Episode 1292 - Rory Cochrane
Guest:Lock the gates!
Marc:All right, let's do this.
Marc:How are you, what the fuckers?
Marc:What the fuck buddies?
Marc:What the fuck nicks?
Marc:What the fuckineers?
Marc:What the fuck cats?
Marc:How's it going?
Marc:Seriously, how are you?
Marc:Closing out this year, looking back at it, and what, looking forward to the new one with hope and an open mind, are we?
Marc:So, happy new year.
Marc:Today on the show, I talked to Rory Cochran.
Marc:I'll tell you the main reason I wanted to talk to Rory Cochran.
Marc:It's really, oddly, it's because of one performance.
Marc:And it's in a movie that a lot of people, I don't know if they'd seen.
Marc:It's the Black Mass movie with Johnny Depp as Whitey Bulger.
Marc:Jesse Plemons is in it.
Marc:And...
Marc:Roy Cochran plays a real guy who was one of Bolger's henchmen, a gangster, a killer.
Marc:And I'd never seen a performance in my life.
Marc:And this is just because I've looked in the eyes of killers before.
Marc:I know it sounds odd.
Marc:Have I?
Marc:You know, I'm not talking about an AA meeting, talking to a vet or something.
Marc:In New York, there was a couple of times where I've met or spent time with
Marc:It's something that happens in show business.
Marc:Occasionally, you find yourself in a room with a gangster or a killer who kills for gangsters or is a gangster killer.
Marc:It just happens.
Marc:It's the way it is.
Marc:That's show business.
Marc:They've always been around show business.
Marc:And there's something about the look in their eye and the sort of matter-of-factness of it all that you know in your heart that they have done this thing.
Marc:But it is what it is, right?
Marc:And so, so many times, even in the best mob movies,
Marc:that people love, Godfather, Scorsese movies, there's something not quite authentic about the nature of a killer in some of those movies.
Marc:Movie stars don't always get it right, right?
Marc:I mean, De Niro has gotten a killer right before, but there is something slightly elevated about the myth of the gangster.
Marc:But somehow or another, Rory Cochran, in that movie, Black Mass in particular, I'd never seen a performance like that, to be honest with you.
Marc:And it was hard because he's working with this insanely made-up actor
Marc:Johnny Depp, who was wearing this... The makeup was nuts.
Marc:It was almost otherworldly, and it was supposed to be a regular person.
Marc:Whatever the case was, there's a scene there.
Marc:There's a fucking scene in there.
Marc:with Rory's prostitute girlfriend and Depp.
Marc:It's pretty grim, but there was just something about, there are these interview segments in that movie where they have interrogations of these characters.
Marc:And I'd just never seen something so natural and so fucking real in the nature of that character.
Marc:So that's really the reason I want to talk to him.
Marc:He's been in a lot of stuff.
Marc:Him and Plemons know each other real well from Scott Cooper movies.
Marc:That was Black Mass.
Marc:Also Hostiles with, I don't think Plemons was in, I can't remember, but with Christian Bale.
Marc:But you might know him from Dazed and Confused from way back.
Marc:Argo, Public Enemies.
Marc:He was on CSI Miami for four seasons.
Marc:He's in the new movie Encounter with Rez Ahmed and Octavia Spencer.
Marc:But it was great meeting him.
Marc:It was intense.
Marc:I don't know, man.
Marc:I'm just, I guess I'm at a crossroads with myself.
Marc:As we head into this new year, I've been wrestling with things in terms of acceptance.
Marc:Whatever's going on in the world, I'm happy it's raining here in Los Angeles.
Marc:Has been for the last week or so, on and off.
Marc:But apparently the amount of rain and how it comes down is something unique to this time we live in as the climate becomes chaotic and
Marc:But I've just been thinking about... I had a weird conversation last night in the green room of the comedy store with some young comics talking about a guy, a middleman, somebody who will facilitate... If you want clips put up on social media platforms to become viral through a Facebook page where you can get a million views and you can make 15, 20 grand a month just through views, through ad buys.
Marc:There's this whole world of new show business that...
Marc:that sort of barters in short clips and people are making a lot of money.
Marc:And I just listening to this and I'm hearing young comics go, oh man, give me his name for sure.
Marc:And I'm like, I'm done, man.
Marc:I'm past that.
Marc:I don't care.
Marc:Like I was always wondering like how some of these people get 300,000 fucking likes.
Marc:And it's because they have people working this angle.
Marc:of new platform oriented show business, you know, to sell tickets, but also to make money in their own right, you know, by numbers.
Marc:And I get it, but I don't do it.
Marc:I'm old school and I just don't, there's no reason for me to do it.
Marc:I don't mind being on the other side of this shit.
Marc:What I've realized lately is that I've got this small window right now to be grateful for what I've made, what I've done to appreciate, and I'm just bringing this up again, the stuff that I've accomplished, and I'm okay right now.
Marc:So how do I, as the world fucking...
Marc:diminishes as the earth dies and people become worse you know how do i find a pocket to at least at the very least look at what i've done and whatever fight that i have fought for whatever i've done it for entertainment the people the fans whoever
Marc:How do I pull back far enough to say, like, all right, so I'm okay.
Marc:Somehow I made it through, I'm okay.
Marc:And I don't have to fucking worry about this shit.
Marc:I don't have to worry about a two-minute clip getting a million views.
Marc:For what?
Marc:I got my people.
Marc:Hopefully I'll be able to do this tour I have planned.
Marc:Maybe I'll shoot another special.
Marc:But it's weird because I know, like even last night, that the comedy I'm doing now is...
Marc:Great.
Marc:It's the best I've done.
Marc:And I know that to be true.
Marc:And I do it for a few hundred people here and there.
Marc:Now with this, it's just odd now too with this, doing these 15 minute sets in the main room of the comedy store with Omicron out there.
Marc:It's just that I'm on stage.
Marc:I'm boosted.
Marc:I test frequently.
Marc:But if I do a good job, I'm bathing in what's got to be a COVID mist up there on stage from laughing people.
Marc:You got to figure there's at least...
Marc:A dozen in every 100 to 200 people who have it.
Marc:So why am I doing that?
Marc:Well, because I don't want to live in fear, I guess.
Marc:And I like what I'm doing right now, comedically.
Marc:I don't know.
Marc:I'm just trying as we enter this new year.
Marc:That is no doubt going to be another difficult year for a number of reasons.
Marc:It's very hard to have illusions of things sort of like getting better or things starting fresh.
Marc:So I tried to enter it with a practical mindset, a rational mindset, and kind of put the focus on what I can do and how am I going to see myself?
Marc:You never know when the other shoe is going to drop.
Marc:Trouble, sickness, whatever.
Marc:All I know is the last week or so during this time of holidays, I celebrated zero.
Marc:No celebrating.
Marc:And there were days where I had nothing to do and it was fucking glorious.
Marc:I mean, I felt that during the pandemic too, but then no one was doing anything.
