Armchair Expert with Dax Shepard XX
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[16] And now I want to tell you about our guest today, who is the most talented.
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[20] He has the funniest laugh you've ever heard.
[21] He smokes a bunch of weed.
[22] His name's Seth Rogan, and we love him, so please enjoy Seth Rogan.
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[26] He's an armchair expert.
[27] So David Harbour was here yesterday.
[28] Love David Harvard.
[29] Oh, he told a story about you.
[30] He's the bad guy in the Green Hornet.
[31] Yeah.
[32] And he was living at your house for a minute, right?
[33] Are you staying at your house?
[34] He was staying at my house for a while.
[35] In Malve, no, where, summer?
[36] I don't even remember.
[37] Maybe, uh, he, he just told the story, and he was, he was very clear to say you're at no fault whatsoever.
[38] Yeah.
[39] But he had been sober for, I want to say, 20 years at that point.
[40] He decided, I'm going to smoke weed like they smoke weed.
[41] They're having a great time.
[42] I remember that.
[43] Yeah, so he did that.
[44] But at any rate, he's so masculine, David Harvard, that I insisted he sit in this chair yesterday.
[45] He's a big masculine man. He is.
[46] is but i brought him to his knees that night emotionally spiritually physically i for sure remember that yeah i'm trying to remember what do you say he said you were playing cranium we were yeah i think what it was yeah he was dating a girl who Lauren's friends with and and they stayed at our place in the beach for like i don't even know how honestly like we may or maybe out of town he was a few weeks or something right yeah yeah i've known him a really long time he um and he's just so I'm so attracted to masculinity.
[47] Are you?
[48] That's my first question.
[49] That's a good question.
[50] Well, I was actually trying to think about what you were as a kid today as I was reading about you.
[51] And I know that you've been into comedy since day one.
[52] But I was wondering, were you not also into like Conan and guys with muscles and stuff?
[53] And I did karate.
[54] Oh, you did?
[55] Yeah.
[56] Instigated by the karate kid or just.
[57] Probably.
[58] But what's funny is, and I actually was thinking about this.
[59] I think, you know, like, it doesn't add up that I have confidence in any way, shape, or form.
[60] Well, that's one of my forthcoming questions.
[61] But I do.
[62] And I think karate from a young age was actually something that gave me a lot of confidence.
[63] Yeah.
[64] Because I, like, you were in confrontation, physical confrontation all the time.
[65] And I did karate with adults largely when I was like a teenager.
[66] And they were like men who would like beat us up.
[67] And using the karate kid analogy, what I slowly realize is that, like, we were the bad guys.
[68] Oh, we were COBRAKal.
[69] Oh, wow.
[70] And we were the guys who were, like, banned from all the competitions.
[71] And our teacher, I think, could only get a place to dojo in the Jewish community center in the neighborhood.
[72] And he was a Japanese guy.
[73] Oh, he was.
[74] Yes.
[75] But he taught him the Jewish community center.
[76] There's a lot going on there.
[77] There's a lot going on there.
[78] There's a ton done back.
[79] But I did karate for me. young age and I think that is but so I was physical and I played rugby uh in high school also which is a very physical it might be the most physical sport it's a pretty physical sport yeah I got I have a personal story about wrestling a rugby player from England when I was 19 yeah and I thought for sure I was going to manhandle him and he just made a fool of me and I've never felt someone so strong like the tensile strength pound for pound no it was unbelievable they're tough and that's why I stopped I was like always pretty big and so I played rugby in the high school and our team was really good.
[80] Instead of football teams in high school in Vancouver, there's rugby teams.
[81] Like that's like the big sport.
[82] It's funny.
[83] I kind of went to like a movieish experience of high school as as his example by the fact I wrote a movie about my high school experience.
[84] But sports were not at all pop.
[85] No one gave a shit about sports at my high school.
[86] Oh, that's very weird.
[87] Yeah, like no one cared at all.
[88] And there was parties, there was all this.
[89] I mean, Superbad again, is large.
[90] largely based on what happened.
[91] So, like, all that stuff happened at our high school, except, and the only thing that wasn't like the John Hughesy kind of thing was that no one gave a flying fuck about anything that, and our rugby team had undefeated three seasons in a row, and, like, no one cared.
[92] Oh, really?
[93] So how did people get, like, supreme social status if they weren't the quarterback of the football team?
[94] What were the attributes that were being rewarded with Poon and.
[95] Yeah, I mean, there was everyone.
[96] kind of partied together.
[97] That's so Canadian in my fantasy of Canada.
[98] And within the parties, there were for sure different groups that conflicted heavily with one another.
[99] But it's kind of like if everyone, you know, in every group there was men and women who would hook up with each other.
[100] There was every, in class of boys and girls.
[101] Yeah, there was boys and girls.
[102] There was every class and category of that.
[103] and yeah but like it's it yeah that's the one like and my wife is from like varsity blues high school literally like like where the foot like the whole town would go out to the football team every weekend yeah what's day like she's from central florida oh fuck yes and like and her high school football team was like one of the best in the nation for years in row when she was like a cheerleader oh god she was lila garrity she literally yeah she was like she went to varsity blues and to me that is like there are things we're always talking about high school and like there are things from my high school experience that to her is just like so fucking crazy yeah and from my perspective that experience of high school where like everyone cares about what the sports team is doing yeah yeah is like insane to me like that's so weird yeah i would have loved to have gone in in the school you went to yeah it had that as like the it was growing achievement no it was it was way better i'm very happy that was not the case yeah ours was much more centered around like drugs and like partying and um good things like that like it wasn't uh partying partying yeah people it was a partying centric school wow and but so it was your high school secular yeah it was a public high school oh okay you went to a jewish elementary school it had Torah in the title tomit Torah yeah It's home of Torah.
[104] So, but what grade did you then transfer to public school?
[105] Junior high school?
[106] We don't have junior high in Vancouver.
[107] Of course not.
[108] So you go, progressive bastards.
[109] So it's.
[110] We go K through 11.
[111] No, exactly.
[112] No, it's K through 7 and then 8, 9, 10, 11, 12 is high school.
[113] Oh, wow.
[114] So when you're in eighth grade, you are going to school with 12th grade.
[115] That's a little dodgy because you could be 12 and there's 18 -year -old men.
[116] a hundred percent muscles and hairy that you're going to school with and that will fucking grow your ass up fast like that was something at the time you were like holy yeah there was like guys with like beards and shins and i was like i'm three pubic hair and it was like oh this guy looks like my fucking dad and sometimes you like had classes with these fucking guys a lot a lot of them lived alone because uh Vancouver at the time was like a shell for money for Hong Kong people in China yeah and So there was a lot of people who went to school, who's like parents sent them to Vancouver to go to school.
[117] English dudes from Hong Kong or Chinese dudes from Hong Kong?
[118] Chinese dudes from Hong Kong.
[119] And all over China, but a lot from Hong Kong.
[120] And they would buy houses in Vancouver and send their kids to school in Vancouver and would live alone.
[121] Wow.
[122] Like Beverly Hills 90210 .1.
[123] It kind of was like that.
[124] Yeah.
[125] It was super weird.
[126] And the other weird thing that I've learned is strange about my high school is we could leave.
[127] We could leave during the day.
[128] And it was very easy to get like free periods.
[129] Oh.
[130] Because like starting, I think almost in like 10, like I think 10, 11, 12th grade, you could have a free period somewhere.
[131] Okay.
[132] And at your own discretion.
[133] Exactly.
[134] Well, it was basically like you didn't, you, you, you needed less credits to graduate than you did to get into a good college.
[135] So if you decided you weren't going to get into a good college, which I did from a very early age, it afforded you some free period.
[136] Okay.
[137] You were on the non -college track.
[138] Exactly.
[139] But because of that, you could leave the campus.
[140] Like, they would let you leave.
[141] So there was like a constant flow of kids coming and going from the school, basically.
[142] This sounds more like a rock festival.
[143] Yeah.
[144] Than it does anything else.
[145] Like, people swing through.
[146] At the time, it wasn't hard.
[147] Like, we could all.
[148] just be like should we leave and we'd be like yeah and then we would just leave and there was no one stopping you from leaving and like it was and and these are the things that none of us knew were weird until i've talked to more american people yeah grew up with like institutionalized schools that we would sneak we had a strong desire to go out to lunch yeah we would do that all the time not allowed that's insane not allowed to the point that you would get detentions and then eventually expulsion from doing this.
[149] So my friend Brian Bowles and I used to, this is not a joke.
[150] We would put our seats down flat.
[151] And then we would drive out of the parking lot and just like peeking over the steering wheel in hopes that the security guard that was stationed in the lot wouldn't see us go to pizza high.
[152] And we also went to our high school was like in a neighborhood where there was like a 7 -Eleven across the street and like a McDonald's down the block and like a subway across the street.
[153] And there was video stores which is like I honestly I think one of the reasons we got sold in a movie.
[154] is there was two giant video stores directly across the street from our high school.
[155] Yeah, and like we would go to them every day.
[156] And just peruse.
[157] Yeah, and like just walk around the aisles.
[158] Oh, this sounds like Utopia where you went.
[159] It was great.
[160] Were there fist fights?
[161] All the time.
[162] Okay, good.
[163] Yeah, tons of them.
[164] Okay, great.
[165] Yeah.
[166] Okay, I would hate for you to have been robbed of the violence that we experienced in my high school.
[167] There was, yeah, like any high school, there was like racial tension.
[168] Okay, okay, good.
[169] I guess, yeah, there was like anywhere else.
[170] It was wonderful.
[171] Racial tension and just intergroup tension.
[172] Sure, guys sleeping with other guys' girlfriends.
[173] All that stuff.
[174] All that stuff.
[175] Were there two groups that seemed to regularly square off when it wasn't not racially motivated?
[176] Like, because they're not jocks, like you didn't have the strata of jocks, it sounds like.
[177] No. Because generally, in my school, the jocks were fighting the burnouts.
[178] Yeah.
[179] You know?
[180] There was like not that kind of thing.
[181] There was like fancier kids.
[182] There was like rich kids.
[183] I guess they were rich kids.
[184] Yeah, I think they were.
[185] there was more of like a rich hirekey perhaps.
[186] Yeah.
[187] That I was not but I was not at all rich so I guess maybe that's why I wasn't one of the more popular kids in school.
[188] Well, yeah, were you?
[189] What was your like social standing?
[190] Well no, I mean I lived, I went to a high school on the west side of Vancouver which is a rich part of town and I lived on the east side of Vancouver which was the not rich side of town.
[191] Right.
[192] The high school in my neighborhood was like I didn't know anyone there.
[193] It was known for being a very rough dangerous high school and I applied to get into a high school like across town basically and so i went to high school like six high schools away from where i technically should have been going to high school how did that impact your like friendship circle so none of your neighbors you weren't going to school with any of your neighbors then right unless they had applied as well no but i lived in a neighborhood that was a hundred percent east indian people like from east india oh really i was the only white person in the entire neighborhood at that time really and so it was like not again there was like I had some friends through through the community center like I played on a soccer team through the community center in the neighborhood but again it was a lot of like they were like insular new immigrants right the country like directly in my neighborhood basically which again just was it made it just a little harder as a kid yeah to make friends you know yeah but you did a lot of um stuff as I read about you you did a lot of, like, extracurricular, I can never say that.
[194] Curricular?
[195] Curricular stuff, right?
[196] Like, as you just said, you were doing martial arts.
[197] I did.
[198] Which comes as a great shock to me, and I love it.
[199] How many years did you do the karate?
[200] A lot until, I would say maybe like, like nine, maybe from when I was like eight till I was like 18 or something.
[201] So you're probably good at karate.
[202] Is that accurate to say?
[203] I'm like physically competent.
[204] I would say, yeah, I probably, it was like a very like.
[205] street fightery type of karate.
[206] You know what I mean?
[207] It was like it was like biting and scratching and hair pulling.
[208] Like it was dirty.
[209] Again, we were the Cobra Chi guys.
[210] I went to one tournament one time because we were never allowed into tournaments like the like the Cobra Chi guys.
[211] And then one time we all went to a tournament together and I instantly got disqualified for punching a guy in the throat.
[212] Oh, fantastic.
[213] And again, like I had No, it wasn't even on my radar that that, like, was not appropriate.
[214] A standard strike.
[215] And I remember, and they were just like, go.
[216] And I was just like, ah!
[217] And then, and, and, and, wait, wait, wait, hold on, no. I want to, I want to, I want to get into that just a tiny bit.
[218] Out of fear or out of killer instinct.
[219] Can you remember what motivation you throw the throat?
[220] I just went for it.
[221] I was just like, it was, did you get into the, I went for an opening?
[222] So your sense, he was, he was from Japan?
[223] Uh, no, he was not from a, I don't know he was the first.
[224] I don't know if he was first generation.
[225] Okay, but did you get into his personal story?
[226] Like, why he was attracted to this grittier style of martial arts?
[227] Did he have an interesting story?
[228] He did, actually.
[229] He, like, had been involved in gangs when he was younger.
[230] He grew up in Vancouver.
[231] He worked as a bouncer for years, he was saying, I remember.
[232] Was he a good -sized gentleman?
[233] No, he was what I would call a diminutive gentleman.
[234] But he was, like, so deep.
[235] dangerous seeming it was crazy is he still with us do you think he is uh my i think my mother because vancouver is not the biggest city in the world but my mother so my mother runs into everybody on earth and i think someone she knows or she ran into him uh somewhat recently and he's not like killed anybody i don't think so but he would talk about like i remember it was things like if you're like he would literally tell you things like a kid like again i went to public high school so I was scared.
[236] I was scared.
[237] And because, like, there was lots of fights and shit like that.
[238] Just kids would try to rob you and take your shit, take your disc man. And I remember he was, I was like, what do I do?
[239] And he was like, he was like at lunch.
[240] And everyone would go to 7 -Eleven at lunch.
[241] And that's where, like, everything happened.
[242] Uh -huh.
[243] Yeah, yeah.
[244] All the drug dealers were there.
[245] Sure.
[246] Like, it was like the hub.
[247] Get to second base behind the place.
[248] Yeah, second base.
[249] Everyone's from weed behind it in like this loading dock.
[250] like that's it all revolved around the 7 -11 but I was scared to go there at first and I didn't leave I remember like the first week of school I was afraid to leave I like being to my friend Evan who I went to high school with who I still work with yeah like we would like sit and eat lunch like in the field because we would like be like is today the day we go to 7 -11 I was like I'm afraid I don't want to go to 7 -11 yeah people I just get randomly punched in the face and shit which happened to everyone time one time Evan more than once I think Someone just walked up and punched him in the face.
[251] That's happening in me. With no warning in any way, shape, or form.
[252] I've been punched by a stranger several times.
[253] Yeah, and then actually, I think one of the guys who punched him found out he was friends with Evan's older brother who went to high school with us.
[254] It was, oh, sorry.
[255] I thought it was, I didn't realize.
[256] But, yeah, it was, it was a weird scene, but.
[257] When you met Evan, I want to believe that I, that your relationship with him is this one I have with my best friend, Aaron.
[258] weekly which we met in seventh grade and we met drawing these um what we called a ball sack cowboys so they were like they were we would draw a penis balls in a penis and it was a horse and then there was a cowboy that would ride on the ball sack cowboys and then there was ball sack obviously yeah stars uh starship pilots and that was a dick and balls that we turned into like a an airplane yeah and we just drew these pictures and passed them back and forth but at any rate i was just saying this the other day to monica Because I just saw him, I went home to Michigan, I saw him.
[259] There's nobody on planet Earth I feel closer to.
[260] There won't be anyone on planet Earth.
[261] Like something happened meeting him at 12 years old where we virtually became one person somehow.
[262] As we were figuring out who we were, we just kind of melded into one person.
