oh, I would have loved it.
Guest:I would have loved it.
Marc:Do you know the show?
Guest:I do know.
Guest:Of course I know the show.
Guest:Yeah, that's me.
Guest:Okay.
Guest:I'm going to have to watch it.
Guest:I mean, I'm aware of it and I've seen the billboards and I know people love it.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:I'm the cranky, slightly- That sounds genius.
Marc:Sort of jaded.
Marc:Downtrodden.
Marc:Oh, genius.
Marc:A little coked up failed director.
Guest:Oh, God damn.
Guest:This sounds like right up my alley.
Guest:I know.
Guest:You blew it.
Marc:Fuck.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:You couldn't really turn things around.
Marc:Jesus.
Marc:You wouldn't be hosting the arm show.
Marc:You're probably making a lot more money with the arm, with the giant ball.
Marc:With the arm.
Marc:What do you call it, the machine?
Guest:Ava.
Guest:Ava?
Guest:Ava.
Guest:Like, you know, Ava.
Guest:Ava, bring the contestant up here.
Guest:You do?
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Guest:Ava talks.
Guest:She talks.
Guest:She asks the questions.
Marc:But what kind of ride is it?
Marc:What kind of device is it?
Guest:It was designed for NASA to test the astronauts.
Guest:Oh, no shit.
Guest:So it's an existing machine.
Guest:It was an existing machine that we found because the big struggle was if we can't find something to legitimately put our players under duress, we don't have a show.
Guest:And we found this device.
Guest:So that thing can get going pretty good.
Guest:I think it goes to, it's like Spinal Tap, it goes to 11 and we can't do it any farther than a two or it'll kill someone.
Marc:So do people sign releases?
Guest:Oh yeah.
Guest:Hell yeah.
Guest:Have there been any accidents with Ava?
Guest:No, because we have like so many fail safes to prevent the thing from going wild.
Marc:All right.
Marc:So you do these great movies that everyone loves saying almost fire.
Marc:We all were.
Marc:You didn't get the breakfast club.
Marc:That wasn't you.
Guest:It's funny.
Guest:I, you know, I auditioned for the breakfast club and I did not get it.
Guest:Clearly, John Hughes had no use for me.
Marc:He didn't like you.
Guest:I could have literally been in.
Guest:I mean, how many John Hughes movies could I have been in?
Guest:Honestly, probably every one of them.
Marc:Sure.
Guest:As a slightly bad guy?
Guest:Anything.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:How about never?
Guest:How about my phone never rang from John Hughes?
Guest:Ever.
Guest:Is that a resentment that you have?
Guest:I'm holding a deep seated.
Guest:Even when he died, I was just resentful.
Uh-huh.
Marc:But about last night, that was from the Nanette play, right?
Marc:Yeah, that's probably my favorite of that era.
Marc:That was a big movie.
Marc:Yeah, it was.
Marc:Yeah, these were all sort of like, these were, because we were the same age, you always seem to have been there in my childhood.
Marc:But then like, okay, so here, I guess the big question is, so all these guys that you started out with, like, well, Tom Cruise specifically, and other people kind of leveled off, but he became a huge star.
Marc:Now, did you feel you were on the trajectory of that?
Guest:Yeah, I mean, for sure.
Guest:I think we probably all, if you would have asked us then, felt like we were all on the trajectory- Even Judd Nelson?
Guest:But taking different paths.
Guest:Oh, I remember vividly being on the set of-
Guest:St.
Guest:Elmo's Fire and the studio president showing up and stiffing all of us and going to Judd and taking him into the corner and offering him like this big movie.
Guest:And we were all like, wow.
Guest:And that was The Breakfast Club?
Guest:It was Blue City.
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Guest:That one.
Guest:Turned out it wasn't a big movie, but I remember he was the guy that the studio was like, yeah, he's the man.
Guest:He's who we're betting on.
Marc:He's got the intensity.
Marc:The sad thing about me bringing up these people in sort of a condescending or dismissive way is that they're all people and they might listen to this and I'll probably have to talk to Judd.
Guest:Listen, I think you've been very even-handed.
Marc:Have I?
Marc:Yes.
Marc:Because I've been in this a long time, but it's been a real slow build for me, and it was just the right speed, and I'm fine.
Marc:But I always wonder how people shoulder the burden of just sort of disappearing or public failure, but they never seem to go away.
Marc:Well, because nobody really ever does.
Guest:They're always working.
Guest:We're just not aware of it.
Marc:That's right, right, right.
Guest:That's what it is, and what you have to learn
Guest:is if you're going to have a long career, there are going to be periods for everyone.
Guest:I don't care who it is.
Guest:You name a person and I will tell you their fallow period.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And I will tell you.
Guest:You have a big board at home?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Just to compare yourself to?
Guest:I went down, but that guy went way down.
Guest:No, no.
Guest:You must not ever compare yourself to others.
Guest:You know this.
Guest:But you had to learn that, didn't you?
Guest:You have to learn, keep your head down, do your own work, and the seasons will change.
Guest:When did you learn that?
Guest:I'm not sure I ever really had an epiphany about it.
Guest:I think it's just something that's gradually become apparent.
Marc:But let's like deal with this.
Marc:So you're fucking, you know, you're doing good.
Marc:Things are like, you know, everything's going your way.
Marc:And then like this videotape shows up and there you are naked and, you know, fucking.
Guest:Listen, let me see if I can get this straight.
