Armchair Expert with Dax Shepard - Lena Waithe

Episode Date: June 1, 2026

Lena Waithe (The Chi, Queen & Slim, Master of None) is an Emmy-winning writer, producer, actor, and playwright. Lena joins Armchair Expert to discuss being a talkative kid in the South Side of Chicago, discovering television through her grandmother, and realizing she was a writer before the industry knew where to place her. Lena and Dax talk about the changing definition of celebrity, the hard-won evolution of The Chi, and her fairy godmothers in the business. Lena explains how identity can become mistaken for activism, how aging can be a privilege instead of a fear, and why the best conversations require listening instead of assuming.Check Allstate first for a quote that could save you hundreds: https://www.allstate.com/See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Welcome, welcome, welcome to armchair expert. I'm Dan Shepard. I'm joined by Lily Padman. And today we have Lena Waif. Mm-hmm. Oh, I love Lena Waith. She's an actor, a producer, and a screenwriter. She created The Shy.

She was on Master of None. We loved that show. Yes. Queen and Slim, Boomerang, Them. This is the final season of the Shy, now streaming on Paramount Plus. You know, Lena, you're going to really fall in love with her if you've never heard her chat. He's just as sweet and wonderful as like, yeah. That's right.

Yeah, please enjoy Lena Waith. This podcast is brought to you by Squarespace. I feel like Spring always does this thing where you realize you've been thinking about something for a long time. And suddenly it feels like, okay, maybe I actually do something with it. Totally. It's less pressure, but more like readiness. Yeah, like you've been sitting on an idea or a project or even just a perspective you care about. And now you're like, maybe this deserves to exist somewhere outside of my own head.

In May being Mental Health Awareness Month, there's already this broader conversation happening. People are more open, more curious, more willing to engage. Which is where something like Squarespace comes in. It makes that jump from idea to actual thing feel way less overwhelming. You can build a site that looks good, works well, and actually reflects what you're trying to put out there. And it's not just hypothetical. Wabiwobb literally used Squarespace to build our site. Yeah.

And Wabiwob is not trying to spend 40 hours figuring out web design. It just worked. Which is kind of the point. So if you've been sitting on something and waiting for the right moment, this might be it. Head to Squarespace.com slash Dax for a free trial. And when you're ready to launch, use offer code Dax to save 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain. We are supported by Airbnb. If you've ever traveled to kids or with extended family, you know how much difference a little extra space can make.

Everyone's on different schedules. You want room to actually relax without disrupting anyone. That's where Airbnb really makes a difference, giving you the space you actually need. Having separate bedrooms, a real kitchen, a common area where everyone can spread out, it just takes the pressure off. We were up in Toronto and we opted for an Airbnb over a hotel. What I love about is everyone can be on their own sleeping schedule. That is nice. Yeah, you're not required to wake up when the earliest riser gets up.

Not for me. I always start by checking out guest favorites. They're the most loved homes on the platform, consistently high. Highly rated by guests. Some trips really do feel better when you have the right space. He's an object, I'm a chance to...

Holy. What? The options. No, no. You were great. Were you offered enough options? Because look how many I have. I know.

That's how I usually am. I just do... Oh, because you brought her a cream top and she was like, I'm not fucking with that much dairy. I don't drink coffee. At all. But about tea? Sometimes.

Is it caffeine in general you don't get down with? I don't know if I need any kind of caffeine. He's like he's already like, he's talking about. Caffeine, caffeine, caffeine, caffeine. Well, he doesn't need it, but he drinks it. I can't do it. Yeah. I don't want to be dependent.

It's fun. It's something to look forward to. Do you identify it all with the many, many things that come across your Instagram about ADHD? Because for me, I'm like, ooh, yeah. Oh, yeah. I don't have ADHD. It's interesting. The person who I share my life, she says...

She's already on here, so I don't want to tell you. I know, I know. I like to watch my podcast. I like, I watch y'all as well. I'm watching a podcast, like, watching on my phone, and I'm, like, watching a Kim Burns documentary at the same time. It's like, I'm doing that. Sure.

And she's just like, how? How are you able to do this and follow what's happening here in this conversation and listen to this documentary? I don't know. It's the thing. My question is, do you think you are consuming both at, like, what percentage? That's a good. question. Because you know, they've debunked the myth of multitasking, right? Like, there's been

enormous studies done where they measure the time spent and then they have proven that if you had just done one at a time and then the next one. Like, this is already kind of known. But I'm not saying that's the case here. I'm just wondering what percentage you think you're. Yeah. You know, the truth is, here's the thing. I will sometimes say, okay, put the phone down. Let me focus on this. I think it's really about not just attention span, which we all have to work at expanding. We have to actively do that. But I think that it's also about giving something your undivided attention. That could almost be your rating system. Like if you had a public platform or you rated things, it would be like, what thing did you shut down all things for? So this season, what showed? You were like,

you know what, we're putting this over here? The thing that I'm like really locked in is half man. Half man. What one is that? That's the gentleman who did baby reindeer. Oh, oh, oh. This is his sophomore effort. HBO Mac. It just came out. Just came out. There's two episodes up right now. I think both are pretty exquisite.

Exquisite, nice words. You know, baby reindeer locked us all in in a real way. But I think, and I got to tell him this, I was really grateful to be able to do that at the Globes. I stopped him and I said, you made me want to be a more vulnerable artist. Oh, that's lovely compliment. No, when he goes into the whole thing about he's in that fucked up

crazy zone of drugs and fucking and that whole, I was like, oh, wow, man, I'm so. impressed he's going here as like an addict. I was like, oh, yes. And it's true. Yeah. Well, we're all addicted to something. Our vices sometimes look different than some are more socially acceptable than others. You know, it's like cheating is a vice. Being unfaithful, I think it can be a vice. We'd say that's low acceptance, right? Yeah, we would agree. Correct. Universally reviled, universally practiced. Estelle. Esther Perel. I didn't. I fucked it up on both No, you just brought her all together.

I made her a one-name artist. You're like, look, let me globby here. Let me make you worldwide. Oh, me look, I got you. But also it's like shopping is a vice. Socially acceptable. Social media is a vice. Absolutely.

But socially acceptable in a way. Because the funny thing is people are on their phones posting on social why you shouldn't be on social. And folks are watching it like, yeah, but I'm getting this message on the very thing you're telling me to get off of. We had the CEO of Instagram off. And he gave this. First of all, live. who's my guy with the glasses who always sending a thing about the updates and stuff?

Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's our guy Adam Mosseri. Okay, yeah. And I love him. I like him a lot. And he's so thoughtful. Barry. Like, he's the dude you should pray is running that thing.

Yeah. And we have a guy and we have this great thoughtful thing. And I challenge him on every damn thing. Wow. And people are on the goddamn app telling me, how could you platform him? You can't support this. And I'm like, you're on the app. You cannot have this position.

Wow. Yes. Of course. Because they have to ratch up. They're on there just to shut it down, I think in their mind. They're going to take down the very thing that they're helping to keep alive. Okay, so we love the new show, Mad Man, Horseman. No, Half Man.

It's too much coffee. I just really like that show a lot in terms of how he's exploring masculinity and what relationships can look like between two men that don't necessarily have to be, both of them have to be queer. But I think he also was exploring versions of that and Baby Ranger as well. But I think he definitely is sort of an artist that's making television in a way that is forcing us to pay attention in a way that I don't know we always do. The fact that this was something that was not proper America Netflix. This was Netflix that was like coming out of the UK.

And as he said to me, he was like, I don't think Netflix thought it was going to be this huge hit. That speaks to the disconnect between, I think, streamers and audiences. I know. And it's sort of like, what do audiences actually want? What do they need? This is the beauty, though. There's downside. to the streamers.

You have a show that's about to be on for eight seasons. If you had that on network TV in 1980, you'd be buying a baseball team. I live through the whole thing. Okay, exactly. The one upside of it is, yeah, they're going to make baby reindeer. That's Netflix. No one there believes in it. But they're going to make it because they're going to make 350 shows this year.

Right. And then that does give the opportunity for all these things that pop. Beef comes out of nowhere. And all these shows come out of nowhere that no one was betting on in like a network way. And that deserves acknowledgement. Like, it's taking a toll on a lot of. aspects of this industry, but that one part is amazing. It's like they switched to niche and then niche became mega hit sometimes. No, that's true. And it's about like what becomes mega hits,

why does it become a mega hit? I'm always fascinated by that. Are we creating stars anymore or just depending on the ones that already have the money to carry a show that might not be that great? Well, stars also are becoming stars in a different way, like not just because they're on TV or in movies or in music. I was looking at all the pictures from the Met Gallo this morning and I was like, I know I'm like getting old. You're like, who are these people? But I don't know any of these people. Yeah, it's like being 30 watching a Billboard Awards.

I know. I was like, wait, I don't know anyone. Is it me or is it that the stars are from TikTok, from things that I'm not on? But they're not on my TV, I don't think. Right. I think the word star is sort of becoming interesting, the word celebrity, public figure.

What does that mean? Because you can become a celebrity in a week, but then your husband that never was. in like a year. It's so fleeting. I know. You're like later, I'm so neat out there.

You've done good. You've maintained. You're fine. Back and forth. We have his friend. I love him so much. Gordon Keith. He's on a popular Dallas sports radio show.

And he has been for like 25 years. He was visiting last time we were talking about AI and everything. And he said to Chris and I, he goes, you know, you guys might be among the last mortal stars. Mortal? Yeah. Like the future stars will be AI. You might be in history the last of the mortal stars. And Chrissy goes, oh, my God, that's so funny, the last of the mortal stars.

The final season and one of the strongest seasons of the comeback is telling us the future, which the comeback has always done. That's your first acting job, too, right? That was technically, yes. The season always starts to take credit from my first TV. I'm like, actually, Michael Patrick King, Lisa Coojo, they threw me in there one episode. Very grateful to Allison Jones, who discovered me. Yeah, what did they predict this season? That AI is going to take over all of the shit.

They've been such ahead of the game, and the comeback is just sort of one of those great shows. I was honored to be asked by New York Times about what are the 100 most important television shows? It was a very tricky task. This is not definitive list. They just came out with 100 greatest song, writers ever, and movies, all that kind of stuff.

So I was honored to be at the table for the television one, and I was really happy to speak about the comeback because it was on when I was in college the first season, and I could see in that much. moment what they were doing with comedy and that was so unique and so special. Because I was already like in Sex and the City, I was already a friend's fan, but to see these two brains come together

and make this show about an aging actress in Hollywood and what she had to do and the fact that they were ahead of the curve in terms of reality television in that first season. And then in the second season, getting into the premium cable type thing and what that would ultimately be and for this third and final season. I mean, now the seasons are spread out between like a decade,

which is so brilliant. It is. The first season was so beloved. And when we talked about it that 10 years later, HBO's like, yeah, do a second season. And now 10 years later, they're doing the third and final. And it is this sort of trifecta of Hollywood and what happens to it. And I'm like, all about Eve, you know, it's sort of, oh, this is what happens.

There's a person that's there that we look at and we love. And then she eventually gets put out to pasture and there's someone that comes in to replace. And it's cyclical. It's sort of telling you, you can only be on the mountain top for so long because you can't breathe the air up there. So you have to start climbing a new mountain or you'll die at the top of the one. You made it to. Everything's driven by young people.

This is also a reality. I'll talk to young people. I have a 13-year-old. We have friends. The people that they don't know break your heart. I mean, literally, the people they don't know. The movies they haven't seen. The movies, they're like, Shawshank Redemption, what?

That wouldn't even know. I wouldn't even take that swing. You would say, okay, I mean, blazing saddles? Like, what are we doing? That one's probably a no-go for most young people. What are we doing? What's the bridge? What's the bridge?

It is up to the parents. The parents got to get in there. Like, my mom, made sure I like Prince. Right. Although that's not a hard job. It was. I didn't get it at first when I was a young person.

In the car, couldn't hear it. I'm in college, in Chicago, he comes to the city, she makes me go. It's one of the things I'm very grateful for her. She's like, you got to come to the concert. I say, I don't like, I don't hear it. I go, I'm like baptized. I'm like, oh, got it.

