Episode 1500 - Paul Giamatti

Episode 1500 • Released January 4, 2024 • Speakers detected

00:00:00Marc:all right let's do this how are you what the fuckers what the fuck buddies what the fuck nicks what is going on out there i'm mark maron this is my podcast wtf welcome to it

00:00:21Marc:This is the 1500th episode.

00:00:25Marc:Is that a big deal?

00:00:27Marc:It's a lot of episodes.

00:00:29Marc:It makes me feel like sometimes if I don't know if I've talked to somebody or not, that I'm not losing my mind.

00:00:35Marc:It's just hard to keep it all in my head.

00:00:37Marc:There's been times recently where I'm like, did we interview that guy?

00:00:41Marc:I don't know.

00:00:41Marc:I got to go check myself.

00:00:43Marc:It's like my part of my brain is the website for this podcast and Brendan McDonald's memory.

00:00:51Marc:Those are two functioning parts of my mind right now in terms of how long it's been and what we've been doing here.

00:00:58Marc:Anyway, look, 1,500.

00:01:02Marc:Now, look, I want to talk about it for a minute because...

00:01:06Marc:As some of you know, over the years, we've done special episodes for these 00 episodes, okay?

00:01:14Marc:Yes, it's a milestone, 1,500, but it's also just another episode.

00:01:20Marc:And the last time we tried to, I remember for the 1,000th, we reached out to Bob Dylan.

00:01:28Marc:Well, it was like this big process, and I've probably told this story before, but it was just one of these revelatory moments where,

00:01:36Marc:Where the booking agents told me, like, hey, maybe you write a handwritten letter.

00:01:40Marc:So I write this handwritten letter and I scan it and I send it off to, you know, Bob Dylan's guy.

00:01:49Marc:And it's very thoughtful.

00:01:51Yeah.

00:01:51Marc:It's for the thousandth, you know, and then the bookers recommend I just call Rosen.

00:01:56Marc:That's Dylan's guy.

00:01:57Marc:Call Jeff.

00:01:58Marc:Just talk to him.

00:01:59Marc:So I got on the phone with Jeff Rosen, Dylan's guy.

00:02:01Marc:And I'm like, so listen, Jeff, you know, we met a few years back.

00:02:05Marc:You know, I met him years ago when I was at Short Attention Span Theater.

00:02:10Marc:And he's like, yeah, I remember.

00:02:11Marc:I'm like, well, look, you know, we got this thousandth episode and it's be, you know, it's a kind of a big deal for us.

00:02:17Marc:Big deal for our listeners.

00:02:19Marc:And we just think it'd be amazing if maybe Bob Dylan would would be the one thousandth guest on my amazing podcast.

00:02:30Marc:So what are the chances of that happening, Jeff?

00:02:34Marc:And Jeff said zero.

00:02:36Zero.

00:02:37Marc:Zero.

00:02:38Marc:He said he's got no axe to grind.

00:02:41Marc:He's not very good at him anyways.

00:02:43Marc:And I'm like, well, thanks for that.

00:02:44Marc:But that but that told me a couple of things, you know, it was like, all right, well, maybe this isn't as big a deal as it is.

00:02:51Marc:I think it is my show.

00:02:52Marc:We ended having a great show without him, despite that.

00:02:57Marc:But this one... Now, yes, look, I've talked to a lot of people.

00:03:03Marc:There are very few people that I haven't talked to that I really want to talk to.

00:03:09Marc:And we were thinking about how we were going to do this.

00:03:12Marc:And the truth is...

00:03:13Marc:This is just another episode when it comes right down to it.

00:03:17Marc:Look, if we've done our jobs here, episode 1500 should be as true to the show as episode 100 or 500 or 1400.

00:03:26Marc:You know, I mean, we always wonder if we should do something special.

00:03:29Marc:But the truth of the matter is, like, look at Albert Brooks.

00:03:33Marc:Albert Brooks was a guest who definitely fits the description of a 1500th episode guest.

00:03:41Marc:Now we got Albert Brooks and he wanted his episode to air close to the release of his documentary in November.

00:03:48Marc:And he also, between us, thought that being the 1500th guest would be too much pressure.

00:03:55Marc:So he was happy that it didn't time out right.

00:03:58Marc:That's true.

00:03:59Marc:Now, I think what happened during this talk with Paul Giamatti is actually the ideal version of what can happen when someone shows up in my garage and

00:04:11Marc:and it just clicks.

00:04:15Marc:And this happens a lot.

00:04:16Marc:It's not a rare thing, but it's been happening pretty consistently for 1,500 shows.

00:04:22Marc:And this show at Paul, we did it a couple weeks ago, and we kind of sat on it.

00:04:27Marc:And I said right after it was done, I said, that one's a great one.

00:04:31Marc:I mean, that's exactly what we do here.

00:04:36Marc:I mean, look, when I started this show, I was just trying to reconnect with my community, to talk to my peers.

00:04:44Marc:There was a lot of apologizing going on.

00:04:47Marc:At the beginning, there was no real professional boundary there.

00:04:51Marc:I don't have boundaries.

00:04:52Marc:They were still on my show.

00:04:53Marc:I was going to talk.

00:04:54Marc:I was there to talk to them.

00:04:55Marc:And I tell people sometimes when they ask me how I developed my interview process, I'll say, look, for the first 100 episodes, it was just me inviting people.

00:05:04Marc:celebrities over to talk about my problems.

00:05:07Marc:The point is those conversations were engaged.

00:05:11Marc:They were familiar.

00:05:12Marc:They were with people I kind of knew almost.

00:05:14Marc:But now, as time went on, people got more famous.

00:05:18Marc:They got more notable.

00:05:20Marc:And my life grew bigger because of this podcast.

00:05:23Marc:I mean, even when we did Robin Williams, who was certainly more famous and more notable, but I kind of knew that guy.

00:05:30Marc:You know, we knew of each other.

00:05:31Marc:But, you know, then we had a president on.

00:05:33Marc:I didn't know that guy.

00:05:34Marc:I did not know President Barack Obama before he came to my house.

00:05:41Marc:No idea.

00:05:42Marc:I had a sense of who he was and what he'd done.

00:05:46Marc:I knew what his job was.

00:05:48Marc:But that's the point.

00:05:51Marc:My life over time grew differently.

00:05:54Marc:because of this podcast.

00:05:55Marc:It grew to include broadening my audience, building a bigger audience, having a successful standup career, having my own show on IFC, having a successful acting career, kind of getting more skilled and deeper with what I do here and all other parts of my life.

00:06:16Marc:I mean, it really has changed.

00:06:19Marc:Some things haven't changed.

00:06:21Marc:OK, some things haven't changed.

00:06:23Marc:Like, for instance, I just quit nicotine again.

00:06:26Marc:For those of you who've been with me for since the beginning, how many fucking times have I been through this cycle?

00:06:31Marc:I'm at the end of my rope right now.

00:06:33Marc:Every nerve, every I'm on my last nerve.

00:06:36Marc:Is that what they say?

00:06:37Marc:I'm a fucking raw nerve right now.

00:06:40Marc:Because I do the same thing with nicotine all the time.

00:06:42Marc:Some of you know this.

00:06:43Marc:This is a consistent pattern.

00:06:45Marc:There are consistent patterns in my life.

00:06:47Marc:But in terms of my abilities creatively, personally, with this show, with the other things, with acting, that's all evolving.

00:06:55Marc:I'm definitely a different person.

00:06:57Marc:But God damn, I want to want some nicotine.

00:07:01Marc:I'll be all right.

00:07:01Marc:I just I get to the point I hit a wall and I think that my pancreas is going to fall out and everything's shutting down.

00:07:07Marc:And I got off.

00:07:07Marc:But it's like the excitement of deep, addictive craving.

00:07:13Marc:is not to be fucked with.

00:07:17Marc:It's something, man.

00:07:18Marc:I'm lit up.

00:07:20Marc:And I know the only thing that can put it out is some nicotine.

00:07:23Marc:I'm not going to have it.

00:07:24Marc:Look, some things about me are consistent.

00:07:27Marc:Some of my behavior, some of my tics, some of my habits, they're consistent.

00:07:31Marc:But over the arc of this podcast, I

00:07:34Marc:Who I am in the world, my skill set, my creativity, how I engage with people, the depth I've been able to access in myself and others has all expanded and changed.

00:07:45Marc:I mean, here's the deal.

00:07:46Marc:And this is why on the 1500th episode, I'm going to be sitting here with a guy who's on an Oscar campaign.

00:08:02Marc:And I'm having the same type of kind of engaged, connected, authentic conversation that I had with my comedian friends when I started out on this show.

00:08:14Marc:However many years ago was that.

00:08:17Marc:And now I can speak about a different skill set.

00:08:20Marc:And now I can create a familiarity with people who I wouldn't have early on.

00:08:26Marc:I didn't even really like to have actors on early on.

00:08:29Marc:But that's not the point.

00:08:30Marc:Obviously, the connection between me and Paul is deeper than, you know, acting or whatever.

00:08:35Marc:We just hit it off.

00:08:37Marc:And I can do that with a lot of people.

00:08:41Marc:And I don't know where it's going to go.

00:08:42Marc:And I just knew when I was done with this thing.

00:08:45Marc:It was a great episode.

00:08:46Marc:And the bottom line is that a lot has changed in 1500 episodes, but some very important things haven't changed at all.

00:08:55Marc:And that is why it is still rewarding to do this.

00:08:59Marc:I don't know what's going to happen.

00:09:01Marc:I did not know what was going to happen with Paul.

00:09:03Marc:I assume that things are going to happen that don't.

00:09:06Marc:And usually that's a good thing.

00:09:08Marc:But it's sort of fucking amazing that we're still operating at this level.

00:09:16Marc:And here's the thing about what we do here is that you listen to this Paul Giamatti episode and you kind of get in, you know, Paul Giamatti, right?

00:09:25Marc:You know him, right?

00:09:26Marc:You got a good sense of Paul Giamatti, but you don't really.

00:09:28Marc:I didn't.

00:09:30Marc:And I think he may have surprised himself during this conversation.

00:09:33Marc:It's just something happens in this room and in the old garage and on these mics and in that chair across from me that the president sat in.

00:09:43Marc:Something happens sometimes where there's such an honest, candid, connected engagement that you get a very full sense in a very deep way.

00:09:54Marc:Even if the conversation isn't deep, you get a very full sense in a very deep way of who we are, because it's not about information.

00:10:03Marc:It's about connection.

00:10:05Marc:And that's really the nuance of, one, doing audio, and two, not doing a structured journalistic interview, whatever those are.

00:10:17Marc:But I just feel like, yeah, you think you know Paul?

00:10:21Marc:Now you will.

00:10:22Marc:I don't think you did before.

00:10:23Marc:That's all I'm saying.

00:10:24Marc:That's the best I can do.

00:10:26Marc:So, folks, I'm at Largo in Los Angeles on Tuesday, January 9th.

00:10:29Marc:San Diego, I'm at the Observatory North Park on Saturday, January 27th for two shows.

00:10:36Marc:San Francisco at the Castro Theater on Saturday, February 3rd.

00:10:39Marc:Portland, Maine.

00:10:40Marc:I'm at the State Theater on Thursday, March 7th.

00:10:43Marc:Medford, Massachusetts.

00:10:44Marc:outside of Boston at the Chevalier Theater on Friday, March 8th.

00:10:50Marc:Providence, Rhode Island at the Strand Theater on Saturday, March 9th.

00:10:53Marc:Tarrytown, New York at the Tarrytown Music Hall on Sunday, March 10th.

00:10:57Marc:Atlanta, Georgia, I'm at the Buckhead Theater on Friday, March 22nd.

00:11:01Marc:Madison, Wisconsin at the Barrymore Theater on Wednesday, April 3rd.

00:11:05Marc:Milwaukee, Wisconsin at the Turner Hall Ballroom on Thursday, April 4th.

00:11:09Marc:Chicago at the Vick.

00:11:11Marc:On Friday, April 5th and Minneapolis.

00:11:14Marc:I'm at the Pantages Theater on Saturday, April 6th.

00:11:18Marc:Go to WTF pod dot com slash tour for tickets.

00:11:23Marc:All right.

00:11:26Marc:So.

00:11:28Marc:Paul Giamatti.

00:11:29Marc:I love the guy who doesn't love Paul Giamatti.

00:11:35Marc:I mean, how is that?

00:11:37Marc:Everyone's one of their favorite actors.

00:11:39Marc:I mean, come on.

00:11:41Marc:I watch Sideways two or three times a year.

00:11:43Marc:I love that fucking movie.

00:11:45Marc:This new movie he's in, The Holdovers.

00:11:47Marc:He's great.

00:11:48Marc:There's an intensity to him.

00:11:49Marc:I just watched Cinderella Man again.

00:11:51Marc:Great.

00:11:53Marc:You guys, this is one of our great American actors.

00:11:56Marc:This is Paul Giamatti.

00:11:59Marc:But this is our 1500th episode.

00:12:01Marc:And I did not know, I did not know,

00:12:05Marc:I never know what's going to happen, but let me tell you something.

00:12:10Marc:Whatever happened with me and Paul in this talk happened right away, and it stuck.

00:12:16Marc:It stayed there.

00:12:18Marc:So The Holdovers is now streaming on Peacock and playing in select theaters.

00:12:23Marc:This is a classic WTF episode for our 1500th with the inimitable Paul Giamatti.

00:12:42Guest:Well, that's what happened to me at the other place.

00:12:46Guest:It was a cute house and everything, but it had a lot of history there.

00:12:49Guest:A lot of things went down.

00:12:51Guest:A lot of things good.

00:12:51Guest:A lot of things bad.

00:12:53Guest:That's part of what it is.

00:12:54Guest:Yeah, layers of stuff.

00:12:55Guest:Yes.

00:12:55Guest:And when I finally, when a girlfriend finally found this house, she said, what about this one?

00:13:01Guest:I'm like, I'll buy it.

00:13:02Guest:I'll buy that house.

00:13:03Guest:Yeah.

00:13:04Guest:I don't miss that fucking place at all.

00:13:06Guest:Yeah.

00:13:06Guest:I don't think I'd miss.

00:13:08Guest:I don't think I'd miss.

00:13:09Guest:I have a lot of books.

00:13:10Guest:Yeah.

00:13:11Guest:Which is great, but then they start to feel, that starts to feel crazy.

00:13:15Guest:And I start to feel, I said the other day, I feel like, you know the Collier brothers were?

00:13:19Guest:They were the two kind of really crazy, I think they were twins.

00:13:22Guest:Yeah.

00:13:23Guest:And they lived in New York in sort of the early 1900s.

00:13:27Guest:And they were super, I think they were really wealthy and hoarding.

00:13:30Guest:Oh, yeah.

00:13:31Guest:And one guy got buried under the bookshelf falling over on him.

00:13:34Guest:And the other guy couldn't find him.

00:13:37Guest:And I was like, and for some reason, I just feel like the books are great, but they're actually depressing me now.

00:13:43Marc:I got a whole room of them.

00:13:46Marc:Let me ask you a question.

00:13:47Marc:I mean, I know you grew up in academia to a degree, but I always aspired to having the books.

00:13:53Marc:Me too.

00:13:54Marc:And like I used to talk about like, you know, and I look at the books and maybe in a third of them, there's a bookmark at page 30.

00:14:02Guest:Maybe.

00:14:02Guest:There's so many of them are abandoned.

00:14:05Guest:And it's just the whole thing is actually getting depressing to me.

00:14:08Marc:Well, that's because we're getting to a certain age.

00:14:10Guest:Well, there's that too, but it's a compulsion too.

00:14:12Guest:It's like I can't stop buying them.

00:14:14Guest:You still do?

00:14:15Guest:Which makes me feel crazy.

00:14:17Guest:What was the last book you bought?

00:14:19Guest:Oh, I just bought a bunch.

00:14:20Guest:I just bought like 10 books.

00:14:22Guest:I come out here, one of the reasons I like coming out here, and actually Glendale's interesting.

00:14:28Guest:One of the reasons I like coming out here is there's really good used bookstores out in LA.

00:14:32Guest:Okay.

00:14:33Guest:What were you searching for?

00:14:35Guest:Like old shitty sci-fi books.

00:14:37Guest:Oh, that's good.

00:14:38Guest:Oh, it's great.

00:14:39Guest:Yeah.

00:14:39Guest:But I have way too many of them.

00:14:41Guest:And now I'm the guy who's like, I'm going to have five editions of the same thing just because I like the different covers.

00:14:48Marc:Sure.

00:14:48Marc:You're a completist.

00:14:49Marc:You have to have... I don't know.

00:14:51Guest:It's like... It's compulsive.

00:14:52Marc:It's just like, oh, that's a new one.

00:14:54Guest:It's a mania.

00:14:55Guest:Yes.

00:14:55Marc:Oh, that's a cool cover.

00:14:56Marc:It's weird.

00:14:57Marc:I kind of stopped...

00:14:58Marc:buying books is I was always the guy that would buy the books you know like the postmodern philosophy that I could never never read them never understand I have a lot of that shit well I used to do never read it I try me too never read it well the observation I had and I've said it on stage before is that the thing about those books is like oh look at these books

00:15:19Marc:Oh.

00:15:20Marc:And I'll underline, dude.

00:15:21Guest:Oh.

00:15:21Guest:I'll underline.

00:15:22Marc:Sure.

