Episode 786 - Will Arnett

Episode 786 • Released February 15, 2017 • Speakers detected

00:00:00Marc:all right let's do this how are you what the fuckers what the fuck buddies what the fucking ears what the fuck nicks what the fuck publicans what the fuckocrats what's happening i am mark marin this is wtf this is my podcast

00:00:25Marc:You're listening to it.

00:00:27Marc:I assume it's not the first time.

00:00:29Marc:So welcome.

00:00:31Marc:Welcome back.

00:00:32Marc:And if it is your first time, welcome for the first time.

00:00:36Marc:How are you?

00:00:37Marc:What's going on?

00:00:39Marc:Today, my guest is Will Arnett.

00:00:43Marc:from Arrested Development and many other things.

00:00:47Marc:Also, he's got his show on Netflix called Flaked.

00:00:50Marc:He's the voice of the Lego Batman, which is very popular with the adults and children alike.

00:00:56Marc:So I'll be talking to him in a little while.

00:00:59Marc:But...

00:01:01Marc:You know, I spent years not making this a political show and making it a human show.

00:01:07Marc:And I'd like to continue making it a human show.

00:01:11Marc:But, you know, things have gotten very urgent.

00:01:16Marc:But let's assume that there will be other elections.

00:01:19Marc:Let's assume that this is not the president for life situation.

00:01:24Marc:Let's assume that the process will pick up again in a couple of years in some of these special elections.

00:01:30Marc:Let's assume that, you know, just, you know, indulge me.

00:01:37Marc:We found out about this new group because they have the same name as us.

00:01:41Marc:They're called WTF.

00:01:42Marc:But for them, it stands for win the future.

00:01:46Marc:Their whole point is to turn all this energy that you see in the streets and at town halls and on social media into election results next year.

00:01:53Marc:There's a lot of work to do.

00:01:55Marc:And there are more than 2,500 critical competitive races in states across the country.

00:02:00Marc:So if you're wondering how you can get involved in an active way, this WTF group has set up a way where you can get involved where you're needed most.

00:02:09Marc:The website is volunteer dot WTF.

00:02:12Marc:Their switchboard is now active and matching volunteers with campaigns around the country.

00:02:18Marc:So go get involved at volunteer dot WTF.

00:02:25Marc:And I've been thinking a lot, you know, when I take time away from my phone and the sort of the panic of refreshing your browser about, you know, personally, you know, what is horrifying to me, you know, outside of

00:02:42Marc:politics and what politicians do and how they're fucking with people is that I've been through elections before I've been through different presidencies before and the fact is is that look I talk to people for a living I've always talked to people for a living basically that's what I've done whether it's on stage or for the past eight or nine years one-on-one here intimately

00:03:08Marc:And I've always had to believe and I still do believe that that when you sit down with somebody one on one, that you can talk to a human being, that you can talk to a person, that if you put aside ideological matters, political matters that, you know, we share more than we don't.

00:03:26Marc:That we have things in common more than we don't.

00:03:29Marc:That our frustrations are probably more similar than they aren't.

00:03:32Marc:How we resolve them and who we are personally in our fear or our anger or our desperation or our hopelessness or our excitement or fury or vulnerability is common where we're human beings.

00:03:48Marc:And I like that dialogue.

00:03:51Marc:A lot is learned from people over the course of this show.

00:03:54Marc:Many people without designation politically, not even knowing where they come from.

00:04:00Marc:I get emails all the time about the struggles of whether it's drug addiction, psychological problems, anger, financial issues, dark times of whatever kind or another, who feel uplifted by hearing other people talk.

00:04:17Marc:about personal things you know that's what you're being a human is for to you know sort of carry the weight and burden and be there to listen to other people and it just fucking terrifies me that we're not going to be able to get back to that

00:04:33Marc:Even with our differences.

00:04:36Marc:That becomes frightening.

00:04:38Marc:There is a frenzy towards negligence in the name of money and power that has very little to do with most of us.

00:04:55Marc:So I get this email.

00:04:58Marc:It just says from a fan.

00:05:00Marc:Hey, Mark, there's a pretty good chance this will get drowned out, but it's worth a shot.

00:05:03Marc:I want to ask you, how is it that you create such an intimate experience for the people you interview?

00:05:08Marc:There's truth in all your interviews, and that's what's captivated me from the first episode I heard.

00:05:13Marc:I'm doing an assignment where I choose to do some community journalism, and I want to ditch the Q&A format.

00:05:20Marc:There's no longer any truth in it.

00:05:22Marc:Hmm.

00:05:22Marc:Do you think that the way you conduct interviews could ever be translated into other kinds of journalism?

00:05:28Marc:I really hope so.

00:05:30Marc:Anyways, if there's any advice that you could give me and how to allow people to converse in other places as fluidly as as they do in the garage, I'm very interested in hearing it.

00:05:40Marc:I've been a fan for maybe seven years now, and your honesty provided something very special that teenagers don't get from adults very often.

00:05:47Marc:I'm headed off to college soon, and you've provided valuable insight and I'm sure will help guide my creative intentions for the rest of my life.

00:05:54Marc:I want to thank you and wish you all the best.

00:05:57Marc:Many respects.

00:05:58Marc:Jose.

00:06:00Marc:Jose, I've been conducting these type of conversations throughout my life.

00:06:07Marc:And if I really trace the roots of it, is that I think when I was younger, like when I was in high school,

00:06:17Marc:I didn't have a real concept of a lot of things like what I was supposed to do, who I was supposed to be, who I was, what my interests were specifically.

00:06:28Marc:And my father was not that attentive, really.

00:06:33Marc:So I found myself kind of hanging around places.

00:06:36Marc:And talking to people that seem like they knew those things, who they were, what they wanted to do, what the world was about, you know, how to be funny and, you know, take life on life's terms, you know, kind of own it.

00:06:52Marc:So I would hang around bookstores, restaurants, record shops, guitar shops in my neighborhood and just listen to people talking and talk to them and ask them questions and sort of just listen to how people navigate their interests and the world.

00:07:09Marc:It would make me feel better to be around people that seem to have a handle on shit.

00:07:15Marc:And I've done that all my life.

00:07:17Marc:So I think that I don't consider what I do journalism.

00:07:21Marc:But I think that, again, if you approach people as people, I mean, if you approach somebody knowing what you want to talk to them about, you know, maybe, you know, talk to them about something else for a few minutes first, you know, ask them questions that involve the immediate environment or or what's happening.

00:07:38Marc:I don't know what the setting is.

00:07:40Marc:Maybe say, I don't quite understand this, and maybe before I ask you this general question about a general thing, maybe you could educate me on something and then get a little back and forth going about the nuances of a particular topic.

00:07:54Marc:And don't be afraid to do follow-up questions.

00:07:56Marc:There are certain moments in a conversation where you pick up an instinct where people just sort of blow by a detail, but if anything...

00:08:05Marc:during what somebody is saying to you as they just move by it, you know, seems like something that has more to it, you know, and you're interested in that or it piques your interest, you know, get into that.

00:08:19Marc:Ask them what they mean by it.

00:08:20Marc:You know, have a conversation.

00:08:22Marc:That's the best that I can offer.

00:08:23Marc:And that's the way that, you know, you find common ground and also you get information.

00:08:28Marc:Just try to talk to people.

00:08:30Marc:You know, if you know, if there's if it's not, you know, pressing or groundbreaking or, you know, there's there's not breaking news.

00:08:37Marc:Just try to talk to the person that you're talking to and you'll make what you want to know sort of secondary and see if it comes up organically.

00:08:49Marc:I, you know, look, I can't teach a journalism class, but, you know, if you've got the time, that's what I would do.

00:08:56Marc:So I guess I talked to Will a few days ago, and I guess I should preface this because, you know, it was the day that the North Korean government launched a test missile.

00:09:07Marc:So there's a bit of thematic underlying stuff there.

00:09:13Marc:That was the subtext of my conversation with Will.

00:09:15Marc:Also, Will is the voice of Batman in the Lego Batman movie, currently the number one movie in the country.

00:09:22Marc:This is me and Will Arnett.

00:09:33Marc:What's happening, Will?

00:09:35Marc:I haven't talked to you in a long time.

00:09:37Marc:I know.

00:09:37Marc:Has it been, like, I didn't realize, like, do you live by me?

00:09:41Marc:Where do you live?

00:09:41Marc:Over there?

00:09:42Guest:I live over there.

00:09:43Guest:You do?

00:09:43Guest:Yeah.

00:09:44Guest:I live in the shit, as we say.

00:09:46Guest:I mean, it's a little different from the actual shit from Vietnam, but...

00:09:49Marc:You mean the nice shit?

00:09:52Guest:It's the nice shit, yeah.

00:09:53Marc:Yeah, the place where the elite live.

00:09:58Guest:I suppose.

00:09:59Guest:I'm cozy with the Hollywood elite, and it's where they put signs up excusing the lack of green grass on the boulevards because of the drought.

00:10:09Marc:Really?

00:10:11Marc:Please forgive our appearance, but we're all hurting.

00:10:13Marc:Yeah.

00:10:14Marc:That kind of thing?

00:10:15Marc:Something like that.

00:10:16Marc:Where do you come from, man?

00:10:17Marc:I realized when I was trying to do research, which I'm not good at, that I know nothing about you.

00:10:23Marc:You're just a funny man that appears in things.

00:10:27Guest:I kind of appeared out of nowhere.

00:10:29Guest:Really?

00:10:29Guest:Yeah.

00:10:30Guest:Even people that I sort of know.

00:10:32Guest:You and I don't know each other that well, but when people say, I didn't know that, I'm like, thanks for Googling me.

00:10:37Yeah.

00:10:37Guest:You know, Jesus Christ, you could find out a lot about me in two seconds.

00:10:41Marc:Sure.

00:10:42Marc:Well, you know, you can do that.

00:10:43Marc:But I have had experiences where I'll Google somebody and it's all wrong.

00:10:51Marc:Really?

00:10:52Marc:Definitely.

00:10:53Marc:I think it was Pam Adlon.

00:10:55Marc:I Googled her because I was going to talk to her.

00:10:57Marc:And there was just all this information about someone who was her father and her stepfather.

00:11:02Marc:None of it was real.

00:11:04Marc:Wait, what kind of sorted past does Pam Adler have?

00:11:07Marc:None of it?

00:11:08Marc:She didn't.

00:11:09Marc:But I thought she was connected to someone who was in the film business.

00:11:12Marc:It just turned out, as I talked to her, that a good chunk of the information on her Wikipedia page was bullshit.

00:11:20Guest:I love, you've probably talked and or thought about this a million times, I love the people when some sort of news item drops about somebody, they die or whatever, and the people who are ready to alter the Wikipedia page to that effect.

00:11:37Guest:Who are they?

00:11:38Marc:Who the fuck are they?

00:11:39Marc:What are they doing?

00:11:40Marc:I don't know how mine appeared.

00:11:42Marc:I don't know who's in charge of it.

00:11:44Marc:Did you make yours?

00:11:46Guest:no i have nothing to do with it i have zero idea and what i love is the idea honestly if you watch the next time like a celebrity dies yeah the second you find out about it go to wikipedia and someone's done because you'll you'll get like a breaking news thing or whatever and just if you can think about it go to wikipedia and it'll be there and he died on january already you're like what the fuck

00:12:05Marc:Yeah, I don't know who does, like, who are the people that are overseeing it?

00:12:09Marc:I don't even know how it works, to be honest with you, Will.

00:12:12Marc:I wish I did.

00:12:13Marc:I know that anyone, the idea is anyone can do it, but there's some sort of oversight somewhere eventually.

00:12:19Guest:Well, it gives you pause when you start thinking that that is possible, that anybody can go do it, and it calls into question sort of the legitimacy of anything that we read, right?

00:12:34Guest:Yeah.

00:12:34Guest:that's happening on a large scale now on a very large scale but that's this this has been happening for a long time with wikipedia with wikipedia and you have to um you know in a court a lot it's it's the the old if if a witness is caught lying immediately the lawyers will say sorry but this person's credibility is called and everything they now say henceforth yeah has to be taken with a grain of salt right um

00:12:59Guest:And if you apply that to what's going on right now, you'd think that people would kind of wise up, and yet they don't seem to want to.

00:13:07Marc:No, we can't even begin to.

00:13:10Marc:We'll just go down a dark hole that has validity and a lot of definition, but let's keep it personal and go down that pit of insanity.

00:13:19Guest:Well, here's what we know about me that's true.

00:13:23Guest:Where do you come from?

00:13:23Guest:I'm Canadian born.

00:13:24Guest:You are?

00:13:25Guest:Born in Toronto.

00:13:26Guest:Are you leaving?

00:13:26Guest:Are you going back?

00:13:27No.

00:13:27Guest:no no not anytime soon why why is that about canadians like even when shit gets real here and shit gets ugly here you're just sort of like no well you know i'm sure that there's a lot of a on a professional uh level it's it's difficult for me to do the things that i want to do there sure there are a lot of great artists and a lot of great things that happen there um and now i feel safe having said that yeah um

00:13:52Guest:But I sort of realized at a young, very young age that if I wanted to be an actor and have, you know, realize my dreams, whatever the fuck they were, they're different now, but that I was going to have to leave.

00:14:08Marc:How big is your family?

00:14:10Marc:You got brothers and sisters?

00:14:11Guest:I have two sisters.

00:14:13Guest:Older?

00:14:13Guest:Older.

00:14:14Guest:Really?

00:14:14Guest:Yeah.

00:14:14Guest:Are they there?

00:14:15Guest:They're there.

00:14:16Guest:They're three years older.

00:14:18Marc:They have kids and everything?

00:14:19Marc:You got nephews?

00:14:20Guest:One of them has kids, and she has two boys, and they live on the street that I grew up on.

00:14:26Guest:Really?

00:14:26Guest:Yeah.

00:14:27Guest:In Toronto?

00:14:27Guest:In Toronto.

00:14:29Guest:That sister lived in the States for a long time, and both her kids were born in Brooklyn, and she just moved back a few years ago.

