Episode 1673 - Regina King

Episode 1673 • Released August 28, 2025 • Speakers detected

00:00:00Guest:Lock the gates!

00:00:09Marc:All right, let's do this.

00:00:11Marc:How are you?

00:00:11Marc:What the fuckers?

00:00:12Marc:What the fuck buddies?

00:00:13Marc:What the fucksters?

00:00:14Marc:What's happening?

00:00:15Marc:I'm Mark Maron.

00:00:16Marc:This is my podcast.

00:00:18Marc:Welcome to it.

00:00:19Marc:Welcome.

00:00:21Marc:Welcome to it.

00:00:22Marc:How how is everybody doing?

00:00:24Marc:How are you holding up?

00:00:26Marc:It's a look.

00:00:26Marc:I'm OK.

00:00:27Marc:Today is a it's a it gets it's a kind of a heavy talk.

00:00:32Marc:I guess I got to do a little bit of a, not a trigger warning.

00:00:36Marc:I don't really like that term.

00:00:40Marc:But towards the end of this conversation with Regina King, you know, Regina King, she's been acting since she was like a teenager on 227 and broke through with her roles in movies like Boys in the Hood and Friday.

00:00:54Marc:She's an Oscar winner for her performance in If Beale Street Could Talk.

00:00:59Marc:She's won Emmys, Golden Globes, Independent Spirit Awards, a lot of stuff.

00:01:04Marc:Right now, she's in the new Darren Aronofsky movie, Caught Stealing.

00:01:08Marc:which I enjoyed.

00:01:09Marc:But towards the end, we do talk about the death of her son in some detail.

00:01:18Marc:He took his own life and she's been public about it to a certain extent.

00:01:25Marc:It came up in terms of talking about grief and mental illness.

00:01:31Marc:So I'm just telling you now it gets it gets a little deep and emotional at the end.

00:01:39Marc:OK, so if that's going to somehow if you don't want to start crying on your run.

00:01:47Marc:You might want to pause it when we start getting into that.

00:01:53Marc:But it's an important conversation.

00:01:56Marc:The whole thing was great.

00:01:57Marc:She's great.

00:01:58Marc:She's great in this new movie.

00:01:59Marc:I went to see a screening of Caught Stealing.

00:02:03Marc:And...

00:02:04Marc:It's interesting because Aronofsky really kind of gets the grit and kind of filth of New York at that time in the early 90s.

00:02:15Marc:It was shot literally a block from my old house.

00:02:20Marc:A lot of it takes place on Avenue A between like...

00:02:24Marc:We have fourth and seventh on Avenue A. He rebuilt the facade to Benny's Burritos.

00:02:30Marc:Kim's video was there.

00:02:32Marc:So it's all very familiar to me because I was around then or even like shortly before that I was still living down there.

00:02:42Marc:So it does have that vibe.

00:02:44Marc:But there's something I learned about watching this movie is that a lot of surprises in the movie, actually.

00:02:48Marc:And it's a pretty good story.

00:02:51Marc:And everyone's good.

00:02:52Marc:Regina's great.

00:02:53Marc:Austin Butler's great.

00:02:54Marc:Zoe Kravitz.

00:02:55Marc:Everyone's good.

00:02:56Marc:But...

00:02:58Marc:There's something about violence that when it's not gratuitous, when it's not heightened or detached from character in a way, or if people get some violence done at them, to them, and they don't really have it coming, it's gnarly.

00:03:18Marc:There is an element of comedy to this thing, but the characters are deep.

00:03:25Marc:And Austin's character is a...

00:03:27Marc:A flawed and troubled guy.

00:03:30Marc:But it is definitely worth seeing.

00:03:33Marc:I mean, I think any Aronofsky movie is worth seeing.

00:03:38Marc:But it was kind of great to talk to Regina today because it's a good talk.

00:03:48Marc:So my show at Largo tonight is sold out, but I'll be back there with the band on Wednesday, September 10th.

00:03:54Marc:You can go to wtfpod.com slash tour for tickets.

00:03:57Marc:Also next week, we're doing an Ask Mark Anything bonus episode.

00:04:01Marc:So this is the last call for you to send in your questions.

00:04:05Marc:Just go to the link in the episode description of today's show and send me whatever you want to ask.

00:04:11Marc:Then get the bonus episode in your full Marin feed next Tuesday.

00:04:16Marc:How's that sound to you?

00:04:19Marc:I talked to a class down at the Annenberg School for communications and media or whatever.

00:04:25Marc:A woman asked me to come speak to her class.

00:04:27Marc:I didn't realize it was the first day of that class.

00:04:30Marc:I didn't realize that I didn't really know what the class was about.

00:04:35Marc:And she just asked me questions.

00:04:37Marc:And there may be maybe there was 20 people in the room.

00:04:41Marc:And there was part of me that one time thought, like, oh, I could be a teacher.

00:04:44Marc:I don't think I can.

00:04:45Marc:I don't think I know how to be in front of an audience for very long without, you know, getting a laugh or knowing that I'm connecting.

00:04:53Marc:And I tell you, teachers have got a tough job.

00:04:55Marc:You've really got to, you know, somehow kind of put some sort of –

00:05:01Marc:filter on to, to not, you know, wonder whether you're connecting or not.

00:05:07Marc:And also I think I forget what it was like to be in college and who I was in college and what I knew versus what I thought I knew big gap, big gap.

00:05:18Marc:And if I really think back on it, like in philosophy class or logic class, or even some of the classes about romantic poetry and stuff, it was way above my mental, uh,

00:05:30Marc:pay grade there.

00:05:31Marc:I tried to take it all in, but it did not come together for me.

00:05:37Marc:I feel like it's just starting to come together now.

00:05:41Marc:I mean, I just, and I wasn't even talking in any lofty way, but I think there's just some basic things about talking about

00:05:50Marc:What you're thinking with points of reference and whatnot that could get totally lost.

00:05:57Marc:And I'm not saying they weren't paying attention.

00:05:58Marc:Some of them had good questions about show business and whatnot.

00:06:03Marc:But I just had that moment where I was walking on campus and I was like, I kind of remember this.

00:06:09Marc:I kind of remember who I was when I was like 21 or 20 at Boston University, you know, wondering if my trench coat was cool or whether I had my glasses frames are okay.

00:06:24Marc:How was my haircut?

00:06:25Marc:You're just kind of going to these classes and, you know, playing the role of student, playing the role of a smart guy or a guy who thought he was smart.

00:06:36Marc:But in terms of what I really could grasp,

00:06:38Marc:In college, in terms of, you know, the classes I was taking, you know, film studies and some satire classes.

00:06:46Marc:It's just the language of academics, the language of philosophy, the language of criticism.

00:06:55Marc:It was just my brain was too blown open.

00:06:58Marc:I couldn't contextualize or compartmentalize much of anything.

00:07:03Marc:And I still strove to do it.

00:07:06Marc:And I have my whole life.

00:07:08Marc:And I think I've gotten a little better at it.

00:07:10Marc:But sometimes when I try to read the texts of criticism or philosophy, I don't fucking know.

00:07:20Marc:I just dump stuff into my head.

00:07:22Marc:Sometimes I pull something out that kind of aligns with kind of what I'm thinking.

00:07:26Marc:Then I feel validated.

00:07:28Marc:And I'm like, yeah, me and this guy who's a brilliant cultural critic, we're kind of thinking the same thing.

00:07:33Marc:I just had half a joke about it, but there's half a book about it here.

00:07:37Marc:But I think I nailed it.

00:07:39Marc:I think I had it.

00:07:42Marc:Maybe that's all I need.

00:07:43Marc:Maybe I can let that go.

00:07:45Marc:But I do know that I don't think I could be a teacher.

00:07:50Marc:But these conversations, they're still the lifeblood of what I do and who I am.

00:07:57Marc:And this one, as I said earlier, it does get heavy.

00:08:03Marc:And something kind of interesting happened during it.

00:08:05Marc:I was able to...

00:08:08Marc:kind of hold the space and listen and remain empathetic.

00:08:12Marc:But I didn't really kind of get, you know, I didn't really attach to my own grief till kind of later in the conversation about hers.

00:08:21Marc:And I think that was good.

00:08:22Marc:I think that's okay.

00:08:24Marc:You know, it was Lynn's, Lynn Shelton's birthday yesterday.

00:08:27Marc:I believe she would have been 60.

00:08:28Marc:And a couple of people were like, I hope you're okay today.

00:08:33Marc:I'm like, I think about it a little bit every day.

00:08:37Marc:I think the anniversary of her passing is more difficult.

00:08:43Marc:And I don't know if I've compartmentalized it.

00:08:48Marc:But there's some part of me that just knows that and has known for a while that, you know, in light of the tragedy of her death, but it's just people die.

00:08:59Marc:And I don't think I've become callous to it, but there's a bit of an acceptance to it, to the struggle of living and the reality of dying.

00:09:13Marc:And, you know, what you do in between and, you know, how do you kind of navigate the urgency to get those tweaks done so you go out fully formed and okay.

00:09:30Marc:Be nice to go out okay as opposed to go out, hey, wait, wait, wait, I got it.

00:09:37Marc:I'm okay.

00:09:39Marc:Cut.

00:09:41Marc:No, wait, give me one more.

00:09:43Marc:Cut.

00:09:43Marc:Fuck.

00:09:46Marc:I think I've decided on my epitaph.

00:09:50Marc:You know, these things come and go.

00:09:51Marc:Some of them are funny.

00:09:53Marc:Some of them are honest.

00:09:54Marc:But I think on my tombstone, if I do that, or on my urn, on my plaque...

00:10:02Marc:I think I just wanted to say the other shoe.

00:10:07Marc:Huh?

00:10:09Marc:What do you make of that?

00:10:11Marc:Pretty good?

00:10:12Marc:The other shoe.

00:10:14Marc:I like it.

00:10:17Marc:Anyway, Regina King is here.

00:10:20Marc:And as I said earlier, it does get heavy.

00:10:23Marc:It might be emotional for some of you towards the last 15 minutes or so of this talk.

00:10:29Marc:She's in the new Darren Aronofsky movie, Caught Stealing, which opens tomorrow in theater.

00:10:34Marc:She also has a new wine line called Me and You, spelled M-I-A-N-U.

00:10:43Marc:And that's important because it is a passion project that we discuss.

00:10:47Marc:It actually kind of moved us through this.

00:10:52Marc:a discussion of grief that I didn't know really how we were going to kind of move out of.

00:11:00Marc:It's interesting when you talk to people and that stuff comes up and I started feeling mine and she was feeling hers and you're like, I don't think we're going to be able to get

00:11:09Marc:out of this and cause we, we need to let it happen.

00:11:14Marc:And, but it, it kind of went right into this reason that she, she created this, this wine and it's touching.

00:11:27Marc:So this is me talking to Regina King.

00:11:35Thank you.

00:11:46Marc:Thank you for coming.

00:11:47Marc:Thank you for having me.

00:11:48Marc:Yeah, painful authenticity.

00:11:50Marc:That's what it's all about.

00:11:51Guest:That's what we're opening up with, right?

00:11:56Marc:Well, you know, I don't think I know how to do it any other way.

00:12:01Marc:But, you know, I guess it takes a while to get to your authentic being.

00:12:06Guest:You know what?

00:12:07Guest:I think that that's true.

00:12:08Guest:And I think some people never quite find that.

00:12:13Marc:Yeah.

00:12:14Marc:Because you put up, I think you put up like all these defenses or ways of getting through life.

00:12:18Marc:And then you kind of get used to those.

00:12:19Marc:And if you never have that moment where you're like, well, this is bullshit.

00:12:23Marc:And find the courage to kind of get past it.

00:12:29Marc:But that's the hard part, right?

00:12:32Guest:Harnessing the courage.

00:12:34Marc:Yeah.

00:12:35Marc:Yes.

00:12:35Marc:That is the hard part.

00:12:35Marc:Yeah, because people are shitty.

00:12:38Marc:And, you know, they're always thinking about themselves.

00:12:42Marc:And I don't know, I deal with it a lot now, and I'm 61.

00:12:44Marc:I just think about it more now, like when I perform.

00:12:48Guest:Really?

00:12:48Guest:Yeah.

00:12:49Guest:Really?

00:12:50Guest:Yeah.

00:12:51Guest:That's interesting, because you hear so many people as, you know, I would say, even just even thinking about myself, each decade, I feel like I...

00:13:03Marc:discover a new right um version of myself yeah or i have a new yeah i don't really give a fuck yeah you know moment you know that helps the new version of yourself exactly as you get older and the zero fucks kind of yeah start to stack up you realize like i really don't give a shit and that's a a powerful place to come from

00:13:24Guest:Yeah.

00:13:25Marc:When you really don't give a shit?

00:13:26Marc:Mm-hmm.

