Wendi McLendon-Covey

[0] Hello, everybody.

[1] Welcome to armchair expert.

[2] My name is Danx Shepern.

[3] And I'm Monica Padman.

[4] We're just discussing Monica's desire to be Veronica Mars.

[5] A teen detective.

[6] And I said, a gum shoe.

[7] And you said, what's that?

[8] And I said, I don't know why they're called gum shoes private eyes maybe because they were very quiet shoes made of gum rubber.

[9] Yeah.

[10] And I said, I think it's because they act like a gum.

[11] sticking to a shoe where you can't see them, but they're there.

[12] And then I said, oh, what if the shoes are picking up facts because they're sticky?

[13] So many options.

[14] I'm sure one of you teen detectives will tell us.

[15] You know, they do these reboots of previous concepts.

[16] And maybe Rob Thomas should launch a new Ron Mars with you.

[17] Well, he is launching a new Ron Mars with Kristen.

[18] That's the same one.

[19] It's the same one, yeah.

[20] But the problem is I'm no longer a teen.

[21] I could play one, though.

[22] I'm staring at you wondering if that's true.

[23] You certainly look much younger than your age, but teen?

[24] I know.

[25] I think I could.

[26] With the right ponytails and.

[27] Yeah, with some double braids in and no makeup.

[28] And like a pencil in your ear and a calculator in your hand.

[29] Sure, and a sign that says I'm 15.

[30] Right.

[31] A shirt that says high school rules.

[32] You're right.

[33] Maybe you could.

[34] Well, before we even talk about who we're going to talk about, thanks so much for the wild success of Good Place Week.

[35] A lot of armcherry's tuned in.

[36] Yeah.

[37] Thanks, guys.

[38] And we really didn't know if there's going to be an appetite for four episodes in one week.

[39] And to our delight, a lot of people checked out.

[40] They enjoyed it.

[41] Yeah.

[42] Makes us happy and encourages us maybe that we'll pick up the pace a little bit.

[43] Yeah.

[44] Or not.

[45] The way you said, yeah, I was like, or not.

[46] Well, you go, yeah.

[47] Yeah, let's talk about it.

[48] That would be great to talk about it.

[49] Today we're going to talk to Wendy McClendon Covey.

[50] She's on the Goldbergs.

[51] She also was a scene stealer in bridesmaids.

[52] But for me, personally, she'll always be the person I was in the Sunday company at the Groundlings with, who I wrote a really ridiculous steely Dan sketch with.

[53] she'll always occupy that little niche in my heart of your old stomping grounds well particularly trying to combine my love for steely dan and comedy oh i see very hard uh -huh when writing sketches you're always trying to kind of incorporate what you just genuinely loved and it wasn't always possible because you're teasing it yeah that's true do you want to tell us about the sketch well the premise of the sketch was someone was going to win tickets to see steely dan it was like a radio contest you had to submit a video for about how big of a Steely Dan fan you were.

[54] And of course, we were the ultimate Steely Dan fans.

[55] And we invited Steely Dan, any of the members of Steely Dan, they were invited to join an all -access pass with my wife.

[56] Uh -huh.

[57] And that's what she said, which included a backstage pass.

[58] Oh, that's funny.

[59] You know what?

[60] It was a six, if I'm being honest.

[61] We shot the whole thing and edited it.

[62] It was a video.

[63] It was a video sketch.

[64] In fact, I have it around the house.

[65] I should show it to you.

[66] Yeah, I'd love to see that.

[67] I bet I could even play the audio from that weird fucking thing on this podcast.

[68] All right.

[69] This intro is much longer than anyone signed up for.

[70] So please enjoy my good friend Wendy McClendon Covey.

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

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

[73] Or you can listen to it.

[74] and for free wherever you get your podcasts.

[75] He's an armchair expert.

[76] Wendy, welcome to armchair expert.

[77] This is very fun for me. I hope it is for you as well.

[78] I'm thrilled.

[79] I'm thrilled.

[80] Thank you for having me. But we're old friends.

[81] We are.

[82] Do you want to tell everybody how we're friends?

[83] Yeah, I do.

[84] Well, you tell them.

[85] So you and I were in the Sunday company together at the Groundling Theater.

[86] And for those who don't know, the groundline.

[87] is a it's like a comedy boot camp I guess sure sketch and writing and and we were in the Sunday company meaning every Sunday we did a show so every our entire lives we're built around shopping for costumes and writing and then memorizing stuff it's virtually uh it's Saturday night live but but live and low low phi yes low quality yeah low something low production value um but I was Just with Jess yesterday, Jess Rowland.

[88] Yes.

[89] Who loves you?

[90] I miss him so much, yeah.

[91] I was under the mistaken belief we had been in one of the levels together, but we weren't.

[92] You had been, you started Sunday Company six months before I got in, right?

[93] Right.

[94] With Jess.

[95] And so six months is significant.

[96] Every six months, like a bell goes off and you either get voted in or you stay in the Sunday company or you leave.

[97] They show you the door.

[98] Yeah.

[99] Yeah.

[100] They showed me that door.

[101] after a year of the Sunday company and yet and yet here we are you upset about that I think it was okay no I think you've done quite well for yourself and I think I'm now over it but I took it very hard because as you just pointed out it is your whole life you right you can't do you can't be successful there and have sketches in the show without writing five to seven sketches a week exactly Exactly.

[102] And then you put them all up on Wednesday night.

[103] You're there for whatever, 10 hours doing sketches.

[104] And then, yeah, you're shopping for weird costumes the next two days.

[105] And then you're learning the show and then you're doing it on Sunday.

[106] And then the whole thing starts again on Monday.

[107] Right.

[108] And if you don't care a lot about that, there's no way you can do that work, right?

[109] Yeah.

[110] There's no reason to do it because, you know, there's lots of other, you know, whenever I hear someone say, oh, you know, I just did it for fun.

[111] I think, honey, there's so many other ways to have fun that are not expensive and are not such a mind fuck but you know some people it's it's a great program it is learning and really being disciplined some people really thrive with it other people it's just not the place for them yes and some people stay there way too long sure but first and foremost i have a ton of respect for the place it also taught me everything i know about writing and i started directing there making shorts i mean every you and i made a short video in 2002, I guess, or something.

[112] Yeah, we did.

[113] So I love the place.

[114] But I think you and I are similar.

[115] Maybe I'm wrong.

[116] We were surrounded by a lot of people that kind of worked a lot during that phase, right?

[117] Like Larry Dorff was in a million commercials and a lot of the people in that program, either in the Sunday company or the main company, they worked quite a bit.

[118] Right.

[119] And they made paychecks from acting.

[120] Yes, they did.

[121] I didn't make any paychecks from acting.

[122] I didn't either.

[123] No. Not during that.

[124] time yeah we had that in common yeah and so to me it's not like if i got kicked out like oh that's fine i'm just i'm in commercials and making a living right i was like no that what now because yeah that's all i have that's my only foot in the acting world is that stage right and uh i also i don't what was your goal there because my i had this crazy idea that that was i was trying to get to saturday night live that's what i thought i i was there for okay do you do you have an idea i my whole thing was I'm going to do this until they kicked me out and I'll and and I'll see what happens but they never kicked me out yes so that was nice but I also didn't have an agent for a long time and I it would drive me crazy because everyone was going out for these auditions and I wasn't even getting the chance it was it would devil me so right as I got in the company I thought I should give this up I'm not getting anywhere I should just take my head shots and throw them on the end of This is an expensive hobby.

[125] Yeah, this is a very expensive hobby.

[126] And maybe I'm just too old.

[127] Maybe I'm not talented.

[128] I hope you never thought that.

[129] Oh, I thought maybe I'm only good here, you know?

[130] That obviously, like maybe I'm just in this little bubble.

[131] And I, you know, some people are very comfortable there and they stay in that bubble.

[132] And they're like, look, as long as I can hear applause in this little place, that's good for me. Well, that got me through 10 years of frustration with not.

[133] working as an actor.

[134] Going there on Sunday and entertaining 100 people was winded myself for a year.

[135] It's the best drug.

[136] It is.

[137] It really is.

[138] It really is.

[139] Yeah, because it's, it is, as we said, as we complained.

[140] It's a lot of hard work.

[141] But then, man, Sunday night, it just doesn't get better than that.

[142] It really doesn't.

[143] It really doesn't.

[144] But yeah, I never, I thought, oh, Saturday Night Live, that might be fun.

[145] And I had two managers at one point.

[146] Oh, great.

[147] You doubled up on.

[148] No, no, no, separate time.

[149] Who assured me. that they could just walk me right through the front door.

[150] Yeah.

[151] And that never happened.

[152] I never got the chance to audition for that.

[153] But it's fine.

[154] Because after a while, it was like sketch comedy.

[155] I don't know.

[156] Well, no, you can have that point of view now because it all worked out.

[157] But when it's not working out, it's hard to have that perspective.

[158] It was for me. Yeah.

[159] But here's what I told myself.

[160] I'm curious what you told yourself.

[161] So I wasn't getting any of these commercials.

[162] I didn't have an agent.

[163] No, I was bad when I went and met with a. agents.

[164] Like just the whole thing I was doing poorly somehow.

[165] Right.

[166] And so when I finally got an agent and then I just simply couldn't book a commercial no matter how many auditions I went on, I, this was my explanation as I was like, well, I'm not handsome enough to be the guy in the chewing gum commercial with his shirt off by the pool.

[167] And then I'm not character looking enough either to be the guy that's getting shit on by the world and renting a car at Avis.

[168] Like I just felt like I was neither, like that they wanted some of the extremes and then I just wasn't either of those extremes.

[169] Again, this is just a weird narrative.

[170] I needed some explanation for why I simply couldn't book anything.

[171] Did you have a narrative of why other people were working and you weren't?

[172] Yeah, I did.

[173] I thought, well, I'm just too weird.

[174] Uh -huh.

[175] I'm too weird to be on a regular TV show.

[176] And I'm not pretty enough to be the pretty girl and I'm not ugly enough to be the ugly girl.

[177] But I am weird.

[178] Uh -huh.

[179] So maybe that can be my niche, but that number's not going to come up a lot.

[180] Yes.

[181] But honestly, Dax, knowing what you know now, do you feel that maybe you didn't book commercials because you're not someone that an ad agency can push around?

[182] Do you feel that you bring an assuredness into the room that's not like, look, this is.

[183] Shut up and eat the cereal.

[184] I'm going to eat the cereal.

[185] And this is how I eat cereal.

[186] This is how a human eats cereal.

[187] And I'm not going to be told otherwise.

[188] I think my weird little bells would go off when I was in those commercials, because auditions.

[189] Because you went on a ton, I would assume.

[190] Did you or do you skip that?

[191] I did for a little bit.

[192] And then I said, I can't do this anymore.

[193] I'm not booking them.

[194] Yeah.

[195] I hate doing these auditions.

[196] So why don't I just take that piece of the pie away?

[197] Well, and I don't know that people, like a general American public, knows what these commercial auditions are.

[198] A high percent, and Monica, who's still in the thick of it, can back us up here.

[199] A high percentage of them, you walk into a room with three strangers and they go, you're at a party and you're dancing to hip hop, go.

[200] And then now you're just, you're dancing to a song that's not playing with.

[201] Yeah.

[202] With three strangers that you're best friends with that you met one second ago.

[203] Right.

[204] It just, you couldn't fast forward into Awkwardville faster than these commercial auditions.

[205] Put on top of that, someone's checking their phone.

[206] someone's looking at you with obvious disdain and someone in the waiting room has tried to sidle up to you and kind of psych you out of your whole thing.

[207] There's a lot of psychic warfare going on in the audition space.

[208] You're 100 % right because I think you could make a generalization that everyone in that cattle call room is not where they want to be and they're feeling insecure and scared.

[209] I was.

[210] They're trying to get out of there before.

[211] They get another parking ticket.

[212] Yes.

[213] They're losing money, hand over a fist in this endeavor.

[214] And then so the way a lot of people compensate for that is to kind of brag.

[215] So quite often I found people would sit next to me and then I'd hear about everything they had done in the last year and a half.

[216] And I'm like, that's awesome.

[217] I've done nothing.

[218] You're probably going to get this.

[219] Right.

[220] Exactly.

[221] Good for you.

[222] Good for you.

[223] But it is a demoralizing.

[224] And did you do this?

[225] I would be like, you know, so TGI Fridays.

[226] Out here, it's Monday.

[227] In here, it's Friday, right?

[228] That was one of the auditions I had.

[229] And I did it in the room and they gave me like three cracks at it.

[230] I just going to get it.

[231] And then I would get in my Honda Civic and I'd shut the door and I'd go, out here, it's Monday.

[232] In here, it's Friday.

[233] And I would do it perfect in my car.

[234] And then I would hate myself for five minutes going, gee, man, why can't you fucking do it the way you do it in your car?

[235] Monica, do you ever do that?

[236] Yeah, I do it all the time.

[237] But I also think it's changed a lot.

[238] The landscape has changed.

[239] One, people aren't doing that as much in the room because everyone's on their phone.

[240] Yes.

[241] So no one's all that interested in.

[242] I'm not.

[243] I am not paying attention to anyone else sitting there.

[244] Oh, so the people that are waiting to go in are no longer interacting.

[245] Correct.

[246] Oh, that's comforting.

[247] I actually, well, now maybe I'll try this again.