[263] Do you have that with Evan?
[264] Yeah, I think in a lot of ways.
[265] Like we met at a very young age and we've spent like a crazy amount of time together for the last like 23.
[266] years or something like that and so yeah at this point it's like there's a real shorthand there yeah yeah yeah stay tuned for more armchair expert if you dare what's up guys it's your girl kiki and my podcast is back with a new season and let me tell you it's too good and i'm diving into the brains of entertainment's best and brightest okay every episode i bring on a friend and have a real conversation And I don't mean just friends, I mean the likes of Amy Poehler, Kell Mitchell, Vivica Fox, the list goes on.
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[278] But yeah, we met in bar mitzvah class when we were 12.
[279] And you both already liked comedy, right?
[280] You were doing stand -up already at 12 years old?
[281] I was just starting to do it and he, I was like writing it, but I hadn't yet performed it.
[282] I didn't perform stand -up for the first time, I think, until after my bar mitzvah.
[283] Okay.
[284] But I met Evan before my bar mitzvah, exactly.
[285] It only holds.
[286] And, but he, like wrote short stories, which is like a 12 -year -old.
[287] He just like don't meet a lot of like 12 -year -olds who like.
[288] And so that was something we talked about, I remember.
[289] And we had a third friend Fogel who is represented as the third guy in Superbad McLevin, who we are also both still good friends with.
[290] But yeah, we met in bar mitzvah class and then what happens the year you go to a bar mitzvah, the year your bar mitzvah is you go to the bar mitzvah of everyone in your bar mitzvah class.
[291] okay and you're 13 yeah you're 12 or 13 okay um just real quick on that weird age to become a man isn't it do we know anything historically about why well folks pick that age it seems very early i think in old days the life expectancy was like you're 30 30 at most so you were like yeah when you were 13 you're like you got to get your fucking shit together man midlife crisis this is it for you it's every day's a gift from here on you're halfway there it's time don't take anything for great from here on that.
[292] That's a good theory.
[293] They have it updated.
[294] They should update bar mitzvah age to coincide with new life expectancies.
[295] Yeah, I feel like that would.
[296] That would be a good idea.
[297] Okay, so you're...
[298] Yeah, so...
[299] Bar Mitzvah class.
[300] So you're in bar mitzvah class.
[301] It's called Talasin to Phelan, bar mitzvah class.
[302] And, yeah, and then you go to the bar mitzvahs every weekend.
[303] Sent you for a whole year.
[304] Yeah, you're at a party circuit.
[305] You're at a party.
[306] You're at a bar or bat mitzvah.
[307] Mostly what you're doing.
[308] that year is like drinking for the first time and smoking weed for the first time and kissing people for the first time.
[309] And at that time, and that's when me and Evan like really started hanging out with each other.
[310] And then he went to the high school that I went to.
[311] Did you like, because you already brought it up, but like your confidence, which is always a mystery to anyone who has it right.
[312] For me, it's 100 % Aaron Weekly.
[313] Like I met him and I said, oh my God, there's another one of me. Yeah.
[314] And if I If I have his approval, I'm fine.
[315] That's all I needed.
[316] And I was, and then I took huge swings because he thought I was funny.
[317] Oh, yes.
[318] And that was just enough for me. We for sure feed each other.
[319] Uh -huh.
[320] Probably not always for the past, but we definitely.
[321] But it can be like a force field, can it?
[322] Like when you're young and insecure, it's like, oh, okay, we're a team.
[323] Oh, for sure.
[324] We were very much like a unit and we were very codependent.
[325] I mean, I think the dynamic and super bad really reflects exactly what we were like, basically.
[326] The only advice I have to any human being is like, get a best friend at 12.
[327] Yeah.
[328] And let that person like help your self -esteem.
[329] Like, yeah, it's, it's true.
[330] I think it was, yeah, it's very helpful.
[331] And I think a lot of people, I mean, do, do, does not everyone have a best friend when they're 12?
[332] I, I think, I think most people do.
[333] I think what's different.
[334] Like Monica's best friend wrote the most lovely note to the friends.
[335] She was obsessed with friends and her best friend wrote the most loving, note ever to friends, the friends.
[336] The friends.
[337] Yeah, to all the friends.
[338] And actually got like signed photographs of all of them mailed to her in Georgia.
[339] And like, yeah, I would imagine that's a best friend right there.
[340] She's still my best friend.
[341] Yeah.
[342] I think that's what's different is a lot of people I think are not friends with the same people they were friends with when they were 12 years old.
[343] Yeah.
[344] And and if they are, it's not like I see Evan every single.
[345] I see Evan as I did when we were 12 years old and like and we there was a few years off there he went to college and stuff but like it's it's been pretty consistent you know yeah and have of the two of you who's changed the most do you think um i mean he he is he is about to have his second kid oh uh -huh and whereas i have no children it shocked me that you so i think that i think just circumstantially much more has changed for him.
[346] It, weirdly, it shocks me that you don't have kids.
[347] Yeah.
[348] Like, I, I have an outside understanding of who you are, but when I see you in real life and stuff, I think, oh, this is a guy who would really like being a dad or would be, you know, it just seems like you would want that.
[349] We're, I'm, we're open to it.
[350] You're open to it.
[351] Yeah.
[352] It's something, it's an active conversation.
[353] Well, we have a class we run at my house.
[354] You guys want to come through.
[355] It's something we talk about.
[356] We guarantee a pregnancy within three months.
[357] That's perfect.
[358] It stresses me. It just seems, it seems like a lot.
[359] Yeah, it is.
[360] Is that the part that scares you?
[361] Or is it the, do I have something to bestow onto a little person?
[362] That doesn't worry me as much.
[363] Okay, good.
[364] Good.
[365] I don't question like, I honestly think I would be good at it.
[366] And I don't, and I don't think like, I have much stupider friends who are good marriage.
[367] And so, that's not my concern as much.
[368] It's just a workload, right?
[369] It's a life, it's mostly just a lifestyle thing.
[370] Like me and my wife, like, enjoy very much.
[371] It's funny.
[372] It's one of those things that became, like, a passive decision and now became, like, is, like, more just due to age, an active decision where, like, we've gone from, like, people who just haven't had kids to people who, like, don't have kids.
[373] And it honestly makes it more fun in some ways because we're just like, man, no one we knows doing this shit.
[374] You're punk rock.
[375] Yeah, we could just do whatever we want.
[376] Not that we do that much, but even doing the amount of nothing we do would be marveled at.
[377] I miss that a ton.
[378] Like, we do so much nothing.
[379] Like, my wife did...
[380] You go to the movies too, right?
[381] Like, you get...
[382] My wife did a puzzle for eight hours straight the other day while just watching peeky blinders.
[383] Like, if you have kids, that's, like, psychotic to think about.
[384] I've been building, like, a Lego Ghostbusters thing just for, like, weeks.
[385] And, like, if you have kids, like, You can't do that.
[386] Your kid will destroy it.
[387] Like, we get all fucked up.
[388] It's just one of the million things you can't do.
[389] You're absolutely right.
[390] But it's gone from just being stuff we do to stuff we actively appreciate.
[391] And we do honestly, we look at each other a lot and we're like, if we had kids, we could not be doing what we're doing right now.
[392] We'll just say this, though.
[393] I was regularly going out with friends who had kids at a restaurant and going, this seems like my worst nightmare.
[394] This is terrible.
[395] You can't enjoy five seconds of it.
[396] but when it is your own kids it is drastically different and that I totally get yeah like all this stuff that seems on the outside like horrendous work it isn't I don't even know why I'm trying to convince you to have kids other than a lot of people do because they seem to like their kids it's like if there's a movie that is good you want people to see it I think it's what like people get joy from it and they want they feel as though I don't have that joy and I appreciate that I'm pretty at peace.
[397] You are, aren't you?
[398] I'm like, I'm not.
[399] You're one of these annoying guys.
[400] There's only really two of you, I think, I have in the category.
[401] It's like you and Will Farrell that it seems like your comedy's coming from a beam of sunshine.
[402] I mean, it's not.
[403] It is not at all.
[404] But it's, I'm, I feel like I'm not like thrown.
[405] I'm not in turmoil over the fact that life is comprised of turmoil.
[406] And it's something that I know is the reasoning for like all creative expression probably at the end of the day.
[407] And so it's not, it's still hard and it sucks and terrible, sad things happen.
[408] And I don't like it, you know, but I've also been very lucky.
[409] Like, I've had a very good, like, I've had a very good life.
[410] And like, I have great parents who are wonderful, who are together and who have a great relationship.
[411] Yeah.
[412] And, you know, like, and I've had, like, I've got success at like a pretty young age, I was speaking, you know, and that lends itself, you know, I'm like, you know, I'm a, I'm a white Jewish dude in Hollywood.
[413] So a lot of that lends itself again to just like, what do I have to be that upset about, you know, it doesn't seem like.
[414] Appropriate.
[415] Yeah, it just doesn't seem inappropriate.
[416] There's other people who should be more upset about shit.
[417] Yeah, but it also is, it's almost impossible to have.
[418] perspective when you're young like did you have perspective of like wow this is happening to me quite young this is lucky you couldn't have felt that way could you have you're just like i'm working hard and now i want this and then i'm setting my sights on that well i had been working for years by the time i was on why i you're like the beetles you had played in germany and so like i started doing stand -up when i was like 13 and did it very regularly and then i got cast on freaks and geeks when I was 16, yeah, so, but like three solid years of stand -of -comedy for someone that age.
[419] And then I kept - Well, by the way, that's a fourth of your life at that back.
[420] Exactly.
[421] And so, exactly.
[422] So by the time, coincidentally, at like, kind of a transitional time anyway, like, I was in grade 11, which, so I was about to finish high school anyway, and people were kind of about to move on anyway.
[423] And so it felt like, okay, like all my friends are going to.
[424] college and I'm going to L .A. to try to be on this show but like, and I felt super fucking lucky.
[425] Like, I remember I couldn't fucking believe it.
[426] I remember like, honestly, the closest to that seat, like I remember like doing shrooms with my friends and like, and like the, I remember so vividly at being like right before I was about to move to L .A. and like the, like, like sitting on the couch with my friend and like the sun was coming up after like all night and I was just like I can't believe that yeah I'm fucking moving that later be on a TV I love that you're prepping for this big role by doing by doing a ton of shoot that's how I prep for everything something I would have done for certain exactly and so no I was very appreciative of it I think um I did get I for sure was like frustrated at times you know creatively and was like someone who like had a chip on their shoulder like a lot of people I, you know, I, you know, but I, well, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, and then, of course, not be the victim of that passion of, occasionally.
[427] It's almost impossible, right?
[428] No, for sure.
[429] And I would, you care that, you know, I would, do you not then get in that situation and wanted to be exactly what you hoped for.
[430] Exactly.
[431] And then the freest, you got canceled.
[432] And then the thing is, like, things that were just discouraging, I guess.
[433] But at the same time, I appreciate it, I could just see.
[434] The thing is, and it's funny about i guess what you would call hollywood and it was one of the funny things about going right from high school to hollywood is they're very similar in a lot of ways like there's a real social structure there's popular people there's popular people there's people there's almost every category of people also there's like the crazy people the weird people the people everyone pretends to like but doesn't like there's the every category of person and and it is a lot like high and and I think I very it was so in a weird way it was an easy transition in that regard right you were already kind of I was I had the mindset for it already yeah and in general I was in a better social standing at Hollywood than I was in high school and so it was pretty good I was in general like I'm like a working actor generally yeah and the fact that even though I went years unemployed after these TV The fact that I'd been on TV shows that, like, were well regarded and, like, people liked.
[435] Did you stop at that point doing stand -up?
[436] Yeah, like, when I moved to L .A., I was, like, 17, and I would do stand -up comedy sometimes at this place, like, in Westwood called the Gypsy Cafe and shit like that.
[437] And it was one of those things were, like, like, big fish in a small pond kind of thing.
[438] And, like, there were some things I really felt like I could compete in.
[439] Like, I felt like as a writer of like screenplays, I was like, okay, like I'm reading what else is out there.
[440] We had written super bad pretty much at that point.
[441] So I was like, I feel like this had like, I can compete in that.
[442] And as an actor, I was getting better I felt like.
[443] And people, again, like I knew like, I think if I get a hold of this, I can be funny.
[444] Yeah.
[445] But I would do stand up comedy and I would perform like at this time.
[446] It was like Zach Alfenacus and Sarah Silverman and like, David Cross and Paul F. Tompkins and all these guys were like the regulars at these places and then I would go up and I would just be like I should not be doing this.
[447] Like they are they're just like I'm not like that at this.
[448] Yeah there's savons at that thing.
[449] Yeah they're like that's they're that's not my thing like I'm like I'm okay at it but I'm not like I'm not like them at this and so I just shouldn't do this right like I mean I was like not I don't have to do everything I was just like, I'm okay at this.
[450] It doesn't mean I was enjoying doing these other things.
[451] And that was also something I realized where it's like the fact that I don't, if I, if, if I wasn't doing it, I wasn't feeling this like deep internal agony or like unrequited expression that I was not getting out.
[452] Instead, yeah, like I was just like, no, I'm just doing it less.
[453] And I didn't feel that bad about it.
[454] after freaks and geeks and undeclared you you at that point were like oh i can just be a writer yeah you were as focused on being a writer is that true or now yeah for sure but at the time my plan i was going to try to use my writing to facilitate my acting like the like i was supposed to be the star of super bad um and that was like my my master plan at the time if i had one was we would make super bad like still alone yeah exactly i was still on it we would make super bad and I would be the star of it and a lot of comedians though were like getting like sitcoms and stuff and I was just like I don't I don't like that I like movies so maybe I can use my comedian thing to get me into little like I love like independent I love like Kevin Smith and you know Westander like we were in high school obsessed with like bottle rocket and clerks and Rushmore came out when we were in high school and we like love those movies and that was also very inspirational because there was a real sense like we knew they were inexpensive films and like you would just read these stories about them kind of the perfect time to be wanting to do that thing because there's so much breakout stuff exactly yeah so we were like it all seemed like if you're in high school today yeah what on earth are you thinking your odds are because the only things that are getting made really or you can make a Netflix thing there's so much stuff you could just well if you're in high school today you could make your own shit And that's what I, you could literally, in high, like, if, if we were young today, we would have just made super bad.
[455] Right.
[456] We would have made it on our fucking phones, you know?
[457] And that would have been the difference is we would have just made it.
[458] You would have been empowered.
[459] And at the time, you just needed lights and cameras and shit.
[460] Minimally hundreds of thousands of dollars.
[461] Exactly, exactly.
[462] And so, but even that seemed obtainable.
[463] So that was really like my plan at the time.
[464] was like, I'll try to make Superbad at worst in like an outrageously inexpensive fashion.
[465] Yeah.
[466] And I'll be the star of it.
[467] And we tried to do that for years and years and years.
[468] Stay tuned for more armchair expert if you dare.
[469] We wrote Pineapple Express throughout that time.
[470] Oh, really?
[471] So we were trying to get Superbad made and Evan would come to L .A. and we would talk on the phone and we wrote all of, we wrote Pineapple Express in that time as well basically and we're trying to make them both basically.
[472] Yeah.
[473] It's crazy how much shit you had in the chamber once things happened for you.
[474] Well, yeah, things happen really.
[475] What's crazy is we made knocked up and Superbad and Pineapple Express all in one like 12 month period.
[476] That is mind blowing.
[477] Yeah, it's crazy.
[478] So really quick about freaks and geeks and um and and undeclared the people it's like the outsiders yeah right i don't know i'm sure you've heard that comparison all the time but but not just on the acting front i think most people know that like you know you and james franco yeah came out of that but on the writing and directing front like the fact that jake casden directed that pilot uh -huh and paul fige yep and um john Hamburg did an episode of your show, right?