Guest:I'm a 20 year old.
Guest:I'm not judging you.
Guest:There was a little judgment, I thought.
Guest:No, no.
Guest:I mean, like, who hasn't made a tape?
Guest:Exactly.
Guest:By the way, the real fuck up was that I didn't wait 20 years later to do it where it would have helped my career.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:You were ahead of the curve, man, on public controversy over a sex tape.
Guest:One billion percent ahead of the curve.
Marc:But I have to assume that I can't even imagine the panic and horror and the stress that you must have went through.
Marc:Did you?
Marc:I mean, by the way, it's 30 years ago.
Guest:I know.
Guest:So it's hard for me to remember a lot of it.
Guest:But my notion of it was it was all like –
Guest:Happening so fast.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And that it was just sort of putting one foot in front of the other.
Guest:Right.
Guest:But you felt the backlash.
Guest:Dude.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I turned on the NBC nightly news.
Yeah.
Guest:And today in America, actor Rob Woe.
Guest:And that's Tom Brokaw leading the news.
Guest:And literally, and another news in Tiananmen Square.
Guest:Violence is erupting.
Guest:And it was like the guy standing in front of the tank.
Guest:That was the second story.
Guest:And the first one was a pixelated U. Yeah, 100%.
Guest:Oh, my God.
Guest:Here's the thing.
Guest:Between that and some of the other things that have happened in my life, I would have no memoir to write.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And I'd have no one-man show that I'd take out and have a blast with.
Guest:Have you done either?
Guest:Without those things, I would have none of those.
Guest:But did I miss the memoir?
Guest:No.
Guest:Two bestsellers, baby.
Guest:Yeah?
Guest:Yep.
Guest:So you laid it out there.
Guest:New York Times bestsellers.
Guest:And the one-man show?
Guest:And the one-man show.
Guest:Sold out all over the world.
Guest:I'm in the middle of doing it right now.
Guest:Are you really?
Guest:Yeah, I did.
Guest:I just played Royal Festival Hall in London.
Guest:I've done that room.
Guest:Yeah, right?
Guest:It's a big- It's 22, 2400.
Marc:Yes, yeah.
Guest:And it's beautiful, right?
Marc:It's great.
Marc:They have the giant organ there.
Marc:Yeah, exactly.
Marc:And I'm going back there in a couple weeks.
Marc:Oh, you're kidding.
Marc:Nope.
Marc:Yeah, I loved it there.
Marc:Yeah, it's great.
Guest:I loved that place.
Guest:So the one man show is new.
Guest:It's I've been doing it for about a year.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:So it's new.
Guest:I'm playing Vegas for the first time, which is exciting because it's like I feel like this.
Guest:The notion that I would have a billboard over the over the Vegas strip playing, you know, I never would have thought of.
Guest:And what's it called?
Guest:Stories.
Guest:I only tell my friends live because that was the first book.
Marc:Okay.
Marc:Oh, really?
Marc:So you're just dishing with some humor, raconteuring?
Guest:It's an evening of stories, 100%.
Guest:Yeah?
Guest:But you've got to read the books because it's- I feel like I didn't do my homework.
Guest:No, no, no, no.
Guest:You would love them just because it's like a style of celebrity memoir that doesn't exist anymore.
Guest:Like I was- What, drinking stories and whatnot?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I mean, it's like David Niven wrote the high watermark.
Marc:It's a very dirty one, right?
Guest:The moon's a balloon.
Guest:Right.
Guest:But it's very insightful.
Guest:It's hilarious.
Guest:And it gives you all of the insight behind the curtain you want, and yet no one gets hurt.
Guest:It's not exploitive.
Guest:Right.
Guest:And it's also sneakily moving.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Sure.
Guest:So that was, that was what I, what I wanted.
Marc:And, and the books.
Marc:Cause you got an arc, you know, you did rise from the ashes to a certain degree.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:To a certain degree.
Marc:I'm still clawing my way up, baby.
Marc:It's a long road.
Marc:But what's like, so, so did you, you wrote it all yourself?
Marc:Oh yeah.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:And is it does it build to like, is there a third act?
Marc:Is there a denouement?
Marc:Is there a story that, you know, kind of like you focus on?
Marc:Is it the tapes or what?
Marc:What's the story in the middle that then you come out of?
Guest:It's it's.
Guest:It's a really interesting structure because I just know what I like in an memoir.
Guest:It's like, I don't want it to be linear because a lot of times I don't care what people were like before they were famous.
Guest:Honestly, I just don't care.
Guest:I just want to know, let me know about the famous part.
Guest:And in other books, like Quincy Jones's book, for example, his non-famous life is actually almost more interesting.
Guest:Right.
Guest:So I mixed it up.
Guest:So it sort of goes through different timelines.
Marc:So no Dayton, Ohio community theater stories.
Guest:Oh, that's in there, 100%.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:It's Malibu, Dayton Community Theater.
Guest:There's nothing that's not in it because job one, if you're going to do a one man show or if you're going to do a memoir is you better be honest.
Guest:You better be authentic.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:And not full of shit.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:And you do that.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:And so now when you decided to do this, you know, along with the mental samurai and this other stuff, I mean, is this something that you've always wanted to do theater or is it like, you know, I got to get some other cash flow coming?
Guest:No, it's really as simple as, you know, I'm in my fifth decade.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And, you know, it's harder and harder and harder to get my adrenaline up.