00:13:26Marc:Because if you really don't, it's freedom.

00:13:29Marc:It's freedom.

00:13:30Marc:Yeah.

00:13:30Marc:It's freedom.

00:13:31Marc:And I don't know, like on stage lately, I've just been, I wrote down in my notebook yesterday, I wrote, limit swagger.

00:13:39Guest:Ah.

00:13:42Guest:Yeah.

00:13:42Guest:I like that.

00:13:43Marc:Just to see, what will that do?

00:13:46Marc:LS.

00:13:47Marc:And just get down to the voice of who you are.

00:13:53Marc:Because we live in this world now where...

00:13:57Marc:Nobody shuts up.

00:13:59Marc:And it's just.

00:14:00Marc:Yes.

00:14:01Marc:The noise.

00:14:02Marc:It's fucking crazy.

00:14:03Marc:The noise.

00:14:04Marc:It's just like a never ending yammering.

00:14:06Marc:Just people.

00:14:07Marc:And there's a frequency to it.

00:14:10Marc:It's almost like a mania.

00:14:12Marc:And I don't.

00:14:13Marc:It just gets to the point where you got to save your brain.

00:14:18Guest:One thousand percent.

00:14:20Guest:It's so crazy that you said that.

00:14:22Marc:Why?

00:14:22Guest:Because just yesterday, you know how like your car hooks up to your Bluetooth.

00:14:28Guest:Yeah.

00:14:28Guest:And if you don't turn it off, just as soon as you get in the car, it automatically starts playing, you know, which on your Spotify or whatever.

00:14:34Guest:And so this one podcast.

00:14:39Guest:Yeah.

00:14:39Guest:That I was listening to.

00:14:42Guest:Yeah.

00:14:42Guest:Because.

00:14:44Guest:There was, and I've never heard of the podcast before.

00:14:48Guest:And it popped up on my flip board.

00:14:53Guest:And so I was so curious about that topic.

00:14:55Guest:So I'm going to listen to it.

00:14:58Guest:And it was interesting.

00:14:59Guest:It was only like 24 minutes.

00:15:01Guest:Good for me.

00:15:03Guest:And for whatever reason, I get in my car.

00:15:07Guest:And I was actually listening to it while I was in New York.

00:15:09Guest:So I'm back in L.A., in my car.

00:15:12Yeah.

00:15:12Guest:And it had gone to the next episode.

00:15:15Guest:And the voices.

00:15:18Yeah.

00:15:19Guest:It was really making me feel crazy.

00:15:24Marc:Yeah.

00:15:25Marc:Yeah.

00:15:25Marc:It's because everyone is like I did radio years ago.

00:15:29Marc:Yeah.

00:15:30Marc:Like morning radio.

00:15:31Marc:I just realized this recently that in order to get up and do live radio and get people are going to work.

00:15:37Marc:You get into this tone.

00:15:39Marc:What's everybody got going?

00:15:40Marc:And here we go.

00:15:41Marc:This is where we're talking at this level.

00:15:43Marc:Yeah.

00:15:43Marc:And you lock into that.

00:15:45Marc:And I think that is... I think it happens innately when people get on these mics.

00:15:51Marc:Right.

00:15:51Marc:And they feel like there can't be any pauses.

00:15:53Marc:You know, to learn how to pause like this... Well, you got to... You know, you have quieter podcasts in there.

00:15:58Marc:But the general means of talking on these mics is... And then on TV, it's all that.

00:16:06Marc:No one stops.

00:16:07Guest:It's no one stops.

00:16:08Guest:And it's like on a frequency that is annoying.

00:16:12Guest:And I have to...

00:16:13Guest:Be honest that I kind of discovered that with myself, with talking on the telephone, that I would go into a pitch.

00:16:21Guest:That was really, I started hearing myself.

00:16:25Guest:Right.

00:16:25Marc:For an interview or just in general?

00:16:27Guest:Just in general.

00:16:28Marc:Yeah.

00:16:28Marc:You know what I mean?

00:16:28Marc:It's good you still pick up your phone.

00:16:30Guest:Yeah.

00:16:31Guest:I still use it for a phone.

00:16:35Guest:That's good.

00:16:36Guest:But yeah, like that same moment that you had when you left radio, morning radio, I had that same realization like maybe about 10 years ago or so where I was like, you know what?

00:16:48Guest:This conversation is not the problem.

00:16:50Guest:I am the problem because my tone is up so high.

00:16:54Marc:Yeah.

00:16:54Marc:And even as an actor, I mean, you know the power of pauses.

00:16:59Marc:But, you know, in regular conversation, sometimes you're just sort of like, let's get this done.

00:17:05Marc:Yes.

00:17:06Guest:But, you know, that's the funny thing.

00:17:08Guest:Another funny thing I realized.

00:17:09Guest:That's how you know with some of those commercials that they're A.I.

00:17:14Guest:Because there are no pauses.

00:17:16Guest:Right.

00:17:16Guest:They just go.

00:17:17Marc:Yeah.

00:17:18Marc:I can't even wrap my brain around the AI yet.

00:17:21Marc:I don't know what to do with it.

00:17:22Marc:It's insane.

00:17:23Guest:It's here.

00:17:24Marc:Well, I know it's here, but everyone's talking about it.

00:17:26Marc:And maybe I'm not knowing when I'm engaging it.

00:17:29Marc:I'm not a complete sucker.

00:17:31Marc:I do like the AI when you search for something on Google and you get all these different options.

00:17:36Marc:That seems helpful.

00:17:37Marc:Yeah.

00:17:37Marc:And when I see some of the AI on the reels on the IG, some of them are funny.

00:17:42Marc:Yeah.

00:17:43Marc:Yeah, but I don't know, you know, what's slipping by me.

00:17:46Marc:Right.

00:17:47Marc:And what's real and what isn't real.

00:17:49Marc:I feel like there has to come a time where we can make a choice to detach from all of it for periods of time.

00:17:57Guest:Well, I think for any sanity, you do have to consciously make that decision to detach.

00:18:05Marc:It's hard.

00:18:05Marc:Yeah.

00:18:06Marc:It's really hard.

00:18:06Marc:It's like drugs, man.

00:18:08Marc:Yeah.

00:18:08Marc:I mean, even like when you're on set, you know, and then like cut and everyone's just in their chair.

00:18:12Guest:I've been doing the last two projects that I've been on.

00:18:15Guest:I've been leaving my phone in the trailer.

00:18:17Guest:How's that working out?

00:18:19Guest:It's worked out really great.

00:18:20Guest:But also because- What did you do at that time?

00:18:23Guest:I actually look at the script.

00:18:27Guest:But usually I don't bring my script to set, to be quite honest.

00:18:31Guest:When I started a show called Southland, Christopher Chulock, who was the producing director there, he made a mandate that no sides were allowed on set.

00:18:44Marc:No sides.

00:18:44Guest:And that was probably the best gift he could have ever given.

00:18:50Guest:I feel like all of us that were on that show probably still operate in the same way.

00:18:55Guest:So since then, you know, I don't bring, unless I have a question specifically for the director and I want to remember my notes that I had written in my script, that's the only time I'll bring my script to set.

00:19:08Guest:Really?

00:19:14Guest:Is Linus the one on peanuts with the blanket?

00:19:17Guest:Yeah.

00:19:18Guest:It's, it's like your binky.

00:19:19Guest:Sure.

00:19:20Guest:You know what I mean?

00:19:20Guest:And so even though you might've prepared, sometimes you just will go up on a line just because you don't have that, that, that,

00:19:31Guest:piece of something right there with you.

00:19:34Guest:I feel like it was really liberating that he had done that.

00:19:40Guest:If I do go up on the line and I'm not able to substitute it with something else because I am actually in the scene,

00:19:50Guest:I just will, old school, call out line.

00:19:52Guest:Sure.

00:19:52Guest:Yeah.

00:19:52Guest:You know?

00:19:53Guest:Yeah.

00:19:53Guest:Well, so it helped your whole process.

00:19:56Guest:Helped my whole process.

00:19:57Marc:How many episodes did you do of that?

00:19:58Guest:We did four or five seasons.

00:20:01Guest:I want to say we did like 50 episodes.

00:20:02Marc:So that's like a full training in No Sides.

00:20:05Guest:Oh, 1,000%.

00:20:06Guest:And whenever we would have guest actors that would come on, they would freak out.

00:20:11Guest:And I mean, these are like established actors.

00:20:13Guest:Just for the day?

00:20:15Marc:Just for the episode.

00:20:16Marc:They think you're going to knock it out and just have the sides and learn them that day?

00:20:20Guest:And then they get that mandate and they're like, oh my God, you guys, they really enforce this?

00:20:25Guest:And we're like, yeah.

00:20:26Marc:Yeah.

00:20:26Marc:Yeah, because you're on set and people are like, wait, cut, can you take the sides out of your pocket?

00:20:30Marc:We're seeing the sides.

00:20:31Guest:We're seeing the sides, all of that.

00:20:32Guest:Or Chris also felt like with the sides, people were disrespecting the words.

00:20:40Guest:You see them on the ground, people walking on them, using them as coasters.

00:20:44Marc:Sure, yeah, just garbage.

00:20:45Guest:Yeah, just garbage, exactly.

00:20:47Guest:So I thought it was great, and I still use that to this extent.

00:20:52Marc:But it also forces you to prepare in a different way, like the real way, like really know it.

00:20:57Guest:Really know it.

00:20:58Guest:And honestly, it also forced a lot of actors, forced us, to have conversations and ask questions before we're actually shooting the scene.

00:21:10Guest:Because that's eating up time in the day.

00:21:12Guest:So we would have like incredibly short days because all of the work was already done.

00:21:18Marc:And that's sort of the job.

00:21:20Marc:Well, it becomes difficult when you do, like, a whole movie.

00:21:22Marc:Like, I watched Shirley.

00:21:24Marc:And, I mean, so you didn't have your sides at all?

00:21:29Guest:No, I didn't.

00:21:30Guest:What I had was the script supervisor and my dialect coach.

00:21:35Guest:And my dialect coach would, before every scene, we would just go over.

00:21:40Guest:Because sometimes...

00:21:42Guest:there were like three or four really big speeches in Shirley.

00:21:47Guest:And, you know, I needed to, they needed to become part of me.

00:21:50Guest:And so those speeches, I feel like I didn't need to go over those lines as much because I'd already, you know, like, got to get these speeches.

00:22:03Guest:And it was more just the dialect coach just pointing out places that I may have, you know, dipped with the dialect.

00:22:11Guest:Right.

00:22:11Guest:But it was for the scenes that are with other actors where I really relied on my dialect coach and script supervisor and luckily had really...

00:22:26Guest:I had actor-actors that are in this for the art form.

00:22:30Guest:We wanted to go through lines.

00:22:32Guest:So we did a lot of just running our lines just together.

00:22:35Marc:Yeah, that's good.

00:22:37Marc:It was a good cast.

00:22:39Marc:What is her dialect exactly?

00:22:43Guest:So, yeah, Shirley has such a unique dialect.

00:22:47Guest:So she's Bayesian.

00:22:49Guest:But she's born in New York.

00:22:51Marc:Yeah.

00:22:51Guest:Then lived in Barbados for like... And her husband's from there?

00:22:57Guest:No.

00:22:58Guest:Jamaican?

00:22:58Guest:Her husband's Jamaican.

00:22:59Guest:Yeah.

00:23:01Guest:And her... I call him her consigliere.

00:23:05Guest:Yeah.

00:23:05Guest:Rest in peace, Lance.

00:23:07Guest:Great actor.

00:23:08Guest:Awesome actor.

00:23:09Guest:Yeah.

00:23:10Guest:He was Ghanaian.

00:23:12Guest:Yeah.

00:23:12Guest:So sometimes the three of us...

00:23:16Guest:And Michael Cherry, who played Shirley's husband, he is actually Trinidadian.

00:23:26Guest:Wow.

00:23:26Guest:So we were all working with dialects.

00:23:29Guest:And sometimes when all three of us were in a scene together, we really had to work to not start picking up the other dialects.

00:23:36Marc:Yeah.

00:23:36Marc:I have to do that here.

00:23:37Guest:Yeah.

00:23:39Yeah.

00:23:39Marc:It happens sometimes.

00:23:42Marc:Sometimes when I interview an old Jewish comedian, I'll ask my producer, at what point did I turn into an old Jew?

00:23:47Marc:When did that happen?

00:23:48Marc:So you're an actor.

00:23:50Marc:Well, I act, yeah.

00:23:51Marc:Yeah, you're an actor.

00:23:52Marc:I do the thing.

00:23:53Guest:Because that's what we do.

00:23:55Guest:We can't really help, but we're like sponges.

00:23:58Marc:I don't know if I ever framed it as an actor.

