Episode 1016 - Dennis Quaid
Marc:all right let's do this how are you what the fuckers what the fuck nicks what the fucksters what's happening i just switched it up i switched it up did you notice i switched it up to what the fuck uh things trying to keep it fresh i'm exhausted i'm fucking exhausted
Marc:I was in and out of sleep all last night, had some weird dream that involves Jeff Sessions.
Marc:I don't know what the dream was, but I heard a voice in my left ear, and I've only heard that one other time.
Marc:That clearly, as if it was waking me up, it sounded like this.
Crime.
Crime.
Marc:And the only other time I heard that voice was when I was strung out on cocaine in Los Angeles, having a psychotic meltdown, hearing voices in my head, and in the same ear, a voice said, get out.
Marc:How far out can I go, I asked it.
Marc:You've gone far enough.
Marc:Crime.
Marc:So what does that mean?
Marc:How you doing?
Marc:You all right?
Marc:How was your night?
Crime.
Marc:Dennis Quaid is on the show.
Marc:Yes, that Dennis Quaid that we all sort of grew up with and he's grown up with us.
Marc:I've been seeing him on screen since breaking away.
Marc:He's here.
Marc:I was excited to talk to him because he's one of those guys where oddly I've seen a lot of his fucking movies and he's got a new movie out.
Marc:It's a I don't know if you call it a thriller or a horror movie, but I watched it and it was pretty scary.
Marc:The new it's called the new movie is called The Intruder.
Marc:It's in theaters now.
Marc:And he's also in a very different film where he doesn't play a psychopath.
Marc:A dog's journey.
Marc:Watch the range of Dennis Quaid.
Marc:So that's coming up.
Marc:I'm talking to Dennis Quaid.
Marc:So let's read some emails because that's always fun.
Marc:Let's lighten it up.
Marc:Subject line.
Marc:Ha ha ha ha.
Marc:Fart talk.
Marc:Welcome to morning radio.
Marc:Mark.
Marc:This could not have been more appropriately timed.
Marc:I'm about to pick up my college-aged daughter, who is proudly the owner of the nastiest gas.
Marc:As a mother, I'm constantly reminded that this younger generation doesn't have the same hang-ups as ours, and this is such a funny example.
Marc:Thanks for the laugh.
Marc:I'm going to replay the intro just for her.
Marc:Angie, you matter.
Marc:I'm so glad that I'm bringing parents together with their kids.
Marc:They're going to have a good laugh.
Marc:Maybe both of them will start farting in the car and don't get into an accident.
Marc:This was fun.
Marc:Subject line, interviewing older ladies, country music.
Marc:Have listened for nine years.
Marc:Look forward to Mondays and Thursdays because of that.
Marc:Two things.
Marc:One, when you interview older women, e.g.
Marc:Sissy Spacek, Jane Fonda, you interject a ton more yes, uh-huhs, or just general grunts while they're talking.
Marc:I'm guessing it relates to your impatience when talking with your mom.
Marc:It's obnoxious.
Marc:Please cut it out.
Marc:two this is where he tries to save it merle haggard's if i could only fly album simple and beautiful maybe give it a listen like he's he thinks he's gonna slide that in with me like i'm going to attack your style and then like but we're still buddies right thanks for what you do scott so i wrote back i think if you listen i do that with everyone sounds like your issue maybe with your mom
Marc:Yeah, I went ahead and hit send on that one.
Marc:I hit send.
Marc:You know how they say, take a pause?
Marc:No pause.
Marc:Boom.
Marc:He wrote back, you never know what's going to happen.
Marc:That could open up a portal to someone's innards that could go on for paragraphs.
Marc:But nope, Scott just hit me right back.
Marc:Well played.
Marc:You damn fucking right it was, Scott.
Marc:I went and saw a play.
Marc:That's a P-L-A-Y.
Marc:I know I say it like pray, play.
Marc:I went and saw a play last night called The Wolves here at the Echo Theater Company in Los Angeles.
Marc:I don't generally go to theater in Los Angeles, but I did.
Marc:This is about a, I think it's a young, I don't know if they're young, they're teenagers, right?
Marc:Teenagers, soccer team.
Marc:And it all takes place on the field over the course of several different matches with some interstitial stuff, some blackouts, some interesting moments with the actresses.
Marc:But I didn't know what to expect.
Marc:It was a little theater.
Marc:There's no intermission.
Marc:And as an older gentleman, you do worry about the pee problem.
Marc:You know, it's like, I guess I'm at an age now where I'm like, oh, should I have drunk that soda?
Marc:Like how much of my night is going to be ruined because I can't go pee?
Marc:I almost peed in my car the other day.
Marc:I'm not proud of it.
Marc:It happened in England and it happened here.
Marc:Did I tell you about that?
Marc:Did I tell you about what happened in San Diego with the pee thing?
Marc:I got to be honest with you.
Marc:Sometimes there are moments in life where you realize I'm not afraid.
Marc:I have courage.
Marc:I'm not going to take any shit.
Marc:I don't have to take any shit.
Marc:I was driving to San Diego and it was getting dicey and there was nowhere to get off.
Marc:There was traffic heading in and I'm holding in pee.
Marc:This is not, it was not, I don't think there's a physiological problem.
Marc:I just had to pee and I was in a car.
Marc:And,
Marc:there was nowhere to go and there was traffic so i'm like and i'm gunning it to where the hotel is i don't know exactly which hotel i'm at yet and i just park in front of this one and i it wasn't the hotel i was staying at and i walk in because i figure i can get away with this it's a lobby situation where's the men's room and they're like you got to use the one in the restaurant next door so i go through and it's connected to the hotel lobby i open the door the restaurant's not quite open yet and
Marc:And they're setting up the waiters there.
Marc:And I go, dude, where's the men's room?
Marc:And he's like, hey, it's only for customers.
Marc:And I looked at him.
Marc:I said, I'm fucking going.
Marc:And he saw it in my eye.
Marc:He saw it.
Marc:I'd like to think he was afraid of my power, but I just think he was like, this old guy's in trouble and I'm not gonna step in here.
Marc:So I went and I peed and I got out and I went to hand him a few bucks.
Marc:Am I here?
Marc:Take it, man.
Marc:Take it.
Marc:If that's your trip, man, if whatever you just did there, if that's the extent of your power, it's for customers only.
Marc:Why do you think, do you think I wanna be in this situation?
Marc:I'm a grown-ass fucking man.
Marc:Do you think I want to be at the point I'm at now with you?
Marc:It's for customers only.
Marc:Here's a couple bucks, buddy.
Marc:You know what I mean?
Marc:Thanks for not getting in my way because you could have stiff-armed me.
Marc:You could have tackled me.
Marc:No!
Marc:No!
Marc:It's for customers only!
Marc:And I'm like, it's too late now.
Marc:You feel that wetness on your leg?
Marc:That's because I'm peeing in my pants and you're on top of me holding me down.
Marc:Who wins here?
Marc:Let's take a couple bucks, buddy.
Marc:You want to take a couple bucks?
Marc:No, man, you don't have to do that.
Marc:All right, I'm just trying to, you know.
Marc:Thank you.
Marc:Could have gotten ugly.
Marc:What was I talking about?
Marc:So I go to this theater thing.
Marc:It was great.
Marc:It was moving.
Marc:I didn't know where it was going to go.
Marc:It's one of those plays where it's sort of like, is this the way it's going to be?
Marc:This whole six to eight women talking like they're kicking around a soccer ball or however many what it is.
Marc:I don't know.
Marc:But they're talking and they're talking about things that teenage girls talk about.
Marc:But they're also talking about genocide and they're talking about periods and they're talking about boys.
Marc:But it all just evolves in a very subtle way.
Marc:And it all takes place around kicking around a soccer ball, waiting to play.
Marc:And it just evolves into this thing that becomes very deep and very moving.
Marc:And it was beautifully performed by all the performers.
Marc:And there's a twist at the end where it just kind of fucks you right in the head and right in the guts and you're crying.
Marc:And it was really tremendous.
Marc:And look, I just wanted to give you a heads up because it closes today.
Marc:But it was good.
Marc:It was good.
Marc:So if you want to tell your friends about it, you can tell them that I said it was good.
Marc:Wow.
Marc:Am I napping?
Marc:I feel like I just took a nap.
Marc:Was I awake through that?
Marc:This is all a dream.
Marc:Did you hear a guy say crime right in your ear?
Marc:Are we all dreaming?
Marc:Nope.
Marc:Hey, I'm going to talk to Dennis Quaid.
Marc:This has been a stream of consciousness shit show.
Marc:I hope you enjoyed it.
Marc:Dennis Quaid is an actor.
Marc:You might know him from many movies.
Marc:The Rookie, The Right Stuff, Breaking Away, The Big Easy, The Long Riders.
Marc:Remember that one where all the brothers were in it?
Marc:The Quaid brothers, the Carradine brothers.
Marc:Christopher Guest has a brother.
Marc:They brought him in.
Marc:Walter Hill movie.
Marc:I'll ask him about that.
Marc:The new movie is The Intruder.
Marc:It's in theaters now, and he's also in a very different type of film, A Dog's Journey, which opens on May 17th.
Marc:This is me and Dennis Quaid.
Marc:He brought his dog.
Marc:He brought his bulldog.
Marc:That's the first time a guy shows up in my house with his dog.
Marc:He's like, is that okay?
Marc:I'm like, not really.
Marc:I've got three cats in the house.
Marc:I don't see how this is going to work out.
