Episode 802 - Michael Chiklis / Kurt Braunohler & Lauren Cook
Marc:Lock the gates!
Marc:All right, let's do this.
Marc:How are you?
Marc:What the fuckers?
Marc:What the fuck buddies?
Marc:What the fucking ears?
Marc:What the fucksicles?
Marc:What the fuckadelics?
Marc:What's happening?
Marc:I'm Mark Maron.
Marc:This is my podcast, WTF.
Marc:You're listening to it.
Marc:I appreciate it.
Marc:Do I sound different?
Marc:I put on a couple pounds.
Marc:Can you hear it in my voice?
Marc:I feel like I'm carrying a little weight in my voice.
Marc:No?
Marc:Am I being crazy?
Marc:What's happening?
Marc:Today on the show, I have Michael Chiklis.
Marc:You might know him from The Shield or The Commish.
Marc:He just put a record out that he's very proud of, his debut rock record influence.
Marc:You can get that.
Marc:But you probably know him.
Marc:He's on the Fox show Gotham as well.
Marc:That's coming back too.
Marc:But Michael Chiklis...
Marc:His name came up, and I have this weird memory of him.
Marc:We went to college together about a year apart.
Marc:We didn't know each other, but we had common friends, and I saw him on stage.
Marc:And I just, I don't know, as I get older, and not even as I get older, my whole life,
Marc:If I have any sort of strange memory connection with people, I want to reconnect and tell them about it.
Marc:And that sometimes is, you know, a lot of times they're like, no, I don't know what you're talking about.
Marc:Or I don't remember that at all.
Marc:And it can be disappointing.
Marc:But I connected with Chiklis on a lot of levels.
Marc:And he has a great experience.
Marc:story of perseverance in this fucking town but also today Kurt Braunler and his wife Lauren Cook uh they come by to chit chat a bit a little bit about uh this uh this podcast wedlock that they're doing together I love Kurt and I think this might have been the second time I met Lauren I'm not sure I think I talked to her about it so it's a it's a fully loaded episode today and
Marc:But I don't know, man.
Marc:Buster got out today.
Marc:I don't know where he is.
Marc:I don't know where he is.
Marc:My kitten, Buster, Buster Kitten, the black cat, black kitten with big ears and the Abyssinian face is gone.
Marc:He broke through the screen while I was at the gym.
Marc:That'll teach me to go to the fucking gym.
Marc:Anyway, so Buster got out, and I don't know if he's coming back.
Marc:I mean, he's eight months old.
Marc:Theoretically, he knows where he lives, but I don't know.
Marc:I've given him so many options of food, and he kind of likes them.
Marc:He doesn't love any of them.
Marc:But he's such a smart cat.
Marc:He's out of his mind.
Marc:But he would fetch and bring it back.
Marc:I was starting to like him.
Marc:He had a real personality.
Marc:He was a real nut job.
Marc:And now he's gone.
Marc:And I'm upset, but I've been through so many cats one way or the other that there's part of me that thinks, all right, well, if this is how he wants to live his life, so be it.
Marc:If it was one of my oldies, if it was Monkey or La Fonda,
Marc:Who are, you know, in their retirement and when they get outside and they're, you know, they're, they're a bit senile and they don't really know quite what to do out there.
Marc:That would be much more upsetting to me.
Marc:I'm upset that Buster's out, but I did get him fixed.
Marc:I did feed him well.
Marc:He's got, you know, he's healthy.
Marc:He has his shots.
Marc:He's chipped.
Marc:He's got a chip in him.
Marc:And, you know, so there's a lot of good things.
Marc:And if he chooses to be an outdoor cat or move in with some nice Mexican people down the road, and that'll be the end of our relationship.
Marc:Maybe he'll stop by.
Marc:I don't know.
Marc:I'll keep you in the loop, but I'm upset about it.
Marc:I was just starting to like the guy, but he was nuts, man.
Marc:Fucking lunatic cat.
Marc:And he came from the wild, and now he's back in it.
Marc:And we just have to see.
Marc:We just have to see.
Marc:That's sad.
Marc:What, I gotta change the end to Buster Lives Now?
Marc:Christ.
Marc:But I don't know.
Marc:What am I gonna do?
Marc:I wandered around yelling Buster.
Marc:I looked under everything.
Marc:You know, I did what I could do.
Marc:You know, I love the guy, but I can't fight with him.
Marc:If he's gonna run away, he's gonna run away.
Marc:Next weekend, April 21st and 22nd, I'll be at the Aladdin Theater in Portland, Oregon.
Marc:I added a show on the Saturday, on the 22nd.
Marc:There may be some tickets for that.
Marc:Pabst Theater, Milwaukee, Wisconsin, on April 27th.
Marc:The Orpheum in Madison on April 28th.
Marc:I'll be at the Pantages.
Marc:Is that how you say it?
Marc:Minneapolis on April 29th for two shows.
Marc:I'm taping a special there.
Marc:I mentioned DC.
Marc:I'm going to be in DC at the Warner theater on May 13th.
Marc:And I'll be at the Miriam theater in Philly on May 12th, the night before a lot of running around to do.
Marc:Cause I got the glow show.
Marc:The Gorgeous Ladies of Wrestling, that's premiering on Netflix, I think, on the 23rd of June.
Marc:I'm going to do some press for that.
Marc:You know, I was talking about, like, I've been listening to a lot of Lee Morgan again.
Marc:And I don't know if I mentioned it.
Marc:The movie, I believe I mentioned it.
Marc:It's called I Called Him Morgan.
Marc:It's a documentary.
Marc:And...
Marc:I don't know why, but I'm championing Lee Morgan.
Marc:This is not any sort of paid ad or anything.
Marc:But he's really blown my mind.
Marc:And the movie sort of blew my mind as well.
Marc:And I guess it's out now.
Marc:It's playing in like a dozen cities.
Marc:I called him Morgan.com is where you can go.
Marc:I've just been in touch with the filmmakers and...
Marc:I like it.
Marc:So Kurt Braunler and Lauren Cook are married.
Marc:They've created this new podcast called Wedlock with Kurt and Lauren.
Marc:It comes out April 20th exclusively on Audible channels.
Marc:Audible channels is available on the Audible app and free to listen to with Amazon Prime.
Marc:Kurt's new album, Trust Me, is also now available from Comedy Central Records.
Marc:Kurt Braunler is good people.
Marc:Funny guy, thoughtful guy, nice guy.
Marc:And his wife is also very pleasant.
Marc:It was nice to have them in the garage.
Marc:So here's me talking at him and talking to him and talking with him.
Marc:So, all right, so you're about to have birth, Lauren.
Guest:Yep.
Guest:Any second, any second.
Guest:Yeah, she's fully cooked.
Guest:Really?
Guest:It really could happen.
Marc:So you're like nine months?
Marc:This is nine months?
Marc:This is it?
Guest:Yeah, 38 weeks.
Marc:And what do they tell you?
Marc:They just say, like, you know, just wait it out.
Marc:Like, you don't, isn't there a point where you force it?
Marc:I'm trying to force it.
Guest:She really wants it.
Guest:I'm doing all the old wives tales tricks.
Marc:Really?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I'm ready.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:I want it now.
Marc:I'm over it.
Marc:You've put your time in.
Guest:Yes.
Guest:More time than I feel anyway.
Guest:It just starts to feel egregious.
Guest:The whole thing.
Guest:We still have to do it this way?
Guest:We still have two weeks to go and every day you're just like, get it out.
Guest:I know.
Guest:I think, yeah.
Guest:It's really uncomfortable?
Guest:In the spectrum of not liking it, I'm really on the far end of being done with pregnancy.
Marc:And then you have to move through the whole, like, having it thing.
Guest:I know, yeah.
Guest:Apparently that's even harder, but...
Marc:Whatever.
Marc:But it's so worth it, right?
Marc:We don't know.
Guest:We have no idea.
Guest:Maybe we'll hate it.
Marc:No, we won't.
Marc:It's going to be great.
Marc:You're going to be in for a while.
Marc:The next part is longer than nine months.
Marc:It could be a lifetime.
Guest:Yes.
Guest:They say that part is much harder.
Guest:But I just feel like once she's outside of my body, I'll be much happier.
Marc:Sure.
Marc:It'll be a different relationship.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:So now, how long have you guys been together?
Marc:I mean, I remember talking to you years ago.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:I think I've met you once.
Marc:I don't know if you were married.
Marc:Were you?
Guest:We were not married yet, yeah.
Marc:How long have you been married?
Marc:Two years.
Marc:And you're already nine months into a baby.
Marc:You guys knew what you wanted.
Marc:Yeah, going for it.
Marc:Yeah, right away.
Marc:And how did you meet?
Marc:Were you a comedian?
Marc:I can't remember.
Guest:No, not a comedian.
Guest:I was on a date with a comedian.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:And then I was at where they were dating.
Marc:Is that true?
Marc:Yeah, I was at a Yola Tango concert.
Marc:Oh, so like nice droney, slow Ira music.
Marc:Mm-hmm.
Marc:And you're on a date.
Guest:That's jamming out.
Marc:Yeah, and which comedian?
Marc:Do we talk about it?
Marc:No, I don't think so.
Guest:I don't think we need to.
Marc:Is he a peer?
Marc:Is he among us?
Marc:He's your peer.
Yeah.
Guest:oh no is this a todd berry story um it is that's hilarious that he can take it well lauren claims it wasn't a date and i was like i think it was a date i love todd berry i hung out with todd berry like you know all the time he's a great guy yeah yeah in new york yeah yeah right um but yeah it was sort of a platonic
Guest:Yeah, you went to the bar, and I saw her at the bar, and then we just chatted for five minutes, and then she left with Todd, and I was with Eugene Merman and my buddy Chris.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And as she left, I honestly said to Eugene and Chris, I was like, I was pretty drunk, but I was like, there goes a girl I'm going to marry someday.
Guest:Really?
Guest:I swear, I did.
Guest:And then even as I said it, I was thinking, you know...
Guest:That was like his tagline.
Guest:He said that about everyone.
Guest:I didn't.
Guest:I really honestly didn't.
Guest:But I thought right then, I shouldn't say that because when I do meet the person I'm going to marry, I'll have said it drunkenly a few times.
Guest:So it was really the first time I said it.
Guest:Right.
Marc:Then he was locked in.
Marc:And it worked.
Marc:And it's a good story.
Marc:You've got to stop telling the part that he said that about everybody.
Marc:Okay.
All right.
All right.
Marc:You do some editorial work, like when you start this new podcast and you tell that story, you can say things like, didn't you say that about everybody?
Marc:And you go, no, of course I know.
Marc:I never felt that way.
Marc:I felt it once.
Marc:And then you create the warmth of your connection.
Marc:So what is this project you're embarking on?
Marc:Another podcast.
Marc:The world needs one.
Guest:Right?
Marc:Yep.
Guest:We need it.
Guest:We just thought, where is there a hole that we can fill?
Guest:It's for Audible, and it's called Wedlock, so it's all about relationships.
Guest:And we've been recording it over the past year, and it's going to come out.
Guest:A year and a half.