[248] Okay, go on.

[249] Or they, unless they pair you, sometimes they, They will pair you to do something together.

[250] And then you have to talk to that person and engage.

[251] But also now, which would definitely change for you guys, they really love if you improvise something well in there.

[252] Which is totally new.

[253] I was always in trouble for that.

[254] That's a problem that I find.

[255] Because tell me why.

[256] Because when you improv in an audition, what they do is they come.

[257] co -opt it and pass it off as their writing later.

[258] And you don't get anything for it.

[259] Yep.

[260] That's happened to me in an actual commercial I saw on television.

[261] They hired a way better looking than me. And he said the weird thing I had said.

[262] Oh my gosh.

[263] That's still happening.

[264] And what are you going to do?

[265] Go to court.

[266] You can't prove it.

[267] Exactly.

[268] Oh, yeah, that's happened to me too.

[269] I think I've said that's, I know I've said it on here.

[270] But at any rate, I had, do you remember my Wilford Brimley sketch?

[271] Yes, yes, yes.

[272] Yes, Dax does a delightful Wilfred Brimley, and I hope you gift us with an impression later.

[273] But go on.

[274] America's going to be cold and, what is it?

[275] It's going to be cold and snowy this year.

[276] So, warm your little ones up with an extra thick bowl of quaker oats.

[277] Say diabetes.

[278] Diabetes.

[279] If you were a loved one's got diabetes, get your blood sugar tax regularly.

[280] But I had this Wilford Brumley sketch, and I was quite confident.

[281] I was probably the only person in comedy doing Wilford Brimley, material.

[282] And then it turned on Saturday Night Live and lo and behold, there was a Wilford Brimley sketch while mine was running.

[283] And it doesn't even.

[284] Yes.

[285] And it doesn't matter if this is real or not.

[286] What matters is in my mind, there were groundlings who worked on Saturday Live as staff writers.

[287] They saw this, maybe not even intentionally.

[288] But they pitched John Goodman this sketch and it gets on Saturday Live.

[289] And I was so wound up about it.

[290] And someone pulled me aside and gave me amazing advice.

[291] And they said, I can see you're wound up about this and maybe you're even thinking about approaching the groundlings to bring this up or whatever.

[292] I would only say if that's your last great idea, then fucking pursue this to the top of the hill.

[293] If you think you have endless great ideas, then just keep it moving.

[294] And I weirdly, because I don't take advice well, I listen to that person.

[295] And I try to remind myself of that all the time.

[296] It's like, yeah, if you've got one good idea in your life, then yep, you better go to court over this.

[297] Yeah.

[298] But if you're an endless well of creativity, then who gives a fuck if Hardee's takes your improv?

[299] That's really the only way to look at it.

[300] Otherwise, you're going to go insane.

[301] We can admit that it happens and that's unfortunate that other people have to do that.

[302] But you're right.

[303] I'll give a more frustrating example, which I guarantee you've participated in.

[304] In a movie, quite often, you rehearse the scene a few times while blocking before the cameras are rolling.

[305] and then you might improv something in rehearsal and then they will start pointing cameras at certain actors and you might not be the first in general at the beginning of your career you're not the first person they point a camera at you're the last person and so I've had lines that I improbed either in rehearsal or in the master or whatever that then another actor who's more popular than me has taken and then that ends up in the movie has that happened to you?

[306] Yes how does that feel?

[307] It has and wow that's again, that's a tough one and you just, there's not anything you can do about it.

[308] Yes.

[309] And when I was getting very frustrated on the specific movie that happened on, I had to really recognize that you and I had come from a background where that was just absolutely forbidden at the groundlings.

[310] There's like, there's a comedic integrity that you would never take someone's funny thing and write it a week later.

[311] Right.

[312] So we had some rules.

[313] But if you're just an actor and everyone's, playing.

[314] I don't know.

[315] I could just see where it's different for them than it was for me. Yeah.

[316] Very hard to get to that part.

[317] Very, very hard.

[318] And then, wait, hold on.

[319] Let me, let me backtrack.

[320] You were getting into punked, right?

[321] Right as I got kicked out.

[322] Ending.

[323] Yes.

[324] And then I think around the exact same time, you got Reno 911.

[325] Is that?

[326] Yeah.

[327] Yeah.

[328] Something like that.

[329] It was very soon after I was called into, because someone saw me subbing for another actor in a show, in a stage show.

[330] So that was my lucky thing that happened, right as I was about to, like I said, throw my headshots over the pier because why are we doing this?

[331] So that was, that was nice and that was wonderful validation.

[332] And then after that, you know, I got an agent who sucked and got a manager who also suck but you know the things started lining up a little bit sure yeah and also after such a long period of starving very little makes you feel pretty darn good for a while right like you're just delighted to have a place to report to work right and i i got to say i was never starving because i always had a survival job so at the time i was working at long beach state editing a social work journal.

[333] And I did that until 2012.

[334] Well, and before we even get into when you start working, I want to point out how your trip through the groundlings was unique in itself because we were all in general.

[335] We were all single or not in something serious.

[336] We all lived in one bedroom apartments.

[337] We lived in Hollywood or I lived in Santa Monica.

[338] But you were fully married and had a home in Long Beachish area.

[339] So that in itself was you were not like out prowling the, that's not a word, paralling, either prowling or, yeah, you weren't out on the town as like a young 20s Hollywood person.

[340] No, I wasn't.

[341] You had like a foundation.

[342] Yeah.

[343] And that was very rare.

[344] It was rare.

[345] And what was also rare is that my husband was the only person who ever encouraged this nonsense.

[346] Really?

[347] Yeah.

[348] meaning your family thought my family thought what are you doing what are you doing we did not raise you to do this uh -huh this is embarrassing for the whole family why why are you doing this you guys were baptist yeah okay so was it what element um bothered them about it was like that it was some kind of an egomaniacal pursuit to begin with or what was the the sticky thing well a lot of it was it was just so far outside of their comfort zone they didn't know what to do because my mom got married at 17 that's how it should be and didn't have to if you know what I'm saying she was not pregnant but she went to high school on the day of her wedding okay and so she had babies by the time she was 20 you know that that was her experience and she you know had most of her life lived within 10 miles, you know, so.

[349] You're also weirdly from California, which is unique in this endeavor.

[350] And, yeah, so that's weird.

[351] And it's also still weird that I still live in your hometown bit, in my hometown down the street from my parents.

[352] Yeah.

[353] That's how much that rubbed off on me. But yeah, so when I first did Reno, they were not pleased.

[354] Oh, they weren't because of the tone of it?

[355] They were not pleased.

[356] My mother wrote me a letter.

[357] And so did my grandpa.

[358] Again, these are people that live down the street, wrote me a letter saying, I am so disappointed in you.

[359] I want you to quit that show right now.

[360] I don't like these people.

[361] I don't like what you've become.

[362] How dare you?

[363] How dare you?

[364] Wow.

[365] Now, I think most people who watched that show understood that it, It was not a reality show.

[366] Yeah, I hope so.

[367] I really hope so.

[368] Maybe a few folks on mushrooms were channel surfing and got confused.

[369] And got confused and bless those people and they're caregivers.

[370] But, yeah, mom was like, we didn't raise you like this.

[371] You are smoking pot.

[372] You're talking badly.

[373] You know, my grandpa wrote me a note saying, I can't even look at you.

[374] Oh, my God.

[375] Oh, my goodness.

[376] It was ugly.

[377] Now, thank God, you weren't 21 when you got those letters, right?

[378] Right.

[379] I was 32.

[380] Yeah.

[381] So at that point, I said, well, you're not allowed to do this to me. It hurt.

[382] It really hurt.

[383] I live in fear still of disappointing my parents.

[384] But that was ridiculous.

[385] And I've, you know, I set my boundaries and whatever.

[386] But as time goes by, you know, I will tell them, hey, don't go see this movie.

[387] You're not going to like it.

[388] And if you do see it, I don't want to hear it.

[389] hear about it.

[390] Now, are they hypocritical in that did they not like comedies themselves?

[391] Or did they have favorite comedies?

[392] Oh, no. They loved comedy, but it was just seeing their daughter do it.

[393] Uh -huh.

[394] And honestly, I really feel it was just a parent's thing of people are going to think we raised her to say these things.

[395] Well, that's what I think I want to hone in on is I would imagine they had some fear that they would be embarrassed around town.

[396] Yes.

[397] That you were acting like a in the church druggy.

[398] Yes.

[399] When in reality, no one's paying that much attention to my parents to criticize their parenting.

[400] By the way, they're either not watching Reno 911 at all because they're unaware of it or they watch it, which means they like it.

[401] So there's really zero risk of it going sideways.

[402] Yeah.

[403] Yeah.

[404] So that was quite a mind fuck.

[405] Well, because you, although, let me ask you this, they were probably very proud that you had a job at a college.

[406] Yes, they were very proud.

[407] Yeah.

[408] And very excited that, you know, I've never asked for money.

[409] You know, all their other friends have, you know, the kids have either gotten badly into debt or had to move back home or, you know, terrible things that have happened.

[410] Me and my sister, we've never asked for anything.

[411] And so now as time has gone by, they say, oh, okay, you guys are both weirdos, but your self -sufficient weirdos and you don't rub off on, you know, you don't embarrass us out in the world.

[412] Every time I meet parents who have 20 plus something children, my first question of them is, are they off the payroll?

[413] And most often they're not.

[414] You know, I think it is pretty standard.

[415] Yeah.

[416] these days especially yeah you know you're there's no guarantee you're gonna get a job out of college yeah so when they didn't want you to pursue it did it what was your reaction to it was it um I'll show you was it like at what level did you want them to be proud of you or conversely fuck you look I did it like what what do you remember having a motivation one way or another yeah I remember I was working at this shitty hotel near Disneyland and hating my life and I didn't understand what I wanted to do.

[417] I mean, I didn't, I did know, but I didn't know how to go about it.

[418] And I just thought, is this my life?

[419] I'm going to work nine to five in this shitty hotel and just look forward to the weekends.

[420] Is that what my life is going to be?

[421] I'm going to look forward to my two o 'clock twicks just to break up the day.

[422] So that's when my best friend and I started taking class at the groundlings and kind of gave us something to look forward to but after that and after I got in the company got an agent blah blah blah I thought you know what I love doing this and maybe I won't make any money right maybe I won't and maybe I will throw my head shots off the pier but I have to keep doing this because now that I know what this is it has to be in my life yeah you took the green pillar whatever the matrix analogy exactly exactly so I just sort of committed to I'm always going to have something this fun in my life to look forward to.

[423] And if I don't, I'm going to go crazy.

[424] And as you already said, what's awesome is you have Greg, who has a stable job, and he's very supportive of you doing this because he recognizes it makes you happy.

[425] And that's pretty awesome.

[426] And now, you know, we just had our 22 year anniversary.

[427] It seems to be working out.

[428] Yeah, that's but like I'm, I'm able to give back to him in a way that I'm really happy I can do it.

[429] Because I mean, he worked two jobs at one point to get me through college and the groundlings.

[430] Yeah, he's a real sweetheart.

[431] He is.

[432] Thank you for saying that.

[433] And one thing, even like when I was thinking the other day that we would be talking, I was thinking what's unique in your situation is the general trajectory of a dude who's married and then gets famous and makes a lot of money is he ditches that first wife.

[434] That's true.

[435] It's sad to say, but that is a very, that's a very well -worn path that is taken.

[436] And you did not do that.

[437] No. Yeah.

[438] And is that a personal integrity thing?

[439] Is it a male -female thing?

[440] Do you have weird fantasies?

[441] We're like, well, maybe I could be with George Clooney in Lake Como.

[442] Because all of our egos are tricky as hell, right?

[443] Yeah, but the thing is, is like, I'm so spoiled.

[444] by him that it doesn't occur to me to look elsewhere.

[445] Honestly, no one would put up with my ass.

[446] Okay.

[447] I am a pain in the ass.

[448] I'm emotional.

[449] I'm moody.

[450] Okay.

[451] But I'm entertaining.

[452] Sure.

[453] On the eyes.

[454] And I fight fair.

[455] Yeah, on the eyes.

[456] I am nothing but fun.

[457] But like, he's just mine and I don't want to go anywhere.

[458] I don't want to be bad.

[459] Yeah.

[460] I don't.

[461] I don't.

[462] But you have an ego like all human beings.

[463] Do you not?

[464] Yeah, yeah.

[465] Let me just, I'll just say for myself, I'm you.

[466] Uh, yes, Greg.

[467] Gregett in my scenario has been so lovely, right?

[468] Uh -huh.

[469] But then I think, wow, if Natalie Portman came on to me, boy, that would feel really good to be liked by her.

[470] Right.

[471] I would minimally have some fantasies about, you know, just, I don't know.

[472] I think maybe, well, first of all, it's just you're a good person.

[473] And I'm probably not as good of a person as you, but...

[474] No, I don't think so.

[475] I just think it's admirable, I would say.

[476] Well, thank you.

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

[478] We've all been there.

[479] Turning to the internet to self -diagnose our inexplicable pains, debilitating body aches, sudden fevers, and strange rashes.

[480] 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.

[481] 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.

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

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

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

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

[486] Prime members can listen early and ad -free on Amazon music.

[487] What's up, guys?

[488] This is your girl Kiki, and my podcast is back with a new season.

[489] And let me tell you, it's too good.