00:14:35Guest:Are your folks still there?

00:14:37Guest:Are they around?

00:14:37Guest:Yeah.

00:14:37Guest:My folks are still there.

00:14:38Guest:They're around.

00:14:39Guest:Really?

00:14:39Guest:Yeah.

00:14:40Guest:And I see my folks quite a bit.

00:14:42Guest:You do?

00:14:43Guest:Yeah.

00:14:43Guest:They come out here?

00:14:44Guest:A lot.

00:14:44Guest:Because of the kids?

00:14:46Guest:Because of the kids and because I'm really close with my family.

00:14:49Guest:Really?

00:14:50Guest:Yeah.

00:14:51Guest:And my mom will probably text during this as we were talking.

00:14:57Guest:She texts me a lot.

00:14:58Guest:Yeah, yeah.

00:14:58Guest:Oh, that's nice.

00:15:00Guest:It's really good.

00:15:01Guest:I'm really lucky in that my parents aren't, you know, they've been very, considering that my dad's pretty conservative in a lot of ways.

00:15:14Guest:What's he do?

00:15:15Guest:He's retired now.

00:15:17Guest:He was, for many years, he was a corporate lawyer.

00:15:19Marc:Yeah.

00:15:20Marc:Was he one of the good guys or the bad guys?

00:15:23No.

00:15:23Guest:Well, it depends on who you ask.

00:15:25Guest:You know, he worked on a... That's true.

00:15:29Guest:For many years, he was a senior partner in arguably Canada's biggest law firm, and he did a lot of... His specialty was mergers and acquisitions.

00:15:43Guest:Yeah.

00:15:43Guest:So he worked on a lot of big deals around the globe, and he traveled a lot when I was a kid.

00:15:47Guest:And you always got along with him throughout all of that?

00:15:50Guest:Yeah.

00:15:50Guest:I did.

00:15:51Guest:But, you know, he was he was he worked a lot.

00:15:55Guest:Yeah.

00:15:56Guest:And I don't mean that as an indictment.

00:15:57Guest:It was just that's what you did.

00:15:58Guest:Yeah.

00:15:59Guest:My dad did that, too.

00:16:00Guest:Yeah.

00:16:00Guest:And your mom would cover for him.

00:16:02Marc:My mom would be home sometime.

00:16:03Marc:Yeah.

00:16:03Guest:Yeah.

00:16:05Guest:I mean, you know, it was but I don't I don't have you know, I didn't like pop into a therapist chair at age 25 and say, God damn it.

00:16:13Guest:My dad wasn't around.

00:16:14Guest:Yeah.

00:16:15Guest:Um, it's just the way it was.

00:16:17Guest:Um, having said that he was great when he, when he could be.

00:16:22Guest:Sure.

00:16:22Guest:Um, and we were very close.

00:16:24Guest:Um, actually in a lot of ways, my dad and I got closer when, uh, probably when I graduated high school.

00:16:32Guest:Yeah.

00:16:32Guest:Um, and I was kind of at a place where I was trying to decide what I wanted to do.

00:16:37Guest:You know, you say to your parents, um, you want to be an actor, especially my parent.

00:16:41Guest:You know, I went to all boys boarding school.

00:16:43Guest:My dad, uh, went to Harvard.

00:16:45Marc:So you grew up with some bread and you were, you know, they definitely had all the options available to you.

00:16:50Marc:And you could have, you know, given that pedigree, the trajectory could have been some big business.

00:16:56Guest:For sure.

00:16:56Guest:I have a lot of friends who have gone into banking, et cetera.

00:17:00Guest:Yeah.

00:17:01Guest:A lot.

00:17:02Guest:And when you were in high school, were you acting and shit?

00:17:06Guest:I was.

00:17:06Guest:I was trying to.

00:17:07Guest:I left boys boarding school.

00:17:10Guest:I was asked not to return.

00:17:11Marc:Oh, good.

00:17:12Marc:So they uninvited you.

00:17:13Marc:Yeah.

00:17:13Marc:What'd you do to deserve that?

00:17:15Marc:That sounds like I was kicked out of a private school at one time as well.

00:17:19Marc:It's a badge of honor, right?

00:17:20Marc:That's great.

00:17:20Marc:Yeah.

00:17:21Marc:I just got kicked out for being a smart ass.

00:17:23Marc:It wasn't even a it wasn't even a respected like prep school.

00:17:27Marc:Right.

00:17:28Marc:It was the it was the shit.

00:17:29Marc:It was like the secondary one.

00:17:30Marc:What part of the world was that?

00:17:32Marc:In Albuquerque, New Mexico.

00:17:33Marc:Oh, okay.

00:17:33Marc:But, like, there was the, you know, there was the, you know, kind of private school, the academy.

00:17:38Marc:And then there was sort of like, no, San Diego Prep.

00:17:40Marc:That's where, you know, I was always the kid that's sort of like, well, he doesn't pay attention and he seems creative, but he's bright.

00:17:46Marc:Same here.

00:17:46Marc:Yeah, let's put him in this one.

00:17:48Marc:Same here.

00:17:48Marc:Not reaching his potential.

00:17:49Guest:Oh, yeah.

00:17:50Guest:Yeah.

00:17:51Guest:Doesn't seem to pay attention.

00:17:54Guest:No, doesn't pay attention.

00:17:55Guest:And for good reason, when you look back, um...

00:17:58Guest:I think a lot of ways it's funny not to, to, uh, digress too much, but my, my own kids watching them, you know, they're in school now they're in first and second grade and, you know, I'm pretty involved at their school and looking at their curriculum now versus what it used to be the way that they actually teach things like math.

00:18:19Guest:Um, it's much less, uh, uh,

00:18:22Guest:They put they stress less on memorization and things like that.

00:18:26Guest:We used to write the way we learned it.

00:18:28Guest:And it's much more about using your own sort of learning it.

00:18:33Guest:Yeah.

00:18:33Guest:Learning it.

00:18:33Guest:Your own inherent cognitive skills like and applying that to and using things like reason.

00:18:38Guest:Yeah.

00:18:39Guest:And it's much more engaging in that way.

00:18:40Marc:i could never fucking wrap my brain around algebra no like like geometry was okay shapes i could handle but like it stopped there i mean i chemistry couldn't fucking manage it it's just memorization of boring shit i guess but the way things work together yeah i mean it would have helped if someone could have taught me how how it worked but yeah it is it's it's like uh they're like puzzles

00:19:03Marc:yeah i couldn't i don't i just can't do it i don't know if i had the patience or ad attention deficit disorder i don't think i do because i can get pretty obsessed and focused when i want to when i when i feel compelled yes when i'm terrified yeah so imagine right so imagine if somebody had had built the drama uh in geometry or in algebra for you maybe you would have been

00:19:25Guest:yeah maybe i don't know so like so you were you were a problem kid or what to an extent i was a smart ass yeah uh and i was you know getting big laughs smoking in the woods i was getting big laughs i still remember some big laughs you do sure sure what's the big laugh um oh gosh i don't know

00:19:43Guest:Every once in a while, I'll think about some... Like prep school laughs?

00:19:47Marc:Yeah, just something that... Where you completely undermine the authority structure?

00:19:50Marc:Constantly.

00:19:51Guest:Yeah, they can't... There's no tolerance for that eventually.

00:19:53Guest:Constantly.

00:19:54Guest:And I would have... Back in the day, a lot of the... And I think this has changed a lot, but...

00:20:01Guest:Back then, a lot of the guys, the men who became teachers in boys' boarding schools out in the middle of fucking nowhere in Canada, you have to think that some of those people are pretty depressed and have given up.

00:20:16Guest:Right.

00:20:16Guest:You think so, but I mean, there are people that want to teach.

00:20:21Guest:Yes, there are some.

00:20:22Guest:I will say there are some, and I had some fantastic teachers, but there were a couple who resented the student body, who were like, these are a bunch of rich little kids.

00:20:32Guest:Yeah.

00:20:32Guest:and fuck them yeah and i'm gonna i'm gonna be the one to grind them down you know and their parents aren't around and i'm gonna have my foot is gonna be on arnett's throat every fucking day and uh you know yeah i got into it once um you know i i when i was in i went away when i was 12 yeah and so when i was like oh it's a boarding school boarding school and it's way up north uniforms uniforms and

00:20:58Guest:So I was 12 years old and I had my shit was all over my room.

00:21:03Guest:I was 12.

00:21:04Guest:Yeah.

00:21:05Guest:And my house master, as he was called, had told me a couple times, you got to clean up your shit.

00:21:10Guest:And I was like, yeah, yeah, yeah.

00:21:12Guest:So I came back one day from class and all my shit was packed into his car.

00:21:16Guest:And he said, hop in.

00:21:18Guest:And he drove me six miles away.

00:21:20Guest:Yeah.

00:21:21Guest:And I had like six garbage bags or four garbage bags full of shit.

00:21:25Guest:And he said, you'll clean up your shit now.

00:21:28Guest:And he dropped me on the road there in the middle of winter.

00:21:32Guest:And these bags were heavy and I had to kind of, I was like, what the fuck am I gonna do?

00:21:37Guest:And I thought, what an asshole.

00:21:39Guest:It's your clothes and everything?

00:21:40Guest:Clothes and everything and just shit, right?

00:21:44Guest:So I was like I was at first.

00:21:45Guest:I was like alright.

00:21:46Guest:This is one of my so take two of the bags and go 100 yards go back and get the other two and this is untenable So I sat there for a second and felt sorry for myself and then I got the idea and I started putting everything on yeah like the Michelin man and then I was tucking everything in and I had and I had all sorts of shit and I managed to To wear everything.

00:22:08Guest:Yeah

00:22:09Guest:And I must have looked insane.

00:22:12Guest:And I did it.

00:22:14Guest:And I walked back in record time and I came back and the look on his face, he was so pissed that I had figured out an easy way to do it.

00:22:24Guest:And in my mind, I'm thinking like, this is brilliant.

00:22:27Guest:He should be celebrating me.

00:22:28Guest:You were learning.

00:22:29Guest:That was learning.

00:22:30Guest:Actual learning.

00:22:31Guest:Applied cognitive skills.

00:22:32Guest:And he was so pissed at me.

00:22:34Guest:I still remember that guy.

00:22:35Guest:He wanted you to walk back somehow?

00:22:37Guest:He wanted me to walk back and I have to drag them.

00:22:39Guest:He also did this thing where...

00:22:42Guest:I forgot what it was, but we had gone to this thing and we had bought a bunch of food and we hadn't okayed it or whatever.

00:22:48Guest:And he wanted us to write letters to our parents saying, sorry that we had bought all this food.

00:22:53Guest:Cheeseburgers and shit and charged it to our thing.

00:22:55Guest:What the fuck are your parents doing?

00:22:57Guest:I mean, were you like the... Well, my parents didn't... So my parents find out

00:23:01Guest:And they're like, that's fine.

00:23:02Guest:We're happy that you got some food and whatever.

00:23:04Guest:But this guy was like, fuck these guys.

00:23:07Guest:So he said, each one of you has to write a letter to your parents apologizing.

00:23:13Guest:And then I'm going to okay them.

00:23:16Guest:I'll look at the letter before you send them off.

00:23:18Guest:So knowing that he was going to write it, that he was going to read it, I wrote this letter that was just an indictment of him.

00:23:24Guest:Yeah.

00:23:25Guest:And I said, mom and dad, I'm so sorry, but obviously Mr. Shalhoub, et cetera, et cetera.

00:23:30Guest:And I just ripped into him and I left it at his door.

00:23:33Guest:He came flying in.

00:23:34Guest:He said, you little fucking, and I said, how dare you?

00:23:37Guest:That's a correspondence between me and my parents.

00:23:39Guest:You're violating federal law.

00:23:40Guest:I was like, you know?

00:23:43Guest:Yeah.

00:23:43Guest:And did he send it?

00:23:45Guest:No, he made me redo it.

00:23:46Guest:I was a, that was a, admittedly, now that I say it out loud, it was a dicky thing to do.

00:23:51Guest:And yet I still maintain that it was.

00:23:52Marc:you had to it was funny yeah sure you gotta you gotta like you know you know kind of prod those guys for sure so you can see what they're really made of yeah um and so what so what happens you go through all of high school at that place so no i i leave there and i go to high school what made them kick you out just a collection of things yeah just a collection literally same thing just being a smart ass yeah yeah and they just they didn't say you're kicked out but the end of uh 10th grade they said uh we'll see you later

00:24:19Marc:They recommended military school for me.

00:24:21Marc:Really?

00:24:22Marc:My parents would never do that.

00:24:23Marc:No.

00:24:24Marc:I remember there was a period where they were looking, maybe you should go here.

00:24:27Marc:They were so clueless.

00:24:29Marc:Your parents were?

00:24:30Marc:Kind of.

00:24:31Marc:I don't think they were that engaged.

00:24:33Marc:They were like, well, go to that school.

00:24:35Marc:It should be fine.

00:24:35Marc:And then when it comes down to it.

00:24:37Marc:But maybe not.

00:24:38Marc:I mean, the fact that they didn't, if they were really clueless, they would have said, yeah, you're right.

00:24:41Guest:Okay, we'll send them to military school.

00:24:43Guest:At least they didn't do that.

00:24:44Marc:Well, yeah, well, they weren't disciplinary, and that's for sure.

00:24:46Marc:But I don't ever remember them helping me with homework or anything.

00:24:48Guest:I don't ever remember what's going on in school.

00:24:53Guest:It's a different world.

00:24:53Guest:My kids said to me a few months ago, I picked them up and do the carpool lane.

00:25:00Guest:And one of my sons said, you know, John Michael's mom, she comes in.

00:25:04Guest:She doesn't do carpool.

00:25:05Guest:She comes into the class and gets him.

00:25:07Guest:And as I'm driving, I'm like leaning over.

00:25:08Guest:I'm saying, hey, granddad, my dad, granddad didn't even know where my school was.

00:25:12Guest:I never saw my dad at my school, ever.

00:25:16Guest:Yeah, me neither, unless they were called in.

