Episode 989 - Allison Janney
Guest: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 fuck nicks?
Marc:What's happening?
Marc:I'm Mark Marin.
Marc:This is my podcast.
Marc:WTF?
Marc:Welcome to it.
Marc:If you're new here, hang out for a minute.
Marc:Get to know some of the other people.
Marc:You don't have to.
Marc:You can talk if you want.
Marc:You can talk back.
Marc:to me and to my guest while you're listening.
Marc:You can get mad.
Marc:You can laugh.
Marc:Do whatever you need to do.
Marc:Just hang out and see if it works for you.
Marc:I'm not everybody's cup of tea, but that's okay.
Marc:That's a weird thing about getting older or getting more comfortable.
Marc:I don't know, but I'm not...
Marc:I'm not really competing with anybody anymore.
Marc:You know why?
Marc:Because who gives a fuck?
Marc:It takes too much energy to be jealous or compare yourself to other people.
Marc:Because if you're doing okay, if you're just doing okay, you're probably winning.
Marc:And I don't like to use the word winning.
Marc:First, I want to say that Allison Janney, the Allison Janney, Oscar award winning Allison Janney, one of the most amazing actresses and presences.
Marc:Is that a word?
Marc:Presences from the show.
Marc:She's on the show, Mom, but you've seen her in many movies.
Marc:She's in the West Wing.
Marc:She's been in a million things.
Marc:But Allison Janney is here.
Marc:All right.
Marc:Hey, look, I've got some announcements.
Marc:A couple of big breakthroughs, but mostly I'd like to tell the people of the UK and Ireland that I'm coming there in April.
Marc:I'll be at the Lowry in Salford.
Marc:April 4th, I'll be at the Royal Festival Hall back in London.
Marc:April 6th, I'll be at the Birmingham Rep on April 8th.
Marc:And on April 11th, I'll be back in Dublin at Vicar Street.
Marc:You can go to WTFPod.com slash tour for all the ticket info for the upcoming, I think, four or five more dates at the Dynasty Typewriter here in Los Angeles through February.
Marc:Those are Sundays at 7 o'clock.
Marc:So they're nicely positioned time-wise for those of you who need to get sitters or whatnot.
Marc:Those are on February 10th, February 17th, February 24th, and March 17th here in Los Angeles.
Marc:And then I got a couple of dates in Colorado coming up March 23rd at the Wheeler Opera House in Aspen and March 24th in Boulder.
Marc:I'll be doing a more extensive podcast
Marc:Club tour, preparing the hour, reaching out to the people, doing multiple shows in multiple cities before I do a few theaters here and there.
Marc:Keeping it light, not trying to kill myself or win some goddamn prize.
Marc:But those days will be forthcoming after I get done with shooting of the third season of Glow.
Marc:So there's that.
Marc:Something happened that that does sort of imply change is possible on all levels, but certainly personal.
Marc:And, yeah, I'm not I'm not thrilled about it, but it happened and it happened in a sort of a roundabout way in a theater.
Marc:So what is the dramatic change?
Marc:I've been doing a lot of comedy lately.
Marc:I finally broke some ground on some new kind of, you know, personally relevant bits, which is good doing the work on that.
Marc:I was at the comedy store last night.
Marc:And for some reason, Chevy Chase got on stage with no act at all.
Marc:Did nothing.
Marc:You know, it's sort of weird to see him, but like, you know, his I used to love him when I was a kid.
Marc:But, you know, over time, you start to realize, man, he seems to be a kind of cranky, nasty old fuck.
Marc:And I saw him sitting in the back of the room.
Marc:I didn't know why.
Marc:I thought maybe just lonely, wanted to come watch some comedy and judge.
Marc:But he got up there and he took questions for about 20 minutes and.
Marc:It was up and down, but it was one of those things where it's like, why did that just happen?
Marc:I guess he's Chevy Chase.
Marc:He can get up there and do what he needs to do.
Marc:But why did he want to do it?
Marc:I don't know.
Marc:It was it was very bizarre.
Marc:And it happened.
Marc:I saw it happen.
Marc:I was there and I was wandering around the back of the room going, what's going on?
Marc:What is going on?
Marc:What is happening right now?
Marc:75-year-old Chevy Chase is up there asking people to ask him questions in the original room at the Comedy Store.
Marc:I think people were happy to see him.
Marc:And, you know, that's what he did.
Marc:There were some moments, but it was just a bizarre thing where you're like, why did that happen?
Marc:This is not...
Marc:That was not life changing.
Marc:If anything, it was a little slightly sad.
Marc:But whatever.
Marc:All right.
Marc:So here's what happens.
Marc:And this is really what I wanted to talk about.
Marc:The change in my life is that I think I'm turning a corner on Steely Dan.
Marc:Hey, look, it's not a big it's I'm not dropping a bomb here.
Marc:Maybe I am.
Marc:I've been judgmental.
Marc:And maybe this might give a portal of hope to those people that are upset about my point of view about, you know, Marvel movies.
Marc:Maybe it's only a matter of time before as I get older and softer, before I start to to relent on my opinions about that.
Marc:But I was at a play, a play, say the L right, play.
Marc:that that was really the high point though i you know i don't go to theater much here in los angeles
Marc:But my friend and I'm going to call him that if I can now judge me, whatever.
Marc:I don't care.
Marc:My friend Tracy Letts has a play up here in Los Angeles at the Mark Taper Forum called Linda Vista.
Marc:And Mr. Letts, my buddy Tracy, set me and my buddy Duncan Birmingham up with a couple of tickets last week.
Marc:And we went and I got to say, I don't know how many of you have seen any of Tracy's plays.
Marc:I haven't seen enough of them.
Marc:I saw August Osage County, which was genius.
Marc:Won a fucking Pulitzer.
Marc:I talked to him about it.
Marc:But this Linda Vista play is fucking great.
Marc:And I do not understand why.
Marc:I've talked about this before.
Marc:You know, go to the theater.
Marc:It's right there.
Marc:I drove down on a Wednesday night and I parked on the goddamn street down there.
Marc:It was no hassle at all.
Marc:And I went in and I said, I did not know what to, I didn't know what to expect from this play, but man, it was for me, uh, it was relatable.
Marc:It was funny.
Marc:It had a great pace and it wasn't tragic.
Marc:It was, it was sad in parts, but ultimately buoyed by the, by the humanity of it and the comedy of it and the relatability of it.
Marc:It's very modern.
Marc:I don't want to give anything away.
Marc:Um,
Marc:But there's some nudity in the play, but it's not gratuitous.
Marc:It's kind of visceral and raw and necessary.
Marc:And it's a lot about relationships.
Marc:It's about who we think we are as people and how we interact with others.
Marc:And at the center of it is a cranky, smart, defensive, broken, self-involved man.
Marc:But there's a lot of women around.
Marc:There's a balance.
Marc:There are relevant themes in it about relationships between men and women, between men and men, between ourselves and ourselves, between us and others, people from other countries.
Marc:It's got it all, but it's all very confined, almost to three or four settings, an apartment in San Diego and...
Marc:A camera shop and a restaurant or two and a bedroom.
Marc:But it's like it just jams.
Marc:The language of it, the pace of it, the comedy of it.
Marc:And the main character, the guy who played the main guy was just great.
Marc:Everybody was great.
Marc:And it's a Tracy Let's Play, so it's got some punch, man.
Marc:But where's the big revelation?
Marc:Is that what you're asking?
Marc:Outside of having an amazing night at the theater, what changed?
Marc:I explained to you it was the Steely Dan.
Marc:How did it change?
Marc:Well, the main character in the play...
Marc:You like Steely Dan and they and in the play in transitions, they played like two or three bits of Steely Dan songs.
Marc:And I've been sort of weird and snobby about Steely Dan.
Marc:I've always felt that it was too sterile, too jazzy, too clean, too, you know, orchestrated.
Marc:The very tone of it, I found condescending.
Marc:but there was something about in between scenes, set, set, set changes.
Marc:They played just a bit of a pretzel logic and there, it just like, all of a sudden I realized like, wait, that's, there's a blues song in there.
Marc:I can hear it.
Marc:And I got home and I put on Pretzel Logic and I, of course, I know some of the songs on there, but I don't I've always just sort of been like, oh, OK, yeah, of course, I know that song.
Marc:I know the chorus was pounded into my head, but never I and I resented people that like Steely Dan because they really like them.
Marc:And it's almost like a fucking religion.
Marc:But I listened to it all, and I realized, like, that guitar is kind of a little dirty.
Marc:That's not alienating.
Marc:This is all right.
Marc:It might be better than all right.
Marc:It might be amazing.
Marc:I'm not going to give it that.
Marc:But the point is, I turned a corner.
Marc:I turned a corner on Steely Dan.
Marc:So, Allison Janney.
Marc:I was thrilled that Allison wanted to do the show because I'm a big fan.
Marc:She seems like an amazing person and an interesting person and somebody I wanted to talk to.
Marc:And I was excited to have the opportunity.
Marc:She's...
Marc:Currently in the show Mom, it's in its sixth season.
Marc:It's on CBS on Thursday nights.
Marc:She's also in the new movie Troop Zero, which has its world premiere at Sundance this Friday, February 1st.
Marc:And this is me talking to the truly amazing Allison Janney.
Guest:You know Phil Rosenthal.
Guest:I do know Phil Rosenthal.
Guest:So Phil Rosenthal invited me and my parents who are in town from Ohio.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:To a goose dinner tonight.
Guest:So today I text him and I go, what time's goose dinner?
Guest:And he goes, 5 p.m.
Guest:And I'm like, who is goose dinner at 5 p.m.?
Guest:So then I was like, I'm doing Marc Maron's podcast from 4 to 5.
Guest:I can't be there at 5.
Guest:And he said, well, see if he can do it earlier.
Guest:And I was like, well, I'll see.
Guest:But I think I'm just going to be a little late to goose dinner.
Marc:Where's goose dinner?
Marc:Is that like in Palisades or something?
Marc:No, he lives over in the Wilshire, mid-Wilshire area.
Marc:Yeah, I had him on years ago.
Marc:And I think it went okay.
Marc:Wait.
Guest:What happened?
Guest:He said to say hi.
Guest:No, no, no.
Marc:We're fine.