Guest:It's been a long time coming.
Guest:Oh, so you've got how many in the can?
Guest:So six.
Guest:Only six.
Guest:It's almost like a mini TV show.
Guest:It's very highly produced.
Guest:Each one has like four different segments to it.
Guest:We travel.
Guest:We interview a bunch of different people.
Guest:You talk to people, humans, and relationship.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:We actually, on a segment, we went and saw bonobos.
Guest:You know about bonobos?
Guest:Are those monkeys?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And they have sex like 45 times a day.
Guest:That's how they negotiate almost every decision they make.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Sounds exhausting.
Guest:It looks exhausting, too.
Marc:And it's very loud, because they scream the whole time they're having sex.
Marc:They scream the whole time.
Marc:Well, you mean they negotiate everything that way.
Guest:Like eating...
Marc:like yeah you can't eat until we fuck like no like i'm gonna i want this food so i'll finger you for a while and then i take the food wow it's a female-led species interesting it's a matriarchal species so what was the angle of that uh as a as a couple doing a relationship podcast we're like can't we be more like this kind of it was about cheating that episode is all about cheating
Guest:And monogamy, like whether or not we're meant to be monogamous.
Marc:And where did that land?
Marc:Did we have to listen to a lesson?
Guest:Yeah, you're going to have to listen.
Guest:Oh, big tease.
Guest:But we will reveal one thing is that that is when we conceived right after.
Guest:Right after watching Monkees, okay?
Guest:Right after Monkees.
Guest:And we knew the exact date because we were staying with my mom.
Guest:My mom was sick during that time.
Guest:And we couldn't try to have a baby in her house while she was sick in the next room.
Guest:Right, yeah.
Guest:So that was the time when we went to see the monkeys have sex over and over again.
Marc:Now, did you plan on conceiving that night or was it more of a negotiation for some food?
Marc:I was really just hungry, mostly.
Guest:There was one bag of Cheetos.
Marc:And you were like, well, you're going to have to, you know, do a little work.
Marc:Do a little work, Kurt, if you want those Cheetos.
Marc:See what happens.
Marc:And I was like, I didn't mind.
Marc:I didn't mind.
Marc:So you've been doing the, you've been recording these since you, for how long?
Marc:Like a year now.
Marc:So since you've been married or a little after?
Guest:A little after.
Guest:So we started the podcast as part of Kurt's old podcast.
Guest:And we recorded, you know, just like in our bathroom or on the street.
Guest:Oh,
Guest:Old school.
Guest:Old school.
Guest:And then Audible took a listen and they liked it.
Guest:And then now it's really blown out.
Guest:And we've gotten to have these great interviews and go places.
Guest:What, they gave you some money?
Guest:Yes, we actually, and they produced it really well.
Guest:So it's kind of sounds like a, like a mini episode, like an audio television show.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Uh-huh.
Marc:Uh-huh.
Marc:So like a full, like it sounds like a day of radio.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Like there's like several shows.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Well, that's how long.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:Like the radio.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Like how long do each of them run?
Guest:They're each 30 minutes long.
Guest:Yeah, but they're packed, man.
Guest:Yeah, it just moves.
Guest:It moves really fast.
Guest:We interview a cam girl on that same episode to talk to her about cheating.
Marc:About being like whether or not when men do that, are they cheating?
Marc:Exactly.
Marc:Yeah, what'd she say?
Marc:She thinks it is.
Marc:But thank God for it.
Marc:I think it is, but it's my livelihood.
Guest:She makes a really great livelihood.
Guest:Her biggest tip one day was $27,000.
Guest:And it's $10 a minute to talk to her.
Marc:What?
Marc:$10 a minute to talk to her?
Marc:And someone tipped her $27,000 for his own work?
Marc:For his homework, yeah.
Marc:For helping him out, do his thing.
Guest:Yeah, it was just like worth 27 grand.
Marc:Right, well a lot of the, wow.
Marc:Well a lot of those, they get gifts, there's a whole sort of other economy to it as well.
Guest:It's really fascinating.
Marc:It is like trading intimacy for money.
Marc:Which one did you talk to?
Guest:Taylor Stevens was her name.
Marc:Oh, okay.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:She's one of the biggest points.
Marc:So that sounds interesting.
Marc:What else did you do?
Marc:Does each show have a theme?
Guest:Yes.
Guest:Every show has a theme.
Guest:What are they?
Guest:Every episode.
Guest:We have cheating.
Guest:We have crisis, which is we kind of did a whole episode all about my mom dying last year.
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Guest:Sorry, buddy.
Guest:Oh, thank you.
Guest:Mm-hmm.
Guest:We did monogamy, kids.
Guest:Dealing with change.
Guest:Dealing with change.
Guest:And that was a fascinating one where we interviewed a man who had been married to a woman for 21 years.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And his wife decided that she was a man.
Guest:And then she actually changed over to become a man.
Guest:And he stayed with her.
Guest:And now he's a gay man in a gay relationship.
Guest:A totally fascinating interview.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:But he has memories.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:He still has memories and photographs.
Marc:Of when he wasn't gay and she was a woman.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:So it's actually sort of a new take on the second chapter.
Marc:It's a new take.
Marc:New take on retirement.
Marc:Surprise.
Marc:It's a retirement surprise.
Marc:It's a retirement surprise story.
Marc:Well, that's good that people are doing new things.
Marc:You work hard all your life.
Guest:Trying it out.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:Variety is the spice of life, right?
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:So have you charted the whole pregnancy month to month?
Guest:Well, that's what's been interesting.
Guest:I mean, we didn't know we were going to have the most intense year of our lives when we started recording this podcast, but it has kind of been a way to check in.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Losing Kurt's mom was crazy.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I mean, we moved to the East Coast for the better part of the year to live with her.
Guest:And we were trying to get pregnant the whole time.
Guest:I mean, we always knew we wanted to have a baby.
Guest:Sure.
Guest:She really wanted us to have a baby.
Guest:It was one thing to maybe cheer her up.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:So we were working on that.
Guest:And then we thought we had failed, actually.
Guest:And then we found out Lauren was pregnant the day after the funeral.
Guest:Wow.
Guest:In a real punch, real gut punch.
Marc:It's a gut punch, but also... But also happiness.
Marc:Yeah, it's like, yeah, that's one of those... Circle of life things.
Marc:Circle of life, but one of those horrible things that's tempered by something amazing.
Marc:Right.
Marc:Yeah, yeah.
Marc:It can't just be beautiful.
Guest:It was a lot in one day.
Guest:It can't just be beautiful.
Guest:No, no.
Guest:But we're naming it after.
Marc:Sort of like the moonlight situation at the Oscars.
Marc:Like, it was so close.
LAUGHTER
Marc:To having all the focus and then bam.
Marc:I know.
Marc:Boom.
Marc:Couldn't.
Marc:Didn't get the celebration.
Marc:Didn't get the credit.
Marc:But obviously it's different.
Marc:It's a horrible loss.
Guest:No, it's just like that, Mark.
Guest:It's just, that's exactly what you.
Guest:It's just like word baiting.
Guest:Hit the nail on the head.
Marc:I don't want to be insensitive.
Marc:You're not.
Marc:I can take it.
Marc:But yeah, no, but it is a circle of life thing.
Marc:So, but in terms of the pregnancy, like this is a whole unknown.
Marc:So you're pretty, you're good for episodes for probably 18 years now if the thing works.
Marc:How the relationship unfolds, you know, when he becomes disillusioned or you do, when the kid causes- Why are we predicting that already, Mark?
Marc:Well, I'd give it to both of you.
Marc:I wasn't being specific.
Marc:Where either one of us does.
Marc:Have you guys talked about that?
Marc:You know, the what's actually disillusioned?
Marc:Well, what's actually going on in the minds of couples?
Guest:Yeah, we try to.
Guest:I mean, that's the kind of the show is trying to, like, kind of get into all the different types of relationships.
Guest:So it's not just about a married couple.
Guest:It's not just about us.
Guest:It's about all types.
Marc:Well, tolerance is an interesting thing.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:You know what I mean?
Marc:Like, you know, the compromises that people make in relationship and like what those do.
Marc:Like, maybe I'm just maybe I need to talk about my stuff.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:Let's get into it.
Marc:We're ready to go.
Guest:That's what we interview you.
Guest:I mean, do you find compromise to be a failure?
Marc:No, no, no.
Marc:I don't think it's a failure, but I think it's something that I didn't realize was totally necessary until probably way older than I should.
Marc:Perhaps everything wasn't about how I wanted it to be, and I couldn't do whatever I wanted.
Marc:And when I couldn't, I felt like the world was ending.
Marc:So now, as a grown-up at 53, I find that compromise is good if you want to maintain trust and be empathetic and respect other people, that sometimes you just got to suck it up.
Marc:Yep.
Guest:And also that- Big light bulb went off for you.
Guest:That's good.
Marc:It's been flickering for decades.
Guest:It's on, and then it's off again.
Marc:Yeah, it's kind of- And then you just unplug it for a little while.
Marc:Yeah, what's wrong with this fucking switch?
Yeah.
Marc:A lot of that.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:No, but yeah.
Guest:Well, we've fought a lot through the pregnancy because I think that for the first time, I've felt like I have to do all the hard work.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And my life is impacted.
Marc:And I'm just, I can do whatever I want.
Marc:Yeah, he's out partying.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And it really, it pissed me off far more than I thought it would.
Guest:I was just like furious.
Guest:Really?
Guest:I mean, like a rage.
Guest:Wow.
Guest:Yeah, because you don't know...
Guest:you don't know how much your life is going to change and then suddenly you're pregnant and you can't do like 90% of the things that you want to do.
Guest:Right.
Guest:And so you feel like we're doing this together, like we're making this baby together, so there should be some solidarity.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And we fought...
Guest:But also I feel like we fought and then I realized that, oh, all of this burden has been placed on you and that I also need to give up.
Guest:He took a big vacation.
Guest:This is the whole fight.
Guest:What?
Guest:Is that I went camping for like, I was like, the baby's coming.
Guest:I'm going to go camping for like one final time.
Guest:He wanted to have one last hurrah, like in the middle of my pregnancy.
Marc:With his pals or alone?
Guest:With his best friends.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:But it wasn't just that.
Guest:You went to a 40th wedding or 40th birthday party.
Guest:Wow.
Guest:Right.
Guest:It was like a week long trip.
Guest:Selfish.
Guest:So selfish.
Guest:What a fucker.
Guest:I was like, you're taking a vacation?
Marc:While I'm here, waddling around.
Guest:Yeah, just like puking constantly.
Guest:I can't even have more than one coffee a day.
Guest:I can't have more than one fucking coffee a day.
Guest:You're taking a vacation.
Guest:Horrible man.
Guest:I stand behind that trip.
Guest:I stand behind it.
Guest:It is not a crazy thing to do.
Guest:Oh, my God.
Guest:To have one final camping trip and then give up and then be like, now I am a father.
Guest:Whatever.
Guest:He's going to take a camping trip in another six months.
Guest:No, I won't.
Guest:It will be two years.
Marc:Oh, you already planned it?