00:15:23Marc:But I retain nothing.

00:15:25Marc:Nothing.

00:15:26Guest:And it's almost like just having the thing itself.

00:15:28Guest:I'm somehow going to absorb something from it.

00:15:30Guest:Well, that's what I realize is that when you're reading it, it feels like you're thinking it.

00:15:34Marc:Yes, that's true.

00:15:36Marc:And then...

00:15:37Marc:And then it's over.

00:15:38Guest:But you're not.

00:15:40Guest:No, totally.

00:15:40Guest:But it's gone.

00:15:41Guest:It's gone.

00:15:42Guest:It's gone.

00:15:42Guest:And I have that.

00:15:43Guest:I have a ton of science books.

00:15:45Guest:Oh.

00:15:45Guest:Physics and all of the quantum shit.

00:15:48Guest:But I understand.

00:15:49Guest:And I try.

00:15:50Guest:And talk about a bookmark at about 10 pages in.

00:15:54Guest:And I'm done.

00:15:54Guest:You try with physics.

00:15:55Marc:Oh, I try with all kinds of science.

00:15:57Marc:I remember when I was younger when chaos theory was a thing.

00:15:59Marc:Yes, exactly.

00:16:00Marc:Exactly.

00:16:01Marc:exactly all of that kind of shit i gotta get that love it oh this is fascinating and i get the gist of it and that's sort of good enough yeah but the gist of a lot of things yeah and just so you can when people bring it up you can at least nod in agreement without lying knowing that you read it but you can't really engage in the whole conversation yeah yeah that's really interesting and

00:16:25Marc:And now I get sent books from, you know, publishers and people.

00:16:28Marc:Oh, I bet.

00:16:29Marc:You know, and there was a lot of that going on.

00:16:31Marc:And some of that, I've grown able to get to unload them, but I still have the core bunch.

00:16:37Guest:Yes, I know what you mean.

00:16:38Marc:I have the core bunch of about like 1,000 or 1,500.

00:16:41Marc:Easily, yeah.

00:16:43Marc:And then like, here's the other thing about the books is like, they start, you can start to smell the paper rock.

00:16:48Marc:Oh, yeah.

00:16:48Marc:So that room, but I kind of like it because I have the room.

00:16:51Marc:Like this was all in my old garage.

00:16:53Marc:But the smell of that.

00:16:54Guest:No, no.

00:16:54Guest:It's specific.

00:16:55Guest:I realized, I was going to say to you, one of the reasons I used to come, the only reason I would come to Glendale when I'd come out here was there were a bunch of good used bookstores.

00:17:04Guest:And I've been obsessed with used bookstores my whole life.

00:17:06Guest:And then I realized what I've done to my apartment is I've recreated a used bookstore.

00:17:11Guest:And it smells like the fucking place.

00:17:13Guest:And I'm not kidding.

00:17:14Guest:I swear to God, what I've done is created a used bookstore.

00:17:18Marc:Well, let me know when you open it to the public.

00:17:20Marc:I'm thinking about it.

00:17:21Marc:I've thought about it.

00:17:22Marc:I've thought about that too, but then even if you want to have a garage sale, they're going to come to your house.

00:17:27Guest:They're going to come to my house, and they're going to take shit, and I'm going to be like, no, no, no, no, no, no, not that one.

00:17:31Guest:Yeah, you can be that guy.

00:17:32Guest:Yes.

00:17:32Marc:It seems like you have your future planned.

00:17:36Guest:And they're going to take me feet first out of a hefty bag just dead.

00:17:40Guest:After they lift the bookshelf off.

00:17:42Guest:Totally.

00:17:43Guest:Totally.

00:17:44Guest:It's going to happen.

00:17:44Guest:But how big is the place?

00:17:46Guest:Two bedroom?

00:17:47Guest:Yeah.

00:17:47Guest:It's a two bedroom.

00:17:48Guest:It's a nice place, but it's all books, shelves.

00:17:52Guest:The whole apartment's bookshelf.

00:17:53Guest:And you don't have a house somewhere?

00:17:55Guest:No, I don't have a house.

00:17:56Guest:I used to have a house in Venice, but I never lived there.

00:17:58Guest:I bought it a long time ago.

00:18:00Guest:Yeah.

00:18:01Guest:And then I never lived there.

00:18:02Guest:It was a rental property.

00:18:03Guest:I just sold it like a year ago.

00:18:05Guest:Yeah.

00:18:06Guest:Yeah.

00:18:06Guest:It was nice.

00:18:07Guest:It was great, but I never lived there.

00:18:08Guest:So what are you reading now?

00:18:10Guest:Is it all sci-fi?

00:18:11Guest:I'm reading a mystery novel right now, but I do read a lot of sci-fi.

00:18:15Guest:Yeah.

00:18:15Guest:That's the thing is I'm not reading.

00:18:17Guest:I'm not doing a lot of heavy lifting.

00:18:19Guest:I'm not sitting around reading Dostoevsky.

00:18:22Guest:Yeah.

00:18:22Guest:And shit, I'm reading, like, old science fiction.

00:18:24Marc:I'd like to reread Dostoevsky.

00:18:26Marc:That's the other dream.

00:18:27Marc:It's like, I'm going to go back to crime and punishment.

00:18:30Marc:And you get to a certain age, I can't even manage the names.

00:18:33Guest:It takes, yeah, well, there's that, too.

00:18:34Guest:I can't remember the names.

00:18:35Guest:And then it just, I read much more slowly now, too.

00:18:38Guest:Which is good, in a way.

00:18:39Guest:I like to read nonfiction.

00:18:41Guest:Ah, see, I'm not good at reading nonfiction.

00:18:43Guest:You're not?

00:18:43Guest:No.

00:18:44Guest:Every now and then, I'll hit a nonfiction thing, generally a biography.

00:18:47Guest:And if I get through it, I feel really accomplished.

00:18:50Guest:I'm like, wow, I got through that.

00:18:51Guest:I did my homework.

00:18:53Guest:No, I did.

00:18:53Guest:No, and it generally has to be kind of racy or something because otherwise I get lost.

00:19:00Guest:But also the thing with nonfiction is I start going, I can't remember the dates, I can't remember the names, but I've never been able to do that.

00:19:07Guest:It is like homework.

00:19:08Guest:I get very, very like I got to remember the names, I got to remember the dates.

00:19:11Marc:Yeah, yeah.

00:19:12Marc:I get so proud when I finish a book.

00:19:14Marc:Like I'll have it on the table for a long time.

00:19:16Marc:People come by like, well, how's that book?

00:19:17Marc:I finished it.

00:19:19Yeah.

00:19:19Marc:That's the same way.

00:19:21Guest:Very proud.

00:19:23Marc:So ridiculous.

00:19:24Marc:It's really stupid.

00:19:26Marc:So let's like, where'd you grow up?

00:19:29Marc:New Haven, Connecticut.

00:19:31Marc:All right.

00:19:31Marc:So let's deal with this thing.

00:19:32Marc:Like, so Sally's or Frank Pepe's?

00:19:35Marc:Oh yeah.

00:19:35Marc:Right.

00:19:36Marc:Okay.

00:19:37Guest:Pepe's.

00:19:37Guest:No, no, no.

00:19:38Guest:No, absolutely.

00:19:39Guest:Pepe's.

00:19:41Guest:Have you been there?

00:19:41Guest:Yeah.

00:19:42Guest:Have you been to those pizza places?

00:19:43Guest:Yes.

00:19:44Guest:Both of them?

00:19:44Guest:Yep.

00:19:45Guest:Now there's other ones, too.

00:19:46Guest:No, I know.

00:19:47Guest:I know.

00:19:47Marc:But, like, you grew up with it.

00:19:49Marc:But I didn't know about the phenomenon of it.

00:19:51Marc:And, you know, look, I went to school in Boston.

00:19:53Marc:I started my comedy career doing— I know that drive from Boston to New York.

00:19:58Marc:Where are you from?

00:19:59Marc:Well, I grew up in New Mexico.

00:20:00Marc:Okay.

00:20:00Marc:My folks are from Jersey, so I always had a relationship.

00:20:02Marc:But I was in Boston for years.

00:20:04Marc:Mm-hmm.

00:20:04Marc:So I know that run from Boston and New York and everything in between.

00:20:08Marc:And I actually auditioned for Yale Drama School in the most ridiculous— Really?

00:20:12Marc:It was ridiculous.

00:20:13Marc:Why?

00:20:14Marc:I don't even want—I can't even— Oh, come on.

00:20:15Marc:Your dad was probably president at the time.

00:20:17Guest:He probably—he might have been.

00:20:19Guest:It had to have been like— It was—

00:20:22Guest:When was it?

00:20:23Guest:Do you remember?

00:20:24Guest:It was probably 86, 85, 86.

00:20:25Guest:No, I don't think he was anymore then.

00:20:28Guest:But just, you know.

00:20:30Marc:I was like so cocky and so like, you know, not prepared.

00:20:33Marc:And I remember very well because I was like, it was, I'd gotten the audition.

00:20:38Marc:I'd done a little acting in college.

00:20:40Marc:And Derek Walcott, he was, I took a playwriting seminar with him.

00:20:45Marc:I was bad at all this.

00:20:46Marc:And, you know, and I remember, like, I was like, I'm going to go audition for drama school.

00:20:52Marc:And so, like, and I had no idea about show business or about, like, what it took.

00:20:55Marc:So for a headshot, I gave a photo booth, like a strip of photo booth pictures.

00:21:00Guest:That's great.

00:21:01Marc:Right.

00:21:01Marc:But and then, like, I needed a referral letter.

00:21:03Marc:So I was like, I got to get Derek to give me one.

00:21:05Marc:And, like, I sort of the day before I went over to his apartment on campus and I knocked on the door.

00:21:10Marc:I'm like, will you write me a referral for Yale?

00:21:12Marc:And he was in his bathrobe.

00:21:13Marc:And, you know, this big Caribbean man.

00:21:15Marc:He's like, okay.

00:21:15Marc:Okay.

00:21:16Marc:And he stands up, he types it on a hand typewriter and sends me away with it.

00:21:21Marc:How the fuck did you not get in to some place?

00:21:24Guest:Because that would have been, I mean, I would have taken you in a heartbeat.

00:21:27Marc:Right.

00:21:27Marc:I thought that the audacity of it.

00:21:29Guest:I mean, just, yeah, absolutely.

00:21:31Marc:But they're not into audacity.

00:21:34Guest:No, they're not in some ways.

00:21:35Guest:I think you're right.

00:21:36Marc:But here's what I realized.

00:21:37Marc:I'm waiting to do the audition.

00:21:38Marc:There's a woman waiting, and she is deep into some, like, heavy, kind of like she's rehearsing with her hands, like, whoa!

00:21:45Marc:Yeah.

00:21:47Marc:And she's doing movement.

00:21:48Marc:Sure.

00:21:48Marc:Grotowski or whatever that stuff.

00:21:50Guest:Yeah, whatever it was.

00:21:51Guest:Yeah, yeah, yeah.

00:21:51Guest:Some kind of movement.

00:21:52Marc:What was that Japanese?

00:21:53Guest:Butto.

00:21:54Marc:Yeah, like that.

00:21:55Marc:It was like crazy.

00:21:56Marc:And I had that moment like before I'm about to go in, not on like an audition where I'm like, oh, I'm not getting this.

00:22:01Marc:Yeah.

00:22:01Guest:Oh, dear.

00:22:04Guest:I don't know, man.

00:22:05Guest:I would have taken.

00:22:06Guest:Do you remember what you did?

00:22:07Guest:Did you have to do monologues and stuff?

00:22:09Marc:Yeah, and I picked some weird fucking Greek.

00:22:12Marc:I didn't even do Shakespeare for the classic.

00:22:15Marc:It was some Greek thing.

00:22:18Marc:I'm mispronouncing things.

00:22:20Marc:And I did a Sam Shepard piece for the current one.

00:22:23Marc:I don't remember if it was Cowboy Mouth or something.

00:22:26Marc:But I'm like, I decided that an action I would do, I would jerk off my belt.

00:22:30Guest:Awesome.

00:22:30Marc:Oh, my God.

00:22:33Marc:And they were just looking at me, Paul.

00:22:34Guest:Had I been in charge, man.

00:22:35Guest:You would have absolutely been in charge.

00:22:38Marc:They were just looking at me, and it was like it's one of those, you know those moments when you're doing acting, auditioning, or whatever, and you're not in a production, but you're being judged by people?

00:22:48Guest:Yes.

00:22:49Marc:And they're right up there on the list of the most embarrassing moments of your fucking life.

00:22:54Guest:Couldn't possibly be more embarrassing.

00:22:55Marc:It was one of those.

00:22:56Guest:The most naked, vulnerable, idiotic.

00:22:59Guest:yeah yeah and i was a long drive back to boston oh god i love that i love hearing that i wish you'd gotten in oh it would have been great you think i might have learned how to do it no you would have been fantastic it would have been good to have some context there was a guy in my class i went to the old drum school there was a guy like that in my class really he laughed after the first year why all right just couldn't handle it

00:23:26Guest:Yeah.

00:23:26Guest:No, he could handle it.

00:23:28Guest:It couldn't handle him.

00:23:29Guest:And it was like, he just couldn't, he was great.

00:23:32Marc:Yeah.

00:23:33Guest:Great actor.

00:23:34Guest:And it's like, I don't, I think he still acts.

00:23:36Marc:Yeah.

00:23:36Guest:He was fantastic.

00:23:37Marc:Yeah.

00:23:38Guest:I loved him.

00:23:39Guest:And he was the best.

00:23:39Marc:Well, there's always that guy.

00:23:41Marc:Because he didn't give a shit.

00:23:42Guest:Right.

00:23:42Marc:He didn't give a shit.

00:23:43Marc:There's always the guy that's like, you remember that guy?

00:23:45Marc:He was a genius.

00:23:46Yeah.

00:23:46Marc:And no one knows what happened to him.

00:23:48Guest:Totally.

00:23:49Guest:He was the first guy.

00:23:50Marc:90% of the time, not a good story.

00:23:52Guest:No, it's not.

00:23:53Guest:Probably not.

00:23:54Guest:But he was the first guy I can remember.

00:23:56Guest:This is, you know, what is this?

00:23:58Guest:The early 90s.

00:24:00Guest:First guy I can remember seeing walking around in his pajamas.

00:24:03Guest:You know, wearing his pajama top out in public.

00:24:06Guest:Wearing his pajama bottoms out in public.

00:24:08Guest:And I remember thinking, this is special.

00:24:11Guest:This guy's got something.

00:24:12Guest:He's really, this guy has definitely got it going on.

00:24:15Marc:He's on his own top.

00:24:15Marc:time zone this guy he's a genius i can he's a genius the pajama top genius yes he's a genius and he really was a brilliant actor of course but if you have a certain type of sensitivity yeah and you come from a mild insanity yourself you're always going to think that you know lunatics are geniuses geniuses and but if you can't apply it no it's not genius

00:24:39Guest:I guess not.

00:24:41Guest:It really is that thing.

00:24:42Guest:They're just special, man.

00:24:43Guest:They're just special.

00:24:44Guest:They're really interesting.

00:24:45Guest:Sure.

00:24:46Marc:I've followed a lot of those guys around.

00:24:47Guest:You must have.

00:24:48Guest:You must have, right?

00:24:50Guest:You know them.

00:24:51Marc:In comedy and in life.

00:24:53Marc:I remember one time when I was a kid.

00:24:54Guest:Comedy seems to be just chock-a-block with guys like,

00:24:56Marc:Well, sure.

00:24:57Marc:We're kind of asocial.

00:24:59Marc:Yeah.

00:25:00Guest:And that's a definite indication that you've got something special going on.

00:25:04Guest:Of course.

00:25:04Guest:If you're completely asocial.

00:25:06Marc:Yeah, because you can't fit into the normal expectations of life.

00:25:10Marc:No.

00:25:10Marc:And then you just decide to do this job where you wander around from town to town, staying in shitty hotels and...

00:25:18Marc:Talking to strangers.

00:25:20Marc:It's not what it used to be.

00:25:21Marc:But I remember when I was in high school, I got obsessed with this guy where I worked at a restaurant at Carlson University.

00:25:27Marc:And there was like a schizophrenic guy who used to sit there.

00:25:30Marc:And he wore these lace-up boots to his fucking knees and shorts and a denim vest.

00:25:35Marc:And he would smoke Winchesters.

00:25:37Marc:And he would draw pictures that made no sense.

00:25:39Marc:And I'm like, no one knows, but this guy.

00:25:41Guest:This guy's a fucking genius.

00:25:42Guest:He's on to something.

00:25:43Guest:He's totally on to something.

00:25:43Marc:And I brought him to my house.

00:25:44Marc:I took him on like a stray animal.

00:25:46Guest:Risky.

00:25:46Marc:My mom knew him.

00:25:47Guest:Did you find out his story?

00:25:51Guest:Was it like he was like, oh, this guy was a minister at one time or something?

00:25:55Marc:I think what it was, and this has happened to me before in terms of like –

00:25:59Marc:trying to get backstory i figured out his name and i think he was like living in a an abandoned house yeah and i i figured out that he was from jersey or somewhere he used to drew pictures of guns and he'd write a lot of things that didn't make sense and it was art it looked like outsider art yeah yeah and his name was pete newhart and i tracked down his family holy shit and he was like he was just what it usually is is the family's like the family's like yes we know yeah

00:26:23Marc:Yeah.

