Lord & Miller (filmmaking duo)

[0] Welcome, welcome to our armchair expert.

[1] Experts on expert.

[2] I'm Dan Sheenanders.

[3] I'm joined by Monica Mouse.

[4] Hi there.

[5] Meep.

[6] I want you to have a mouse noise you do when we say, man, Monica Mouse.

[7] Oh, okay.

[8] I heard that.

[9] Oh, good.

[10] Good timing, Wobby Wob.

[11] We have two of our favorite, favorite, favorite creators today.

[12] Yeah.

[13] Phil, Lord, and Chris Miller, popularly known as Lord and Miller.

[14] They are Academy Award -winning filmmakers.

[15] They directed Spider -Man into the Spider -Verse, which we loved, the Lego movies, which were just so groundbreaking.

[16] 21 and 22 Jump Street, both hysterical.

[17] Last Man on Earth, one of my favorite shows of all time.

[18] And Clone High.

[19] They have a new show out right now on Apple Plus, with maybe the best cast in television, called The After Party.

[20] Every comedian you've ever loved, minus Monica and I, are in it.

[21] It's really, really good.

[22] It's very cool.

[23] It's like a murder mystery show in each episode is a different genre.

[24] Yeah, you watched the whole thing last night, which you'll hear about in the fact check.

[25] Easter egg, Monica's not well.

[26] But she's okay, but she's not well.

[27] Thoughts and prayers.

[28] I love you.

[29] Please enjoy Lord and Miller.

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

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

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

[33] He's an armchair expert.

[34] Right out of the gates what we need to address is generally we don't interview two people at a time.

[35] Uh -oh.

[36] It gets confusing.

[37] Yeah.

[38] And in fact, it's very helpful that I'm male and she's female just for the host's sake, right?

[39] If one of us didn't sound nerdy, it would be a lot easier.

[40] Nasal nerd voice.

[41] I'm Phil Lord.

[42] And I'm Chris Miller.

[43] That's what it sounds like.

[44] That's what we're like.

[45] No, no. It's true.

[46] So we're going to try this.

[47] We're going to try to cement this for the listener.

[48] Again, and I don't ever have to ask guests to do this, but in this case, we're going to have to ask us.

[49] So I need you to start and say your name.

[50] My name's Chris Miller, and I sound like this.

[51] Okay.

[52] And my name is Phil Lord, and I sound a lot like Chris Miller.

[53] No, they're different.

[54] It's good.

[55] Different enough?

[56] Also, I'm assuming we'll just announce our name before everything we say.

[57] I will say Chris.

[58] Yes, this is me. And then Phil will say yes.

[59] Yeah.

[60] Oh, this reminds me, so this wonderful guy I was in the groundlings with, Guy Stevenson, very funny, bizarre sense of humor, is obsessed with robots and gorillas and all this kind of stuff.

[61] So he wrote a sketch, and it was Stephen Hawking's teaching astrophysics to a class of six other people who also had his condition.

[62] So everyone's got the same computer voice.

[63] Then someone says, can I go to the bathroom?

[64] Yes.

[65] Who needs to go to the bathroom?

[66] Me, who?

[67] The girl.

[68] No, I don't.

[69] Class dismissed.

[70] Who's saying class?

[71] And it becomes like a mutiny.

[72] And no one can figure out who's talking.

[73] And they keep going, it was the girl.

[74] No, it wasn't.

[75] This is the girl.

[76] Oh, my God.

[77] And, you know.

[78] It probably couldn't fly today.

[79] I wonder.

[80] I bet it could.

[81] You think so?

[82] Well, you know, if something's genius, it transcends.

[83] all the layers of no -knownness.

[84] And if it's nice.

[85] It's kind of celebrating, yeah, that they might have had like a mutiny and they have a sense of humor and...

[86] Yeah, right.

[87] And honestly, that if you have a disability, you could still be funny.

[88] And funny things still happen to you.

[89] If it doesn't feel like you're punching down, I think it works.

[90] Right.

[91] Obviously, Stephen Hawkins.

[92] You're punching up minimally intellectually.

[93] That's for sure.

[94] So guys, where do we start?

[95] Lord and Miller, I'm just going to start with my love for you guys.

[96] And it's a very sincere one.

[97] I hope it's gotten back to you at some point in your life.

[98] You come up a lot on our show.

[99] Yeah, I love you guys.

[100] So my first experience was cloudy with a chance of meatballs.

[101] How many years ago was that movie?

[102] Those 2009.

[103] Okay, so I didn't have kids.

[104] I just was there.

[105] I was going to blame it on my kids, but I just was there.

[106] I think the title got me maybe, and I wasn't so into animated movies.

[107] And I was like, this is revolutionary.

[108] I loved that movie more than you can imagine.

[109] I think that's the first time I saw your guys' name.

[110] And then, of course, I knew about Lego movie, this and now.

[111] But then you sucker punch us all with Last Man on Earth.

[112] Right title?

[113] That's it.

[114] I always get confused with it.

[115] Last Man standing.

[116] Oh, it's tough.

[117] Too many Last Man's so different, but the names are too close.

[118] I know.

[119] It's really true.

[120] Dermit Moruni and McDermott.

[121] Tried to get them to change.

[122] So I guess at that point when I was watching Last Man on Earth, I went from me liking you guys to, I don't like these guys.

[123] They're too good.

[124] at this.

[125] It seems effortless.

[126] It got negative.

[127] Yeah, I did.

[128] I was so happy when everything went sideways on Star Wars.

[129] That's something I would do.

[130] I can find myself in that pickle.

[131] You can relate to us.

[132] And then it only got compounded when I had directed a live action movie and the studio liked it.

[133] So they said, why don't you come over and take over this animated project?

[134] And I've never done it.

[135] And then I realized, it's so hard.

[136] Oh, my God, is it hard?

[137] I was so bad at it.

[138] It was so hard.

[139] It was a year and a half of my life.

[140] And again, I went back to, these guys are incredible, they're impossible.

[141] And then your guys' as meet cute is really wonderful.

[142] So I think we should maybe start there.

[143] You guys were classmates.

[144] It's true.

[145] We went to college together.

[146] Which college?

[147] It was Dartmouth College.

[148] I knew it was going to be a fancy one.

[149] Fancy school for fancy people.

[150] Is that where Mindy Kaling?

[151] It is.

[152] True fact.

[153] Did you cross -past?

[154] She was a freshman when we were seniors and we were in the same improv group together.

[155] Oh, my God.

[156] Cool.

[157] It's true.

[158] I love that.

[159] Correct me if I'm wrong, but Dartmouth to me seems like maybe the sweet spot where you don't have to apologize you went there.

[160] You can say it.

[161] It's a good school.

[162] You don't have to say I went into school in Boston or in New Haven.

[163] Yeah, there's a lot of schools up there.

[164] They were sort of like the party version of the fancy school.

[165] I love that.

[166] Where are you originally from, Chris?

[167] I'm from the Seattle area, Lake Stevens, Washington.

[168] Oh, wonderful.

[169] I'm very well versed in Seattle.

[170] Oh, yeah?

[171] Dated a girl that was from there for nine years, Marysville.

[172] Everett, Tallala Reservation.

[173] Walla Walla Sweet Onions.

[174] Oh, yeah.

[175] Come here.

[176] I grew up on the same street as Chris Pratt.

[177] Oh, my goodness.

[178] I'm the second most famous Chris from Lake Stevens.

[179] That's not fair.

[180] What's the name of this street?

[181] It's called Davies Road.

[182] There it is.

[183] Oh, my gosh.

[184] He had to ruin that for you.

[185] I know, right?

[186] That's not nice.

[187] Let me make a sales pitch for you guys.

[188] Okay.

[189] Washington folks, rugged.

[190] Look at me. You're just grabbing me. Yeah.

[191] And liberal.

[192] Yeah.

[193] It was confusing for me being from Detroit.

[194] I went there and I was like, this guy's going to knife me. He's got a big beer and a sweet truck.

[195] And then he was like, we got to make marriage equal.

[196] And he's really aggressive about it.

[197] Yeah.

[198] You can be both.

[199] Yeah.

[200] I like it.

[201] Your parents, were they in the aerospace industry?

[202] Were they in tech?

[203] My last name is Miller and my dad runs a lumpermill.

[204] Oh, he does?

[205] Like makes shakes and shingles.

[206] And he's in the timber industry.

[207] Big industry up there.

[208] Was he so bombed that you weren't like going?

[209] The family business?

[210] Yeah, yeah.

[211] I think he realized pretty early.

[212] on that I was not.

[213] I spent one week that was supposed to be a summer job shoveling sawdust, and I was like, this isn't going to fly.

[214] And I found myself a job at a country music radio station writing ads.

[215] Oh, there we go.

[216] But was he involved with just the processing, or was he also doing the cutting, the excavation of the lumber?

[217] Where does he get involved?

[218] It was my grandpa's company, and my dad and his brother have been running it.

[219] And now it's like a family company.

[220] There's a mill, and there's the whole thing.

[221] Do you have brothers or sisters who will take it over?

[222] And neither one of them either went into the timber business.

[223] I went to visit the mill and they have a machine that scans the log and then does a bunch of math to decide the most efficient way to slice the log up based on to the moment prices.

[224] Like, oh, a two by four is worth a little more than I don't know what else there is.

[225] Well, generally the longer, the more valuable.

[226] And what's expensive right now, guys?

[227] It is.

[228] Maybe you can hook us up.

[229] We're doing a lot of projects.

[230] on some shingles.

[231] I see that.

[232] You profiteer.

[233] I tell you what a pocket, right, like a little skim.

[234] Got to wet my beak a little.

[235] Yeah.

[236] You saw this COVID thing coming and you started shopping for yachts.

[237] And then how about you, Phil?

[238] What area of the country are you from?

[239] I grew up in the Seattle of Florida, Miami.

[240] Oh, wow.

[241] Another mid -sized port city.

[242] By the way, we're all three are the same age, which I love.

[243] And then so your father was in aviation in the 80s in Miami.

[244] True fact.

[245] What's my next question?

[246] Oh.

[247] Is that a way?

[248] way of asking was he a drug mule?

[249] Yeah, did he smuggle?

[250] Did he ever get approached to smuggle?

[251] I am sure people that worked for him could have been involved in that, but not my dear old dad, sweet, sweet Wally Lord is too circumspect, would never do such a thing.

[252] In fact, he probably hurt the business because he found out, so one of the businesses was a repair shop and they did a bunch of work for UPS that manages this huge fleet of planes.

[253] But the reason they had this account was because we were bribing them.

[254] And then he found out that they were being bribed.

[255] And he was like, we got to stop that.

[256] And they're like, great, we're going to go down the street to the other guys.

[257] So he walked away from an enormous contract.

[258] Too ethical.

[259] Too ethical.

[260] Unlike the millers over here.

[261] Absolutely.

[262] Clear cutting America.

[263] Yeah.

[264] But it was everywhere.

[265] There were like three drug dealers on my street.

[266] Yeah.

[267] They were like different like, don't go play with like Danny's kids.

[268] Yeah.

[269] Well, I think what was originally making the headlines when we were younger were salacious, the Black Widow, gunning down people in front of the shopping center.

[270] But now that there's more and more docs coming out, you realize, like, every time Dick and Harry was involved in it in some way, there's a couple great ones.

[271] Yeah, the Billy Corbin ones, cooking cowboys.

[272] Love the cocaine cowboys ones.

[273] But even more playful is that bad sport series on Netflix.

[274] Have you guys seen that?

[275] No, it's great.

[276] It's incredible.

[277] It's by the guys who did Wild World Country.

[278] Oh, loved Wild Country.

[279] So there was this guy.

[280] He's a hillbilly from Appalachia, moves down to Florida when he's like 13.

[281] He's an outcast.

[282] He gets a job of contracting.

[283] They asked, can you get weed?

[284] I know guys at school.

[285] Now he builds this into a thing.

[286] I'm going to cut to the chase.

[287] He'd always want to be a race car driver.

[288] He ends up with a fucking full -blown ocean -going tanker that he buys.

[289] And it's loaded with like 150 tons of marijuana or shipments.

[290] Hundreds of millions of dollars.

[291] Just a good old nice guy starts racing.

[292] He's a natural.

[293] He wins the SECA his first year.

[294] He raced in the Indy 500.

[295] He was rookie of the year.

[296] It's the cutest most lovable story.

[297] And it was always, we eat no Coke.

[298] And you realize, like, oh, there was also tons of people like that.

[299] Right.

[300] Yeah.

[301] That's amazing that weed made his way into his dream.

[302] Yes.

[303] Well, we've been to Vancouver a few times for work.

[304] And the thing that I thought was remarkable was that there would be people in, like, a fleece pullover.

[305] And then they would get into, like, a Lamborghini.

[306] And I was like, oh, right.

[307] This is another mid -sized port city with an illicit drug trade underlying all of its industry.

[308] Well, I think it's in cocaine cowboys where they're saying that the average Federal Reserve cash holdings at any given time, there's like 20 of them throughout the country, was somewhere on the order of like 40 to 50 million in cash, and that the Florida Federal Reserve always had like $6 to $7 billion in cash.

[309] It was like preposterous.

[310] And the economy was booming when the whole country was hitting the skids.

[311] It just touched everything.

[312] Were you aware of it?

[313] No, not at all.

[314] Other than that Miami Vice was on the air and, like, would shoot in, like, a house in the neighborhood.

[315] And that was, like, the coolest thing that could happen is Miami Vice would shoot in your neighborhood.

[316] Hell yeah.

[317] Or, like, they shot in, like, my friend's house.

[318] Oh, my God.

[319] And it just blew everybody's mind.

[320] Was Sunny there, Crockett?

[321] Was he in the scene?

[322] Sonny Crockett was there.

[323] Tubbs.

[324] Michael Thomas was there.

[325] It just was like we were all crowding around, like, with our little toys are us skateboards watching the whole.

[326] thing go down.

[327] So you didn't see any kind of violence or anything related to it.

[328] Nothing like that.

[329] It's just that you realize like, oh, anyone who had a bank account, anyone who took out a loan from a local bank was touching the money.

[330] Yeah.

[331] Yeah.

[332] And that like, oh, my friend, he had that uncle that would just like show up with like a bunch of just fans.

[333] Like, you know, like an entire truck with a whole gross of fans.

[334] Okay.

[335] You'd be like, all right.

[336] So that was not right.

[337] And then I had a classmate in high school who like disappeared and then he didn't show up to the first day at school and then his dad was on the news oh my gosh like oh he's part of the median drug cartel and had to like skip town oh my you would have loved so it was all there you just like you didn't realize until like it would like pop up yeah and again maybe more of these documentaries it'll be like we'll find out your teacher or or phil like what if i watch a documentary and i'm like i was a courier the whole time I thought I was just like JV cross -country, but I was...

