Chris Pine

[0] Welcome, welcome, welcome to armchair expert.

[1] I'm Dan Rather, and I'm joined by Monica Monsoon.

[2] Handsome actor alert.

[3] Big time.

[4] Trigger warning.

[5] If you get horny too easy at work, don't listen to this one.

[6] You might need to wait.

[7] This was a great one.

[8] It was really, really fun.

[9] It really, really was.

[10] He's so interesting.

[11] He is insanely interesting.

[12] You'll hear about it.

[13] I thought he hated me. Maybe he was, I love that he admitted he was judgmental of me. Such music to my ears to hear You hear that in a little bit of a way that Isn't there Is a little bit of a stretch Okay, that's fine I'll let the listener decide Yes, exactly But these are my favorite kind of interviews They happen occasionally where it's like I got a story about somebody Maybe they have a story about me And then we chat and we like each other so much He's so smart Chris Pine Very smart Right out of the gates I'm like Berkeley Okay Yeah Okay Berkeley And then a story I would have never guessed and unraveled every story I had made.

[14] You really went nuts over a piece of this, which you'll hear.

[15] Yes, I unraveled.

[16] Yeah.

[17] In the best way.

[18] Oh, I love it.

[19] What you think about people is not always the truth.

[20] I'm so wrong.

[21] It's insane.

[22] You would think I would learn to stop guessing, but no. No, you never stop.

[23] I get it right one in five times, and I'm like, yeah.

[24] And that's enough for you.

[25] That's enough.

[26] I'll stick with those.

[27] Of course, Chris Pine was in Star Trek.

[28] Wish, Wonder Woman, Dungeons and Dragons, as my kids now are very acutely aware of The Princess Diaries.

[29] He has a new movie out that he wrote and directed called Pool Man out May 10th.

[30] You'll hear all about that.

[31] Again, very impressive, writing, directing job, very, very smart, very quirky, very interesting, very stylized, very good.

[32] Please check it out and enjoy my new friend, who I might start saunying with.

[33] Chris Pine.

[34] He's an obtrane.

[35] He's an option expert.

[36] You're talking to the sod expert.

[37] Yes, how are you welcome?

[38] I have a few sod experts here.

[39] Hi, I'm Monica.

[40] Nice to meet you.

[41] You son of a bitch.

[42] Look what you just arrived in.

[43] Is that a 69 -ish?

[44] What is that?

[45] It is indeed.

[46] That is gorgeous.

[47] 30 ,000 original miles.

[48] Oh.

[49] How many have you heard that?

[50] In the green.

[51] I love the green.

[52] I've had it for like probably seven years and And then right before COVID hit, I got nearly T -Bone.

[53] I was working on this film, and this woman came through a red and at 45 almost basically killed me. But she clipped the back.

[54] Uh -huh.

[55] And they had to take it all apart.

[56] COVID hit.

[57] The company went out of business so that I didn't have it for two years.

[58] Oh, my God.

[59] So I just got it back.

[60] And are you so happy?

[61] What is it, a four -speed?

[62] No, it's a five -speed.

[63] I don't have any old cool Porsches.

[64] I had a 9 -11 for a while.

[65] My buddy wanted it in Michigan.

[66] I collect station wagons.

[67] Oh, I have one.

[68] You do.

[69] You do.

[70] Oh, okay, great.

[71] Blue on wood panel.

[72] Wait, this has to be on air.

[73] You guys are talking too much.

[74] Mine's favorite topic.

[75] You know who's...

[76] We're attracting a lot of car guys these days.

[77] You know, do you...

[78] Have you ever met Joan and Nolan?

[79] Very briefly, he and his wife.

[80] Is he a car guy, too?

[81] Yeah, we just interviewed him and he rolled up in an Ariel Adam, one of those crazy...

[82] Oh my God.

[83] Yeah, no roof.

[84] It was really cool.

[85] Yes.

[86] I'm a pretty basic dude when it comes to it.

[87] I have a...

[88] 57 speedster that I wanted ever since I saw down 2 -0.

[89] Yes, of course.

[90] Dylan drove it.

[91] Dylan drove it.

[92] I was like, I have to have it.

[93] I have a 280s -L.

[94] The little convertible.

[95] That was on a show, too.

[96] Yeah, yeah, that's LA law, but that's like...

[97] He had a 5 -6 people.

[98] That could actually be a Porsche.

[99] I was thinking shampoo.

[100] Oh, sure, sure, sure.

[101] Can I tell you right now looking at you in the car you've arrived in, which is so gorgeous.

[102] And you're very stylish.

[103] I've been watching a lot of interviews with you.

[104] Thanks, man. You have a lot of style, and I say it sincerely.

[105] Fashion guy.

[106] If you don't already own a big.

[107] BMW 3 .0 CSI.

[108] 3 .0 CSI, look.

[109] It screams you.

[110] Forever.

[111] I'm a huge fan.

[112] My first car, so everybody in my high school, I went to very shishi high school here called Oakwood, and so everybody was getting their big fancy.

[113] At that point, it was the escalades.

[114] Maxima.

[115] Oh, okay.

[116] Supra.

[117] Prelude was big.

[118] But my grandmother left me a little cash.

[119] It was like $750, and I bought a 1972, 2002, which is a beautiful car.

[120] What's that?

[121] You just said so many numbers.

[122] Okay, so the BMW 2002 is, other than the 3 .0, probably the coolest BMW.

[123] I think the 3 .0 is chicer and kind of has that elegant line to it.

[124] More James Bondi.

[125] 100%.

[126] The 2002 is like the precursor to the three series.

[127] But it had so much personality.

[128] And the reason why I got into it is because a guy on my street had an alpina version of it.

[129] Oh, I just tried.

[130] Skirt.

[131] Oh.

[132] I mean, just so cherry.

[133] Burgundy on black with a tent It was fire I fell in love with it So I went out to Sunland And found this guy He was a former mathematician That fell out of love with teaching And then opened up this 2002 junkyard basically He was one of these real characters And went out to his place in Sunland Near the Cement Factory out there Off of deep, deep Lancashim You know, off from near the fire It's where all my car works down it And I think he ended up selling it about I fucking dream of that car And you got it for $7 .50?

[134] All told it was probably $1 ,500.

[135] I had it all the way through college.

[136] I drove it up to Berkeley.

[137] I had my first two or three years in L .A. No air conditioning, hot summer.

[138] Stick shift?

[139] Of course.

[140] Yes.

[141] Slow.

[142] So slow.

[143] Yeah.

[144] But girls like that car, right?

[145] Yeah.

[146] It's got five.

[147] You know.

[148] I mean, I'm a little embarrassed.

[149] I had a flip phone for many years, which I was very proud of.

[150] Right.

[151] I just saw Dune.

[152] And you know, Stalin, Sarsgard is that giant man with tubes coming out.

[153] out of him and he sits in a pile of oil.

[154] Does he need to stay damp?

[155] We need to get into that.

[156] But I'm trying to agree, is he like have a moisture?

[157] How does it work?

[158] Yeah.

[159] I think to myself, this march of technology is essentially getting us to a place, either consciously or not, where that is what we become.

[160] Just people on a couch where everything's done for us.

[161] Wally.

[162] It goes back to Wally.

[163] Goes back to Idiocracy, Frito.

[164] I've got everything I need.

[165] I'm sitting on a toilet, the flatcherin tube in my mouth.

[166] So my point being, I like things that have a little bit of difficulty.

[167] even the simple difficulty of it's a little hard to start the car in the morning.

[168] And if it's a little hard, you've got to kind of spend some time with it.

[169] And you've got to warm it up.

[170] And if it's not moving, you've got to check the choke.

[171] Is my choke busted?

[172] You want to be involved.

[173] Yeah, I want to have the tactility of life of like a bit more friction.

[174] Yeah, a little bit of inertia.

[175] I agree.

[176] I want to have some ownership over the experience.

[177] If it just is delivered to my eyes and my ears, I don't have the pride in having participated in it.

[178] When I say this, I'm talking about the iPhone.

[179] You don't have a flip phone, but that also doesn't...

[180] No, it's just a little baby iPhone.

[181] Oh, it's a baby iPhone.

[182] Okay.

[183] Even something as simple as Google Maps, which I use all the time.

[184] But think about all of the magic, faded experiences that it's maybe denying us by just giving us the direction.

[185] So we're just looking at this whole thing rather than, you know what, I think I'm going to cut down Spalding.

[186] You'll like this.

[187] I just pitched to my 11 -year -old.

[188] We're going to go to Europe.

[189] And I was telling her, you know, what I used to love is I would go places and you'd leave your hotel.

[190] and you would just get lost because you didn't really know.

[191] And then you might consult a map at some point, but that was so fun.

[192] And she goes, oh, that does sound really fun.

[193] And I said, okay, well, let's commit.

[194] If the next time we go somewhere, let's leave the hotel and just turn left, right, left, right, and see if we can find our way back.

[195] Look, I have nothing against maps.

[196] Yeah, we don't hate maps.

[197] But an actual map is also kind of fun.

[198] And then trying to fold it back up in the way originally.

[199] If you're an anxious person, you love map.

[200] I am completely an anxious person.

[201] You are?

[202] Oh, my God.

[203] Yeah.

[204] Getting lost sounds rough to me. That's part of the cognitive behavioral life discipline work of being an angsty person is like, working through it.

[205] And be like, we're going to go get lost.

[206] And it's totally okay.

[207] And if we don't get to dinner at 7 .15, that's fine, too.

[208] If we even lose the reservation, that's fine.

[209] We're going to live.

[210] Yes.

[211] It took me six months to get the reservation.

[212] So I can't lose it.

[213] Sorry.

[214] So maybe we just.

[215] you take the over.

[216] Yeah, that's right.

[217] You're right.

[218] I don't have a lot of anxiety and I'm quick to go like, yeah, and then I'll be somewhere else.

[219] You've never had anxiety.

[220] I have it at night when I'm sleeping.

[221] I wake up and I obsess on things.

[222] Have you ever had performance anxiety getting on stage as a comedian?

[223] Doing stand -up, yes, not sketch comedy.

[224] That was fine because I had friends and if we ate shit.

[225] Kind of a structure.

[226] Well, we would share in the embarrassment and someone's there to help maybe, I guess, if things go sideways.

[227] But when I did start doing stand -up very late into this.

[228] So you didn't start out.

[229] No, I moved here to do stand -up, and I was just too afraid.

[230] And I discovered the groundlings, oh, you can do it with other people.

[231] That's not as scary.

[232] And then I fell in love with that.

[233] But then at a certain age, I was like, you came here to do this thing, and you're going to die having not done it.

[234] And so it was a New Year's resolution.

[235] And then I did do it for two years.

[236] But the notion of walking up there, can I bore you for one second?

[237] This is taking up too much of your interview.

[238] I'm curious because I think it comes back around to having made this film is it's a a version of the naked vulnerability, I would imagine comedians much more so.

[239] And I've only done it once years ago when I was at the Williams Town Theater Festival.

[240] I did a class with Lou Black, a stand -up comedy class.

[241] We prepped this thing on stage.

[242] But you also did the atheist is a one -man show.

[243] To stand up on stage, and you are looking at everybody and you're registering energy, there is a level of courage there.

[244] And I also think a building up of thick skin that I admire so much, you just have to bowl through.

[245] I'm sure we admire the same thing.

[246] It's It's specifically comedians that are on stage, their pace is so calm and slow.

[247] Yeah.

[248] That's the ones where I'm like, oh, my God.

[249] You're not nervous at all.

[250] You're like, I know that this goes at this speed, and eventually everyone will be happy it went at this speed is amazing.

[251] But my stupid anecdote was, there was a scene in this movie I directed hit and run, and Kristen and I are in my off -road car, and we have to drive through a barn door.

[252] This is all practical.

[253] On the other side of the barn door is two ramps, and then we're going to jump two cars.

[254] And it's really Kristen and I, and the big challenge is it's very dark.

[255] in the barn.

[256] They let you do that.

[257] Well, I directed it and got the money for it, so yeah, I let me do it.

[258] There you are.

[259] The challenge was inside the barn, it was dark.

[260] And then the moment we break through the barn door, it's super bright out.

[261] And so my eyes are going to have to adjust.

[262] I'm going to see these two ramps.

[263] And so my stunt coordinator, Steve Castor, a great friend of mine, he leans into the car just before we're about to go.

[264] And he said, how are you doing?

[265] And I said, I'm good.

[266] And he said, okay, how nervous are you?

[267] And this is my most sincere evaluation of stand -up.

[268] I said, if stand -up is a...

[269] a 10, I'm at like a five and a half.

[270] That's the comp for me. Driving a race car through barn doors and jumping two other cars is half as scary is walking up onto a stage and you've told them, yeah, I'm going to entertain everyone for 15 minutes, just me. And then if it's not working out, I'll just have to stay that whole 15 minutes.

[271] I'm assuming you've been on stage when it hasn't worked.

[272] Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

[273] What is that experience like.

[274] Oh, my God.

[275] What an experience.

[276] What happens is you're like, well, this is terrible.

[277] I will continue.

[278] You're above yourself, listening to yourself, go through the rest of it, as you're just staring at the audience somehow in your third eye.

[279] Some people like it, though.

[280] They like to bomb.

[281] We've had a few people on who've said that.

[282] There's something about the bombing that gets them revved up.

[283] I almost think they're the real comedian.

[284] Like, I think that's what they have that I don't.

[285] Unpack that a bit more.

[286] I don't totally understand that.

[287] I don't really get it, except I experienced it when I read a mean, comment once on Instagram where I was like, I think this is what they mean.

[288] You get so uncomfortable by people being mad that it almost makes you lean into them hating you and just being like, okay, you hate me. I'm going to double down on this.

[289] They just don't retreat.

[290] I think that's a tricky, because I've had a year to think about it after I finished my film, which has brought up a lot of stuff.

[291] I have this vision of this samurai emotional ninja in my mind.

[292] There is no good.

[293] There is no bad, there just is.

[294] And that leaning into the negativity, there is still invalidating of the other saying, well, fuck you, I'm going to show you, which disempowers yourself.

[295] But that fuel is so sexy.

[296] Yeah.

[297] Because it's righteous and it's like vengeful.

[298] It's nitrous.

[299] It's like addiction.

[300] It's that serotonin hit of like, whew.

[301] But there's that ninja samurai other thing of like, that's cool, man. I don't know how effective and practical that is for the comedian on stage, but I think there's like a life lesson anyway.

[302] I'm going off into the weeds here.

[303] It's best case.

[304] This happened to me, Vegas Grand Prix, so six months ago.

[305] I did a live show with my Formula One podcast, and it was in front of this crazy, rowdy bar audience that had no idea who we were, had never heard the show, didn't like Formula One, and it was a disaster.

[306] People were actively coming up on stage and just grabbing pictures with me in the middle of the whole thing.

[307] It was the biggest disaster of my professional.

[308] Were you there?

[309] No, I'm not on the F1 podcast.

[310] She was spared.

[311] Our shows go great.

[312] We haven't experienced that.

[313] Lazy boys in Los Phyllis.

[314] When we want to do live shows, yeah, they go a lot better.

[315] But this was a humongous disaster.

[316] I don't know if I know the real kink of those comedians, but what did happen to me is I was like, this is unsalvageable, and we have committed to an hour.

[317] That's what we were hired to do.

[318] It's going to be the longest next 55 minutes of my life.

[319] But I did have the presence of mine to go, you're going to remember this for life.

[320] For the memoir.

[321] Us four will be talking about this experience for the next five days.

[322] And like if it had gone easy, you'd forget it.

[323] 100%.

[324] So I did have that where I was like, oh, man, we've got a story to tell for the next couple weeks.

[325] There's definitely a cachet there.

[326] Yeah.

[327] I don't know if that's the ninja place to be, but there was some kind of like, looking at the bigger picture maybe in the moment.

[328] Well, there's a version of my emotional ninja samurai, which is you just spin it a different way.

[329] The Victor Frankel of it all.

[330] Who's Victor Frankel?

[331] When I was 15, my mom.

[332] Mom gave me this book, Victor Frankel's Man Search for Meaning, he was a Holocaust survivor.

[333] This is obviously the extreme version of a bad situation.

[334] But it's all about reframing perspective.

[335] It's like how can you be immersed and enmeshed in the absolute worst thing?

[336] And do you have the power to reframe it to experience it differently?

[337] Yeah.

[338] Mom was an actress and then became a psychotherapist.

[339] Yeah.

[340] My grandmother was an actress in the 30s and 40s.

[341] and she was from Corpus Christi, Texas.

[342] She was a beauty queen, redhead.

[343] Came out to Los Angeles in 32, maybe.

[344] Ended up becoming a scream queen in B -movies at Republic Pictures, which is now CBS Radford.

[345] She did movies with Aberyn Costello, Lon Cheney Jr. She did a lot of horror movies.

[346] She ended up a universal.

[347] Huge pin -up girl during World War II.