Marc:We're fine.
Marc:But I watched a documentary he made about traveling to Russia to sell everyone who loves Raymond to a global, anywhere he can.
Marc:And in the documentary, it was clear that his parents still lived in the house that he grew up in.
Marc:And I had this moment where I'm like, why don't you get him a house?
Marc:And he's like, they're fine.
Marc:They're fine.
Marc:And I just sort of like, yeah, I have a billion dollars.
Marc:Maybe you can get your folks a house.
Guest:I think that he finally did, by the way.
Marc:Oh, good.
Guest:Goose is nice.
Marc:It's very fatty.
Guest:I don't know.
Guest:I'm afraid it's going to be a little gamey.
Guest:I'm not a fan.
Guest:It's not gamey.
Guest:It's fatty.
Guest:It is.
Guest:Well, you've never had Goose?
Guest:I've never had Goose.
Guest:Really?
Guest:I've played Duck, Duck, Goose.
Guest:Sure.
Guest:I've been called Goose.
Guest:Been Goosed?
Guest:I've been Goosed.
Guest:Yeah, all those things.
Guest:But not in an office situation?
Guest:No, not in a office situation.
Guest:me too way you haven't been me too good um no good i've been listening to your pod i listen to it a lot you do yeah i do and um i was afraid to come on your podcast because i'm a i i feel like i'm a better listener than i am a talker um so if you really just talk to me for an hour and yeah i'm not to talk more about goose no i don't oh i'm done with the goose my goose is cooked i have one one goose story where like some
Marc:Years ago, it was Christmas and a drug dealer that knew everybody and was involved in everyone's life.
Guest:I can't believe a drug dealer is associated with a goose.
Marc:Yeah, no, he had a Christmas party or a birthday party for a guy I knew.
Marc:That is now a farmer in Nebraska, alcoholic farmer in Nebraska.
Marc:But they cooked a goose, but there was no plates.
Marc:So really, it feels like there was no knife, but there was this cooked goose that people were just going at.
Guest:Did you just pass it around and gnaw on it and rip it?
Marc:I don't think it was your traditional Christmas goose dinner.
Guest:No, that sounds very not traditional.
Guest:I used to have no utensil meals in college.
Guest:You did?
Guest:I went to Kenyon College in Ohio, and I don't know why we thought this was a fun thing to do.
Guest:We'd go to the diner in Mount Vernon, Ohio, and have breakfast, and you just couldn't use utensils.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:Oh, you had to use your hands no matter what?
Marc:It wasn't like a Moroccan-themed?
Marc:No, no.
Guest:It was a diner, diner.
Guest:You know, sunny-side up eggs, and you just had to eat everything with your hands.
Guest:You and your friends.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Was it a theater thing?
Marc:I don't know.
Guest:I don't know.
Guest:It was a stupid thing.
Guest:It was a really stupid thing.
Guest:One of those things you do in college.
Guest:Did you smoke?
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Guest:Yeah?
Guest:When did you give it up?
Guest:Who said I gave it up?
Guest:Oh, nice.
Guest:Good for you to hang in there.
Guest:Well, I'll tell you what.
No.
Guest:No quitter.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:No, I have.
Guest:I've been back and forth with that, and I just... Yeah.
Guest:I've quit so many times, and I'm reading for the fifth time Alan Carr's Easy Way to Stop Smoking.
Marc:Yeah, you got to read it again and again.
Guest:I'm reading it right now.
Guest:I have a stop date again.
Guest:But I did just have to play this role in this movie about Roger Ailes.
Guest:I had to play Susan Estrich, the Roger Ailes lawyer.
Guest:She's a feminist lawyer.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Activist.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Rape survivor.
Guest:Incredibly smart woman.
Guest:But she talks like this.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:So I was, you know, I was I was doing a movie like that.
Guest:So I can't I can't stop smoking now.
Guest:I got to, you know.
Guest:Did she smoke?
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Guest:But, you know, not on camera, obviously.
Guest:But you could tell that she smoked.
Guest:So I thought, I can't quit smoking now.
Guest:I've got to keep smoking because I've got to keep that voice going down.
Marc:For real.
Marc:You want it to be authentic.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Exactly.
Marc:And you still have it.
Marc:Good.
Guest:I can go down there, but.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Well, you know, if you keep smoking, you'll just have that voice.
Marc:I'm not going to.
Marc:I'm just going to have Paul Malls fall out of my mouth when I open up.
Marc:Paul Malls.
Marc:Strangely mild for the fact that they're not filterless is my recollection of them.
Marc:I've never smoked a Paul Mall.
Marc:What was your cigarette?
Marc:Oh.
Guest:What was?
Marc:Whatever.
Marc:Wherever you're at.
Guest:What did you start with?
Guest:I started with, for whatever reason, Tarrytons, because I'd rather fight than switch.
Guest:Would your folks smoke them?
Guest:No, no.
Guest:Actually, that's not true.
Guest:My first cigarette was my grandmother, who I blame.
Guest:She glamorized it all because she would go to the beach with her straw hats and her yarn around her hats and her shaker of martinis and her Marlboro Reds.
Marc:Yes, that's what I started with.
Guest:So I would steal, and she had them in her house in the little silver cups with the cigarettes everywhere back when it was like, you know?
Guest:And I'd steal a couple of those and take them to the beach, and we'd go under the boardwalk and smoke Marble Reds.
Guest:It was kind of, it was like so, I mean, God, that habit was so romanticized and so mischaracterized in everything it brings to you.
Guest:They really did a great job of marketing that.
Marc:And I still love them.
Marc:No matter what I know about them, my character on Glow smokes and I got to smoke those horrible herbals.
Marc:But you know what's nice about smoking?
Marc:When you get cast to smoke, you know how to do it.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Nothing worse than a smoker who doesn't know how to smoke.
Guest:But I actually told people how to do it because the trick is you never look at the cigarette.
Marc:That's how you look like a smoker.
Marc:Oh, yeah.
Marc:It's just part of your body.
Marc:You just don't look at it.
Marc:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Marc:It's so weird to have him back in my hand again.
Marc:Oh, God.
Marc:Marlboro Redzo.
Marc:I read just the other day that they were originally marketed to women before cowboys.
Guest:Really?
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:I don't know when that happened, but I'm reading a book about the making of the Wild Bunch and somehow it went on a tangent about Marlboro because of someone in the book.
Marc:And originally it was marketed to women and then they just shifted the complete other direction.
Guest:God, I wish, I wish, I can't even see what the visual was for that, for women.
Guest:I don't know, but God, they didn't.
Marc:What about that Fox movie?
Marc:How did it come out?
Marc:What are you feeling?
Guest:Well, I didn't, I didn't, I just finished, I think they wrapped today, actually.
Marc:Really?
Guest:Yeah, so it's not, it has to be edited and everything has to come out.
Guest:And I signed an NDA, so I can't talk about it.
Guest:At all.
Guest:Except for to say that I did it.
Guest:And what's his name?
Guest:Roach directed it?
Marc:Jay Roach directed it.
Guest:Jay Roach.
Guest:God, I love him.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:Have you met him or worked with him?
Marc:I met him on a plane once and I have not, I think he wanted to be on the show.
Marc:I should probably have him on the show, but I forgot.
Marc:You would like him.
Marc:He seemed like a nice guy.
Guest:He's a really smart, thoughtful guy as a director, as an actor.
Guest:The notes, I got to work with John Lithgow and we just were sitting together and Jay would come over and say something and John looked at me and said, everything he says I can use.
Guest:Really?
Guest:There's nothing he says that you can't use as an actor.
Guest:It's really extraordinary, and he's really gracious and supportive and appreciative of what you do as an actor.
Marc:Yeah, is it shot as a comedy?
Marc:No, it's, yeah.
Marc:You can't talk about it at all.
Marc:I mean, he's sort of a comedy director, so I was just wondering.
Guest:Yeah, no, this is not that.
Marc:Okay, fine.
Marc:I understand.
Guest:I'm not going to try.
Guest:I'm just looking at your bookshelf.
Marc:His son gave that to me.
Marc:Really?
Marc:I mean, look, I just stuck it up there.
Marc:I love it.
Marc:There's a few books, you know.
Guest:I love the book.
Guest:That's a book I would buy for its cover.
Marc:Exactly.
Guest:The Naked Mind of Buddy Hackett.
Marc:Yeah, these are just some of the books.
Guest:And all your guitars.
Guest:Guitars.
Marc:And then stashed over there, hidden is the...
Marc:recovery stack that's on the floor there.
Guest:Oh, I've got all my self-help books on the bottom of my shelf, too, like tons of them.
Guest:My mother sent me one every week when I was in college.
Guest:Oh, my God, that's hilarious.
Guest:I've got recovery books, too.
Guest:I've got everything.
Marc:I'll be honest with you.
Marc:I don't know if I should tell you.
Guest:What?
Marc:Well, I had, like, you know, Brolin was coming on, Josh.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:And I put my, I made sure I put my 12 and 12 up on this shelf so he would see it directly so he would, you know, start maybe talking about it.
Marc:Oh, my God.
Marc:You know what I mean?
Marc:Because you're not supposed to talk about it, but I do openly.
Marc:And, you know, it's like, you know, fuck it.
Marc:I mean, in my mind, it's like, you know, normalizing that thing is the best anyone can do.
Marc:I think so, too.
Marc:At this juncture, that tradition has to be re-thunk.
Guest:I agree.
Guest:I concur.
Marc:So now, Ohio, you went to Kenyon, but were you from there?
Guest:Well, I was born in Boston while my father was finishing at Harvard Business School.
Guest:Oh, that's fancy.
Guest:Fancy.
Guest:And then they moved to Cincinnati, Ohio.
Guest:And then to Dayton, Ohio.
Guest:And my father went into his grandfather's business, which was commercial real estate.
Guest:Oh, and he stayed in that?
Guest:And he stayed in that, even though in his heart, he's an artist.
Guest:He's a musician.
Marc:What's he play?
Guest:He's a jazz pianist and he plays guitar.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:He's just, my dad is 80 people.
Guest:Five, and he just, I bought him recumbent trike for the holidays while he's out here.
Guest:When I left, he was out on a bike trail somewhere, and he'll come home and play guitar for hours.
Guest:Really?