Marc:Yeah, I've already planned it.
Marc:You told the guys?
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Get them together.
Marc:Same time, two years from now.
Marc:We're doing this.
Marc:We're going.
Marc:No matter what.
No.
Marc:well i mean i i yeah i imagine that it's uh at some point if you're a woman and you're pregnant and uh you know you the the idea that it's a team effort seems like a lot of lip service on behalf of the dude eventually it's like you know it's not you know like i mean no matter what they get you or exactly go out and get you food or make you comfortable or accept everything you're going through it's still you doing it yeah it's in you
Guest:Every sacrifice.
Guest:Every time you have like three cocktails, I'm just fuming.
Guest:Wow.
Marc:This is getting more... I know, I'm really letting some things out.
Marc:So that's like every night, I guess?
Marc:Are we going further into this?
Marc:Is this about Kurt's drinking?
Marc:Is this a...
Marc:Is this an intervention?
Marc:Is that what's happening?
Marc:I'm afraid to make her laugh too much.
Marc:A kid might come out right now.
Marc:Right here.
Marc:I had Ali Wong breast pumping breast milk.
Marc:Really?
Marc:She did that.
Marc:She pumped on the air.
Marc:That's exciting.
Marc:So if we can have a baby on the air, I'm all for it.
Marc:I don't know what I can do.
Marc:She would be happy to have the baby right now.
Marc:Spacing food.
Marc:What would I have to do?
Marc:Well, you'd have to go to the hospital.
Marc:Right.
Marc:I mean, unless it was like really cool.
Guest:Well, no, we wouldn't have to go to the hospital.
Guest:We would have to sit for like five hours while she dilates.
Guest:Maybe two days.
Guest:So you don't want to have that on your hands.
Guest:I was just hanging out in the studio.
Guest:That seems like a real long episode.
Guest:It'd be a big day.
Guest:You would have to cut it, time lapsing.
Guest:We would have to do that, yeah.
Guest:A lot of it's just going to be her moaning.
Guest:So it'll be nice for a meditation CD, but maybe not for a podcast.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:Pregnant lady moaning through early contractions.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:That'd be very comforting.
Guest:The unedited version.
Guest:It's really long.
Marc:So do you know what's in there?
Guest:It's a girl.
Marc:Oh.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:We're going to name her after my mom.
Marc:Oh, that's great.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:That makes sense.
Marc:And that's a good story.
Marc:Sad story.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:To tell her.
Marc:But.
Marc:Yeah, so right off the bat, you can have some sadness, even in the naming of her name.
Marc:Yeah, you just put it in as early as possible.
Marc:Tragedy.
Marc:It's going to happen.
Marc:It is.
Marc:You might as well introduce them to Europe.
Guest:Just kick off with the saddest story possible.
Marc:So have you painted the room and bought the stuff and all that shit?
Marc:We're so ready.
Guest:We're so ready.
Guest:At this point, it's just like an anticipation for an unknown.
Guest:It's just like how much can I prepare for something that you don't really know what the situation will be like once the child is here.
Guest:Yeah, we had a chat the other day on the way to the doctor's office and it was like, it's weird that it'll be all the time.
Marc:meaning like i can picture and this is so i mean like and again i i feel like i've always known i wanted to have a kid but it's weird to imagine that i can picture it for a couple hours yeah but then like that's where i drop off yeah i don't have any you know and i'm 53 there's a reason for that right because i know well enough that i'm a panicky self-absorbed i'm panicky freak and i'm like yeah maybe it's better off there's no reason i need to make another one of those to go out into the world terrified it's
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:It is surreal to imagine that there's no one to hand it off to.
Guest:There's no break.
Guest:Yeah, especially because he'll be camping.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I do have a camping trip scheduled for right after the birth.
Marc:Oh, the secret camping trip.
Marc:It's a secret camping trip.
Marc:I'm out.
Marc:You okay here in the hospital?
Marc:I'll be back in three days.
Marc:I'll be back.
Marc:Don't worry, babe.
Marc:It's going to be great.
Marc:Well, that's great.
Marc:So now, when does the, because it sounds like this is going to be an ongoing thing, and I notice that every time she started to say something, you look terrified, which is good for podcasting that you're immediately in like, where's this going?
Marc:What did I do?
Marc:A lot of trust there.
Marc:What is she talking about?
Guest:I didn't realize, look at that.
Guest:I didn't realize the face.
Guest:I was just these wide eyes.
Guest:Yeah, like, what are you telling him?
Marc:What are you talking about?
Marc:Did we discuss this?
No.
Marc:That's good.
Marc:And hopefully her attitude will become more cynical and horrible.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Like she'll love the kid, but still her resentment of you will grow.
Marc:It will grow forever.
Guest:For years.
Marc:Oh my God.
Guest:Could it happen?
Guest:I hope not.
Marc:This is going to be great.
Guest:It's going to be great.
Marc:So what about work for you?
Marc:What happens with that?
Marc:Were you working?
Guest:We both work from home.
Guest:We're both writer, actor people.
Marc:He occasionally goes on stage from what I understand.
Marc:There's a billboard of him with his big face smiling on sunset.
Guest:Seven feet tall.
Guest:What is that for?
Guest:That's for my Comedy Central special.
Guest:It will have come out March 3rd.
Marc:Okay.
Guest:So it'll be available for people to watch when people hear this.
Guest:It's a great special.
Guest:Great.
Guest:I'm proud of it.
Guest:I'm excited for people to see it.
Guest:Portland at the Revolution Hall.
Marc:I've been there.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:That's the old high school?
Marc:Yep.
Marc:Yeah, it's good.
Marc:It's a good spot.
Marc:It's pretty good.
Marc:I played there.
Marc:I play the Aladdin, too.
Marc:There's good audiences up there.
Marc:They're excellent audiences.
Marc:Did you live there once or something?
Marc:No.
Guest:No, no, no.
Guest:My record label, Kill Rock Stars, is there.
Guest:Oh, right.
Guest:So I've been doing shows there for a long time.
Marc:Well, that's great.
Marc:Your first big special?
Guest:Yeah, and a kid.
Guest:Yeah, my first televised special.
Guest:First hour, yeah.
Marc:First hour.
Marc:Congratulations.
Marc:Thank you very much.
Marc:And congratulations on the Audible deal, the podcast.
Marc:What's it called again?
Marc:It's called Wedlock.
Marc:Wedlock.
Marc:It's a great show.
Marc:Well, you know, the great thing about it is, you know, what's happening?
Marc:Why are you touching your stomach?
Guest:Oh, she just moves.
Guest:Like, she does a, you know, like a sharp elbow out.
Marc:Oh, yeah?
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:She wants out.
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Guest:She totally wants out.
Marc:I find it exciting, but frightening.
Guest:me too yeah i think that that's across the board yeah yeah it's like oh look at this what potential and also terror yeah yeah yeah i don't know why someone hasn't done like a well i guess they did rosemary's baby there it is yeah the horror movie version of sure sure yeah yeah see he's got his brain in the right place clearly
Marc:how can we turn this into some money i like that the idea is it's wedlock but you know you know like the challenges that you're gonna have doing the podcast as this all happens maybe there'll be um like uh what do you call it spin-offs you know when you separate because of our new partners his first his fourth camping trip you're like i'm fucking out of it you secretly recording from a place you've run to with the kid undisclosed location
Marc:My own personal wedlock.
Marc:Well, congratulations.
Marc:Thank you.
Marc:And good luck with the podcast.
Marc:It's good seeing you guys.
Guest:Thanks so much.
Guest:Good to see you.
Marc:So check that out.
Marc:Check out Curt and Lauren's podcast, Wedlock.
Marc:It's out on April 20th at Audible Channels.
Marc:On the Audible app and on Amazon Prime.
Marc:And, you know, go look at Curt Brown or do comedy.
Marc:Do it.
Marc:Mike Chick was up next.
Marc:Great actor, but a hell of a story.
Marc:I'll talk about Mike in a second, but here's something you might want to know about.
Marc:If you care about protecting the environment and you're worried about the things being done to roll back progress, then you should think about supporting the National Resources Defense Council.
Marc:And in the process, you can win a trip.
Marc:to a huge night of comedy.
Marc:On April 25th in Los Angeles, there's a huge benefit for the NRDC's litigation fund.
Marc:That's the way the NRDC fights anti-environmental agendas in court.
Marc:Anyway, it's going to be an amazing event with performances by Larry David, Martin Short, Tig Notaro, Gerard Carmichael, Tony Hale, JB Smoove, Pete Davidson, and more people.
Marc:Anybody that goes to NRDC.org slash comedy and donates $10 or more will be entered to win a pair of tickets plus airfare and a night in a hotel.
Marc:That's NRDC.org slash comedy.
Marc:Go make a donation to help defend our planet.
Marc:Yeah, man.
Marc:Spaceship Earth is soon to be hurling through space on fire.
Marc:On fire.
Marc:So, Chiklis...
Marc:Mike Chiklis, as some of you know from The Shield, from The Commish, but he was also cast almost freshly out of acting school not long after in the John Belushi movie, Wired, and it became a debacle.
Marc:Like it was his first big break and it nearly broke him.
Marc:But before that, he was at the School for the Arts in the acting program at BU, and I was at BU about a year behind him,
Marc:The Shield was a pretty amazing show, obviously, and The Commish was very popular, and I didn't really know that show, and I didn't watch much of The Shield, but I knew about his transformation into this different type of character, but it was really great to get to know him and his sort of commitment to theater and the craft and to acting and also the harrowing tale of being blown out.
Marc:I thought it was great.
Marc:And it was great to meet him, great to talk to him.
Marc:And as I said, he's got a rock and roll record out.
Marc:Can I call it rock and roll?
Marc:Is that old man talk?
Marc:His debut album, Influence, is available now wherever you get music.
Marc:He's on the Fox TV show Gotham, which returns on April 24th and is on Mondays at 8 p.m.
Marc:7 central.
Marc:This is me and Michael Chiklis.
Music
Marc:So here's the deal.
Marc:Michael Chiklis.
Marc:Mark Maron.
Marc:I went to Boston University.
Marc:Okay.
Marc:All right.
Marc:And you were this guy that I knew was in the fine arts department.
Marc:And the connection was I saw you.
Marc:I was doing stage troupe.
Marc:I think you graduated a year ahead of me.
Marc:You weren't in the fine arts department.
Marc:No, I was in the liberal arts department, but I was doing stage troupe.
Marc:And I was best friends for a while with Steve Brill.
Guest:Oh, no kidding.
Marc:Who was in communications, but also a year ahead of me.
Marc:But I was also really close with Mary Patton, Mike's sister.
Guest:Yeah, yeah.
Marc:And you and Mike were both in the School of Fine Arts.
Marc:That's right.
Marc:So I kind of knew Mike a little bit.
Marc:I knew Mary, but there was this world.
Marc:But you were like the guy.
Marc:You were one of the guys over there at the School of Fine Arts.
Guest:I didn't know that.
Guest:Well, in my mind.
Guest:All right.
Guest:That's cool.
Guest:I'll take it.
Guest:I like being the guy anytime I can be the guy.
