#568 - Danny McBride
Episode Stats
Length
1 hour and 29 minutes
Words per Minute
227.23613
Summary
Actor, comedian, writer, and director Danny McBride joins Jemele to discuss his new HBO show, Righteous Gemstones, and how he spends his time on the beach. He also talks about how he got into comedy, and what it s like to be in Los Angeles.
Transcript
00:00:00.000
We hope you're enjoying your Air Canada flight.
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Fast-free Wi-Fi means I can make dinner reservations before we land.
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Wi-Fi available to Airplane members on Equipped Flight.
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Today's guest is a comedian, an actor, a writer, and a director
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known for some of the funniest shows that anyone has ever seen.
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He's going into his fourth season and final season of Righteous Gemstones,
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He's a legend, and he's one of the most requested human beings ever
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I'm grateful to spend time with Mr. Danny McBride.
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Or is this just, am I the only lucky guy today?
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Is this going to have where all of our lines are?
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If the whole interview were scripted, man, that'd be freaking pretty amazing, man.
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There's a place called Matcha Luther King that I went to, and I was like, this is, it just
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like, is that a, like, are we at that level where you're taking a guy like that and turning
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Yeah, it was cool, but it was just like, you know.
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I just definitely just having one of those days where it's like my skin feels all dry
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I don't know how hydration became like the hot thing in the past 10 years.
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People only started drinking water and hydrating the last 10 years, you think?
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Yeah, but I used to live on King Street over there right across.
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It was like women's fine clothing or something.
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Except I took a girl on a tour, one of the – I mean, it's one of the – I think it's
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one of the five most unique cities in America, I think.
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And I took a girl on like a carriage tour or whatever, and it was a black girl that I
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And a lot of it's kind of – it gets a little – you know, some of the history around
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So like in a certain point, I'm just – I'm like trying to tip the driver early.
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And you go out to like the beach and stuff there.
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Do you guys spend time on the beach or what is your life like there?
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And then – yeah, we're on the water all the time there.
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Yeah, why don't they have – who's coming out with the big boy board?
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Yeah, so you have to just go all in on the boogie boarding.
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I could stand up on this thing, but I choose not to.
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Dude, but is there anything a little bit dicier than being an adult boogie boarder?
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You're not going to pick up any new fans doing it.
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Your wife – the wives are always just standing in the distance, like, just waiting for –
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I always like to share new products that I find useful in my life, and this is a dick laser.
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What it is is it's like a laser pointer that is a dick that projects dicks.
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So if anyone's running their mouth too much in here, look at your shoe.
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There's some variable settings on there, too, I think, where you can kind of change what nasty stuff you put.
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The other end is where you get the dick right there.
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Yeah, and then the other one's where you embarrass him.
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Anytime anyone's talking too much in here, you just throw one of those across their forehead, and it'll shut them up fast.
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Or if you see an old guy, you put a limping on him just to fucking.
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There's nothing cooler than that seeing some cats chasing a little cock around.
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We've had two really neat gifts, and this is definitely one of them.
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Was your neighborhood cool growing up, or was it like in a city?
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I was born in Georgia, and then we actually spent a few years after that.
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My dad was a guard in the prison at Lompoc in Lompoc, California, so I lived for a few years on the prison reservation right outside of the prison
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where, like, all the people lived whose parents worked in the prison.
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All types of, I bet it's pretty diverse over there, was it?
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And I lived there, and then my dad got transferred to the Federal Bureau of Prisons in D.C., and so that's when we moved to Virginia.
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Is it scary being this child of somebody that works at a prison?
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I didn't really kind of get it until, like, I mean, this was, like, I'm talking, like, real little.
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Like, I moved out of there, and we were, like, in kindergarten.
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I can remember, though, one night, the alarm was going off, and, like, my dad came in and, like, rounded me and my sister up, and we had to go into their bedroom and shut the door, and I, like, looked out the window, and it was just my dad with the shotgun going outside, jumping in the back of a pickup truck with all my friends' dads.
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There was, like, a prison break, and they were going to go chase the dudes down.
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It was like, ooh, this is some real shit right here.
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Yeah, because I wonder if you did, like, if you're dead.
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I guess he doesn't bring work home, because that would be like having an inmate come over for dinner or whatever.
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I think if he brings work home, there's a big problem.
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I, um, we grew up by this, it was, like, a prosthetic kind of, not factory, I guess.
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I think it was hoping that, like, after the war, like, prostheticking would scale up or whatever.
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But, so, but it never really did, but they had a lot of, um, they give us, like, the use, like, the fucking, you can get them out back.
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Sometimes they used ones, the ones that didn't.
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Used prosthetics, ones that people didn't want?
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Yeah, returns, or ones that were, um, they did, they didn't, uh, it's not, like, veneers, but they just didn't do the edging right on it or something, or the hand was too small for the guy who ordered.
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But we would, yeah, you'd have people, like, or it would be two middle fingers, some, you know, guar fan would get, like, one with two middle fingers on it.
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But, um, but that was something that was always funny around us, because you'd see, like, people would chase each other with different little appendages.
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You'd see fucking somebody, you know, not hit their wife, but throw a hand at her, you know, or something.
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It was cool that you knew where to find those, those rejects.
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Or you'd see, like, somebody try to break into a car, but not using their own fingerprints, like, try to.
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You could probably get fake hands with two middle fingers still if you wanted to, I bet.
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Especially with just how the things are going these days.
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It's like, I think you almost want two middles.
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Yeah, I feel like with the state of the world, we all definitely need more middle fingers.
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Do you, um, I know since you live over there in Charleston, do you stay out of, like, I know that you don't have social media and stuff like that.
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Like, uh, when we shot Vice Principals, Walton Goggins and, like, Busy Phillips, they were on there.
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And they were all, they were involved with social media.
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And they were kind of telling me, you got to get in there.
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And so I, like, had an Instagram account for, like, a matter of a few months and was like, fuck this.
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I felt like it was a gateway for just crazy people to be able to reach out and touch.
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So I, uh, yeah, it just wasn't that, I don't know, it wasn't, it wasn't my deal.
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But, uh, yeah, it just didn't feel like a natural fit for me.
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And so, but that's, it's just good that you, like, recognize that.
00:10:04.560
Yeah, it's kind of addicting and it makes you feel bad, I think, sometimes.
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Some things are nice to see because it feels inspirational.
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But then sometimes you're just like, it's, yeah, you're keeping up with this kind of weird void, it feels like.
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The only thing I miss about it is I like seeing bum fights.
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Um, do you miss like, like being, when I, when I was a kid, like things were dumb.
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Like shit was just, you could be funny all day.
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When you got home, like there was just, shit was possible.
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Or it was just like, everything was going to kind of be okay.
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Do you miss like, um, but I noticed as I get older, I just, my brain doesn't even come up with like some of the ideas and stuff that I had when I was a kid.
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And like, like, do you notice any of that for yourself?
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Like that you felt like your humor was different than, or that humor changes as you get, as you get older.
00:11:05.020
I just feel like, I feel like if you're creative, being bored is good sometimes.
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And I feel like sometimes with these phones, with all this information all the time, your brain is just constantly occupied by other people's noise.
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And so I felt like when I kind of turned that stuff off, I just felt like there was all of this noise that just went away.
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Cause maybe sometimes I think I miss, that is what I miss.
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Not knowing about everything that's going on in the world.
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And not wearing all these things on my face that aren't even of my own life kind of in a way, you know?
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And I had this weird thought about the other day, like, say it's like you're a parent.
00:11:53.940
And you're always seeing, like, these cute things that kids do on TikToks and different things.
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Like, if your kid isn't as boisterous or isn't, like, does it, like, I don't know.
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I thought about, like, it takes almost all of our, like, some of our good, like, our good reactions or the things that are kind of supposed to be reserved for kind of real people in our lives.
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Does it start to, like, take those reactions to those people?
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I feel that you'll see people on there that are going on these beautiful vacations.
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You're like, damn, how do they know about, how do they know to go to these places?
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Like, you start comparing all these things in your world to what you see there.
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I mean, I'm not someone who's, like, I'm not against it all.
00:12:38.480
I think that there's also awesome stuff with just anyone being able to have a voice and anyone being able to reach people that have what's in common.
00:12:47.200
But, yeah, I think for me, I just kind of, I saw that it probably wasn't going to be the best thing for me.
00:12:55.840
You're almost like, damn, Christopher Columbus.
00:13:00.620
I'm waiting for it to go extinct, and I don't think it ever will.
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I'm just pretending like none of these advancements are there, dude.
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I'm just in my house making rocking chairs and selling, you know, taffy.
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I think my hobbies were always, like, making stuff.
