Mark Duplass

[0] Hello, everybody.

[1] Welcome to Armchair Expert.

[2] I'm Dachshepard.

[3] I'm joined by Manika Padman.

[4] That's me. She's a manic a bad man. She's a Madca bad man. I hope you get so popular that you are the focus of a popular song where they call you a bad man. I'd like that too.

[5] Oh, I really like that.

[6] Wouldn't that be great?

[7] But he's of mine during Dawson's Creek.

[8] They wrote a song about Katie.

[9] Katie.

[10] You know what I'm saying?

[11] Katie Holmes.

[12] Katie Holmes.

[13] They wrote a song about Katie Holmes.

[14] Is that the theme song?

[15] No, it's not, but he just wrote a song about her.

[16] My friend Jason Delion, I tell you about all the time, the anthropologist, who's a genius.

[17] Okay.

[18] He was in a punk band when we were in college, and he wrote a song about her, and she found out about it.

[19] Oh, I'm dying for someone to write a song about me. Yeah.

[20] Well, some musicians get on that.

[21] This song's not going to write itself.

[22] Hey, today, an old pal of mine's here.

[23] Yeah.

[24] Mark Duplos.

[25] Yeah.

[26] You may know him as one of the two Duplas brothers.

[27] Correct.

[28] We talk about that a lot, sharing an identity, a working identity with a brother.

[29] There's a lot of yummy stuff there.

[30] I discovered Mark through the Puffy Chair, this great, great little tiny $5 movie he made that I believe went to Sundance and I saw it.

[31] And it's one of my favorite movies ever.

[32] And then I asked him to go have a lunch with me and he and Jay did.

[33] And we became pals and ended up working for him on a movie he made.

[34] called the freebie, which you like.

[35] I love it.

[36] Sounds like I'm plugging my own stuff.

[37] Yeah.

[38] I'm just trying to make this personalized so for everyone feel some connected.

[39] They'll hear it on the episode.

[40] Connected Tissu.

[41] Anyways, Mark DuBlaas has a lot of amazing projects.

[42] He's been a part of and he has currently room 104 on HBO coming out November 9th.

[43] He's a very cool idea.

[44] All separate individual stories that all take place in the same hotel room 104.

[45] It's very cool.

[46] Yeah.

[47] Please enjoy Mark Duplas.

[48] Wondry Plus subscribers can listen to Armchair expert early and ad free right now.

[49] Join Wondry Plus in the Wondry app or on Apple Podcasts.

[50] Or you can listen for free wherever you get your podcasts.

[51] You're from Louisiana.

[52] Do I remember that correctly?

[53] You do.

[54] In one story, I don't know if you're comfortable.

[55] telling, but if you are, it's one of my favorite stories you've ever told me. And I think it sums a lot of things up just about life on planet Earth.

[56] And that's your dad's bowling team story.

[57] Yes.

[58] Is that appropriate for the air?

[59] That is totally appropriate.

[60] Okay, great, great.

[61] Yes.

[62] So the story is particular to a time and place, a 1980s southern male and how he wants to be a good father and be a person who, who can cater to his own needs and desires, but has no emotional awareness and zero skill sets and therapy is not around.

[63] Right.

[64] So it's the caveman making his way out of the cave towards us, but not there yet.

[65] Sure.

[66] And it was actually one of my father's friends is the story.

[67] Oh, it was.

[68] Okay.

[69] And he joined a bowling league.

[70] And it was lovely because every Wednesday night, he got to go bowl and he got some time with his friends.

[71] And he got a little bit of time to himself.

[72] And it made things go around.

[73] Well, and let's just be honest.

[74] Time away from the racket of kids and wife and everything.

[75] Yeah, that's really what he needed.

[76] And then there was one night where the bowling league was not going to meet.

[77] And he was ready to go tell his wife, this is a night I'm going to be home.

[78] And a good friend of it said, hold, what are you doing?

[79] And he said, what are you talking about?

[80] He said, if you go home now, you're going to break the cycle.

[81] You're going to break this wonderful streak of Wednesday nights that you have away from home.

[82] and you're going to break it not only for yourself you could possibly break this for all of us so there's a larger thing at stake here um so he's what what am i supposed to do he's like i tell you what you're supposed to do you need to get that ball and you're going to put it in that bag and you're going to go into your car and you're going to drive down the block and then you're going to sit in your car with that bowling ball by yourself for four hours and then you're going to go back in the house and he did And he did it.

[83] And he kept the league alive for himself and for all of his friends.

[84] Good for him.

[85] Were they all independently sitting in their cars at the end of the street?

[86] I mean, why did they at least get together?

[87] The bowling alley itself had been demolished for three and a half years before the wives.

[88] No. No. But if we were making the episode, yes, that's what we would do.

[89] It's funny.

[90] You would say episode.

[91] Isn't it funny?

[92] We used to say everything.

[93] Any idea you had was always a movie idea.

[94] Totally.

[95] And now you go like, oh, no, it's a show idea.

[96] And in nine months, it'll be, yeah, that'll be the web episode.

[97] Right.

[98] Or the story, the Instagram story or something.

[99] You were quick to embrace that.

[100] I loved that transition.

[101] Mm -hmm.

[102] But I have loved all transitions in my career.

[103] And it's funny, I was talking about this with someone the other day about, I don't know how to describe it best, but I find that respectfully a lot of my filmmaking companions and peers have an entitlement about them.

[104] Sure.

[105] They feel like they have a vision for a movie.

[106] And because they believe that it's good or interesting, the world should give them that money.

[107] And oftentimes that vision is like, I want to make an incest drama with no stars and I want my $15 million to do it.

[108] And this world sucks that it won't give me that.

[109] Right.

[110] And for whatever reason growing up in the South, going up outside of the industry, I just never had any of that.

[111] It was always like, might there possibly be any place for me?

[112] And it started out making microbudget little movies.

[113] And then when that started to feel challenging or I wasn't going to be able to do it the way I wanted to do it.

[114] And I saw a space open up on the TV side or whatever it was for me. It was never, God damn it, I'm not able to do what I want to do.

[115] Now I've got to pivot and fuck all this.

[116] I'm upset.

[117] Yeah.

[118] It was just like, there's another spot.

[119] where they'll accept me and I can get to do my thing and that's just great for me. It's just...

[120] Yeah, that sounds liberating.

[121] Now, I've never been like, I'm entitled to the movie marketplace of the 80s.

[122] You know, but at the same time I have had a couple thoughts, one being like, oh, if I had had my exact same career in 1990, I would have made a few million dollars a movie.

[123] That's just what you made on the lower middle rung of the ladder.

[124] 100%.

[125] Yeah.

[126] Or even I had Mike Schurin here.

[127] We were walking.

[128] to the car afterwards.

[129] And I said, does it ever bother you that had you had your identical TV career in 1990, you'd own the Red Sox?

[130] Yeah.

[131] Like you love baseball.

[132] Yeah.

[133] He goes, yeah, I think about it kind of often.

[134] Yeah.

[135] Yeah.

[136] But yeah, a saner side of yourself goes, still way too much money to say words in front of a stationary camera.

[137] That's basically how I feel.

[138] Yeah.

[139] And I also, I have that added thing of like I kind of found this niche and we used to talk about this a lot of like accidentally realizing that like making things cheaply was not just a way to get to Hollywood but was its own ecosystem that could be financially sustainable in the long run and so once I figured that out through like the puffy chair and baghead and when you and Katie made freebie together I was just like everybody else was like I'll just do this for a little while and struggle until Hollywood accepts me yeah yeah yeah and then I went and made my first studio movie you had to have had like the Soderberg map at least laid out right I didn't understand that stuff you didn't like oh you go to a Sundance with sex lies and video oh sorry that one yes yes here is the trajectory yes and then you make out of sight yes that's what I thought was going to happen right and it kind of did because I got to make Cyrus and search light and then not that this is the most important thing I did get to make the movie I wanted there I get so beat up in the process.

[140] I was like, oh, we're never going to last.

[141] Like, I'll make two of these.

[142] Like emotionally and spiritually kind of destroyed through the process of like, well, essentially the studio heads believing that they knew best, having to explain every single thing that I wanted to do, the death of the fun of creativity through that process of having to put into words everything you're about to do as a. opposed to that unspoken thing where Jay and I look at each other and we get an idea and we just go do it.

[143] Sure.

[144] The way that like you and Nate used to be making your stuff that just makes you feel 12.

[145] Oh, yeah.

[146] And so I was like, if I have to like take two years and talk everything out every time I make a piece of art, I'll be retired at 35.

[147] There's no way I'll last, you know.

[148] Well, it is, yeah, it is interesting.

[149] Nothing is for free.

[150] So it's like you want more money.

[151] You want a crane shot?

[152] Cool.

[153] You want a helicopter?

[154] Yeah.

[155] Yeah, we'll give you that.

[156] But also, now we have a lot more saying this whole thing.

[157] But the weird thing, and I would love to say I was like smart enough to engineer this, but it was just kind of happenstance was that was the same time where like I really wanted to do a lot of acting stuff, but I couldn't like get really good roles just yet.

[158] And so I was going out and making these small movies like your sister's sister with Lynn Shelton and I did this movie, the one I love with Elizabeth Moss.

[159] And I made them for like $100 ,000.

[160] Right.

[161] And I was doing that at the same time.

[162] time I was making like a $7 million movie at the studio.

[163] And I made way more money making the little movies, taking them and selling them to Sundance.

[164] Ironically.

[165] And I was like, wait a minute.

[166] This is wonky.

[167] Yeah, yeah.

[168] And that's kind of what shifted me over too.

[169] So to your point of like, fuck, yeah, maybe I could have made a lot more money back then in the heyday, but I don't know for me. People do underestimate the part of the job that, and I actually think you're seemingly pretty good at that.

[170] A big component of the director's job is how good of a car salesman they are, because you're going to get a note on your project and you're going to walk into their office and explain why your idea.

[171] So really, you have to be very persuasive.

[172] Yeah.

[173] You can't just be like, you know, fuck them.

[174] I know I'm an artist, blah, blah, blah, but you're just not going to go that great.

[175] It's not going to go that great.

[176] And there's certain people, and I call it judo, like my mentor has always been Favreau because I worked with him and he's in the the way he just handles all those layers and how he treats people and the judo he does it's all just judo and so much of the job is that yeah emotional and spiritual karate it's great um you got to be good at that I I feel like that is half of my job when dealing with like my crew members and my people and like being sensitive to their needs and keeping them happy.

[177] But I have actually completely extricated myself from the need to satisfy any studio heads or any executives to give me any money by making things.

[178] I figured out the price point where they won't have to ask.

[179] I was, yeah, I was going to get to that.

[180] Because one of the impressive things, well, let me start at the beginning actually.

[181] I saw the puffy chair, which I just still maintains in my top 20 movies.

[182] It's just such a fucking great movie.

[183] And so much of it because of your acting in that movie.

[184] You're just so sincere in that movie.

[185] It's so good.

[186] I mean, when you go, and you're serious.

[187] And you're serious.

[188] The guy wants to charge you.

[189] What is it?

[190] Your chair.

[191] Yeah, the chair is telling you know what's just going to be.

[192] Uh -huh.

[193] And you're serious.

[194] That was so great.

[195] And then I, stupidly, was like, hmm, I want to meet these guys.

[196] Never occurred to me that every other actor also saw the puppy chair.

[197] Like, at that point, Jonah Hill had already seen it, wanted to meet you guys.

[198] there were some handful people but it wasn't like we were being flooded when we took our first meeting together it wasn't like oh fuck now everybody wants to meet us it was no it was we were excited too right we love Tom Cruise but we don't never really want to work with him how on earth do we turn him down for a meeting yeah where's Dackey give me Ducky Shepherd yeah but you were gracious enough to meet me at Cafe 101 you and J and I all met and presumably well by your own admission it wasn't until later like you happen to stumble across let's go to prison you go oh you can actually act serious so maybe yeah maybe we could work to there but when you took the meeting your knowledge of me was just like super broad comedian very little interest in meeting me but we go to this breakfast and boy do we we just hit it off don't we wasn't that wasn't that fun it was a really fun breakfast what is that's like two thousand and fucking six I want to say it's six yeah 12 years so we're talking 12 years ago that's bonkers none of us have kids of us are i don't think you're married yet no no i'm single i believe even yeah so we start hanging out and we have this is enviable we'd have these movie parties weren't weren't i mean i wish there's a handful of there were specific there were specific parties it couldn't have been more specific in when i fantasize about being like single and no kids there's only like a handful of things i really miss those parties are one of them when you have children and when you have children and when you you're concerned with how to make them good beings in a very complicated world, you don't often make time to spend five hours eating pizza and watching really great old films that happen to show a lot of great gratuitous male nudity in them so that you can all enjoy them and make jokes about them.

[199] Yes.

[200] It tends to go lower on the pecking order.

[201] Yes.

[202] And even when you were saying great old films, people are probably thinking we were getting together to watch Casablanca or something.

[203] No, we were watching Tango and Cash.

[204] We were watching the robot movie.

[205] What was it?

[206] That was a Ben Kosalky.

[207] Oh, oh, right, right, right, right.

[208] We did not feel like it held up.

[209] Yeah, yeah, that one did not hold.

[210] It wasn't really even delivering on the comedy.

[211] No, it was.

[212] What is that movie?

[213] Robocop.

[214] Robocop, yes.

[215] Robocop.

[216] Very violent, though.

[217] That part was amusing.

[218] Holy cow.

[219] Splattered hands.

[220] Yeah, the high watermark for me is Tango and Cash because we, oh, I know how it's, maybe even how it started.

[221] We, didn't we watch hot.

[222] Lawrence Caston.

[223] Yeah.

[224] 1881.

[225] Uh -huh.

[226] Kathleen Turner.

[227] Kathleen Turner and William Hurt and it's called.

[228] Oh, and it's set in Orleans.

[229] And no, Florida.

[230] Is it Florida?

[231] And it is called body heat.

[232] Body heat.

[233] There are people screaming at their dashboard right now.

[234] You fucking body.

[235] You guys are supposed to be in this industry.

[236] So we watched body heat, which was so great because.

[237] Noir, sexy.

[238] That scene, first of all, just a great movie.

[239] Just on its own worth watching.

[240] 100%.