Guest:doing traditional acting stuff because I've been doing it for so long.
Guest:So to go out by myself on stage alone and entertain people with something I've written for 90 minutes on the Vegas Strip or the Royal Festival Hall, that gets my adrenaline going.
Guest:To try to produce and host and do a whole genre that I've never...
Guest:been in don't have any knowledge about in in the game show world that that gets my adrenaline going so you're reengaged yeah because listen i'm 55 years old i gotta i gotta keep being reengaged and curious do you get bored on sets a lot oh it's brutal there's nothing more brutal than the boredom on a set
Marc:You know, that's what I find.
Marc:You know, all my life I've wanted these opportunities to act and then I get them and I'm like, oh, that was a nice three minutes of work.
Marc:Now how long?
Marc:I know.
Marc:Two hours.
Marc:Now you know why everybody's doing drugs and everything else.
Marc:It's hard to figure out what to do with your time.
Marc:So what were you writing?
Marc:Right.
Marc:Exactly.
Marc:You were never a drug guy, huh?
Guest:Oh, in the day I was.
Guest:I mean, I've been sober now for 20.
Guest:I don't want to get out of myself, but it'll be 29 years in May.
Guest:Oh, yeah?
Guest:Like active, sober?
Guest:No, sober, sober, 100%.
Guest:Yeah, I'm coming up on 20.
Marc:Do you do the thing?
Guest:Oh, that's great.
Guest:Yeah, I do the thing.
Guest:Sure.
Guest:I do the thing, 100%.
Marc:So when did you... So that's... You got 20.
Marc:Yeah, baby.
Marc:Yeah, it's coming... August is 20.
Marc:So you got it... You did it 10 years before me, so you were in your 20s?
Marc:And you were like, I'm done?
Guest:What was that day like?
Guest:I was done, dude.
Wow.
Marc:I mean, you know what it's like.
Marc:But I don't know what it was like at your level.
Marc:I mean, you're running around with Judd Nelson and some guy named Chewy.
Marc:See, I don't know anything about Judd Nelson, but I have to assume that the access you had to the environments that you could get into and live with, it must have been a lot more exciting than mine.
Marc:It was great.
Marc:I'm out on the road, you know, in fucking, you know, Minneapolis with some guy I don't know with an eye patch.
Marc:Yes.
Marc:Who brought the shit in the other comic.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:No, we, no, I'm in the grotto at the Playboy Mansion.
Guest:Okay.
Guest:You know what I'm saying?
Guest:And you're in 22.
Guest:Yeah, I'm 22.
Guest:Uh-huh.
Guest:And I'm single.
Guest:Uh-huh.
Guest:So it was- But you're on Coke, so not great.
Guest:Oh, no, great.
Guest:Okay.
Guest:yeah that's great who are we kidding listen drugs and alcohol are great yeah until they're not yeah and um it when it was not um it was not good and and it took me a while to figure that out but when i did i was truly well and truly done did did you see people go down did you were you afraid for your life
Guest:No, not yet because I've since seen that a ton.
Guest:I've lost more friends and seen more people go down since I've gotten sober.
Guest:From the shit?
Guest:Than I did then.
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Guest:Part of it was I'd met my wife and I knew that she was the one for me and that if I couldn't make it work with her, I was probably doomed to end up like my biggest nightmare would be Warren Beatty in Shampoo where you're like,
Guest:alone on christmas eve standing on mulholland drive watching the sun go down and all of your bimbos don't want to see you that's like that's sort of where i the worst iteration of myself i thought yeah and and i thought the only way to make this work with this great woman was to to get sober did she demand it no no she was great she was but she was also like i love you i'll be your friend i'll be your friend forever right but i can't be with you if you're gonna be
Guest:If you're going to be like this.
Guest:And then I had also my grandfather had just died.
Guest:So there was like a lot of things that just happened at that moment.
Guest:They weren't massively earth shaking.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:But it was enough to get me to be like, I'm done.
Marc:That's that's quite a crossroads where you like you're you're the the projection of what your life would be loneliness, you know, because you had no intimate relationships, really.
Marc:None.
Marc:And you just realize that if I don't lock into this with this woman and get off of this shit, I'm going to regret it for the rest of my life.
Guest:I really felt like it was like the game Frogger.
Guest:And you're on that log.
Guest:You're like, do I jump now?
Guest:Do I jump now?
Guest:And the lily pad comes.
Guest:You go, this is the last lily pad.
Guest:This is it.
Guest:You got to get on this pad.
Guest:You're done.
Guest:Did you ever have any nights where you almost like died?
Guest:No, I was very professional at it.
Guest:What was your thing?
Marc:Blow?
Guest:I was never stoned on the set, never.
Guest:Was it blow?
Guest:It was the right mixture.
Guest:Of blow and booze?
Guest:Of blow and booze.
Guest:Getting that mixture right was heavenly.
Guest:yeah yeah and it lasts about an hour and then yeah and then you're just fucked up on coke yeah exactly you're you're awake with nothing to do that's exactly what it was yeah um and then you know uh but i but i almost immediately found yeah that um my biggest fear getting sober was i wouldn't have any more fun that was my honestly my biggest fear that i'd become one of those boring people one of those
Guest:you know bible thumpers about about about sobriety yeah dude i currently have a massive wine cellar that's amazing and it's for my guests and i want people to have fun and i love being around people who can still do what i used to do and it's still working for them i have no judgments at all and i just collect wine as a hobby
Guest:uh no you if you're gonna be a good guest yeah a good host yeah a good host i'm sorry host is what i meant but like i found out very quickly that there's way more fun in in sobriety than there was getting high right well it's weird because once like not only do you you you still have a good time but you're so nuts for the first couple of years that you're not really thinking about fun anyways you're just sort of like this is fucked
Marc:What?
