Matt Walsh Breaks Down The ＂Am I Racist？＂ Support Group Scene
Episode Stats
Words per Minute
185.49606
Summary
A scene from my new film, Am I Racist? In this scene, a group of white participants watch a scene from the film Am i Racist. The white participants in the group feel that there is something in themselves that they have to overcome when all that s being requested of them is to cry in front of a black woman.
Transcript
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okay we're here at the movies we're gonna watch a scene from my new film am i racist uh and i'll
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i'll give a little commentary as we go along walk you through it before we play this quick
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quick setup if you haven't seen the movie yet um this is the first support group that i go to
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as i'm just beginning the journey to de-center my whiteness and i'm really confronting my um my
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internalized racism and um and and so it's very important that i go to this group as a support
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group for people that are dealing with their own whiteness at this point where it picks up i've
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already been at the group for a while and i've been participating i feel really good about it i don't
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know how the other people in the group feel i get emotional at one point i leave to the cry room
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which they have set up specifically for white people who cry because you don't want to cry in
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front of a black woman we're told while i'm at while i'm in the cry room getting very emotional
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that's when the people in the group realize who i am they realize that i'm a dastardly conservative
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commentator and i come back in and the tone is very much shifted uh and that's where it picks up so
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let's watch the white participants in the group feel that there's something in themselves that they
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have to overcome when all that's being requested i have no idea why she stands i've watched this
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scene a million times i don't know why that woman stands how are you sign of respect maybe
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oh no problem you good yeah yeah remind me of your name again uh uh steven steven yeah okay um
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did you want to come up come up yeah do you want to come up and okay so pause it there for a second
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sure so this this is a interesting because you know when you're making a movie like this and it's all
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real and you're you're it's we're we're talking to real people and we want to get authentic reactions
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there's no script or anything uh you don't because you you go into any scene or any interview you don't
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know exactly what anybody's going to say you know what you want to get out of the scene because
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we're telling a story we're trying to expose something we're trying we're doing all that uh
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so in in my head going into any of these any of these situations i have a there's like a it's a
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tree with different branches of possibilities of what they could say and how i should react to it
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um but but sometimes they they hit you with something you weren't expecting and so when i
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came in and i sat down and i knew they were not going to be happy that they'd want to kick me out i did
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not expect that brashia who's leading the group would would ask me if i want to come up
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and lead the group that was a total that was an unexpected thing and so in my head right now
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there's a little bit of i'm uh it's a it's a quandary because i'm like well this is a
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maybe i should come get up and start leading the group i i didn't expect to have that opportunity
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but at the same time we need them to kick me out because we also need that for the story
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this is our this is our inciting incident the reason why i end up wearing a costume so i had to
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decline i declined the opportunity to get up and lead the group um i think ultimately that was the
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right choice but i still i still wrestle with that like my physical safety and yours and everybody else's
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here is okay why would your physical safety not be okay did i miss something
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i don't feel comfortable what can you guys catch me up to speed on what's going on here you don't
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need to be caught up we're gonna be silent so you check the woman next to me looks like she's gonna
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start laughing 15 i it depends on how you count them let's pause it for a second let's pause it right
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there yeah right there so this woman the the blonde woman next to me i feel like she's a and i've also
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been trying to figure this out ever since the movie i think she's a secret fan because uh she
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almost broke multiple times the guy on the other side of me is not a fan at all that guy is definitely
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not a fan you know the other interesting detail about that dude is that he's a professional cuddler
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the cuddlist is what they uh is what is what they call him in the business that didn't come up that
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didn't come up during the during the the scene but we just knew that about him because you know we do
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our we do our background research he's a professional cuddlist he cuddles people for a
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living i didn't get a very cuddly vibe from this guy i gotta be honest with you the whole time i was
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there um i didn't it didn't it didn't feel very welcoming from him let's continue i would really
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appreciate it if you left so that the people who actually want to be here and deserve to be here
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can get what they do can you please leave i would like it if you left i'm trying to learn i'm on
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this journey come with me well thank you i didn't i didn't consent to be touched i'm not offering to
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touch you i'm proud i'm proud of that line i gotta say i'm proud of that okay i'll admit it i'll admit
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it my name's not stephen maybe you already knew that my name is matt walsh