00:26:24Guest:Yeah.

00:26:24Guest:You know, we did everything we could.

00:26:25Guest:He's been gone for years.

00:26:26Guest:No, totally.

00:26:27Guest:Totally.

00:26:27Guest:Yale, New Haven was filled with fascinating people like this.

00:26:31Guest:Well, I think universities attract people like this.

00:26:34Marc:And you grew up in, like, you grew up the whole time in New Haven when your dad was, like, a professor first?

00:26:40Guest:Yeah, I was a professor for years.

00:26:41Guest:Yeah.

00:26:41Guest:So I grew up in New Haven, yeah.

00:26:43Marc:And, like, they were just around.

00:26:44Marc:They gravitate to the university.

00:26:46Guest:I think they do.

00:26:46Guest:Yeah.

00:26:47Guest:You know what I mean?

00:26:48Guest:And they're at the university, too.

00:26:50Guest:Yeah.

00:26:50Guest:There's all the kind of eternal, perpetual grad student guys.

00:26:53Guest:Yeah.

00:26:54Guest:And women who are kind of there forever.

00:26:56Guest:Yeah.

00:26:56Guest:And they're fucking weird.

00:26:57Guest:Yeah.

00:26:57Guest:And they're hanging around the coffee shops.

00:26:59Guest:Yeah.

00:27:00Guest:And they've got stacks of books.

00:27:01Guest:And they've been there forever.

00:27:03Guest:Oh, those coffee shops.

00:27:03Guest:And they're never going to leave.

00:27:04Guest:Yeah, yeah, yeah.

00:27:04Guest:And they're like, you know.

00:27:06Guest:And they're almost the same thing.

00:27:07Guest:Sure.

00:27:08Guest:And it's very much this kind of, like, marginal genius thing.

00:27:11Guest:Right.

00:27:11Guest:Of some guy who's up there studying Mesopotamian poetry.

00:27:14Guest:Sure.

00:27:15Guest:And he's never going to fucking do anything but that.

00:27:17Guest:Cracking the cuneiform code.

00:27:19Guest:Yes, exactly.

00:27:20Guest:Exactly.

00:27:21Guest:Cracking the Mayan hieroglyphs.

00:27:23Guest:Yeah, yeah.

00:27:23Guest:And who the fuck knows where he's from and where he's, you know, and he's just found this place and that's where he's landed and he's never going to leave.

00:27:29Guest:I know.

00:27:30Guest:And that's what I feel like in my apartment.

00:27:32Marc:Yeah, yeah.

00:27:33Marc:But you're not.

00:27:34Guest:I don't know.

00:27:35Guest:I'm worried I am.

00:27:37Marc:But you know what the weird thing is?

00:27:38Marc:I think that certain type of people, and I'm one of them, you're jealous of those guys.

00:27:45Guest:Mm-hmm.

00:27:46Guest:That's the fucked up thing.

00:27:47Guest:I know.

00:27:48Guest:I'm really envious that there's a strange desire to be one of those guys.

00:27:53Guest:Yeah, yeah.

00:27:53Guest:No, totally.

00:27:53Guest:That guy doesn't give a fuck.

00:27:54Guest:He doesn't give a fuck.

00:27:56Guest:And he's off on his own stupid, weird thing.

00:27:59Guest:Yeah, yeah.

00:27:59Guest:And he's studying the Babylonian shit.

00:28:01Guest:Yeah.

00:28:01Guest:He's doing the most marginal fucking thing possible.

00:28:04Guest:Yeah.

00:28:05Guest:And that's awesome.

00:28:06Marc:Yeah.

00:28:06Marc:Well, the thing we don't see is when they're at home going like, what am I doing?

00:28:10Guest:Totally.

00:28:11Guest:But I think in my imagination, they don't have that moment.

00:28:14Marc:They never do that.

00:28:15Guest:I think in my mind, they never have that moment.

00:28:18Marc:Yeah.

00:28:19Marc:They're always the weirdo.

00:28:21Guest:They're happy to be the weirdo.

00:28:22Guest:They're happy to be the marginal genius nobody listens to and nobody pays any attention to.

00:28:26Guest:Yeah, yeah.

00:28:27Marc:But I don't think that's true.

00:28:29Marc:No, no, no.

00:28:30Marc:They're all mentally ill, Paul.

00:28:32Marc:Maybe.

00:28:32Marc:There's just no room in the hospital for them.

00:28:36Marc:No, there really isn't.

00:28:36Guest:No, they found a different hospital.

00:28:38Guest:Sure, yeah.

00:28:39Marc:But I know that whole vibe, that coffee shop scene, the big work.

00:28:43Marc:Because I was in Boston for years, and Harvard Square used to have that.

00:28:46Guest:Full of it, absolutely.

00:28:47Marc:You know, there were just those places where—

00:28:49Guest:My friend used to call it the off-campus housing guys.

00:28:53Marc:Yeah.

00:28:54Guest:You know what I mean?

00:28:54Guest:The dudes who are, you know, you're living off campus and there's some guy down the hallway who's some weird guy.

00:29:00Marc:Who's been in the house for 30 years.

00:29:03Marc:Totally.

00:29:03Marc:And he's watched several different crews of undergrads and grads.

00:29:07Guest:And every now and then, oh, he left me a pot of beans outside my door.

00:29:10Guest:What the fuck?

00:29:12Guest:Yeah, the guy down the hall.

00:29:13Guest:It's just weird.

00:29:14Guest:He's got a monkey, I think, in there.

00:29:17Marc:You know what I mean?

00:29:18Marc:It's just like, what is it?

00:29:18Marc:What is going on?

00:29:20Marc:Yep.

00:29:20Marc:I lived in a house like that.

00:29:22Guest:Yes.

00:29:22Marc:In Somerville.

00:29:23Marc:Yes.

00:29:24Guest:Everybody.

00:29:24Guest:Yeah, I did, too, in New Haven.

00:29:26Marc:I don't know.

00:29:26Marc:Do they exist still?

00:29:28Marc:I wonder, actually.

00:29:29Marc:I think we were the last generation.

00:29:31Guest:But that's interesting.

00:29:32Guest:Why doesn't it exist anymore?

00:29:34Guest:Where's it gone?

00:29:35Guest:Because I think you're right.

00:29:36Guest:It doesn't really happen so much anymore.

00:29:38Marc:Because I think we were tethered to the sort of end of a wave that was connected to some intellectual artistic tradition that we still aspire to.

00:29:49Marc:And I think once everything became fragmented and more self-centered and decontextualized because of the Internet, that there's no you don't feel that legacy anymore.

00:30:00Guest:That's interesting.

00:30:01Marc:I sounded like one of those books.

00:30:03Guest:Fucking amazing, dude.

00:30:05Guest:You really took that out.

00:30:06Guest:Did that make sense?

00:30:07Guest:It did, actually.

00:30:08Guest:And it's interesting, that thing of, like, subcultures are gone.

00:30:12Guest:I mean, it's obvious, I guess, but it's like they just disappeared with the internet.

00:30:16Guest:I think so.

00:30:16Guest:Now everything's...

00:30:17Marc:subculture everything you can well it's it's small culture yeah yeah everybody can find their own little cranny in the uh in the mediated world yeah there was something about lack of mediation i think that that helped things yes yeah i remember reading those books or taking that class about you know mediation yeah and uh you know lenses and how most of what we take in is not really reality like one of those yes and now frames of reference really true dude yeah it is it seems like it yeah

00:30:45Marc:So when you're growing up, so you, okay, we established Pepe's.

00:30:48Marc:Yes.

00:30:49Marc:And that was it for you.

00:30:51Marc:No clam pie at Sally's?

00:30:53Guest:No.

00:30:54Guest:Sally's was not.

00:30:55Guest:I don't know why, but my father wouldn't go there.

00:30:58Guest:He wouldn't set foot in there.

00:30:59Guest:My grandfather was settled in New Haven when they came from Italy.

00:31:03Guest:Yeah.

00:31:03Guest:So my grandfather had already grown up there going to Pepe's.

00:31:08Marc:Oh, so it was a family institution.

00:31:10Marc:I think so.

00:31:10Marc:I didn't know anything about this New Haven pizza shit until like a few years ago.

00:31:15Marc:Yeah.

00:31:15Marc:And there's a guy named Dean Falzone who like, you know, he's got a brother-in-law or something that, you know, wrote a book about it.

00:31:21Marc:He made a movie about New Haven pizza.

00:31:23Guest:It's a thing.

00:31:24Marc:No, I know it's a thing, but it's very specific.

00:31:26Marc:It's not nationwide.

00:31:28Marc:It's like a coded thing.

00:31:29Marc:There's only people who know New Haven.

00:31:31Marc:It's not like Chicago pizza versus New York pizza.

00:31:34Marc:When you bring up New Haven, they're like, what are you talking about?

00:31:36Marc:They don't make it anywhere else.

00:31:38Guest:They really don't, though.

00:31:39Guest:I've never had any pizza like it anywhere else in the world, even.

00:31:42Guest:Is it great, though?

00:31:43Guest:I think it's great.

00:31:44Guest:But like my son, I took my son to have it, and he was sort of lukewarm about it.

00:31:48Guest:He was not impressed.

00:31:50Marc:Yeah, because it didn't make sense.

00:31:51Guest:No.

00:31:52Guest:It was like, this is weird.

00:31:53Guest:Yeah, where's the sauce?

00:31:55Guest:It's too burned.

00:31:56Guest:Too chewy and too burned.

00:31:57Guest:And it was like- It's an acquired taste, kid.

00:32:00Guest:Yeah, no, it was.

00:32:00Guest:And I had to keep saying it.

00:32:02Guest:But I keep insisting this is really the- I mean, for me, it is.

00:32:05Guest:Yeah.

00:32:06Guest:Nothing compares to it.

00:32:07Marc:But what- Because the times- I've gone to New Haven a couple times.

00:32:10Marc:I play at that.

00:32:11Marc:What's that theater there?

00:32:12Marc:Is this not the state theater?

00:32:13Marc:It's a little theater.

00:32:15Marc:Not the Schubert.

00:32:16Marc:Yeah.

00:32:16Marc:No, it's like it's right across from the place that makes the horrible burgers with the press.

00:32:21Marc:You know that.

00:32:22Marc:Louie's lunch.

00:32:24Marc:Yeah.

00:32:24Guest:Where they claim to have invented the hamburger.

00:32:26Guest:The cheeseburger with the machine.

00:32:28Guest:With the nasty, blackened, crusty things.

00:32:32Guest:With the upright, the vertical grills.

00:32:34Guest:Yeah, the vertical.

00:32:34Guest:So the fat drips out nicely.

00:32:36Guest:Yeah, yeah.

00:32:37Guest:So it's nice.

00:32:38Marc:But it's like right across from that, the theater.

00:32:40Guest:Yeah, I know what you mean.

00:32:41Guest:I can't remember what it's called.

00:32:43Marc:So I go back and I'm there and I go to the museum and I'm on the campus a little bit.

00:32:48Marc:The art museum is great.

00:32:50Guest:You ever been to the Natural History Museum?

00:32:52Guest:No.

00:32:52Guest:The Peabody Museum?

00:32:53Guest:You should next time you're in New Haven.

00:32:55Guest:No.

00:32:55Guest:Yeah.

00:32:55Guest:Go to the Peabody Museum.

00:32:56Marc:I stayed at that pretty hotel that's sort of a library-themed thing.

00:33:00Guest:Yeah, yeah.

00:33:01Guest:No, I can tell you there was never anything like that.

00:33:04Guest:It's weird when I see that hotel.

00:33:05Guest:It looks like a hotel from Santa Monica.

00:33:07Guest:Yeah, yeah, like it landed.

00:33:08Guest:Yeah.

00:33:09Guest:It's like when I see that in New Haven, which was really a dumpy city.

00:33:13Marc:It was.

00:33:13Marc:Well, that's the question because you go back.

00:33:15Marc:When you were growing up, was the Italian neighborhood still intact?

00:33:18Marc:Pretty Italian.

00:33:20Guest:Oh, really?

00:33:20Guest:That's where my grandfather was.

00:33:21Guest:I grew up, yeah.

00:33:22Guest:So you would go over to your grandfather's?

00:33:24Guest:No.

00:33:25Guest:At that point, they lived up in Massachusetts.

00:33:27Guest:My dad was born in Boston and lived in that area, Massachusetts.

00:33:31Guest:All right.

00:33:33Guest:But I still had relatives in New Haven, Italian relatives.

00:33:36Guest:Now?

00:33:37Guest:Yeah, probably.

00:33:38Guest:Yeah, I don't see them anymore.

00:33:41Guest:But yeah, there's definitely a lot of Italians still there.

00:33:43Guest:But your mom's not Italian?

00:33:44Guest:No.

00:33:45Guest:No.

00:33:45Guest:She was from New Jersey.

00:33:46Guest:She was from Plainfield.

00:33:48Marc:Jersey?

00:33:48Marc:Jersey.

00:33:49Guest:All right.

00:33:49Guest:She was from Jersey Shore and then Plainfield.

00:33:52Marc:I got Jersey Shore people.

00:33:53Marc:Do you?

00:33:53Marc:Yeah, I think that's where my father's family landed.

00:33:57Marc:So when you're growing up, you got how many siblings?

00:34:00Marc:I had two.

00:34:02Guest:Now I just have one.

00:34:04Guest:My sister died in June.

00:34:06Marc:I'm sorry.

00:34:06Marc:That's all right.

00:34:07Marc:Oh, you got the brother.

00:34:09Marc:I have a brother.

00:34:10Marc:Who's the actor.

00:34:10Marc:Who is also an actor.

00:34:12Marc:How's that going with you two?

00:34:13Guest:It seems to be going okay.

00:34:14Guest:He teaches it now, too.

00:34:16Guest:Oh, good for him.

00:34:17Guest:He teaches at Temple.

00:34:18Guest:Yeah, it's right.

00:34:19Guest:He teaches at Temple in Philadelphia.

00:34:20Guest:Good for him.

00:34:20Marc:Yeah.

00:34:21Marc:It's almost like when somebody kind of breaks away from the dream, you're like, congratulations.

00:34:27Marc:Congratulations.

00:34:29Guest:Yeah.

00:34:30Guest:Listen.

00:34:31Guest:Absolutely.

00:34:32Guest:And he's out there at Temple.

00:34:34Guest:He still acts, but now he teaches, and I think he's a really good teacher.

00:34:39Guest:And he's happy?

00:34:39Guest:I think he's happier than probably, yeah.

00:34:42Marc:That's such good news.

00:34:43Marc:When I see somebody in comedy who I haven't seen in a while, and they're like, oh, yeah, I got out a long time ago, and I'm doing this, and I'm like,

00:34:49Marc:Oh, good for you.

00:34:50Guest:Congratulations.

00:34:51Guest:I feel the same way.

00:34:52Guest:Good for you.

00:34:53Guest:Yeah.

00:34:53Marc:Absolutely.

00:34:54Marc:I feel the same way.

00:34:56Marc:I think when you're in it long enough, even with the career that you have, you know that it's like one job to the next.

00:35:03Guest:Absolutely.

00:35:03Guest:Chain smoking jobs.

00:35:05Guest:Just chain smoking.

00:35:06Guest:Doing several jobs at once.

00:35:08Guest:Well, you work all the time.

00:35:09Guest:I used to do that.

00:35:10Guest:I do two or three jobs at the same time.

00:35:13Marc:Like acting jobs?

00:35:14Marc:Yeah.

00:35:15Guest:I'd do two movies or something because they're stupid.

00:35:18Guest:Just because of panic?

00:35:19Guest:Yes.

00:35:20Guest:Absolutely.

00:35:22Guest:Completely because of panic.

00:35:23Guest:I was like, I can't.

00:35:25Guest:It's a shark thing.

00:35:26Guest:If I stop moving, I'm going to die.

00:35:28Guest:They're going to forget.

00:35:29Guest:They're going to forget.

00:35:30Guest:Everybody's going to forget.

00:35:32Guest:Oh, God.

00:35:32Guest:So I would do multiple things at once.

00:35:34Guest:So your dad was an English professor?

00:35:36Guest:He was a comparative literature professor.

00:35:41Guest:So it was English and Italian stuff.

00:35:44Marc:Huh.

00:35:44Marc:And you grew up in that.

00:35:46Marc:Yeah.

00:35:47Marc:The weight of it.

00:35:48Guest:Yeah.

00:35:49Guest:Yeah.

00:35:49Guest:I mean, I liked it.

00:35:50Guest:Yeah.

00:35:50Guest:Because again, it's like I liked the libraries and all that stuff.

00:35:54Guest:It's such a nice way to grow up.

00:35:55Guest:It's a really nice way to grow up.

00:35:56Guest:Because it feels important.

00:35:57Guest:Yeah.

00:35:58Guest:It feels so, it's also very cozy.

00:36:00Guest:Yeah.

00:36:00Guest:It's cozy.

00:36:01Guest:It's like leather arm chairs and lamps.

00:36:03Marc:And if there's ever a disruption, you're like, who let them in?

00:36:06Guest:Yeah, totally.

00:36:07Guest:And people, there's pipes smoke.

00:36:09Guest:People smell people's, my father's colleagues, the pipes smoke.

00:36:13Guest:It's cozy.

00:36:13Guest:Oh, yeah.