00:25:18Marc:Yeah, maybe.

00:25:19Marc:Yeah.

00:25:20Marc:I remember I had a drunk electronics teacher.

00:25:23Marc:Really?

00:25:24Marc:I had three drunks for teachers.

00:25:26Guest:It was much more acceptable back then for teachers to be drunk.

00:25:29Guest:Because you smell them drunk.

00:25:31Guest:Yeah, I don't know if I ever smelled, but I knew that there were teachers who drank, because they lived on campus, who drank at night.

00:25:38Marc:You want me to check and see if the missiles have been launched?

00:25:40Marc:yeah that's at any moment right i hope not but it's a sad fucking state of affair that we've got a uh not yet not that i've got you got what do you got anything let me see nothing yet i feel like

00:25:57Guest:Yeah.

00:25:59Guest:Okay, okay.

00:26:00Guest:No, I feel like we're good.

00:26:01Guest:We're good for now?

00:26:02Marc:Okay.

00:26:04Marc:It's the world we live in.

00:26:06Marc:I can't.

00:26:08Guest:I know.

00:26:08Marc:I'm having a hard time dealing with it.

00:26:09Marc:Yeah, me too.

00:26:10Marc:I can't imagine it.

00:26:11Marc:I just can't.

00:26:12Marc:Anyone who's connected intensely to what's happening, I can't imagine anyone going like, this is good.

00:26:18Marc:It's going well.

00:26:19Marc:There's no way.

00:26:20Marc:But let's get back to Canada.

00:26:23Marc:I think Toronto is a great city.

00:26:24Marc:The difference I always notice is this feels like a real city without the menace.

00:26:29Marc:Yes.

00:26:30Marc:Yes.

00:26:31Marc:You see people sitting on park benches at 12 at night just taking it in and I'm like, what's happening?

00:26:36Marc:What's happening?

00:26:37Guest:Yeah, no, there's nothing happening.

00:26:39Guest:And, you know, it's funny, since I've left Toronto, there are people, including my parents, who will say, oh, no, no, no, they had some shootings.

00:26:47Guest:It's almost like they're trying to validate its status as a real down and dirty city.

00:26:53Guest:I used to make this, it's a stretch calling it a joke, but I would say, a lot of people will say that Toronto is a clean New York, and I prefer to think of it as a dirty Winnipeg, but there's some truth to it.

00:27:03Guest:So that, which is, yeah.

00:27:05Guest:I mean, as a kid growing up and as a teenager, there was never any, there was never any fear that anything bad was going to happen.

00:27:12Marc:Yeah.

00:27:13Marc:There's no edge to it.

00:27:14Marc:And like, you know, right now I could use that.

00:27:16Marc:I would feel like it would be a pleasant few weeks if I were just, I wasn't terrified of my own people.

00:27:24Guest:Well, it's, it's, it was true that I moved, you know, I moved to New York in 1990.

00:27:28Guest:I was 20 years old.

00:27:29Guest:so wait let's go back then let's so you get you get kicked out of the prep school you go to a regular high school i went to a uh what they call an alternative school in toronto yeah um where i didn't really have classes per se and it was all kind of essay based and it was run through the toronto board of education i love that when creative people actually go to those schools that where you sort of do what you want how is that going to end up well

00:27:51Guest:Well, you know, it turned out okay for me.

00:27:55Guest:You know, I'm here.

00:27:57Marc:It was kind of like this.

00:28:00Guest:I was drinking coffee and talking to people.

00:28:02Guest:I mean, I've been doing this for 40, 35 years, whatever it is.

00:28:08Guest:Yeah, I guess it helps you learn who you are.

00:28:09Guest:It doesn't give you any practical skills for life.

00:28:13Guest:Not if I were to want to do anything other than what I'm doing.

00:28:16Guest:Which is a gamble.

00:28:18Guest:It was a big gamble.

00:28:20Guest:It worked out.

00:28:21Guest:I said to my dad recently, I said, who knew that goofing off was going to pay off so well?

00:28:24Guest:Yeah.

00:28:25Guest:What did he say?

00:28:26Guest:He agreed.

00:28:27Guest:Reluctantly.

00:28:29Guest:But yeah, I went to this school and I actually, I studied theater and I was able to get credit for it.

00:28:35Marc:And you studied it on your own or with a guy?

00:28:37Guest:no i went to a there was an actual theater in toronto called tarragon theater and they had a sort of a studio component there where they had and my i had my godmother uh ran this school she was a good friend of my mom's and she's still around and my aunt judith and um she's ill right now but uh she's one of the more influential people in my life and

00:29:00Guest:And she was the person who actually kind of really got me interested in learning in a different way.

00:29:08Guest:And I sort of rue the fact that that didn't happen earlier because she encouraged me to read, you know, she'd say...

00:29:16Guest:Oh, you know, don't just read Hemingway.

00:29:19Guest:Don't just read The Sun Also Rises.

00:29:20Guest:Read all of Hemingway and tell me.

00:29:21Guest:And I just did it on my own.

00:29:23Guest:And I discovered things like reading became such an important part of my life because I was encouraged to do it and to engage in a way.

00:29:29Guest:This is by your aunt?

00:29:30Marc:Yeah.

00:29:31Marc:It's nice to have one of those influences, you know, the sort of creative, intellectual push.

00:29:38Marc:Yeah.

00:29:38Guest:Yeah, for sure.

00:29:39Guest:And who, when I'm 16 and I say, you know, I think I want to be an actor, she's like, that's great.

00:29:43Guest:Yeah.

00:29:44Guest:And here's what you should do.

00:29:45Guest:Yeah.

00:29:47Guest:And don't tell your parents.

00:29:48Guest:And don't tell your parents.

00:29:52Guest:And while I'm looking for, from her, I'm looking for sort of official certification that this is the right move.

00:29:57Guest:Right.

00:29:59Guest:And that was a great move for me, going there and learning with her.

00:30:04Guest:And...

00:30:05Guest:It was a good time in my life.

00:30:07Guest:What was the theater like?

00:30:08Guest:I mean, what did you do there?

00:30:09Guest:It was good.

00:30:09Guest:You know what's funny?

00:30:10Guest:I took a class there.

00:30:12Guest:It was monologue writing.

00:30:13Guest:Yeah.

00:30:14Guest:And there was a guy in my class who was writing these bizarro monologues, and they were really funny, and he performed them himself.

00:30:22Guest:And I was 16, and he was probably 25 or 22.

00:30:27Guest:And he's trying to be an actor, a comedian, et cetera.

00:30:31Guest:And one day between, like on a smoke break, because I was already a heavy smoker.

00:30:37Guest:When did you start?

00:30:38Marc:you know 13 yeah well what canadian cigarettes yeah which ones um players light oh yeah yeah they're good yeah i used to like going i used to like getting exotic cigarettes like i was export a and yeah yeah but i never liked the taste of them they're too much i i smoke these i you know i still smoke them well i quit and then i'm back and i'm kind of like on my last list what are those these are um marlboro golds from europe they're

00:31:02Guest:That's all I'll smoke.

00:31:04Guest:For a while I was like, I'm only gonna smoke those because I can't get my hands on them.

00:31:07Guest:And then I just had people mewling them for me.

00:31:09Guest:Anytime I hear about somebody going to Europe, I'd be like, hey, can you give them 40 bucks to grab me some smokes?

00:31:15Guest:It's fucking terrible.

00:31:16Guest:So you're smoking and you're talking.

00:31:18Guest:And I'm talking to this guy and he says, why don't you come down?

00:31:20Guest:You should come down next weekend.

00:31:21Guest:We're doing, I've got this comedy group and we're doing some stuff, some sketches at the Riv in Toronto.

00:31:28Guest:And I was like, yeah, sounds great.

00:31:30Guest:What are you guys called?

00:31:31Guest:The kids in the hall.

00:31:32Guest:and it was Mark McKinney.

00:31:34Guest:That's who was talking to you?

00:31:36Guest:Yeah, and I took a monologue writing class.

00:31:38Guest:He doesn't know, he has no idea who I am, I'm sure.

00:31:40Guest:Today, I think, or at that time.

00:31:43Guest:He probably knows who you are now.

00:31:44Guest:Maybe, maybe, but you know, I was 16 and he was in my class.

00:31:49Guest:Was he funny?

00:31:50Guest:Oh my God, he was so funny.

00:31:51Guest:He was the star of the class.

00:31:52Guest:Yeah.

00:31:53Guest:And he was absurd.

00:31:55Guest:Yeah.

00:31:55Guest:And I loved how absurd he was.

00:31:57Guest:I had an appreciation for that.

00:31:59Guest:So what'd you do?

00:31:59Guest:Wait, you go to the kids in the hall show?

00:32:01Guest:I didn't go.

00:32:02Guest:i've had so many things like that happen i had years later in new york um i uh i had i lived in a building uh on hudson street right across from the holland tunnel yeah and the guy living upstairs for me what yeah it was terrible yeah the building's not even there anymore yeah it was rat and fest and it was before like that area was cool yeah we used to call the neighborhood work because the only people who went there were people who went to work in those

00:32:26Guest:that are buildings that are all condos now.

00:32:28Guest:Right.

00:32:29Guest:Um, and the guy upstairs for me was Damien Loeb, this painter.

00:32:32Guest:Yeah.

00:32:32Guest:Who kind of had a moment 15 years ago.

00:32:35Guest:Right.

00:32:36Guest:Uh, but he, uh, he and I, my roommate worked at Goldman Sachs.

00:32:42Guest:Um, and so he paid more rent than I did.

00:32:45Guest:and then Damien and I would spend the day smoking cigarettes, and his art at that time consisted of, he'd take high def, he was one of the first guys I knew who had a high def camera and television, high def videos of himself having sex with his Asian girlfriend, and then he'd make paintings of that.

00:33:06Guest:So I loved going to the studio.

00:33:08Guest:It was great.

00:33:09Guest:Right upstairs.

00:33:09Marc:Just watching him fuck people on camera.

00:33:12Guest:Yeah, it was amazing.

00:33:13Yeah.

00:33:13Guest:And he had a buddy of his, same thing, he's a DJ, I'm a DJ, come see us play, blah, blah, blah.

00:33:19Guest:No, I'm good, Moby.

00:33:23Marc:Same thing.

00:33:23Marc:So Moby was hanging around?

00:33:25Marc:That must have been when he was just starting out, because I think Moby's from Connecticut.

00:33:28Guest:And so is Damien, maybe that's where they knew each other.

00:33:32Guest:But I didn't really know him, and he didn't have a record deal or anything.

00:33:38Marc:Sure.

00:33:38Marc:And then he made two records and made enough money to live the rest of four lives.

00:33:43Guest:Yeah.

00:33:45Marc:Unbelievable.

00:33:45Marc:Yeah, man.

00:33:45Marc:That's a fucking racket.

00:33:47Marc:That's the business.

00:33:47Marc:Yeah.

00:33:48Marc:There's guys that did one record, two songs even.

00:33:51Marc:Yeah.

00:33:51Marc:I'm good.

00:33:52Marc:Back in that sweet spot right before it went away.

00:33:55Guest:Yeah.

00:33:55Guest:That was it.

00:33:56Guest:All right.

00:33:56Guest:So you wanted to be a serious actor.

00:33:58Guest:Yeah.

00:33:58Guest:So I moved to New York to, and I studied at least Strasburg.

00:34:01Marc:Oh, you did?

00:34:02Marc:So after the theater thing, how old were you and moved to New York?

00:34:05Guest:20.

00:34:06Guest:Oh, really?

00:34:07Guest:So you're like, I'm out.

00:34:08Guest:I'm out.

00:34:08Guest:I went to college for half a year and I dropped out, Concordia University in Montreal.

00:34:13Guest:And I got to college and I remember it was right around Christmas time.

00:34:22Guest:And I remember all I was doing was partying like everybody else.

00:34:26Guest:And I remember thinking, this is it.

00:34:30Guest:I really did.

00:34:31Guest:And not like some fucking visionary.

00:34:34Guest:I was 19 years old and I thought, what else?

00:34:37Guest:I'm just going to kind of do this and then move back to Toronto.

00:34:41Guest:And a lot of the people I grew up with were there in Montreal at college.

00:34:45Guest:And then everybody's going to go back to Toronto and just be friends forever in the same group.

00:34:50Guest:Sort of upper middle class white kids.

00:34:53Guest:And I thought, oh my God, this is a nightmare.

00:34:56Guest:And I got to get out of here.

00:34:57Guest:Yeah.

00:34:58Guest:And I remember calling my parents from a pay phone.

00:35:01Guest:Yeah.

00:35:01Guest:There used to be a thing called a pay phone where you'd go and you'd put money in just for the listeners.

00:35:06Marc:Yeah.

00:35:07Marc:And they were kind of dirty.

00:35:08Marc:They were kind of dirty, yeah.

00:35:10Guest:And they had stuff carved.

00:35:10Marc:I see some of them around sometimes.

00:35:12Marc:I'm like, wow, look at that.

00:35:13Guest:I saw two in New York last week.

00:35:14Guest:Yeah?

00:35:15Guest:Bizarre.

00:35:16Guest:It is weird.

00:35:16Guest:Well, one of them didn't have a phone in it, but I used it to make a call because it was quiet.

00:35:20Guest:Right.

00:35:21Guest:And it was out of the way.

00:35:22Guest:Or light a cigarette.

00:35:22Guest:Yeah.

00:35:23Marc:I used to duck into pay phones to do one hits off of weed.

00:35:26Guest:Sure.

00:35:27Sure.

00:35:27Marc:Oh, the one hitter.

00:35:28Marc:Oh, the best.

00:35:29Marc:Oh, the best.

00:35:30Marc:God damn it.

00:35:32Guest:And yeah, so I called my parents and I sent them out.

00:35:34Marc:So you had the white light moment.

00:35:35Marc:Yeah.

00:35:36Marc:You saw your death through mundanity.

00:35:39Guest:Exactly.

00:35:39Guest:And to my dad's credit, he said, okay.