Guest:Yeah, he just still sits and takes the guitar.
Guest:And he's good?
Guest:He's really good.
Guest:His hands are, he's got some arthritis stuff, so the piano's a little harder for him, but he is, jazz piano is what he grew up doing.
Marc:And you grew up with that now?
Guest:Oh, every day.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I grew up with that kind of music.
Guest:Every morning, every night he'd come home.
Guest:And we used to joke that he'd learn to play the piano so he wouldn't have to talk to anybody because he really loves to just be at the party and be the guy who's making the music, but he doesn't have to do any small chat, any chit-chat, anything.
Guest:But the guitar now, he just...
Guest:Who was he?
Guest:He made me, I set up my Sonos system for him on his phone and he put on Jimmy Rainey.
Marc:That's his guy?
Guest:He's listening to right now, a guitarist that he's listening to.
Guest:What kind of jazz piano did he play?
Guest:Old timey?
Guest:He was like Fats Waller or Tatum, that kind of music.
Guest:It was really great to have that growing up.
Guest:That's nice.
Guest:And yet I didn't.
Guest:I mean, I learned to play the piano, but I didn't follow through on that.
Guest:Instead, I wanted to become a figure skater, and then I went into this, into acting, and then, you know, just, it never, my musical talent didn't come out of my fingers.
Marc:But it was an encouraging environment to be creative.
Guest:Yes, and to music.
Guest:Music is very much a big part of what I do when I act.
Guest:I always have to find music that helps me feel a certain way, whatever I have to feel in a scene.
Guest:Music helps me get anywhere I need to go.
Marc:So you can identify certain pieces of music that will make you have certain feelings?
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:And did your mom, was she a musician?
Guest:No, she was an actress.
Guest:She went to the American Academy of Dramatic Arts in New York City.
Guest:She did.
Guest:And she did Summerstock and was roommates with Rue McClanahan and Eileen Brennan.
Guest:They were her really good friends.
Guest:And she did plays with Tallulah Bankhead and Tony Lobianco.
Guest:But she was just like an apprentice at a summer stock when she did that.
Marc:Oh, and they were those guys, those older actors used to do the circuit, right?
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:They'd come out and do like a family friendly or fun show for a few weeks.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:So she was in those and got reviews for her great legs.
Guest:And one, I think that she saved that review, which was kind of fun to look at.
Guest:Tallulah Bankhead.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:I have no point of reference for her.
Marc:I know a lot of older actresses.
Marc:Do you?
Marc:Not really.
Marc:I know the name.
Marc:I know.
Guest:Tallulah Bankhead.
Guest:I can't think of one thing that she's in right now at all.
Guest:It's odd.
Guest:That makes me mad at myself.
Guest:But Eileen Brennan, of course, is one of my heroes.
Guest:You have to know her.
Marc:I think so.
Guest:And The Last Picture Show.
Marc:Oh, yeah.
Marc:Of course.
Marc:Oh, yeah.
Marc:She's great.
Marc:The Sting.
Guest:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Guest:She's private bench.
Guest:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Guest:She's just genius.
Guest:Is she still around?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:She is not.
Guest:But I grew up getting to go see Eileen in a play.
Guest:We'd go to Chicago because Eileen was in a play there, and we were kids, so my parents would take us to the... She's a friend of your mom still?
Guest:Yes.
Guest:Well, she was.
Guest:They remained friends throughout her life.
Guest:And, um, but so that's where I think I fell in love.
Guest:I knew my mother had been an actress and then I got to go see Eileen when I was a little girl and it was so sort of glamorous and romantic to get to stay up late and, you know, to have Eileen come visit after her night on stage.
Guest:And I just idolized her.
Guest:So I think that helped me, you know, make a, make a decision to become Dayton, Dayton, Ohio.
Guest:It's a real nice way to spend the day in Dayton, Ohio.
Guest:Oh,
Marc:Randy Newman.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:I love that song.
Marc:It's a great song.
Marc:Did your dad do any major architectural masterpieces?
Guest:No, but my great-grandfather did, Frank Hilsmith, the Dayton Art Institute, and they're a beautiful building.
Guest:He built it?
Guest:Oh, he didn't build it, but he helped make that come to fruition.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:But no, mostly my dad's just commercial real estate, nothing artistic there.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:But I suppose in the wheeling and dealing of, you know, contract, I don't know.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:I don't know about it either.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:But it's a big business.
Marc:They make strip malls and hotels and stuff.
Guest:He did have a, he housed a, he had a building that he was renting out to someone who had an, it was an ice skating rink.
Guest:So that's where I got to go skating.
Guest:So I got skating, free skating anytime I wanted.
Guest:And I wanted to become a figure skater.
Guest:And my mother would get up at, you know, five in the morning and take me to the rink.
Marc:Come on.
Guest:Yeah, I worked on my figures, the compulsory figures that figure skaters do.
Guest:You know, they trace, you know, figure eights and loops and things.
Guest:And that came in useful to get yourself an Academy Award.
Guest:Exactly.
Guest:It kind of did.
Guest:I mean, you know why it did?
Guest:Only because I knew the world of figure skating.
Guest:I knew what it took for a mother to get up at that hour and get her daughter to the rink and how expensive things were.
Guest:I felt like I had enough of a knowledge about it real firsthand that I felt, yeah, I can play that role.
Marc:So when you were there next to the ice in the rink, it was familiar?
Marc:Yeah, absolutely.
Marc:How long did you do that for?
Guest:I only did it for maybe three or four years, and then I had this accident where I went to a play class window.
Guest:On skates?
Guest:No.
Guest:It seems like something would take some work.
Guest:Much better story.
Guest:I was going in for a triple axel, and I swung too far.
Guest:Flew out of the ring and through the play class door of the ring.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:No, it was at a party.
Guest:I'll tell you the true story because I don't tell everyone this true story.
Marc:Is there a falsehood out there?
Guest:There is.
Guest:Okay.
Guest:I just graduated from high school to a very exclusive boarding school in Lakeville, Connecticut called Hotchkiss.
Guest:Oh, really?
Guest:My father had gone there.
Guest:Prep school?
Guest:Yeah, prep school.
Guest:His father went there.
Guest:My brothers went there.
Guest:It was like one of those things.
Guest:Legacy.
Guest:And I was like one of the first group of women to go through there.
Guest:I graduated, and they were throwing a party for me at home at a friend's house.
Guest:And there was a band, and there were parents and kids, and someone had just given me my first Quaalude.
Guest:Oh, good.
Guest:Which may have saved my life, because here's how I figure that.
Guest:Slow down your heart.
Guest:Maybe.
Guest:I don't know.
Guest:Yeah, because I lost three quarters of my blood.
Guest:Like I did almost.
Guest:Oh, my God.
Guest:It was, you know, and we were playing this game where the girls had balloons tied around their ankles and you were in a couple and you tried to pop the other couple's balloons.
Guest:Wow.
Guest:Okay.
Marc:I wish I could say like, oh, of course.
Marc:No one's ever played that game.
Guest:Right.
Guest:And I was cheating.
Guest:I had a strapless long dress on and I had it tied around my knee so no one could pop my balloon.
Guest:And so we were the last two couples and this guy was furiously trying to step on my dress and it ripped it and it started to fall off.
Guest:And I was in front of all these people and I picked up my dress and ran to go in through the porch sliding doors and some of them were open and some of them weren't.
Guest:And I just...
Guest:Crashed into it.
Guest:Oh, my God.
Guest:And the glass fell onto my leg, which is where I lost... You cut the big one?
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Guest:My right leg.
Guest:Less artery tendons.
Guest:It was crazy.
Guest:Oh, God.
Guest:And all I could do is I turned to the band.
Guest:It's right there.
Guest:And they're all like...
Guest:their jaws on the floor and I'm like and I'm thinking that I just cut my finger and I'm just saying keep playing keep playing keep playing I'm so embarrassed that I've stopped the party guy please keep playing and then I turned around and I looked at everyone in the party just staring at me and it was like slow motion and I thought okay
Guest:okay, this is a movie, and I'm going to scream, and I'm going to faint, and I'm going to die.
Guest:And I remember thinking that.
Guest:And so I screamed, and I remember falling, and I remember just seeing a lot of people's faces come in over the top of my head, like seeing people with drinks and cigarettes looking over to look at my face, and it was the weirdest thing.
Guest:And then the hospital people came, the ambulance.
Guest:There's blood all over?
Guest:There's blood all over.
Guest:I lost three quarters of my blood.
Marc:Oh, my God.
Guest:It was crazy.
Guest:It was a crazy...
Guest:accident that happened to me in my life i was in the hospital for seven weeks i missed my first year of of college i just took had to take a year off to to and again this this this helped you do uh the film margaret oh yeah see life into art yep exactly god did i talk about yeah that was uh yeah for that for that fucking one scene that was
Guest:Kenny Lonergan is one of my favorite writers on the planet.
Guest:I just, I laid in a pool of blood on Broadway and 74th street for the whole day because I was covered in blood and they were like, well, we're going to take a break.
Guest:Do you want to?
Guest:And I was like, what am I going to do?
Guest:Go to crafty?
Guest:And I'm like, I can't, I'm just going to stay here.
Guest:Just give me a pillow.
Marc:Stay there with a teamster.
Guest:And I lay on the, on Broadway for the whole, like for the whole day.
Marc:With your fake leg, like over a few feet away.
Marc:Yeah, exactly.
Marc:That scene was so fucking leveling.
Guest:That movie, yeah, that scene was... And that's Kenny.
Guest:Kenny directed me in the... I didn't know what to do.
Guest:I had no idea.
Guest:Like, how do you... And he was like, be mad now.
Guest:He just kept giving me different things to be.
Marc:Oh, for each piece?
Guest:Just giving me different directions.
Guest:Because I think in his mind that that experience must be very... Obviously disorienting, but... Dying.
Guest:Dying.
Guest:Yeah.
Yeah.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:It's more than that.
Guest:I don't know.
Guest:I just know that his direction helped me.
Guest:Don't.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:No, no.
Guest:Be mad now and be.
Marc:But did you have with the same lines or was it with the same lines?
Marc:Okay.
Marc:Same line.
Marc:Okay.