00:24:02Marc:I just thought I was needy and believed that...

00:24:05Marc:Other people's lives were infinitely more interesting than mine.

00:24:09Marc:That's funny.

00:24:12Marc:So I just kind of glom on, you know, take the ride.

00:24:15Guest:Are you a people watcher?

00:24:17Guest:Sure.

00:24:17Guest:So yeah, because every actor that I know...

00:24:23Guest:We're all people watchers.

00:24:25Marc:I do it a lot more.

00:24:26Marc:I'm doing it more again.

00:24:27Marc:Yeah.

00:24:29Marc:Because, you know, Robert Crumb is the cartoonist.

00:24:32Marc:No.

00:24:32Marc:Well, he does.

00:24:33Guest:That name sounds familiar.

00:24:34Guest:What is cartoon?

00:24:35Marc:He's like an underground cartoonist.

00:24:36Marc:He did like in the 60s.

00:24:38Marc:He did like Mr. Natural and all that.

00:24:40Marc:You'd probably recognize.

00:24:41Marc:Recognize the cartoon.

00:24:42Marc:Yeah.

00:24:43Marc:Yeah.

00:24:43Marc:He has a very specific way of looking at almost everybody, and it's kind of like just slightly grotesque.

00:24:52Marc:And I just watched a doc about him again, and I've been looking at everybody kind of like that, and it humanizes them.

00:24:59Guest:Slightly grotesque.

00:25:00Marc:Yeah, slightly.

00:25:01Marc:Just evens the plan, too.

00:25:02Marc:Slightly grotesque.

00:25:03Marc:Hold on one second.

00:25:04Marc:I don't want to be rude, but I just want to say hi to my mother.

00:25:08Guest:Oh, hi, Mom.

00:25:09Marc:Yeah, hold on.

00:25:09Marc:It's hard to get her.

00:25:10Marc:Hello?

00:25:11Hello?

00:25:11Guest:Hi.

00:25:12Marc:Well, how are you doing?

00:25:15Marc:Good.

00:25:15Marc:What's up?

00:25:16Marc:I'm interviewing somebody, but I didn't want to miss your call.

00:25:20Marc:Are you doing okay?

00:25:23Guest:Yeah.

00:25:23Marc:Yeah?

00:25:24Marc:Were you watching me in that show?

00:25:26Guest:Yeah.

00:25:27Marc:Did you like it?

00:25:28Guest:I loved it.

00:25:29Marc:Oh, good.

00:25:30Marc:Look, I'm trying to make plans to get down there, so try to stay here.

00:25:34Marc:Okay.

00:25:36Marc:All right?

00:25:37Marc:But you feel good?

00:25:38Guest:Yeah.

00:25:39Marc:All right.

00:25:39Marc:I love you.

00:25:40Marc:I'll talk to you.

00:25:40Marc:I'll call you tomorrow.

00:25:41Guest:Okay, babe.

00:25:42Guest:Bye-bye.

00:25:44Guest:Oh, moms are the best.

00:25:47Guest:And you're such a—yes, you are truly a comedian.

00:25:50Guest:The fact that you would say, so just stay here.

00:25:55Marc:Well, she's down in Florida, and I haven't been able to get down there.

00:25:59Marc:And, you know, she is getting older.

00:26:01Marc:So there's that thing where—

00:26:04Marc:Whatever my relationship with her is, you kind of go through life and you're kind of like, yeah, I'll call her later and whatever.

00:26:11Marc:And then all of a sudden you're like, I got to... Yeah.

00:26:14Guest:My sister and I, we're going to have to have a real deep conversation right now.

00:26:20Guest:We go...

00:26:21Guest:Once she'll go for one week and I'll go for one week.

00:26:24Guest:Our mother's in Ohio because my stepdad died a couple years ago.

00:26:31Guest:And so she's in this house by herself.

00:26:34Marc:Oh, she's still in her house.

00:26:36Guest:Still in her house.

00:26:36Guest:She doesn't want to move.

00:26:38Guest:She doesn't want to move here.

00:26:39Guest:Are there stairs?

00:26:40Guest:Yes.

00:26:40Guest:The stairs are what's keeping her heart going.

00:26:42Guest:Oh, good.

00:26:43Guest:You know, she goes up those stairs faster than...

00:26:46Guest:But, you know, she's 81.

00:26:49Guest:And so we're going to have to it's thank God I have an amazing my bonus sister.

00:26:58Guest:She's our stepsister.

00:27:00Guest:So even though her father passed.

00:27:03Guest:She still comes and sees my mom every other day.

00:27:07Guest:Oh, that's the best.

00:27:08Guest:Yeah, she is absolutely the best.

00:27:10Guest:I love you, Stephanie.

00:27:11Marc:That's the best.

00:27:13Guest:But we're going to have to come more than one week out of the month.

00:27:20Guest:And she's still chatty with it?

00:27:22Guest:She is, she's battling the beginning stages of dementia.

00:27:29Guest:And I'm finding a lot of my friends were in this same place with their parents.

00:27:34Guest:But the thing that's really kind of heartbreaking, watching your parents lose their independence.

00:27:40Guest:Yeah.

00:27:41Guest:Yeah.

00:27:41Guest:is that with my mother's situation, she's aware of it.

00:27:45Guest:It's not like she's not aware of what's... Of the mental thing.

00:27:47Guest:She's fully... She's a teacher.

00:27:49Marc:Yeah.

00:27:50Guest:And so she feels a decline and will be in mid-conversation and she'll just stop.

00:27:58Guest:Yeah.

00:27:58Guest:And she'll say, I want to... I just don't know the words.

00:28:02Guest:Yeah.

00:28:03Guest:And so to know that that's happening to you...

00:28:08Marc:It's heartbreaking.

00:28:09Guest:It's heartbreaking.

00:28:10Guest:So we just try to remind her just to give herself grace.

00:28:15Marc:Well, that's nice because my dad's pretty far gone with it and he doesn't seem to know it all.

00:28:20Guest:Well, that's what we commonly recognize, any type of dementia.

00:28:27Guest:I hate the word dementia.

00:28:29Guest:I want to just call it old timers.

00:28:31Marc:Yeah.

00:28:32Marc:I say my dad's newly demented.

00:28:35Okay.

00:28:35Marc:Because, you know, dementia is sad, but newly demented.

00:28:38Marc:It's like, what's going to happen?

00:28:39Marc:Well, what's this thing?

00:28:40Guest:Yeah.

00:28:41Guest:Yeah.

00:28:42Marc:Well, there is something to that.

00:28:44Marc:I mean, he still seems to know me.

00:28:47Marc:And, you know, his wife is a bit younger than him.

00:28:49Marc:And she kind of makes him listen to the podcast and stuff.

00:28:52Marc:So he knows me.

00:28:54Marc:But, like, day of stuff.

00:28:56Marc:You can dig up some memories and stuff.

00:28:58Marc:But, like, you ask him if he feels well or if he remembers the movie.

00:29:02Marc:Yeah.

00:29:02Marc:He doesn't seem to care.

00:29:03Marc:I think he's in the ventriloquist dummy stage of dementia where his wife, I'll say, did you see a movie yesterday?

00:29:14Marc:And he goes, yeah, Rosie, what was that movie?

00:29:17Marc:So she just speaks through him.

00:29:19Guest:Yeah.

00:29:19Marc:And it keeps his brain alive.

00:29:21Guest:Yeah.

00:29:21Marc:But the whole, I don't know, both of them are still alive.

00:29:24Marc:Yeah.

00:29:25Marc:Did your parents have you young?

00:29:28Guest:Well, my mother, I...

00:29:31Guest:i don't know i mean i feel like she was born in the 40s so she had me at 26 27 so that's the age that most people now people are having children later in life yeah so i would say no they my mother was a normal age and my father was older my father was 16 years older than my mom yeah he was yeah

00:29:54Marc:My mom was 22, but even 26.

00:29:56Marc:If you think about a 26-year-old now, you're like, what?

00:29:59Guest:Yeah.

00:29:59Marc:It's crazy.

00:30:00Guest:Yeah, I had my son at 25.

00:30:02Marc:Really?

00:30:02Marc:Yeah.

00:30:03Guest:You're like a kid.

00:30:04Guest:Well, I didn't feel... I mean, you know, I owned a home at that time.

00:30:07Marc:Sure.

00:30:08Guest:You know, I... Yeah, yeah, yeah.

00:30:09Guest:So I've been working since I was a child.

00:30:12Guest:Well, I guess you're not really a kid, but like, I just... Well, in some cases, yeah.

00:30:18Guest:I will definitely say that...

00:30:21Guest:Lucky to have the mom that I have because I do I do know even then that I was much more mature than my my peers.

00:30:32Marc:Yeah.

00:30:33Marc:And what does she you don't come from Ohio.

00:30:36Marc:do you?

00:30:37Guest:No, I'm born and bred in L.A.

00:30:38Guest:My parents met here in L.A.

00:30:40Guest:Okay.

00:30:41Guest:And had me and my sister.

00:30:43Marc:And what's she doing in Ohio?

00:30:45Guest:She went back to, my mother's from Ohio.

00:30:47Guest:Oh.

00:30:47Guest:So about a little over 30 years ago, when my grandmother was starting to slow down a bit, she moved back to Ohio to be closer to her.

00:31:00Guest:Oh, to her mom.

00:31:01Guest:Yes, yes.

00:31:02Marc:But you're not planning to move back to Ohio?

00:31:04No.

00:31:04Guest:Um, that's the, we are going to have to have that conversation.

00:31:08Guest:Really?

00:31:08Guest:Well, I mean, I'm not at a place where I'm okay with

00:31:20Guest:moving my mother out of a space where she is uncomfortable, you know, out where she's comfortable, to a space that she has to get to know.

00:31:28Guest:You know, like I said, she doesn't have, she remembers things.

00:31:32Guest:It's not like, where am I?

00:31:34Guest:She doesn't have, you know, any of that.

00:31:37Guest:She's very much aware.

00:31:38Guest:She keeps her calendar.

00:31:40Guest:She, you know, and she just knows where everything is.

00:31:43Guest:And, you know, it's our mom.

00:31:45Guest:So we, right now, we're going to be the ones that have to...

00:31:49Guest:Right.

00:31:50Marc:So what would you think about like just get an apartment there or something?

00:31:54Guest:Well, her, the house that she's in is big because, you know.

00:32:00Guest:Right.

00:32:01Guest:And it's just her in it.

00:32:02Guest:So I think, look, I'm having this conversation with you and I haven't started having it with my sister yet.

00:32:10Guest:So the plan to have the conversation with my sister is that maybe.

00:32:14Guest:You can just tell her to listen to this.

00:32:16Guest:Yeah, listen to the podcast and what the.

00:32:19Guest:Yeah.

00:32:19Guest:That might be her response when I tell her.

00:32:22Guest:But my thought is that maybe we would just—how we're alternating weeks now, that maybe we just kind of stretch it out and alternate months.

00:32:30Marc:Yeah, that might work out.

00:32:32Marc:Yeah, it might.

00:32:32Marc:We'll see.

00:32:33Marc:So, getting back to Shirley, that movie seemed like—it was a movie that—

00:32:39Marc:I didn't think I'd ever see.

00:32:40Marc:And, you know, I don't my memories of Shirley Chisholm were, you know, I was a kid.

00:32:46Marc:Yeah.

00:32:47Marc:But I remember it was a big deal.

00:32:48Marc:So really watching your movie was the first full arc of education I got about her.

00:32:56Marc:Wow.

00:32:57Marc:And it's an important story.

00:32:59Marc:Yes.

00:32:59Marc:So when did you get hung up on that story?

00:33:03Wow.

00:33:03Guest:My sister and I got hung up on that story about 17 years ago.

00:33:09Guest:I mean, because just separately, we both had conversations with people who had never even heard her name.

00:33:21Guest:And so that was a little mind blowing for us.

00:33:23Guest:And then we did a little bit more asking people about, do you know who Shirley Chisholm is?

00:33:31Guest:And found that more of our East Coast friends knew who she was than West Coast friends.

00:33:39Guest:And we were like, okay.

00:33:41Guest:Her story, she's like...

00:33:43Guest:The godmother of a first, you know, and she's the blueprint.

00:33:49Guest:Right.

00:33:49Guest:And so we set out to do this film and it took us this long to get to actually becoming a reality.

00:34:00Marc:How did you like how did the process happen?

00:34:03Marc:Because it was your idea?

00:34:04Marc:You like optioned a book or you bought the story?

00:34:07Marc:Yeah.

00:34:08Guest:Actually, so we were with a lot of different teams of writers along the way.

00:34:13Guest:Well, not a lot.

00:34:16Guest:Went through a lot of versions?

00:34:17Guest:Yeah.

00:34:19Guest:Only one version of a script.