00:35:43Guest:I said, I gotta do this.

00:35:44Guest:And they said, well, what are you proposing?

00:35:47Guest:I said, I gotta go and try, go to New York.

00:35:50Guest:It was always gonna be New York.

00:35:51Guest:And they said, okay, well, you're gonna have to come back.

00:35:53Guest:And I got a job for six months in Toronto to make enough money so that I could move to New York.

00:35:59Guest:What was the job?

00:36:01Guest:I was selling paper towel and toilet paper and stuff like that.

00:36:06Guest:This guy I knew started this company.

00:36:08Guest:Really?

00:36:09Guest:Yeah.

00:36:09Guest:Do you remember... Do you remember... Oh, not do you remember.

00:36:14Guest:They still exist.

00:36:15Guest:It's that Swedish company that says... It's Torque or something.

00:36:19Guest:Mm-hmm.

00:36:19Guest:And you pull the paper down from the middle.

00:36:21Guest:It's like a big round dispenser.

00:36:23Guest:Mm-hmm.

00:36:23Guest:And...

00:36:24Guest:And then some of the toilet paper rolls are huge rolls.

00:36:27Guest:Yeah, you see them in airports.

00:36:29Guest:In airports and shit, yeah.

00:36:30Guest:And at the time, they were just coming to North America from Sweden.

00:36:33Guest:And this guy got a distributorship or whatever, and I worked for him.

00:36:38Guest:He was a year older than me, and he had this company.

00:36:40Guest:And you'd go to places and go, look at this.

00:36:44Guest:Yeah, go to bars and restaurants and sell it to them.

00:36:46Guest:And then I'd install it as well.

00:36:48Guest:I was a one man, you know, one man twerking.

00:36:51Guest:Yeah.

00:36:51Guest:So I'd go in, they'd, you know, some restaurant would be like, okay, yeah, we want to switch over all our, and by the way, I knew nothing about construction.

00:36:59Guest:I mean, installation, all that kind of shit.

00:37:01Guest:And I had like a toolbox and I go into their bathroom and I'm like putting in fucking in through the drilling through tile.

00:37:08Guest:Like I just learned I'd fucking crack shit and whatever.

00:37:11Guest:And I'd ruin.

00:37:12Guest:And then, you know, I, I just did it.

00:37:14Guest:The commission gig.

00:37:15Guest:It was a commission gig.

00:37:16Guest:So you were a good salesman.

00:37:19Guest:I was decent.

00:37:20Guest:Yeah.

00:37:20Guest:I was decent.

00:37:21Guest:You made enough to go to New York.

00:37:22Marc:I made enough to move to New York for one year.

00:37:26Marc:Yeah.

00:37:26Marc:And now you know about that company.

00:37:28Marc:What is it called?

00:37:28Marc:Torque?

00:37:29Marc:Torque.

00:37:30Marc:Torque.

00:37:30Marc:They're still around.

00:37:31Guest:T-O-R-Q, I think.

00:37:32Marc:Yeah, they're sort of problematic with toilet paper sometimes because if the end is not hanging out... Then you're screwed.

00:37:38Marc:Yeah, it's hard to get in there.

00:37:39Marc:And it's heavy, so you got to roll it with your hand.

00:37:41Marc:Yeah, I'm not happy with the product.

00:37:44Guest:No, especially in a place where you want to... I want a refund, Will.

00:37:45Guest:Well, where you want to touch the least amount of things as possible...

00:37:49Guest:I say to my kids now when we go into a public, I'm like, don't touch anything.

00:37:52Guest:Do what you got to do and make it to the sink.

00:37:56Guest:Yeah.

00:37:57Guest:And then air dry your hands.

00:37:58Guest:And just don't touch.

00:38:01Marc:So I did that.

00:38:02Guest:Yeah.

00:38:02Marc:And then I moved to New York.

00:38:03Marc:And what was the plan?

00:38:04Marc:That was where you lived in the work neighborhood?

00:38:07Guest:No.

00:38:07Guest:First, I lived on the Upper East Side.

00:38:10Guest:I got an apartment from, I sublet an apartment from a girl who had been at Strasburg and she sublet it to me.

00:38:16Marc:All right, so how did you get into that program?

00:38:19Guest:I went down and met with them.

00:38:21Guest:Flew down to New York.

00:38:22Guest:Before you went?

00:38:22Guest:Before I went.

00:38:23Guest:Yeah.

00:38:25Guest:And met with them, and then I went back.

00:38:30Guest:That was sort of like- Did you audition, or who were they?

00:38:33Guest:Did you remember the teachers?

00:38:35Guest:I don't remember the teacher then.

00:38:36Guest:I did like a monologue.

00:38:39Guest:I don't remember who the teacher was then, but I had a very influential teacher at Strasburg.

00:38:43Guest:Who was that?

00:38:43Guest:Acting teacher, this guy George Lauros.

00:38:45Guest:Yeah.

00:38:46Guest:L-O-R-O-S.

00:38:47Guest:So I get in, I go back to Toronto.

00:38:49Guest:Yeah.

00:38:50Guest:I grab all my shit, which was nothing.

00:38:52Guest:Yeah.

00:38:53Guest:The first five years that I lived in New York,

00:38:56Guest:I moved a lot.

00:38:59Guest:I could move with one cab because I had like two bags.

00:39:03Guest:I had nothing.

00:39:04Marc:And a futon.

00:39:05Guest:Barely.

00:39:06Guest:I didn't even own a bed at first.

00:39:08Marc:Just go buy a futon.

00:39:09Guest:Buy a new futon.

00:39:09Guest:Throw it on the floor.

00:39:10Guest:You know what?

00:39:11Guest:A futon mattress on the floor, I still to this day think that's the best sleeps I ever had.

00:39:15Guest:You think so?

00:39:16Guest:Yep.

00:39:16Guest:I had one on 21st Street for years.

00:39:18Guest:I lived on 21st Street between 7th and 8th.

00:39:21Guest:And I remember those as being like the deepest sleeps.

00:39:25Guest:Maybe I had no worries back then.

00:39:27Marc:Maybe.

00:39:27Marc:I mean, I remember the day I realized that futons were kind of a racket.

00:39:32Marc:You had your basic futon that got hard over a year or so, which was pretty good.

00:39:38Marc:But then he started doing foam cores and layers.

00:39:40Marc:And I started to realize, beds in general, I think it's some sort of scam.

00:39:45Guest:Maybe.

00:39:45Guest:Although, people will argue, hey, listen, you spend a third of your life in bed.

00:39:50Guest:It should be...

00:39:51Marc:that should be the highest ticket i remember when i got a very expensive futon frame pulled it up off the floor but my apartment on the lower east side was not really big enough to accommodate it spatially yeah so one room was just the bed frame sure yeah i i see now i never liked the frame uh-huh they were never comfortable to me so i just had and i would roll it up during the day yeah so i had more space yeah

00:40:13Guest:All right, so you're there five years.

00:40:16Marc:What are you doing?

00:40:17Marc:What did you learn?

00:40:18Marc:What do you use now?

00:40:19Marc:What did you take with you?

00:40:22Marc:What's your technique and craft?

00:40:23Guest:Yeah.

00:40:24Guest:The only thing I like talking about more than actors craft is independent film.

00:40:28Guest:Yeah.

00:40:31Marc:No, but I mean, it's like I talk to people that go to Stroudsburg and I've talked to actors and like they're, you know, I guess it's all like I believe that if you have some sort of talent for it, you have it.

00:40:41Marc:But I mean, you do learn something.

00:40:43Guest:Well, you know, it's yes, you do learn something.

00:40:45Guest:And I, you know, I had a lot of great.

00:40:47Guest:I did have some good teachers.

00:40:48Guest:I had, you know, you first start there, you're learning.

00:40:52Guest:It's all sense memory stuff.

00:40:53Guest:It's methods, you know, all that.

00:40:55Guest:You could wrap your brain around that.

00:40:57Guest:Uh, a little, at first I thought, well, what the fuck is this shit?

00:41:00Guest:And then, and you're doing, you're sitting in a chair and the whole point is to try to relax as much as you can on an uncomfortable chair.

00:41:05Guest:Yeah.

00:41:06Guest:Um, what did in your mind?

00:41:08Guest:You're like, this can't, this can't, yeah.

00:41:09Guest:How is this going to help me be on law and order?

00:41:11Guest:Yeah.

00:41:12Guest:Um, but what it did do was it helped me kind of tap into the idea of like sort of focusing on and concentrating on what I, I guess what I, uh, you know, being, being in the moment, I suppose.

00:41:28Guest:Um,

00:41:28Guest:But I had a... George Loras was great because when a lot of the other teachers were talking about the method and all these things that you had in preparation, he would then say... He had been a working actor, he'd done a million things, and he said, there's no set and there's no director who's going to wait for you to fucking get into fucking character.

00:41:45Guest:You've got to be ready to go.

00:41:46Guest:And he was much more about the practical application.

00:41:49Guest:And his number one thing was about being sensitive to the material.

00:41:54Guest:And...

00:41:55Guest:And he was a really great teacher in that way.

00:41:58Guest:I remember this other guy and a girl were doing a scene.

00:42:02Guest:I forget what it was from.

00:42:03Guest:And George would sit in the front row of this little theater.

00:42:06Guest:And they're doing a scene where the guy's bringing the girl home for a date or something.

00:42:09Guest:And he says, I'm going to stop you right there.

00:42:12Guest:And he says to the guy, Tony, he says, Tony, what is your objective in this scene for your character?

00:42:17Guest:And this guy, Tony, is like, well, you know, I'm going to come home.

00:42:19Guest:And this girl, he goes, no, no, no, no, no.

00:42:21Guest:Tony, you want to fuck her cunt.

00:42:26Guest:And then everybody goes, oh, Jesus, George.

00:42:28Guest:And all the women in the class were like, George.

00:42:29Guest:I remember this thing.

00:42:32Guest:He turns around and goes, I'm sorry.

00:42:33Guest:I'm sorry.

00:42:34Guest:Vagina.

00:42:36Guest:As hilarious as that was, it was also very helpful.

00:42:44Guest:It helped me kind of break down like, oh yeah, breaking down scenes and all that kind of thing is very just, it's all just about applying logic.

00:42:51Marc:Yeah, I need to get better at that as an actor too.

00:42:54Marc:Because I just sort of show up in it and from the lines, I'm like, all right, I need to, I know what's going on.

00:42:59Marc:But I think if you really put an objective in there, in your head, it'll probably hang the words on something a little better.

00:43:06Guest:Yeah, I think yes, and it probably will.

00:43:10Guest:There are all sorts of little things.

00:43:11Guest:I feel like it's always just about stuff that you pick up along the way.

00:43:15Guest:And you hear things here and there.

00:43:19Guest:I remember a girlfriend that I had years ago whom I lived with in New York.

00:43:23Guest:She did Dead Man Walking.

00:43:28Guest:She was in the first bit of that.

00:43:29Guest:And she had told me, I heard this secondhand that Tim Robbins had said, the most important thing is entrances and exits.

00:43:38Guest:And that stuck with me.

00:43:40Guest:As a 25-year-old, I was like, okay, yeah, that makes sense.

00:43:44Guest:Open big, close big.

00:43:45Guest:Yeah, and it's always been a thing that's kind of in the back of my mind.

00:43:48Guest:I don't know if I actually practically apply it every time.

00:43:51Guest:Yeah, yeah, yeah.

00:43:52Guest:And I since have gotten to know him a little bit, and I sent Tim Robin, and I saw him a year ago.

00:43:57Guest:We were shooting in Venice, and he came by on his bike.

00:43:59Guest:We were chit-chatting, and I said, by the way, do you remember Missy?

00:44:02Guest:I remember years ago, she told me this, and I told him that, and he kind of like, oh, did I?

00:44:06Guest:He didn't even remember.

00:44:07Guest:That's not even his thing, necessarily.

00:44:09Guest:He thought it was like a Buddha moment.

00:44:11Marc:He's like, oh, yeah, okay, yeah.

00:44:12Marc:But no, but it's weird how things like that, that makes sense to me.

00:44:15Marc:Like, you know, when you walk in.

00:44:17Marc:Yeah.

00:44:17Marc:Or, you know, right when your scene starts.

00:44:19Marc:Yeah.

00:44:19Marc:You know, plant yourself and then, you know, take the beats necessary to exit beautifully somehow.

00:44:25Marc:Absolutely.

00:44:26Guest:People don't remember everything in the middle.

00:44:28Guest:All they remember is you coming in and you leaving.

00:44:31Marc:Especially if it's a laugh line on either of those.

00:44:33Marc:Absolutely.

00:44:34Marc:The exit laugh line.

00:44:35Marc:Very powerful.

00:44:36Guest:Memorable.

00:44:37Marc:Even in life.

00:44:38Guest:If I get a decent enough laugh, I'm looking for the exit.

00:44:41Marc:Yeah.

00:44:42Marc:Oh, yeah.

00:44:42Marc:And then, like, usually you do it and then you come back and you're like, I don't know where I was going.

00:44:45Guest:Yeah, everyone's like, where the fuck are you going?

00:44:49Marc:You're driving this airplane.

00:44:51Marc:Yeah, I do that in fights, too.

00:44:53Marc:Like, fuck this, fuck you, I'm out.

00:44:55Marc:And then you walk out and you're like, where am I going?

00:44:59Marc:Hey, I don't know, I'm okay now.

00:45:01Marc:Do you have a lot of fights?

00:45:03Marc:Used to.

00:45:03Marc:You did?

00:45:04Marc:Yeah, I tried to cut back on it.

00:45:05Marc:yeah yeah it was I had to sort of search myself and figure out what was really going on there and it was just an insane discomfort with intimacy and the idea that was being manipulated constantly yeah shit man I mean it sounds like you're on top of it can I smoke in here yeah

00:45:24Marc:No, like what I realized lately because of the woman I'm with now is interesting is that, you know, I'd get upset about something and I'd start a fight.

00:45:32Marc:And she says to me, she goes, you know, you're arguing with yourself.