Marc:He's like, ah, just leave her somewhere.
Marc:I'm like, I don't know.
Marc:And then I realized that my yard is actually enclosed and I could have a dog if I want.
Marc:And we put his dog out there and it worked out.
Marc:It was a bulldog, kind of a small mid-sized bulldog.
Marc:I guess they come in sizes, bulldogs.
Marc:You can order small, medium or large.
Marc:His was a medium-sized bulldog.
Marc:I think it was called that.
Marc:What kind of dog is that?
Marc:It's a medium bulldog.
Marc:You can get it in small, medium, large, extra large.
Marc:And those are the ones that they can barely walk because they're hobbled.
Marc:And like, isn't it adorable?
Marc:I don't know.
Marc:It looks crippled.
Marc:Is that adorable?
Marc:Anyway, this is me and Dennis Quaid.
Marc:It's a little odd to walk people up into the house, you know, past the bedroom.
Guest:It's what it is, man.
Marc:Yeah, it's the future of entertainment.
Guest:That's right.
Marc:It's the now of entertainment.
Marc:The now, yeah.
Marc:Have you done some other home-based podcasts?
Guest:Well, I'm actually executive producing and narrating a podcast with T-Bone Burnett and Bob Dylan.
Marc:I just had T-Bone over here.
Guest:Oh, you did?
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And Jared Goodstadt.
Marc:Jared Goodstadt?
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:Who's that?
Guest:Jingle Jared.
Marc:You ever heard of him?
Marc:No, wait, but you're gonna do it with Bob and T-Bone?
Guest:Well, Bob is contributing a song.
Guest:Oh, okay.
Guest:Pooh Bear.
Guest:Do you know who Pooh Bear is?
Guest:No, who's that?
Guest:Musician.
Marc:I feel like I should know him.
Guest:He's mostly a writer-producer these days.
Guest:He did...
Guest:the American version of it, like Despacito, and he has a couple of other real hit songs with Justin Bieber.
Guest:A lot of them produces his record and stuff like that.
Marc:So like T-Bone, he was one of the last guys out in the garage before I had to do the construction.
Yeah.
Marc:But his ex-wife, it's not Sam, is it?
Marc:Yes, it is.
Marc:Yeah, Sam Phillips.
Marc:Sam Phillips lives around the corner.
Marc:I just ran into her husband.
Marc:No kidding.
Marc:I ran into her husband yesterday and introduced himself to me.
Marc:Really?
Marc:And she grew up here, so he knew the neighborhood.
Marc:Oh, that's incredible.
Guest:His daughter lives over here?
Guest:I guess so.
Guest:Yeah, they had a daughter together.
Guest:I think she's about like...
Guest:1920, something like that.
Guest:All your kids are getting older.
Guest:Yeah, I don't care.
Guest:You have young kids, too, don't you?
Guest:I have 11-year-olds and 27-year-olds.
Guest:But T-Bone and I go back for 42, 43 years.
Guest:When I first came out to L.A., he was one of the first people I met.
Guest:Really?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:He was helping my brother to audition for the Buddy Holly story.
Guest:For the lead?
Guest:Yeah, for Buddy Holly.
Guest:And then later on, I married, my first wife was PJ Souls, who used to be married to Stephen Souls, who was in the Alpha Band with T-Bone.
Guest:They were the backup band for Dylan at the time.
Guest:For Rolling Thunder.
Guest:The Alpha Band, yeah, and the Rolling Thunder Review.
Guest:So we used to go to a lot of Dylan concerts, and then T-Bone was the producer of Great Balls of Fire music.
Marc:He did that whole movie?
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Where you played Jerry Lee Lewis?
Marc:Yes.
Marc:Did you have to deal with Jerry Lee Lewis?
Marc:On a daily basis.
Guest:You were recording, by the way?
Marc:I hope so.
Marc:Yeah, good.
Marc:Yeah, I mean, like, what year was that?
Marc:I mean, I can check if you don't remember.
Marc:That was 1986 or 7, I think.
Marc:And that's why I remember that movie.
Marc:It's a good movie.
Marc:And it's a tough role to play because he's...
Marc:He's a deep, dark well.
Marc:Yes.
Marc:But there's also the pop star side of it.
Guest:Yeah, and the beginnings of rock and roll.
Guest:The movie was done to be like a summer release movie.
Guest:But then you really started thinking about it, and they kind of made it into very kind of pop music, very accessible type of thing, and stayed away from most of the dark stuff.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:If you really think about it, you're going to drop your kids off at the theater to go see a story about a 21-year-old guy marrying a 12-year-old girl.
Guest:Right.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:In the Southern way.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And that's kind of a tough ask, I think.
Guest:But the film, looking back at it now, it...
Guest:it's kind of infectious.
Guest:It grows on you.
Marc:Sure.
Marc:Well, I mean, I was sort of fascinated with him, the fact that he's still alive and he's still making records.
Marc:Some of those guys, there's collections, they never stop recording.
Marc:There's hundreds of recordings.
Marc:I don't know where they found the time.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Well, of course, they always find the time.
Guest:Musicians, they're always recording.
Guest:They'd rather record than go on tour.
Guest:So they're just in the studio hanging around.
Guest:In the studio, just whatever comes to mind.
Guest:They'll go in and cover.
Guest:You do cover songs.
Guest:They'll go in.
Guest:I mean, these days, it's very collegial.
Guest:Everybody's working with everybody else.
Guest:It's easier, too.
Guest:Just like social media.
Guest:They're getting in on each other's social media.
Guest:You invite somebody who's up and coming, or you invite an old established guy into your song.
Marc:Sure.
Guest:They don't give you street cred or whatever.
Marc:Right, and it's also easier without tape.
Marc:Yes.
Marc:You know what I mean?
Marc:Oh, everybody's got a studio just like you in their house.
Marc:Yeah, and you can do good quality shit.
Marc:Right.
Marc:Okay, so you've only done that a couple of times, I guess, where you actually play a real person.
Marc:No, a whole bunch of times.
Guest:Really?
Guest:Yeah, I'd say maybe a quarter of my roles have been real people.
Marc:Is that true?
Guest:It seems like it at this point.
Guest:I played Gordo Cooper and I played Doc Holliday.
Marc:Oh, that's right.
Guest:I played Jimmy Morris, the pitcher and the rookie.
Marc:Oh, that was a real guy.
Marc:But Doc Holliday, you can't hang out with.
Marc:I mean, you could hang out with Gorda, right?
Marc:And you could hang out with Jerry Lee Lewis, right?
Marc:Yes.
Marc:But when you're hanging out with Jerry Lee Lewis, I mean, he must have been a pain in the ass on some level.
Guest:Not in a bad way.
Guest:Yeah, I'll say this, because sometimes it almost seemed that there was a little bit of the 14-year-old bully schoolyard in there.
Guest:Yeah, sure.
Guest:But that's him.
Guest:He has a learned sort of...
Guest:I won't call it suspicion, but he kind of checks people out.
Guest:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:But he's also just a very generous human being.
Guest:He was one of my piano teachers.
Guest:Yeah, and we did a video together.
Guest:I have such respect for him.
Marc:Did he teach you how to play like Jerry Lewis did?
Marc:A little bit.
Guest:It's all about the left hand.
Guest:But he was also on the set every day.
Guest:He was over my shoulder going, you get it wrong, son.
Marc:Yeah, that sounds about right.
Marc:So it's weird when I got to interview a guy who I feel like I grew up with.
Marc:You know, in the sense that like you're very familiar to me, you know, from all the roles going back to like, you know, breaking away.
Marc:And then like you're just always sort of there.
Marc:You've always been there.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:And now like these like it's these insurance company commercials.
Marc:Insurance.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Kind of funny.
Marc:They're surprisingly painless.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:They are.
Marc:I like the sort of inside idea of it.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Lift the veil to be transparent.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:But the weird thing is in a time where I don't think a lot of people are watching a lot of television, you're all over the place.
Marc:You're all of a sudden this familiar presence to everybody on a very immediate level every day.
Guest:Yeah, I think that's finally at the end of the day, there's someone from just about every generation.
Guest:it's kind of transgenerational for a different movie right it could be dragon heart yeah or it could be dreamscape going further back you know for the snake uh that i have my parent trap kids yeah and the rookie you know is another one and uh in the company what was that other one that good company good company i love that movie yeah but the certain generations that were kids when they saw the film and kids grow up right yeah and then and get them as kids you got them
Marc:Yeah, right, and they remember you forever.
Guest:Kids have better memories than adults.
Marc:Right, and it sticks in there.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:But where do you come from originally?
Marc:I come from Houston, Texas.
Marc:Really?
Guest:Yeah, the first 20 years in Houston.
Marc:Houston.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:So your family's like Texan.
Guest:Yeah, or Houston is sometimes referred to as West Louisiana.
Guest:Oh, really?
Guest:There's a lot of Louisiana people there, that's for sure.
Marc:And are they from Louisiana, your people?
Guest:Well, going way back with that, but my dad was from Oklahoma.
Guest:He grew up in Oklahoma the first five years of his life.
Guest:In fact- Cowboys?
Guest:Oil?
Guest:More reservation type.
Guest:And my cousin is Gene Autry.
Guest:Really?
Guest:Third cousin.
Guest:Yeah, he was my grandfather's first cousin.
Guest:No kidding.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:So he's the singing cowboy, right?
Guest:Yes, that's right.
Guest:He was also on the Angels.
Guest:and KTLA.