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Like, when I was a kid, I'd make movies or write stuff.
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And then once that became my job, then people are like, what are you into?
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It's like, I guess just my job is what I'm into.
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We would drink so much gin and tonics and just wet the bed all the time over there.
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You better fucking put a catamaran between you and your wife, dude.
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Oh, you know who I saw yesterday speaking on social media?
00:14:10.380
And you don't want to look for too long because it's like, it's just not something you do.
00:14:18.720
But it's kind of weird because you don't want to be like, I'm talking to a kid or whatever.
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There was like some guy in there who had overdosed on age or something.
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Like some super old guy who's like, I'm a producer, you know?
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He's like, I produced the Mayflower or whatever.
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But yeah, anyway, this was like, this is the coolest thing that ever happened.
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First of all, he had two Pepsis or whatever past 8 p.m., which I think he is.
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He's going to, the bedtime stories won't work anymore.
00:15:02.160
And some people say his grades have been suffering.
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He's just going to be able to do whatever he wants in this world, I think.
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My son watches all this stuff, so he keeps me up to date on who's who.
00:15:29.260
But he's kind of like the Macaulay Culkin of their generation, it seems like.
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But yeah, he was fucking eating at Craig's with some, it just like, it was very bizarre.
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And I asked him a question and he just started doing his arms like that.
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I think he, I mean, I'm an adult and I shouldn't have really been talking to him, so I think
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And the weird thing is you see all these adults looking at him, it's just got to be so weird
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It's like he's this generation's Shirley Temple.
00:16:05.040
But he definitely looks like his, yeah, I just heard his grades have been suffering.
00:16:08.420
And I even was like the dad, I was like, somebody said he's had issues in social studies.
00:16:11.820
And he looked at his dad like, you've been telling me.
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My friend and I made a movie, David Spade and I wrote a movie.
00:16:21.980
Thank you for inspiring people to like, just kind of create stuff on their own.
00:16:34.400
Maybe him and Chris Elliott were like the best people that came in.
00:16:38.100
Yeah, Steve Little is such a, he's such a good dude.
00:16:44.420
He's like a, just like a teddy bear that's been like, not in a halfway house, but definitely
00:16:48.260
like, like boot camp, like could have been a wrestler type of energy.
00:17:05.180
When we wrote the pilot for Eastbound and we had that role, you know, we were, we just
00:17:09.340
went to like, you know, we went through the regular casting process.
00:17:11.940
And honestly, like as soon as I saw him, then that's like where that character kind of like
00:17:17.080
Like there was no intentions when we first wrote that, that that character would be such
00:17:21.420
But it was seeing how genuinely funny he was and how cool he was.
00:17:25.040
Then every season just became like, what can we get Steve to do this year?
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He'd always take it much further than we ever imagined.
00:17:36.440
And he drank out of those little, you know, those little creamer cups.
00:17:46.460
Uh, I was launching this tequila brand, Don Gato, and I got him to come down there with
00:17:52.680
And after the first day of shooting, I came down to the hotel bar and he was just there
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Tell how, tell her how much fun I'm having here.
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I was like, that's what I love about Steve Little.
00:18:08.940
He definitely seems like a hug that got left somewhere, but rescued.
00:18:14.800
We texted a little bit after I got to touch base with him and say, Hey, but that was just
00:18:19.900
Like you see people and you're like, Oh, this works for casting because we would have
00:18:23.620
friends that would send in videos and some of them are like audition tapes.
00:18:26.720
And then you're like, Oh man, that's my friend.
00:18:31.760
It's like, it's super specific kind of to watch because I used to just put in audition
00:18:37.660
tapes and I would never get booked for anything.
00:18:39.280
And I was like, but then this time we're getting the videos in cause we're doing the casting.
00:18:43.560
And you're like, Oh, first of all, I see why I never got anything.
00:18:50.300
But then, um, but then you'd have friends that would send a role and you're like, Oh,
00:18:54.680
Or this would be kind of risky, but it might be adventurous.
00:18:57.740
It was, that was probably one of the most fun things I think about creating something.
00:19:01.740
That, that casting is definitely fun because stuff can just take a new life on and, and
00:19:06.060
It's one of those deals where someone can be really good and you can kind of tell instantly
00:19:09.640
whether it's a, the right fit or not, not even based on their talent, but like whatever
00:19:13.980
ideas you had in mind for what that character looked like or how they talked.
00:19:17.340
And you can kind of tell instantly when someone comes in like, yep or nope, you know?
00:19:23.580
Just, I've been lucky that I have like tried to write most of the things that I've done,
00:19:28.580
but, uh, yeah, just being an actress to show up constantly and put yourself out there in
00:19:34.120
It is hard and drive over there and be depressed while you're driving over there, trying to
00:19:38.300
do your lines and be in traffic, sitting in a lobby where it's a bunch of dudes who look
00:19:48.180
That was some of the tough, like I did that for probably six or seven years probably.
00:19:52.400
And I never had any hope that I was going to, I almost did it.
00:19:57.700
I think you're just in LA also when you're young enough, you have the energy to do it.
00:20:00.900
Um, with fist foot way, you didn't write that, right?
00:20:08.080
Um, and you guys shot that on, on super 16 or no super 16.
00:20:13.300
And you made that without going through sag and stuff, right?
00:20:18.940
I think we shot it for about 70 grand, shot it in like a little less than three weeks.
00:20:27.040
And, um, yeah, I mean, it was, um, I, we had, Jody and I had both lived in LA for a few years
00:20:32.760
And, you know, neither of us had found like any real success.
00:20:35.940
And so it was sort of a hail Mary of just like, all right, let's just see if we can kind
00:20:41.580
And what, what do you, what do you notice that's easier about doing a film like that
00:20:44.560
or doing something where you have to go through all the, uh, where, where everything
00:20:47.600
is more, um, you know, uh, guilds and all of that.
00:20:51.240
You know, if you're at a place where you can afford the guilds, then you're already have
00:20:54.600
a leg up, you know, you're already kind of in the zone.
00:20:56.880
That thing there was like, there's no one trying to help us make it.
00:20:59.620
There's no one, you know, they're not, they don't care about it, not being the guilds
00:21:02.580
because they just don't ever think it'll see the light of day.
00:21:05.160
So, you know, every bit of that is a fight because not only do you have to kind of get
00:21:09.280
the resources and figure out how to do it and how to talk people into coming and doing
00:21:15.460
Uh, but then even once it's done, there's no guarantee that anything will ever happen with
00:21:20.500
And so I think that can be pretty discouraging for people sometimes.
00:21:26.940
Like we got, we made this movie and now we're figuring out, like we wrote it and everything
00:21:33.180
Cause you're like, all you really have right now is this piece of debt kind of, um, but
00:21:46.660
And now, especially the entertainment industry has changed so much and yeah, it's all risk.
00:21:53.300
Do you, um, do you envy things about the entertainment industry right now?
00:21:56.820
Like as opposed to whenever you kind of first got into it, you know, what I find interesting
00:22:00.900
is like, I, you know, I went to film school in North Carolina.
00:22:04.340
That's where I met Jody Hill and a lot of the guys I work with.
00:22:06.820
And, uh, you know, in the nineties there was just like such a, uh, a healthy independent
00:22:12.880
I mean, you were going to film school and you're seeing guys like Tarantino and, you
00:22:17.160
know, Kevin Smith and all these dudes are just like making stuff.
00:22:20.140
That's pretty simple and it's not requiring massive budgets and they're finding audiences.
00:22:29.020
And it's kind of funny that it was much harder to make an independent film than I mean, you
00:22:34.280
You had to like, there was all these elements of things that were super expensive and it
00:22:38.240
seems kind of crazy that with technology, it should be easier than ever to make something
00:22:43.080
independent, but it feels like the market is like not as healthy as it used to be.
00:22:50.140
And then, but something new will come out of it, right?
00:22:52.060
That's how you kind of think like, how does this evolve?
00:22:57.020
Was there a movie that you like, like that you may, that you wrote or that a role or some
00:23:02.300
little piece of something that you wanted to do that once you started to get a little
00:23:04.880
older, because sometimes I'm like, fuck, this thing would have, for me would have been great
00:23:09.920
I think I could have pulled it off, but now it's like, um, do you ever think like that?
00:23:13.780
Like, was there some, like, was there something you had?
00:23:17.120
You're like, fuck, now I'm going to have to cast somebody to do it instead of do it.
00:23:21.140
I, uh, it's so hard writing stuff that most of the time when I have written something,
00:23:26.360
it's been with the intention of going and making it.