[338] Why don't I have to wear a backpack while I'm running?

[339] I can tell, Phil, that that's not a joke, the JV cross -country.

[340] Yeah, I wasn't good enough to be varsity cross -country.

[341] But you look like a long -distance runner.

[342] Yeah, I could totally see it.

[343] Endurance.

[344] Yeah, you don't have to have skill, you just have to have will, and you have to be Catholic enough and self -flagellating enough to just take the pain.

[345] You have to be mad enough at yourself.

[346] Yeah, that's it.

[347] Okay, so you're at Dartmouth, and then this is really cute, too.

[348] you both have your own column in the school newspaper.

[349] We had our own comic strip.

[350] Comic strip.

[351] Yeah, we drew comic strips in the school paper.

[352] But independently.

[353] Independently, Chris took over for Jake Tapper.

[354] That's right.

[355] You guys.

[356] You've already said so many names.

[357] Chris Pratt.

[358] Dropping names.

[359] Jake Tapper.

[360] You dropped Mindy.

[361] Yeah, but they picked it up.

[362] We picked it up when you dropped it.

[363] So did you guys know Jake?

[364] I know he interviewed me my senior year, he was working for a newspaper somewhere, but he also worked for the alumni magazine.

[365] And he interviewed me for the alumni magazine, and that's what I met him for the first time.

[366] Okay.

[367] But he was the outgoing cartoonist.

[368] That's right.

[369] The year before.

[370] What's more likely to get you in there?

[371] Clever content or, like, great artistic skills?

[372] Willingness to do it, I think.

[373] It's a small school.

[374] Anyone who could do it.

[375] They're like, ah, you're willing to do it regularly?

[376] Then you got the job.

[377] All right.

[378] Then let me ask a better question.

[379] What part of it did you accept?

[380] a clever concept or like the execution of the artwork.

[381] I would say the artwork for mine was way less sophisticated than the work for Phil's.

[382] It was all about the joke for me. But Chris was excellent at being able to think of an idea and execute it in 45 minutes at like midnight right before the deadline, which is why his strip appeared daily and mine appeared inconsistently weekly.

[383] Okay.

[384] You're a perfectionist.

[385] Yes.

[386] but also very messy.

[387] And they weren't very funny, as I recall.

[388] They just were like elaborate.

[389] Okay.

[390] So I was like trying to be Windsor McKay or some shit.

[391] And Chris was just being funny and cute and good.

[392] And then how do you guys cross paths?

[393] So we met freshman week.

[394] A friend of ours was like, oh, I know someone just as weird as you and like made a match.

[395] Oh, wow.

[396] But we really didn't become friends until I accidentally lit Phil's girlfriend's hair on fire.

[397] Okay.

[398] Oh, my.

[399] She was playing a game called Jewel.

[400] which was like Tetris and I was playing a game called Let's see how close I can get this lighter to Heather's hair without her noticing and I won and her oily hair caught fire terribly and it smelled terrible She was okay, she didn't really notice Yes, I just got blue on her head And so Chris and I locked eyes Over him putting the hair out and she's like, what's up guys?

[401] Are you playing with the hair?

[402] And we both made a decision not to say anything Oh my God And what's that smell?

[403] Burnt hair smells terrible and smell terrible for quite a while.

[404] I think precipitated the ultimate breakup.

[405] And there you go.

[406] It was a factor.

[407] Sure.

[408] Well, oily hair also doesn't sound all that appealing.

[409] That was fun.

[410] Oh, you love the oil.

[411] It was so smooth.

[412] It was so smooth.

[413] It was so smooth.

[414] Almost wet.

[415] Nice shine.

[416] I don't mind an oily hair.

[417] There's a line.

[418] That's right.

[419] There's a limit.

[420] There's a line.

[421] Like bedhead, it looks sexy.

[422] Right.

[423] Mad it down like a wet rat.

[424] It's a bummer.

[425] When do you guys start working together?

[426] Because the part of your story that I read seems just frankly suspicious.

[427] And I'm being serious.

[428] Which version did you read?

[429] Okay, I read a version where Michael Eisner came across your guys' thing.

[430] This is true.

[431] This also involves Jake Tapper.

[432] Yeah, it's a very article that Jake Tapper wrote.

[433] This is like the most story of like privilege.

[434] Rename the show, Privilege Mountain.

[435] Privilege Peak.

[436] Again, it's not a replicable situation for anybody.

[437] Sure.

[438] But that article about me had made its way to the Walt Disney Company and into the hands of Michael Eisner.

[439] But how?

[440] See, this is the part.

[441] One of his kids who we didn't know was a different time than us had gone to Dartmouth.

[442] And because of that, they would send him mail in the hopes that someday he would donate money to the college, which he never did.

[443] Yeah.

[444] And so because of that, I guess he was flipping through a thing on the story goes on the jet.

[445] And Saad's article, sent it to someone who sent it to someone who sent it to someone who called me. What was the meat of the article?

[446] The title of the article is the next Dr. Seuss, question mark.

[447] Because Dr. Seuss had gone to Dartmouth.

[448] Also, just to name drop yet again.

[449] We really have a high tense.

[450] Oh, privilege town.

[451] Also, what a big swing.

[452] I know.

[453] The answer was no, by the way.

[454] Next Einstein.

[455] Next Walt Disney.

[456] Emphatic, no. And it had a picture of Chris holding like a pencil, and then they comped in.

[457] The cartoon character.

[458] Gleasy the Wonder Squirrel, his character from his comic strip.

[459] Okay.

[460] It had some distortions.

[461] That's right.

[462] I had interned at ILM one summer while they were making the Star Wars prequels, and it said that I had designed the dinosaurs for the new Star Wars movies.

[463] And I was like, this is wrong for like four reasons.

[464] Not to impugn the journalistic integrity of Mr. Tapper.

[465] No, we can.

[466] He learned.

[467] Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

[468] Anyway, got to some lower -level person who ended up calling me in my off -campus apartment.

[469] they said, oh, would you like to fly out to Los Angeles for a meeting?

[470] And I said, I can't.

[471] I have midterms.

[472] No. And then I said, my buddy, Phil, and I are moving out to Hollywood when we graduate.

[473] With two huge mistakes.

[474] Can I bring my friend?

[475] And also, let me save you some money and I'll just fly myself out for the meeting.

[476] I will send you our VHS tapes of our films and meet you in the summertime.

[477] How about this?

[478] I imagine the window of his interest in me is huge.

[479] I'm sure he'll be thinking about this.

[480] article for months so let's just count on him still being interested in one year how's that sound gang it was crazy i feel like they hung up they're like they're playing hard to get i guess they must have other offers i don't know what's going on could it work to your advantage it ended up working we moved to los angeles and we go into that meeting which was rescheduled for like three months later at least yeah it could have been five months anyway it was a very short meeting and the guy was just sort of like i like your films we loved for you to work here this is Eisner.

[481] No. No, this is Barry Blumberg.

[482] At that time, the head of Walt Disney television animation.

[483] There was like a game of telephone.

[484] It went from like Eisner gave it to Charles Hirschon, gave it to Dean Valentine.

[485] By the time he gets to Barry, it's like, these are Eisner's boys.

[486] Oh my God.

[487] Wow, that could go either way.

[488] It was a five -minute meeting.

[489] And we got hired to make up Saturday morning cartoons.

[490] And our classmates who all, you know, got hired by investment banks and together took down the world financial system.

[491] They were all making the same money as us In their first crazy year of interning or whatever And we felt really lucky Because they were like working 100 hour weeks And we were like drawing cartoons in our underpants Wow This is like Mandy Moore's story Like there's some impossibilities I guess this is a relief I don't know anything about Michael Eisner We still have not ever met him Oh okay well good I won't even be risking your all's friendship Oh Uncle Mikey Yeah like the Mandy Moore one.

[492] But to be honest, when I hear like, oh, Michael Eisner was combing through a fucking colleges to look for, it doesn't sound right.

[493] Well, it's because Eric Eisner went there, the development office at Dartmouth was always trying to get money.

[494] Yeah, I mean, it makes sense now.

[495] But this is not too far off of, like, some of the Weinstein stories.

[496] Like, I can't believe it.

[497] Walt Disney Company calling me, I saw your picture in a thing.

[498] Yes, exactly.

[499] Well, fly you out.

[500] Eisner's lawyer is calling as we speak.

[501] Again, I don't know him.

[502] That's where my skeptical...

[503] We're not making any accusations.

[504] No, no. But I'm delighted to hear it.

[505] And now it's a kind of...

[506] I'll work out great.

[507] He made no effort to meet us once we were hired.

[508] So is the first thing you guys do clone high there?

[509] That was the first thing that we ever did that got made, really.

[510] I relate to it in so many ways because for most people, now there's others.

[511] There's like Quentin Tarantino.

[512] It's like comes out and he's fucking brilliant.

[513] But then for most of us, boy, is it a learning curve?

[514] The amount of failures.

[515] If you just learn of you guys because of Lego movie, you would really not have the full story.

[516] And I just think it's always a great, I don't want to say message, because I'm not trying to educate anyone, but just what perseverance is, what fucking up and learning from it is, what is taking advice from other people.

[517] Like, what that whole experience, you've just had a ton of it is what I learned about you guys.

[518] And what, like, overnight success is, which is like seven years of work.

[519] Our first movie, we started making it in 2006.

[520] So it's like nine years after moving here.

[521] Making Cloudy.

[522] And that was a movie we started directing a year after we had gotten fired from it as writers.

[523] Oh, weird.

[524] So first you write this script.

[525] They can you and they bring in another writer or writers.

[526] Which happens a lot.

[527] Happens a lot.

[528] And then they fire them and then they come back to you.

[529] Now, here we go.

[530] This is where there's a lesson in here.

[531] A lot of people are like, fuck that.

[532] We were right.

[533] But no, you come back and you start working out again, right?

[534] Right.

[535] They've had fired then the directors as well.

[536] And so we said, we'll come back.

[537] but we have to be the actual creative authors of it.

[538] And we had no leg to stand.

[539] It was like we were anybody, but they were like, you know what?

[540] We'll take a flyer on these guys.

[541] It was like literally every three months they could fire us along the process.

[542] That's what I was going to say.

[543] There was a conversation at some point somewhere where someone says, I'll just fucking bring them back and see what happens.

[544] Give them three months.

[545] And there's never like an official green light because they could just keep spending a little more money.

[546] They told us they greenlit the movie four times.

[547] Right.

[548] And then my favorite one was when they called us and said good news, They feel like they would have lost more money on the movie if they don't finish it than if they do.

[549] So you're 100 % Greenland.

[550] We're like, what?

[551] I thought we were making this thing.

[552] No, but now we really are making it.

[553] It's a true vote of confidence.

[554] They've passed the point of no return.

[555] Congratulations.

[556] Also, Clone High, Callie, my best friend, loved Clone High.

[557] Great taste to your friend, Callie.

[558] I always like Callie.

[559] She does have great taste.

[560] What an iconic show.

[561] But then Clone High was made, and then it was thrown away, right?

[562] Yeah, it blew up pretty badly.

[563] The concept is clones of famous historical figures that go to high school together.

[564] So it was like JFK and Cleopatra and Joan of Arc. Unfortunately, Gandhi.

[565] And Abe Lincoln.

[566] And we were really worried that Kennedy's stuff was going to be in poor taste.

[567] Their like peach pit on that show was called the grassy knoll.

[568] Oh, okay.

[569] There's a lot of assassination comedy.

[570] Yeah.

[571] And so we're like, man, the Democratic Party is probably going to shut us down.

[572] And then it was instead, our Gandhi character.

[573] The concept was that he was worried about living up to the original Gandhi.

[574] So he's like, fuck it, I'm going to go the other way.

[575] Sure.

[576] And so then there was an article about it in India that said that Gandhi wore an earring and ate junk food.

[577] And there was a hunger strike.

[578] For a real hunger strike.

[579] For a real hunger strike.

[580] 150 politicians in the lobby of the MTV India offices.

[581] Gandhi's grandson also was...

[582] He was part of it.

[583] The day this happens, Tom Freston, then the head of...

[584] Viacom happens to be visiting the offices.

[585] And they said, we'll revoke your broadcasting license in India unless you take the show off the air.

[586] Oh my God.

[587] They're like a billion people or a low -rated animated comedy.

[588] What should we do?

[589] How long did the strike go on?

[590] I think once they said, we'll take the show off the air, they all went home.

[591] I guess what I'm wondering was that like an afternoon?

[592] The hunger strike only lasted like daytime.

[593] Okay, so it was like intermittent fasting.

[594] Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[595] But I think that was like the modi.

[596] crew.

[597] Yeah, that's like the proto -nationalist.

[598] Proto Modi.

[599] It's fun to say.

[600] Oh, boy.

[601] Juicy.

[602] That's what I love about Indians, though.

[603] That's not a good part about us.

[604] Yeah, no, I love it.

[605] So feisty.

[606] We do have conviction.

[607] Very assertive.

[608] That's good.

[609] I like it.

[610] So that kills the show.

[611] Yes.

[612] But it comes back.

[613] 20 years later.

[614] Now we're making a second and third season of the show.

[615] No way.

[616] That's going to come on HBO Max.

[617] With Gondier or without?

[618] That's a great question.

[619] You'll have to wait to find out.

[620] Oh, my God.

[621] What a great cliffhanger.

[622] No, you guys played it safer this time, and it's one of the Shaws, what it was?

[623] Oh, God.

[624] Iran.

[625] What's his name?

[626] Tolkameini.

[627] Tolokamini's a clone.

[628] Yeah, it's going to be great.

[629] The kids are going to love it.

[630] That's so exciting.

[631] Are you a little bit like, yeah, fuck you guys.

[632] Now we get to come back and do our original show because we're really famous and really revered now and fuck you.

[633] India?

[634] I'm going to guess you guys don't have that because you couldn't have that and have sustained and gone through.

[635] through all the hurdles.

[636] Do you hold on the grudges like that?

[637] Chip on our shoulders.

[638] Like a motivating one.

[639] Okay, yeah.

[640] But very few grudges.

[641] I think Florida's Secretary of State Catherine Harris.

[642] Okay.

[643] Let's get her out in the ether.

[644] Yeah.

[645] What's your beef with her?

[646] Still old in a grudge.

[647] That's the whole Gourbush thing.

[648] Oh, okay.

[649] I'm still mad about that.

[650] Chads.

[651] Hanging chads, yes.

[652] This is some timely stuff guys.

[653] This is a blast from the past.

[654] This is a little timely stuff.

[655] 80s.

[656] drug cartel stuff and fucking hanging shats.

[657] You're a privileged mountain.

[658] That's what we talk about.

[659] Why upon the peak of privileged mountain.