[479] Nick Stoller was a writer.
[480] Greg Matola was a director.
[481] Yeah, John Favreau directed an episode.
[482] Yeah, the last episode of the season or something.
[483] Yeah, Van Declared.
[484] When you look at it that way, right, it's a little bonkers, isn't it?
[485] Yeah, I mean, it's amazing.
[486] Yeah, it's crazy.
[487] And, like, I mean, one thing no one cannot say about John Apatow is that he doesn't have, like, an amazing eye for talent, you know?
[488] Like he, it's, it's completely, uh, yeah, it's truly uncanny, uh, the amount of people that he was able to wrangle from early on.
[489] He's like Lauren Michaels of the West Coast almost.
[490] Yeah.
[491] And like, with kind of movies in television instead of sketch comedy, basically, you know.
[492] Well, and I think what, what you could, um, obviously deduce from the fact that you then went on to work with almost all those people I just listed.
[493] Yeah.
[494] It means that you weren't a dick during that period.
[495] because you could have easily been like, oh, who's this guy and I'm a brat and blah, blah, blah, but it's very obvious.
[496] You now worked with every one of those guys, right?
[497] Because you're a voice in Fabros.
[498] Lion King, yeah.
[499] Lion King.
[500] So it's almost like every one of these people you've gone on to.
[501] Stoller and Motola and, yeah, a lot of them.
[502] Yeah, I was, yeah, I was, I tried to be, I was, I tried to be nice, you know?
[503] Yeah, yeah.
[504] And I was very, I was a very hard worker.
[505] like I also I I I I it wasn't lost on me that I was 18 years old in a room full of you know 27 to 50 year old who knew a shitload about movie making and stuff yeah and writing and we're just older and just uh you know and so I tried not and but from a very young age from the time I was 13 I was like at sitting at a table with like grown stand of comedians in the back of a club talking and I learned from a very young age to like understand that and to not be the annoying kid and to like to navigate that you know and to be because there was also another stand -up comic who was around my age who did stand -up comedy sometimes who nobody fucking liked and he was actually someone who I could point to as like the 14 year old comedian and I was just like oh bad don't act like that fucking guy yeah he was like so entitled and like act like an I think it says a lot about your own self -esteem for whatever reason at that time because I would have blown that.
[506] I know I would have.
[507] I would have been, I would have had the hardest time just filling my role and being beta and just learning.
[508] I would be trying to impress them about all the shit I knew.
[509] I would have blown that.
[510] I don't think there's no way at 17 or 18 or 19 I wouldn't have tried to impress them in this terrible way.
[511] Well, I'm sorry.
[512] I'm sorry you feel that way about yourself.
[513] I guess you just knew that you're being hard on yourself.
[514] I think you knew that maybe you just knew your work was going to speak for itself, that you would just, you would write and you would create.
[515] I also think that I was at an age when like education was a part of the process to me. Like, it was like, I understood that it was like an amazing opportunity.
[516] Like, I was like a dog with a bone.
[517] Like I was like, you know, there was like.
[518] I think there was like 14, I don't know how many episodes I'm on declared there were, but maybe there's 16 of them.
[519] I think as a writer, my name's on like five of them.
[520] Like, and I was acting on the show at the same time.
[521] Like, I was just like, I was like, I'll stay here.
[522] I'll sleep for one fucking hour.
[523] Right.
[524] And I'll act all day and then I'll go and write until fucking four in the morning.
[525] And then I'll sleep until six in the morning and then I'll go to set and I'll act all day.
[526] Yeah.
[527] And I'll do it all again the next day.
[528] like I was just like I was just going to show people that I and myself that like I was willing to work harder than anybody was basically like the only thing I knew I could control I was like I can't all I can control is my I look how I sound how I sound I'm as tall as I'm yeah all those things are predestined yeah but I can I can control how much effort I put in and I can make sure that I'm telling myself.
[529] that I'm working harder than everyone that is trying to do the same thing I'm trying to do.
[530] Because I was also like hyper appreciative, I think again, maybe probably through doing stand of comedy because it's a little competitive, you know?
[531] So I try not to be a competitive person because I try to be able to tell myself like, I'm just going to work as hard as I humanly can.
[532] So no matter what, I just know that that's what I did.
[533] And and I won't, if I win, I win, if I lose, I lose, whatever it is, I just know that like it won't be for lack of effort it will be for some other thing and i really i do feel that way like and and i and at the time i was hyper aware of that i was like i'm just going to work everyone else as like as i'm just going to show everyone that like i will work an unlimited amount of time and do you think that was something that was taught to you or that you just genetically are hardwired that way i think it was something i knew that i needed to do to do what i wanted to do like i think it was more born out of sheer necessity like i knew i wanted to from very young age like i was able to express myself through comedy and i had an instinct that i would be able to express myself through movies and through screenplay writing yeah and and to me like it was just like a very clear root to having a life that was like not the worst version of life and maybe on the contrary like a good version of life and I was very aware of that from like a very young age and I was just like...
[534] Do you have a theory on why you wanted that so much?
[535] No, I don't know.
[536] I think it was because I was kind of like a depressed kid.
[537] Mm -hmm.
[538] Um, and I was a kid that today would probably have been put on like a lot of riddling and shit like that.
[539] Right.
[540] Right.
[541] And I think I was, I had like behavioral problems not and, but I think at a you were, you were hyperactive.
[542] I was hyper.
[543] I was always getting kicked out of class and shit like that.
[544] Like, I was always like, I was just like every, I made my teachers cry.
[545] Like, like, like, like, when I was in grade like three, like, like, not out of being like mean, just out of being like, I would push them to the brink of their their limits yeah um and and then i think i started to realize like oh this is like a way i can express myself it's something i but but when you when you smoke pot again i'm just because i'm sober i couldn't be more pro drugs i did mushrooms every day for five now every weekend every saturday for five years i love it i would have loved to have kept doing it um when you smoked pot for the first time, did you get a sensation of like, oh, this feels right?
[546] Because you just point out that you probably would have been medicated.
[547] And then I've talked about this once before on here.
[548] I read this amazing article by a psychiatrist saying that when he sits with patients and he asks them like what recreational drugs they do.
[549] And then the response to those drugs, he said, when I have a patient that does cocaine and they can go to sleep, I go, well, that person is ADHD.
[550] We have our own drugs riddle in it and that we would put them on.
[551] But people find the drugs they need and it just we just offer different drugs um and and so one of the things was when people who smoke pot who get energized and productive and creative that they typically have depression yeah probably yeah so i've always i've always been astounded like you're one of my favorite stern interviews i think you must have done that show what four times at this point more probably even yeah uh you're the greatest stern guest and when yeah when you go through your routine and how you can write stoned and you can do all these things don't i think oh that must have something to do with what's going on probably yeah i mean again i think i i did start what's interesting is i started smoking weed at around the time all this stuff started to culminate like yeah like when i got into high school when i started doing stand -up comedy when i started writing super bad like but i've also never felt like impaired by it right and i You've never felt...
[552] You're clearly not.
[553] Yeah.
[554] I've never felt like...
[555] And I've always thought, like, honestly, that connotation or that even association was, you know, like, misleading.
[556] Bothered you, right?
[557] Like, yeah, the, the association with impairment and weed.
[558] I don't think that that is, that they're analogous.
[559] Well, I mean, every few years, like anything, they're trying to make the public discipline.
[560] like they kind of have to reinvent the reasoning for it when the previous reasoning is proven to not be valid basically.
[561] So at first it was illegal for very different, like people have led it first it made you go fucking crazy.
[562] Then it made you turn into a criminal.
[563] Then it turned you into a lazy useless person.
[564] Then it's like and then slowly all those things are kind of debunked over the years and um, you know, and I think luckily now people seem much more culturally accepting of it, I think, and people are realizing that it has a lot of, but therapeutic purposes, but I think everyone has these things, you know, and I think like it's not, everyone has like, coping mechanism, has lenses through which they need to augment.
[565] How much nicotine have you watched me ingest since we sat down?
[566] So I found nicotine, like I need it.
[567] I've been off of it.
[568] I don't think it's clearly.
[569] I'm grumpy.
[570] I lack energy.
[571] There's all these things.
[572] I don't know what it is about nicotine, but it's the drug I need.
[573] Yeah.
[574] I've lived life off of it and I've lived life on it and I far prefer life on it.
[575] So I ask you these questions.
[576] I also think there's like a myth that there's like this baseline level of like purity that everyone can maybe strive to achieve.
[577] If you work hard enough, you'll just need nothing.
[578] But like that is not.
[579] like I don't know if that's real because I'm like what are you eating maybe what you're eating isn't making you feel good like even if you need nothing you're eating something maybe that needs to counterbalance not everyone can afford perfect food all the time I think it's way too simple it's like this laziness to go like well what are we really concerned about what I'm concerned about is depressed yeah they're unproductive and that's leading to all kinds of problems in their life those are problems that are worth being concerned about yeah for sure uh you know trying to to regulate some inside emotions with outside stuff and it's not working and it's creating more havoc in your life those are all things to work but just to say across the board weed is good or bad I think is a kind of a waste of time you're better I kind of think weed should be available I think that that that I would say across the board yeah in a legal regulated way I totally agree like like again it's like saying anything else is you know is coffee good or bad for some people it's good For some people, it's bad.
[580] Yeah, some people get anxiety and panic attacks from caffeine.
[581] Some thrive.
[582] Exactly.
[583] So I would put them in similar categories, honestly.
[584] Do you get sick of talking about the weed thing?
[585] You can be dead honest with them.
[586] I honestly, sadly, I get, I've probably reached the limit on like joking, like making, making work where the central, the hilarious joke is the illicit nature of weed.
[587] Yeah, being super stoned.
[588] But that being said, like.
[589] it, no, I'm not, because it's something, honestly, that has, in my opinion, like, facilitated a lot of my functionality.
[590] Yeah.
[591] Which I would argue is quite high.
[592] Yeah, absolutely.
[593] Throughout the majority of my life.
[594] Well, that's why I would urge you to always talk about it because you're one of the better examples of how some people use it in it.
[595] And that's another reason.
[596] I'm more than happy to talk about it is that I understand when because when I was young had just I I I it's so still there was there's far more important causes that you could say this about that I don't want to pretend that this is like yeah I'm not going to die like no it's up there with childhood yeah exactly but like it's something that I do think a lot of people be you know it again it helps facilitate like a good functionality level for them and I felt a lot of shame about it and I I felt like I was, yeah, at times.
[597] And any time I stopped wanting to use it regularly, it was purely built out of shame.
[598] It wasn't built out of like, I don't think I'm doing a good job.
[599] I don't think this is working well.
[600] It was always like, oh, man, like everything is telling me that this is not what I'm supposed to be doing.
[601] And then when I would hear about other people, I remember you would just hear like, oh, Jack Nicholson smokes weed all the time.
[602] I was like, oh.
[603] I think among other things.
[604] Yeah, exactly.
[605] And then you would hear like, oh, Harrison Ford smoked weed.
[606] These people smoked weed.
[607] And I remember it was weirdly, like, hugely validating to see, like, oh, there are people that have made it to respectable places in the world who have functioned on a day -to -day basis in a way that one would consider compliant with society, if not above and beyond those expectations, a smoked weed regularly.
[608] And I think that was something.
[609] In the same periods, did you quit ever for a long period of time?
[610] No. Never.
[611] It's like beating off where you feel bad, but then you can't not do it.
[612] No, I've never gone like a significant amount of time without smoking weed unless I'm like in a country where it's like highly illegal.
[613] So days or weeks?
[614] I've probably got like six day chunks because of like travel.
[615] Uh -huh.
[616] And are you, are you edgy in those?
[617] Like can you feel the lack of it or is it fine?
[618] it's probably I'd rather have it yeah of course I want you to have it I can't put too much on how supportive I am of you smoking wheat as soon as you got in here today I said I want you to please smoke weed if you want to do this I probably would yeah I can't wait but I only ask how to curiosity like do you feel a little edgy when you don't do it what's funny is and I like someone who is truly reliant on something feel more anxiety going in to knowing that I'm not going to have it, then I do once I'm actually there and can't have it.
[619] You know what I mean?
[620] That makes a ton of sense.
[621] Like, I'm worried like, oh, no, am I going to be fucking miserable?
[622] What's it going to be like?
[623] And then I get there and I'm like, whatever, it's fine.
[624] It's not that bad.
[625] Well, one of the funniest stories I've heard you tell on Stern was, how many days did you guest host the, like, was it Hoda and Kathy Lee?
[626] Just one day.
[627] Oh, just one day.
[628] And which to me, that, whoever might have any, issue with you smoking weed um i think it's far more curious that there's a show in the morning where these two women get fucking shit out yeah they get fucking drunk monkey they go for it i was like i was appalled i was nothing short of appalled i was like i thought it was a gag right it's like i don't smoke real weed on fucking screen right what i'm doing it would be like if me if we if we were smoking, we, like, we don't, we don't do that.
[629] Oh, you don't do that?
[630] Oh, you don't do that?
[631] No. Because of how many takes you have to do and that you just get too, but you, because there's a crew, like, like, cause it's, it's, because it's not, it's rude.
[632] Because I find, because I think it's rude.
[633] Honestly, that's largely why.
[634] You act, you'll act, you'll act stone though, right?
[635] I do.
[636] Yeah, but not like, uh, I do, but I find that, honestly, it's a, I find that I look, like, I, I physically will look a little stone sometimes.
[637] So I try mostly just for like physical reasons to leave enough buffer that I'm not like really baked off my ass.
[638] Okay.
[639] There have been even like, there's been scenes here and there while like I'll be in editing and be like, oh man, I look pretty fucking baked at that scene.
[640] It might work for the character, but it's good to mentally note when you're doing Steve Jobs.
[641] Yeah, exactly.
[642] Yes.
[643] I did not smoke weed when I made the Steve Jobs movie.
[644] Yeah.
[645] So, but you get to Kathy Lean, and Hoda.
[646] Yes.
[647] And what time in the morning is it?
[648] It's like 8 a .m. 9 a .m. 9 a. And they're like, what do you want to drink?
[649] First question.
[650] And I'm like, what?
[651] Coffee?
[652] And they're like, no, out there.
[653] They drink.
[654] What do you want to drink?
[655] And I'm like, I don't know.
[656] Like, what do they drink?
[657] Oh, just wine like big.
[658] And what like we drink very big glass of wine.
[659] That's what you're right.
[660] Well, a lot of people, like some wine glasses hold around a bottle of wine and they're like and they just fucking.
[661] And like I was...
[662] They put back a bottle of wine.
[663] I couldn't believe it.
[664] Did you choose wine?
[665] I can't.
[666] I think I might have had a beer because I was like, I'll nurse it.
[667] Like, it seemed a little more respectable, I guess.
[668] But part of me would have really dug it.
[669] Were you like, fuck it.
[670] Yeah, let's get hot cheeks and warm ears on this?
[671] I'm not like, I don't.
[672] No, I didn't want to...
[673] I feel like I did ultimately end up saying something to like one of the editors of Entertainment Weekly or something that I should like...
[674] I do feel like I said something to, one of the guests that ultimately, I was like, oh man, that beer at fucking 8 a .m. was not the greatest play in the world.
[675] But even as an alcoholic, which I was, it is a unique feeling to get drunk at 8 a .m., which I certainly did, but it's such a different context than I do prefer it to night.
[676] Like, not, I don't drink that much in general.
[677] Right.
[678] And I will go like months on end without being drunk in any way, shape, or form.
[679] Yeah.
[680] But like, I do like drinking during the day.
[681] Yeah.
[682] If you ever go camping, like as teens, we would camp.
[683] And on a camping trip, you wake up and drink beer.
[684] Yeah.
[685] And it is the neatest feeling to be like starting your day with that buzz.