Marc:This is what it is.
Guest:I had the opposite.
Guest:I was like euphoric.
Guest:Really?
Guest:For the first two or three years.
Marc:I was just angry.
Marc:I'd go to meetings and be like, fuck you people.
Marc:I don't want to be here.
Marc:This is bullshit.
Marc:Oh, really?
Marc:Yeah, man.
Marc:Because I just ran out of choices.
Marc:It was undeniable that I was going to not live.
Guest:uh or be a productive person if i didn't do it but i did it because of a woman as well but i got in there but i was you know i knew i had to be there but you know i wanted to fight it oh that's interesting i was done fighting i was i was what did they say i was sick and tired of being sick and sure sure so you were just sort of like relieved once you got if they'd have told me to stand in the corner on my head for five hours a day to stay sober i would have done it yeah yeah
Guest:Do you sponsor people?
Marc:I don't as much as I should.
Marc:I don't either because it's weird sometimes for me.
Marc:And I know we shouldn't be talking about it, but I do on the show, so it's okay.
Guest:But I'm a big believer in the program.
Guest:Sure.
Guest:And more than anything, it's given me the tools to lead my life in so many other areas.
Guest:That's the real thing.
Marc:Well, that's the thing they say.
Marc:If you put your sobriety first, everything will fall into line.
Guest:And I haven't thought...
Guest:The notion of drinking or using it, I would be as likely to do that as I would to go to Mars.
Guest:It's that my issue is like living life on life's terms and using all of those tools that I've learned.
Guest:Right.
Guest:And they've just changed my life.
Marc:I never think about it.
Marc:And when I do think about it, just it's so scary and exhausting.
Marc:Right.
Marc:I know.
Marc:Sitting in front of a bunch of lines.
Marc:I mean, can you fucking imagine that at our age?
Guest:So you have reoccurring dreams about it?
Marc:Occasionally.
Guest:I have three reoccurring dreams.
Guest:One is it's junior high and I'm at school and I forgot to wear clothes.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And I'm like trying to hide.
Guest:There's that dream.
Guest:I have it's opening night.
Guest:I'm standing backstage, the lights go up, and I've forgotten to learn the lines.
Guest:Well, that's, yeah.
Guest:Right.
Guest:And then the other one is, I come to a realization that I've been drinking.
Guest:Oh, and you haven't told anyone.
Marc:All along.
Marc:Oh, yeah.
Guest:And, but didn't know I was drinking.
Guest:Right.
Guest:And now I have the choice of, do I tell people?
Guest:Right.
Guest:Do I, and that's the reoccurring dream I have, and I have it a lot.
Right.
Marc:I've had similar ones like that where I'm using and I haven't told anybody and I'm just living in this lie.
Marc:Right?
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:It's weird.
Guest:And then it's all about like, by the way, I love when I have the dream because it's a little bit of experiencing what it would be like.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:It's so funny, the stage fright line, that panic in that moment.
Marc:It's crazy.
Guest:On opening night of a few good men at the Royal Haymarket in London,
Guest:Aaron Sorkin and I are there.
Guest:And the critics all come on opening night in the UK.
Guest:It's not like here we never know.
Guest:Is this the first time it's there?
Guest:This is the first time it's there.
Guest:First time we've ever done the show.
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Guest:And I'm playing Lieutenant Caffey and I have somebody on the witness stand.
Guest:And it's a courtroom drama.
Guest:Like it's like there's plot.
Guest:And I realize I like that.
Guest:I've jumped two and a half pages ahead.
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Guest:And I'm like, this is a nightmare.
Guest:You have self-correct.
Guest:And I had to figure out a way to weave it back.
Guest:But that that's my my biggest.
Guest:Holy shit.
Guest:moment involving dialogue and lines with with huge stakes and did you did you pull it off i pulled it off and no one was the wiser the only person who would have known would have been aaron himself and he'd gone out to smoke a cigarette and missed it thank god and he must have been pretty excitable then too yeah he's he's one of the he's one of the great i mean i interviewed him he's real sober too yeah yeah he's real locked in yeah he's the best
Marc:Well, I so like after the controversy, though, I mean, it doesn't seem like you stopped working.
Marc:And it feels to me that that because of that, it gave you a sort of a weird opportunity to explore roles that you probably wouldn't have.
Marc:100 percent.
Marc:Like you could be whatever the fuck you wanted.
Guest:one it removed a ton of pressure in that way um it you know it also coincided with a really awkward like time for like traditional like leading men yeah you're um mid to late 20s is usually it's changed now yeah the business has changed a lot but in those days it was not a great time like you were too young really to play parts with substance right and you were too old to play the young ingenues that you've been playing yeah so it's
Guest:sort of also coincided with a time that was going to be rough anyway.
Guest:And then as I got a little bit older, you know, more parts of a little more depth and a little more interesting started to come my way.
Guest:And I think hosting Saturday Night Live, the first time I did it for sure, opened the door to the whole Mike Myers, Lorne Michaels, Wayne's World, Austin Powers, Tommy Boy sort of comedies that I did.