Marc:And I felt that again, like, you know, I, I don't mind knowing tomorrow is empty and I don't have to be full of dread about getting somewhere or doing something or talking to somebody or fixing this or that, or fucking, you know, taking care of something.
Marc:It's just, I have no problem.
Marc:With nothing to do.
Marc:Because I fucking make myself busy, man.
Marc:I do the work.
Marc:I enjoy things.
Marc:But I guess at the very least, as you enter this new year, try to find some gratitude and again, try to be decent to people.
Marc:So, listen.
Marc:Happy New Year.
Marc:Please be careful.
Marc:I imagine parties are limited.
Marc:Try not to get the COVID.
Marc:If you do, ride it out.
Marc:Don't freak out.
Marc:Go to the hospital if you have to.
Marc:But I sought out Rory Cochran, and he was nice enough to come over.
Marc:And we...
Marc:We hashed it out a little bit.
Marc:His new movie, Encounter, is now streaming on Amazon Prime Video.
Marc:It's an alien bacteria movie.
Marc:Alien organisms that come on like a sickness.
Marc:This is me talking to Rory Cochran.
... ... ...
Marc:I noticed that you don't do much of this because there's no information on you.
Marc:Oh, good.
Marc:Somehow or another, you've managed to remain anonymous somehow.
Marc:Do you put effort into that?
Guest:I guess you could call it effort.
Guest:It's more of like a protective measure for me.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I mean, first of all, I think that as actors, we're always lucky to work.
Guest:Right.
Guest:You know, SAG's like 1% of union members work ever.
Marc:Is that true?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:So, yeah, it's kind of depressing.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:um my idea or my game plan is that if you don't do everything that's put in front of you right then you can have longevity oh okay and so yeah sometimes people you know get pissed off if you pass on something yeah yeah but you know they're not living your life or in your shoes right you know hopefully they'll get over it yeah
Guest:But yeah, I just try to work with good people if I can.
Guest:I've never turned down an opportunity with a good group.
Marc:But how does that play into staying sort of under the radar in terms of public knowledge of you?
Marc:You just don't do stuff.
Marc:You don't like to?
Guest:Well, I mean, I don't think it's important for me.
Guest:I think there's far too many people, you know, out there giving their opinion on, you know, there's too many opinions out there.
Guest:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Guest:Nobody, you know, there's enough.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Right.
Guest:You know, there's some people that get into it because they want to be like a movie star.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Or they want to be famous.
Guest:Right.
Guest:I don't want those things.
Guest:I like opportunities.
Guest:Yeah, right, right, right.
Guest:That makes sense.
Guest:That some of those people have.
Guest:Right.
Guest:But that was never a goal of mine.
Guest:Right.
Guest:So why would I want to kind of embrace that if I'm not getting the money these guys are getting?
Guest:Right.
Guest:And you know what I mean?
Guest:It's like that seems like the worst part of it.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Right.
Guest:You know, I was thinking about that as an actor, you need to have organic experiences with people.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Who don't know who you are.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Who don't, you know, have prejudged you or what have you.
Guest:In life, you mean.
Guest:And those can be good or bad experiences, but you need them to kind of be human and to be able to portray humanity in your way.
Guest:And if you're living kind of like an avatar or not a real existence, you don't go to the grocery store.
Guest:You have assistants and they hold the umbrellas for you.
Guest:You don't have an umbrella holder?
No.
Guest:I wish I get one.
Marc:At the very least, I think you should have an umbrella holder.
Marc:And then you could maybe you could portray an umbrella holder.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Well, I mean, when did you like because the reason I was excited to talk to you and because I'm a big fan of your work and the work I've seen of it.
Marc:of yours and in a way that I think addresses what you're talking about.
Marc:When I saw Black Mask specifically, and I like Cooper, I think he's a good director.
Marc:Yeah, me too.
Marc:That having been in comedy a while and having met a couple of real gangsters, the portrayal of real gangsters or of gangsters in general is always sort of heightened.
Marc:And you don't necessarily believe that they're killers because a lot of those guys are just people.
Marc:And I felt that the way that you did it or embodied that guy and just the look in your eye and the sense of, I don't know, it was a very subtle, almost sympathetic performance of that guy.
Marc:But I knew he was a killer, but you didn't play him as a killer in a way.
Yeah.
Guest:Yeah, I mean, I don't think that people wake up in the morning and, you know, I'm a killer.
Guest:I'm going to walk around like I'm a killer.
Guest:I mean, they have feelings and they're human beings.
Guest:Maybe, you know, bad human beings.
Guest:They have families and they have problems.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:It's just their job.
Guest:It's just their job.
Guest:And funnily enough, I was in Boston and I had, you know, the Boston accent is very, very difficult to do.
Guest:I mean, for me, I've done a bunch of different accents.
Marc:It's the worst because you could easily make a mockery of it.
Guest:You could, and also there's different variants of the accents.
Guest:Some people don't have that R that goes up.
Guest:They'll just have a regular R. It's regional.
Guest:There's North End accents.
Guest:What'd you go with?
Guest:I just went with God.
Guest:No, I would just say I had a dialect coach, and that's not the way that I can work, really.
Guest:I got to talk.
Guest:So I found some guys in Boston.
Guest:We hung out.
Guest:From where?
Guest:Which part?
Guest:I was there for years, Boston.
Guest:Southie.
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Guest:Okay.
Guest:And I knew these guys.
Guest:From how?
Guest:One was a... There was a boxing gym here called Wild Card, and Freddie Roach used to run it, and there was a guy in there named Tommy Barrett who was a boxing coach.
Guest:And I was literally in bars in Boston telling old men that I'd buy them a beer if they would just talk to me.
Guest:And I was in this bar in Southie.
Guest:They like to talk, don't they?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Well, I mean, if you buy them a beer, they'll talk to you.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And I saw Tommy Barrett sitting in this bar called Whitey's, ironically, in Southie.
Guest:Uh-huh.
Guest:And he was just like, you know, I got you, don't worry.
Guest:Uh-huh.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:So he sets you up with guys?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And we just, you know, he was dialed into that Southie kind of- And the guy you portrayed is a real guy?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Steve Flemmie, they called him the Rifle Man because he shot a bunch of people in the Korean War.
Guest:It was very accurate.
Guest:And that's how he got that nickname, not because he was a so-called killer.
Guest:Right.
Guest:From a war experience.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Now, when you go into a role like that with Scott and you're working with...
Marc:with Depp, and I just have Plemons in here, you know.
Marc:I love Jesse.
Marc:Yeah, yeah, he's great.
Marc:And I was talking about you, I'm like, you guys are great.
Marc:And he's telling me how, like, he says, you don't like to talk, like, on camera.
Marc:Like, you'd rather just act, like, you know, with as little lines as possible.
Marc:I'm like, well, I'm supposed to interview him.
Marc:Is that going to be...
Guest:Well, yeah.
Guest:Well, he's right about that.
Guest:But sometimes things are overwritten.