[686] Wine tasting is the adult equivalent to that.
[687] Yeah.
[688] I loved it.
[689] So did you, because that must have been your first time in the morning buzzed on TV.
[690] It was very, very, very strange.
[691] Was it enjoyable, though?
[692] It sounds fun.
[693] Yeah.
[694] I went back, it was just me and Hoda.
[695] Okay.
[696] Which was cool.
[697] Let's be clear.
[698] Hoda's cool.
[699] not to say Kathy Lee's not chill I don't know either way but I went back on another time and me and Kathy Lee had a little bit of like I don't want to say altercation because that implies maybe something physical happened but so a confrontation an on -air confrontation oh wow about what topic about the definition of the word slash legality of the word escrow oh what a thing to debate Well, it was, it's a big part of the movie, Neighbors, and I was on there promoting it.
[700] And she kept, she claimed I was wrong in my use of the word escrow.
[701] And what was your use?
[702] Because I want to see if I'm in her camp or yours.
[703] Hopefully we can have another confrontation.
[704] I was, just, spoiler alert, I was right.
[705] So.
[706] But my understanding is it is it is an account, it's a third party bank account.
[707] Where they hold the money during which time, like, inspections are done on a house that you've purchased and all the paperwork is signed on.
[708] And then it goes into the seller's account, yeah.
[709] Exactly.
[710] And once the stipulations of the deal are lifted, the escrow's move from what catch was.
[711] Closed.
[712] She did not feel that that was.
[713] Do you recall what her position on escrow was?
[714] She did think that's what it was.
[715] A, and I don't think she thought it was something that happened.
[716] I think she thought it was something that maybe only happened in California because she did get it.
[717] Okay.
[718] You know what that tells me?
[719] and I say this my full admission of my own life that means she has a business manager she has no fucking clue when you buy a house like she has pointed to houses and then she's given keys and there's a lot of shit I don't know I wouldn't argue about the exact dynamics of how to pay an electrical bill for example who knows because it's not something I've done in myself someone walks down there with it no yeah how do they do it I picture I picture the things from monopoly when you say the electric company But because I'll, admittedly, I've had a business manager since I was 18 years, 17 years old.
[720] I could be wrong.
[721] The next thing you read about me is that I've been robbed blind.
[722] My friend, I'm one of those guys who'd be like, he didn't know anything about his finance.
[723] They took everything from him.
[724] I have a friend in Tennessee who works for a fireman's fund and he investigates claims, right?
[725] He's a super smart hillbilly.
[726] And he just randomly said to me, he's like, so, yeah.
[727] all have your money with a business manager?
[728] And I said, Did he say Jew?
[729] It came.
[730] He said, you all got a Jew business manager?
[731] I think it was implicit in the term business manager that it was here.
[732] So he goes, he goes, how often y 'all audit him?
[733] And I go, hmm, I never have audited him.
[734] Yeah.
[735] And I all of a sudden felt really stupid.
[736] Like, oh my God, I'm being trusted with both Kristen and finances and I'm not doing any due diligence.
[737] So I came home and I called my business manager, who, by the way, is my favorite person I work with.
[738] I've been with him the longest.
[739] I trust him.
[740] I love my guy.
[741] I wonder if it's the same.
[742] But at any rate, he's Jewish.
[743] Mine too.
[744] Well, so I call him up and I go, so listen, I've decided I'm going to audit you.
[745] And he goes, great.
[746] I know we audit other people for our clients and I'll know exactly what to give the person.
[747] Great.
[748] I use this guy out of Georgia who doesn't know who we are, doesn't give a flying fuck.
[749] He just is a forensic accountant.
[750] He's 70s.
[751] So this guy goes through everything over the course of like three months, right?
[752] He calls me up and he's like, you're good to go.
[753] Everything looks, you know, perfect.
[754] I'm like, great.
[755] So then I call Howard and I say, hey, I just hope you know that that wasn't any like vote of distrust.
[756] I just felt guilty not monitoring this.
[757] And he goes, you know, I totally understand.
[758] And I go, do people do that often?
[759] He goes, in 20 years of doing this, you're the first person to audit us and I was like oh my goodness we don't pay attention at all and I wouldn't have that makes you a genius if I hadn't been made to feel like such an asshole but I'm auditing my guy I got the perfect guy for you Don't I'm gonna honor your guy he won't know who the fuck you are that's great so unimpressed he's an inside guy though the guy you're the guy you were auditing suggested the guy that you used to audit no my friend from Tennessee oh the other guy did it who does a lot of auditing through Fireman's fun has an assassin in Georgia.
[760] The way you said it was so nice.
[761] I'm going to use that exact wording.
[762] I'm like, hey, just so you know, I love you.
[763] I love you, you're great.
[764] The reason I started to feel guilty.
[765] I haven't audited you.
[766] That's how much I like you.
[767] I want to prove your reputability to people.
[768] Were you just, was it effortless for you to turn that over to somebody?
[769] Yeah, I was totally never like, I, money was never, like, highly valued in my family.
[770] Yeah, I wanted to know about that.
[771] Like, I mean, my parents, like, were.
[772] like socialist essentially you know you said radical jewish social yeah and i went to like a summer camp that was like a socialist summer camp and like my parents met on like a kibbutz like um which is like essentially like a commune yeah like so um and and we didn't have a lot of money but like we weren't you didn't fetishize it no not at all and and and like i know a lot of people who grew up that way and and again it's one of those things i think as you get a little older you're like oh that's nice that that that wasn't something that i was no it's completely like conditioned to think was the be all end all of and it didn't impact at all how much you ended up making like i thought about it nonstop i think about it on some but it didn't it didn't yield me more money than you got by not thinking about it no and i never think about like i know a lot of people who like ascribe and it's one of these things that happens a lot where like they ascribe their own there's some equivalent to like the deals they are able to get and and how far or valuable their money is in comparison to other people's money and they draw a lot of worth from that.
[773] Just in general people saying like oh I got the best deal on this like how much is this person paying?
[774] I want to pay less like I assume I'm paying more than everyone for everything and I am 100 % okay with that I'm never like they're ripping me off like how dare they I'm always like yeah I have I have more money than a lot of people if you're ripping me off a little bit that I would expect how that all that's kind of part for the course It doesn't make me feel like I'm a shittier as a result of a better.
[775] It doesn't reflect on me. If I buy something that I see I could have bought it for a little less money a few days later.
[776] I'm not like, fuck, I'm an idiot.
[777] No, I don't care.
[778] Like those are the things that, and I see it sounds obvious, I'm sure, to people.
[779] But those are things I see people with huge amounts of money really put a lot of energy into.
[780] Oh, can I tell you?
[781] Like, it's fucking crazy.
[782] my things is it's two fears that feed one another so one fear is that you would not think I'm smart that's a big fear I have another fear is money yeah so not only I have to get a good deal because I'm obsessed with money but then also I don't want you to think I was an idiot and I left money on the table or I got taken advantage of a lot of people I'm okay with that I'm I don't mind if people think I'm getting taken advantage of leaving money on the table I already have more money than I ever thought I would have if I have a little as long as you're not taking all my money then I'm pretty it's not the worst thing in the world it's really lovely it's how christin is too and i think a lot of people the other thing like yeah and i think a lot of people like put a lot of like you know they they feel like they have especially in hollywood i think they feel like if they're not getting treated it's a measure they feel like if they're not getting treated better than everyone in general then they are not as worthy a person as they hope they are are yes in general you know absolutely and and i I think money goes to that, where it's like, well, if I'm paying this for something, then maybe I'm not as good as I think I am.
[783] Yeah, well, it's an industry of like very fluid value.
[784] Yeah.
[785] And evaluating yourself is something that you're always wrong about and is changing hourly.
[786] And so there's a ton of insecurity just in general.
[787] For sure.
[788] Understandably, as you're like, you do one movie and you're number one on the call sheet.
[789] Then you do another movie, you're number four.
[790] And then you're, then you have this trailer and then you have a different there's all these little flags planted all around that you could if you cared evaluate yourself and it's super dangerous.
[791] A hundred percent I fortunately...
[792] You seem to be very at peace with all that stuff.
[793] I'm mostly, I'm at peace with that stuff.
[794] I've chosen to boil it down into like are my movies good and did they do well.
[795] I've chosen to focus on those two things basically like I've dumped all my anxiety of my entire career into two buckets basically is are they considered good and did they do well enough that I'll get to continue working.
[796] So yeah.
[797] So when something doesn't do well, how hard do you take it out of 10?
[798] It depends if it's considered good or not.
[799] Okay.
[800] What if it's a double whammy?
[801] Then that sucks.
[802] And I've had a few and it's a bummer.
[803] Yeah.
[804] Yeah.
[805] What's the recovery period for you on that?
[806] It depends.
[807] Generally, until the next thing.
[808] Like, I'm probably not fully healed until something else comes out until I'm able to, honestly, though, I think before that, for me, if I'm working on something that I genuinely think will lead to that, whether I'm wrong or not, that usually makes me feel a lot better.
[809] Like, just having an idea that I'm like, this is going to, to like the interview was very traumatic for a number of reasons you know and that like really wobbled me i would say yeah but like i just we just kept working and like we were and and we were making stuff that we really liked and we're excited by and even though it it took a while for it to come out it was stuff that like as we were doing it i was like okay like people this will be it'll be this will be good people will like this this won't be like like Or at least I, I'm excited by this.
[810] So even though there's like, it's, you know, but that doubt is always there.
[811] Even when you've had, even when you're coming off something good, you're worried off, you're worried that the next thing isn't going to be.
[812] So, like, that's also something, but like, as long as I'm working on something I like, I'm genuinely pretty happy.
[813] Well, I could see, what's interesting is I could see your, your previous, your career before the interview, is that what's going?
[814] It is.
[815] Yeah.
[816] Oh, I'm so bad with this.
[817] I'm going to edit that out.
[818] I could see it going one of two ways.
[819] Like, in my mind, if you have the interview, but you've already had Pineapple Express and Super Bad and 4Gal Virgin, all these things, my mind goes like, we've had so much success, it must help in getting over something like that.
[820] But then at the same time, I could see it going the other way where it's like you feel the pressure to keep succeeding.
[821] Yeah.
[822] And we were worried.
[823] There's probably no good jumping off point for something that goes sideways.
[824] That's south.
[825] Yeah.
[826] Like, and we were worried.
[827] that like will people just forever have filed us away in their heads alongside something that is not funny like will we seem like people who are just like how dare they try to make another movie the last time they did don't don't they see what happened like there was a little bit of that also where we were just like will people accept more from us or where they'll be like all right like we gave you pack it in guys yeah like you you you you you you you You've shown your hand and we're not happy with it.
[828] And so...
[829] But do you think your perception of what the global perception of that movie is is accurate?
[830] Because I'm highly suspicious that it's not.
[831] Even hearing what you're...
[832] What you're saying right now is I don't believe...
[833] My hunch is that the world doesn't even view that thing the way you think they do.
[834] I don't think so.
[835] And that's the thing I've learned over the years also.
[836] I think just at the time, like, it was the first thing we made that, was really like even though like it didn't like on the grand scale of things like it wasn't that poorly received it actually probably even though it didn't come out in theaters like financially didn't do as bad as some of the other things we've done over the years and so it I think if those are the barometers that I'm generally kind of using is like is it viewed as good like not as good as something not as bad as others is it was it a total failure that prevented us from working in the future?
[837] No. But it was really like, it was the first thing I made where people were like, they shouldn't have made this.
[838] And that...
[839] Well, but, but, but let me just...
[840] That's a weird thing to be told.
[841] Well, yes, but also that that's an advantage they have after the fact, because they could have probably said that about any one of your movies had they not worked.
[842] Yes.
[843] They could have said like, oh, they should have never made knocked up.
[844] Yeah, yeah, yeah.
[845] If it didn't work.
[846] But that's just bullshit.
[847] That's just people jumping on after something...
[848] But I think what it was also was like the margin of error for this, knowing that like the best versions, another good, all -rated comedy of the worst version is like nuclear annihilation.
[849] Maybe they shouldn't have gone into that arena, knowing that was the potential margin of air.
[850] Well, I can tell you what, my, my, my, my, the first time I heard about it, I was taking a meeting at Sony with an executive there, a woman who loved you guys.
[851] Yeah.
[852] And she explained what you guys were making.
[853] Yeah.
[854] And I remember being so happy.
[855] Yeah.
[856] I was genuinely, like, in my soul, I was like, God bless these guys that they've been given it, they've been given some, uh, opportunity and they're doing exactly what I'd, I'd pray they would do.
[857] It made me so excited that that's what the movie was.
[858] Anything that came after that.
[859] Yeah.
[860] I was just like, fucking ballsy, punk rock, cool move.
[861] Good for them.
[862] Yeah.
[863] Now, the thing that I feel like if I were you, I would have maybe felt bad about was the crazy unforeseen fallout of like this hack.
[864] That I don't feel as bad about it as you would think because the head of Sony, Michael Linton, like, was explicitly warned about the likelihood of a hack.
[865] Oh, he was.
[866] Yeah.
[867] In a meeting.
[868] I was in.
[869] Oh, okay.
[870] And they proceeded to do nothing about it.
[871] Okay.
[872] And like, I only think, I probably don't know as much about it as I should even bring it out, but I only know that like Amy Pascal is someone who have met a dozen times.
[873] Yeah.
[874] and I just adore her.
[875] Oh, she's great.
[876] Yeah, lovely lady.
[877] We're still working with her on several movies.
[878] She's just so lovely.
[879] And then I also can only imagine if you went through all my emails.
[880] Yes.
[881] What her emails were would look like duck, duck goose compared to things I've said.
[882] In emails, I would be done for life.
[883] Yeah, I mean, that was a reality I had to face as well in some ways.
[884] But like, yeah, I mean, I do feel, I mean, I don't know if it's my full.
[885] fault and that's the thing.
[886] I don't think you should feel guilty, but I'm only saying I can imagine myself taking on that guilt.
[887] That I never quite took on.
[888] What I more felt guilty, I didn't.
[889] Because you're blaming the victims at that point.
[890] Exactly.
[891] Like, I was actually pretty angry.
[892] And like, to me, at the time, like, I just remember a lot thinking like, all right, like, a crime has been committed by North Korea.
[893] Or, or by some hacker who hates Sony.
[894] Whoever it is.
[895] Oh, it's not confirmed that it was a North Korean thing.
[896] I mean, there's.
[897] There's.
[898] There were.
[899] Russian hackers may be employed by...
[900] It's one of these like conspiracy -ish things.
[901] We're like people...
[902] Again, the thing with like a hacking is it's hard to definitively say who did it.
[903] So there is people who say definitively it was North Korea and there are other people who say that it wasn't North Korea.
[904] And the truth is like we go...
[905] I personally go back and forth on thinking like who did it and why and various things.
[906] And so do the other people involved in this story.
[907] Although one country clearly would have the clearest motive.
[908] But it's weird because like of all...