And then I go out and by every record, which took me like a long time because he was just releasing music every week since he came out. I guess you're nine years younger than me. So that explains a little bit. I couldn't have not loved Prince. You know, I was probably in fifth grade when Purple Rain came out. You were either into Michael Jackson or Prince.

And to me, Prince was dangerous. And I liked him. I was like, okay, that guy's dangerous. I'm into him. See, like, Michael was, like, perfect for, like, this is going to sound so wrong. But he's perfect for, like, if you're a kid. Yes. Sorry.

I know, I know, I know. Like, you. You don't want to talk about your partner. But now he said Michael Jackson's perfect if you're a kid. Oh, no. You tell your problem, says, good news and bad news. You did not talk about. So we did avoid what?

If you're a kid, like Michael Jackson was magic. I mean, there is a reason he is so complicated. He was half-kid. He seems trapped in his. Smokey Robinson has this really great quote. He said, Michael Jackson had to be a man when he was a kid. And when he became a man, he was a kid again. Yeah.

Yeah. I co-sign on all that. What I don't co-sign on. on in that that is somehow a justification for the behavior that. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I don't think he was justified. Yeah, yeah. He was just like, that was an observation.

I just think we say that. Like, I definitely do think that's right. I think his childhood was stolen from him. And then he lived it out as an adult in Neverland Ranch. I mean, literally creating like, but let's that not take him off the hook. Yeah. The one's like a big digression.

Perfect. So I had never met you. I had seen you on Master of Nun. Yes. I liked you on Master of Nunn. Thank you. I loved the Thanksgiving episode. I remember.

I had no idea you were a writer. And in fact, not till much later, I thought maybe that was your first time writing. Right. Like, I didn't know your history. That was my fear actually about doing the show. Because I was like, oh, these people are going to think I'm an actor who's trying to write. But actually, I'm a writer that you want to act. Yes, yes.

He's like, right, yeah, don't care. You already a staff writer on Bones at that point, right? Yeah, I did that because I needed a job. I did. I met you in real life. We were at this event. And I'll add, I'm so excited you're a 2 p.m. interview because that means Delta will be here when we get done. So I was with Delta when we met and something happened between you two.

I don't want to speak for you, but there was an explosion of charisma and connection. Yeah. I think the first thing she said to you was, I love your voice or something. Yeah. And then I saw this side of you. And she has that effect on people. Not that it took a lot. But I saw a side of you immediately that was like, oh, I love this person.

Yeah. I got to say of all the stopping chats I've had in my life, I ranked that very high and like, oh, yeah, I really love this person. Wow. Yeah. It was a very memorable hour and a half hang. No, it was clear that you're raising kids that know who they are. That was, I think, very interesting to be talking to a young kid who was almost like fully formed. She was probably nine then, yeah. Right. That's why it throws you a bit. Fucked up. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Because I'm going like, what? You know, to be a girl with a husky voice and have. one in her life, there was sort of this thing of like her having like almost her own sort of voice, her scratchy voice. Yeah. Hers was real scratchy then too. Yeah. Yeah. So sort of like, oh yeah. The two girls with cool

voices. Yeah. Like yeah. Like we see each other. We see each other. I hear you. I hear you. Literally and figuratively. It was a lovely meeting. It was lovely. I really enjoyed learning about you today. It starts in Chicago, yeah. 1984, May 17th. We're about to have a birthday. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Oh, yeah. I'm right. I'm on Jackie Robinson year. About to be 42. How do you feel about aging? You're very accomplished. That helps. Yeah. I think I love it because, you know, it's interesting. Oprah did this really interesting episode back in a day with these amazing women who kind of

were known for being beauties in their dayday. Like it was Diane Carroll, like Lauren, the model. McCall? No, no, no. Lauren. I'm forgetting, but she was like a model with like a gap tooth or whatever. But she just had these women on there who were just really known for their beauty. And she asked them what they fear at the most.

And they all set aging. Oprah was kind of taken aback by that because Oprah was kind of taken aback by that. because Oprah said, that's not a thing that scares me. And Oprah in that moment literally is having this light bulb moment in front of people. She's saying, oh, I think it's because I'm not worried about a beauty type of thing fading. Yes. That's not what her value proposition was. That's not what my value was.

Also, black people age better. Well, this is true. This is true. We should get something in the deal. Yeah, absolutely. Oh, yeah. Don't get us. There's very few perks, but that's one of them.

We got to deal with some shit. But also, I'm a person, an interesting way that doesn't concern myself with the male gaze. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. And so. there's this level of, I don't need to look younger than I am. I don't need to appeal to a certain audience. I just want to get wiser and evolve and grow and learn and know something more today that I did yesterday. There's a lot of factors too.

I would argue and correct me if I'm wrong, the older black woman has a matriarchal position that's very cherished and valued. I know you lived with grandma right at some point, right? Grandma means a lot. True. Also knowing you're aging into a role of great relevance and purpose versus a lot of the white ladies are just thrown out of the pasture. Malichish. Yeah.

Yeah. So I think there's a lot of different things in the mix. Yeah. I think to me, it's just whatever somebody says, I hate getting older. I say, what's the alternative? Yeah, exactly. It's better than the alternative for sure.

But it's funny that you bring up the male gaze part because we just had this crazy experience last week where we interview some of the listeners and we had this man on to tell a story. And I was like, oh my God, he's so hot. He graduated from the same college as me. And I was like, I graduated in 2009. When did you graduate? And he graduated in 2021. And I was like, oh my God. I had like a real, I'm old. I'm, I guess a cougar. I hated it. And I don't ever walk around thinking that. I never walk around thinking I'm It was because I'm in front of this young, hot guy. She's 53, by the way.

I don't know if you know. She didn't say her age. Yeah, I don't have to be very fast math. Okay. I'm 38. But, but. We look great. Yeah.

You're like, you're killing. Yeah, you're crushing. I was pumped. I was like, oh, good. We're in a phase where she finally, like, is into fucking a younger dude. Like, let's get on with that. I mean, that's not where it went. No, it just made me feel so old and irrelevant.

And I was like, oh, wow. I normally never feel that way in life. I'm pretty confident, but then in juxtaposition to this young guys, when you say male gays, there is something very real about that. Yeah, like I'm not really concerned about that. Yeah. Yeah. I feel like the door's open for me to tackle something that's so dangerous to tackle.

It is funny that you say, like, I'm not concerned with the male gaze. And I got to say leading into meeting you, I think the reason I was shocked we got along so instantly well, by my estimation, was like, I'm nervous around lesbians because, I'm so used to my value proposition being you might like me. And so like for me to enter a situation where it's like, I know you're not going to like me. Capital L like me. And I have to confront how much capital L like me means to me.

That's real. And how much of my own personal self-esteem and value comes from capital L like me. Do you like me? And so I know, oh yeah, you're never going to like me. I start there, which it fucks me up a little bit. Oh, that's true. And then a lot of your art is deeply activist-oriented. You have a lot of causes you care about.

And then so my next insecurity goes like, she's going to look at me. I'm like, this dude doesn't give a fuck about anything. I go on with these two insecurities. And then I start talking to you and I go, no, I think she likes me. Maybe capital L like me, but I can live with this. And is that enough? Is lowercase L enough? It totally is.

And I think everything can get so easily misread. I'm sure there's some lesbians who are like, oh, he don't like me because he only likes people he can fuck. And I'm doing the opposite. thing and neither's Drew. No, yeah. I can't say I've had a lot of lesbian friends and I have to acknowledge it's got to be some part of my own insecurity or so I feel like

oh, I'm invisible to this person or something. That's super interesting. A couple of things. Like I'm so scared saying that. No, no, no, no. This is like really great. First thing I want to touch on is the art being rooted in activism and the truth is I don't think of myself as a activist in a way. I think of myself as a human who studies human behavior,

and I try to, like, capture it for us to look at. I think because a lot of stuff I'm dealing with is black folk. It can be sort of categorized as, okay, this is what this group of people is dealing with and going through, especially with a movie like Queen and Slim or something of the Like Them Covenant, which I produced, I didn't write or direct on that. But that was a black person who, I believe, identified as queer. But he was trying to explore something there through that. And Queen and Slim, I was exploring something.

about our society and then you look at something like the shy which is sort of exploring just sort of life, middle class, Chicagoans. But because if it's people who are part of a marginalized community, it sometimes can be seen as, oh, this is a political thing

because we don't have any choice for it to be anything other than that. But interesting about Thanksgiving episodes, like so many straight white dudes come on to me, tell me how much they love it. Oh, I love it. And that was a breakthrough for me because I used to think of it

as the black episode of Master of Nunn. Oh, interesting. Oh, we're going to have a black episode of disease? Oh, cool. Oh, yeah, okay, a gay black episode. Yeah, yeah. And I just thought it was for the gay black folk. Now, gay black folk love the Thanksgiving episode.

Sure. I think everyone loves that. But that's the thing. Yeah, yeah. That's the trick. Yes. Is that, yes, it's specific, but it's also universal. So, you know, I don't think you're preaching.

I think you're telling the stories that are true to you. You're supposed to write what you know. Exactly. And you are in these two groups that inevitably are going to seem political. Oh, absolutely. But for me as an artist, my goal is to not separate myself from the things that make me who I am, but to get. folks who don't look like me, love like me, come from the walk of life that I do,

to be able to look at the work and not only see it through a particular lens. It's to say, hey, you can see yourself in this character. It's the way I see myself in the lead character and Baby Rainier. Well, I was going to say, even when you listed the shows that you like right now, of course those are the shows that you like. Some people might go, oh, I'm surprised that she's watching that show. Oh, really? Yes, as a black woman, they're like, oh, you're not just watching power and girlfriend.

Okay. You know, nothing wrong. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, I also love bait. Want to shout out Rizumet on Amazon if you haven't seen it? Check it out. Beautiful show. He's going to be mad.

You ain't seen it. I know, see it looks like so. Everyone's in trouble. How about assuming you see paint? Exactly. But I'm also like, why you got seen bait? Okay?

What issues do you have? Let's just start with everyone's in trouble. I know. To go to the thing about like me and straight men, I feel like I have really great relationships with straight dudes. And a big part of that I think is because sex is not on the table. So they don't feel this need to perform. Yeah.

Because nothing's coming from it. And I think that's why. I also have very interesting relations with straight women because that gets a little dicing because it's a level of, huh, you're kind of masked, but you're a woman. And I kind of like this energy. I'm kind of confused. It can get a little tricky because I'm going like, are we cool? Are you hitting on me? Are you are?

But I don't know what's going on. And so I just hear what you're saying in terms of, oh, but if you couldn't like me, then what's my end? What am I doing? What's my value to anybody who wouldn't like me? Right. And the truth is, it's like there's so much value because that isn't all that you have to offer. for me. Yeah, I know it's stupid as I'm saying it, but it is the emotion I have, right, that I have to think through. That's super interesting. I go like, oh, I've got nothing to offer

this person there. I'm going to want to interact with me. And I got to step over that. I think that's super fascinating to me because I think for me when I approach, I'm just, I'm curious what's the energy going to be. I'm more curious about that because my brain isn't always there. I more so want to know, well, who are you? What's the the thing. The word I dislike the most is assume. Anytime someone says it, what follows it is sort of so what you're saying is you didn't ask, you didn't go to the source. You came up with a narrative for yourself about a person. And by the way, there are people that have narratives about me that are completely based on nothing. I think I had created one. She won't like me.

She'll think I don't care about anything. Why would she want to talk to me? I'm talking to her while. She seems to like me. She's smiling. That's what a lot of our society is doing right now, which is why I think it looks the way it does. We assume things about each other, rather than having that moment of, like, talking to each other and really hearing each other. Because even like, what you just said, I try to be an active listener.

That's why I was like, I heard the couple things that said, I was like, okay, I want to address the activist thing. I was like, because that's really interesting to me. It's not combative, but it's sort of like, oh, huh, that's interesting thing. I know that word's dicey. Like, for me to even say actor, I know that's a loaded word. No, it's not. But to me, it's like, I get what you mean.