00:23:28.640
I only have a few things that I've written that I didn't kind of move on, but most of
00:23:33.680
them were just because it wasn't any good and it wasn't something to kind of pursue.
00:23:37.140
But luckily, uh, all the stuff I've really put my energy into, I've been able to see it
00:23:50.360
Like a guy, like the sole survivor of a sinkhole, right?
00:23:55.040
And people are like, they fucking love him cause he made it cause God picked him.
00:23:58.480
And he, and at the cafe, they even have like, it'll have like a little oatmeal there, but
00:24:06.100
And so you think that you've gotten too old to be sinkhole baby now?
00:24:09.380
Well, because, but then what happens is it creates a lot of hype when something happens
00:24:16.480
Like suddenly you're a celebrity, but how do you live up to that in a small town when you didn't
00:24:20.080
really do anything when really God did it with gravity.
00:24:22.800
And now you have to fucking live like the repercussions of being sinkhole baby.
00:24:26.600
And then you go on tour with like other people, like hit by lightning guy and fucking, you know,
00:24:35.220
I just feel sometimes like I'm just getting a little too old.
00:24:38.840
Hey man, you're never too old to be a sinkhole baby.
00:24:46.460
And I think I don't know what the second half of it is.
00:24:57.600
And then at the end you go to the cafe and they put two raisins on top of that.
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00:28:05.940
Yeah, we helped him produce Tires, his show he does for Netflix.
00:28:12.120
Yeah, because it's so funny that I think there's times when I see him and I'm like,
00:28:15.720
oh, there's something about him that it's not just you, but there's something about the
00:28:22.920
He's himself, you know, not polished and just kind of shooting from the hip, you know?
00:28:42.120
Like, Tires was kind of a comedy that I think kind of changed things because there's jokes
00:28:45.680
in there that I feel like they wouldn't put on Netflix 10 years ago or even five years
00:28:52.840
You know, I feel like this, we've always tried to push it in everything that we've done.
00:28:56.840
I've, you know, I know people are like, oh, you can't make comedies about this, that
00:28:59.680
But, you know, even when we made Eastbound and Down, it wasn't like they were asking for
00:29:03.240
It wasn't like people were like, we need like a racist baseball player that cusses at kids and does
00:29:08.860
I mean, there wasn't like a, like an ad in the trades for it.
00:29:11.940
You know, I think that you come in, you make something funny and then that's what, you know,
00:29:19.380
I think that obviously you see people getting in trouble for saying fucked up shit.
00:29:24.020
But I also like, I feel like it's very rarely do you see people get in trouble for actually
00:29:29.120
like making something that is, you know, I think people get, I think people get in trouble
00:29:37.380
But I mean, rare, I mean, I can't really think of where people really get in trouble for like
00:29:43.400
I mean, maybe I'm like forgetting things, but I kind of feel like a lot of times people just
00:29:49.120
And I think when you make something that pushes the boundaries, everyone's not going to kiss
00:29:55.020
And you have to be cool with that being part of what goes with pushing the boundaries is
00:29:58.460
that those boundaries are going to sometimes push back on you.
00:30:02.460
Yeah, I almost relate when you're saying that, it makes me feel like it, like if you tweet
00:30:06.360
something, you're just saying something, you're looking for controversy.
00:30:08.900
It's like, yeah, but if you go out and make like, uh, put out a conversation of something,
00:30:18.260
There's all type of shit, but you go and, uh, actually put a conversation out.
00:30:22.600
Then it is more of like discussion and people at least respect that you had the conversation.
00:30:28.120
I mean, obviously you can be judged on whether it's good or not, but that's a different thing than
00:30:32.160
whether if you're just putting something out there, that's problematic and people get
00:30:36.100
I mean, it feels like that's honestly what you're asking for, right?
00:30:38.260
When people put something out there that's controversial, it's made to have people start
00:30:58.260
I mean, I fucking used to overdose over there in Charleston, especially on Halloween.
00:31:01.140
I mean, dude, one year I made out with three ladybugs, dude.
00:31:04.200
Oh, just the creatures, the ladybugs, the actual insects?
00:31:11.020
And then you wet the bed and went sailing after that?
00:31:16.500
That's the Charleston decathlon right there, dude.
00:31:30.280
Did you not one of yours was a thing or, you know, the, uh, is there any real gravity
00:31:35.840
Cause I'll, I'll fucking shine this dick on myself if you need me to.
00:31:44.060
And, um, one of the first moves I ever did was Hot Rod, which is produced by Lorne Michaels.
00:31:48.000
And, uh, when we, um, when we were shooting Hot Rod, I met Bill Hader and Andy Sandberg
00:31:55.660
And, uh, they were just coming off their first year of SNL.
00:32:00.220
And Lorne had actually kind of, uh, prodded me to see if I was interested in joining the
00:32:04.440
cast, but it was the same exact week that we sold Eastbound and down.
00:32:09.020
And so I was like, as much as I'm flattered, this is, uh, this is what I'm going to go
00:32:14.040
And, uh, and then none of them ever talked to me ever again.
00:32:19.200
Well, after seeing Kenny Powers, how do you think Kenny Powers would pitch against some
00:32:27.780
I feel like there should just be a special league for just all the dudes who juice it up.
00:32:39.020
And the Trump sun is starting up, which is kind of like imperfect.
00:32:45.940
Oh, dude, which is, that's also what I call my erection.
00:32:52.540
Cause I'm one of those pills, but a group, oh yeah.
00:32:55.600
Is infusing funding and some political muscle into the enhanced games.
00:33:01.480
This will sort of, anybody who wants to dope it up, we'll stay out of the, uh, the regular
00:33:06.000
leagues and they'll be, they'll gravitate towards this.
00:33:09.900
It says he's offering $1 million for the first sprinter to break the a hundred meter world
00:33:14.520
Can you imagine some guy just the rest of his body's falling off?
00:33:26.740
It's just going to be super humans leaping over houses.
00:33:31.600
You would meet up with the guy behind the wind Dixie and get some test 200.
00:33:34.840
First of all, you would hide it from your wife and have to pull over on the side of the interstate
00:33:40.160
And you and your buddy who have been like talking about how, who commonly refer to against gay
00:33:45.840
folks have to pull over and shoot it into each other's rear end.
00:33:50.000
And then all your hair falls out and zits start forming on your back.
00:33:56.020
But, but you're ready for the three-legged race with your buddy.
00:34:07.120
I've been, I live in Charleston, like we talked about, but so I've been out in LA this
00:34:19.600
Well, it's nice of you to say that and lie to me, but I will say that I waited in line
00:34:24.580
once I'm going to get a photo with you, like probably maybe 10 years ago somewhere.
00:34:33.820
I know people, when this show first started, I think everyone thought you were on the show.
00:34:43.880
I think I actually, honestly, when it, when the first season came out, I remember, I remember
00:34:47.480
I had, I met with a reporter and they asked me what it was like to work with Theo Vaughn.
00:34:55.000
Oh, I've had people come up to me and think I'm in the gym so it's 20 times.
00:34:59.780
I like, yeah, but oh, this dude's so awesome, man.
00:35:30.720
I'm just noticing how much more rip Tony is now.
00:35:33.140
Like he was always strong, but God damn, that dude got really strong over the last few
00:35:39.920
Him and him and divine oftentimes in the when we're shooting down Charleston, those guys
00:35:45.600
And so every day that they're not working, they're just fucking pumping iron together.
00:35:49.040
Are they just getting strong, spotting each other?
00:35:57.960
So also that's how you also kind of like met gay guys, you know, or at the first time.
00:36:04.240
It was like, dude, yeah, these guys are fucking.
00:36:06.460
But I think it did a lot for our town because some people who may not have like kind of
00:36:10.100
like, you know, branched out more, you know, or just like had more questions.
00:36:16.960
And then more gay people started kind of like drugs are the great equalizer.
00:36:26.380
Oh, were there real life pastors that you used to, to, that you sent your gemstone pastors
00:36:39.240
Do you send them like, did you have them reflect on guys or you go watch, you get some front
00:36:43.800
row tickets to some Osteen or what were you doing?
00:36:46.660
A lot of it was just like watching videos and stuff.
00:36:49.180
And then I actually kind of went around and I did it.
00:36:51.240
I interviewed a few different pastors just before I told them what I was making a show
00:36:55.980
And just, you know, for my own ideas, my own insight and people were responsive.
00:37:00.720
They, they talked to me, you know, my aunt, she actually sadly passed away just a few weeks
00:37:05.720
Uh, so I talked to her a lot about the church and, uh, really what kind of church did she
00:37:11.080
She, I think it was, I feel like she was, um, it was in Atlanta and it was just, it wasn't
00:37:15.400
a mega church, but it was one of those sort of these, uh, you know, churches that can pop
00:37:19.840
up in shopping centers and not look like your typical church.