Marc:So, yeah, you were able to do, like, you're good at playing some weird, horrible version of yourself for comedic effect.
Guest:100%.
Marc:100%.
Guest:But I remember that movie, Bad Influence.
Guest:Oh, thank you.
Guest:That was a good one.
Guest:I like that one.
Guest:That's a menacing movie.
Guest:Talk about a movie that's before its time.
Guest:And you were just sober then?
Guest:No, it was right at the end.
Guest:Because that's like that character is fucked up.
Guest:Oh, it is the most demented movie, demented character.
Guest:And I mean, and it was right at it was right when the video came out.
Guest:Yeah, right.
Guest:It was right at the height of my craziness.
Marc:So culturally, you were a fucking sordid figure.
Guest:Yes, I was living.
Marc:I was living the character.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:And it's like, what was the angle?
Marc:The one scene I remember that like, I can't get out of my mind because it like is when James Spader is the character who plays his brother comes to the door and he's just like, yeah, could you just tell him I have the fear?
Marc:And you're like, I have the fear.
Marc:Yeah, because he's high and he's fucked up and he just slammed the door in his face.
Marc:But like, like, remind me what the angle was, what you were.
Guest:It was basically I was in an iteration of the devil.
Guest:Right.
Marc:No.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:But what was your what were you doing to Spader?
Marc:Like you how do you met him?
Marc:You guys were friends or I mean, the character in the movie.
Guest:I came up to him in a bar.
Guest:Right.
Guest:And he was telling me his sob story.
Guest:And I just charm myself into his life.
Guest:And the one thing that I get him to do because he's in a relationship to be engaged to this.
Guest:And it's clear he doesn't love her.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:But he should marry her and she's rich.
Guest:He should do it.
Guest:But it's really clear he doesn't want to do it.
Guest:So I get him to fuck some girl.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And I film it.
Guest:Right.
Guest:And then I go to the engagement party.
Guest:And he put...
Guest:And I put it on for the family to see.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And then he goes, and he's like, what are you doing?
Guest:And I go, I'm saving your life.
Guest:It's such a great, it's a David Koepp script.
Guest:So David Koepp then went on to write everything from Jurassic Park to Carlitos Way.
Guest:He's one of the most renowned screenwriters in our business.
Guest:But this was his very, I think it was his first or second script.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:It's a crazy movie.
Marc:Yeah, it's really, really fun.
Marc:But I imagine, oddly, that because of the controversy surrounded you, and then you play this iteration of the devil, and there's a sex tape in the movie, that must have re-ingratiated you to Hollywood in some new way.
Marc:They were sort of like...
Marc:I don't know, this guy, maybe we can work with this.
Marc:The fallen Rob Lowe.
Guest:Listen, everybody loves a redemption story.
Guest:And I also think that no matter who you are, if you legitimately got it, you're always a threat.
Guest:Oh, yeah?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:You can just do it.
Guest:You're always a threat.
Guest:And you keep your looks.
Guest:You're not all beat up.
Guest:No, and look, and everybody, like I said, everybody has their time in the barrel.
Guest:There's being in the barrel for, you know, something embarrassing, and then there's being in the barrel for doing something wrong, and that's a totally, totally different, you know, thing.
Guest:It's like, you know, I just have, having put my kids through college.
Guest:Both of them?
Guest:They're done?
Guest:Both of them are done.
Guest:Wow.
Guest:One's in law school now, so he's not really officially done.
Guest:Well, that's great.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And like I watched the college mission scandal from afar and just go, fuck, oh, my God.
Guest:It's madness to watch that.
Marc:Well, it's madness because there's like, you know, it's one of those things because you know how it happens.
Marc:You know, you operate in the rare air of privilege and you just go like, this is what people are doing.
Marc:So I'm going to do it.
Guest:I mean, I guess.
Guest:I mean, I would never dream of doing what these people are on wiretaps doing.
Guest:I mean, look, my kids are really privileged.
Guest:They're lucky.
Guest:They went to great schools.
Guest:I was able to pay for the schools.
Guest:I was able to pay for tutors.
Guest:So they already have such a leg up.
Guest:But my kids busted their...
Guest:ass and you and you made sure that they did that oh yeah no i was very early on very very strict about academics and it starts immediately were you that way you weren't that way i was good in school yeah um i liked school i worked really hard i was good in certain areas and not good in like math and all that stuff but i was i was i was serious about school i was yeah um
Guest:Well, I mean, but that's good.
Guest:I mean, you turned out to be a good parent somehow.
Guest:Thank God you got sober.
Guest:No, for sure.
Guest:My kids laugh because they can't imagine me taking a drink, you know?
Guest:Oh, really?
Marc:They've never seen it.
Marc:What a gift that is.
Marc:I know.
Marc:Jesus.
Marc:You really got out young.
Marc:That's impressive.
Marc:I mean, it took me 10 years more than you.
Guest:And here's what you know.
Guest:It takes what it takes.
Guest:No, I know.
Guest:I know.
Guest:It's like you can't do it for... And the irony is we think we did it for the girl.
Guest:You mentioned the girl in your life.
Guest:I mentioned my wife, sure.
Guest:But at the end of the day, the only reason we do it is for ourselves.
Guest:And it...
Marc:you can't do it for your job you can't do it for your court case you can't do it for any of it no no you gotta be ready to do it and it's gotta it's gotta click in yeah you know if it don't click in it ain't gonna click in yeah no i lost a girl i made her horribly miserable i just like i went right from drugs to just draining her of her life force she got out and and in retrospect i can't blame her amazing
Marc:But I grabbed on, man.