[241] Secondly, there's a lot of nudity, which is great.

[242] And Nate Tuck is uniquely skilled at discovering things in real time.

[243] And what he realized is there was a moment where Bill Hurt gets off of Kathleen.

[244] And they're both nude.

[245] And his penis actually is stuck to her skin.

[246] And it actually kind of stretches and then releases.

[247] and it's a fruit roll -up -esque and it's yeah release pattern and it's only three or four frames yeah I don't know how he caught it and he goes whoa he does he goes whoa and then of course we pause and we go back frame for frame and we are so delighted I mean and by the way when was the last time you when watching a movie paused and went back that's something that ends when you're like 12 years old particularly when there's nudity sure sure that was that's how it evolved All, like, we were, by the way, we're blowing right by the boobs, Monica.

[248] We almost are disinterested in the boobs or the female buns.

[249] We want to see male buns, male penis, and hopefully male balls.

[250] Who had the really short butt and shen into your own cash?

[251] Well, I was building detangle in cash, because I think that's the apex of our.

[252] It was just beautiful.

[253] Because I don't think we were aware that that scene was coming our way.

[254] So there was like eight of us in this group.

[255] It was you, your brother, Ben Kosalki, Nat, Julian Woss.

[256] Julian Woss.

[257] And then we had Nate and then we had Larry for a little bit for a couple of them.

[258] That was nice.

[259] And a side note to that whole thing was that Nate Tuck had an email address that if you flipped his name.

[260] Oh, my God.

[261] It was another Nate Tuck.

[262] Pallendron.

[263] A Pallandrum?

[264] No, there's another Nate talk.

[265] And their emails were, I don't want to give either of their emails out, but suffice to say, you could flip them and it was the same, you know.

[266] So we had the wrong Nate Tuck on this email.

[267] chain for about a month and he was responding but by the way and he was responding so subtly that he had sustainability on his mind he was like I'm going to be in this group of friends for years to come yes it was not a one and done like all right I'm going to act like him and then I'm going to say something crazy he was waiting until someone throughout an address a physical address that he could show up to and he's like I'm not coming forward until I get that address and then eventually I said Nate, like, it's crazy to me. He didn't respond to blank.

[268] He's like, I don't even know you guys were playing out a thing.

[269] And I'm like, you're on the emails.

[270] And he's like, no, that's the other Nate Tuck.

[271] So real Nate Tuck reaches out to fake Nate Tuck.

[272] And they communicate.

[273] And then he reads us that guys.

[274] And we're like, we need to get this guy into Hollywood and writes him.

[275] He's incredible.

[276] He was brilliant.

[277] He was unbelievable.

[278] He got into the voice of the real Nate Tuck.

[279] He did.

[280] He knew to only respond to two of every three emails because that was very Nate Tuck, like.

[281] He really had it.

[282] Boy, so anyways, we had an imposter, which is its own great caper.

[283] If you're out there, other Nate Tuck, we applaud you.

[284] We salute you.

[285] For those about to rock fire, we salute you.

[286] So anyways, it all built to us watching Tango and Cash, which I believe was Ben Kassalki.

[287] Yes.

[288] Genius.

[289] He knew.

[290] He knew.

[291] We didn't know.

[292] There's just a kind of innocuous shower scene if one can be innocuous where our lead character is sliced alone and Kurt Russell are showering and maybe talking about the case.

[293] I think what it is is they're in prison and they have to do their showers.

[294] Because remember they get framed?

[295] I mean barely.

[296] Yeah.

[297] And if I remember correctly, there's a little bit of like slight discussion of whether they should do this or not and what happens with the dropping of the soap.

[298] And I think it's like a, I think it's like a French overs from behind while they're shirtless.

[299] Yes.

[300] And then they step into that wonderfully extended frame for us and allow the reveal to happen.

[301] And they walk away from camera for a very long time.

[302] Very long time.

[303] Very long time.

[304] The only butt shot I know that's more gratuitous on a male was, and I was just showing Monica this weekend in Toronto, is Swayze in Roadhouse.

[305] An incredible one.

[306] I think it's the high water market.

[307] It is.

[308] I'll tell you why.

[309] He gets out of bed in a lot.

[310] a wide shot and he's nude and you see his buns and they're off the charts perfect yeah and he looks like a um their dancer buns their dancer buns slash gymnast yeah yeah i mean there's there's some bulk to his whole body yeah and you're like wow that's a real big butt shot like great and then slam we cut to a close up there's a close up from the wide still not over the escalation he then squeezes and clenches his cheeks do you remember that part no he fucking clenches his butt cheeks in the close -up.

[311] It's so perfect and it's so telling.

[312] He's like, no, this thing was, this was probably storyboarded.

[313] This was with a drawing of the clenched butt cheeks.

[314] Well, all great movies start with an impulse.

[315] And let's just imagine that the movie began here.

[316] The other way that the story might have gone down was the assistant editor brought everybody in and said, listen, we got a bunch of really great shots here that we could use.

[317] There's a wide, there's a medium.

[318] I put them all on a string out.

[319] obviously we're not going to use all of these pick which one you want yeah you can't use two you can't use all of them and then everybody watched it and they said yes it's perfect it's perfect yeah just the assembly of shot that's it anyways yes so you know i'm not even i'm not even i don't want to publicly say who had this this short buck crack but in tango in cash there is a very short buck there's one short of two meaning the crack starts a mere inch or two above the anus.

[320] So it's just kind of it's cheeks, but they're very, very, like if you were to measure the whole butt crack, okay.

[321] I bet it's four or five, three or four inches.

[322] I think the truth of the matter is we can talk about this all day long, but until you go and just see it, you're not going to really know.

[323] I'm going to post a picture of it.

[324] What it is.

[325] Okay.

[326] And that'll be on you because again, I don't want to sound critical.

[327] All butt cracks are cute and beautiful and wonderful.

[328] And they all, they generally well, you could also zoom in in a way that does not reveal the actual holder of the butt crack.

[329] Okay, yeah, yeah.

[330] Oh, that's a great idea.

[331] And let them guess.

[332] Let everybody guess.

[333] It sounds like you're being complimentary, so it's fine.

[334] Look, both guys had much better asses than any of us in the room.

[335] Yeah, there's no question.

[336] Did you test it?

[337] Did you all pull your pants down and give it a good?

[338] No, but I'm shocked we didn't.

[339] I think that if we'd been like five years younger.

[340] Or certainly if I had still been drinking.

[341] Yes.

[342] I would have probably stood next to the projector.

[343] I got this.

[344] So that was some good fun Those are great days They really were And they're really innocent Yeah Like when you think of like I think a lot of people reflect Like they miss going to a nightclub Or like you know Meeting some chick or something And I'm like I'd love to be on that couch Tons of Lucifer's pizza Here's something I can just You know Your kids are a little younger than mine My daughters are 10 and 6 And we're in this wonderful phase of reintroduction of fun movies together.

[345] And, you know, a lot of, like, Friday night, like, we make pizzas, and they're, like, whip out one of the classics on us, you know, and let's have some fun.

[346] Like, Ango and Cavs.

[347] Right, right.

[348] So, we, uh, you know, of course, I was, like, so protective of my 10 -year -old and what I would show her.

[349] And now my 6 -year -old, I'm just like, well, she can fucking watch anything, because that's what happens.

[350] Totally.

[351] And we watched Talladega Nights the other night.

[352] Oh, wow.

[353] And there's that wonderful scene where Will Ferrell gets blindfolded, and, like, he's like, you you had to drive with your spirit.

[354] And they know, they're feeling the comedy coming.

[355] They're getting excited.

[356] And I'm excited to watch with them and, you know, share their first viewing.

[357] But something amazing happened, which I had totally forgotten, which is, you know, there's a wide shot and the car like bunks off of like three or four cars and then crashes into a house.

[358] And they laughed and they giggled.

[359] And then my six years ago said again.

[360] And I was like, oh, remember the time in life when you would pause and rewind a scene and watch it 15 times with your friends and it would get progressively more fun.

[361] and you would kind of even force the laughter to keep it going because you wanted to be in that, you know?

[362] And so we get to do that now every night.

[363] And that's going to be the return of that for you to a certain degree of that innocence and that fun.

[364] Oh, God.

[365] Because we did, we did do roadhouse all together.

[366] And we watched this scene with John Doe shooting the shotgun.

[367] Unbelievable.

[368] It's the single biggest moment that.

[369] Didn't you have a series of pictures of it in your.

[370] Yes.

[371] Well, my obsession with John Doe, it had the best payoff, really, because we discovered watching Roadhouse that there's an actor in the film, John Doe, who was the lead singer of X. Hell yeah.

[372] Yeah.

[373] I didn't know that when I watched it the first time.

[374] I was unaware, but.

[375] Nor were Nate and I. So the most amazing reveal for us is we just are watching the movie, and I don't know whether Nate saw it or I saw it.

[376] But there is a scene where John...

[377] I'm betting on Nate.

[378] Probably Nate.

[379] He has the eyes for this.

[380] He's firing a shotgun And every time he pulls the trigger He brings his knee up in the air And then slams his foot down And it's choreographed to walk There's no reason Up is a gross understatement Of what that is That was I mean When you see horses dance That's exactly what his leg looks like While he's firing this gun No one would ever make this choice In the history of movies And he's a glorified extra in this moment He is he's what you'd call a day player They bring in a few days for the whole movie And so it's so a spectacular choice that we think fuck we probably miss some other great choices he's made so now we start going backwards through the movie and just two scenes before he's scratching his back with the trigger of the shotgun in the background of a like a very serious scene and we're like oh my god he delivered then we go back to another scene and he's in the bar and he's got this straw and he's just ripping it around in like a windmill and then he throws a rag at somebody so every single scene he was in he stole so then we're like okay this guy's a genius we We must find out who he is and we must watch all of his movies.

[381] So now we start going through the credits.

[382] And when we get to the fucking the punchline of all punchlines, the guy's name is John Doe.

[383] Wow.

[384] Not even a real name.

[385] John Doe.

[386] I mean, talk about art. It's incredible.

[387] And he shows up in a lot of great.

[388] He's in a boogie night.

[389] He's a good girl.

[390] He's been around, man. Always for two minutes.

[391] Always.

[392] And so I think Nate and I told you our great idea is that we were going to try to hire John Doe.

[393] We were going to try to make a whole movie where John Doe doesn't know he's the star.

[394] Oh, yeah.

[395] Well, we keep, at the end of every night, we go like, great work today, John.

[396] We're bringing you back tomorrow.

[397] And then just he'll be in all 30 days of the shoot.

[398] And we get other big actors to be kind of in the scenes, but we'll always push past them.

[399] Yeah.

[400] Anywho.

[401] And he watches the premiere of the movie and realize that that night.

[402] He is the goddamn star of the film.

[403] So anyways, when I was working with Craig T. Nelson, he was also in poltergeist.

[404] Oh, God.

[405] I didn't know that.

[406] You got to watch it.

[407] John Doe.

[408] It's textbook John Doe.

[409] He's in the backyard.

[410] He's a part of the construction crew building the pool.

[411] And he has rolled up some plans and he's just shouting at people and pointing the plans at other people in the scene.

[412] He made himself the foreman.

[413] Like it's definitely not written that he's the boss, but he made himself the boss.

[414] And I said to Craig T, I'm like, there's no way you'd remember this.

[415] This is 30 years ago.

[416] But do you remember working with this guy, John?

[417] dough.

[418] And he goes, was he the guy with the plans in the back?

[419] Oh, yes.

[420] And he goes, oh, you bet your ass.

[421] I remember him.

[422] I was keeping my eye on him.

[423] I was so delighted to find out he had made that impression.

[424] What a wonderful career he has had.

[425] He's been in 150 movies.

[426] Stay tuned for more armchair expert, if you dare.

[427] We've all been there, turning to the internet to sell.

[428] Self -diagnose our inexplicable pains, debilitating body aches, sudden fevers, and strange rashes.

[429] Though our minds tend to spiral to worst -case scenarios, it's usually nothing, but for an unlucky few, these unsuspecting symptoms can start the clock ticking on a terrifying medical mystery.

[430] Like the unexplainable death of a retired firefighter, whose body was found at home by his son, except it looked like he had been cremated, or the time when an entire town started jumping from buildings and seeing tigers on their ceilings.

[431] Hey listeners, it's Mr. Ballin here, and I'm here to tell you about my podcast.

[432] It's called Mr. Ballin's Medical Mysteries.

[433] Each terrifying true story will be sure to keep you up at night.

[434] Follow Mr. Ballin's Medical Mysteries wherever you get your podcasts.

[435] Prime members can listen early and ad -free on Amazon Music.

[436] What's up, guys?

[437] This is your girl Kiki, and my podcast is back with a new season, and let me tell you, it's too good.

[438] And I'm diving into the brains of Entertainment's Best and brightest, okay?

[439] Every episode, I bring on a friend and have a real conversation.

[440] And I don't mean just friends.

[441] I mean the likes of Amy Poehler, Kell Mitchell, Vivica Fox.

[442] The list goes on.

[443] So follow, watch, and listen to Baby.

[444] This is Kiki Palmer on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcast.

[445] Has your experiment with your kids ever backfired where you are presenting a movie that you really love and they don't know.

[446] It's like past.

[447] Yeah, it has.

[448] I think every parent has that experience, you know, I also have a lot of nieces and nephews from age like, you know, 13 to 22 at this point on the other side of my family.

[449] And I had one really fun experience where like they were all age like six to 15 and none of them had seen ET.

[450] And I was like, I arranged for like the perfect viewing back in our house, made sure it was going on early enough so they wouldn't fall asleep.

[451] And, you know, ET is is traditionally speaking quite slow in its exposition.

[452] And it takes quite a while for the man himself to show up before the little guy yeah and my niece at the time who was six like as soon as she's like where is he what's going on it's like he's coming you know and then as soon as he showed up on the screen at like minute 40 she's like that's et I was like yeah that's him she looks at me with this like look of distaste and she says he looks like a big steak and I looked at him and I was like He kind of looks like a well -done Salisbury steak, actually.

[453] It's like a good point.

[454] So like there's inevitably some moments like that.

[455] But mostly I find if you do like a little like what I call like active viewing with the kids where you can engage with them, like Truman Show was an active viewer one where like my 10 year old could get the nuance.