00:34:21Guest:Right.

00:34:22Yeah.

00:34:22Guest:Two other ideas of what it could look like.

00:34:26Guest:And so the first writing team we were with, they were still close to them now.

00:34:33Guest:We still are trying to find that project to do.

00:34:36Guest:But what happened is their stars started rising.

00:34:40Guest:My stars started rising.

00:34:42Guest:And we just the time.

00:34:43Guest:Yeah.

00:34:44Guest:We put together a package.

00:34:46Guest:We had, you know, locked in on an outline that we felt like was was was.

00:34:51Guest:Yeah.

00:34:53Guest:And then we just started, you know, life started and going different ways.

00:34:58Guest:And then Raina and I picked it back up again.

00:35:01Guest:It may have been... Is she your production partner?

00:35:06Guest:My production partner.

00:35:07Guest:My sister Raina is my production partner.

00:35:10Guest:And I can't really remember exactly when, but it was... I was shooting the second, third season...

00:35:21Guest:of American Crime with John Ridley.

00:35:25Guest:And I said, Raina, what do you think about John Ridley?

00:35:32Guest:Why not?

00:35:33Guest:He loves history.

00:35:36Guest:And she was like, ask him.

00:35:37Guest:Ask him now.

00:35:37Guest:Ask him while you're on set.

00:35:38Guest:And I'm like, okay.

00:35:40Guest:You got the time.

00:35:41Guest:You're not using your phone.

00:35:43Yeah.

00:35:43Guest:I see what you did there.

00:35:47Guest:That's a true comedian.

00:35:49Guest:You guys know how to bring that back.

00:35:51Guest:I love it.

00:35:53Guest:So asked him.

00:35:54Guest:He loved the idea.

00:35:56Guest:And so we started getting to work.

00:35:59Guest:And in that small amount of time.

00:36:02Guest:all of a sudden an announcement was made that Viola Davis was going to be doing Shirley Chisholm.

00:36:10Guest:Another project.

00:36:12Guest:Another Shirley Chisholm project.

00:36:13Guest:How the fuck does that always happen?

00:36:15Guest:I don't know.

00:36:16Guest:And here's the thing.

00:36:17Guest:We had the rights from her sister, the life rights from her sister.

00:36:21Guest:So we had been, even though that long pause had happened before we approached John, there...

00:36:29Guest:we still kept continuing the rights with our sister Muriel.

00:36:33Guest:And Muriel was like, you know, am I going to see it one day?

00:36:36Guest:And we were like, Muriel, we are, we are.

00:36:38Guest:And she died just as we were starting production.

00:36:42Guest:So that was kind of pre-production.

00:36:45Guest:So that was sad.

00:36:46Guest:But, you know, we kept our word, you know.

00:36:50Guest:Did Valo make hers?

00:36:51Guest:No.

00:36:52Guest:So what happened was when I saw that announcement,

00:36:55Guest:We got together, kind of huddled as a team, and had talked about, well, we should make an announcement, too.

00:37:02Guest:And I said, you know what?

00:37:04Guest:I love Viola.

00:37:05Guest:She's, like, amazing.

00:37:06Guest:And I think she would be an amazing Shirley Chisholm.

00:37:10Guest:So if she's made it there first, then you know what?

00:37:14Guest:Wow.

00:37:14Guest:Let's just—we'll have to step away.

00:37:16Guest:And whatever happened—

00:37:19Guest:that that didn't work out.

00:37:20Guest:And as soon as it didn't work out, we jumped back in, made an announcement.

00:37:24Guest:Did you talk to her about it?

00:37:26Guest:I still have not talked to her about it.

00:37:28Guest:I know John Ridley.

00:37:29Marc:We started doing comedy together.

00:37:31Marc:Yes.

00:37:31Marc:It's crazy.

00:37:32Guest:I keep forgetting that that's where John, you know, is...

00:37:34Marc:For a few years there.

00:37:36Guest:Yeah.

00:37:37Marc:And he was good.

00:37:38Marc:He was like angry and intense.

00:37:40Guest:Angry and dry.

00:37:42Marc:Yeah.

00:37:43Marc:And I've talked to him.

00:37:44Marc:He was on the show years ago.

00:37:45Marc:But yeah, he's really kind of become a lot of things.

00:37:49Marc:Yeah.

00:37:51Marc:Better that he stayed out of comedy.

00:37:52Marc:Yeah.

00:37:52Guest:1,000% better that he stayed out of comedy.

00:37:55Guest:I feel like when he first said that he started in the comedy space with writing as well, and I was like, I just feel like I'd have to think too much about the joke to get the joke.

00:38:10Marc:Yeah.

00:38:10Marc:He's a very smart guy, and he has some very smart jokes.

00:38:14Marc:I still remember a couple of his jokes.

00:38:16Marc:I brought it up with him.

00:38:17Marc:But so do you find that how do people react to the story?

00:38:22Marc:Did you get feedback on Shirley?

00:38:24Guest:I mean, you know, you never know if people are giving you a B.S.

00:38:30Guest:version of what they feel about something.

00:38:33Guest:But.

00:38:34Guest:It felt genuine.

00:38:36Guest:Every person that expressed that they did not know.

00:38:41Guest:Thank you for letting them know.

00:38:43Guest:We got a lot of that.

00:38:45Guest:We got a lot of, you know, that they thought it was just such an amazing cast.

00:38:53Guest:Yeah, yeah.

00:38:54Guest:And we got a lot of people who were, you know, like part of the campaign.

00:39:00Guest:Yeah.

00:39:01Guest:Oh, really?

00:39:02Guest:They were teenagers.

00:39:03Guest:Yeah, yeah.

00:39:04Guest:And who were very thankful for telling Mrs. C's story.

00:39:09Marc:Yeah, sure.

00:39:10Marc:That's great.

00:39:11Marc:That's great.

00:39:13Marc:But you didn't want to direct that one?

00:39:15Guest:No, no.

00:39:17Guest:The acting and the embodying her, that was just, that's heavy lifting.

00:39:24Marc:I did not want to.

00:39:25Marc:Especially with the dialect and everything.

00:39:28Marc:Yeah.

00:39:28Guest:Just all of it.

00:39:29Guest:She's such a specific character, you know, just from how she walked, the way she spoke, the way she would change the way she'd speak, depending on who she was talking to.

00:39:39Marc:And you got to study footage, too, I imagine.

00:39:41Marc:Yeah.

00:39:42Marc:And it's hard.

00:39:42Marc:Like, if you're in every scene, how are you going to really direct?

00:39:45Marc:Yeah.

00:39:46Guest:I mean, people do it.

00:39:47Guest:I know.

00:39:48Guest:Like, Don Cheadle did an amazing job.

00:39:50Marc:Miles Davis?

00:39:51Marc:Oh, my God.

00:39:52Marc:People don't talk about that movie enough.

00:39:54Marc:Yeah.

00:39:54Marc:What a weird fucking movie that is.

00:39:56Guest:What a weird fucking great movie.

00:39:59Marc:Totally.

00:39:59Marc:You know what I mean?

00:40:00Marc:Totally.

00:40:00Guest:You know, it was stylized.

00:40:01Marc:Because the whole thing's like a hallucination.

00:40:03Guest:Yeah.

00:40:04Guest:Which makes sense through the eyes of mine.

00:40:06Guest:Yeah.

00:40:06Guest:I thought it was great.

00:40:07Guest:I thought it was...

00:40:08Marc:amazing it's such a shame like in this world of media that things just come and go I know and it becomes hard to find I know and people work so hard on them I feel like part of it is because there's just so much content I know yeah just the idea that we call it content now is terrible I know

00:40:29Guest:And how so much content is being made to entertain distracted people.

00:40:39Guest:People who can't actually put their phone down and watch a film or watch a show.

00:40:45Marc:Well, they keep telling us that people aren't capable of attention spam, but they're guilty of causing that.

00:40:51Marc:One thousand percent.

00:40:52Marc:People are capable.

00:40:53Marc:Yeah.

00:40:54Marc:But, you know, you've designed the system based on an algorithm that, you know.

00:40:59Guest:Don't get me started.

00:41:00Marc:All right.

00:41:01Guest:Don't get me started.

00:41:02Marc:What made you decide that for your your film directing debut that that night in Miami was the one to do?

00:41:12Guest:Well, I had a meeting with my lit agent, and he was a new lit agent.

00:41:23Guest:I didn't gel quite right with the first one that I had.

00:41:29Guest:And so with Harley, we went to lunch, and I told him that I wanted to do something that was...

00:41:40Guest:Entertaining, but that was centered, that the story had a true real life happening as the backdrop.

00:41:54Guest:Yeah.

00:41:55Guest:And that that was, you know, he asked me the question, what type of films do I want to direct?

00:41:59Guest:I'm like, all types of films, but this is one.

00:42:01Guest:Yeah.

00:42:03Yeah.

00:42:03Guest:And he sent me three scripts that had that, that met that note.

00:42:10Guest:And when I read One Night in Miami, I was like, oh, my God.

00:42:15Guest:Like, this is my father.

00:42:18Guest:This is my son.

00:42:19Guest:This is my uncle.

00:42:21Guest:Like, I could see all the men that really had made an impact in my life.

00:42:27Guest:It felt like if...

00:42:31Guest:Them and their friends were having real heart-to-heart discussions, debates.

00:42:36Guest:Yeah.

00:42:37Guest:That they would look something like this.

00:42:39Marc:Right.

00:42:40Marc:But people with consequence.

00:42:42Marc:With consequence.

00:42:42Marc:Cultural, political.

00:42:44Marc:Yes.

00:42:45Marc:And that's a real story.

00:42:47Marc:Yeah.

00:42:47Marc:It's crazy because not unlike Shirley, which was a different and bigger story, this was sort of a clandestine, you know, no one would know this story necessarily.

00:42:57Marc:Yeah.

00:42:58Marc:But it was a play first?

00:42:59Guest:It was a play.

00:43:00Guest:Kemp Powers had written the play and it had done really well.

00:43:03Guest:Yeah.

00:43:04Guest:I mean, it performed all the way from the West End to here.

00:43:07Guest:So is it based on a real event or is it a- Yes, that night actually took place.

00:43:12Marc:With-

00:43:12Guest:It was Muhammad Ali, Jim Brown, Sam Cooke, Malcolm X. Yes, that night actually took place after Muhammad Ali's win that literally solidified him into being the great that we know him to be.

00:43:30Guest:And again, those conversations that they were having are conversations that a lot of...

00:43:42Guest:black men are having and so what is it for me like what how powerful for Kemp to be fearless enough to write a story to put these four giants yeah and say we're gonna look at them as just regular men yeah yeah I guess that was the trick yeah and they're all very different

00:44:06Guest:could not be more different.

00:44:09Guest:And that's really like if, you know, people always say, well, what is this story saying?

00:44:14Guest:What message?

00:44:15Guest:Is that, I think for me, is that there's no only one right way to do something.

00:44:22Guest:You know, it's situational.

00:44:25Guest:This move may be the best move.

00:44:28Guest:This move may be the best move.

00:44:30Guest:And sometimes it's a combination of all of them together and seeing especially that relationship between Sam Cooke and Malcolm X was especially beautiful to me to be able to consider that relationship.

00:44:48Guest:There is a such thing, and human beings actually do debate healthily.

00:44:54Guest:Yeah.

00:44:54Guest:And actually grow from those.

00:44:58Marc:Yeah, challenge each other.

00:44:59Marc:Yeah, challenge each other.

00:44:59Marc:And take the hit and change their thoughts and change their minds.

00:45:02Marc:Yeah.

00:45:03Marc:Yeah, so it was a beautiful thing, that movie.

00:45:06Guest:Yeah, thank you.

00:45:08Marc:Do you consider your first big break with Singleton?

00:45:13Yeah.

00:45:14Guest:You know, honestly, Mark, I feel like I have a few big breaks.

00:45:18Guest:I feel like obviously, you know, when I was on the show 227, just as a child, you know, that's huge.

00:45:26Guest:And then I feel like then the next one was with John and Boys in a Hood busting out of being the little girl on...

00:45:37Marc:A little girl show.

00:45:38Guest:Two, seven.

00:45:39Marc:Yeah.

00:45:39Guest:You know, they did no wrong.

00:45:42Guest:Yeah.

00:45:43Guest:And then Jerry Maguire.

00:45:45Guest:Yeah.

00:45:45Guest:You know, so I felt like those three were just really pivotal.

00:45:52Yeah.

00:45:53Marc:moments in my career that the industry started to see me as truly an actor yeah you know yeah and but like when you direct I mean did you like I assume Singleton was kind of a force

00:46:09Marc:As a director.

00:46:10Guest:Absolutely.

00:46:11Marc:But it was fun.

00:46:13Marc:Yeah.