00:36:14Guest:But that's deceptive because it's a fucking shark tank.

00:36:17Guest:It's a shark tank.

00:36:18Marc:And also it turns out a lot of it is just a big racket.

00:36:21Marc:Yeah.

00:36:21Marc:The college racket.

00:36:23Marc:Also a huge racket.

00:36:24Marc:Yeah.

00:36:24Marc:Yep.

00:36:25Marc:Also a huge racket.

00:36:26Marc:But you decided not to go into arts and letters.

00:36:29Marc:You went into acting.

00:36:30Marc:How is that?

00:36:31Marc:But were you seeing productions at Yale?

00:36:34Marc:I mean, what inspired you to do it?

00:36:35Guest:Yeah.

00:36:36Guest:I mean, there was stuff at the Yale Rep and there were other theaters.

00:36:41Guest:There was this place called the Long Wharf Theater, which was like a regional theater.

00:36:45Guest:Yeah.

00:36:45Guest:Yeah, my parents—you know, it's a university, so it's an artsy environment.

00:36:50Guest:So it's like—and my mom was really into taking us to plays, and my dad, too, and movies and stuff.

00:36:56Guest:So it was a lot of that.

00:36:57Marc:So I feel like we—like, I'm just barely a boomer, and you're sort of the next one.

00:37:03Marc:Yeah.

00:37:03Marc:But like there's this like this area there where we, you know, where it was the last sort of, you know, gasp of that type of culture where we were actually part of that first generation revival movie house stuff.

00:37:15Marc:Yes.

00:37:15Marc:You know, all that stuff that happened.

00:37:17Guest:Yeah, very much so.

00:37:18Marc:In the 30s, 40s and 50s was being, you know, kind of assessed.

00:37:21Marc:Yeah.

00:37:21Marc:Yeah, that's right.

00:37:23Guest:Coming back and you're absorbing all of that stuff.

00:37:26Guest:Absolutely.

00:37:27Marc:And it's coming back now a little bit.

00:37:29Marc:In this town, there's revival houses again.

00:37:32Marc:American Cinematheque is doing a thing.

00:37:34Marc:Really?

00:37:35Marc:Yeah.

00:37:35Guest:Is it like the silent movie theater thing still?

00:37:38Guest:Does that place still exist?

00:37:39Yeah.

00:37:39Marc:It's a movie theater, but it's no longer the silent movie theater.

00:37:42Guest:It's not just silent movies.

00:37:42Marc:It doesn't go, well, it doesn't go that far back, you know, but, you know, Tarantino's got his theater.

00:37:47Marc:Right, yeah.

00:37:47Marc:When it's not running, you know, weird grindhouse things that, you know, nine people want to see, they've got.

00:37:53Marc:Some, like, Singaporean, like.

00:37:56Guest:Yeah, yeah, yeah.

00:37:56Guest:Blood fest.

00:37:58Guest:Exactly.

00:37:58Guest:Cannibalism movie.

00:38:00Marc:But I went over there and I saw The In-Laws recently.

00:38:04Marc:Yeah, great.

00:38:05Marc:I went to American Cinematheque.

00:38:07Marc:They let me host a screening and I chose Dog Day.

00:38:10Guest:Yeah.

00:38:10Marc:And they found a perfect print of it.

00:38:11Marc:Oh, amazing.

00:38:13Guest:When was the last time you watched that movie?

00:38:14Guest:I haven't seen that in a while.

00:38:15Guest:Holy shit.

00:38:16Guest:You know what I saw last night?

00:38:17Guest:I saw Blue Velvet was on TV.

00:38:20Marc:I saw that at Tarantino's place.

00:38:21Guest:Oh, my God.

00:38:22Guest:That movie is perfect.

00:38:23Guest:Almost perfect.

00:38:24Guest:Yeah.

00:38:24Marc:When was the last time you saw it?

00:38:26Guest:I don't think I'd seen it in maybe 15 years.

00:38:28Guest:Right.

00:38:29Guest:I think I saw it when it came out and I'm seeing it.

00:38:30Guest:I saw it when it came out and then I think I saw it again and this was maybe the third time ever.

00:38:34Guest:I mean, it was a movie when I first saw it.

00:38:36Guest:I thought it was amazing.

00:38:37Marc:I did too, but I didn't realize that there was actually a story.

00:38:40Guest:Yeah.

00:38:40Guest:That's actually, no, no.

00:38:42Guest:That's really funny you say that.

00:38:43Guest:Yeah.

00:38:44Guest:Because the last time I saw it and this time I saw it, I was like, oh, there's like a real kind of like pulpy noir story going.

00:38:51Guest:on.

00:38:51Guest:Didn't notice it.

00:38:52Guest:Completely didn't get it the first time.

00:38:54Guest:No, not at all.

00:38:56Guest:And actually, it's kind of great.

00:38:57Guest:And I was like, oh, it's like one of those war movies.

00:38:59Guest:Exactly.

00:39:00Guest:I didn't really get that.

00:39:01Marc:Yeah, because we were overwhelmed with the Lynchian thing.

00:39:03Marc:Yes.

00:39:04Marc:And Dennis Hopper.

00:39:05Marc:Yeah, actually, that was the whole thing when I was younger.

00:39:07Marc:And he's not even in it that much, which I also realized not too.

00:39:10Marc:Yeah, I couldn't believe that there was a story.

00:39:11Marc:And it happened

00:39:12Marc:I couldn't believe it either.

00:39:14Marc:And there's a real story.

00:39:15Guest:Totally.

00:39:16Guest:Yeah, genuinely a story.

00:39:17Marc:That's what it is about something.

00:39:18Marc:I know.

00:39:19Marc:It's not just about, like, that was weird.

00:39:22Guest:But that's an interesting thing to me, is that as I get older, like, the stuff that struck me as weird when I was younger no longer seems as weird.

00:39:30Guest:Now it seems, and I don't know whether that's age, but now it just seems normal to me.

00:39:34Guest:Well, no, because I think things that seem so surreal and strange.

00:39:37Guest:And now I look at it and I look at that movie now.

00:39:40Guest:It was so strange then.

00:39:41Guest:Now I look at it and I go, it seems like realism to me.

00:39:45Marc:But I think there's also the fact that when we're younger and we're aspiring to be either intellectual or an art or a film guy.

00:39:55Marc:You're looking for strangeness.

00:39:57Guest:Yeah.

00:39:57Marc:But you're just wide open and you don't even know how to assess things.

00:40:00Marc:That's true.

00:40:01Guest:Right.

00:40:01Guest:Yes.

00:40:02Guest:And you're looking for I was looking for weirdness.

00:40:05Guest:Sure.

00:40:05Guest:Weirdness was going to be more.

00:40:07Guest:Sure.

00:40:07Guest:As we've talked about.

00:40:08Marc:We were trying to become the marginal.

00:40:11Marc:Yes.

00:40:12Guest:There's got to be a path.

00:40:13Marc:there has to be a training you gotta train yourself to be the marginal guy that's right though I had the same experience with Paris, Texas which I saw when it came out and I had no idea what it was about no but a lot of things are like that I remember I remember making laughing

00:40:28Guest:I remember making myself watch the movie Solaris.

00:40:32Guest:You ever seen that?

00:40:33Guest:The original one?

00:40:34Guest:Yes.

00:40:35Guest:Making myself watch it.

00:40:36Guest:And it was fucking, it felt like it was 17 hours long.

00:40:39Marc:It was just brutal.

00:40:40Guest:I don't even know.

00:40:41Guest:I felt like I'd been beaten up afterwards.

00:40:42Guest:And they remade that, didn't they?

00:40:44Guest:With Clooney?

00:40:44Guest:Yeah.

00:40:45Guest:I've never seen that.

00:40:46Guest:But then I saw it again, not that long.

00:40:48Guest:And I'm like, oh yeah, there's a story.

00:40:50Guest:It's actually pretty coherent.

00:40:52Guest:It's not that...

00:40:53Guest:And you're kind of like, okay, all right, it's weird, but it's not.

00:40:56Guest:But I just remember it being this mad fucking thing.

00:40:59Guest:But you're right.

00:41:00Guest:Your brain is not formed.

00:41:02Guest:I think that's it.

00:41:02Guest:No, your brain really literally isn't formed still.

00:41:05Guest:My son is 22 years old.

00:41:06Marc:I'm like, his brain's still not formed.

00:41:08Marc:Yeah, you're just taking stuff in.

00:41:10Marc:Still, yeah.

00:41:11Marc:Do you have any of your movies that you look at and you're like, oh, my God, what was that?

00:41:16Guest:Probably.

00:41:17Guest:I don't know.

00:41:19Guest:I don't watch a whole lot of them.

00:41:21Guest:But like weird, some of the weird, yeah.

00:41:24Guest:I mean, I did this kid's movie that's probably the weirdest thing.

00:41:27Guest:Really?

00:41:28Guest:Yeah, I did this movie called Big Fat Liar.

00:41:31Guest:Yeah.

00:41:31Guest:That's like kids, generations of people have seen this thing.

00:41:36Guest:It's just bizarre.

00:41:37Marc:Yeah.

00:41:38Guest:I mean, it's really strange.

00:41:39Marc:Yeah.

00:41:39Marc:Well, maybe that's going to be one of those movies when these kids grow up like, I had no idea what that was about.

00:41:44Oh, no.

00:41:44Guest:Totally.

00:41:46Guest:That would be amazing.

00:41:47Guest:If that was their fucking... If that was their Paris, Texas.

00:41:52Guest:And their blue velvet.

00:41:55Guest:I'd love that, actually.

00:41:56Guest:That would be great.

00:41:57Guest:I've never even thought that that's going into people's kids' heads and it might be the same thing.

00:42:02Guest:I've never thought about that.

00:42:03Guest:That is fucking some bizarre thing that's going to haunt a kid.

00:42:06Guest:Of course it is.

00:42:07Guest:I know, but I never really think of that.

00:42:08Marc:I was recently exploring the fact that my grandparents accidentally took...

00:42:13Marc:Me and my brother, when they were visiting us in New Mexico, to see Deliverance, not knowing what it was.

00:42:19Marc:Like, when it came out.

00:42:20Marc:Sure.

00:42:20Marc:And the weird thing about that, though, Paul, was that, like, I remember the rape scene.

00:42:26Marc:But all I remember, like, because all I remember was there was a man in his underwear.

00:42:31Marc:Yeah.

00:42:31Marc:You know, they're making him make noises.

00:42:33Marc:Yeah, right.

00:42:34Marc:That's all I remember.

00:42:35Marc:And then I watched it again recently.

00:42:36Marc:I'm like, holy fuck.

00:42:37Marc:Holy shit.

00:42:38Marc:They really raped that guy.

00:42:39Guest:That movie's terrifying.

00:42:40Guest:But my child brain didn't register it.

00:42:43Guest:No, you didn't get it.

00:42:44Guest:Yeah, exactly.

00:42:45Guest:No, you just didn't get it.

00:42:46Guest:It's the same.

00:42:46Guest:My mother did that stuff, took us through like wildly inappropriate things like that.

00:42:53Guest:I'm glad because it went in.

00:42:55Guest:You know what I mean?

00:42:56Guest:Like I absorbed it.

00:42:57Guest:And that's cool because something went in there in an interesting way.

00:43:01Guest:But I didn't know what the fuck was going on.

00:43:03Guest:I remember seeing the conversation.

00:43:05Marc:Yeah, that's a hard movie.

00:43:06Guest:And it was terrifying to me.

00:43:08Guest:It was just scary.

00:43:09Guest:I was like, I don't know what's going on.

00:43:10Guest:I have no idea what's going on.

00:43:11Guest:But that guy's just taking apart his entire house.

00:43:13Guest:Yes, I don't know what's going on.

00:43:15Guest:But it terrified me.

00:43:16Marc:Yeah, yeah.

00:43:17Guest:Because I absorbed the menace of it.

00:43:18Marc:Because of the obsession of it.

00:43:19Guest:I got the menace of it.

00:43:20Guest:Right, right, right.

00:43:20Marc:Nothing else.

00:43:21Marc:And that's a very, like, mental menace.

00:43:23Guest:Yeah.

00:43:24Guest:Yeah, you feel the menace of it even as a little kid.

00:43:27Marc:So you go to Yale undergrad?

00:43:31Marc:Yeah.

00:43:31Marc:And you study what?

00:43:33Guest:I studied English.

00:43:33Guest:I ended up studying English.

00:43:35Guest:Did you take your dad's class?

00:43:36Guest:No, he was not there anymore.

00:43:37Guest:Oh, he wasn't?

00:43:38Guest:No.

00:43:38Guest:No, he'd left by then.

00:43:40Guest:Where'd he go?

00:43:42Guest:He sort of didn't do anything for a little while.

00:43:44Guest:Was that a weird time?

00:43:45Guest:Probably for him it was, yeah.

00:43:47Guest:Were your parents together?

00:43:48Guest:Yes, they were.

00:43:49Guest:Yes, yes.

00:43:50Guest:That's good.

00:43:52Guest:I guess.

00:43:52Guest:I don't know.

00:43:53Guest:Sometimes I'm like, probably would have been better not to.

00:43:56Guest:Yeah.

00:43:58Guest:But, yeah, he took a couple, maybe a year or two before he...

00:44:04Marc:Yeah.

00:44:04Marc:Became the baseball commissioner?

00:44:05Marc:Before he went into baseball.

00:44:06Marc:But he was the president of Yale.

00:44:08Marc:He was.

00:44:09Marc:For years?

00:44:10Guest:No, not for that long.

00:44:11Guest:I think most of those guys stay in that job for years.

00:44:14Guest:Yeah.

00:44:14Guest:I don't think he liked doing it.

00:44:16Marc:It's hard to be a bureaucrat in academia.

00:44:19Guest:Yeah.

00:44:19Marc:Yeah.

00:44:19Guest:My buddy's a... Not fun, I don't think.

00:44:21Marc:He's a writer.

00:44:22Marc:He's a teacher at Columbia, and he's a brilliant guy.

00:44:24Guest:Yeah.

00:44:25Marc:Sam Lipsight.

00:44:25Marc:Yeah.

00:44:27Marc:But when you hear about what it takes to be a tenured guy and just to deal with school stuff... No, like I said, it's a shark tank.

00:44:33Guest:And it's like, I don't think he... I think he thought that was going to be maybe more enjoyable than it was, and it wasn't.

00:44:40Marc:Yeah, because you're a manager.

00:44:41Guest:You're a manager at best.

00:44:43Guest:And it's like you're just a money... You're raising money the whole time.

00:44:46Guest:So when you did undergrad, did you learn anything?

00:44:49Guest:What was your focus?

00:44:51Guest:I guess like American, sort of 19th century American stuff, like Poe and Melville.

00:44:57Marc:Oh, really?

00:44:58Marc:Which was stuff I liked to read, so that was good.

00:45:00Marc:It's easier.

00:45:00Marc:I was a romantic literature, it was my focus undergrad, but both years, for both semesters of the focus, it was at nine in the morning.

00:45:10Marc:Yeah.

00:45:11Marc:tough going dude so you mean like like reading like uh like shelly byron yeah i can't read poetry it makes no sense and i was cramming it and like i'm not i think i might still have an incomplete i'm pretty sure i probably do i'm pretty sure i probably it was i think was a paper on blake oh yeah well yeah well that stuff actually i can read that's sort of some of that makes sense but yeah

00:45:34Marc:Well, yeah, it's very simple language, but then there are the drawings, and then there's just books upon books of analysis, and I'm like, what are they seeing?

00:45:41Guest:I know.

00:45:42Guest:Why are you... Well, that's a whole other thing is the critical shit I couldn't read.

00:45:46Guest:So it was good because I was reading Edgar Allan Poe.

00:45:49Guest:I'm reading horror stories, so that was good.

00:45:52Marc:But then you get done with that, and you decide, like, I don't want to teach?

00:45:56Guest:Well, because I think the thing that I did...

00:45:59Guest:I don't know that I learned much about it, but I did a lot of extracurricular theater as a graduate.

00:46:05Guest:That's really what I ended up doing.

00:46:07Marc:So like the non-theater school theater company.

00:46:10Marc:Yeah.

00:46:10Marc:So that's what, yeah.

00:46:12Guest:Like what plays you do?

00:46:13Guest:Whatever.

00:46:14Guest:You would do.

00:46:15Guest:I did Indian Wants of Broncos.

00:46:17Guest:That kind of thing a lot.

00:46:18Guest:Like people did Hurley Burley and stuff like that a lot.

00:46:21Guest:I didn't do that.

00:46:21Guest:Zoo Story.

00:46:22Guest:We did Zoo Story.

00:46:23Guest:We did Glengarry Glen Ross.

00:46:25Guest:Oh, that's brilliant.

00:46:25Guest:Yeah, that was bold because I think they didn't have the rights to it when we did it.

00:46:29Marc:Nothing like a bunch of 19 girls doing Wenger.

00:46:32Guest:Totally.

00:46:33Guest:Sitting around in trench coats trying to be like old Jews from Chicago.

00:46:38Guest:No, totally.

00:46:39Guest:We pounded the white powder in your hair, the whole thing.

00:46:41Guest:Yeah, yeah.

00:46:42Guest:Fantastic, though.

00:46:43Guest:Fantastic.

00:46:44Guest:I mean, so great that we had the fucking balls to do it.

00:46:48Marc:Everyone's parents loved it.