[490] And I'm diving into the brains of entertainment's best and brightest, okay?

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

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

[493] I mean the likes of Amy Polar, Kell Mitchell, Vivica Fox.

[494] The list goes on.

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

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

[497] Now back to the hotel in Anaheim, because my grandparents ran a roadside motel on the border of Indiana and Michigan, in Sturgis, Michigan.

[498] And my grandma had the privilege of finding a couple dead bodies, which is kind of standard practice if you're running a motel.

[499] It kind of is, yeah.

[500] So I'm curious when you, what capacity did you work at the hotel and did you deal with any homicides or?

[501] Let's see.

[502] Well, I'll tell you this.

[503] And I'm trying to write a show about this hotel as well.

[504] I never dealt with anything dead.

[505] I worked in corporate sales.

[506] Oh, okay.

[507] Which is a fancy way of saying I tried to solicit business people to come and stay at our shitty hotel.

[508] And that was just far enough away from Disneyland to be inconvenient.

[509] Okay.

[510] Right.

[511] No upside.

[512] No. If you wanted a view of the El Torito or the rock breaking facts.

[513] factory next door.

[514] We could give you that.

[515] And if you love dealing with the Disney traffic en route to our hotel.

[516] Yes.

[517] This is for you.

[518] Yes.

[519] If you want a three mile drive that takes an hour and a half, come stay with us.

[520] Look no further.

[521] Look no further.

[522] You weren't really dealing with like people coming to the front desk and going like, I just fucked up my toilet and No, I heard all that stuff second hand.

[523] Yeah.

[524] I think we I think we need to call it.

[525] I think we need to call surveyor and maybe um a guy with a plumb bomb a hazmat company yeah i didn't have to deal with that thank goodness but you would hear things through the rumor mill yes yes and there's always hookers sure always i don't care where the hotel is i don't care how upscale or down market it is there are hookers at every hotel you can count on god bless the working girls yeah okay they're just trying to go to computer classes and feed their kids that's right that's right their parents Their parents too, probably aren't stoked with their life choice.

[526] They're wrestling with that.

[527] You know what?

[528] And was there effort made by the hotel to get rid of them?

[529] Or they were like, you know what?

[530] This is good for business.

[531] I don't think there was an effort to get rid of them because that's just fruitless.

[532] Uh -huh.

[533] Okay.

[534] You can't get rid of them.

[535] They can't be gotten rid of.

[536] And listen.

[537] If they pay their bill.

[538] Yeah.

[539] And they always do.

[540] What are you going to do?

[541] You can't govern what goes on in the room.

[542] I have the most...

[543] Really, unless there's a homicide.

[544] Okay.

[545] Inappropriate story that just popped into my head about a sexual experience I had at a hotel.

[546] Really?

[547] Monica knows this story.

[548] I didn't tell Chris in this for maybe nine years we were together before I said this had happened.

[549] But I was working on a movie in New Mexico.

[550] Okay.

[551] I don't go to strip clubs.

[552] It's not my thing simply because the reason I like sex is I like approval.

[553] Uh -huh.

[554] And paying for approval, something's lost for me. It is weird.

[555] Yeah, it's like, you like me because I gave you money.

[556] I just, it doesn't fill the hole I'm looking to fill.

[557] Okay.

[558] But we were shooting all nights.

[559] And so on our weekends, we were keeping those hours and quite literally the only thing open in Albuquerque was the strip clubs.

[560] So I went on several occasions with different cast members from the movie.

[561] Okay.

[562] And on one of these trips, I met a nice gal.

[563] And we exchanged numbers.

[564] A gal, he says.

[565] Go on.

[566] And this gal decided to come over to the hotel.

[567] there were moments where she was supposed to get there at two in the morning.

[568] I was like, cool, let's do this.

[569] At three in the morning, she still wasn't there.

[570] I'm starting to rethink it.

[571] By four in the morning, I'm like, I'm out.

[572] I don't want to do this.

[573] It's four in the morning.

[574] There's nothing I want to do it four in the morning.

[575] And she finally showed up.

[576] She had a humongous bag of McDonald's.

[577] And then she wanted to take a bath.

[578] And then I'm like, oh, my goodness, now we're taking a bath.

[579] Okay.

[580] I mean, I'm not taking a bath.

[581] She's taking a bath.

[582] Right.

[583] We're now banging on the door of 6 a .m. And I'm like, I don't want to have sex with.

[584] anybody at 6 a .m. And the sun's coming up.

[585] Just met, whatever.

[586] But I've invited her over, and we're going to do that.

[587] So we do that.

[588] Now, the hotel we were staying at had a free breakfast.

[589] Okay.

[590] And we got it every morning when we got off work after shooting all night long.

[591] The whole crew, right?

[592] We'd go eat breakfast and it was great.

[593] Yeah.

[594] Well, when the gal showed up, she had a roll -on bag.

[595] I guess she had her costumes from the strip club or whatever in this roll -on bag.

[596] And so it was a little weird when I opened the door and she had luggage because I thought, oh, is she planning on staying for a long time?

[597] Whatever.

[598] That's not, that's neither here nor there.

[599] We do things.

[600] She ends up leaving at 7 .30 in the morning or whatever.

[601] Okay.

[602] Oh, boy.

[603] The next day I go to work, then get off work, then we all go to get this free breakfast.

[604] And when we try to enter the dining room for the free breakfast, they want a hotel key.

[605] And I say, that's weird.

[606] You guys want to see our hotel key.

[607] I'm not used to doing that.

[608] I don't even know if I have mine on me. And the guy goes, oh, we got to start checking for keys because yesterday morning, a woman was posing as a guest and had a roll -on bag.

[609] And he described my lover.

[610] Oh, my.

[611] And when I found out was that this gal left my room.

[612] She had just had a huge bag of McDonald's, like an hour before Coitus, left my room and then stopped by the free buffet and was eating at, presumably pancakes and whatnot.

[613] Right.

[614] And then they asked her if she was a guest and she wasn't.

[615] And they thought she had this bag as a prop.

[616] So at any rate, I changed the entire policy at this embassy suites.

[617] Oh, you don't mess with embassy suites.

[618] That breakfast is a courtesy.

[619] So I'm sorry.

[620] I'm sorry.

[621] No, no, no, no. That's delightful.

[622] I wasn't at my best.

[623] I was lonely.

[624] I was shooting nights.

[625] And there were a lot of things where that gal gave me comfort.

[626] and then she did then try to get free a free breakfast out of the deal.

[627] And then the policy was changed.

[628] All right.

[629] Well, I think we've learned a lot.

[630] We've learned a lot.

[631] Well, first of all, night shoots, they mess with your head.

[632] And you find yourself doing weird things that you don't, you wouldn't do.

[633] Night shoots are really soul crushing.

[634] They really are.

[635] They're soul crushing.

[636] And it gives you a great appreciation for the many, American men and women who are working nights.

[637] It really fucks up here because I would get off work.

[638] And by the way, I was only a year sober at that point.

[639] So he was bringing back these really visceral memories of being up all night long doing drugs and coming out at home while the sun was up.

[640] So I was just in a, I hate, I was in a bad space just in general.

[641] Yeah, at the embassy suites for a couple months.

[642] And I needed some attention.

[643] Oh, a couple of months.

[644] That hurts my heart, Dax.

[645] Anywho, okay.

[646] So you're doing the ground lanes.

[647] And then you do well there and you get Reno 9 -1 -1.

[648] Yeah.

[649] And you do that for a few years, right?

[650] Uh -huh.

[651] I was on it for five seasons.

[652] It ran for six seasons.

[653] Yeah.

[654] Okay.

[655] And you were, were you fulfilled during that period or did you start setting your sights?

[656] Because again, our mind is so quick to readjust like, oh, I killed it just be on this.

[657] And then when you're on it, you're like, oh, I guess maybe I'd also kill the beat.

[658] Were you calibrating like what you wanted to do next?

[659] Yeah, I was.

[660] because you have to think three moves ahead, always.

[661] And as much...

[662] I got to remember to bring my bag.

[663] So I look like a hotel customer so I can get that free breakfast.

[664] Stock up for later.

[665] But yeah, three moves ahead.

[666] Three moves ahead.

[667] And while Reno was really fun, it was basic cable.

[668] So it didn't pay a lot of money.

[669] Right.

[670] And we shot the show so fast that, you know, I was, you know, we'd work for three weeks and then be off for a year.

[671] You know what I mean?

[672] So you have to fill your time.

[673] And again, I had my side hustle.

[674] I was editing that journal and that gave structure to my days.

[675] But I thought, well, I have to sow seeds so I can keep this going because I don't want to go backwards now.

[676] Yeah.

[677] Well, you're not a cookie cutter star.

[678] No. It's not like you go, oh, this person should do X, Y, or Z. You have to truly understand your unique talent and you're what you're.

[679] do so well.

[680] And you have to get in rooms and show people the goods.

[681] What?

[682] You know, nobody wants dessert until you parade the dessert cart by.

[683] So you have to parade that cart by all the time.

[684] Right.

[685] And then they say, oh, that looks good.

[686] I mean, don't you find that to be true?

[687] Yeah.

[688] Well, I'll decide out of mind.

[689] I'm guilty of this all the time myself.

[690] I'll like, I'll be casting something that I'm making.

[691] And I'm just totally forgetting someone that I think is brilliant.

[692] And then I run into them two years later and like, why don't you And I'm like, I don't know why.

[693] I should have.

[694] I just, I literally, what you weren't in my man at that moment in time.

[695] So you have to, you as the actor have to take the responsibility of getting your butt in certain rooms.

[696] And you have to strategize.

[697] And it's, it's work.

[698] It's a lot of work.

[699] Yes.

[700] And that's something that I will also, and then we'll move on from it.

[701] I would say there were a handful of really hard workers at the growlings.

[702] There were some people that were just, they were so funny.

[703] They couldn't help but be funny.

[704] And they could really just kind of get by, by getting cast and other people's sketches.

[705] They didn't have to write a ton, whatever.

[706] You worked incredibly hard.

[707] I will say that.

[708] And you worked incredibly hard.

[709] I like to think I did.

[710] Yeah, you did.

[711] You know you did.

[712] I'm not that great at evaluating myself accurately in that period.

[713] But yeah, you were a very, very hard worker.

[714] So in between Reno 911 and for me, the next big thing is bridesmaids.

[715] But there's a lot.

[716] There's work in between there.

[717] There's years go by in between.

[718] there and you're just steadily plotting along or they're steadily plotting along um doing guest spots and whatever which I was always happy to do and I didn't know this but it's kind of looked down upon like if you are starring in a show and then that show goes away for you to do guest spots it's kind of frowned upon like oh well why would you do that why are you going backwards but I never had those credits right so I had to fill in and I was happy to do it like waitress number two are you kidding me bring it I'm happy I'm very happy to do this so there was one year where I thought oh what the hell am I doing what am I going to do am I should I teach I don't want to right but I I tried I tried um teaching at the ground legs I tried training there and found that I am not good at it I am terrible at teaching It's good to know about yourself.

[719] Oh, yeah.

[720] Because Jess, who we talked about, Jess, by his own admission, not a great improver.

[721] I've gone to an improv class that he taught.

[722] Yeah.

[723] Brilliant teacher of improv.

[724] Really?

[725] Yes, knew those rules inside and out.

[726] I had forgotten half of them.

[727] He knew him like inside now and he's great at motivating people and encouraging them.

[728] And he was just a brilliant teacher.

[729] And I thought, oh, well, that's an interesting paradox there.

[730] Interesting.

[731] Jess Roland, a true unicorn.

[732] I've had him on this podcast to sing.

[733] Pippie Longstromp in Swedish.

[734] So people are pretty familiar with him.

[735] Six foot seven, redheaded kid.

[736] Talk about needy.

[737] Plays basketball and dances like a champion.

[738] You know?

[739] He could cheerlead and kick your ass.

[740] Yeah.

[741] Oh, he's amazing.

[742] So what year does Reno end and what year is bridesmaids?

[743] Let's see.

[744] Rino ended for me in 2007 I think and right around that time we had the first table read for bridesmaids oh really yeah so we we did the table read for that like three years before it filmed so that was weird that shows your listeners how long things take sometimes yeah so we shot that in 2010 and no one thought it was going to be sure anything I mean who's going to go see girls be funny who's going to see a bunch of girls yeah you know just girling around and being all girly talking about their menstrual cycles and yeah just bleeding all over everything but did you have a fear having been a part of it so if you if you did a table read three years before it shot at any point did you go like oh well they let me read that role because we're all friends but now that it's getting real and a studio's involved they're going to ditch me did you have any of those fears yeah absolutely and I thought but at least they let me read it what a good attitude you know You know, because I don't, that's, that is my attitude is I don't want anything that doesn't want me back.

[745] So if it's mine, it's going to come to me. There's nothing I can do to stop it.

[746] That's Monica's got a great piece of advice.

[747] Her grandma gave her that she gave us, which is love the thing that loves you back.

[748] My grandma didn't give it, but that is my piece of advice.

[749] That is true.

[750] She doesn't want it to be my grandma.

[751] Her grandma is so fucking hot.

[752] He loves my grandma.

[753] She's a stone cold tin.

[754] She was.

[755] She was.

[756] She's a whole grandma now.

[757] But obviously still got some swagger if Dax is mentioning it.

[758] He hasn't seen her in the flesh.