Marc:So I went to see a show.
Marc:I think it was a Brendan Behan play.
Marc:Like you were the star.
Marc:Like it was, it was in a big room.
Guest:Like main stage, main stage over.
Guest:Exactly.
Guest:Theater.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:You saw that.
Marc:I saw that.
Marc:That's great.
Marc:And I was like, well, that's the guy.
Marc:He's the big guy.
Marc:So I always had this like weird half obsession with your career and what, cause we went to the same school and you were, you know, I didn't go to SFA.
Marc:I tried to, yeah, I kind of wanted to, but I didn't get in, but I did take classes up there with a guy named Robert Young.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Bob Young.
Guest:Comedy classes.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Odd things are funny.
Guest:Threes are funny.
Guest:Fives are funny.
Guest:Is that what he said?
Guest:That was his whole thing.
Guest:Yeah, he was at the odd numbers.
Guest:Yeah, he was a weird little guy.
Guest:Anything odd.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Because he was odd.
Marc:He was odd.
Marc:He made me do a monologue from Cyrano being held back by three people.
Marc:I think he sensed my anger and was trying to minimize it.
Marc:bill young but like we're like let's let's go through it because like there was um because you know you have had an interesting career that started off a little rocky but where'd you grow up i grew up in while i was born in we were like the white version of the jeffersons we moved on up you know we were in i was in lowell lowell massive i did one of my first comedy gigs oh no kidding at the derby park at the herpy park you know that place i
Marc:We called it Herpy Park.
Marc:Was it like where you drank when you were in high school?
Guest:Yeah, that's where you drank.
Guest:And there was a great story that one of my best friends punched the bouncer there and got his shit kicked out of him.
Marc:Really?
Guest:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:Herpy Park.
Guest:It was like the one bar in town or something?
Guest:Yeah, it was like a hole.
Guest:Well, you know, I mean, it was a big bar and it was just a...
Guest:It was a place to go and drink and pick up chicks when we were in high school.
Marc:Yeah, it was like they had a comedy night.
Guest:Right.
Marc:That was later, though.
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Marc:It must have been when I was in high school.
Marc:It was probably 89 when I was doing that.
Marc:But they had this weird kind of not even a real stage.
Marc:I just remember it was in the corner.
Marc:There was brass railing around it.
Marc:I think it was probably my first paid gig.
Marc:I was opening for some guy.
Guest:Right downtown there, right in the middle of the town.
Guest:But my father, you know, having been raised in the acre there, which is a, you know, it was just a really down, dead mill town.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And my father wanted to, you know,
Guest:do better by us so he moved us to andover yeah which is you know uh the opposite you know it's very waspy you know yeah i mean they considered me like like one of the parents of one of the kids there once said to me chiklis what sort of a name is that and i said it's greek and he goes oh you're ethnic how charming really yeah
Marc:But also, Lowell's got all that Jack Kerouac history.
Marc:Yeah, my dad knew him.
Marc:Really?
Guest:Yeah, I didn't know him well, but he knew him.
Marc:Right, because he was around later in life.
Guest:He was around.
Guest:Yeah, my father was in that beat generation.
Guest:He was a cat.
Guest:I call my dad Daddio.
Marc:Oh, yeah?
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Was he involved in the arts?
Guest:He was just a jazz aficionado.
Guest:Believe it or not, my father's a hairdresser.
Guest:Oh, really?
Guest:Yeah, he opened a small chain of beauty salons during that time because he saw there was this gap.
Guest:There were only barbershops or beauty parlors.
Guest:And he wanted to do this unisex salon.
Guest:And he did that really successfully.
Guest:So he was able to move us.
Guest:We moved on up.
Marc:He had a chain of beauty salon.
Guest:Well, yeah.
Guest:At one point, he had a couple of shops, but now he just has the one.
Guest:And he's long retired, but his wife still works it.
Marc:Really?
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:So he was a barber.
Guest:Well, no.
Marc:He was a hairstylist.
Marc:Oh, I get it.
Marc:I get it.
Marc:He started out a barber.
Guest:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Guest:And the thing is, he's such a tough guy, too.
Guest:To meet my father, you'd think like-
Guest:He was like a construction worker.
Guest:Alpha barber.
Guest:An alpha barber.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And I was like, you know, Dad, how did you get into this?
Guest:He's like, it was style, man.
Marc:He liked it.
Guest:It was style.
Guest:In the 50s, it was all about style.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Did he do shaves and stuff back in the day?
Guest:He did all kinds of shit.
Marc:Bottles of blue stuff.
Marc:And then he moved into the creams.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Yeah, yeah.
Marc:He evolved with the industry.
Guest:Exactly right.
Guest:Went down and studied with Vidal Sassoon for a little while.
Guest:Did he?
Guest:Yeah, he was a cat.
Guest:My dad's a cat.
Guest:He turned me on to jazz as a little kid and brought me to the Newport Jazz Festival every year for years and years.
Guest:And that's how I really got into music and playing drums.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Well, you're just playing my guitar.
Marc:You seem like you have a few chops.
Guest:Yeah, I'm all right.
Guest:I mean, I don't play guitar.
Guest:I mean, I do in that I write on guitar, but I'm a drummer, and I'm a singer.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:But guitar and bass, I'm actually a much better bass player than I am a guitarist, and I think it's because it's where the rhythmic meets the, you know, where the percussive meets the melodic.
Marc:Right, yeah, yeah.
Marc:Well, yeah, I mean, bass players, the rhythm section is very important.
Marc:They're not appreciated as much as they should be.
Guest:That's right.
Guest:Well, and you will love the rhythm section on my record.
Marc:Yeah, they're pretty solid.
Marc:I listened to it.
Marc:I think they sent me the CD.
Guest:What's it called?
Guest:What was the name of the album?
Guest:Influence, because I went back.
Guest:I mean, if I'm going to put out my first solo album, I have to go over some of my influences.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Would you call it a vanity project, or are you really throwing your hat in the ring?
Guest:No, I'm really throwing my hat in the ring.
Guest:It's something...
Marc:What is that bad question?
Guest:Well, no, it's just it's it's no, it's something that I think that every actor who wants to put out music.
Guest:Yeah, has to deal with it.
Guest:Yeah, you know, because immediately there's a lot of eye rolling and like, oh, yeah, you go.
Guest:But I've been a musician my whole life, so, you know, fuck it.
Guest:This is a love thing.
Guest:It's not a vanity thing.
Guest:It's a love thing.
Guest:It's about having guys like Steve Lukather come over to my house and blow a guitar solo on my music.
Guest:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:You know, that's fun.
Guest:That's not vanity.
Guest:That's love.
Guest:You know what I mean?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Honestly, the great thing is I don't have to make my living as a musician because it sucks and it's hard to do right now.
Guest:At 50, whatever.
Guest:Well, at any age.
Guest:Because right now, people aren't buying records.
Guest:They just don't.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I mean, Paul McCartney put out a record and 100,000 people bought it in America.
Marc:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Marc:Paul McCartney.
Marc:Yeah, I know.
Marc:But there are people making money in music.
Guest:No, there aren't.
Guest:Not off of records.
Marc:No, not off record sales, but they're figuring out other ways.
Guest:Live touring.
Guest:You know, I've made some money off of this record by licensing songs.
Guest:Like they licensed a couple of things for the Super Bowl from me.
Guest:They did?
Guest:Yes.
Marc:Well, you got one of those great belting voices.
Guest:Thanks.
Guest:Well, some of it's anthemic because I'm very influenced by bands like Queen and rock and rollers of that time when we were in college.
Marc:Sure.
Marc:No, I get it.
Marc:Was this always the dream?
Guest:Was this always the thing that- I was always in bands in college.
Guest:All through high school, college, and afterwards.
Guest:And then I was in a band that was unreal at that time that we were recording our first studio album, and I got the role of John Belushi in the film Wired.
Marc:Well, yeah, let's talk about that trajectory, because that was sort of an interesting story, because I don't know if I ever...
Marc:Knew the whole story, but... Fuck.
Guest:That's a long story, man.
Guest:That's the whole thing.
Marc:I'm curious about it.
Marc:But, like, because, you know, you did bounce back.
Marc:You did have a great career.
Marc:You do have a great career.
Marc:But, I mean, the rocky beginnings, I remember hearing about it, because I was a Belushi fan.
Guest:Me too.
Marc:But I don't know what I heard or what is real.
Marc:So you graduate BU.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And you move out here.
Guest:Well, you know how we had the league auditions that the top 10 schools of theater in the country have these things called they're in the theater league.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Right.
Guest:You know, Carnegie Mellon and.
Guest:And NYU and just a bunch of schools that are... And BU is up there, right?
Guest:BU is right there.
Guest:I mean, we consistently put out really great people.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:It's a great program.
Guest:It really is.
Marc:I remember people in that program.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Tammy Tweedy.
Guest:Tammy, yeah.
Guest:Julianne Moore.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:Well, she was the year before me.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Really?
Guest:I didn't know that.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:She's my buddy.
Guest:So we went down to New York and I, you know, you hope that you get your, an agent sees you or something.
Guest:And I was really lucky.
Guest:I got my first agent out of that.
Guest:And also I was seen for my first movie, which was Wired.
Guest:Yeah.
Yeah.
Guest:And it took two and a half, three years after I graduated for that to actually come to fruition.
Marc:So you get the agent.
Marc:There's this project that they- I auditioned for it right out of college.
Guest:Literally, I was still in college.
Guest:Right.
Marc:I think that audition tape is around.
Marc:Is that right?
Marc:Or am I thinking about the new guy?
Guest:No, you're thinking about the Shield one.
Guest:uh it's around it's out there but the but i don't know what happened to that audition i i auditioned like 12 times over two years for for for the john belushi story because it kept going out of production and then a new director would get attached it was so troubled and i didn't know like like naively i was in i was a theater at new york man i didn't know what was happening in hollywood so you moved to new york you auditioned for the thing you're living in new york
Guest:Yeah, I'm living in New York doing off-Broadway theater at La Mama down in the East Village.
Guest:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:And I'm working at a restaurant and a comedy bar.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Which comedy bar?
Guest:A place called Comedy U Grand down in Soho.
Marc:Oh, my God.
Guest:Did you ever go there?
Guest:I don't know.
Guest:Everyone was going there at the time.
Guest:And that's how I got to know Larry David.
Guest:And that led to my appearance on Seinfeld.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Just so many people used to come through there.
Guest:Comedy U Grand.
Guest:Comedy U Grand, it was called, in Soho.
Guest:I don't remember that.
Guest:It was a little sliver of a joint, man.
Guest:Like, wow, when was that?
Guest:Maybe 90 seats.
Guest:I don't remember that.
Guest:That's like before my time.
Marc:That's the 85, 86, maybe 87.
Marc:Oh, yeah.
Marc:And people were hanging out there.
Marc:I don't know that place.
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Marc:Like, I was bartending.
Marc:I kind of pride myself on knowing all the places.
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Guest:I was bartending there, and I'd go up sometimes on open mics and try my hand at it, especially since I thought I might end up doing the Belushi story, right?