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mm-hmm i just was here on this on this journey that i'm just starting but i see that i'm not
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wanted if you were on your journey then you would have told us who you were your real name but you
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thank you so much i really had the transformative experience myself and my pronouns are he him
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you can see wait can we go back yeah right there there's there's my that's uh that's a little
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easter egg in the movie some people have noticed that's my my one of my black friends ben uh who
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appears uh multiple times in the film has quite a prominent role you see him in the background there
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uh only in this scene he's he's he's he's not my friend he's pretending you can see he's pretending to
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be he's pretending to be upset that i've uh that i have infiltrated and crashed this uh this seminar
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so there's a lot of you know there's like the movie within the movie within the movie
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and one of the ways that you can make a movie like this is that there has to be a whole other
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kind of narrative playing out in the background that is not on camera except for only brief glimpses
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and there it is i think he's playing the role really really brilliantly you can see he's got his
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hand on the hip he's like who is this guy get this guy out of here really well done well done
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the cops the cops did come they did show up in real life i was raw and emotional i was long gone
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i fled the state i was in uh i was in new jersey by the time they showed up and they called the
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police my mere presence in the room caused them pain i'll never be accepted now look at the acting
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look at the acting in this scene here if they know that i'm matt walsh they'll always be an outsider
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i need to go deeper undercover this uh this scene here is there's because this is a scene that we shot
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um in the bathroom actually in the bathroom uh here at dw studios we had this all and normally that
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would be uh it's it's frowned upon to set up cameras and uh and lighting inside a bathroom
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especially at work at your workplace that's an hr violation it's like in the handbook you don't do
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that but in this case it was okay because nobody else was using the bathroom at the time and anyway
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uh but this this scene this little scene here this little moment i consider to be my finest acting
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uh in in my in the film and in my professional career um and it doesn't it doesn't seem like much
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because on the surface all i'm doing is just staring expressionless in a mirror but there's you
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there's all these it's subtle it's a very subtle the acting here it's oscar worthy if we're being
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honest this is daniel day lewis level acting it looks like i'm just staring but it's in my eyes you can
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see and there's other you see that i have one button unbuttoned on the shirt that's another
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it's a little subtle move which which expresses that i forgot to button my the top button i guess
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but uh anyway that's what you want to look for in this scene it's all the acting is all in the eyes
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here i need to look like one like someone who is progressive tolerant enlightened let me think
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have i ever met anyone like that ah yes yes i have what is a woman
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here it is the superhero origin story the big reveal
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there we go yeah that's the scene uh you know something else i could tell i don't think i've
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uh i think this is a behind the scenes note that i haven't told anybody yet i don't think it's come
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up or i haven't revealed it but um well i get asked a lot about deleted scenes are there deleted scenes
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of course there are a lot of deleted scenes anytime you're making a movie you're gonna have deleted
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scenes you're making a movie like this you're gonna have a lot of deleted scenes because we have
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like i don't know 10 hours of raw footage probably more uh but actually this little reveal here of
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me wearing the professor you know the callback i we as you can see we're not very subtle about it
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modeled my look after the professor from what is a woman who by the way i'm sure is thrilled that he
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that he made a appearance in a second matt walsh film um anyway this reveals actually this is part of a
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of a longer this this is actually what you see right there is part of a 12 hour i'm not exaggerating
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part of a 12 hour shoot that we did we had a whole wardrobe you know the classic from every
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every uh movie ever made where they've got the the uh the wardrobe change scene the wardrobe montage
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where you're trying on different crazy costumes before you land on the right one and we had a whole
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scene like that that we did it took 12 hours to film they had me in all these different costumes
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uh and it was torture is it towards the worst thing i've ever done in my career is a torturous
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not only is it 12 hours of filming but you're making you're putting me in wardrobe and makeup
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over and over and over again which is my least favorite thing and making me wear silly costumes which
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is even even less of my favorite thing and uh so we had that scene and but we ultimately decided
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that it just it was too long and we didn't need all of it we just all we needed was this shot
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and so that that hit the cutting room floor and you'll never see it it'll never see the light of
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day don't ask me if we're going to release it we're not you will never ever see that scene uh
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but i think what we left with was is is even better i don't know how to end this i think that good sean