Guest:Sure.
Guest:Writers are right.
Guest:But people don't talk.
Guest:Potentially.
Guest:Exactly.
Guest:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:And it's no offense to the writer sometimes.
Guest:It's just, you know, you want to try to...
Guest:find a way to portray somebody that's not giving a monologue or something like that because they wouldn't do that.
Guest:Right, it happens all the time.
Guest:You wouldn't do that.
Guest:We were just talking outside.
Guest:You're not going to give me a dry tribe of stuff.
Guest:No, just what talked about the car.
Right.
Guest:That's what people do.
Guest:But back to your point earlier.
Guest:So I got to meet the real Johnny Moderano.
Guest:Now this guy went to prison.
Marc:The guy you portrayed?
Guest:No.
Guest:No, another guy.
Marc:That was another guy, real character.
Marc:The other gangster.
Marc:Was he in the movie?
Marc:Is he portrayed in the movie?
Guest:I remember.
Marc:He looks more Italian-looking guy.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:So he was really the hitman for- Whitey?
Guest:for whitey and those guys and um anyway i got to meet him on my own just sort of through connections i made there's a place called um daisy's daisy buchanan's yeah and uh that's where all the red sox players the yankees players would even go after their games anyway
Guest:And Joe, who was the owner of that place, at the time it's closed now.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:But he knew Matarano, and I got to meet him a couple times, and he told me... I mean, this guy's killed like 100 people.
Guest:Was he in prison?
Guest:He did 12 years, and I think...
Guest:It wasn't even for all the, you know, it was just a plea.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And anyway, he told me, he said, yeah, it's like, you know, we're hanging out, we're go chase girls together, we're gonna go do this here, we're gonna go kill guys together.
Guest:Right.
Guest:It's just a thing that they, you know, it wasn't as... They didn't think of it... Wasn't their whole life.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:It was just part of their life.
Guest:It was part of it.
Guest:It was, you know, his living.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And sometimes they knew the guys they were killing.
Guest:I'm sure they did.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:So, and how did you integrate that?
Marc:I mean, what I was going to ask you before was, you know, when you read the script or when Scott reached out to you to do the film, you know, what kind of information were you given?
Marc:Like, what was the kernel of that guy that you were like, this guy, I got the key to this guy?
Guest:um you know i i i read his book i i did research i met his when he wrote a book uh where they wrote a book on okay yeah um i met his son oh really in uh in boston randomly yeah randomly yeah how'd that play in pool uh and uh he was a great great guy uh steven yeah and um
Guest:I just sort of try to put pieces together.
Guest:I ended up meeting a go-go, an older go-go dancer that used to hang out with Steve Fleming, and she would tell me stories.
Guest:Is Steve dead?
Guest:He's in prison.
Guest:Oh, right.
Guest:I'm not quite sure.
Guest:Right.
Guest:I think he's still alive.
Guest:You didn't try to reach out to him?
Guest:No.
Guest:um at that point we had already when i had met his son his son offered to to to drive up nobody knows where this guy is apparently but of course his son does yeah sure so some was like we could drive up there it's like five six hours yeah uh at that point like three quarters of the movie was over right so i thought there was very little i could yeah um
Guest:But he would tell me stuff like my dad, you know, smoked cigars.
Guest:He didn't smoke cigarettes.
Guest:He did this.
Guest:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:You know, he wasn't this.
Marc:How did you get feedback from him after the movie?
Marc:The son?
Marc:Did anyone?
Guest:Yeah, I believe they all liked it.
Guest:Oh, they did?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:That's tricky, right?
Guest:It is tricky.
Guest:And you're not searching for the feedback.
Marc:No, of course not.
Marc:But like when you play, like I just played Jerry Wexler in the Aretha Franklin movie.
Marc:Nice.
Marc:And, you know, because you do that kind of research where you try to get into the guy and figure out how he talked and what he did and what drove him.
Marc:And then, you know, you do it.
Marc:And, you know, when somebody who knew him says, good job, it means something.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:No, I mean, it's flattering.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And, yeah, I got a lot of positive, I guess, compliments.
Guest:I thought it was amazing.
Marc:And I, like, I don't, like, so we're...
Marc:If it was never to be... Obviously, you work pretty regularly.
Marc:I see you in a lot of stuff.
Marc:I watched part of the new movie.
Marc:I'm glad I didn't watch all of it.
Marc:I got the link a little late, but I'm bad at talking about movies I've seen that you're promoting because I'm bad with spoilers.
Marc:But I know that there's a parasite problem...
Marc:And that, you know, there's aliens.
Marc:And I'm assuming that somebody saves the world, but I don't know.
Guest:Mark, I don't know.
Guest:I'm actually going to see it on the second.
Marc:So the premiere?
Marc:What is that, Thursday?
Guest:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Marc:So I don't know.
Marc:Well, we'll both find out, I guess, eventually.
Guest:I can tell you what I do know is that the director did a movie called Beast, which was his first movie, and it was terrific.
Guest:Oh, wait a minute.
Guest:Beast?
Guest:Yeah, just Beast.
Marc:Huh.
Marc:What was that about?
Marc:I feel like I might have seen that.
Marc:I did see that.
Guest:That's kind of a gnarly movie.
Guest:Yeah, I thought it was excellent.
Guest:And, you know, when they brought me this thing, they told me Riz Ahmed and Octavia Spencer.
Guest:It looks good.
Guest:It's got a good look.
Guest:I thought, yeah, I'm in.
Marc:Sure.
Marc:So if the agenda was not really to become a movie star, like when you started, because I remember you when you were a kid, how did it start?
Marc:When did the drive start to be an actor?
Guest:It was more or less, I guess I fell into it a little bit.
Guest:We grew up in Jamaica, Queens in New York.
Guest:I know that part, yeah.
Guest:How many in the family?
Guest:Uh, at that point, it's my brother and my sister and my mother.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And we're living in this crummy, you know, one bedroom apartment.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And the idea was like my local school, I remember being in third grade.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And they shot some sixth grader shot another sixth grader in the head.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And I was like, I kind of don't want to go to that school anymore.
Guest:So I just kept going further and further away from my school from where I lived.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:Because obviously your mom agreed with you.
Marc:Maybe you shouldn't go to that school.
Guest:I don't remember the conversation, but I just remember going one subway stop and then going three subway stops for junior high school.
Guest:And then my zoned high school was Hillcrest, which was a very dangerous school.
Guest:So there was this school called the Performing Arts in New York City.
Guest:And so my brother had... You have to audition.
Guest:And so they have five departments.
Guest:And he was going for art.
Guest:And my sister was going for voice.
Guest:And I thought, well, I don't want to miss out on this.
Guest:So they were all in the arts, huh?
Guest:So I went for drama and art.
Guest:I ended up getting in for both.
Guest:And...
Guest:What kind of art?
Guest:Painting?
Guest:Yeah, just all around.
Guest:And my brother was always complaining about the art department, so I was like, let me try this drama thing.