Guest:Right, right, right.
Guest:And I mean, so many of the people that are huge now and were just coming up, whether it's Jerry or Brett Butler or... Yeah, Brett, yeah.
Guest:Rosie O'Donnell went to BU.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Was in my freshman class and got cut from BU.
Guest:Right.
Marc:I think I kind of knew.
Guest:And I walked her back to the dorms and I just listened to her.
Guest:She paced around going, I'm going to fucking go back to New York and do what I do.
Guest:I'm going to do stand up.
Guest:And it worked out okay for her.
Guest:It did.
Guest:Yeah, sure, sure.
Guest:So I've always felt ties to stand up and I've had a lot of friends in that area.
Guest:um but comedy you grant i loved working at it was it wasn't a long time that i worked there because yeah it was shortly after i started working there i ended up getting wired yeah and which was in 88 uh-huh which i can't believe it's 29 years ago isn't that wild and when i went out here i came out here to la i shot that for five years and i mean five months hello and uh
Guest:I had no idea until two and a half months into it that there was any controversy surrounding it.
Marc:So you're shooting it.
Marc:Who ended up directing it?
Guest:Larry Pierce.
Marc:Uh-huh.
Guest:Who never worked, essentially.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:After that.
Marc:And how was the experience?
Marc:How was the script?
Marc:Well, the script I had troubles with, but, you know, like, I'm...
Marc:That's from the Woodward book, is it?
Marc:Who wrote that book?
Marc:Wired by Bob Woodward.
Guest:And it was kind of the sordid... Yeah, what it was was... And I challenged him at the time.
Guest:I remember saying to him, you know...
Guest:have you ever smoked a joint yeah you know and he's he was very buttoned up and he literally spoke like you know like black comedians version of a white guy yeah yeah yeah you know he's very like yeah you know uh no i i certainly did not yeah yeah and uh you know so he wrote the he actually wrote the script the you know he wrote the book you met with him
Guest:Well, no, I met him during the process of making this show, but the problem was I was, you know, here I am.
Guest:I'm an actor.
Guest:I'm an empath.
Guest:I'm trying to honor John.
Guest:I'm trying to come from that place.
Guest:And, you know, everything was very sort of damning.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:You know what I mean?
Guest:And it's because I think the way Woodward put it to me was like, hey, man, I'm a...
Guest:I don't write prose.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I'm an investigative reporter.
Guest:I don't write something unless I can corroborate it from five independent news sources, which, by the way, can you imagine today?
Guest:Right.
Guest:It just doesn't happen.
Guest:Sure.
Guest:But he's like, I just, you know, but the problem is when you write John did this, John did that, John did this.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:In black and white, it reads as an indictment on him and the people around him.
Guest:Sure.
Guest:It lacks the humanity of all the good things and wonderful things about John and who he was as a person, which I tried to bring to the dance, but I had no idea that on the other side of it was his family and friends and business associates absolutely apeshit about the book.
Guest:Uh-huh.
Guest:And wanting the book never to be made into a film.
Guest:And then once we started to make it, basically them going, anyone involved with this film is done.
Guest:So that's Brillstein and the crew.
Guest:Ovitz, more importantly.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Because he was the king of the world at that time.
Guest:Right.
Guest:And, you know, I find this out two and a half months into production.
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Guest:And the way I found out was insane.
Guest:We shot at the Palace Theater on Vine.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:just off of Hollywood Boulevard, we shot the Blues Brothers sequences.
Guest:Yeah, yeah, right, right, yeah.
Guest:We're there for like three whole days.
Guest:We're shooting.
Guest:And it was an incredibly exciting time for me.
Guest:I'm playing Belush.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Academy Award winning producer, Ed Feldman.
Guest:You know, incredible time, 23, 24 years old.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Just insane.
Yeah.
Guest:It's your big break.
Guest:It's huge.
Guest:It's huge.
Guest:And MTV is there and Entertainment Tonight and they all do interviews with me and I go back to my apartment that night in Beverly Hills.
Guest:They have me all set up and I turn on the television and I watch the interviews on MTV and then they do this whole thing with me and then...
Guest:halfway through the segment, the horror movie music comes in and they do this stinger.
Guest:And all of a sudden they cut to Dan Aykroyd going, all my witches, all my curses, you know, to anybody involved in this project.
Guest:And I was like,
Guest:What?
Guest:What?
Guest:And this is how I found out.
Guest:On MTV.
Guest:On MTV.
Guest:And I call the producer and the director and I go, get the fuck over here right now.
Guest:And they came over and they were like...
Guest:You know, I won't really.
Guest:You didn't you don't know about this.
Guest:I'm like, no, no one ever told me and no one ever discussed it.
Marc:You're in the process.
Guest:And I'm already the guy.
Marc:And now I'm, you know, and also media didn't work as fast as it does.
Guest:No, no.
Guest:It's just a different world.
Guest:Then, you know, if you were a theater, you know, theater at New York.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:You didn't know what the fuck was going on in Hollywood.
Guest:Sure.
Guest:I didn't know who Michael Ovitz was.
Guest:Yeah, there's just a couple of sources of information.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:You know, I was reading the New York Times every day and the New York Times wasn't writing about that.
Guest:So you just find this out.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And I, you know, I freaked out.
Guest:But I had to do, I was in, you know, so I did the best that I could do.
Marc:How much more shooting was there after you found out?
Guest:Half of it.
Marc:Oh, my God.
Guest:I tried to put it aside.
Guest:I tried to put it out of my mind.
Guest:My mantra was sort of like, don't fight.
Guest:Just let the work speak.
Guest:The work, the work, the work.
Guest:Right, right.
Guest:But also, I didn't really think that anyone would take it out on me.
Guest:You know what I mean?
Guest:I was just an actor.
Guest:Sure.
Guest:And it turns out, you know, I got back to New York crickets.
Guest:And not based on the work, not based on anything, but...
Guest:just based on the order i was put out yeah yeah the order had been put out clearly because my agent called me and apologized she was like darlin i i can't get you seen for an under five which is you know like a what is that an under five line oh you know bit part really nothing it was over so you should have to go back to theater and this is over this is before the movie's even released
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Like right directly following.
Guest:You rap.
Guest:Rapping and coming to New York.
Guest:And I was an up and coming guy.
Guest:You know what I mean?
Guest:Like you said, I was the guy.
Guest:You know what I mean?
Guest:Like there was some buzz about me.
Guest:Nope.
Guest:Like you're done.
Guest:Wow.
Guest:So I went like, well, all right.
Guest:And it was terrifying and shitty and bad.
Marc:Well, what'd you end up doing?
Marc:Did you like say, I got to get a job or what?
Guest:I go, well, you know, look, let's start auditioning.
Guest:Fortunately, I mean, I got paid a lot of money for me at the time.
Guest:You know what I mean?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:So I had this little apartment in Brooklyn.
Guest:It didn't cost much money.
Guest:And you stashed the bread.
Guest:I stashed the bread and I was there, you know, sort of.
Guest:But my career was over.
Guest:And I just said, well, let's go back to theater.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:So I ended up auditioning and getting the role of, believe it or not, Stanley in Streetcar.
Guest:I went back to Lowell and did play Touchstone in You Can't Take It With You.
Guest:You went home for what?
Guest:I went home to Merrimack Regional Theater, the theater that I helped to start when I was like 14 years old in Lowell, Massachusetts.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Oh, you really did?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Uh-huh.
Guest:And it's still one of the thriving equity regional theaters in the country.
Marc:So was that part of, in your mind, you're like, I'm going to go home for a while.
Marc:Let me see if I can get a gig there or it just happened.
Guest:Well, no, it just happened.
Guest:Like, you know, I was telling some old friends from back there, you know, I'm done.
Guest:I can't get seen.
Guest:I can't get arrested.
Guest:No one will see me.
Guest:Yeah.
Yeah.
Guest:and uh they were like well could you want to come back here and do a show and i was like sure i mean you know so i went back and did that and then i auditioned for this thing at the players theater of columbus ohio yeah and i went to you know i was brutally humbled by that that whole process because i had only aspired to be in films my whole life i didn't even intend on doing television i was a snob yeah i was like i'm gonna do theater and film right
Guest:But then the film was just over.
Guest:Not based on anything other than you did this project.
Guest:We are in control of the town.
Guest:We don't want you in anything.
Guest:Oh, my God.
Guest:Terrifying.
Guest:The guy who broke it was Burt Reynolds.
Guest:He was the one who...
Guest:And basically, you know, through a friend that worked on Wired with me, unbeknownst to me, my friend called me and said, hey, why don't you come down to Florida and go fishing with me?
Guest:And I went down there and got waylaid.
Guest:He basically introduced me to Bert on the set of BL Striker.
Guest:And Bert was like, listen, I heard what happened to you.
Guest:I grew up during the McCarthy era.
Guest:I don't believe in blackballing.
Guest:How'd you like to play the villain in this next movie of the week that we're doing?
Guest:And I was like, and boom, literally when he hired me, all of the television doors opened up again because it was a television movie of the week.
Marc:Right.
Guest:And like overnight now, all of a sudden I'm up for like 12 pilots.
Marc:And what was the time in between, you know, you being blackballed and this happening?
Guest:Well, it was about, let's see, it was early spring, or it's late spring that I finished the movie, and all through the spring, the summer, the fall, I couldn't get seen for anything.
Guest:And then in the late fall, this thing happened with Bert, and I was working on that, but...
Guest:But I still was booked on Streetcar Named Desire, so I had to go and do that.
Marc:How was that playing Stan?
Guest:It was a dream because I loved that play.
Guest:Interestingly, right after that, that's when the Cannes Film Festival opening for Wired was, right after I finished that.
Guest:So the first...
Guest:question i was asked by the international press corps yeah at can you went yeah i went yeah oh you should that was bold here you are persona non grata you're like i'm gonna go oh yeah well they wanted me to go they wanted me to promote the film and also you know i wanted to see what that was yeah sure which is an incredibly overwhelming experience yeah yeah a kid from andover you know yeah
Guest:And how was that?
Guest:It was insane.
Guest:Did they respect the movie or were they?
Guest:It was the big movie of the opening.
Guest:It was the controversial movie of the thing.
Guest:And no, the movie was maligned generally.
Guest:It was because it's not a great film.
Guest:The director's cut that I saw was a far better film than the film that was released.
Guest:And I think it was just cut to pieces because of all the lawsuits pending against it.
Guest:But I'm glad that I didn't lash out or lash back at anybody or fight with anybody.
Guest:Or fall into yourself.
Guest:Or go into a depression and fucking blow my head off.
Guest:And I just said, keep working.
Guest:Work wherever you can work and do the best work you can do.
Guest:And that's what's going to go out, was my thought.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:That's the only thing out of, I guess, blind terror and not knowing what else to do.
Guest:That's what I went with.
Guest:And it worked out, thankfully.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:So, all right.
Marc:So, Burt gives you the gig.
Marc:You do the TV movie.
Marc:And how was that thing?
Guest:That was awesome.
Guest:And I mean, you know, Rita Moreno was in it.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:She put me on the phone with Marlon Brando.