Marc:I grabbed on.
Marc:You take what you need.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:So, all right.
Marc:Now, how do you decide?
Marc:I mean, you talk about kind of having, you know, you're the oldest guy, the most knowledgeable on the set.
Marc:You've been doing this a long time.
Marc:You'll do TV.
Marc:You'll do movies.
Marc:You'll do whatever.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Well, I will do whatever, but I'll do whatever.
Guest:Where do you draw the line?
Guest:I will do whatever I feel is going to be an interesting experience or where what I feel like I can give will be additive.
Marc:Okay.
Marc:So do you turn down a lot?
Marc:A lot.
Marc:And is it usually small movies or just shitty parts or you don't know?
Marc:It's just project to project.
Guest:Dude, I turned down Grey's Anatomy.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:So it can be a monstrous... For an arc or a regular thing?
Guest:To play McDreamy.
Marc:Oh, really?
Guest:That's a minor... It probably cost me $70 million.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Hey, it's just money.
Guest:You're not thinking about that.
Guest:But you know what?
Guest:But listen, at the end of the day, it was like I watched it when it came out and when they started calling the handsome doctor McDreamy, I was like, yeah, that's not for me.
Marc:Right.
Marc:It's not for me.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:But the comedy thing, that was one of those things because you weren't really prone that way.
Marc:No, but I was always a big comedy guy.
Guest:Just people didn't know.
Guest:I can remember being 12 and 13 and watching the first seasons of Saturday Night Live.
Guest:And then I would perform the sketches for my parents when they would wake up on Sunday mornings.
Guest:So I was a comedy nerd from the get-go.
Guest:I just had never had a chance to do any of it until I hosted the show, which was a dream come true.
Marc:And what was that coming off of?
Marc:How'd you get the gig?
Marc:You've done it a few times, right?
Guest:I've done it three times.
Guest:I did it in 90 for Bad Influence.
Guest:Ah.
Guest:And then... Was that a hit movie?
Guest:No.
Guest:Critics loved it and the audience just... It was a little tiny release, terribly released.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I remember loving the movie.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:It's a really good one.
Guest:It's for sure one of my... If I had to pick...
Guest:Too off the top of my head, it would be Bad Influence and About Last Night.
Marc:So comedy though, it all started with the relationship with Lauren and Mike.
Guest:Yeah, with Lauren and Mike.
Guest:And I remember working on Wednesdays, you go in with the writers on SNL and walking into Mike Myers' office.
Guest:We'd never met.
Guest:And him saying, do you want to do a Wayne's World sketch on the show or do you want to do sprockets?
Guest:And I was like, I hate Wayne's World.
Guest:I think it's stupid.
Guest:I want to do sprockets.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Which we did.
Guest:And it was really fun.
Guest:And then the irony that we would end up in Wayne's World is funny.
Marc:So that's really what drives you is you want to have a new experience and a good time.
Marc:Totally.
Totally.
Marc:But West Wing, that was good, and that was not comedy, but that was really a community.
Marc:That must have been an amazing experience for years.
Guest:Yeah, when I read that script, I mean, there are very few scripts that you read and just blow your doors off like that, and also read a character where you go, I'm the only guy who can play this part.
Guest:Which, of course, is not true.
Guest:But that's what it feels like.
Marc:I felt that way about the wrestling show.
Marc:So I'm glad that it didn't make it to you, that you were just an idea.
Marc:No, but there were parts like that.
Marc:No, I know.
Marc:I don't have the range that you do, obviously.
Marc:So if the guy's kind of like me, I'm good.
Marc:yeah let's listen by the way that plenty of people made a great career in that in that yeah year yeah but you but i but you don't really i mean it's weird because you think you know i think i know you but you do a lot of stuff that it's not really you i mean you can definitely not be you oh listen and behind the candelabra that thing was that was crazy that's me at the far edges of my range
Marc:That thing, I love that movie.
Marc:I've watched that thing like four or five times.
Marc:Thank you.
Marc:You're great in it.
Marc:And Michael Douglas?
Marc:It's an amazing movie.
Marc:It's crazy.
Guest:Crazy.
Marc:Who are you talking to, Mumbles?
Guest:It's just, it's unbelievable.
Guest:Oh my God, I look like my father.
Guest:I look like my mother.
Guest:No, no, Nanette.
Marc:He's just, he's unbelievable.
Marc:Damon was great.
Marc:But your character was like inspired because it was almost like a David Lynchian character.
Marc:Like...
Marc:Was that a real guy?
Marc:It's a real guy.
Guest:Plastic surgeon.
Guest:Yeah, real plastic surgeon who was notorious for giving one of the first big famous botched face jobs in LA.
Guest:There was a very well-known realtor in LA who notoriously had a horrific face job done.
Guest:He's dead.
Guest:He blew his brains out.
Guest:He did?
Guest:Yep.
Guest:There are no real photos of him.
Guest:So I imagined that character.
Guest:What happened was I got this offer.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And this is what's great about this business.
Guest:I don't know Steven Soderbergh.
Guest:I love him.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:Never met him.
Guest:Never had a general meet nothing.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Out of the blue phone call.
Guest:I want you to do this part in this movie.
Guest:Great.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And I've been tracking the movie just as a fan.