[456] My six year old, I was just like, let me just let her know clearly that like this guy is being trapped by a bunch of people and he's trying to get out.

[457] So she has that elemental thing that she can hang on to.

[458] Sure.

[459] But, man, most of them, they get something out of it and it goes well.

[460] You know the one that's really blowing my mind?

[461] The only live action thing that Lincoln wants to watch, because they played it at a preschool last year, is they play Golden Girls.

[462] So I have bought the whole catalog of Golden Girls.

[463] Wonderful.

[464] And she watches Golden Girls and laughs.

[465] It's the weirdest thing.

[466] I mean, it's the same element of why we all laughed when we were 15 when it came out or why anybody was laughing completely outside of the age bracket.

[467] Why is that?

[468] Yeah.

[469] Yeah.

[470] And I don't know if she's like the sound, the laughter, you know, the laugh track.

[471] The laugh tracks cueing her to laugh.

[472] And she just likes watching the old ladies talk.

[473] I can't really, I can't figure out what's really happening.

[474] There's also something about the truly like well done sing songy, snappy dialogue and the pace of the da -da -da -da -da -da -da -da -boom.

[475] Yes.

[476] That is like sharpest on that show, which I don't understand any of that.

[477] I've never been part of a sitcom.

[478] Like you're closer to that.

[479] Well, no. This year has been my first time ever on a multi -cam show with a live audience.

[480] And I had a lot of nerves about going into it.

[481] And I have learned the rhythm.

[482] And it's almost detrimental.

[483] I'll like occasionally pull the writers aside and I'll go like, look, I know this joke's getting a laugh, but I don't think the logic's behind it.

[484] I think it's just the rhythm of what I'm saying.

[485] 100%.

[486] Yeah.

[487] And you can slide things by people.

[488] And you almost feel a little cheap or like it's not.

[489] not fair.

[490] I did a movie with Ray Romano earlier this year.

[491] Together, the two of us, it's a buddy movie, a very small movie.

[492] And he was very interested in coming into my world and just learning from us with the improvisational process.

[493] We didn't have a script.

[494] He was very out of his element.

[495] It was really fun.

[496] He's an incredible guy, as you know.

[497] But there were moments when he would see that we were struggling to land something.

[498] And he wanted to be generous and also a student of what we were doing.

[499] But I could look into a his eyes and be like, I know how to land this.

[500] I know exactly what to do.

[501] And I would be like, you just give this to us because we need it.

[502] And he would literally say things to like, you just need to end this sentence with a hard consonant.

[503] And if you do that, it's going to be funny and it will land.

[504] And he would do it.

[505] And we were like, oh my God.

[506] It's crazy.

[507] A CK noise at the end of this sentence makes the joke go.

[508] Let's move on.

[509] Well, and I say this with a ton of love.

[510] And I revered him and got to know him and worked with him and think he was a genius.

[511] So those things said, Robin Williams, I would sometimes watch him on talk shows at the height of his powers.

[512] And he would go, well, yes, I received the phone.

[513] Go, what I received?

[514] And then he would just like be clicking through these voices really, really quick.

[515] 100%.

[516] It's hysterical.

[517] And then they'd go to commercial.

[518] And then I would just go through the actual words that were said.

[519] Yeah.

[520] And I'm like, oh, there wasn't any jokes in there.

[521] It was just kind of random words and great voices.

[522] It was a delivery mechanism.

[523] Yeah, it was.

[524] Well, all right, guys.

[525] Okay, well, there we are.

[526] Now, I would say you've kind of navigated the last 15 years quite well.

[527] Thanks.

[528] Yeah.

[529] But I got to imagine you've had a bunch of really difficult decisions to make insofar that great offers are hard to make.

[530] Whatever.

[531] Yeah.

[532] We will acknowledge how lucky we both are.

[533] Yes, very, very fortunate.

[534] But you've had all these zigs and zags where you're acting, but then you're directing, but then you're producing.

[535] And I wonder what your thought process was.

[536] that has been because we share that in common where it's like I don't know for three years I'm directing now all of a sudden I'm back to acting full time and I'm convinced every time I make one of those shifts that it's forever me because I'm black and white and a moron yes you know my therapist is very good with me about pointing that stuff out where I'm just like man I think I'm ready to retire you know all I want to do is just like I just want to like work out and like be of service to the community and like getting the get in my pool and relax and like just be a good dad And she's like, great, you go ahead and do that.

[537] And if 48 hours come back to me when you're tired of that.

[538] Yeah.

[539] And we'll figure it out.

[540] Sure.

[541] But I have done a lot of those shifts.

[542] And a lot of those have been sort of lifestyle things.

[543] And, you know, I think that the phase I'm in right now is like very into writing and very into producing because I can do those mostly from home or from anywhere.

[544] Right.

[545] And sort of the, just the ridiculousness of the 12 to 13 hour day on set.

[546] as a director or an actor while I have a 10 and a 6 year old is like very apparent to me. And like I can always do that.

[547] These are very special years and I'm never going to get those back.

[548] So there's been a lack of directing and like acting like full time in a TV show.

[549] Like I love going and like I do totally with Jason Reitman for like six days and we have this great time together.

[550] And then I get to go home.

[551] Like that's where acting is for me now.

[552] Or even you were on Goliath.

[553] That was great.

[554] Because you know you're just going to do one seat.

[555] He did one season on it.

[556] It's close.

[557] Tried some weird shit.

[558] It was close.

[559] Larry's a friend.

[560] We had fun.

[561] I got to do scenes with one of my heroes and Billy Bob Thornton.

[562] Isn't he spectacular?

[563] He was so wonderful.

[564] You know, we got to these places where some of our scripts are coming in a little later because like every TV show now is in tumult in some shape or form.

[565] I don't know that I said tumult right, but I'm okay with it.

[566] I don't know what it means.

[567] So I'm assuming you made.

[568] Oh, tumultuous for sure.

[569] Timultuousness.

[570] So the point of that is that we were getting some scripts that were written the night before.

[571] And Billy Bob is in a place in his life where he should just be like, fuck this, this isn't great.

[572] You know, and he was so cool.

[573] What kind of bull shit is this?

[574] What do you write this on the fucking way to work?

[575] And he would bring it in.

[576] You write this in the trunk of your car?

[577] One of the climactic scenes of the season, he and I just improvised together and put up two cameras and figured it out together over an hour and a half felt like something you and I would do on a $15 ,000 movie.

[578] Yeah.

[579] Just loved him.

[580] So that has been in a really good place for me. Was Trilling shooting that episode?

[581] Trilling was shooting that episode.

[582] He's the perfect guy to be at the helm for that kind of Let's fucking, let's shoot from the hip on this one.

[583] Let's go get it out.

[584] Love him.

[585] Love him.

[586] Well, just Larry Trilling, we love you so much.

[587] We do.

[588] And I almost did that role.

[589] Do you know that about me?

[590] No. You don't, they never told you that?

[591] That is.

[592] So I got a call going like, so hey, there's basically three chefs in the kitchen.

[593] Yep.

[594] One of the three chefs wants you to play this role.

[595] Would you do it?

[596] And I'm like, I would fucking do 20 episodes.

[597] of a Pizza Hut commercial with Larry Trailing.

[598] Yeah.

[599] Who cares?

[600] I'm in.

[601] I don't even need to hear about the character.

[602] It doesn't fucking matter.

[603] If I get to go spend 10 hours a day with Larry trailing for a few months, I'm in.

[604] And I was pretty pumped about it.

[605] And then it was, I don't know, a couple weeks later, they're like, so they're not going to hire you.

[606] The other two chefs really like Mark Duplas.

[607] And I was like, well, that's good.

[608] That's okay.

[609] Yeah.

[610] By the way, how many times has that happened?

[611] That conversation in the back and forthness?

[612] Not between you and I. I bet it has.

[613] Oh, maybe.

[614] We don't know.

[615] We have no idea.

[616] You know?

[617] If you're out there and you've been debating between hiring Marker, please tweet us.

[618] I'd like to know.

[619] And I can say for certain that we are close enough as to where we can honestly talk right here openly about the pros and cons of each of us and what you would get and what you would lose.

[620] Oh, absolutely.

[621] We'll do a second podcast on that.

[622] Yeah, there's a million things I could talk to you about.

[623] I mean, there's so many things because we've shared this thing, I know for me, I am just like you.

[624] Like, what's interesting about my experience on chips, which I've talked about in here before, is on one hand, I made the exact movie that was in my brain.

[625] So I just feel elated with that.

[626] You know what I'm saying?

[627] You should.

[628] There's an explosion every 45 seconds.

[629] There's tons of mal nudity.

[630] It's everything we would want.

[631] I can't remember as you or Ben who wrote me a note that was like, oh, my God, I finally saw chips.

[632] And it's just straight what we paused on for the whole movie.

[633] So there was that, and that felt great.

[634] And then, of course, too, you know, when it's going well, there's a few highs like actually being on a set directing a movie where shit's working.

[635] It's just, it's incredible.

[636] It's the high bar.

[637] And when you are clearing it, it is euphoric.

[638] Yes.

[639] And especially with our schedule, it was like we had to shoot all of our action set pieces on two days on weekends.

[640] We could shut stuff down.

[641] So, like, every weekend, there was this huge challenge.

[642] And if I was driving home on Sunday night and we got everything, I would just be like, fuck.

[643] It was like scoring a touchdown.

[644] I was never an athlete.

[645] So it just felt great.

[646] But I made this bad choice where I was like, my new identity is a director of movies.

[647] I am a writer and director of movies and I'm going to do this for 10 years.

[648] And the only thing that really hurt about it not performing was I was like, oh, I need a new identity now.

[649] I've been wearing an identity for two or three years and now that's out the window.

[650] This one feels bad.

[651] Yes, I've got to go back to the drawing board.

[652] Isn't that like, you know, I mean, look.

[653] Look, I, Katie and I taught my wife, Katie, who's an actor, and Dax and Katie did a movie together.

[654] We've kissed a few times.

[655] Well, you said at the end of, I got to tell that before we leave.

[656] Okay.

[657] You at the end of the bed.

[658] Oh, yeah.

[659] That was great.

[660] We made a $12 ,000 movie together in our bedroom.

[661] It was great.

[662] But, you know, I feel very fortunate that most of the time my identity is spread around in a bunch of different places within the industry.

[663] so that I have like anywhere from like 12 to 15 things going on.

[664] We have a company of like 10 people.

[665] And so when I take two arrows, one in the leg and one in the butt, one of those projects, I'm buoyed by the other things as opposed to them taking me down.

[666] It wasn't like that for a while.

[667] And I totally understand that heat.

[668] I was like, shit, man. Well, because where's the worth here now?

[669] And for me, like, it should have been obvious to me. It's like, oh, I can still act.

[670] But because I hadn't been, I didn't audition, I didn't take meetings.

[671] It was like for two or three years, I just really wasn't in the market of acting.

[672] I had that panic of like, oh, have I left for too long?

[673] Yeah, yeah.

[674] Well, no, because you're interesting and you're good and you're back.

[675] But you know, to that end of like the identity shifting and where do I land?

[676] I mean, the biggest shift that I have gone through is in the last, I would say, two to three years is Jay and I having some.

[677] version of a conscious uncoupling as a true creative duo.

[678] Oh, yeah.

[679] And that.

[680] Because for people who don't know, just from the get -go, you made Puffy Chair with your brother, Jay.

[681] Yeah.

[682] And then you made several movies thereafter with Jay.

[683] We made everything lockstep, you know.

[684] And I was, I would act in things a little bit, but 98 % of my creative identity was locked to my older brother who I. You are known as the Duplas brothers.

[685] That's it.

[686] Yeah.

[687] And we always knew that that was, it was going to come a much.

[688] moment and I'm sure that you and Nate Tuck probably had some of this at some point in time where the little boys who sleep in the same bed are going to have to figure out another way.

[689] Right.

[690] And that has been really huge for both of us.

[691] Because Jay's big evolution is that he got cast on transparent and discovered he fucking loves acting.

[692] A hundred percent.

[693] That was a big part of it.

[694] And then I think a big part of it is that, and we wrote, look, we wrote all.

[695] all of this.

[696] We wrote a book about this basically.

[697] Oh, you did.

[698] We wrote a 300 page book about like what we have gone through how we banded together to try and get here and how that closeness almost killed us at a certain time, even though we needed it.

[699] Right.

[700] And I think the long and the short of what happened with Jay is that he's someone who is four years older than me, who I worshiped forever.

[701] And then at a certain point, he kind of realized like my engine is moving at a speed that he does not enjoy.

[702] And I am, I'm wanting to make all of these things and he's feeling dragged along with me. Right.

[703] And then this awful thing happened to him, which is that I was the first one of us to like get on television.

[704] So we would show up at a party.

[705] And everybody would come talk to me. And he's like, oh, so I'm the older brother.

[706] And then my little brother is like the face of our like enterprise.

[707] And in order to be in a creative relationship with him, I need to.

[708] to be like dragged by him into these things yeah and and he basically had to come to me and say like I need to breathe and I need some I need my own identity I need my thing and and transparent was a huge part of realizing that for him but that almost killed me I mean I spent six months just being like oh god but then like every breakup you're like oh I'm not saying I definitely want you back but it still hurt that you're like did this to me you know and so we had to create this space with us and and what that has led me to even though i fought it for a little bit is an immense amount of joy where i now collaborate with like tons of different people i was in essentially a monogamous collaborative relationship with my brother right and now i have things like room 104 that we do which is like i realize it's like oh this is my destiny this is what i'm good at I make like 24 episodes, I write half of them, and then I give them to like a 25 -year -old filmmaker.

[709] Well, Julian Woss, our good buddy, Julian.

[710] And I say, let's go do this thing and you bring your energy to it and I'll bring it.

[711] And I never got to do that because I was in a marriage.

[712] And that has been so great for me, you know.

[713] So that I'm kind of in this new spot now where like, I don't believe I'm in the place.