00:37:22.600
And she kind of moved into counseling after that as well.
00:37:25.080
And, but, um, you know, I grew up in a household that was pretty religious.
00:37:28.740
My mom was, uh, she did like puppet ministry when I was a child.
00:37:32.580
She would like do the children's sermons and stuff like that.
00:37:37.320
And do they hide behind something to do that is out front?
00:37:39.800
It's like a little, we, we had this like, uh, PVC pipe frame with felt over it and they'd
00:37:47.540
And, uh, and, and my mom had like, uh, like boxes of these puppets and she would, uh, drum
00:37:52.800
up these little scripts and, you know, kind of mostly Bible characters.
00:37:56.360
Uh, no, there, well, sometimes there would be, but sometimes they would just be these characters
00:37:59.780
and they would have to learn Bible lessons, you know?
00:38:03.960
So it was like, it was like suddenly Paul Revere's in one of the scenes or something.
00:38:08.460
But it was, uh, you know, so I grew up with all that stuff.
00:38:12.040
So yeah, this is exactly, that's the kind of shit we do right there.
00:38:24.040
He's learning about the, he's, he's singing a song about sinkhole baby, you know, and about
00:38:28.480
how Jesus raised him up out of the sinkhole, made him into a little raisin.
00:38:35.280
I'm trying to think if we had any puppets, like, uh, no, what did we have?
00:38:58.020
She, uh, she, she moved, they lived in Virginia.
00:39:00.580
And then when we moved down to Charleston, uh, she moved there.
00:39:06.900
We were here for, I was here for like 20 years.
00:39:09.600
And so when I convinced her to move to Charleston with us, uh, you know, figured it was only right.
00:39:16.480
Her mom, who's a Angeleno, she moved down there too.
00:39:19.740
So now for the first time in my life, I have like all, I live in the same town as my parents.
00:39:35.080
I'll have the girl, I'll have the family, you know, it's been, it's, it's been nice, man.
00:39:40.480
I, I always feel grateful for what we get to do.
00:39:43.280
And, uh, but the fact that like, like this show, all the shows we've done, I've made it with
00:39:47.400
all the, my buddies that I met in college, you know, guys I met when I was 18 years old
00:39:51.800
were, you know, smoking weed together in the dorm rooms, talking about movies and all this
00:39:56.320
And now, you know, 25 years later, we're all still doing the same stuff.
00:40:02.940
I wonder, um, yeah, I would like to get to meet a wife sometime soon.
00:40:06.940
Where did you meet your wife at a certain location?
00:40:08.960
I met her and she was like a friend of my neighbor when I lived in this shitty apartment
00:40:14.200
And so it was just kind of one of those things where you don't have any money to go to any
00:40:18.160
of these expensive bars or clubs when you're in your early twenties out here.
00:40:21.700
And yeah, except for the fucking Rizzler, you're going to Craig's dude, drinking two
00:40:29.000
I didn't want to say anything, but yeah, his grades are down, but the money's up, you know,
00:40:34.360
I've had that like, you know, moving, I went to college in North Carolina and moved here
00:40:38.520
in 99 and man, this was a tough, this is a tough city to come into from with nothing.
00:40:44.760
I feel like when you get out here and you're waiting tables and PA and, and just doing all
00:40:48.980
this stuff, making no money and it hurts, you can't go do anything.
00:40:51.820
And every girl that's your age is dating someone who's 15 years older and successful.
00:41:00.080
And they take a girl like on a world tour and then you're like, I'm supposed to what?
00:41:04.060
Like, what am I, how am I even going to compete?
00:41:06.340
Dude, I remember on my birthday, we, I got out here, I've been out here for like a year
00:41:13.040
I was saving, when I finally went and looked at the price, I was probably saving $60, right?
00:41:17.860
Had to borrow somebody's truck to go get it, um, out towards the recita, get it back home
00:41:24.480
I get it over to the door of our apartment and it gets, it will not go in.
00:41:31.860
I just, I remember sitting against the wall crying.
00:41:35.140
I was on steroids, but I was also sitting there just, and dude, parking spots were too
00:41:42.100
You'd get a ticket and you would ding the, everything about LA was fucking impossible.
00:41:46.820
And it felt too, like when the city, the city could be against you, you know, like parking
00:41:51.680
I mean, it just felt like when your day was bad, that's always when you would come out
00:41:56.180
and there'd be a boot on your car and it would just get worse and worse and worse.
00:41:59.360
And, and that's the other thing is when you're kind of living on the edge like that, it feels
00:42:04.520
Like people would walk over you and if you were laying on the ground bleeding, you know?
00:42:10.560
Did you, um, did you ever do standup too or no?
00:42:15.120
I mean, I, I desire to, you think I don't, I, I didn't really, you know, honestly, I
00:42:19.300
didn't even really have any ambitions to be an actor.
00:42:21.660
It's like, you know, I went to film school to write and to make, I always kind of imagined
00:42:25.040
I would just be behind the camera and, uh, you know, and that's true.
00:42:30.200
I mean, uh, yeah, I didn't have any ambitions of, of trying to be an actor at all.
00:42:34.300
David green, who was another classmate of mine, he made this movie called all the real
00:42:39.840
It's, it's a beautiful film about first love and Appalachia.
00:42:46.660
But his, uh, his, uh, he had an actor who backed out of the show the last minute and
00:42:53.560
And he just asked me to come down and play the role cause he didn't have time to cast
00:42:58.440
And it was the very first time I ever acted in anything.
00:43:00.680
And, uh, and after Jody saw it, he wanted to make a movie and he was like, well, you're
00:43:05.700
the only person we know who's been in something.
00:43:07.700
So it's funny that we thought that was a leg up just that dude right there.
00:43:16.040
It's so crazy that when you go from an idea, like even with this, like it was all emails
00:43:21.980
and then we show up one day on set and there was a real movie going on.
00:43:26.880
I was like, Oh my God, I thought everybody was just fucking around.
00:43:29.620
Like, and then it was a real movie and there was like people and people don't know what
00:43:33.180
they're doing and people do know what they're doing.
00:43:34.840
People are yelling and people are, but there was, it was like, Oh my God, this is really
00:43:39.400
And then you realize it's so hard to make something really too.
00:43:44.040
Like we got pushed by the fire for a week and it was like, suddenly that changes everything.
00:43:49.620
And then we had to shoot one day, the day with Steve little, where it's like the winds
00:43:54.940
So it's like fucking pretend that the winds are 40 miles an hour.
00:44:01.280
I mean, that's what a lot of this stuff becomes is it becomes surrounding yourself with just
00:44:05.500
strategists, like people on your team that just know how to solve problems because that's
00:44:09.920
what a hundred percent, what all making anything is, is you got your idea of what it's going
00:44:14.340
And then every day it's dealing with something that's coming your way to make it less than
00:44:19.400
And you've got to figure out how to navigate it.
00:44:21.620
When we shot the season of gemstones right near the end, I mean, like there's this like
00:44:28.340
And, uh, I fought really hard to be able to get in this place and shoot there, but we
00:44:33.420
only had limited time in the night before we had to shoot like the last scene of the
00:44:38.200
Hurricane Helena comes through that part of Carolina and just like decimated everything.
00:44:43.500
And this location that we're at, it's like a hundred mile per hour winds, no power.
00:44:48.120
And it's like, there's no alternative, you know, we have to shoot this thing.
00:44:53.340
So it's like, like, well, once these hurricane force winds die down, maybe we'll try to get
00:44:57.280
some extension cords and finish this thing off.
00:45:03.720
It's, I think it's just saying no matter what level things are at, if you're doing something
00:45:06.960
in your backyard and you and your brother plan to shoot something and then halfway through,
00:45:10.620
he doesn't like his attitude changes and he goes in the house.
00:45:13.660
It's like, it's always, and that ruins it, whatever your little plan was, it's always
00:45:18.460
There's always something that's going to show up.
00:45:26.420
I mean, I've been really lucky with HBO that they've always been real supportive of the
00:45:30.640
And they're, they're awesome partners to have in this.
00:45:33.560
And man, I think it kind of just came as we started writing this season.
00:45:38.020
I felt like when I was starting to write it, like everything I was kind of gravitating towards
00:45:41.160
was all like about closure and sort of wrapping up these characters, like longer stories.
00:45:45.920
And so I kind of kept myself open while we were shooting, like in case I got any other
00:45:49.820
ideas of like, maybe I'd come back and do another one.
00:45:52.300
But as we kind of shot more and more, it just, it felt like it was the end.