It doesn't seem like an odd thing at all, what you said. But I think for me, it's helpful to hear and to kind of go, okay, I see how the work can be perceived that way. And because I have no control for how people perceive the work. But I think for me as an artist, it's always about, okay, that's how it can be seen. Okay, cool. And how do I continue to make work that no one feels ostracized from it? Because some people may go, I don't want to because that's active. I don't want to just kind of chill.

I don't want to be taught a lesson. Exactly. And sometimes work, especially by women or women of color or if you ask queer to that mix, there's this idea, this assumption that, oh, this is going to be a lesson. There's going to be a moral gear. It's about to be woke. Versus just, oh, that was just kind of funny

and human and grounded. It can be a burden because even if you're saying something or you're making a piece of art that a white woman made straight, people might not be like, it's an allegory or it's a lesson or it's trying to teach me. That's part of the thing. I mean, sometimes we'll get in, like, debates here. But if I'm saying something, it's kind of like I'm speaking on behalf of always. And not always.

I'm just saying what I think. Right. But you have to always like identify that. Yeah. I'm just talking to my point of view. I don't represent everyone. I know. And that's exhausting.

It is. But if you don't do it. I know. If you don't do that, then people are like, oh, so you're speaking for us? You're thinking for me. It's just like, oh, no, I'm not.

I'm thinking for myself. Hey, that's a part of the way people do interviews. If you pay attention to it, they're like, I'm just talking about me. No offense to this person. Know that. I don't want to. Yeah. I'm sorry I'm married and a healthy marriage.

I'm sorry. I know. What? It's like, Jesus. What? I know. It got really out of control. No, but I like you.

I have to get to know. You have to meet you. Yeah, yeah. I like you so much, too. Yeah. I did immediately. I didn't let any of that get in the way. It was just like passing thoughts as I consumed your art.

We're programmed. So you were zero to 12 south side of Chicago. Correct. And what was that like? Mom and Dad divorced at three? At two. Dad died suddenly when I was 14. But I only saw him from like until I was like seven.

And then like seven years kind of went by. He was gone. Was he an addict? Well, you know, it's crazy because I want to get his death certificate because I didn't know anything about how he died. And he was actually killed by someone. But it was sort of in self-defense. So it wasn't a situation like that. But the coroner did show that there was cocaine in his system.

There is a history of addiction. My dad love cocaine. And then I grew up to love it too. It smells so good. This is why my grandmother told me. She said, the grandma's going to say, it said, you're blood. So be mindful. A lot of us kind of got told that.

They told me that too. Oh, shit. You didn't. They told me, and I said, got it, but let me just see what's up. I got to find out for myself. Oh, they were right. Did you see the Chevy Chase, Doc? Yes.

Jesus Christ. I would love your analysis. I thought it was quite fascinating. I thought it was quite human. I'm a person that's done a documentary about a person who was no longer here, being Mary Tyler Moore. That can be a little bit trickier. I don't want to say there's more pressure, but her widower was kind enough to give us

the life rise in the space to tell that story. It took us about five years. Just going through a lot of interviews and things like that. Obviously, written a memoir when I was much younger and just obsessed with the Murray-Talimore show and Dick Van Dyke and all that kind of stuff. But it's tough to kind of create a portrait of a person. And obviously that person is still here and he's being interviewed. And, you know, I've heard the stories.

I think a lot of us have. And they're in the doc. Yeah, exactly. It's pretty unflinching on his many, many outbursts and shittiness. I learned a lot of things that I didn't know, which I think is the point of a documentary. Childhood didn't sound great. No, not at all. It's tricky because it's not about making excuses, but rather about giving you context for a person.

It's an explanation, not an excuse. That's what I like to say. Those are different things. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. But I think the thing with Chevy that got me the most was the 50th S&L bit. To watch that and to see him still be affected. Can't get out of his own way. For people who haven't seen it.

Well, I also don't want to, okay. No, no, you're not going to ruin anything. I can't get out. But if people know that there was a 50th anniversary special on SNL with like everybody that ever pretty much touched it and a lot of the people that were important to the show, by the way, Lauren Michaels is interviewed as well, which I thought was really important. But Chevy talked about. not being in the show.

Yeah. And even though he was very much part of the origin of the show, I mean, that's not disputed. But also he came back and hosted. It wasn't the best energy for, I think, either party when he came back to host. And sometimes your reputation, you leave a mark that can stick with people and who knows what happened. That's the thing. He doesn't know what happened. Lauren kind of is Lauren sort of, I don't know.

We try. But also Martin Schwartz has something really interesting. He was like, Billy Crystal was there as well. He didn't speak either. So what are you going to say? So Martin Shorty definitely gave some context to the situation. But, you know, what I appreciate is that Chevy Chase said, like, I was hurt by it. He was hurt.

He reaped what he sowed. What I respect is vulnerability. Yeah. I respect the honesty. The toughest thing for people to do is just to say, that hurt my feelings. Yes, literally. You know where my compassion came from? Where?

It'd be one thing if he was so happy and unaffected by the wreckage he seemed to be incapable of not creating, right? Like, if he was sitting there high on his horse, feeling great about it all, and enjoying life and feeling good. He is a victim of it all. He's very uncomfortable. He's in such discomfort. It's very obvious. That's true. And so I look at it and I go like, yeah, he was terrible to a lot of people and primarily himself. And I have compassion for that, that kind of self-destructive. I can relate to it. And then also these crazy glimpses of him where he's still a fucking genius. Like just him interacting with the dude with the flowers. And I shared, so I'm lying back from the NBC up front and they put me in a car with him. I've never met him. Oh my God. We're sitting in a car together.

And then we pull up to the hotel, and there's 600 people out in front of the hotel to see stars. And when he gets out, everyone's so excited, right? And he's trying to walk through this crowd and goes, oh, yes, so feeling much better now. Thank you for asking. And he keeps moving. And I was like, feeling much better now. Thank you for asking is one of the funniest things I've ever heard. And that's also part of him, right?

But I think that's sort of a portrait of a person. Stay tuned for more armchair expert. If you did. We are supported by Allstate. Checking Allstate first could save you hundreds on car insurance. Not checking what the warning light means before pulling out of your driveway. You absolutely convince yourself it was probably just a censor thing right up until you were standing on the side of the road waiting for a toe. Yeah, checking first is the right move.

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What I love about those documentaries, adding my own to it, you know, with Mary Tyler Moore, is that she's the woman that could turn the world on with her smile. But she also was an alcoholic and dealt with a lot of death in her family. and her son as an accidental suicide. And he was in his 20s. And then she also did ordinary people before that and then experienced it in real life. She went through a ton, but was sort of the Jackie O'O of television of her time.

And so I think ultimately, when you're trying to paint a portrait of someone, there's a lot of colors you have to use and you have to really let people speak to their experiences of them. And the truth is, everybody's right. Even though there's a moment in the doc where someone talks about how he was treated by them And he was saying, I don't recall that.

But this person's truth exists. The documentary allows Chevy's truth to exist as well. Yeah, they're just wreckage. But that's the thing. It's like the Peeway Herman Doc, I thought, was really phenomenal. Because I grew up with that. I loved that doc. That doc, I watched it multiple times.

Yeah, that's a beautiful. It's so stunning because I didn't realize what I was actually getting when I was watching that show. Me neither. He was speaking to the crazy weird kids. Yes. It was all misfits. Yeah. And I didn't even get that, but I felt very connected to him.

Yeah. I didn't know I was a misfit. until I realized, I'm like, what is it about this language that he's speaking that I understand? Sometimes you don't know what you're seeing until somebody points it out to you. And so, and I think that's the other thing, too, you get perspective. You can look back on a career and go, oh, and then you see the downfall. He goes, oh, this is interesting out. That kind of went how they tried to make it like he was a bad dude.

Breaks my heart. That's crazy. He was straight and fucking hookers. Like, he could have done anything straight and I don't know what to happen. Oh, yeah. That's the thing. Hello. Anyway, it's the thing about these people's lives and the impact they have on us that we don't even realize.

and then you realize that this person that has such an impact on you was a person. Oh, yeah, everyone. It's weird when you realize your parents are a person. You're like, oh, that's weird. There's only one person I think might not be a person. But this is one. Who? Stephen Segal. I'm not.

You're going to win anywhere. Like, I know if I watch the doc and I saw the record, he'd be very comfortable. You're like, I don't know. I'm going, yes, but going, yes, but going, yes, but going, yeah. So I read that you wanted to be a TV writer at 7. And this feels impossible to me because when I watched TV at 7, And it wouldn't have even occurred to me that it had started with writing. It's just like these people exist on this box.

I think that might be real. I think the truth is I knew I liked writing as a kid. I liked the assignment of having to summarize the book or tell about what you did the day before. And I remember my teacher really affirming me that young saying, I look forward to reading your papers. We both know our teacher's name. Who was it? Mrs. Tarbonis. Yeah, Larry Leclair.

Come on. Yeah. When they tell you you're a good writer. You're like, okay. I think what we say is so powerful. The power of the tongue is real. Yeah. And I just need to always, any opportunity, give any little kid that thing.

Yeah, because they'll remember it. It stays with them. Both ways. Whether you're told you're not good at something or you are good, like, it just sticks. For sure. So, no, I was really grateful to have that. But also, obviously, love watching television as a young person. I used to watch old TV because I had the grandma in the house.

We was watching, like, all in the family. Yeah. Oh, yeah. I did that too with my grandma. Yeah. All in the family. Sambr and son. Well, we like the Jefferson's good times.

Obviously, being a family of Chicago, I got to watch that old TV. That had a really big impact on me. A different world was really important to me, which is the spinoff of the Cosby show. For the younger audience, really sort of speaking to me, even though I was like, didn't even know what college was. I had beef with that show. Okay, what's the beef? I'd say my first number one love of my life was Lisa Bonnet. Of course.

I mean, for, get it. And then she gave birth to herself. Come on, Zoe Kravitz. I know. I got to dance with her one night for like two hours. What? just need to tell you. Chris and I write a thing.

Of course. This is how every story starts. And Kristen goes, there's your girl. This is why you're married to the best lady on the planet. She goes, there's your girl, and she's dancing. And you love to dance. So get over there. Okay.

And I fucking dance for two. I was floating on a cloud. Anyways, the spinoff was like, she took us to the spinoff, right? Correct. And then she got in the boot after the first season. But that's the way it's supposed to go. I lost my lead season three. You know, people knew about that.

But there's something that happened. happens when the universe takes someone away like that. Where we're going to hang the hat on this person. Well, let's remove that person and now see what you do. And what happened was a different world became the show was ultimately meant to become, which was supposed to be about Jasmine Guy and Kadeem Hardison and Creece Summer and Chanel Brown and Darryl Bell and Sinbad and everyone that came in and touched the show. So that show was like everything.

It was just everything. It's like even I talk about it now. Did you just want to live in the world? Did you want to be in that college? weren't they all in a college? That shows a big reason why a lot of folks went to historically black colleges. My black ass, loving a different role the way I did. I'm going to Columbia College in Chicago, study writing and producing television.

But I did go visit Fisk, which was the HBCU as well. I wanted to stay in Chicago and I wanted to go learn how to write television. Is Columbia, Chicago a part of university? A part of the New York. They're completely different things. Completely different. I was trying to figure that I was researching you today. I was like, I'm raining all about it.

I went to the college. That tells you like, you know. Okay. But she was an exec or is an exec and I'm a writer. So it makes sense. It's like, okay. You're like all this ads up. You're these different parts of your brain.

But I went to Columbia and it was really the best thing. Can I ask really quick, though? Who are you in elementary? Who were you in high school? Who were you in junior high? Oh, who was I? Yeah, in Chicago. And you moved to Evanston.

But tell me the first 12. Oh, my God. Who are you? Who are you? Who are you? I was, the conduct grade was always low. Class funny? Just a busy body.

Talking too much. Mama having to come up to the school. You said you're not ADHD, but this is sounding a teen. I was a social butterfly way young. I was there to socialize. The grades were solid, though. The reading and the writing and all that, I was killing it.