[759] A lot of people, they had a time machine, they would go back in time and kill Hitler.

[760] And I would go straight to India, 1939, and I would try to woo her away from her grandpa.

[761] Wow.

[762] Change the course of all of our lives.

[763] I'd be so proud of your granddaughter.

[764] That's a compliment.

[765] If I had a granddaughter as good as you, who's so smart, I'd be so happy.

[766] I love this conversation.

[767] I love where this is going.

[768] It's a weird one.

[769] I like it.

[770] Love the thing that loves you back.

[771] Yeah, that is my advice.

[772] I heard it somewhere.

[773] You were like, hey, if I'm supposed to be in this, I'll be in it.

[774] That's a really healthy perspective to have.

[775] And they called me in and I got to read and I was like, well, that's just nice.

[776] That's nice.

[777] I'm not going to get it.

[778] But how sweet of them to remember this and bring me in.

[779] And I really can't ask for more than that because it's probably out of their hands.

[780] But I know nothing about that movie behind the scenes.

[781] So I'm only theorizing.

[782] But I have to imagine it was Universal, maybe it was a studio.

[783] Uh -huh.

[784] Yes.

[785] At some point, they're saying we should get Anna Kendra or whatever.

[786] I don't know who the popular people were at that time.

[787] But certainly they were suggesting to fill those slots with a lot of known people probably.

[788] And Melissa McCarthy was not one of those people at that time.

[789] Yeah.

[790] And you were not one of those people.

[791] No. So who was it that had the integrity that was saying to them?

[792] No, no, no. It's going to be these.

[793] Was it was Christian?

[794] Kristen Whig and Annie Mummolo that at least, you know, at least made the suggestion of, look, we wrote this with these people in mind and you should at least see them.

[795] Yeah.

[796] And then probably Judd, too, knew that that was a recipe that had worked for him.

[797] He must have.

[798] And Paul.

[799] I mean, I got to say, they were very fair.

[800] They brought in everybody.

[801] And so when I kept going back, I thought, again, this is just so nice of them to bring me in.

[802] here you know my grandpa had just died days before i did not feel funny uh -huh i did not want to go in i i almost canceled oh because i just wasn't i wasn't feeling it but again that's sometimes when you make the biggest breakthroughs is when you don't care oh because you bring nothing into the room that people can pick up on you know i have uh i i have said that i think auditioning is not on like dating, which is a healthy dose of I don't need this can go a long way to being attractive to other people.

[803] Right.

[804] And now as that may be.

[805] It isn't because now when you go into audition, you don't dread it anymore because you release the need to even care.

[806] Like, oh, I'm doing a free acting class today.

[807] And it comes in other ways.

[808] Some of it's like some financial security.

[809] Some of it is like other jobs.

[810] Some of it for me is like I have kids like, okay, if I'm not blank, I'm still a dad, which is probably my number one source of self -esteem.

[811] So, you know, how bad can any of this get?

[812] All those things are, to me, helpful hijacks of my own fear going into rooms.

[813] Right.

[814] So when I, you know, I went in, I think, three times, three different auditions.

[815] And then I get a call.

[816] It's Kristen and Annie on the phone.

[817] And they said, Wendy, thanks for coming in.

[818] This feels mean.

[819] Yeah.

[820] It was really nice.

[821] and after they saw everybody, they decided that they want you to do it.

[822] You bitches.

[823] But anyway, so that, you know, great.

[824] We're going to do it.

[825] Okay, that's, that's, again, just so nice of you guys to even think of me. Well, you're going to hang out with four friends, right?

[826] For a while.

[827] And it was great.

[828] Because it's all groundlings.

[829] Ellie was not a groundling and neither was Roseberg.

[830] And Rose had never done comedy before, and she was great.

[831] So, yeah, so that ended up being a nice little turning point.

[832] But my manager at the time said, I don't think you should do this movie.

[833] I don't think it's funny.

[834] He would call me on Ambien or something.

[835] He would call me at weird times of the night and just ramble, ramble, ramble.

[836] And he'd call me and he'd say, you know what you need to do?

[837] Write a blockbuster movie.

[838] I can't think of anything else.

[839] That's what you need to do.

[840] Oh, my God.

[841] you do that, I really don't know what we're going to do for you.

[842] And you shouldn't do this movie.

[843] I don't find it funny.

[844] It doesn't resonate with me at all.

[845] Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

[846] I mean, I would put the phone in a drawer, go do something else.

[847] I'd take the phone out of the drawer.

[848] He'd still be rambling on and on and on.

[849] So again, if I had listened to this fool, and I did listen to him for three years thinking there is, he's got a bigger plan.

[850] He's got a bigger plan.

[851] He didn't have a plan.

[852] He didn't have a plan.

[853] He's just a normal human being that was fallible and was trying to as best of...

[854] Well, you're being very nice.

[855] I want to say he was a jackalope who was on drugs.

[856] Well, let's just say he probably wasn't malicious.

[857] He wasn't nefarious.

[858] He didn't wake up and go, how can I ruin Wendy.

[859] He just didn't know how the hell to help you.

[860] He just didn't know what to do.

[861] And he felt compelled to say words to you.

[862] Yes.

[863] As if he had some plan and fill that space.

[864] And also, he couldn't get to sleep.

[865] And he needed to take ambient and he built up a tolerance.

[866] Right.

[867] And take two and three at a time sometimes.

[868] And when we'd have an in person meeting, he'd run to the bathroom constantly.

[869] Oh, okay.

[870] So either IBS or maybe powdering his nose.

[871] Maybe.

[872] We will never know.

[873] We'll never know.

[874] We don't need to.

[875] I wish we had like a hotline where we could call them and just go, hey, just want to clear this up.

[876] We do not want to misrepresent you.

[877] Were you a drug addict or IBS?

[878] Those are the only two options you can pick.

[879] But you shoot the movie and then it comes out.

[880] And can we just for a second, fall on over Melissa?

[881] Yeah.

[882] Because you and I knew Melissa McCarthy for at that point eight years.

[883] And I knew her to be, because I was in a. comedy troupe with her way before we were in the Sunday company or anything else.

[884] Right.

[885] I knew her to be the funniest human being I'd ever seen in real life.

[886] Yes.

[887] Like in 3D.

[888] Absolutely.

[889] Absolutely.

[890] And I was so excited when she got Gilmore Girls because she like bought a home and had a paycheck and that was mind blowing.

[891] Oh, yeah.

[892] She was always the gold standard because it was like, excuse me, Melissa has two couches.

[893] Do you understand?

[894] Like every room in her house is a different color.

[895] I don't know if you guys get it.

[896] Yeah.

[897] Like she was always, you know, had a fridge full of food, had parties.

[898] Like she was doing great.

[899] Oh, she was an icon.

[900] And but there was a part of me that thought, well, this is great.

[901] I would kill to be in her position.

[902] But part of me also was like, yet there's an injustice happening because she's female Bill Murray and she might be in a golden cage.

[903] She might be trapped in a gold jail cell.

[904] Yeah.

[905] Because she is a comedic franchise just waiting to happen.

[906] happen, but it's not going to happen in this lane she's in.

[907] So when bridesmaids came out, I just felt like there was this cosmic justice happened.

[908] Yes.

[909] And I remember thinking, wait, why doesn't everybody know she?

[910] Wait a minute.

[911] You really have never seen her do this before?

[912] Like, but taking for granted that she had not been given.

[913] Yeah, she hadn't been given the opportunity to do that.

[914] But we'd seen her on stage and we knew, oh, she's got some stuff up her sleeve.

[915] Like, people are not, they don't know what she's capable of.

[916] So that was kind of cool to see her.

[917] So for me, it was so exciting to watch that explosion.

[918] Yeah.

[919] And likewise, so happy for you, because I love you and I'd known you for a decade.

[920] You're so sweet.

[921] It was such a cool thing.

[922] It didn't happen that way for me. You didn't get $20 million for your next movie?

[923] I didn't.

[924] Oh, okay.

[925] And yet, and yet, it's okay.

[926] Like, I still, I get by, Dax.

[927] Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[928] You have a beautiful.

[929] I do all right.

[930] I don't even know what color to describe it.

[931] You have been the most uniquely colored Tesla I've ever seen in my life.

[932] I can't help.

[933] Ash green, I'd call it.

[934] Ash green.

[935] Ash green car that caught on fire and is now ash.

[936] Exactly.

[937] There you go.

[938] So was there any?

[939] Okay, so immediately after Bridesmaids, Melissa becomes a gigantic star.

[940] Yes.

[941] Kristen has every offer in the world Everyone just explodes Did you feel like you did not have an explosion after that And were you at all jealous?

[942] I didn't have the explosion to that degree But I can't say that I was hurting Right you know You are getting people wanted to meet you Yeah I was doing okay And it allowed me to fire my reps Because they were wrong And had nothing lined up for me So I got new reps got that all situated and I mean I've worked pretty nonstop I can't yeah you know I'm doing all right absolutely you're the lead of a hit sitcom I mean I don't really know what more managed to work out in some weird way and yeah yeah yeah um yeah now why wasn't there a bridesmaids too I think I find it very frustrating that yeah especially because that would happen in an era where you guys could have done three and they would have all done well.

[943] Kristen wasn't up for it.

[944] Didn't want to do it.

[945] And that's the long and short of it.

[946] And did you ever call her and go like, hey, bro, why not?

[947] Let's go have fun.

[948] No, because I know everybody else has done that.

[949] And she didn't want to.

[950] Yeah.

[951] And you can't make someone do something that they don't want to do.

[952] But yeah, it was, it is weird.

[953] Yeah.

[954] That we haven't.

[955] But you know what, life is long and maybe she'll reconsider.

[956] I mean, Anchorman, too, happened 10 years after the fact.

[957] Yeah.

[958] But yeah, I don't know.

[959] The whole thing is curious to me. And then it forces me to take on my favorite role, which is armchair psychologist.

[960] Okay.

[961] I love it.

[962] Because it needs an explanation to me. I can't fathom.

[963] We all started in the groundlings.

[964] We all want to do comedy.

[965] And then you have something that is just a humongous success.

[966] And then you go, don't want to do it again.

[967] I need an explanation for that.

[968] So I just end up coming up with some theories that may or may not hold water.

[969] Let's hear.

[970] Well, again, I don't know any of this to be true.

[971] This is just what I'm thinking.

[972] I think we all, it's such a bizarre mental human ego thing.

[973] It's like soon as we get the thing we think we want and we don't.

[974] Don't feel fulfilled because we've told herself, I've told myself, if I ever ever the number one comedy in America that I've written, that'll be the day I love Dax Shepard.

[975] I look in the mirror.

[976] I go, you motherfucker, look at this guy.

[977] You did it.

[978] You're great.

[979] You're perfect.

[980] If you haven't recognized yet that work success won't translate into self -esteem.

[981] Yes.

[982] Very, very important listeners.

[983] Listen to Dax right now.

[984] So if you get this number one movie.

[985] Yeah.

[986] And all of a sudden, you're Kristen and you don't feel fantastic, then you go, oh, I guess I need recognition in a dramatic field.

[987] I need to prove myself in a whole other arena.

[988] Then I'm a great actor.

[989] And if I do that, then I'm going to feel awesome when I look in the mirror.

[990] And so I'm not going to do this comedy thing.

[991] And now I'm going to prove that I, because I already proved I can do that thing and it didn't make me feel good.

[992] So now I'm going to prove I can do something else.

[993] And I just think that's an incredible.

[994] human thing to do.

[995] How many actors are like, they become huge actors and are like, no, I need to be seen as a musician.

[996] I've got to be seen as a serious musician.

[997] Maybe they're serious musicians.

[998] I don't know, but I have to assume some of those people are dealing with, they've told themselves they'd feel a certain way.

[999] If they achieved X, Y, or Z when you do that, you don't feel that way.

[1000] You've got to try to achieve another thing you think will make you feel that way.

[1001] I think that's a very valid theory.

[1002] But don't you think it also could just be a real fear that it would be, it would get ruined this thing that ended up pretty perfect if she did another one and it was not as good or not as well received or whatever happens that that would diminish the whole thing well i i can definitely believe she thought that but i don't subscribe to the theory that doing something else can ruin something that already exists right i don't believe that so you could make another movie that didn't live up to that first one but that second movie might also still be incredibly entertaining Smoking the Bannett 2 is not as good as smoking the band at 1, but I still love it.

[1003] Yeah.

[1004] And then in the rare case, you make Godfather 2 and it's better than the first one.

[1005] So sure, you could think that, but I would think that would be a hiccup of thinking as well.

[1006] Yeah, I agree.

[1007] But I do understand this idea of like she wants the whole conversation to be bridesmaids was flawless.

[1008] Incredible and took the world by storm.

[1009] And if there's multiple that aren't as good, then it's.

[1010] It's like, oh, but the second one was not that good.

[1011] But that's fine.

[1012] Like, you don't, she probably just doesn't want that in the conversation at all.

[1013] Or it could be that she just was burnout on it.

[1014] Because, again, we did the first table read in 2007.

[1015] So by the time we finished up with everything in 2012, it could have been just, I don't want to hear about bridesmaids anymore.

[1016] Sure.

[1017] I'm sick of it.

[1018] There could have been people that she would have been forced to work with on that, that she no longer wanted to work with.

[1019] So that's part of totally plausible.