Guest:So you just do different takes.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I'm not a great, uh, improviser, uh, except for maybe at the end of scenes, I'll come up with something to say in the silence.
Guest:If they let the camera keep rolling, then I'm like, I'll come up with something.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:I love it.
Marc:But that, that, that scene sort of like is the whole movie.
Marc:The whole movie is built around you getting hit by a bus.
Guest:Which is exactly what Kenny told me when he said, when he tried to get me to come from LA to do it.
Guest:And he said, it's just this, it's a really pivotal scene.
Guest:It's one scene, but, but, but you know, it will, it will never get cut.
Guest:You were in the movie and that's what the whole movie is about.
Guest:It focuses on that incident.
Guest:So it's really important to me.
Guest:Please come do it.
Guest:And I said, I will, I will do it.
Guest:I will do it for you.
Marc:Did you like the movie?
Guest:It's incredible.
Marc:It really is.
Guest:It's a masterpiece.
Guest:It really is.
Guest:The first post 9-11 masterpiece, I think.
Marc:Yeah, and I talked to him about it, and I don't know which version I saw, because now I'm thinking I just spent two and a half, three hours, and I might have watched the wrong version.
Guest:Watched the short version, yeah.
Guest:I don't know if I've seen the uncut version, actually.
Marc:But I thought everyone was so fucking good, and the other woman who plays your friend,
Marc:Now I'm forgetting her name.
Marc:Elaine May's daughter.
Guest:Oh, you're talking about Jeannie Berlin.
Marc:Exactly.
Guest:Yes.
Guest:And J. Smith Cameron.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Who's Kenny's wife.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:She's brilliant.
Marc:She's great.
Marc:I love her.
Marc:But you didn't get to work with them because you're dead.
Marc:No, right.
Marc:Everybody's talking about you, but you're dead.
Marc:You're long gone.
Marc:Yep.
Marc:Dead.
Yep.
Marc:But a great movie.
Marc:So you go through a plate glass window.
Marc:Do you almost die?
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:Is that what happens?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Three quarters of your blood.
Marc:Three quarters of your blood.
Guest:Did you see, like... I just know that in the ambulance, I was really irritated because they kept slapping my face.
Guest:Stay awake.
Guest:Stay awake.
Guest:They didn't want me to slip into a coma, so they kept asking me all these stupid questions.
Guest:But I didn't tell them I had a Quaalude.
Guest:Oh.
Guest:I didn't tell them.
Marc:See how deep shame runs?
Marc:I was so- Your wife could have hinged on it, but- I didn't tell them that.
Marc:You don't want to cop to it.
Marc:Is this the first time you've really talked about that the Quaalude was involved?
Guest:I'm sorry.
Guest:Yeah, I think it is.
Marc:Well, good.
Marc:How does it feel?
Marc:Do you feel like a burden has been lifted?
Guest:Not really.
Guest:I mean, I don't know.
Guest:I wish there were more.
Guest:I would kind of like to try one without going through a play class window.
Guest:Can't get them anymore.
Guest:I don't think it's the reason I went through the play class window.
Guest:I think it may have, I don't know.
Marc:Kept you loose.
Marc:Kept you loose.
Marc:Yeah, yeah.
Marc:Could have been worse maybe.
Marc:It sounds like it was pretty bad.
Marc:It was pretty bad.
Marc:Maybe the clay would stop you from cutting your neck open.
Marc:But if you want to look at it that way, but it doesn't sound like it got off easy.
Guest:No, I kind of want to, let's do our like a jaws thing here and compare scars.
Guest:There's my scar here.
Guest:See, it goes like this and it went all the way down and cut across here and cut the tendons.
Guest:And so my foot, I can't lift up my toes on that.
Marc:Oh, now?
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:My foot's really fucked.
Marc:So that's what got us there, is the end of your figure skating career.
Guest:The end of my figure skating career was that.
Guest:And then, yeah, and then I went to Kenyon.
Guest:And my freshman year at Kenyon College, that's when they had built this beautiful new thrust stage theater called the Bolton Theater.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And they had Paul Newman, who was a graduate of Kenyon, he was coming back to direct the first play in the new theater.
Guest:And you're a freshman?
Guest:I was a freshman, and I got in that production, and I got to be, I mean, there were just chorus girl parts for the women in that.
Guest:It was called C.C.
Guest:Pyle and the Bunyan Derby.
Guest:Why that play?
Guest:It was a new play that Michael Christopher, who had just won the Pulitzer Prize for Shadowbox, he wrote this play for Paul to direct, because Paul and Michael Christopher and Joanne Woodward, they're all friends.
Guest:In Westport, hanging around.
Guest:Yeah, sure, sure.
Guest:And so they asked Michael to write this play, and he did, and it was the only production ever done at Kenyon.
Guest:And I got cast in it and started a friendship with Joanne and Paul.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:As an 18, 19-year-old?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:It was pretty great.
Guest:They took to you?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Paul said, if you ever need a favor, you let me know.
Guest:He said, it has to be very specific, so don't waste it.
Guest:But if you have a favor, I want to help you out.
Guest:And I never asked him for it because I kept judging my favors.
Guest:I was like, that's not a good enough one.
Marc:Oh, really?
Marc:What were some of the options?
Guest:I don't even know.
Guest:Can you get me an acting career?
Guest:It took me forever.
Guest:I didn't start working until I was 38.
Guest:So I had a lot of years in New York where I was just doing- 38?
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:So you're dealing with Paul Newman in what year is that?
Guest:That's 78, 79, somewhere else.
Marc:Wow.
Marc:So, like, he was still, like, it was sort of the new, you know, older Paul Newman doing movies.
Marc:Was that around the time of the verdict, maybe?
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:What a great movie.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:But what kind of guy was that guy?
Guest:Oh, he was extraordinary.
Guest:He was so... He was a...
Guest:I love to watch the way he directed because he loved actors.
Guest:He loved talking about acting.
Guest:He did.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:He really loved the whole process.
Guest:He loved directing.
Guest:He would sit and he would watch a scene going on and then he wouldn't direct from out in the auditorium.
Guest:He'd get up on the stage and put his arm around whoever he wanted to talk to and give a note to.
Guest:And so it became this private relationship you'd have with Paul.
Guest:And I kind of loved it as an actor, too.
Guest:Like, I don't want to know what you're being told to do if I'm doing a scene with you, Mark.
Guest:And it's kind of cool to not know what the director told you to do and see how it affects me.
Guest:And he just, he was, he really, I just was impressed by how much he loved actors and acting.
Marc:Yeah, yeah.
Marc:I was just thinking of a moment I had.
Marc:I don't, I'm new to really sort of.
Guest:You're great in Glow.
Guest:Well, thank you very much.
Guest:You really are.
Guest:I love the show.
Guest:Chris Lowell's a friend of mine.
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Guest:And I think the show's amazing.
Guest:Well, thank you.
Marc:I think you're a really good actor.
Marc:I appreciate that.
Marc:You know, I think if it's in my wheelhouse, I can do it.
Marc:But here's what happened to just talk to your story, which is better.
Marc:in terms of not knowing what the director is directing other actors to do, is I did a very short walk and talk scene with Robert De Niro in this new Joker movie.
Marc:I'm going at it with De Niro, and it's cut, and then I see De Niro walk over to Todd, and I'm like, oh.
Marc:And Todd comes up to me and goes, hey man, like I didn't see him talking to De Niro.
Marc:He goes, you're coming in a little hot.
Marc:I'm like, okay, okay, yeah, okay, I'll take it down, I'll take it down.
Guest:I'm a little jacked up.
Guest:I guess, I mean, but you'd hope that the director would, if the director wanted you to do that, he would do that.
Guest:But I understand him going that route.
Guest:No, that's the right route.
Marc:That's the right route.
Guest:But yeah, I've seen that before, too, in a scene.
Guest:I see someone going to the director and I'm like, my cackles go up.
Guest:I'm like, what the?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:You know, Brad Whitford always says this funny thing.
Guest:He says, when an actor gets a note, the first thing he thinks is, fuck you.
Guest:Yeah, right.
Guest:And then it's like, I suck.
Guest:And then the third thought is, how can I please you?
Marc:You guys worked together forever.
Guest:Yeah, well, I keep thinking it was seven years.
Guest:Maybe West Wing was six years.
Guest:I can't even remember anymore.
Marc:It feels like it was on my entire life.
Marc:Oh, my God, yeah.
Guest:I did, I mean, if I added up all my personal time in those six or seven years, I probably had an hour of free time.
Guest:I mean, those hours were, I mean, do you have them on GLOW?
Guest:Do you have those hours?
Guest:Crazy?
Marc:12, 13 hours.
Marc:We're not, I mean, they usually make their days, give or take an hour.
Marc:So, like, you know, we're not going much over 12 hours, but, you know, some days, yeah.
Marc:And you're dealing with a lot of people when you have the big cast thing.
Marc:And everyone's got to be there, even if it's just to go, can I leave?
Marc:You know, even if it's one line, you're still there.
Marc:Oh, and we were in the, we called it the awful office because it was just, you would be in there for hours.
Guest:And the trick was to place yourself in the scene where you'd have to be in the least amount of coverage.
Guest:And that became the game.
Guest:You had that choice?
Guest:It was, well, you justified your care.
Guest:No, I think that CJ would be standing here because she needs to be close to the door in case there's emergency, whatever we would like.
Guest:In case CJ, in case Allison needs to go home early.
Guest:Because Allison has a party she wants.
Guest:to go to.
Guest:She has a plane she has to catch.
Guest:Oh, Dulé was really good at that.
Guest:Dulé Hill was really good at placing himself to get out of a scene.
Marc:You're like five feet away from all the other actors.
Marc:There's no reason for like an over the other person shot.
Marc:No overs.
Marc:I'm alone over here.
Marc:You don't tie me.
Guest:I'm not tied into anyone.
Guest:You're free to go shoot around.
Marc:Didn't the director ever come in and go like, why is everyone standing against the wall?
Marc:but 38 so wait so you were now your relationship with with paul yeah and well joanne but you went through all four years of kenyon i did and you stayed in theater you but you got what a liberal arts degree theater history major but but you were doing the acting but that you couldn't major in it as an undergrad
Guest:No.
Marc:Right.
Marc:No.
Guest:And then did you do graduate?