[660] I see.

[661] Four gather to talk about their improbable rise, but very predictable rise.

[662] So is the turning point the success of Cloudy where like things are changing pretty dramatically?

[663] We worked on a string of sitcoms for seven plus years, most of which were canceled immediately.

[664] And then the one time we were on a show that wasn't.

[665] going to be canceled that we enjoyed, which was how I met your mother.

[666] We left to go make Claudia with the chance of me both our life.

[667] This is too good.

[668] This doesn't feel like love.

[669] The hours are good.

[670] Cass is friendly.

[671] Our friends are running it.

[672] It's going to eventually be valued at a billion dollars.

[673] Let's get out of here.

[674] Let's blow this popsicle stand.

[675] Goodbye.

[676] Stay tuned for more armchair expert.

[677] If you dare.

[678] What's up guys?

[679] This is your girl Kiki and my podcast.

[680] is back with a new season, and let me tell you, it's too good.

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

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

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

[684] I mean the likes of Amy Poehler, Kel Mitchell, Vivica Fox, the list goes on.

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

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

[687] We've all been there.

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

[689] 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.

[690] 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.

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

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

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

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

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

[696] At the time, was it just always a very flexible North Star?

[697] Or was there something you guys were certain you wanted to be doing?

[698] But then you were like, well, we'll do this in the meantime.

[699] What was the priority list for you guys creating?

[700] In terms of, like, working in features, I think we felt like careers are long.

[701] We got a job in TV.

[702] Let's see if we can get any good at this.

[703] And that thing will work itself out, whereas we had a lot of friends who were writing screenplays in the middle of the night and stuff.

[704] For the first few years, we didn't really do that.

[705] The first screenplay we ever wrote was cloudy, which is why probably we got fired.

[706] There's also a great story in here.

[707] I don't know how you feel about it in retrospect, but Amy Pascal.

[708] We've made a bunch of movies with Amy.

[709] She was the president of Sony.

[710] The head of the studio.

[711] She was a part of the North Korean hacks where she had like talked shitty about some people in a fucking email.

[712] She wrote some emails that were not all positive.

[713] I've read a lot of emails in Hollywood.

[714] They don't really make the top 1 ,000.

[715] Our emails are in that.

[716] Oh, they are.

[717] Congratulations.

[718] What did they say?

[719] There were some embarrassing things.

[720] Oh, tell us.

[721] Speaking ill of some people.

[722] Chris is much more circumspect.

[723] Somebody was like, Phil, if you ran the circus, Like, what's your advice about how this division of the company could be run better?

[724] I said, oh, well, and I rolled up my sleeve.

[725] You find it all on paper.

[726] Oh, my God.

[727] Signed it.

[728] I literally listed people.

[729] I thought of that.

[730] It was super smart.

[731] Oh, by the way, I would have started that email with, finally, you've asked.

[732] That's how I felt.

[733] Yes, in my mind, I'm always like, they're going to ask me eventually.

[734] You don't have to write an email.

[735] You can just tell me on.

[736] No, I want that.

[737] in writing, in perpetuity.

[738] But yeah, so she didn't like the early animatic of Cloudy because it was just a lot of jokes and no emotional story.

[739] And we were like, what do you want?

[740] And she slammed the table and said, I want a story.

[741] And then she's stormed out of the room.

[742] So Hollywood.

[743] I know, right?

[744] And then she had us work with this woman, Lindsay Duran, who's the greatest human being.

[745] She used to run United Artists, and she has this business as a script whisperer.

[746] Oh.

[747] She secretly goes and gives people advice.

[748] How cool.

[749] movies and television.

[750] But she worked on everything you ever liked.

[751] She worked on Ferris Bueller's Day Off.

[752] Never seen it?

[753] Go ahead.

[754] She produced Dead again.

[755] You made that up?

[756] Sense and Sensibility.

[757] Oh, wow.

[758] She has a romantic's flair.

[759] Yeah.

[760] She can do it all.

[761] Spinal tap.

[762] It's like sense and sensibility.

[763] Basically is a gun.

[764] Oh, yes.

[765] So she's like a person who makes pretty good movies amazing.

[766] And so she helped us make the story into something that was actually an emotional story that made sense and And you cared about the characters and what was happening.

[767] And at first we thought we were too cool for school.

[768] We didn't want to be sincere because it was too vulnerable.

[769] And so we had to learn how to open up our hearts and be sincere and try to also be funny at the same time.

[770] And it made the comedy better.

[771] Let's start by saying we're all funny because we felt like we were going to get murdered by the jock and the football team.

[772] And so the last thing you're thinking is like, no, no, no, I developed this to defend myself against that.

[773] I'm not going to be sincere.

[774] No. If I do that, I get hurt.

[775] Yes, it's antithetical to this whole thing you just bought.

[776] Were you a late bloomer because you're now tall and strapping?

[777] You know, it's weird.

[778] I trigger in so many people that I am the dude who shoved you in high school.

[779] I instinctually feared you when we met.

[780] I skateboarded.

[781] I snowboarded.

[782] All my friends were artists.

[783] I did not like jocks.

[784] But I was like a very trauma kid.

[785] Fucked up.

[786] All my friends were fuck up.

[787] I was an outcast.

[788] You saw Minding the Gap.

[789] What one is that?

[790] That great documentary.

[791] It's about a skate crew, and the director, who's amazing, just started shooting them.

[792] They were, like, 14.

[793] Then he shot footage for, like, seven years.

[794] Whoa.

[795] And as they grew, the more he learned about his crew, the more he realized they were all victims of abusive households.

[796] Yeah.

[797] And that's how they found each other, but they didn't know.

[798] It's a great film.

[799] I have to see that.

[800] Well, because I just watched the Tony Hawk documentary that was just made by Sam Jones Club When the Wheels Fall Off.

[801] I haven't seen it.

[802] He's a great filmmaker, though.

[803] It's incredible.

[804] and it's that.

[805] Like, none of us that got drawn to that scene had a dad practicing anything with us.

[806] Because everyone else had a leg up.

[807] So if I went to play soccer, it's like, their dads have been kicking a ball with him.

[808] But as skateboard, we all started knowing what the fuck to do.

[809] It wasn't embraced by the elite of my school.

[810] So you had a shot.

[811] You were all learning it and no one had a leg up.

[812] I brought a very specific type of kid together.

[813] The people that are often intimidated by Dax, he's often intimidated by.

[814] Like when we had Mike, I always referenced, that.

[815] Mike, sure.

[816] Yeah.

[817] Oh, right, right, right.

[818] Oh, he's intimidated.

[819] Well, yeah.

[820] We had a meeting with him two days ago.

[821] Oh, you did?

[822] We did Brooklyn 9 -9 together many moons ago.

[823] Oh.

[824] That's not the issue for me. Not only is he smart.

[825] He's a good person.

[826] I know.

[827] He's so good.

[828] I hate him.

[829] I do.

[830] I hate his guts.

[831] He's too good.

[832] He's smart and good?

[833] Come on.

[834] I literally was five minutes into the Zoom.

[835] I'm like, I need to be a better person.

[836] I need to read more.

[837] I'm not smart enough.

[838] Who am I kidding?

[839] We love Mike.

[840] It's true.

[841] In that process, though, a lot of people, the head of the studio says, where's the fucking story?

[842] And then you spend the next 10 weeks convincing your agent, they don't understand why we're brilliant.

[843] You don't meet with the person.

[844] You learn nothing from her, the whisperer, and just nothing ever happens.

[845] Right.

[846] So I guess my question is, if being a team has been maybe helpful in those moments.

[847] A hundred percent.

[848] We first had to learn how to work together and then how to be open to each other's ideas because, you know, we both are making our own stupid things.

[849] And we're getting pretty good at it.

[850] turning the corner I thought just this morning It's hard It's really hard To share credit To share identity Oh I see it this way And I see it this way And like who wins this debate And then you have to find another way Or understand where the other person is coming from And it's like being married Without the fun part Exactly Have you ever done couples therapy together We've talked about it We've talked about it But we're too I mean his dad is a Miller My dozen airplane parts We don't do this sort of I think my guess for that is you're afraid you'll break the house of cars that were built upon that whatever you would fix is the fuel in the engine that makes you guys maybe there's that my mother is a therapist a Cuban therapist a Cuban therapist and she says you know some things shouldn't be examined wow she's like some things if it works patched over it it's fine yeah maybe you don't want to go under the hood unravel the sweater but for sure when you have a meeting like that immediately you bristle and be like she doesn't know what she's talking about this is good.

[851] We're geniuses.

[852] Yeah, exactly.

[853] But it only takes one of you, go like, well, maybe we should consider what she's saying, let's listen.

[854] So who generally has that roll or does it flip flop?

[855] We swap.

[856] We swap, but I would say mostly Chris.

[857] He's the less hot -headed.

[858] Sometimes I get hot -headed.

[859] Unless he gets hot -headed and that I immediately swap rolls.

[860] That's good.

[861] And I'm wonderful.

[862] I should get more hot -headed more often.

[863] If you want me to be a great guy, just piss this guy off.

[864] So it's a flip -flopping, good cop -bag cop.

[865] Yeah, sort of an instinctive, good cop, bad cop.

[866] But you learn that the way out of loggerheads is you generate a new third thing that neither one of you would think of.

[867] And you learn to value the conversation and know that the conversation is the engine.

[868] That's the creative entity, not me and not Chris.

[869] Right.

[870] And it helps you not have this sort of oture theory where it's like, everything that comes out of my brain is brilliant.

[871] you're always kind of like, I'm thinking about, I want to make this thing that Phil is going to like because then it's going to be great.

[872] And if Phil likes it, then he can build on it and make it better, make my life better.

[873] And then you can open it up to the entire crew and then other people can bring their ideas and you don't have to be like, well, it didn't come from me, so I'm not interested.

[874] You can be like, that's a great idea.

[875] This is going to be great.

[876] And it's going to make all of us look great.

[877] So the downside, in my opinion, is like neither one of you will ever get full credit.

[878] And that's a bummer.

[879] We all want kind of full credit, human nature.

[880] we come out that way kind of piggy, piggy, like I am greedy little piggy.

[881] Yeah, no, that's true.

[882] Right?

[883] The upside of it is, and this is what I always say, I'm so grateful to be married to Kristen because whatever I do is not very impressive.

[884] And that's so fucking healthy for me. I think the fact that neither of you can take too much credit probably is very good for you just long term as humans.

[885] It's grounding for sure.

[886] People don't hold you up as a singular genius who is a vessel for ideas from God.

[887] Right.

[888] Yeah.

[889] I don't know if that's...

[890] That's a healthy way to imagine creative people.

[891] That's just a person and they get ideas and they're able to write them down and they're pretty good.

[892] You also mitigate the risk of the very, very common downfall of a talented director, which is their first movie they make, they had to appease a lot of people above them.

[893] You start in this process where you're going to get a lot of notes and you have to receive them because you have no success.

[894] And then you have a hit.

[895] And then the next time you don't have to compromise as much.

[896] And if that one works, by the third movie, no one can check you and most people can't handle that.

[897] So I think the fact that you check each other all the time, even when it gets elevated, has to be beneficial.

[898] A hundred percent because I think we are the toughest critics on our own stuff and we are ruthless on it.

[899] And I think it comes from anxiety and being scared of making something that nobody likes.

[900] But you need friction.

[901] You know, that's part of it.

[902] You can't fly without there being like tooth to the atmosphere, right?

[903] There has to be something that pushes against your ideas and it's that conversation that makes it good.

[904] So, A lot of times for us, that's just watching the movie and imagining what an audience is going to experience.

[905] I'm so glad you just referenced the dynamics of Lyft.

[906] Yeah, that's right.

[907] Here we're just a physics lesson here for all of us.

[908] I really like it.

[909] I was watching the Wu -Tang Clan documentary.

[910] I don't know if either of you've seen that.

[911] I wasn't even a Wu -Tang fan, per se.

[912] I know how much people love them, so I wanted to watch it.

[913] I'm watching it.

[914] And the coolest thing that they did was they bring all these guys that are in the Wu -Tang Clan into this theater.

[915] And they just start spitting rhymes to each other they've come up with, right?

[916] And they're older.

[917] All the success in the world.

[918] And then they pull, like, method man aside, and they're like, what was going on?

[919] He's like, all I want to do is still, I'm just trying to impress so -and -so.

[920] And they each had a guy in their crew who they always still wanted to impress.

[921] And I was like, that is the purest best form of creative fuel.

[922] And so it sounds like, and you have that.

[923] Like, you want Phil to go.

[924] Oh, that's great.

[925] That's the best.

[926] And I have a little Phil on my shorter word.

[927] I'm writing a scene.

[928] And Phil has a little Chris.

[929] And it's like, oh, he's going to think this is dumb.

[930] Like, there's a lot of, like, I'm cheating here.

[931] and I'm trying to, like, whistle past the graveyard and not let anybody see that this is fundamentally broken, and he's going to bust me on this.

[932] And I know that, like, I'm writing this 10 -page scene that should be one page.

[933] Chris can't bust me on that.

[934] You bring up something, though, and my wife doesn't have it as much.

[935] Monica has it a lot.

[936] She and I are always doing this.

[937] You know, if you're an actor, you see shit happening in a movie, and you're like, he wanted to get out.

[938] He's not in the wide.

[939] These are little things you pick up.

[940] Similarly, as a writer, I'm watching something, I'm like, they just didn't give a fuck.

[941] They were like, you know what?

[942] This doesn't add up.

[943] Someone had to have flag this.

[944] And they're like, fuck it.

[945] And it drives me insane.

[946] Do you guys have a hard time with that?

[947] Yeah.

[948] And I'd say that the people we collaborate with the best are people who will do it for free and that they look at something and they flag it.

[949] We work with some really great people that are on a mixing stage right now doing something.

[950] And something happened when we thought we were done.

[951] And then they say, oh, you know what?

[952] Somebody came in here and they flagged something for us on their off day.

[953] And we drove.

[954] in and fixed it.

[955] And that's like up and down the crew.

[956] There are maniacs.

[957] People who are maniacs.

[958] Right?

[959] They care so much about the stuff.

[960] Yeah.

[961] That it doesn't matter.

[962] And that's how we are.

[963] I care so much about it being good.

[964] Yeah.

[965] It is a delicate balance.

[966] So you want the people to have enough ownership over the movie you're all making together that they come in on their day off or that they fix it out of the goodness of their heart.

[967] Right.

[968] And also you can't have everyone making their own movie because everyone also has their own movie in their head.

[969] It's your job, you know, as the head of the ship to point everybody in what success looks like.

[970] And you go like, stuff in this direction is what we're going for.

[971] And if you have an idea that you think will be in this direction over here, but not over there, then it's going to make it into the movie.