00:45:35Marc:You're just making up all this stuff that I'm doing and I'm not doing anything.

00:45:39Marc:And I had this moment.

00:45:40Marc:I'm like, that's kind of true.

00:45:42Marc:But you're kind of fucking with me now, though, right?

00:45:44Yeah.

00:45:44Guest:So you've already kind of had half the argument before you get to the conversation.

00:45:51Marc:You're just projecting all these things that they did or they're doing or they're thinking, and it's really all your insecurity.

00:45:58Guest:You're arguing with yourself.

00:45:59Guest:It's funny you say that.

00:46:00Guest:I think I do that.

00:46:01Guest:I realize that I sometimes will maybe do a version of that, and then I'll come in and I'll go...

00:46:07Guest:everything okay yeah and they're like yeah why not and then everything oh because we've just had an argument yeah yeah yeah well i went through some shit with you in my head what is that is there an ashtray that works over this is okay did obama smoke no okay good for you he had a tea did he sat there and had a tea i was hoping he smoked but he didn't he didn't smoke i i think he manages it yeah i think he's a gum guy

00:46:28Guest:do you think he's smoking now has he had one do you think since yeah i probably i i don't know that i i don't i can't assume but i think he's like got it down because you know he's got you know he's got a family and you know he's older and it's sort of a hard habit to defend after a certain point oh it's it is the worst i liken it to uh i i often say that i'm it's like i'm cleaning the gun that i'm going to use to shoot myself with yeah it's

00:46:53Marc:oh this oh no this this is the thing that's gonna kill me i'm just getting it ready yeah yeah it looks good though right feels good i eat these nicotine lozenges all the fucking time let me look at these they're great nicotine lozenges yeah i feel great are they oh my god like you know like for me because i'm a fucking drug addict yeah same uh you know i got drunk

00:47:13Marc:yeah i know yeah you're you're an addictive personality yeah but like you know i get what i get the buzz do you know what i mean like if i like i look forward to it at night i'm gonna wake up and have one with my coffee and i'm gonna feel it yeah yeah like sometimes the gum it's like you feel it but then it goes away too quick because you chew it too fast but this with these you kind of let them linger in your mouth yeah it's a good delivery system it is that's exactly right yeah good delivery system

00:47:38Marc:So how do you land the first roles?

00:47:40Marc:What are they?

00:47:41Marc:What happens?

00:47:42Marc:Do you think, like, when did you become Will Arnett?

00:47:44Marc:That was Arrested Development, where everyone was like, that's the guy.

00:47:47Marc:I was always him.

00:47:48Guest:I was just waiting for everybody else to figure it out.

00:47:50Marc:Yeah, but you did some things that weren't necessarily comedy, no?

00:47:53Guest:Or was it always comedy?

00:47:54Guest:No.

00:47:54Guest:I did some... Well, first I started working in New York.

00:48:00Guest:I was doing a kind of about as far off Broadway one-act play, and a girl who worked at William Morris in New York back then... What was the one-act play?

00:48:13Guest:It was called Answers.

00:48:15Guest:Yeah.

00:48:15Guest:And it was like...

00:48:16Guest:about a guy and the cops get him to confess to something he didn't do.

00:48:20Guest:And it was like, you know, and I played this kind of like small theater, tiny theater, like 99 seat theater.

00:48:26Guest:And I, you know, I played this kind of like sort of junkie kind of, you know, and by the way, when I was, and I was 23, when I was 23, I looked like I was 12.

00:48:36Guest:It was not, um, but, uh, I was applying all my acting to,

00:48:41Guest:You were doing it, taking those pauses, working the chair.

00:48:46Guest:And she brought me in to William Morris.

00:48:50Guest:And while I was there meeting with these agents and they were gonna start sending me out, one of them said, you should go and talk to the people in the voiceover department.

00:49:00Guest:And I said, sure, what's that?

00:49:03Guest:And they said, have you ever thought about the voices on commercials and stuff?

00:49:06Guest:And I said, no.

00:49:08Guest:It's never occurred to me.

00:49:09Guest:Those are people?

00:49:10Guest:Yeah.

00:49:10Guest:Yeah, yeah.

00:49:11Guest:Oh, yeah, there are voices on commercials.

00:49:13Guest:Yeah.

00:49:14Guest:And I went and I talked to them, and they said, well, we're going to start sending you out.

00:49:18Guest:And immediately they started sending me to auditions.

00:49:23Guest:And it wasn't very long.

00:49:25Guest:I'm going to say probably two months into it, maybe, I got my first gig.

00:49:30Yeah.

00:49:31Guest:uh for for a health care company out of new england called harvard community health plan uh-huh we're what health care should be yeah yeah i'm in yeah yeah and they flew me to boston to to record it which was kind of unusual um but it was i guess it was because it was a whole radio and television campaign and they were all there yeah it was like kind of

00:49:54Guest:20 commercials yeah recording right they brought me up there and I think they were probably surprised when I walked in yeah because I sounded like an older right yeah yeah you've always had yeah yeah yeah and then I was like a punk kid yeah but you did it

00:50:11Guest:I did it and then I started working a lot in voiceover and I was able to pay the bills and then some.

00:50:18Guest:And I became the voice of Evian Water and Boston Market and Lay's Potato Chips.

00:50:26Guest:Wow.

00:50:26Guest:Hershey's Cookies and Cream.

00:50:28Guest:Really?

00:50:28Guest:So you were making money.

00:50:30Guest:Yeah, I was making real money.

00:50:31Guest:And the funny thing, I said recently actually, it occurred to me, I was making like executive level money.

00:50:37Guest:Yeah.

00:50:38Guest:And I would do things like Lockheed Martin.

00:50:41Guest:I would do all these weird corporate things like Sunday golf type commercials.

00:50:46Guest:Aim investments.

00:50:48Guest:Invest with confidence.

00:50:50Guest:Stuff like that.

00:50:52Guest:And again, I was like this punk-ass kid who was burning out in New York.

00:50:58Guest:But it was very lucrative, and it meant that I didn't have to have... A lot of my friends were waiting tables or whatever, and I didn't have to do that.

00:51:06Guest:And I probably got lulled into a sort of a comfort level.

00:51:10Guest:Were you boozing a lot?

00:51:11Guest:Yeah.

00:51:12Guest:Yeah.

00:51:12Marc:That was, was that constant?

00:51:14Guest:No, there were a few years where I wasn't.

00:51:16Guest:And then, and then I was in the mid to late nineties.

00:51:19Guest:I was, and I was boozing a lot.

00:51:23Guest:And I would go to McManus a lot on, you know, on seventh Avenue and 19th street.

00:51:28Guest:That was my spot.

00:51:28Guest:Oh, yeah?

00:51:29Guest:It ended up becoming like a big kind of after-UCB hangout.

00:51:34Marc:Oh, it's a shitty little bar, right?

00:51:35Marc:Yeah.

00:51:36Marc:So you were the kind of drinker that was a shitty little bar, but it was still a shitty little bar.

00:51:41Guest:Yeah, it was before it was like a hangout.

00:51:43Guest:It became that because my buddy...

00:51:45Guest:Do you know Ali Farnakian?

00:51:46Guest:Yeah, I do.

00:51:47Guest:So it was because of Ali used to hang out with... I knew Ali through different guys from North Carolina.

00:51:53Guest:Really?

00:51:53Guest:That's how I kind of met all those sort of UCB people and stuff.

00:51:59Guest:And my ex-wife was through Ali.

00:52:01Marc:Oh, yeah.

00:52:01Marc:I remember him.

00:52:02Marc:Doesn't he teach now?

00:52:03Guest:Yeah.

00:52:04Marc:He's got his own theater, the pit.

00:52:06Marc:Right.

00:52:07Marc:And I remember there was like period... Because I remember when the UCB showed up in New York.

00:52:12Marc:Yeah.

00:52:13Marc:I remember when they were doing Luna Lounge with me, and then they started that first theater with the weird seats.

00:52:22Marc:The one that Walsh lived on top of?

00:52:24Guest:Oh, no.

00:52:24Guest:Yeah, that one.

00:52:25Guest:That was the one on 22nd Street.

00:52:26Guest:That was their first theater.

00:52:27Guest:But before that, they would do ASCAT on Sunday nights upstairs, 17th Street.

00:52:34Guest:What the fuck was that place called?

00:52:36Guest:And I remember a young Jake Fogelnest being in the front row, and he was just a fan, and him kind of...

00:52:42Guest:Tittering with his friends.

00:52:43Guest:Yeah.

00:52:43Guest:You know, and I mean, of course, now I've since known Jake for years.

00:52:47Guest:I knew him when his dad used to bring him to comedy shows.

00:52:49Guest:Yeah.

00:52:49Guest:Like when he was like 10.

00:52:51Guest:Well, I remember, and his dad would be around sometimes back then.

00:52:55Guest:And one of my agents from William Morris from back in the day in 1996, it was like January 96, and he says to me,

00:53:04Guest:you've got it.

00:53:04Guest:I've, I've just got this new, uh, young comedy troupe from Chicago and they've moved here and they're performing at the West bank theater on 42nd street, the restaurant downstairs, there's a little theater.

00:53:16Guest:Yeah.

00:53:16Guest:I remember that.

00:53:17Guest:And it was UCB doing a bucket of truth, their sketch show.

00:53:22Guest:Yeah.

00:53:22Guest:And it was, uh, Walsh and Besser and Ian and Amy.

00:53:26Guest:Yeah.

00:53:27Guest:Uh, and they did bucket of truth and that was the first, and it was Peter Principato was then, who's now my, has been my manager for years.

00:53:33Guest:Still?

00:53:34Marc:still i remember him yeah yeah and peter's been and he was my agent starting in 93 i remember when he was an agent yeah him in his leather jacket coming around i just spoke to him the whole way here yeah um yeah and peter had said you got to go see these guys i think i was kind of a dick to him yeah i was i never really had the social graces to uh understand uh how show business worked i i would always go out of my way to be a dick to all the people that could possibly help me sure

00:54:01Marc:That was your badge.

00:54:02Marc:Yeah, that's what kept me out of the real work for a long time.

00:54:08Marc:So wait, so this agent, so you do all these voiceovers, so when do you just start kicking into the acting?

00:54:13Guest:So I did a couple independent films.

00:54:15Guest:Yeah.

00:54:17Guest:And none of them kind of really did anything.

00:54:21Guest:And it was back when they were making a lot of independent films all over the place.

00:54:25Guest:It was very in vogue.

00:54:27Guest:Yeah.

00:54:28Guest:I got my first kind of really sort of paying acting gig.

00:54:33Guest:I did a pilot for CBS, and it was in 96.

00:54:39Guest:It was that same winter, 96.

00:54:43Guest:I did a pilot for Warner Brothers CBS called Grant and Lee, and Kevin Pollack was the star.

00:54:50Guest:Yeah.

00:54:51Guest:Yeah.

00:54:51Guest:And I was auditioning in New York for pilots and they saw my tape and, and, and flew me out to test for it.

00:54:58Guest:It was a big deal.

00:54:59Guest:And, you know, I, I, I guess I never, I always liked sort of the idea of comedy, but I never really talked about it in that way.

00:55:07Guest:I wasn't a standup.

00:55:08Guest:I didn't come up through sketch.

00:55:11Guest:Um, it just didn't seem like something that was on my, it just wasn't on my radar.

00:55:16Guest:Right.

00:55:16Guest:Yeah.

00:55:17Guest:And it wasn't a thing in New York as much.

00:55:19Guest:There was stand-up, certainly.

00:55:20Guest:But the sketch thing wasn't.

00:55:21Guest:Hadn't happened yet.

00:55:22Guest:Hadn't really happened, as you know.

00:55:23Guest:Yeah.

00:55:24Guest:And so anyway, I went, I did this pilot, and it didn't get picked up, but I kind of did okay, I think.

00:55:31Guest:And then I started auditioning and testing more for pilots.

00:55:35Guest:and every year I would sort of, I started testing, they would fly me out for five, 10 pilots, and I'd get really close, and then I did another pilot a few years later for,

00:55:50Guest:At this time, I will say I was boozing and I probably didn't look my best and was not in the best form.

00:56:00Guest:Yeah, right.

00:56:02Guest:But I could still do my voiceovers and make an increasing bank.

00:56:06Guest:Yeah.

00:56:07Guest:So I was like, fuck it, I don't care.

00:56:09Guest:And then I had a moment, I was like, all right, I got to get my shit together and kind of pare that down and quit it.

00:56:14Guest:But right before that, I did a pilot with my friend Michael Malley called The Michael Malley Show.

00:56:19Guest:I remember him.

00:56:19Guest:NBC, yeah.

00:56:20Marc:Didn't he famously lose his mind for a minute?

00:56:23Guest:No.

00:56:23Guest:That's a story that's kind of taken on its own life.

00:56:26Guest:He had, during this show, it was back when they were giving out these big development deals.

00:56:31Guest:Right, I remember.

00:56:32Guest:I had one.

00:56:33Marc:Not as big, but, you know.

00:56:35Guest:But, yeah, you had one, and lots of people had these.

00:56:37Guest:Yeah.

00:56:38Guest:And Mike had this big deal, and he went to make a movie.

00:56:43Guest:From the time we shot the pilot to the time we were shooting the series, he went and made the movie.

00:56:47Guest:I think it was 28 days.

00:56:48Guest:It was Yestir, right?

00:56:49Marc:Wasn't that the... He ended up being on Yestir.

00:56:51Marc:Right, yeah.

00:56:52Marc:So he went to make the movie.

00:56:53Guest:So he went to make the movie, and he comes back, and...

00:56:55Guest:he felt like the writing staff had gotten way off of what the original idea was.

00:57:00Guest:Yeah.

00:57:01Guest:And Mike is, he's still a very close friend of mine and one of the all-time great guys, great people.

00:57:07Guest:He's a solid person.

00:57:08Guest:Yeah, I always see him in things and he's good.

00:57:09Guest:You know, I saw him, he was in Scully.

00:57:11Guest:He was good.

00:57:11Guest:He's really good.