00:46:13Marc:Well, yeah, you were younger and it was exciting.

00:46:15Marc:Yeah, it was exciting.

00:46:16Marc:Fun cast.

00:46:17Marc:Yeah.

00:46:17Marc:But, like, I think, and I've said this before, but I think Baby Boy is a fucking masterpiece.

00:46:23Guest:Yeah.

00:46:24Marc:I mean, like, that movie, I can't believe that movie.

00:46:26Guest:Yeah.

00:46:27Guest:One of John's abilities is to...

00:46:33Guest:recognize talent in people that we don't even know that we have.

00:46:41Guest:Yeah.

00:46:42Guest:And identify that.

00:46:43Guest:And so that was the case with, you know, while Tyrese may not have been trained and Taraji was more trained, I think he recognized something in both of them that let's put these two together.

00:46:58Marc:It was so, you know, it's hilarious.

00:47:00Marc:Yeah.

00:47:01Guest:Yeah.

00:47:01Guest:It's hilarious, and it's heartbreaking, and it's all the things.

00:47:05Guest:Ving Rhames.

00:47:06Guest:Yeah.

00:47:07Guest:Oh, my gosh.

00:47:08Guest:Oh, my gosh.

00:47:10Guest:Yeah.

00:47:12Guest:That's a project that we're developing now at our company, a character in there.

00:47:22Guest:The plan is when we get the official green light that I'm calling Ving up.

00:47:29Guest:You are?

00:47:29Guest:It's time for you to reprise that energy that you had there.

00:47:34Guest:It was something else, right?

00:47:35Guest:If he hears this, it's an early call out.

00:47:39Marc:Where did you start acting?

00:47:41Marc:Did you train here?

00:47:42Marc:Yes, here in L.A.

00:47:44Marc:In school, or did you just seek it out?

00:47:46Marc:Because it's interesting when people grow up in L.A.

00:47:48Marc:because it's all here.

00:47:49Guest:It's everywhere.

00:47:51Marc:Yeah, yeah.

00:47:51Guest:Well, my mother, being a teacher, also was always and still does believe that the arts are just as important to exercise your brain and all of that as math, science.

00:48:10Marc:Yeah.

00:48:11Marc:Oh, that's good.

00:48:12Guest:Yeah.

00:48:12Guest:And so she always supported anything my sister and I wanted to do.

00:48:15Guest:So whether it was...

00:48:17Guest:tap dancing or playing piano we just had to stick through it throughout the amount of time we signed up for sure and so uh we started we were at one of um my mom's friend's house and up the street from that friend todd bridges live yeah

00:48:39Guest:And his mom, Betty Bridges, was outside roller skating while we were outside roller skating.

00:48:47Guest:So, you know, at eight years old, it's kind of like, to her, I would never think that now.

00:48:55Guest:But she was an old lady to us.

00:48:57Guest:And we were like, oh my gosh, she's out here on roller skates.

00:49:01Guest:And I guess us being so curious about it and asking her, you know, so...

00:49:08Guest:It doesn't hurt for you to skate, you know, just asking her all of the dumb kid questions.

00:49:14Guest:And actually, there's no dumb question, only the one that wasn't asked.

00:49:19Guest:I don't fully believe that.

00:49:21Guest:Right.

00:49:22Guest:Yeah.

00:49:23Guest:For the kids that are listening.

00:49:24Guest:For the kids that are listening.

00:49:25Guest:Yeah, be questioned.

00:49:26Guest:Ask questions.

00:49:27Guest:Yeah, ask questions.

00:49:28Guest:And so she, I guess, took a liking to us being so, you know, bold to ask a grown-up these questions.

00:49:38Guest:So she was like, well, where do you guys stay?

00:49:41Guest:And we're like, we're just visiting our friend.

00:49:43Guest:And she was like, well, is your mother here?

00:49:45Guest:And we were like, yeah.

00:49:47Guest:Yeah.

00:49:48Guest:And so she roller skates to that.

00:49:51Guest:Yeah, we didn't really know.

00:49:52Guest:And so we walk in and we're like, Mom, this lady outside wants to see you.

00:49:57Guest:And Raina and I are looking at each other.

00:49:59Guest:And she tells my mom that she has an acting academy.

00:50:05Guest:And would we be interested in going?

00:50:10Guest:And we were like, oh, my God.

00:50:11Guest:Yes, please.

00:50:12Guest:Because at that point, my sister and I used to put on plays for our parents and recite Shel Silverstein poems from where the sidewalk ends.

00:50:25Guest:We were performing.

00:50:27Guest:So to hear her say that was just like, yes, absolutely.

00:50:31Guest:And it worked out.

00:50:32Guest:It worked out.

00:50:34Guest:I didn't have to become a dentist.

00:50:36Guest:A dentist?

00:50:37Guest:That was the second choice?

00:50:38Guest:That was the second choice, yes.

00:50:40Marc:Yeah.

00:50:40Marc:But that's crazy.

00:50:41Marc:Yeah.

00:50:41Marc:And I saw, like, I mean, you've done so much stuff.

00:50:44Marc:I watched the new movie.

00:50:45Marc:I did watch that.

00:50:46Guest:Oh, you got a chance to see?

00:50:48Marc:Caught Stealing?

00:50:48Marc:Yeah, I saw it yesterday.

00:50:49Guest:Oh, sweet.

00:50:50Marc:Sweet.

00:50:51Marc:They set me up at the AMC in Burbank alone at two in the afternoon at the whole theater.

00:50:56Marc:Did you?

00:50:57Marc:No one else?

00:50:57Marc:No one.

00:50:58Marc:Shut up.

00:50:59Marc:Yeah, it was just me watching it.

00:51:00Guest:I haven't seen it.

00:51:01Guest:You haven't?

00:51:02Guest:I have not seen it.

00:51:03Guest:What?

00:51:03Guest:Really?

00:51:04Guest:Well, because Darren.

00:51:06Marc:Yeah.

00:51:07Guest:And you know what?

00:51:08Guest:I'm not mad at him for this.

00:51:09Guest:He does not want to send out any screeners.

00:51:12Marc:Well, that's why they had to do that screening.

00:51:14Guest:Yeah.

00:51:15Marc:Oh, you could have come.

00:51:16Guest:Yeah.

00:51:16Guest:I mean, here's the thing.

00:51:19Guest:all of the times because that's what they were doing wanted to do what they did with you which means that's more expensive because they're buying out the theater for that or the showing they're not having regular press screenings right and so I some of the screenings there are press people there but they have to work out you know when they can come and so it just hasn't worked out with my schedule to not

00:51:49Guest:Well, watch it on the screen.

00:51:51Guest:So I'm going to watch it at the premiere.

00:51:52Marc:It's a it's it's kind of a great movie in in in the sense that it's it's rare that you see a movie where, you know, violence isn't necessarily gratuitous.

00:52:03Marc:It's just detached from character, just something you expect, because all the all the violence in it is is is pretty violent.

00:52:11Marc:That's what I keep hearing from people.

00:52:13Marc:It's pretty violent.

00:52:15Marc:But I think the reason people respond to that is because it's all very character driven.

00:52:20Marc:And the frame of the movie is fairly real.

00:52:23Marc:He went out of his way because I lived in that area where he shot for years.

00:52:27Marc:Oh, wow.

00:52:27Marc:Oh, really?

00:52:28Marc:I lived right on 2nd Street between A and B. Okay.

00:52:31Marc:So like walking by Benny's Burritos and Kim's video, I'm like... Because I knew he had rebuilt it.

00:52:37Marc:Yeah.

00:52:37Marc:But I literally lived on that block for like a couple of years.

00:52:41Marc:Yeah.

00:52:42Marc:And he kind of made it pretty gritty and it seemed like the right time.

00:52:46Marc:And there was something...

00:52:50Marc:I tell you, once, you know, Liev and Vincent as the Hasidic Jews, it's so hard not to see guys doing those characters and wait for laughs.

00:53:02Guest:Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

00:53:03Marc:But it's the opposite.

00:53:05Marc:Yeah.

00:53:05Marc:But there's that one scene with Carole Kane.

00:53:07Marc:I guess you haven't seen it yet.

00:53:08Guest:I haven't seen it yet, I know.

00:53:10Guest:I can't wait because the feedback has been really great.

00:53:14Guest:And honestly, when the script came my way...

00:53:20Guest:First, I said, absolutely, I want to read it when I learned it was Darren.

00:53:25Guest:I mean, there's like every actor, you have your list of directors, filmmakers you want to work with.

00:53:33Guest:And I would say everybody, Darren is in their 10.

00:53:38Guest:I feel like it.

00:53:40Guest:You just respect just his storytelling abilities so much.

00:53:46Guest:And so then I read the script and I'm like...

00:53:49Guest:Okay, so Darren Aronofsky's doing this story.

00:53:54Guest:Oh, all right.

00:53:55Guest:Yeah.

00:53:55Guest:Because I'm all about, don't be put in a box.

00:53:59Guest:Yeah, sure.

00:54:01Guest:And it's very clear that you may not call this a comedy, but if Darren Aronofsky's going to do a comedy, this is what the comedy is going to be like.

00:54:10Guest:He calls it a comedy?

00:54:11Guest:I don't know that Darren would actually say that it's a comedy, but I know that that is the closest thing to a comedy that Darren would do.

00:54:21Guest:And he has a sense of humor.

00:54:23Marc:Well, yeah.

00:54:24Marc:And there are jokes in there.

00:54:25Marc:And it's kind of an underdog story.

00:54:30Marc:But the characters are pretty thorough.

00:54:34Marc:Yeah.

00:54:34Marc:So, like, you know, even if you have to suspend your disbelief around, you know, some of the, you know, the realities of the thing.

00:54:41Marc:And it's clearly shot with this sensibility of like it's a guy caught in a caper that he didn't expect to be caught in.

00:54:48Marc:So that in itself is sort of a comedic premise.

00:54:50Marc:Right.

00:54:51Marc:And, you know, the punk rock guy is kind of a clown.

00:54:53Guest:Yeah, Matt Smith.

00:54:55Marc:And the chassids are kind of funny.

00:54:58Marc:But your character is very intense.

00:54:59Marc:And Griffin Dunn is that— So awesome.

00:55:03Marc:The old guy, he played that really well.

00:55:06Marc:Yeah, Paul from Paul's Bar.

00:55:07Marc:Yeah, so there's definitely—I guess if I really think about it, it's comedy.

00:55:13Marc:But the weight of where all you guys are coming from is heavy, man, right?

00:55:18Marc:Yeah.

00:55:19Marc:And it is a spoilable movie.

00:55:22Marc:So we can't really.

00:55:23Marc:We can't say much.

00:55:24Marc:We can't talk too much.

00:55:26Marc:But your character is so great.

00:55:28Marc:And just the fact that you're all in.

00:55:30Marc:Yeah.

00:55:30Marc:You know, when you see her.

00:55:32Marc:Yeah.

00:55:32Marc:You're like, all right, well, this is.

00:55:34Marc:Yeah, but we can't.

00:55:35Marc:Because the plot twists actually worked.

00:55:38Marc:Yes.

00:55:39Marc:You really don't see them coming.

00:55:40Marc:Yeah.

00:55:40Guest:That's the great thing.

00:55:41Guest:And when I read the script, that's what I told Darren.

00:55:45Guest:I said, usually with the story, you're like, oh, okay.

00:55:52Guest:By page 30, you know that this character is going to do this.

00:55:55Guest:Yeah, yeah, right.

00:55:56Guest:And I was like...

00:55:57Guest:darren i did not catch it yeah so um i felt good after you read it the first time after i read it the first time i didn't catch it until you know it was revealed and and there's several of those moments yes exactly yeah and so i just felt like if anybody's hands this was going to be good in it's in darren's hands and then he's telling me at that point i

00:56:20Guest:I want to say only Austin Butler when there was interest with me.

00:56:26Guest:Austin was the only one that was cast.

00:56:30Guest:And so I've heard great things about Austin.

00:56:34Guest:And I went and met Darren and I was...

00:56:39Guest:You always go into something and hold your breath when it's someone you're meeting, someone you're a fan of, because you don't want that to be destroyed.

00:56:47Guest:I don't want to be like, fuck Darren Aronofsky movies.

00:56:51Guest:I didn't want to feel like that.

00:56:52Guest:And he could not have been more clear about the story that he was trying to tell, and it was the story that I read on that page.

00:57:02Guest:I felt like, here's an opportunity to do something that...

00:57:07Guest:It's a little pulpy, but it puts us in that place of, even though the film takes place in the 90s, but of those 90s films that we love.

00:57:17Guest:They weren't a bunch of green screen.

00:57:19Guest:It was like a fight was a real fight.

00:57:23Guest:A car crash was a real car crash.

00:57:25Guest:Just all of that.