[1020] Let me also state, I love Kristen Wick.

[1021] I think she's the nicest.

[1022] Nobody doesn't love Kristen.

[1023] She's one of the sweetest people out there.

[1024] I'm not accusing her of anything that I would think was a moral judgment of her.

[1025] I actually think she's phenomenal as a person on top of everything else.

[1026] But we have a real life example.

[1027] You can look at Hangover.

[1028] So I don't share this opinion, but a lot of people didn't like Hangover too.

[1029] I actually loved it because I thought the filmmaking was like Michael Mann level brilliant.

[1030] Third one, I don't think I loved.

[1031] But regardless, I think in general people don't think the second, third installments were as good as the first.

[1032] But I don't think that anyone's then gone back and retroactively said Hangover One wasn't brilliant.

[1033] Have they done that?

[1034] Right.

[1035] I don't think so.

[1036] But I could see how Todd Phillips would not like that there were components that were not good when the first one was humongous.

[1037] Uh -huh.

[1038] I agree with everything.

[1039] you're saying, but I can also see what's happening with the people who've invented this in their brain.

[1040] Yes.

[1041] That they're a little narrative at that moment.

[1042] Anyways, I think it would have been fun if you guys would all got together and partied again.

[1043] Everyone made like $40 million.

[1044] That would have been fun.

[1045] Making tons of money is fun in my experience.

[1046] I've found that to be true in my life as well.

[1047] Stay tuned for more armchair expert if you dare.

[1048] Now, how long did you live in the house I used to go to to write?

[1049] before you change?

[1050] You don't still live in that house?

[1051] We moved a year ago.

[1052] A year ago?

[1053] Yeah.

[1054] So, and now we live down the street from that house.

[1055] So we still own it, but we live on a hill.

[1056] And you put cameras in it and you're renting it and then voyeuristically watching the tenants live their life.

[1057] Yes.

[1058] It's a great way to live.

[1059] And I like it because I'm real antisocial, but this makes me feel like I'm like I have friends.

[1060] Sure.

[1061] Sure.

[1062] Now, I think I'll go straight to you.

[1063] So Goldbergs, explain to me how that comes about.

[1064] So I had done a recurring role on a show called Rules of Engagement.

[1065] David, David, David, David, Spade.

[1066] Oliver Hudson, yeah.

[1067] Beautiful man, right?

[1068] Isn't he a beautiful man?

[1069] Oh, my God.

[1070] It's so, I used to hang out with him a lot and we'd play poker.

[1071] And I couldn't concentrate on my hand.

[1072] And sweet.

[1073] Beautiful, nice man. And funny.

[1074] Yeah.

[1075] So good looking though.

[1076] good looking it's it'll hurt your feeling it doesn't do his hair i'm not sure that he he makes or he doesn't he doesn't care it doesn't really matter how things lay and fall he's gorgeous just accidentally sexy yeah just brings it oops woke up like this um and his new show what is it called handsome something splitting up together splitting up together handsome is it said in handsomville us yeah it is it is he's the mayor he's the mayor Um, okay, so I had done that and, and I kind of, was that multi -cam?

[1077] It was multi -cam.

[1078] Which was very interesting.

[1079] No, no. Um, so through that.

[1080] But did it take you back to Grinley?

[1081] I just did it for the first time this year.

[1082] I kind of did.

[1083] I love it.

[1084] Yeah.

[1085] Like, oh, but someone's reacting to what I'm saying?

[1086] This is amazing.

[1087] And the hours are sweet.

[1088] Forget it.

[1089] Really good.

[1090] But so because of that, I got, I got an offer.

[1091] to do the Goldbergs.

[1092] So that was kind of cool.

[1093] Yeah, absolutely.

[1094] You're just offering it to me?

[1095] That's nuts.

[1096] Prior to that, I had done a pilot for ABC with John Leguizamo and Christopher Lloyd.

[1097] Hmm.

[1098] And 21 gigawatts.

[1099] Is that the guy?

[1100] That's the one.

[1101] That didn't go, but they filmed it twice because they thought, you know, this is a good idea.

[1102] We love this cast.

[1103] Let's try it again.

[1104] But there was nowhere for it to go.

[1105] Uh -huh.

[1106] But so then I was in the ABC stable of hose.

[1107] Oh, okay.

[1108] So then it was like, oh, we got this thing.

[1109] Did you have a holding deal with them?

[1110] I didn't.

[1111] Okay.

[1112] I did not.

[1113] Okay.

[1114] I didn't think that would be a good thing.

[1115] I think that usually ends up not being great.

[1116] Right.

[1117] But anyway, so I got the Goldberg through that.

[1118] Now, when I was with the agent that told me not to do bridesmaids, I said, you know, I have this idea for a show that takes place in the 80s.

[1119] And I pitched them this idea, and he says, you know, no one wants to see that.

[1120] No one wants to see a show about the 80s.

[1121] It's too expensive.

[1122] And it's the 80s, which nobody cares about.

[1123] So go back to the drawing board.

[1124] Cut to, here I am on season 6 of a show that takes place in the 80s that seems to be doing all right.

[1125] So anyway.

[1126] When you leave here, will you please give me his number?

[1127] I will absolutely name.

[1128] I'll tell you why I want his number because every time I think of an idea I'm going to call him and pitch it to him and if he loves it I'm going to abandon the idea and if he hates it I'm going to like dedicate a lot of time to developing it I like it sounds like he has the perfect opposite radar yeah to work I you know what I think you you have a really good theory there my uncles had a family friend that was so bad at betting that they literally would wait to he bet on a football team and then they just always take the opposite.

[1129] Really?

[1130] And they did quite well for decades based on betting against, I believe it was Victor.

[1131] Okay.

[1132] All right.

[1133] No, I like that.

[1134] He could serve as my Victor in this.

[1135] Use everything at your disposal.

[1136] All weapons.

[1137] And he knows nothing.

[1138] And I think your instinct is good.

[1139] So you just got straight, a cast and offered to be in the Goldbergs.

[1140] And did you have any fear of like, wow, okay, this is a big swing.

[1141] I'm going to be the lead of the.

[1142] show it'll be my face on the posters if it tanks it's all on my shoulders any fear like that i never thought about that oh wow i never thought about that until until into season one people started saying that to me oh saying saying like well i mean that's got to feel weird that you're carrying the whole show oh and i thought am i god i thought i was having a good time i I don't know.

[1143] Then I started getting in my head a little bit.

[1144] But I, look, it's going to do what it does.

[1145] Yeah.

[1146] I think it's funny.

[1147] I think America thinks it's funny.

[1148] It seems to be working.

[1149] I think it's an ensemble show, really.

[1150] But yeah, it's funny how you don't think about these things.

[1151] And then someone gets in your head and then really makes you feel bad.

[1152] And you don't want to think they're doing it on purpose.

[1153] And by the way, they're just transferring their fear to you, which is what I just did.

[1154] Like, I have that fear of like, oh, man, if I'm on all the billboards and everyone knows and then it fails, I'll be so embarrassed.

[1155] That's my fear.

[1156] Oh, wow.

[1157] So I'm just asking you if you have a similar fear, but then I'm expecting you.

[1158] No, I feel like if it failed and my name was on the billboard and all of this, it would just go away and no one would think about it anymore.

[1159] Well, you're right.

[1160] That is actually the reality of it all.

[1161] And then even I'll go a step further.

[1162] How egotical of me to think that the vehicle that isn't the star, that this shows the star, the concept is the star, the writing's the star, the show's the star.

[1163] Dak Shepard's not the star.

[1164] He's a part of this thing.

[1165] And so why would I even take all that credit for it failing?

[1166] Do you do that a lot?

[1167] Do you find yourself doing that a lot?

[1168] Do you take yourself to that headspace?

[1169] I take myself, yeah, the calculation I run through in my head is how am I going to be humiliated in the future?

[1170] Okay.

[1171] How will I be embarrassed and how do I head that off in the past?

[1172] Okay.

[1173] So like how do I not say something around the bully that's going to give him ammo to come at me?

[1174] And yes, I have a very defensive, proactively defensive view of the world.

[1175] That's so interesting.

[1176] It's lessening.

[1177] It has dissipated with more and more proof that that's not how the world works.

[1178] Yes, I think a lot of my life has been trying to not give someone ammo to embarrass me or humiliate me or shame me or whatever it is.

[1179] Isn't that interesting?

[1180] Yeah.

[1181] Well, you are a many -level person.

[1182] Well, do you have an older?

[1183] You have a younger sibling, right?

[1184] I have a younger sibling, yeah.

[1185] And my brother is a beautiful human being.

[1186] This is not an assassination on his character.

[1187] But it is the older brother's job to fucking tease and ridicule you from day one.

[1188] So I just think as a way of life, I didn't give him any ammo.

[1189] I wouldn't do anything in front of him that I could potentially fail at and then be embarrassed in front of him or let him make fun of me. So, you know, maybe it's just growing up as the younger brother that I am more careful about when I'm going to put myself out there.

[1190] That's so, I'm very surprised to hear this.

[1191] You're someone that I would never worry about.

[1192] You know that.

[1193] Do you know this about yourself?

[1194] No, tell me about this.

[1195] Okay, let me tell you about yourself.

[1196] This is an observation.

[1197] Again, I haven't had FaceTime with you in a long time.

[1198] Too long.

[1199] Too long.

[1200] Working with you at the groundlings, and again, that was a year, year and a half that we did that.

[1201] But it was constant.

[1202] So you get to know a person.

[1203] And the way you just spoke about Melissa.

[1204] Uh -huh.

[1205] Is the way we all thought about you.

[1206] I don't believe.

[1207] I don't accept that for one second.

[1208] I will, well, I'm going to go further.

[1209] I'm going to go further, Dax.

[1210] Okay.

[1211] That you know you're the whole package.

[1212] You know that you're talented.

[1213] You can write.

[1214] You've got hustle.

[1215] You're good looking.

[1216] But on top of that, you have that little extra that little dash of tahine okay that this is so hard for me to accept no I've seen people fall in love with you men and women oh wow like you weave a spell okay and I've seen people like so fall under your spell to where you how do I want to say this you're like a wizard oh my goodness I don't even feel unethical.

[1217] Like a charisma wizard.

[1218] Like a David Koresh or...

[1219] You could start your own religion and people would follow it.

[1220] Oh, Jesus.

[1221] All right.

[1222] Everyone would.

[1223] I would tithe.

[1224] I'm ready to tithe to you.

[1225] But...

[1226] No, I've never had that image of myself.

[1227] You have that little something where you're always going to be okay.

[1228] And so it...

[1229] I'm just surprised that you have an Achilles heel.

[1230] of any sort when it comes to these things because I always thought like, well, let's see, this punk thing might work out for Dax, but he'll get on a show at some point.

[1231] And maybe he'll do theater for a while.

[1232] Maybe he'll write some things.

[1233] But in the end, he could end up being a shark hunter.

[1234] And that'll be fine too.

[1235] That sounds really good.

[1236] Because you have, you have many dimensions.

[1237] And if anything, I always felt like you might have a hard time picking.

[1238] Oh, wow.

[1239] Because you're good at so many things.

[1240] You know this.

[1241] Well, listen, all I want in life is to be told basically what you just told me. Well, there you go.

[1242] And it is so hard.

[1243] And we've, we've recorded it.

[1244] It's so crazy.

[1245] That's crazy to me. Yeah.

[1246] That's crazy to me. Yeah.

[1247] So because I didn't work for 10 years, by the time, you and I met and I got punked.

[1248] I had been out here doing nothing for 10 years.

[1249] So I had a lot of data to suggest I wasn't going to be okay.

[1250] Now, I'm fucking 43.

[1251] But you always, you always had food on the table.

[1252] You always had money.

[1253] You're 100 % right.

[1254] And it took me years.

[1255] About five years ago, I finally said to myself, Jesus, dude, just look at the facts.

[1256] You're fine.

[1257] Every year you've made some money, it's going to work out.

[1258] And now, and also just having to say to myself, you're 43.

[1259] When are you going to acknowledge it worked out.

[1260] Like you're going to miss the whole.

[1261] I really thought, oh, what are you going to wait to your deathbed to look back and go?

[1262] It worked out all right.

[1263] But I had to make a choice to start basically making a gratitude list regularly to remind myself like, no, dude, everything's fine.

[1264] Don't wait till the end to take your foot off the gas of panic.

[1265] So anyways, it's bizarre to hear you say that about me. But that was not my opinion on myself.

[1266] You've been making it work in one of the most expensive cities in the world.

[1267] Right, yeah.

[1268] You're doing fine.

[1269] I've never been hungry.

[1270] In a business where logic does not rain.

[1271] Yeah, that's true.

[1272] You're doing great.

[1273] We're both doing great.

[1274] Yay.

[1275] Now, and I feel terrible.

[1276] I just hijacked the whole thing to make it about me. No, you didn't hijack anything.

[1277] You, now, you get on the Goldbergs.

[1278] Yeah.

[1279] And how neurotic are you?

[1280] you about checking in with what people are thinking about the show?

[1281] Is that something you suffer from or did you start maybe where you were neurotic and then you've backed off?

[1282] Tell me what you're.

[1283] I was neurotic at first.

[1284] It's impossible not to be right?

[1285] Because again, everyone sends you.

[1286] Oh, you know, everybody's a cub reporter and they got to send you all their bullshit.