[972] And that's when people will go home and be like, I had this idea and I just want to work it out myself.

[973] And I brought it in.

[974] What do you think?

[975] And you go like, that's amazing.

[976] Yeah.

[977] You know, nine times every ten, you're like, that's great.

[978] Let's do it.

[979] Or we'd be like, that's great.

[980] But it doesn't quite fit for what we're doing for this thing.

[981] It's awesome, but it's not going to work for this.

[982] Okay, so on that topic, who's it most heartbreaking to give the bad news to actors, writers, animators, production design?

[983] Who do you have the hardest time going like, that is so funny?

[984] But is it actors?

[985] Yes, that's the hardest part because we're trying to please them so much.

[986] And also, if their creativity feels diminished, then they, like, lose whatever that thing is that makes it awesome.

[987] It's so precarious.

[988] An early lesson.

[989] Remember when we asked Rob Wrigal, who's the most amazing guy, like, just take it down a tiny bit.

[990] And then he did a take, and it was boring.

[991] And then the next take, we were like, I will never say that to you again.

[992] Yeah.

[993] Just kidding.

[994] Go for it.

[995] Bring your heart and your life and everything.

[996] And I'm sorry I ever said that.

[997] And I think if you have an attitude of, we're going to try it this way, we're going to try it that way.

[998] I wouldn't have options in the edit.

[999] Because there's two of us, if we have a disagreement about how the scene should be or how something should be, we have multiple takes.

[1000] We'd be like, okay, let's do it this way.

[1001] Yeah.

[1002] And now let's do it that way.

[1003] And as long as everybody knows that we're going to try a bunch of stuff and it's not about what they're doing is just about having options in the edit room, I feel like actors get a lot more comfortable being like, oh, we're going to play around.

[1004] And if they really trust that you're not going to pick the bad take.

[1005] That's the biggest thing for an actor is that they have to feel like I can fail in a take and I'm not going to be afraid that it's going to show up on screen and make me You're not going to hang anyone out to dry.

[1006] That's the part of your career that gets easier is that you have the product to make people feel safe.

[1007] Right.

[1008] So I've seen all your movies and no one look like an idiot.

[1009] I at least know going in.

[1010] Like, okay, take David O. Russell.

[1011] You can't find a bad performance in any movies he's ever made.

[1012] You might have seen an actor in something.

[1013] They were horrendous and you think they can't act.

[1014] They're in a David O 'Russ movie.

[1015] They're fucking brilliant.

[1016] Like, you could go in there.

[1017] And if he says, put this banana up your ass.

[1018] It's going to work.

[1019] Like, all right.

[1020] I bet it's going to.

[1021] It seems like it's impossible, but I trust you.

[1022] I read an interview with Todd Phillips.

[1023] Todd Phillips, his own personal take on comedy is it has to be dangerous or it's not funny.

[1024] I personally subscribe to that hugely.

[1025] Predictability is not funny.

[1026] You want to be surprised, right?

[1027] And so being dangerous is like you're on the edge of your seat.

[1028] And I think comedy and horror are very similar.

[1029] They're like eliciting an auditory response that was not planned.

[1030] You're like, oh, my God.

[1031] Yeah.

[1032] And it works or it doesn't.

[1033] Oh, of course.

[1034] You laugh or you don't.

[1035] You scream or you don't.

[1036] I think part of that is feeling uncomfortable and tension and then the release of that attention.

[1037] Yeah, I try to explain to my little girls because they're seven and nine.

[1038] And it's like, what's comedy?

[1039] And I say, well, I think in the purest form, right, it's just when the unexpected happens.

[1040] And so they're supposed to climb the staircase normally.

[1041] But, boy, God, they're falling down and now they're, you know, like...

[1042] That's not how it's supposed to work.

[1043] Especially if they're grown up.

[1044] I'm going to put a shoe on your head.

[1045] Shoes don't go on your head.

[1046] They go on your feet.

[1047] Well, also, kids are trying to figure stuff out all the time.

[1048] So their whole life is about, like, does the shoe go on your head?

[1049] So when you play with that, it's really satisfying.

[1050] It is.

[1051] Like, you're worried about that, too?

[1052] So am I. Do you guys have comedy directing heroes?

[1053] Oh, man. I mean, the Coens who have always been up there for us.

[1054] Hal Ashby.

[1055] Oh, sure.

[1056] We just showed this movie The Landlord at the Cinematack.

[1057] I haven't seen that.

[1058] It's his, like, first movie.

[1059] I really recommend it.

[1060] He was an editor, right?

[1061] Academy Award -winning editor.

[1062] He did Harold and Mod, which is a movie that Bill and I bonded over.

[1063] Greatest movie as a kid.

[1064] What an anthem for The Outcast, right?

[1065] Oh, my God.

[1066] I saw it when it was way too young.

[1067] Me too.

[1068] My dad would watch it.

[1069] My dad told me and my sister who was even younger to watch it.

[1070] I saw a scarface in the theater with my grandpa and we're the same age.

[1071] Oh, my.

[1072] Wow.

[1073] That's great.

[1074] What did you think?

[1075] Oh, my God.

[1076] When they cut the guy over the chainsaw in in the bathroom, I was just like, oh my God, that's the world we live in.

[1077] Like, people get cut up.

[1078] Yeah, were you scared?

[1079] Terrified.

[1080] It changed my worldview.

[1081] I think it really did.

[1082] You were like, look at how happy this guy is.

[1083] He's rich.

[1084] I should get rich.

[1085] True.

[1086] I need guns.

[1087] I need, yeah, yo.

[1088] I need to get rich.

[1089] Yeah, I think of him is like, I better get fit.

[1090] Like, because you never know when something's coming in the window with a trade song.

[1091] Yeah, that's so true.

[1092] But Ashby, one of the things he does that I love is if there's a plane going overhead during a take, he just rolls.

[1093] Sure.

[1094] And he just puts it in the movie.

[1095] Or like as an editor, like the scene's over and then one person leaves and then you're with the other person.

[1096] And they like open the fridge and pour a glass of orange juice and then take a sip.

[1097] And then he gets the scene.

[1098] And you're like, why did we do that?

[1099] It's just weird.

[1100] And the other thing he'll do is in Harold and Mod, there's a long conversation.

[1101] that is continuous and across a sentence he changes locations oh and they continue the thought in the new place oh my and it's amazing so like the story is on track the emotions are huge and somehow I can still be really loose with the form what attracted us to that type of stuff is like it's doing something new and trying something different and always like trying to push the boundaries of what has been done and what can be done and what people think of a film if you're just doing something that feels like oh this is a good version of one of these things that we've seen yeah under times where it's very boring, but if it's a thing that hasn't been done before, it gets very exciting for us.

[1102] We are attracted to novel stuff.

[1103] Absolutely.

[1104] New, novel, unexpected, dopamine.

[1105] So you ran the room for Last Man on Earth?

[1106] No, we produced it and directed.

[1107] That's like the mind of Will Forte.

[1108] We came up with the idea together.

[1109] He's a brilliant genius and very, very, very particular.

[1110] Right.

[1111] And that show is so him.

[1112] He might be my favorite comedian network.

[1113] He cracks us up.

[1114] He's so brilliant.

[1115] He's so goddamn authentic.

[1116] It's insane.

[1117] How do you assist somebody in doing that?

[1118] So, Forte, we've known since he was a writer.

[1119] In the 70s show?

[1120] Yeah, he was on 70s show as writing.

[1121] And we met him.

[1122] He did a bit at the Aspen Comedy Festival where he and this guy, Mike Schwartz, all they did was say the words, ain't no party like an Otis Day party because an Otis Day party don't quit for 10 minutes straight with different reflections.

[1123] He was at the growlings and we would see him there and he was doing wild sketch.

[1124] just repeating an idea or a word.

[1125] And often at the end of the show, in case people decided to leave.

[1126] They could walk out and they could just walk out and they wouldn't miss anybody else's sketches.

[1127] And so we loved him so much and we were friends and we were like, oh, you should be the lead of our only chance to have our own television show Clone High.

[1128] So we cast him and got him his sag card.

[1129] Wonderful.

[1130] To me, his specialty is he does abstract comedy, but from a deep place of emotional need.

[1131] all of his characters have to get the spelling B word right yes Tim Calhoun wants to be the president so bad right like McGrouber wants to be McGuiver so bad so it's both it's like high abstract art comedy and it's like deep emotional acting we just saw ourselves as like the midwives of that show we pitched him the idea that we had knocking around about a feature where we were like If there was an apocalypse, we would be so bad at it.

[1132] And then he went away, came back with the best pitch I've ever seen for a television show.

[1133] And he just went through the episode.

[1134] He's like, I'm alone.

[1135] And then I pray for a woman and I meet her.

[1136] And then we get married.

[1137] And even though it's a big compromise.

[1138] And then I meet another person.

[1139] And it's like January Jones or something.

[1140] So it's immediately like an emotional dilemma for a super selfish person to go through.

[1141] Oh, my God.

[1142] I want to rewatch it just thinking.

[1143] And so our thing was like, oh, I think we can bring out the thing that we love about Will.

[1144] Right, right, right.

[1145] It was such a perfect pairing.

[1146] We had him on like five minutes after the announced they weren't doing another season.

[1147] I said, how are you?

[1148] And he's like, I'm just so relieved because it's too much.

[1149] You can tell he was going to die.

[1150] He was going to hurt him.

[1151] We were so happy when he didn't have to do another season because I'm like, oh, Will can be healthy again.

[1152] And then like three months later, you're like, look at this person.

[1153] He's healthy, unrecognizable.

[1154] That's never get this show back on to hair.

[1155] Oh, my gosh.

[1156] I hope this isn't offensive.

[1157] I don't think it is.

[1158] It's meant to be a compliment.

[1159] When you walked in, I had never seen you guys.

[1160] I imagined you to be much older.

[1161] Oh, we aren't old.

[1162] No, because you've done so much and you've worked with so many people and you've just been around and in the ether that I imagined you to be like in your 60s.

[1163] I got the strings put in.

[1164] Okay, you work.

[1165] They work.

[1166] This is Lego hair.

[1167] I could just pop out.

[1168] Okay, perfect.

[1169] But their names don't help in that.

[1170] Right.

[1171] Old man names.

[1172] Lord and Miller sounds like a gentleman's.

[1173] apartment store?

[1174] Yeah, Lord and Taylor, but also, like, where you might get a bespoke suit made.

[1175] We have a haberdashery on this side.

[1176] And Phil is like a guy you play racquetball with.

[1177] That's true.

[1178] Phil.

[1179] Is that your Cuban mother?

[1180] Like, he's going to be his American.

[1181] Oh, Felipe.

[1182] Yeah, the name works well in both.

[1183] Well, it's beautiful in at least one language.

[1184] Philip is lovely.

[1185] It's nice.

[1186] Got one L. It's very elegant.

[1187] But you know what I mean?

[1188] Like, they come up all the time on the show.

[1189] It just feels like.

[1190] They're institutions.

[1191] Yeah.

[1192] Okay, now I need to go to, it's an enormous paradigm shatter Lego.

[1193] I don't know how one thinks of that.

[1194] I mean, just visually.

[1195] Now you take it for granted because we've all seen 25 of them and we know all about it and there's TV shows, whatever.

[1196] And it's a given that that would be a way to animate.

[1197] It's already that far away from it that it seems like it's a given.

[1198] It's really unimaginable.

[1199] It's a crazy breakthrough -y idea and I want to know how it came about.

[1200] You just mean like the idea of like the stop motion Lego approach.

[1201] So there's a movie.

[1202] called the Magic Portal, which I think is the first, quote -unquote, brick film.

[1203] Okay.

[1204] I'm like that 80s.

[1205] Yeah, it's like 79 or something.

[1206] And it's real stop motion.

[1207] And it's proper stop motion.

[1208] It's somebody in their basement.

[1209] And there's all these really groovy effects in it.

[1210] I think it took, like, somebody in Australia, like two years to make.

[1211] It's like half an hour.

[1212] Family life was great.

[1213] Yeah, exactly.

[1214] A lot of time on my hands right now.

[1215] And it was the first person to really make a movie that way.

[1216] And so when we got approach to work on it, we thought, well, this is just a giant commercial for a big company and soulless, so that's why we want to do it.

[1217] We said no at first.

[1218] Well, you guys had just left the Taco Bell movie.

[1219] Yeah, exactly.

[1220] I remember correct.

[1221] We're working hard of this Vilveda Shells and Cheese movie.

[1222] It's more about that Chiwawa spokesperson.

[1223] But we said, well, we got an idea for it, but we'll write it, but we won't direct it.

[1224] And then we're like, well, if you did do it like one of these, brick films like people make in their basement and you made it look like it was stop motion where everything was made of Lego even the smoke and the water and everything that would be cool I don't think they would let us do that but it would be the only way to make it not be embarrassing and so then we said okay well directed but only if you let it do it this way yeah and they did who was it that way it was Warner Brothers they were worried because you know movies need acting right and you need to empathize with the character and these characters have like cylinder heads they can't even clap because their arms like don't go that way.

[1225] They've got claw hands.

[1226] But then you just lean into it in these amazing ways.

[1227] Our whole thing was like the limitations are part of the pleasure of watching.

[1228] That seeing the cleverness of how people solve problems, just how do I get this character to clap?

[1229] So they just like twist their wrists like that and we play like sound effects of them clapping and it works.

[1230] And how do I get them to just pick something up?

[1231] Just the problem solving is so fun to watch.

[1232] And that adds a whole fun layer.

[1233] The other thing is, how could we make this, like, posh toy from Denmark into an agent of democracy?

[1234] Yeah.

[1235] The idea being, like, these things are everywhere.

[1236] They're going to outlast the human race.

[1237] But they're also, like, great little tools for creativity that everybody has in their house.

[1238] What have you made a movie that felt like the way a kid makes a movie in their head?

[1239] Can it feel DIY?

[1240] Yeah.

[1241] And it's this big movie from Warner Brothers, but it looks like, you know, like somebody animated it by hand at home.

[1242] And we were very insistent.

[1243] If this feels like it came from a company, it is going to fail.

[1244] I feel like it came from the Lego group or from Warner Brothers.

[1245] It's going to have a stink on it and people are going to hate it.

[1246] But you also were clever in the casting of it.

[1247] This gets done well occasionally, which is like you have a tone.

[1248] You see the risk that this tone runs and then you counter -program it with who you put in it.

[1249] It's like having a serious movie that could be sacrum, but you have the comedians be serious.

[1250] Or vice versa.

[1251] You know, you put fucking denier.

[1252] in Meet the Parents.

[1253] You know, like, there's ways to be artful about how you're going to address potential problems by who you cast.

[1254] Right.

[1255] So, like, the cast was so edgy.