00:57:12Guest:He's a good actor.

00:57:13Guest:He's a really good writer.

00:57:14Guest:Yeah.

00:57:15Guest:And...

00:57:15Guest:But most of all, he's an incredibly good guy.

00:57:18Guest:And he wrote this, what became to be known as a manifesto, to all his writers, saying, look, I've got this responsibility.

00:57:29Guest:He's from New Hampshire.

00:57:30Guest:He's sort of blue collar.

00:57:32Guest:He took it really seriously that they gave him all this money.

00:57:36Guest:He felt a sense of responsibility to do the right thing with his show and make it the best version possible.

00:57:40Guest:He wrote this thing.

00:57:41Guest:and really out of a good place, and somebody in the writer's room immediately faxed it to every other writer's room.

00:57:48Guest:Yeah.

00:57:48Guest:Leaked it.

00:57:49Guest:Leaked it.

00:57:50Guest:And then they printed it in The Hollywood Reporter, and he became... And everybody was... You know, he was basically the laughingstock.

00:57:56Guest:And I remember the day that that happened, and he was so...

00:57:59Guest:he's like i fucked up i i shouldn't have i guess i shouldn't have given a shit and he was so despondent yeah and i thought you know what fuck everybody else that's bullshit he's such a good guy if there's anybody that did not deserve it was him and he he became known as the guy who like lost it for a minute and he by no means there's nobody who's if there's anybody who never lost it it's mike o'malley yeah

00:58:22Marc:I'm glad he survived, you know, because it was like, you know, at that time, I'm sure I was like, oh, geez, that guy.

00:58:28Marc:I know.

00:58:29Marc:Probably had my own resentment about him.

00:58:30Guest:Well, as you know, it's like it's the everybody, you know, in this town, especially it's like, don't let him see you trying.

00:58:38Guest:Yeah.

00:58:39Guest:Yeah.

00:58:39Guest:So I did all these things.

00:58:40Guest:And then and then eventually I around 2000, I got sober and I kind of got my shit together.

00:58:47Guest:You've been sober that long?

00:58:48Guest:Well, I had a, I had a, uh, a moment last year where after 15 years, I kind of went out.

00:58:56Guest:Um, cause everybody was talking about Rose and it was never around before.

00:58:59Guest:Rose?

00:59:00Guest:Uh, it's a bit, but, but, uh, but I ended up, you know, having a sort of a moment for how long was that moment?

00:59:09Guest:Let's let's call it six months, but I don't want to get into the particulars.

00:59:13Guest:But yeah.

00:59:14Guest:And I actually talked about recently and I sort of did this interview with the Hollywood Reporter last year and I kind of mentioned that.

00:59:22Guest:And then, of course, immediately it's like the Daily Mail, like.

00:59:25Guest:Arnett hits the bottle as if I'm living under a bridge.

00:59:28Guest:I'm like, no, fuck, that's not what happened.

00:59:30Guest:Yeah, you can't do it.

00:59:31Guest:So I'm like, you can't talk about it because people just use everything against you.

00:59:34Guest:This is quick bait.

00:59:35Guest:Yeah.

00:59:36Guest:Yeah.

00:59:37Guest:But anyway, that was the moment back then that kind of my- In 2000.

00:59:42Guest:2000.

00:59:43Guest:Yeah.

00:59:44Guest:Summer of 2000, and that was sort of a pivotal moment in my life.

00:59:50Guest:And-

00:59:52Guest:And then I was living out here briefly in Venice.

00:59:55Marc:Did you get married?

00:59:57Guest:Were you married twice?

00:59:59Guest:Yeah, I got married when I was very young, when I was 24 briefly for a month.

01:00:03Guest:It's on my Wikipedia page.

01:00:06Guest:I put it on there a long time ago.

01:00:07Guest:Yeah.

01:00:09Guest:For a month.

01:00:10Guest:Literally like a month, yeah.

01:00:11Guest:I was 24 and kind of caught up in the moment.

01:00:14Guest:And as soon as we did it, I was like, oh, God.

01:00:18Guest:I'm not kidding.

01:00:19Guest:Like at City Hall in New York.

01:00:22Yeah.

01:00:22Guest:How long had you known her?

01:00:24Guest:A month.

01:00:25Guest:No.

01:00:25Guest:Yeah, I swear to God.

01:00:27Marc:So you knew her a month and you went and got married.

01:00:28Guest:And I wasn't drinking.

01:00:29Guest:Yeah.

01:00:30Guest:Yeah.

01:00:30Guest:And it was just no good.

01:00:32Guest:It was just stupid.

01:00:33Guest:It was like- And she thought it was stupid?

01:00:36Guest:Eventually she did, yeah.

01:00:39Guest:Initially she wasn't psyched that I came to Jesus before she did.

01:00:43Guest:Yeah.

01:00:44Guest:But again, I was so dumb.

01:00:46Guest:I was 24.

01:00:47Guest:I mean-

01:00:48Guest:Young people are dumb.

01:00:50Guest:No, I know.

01:00:51Guest:And I include myself in that, young people.

01:00:53Marc:You get caught up in feelings.

01:00:54Marc:We're sensitive people, us people.

01:00:56Marc:Yes, yes.

01:00:57Marc:Yeah, and you're like, this is it.

01:00:59Marc:And then you realize, like, well, I learned what not it is.

01:01:02Marc:Yes.

01:01:04Guest:And, you know, I realized years later, like, oh, I still am capable of making major mistakes.

01:01:11Guest:Hard, man.

01:01:11Marc:Yeah.

01:01:12Marc:Yeah, because, you know, getting to know, like, the patterns.

01:01:16Marc:Yeah.

01:01:16Marc:That's a fucking trick.

01:01:18Marc:Yes.

01:01:18Marc:And then knowing them is one step.

01:01:20Marc:Then the next step is like, don't do that.

01:01:24Guest:Yeah.

01:01:25Guest:Well, learning to go, the hardest thing for me to learn how to do was to go take a beat.

01:01:31Guest:Yeah.

01:01:32Guest:Don't be impulsive.

01:01:34Guest:Ugh.

01:01:34Guest:And let it sit for a second.

01:01:36Guest:Yeah.

01:01:37Guest:And then react.

01:01:38Guest:I don't need to have a reaction.

01:01:39Guest:You can do that.

01:01:40Guest:Yeah.

01:01:42Marc:I'm better at it.

01:01:43Marc:Yeah, yeah.

01:01:44Marc:So, all right, so tell me about how Arrested Development happened, because that's like... So, I moved back to... I was living in New York now.

01:01:50Guest:I moved back to New York because... Do you want me to check and see if we're at war?

01:01:53Guest:Yeah, let's see.

01:01:56Guest:I don't got anything.

01:01:56Guest:Oh, wait, shit.

01:01:57Marc:No, it's Beyonce.

01:01:59Beyonce.

01:01:59Guest:We all agree that Mar-a-Lago is not the Winter White House, right?

01:02:03Marc:Well, we all agree it's not the place to have national security confidential classified briefings at the table.

01:02:09Guest:With other diners around, yeah.

01:02:13Marc:That's not the best way to... That's not the best way to conduct classified international security issues.

01:02:20Guest:Yeah.

01:02:21Guest:Yeah.

01:02:21Guest:I moved back to New York.

01:02:24Guest:Amy, my ex-wife, Amy Poehler.

01:02:28Guest:When did you meet her, though?

01:02:30Marc:I mean, I know you met her way back.

01:02:32Guest:I met her way back.

01:02:34Guest:We'd sort of met before, and then I met her.

01:02:37Guest:I went as Ali Varenakin's date to a dinner to Cafe Lou in New York.

01:02:43Guest:In the 90s?

01:02:44Guest:No, this is like late 2000.

01:02:47Guest:I'd gone back to New York.

01:02:48Guest:We had met before, but this was the first time we were- You'd just gotten sober.

01:02:52Guest:Yeah.

01:02:53Marc:Uh-huh.

01:02:53Marc:Yeah.

01:02:55Marc:Like four months before.

01:02:56Marc:Oh, so that's always a good time to make impulsive decisions.

01:02:58Guest:Yes.

01:02:59Guest:Well, you know, in my defense, I wasn't really doing- I was just kind of-

01:03:03Guest:i'd come back to new york for a couple weeks i was visiting my sister and uh ali said i'm going to this dinner yeah uh with my buddy fred weller and his then girlfriend now wife and ali and and my buddy jack and and yeah um my my friend had gone on a on a date with amy yeah and then she was coming to this dinner but it wasn't really working out with them this is post matt amy yeah post matt besser yes yeah

01:03:28Guest:and she, and we just, we hit it off, and we started, we chatted the whole night, and then she came to California, and they were doing shows out here that January, and we continued to, and we went out a couple times, and it was great, and then we started dating,

01:03:46Guest:And she was basically out here kind of with me and I did another pilot.

01:03:54Guest:She was doing a pilot at the time with Judd called North Hollywood with Jason Segel and Judge Reinhold.

01:04:02Guest:And then she got SNL.

01:04:07Guest:Right.

01:04:09Guest:And it was like July of that year, 2001.

01:04:11Guest:And she was like, should I do this?

01:04:16Guest:Yeah.

01:04:16Guest:And it was like a real, um, I mean, I'm not violating it.

01:04:20Guest:It was just, you know, we talked about it and wasn't sure.

01:04:22Guest:And I said, yeah, let's, let's go.

01:04:24Guest:And so we moved back to New York as, uh, uh, arrested happened like this.

01:04:29Guest:So Amy was doing SNL and, uh, not married yet.

01:04:32Guest:We were not married.

01:04:33Guest:Uh, we were, we, then we then got engaged.

01:04:38Guest:Yeah.

01:04:39Guest:Like a year and a half later.

01:04:41Guest:Um,

01:04:41Guest:And I did a pilot, another pilot for CBS, 20th for CBS.

01:04:49Guest:So you're working.

01:04:50Marc:I mean, between voiceovers and pilots and guest appearances, I mean, you're making a living, and it's good.

01:04:55Guest:Yeah, I was making a good living, and I was kind of content in a way.

01:04:59Guest:And we were, I was doing a pilot basically every spring, it seemed like.

01:05:03Guest:And I did this pilot, though, and it gets picked up, and everybody's kind of celebrating, and I had a bad feeling

01:05:10Guest:just about the way that everybody was kind of dealing with me.

01:05:14Guest:And I remember saying to Peter Principato, there's something, something's up.

01:05:18Guest:Yeah.

01:05:19Guest:Now you're crazy.

01:05:19Guest:You're paranoid.

01:05:20Guest:And I said, yes, I know.

01:05:21Guest:But in addition to that, something's up.

01:05:23Guest:Yeah.

01:05:24Guest:And sure enough, I got fired off this pilot, the show called still standing that ran for a few years on CBS.

01:05:31Guest:Yeah.

01:05:32Guest:And I remember, I remember getting the call from Peter saying, I don't know how the fuck you knew, but you were right.

01:05:39Guest:And I felt at this point I'd been doing it long enough that I could sense shit like that.

01:05:45Guest:And I was really mad on a lot of levels.

01:05:50Guest:I was disappointed that I was fired.

01:05:52Guest:You feel kind of embarrassed.

01:05:53Guest:You feel like people care.

01:05:55Guest:Obviously nobody notices.

01:05:56Guest:But you feel like...

01:05:58Guest:you just, you feel shitty, and I remember my friend Brian Callen, who's a stand-up, do you know Brian?

01:06:04Guest:Brian's saying to me, oh, what, you're mad that you're not gonna have one scene a week where you come in and you're the guy who goes, hey, what the hell happened to my couch?

01:06:10Guest:He's like, you should be happy.

01:06:12Guest:They're doing you a favor.

01:06:14Guest:And it was, he's like, stop, stop feeling, you know, sorry for yourself.

01:06:18Guest:And so that fall I decided to do a play.

01:06:22Guest:There was a guy I had done a reading with the summer before, a couple summers before in New York Stadium Film up at

01:06:27Guest:and he was coming to New York and he was doing a play about the tragedy at Lockerbie called The Women of Lockerbie with the new group in New York.

01:06:37Guest:I call Peter Principato and I say, I'm not reading for anything for pilot season.

01:06:41Guest:And he's like, don't be stupid.

01:06:42Guest:And I said, no, you know what?

01:06:43Guest:I'm done.

01:06:43Guest:I'm done with being disappointed and I don't want to have anything to do with it anymore.

01:06:48Guest:I'm not going to audition, and boy, the TV business is going to be really missing me.

01:06:51Guest:Yeah.

01:06:52Guest:And then I get a... I remember my friend started talking about this script, Arrested Development, and the woman who cast the show that I got fired from the year before, Deb Borilski, when I was fired, sent me a handwritten letter.

01:07:07Guest:Yeah.

01:07:07Guest:And said, which is really sweet, and she said...

01:07:10Guest:I thought you were great on this show.

01:07:12Guest:Uh, I don't want you to don't take this personally that they fired you.

01:07:16Guest:I think they made a big mistake.

01:07:17Guest:I think you're a talented guy and I think it's a real injustice, et cetera, et cetera.

01:07:22Guest:And it was very sweet.

01:07:23Guest:I've never, nobody's ever done that before and or since.

01:07:27Guest:Um,

01:07:27Guest:And she was casting Arrested Development, Deb Barilski.

01:07:33Guest:And she called Peter Principato and she said, there's this part of the brother who's a magician and they can't cast it.

01:07:40Guest:And Will should come in and read for it.

01:07:42Guest:And Peter called me and I said, you know what?

01:07:44Guest:It's very nice of Deb, but I'm not interested.

01:07:46Guest:I'm doing this fucking play about the women of Lockerbie.

01:07:49Guest:Remember the tragedy over Lockerbie.

01:07:51Guest:Yeah.

01:07:52Guest:And so Deb ended up calling me.

01:07:54Guest:Yeah.

01:07:55Guest:And she's like, you just got to read for it.

01:07:57Guest:And I said, fine.

01:07:59Guest:And he faxed me and the fax rolled paper.

01:08:02Guest:Yeah.