Guest:He's probably, I would say Gene Autry, dollar for dollar, you can make a case that he was probably the richest man in show business all time.
Guest:Relative to?
Guest:He wrote Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer.
Guest:Just that.
Guest:And Frosty the Snowman.
Marc:He wrote Frosty the Snowman?
Guest:Yes, along with a couple things.
Guest:And then he had a very successful career.
Guest:as a singing cowboy, and then he bought KTLA Channel 5 here in Los Angeles, and that was back in the day of early television when there was no east-west coast hookup.
Guest:And so Channel 5 broadcasted to the entire western United States.
Guest:It was basically a network.
Guest:It was huge.
Guest:And, of course, he owned all the land, too, that went under it.
Guest:He bought a bunch of land in Anaheim, and he built, you know, the Angels played there, and he owned that.
Guest:No kidding.
Guest:So if you take it for dollar for dollar, the guy was- Did you meet the guy?
Guest:I finally met him in the opening of Wyatt Earp.
Guest:He came to that.
Marc:how old was he uh by the time i think he was in his 90s uh maybe he lived a very long time yeah great great human being and it was your grandfather's first cousin yeah that's wild and you're and they're from oklahoma but then you have people from louisiana and then people from texas yeah and like what's your what's your what was the family's business uh my dad was an electrical contractor and you know had his own business yeah um
Guest:But he was also a frustrated actor.
Guest:And he was crooning around the house all the time.
Guest:His Elvis was Bing Crosby.
Guest:Oh, really?
Guest:And Dean Martin and Frank Sinatra.
Marc:But he didn't actually perform?
Guest:Like he wasn't a guy that... Yeah, he would go down to the piano bars.
Guest:Oh, he would?
Guest:Yeah, he loved to do that.
Guest:He was always doing routines.
Guest:He introduced my brother and I to acting, really, by pointing out...
Guest:actors on television and Laurel and Hardy and all those bits.
Guest:That's probably where we got the bite.
Guest:Oh yeah, you think?
Marc:What's the age difference between you guys?
Guest:Three and a half years.
Guest:It's not that much.
Guest:My mom's from East Texas.
Guest:which means well that would be uh very country yeah east texas my grandfather yeah uh came to texas in 1901 at a covered wagon really from tennessee yeah from the south yeah so it's like it's all right across yeah yeah and what was he doing what did he do well he was uh set up basically
Guest:He basically kind of scraped all his life.
Guest:He was a roughneck on oil wells, which is a really tough job.
Guest:Sure.
Guest:Because his wife had died, my mom's mom, and we had to scrape it together with the kids.
Guest:And he was a cotton farmer for a while.
Guest:He was a tent preacher for a while.
Guest:Sold Bibles door to door.
Marc:Isn't that weird?
Guest:His last job was a guard in an Austin insane asylum.
Guest:And then his wife's, his second wife's father died and left those kids some land, and he hocked his Buick, and he used to be a roughneck on oil rigs.
Guest:And he knew what was around.
Guest:And it was during the late 50s.
Guest:And what do you know?
Guest:They struck oil, of course.
Guest:And he went to being worth zero to like $2 million, just like that.
Marc:Just because his wife's kids inherited the land, and he was like, let's take a look under there.
Marc:There's gotta be something under there.
Guest:Well, he actually, they wanted to sell it, so he bought the oil rights to it.
Marc:That's a good story.
Marc:I think it's interesting that there was a time where people could just decide to be preachers.
Marc:It didn't require any training.
Guest:Well, you can still do that.
Guest:In fact, even more than ever now with social media and podcasts, you can decide to be a preacher.
Marc:But you can make a go at it.
Marc:You can make a living if you were entertaining enough.
Marc:Right.
Marc:That it was really a performance trip, right?
Marc:Yes, and you can even call yourself doctor.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Was he a doctor?
Marc:No.
Marc:No, he was not.
Marc:So you guys are, I just like Texas.
Marc:I grew up in New Mexico, but it's definitely not Texas.
Marc:And I like Houston.
Marc:Like Houston's become kind of a weird eclectic city.
Marc:It's very spread out.
Guest:Yeah, it always has been.
Guest:Really?
Guest:Yeah, really.
Guest:You know, it's always had that Cowtown stamp on it.
Guest:or whatever, but it always has been a very, it was a great town to grow in for music.
Guest:You had all kinds, you know, it was a big city, so you got a lot of different kinds of music, different influences.
Marc:And music's important to you.
Marc:You play, right?
Guest:It's in the East Texas, and so you get that Texas rock and roll and the Western swing thing, and then Louisiana invites the Cajun, Cajun, Zydeco influence, and then it's cosmopolitan.
Guest:i.e.
Guest:my dad was singing Bing Crosby and Dean Martin.
Marc:But also you get some of that conjunto music, the accordion Mexican music.
Marc:Yes, exactly.
Guest:So it was a great place to grow in for music.
Guest:It was like a music gumbo down there.
Marc:And you're a guitar player?
Marc:Yes.
Marc:And did that start before the acting?
Marc:Yeah, of course.
Guest:Yes, yes it did, when I was about 12.
Guest:My grandfather actually bought me my first guitar.
Guest:It was like a $12 guitar from Western Auto.
Guest:From Western Auto?
Guest:With nylon strings.
Guest:And I tried to learn Light My Fire.
Guest:That was the first one?
Guest:Yeah, to try to learn it.
Guest:Yeah, that's not too tough.
Guest:Actually, if you're first learning, that's not a great one to- Oh, those are kind of rough chords.
Guest:Yeah, some bar chords that you have to hit there, and you don't have the muscles for that.
Guest:So were you in rock bands?
Guest:We called them combos back in the 60s.
Guest:From seventh grade, I had- You were in a combo?
Guest:Yeah, it was a way of getting girls.
Marc:That's what a lot of people say.
Guest:Because I wasn't big enough to be on the football team or anything like that.
Guest:And that's how I wound up in the drama room, basically.
Marc:So your brother, was he also in the music?
Guest:He was more into stand-up comedy.
Guest:Really?
Guest:Yeah, as a kid, kind of growing up.
Guest:And in fact, had a really great with Trey Wilson.
Guest:Do you remember Trey Wilson?
Guest:He was in Raising Arizona.
Guest:He was Raising Arizona, the unfinished furniture guy.
Marc:Yeah, he's great.
Guest:And he was also Sam Phillips in Great Balls of Fire.
Guest:Right, that's right.
Guest:We were all at the University of Houston, and he had a stand-up, Quaden Wilson.
Guest:They were in a team?
Guest:Incredible, yeah.
Guest:And they came out here, and they would be at the comedy store when they first came out here.
Guest:Really?
Guest:Yeah, back in the early 70s.
Guest:I had no idea.
Marc:Right when the Comedy Store was in its heyday.
Marc:I guess so.
Marc:And that's how he got in.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:Was doing stand-up.
Guest:Yeah, and he had a little apartment right behind the Comedy Store where they're on Sunset.
Guest:I had no idea that Randy Quaid was a comic.
Guest:Yeah, but he didn't come here for that.
Guest:But he did it.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:They came through Texas when they did Last Picture Show, casting, because they wanted local casting for the Peter Bogdanovich authenticity, the accents and everything, and they went to the colleges, and Randy was at the University of Houston, and he got a part.
Guest:He was doing the acting thing?
Guest:Yeah, he was majoring in the acting program.
Marc:No, I remember the part.
Marc:He played this sort of dorky rich kid.
Guest:Yeah, I did it last Easter.
Guest:And then Bogdanovich called him up a year later and said, come out here and do this little role with Barbra Streisand and Ryan O'Neill in What's Up, Doc?
Guest:And that was his ticket out to L.A.
Marc:And he just stayed.
Marc:And you were just starting college at that time?
Guest:See, I was still in high school.
Guest:When he got those roles.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:How's he doing, by the way?
Guest:He's doing all right.
Guest:Yeah?
Guest:He's doing fine.
Guest:He's doing okay.
Guest:Okay.
Guest:I'd like to see him work.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:That's what I'd like to see him, come back and do some more work.
Guest:And I think a lot of other people would, too.
Guest:He's a great actor.
Guest:He's one of my five favorite actors.
Guest:No, he's a great actor.
Guest:I mean, he cracked me up all the time growing up, you know?
Marc:No, he's always been great.
Marc:And The Last Detail is one of the great movies.
Marc:Incredible.
Marc:He's great in that.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Well, as long as he's okay.
Marc:Okay, so you saw he had success with it, and then you just decided to follow suit, or you're already heading that way?
Marc:Well...
Guest:I was kind of torn between music and acting.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:But, you know, I was in the high school, and I wasn't really... You were in a jock then?
Guest:Like I said, I tried to... It's a rite of passage to go out for the football team in Texas.
Guest:And you were too small?
Guest:Yeah, I was kind of lateral.
Guest:I weighed like 130 pounds a jock.
Guest:Because you seem pretty athletic now.
Guest:Well, now.
Guest:I've played a lot of football players and baseball players.
Guest:That's how you got in shape?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:But I definitely wasn't going to make it, so that's how I wound up in the drama room with all the girls.
Marc:And was that the last time in terms of continuing to study?
Marc:Because I was talking to my producer about this.
Marc:There's not a lot of guys like you who are around anymore who can do sort of anything as an actor.
Marc:You're your own thing, but your range is insanely broad.
Guest:Well, I think you also got to give the younger guys...
Guest:Time to age, mature, grow up, and get experience.
Guest:It just comes through experience.