You know, I was talking too much. And then junior high, I was very much like a tomboy, but I hung out with all the pretty girls and stuff like that. I was a net crew. I loved movies. That was a big part of my personal. People could ask me about anything. Can I ask how early you were fully aware of being queer?

And then when you started sharing that with, friends. Oh, man. That's so interesting because I feel like I'm a person that believes it's sort of in you from the beginning. It's about where you recognize it. But I mean, for a minute, you're just not even sexual. True.

No, but the thing is when your kids, like, you laugh and you have crushes. That's true. You like other kids. Like you're like six or seven. There's teachers you like. That was never one of my fantasy, though, because my teachers were like my aunts and moms. They were like amazing. Yeah, yeah.

But they just were. giving that. But it was really about, I was looking at these actors and stuff coming up and the Janet Jackson's. I could recognize, I'm like, Janet is beautiful. I was like, okay, what's happening over here? Holly Bear is beautiful. I can recognize Whitney Houston is beautiful. But I also considered my mother to be beautiful. And so there was a level of like, oh, you're beautiful, she's beautiful. Okay, these women that I could recognize, it was a different thing. Did you have a young mom? Are you the older sister or the younger? And my mom was like in her 30s. Like, she had a, so I don't know. It feels like the usual age. have kids. And my sister's like almost two years older than me. And so it was just the two of us.

And I just gravitated toward the female energy. But then I was also a tomboy, like outside with the boys and stuff like that. And so I think for me, high school, I definitely felt very queer. But the thing about tomboy girls don't really get teased the way boys who are effeminate do. No, right. Because in a patriarchal society, it's not odd to be a girl that wants to be a boy. It's odd to be a boy that wants to be a girl because girls are sort of second class. citizens. Right. Yeah. And so that was the thing, like, I was never teased or made fun of. So I was never, I was never eyeball. And then in college, I was still living with my mom, so I wasn't really out exploring. It wasn't until I moved to L.A. where I was like, okay, where are the gay clubs

at? Where are the gay kids, this and that? And then when I would go to those clubs, I would feel very much like an outsider. Like, I wouldn't feel welcome. Did you feel inexperienced? Definitely. Felt inexperienced and also felt like I don't have any gay friends either. And so I've just cultivated this sort of like queer black women. It's not like a requirement. But the thing is, like, we had to curate that, cultivate that community. Like, it wasn't just like, oh, where's my other

queer black mask women? It's not turnkey. No, like, you got a really fine folks. And we've literally found it. We were hanging out last night. And it's private. We don't have our phones. We're just having dinner.

We're sharing. It's amazing. But it took a beat for us to like figure that out. Yeah. And so I think that's the interesting thing about community is that it takes effort. It takes time. It takes energy.

Everything worth having. No one ever knocks on your door and gives you something that's worth having. No. I do think there's this desire of everything you can have delivered to your door and not friends. No, not friends, not partners, not any of that stuff. No, you got to work for it. All the shit that's worth having. You got to fight for it.

They don't hand it out. They don't. And then when you get it, that's when the real work begins. Yeah. So you got, I don't want to say lucky because obviously you had gotten a degree in it, but you land pretty quickly in L.A. after graduation as an assistant to an executive. of girlfriend. Yes.

Yeah, right? Which I was loving. And the greater of that show at the time had been the youngest black show runner ever, like 30 maybe, right? Because Yvette Lee Bowser, who wrote on a different world, she was up top. She had a crazy show called Living Single. So she was outside as well. I want to give her her flowers. And then Mara Brock Akeel was also coming up at that time.

Mara. Yeah. Anytime M-A-R-A, I'm afraid, is it Mara or Mara? It's Mara. In this case, it's Mara. I have to interject. I have to. I have to.

Please, come on. Last week or two weeks ago, I met Mara twice in like one week. She's stunning. And she's incredible. I went to dinner. One of your events? One of my events? I started to go to their events.

But she was at two and she's the best and we exchanged numbers. I told her the story of the show and she was like, I want to listen. What episode? So I was like sending her episode. So hopefully she'll hear this. Oh, yeah. So big shout out. Mara Brucker Q, I'm going to send it to her.

I'm going to send it to her. I'm going to send her episode. That feels like a real blessed. seen the land with that person as a potential mentor. Oh, my God. And she has, she has been. She came to the Queen as Slim Premier. Gina Prince Bythwood, I want to shout out as well, who wrote directed Love and Basketball.

Mara got me a job working for her on Secret Life of Bees once I was done with Mara. And then Gina got me a gig working for Ava Dubernay when she went to go direct her first film. So that's my trifecta of fairy godmothers in the business. And Gina just hit me like today because she got a chance to look at my play that I did in Baltimore and her and Reggie Bythwood, her husband, who was also a big mentor of mine. they literally sent me a text today saying, hey, we love this play. It was very well done, really proud of you. And I was like, it's like, I'm like, my parents are telling me they're probably right now.

Okay, so when you leave that show, is your first staff writing job on Bones or is it on the Nickelodeon show? Nickelodeon was first and then I got Bones. So I did the half hour multi-cam and then I did the hour-long procedural. And culturally going from... So different. Yeah, and how did that go? I kind of struggled on the Multicam Kids show thing because it's just sort of not

My vibe. You're not watching a lot of that. Yeah, but like I needed a job and the lead was a black girl. And so they couldn't hire. Shout to Izzy. I love him. He was like, all right,

I'm going to have you two black women split the check because he's otherwise. I can only have one. I know. It's sort of how it goes. It's not his fault. I mean, just the way it goes.

They did like the paper team situation. So me and another black female writer shared an office and we were on a writing team. Then I didn't like work for a bit, but I wrote the pilot of the shy, had the table read for it. Did you sell it to Nevins? Yes. I love him.

I love him so much. She's the best. I call him my Clive Davis. He was like, come on in. He taught me a lot, too. He said to me, whatever you don't get in your first season, you'll get in your second. Whatever you don't get in the second season, you'll get in your third. It was so great at a breakfast.

And he just sort of gave me such great advice. But he bought the pilot in 15, but you didn't shoot it till 18? We shot two pilots of it. We did one pilot, and he said this could be better. And he was right. And then we did it again. And then that was the one he greenlit. So two things.

A, hard to hear that. B, what a champion is say, go get it right? Yeah. Right. Was it hard to hear it or did you know it as well? Or was he wrong? No, he was right ultimately. I can't have to give him that.

I, though, didn't think the director we had for the first one was the right director for it. I will say that. And they were like, no, this is a big deal. By the way, no need to say his name, whatever, but no need to disrespect anyone because he is very talented and amazing. I just didn't think he was right for what I was doing. And so then we did that. And in essence, like, Nevinz was like, yeah, okay.

We were both right. And so he said, let's go here. And we got Rick Fahma Yua, who directed Dope, who directed The Wood. And he directed the pilot of our show, which is a big reason why I think it went. And we had a beautiful cast and Alex Hibbard who came from Moonlight right over to our set. And obviously, Jason Mitchell was coming off straight out of Compton and Yolanda Ross and Jacob Latimore. Just the whole cast was really wonderful. And they sort of brought us into this space of, oh, okay, this is the show.

I always wanted to be an ensemble piece, but they were like, no, you need a lead. And then, of course, season three, our lead was taken away due to some events. And then it became the show that I think I always intended it to be. Do you think this description's fair? I've read this many times where people say like it's a hopeful version of The Wire. Hmm. I mean, that is maybe the greatest show for me. I mean, so it never hurts to be in the same sentence.

You know, yeah, I definitely get the comparisons for sure. And I think The Wire did something that hadn't been done on television before. And I never feel like weird about comparisons or people mentioning things in the same sentence because I think that's such an honor. And I think the shy really, for me, was the slice of life ensemble. I didn't want to necessarily go too deep into these different organizations or places or things like that because I really wanted to have people in living rooms having conversations while people in living rooms are watching it and maybe be encouraged to have their own conversations. I'm a writer that I think leans into conversations. Wanting to start conversations.

Not even wanting to start them. But once you have them. I love Matthew Lopez, phenomenal playwright recently said to me, which by the way, which he got from Mike Nichols, but he was saying that every conversation, there's like three categories. It's like it's a negotiation, it's a seduction, or it's a competition or something like that. And so I really kind of carried that, and I'm maybe paraphrasing, but I really do love the art of a conversation. Yeah, conversing, for me, it's a very fun game. It's like the best game, and you can play it all day long.

Yeah, exactly. I just love games, and I think talking to people is just this super fun game. Sometimes people like to be in combat in conversation, and I prefer to be in dialogue. I mean, you're saying something. I'm digesting it. I say something. You digest it. And we can kind of accept that.

Mine would be opposite of comeback. It would be I say something and it opens the door for you to say something even scarier, which opens the door for me to say something even scarier. That to me is like the ratcheting up of it. Not like a conflict, more just like, I'm going here. Oh, fuck, okay. I'll meet you there.

And then plus one. Yeah. That's the fun game of it. I love that. I think because that's really how you get to be close. I'm going to say something scary. And that gives me permission to say something scary, too. So I think Master a Nunn is a very interesting and probably unexpected deviation.

Yeah. But ultimately has to be a wonderful thing to integrate into the overall thing. They want to change my life. I learned the story today. I would have assumed you and Aziz were friends and that the role was written for you. I know. But that is not at all what it was. Yeah, no, not at all.

It was written for a white woman that might become his law of interest. Correct. Oh. Yeah. So walk us through. True how. I don't want to do it. He's like,

I don't know if it was a white woman. It was just supposed to be a straight woman. Whatever. He could come on this show and tell us himself. Look, here's the truth. I don't know how likely that is. But you get Brad Pitt. As he's in sorry, I don't know. We'll see what happens.

He's hard to get this guy. Trust me. I know. I know. I love him. I love him. He's my brother. He doesn't like to talk.

He doesn't want to talk to people. Like, that's just how he is. He talked to Amy, which was just surprising. We've had maybe 15 text exchanges. Come on. And they're all about watches. I'm like, that's all we're going to do, huh? Take it.

It's more than what I'm going to get. When we first started the show, there was a list of like eight people that we wanted. He'd be great, though. And he's on there. Having me here doesn't hurt because now he'll be like, okay, all right. Talk to me about it. She lived. Yeah, exactly.

I think she lived. Let me call her first and make sure she lived. Talk to me about it. No, the Michael thing's really going to throw him. He's like, I'm never going on there. I don't, no, no. Oh, Jesus Christ. Again, I got a good shout out to Allison Jones.

We had her on, by the way. Yes. Friend of the podcast. That's right. I did. I watched it. We love her. That's also a rare thing because she also doesn't talk to people.

I know. She's like, I just discovered people. But you know, not because she doesn't want to per se. She made it very clear. She was so flattered. And no one ever cares about casting directors. She just didn't think anyone. She kept thinking, why are you interviewing?

So crazy. Which is insane. Yes, it's insane. But it's very endearing. She's phenomenal. She literally saw something I put out online, which I wasn't even in. There was a pilot presentation for a show ultimately did called 20s. I would put it out there because I wanted some of

to see it and go, okay, we could do this. And so then I got a call that she wanted to meet me. I didn't know who she was, but I went and sat with her and I walked by the poster for freaks and geeks and bridesmaids and Fresh Prince of Bel Air. And I thought, oh, okay. But she's like Lauren Michaels. Got it. Yeah.

So I stood across from her. And I just talked to her about television. And she has such great taste and everything. And I talked about Maude and watching that and watching Golden Girls. Are you pretty encyclopedic with TV stuff? Yeah. I mean, I worked at Blockbuster for a while. Yeah, yeah.

And Best Buy and Movie Theater. Yes, in the movie theater. You did your homework. I do. I know all my stuff. So we were just like talking about the most randomest like things. And she just kind of goes, have you ever considered acting? And I said, I have not.

She said, okay. So can I bring you in for some stuff? Just for like, you know, shit and gickles. And I was like, sure. And she did. She brought me in for V. And I wasn't able to really handle that because Julia Louis Dreyfus was like in front of me. And so I wasn't expecting that.