Guest:Oh, really?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:She's like, I'm like, what are you doing next, Michael?
Guest:I go, oh, I'm playing Stanley in Streetcar.
Guest:She goes, well, you know, my friend Marlon originated that.
Guest:And I was like, yeah, I know.
Guest:She goes, well, you should talk to him.
Guest:He's a sweetheart.
Guest:I'm like, no, I'm not going to.
Guest:okay so like 20 minutes later she's got a cell you remember the brick the gray cell phone she's like walking out yeah she's like oh it's and i'm like what and she hands me the phone don't do it
Guest:You'll upset yourself every night.
Guest:Tennessee Williams is crazy.
Guest:I'm like, it's the reason I became an actor.
Guest:Oh, fuck that.
Guest:Anybody can be an actor.
Guest:I'm like, what?
Guest:Don't do it.
Guest:Yeah, he encouraged me not to do it.
Guest:Because it would drain you?
Guest:Yeah, because you'd upset yourself.
Guest:That's the quote that's burnt into my mind.
Guest:Was he right?
Yeah.
Guest:No, he wasn't right.
Guest:No, it was so disappointing.
Guest:I never got to meet him in person.
Guest:God rest his soul.
Marc:But it sounds like you had a pretty good conversation.
Marc:It was probably better off on some level.
Guest:I really barely spoke.
Guest:I was so gobsmacked.
Guest:I was like, and I look at her and I go, what did you do?
Guest:And she's like, oh, quiet.
Guest:She was so funny.
Guest:And Ozzy Davis and Ruby Dee were in that.
Guest:I mean, it was crazy.
Guest:And Bert took me to that dinner theater and
Guest:Down in Florida?
Guest:Yeah, that's where I met Charles Nelson Riley and all these different friends of his that were out of their minds.
Guest:Dom DeLuise?
Guest:Dom, yeah, who I became friends with.
Guest:He came and saw me when I did a one-man show on Broadway.
Marc:Oh, really?
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:He was a funny guy.
Guest:Yeah, I'm friends with all his children.
Guest:I ended up getting to know Pete when I went up to Vancouver to do...
Guest:the shield he was not the shields i mean the commish he was on um 21 jump street oh yeah yeah at that time so like but your interest like the is you started a theater uh in high school i didn't yeah well i i yes i i i should i'm just i don't want to take be too much of a credit monger right well
Guest:I had been cast in a summer stock season as a ninth grader.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:That's my first professional gig in a semi-pro summer theater thing.
Marc:What was the role?
Guest:It was just a bunch of bit roles back in big famous musical revivals.
Guest:Right.
Guest:You know, Bye Bye Birdie, Carnival.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:You know, get your guns.
Marc:You were in rotation.
Guest:You were the kid.
Guest:Yeah, I was the kid.
Guest:I was local hire, right?
Marc:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:And during that time, the guy who was the director of that production hired me, a guy named Mark Kaufman, became my sort of theatrical mentor.
Guest:He saw me in himself, saw my ambition, saw my talent, and sort of winged me.
Guest:And he became friends with my family, my mother and father.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:So he would drive me home after rehearsal because I was on the way to his place.
Guest:Right.
Guest:We would go in the backyard.
Guest:It was summertime.
Guest:My father would be cooking on the grill.
Guest:We'd sit and we'd talk about life and different things.
Guest:And at one point he said, hey, I noticed, you know, there's no...
Guest:there's no regional theaters around here.
Guest:Where do you guys go when you want to see great theater, legit theater?
Guest:And I said, well, we go into Boston.
Guest:He goes, do you think that the Merrimack Valley could sustain a theater company?
Guest:I go, absolutely.
Guest:And I said, and I was only 14, but I said, the reason why I know that is because every production you go to, whether it's just a high school production or community theater, it's packed to the rafters.
Guest:There's an appetite for people want to, they're bored around here.
Guest:There's nothing to do.
Guest:They want to go and see something.
Guest:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:So we embarked on opening this theater, and I went with him to all these different meetings, and I really, really wanted... I was like a protege.
Guest:I helped and watched and was privy to this process, watching this guy.
Guest:I mean, it was his baby, and he opened it, a 30-something-year-old man.
Marc:And he's bringing this kid around.
Guest:He brought me along, yeah.
Guest:He brought me along for the ride, and it was one of the most incredible experiences.
Guest:It just...
Guest:in a lot of ways but also seeing the nuts and bolts of the business sure work even at that level yeah to try to get the funding to do it going to nancy donahue and having her contribute a ton of money she was one of the you know the the who is she a big socialite and lol you know had a ton of money right now so we you know we tapped into certain people my father is you know the
Guest:Cutting hair and telling everybody about the theater and everybody wants to get involved.
Guest:They want to be members of the board.
Guest:So we helped to make this thing, me and my family helped to make this thing a staple.
Guest:And now I'm a permanent member of the board and that's just a...
Marc:Is it still working?
Marc:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:All these years later, 40 years coming up.
Guest:That's a great story.
Guest:Yeah, yeah, pretty cool.
Marc:You were integrated into the theater.
Guest:Well, that's when I really absolutely fell in love for good.
Guest:You know, that year when I played Hawkeye in MASH in ninth grade, believe it or not.
Guest:Like, how hip is that, that they did that?
Guest:You know what I mean?
Guest:And who does that?
Guest:I don't think they cut a thing out of it.
Marc:Was that a weird cast?
Marc:Was there an artistic choice to cast a ninth grader?
Marc:I don't know, man.
Guest:I was just a wise-ass.
Guest:And that's when the casting director for the summer theater saw me, encouraged me to go and do it, and then I met Mark, and boom.
Guest:That was it.
Guest:Next thing you know, I'm in.
Marc:That's your life.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:The rest of my life.
Marc:So now you're back in the loop after Reynolds throws you the line.
Marc:Yeah, next thing you know, I'm on Miami Vice.
Marc:You're doing bit parts.
Guest:Well, no, I'm not doing bit parts.
Guest:I'm doing guest stars now.
Marc:Okay.
Guest:Now I'm the guest star of the week on all the big shows of that period.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Whether it was Miami Vice or Murphy Brown, Seinfeld.
Guest:Right.
Guest:you know i i'm really you know i'm i'm a working actor looking for the next and you're living out here no i'm still in new york i'm still in brooklyn wow being cast out of new york being cast out of new york for big shows and uh um then wise guy happened yeah and i went to vancouver and shot a five show arc on wise guy what was that show
Guest:Wise guy, Ken Wall.
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Guest:You know, Kevin Spacey, Chaz Palminteri.
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Guest:And I did this five-show arc with Chaz, you know, playing one of his minions, right?
Guest:And I was just a hot-headed minion in that, you know.
Guest:And Steve Cronish, who was one of the head writers of that show, watched me do this scene where I flip out and, you know, shoot a ping pong ball.
Guest:not ping pong a pinball machine yeah you know yeah to shit and he he pulls me aside he goes hey listen you know i just watched you shoot that scene and i have a pilot that i've written and you're way too young for it but you're the guy yeah and i was like well cool what is it he goes it's a i know you're you know because at this point i'm like 25 yeah
Guest:He goes, you're just innately the guy, but in 15 years, you're a guy.
Guest:Right, right.
Guest:I go, well, I can age up.
Guest:What is it?
Guest:You know, of course, actors.
Guest:I'm like, I can do it.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:You know?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And he goes, it's about a police commissioner.
Guest:I go, oh, shit, in my head.
Guest:I go, like, oh, fuck.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:You know, he goes, but he was the youngest police commissioner in the history of the United States, like 37.
Guest:That was based on a true story?
Guest:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:Oh, okay.
Guest:The police commissioner of Rye, New York, a guy named Tony Schembrey.
Guest:Great guy.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And they called him Tony Scali in the show.
Guest:So I auditioned for it in front of Steve Cannell.
Guest:And then Cannell said, look, in order to get this at CBS, who owned it at the time, we have to trick them.
Guest:We're going to shoot you, but we're going to age you up because the president of CBS at that time
Guest:just he was not a creative type he was you know and they probably had some guys in mind well yeah you know that and you know well they had tried a bunch of people and they just couldn't find the guy for a long time so I shoot the thing like three scenes of it we send it over to to CBS he's like awesome he's the guy who can't wait to meet him so I go to meet him as a matter of course because it's done yeah
Guest:But I made the mistake of going in jeans and a t-shirt.
Guest:And as soon as I walked in his office, he looked at me and went, you're a young man.
Guest:And I went, well, yeah, but you saw the tape.
Guest:And he's like, could you excuse us?
Guest:And he dismissed me.
Guest:Oh, my God.
Guest:I was like, here you go again.
Guest:Sent back to the hotel.
Guest:Phone's ringing.
Guest:Steve Cannell, sorry, chicky.
Guest:It's over.
Guest:He's freaked out at how young you are.
Guest:He doesn't think he can do it.
Guest:What the fuck?
Guest:That's Marc Maron.
Marc:What the fuck?
Marc:And he saw the tape and everything.
Guest:He saw it, yeah.
Guest:But his brain divorced from it.
Guest:He was just like, you can't be that young and play this role.
Guest:And I was like, motherfucker.
Guest:So I moved on with my life and cut to like a year and a half later, the phone rings and it's Steve Cronish.
Guest:And Cronish goes...
Guest:uh you know uh the do you want to play the commission i go fuck you dude he goes uh i thought he was playing with me he goes no i mean it uh it's now at abc and i had just done a pilot for abc that didn't go yeah but the guys at abc were like they wanted me for for a show yeah
Guest:and that's how the commission was born it happened we went to abc and ended up doing that show there how'd you deal with that rejection of that like signing the fucking deal and then like you know the thing about my career i've been bitch slapped around and then risen up oh after it so many times at this point you know those things that you punch and they go down to the ground and then they come back
Guest:Sure, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Guest:That's what my wife calls me is one of those things.
Guest:I don't know what they're called.
Guest:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Guest:Because I know innately not to take it personally.
Guest:I don't think any of this has been personal.
Guest:Right.
Guest:I think that this is a huge industry.
Guest:There's a lot of people vying for position.
Guest:Right.
Guest:um and you know producers are trying to fit puzzles together like if you look at the the role of a of a network president for example yeah he's got or she has got you know a 250 million plus dollar budget in front of them for a year of television at any given time right probably not even accurate it's probably more than that yeah
Guest:So, you know, that's a lot to sort of compartmentalize.
Guest:And you've got a lot of people working underneath you.
Guest:And basically, you've got to look at it like a jigsaw puzzle.
Guest:Like, oh, Marin fits here.
Guest:Chick list is perfect for this.
Guest:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Guest:And they just try to plug you in.
Guest:Right.
Guest:And that's why it's become such a thing over the last two decades about branding.
Guest:Oh, you've got to have a brand.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:What's your fucking brand?
Guest:Right.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Somehow I've always raged against that shit, you know, because whenever I start to form a brand, I break it and go in a different direction.
Guest:In terms of it as an actor.
Marc:As an actor.
Marc:Right.
Marc:Like what's your wheelhouse?