00:57:27Guest:All of those diehard type feelings that you would have be suspense at the edge of your seat.

00:57:34Guest:That's how the script read.

00:57:35Marc:I think it definitely came off that way.

00:57:38Marc:But it is interesting that you get invested in these characters.

00:57:42Marc:And it's all surprising.

00:57:45Marc:There is a heavy emotional weight that Austin has to carry.

00:57:51Guest:And you know what's also funny to me, Mark, that so often in movies like that when you have just the character, how did I wind up here?

00:58:01Guest:Yeah.

00:58:02Guest:a lot of times those movies annoy me because we know why you ended up thinking.

00:58:09Guest:You know what I mean?

00:58:09Guest:You keep doing dumb thing after dumb thing.

00:58:12Guest:Whereas with Hank, Austin's character, you feel for him because you're like, God, he doesn't deserve that.

00:58:21Marc:Come on.

00:58:22Marc:He had no idea.

00:58:24Marc:Yeah.

00:58:25Marc:It was kind of great.

00:58:27Marc:And the film...

00:58:29Marc:if field street could talk you know i interviewed jenkins berry on here wow that guy is is a fucking genius i was supposed to i was gonna say it but i'll let you finish this into i couldn't like you know i had this experience you know watching underground railroad and and i was like why isn't the entire world talking about this i know

00:58:56Guest:And I just couldn't understand.

00:58:58Guest:But it's back to what we were talking about just 10 minutes ago.

00:59:02Marc:Yeah, with things get lost.

00:59:04Marc:Things get lost.

00:59:05Marc:Yeah, but I do think that something like that.

00:59:07Marc:And also, you know, there's a certain way that this culture, and look, I'm no one to call out any specific institutionalized problems, but how they frame, you know, black artists' work

00:59:22Marc:It just doesn't, you know, I don't know how you celebrate something as intelligent and elevated as Underground Railroad unless you have all the critics who are like, this is it.

00:59:32Marc:Right.

00:59:33Marc:You know what I mean?

00:59:34Marc:Or else it's just no one knows what to do with it or where it goes.

00:59:38Guest:I think, you know, because we are still such a divisive community.

00:59:45Guest:I'll just say country.

00:59:46Guest:I'm not going to speak about the rest of the world.

00:59:48Guest:And we are in an even more divisive place than, say, where we were.

00:59:55Guest:Horrendous.

00:59:55Guest:You know, before Underground Railroad.

01:00:00Guest:I think...

01:00:01Guest:Because we just cannot look at stories as American stories.

01:00:06Guest:If they're predominantly black people in them or predominantly white people in them, they're predominantly Latino or whatever.

01:00:13Guest:It's their stories.

01:00:16Guest:And we're all guilty of it.

01:00:18Guest:We've all bought into this construct.

01:00:20Guest:And so it's...

01:00:24Guest:It's unfortunate because, like you said, someone like Barry Jenkins, who is so brilliant, and it's not really just so much brilliant like smart.

01:00:35Guest:Just his taste is brilliant when you just look at his filmmaking.

01:00:39Guest:Like, let's just, like, take the words out of it.

01:00:42Guest:But the choices that he's making and why he's making those choices is so fascinating.

01:00:48Guest:And when you talk to Barry, the thing that I love most, like, I would have to pull myself off the phone every time I talk to Barry because you can't help but lean in.

01:00:58Guest:The way he...

01:01:01Guest:tells a story even if it's not a story for television or film just telling you a story is so engaging and forces you to lean in and I never felt at any point working with Barry that he was felt like he was the smartest person in the room or made me feel like he never had to over explain something because

01:01:32Guest:which I find in some conversations because I'm not quite following what you're saying because, you know, you're talking over me.

01:01:43Guest:I never feel that ever when I'm speaking to Barry.

01:01:47Marc:Yeah, because that movie was beautiful.

01:01:49Guest:It was a really, really loving set in the sense of family was so much the anchor of the story.

01:01:59Guest:And so everyone involved.

01:02:02Guest:And, you know, it starts with Barry.

01:02:03Guest:It starts at the top.

01:02:04Guest:So that energy just was... It really does with the director.

01:02:07Guest:Yeah.

01:02:08Guest:Huh.

01:02:08Guest:Yeah, it was within all of us.

01:02:09Guest:I mean, we were working and shooting in really small places.

01:02:13Guest:Like the family apartment was an actual...

01:02:18Guest:a brownstone that we were in whereas normally when you especially when you have you're gonna have a scene with eight people in the room yeah you're gonna build that set yeah especially when right but no Barry was like I wanted to if you could cut the screen and smell it it would smell like New York yeah yeah yeah yeah so you won the big prize I

01:02:40Guest:I won the big prize.

01:02:42Marc:Yeah.

01:02:43Guest:Yeah, that's what they say.

01:02:45Marc:You've won a lot of prizes.

01:02:46Guest:Yeah.

01:02:47Guest:You know, it's funny.

01:02:48Guest:I was doing some press for caught stealing last week.

01:02:52Guest:And in one of the interviews, they said, so did you know that that year you were the most awarded actor, you know?

01:03:00Guest:Yeah.

01:03:01Guest:And I was like...

01:03:02Guest:We're not just talking about black actors, right?

01:03:04Guest:Are we talking about all the actors?

01:03:06Guest:And they said, yeah, and I just learned that last week.

01:03:09Guest:That was a real interesting ride for me to be in this business as long as I had been in this business.

01:03:16Guest:I'd never experienced the campaign run.

01:03:20Guest:Oh, right.

01:03:21Guest:So I really had no— No idea how it resulted?

01:03:25Guest:No.

01:03:25Guest:How it resulted or what you had to do.

01:03:28Guest:Yeah.

01:03:29Guest:Oh, yeah.

01:03:29Guest:That's it's fucking work.

01:03:31Guest:Yeah.

01:03:31Guest:And I was shooting Watchmen.

01:03:33Guest:So I was working Monday through Friday.

01:03:35Guest:I'd get on a plane Friday night to go promote Saturday and Sunday screening here, screening there.

01:03:41Guest:Which movie?

01:03:42Guest:Beale Street?

01:03:43Guest:To promote Beale Street.

01:03:44Guest:The first part.

01:03:46Guest:Of shooting Watchmen.

01:03:47Marc:It was... Yeah, sure.

01:03:48Marc:It was work.

01:03:50Marc:It's work, and sometimes you've got to buy them presents.

01:03:52Guest:Well, with the Golden Globe, you know, it's insane.

01:03:56Guest:But prior to that, I had won Emmys.

01:04:01Guest:Yeah, absolutely.

01:04:01Guest:But still, that television campaigning, the film, that's just another beast.

01:04:08Guest:That is a whole other beast that had my head spinning.

01:04:12Guest:And one time I looked up and I had literally, between shooting the show Watchmen and promoting Bill Street, I looked up and I had worked like 21 days straight.

01:04:24Guest:And at that point, your body tells you,

01:04:28Guest:I'm out.

01:04:28Marc:Yeah.

01:04:29Marc:Yeah.

01:04:29Marc:It's done.

01:04:30Guest:I'm done.

01:04:31Marc:Yeah.

01:04:32Marc:But 21's pretty good.

01:04:33Guest:Yeah.

01:04:33Marc:I just did like a few weeks for like I have an HBO special out and it was in an animated movie and, you know, a couple other things.

01:04:42Marc:We're ending this show.

01:04:43Marc:And after four weeks, I was just like, all right.

01:04:46Marc:What's going to happen is going to happen.

01:04:48Guest:Yeah, I need that Saturday or at least just Sunday.

01:04:52Guest:I need one day to.

01:04:53Guest:Because there's a repetition to it.

01:04:55Guest:Yeah, to recharge, to sleep, to not talk.

01:04:59Guest:Yeah, yeah.

01:05:00Guest:And you don't realize until you don't have that.

01:05:03Marc:Yeah.

01:05:04Marc:How much you need it.

01:05:05Marc:Yeah, you burn out.

01:05:06Marc:Yeah, the repetition is what gets you.

01:05:08Guest:Yeah.

01:05:09Guest:Yeah.

01:05:10Marc:Because it's very hard to.

01:05:11Marc:And then to be interesting.

01:05:13Marc:That's right.

01:05:13Marc:The acting really comes into play when you're getting that same question for the 40th time.

01:05:18Guest:Yeah.

01:05:18Guest:And the enthusiasm that people have when they ask that question, like it's the first time it was asked.

01:05:23Marc:I know.

01:05:24Marc:It's kind of interesting.

01:05:26Marc:Yeah.

01:05:26Marc:That's a diplomatic word.

01:05:28Marc:Yeah.

01:05:28Marc:Well, no, you've done amazing work.

01:05:30Marc:And I know you've been, you know, very public about your son's passing.

01:05:35Marc:And, you know, I've talked a bit about grief on here.

01:05:38Marc:because my partner Lynn died quickly and tragically.

01:05:42Marc:And it seems that what I realized for myself, before having known what you'd gone through and was different, is that there is not really a kind of public conversation that makes grief and grief

01:06:02Marc:the experience of it, no matter what the cause of it, kind of just a human regular thing?

01:06:10Guest:No, no.

01:06:12Guest:And it's interesting because, you know, it's one thing when, you know, it's a parent that's grown old.

01:06:19Guest:Right, sure.

01:06:20Guest:Something like that.

01:06:22Marc:Yeah, you're kind of happy.

01:06:23Marc:It's like, okay, you've done enough.

01:06:25Marc:You've done, yeah.

01:06:26Marc:You did it.

01:06:26Guest:Yeah, but the hole that is left.

01:06:34Yeah.

01:06:35Guest:when I speak to other people who've shared the same experience that I, I have and I'm speaking to them and they're like 20 years from it, it never gets refilled, you know, and you just, it, it softens at times.

01:06:53Guest:Um, I've learned most things,

01:06:57Guest:The thing that's most clear to me is that that expression, mutually exclusive, I don't really exist in that space.

01:07:08Guest:You know, like literally sadness and happiness is always working in concert within me all the time.

01:07:15Guest:I mean, I can literally.

01:07:17Marc:Always or just after his death.

01:07:20Marc:After Ian's death.

01:07:21Marc:Yeah.

01:07:22Guest:After Ian, I say peaced out.

01:07:25Guest:Yeah.

01:07:27Guest:yeah i mean like i can have a guttural laugh yeah and literally it'll end up being a cry yeah or um i can have moments where i'm talking to ian and i'm like oh all right that was a good one yeah and then

01:07:48Guest:And feel the joy that he always gives me.

01:07:56Guest:And then at the same time, just miss him so much.

01:08:03Guest:How did you deal with the unanswered questions?

01:08:12Yeah.

01:08:12Guest:I'm always dealing with them.

01:08:19Guest:Sometimes it's just accepting the things that you can't change, like the serenity prayer.

01:08:30Guest:But I will say that I have such an amazing support group

01:08:39Guest:You know, from my mother to my dear friends and who are all, you know, grieving as well.

01:08:48Guest:You know, not the same as me, but I also realize that it's a very unhealthy thing to compare grief.

01:08:58Marc:I used to have Kleenex here.

01:09:00Marc:Hold on.

01:09:03Guest:I used to have them right here.

01:09:05Guest:You know what?

01:09:06Guest:I have some in my purse.

01:09:08Guest:I do.

01:09:10Guest:That's another thing that I've learned.

01:09:11Guest:I always have that.

01:09:13Guest:Yeah.

01:09:13Guest:Never.

01:09:14Guest:I never had tissue in my purse all the time.

01:09:16Guest:And yeah, now I always do.

01:09:18Marc:Yeah.

01:09:19Marc:I like the only reason I brought it up at all is because of the it seems that you find it important to have a conversation about it.

01:09:28Guest:I think there's no other way for when you're in the public's eye and you have...

01:09:38Guest:You don't have the blessing of mourning or grieving with your family.

01:09:45Guest:Yeah.

01:09:45Guest:You know, there is that moment of you got 24 hours with the news.

01:09:52Guest:You can't stop the police from... Jumping the story.

01:09:57Guest:Yeah.

01:09:58Guest:And so...

01:10:00Guest:I tried to stay off of the internet and all that stuff because you know that someone is going to say something that is going to send you and

01:10:16Guest:And I had a moment, I don't know how I ended up, something coming across my phone.

01:10:26Guest:Somebody was saying, I guess wants to call themselves a journalist, that they were saying, you know, they were looking at Ian's post and saying that if the family had been paying attention, they would have been able to stop.

01:10:44Guest:And that just...

01:10:46Guest:Killed you.

01:10:48Guest:Just infuriated me, you know, that how dare you?

01:10:52Guest:How dare you make assumptions about what's happening in our home, in our lives?

01:10:59Guest:And how...

01:11:04Guest:the amount of humility that people don't have is mind-blowing.