Guest:I never had any strategy in my career except to try as many different types of things as possible.
Marc:But in terms of training, did you continue to work on that stuff?
Guest:Well, when I was at the University of Houston, there was this great acting teacher, which was the reason I was there.
Guest:And my brother was there, too, and Trey and a lot of people, because of Mr. Pickett.
Guest:And he taught acting as a craft.
Guest:And I was torn between music and acting.
Guest:And I saw my brother's success, which made it real that you can actually get jobs out here.
Guest:It wasn't some faraway world, Hollywood, in my mind was.
Guest:And I wasn't serious in high school.
Guest:But then when I got into Mr. Pickett's class, within the first week, I knew what I wanted to do with my life.
Guest:And it's a real gift for an 18-, 19-year-old kid.
Guest:And what was so inspirational about that guy?
Guest:Because he taught acting as a craft.
Guest:And I was very much into human behavior and psychology.
Guest:And that's really what acting is.
Guest:And he sort of made that apparent by being observant of people, of creating a character sort of from the outside in.
Guest:And the outside will tell you what's going on with that person on the inside.
Guest:That's how it works.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Well, that's just one of the things.
Guest:It wasn't like a method, method class.
Guest:He wasn't like that.
Guest:He was basically... Sort of the opposite of the method almost.
Guest:And he had constructive criticism.
Guest:He could be brutal.
Guest:But he taught it as a craft and it gave you a space to really learn and
Guest:And fail.
Guest:That's really the space to fail rather than being out here getting jobs and failing on camera.
Guest:You get to fail in a class doing a scene and then work on it and come back and do it again.
Guest:And you learn by trial and error.
Marc:So you work from the outside.
Marc:So has that stayed with you, that kind of outside in?
Marc:Because I believe that's true, that if it's on the page, and you do what's on the page, you'll find who you're supposed to be, right?
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:Well, that was another thing that he thought, is what does the playwright say about the character?
Guest:What does the character say about himself?
Guest:What do other people say about the character?
Guest:What are his actions?
Guest:And...
Guest:his motivations basically, and how does that fit into the spine of the play or the story that you're thinking about.
Guest:So I always thought sort of like mythically in every role I've taken, no matter how silly the part is.
Guest:And it's become, over the years, I mean I used to write everything down, but over the years it's become more like osmosis.
Guest:It kinda seeps in there.
Guest:What did you write down?
Guest:I would write all that stuff down.
Guest:Like a backstory?
Guest:Yeah, yeah, or a whole history and stuff like that.
Guest:Now it's just something I just kind of, I don't know, it's become so much a part of me that it's, like I said, it's just like osmosis.
Guest:It just seeps in and I just find myself doing it.
Guest:And I let go a lot more than I used to.
Marc:Well, this role, I don't know that I've seen you in The Intruder, the new movie.
Marc:I don't think I've seen you be this horrifying.
Guest:That part was just letting go, to tell you the truth.
Guest:Of course.
Guest:I may have had about two or three people that I've met in life.
Guest:I may have had them sort of in my mind.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:But it's still me back there, actually...
Guest:Kind of having a nice laugh, to tell you the truth.
Marc:Sure, but I mean, am I wrong?
Marc:Isn't this the most evil fuck that you've just- Yeah, I would guess so.
Marc:Yeah, I would guess so.
Marc:Like a psychopath.
Guest:I'm usually the warm and fuzzy guy.
Marc:Well, no, you've played some slimy dudes.
Marc:Yeah, I know, but- But this guy's straight up psychotic.
Marc:Who was that?
Marc:Who was one of the more slimy characters you played?
Marc:Well, the guy- Oh, in traffic.
Marc:The lawyer in traffic.
Guest:Yeah, the lawyer in traffic.
Marc:For sure.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:But he wasn't necessarily a villain.
Guest:He was basically- No, he was just a slimy lawyer.
Marc:A bag man, really.
Marc:Yeah, right, right.
Marc:A morally compromised fellow.
Marc:But this guy in The Intruder is like menacing and horrible.
Marc:What was that fucking thing you were doing with your teeth?
Marc:I don't want to spoil anything, but what was that?
Marc:There's a moment where you're on the bed and you're just kind of looking at your teeth.
Marc:Oh, yeah.
Guest:He was just obsessed.
Guest:He's OCD.
Guest:OCD and psychotic.
Guest:That had to do with really kind of making sure everything was just nicely clean, even though he lived in filth.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:So that was just an impulse you had.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:They just needed some stuff.
Guest:They just shoot him here in a space, and it wasn't even scripted, so we just kind of made it up as we went along.
Guest:Well, I noticed it, and it was creepy.
Guest:Yeah, they don't show up, but I actually had my hair in a Hitler haircut.
Guest:Oh, really?
Guest:They didn't want to go overboard?
Guest:Yeah, there was a few things they wanted to pull back from.
Guest:Because, you know, I have this tendency, I'll go out there and just go big, because it's much easier to pull back than it is to add, is what I kind of think.
Guest:And so I would have...
Guest:You know, actors don't really know what's too much.
Guest:Sometimes that's what a director is for.
Guest:And Dion's such a great director.
Guest:And I just said, you know, I asked him at the beginning, please just pull me back if you see me going a little too far with this.
Guest:Because it's easy with this part.
Marc:Right, because you've got a lot of leeway.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:You're a psychopath.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:You do the thing you want.
Guest:You're the 800-pound gorilla.
Marc:So going back though, what were the first movies for you?
Marc:Before Breaking Away, there was a few?
Guest:Before Breaking Away, I came out of here and I spent... So right after college you come out here?
Guest:Yeah, I come out of here.
Guest:Well, I didn't even finish college.
Guest:I went two and a half years there because I was going to be an actor.
Guest:That's the reason I went.
Guest:And you got enough?
Guest:You were like, I get it, I get it.
Guest:Degree was not really going to do me much good out there in Hollywood.
Marc:It didn't matter?
Marc:But you felt like you learned enough?
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And I...
Guest:It was time for me to go.
Guest:So I came out and sent my picture to every agent in town and got turned down.
Guest:And so I started calling up casting directors.
Guest:Were you living with your brother?
Guest:I was on his couch for about the first couple of months.
Guest:In fact, then my very first movie set I was on, Randy was doing Missouri Breaks.
Guest:Marlon Brando and Jack Nicholson.
Marc:I remember that.
Marc:You know why you just woke up?
Marc:Because I cut your throat.
Guest:That was my first set.
Guest:I was on watching Marlon Brando and Jack Nicholson.
Marc:It's a pretty good movie.
Marc:Brando is out there, man.
Marc:When he's dressed up with the old lady on that horse.
Guest:That had nothing to do with the script.
Marc:I know.
Guest:I would go to dailies every day and watch Marlon Brando.
Guest:They'd do 10 takes of a scene and he would do it 10 different ways.
Marc:I'm trying to remember.
Marc:Oh, your brother was one of the guys he was chasing.
Marc:He was in the crew.
Guest:He had an excellent scene.
Guest:He had a great couple of scenes, especially at the campfire before Marlon Killson.
Guest:Right.
Marc:So that's how he got introduced.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And then, you know, I got an agent after about a year.
Guest:I was calling up casting directors and, you know, just out of variety where it said films in the future.
Guest:And I would just go in and ask for an interview just because, you know, because they're the ones that cast a film.
Guest:And then nine out of ten would say no.
Guest:One would say yes.
Guest:And so I'd go in and...
Guest:Finally, I would look at my shoes for the first couple of interviews, because I learned how to do interviews that way.
Guest:And after about nine months of that, one of them called up one of those agents that had turned me down, and I got an agent, and then about two months later, I got a job.
Guest:Did you meet Brenda?
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Guest:I actually taught Brando a couple of chords on the mandolin.
Guest:He had to do a scene where he's playing mandolin.
Marc:I kind of remember that.
Guest:I play guitar, and they said, Marlon's got to learn to play mandolin.
Guest:Anybody here play mandolin?
Guest:I just went, oh, I do.
Guest:I play mandolin.
Marc:Sure, like the wind.
Guest:Of course I play it.
Guest:I didn't play mandolin.
Marc:I did not play mandolin.
Marc:Is it the same tuning?
Guest:No, it's different.
Guest:It's different tuning.
Guest:And so I, you know, I just went to the music store and got like a chord book and learned the three chords that were in that song, you know, and, you know, got to spend an hour in his trailer with him.
Marc:Oh, how was that?
Guest:That was like a big thrill of my life.
Guest:I could barely talk.
Guest:Let's just put it that way.
Guest:Was it weird?
Guest:Well, as far as being starstruck, you know.
Guest:Sure.
Guest:These days, you know, I definitely don't get starstruck over too many people.
Guest:Right.
Guest:I mean, he was my idol icon, you know.
Guest:And it was before he went totally loopy, right?
Guest:He never went totally loopy.
Guest:No?
Guest:No, he never did.
Guest:He may have seen that way to the outside of the world, but he was not.
Guest:He was a brilliant, he was a genius, and he was also just a very sweet man, too.
Guest:Uh-huh, uh-huh.
Guest:And, you know, I get to spend an hour in his trailer with him, you know?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And... Did you talk about anything?
Guest:I hardly remember.
Guest:I hardly remember what we talked about.
Guest:I could hardly put a sentence together.
Marc:But you're showing a mandolin, too.
Marc:Yeah, I'm showing a mandolin.
Guest:So at least I had something to, like...
Marc:Something real to hold on to.