[1287] You know, oh, here's this, this critic said this and this critic said this.

[1288] And that really was tough.

[1289] And then you get on Twitter and you engage in the emotional cutting that is Twitter, you know, and now they want you to live tweet with the fans.

[1290] But again, if this was all so terrible, I don't have to do it.

[1291] Oh, sure.

[1292] You know, look, I think, I think, yeah, all this goes without saying you're super grateful to have this crazy, rare opportunity.

[1293] Yeah, yeah.

[1294] And poor as any of us to deal with any of the stuff.

[1295] Great.

[1296] Now, with that said, you're a human being.

[1297] There's a couple on any given day, 10 ,000 people casting an opinion about you, how you act, how funny you are, how you look, what your hair looks like, what clothes you're wearing, all these things.

[1298] And you're a human being.

[1299] It doesn't matter if you have $10 billion in the bank or they gave you a fucking star on the Hollywood Boulevard.

[1300] That doesn't matter if someone's telling you your hair looks like it's made of straw or something.

[1301] You're just going to go, wait, does my hair look like that?

[1302] I need to think about it.

[1303] I have people all the time, like, tweet me like, your Botox looks terrible.

[1304] I'm like, what are you talking?

[1305] You're saying?

[1306] Oh, my God.

[1307] And then it's like, your fillers are, you've had this, like, people accuse me of like plastic surgery.

[1308] Now, I've owned the fact that I had a very comprehensive laser treatment called CO2 laser.

[1309] Oh, okay.

[1310] Oh, yeah.

[1311] It takes it down to the studs.

[1312] You can't even sit next to an open window.

[1313] In the car world, we'd call it a. frame off restoration.

[1314] Yeah, they just burnt my whole face off and said, oh, it'll heal back normal.

[1315] So I did have that and I'll own the shit out of that.

[1316] But these other things, people accuse me of facelips and stuff.

[1317] And it hurts my feelings.

[1318] Yeah.

[1319] I'm sorry.

[1320] I'm a human.

[1321] And I think, oh my God, that's what people are saying around town is that I've had a bunch of cosmetic surgery.

[1322] No, I wish I could be a strong enough person to say it doesn't hurt, okay?

[1323] Because you're just a sad loser.

[1324] Yeah.

[1325] Yeah.

[1326] Hiding behind your keyboard.

[1327] But yeah, it does.

[1328] hurt.

[1329] It does hurt.

[1330] And I wish that, I wish we weren't there as a society, but that's how people weigh in and it really stinks.

[1331] Yeah, it's a double -edged sword.

[1332] So there's this huge positive aspect that all these people follow you and you can potentially get out things you care about.

[1333] Like I know you stopped editing that thing in 2012, but that's an issue clearly.

[1334] Those issues concern you.

[1335] Social justice.

[1336] Yeah.

[1337] And you got to be, you have this platform to put that out and that's great.

[1338] And then you got to deal with some of the riff raft that goes along with it.

[1339] But my thing is like, I'll read something and I'll go, oh, that's ridiculous, right?

[1340] Like I even had someone, like people also, not as much anymore, but people used to always like maybe accuse me of riding Kristen's coattails or that she made more money than me and as a male.

[1341] That was so, my ego is so fragile that I would want to respond like, no, I have more money.

[1342] I mean, literally I'm comprehending, I'm contemplating telling strangers that I have more money in the bank account than Kristen 10 years ago.

[1343] How insane is that?

[1344] Because I'm so threatened.

[1345] But I read it and I go, oh, that's stupid.

[1346] I don't care.

[1347] But then the test for me is I'm driving by myself two hours later and that tweet is in my head.

[1348] I'm like, I'm rereading it in my head.

[1349] And I go, I have to admit that this has an effect on me. Yeah.

[1350] Or when people say, well, you're childless.

[1351] Oh, yeah.

[1352] No, yeah, I am.

[1353] But that's because you're barren.

[1354] It's not because I'm.

[1355] I am barren and I'm proud of it.

[1356] no yeah and i and things like that bother me why i i consciously chose not to have kids so why am i upset when someone brings it up but so box that for a minute for me because um i'm guilty of a lot of times on here i want people like you to have kids well hey i have them and i fucking love it right i know you're the best so it's like if i have a car i love i'm like hey if you're in the market for a new car man this one's great i'm just going to tell you like i happen to get a lot out of this.

[1357] So there's a testimonial that it's fun, I'm going to give it to you.

[1358] Okay.

[1359] Second is there are people that I respect that I want to populate the earth.

[1360] Okay.

[1361] So I will often be like kind of trying to nudge the people I think would be good to populate more people.

[1362] Okay.

[1363] And then in doing so, I must regularly shame people the way you're talking about.

[1364] Okay.

[1365] So, yeah, just walk me through what it's like to be a woman in the public eye who doesn't have kids and what.

[1366] Yeah.

[1367] I get so many shamed.

[1368] Shady comments from people.

[1369] Maybe they don't mean it to be that way, but that's how it comes across because you're starting to get into my family planning sector, which is none of your business.

[1370] You know what I mean?

[1371] I have legit, never wanted children.

[1372] I did not play with dolls when I was younger.

[1373] I thought it was a lot of work.

[1374] I love kids, but I just, I'm 48, and I feel like I'm too.

[1375] immature.

[1376] Now, I read things about like, oh, Diane Keaton adopted her first kid at 50.

[1377] Maybe at 50 I'll feel like doing that.

[1378] Maybe there will be some weird revelation and that's what I'll want to do.

[1379] And I'll do it then.

[1380] I'm not closed off to that.

[1381] But I've just never had the urge to have anyone pass through my body.

[1382] And my sister hasn't either.

[1383] We're more than happy not having them.

[1384] I don't feel like anything's missing.

[1385] And armchair psychologize it for me. Tell me why do you think people do that?

[1386] I think some people might do that because it's something they can lord over another person.

[1387] I feel like maybe they do it because they think oh God you really can sleep till whenever you want.

[1388] Like you don't answer to anybody.

[1389] Wow, I should have rethought this.

[1390] You and Greg could go on vacation.

[1391] Uh -huh.

[1392] Fun thing is, we don't.

[1393] Well, then fuck, then now I think you really should.

[1394] You know, when you have parents who are older who need you to be around, you don't get to go off as much as you want to.

[1395] And that's fine.

[1396] It's fine.

[1397] Yeah, I don't.

[1398] Well, I think there's, other than that, I can't.

[1399] There's a lot of, I think there's so many layers to it.

[1400] So I gave you the two layers I have.

[1401] But I also think there is, it is a, it is a lever.

[1402] to shame people to shame women weirdly like I just said barren and I guess the equivalent for that for a man is to be seen as impotent like that that would be the ultimate failure for your gender is to be impotent and then likewise to be barren right and we just all inherited these 100 ,000 year old principles or whatever it is and then I think there's also for a certain little subset there are people that regret they didn't pursue something.

[1403] with all their heart and then you did but you don't have kids and then maybe their justification for why they didn't give their all to something as well I had kids and that's more important so now I feel shitty about that but but I've come up with the way out of it and now I've got to include you in it right and imagine being a child of one of those people where they're like well I was going to do this but then I had kids and I love them.

[1404] I love them.

[1405] They're great.

[1406] I never regretted it.

[1407] It's such a blessing, such a blessing.

[1408] But yeah, had I not had kids, I really would have been on Broadway.

[1409] Yeah.

[1410] Or whatever, or whatever bullshit things.

[1411] Like, don't pin that on your kids.

[1412] Yeah.

[1413] Do not pin that on your kids.

[1414] But no. And then now let me come even from another angle of it, which is I have a favorite analogy that I kind of learn maybe in AA, which is I generally only respond to comments that I have fear of myself.

[1415] Okay.

[1416] So my example is always like I could read a thousand comments on Twitter that all said, Dax, you're too short.

[1417] Okay.

[1418] I could read a billion.

[1419] It will never bother me because I don't have any fear of being too short.

[1420] I just know objectively I'm tall.

[1421] And so when something is bothering me, to me it's a little bit of a clue of right or wrong, oh, I must have that fear of myself a little bit, right?

[1422] So the Kristen thing, even though I knew at the those time.

[1423] Now she does have more money than me. I can own it.

[1424] At that time when I had more money, the notion that people would think that I didn't and she did is because I put a lot of value on financial security.

[1425] I think it's a defining characteristic of a man to be self -sufficiency.

[1426] There's all these.

[1427] I have all this baggage about money and worth and my real value is tied to my financial value, all these things.

[1428] So I go, okay, the accusation.

[1429] The accusation.

[1430] is inaccurate, but I have some work to do on this topic, or it really wouldn't bother me. Okay.

[1431] So thinking of it in those terms, why would the, you know, the attack that your childless even bother you in the slightest?

[1432] Do you think there's anything that any fear under there that does get triggered?

[1433] Or is it part of the - I think one thing that irks me is, okay, well, I'm going to get shade because I don't.

[1434] don't have kids, but yet if I had kids, that would possibly cost me jobs because I couldn't leave right away.

[1435] Like, it's the working mom thing.

[1436] Like, have your kids, you know, women have kids, blah, blah, blah.

[1437] Women have to take care of those kids and they get problems from their workplace when they have to take off to take the kid to the doctor.

[1438] And, like, everything is set up against them, it seems like.

[1439] Sure.

[1440] But you wish for me to have this.

[1441] So what is it that I'm expected to do?

[1442] I can tell you exactly what would happen if you had two kids because I have a lot of people on this show.

[1443] Like Caitlin was here.

[1444] Caitlin has two kids.

[1445] So the second you have kids and you're a woman, then the question just shifts to how do you find time?

[1446] The implication being you're a bad mom because you work too much.

[1447] So there is no winning the thing.

[1448] It's either you don't have kids or you have kids.

[1449] So you must be a shitty mom because you also work a lot.

[1450] Yeah.

[1451] There's really no way to win.

[1452] There's going to be some criticism and weird questions no matter what.

[1453] So I got to do what's good for me and my psyche, which is to not have them.

[1454] Right.

[1455] Because my heart is not in it.

[1456] And yet, you can always borrow mine for an extended period.

[1457] And I know they are little angel babies.

[1458] I know this already.

[1459] Uh -huh.

[1460] Oh, mine?

[1461] Yes.

[1462] Oh, you'd get a bang out of my second one so much.

[1463] Oh, she's, we call her, we call her, um, Shirley Farley.

[1464] She's a mix between Chris Farley and Shirley Temple.

[1465] She's a plus size gal.

[1466] Oh, I love her.

[1467] And she is, I think, I mean, I would put her in it.

[1468] The only woman I've ever met as funny as her is Melissa McCarthy.

[1469] Like, she can't do anything that's not hysterical, right?

[1470] She's so, she's so special.

[1471] She's my soulmate.

[1472] Really?

[1473] Yeah, I love her so much.

[1474] And she has a trunk full of costumes and wants to put her.

[1475] on a show.

[1476] Roller case full of costumes going into hotels.

[1477] She's changing policies across the country.

[1478] All of my comedian friends just can't, like if they're around, they just stare at her.

[1479] Like the show's on.

[1480] We kind of say, what do we say she's like the star of her own cartoon?

[1481] Cartoon, yeah.

[1482] She got a new haircut and I was like, is it for season two of your cartoon show?

[1483] And then she's also a fucking asshole because of that.

[1484] Because she is, she, she knows, she has her own point of view so hardcore, which is what makes her so hysterical.

[1485] Right.

[1486] And then it's just terrible to deal with when it's bedtime, you know.

[1487] Oh, my God.

[1488] She's not done.

[1489] No, she's not done.

[1490] And she doesn't agree with much that's going on around her, which is why she has that perspective to make fun of it.

[1491] Anyways, it's a hoot.

[1492] I hope you'll be around her at some point.

[1493] So Goldbergs is in its sixth season.

[1494] Yeah.

[1495] And how many episodes of year do you guys do?

[1496] 22.

[1497] 22 to 24.

[1498] 22 to 24.

[1499] And do you, when I was on parenthood, I don't think I've ever felt safer in my life.

[1500] I'm a factory worker at heart.

[1501] I loved going to a place and punching the clock and knowing I'd be going there for nine months a year.

[1502] I love it.

[1503] Isn't it great?

[1504] Yeah.

[1505] I love being regimented.

[1506] There's safety in that structure for me. Three weeks on, one week off.

[1507] Okay.

[1508] I can do that.

[1509] I can do that.

[1510] 60 hours a week if I have to, fine.

[1511] Yeah.

[1512] Fine.

[1513] Yeah.

[1514] I love it.

[1515] And you can actually just plan your life.

[1516] You can't do that with movies.

[1517] No, no, it's great.

[1518] It's great.

[1519] Yeah.

[1520] There's nothing bad about it for me. Oh, when does that come out, by the way?

[1521] When, when you guys from here?

[1522] September 26th.

[1523] September 26th.

[1524] Yeah.

[1525] Did they get later and later?

[1526] Is that in my head?

[1527] It seems like they do.

[1528] I feel like when I was a kid.

[1529] Like, shit started in the fall, September 1st.

[1530] Right.

[1531] Yeah.

[1532] Like right when school started, you, the new shows started.

[1533] Yeah.

[1534] Yeah, they get later.

[1535] They get later.