Guest:No.
Guest:Well, I went to the neighborhood playhouse school in New York, which is not just an acting two year acting program that Joanne Woodward had gone to.
Guest:And she said, you should come to New York and go to the neighborhood playhouse.
Guest:So I ended up going there, but not because I filled out.
Guest:I don't know what my deal is, but I didn't fill out the application.
Guest:My friend Allison filled out my application for the Playhouse and sent it in.
Guest:And so I got a letter saying I was accepted and I didn't apply.
Guest:Right.
Guest:So things like that have happened in my life when people do things for me because they know that I'm a procrastinator and I'm lazy.
Marc:Was it procrastinating or were you just sort of like you did?
Guest:I was probably afraid to go to New York and try to be an actor.
Marc:From Ohio?
Guest:Yeah, I didn't think I would.
Guest:I just didn't think.
Guest:I didn't know what I was going to do.
Marc:Were you keeping in touch with them throughout college?
Marc:This is pre-email, like with the Newmans.
Guest:No, I mean, after that play was a pretty big thing for all of us, and we spent a lot of time with them.
Marc:What did you learn from him during that, aside from being an intimate director?
Guest:I played pool with him.
Guest:I got to drive his Datsun 280Z.
Marc:So you learned how to drive a stick with Paul Newman?
Guest:No, I had a, actually that was how I got, I auditioned for the play and my grandmother had just given me a Scirocco.
Marc:Oh yeah, the Volkswagen Scirocco.
Marc:A 1978 Scirocco.
Guest:I had a navy blue Scirocco stick shift.
Guest:Were there stripes?
Guest:No.
Marc:Okay.
Guest:navy blue with tan interior oh nice yeah and i um i talked about my drive from dayton ohio to to kenyon college and how i could cut off this amount of time if i drove over the speed limit on the stretch and whatever i thought i was appealing to i knew he was a race car driver and i thought this your scirocco stories would really charm i don't know if that's what it was or if i i just had the baby fat of a you know 1930s 20s i don't even remember what the
Marc:But part of the audition was driving?
Marc:No, you just had to tell a story.
Guest:They just said, get up on stage and tell a story.
Guest:And you were appealing to his, you know.
Guest:I was appealing to his race car driving interests.
Guest:And it worked?
Guest:Well, it did.
Guest:I got cast.
Guest:I don't know if that was it or if it was my good looks or, you know.
Marc:Maybe you just did a good job acting.
Marc:Maybe you had that thing.
Marc:Maybe I did.
Marc:But what was his, like, approach to, like, talking about actors?
Marc:Because, like, he's sort of a method dude, right?
Yeah.
Guest:I don't know if he's methody methody, but... I thought he was the Strasburg guy, no?
Marc:What do I know?
Guest:I don't know which one he was.
Guest:I mean, Joanne was definitely part of the group theater, but I don't know about Paul so much.
Guest:I just know that he liked talking about acting and choices, and I think he was more into the cerebral part of it.
Guest:Joanne came to it from the Playhouse.
Marc:So what is that?
Marc:So you graduate college and you go to New York.
Marc:You tell your parents, I'm going to New York.
Marc:I'm going to be at the Playhouse after your friend Allison gets you in.
Guest:I know.
Guest:She gets me in and I go and they're like, okay, sure.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:What is that thing?
Marc:I remember seeing it.
Marc:What was the actual, what was that Playhouse?
Guest:The neighborhood playhouse was, it was on 54th Street, 2nd and 3rd, somewhere there, a big red door.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Like a town, four-story building, and they taught, a lot of Virginia taught elocution, and there was breath, there was a little of that breath work.
Marc:So it was a school.
Guest:It was a school, yeah, a two-year program.
Guest:They had 100 students in the first year, and then 24 in the second year.
Guest:Right.
Guest:um oh everyone so really you get there's that big there's that big a cut yeah holy shit and you learned about emotional preparation and you learned about i mean there's some things that just are terrible because you learn to sort of disrespect the word the words oh right just any script your script you sort of they tell you to throw it don't worry about the script it's all about the emotion really do you think the opposite is true now
Guest:Yeah, but it's learning to work with the emotion.
Guest:It's a good process to go through to not think of the script.
Marc:So read it and think what's feeling.
Guest:So you could say a line, like if the line was, I hate you, you don't necessarily have to say it like, I hate you.
Guest:You could be like...
Guest:I hate you.
Guest:You'd be happy.
Guest:I mean, it just taught you to just disconnect from the script and have an emotional life aside from it.
Guest:And then you marry the two later.
Guest:But it takes you years to come to that, I think.
Marc:Do you do the action verb thing or the action words for each sentence of the script?
Marc:What you're trying to do?
Marc:No.
Guest:I don't do any of that crap.
Guest:I don't know what I... I don't do...
Guest:I just... Yeah, you've been doing it a long time and you do it.
Guest:Just in that moment I do it, I don't... And I always feel bad when I see someone's script.
Guest:I've got all these things written all over it and I look at mine and there's like absolutely nothing.
Guest:So you don't even highlight the name?
Guest:Well, that I started doing just to look like I was like, you know, we're going to remember... This is my line.
Guest:highlighting and then scribbling something to look like and xing and putting arrows and like exclamation point and um but i don't i don't know i just know i i do it as i feel it rehearse it and then i know what it is or maybe i don't maybe sometimes i don't even know what i'm doing right i'm doing it yeah and and it's working so i don't have to that's what i hate having to talk about what i do after is like i have no idea right what i'm doing and and this i don't know how to break it apart or tell you i just you did a lot
Guest:of it and you do a lot of it and you work a lot so i mean it's like eventually you've you it's your job yeah yeah it's just my job yeah but but the neighborhood playoffs do they put on shows as well well for the second year students you do to showcase to you know get agents to to come and is that what you did i did i didn't get an agent out of it though really
Guest:Yeah, I think I was just, I was too tall and too, not pretty enough to be an ingenue, too weird.
Guest:Like, I had to cry to get older before I started working.
Marc:But wait, so what did you do from age 22 to 38 or whatever?
Marc:Oh, God.
Marc:I mean, like, you're telling me, really, that you didn't... Well, I did, honey, I did, well, honey, sweetheart.
Guest:It's okay.
Guest:Baby.
Marc:Yeah, all of those.
Marc:What's your name again?
Guest:Mark.
Marc:Marin.
Marc:Mark.
Marc:Marin.
Guest:I'm talking to you.
Guest:I did, I...
Guest:I did.
Guest:I did.
Guest:Okay, let me tell you.
Guest:I scooped ice cream on Spring Street.
Guest:I worked as a nighttime receptionist at a recording studio, which I say, which I actually was a drug dealer there because I didn't know it, but I was... People were dropping things off.
Guest:...and dropping things off for the nighttime session musicians.
Guest:Like, oh, Mr. So-and-so, here this came for you for, you know... Is there a Mr. So-and-so?
Marc:Are you hiding someone's name?
Guest:Yes, I'm hiding someone's name.
Guest:I'll tell you after.
Guest:Because you'll probably know.
Guest:I don't know.
Guest:Any of them.
Guest:But it was kind of crazy to realize that.
Guest:And I didn't tell my parents that, of course.
Guest:Do they know about the Quaalude?
Guest:They don't.
Marc:Oh, good.
Marc:Well, I'm glad you told me.
Marc:They're just down the street, wherever they are.
Guest:They're not going to listen to this.
Marc:Probably not.
Marc:My dad hasn't.
Marc:Are you serious?
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Really?
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:And not one of the 900.
Marc:Come on.
Marc:I mean, he's just lying to you.
Marc:Maybe he is.
Marc:That's true.
Marc:Maybe he is.
Guest:I don't know.
Guest:Is he that kind of guy?
Guest:Is he secretly proud of you?
Marc:No, he's proud of me.
Marc:Yeah, no, he's definitely proud of me.
Marc:I don't know what he's doing.
Marc:You talk about your dad playing guitar.
Marc:My dad sits around going like, I just don't want to do anything.
I just don't want to do anything.
Marc:He's got all this time on his hands, but he can't figure out one fucking thing to do.
Marc:Except complain about not wanting to do anything.
Marc:What did he do for his life?
Marc:He was a surgeon.
Guest:He was a surgeon?
Marc:He was a surgeon.
Guest:God, couldn't he knit or something?
Guest:I don't know if that'll do it.
Marc:He retired.
Marc:He tried a lot of weird things.
Marc:He became a postman for a while because he thought, I don't know, I think he had some weird idea that he would be socializing with people as a mailman.
Marc:And then he worked at Walmart for a minute.
Guest:How old is he?
Guest:Is he like my 80s?
Marc:He just turned 80.
Guest:Oh, he's younger than my folks or five years older.
Guest:So he needs to be doing something.
Marc:Yeah, I don't know.
Guest:Get him a guitar.
Guest:Does he play a guitar?
Marc:It's tough.
Marc:He sits around.
Marc:He does weird research online.
Marc:He watches the wrong kind of television.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:What's the wrong kind of television?
Marc:Fox.
Marc:He watches Fox.
Marc:Oh, the wrong kind of television.
Marc:But he's never been... He doesn't know much about politics, but I think he likes the anger of it and the focus of the personalities.
Marc:And he tends to think it's real news.
Marc:And then he gets on the phone with me and starts talking, doing Fox talking points.
Marc:And I'm like, I'm not even going to do this with you because you don't know what you're saying.
Marc:And then I'll explain to him that there are three branches of government and that there's a legislative branch and a...
Marc:And then he's like, okay, maybe you're right.
Marc:I don't really know what I'm talking about.
Marc:And your mom?
Marc:She's in Florida.
Marc:She's all right.
Marc:So when your dad is?
Marc:Yeah, he's in New Mexico in Albuquerque where I grew up.
Marc:Everyone's better off that he's got his life there and his wife.
Marc:And we're all very grateful that she has him covered.
Guest:Okay.
Guest:Okay.
Guest:Copy that.
Guest:Copy that.
Guest:But that worries me.
Guest:I want to think about your dad just sitting there.
Marc:His hobby is complaining.
Marc:That's what he does.
Marc:That's his thing.
Marc:Worrying and complaining.
Marc:I feel like I'm this close to that.
Marc:Really?
Guest:I don't want to go.