Guest:And I was god-awful, by the way.
Guest:I mean, just... How did it start?
Guest:Just you have to audition.
Guest:Do you remember what you did?
Guest:I did a monologue or two.
Guest:They were just terrible, but I was always never good at auditioning.
Guest:Anyway, they took pity on me, let me in, and then that was that.
Marc:That was that?
Marc:And then, so going into it primarily to escape...
Marc:Escape.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Escape.
Marc:And I guess at a relatively young age, you realize that life is pretty fragile and things are dangerous.
Marc:And, you know, you sought this sort of other world.
Marc:Now, not really knowing whether or not that was a world you necessarily wanted to be part of...
Marc:When you got there, what changed for you in terms of, like, did you, were you, like, in awe of people doing that stuff?
Marc:I mean, it's a whole different world, man.
Guest:Yeah, I wasn't in awe of that.
Guest:I mean, it was all kind of silly.
Guest:And, you know, they're doing these exercise, sense memory exercise, and just stupid things.
Marc:Unless you went there for all of high school.
Guest:i did yeah and then they they sort of had this um policy where you couldn't audition professionally if you were in school it was a public high school but again uh you had to there was thousands of kids that wanted to go yeah yeah they would accept maybe two three hundred yeah um
Guest:But so one day a friend of mine was like, hey, I'm going to go on this audition after school.
Guest:We can get a slice of pizza afterwards.
Guest:And I was like, well, we're not supposed to do that.
Guest:And he said, yeah, it doesn't matter.
Guest:So I go with him and the cast director was like, hey, are you going to read too?
Guest:And I said, no, I'm just here with my friend.
Guest:She was like, well, we're seeing a lot of people.
Guest:Maybe you should read.
Guest:And I was like, yeah.
Guest:And she was like, well, just take a look.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:So I read for that, and she's like, I got good news and bad news.
Guest:The bad news is I'm not bringing your friend back.
Guest:The good news is I'm bringing you back.
Guest:I ended up getting that thing.
Guest:What was that?
Guest:It was a show called Saturday Night with Connie Chung.
Guest:Do you remember her?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And so they did this docudrama about... So Marlon Brando was in half the episode, and then I'm in half the episode.
Guest:Marlon Brando?
Guest:Yeah.
Okay.
Guest:It's kind of cool.
Guest:Did you meet him?
Guest:I didn't meet him.
Guest:He had done an interview with her, and then half of it was me playing this crack dealer in Brooklyn.
Marc:Huh.
Marc:And so your first gig was like a reenactment?
Guest:Yes.
Guest:Well, yeah, sort of, yeah.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:How long did that show stay on the air?
Guest:I don't remember that.
Marc:I don't know.
Marc:So it was like Marlon Brando, and now we're going to take you to a crack corner.
Marc:Yes.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:Was there a story?
Guest:You didn't know.
Guest:I mean, it was a story.
Guest:It was based on a real kid that was like a 14-year-old crack deal.
Guest:What did Marlon Brando have to do with it?
Marc:He was just doing an interview.
Marc:Oh, so he was just another part of the show.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Did you watch that part?
Guest:I don't know if I watched the whole thing.
Guest:I think they might have sent me a tape or something like that.
Guest:So that kind of got you rolling?
Guest:In a way.
Guest:Was it interesting to you?
Guest:Sure.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I mean, it's something I could do, you know, in my sleep.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Play a drug dealer.
Guest:There were so many of them, you know, you knew of them.
Marc:You knew them.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:So then after that, did you get in trouble at school?
Marc:No.
Marc:For doing it?
Marc:No.
Marc:Oh, no.
Marc:No.
Marc:So the policy doesn't hold?
Marc:No.
Marc:And you were what, a sophomore, freshman?
Marc:I was a junior, I think.
Marc:Yeah?
Marc:And then does it start rolling from there?
Marc:Did you start going on more auditions with that particular casting director, or you don't know what happened?
Guest:No.
Guest:I went on another thing, and I got that, and that was to play a transvestite in this movie, Matt Dillon.
Guest:It was a little tiny part, and that was a whole...
Guest:Another thing.
Guest:That was a sort of lesson in the industry of how people, there was an actress and she wasn't going to do this thing unless her brother got a part.
Guest:What was this?
Guest:What movie?
Guest:The director's like, I don't know where to put this fucking guy.
Guest:He's going to be your brother.
Guest:And they do this whole scene.
Guest:I'm supposed to have one line.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And we turn into this whole long scene because this guy's forced to be in the movie.
Guest:So we shoot this thing.
Guest:Wow.
Guest:That was part of the negotiation?
Guest:He never used the thing because it was just to satisfy her.
Guest:Oh, I got your brother in the movie.
Guest:Right.
Guest:And then he cut everything.
Guest:And then he just cut that out.
Guest:Me too?
Guest:I think my line's still in there.
Guest:I don't know.
Guest:I mean, I didn't care.
Guest:I knew this wasn't the one.
Marc:So this was a kiss before dying?
Marc:Yes.
Marc:Oh, yeah.
Marc:So do you sometimes not read the whole script?
Marc:Yes.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:What does it depend on?
Guest:It depends on, I guess, how heavy I am in the script.
Guest:Right.
Guest:And, I mean, I don't believe you have to.
Guest:It's not necessarily out of laziness.
Guest:No.
Guest:It's just that you don't need to know what...
Guest:Happens after.
Guest:Right.
Guest:You don't need to know what these people are doing unless it affects you or they're talking about you in some way that shapes your character.
Guest:Sure.
Guest:For the most part, it's almost better if you don't know.
Guest:Sure.
Guest:No, I think I agree with that.
Marc:Now, did your brother and sister stay in the arts?
Guest:No.
Guest:No, they didn't.
Guest:Well, actually, my brother kind of did... He... I think he has, like, a production company in New York, and he's kind of... Yeah, I would say yes.
Guest:My sister's a lawyer.
Marc:And did you... Was there... Because, like, you know, when I talk to people who...
Marc:are in the arts and stuff, did you get support at home?
Marc:Did you come from arty people?
Marc:No.
Marc:No.
Marc:No.
Marc:I got thrown out of the house because I wouldn't go to college.
Marc:Oh, okay.
Marc:So after the kiss before dying,
Marc:Because I remember you in Dazed and Confused.
Marc:And it's interesting when you see how you've turned out as a grown-up that a lot of the roles you take now are weighty.
Marc:They're heavy.
Marc:You bring a lot to it.
Marc:And that character was kind of this, I mean, obviously you're a kid, but was that the big break?
Guest:That was, yeah, I guess you would call it that, where you sort of enter into the zeitgeist a little bit.
Marc:Yeah, and how did that, well, what was Fathers and Sons?
Marc:I can't remember if I've seen that.
Guest:That was, I consider that sort of my first movie.
Guest:That was Jeff Goldblum.
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Guest:And I played his son.