Marc:Right.
Guest:Because the notion of the movie sounds so mental.
Marc:Yeah.
Yeah.
Guest:And so I sat there and I'm competitive.
Guest:And I come from ensembles.
Guest:Outsiders was an ensemble.
Guest:St.
Guest:Elmo's Fire was an ensemble.
Guest:West Wing was an ensemble.
Guest:And the keys to ensemble is you better fucking plant your flag or you're going to get eaten alive.
Guest:Really?
Marc:Yes.
Guest:Is that true?
Guest:Fuck yeah.
Guest:You need to be a team player.
Guest:Right.
Guest:But you also need to get your numbers.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:You know what I'm saying?
Guest:Kind of.
Guest:You need to get your touches.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:As they say.
Guest:Now you're not a sports guy, but I'm giving you some sports vernacular.
Marc:Well, no, I like to know this because I was recently in an ensemble movie and I realized I had to figure out what my place was in it.
Guest:It's an orchestra and what are you going to play?
Guest:Right.
Guest:And by the way, sometimes you're going to play under.
Guest:Like I'm just going to do a low bass riff.
Guest:Right.
Guest:You know, just be in the pocket.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:The whole time.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I understand these metaphors.
Guest:Or you're like, you know what?
Guest:I'm putting the squawk box on it and I'm going to blast it.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:So I figure I got Michael Douglas, who's a genius, playing Liberace.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Matt Damon, who's also one of the great actors in butt tight velour shorts and with frosting on his hair.
Guest:Like I got to bring my A game.
Guest:So I concocted this character.
Guest:And this look.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:You came up with that look?
Guest:100%.
Guest:Well, I called Soderbergh beforehand and I said, listen, I think the tone is pretty clear from reading the script, but I just want to ask you, I have an idea, but it's a really big swing.
Guest:Are you down for that?
Guest:And he was like, oh, swing away.
Guest:I was like, great.
Guest:And you didn't even have to pitch him?
Guest:I just showed up like that.
Guest:With the hair?
Guest:Yep.
Guest:And I had- Did you have weird teeth?
Guest:I had hair, I had teeth, and I also had, they had taped my skin back, like in my eyes and forehead and neck, so it looked like I had a bad facelift.
Guest:Right.
Guest:And you seemed almost drugged out.
Guest:It was a little drugged out and he looked very sort of metro.
Guest:So I kind of wanted to cut against that because the other guys are so openly gay.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:So I used the voice from the guy I used to do the men's... Remember the men's... What was it?
Guest:Men's Warehouse.
Guest:Remember the men's warehouse commercials?
Guest:Yeah, I kind of do.
Guest:The guy like, you're going to like the way you look.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Remember that guy?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:So I just stole that voice.
Yeah.
Guest:You're going to like the way you look.
Guest:So that was funny to look like a woman.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Basically.
Guest:Right.
Guest:But to have that voice.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I thought the California diet is 20 pounds in 10 days.
Marc:And did you, because the movie is not really a comedy, but it's not.
Marc:But it's hilarious.
Marc:It is.
Marc:It does have that tone.
Marc:There's definitely moments where, and that character was so like out there that it definitely provided that.
Guest:It also proved to me that the old adage that it isn't about the size of the part.
Guest:Because in all of the work that I've done in my career for my peers, that part, 1 billion percent was the part.
Guest:Like in terms of, you know, you're walking down the street and Spike Lee runs across traffic to hug you or whatever.
Marc:Really?
Guest:It's around that part.
Guest:Yeah, people lost their minds.
Guest:No kidding.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Because they'd never seen you do anything like that.
Guest:I honestly think people didn't think it was me until the credits.
Guest:Wow.
Guest:I'm pretty sure.
Marc:And a lot of people didn't.
Marc:Yeah, that's great.
Marc:It was definitely an inspired part.
Marc:I'm having that experience with fucking, have you watched a new True Detective?
Marc:Oh, yeah, yeah.
Marc:With Dorff?
Marc:What the fuck?
Marc:I didn't even know it was him for half the first episode.
Guest:I'm like, where'd this guy come from?
Guest:Isn't it great when you see somebody like, or like in Star is Born, when you see the comic.
Guest:Dice.
Guest:Andrew Dice Clay.
Guest:Yeah, yeah.
Marc:He can act.
Guest:Yeah, you're like, I love, listen, when people reinvent themselves, it's the best thing ever.
Guest:And no matter who you are, you got to reinvent yourself like every decade.
Marc:I swear to God you do.
Marc:So tell me more of these acting tips.
Marc:So in an ensemble, you've got to figure out how you're going to stand out.
Guest:You got to.
Guest:I mean, finding that right nexus of being a team player, supporting your other actors, serving the story.
Guest:This is not about scene stealing.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Although it is.
Guest:It's not about sandbagging your other people.
Guest:You're building them up.
Guest:You're there to support them.
Guest:But you're bringing it.
Guest:But you don't want to be steamrolled.
Guest:You don't.
Guest:Dude, I don't want to sit there with Michael Douglas and Matt Damon and get my hat handed to me.
Marc:It's not happening.
Marc:But how would that happen?
Marc:Has that happened to you where you're in a scene and you're like, I just got buried?
Yeah.
Guest:um it happened i remember it happening to me once um in class and i did a scene with cliff robertson cliff robertson's got an oscar yeah you know what i mean sure and for playing half who what did he play oh that wasn't he great in that movie dude that movie is the best yeah star 80s quite a movie the best oh my god
Marc:Eric Roberts really was something.