[1256] It's, like, all the greatest comedians, and they're going to lend their cumulative edge to this thing that could potentially seem too goofy and bright and stop motiony.

[1257] Absolutely.

[1258] You wanted to feel like it was part of, like, the alt comedy scene.

[1259] Yes, yes, yes, yes.

[1260] And you want to be like, I can't believe they let them get away with doing this.

[1261] That's what it felt like.

[1262] At the time, it was wild to have Chris Prappy the star of a movie.

[1263] He had never started anything.

[1264] He was like the sixth banana on Parks and Rec.

[1265] Yeah.

[1266] He owes you guys everything.

[1267] For sure.

[1268] Yeah.

[1269] Stay tuned for more armchair expert.

[1270] If you dare.

[1271] Occasionally I'll watch something and it's so good that I'm jealous in a way that makes me want to go do something.

[1272] Happens all the time.

[1273] All the time.

[1274] Yeah.

[1275] So like what's something recently?

[1276] I was really excited by the crazy filmmaking that the Daniel did in everything everywhere all at once.

[1277] I haven't seen it.

[1278] It is bonkers.

[1279] It is like so ridiculous.

[1280] It's nuts.

[1281] But it's like very innovative filmmaking, I thought, that I think it's worth checking out.

[1282] I can't wait to see it.

[1283] It happens to me with Danny McBride.

[1284] So first I was just jealous of Danny McBride.

[1285] Who's worse?

[1286] Him or Mike's shirt?

[1287] I can't tell.

[1288] Him.

[1289] I'll tell you why because he's happy as a motherfucker doing it.

[1290] I watch his stuff and I go, oh my God.

[1291] I want to make righteous gemstone.

[1292] Like, I'll get that feeling, you know?

[1293] I know.

[1294] And he's coming from a place of warmth and kindness and, like, understanding of people's frailty, even though he's always playing an asshole.

[1295] He's one of the lead voices in Mitchell's versus the Machines.

[1296] Oh.

[1297] And so we went down to South Carolina.

[1298] To record him.

[1299] And so the first record, we all went down and did it together, and he was so gracious and took us in, like, he's got, like, a setup where, like, he takes a golf card from his house, to this incredible restaurant.

[1300] The Little Island he lives in.

[1301] The Little Island is the mayor of the whole place.

[1302] And I was like, what are you doing?

[1303] You guys all moved here, you maniacs?

[1304] And he was like, here's the thing.

[1305] What if all the music only came from two cities?

[1306] They only came from like L .A. and New York.

[1307] There would be no Memphis Blues.

[1308] No more town.

[1309] There would be no, like, New Orleans jazz.

[1310] There would be no Afro -Cuban music.

[1311] There would be nothing.

[1312] And so why do movies or TV shows have to come from one or two places we get to make it here.

[1313] Not only are we training the next wave of people who wouldn't have had this chance, right?

[1314] That's local crew that are like getting lit up and somebody great is going to come out of that if they haven't already, right?

[1315] The pilot of that show looks like Scorsese made it.

[1316] It's insane.

[1317] Yes, they're doing an incredible job.

[1318] And then it has the gestalt and voice of the place in which it's made and it makes it its own thing.

[1319] And I have thought about that just about every day since he said.

[1320] What a great analogy Because if I had to sum it up, I'd say that his shows are like albums.

[1321] They feel analog.

[1322] I can feel the rhythm.

[1323] He's got nasty tasting music.

[1324] I just love all the music selection.

[1325] Yeah, and he's happy.

[1326] And he's happy.

[1327] And they're having fun.

[1328] There's like a fun cycle when you have like professional jealousy, right?

[1329] Yeah.

[1330] I remember watching season two of Fleabag.

[1331] Oh.

[1332] We were just talking about that today.

[1333] And going like, God damn, Phoebe.

[1334] Shut!

[1335] You're so good.

[1336] I hate her too.

[1337] Asked about the grudges.

[1338] Catherine Harris, former Secretary of State, Florida.

[1339] Phoebe Waller Bridge.

[1340] Danny McBride, Mike Scher.

[1341] She's the greatest person also.

[1342] But like this cycle of going to like, I'll never be able to do something that is this well observed and is like innovative in all these ways.

[1343] A couple days of just hating myself.

[1344] And then coming back and going to go like, no, I'm going to do something.

[1345] And it just motivates to like, I don't want to do something that's been done 100 times before.

[1346] I just want to do something new and interesting.

[1347] You want to give this someone the experience that you have when you're watching Fleming Back.

[1348] Right.

[1349] You're like, whoa.

[1350] Okay.

[1351] Now, you guys have the very best taste in comedians, period.

[1352] Outside of the fact that you've never hired me, but let's just let that slide.

[1353] Yeah, maybe the second best taste.

[1354] Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[1355] But the after party, they put some bucks behind the P &A.

[1356] Like, I want to say a Super Bowl is the first time I saw a fucking commercial for that?

[1357] I wish.

[1358] That would be great.

[1359] No. Oh, it was a playoff game, though.

[1360] Oh, yes, the playoff game.

[1361] It was, like, the last playoff game.

[1362] Yeah.

[1363] I was like, that's a pricey little ad right there.

[1364] There you go.

[1365] You've assembled every one of my favorite, like, third on the call sheet actors of the last 10 years.

[1366] We had only worked with a couple of them, but they were all people we'd been fans of and wanted to work with.

[1367] And that ad is very specifically designed just to show you, like, the firepower?

[1368] Eight faces.

[1369] You know her.

[1370] Remember him?

[1371] Remember her?

[1372] Yeah.

[1373] You might not know everyone's name, but you know that face and that face and that face and you want them to be together.

[1374] They're funny.

[1375] But also feels like kind of what you did with Lego, which is like it feels all, like it's like if you're in the scene, then it's like, I know all those people.

[1376] You feel like you're in the club.

[1377] Right.

[1378] It's like not everybody is a household name, but everybody steals the show of the thing that they came from.

[1379] Yes.

[1380] Where do we even start?

[1381] Ike Barrenholz.

[1382] Very, very, very funny.

[1383] So sweet.

[1384] So funny.

[1385] I repeated a joke he told us on here, probably more than any other joke I've heard in the last decade, which was his writing partner is not Jewish and he is Jewish.

[1386] He says it all the time.

[1387] Any pitch meeting, he'll go, you know, Mike lost his great -great -grandfather in the Holocaust.

[1388] Fell off a guard tower.

[1389] What a joke.

[1390] It's a very Ike joke.

[1391] Ike was so valuable in part because he is such a patient, good person on a show like that where everybody's great.

[1392] There are days when, like, in a 10 -person scene.

[1393] you wait and then it's the end of the day and we're rushing and love you so much ike we've got three takes yeah maybe two yeah to get all your shit in a close up we're all working next sunday and he had like three or four things ready to rock that all belonged in the show so that you couldn't decide which one it was a great thing about that cast was that every single one of them was like a hyphenate they all had like made their own stuff written things produced things directed things, whatever.

[1394] They all were great improvisers and had lots of great ideas.

[1395] They're all really smart and so they could all bring so much to every scene.

[1396] And when they would add things or had ideas for things, it wasn't the type of thing where it's like, this is never going to make it.

[1397] Yeah, that was serving the story.

[1398] Right.

[1399] It wasn't intuitive.

[1400] Because it's a murder mystery and you can't improvise that.

[1401] The clockwork of it has to be very precise.

[1402] You're hiding information and you're dealing out information very intentionally.

[1403] And they all could understand what was going to work or not work for the whole thing because they had been on the other side of it creatively.

[1404] They knew the lanes, like I obviously great at this sort of thing, like find the lane that this is going to be good stuff that can make it into the show.

[1405] Yeah, that's on story.

[1406] That's relevant.

[1407] That's not a non sequitur.

[1408] But so great is that like every single one of these people cracks everybody up on the set.

[1409] It was a really joyous experience making that show because you just got 12 of the funniest people and any one of them could be the star of their own show and they're all together like cracking each other up.

[1410] It almost neutralizes things, right?

[1411] Because egos and personalities, they're tricky on sets.

[1412] I've seen this a bunch of my wife's been in some of these.

[1413] Like, everyone knows this person's making $21 million for this movie.

[1414] There's just very weird dynamics.

[1415] I've been on movies where, like, I'll give you an example.

[1416] I was in this movie, The Judge.

[1417] So you got Robert Donnie Jr., you got Robert Duvall, you got Billy Bob Thornton, you've got Vincent Donovrio.

[1418] You have all these guys.

[1419] Some of them, I'm not going to say who, but some people have bad reputations.

[1420] And then they get together and it's just like, it's just neutral.

[1421] Because everyone's a bad motherfucker.

[1422] Everyone's got nukes and everyone just behaves.

[1423] There's like some symphony to it.

[1424] They all have nukes.

[1425] Yeah, like if Duvall starts acting, Braddy, it's like he's seen next to Iron Man, he's gonna feel stupid, vice versa, go down the line.

[1426] But have you ever been on one of those shows where it just escalated?

[1427] A friend of ours was trying to make a movie and one of the people was like a once in a generation star.

[1428] The other one was also a huge star, and the older big star was like two hours late.

[1429] Okay, yeah.

[1430] So the slightly younger big star was like, fuck, I'm going to be three hours late.

[1431] They just kept topping each other.

[1432] Oh, there's so many great stories.

[1433] I've gotten to sets, and I like, where's my trailer?

[1434] And I was like, oh, that's a big, nice trailer, blah.

[1435] And then I get there the next day, and it's like, oh, then there's two really nice big trailers.

[1436] Like, someone obviously went up the flagpole.

[1437] And then, like, three weeks later, there's a third really nice trailer.

[1438] And you were thinking, like, am I supposed to call someone and say, like, where's the hotline for more trailers?

[1439] I'd like to spread my leg.

[1440] On that show, because we were shooting during the pandemic pre -vaccine, it was the first time anybody had left their house.

[1441] Wow.

[1442] And so nobody went to their trailer.

[1443] Everyone just hang out.

[1444] And so it's just like, I can be around another human being that isn't my family.

[1445] And this is amazing for me. It was like going to camp or something.

[1446] It was really fun.

[1447] I would guess this is the best part of your guys's success.

[1448] The obvious thing would be like, oh, they can probably get the stuff made they want to make.

[1449] That's really nice.

[1450] Everyone wants to be able to do that.

[1451] But in truth, I'd imagine the fact that you guys can pretty much play with anyone you want to play.

[1452] with and that you get to be behind the monitors watching people you're just fans of that you've collected i have to imagine that this is the very best part of having lots of success the most exciting thing is watching someone you like and admire get an idea spontaneously and it's captured and you're like the feeling i have is relief because i'm like oh god we got something she figured it up we got a nibble like we have a thing and now if we get like a couple of of these things a day, then we'll have a whole darn movie or a whole great TV show.

[1453] Happened yesterday.

[1454] There was a reshoot for a movie that we're producing.

[1455] Additional photography, just like a quick pickup.

[1456] This is a four -week quick pickup.

[1457] Just a six -week A Marvel pickup.

[1458] And boy, and it was like, everyone was grouchy.

[1459] It was like a 14 -hour day.

[1460] And then the cameras roll and these three boys just start yelling at each other in the funniest way and everything was okay.

[1461] It's the wind and the sails.

[1462] It's like, oh, right.

[1463] If all this stuff goes right, you get to see people do something you've never seen or heard.

[1464] That's it.

[1465] Yeah.

[1466] That's it.

[1467] It is great that they trust that you're not going to pick the bad takes and you're going to protect them and then they're like comfortable trying stuff out and that's where you get the best stuff.

[1468] Yeah.

[1469] And it's a compliment to you.

[1470] It is.

[1471] To be trusted by people who are scared is a really beautiful thing.

[1472] Yeah, you're very exposed.

[1473] as an actor and it's out of your control and that's terrifying.

[1474] It's a weird job and creative people and anxious people and socially anxious people correlate very strongly.

[1475] Yeah.

[1476] So now you're putting someone who really cares.

[1477] Like literally the reason they're a good actor is they have a lot of mirror neurons that are really good at picking up what other people think and feel.

[1478] Spidey senses through the roof.

[1479] So now it's like, okay, now there's 50 people looking at me and all I can hear is my brain screaming about whether they like me or not.

[1480] Yeah.

[1481] And I'm supposed to ignore that.

[1482] And pretend to be a doctor or something.

[1483] And one of the best things that we ever did was before doing 21 Jump Street, we took an acting class.

[1484] Oh, no shit.

[1485] And it was terrible.

[1486] We belonged behind the camera.

[1487] Behind the camera.

[1488] As James Kahn once told me. Oh.

[1489] He was the voice in Cloud of the Chesa Veebles.

[1490] He was the dad.

[1491] Two funny James Kahn stories.

[1492] He's really great in the movie.

[1493] But he was disappointed that he wasn't, I want to be like an alligator as something.

[1494] Like a funny alligator.

[1495] And so he was like a little miffed that he didn't get to do more silly stuff.

[1496] Yeah, he wanted to do some silly stuff.

[1497] And he wanted someone to read with him.

[1498] So I read with him and he was like, you should stay behind the camera.

[1499] Chris, right, do the next scene.

[1500] Then he did a scene with his son, Flint, played by Bill Hater.

[1501] Opposite energies.

[1502] Very opposite energies.

[1503] We had them, I think, over ISDN.

[1504] They were in different cities but doing the scene at the same time over a microphone.

[1505] And they did a take.

[1506] And, you know, in a microphone, people get really quiet.

[1507] So he was doing it real quiet.

[1508] We said, you know, you guys are across the yard from one another.

[1509] This is 30, 40 feet.

[1510] So if you could project your voice, I'm like, okay, okay, okay.

[1511] You haven't animated this, right?

[1512] No, no, no. But we started, but no problem.

[1513] Go ahead.

[1514] Flint, come over here.

[1515] I don't want to yell.

[1516] Oh, my God.

[1517] Oh, my God.

[1518] Jimmy Kahn's one of my very favorite actors of all time.

[1519] He is amazing.

[1520] Thief is probably my favorite movie period.

[1521] It's such a great.

[1522] Michael Man's first film, yeah.

[1523] And best.

[1524] He has a scene in that movie.

[1525] At the diner.

[1526] At the diner.

[1527] It's, I think, four setups.

[1528] It's 10 minutes long.

[1529] It starts with literally he just like yanked her out of a car.

[1530] Yeah, very violent.

[1531] She's so fucking pissed.

[1532] They hate each other.

[1533] The coffee's bad.

[1534] And at the end of the scene, she agrees to marry him.

[1535] Yes.

[1536] It's one of the best freaking scenes.

[1537] Does not make any sense at all.

[1538] And we did the scene in our acting class.

[1539] You remember that?

[1540] No. It was one of the scenes that we sort of learned from and had to like break down every move.