[1536] I get like 60 minutes is my, my, my, my, my, big addiction and I just yeah this time of year I'm like just get on with it do so fucking put a new news story on and it just I feel like it's getting later and later we're getting old dax I think that's what it is I don't you know how I know I'm getting old is they show these commercials for Viking cruises on 60 minutes and for 30 years of my life I'm like who would want to sit on that tiny little boat float down the Rhine River in the last couple years I'm like oh no no walking or standing just sit and watch the sights go by I'm in everything is right there.

[1537] It's just lazy.

[1538] Wait, five star restaurants.

[1539] Oh, excuse me. The most you're ever going to have to walk is like 60 feet.

[1540] It sounds pretty damn good to me. Yeah, because Kristen shot on this huge cruise ship.

[1541] I think it was like the biggest one in the world.

[1542] And, well, you had a blast, but I was like, it's a hike to go get coffee.

[1543] It's like 12 decks up and it's at the aft of the ship.

[1544] Oh, my gosh.

[1545] Get me on a Viking cruise in a chair.

[1546] Never walk more than 60 feet.

[1547] I want a ship on a human scale.

[1548] Right.

[1549] That's what I want.

[1550] I don't need to be on Zeus's ship.

[1551] Put me on a human ship.

[1552] I don't need to be on a floating mall.

[1553] Who does that?

[1554] Yeah, this thing had like a, it had a title wave.

[1555] It could generate, like a surfing wave.

[1556] It was incredible.

[1557] Well, Wendy, I adore you.

[1558] I love you.

[1559] I adore you.

[1560] I have so much fun.

[1561] And I hope you do too, having like been relatively young when we met all these people.

[1562] Yeah.

[1563] And I wonder if you remember that the Academy Awards were Nat and Jim were nominated for writing the descendants.

[1564] Melissa and Octavia were nominated or whatever.

[1565] Tate was his movie was not.

[1566] It was like all groundlings people that we were all starving.

[1567] And we were there because we presented awards.

[1568] Yes, you were there.

[1569] And it was nuts.

[1570] nuts.

[1571] It was such a weird full circle moment.

[1572] And I cried a lot that night.

[1573] It was crazy.

[1574] But I love watching people succeed that I came up with.

[1575] Like, I know how hard everybody works.

[1576] Yeah.

[1577] And it's so gratifying.

[1578] And I love it.

[1579] It's almost like a family member.

[1580] You know, you're watching them succeed and prosper.

[1581] And it's like when things go bad for them, I feel it too.

[1582] And when things go great for them, I'm right there rejoicing, even though I don't get to see hardly anybody anymore.

[1583] But I still clock everyone.

[1584] And I just so tickled for everyone's success.

[1585] And not to qualify it.

[1586] But these aren't people who showed up.

[1587] They were the hottest person in their town.

[1588] They got off a bus and they were smoking hot.

[1589] And then they got a fucking lead roll and something.

[1590] If ever there were a group of people who just worked their ass off and enforced their way into that place.

[1591] And that's what makes it all the sweeter.

[1592] Yeah.

[1593] Are they, is that group of people your core social group?

[1594] Do you have a big social group?

[1595] I, like we said, I'm down in Long Beach.

[1596] So my social group is mostly non -actors.

[1597] Non -actors.

[1598] Childhood friends?

[1599] Childhood friends, high school friends.

[1600] And same with Greg?

[1601] Same with Greg.

[1602] Yeah.

[1603] Yeah, you have kind of a quiet non -Hollywoody life, right?

[1604] I keep it real boring.

[1605] Keep it nice and boring.

[1606] Really boring.

[1607] Do you have weird fantasies about?

[1608] anything?

[1609] No. I keep it real boring so that when I go to work, I can go bananas.

[1610] Uh -huh.

[1611] And then come back and be boring.

[1612] Uh -huh.

[1613] Just have some nice guacamole and chips.

[1614] Sure.

[1615] Listen to pop some steely dana.

[1616] Exactly.

[1617] See, that's scratching me right where I itched at.

[1618] Well, that's what we discovered early on is that we both love steely Dan.

[1619] That's right.

[1620] Real great video about trying to get free tickets to win tickets.

[1621] Yeah, yeah.

[1622] And we offered a backstage pass to you.

[1623] Do you remember that?

[1624] It was a full access.

[1625] All access, huh.

[1626] And you said, including backstage pass.

[1627] All right.

[1628] I love you, Wendy.

[1629] I love you.

[1630] Thank you so much for going on an armchair expert.

[1631] And good luck with the season of Goldbergs.

[1632] May you do that show for as long as you want to do it.

[1633] Oh, blessings.

[1634] 20 years, do you like?

[1635] I want to do 20.

[1636] Sounds good.

[1637] Sign me up.

[1638] All right.

[1639] Love you.

[1640] Love you.

[1641] And now my favorite part of the show, the fact check with my soulmate Monica Padman We're coming live from 30 Rock for this fact check This is very exciting, you guys We're out on a field trip Yeah And I guess we would spoil who we're going to record with But again, you could probably Well, you could take a pretty good stab at it Although there are a lot of people that Are up here Al Roker Yeah, sure Could be him You got a cast of Saturday Night Live folks.

[1642] Whole Saturday Night Live cast.

[1643] You got James Fallon.

[1644] You got Cedric Myers.

[1645] Yeah.

[1646] You got whoever the anchors are of today's show.

[1647] Yeah.

[1648] Idrisalba and Carrie Russell and Clark Kent.

[1649] Yeah.

[1650] But at any rate, we are in a conference room.

[1651] Our guest was nice enough to provide us with a little space because we're on the road.

[1652] We did some live shows in Brooklyn.

[1653] Thanks for coming out to the live shows.

[1654] Oh, you guys, it never ceases to be the most heart expanding experience.

[1655] Yeah, it's really special.

[1656] Just sit with the cherries.

[1657] Have some cherry time.

[1658] The armchair army.

[1659] Mm -hmm.

[1660] I kind of started using armchair army.

[1661] I like it.

[1662] That was suggested, I think, by some of the dude listeners who would rather be a part of an army than a cherry tree, I guess.

[1663] Very stereotypical.

[1664] Sure.

[1665] bolzine the stereotype.

[1666] Yeah.

[1667] It's okay to want to be a, it's okay to be a cherry if you're a guy.

[1668] Yeah, absolutely.

[1669] You should just own it.

[1670] Own your male chariism.

[1671] You could think of your testicles as little cherries.

[1672] Sure.

[1673] You know?

[1674] Sure.

[1675] But do you think people want to think of?

[1676] I would love to.

[1677] Okay.

[1678] If I could describe my testicles as cherries, that makes them sound appetizing.

[1679] That's true.

[1680] And non -offensive, like, ooh, but those things smell nice.

[1681] That's true.

[1682] A tasty.

[1683] The darker, the berry, the sweeter, the cherry.

[1684] So, Wendy, McClend and Covey.

[1685] Yeah.

[1686] Old dear friend of mine.

[1687] Yeah.

[1688] And not very many facts.

[1689] Oh, good.

[1690] Great.

[1691] Just a couple.

[1692] Truth but told, you were really put under the gun for this, too, because we did two shows Saturday night.

[1693] And then Sunday we recorded a guest.

[1694] Then we saw a magician.

[1695] Oh, you guys.

[1696] It's been a magician heavy few days for me. I got to see two magicians in three days.

[1697] Ooh, really did something.

[1698] And you got real worked up on Friday's magic act.

[1699] Go ahead.

[1700] Who is the guy you saw?

[1701] His name is Dan White.

[1702] Dan White.

[1703] The show, it's the magician at the Nomad Hotel in New York.

[1704] Very exclusive show.

[1705] Okay.

[1706] For real.

[1707] It's very hard to get into.

[1708] I had my mom throw her weight around to get me a little seat in that show.

[1709] And then there was the wrong day.

[1710] Which happens kind of often with you and mom.

[1711] Because mom also planned a escape room for your birthday one time.

[1712] And we all went like eight of us.

[1713] And then we got there.

[1714] The tickets were for the following weekend or something.

[1715] The next day.

[1716] The next day.

[1717] But then dad took us all to dinner over at the chateau.

[1718] That's right.

[1719] We had a nice bowl and ayes.

[1720] It always works out.

[1721] It always works out because it comes.

[1722] from such a good place.

[1723] The intention is so nice that it always works out.

[1724] Yep.

[1725] And you ended up getting into that show.

[1726] I got into that show.

[1727] Should I brag?

[1728] I'm not going to rack.

[1729] So, yeah, it was full of PQ's.

[1730] He was so many things.

[1731] He was an amazing magician.

[1732] Would you say sexy was number one?

[1733] Yeah.

[1734] Well, yes, all these things compile up to be very sexy.

[1735] Right.

[1736] So he was very good at his craft, incredibly good.

[1737] He did one trick.

[1738] I don't think I'm supposed to tell, so I won't.

[1739] I'll say he cut you in half and juggled your torso.

[1740] And I'm still in half and I'm alive.

[1741] No, he did a few things that were incredible.

[1742] He was very, very charming, but not trying too hard.

[1743] He wasn't trying.

[1744] He wasn't doing corny jokes.

[1745] He was just doing amazing jokes.

[1746] That's where it gets rough for me in these magic shows.

[1747] The thing I'm confused about is you have comedy and then you have magic.

[1748] I don't know why magic needs to be being funny.

[1749] Yeah.

[1750] No comedian.

[1751] Well, I guess some comedians do do magic.

[1752] They should stop.

[1753] Whatever comedians are using magic.

[1754] Well, look, I get the impulse.

[1755] You want any show to have some comedy.

[1756] Any show you're doing ever live.

[1757] You need to be live on a state.

[1758] Yeah, you want some energy and stuff.

[1759] some comedy and I get that but the ratio is like one to one at most of these things you're hearing way more jokes than you're seeing magic tricks and that should never be the case I think if people see this show if you use I really want you to see it so you can understand my love for magicians because those are the magicians I'm talking about when I say I'm in love with magicians not like not the comedy heavy correct okay so anyway it was it was incredible And if anyone has the opportunity to go see it, you should go see my boyfriend.

[1760] Check it out.

[1761] That's right.

[1762] He was so good.

[1763] Why did we get on the subject of magic?

[1764] Well, you had to do this fact check with very little time.

[1765] I did because we also had a very large week, last week, four episodes for you cherries and armies.

[1766] Yeah.

[1767] For you soldiers.

[1768] Okay.

[1769] So, oh, Reno 9 -1 -1, that's Wendy's show.

[1770] That is a mockumentary show, okay?

[1771] It's not a real life cop show.

[1772] And I know that that was a little confusing to some people.

[1773] Some people thought it was real.

[1774] What people?

[1775] In the world.

[1776] Really?

[1777] Well, we talk about that on the episode a little bit.

[1778] Those people are smart enough to turn on a TV, but so dumb they can't discern the difference.

[1779] A show a bunch of cops and short shorts.

[1780] But when Reno 9 -1 came out, it was sort of one of the first of these like mockumentary style things so maybe it just threw people for a loop and they just didn't know I mean if you're yeah for those that were super stone maybe and they're clicking now like oh this is a funny episode of cops these got crazy short shorts but it was parodying cops copse the show It's parodying of cops.

[1781] And highly improvised.

[1782] Yeah.

[1783] Which is fun.

[1784] That's so fun.

[1785] Yeah.

[1786] You got to do an improvised show, too.

[1787] I did.

[1788] Punked.

[1789] Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.

[1790] You had to improvise in that.

[1791] That's right.

[1792] You want me to do a scene from punk?

[1793] Yeah.

[1794] Will you punk me?

[1795] Yeah.

[1796] Hi, I'm here from the IRS.

[1797] I'm taking your house.

[1798] You didn't file your taxes.

[1799] I did, though.

[1800] Oh, okay.

[1801] Have a good day.

[1802] Cool punk Cool improv You thought my improv was bad No I was coming in on mine Oh I see We don't attack you publicly Only in writing Yes you do And I deliver them I mail them to you You said that you would like to go to If you had a time machine that you would go back to 1939 and woo my grandma away from my grandpa But she wasn't even born until 1940 Oh okay So you'd have to go back to...

[1803] Right.

[1804] Yeah.

[1805] I'd do it.

[1806] I know you would.

[1807] And then I'd be...

[1808] And then I would not exist anymore.

[1809] Think about what you'd do.

[1810] No, you would be my granddaughter.

[1811] No, that's not how biology works.

[1812] I think you know that.

[1813] You'd be 5 '9.

[1814] It wouldn't be me. You'd frequency our lives.

[1815] Have you seen that movie?

[1816] No. Oh.

[1817] Fantastic movie.

[1818] Okay.

[1819] Frequency.

[1820] You, I can't believe you haven't seen it.

[1821] Junk Cusack?

[1822] No, it had, um...

[1823] Who was that Be Arthur?

[1824] Guy No, I'm thinking Dennis Quaid Oh, D Quaid I'd had Dennis Quaid Uh huh Also known as Randy's brother Dennis Quaid He was in it And it was great It was like About this boy Who could talk through this radio Yep yep yep yep yep He was communicating With his dead father Father over a ham radio Yes and then he Shortwave radio And it's like Do you change If you tell him you're going to die if you go fight this fire he was a fireman look at the part great casting then you change the course of everything and not necessarily for the better butterfly effect butterfly effect sliding doors there's been many movies about this people are obsessed with what would change I'm kind of obsessed with it anyway if you moved in with my grandma I wouldn't be here my mom would have just had an affair with her it would probably still change things I don't know.