[714] where like I'm ready to kill myself to author a piece of art like I'd actually rather enjoy my time with my kids sure what I can do is like launch it into space and then like be that that rocket ship that like breaks off halfway yes yes yes and then be like here you take this and go make it great you're the first engine I'm the first engine yeah and it's what I'm like really good at you right well you're also you're you're incredibly entrepreneurial don't you think I think I am entrepreneur you are and weirdly in our town that seems like a kind of a gross word yeah I but I dig it yeah I've I don't know about you but like right out of the gates like when I got a lawyer and I knew there were contracts yeah I wanted to read the contract I want to know what all these definitions meant and what do other people get and how does all this work and then I've had that fascination with studio presidents I'm like wow how does the president yeah like I want to know about every single aspect of it I'm just curious I like cracking models too.

[715] That's been a big part of the fun of this for me, like, almost like the gamesmanship or the gambler in me or something.

[716] I've always loved the idea of like, all right, I could take $2 million from this person and go make the movie.

[717] I'd so much rather make it with my friends for $150 ,000, give everybody like 75 % of the profits and go take it to Sundance and see what we can sell it for.

[718] It's just so much more exciting to me to do that.

[719] And it just happened to be at a time in the industry where like, well, that ended up being like a good thing.

[720] Yeah.

[721] So now our whole, kind of our whole MO is just like, studios are expecting to make things for X. And I figured out that if I'm willing to only take 0 .3x from them, they'll let me do whatever I want.

[722] And then if I can go make that for 0 .03X, which I learned how to do, then all my people around me make a ton of money and we share it in this sort of like socialist, communist way.

[723] Right.

[724] And I got a little corner of the sandbox.

[725] Yeah.

[726] And I'm just so happy there.

[727] Yeah.

[728] So you got into bed with HBO on what was the first project you guys had?

[729] The, the big thing that started it was togetherness, you know?

[730] And togetherness was a traditionally modeled television show and a certain group of people really, really like that show.

[731] But it never blew up.

[732] Right.

[733] And, and then we realized after like two seasons, like, I mean, they were grossly overpaying us for that show.

[734] Even though it was one of their cheaper shows for what we normally make things for, you know?

[735] Yeah.

[736] Yeah.

[737] And their opinion was like, if you're going to be one of our Sunday night star shows, you kind of got to like deliver, you know?

[738] Yeah, of course.

[739] And kind of like Chips was to you.

[740] It's like, we're going out wide with this movie.

[741] You got to do it.

[742] Yes.

[743] You know?

[744] And I realize like, I don't either, A, I'm not the kind of person who has a sensibility that is going to make something that will be enjoyed that widely.

[745] Or B, I don't know if I want the pressure to have to do that.

[746] Well, let's, yeah, that's a great.

[747] I want to.

[748] honing on that for one second is it is a very bizarre admission one can have that like I know I do something great I am confident in it I don't know that a lot of people like that thing I do that's great it's very weird like when I made hit and run I'm like I feel like I made again a movie I would die to see yeah but then I had to admit well guys who like car chase movies don't want to see a love story and women who want to see a love story don't want to watch cars jump so Who was I getting?

[749] You know, like there was part of me that had to acknowledge.

[750] But there was a crossover in that Venn diagram.

[751] And if it is made at a certain price point.

[752] Well, yeah, I made it for a million dollars so it couldn't lose.

[753] Yeah, you were good there.

[754] Yes, yes.

[755] I could have made 20 more of those.

[756] And for me, the answer was not to like siphon off the originality of what made hit and run, hit and run.

[757] It was actually to just say, well, I like making hit and run.

[758] So now I got to find the model that works for it and keeps it sustainable.

[759] And you and I now both work in a era of, of film and television where you can be a niche voice.

[760] Oh, it's the best.

[761] So as much as like people are lamenting the 80s model where you'd be making all this money.

[762] Totally.

[763] You also can have this very bizarre point of view that 900 ,000 people are going to find.

[764] And that's a plenty.

[765] Being a tiny sliver of the pie and being valuable has saved my life.

[766] Yeah.

[767] Like that, that is, that's the key.

[768] It's so great, right?

[769] Yeah.

[770] So after that, you also had a cartoon or you still have a cartoon?

[771] We have animals on HBO.

[772] Yeah.

[773] How long has that been running?

[774] That's been running for three years.

[775] And that was another great gamble where, you know, these guys were making this cartoon in their closet for $17, making shorts out of it.

[776] And they were taking meetings around L .A. And they were going to get the development deal.

[777] I was like, guys, come out here.

[778] I'm going to rent you a two -bedroom apartment for $1 ,500 a month.

[779] I'm going to personally pay for us to make an entire season of television.

[780] You work on the whole thing.

[781] You're going to own a huge chunk of it.

[782] You're going to wait way more money and be totally.

[783] creatively satisfied doing your own thing yeah and then we took two episodes of that to sundance and HBO bought two seasons from us and it's funny because like we technically make that for no money but because it's done in the way that the guys want to do all the work they still do all the work yeah they make more money than if they were making bob's burgers sure because it's just their own thing isn't it awesome when it works out that oh god it doesn't always work out that way well that one that one was well when it works out that way yeah but so then in your time at HBO like me you start asking a lot of questions yeah yes right so walk me through so where you get curious yeah so so togetherness they come to us and they kind of say look you know maybe we could continue going with this show but it's not quite killing it and it's kind of expensive and and i'm just thinking to myself i could have made this so much more cheaply why did why did we do this bloated level of it i'd honestly tried to get them to let me make it as just an HBO go only show And I was like, we don't do that.

[784] Right.

[785] And I was like, and they're like, make it a big show.

[786] We'll go win Emmys.

[787] And they're like, well, we didn't win Emmys, so it's going to be a problem.

[788] And so right after that, I was like, oh, okay.

[789] So now I know that if we make these shows for like $3 million an episode or what people are making them for, unless you hit, you're kind of dead, you know?

[790] Yes.

[791] But what if I'm making them for like a fraction of that cost?

[792] And I can just be like, Mr. Added Value for you on.

[793] Friday night right not that many people are watching and it's cool expectations are low expectations are a little lower we love low expectations dude I love it so much to be greatly satisfying everyone as a B plus in the world because they thought the B minus was coming oh I love it yeah it's a very sweet spot it's my sweet spot you know and room 1 of 4 came out of that came out of that too and so I started yeah that was so from what I know about it it was reverse engineered.

[794] Yep.

[795] That was it.

[796] I was like, okay, I can do something.

[797] It all takes place in one room.

[798] There's one set we're going to build.

[799] There's no major cast deals because there's new people every night.

[800] I can do a really great, I mean, look, HBO like has diversity problems in front of and behind the camera.

[801] And I was like, great.

[802] We'll just hire everybody out of film school that's new and interesting and wild different voices.

[803] Yeah.

[804] And they look at it like a little bit of a lottery ticket.

[805] And they're just like, okay, this could blow up.

[806] That'd be cool.

[807] If not, I'm busy trying to figure out what the next game of Thrones is going to be.

[808] Yeah, totally, yeah.

[809] But I got Mark over here in the corner making me some like well reviewed stuff that may or may not do well.

[810] Yeah, it's almost like a farm club.

[811] It's 100 % of farm club.

[812] I'm double A over there.

[813] Really single A. Single A is where the new big exciting stuff comes from.

[814] Okay.

[815] How many episodes have you guys done now?

[816] So we did 12 in the first season and we just shot 24 and our second season is a group of those 12.

[817] We did two and three in a row.

[818] Okay.

[819] Because you could like, obviously back to back, there's so much cheaper to make.

[820] Yes.

[821] Always looking to.

[822] Amortize the cost.

[823] It's such a, I never expected that.

[824] Like, I love that, though.

[825] I was such a, like, fairy artist, like, floating in the world.

[826] And then, like, started to get put into a corner and was like, I think the way to fight my way out of this corner is not to be a louder artist, but actually to be a smarter business person about this thing.

[827] For sure.

[828] And I luckily, like, have that in my dad.

[829] I don't know about you, but, like, you and I don't know about you, but, like, you and I don't have the same sensibility as far as what we like to make yet one of the things I took the most amount of pride in chips was like oh five major car chases for 25 million bucks you just don't see no one's getting that no I like I walked away from that going like oh my god I know how to do this like you I know how to make it cheap totally and it's a great I get great pride in that I take great pride too I mean America doesn't give a fuck I later since like I guess it's smarter to be the director.

[830] It's like, no, I need more money.

[831] Yeah.

[832] Yeah.

[833] They're kind of fucked.

[834] Yeah.

[835] They're pot committed.

[836] Yeah.

[837] Yeah.

[838] That's probably the wiser thing.

[839] But I do take this bizarre pride in that.

[840] I don't know if it's, I mean, I might be projecting, but like for me, um, and I don't know if it's the same for you, it's this feeling as I get older of like, what's important, where should I be spending my time and really wanting to feel valuable.

[841] And like when I'm in that spot in room 104 and I'm like, somebody's got to write a 25 minute one act play that takes place really well in this.

[842] this room and get two good actors in there.

[843] It's this thing where I feel like I am uniquely qualified to do this and I'm one of the best people to do it.

[844] And I've had so many situations I'm sure you have where you're just like, I got hired to do this job and like I'll make it work.

[845] But there's like about 150 other guys who can do this so much better.

[846] I spent a year in that situation.

[847] In a situation like that.

[848] You know, and like my dad and I directing a cartoon.

[849] Okay.

[850] I was like, Jesus Christ.

[851] I'm sitting in an office talking.

[852] I'm not, this is not what I'm supposed to be done.

[853] You're supposed to be writing a wheelie on something.

[854] Yeah, I directed a commercial once, and I was just like, oh, God, I'm just the worst person for this.

[855] Yeah, I did that too.

[856] But, like, my dad and I, like, watching the NFL when I was little.

[857] I remember this, like, so specifically, we used to always, like, you watch the game.

[858] It's fucking 20 to 20.

[859] There's 15 seconds left in the fourth quarter.

[860] Like, multiple 375 -pound guys have been killing themselves for an hour.

[861] And then a 140 -pound kicker is going to come out and decide the fate of the whole game.

[862] Yeah.

[863] And the stress.

[864] that he must feel and you look in his helmet and he's never stressed and he's never cool and he wants the ball and my dad like looked at me and he's just like you'll know you're in the right spot in your life when you get in that moment and you're like I want the ball oh that's a great way to think and when I'm in when I'm in room 104 and the heat is on and we need a dialogue rewrite and that thing yeah how do you make something interesting happen in one room and do it new way I'm just like give me the ball yeah I never want it for the commercial I never want it for any of the other things you know and isn't it it's it's funny too it's really counterintuitive.

[865] When you're younger, you think you want like the biggest, widest canvas.

[866] Yeah.

[867] Humanly possible, right?

[868] But isn't it, so much creativity can come out of constraint.

[869] That's the story of my life.

[870] Isn't it, it's so counterintuitive, but it's like, if you force me into a little box, I can figure out, you know.

[871] I have, I have so much experience with that.

[872] I do it to the people that I hire on room 104 specifically.

[873] I say like, I need a story.

[874] like this that has this sensibility, I'm only giving you three actors, and it kind of needs to be about 25 pages, and it needs to be set in 1987.

[875] Here you go.

[876] Right.

[877] And they do so well they fight against it.

[878] They get a little rebellious.

[879] They get a little angry.

[880] That inspires them.

[881] Yeah.

[882] There's a story about Igor Stravinsky, who's just like, you know, this unbelievable composer.

[883] And he, when he was like 22, learned so well what he could do with an entire orchestra.

[884] And it paralyzed him because the sea of infinite possibility of what he could do destroyed him.

[885] And so what he started doing is he'd invite people over to his house and he would put down a piece of paper and he'd say, okay, Dax, write down an instrument, Monica, write down an instrument and then he'd write down at like eight instruments.

[886] Then he'd cover them and say, you write down a number, you write down a number.

[887] And he'd walk away and be like, okay, I got eight bassoons, two tubas, one violin, six violas and a drum.

[888] And then he would go have to write with that.

[889] And that was the only way he could compose.

[890] And I was like, that's great.

[891] Can I tell you we're off topic?

[892] This is why I love fixing stuff at my house.

[893] You know, I work on cars and stuff.

[894] I never have the right stuff.

[895] Yes.

[896] I have X amount of things in this little tray in my garage.

[897] And I'm fixing bizarre stuff like kids' toys that are breaking, all this kind of stuff.

[898] And there's nothing to enjoy more than going, I don't have the right parts, but this, I'm going to get this thing to work.

[899] How am I going to do this?

[900] Nothing feels.

[901] Monica had to sit through this whole.

[902] I put a car stereo in my car a couple of weeks ago that didn't fit.

[903] And then four days of staring at the.

[904] this hole in my dashboard until I find it's like, aha, I've got it.

[905] And I would not go to a park store.

[906] No, no, no, no, no. No pride in that.

[907] It's vitality.

[908] It's really fun.

[909] It is.

[910] When we made the Puffy chair, we had that same thing where we're like, I want to make a feature film.

[911] What are my assets?

[912] What do I have around?

[913] We're like, we got a van.

[914] We got this apartment.

[915] We got this.

[916] And then we're like, put it in a bucket.

[917] We're like, this is what we're going to make a movie with.

[918] That's right.

[919] And it was never more inspiring than that.

[920] Stay tuned for more armchair expert.

[921] If you dare.

[922] Now, back to Jay for one second.

[923] Now, I'd imagine there's pros and cons of having a partner.

[924] And one of the pros is it's kind of like doing sketch comedy instead of stand -up.

[925] Like, if you shit the bed up there, you guys will both leave and have a good laugh backstage.

[926] Like, sharing that failure.

[927] 100%.

[928] It's so helpful.

[929] 100%.

[930] Particularly on that climb up the first mountain of life.

[931] You know, like really, oh my God, I'm so terrified.

[932] If I stumble, you are there.

[933] I need you.

[934] when we were going to pitch meetings together we would call it like the dolphins because like basically like I would lead off and then like you know you see the dolphin coming out of the waves and just as I would start to tank and crest into the back of the ocean he would take right off again and like save me you know it's like you could never get through a pitch by yourself you know right need that but then I would imagine as a you know mid 20s human being on planet earth also the con is the glory is then shared I didn't have any of that you didn't know I really didn't at the time.

[935] Do you think it's because you were brothers and you loved each other?

[936] Do you think it was another dude you had met in college?

[937] It would have been that easy?

[938] I can't say for sure.

[939] I do know that the DNA of my relation with Jay is very, very special and that we weren't threatened by each other.