You got to be a fucking gun slinger. To be a. I was like, that's not a great starter acting job. I'm like, I said, you're throwing me out here. But then she did bring me in for a tape and I got the comeback, which was cool. And then I got a call that said, can you just go meet with Aziz? Wait, really quick, can I ask? At that time where you're like extra money?

Or were you like, I want to act. I have a desire to act. No, I just really trusted her instincts. I didn't think that that was something that was in the cars from me, though. I'm a writer. That's what I do. So because Aziz and her, she was obviously brought on to do the show. It didn't even have a title.

It took forever for us to get the title of the damn show. It was untitled Aziz. project because y'all know how that goes. But obviously, I was a fan of Parks and Rec and knew his comedy. But I got a call that was from her office and says, want you to go meet with Aziz. And I was like, why is it casting people calling me? What's about the staffing? Yeah. I don't know, but go meet with Aziz and Alan Yang. And obviously I knew Alan Yang's name as well. And so I thought, okay, all right, I'll go sit with them. But it's from Allison's office. So this is strange. And they were like, I don't know, just go to his house and sit and talk to

him. And so I later found out that Aziz told her that he didn't want just people to come in and read with him. He wanted to meet people first. And and see if they were interesting and then read. So he just said to her, send me interesting people. And by the grace of God, she and I just met. She said, oh, Lena Waith is interesting. You should meet her. And he was like, okay, I don't know who that is, but send you to the house.

And so I went to his house and sat with him and Alan, not unlike this, literally kind of almost similar. The furniture and everything. And I just sort of talked to them like I would if it was a staff writing meeting, but that clearly wasn't. And I just was like myself, I had recently fallen in love. I was just being myself, comfortable with my own skin. And then I got the call. Okay, he wants you to read with them. And I was like, oh, okay.

So, okay, we thought I was interesting. So I came in, sat down, read with him, and it was just instant. Then I came in the test for it. The casting couch, it was a very straight, white woman sitting next to me. And she's like, are you going in for Denise? And I was like, yeah, are you going in for Denise? She was like, yeah, she's like, it's funny. We get bummed each other all the time.

And I was like, right, yeah, that's weird. By the way, it's so much better. Oh, yeah, it's way better. Another one is when you sit down, it's like, yeah, I'm kind of the same, but way less good looking to this guy. You're like different variations of each other. Yeah, yeah. And so, to me, what I looked at, it was Alan and Michael Scher, too, who was our parent on that.

It was basically them saying, this is the NBC 1994 version of this show. This one we're bringing in. Of course, when I come in, it's like, this is where the shit is going. Like, this is what it is. And so I totally get what they were doing. And so obviously when I went in, I had a cold too. And when I went in, I was like, oh, I told Michael Schro, this is my flu game. I'm going to talk right around this, man.

Because I was like, let's go. Because I could just feel something was interesting. And, of course, after I read and tested disease, was like, come on. And were you encouraged to be loose and improv in that? audition a little bit. Because again, if I'm going from, okay, we have this one archetype. But we're trying this other thing out.

Let's see all the flavors. Like, I would want to know. They knew I was a writer. They were like, you know, but I also didn't come in there. I didn't want to blend the two. So the season one, I didn't write anything. Oh. Me and Zsiz would have conversations where he would take

little things from there and put it in there. But then season two is success. He was like, okay, I want to do a Denise centered episode. And I was in season two a lot less because I had gotten ready player one. And that was a very interesting, tricky thing because it was like classic. Like, we got a season. to, and now you say you want to go do this Spielberg movie, only be in there for a couple episodes.

And I was like, yeah, I was like, but this is an opportunity. I'll give you a great episode. Just talking shit. Yeah, yeah. I'll give you a great episode. It'll be fine, man. Don't worry about it. Like, I got to go to this movie.

And he's all like, oh, God, classic. And so sure enough, he came to London where I was filming so he and I could write the episode. Oh, wow. Because I said, I can't write that episode with you. I said, because I got to focus on this movie, man. I'm like, how many all I'm talking to be in a fucking Steve's Spielberg movie. I got to show up. He was like, if you don't write it with me, it's not happening.

Uh-huh. Good for him. And so I was like, fine. And I won an Emmy. Yes, it did. You won an Emmy for that. Yeah, became the first Black woman to win for Outstanding Writing in the Comedy Series. Yeah.

So great. And did you love acting? It took some getting used to because he did want me to be myself. And you're in New York City? I was in New York City, baby, going to restaurants with him. Yeah. I mean, he's like, show me a really. He's like, he's the reason I know how to eat oysters and, like, caviolett's kind of stuff.

because he's such an old school gentleman type guy. He knows every restaurant. And I'm like, okay, this is all fascinating. Yes. What a tour guide to New York he must have been. Oh, my God. I mean, even in London, too. I watch the show.

I'm like, I want to spend a week with him and fucking meet him at corners and eat shit. I know. Shopping, eating. Yeah, look at girls and eat shit. Let's go. No, it was fantastic. I remember we used to go see Moonlight together.

And Barry Jacobs was doing a Q&A after. And it was just like, we were because we knew we had Thanksgiving coming up. is we're like, oh, this is crazy. He's someone that is a big part of not just my career, but I think just my evolution as an artist and as a person in the world. And I'm really grateful for his existence because my career wouldn't look the way it does if it weren't for him.

And Allison Jones and Alan Yang and Michael Scher and Netflix, those guys over there. It's just such a big part of my career. Now, what did you have to learn to run the shy? I'd never run it. I'm not a showrunner. Oh, you've never run. I did the showrunner training program with the WGA,

and I realized, yeah, someone said, getting your own TV shows, like being beaten to death with your own dream. And nothing is truer than that. I always say the hardest core motherfuckers in all the show business are showrunners. Oh, yeah, that's what I do. You have to give it to them.

That's why I don't do it. Because they're doing budgets. They're doing with actors. They dealing with execs. They do every single piece of it. The way I get to sit here, you know, shout out to Jewel and Justin, who co-show run it together.

I do think it's a two-person job. I get to be the creator. You know what I'm saying? And I get to like give notes and things like that. You were in the writer's room, my imagination? I wasn't a writer's room for season one and season two. And those are rocky times because I was a young buck. Like I was 30, 31.

That's young to be a show creator. They have showrunners they put you with who are older and wiser. But at the same time, I'm doing something new and you're holding on something old. That's the inherent tension in all these situations. Always. Is I'm trying to do something new, but you know how to do it. Right. Both of you are right.

Yes, correct. But we're fighting. But you can't get the green. light until they're like, well, we approve this guy to come oversee. If they spent $100 million or something, they want someone that has done it many times successfully. I lightly called Michael Schra, our parent on, you know, Master of None, because you need that person that's going to kind of watch over and, okay, all right, what are y'all doing? Okay, what are you going to do what?

That's the nature of the bees. And I think people that watch television don't always think about all those things. Or sometimes you have a whole episode and this actor got sick or this actor got a movie. Okay, you go here. We got to rewrite this and that changes that storyline. But we'll figure out these two actors who we want to be a couple, don't really have great chemistry. Okay, so we'll go over here. It's like all these different things.

Not creative. It's logistics. Yes, it's logistics. It's like it's also a workplace. It's like everybody don't always get along. Yeah, you're doing a lot of. Therapy for people, HR. Exactly.

Okay, HR. Dealt with that. So it's just like, okay, it's eight seasons. I was like, yo, I'm going May 8th is we're going to be in Chicago. Last Day of Filming. We're going to do the whole thing and go promote it in New York. Now explain this to me. So seasons one through five, 10 episodes.

Season 6, 16 episodes. They did that. They asked us for more. Yeah. Season 7, 12. And eight, I asked us to go back to 10. Okay, so for our last season... Gonna be 10, baby.

Okay. Yeah. Unconventional, by the way, Parenthood, which I was on for six years, we never did a season of the same number. Same thing. I was like, we did 13, we did 21, we did 18, we did 14.

Was that because of the streamer or the network? It was the network. It was like they would never kind of commit to us. We were always on the bubble all six years. And it was like, this year was like, good news, 16. We're like, what number is that? You're either doing 13 or you're doing 22 at that time.

we're going to do 16 and then one year we were going to do it. They tell us midway through, I don't know. It was very confusing. When we told us they wanted 16 episodes, we had already had our 10 episode pitch. So we had to go to them and say, well, you got to give us a few more weeks to figure out what that is. And they're like, okay, but it's good news. They want more episodes. And it's like had a new guy had come over and he wanted more episodes because it was doing well.

But we had never told a story that way before. People don't really like, you're being told. You're like, okay. So we're going to do 16. Got it. And then seven. Oh, you're doing 12. Okay.

And that's why they said, yo, eight, I got to, this will be 10? Okay, cool. Yeah. Do you have the pride of having a show that went eight seasons? This is like, you're in the thinnest of air. I know. There's a lot of gratitude. But also knowing that when we came on at that time, it was a different world.

Eight years ago, I know. Things were very different. Very different. Even slightly more than eight because we did the first pilot, then we did the second one. So we had a mini room and then this and that. You mean, you sold the pitch in 2015. Correct. So you've been doing this for 11 years.

Exactly. You've only seen eight seasons. But, you know, as a pilot, they'll never see the lot of day. There's things that I've lived through that have really made me the artist I am now and made me someone that can really see things from a lot of different angles. In 2018, you became the voice of AT&T. I'm wondering what your tagline is. Can you say it? I want to hear it.

Oh, my God. He gets paid to say. I made Billy Crude up do the Visa commercial price list. Master card. I made him do it to Monica. Get home on. This is how you know. I wrote one to fuck with Monica that he had to write.

Mastercrite was fantastic. Oh, my God. cold read. It was perfect. What is, what was my main? Because it was like, what was my main timeline? I'm forgetting it. I haven't done it at E-T&T. Just okay is not okay. Just okay is not okay. Is that it? Does that feel familiar? It was that, but it was something else too. It was something else. How many years did you do that? Oh, I did that for a few years, like, maybe like three? That's the best job in Hollywood.

It was the best. And I could do it to crib, too. Yeah, exactly. And the pay is nice. It's lovely. It's like nice payday. Yes, it is. Yeah, for minimal work. If you looked at your career and you charted your hourly rate, there would just be this huge spike and it'd be your 18-N-T. It's right there. It's right there. And people would recognize me from my voice.

Uh-huh. Speaking of the voice thing. Well, Delta, yeah. They knew. They're like, hmm, your voice sound familiar. Oh, maybe Delta's like going to have a huge campaign. No, she will. She will.

She will. I'm jealous already. She's the kid who, you know, I'm certain to be wrong. What I love is she loves right. writing more than anything. She writes compulsively. We just had the conversation last night. You would love this. I imagine if you can imagine having a kid, this would be the ultimate conversation you could ever have, right? She wants to win. There's like a writing competition at school to write basically the closing statement of elementary. And so all the kids are writing

something. She really wants to get picked and to be able to read it on stage. She wrote it. And then she read it to Kristen. And Kristen said, it's really good. But I think in your better off speaking to your dad about this, but I'm not sure that it's you. And so she came upstairs and she's like, mom said this, I'm read it to me. And I got to have this conversation with her. And I said, the challenge as a writer is to never write for anybody but you. And it's so hard. That's true.

I said, so you could choose to write this to try to win a contest or you could choose to write the story that you would tell your best friend, Inca, about your experience at CWC. What would you say about your experience to Inca, your best friend? And she was like, I get that. Okay, I get that. And I was like, this is like the dream of all dreams. I have a conversation like that with my daughter about what it means to find your voice as an artist. Oh, that's good.

I was just floating on a cloud this whole conversation. It was so fun. You know, it's interesting because I am childless by choice. And we talked about this a little bit. Like, if you don't remember that, I'm still in that camp. It's so fascinating because there's so many things that I think about in terms of like why I don't want to be a parent. A lot of it's because you have to have a sort of mental capacity for that at the end of a day. What's interesting is you have the capacity to sit and like hear it, give the note.