00:45:57.540
And I, I don't know, TV is one of those things too, where it's a strange art form because
00:46:02.840
if it's good, the reward is you just get to keep doing it and doing it and doing it.
00:46:06.900
But sometimes that doesn't necessarily make for the best story, you know, just to have,
00:46:10.120
you know, all right, this is like the 10th time these characters have almost died, you
00:46:16.900
And, you know, I mean, it's people are getting hit with so many things these days.
00:46:20.960
Like there's so many things vying for your attention.
00:46:24.460
It's, it's a lot to ask an audience to like stick with the show for 10 years or something.
00:46:29.500
And just think that your tastes in 10 years will be the same as it was in the first season
00:46:34.160
So for me, I didn't want to stay in it longer than we needed to.
00:46:37.600
I never wanted to make it something where it didn't matter.
00:46:40.100
I always kind of wanted to make sure it was relevant and something we were all having fun
00:46:43.820
doing and never kind of, uh, evolve into something that just feels like a job.
00:46:49.840
Was there something special that you like to do for your crew and stuff like that?
00:46:53.180
Like you talk so much about like the guys that work for you and work with you.
00:46:55.660
I'm sure you use a lot of the same crew and stuff too, because they're, you develop relationships,
00:46:59.500
you know how people are going to work, you know what people will be there for you on those,
00:47:02.020
you know, when it's 1am and you're like, what the fuck are we going to do right now?
00:47:05.540
Um, what's something you'd like to do for them?
00:47:10.300
I mean, to me, I feel like it's one of those deals.
00:47:13.960
Uh, but I, I do feel like, you know, especially living down there when you're asking people
00:47:17.940
to come work on the show, you're asking them to like leave their lives through the comfort
00:47:21.100
of their home, sometimes leave their spouse or their partner and come down there for,
00:47:27.100
So I've been on stuff where I've been on location and it's sort of like, yeah, good
00:47:31.780
You know, you're just going to end up, you don't know anybody.
00:47:44.140
Sometimes people want to be left alone in the Westin, but I try to just make everybody feel
00:47:48.360
like they're at home when they come there, like try to make them have a good time.
00:47:51.280
And ultimately it's like, you know, for me, it's the whole idea that we get to make this
00:47:57.120
Like, I don't even watch these things after we're done.
00:47:59.500
I don't even go back and watch any of this stuff again.
00:48:01.640
My experience with it is like the act of making it.
00:48:06.940
Uh, I'll, I'm in, you know, I'm on, I oversee like every cut of this show and in post, but
00:48:12.940
yeah, once this stuff like is done, I'm kind of done with it.
00:48:16.040
You know, it kind of feels even the old movies from pineapple to tropic, it's like, I'll
00:48:21.100
And then I oftentimes just will never even see them again.
00:48:23.540
You know, I'll see clips of things online and be like, Oh, that's crazy.
00:48:32.120
Like you were saying, those problems that come up solving that stuff, that feeling of
00:48:36.380
accomplishment when you do sort of dodge a bullet, like that's the excitement and the
00:48:43.300
I noticed I liked the, um, giving somebody an idea and be like, not telling the other
00:48:53.260
We had this one moment, like Spade is like taking this dog for a ride.
00:48:57.460
Cause the company, he works for this company called last lap.
00:48:59.900
They give dogs rides like they're like, they're about to be euthanized or whatever.
00:49:02.800
He gives them a couple more spins around town, you know, in his car.
00:49:07.940
So he pulls up and then it's like Kirk Fox, you know, he is Kirk Fox pulls up.
00:49:15.020
And, uh, Kirk's just been like looting in the air, I guess sort of stoplight.
00:49:20.420
And he's like, what are you guys, you guys get anything good?
00:49:22.540
He's like, yeah, we just got a hot lead on John Bonet's wedding dress.
00:49:30.700
That was, that was out of, that was out of your pocket.
00:49:32.660
And I snuck over just like a fucking, like a, like a fucking Navy seal.
00:49:36.980
I just put this little fucking, I just shine that cock right in his soul.
00:49:46.020
I always liked, even when we were a kid, like we would go like, like not getting molested,
00:49:58.480
But I remember one time we left and I told everybody that Jay Leno had died.
00:50:03.660
So the whole weekend you would hear the dads talking about it, kind of reminiscing about
00:50:07.560
Leno and some of their favorite guests and shit.
00:50:09.100
And I would be in my tent laying down, just crying out of my fucking little penis.
00:50:18.080
I, then those, that, that kind of stuff was boy scout camps.
00:50:23.340
And I remember it was like, we had this, our cub master was this, uh, was one of the
00:50:27.680
kids dads and it was him with, you know, 12 boys and we're camping and he just got over
00:50:35.500
He just got stranger and stranger and at one point he just kind of like left, you know,
00:50:39.580
left the camp for a while and had been a bit since he'd been back there.
00:50:43.220
And every night we would always notice that he'd go into his tent and he would just like
00:50:47.840
lay down and put these headphones on and just kind of lay there.
00:50:50.440
And so I was so curious, like, what is this motherfucker listening to?
00:50:55.500
And when he was gone, I snuck into his tent and I picked up his headphones and I put it
00:51:00.760
They were like messages from his wife talking about how he was a good man.
00:51:10.440
This guy's sitting in here just like listening to his wife, pump them up and with those 12
00:51:22.920
It seemed like the tires were about to fall off.
00:51:27.600
Probably keeping him on the end of a fucking rope, dude.
00:51:33.040
I got, almost got sent home from that camp too, because I pulled a knife on a kid.
00:51:38.420
But I had, I had that, you know, when you're that age and you have your little knives, your
00:51:42.140
little Boy Scout knives, you're constantly playing with it.
00:51:44.460
And I guess this other troop walked past us and I'd pulled that knife out and they thought
00:51:50.780
And I had to go into the office and explain myself, you know, and I got my knife taken
00:51:58.360
There was something I remember like, um, when I was a kid, we used to, well, we'd get one
00:52:04.520
I remember the mosquito truck would come by and we'd get on our bikes and fucking ride
00:52:19.520
Dude, bro, if I got, went near a bird, it would die after that.
00:52:24.420
Like anything, anything that could fucking hit the airwaves is dead.
00:52:29.980
I was like anything that could fly was, it was, that was something fun.
00:52:34.200
I remember, I remember being in the woods and somebody would say like, I saw something
00:52:38.760
and then you would run the fear that went, you didn't see anything.
00:52:42.140
Somebody did and they started to leave and suddenly you were alone.
00:52:45.040
Even if you were one step alone in the woods from your friend, it was like.
00:52:53.800
I grew up in Virginia and it was a neighborhood that was like brand new.
00:52:58.220
And like, so it was all woods and stuff and all construction.
00:53:01.000
It was all like, they were just building one of those big subdivisions.
00:53:03.360
And we were like one of the first houses in there.
00:53:05.520
And so me and my friends would just have like the run of that place.
00:53:09.060
But there was like this one construction site and we were young.
00:53:12.720
And we would just like go there at nighttime and just like take all their lumber and their
00:53:16.940
shit and go make ramps and go build tree houses.
00:53:19.480
And there was this one house that we kept doing it to and there was a construction site.
00:53:25.500
And I guess the guys who were building the house found out where it was at.
00:53:28.500
And we came out to our tree fort and they had like ripped everything down.
00:53:32.560
So then that next day we went to that place and we fucking destroyed that house.
00:53:36.760
We took cinder blocks and threw it through the walls.
00:53:39.380
We were like these fourth graders thinking we're just going to show these guys what's up.
00:53:53.320
On our Diamondback, you know, freestyle bikes, our BMX bikes, just thinking we ran that shit.
00:53:59.640
Dude, I was trying to – oh, we had a glitter – I don't know if it was a glitter truck.
00:54:03.920
I think it was a glitter truck that toppled over like in the interstate near us.
00:54:06.840
And it was like – and it was like kind of, I guess, a windy time of year.
00:54:10.580
And our fucking town had glitter in the area for two years.
00:54:16.320
I mean, you fucking – yeah, you couldn't even – you just – you'd meet somebody and half of them would fucking –
00:54:25.860
It is crazy how if you have a construction site, if you're building a house,
00:54:28.320
if any kids in the neighborhood, you – they – all they do is get in there and break shit.
00:54:33.120
They have no concept of like someone's paid money for this.
00:54:38.320
It just is looked at as like this is – this doesn't matter.
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00:57:59.000
Yeah, that's the stuff that I think sometimes about getting older.
00:58:01.740
Do you ever start to think like that you only get to do so many things?
00:58:05.020
Does that start to become a thing in your head at all?