[348] Married a lawyer, Max Guilford -Nay Goldfarb, who came over with his parents from the Ukraine and ended up on Mott Street and Lower East Side, and then ended up in Boyle Heights out here when Boyle Heights was the largest Jewish community in Los Angeles.

[349] In fact, it has the oldest Jewish cemetery in Los Angeles.

[350] Which is now almost entirely Latino.

[351] Exactly right.

[352] Nicotine toothpicks?

[353] 100%.

[354] I already clocked your lozenges.

[355] We got to put a button on all this, which is like, I've come across you a couple times and I really thought, I don't think this guy likes me. And now with the Porsche and the nicotine, I'm feeling like what a missed opportunity.

[356] True of friendship it is?

[357] Why do you get the sense that I didn't like you?

[358] We'll get into that later.

[359] Oh, I can't wait.

[360] Never seen those toothpicks other than in your pocket.

[361] Yeah, the story about this is I was making a movie and I'm on hour 19 or whatever and you're overdoing fucking whirdle.

[362] When I have my 19 cigarette, I'm like, toothpicks, man. Nicotine fucking toothpicks.

[363] Yeah.

[364] And I hopped right on the phone.

[365] I called my business manager.

[366] I was like, let's do this now.

[367] Let me just take a quick beat.

[368] Check Google if anything's after.

[369] There's 12 products in the market.

[370] It was my tequila, and I got fucking shot down.

[371] I do that, too.

[372] I invent shit, and then I look, and it's like, it's everything.

[373] Anyway, they have my mom and my mom grew up in Beverly Hills.

[374] Max was successful as a lawyer.

[375] He was kind of on and off successful.

[376] I guess he produced a couple things with my grandma.

[377] He ended up becoming the president of the Beverly Hills bar, and he died very young, so I don't really have any stories of him.

[378] But my mom grew up in this really interesting community in Beverly Hills in the 50s.

[379] she went to school with everyone.

[380] It was Hollywood glamour years when all the movie stars lived in L .A. They were all concentrated.

[381] Yeah, it was the studio system.

[382] And then, yeah, she became an actress and worked at the Mark Taper Forum when they had a repertory company in the late 60s, early 70s, did a ton of television and met my father in 64 and my father had come out from Scarsdale, New York.

[383] My father's full name is Granville, Whitelaw, Pine.

[384] Wow.

[385] Oh, my goodness.

[386] Granny.

[387] Granny, that's cute.

[388] No one ever calls it.

[389] They call him Robert or Buzz.

[390] Does he have grandkids, and do they call him Grandi?

[391] Grandpa Granny.

[392] That would be good Grandpa Granny.

[393] Grandpa Granny.

[394] No, Luca calls him pops.

[395] This is your sister's child?

[396] Yeah.

[397] And then both of my parents were actors and my mom.

[398] I think the last thing she did was Masters of the Universe in 1984.

[399] She played Courtney Cox's mom.

[400] Oh, okay.

[401] Why did she choose to end that experience and go into psychotherapy?

[402] She quit acting kind of ostensibly in 1980 when I was born.

[403] My father was doing very well.

[404] He was on a TV show called Chips, and it was number one on NBC.

[405] It's a big deal.

[406] You know, Dax did a remake of Chips.

[407] Oh, that's right.

[408] Oh, my God.

[409] That is fucking right.

[410] Oh, my God.

[411] Oh, wow.

[412] I learned something very painfully, what you just had to say, a very popular show named Chips.

[413] I found that out the hard way that people currently today don't know about chips.

[414] Oh, well, I mean, it's like, no. 40 years ago.

[415] When we were recruiting people to go to the screens, they were like, that was so literal.

[416] It's about potato chips?

[417] It's like, no, man. Come on, California Highway for Larry Wilcox.

[418] Larry Wilcox.

[419] How old are you?

[420] I'm five years older than you.

[421] So we're around the same time.

[422] Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[423] Well, certainly if your father's on the show, too, you're uniquely aware of it.

[424] Yeah.

[425] How long did that run?

[426] Less than I thought when I got into remaking it.

[427] Five or six years, I think.

[428] 76 or 77 to 80.

[429] Okay.

[430] So for me, that was half of my whole childhood.

[431] So it seems like that show was on for 10 years.

[432] Yeah.

[433] But times were good, I imagine, when dad was on that show.

[434] Yeah, I mean, I was like a guppy.

[435] I don't really remember anything of those years other than we had a nice house, and we lived, as my mom called it, south of the boulevard, which is a big deal in Los Angeles, south of Venture Boulevard, had the Gelson's card, had the Neiman's card.

[436] It was the golden years of network television, too, so it's like when you went to up fronts, back east, they fly you first, and they give you per diem and the limos and all that.

[437] These are just tales that my family have told each other.

[438] So my mom was a very happy housewife, I think.

[439] My father got his sag card in 64.

[440] He was under contract at Universal before the contract system ended.

[441] The last studio that did it, he got paid a weekly stipend to learn how to sing, to learn how to dance, to learn how to write horses, to take elocution lessons.

[442] It's like a finishing school for actors.

[443] Yeah, and that's what the studio system was.

[444] You got paid to be under contract at Universal, and you were just kind of on call for their casting directors to call you up to say, go out for the Virginian, go out for guns, smoke.

[445] And they did really well through the 70s and actually did a pilot with Michael Douglas called Streets of San Francisco.

[446] My mother saw them filming it while on a trip to San Francisco while I was in her belly.

[447] She tells the story all the time.

[448] And she saw Michael Douglas on a sidewalk and it's like the highlight of her life.

[449] Oh my God, dude.

[450] We have a lot of them.

[451] This missed opportunity.

[452] Entanglement.

[453] It's not, there's time.

[454] There's our 50s.

[455] Yeah, exactly.

[456] Plenty of Both gray.

[457] You have all your...

[458] But listen, none of the sides are completely gray.

[459] And when this grows out, it just gets grayer and grayer.

[460] I'll grant you that you're ahead of me. I don't know, but...

[461] Okay.

[462] And then going into the 80s, it got rough and rougher.

[463] My dad, the work got sparser and sparser, and then the real estate crash in 87 or 88 pretty much wiped my family out.

[464] Then it was some really rough years.

[465] And then my mom went back to school.

[466] I have so much respect for what she did.

[467] She went back to UCLA and got her VA.

[468] She went back and got her VA.

[469] her masters at Antioch, all the while she worked for jobs.

[470] She worked in an antique store.

[471] She did after school creative arts and taught kids animation, even though she had no idea about animation.

[472] She taught acting at UCLA Extension.

[473] She taught acting to me and my friends.

[474] My dad was doing other jobs to try to make ends meet.

[475] So there was a period of time when it was really well.

[476] Really quick.

[477] In a way, your dad lives out this fear I walk around with, which would be I would return to civilian life, but people would remember me. That's terrifying.

[478] You can't do it anonymously.

[479] You can't just go, hey, I'm going to take care of my family and go do this thing.

[480] People are going to be like, hey, you were the sergeant on chips.

[481] The kind of deep respect I have for my father, now becoming a man, because I think I'm still becoming a man, to know what he had to do for his family.

[482] It requires a strength and a humility.

[483] I don't know if I would have that similar strength.

[484] I think the majority of folks that found themselves in that situation just self -destruct, they can't do it.

[485] They would crawl into a bottle.

[486] And my family, despite certain emotional fissures that 25 years of therapy, I still probably deal with, they stuck together, they put two kids through college and private school, put my mother through school, paid off their debts.

[487] It's deeply admirable.

[488] It is.

[489] It's beyond.

[490] I think I admire that version of humility almost more than anything else.

[491] That would be so hard for me. That would be painful for me. What I'm really thankful for in terms of the gift that it gave me is that I have a deep respect for the fickleness of the business.

[492] I have a deep understanding of how very quickly it can go, how very good it can be, and how very quickly people are not returning your phone calls.

[493] The idea of what's authentic and what's not and what's business and what's true friendship, my radar is keenly set to that.

[494] And also, I hope, a deep appreciation for I have a Portia because I remember my father in the good years had this beautiful.

[495] 65 -365 SC.

[496] It was this black -topped bucket Porsche.

[497] And I remember the day that he had to give it up.

[498] And obviously, I understand these are Cadillac problems, but there's a sense of, it's almost like for my father.

[499] Oh my God, I get it so much.

[500] I'm in many ways living out my father's dream right now.

[501] And I think of him.

[502] I remember he and I were watching below.

[503] There's a moment where Johnny Depp invites his dad over to look at the house and the cars.

[504] And I was watching it with my dad.

[505] And my dad goes, there's about a million and a half dollars worth of cars right there.

[506] That A .C. Cobra's worth this.

[507] Oh, so you shared the car thing with your dad.

[508] Yeah.

[509] All this bullshit I have gives me X amount of pleasure.

[510] I thought it would give me more.

[511] But I let my dad come in the gates and look around.

[512] And I go, no, we're going to keep all this shit.

[513] Because I want him to come in the gates and go, yeah, yeah, yeah.

[514] You want him to be proud.

[515] Yes.

[516] And I want to live out his fantasy and mine.

[517] But I think it's maybe something more than pride.

[518] there's a deep sharing.

[519] There's like, you did good.

[520] This is for us, boys and their dads.

[521] It doesn't get more primal than that.

[522] Boys and their moms too, but it's all primal.

[523] And girls and their parents and girls and their moms.

[524] It's all complex.

[525] It's all a complex for sure.

[526] As your mother picked up these skills in psychotherapy and she mastered that, did you, A, witness and evolution in her and how she dealt with things?

[527] and did it impact how your family operated?

[528] Like, she went out and got a pretty awesome skill set.

[529] I have to imagine the Annette Benning character in this movie is some, whether conscious or unconscious, nod to mom.

[530] It's very interesting thinking about coming on this podcast and thinking about doing these long -form things.

[531] I promise you this is a roundabout way of answering your question.

[532] Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[533] We have all the time.

[534] I listen to your story about your addiction, specifically the moment day seven.

[535] And I thought, that is a fucking courageous thing to do.

[536] It's a really tough thing to do.

[537] And as you said on the podcast, which I find very moving and very specifically to my point, it's one thing just you two and Kristen.

[538] It's another thing to offer this as some sort of communal world social offering.

[539] Watch me try to do the difficult thing that maybe you can follow my path and do the same thing.

[540] I couldn't do what you do.

[541] This kind of self -revealing in such a huge way is really brave.

[542] I also find it terrifying, is the too much, I think, as an actor myself, someone who is not on social media, someone who tries very keenly to create a separation and a boundary.

[543] So I think coming on these pockets, these long forms, it remind me very much of my favorite interviewer of all time to Cavett, but even more so than Cabot.

[544] Especially talking about very complex things is obviously you're keenly aware of family units.

[545] We just talked about the complexes and all that.

[546] Also, everyone's alive.

[547] Yeah, everyone's alive.

[548] Yeah, everyone's alive.

[549] So what's It's fair.

[550] What's respectful?

[551] What's your right to do that?

[552] How can you be authentic and have a true conversation?

[553] I've said I'd come on this show and bring my full self to bear in a way that I can live with, but also...

[554] No, it's very tricky.

[555] It's very tricky.

[556] It is.

[557] I acknowledge it.

[558] But my question for you, because I really am so curious is like, how did you make the decision to do that?

[559] Not specifically only day seven, but to be that open, essentially from what I can gather and I don't know you well, but 24 -7 with many different facets of your life.

[560] I would say first, just AA.

[561] So I've been going to AA for 20 fucking years coming up in September.

[562] And so I've gotten used to saying out loud these terrible things I did thought or perpetrated on other people, expecting everyone there to shun me and exclude me and ostracize me and actually seeing through practice looks of recognition, comfort, a calming, I guess like a immersion therapy.

[563] I had to do it over and over again.

[564] And then, lo and behold, opposite of my expectation, it's always been met with understanding.

[565] Even if someone didn't do that thing, it's very related to another failing that had.

[566] And so there's no way I could do this show had I not been in AA for 20 years and practice just letting it all hang out and realizing people don't ultimately judge you that much.

[567] People judge when they smell.

[568] But I was going to say, AA is one thing.

[569] A .A. is built on precisely what you've just described.

[570] The inner web and the noxious soup that that is.

[571] Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[572] It's definitely not that.

[573] Or is it?

[574] I will say the day seven thing, and I want to, again, give credit to Bradley Cooper, because I, of course, called him and said, hey, I relapsed.

[575] I have a new date.

[576] And he said, what are you going to do about your show?

[577] Because you talk so much about being sober for, at that time, 17 years or 16 years.

[578] 16, yeah.

[579] I've already inflated it.

[580] How embarrassing?

[581] I think I was 23 years sober at the time of that relapse.

[582] No, but Bradley just said something that was undeniably true.

[583] He goes, if you're telling people that you're sober because you hope that it will be helpful and encouraging for someone else to try it.

[584] And that is your true goal is to help people.

[585] You being sober for 16 years and being married to Kristen Bell is not very helpful to people.

[586] You eating shit after 16 years of doing this is really healthy.

[587] helpful to people.

[588] And so in conjunction with just knowing I had been honest enough up to that point that it would have felt like a real betrayal of the agreement between the listeners and I, the arm sherrys.

[589] And then, but Cooper really articulating it in that way, which is you're basically full of shit if you don't share this.

[590] Wow.

[591] Which was true.

[592] But even with those marching orders and maybe some conviction about that, when we put it, I was like, but then it'll go into the dark chasm of the web and people will.

[593] say, I always knew he was this, but that didn't happen.

[594] And also who fucking cares?

[595] It's also, it's one of my favorite words, the solipsistic, all of a sudden you're like, everybody's fucking talking about this.

[596] Yes.

[597] Fuck, man. Yeah, when your movie doesn't open, like you walk on the street and you're convinced everyone read the fucking Hollywood reporter this morning.

[598] I remember going on the set at Parenthood just thinking every crew member feels so bad for me right now.

[599] And half of them didn't even know I had a movie that came out.

[600] That's very helpful.

[601] I appreciate that.

[602] That makes a lot of sense.

[603] I want to let you off the hook.

[604] A, this is what I do.

[605] So, like, whatever cost it may create on an acting front is no longer of concern of mine.

[606] You don't act anymore at all.

[607] I haven't for a couple years, and I don't intend to.

[608] I do this.

[609] We do three episodes a week.

[610] I love it.

[611] I'm doing my favorite part of acting, which is shooting the shit with you at Video Village.

[612] Truly, I just don't have to go through makeup or I have a wardrobe fitting.

[613] I've got just the thing I love the most about it.

[614] That sounds pretty great, too.

[615] I'll be honest with you.

[616] So by no means do I expect anyone that comes on here to have the same level?

[617] No, but I read your mission statement.

[618] God, it's very old.

[619] The messiness of being human, we've cut that.

[620] We're a little embarrassed about it now.

[621] But I wouldn't be, you know how it is.

[622] Doing press for shit, frankly, sucks most of the time.

[623] If I read another GQ article about it, they tried to put them in a box, but then he showed him all the different...

[624] And Chris Pine is saying, not anymore.

[625] It's like, fuck and shoot me. But I also don't want to be that asshole.

[626] that doesn't show up.

[627] Yeah, you can't be above it.

[628] You got to sell your stuff.

[629] It's not bad.

[630] You just want to show up and be like, yeah, I'm going to have a real legit conversation with you and not bar myself.

[631] Anyway, I've been in a whole meditative cycle about these podcasts.

[632] I've never done them before.

[633] It's such a different art form, as you know, than doing bits on a talk show at night.

[634] What scares you?

[635] Is it the actors thing about if people know too much, then it's hard to transcend that in a role?

[636] Or is it just people will come for me?

[637] No, I mean, obviously, I think that's proven, obviously, to be not an issue in today's age where the oversharing of everything is owned by everybody on the planet.

[638] So it's like, we're all in the soup together.

[639] It's a good question.

[640] I want to probe it a little bit.

[641] Someone asked me, like, why do you become an actor?

[642] I never really had any desire to become an actor.

[643] I played sports.

[644] I want to play baseball.

[645] That was very clear at 15 not going to happen.

[646] Went to college.

[647] It was very insecure, low self -esteem, very kind of introverted, found acting.

[648] It was good at acting.

[649] People were like, you're handsome and talented.

[650] I was like, that feels good to hear.

[651] I'm going to do more of that.

[652] Give me more.

[653] So baseline fundamentals is like validation, right?

[654] Yeah.

[655] So our art form can be, at least from my initial entry into it, built on that very toxic and not necessarily a healthy thing.

[656] A lot of work to kind of unpack that and figure it out and move through it.

[657] You add on top of that then a whole other art form or thing, which is this divulgence of everything into the world and this intimacy in quotes with millions upon millions of people that then can interact with you in this way.

[658] for someone whose natural tendencies to seek that validation, I think the overwhelming cascade of that stimuli it'd be too difficult to try to run away from.

[659] So then the relationship, another my favorite words, the enmeshment in that becomes like, I already have enough to unpack.

[660] I love this.

[661] So this is the thing I still struggle with and police myself about and check in with all the time.

[662] That's why, like, Day 7 is something I don't like talking about, weirdly.