00:46:49Guest:Absolutely.

00:46:51Guest:And who knows?

00:46:51Guest:Maybe it was good.

00:46:53Guest:Maybe it was good.

00:46:54Guest:Maybe just maybe it was good.

00:46:57Guest:But stuff like that.

00:46:59Guest:Yeah.

00:46:59Guest:And so, yeah, whatever.

00:47:00Guest:But you took to it.

00:47:01Marc:You were like, oh, yeah.

00:47:02Guest:Well, yeah, I really enjoyed doing that.

00:47:04Guest:So I think probably if I, I don't know if I learned anything, but that's what I did.

00:47:07Marc:Yeah.

00:47:08Marc:You know, mostly.

00:47:09Marc:Without any acting training at all.

00:47:12Marc:No.

00:47:12Marc:You were just doing it.

00:47:13Guest:Yeah.

00:47:13Marc:When you got into Yale drama school, you did the audition, right?

00:47:16Marc:I did do the audition, yeah.

00:47:18Marc:Do you remember what pieces you did?

00:47:20Guest:I did the Shakespeare thing I did was Richard II.

00:47:26Marc:He's the hunchback?

00:47:27Guest:No, that's Richard III.

00:47:28Guest:Oh, sorry.

00:47:29Guest:I should have just done a hunchback for him anyway.

00:47:33Marc:I saw William Hurt do that on Broadway, and the effort he put into the hunchback, it was so distracting.

00:47:39Guest:Right.

00:47:39Guest:But I get a little distracted by all... I'll tell you, I was in Sweden once.

00:47:44Guest:I was in Stockholm.

00:47:47Guest:I like the way they were like...

00:47:49Guest:Yeah.

00:47:50Guest:You were in Sweden.

00:47:51Guest:I was in Sweden.

00:47:52Guest:Where's this going?

00:47:52Guest:I know.

00:47:53Guest:You were just like, uh-huh.

00:47:55Guest:I saw, and I walked by a theater, and they were doing Richard III.

00:47:58Guest:It was in Swedish, and I went in and watched, and it was great.

00:48:00Guest:Yeah.

00:48:00Guest:Because it was all in Swedish, but the guy who played Richard III did nothing.

00:48:04Guest:He didn't do any of that stuff.

00:48:05Guest:Yeah.

00:48:06Guest:He didn't have a hand.

00:48:07Guest:He didn't have a limp.

00:48:07Guest:He didn't have a hunchback.

00:48:09Guest:He did nothing.

00:48:09Guest:He just was weird.

00:48:10Marc:Yeah.

00:48:11Guest:And I was like, that was the best I've ever seen it done.

00:48:13Marc:It took the easy path.

00:48:14Guest:Well, no.

00:48:15Guest:I actually think it was the harder path.

00:48:16Guest:Yeah.

00:48:17Guest:The easier thing is to be all like, eh.

00:48:19Guest:But you've got to stay in that.

00:48:20Guest:Yeah, yeah, yeah.

00:48:21Guest:That's true.

00:48:22Guest:You do, you do.

00:48:23Guest:But it's kind of the easier thing.

00:48:25Guest:Because as long as you have some weird thing you're doing, everybody's going to pay attention.

00:48:29Marc:He played Richard with a tick.

00:48:30Marc:It was just like a minor tick.

00:48:31Guest:He did.

00:48:32Guest:Towards the end, he started having a weird tick.

00:48:34Guest:But it was actually very effective.

00:48:36Marc:Yeah.

00:48:37Marc:Are you good with Shakespeare?

00:48:40Marc:What?

00:48:43Guest:Yeah, I mean, I got all the training in it and stuff.

00:48:47Guest:I've hardly ever done any.

00:48:50Guest:I played Hamlet.

00:48:51Marc:You did Hamlet.

00:48:52Guest:I did Hamlet like 10 years ago.

00:48:53Guest:I was too old to do it.

00:48:55Marc:That's always a good choice.

00:48:56Marc:To be too old?

00:48:58Marc:Yeah, to be too old to do Hamlet.

00:49:00Marc:I just got to get this out of the way.

00:49:01Guest:Totally.

00:49:02Guest:The guy had asked me to do it when I was younger and I didn't do it.

00:49:05Guest:I should have.

00:49:06Guest:I did it.

00:49:06Guest:I was too old.

00:49:07Guest:But it was fun.

00:49:08Guest:But I hadn't done any Shakespeare.

00:49:09Guest:I don't know if I'm any good at it.

00:49:11Marc:Was it a revelation?

00:49:12Guest:Did you connect with it?

00:49:15Guest:Yes, I suppose I did.

00:49:17Guest:Yeah.

00:49:17Guest:I mean, yeah.

00:49:18Guest:I didn't know the play actually that well and I'd never seen it before.

00:49:21Marc:I'm not good with Shakespeare.

00:49:23Marc:Neither am I. I can't understand it.

00:49:25Marc:I can't understand it.

00:49:27Marc:If poetry's tricky, that's going to— Exactly.

00:49:30Marc:No, I get lost at the language, and I've talked about it a lot, and I've had Ian McKellen.

00:49:35Marc:Sir Ian McKellen, sit where you're sitting and do it to my face.

00:49:38Marc:And you can't understand it.

00:49:39Marc:No, I got it then.

00:49:39Marc:Oh, you did?

00:49:40Marc:Well, he picked a good—

00:49:41Guest:He made it clear.

00:49:42Guest:Yeah.

00:49:42Marc:Yeah.

00:49:42Marc:But it was just a, it was a simple thing.

00:49:44Marc:It was an interesting, it had a, it had a point and, but it didn't make me.

00:49:49Guest:I still don't.

00:49:49Guest:Even when those amazing people do it, it's great to hear their voices.

00:49:52Guest:They have beautiful voices.

00:49:53Guest:You pay attention, but I can't, still can't follow it.

00:49:56Guest:all right so you go to yale now like that's hard right yeah it is yeah it's like it's it's non-stop and it's intense and there's a lot of physical training stuff that's hard yeah you know yeah it's non-stop but it was but it's good you're you're acting all the time and that's great you know but you learn things yeah i mean i think you do just by repetition yeah sort of like you just get a lot of experience yeah yeah yeah was there anybody in uh in your group your crew that we know

00:50:22Guest:There was a guy named Lance Reddick who was in my class who was on The Wire.

00:50:27Guest:Oh, yeah.

00:50:27Guest:He was a terrific actor.

00:50:28Guest:Yeah.

00:50:29Guest:He passed away at the beginning of the year.

00:50:31Guest:Oh.

00:50:31Guest:But he was great.

00:50:32Guest:Yeah.

00:50:32Guest:And I think he's the guy who did a lot.

00:50:35Guest:Yeah.

00:50:35Guest:In a lot of things.

00:50:36Marc:Now, do you cite Yale as the place?

00:50:39Marc:I mean, do you go back?

00:50:40Marc:Do they have you come back and do?

00:50:43No.

00:50:43Guest:No.

00:50:44Guest:They'll go back and hold a seminar, a master class and stuff like that.

00:50:48Marc:They give you an award or anything?

00:50:50Guest:They gave me a degree this year.

00:50:52Guest:The university did.

00:50:54Marc:Yeah.

00:50:55Guest:Oh, they did?

00:50:56Guest:They did.

00:50:56Guest:They gave me an honorary degree.

00:50:57Guest:I have no idea why.

00:50:59Guest:It was very nice of them.

00:51:00Marc:Did you go dressed up in the...

00:51:01Guest:They wear the robe.

00:51:02Guest:And the gown.

00:51:03Guest:The whole thing, yeah.

00:51:03Guest:The hat.

00:51:04Guest:The floppy hat.

00:51:05Guest:Did you do a little speech?

00:51:06Guest:Velvety hat.

00:51:07Guest:I didn't have to do a speech, thank God.

00:51:09Guest:You didn't do a presentation?

00:51:10Guest:No, I'm terrified of having to give public speaking.

00:51:13Guest:Really?

00:51:13Guest:It's the worst.

00:51:14Guest:No shit.

00:51:15Guest:I hate it.

00:51:16Guest:What happens?

00:51:17Guest:Freeze up.

00:51:18Guest:I freeze up.

00:51:19Guest:I really do.

00:51:20Guest:I freeze up and I start saying shit that makes no sense.

00:51:23Guest:And I'll probably start swearing.

00:51:25Guest:That's good.

00:51:26Guest:I would expect you to yell.

00:51:27Guest:No, I don't know.

00:51:29Guest:I think I get very quiet.

00:51:31Guest:I get very quiet.

00:51:32Guest:I get really cowed.

00:51:34Guest:I'm not good.

00:51:34Guest:I can't speak off the cuff publicly.

00:51:37Guest:Oh.

00:51:38Guest:No.

00:51:38Guest:I mean, I guess I'd have to prepare a speech, but then that's not going to work either.

00:51:42Guest:I don't like speaking in public speaking.

00:51:44Marc:You just don't do it.

00:51:45Guest:No, I'm the guy I don't want to give a toast at a wedding.

00:51:48Guest:I can't stand it.

00:51:50Marc:So like if you're in a group situation and you kind of feel it coming.

00:51:53Guest:Oh, that's fucking terrifying.

00:51:56Guest:It's the worst.

00:51:57Guest:You're just waiting for Paul.

00:52:00Guest:Oh, God, no, please don't.

00:52:01Guest:And those kinds of things when it's like it used to be, you know, you had a play.

00:52:05Guest:It's like a magic show.

00:52:06Guest:And somebody's going to ask you up on stage.

00:52:08Guest:Nothing would be a bigger fucking nightmare than to be asked up on stage.

00:52:12Guest:Oh, it's the worst.

00:52:12Guest:The worst.

00:52:13Guest:The worst.

00:52:13Marc:Well, that's funny because I get that too.

00:52:15Marc:And like, and because I'm a cop, I remember like I went back, but you must be, I mean, you know, I don't like, I do a very specific thing.

00:52:22Marc:I've grown over the years to know that, you know, I'm not, you know, I'm not the guy.

00:52:25Marc:It's like, Hey, we're having a few, uh, you know, we're, we're doing a, we're, we're honoring this person.

00:52:30Marc:You think you could do like, no, no, I can't.

00:52:32Marc:It's all very, I do a very selfish thing.

00:52:35Guest:Yes, no, you're right.

00:52:36Guest:And it's like, I don't know how to do that.

00:52:38Guest:Don't ask me to come and give a heartfelt speech about somebody.

00:52:41Guest:I don't know.

00:52:41Guest:You have Jeff Ross do it.

00:52:43Guest:But then I also feel like it's private.

00:52:45Guest:If it's somebody I know, it's also like I don't want to get up there and it's private.

00:52:49Marc:But what is it that...

00:52:50Marc:I mean, because it seems like you feel the same thing I do.

00:52:52Marc:It's like for some reason, no matter how many years I've done what I do, and I've got different – I have a spectrum of ways I can do it.

00:52:59Marc:I can be aggressive.

00:53:00Marc:I can take control and everything.

00:53:02Marc:But that sort of thing where it's not the context for what I do.

00:53:06Marc:No.

00:53:06Marc:And I'm asked to do it.

00:53:07Marc:Like I literally – my entire sense of self collapses.

00:53:11Guest:Collapses.

00:53:11Guest:And I don't know.

00:53:13Guest:And then I run like Rolodex through who am I supposed to be?

00:53:17Guest:Who do I be?

00:53:18Guest:How do I do this?

00:53:19Guest:What do I do?

00:53:19Guest:What's the right behavior?

00:53:20Guest:Because I know Mimi just wants to cry.

00:53:23Guest:Totally.

00:53:25Guest:Or start yelling.

00:53:26Guest:Just fucking yell at people and talk about it.

00:53:28Guest:No, that's really weird though.

00:53:30Guest:I realized something recently that was really, really chilling.

00:53:33Guest:And part of it was my sister once said to me, she saw me on a talk show doing something.

00:53:38Guest:She was like,

00:53:39Guest:She was a very intense person, very smart.

00:53:43Guest:And she was like, you are full of shit on that thing.

00:53:46Guest:I saw you and everything coming out of your mouth is just a lie.

00:53:49Guest:And she seemed so... And I thought, oh, I thought I was doing really well on that, wasn't I?

00:53:54Guest:And it's like, no.

00:53:55Guest:And I watch myself sometimes on a talk show and I go...

00:53:58Guest:I don't believe that guy at all.

00:54:00Guest:And then I'll see myself in a movie and I'll go, oh, I believe that.

00:54:03Guest:You do.

00:54:04Guest:That's weird.

00:54:04Guest:Yeah.

00:54:05Guest:That's not right.

00:54:06Guest:I shouldn't believe myself playing a character more than I believe myself just being me.

00:54:11Guest:That's weird.

00:54:13Marc:Yeah, but you're not just being you.

00:54:14Marc:It's heightened.

00:54:15Marc:Yeah.

00:54:15Marc:And there's an expectation.

00:54:16Marc:Yeah.

00:54:17Marc:And you've talked to a segment producer.

00:54:18Marc:Yeah.

00:54:19Marc:And they've convinced you that the story that you have is really great.

00:54:22Guest:It's going to land huge.

00:54:24Guest:Yeah, it's huge.

00:54:24Guest:It's just like, it's so unnatural.

00:54:26Guest:Yeah, so it's not you.

00:54:28Guest:It's really not you.

00:54:29Guest:You're right.

00:54:30Marc:Like, if you go out there as you.

00:54:31Guest:But I should be more convincing as me, shouldn't I, than as a character.

00:54:36Marc:No, because, but you are convincing as you.

00:54:39Marc:We're having a nice conversation.

00:54:40Marc:This feels less like that, though.

00:54:42Marc:Well, there's not 500 people sitting here.

00:54:45Marc:And I don't know what we're going to say.

00:54:47Guest:Yeah.

00:54:47Guest:And that's actually part of it, too.

00:54:48Guest:I don't know what we're going to talk about.

00:54:49Marc:Well, you can't just go do that on television.

00:54:51Guest:But people, there are people who are really good at that.

00:54:53Marc:Few.

00:54:54Marc:There are people that can do panel well, but it's just because they know how to tell the joke or land the story.

00:55:00Marc:But no one's going up there like the old.

00:55:02Marc:If you watch fucking old Dick Cavett shows, the amount of dead air.

00:55:05Guest:Oh, my God.

00:55:06Guest:It's ridiculous.

00:55:06Guest:Actually, you watch that and it's kind of shocking how not great it is.

00:55:10Guest:Oh, it's the worst.

00:55:11Guest:Dick Cavett is terrible.

00:55:12Guest:Dick Cavett's really, I mean, God bless him.

00:55:15Guest:It's amazing.

00:55:16Marc:But it's really awkward and weird a lot of the time.

00:55:19Marc:Like even some of the old Carsons when it was an hour and a half.

00:55:22Marc:Just like this dead air and jokes not landing.

00:55:25Guest:And just spinning your wheels for a while.

00:55:28Guest:That's what it looks like.

00:55:28Guest:Yeah.

00:55:29Marc:So, like, they've kind of refined it.

00:55:31Marc:You're right.

00:55:31Marc:And they have expectations.

00:55:32Marc:There was a time, Paul, where you could go on stage and just be like, I don't really know what's going on.

00:55:36Marc:And really kind of bomb.

00:55:37Marc:And you're right, though.

00:55:38Guest:And it was enough.

00:55:39Guest:That's really interesting, though.

00:55:40Guest:You're right.

00:55:40Guest:And they've refined it to such a degree that people can't sort of, like, spin their wheels and bomb anymore.

00:55:45Guest:Well, I can.

00:55:46Marc:I've done it a lot.

00:55:47Marc:I have a whole reel of panel appearances.

00:55:51Guest:But this is before they've refined it.

00:55:53Marc:No.

00:55:54Marc:No.

00:55:54Marc:It was just that...

00:55:55Marc:There was a period there where I lived in New York, and if Conan got stuck for a guest, I'd usually have enough things in the hopper.

00:56:04Marc:To just call you up.

00:56:06Marc:Yeah, because I was a panel guest, and I used to do sit-down comedy.

00:56:09Marc:But I'd go out there with shit that wasn't quite prepared, and then it became this dynamic that I didn't plan.

00:56:15Marc:I would go on to Conan, and I would say something, and it would tank, and then I would get mad at the audience, and Conan would be like, this is Mark.

00:56:22Marc:And I'm like, it's not Mark.

00:56:23Marc:I didn't want that to be me.

00:56:25Marc:And it became a thing.

00:56:27Guest:Yes, right.

00:56:27Guest:Then it becomes a thing.

00:56:28Marc:Flailing.

00:56:29Marc:Right.

00:56:29Marc:Then it becomes a thing.

00:56:30Marc:But now I feel better about it because just recently I've been able to let that go because I watch Rickles on Carson.

00:56:36Marc:I watch Rickles on Carson alone.

00:56:37Marc:But dude, like 90% of it, he's just like he's drowning the second he gets out there.

00:56:43Guest:But that becomes funny.

00:56:45Marc:That's right.

00:56:45Marc:And half of it doesn't even make sense.

00:56:47Guest:He's fascinating because a lot of it doesn't make sense.

00:56:50Guest:Some of the funniest shit he says makes absolutely no sense.

00:56:54Marc:Here he goes with the hat and the ear and you're like, what?

00:56:56Guest:You're like, what does that mean?

00:56:58Guest:But it's really funny.