[1825] We don't know.

[1826] What if I already did this?

[1827] What if unbeknownst to you, in 2013, they invent a time machine.

[1828] Uh -huh.

[1829] And I've already done this.

[1830] I had an affair of grandma.

[1831] Okay.

[1832] And you're still here and I'm still here.

[1833] There's no way to say that hasn't happened.

[1834] You're right.

[1835] And then we haven't, so we're still in that life, though?

[1836] No, it already looped through.

[1837] Because if in 2013, in 2013, When I go back to 1958, I've already done it.

[1838] I know, but you already did it.

[1839] Oh, and then you came back?

[1840] Yeah, of course.

[1841] I'm not going to stay forever.

[1842] So you came back to 1931 and then you went back to 2018.

[1843] You've been traveling all over?

[1844] No, no, no, no, I went from 2013 to 1958.

[1845] Yes.

[1846] Partied with your grandma for like a year.

[1847] Great.

[1848] Then I thought it was going to get like, oh, I don't want to ruin her marriage because I don't want to fuck up Monica being born.

[1849] And then I went back to 2013.

[1850] Yeah, sure.

[1851] And I'm there.

[1852] Well, you're also here.

[1853] I know.

[1854] So you can't split.

[1855] No, you can't split your body.

[1856] I never would.

[1857] Think about this.

[1858] In 10 years, they invent a time machine.

[1859] Dax gets in it.

[1860] He goes back to 1958.

[1861] Yeah.

[1862] Yeah.

[1863] It has an affair with your mother.

[1864] But you'd age.

[1865] You'd be dead by, or you'd be my, you'd be.

[1866] Well, I returned to 2013 -1 after I've had an affair.

[1867] You're living this current existence.

[1868] If in 2013 I take a time machine in 1958.

[1869] Oh, I see.

[1870] It's already happened.

[1871] So we just haven't gotten there yet.

[1872] We haven't gotten to 2013.

[1873] Right.

[1874] But if, in fact, I go in 2013, back to 1958, that means that right now in this current time and space, I've already gone back to 19508.

[1875] Okay, yeah, I guess I see.

[1876] That's tricky.

[1877] So what I'm saying is it's already happened and everything worked out.

[1878] Okay.

[1879] Rest easy.

[1880] Great.

[1881] Okay.

[1882] Oh, you said the Matrix metaphor take the green pill, but there's no green pill.

[1883] There's a blue pill and a red pill.

[1884] Okay.

[1885] The terms popularized in science fiction culture are derived from the 1999 film, The Matrix.

[1886] In the film, the main character, Neo, was offered the choice between a red pill and a blue pill by rebel leader Morpheus.

[1887] The red pill represented an uncertain future.

[1888] I would free him from the enslaving control of the machine, generated dream world, and allow him to escape into the real world.

[1889] But living the truth of reality is harsher and more difficult.

[1890] On the other hand, the blue pill represented a beautiful prison.

[1891] It would lead him back to ignorance, living in confined comfort without want or fear within the simulated reality of the Matrix.

[1892] What would you pick?

[1893] Well, I already took the red pill a long time ago, so now I would take the blue pill.

[1894] You took the red pill when you were visiting my grandma?

[1895] No. I think definitely the blue pills allowed me to go back and date your grandma because only in a simulated world with someone of created time travel and allowed me to go date your grandma.

[1896] So that's definitely, at some point I take the blue pill.

[1897] But I think currently I'm on the red pill.

[1898] Why do you think that?

[1899] I'm going to switch prescriptions.

[1900] Why do you think you're living in a red pill?

[1901] Because I think I'm living in reality.

[1902] You do?

[1903] Even though your life's so fantastic.

[1904] If I'm in a simulation, they gave me arthritis.

[1905] I just feel like that's, why did they do that?

[1906] I mean, maybe that's part of it.

[1907] They gave you arthritis.

[1908] Look at the rest of your life.

[1909] Yeah.

[1910] Oh my God.

[1911] No, the rest of my life is fantastic.

[1912] My life is very blue pillish.

[1913] Yes.

[1914] Yes, but nearly dying a bunch of times and stuff makes you feel red pilly.

[1915] And then not.

[1916] And then not.

[1917] I can't believe you think you're living the red pill.

[1918] I do.

[1919] I think I'm in reality.

[1920] I don't think I'm in a virtual.

[1921] reality.

[1922] I'm not Elon Musk.

[1923] You.

[1924] So I've taken the blue pill, but you've taken the red pill?

[1925] No, I've been, I'm definitely taking the blue pill.

[1926] Okay.

[1927] My life's great.

[1928] Okay.

[1929] As long as you think we were on the same pills, I'm fine with it.

[1930] Yeah, we are.

[1931] We're both living in a very privileged matrix.

[1932] One time I got my stepfather so upset.

[1933] A couple of Christmases ago, we were talking about like the apocalypse because they're very mild preppers.

[1934] My mom in my stepdad where they've got like, you know, I don't, a couple hundred gallons of water grain and stuff.

[1935] Okay.

[1936] And they were kind of telling me about their supplies and whatnot.

[1937] And I said, I'm out.

[1938] If there's an apocalypse, I'm out.

[1939] I'm not going to wander the fucking countryside trying to defend my family from roving rapist marauders.

[1940] Why would I even want, like, I've had a great life.

[1941] I'll just end the day of the apocalypse.

[1942] Yeah.

[1943] I don't need to stick around and prove that I could fend for my survival.

[1944] and be absolutely miserable and watch my children get harmed?

[1945] Why don't I do that?

[1946] You would do it to protect your kids if they didn't want to die.

[1947] No, we would all take the blue pill.

[1948] Well, you can't tell them to end their life.

[1949] Well, if I could sell them all on it, like, hey, you guys, let's all take this blue pill.

[1950] Let's lay on the ground and hold hands.

[1951] Right.

[1952] Let's just peacefully avoid all the rape and abuse and confinement and starvation.

[1953] Why go through that?

[1954] Why?

[1955] I know.

[1956] It's kind of like, how about this?

[1957] You know what the exact equivalent is?

[1958] Is you go to a restaurant and you have the best meal of your life.

[1959] And then at the end they go, now here's a plate of shit.

[1960] Take a bite of that.

[1961] And you go, why?

[1962] And you go, because that's what's next.

[1963] Just because that's what's next doesn't mean you should do it.

[1964] This is what it is.

[1965] You'll no longer be able to taste that delicious meal because you'll be, you'll have a shit taste.

[1966] But it's here's a plate of shit.

[1967] If you eat it and get things.

[1968] through it, there might be a better plate of pasta after or...

[1969] There's not...

[1970] If this world collapses, we won't rebuild civilization in my remaining 20 years.

[1971] It'll just be a long plate of shit.

[1972] And at the end of all that, I'll go, you know what?

[1973] I should have quit when the fucking creme brulee came out.

[1974] I should have had the creme brulee and just exited.

[1975] Why don't I just stick around to eat shit for 20 years?

[1976] It's because we're obsessed with longevity.

[1977] We measure lives that way Like No, I don't think it's that I think people have a hard Time of Suicide Yeah I do Suicide is painless That's the MASH song I don't know it Oh it's a mash theme Maybe this is also why it's weird When you're singing Because sometimes I'll ask you's me You won't stop singing You keep going until you're done Well I think a few more bars in you'll remember the song and then your question will be answered but that doesn't seem to happen often so maybe I should change my approach well and then what was my question I don't even remember it but it was oh I said is that the mash theme song O 'Reilly good God that was the mash theme song on the TV show yes Monica okay okay we could talk about your laser procedure if we want oh good did that come up on uh yeah so I had this thing didn't I say it though in the thing I had a thing called CO2 laser.

[1978] CO2 laser.

[1979] Tell us about it.

[1980] It's the most powerful.

[1981] O 'Reilly.

[1982] Sorry, we just ate a lot of pizza.

[1983] Oh, yeah.

[1984] So CO2 laser, which is like a thousand times stronger than the red or green or whatever average laser someone's getting.

[1985] I mean, they blasted my face off.

[1986] And I had the opportunity to see it.

[1987] And I can confirm.

[1988] I can confirm that you lost your face.

[1989] It was incredible.

[1990] It was so crazy.

[1991] I looked like Mickey Rourke when he played the monster in Sin City.

[1992] Like my face swelled up so bad the next day.

[1993] It looked like I'd just been hit with a baseball battle a thousand times.

[1994] Yeah.

[1995] It like swelled up and then the swelling went down.

[1996] Yeah.

[1997] And then you looked normal again.

[1998] And then I look normal.

[1999] But my skin's still right around my eyes, which a lot of people commented on pitchers.

[2000] But you know what?

[2001] I just can't take the time to explain it to everyone who's asked what happened to my eyes.

[2002] So don't feel bad.

[2003] It's just I can't spend my day like explaining the CO2 life.

[2004] procedure, laser beam procedure.

[2005] Yeah.

[2006] But what's funny is when I looked at the before and after, I'm like, oh, these people look great.

[2007] And then the doctor rightly said, you know, some people stay red for six, seven months.

[2008] And I'm like, some people.

[2009] I ain't some people.

[2010] I'll be fine a week.

[2011] Guess what?

[2012] I am some people.

[2013] Oh, so she said.

[2014] Oh, yeah.

[2015] This is, I'm like on the bad end of how long it takes from the redness to go away.

[2016] Got it.

[2017] Got it.

[2018] Yeah.

[2019] It doesn't, to me, it looks normal.

[2020] Well, you look at me a lot.

[2021] Yeah, I do.

[2022] Even I started to get used to your face looking all swollen.

[2023] That was disturbing for you and the children, really.

[2024] It really, I mean, we'll never post a picture, but it, um.

[2025] But I have one.

[2026] We don't need to post it, but.

[2027] That would be a really good step for my self -evolvement is if I was willing to post that picture.

[2028] Like that would be the day that my self -esteem was finally.

[2029] Perfect.

[2030] In an optimal range.

[2031] But you don't look, but it was for three days.

[2032] Yeah, I don't even think that long.

[2033] You don't look like that.

[2034] So it's, it's kind of, it's, I don't really know if it's the cure you're thinking.

[2035] Also, you might not be able to unsee that photo.

[2036] It could jeopardize the rest of my acting.

[2037] No, never.

[2038] Every time I come and I look like a waterlogged monster.

[2039] It was really interesting.

[2040] It was really.

[2041] You know what's fun though is there's all kinds of things you could probably need your say like, why do that?

[2042] Why are you so vain?

[2043] That's all fair.

[2044] but I enjoy the experience of change.

[2045] Like I felt like a different person for three days, a monster.

[2046] Yeah.

[2047] And it was fun.

[2048] I like that kind of thing.

[2049] Yeah.

[2050] You know?

[2051] You liked it?

[2052] Yeah.

[2053] I feel like you didn't like it.

[2054] Maybe I didn't like it, but I like that I didn't like it.

[2055] Okay.

[2056] Yeah, sure.

[2057] Does that make sense?

[2058] Yeah, I understand that.

[2059] I can't explain, articulate it, but.

[2060] Yeah.

[2061] Well, we were talking about this the other day.

[2062] I think you also like, seeing like the capacity of the human body.

[2063] I do, I do.

[2064] Really pushing it to different levels.

[2065] That's right.

[2066] I do.

[2067] I do.

[2068] All right.

[2069] You said that TV, you think TV shows are starting later and later now because her shows premieres at the end of September right around now.

[2070] And you were like, when I was a baby, a little baby, the TV shows would start earlier.

[2071] And so I did some research.

[2072] Great.

[2073] Friends premiered on September 22nd, also late September.

[2074] Yeah, third week.

[2075] Seinfeld premiered on July 5th.

[2076] Now that seems like an anomaly, okay?

[2077] Yeah, that's what we'd call an outlier in the data.

[2078] Yeah, correct.

[2079] The data.

[2080] Now Silver Spoons, now we're in your range, premiered September 25th.

[2081] Bonkers.

[2082] Yeah.

[2083] Wow.

[2084] Wow.

[2085] And party of five.

[2086] I'm so glad you chose my shows.

[2087] That was really thoughtful.

[2088] It premiered on September 12th.

[2089] Well, okay.

[2090] Now that's kind of a compromise.

[2091] Yeah, yeah.

[2092] So it's kind of all over.

[2093] All over the map.

[2094] Willy -nilly.

[2095] Wishy -washy.

[2096] But Good Place is premiering the 27th or some shit.

[2097] That's dams nears October.

[2098] But 25th for Friends.

[2099] I'm sorry, 22nd for Friends, 25th for Silver Spoons.

[2100] Those are all three week.

[2101] We're now in the fourth week of September.

[2102] We're almost to October.

[2103] I wonder for them that's the cutoff.

[2104] Maybe, yeah.

[2105] Yeah.

[2106] I don't know.

[2107] Okay, dokey, I think.

[2108] That rounds out the facts.

[2109] That's it.

[2110] That's it?

[2111] That's it?

[2112] Yep.

[2113] I love you.

[2114] I'm having so much fun with you and Rob in New York.

[2115] Yeah, me too.

[2116] I feel very lucky.

[2117] Me too.

[2118] Yeah.

[2119] Thanks, everybody.

[2120] Bye.

[2121] expert on the Wondry app, Amazon music, or wherever you get your podcasts.

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