Marc:I guess that's a good point, though, about about, you know, you know, what people in the world know about somebody and what, you know, like, you know, it is sort of strange the assumptions we make.
Marc:He was an odd guy, you know, who, you know, was gifted and got old and got, you know, sort of like he seemed strange to.
Guest:And, you know, there was a certain kind of alienation from the business for him because it was back in the day he sort of invented the idea that you don't go to award shows.
Guest:Right, right.
Guest:And, you know, he turned out and had, you know, what was her name that accepted the Academy Award for him?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:So that put him in the kind of sort of oddball category for a lot of people.
Marc:Native American woman.
Guest:And then Mutiny on the Bounty was, that was, it sort of, he was in Hollywood jail for quite a few years, for about 12 years because that movie had gone so over budget and they pinned it on him.
Guest:And every other actor idolized him because he basically invented modern acting.
Marc:I know.
Marc:Which movie was it for you that kind of made you like, oh, Brando?
Marc:A Streetcar Named Desire.
Marc:It's crazy, right?
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:And on the waterfront?
Marc:Oh, incredible.
Marc:So you're out here like a year, and you're showing Brando how to play mandolin.
Marc:That's exciting.
Marc:Well, yeah.
Guest:I mean, that's enough for a lot of people.
Guest:But then I got my first movie was called 93055.
Guest:The date.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And it's the date that James Dean died and its effect that it had on on these seven college kids in Arkansas.
Guest:And it was James Bridges was the director.
Guest:I think he did paper chase.
Guest:I mean, the China syndrome you might remember him from.
Guest:But a great director, and he was from Arkansas.
Guest:So it's kind of basically his story.
Guest:I remember the first time the camera came in on me.
Guest:It was really quite intimidating.
Guest:And they had big cameras back then.
Guest:Big film cameras.
Guest:Big, huge lights.
Guest:Right before my first take, one of those big Klieg lights that are about as powerful as the sun.
Guest:And the wind, it just falls over about four feet from me.
Guest:so and you're already you're kind of spooked you know like a dog that's been kicked you gotta get one yeah and uh but uh that was a great uh way to start because jim was uh you know he was very uh protective of everybody and you know was bringing because all the actors it was our first movie dennis christopher's first movie and
Marc:How'd it come out?
Marc:Because I don't know that movie.
Marc:I feel like I should know.
Guest:It kind of came and went at the time.
Guest:It was a very personal story.
Guest:It was a movie of the 70s.
Marc:Right.
Marc:And you were what, 20?
Guest:It was kind of dark, too.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And I was 21.
Guest:77.
Guest:21.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And that led to breaking away.
Guest:23?
Guest:I was 23.
Guest:Oh, my God.
Guest:Okay.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Yeah, another nine months, got another job, kind of like drive-in movies.
Guest:I did a couple of those and AIG.
Guest:Then Breaking Away came along and that really changed my life and my career.
Guest:Were you playing a teenager at 25?
Guest:Yes, I was playing teenagers up until I was 27.
Guest:Up until I played Gordo Cooper, I was still playing teenagers.
Marc:Breaking Away was like a huge movie because it was one of those movies where as a kid, you'd go see it.
Marc:Right.
Guest:It was such a surprise, too, is basically, I think, you know, they had those kind of what turned out to be the Brat Pack in the 80s.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Youth movies, you know.
Guest:I think Breaking Away was really the first of those.
Marc:Yeah, because it was you, Dan Stern, Daniel Stern.
Guest:Danny Stern, Jackie Earl Haley.
Marc:He disappeared for a while, and then he came back.
Marc:Yeah, Danny, who's fantastic.
Guest:Wow, man.
Guest:I was so proud of him for that.
Guest:He was out for a while, right?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Do you guys talk?
Guest:We had a reunion about three years ago.
Marc:The Breaking Away reunion?
Marc:It was really cool.
Guest:It was like the 30-year reunion.
Guest:And Dennis Christopher still has the bicycle from there.
Marc:No kidding.
Guest:And we got together.
Guest:I haven't seen him in much lately.
Marc:Dennis and I have stayed in touch through the years.
Marc:He played the guy who was obsessed with the Italians.
Marc:Right.
Marc:And Daniel was Daniel.
Marc:Right.
Marc:You know what's weird is I can't really remember.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:I can't remember the other team at all.
Marc:I can't remember the jockey guys.
Marc:I know you guys were sort of the, you know, the working class, the long shot.
Marc:Right.
Marc:We were the locals.
Marc:Right.
Marc:The locals.
Marc:That's what we were.
Marc:I don't remember.
Guest:You and, you know, and we felt like strangers in our own hometown.
Marc:Right.
Guest:Basically were treated like that.
Guest:Right.
Marc:Oh, and I remember there was that scene where you're swimming in the quarry and you hit your head and it's so horrible.
Guest:Yeah, and that quarry actually that we were at, that was the quarry that they built the Empire State Building from.
Marc:Really?
Marc:That very quarry, yeah.
Marc:I just know when I went to look at that college, which I did after I got out of high school, I was like, this is where they did that movie.
Marc:Yeah, it was like 100 feet deep down there.
Marc:I know, I went and saw the quarry.
Marc:There's a couple of them out there.
Marc:Right.
Marc:And they built the school out of that too, that whole Bloomington.
Marc:Right.
Marc:So that's where it starts.
Guest:And also, Peter Yates basically taught the four of us film acting.
Guest:He taught me how to be... It wasn't a stage.
Guest:The camera's getting close, and it will read your mind.
Guest:You don't really have to do anything.
Marc:Don't overdo it.
Guest:Well, you always have a tendency to want to...
Guest:act you you think other people can't see it right and also when you see yourself on film especially for the first time you don't you can't tell anything yeah you don't see anything right but he was you know i'd been cast for a reason because i looked and sounded like the like the guy he wanted to you know the character yeah and so he told me how to be small you were the troublemaker kind of guy
Guest:I was the guy that, you know, who's like probably the most pissed off.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Because, you know, my days of glory had come and gone.
Marc:High school football.
Marc:Right.
Marc:That's right.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:But it was such.
Guest:And then when he came out, I remember driving to the theater and my brother was in the front seat driving us there.
Guest:And he goes, it looks like he got a hit because the line was around the around the block.
Guest:That was back in the days when they'd have lines around the block.
Guest:Sure.
Guest:And people would just show up.
Guest:You know, it was kind of mysterious.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:People would show up.
Marc:yeah as far as openings you know like audience could smell movies back then you know and i think they still can to tell you the truth well it's weird i just talked to uh erwin winkler like two weeks ago about the right stuff specifically and about like the sort of jarring experience that you know everything leading into that movie and everything about that movie it should have been a huge movie yes it should have it uh it was a dud at the box office it was made two million dollars which is a penance you know for opening weekend he couldn't figure it
Guest:Oh, I know exactly why.
Guest:You do?
Guest:Yeah, there's a couple of reasons why.
Marc:Was it something competing?
Guest:It was an election year.
Guest:John Glenn was running for president.
Guest:John Glenn, none of the astronauts had anything to do with the movie.
Guest:They wouldn't get behind it?
Guest:No, they wouldn't get behind it.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I just like they wouldn't get behind the novel.
Guest:And I know why, because of Gus Grissom, the way Gus Grissom is Tom Wolf turned him into a literary device, you know, because they had this whole thing about the top of the pyramid.
Guest:Right.
Guest:And.
Guest:Gus, you know, he went up there and had dimes in his pocket, you know, like he's- That's real, right?
Marc:Souvenirs.
Marc:Yeah, sure.
Guest:Yes, he did.
Guest:Everybody else did, too, okay?
Guest:Okay.
Guest:But to make a thing of it, but it was about the hatch.
Guest:He was in the second flight.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And when he landed, the hatch just blew.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Right?
Guest:And they lost the spacecraft.
Guest:It went to the bottom, and he did not get the parade that Shepard did.
Marc:That's all true.
Guest:All true.
Guest:This is all true, and not even to go to the White House.
Guest:He was disgraced in a way.
Guest:That's what Wolf would have you think, but that is not the truth.
Guest:Okay.
Guest:For one thing, that was the first time that they'd ever had a hatch on a spacecraft.
Guest:Before that, they were just bolted in, and the astronauts had all insisted...
Guest:that they have an escape hatch that they could blow with explosives, and had a window, and also a window in it, because they were pilots, and they wanted control of it.
Guest:So they sent it up on its flight, but they had not taken into account the pressurization effects on those explosive bolts.
Guest:So when he hit the water, and the effect of splashdown hit the water,
Guest:And the thing just did blow because it wasn't designed right.
Guest:And he almost drowned, his suit filled with water.
Guest:He was about three seconds away from actually going 1,000 feet down, just like a spacecraft.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Because it was going to be dead weight.
Guest:And he was saved, and...
Guest:If he was so disgraced, if he had blown it so much, then why did they give him the first Gemini flight?
Guest:And why did they give him the first Apollo flight where he was killed there on the launch pad?
Guest:But I think he would have been the first man on the moon, to tell you the truth.
Guest:because he was the best pilot that they had.
Guest:He was very calm and cool, he had an engineer's mind, and he was the one that was really, most of all, complaining about, because it was such a hurried process, getting to the moon,
Guest:That they skipped a lot of quality control getting there.
Guest:Sure.
Guest:And he was the one that was complaining about it the most.
Guest:In fact, he was complaining about the wiring that they had in front of them in an oxygen-rich environment.
Guest:And sure enough, they wound up, that's how they got killed.