[940] And I also think it was tied to the fact that I really believed once I chose to be first a musician and then a filmmaker, but essentially an artist coming from the suburbs of New Orleans with no connections where all my friends were going in a business school and doing a different path that I kind of had no business being here and that if I was going to get anything, it was going to be a miracle.

[941] And so A, that made me feel like I needed to tie myself to J to double our chances of success.

[942] And B, it just felt like if I got any scrap remorsel, it was such a wild, unexpected victory that I never felt like, oh, it's less than I hoped it would be.

[943] It was always more than I hoped it would be.

[944] Oh, that's nice.

[945] And it still is that way.

[946] to this day, you know, like, oh my God, we, I got Ray Romano to come do a movie with me, you know, whereas like, everybody else is like, of course he's going to come do a movie with you.

[947] You're, you're an established filmmaker, you know?

[948] It's not a self -doubt or it's not a self -hatred or anything like that where I don't deserve it.

[949] It's just, I just didn't really think I was going to get there, you know, and that hasn't really left me. Right.

[950] But having been the face of the brothers because you were on, uh, what was the, I was on the league?

[951] you run the league for a while it was easier on me than it was on jay right that's that would be my guess i was the baby brother uh -huh and then i was the guy getting all the attention at the parties you know yeah did you feel like a codependent guilt over that yeah and i didn't i didn't understand i would i like to believe that i'm like an emotionally enlightened person who goes to therapy and can talk about it all but i didn't understand what jay was going through until we went to one of those parties the year that parent came out and nobody wanted to talk to me and everybody wanted to talk to Jay.

[952] And the people who did want to talk to me wanted to like talk about dick jokes from the league and the people wanted to talk to Jay wanted to talk about the premier civil rights movement of trans.

[953] You know and I was like he's been dealing with this for 10 years.

[954] Yeah.

[955] What the fuck?

[956] Yeah.

[957] It's all it can be really hard on relationships too.

[958] Like there was a period where I was still with Bree and then I was slightly famous.

[959] And what was so weird is that for the nine years we had been together before that, people certainly remembered Brie more than me. She was much better looking and had a better personality.

[960] Yeah.

[961] And then on a dime, we'd go to places and people would be meeting her for the third time and forget.

[962] And I was like, oh, my God.

[963] This is such a 180.

[964] And it killed me. I couldn't.

[965] I hated it.

[966] Yeah.

[967] And it makes you hate other people for doing things that are kind of natural to them.

[968] Absolutely.

[969] kissed at them, which sucks.

[970] Yes, they're being human.

[971] And then you, we, another thing we have in common is that your bride is an actress.

[972] And see, I'm on the Katie side of it, I'd guess, where my wife's more famous than me. But I have also had enough fame that I'm delighted that she's, there's no problem being there for you.

[973] Talk to her.

[974] Yeah.

[975] I'm happy as fuck if someone would rather talk to her, you know what I'm saying.

[976] Yeah.

[977] There's been enough to go around.

[978] My cup got filled up a while back.

[979] A long time ago.

[980] Yeah.

[981] So I actually take, you know, great pleasure in that.

[982] But is that tricky?

[983] It is a hundred percent tricky.

[984] We've had a really long journey with it that began the moment we had our first child, where Katie and I both, I think, naively thought and told each other, 50 -50, egalitarian parenting.

[985] Here we come.

[986] I'm the woke dude.

[987] I'm going to change diapers.

[988] We're going to do all this stuff.

[989] And I did, but my career was just two steps ahead of hers at that time.

[990] And then a massive golf started to happen where we had come out of the puffy chair kind of on each other's heels.

[991] I was slightly ahead because I was like the writer -director and I could get a little work, you know.

[992] And what happened is I started to get that work and it was there and it was available and we needed the money.

[993] And I started going and she basically got stuck in the caretaker role.

[994] And then that almost killed her.

[995] I mean, that was so hard for her.

[996] That's part of why we made the freebie together.

[997] For those of you don't know, Dax and Katie did this movie, The Freebie, this was, I guess, about a year after the point I'm talking about right now.

[998] And that was, thank you.

[999] Really great movie.

[1000] And that was such a savior for her to be able to, like, express herself and do her thing.

[1001] And it was such a wonderful thing where my mom came into town and, like, stayed in our back house with, or our oldest while, like, I was around on set as a producer and the three of us were making this thing together.

[1002] And it was so beautiful and wonderful.

[1003] But those moments have been few and far between for her while I have predominantly gotten to do what I want to do.

[1004] So we've had to get really.

[1005] Well, it seems like a very easy decision when you're in that situation.

[1006] Like, well, one's going to pay more.

[1007] Yeah.

[1008] So it's like, well, we know what the answer has to be.

[1009] Even between Kristen and I, if we were to both be offered a movie at the exact same time, she's got to do it.

[1010] And I'll go with the kids.

[1011] Yeah.

[1012] Like, that's just the facts.

[1013] Yeah.

[1014] But we don't operate like that anymore.

[1015] Well, right.

[1016] You also get to a point where you don't have to make that.

[1017] There's enough money around now where that's not the most important thing in the world.

[1018] Yeah.

[1019] So we now have to like make a different set of priorities.

[1020] And what's been very, very interesting is that we also have to do things now where we say, listen, it's not just about is Mark going to take a job in October, which will then preclude Katie to take a job.

[1021] Sometimes it's like we got to just leave a little space for the magic of the universe to potentially fill this because sometimes it will.

[1022] And if I just continue to generate things at my breakneck insane pace because I am a bit of a workaholic and I'm working on that.

[1023] I will suck up all the air and there will be no time or space for Katie to do her thing.

[1024] So that's something we work on a lot and talk about.

[1025] Yeah, Bell and I as well.

[1026] I'm definitely, again, I'm also five years older than Kristen, which is significant.

[1027] I see the end more than she does.

[1028] My parents, my dad died super young.

[1029] So it's a whole different paradigm for me. But yeah, I'm like, I feel like occasionally like tapping on the shoulder going like, hey, by the way, this is all going by.

[1030] Like, this is really happening.

[1031] It's blowing by.

[1032] Yep.

[1033] We've been in fights for it.

[1034] And it's funny because I had to recognize it's my own thing.

[1035] But it's like, I want to do an act of a policy at our house that no matter what, we take a two week vacation at the end of the summer.

[1036] I don't give a fuck who offers you what.

[1037] If we can't make that commitment.

[1038] We're doing it wrong.

[1039] Yeah, then what the fuck?

[1040] Yeah.

[1041] And it came time, I think maybe even last summer, the summer before.

[1042] It was like that two -week thing all of a sudden was getting cut down to 10 days because she had some offer.

[1043] And I took it really bad.

[1044] I was, I took it as like, you know, this was her verdict on how much she gave a shit.

[1045] Yeah.

[1046] And then at a certain point of being really mad and fighting about it, I had to go like, I made up the two -week thing.

[1047] Yeah.

[1048] I made that up.

[1049] I can't just, you know, enforce this thing that I've decided is the right amount of time.

[1050] For her, 10 days is fine.

[1051] But yeah, those are hard things to juggle.

[1052] And we do a lot of those little things.

[1053] Like every three months, we go away for a minimum of two days together.

[1054] That's just the two of us.

[1055] That's something we've never done it since we had kids.

[1056] We have to do it, you know?

[1057] I agree.

[1058] And look at each other's eyes and try.

[1059] Try to remember the thing.

[1060] And then we do things where we plan our vacations, which is really tough for me, like six months in advance when the flights are too expensive and when the hotels aren't given the good deals because I like a fucking good deal.

[1061] Sure.

[1062] But I got to do it.

[1063] You want a price alert.

[1064] I want a price alert.

[1065] And I got to pay like, Honolulu for nine nights.

[1066] Yeah, exactly.

[1067] My starward points.

[1068] All inclusive.

[1069] So we have to do those things.

[1070] And we're talking about it right now.

[1071] we're going to take, our goal is to take a month this summer and get away from everything.

[1072] You know, our kids are really interested in getting on your rail and just like jumping on trains together and like doing things.

[1073] So, yeah.

[1074] So basically we're like, well, we're booking this trip now.

[1075] I don't think I'm as extreme as you are.

[1076] I'm like, look, if Katie gets a massive opportunity and wants to bump that, she gets to do that at this point.

[1077] Right.

[1078] She took a big bullet for us as a family and like being a primary caretaker for our children for a long time.

[1079] Yeah.

[1080] And like, So now if something really good comes, she pretty much gets to take that.

[1081] Yeah, it's your time.

[1082] And it's my time to make the world go around, you know?

[1083] And I'm making it sound like it's like some big like sacrifice.

[1084] The truth is I just, it's so fun right now with the kids.

[1085] Katie's going to go do a movie on and off in Texas for like five weeks coming up, you know.

[1086] I also want to, let's just publicly say out loud that I also recognize 99 % of Americans can never even pick the two weeks.

[1087] Unbelievable.

[1088] Yeah.

[1089] So here I'm complaining, but I do this one.

[1090] just want to take one second to acknowledge.

[1091] It is important to be aware of these things.

[1092] But what if you you go to therapy, what is your conclusion of why you are a workaholic?

[1093] Because I already have an armchair theory.

[1094] Yeah.

[1095] Yeah.

[1096] So I have a couple of them and none of them feel very clear.

[1097] The most clear thing to me is I was raised and I'm very thankful the way I was raised, which is Mark Duplas, you're incredible.

[1098] And you can do anything.

[1099] Right.

[1100] That gave me the confidence to come to this town and do the things that I have done.

[1101] Yeah.

[1102] And I would not have been able to do that without that upbringing.

[1103] Okay.

[1104] But what happens to you when you are 23, 24, 25 and you are struggling and you are not living up to these expectations that you have basically put on yourself, but they were they were messaged to you.

[1105] Yeah.

[1106] You start to feel real bad about yourself.

[1107] Yeah.

[1108] And so I started revving an engine, which turned out to be a quite powerful engine to get myself up that mountain.

[1109] And I had to rev it at 180 miles an hour to go two miles an hour for about 10 years.

[1110] And now I am trying to pull my foot off of that gas.

[1111] But the rhythmic revving of that engine is very difficult for me to pull off up.

[1112] That's one theory.

[1113] The other theory is I'm just one of these people who has a little hole inside of them.

[1114] And some people have that.

[1115] sure and I kind of have a sense of humor about it and I understand what it is because it gets partially filled by so many things well you have depression right yeah and I have depression so I can take medication now and get a good handle on that right but it still doesn't that take years to figure out exactly took me like took me like 10 years to figure out what it was it was like oh oh you're not hungry and tired you're depressed like I didn't understand that your bed's not uncomfortable exactly yeah but by the time I was like I was like like 30 I got my meds dialed in and I've been there in a place but it doesn't fix it but it helps it's a net that keeps me from tanking yes um and exercising and 100 percent that's everything the sleeping the exercising the eating the endorphins all that stuff and my life is I'm so fucking blessed to be in the marriage I am in have the kids I have the career that I have so all that stuff is buoying me in this wonderful way um but there will I don't think ever be a moment in my life where I'm not a sitting in a chair my foot isn't slightly tapping sure about something sure I don't know what it is so I too I had that that you know I was the golden child and my mom thought I could I mean really thought probably I could become president yeah which is again is awesome and at the same time when I'm 28 and still unemployed it's the weight of that failure was exponential so that's interesting and I you felt that too tremendously yeah I was just like and in a bizarre way it's my kind of armchair theory for why all these shooters are white.

[1116] So I think there's a lot of white guys that are like, wait, I'm supposed to be spectacular.

[1117] So the whole system must be failed because I know I'm supposed to be spectacular.

[1118] That's an unshakable truth.

[1119] Yeah, white guys have like just this born entitlement.

[1120] Anyways, that's a side note.

[1121] I wonder for you, because I've just recently discovered it about myself, I'm very attracted to situations I can control.

[1122] So as an actor, when they yell action, I'm in control of how that scene turns out.

[1123] No matter how it's written, it has to go through me and then I'm in charge of it.

[1124] And I can make it something.

[1125] And I can steer it.

[1126] Now, I cannot steer a conversation in my kitchen with Kristen.

[1127] Yeah.

[1128] I certainly can't steer a conversation with my three and five year old.

[1129] Yes.

[1130] I can't steer a conversation in any part of my life other than on a set.

[1131] Yeah.

[1132] I can make it exactly how I would want it.

[1133] And then it's only amplified by a trillion when you're directing something.

[1134] Or even sitting down to write something.

[1135] I'm going to create a world that I like.

[1136] And this will happen and this will happen.

[1137] But then there'll be justice at the end.

[1138] Like all that control is intoxicating for me. And in fact, I'd have this little speech I'd give myself on my way home from the editing room during chips.

[1139] It's like I'm leaving a place where generally my opinion's pretty valued.

[1140] Yeah.

[1141] And it's going to people are going to at least try the thing.

[1142] 100%.

[1143] And on the ride home, go, you're about to enter into another ecosystem.

[1144] Here we go.

[1145] Your opinion's as valid as the three -year -olds.

[1146] Yeah.

[1147] And it's a big adjustment.

[1148] I think that does resonate with me. And, you know, I also.

[1149] Because again, if you have depression, you're not in control of your emotions, which is infuriating.

[1150] Yeah.

[1151] You're at the whimsy of your biochemistry.

[1152] And that's frustrating.

[1153] It is.

[1154] And then here's this thing where you are in charge.

[1155] Yeah.

[1156] And I think that that's huge for me, and particularly the world -building aspect of it.

[1157] And I don't know how you feel about your creative flow or your creative brain and how things come to you, you know.

[1158] But I find that I tend to be really creative in times when things are a little confusing to me in life.

[1159] And it's not like, I have to suffer to be creative.

[1160] It's not that.

[1161] But when I'm a little unmoored and a little unhinged or a little unhinged or a little unshused.

[1162] certain.

[1163] My feet are half off the ground.

[1164] I tend to coincide with the times when the muse is like kind of flowing through me. Sure.

[1165] So I, I really enjoy going to that place when that happens.

[1166] But what I'm doing lately with my therapist is that's like a drug for me that I don't want to be addicted to, right?

[1167] Yes.

[1168] So we've been trying to build this system of like, well, because you could almost subconsciously be unmooring yourself.

[1169] A hundred percent.