Guest:I was thrilled to get that part.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:you know we shot it in new jersey jersey uh in asbury park oh yeah yeah and um i love jeff goldman from the fly you know he's a great actor very quirky interesting actor i think um so i did that but that didn't really uh go anywhere you played his son yes how are you out of school yes do you still use some of the stuff that you learned when you were a kid in putting your shit together now
Marc:Not from school necessarily, but maybe from just growing up.
Marc:And did you come away from that experience at that high school with some craft in place?
Guest:Yeah, I don't want to downplay the intentions that school has.
Guest:And, you know, a lot of people came out of that school and did very well.
Guest:You have basic sort of things that you pick up, sure, especially after four years.
Guest:Right.
Guest:But it was...
Guest:It was a good place, especially for some people that had sort of challenging home lives.
Guest:And yeah, I mean, I think- You felt that that was a common thing?
Guest:There were a lot of kids in that school where, you know, it was a good thing that they were there.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Right.
Guest:You can very easily go into a different direction.
Guest:I mean, even in that school, they had kids, you know, some kid asked me to sell crack.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:You know, showing me guns.
Guest:I'm like, wow, what department are you in?
Guest:The crack department.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:And now so then I have to assume that when you get an opportunity to work with Goldblum that, you know, there you know, you're picking stuff up, you know, that, you know, engaging with these other, you know, he was he's kind of an interesting actor.
Marc:I mean, did you find you were absorbing stuff?
Guest:Not really.
Guest:I mean, you learn from things.
Guest:I remember we were doing a scene at the end, and I was ready to go, and they broke for lunch, and then we had lunch, and then after the lunch, I just didn't have the same feelings.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:that i had when i was starving and so it was bad you know it wasn't good but it's those kind of things you pick up oh we're going to do an emotional scene i'll eat afterwards oh yeah right so that was the lesson you couldn't you couldn't fake it yeah yeah do you so you so you're able to look at the post lunch scene in the movie like yeah it's full of food but you know that as sure as an actor you see you go god maybe nobody will pick it up but you know
Marc:You know, of course, you know everything.
Marc:Like, you know, like, you know, like, why didn't I wait one second before I said that?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Are you able to watch your shit?
Guest:I mean, I do.
Guest:I watch it because I try to, you know, learn.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Or is there something I could have done better differently?
Guest:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:But I don't watch a lot.
Guest:I don't watch the movies again because I feel like you got to just keep moving forward.
Guest:I get that.
Guest:So how does Dazed and Confused happen?
Yeah.
Guest:So I am in L.A.
Guest:For what?
Guest:The other movie or what?
Guest:No, I'm just out here.
Guest:Oh, you moved?
Guest:I moved out.
Guest:I'm working at Jerry's Deli.
Guest:Out in the valley?
Guest:In the valley.
Guest:I think they closed it now.
Guest:I think so too.
Marc:How old were you when you moved out here?
Marc:19.
Marc:And you didn't know?
Marc:You had representation, I guess?
Marc:uh yeah sort of yeah i did probably wasn't the strongest but you know but you but you had a you had a reason to come because you'd done the two movies yeah i mean i was really you know gambling yeah um but that's not an old story a lot of people do that sure um
Guest:But yeah, so I was out, and then I go in for this casting session.
Guest:I meet Don Phillips.
Guest:He casts Fast Times of Richmond High, Saurpico.
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Guest:He produced Melvin Howard.
Guest:Oh, that's a great movie.
Guest:He just died on Thanksgiving.
Guest:Oh, shit.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:How old was he?
Guest:I got the call that wasn't... Well, you stayed close with that guy?
Guest:I did, but more like he'd call me and be like, Yankees suck, Roar.
Guest:You know?
Yeah.
Guest:we were just buddies so he's an old timey casting director uh yeah yeah yeah and producer and producer and he um he was casting that and uh he just had a process where he wouldn't make actors read he would just talk yeah to them and get a feel and sense for them and then he'd bring them back accordingly yeah and uh
Guest:And then everybody, it was like four or five times you had to go back, and then everybody read the main character, and all the girls read the main girl character.
Marc:For Dazed and Confused?
Guest:Yes.
Guest:And then they sort of put you where they thought that you should go.
Guest:But I remember they had a pizza party for all the finalists.
Guest:and they basically told everybody you got the part, except for me.
Guest:I went back to New York, and I was like, oh, well.
Guest:I thought you moved out here.
Guest:I did, but I had gone back to New York just to be like, fuck this for a minute.
Guest:And then I got a call, like, do you want to go to Texas for the summer?
Guest:And I was like, yes, I do.
Guest:And yeah, it was great.
Guest:I mean, that was a blast.
Guest:So that character was kind of lit up.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And it seems very different than you.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I mean, I knew hippies growing up.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:So you knew the rap.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:And was that all scripted?
Guest:A lot of it was improvised.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:But when that movie came out, it didn't do well in the box office, but it became like a cult classic.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:and for about a year afterwards all they were doing was offering me you know that part dude where's your car uh right half baked you know just all these similar because you were a character right and i thought well if i go down and it goes back to what we talked about in the beginning if i if i go and take all these jobs you know then i'm that guy right right and as a kid almost
Guest:Like you're playing teenager.
Guest:You get boxed in.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And yeah, you take that.
Guest:Then that money's gone, right?
Guest:Right.
Guest:And then who are you?
Guest:That's your resume.
Guest:And so you knew enough to avoid that.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I made sure that the next thing I did after that was completely opposite.
Marc:So you were given at least the opportunity to read for a lot of stuff, and you were able to have a choice, and you were able to get whatever came next, 11 of 45 or whatever.
Guest:Again, Don Phillips didn't cast that, but he introduced the director and me and some other people together, and he sort of was responsible for making that happen.
Guest:So he's sort of your champion, that guy.
Yeah.
Guest:I mean, he championed me definitely.
Guest:He championed a lot of people.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:But he wasn't, you know, I wasn't not going to eat.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Because, you know, if Don didn't come through on something, I didn't look at him like that.
Guest:No, no, right, right.
Marc:He was just a pal.
Marc:Right.
Marc:Yeah, yeah.
Marc:But I guess the point is he believed in you early on.
Marc:He did.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:And it's good to have those guys.
Guest:it is yeah and he uh i mean when you look him up later he he is uh he was a legend yeah i mean just even just going out i have friends multiple friends that are in the business yeah they can tell you about don phillips and were you guys hanging out too like did he like did he share stories about the old days yeah yeah yeah oh that's great
Marc:yeah it was wonderful uh i'll miss him yeah were you able to uh and he wasn't minding his p's and q's you know he tells you what's up right yeah so you got the real story yeah yeah yeah so were you able to uh like who when you were coming up i mean who were the guys that you look up to when you when you were watching movies or who were you who were your guys you know like where you were like that's the guy
Guest:You know, when you're younger, you always think about Robert De Niro and those guys, Pacino.
Guest:When you're in the business for a while, people can be sort of disappointing.
Guest:Sometimes if you meet them or just sometimes you just see... Oh, yeah.