[663] even though I put it out, because I know me, it sounds like we're similar, I don't want it to become a story I tell and I've figured the beats out too and I can deliver and entertain you and get approval.

[664] I don't want to dishonor it by making it that.

[665] And I don't want to make my life and my real fears and concerns and thoughts and the things I care about.

[666] I also don't want to commodify those and monetize those.

[667] and exploit those.

[668] That I relate to greatly.

[669] I'm already a gross pig in seeking the validation when I'm trying to be funny and make you laugh.

[670] And it would feel like a deep betrayal of myself to then do that with my own real life, that it would just be a sick path to go down.

[671] It's interesting, too, I find for someone as myself who came into it so insecure, who didn't really want to be looked at.

[672] I hold both introvert and extrovert.

[673] Can I ask really quick, just so I understand that part a little bit more?

[674] You were super handsome in high school, weren't you?

[675] I was not.

[676] I had awful cystic acne at 15, which for anyone out there that's ever experienced that I think you know is.

[677] Horrific.

[678] Time to pop up here, Monica.

[679] Not my time, cystic acne.

[680] Yeah, I also fully.

[681] You get it.

[682] I still have big hormonal bouts.

[683] I froze my eggs a couple times.

[684] And after that, there was a big hormonal flux.

[685] And I was like, I'm back to being that teenager.

[686] And it sucks.

[687] I mean, it is crippling.

[688] Emotionally crippling.

[689] Stay tuned for more firearm -share expert, if you dare.

[690] I find it odd that, you know, there's obviously talk about many things, people with problems with obesity or struggling with their sexuality.

[691] It seems like we're maybe turning a page in that.

[692] But no one ever talks about, I feel like it's considered a banal or a part of childhood or adolescence, but if you've dealt with a severe case of it or even a mild case of it, there's no hiding at all.

[693] Nope.

[694] It's certainly crafted.

[695] In great part, the human I am.

[696] For me, it was like an emotional armoring.

[697] I had this great moment with this actor once, and I met him, Hi, how are you?

[698] God, man, I'm a big fan of your work.

[699] I think you're a great actor.

[700] I'm a great mimic.

[701] It blew my fucking hair back.

[702] Because what he said pointed to this very specific thing, which is that moment before squirrel.

[703] You emotionally armor yourself as like, I have got to get through the day.

[704] Yeah, like you're marching through a battlefield or something.

[705] social interaction is going to be brutal, and I'm going to be watching it the whole time, and I will mimic what it's like to be just another kid.

[706] Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[707] And so the level of exhaustion then that you have, I can only talk about my experience, but doubly so, triply so you feel like you've been flattened by an 18 -wheeler at the end of the day.

[708] So to answer your question, I was not.

[709] I think it's like comforting and shocking how many people feel that.

[710] Like, when I look back on high school, I'm like, is it a miracle anyone ever even showed up because everyone had some weird thing.

[711] It seems like maybe these jocks seem to have it made.

[712] I don't know.

[713] From my perspective, they look like they're having a good time.

[714] But what a cauldron that high school experiences.

[715] I wouldn't, you couldn't fucking pay me anything.

[716] Yeah, a billion dollars.

[717] Pure like you have a great time in high school?

[718] No. College?

[719] No. If you were this handsome in high school, you might not have gone to Berkeley.

[720] I was geared from a very young age to do well.

[721] I was a really good boy.

[722] I behaved.

[723] And then, I had my delayed adolescence at like 30 for a good 10 years, sure, sure, which nearly took me down.

[724] But I've studied, I'd love to read.

[725] Because again, I was part introvert, part extrovert.

[726] I carried that introvert long before the acting.

[727] The acting just basically exploded it steroidally to a degree where if it was a matter of going out to lunch or finding the darkest corner to go to, like, study a sonnet or something, that's what I would do.

[728] But don't you think, okay, so this is just tying back into the validation thing, because someone told you you're handsome and talented.

[729] To me, like a physical compliment is, unfortunately, I know logically wrong, the highest compliment.

[730] No, you're probably right.

[731] So that was 15 on and off until I was about 22.

[732] But when I went to college and started acting, I was probably 19.

[733] So, yeah, that's four years.

[734] Because, again, the PTSD that I had was very real.

[735] So, yeah, that compliment was like, that's exactly what I needed.

[736] I've been needing.

[737] I've been dying for this.

[738] I feel fraudulent because I didn't have the cystic, but I'm telling you, You know, hold on, no. There's still time.

[739] You know we relate on this.

[740] I hate to say it, but like if someone was going to say either Dax is a genius, he's a great father or he's hot, I would want to hear hot.

[741] I'm that great actor.

[742] What about cars?

[743] You got to throw that in there.

[744] Great cars.

[745] But yeah, man, it's so real.

[746] It's crazy.

[747] What's fascinating, though, is I don't know any of that about you.

[748] I see you for the first time in Star Trek.

[749] And I'm like, this asshole.

[750] Yeah, he's so handsome.

[751] How dare this fucking guy?

[752] I'm like immediately, I'm angry.

[753] Sure.

[754] God damn.

[755] And if I look like that, I feel like I could maybe be the lead of Star Trek.

[756] So my relationship with you.

[757] So then I'm curious with that background, did you ever feel like you were playing the character of the handsome guy?

[758] Of course.

[759] Oh, my God.

[760] This is crazy.

[761] No one's winning.

[762] I'm watching Star Trek.

[763] I'm like, this asshole, he knows when he walks on the street.

[764] Everyone's turning their head.

[765] Like, I'd kill for five minutes of that.

[766] Then you're up there and you're like, this is a fraud.

[767] When are they going to call and go, like, we know about your acting.

[768] We're taking this.

[769] So, for my experience, my first job in a film was as a prince.

[770] Prince's Diaries.

[771] Which is like, we're only less than 10 years from what was so traumatic.

[772] And people are like, you're the handsome guy?

[773] And I'm like, are you high?

[774] You're the prince someone would dream of.

[775] There's no way I can live up to that.

[776] Because I haven't lived up to that in my own sense of sense.

[777] You know the truth, in quotes.

[778] So then when you're then introduced to the bombardment of them people commenting and criticizing and people are commenting on your acne scars or whatever, I conflate everything to being not good enough, which I'm already feeling inside anyway.

[779] So it's like, fuck all y 'all.

[780] I didn't ask for this fucking thing.

[781] I was pretty convinced I was going to be doing these character parts.

[782] So that cognitive dissidents was something I really had to wrestle with for a while.

[783] And then by virtue of time and just the hard edges wearing off, you're like, okay, fine, this is the trip I'm on, fucking let's do this.

[784] And then you do it and you get more inured to what people say, you get more inured to watching yourself on screen and being like, that's awful.

[785] You get to sit in the joke of it a bit more.

[786] So now I'm thankfully 20 years into it and I can be like, it is such a trip that this happened to the kid that had to go through what I went through.

[787] And what a great gift to that kid to be like, look, man, is that fucking crazy?

[788] Well, that's it.

[789] Did you watch the Phil Stutz Jonah Hill, Doc?

[790] No, I am curious about it, though.

[791] Sounds like you've already done this work.

[792] But the part that just made me cry is he's bringing out a picture of Jonah as a young boy, very overweight.

[793] And they're discussing that the shadow's born there.

[794] And Phil says, basically, he wants you to invite him to where you guys have gone.

[795] That's why he's still battling you because you haven't invited him in.

[796] In the madness of four years of your life defining who you are, I was dyslexic, right?

[797] So I'm a dummy.

[798] So it doesn't matter how smart I, what I do at UCLA, I just can't shake this fucking thing.

[799] And at some point, I want to go like, hey, look where we're at.

[800] Come along.

[801] That's like the dream, right, is to bring along the shy boy.

[802] Bring along the shy boy and just be like, isn't it a gas, man?

[803] Ultimately, isn't it so fun?

[804] Because the fight has a lot to do with the boy and the shame and the self -flagellation, the not enough.

[805] and all of that stuff that we know.

[806] What happens in that circumstance, at least for me at 15, is the armoring is rigid, and it was super helpful.

[807] It saved my life, I'm sure.

[808] But at some point, you've got to dissolve the armor a bit.

[809] It's nice to loosen up.

[810] It's nice to smile a bit more.

[811] It's nice to invite joy in and not fight it so much.

[812] And trust the good stuff a little bit more?

[813] I don't know if I'm quite there yet, because that's its own separate form of childhood complexes.

[814] which really was born from just seeing lack and the fear of lack and the disappearance of enough.

[815] So that's its own bag.

[816] Yeah, waiting for the other shoe to drop all the time.

[817] I would say 15, 27, 30, and then 40 through 44 have been deep moments.

[818] And I think this one right now is just a real re -evaluation.

[819] And it's certainly Maslow's hierarchy.

[820] And I realize it's Cadillac problems.

[821] I feel like I need to preface it always with that.

[822] But like, is this?

[823] what it is?

[824] Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

[825] The opening of The Matrix, and I was trying to explain to someone, and I think it's a pretty good metaphor, whereas before life felt like you're in a huge ocean, but they're buoys everywhere.

[826] First job, first house, working with so -and -so, and they're focalizing, and they are flow state, and they are driven by a lot of righteous anger and shame and all these things that feel really good.

[827] Well, you burn through that, and all of a sudden you wake up one day, and you're just in a giant fucking ocean.

[828] Right.

[829] And that's it.

[830] So I love that we're talking because I was in the exact same spot at the exact same age virtually.

[831] And I relate so deeply.

[832] It's like we need a whole new reason to do anything.

[833] And that's terrifying.

[834] But I think in a bizarre way of all the gifts it seems like we've been given, the ultimate gift of excessive good luck is you ultimately do have.

[835] to figure out, well, what really is this all about?

[836] Because the Porsche is awesome.

[837] And on the ride over, it was great.

[838] But it's going to do nothing for you tonight at 9 o 'clock when you're at home by yourself.

[839] It will just have no power over you.

[840] But weirdly, what a fucking gift.

[841] As I said, it's like Cadillac problems.

[842] But I think it's even deeper.

[843] Yeah, yeah.

[844] Your needs and wants.

[845] My needs and wants for met.

[846] So it is a gift to be able to be like, I have an opportunity as a self -artist now to shape things as I want.

[847] But that kind of breadth of choice is almost paralyzing because it's so much nicer to be like, I really want this film to do well.

[848] I could probably have said the same thing 10 years ago and been probably as articulate about these things as I am now.

[849] But experientially, I think I could have diluted myself to say, no, I took the job because of X, Y, and Z. I really had themes that resonated with me. And that's true.

[850] but deep fucking bass note is like, I think it's going to do well.

[851] I think people are going to like it.

[852] And like me. Yeah.

[853] So to really get to a place where you're like separating the threads.

[854] Yes.

[855] And you also want to hold on to them.

[856] I can get myself in a situation where it's like, I'm going to transcend everything.

[857] And then I go, and then why am I here?

[858] That's the thing to do is we've got to transcend the ego.

[859] It's like, I don't fucking think you actually want to transcend the ego.

[860] Exactly.

[861] What's the point?

[862] Well, there's a whole bunch of reasons why it's there.

[863] Yeah.

[864] Of course we're going to want to be liked by people.

[865] We're social creatures.

[866] And if you're on the fucking serengetting, you're not like, guess who they're fucking leaving behind.

[867] Just starve.

[868] You're dead.

[869] It's not frivolous status.

[870] It's balance.

[871] I have to peeve.

[872] But that.

[873] Oh, yeah, yeah.

[874] Great.

[875] Oh, my God.

[876] I get to pee in front of all of them.

[877] No, no, we'll step out.

[878] All good?

[879] Yeah.

[880] Are you interested in these?

[881] Have you gotten into these at all?

[882] Oh, I love those.

[883] After many of the non -strinking crochet shakes, I think I made start back in the big news.

[884] That's breaking news.

[885] Of the gas?

[886] I just stopped because I stopped lifting.

[887] But now they're saying that, yeah.

[888] Do you read out, Liv?

[889] Yeah.

[890] He says don't do it?

[891] No, put on muscle.

[892] Because you're going to decline at a predictable rate.

[893] And they say to eat the same amount of grams of protein as you weigh poundage.

[894] It's ridiculous.

[895] It's hard.

[896] Do you do it?

[897] I want to say yes because that is my goal.

[898] And I say probably four days a week I do.

[899] And then certainly three days a week.

[900] Like today, we're recording you.

[901] Then we're going to record for three.

[902] hours with armed cherries.

[903] I can't meet my protein meats if you're taking a four -hour chunk out without eating.

[904] So then you've got to eat like 85 grams of protein on setting or something.

[905] One egg is eight grams of protein.

[906] I know.

[907] You know what's a hack though?

[908] Do you do the good culture cottage cheese?

[909] Uh -uh.

[910] That has 48 grams of protein in one tub.

[911] And I can definitely pound one of those effortlessly and I love it.

[912] And then the other hack is chia seed overnight pudding.

[913] Oh, wow.

[914] And then put the scoop of 30 grams of protein.

[915] chocolate in there and it's delicious.

[916] So there's some ways I've figured out.

[917] It's just a lot of work.

[918] But it is.

[919] It's a lot of work.

[920] It is.

[921] And then you end up like me, you figure out what works and you just can't deviate.

[922] So I eat the exact same thing every single day, seven days a week, virtually.

[923] I don't know if I have that kind of discipline.

[924] This dog picture is driving me. Oh, great.

[925] This one?

[926] Thank you.

[927] Oh, my God.

[928] You're the only person who's fixed it besides you.

[929] Yeah, but people complain in the pitchers, fellow OCD people.

[930] And if I sit over there, yeah, it drives me nuts.

[931] Okay.

[932] I can also take it completely off the wall.

[933] No, I like, I like, okay, it goes good.

[934] I bump it with my lazy boy is what happens, and then it gets a skew.

[935] I just want to tell you how much I'm enjoying this.

[936] Yeah, it's a good talk.

[937] I really, really like it.

[938] That's why I love hearing people's stories, because it's like, there's no way I would have imagined that when I'm watching Star Trek.

[939] And I'm like, yeah, of course this guy has this movie.

[940] Most people think that way.

[941] That's wild, isn't it?

[942] Self -perception versus witnessing and being witnessed, right?

[943] It's like a primary need.

[944] It starts with kid at the breast with mom.

[945] You're looking and being witnessed.

[946] But if you're not being witnessed the way that you perceive yourself and there is that cognitive dissonance, it's very difficult.

[947] Yeah.

[948] I hate to ask this question because, again, I don't want to get you into too much self -exposing, but I was wrestling with similar feelings as you.

[949] Talk about the armor you put on in the character I was playing.

[950] And then the first time I drank beer, I was like, okay.

[951] I get it now.

[952] This is what we've been trying to feel like.

[953] The amount of relief.

[954] And I think I've known so many addicts and feel like I understand it.

[955] I'll give you one second story that really sums it up.

[956] My best friend, Aaron Weekly, his fucking childhood was so gnarly.

[957] It made mine look great.

[958] His was the gnarliest I've ever seen.

[959] And he got addicted to huffing gas.

[960] I don't know if you've ever huffed gas.

[961] it's the worst high on planet earth and since he's gotten sober and we've talked so much about it all that was his primary thing well just at a point in ninth grade that's what he had access to all the time he kept a fucking gas can in his locker in ninth grade and got thrown out of school but the key thing about that as i'm now older and i look at that that high was preferable to status quo and that's saying so which says a lot if you've ever huff gas it's miserable the notion that that would be It's so heartbreaking.

[962] Cutting oxygen off to your brain.

[963] To stop thinking.

[964] And giving yourself a headache, but even the headaches a better distraction than the other stuff to me really frames addiction, the relief aspect of it.

[965] And you can almost see how gnarly someone's life was by what they were even willing to get addicted to.

[966] The greatest thing I wrote about it, this woman wrote something, forget the name of it, but she's like, the hardest thing about addiction is 5 p .m. Because at 5 p .m., is going to happen but 501 and 502 and just sitting in the boredom of writing the wave of your neurotransmitters of your brain just is like more serotonin and less for no fucking reason whereas that drink right there is guaranteed to give me a boost in seconds and I know for a fact it works every time it's the most dependable friend I have but I'm just curious when you were young and you were dealing with all that.

[967] Did you have that experience where you drank or you smoked weed or you did something and you were just like, oh, relief.

[968] I'm not like thinking of this.

[969] I was such a good boy.

[970] It was when I was 30 looking back now, I was having a drink every night.

[971] Love Scotch and then 30 was really go time in Exploreville.

[972] That hit a wall when I was about 39 and 39 to 44 been a different time.

[973] Thank God.

[974] It's a good run.

[975] Nine years.

[976] You can get a lot in in nine years.

[977] This is very common, though, too.

[978] I got sober at 29, like three months before I turned 30.

[979] And it sounds like for you 39.

[980] Like, there's something about approaching.

[981] You're like, okay, we're about to enter another decade.

[982] There's 39 and it was also COVID.

[983] And the party was so long in the past.

[984] Yeah.