You don't hear the rewrite. You're going to maybe be there if she wins. You know, it's going to be. It's a lot of it. If she doesn't get it, then there's also that, you know, emotional showing up that you'll do. The most likely thing is if she succeeds at writing the thing she'd really tell her friend, Inca, it's not going to get picked. Oh, well, who knows? We don't know that.

We don't know. But at this age, at this age, in that context, it probably won't be rewarded originality in true voice. But that's also a little lesson you got the gear. Well, I told her. I said, look, hon. I always wrote. You send her up?

No, I told you. Well, luckily, I got my own storyteller. It's like, I've always written what I wanted. And it didn't work. It didn't always work. Well, I wanted a car chase movie. That was a love story. Nobody wants that.

I wanted that. And it didn't work. But I kept doing it. And one day, the podcast happened. It took so many years of me being truthful to that. Sometimes it takes a while, but you will have the pride of having always told the story you wanted to tell. And that is invaluable and worth more than any amount of money you could have made. Absolutely.

Where I do that, because I have this mentorship program where there's writers, there's actors, there's people who want to be execs. And I get on Zooms with them once a month and they can ask me whatever they want. We have these lovely private conversations. And I think that's where I realize, oh, that's where I can show up and be real. because also it's that element, too, of being supportive and encouraging, but also being grounded and being realistic. And I think that is the path you're walking with your kid. Maybe for me, as a mentor, which I've become and I try to do that,

it's still a responsibility. Yeah. But I think you're doing, I always say parents are doing God's work because it's a different kind of responsibility that you have. This is a person that is a reflection of you, but also you want to make sure that they're in a carbon copy of you. So it's like you've got to give her guidance, but also make sure she has a space to become more of herself.

Stay tuned for more armchair expert, if you dare. The thing you fight the most as a parent constantly is they are their own thing. It's all you're doing. Like, you're trying your heart to see. But think about how many parents don't do that. There's so many parents whose children are really doing the thing that parents want them to do. It's very natural and gratifying to see yourself in other things. things. We search for that and that's how we bond and it's great. Invariably, you do that,

you see all these things that are similar to yourself in it and it's very gratifying. But then you have to go like, and that's 10% of them. I might miss the other 90% is not like me at all because I'm not looking for it. Right. You've got to remind yourself to constantly look for it. Back to the baby thing. So what happened to me was, A, I've always wanted kids. So that's standard. But also I had a friend who had a daughter who I just fell in love with. I'd take her trick or treat and she'd ride on my shoulders. And I just constantly was like, if I don't get a Madeline before I die,

I'm gonna, what a, you know. You're built for it. Yeah, I'm built for it. But Delta fuck you up a little bit. Oh, yeah. No, that's all the problem. No, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Because then I don't meet kids and I'm like,

oh, can my kid be cool and chill? Yeah, first they say well. But then the jerky party is, though, they're going to have moments of not being chill, not being cool, like upset. It's just a lot going on. There is a lot. You know, I'm just like, how much do I have,

I got responsibility for myself, my community, my work. And you feel fulfilled. I do, yeah, yeah, yeah. You're like, I'm whole. Yes. And I do think it can be very societal. I think sometimes people say, oh, why do you want to have kids? Oh, you know, I'm on that age.

I couldn't finally afford it or it's that time. Although now there's so many every other week there's an article near times about people can't afford to have the children now. So they're deciding not to for certain reasons or people don't like the world they may bring them into. But for me, it's more of an internal thing about what do I actually have the mental capacity for? What I also think about is at the end of a long day, what do I want to do with myself? And I think the first thing is to not take care of someone else. Yeah, yeah, that's fair.

Because it's a different kind of thing that you're doing. Because also, anything could happen with kids. Like, they fall, break something. That's so scared. Can I hit you with something? Go ahead. And I'm trying to continue into. No, no, no, no.

But I'm just, I just want to point out a lot of these counterintuitive things. Yeah. You might be shocked to learn or find out or experience that taking care of them is taking care of yourself in a way that was unimaginable. Oh, that's interesting. The amount of healing and perspective that's happening in those moments and the right sizing of all of your concerns and all these existential things you have in the racket in your head and the things that are important. Like, somehow it can alleviate all of those things. It's like, you think you're going to be overwhelmed, but weirdly it prioritizes things in this way. Oh, this is weirdly nurturing to me and has,

yeah, just prioritize things in a very clean and lovely. Like, Here's what I miss about being an addict. The beauty of being an addict is you have a single goal. Yes, it's true. I'm telling you, it's a liberating fucking thing. It's like, I have one mission today. Do not fall off of this high. That's so peaceful.

Is it difficult for you to watch stuff like euphoria or like anything else? I love it. So you can watch. Oh, I love it. Yeah, yeah. Because I know, it's not like I just see it. I'm like, oh, I've been in that room. I know this thing.

Yeah. I love it. Got you. Some addicts can't watch that shit. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. No, yeah, but I hear you. Because I love Jada Pinkett calls her children, her teachers. She says they teach me things about herself, life, all that kind of stuff.

And I thought that was a really interesting way of looking at parenthood. Because obviously, you're thinking this other way around. But I think for me, I am taught something by human beings every single day. And that's why I feel like I don't need to produce one or have somebody produce one because it really is a writer's job to be a witness, to really look at it. human behavior and try to understand it and accept things about it that don't make sense to us sometimes. Because when I look at society, it's easy to get frustrated, but rather I say, why are we behaving this way? Because it's not out of sheer desire for destruction. It's out of

sheer desire to be seen, to be loved, to be a part of something. And so I think, yeah, I may not be a parent and I don't have a desire to be. But I think what I do have a desire to do is to understand humanity and have empathy for us and be able to reflect us back to ourselves so that way we could better understand ourselves. I mean, Chelsea Handler says this so perfectly all the time. She's like, I don't have kids. So I have the capacity to give to all these other kids. Like she's a constantly. Yeah. And just like she gives all these charities. She's just like, I have space. If I had a kid, I could not feasibly do all of that. Yeah. And I will say my friend Melina Matsuica, who has a little one who's like her son,

who's not yet one. And he is in that space of when I come over there, I can just like hold him. And I was over there holding him. And she's like, you come over here to get your baby fix. That's the problem. And I was like, what? No.

No. Because when I hand them back, when I'm sitting there, also low-key getting tired, he's getting heavy as hell. He's heavy. She knows. I'm like, girl, this is not normal, girl.

What is happening? What's in the breast milk? She's like, I know child. But as I give her back, because I'm like, yo, I'm exhausted before I leave it. She's just like, this is you give him back over here. I was like, yeah, I want to give him back. I want to give him back.

We had a terrifying moment when Kristen was probably like six months pregnant. We went out to eat with our friends, the Hansons, and they already had two little kids. And we were at Bob's Big Boys trying to have dinner. Impossible. It was not possible to have dinner with these kids there. And so you guys were like, look what we're about to do. Oh, Lord, we can't go to Bob's Big Boys anymore. Like, that's a wrap on going out to fucking eat an hamburger?

Y'all don't want to leave the house, though. Let's keep it out. Let's be honest. You don't need house. Yeah. Now we have an excuse. So you got that built-in excuse. That's nice.

That's other thing. Parents don't be going nowhere. Anytime I don't want to go somewhere, there's a play that night. Oh, look, see? Look, I'm here. I go out. I go out a little bit. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Just a little bit. You're social. You've been since elementary. Problems. Yeah. It's your life. It's your life force. You're social, too.

I am. You're social too. Drives my wife crazy. Like how many. people do you need to talk to? I'm like, everyone, hopefully. I think there's like seven billion left I have to talk to. It's like, it's your job. It's your job. She always says the greatest gift about this show is that like, I do get to talk myself out enough. So that way we can go. I'm tolerable at night. Yeah. Yeah. The load's not all on her shoulders. I love you guys. I love you guys

together. I'm not team share. What happens? I'm not. I'm not. I'm like, guys, no, I say internet. What do you do? Can I tell you my conclusion? I think it's a good one. Oh, God. That's all we got asked about when we got nominated this year. But I think my final conclusion on it is the best way for me to digest that is nobody's good enough for her. Oh, my God. And I love that.

And that's true. But I'm the next best thing. That's right, brother. Yeah. Yeah, you're killing it. You're killing it. That's the message. The message isn't against me.

No. It's nobody's good enough for her. And I love that. I'm glad that's how she feels about her. And I'm glad that's how America feels about her. This is real. This is real. I can live with that.

But to me, I just love what you two represent, which is... 1950s. Old school. No, but I think sometimes people have an idea of who they're supposed to be with. That idea is never as good as who they're actually supposed to be with. She said I was supposed to marry, like, head of UNICEF. She was supposed to marry Mike Sher. Oh, wow.

You know, a good boy. Mike's pretty successful. And he's just a good human being. Oh, my God. He wakes up thinking how he can help other people. I don't. I wake up thinking about speedboats. I'm like, should I order a donzie or buy a used one?

No, but you also type of person that said, I got to get a Madeline before I die. Yeah, yeah, that's true. That's real. I do want to ask one thing, and you can say no. Okay. But you were with someone for a couple years. Uh-huh. And then you got married, and it only lasted a couple months.

Uh-huh. And I'm dying to know if something about the title fucked everyone up or you up personally. It wasn't the title, no. It was me also feeling like even though I'm not as happy as I should be, I think this is what I'm supposed to be doing. And I just didn't have the language or understanding of that. My happiness didn't feel like it was important. I think what was most important was that I honor this relationship. Keep this thing going, whether you're enjoying it or not.

Because of how much it's changed my life and how grateful I am for it and how amazing this human is. And when I don't want to say happiness, I want to be frivolous about that. Like, I think we wanted different things. One of the things is like, I actually realized I didn't want to have children. And that's a pretty big life change. And so, but at that time, I just thought, I just kept putting it off. And so that wasn't me lying. It was me still trying to understand what I wanted and who I wanted to be.

And I think that's why for me it's really important having this perspective stepping back. Because like we have to really ask ourselves whose life we want to, because a marriage and a relationship is the blending of two lives, truly. And so you have to really ask yourself, what life do I actually want? And I don't think I was very clear about that. All I knew was I want to be with this person. I want to have this house. I want to have this dog.

I want to have this mural. But then I didn't ask myself, but like where do you want to be if I was like, really? And in its best version, it's like, I wanted this life, this person wanted this life. And then magically when we get together, the two of us get a life that night. of us even thought of. Right, right. And that's like maybe the greatest thing that can happen. Yeah, I mean, or you can say, yo, we have impacted each other's lives in such a significant

way. And now this might be where we give each other room to go and have lives that make sense for both of us. Yeah. Right. That's great. That's hard to do. Yeah, but I didn't do it in a way that was noble, that was honest, that was kind.

It was done in a way that felt like a car crash. And that's because I just sort of like was driving the car too fast, not knowing the gear, and just sort of going. And that doesn't remove accountability for my behavior. It's hard to exit these things elegantly. Very few people. I wish I could have, you know, landed the plane better. You know what I mean? But I think ultimately, and again, it's about giving yourself grace and kind of looking back at it.

Oh, you could have handled that much better. You could have dealt with that in a different way. But what I do also understand except is that I'm where I'm supposed to be. I know she's where she's supposed to be. and I don't have any ill will toward anyone. If anything, the will is toward myself. I think for me, the greatest feeling is I was with a woman for nine years. I still love her to death.

We're friends. And her life turned out so fucking good. Nice. And I'm like, oh, yes. Oh, yeah. This person's life is like, too now is better without my husband. That's where I could kill you. If you crash the car and the person's fucked up, that's hard to live with.

But if, like, you can look back and they're like, oh, good, she's so happy. She has the perfect husband and the perfect kids. and fucking muw. It's so happy. And that to me is how you know you really love somebody, is that when you want them to be happy and happier without you. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Because I don't know if that happiness would have ensued if I would have stayed there.

To me, removing myself, I think was actually the right thing to do because I wouldn't have been able to deliver the life that I think you would have wanted. Yeah. What do you most excited to do? You've done so many things. You have created many, many shows. You have them on Amazon. Obviously, we have the shy.