01:11:12Marc:Yeah, they're predatory cowards in terms of information.

01:11:17Guest:So I just started leaning into...

01:11:21Guest:All of the good energy that was coming towards me and surrounding me.

01:11:26Guest:And, you know, made the decision that, you know, my team is like, you're going to have to say something.

01:11:37Guest:Right.

01:11:38Guest:And I'm like, as Ian used to say with potty training.

01:11:43Right.

01:11:44Guest:Tomorrow.

01:11:45Guest:I'll do it.

01:11:46Guest:I'll do it soon.

01:11:48Guest:And then I knew that I needed to have that first public conversation with someone I trusted.

01:11:56Guest:And so that's how Robin Roberts was that person.

01:12:01Guest:I reached out to her and said, you know.

01:12:03Guest:Can I do this with you?

01:12:06Guest:And she we had a tearful moment and she was like, absolutely.

01:12:11Guest:And, you know, and she took care of me.

01:12:13Guest:She made sure that I didn't have to come into the studio.

01:12:16Guest:We went someplace where it's just she and I speaking.

01:12:20Guest:And the response to people.

01:12:28Guest:Leaning in to.

01:12:35Guest:Although it's sad, but that they share something with me, grief.

01:12:41Guest:Right.

01:12:41Guest:You know, we all share a smile.

01:12:45Guest:Yeah.

01:12:45Guest:We all share love.

01:12:46Guest:Yeah.

01:12:47Guest:And I put that in air quotes.

01:12:48Guest:Yeah.

01:12:50Guest:And we all eventually at some point are going to have a relationship with grief.

01:12:58Guest:But we don't talk about it, as you said.

01:13:00Marc:People retreat from it.

01:13:01Guest:They retreat from it.

01:13:02Marc:And also, I think that what happens is, what I found in a different situation is that...

01:13:11Marc:And it's not like a hunger, but it brings people together in a way that is so specific.

01:13:20Marc:And in your situation, people who deal with mental illness, people who deal with the kind of loss you had, people who deal with these unanswered questions about the nature of other people or the nature of their pain or the nature of how to frame that, that any time that a community can come together around something tragic like that—

01:13:40Marc:You know that it's a common story.

01:13:43Guest:Absolutely.

01:13:44Guest:I think one of the things that we've always, until recently, when a commercial or ad or something was talking about depression, it would always look like a person that presents very sad.

01:14:04Guest:And so...

01:14:09Guest:I am living knowing that that's not what, you know, as I'm, you know, we're going through, you know, Ian's depression.

01:14:17Guest:And this is the first time I'm talking about it.

01:14:21Guest:But as we were living it, it was just always so amazing how Ian...

01:14:30Guest:Still would lead with joy.

01:14:32Guest:Yeah.

01:14:32Guest:Even when, you know, we would and only those close Ian's father and myself.

01:14:40Guest:Yeah.

01:14:41Guest:You know, my sister and close friends of Ian's and not even all of his friends were aware of the depression.

01:14:47Guest:Right.

01:14:49Guest:And.

01:14:51Guest:Yeah.

01:14:53Guest:It's just so irresponsible as human beings in the medical profession to present depression as something that looks like people walking around sad.

01:15:07Guest:Yeah.

01:15:07Guest:Because that's not...

01:15:10Marc:only how it looks.

01:15:12Marc:Yeah, because it's a battle.

01:15:13Marc:It's a battle.

01:15:14Marc:Absolutely.

01:15:15Marc:And, you know, leading with joy, I mean, that's the fight from within.

01:15:21Marc:Yeah.

01:15:22Marc:And then when you're sitting by yourself or whatever, it's a constant battle against something that obviously becomes uncontrollable.

01:15:31Marc:Yeah.

01:15:32Marc:Was there a point where was he trying to do medicine and stuff?

01:15:38Guest:Yes, there was a point, but, you know, there was a...

01:15:48Guest:period of time of just doing the therapy, going to the psychiatrist and not wanting to give in to medication.

01:16:02Guest:And I think probably a lot of it is seeing how so many people were when they were on it.

01:16:10Marc:How just kind of... And he's a creative guy.

01:16:13Marc:Creative.

01:16:14Guest:And I do know that

01:16:18Guest:if he started the medication sooner, all of the music that he wrote, all of the paintings that he would not have done them.

01:16:30Guest:I'm not going to be a person to sit here and I feel like it's a dangerous place to go to say...

01:16:40Guest:if Ian had stayed on medication, that it would have been a different result.

01:16:50Guest:I don't believe that.

01:16:52Guest:I don't... This is the result?

01:16:55Guest:I know...

01:16:57Guest:Everything that we did, everything that he did, he had stopped smoking, stopped, you know, just everything working on the depression.

01:17:06Guest:And, you know, at one point he said, Mom, I'm just so tired of talking.

01:17:12Guest:And seeing that pain in your child that is working to help.

01:17:22Guest:beat depression, you know, whatever beat depression is, you know, um, you know, it's really, really, really, you know, you feel helpless.

01:17:34Guest:Yeah.

01:17:35Guest:As a parent, as a parent, you've, you want to be able to provide help, um, help.

01:17:43Guest:Yeah.

01:17:43Guest:You're trying to, you know, and, um,

01:17:47Guest:What's helpful for you is not helpful for the next person.

01:17:50Guest:So we're always, when it comes to...

01:17:56Guest:mental illness, especially, you know, it's, uh, uh, unfortunately, um, it is a, like trying on clothes.

01:18:10Marc:Does this fit?

01:18:11Marc:Does this, you know, looking for something to work, looking for something to work, you know, um, and like now do you, uh, is there some sort of path towards acceptance?

01:18:26Guest:Um,

01:18:29Guest:Yes, but I still, you know, I just miss him so much.

01:18:37Guest:And I don't know that...

01:18:45Guest:like there are moments that I feel in.

01:18:50Guest:Yeah.

01:18:52Guest:Um, but because I miss him so much, his physical presence.

01:18:58Guest:Yeah.

01:18:59Guest:Um, the, you know, when that's the person you talk to every day and, um,

01:19:07Guest:Or the person that you want to hear there.

01:19:11Guest:What would your commentary be on this, Ian?

01:19:18Guest:I don't have that.

01:19:22Guest:It's irreplaceable.

01:19:25Guest:Do you still talk to him?

01:19:27Guest:I do.

01:19:28Guest:I do.

01:19:29Guest:I do.

01:19:30Guest:I do.

01:19:31Guest:It's so hard.

01:19:32Guest:Yeah, so there's no plan.

01:19:36Guest:There's nothing for someone to say, this is what you're supposed to do to accept what fate had in store.

01:19:47Marc:Yeah, I think there are things that say that, but I don't know how, unless you're a deep believer.

01:19:55Marc:Yeah.

01:19:56Marc:Right.

01:19:58Guest:And you know, a bit of me, like, I feel like if I didn't have, and maybe this is my own mental shit, that if I didn't have this sadness, then I'd be scared.

01:20:10Guest:Right.

01:20:11Guest:Yeah.

01:20:12Guest:Because then that would mean that I...

01:20:16Guest:Ian is not my world.

01:20:18Guest:Right.

01:20:18Guest:You know, then I was not honest to myself or to him.

01:20:25Marc:Well, you said something somewhere that I thought was kind of amazing, which is that grief is love that doesn't have anywhere to go.

01:20:31Guest:Yes, I can't remember who actually said that, but my aunt, and I say my aunt, my play aunt.

01:20:40Guest:I've known her, my mother and her have been friends ever since they were in the fourth grade.

01:20:46Guest:She had given her a card that said that.

01:20:49Guest:And my mom gave it to me.

01:20:52Guest:And it just really stuck with me because it gave me words to...

01:21:00Marc:verbally express how i'm feeling yeah you know yeah and and i think that with your work and with you know honoring his memory by you know sharing it it's just it is it like i i think that it can't be i'm sorry it's okay talked about enough that you know this is a disease you know exactly and and that it's not it's not something you can will yourself out of

01:21:27Guest:Honestly, Mark, I think that's the biggest stigma is that people can't look at mental health as a disease.

01:21:38Guest:Like you can, if someone has, let's just say cancer and they, whatever drugs or whatever, put them into remission.

01:21:51Guest:Yeah.

01:21:52Yeah.

01:21:53Guest:And then you have someone else that has cancer, and they do all the drugs, and they don't.

01:21:59Guest:Yeah, right.

01:22:01Guest:So what's the difference, you know what I mean, of someone that's using all of the therapy tools with all of the...

01:22:10Marc:All the different ways.

01:22:11Guest:All the different therapies.

01:22:13Guest:You know, I just I know that Ian is tired.

01:22:18Guest:Yeah.

01:22:19Guest:You know, and I know that there is a part of him that looked at people much older than him still fighting that battle and losing it.

01:22:31Guest:Yeah.

01:22:32Yeah.

01:22:32Guest:That hadn't, I'm sure, made an impression on him.

01:22:37Marc:Yeah.

01:22:37Marc:And I just feel like, you know, when it's just, you know, talking about it there, like, I think, if anything, that whether.

01:22:48Marc:It seems impossible to have a sort of deep acceptance of tragedy in your own life, but I do think that making it, demystifying it and accepting the illness and that this is an illness that happens to a lot of people.

01:23:10Marc:And like you said, some people can get through it, kind of.

01:23:15Marc:Some people don't.

01:23:16Marc:That's the only thing you can do.

01:23:18Guest:And honestly, Mark, for one, thank you for, you know, making this space safe, you know, for me to talk and that this was not what we were having this interview for.

01:23:30Guest:But I think a big part of me just because it's Ian is my heart.

01:23:36Guest:Yeah.

01:23:37Guest:we're in this cancel culture and that I have been so thoughtful to be very selective with when I speak, who I'm speaking to, because people are just waiting to cancel somebody or to take what someone says and pick it apart and say what a person really meant.

01:24:04Guest:You know, I mean, you even see, uh,

01:24:07Guest:they even look at people's body language and say, this is what this person means when this couple holds each other.

01:24:14Guest:So, you know, I'm like, don't fuck with Ian.

01:24:17Guest:So that's part of me, the reason why...

01:24:22Guest:I'm very selective when I'm speaking.

01:24:24Guest:Sure.

01:24:25Marc:Yeah.

01:24:25Marc:And also, just stay away from that shit.

01:24:27Guest:Yeah.

01:24:27Guest:That part.

01:24:28Guest:Yeah.

01:24:29Marc:That part.

01:24:30Marc:Because it's just there's... It's part of that sort of mania that we talked about at the beginning.

01:24:37Marc:Yeah.

01:24:37Marc:There's just this frenzy to create...

01:24:41Marc:garbage at the cost of people's feelings, their hearts, their lives.

01:24:47Marc:Right.

01:24:48Marc:And people, nobody's do it.

01:24:50Guest:Who are these fucking people?

01:24:51Guest:Yeah, yeah.

01:24:52Guest:Keyboard gangsters.

01:24:53Marc:Yeah, yeah.

01:24:55Marc:I try to stay as far away from that as possible.

01:24:57Marc:Oh, yeah.

01:24:58Marc:I had, you know, after Lynn died, there were monsters, you know, saying, you know, like, Mark killed his girlfriend.

01:25:07Marc:You know, like, it's like, who sits there and does that?

01:25:11Marc:You know, like diminish, it's inhuman.

01:25:14Marc:It's inhuman.

01:25:15Marc:But you can't expect humanity from this monster that we carry around with us.

01:25:19Marc:Yeah.

01:25:20Marc:Well, I'm sorry if I got you too down.

01:25:23Marc:No, no.

01:25:24Marc:That's the thing.

01:25:25Guest:Like what I said before.

01:25:28Guest:Happiness and sadness are always working.

01:25:30Guest:And I really mean it when I say in concert.

01:25:33Guest:Because if I don't embrace it as in concert.

01:25:36Marc:You know, it's weird.

01:25:37Marc:I just realized about that.

01:25:39Yeah.

01:25:39Marc:is that it does that happiness and sadness in concert because once you have a foundation of grief, that on some level you understand the battle.

01:25:53Guest:Yeah.

01:25:54Marc:Of, you know, of non-clinical sadness.

01:25:59Marc:Yeah.

01:25:59Marc:You know what I mean?

01:26:00Marc:Yeah.

01:26:00Marc:And I guess that is the human spirit is to keep, you know, that balance.

01:26:06Marc:Yeah.

01:26:06Marc:Because what else are you going to do?

01:26:07Marc:Everyone's going to go do this.

01:26:08Guest:What else are you going to do?

01:26:10Marc:Yeah.

01:26:10Guest:That's when one of my eyes was like, Mom, I just sometimes, I just don't know what to do.

01:26:15Marc:Yeah.

01:26:15Guest:She said...