00:57:00Marc:So, okay, but...

00:57:01Marc:So, like, when you get out of Yale, do you feel ready to go?

00:57:04Marc:You understand show business?

00:57:06Guest:When I get out of Yale drama school?

00:57:07Guest:Yeah.

00:57:08Guest:But, you know, I took about two and a half years between undergraduate and graduate school where I lived in Seattle.

00:57:18Guest:And I managed, after a little bit of time, to make a very small living as an actor.

00:57:27Guest:In Seattle.

00:57:28Guest:In Seattle.

00:57:28Guest:At that time, Seattle was the number one city in America.

00:57:31Guest:They were making all these movies and TV shows.

00:57:35Guest:I didn't work at any of the regional theaters.

00:57:37Guest:I worked at these little, there were a million little bands.

00:57:40Guest:Black box experimental things.

00:57:41Guest:So were you doing new playwrights stuff?

00:57:43Guest:Yes.

00:57:44Guest:A lot of shit like that and stuff like that.

00:57:46Guest:And then doing like industrial films for Boeing.

00:57:51Guest:Oh, yeah.

00:57:51Guest:And stuff like that.

00:57:52Guest:And then getting a day on a TV movie, a Linda Evans TV movie kind of thing and having a day of that.

00:57:59Guest:And so managing to actually... So I actually...

00:58:01Guest:I kind of had experience of actually being in the world trying to find acting work.

00:58:06Marc:But that's funny because, you know, by doing that, you were able to hide the thing that most actors do in New York in front of everybody.

00:58:13Marc:What do you mean?

00:58:13Marc:The black box theater thing.

00:58:15Marc:Yes, totally.

00:58:15Marc:You didn't have to start a theater troupe or get naked on Avenue A. A lot of nudity.

00:58:21Marc:A lot of nudity.

00:58:22Guest:But you were doing that in secret.

00:58:23Guest:I did that in New York, too, though, actually.

00:58:24Guest:Oh, you did?

00:58:25Guest:No, perfectly happy with that, though.

00:58:26Guest:Very proud of being nude on it.

00:58:28Guest:Yeah, absolutely.

00:58:29Guest:In New York?

00:58:29Guest:Nude in New York.

00:58:30Guest:Was that the name of the show?

00:58:31Guest:It should have been.

00:58:32Guest:I can't remember the name of the thing.

00:58:33Guest:I did it at La Mama.

00:58:35Guest:I was at La Mama where you got to get a lot of nudity.

00:58:38Guest:It's required that you get naked at some point.

00:58:40Guest:So, yeah.

00:58:42Guest:So I had done... Three years in Seattle.

00:58:44Guest:You're right.

00:58:44Guest:I'd done about three years.

00:58:46Marc:That's where you probably built a certain amount of confidence anyways.

00:58:50Marc:I think so.

00:58:51Marc:Applying the skill set.

00:58:53Guest:When I went to drama school, I was kind of the only person that had actually...

00:58:58Guest:been out in the world trying to do stuff.

00:59:00Guest:Oh, see, that's why, you know, when you got there.

00:59:02Guest:And then I decided I really need to hone my chops.

00:59:04Guest:Yeah, yeah, yeah.

00:59:06Guest:Put my clothes on and hone my chops.

00:59:07Guest:Yes, yeah, exactly.

00:59:09Guest:So I need to go back to school.

00:59:10Guest:And then how soon do you start working after?

00:59:12Guest:I started working pretty soon afterwards, doing regional theater stuff.

00:59:17Guest:Oh.

00:59:18Guest:Yeah, yeah, going out to San Diego.

00:59:20Guest:Yeah, doing stage stuff was what I thought I was going to do.

00:59:23Guest:But I started working pretty consistently.

00:59:25Guest:Regional theater.

00:59:26Guest:How was that, looking at that audience?

00:59:27Guest:Kind of great.

00:59:28Guest:Was it?

00:59:29Guest:You can hear the hiss of the oxygen tanks.

00:59:32Guest:Just the ssss.

00:59:33Guest:You can hear the lady old, you know.

00:59:36Marc:The challenge of theater, dude.

00:59:38Marc:I've talked to Annie Baker and what's that guy, Stephen Karam, is that his name?

00:59:42Marc:Yeah, yeah.

00:59:42Marc:And just like the nature of theater.

00:59:45Marc:Even when you're doing bold new stuff, it's still like, here they come.

00:59:49Guest:In those situations, it's tough.

00:59:50Guest:Yeah.

00:59:51Guest:But, you know, they get loyal audiences in those places, so it's nice.

00:59:54Guest:They show up.

00:59:54Guest:Did you ever do any kind of theater like that or anything?

00:59:56Marc:Not really.

00:59:57Marc:I did some plays in college, but I never... The pursuing the acting thing, it was just too much for me, and I always wanted to be a comic.

01:00:05Marc:And I think for years, I didn't even have...

01:00:07Marc:you know, representation as an actor.

01:00:10Marc:You know, like I think I got a pretty powerful manager that tried his best and he would get favors occasionally from agents.

01:00:18Marc:Just, you know, send Mark out on something and see if it sticks.

01:00:21Marc:I do one edition and then they'd abandon me.

01:00:24Marc:It didn't really come around until recently.

01:00:27Marc:I'm trying to get the hang of it.

01:00:28Marc:Yeah.

01:00:30Marc:Okay.

01:00:31Marc:Yeah.

01:00:31Marc:I do all right.

01:00:32Marc:But like, I still don't feel like, you know, I was so in it.

01:00:35Guest:Yeah.

01:00:36Guest:You do.

01:00:37Guest:I do.

01:00:37Guest:Yeah.

01:00:38Guest:But I don't do the like methody thing, but I can feel like I'm in it.

01:00:41Guest:Yeah, definitely.

01:00:42Guest:But like in terms of accents can make me feel like I'm more in it.

01:00:45Guest:Yeah.

01:00:45Marc:Cause I rewatched a, you know, I don't, I watched a new movie.

01:00:48Marc:I watched a holdovers.

01:00:49Marc:I watched sideways at least twice a year.

01:00:52Guest:Really?

01:00:52Guest:Yeah.

01:00:52Marc:I can't.

01:00:54Guest:I just can't.

01:00:55Guest:God, you like it.

01:00:56Marc:Good.

01:00:56Marc:I can't.

01:00:57Marc:I have to watch it.

01:00:58Guest:Yeah.

01:00:59Guest:Okay.

01:01:00Guest:Okay.

01:01:00Guest:But you know, it's interesting with the holdovers.

01:01:02Guest:I actually was started out before I didn't ever do it on film.

01:01:07Guest:But I was like, maybe this guy should have some kind of old school New England-y thing.

01:01:11Guest:And I did that for a while when we were rehearsing.

01:01:14Guest:And I was like, nah, I don't need to do this.

01:01:16Guest:But I'm glad I did it because I actually think it helped.

01:01:19Guest:Put you into the zone.

01:01:20Guest:Yeah.

01:01:20Guest:It actually helped.

01:01:21Guest:Yeah.

01:01:21Marc:And I imagine that your childhood probably helped as well.

01:01:24Marc:Yes.

01:01:26Guest:For sure.

01:01:26Guest:All these people.

01:01:27Marc:Yeah, yeah, yeah.

01:01:28Marc:In terms of like knowing that world.

01:01:30Marc:Yes.

01:01:31Guest:All those people.

01:01:31Marc:And the sort of weird kind of self-importance that crumbles throughout the movie.

01:01:37Guest:Totally.

01:01:37Guest:That kind of self-importance.

01:01:38Guest:But I think that kind of self-importance in general is really funny.

01:01:42Guest:Yeah.

01:01:42Guest:I find that kind of thing very funny.

01:01:44Guest:Especially when it's so fragile.

01:01:46Guest:Yes.

01:01:47Guest:And it is.

01:01:48Guest:Totally.

01:01:48Guest:Super fragile with guys like that.

01:01:50Guest:You know, and it's like, because it's all based just on this kind of like high intellect.

01:01:54Guest:And then that intellect only alienates you more and doesn't hold up really outside of that narrow world that you're in.

01:02:02Marc:And he gave you, and that was the confines of that character in the movie.

01:02:08Marc:Yes.

01:02:08Marc:It wasn't a choice.

01:02:09Guest:No, that's what the guy's going through.

01:02:11Guest:He lived there.

01:02:11Guest:Yeah, that's the whole thing.

01:02:12Guest:Yeah.

01:02:13Guest:Well, he's come to rest at this place.

01:02:16Guest:It's the only place he feels safe.

01:02:17Guest:He's marginal.

01:02:18Guest:Yeah.

01:02:18Guest:He's one of these marginal people.

01:02:19Guest:But then it doesn't support him anywhere else but that place.

01:02:23Guest:Yeah, when he gets out in the world.

01:02:24Guest:Or with anybody.

01:02:25Guest:If he's then forced to have to sit with two other people alone for two weeks, then it falls apart because it doesn't really work.

01:02:34Marc:Yeah.

01:02:35Marc:But these characters, some of the characters you do...

01:02:39Marc:You know, I don't know all of them, but there is that element, you know, I don't think in John Adams, but there... Well, no, what?

01:02:46Marc:What element?

01:02:47Marc:Well, that, the real comedy heart of it is the sort of abrasiveness of the confidence that is so, you know... Misguided, and it just doesn't land right.

01:03:01Guest:And when it crumbles, it's like the best.

01:03:03Guest:Yes, I agree.

01:03:04Guest:Yeah.

01:03:04Guest:I actually, I mean, I think it's true of John Adams.

01:03:07Guest:It's not necessarily funny, but it's the same thing.

01:03:11Guest:Yeah.

01:03:11Guest:I mean, it's a guy which is so convinced of his own rightness and his own intellect and his own ability to carry out shit.

01:03:17Guest:Yeah.

01:03:18Guest:And nobody cares.

01:03:19Guest:Nobody wants to listen to him.

01:03:20Guest:Nobody cares.

01:03:22Guest:And it's like, you know, he's a pain in the ass.

01:03:24Guest:Yeah.

01:03:24Guest:He's so convinced.

01:03:25Guest:It's a little different with him, I guess, but it's the same thing.

01:03:29Guest:Yeah.

01:03:29Guest:Yeah, I don't know why I end up having to do that all the time, but I do a lot of times.

01:03:33Marc:But I imagine no one ever has to give you this direction.

01:03:37Marc:Hey, Paul, could you come in hot?

01:03:41Guest:You know, though, I do.

01:03:43Guest:I would say, though, it's true.

01:03:45Guest:It's true.

01:03:46Guest:But I would say that more than you might think, I have people be kind of like...

01:03:54Guest:you know yeah just really get more way and i'm like okay okay i'll do but more than you would think yeah more than you would think bring it up a little yes as i'm getting older i definitely i'm like i just want to be quieter i just want to sit and be quieter yeah because i'm old i'm getting old i know it's weird to feel that yes i'm getting old but but this movie you've worked with like with alexander payne before yeah you

01:04:17Marc:You know, it's one of those kind of hard to define genres where, you know, essentially it's mostly comedy.

01:04:25Marc:Yeah.

01:04:26Marc:But it doesn't play out in a standard comedic structure.

01:04:29Marc:No.

01:04:29Marc:Yeah.

01:04:30Guest:It's not jokey.

01:04:31Marc:But also the ending is not, there's no kind of reunion.

01:04:36Marc:It's a dramatic ending.

01:04:37Guest:Yes.

01:04:37Guest:And no, but there's no great transformations or anything like that.

01:04:40Guest:There's no lessons learned.

01:04:41Guest:There's no big lessons learned, clearly learned in any way.

01:04:44Guest:Well, you get humbled.

01:04:47Guest:Yes, yes, yes.

01:04:49Guest:I mean, the transformation happens.

01:04:50Guest:But is he going to change?

01:04:51Guest:Is he really going to change much, that guy?

01:04:54Guest:Will he go off?

01:04:55Guest:Because people have said to me about this movie.

01:04:56Guest:You know, at the end, I take a sip of cognac and spit it out the window.

01:05:01Guest:They're like, so he's not going to drink anymore.

01:05:03Guest:I'm like, no, he's going to keep drinking.

01:05:06Guest:I'm like, no.

01:05:06Marc:That was a fuck you to the D. Yes, exactly.

01:05:09Guest:So it's like...

01:05:11Guest:Lessons are learned, but will they stick?

01:05:12Guest:I don't know.

01:05:13Marc:Well, I think the lesson is... It's interesting about transformation as being an objective of dramatic narrative.

01:05:21Marc:Yes.

01:05:21Marc:Because is it enough that you took the action you did at the end of that movie to say that that character transformed?

01:05:31Marc:I'd say yes.

01:05:32Marc:Would you?

01:05:32Marc:It could be, yeah.

01:05:34Marc:And I don't want to give away the ending.

01:05:36Guest:No, no, but I think it's...

01:05:38Guest:It's definitely a change.

01:05:40Guest:You give up your entire comfort of existence.

01:05:43Guest:He does give up everything.

01:05:44Guest:But how much did he want to get out of there anyway?

01:05:46Guest:Was he tired of it anyway?

01:05:48Marc:Yeah, but he was a dreamer, and he lived in this fantasy of what he would do, which is write a book.

01:05:55Marc:Well, yeah, you don't think he's driving away and he's going to make it to Greece.

01:05:59Guest:No, but I think there's people who do, though, want that to be the case.

01:06:06Marc:Right, but the second half of that story is what we assume happened.

01:06:09Marc:What we don't want to think about happens to those guys in the coffee shops.

01:06:11Guest:Exactly.

01:06:12Guest:Yeah, exactly.

01:06:14Guest:That's right.

01:06:15Guest:So I don't...

01:06:16Guest:So what you're saying is true, but I do think some people want to play it out as a bigger transformation than it might be.

01:06:23Guest:I don't know.

01:06:24Guest:All I'm saying is I don't know.

01:06:26Guest:I don't know.

01:06:27Marc:Now, I'm going to discuss an issue I had with that movie because I'm not going to talk to pain about it.

01:06:32Marc:But it's like it's minor because I enjoyed the movie.

01:06:35Marc:Yeah.

01:06:35Marc:OK.

01:06:35Marc:But but just like in your understanding, the script, when all the other kids get on the helicopter, where the fuck are they going?

01:06:43Marc:Yeah.

01:06:43Marc:They're going skiing somewhere, aren't they?

01:06:46Marc:All of them?

01:06:46Guest:Even the two little ones?

01:06:48Marc:The Korean kids going skiing?

01:06:50Guest:I think they're just all going to go.

01:06:53Guest:That was clear.

01:06:55Guest:What I'm saying is we had to get rid of the four kids.

01:07:00Guest:Yes, they did.

01:07:02Guest:And Alexander gets asked this question and I see him and he goes and he says, what is the phrase?

01:07:08Guest:It's like the Greek deus ex machina.

01:07:11Guest:Oh, sure.

01:07:13Guest:Like God from the machine.

01:07:15Guest:He's like, it's a little bit deus ex machina.

01:07:17Guest:Wow.

01:07:18Guest:It's a little bit like something has to happen to get them out of there.

01:07:20Marc:That's like code for a script problem.

01:07:22Guest:Okay.

01:07:23Guest:Okay.

01:07:24Guest:Okay.

01:07:24Guest:I mean, listen.

01:07:26Guest:Oh, I love it.

01:07:27Guest:Deus ex machina.

01:07:29Marc:It's like, look, let's just do it.

01:07:30Marc:You know, the story's strong enough.

01:07:32Marc:It's not going to.

01:07:33Guest:It can sustain it.

01:07:34Guest:It can hold it.

01:07:35Guest:People will go with it.

01:07:36Guest:Absolutely.

01:07:37Guest:Absolutely.

01:07:38Marc:Absolutely.

01:07:40Marc:In other words, we don't have another solution for this.

01:07:42Guest:Get them out of here.

01:07:44Guest:I would like to think the two young kids are going to sit in the ski lodge.

01:07:47Guest:Maybe they won't go skiing.

01:07:49Marc:Sure.

01:07:49Marc:And they were able to track down the missionaries.

01:07:52Marc:Yes.

01:07:52Marc:To get permission.

01:07:53Guest:Yes, yeah, yeah, yeah.

01:07:55Guest:The Mormon kid.

01:07:55Guest:That's a good point, too.

01:07:56Marc:Within a couple hours, they were able to find the Mormon parents.

01:08:00Guest:Now, you're thinking about it way more than I think anybody did.

01:08:03Marc:No, deusus machina.

01:08:04Guest:Okay, okay, okay.

01:08:06Marc:I'm not, it's not, it wasn't a problem for me in this story.

01:08:10Guest:It didn't mar your experience.

01:08:11Guest:No, but I was sort of like, where'd those kids go?

01:08:13Guest:I think, I don't know that you're alone in that field.

01:08:15Guest:Oh, really?

01:08:16Guest:Interesting.

01:08:16Guest:Yeah, I think some people are like a little too convenient.

01:08:19Guest:I didn't think it was too convenient, but that's me.

01:08:22Marc:i'm on board i'm on board with the job but the weird thing is is like it's only because of you know the convincing reality of the movie yeah that like you yeah things like that happen in movies all the time yes yes you know what i mean it's like all of a sudden like i watched a cinderella man last night i don't know if i i think i mentioned that i watched it again yeah you know because i was like well maybe i should you know just bone up just brush up bone up on

01:08:46Marc:Well, it's a weird thing, and I've started to do it more.