The shy. Yeah. Wrapping up. May 22nd Paramount Plus. Last season, the Shy says goodbye. Okay, Shai says goodbye. Eight seasons. What are you dying to do?

You're also a producer and cats, which has got nominated. Angelica Ball, myself, Cynthia Revo, Jeremy Pope, La Roach, John Legend. Dominated today for nine nominations. One of the ones, thank you so much. One of the ones I'm in there is for Best Revival of a Musical. Uh-huh. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Now, let me ask you, were you a fan of cats?

No. Yeah. The whole time I'm like, what's going on? And then I went to go see this version where it's told through queer black ball culture, which really makes so much sense. It lends itself to this world. So it's almost like it was meant for this world. Couldn't agree more.

It's phenomenal. It was perfect. That world would have made sense in the ball world and almost nowhere else. Exactly. Paris is burning. I highly recommend everybody check out. Also, you know, a criterion collection, Jenny Livingston, phenomenal documentary changed my life as well.

What's that about? That's about the ball culture. She made a documentary about it when she was coming out of NYU. And it just is a movie that has been such an archival of our queer black ancestors and what they were doing at the time and the things that they were saying. But also speaks to the reality of the time what was going on. So I obviously loved that. And then I went to go see this show at Pack, which was where it started.

And I was blown away by it. And then I wanted to be a part of it. And they were kind enough to let me join the team and came over to Broadway. And here we are. So do you want to do another show next or do you want to do a movie? Or do you want to do more AT&T commercial? I'm doing a movie. Writing a movie now was an adaptation of a short story

called Grand Rising, which is something that you guys, if I say that, you kind of go like, huh, I don't know what it is. It's a different way that sometimes black folks in certain groups say good morning. Instead of Good Morning, they say, Grand Rising. Oh, wow.

Grand Rising is something that sometimes if you feel like a little more enlightened, you sort of say that. Yeah. So when we wrote this amazing short story, I read it, loved it. I raised my hand to see if I could possibly come on and adapt it. They were kind enough to trust me with that.

Fox Searchlight. is doing it. We're not telling much about what the movie is because I think that's the new thing now. It'll be a little bit mysterious about the storyline. Let folks come, experience it for themselves and see what it is.

But I'm working on that right now. A couple TV show ideas. Maybe we want to play with like, what it is to be in your 40s. So stay tuned. And then, yeah, theater, theater, that's what I care so much about just because I think with everything

happening with the streamers and people not really want to go see the movies. Live entertainment is something that we can't deny. And it's like Station 11. It's like they're going around town performing Shakespeare. for the people for entertainment. Because when all of this stuff shows down,

what do you have is people that can interpret words on the page and inspire you and move you? I think it's why Hamlet hit us all. Shakespeare sort of wrote about the most difficult thing he ever had to experience, and we just know it to be one of his great works, but to see that movie and to see how that story was happening in real time, obviously the way they were showing it, just reminds me that this is how we actually like to be communicated with.

I'm ashamed to say I haven't seen it yet. It's okay. Don't worry about it. I have kids. Isn't there? That's another kid shit. Yeah. That's okay.

She didn't see F1 when Brad came. She was like, I don't. Yeah. I'm not fucking. I wasn't, you know why I was editing this show. I couldn't make it. I hear it. I hear it's fine.

I heard it's fine. I heard you're fine. I heard you look fine. I can see that you are fine. I can look good in it. No, yeah, yeah. So theater's my shit. Lena, I just, I adore you.

I really, really, really like you. I'm really, really like you. I'm so glad I got to spend a couple hours with you that day. And my heart swells when I think of you. And I'm really glad you came. And I want everyone to watch the final season of the shy. May 22nd on Paramount Plus. Go see cats.

Yes, please. Watch them. I was a part of season one of them covenant. Season two, I wasn't, but I think both seasons are really strong. Okay. Also, Tonys. We're putting out good vibes. Come on.

Come on. Tony's. The Anthony's, as I call them. Get you a couple Anthony's. Anthony's. Let's get that EGOTG. Look, come on. Let's go.

I know. Got the Emmy. We're going to see what happens. All right. Be well. Thanks for coming. Thank you. Thank you.

Thank you so much. Stay tuned for the fact check so you can hear all the facts that were wrong. What's up? What it is? What is up? How are you? I'm good. You're good?

Yeah. Yep. Yep, yep. Okay. Well, we both went to Delta's play. Oh, my heavens. That was a big event. It was a huge event. Big event. In events that happen within the event. Yeah. Tell. Do tell. Yeah. Okay. Mary Poppins. Yes.

And I think some backstory is necessary. And you can help me be objective here. But Delta's like she's never been super into acting or musical theater or singing. Yeah. Like just a mild interest. I think she's done a few little plays. I think she did last year's school play. But she just seems she seems to be in it for the social aspect of it, which is great. So we all went, you, Anna, me, Kristen.

Who else was in that one o'clock show? Kristen's mom and dad. Oh, yeah, Kristen's mom and stepdad. And for the first two-thirds of the play, no Delta. She's not in it. She was not in it. Yeah. And you were directly behind us with Anna.

And we were having some fun up until then, right? Yeah. Because there's a lot of goof. It was the first run through of it. Yeah. There's lots of mic errors. There's, you know, there's the expected stuff. Yeah.

We've discussed the plays before. Yeah, it's the whole school. So there's second graders out there, you know. Yeah. And everyone did a great job. Everyone did a great job. And it was also very fun. You know, you can hear the mics and the bad, you know, the same, same old stuff.

Yeah, yeah. All the standard fair. And I think even on us, is Delta in this, you know, at some point? Yeah. Then she came out. She was Mrs. Anderson. And for people don't remember. and I'm not super well-versed in Mary Poppins.

Yeah. Meredith Poppins. Yeah. She splits at one point and they bring in Mrs. Anders. And she's an old-fashioned old... Is it Anders or Anderson? Anders or Anderson. Oh, we don't know.

Okay. Tomato. Okay. She comes out and she's a bitch. She's mean to the girls and she's shoving people around. Yeah. And right when she came out, she was full commitment, full energy. Yeah.

She came out with a real presence. A real presence. real intention. Yeah. Her, immediately, her dictation was off the charts. Oh, yeah, they have to do accents, which I should, I just wish they would take that off these kids' plates. I think, you know, all in all, they did pretty darn good.

Yeah. I think if you got, like, adults to do it, the accents would have been much worse. Like, just a random sampling of adults doing British accents. Yeah, that's probably true. I was like, it's not, I was expecting to hear some real, it could be worse. Some real snafews. Yeah, I just feel like they should have taken that. What was going on?

Like, they needed to just take. Yeah. Yeah. But anyway, she did a great accent. She did a great accent. And you could understand everything she said. And she was projecting. She was loud.

She was. And then she has a solo song. All right. Maybe you take over now because I might sound too subjective as a father. I'm subjective too. I don't know that I can be very objective. Yeah. But no, she just did so.

She just like had. so much confidence. She's saying it's so well. She wasn't, like, you know, you're kind of scared when these kids are singing. Yes. Like, obviously. Anyone's singing. If any play, it's like, oh, God, like, what if they mess up?

Or what if they, you know, whatever. It's very stressful. And she just knocked it out of the park and was so confident and, like, loud. Like, she belted, like, with her diaphragm. Like, she did it all. all right. And it was, oh, it was so wonderful. Yeah, two mega belts. It was so good. The last one with her on top of a staircase. And she looked possessed. Yeah. She, like the level of commitment and she was

screaming to the rooftops and it was holding. Yeah. I couldn't believe it. I couldn't believe it. I mean, from last year's play to this year's play, major jump. Oh my goodness. Major jump. Like, we have four performers in the family. Sure. And she just threw down a performance that I think might top, you know, both Kristen and I's professional work. Well, okay. I don't want to.

Now, I guess, we are getting subjective because that's not true. But it was like, I think last year at this time, we had this conversation here that was a little touchy, but I was like, she's not committed. No, well, she was more her mission. on that previous one as we talked about was to make sure everyone else was do. She was being very bossy, like vocally, like up on stage, like telling people what to do. Get over here. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. And I was like, oh, no, like I wish she would just commit. Yeah, no. And then, boy, did she take the note. I mean, I didn't give it. Right, right. She learned on her own and she really just.

She brought the fucking house down. It was so good. It was so exciting. I said, we cheered like it was a super. Yes. I said, wow. Okay, so that's what the experience is for these people who have kids that are great athletes and like score a touchdown. I've never really had that experience yet. No touchdowns in the family. No goals scored. And this was, I get how the parents get addicted to it. Oh, yeah. It was so exciting. I know. Yeah, we were rowdy screaming for her. It did remind me, I told you this, but, um, There's a picture of the state championship second year, I think. Maybe first year. I don't remember.

But there's a picture of the parents. And, you know, everyone is just, like, freaking out. There's this picture of my dad is wearing a hat. He's, like, wearing a boa. Oh, a boa? Yeah. They, like, hand these out. In my head, he has a boa.

Maybe he didn't. He's like, yeah, up out of his seat, screaming. And it does it. It takes over. It takes over when your kid is like hitting. Crushing. Yeah. It's so exciting.

And then the moment that was tied for that moment where she was on the steps at the ends yelling from the bottom of her soul as loud as she could was, and Lincoln was there all day volunteering to help all the girls backstage get in their outfits. As an alumni. Yes, yes. And I had this. you know, 30% anxiety over, okay, well, one child has already declared this is her path. The younger sibling now has just come out and fucking crushed.

Oh, wow. Okay. What will this reaction be? You know, what will seeing her get so much attention and praise from us do? I had some anxiety about that. Yeah. And I think you were standing there. It was so,

when Lincoln ran out and they met each other in the seat. She ran out. They were a huge hug. And she picked her up off the ground and squeezed her. And she was genuinely so pumped for her. She was so proud of her. It was so sweet. It was so sweet.

My heart was just destroyed at that moment. I'm like, oh, yeah, siblings, man. Yeah. It's more important than anything else. Yeah. Well, no. You know. Yeah.

You don't know about that statement. Yeah. So it was. Did you ever see Neil crush at anything? And did you give him the full? No. No. Only now.

Now, I mean, he's crushing that father. He's about to crush. He's about to crush. Yeah. No. No, I was really hard on him. Yeah. But he needed it.

Yeah, he needed it. He's, look at him now. He's doing great. Yeah. It all's not. My mothering. But yeah, no, it was really, really sweet, and I loved it. And then there was a 5 o'clock, which I didn't go to, but there was a big incident.

Yes. So we're at the 5 o'clock. The curtains down were... Intermission, right? It wasn't intermission. It was just between some scenes where there was a little downtime. Oh. And so the curtain was down.

And then all of a sudden you hear from the audience this horrendous crashing sound. Yeah. And it's like it's substantial, right? The kind of ground shook. Yeah. And my only thought was like, oh, did one of the sets? Because they had pretty big sets on stage, like two-story sets. Did one fall forward?

Yeah. And oh, my God, where are the kids? Yeah. And so I'm thinking this. And then Kristen jumps up and goes backstage because she's like, you know, clearly something's happened. You can hear kids back there like, they weren't screaming, but there were noises. Okay. So she goes back there, a scopes out comes back, and she's like, you are not going to believe the size of this tree that just fell into the school.

And so after the plant, I went and looked back. And there's just like, you know, like a cement balcony with like a really huge steel railing, maybe a loading dockish thing off the back of the gym. And this enormous tree, like the width of our oak tree in the front yard. Like the trunk had to be like 36 inches in diameter, maybe. maybe more. It just exploded and it fell in all these directions. It bent like the big fence post size railing. Yeah. It was just crumpled like a taco. Huge branches on there. A table that they were all sitting on. So scary. Ten minutes before was flattened. Oh. Oh. It's crazy. And I was like, Oh, my God.