Guest:I don't want to go to Mark Martin's pod.
Marc:Yeah, I know.
Marc:Where is it?
Marc:Where is it?
Marc:What time?
Marc:Can we do it earlier?
No.
Guest:Phil Rosenthal has a goose.
Guest:No, I was really excited about coming to talk to you, although intimidated because of all your, you know... Anna Faris said you didn't want to do it.
Guest:Well, she said that because she... No, it's not entirely false.
Guest:I didn't want to do it because I didn't... Because I was intimidated and didn't... As I said, I didn't want to... I'm like a better listener and I feel like I don't have a... Well, whatever.
Marc:I don't want to go down the self-pity thing.
Marc:I was intimidated.
Marc:Really?
Marc:Come on.
Marc:I was...
Marc:Allison Janney's coming over, and all I know is what I know from watching you work.
Marc:I didn't know which character you would be when you came here, and most of them were scary.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:You're like, which one is she really?
Marc:Because there's a few that I really don't think I could talk to.
Guest:Oh, my God.
Guest:You're right.
Guest:Okay.
Guest:I get that.
Guest:I get that.
Guest:I get that.
Guest:But I hate when people think that they're going to be talking to CJ and I'm not that thing.
Marc:But somehow or another, you've managed to transcend that, which is impossible.
Marc:I imagine there's plenty of people that still see you as her, but I didn't watch the West Wing.
Marc:I'm one of those people.
Marc:So, to me, you've always been that actress.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:yeah and then at some point you were like that's alison janney she's amazing but for about a decade you were that oh that lady that lady from the that tall lady from the from american beauty and i remember seeing her in little things right yeah and then she yeah yeah that's right martin sheen calls me the big lady oh really he could he was terrible names and he knows my name now but but but he would call me the big lady how did you teach him your name by walking up going alison i called him pumpkin head until he
Marc:He learned until he said my name.
Marc:I know it was a great show, but I don't know what years were that because I was probably not watching television.
Guest:I think it was 2000 to 2006.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:No, I don't know what I was doing, but TV wasn't part of it.
Marc:That's all right.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:I was busy trying to be a comedian.
Guest:A lot of people are coming to it now because it's so great.
Marc:Relevant.
Guest:It's an antidote to what's going on now.
Marc:Can we have that one?
Marc:Why can't Martin Shee be president?
Marc:Why can't he?
Marc:Oh, God.
Marc:What a mess.
Marc:Oh, my God.
Marc:All right.
Marc:So you're scooping ice cream.
Marc:You're a drug middleman.
Guest:Yep.
Guest:Middlewoman.
Guest:And I'm in a lot of theater companies.
Guest:That was big.
Guest:Big theater companies, the Red Earth Ensemble, the Facts in New York, the Shadow Facts Company.
Guest:And then Joanne started the group, the Actors Group of New York, otherwise known as Agony.
Guest:We had that.
Guest:So we just did plays and tried to get people to come see them, tried to get agents to come see them.
Guest:And I had, you know, my terrible agent stories where people had said, you're too, you're not...
Guest:pretty you're too tall what are we going to do with you aliens and lesbians and all that kind of stuff i had aliens and lesbians those are the options yep wow apparently and um and i just stuck it out i just um you know i i i went to the johnson o'connor institute to do aptitude tests to figure out what else i could do because nothing was happening and what came out figure skater no well i a systems analyst
Guest:What does that even mean?
Guest:What do they do?
Guest:Well, my understanding is that someone hires them and they go into a company and go, oh, I see.
Guest:This is what's wrong.
Guest:You need to do this.
Guest:Move this person over here.
Guest:They see what's wrong and fix it.
Marc:Fixers, I guess.
Marc:So you got the control freak diagnosed?
Guest:No, I feel like they didn't know what to do with me.
Guest:They looked at, I envision these people in a room that were like, what are we going to tell her?
Guest:I don't know, because I just, I can't imagine, I can't do anything.
Guest:Tell her she'll be, that's easy systems now.
Guest:Yeah, it's vague.
Guest:Yeah, and I didn't, I don't know.
Guest:And then I think the next day I got a job understudying Kate Nelligan and Faith Prince and Terrence McNally's bad habits at the Manhattan Theater Club.
Guest:And that was a huge thing for me to get.
Guest:That was your first job?
Guest:That was my first job after I was going to quit for the last time.
Guest:I was really going to go back.
Marc:In these theater companies, did you come across people that you now know that are big actors?
Marc:Because I know there were people that had theater companies.
Marc:I don't think a lot of people went on to do it.
Marc:It's tough.
Marc:Long haul.
Marc:Tough racket.
Marc:If I were something else I could have done, I would have done it.
Marc:Yeah?
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Isn't it weird when you're possessed by something and then it's too late to do anything else?
Yeah.
Marc:Yeah, what am I going to... You just come up blank where you're like, I could always... Oh, no.
Marc:It's too late.
Guest:I know.
Guest:I'm at that age now where I just realized, oh, yeah, there's nothing else.
Guest:Even at 38, it was like, wow.
Guest:That's scary.
Guest:I can't do that anymore.
Guest:I can't do that anymore.
Marc:So what was the big break outside of being Kate Mulligan's understudy?
Guest:I got to say, okay, getting my first Broadway show was Present Laughter with Frank Langella that I did at the Walter Kerr Theater.
Marc:Oh, that's big.
Guest:Which is where Springsteen was doing his show, which was so cool for me to think.
Guest:But anyway, that's where I had my Broadway debut in that theater.
Guest:Frank Langella?
Guest:Frank Langella.
Guest:He's a powerhouse.
Guest:Yeah, he is.
Guest:I was terrified of him.
Guest:Terrified, convinced I was going to get fired.
Guest:Every day of rehearsal, I was... It was just the two of you?
Guest:No, it was a big cast.
Guest:But I had to play his ex-wife and we're the lead relationship in the play.
Guest:And I was so terrified of him.
Guest:And since...
Guest:you know i i got through that awful awful um phase but it was really and my my younger brother hal was the one who saved me with that because he was he he brought up that movie the gene hackman the hoosiers you know when they take the small town team to the big town it's like look it's the same size basketball um court yeah right right measurements the same relationship to that and my brother was like that's all it is just because it's broadway doesn't you know it's the same relationship but you got an audience you got a stage you do it
Guest:And it did.
Guest:It did kind of work.
Guest:Calm me down.
Guest:Help me help me get over the bad part of it.
Guest:And once that once I was out there, you forget how much the audience, as much as I'm afraid of them, they really bring a lot to, you know, booing you up.
Guest:Like you got.
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Marc:It's like that's what you do it for.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Like, you know, like I imagine after a week when you're actually doing the run, you're like, holy shit.
Guest:this is the way I wanted to do this yeah it was kind of fun I wish it had been fun going back to Broadway I went to do Six Degrees of Separation last or 2017 in the spring of 2017 yeah no good no it was just I had stage fright like crazy I was like no no no no what I haven't come all this way to have this bullshit no this is terrible it was really it was just no I hated it
Marc:I'm laughing at something that... Do you know Harper, David, the actor from Stranger Things?
Marc:It was just that moment where he would... We were talking about when you're about to go on stage and you're freaked out.
Marc:And you've done it a million times, but for some reason there's that moment where you don't think you know any of it.
Marc:He just had this moment where he's like two lines away from his entrance and he goes, Somebody give me a script!
LAUGHTER LAUGHTER
Guest:i have lived that i have lived that moment i have many times oh it's horrifying it's terrifying right before when i had to go on for kate nelligan when i in bad habits i actually had to go on you did and the show starts with a big crack of of of thunder and lightning effect yeah and i'm and you have to i have to walk out on stage in that thunder lightning and the thunder goes and i'm like what's my first line what's my first line i'm screaming like literally didn't know and i had
Guest:to walk out.
Guest:I'm like, I don't know what it is.
Guest:I don't know what it is.
Guest:And the lights came up and it was there.
Guest:It came out.
Guest:It just came out.
Guest:But I was... The worst.
Guest:Oh my God.
Guest:Because that's the one that you need to get in.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:If you don't have that, you can't get in.
Guest:Oh my God.
Guest:Why did we... It's terrifying.
Guest:Awful, awful, awful.
Guest:I felt like... I mean, not to bring up politics because I don't want to talk about it.
Guest:But that meeting with Pelosi and Schumer and Pence and Trump in the... When Pence is sitting there, I was like, that is my actor's nightmare right there.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:It's like, I'm in a play, but I forget what my lines are.
Guest:I don't even know if I'm in the scene, but I'm out here on stage.
Guest:It just embodied everything that I fear about being on stage and not knowing.
Marc:It's terrible.
Marc:Now I'm worried about you making it to the goose party.
Marc:What time is it?
Marc:It's 4.30 already.
Guest:That's fine.
Guest:My goose party is... Yeah, but I don't have to be there at five.
Marc:Okay, all right.
Marc:Because I feel like... No, please.
Marc:I'm not freaking out.
Marc:So you do theater and then you...
Guest:I got a soap opera, The Guiding Light.
Guest:That was a huge thing for me to get in terms of paying my own rent.
Guest:Because my parents have helped me along the way this whole time.
Guest:I'm very fortunate to have had their help.
Guest:Even though my father would be quite concerned and say, I think you might want to get a job.
Guest:Maybe you should be a systems analyst or something.
Guest:I think I didn't even tell them that outcome.
Guest:Because they would have went, that sounds funny now.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:So, yeah, I was Ginger, this maid on The Guiding Light, and they paid me very well.
Marc:And you did a lot of episodes?
Guest:Yeah, I did.
Guest:I think I always forget.
Guest:I think I did it for a year.
Marc:It's like a crash course in weird TV because you just shoot like 100 of them, right?
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:I don't know.
Marc:My impression was they shoot quickly.
Yeah.
Guest:They did.
Guest:They broke down the day in terms of either shot in the afternoon or the evening or the morning or the afternoon.
Marc:They do like an episode in a day, right?
Guest:It was great.
Guest:It was very fast.
Guest:And I loved it.
Guest:It was kind of fun.
Marc:Do people know you from that?
Guest:No.
Guest:Well, maybe some...
Marc:Ladies.
Guest:People out there.
Guest:But I've never had anyone say, oh, my God, Ginger on the Guiding Light.