[1170] Right.

[1171] So what we talk about now is like, how can I let those things flow through me still like honor this like big creative flow I have that the workaholic wants to make a project out of every idea it comes yeah but not like be working all the time and miss time with my kids you know because right now I'm on a schedule that's basically I don't work any more than nine to three p .m. Oh that's nice.

[1172] I'm home at three every day for the homework and the fun and the bed times you know and then I do emails at night and stuff like that which I shouldn't but I do right and so what we do is she's like okay she was brilliant she's like a good life coach for me she's like when you get an idea you get to make out with it and make love to it for like 48 hours like me you meet someone like a weekend to san barbara fucking crazy like here we get a sweet at the four seasons and just do it in room service and go nuts and then you take that document and you put it in a folder in your desktop okay and if after a month you can't stand it you have to go back to it sure you get to have that And 95 % of them were just those weekends in Santa Barbara.

[1173] I just needed to like, but I have to be careful now because, and you can probably identify with this, as obnoxious as this sounds, I'm at a place in my career where I have access enough that if I call someone and I say, I have this idea, I'm going to go make it, it happens.

[1174] Right.

[1175] For better or worse.

[1176] For better or for worse.

[1177] So I have to fucking put them away and make sure they come back.

[1178] So I'm doing a lot of little things like that.

[1179] I have a weird little rule like that too.

[1180] It's like I come up with an idea, I kind of flush it out.

[1181] I tell a few people.

[1182] Yes.

[1183] And then if like three weeks later, I'm still telling a few people or bouncing it around, I go like, oh, this has legs.

[1184] It's coming.

[1185] This is more than like, yeah, one -night stand.

[1186] And just like romances, you'll often find that some of the ones that actually in the first two days, the sex wasn't what you thought it would be.

[1187] But then it turns into something much deeper.

[1188] Absolutely.

[1189] And more sustainable.

[1190] True lovemaking.

[1191] Who knew?

[1192] Absolutely.

[1193] I'd eye contact.

[1194] Yes.

[1195] Well, I have a similar.

[1196] struggle and mine is I'm mostly motivated out of the voice in my head that says you're a fucking lazy piece of shit you're going to be penniless you still have that voice that's how I work oh my god dacky I go well look I've gotten better because I'm aware of it but but but in general my whole work life is you go to that fucking hotel room you're writing eight pages a day or you're a piece of shit and you're a failure yeah and then And when I'm at that hotel room, speaking about control, I would love for someone to film how I write.

[1197] Because day one, I wake up and I take a little walk to get my brain, you know, working.

[1198] I sit down, I force myself to write eight pages.

[1199] And then I generally, and I don't eat because that bogs me down.

[1200] And then at night I like to do an hour of exercise.

[1201] I'll just jump to day five.

[1202] Day five is I wake up, I jog two miles.

[1203] I come back I eat only nuts I write I stop in the middle I work out full workout I come back I write more and then I go back and I work out again I become a robot this is more and more control and I need another layer of it It's so freaky When I write And I love being that way Even though you enjoy that time Well I don't even enjoy Any of those activities I'm doing But when my head hits the pillow The narrative Dax goes Oh you're literally Look what you did Yes you're going against All your impulses to be stagnant and whatever but I feel like if you left me in that hotel for three weeks I would be dead I would you might be dead yeah yeah yeah and I want to learn to work from a place of joy yeah in fun in collaboration all those things but I find it very challenging that's interesting yeah I mean I share a lot with you I don't share as much of that that pain or that that that forceness in that process you know I actually genuinely get kind of happy when I write it's hard but I what I do share with you is the rhythmic nature and getting into that structure when I write I go out to Palm Springs me too and I I'm mostly in either a swimsuit or pajama pants and I write until I hit that first wall and then I go and like sprint around the block a few times and I jump in the pool and then I jump in the hot tub and get the and get it shaken up and then I come back in and then I go again and I go in these little cyclical stints yes And it really, I can get so much done in that time frame.

[1204] And I love when you are blasting through pages.

[1205] Oh, God.

[1206] That is the fucking best.

[1207] Orgasmic when it's like I can't, I'm not have lost count of how many.

[1208] Yeah.

[1209] So those days where my goals always ate a day.

[1210] Yeah.

[1211] But it's the days where I go to Ben, it's like 14 pages.

[1212] I fucking did it.

[1213] The fucking wrote a set piece.

[1214] Those feelings are incredible.

[1215] You were just saying while you were urinating that with the kids, it starts occurring to you.

[1216] Oh, pretty soon, they're not going to want to hang out.

[1217] me like I'm bothered that they want to come into my bed at night yeah and then there'll be a point where they will not even want to hug me for a few years because yes yeah and I think that I've close with a lot of people who have some older kids and the one lesson I'm getting from them is like if you are very worried about the fact that they might not want to hang out with you you're in about as good a spot as you can be to have kids who actually want to hang out with you so you're probably going to be okay yeah but what's happening to me as a parent now is like very much like loosening the strings on life lessons and frameworks that I feel like are going to help them and getting into much more of an egalitarian marriage with each of my children.

[1218] And that doesn't mean I'm just like one of these parents who just wants to be their friend and isn't offering guidance.

[1219] But that's just going to become less and less helpful for them and less and less helpful for our relationship.

[1220] So there's a lot of asking questions about how they feel about things.

[1221] There's a lot of like, well, man, I don't I don't know.

[1222] like this is confusing what should we do where we try to figure things out and that was one of the best things my dad did for me is like a confident young male was he just put himself next to me at a certain point and when I would bring up issues he would just be like yeah I don't know yeah figure this out you know yeah and the more I do that with my kids I start to see their chest they're to like puff up and they blossom and and then we have of course the dialogue that goes with it and the intimacy yes I'm hopeful that that's going to be sustainable but I'm I'm encouraged by the fact that I always love being with my mom.

[1223] Like, I never went through a phase.

[1224] No, I would go to the movies with her in high school, senior in high school.

[1225] I'd meet her on a Saturday night and go to the movies with her.

[1226] Can you figure out and you look at the DNA of what it was happening there?

[1227] Some tools.

[1228] Well, first of all, she's just awesome.

[1229] She was the most open -minded.

[1230] Yeah.

[1231] Was not afraid of sex.

[1232] Was not afraid of all these things.

[1233] Just very open -minded and cool.

[1234] You could say anything.

[1235] You could talk to her.

[1236] 100%.

[1237] big.

[1238] Yeah.

[1239] And then secondly, some dysfunction, which is single mom.

[1240] And occasionally, we were the spouse.

[1241] What you're saying about being in marriage, I was sometimes her emotional stability.

[1242] Yeah.

[1243] Again, not probably advisable, but loved it.

[1244] Loved it.

[1245] But I wouldn't have wanted a different mother.

[1246] Yeah.

[1247] And you feel relevant and useful to her.

[1248] I feel that with my kids.

[1249] When they can offer me something, I remember one night where I was like, supposed to be putting them down to bed.

[1250] and I had to get it done at a certain time because I wanted to get the sleep in before school and I was so tired and I was stressed and I didn't have it and I just lay down in the bed and I was like girls I don't have it tonight and I don't know what to do you know and they like looked at each other like in this surprised way they were like eight and four at the time you know and then they like rallied around they got all their stuffed animals and they brought them in the bed next to me and they're like do you want some Advil what are you going to do you know and then they like went and like got themselves ready for bed because they like knew I like needed it you know yeah I was like dude can one of you guys read the story tonight I just don't have it you know and like that sort of like gentle dropout of the president you know it was like really awesome you know I'd love to say I like design that but I was really just like fuck I don't have this yeah you were out there's no no fuel in the tank yeah I remember specifically and I bet you have a similar memory I'm three years older than you two years old I'm 41 I'm 43 okay so two years so the very first time it hit me like a ton of bricks like oh Jesus my teachers are human beings was the space shuttle oh god I remember it were you guys watching it we were watching it they wheeled in the TV yeah whole thing we're in an assembly we're watching it with all these teachers that happens I can't even remember understanding what I saw basically was like oh things going up in the air oh wow there's a bunch of mess on the screen that's probably less desirable than what we hoped.

[1251] Yeah.

[1252] Is that what was supposed to happen?

[1253] Yeah.

[1254] I don't know.

[1255] I certainly am not going to, oh, there's teachers on board and blah, blah, blah, blah.

[1256] I was more like, wow, that was a cool explosion maybe.

[1257] I don't know.

[1258] I was very young.

[1259] But man, all those teachers started bawling.

[1260] And they were hugging each other.

[1261] And I was like, oh, we're fucked.

[1262] Like the people that are supposed to be in charge of this whole thing are human.

[1263] It's such a great moment.

[1264] And I mean, we talk about this a lot as parents, but like I was lucky enough to grow up in a household with parents who loved each other.

[1265] But it was the 70s and 80s where there was some slightly unhinged behavior of like parents drunk not really looking out for us in the middle of the night, them falling asleep first and not putting us down and us.

[1266] And so like that that safe danger of like what the leaders have fallen.

[1267] So we must do something.

[1268] It's like I think really good.

[1269] And we like Katie and I'm like engineer some of that stuff for our kids a lot now.

[1270] You know, it's just like.

[1271] Do you know what Jonathan Haid is?

[1272] I don't think so.

[1273] NYU psychologist he's like when he's he's a smarty guy he's one of the smartest guys in the world literally he's on it anytime they need a smart person he's on so he was here and he was saying how he had read a book and he was saying how vital it is that children have completely unsupervised time where they really got to figure some shit out and yeah how how he has started to institute it and it's it's hard as hell but like he started they live in New York and he started sending this kid like down the block to go to the grocery store eight and he said what was the most bizarre thing is for the kid because no one does that anymore i mean i was on my own all the time god jay and i were just left absolutely wonderful yes lighting shit on fire in the woods you know yeah it was great and there were kids everywhere that were now there's none yep kids are never unaccompanied and he said the hardest thing is for the eight -year -old is every adult stopping them going like oh do you need your parents totally he feels like a freak I'm just going to the grocery store across the street from his house.

[1274] I find camping is one of the best things you can do.

[1275] Like if there are campgrounds that have like, you know, 50 to 100 square miles that are sequestered and they can't get out.

[1276] And that is the mini domain with which they can get all Lord of the Fliesie without actually getting hurt.

[1277] Yes.

[1278] That is the best thing.

[1279] Do you guys still go to Maine?

[1280] We don't go as much as we used to because a lot of the cousins that were there have kind of grown up and moved away.

[1281] But we do get some of that.

[1282] And it's a crazy hike out there, right?

[1283] Yeah.

[1284] Yeah, and it's a hall for us.

[1285] It's a fucking bizarre happen to your house.

[1286] Which one?

[1287] Didn't you guys have a little house there in Maine?

[1288] We had a house in Maine, but we sold it.

[1289] Did you discover someone was living in it or something?

[1290] No. Oh, I thought something freaky happened.

[1291] Although maybe it's possible.

[1292] If you do find out about it, it might be the same person is stealing water from your refrigerator.

[1293] I was so happy, I want to say it was Nate.

[1294] So the first time I was shown him this house right here that's under construction.

[1295] We go inside and.

[1296] Ryan, it was Ryan Hanson.

[1297] Oh, was Ryan Hanson.

[1298] second best.

[1299] Oh, Ryan came to a cup, I think one or two of these, the movie watching parties.

[1300] At any rate, we're walking through the house and all of a sudden I go, hmm, there's more stuff in this room than I remember.

[1301] There's like some cans of spray paint and there's like some work tools, rags, whatever.

[1302] And I just have this moment where I go, I think someone's sleeping in this house.

[1303] And listen, this is the best part.

[1304] He goes, do you think so?

[1305] And I go, I promise you this happen.

[1306] I go, if there's a shit in the bathtub, someone's living here.

[1307] Because the water's turned off.

[1308] Totally.

[1309] So that's where it's happening.

[1310] The toilets had been removed.

[1311] Yeah.

[1312] We walk into the bathroom and there are several human dumps in.

[1313] Unbelievable.

[1314] And it was this weird juxtaposition of being so excited, I guessed right?

[1315] A hundred percent.

[1316] And so concerned there were lots of human extrament in the tub of a house I owned.

[1317] You know, I, that is a funny story.

[1318] But I'm going to go out on a limb and say this might be a truly definitive story for you in terms of how you have lived your life and how you should continue to live your life, which is I think that there is a deeply old soul in you somehow, some way, shape, or form.

[1319] And I remember meeting you and being like, I love that this guy is the is the muscle car guy with all of this old soulness in him.

[1320] and your instinct that there was a man taking a shit in the bathtub and that that would define and that you were right just means like it's not instinct it's it's practice he did that it's knowledge based on his own experience I think you just need to promise me that like next time like big decisions come in love you will close your eyes and tap into that person those instincts are going to lead you well well you know what I did is I know exactly what I did I just imagined I was living in that room.

[1321] And I thought at some point, also, I discovered a bunch of rags in the trash can that had paint sprayed on them.

[1322] And I said acetone.

[1323] And I was like, oh, this guy's huffing.

[1324] He's huffing.

[1325] So he's high.

[1326] He's going to have to take a shit.

[1327] And he's fucking high.

[1328] And it's not his house.

[1329] He's not going to go shit in that tub and just shut the door.

[1330] Like, I just felt like that's what I would do.

[1331] That was some basic detective work too, but it was good.

[1332] Yes.

[1333] Very, very good.

[1334] Very like Columbo.

[1335] Ritumption.

[1336] good.

[1337] All right.

[1338] The last thing I want to ask you before you go is you didn't have it with Jay, but have you ever felt a sense of competitiveness with your peers?

[1339] That's a really good question.

[1340] The first, I don't know why this comes to mind.

[1341] The first answer is that I got pubes late.

[1342] Okay.

[1343] And it was really difficult on me that one of my best friends was like, I was kind of the guy who got the girls and then he got the hairy legs and the pubes.

[1344] and like overtook me okay and I remember being like we were hanging out and I was like I don't want to see anything going on down there until I get that too like that was like the biggest part of that was the biggest competition for me I was late to get pubs as well it hurt why because you thought girls wanted to see that or just made you a man manhood mine was pre even girls being part of it It was just like of the four different dudes that we were showing our penises to each other, I was last to get hair.

[1345] You're the bald eagle.