[985] And then it was just me with a shovel.

[986] And when you admit to yourself, like, I'm also romantic and I'm telling a great story about myself and my life.

[987] And when you finally admit, there's nothing new going to happen in this direction.

[988] I'm going to repeat.

[989] I'm going to wake up next to somebody.

[990] I'm going to do this, but I've already done it.

[991] It has the appearance of new, but it's not.

[992] Also, this shiny, blissful first hour of doing whatever you're doing, even that blossom has fucking worn off.

[993] So really, the majority of the time is just the shame cycle of the next, however long.

[994] Self -hatred.

[995] There's a version of that that I think is akin to what we're talking about in terms of the validation aspect.

[996] Getting back to that emotional samurai I was talking about is using in that way, the day begins, You're like, fuck, hard day work, but you know what I'm going to meet the guys at the 4 ,100.

[997] Okay, so yeah.

[998] All right, great.

[999] What's going on?

[1000] What's going on?

[1001] And then you're having a great time.

[1002] You're like, fuck it, man. It's only 10.

[1003] And then it's like one.

[1004] And then you're like, something should happen at one.

[1005] And then you wake up at 6 for work and you're super hungry.

[1006] We're like, never again.

[1007] Never, ever again.

[1008] Take all the American spirits and throw them away.

[1009] And you're like, fuck it.

[1010] And then maybe that night, no. But then Wednesday and you're like, okay, I'm going to meet the guys.

[1011] Right?

[1012] But so essentially you're constantly on a dive of expectation, expectation meeting, high, high, high drop.

[1013] Shame, shame, shame, expectation.

[1014] Constantly the roller coaster, which is all about this validation shame cycle.

[1015] It's a similar experience of it.

[1016] And you learned to work.

[1017] I went to UCLA and I was going through the ground lanes.

[1018] It became a part of how I knew how to do stuff.

[1019] It's like, oh my God, Monday through Thursday, we've got a lot to make up for.

[1020] And so turbocharged Dax is here.

[1021] I don't even know how.

[1022] to function either I'm absent or I'm turbocharged.

[1023] There's no like moderate version of me plotting along.

[1024] Bringing back my metaphor, which I'm really into right now, what's it like just to be in the ocean?

[1025] And what's it like to just sit at five?

[1026] And the amount of then presence you get to all of it because there's nothing left but to be deeply now.

[1027] Because what are you going to do?

[1028] The thing that I've in the past seven years is sauning.

[1029] Did you read dopamine nation by chance?

[1030] It sounds like you really have knowledge of that.

[1031] No, why?

[1032] Lemke, great book, Stanford.

[1033] It's everything you're talking about.

[1034] The body will find homeostasis, period.

[1035] You can't outsmart it.

[1036] So you can dump all this shit at it.

[1037] But guess what you got to return to?

[1038] And it's like a four to one investment.

[1039] So if you smoke a cigarette, it's great for four minutes.

[1040] You're going to feel like shit for 20 minutes.

[1041] If you cold lunch for 10 minutes, guess what?

[1042] You get good chemicals for three hours.

[1043] Well, that for me during that COVID moment, I think it was the body shock.

[1044] I don't have the discipline like you.

[1045] So I'm not going to go to the gym or jump rope.

[1046] I'm going to go burn myself in this fucking Sona.

[1047] Passively hurt myself.

[1048] I can get through it.

[1049] And then after an hour and a half of that, I'm like, 5 p .m. has passed.

[1050] That's funny.

[1051] That's my drug currently is sauna.

[1052] So we record in here.

[1053] If it's a very long day, I step out feeling like, well, I deserve a reward.

[1054] Every day for me. Yeah, so then I go in there, and I'm like, angsty and itchy, and I deserve something.

[1055] And then when I leave there, I'm like, okay, I'm out of everything, and this is tenable.

[1056] I'll do that or I'll have some sugar.

[1057] At that COVID moment, it was like the drink or Jenny's the Dera -ha -ha -ha -ha -ha -ha -ha -ha.

[1058] You know, face -fucking a pint of whatever.

[1059] Okay, well, that was a party.

[1060] Let's talk really quick, and then we're going to talk about the movie.

[1061] I promise you.

[1062] So the two times that I know we've met, this is always a game of roulette to play, because sometimes people have met me, too.

[1063] I just learned from a guest that I shoved somebody, and I did not know I did that.

[1064] But I had been on set with you for maybe a night shoot on Wet Hot.

[1065] I was in a scene, and you were there, and that was really my first time meeting you and I'm friends with Banks and I saw that you and Banks have a great relationship really fun and I remember trying to get a little something moving with you like just chatting you up a little bit.

[1066] I left that night and I was like I don't think he was terribly interested.

[1067] Because I was so nervous dude.

[1068] You think?

[1069] I don't think I fucking know.

[1070] You're talking about when I sang on the roof?

[1071] Yeah I guess you did sing on the roof but I thought you were brilliant I was terrified to learn the song in my trailer and I was desperate trying to learn in the song.

[1072] And I had to perform in front of all of you.

[1073] Yeah, I was nervous out of my mind.

[1074] Life is a comedy, man. I'm never right on when anyone's going on.

[1075] But it's also, I mean, I'm just using this as an example.

[1076] I'm not calling you out on this, but we do all think everything's about us.

[1077] Of course.

[1078] Nothing's about us ever.

[1079] Even though, because everything is about the other person.

[1080] Yeah, it is.

[1081] Everyone's in their own head dealing with their own stuff.

[1082] Talk about one of those things, though, you know intellectually.

[1083] And then when it's happening, you can't see it that way.

[1084] There's no way I'm considering that you are dealing with something.

[1085] Other Even though it's so obvious.

[1086] You got up that day to figure out whether you liked me or not.

[1087] Have we met other times?

[1088] No, it was just that.

[1089] It was wet hot.

[1090] Then I bumped into you coming in or out of the bathroom just a few months ago.

[1091] And then I think I brought up Wet Hot, but I probably caught you off guard.

[1092] I don't think you said anything about Wet Hot.

[1093] You don't think so?

[1094] I think I did.

[1095] I think we met on.

[1096] Then I was like, he doesn't remember me. I'm wet hot.

[1097] He's dying to get out of his bathroom.

[1098] This guy just, I'm not for him.

[1099] That's fine.

[1100] Not everyone loves Diet Coke.

[1101] Oh.

[1102] Oh, my God.

[1103] Are you a Diet Coke free?

[1104] Oh, God.

[1105] Can you drink enough of it?

[1106] Love it.

[1107] Love it.

[1108] You love it, too?

[1109] No. Oh.

[1110] Oh, can we found.

[1111] It's the grossest thing on...

[1112] We need some friction.

[1113] We need some friction.

[1114] I'm with you on that.

[1115] I like Coke.

[1116] It's because it's what I grew up on.

[1117] My mom only drank, like, Tab.

[1118] Oh, Tab.

[1119] Yeah.

[1120] Is this still around?

[1121] I wish.

[1122] Once Coke got the big boys got into the scene, they're like, let me show you how to do a sugar -free soda.

[1123] Sorry, Tad.

[1124] This string cheese is so good.

[1125] Good.

[1126] Does anybody want some?

[1127] I'm okay.

[1128] Thank you, though.

[1129] I do like a string cheese.

[1130] So, yeah, I tallied both of those experience up to, like, this gentleman has zero interest in me, and I understand.

[1131] I wouldn't have much interest in myself either.

[1132] And then when you rolled up today, I was like, well, I'm thinking I might be wrong.

[1133] I'll be honest with you.

[1134] I maybe have some preconceptions and judgments about people that willingly offer themselves a lot to the world.

[1135] I definitely think I have judge you before.

[1136] What a Jagoff doing this?

[1137] He's just talking about himself all the time.

[1138] And again, the world could use a bit of this.

[1139] And then you actually sit across from someone and like, this guy's a very self -reflective, curious.

[1140] You're looking at me like you're interested in what I'm talking about.

[1141] I'm terribly interested, yeah.

[1142] I've gained a lot of respect just sitting across from you and talking to you.

[1143] Now, do you find this?

[1144] I'm glad you said that by the way.

[1145] Me too.

[1146] That's awesome.

[1147] My shadow says that same thing all the time.

[1148] Like if I were on the outside, I would hate this guy.

[1149] Shut up about yourself.

[1150] Great.

[1151] You're sober.

[1152] You do therapy.

[1153] There's the voice in the playground from Michigan that is saying that to me as well all the time.

[1154] But do you also find that you tend to hate people that are like yourself the most?

[1155] Yeah, I can own that maybe there's a potential resentment of someone that can offer themselves so freely in their vulnerability and own it that I would have a great fear of doing.

[1156] I definitely see that, but speak more to what you were suggesting.

[1157] Well, two things, because now you just reminded me of another reason I'll hate people.

[1158] But in that same call with Cooper where he told me I had to come out.

[1159] He also said, oh, duh, this is why you're so judgmental of so -and -so because you had a big secret and you knew they had a secret and you fucking hated that you had this secret and so you hate seeing it in them.

[1160] But it was just a throwaway.

[1161] He's like, oh, that's why you're mad at so -and -so, a mutual friend.

[1162] And I was like, oh, fuck, he's completely right.

[1163] I have been looking at this other friend going, this motherfucker's such a fraud.

[1164] He tells these people he's this and he's that.

[1165] And I know he's really fucking around.

[1166] You know, I had all these judgments.

[1167] And then in reality, I was currently living with this enormous lie.

[1168] And so I can see it in everyone else who's living with it.

[1169] And I fucking hate it about myself.

[1170] So then I hate it about them.

[1171] But then there's another thing, too, Monica O 'Noy and I were just talking about this.

[1172] Timothy Shalomime.

[1173] Shalem.

[1174] Shalem.

[1175] I'm proud of myself that I like him so much.

[1176] You feel like it's a marker of growth.

[1177] I really do.

[1178] Because conventionally, I'm like, I can't compete.

[1179] Women love that species.

[1180] And I'm not that species.

[1181] So I hate this person.

[1182] It's one of those two ways either like I really relate to them or I think that somehow I won't be able to compete with them.

[1183] What resonates with me there is in this my year of reflection since I finished my film and whatever I'm going through, what is life?

[1184] Man, the times that my insecure ego pops out.

[1185] I'm like, that motherfucker's film did so well.

[1186] Fuck him.

[1187] Or like can't even watch the film because it's like, I can't deal with it.

[1188] I can't deal with that.

[1189] That part of me is still so alive And I guess the only way that I can meet that Is with a certain amount of levity The other thing that I resonate with there is It brings up a lot of what I've gone through with my film Because when the film came out at Toronto It was fucking obliterated I didn't read any of the reviews But I heard that they were pretty mean Been there But just thinking about when I can do the same fucking thing That I can be the gossipy Part of the gaggle in high school What an ugly I don't want to be that person I don't want to be talking shit about a person I don't even know Even people that I have worked with, if there's one person in particular, I have major reservations about, and I love any opportunity.

[1190] Sure.

[1191] But how really gross in high school it is, that I get caught up in doing that.

[1192] We all do that.

[1193] No, I know, but it's just equality that's not cool.

[1194] I hate to make this whole episode about Cooper, but the other big pearl wisdom he gave me is he goes, you know, when someone says something terrible about someone else, my first thought isn't about the other person that they're talking about.

[1195] it's about them and once he pointed that out my own vanity was like i gotta stop doing that because it's true it says way more about more about you than this person i'm shitting on of course but yeah i did recently i saw a movie that everyone loved how it was directed and i was like yeah their music budget was the six million dollars they had a needle drop every 30 seconds when their scene didn't work i did find myself but again i don't have that insecurity much as an actor or comedian anymore but as a director than the whole new avenue opened up to me of well that only worked because of this yeah it's something i have to shed it just a fucking yeah you know i'm so disappointed in myself when i do so am i it's such a hangover in the dichotomy of hating myself yet being righteously above these other people i'm shitting on it's hysterical we've got into some every time you bring up somebody else yeah monica flags it yeah i'm like i don't think that's a good move truthfully it's when i'm insecure it's Like when we're at a live show and it's just going okay and then it'll drop something I shouldn't have dropped out loud because I want to lift it up a bit.

[1196] I'll just go to it.

[1197] Using someone or something.

[1198] I'll shit on someone.

[1199] I know people will like it.

[1200] We love hearing that someone was an asshole and occasionally I'll tell people who was an asshole.

[1201] I never do it on here.

[1202] But you're also speaking to people's capacity and desire.

[1203] Yeah, I'm giving them what they want.

[1204] You love a stoning.

[1205] Yes.

[1206] We love a stoning.

[1207] And then I feel terrible.

[1208] It's the worst part of humans.

[1209] Of course.

[1210] So if we can transcend that, we should.

[1211] It's like maybe don't go there.

[1212] Also, for me, it's out of fear.

[1213] It's like, what if that person is best friends with them?

[1214] That's always my thing.

[1215] You don't know who knows who.

[1216] And especially in this industry, everyone needs to be very careful.

[1217] Even I was listening to this podcast and one of the hosts was talking about his favorite podcast and there was another host there.

[1218] And he said, you know, I also really like armchair expert.

[1219] As soon as I heard it, I was like, oh, boy, where's this going?

[1220] And he said, it can be problematic, but I do think Dax is a good interviewer.

[1221] And then the other person said, I tried that and I couldn't stand it.

[1222] And I'm listening to this.

[1223] And if that person knew I was listening, they would never say that.

[1224] And they would probably be like, your show's great.

[1225] That's a great point.

[1226] And it's classic mom aphorism.

[1227] It's like, if you're not willing to say it to the person's face, don't say it at all.

[1228] That's something I can live by.

[1229] It's like a good thing to remember.

[1230] That actually kind of reframes, maybe I don't hold so much shame.

[1231] about some of the shit I've talked about.

[1232] Because, frankly, for certain situations, individuals, I think I would...

[1233] You would say it to me?

[1234] No, I know I would say.

[1235] That's often my defense, too.

[1236] So I'll go like, yeah, I'd say this right to their face.

[1237] Yeah.

[1238] I don't know if we should...

[1239] Anyway.

[1240] Let ourselves out of jail so quickly for that one.

[1241] Yeah.

[1242] Anyway, it's just interesting.

[1243] No, I think, frankly, the lesson is just, if you don't have anything nice to say, don't say.

[1244] I know.

[1245] Yeah.

[1246] Stay tuned for more Firefire expert.

[1247] if you dare.

[1248] Okay, how long had you been wanting to direct?

[1249] And one thing I admire about your career, I just want to add before it, because I was going through it, and I'm sure you have your own assessment of your career, but from my perspective, the notion that you're in, like, multiple franchises, it's just nonstop.

[1250] You've been in so much fucking shit that's worked.

[1251] It's like really a very low percentage career to have had that much success.

[1252] I don't know what it feels like inside of it, but when I have to make this list, today.

[1253] I'm like, oh, my God, I'm in that.

[1254] That's another franchise he's in.

[1255] And he stops all the time and does plays.

[1256] Crazy to me. Well, I mean, the last time I did a play was 10 years ago, I think.

[1257] Okay, but you were doing plays post Star Trek, where I'm a greedy little pickup on, what's what's next?

[1258] I have this opportunity.

[1259] I got to go.

[1260] I loved doing theater, and I had a great time the last time I did it.

[1261] And then I got offered something at Williamstown Theater Festival.

[1262] It was a Sam Shepard play and I was memorizing it's a two -hander and I was like three pages in I was like I don't really like this play I love even that process of looking at a 70 page play and memorizing the whole thing there's something really satisfying about it anyway and that was the last time to do something eight shows a week I think you have to have a real hard on to explore something in there because it's a grind you did fat pig I wish I would have seen that because I saw it in New York Kristen took me to yeah what a rad play though dark nasty Lebutte I love Lebutte people politics stuff Shows you stuff you don't want to look at.

[1263] I like his stuff a lot, too.

[1264] Yeah, I almost feel guilty that I like it so much.

[1265] Was the movie Friends and Neighbors, Jason Patrick's in there?

[1266] He's all of a sudden saying that he raped this kid.

[1267] And you're like, whoa, yeah, yeah.

[1268] Fuck, but it felt so real.

[1269] Like, I think that's some dude's story.

[1270] How good is Jason Patrick?

[1271] Oh, what a beast.

[1272] Rush?

[1273] Oh, baby.

[1274] Wow, I haven't revisited that.

[1275] Jennifer Jason Lee, ding, ding, ding.

[1276] Yeah.

[1277] That's where I kind of fell in love with her.

[1278] For me, Hudsucker proxy.

[1279] Oh, yeah.

[1280] Yeah.

[1281] She is a joy, like a real artist, just marching to the beat of her own drum in a beautiful way.

[1282] She's radical.

[1283] Yeah.

[1284] Did you see Season 5 Fargo?

[1285] Have not yet.

[1286] He's so awesome.

[1287] Really?

[1288] Oh my gosh, she's so awesome.

[1289] That is the best season of television I've ever seen.

[1290] I can't wait.