Marc:So basically, the brotherhood of astronauts were like, fuck this movie.
Guest:Well, I wouldn't say, it wouldn't be so much fuck this movie, but well, Gordo Cooper, I was lucky.
Guest:Just so happened, because I'd read the book, I grew up in Houston, which is Space City.
Guest:Gordo Cooper was my favorite astronaut as a kid.
Guest:I was right in the pocket of that age where they rolled in the TV and you saw them going into space.
Guest:They replaced wanting to be a cowboy or anything else.
Guest:And Gordo Cooper was my favorite astronaut of the original seven because he was the youngest.
Guest:It was sort of like a rock and roll astronaut.
Guest:I really liked that name, Gordo.
Guest:And then I wound up, you know, the book came out and said, if they ever do a movie like this, I would.
Guest:Oh, I'd give anything to play him.
Guest:And then I went in to audition for it, and what do you know?
Guest:I got it.
Guest:It was like the dream of a lifetime.
Guest:And then guess what?
Guest:It's like they discouraged everybody from contacting their astronauts or whatever.
Guest:Why?
Guest:Well, I guess either what?
Guest:Either liability or suit or, you know, NASA wasn't behind it and all the rest from the get-go because they weren't, NASA wasn't behind, didn't really like the way Tom Wolfe had betrayed everybody as well.
Guest:You know, Tom Wolfe was trying to create a novel with things and so he needed literary devices with this whole theme of the top of the pyramid.
Guest:But it turned out Gordo Cooper lived three miles from me in L.A.
Guest:Come on.
Guest:Over in the valley.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:So I called him up.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And he said, come on over.
Guest:And he was the most generous, wonderful dude.
Guest:And from him, I learned to fly because I was telling him, you know,
Guest:I should learn that radio voice you guys got.
Guest:I'd like to learn to fly.
Guest:I said, well, yeah, I'll learn to fly.
Guest:So he sent me over to Budwall in aviation there in Van Nuys, and I got my pilot's license while we were doing the film on the sly.
Guest:You still fly?
Guest:Yeah, I fly jets.
Guest:I fly Citation jets now.
Guest:I kept that up after, you know, after we were there.
Guest:That must be fun.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Well, it's darn convenient.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Let's put it that way.
Guest:You have a plane?
Guest:I've had three.
Guest:Then I had a Bonanza single engine, which I really miss.
Guest:But it just got to be, I would fly 400 hours a year, which is a lot.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And for different reasons.
Guest:But it just got to be hours working so much.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:you know, this and that, that, you know, that dwindled down to like 90 hours and it, you know, costs more to keep your plane in a hangar than it does to, you know, to fly.
Marc:So, so, so hanging out with Gordo did, uh, so you got a real good sense of that guy.
Guest:Oh yeah.
Guest:And I, you know, flew with Jaeger in, uh, in, uh, a Bonanza over, uh, over the lake bed where, you know, used to, where Poncho's was and out there at, uh,
Guest:Edwards Air Force Base.
Guest:He was on the set every day.
Guest:It was like having John Wayne on the set every day.
Marc:That's my favorite moment really oddly of that movie is your moment on the press conference.
Marc:Who's the best pilot you ever saw?
Marc:And you have that moment where you're thinking of Jaeger.
Marc:Right?
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:And then you're looking at him.
Marc:Right.
Marc:But like that beat, I love that beat.
Guest:Yeah, he's gonna give it away.
Marc:The unsung hero.
Guest:Yeah, he was the guy that couldn't make it because he didn't have a college degree, number one.
Guest:They were looking for college degrees.
Guest:And Yeager was the best pilot.
Marc:And Shepard was so good.
Marc:He was really good.
Guest:Everybody was so fucking good.
Guest:He and Yeager hung out every day.
Guest:They'd be over there, you'd look over, and they had the hood of Sam's truck
Guest:open.
Guest:You know, going over the engine because Sam doesn't fly.
Guest:He was afraid to fly.
Guest:He had a thing.
Guest:I guess he'd had a bad experience, but he didn't fly.
Guest:He drove everywhere.
Guest:Really?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:So he had his truck.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:They'd be over there.
Guest:And, you know, Yeager was from West Virginia, you know, basically started out repairing lawnmowers.
Guest:That's how he learned about engines.
Guest:So, you know, they loved engines.
Guest:They'd be over there talking engines all day long.
Ha, ha, ha, ha.
Guest:And Levon Helm, too.
Guest:Oh yeah, he's great.
Guest:Got a stick of Beeman's?
Guest:Yeah, a stick of Beeman's.
Guest:I might have me a stick.
Marc:It's great.
Marc:I think that was the first time he acted, too, I think.
Marc:Well, The Coal Miner's Daughter.
Marc:Oh, that's right.
Marc:Was that after or before?
Guest:No, that was before.
Guest:No, I don't know.
Marc:It's kind of mixed up in my memory now a little bit.
Marc:But I love that movie, and I thought the script was great, and I thought the comedic elements were great, because the thing that's great about that movie is
Marc:It's a great heroic story, but there's a lot of comedy in it.
Guest:Yeah, and it's become a classic since then, but the original thing was why did it fail at the box office?
Guest:So John Glenn was running for president at the time, and I think that had a lot to do with...
Guest:And then Walter Cronkite actually did an interview right around the time that it was coming out.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And he was with the astronauts and with NASA and all that.
Guest:And the way they portrayed the astronauts was as Boy Scouts, basically.
Guest:They could do no wrong.
Guest:And they were...
Guest:They were human beings, you know, who were out there doing things we probably should, we wouldn't want our wives or, you know, sometimes friends to know.
Guest:And that was, you know, the press went along with it.
Guest:Back then, you didn't have paparazzi out there.
Guest:You were following your every move, wanted to help you.
Marc:And they were managing it.
Marc:They did with Kennedy.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Managing the image.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:You know, everybody's putting in Walter Cronkite.
Guest:You know, these guys were heroes that had put their life on the line.
Guest:They weren't used to being celebrities.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And so Walter Cronkite dissed the movie based on.
Guest:Based on based on that.
Marc:And it showed too much of their humanity in a way like the too much behind the scenes.
Guest:I guess he thought it was a little too one sided about, you know, the sort of extracurricular thing and also the way but really basically the way it had treated Gus Grissom.
Guest:Mm hmm.
Guest:And.
Guest:I agreed with that, to tell you the truth, about the way they had, because that's what people will remember.
Guest:And he gave his life, really, for...
Guest:He gave his life.
Guest:They went in there knowing that they basically had about a 50% chance of dying every time they went up.
Marc:That's interesting.
Marc:I don't know that Erwin Winkler considered any of this.
Guest:They probably did because they saw it as just another movie and you can't blame them.
Guest:They're out to turn a book into a film.
Guest:And
Guest:It was a perfect timing for the film, I thought, too.
Guest:It was right there sort of when it came out, sort of at the beginnings of Reagan administration.
Guest:The right time for it to succeed.
Guest:Yeah, and I think actually...
Guest:One of the, towards the end of shooting, I think that's when one of the shuttles blew up.
Marc:Was it that early?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Huh.
Guest:I remember going down to NASA for that.
Guest:It was just, the research was great.
Guest:You got to go in all those doors and say authorized personnel.
Marc:Well, they let you in there, though, but they weren't supportive of the movie, but they still let you go down there.
Marc:Oh, yeah.
Guest:Huh.
Guest:Yeah, yeah.
Marc:That's wild.
Marc:Yeah, it was, you know.
Marc:And we skipped the, we didn't talk about the Long Riders, which I was fucking excited about.
Marc:I remember because I was in high school still, and it was like all the brothers.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:And it's fucking Walter Hill.
Marc:That, yeah.
Guest:It's like you and your brother, and is there a third Quaid?
Guest:Well, we have a half-brother, his name is Buddy.
Guest:Was he in it?
Guest:No, he was just born about four years old.
Marc:It was the Carradines.
Marc:Oh, the Keeches and the Carradines.
Guest:Two Quades, yeah, the Keeches, two, and then the Carradine brothers, so three Carradine brothers.
Guest:Right.
Guest:And then Chris Guest.
Guest:Had a brother.
Marc:Chris Guest, you know Chris Guest.
Guest:Sure, yeah.
Guest:And his brother.
Guest:I just love the whole idea of it.
Guest:I remember being a pretty good movie.
Guest:It was a really good movie.
Guest:Walter Hill directed it.
Guest:It was about the James gang.
Guest:That was one of the last of the great ones of that particular era.
Guest:When Westerns were going out of style, you still see some good ones every...
Guest:every once in a while.
Marc:Yeah, I just read a book about, there's a new book about the Wild Bunch, about the making of the Wild Bunch, about Peckinpah and that whole trip down there.
Marc:It just was crazy, man.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Just going down to Mexico and just camping out and the kind of risks they took and just how insane it was.
Marc:Oh, yeah.
Marc:And most of the guys he had on, he was tapped into that whole crew of stunt dudes
Guest:you know wackos right they'd do anything and they'd come in you know after a hard night oh yeah and they just sam just to recover would say uh go build some track go build some track for a tracking shot knew that would take at least an hour and a half so he can get get get himself get right yeah did you ever meet that guy
Guest:I actually owned Sam Peckinpah and Warren Oates owned a piece of property in Montana.
Guest:And Warren and I did Tough Enough together and we became good friends.
Guest:And I owned a little piece of property in Montana at that time.
Guest:And Warren and I, he became kind of like...
Guest:kind of fatherly in a way.