[1346] That's right.

[1347] And it's just not great.

[1348] And I don't know why that's tied to manhood or identity in some way, shape or form.

[1349] But that was like the last like real visceral, like competitive with a peer thing that I can that I can remember.

[1350] There have definitely been moments where there are people's either careers or something that I have thought.

[1351] about it.

[1352] I was like, oh, man, that would be so cool, you know, but, but how about when you feel like you've carved out a niche?

[1353] And then you see someone kind of coming into it.

[1354] You're like, oh, no, hold on now.

[1355] If you come in here, now I don't have a niche.

[1356] Yeah.

[1357] Have you ever had that fear?

[1358] I don't feel that.

[1359] Oh, that's good.

[1360] I feel that.

[1361] I feel like this is probably showing a lot of ego, but it's just honest.

[1362] I'll just say it.

[1363] It's just like, there have been people who have told me, I talk too loudly and too openly about what I do in this industry.

[1364] and how I make things and that's my IP and I need and I need to be more protective and shut the fuck up.

[1365] Uh -huh.

[1366] And my feeling is like I dare anyone to try and do what I can do because I'm the special person who knows how to do this.

[1367] You can you can read the math on this, but it takes a certain kind of person to do this.

[1368] This is where I want the ball, you know?

[1369] So I kind of feel like I'm I'm good where I'm at because it's very specific.

[1370] Yeah.

[1371] And and not that many people can do it the way I do it.

[1372] So I feel pretty good.

[1373] Yeah.

[1374] Yeah.

[1375] That's wonderful.

[1376] Yeah.

[1377] It's a healthy ego, I guess, or something.

[1378] I don't know.

[1379] Knowing your value probably.

[1380] Yeah.

[1381] That's good.

[1382] Yeah.

[1383] I've just recently got there.

[1384] Yeah.

[1385] Or I literally am finally like, I will be absolutely fine.

[1386] You're going to one way or another.

[1387] I'll either be writing something for a paycheck, acting, or shooting something.

[1388] Like, how long has Kristen been telling you this?

[1389] Oh, yeah, a lot.

[1390] She's a huge fan.

[1391] She's definitely wind in my sales at all.

[1392] Yeah, I felt that when I first met you guys, you know?

[1393] Or when I met her with you.

[1394] That's interesting because, you know, I think like if you ask Katie, like, oh, what's the, what's the thing that Mark needs to know that he doesn't know is that like you don't have to like go out and try and show everybody how cool you are to get their respect.

[1395] You'll actually be a lot more likable if you're just like human and silly like you are with me. Yeah.

[1396] And that's like one of my lessons, you know?

[1397] And then I look at Katie and I'm just like, there's a similar lesson to what you had just learn which is like she has so many goals and things she wants in her career and and it's very similar to what you're telling Kristen which is just like we're about to die yeah and none of this is going to matter you know um yeah it's going to be okay i've even gotten to a place that's probably going to destroy me which is it occurred to me this notion i have that in 40 years some teens are going to pop on Breaking Bad and watch it It's not going to happen Yeah So my desire Like my need to be on something great Even that All of it's going to go in the trash heap Is great Even their best things that we love It's letting go of this silly notion Of being somehow immortalized By something or I don't think that's going to destroy I think that's going to lead you to someplace A little dangerous But ultimately transcend it.

[1398] It is.

[1399] I've gotten there.

[1400] It's like I'm doing things sometimes that I will never watch.

[1401] And I'm just enjoying the process, which is almost, I had to back into, well, it's not about the result because I don't like this thing.

[1402] But fuck, the process is amazing.

[1403] And that's what I'm aspiring to love in life is the process and not the results.

[1404] That's all you got.

[1405] That's really it.

[1406] Mark Duplas.

[1407] I love you.

[1408] Tackles.

[1409] You're such a sweetheart.

[1410] I also love Jay so much, too.

[1411] Are you guys just not going to work together now?

[1412] We are a company and we do continue to work together on certain things.

[1413] But there's very much like a like, I'm going to go do my thing.

[1414] And then occasionally he'll come in and consult on it.

[1415] He'll do his thing and we'll do that.

[1416] And then someone's going to listen to this podcast two years from now and be like, I thought they said.

[1417] No, because they just directed a movie together because nothing is permanent, even though I think it is.

[1418] Yeah.

[1419] But right now we're breathing separately.

[1420] and it feels good.

[1421] Yeah, that's great.

[1422] Well, I love both of you.

[1423] And I really, I do still hold out the idea that we will get on a couch with many pizzas.

[1424] Oh, we will, baby.

[1425] And we will freeze frame on a penis stuck to someone's abdomen.

[1426] And we will just.

[1427] We will be our prepubescent 12 year old selves.

[1428] And our hairless penises will become healed.

[1429] That's right.

[1430] And it will be okay.

[1431] That's exactly what's going to happen.

[1432] All right.

[1433] I love you.

[1434] Can't wait for that.

[1435] Love you, bud.

[1436] Come back and watch Room 104.

[1437] When does it come out?

[1438] November 9 on HBO.

[1439] November 9th on HBO.

[1440] All right.

[1441] And lastly, just because we love Julian so much, what's his episode called?

[1442] Julian's episode is called Arnold.

[1443] It's about a young man who does not like to go out.

[1444] He goes out and he wakes up the next morning in Room 104 soaking wet and does not remember what happened to him and makes his way through the night in his memory via song.

[1445] and it is a musical episode starring Brian Tyree Henry of Atlanta fame.

[1446] Oh, we love Atlanta.

[1447] How about that kid?

[1448] You're not jealous of that kid?

[1449] Donald Faison.

[1450] Donald Faison?

[1451] Donald Faison.

[1452] That's great.

[1453] I'll cut that up.

[1454] We should all end right now, end it right here.

[1455] Donald Glover.

[1456] Dude, Donald Glover's got so much pressure.

[1457] He's like the president of a kingdom.

[1458] That's a good way to look at it.

[1459] God, I get to fly.

[1460] float around in a pool with love handles and it's fine.

[1461] That's true.

[1462] But boy, I watch them sing and then I love Atlanta.

[1463] I'm just like, God damn you.

[1464] He's having a moment.

[1465] But at a certain point he's going to fall.

[1466] Well, that's going to hurt really bad.

[1467] That's a good way to look at.

[1468] I don't know.

[1469] You can't be avoided, can it?

[1470] When you're just a B plus cruising around.

[1471] Hey.

[1472] Yeah.

[1473] It's hard to notice if someone's dip below there.

[1474] All right.

[1475] For real, though, I love you.

[1476] Love you too, but.

[1477] Toot -Loo.

[1478] And now my favorite part of the show, the fact check with my soulmate Monica Padman.

[1479] All right, this is a big swing.

[1480] Okay, let's hear it.

[1481] Because this is fact check.

[1482] Fact check time.

[1483] And no one's going to save you from the girl that's checking facts.

[1484] You know it's fact check.

[1485] Fact check time You know it You gotta get up Get up Wow That was thriller I know You recognized it Yeah I wasn't sure This person was nice enough To write out the real lyrics Next to the fake ones Oh I like when they do that Yeah it was really helpful But I still didn't know if you got it I totally got it It was exactly perfect All right kick us off girl All right tango and cash You guys talk about that and you talk about a very short butt crack right okay but we're not going to say who we're not going to say who but I am going to post a picture oh and oh I don't know if I like this well they can look it up and they will and they did but we won't well I'll cut their heads off I guess okay do that yeah yeah but well look here's the thing first of all do you know bad I would feel if someone posted a picture short butt crack it would be career ending to me I would never show my buns again in a movie.

[1486] Well, would you?

[1487] Listen, this is what I'm going to tell you.

[1488] I think you're wrong.

[1489] I don't think his butt crack is short.

[1490] I think it's the angle and there's two people.

[1491] Of the angle?

[1492] It is high and wide.

[1493] There's two people in this picture.

[1494] Two gorgeous men with great physiques.

[1495] To me, the butt cracks don't look so dissimilar.

[1496] Oh, wow.

[1497] Yeah.

[1498] And I think it's the angle.

[1499] And I think, you know what I think's we're.

[1500] A huge long butt crack.

[1501] Oh, really?

[1502] A super long butt crack.

[1503] I've long said this.

[1504] The ideal butt crack would start at the shoulder blades.

[1505] Oh, my God.

[1506] Yeah, that would be the ideal Robert Crumb buck crack.

[1507] It goes shoulder blades, butt crack for about two feet, and then the little legs pop it out.

[1508] Do you really think that's ideal?

[1509] Yeah, that's cool.

[1510] Who cares?

[1511] I don't want to establish ideal.

[1512] deals.

[1513] I'm just saying if your butt cracks started in your shoulder blades, that'd be cool.

[1514] I guess it'd be cool.

[1515] Because then you could reach over your shoulder to wipe.

[1516] No, you'd still have the butt hole would still be.

[1517] You're right.

[1518] You're right.

[1519] You're right.

[1520] We're right.

[1521] We really, we really started off in a dirty place.

[1522] In the gutter.

[1523] That's what happens when you start off on thriller.

[1524] There's monsters and stuff.

[1525] That's right.

[1526] Well, I really wish I would have sang that one on the Halloween week.

[1527] I know.

[1528] It's okay.

[1529] Number two item after I wed your grandmother.

[1530] Number two.

[1531] My number two item in my time machine after I wed your grandmother will be to go back and do thriller on the fact check for Halloween week.

[1532] Wow.

[1533] I've got weird priorities.

[1534] That's a big, yeah.

[1535] Not going to buy Apple stock.

[1536] Not before I fix that fact check.

[1537] Anyway, my point is, I think all butt cracks are beautiful.

[1538] And I think it was the angle.

[1539] Okay.

[1540] Great.

[1541] So I don't think it's three or four inches.

[1542] I'd kill to look like either of the guys in that photo, so.

[1543] Yeah.

[1544] Okay.

[1545] John Doe has been in, he has 79 acting credits on IMD and 45 for soundtrack.

[1546] Oh, sure, because he was in the band X. For writing and performing 45 credits.

[1547] Way, way, way more extensive career than myself.

[1548] Plus 79 acting credits.

[1549] Go.

[1550] Crazy.

[1551] No, go.

[1552] Go where?

[1553] Math.

[1554] Oh, what do you want me to do?

[1555] Hit me with the numbers again.

[1556] I didn't know I was going to be doing quick math 45 plus 79 okay that's easy that's 125 125 24 um yeah I think 124 it should be 4 yeah 125 that was pretty quick yeah it was quick that was quick okay so he was born on February 25th 1953 how old is he 53 mm -hmm 47 267 65 55 okay I haven't done the math in my head so I should have done that beforehand I guess you should that's what you should do is you should add all these things up and then you should say there's 65 is all you said yeah 65 is what it is you should say you should add numbers and say oh in the in the episode you said and then just add like three numbers and I never said well that would be against my role oh okay you know that would be bending your but when there when there are trick when there are times like this week and do a lot of math okay okay so anyway his name his real name is john nominson duchoch du kock well du kock i wonder what kind of that sounds maybe eastern european i don't know if it's du kock or duchokic du kaki isn't no boo kocky yes yes well dukaki sounds even worse it sounds like number two yeah yeah okay but it might be duchok chock i don't know Sounds like Dukakis, too.

[1557] You're probably too young to remember Dukakis.

[1558] No, the politician, yeah.

[1559] Yeah, you ran for president.

[1560] Yeah, Michael, right?

[1561] Big eyebrows.

[1562] Oh.

[1563] Eyebrow game was on point.

[1564] My eyebrows need some work right now.

[1565] You want me to work on them?

[1566] No, because I went to this place to get my eyebrows done, and I'm not allowed to touch them for six weeks.

[1567] Oh, so they can get a good, are they going to do it with a string?

[1568] Is that what you do?

[1569] That's my, that's, um, microblading.

[1570] Oh, that's called threading.

[1571] Yeah.

[1572] Yeah, you're right.

[1573] What's microblading?

[1574] Where they make little incisions on your eyeball so that you can get more air in there?

[1575] No. If you try too much, that's how they dry out your eyes.

[1576] No. Microblading is an eyebrow thing that they do.

[1577] They like fill in with kind of like tattoo.

[1578] Oh, okay.

[1579] Yeah.

[1580] What about just getting electrolysis on your eyes?

[1581] Would you ever do that?

[1582] Where they burn out the follicle permanently?

[1583] Oh, like laser hair removal.

[1584] That's right.

[1585] I would not do that on my eyes, no. Because?

[1586] Well, because I'd be afraid.

[1587] Like I don't know.

[1588] The style would change.

[1589] I used to have super, super thin eyebrows because that was the style.

[1590] And now the style is to have nice thick eyebrows, which is good for me because I have that naturally.

[1591] I love that you have so many options.

[1592] You can have different eyebrow styles.

[1593] Uh -huh.

[1594] Good for you.

[1595] But right now I have to wait weeks and then she goes in and then she makes them perfect.

[1596] And she's training them to do that on their own.

[1597] That's not true.

[1598] No, I promise it is.

[1599] I don't believe in that.

[1600] I believe in her.

[1601] You can't change your genetics.

[1602] I'll show you.

[1603] Okay.

[1604] You should see her eyebrows.

[1605] They're perfect.

[1606] They probably are, but it's because she's trimming them that way.

[1607] No, they're not.

[1608] The hair doesn't stop growing.

[1609] You can't make hair.

[1610] Yes, you can.

[1611] Unless you're burning out the follicle.

[1612] No, your hair does get trained.

[1613] I don't want to get too, I don't want to get too into it, but it does get trained.

[1614] Okay.

[1615] The movie that he did with Ray Romano is coming out later this year.

[1616] So far doesn't have a title.

[1617] Untitled Duplas Brothers, Ray Romano.

[1618] project described as a bittersweet romance about friendship mortality and made up sports oh everyone should know a fun behind the scenes fact that the power went out in the middle of the episode that's true yeah it went out right in the middle of when we were talking about robin williams and we said maybe it was his ghost of robin williams so that's a fun fact for people yeah absolutely behind it's more of a behind the scenes thing bt yes it is a btas mark equated.

[1619] I don't remember what it was.

[1620] His life or something to a farm club.

[1621] And he said he was single A. And I didn't know what that was a farm club.