[1541] And the crazy thing is you realize how vulnerable you are as an actor and how if someone gives you a note that feels like it's getting to you personally.

[1542] You're like, oh, they don't like me as a person.

[1543] Very thin line between the product and you.

[1544] Yeah.

[1545] I'm so glad you guys did that.

[1546] And it was like, oh, I have been doing this all wrong.

[1547] It was really eye -opening to put yourself in those shoes.

[1548] I think a lot of people who watch actors or watch movies are like, I could do that, I could do this.

[1549] Like, you probably could do it in your living room.

[1550] Right.

[1551] With nobody watching you, with no direction, like knowing how to hit your mark.

[1552] You just did it perfect and they figured out that the light was two feet to the wrong way.

[1553] Now you have a shadow on your face.

[1554] So throw that out.

[1555] That's acting, not being able to like just a moat.

[1556] And you get tired physically.

[1557] Yes.

[1558] Because you're like concentrating so much?

[1559] That was one thing I don't think I understood.

[1560] I was like, why are they so tired?

[1561] They're saying words.

[1562] They say words, and then they take like a 40 minute break.

[1563] We do voices on Clone High, so, like, we'll sometimes have to be behind a microphone, which is like four straight hours of creativity and concentrating and being anxious.

[1564] And I, like, can't put two words together.

[1565] So it's exhausting.

[1566] But I think a lot about basketball players.

[1567] They can be awesome for seven minutes, and then they need a break.

[1568] It's about confidence.

[1569] You know, and if you're like missed, you just need to watch something go in and then you get better.

[1570] Jordan, if he doesn't make that shot in North Carolina.

[1571] We don't know of him, Jordan.

[1572] So we have tickets where we get to watch Tailu, the coach of the Clippers, like do his thing and be an awesome coach.

[1573] And the thing that's so remarkable about him is he's relentlessly positive.

[1574] And it's not that he's not mad or annoyed.

[1575] He has the best, like, ugh, stinky cheese face in the league.

[1576] Okay.

[1577] But then the minute he gets in the huddle, he's like, these are the affirmative, positive things we're going to do.

[1578] These are the points we've already put on the board.

[1579] It's all positive.

[1580] That's great.

[1581] Yeah, we interviewed Pete Carroll and he was very much that way.

[1582] Yeah, he's very positive.

[1583] And it was encouraging.

[1584] I don't know.

[1585] Do you guys have this?

[1586] Like, I'll hear a story about Enriot.

[1587] Well, I've heard many stories.

[1588] And I'll go, yeah, I'll probably never be a great director because I just can't do it.

[1589] I can't make Birdman.

[1590] You have to do it within your personality.

[1591] That guy has got, like, cool, like, salt and pepper flowing.

[1592] locks, right, and like a cool beard.

[1593] He can yell at you and be like, okay, man, yeah, I will do that.

[1594] If this was the Crusades, he could march me wherever he wanted me to go.

[1595] We look like virgins.

[1596] Well, we can't do that.

[1597] You're actually hot as fuck.

[1598] You know that.

[1599] Many times I've been thinking people must have told you you look like Heath Ledger.

[1600] I've gone through some stages.

[1601] There was a Heath Ledger stage.

[1602] There was a Fred Savage.

[1603] Yeah, sure.

[1604] Oh, yeah.

[1605] And then about a five.

[1606] five -year Emil Hirsch in the film, Milk.

[1607] Specifically in milk.

[1608] Only in milk?

[1609] Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[1610] This comparison does not apply outside the confines of milk.

[1611] I'm seeing a lot of Heath Ledger.

[1612] I got that the other day.

[1613] It came back.

[1614] Yeah.

[1615] You're so good looking.

[1616] It's distracting.

[1617] Distracts me every day, guys.

[1618] How do you do it?

[1619] I don't know.

[1620] Oh, and people hate when I say people look like each other.

[1621] This is a new complaint.

[1622] I'm sorry.

[1623] Maybe one or three people said that.

[1624] I feel like if someone said I look like Heath Ledger, I wouldn't be sad about it.

[1625] Thank you.

[1626] I have a friend.

[1627] Should I out him?

[1628] He'll love it.

[1629] My friend Kevin Zegers, he was Airbus.

[1630] He was a kid.

[1631] He's a great actor, really, really fucking good actor.

[1632] There was at least a period where he looked a lot like Zach Ephron.

[1633] And he actually said to me, he's like, oh, if I hear it, I look like Zach Ephron one more time.

[1634] I go, oh, boo, fuck you.

[1635] Oh, so sad for you.

[1636] Oh, what a bummer.

[1637] You look like Zach Efron.

[1638] Must be tough.

[1639] Hard life.

[1640] Okay.

[1641] So, given that you guys can work with who you want to is.

[1642] Will you hire us?

[1643] Yeah.

[1644] Let's do it.

[1645] I think especially for us, like, who knows way too well how much the sausage is made.

[1646] Right.

[1647] When you do get that.

[1648] Also, Severance, I know if you guys watch Severance.

[1649] Watch Severance.

[1650] Oh.

[1651] Yeah, we loved it.

[1652] The Lumen Building is Bell Labs in New Jersey, which was where basically every invention was made.

[1653] Yes.

[1654] And now is like an office park with, you know, like a mall with restaurants in it.

[1655] Oh, really?

[1656] Yeah.

[1657] And I went there because my wife is from New Jersey.

[1658] It was there over the holidays.

[1659] Like Christmas time.

[1660] Her uncle is Michael.

[1661] Eisner.

[1662] Yeah, right.

[1663] Very much not.

[1664] I would finally find out.

[1665] What have you led that up?

[1666] That would be amazing.

[1667] That would be amazing.

[1668] My wife, Katie Eisner.

[1669] That would be amazing.

[1670] But no. We met some friends at a bar in the Bell Labs building and I was like, why isn't no one ever shot something in here?

[1671] This place is amazing.

[1672] The design of it's incredible.

[1673] I was like, we got to think of something to set here.

[1674] And then like a couple months later, I watched the first episode of seven.

[1675] I was like, all right.

[1676] They did it.

[1677] They did it.

[1678] Soviet era.

[1679] Yeah.

[1680] Anyway, point is Apple TV Plus where also the after party is they're freaking killing it, guys.

[1681] There we go.

[1682] Good bedfellows.

[1683] It is tricky.

[1684] I imagine when you guys signed up to do after party on Apple Plus, you're still trying to figure out, like, which one of the people had deals at this weird name?

[1685] And I won't say that weird name.

[1686] And you're like, you're hoping they have something that pops and that you're not going to put this thing into the fucking ether.

[1687] Yeah, I mean, that's the fear.

[1688] Obviously, you're like, is this a real place?

[1689] to make things.

[1690] But they were the place that seemed to get it the most.

[1691] It's an ambitious show, you know, because every episode is told in a different film style, right?

[1692] And so one's a musical, one's a thriller, and one's an action thing.

[1693] And so you have to be able to do a proper car chase and fist fight and dance number.

[1694] There's an animated one and all that stuff.

[1695] It's expensive.

[1696] Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

[1697] It's not like just like a regular show where you're like, oh, we built a set and we can just say some stuff.

[1698] Yeah.

[1699] Every episode is like a little movie.

[1700] And they were the ones who really understood that to do it right, required to take it seriously.

[1701] It seemed like the best place because, you know, doing it somewhere else.

[1702] They were like, oh, we'll try it.

[1703] And you have to, like, do a half -assed version of a car chase that would have been a bummer.

[1704] Yeah.

[1705] I feel nice when something's been curated for me. And I go, like, oh, somebody who's really smart, picked specific things.

[1706] That's like a great luxury.

[1707] It's not a junk drawer of like, we're throwing a bunch of spaghetti at the wall.

[1708] Yeah.

[1709] You decide.

[1710] Yeah, you're right.

[1711] You don't get fatigued just going through the offerings.

[1712] Right, you're like, what does this thing have for me today?

[1713] Yeah.

[1714] My friend Callie works for Netflix.

[1715] It's great.

[1716] They have a lot of great stuff too.

[1717] Yeah.

[1718] Thank you.

[1719] She's the one in the Love Clown High.

[1720] There you go.

[1721] Excellent taste.

[1722] Great taste.

[1723] Excellent taste.

[1724] I always said that about Callie.

[1725] Okay, so everybody should watch the after party, and they should watch it on Apple Plus.

[1726] And to your delight, you'll be starting it, and most of them are out.

[1727] You can rip through.

[1728] It's all out.

[1729] Yeah, you can binge that bad boy.

[1730] We're starting a season two, and so there you go.

[1731] Oh, you are.

[1732] When do you start that?

[1733] May 12th.

[1734] That's not a real day.

[1735] Yeah.

[1736] I just made it up.

[1737] That sounds like a number.

[1738] May 37th.

[1739] It's May 9.

[1740] 42nd.

[1741] Well, you guys would be fools not to put Monica Minnie Mouse in it.

[1742] She is a spectacular comedian, so let's get her in there.

[1743] If you're not too afraid of sex appeal, that's what I'll say.

[1744] Well, you know.

[1745] I can get a wig on.

[1746] Downplay it.

[1747] Yeah, sure.

[1748] We've made the worst sex scenes.

[1749] I agree.

[1750] Tell me the whole world.

[1751] We made a sex scene with Forte and Shaw where because it was on a broadcast network.

[1752] Oh, yes.

[1753] The standards and practices ruled that they could not move.

[1754] No thrusting.

[1755] If there was any movement, it was considered thrusting.

[1756] The bit was just that they stayed perfectly still and she was really into it.

[1757] And the second he moved a bit, she goes, no, no, no, no, no. And then they just perfectly still.

[1758] Oh, that's perfect, though.

[1759] This is your brand.

[1760] It's like, you isolate the limitation, and then you make the whole thing about the limitation.

[1761] That's it's so great.

[1762] It's sex jokes written by virgins.

[1763] You turn lemons into lemonade.

[1764] Oh, I love it.

[1765] Okay, well, guys, this is really fun getting to know you.

[1766] Oh, likewise.

[1767] Yeah, so fun.

[1768] Thanks for you.

[1769] Humongous fan.

[1770] You're in the Mike Sure category.

[1771] Also likewise.

[1772] I love it.

[1773] That's right.

[1774] That's right.

[1775] Of the hated guests.

[1776] Intimidated and excited for the next project and hoping you guys die in a bus craft before you do even more.

[1777] What's the next big, humongous thing you guys are doing?

[1778] Are you doing, like, feature world?

[1779] We're doing a sequel to the Spider -Verse movie.

[1780] Okay.

[1781] That was excellent.

[1782] Nicholas Cage, we don't know.

[1783] We'll just let some secrets say secrets.

[1784] Okay, great, great, great, great.

[1785] You guys have to go to Comic -Con and do that whole thing.

[1786] We do usually go to Comic -Con for that stuff.

[1787] Are you scared when you're there?

[1788] I had a real change of opinion on it because the first time I went and I was like, oh my gosh, look how excited everybody gets about this stuff.

[1789] I don't feel this kind of joy in my life and it was scary to me that people felt that kind of joy.

[1790] Yeah, you don't trust it.

[1791] Yeah, it's like when my kids, the ice cream truck would come by and they'd lose their brains.

[1792] Yeah.

[1793] And I'm like, I don't get excited about anything let alone like sugar water on a stick.

[1794] Yeah.

[1795] And look how happy and excited they are.

[1796] So the first time I was like, I can't relate to this.

[1797] And then I realized this is great that there is a thing that people are excited about and have so much joy.

[1798] They're going to wait in line and dress up like something.

[1799] And they've gotten in touch with that sort of youthful joy.

[1800] And I wish I knew how to feel that way.

[1801] And I wish I was not dead inside.

[1802] And it's in there.

[1803] You know, like we love all the same stuff they love.

[1804] I just don't know how to express it in the way that they know how to express it.

[1805] You're afraid it goes back to cloudy.

[1806] Exactly.

[1807] You're nervous that if you should.

[1808] What the fuck just happened?

[1809] Your chairbread?

[1810] Liquid death.

[1811] Just some liquid death.

[1812] If you were caught being that joyous, someone might attack you and make fun of you.

[1813] It's too vulnerable.

[1814] I can't be vulnerable.

[1815] Yeah, that's what it is.

[1816] I'm going to do a dance and...

[1817] I love it.

[1818] It's a Super Bowl.

[1819] It's like their Super Bowl.

[1820] Do you guys cry at Flashmops?

[1821] What are they called?

[1822] I like when people...

[1823] Oh, do something together.

[1824] Yeah.

[1825] The Olympians one time made a video on their way to Rio or something, and it was, call me maybe here's my number and they all choreographed it on the airplane ride I cry when I see it because I think the world's so hard to be sincere and earnest beautiful in yeah and for people that come into sync to me that's what's so beautiful about it the choreography they do the same thing at the same time yeah and that's so beautiful to me and so difficult isn't there like an airline safety video Oh, yeah.

[1826] But there's a dance?

[1827] That thing makes me cry, maybe, because I'm, like, at altitude.

[1828] Yeah, yeah.

[1829] One of the things we've discovered is that, like, what spectacular isn't people being in conflict and getting in a fight.

[1830] What spectacular is seeing them in harmony.

[1831] Because we know what we're in conflict every second.

[1832] And every once in a while, we're in harmony.

[1833] And if you can put that on screen, I think it's really special.

[1834] Yeah, I need to.

[1835] All right.

[1836] Well, I like you guys.

[1837] We like you.

[1838] Thank you.

[1839] wait to continue to listen at one and a half speed.

[1840] Yeah, it's a long show, but one and a quarter, guys.

[1841] Sometimes I talk really fast, though, sometimes you're never listening for me, it's the guess.

[1842] Oh, absolutely.

[1843] Yeah, okay, you know, we fast forward.

[1844] It really is one and a quarter.

[1845] Russell Brand.

[1846] Oh, we had Russell Brand on people thought they were accidentally listening.

[1847] You got to listen on half speed.

[1848] It's insane.

[1849] It's impressive.

[1850] Love you guys.

[1851] And now my favorite part of the show, the fact check with my soulmate Monica Badman.

[1852] Hi.

[1853] Oh, no. Oh, no. Buddy.

[1854] I know.

[1855] Oh, no. Are we going to talk about it?

[1856] But, yeah, I guess we could talk about it.

[1857] Okay, I'm going to walk you through my journey.

[1858] Okay, I wish the listener can see you.

[1859] You look like a baby Okay You look even smaller and chubbier Than the little girl in the field Chubby Not really Just your cheeks look Because you know you look You're droopy -eyed Yeah I'm really sweaty Now you look hot Let's just start there And then now that we're there Let's also say you look Droopy Droopy Yeah I am So I woke up And I felt great This is yesterday Okay.