Guest:And he had a heart attack at age of 51 and died with his boots on.
Guest:And I bought his half of the place with Peckinpah.
Guest:And then Peckinpah died about 10 years later and I bought his half from the kids.
Guest:So I had their place in Peckinpah's cabin.
Guest:Warren was down at the bottom and it actually had plumbing and stuff.
Guest:Beautiful place.
Guest:And then
Guest:Sam was up three miles up in the mountains, no running water, no plumbing, no electricity.
Guest:He got everything out of the creek, and he had his bookcase up there.
Guest:He built the bed, the bed, and he built it, and the table.
Guest:big, huge, wonderfully made craft, such craftsmanship.
Marc:Sure.
Guest:Not a nail in it.
Guest:It was all pegged.
Guest:Oh, wow.
Guest:And then this bookcase was there, and there was a 1972 Playboy magazine that was the Holy Bible, and it opened up the Holy Bible, and there's a couple of Polaroids in there of some of the stunt guys and Warren, and then there's a picture of Sam.
Guest:in his long johns on the side of a house and he's got a he's got his holster on you know so he's he's he's got you know he's got his gun in there and uh uh great and then there's the holster sitting right there and then there was a uh mason jar full of moonshine uh-huh that that's the way he lived in montana yeah that was his vacation house yeah
Marc:Well, it's nice you got an opportunity to spend time with those guys.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Well, I never met Sam.
Guest:Oh, you didn't?
Guest:No, I never did because every time I would go up there, he would be in town, I guess, at the Murray Hotel.
Guest:He liked to play poker.
Guest:Real character.
Guest:But Warren and I were great friends.
Guest:I had that place for 25 years and just recently sold it.
Marc:Oh, wow.
Marc:Yeah, I love those.
Marc:I used to do a Peckinpah film fest every year and just go through all the way from Ride the High Country up.
Marc:Beautiful movie, that one.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:I mean, they're really trippy, fucked-up man movies.
Marc:Bringing me the head of Alfredo Garcia.
Marc:That movie is so fucked up, too.
Marc:Yeah, Warren Oates' favorite movie.
Marc:Where he's just talking to the head.
Marc:He's driving with that wrapped head, and he's talking to it.
Guest:But my favorite is The Wild Bunch.
Marc:Oh, it's great.
Guest:It was just...
Guest:As far as that era of the 60s, early 70s, and, you know, that movie along with Bonnie and Clyde of really ultra-violence that was in that film, it was, you know, as art and...
Marc:It doesn't even compare now.
Marc:It's so weird.
Guest:Real Western, man.
Marc:But it's so risque.
Marc:You know, it was risque at the time.
Marc:But now you look at what's happening and it's like it's nothing.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:What we see on television every day, you know.
Marc:And reading the book about it, I didn't really take into consideration a lot of the kind of like these were guys in a transition period in the West.
Marc:Like they were old timers.
Guest:Right.
Marc:You know, trying to adapt.
Guest:Well, yeah, you see a car.
Guest:He always put it like an automobile in a lot of his movies.
Guest:And that was sort of like about the end of the beginning of something else.
Marc:It's like the Ballad of Cable Hogue with the Robards.
Marc:That's all about a car showing up, I think.
Marc:There's a scene where it's like, oh, it's over.
Marc:Yeah, it's about the end of their world.
Marc:Yeah, exactly.
Marc:Yeah, trippy, man.
Marc:I don't know why I keep saying trippy, but it's deep stuff.
Marc:It's deeper.
Marc:Because it's trippy, man.
Marc:Yeah, man.
Marc:Well then, okay, I'm just going to pick and choose a couple because we're kind of moving through it.
Marc:But I remember the Big Easy because you put on the full drawl.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:You really kind of locked into the accent.
Guest:Well, yeah, I wouldn't call it a drawl, but that was a blend between a Cajun, like a patois type of accent, and
Guest:and what they call a yet, New Orleans yet, which is sort of close to like a Brooklyn type of thing, where they talk.
Guest:And so you put them together, and it kind of comes out like that.
Guest:And I met four people that were like that, that had that accent in New Orleans.
Guest:It's not very common, but I met four people.
Guest:And that's where you pulled it from?
Guest:I just kind of put them together and just came out with that one.
Marc:I'm kind of fascinated with the kind of darkness of New Orleans, I guess, like a lot of people are.
Marc:And I thought that was a manageable way to move through it.
Guest:Yeah, it had a lot of charm, that movie, to it.
Guest:And Tennessee Williams, kind of describe it, had a rapish charm, but there was always...
Guest:a latent violence.
Marc:Right.
Marc:That would be... Well, there's a darkness there.
Marc:There's definitely sort of a... There's something about the swamp and about the weird kind of mix of peoples and how they've evolved.
Marc:It's a gumbo.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:And that's where the Quades actually came from because they were in Canada and they came down in there and they're back up in the swamps of Louisiana and
Guest:Because just to be able to get away, there was French speaking.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And there were Native Americans up there, and it all mixed together.
Guest:Right.
Guest:And also Spanish, leftover Spanish.
Guest:And in fact, up until the 1930s, your first language, if you were born there, was French.
Yeah.
Guest:It wasn't Huey P. Long, when he became governor of Louisiana, built the bridges over the bayous.
Guest:And so basically they were secluded from the rest of the world up until then.
Marc:Right, and I think that's what's interesting is these kind of people that kind of, you know, different types of people that kind of became one people.
Marc:Right.
Marc:It only happened, it didn't happen in a lot of places, but it sort of happened there.
Guest:Yeah, it's really kind of more of what America is supposed to be like than any other region.
Guest:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:Well, you had black, white, Native American, Mexican, just everything.
Marc:So you've got some Native American in your family?
Guest:Yes.
Guest:Yeah?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:You tracked that back?
Guest:Yes, I tracked it back.
Guest:My grandfather and then back to that.
Guest:They actually, the Quades, I've deduced...
Guest:They left Louisiana for Oklahoma, I think, to escape the Civil War or some draft thing.
Marc:Who knows?
Guest:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Guest:It wasn't their fight, I think.
Guest:So that's how they wound up in Oklahoma.
Marc:I'm not going to die for this one.
Marc:Oh, that's right.
Marc:You played Doc Holliday.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:That was... Gosh, I love that guy.
Guest:He was one of my favorite characters I ever played.
Marc:Yeah, that was good.
Marc:One of the most difficult, I think.
Marc:And that was with Cosner's White Earp.
Marc:Yes.
Marc:Did he direct it?
Guest:Maybe cut a half, all the stuff that was shooting Buffalo and everything.
Marc:Oh, Kasdan directed that.
Guest:I didn't even fucking know that.
Marc:He tried the Western twice.
Marc:Yes, well, Silverado and White Earp.
Guest:I think he tried to pack too much into Silverado.
Guest:I think he tried to pack too much into Wyatt Earp, to tell you the truth.
Guest:I mean, yeah.
Guest:I kind of felt like it was too long.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:And it was also being made at the same time as Tombstone, which I think is actually the more accessible movie.
Guest:It's a shorter movie.
Guest:Well, it actually tells the story and tells it succinctly.
Guest:That's Kurt Russell.
Guest:Yeah, Kurt Russell.
Yeah.
Marc:I was actually offered that one too.
Guest:To do Doc?
Guest:I was offered Tombstone.
Guest:For Doc Holliday on both?
Guest:Yes.
Marc:What did you think of Val's version?
Marc:I thought Val was very good.
Marc:What was his little tag?
Marc:You're my huckleberry.
Guest:You're my huckleberry.
Marc:He really went over the top with it.
Guest:I liked it.
Guest:I really liked his performance, you know.
Guest:And then he could just get mean.
Guest:He really had that right about Doc.
Guest:I mean, I learned everything about Doc.
Guest:I really kind of fell in love with the guy.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Because he was one of those guys, you know, he had tuberculosis and, you know, he was going to die.
Guest:That's the reason he was out west.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:He was a dentist and the reason he was out west was because it's the only place he could breathe.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And he knew he was going to die.
Guest:So in a gunfight,
Guest:he could he could stand there and be calm and aim and fire and that you know because that's usually what won the day not being fast oh because he didn't pull guns and they just freak out scared you know you're scared shitless and you're just you know you're shooting everything and uh it's the guy who could keep his head and aim who would
Marc:And he could keep his head because he knew he was going to die anyway.
Guest:He's going to die anyway.
Guest:He didn't care.
Guest:That's wild.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Do him a favor.
Guest:The rookie, you're the baseball player, you learn to play ball.
Guest:Yeah, Jimmy Morris was on the set for all of that, too, which I really appreciated.
Guest:And thank God he was left-handed.
Guest:And great story, which sort of reflected my own life at the time.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Because the movie's about second chances.
Guest:Right.
Guest:And that movie was...
Guest:really got the ball really rolling for me.
Guest:I mean, start with the 90s, I was kind of, my career was kind of going through a valley, let's put it.
Marc:Was it?
Guest:Parent Trap sort of started a new thing.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:But then The Rookie really cemented that, and it also came out back-to-back performance in Far From Heaven.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:You were great in that.
Marc:I mean, that's the thing, it's like they're so vastly.
Guest:So I was a gay guy and a major league pitcher.
Marc:But you approach everything the same way.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:You know, in terms as an actor.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:You kind of like figure.
Guest:Human behavior is a very, always been very interested in about what makes people tick.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:Why are they the way they are?
Marc:And do you, I guess you answer it with each character.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:What would I do if I were that character?