Guest:Well, I mean, I think that the industry would say cops because my, you know, two of my most successful things were...
Guest:were playing police officers, even though they were antithetical to each other.
Marc:The commish and the shield.
Marc:So let me ask you something, though, because I remember part of the obsession that I had in wondering where you went and how... Because I didn't know Mike Patton that well, but my friend Steve was friends with them, but they had a contentious relationship.
Marc:But I knew Mary pretty well, and I'd met Mike a couple of times.
Marc:And I just saw you guys as like... I got these rumors back, because Mike was a good actor...
Marc:Yeah, really good.
Marc:I saw him in Indian Wants the Bronx, I think.
Marc:Yeah, I was in that.
Marc:You were the Indian guy.
Marc:That's right.
Marc:I played the Indian.
Marc:Believe it or not, me.
Guest:I saw that.
Marc:You know why I remember it now?
Marc:Oh, you saw that.
Marc:You want to know why I remember it?
Marc:Yeah, because I wanted to be an actor, but I was over in the liberal arts college and I couldn't.
Marc:So, like, I remember it because Mike, he had a piss in the garbage can one time.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Like, there was a piss scene where he had a piss with his back to the audience.
Marc:I remember during one of the scuffles, the squirt bottle fell out of his pocket.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:And I was like, oh, that's what I remember that happening.
Guest:That's so crazy.
Guest:You do?
Guest:Yeah, because he was horrified.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:He was so embarrassed.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Oh, my God.
Guest:Wow.
Guest:That's a long time ago, man.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:And that was a challenging role because you really said very little and you just had to be terrified the whole time.
Marc:He was a victim.
Marc:Yeah, I just remember that now.
Marc:That was you, of course.
Marc:So yeah, I do have a history with you.
Marc:Whether you have a history with me, I don't know.
Marc:But I remember there was a... I know that Mike was doing Shakespeare, that you guys went these divergent rounds.
Guest:Are you guys friends?
Guest:We're Facebook friends at this point.
Guest:We had sort of a falling out.
Guest:And some years went by, and I think when Facebook happened, I reached out to him and went like, hey, man, we're really good friends.
Guest:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:Why aren't we still really good friends?
Guest:And he was like, yeah, absolutely.
Guest:And he accepted my friend request.
Guest:But he lives in Seattle, and I live here.
Guest:And if I go up to Seattle at some point, I will absolutely call him and look him up.
Guest:Sure.
Marc:Does he have a family and stuff?
Marc:You got a family?
Guest:I do.
Guest:You know, that really changed the equation of my life.
Guest:You know, once I got married and then I had one daughter and then I had another daughter and then, you know, it becomes, you know, everything.
Guest:Responsibility.
Guest:It really does.
Guest:I mean, and a lot of friendships end up falling by the wayside, especially when there's geographical problems, you know?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I've tried to maintain, you know, my five best friends from high school are still my five best friends.
Marc:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:It's funny how that works.
Guest:I kind of like that.
Marc:Yeah, yeah.
Marc:They knew you before.
Marc:They're never going to judge you as anything.
Marc:They don't give a shit.
Marc:Right, yeah.
Marc:You're still the guy that they knew.
Guest:Yep.
Guest:You know, I'm on the board at BU.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:You know, for the dean's advisory board.
Guest:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:And I speak to the freshmen about craft because they're about to go into the bubble.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And I speak to the seniors about the world.
Guest:The business?
Guest:The business.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:So there's a vocational aspect to that.
Guest:But speaking to the freshmen, I always say to them, you have to define success for yourself.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Because if it's just all about the, you know, holding awards in your hand and the glam and all that shit, that's a very finite thing.
Marc:Only a few people in that club.
Guest:Yeah, that's a real tight ring.
Guest:There's like seven rings in the business, you know?
Guest:To get into that ring is... Yeah.
Guest:You know, and I know a lot of people who are, you know, work-a-day actors who...
Guest:are in it you know who they are they're in your you know your psyche yeah you know like a guy like brian howe been around forever been in a you know dozens of movies television series he's currently on westworld he's amazing yeah uh this guy but
Guest:But I don't think anyone really knows Brian's name, per se.
Marc:I know.
Marc:I don't.
Marc:Now I have to Google him.
Guest:And he's a really successful and tremendous actor, highly respected.
Guest:Everybody loves Brian.
Guest:But there's all different places in the business.
Guest:I look at Nina Tassler, who was an acting major at Boston University.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:she ended up oh yeah that guy she ended up going yeah you know who he is sure you've seen him dozens of shit right so uh nina ends up going behind the scenes ends up working for a guy named les moon vest when he's a producer at lorimar boom boom boom they keep on you know working their way up and next thing you know she's the president of cbs yeah for a long time and incredibly successful so everybody has their path right everybody goes
Marc:In the business.
Guest:In the business.
Guest:You know, I knew I knew you somehow and there was some sort of connect.
Guest:Someone, I can't, you know how life, what are we, you're 52, 53?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I'm 53 years old.
Guest:So many different things.
Guest:I've traveled so much.
Guest:And so, you know, I remember distinctly having a conversation about you with somebody and I can't remember whom.
Guest:But I remember them saying, and I thought it was BU.
Guest:It was a BU connection.
Marc:Well, that's interesting that at least you're still giving back and trying to help the people with the dreams.
Guest:Absolutely.
Guest:My daughter just graduated from USC this past year.
Guest:And she was a theater major, although now she identifies herself as a writer who acts.
Guest:And she just signed a book deal, as a matter of fact.
Guest:Oh, really?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Incredibly.
Guest:She's writing a novel and she got about a third of the way through it, pitched it.
Guest:And yeah.
Guest:It's great.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And it's going to be out a year from now, Mother's Day of 18.
Guest:And it's...
Guest:It's a brilliant fiction.
Guest:It's comedic.
Guest:It's about her relationship with her mother.
Guest:It's called Raising Mom.
Guest:It's brilliant.
Guest:Is it based on truth?
Guest:Yes, very much so.
Guest:We're all represented in it.
Guest:But it's definitely fiction at the same time.
Guest:She's fashioned this sort of narrative.
Guest:And it's not hurtful.
Guest:Oh, she kicks us in the teeth a bunch of times, but in a great way.
Guest:It's really actually, it's a love story.
Guest:It really is.
Guest:And it's wonderful and it's got a huge heart, but it's got teeth.
Guest:She's definitely got this dark ribbon through her.
Guest:She played my daughter on The Shield.
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Guest:You know, she played Cassidy.
Guest:So she's got some... She's her father's daughter, that's for sure.
Guest:But I love that she's a writer and she's creating content.
Guest:And in the meantime, I got to be her...
Guest:you know, her graduation speaker.
Guest:Oh, yeah?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Where, at USC?
Guest:At USC.
Guest:Oh, wow.
Guest:Which was insane to get, you know, to give my daughter her diploma.
Guest:Isn't something that happens, man.
Guest:It's crazy.
Guest:Sweet.
Guest:It is insane.
Guest:Yeah, so I've been...
Guest:I've been really fortunate in a lot of levels.
Guest:You know, I keep stepping in shit.
Guest:You know what I mean?
Guest:And I guess also I'm always forward.
Guest:I'm always moving ahead.
Guest:I don't like to sit back and look at past successes or even past failures only to the degree of like to look at it, learn or glean whatever I can from it and then move the fuck on.
Marc:Well, yeah.
Marc:Well, you went from, you know, the commish.
Marc:to the shield which was like this strange like complete transformation that you know but that must have had like you know the commission you did well and i'm sure after that run was done you felt proud and you you banked some money and you got your health insurance and the family's happy and everybody's good and you know it was probably sad for it to go away but you know it was done well there's always these dips especially when you do a long-running television series yeah
Guest:That's where anybody who's an actor has to listen up right now, because if you have a long running series as an actor on a television show, it's different than anything else.
Guest:You've left this, especially if it's successful.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:You've left an indelible image, an imprint on the public.
Guest:right and it's going to take a little while for another generation to come up and also for those people to sort of be able to accept you in another context right you know yeah so there's inevitably this sort of downtime so if you're into music that's a perfect time for you to record a record yeah or if you're into theater go and do a a show on broadway as i did right after the that was your one-man show yeah what was that about
Guest:Men and Women.
Guest:It was called Defending the Caveman.
Guest:Rob Becker did it.
Marc:Oh, you did Becker's show?
Guest:Becker's show, yeah.
Guest:No show.
Guest:Yeah, at the booth.
Marc:Do you know Rob?
Marc:I don't know Rob, but I know the show and I know he started as a comic.
Guest:When did you get into comedy?
Marc:Well, after college.
Marc:I was there for five years at BU.
Marc:I left in like 86 and I came out to LA for a bit and then I kind of hit the wall on drugs and I went back to Boston and started.
Guest:Wait a minute.
Guest:Hold on a second.
Guest:I'm having a flash...
Guest:I think it was Dennis Leary who I talked to about you.
Marc:Yeah, that's possible.
Marc:Do you know Dennis?
Marc:Yeah, he was part of his company.
Marc:Jim Serpico at Apostle produced my TV series for four seasons.
Guest:Okay, okay.
Marc:So was that relatively recent?
Marc:Relatively recent.
Marc:Yeah, that's probably it.
Marc:Sure, because when I got back...
Marc:To Boston, 1988, I came in second in the riot, and that's when I started working as a comic.
Marc:Oh, cool, cool.
Marc:But I've been in a lot of different places.
Marc:I was in San Francisco, New York, and back here in L.A.
Guest:now.
Guest:Comedians, man.
Marc:Well, yeah, well, yeah, that was it.
Guest:Bounce around, you're always on the road.
Marc:But getting back to Becker, when I was in San Francisco, he was this guy who did stand-up, and then he was one of the first to kind of franchise that show.
Marc:He did that show for years, and then it just became this thing.
Marc:Made a fortune off it.
Marc:Yeah, and then it came this thing that other people could do.
Marc:And you were one of those people.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:Well, you know, he had established it on Broadway at, you know, the Helen Hayes, which was a smaller theater.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And then I took it to the booth, which was, you know...
Guest:it just blew it out it was a larger theater was like 1100 seats and you know yeah and i did a six month run yeah and then he while i was doing that he went to i think chicago and and mounted it there yeah so like you say he franchised it and he had mounted a production in vegas or something like that anyway he did really well yeah yeah you know and then so so that's what you're doing to buy your time and then how does the commish happen i mean how does yeah yeah
Guest:well because you know you got to look at what's coming at you you know here i had just done a you know a comedy and i was well known for playing you know this affable sort of roly-poly guy on the commish and i wanted to break that shit you know i you know what happened was in 2000 i ended up doing two gigs i played curly in the three stooges movie a tv movie
Guest:Yeah, it was a TV movie with Evan Handler and Paul Ben Victor, and Mel Gibson produced it.
Guest:Really proud of that movie, actually.
Marc:Did you do a lot of research?
Guest:Yeah, I read all about those guys, saw a ton of video, a ton of old films.
Guest:Can you do the laugh?
Guest:Sure.
Guest:You know, your mother and my mother are both mothers.
Guest:It's been a while.
Guest:It's good.