Guest:No one ever recognized me from that.
Guest:And then shortly after that, I did, you know, Williamstown Theater Festival introduced me to a lot of people.
Guest:That's where I think I made a lot of connections that paid off later.
Guest:And Stanley Tucci.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And I, we got cast in this play with Naked Angels called Fat Men in Skirts.
Guest:It's a Nikki Silver play.
Guest:Really crazy, crazy play.
Guest:In it, I get, you know, it's a plane crash and we start off on an island.
Guest:We've crashed our planes, crashed on an island with my son.
Guest:At the end of the first act, my son is sodomizing me.
Guest:Then I'm like going back crazy from the island.
Guest:It's one of the, but it's hilarious.
Guest:Sounds funny.
Guest:It's really crazy and funny.
Guest:But Stanley was in that with me, and then he wrote this movie called Big Night.
Guest:Yeah, I saw that movie.
Guest:And he said, hey, will you come be in this movie?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:So that was kind of a cool thing.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And then Mike Nichols saw me in that production of Fat Man in Skirts, and he put me in Primary Colors, which was a huge movie for me because I...
Guest:Got to do that big pratfall down the stairs.
Guest:And I know that's where Aaron Sorkin saw that movie and wanted to see me for CJ on the West Side.
Marc:So those were the primary ones.
Guest:Those were kind of big things that happened that introduced me to people who ended up playing.
Marc:So you didn't do a lot of bit parts in TV, or you did a few?
Guest:I did a few.
Guest:I did one on Bill Cosby's show.
Guest:And I don't remember which show it was of his.
Guest:You were still in New York, though?
Marc:I was in New York.
Guest:Yeah, I was in New York, and I remember going in for the part of a nurse, and then they changed it to a janitor, and then they kept changing my part around.
Guest:I never saw it.
Guest:I have no idea.
Guest:So I did that little part.
Guest:I did the soap opera.
Guest:I did not too much, mostly theater, all theater things.
Guest:So you were like, did you actually do a Prairie Home Companion?
Marc:Oh, yeah, I did that a lot.
Marc:And was that like a regular gig?
Marc:Did you have to live in Minnesota or you'd go knock him out?
Guest:No, I had, I took that job because I was afraid of flying and I thought I gotta, I didn't want, I told myself I would never let my fear of flying get in the way of taking a job.
Guest:And so I got auditioned for the Perry Home Companion and I got the part and it meant that I would have to fly every Friday to Minnesota and we would tape the show on Saturday and I'd fly back Sunday and
Guest:So I had to do that.
Guest:But I had my brother, my younger brother lived in St.
Guest:Paul.
Guest:So I got to go see him.
Guest:So I looked at it as an opportunity to see him and also just get over my fear of flying.
Guest:So I did it and had a great time working with Garrison.
Guest:He's a very eccentric, brilliant man.
Guest:And I had a lot of fun with everyone who worked on that.
Marc:It sounded fun.
Marc:I would listen to it sometimes because I just have NPR on it when I was living in New York.
Marc:It seemed a little oddly.
Marc:I would just listen to it, but it didn't seem like it was really geared towards me, but I enjoyed it.
Guest:It was kind of hokey a little, but in a comforting way.
Marc:Guy Noir.
Guest:Yeah, Guy Noir.
Guest:I loved doing those skits with him, doing all those voices.
Guest:Were you the lady on Guy Noir?
Guest:In some of them, yeah, not all of them.
Guest:But there was a season where I played the lady in that, and I did the joke episodes with him.
Guest:And he had some cool people working for him.
Guest:There was this one guy, I wish I could remember his name.
Guest:He had really long hair, and he would drive the trucks, and he would go to wherever Garrison was going ahead of time to...
Guest:To hang out in the local bars and find out all the local stories.
Guest:Oh, really?
Guest:The research?
Guest:No shit.
Guest:The research.
Guest:And then he'd give it to Garrison, who would write these unbelievable models.
Guest:I mean, he never, he would just go out and talk.
Guest:He wouldn't have a script or anything.
Guest:Oh, really?
Guest:He didn't have a teleprompter.
Guest:He would just go out on stage and just talk.
Guest:It was kind of extraordinary what he could do.
Guest:Did he get into a little trouble?
Guest:I don't know.
Guest:Oh, I can't remember.
Guest:I feel like he, I don't know.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:Now that you're saying that, I'm going.
Marc:I wonder, but you didn't have any problem.
Guest:No, not at all.
Guest:Nice guy.
Guest:No, he was, he was lovely and I enjoyed doing that show a lot.
Marc:So after those movies though, like I think the first time that like I really registered you was in the ice storm.
Oh.
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Marc:I love the movie because it was my parents' generation, that they were coming of age as young parents in that time.
Marc:Did your parents do key parties?
Marc:I don't know, but I feel like there might have been some swinging.
Marc:I'm not sure, but looking at some of the pictures of them in the 60s, I was sort of like, hmm.
Guest:I don't know your parents, but I feel like looking at you, I would think that of your parents more than my parents.
Guest:Right.
Marc:There's a lot of pictures of my mom in some swinging garments and my dad in some Nehru collars.
Marc:All right.
Marc:Yeah, maybe.
Guest:Not my parents.
Guest:They were very... No.
Marc:That wasn't their bag?
Marc:No.
Marc:But that was like a big movie movie.
Guest:Yeah, it was cool.
Guest:It was a really good movie to be part of, and I remember.
Guest:And you know what else was... When did... Okay, American Beauty and Ice Storm.
Marc:When did those guys... 1999, American Beauty, Ice Storm, 97.
Marc:So you must have done it like a year after.
Guest:I guess so.
Guest:I think maybe being in that Ice Storm was helpful to get in...
Guest:Well, Alan Ball is the one who got me into, see, this is another theater connection, because I did his play six, no, five women wearing the same dress at Manhattan Class Company in New York, and Alan wrote that, and he had me come in and read for Sam for American Beauty, and then I got that, but...
Marc:That part's so disturbing.
Marc:I know.
Marc:What music were you playing for that role before you went on?
Guest:I wish I could remember.
Guest:Actually, you know, it's weird.
Guest:I remember sitting there in that dining room and just staring, and I thought, wouldn't it be fun to think of the best sex you've ever had?
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:And I kind of thought about that.
Marc:But you didn't tell your face?
Guest:No.
Guest:But it's just like... Longing.
Guest:Longing.
Guest:Something longing or something missing.
Guest:I don't know.
Marc:Oh, my God.
Marc:It's horrifying.
Marc:It was a sad character.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I figured she was on the wrong dose of medication, too.
Marc:Oh, that's what you're thinking.
Marc:That's what I thought.
Marc:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:That's what it seemed like.
Guest:She just had to be a little anesthetized.
Guest:And The Hours.
Marc:That's a big movie for big actors.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:That was good.
Guest:That was one movie.
Guest:Aaron let me go do that while I was doing West Wing.
Guest:I was the only actor of the main group that wasn't in all of the episodes because he let me go do The Hours with Meryl and London.
Guest:And that was pretty exciting to be part of that and be with her and get to do a kissing scene with her and be like...
Guest:you know, be her girlfriend.
Guest:It was crazy.
Guest:And she was so much fun, which I loved about her.
Guest:She was so not like this, you know, up on a pedestal.
Guest:She was just a girl.
Guest:She likes acting.
Guest:She just wanted to have fun.
Guest:She liked to have fun and be...
Guest:And I remember, oh, my God, where we were staying in some Hyde Park hotel.
Guest:I don't remember, but it was a small little boutique hotel.
Guest:And I think it was John Cleese who was in the other – we were in the bar area, and he was in the dining room.
Guest:And I think she wanted to go say hi, but she didn't know if he would remember her.
Guest:And I was like, Meryl, of course he would know who you are.
Guest:Go say hello.
Yeah.
Guest:She comes back just absolutely dejected that she said she did her best sort of drive by where she just sort of walked through, floated through and like looked in his general direction and then didn't have the right eye contact and kept walking.
Marc:John was probably just being a dick.
Guest:Probably.
Guest:I don't know, but it just made me love her even more.
Guest:I was like, seriously?
Guest:You think he's not?
Guest:You're Meryl Streep.
Guest:Just go say hello to him.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:That's so funny.
Guest:That endeared her to me.
Guest:I've talked to him.
Marc:He's a good guy.
Marc:Yeah, I know.
Guest:I listen to your podcast with him.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:But I guess that Juno, too, that really...
Marc:put you on a bigger map.
Marc:I know West Wing did, but as a film actress, starting to kind of get away from the TV thing a little more, right?
Guest:Yeah, I was glad that I had the opportunity to have those, because I think a lot of people knew my work beforehand in stage and theater and other things, and Drop Dead Gorgeous was a movie that a lot of people are like...
Guest:huge fans of, cult fans of that movie.
Guest:And that was a crazy character I played.
Guest:So anyone who was doing research, people just knew that the CJ wasn't the only thing I had in my pocket, even though that was my introduction to the world.
Guest:I mean, it became, a lot of people don't want to give her- What's your relationship with Sorkin?
Marc:um sorkin i i love him i want i wish i could work with him again i don't know you will um familiarity breeds contempt sometimes did you do that that uh studio uh 60 thing i did i did uh i got to be myself like i was one of the you know guest hosts and so uh what's just good to winning an oscar i that was exciting to watch
Marc:Wow.
Marc:Could you believe it?
Marc:How much did you think it was going to happen?
Guest:No, I love my friend Stephen Rogers who wrote I, Tonya.
Guest:And he told me about it when he was writing the part way back before he even finished the script.
Guest:He said, I'm writing you a part and you get to wear a fur coat and have a bird on your shoulder.
Guest:And I was like...
Guest:Okay, sounds like a winner.
Guest:Can't wait.
Guest:And then they were trying to figure out, they decided they were going to do it whenever we did it.
Guest:And I was doing Mom, and I was rehearsing for my Broadway play I was doing.
Marc:The Six Degrees?
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:And I was like, I don't have time to do this movie.
Guest:And Stephen's like, we're not doing it without you, so we're making it.
Guest:I said, I honestly don't know if it's going to work, so...
Guest:The producers of Mom, the producers of Six Degrees of Separation, and the producers of I, Tonya all figured it out.