[909] the other shit that's happened like this is what north korea hacks hacks someone over like in a massive way like not like like it just seems like there's been a lot of aggression back and forth between north koree i don't know if our movie was like the most egregious right like uh example of it you know what i mean yeah and so again i don't know i get it's something i go back and forth on honestly but the the hacking itself was like not something we took on because it that was like Sony was always getting fucking hacked also like they're notoriously hated by hackers they did this thing in the 90s I think late 80s early 90s where they people were like ripping off compact des CDs oh yeah yeah and Sony created like Napster stuff yeah they were burning diss and shit Sony created ones that would like destroy your computer oh wow if you tried to copy them upload it in a way that was illegal and it made it that hackers just fucking always hated them and it's why the PlayStation network is like always getting hacked oh it is like a lot disproportionately from the other like uh video game uh i don't think i don't know if the xbox network has been hacked as many times as the PlayStation one for example they're just known for being a company hackers don't like which just again it's all like conspiracy theory shit yeah but again there was always a enough confusion about it that it was not something that I like fully was like it's our fault Sony got hacked right um I don't know if it's it's really weird though because you you have the kind of personality that I mean again I don't really know you personally but it would appear to me I could see where you would think the whole thing is really funny like but I guess when you're in the in the middle of it because to me on the outside it was kind of funny it was like this is a really kind of punk rock outcome there's something about about it that felt very like of all people to get in an international crisis i know yeah it's you there's something about that that i find and it kind of reflected the movie in a funny way um it was it was it was it was a lot i'll just say it was a lot it was a little much and it's the kind of thing now looking back on it at the time like it was the first time that i had been that probably the only time that I'd been this I mean now there's been little like dips in the water here and there but it's like I was the subject of like the news like the president like Obama was giving like entire press conferences about it like there was like I remember like a press conference happened when it was all happening and we were like are they going to ask about it like maybe they won't and the first five questions were about it and like create making Obama talk about it for like 15 minutes like And, like, at that moment, and it was kind of cool, I guess, he ultimately was like on our side.
[910] And like it was it was, it was like, it was just a little much.
[911] It was just a lot to process at the time, I think.
[912] I would really want to get you on mushrooms and replay that whole thing because it would be so beyond comprehension.
[913] Yeah, it really.
[914] And it kind of like, it rattled me for a little while.
[915] Like I was, I wasn't sure how people would react.
[916] um were you having a hard time writing at that point did that like affect your desire to sit down and write no because the whole time we were working on sausage party and like that's something we've been writing like for almost the last like decade and so like we were just always working on it and like and i didn't have time to like not keep writing you know what i mean like and i yeah like i made the steve jobs movie like right after like it all happened in december like i was shooting that movie like in the middle of January and then like we directed the pilot for Preacher in April and then like we we were making neighbors two after that like it just like kept rolling basically and so it what but it wasn't until the next movie came out which was the night before um which again like it was like fun like it didn't do that well and it and it was well enough reviewed that I was like happy with how overall it was perceived and people seemed to think it was funny but it it was good enough that I was just like we're past the next one we're over the hump like that's what it feels like it's not the worst thing it's not the best thing it's back to kind of business as usual a little bit I hope the time it'll be funny to use if you indeed do have a kid at some point yeah and you sit your 20 year old down and explain to him that you you caused an international crisis I think you'll have such delight in telling him and one real net out that is just funny is like now no matter where I am and people are like in the world and people are like what do you do and I'm like I'm an actor and people like would I know you from anything and I'm like I made this movie about North Korea and 100 % of people are like oh yeah I remember that that was you so it's given me it's given me one thing that everybody's heard of do you do you have those conversations yeah you run into people that are like who are you?
[917] That seems hard to believe.
[918] It happens a lot.
[919] It happens a lot like when I'm...
[920] When you're in Afghanistan, in Patagonia, and Sri Lanka, in Mongolia.
[921] It happens a lot.
[922] So how did, when you, the Steve Jobs movie, you were so fucking good in it.
[923] Thank you.
[924] You really, really, really were amazing.
[925] And Danny Boyle directed that.
[926] How was that?
[927] It was great.
[928] Did you love it?
[929] I just worshipped Danny Boyle.
[930] Oh, he's amazing.
[931] I loved it.
[932] It was like, to me, those things are like super educational and I'm like largely, you know, studying what the director's doing and how it's all coming together and I'm talking to them a lot and and with the, and the actors, I'm just trying to like do the scenes the best of my capabilities and not fuck it up and like that was obviously, you know, a little intimidating.
[933] Yeah, I was curious if, if you like.
[934] like I had anxiety going into that at all.
[935] I did a little bit, yeah, but not, not, I have anxiety.
[936] In a way, it was, it, it, it's, it is in many ways, I think, easier to do drama than comedy.
[937] And so it in some, and also, like, right after the interview was when it happened.
[938] So, like, I was, I was a little wobbled.
[939] And, like, the notion that I didn't have to, like, improvise fucking jokes.
[940] for 12 hours a day and instead I could just learn Aaron Sorkendial log and say it like that to me was like honestly like a huge relief and also just to get in the mechanics of filmmaking for two seconds if you make a joke in a movie me doing a slow pushing on you and playing David Gray it's not going to get us there emotionally there are a lot of tricks in a drama that are at your disposal that just aren't there in a comedy No, it's true.
[941] You can tell the audience what to think a little bit.
[942] I can just play, yeah, I can film your dead, plain face.
[943] Yeah.
[944] I push in on it long enough and slow enough.
[945] You know.
[946] I play the right song.
[947] I go, this motherfucker's got some trauma going on.
[948] Yeah.
[949] The audience fills in, fills it in for you.
[950] A lot of gaps.
[951] But they can't fill in comedy for you.
[952] They can't just make up a joke in their head in that moment.
[953] It would be great if they could.
[954] It would be so much easier.
[955] It would be a lot easier.
[956] But yeah, and so it was, and improvising, we honestly do it less and less.
[957] and I think people are getting a little sick of it, which is why we're doing a list.
[958] Like I think it's something that we helped usher in and now it's something that people have grown tired.
[959] It's a little bit of a, it's metastasized a little bit.
[960] I just like it's become highly identifiable a little bit.
[961] Like I actually, I just watched Game Night, which I really loved, and I could tell just from the way it was shot that it was not heavily improvised.
[962] Just again, like knowing about the mechanics of directing.
[963] It's not dueling over.
[964] They couldn't have shot it like this if they were improvising.
[965] It was incredibly specifically shot.
[966] And it was, It was so refreshing.
[967] It was like, ah, like, it was nice that you could tell they, like, weren't just riffing.
[968] Instead, they were, it was more constructed.
[969] I was bumped in a movie, a drama.
[970] I don't want to, like, shit on anything, but very popular drama, and it had some well -known improvers in it, and I thought the, I noticed the other actors that are traditionally dramatic actors, I could see them doing it, like, oh, they want it in on it.
[971] Yeah, yeah, yeah, that happens well.
[972] And it was just in this context of a director, I already loved.
[973] then I was like, no, no, no, no, I don't like this.
[974] Like, I can feel it, and it's someone trying to keep up, which I don't like.
[975] Yeah, yeah, yeah.
[976] And it's just taking me out of it entirely.
[977] Yeah, that's tough.
[978] And that seems to, yeah.
[979] And also, improv's a little more specific of a skill than I think maybe some people are recognizing, which is anyone can say non sequiters, that's fine.
[980] But, like, actually driving a story forward or hitting the same bead in the scene, that's not a skill that, like, 90 % of actors in SAG have.
[981] No, and also understanding the technical aspect enough to know when to improvise.
[982] Yeah, when it could possibly make the edit.
[983] Yeah, like, that's just something that like, I mean, is like, as someone who both is improvising and then having to deal with the footage afterward the fact, it is like something I've become highly sensitive to because just, I just so many times we'll see people do stuff and I'm just like, motherfucker, we can't use any of the shit.
[984] Like, and I'll just let you say it because it's a bummer for me to tell you in front of everyone.
[985] Like, all this shit's useless.
[986] Absolutely.
[987] Everyone thinks it's so fucking funny.
[988] But, like, I'm sorry.
[989] Like, you should have said this shit an hour ago.
[990] Also, did you have this experience, too?
[991] Like, once I started editing stuff, I shot, I was like, I don't want eight great options.
[992] Yeah.
[993] It's already hard enough for me to pick between the top two options I have.
[994] Like, I don't really want 12 fucking things that are, who knows what you.
[995] one's better.
[996] No, it's true.
[997] It's something that we grew like a little like I for sure think we've started to shoot more specifically as we as we go on.
[998] And well, and then we've been directing a lot of TV lately, which you just have a lot less time.
[999] And so, and we've actually liked that because it forces you to think of things very concisely.
[1000] And because in editing on television, honestly, a lot of the time, you don't even have time to go through all the alts and and find all the improvisation.
[1001] So they kind of stay away from it a little bit more.
[1002] And you're so.
[1003] And you're so.
[1004] you're so confined by the act breaks and all that stuff exactly right that there's the economy so high exactly and so like that was has actually been very educational and enjoyable is directing yeah like going from having like as much time and freedom as we want to having to work in a very confined box yeah um yeah has been i think we just had david sidaris on and he was talking about how he has page limits for himself and that he loves having page limits for himself you know I think I work very, yeah, I work much better with, like, confinement, I think.
[1005] It's more fun to try to figure out how to play within the box, weirdly, right?
[1006] I think you watch.
[1007] Because if there's no box in the sky's the limit, then actually everything has to be the greatest thing ever done.
[1008] Well, you see a lot of, a lot of creative people, like, make the rules for themselves.
[1009] And, like, the really great ones you can see make the rules for themselves and play within those rules.
[1010] And I think, like, food is probably the most easy to identify, like, representation of that.
[1011] because it's like, you know, they'll use only like, you know, it's like, here's beef five ways.
[1012] You know, here's a tasting menu, but it's all local ingredients.
[1013] It's all vegetables.
[1014] It's going through each thing.
[1015] And you just see like, oh, there couldn't be a more defined set of parameters that this person is working in.
[1016] And it's almost the better restaurant you go to, the more of those parameters there are creating.
[1017] a bullseye that only that person can hit and I think that is like what's good about a lot of again creative parameters are for us like the first movie we made was all set in one house basically yeah yeah and that was like really helpful for us like yeah you had to get inventive about where it allowed us to really yeah it allowed us to really it couldn't have been a more literal example of working within a box you know yeah because we were working within a box and and we found it very freeing in a lot of ways because it made it all of one piece almost no matter what we did.
[1018] The location unified the whole thing.
[1019] Which I think was helpful.
[1020] What did you pick up from Danny Boyle?
[1021] Was there anything in particular?
[1022] You were like, oh, that's interesting.
[1023] That's part of his secret sauce.
[1024] Yeah, for sure.
[1025] One thing I loved that he did, and we actually hired his composer to do the next thing we directed because we liked it so much was he had his composer write the score before the filming even started and throughout filming so they were never using temp score and I hate temp score like it drives me crazy and you're always like you've got like a Jurassic park yeah exactly and inevitably start just so people know when you're editing like you're trying to put some music in these scenes and your editors like grabbing oh this emotional scene let's what's the best emotional scene ever made.
[1026] And then you take that song and you're not watching your movie.
[1027] We'll use the end of the notebook.
[1028] And then like, oh, there's an exciting moment.
[1029] We'll use, yeah.
[1030] We'll use John Goldman.
[1031] Yeah, like it's jaws.
[1032] And then you watch your movie and it's so fucking misleading because you have like 10 of the best pieces of music ever written in your movie.
[1033] And then you watch the scenes without that.
[1034] And you're like, ooh, we got a little bit.
[1035] Well, and then it's unfair to your composer, I find, because they're constantly chasing.
[1036] Yes.
[1037] It would be as though, like, you blocked every acting scene with Marlon Brando and then showed it to your actor.
[1038] And we're like, all right, like, here's what we're going for, something like this.
[1039] And the actor's just like, all right.
[1040] So, yeah, Jackie Chan does the stunts.
[1041] Yeah, like, this is what you're doing.
[1042] So just do that now.
[1043] Like, double flip over the table.
[1044] Yeah, and like, not only not is it what that person's instinct probably is, they're chasing some, like, impossible to achieve standard often.
[1045] Yeah.
[1046] And so that was something he did that we started to do, and we've done it in the last.
[1047] few things we've done is we've gotten the composer to write music beforehand and we'll say write like an emotional piece right like a theme right we'll have them we'll have them write a bunch of shit and then we'll use it as the temp score basically and that's what danny did and and we just straight up stole that shit um i'm trying to think what else i stole from danny there's a what is camera wise did you notice anything that he he does use different formats that i liked it was a lot of uh oh he was using like multiple different bodies.
[1048] Yeah like the like it's in three eras the movie so he did like 16 millimeter the first era and 35 the second era and then HD the third era.
[1049] Oh really?
[1050] Yeah.
[1051] Oh that's fascinating.
[1052] It was fucking cool.
[1053] That was super fascinating.
[1054] More and more what you what I see when I was working with him and people like him is you're just like oh they really like empower these artisans that they've that they've hired and they really work with them and talk to them.
[1055] And talk to them.
[1056] and bring them into the process.
[1057] Which in itself is almost a weird paradox, though, because being Danny Boyle allows you to get some people that you really should just empower and let them be.
[1058] But as you're building a career, you're not getting access to all Academy Award -winning crew members, so I'm imagining you have to insert more of your opinions.
[1059] That makes sense?
[1060] Like, when I think about Spielberg making a movie, he's a genius undoubtedly.
[1061] But also his costume designer has nine Academy Awards, his DP has, Janush Kaminsky.
[1062] You know, so you're definitely starting in a better place, and it's probably easier to empower those people.
[1063] It is.
[1064] I find it's actually harder, though, to get at, like, I've worked, you know, as a director with, like, very new DPs who've done very little and very, very established DPs who've, like, shot some of my favorite movies from my childhood, you know?
[1065] And that's actually a lot harder in a lot of ways because it takes more courage to say like, no, I think the shot looks better from over here.
[1066] Like, I know we planned on doing it like this, but now that I'm here, I think we should do it 100 % differently from that.
[1067] And like that was actually, I actually found that like there was a certain freedom that I enjoyed.
[1068] Like this is the end, Brandon Trost, who's RDP, who we still work with to this day.
[1069] who shot almost every movie I've been like associated with since this is the end basically but he was like younger than us which was crazy at that time and and he hadn't shot a lot of movies that were like of this scalp by any stretch of the imagination but what was nice about that is it made him like a true collaborator with us instead of it being like I'll shoot guy there's the DP it made it be like okay okay like you're one of us like and all of our asses are on the line exactly exactly and and and i found i and it's my own personal thing like i find i get like intimidated by people and i'm a little less willing to like exact my specific yeah vision at times because i'll just second guess myself for the reasoning behind it but i've always regret it and almost every time i don't say yeah i think i'd rather the cameras over here i like I'm like, fuck, I wish the set of the camera was over there.
[1070] If you heard by chance this story about Paul Thomas Anderson and Daniel Day Lewis on, there will be blood.
[1071] They were on Charlie Rose talking about this.
[1072] Have you seen that by chance?
[1073] No. So Charlie Rose goes, so guys.
[1074] I never watch anything from any other filmmaker as a rule.
[1075] I'm joking.
[1076] I don't want to hear it.
[1077] I don't want to fucking hear it.
[1078] Charlie Rose goes So you guys had an interesting first week of filming What happened?
[1079] And you can sense that neither of them really wants to tell the story Because both of what they do is so special They don't even want to kind of even address how they do the thing they do Understandably But what happened is they shot for a week Okay well apparently after one week of shooting Paul said to Daniel Day Lewis Dan Lewis I want you to come watch dailies of this week And Dan Lewis said I don't watch dailies and Paul said, yes, I know that you don't watch Daly's, but I really would like you to come watch it.
[1080] So they sit down and they watch the whole first week of Daly's, and at the end of that, Paul says, I don't think your character works.
[1081] Yeah.
[1082] And Daniel DeLewis goes, I think you're right.
[1083] Yeah.
[1084] And they completely reshot that.
[1085] I just, all I took from that is like, I can't imagine ever having the confidence to basically tell the world's greatest actor.
[1086] Yeah.
[1087] Hey, I don't think, I think I might know more about this thing, than you do as the greatest actor.
[1088] Like, I know, because I would be probably tempted to go, fuck, this doesn't feel right to me, but goddamn Daniels never been anything but fantastic.
[1089] Maybe I'm crazy.
[1090] No, for sure.