[1860] I felt great.

[1861] Let's say 8 .30.

[1862] Mm -hmm.

[1863] Then it was time for my walk, my coffee walk.

[1864] Okay.

[1865] So on my walk there, I was like, huh, I don't feel great.

[1866] Sure.

[1867] But that could have been a million.

[1868] I don't feel great a lot, you know?

[1869] Yeah, we all are up and down.

[1870] And your flies are coming tomorrow.

[1871] Exactly.

[1872] So this is compounding everything, I think.

[1873] Mm -hmm.

[1874] I'm even going to go a step further.

[1875] I bet between your vaccine and whatever else, you probably just would have killed it all on its entry.

[1876] But the fact that your immune system is reduced because of your flies, it's losing the fight enough to get positive.

[1877] I know.

[1878] That is why I think I feel so bad.

[1879] We're like, we know a lot of people who've had it.

[1880] They're like, it just kind of felt like a head cold.

[1881] Mine does not.

[1882] It feels like a flu.

[1883] Okay.

[1884] But that could be because of my flies.

[1885] and that's like, that's so disrespectful of them.

[1886] Like, it's not a good time for them to come.

[1887] Yeah, did it cross your mind and go back on your pill?

[1888] Fuck up your whole cycle, but just go back on.

[1889] I didn't even think about that.

[1890] Yeah.

[1891] You know me?

[1892] I'm always trying to hack the body.

[1893] I know.

[1894] You know, it is funny, but I don't know why I think this is funny.

[1895] All my conservative friends, like I have a bunch in Nashville and I have a bunch in Michigan.

[1896] They already had it, you know, they had it like eight months ago or whatever.

[1897] It's like the liberals turn.

[1898] Every liberal I know has it.

[1899] It's like the liberal wave.

[1900] Yeah.

[1901] I think it makes sense because...

[1902] We're finally acting like the conservatives did six months ago.

[1903] Yeah, we're like we have to live our lives.

[1904] And not to mention there's that medicine.

[1905] So like no one is going to die.

[1906] Right, right, right, right.

[1907] So I feel like, you know, that's all we can do.

[1908] Anyway, so then I'm standing in my coffee line and I'm like, yeah, I don't feel great.

[1909] But then I started to cough a little bit.

[1910] And then I got self -conscious about my cough in my line.

[1911] Sure.

[1912] You know?

[1913] I didn't want people to be scared.

[1914] As they, well, it turns out maybe should have been.

[1915] Could you reenact the cough?

[1916] I want to know what kind of cough it was.

[1917] I was like this.

[1918] Okay.

[1919] Like one dry.

[1920] One dry pop.

[1921] Oh, well, actually, now that I'm remembering, I have brain fog.

[1922] Sure, yep.

[1923] It was a tickle in my throat.

[1924] It was one of those things where I needed to keep coughing.

[1925] I didn't want to keep coughing.

[1926] It was really uncomfortable.

[1927] You capped it at like one pop, but you wanted to go three, four.

[1928] That's where, you know, I think we're all in this situation.

[1929] Like, when you're on an airplane, the guy behind you, he popped.

[1930] No problem.

[1931] But then you hear, now, like on the fourth cough, I'm starting to think infection.

[1932] Yep.

[1933] Yep.

[1934] But, you know, I cough a lot just because I'm a mess.

[1935] My lungs are always fucked up, whatever.

[1936] I try to cap mine too, but sometimes I sort of.

[1937] swall things down the wrong hole on an airplane.

[1938] And now I'm like 13, 14 coughs.

[1939] And I'm like, oh, these poor people are convinced I have COVID.

[1940] I mean, I've always been a little self -conscious about that.

[1941] Like when you have a tickle and you can't stop, you know?

[1942] Yeah.

[1943] But COVID's made it way worse.

[1944] That sounds like a euphemism.

[1945] When you have a tickle and you can't stop.

[1946] That sounds like what Molly would have said, Shannon to her aunt.

[1947] Oh, true.

[1948] True.

[1949] Okay, also lots of ding, ding, ding.

[1950] So this is for Lord and Miller.

[1951] and okay hold on i'm going back to my story people are going to have to stick with this because you know they're catching me on a sick day yes that's right you're not at your best yeah what if this whole thing was you had diarrhea and we thought people understood you had diarrhea but we failed to mention no it's just diarrhea this but no you have covid anywho so then i took a test i was negative this was a fallacy that maybe this will help somebody i thought since i I didn't feel well.

[1952] If I had it, it would have shown up then.

[1953] Yeah.

[1954] Like, that should have shown up.

[1955] And I just thought, okay, great.

[1956] So, like, it's just a little cold or something.

[1957] And then as the day went on, like, I just started feeling worse and worse.

[1958] And then by, like, 4 .30, I was like, oh, boy.

[1959] This is more than just diarrhea.

[1960] No, I didn't have diarrhea.

[1961] In fact, the opposite, I feel like...

[1962] Constipated.

[1963] A little bit.

[1964] Okay.

[1965] Maybe you'll just have one.

[1966] big dump and then everything will be back hunky dory back to norm that's all COVID is yeah it's constipation look some biologist is going to really or infectious disease doctor is going to yell at me in the comments about this but I think oh this is why I think you test it negative you feel crappy because your body starts fighting this pathogen it's identified a pathogen and as it's killing it then expels it and that's when you become contagious is when you start expelling They call it, I know what it is, shedding, shedding.

[1967] So you start shedding the illness because you're killing it.

[1968] And then you start pumping it out the nose, the lungs.

[1969] No, acho!

[1970] All these different, you know, diarrhea.

[1971] Oh, no, get it out.

[1972] Get it out.

[1973] That's when it's contagious.

[1974] I will say, I'm disappointed in myself.

[1975] Why?

[1976] Because I just thought I'd be stronger.

[1977] Oh, well, you're doing good.

[1978] You're at work right now.

[1979] I know, but I just thought I'd be one of those people that's like, yeah, it was just like a little head cold or asymptomatic.

[1980] Yeah, asymptomatic.

[1981] You know, I just, there's a funny irony in the air.

[1982] Oh, about you?

[1983] Yeah, this is a funny irony.

[1984] I'm not proud of it.

[1985] I didn't do anything special.

[1986] I wonder if you're immune.

[1987] Maybe.

[1988] Or like the VACs really work great in me. Obviously, the VACs protects the vast majority of people.

[1989] I know, but it's gone now.

[1990] That's the problem.

[1991] It's out of our systems.

[1992] Mine's only four months old.

[1993] I got mine maybe January 8th or 9th, the third.

[1994] Oh, okay.

[1995] So maybe you still have a little bit of that guy in you.

[1996] Sure.

[1997] Anyway, I'm so glad.

[1998] You're the person I'm the most worried about because you have an autoimmune disorder.

[1999] Right.

[2000] But I think that helps too because my immune system's overactive.

[2001] That's why it attacks itself.

[2002] So I think that also is one of these rare times it's a benefit.

[2003] No, I think it's not.

[2004] They say that people with autoimmune are high risk.

[2005] Yeah, remember when they extended it to actors to get the vaccine.

[2006] So I got to go in there.

[2007] And then when I got there, I realized I had two previous things that would have let me get it, autoimmune and addiction.

[2008] Also, the autoimmune, you know, today, of course, I was Googling, like, why do some people have worse symptoms than others?

[2009] And now they're able to do a little bit more.

[2010] Meta kind of analysis.

[2011] Which is cool.

[2012] One of the thoughts was that some people kind of do that, essentially, like their bodies start putting out a lot of this, oh, this is bad.

[2013] You have COVID brain.

[2014] That's okay.

[2015] I really do.

[2016] I looked it up.

[2017] Let me read it.

[2018] It is a fact check after all.

[2019] See, I'll look at my history.

[2020] Oh, that's a great place to start.

[2021] Yeah.

[2022] You look so adorable.

[2023] You look like a one -year -old baby.

[2024] Do you need anything?

[2025] Can I drop anything off?

[2026] That's really sweet.

[2027] No, Kristen Drop just dropped off some stuff, which was really nice.

[2028] I told her not to, but she did it anyway.

[2029] Of course she beat me to it.

[2030] The adrenochrome?

[2031] No, take double your adrenochrome dose.

[2032] That's probably why you got an identity is that I'm on a much bigger dose.

[2033] That's true.

[2034] I looked at a lot of websites, so I have to see if this is...

[2035] Any pornography?

[2036] No. Okay.

[2037] Because sometimes when people get sick, if you get really sick, you kind of get horny.

[2038] Because your body wants to help you feel better.

[2039] And so one of the thing it deploys is horny molecules.

[2040] I think people can relate to that.

[2041] Rob, do you ever get like horny when you're really sick?

[2042] Not really, but no. No, not really but, but no. I was going to say sometimes when Natalie is sick.

[2043] She's horned.

[2044] Well, her body's like really warm.

[2045] Uh -huh.

[2046] Oh, you get horny for her when she's sick.

[2047] Oh, yeah.

[2048] Oh, that's cute, Rob.

[2049] That's really cute, but also opposite.

[2050] Yeah, it's not helpful.

[2051] Yeah.

[2052] Yeah.

[2053] No, I think that's sweet because, you know, that is one thing yesterday.

[2054] My body was just, it hurts so bad.

[2055] And I, I was like, oh, I wish someone would hold me. Yeah.

[2056] Yeah, you need a spoon in these stitches.

[2057] Yeah.

[2058] Yeah.

[2059] Okay.

[2060] I'm having trouble finding it.

[2061] I can't even imagine you know what you're looking for at this point.

[2062] No, I know.

[2063] Oh, okay.

[2064] Oh, best soup, Los Angeles is one of my searches.

[2065] Of course.

[2066] Yeah.

[2067] While you're looking for this, this will be a fun update.

[2068] So me and the kids and Mom rode to Alcove yesterday here in town.

[2069] And then a man, a strange man approached Lincoln with great familiarity.

[2070] And my spidey senses popped.

[2071] And then it was Wobby Wob.

[2072] And it was a pop -out.

[2073] But I was delighted because it was not an assailant.

[2074] It was Wabiwob.

[2075] So it was a bumpin.

[2076] And of course he had just come from, ding, ding, ding.

[2077] Maru.

[2078] Of course.

[2079] Yes.

[2080] And as I drove by on the bikes, I was like, I'm going to see Rob or Monica in this line.

[2081] There's no way I'm not going to.

[2082] So at any rate, Wabi Wob gave us a hug, high five.

[2083] He bails.

[2084] We finish up.

[2085] Lincoln goes, Mom, your bike was stolen.

[2086] Sure enough.

[2087] Mom's bike was stolen.

[2088] My only two thoughts are one, Delta spilled a whole Diet Coke on me, so I had to get up and go get more ice.

[2089] I was gone for a minute.

[2090] Took my eye off the prize.

[2091] Could have happened then.

[2092] Or when Wabiwob distracted me and I had to hug him, maybe that's, maybe Wabiwob was working in tandem.

[2093] I had someone with me. You did.

[2094] Okay, you were the decoy.

[2095] And then the thing that a little bit frustrated me is this guy goes, oh, yeah, the white bike.

[2096] And I go, yeah, yeah, I saw a homeless guy grab it and take it.

[2097] And I'm like, okay, and you didn't think to just go like, hey, is that anyone's bike?

[2098] Then Lincoln and I sped home on bikes, got the car, went and picked up Delta.

[2099] Now, a side note, Delta ditched her bike midway there because it was too small for her, as I told her it was.

[2100] And she was hitting her knees on the handlebar.

[2101] She went to go to the bigger bike.

[2102] She finally had to bail out.

[2103] Then she rode with me holding her.

[2104] Then she didn't like that.

[2105] Anyway, you know, a whole Delta.

[2106] Oh, wow.

[2107] So Lincoln and I blow home.

[2108] We get the car.

[2109] We go pick them up.

[2110] And then we cruise around.

[2111] I'm like, I'm going down to under the L .A. I see a lot of people storing bikes down there.

[2112] So I go route through a few encampments looking at bikes.

[2113] There's hundreds of bikes down there.

[2114] Hers is not there.

[2115] Then we circle back, blah, blah, blah.

[2116] We find the bike.

[2117] It's on Hillhurst, leaning against a bush.

[2118] So I get out and I get the bike.

[2119] And there's some folks there, some unhoused.

[2120] And so I tell, Kristen, you drive the car.

[2121] I'll drive this lady's bike home.

[2122] And then, of course, I got to ask these guys, either of you snagged this bike.

[2123] Because what was missing bike, we got it back, recovery, great.

[2124] But there were three Barbies in the basket, and they were gone.

[2125] And I needed to get those Barbies for Delta.

[2126] So then I asked if these two dudes who were banging back a couple joints, if either of them had snagged the bike.

[2127] If so, all I'm looking for is the Barbies.

[2128] This escalated quickly.

[2129] I had to go full silverback mode.

[2130] They declined my invite.

[2131] I ended up riding home.

[2132] I don't think they had the Barbies.

[2133] It was quite a scenario.

[2134] That's scary.

[2135] I didn't know about that part.

[2136] Yikes.

[2137] They're both dead.

[2138] Well, this is a ding -ding -dink for the after -party.

[2139] I watched it all last night.

[2140] Oh, you watched the whole show, the after -party?

[2141] Yeah.

[2142] I really enjoyed it.

[2143] Oh, good.

[2144] I really, really, really enjoyed it.

[2145] I couldn't sleep because of my sickness, so I just watched it.

[2146] How fun.

[2147] It's good.

[2148] And then another Sim moment.

[2149] My friend Aiden, the fellow mermaid.

[2150] The fellow mermaid, who I talked about on Molly's episode, she's also in the after party.

[2151] And I was watching it, and she texted me. No, ding.

[2152] And we don't talk.

[2153] Like, you know, it's not like we talk every week or anything.

[2154] And she texted me. Let's get together and shampoo our hair with herbal essence.

[2155] We will.

[2156] Oh, God.

[2157] What a party.

[2158] Are you watching Under the Banner?

[2159] Yeah, I'm caught up.

[2160] Oh, I love it.

[2161] Oh, my God.

[2162] I know.

[2163] Me too.

[2164] I love it.

[2165] I hope everyone watches it.

[2166] Under the banner of heaven on Hulu.

[2167] Not an app.

[2168] Was that a cough or a sneeze?

[2169] Oh, there's some symptoms.

[2170] Real -time symptoms.

[2171] Sneezes.

[2172] Okay.

[2173] Your blanket has COVID all over it now.

[2174] I just thought you kind of, yeah.

[2175] Oh, you know what's one sad thing?

[2176] I don't have any tissues, so I have to use toilet paper.

[2177] Okay.

[2178] Oh, boy.

[2179] Okay.

[2180] All right.

[2181] We're back.