[1291] Okay, so how long through the process before you started going like, I want to direct?

[1292] I never wanted to direct at all.

[1293] I really had no desire to do it, much like acting.

[1294] And then I had this idea for this film.

[1295] and it started with the title and the name of the character and it made me giggle and I couldn't stop.

[1296] Then a year passed and I was still thinking about it and then I tried to hire a writer and met with a writer a couple of times and that never worked out.

[1297] And then COVID just hit.

[1298] We were in quarantine and I was losing my mind and some personal stuff was happening.

[1299] And then I just was like, fuck it, man, let's do it.

[1300] And sat down and wrote it with a pal and ended up rewriting it 25 times.

[1301] Yeah, is the co -author a friend?

[1302] known him for 25 years.

[1303] He's my producing partner.

[1304] And he also, so we're producing now.

[1305] I never wanted to produce either.

[1306] And he was making a career switch.

[1307] And he's like, why don't we produce together?

[1308] I was like, not a chance.

[1309] He's like, give me two years to shadow and bring you some stuff.

[1310] And he started bringing me stuff.

[1311] And he'd always had a really good eye and was always someone I'd send scripts to for the real.

[1312] And all the stuff he was giving me were written by this group of friends we've all had since we were 21.

[1313] From Berkeley?

[1314] I didn't really leave Berkeley with many friends.

[1315] but I came back here and ended up in this crew of kids that had gone to USC and this large group of friends from the theater department there and now they've been my closest friends for 20 -some odd years.

[1316] So he was bringing me all this stuff for my friends and I was like, you know what, this is kind of fun.

[1317] If we do a production company, I get to work with my best friend and try to get work for all of my friends, that's a cool modus operandi.

[1318] By the way, that's the buoy that's left in the ocean.

[1319] That's fun.

[1320] And now to look back, we've gotten jobs for tons of people and sold shows and really learned our little baby production company that had to start from zero I felt like to learn the ropes of what it's like to get shit done in this town which is a miracle anything gets done so he's the guy that I corrode with I didn't recognize right away Matthew Jensen I probably should so Matt did both Wonder Woman's he did I Am the Night this limited series that I did every time I've worked with him he shot on film and I wanted to shoot on film he's a brilliant cinematographer It's outrageously beautiful.

[1321] It's mad, man. It's shockingly beautiful for a small movie.

[1322] We shot in 21 days, unfil.

[1323] Five locations.

[1324] It makes you fall in love with L .A. Some of them, I'm like, where the fuck is that?

[1325] How did they find it?

[1326] I would imagine your location scouting process was so stressful.

[1327] Brutal.

[1328] The places you want to come so much.

[1329] Yeah, there you go.

[1330] You know all about it.

[1331] Knowing how the sausage is made, I'm like, A, this looks way too good.

[1332] Yeah.

[1333] It's like overachieving from frame one of you coming out of your trailer.

[1334] And then the locations, I was like, how did they get these?

[1335] Where are they?

[1336] And then you got the location, but then you got to dress it.

[1337] And you got a money.

[1338] The production design was off the charts.

[1339] Talk about Hudson Zucker Proxy has very art decal vibes.

[1340] Aaron McGill that did it.

[1341] I'd seen a movie that she did.

[1342] Aaron's a genius.

[1343] No money, no time.

[1344] And it's stunning.

[1345] Even the hallway you're eating nuts in?

[1346] Talk about OCD.

[1347] You were looking at this picture.

[1348] I'm like, okay, I understand getting the miracle of that location.

[1349] But you're looking at a door and stuff's going to happen out the door.

[1350] But then we have a stucco wall behind there.

[1351] And I'm like, What were the odds that stuck a wall wasn't all fucking piss stain and shitty?

[1352] Oh, man. I found myself so distracted with how impressed I was with the stuck wall.

[1353] We had to move into that hallway 16 hours before we shot there because we lost the other location.

[1354] Oh, my Lord.

[1355] All sorts of fun independent stuff.

[1356] Let's get a premise for the listener.

[1357] Yes.

[1358] The short is that it's a screwball comedy about a pool man that uncovers corruption in the city of Los Angeles, only to go on this incredibly absurd detective hunt, which reveals more about himself than it does.

[1359] as the actual crime.

[1360] It's kind of film Noari.

[1361] A smidge, yeah.

[1362] It's very Lubowski -esque.

[1363] Definite shades of Lubowski.

[1364] I didn't know if that would trigger you or not.

[1365] It is what it is.

[1366] But then there's also all this Chinatown stuff, water in L .A. You're referencing Chinatown.

[1367] There's this deep love for L .A. When I was watching it, I'm thinking like, why does he land on this story?

[1368] What is it?

[1369] And then I'm trying to backfill what I think you're all about.

[1370] And then I'm like, he grew up here in the 80s.

[1371] And let me add, too.

[1372] I had a L .A. geography class at UCLA wasn't my major, but maybe my favorite class I ever took.

[1373] We learned about all the booms and busts.

[1374] So you read City of Quartz?

[1375] Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

[1376] And like, annexing these big swaths of land and the orchards and all that.

[1377] It's one of the more fascinating cities in America.

[1378] Oh, my God.

[1379] Self -created out of absolutely nothing.

[1380] And so I'm like, okay, this is cool.

[1381] You have like a deep love.

[1382] Your character, he's maybe crazy in the simplest terms.

[1383] He's a little delusional.

[1384] He writes a letter to Aaron Brockovich every single day.

[1385] He sees himself as this warrior defending the city for my guest, gentrification and other things.

[1386] And then I was thinking, how much of this knowledge did Chris have?

[1387] And then how much of it did you have to go and study?

[1388] Because it's so dense.

[1389] The film is totally dense.

[1390] They say right about what you know.

[1391] I grew up in Los Angeles.

[1392] And so there was a lot of conversation about making it more accessible to non -Angolinos.

[1393] And I was like, look, man, if I make one, fucking film in my life, I'm just going to go balls out with just everything I want to do.

[1394] The obsession of the characters with what food places have been shut down is so L .A. I love and hate the city so much.

[1395] I mean, I don't even know where to start.

[1396] How close are you to hear?

[1397] I am a minute and a half.

[1398] And you grow grapes in your yard.

[1399] I grow grapes in my yard.

[1400] How many grapes do you yield?

[1401] I've been making Sauvignon Blanc for six years.

[1402] There were Cabernet Sauvignon on my property before, and that, It was the whole reason why I decided to replant because I was like, oh my God, they're so pretty.

[1403] We get about 12 cases.

[1404] That's cool.

[1405] Yeah.

[1406] And when people come over, you're like, would you like a glass of wine out of my yard?

[1407] I sent it as Christmas gifts and have honey on my property.

[1408] I'm really lucky.

[1409] I have about an acre and a half up in the hills.

[1410] I have a very small house, which I love.

[1411] So most of it's land.

[1412] I'm surprised I've never bumped into you in the neighborhood.

[1413] Monica, have you ever seen Chris strolling around?

[1414] I haven't.

[1415] Do you eat at all time or any of that stuff?

[1416] I love all time.

[1417] At water, there's a new restaurant called Spina that I love.

[1418] It's opened up by a guy that used to be a waiter at Angelini Austria, which is one of my favorites.

[1419] It's this little hole in the wall.

[1420] He's from Sardinia.

[1421] He's cooking great stuff over there.

[1422] Your life's like an art form.

[1423] I kind of, I feel like unartistic.

[1424] What are you talking about?

[1425] Well, the Porsche and you know these restaurants so well and your appreciation for the Joyce in the ceiling.

[1426] I'm just feeling like I need to up my game a little bit.

[1427] I would like you to have some wine here.

[1428] I would like that.

[1429] I should have brought wine.

[1430] Oh, that would have been amazing.

[1431] Monica's a wine, though.

[1432] We need a rebrand for that word.

[1433] A connoisseur.

[1434] Yeah, I'm a wine connoisse.

[1435] Samoye.

[1436] Okay, other compliments I want to give you.

[1437] Let's geek out for a second on Annette Benning for me if I had to do a top ten list of all time.

[1438] I think her and American beauty, of course.

[1439] When she's slapping herself in front of that door wall.

[1440] She's a force of nature and then she marries.

[1441] That's part of it.

[1442] Royalty of Hollywood.

[1443] She is magical.

[1444] I had no time and I'm working with combined.

[1445] I don't know how many Oscar nominations and wins between her and DeVito and Jennifer.

[1446] You have to come and play and I'm directing too and I'm in every scene and you know it's dense and there's a lot of words.

[1447] You just kind of have to flow and what I'd say about Annette, it's like working with a Ferrari.

[1448] You give her one little adjustment and all of a sudden you just watch her go off.

[1449] It's so much fun to work with something like that.

[1450] Her and DeVito are great parents too.

[1451] And then you have DeVito and DeVito comes from comedy so DeVito can do whatever you want.

[1452] you just have to corral the Danny, you know.

[1453] I was trying to get him to learn this fucking monologue.

[1454] He just wouldn't learn the monologue.

[1455] He's like, I got some stories I want to tell you.

[1456] So he's telling me these stories.

[1457] I'm like, this is great, Danny.

[1458] Say that.

[1459] He's like how I can't say that.

[1460] Then he sends me four different monologues, just stories.

[1461] And so on the day, we just had him fucking talk do his four different monologues.

[1462] And the one that we chose was this story about doing Children's Theater, Massachusetts, then ending up at Cape Cod and smoking a bit of hash.

[1463] Yeah.

[1464] But that's Danny.

[1465] So he's a completely different type of actor than Annette.

[1466] And then you have Jennifer and Jennifer's very quiet and has so much going on.

[1467] But her comedic sensibility is so on point.

[1468] And she's just this beautiful animal.

[1469] I didn't do much directing.

[1470] The movie's kind of like a tonal smorgas board of there's big acting.

[1471] There's small acting.

[1472] There's all sorts of stuff.

[1473] So it was just me kind of doing volume control more than anything else.

[1474] I loved my script supervisor.

[1475] She's the saving grace between her.

[1476] and my editor, the saving grace of my life on this film.

[1477] And I loved her and I trusted her.

[1478] Julius Schachter, she'd just done everywhere all at once.

[1479] In my film, there's a lot happening.

[1480] And so talk about being able to handle a lot all at once.

[1481] No, it's probably the most masterful edit I've ever seen of any movie in my life.

[1482] I don't know how they juggled that.

[1483] You're outrageously good.

[1484] I mean, you're so...

[1485] It's back to the comedian thing.

[1486] You have a pace that is so frenetic yet very relaxed.

[1487] I've seen you in a lot of things.

[1488] I feel like this is really up there for you.

[1489] Thanks, man. The best thing you've ever done.

[1490] You're so funny.

[1491] It's been a hard thing trying to describe the film.

[1492] Like, I wouldn't even describe it as a comedy.

[1493] I call it a giggle or it's hopefully a delight.

[1494] I think it's a vibe.

[1495] It's like a state of mind.

[1496] First of all, you're either going to lean into this film or you're not.

[1497] If you're on the wavelength and you go for the ride and just want to chill with these people being absolute fucking lunatics, I think you're going to have a great time.

[1498] And if not, it's not going to be your cup of tea and it's all good.

[1499] But the best moments I've seen from people coming out of it, and experiencing it the way that I want them to is it's just like a lightness.

[1500] Yeah, it's very playful.

[1501] I think there's also a bottle rocket quality.

[1502] There's a bottle rocket, and I think, Darren, the character that I play, do you pick that up?

[1503] Is that all right?

[1504] Oh, it's totally fine.

[1505] We've never not been in construction since we started.

[1506] So have I?

[1507] Yeah.

[1508] 15 years.

[1509] 14 years.

[1510] I have a guy at my house that's basically like the guy from Murphy Brown.

[1511] Yeah.

[1512] So his spirits are like Peter Sellers and Peter O'Toole.

[1513] It's like the bombacity of Peter O'T where if you watch Peter O'T, there's no normal acting happening there.

[1514] It's just giant, impassioned acting.

[1515] And then you have Peter Sellers, whether it's Pink Panther, which I think is maybe for me, one of the best comedies of all time, or being there, which is really my North Star for this, there's a centeredness.

[1516] I'm happy you say that because I was trying to capture an acting style, so to speak, that was large and very grounded at the same time.

[1517] It was, like, really expansive and pushing the limits and going into, like, screwball kind of slapstick and very centered.

[1518] The film is, for me, a laugh and hopefully a cathartic moment at the end for people that resonate it and feel it.

[1519] But for me, it's a lot about listening.

[1520] This is a movie really about people not oftentimes really listening to one another.

[1521] And it reminded me a lot of growing up, quite honestly.

[1522] I was trying to capture a spirit of what it was like to live in a particular kind of household sometimes where the dropping in of being actually relational is what you're searching for.

[1523] but there's all of this other plate spinning.

[1524] So it is a state of mind, really.

[1525] Another influence was certainly David O. Russell and how he captures the neuroses of being alive where people, I mean, in this case, we're talking about steaks and lobsters, and it's like, what are we talking about?

[1526] That's the frustration really of this character who ultimately is looking to be loved and to love, is looking to find connection in a very kaleidoscopic sort of way.

[1527] That's truly the story about.

[1528] about a kid trying to become a man. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[1529] I'll tell you this, my wife was coming in and out of the room, and I was watching it in bed.

[1530] And she came in, and she goes, okay, great.

[1531] Now he's going to try to be funny, too.

[1532] He's coming for us.

[1533] And then she sat down, and then she was laughing out loud, and I go, I know it sucks.

[1534] He's kind of great at it, huh?

[1535] And she's like, yeah, he's fucking really, really funny.

[1536] He's great.

[1537] I appreciate that.

[1538] Yeah, there were tons of tons of laughing out loud.

[1539] I mean, it's so interesting now to have it out, 100 people have seen it.

[1540] So to talk to a newbie, to feel the energy and what you took away from it is very nice.

[1541] And we could do three hours on the experience, which is like, I know exactly where you're at.

[1542] I've been through the whole experience.

[1543] Here's what I'll say about the experience.

[1544] So joyful.

[1545] Amongst all of the insane getting the financing billioners that didn't exist, people wanting to pull the plug, all this stuff for my memoir, which I can't wait to write.

[1546] Never.

[1547] Joyful flow state for probably a year.

[1548] Never not thinking about it.

[1549] People.

[1550] People all told me that shooting it was going to be terrifying.

[1551] I fucking had an absolute ball.

[1552] Could not have had more fun.

[1553] Same.

[1554] Stressful, but it's like whatever.

[1555] We don't have the orange stick.

[1556] They didn't get our fucking red stick.

[1557] So much fun.

[1558] Making all the choices.

[1559] Solving problems as they come up.

[1560] Solving problems.

[1561] People were like, people are going to want a leader on set.

[1562] And then I was all nervous that I was going to be able to make a decision.

[1563] All of a sudden, you get into this great thing of being like, I don't know if it's red, but my mind said red.

[1564] So we're going to fucking go red stick.

[1565] Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[1566] Trusting the gut.

[1567] Trusting the instinct and fucking rocking and rolling.

[1568] I called Following the Giggle.

[1569] It's like if it tickled my brain, we're going with it.

[1570] It's like, yes, and.

[1571] And I knew on an analytical level in my brain, not my heart, that I was like, I'm setting myself up here for, am I truly ready to put this thing out in the world and let it potentially be beaten with a heavy bat?

[1572] And I would think about it and then just immediately have a red stick, orange stick problem to think about it.

[1573] So it was great.

[1574] I had a lot to free myself from the burden of thinking of that.

[1575] And then once we picture locked in it was done, And that wave hit me of like, oh, my God.

[1576] And then settling in for the weight of that experience of putting it out, I never really understood how hard that would be, the vulnerability of that experience.

[1577] And it's not one dinner you had.

[1578] It's a year or three of your life.

[1579] I always say, if I could live in production as a director, sign me up.

[1580] I would never look back.

[1581] It's the only thing in the world I've found that's identical to cocaine that's not cocaine.

[1582] Like, I am on fire when I'm there and I want to do it for 20 hours a day.

[1583] Are you going to do more?

[1584] I think also the grief that I've been feeling this past year is because, as you know, writing is the lonely job.

[1585] I mean, I have an idea that it couldn't be any different from this, which I'm excited about, but totally bitten.

[1586] Going back and having watched a lot of the silence to prep for it and watching Buster and watching Charlie and watching Harold Lloyd, watching all these guys that did all of it.

[1587] There's a magic.

[1588] to knowing that it's his art. Also, to watch Buster do it.

[1589] Buster's my hero.

[1590] He's my hero.

[1591] I'm obsessed with him.

[1592] Unbelievable, the kind of physical comedy he was doing.

[1593] It's Jackie Chan times three.

[1594] And you know about his process?

[1595] So he had his own studio.

[1596] They'd shoot bits until they ran out ideas.

[1597] And they broke and either played baseball.

[1598] He had a baseball diamond on his lot.

[1599] I didn't know that.

[1600] Or they broke and played pinnacle.

[1601] And they just played baseball or pinnacle and shot the shit until they thought of another bit to film or how to add.