[1091] I think that, yeah, I've been in similar situations where, like, to me, once I have it in my head that something's off, it's, like, pretty hard to convince me not to do something about it.
[1092] And, like, for, yeah, we've done things in our movies where I mean the smallest example is like in sausage party like Nick Kroll's character was like a hundred percent different character and then in one day we were just like we should 100 percent redo everything you've done over the last year basically yeah how do you how do you even bring that up that's so hard right yeah who's the nicest guy was like he was like yeah fucking he was like if you got god bless him was like if you guys think it'll be better like this then I 100 % trust that and I will come in and I'll try a hundred and ten percent to do whatever new thing we come up with yeah and like and he fucking did and like it was but it was like yeah it's one of those calls I don't know I almost take more pride in changing my mind like the more I work honestly like to me that becomes the thing that as I look back like displays more bravery than going along with the program.
[1093] Yeah, I agree.
[1094] And if I have regrets, it's in the past about creative things that have happened that I look back on.
[1095] It's mostly like that we ignored some thing that we all kind of knew was the problem.
[1096] That hurts a lot.
[1097] But we just like either kind of wanted to ignore it, maybe we didn't quite think it was wrong, or just didn't put enough thought into it, which is the worst.
[1098] Or a lot of it's just right.
[1099] You just don't want to hurt someone's feelings.
[1100] Yeah, that happens sometimes.
[1101] I think at times it's just been like under scrutinizing sometimes also and like we put our shit through more scrutiny than like and we get other people like we we seek a lot of external input because like yes a lot because like at what point in the process every point in the process okay like you have mentors that you or people who's friends never just anybody like whoever I'm standing next to at any given moment like I will just yeah like we will we will tell people.
[1102] people are ideas the movies we're working the movies we're considering writing will tell people like do you think this is something we should put more energy into yeah um all the time and then then then when the script is done we'll send it to people and then and then we'll do readings we'll do table reads we'll have round tables we'll invite people to sit around and talk about it well yeah um yeah we'll and then yeah and then that will continue through every step of the process yeah so you produce and you you guys shot the pilot of preacher right which is on amc uh -huh Yeah, and then we've directed a few episodes, like, throughout the season.
[1103] And I can sense, and maybe I'm wrong, but just from the outside, I can sense that you care a lot about that project.
[1104] Does that accurate?
[1105] Well, yeah, because it's the first, it's the first several things for us.
[1106] Like, it's a comic book that we loved growing up, and it was, like, one of the first, like, properties we tried to make when we had, like, any success in Hollywood.
[1107] And it just kept not, we just were not the people who were appropriate to make it, it seemed.
[1108] So, like, our first meeting for it was, like, 10 years ago.
[1109] Like, that's how long it took us to, like, eventually get it going.
[1110] And so, yeah, and we just love the comic.
[1111] And, and me and Evan grew up reading comics.
[1112] And so this idea that, like, you know, it was interesting as comics became so popular.
[1113] And these Marvel movies and shit became so popular, like.
[1114] Are you resentful at all about that?
[1115] No, it wasn't resentful because, like, I could not have less desire to direct those movies.
[1116] but there was something about like hey like we've liked this shit forever and now other people who maybe doesn't like it as much or for as long or getting to do it right but then there's preacher which was like our thing that we liked that we got to make and then there's another one called the boys that we it's our thing and we got to make and then there's and then we start to realize like oh there's tons of comic that are just not marvel that we like and and now we're just trying to make all of those basically oh that's cool yeah but I could imagine like like if, you know, growing up, loving psychedelic furs and then all of a sudden now the whole world's obsessed with it and me going like, no, this was this thing that defined me as someone different.
[1117] And now this is something everyone's into.
[1118] It's more something that I didn't realize was such a niche thing.
[1119] Like, we did so much shrooms throughout high school that like, I assumed everyone did a ton of fucking shrooms all throughout high school.
[1120] I had no idea that like, that like, I thought it was like, you drink beer, you smoke weed, you get heavily into psychedelics.
[1121] I didn't understand that that wasn't like what everybody did.
[1122] I mean, and that, and way less people seem moved on shrooms.
[1123] Yeah, I'm always a little disappointed.
[1124] A lot of like 40 -year -olds are doing shrooms for the first time and creating like entire philosophies around it, which is so fucking, as someone who started doing them when they were 14 is just like funny to see in some ways.
[1125] Yeah, there's like a whole movement backed by science that has all these, I've been trying to Monica to do it now for three years.
[1126] I've been like making a case for her to do.
[1127] But I've never done any drugs.
[1128] Just weed.
[1129] Besides pot.
[1130] Yeah.
[1131] I hardly count.
[1132] But I want her to do mushrooms and I'd like to see her do some Molly before she passes.
[1133] I think it's an experience that should not be missed.
[1134] For sure.
[1135] I mean, if you don't want to do it, don't do it.
[1136] Well, if you...
[1137] Or do it.
[1138] That's not his philosophy.
[1139] Because even if you don't want to do it, my hunches, when you, when the Molly experience starts, you'll want it.
[1140] Yes.
[1141] Molly's a drug that's hard to have a bet.
[1142] Like, if it's not, if it's of quality product.
[1143] It's like back to the future.
[1144] You're going to like them.
[1145] Exactly.
[1146] It's one of those things that's like, it's, it just is good.
[1147] It is, it's objectively good.
[1148] Have you done ayahuasca?
[1149] No, but a lot of my friends have.
[1150] Do you have any desire to try it?
[1151] I don't know.
[1152] I've, like, gone pretty deep into hallucinogens.
[1153] And like, it's not.
[1154] It doesn't seem fun.
[1155] It's the one thing that everyone I know, who has like no like who has never done too much drugs came back from yeah and we're like I don't know if I would do that again it seems to affect people very differently though because then I have like one of my very best friends is one of these guys who's done it like 60 times you know and goes to these retreats and for like 10 days in a row we'll do it every day and like for him it's just like purely therapeutic and then I have other good friends who like you know I've never seen the limits of their intake and they came back like as literally they were in fucking nom or some shit you know like they're they're not quite the same and so like that that I think but I don't know I would I would probably do yeah but not a strong desire because I hear people talk about and then just my nature as a person's like I don't I want to know what everyone's talking like I want to yeah it's hard for me to hear about an experience that I haven't had exactly I'm the same way I'm the same way especially like I get drug envy I think yeah I mean or even a trip if someone goes oh we went to this country it was amazing i don't have i don't have that as much as i do with drugs but yeah i get yeah if people seem but i don't know like at the same time i'm just like you know like do they really seem like they've seen some fucking no no no i i don't even know that i yeah yeah they just did drugs in another country so it just seems did you ever did you find like shrooms did that did that ever take a turn for you because yeah my last time doing shrooms was the first time i ever had a bad experience and it was it was bad enough that i was like hmm i don't know that i mean i ended up getting sober anyways but i i wonder if i would have uh gone off of it anyways just because when it goes south it can be memorable no i've had it go every which way but like what i find is that i did them recently and like got a thousand times more fucked up than i oh really okay okay that's kind of neat to know yeah and it was still out there super It was like, I hadn't felt like that since I was in high school.
[1156] Like, honestly, I was just like, this is, I was like, I've gone to another realm of function out.
[1157] Like, like, you would take me to an insane asylum if you, if you happened upon me. And yeah, and that had everything with, like, that was at moments very terrible and at moments very great and at moments, you know, but like, I don't know, like, to me, it's, I think to me personally, I find it helpful to, like, confront some things that may it's really just to make it's like looking under it's like looking in every drawer you know like it's really to like i that's what i personally have found it helpful for is like if there is anything you're you're sitting on that will probably uncover it in some capacity yeah a huge amount of mushrooms um and so that like that's something that i've that yeah that that i've and it was something that i was like i feel like I think I should do shrooms.
[1158] I haven't done them in a few years.
[1159] I've like a lot, you know, maybe my brain could use like a kick in the fucking gut.
[1160] And then, yeah, yeah, and then I did them and I got a hundred million times more fucked up than I thought I was going to.
[1161] And then I did acid for the first time recently, How was that?
[1162] I tried it one time and it didn't work for me. So I feel very...
[1163] For me, it worked.
[1164] It was, I found it to be like a little, like, generic.
[1165] Okay.
[1166] It was, it kind of just felt like a drug.
[1167] Like, Like a chemical -y drug.
[1168] Yeah, like it was like somewhere, it felt like it wasn't quite as hallucinatory as like crazy amounts of shrooms.
[1169] It's crazy amounts of shrooms, which are like out, like, and it was also contrasted by the fact that like a few weeks earlier I had done shrooms and like literally like the universe melted around me. And so it was like it was a high hallucinatory bar to hit.
[1170] Sure, sure.
[1171] But it was, it was fun.
[1172] It lasts a super fucking long time.
[1173] Like how long?
[1174] Like 12 hours?
[1175] 12 hours.
[1176] Like, I took them at 4 p .m. and, like, forced myself into bed at, like, 4 a .m. And was, like, like, probably, like, hallucinated almost the most as I was lying in bed, like, trying to go to sleep.
[1177] That's the part that doesn't appeal to me when, even when I have my fantasies about doing drugs.
[1178] Well, yeah, I was in a bunk.
[1179] I was literally in a bunk bed, and Evan was in the bunk bed.
[1180] Oh, my God.
[1181] This is wonderful.
[1182] It's so cute.
[1183] And so it wasn't, I was, I was okay.
[1184] I felt it, I felt at peace.
[1185] And then I woke up the next morning and I felt 100 % okay.
[1186] Oh, that's great.
[1187] I'm assuming you're in his house and his children's bunk bed?
[1188] No, we were in, uh, we rented a house, uh, like in the desert.
[1189] Oh, okay.
[1190] This is fantastic.
[1191] It was wonderful.
[1192] Yeah.
[1193] Um, well, is there anything because like Will Ferrell, I have a fantasy about him and you, you, you occupy it for me too um any dysfunction for you like you're you're you're you're I'm high all the time that probably but I don't think that's a no I don't know I mean that's one many would argue that that is I wouldn't I would say I've corrected but I yeah it's probably a course correction I guess in a lot of ways yeah I wouldn't argue that I guess I'd be more curious if like there's is is there like emotionally detached is there is there anything that you like you you actively work on like you know what I got a really you know simply because you're so high -functioning work -wise and then you've been married to Lauren how long or you guys have been together for 13 years 13 years yeah like you have a very successful relationship you have very successful work life yeah to me on the outside it seems like you're almost perfect I'm a little frustrated by it I think I could I try to see I think I could communicate with my friends and family more really yeah and I've gotten better back you have also let me I just want to add you because I wanted to bring this up.
[1194] You know, I want to get you out of here.
[1195] You also have this humongous heart that I was privy to by seeing the speech you made about Alzheimer's.
[1196] I can't remember where I saw, but you made a kind of public speech about Alzheimer's, right?
[1197] Or you've probably done a bunch.
[1198] A couple, yeah.
[1199] Yeah, and you were very emotional in the one I saw.
[1200] And I was like, oh, wow, he's also a really sweet human being who's taken on a cause that isn't immediately his.
[1201] It's his wife's mother or father?
[1202] Mother.
[1203] Yeah, and I was like, oh, this guy's a beautiful person on top of all this other stuff.
[1204] That's nice.
[1205] And it made me hate you just a little bit more.
[1206] Yeah, just a little bit more.
[1207] Yeah, just a little bit more.
[1208] But you're like, you're in touch with that and you have the confidence to be vulnerable and all that.
[1209] And I really applaud that, probably more than anything else that you do.
[1210] Like, that's a really cool thing that you decided to take on.
[1211] And you, what's the thing you started to help raise money for something for comedy?
[1212] What is it?
[1213] Hilarity for charity.
[1214] Hilarity for charity.
[1215] That was our charity.
[1216] Yeah, exactly.
[1217] I mean, yeah, we made it, me and my wife.
[1218] I mean, it was mostly born out of just like sheer depression and like wanting to feel some agency over something that we felt very powerless over.
[1219] Yeah, it's the most powerless, right?
[1220] Exactly.
[1221] And so, but.
[1222] It's just, my grandmother had it.
[1223] To me, it's just like, it's a sinking ship.
[1224] It's just taking out more and more and more water.
[1225] There's really nothing you can do but watch.
[1226] Yeah, it's a huge bummer.
[1227] Honestly, doing that stuff was the fact that I get credit for it in any way, the fact that people think I'm like a good person for it in any way is like, to me, just proportionate to the amount of energy and unhappiness it causes me because like it's, it's mostly really fun to do.
[1228] I don't put an, like, I spend a lot of time doing it and I put a lot of effort into it, but I'm, I, it doesn't feel inordinate.
[1229] I also spend a lot of time.
[1230] lot of time doing things i and other things that that is that a thing do you do you um do you do you do you do you do you do you have any symptoms of like being a workaholic like do you think i'm also very good at shutting off like i was just on vacation for a week and like i i was like i'm not one of those people who like can't put their phone down and like needs to keep like going like you never feel like lauren's like really dude you got to go today or you have to direct that episode or you don't ever get that sense.
[1231] Oh, I mean, sometimes, but not.
[1232] I think it's more just like we like spending time together.
[1233] And so it's a bummer when we can't spend as much time together as we would like.
[1234] But she herself, you know, she does the exact same thing I do.
[1235] And she completely understands how, you know, important it is to be able to express yourself in these ways.
[1236] And again, if I ever felt like it was.
[1237] derailing things you know we I've you know we've we've both thought to amazing lengths to spend a lot of time together right the last year was for sure the most time we've ever like father exactly yeah um let's just talk about that movie which stars your wife yeah yeah you're in it I have a small role in it and your wife Lauren directed it why she wrote it and directed it and yeah and and and she's been working on it the last like year um and it was a on location in Florida and on a Florida, New York, yeah, and I ended up being with the kids for three weeks unexpectedly because of the hurricane.
[1238] I know, it's so crazy, yeah, and I was in Florida for a lot of that time and giving my wife edibles and exactly, giving her vapeens.
[1239] I called her, I called that movie her spring break that she never had.
[1240] It kind of was.
[1241] You could say there was a sense of like, I can't believe I'm getting away with this shit.
[1242] Which I was so in favor of.
[1243] She's up with young cast members.
[1244] No, she cut loose.
[1245] Yeah, it was.
[1246] Doing edibles in the morning.
[1247] I'm like, go get it, girl.
[1248] It was great.
[1249] Yeah.
[1250] My wife, everyone well intoxicated.
[1251] When she is writing that, and directing it, I guess, is she using you?
[1252] That's not the right word, but you know what I mean?
[1253] Is it like she needs you as a collaborator?
[1254] Yeah, I mean, we both are very relying on one another for input.
[1255] Like, I harass her to read everything and she's made huge impacts on some of the movies we've made over the years like the only reason they're good is because of the people because of things she's said about them or input she's given us you know and that goes for a lot of like Evan's wife I could say easily you know the exact same thing about and other people who work in the company like but yeah I show her everything I write and every script of a movie that I might be in.
[1256] I ask her to read.
[1257] And every joke before I go on a thing, I ask her to look at.
[1258] Same thing.
[1259] Yeah.
[1260] It's great.
[1261] And like we used to, I think a little more early on, it was like a little bit more of an awkward dynamic.
[1262] And we used to like try to separate church and state a little bit.
[1263] And we were like, should we work together?
[1264] Should we not?
[1265] Maybe we shouldn't work together.
[1266] Maybe we should do that.
[1267] Maybe it'll seem maybe it's better to not do that.
[1268] And then a few years ago, we were just like, what the fuck are we doing?
[1269] I was like, if you weren't my wife, I would want to work with you.
[1270] So all I'm doing is like giving other people the opportunity to work with you.
[1271] And also maybe the project isn't going to be as good because we would work well together.
[1272] All in favor of some like weird hypothetical things.