[2182] Back on track.

[2183] So I found the article.

[2184] Oh, great.

[2185] This says, and there's a lot of false info out there.

[2186] So preface.

[2187] It is a dot org, but I...

[2188] Yeah, we know that anyone can have that.

[2189] That's right.

[2190] Yeah.

[2191] This says...

[2192] One way in which immune cells signal to one another and regulate their responses to pathogens is through the secretion of proteins called cytokines.

[2193] I'm not sure if I'm saying that right.

[2194] However, in some situations, uncontrolled release of these substances can trigger a, quote, cytokine storm, characterized by excessive inflammation and damage to cells and organs.

[2195] This is thought to be a key driver of severe COVID -19 illness, which is why many hospitals now use anti -inflammatory drugs.

[2196] So when you were saying you have a more indefinitely.

[2197] intense immune system, it's actually bad.

[2198] Because it could get into a Cytocon storm.

[2199] And then I thought maybe that's happening to me because I would have an immune system that tries to overachieve.

[2200] Of course, A plus if it's on the table.

[2201] Kill everything.

[2202] Let God sort it out.

[2203] Ding, dang, dang, under the banner.

[2204] Oh, wow, yeah.

[2205] Okay, I'm going to get into some facts.

[2206] Okay, you said in cocaine cowboys, if they said the average federal reserve cash holdings at any given time, 40 to 50 million in cash.

[2207] Yeah, I was just throwing darts at a dartboard here.

[2208] I don't know what it really was.

[2209] Well, okay, yeah, and Florida Federal Reserve had $6 to $7 billion, you said.

[2210] Right, right, right, right.

[2211] You were just saying there's a bunch of bigger.

[2212] Yeah, I was trying to say there's like a hundred X difference between the average and the Florida one.

[2213] Yeah.

[2214] And then the problem is now I'm realizing my research is wrong because this isn't cash.

[2215] Was it include gold or something?

[2216] Well, I don't know, but this says as of April 20th, the Fed's assets stand.

[2217] at 8 .96 trillion.

[2218] Yeah, I'm talking about like a regional federal reserves that deal with the money coming in and out.

[2219] So the money comes into the state reserve and then gets funneled eventually back up to the main federal reserve.

[2220] And so you have all these little satellite banks that are dealing with the money regionally and there was just a hundred X amount in the Florida reserve as there was any other one in the nation.

[2221] Oh, I see.

[2222] Really just showing how much cash was coming in and out of Florida.

[2223] Compared to other states.

[2224] Yes, yes, yes.

[2225] And like at the time, this was all in Killing Pablo as well.

[2226] You know, Amy's and Cocaine Cowboys, I don't know.

[2227] I watched so many of these damn things.

[2228] But like there was a full recession in the 80s, but there was a wait list for Ferraris, Mercedes, and Porsche in Florida.

[2229] Because there was just billions of dollars coming in from narco trade.

[2230] Okay.

[2231] Well, then that fact is bunk because.

[2232] I was confused.

[2233] I thought you were saying the National Federal Reserve has less money than Florida's State Reserve.

[2234] I got you.

[2235] I imagine other people were confused, too, so I'm glad we drilled deeper into it.

[2236] Okay, so you said the bad sports show on Netflix is done by the Wild Wild Country People.

[2237] It's actually not.

[2238] It's untold that's done by the Wild Wild Country People.

[2239] Thank you.

[2240] Thank you.

[2241] Both are incredible shows.

[2242] They really are.

[2243] And they came out pretty much at the exact same time, so it was confusing.

[2244] Yeah, a few months apart.

[2245] I'm sure the makers of both of those were like, I wish you could have space us out a little bit.

[2246] I tried to find out how long the India clone high hunger strike went on.

[2247] But I think it was just like that day.

[2248] And they made the decision pretty quickly.

[2249] Maybe I'll go on a hunger strike until you're negative.

[2250] Oh.

[2251] Yeah.

[2252] Because I could do that.

[2253] I could achieve that.

[2254] Okay.

[2255] So is that just like a personal goal?

[2256] It's not really about.

[2257] It's about you.

[2258] You tell your body.

[2259] I think if you, because you're very goal oriented.

[2260] If you have the goal of saving me by saving yourself, it'll probably speed things up.

[2261] Okay.

[2262] I'll talk to my house.

[2263] In your cytosines.

[2264] Yeah.

[2265] Phil said the magic portal was the first brick film.

[2266] The first known brick film is a Danish movie.

[2267] It's called Journey to the Moon.

[2268] It was created in 1973, six -minute vision.

[2269] video featured both stop motion animation and live action and was recorded on Super 8 film.

[2270] Oh, wonderful.

[2271] Okay.

[2272] You told Ike's famous joke.

[2273] Oh, right.

[2274] Which has been updated at the live show.

[2275] Yeah, that's right.

[2276] You guys will hear it on an upcoming episode.

[2277] Yeah, he's got part two of that joke.

[2278] Yeah.

[2279] You were telling it, and so in telling it, you were just like, his partner, Mike.

[2280] Okay.

[2281] You know.

[2282] Dave is his partner?

[2283] Yeah, Dave Stasson.

[2284] Yeah.

[2285] You knew.

[2286] I know now.

[2287] But I didn't know then.

[2288] That's weird.

[2289] Yeah, that is weird.

[2290] Well, he probably told you again.

[2291] Yeah, probably because I heard it.

[2292] But also, I was driving down the road today.

[2293] There was something I was trying to think of for two days, the last two days, and then today I thought of it.

[2294] So that happens too, right?

[2295] But you had COVID with...

[2296] Okay.

[2297] I thought it was interesting what he was saying about the Bell Labs building and that it's the Lumen building for Severance.

[2298] How cool.

[2299] Very cool.

[2300] And then I wanted to figure out what some of the inventions were.

[2301] at Bell Laboratories.

[2302] Oh, wow.

[2303] Okay.

[2304] Well, we start with Alexander Graham Bell, so the telephone, the phonograph, some kind of battery technology.

[2305] That's why I got interested in them.

[2306] Researchers working at Bell Laboratories are credited with the development of radio astronomy, the transistor, the laser, the photovoltaic cell, the charge coupled device, CCD, information theory.

[2307] Nine Nobel Prizes have been awarded for work completed at Bell Laboratories.

[2308] Wow.

[2309] What an esteemed joint.

[2310] Yeah, that's cool.

[2311] And now, maybe an Emmy -winning show set.

[2312] Most likely.

[2313] Okay, the airline safety video dance is Alaska Airlines.

[2314] Oh, okay.

[2315] Which was Virgin, I think, before.

[2316] Yeah, Virgin had some, because they have crazy lights.

[2317] Yeah, I think Virgin had the dancing one as well.

[2318] and then maybe they took it when Alaska bought them.

[2319] Did Alaska buy Virgin?

[2320] Yeah, I'm pretty sure.

[2321] Oh, wow.

[2322] I liked Virgin, and I liked when Alaska would randomly have a Virgin plane.

[2323] Yeah, people liked it.

[2324] It's like a party bus plane.

[2325] The Alaska Air Group acquired Virgin America in April 2016.

[2326] Okay, six years ago.

[2327] Congratulations, Alaska.

[2328] No. Didn't you say 16?

[2329] Yeah.

[2330] It's 22.

[2331] Yeah, 16 plus 16.

[2332] Oh, my God.

[2333] Oh, my God.

[2334] Slow math.

[2335] Yeah, the opposite of fast math is COVID math.

[2336] Now we know.

[2337] Rona math.

[2338] I wish we had a sound effect for it.

[2339] So do I. Oh, I have one.

[2340] I have one.

[2341] Hold on.

[2342] Oh, you guys both do.

[2343] Don't hit that one that plays for a minute.

[2344] Oh, great.

[2345] That was a good one.

[2346] I don't know if she can hear our sound effects.

[2347] Oh, that was you?

[2348] Oh, Robbie Rob just did that.

[2349] Don, dun, dun, dun, dun, dun.

[2350] No, I did that.

[2351] Oh, okay.

[2352] I don't think it passes through Zoom.

[2353] Okay.

[2354] Well, you both did the same one.

[2355] That's convenient.

[2356] Wow, Sim.

[2357] I hope it overlaps in a really dissonant way.

[2358] That's a new medley that takes off.

[2359] Me too.

[2360] I need an outlet for singing.

[2361] Okay.

[2362] So my new thing, I think, is going to be taking really well -known songs and trying to sing the lyrics but with a whole new melody because it's kind of hard.

[2363] Oh, that sounds really hard.

[2364] Okay.

[2365] So let me play you last night's that I could not stop singing to myself.

[2366] Okay.

[2367] And if you liked it, then you should have put some rings on it.

[2368] If you liked it on, then you should have put some rings on it.

[2369] I've ever liked it.

[2370] Then you should have put some rings on it.

[2371] You know what I'm saying?

[2372] Are that the right lyrics?

[2373] No, I mean, I'm fucking with the lyrics a little bit, but if you liked it and you should have put a ring, on it.

[2374] It was in a cartoon my kids were listening to, and then the whole night I could not stop going.

[2375] And if you liked it, then you should have put some rings on it.

[2376] This is the kind of thing I would normally send to Aaron, really.

[2377] I guess that's my only outlet, is to send these things to Aaron.

[2378] What do you mean?

[2379] You can do it here?

[2380] Yeah.

[2381] Well, and I just did, but here's from our trip.

[2382] Let's see.

[2383] So that's that commercial we love.

[2384] It's for a pharmaceutical called Ompenza.

[2385] We can't get the name right, but it goes, oh, oh, oh, impanzet.

[2386] Here, I'll play it again.

[2387] Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, pezzanick.

[2388] Oh, wow.

[2389] That's fun.

[2390] Oh, my God, a huge development.

[2391] I hope you can see this.

[2392] Actually, I'm going to send it to your phone so you can look at it right now.

[2393] The biggest right of passage, and obviously I had nothing to do with this.

[2394] I would never promote this behavior, but bless your heart.

[2395] Thank you.

[2396] Oh, bless your heart.

[2397] Okay.

[2398] Okay, so go ahead and look at your phone.

[2399] Oh, wow.

[2400] It's a picture of a penis.

[2401] Yep, and really humongous testicles.

[2402] Yeah, really big balls.

[2403] And then hair.

[2404] I guess that's hair, yeah.

[2405] We'd have to ask Lincoln because she's who drew this.

[2406] Oh.

[2407] Oh, wow.

[2408] I did not expect that.

[2409] Right.

[2410] She presents this to me and says, Daddy, I drew a penis.

[2411] And, of course, I'm not going to shame her for drawing a penis.

[2412] Who cares?

[2413] And then I'm thinking, this is probably about the age I started drawing penises.

[2414] And I don't know what else is.

[2415] I go, well, you know, I've drawn somewhere around 11 or 12 ,000 people.

[2416] penises in my lifetime.

[2417] Trying to make her feel normal.

[2418] Okay, because she has some accoutrema.

[2419] Look, it doesn't resemble me at all.

[2420] I wish I had balls that big.

[2421] That would be so sexy, but I don't.

[2422] But this guy's got a couple of cantalopes.

[2423] Yeah, I actually think something might be wrong with this person.

[2424] Eleventitis.

[2425] Yeah, unfortunately.

[2426] Cephalus of the testicles.

[2427] No, what do they call that?

[2428] Acephalitis.

[2429] Encephalitis.

[2430] Thank you.

[2431] Really good job.

[2432] Encephalitis of the test.

[2433] testes.

[2434] I have questions for her.

[2435] Well, let's bring her on.

[2436] Okay, to do like an artist, kind of walk you through the back story.

[2437] Of the piece.

[2438] Also, you can see where she erased something and then took another shot at it, right?

[2439] There's like two other stabs at it.

[2440] Multiple shafts drunk.

[2441] Yes, yes, exactly.

[2442] Neither length seemed right to her.

[2443] I guess, in relation to the testicles.

[2444] Oh my God, she even drew a pee hole.

[2445] A urethra, yeah.

[2446] Wow.

[2447] This is a great first stab at it.

[2448] I hope she'll be drawing the Balsack Cowboys soon.

[2449] You know what people never do is draw vulvas.

[2450] Unfortunately, yeah.

[2451] Remember, that came up when we had Gwynethon, that women don't see each other's vaginas the way boys see each other's penises.

[2452] But even, like, Lincoln's drawing this.

[2453] She's choosing to draw a penis instead of a vulva.

[2454] But there's so much more going on.

[2455] Well, I think also there's just way more to draw.

[2456] It would be like trying to draw an ear.

[2457] Yeah, trying to draw a ear.

[2458] That's a great analogy.

[2459] That's even hard.

[2460] That's more intense than a penis.

[2461] But I'm just saying any bozo can make two balls and a stick.

[2462] Oh, right.

[2463] Too much to tackle.

[2464] Speaking of vulvas, under the manner of heaven, we're getting into some polygamy episodes.

[2465] Yes.

[2466] Lots of vulvas.

[2467] Well, Joseph Smith had access to 33.

[2468] Yep.

[2469] And young girls.

[2470] Yeah.

[2471] Really, really rough.

[2472] Really rough.

[2473] Rough, rough, rough.

[2474] rough well smooth because they're young well i'm not gonna weigh in on you're you're in better shape than me to talk about that oh boy well i love you i help you feel better thanks i will good because i'm not gonna eat until you're negative yeah the hunger strike is starting to put pressure on me it's really easy for me to say that right now because lincoln and i stopped on the way home from riding at the motorcross track and head in and out so i'm so full right now that i'm like yeah i'll just not eat for a long time, but I bet in three hours, it's going to feel more challenging.

[2475] While we're on it, Lincoln, first day at the motocross track on her new one -town, big, big motorcycle.

[2476] She did great.

[2477] She probably did 40 laps, didn't have an issue.

[2478] And then Jolene, I've told you about Jolene.

[2479] She's like one of the best female motocross riders in the history of motocross does backflips.

[2480] She's so great.

[2481] And she's so sweet and lovely.

[2482] And Lincoln and I were out on the like what's called the Vets track, like the smaller track riding.

[2483] And she came out there off the big track.

[2484] And she came up to Lincoln and said, can I ride with you?

[2485] And then she rode next to her.

[2486] And she, like, pushed her a bit, which was great.

[2487] It was so fun.

[2488] And then after their two laps, Lincoln goes, I can't believe how fast I was going.

[2489] And I thought, you lucky little bastard, you get egged on and coached by one of the greats of all time.

[2490] Well, yeah.

[2491] She's also good enough, though.

[2492] Yeah.

[2493] You know.

[2494] But just so lucky.

[2495] Yeah.

[2496] Oh, how great.

[2497] That's so fun.

[2498] Okay.

[2499] That's all.

[2500] Love you.

[2501] Love you.

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