Marc:The best.
Guest:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:One of my favorites.
Guest:I could quote every line from that movie.
Guest:I love that movie.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:But no, he won it for Charlie, where he plays the guy who mentally regresses.
Guest:Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Guest:Older movie.
Guest:Based on the book Flowers for Algernon.
Guest:And in class, I had to tell him that I forget what the scene even was, but he was hearing that his wife, my mother, was going to go into a mental institution or something, and he just wiped the floor with me.
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Guest:I just sat there with him and got, oh, okay.
Guest:So that's how it's done.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I was 20.
Guest:And I was like, okay, I'm not going to let that happen again.
Marc:And he wasn't even breaking a sweater.
Marc:No.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Those guys, like I talked to Jeff Daniels about it.
Marc:He said, you got to, you know, those older dudes, those actors, the big actors, they know exactly what to do with their face.
Guest:100%.
Guest:It's your face, your eyes.
Guest:I had dinner with Michael Caine this year who famously has a lot of great acting.
Guest:His book, if you haven't read it, he's got great acting.
Guest:His new book, Blowing the Doors Off, is all about this.
Guest:It's amazing.
Guest:And his thing is all about where you look in your other actor's eye.
Guest:It's very broken down into the technique of it, which is a big part of it.
Guest:This is for film acting, really.
Guest:For film acting, but there's also the same technique for theater.
Guest:It's just a different technique.
Guest:But very few actors have the experience, the talent, and the technique.
Guest:And when you have that, you're a monster.
Guest:And you feel like yours is all tight.
Guest:Just look, what's the thing about 50,000 hours?
Guest:Sure.
Guest:Right?
Guest:I'm way over that.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:I'm way over that.
Marc:I thought it was 10,000.
Marc:Is it 50 now?
Marc:I think it might be 50.
Marc:So what's the plan, man?
Marc:So are you going to shoot the one-man show?
Marc:So I haven't, people have talked about it.
Guest:I haven't decided yet.
Guest:I mean, maybe there'll be a residency in Vegas, which would be really fun.
Guest:You could just fly out there.
Guest:Just fly out and do it.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Because I love doing it.
Guest:I mean- What's the hotel you're doing at?
Guest:The first one I'm doing is Planet Hollywood.
Guest:Mm-hmm.
Guest:And then I'm doing, I think I'm going to do Caesars after that.
Marc:So like a residency would be what, three nights a week?
Marc:Right.
Marc:Right.
Marc:I don't know.
Guest:I guess you can figure it out.
Guest:Friday, Friday, two shows Friday, two shows Saturday.
Guest:Sure.
Guest:And then I have a new limited series called Wild Bill that I shot for ITV that'll be probably on Hulu or Netflix.
Guest:A Western?
Guest:It is not a Western.
Guest:I play an American law enforcement analytics specialist who takes the job nobody wants to run the Boston Lincolnshire Police Department.
Guest:Boston Lincolnshire is in the middle of England, the home of Brexit.
Guest:Do you do British?
Marc:Are you American?
Guest:I'm American.
Guest:It's a fish-out-of-water crime drama, and it's awesome.
Guest:I just finished doing it.
Marc:And you had fun doing that?
Marc:Yeah, and it came out great.
Marc:And what about movies?
Marc:Any movies?
Guest:Let's see what's happening with me.
Guest:I have a movie on Netflix, a holiday movie coming out next Christmas, which is really fun.
Guest:Shot entirely in Africa.
Guest:It's really romantic.
Marc:Really?
Guest:And I am negotiating and likely to do a movie with the director who did Rudy and Hoosiers, two of my favorite sports movies.
Guest:Hoosiers, great.
Guest:Great.
Guest:And it's the story of Carol Rosenblum, who is one of the original owners of the NFL.
Guest:And it's basically the story about the creation of the NFL.
Marc:Oh, really?
Guest:As told through his eyes.
Marc:And that's you?
Marc:And it'd be Carol Rosenblum, yeah.
Marc:And then, of course, Mental Samurai.
Guest:And then as you call it the arm, what do you call it?
Marc:It's genius.
Marc:The arm.
Marc:You call it the arm show.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:It's the arm show.
Marc:The giant arm.
Marc:It's the giant arm.
Marc:Dude, it's addicting.
Marc:Sure.
Marc:People like, they don't want to be, if you're just challenging them with questions and there's an amusement park ride, it's great.
Marc:I mean, that's what I want.
Marc:It's all anybody wants, Rob.
Guest:It's all anybody wants.
Marc:Thanks for talking, man.
Marc:That was great.
Marc:Appreciate it.
Yeah.
Marc:That was Rob Lowe.
Marc:The show is Mental Samurai on Fox.
Marc:Tuesday nights on Fox.
Marc:Also, go to WTFPod.com slash tour for all those upcoming dates in the UK.
Marc:I believe there's some tickets left for London, Birmingham, Salford, Dublin, but not many.
Marc:So go there, WTFPod.com slash tour.
Marc:for all the upcoming dates in San Diego, St.
Marc:Louis, Madison, wherever.
Marc:All right?
Marc:All right, good.
Marc:I'm going to get ready to perform.
Marc:I might go get something to eat.
Marc:All right?
Marc:You want to buy a house?
Marc:Huh?
Marc:How about a house?
Marc:Boomer lives!
you