[1602] to the bit.

[1603] So his life was just being on that lot with gag guys filming until they ran out ideas fucking around coming up with more ideas and then going and filming them and I'm like that would be the existence.

[1604] You have to read the oral history of Hollywood.

[1605] Oh, I haven't.

[1606] It's all of these AFI interviews that they did I don't know starting in maybe the 70s to now.

[1607] It's a compilation book starting with the birth of cinema with all of the players talking first person accounts all the way through Spielberg to Nolan.

[1608] But you get a sense of precisely what it was like in the early baby days of it and how they rolled and how these guys were coming up with gags all of the time and how the gagmen then turned into guys that were being brought into the talkies and it's very very cool it is well chris this was delightful pool man is out may 10th theaters or streaming in theaters yes indeed in theaters we got the premiere at the vista which i was a east side of all fucking super stoked about yeah and will you show a film print of it there?

[1609] They can do that.

[1610] My 35, yeah.

[1611] Yeah.

[1612] Oh my god.

[1613] My canisters of film.

[1614] One of the most exciting.

[1615] It's my life.

[1616] I love it.

[1617] This has been such a delight.

[1618] I was 100 % wrong about you on every assumption.

[1619] I was 100 % wrong about you, Dad.

[1620] Look at that.

[1621] We love to be wrong.

[1622] The bromance begins.

[1623] And do you race cars or do you race motorcycles?

[1624] So I did race cars, and currently I just do a lot of track days on the motorcycle.

[1625] I'm going to code two weeks.

[1626] What?

[1627] Yeah, it was just at Willow Springs.

[1628] No. On a motorcycle?

[1629] Yeah, Willis Springs, then I was in Vegas.

[1630] I just started, but yeah.

[1631] What are you doing after MotoGP?

[1632] Are you going to MotoGP?

[1633] I'm going to MotoGP?

[1634] Yeah, I'm going to try to go.

[1635] And then the day after, there's an Apprilla Alpine Star Day, private day at Koda.

[1636] Oh, so you know, he and old.

[1637] Yeah.

[1638] Oh, my God.

[1639] Why don't you come to that?

[1640] I'm going to that.

[1641] I just shipped my leathers down.

[1642] How long have you been motorcycle raised?

[1643] 20 years?

[1644] Oh, you're deep into it.

[1645] I'm so into it.

[1646] Oh, my God.

[1647] Yeah, it's pretty much my religion.

[1648] It's what replaced snorting cocaine.

[1649] and I've only had one off.

[1650] Do you ride motorcycles around town?

[1651] No, I kind of stopped doing that.

[1652] I'll do an early, early morning on a Sunday or something.

[1653] Yeah.

[1654] You should come to get to ride Cota.

[1655] I've never ridden it.

[1656] I am just starting out, by the line.

[1657] Yeah, it doesn't fucking matter.

[1658] Just know that that's an option for you.

[1659] I'm definitely thinking about that.

[1660] Have you been out?

[1661] No, God, no. It is...

[1662] There's nothing like it.

[1663] Nothing.

[1664] I explained it on here as like, you want to be in a state of presence.

[1665] There's nothing on the planet that can force you.

[1666] Thank God for it.

[1667] You can't even on a straightaway think about what's coming tomorrow or yesterday.

[1668] You have to be a second by second the whole time.

[1669] And then when you carve that great line, like, it's just delicious.

[1670] Oh, it's just delicious.

[1671] Well, it sounds like you guys have a lot to do together.

[1672] This is very exciting.

[1673] It's almost too much stuff.

[1674] And next time you hang out, bring some wine for me. Absolutely.

[1675] All right, Chris, this is a party.

[1676] Such a pleasure.

[1677] Thank you.

[1678] Everyone see Pullman May 10th.

[1679] That's the one.

[1680] Hi there.

[1681] This is Hermium, Hermium.

[1682] like that, you're going to love the fact check with Ms. Monica.

[1683] Okay, I want to be honest about something.

[1684] Don't you think that's a very scary thing to hear as a starter for anything?

[1685] Yeah, can we talk?

[1686] Oof.

[1687] Yeah, that one's scary.

[1688] Yeah.

[1689] And I want to be honest.

[1690] Yeah.

[1691] I know.

[1692] Uh -oh.

[1693] I'm booking an appointment.

[1694] Okay.

[1695] With a dermatologist.

[1696] But I just don't know what's going to have.

[1697] happen when I go.

[1698] And I just want to be honest about that.

[1699] What does that mean?

[1700] I don't know.

[1701] Dermatologists aren't plastic surgeons, or are they?

[1702] Well, this one does stuff.

[1703] This one is.

[1704] This is a hybrid?

[1705] It's not a plastic surgeon.

[1706] Sorry, I'm going to let you open that.

[1707] Okay.

[1708] This is super important, honest moment.

[1709] If I'm going to get anything, I want to do it via dermatologist, and one was recommended.

[1710] What are we thinking we're going to do?

[1711] I don't know.

[1712] And I'm probably not going to do.

[1713] Is this all in?

[1714] Yeah.

[1715] Oh, great.

[1716] Yeah.

[1717] I applaud you.

[1718] Yeah.

[1719] I mean, I think I'd be too self -conscious of doing something and then not addressing it.

[1720] Yeah.

[1721] If I got an eye transplant and then I never addressed it and people were like, whoa, her eyes are looking purple.

[1722] It's weird that they're purple.

[1723] And then I was like, they've always been purple.

[1724] Yeah.

[1725] And no, I'm not on Ozempic.

[1726] Right.

[1727] I'm like, just be honest.

[1728] It's fine.

[1729] It's all fine.

[1730] people's decisions.

[1731] But you also have in mind something.

[1732] Is it neck related?

[1733] Yeah, okay.

[1734] So I hate my neck.

[1735] We all know this.

[1736] This is age, as a, tail as old as time, since I was that small.

[1737] I have neck problems.

[1738] Can I pause you for one second?

[1739] No, I have neck problems in that oil painting.

[1740] No, the baby in the photo is the most perfect little being that's ever existed.

[1741] The baby has a neck issue already.

[1742] No. Okay, I just want to pause you to say I love our job so much.

[1743] Me too.

[1744] I love our job so much.

[1745] But?

[1746] That is no but.

[1747] I'm really feeling it today.

[1748] Oh, good.

[1749] I love it too.

[1750] We did back -to -back interviews and now we're getting to do fact check and it's my favorite thing to do.

[1751] And I love it and I love the job and I love you and I love you, Robbie.

[1752] Me too.

[1753] And I'm so grateful.

[1754] And we're going to do ads after this.

[1755] Oh, now I don't love Rob.

[1756] Now I hate Rob.

[1757] But, yes, I agree.

[1758] Lots of gratitude.

[1759] Yeah.

[1760] Okay, so back to your neck.

[1761] Except not for my neck.

[1762] I don't, that's one place I don't, well, okay, I guess I have gratitude that I have a neck.

[1763] Certainly.

[1764] I can start there.

[1765] Yep.

[1766] I know someone without a neck.

[1767] You do?

[1768] Yeah.

[1769] Okay.

[1770] So standing by my gratitude that I have a neck.

[1771] Mm -hmm.

[1772] And my neck is knock on wood.

[1773] Knock on wood.

[1774] My neck is in good shape.

[1775] Like, it's doing what it should do as a neck.

[1776] It functions, yes.

[1777] But I do not like it aesthetically.

[1778] And what options are out there?

[1779] There are some options.

[1780] Do they pull, they do like a facelift?

[1781] Not a lift, not doing a lift, no. But that is an option, right?

[1782] I think you could do a, I don't know, yeah.

[1783] Imagine they could like cut the back of your neck skin a chunk out, then pull it tight and suture it and that would tighten up the front of your neck.

[1784] Yeah.

[1785] That's logical.

[1786] They could probably bet that seems very invasive and there's less invasive ways.

[1787] Okay.

[1788] So there's a procedure called, I might cut that.

[1789] I mean, I cut that.

[1790] Because I don't want people specifically, like, saying this is.

[1791] And then they'll find, like, the two examples.

[1792] So there is a procedure that's a neck procedure.

[1793] It's not a procedure.

[1794] It's an injection.

[1795] Okay.

[1796] So it's non -surgical.

[1797] I'm not doing anything surgical.

[1798] Okay.

[1799] Baby steps.

[1800] No, I'm really, like, I don't even think I'm going to go through with any of this because I'm so scared of it.

[1801] Yeah.

[1802] And I'm particularly scared of this procedure because I have heard, like, you know, you hear one bad story.

[1803] and I can't unhear that bad story.

[1804] But I do know some people who've had this.

[1805] Oh, great.

[1806] Personally.

[1807] Yeah.

[1808] Oh, great.

[1809] They like it.

[1810] And so...

[1811] What does it do?

[1812] It just, so it kind of just like melts.

[1813] It's supposed to like melt the fat around here.

[1814] Yeah, the extra fat in your neck.

[1815] And tighten it all up.

[1816] How can it tighten it without cutting some of the skin out?

[1817] No, like the skin can, you can like, that's what Botox can, like, tightens.

[1818] everything and it kind of lifts it and I might get that I don't know in your neck or your face well if they say they can put that in my neck that's best case I trust both I've never had it although if you had Botox in your neck you probably couldn't swallow people do get people get Botox in their jaw a lot and so if they say that's good enough like that will just like make it a little more defined yeah that's great okay I just am going to go in for a consultation and see what she has to say about my neck options and then Then maybe I might try Botox, but I don't, I really actually don't think I need Botox.

[1819] No, you have no wrinkles, but continue.

[1820] I don't have any wrinkles.

[1821] Yeah, zero.

[1822] But then someone said it's more than just wrinkles that it like, someone said it was Liz.

[1823] Listen, I'm not a doctor, but.

[1824] Dr. Liz.

[1825] We were all talking about this and she was like, you don't need it.

[1826] She was like, but if you had it, you would look like a supermodel.

[1827] And now I can't unhear them.

[1828] Listen, I don't think it tightens your skin.

[1829] Here's my understanding of Botox, right?

[1830] It is botulism.

[1831] That's what it is, Botox.

[1832] Yeah.

[1833] You put it in and it paralyzes the muscles it's been injected into.

[1834] Right.

[1835] Now, those muscles can't move the skin in the way that creates the creases.

[1836] Exactly.

[1837] So it's really just freedom of the repetition of the wrinkles.

[1838] Right.

[1839] So I'm not sure how it would make your dermis tighter, but certainly the lack of moving the muscles that create the wrinkles.

[1840] is what happens.

[1841] And then that softens up.

[1842] Well, for sure.

[1843] That's how it started.

[1844] But now it feels like there's all kinds of new stuff and new things.

[1845] But like I said, I'm just putting that out there because I want to be honest with the arm cherries.

[1846] I'm going to contradict myself.

[1847] I'm going to be both things.

[1848] I support you.

[1849] I'm all for it.

[1850] I'm not going to talk you out of it.

[1851] Great.

[1852] The only thing that gives me pause is the notion that you went to a dentist and they convince you that you could have better teeth than you have.

[1853] That's the only thing that scares me is you have such spectacular teeth.

[1854] And whatever picture they showed you, you were like, yeah, that's the only thing that scares me. Does that make sense?

[1855] Yes.

[1856] Thank you.

[1857] Thank you.

[1858] No, no, no. My teeth, you're wrong, though, in that it wasn't like I went to the dentist, my great dentist, that I love.

[1859] Appa, dentist.

[1860] Oh, I know.

[1861] I do need a new dentist.

[1862] They're really good, for real, they are really good.

[1863] They'll probably try to get you to have veneers, but maybe you want that.

[1864] So I have always wanted that.

[1865] I don't understand that.

[1866] I know, but just listening.

[1867] I accept it, I accept it.

[1868] I've always wanted it.

[1869] So it wasn't that they showed me a picture or they said, you know, it was confirming what I already thought.

[1870] Okay.

[1871] And then this is going to be the same.

[1872] If it's a neck, if they say, well, look, I hate my nose, right?

[1873] But I'm not going to touch it.

[1874] Okay, good.

[1875] Your nose is great.

[1876] hate my nose, but I've learned that that's my nose.

[1877] Uh -huh.

[1878] And so they might say, you know, we could put a little, like, tiny bit of filler here.

[1879] We could do a little something here and it will, but I'm not doing that to my nose.

[1880] But if they can make it so that I don't look at 90 % of pitchers and cringe at my neck, I would love that.

[1881] Yeah.

[1882] I love it.

[1883] I want that for you.

[1884] Yeah.

[1885] Mm -hmm.

[1886] So we're going to see, but I also want to, I am also going to be careful and I am nervous.

[1887] is that this procedure, I'm nervous it could go bad.

[1888] Well, I'll tell you something that kind of spooked me a little bit because I'm willy -nilly.

[1889] You know me. Yeah.

[1890] I'm totally willy -nilly.

[1891] But then I was watching that models documentary, which I loved so much, the supermodels one.

[1892] And was it Evangeli?

[1893] What's her name?

[1894] Linda Evangelista.

[1895] Yeah, we're not being mean.

[1896] She talks about it in the documentary.

[1897] Linda Evangelisa had some interesting freezing.

[1898] That's what I'm talking about.

[1899] That's what it is.

[1900] She had the one that went bad.

[1901] Oh, yes.

[1902] Oh, fuck, man. I saw that and that really scared the shit.

[1903] I almost think I thought of you when that happened.

[1904] Yes, because I probably was like, I want that.

[1905] It's called Kybella.

[1906] Oh, my God.

[1907] Is it crazy for them to test a little part on your hip to see how your body responds to this?

[1908] That's not a bad idea.

[1909] Like, that's not to start with something super visible.

[1910] But I don't want a hip lump either.

[1911] Back your thigh.

[1912] Somewhere that you think you don't mind having, like, better find out there.

[1913] Yeah.

[1914] I could ask.

[1915] Your butt.

[1916] Or my butt a butt lump.

[1917] A butt hole.

[1918] Because, you know, the expectations aren't going to be high, you know.

[1919] But I have a nice butthole.

[1920] Okay, well, then don't mess that up.

[1921] Listen.

[1922] Bottom of your foot.

[1923] I think maybe some, there's been some advancements.

[1924] How long does it take?

[1925] Ten minutes.

[1926] Oh, wow.

[1927] It's not, they just inject, you know, they pull it and they inject stuff.

[1928] Okay.

[1929] But I am scared, but I do want it.

[1930] It says it is generally considered to be safe.

[1931] Well.

[1932] That's the word you're looking for.

[1933] Exactly.

[1934] Trust me. I've read everything on it.

[1935] It damages temporary is what it says, in most cases.

[1936] Oh, if the lump happens, that's why I was like, because some of the other things like filler, they can dissolve it quickly.

[1937] Yeah.

[1938] But this, I don't think you can.

[1939] Yeah, it looks like nerve damage is really the main thing that it could cause.

[1940] You don't need your neck nerves.

[1941] Yeah.

[1942] I'm not on wood -colored wood.

[1943] You've got to be more specific now.

[1944] You've got to say wood -colored wood.

[1945] Okay, I will.

[1946] Well, thanks for letting us in on that.

[1947] I just want to let people know.

[1948] And I'm going to, if I get it, I'm going to tell people.

[1949] You're going to own it.

[1950] Yeah, because also if I like it and other people want to, I'm not going to endorse.

[1951] I'm not going to say like everyone should.

[1952] But then when if we're doing a live show and some gal comes up to with a huge lumps all over her neck?

[1953] And she's like, Monica, I trusted you.

[1954] I mean, I don't think you should advise it regardless of your outcomes.

[1955] I am not ever going to advise, but I want people to look at pictures of themselves and like it.

[1956] Is it?

[1957] How much is it?

[1958] $800.

[1959] You think that's a lot?

[1960] No, it's nothing.

[1961] I know.

[1962] This thing must be nothing.

[1963] You don't even need to think about it.

[1964] Go in and get it.

[1965] You think?

[1966] Yes.

[1967] If I get a lump, what are you going to do?

[1968] Cut it out.

[1969] I'll use my technique, I thought.

[1970] I've cut the back of your neck and I'll take out a section and we'll cinch it up.

[1971] Yeah.

[1972] Especially now that staples are on the table.

[1973] Like now people get sutured up with staples.

[1974] Surely I could do some staples.

[1975] Anyway, this is a slippery slope in general for people.

[1976] It is.

[1977] And I really am highly aware of that.

[1978] Yeah.

[1979] Tattoes are very similar.

[1980] Yeah.

[1981] It's like the hurdle to do it once is one thing.

[1982] And then once you get it, you're like, oh, yeah, I liked that.

[1983] So I would like more of that.

[1984] I know.

[1985] Actually, you know you're fucking covered tattoos.

[1986] Neck tattoos, which you've threatened.

[1987] Yeah.

[1988] You get Kybella.

[1989] I'm getting a neck tattoo.

[1990] No. Anywho, so that's where I'm at in my journey.

[1991] Great.

[1992] When do you think this will happen this week?