01:08:49Marc:Like, I've seen many of your movies, but, like, I don't always remember the movies, right?

01:08:55Marc:And that was a big one.

01:08:56Marc:I was nominated for an Oscar.

01:08:58Marc:And I watched it, and I was only going to just kind of get a feel, but then I'm in, you know?

01:09:02Guest:I've got to do the whole thing.

01:09:04Guest:Right?

01:09:05Marc:That one's very... But again, you know...

01:09:10Marc:Do you have a problem with the character actor title?

01:09:15Guest:No.

01:09:15Guest:Right.

01:09:15Guest:I don't really necessarily know what it means, but it's like, no, I don't.

01:09:19Guest:I mean, I think I knew what it used to mean.

01:09:22Guest:I don't really know what it means now.

01:09:23Guest:No?

01:09:24Guest:I don't know.

01:09:25Guest:Like, what it used to mean was sort of like, you know, William Demarest is going to show up and be the cranky bus driver or something.

01:09:32Guest:So it still means that.

01:09:33Guest:Bill Demarest.

01:09:34Guest:Does it, though?

01:09:36Yeah.

01:09:36Guest:Who do we got for this show?

01:09:38Guest:Bill Demarest is going to show up and be the cranky janitor.

01:09:41Guest:I guess it is what it still means.

01:09:44Guest:Is that what it still means?

01:09:46Guest:Let's see if we get Giamatti.

01:09:48Guest:He's going to show up and be the feisty trainer.

01:09:51Guest:Then we'll get Giamatti.

01:09:52Guest:He'll be the feisty teacher.

01:09:53Guest:He'll be the crusty but lovable.

01:09:55Guest:What is crusty but lovable?

01:09:56Guest:That's network when they talk about the crusty but lovable.

01:09:59Guest:Yeah, yeah.

01:10:00Guest:So...

01:10:00Guest:Okay, that's still what it means.

01:10:02Guest:No, I have really no problem with it then if that's what it still means.

01:10:06Guest:Because it's like, yeah, you'd be the crusty but lovable hotel manager or something.

01:10:11Guest:Yeah.

01:10:12Guest:If that's what it means, I really have no problem with it because I love those guys.

01:10:15Marc:Yeah.

01:10:16Marc:I love that stuff.

01:10:17Marc:But it's a great character because, you know, you're able to do whatever.

01:10:21Guest:Oh, Cinderella Man?

01:10:22Guest:Yeah.

01:10:22Marc:Yeah, yeah.

01:10:23Marc:Because that scene where she shows up at his apartment, it's great.

01:10:27Guest:It's great.

01:10:27Guest:Yeah.

01:10:28Guest:Yeah.

01:10:29Guest:It's fun.

01:10:29Marc:And there's some emotion to it.

01:10:30Guest:Yes.

01:10:31Guest:Yeah.

01:10:31Marc:It's a little... Now, when you're working with someone like Russell Crowe, what is that experience for you?

01:10:37Marc:Are you coming at it from a different place generally, or do you not think about that?

01:10:41Guest:No.

01:10:42Guest:No, with him, it wasn't different.

01:10:43Guest:No.

01:10:44Guest:Because he's pretty like...

01:10:46Guest:straightforward now he does it it's it wasn't anything it didn't feel different in any way no yeah have you had experiences on set where you're like all right he's gonna do this work and i'll just wait over here yeah yeah i did this i did a movie with jim carrey where he did this full-on like i'm immersed all the time thing oh the the annie kaufman movie on the moon yeah yeah yeah yeah

01:11:09Marc:Yeah.

01:11:10Marc:He's immersed all the time in whatever it is.

01:11:12Guest:Yes, that's true.

01:11:13Guest:That's true.

01:11:14Guest:But he really did the whole nine yards, like the Daniel Day-Lewis thing.

01:11:20Guest:Yeah, yeah, yeah.

01:11:21Guest:Who I hear that when you do it with him, it's like you don't really notice it in a way.

01:11:26Guest:Yeah, yeah.

01:11:26Guest:It's like he's so in it.

01:11:27Marc:He's so good that you believe you're hanging out with Abe Lincoln.

01:11:29Guest:Exactly.

01:11:30Guest:Well, that's what people I know did that set.

01:11:32Guest:They walk in the room and it's like, oh, my God, it's Abe Lincoln.

01:11:35Guest:Yeah.

01:11:36Guest:Let's go talk to Abe Lincoln.

01:11:37Guest:But people said that's what it was like.

01:11:40Guest:I'm telling you.

01:11:41Guest:I'm telling you.

01:11:42Guest:How'd you not get in that movie?

01:11:43Guest:I don't know.

01:11:44Guest:I was a little irked that I wasn't in that.

01:11:46Guest:I wasn't the crusty but lovable, you know, secretary of commerce.

01:11:49Guest:Or congressman.

01:11:50Guest:Congressman.

01:11:51Guest:There definitely was a role in there for you.

01:11:53Guest:Congressman from, you know, wherever, North Carolina or whatever.

01:11:56Guest:Crusty but lovable.

01:11:57Guest:But, you know, a nice turn at the end.

01:12:00Guest:You know, something comes around at the end and votes.

01:12:03Guest:Yeah.

01:12:03Guest:Unbelievable.

01:12:04Guest:Yeah, I know.

01:12:05Guest:No, I was a little bit like, I can't be in that.

01:12:07Guest:Every actor in Hollywood is in that movie.

01:12:09Guest:Every actor in Hollywood's in that.

01:12:10Guest:But also it was a little bit like, maybe it would be confusing if I did that because I'd been... John Adams already?

01:12:16Guest:Yes, exactly.

01:12:17Guest:That might have been confusing.

01:12:19Marc:But do you feel like you're typecasted sometimes?

01:12:21No.

01:12:21Guest:Yeah, sometimes I think the bigger roles that I do are kind of similar.

01:12:25Guest:Yeah.

01:12:26Guest:Yeah.

01:12:27Guest:Is it okay?

01:12:28Guest:Yeah, because they're good roles.

01:12:30Guest:Yeah, yeah, yeah.

01:12:30Guest:You know what I mean?

01:12:31Guest:It's like I have good stuff to do in them.

01:12:34Marc:Yeah, so you still like having that?

01:12:37Guest:Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

01:12:38Guest:The smaller roles got more interesting as time went on.

01:12:41Guest:Yeah?

01:12:41Guest:I got more kind of varied, felt a little bit more varied in the smaller roles.

01:12:45Marc:And this is not meant as an insult.

01:12:47Marc:It's just meant I haven't seen Billions.

01:12:51Marc:Now, it must be odd that at this point in your career, there are some people that only know you from Billions.

01:12:55Guest:Yeah, well, that's always weird, though.

01:12:57Guest:Whatever the hell is the thing, then it becomes the thing people know you for for a while.

01:13:02Marc:And it's been on for a while.

01:13:03Guest:It was on forever.

01:13:04Guest:It was on for seven, eight years.

01:13:05Guest:It's done.

01:13:06Marc:But I was in radio for years, and your big break was a guy that was very familiar to me.

01:13:11Guest:That actual guy?

01:13:12Guest:Well, just the radio.

01:13:14Guest:Yes.

01:13:15Marc:That guy exists in radio.

01:13:17Guest:That's right.

01:13:18Guest:Near America.

01:13:19Guest:Yes, that's right.

01:13:20Guest:You did all of that.

01:13:20Marc:Yeah, for a couple years.

01:13:21Guest:What's his name?

01:13:22Guest:Sam Cedar?

01:13:23Guest:Yeah, Cedar.

01:13:23Guest:Sure, yeah.

01:13:24Guest:Is it still?

01:13:25Marc:He does a thing.

01:13:26Marc:Sam and I did a streaming video show when no one was able to stream yet.

01:13:31Marc:Interesting.

01:13:31Guest:Interesting.

01:13:33Marc:And we go way back, Cedar.

01:13:34Guest:Yes.

01:13:35Guest:I did a thing with him years ago.

01:13:37Guest:I did a pilot.

01:13:39Guest:I did a sitcom briefly with Sam Cedar many years ago.

01:13:42Guest:He was funny.

01:13:43Guest:Really funny.

01:13:43Guest:He really was.

01:13:45Marc:He's very funny in a very specific way, but he's also very opinionated, argumentative, and relentless.

01:13:53Marc:He does a thing called Majority Report, and that's his bread and butter.

01:13:58Marc:He's a progressive podcast guy.

01:14:00Guest:Nice.

01:14:00Guest:Very good.

01:14:01Marc:Yeah.

01:14:01Marc:But like, do you think that that private parts like that, like it puts you on the map, but on some level you've been in that zone forever?

01:14:10Guest:Well, yeah, I mean, definitely.

01:14:12Guest:And it was really fun and it definitely was something I had more to do than I'd ever had to do before.

01:14:17Guest:But, you know, I kind of.

01:14:19Guest:There's some funny way in which I was somebody asked me once, you know, when you were recently when you were a kid and plays in school and grade school.

01:14:28Guest:Yeah.

01:14:28Guest:And they said, what was the thing that you did in grade school and you loved?

01:14:32Guest:And I was like, when I was in the fourth grade, we did the Pied Piper of Hamlin.

01:14:35Guest:You know what I mean?

01:14:36Guest:Like it was a little kid's thing with the Pied Piper family.

01:14:39Guest:Somebody said, who would you play?

01:14:40Guest:And I said, the corrupt mayor who rips the Pied Piper off, who says, I'm going to pay you to get all the rats out of town.

01:14:46Guest:And then it's like, fuck you.

01:14:47Guest:I'm not going to pay you once all the rats are out of town.

01:14:49Guest:I'm like, I've kind of been doing the same thing ever since.

01:14:53Guest:I was in the fourth grade.

01:14:54Guest:I'm kind of playing the petty bureaucrat.

01:14:56Guest:No matter what it is, it's like kind of the petty bureaucrat to the guy that I play a little bit.

01:15:02Guest:You know what I mean?

01:15:02Guest:The kind of the small man who wants the power, but he can't really handle the power or something.

01:15:09Guest:But that's not like really who you are.

01:15:10Guest:I don't think so.

01:15:12Guest:Yeah.

01:15:13Guest:I don't think so.

01:15:13Guest:But it must be fun.

01:15:14Guest:But that's an interesting question.

01:15:15Guest:That's a whole question of how much is it you?

01:15:18Guest:How much is it like not you?

01:15:19Guest:How long do you spend with that question daily?

01:15:21Guest:Well, it's an interesting question.

01:15:22Guest:It's an interesting question.

01:15:26Guest:It's not every day.

01:15:27Guest:It's not a daily thing, but it definitely comes up.

01:15:30Guest:But that's an interesting question because you do sort of sometimes go, what is it about me that seems to translate into something?

01:15:38Guest:These kind of weird guys like this, complicated guys, I don't know.

01:15:41Marc:Is there a role that you're dying to do?

01:15:43Guest:I don't know if there's anything I'm dying to do.

01:15:46Guest:Somebody asked me, and I said I would like to do the guy who doesn't talk very much.

01:15:53Guest:I'd like to do the kind of like the silent guy.

01:15:56Marc:That would be so hard for your fans.

01:15:58Marc:What's wrong with Paul?

01:15:59Marc:Why is he not talking?

01:16:01Marc:Why is he not yelling?

01:16:02Guest:He's not yelling.

01:16:03Guest:He's not talking.

01:16:04Guest:Because I have to play really hyper articulate people.

01:16:07Guest:And it's like I'd like to play the kind of guy who just, I don't, for whatever reason, doesn't talk as much.

01:16:12Guest:Interesting.

01:16:12Guest:I did do one.

01:16:13Guest:I did do one movie where I didn't have to talk as much.

01:16:15Guest:What movie was that?

01:16:16Guest:It's, I can't remember the title.

01:16:19Yeah.

01:16:19Guest:It's a thing I did.

01:16:22Guest:Talk about the accent going in and out.

01:16:24Guest:Yeah.

01:16:24Guest:I did a Canadian accent.

01:16:25Guest:It was with Paul Rudd, and I can't remember the title.

01:16:27Guest:Oh, that's all right.

01:16:29Guest:It happens.

01:16:29Guest:You've done 100 movies.

01:16:30Guest:But this is the memory thing I was talking about.

01:16:32Guest:But you've done 100 movies.

01:16:34Marc:You know, there's some guys, like, you know.

01:16:35Marc:It'll come to me at some point.

01:16:36Marc:I've learned it, like, with certain actors.

01:16:37Marc:Like, they do movies.

01:16:39Marc:The only thing that gets them to do the movie, it's like, all right, so it's two weeks and it's here?

01:16:43Marc:Okay.

01:16:44Marc:Two weeks and it's here, or it's like it's two weeks and it's...

01:16:46Marc:Australia, something like that.

01:16:48Guest:That's a big thing.

01:16:48Guest:As long as it's not a month or two months.

01:16:51Guest:Well, yeah, I don't know.

01:16:52Guest:I don't mind that.

01:16:52Guest:As long as I'm not having to carry the thing.

01:16:55Guest:I enjoy going to.

01:16:57Guest:Oh, yeah?

01:16:57Guest:Sure.

01:16:58Guest:Yeah, yeah, yeah.

01:16:59Guest:Travel was a big part of it.

01:17:00Marc:So your father, before he tragically died very young, was a baseball commissioner.

01:17:07Marc:And it seems like that was a big part of your life, baseball.

01:17:10Guest:I was not a big fan.

01:17:12Marc:No, because I was going to wonder if you ever did a baseball movie.

01:17:16Guest:I have done a baseball movie.

01:17:18Guest:Which one?

01:17:18Guest:I did a weird baseball movie.

01:17:20Guest:It's called... It's called The Phenom.

01:17:25Guest:Okay.

01:17:25Guest:It's a weird little... It's a good little movie, actually.

01:17:28Guest:Yeah.

01:17:28Guest:And it's about a pitcher who gets the... You know, he gets the... Do you play a scout or a manager?

01:17:34Guest:Hold on.

01:17:36Guest:Hold on.

01:17:36Guest:Is it about a guy?

01:17:37Guest:Hold on.

01:17:37Guest:Steady.

01:17:38Guest:This might come as a surprise to you.

01:17:40I...

01:17:40Guest:It's about a guy, a pitcher, who gets the yips.

01:17:44Guest:You know, he can't get it over the plate.

01:17:47Guest:And so I play as a sports psychologist.

01:17:49Guest:Wow.

01:17:50Guest:Oh, big switch.

01:17:51Guest:And so I play a sports psychologist, and Ethan Hawke is in it and plays the kid's father.

01:17:56Guest:It's actually a really interesting movie.

01:17:59Marc:He's great in it.

01:18:00Marc:He's an interesting actor.

01:18:02Marc:Yeah, he's great.

01:18:03Marc:Because he can really do it, and he's very intellectual about it.

01:18:05Marc:Yeah, he is, actually.

01:18:06Marc:And he's very focused.

01:18:08Marc:I talked to him once, and I never forgot it, where he got cast in Training Day with Denzel.

01:18:14Marc:So what he did was, not unlike a football team watching the other team's games.

01:18:22Guest:Stealing their signal?

01:18:23Guest:Oh, right.

01:18:23Guest:Yeah, studying their games.

01:18:25Guest:He did that with Denzel.

01:18:26Guest:He did that.

01:18:27Guest:With all his movies so he didn't get fucking eaten.

01:18:29Guest:So he wasn't like getting in there and just being like, holy shit.

01:18:32Guest:Or just being like plowed under.

01:18:34Guest:But he wouldn't have anyway, I don't think.

01:18:36Guest:No, I don't think so, but I like the prep.

01:18:37Guest:Yeah, that is interesting.

01:18:38Marc:It's just sort of like, all right, this is how he's going to come at me.

01:18:40Guest:I just saw the Equalizer 3 on a plane.

01:18:43Guest:God, they're satisfying, aren't they?

01:18:44Guest:So satisfying.

01:18:46Guest:Holy shit, that movie was great.

01:18:47Guest:The new one?

01:18:48Guest:Yeah.

01:18:49Guest:Oh, God.

01:18:49Guest:Okay, I'm going to watch it.

01:18:50Guest:It was really good.

01:18:51Guest:It falls apart a little bit at the end, but it was really good.

01:18:53Guest:Really?

01:18:53Guest:Do the kids leave on a helicopter?

01:18:55No.

01:18:55Guest:Oh, boy.

01:19:00Guest:No, but not far from that.

01:19:05Guest:Not far from that.

01:19:07Guest:Yeah, along those lines.

01:19:09Guest:Along those lines.

01:19:09Guest:Yeah, yeah, yeah.

01:19:10Guest:It's good.

01:19:11Guest:It's good.

01:19:11Marc:It's satisfying.

01:19:12Marc:I don't watch a lot of that stuff.

01:19:13Guest:I like action movies.

01:19:14Guest:You do?

01:19:14Marc:Yeah.

01:19:15Marc:Do you watch the John Wicks?

01:19:17Marc:Yeah, I like those.

01:19:18Guest:I haven't seen the latest one.

01:19:18Marc:I haven't seen any of them.

01:19:19Guest:That guy I mentioned before, Lance Reddick, my friend who died, he was in all of those.

01:19:22Marc:Oh, really?

01:19:23Marc:I'd have to look at a picture of him.

01:19:25Marc:I'm sure I know who he is.