[1273] But if I'm Lauren, because I've had this as me where I'm, I've done a bunch of like I'll do a cameo in Kristen's Veronica Mara's movie or I'll go do a cameo on her TV show.
[1274] And what's really funny is because she's more famous than me and more successful, when she's, she does something in my project, I feel like people are going, oh, she had to do that because they're married.
[1275] Yeah.
[1276] And then when I do it came in on her shit, I feel like people are thinking, oh, she got him, she got him a job.
[1277] No matter what it sucks.
[1278] That's my low self -esteem.
[1279] Probably no one's thinking any of those things at all, but they do cross my mind.
[1280] So I'm just wondering if, like, if I'm Lauren, I might have that, because I certainly have it with Kristen where I'm like, I would just feel like I'm a little nervous what people are going to think.
[1281] All people are thinking is like, I love Kristen and Dax.
[1282] Exactly.
[1283] A hundred.
[1284] A hundred percent.
[1285] And like it was something that I think, yeah, we were like overly sensitive towards, was like, oh, like, will it seem like one of us is facilitating the other's success in some capacity?
[1286] But then like, what I was also thinking is also like, I'm always having my success facilitated slash facilitating other people's success purely based on the fact that I like them and I think they're talented and like it is it was almost like again like I was excluding we were excluding one another from each other's work for completely made up reasons and largely probably ultimately because of or at least for me is like what strangers are gonna think like you keep coming like Chris and I all constantly like both of us step in it publicly once every six months we send a tweet or something happens where we stir up some some bees and then we have this mantra we have for each other that whoever's not stepped in the behind we go like hey just remember does anyone in your family think this about you yeah no does any one of your friends think this about yeah no so oh so everyone in your real life doesn't think anything yeah and i just you have to kind of actively remind yourself of that no very much so yeah it's super exactly and that was like i mean it's i came here just now from a pitch that we did with evans wife who is also a writer Lisa and she's a great writer and it was another thing where she was out there like selling projects that were fantastic that we were like man it'd be great when we could make those but she's your wife so we can and then one day we were just like what the fuck are we doing like if anyone should be doing it it's us it's actually the opposite of what should be happening a hundred percent was and so we've since and we all want to make it on our own we have the sense that we want to make it on her but what's really funny about it is that I didn't make it on my own.
[1287] I, I piggybacked on Ashton Coucher being famous.
[1288] So, like, it just means a stranger who's famous is going to help me. 100%.
[1289] It's preposterous.
[1290] It was super a weird, it was a very weird moment where I think we all looked at it.
[1291] The bedrock's probably good.
[1292] It's probably, like, an aversion to nepotism.
[1293] Yeah.
[1294] In a meritocracy is probably a good advertor aversion to have.
[1295] But it is ironic that you're just going to get that from someone else.
[1296] Yeah, and like, who's to say anyone's opportunity is based on merit necessarily.
[1297] I think you have to be good in order to actually succeed, ultimately.
[1298] Well, ultimately, the truth will come out.
[1299] Yeah, exactly.
[1300] You can get lucky a few times.
[1301] And so I think that is, looking back, it was an odd choice.
[1302] But I think, I mean, it's nice to be in Lauren's movie because it's, but it's also, I understand that it's probably meaningful that I'm not the star of the movie.
[1303] Because that, I think, would, again, as silly as all this stuff is, it's probably a relief to not have that associated with it as much.
[1304] You know what I mean?
[1305] Because, again, it's...
[1306] Or you've walked halfway to the real goal, which is who gives a flying fuck.
[1307] Exactly.
[1308] Well, I think now I would...
[1309] But I do think now I would just...
[1310] Like, now I would be more than happy to be the star.
[1311] Again, I'd like her more than most people, so why the fuck not?
[1312] Yeah.
[1313] When does that movie come out?
[1314] We should both know it.
[1315] August 3rd, August 6th.
[1316] August 3rd or 6th on Netflix?
[1317] Exactly.
[1318] Let's do both.
[1319] August 3rd.
[1320] August 6.
[1321] Watch it twice on August 3rd and August 6th.
[1322] But yeah, your wife directed, my wife, starring.
[1323] And thank you so much for making time.
[1324] I know you're crazy busy.
[1325] And of course, another thing about you is you do everyone's thing.
[1326] I try to do people's things.
[1327] Yeah, it's really important.
[1328] Is it, you just try to be of service to other people?
[1329] Because people have been of service to you.
[1330] Because people have been of service to us.
[1331] And, again, it's one of those things looking back at the things I've asked of people.
[1332] and the things I've gotten people to do and the amazing generosity like it's honestly one of the things I'm like most proud of in a lot of ways looking back is like who is willing to keep working with us and who is willing to trust us it is the real test of everything and I'm so thankful for that any of these people that I consider are so skilled and and talented and amazing that like the fact that they in any way would entrust anything with me in any way, shape, or form is just something that I'm, I know how thankful I am for it.
[1333] So I try whenever I can do something for people that I respect and that I like what they're doing.
[1334] And then, and, and, and, and, and, and it seems like, uh, again, the, the kind of thing that, um, again, I just try to be available because.
[1335] Yeah.
[1336] It's really admirable.
[1337] Don't, you're right.
[1338] Don't have kids.
[1339] Exactly.
[1340] You'll never be on another podcast.
[1341] If I had kids, I would not fucking be here right now.
[1342] There's no doubt about that.
[1343] Well, thank you for coming.
[1344] You're so fun.
[1345] I really, really do look up to you.
[1346] I'm going to tell you one second story.
[1347] After Idiocracy, Judd asked me to come meet with him for 40 -year -old Virgin for the role you did.
[1348] Oh, that's funny.
[1349] And I had just done without a paddle where I was third banana and without a paddle.
[1350] And then I did Idiocracy where I was third banana and that.
[1351] And then I was very arrogant and I was like, I think I'm ready to go to.
[1352] I've done third banana.
[1353] I want to go to number two banana.
[1354] Second banana.
[1355] And I have a lot of respect for Judd, so I don't want to waste Judd's time.
[1356] That was my, by the way, I'm five minutes in the business of getting off.
[1357] I don't know what I'm supposed to do.
[1358] There's no rule.
[1359] So I really thought I was being generous to his time by saying I don't want to meet him because I really want to be the second banana and the next thing I do.
[1360] And so I never did meet him.
[1361] And then you, of course, did that role.
[1362] And you were fantastic.
[1363] none of this would have happened to me but there was a moment when when knocked up came out where I was like oh no the size of the shit in the bed you took and despite I guess what I'm trying the point I'm trying to make is you were so well positioned for me to hate you because I had fucked up and I should have met on that movie and you would have probably gotten it anyways I'm not even suggesting that but then you also did this movie I really it was all set up on a platter for me to dislike you and then I just fucking loved you and I thought you were so great in Fort Hill Virgin and then I loved you and knocked up and I was just watching this career that I thought part of my brain thought oh wow that could have been me look how fun it looks and now he's getting to make the movies he's written that I could be making the movies I've written and despite that I still was able to cheer for you that's how likable you are I would have hated me I would have only rooted for my complete and utter failure.
[1364] Destruction.
[1365] Well, just, I mean, that's, I auditioned for idiocracy and did not get cast in it.
[1366] Oh, you did?
[1367] I did.
[1368] For Frito, from my wrong?
[1369] No, Justin Long, I think.
[1370] Oh, right, right, right.
[1371] And what's funny also, actually, about without a paddle is that there's a scene in it where you guys are like, it's about a weed field.
[1372] Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
[1373] I had written Pineapple Express at that point and was convinced that without a paddle, stole not I know I did not think they stole it but I thought it ruined oh yeah the movie oh yes I thought it made it that no one would make pineapple express I just not because it like not because of any like when I read the script I remember because Jason Siegel was auditioning for it oh okay I was highly jealous because like why aren't I did like that was like my whole life for years scripts on Jason Siegel's fucking dining group table that he was auditioning for that I wasn't and I was just like what is happening and And then, yeah, then I remember reading it.
[1374] And I remember actually think he was like, because I told him about her, he'd read Pineapple Express.
[1375] He's like, this movie has a scene where they like burned down weed field.
[1376] And I was like, fuck.
[1377] Oh, yeah.
[1378] And I think I was 27 or 8 at the time.
[1379] And that's all I thought about.
[1380] Like, oh, fuck.
[1381] Well, I'll give you a great example is we had a bear scene in our movie.
[1382] Like Seth gets taken by a bear.
[1383] And I want to say, Anchorman came up before.
[1384] Anker man has a bear scene.
[1385] Yeah, yeah.
[1386] And in a bear scene.
[1387] And I remember Steve Brill calling me, like, we're all in a huge pair.
[1388] panic.
[1389] There's two movies with a bear scene and it's like it's the end of the world and our movie will never work because now they...
[1390] Now it don't give us shit.
[1391] No, and when I watch it, I don't even fuck.
[1392] Like, did you see Deadpool 2?
[1393] No. Okay, it's very funny.
[1394] I hear it's great.
[1395] I assume you saw McGruber.
[1396] Yes.
[1397] My favorite part of McGruber ever.
[1398] What a breakthrough comedy idea.
[1399] Love that movie, yes.
[1400] Was when he takes 20 minutes to assemble the 18th.
[1401] Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
[1402] And then he blows him up in a van, right?
[1403] And that happens in Deadpool.
[1404] The exact same thing.
[1405] and I loved it in both things.
[1406] And I never thought I was happy they did it again because I liked it so much the first time.
[1407] And at no point did I think they stole from anyone.
[1408] But if I were in that situation, I'd be panicked about all of that.
[1409] You'd be like, oh, we can't make Deadpool 2 now.
[1410] Yes, we got to shelve this movie.
[1411] I don't care if it's $800 million for flushing down the toilet.
[1412] No, 100%.
[1413] Yeah, it's so funny how that stuff.
[1414] It means so much to you.
[1415] At the time, yeah.
[1416] It's like, I remember putting so much in every one of those movies that I would audition for.
[1417] I remember like thinking like not getting cast in like final destination was like the worst thing that ever happened to me. And like not being in idle hands was like the worst moment of my life.
[1418] Like yeah, it's so funny looking back where you're just like, oh like I'm so glad I'm not in those.
[1419] How weird would it be if I was in final destination?
[1420] That would be so strange.
[1421] Yeah, it would just...
[1422] My audition like that was was the first Fantastic Four.
[1423] They wouldn't release the real script.
[1424] So they gave you jibberish, like a scene that was all sci -fi mumbo -jumbo.
[1425] Like, it could not be memorized.
[1426] There's just no way you could memorize.
[1427] Because it was all fake words that sounded galactic.
[1428] And this is the only time it's ever happened to me in an audition.
[1429] I get halfway through.
[1430] I'm not pronouncing anything correctly.
[1431] I'm just, I'm objectively terrible.
[1432] And just in the middle of it, I go, look, guys, let's, I don't think.
[1433] any of us deserve any more of this.
[1434] Yeah, I was like, I'm just going to save all of us the next three pages of this.
[1435] Thank you.
[1436] And I left.
[1437] And it's the only time I did.
[1438] But I remember driving home going, well, that's a wrap on you.
[1439] You'll never be.
[1440] Yeah.
[1441] You just bailed out of an audition midway through.
[1442] And then it's one of those things where it's like, no one gives a fuck.
[1443] Those people, they didn't remember that shit happened by, by two hours later, they were just like, business is.
[1444] Especially when you get on the other side of it and you recognize what that process is.
[1445] It's so informative of like.
[1446] Oh, yeah.
[1447] too stressful emotionally draining well unlike this which was a goddamn pleasure it was lovely set thank you so much for coming thanks for having and i hope that uh like father's amazing i hope that uh the preacher wins every award it won't okay and then the pilot you just directed i hope that is the next stranger things it'll be great and uh and then have some kids so we can hang out because we can only hang up we're going to hang out with kiddied people yeah that's right okay you're off the table i'm in all right see you and now my favorite part of the show the fact check with my soulmate monica padman she's an armchair fact check she's an armchair fact check i can't hit that note my voice my voice is hanging on by a thread why is your voice hanging on by a thread well monica thanks for asking i i'm shooting my game show spin the wheel and today i filmed three back -to -back episodes a lot And I'm really revving everyone up.
[1448] I'm trying to be high energy.
[1449] I'm yelling probably more than I should.
[1450] I'm not protecting my instrument and now I'm paying the price.
[1451] Are you breathing from your diaphragm?
[1452] God, no. I don't even know what that means.
[1453] Kristen told me to breathe from my diaphragm.
[1454] Like, you fucking breathe from your lungs.
[1455] No. It's a trick.
[1456] No, you breathe from your diaphragm.
[1457] You need to take one acting class.
[1458] But explain that.
[1459] You breathe from your lungs.
[1460] Take a breath in.
[1461] Put your hand on your stomach.
[1462] Take a breath in and make your stomach.
[1463] expand when you do it.
[1464] Okay.
[1465] Not, no, I can see your whole upper...
[1466] Look at my fucking bellies popping out like Craig T. Nelson's in Poultergeist.
[1467] Look when I do it.
[1468] Okay.
[1469] It looks so cute when you do.
[1470] Please always breathe from your diaphragm going forward.
[1471] That's why my voice is protected.
[1472] Oh, you're always protecting your voice.
[1473] Yeah, always.
[1474] Because you never know when you'll be called on to host three episodes of an hour -long game show in one afternoon.
[1475] You never know.
[1476] You just don't know.
[1477] You probably also would be more responsible about the yelling.
[1478] I get caught up in the moment.
[1479] No, I would be yelling during a game show for sure.
[1480] People are like landing on a million dollars and I go berserk and I start running around.
[1481] I'm afraid I'm going to rip my suit.
[1482] My suits are so tight.
[1483] That's nice.
[1484] Is it, yeah, I think I would feel so, I would feel everything they were feeling.
[1485] Yeah, it would be hard.
[1486] It's impossible not to because the stakes are so high.
[1487] But I got to tell you my boss, who I love, I don't know that I've liked a boss more ever.
[1488] Andrew Glassman.
[1489] He's in my ear.
[1490] I have a little ear wig in so he can tell me shit, you know?
[1491] Mm -hmm.
[1492] And he said, right before we started, he goes, my God, you look like Daniel Craig in that suit.
[1493] Oh, boy.
[1494] I can't imagine being told something nicer than you look like Daniel Craig in a suit.
[1495] I mean, I think he was just pumping me up so I'd feel confident, you know?
[1496] I think it was a mental trick, but I took it in that moment and it made me feel great.
[1497] Good.
[1498] And then I strutted on that stage, Monica.
[1499] Oh, no. I guess in this scenario, it's a good thing.
[1500] I peacocked up and down that circular stage.
[1501] I guess it's a good thing.
[1502] Yeah.
[1503] What kind of facts did we stumble onto?
[1504] A couple.
[1505] With Seth Rogi.
[1506] Well, he was talking about how his wife went to a very quintessential American high school.
[1507] Oh, right.
[1508] And you said, and you said, oh, she was the Lila Garrity.
[1509] Ah.
[1510] So that's from Friday Night Lights for people who do not.
[1511] Our favorite show.
[1512] Yeah, which was a little confusing because he was talking about Varsity Blues.
[1513] Oh, okay.
[1514] And then you said she was like the Lila Garrity.
[1515] So I don't want people to think Lila Garrity is from Varsity Blues.
[1516] She's from Friday Nightwives.
[1517] She's from Blue's Clues.
[1518] No. Don't spread fake news.
[1519] I won't, I won't.
[1520] She could have been, but I haven't looked it up if Minka Kelly was ever on Blue's Clues.
[1521] I think we would have heard about it, especially with how much we've talked about Blues Clues.