01:08:03Guest:To our apartment that we had down in Tribeca at the time.

01:08:06Guest:And I took the subway up to read, you know, to go to some office.

01:08:09Guest:Yeah.

01:08:10Guest:The West Side.

01:08:12Guest:Be put on tape by an assistant.

01:08:13Marc:Yeah.

01:08:14Guest:And I just read the side.

01:08:15Guest:I just got the sides.

01:08:15Guest:I don't even have the script.

01:08:16Guest:Yeah.

01:08:17Guest:I might have the script, but I didn't read it.

01:08:18Guest:I was like, fuck that.

01:08:19Guest:I'll read the sides.

01:08:20Guest:Yeah.

01:08:20Guest:put it on tape don't think about it i get a call the next morning they're like great they want you to fly out to california and they're gonna make a test deal and i'm like jesus christ it's funny when you don't give a shit you're like all right all right not only do i not give a shit i go to meet my buddy giles who's my my oldest buddy lives here now and yeah pete giles he and i are at mcmanus he's still drinking at the time and so it's like friday at one and he's and we're playing video golf we played golden tea for hours yeah

01:08:47Guest:The amount of money and time I put into golden tea, I could have gone to law school twice.

01:08:52Marc:Do you golf in real life?

01:08:54Guest:I do, but my golf, you know, these days I hurt my knees.

01:08:57Guest:I'm old.

01:08:58Guest:But, so I'm playing video golf.

01:09:00Guest:I'm playing Golden Tee at McManus with Giles.

01:09:03Guest:And Principato calls me again.

01:09:04Guest:He's like, listen, man, you gotta go home and sign your test deal.

01:09:07Guest:Because you know you sign a test deal before you audition your final test.

01:09:11Guest:Sure.

01:09:12Guest:They work out your contract.

01:09:13Guest:And then you go before network.

01:09:14Guest:You go before network so that if they want you, you can't go, great, so my price is double.

01:09:19Guest:Right, I get it.

01:09:20Guest:You've already made your deal.

01:09:21Guest:Yeah, I've been in that situation.

01:09:22Guest:Yeah.

01:09:22Marc:It makes it, it makes the, it makes this sort of that fucking, when you got to go in that room full of the network people and everything else and you've signed a test deal, it's just the worst fucking experience.

01:09:30Guest:It's the worst.

01:09:31Guest:And if you think about it, if you're an out of work actor who doesn't have a lot of dough, you've now got the extra carrot of, oh, you could make X amount of money if you do this right.

01:09:40Guest:And if you don't, your year is fucked.

01:09:42Guest:Yeah.

01:09:43Guest:It's terrible.

01:09:43Guest:And you pay your own flights.

01:09:45Guest:Yeah.

01:09:45Guest:All that shit.

01:09:46Guest:Yeah.

01:09:46Guest:So I go, so he keeps calling me.

01:09:48Guest:Have you, I'll go home and I'll sign it.

01:09:50Guest:The deal was the studio couldn't look at my tape until I signed my test deal.

01:09:56Guest:And they keep calling and I go, Pete, if they keep calling, they've already looked at it.

01:10:00Guest:Yeah.

01:10:01Guest:I go, why aren't you renegotiating the deal?

01:10:03Guest:You fucking, like, come on.

01:10:05Guest:Anyway, I go home.

01:10:07Guest:I sign it.

01:10:08Guest:I fly out to California.

01:10:09Guest:I remember so well that we can have a cold.

01:10:13Guest:I felt crappy.

01:10:14Guest:It was like February, late February 2003.

01:10:17Guest:And I hang out.

01:10:21Guest:I see Brian Callen.

01:10:22Guest:Yeah, I see him there.

01:10:24Guest:And it's it's like a work session with the Russo brothers and Mitch.

01:10:28Guest:And Brian and I read with each other out in the hall at the old TV building over at the Fox lot.

01:10:34Guest:And Brian says to me, he's like, you're going to get this.

01:10:36Guest:I said, no fucking way.

01:10:38Guest:He's like, yeah.

01:10:38Guest:I was so jaded.

01:10:40Guest:I was like, not happening.

01:10:41Guest:I go in, I work with those guys.

01:10:43Guest:It goes kind of, okay, fine.

01:10:46Guest:I leave it.

01:10:46Guest:I'm sick enough that I don't even, again, I still don't care.

01:10:49Guest:Yeah.

01:10:50Guest:And you hadn't read the script.

01:10:52Guest:And at this point, maybe I'd read the script, but like whatever.

01:10:55Guest:Do you remember liking it or thinking it was- Yes, it was good.

01:10:58Guest:Yeah.

01:10:59Guest:It was very good.

01:11:00Guest:But it also had, Mitch had written like a disclaimer on the front, on the cover letter.

01:11:05Guest:Yeah.

01:11:05Guest:Saying, this is going to be shot, handheld.

01:11:08Guest:There are going to be no, it's not going to be business as usual.

01:11:11Guest:No trailers.

01:11:12Guest:It's going to be all guerrilla style.

01:11:14Guest:I remember thinking, fuck you, dude.

01:11:15Guest:What do you think this is, art?

01:11:18Guest:And it's commerce, man.

01:11:21Guest:And I go in.

01:11:23Guest:Jaded.

01:11:23Guest:So jaded already.

01:11:24Guest:TV jaded.

01:11:25Guest:TV, 33-year-old jaded.

01:11:28Guest:I go in Monday morning, and Tony Hale was out there too, who played Buster, and his wife.

01:11:34Guest:Martell, at the time, was a makeup artist on SNL.

01:11:37Guest:I knew Tony a little bit.

01:11:39Guest:He and I read the same morning, also with Jessica Walter, whom I'd done my first pilot with, Kevin Pollack.

01:11:45Guest:She played the mom on Arrested.

01:11:46Guest:She and I had done that together.

01:11:47Guest:It was just like a weird kind of everything coming together.

01:11:51Guest:And I go in and I test.

01:11:53Guest:And I got the show.

01:11:56Guest:And... That doesn't sound menacing, does it?

01:12:00Guest:No.

01:12:00Guest:Okay, good.

01:12:01Guest:If they're looking for anybody out here, it's you, by the way.

01:12:05Guest:Yeah, it goes well.

01:12:07Guest:And I stayed.

01:12:08Guest:I stayed in California because we did a table read that night.

01:12:12Guest:And I stayed because over the course of the next few weeks, we just made the... Did they cast you?

01:12:17Guest:Yeah.

01:12:18Guest:yeah i go in i remember going in right before i go in mitch is there and he says um he's like you're gonna get this now it's his show and i go don't say that yeah and it was i was reading against um uh alan ruck yeah i remember from ferris bueller's and he was on spin city yeah yeah yeah good actor yeah he's funny yeah alan and rain wilson yeah

01:12:42Guest:Alan goes I go in first then I come out and I go again I'm sick I go into like blow my nose and wash my hands I feel terrible then Alan comes out in that time yeah and then they and then Mitch and everybody comes out Mitch is like you got it to me yeah Alan's barely left and Rain is still sitting in the thing and I've been in his position he's fine now yeah

01:13:04Guest:But I've been in that position so many times when you're not the guy.

01:13:08Guest:Yeah.

01:13:08Guest:And I said to Mitch, hey, hey, that... I didn't... I didn't mean to say hi.

01:13:12Guest:I said, hey, that guy's still there.

01:13:14Guest:Go and let him know or get him out of here before we celebrate.

01:13:18Guest:I can't... I felt too badly about... But you had already read.

01:13:21Guest:They didn't even read them.

01:13:23Guest:But you, you'd already read it.

01:13:25Guest:I'd already read it.

01:13:25Guest:I read Alone and then we did a group scene with Tony and Jessica and Jason.

01:13:32Guest:And it was like, it's so funny looking back on that now and Mitch in those moments, like Mitch and I are, you know, he's been one of my best friends of my life and we still work together and, you know, he produces our show Flaked with us and he's just such a part of my life and Jason is...

01:13:48Guest:from that moment on we were we we've been like brothers it's so funny to look back at that actual day yeah you guys sort of reinvented television i mean it was a completely new thing people fucking love it cross is hilarious everyone's hilarious yeah it was weird it was such a funny like when we first started i knew david a little bit from new york yeah um not well and and but uh

01:14:09Guest:We started shooting that show and immediately from the first time we did like a big group scene, it felt different.

01:14:17Guest:And Mitch is such a brilliant guy and he's a brilliant writer.

01:14:20Guest:He's probably the funniest person I've ever known.

01:14:24Guest:You just knew that we were doing something that was, you know, the writing was so good and that it was funny.

01:14:32Guest:But at the same time, that whole first fall before it started to air, it didn't air until November.

01:14:38Guest:We started shooting in August.

01:14:41Guest:We were making it in a vacuum.

01:14:44Guest:And it was odd in a sense that you knew it was different.

01:14:48Guest:We knew it was different, but there was no reaction to it yet.

01:14:51Guest:So we were just making episodes.

01:14:53Guest:And there was something kind of freeing about that.

01:14:57Guest:There was no pressure to do it one way or the other.

01:15:01Guest:And then when people started reacting and liking it, I never even thought about shit like...

01:15:08Guest:reviews because i was so concerned with just trying to get a fucking job for so long right that that was so far down the right and you weren't necessarily as invested in the show you were working yeah yeah exactly wasn't on you no it wasn't at all yeah and uh and so and then and then it sort of started to pick up steam became a phenomenon

01:15:30Guest:I guess.

01:15:31Guest:Yeah, definitely.

01:15:32Guest:But at the same time, don't forget, we had zero ratings.

01:15:36Guest:Yeah.

01:15:36Guest:So, you know, we were constantly, every Monday morning, Bateman and I would be like sort of pouring through the ratings and trying to like, hey, we went up a tenth and-

01:15:48Guest:Girls 18 to 19.

01:15:50Guest:The worst.

01:15:51Guest:The fucking worst.

01:15:51Guest:The worst.

01:15:53Guest:He's a good guy.

01:15:53Guest:I talked to him.

01:15:54Guest:Bateman's the best.

01:15:56Guest:And I have so many memories of just him sitting in his little shit trailer with the door open wearing his stupid Michael...

01:16:05Guest:Yeah.

01:16:06Guest:Costume, pages.

01:16:08Guest:Yeah.

01:16:08Guest:Back then it was paper.

01:16:09Guest:Yeah.

01:16:10Guest:Going over the ratings.

01:16:11Guest:Oh, really?

01:16:12Guest:Yeah.

01:16:12Guest:Freaking out?

01:16:12Guest:Yeah, yeah, yeah.

01:16:13Marc:I got something good.

01:16:14Guest:We're just holding on to any crime.

01:16:16Marc:So how did it ultimately stay on the air?

01:16:19Guest:We got nominated that first, it started airing in November.

01:16:22Guest:Yeah.

01:16:22Guest:And then in December, out of the blue, we got nominated for a Golden Globe.

01:16:27Guest:Right.

01:16:28Guest:And we were like, holy shit, Golden Globe.

01:16:30Guest:Yeah.

01:16:31Yeah.

01:16:31Guest:And we get to go?

01:16:32Guest:Yeah, hang out.

01:16:34Guest:It was so far removed from everything where I was at.

01:16:39Guest:Yeah.

01:16:41Guest:I mean, I guess that's not entirely true.

01:16:43Guest:Amy was doing SNL, so she was kind of in a high-profile thing.

01:16:46Guest:But for me, it just seemed like that was her gig.

01:16:50Guest:And then after the first season, we got nominated for a bunch of Emmys.

01:16:54Guest:And then we won the Emmy for Best Comedy.

01:16:59Guest:And that was so gratifying.

01:17:03Guest:I remember before the ceremony, Kraw sang, if we win, we're on the same road.

01:17:09Guest:We should get up, celebrate with each, you know, walk out to the aisle and then go the other way out the theater and get in our cars and leave.

01:17:18Guest:Yeah.

01:17:18Guest:And I was like, that's, yes, hilarious.

01:17:20Guest:I remember Amy saying to me, don't listen to Cross.

01:17:22Guest:You cannot do that.

01:17:28Guest:But yeah, it was very validating.

01:17:29Guest:It was such a thrill.

01:17:31Marc:Yeah, that's great.

01:17:32Marc:And then the ones you did a couple years ago went over well.

01:17:36Marc:Everyone was excited.

01:17:37Guest:Yeah, there were people who had complaints.

01:17:39Guest:There were a number of reasons that Mitch constructed those shows the way he did.

01:17:45Guest:Some of it had to do with schedule of getting everybody back on board.

01:17:53Guest:But I feel like when you go back, the format was that each character had their own episode, some have multiple episodes, and that everything kind of...

01:18:02Guest:you could follow, everything kind of collapsed on itself and the storylines were all intertwined.

01:18:08Guest:I feel like when you actually go back and look at it as a whole, it's a pretty masterful, it's very complex what he did.

01:18:16Guest:And I spent some time in the writer's room on that and it was like a code breaking room from World War II.

01:18:23Guest:I'm not kidding, it was different colored index cards with different colored pieces of string

01:18:28Guest:sort of denoting character or cause and effect and stuff going back and forth.

01:18:32Guest:It was insanity.

01:18:33Guest:Yeah.

01:18:34Guest:And it was like such a window into Mitch's brain, which is scrambled eggs.

01:18:38Guest:Wow.

01:18:39Guest:But yeah, but he pulls it together.

01:18:40Guest:He makes the omelet.

01:18:42Guest:He really does, honestly.

01:18:43Marc:So what now, he produces Flake.

01:18:46Marc:Now is that your, that's your show?

01:18:49Guest:Yeah.

01:18:50Guest:You created it?

01:18:51Guest:Yes.

01:18:52Guest:And it's sort of based on-

01:18:54Guest:Well, it's not really based on reality in the sense that that story is fictitious.

01:19:01Guest:But you're hip to being fucked up.

01:19:03Guest:Yeah.

01:19:04Guest:I'm hip to being fucked up and I'm hip to... I decided that I wanted to kind of make something that was...