00:58:06.680
I mean, you've been, you know, so proclivative or whatever it's called.
00:58:14.160
So, and, but do you ever start to think about that?
00:58:17.100
Like, shit, I got to, you know, or is it kind of like, I know I've had a good amount of time to make what I've wanted.
00:58:25.360
You know, when I was living out here in Los Angeles, like we lived up off of Mulholland.
00:58:28.660
And my son was like, you know, he was, you know, he was like in kindergarten.
00:58:34.180
He's starting to like, you know, he's like, I want to learn to ride a bike.
00:58:38.520
You're never going to be able to like ride a bike up here on Mulholland, you know.
00:58:42.380
I'm like, oh, he's not going to have the same experiences I had.
00:58:45.600
That level of freedom of just kind of like coming home from school, dropping your book bag off and just like taking off until the sun went down.
00:58:51.720
And that stuff is important, you know, that little bit of independence.
00:58:56.160
I kind of kept feeling like every time he got to play with somebody, there was always like me and my wife having to like orchestrate it and sit there in the background watching them play.
00:59:04.560
And, you know, that was kind of honestly like the main reason why I wanted to move back to the south is I kind of wanted to go somewhere where he could, you know, unleash.
00:59:13.880
He could get on a bike and have a little bit of freedom and kind of have that, you know.
00:59:17.400
It feels like you can always move to the big city, but it's definitely harder if you're a city boy to kind of like go back, you know, go somewhere small.
00:59:24.860
So I kind of wanted them to have a little bit of that sort of life, a little taste of that, you know.
00:59:31.020
And, you know, because like you said, it goes by quick, you know.
00:59:35.540
You can't just go destroy a construction site without ending up in prison.
00:59:39.040
You know, I wanted him to be able to go destroy some construction sites and just get a slap on the wrist.
00:59:45.080
Yeah, I want him to fucking beat up some drywall.
00:59:48.400
Yeah, I moved to Nashville a few years ago, and I like it over there.
01:00:06.740
And, yeah, it's like Chattanooga's fucking great.
01:00:11.900
Yeah, it's just like there's like mountains, whitewater rafting.
01:00:14.640
It's almost everything you wish was in Nashville that isn't.
01:00:21.220
I'd never even been to Nashville until we moved to Charleston.
01:00:23.720
I think my wife and I were just like looking for what was a quick trip away.
01:00:30.600
So Chattanooga, though, I got to check that out.
01:00:33.180
And they have this beautiful walking bridge where you walk.
01:00:35.540
It's like it used to be a bridge, but they shut it down or whatever because it couldn't bridge anymore or whatever.
01:00:42.200
It's just like a brave road really at that point.
01:00:50.380
But it's – yeah, but just the whole area is awesome, man.
01:00:53.520
They have a place called Lookout Mountain there where you can see like seven states or something from it.
01:00:57.100
A lot of Civil War shit if you're big into Civil War reenactments and shit like my buddy's dad used to referee those and shit.
01:01:03.360
So we'd go watch those a lot and like – so I love that kind of shit.
01:01:10.880
I grew up in – after we left California, I grew up – I spent most of my time in Fredericksburg, Virginia.
01:01:19.980
In my backyard, I'd find like Civil War bullets and stuff.
01:01:22.740
I mean we were all – it was – that stuff loomed heavily over my childhood just because it was so close.
01:01:28.420
I mean I even have a buddy that his old man would put on night vision goggles and go out to the National Park battlefields and go metal detecting because that's a federal crime.
01:01:40.200
And he would go out there and just like outrun those park rangers and just get bullets and bayonets and like all this stuff.
01:01:46.360
We'd always like play around with all that stuff in his garage.
01:01:55.780
Bro, that shit was a big part of growing up in the South.
01:01:57.960
Somebody would be like, dude, they found arrowheads on our property.
01:02:02.380
They found a fucking canteen from 70 years ago.
01:02:06.260
That was a huge thing about growing up in the South.
01:02:08.880
My buddy who still lives back there, I went to go visit him a few years ago and we were supposed to catch up.
01:02:16.140
Yeah, we were going to catch up downtown for a few beers and he's like, hey man, come back behind the high school here.
01:02:25.380
But I went back behind the school and we kind of like walked down to the woods and we come down there and he's found this place that he's like completely like roped off like it was an archaeological dig site.
01:02:37.220
And I'm like, what the fuck is going on back here?
01:02:39.460
And he's like, man, I think I found like an old Indian camp here.
01:02:43.200
And he started showing me all this shit that he had found.
01:02:45.220
It was like weird like pottery and arrowheads and all this stuff.
01:02:51.060
And he was just like, yeah, man, if you – there's so much of that stuff here that basically if you just like look for some place that had like access to water and had a lot of sunlight during the course of the day, that nine times out of ten, somebody would have saw that as a place to set up camp.
01:03:05.140
And then you start digging around and it's all under there.
01:03:09.120
But it made me start looking at it everywhere a little differently.
01:03:19.560
He hid a couple million dollar treasure and it finally got found a few years ago.
01:03:22.400
He made like a treasure – like a story about it.
01:03:31.340
God, I used to always want to look for bodies on the side of the interstate.
01:03:34.960
Oh, you were just trying to make a sequel to Stand By Me?
01:03:37.500
Just trying to find Browers, Flowers, whatever the fuck his name was.
01:03:41.640
Yeah, Stand By I-65 is what it's going to be called.
01:03:44.660
But, yeah, that's something that I always wanted to do.
01:03:47.700
I want to ask you about your kids before you leave.
01:03:49.100
What's something that you admire about your children if you're okay talking about your children?
01:03:55.600
Because it's cool for you to leave for the – you know, that one of the reasons you wanted to leave that was for them.
01:03:59.100
Like, you know, to be able to make – do choices like that, like with social media, just like to make kind of like choices that are for the betterment of yourself or others is pretty – it's harder to do these days than I think people think.
01:04:10.380
So it's something that – it seems pretty neat that you're able to do.
01:04:14.660
Yeah, well, you know, like I said, my wife is from Los Angeles.
01:04:18.720
So she had never really lived outside of California.
01:04:24.180
But, yeah, once I had kids, it wasn't like I thought they would have like a terrible childhood growing up here.
01:04:28.720
But I just knew that there were going to be certain things that they wouldn't be exposed to that I just thought would be useful for them to be exposed to.
01:04:34.780
And my wife and I, we headed down to Charleston for a long weekend to kind of like just take a look at it without the kids and just sort of like could we do this?
01:04:45.640
And we had looked at some houses and then we were kind of sitting in this bar just having a drink, kind of like writing down on a napkin like the pluses and minuses, like how realistic it would be.
01:04:55.860
And I remember looking out the window and there was like a group of probably, you know, 10 kids, like probably between the ages of like 7 and 15 on skateboards and bikes and jean shorts, no shirts, carrying fishing poles, not a parent in sight.
01:05:11.080
Like this is like exactly what I want our kids to be able to do is just that.
01:05:14.640
I want them to be able to like be free to kind of like explore the world and to see things without having to worry about them so much.
01:05:22.840
And I mean, my kids are just, I don't know, my daughter is like insanely funny.
01:05:30.200
I mean, like, I mean, honestly, like before she even talked, she was giving people the bird, flicking people off.
01:05:35.020
Like I channel her in that character, Judy, the sister in Righteous Gemstone.
01:05:50.780
That's so funny that you would channel even like a child.
01:05:54.520
And Edie and my daughter have a very special relationship.
01:05:57.760
Edie calls it that they're in the bad girls club.
01:06:00.180
And so every time Edie talks to my daughter, she'll be like bad girls club.
01:06:06.040
But yeah, my daughter came by the set this year and there was a dead body on the set, not a real one.
01:06:15.120
And there was like fake blood and she was like kind of obsessed with like, what is this?
01:06:20.800
And I started realizing, oh man, yeah, she doesn't have any concept of what this is or what I do when I leave.
01:06:26.200
And she kind of got really obsessed with this idea of fake blood.
01:06:31.180
And our props master gave her this big tub of like, you know, fake movie blood.
01:06:39.620
She'll call us in and she'll be like laying in the shower with like blood coming out of her belly button and out of her neck and pretending to be she's a sicko.
01:06:47.620
So, yeah, it seems like things are going good over there.
01:06:51.800
But I would, dude, my brother, so my dad was like real old when I was born.
01:07:00.320
I've talked about it before on my comedy show, but he'd be like dad's dead.
01:07:07.820
Because dad was like, you know, dad would be 79.
01:07:13.840
And I'm like, you know, the first time I was like, no, no.
01:07:17.680
And I'd go in there and he would be alive, right?