[1522] probably she um it's a good show it was a great show and she was so cute in that show huh yeah oh i thought the the chemistry between her and riggins was on fuego you mean are you thinking of the other girl no the blonde the blonde girl the blonde girl isn't lila garrity i know yeah yeah yeah oh so you are thinking of riggins was dating lila garrity on the show and and he put it in uh no they dated they had the real romance there's a we're only going to solve this one way and that we're going to rewatch that whole series together well here's a thing i'm glad this happened actually i know that you didn't finish and i did i'll tell you why i'll tell you why before you i know what you're insinuating and i'll tell you i haven't finished right in in the same way that i have not read the last Bukowski book.
[1523] I have a Bukowski book.
[1524] This is true.
[1525] Sitting in my bookshelf that I'm not going to read because I can't live life knowing I've read every Bukowski book and there's none left.
[1526] And I can't live knowing I've completed Friday Night Lights.
[1527] That's sincere.
[1528] That's why I haven't watched.
[1529] Yes, that's why I haven't watched it.
[1530] But you don't know, so much happens.
[1531] And I have the luxury of finding out still.
[1532] Are you going to?
[1533] It's been quite a long time.
[1534] Of course.
[1535] Right when I get diagnosed with something terminal, I'm going to turn that on.
[1536] I'm going to open up my Buchowski book, and I'm going to have a great last couple weeks.
[1537] You might not.
[1538] It's a pretty sad last season.
[1539] Okay.
[1540] Well, it won't be sadder than my terminal disease.
[1541] That's true.
[1542] Anyway.
[1543] Oh, he said in kind of passing, but he said Vancouver's not the biggest city in the world.
[1544] He was talking about how people run into each other, and he was just saying that as like a phrase.
[1545] Vancouver's not the biggest city in the world.
[1546] But the largest city in the world by population is, do you want to guess?
[1547] Yeah, Mexico City.
[1548] Nope, but I think that is probably pretty high up.
[1549] Probably number two.
[1550] Well, it was not number two, but.
[1551] Well, it had $25 million when I was in college.
[1552] Really?
[1553] Yeah.
[1554] They had the population.
[1555] Well, they lost a bunch of people then.
[1556] Oh, really?
[1557] Yeah, because.
[1558] Oh, no. They passed?
[1559] I don't know.
[1560] Let's just hope they moved out.
[1561] The highest number, the number of the largest city is less than 24 million.
[1562] I said 25, but all right, what does that say?
[1563] Oh, well, it's 24 million.
[1564] Shanghai.
[1565] Mm -hmm.
[1566] Largest city in the world by population, 24 mil.
[1567] Well, I can't do it now, but on a future fact check, I'm going to find out what year Mexico City had a population of 25 million.
[1568] And I'm sad they're losing, folks.
[1569] I mean.
[1570] You know, what does it say?
[1571] What do you have there for Mexico City's population?
[1572] Yeah, I knew this is crazy.
[1573] There's no way.
[1574] There's loss.
[1575] They lost 60 % of their inhabitants.
[1576] What happens?
[1577] For our listeners, Rob just said that Mexico City has 9 million people.
[1578] And in 2010, had 8 .8 or something.
[1579] Oh, my God.
[1580] How could I have been that off?
[1581] Yeah, I knew this was wrong from the beginning.
[1582] As soon as you said it.
[1583] Mexico's I still don't believe it.
[1584] Oh, my God.
[1585] There's been so many fatalities from this narco war.
[1586] They killed 16 million inhabitants.
[1587] You'd rather believe that than just accept that you're wrong.
[1588] I'm so wrong.
[1589] I'm super wrong.
[1590] Yeah.
[1591] It couldn't be wronger.
[1592] Jeez, Louise.
[1593] And I don't know, my fucking phone won't work.
[1594] Okay.
[1595] It's trying to protect you.
[1596] It probably is.
[1597] Okay.
[1598] So we were talking about bar mitzvahs.
[1599] And you asked, why is the age of?
[1600] 13.
[1601] The term bar mitzvah refers to a young man who has reached the age of 13 plus one day.
[1602] Most references to the age of 13 come from stories the rabbis told about characters in the Bible at 13.
[1603] So there's all these boys turned men in the Bible at age 13.
[1604] So that's one of the reasons.
[1605] Yeah, okay.
[1606] They go all these guys turned into a man. Right.
[1607] A man at 13.
[1608] Maybe our boys should be men at 13.
[1609] Mm -hmm.
[1610] Still seems awfully young to be considered a man. Yeah.
[1611] Some explain that the fact that the age of maturity is 12 or 13 is simply an oral tradition that God imparted to Moses on Mount Sinai.
[1612] Now, I've met a lot of 12 -year -olds.
[1613] It doesn't seem like the transformation is complete at 12.
[1614] That's for girls.
[1615] And girls are more mature than boys.
[1616] But still, when you wander the halls of a junior high, which I do recreationally, Just to check in with the youth, you're not seeing anyone there at the junior high that is a man or a woman.
[1617] I just want to tell everyone that's not true just in case they think you're like walking into some locker rooms and stuff.
[1618] I could give a lot of motivational speeches that, you know, I could find business there other than just being a creep.
[1619] Like I could talk to dyslexics or something.
[1620] Don't you think I should do that?
[1621] You're wandering around the halls.
[1622] Just looking for dyslexic.
[1623] Well, what if I'm just wandering around?
[1624] You're just asking people, are you dyslexic?
[1625] How are you doing on your reading?
[1626] Bad?
[1627] Give them a little test.
[1628] Yeah.
[1629] Yeah.
[1630] It's the youngest age at which someone is referred to as a quote man in the Torah.
[1631] Is 13.
[1632] Yep.
[1633] In a day.
[1634] Correct.
[1635] Well, 13.
[1636] Oh, okay.
[1637] The first day of 13 is not 13.
[1638] You have to have had a full day of 13 to really be 13.
[1639] Everyone knows that.
[1640] Okay, I didn't know that.
[1641] Thank you for telling me, though.
[1642] That's any age.
[1643] Like when I turned 31 in a couple weeks, I won't really be 31 until the day after.
[1644] Okay, not to backtrack.
[1645] Here's my fucking number, thank God.
[1646] I did Mexico City metropolitan area population, and it's 21 .3 million.
[1647] It says, according to the most recent definition agreed upon by the federal and state governments, the population of Greater Mexico City is 21 .3 million, which makes it the largest metropolitan area of the Western Hemisphere and the 10th largest agglomeration in the largest Spanish -speaking city in the world.
[1648] At least I got close to my 25 million.
[1649] I mean, I would have seemed absolutely insane if I, If it were 8 million, and I said 25.
[1650] How many people in Mexico City?
[1651] 8 .851 million in 2010.
[1652] Yeah, but if you do Mexico City metropolitan area population, it's 21 .3 million.
[1653] Look, that's not how we're supposed to be doing it, I don't think.
[1654] Because if you just go ahead and if you type it.
[1655] I only was trying to answer where I got that number, Monica.
[1656] Do you see that?
[1657] Because I did learn that number.
[1658] I did learn that number at college.
[1659] But you understand that when you say that, and then it's totally.
[1660] and all this and I have been, I can't keep it in if it's wrong.
[1661] It's still right.
[1662] The biggest city is still Shanghai.
[1663] And you just said city.
[1664] You didn't say metropolitan area.
[1665] I know.
[1666] That's why I know.
[1667] This was a side conversation about how on earth I had that number, 25 million in my head.
[1668] And I luckily found the answer, which is, it's the metropolitan area of Mexico City.
[1669] That's 21 .3 million.
[1670] I feel a lot better.
[1671] I felt crazy.
[1672] Yeah, that was crazy, seeming.
[1673] I was off by a factor of 300%.
[1674] I can't have that margin of error and still call myself an armchair expert.
[1675] That's true.
[1676] I'm glad we clarified that.
[1677] You mentioned again the article about drugs that...
[1678] I found it.
[1679] I know.
[1680] So what is it?
[1681] Yeah.
[1682] It's about time I say what this article is.
[1683] Woo!
[1684] Okay, so the title of the article that I often reference is, can nicotine be good for you?
[1685] and it was in the New York Times and it was written by Anna Fells F -E -L -S and yeah I'm quoting if a patient tells me he falls asleep on cocaine I wonder if he might have attention deficit disorder a patient who smokes marijuana to calm down before important business meetings leads me in the direction of social phobia or other anxiety disorders Yeah, so it goes in, and it also tells you the pros and cons of nicotine, which, of course, I'm always tremendously interested in as a deep, deep nicotine addict.
[1686] What year was it written?
[1687] That is a great, it's an outstanding question, and it's not readily available.
[1688] Oh, March 5, 2016.
[1689] Hmm, great.
[1690] It wasn't written in the 80s.
[1691] Yeah.
[1692] We don't have to discount it.
[1693] It's still relevant.
[1694] Yeah.
[1695] For another couple months.
[1696] Mm -hmm.
[1697] Oh, the Paul Thomas Anderson, Daniel DeLewis movie.
[1698] You were talking about that story, but you didn't say what movie.
[1699] There Will Be Blood.
[1700] Didn't know if it was that, or they've done another movie, Phantom Thread.
[1701] That's right.
[1702] Most recently Phantom Thread.
[1703] So it was There Will Be Blood that you were talking about.
[1704] It was, yeah.
[1705] Okay, great.
[1706] Iowaska?
[1707] Teach me about that.
[1708] Am I allowed to take it and still call myself sober?
[1709] No. I don't believe so.
[1710] What if it's for medicinal reasons?
[1711] Sure, I guess.
[1712] I mean, that's up to you.
[1713] That's up to you and your sponsor to decide.
[1714] That's right.
[1715] But it does make you like puke and have diarrhea and expel everything and have a huge purge.
[1716] Yeah, did I bring up the episode of Chelsea Handler on her Netflix show where she goes around and does weird shit?
[1717] She went and did Iwaska on camera.
[1718] And they were all being very thoroughly warned that some diarrhea might be in their future.
[1719] And there was toilets close by.
[1720] And it's very communal.
[1721] So that part was kind of put me off.
[1722] Did you see it?
[1723] She did not experience diarrhea.
[1724] Oh.
[1725] Luckily for her being on camera and all.
[1726] Yeah.
[1727] But also I got to applaud her lack of vanity to put herself in a situation if she made diarrhea on camera.
[1728] Did she puke?
[1729] I can't remember if she puke.
[1730] but you know how I feel about puking it's like no whoop it's like coughing to me sure so I wouldn't have minded if she puked nor even filed that into of like a crazy moment I would have just thought oh yeah she sneezed right uh anyway so it's pretty hard on your system I believe this whole experience but people have huge breakthroughs and it is supposed to be a spiritual medicine does it dissolve the sense of self.
[1731] I think that's the goal in a lot of these hallucinogenics is to take the area of your brain offline that deals with ego and identity and self and help you feel connected to the rest of the world.
[1732] Yeah, it's an entheogen, which is a class of psychotic substances that induce any type of spiritual experience aimed at development.
[1733] So it does have a, it does have a positive purpose.
[1734] Well, one of those developments may be diarrhea.
[1735] That should be mentioned.
[1736] Lots of it.
[1737] Before you go out and buy some.
[1738] Yeah.
[1739] Off somebody at your local 7 -Eleven parking lot.
[1740] Oh.
[1741] I mean, do you think maybe they're just having, they're just delirious from all the fluid they've lost?
[1742] Like, sometimes when I have the flu, I feel like I'm having a spiritual experience.
[1743] Really?
[1744] Like, I'm not in a normal mind.
[1745] Sad.
[1746] Yeah.
[1747] And the state of mind.
[1748] Does that help you feel, though, connected with the rest of the world?
[1749] I think that's where the spiritual component, where the rubber meets the road, is when you start feeling that we're all interconnected and we're all a part of this big stew of molecules and there is really no division or delineation between Monica Padman and Dak Shepard.
[1750] It's a romantic notion.
[1751] But it could be placebo.
[1752] It's like you're doing these drugs, knowing that this is coming or wanting that to come.
[1753] and then you're also delirious from your dehydration.
[1754] Well, hold on.
[1755] I don't know that you're dehydrated.
[1756] Yeah, if you're vomiting and diarrheaing, if you have the flu because of this, then you are dehydrated.
[1757] They probably don't let you have any water.
[1758] It's hard to make diarrhea a verb because you just said it and I say it too, diureen.
[1759] It doesn't sound like you want to be able to make it a verb, but I don't know if it makes itself a verb all that easily.
[1760] But I can tell you as someone who's been on Mass. amounts of hallucinogens, it is not placebo.
[1761] You don't know.
[1762] Well, I do know that after hundreds of trips, that probably the placebo effect would have worn off.
[1763] Yeah.
[1764] I don't know.
[1765] I know you don't know.
[1766] You're hating on shrooms.
[1767] It's fine.
[1768] I'm not hating on.
[1769] Although I, you brought it up in the thing that you want me to do it.
[1770] And boomers.
[1771] Why would I do it if literally both of you said that.
[1772] that, or you definitely said, that the last time you did it was just a terrible experience.
[1773] I think Sam said the same thing when he was on.
[1774] Why would I do that?
[1775] That could be my first experience on it.
[1776] I'll tell you exactly why.
[1777] Because when I order 100 pizzas, one of those pizzas sucks.
[1778] I get food poisoning from one in 100 pizzas.
[1779] I would still advise you to eat pizza.
[1780] It's amazing.
[1781] And I've had over 100 great experiences.
[1782] The reason I had the one bad was that my partner in crime, Josh, lost his shit and took us together down to dark dark spiral.
[1783] Well, if it's that, if you're that, I'm going to be there.
[1784] I'm going to be with you while you take your boomers and I'm going to keep things very positive.
[1785] I'm going to be your shaman.
[1786] If this is a drug that makes you so susceptible that someone next to you is behaving a certain way, that makes you then have an equally terrible.
[1787] time.
[1788] I can tell you that sober being next to him in a cabin, I would have had a terrible time because he was trying to pull his hair out of his head.
[1789] So it was a gruesome thing to witness high or otherwise.
[1790] Why would I ever do something that makes someone want to pull their hair out of their head?
[1791] It's my belief that Josh already felt like he wanted to pull his hair out of his head.
[1792] And then the drugs just facilitated that.
[1793] Well, I don't think you want to pull the hair on your head.
[1794] I don't.
[1795] no if I do and I don't well you know what the offer is off the table I rescind the offer okay I will not be your shaman as you wander through a kaleidoscope landscape on boomers cool I'll find somebody else all right now you might do it to spite me maybe I will diureen um like father came out on August 3rd not August 6th and it's out currently And it's done incredibly well.
[1796] I'm sure it has.
[1797] We just found out it's done incredibly well.
[1798] Go watch it.
[1799] Stream that shit.
[1800] Mm -hmm.
[1801] That's all.
[1802] That's it?
[1803] Yep.
[1804] We're going to go out on the celebratory note that Like Father has performed admirably on Netflix.
[1805] Yes.
[1806] Was there anything that Seth was promoting that we're supposed to remind people of?
[1807] Like Father.
[1808] Like Father and the preacher is a show he directs and produces?
[1809] Yeah.
[1810] I don't know when.
[1811] I don't know the timeline of that, but...
[1812] We just don't know.
[1813] But everyone should watch that, too, and watch everything set does because it's all very good.
[1814] It's always impressive.
[1815] Knocked up is one of my favorites.
[1816] You just love that one.
[1817] Did you, were you able to easily see yourself as Katie Hegel in that movie?
[1818] Is that why you were able to connect with the female protagonist in a way that allowed you to experience it a little more?
[1819] No, no, I've never gotten accidentally pregnant.
[1820] Okay.
[1821] So...
[1822] Yet.
[1823] Yet.
[1824] Yet.
[1825] All right.
[1826] Well, I love you, Monica.
[1827] I love you.
[1828] Dang, nag.
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