[1993] Um, it's, there's an appointment available on Saturday.

[1994] Oh my guess.

[1995] So maybe the next time I see you, you'll have a completely different neck.

[1996] There's no down time.

[1997] Where else get, you can only get it on your neck?

[1998] Kybella, yeah.

[1999] That, it's just a neck thing.

[2000] There's other things you can get.

[2001] Don't get stuff.

[2002] See, this feels hypocritical.

[2003] I know, but I want everyone to do what I want to do.

[2004] Yeah.

[2005] But even sometimes I see pictures of people.

[2006] I think it's great.

[2007] If they like it, great.

[2008] But it's pictures and it's presented as, it's so natural.

[2009] Mm -hmm.

[2010] And yet I don't think so.

[2011] You know.

[2012] Well, that is a curious, we won't never know, but there is a version of this where you did it, didn't say anything, no one's looking for it, and probably no one ever thinks anything.

[2013] Okay.

[2014] Because no one is even, I hate to say this because I want you to get your Cabella.

[2015] No one is No She's Monday I know Oh my gosh Just in time It's a sign You should do it Oh my God And you can say to her I got a cabella For you Well and hers is Cabello So she might be upset Okay She'll think you pronounce it weird Well now I've lost My turn Sorry This is what I'm gonna say And this is not to tell you Not to get it Get it get it You're not gonna like No one No one No one thinks you have a bad night No one looks at your neck and has had any thoughts about your neck.

[2016] I've never noticed it and I look at 100, 200 photos for episode.

[2017] But I still want you to get it because it doesn't matter what other people think.

[2018] It matters how you feel and I'm supportive of it.

[2019] But also, no one looks at your neck.

[2020] Nobody.

[2021] Okay, first of all, people look at things and they notice my neck.

[2022] You might not and you might not.

[2023] And that's crazy to me. But I've had validate, like I've mentioned this to people in my life who love me very much.

[2024] And they are like, you could get, like, they aren't, they're not like, oh, my God, you need it so bad.

[2025] Would you start crying?

[2026] Say it to me, I'm someone you've not told this to.

[2027] Okay.

[2028] So I'm considering getting blank.

[2029] No, about time.

[2030] Yeah.

[2031] Would you start crying?

[2032] Probably.

[2033] Yeah, that's rough.

[2034] It's so mean.

[2035] I even think I wonder.

[2036] No, what kind of, what kind of roleblood is?

[2037] Like, Eric might, like, if Eric had thought that, he would say it.

[2038] I know.

[2039] Like, you got to be careful.

[2040] I'm going to try it around him.

[2041] Let's see what he.

[2042] No, you know what you should do?

[2043] You've told, well, fuck, Eric could listen to this.

[2044] Because what would be more interesting and it would be disheartening and nice, which is you get it and don't tell anyone.

[2045] No one would.

[2046] But how, they're not going to say, even if they do notice, they're not going to say, Monica, your neck looks good.

[2047] But you know what they would say?

[2048] They would go, oh, you look so good.

[2049] Now it's a moot point because I'm saying it.

[2050] And I'll say if I get it or not.

[2051] Well, if anything, now we're going to find out which of our friends listens to the show.

[2052] Yeah, you're right.

[2053] Fair Weather Friends.

[2054] That's that.

[2055] Okay.

[2056] That's that on my maybe.

[2057] Cosmetic surgery, non -surgical.

[2058] Non -surgical stuff.

[2059] Well, I'm excited for you.

[2060] Thanks.

[2061] Yeah, I hope it's, I hope it.

[2062] We'll see if I go through with it.

[2063] But if you go through with it, I hope it turns out to be exactly what you want.

[2064] Well, me too.

[2065] Yeah.

[2066] I hope it's not lumps.

[2067] Yeah.

[2068] Oh, my God.

[2069] Who's this for?

[2070] This is for Chris Pine.

[2071] Oh.

[2072] Wonderful.

[2073] Yeah, super fun.

[2074] Super fun.

[2075] Really cool guy.

[2076] So smart.

[2077] Really smart.

[2078] Do you think you stereotype anything about actors?

[2079] I don't, but when other people bring stuff up about actors, I tend to agree.

[2080] Interesting.

[2081] Like, it's not on top of mind for me. You know, a lot of people say, like, I would never date an actor.

[2082] Dating actors is bad.

[2083] And I never think of it.

[2084] about that, but, but there are some through lines that can happen.

[2085] Sure, there's some over -indexing.

[2086] Yeah.

[2087] I don't have any stereotype or no preconceived notion that they're not going to be smart, but I do think I assume actors aren't educated.

[2088] Oh.

[2089] Like that they didn't go to college and get a degree of something substantial.

[2090] Yeah.

[2091] I imagine they studied theater, which is great.

[2092] That's still substantial.

[2093] It's not...

[2094] It's all a spectrum.

[2095] It depends on who you're asking.

[2096] Because a lot of people would say, not to offend you, people who do, like, organic chemistry probably don't think anthropology is all that, like...

[2097] Legit.

[2098] Okay.

[2099] Yeah.

[2100] You can get a BS in anthropology.

[2101] You can go to med school right from anthropology.

[2102] You can go to med school from anything if you'd take the right prerex.

[2103] Sure.

[2104] Then you'd have a Bachelor's of Science.

[2105] Sure.

[2106] But like there's labs and, you know.

[2107] I'm just, I'm saying, it's a, it's a liberal art. Okay.

[2108] I don't agree, but I'm telling you because you are doing that to another.

[2109] Well, one is learning how to express yourself and one's like learning the history and evolution of mankind.

[2110] There's a lot of history in theater.

[2111] Well, if you're that, if you're like an art history major and you know like every single period of art and all, the participants and it's a history you are a historian at that point but generally when you go to school for theater you're not like becoming an expert on plays are you there's time yeah there's playwriting classes you have to take there's tons of history classes you have to take you have to read all of shakespeare there's a lot okay i'm not trying to offend anyone i've also interviewed a bunch of people who majored in theater and there would be the first to say like yeah i didn't take any of those classes like i don't know anything about western sieve i don't know anything um tish tish people they don't have to take anything.

[2112] At NYU, you don't have to, I don't think.

[2113] Yeah.

[2114] Most other schools require a lot of pre -wrests.

[2115] Why would they study something else if that's what they want to do?

[2116] I'm actually not judgmental, but I guess I just don't think of most actors have, having focused on something conventionally majored in.

[2117] Yeah.

[2118] I agree that when I hear that someone, I mean, this is bad.

[2119] This is gross.

[2120] But when I hear that like someone has an engineering degree, that's an actor, you're like, oh, wow, that's kind of unique.

[2121] surprising, but I was going to say even regardless of what they majored in, when I heard Reese where this man went to Stanford, I was shocked.

[2122] I was surprised.

[2123] Yeah, it's kind of cool.

[2124] And it's very cool.

[2125] But then really, because why?

[2126] Who cares?

[2127] I shouldn't care either way.

[2128] But I do know almost, I think I know all of the actors who have ever gone to Ivy League schools.

[2129] Yeah.

[2130] You know, we know Natalie went to Harvard.

[2131] Exactly.

[2132] We know Ben and Matt.

[2133] Yeah.

[2134] Yeah.

[2135] We know, yeah.

[2136] I don't know if I knew Reese went to Stanford, but Maybe I did.

[2137] Yeah.

[2138] A bunch of people went to Yale drama.

[2139] Yeah.

[2140] Edward Norton went to Yale.

[2141] Uh -huh.

[2142] Yeah.

[2143] There's some Yallies.

[2144] Bradley went to Georgetown.

[2145] That's a good school, great school.

[2146] Paul Giamani went to Yale.

[2147] Yeah.

[2148] So, you know.

[2149] And maybe it's the exact same percentage as everyone else.

[2150] I don't.

[2151] It's just more surprising because a lot of actors decide not to go to school because you don't have to.

[2152] No, it's not beneficial at all in the acting world to know about.

[2153] King George or anything?

[2154] Well, it can be, because you can pull, like the more you know in general, I think the better of an actor you are.

[2155] Yeah, unless you're playing Frito, then you've got to forget everything you know.

[2156] Sure.

[2157] Yeah.

[2158] But you have to know it first to know to forget it.

[2159] Especially about what's in the pants.

[2160] God.

[2161] Because he doesn't know what he wants to get in there so bad.

[2162] What's in there?

[2163] Oh, okay.

[2164] Is he gone?

[2165] Yeah, he's gone.

[2166] Okay.

[2167] It's sort of a ding, ding, ding, because we talk about Neil LaBute.

[2168] Oh, right.

[2169] And I didn't chime in here because I didn't want to slow down the flow, but I love Nealabute.

[2170] And I did a lot of Nealabute reading in theater.

[2171] I'm delighted to hear that.

[2172] Yeah.

[2173] Because a lot of it's very mean.

[2174] Well, it's...

[2175] And you have a mean trigger.

[2176] It didn't feel mean to me. It felt harshly real.

[2177] Well, that's the thing, like, and again, this kind of becomes a debate we won't have.

[2178] But, like, I think there's a lot of people that want to see what should be in movies and not what is in movies.

[2179] And a lot of the world is mean as fuck and dark as fucking sadistic.

[2180] And so his stuff represents what is, I think, very much the reality of a lot of life.

[2181] Yeah.

[2182] But some of it's harsh.

[2183] Yeah, but a lot of plays, when you're really really really, like tons of plays all the time a lot of them are dark and twisted and not musicals cruel though like he seems to have a comfort level with airing a lot of the cruel things people say about each other yeah yeah and what's interesting is like two things are it's like it's shocking because you don't hear that in plays or in movies and then also commercial commercial plays and then second you're going like yeah that's what I heard on my playground like people are fucking cruel and mean.

[2184] Yeah.

[2185] The shape of things was my favorite play throughout college.

[2186] I don't think I've seen that or read that.

[2187] What's that about?

[2188] It's about this guy who ends up in this relationship.

[2189] He is ugly.

[2190] Like he...

[2191] And he ends up in this relationship and the woman starts, oh my God, ding, ding, ding.

[2192] Starts like...

[2193] Giving him plastic surgery?

[2194] Not really.

[2195] I think he actually maybe does end up in plastic surgery.

[2196] I don't remember very...

[2197] I don't remember all.

[2198] all the specifics, but like changing things about him and making him more attractive, but then there's like an affair that happens.

[2199] I don't know, it's like this group of four people and it's twisted and odd and they made a movie about it, but I never saw it.

[2200] Paul Run.

[2201] Paul Run.

[2202] And Rachel Wise.

[2203] Oh, maybe I saw it.

[2204] Playing, he was playing ugly.

[2205] Yeah, he had plastic surgery to fix his large nose.

[2206] Okay, yeah.

[2207] Oh my God.

[2208] It all circles back.

[2209] But yeah, I loved that some girls also.

[2210] Now I'm looking at his page.

[2211] There were a lot.

[2212] I read a lot of them at the time.

[2213] I used to love, I still have a ton of plays, and I loved the feeling of just rifling through a play.

[2214] There's some really, not, again, sorry.

[2215] I'm not a musical fan.

[2216] Right.

[2217] I don't like musicals, but I do love plays.

[2218] Yeah.

[2219] I love straight plays.

[2220] You loved it.

[2221] Yeah, that was a musical.

[2222] I did love it.

[2223] I was invited, and so I went to the opening night of Sufts, which was great.

[2224] But I thought to my, I was like, is this going to be a musical?

[2225] Oh, you didn't know going in?

[2226] I didn't know and I didn't want to know.

[2227] Right, because then you would have really not wanted to be there.

[2228] Yes.

[2229] And then it was a musical, but it was very good.

[2230] You know what's funny is I would say I don't like musicals either, but what's really funny is I've only probably seen four.

[2231] And two of them I really like.

[2232] So it's kind of like, I don't even know if it's a really legitimate opinion.

[2233] I've seen a lot of them.

[2234] I've seen a lot of them.

[2235] Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[2236] If you only go and see Hamilton in the Book of Mormon.

[2237] You like musicals.

[2238] The musicals are great.

[2239] Yeah, exactly.

[2240] So, Chris.

[2241] Okay, one thing, why is the Dune guy in oil?

[2242] Oh, yes.

[2243] What is happening?

[2244] Is he drying out?

[2245] No, the imagery of Baron.

[2246] How do you say the last thing?

[2247] Harkinen.

[2248] Harkinen, thank you.

[2249] Harkinen, bathing in oil is another.

[2250] unsettling aspect of the character and one that doesn't appear in the books.

[2251] The substance is actually a healing mud bath, which was inspired by a dream in which Barron Harkininin emerges from underneath oily liquid like a hippopotamus.

[2252] Yeah, that's what it looked like when he came out of that thing.

[2253] Yeah, I did.

[2254] Hippopotamai.

[2255] I do not like him.

[2256] I learned something weird today while I was researching our guests, which is not only where we shook the other day when we found out there was two.

[2257] two, there was hippocampi.

[2258] Yeah.

[2259] Do you know there's amygdala?

[2260] Oh.

[2261] There's more than one?

[2262] Yeah, there's two.

[2263] They're in both.

[2264] What?

[2265] Both hemispheres have an amygdala.

[2266] We just don't know.

[2267] We just keep learning.

[2268] We don't know shit.

[2269] Yeah, mineral -rich concoction to aid in recovering in health.

[2270] Okay.

[2271] Yeah, he looked very unhealthy.

[2272] He's not healthy, no. I don't want to shame him, but he also doesn't look healthy.

[2273] I don't mind shaming him.

[2274] He's bad.

[2275] Yeah.

[2276] Okay.

[2277] I'm back.

[2278] Yeah.

[2279] I'll shame him.

[2280] He said one of his favorite words is solipistic, which means it says someone who's solopistic is so focused on their own wants and needs that they don't think about other people at all.

[2281] We already had that word selfish.

[2282] Well, right.

[2283] You could also call it solipistic person selfish or self -centered.

[2284] Okay.

[2285] But it's a cooler word.

[2286] Yeah, hard.

[2287] I'm afraid to even try to say it out loud.

[2288] It's hard.

[2289] Solopistic?

[2290] You did it.

[2291] Whoa.

[2292] Don't try it.

[2293] Don't do it again.

[2294] I'm going to have retrodo, do it again.

[2295] First and last time I were saying it.

[2296] Okay.

[2297] Is Tab still around?

[2298] Yeah, you can get it on Amazon.

[2299] Really?

[2300] Yeah, I saw, I see it.

[2301] Wow.

[2302] Oh, it says currently unavailable.

[2303] Yeah, since 1987.

[2304] It says we don't know when or if this item will be back in stock.

[2305] Oh, wow.

[2306] Discontinued in 2020.

[2307] Fuck, you just missed it by four years.

[2308] Now we have to find it on eBay.

[2309] I'll be so old.

[2310] I know.

[2311] Yeah.

[2312] Once in a bloom, because we buy Diet Coke in such quantity that occasionally you'll grab a 12 -pack and it's been in there for a few years.

[2313] And it can start to taste like the aluminum can and it's terrible.

[2314] That's bad.

[2315] And there's no way this tab wouldn't be tasting like you put a mouth full of pennies in your mouth.

[2316] We said that I'm a wine connoisseur.

[2317] Yeah.

[2318] Well, you said whino and I said that needs a rebranding and then we went with wine connoisseur.

[2319] I just, again, circling back, I want to be honest.

[2320] Yeah.

[2321] I'm not a wine connoisseur.

[2322] I don't know that much about it.

[2323] Okay.

[2324] Though that is a goal.

[2325] It is.

[2326] Before I maybe one day eventually becomes sober, maybe.

[2327] Yeah.

[2328] I want to learn about wine.

[2329] I loved that show, the show I didn't really like, but I liked a lot.

[2330] There was a show I didn't like, but I...

[2331] Was it Japanese?

[2332] Half Japanese, French, and American.

[2333] Okay.

[2334] Okay, I guess I'll just say it.

[2335] Drops of God.

[2336] Yeah.

[2337] There we go.

[2338] It's a show I really enjoyed, and yet I didn't like it.

[2339] So it's weird.

[2340] I kind of like those shows.

[2341] I have a few of those, too.

[2342] Yeah.

[2343] It's more novel.

[2344] It's interesting.

[2345] Yeah, I blew through it.

[2346] I watched the whole thing, and it was really good at keeping your attention.

[2347] The world is cool.

[2348] I'm not remembering the series, but there was the series where it was like, I didn't like the episode at all ever, and the ending was always a perfect cliffhanger ending where I had to start.

[2349] Was it loop in?

[2350] You didn't like that.

[2351] That's the only show I've ever made it out loud on here that I didn't like.

[2352] And that was mostly...

[2353] And that's like not a bad enough show.

[2354] And I...

[2355] It's not a bad show.

[2356] It's not even a bad show.

[2357] Yes, I love it.

[2358] The writing was very convenient.

[2359] I'm particularly allergic to very convenient.

[2360] So anyway, that world, the wine world, and she smells it, and then she can do pear and moss and frankincense.

[2361] And I want to do that.

[2362] Oh.