01:07:20.860
And then it got to this is where I knew this is when something I think got weird maybe in my head because I would be like, he better fucking be dead or I'm going to beat your ass, right?
01:07:31.460
It became like just the whole juxtaposition of that little thing in my head.
01:07:41.940
And then look, you got older and you did that to other people by telling people Jay Leno was dead.
01:07:54.760
I just, yeah, there was something so much fun about being young.
01:07:57.440
And Michael Landon was supposed to come to our town one time and meet people at the fair.
01:08:00.340
And my mom got all dressed up and went and he didn't come.
01:08:04.000
Is that why you have that Michael Landon cutout there?
01:08:10.340
You kind of look like a young Victor French, actually.
01:08:15.300
I wouldn't have pegged you for a Highway to Heaven fan.
01:08:32.560
I think we could, let's redo Highway to Heaven.
01:08:43.680
Yeah, we just meet people and ruin their lives.
01:08:58.600
The first movie I ever saw, I think, was, yeah, that's it right there.
01:09:07.700
Yeah, and that little turn he had in Long Legs last year, I mean, how scary is that?
01:09:20.400
When I look at the state of the world, I feel like what the world needs now is more devil.
01:09:28.180
Was there ever something weird, like once you started making some money?
01:09:30.500
Because making money is an interesting thing, right?
01:09:32.620
Some people really get into it, and that's their thing.
01:09:35.100
But it's like, were there ever a team that you wanted to invest in or some interesting
01:09:44.620
Man, I don't think I have ever, I mean, I think growing up without any money, it's like
01:09:49.100
the moment you get your hands on some, you just try to sock it away because you're thinking
01:09:55.860
So I need to start being a little bit more ambitious with my spending, though, and just
01:10:03.540
It's like, well, what if, yeah, it's just scary.
01:10:09.840
I think I want to start like a halfway house, but that makes clothing, too, dude.
01:10:17.340
That's kind of a dumb joke, but thank you for laughing at that.
01:10:21.260
Yeah, what was something else that I was thinking about?
01:10:24.620
Because I'll never see you again, but I was just trying to think of what it is.
01:10:26.740
You don't think we'll ever see each other again?
01:10:31.240
Do you get impressed by a lot of the stuff that you see out there?
01:10:37.420
Like, you'll see a movie, you'll see something, and I'm like, it makes you want to keep making
01:10:41.060
Do you think you'll take a little bit of a break?
01:10:43.040
Are you already have something you're making next?
01:10:44.520
No, I think I'm going to take a little bit of a break.
01:10:46.080
Like I said earlier, my hobby is basically writing and creating, so I'm sure I won't
01:10:51.780
stop that, but it takes a lot to make something like this.
01:10:54.520
Gemstones, I've been on this now for seven years of working on this thing full time, and
01:10:59.440
I'm looking forward to just chilling out for a little bit and spending time with the
01:11:03.540
fam, but as soon as you start doing that, then you'll get an idea for something else.
01:11:07.440
And so I feel like I'll always want to make stuff, but it's also good to just enjoy your
01:11:11.520
life a little bit, too, and not be so worried all the time about what's going to be next
01:11:16.740
Yeah, I get definitely caught up, like I have to do this or this, but then sometimes
01:11:20.500
I do start to notice a little bit more, like I want to chill out, because I want to give
01:11:28.260
Yeah, that used to be the most fun, dude, when your brain gives you an idea and it just
01:11:32.060
makes you laugh, you're by yourself or whatever.
01:11:34.080
Totally, yeah, and then you've got to share it.
01:11:41.740
You know, Tony Cavalero, actually, he's helped us out.
01:11:44.340
Tony Cavalero is a big deal in the lacrosse world.
01:11:48.080
Yeah, he's a big deal, and my son has shown an interest in it, so Tony has kind of pushed
01:11:53.820
us in the right direction of getting him into a cool team, and that lacrosse shit is pretty
01:11:59.620
I've been with him through all his different interests of sports, from baseball to football,
01:12:04.660
and you go on to those little parks and rec teams, and it's always just some kid's
01:12:12.720
The lacrosse shit, though, is like, the coaches are young.
01:12:17.640
I feel like the kids just respond to them in a different way than they do somebody's dad.
01:12:25.200
I've never heard anybody even talk about that, except for this girl, Mubi, that works
01:12:32.360
Oh, one of my friends from New York would talk about it sometimes.
01:12:35.740
Yeah, I didn't know anything about it at all, and then I watched it, and I'm like,
01:12:39.280
I mean, they, like, knock each other down on the ground, hit each other with these sticks,
01:12:51.960
I think that the stick is pretty cool, but, you know, you got those pads.
01:12:54.940
The gear is pretty awesome, but, I mean, it is a pretty rough and tumble sport.
01:13:02.580
Like that, you just knock the shit out of people and knock them on the ground.
01:13:08.200
You see them doing it, and you're like, oh, you're allowed to do that.
01:13:15.900
I've seen a 10-year-old do that to another 10-year-old.
01:13:23.880
Is it interesting whenever you see your kid, like, say you take him to lacrosse and he likes it,
01:13:27.600
is it interesting that you learn something about him by watching him start to like something?
01:13:33.400
I mean, you know, parents are probably, the worst thing you can do is kind of like always push your kids into what you're into and expect that.
01:13:40.600
You know, using their childhood as a way to kind of like work out all your demons.
01:13:48.020
Like, I don't even think my kids even like movies.
01:13:49.560
You know, it's like I've tried to, like, have movie nights with them and stuff and they're like, yeah, we're good.
01:13:56.260
You're like, you're part of that dying art form.
01:14:04.920
He, they, I like, I like all that shit that they watch.
01:14:08.840
There's that one kid, I think his name is Ryan Trainor or something.
01:14:12.000
He does, like, the stuff where he has, like, 10 cents and he tries to, like, make money to get across the country.
01:14:23.060
I'm like, no wonder y'all aren't watching movies, man.
01:14:24.860
You guys are, you guys have this all dialed in.
01:14:28.300
Yeah, he'll, like, start with, like, a penny and, like, figure out a way to get across the country with just starting with that.
01:14:38.960
This has, so this video has 60 million views, right?
01:14:41.160
Like, it's crazy how much is out there that you've never even heard of and you'll be exposed.
01:14:50.200
There's a guy, there's these kids, Colby and Sam, that are, like, these ghost hunter kids I want to get to meet.
01:14:57.420
We just had some streamers in, and that lifestyle is insane, man.
01:15:05.820
And you have to be yourself, so you can't really hide who you are at all.
01:15:23.140
I do remember being a kid, like, over at your friend's house, sitting around the couch, watching somebody try to beat a game.
01:15:31.280
I guess they're just not doing it maybe together as much, but maybe they are.
01:15:38.120
I mean, we would go play at the church parking lot, dude.
01:15:41.520
Anybody that would answer the door on the way down the street, it was three or four blocks to get down there.
01:15:46.140
If you answered the fucking door, you were playing defense, right?
01:15:48.880
So we would knock on the doors about 3.40 in the afternoon, walk down there.
01:15:54.760
Somebody, I don't know who put it out there, like the devil or whatever.
01:15:57.480
But in the field, they had a field in front of the church off of Highway 190 over there in Covington.
01:16:02.880
And sometimes every two years, somebody would step into the hole and break their leg or ankle.
01:16:16.200
But, yeah, if you answered the door, you had to come play, man.
01:16:18.880
And we would get on our bikes, and we would ride.
01:16:20.960
They had, like, a ride probably about a mile and a half over this place called Pat's Shrimp and Video, right?
01:16:29.220
It wasn't all you could eat, but it was, like, all they could put in the bag.
01:16:41.880
Dude, I went to the last Blockbuster in Oregon probably two years ago.
01:16:46.100
And these are the things I found fascinating about it.
01:16:48.080
For one, you're not just stuck with what the platform, like the app or whatever we look on it now, Netflix, et cetera, is putting in front of you, like those 10 or 12 movies at a time.
01:17:01.180
And you're like, oh, I forgot about this movie, right?
01:17:11.060
And you'll be like, drama, I'll do with that, you know, like different ones, like diabetes is a section.
01:17:17.680
Some of the sections have gotten a little bit more casual than before.
01:17:22.840
I'm going to get me a good diabetes movie this weekend.
01:17:26.040
Yeah, I want to see these lactose intolerant films, whatever.
01:17:30.300
But it's a totally different experience than it was.
01:17:35.700
Only about four, five nice months out of the year at all, though, to be honest with you.
01:17:40.080
That's why they got that blockbuster still in business, man.
01:17:43.620
But your brain would be like, oh, what do you – and you talk with your friend, what do you think about this?