Guest:Yeah, so you kind of...
Guest:Your candle goes out.
Marc:It ruins it for you.
Marc:It's almost like what you were talking about.
Marc:When you do get to meet them, you have that human experience that you were talking about, and that's got to play into the catalog that you're doing.
Marc:Do you know what I'm saying?
Marc:If you meet one of these guys that you thought was great or whatever, and they're disappointing or they're just painfully human or not interesting, that's one of those human experiences, that disappointment.
Guest:Yeah, and no one, I think, should be put on a pedestal.
Guest:And I don't think they'd want to be put on a pedestal.
Guest:And if they did, then they're probably a fucking asshole.
Marc:Sure, yeah.
Marc:But it is kind of an interesting thing, because I imagine over time, I don't know the full filmography, but you must have met a lot of guys you spent your childhood watching.
Guest:Yeah, sure.
Guest:And, you know, it's nice when that happens.
Guest:You feel fortunate.
Guest:You feel, I mean, listen, it was great to work with Johnny Depp.
Guest:I was like, holy shit, you're fucking, you know, you're Johnny Depp.
Guest:You know, the guy's like the biggest movie star in the world.
Guest:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:And was he a nice guy?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Sweetheart.
Guest:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Guest:And, you know... Yeah, just to... The problem with the media is that they portray whatever they want to portray, but they don't know necessarily these people.
Guest:Sure.
Guest:And they paint them as these... Yeah.
Guest:The guy's like...
Guest:Wouldn't come to work because they were treating the crew badly.
Guest:You know, we were in Wisconsin shooting this Michael Mann movie.
Guest:Which one was that?
Guest:Public Enemies.
Marc:Oh, yeah.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:What'd you play in that?
Guest:I played an FBI agent.
Marc:And O'Dep sort of went on strike for a day or two?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I mean, everybody had to fly in the studio heads because they were just because they were, he didn't want to go to work where you're treating the crew badly.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:You know?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I mean, think about that.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Right.
Guest:So he doesn't have to do that.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:But he's saying, no, I want people, you know what I mean?
Guest:People treated correctly.
Guest:It's like a character thing.
Guest:Sure.
Guest:So when, when they assassinate somebody's character, I think it's awful.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Because people believe whatever they, what's out there.
Marc:What do you take from, when did you start to feel, obviously the actor you were in Dazed and Confused, you were younger and you got the character or whatever, but it seems that at some point,
Marc:You started to sort of realize, like, I don't want to be a movie star.
Marc:I mean, I guess you knew that pretty close right after that, that you weren't going to be typecast.
Marc:But at some point, your sort of approach to acting must have expanded, you know, in terms of like how you were going to, you know, utilize your experience and, you know, deal with these guys as human.
Marc:When does that start to where'd you get that?
Guest:I mean, I guess I decided after the Dazed and Confused thing that, you know, you could probably clean up right now financially.
Guest:Right.
Guest:But if I want to be in it for the long haul.
Marc:So it was a business decision more than an art decision.
Guest:I mean, I think it was both.
Guest:Money was never part of the process.
Guest:It was just, how can I do this for a long time?
Guest:I'll give you an example.
Guest:So there was a cast director named Mally Finn.
Guest:Are you familiar with her?
Guest:Well, she's no longer with us, but she was...
Guest:Cast in this movie, Titanic.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And she brought me in and asked me straight up, she was like, do you want to be a movie star?
Guest:And I said, no.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And she goes, well, what do you want to do?
Guest:I said, well, I want to be like a freight train that just keeps on moving.
Guest:yeah you know yeah and she's like all right well there's four or five actors that i'm considering it for to meet james for this yeah they didn't need a star because they had 250 million dollars yeah uh and she's like i won't bring you in to meet james yeah and i said okay
Guest:So no Titanic.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:I mean, who's to say?
Marc:No, of course.
Marc:But the point is that you knew you wanted longevity and to sort of have a lifetime of work.
Marc:And evolve with the work.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:You know, as opposed to, you know, ego driven.
Marc:Right.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:So you don't you don't have any differentiation.
Marc:You know, you know, TV is fine.
Marc:I mean, nowadays are there.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:But when he started, you know.
Marc:I mean, you did a lot.
Marc:Oh, yeah, you did a lot of CSI.
Marc:But back in the day, I imagine you're hanging out with some actors, right?
Marc:When you're younger, in your 20s, you had some friends.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:And you had that sort of business, sort of like, don't do TV, man.
Marc:Was there any of that going on?
Guest:You know, back in the day, there were producers who still felt like, oh, well, that guy's a television actor.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:But nowadays, it doesn't fucking matter what the hell you do.
Guest:But when did you start doing TV?
Guest:I took that job when I was 30.
Guest:I had moved back to New York.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:It was really good money for me.
Guest:I was like, this is kind of crazy.
Guest:The CSI Miami?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And so we did that, and I just- Did you spend a lot of time in Florida?
Guest:No, not too much.
Guest:That was fun, though.
Guest:They'd fly us down for pickup shots or aerial shots, whatever the fuck.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:But we did that and it was the number one show in the world.
Guest:Not just America, in the world.
Guest:And everybody thinks I'm nuts.
Guest:I want to get off this thing.
Guest:You did want to get off it?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:But you did like a lot.
Guest:Well, I did two years.
Guest:And so after two years, you can negotiate and get the really good money.
Guest:And they said, do you want to do that?
Guest:I said, no.
Guest:I said, I just want, can they let me out?
Guest:And they said, everyone thought I was nuts.
Guest:I mean, really.
Marc:So they had to kill you?
Guest:I didn't have a, well, I didn't ask them to kill me, but that's what they decided to do.
Guest:But then part of the.
Guest:You didn't ask them.
Guest:Yeah, I said, well, are they going to let me out?
Guest:They said, yeah.
Guest:They said, but you have to do two episodes for the remainder of your contract, which was the six-year contract.
Guest:So I said, well, they shot me.
Guest:They're not going to...
Guest:do that that doesn't make any sense yeah and so three years later they brought me back i was like a ghost and they were like and i did it because i agreed to you know and and and and given that that was the thinking of how to bring you back that's probably why you left in the first place is that there was a number of reasons why i left uh
Guest:They didn't treat people very well.
Guest:They went through seven wardrobe departments in my two years.
Guest:Really?
Guest:You stopped learning people's names because they would just fire them left and right.
Guest:And then you're, you know, you're, you're, um, you're getting into, I felt like I was getting into bad patterns where I just didn't care.
Marc:Well, that's the, I think that's the thing is that's the, that's the, the, the Faustian bargain that you make, you know, that most people make for the money.
Marc:You know, why, why bail?
Marc:Well, I mean, if you're soul dead and you're sweeping through the thing and, and, you know, and, and you're not honoring your, your heart, what do you, you know, after a certain point, that's going to crush you.
Yeah.
Guest:Right, and I don't have children, so if I did, I probably would have wrote it out.