01:19:14Guest:I like the idea initially of a guy... I've always liked the idea of a big fish in a small pond.

01:19:20Guest:Yeah.

01:19:21Guest:And so I remember seeing somebody I know being in Venice and everybody stopping him on the corner and he's in the program and everybody's like, hey, man, what's up?

01:19:27Guest:And it was like a business guy and a fucking homeless dude.

01:19:31Guest:Yeah.

01:19:31Guest:And I was like, how the fuck do you know everybody?

01:19:33Guest:Like, what is your deal?

01:19:34Guest:Right.

01:19:35Guest:And it struck me as being kind of funny.

01:19:37Guest:And Venice is...

01:19:39Guest:I love Venice and I've lived there on and off over the years.

01:19:42Guest:And it is a place where people go to reinvent themselves.

01:19:47Guest:Truly, like you can just go out there and sort of adopt a persona.

01:19:50Guest:Right.

01:19:51Guest:And we have a character in the show, we didn't really get into it, but there was a guy years ago who we knew, his name was Stefan, and then somebody else said, we were talking about Stefan, they said...

01:20:02Guest:Oh, I went to high school with him.

01:20:04Guest:You mean Steven?

01:20:05Guest:Yeah.

01:20:06Guest:And we're like, holy shit.

01:20:08Guest:When you're 25 and you just decide, I'm going to call myself Stefan and everybody else is going to go.

01:20:12Guest:And none of these people know me.

01:20:13Guest:They don't know my story.

01:20:14Guest:Right.

01:20:15Guest:And you can create this identity.

01:20:16Guest:And so I like that.

01:20:18Guest:And I think in a lot of ways, I wanted to get into the idea of who we really are versus who we show the world.

01:20:28Guest:Right.

01:20:30Guest:Right.

01:20:30Guest:And that kind of fascinated me.

01:20:32Guest:Yeah.

01:20:33Guest:Just on a personal level, you know, I started it as sort of an exploration of things I didn't like about other people.

01:20:43Guest:Number one, sort of dishonesty and lying.

01:20:46Guest:Yeah.

01:20:46Guest:And I ended up, it got very sort of murky and I kind of, it also became an exploration of things I didn't like about myself.

01:20:53Guest:Sure.

01:20:54Guest:At the same time.

01:20:55Marc:Yeah.

01:20:56Marc:It's so funny because that process of like, you know,

01:20:58Guest:those resentments that you have against others like sometimes it can take a while for you to realize like oh this isn't like we were talking about before I'm having a conversation with myself yeah yeah absolutely yeah and it was it was tough I it wasn't until it wasn't until I was deep in the process of my my writing partner Mark Chappell is an Englishman who wrote with I met him through Cross years ago he wrote Todd Margaret with oh yeah you're on Todd Margaret yeah yeah

01:21:22Guest:And so that's how I met Chappie, who's an Oxford-educated Englishman who had never been to Venice before.

01:21:30Guest:And I just pitched this idea to him one night.

01:21:33Guest:I was in London, and he was like, yeah, it sounds great.

01:21:35Guest:And we just started writing an outline the next day, and he came over here and immersed himself, and he's the greatest partner I could ever ask for.

01:21:42Guest:He and I wrote every episode of the first season, and as we were doing it, it started to...

01:21:50Guest:get heavier and heavier.

01:21:51Guest:And it wasn't until I was in the middle of that process I realized what was going on.

01:21:54Guest:And at the center of it is this guy, Chip, who is this kind of big fish in a small pond who's created this persona for himself, who's created this kind of cool identity.

01:22:06Guest:And at the heart of it, he is a sober guy who's helping people.

01:22:10Guest:I also like the idea of a guy who's helping people

01:22:14Guest:by selling this life and this thing, and yet he's not necessarily adhering to it himself.

01:22:19Guest:Right.

01:22:20Guest:But it still works on other people, so is he a bad person?

01:22:24Guest:Oh, yeah.

01:22:25Guest:Because he's kind of doing the right thing.

01:22:26Guest:Well, I mean, that's where you get into the loop, right?

01:22:29Marc:yeah well what you get into and people say well that's a pretty simplistic way to look at it but that life is complicated right it is it is there's no black and white answer well right and also like you know i think about that stuff a lot like you know i know that you know i can show up for people but sometimes in my personal life i'm a i'm a fucking you know depressed angry dick yeah but does that what does that mean exactly that's just like you know people are a little complicated

01:22:53Marc:Yeah, yeah.

01:22:55Marc:People are complicated and- And if the good column outweighs the bad column, you're doing okay.

01:22:59Marc:100%.

01:23:00Marc:Yeah.

01:23:01Guest:And if you can try to own the shit that you've done and go, okay, fuck, I need to try to be better than-

01:23:10Guest:I guess that's all you can do.

01:23:13Guest:Now, where are you at now?

01:23:14Guest:You're about to drop the second season?

01:23:16Guest:Yeah, so we did the first season, and then we started shooting that came out last March, and then we shot the second season.

01:23:23Guest:We brought more writers on this year.

01:23:26Marc:And now, do you picture an arc?

01:23:28Marc:Because my experience in writing television, I always assumed that these people that write these series can see the whole thing through four or five seasons or eight seasons.

01:23:38Marc:I didn't have that experience.

01:23:40Guest:Well, we did.

01:23:42Guest:It's funny.

01:23:43Guest:One of the criticisms of the first season was that

01:23:47Guest:Oh, these guys here, you have these guys in their mid forties living in Venice.

01:23:51Guest:And you're like a self-help guy.

01:23:53Guest:Kind of.

01:23:53Guest:Yeah.

01:23:54Guest:He's, he's just a, he's a big sort of like program guy.

01:23:57Guest:Right.

01:23:58Guest:And who, but who, as we find out, he kind of uses it a lot to excuse himself of his own behavior in his real life.

01:24:04Guest:Like anybody uses a spiritual system.

01:24:06Guest:Yes.

01:24:07Guest:That affords you the ability to be forgiven.

01:24:09Guest:Yes.

01:24:09Guest:Yes, 100%.

01:24:11Guest:Yeah.

01:24:12Guest:You know, yeah, my God is very forgiving.

01:24:14Guest:No kidding.

01:24:15Guest:Yeah.

01:24:16Guest:Your God forgave you?

01:24:16Guest:That's fucking, what a coincidence.

01:24:19Guest:Yeah, yeah.

01:24:20Guest:And we, I, you know, we always had this, I always pictured that there would be a sort of a fallout to what his behavior in the first season.

01:24:31Guest:And I was never, it was never,

01:24:34Guest:an endorsement of that kind of character yeah if we never got to make a second season it might have seen that way but we always knew where we wanted to where we wanted to go and I'm not there is a version of going beyond it I'm not sure it's necessarily something I want to do it's been a very trying experience for me on a lot of different levels like what

01:24:54Guest:Well, because just on a purely sort of logistical level, you know, writing it and acting in it and show running, Mark and I run it.

01:25:03Guest:Yeah.

01:25:04Guest:And, you know, every decision, every fucking minuscule decision we have to make.

01:25:09Guest:Yeah.

01:25:09Guest:And sometimes you just want to act.

01:25:10Guest:Yeah, sometimes you just want to show up, not like, oh yeah, no, sorry, hang on, the cup should be like this, and the thing should be like this.

01:25:17Marc:Let me see what you got in the camera, what's in it, okay.

01:25:19Guest:You know, constantly.

01:25:22Guest:So there's that, and also just the subject matter itself.

01:25:25Guest:I got really close to the bone last year, and I ended up kind of...

01:25:28Guest:As a result, kind of blurring the lines.

01:25:31Guest:And I'm like, did I do it because I wanted to get closer?

01:25:35Guest:Is this method acting bringing it back to Strasburg?

01:25:37Guest:Was I trying to get closer to what was going on?

01:25:40Guest:Yeah.

01:25:40Guest:Or did I write it as an excuse to do that?

01:25:44Guest:Yeah.

01:25:44Guest:I still don't know.

01:25:46Guest:So you're challenging yourself in ways you didn't think.

01:25:50Guest:100%.

01:25:51Guest:Yeah.

01:25:51Guest:This is not how I envision what I envision doing to myself at age 45, 46.

01:25:57Marc:You can't just phone it in.

01:25:59Marc:No, you cannot.

01:26:01Marc:And you've been through a certain amount of life shit to where you're like, this guy's too close to me.

01:26:06Marc:Like, am I revealing too much about myself?

01:26:09Marc:100%.

01:26:10Guest:Yeah, 100%.

01:26:11Guest:It got really... It put me in a nervous space for a while, which is probably good, I think, in the long run.

01:26:19Guest:But yeah, I have been through a lot of shit, and a lot of people have been through way worse shit than I have.

01:26:27Guest:But I've been, in my own way, I've been through my own shit, and I'm sort of at a place now where maybe it's time to lay this one down and let it be.

01:26:37Guest:But...

01:26:37Guest:I'm happy with what we did.

01:26:38Guest:We had some great writers this year and Mark and I still wrote and I directed this year for the first time, which I've never done.

01:26:46Guest:Yeah, you got to do that when you got the opportunity.

01:26:48Guest:Yeah, I've never been one of those people who's supposed that I can do it.

01:26:52Guest:Yeah.

01:26:53Guest:I don't know if I'd be any good at it, you know.

01:26:55Marc:Well, usually like when the thing that you're afforded when you're, you know, in the second season of your own show is, you know, you've got a DP that knows what he's doing.

01:27:04Marc:And usually, you know, you can be guided.

01:27:06Marc:It's very hard to direct and act because you got to keep running back to the playback machine and do another take.

01:27:11Marc:But but it's like it's like popping your cherry.

01:27:13Marc:You got to do it.

01:27:15Guest:Yeah.

01:27:16Guest:And, you know, luckily I have Chappie with me, Mark.

01:27:19Guest:Yeah.

01:27:19Marc:But yeah, it was it was challenging.

01:27:22Marc:it's cool because now like at least you know you're in the guild and if you want to direct something that's not you yeah you can try it yeah i've thought about it but who knows yeah and now your personal life you okay you and the kids are good and great you get along with amy or yeah yeah it's worked out it's worked out yeah everything leveled off and everything's good and and uh you know i'm co-parenting like it's essential that you know that shit levels off

01:27:48Guest:yeah you know what that shit was to be honest that shit was always level oh good yeah it's always been about the kids and um they're everything for me and and for her starts uh every day is you know the kids happiness yeah and that's it you know and that comes to work and everybody i work with and everybody i do things with they all know that that's first and foremost and um

01:28:14Guest:and then everything else is kind of falls in line after that.

01:28:17Guest:Everything else is gravy.

01:28:18Guest:Schedule.

01:28:19Guest:I, I look at everything as it takes me away from my kids, every job, every meeting, every everything.

01:28:26Guest:Yeah.

01:28:26Guest:And so it better be worth it.

01:28:29Guest:And the sobriety solid.

01:28:31Guest:Sobriety solid.

01:28:32Guest:Took me a minute.

01:28:33Guest:Yeah.

01:28:34Guest:Um, actually not really, but it took me a minute to sort of, but you had a program.

01:28:39Marc:I mean like, you know, when you, when you did go out, you knew where you had to go back to a million percent.

01:28:44Guest:That's the worst part or the best part.

01:28:46Guest:Yeah.

01:28:47Guest:But it's always there.

01:28:48Guest:Yeah.

01:28:49Guest:It's sort of like, you know.

01:28:50Guest:I had enough in me to know as you're doing it, you can't even really enjoy it.

01:28:56Marc:No, there's no way.

01:28:57Marc:I can't imagine it.

01:28:58Guest:I can't imagine it.

01:28:59Guest:And the best part is, you know, best slash worst part is my friends in sobriety who are great, who would just be like, okay, man.

01:29:06Guest:Yeah.

01:29:07Guest:Okay.

01:29:08Guest:And I'm like, oh, fuck you.

01:29:09Guest:You're trying to justify it?

01:29:10Guest:Oh, yeah.

01:29:11Guest:Yeah, yeah.

01:29:11Guest:No, I'm good now.

01:29:12Guest:I'm good now.

01:29:12Guest:Everything's good.

01:29:13Marc:I mean, you know, I did some time.

01:29:16Marc:You know, I got it.

01:29:17Marc:I got it.

01:29:17Guest:Yeah, and they're like, okay, man.

01:29:19Guest:We'll see you.

01:29:19Guest:All right, we'll wait.

01:29:20Guest:I'm going to be right here.

01:29:21Guest:We got a seat safe for you.

01:29:23Guest:And it's funny, now my sort of feeling about it is much more like, God.

01:29:28Guest:What a jackass I was.

01:29:31Guest:But, you know, again.

01:29:32Guest:At least you didn't die.

01:29:33Guest:Yes.

01:29:34Guest:At least I didn't die.

01:29:35Guest:And I consider myself, in that sense, very lucky.

01:29:39Marc:It's like, to me, that's the most frightening thing, you know, having 17 years and you see these guys that go out after, like, that long.

01:29:44Marc:And, like, they don't...

01:29:45Guest:It's not good.

01:29:47Guest:No.

01:29:48Guest:It doesn't.

01:29:48Guest:Well, that's the thing.

01:29:49Guest:I knew, again, I knew exactly where that goes, you know, and I've seen it enough and I've been around enough guys and I've been around the rooms long enough to know the natural progression.

01:30:03Guest:It might be okay today.

01:30:04Guest:Yeah.

01:30:04Guest:Here's where it goes.

01:30:05Guest:Right.

01:30:06Guest:Yeah.

01:30:06Marc:Good.

01:30:07Marc:Well, I'm glad you're back and I'm glad things are working out and I'm looking forward to the new thing.

01:30:12Marc:Thanks, man.

01:30:17Marc:So that was Will Arnett.

01:30:19Marc:It was nice talking to him.

01:30:20Marc:And we're still here.

01:30:22Marc:I believe I will play some guitar but not think about it too much.

01:30:28Guest:Hold on a second.

01:30:42Guest:Thank you.

01:31:04Guest:Boomer lives!