[1622] I thought it was like this game that Jess, our friend Jess plays on his phone.

[1623] Farmville?

[1624] It's called Farmville, I think.

[1625] I don't think it's called that.

[1626] Okay.

[1627] But he has a farm on his phone and he tends to it.

[1628] All day long.

[1629] Almost all day long.

[1630] Oh yeah, yeah.

[1631] He cares a lot about it.

[1632] And I thought this was something akin to that.

[1633] Okay.

[1634] Yeah, you were pretty off.

[1635] It was off.

[1636] It's a sports term.

[1637] In sports, a farm team, farm system, feeder team, practice squad, or nursery club is generally a team or club whose role is to provide experience and training for young players with an agreement that any successful players can move on to a higher level at a given point.

[1638] Yes.

[1639] The minor leagues in baseball are the farm teams.

[1640] Yeah.

[1641] Yeah, well, he said farm clubs.

[1642] So it was confusing.

[1643] If you had said farm team, I would have known exactly.

[1644] You would have?

[1645] No, I'm kidding.

[1646] I definitely wouldn't have known.

[1647] I wouldn't have known at all.

[1648] I would have thought that it was like on the farm they have teams.

[1649] Like a 4 -H clubs.

[1650] Like 4 -H is a farming club.

[1651] But I would have more thought like on the farm there's a team that handles the pigs.

[1652] And then there's a team that handles the chickens.

[1653] Okay, sure.

[1654] Yeah.

[1655] You know, I bet it feels so good to move up from a farm team to a real team.

[1656] We were just watching the World Series, and one of the guys who's playing the very best on the Dodgers was on a farm team.

[1657] He got brought up this year from minor league.

[1658] That's the American dream.

[1659] It is.

[1660] He was famous and rich.

[1661] You know, when I started on my cheerleading squad, I was an alternate.

[1662] Oh, okay, great.

[1663] So I was basically on the farm team.

[1664] Yeah, and you earned your spot.

[1665] Yeah, because a girl broke her shoulder.

[1666] Did you set that up?

[1667] Mm -hmm.

[1668] Did you put a little Vaseline on the ground?

[1669] ground where you knew she, her spotter was going to land.

[1670] I did.

[1671] I did.

[1672] Oh.

[1673] Yeah.

[1674] And I'm proud of it.

[1675] Yeah.

[1676] This episode talks a lot about the brothers and the brother dynamic and how they would go to parties for so long and everyone would want to talk to Mark and Jay would kind of just like be there, which is a lot.

[1677] Mm -hmm.

[1678] Don't you think?

[1679] You feel invisible?

[1680] Yes.

[1681] Yeah.

[1682] And I experienced this recently.

[1683] Yeah.

[1684] Yeah, pretty bad.

[1685] You went to an event with Kristen.

[1686] and you felt pretty invisible.

[1687] And they put you in a pretty bad sitting situation.

[1688] Yeah, we arrived there, and then there was no dinner for me. Yeah.

[1689] And they put me in.

[1690] You don't deserve dinner.

[1691] You're nobody.

[1692] Yeah.

[1693] We only served dinner to real people.

[1694] Right.

[1695] And you're not a real person.

[1696] So then they put a chair for me next to her, but there wasn't space at the table.

[1697] There wasn't space at the table.

[1698] So they had it in like the aisle where all these, in the middle of all these tables.

[1699] And I was just sitting there.

[1700] And then a bunch of people, because they love Kristen, understandably, were coming up to her and wanting to talk to her.

[1701] And then some security guard came up to me and said, oh, I'm so glad you're here.

[1702] Thank God.

[1703] So you can block her from all these people.

[1704] Despite the fact that's my role.

[1705] Yeah, exactly.

[1706] Anyway, it was a terrible feeling.

[1707] You really didn't enjoy it.

[1708] That was right before Toronto.

[1709] Yeah.

[1710] You got to Toronto and you're still shaking that off.

[1711] Well, and I want to be really, really clear that Kristen had nothing to do with the feeling.

[1712] She was doing her best to alleviate some of this.

[1713] She was feeding me food off of her plate.

[1714] Oh, scraps?

[1715] She put in a napkin and hand you.

[1716] She put it on the floor and let me eat it.

[1717] No, no. She was feeding me food off her plate and she was introducing me to people and she kept introducing the pop.

[1718] She kept talking about the podcast to people.

[1719] She was really doing her best.

[1720] And even though she didn't need to do.

[1721] The people just thinking about flying fog.

[1722] They didn't care about me. me even though I was wearing a really cute dress undoubtedly undoubtedly anyway it's just hard to be that person it really is it is it is yeah yeah so I just I could just commiserate with that feeling I guess that's it I thought maybe you were going to say something interesting about it but you're not yeah that's a bad feeling have you ever been in that position oh certainly but I've had enough attention.

[1723] I'm delighted if I'm with someone who happens to be getting more attention.

[1724] Well, not now then.

[1725] I mean when you didn't have attention.

[1726] Yeah, you obviously don't.

[1727] The only thing I can remember is like, you know, shooting the pilot of punkting, going out to dinners with Ashton and sitting next to him and yeah, people like basically standing on me to get to him.

[1728] But I think I was just so pumped to be with him somewhere and witnessing what fame looked like in real life.

[1729] Oh, interesting.

[1730] Yeah, I was just excited to be around the whole thing.

[1731] Huh, that's interesting.

[1732] Yeah.

[1733] I had that thought when I was sitting there.

[1734] I was like, oh my God, at one point in time, I would have been so excited to just be in this room.

[1735] And now I'm like could care less about being in that room.

[1736] And I just want to go into a Burger King and eat some chicken sandwich and have a seat at the table.

[1737] Heavy mayonnaise.

[1738] Yeah.

[1739] Like really, I was like, I'm not impressed by any of this anymore.

[1740] Right.

[1741] Which was good, I guess.

[1742] It's a wonderful thing to know you don't care about anymore.

[1743] Yeah.

[1744] Okay, so sorry to take a turn, but the Challenger Space Shuttle.

[1745] Explosion.

[1746] Yeah, explosion.

[1747] We talk about that.

[1748] Yeah.

[1749] You said there were teachers, but there was only one teacher.

[1750] Yeah.

[1751] Kristen McColliffe.

[1752] Oof.

[1753] Yeah.

[1754] Yeah.

[1755] Yeah.

[1756] And 17 % of Americans watched it.

[1757] Wow.

[1758] Yeah.

[1759] Wow.

[1760] So to do some quick math, that's around 56 ,000 people.

[1761] I mean, 56 million people are watching that.

[1762] It was in 1986.

[1763] Is that still right?

[1764] I don't know.

[1765] The population was probably only like 270 then.

[1766] Still over 50 million people.

[1767] Still fast math.

[1768] And a lot of them children.

[1769] Oh, yeah.

[1770] Because it was happening, like schools were watching it.

[1771] I doubt they were watching it at AutoZone.

[1772] They probably didn't pull a TV in there for the employees to watch.

[1773] Maybe.

[1774] But for teachers, it was a big one.

[1775] Yeah.

[1776] Oh, so sad.

[1777] Mm -hmm.

[1778] It is weird because really, it's not sadder than previous times there's been a but it's funny because you go oh if an astronaut he dedicates his life or she dedicates her life to be an astronaut she knows the risks so if they die it's for some reason a little less sad right but a teacher you're like well boy I don't know why there's just something in the filing cabinet in your head it makes it a little sadder right I mean all thing all human deaths are equal probably yet it does get elevated did.

[1779] Let's put it this way.

[1780] You hear a boxer dies in the ring and a fight.

[1781] You feel bad, but you go, oh, that's what happens.

[1782] Right.

[1783] You hear a guy out with his kids gets punched at an ice cream parlor dies.

[1784] Your heartbroken.

[1785] Exactly.

[1786] Yeah.

[1787] Same thing.

[1788] Someone got killed from a punch.

[1789] Right.

[1790] But it is, it is, yeah, exactly.

[1791] You're, I guess, assessing the risk factor for the people who are making those decisions.

[1792] Yeah.

[1793] Yeah.

[1794] It is all set.

[1795] It's sad for the box.

[1796] Also, people who are afraid of doing things, it helps confirm to them their right to not be a risk taker.

[1797] Like if a parachute or something, they're like, well, you get what you, you know, you get what you got coming or something like that.

[1798] Do you think people take some joy and when risk takers die?

[1799] I don't think.

[1800] Because they're generally not.

[1801] No, I don't think anyone takes the joy.

[1802] I'm so glad that guy died jumping.

[1803] No. You don't think so?

[1804] No. I don't think anyone thinks that.

[1805] I think they think, they think.

[1806] They deserve it.

[1807] I think, no, I think they think, and this is what I think, every time I hear about a car accident where someone's not wearing their seatbelt, I'm, I think, oh, God, that's awful.

[1808] I'll never be in that position because I always wear my seatbelt.

[1809] So it's more like, it's not like joy or anything.

[1810] It's just like, oh, my God, there's so many terrible things that happen.

[1811] That's not a terrible thing that's going to happen to me because I don't do that.

[1812] Right.

[1813] And that's the same with the parachuting, like, oh, that's awful.

[1814] But I'm never jumping out of an airplane.

[1815] So I'm never going to be the person who dies that way.

[1816] But, okay, so great.

[1817] So now we kind of found our way back to this thing.

[1818] So, yeah, most of the time when an astronaut's dive, everyone can go like, oh, that's not going to happen to me. I'm not an astronaut.

[1819] Yeah.

[1820] But you can go like, I am a teacher.

[1821] Wow, I could end up on that thing and it could blow up.

[1822] So yeah, maybe that's the thing.

[1823] It felt a little more plausible to happen in their own life.

[1824] Mm -hmm.

[1825] Oof.

[1826] It's all sad.

[1827] Yeah.

[1828] How long is your butt crack?

[1829] I'd rather measure it and tell you than guesstimate.

[1830] Okay.

[1831] When I picture myself, like in the mirror, I'm feeling like it's 11 inches, 12 inches.

[1832] I think there's a foot of butt crack back there.

[1833] What the fuck is Wobby Wob doing?

[1834] He's leaving.

[1835] He's packing up his shit.

[1836] He made a fart noise.

[1837] Oh, a sound effect.

[1838] Yeah.

[1839] Yeah.

[1840] You did a Foley.

[1841] He did a little folly.

[1842] That was nice.

[1843] Like Fred Nora's from the Stern program.

[1844] We still haven't done.

[1845] I know.

[1846] I got to have to put it in my backpack so that it gets here.

[1847] That's all it's going to have.

[1848] The anticipation.

[1849] Hopefully it'll pay off.

[1850] And two things more.

[1851] Mark mentioned that someone was stealing water from our fridge.

[1852] And so there's a caper happening.

[1853] I'll just say in the attic where water keeps disappearing from our fridge.

[1854] Yeah, which is so weird.

[1855] It's so weird.

[1856] There's no sign of a break in.

[1857] Exactly.

[1858] We can't figure it out.

[1859] Maybe there's a little.

[1860] mouse that lives in here under the couch and when we leave the little mouse gets a water yeah and then recycles it outside yep yeah that sounds plausible very environmentally conscious mouse and then also you refer to julian a lot julian was yeah who is your friend and a composer a really good composer and he composed songs in hit and run and in brother's justice and in baby director and in baby director yeah yeah more than all that he's like a spectacular dad yeah yeah I always feel a little.

[1861] When I'm around, I'm like, I think this guy's doing a better job to me. Yeah, it gives me a little self -doubt.

[1862] Okay, time for my two things.

[1863] One is, I'm going to say this as gently as possible.

[1864] If you're an arm cherry and there's a guest that you see promoted and you don't like that guest, first and foremost, I think I'd listen to anybody.

[1865] Like when Stern has people on all the time that I think I don't like or I disagree with their thing, I'm almost more interested in those people.

[1866] Like, I'd love to hear Stern interview Rush Limbaugh.

[1867] I would be like counting down the days to hear that.

[1868] So just conceptually, I don't really understand choosing to not listen to somebody because you disagree with what they said in the past.

[1869] Yeah.

[1870] All that aside, you're free to have that opinion.

[1871] Don't tweet me or Instagram messages to me about how much you hate someone, how terrible they are.

[1872] I just don't like that.

[1873] I'll delete it.

[1874] We're a place of positivity.

[1875] You know, say something positive.

[1876] And if you're feeling negative, you know, tell your buddy at home or something.

[1877] You don't need to put it out in the world publicly for that person to read.

[1878] That's not cool.

[1879] What was the other thing I wanted to say?

[1880] There was one other thing of a meaning to say on here.

[1881] I guess I forget the other one.

[1882] Okay.

[1883] You can remember for next time.

[1884] Yeah.

[1885] When I bring my special rain making, Foley instrument.

[1886] Can't wait.

[1887] Can't wait.

[1888] And again, I'm sad Halloween's over.

[1889] I'm sorry.

[1890] But Thanksgiving's coming up.

[1891] Ooh, I need a voice for that.

[1892] What's your favorite Thanksgiving food?

[1893] I don't like Thanksgiving all that much.

[1894] You don't like any of the food?

[1895] I like the stuffing.

[1896] That's my favorite part by far.

[1897] You don't like the sweet potatoes?

[1898] They're fine.

[1899] I like the rolls.

[1900] I like the rolls.

[1901] I don't care about cranberry.

[1902] The turkey's always dry.

[1903] Pumpkin pie, I don't understand why we make a pie out of pumpkin.

[1904] Okay.

[1905] You know, when you guys are going through it, here's what I like.

[1906] I love those rolls, those brown and served rolls with a nice stick of butter.

[1907] And then the stuffing, but that's just, that's 100 % car.

[1908] I can't believe you don't like the sweet potato with the marshmallow.

[1909] My favorite.

[1910] Yeah, I should like that more.

[1911] I love it.

[1912] Oh, here's another weird thing.

[1913] I love potatoes more than anything.

[1914] I can't stand mashed potatoes.

[1915] They destroy all the structural integrity of the potato.

[1916] It's just mush.

[1917] Why don't even go even a step further and just turn it into a drink?

[1918] I drink it.

[1919] I'd be a cup of, you know, milk, yeah.

[1920] I'd be happy to drink it.

[1921] All right, I'll make you one in the Vitamix.

[1922] Okay.

[1923] All right, love you.

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