01:17:47.080
You kind of discuss it to – it just like – it was much more – it was so much different than, oh, I'm just going to pick one off of here.
01:17:58.740
I think that like when you have access to all of it, it makes all of it not that special.
01:18:02.420
And I think, weirdly, there was something about like if you went to the video store and you wanted to see a movie and it wasn't in, it made you instantly think that that movie was a bigger deal than anything.
01:18:13.660
And then like when you finally got it, you would have all this other stuff invested in like, you know, wow, I'm so lucky I got Under Siege.
01:18:26.780
Van Damme, when I was growing up, that shit was blood sport.
01:18:29.700
I can't believe that that's a genre that doesn't really exist.
01:18:33.140
You're just like, are there no like 20-year-olds who know martial arts that are good-looking that can just whip ass and be action heroes?
01:18:44.360
Yeah, a lot of – yeah, that kind of stuff doesn't exist.
01:18:52.560
Garbage pill, kids' cards, we ride and get those bitches.
01:18:58.840
Did you just sit there watching Highway to Heaven?
01:19:07.920
I look like I've obviously done some cocaine and you look like –
01:19:17.320
That looks like me after I've watched some of them diabetes films.
01:19:24.840
Dude, my dad bought this car off like some kind of blackish, kind of black guys that live by us.
01:19:30.280
And it was like some guys that were in the culture with the big speakers in the car.
01:19:34.200
And at that time, it was white and black guys that had speakers in the trunk.
01:19:37.420
But he bought a Cutlass off of them and he would listen to like Paul Harvey and shit like in his car.
01:19:49.380
It was like all the – you could count that any kid who had like the shittiest car would have just straight up stadium speakers in the back.
01:20:11.500
Do you kind of like – was that something that you – what is something surprising that you found about parenting?
01:20:20.860
You know what's fun about it, man, is like I try to stay pretty involved in my kids' lives.
01:20:24.920
Like I don't want to – I know it goes by quick and I don't want to like miss it all and then have all these regrets, you know,
01:20:30.500
when my kids don't want to talk to me when they're all grown.
01:20:34.560
But, you know, it was fun as they got into school, like going back – like walking in for a parent-teacher conference
01:20:42.260
and having to sit in those little chairs and talk to the teacher and be like, I forgot all about the shit.
01:20:46.580
And you just remember all these feelings and emotions of what comes around with the first day of school and I don't know.
01:20:52.700
It's kind of – and then just seeing childhood from this side of it and you kind of also realize how short it is.
01:20:58.860
You know, when I was a kid, I thought my parents' whole existence started when I began and, you know, that was their whole life.
01:21:04.220
And then you kind of realize, man, that time period was just a blink in the eye for them and it's the same.
01:21:13.300
And I already find myself just getting like sappy and sad, just like it's been a good run.
01:21:21.800
Yeah, because I guess once they hit – like, yeah.
01:21:25.500
I mean, already now it's like we – at nighttime, you know, we'll all sit down to hang and he'll be upstairs on the game or talk with his friends.
01:21:35.460
You can't really express that to him because that's kind of weird, huh?
01:21:37.660
Yeah, it does hurt a little bit, but you also – it's good.
01:21:41.440
You don't want him just sitting there trying to suck off the teat, you know, for too long.
01:21:44.980
You need him to kind of get out there and want to spread those wings.
01:21:49.520
Have you ever wanted to pull off like a heist or something?
01:21:58.820
I'm talking about just some sucker walking down the street with a nice watch on.
01:22:04.280
If you were to do a bank robbery, you had to go in there with a couple of guys.
01:22:09.380
Well, I think after this wonderful conversation, I feel like you'd be game.
01:22:16.100
Maybe you guys could confuse people by them not knowing who's who, you know.
01:22:21.260
I'd take the whole gang of righteous gemstones in there, man.
01:22:42.640
There was a rumor that he had lived in Bogalusa, Louisiana.
01:22:46.680
So he was always like one of these like rumored people that lived in the distance, you know.
01:22:50.680
So there was always a strong love for John Goodman from Louisiana area.
01:22:59.040
And it was insane to be able to get to work with him on this show.
01:23:02.780
I just – it'll be one of the things I'll miss the most about making this show was getting to see him every season.
01:23:14.720
He's a father – you know, he's been a father to half of America over time.
01:23:20.080
It's like he was making TV shows when TV wasn't cool, and he would still be able to go pop in and work with the Coen brothers.
01:23:27.000
And, you know, he just was doing his own thing and been doing it for this long and always funny, always good.
01:23:32.700
I mean, he never shows up in something, and it's not impressive.
01:23:37.300
Like even being an actor and looking around, you look at it and you're like most people have maybe a handful of years in them, you know.
01:23:46.060
Like I would think about actors that I saw in movies when I was a kid, and you'd kind of be like, oh, man, what happened to that person, you know.
01:23:53.340
Like you'd kind of look at their filmography and you're like, oh, man, most people only have a span of a few years, maybe even a decade.
01:24:03.280
And then – but you look at a guy like Goodman and how long he's been working.
01:24:06.920
And you realize like that's no easy feat in that he stays relevant and he stays good and the stuff he chooses is cool and the roles he plays are cool.
01:24:17.480
Yeah, yeah, Carol O'Connor is buried not far from my apartment in Westwood.
01:24:21.880
And I'll take people over there a lot of times if they're visiting in town or whatever.
01:24:26.740
And he's definitely one of my favorites because of In the Heat of the Night.
01:24:35.640
You're an In the Heat of the Night guy in Highway to Heaven.
01:24:39.820
Yeah, I just love – I love like kind of southern kind of – I just – yeah, I love those things, man.
01:24:47.360
But what was I going to – who was I – oh, Carol O'Connor.
01:25:19.020
It does – there's no other like blocks of grass anywhere near it.
01:25:22.220
It's just like big buildings, tall, huge buildings.
01:25:24.740
And then there's this one little bitty – it's a – it's fucking 40 square yards.
01:25:38.280
That's what's so crazy about L.A. is I feel like – L.A. has done a really shitty job
01:25:45.140
You know, like I feel like every time I tried to rent an apartment back in the day,
01:25:48.040
everyone would tell you like, oh, Charlie Chaplin lived down the street.
01:25:51.140
But you're like, you realize this shit is – it is – these people mean something
01:25:56.500
And the idea that like so much gets built and torn down, like I feel like you look at Hollywood
01:26:01.000
Boulevard and you're like, man, this should just be like Colonial Williamsburg.
01:26:04.080
This should be some shit where you just walk in and it looks exactly like it used to back
01:26:08.680
You know, it's like this is such a unique – there's such a unique history to this place
01:26:13.260
that, you know, it's kind of sad that all you can do is go to a little cemetery to
01:26:19.260
It would be kind of cool if you could walk in the same bars and restaurants they did.
01:26:25.400
If you got to go by the apartment that Walter Matthau lived in.
01:26:28.800
Yeah, I think it would mean something to people.
01:26:33.440
Yeah, because you'll go like – we'll preserve some places.
01:26:37.020
I like a lot of like – but yeah, Hollywood just kind of – Hollywood's never had much
01:26:43.900
I think in the day, everyone's just trying to survive.
01:26:45.860
But now when you kind of look back at what Hollywood is, you're like, wow, there's
01:26:49.280
some pretty influential things and people that have been around here and some of these
01:26:52.500
places that people take for granted are – they have like cultural and historical significance.
01:27:05.500
He's just going to sit here and lie his ass off.
01:27:08.860
He also – he complains that he like – he said he was getting that shin thing where
01:27:18.960
I really – he'll be like another one that I'll miss seeing him every year.
01:27:23.800
Yeah, it's weird when a set ends, when the shoot ends.
01:27:25.980
It's just like – it's like the last day of school.
01:27:31.520
And then the next day or two, you're just in and –
01:27:35.140
It's all – yeah, but hopefully I get to keep in touch with a lot of these people.
01:27:41.820
You know, I met them on Vice Principals, and both of them are like two of my closest friends.
01:27:47.220
Yeah, so hopefully I'll get to keep in touch with these people.
01:27:55.560
Danny, everybody, thanks so much for all the entertainment, dude, all the inspiration.
01:27:59.100
And, yeah, I just really appreciate your time, man.
01:28:03.520
So, and congrats on getting to spend time with your kids.
01:28:06.940
I hope you put that dick laser to good use, okay?
01:28:12.040
I'm putting this on some fucking bitches back at the UFC fight this weekend.
01:28:22.760
Now I'm just floating on the breeze, and I feel I'm falling like these leaves.
01:28:33.520
Oh, but when I reach that ground, I'll share this peace of mind I found.