Guest:But it was crazy.
Guest:I was like, how am I going to... It looks like you're always working, though.
Guest:Well, that was crazy.
Guest:That was a kind of unusual... Yeah, no, yeah.
Guest:A lot of things had to be finessed.
Guest:And then to find out... I didn't think for... I mean, you don't... I think that's the best way to go into a role.
Guest:Not like, I'm doing this role because I'm going to win an Oscar for it.
Guest:Right.
Guest:I don't know how many people can do that or who have done that, but I certainly didn't take it because of that.
Guest:I took it because it was my friend Stephen who wrote it, and it was a great script.
Guest:Great tone, that movie.
Guest:It's a really great tone.
Guest:Oh, everybody was good.
Guest:God, he nailed that.
Guest:Which one was he?
Guest:He's the director.
Guest:Oh, okay, yeah.
Guest:He just did a fantastic job.
Guest:So I didn't know that was going to come of it, and then it started slowly building, the word of mouth, and then
Guest:then getting nominated for things.
Guest:And every time I'd win something, I thought, well, I'm not going to win the next thing.
Guest:You know, it just kept the pressure building.
Guest:And because of who I'm up against, you know, Laurie Metcalf's one of my favorite actors of all time.
Guest:I've never, but I know her.
Guest:I've met her in passing.
Guest:I just love her so much.
Guest:So I was, I just, and Octavia, who's my dear friend, I love.
Guest:And I just, you know, Mary J. Blige.
Guest:There were so many...
Guest:So when it was that night and I was waiting to hear my name, it was more of when they said it, it was more like, oh, my God.
Guest:It was more of a relief that I didn't get to that point and lose because I had won.
Guest:It was just there was so much pressure and so many people watching.
Guest:I felt so many people's shoulders and eyes on me wanting me to win.
Guest:And it was more like, oh, my God.
Guest:Thank fucking God.
Guest:Oh, thank God.
Guest:Thank God.
Guest:Thank God.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And then getting up there, I was just like, I felt somewhat just very calm and like, it's a lot to go through one of those campaigns.
Guest:I've never done anything like that.
Guest:And the line that my friend Nick Bacay gave me to say, I did it all myself, was so fun to say because it was so, I mean, I memorized the lines and I said them.
Marc:He's a funny guy.
Guest:How do you know him?
Guest:Nick and I were in college together.
Guest:We went to Kenyon College together.
Guest:No kidding.
Marc:Because he was involved with the first comedy channel like a million years ago, if I'm not mistaken.
Guest:That sounds right.
Guest:Well, he's one of our showrunners on Mom.
Marc:Right.
Marc:That's it.
Guest:And with Gemma Baker.
Guest:And Nick is fantastic.
Guest:I love him.
Guest:We did plays together.
Guest:That's cool.
Marc:Well, so there you go.
Marc:That's a guy you've known forever.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:And I thought the movie was great.
Marc:And you dedicated the Oscar to your brother.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:He had passed away?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Well, he took his own life.
Guest:Oh.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:He was suffering probably a lot of mental issues, substance abuse.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:For his whole life?
Guest:I would say pretty much at least most of his adult, young adult life.
Guest:I mean, he died when he was 49, so I would say most of his mid-30s on.
Marc:The struggle just got him.
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Guest:He was in and out of places, and we kept trying to get him to, as my father said, he just couldn't find a place to land.
Guest:yeah oh yeah it was really sad is that something that's in your family um mental there's a lot of mental addiction a lot of things yeah i would say there's a there's some pathology yeah there um on both sides i would say yeah so yeah i think he just um i wish he had gotten the right help yeah and just it was been going on for years yeah yeah well i'm sorry to hear that
Marc:I know, me too.
Marc:Was that some of the impetus for doing a show like Mom?
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:It was a world that I felt that I wanted to be part of, telling whatever I could do to de-stigmatize it.
Marc:To normalize.
Guest:To normalize it and show people not just the dramatic parts of getting sober, but people who actually are living in recovery and having fun.
Marc:And hilarious.
Guest:And hilarious and having fun.
Guest:It just...
Guest:That felt like an important story for me to tell, and I wanted to because of my brother.
Guest:I feel like there are other ways I should be honoring him, too.
Guest:I think that's a good way.
Marc:I've been in the rooms for 19 years, and there's a depth of humor and wisdom there.
Marc:that you know that it because of the language of recovery and because of the nature of people's personal stories in those rooms like you know you're laughing at stuff that's pretty fucking dark yeah and it's pretty beautiful he i wish that he had found that um that in the rooms he just was like i can't go to another fucking church basement
Guest:Oh, yeah, he just resisted.
Guest:He did not like the community.
Guest:He didn't like going to meetings.
Guest:The compulsion was too strong.
Guest:I guess, is that what it is?
Marc:Well, I think everybody resists it at first, and it's just like either you're going to have that moment where...
Marc:You know, you've you've you've really run out of ideas.
Marc:Right.
Marc:So and then all of a sudden you realize, like, I can make this my own.
Marc:There's there's obviously help here.
Marc:And, you know, and there's no rules necessarily.
Marc:Right.
Marc:So it's just a matter of, like, understanding the things for yourself and realizing, like, you know, getting past.
Marc:the way the 12 steps look on a wall as being these weird God-oriented things and sort of integrating them, understanding powerlessness, right?
Marc:I mean, that's the whole trick.
Guest:Yeah, I don't think he got that.
Guest:The God thing always bothered him.
Marc:Yeah, but you can just remove that, I think.
Guest:I know.
Guest:I feel like he had enough people telling him that, but he just didn't want to get it, I think.
Marc:Yeah, and there's nothing anyone can do after a certain point.
Guest:No.
Marc:Yeah, I mean, the powerless thing, it's like, I don't know, the disease is strong, you know?
Guest:I've been in a lot of the Al-Anon meetings, and I love...
Guest:going to those, but I even get self-conscious thinking, do people think I'm here because of my show?
Guest:Oh, researching?
Guest:I feel bad thinking people will think that.
Guest:And then I went to one meeting where someone came up to me and said, just so you know you're not safe here, so be careful what you say.
Guest:And I was like, copy that.
Guest:And then I even stopped.
Guest:I should be in those rooms every day.
Guest:I'm like the classic Al-Anon person in every...
Marc:way codependency is a rough game you know because it's so fucking heartbreaking you know to have to learn how to do that if you don't have the boundaries or you know you're not like that sort of like the idea of detaching but caring is a tricky I know it's the most heartbreaking thing to because I think one of the last things we were just trying to get my brother to we were oh I don't even want to
Guest:It's detached.
Guest:It's this detachment part and cutting off from finances and things because – Enabling.
Guest:Yeah, I'm trying not to enable.
Guest:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:And just wanting to enable because I want to – because that's love to me.
Guest:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:Make it feel safe.
Guest:What do you need?
Guest:Do you need some –
Guest:Xanax, I'll go to Laredo, I'll go over the border.
Guest:Right.
Guest:I mean, I don't even know what else all was in his system in the end, and I wish I did know.
Marc:But it was on purpose.
Guest:Yes.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:It was very much on purpose.
Marc:So, but I think like it has working with, you know, to sort of approach that as comedy must be kind of relieving in a way.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:And Anna's really funny.
Marc:She's hilarious.
Marc:And you get to do like just like three camera.
Marc:But like it was interesting when I watched it because I watched a bunch of them when I talked to her.
Marc:It did not help the conversation.
Yeah.
Marc:That's way up there with one of the kind of more challenging conversations because we were engaging and we were deeply engaged, but she wasn't giving me much.
Guest:Yeah, she holds her cards close to her chest.
Guest:And I kept pushing.
Guest:She kept charming me.
Guest:I know.
Guest:She's like, no, no, no.
Guest:We're not going to talk about that because then I have to talk about it.
Guest:She helps me.
Marc:She is hilarious.
Marc:But I liked it.
Marc:I like having that tension, and it was fun.
Marc:I think the point where I'm talking to her while she's peeing was, I think it was the first.
Guest:That was my favorite thing.
Guest:Yeah, it was the first on the show.
Guest:It was hilarious.
Guest:It was hilarious.
Guest:She is so hysterical.
Marc:But I think that like, even though it's a three camera and even though, you know, it's, it's very cleverly written, but it's still a joke driven show that there's a depth to it because of the nature of what you're doing.
Guest:I'm grateful for that.
Guest:Cause I don't, I mean, I know there's, there's a lot of, we have to serve the jokes, but I, I love the moments that are quiet that we, that, that are real.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:There's definitely some real shit in there.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Well, I, I think you do great work.
Marc:Mark, I think you do too.
Marc:And now I want you to go eat goose with Phil Rosenthal.
Marc:Are you taking your parents?
Marc:How's that work?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Well, now I see I was all worried about the logistics of everything because my mom's not good in the car with other people.
Guest:And so my assistant is driving them and then your guy.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Who you picked.
Guest:Yeah, who used to drive me occasionally.
Guest:Jose, who's very nice.
Guest:He's a wonderful driver.
Guest:He's going to drop me off at Phil's house right now.
Marc:Yeah, I think you can get there by 530.
Guest:Should I give the exact address?
Guest:Tell me where the house he bought his parents is.
Marc:I'd like to know where that is.
Marc:Where's the house that Phil bought his parents?
Guest:I was going to ask him that when I see him.
Marc:I don't know.
Marc:I'm fine with Phil.
Marc:I hope he's fine with me.
Guest:Well, he sounded like he was, but I'll find out more.
Marc:No, no, don't.
Marc:Let's just leave it where it's at.
Marc:All right.
Marc:Nice talking to you.
Guest:Nice talking to you, too.
Marc:Wow, that was great.
Marc:What a great time.
Marc:What a great talk.
Marc:What a great person.
Marc:I like her.
Marc:I love her.
Marc:I love her.
Marc:Is that all right?
Marc:So, again, Mom is on CBS on Thursday nights.
Marc:It's in its sixth season.
Marc:And Troop Zero, Allison's new movie, has its world premiere at Sundance this Friday.
Marc:I'm going to play my three chords in a slightly different way than I usually play them again.
Marc:Okay?
Marc:So let's do that.
Marc:My three chords happening now.
Guest:Boomer lives.