01:26:16Guest:You do what you're doing.

01:26:18Guest:You're here.

01:26:22Marc:I get that so much because, like, I don't think I really look to my parents for advice much after a certain point because they weren't those kind of parents.

01:26:29Marc:And I'm 61.

01:26:30Marc:There's some days there's like, would someone please just tell me what to do?

01:26:34Marc:Do.

01:26:35Guest:Just tell me what to do.

01:26:36Marc:Yeah.

01:26:39Marc:And that's a hard thing to sit with.

01:26:41Marc:Yeah.

01:26:42Marc:All right.

01:26:43Marc:Well, we could talk about the wine.

01:26:45Marc:Yeah.

01:26:45Marc:We could.

01:26:46Marc:We could.

01:26:48Marc:Would that be a good transition for you to go out on?

01:26:51Marc:I mean, absolutely.

01:26:52Guest:I mean, Ian's name is right there in the middle.

01:26:56Marc:Shit.

01:26:58Marc:How'd you get involved with wine?

01:27:00Marc:Ian.

01:27:01Marc:Really?

01:27:02Marc:I mean.

01:27:02Marc:He was a wine guy?

01:27:04Guest:Ian is a...

01:27:11Guest:He loves a story and has great taste.

01:27:19Guest:So when you're an artist like he is and you discover new things, you want to be the one to share it.

01:27:28Guest:And so he would share wines with me.

01:27:31Guest:He just...

01:27:34Guest:And I think a lot of it came from being a chef.

01:27:37Guest:Yeah.

01:27:37Guest:You know, he just, the pairing.

01:27:39Guest:He was a chef?

01:27:40Guest:Yeah, yeah.

01:27:41Guest:Of all, of so many things.

01:27:43Guest:He was a chef, a musician.

01:27:45Guest:I mean, he was even in One Night in Miami and auditioned for the role.

01:27:53Guest:But...

01:27:54Guest:I digress.

01:27:55Guest:Oh, so with the wine, Ian introduced me to orange wine about six years ago.

01:28:01Guest:I've never had any desire to be in this industry, in the hospitality.

01:28:08Guest:Well, no, let me take that back because I did have a restaurant, but never to actually sell...

01:28:14Guest:A brand.

01:28:15Guest:A brand, you know, of wine.

01:28:18Guest:You know, like everyone that you speak to that's in the business is always like, if you want to lose money, that's the business you get into.

01:28:26Guest:And so in this space of trying to...

01:28:33Guest:understand what this new relationship is with Ian.

01:28:36Guest:I'm looking for, I was always looking for ways to, when you're talking to your friends and they're talking about what their children are doing now and I have old stories, how do I create new stories?

01:28:53Guest:So it was like, we're going to do an orange wine.

01:28:57Guest:And so that's kind of how the birth of me and you

01:29:00Marc:That's what it's called?

01:29:02Guest:Yes.

01:29:02Guest:It's spelled M-I-A-N-U.

01:29:05Guest:And you pronounce it me and you.

01:29:08Guest:Yeah.

01:29:09Guest:And Ian's name is in the middle because when you put the M and the U on the end.

01:29:14Marc:Yeah.

01:29:15Marc:And is it like small batches or how does it work?

01:29:18Guest:Yeah.

01:29:18Guest:This is self-finance.

01:29:20Marc:Okay.

01:29:21Guest:Good.

01:29:21Guest:I'm the vineyard or I'm procuring the grapes.

01:29:24Guest:So, yeah.

01:29:25Guest:I have people like, oh, my God, you going to send me some?

01:29:29Guest:I'm like, absolutely not.

01:29:30Guest:I am not.

01:29:32Guest:But it is available at meandyouwines.com.

01:29:35Marc:There you go.

01:29:36Marc:Yeah.

01:29:36Marc:There's no samples.

01:29:38Marc:No samples for the press.

01:29:40Marc:No, some samples for the breast.

01:29:42Marc:Oh, good, good.

01:29:42Guest:But very smart samples.

01:29:45Guest:And how's it landing?

01:29:47Guest:It's landing where we're almost sold out.

01:29:49Marc:Oh, good.

01:29:49Guest:So that's pretty exciting.

01:29:50Guest:And then you do another batch?

01:29:52Guest:Yes, and now I'm in the business part of it.

01:29:56Marc:You know what I'm saying?

01:29:56Guest:It was more just a way to put something in a bottle that was the closest—

01:30:07Guest:For people who did not get the opportunity to be blessed with Ian's presence, to taste something and get an idea of just how whimsical he can be, how tasty he can be, how artistic.

01:30:23Guest:He can be, the label is very artisanal.

01:30:27Guest:It's like a canvas.

01:30:28Marc:Oh, nice.

01:30:29Guest:And so I'm just doing that more.

01:30:34Guest:This is Ian and I creating this together.

01:30:37Guest:I love it, yeah.

01:30:38Guest:And then now I have to think about the business part of it.

01:30:41Guest:Are we going to make it bigger?

01:30:43Guest:Yeah.

01:30:43Guest:How do we sustain?

01:30:45Guest:Am I going to look at a different, you know, looking at a wine or different grapes?

01:30:51Marc:Yeah, yeah, yeah.

01:30:52Marc:Is that fun?

01:30:53Guest:Most part it is.

01:30:55Guest:For the most part it is.

01:30:56Guest:But it's a little terrifying because I had to enter back into the social media space.

01:31:06Guest:And so I kind of slowly started doing it knowing that the wine launch was coming up.

01:31:14Marc:You can also have someone do that for you.

01:31:16Marc:Filter it.

01:31:17Guest:I'm a control enthusiast.

01:31:20Marc:I've never heard it put that way.

01:31:24Marc:I like that.

01:31:25Marc:That almost sounds like something you could put on a business card.

01:31:28Guest:Regina King, control enthusiast at your service.

01:31:31Marc:Yeah.

01:31:32Marc:All right.

01:31:33Marc:Well, it's a beautiful thing that you're doing, and it's great talking to you.

01:31:37Guest:It's been great talking to you, too.

01:31:40Guest:What are you going to do next?

01:31:41Guest:I understand that I'm lucky enough to get in here.

01:31:46Guest:Yeah.

01:31:46Marc:Well, you know, I got to do another season of that show with Owen Wilson.

01:31:51Marc:And, you know, I just put out a special and I'm starting to build another bunch of comedy of some kind.

01:31:57Marc:I want to try and take it somewhere different.

01:32:00Guest:Yeah.

01:32:01Marc:I feel like I've said all I've got to say on some level and I want to try to say something different.

01:32:05Guest:Something different.

01:32:06Guest:I was about to say, say something different.

01:32:08Guest:Yeah.

01:32:08Guest:It's not every, you don't feel like you've said everything you have to say.

01:32:12Marc:You just want to say something different.

01:32:13Marc:Yeah.

01:32:13Marc:Some part of me thinks I can lighten up a bit.

01:32:15Marc:Yeah.

01:32:16Yeah.

01:32:16Guest:I mean, I don't know.

01:32:20Guest:I feel like, and maybe again, it's just me.

01:32:25Guest:Yeah.

01:32:25Guest:To me, when the humor is rooted in like the real shit.

01:32:30Yeah.

01:32:31Marc:It's better.

01:32:32Guest:It's funnier.

01:32:33Marc:For sure.

01:32:33Marc:Yeah.

01:32:34Marc:I mean, I did a whole, my last special was From Bleak to Dark, but there was about a half hour about grief.

01:32:40Guest:Oh, wow.

01:32:41Guest:I have to check that out.

01:32:42Marc:You should.

01:32:42Marc:It's an HBO special, and it was about, you know, finding some way of coping and dealing with what happened and making it a public thing to release some of that.

01:32:55Marc:Because, like, the sadness is real.

01:32:58Marc:It's unavoidable.

01:32:58Marc:but there are even inappropriate jokes around it that you can have with yourself that other people who have been through it can share it, but people who haven't are like, oh shit.

01:33:13Marc:But those are important.

01:33:15Marc:Well, it was great talking to you.

01:33:17Guest:Thank you.

01:33:18Guest:It was great talking to you too.

01:33:19Marc:Thanks for doing it.

01:33:25Marc:Okay.

01:33:27Marc:I know.

01:33:27Marc:It was real.

01:33:29Marc:That was real stuff there.

01:33:32Marc:You can go see Caught Stealing tomorrow.

01:33:35Marc:It opens everywhere.

01:33:35Marc:And check out her new wines at meandyou.com.

01:33:39Marc:That's M-I-A-N-U dot com.

01:33:43Marc:Hang out for a minute, folks.

01:33:47Marc:Hey, people, on Monday's show, a return guest, Tim Heidecker.

01:33:51Marc:He was on an early episode by himself, then once again with Eric Wareheim.

01:33:56Marc:Now we're having one last talk in the garage.

01:33:59Guest:I did cry once on stage during the music.

01:34:02Guest:It's so vulnerable to me.

01:34:03Guest:Yeah.

01:34:03Guest:Yeah, I just feel like, and I think that...

01:34:07Marc:I think that doing the music and sort of moving through that fear, it's going to help my stand-up in a way because I'm just tired of the patter.

01:34:15Guest:Yeah.

01:34:16Guest:There is something about like –

01:34:19Guest:I'm so clear about why I'm doing it for myself, but I don't know how close I am to understanding if I'm doing it for the right reasons for my audience.

01:34:32Guest:Yeah.

01:34:33Guest:That's the trick.

01:34:34Marc:Yeah, but how much of that lives in our head anyways?

01:34:37Marc:And in the comments, I don't know.

01:34:40Marc:I'd worry about that too.

01:34:42Marc:Like, oh, let's indulge Mark with his little music dream.

01:34:46Marc:And certainly growing up, seeing comics that do music, I'm like, oh, fuck.

01:34:49Marc:what's he doing?

01:34:51Marc:Yeah.

01:34:52Marc:It didn't go well for Kennison.

01:34:54Marc:Right.

01:34:54Marc:He was pretty serious about it.

01:34:56Marc:Any comic that has music seriously.

01:34:58Guest:I know.

01:34:58Marc:It's very hard to watch, to frame it correctly.

01:35:02Guest:Yeah.

01:35:02Guest:Even if they're amazing.

01:35:03Guest:Right.

01:35:04Guest:You know?

01:35:04Guest:Yeah.

01:35:06Guest:And it's a shame because I think we all come from like growing up wanting to just do stuff.

01:35:11Guest:Yeah.

01:35:11Guest:And not thinking about the genre and how it's going to be classified at blockbuster video or whatever.

01:35:16Marc:I guess.

01:35:16Marc:But like when Eddie Murphy did My Girl Wants to Party all the time.

01:35:19Guest:Oh, terrible.

01:35:19Marc:I think.

01:35:22Marc:Yeah.

01:35:22Marc:I'll agree with that.

01:35:23Marc:Yeah.

01:35:24Marc:But it all comes down to, if you're not doing it to sell records, and you're doing it earnestly to express yourself, then it's legit.

01:35:35Guest:I think that's where I'm coming from, is I have things I want to say that don't belong in my comedy.

01:35:40Guest:Yeah, I haven't figured out how to write a song yet.

01:35:42Guest:Yeah.

01:35:43Guest:I think I've probably written some, but I have to find them.

01:35:46Guest:Does that make sense?

01:35:47Guest:Yeah.

01:35:47Guest:I mean, either John Lennon says, like, keep it short and make it rhyme.

01:35:53Guest:Did he?

01:35:53Guest:Yeah, I think so.

01:35:54Guest:But he also has all those chords.

01:35:56Guest:You have the Beatles chords.

01:35:57Marc:A lot of chords.

01:35:57Marc:Yeah, I don't.

01:35:58Marc:I'm still strictly a one, four, five.

01:36:00Marc:No, those are good, too.

01:36:01Marc:With an occasional.

01:36:02Guest:Those are the catchy ones.

01:36:03Marc:With an occasional two.

01:36:05Marc:Two minor.

01:36:06Marc:Yeah, two minor.

01:36:07Marc:Right, exactly.

01:36:07Marc:To make it pop.

01:36:08Marc:Yeah.

01:36:09Marc:That's Monday, which is also the 16th anniversary of our very first episode.

01:36:15Marc:Wow.

01:36:16Marc:Wow.

01:36:19Marc:How did that happen?

01:36:20Marc:Also, a reminder before we go, this podcast is hosted by a cast.

01:36:26Marc:And here's a little jigsaw puzzle.

01:36:40Yeah.

01:36:43Thank you.

01:37:23Thank you.

01:38:00Thank you.

01:38:39Bye.

01:39:26Bye.

01:39:30Bye.

01:39:57Marc:Boomer lives.

01:40:07Marc:Monkey in La Fonda.

01:40:08Marc:Cat angels everywhere.