[2363] Oh.

[2364] Our friend, mutual friend, Audra.

[2365] Yeah.

[2366] She's a, I think, level two, Somme.

[2367] Samoye?

[2368] Uh -huh.

[2369] Oh, what?

[2370] There's levels?

[2371] Yeah.

[2372] It's, I think, three or four levels.

[2373] So she's halfway to the top.

[2374] And it's really hard.

[2375] It starts to get, like, the top level, there's, like, a hundred of them.

[2376] Right.

[2377] Like, you need some kind of genetic advantage at some point.

[2378] Well, that's what we need.

[2379] Super smeller, super taster.

[2380] Yeah, but you can train it.

[2381] So that's, so she's going to help me. Okay.

[2382] We're going to do classes.

[2383] Oh.

[2384] And you start with, you just start smelling the smells themselves alone.

[2385] So you can build the memory of that's cherry on its own.

[2386] And then you're able to do it.

[2387] And then you can say 1962, Pino Noir, French Valley, Bordeaux, Yellow Hill.

[2388] I'm so judgmental of.

[2389] You already know this about me. I know.

[2390] And I want you to get over it.

[2391] It's one of my few really judgmental things.

[2392] You need to get over that.

[2393] One of them is like, just admit you're a drunk.

[2394] Stop trying.

[2395] Not you, not you, not you.

[2396] No, that's actually.

[2397] But these people who is like their whole life's dedicated to their wine cellar and this bottle.

[2398] And every time they open it, they're act like they're doing something super special.

[2399] You're just getting drunk.

[2400] You're just getting drunk.

[2401] You're trying to make it really elevated.

[2402] Yeah.

[2403] Stop.

[2404] That's not true.

[2405] Okay.

[2406] Real Psalms, for the most part, they spit it out.

[2407] Oh, I'm not talking.

[2408] talking about sums.

[2409] I'm talking about drunks who get super into their wine collection and they're using it as this like they're doing something super cultured and elevated.

[2410] They're just getting drunk and they because they've made it this very cultured elevated experience, they don't have to recognize that they're just getting hammered every night on wine.

[2411] That's one of my judgments.

[2412] Two of it, of course, it's a class thing.

[2413] I know.

[2414] But like at some point.

[2415] Yeah, when you own 10 cars.

[2416] A hundred percent.

[2417] You have to be a bird's eye view about this.

[2418] Yeah, it's hypocritical.

[2419] Because then you come off hypocritical, which is the worst thing.

[2420] But what if you're acknowledging you're hypocritical?

[2421] No, it's still bad.

[2422] It's like if you're acknowledging it but you refuse to take steps to overcome that or fix that.

[2423] If I dug really deep and I maybe got more honest, maybe it would be that I don't think I could ever tell the difference.

[2424] So I feel excluded by it.

[2425] But you don't have to.

[2426] Like, I can't look at, like, you look at, it's literally the exact same thing.

[2427] You looked at Chris's car.

[2428] You knew immediately, you knew the year, you knew the thing.

[2429] That's what Psalms do.

[2430] And it's rare and it's cool.

[2431] I have no problem with songs.

[2432] I know, but I'm just saying, I don't watch you do that and think, like, I don't know how to do that.

[2433] So, that's weird.

[2434] You know the power of the brain.

[2435] And do you think it is possible, though, that people do change their age?

[2436] experience with it because they've learned it's the perfect vineyard they know it's rare they know it's from this year once all those details don't you think the experience itself changes like here's my great suspicion i think you could take a pretty normal mid -level wine and present it to people as something and i'm pretty certain those people would be like oh my god it's so good maybe whereas the car thing is quantifiable it's like it has this horsepower goes to you, because you know.

[2437] But it does this lap time at this track.

[2438] That no one's using.

[2439] I'm just saying it's all real.

[2440] It can't be tricked.

[2441] You couldn't go like, hey, this is the fastest car from 1966.

[2442] Drive it.

[2443] And then it goes zero to 60 and 12 seconds.

[2444] You can't really trick that.

[2445] Well, you can't trick someone who knows.

[2446] But you could trick me. You could tell me this goes, this does this, this says.

[2447] And I'd be like, great.

[2448] I totally believe it.

[2449] I would think, oh, that's cool.

[2450] that's elevated.

[2451] Same with wine.

[2452] People who really do know if things are good or bad Yeah.

[2453] By the way I think this happens outside of wine too.

[2454] I think this happens with meat.

[2455] Now meat is something I'm super into.

[2456] And I think people have such a fucking boner for Wagyu and A13 Wagyu and all this stuff.

[2457] And I've had the samplers and then I have a rib eye right next to it and I'm like, I think you guys are all smelling each other's farts.

[2458] Like I don't think this isn't do you have any thoughts on Wagyu Rob?

[2459] I'm not big on just steak alone.

[2460] Yeah.

[2461] Like, I like more complexities and it.

[2462] Yeah, I just, I do think some of these things can become, you know, if you tell us, like, oh, here's 10 kinds of caviar.

[2463] This one is the rarest in the world.

[2464] There's only 10 cans of it.

[2465] People are, it's going to taste better to them.

[2466] Yes, I do think there's a mental aspect to it for sure.

[2467] But there is a actual process in winemaking.

[2468] And it's, sorry Trader Joe's, but Charles Shaw is, is not processed in the same way that some nice wines are.

[2469] Also, I apologize to everyone who loves wine and it feels like I just shit on their hobby.

[2470] I am sorry.

[2471] This is all my baggage.

[2472] Because it's a fun, it's fun.

[2473] And I, I mean, I don't think I could, well, hopefully I will one day.

[2474] But I can't taste a difference between a $100 bottle of wine and a $7 ,000 or a $6 ,000.

[2475] I probably couldn't.

[2476] Right.

[2477] But I do think if someone told you this is a $6 ,000 bottle of wine, it would taste different.

[2478] Maybe.

[2479] But there is a taste difference between.

[2480] between a $15 bottle of wine and a $75 bottle of wine.

[2481] I accept that.

[2482] There's a hangover difference.

[2483] There's a lot.

[2484] I believe that.

[2485] Yeah.

[2486] There's just like a threshold of it that I think it gets kind of silly.

[2487] Yeah.

[2488] I agree.

[2489] Yeah.

[2490] So I'm going to learn it.

[2491] Okay.

[2492] And I'm going to get Kybella.

[2493] Okay.

[2494] Okay.

[2495] Next time I see you're going to be.

[2496] I have to bleep that.

[2497] I have to bleep that.

[2498] You're going to try to pair my egg and rice.

[2499] dish from squirrel with something perfect.

[2500] I want to be able to pair like that.

[2501] That's fun.

[2502] I had the same chip on my shoulder when I drank, which is like, there isn't a better whiskey than Jack Daniels.

[2503] Sorry, y 'all.

[2504] That's not true.

[2505] So you're like, Maker's Mark and all these people.

[2506] I'm like, you guys have just convinced yourself from the packaging and the price point that this is better than Jack Daniels and it is not.

[2507] That is, that is, you're being so objective about things that are subjective.

[2508] To you, Jack Daniels tasted the best.

[2509] I disagree.

[2510] I like Four Roses, and that's not fancy.

[2511] Okay, great.

[2512] I accept that then.

[2513] Well, I also actually, I like Woodford or what's the other one I like that Jess likes that I. I think it's old packaging.

[2514] No, it's not.

[2515] Okay, okay, okay.

[2516] Because you were drinking it to get drunk.

[2517] No, well, also, I want to, I can drink any one.

[2518] So I'm drinking the one that tastes the best to me, additional.

[2519] No, you weren't at the time wanting to drink like something.

[2520] fancier though expensive.

[2521] No, I wanted to taste the very best thing.

[2522] I wanted to drink the thing that tastes the very best to me. The best at a price point though.

[2523] You weren't going to Blantons.

[2524] You weren't going to spend like money on Blantons to drink all in one night.

[2525] The end of my drinking, yes.

[2526] I had plenty of money to buy whatever I wanted.

[2527] At 29 when I quit, I could have bought anything.

[2528] And would you, yeah, that's true.

[2529] And I was in Hawaii with Dean and I'm drinking Jack Daniels.

[2530] I can get anything.

[2531] I know.

[2532] I just think it's different.

[2533] Yeah, I'm probably different.

[2534] I think it's different.

[2535] Also, why do I care?

[2536] No, what you could say that is the same to me?

[2537] Like, you want to really skewer me?

[2538] I don't think cars is a great example just because there are all these numbers associated with it.

[2539] There's ways to evaluate it.

[2540] Clothes is preposterous, and I'm all in on the clothes.

[2541] Clothes is not preposterous.

[2542] Oh, my God.

[2543] Like, certainly someone, who's wearing like a polo sweater is like this is made of wool and it's a very great sweater there's no way your Gucci sweater is better no i think there's a lot of merit to that but i'm in like i want the burberry sweater that you got me and you can't argue that jordan's are better you don't perform better playing basketball jordan's there's better craft though in some of this stuff like those shoes are made better than like some of it but i don't know that it's not proportional at a certain point.

[2544] Not at the price point.

[2545] Well, depending on what we're talking about, but yes, there's fit.

[2546] There's so many things that are different from a fast fashion place.

[2547] Yeah, that's always said polo.

[2548] That's not fast fashion.

[2549] It's like that is, polo is like, it's great quality, everything.

[2550] I don't know enough about their practices.

[2551] I don't either.

[2552] I mean, they make.

[2553] The go after them.

[2554] Yeah, I don't know what's going on with them, but I know like a place I have some stuff from.

[2555] Okay.

[2556] The rope.

[2557] The rope.

[2558] I'm not saying it.

[2559] Just like I'm not saying Kaipala beep.

[2560] So it's like it's manufactured in Italy.

[2561] The stuff's made there.

[2562] It's not fast fashion.

[2563] Right.

[2564] Fast fashion's bad.

[2565] That's what they say.

[2566] It is bad.

[2567] I know, but there's, listen, there's a sunscreen.

[2568] Did anyone respond to sunscreen?

[2569] No, there's a proletariat.

[2570] No, shockingly, no one is that pissed about sunscreen.

[2571] I think I've just worn everyone down at this point.

[2572] I know.

[2573] Of course.

[2574] My wife and my.

[2575] family they're just like oh he's talking again but we don't need to listen um okay my problem with shaming fast fashion is it you're gonna hate this well i'll tell you why okay because you're shaming people who can't afford the other stuff it's like okay so what we're like somehow the the elites have decided that their fashion which costs a ton of money is moral and this entry level shitty disposable stuff like those people want to look cute too just like the rich people and they can't afford the other thing and now we're shaming them like they're ruining the planet I'm not shaming the people buying it I'm shaming the companies that are doing it that way they don't have to they don't have to create at that level it's like so mass produced it's so much shit that's unnecessary they don't have to do that but they're doing it for profit and commercial appeals so it's not the people I agree yeah like everyone wants to look of course you buy what you can afford it's the companies though now these people have to look turn on the news and it's like great where i shop is a moral i don't want them to think that but i do want them to start shopping at the road i'm kidding i'm kidding i'm kidding we didn't hear about the i'm kidding it was a joke by the sunscreen but we might hear about that okay because i actually think this is interesting because the right conservatives conservatives yeah or you know a portion of this country is very eye -roly about, oh, my God, now we can't say this, now we can't say that, now we can't.

[2576] And I'm going to say, I'm like, we can't shame fast fashion.

[2577] I don't think you can because people don't have an option to buy anything but fast fashion.

[2578] Well, people don't have an option but feel hurt by racism either.

[2579] I guess we're all just feeling sort of like, oh, what?

[2580] can we do this is great we all have our pet projects anyway one thing that is a ding ding ding to my psalm days yeah he said he grows his own wine well he goes his own wine that's true but he he said the hardest thing about addiction which i think he sort of meant sobriety is five p .m. oh uh -huh because at five p .m you there's nowhere to go you just have to like get through till the morning Yeah.

[2581] And I've been thinking about that so much.

[2582] Did that resonate?

[2583] Yeah, that time of the day.

[2584] When it hits five.

[2585] It's time for a drink.

[2586] Yeah.

[2587] It's crazy.

[2588] It is funny when somebody put something on your radar and then, oh, it's kind of Bader Mindhoff, I guess.

[2589] It's like, then you just see it.

[2590] You see it all of a sudden.

[2591] Once you're aware of it, you're like, oh, my God, it was there this whole time and I'm so aware of it now.

[2592] Yeah, because I think like you go through the day thinking, oh, I'm not going to drink today.

[2593] There's no. reason but then five comes and all of a sudden there's like a reason there's not a reason but it's like it's five o 'clock and i want to like hang out now yeah really it's the separation between the workday and the night see i think it's what you really want because i have now done it i have it really deeply with the sauna it's like i need to transition from that zone exactly like if i go in my house and act like i do on this podcast my family's going to go bananas you know i got to like transition Yeah, like for me, it's like if I just go home right now, then I'm going to work.

[2594] Uh -huh.

[2595] And I'd rather not.

[2596] Like, I'd rather have a break between this work and that work.

[2597] Mm -hmm.

[2598] And a hang sounds like a fun way to do that.

[2599] Yeah, for sure.

[2600] But I need something else probably.

[2601] What do we do about people who don't have sonnas?

[2602] I mean, I was, no, I thought that during this episode, I was like, this is going to be eye -roly for some people.

[2603] Yeah, of course.

[2604] Because, and I get it.

[2605] It's like, okay, what about the people who don't have these options?

[2606] What do they do?

[2607] Well, I'll tell you, and I was just about to suggest this to you, you won't do it.

[2608] But if you went for a 20 -minute jog after this, after each day of work, I really think it would be the exact same thing.

[2609] Well, I've been, I have been.

[2610] Jogging.

[2611] Back to jogging.

[2612] Yeah.

[2613] I've seen Phineas two out of three.

[2614] Actually, three out of three, but he didn't see me on one of them.

[2615] Did you flag them now, though?

[2616] Yeah, now we talk.

[2617] I saw him this morning.

[2618] Yeah, he's out and about, and I met Claudia.

[2619] How is she?

[2620] She's very, very sweet.

[2621] Yeah, it's really funny for his episodes when I was reading the comments, it was nice to see how much people love her.

[2622] So many of the comments were about Claudia.

[2623] That's cool.

[2624] So I know her brother very well.

[2625] Oh, you do?

[2626] Yeah, I was his roommate when I was like 18.

[2627] Are they from Chicago?

[2628] Yeah, Chicago.

[2629] Oh, that makes sense.

[2630] The Chicago contingency is strong.

[2631] Definitely more guests and callers.

[2632] Lots of Chicago.

[2633] But jogging.

[2634] I think if you jog, I think it's just like there's a restlessness at the end of something.

[2635] Mm -hmm.

[2636] And then I think if you like just kind of exert yourself in some way for a half hour.

[2637] I know, but it's also like, that's an annoying thing to do.

[2638] Yeah.

[2639] Unless you start really associating it with the post.

[2640] I like the feeling after, yeah, I know.

[2641] Like for me, when I walk into the sauna, I don't even think about that it's going to be hot.

[2642] Right.

[2643] Or uncomfortable.

[2644] I don't, I just so associate it with like a kind of placid, calm feeling after, that that's all I really experience.

[2645] Yeah.

[2646] I don't know.

[2647] I'm going to.

[2648] But I, I was, I didn't drink for 17 full years without a sauna.

[2649] So I don't feel too bad.

[2650] I know.

[2651] I know.

[2652] No. Did Spina stay in the edit?

[2653] Yeah, and I want to try it.

[2654] Oh, you went.

[2655] So I went after this interview.

[2656] Yeah, you went that night to the restaurant that Chris mentioned.

[2657] It was insane.

[2658] Oh, I want that.

[2659] I want to go.

[2660] But nothing's gluten -free, right?

[2661] No, it's all like homemade pasta.

[2662] We've gone twice since the interview.

[2663] I want that so bad.

[2664] Oh, what are you doing tonight?

[2665] Maybe getting it.

[2666] Oh, my God.

[2667] We'll see.

[2668] That's it.

[2669] Oh, okay, wonderful.

[2670] That's all.

[2671] We learned a lot.

[2672] Love Chris.

[2673] He was great.

[2674] I really, really, really liked him.

[2675] We do have hats from his movie.

[2676] Well, he sent hats.

[2677] Those are cute.

[2678] Oh, this is a cute hat.

[2679] Poor man, quarter -eye hat.

[2680] Yes, this is a cute hat.

[2681] He's very fashionable, so I'm not surprised that this...

[2682] Extremely.

[2683] If I didn't make too fine up a point on it, his aesthetic in life is really top -notch.

[2684] The whole car thing is ideal.

[2685] Yeah.

[2686] I'm pretty proud of myself that I got 1969 on the button on the...

[2687] that one.

[2688] I know.

[2689] If you're proud of yourself for that, you should be proud of all the Psalms.

[2690] Okay, I am.

[2691] Okay.

[2692] I tip my free hat to you, songs.

[2693] All right.

[2694] Love you.

[2695] Love you.