Guest:Interesting, yeah.
Guest:And I probably would have made a lot of different choices.
Guest:Sure, sure.
Marc:Yeah, to have children would have been one.
Marc:Yeah, yeah.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Well, I mean, so, but most of it was because you wanted to honor, you know, what you got into it for.
Marc:I mean, it was a good gig.
Marc:It got you solvent and, you know, you're grounded and you got a life and you got some money in the bank.
Marc:So now, like, go back to doing what, you know, the things you want to do as opposed to be that guy for the rest of your life.
Marc:I mean, you avoided being that guy before.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I mean, yeah.
Guest:I don't regret that one bit, but I certainly don't know how it would be had I done it for 10 years.
Marc:Well, yeah, but it seems like that I have to assume...
Marc:That every job you take, you know, adds to a certain amount of experience.
Marc:Right.
Marc:So, like, you know, whatever it was for those 50 episodes, you probably got some chops.
Marc:You know, somehow, you know, you become more of a veteran.
Marc:And, you know, there's certain habits and stuff that they're good to have in place.
Marc:So you can kind of free yourself to do the other shit.
Guest:Yeah, you always learn something.
Marc:How different, like with Public Enemy, so you work with Michael Mann.
Marc:Now, in terms of directors, what's your experience been in terms of, because I've talked to directors, I've talked to actors with directors.
Marc:Have there been directors that have had a profound influence on you?
Marc:I imagine Cooper does.
Guest:I mean, Cooper's, you know, like...
Guest:For him to take a chance on me playing Steve Fleming in Black Mass, which is, you know, that Whitey Boulder story belongs to Boston.
Guest:It's their thing.
Guest:And a lot of people tried to make it for a long time.
Guest:And not only that, you know, when they're making it, you have the agencies obviously pushing their clients, you know, trying to package it.
Guest:you know sure so they sort of had to him and john lesher had to go uh around that yeah and just say we want you to to do it and um how'd you meet scott on that he brought you in for that he just yeah he he he knew you and he wanted i i guess he knew of me yeah um but uh
Guest:Yeah, and once I, you know, we had a rapport, I was like, this is fucking amazing.
Guest:And then we did Hostiles.
Guest:Yeah, you were great in that too.
Marc:I met him on a plane.
Marc:He told me that.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:And I'm like, who's that guy?
Marc:What is that guy all about?
Marc:Oh, he told you about that?
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:I was like, even back then, I was like, I want to meet that guy.
Guest:Well, thank you.
Yeah.
Guest:So, yeah.
Guest:So as an actor, when you work with a guy like Scott, you just feel free.
Guest:You kind of feel at home.
Guest:You feel supported.
Guest:You feel nurtured.
Guest:There's like a shorthand.
Guest:You just feel like you're able without any, you have nothing holding you back.
Guest:Interesting.
Guest:He gives you the freedom to bring what you can.
Guest:And of course, you know, he knows what he wants and how to manipulate, you know, certain scenes and stuff.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:But yeah, it's just a very freeing experience.
Marc:Would you say that's like one of the better experiences you've had?
Guest:yeah i would i'm both films yeah hostiles yeah that's a great movie it is a good movie and i you know just the experiences uh that you that you have when you make these movies like in boston i met all those people in new mexico i'm you know we had this um this advisor this uh
Guest:He's the chief of the Northern Cheyenne.
Guest:His name's Chief Phillip.
Guest:And he's a good friend of mine now.
Guest:We've been out to the reservation in Montana, and I've been with him in other places in America.
Guest:It's just...
Guest:You know, that's the beauty of part of this business is developing these relationships that you would never otherwise, you know, come across probably.
Marc:So what's that experience been like for you?
Marc:Like, you know, having a relationship with contemporary Native American culture?
Guest:You know, growing up in New York, I had never met a Native American before.
Guest:So it was very powerful.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Especially the subject matter of that movie.
Yeah.
Guest:it's just uh in terms of the history and yeah i you know i wish there was a way because i think that a lot of uh americans don't even know or understand what what what's still happening yeah uh with these uh reservations yeah um with that with the drug drug problems
Guest:I mean, number one, deaths by police.
Guest:Oh, really?
Guest:Missing women never get... You know, that white girl was missing.
Guest:Ten minutes, yeah.
Guest:All over the news for like a month or whatever.
Guest:Yeah, until they found her and the killer.
Guest:They're missing all the time.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And nobody's done anything about it.
Marc:Must be heavy.
Marc:And it is...
Marc:I grew up in New Mexico.
Marc:He's not from New Mexico, though.
Marc:They brought him in, right?
Guest:Yeah, he's from Montana.
Marc:Yeah, yeah.
Marc:It's beautiful up there, right?
Marc:Mm-hmm.
Marc:And when you do, like Michael Mann, what was that like to work with him as a director?
Guest:Um, he, you know, it's, it's Michael Manson.
Guest:You're excited.
Guest:Um, he's very, very particular, um, about what he wants.
Guest:And, um, it, uh, he, sometimes I think he creates, uh, um,
Guest:like a sense of of chaos that doesn't need to be there oh really uh yeah but you know he's made so many good films that um you know if if you think it works for you then right right i guess so you gotta repeat there were a lot of frustrated departments on that film i'll just say
Marc:You seem to be pretty sensitive on the whole operation, which is nice.
Marc:Like, you know, you seem to have a sense of the community of a project.
Guest:Well, it's important.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I mean, as you know, fucking catering is very important.
Guest:Oh, dude.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Like, it affects the morale, right?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:When you've got bad food, it's the worst.
Guest:When you've got crew guys going out to McDonald's because the food's so bad, then you're not going to have a happy set.
Guest:Cable is not going to be lame the way it should.
Marc:Even craft services, if that stinks, it's like... Because you're living there.
Guest:People should be cognizant of the whole group.
Marc:But even like it seems that your alliance or your understanding...
Marc:And these are just relationships part of the job to know these casting directors and understand what they've done and where they come from and who they are as people.
Marc:It's important because they're your portal.
Marc:They're going to be the ones that are like, let's bring that guy in.
Guest:um yeah yeah what about uh argo was that exciting yeah i mean i i um i love we got to shoot in istanbul which is great had you been there before i hadn't wow so that was really great and um you know ben is a tremendous director i mean the town
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Guest:It was fucking phenomenal.
Guest:I like that movie.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:And I just saw him in that Clooney movie.
Marc:I saw him in two movies.
Marc:Good actor, too.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:He was excellent.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:And how was that set?
Marc:Did you feel like he could really do the work?
Guest:Yeah, he had us live in a house in Hancock Park, the flat, somewhere down there.
Guest:Had us the five or six, however many it was of us.
Guest:Hostages?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:We lived in a house for a week.
Guest:We didn't know each other.
Guest:Had the wardrobe, 70s wardrobe, and just see you in a week kind of thing.
Guest:And they bring us food.
Marc:Right, right.
Marc:So you had a sort of a slightly upscale hostage experience?