Guest:And you sort of live in their shoes and their skin.
Guest:But it's always you.
Guest:You can never get away from playing yourself because you always are playing yourself.
Guest:It's just that we all have...
Guest:everything that every other person has all the same emotions all potentially the same reactions to those emotions or you know these cliches about life because they're true and um but you're always playing yourself yeah right i guess that's true i i mean i guess i you know i've done i've been doing some acting myself and i'm always sort of wondering about that but you're gonna do some version of
Guest:You don't go to see Vito Corleone or whatever.
Guest:It's Marlon Brando.
Guest:Everybody knows that's Marlon Brando.
Guest:It's like, oh, he disappeared into the characters.
Marc:But some people do.
Guest:Yeah, but Marlon Brando just is doing a great job with that character.
Guest:Right.
Marc:That's true.
Marc:It's true.
Marc:But some people seem to go through a tremendous amount of process in order to get places.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:Yes, and that's part of learning acting, and there's still, I know actors that are still like that.
Guest:Bill Hurt is very studied, and everybody has their own particular method.
Marc:That's the method.
Guest:Everybody has their own way of doing things.
Marc:Right, but the funny thing about Hurt is there's no more a person that's more painfully Bill Hurt than Bill Hurt.
Marc:Yes, exactly.
Marc:Whatever he's doing, he's always going to be like, he's got that intensity, the pacing.
Guest:He's going to take it, like a simple question, he's going to take to some place.
Guest:Have you worked with him?
Guest:Oh yeah, I've worked with him twice.
Guest:I just worked with him, in fact.
Guest:I love the guy.
Guest:I really totally love the guy.
Guest:I love his point of view of life.
Guest:Uh-huh.
Guest:I love his quirks.
Guest:And he's a brilliant actor.
Guest:And he just feels so deeply about everything.
Guest:And a very sensitive human being.
Marc:And what was it like working with like on that crazy Oliver Stone movie?
Guest:uh with oliver yeah with everybody uh you know i knowing off oliver's reputation you know what he put other quarterback were you i played a quarterback tap rooney and you know the jimmy fox is the up and cover right that's right i like that movie it was great i think it's the best football movie ever done to tell you the truth because it's so visceral you really feel yeah what it's like to be in the game yeah
Guest:I thought Oliver Stone, given his reputation, which was just a reputation in a lot of ways, that a lot of people were going to get hurt doing that film.
Guest:And nobody did.
Guest:Nobody did.
Guest:He took care of everybody really well, and he made an incredible movie.
Marc:Yeah, it's weird that comes up again, this idea that the general public makes judgments of people based on the information they get.
Marc:But once you're sort of in it and working.
Guest:Well, you know that joke.
Guest:We call him taco because he makes great tortillas, and we call him this because he does that.
Guest:And then what do they call you?
Guest:Well, you fuck one goat.
Yeah.
Marc:That's right.
Marc:That's true.
Marc:You're the goat fucker.
Guest:You're the goat fucker.
Marc:All right, man.
Marc:Well, you know, it's really great to talk to you, and obviously there's more to talk about, but I feel like the dog's got to eat.
Marc:She's coming out.
Guest:I guess your contract is out there.
Guest:She's barking us up there.
Marc:But the Todd Haynes thing, I talked to him years ago, too.
Marc:Who?
Marc:Todd Haynes, the guy who did- Oh, yeah.
Marc:Far From Heaven.
Marc:Brilliant, brilliant guy.
Marc:But when you work with somebody like that, he's a very unique director.
Marc:He's got very specific vision for that movie.
Marc:He's making sort of his version of a Douglas Sirk movie.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:In the process of working with all these different directors, do you find yourself... What is the experience from director to director?
Guest:I am always there as an actor.
Guest:This is what I learned early on.
Guest:The actor is actually there to serve the director.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Because even though it may have been written by, you know, from a novel by this or whatever, it's still the director is telling the story.
Guest:Right.
Guest:He's directing.
Guest:In fact, that's what it means.
Guest:He's directing where the camera is, what the camera is looking at.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:To tell the story.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And...
Guest:So I'm there to serve him because I can't be making a different movie than the director.
Guest:That won't work.
Guest:And I'll look like an idiot.
Guest:So you have to trust your director.
Guest:I've been very, tried to be very good about choosing strong directors.
Guest:I like strong directors, in fact.
Guest:who will take me out of my comfort zone because actors have a general tendency to either have the same haircut they did in the last film or do the same things that they know will work because that's their money.
Guest:Maybe it's my smile.
Guest:But a director who will take you out of your comfort zone and make you do
Guest:things you're not comfortable doing.
Guest:That's the best.
Guest:That's the best.
Marc:That's when you are the best, too.
Marc:Well, you're right.
Marc:You have very specific Dennis Quaid-isms, but even in this new movie, it's like all those become so malignant and awful.
Marc:Even the things that... Yeah, sort of use it.
Guest:Your smile is just... Basically, the first part of the movie, I'm playing the parent trap dad.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:And then things go bad.
Marc:Then things go bad.
Marc:How do you stay in character generally over time?
Marc:Is it just happening?
Guest:I just turn it on and off.
Guest:Oh, really?
Guest:You know, I kind of first started to learn that with work with Meryl Streep in Postcards from the Edge.
Guest:And she was just like, you know, the great Meryl Streep.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And she is.
Guest:But, you know, she would just like, she'd be like goofing off, you know, just talking.
Guest:You know, we're just like having a good time on some completely different other subject, you know.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:It has nothing to do with the movie or the emotion, appropriate motion that goes with the scene that we're doing.
Guest:They say rolling and we're still like, okay, action.
Guest:Right in.
Guest:Right into it.
Guest:Just like that.
Guest:And then...
Guest:Cut right out of it.
Guest:No kidding.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Not walking around in it.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And I tell you what, it's actually easier in the long run to work that way.
Guest:Of course, number one, you don't take your work home with you.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Which the last time I did that was great balls of fire.
Guest:And I wound up in rehab doing that.
Guest:And number two, you just drop it like a hot potato so that you can go do what you ever have to do in your life, and you come back, and it'll be fresh.
Guest:In other words, I actually like it when I don't know what I'm going to do.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:You know what I mean?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Because you'll be in the moment more that way.
Guest:If you're not living it.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I don't learn my lines.
Guest:I may read the script about 10 times, but I don't learn my lines.
Guest:Until the day of?
Guest:Most of the time during rehearsal.
Guest:Really?
Guest:Unless I have a really long, long speech.
Guest:But you know the story and you know the character.
Marc:I just listen.
Guest:It makes you listen more to what the other character's saying so that you know the response.
Guest:It makes it more in the moment that way for me and I don't have to make up something.
Guest:You take all that stuff that you learn as an actor, the technique, learning about all those basics, and then you wad them up and throw it away and just let go.
Guest:Are you sober, Guy?
Guest:Well, I don't do cocaine anymore.
Guest:That was my drug of choice.
Guest:In fact, 1990, I did 30 days, 28 days in there, and I quit everything for like 10 years.
Guest:I did what they told me to do.
Guest:But then I started having a drink about the year 2000.
Guest:Alcohol was, I don't like the feeling of being drunk.
Marc:Right.
Marc:So you can manage it?
Guest:Yeah, it's nothing bad.
Guest:I just like that.
Guest:I get a little buzz, but feeling drunk, I feel so sluggish, and I don't like that feeling.
Marc:Cocaine was crazy.
Marc:Can you even imagine?
Guest:Cocaine I would do until it was all done there, and I would ask you if you had some when I had plenty in my pocket.
Marc:Been up for three days.
Marc:Yeah, it's a crazy drug.
Marc:As an older, I'm 55, you're older than me, but the thought of doing it now is just like, oh my God.
Marc:It's horrendous.
Marc:You gotta look back.
Marc:I can't imagine it.
Marc:You're up for three days talking about nothing to nobody.
Guest:Yeah, or you do the first snip of it, then spend the next 12 hours trying to get that feeling back again.
Guest:And then you're just up.
Guest:Yeah, then you're just up, and you gotta be at work in an hour.
Guest:The worst.
Guest:Not really great.
Guest:The worst.
Guest:Build some track.
Yeah.
Marc:All right, man.
Marc:Great talking to you.
Marc:You too, man.
Marc:Thanks for coming back.
Marc:It was really a lot of fun.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:So that's that.
Marc:How was that?
Marc:I love that guy.
Marc:It's like, you know, sometimes I'm in this chair and I'm looking right at a guy I've looked at on screen my whole life and he smiles and I'm like, that's Dennis Quaid.
Marc:Sitting right there.
Marc:I'm going to play some echoey guitar.
Marc:I'm going to bring some more pedals up here.
Marc:Apparently I'm going to be here a while.
Marc:I will get some more pedals.
Marc:But I'm just going to do this now.
Marc:I am the Three Chord Wonder.
Marc:Is that alright?
Marc:Is that a good superhero name?
Marc:The Three Chord Wonder?
Marc:Here he comes with his basic blues power.
Marc:Here he comes with his basic ability to play three chords in a thoughtful, kind of ethereal way.
Marc:Look out!
Marc:Everyone's going to take a pause because I'm the three chord wonder.
Marc:I distract them.
Marc:They're like, is this song going anywhere?
Marc:I don't think so.
Marc:Oh no, we've been tied up by the other superheroes.
Marc:Yep, I did it again.
Marc:Enjoy.
Guest:Thank you.
guitar solo
Marc:Boomer lives!
Thank you.