Guest:I love Curly.
Guest:And that was daunting because whenever you play- A real guy.
Guest:A guy, you got to sink in.
Guest:And I loved it.
Guest:I'm very proud of that movie.
Guest:People should look it up.
Guest:It's a great movie.
Guest:And then the other thing I did was this ill-fated year on a comedy, a half-hour sitcom called Daddy-O.
Guest:And it was a benign, sweet, good, big-hearted show.
Guest:But again, it was more of the same.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And I was like, man, when it ended, I bitterly said to my wife, I got to do a show called fucking blow me.
Guest:You know what I mean?
Guest:Because, you know, I just wanted to do something.
Marc:you know real and satisfying satisfying you know as an actor when you're just doing that and you got to take the gig if it's offered to you well you know i'm raising children at this point now i got two kids yeah and and then when you do mortgage payments when you do you have no control yeah over the content and if it's silly you just suck it up and yeah do the best you can exactly and people you know
Guest:And you know this.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:The public seems to think that we all have our just druthers.
Guest:You know, we could just do whatever the fuck we want.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:So, you know, I made this choice because I had all of the choices.
Guest:I mean, you know, I say to people, have you looked at me?
Guest:I don't.
Guest:I'm not Brad Pitt.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I never was Brad Pitt.
Guest:I mean, you know what I mean?
Guest:There's like 10 guys, maybe, over the course of the 30 years of my career that were in that position where the scripts were coming at them.
Guest:Right.
Guest:You know, in the feature side, especially.
Guest:Sure, sure.
Guest:And then the rest of us in the next ring are duking it out and fighting for every inch for everything and trying to get that role that can break through a showcase your work.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And the only reason that the shield happened is because it was at FX and it was off everyone's radar.
Guest:In fact, I was a television star at that time.
Guest:And, you know, I know I used quotes and it's annoying as shit.
Guest:I used air quotes and you guys can't see that.
Guest:Then I'm glad.
Guest:Anyway.
Guest:Anyway.
Guest:my the people in my camp at the time were like you can't do this you're a network television star it's fx and you're out of shape yeah well no actually at the time i was ripped you got ripped that's why you did that in your downtime i did that in my downtime worked it out got an insane shape and i was looking for that kind of a role really and when i read it i was like are you guys crazy have you read this it's the best pilot i've ever read
Guest:So I went for the material, the material, the material, and hoped that I'd have a great tape from it that would break the mold.
Guest:That was the height of my expectation.
Guest:Like, please let me get some good tape out of this shit so people won't think of me just as the commish or daddy-o.
Marc:Yeah, yeah.
Marc:The four people that watch Daddy.
Guest:And it was incendiary, although I thought it had tremendous potential.
Guest:I was like, God, if people see this, they're going to dig this.
Guest:Because this is, you know, I loved what it was going for.
Marc:The morally dubious alpha cop.
Guest:Yeah, well, it's just about, look, it's very resonant right now.
Guest:The thematic question of the shield was, what are we willing to accept from law enforcement post 9-11 America to keep us safe?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:That's what's happening right now.
Guest:Yeah, right.
Guest:And you see the ambivalence and the gray areas of how tough it is to be a cop and how hard it is to do your job and how contentious it is with the public and how some bad apples ruin it for the rest of the blue.
Guest:It's so relevant still.
Guest:So I thought, man, this could break through, but it's on fucking FX.
Guest:You know what I mean?
Guest:And we were the first.
Guest:So when I won the Emmy,
Guest:It was an earthquake.
Guest:It was a tectonic shift.
Marc:Shift.
Marc:The networks.
Guest:All the networks went, which cable network do we own?
Guest:Because they all own them.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:People don't realize that they all own its right pocket, left pocket.
Guest:Right.
Guest:So they did something brilliant business-wise.
Guest:Fox went into competition with itself at FX because Fox owns FX.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Right?
Marc:Yeah, but they were like, well, why not?
Guest:Yeah, and FX now, look at FX.
Guest:Look at the quality, amazing stuff that they do, one show after another.
Guest:I have to say, Peter Liguori and Kevin Reilly, the first two presidents of FX, their first three forays into original scripted material was The Shield, Nip Tuck, and Rescue Me.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:You know, just a one, two, three punch of three massive hits.
Guest:And look at the careers that have launched out of just those three shows.
Marc:Sure.
Guest:Like writers, actors.
Marc:Yeah, they did.
Marc:And it was raw and it had, you know, real edge to it.
Guest:The mandate at the time, it's really, you know, it's kind of harkens back to the early days of Sundance where you have no money, no time, but the willingness to let artists do their thing.
Guest:Yeah, Louis.
Guest:Yeah, exactly, Louis.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:God, I've not met him.
Guest:Oh, really?
Guest:This is so insane.
Guest:Like, my favorite, he kills me.
Marc:Oh.
Guest:Louis C.K.
Marc:He's a little elusive, but I think if you hang around New York, you could meet him.
Guest:Just watched Oh My God again the other day and kills me.
Marc:So, yeah, so that defines you.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:That was the role.
Guest:yeah well that was that was you know that was a huge breakthrough for me and what it's done is made people realize that you know i have a considerable amount of range yeah you know yes i can play the roly-poly affable guy but i can also play a motherfucker too yeah and everything in between you can play a superhero yeah suck it you got the full package
Guest:The full emotional package.
Guest:I always admired people in the industry that were versatile.
Guest:Sure.
Guest:Character actors.
Guest:Yeah, people who could put on a bunch of different hats and really sell it.
Guest:Gene Hackman, I love.
Marc:He's the best.
Marc:He's the best.
Marc:I think he retired.
Guest:He did.
Guest:He did.
Guest:But one of the greatest things in the world was to hear that he was a fan of The Shield.
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Guest:I bet.
Guest:Through DJ Caruso, director.
Guest:He told you.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:DJ worked with me on The Shield.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And Eagle Eye.
Guest:And he made a movie with him.
Guest:And he was like, oh, you work on that show, The Shield.
Guest:I love that show.
Guest:That's the real shit.
Guest:And I'm like, oh, God.
Guest:It's beautiful.
Guest:I could die now.
Marc:Hackman was so good.
Marc:Hackman.
Marc:Yeah.
Yeah.
Marc:you know and what so you like i'm just looking at stuff and i i don't watch a lot of stuff but it looks like you know you just do the work you know you do animated shit you do you know i love working man i do um what is no ordinary family how'd that go that was uh a superhero show
Guest:that I did for one season that a real shame because it had a huge following people loved it and it was just a behemoth and we shot it in LA and it cost so much money and I don't know you know you never know the real for something going down because it's interesting you know I looked at the numbers of that show and they were strong and I still obviously something was wrong with the math yeah
Guest:You know, you never know who's pissed off at who, too, in terms of producers.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:You know, I mean, there's talk about, you know, that's Greg Belanti produced the show and he was moving over to Warner Brothers at the time.
Guest:And, you know, and ABC was like done with him.
Guest:So ABC Disney.
Guest:So that you never know as an actor unless you're right in there with everybody.
Guest:Even then you don't know.
Guest:Sure.
Marc:Yeah, yeah.
Marc:You're not in the room- And you don't find out until the day after.
Guest:With the network.
Guest:You're not there when the network guys go in there and shut the door and make their decisions.
Guest:You know, they're going to tell you what they're going to tell you, but you don't really know what the... And it usually has to do with the bottom line.
Guest:Sure.
Guest:But it can also have to do with relationships or broken relationships.
Guest:Sure.
Guest:Bottom line is it didn't go forward.
Guest:It was a fun show.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:A great cast.
Guest:Julie Benz, Romney Malco.
Guest:We had a blast.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And it was, you know, people...
Guest:Man, it's so funny.
Guest:People look at television and, you know, they feel I think that they think that actors have so much more control than they do.
Guest:Why didn't that guy stop them from taking?
Guest:Well, you know, many people walk up to me and go, you know, why don't you just have them do another season of Vegas?
Guest:I'm like, because they canceled it.
Guest:We'll tell them, you know, you can do that.
Guest:Go and tell them that we loved it.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:There is a sort of blind side to how the business works.
Guest:That's not what happens.
Marc:And are they still making Gotham's?
Guest:Yeah, I just finished.
Guest:Literally, I just two days ago finished and came back from New York.
Guest:I've been in New York for the last two years, living on 56th and 6th, like 100 yards from Trump Tower.
Marc:It's been crazy, huh?
Guest:Oh, my God, what a cluster.
Guest:It's just been a...
Guest:It's really incredible to watch that evolve over the last two years into what it is now, which is a colossal clusterfuck.
Guest:Well, I mean, it's costing tens of millions of dollars to just isolate that building.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Because it's in the center of Manhattan.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:You know, and I'm just happy to be out of there right now.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:It's just madness.
Guest:But it's been wonderful.
Guest:You know, I'm really glad to be getting back into shape.
Guest:Like last year, I got so fat because I went to New York and I was doing Gotham and living in New York.
Guest:And I was going to every theater production and I go into restaurants.
Guest:Mr. Chick was right this way.
Guest:And here's another appetizer that you didn't order.
Guest:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:And I was just, for me, thanks.
Marc:Sure, you don't want to insult the guy.
Guest:I didn't want to insult the guy.
Guest:So this year I made it about, you know what, let's get back to my brand and get back into shape.
Guest:So I've really been going hardcore for about six months again, and I'm starting to get back to me.
Marc:Get tight.
Guest:Ready to go, yeah.
Marc:So now with the music, with the Influence record-
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Do you play out?
Guest:We just did.
Guest:In November, we played our first live show, 12-piece band.
Guest:I got the guys from Conan O'Brien's band on this too.
Guest:Which ones?
Guest:Scott Healy, who's the head of the band, the keyboard player.
Uh-huh.
Guest:and la bamba yeah the guys in the brass section it was incredible experience you know i built a studio in my house a recording like you did with this i built a cool recording studio in my house world class oh it's great yeah and i just had session players come to my house i'd show them the tune we'd shed it
Marc:I'm glad you're enjoying yourself.
Marc:And I'm glad it worked out over and over again.
Marc:Yeah, that's right.
Marc:And that's me.
Marc:I'll just keep swinging.
Marc:All right.
Marc:Thanks for talking, Mike.
Marc:Pleasure.
Marc:Pretty cool, right?
Marc:That was a good talk.
Marc:He's like a solid dude, man.
Marc:A solid dude.
Marc:Does my words sound fat?
Marc:Where's the guitar?
Marc:I gotta give my new guitar a rest, because in order to get the sound I want, it destroys my left eardrum, which has problems.
Marc:Yeah, my ears are going, my cat's gone, my voice has gotten fatter, the world's gonna be just a flaming rock.
Marc:spinning through space.
Marc:Let's not be negative.
Marc:Let's be thoughtful and engaged.
Marc:Let's use a phase shifter.
Marc:That ought to do it.
Marc:Phase shifter and a telecaster.
Marc:What problems can't be solved with that?
Marc:... ... ...
Guest:guitar solo
Guest:Thank you.
Marc:Boomer lives.
Marc:Buster, come home, goddammit.