Guest:Yeah, we had to figure it out.
Guest:Play board games, tell stories, drink a lot.
Guest:But by the end of it, we had a sort of a forced artificial bond that was becoming real.
Marc:And that completely grounded the roles.
Marc:I think it helped.
Marc:Yeah, yeah.
Marc:Yeah, I guess so.
Marc:I guess like, you know.
Guest:But, you know, you go to Istanbul and, you know, guys are grabbing these girls in the street and, you know, they're terrified.
Guest:And I think all that stuff sort of helped.
Guest:Oh, that the culture itself was- Yeah, well, because it's not, you know, it's not, they're not used to these foreigners sort of walking around showing skin.
Guest:Right.
Guest:So you're just saying they can't control themselves?
Guest:I'm not saying all of them.
Marc:I'm saying, you know, it happened.
Guest:Right, right.
Guest:It shook them up a little bit.
Marc:Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Marc:So is there something that you, like as, I know you just want to be a freight train and just want to keep moving and keep getting opportunities, but is there something in your mind you want to do or accomplish, you know, as an actor or try that you haven't done yet?
Marc:Do you, you know, I asked Jesse about it.
Marc:I said, why don't you guys, I thought like the two of you should do True West.
Marc:And he's like, we don't do theater.
Marc:He's like, you're not going to do theater.
Marc:It's like, no one does theater.
Marc:Like, you know, I thought that you two guys should, you know, do like a play, a Sam Shepard play.
Marc:I really was pitching him hard on it.
Marc:He says, we're always not going to do theater.
Guest:I just, you know, God bless those people that do that, you know.
Guest:That's all I can say.
Guest:I, yeah, I have.
Marc:No desire.
Guest:No desire.
Yeah.
Marc:It's interesting, though.
Marc:I mean, right?
Marc:Because you must have done it in high school a bit.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And, you know, I wasn't jumping up or down about that.
Marc:What is it essentially about that type of acting that is a turnoff?
Guest:I think it's a lot of risk.
Guest:There's very little reward.
Guest:There are plays I've seen where there are tremendous performances and they're real and amazing.
Guest:And then there's others where they're using their diaphragm to reach the back of the room.
Guest:It's kind of all exaggerated.
Guest:It's not your bag.
Yeah.
Guest:It's on my bag.
Guest:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:And, you know, I want to watch a movie, you know?
Guest:I'd rather watch a movie.
Marc:But also acting in movies is so much different because, you know, you can bring it way in.
Guest:You can bring it way in.
Guest:You can do it again.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:You fuck up.
Marc:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Marc:So that's sort of part of it, too.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:It's a big part of it.
Guest:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:We were doing a Shakespeare play in high school, and I was playing Jakeways from As You Like It.
Guest:And my mother somehow goes backstage before the show.
Guest:Nobody else's parents were there.
Guest:She's like, don't forget your lines.
Guest:It never occurred to me to forget my lines.
Guest:I didn't know that was a possibility.
Guest:So I go out there.
Guest:I got the famous speech.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:All the world's a stage and so forth.
Guest:And nothing.
Guest:I forget my fucking lines.
Guest:I'm like, holy shit.
Guest:There's like 750 people on this thrust stage.
Guest:We have the outfits and Juilliard on, you know, mustaches and shit.
Guest:And I'm like, holy shit.
Guest:Gone.
Guest:Nothing.
Guest:And the little groundlings are like trying to, you know, tell me the lines.
Guest:I got through it somehow.
Guest:And the next three nights were fine.
Guest:But...
Guest:that was scary you know because it's not like yeah yeah yeah it's like yeah can't stop it's shakespeare yeah you know and our teacher said oh well if you're afraid of line just say couch we a while and mark you can't do that yeah you can't do that in shakespeare yeah yeah just stop making up
Marc:Well, I mean, that's a lot to unpack in terms of, you know, why you might not want to do theater.
Marc:It involves your mother and forgetting your lines.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:And that'll do it.
Marc:So this role that you did just now with the encounter thing, the cop.
Marc:Now, how do you decide that you're going to do a project?
Marc:Like, what is it, the usual?
Guest:It is, you know, who are the people?
Guest:Sure, good people.
Guest:And who's the director.
Guest:Okay.
Marc:It all, like, linked up.
Marc:And you like the part enough?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And, you know, I love Riz Ahmed, who, you know, has since The Night Of on HBO, which is really great.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:and octavia is amazing to work with she's so cool and like professional and nice and just she's just like a dream to work with really when you work with other actors what what what determines whether it's great for you i mean if they're they're basically not an asshole you know right you know if they're weird and they do their shit and
Guest:I don't care how weird people are or what they got to do to get wherever they need to be.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Don't fuck everybody else up.
Guest:You know, don't fuck me up.
Guest:Don't fuck other people up because of your bullshit.
Guest:Right.
Guest:You know?
Guest:Right.
Guest:That's all.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:It's pretty simple.
Guest:You know?
Guest:Right.
Guest:Don't ruin it for everybody.
Guest:No, it's like America.
Guest:Just be fucking decent.
Guest:Get your shit together and be decent.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:That's all.
Guest:Doesn't matter.
Guest:There's no room with the venom and fucking hate and division.
Guest:Just get your shit together and be decent.
Guest:Be a decent person.
Guest:That's it.
Marc:Yeah, on all levels.
Guest:It's not that difficult.
Marc:Across the board.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:Well, I think that's a good place to end.
Marc:It's good talking to you, man.
Marc:Hey, you too.
Guest:Thanks for doing it.
Guest:Hey, listen, you ever go by the comedy store?
Marc:I'm always there, yeah.
Marc:Yeah?
Marc:Why?
Marc:No, I just- You come down?
Guest:I do.
Guest:Oh, really?
Guest:I love that place, yeah.
Marc:Oh, yeah.
Marc:I'm there almost every night when it's open.
Marc:Really?
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Have you been since the pandemic ended?
Guest:Once.
Marc:Oh, yeah.
Marc:I'm usually there.
Marc:I put in for this week.
Marc:I got to fly up to Sonoma tomorrow to interview the Smothers Brothers.
Marc:But I'll probably be there this weekend, Friday and Saturday.
Marc:Nice.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Come down.
Marc:Say hi if you're there.
Marc:I will.
Marc:Which room do you hang out in?
Marc:Well, I mean, it all depends what she gives me.
Marc:Maybe we'll switch numbers and I'll let you know.
Marc:Okay, good.
Marc:After this.
Marc:Good.
Marc:Thanks, man.
Marc:Pleasure.
Marc:There you go.
Marc:Rory Cochran going all the way back.
Marc:Heavy dude.
Marc:Heavy cat.
Marc:Playing it tight.
Marc:You can watch the movie Encounter streaming on Amazon Prime Video.
Marc:And also, I got my Fender Champ back.
Marc:And this is what it sounds like.
Yeah.
Guest:boomer lives monkey la fonda cat angels everywhere man man