01:19:27Marc:All right.

01:19:28Marc:So what's happening now?

01:19:29Marc:You got a big day?

01:19:30Guest:No, actually.

01:19:34Guest:I have a very light day after this.

01:19:35Guest:Oh, you do?

01:19:35Guest:This has been heavy.

01:19:37Guest:This has been heavy.

01:19:38Guest:What are you kidding me?

01:19:39Guest:We've just laughed for an hour and a half.

01:19:40Guest:I do a podcast.

01:19:42Guest:no you don't yes i do okay i do do you really not believe me do you really think i come in here are you kidding i did not steal your format though it's i don't know i know everybody does it don't do that don't they everyone has something yeah i mean i but i don't own the format it was just very but you know but you are kind of you're like the first person to do this the thoughtful candid you know full you know engaged conversation thing yes i suppose so yeah yeah yeah it kind of

01:20:08Guest:Yeah, I'll take that.

01:20:10Marc:Okay.

01:20:11Marc:So what are you doing with yours?

01:20:12Guest:Mine's all about like esoteric weird shit.

01:20:15Marc:Oh, like in what variety?

01:20:17Guest:UFOs and stuff like that.

01:20:18Guest:Yep.

01:20:18Guest:Ghosts, things like that.

01:20:20Guest:Yeah, I do a thing called chinwag with a guy who's a philosopher.

01:20:24Guest:What?

01:20:24Guest:He's a philosophy professor.

01:20:25Guest:Wait, so you- There's an art college in Chicago.

01:20:28Marc:Okay, but what's the angle?

01:20:30Guest:He's skeptical.

01:20:31Guest:I'm less skeptical.

01:20:32Guest:Of ghosts?

01:20:34Guest:All kinds of things.

01:20:35Guest:All kinds of things.

01:20:36Guest:We talk to a Roman historian.

01:20:40Guest:We talk to a guy who's a psychedelics researcher.

01:20:42Guest:We talk to a dream and sleep.

01:20:44Guest:It's just whatever weird topic.

01:20:45Marc:This is all part of the quest to be the guy in the coffee shop, Paul.

01:20:49It is.

01:20:49Guest:No, it is.

01:20:51Guest:It full on is.

01:20:53Guest:It's not a joke.

01:20:54Guest:It really is.

01:20:55Guest:It really is.

01:20:55Guest:It's fully embracing.

01:20:56Guest:It's like you only have the courage.

01:21:00Guest:No fucking joke.

01:21:02Guest:I say with all fucking seriousness and candor,

01:21:06Guest:I got tired of not talking about shit like this.

01:21:10Guest:Sasquatch and shit like this.

01:21:13Guest:And like precognitive dreams and stuff.

01:21:15Guest:I really did.

01:21:16Guest:Because I'm interested.

01:21:18Guest:And so I was like, I'm 56.

01:21:20Guest:Who knows how much longer I'm going to live.

01:21:22Guest:So I want to talk about this stuff.

01:21:23Guest:And I have a buddy who likes to talk about it, too.

01:21:26Marc:No, I get it.

01:21:26Marc:But I've gone through periods of that.

01:21:30Marc:Being interested in stuff like that.

01:21:32Marc:Well, what happened to me, how I learned my lesson around managing my fucking mind.

01:21:39Guest:Yeah.

01:21:41Marc:Is that when I was younger, I did a lot of cocaine.

01:21:47Marc:And I was out here at the comedy store.

01:21:49Marc:And it was right after college.

01:21:51Marc:I wanted to be a comic.

01:21:52Marc:And I got caught up with Kendison and that world.

01:21:55Marc:And a lot of cocaine and no sleep.

01:21:58Marc:Holy cow.

01:21:59Marc:So I got cocaine psychosis.

01:22:01Marc:Right.

01:22:01Marc:And I was pretty sure that there was a very dark, mystical conspiracy.

01:22:04Marc:So the next stop is like, sure.

01:22:07Guest:Yeah.

01:22:07Guest:So everything was connected.

01:22:09Guest:JFK assassination and stuff like that.

01:22:10Marc:That was part of that a little earlier.

01:22:12Marc:Yeah.

01:22:12Marc:That's now become QAnon.

01:22:13Marc:So you know where that goes.

01:22:14Marc:Yes.

01:22:15Marc:And I talked to a – you should listen to my episode with this guy, Robert Guffey, who wrote a book called Operation Mindfuck.

01:22:21Marc:Have him on your book.

01:22:22Guest:That sounds great.

01:22:22Guest:Okay.

01:22:23Guest:That's exactly the kind of thing.

01:22:24Guest:Sure.

01:22:24Guest:Yeah.

01:22:25Guest:Not stealing your shit, though.

01:22:26Guest:No, you're not.

01:22:27Marc:You're not.

01:22:28Marc:But, like, I have to manage that because if you have a propensity to the mystical –

01:22:34Guest:Are you a believer in it?

01:22:36Guest:Well, who knows?

01:22:37Guest:At that point, if you're doing a shit ton of cocaine and not sleeping, you might just be able to.

01:22:41Marc:But any conspiracy is satisfying because you're backloading a pattern.

01:22:45Marc:Right.

01:22:46Guest:Yeah, it's a narrative.

01:22:47Guest:It's a satisfying narrative.

01:22:49Marc:I remember I wrote a book, and there's a scene where my buddy Jim worked in politics forever, like in Washington for presidency.

01:22:56Marc:He's an advanced guy, but he's a guy, a Washington guy.

01:23:00Marc:And I remember he takes me on this tour.

01:23:03Marc:I think it might have been for cocaine psychosis, but I was always heading there.

01:23:07Marc:And I'm like, we're walking around Washington, and I'm like, you know what this is about.

01:23:12Marc:It's the Freemasons.

01:23:13Guest:Absolutely.

01:23:13Guest:The whole thing, the city's laid out in a pattern.

01:23:16Marc:Exactly.

01:23:16Marc:I know, yeah.

01:23:17Marc:So I go off on this whole rip and Jim looks at me and goes, Mark, people here just aren't that organized.

01:23:22Marc:That's true.

01:23:23Guest:I know it's true.

01:23:24Marc:That's absolutely true.

01:23:27Marc:That's absolutely right.

01:23:28Marc:And yet the Masons are the Masons.

01:23:29Guest:Right.

01:23:29Guest:You can become a Mason.

01:23:30Guest:Yes.

01:23:31Guest:Anybody, we can become Masons.

01:23:33Marc:Of course.

01:23:33Marc:Yes.

01:23:34Marc:But you can't get the big, you know.

01:23:35Guest:You can't get up to the top.

01:23:37Marc:Sure, you know, and there's the whole sort of, you know, George Washington was wearing a Masonic apron as an inauguration.

01:23:42Guest:But you can see paintings of him wearing a Masonic apron.

01:23:45Marc:Sure, but so fucking what?

01:23:47Guest:It's true.

01:23:48Guest:But all that shit is actually very boring.

01:23:50Guest:It's not anywhere near as interesting as you think it's going to

01:23:52Marc:There's a—you should go—have you been up to San Francisco to the Freemason Hall?

01:23:56Guest:There's a— No, it's a great one in San Francisco.

01:23:58Marc:It's a huge one, and I've done comedy there.

01:24:00Marc:It's a beautiful place, but they have a fairly expansive Freemason museum.

01:24:05Guest:Like history.

01:24:06Guest:I've been on the one in London, which is like the central one in London, where they have a painting of George Washington.

01:24:12Guest:Ben Franklin?

01:24:12Guest:The Hellfire Club?

01:24:14Guest:Oh, no.

01:24:14Guest:That's a whole other thing, though.

01:24:16Guest:That's not connected with the Freemasons.

01:24:17Guest:No?

01:24:17Guest:That's just like a sex club.

01:24:19Guest:isn't it?

01:24:20Guest:I don't know.

01:24:20Guest:I think it's all kind of connected.

01:24:21Guest:Illuminate's true, actually.

01:24:23Guest:I got a bunch of books.

01:24:24Guest:You want some new books?

01:24:25Guest:Some literature.

01:24:25Guest:I'm ready to let go of the books.

01:24:27Guest:But you're absolutely right when you say that basically it's on track to be the fucking, the marginal, the marginal weirdo at the university.

01:24:35Guest:Oh, yeah.

01:24:36Guest:Or it's just, yeah, it's interesting.

01:24:37Guest:It's exploring that.

01:24:38Guest:You just don't have the guts, Paul.

01:24:40Guest:I don't.

01:24:41Guest:I don't.

01:24:42Guest:I don't.

01:24:42Guest:I have to hide behind a microphone and do it.

01:24:45Guest:Just lock in and lose yourself.

01:24:47Guest:I don't have the guts.

01:24:48Guest:So the world would go like, holy shit, why is that guy at the protest?

01:24:51Guest:But I think, oh my God, you need to go full on that.

01:24:55Guest:That would be amazing, wouldn't it?

01:24:56Guest:Sure.

01:24:57Guest:It happens, I'm sure.

01:24:58Guest:I've known fairly sane people.

01:25:00Guest:Who have gone full on that way.

01:25:02Guest:Of course.

01:25:02Guest:Like QAnon?

01:25:03Guest:Yeah.

01:25:04Guest:Really?

01:25:05Guest:Yeah.

01:25:05Guest:Actually, you're right.

01:25:05Guest:I actually know a guy.

01:25:06Guest:Brain's kind of soft, dude.

01:25:07Guest:I knew a guy who went that way.

01:25:10Guest:It's interesting because he was an old school psychonaut hippie guy.

01:25:15Guest:Of course.

01:25:15Guest:From the 60s and 70s.

01:25:17Guest:And where that dovetails with the same thing, with the crazy right wing thing, it's fascinating.

01:25:23Guest:Yeah.

01:25:23Guest:That weird old hippie thing.

01:25:25Guest:Yeah, but it was all a joke.

01:25:26Guest:The Illuminati was a joke.

01:25:28Guest:It was a prank.

01:25:29Guest:It's true.

01:25:29Guest:It was all a prank.

01:25:30Guest:It's all that church bobshit.

01:25:32Guest:It was before that.

01:25:33Guest:It was meant as a reaction to the John Birch Society.

01:25:36Guest:Right.

01:25:37Guest:Nice.

01:25:37Guest:Robert Anton Wilson and all that stuff.

01:25:39Guest:Yeah, he was a joker.

01:25:41Guest:It's a joke.

01:25:42Guest:Was it really, though?

01:25:43Marc:No, it's okay.

01:25:44Marc:I'm not going to do this with you.

01:25:48Guest:Will you be on my show?

01:25:50Marc:Maybe.

01:25:51Guest:Really?

01:25:52Marc:Yeah.

01:25:52Marc:Where do you tape it?

01:25:53Guest:You could be here.

01:25:54Guest:I just do it from my home.

01:25:55Guest:Oh, you do it from Zoom?

01:25:56Guest:Yeah, I do it from a Zoom.

01:25:57Marc:To tell you how I managed to keep this shit out?

01:26:00Marc:Yes.

01:26:00Marc:Oh, yeah.

01:26:01Guest:That would be really interesting, actually.

01:26:02Marc:You kind of have to.

01:26:03Marc:You got to make a decision.

01:26:04Marc:You do.

01:26:05Marc:There's so much coming at you, and because of algorithms, it's, you know.

01:26:09Guest:Now it's even easier.

01:26:10Marc:Well, radicalizing people one way or the other is like, it happens in days.

01:26:14Guest:Yeah.

01:26:15Guest:Hours.

01:26:15Guest:Matter of hours, it sounds like.

01:26:17Guest:But that's that whole thing.

01:26:18Guest:The accessibility and all this stuff has gotten too easy.

01:26:22Guest:I'll show you some books.

01:26:23Guest:You've got some books?

01:26:24Guest:I do, absolutely.

01:26:24Guest:Some literature, some pamphlets.

01:26:26Guest:I have an old... But that's exactly it.

01:26:28Guest:Like at one time, you had to mimeograph this shit off.

01:26:31Guest:You had to have a mimeograph machine.

01:26:34Guest:You staple it together.

01:26:35Guest:If you wanted to find this stuff, it was hard to find any of this kind of stuff.

01:26:39Guest:Yeah.

01:26:39Guest:Even the UFO stuff, it was all harder to find.

01:26:42Marc:But what you really got to track with a lot of the propaganda that is conspiracy oriented is the right wing drive of it.

01:26:52Guest:It essentially feels like a conservative impulse.

01:26:58Marc:It's a divide and conquer mindfuck.

01:27:00Marc:Yeah.

01:27:01Marc:You know, so so the the actual corporate elites can just keep everybody fucked up and confused and fascist if necessary.

01:27:10Guest:Yeah.

01:27:10Guest:But don't you do you think people have a propensity and natural hunger to want just fascism anyway?

01:27:15Marc:Of course.

01:27:16Marc:Yeah.

01:27:17Marc:It's a lot easier than tolerance.

01:27:18Guest:Way easier.

01:27:19Guest:Way easier.

01:27:20Marc:If everyone thinks the same.

01:27:21Marc:So much easier.

01:27:22Guest:Just turn it all over to that guy.

01:27:23Guest:He'll do everything.

01:27:24Marc:And also, just like we can hate all these people and even kill them?

01:27:27Guest:Yeah.

01:27:27Marc:Great.

01:27:28Guest:I'm annoyed.

01:27:28Guest:I've been annoyed.

01:27:29Guest:Democracy is just a drag.

01:27:31Guest:It's exhausting.

01:27:32Guest:It's too hard.

01:27:33Guest:Yeah.

01:27:33Guest:Let's not sell it too hard.

01:27:34Guest:Let's not sell it too hard.

01:27:37Marc:We're kind of like, well, it makes sense, Mark.

01:27:40Marc:I'm like, where's this going?

01:27:42Marc:Jesus, Paul.

01:27:43Guest:Maybe you shouldn't do the podcast.

01:27:47Guest:No.

01:27:47Guest:That's interesting, though.

01:27:48Guest:The marginal guy.

01:27:50Guest:Yeah.

01:27:50Marc:good talking to you yeah really good talking to you thanks man yeah man how was that that's what we do here that is what we do here

01:28:05Marc:The Holdovers is playing in theaters and available to stream on Peacock.

01:28:10Marc:What a great guy.

01:28:11Marc:I didn't even get his phone number.

01:28:12Marc:I sure got his fucking phone number so we could hang out.

01:28:16Marc:Can someone just get me Paul's phone number?

01:28:18Marc:Thank you.

01:28:19Marc:Hang out a minute, you guys.

01:28:23Marc:Man, 1,500 episodes is a lot to take in if you're new to WTF.

01:28:30Marc:So for full Marin subscribers, we do archive deep dives where we walk you through some of the memorable episodes in our back catalog.

01:28:38Marc:We recently did one about our 200th episode.

01:28:41Guest:John Mulaney at the time asked, what do you think is edgy in comedy?

01:28:48Guest:And I'm interested to know if your answer to that is different than it was back then.

01:28:53Marc:Well, I think it seems to me, for me, to be vulnerable enough to take real emotional risks on stage and figure out where the humor is in that and also to stay...

01:29:08Marc:To sort of keep your heart in the game with that stuff.

01:29:13Guest:The answer you gave when he asked that was, it was instant.

01:29:17Guest:You said, being completely honest.

01:29:21Guest:Yeah.

01:29:21Guest:That's edgy.

01:29:22Guest:Which I hear as different from what you just said.

01:29:26Guest:They're related.

01:29:27Guest:But what you're saying now about...

01:29:30Guest:being vulnerable and showing that vulnerability.

01:29:33Guest:That's emotional honesty.

01:29:35Guest:Exactly.

01:29:35Guest:And it reflects a maturity and some corrections you've had to make in your life about that idea of just being completely honest.

01:29:44Guest:Like you have over the course of the last 12 years kind of

01:29:48Guest:redirected certain things because you feel there are things that can be kept personal or there are things that don't have to be shared.

01:29:56Guest:Or, you know, it's like that thing you've talked about with Louie when you told him he had to talk about the Oklahoma City bombing, right?

01:30:05Guest:Like when he was going to do his Letterman show.

01:30:07Marc:But that was different.

01:30:11Marc:I think that honesty can be, that a certain type of honesty can be a defense mechanism.

01:30:17Marc:And it can be jarring.

01:30:20Marc:And it can be, you know, for effect.

01:30:23Guest:Well, that's the funny thing.

01:30:24Guest:You were likening it to people who did edgy comedy for effect at the time in this episode.

01:30:29Guest:You were like, you know, it doesn't take much to be like, I don't know, the Pope licks my balls or Jesus lives in my ass.

01:30:37Guest:I just love that those are your two examples.

01:30:45Marc:Yeah.

01:30:45Marc:I kind of like, I'm going to bring that back.

01:30:48Marc:Jesus lives in my ass.

01:30:50Marc:To sign up for the full Marin so you can get bonus episodes twice a week and every episode of WTF ad free, go click on the link in the episode description or go to WTF pod.com and click on WTF plus.

01:31:04Marc:This is a little guitar piece I call, Wouldn't Nicotine Be Nice?

01:31:08Guest:Now.

01:31:52.

01:32:03.

01:32:22guitar solo

01:32:48Thank you.

01:33:02guitar solo

01:33:34Guest:Boomer lives.

01:33:35Guest:Monkey and La Fonda.

01:33:36Guest:Cat angels everywhere.