I just was like, yeah, my first thought was, oh, this is why it's completely pointless to worry about your children. Because you're not even going to think to worry about, I hope a random tree doesn't fall on them on the fucking playground of the school. Some people do think like that, though, but it's a lot too much. It's not generally. People are worried about kidnapping and all these other things. Right. That's true. Yeah. And it's like, okay, so thus far, the closest call we've ever had was just a tree exploded in the backyard of the.

of the school. Yeah. I mean, freak accidents do happen. Yeah. Yeah, it's very scary. And like, you just don't even know what to worry about. That was my thing. Yeah, that's a good takeaway.

Like, yeah, that's crazy. That was almost a fucking newsworthy disaster. Oh, my God. That would have been so. Ugh. It was crazy. But everyone will have a different takeaway. Someone will be like, I knew God was real.

You know, someone will say, say, sim, me, probably. Yeah, there's a lot of takeaways. You just choose. Yeah, you get to pick. Yeah, I mean, I don't think there's much meaning behind it for me other than just, oh, it's a good reminder that like life's that way. Yeah. And it's really pointless to even worry about anything. Yeah.

That's a great example of confirmation bias, right? It's like whatever your overarching theory on life is, everything, every bit of proof will file in and support that. Yeah. So it's like for you that, that proves the world's scarier. Well, I didn't say that. Sorry, didn't mean to give you that. Yeah. Label.

Yeah. And then for me, it immediately confirms like, yeah, what a waste of time to worry. I don't think I thought like the world's scarier. I just feel like, yeah, things go wrong all the time. Yeah, yeah. But also I think like, wow, so lucky. Just like so lucky. And we're just missing things all the time.

Oh, yeah. Yeah, yeah. Just like constantly avoiding catastrophe all the time. Yeah. But yeah, like yesterday I was walking down the street and there were so many cop cars, but they weren't regular cop cars. They were all like just like black cars. Unmarked.

But then one was like on, like headlights or whatever in the back. But there were so many in a row. Where was this at? On Western. And I was just walking by. noticing all these cars and and I was like oh well something is going on something probably bad yeah yeah and I thought oh do I should I go home like this is right where I'm about to be okay and you're in the car yeah I was walking to Cara and so it was next to

by the Maskin Robbins or that weird apartment building in between yeah that sketchy apartment Yeah, yeah, yeah. And I was like, I mean, there could be a bomb in there. Uh-huh. Should I go home? But then I was like, I mean, they'll probably tell us to leave. Like, I guess I trust that someone in charge would tell us to leave. And there was a cop on the street and he just said, hi.

When I went by, so I was like, I can't be that bad. Right. He didn't say, ma'am going the other side of the street. Yeah, exactly. Or you shouldn't be here, ma'am. Ma'am, you shouldn't be here. I wanted to. I should have. And then, because when we left, that's still there. And someone was yelling at them because cars were blocked in and he was yelling and I didn't want to bother them. They're probably executing a search warrant. He said when I heard one of the cops say something like when we finished the invest, we're almost finished with the investigation.

Okay. So. So someone went missing. I was like maybe it's a bomb or maybe it's a jumper or. Or maybe it's a big drug, like probably a big drug situation. Uh-huh. Or hijack. Sex work. It could be a sex situation. Mm-hmm. A negotiation.

A stand-up? Hostage negotiation. I mean, there could have been so many things. Uh-huh. Yeah. And that guy, I wish she would have asked because he would have told you. I know. I know.

I know. I know. I thought about it. You would have made a little more dangerous. dangerous than it was. Like, yeah, we just, you know, you probably like, you know, fluffed it up a little bit. Officer, should I go home? Are I safe to go home or should I stay here?

Are you safe to stay next to you? Will you protect me? I feel safer next to you. Um, yeah. He's like, I'm just coming out. I was first one in. So they're told me, go ahead and have 10 minute break, which is why I'm out here. But I was first one.

I'm in there. I was, I was first one in there. Once I saw it was not dangerous. Then I was like, okay. Oh, it's not dangerous. Well, it could be. Could always get dangerous. Probably want me to stay close.

Oh, okay. Yeah. What are you doing for dinner? I'm hanging out with my friend Jess. You'd love him. Oh. You can go. All right.

Have fun. I think we're all wrapped up here. Okay, this is interesting on, okay, dates. Mm-hmm. So we have a friend who just went on a first date. Oh, we do? Mm-hmm. And this.

This person brought me up a few times because I'm in stories. Sure. Right? Yeah. And then at some point, the girl, it was a girl on the date. It's a lesbian on a date with a girl. Okay. Okay.

And she brought me up. Yeah. And then at some point, the girl on the date said, should I know who that is? Oh, okay. And then my friend said, oh, she's my friend. blah, blah, blah, blah. And I, then she was telling me this and I was like, yeah, this is tricky. It can get tricky if you're bringing up your friends a lot on a date,

but they don't really know the backstory. They don't know, like, the level of friendship or... Whether either party are... Lesbably... Exactly. Sexually attracted to one other. Yeah, if you're bringing up Jess all the time, they don't know he's gay.

You got to go my gay friend, Jess. You go my gay friend, Jess. I know. And then that seems, I'm my straight friend, Monica. I know. But that seems like a weird thing to say. Like, oh, I mean, he comes up. Like, he's, he comes up, right?

And so, yeah, I guess I have to say like, oh, my, my friend. I think I'll just say my friend, Jess. And maybe it'll be obvious he's gay. Uh, I mean, I don't know. I don't know. To me, it's obvious he's gay, but I know it. I know it. I know.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. He at least has a name that could pass as a female. Oh, right. That is true. But if you're talking about beefy burger or anything penis related, he'll. Don't think I'm probably going to bring up beefy burger. Yet, yet. Yeah, it will come up.

But anyway, yeah, it's like a weird thing about how much you talk about the other people in your life. On a date. On a date. I think it's only... The opposite sex if you're straight and same sex if you're gay. I think it's only a thing if you're talking about your ex a lot, which is also fine. On a first day, I think you should. There are versions of it that are totally fine.

Right. If you still have complicated feelings about your ex, it's not the place to discuss that, nor is it this new. person, their duty to comfort you through that. Right. There are all these rules. But if you've been with someone for a decade and you're talking about your life and then we're going to ignore the last 10 years of your life, you know, like, of course, if you were with someone.

They're going to come up. Yeah, I don't think that's a big deal. I don't think it is a big deal either for me. But I think a lot of people would say that's wrong. Like everyone has these rules. I think those people are really insecure and that's their issue. Yeah. I don't think it would bother me.

If someone having had an X is too disturbing for you, you have some insecurities. Yeah. That's not, it's not that other persons. I know. I think I'm kind of like, I want to know. Sure. All the details. Yeah, I do.

Yeah. But I don't want them to ask me. So I think I'm just leaving that off. Okay. I think it's like, it's just like, hey, let's never talk. Let's not talk about any of our past. Okay. But we're now on a date.

We're on a day. Okay. Hi. I like your hair. Further along. We're dropping into like the most. I want to know exactly like what kind of info you're interested in about the X. Okay.

Yeah. Because I think. So, well, you have to bring her up, I guess. Yeah. Well, we had to, we were sharing our dog. And then it just got kind of ridiculous. And finally, I was like, just you can have Snickers. That was probably hard.

I have a friend who is going through that too. It's really. A boyfriend? No, no, a girlfriend, a girlfriend of mine. Yeah, but it's tough. She's gay. No, she was straight. She was my girlfriend.

No, my friend is gay. Oh, okay. So don't worry. I was hoping you would, I would figure out what you want to know about the ex. I know, well, what do you want to know about an ex? I don't know. I don't know what they'd look like physically, don't know? No, I actually don't.

Are you sure? Well, sure. I don't know if they were Indian. Oh, fuck. Because I know you got a whole thing about that. I don't want if, okay. Do it again.

You might need to. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. So anyways, we had booked this trip and like we talked about going on it together. But I was like, I don't want to be in Bombay with my ex.

So I was like, you can just take someone else. Oh. Yeah. And I transferred my ticket. Okay. Oh my God. First of all,

that would not to me. I'm not like, oh, so she was Indian just because you were going there. I'm just trying to tempt you in that direction. Oh, have you? I don't even, I wouldn't even ask. I would just be, I would say, I would say, have you been to India before? How long were you guys together? You don't think you go, have you been to India before?

I mean, no. You don't care. You just want to know what the girl now. Yeah. Well, I almost was about to say, oh my gosh, I went to India last. last year on this kind of random crazy trip. And it was so, it was so cool because I've only been one time before when I was little. And it was really cool.

Oh, are you Indian? I am. Yeah. Well, I thought you were Lebanese. Oh, no. No, no. I'm not. Well, I mean, I was born in Georgia and raised here, but my parents are Indian.

Oh, cool. How long were you with your ex? How long were you with her? Five years. Wow. Wow. Yeah. from 46 to 51.

What happened? Do you mind me asking? Sorry if that's too private. God, I mean, what happened? Like a million things happened. Really? Yeah, as happens in a relationship. Yeah, it's hard.

Like, I could list things, and it would probably just be me blaming her, but I'm sure I'm half the reason. That's very evolved. Yeah, yeah. That's evolved of you. Yeah. What are you going to order?

But she's, oh, you're off of it. You don't. The old? She young? Is she Indian? I'm not asking that. I had never asked. Okay, I was on a date once where it came up, but I didn't ask.

He brought it up. What did he say? He said, like, she was Indian and her family and something about an Indian prince. And I was like, I hate this. I absolutely hate this. If anyone says Indian prince, to me, you're not for me. Well, what is the stereotype of me?

I don't know. I know of the Jewish American princess. That's a stereotype. That has a name. Yeah. Jap. It offends both people at, two groups of people at once. It's a two-fer.

Even if someone said Jap to me, I'd be like, I wish you didn't say that. Yeah, sure. You know? Was she a jab? Someone I love said it recently. When they were referring to a Jewish American princess or a Japanese person? Oh, a Jewish. You didn't even get that part?

Yeah, I forgot. Oh, gosh, okay. Jewish. I thought you were saying it offends princesses and Jewish. No, I don't care about offending princesses. They're a tiny group. Your wife is a princess. Not a real one.

She is the closest we got. She played a princess. No, there's actual princesses on Earth. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Okay, well, I don't want to offend them either, but I can live with that. Me too, me too. Talking about punching up or down.

Royalty, yeah. Yeah, punching up a royalty. I'm fine with that. It's more the Jewish part I didn't love when they said it. Yeah. Well, I'm from a very Jewish area of Michigan. I know. So that term was used a lot.

Right. And quite often by Jewish people. Right. Well, they're allowed. Mm-hmm. But this person wasn't Jewish. Anyway, okay, if you said it to me on a date, say it somehow. Jap.

Oh, are you Jewish? Yeah. Oh, cool. Yeah. Hard to be Jewish right now. Oh, my gosh. I know. I feel like the world is nuts. By the way, the first date is somehow straight into Palestine, Israel, it's a bad day. I'm going to bathroom. Yeah. Oh, my God. I'm going to, I'm going to shank. I got to go shank. I'm going to go shank. I'm going to go chunk all over the floor in the bathroom.

I want to go to my car. Because I prefer doing that than having this conversation. Well, yeah. No, I know. I know. But you know, I do get deep and I do worry. Sometimes that, like, I get us to a place we're not supposed to go too soon. Oh, well, that can be fun. I know. But then it's, like, not fun because then, yeah, we're talking about. I don't think what I know so far, which, oh, I guess I should tell me about going on a date. That should be clear. Oh, okay.

From what I know so far, I just don't. I think he's very chill. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And I don't think we're going to talk about global news. Global politics. Yeah. That's good. Stay tuned for more armchair expert, if you dare.

What if he's super into crypto? And he wants to tell you about crypto the whole time? That's a hard one. Even if everything else was like a thumbs up. Yeah, I think I would say. What would you say? I would say. I go, have you heard of bellissium?

Oh, it's of one-to-one currency. It's so strong and promising. Oh, I haven't heard of it. $13 a coin, and it's already up to $1390. That's cool. Do you, how, um, do you know Ben McKinsey? Have you ever heard of Ben McKenzie? He was from the OC, but he's also.

Oh, I never, I never saw the OC, but I heard it was really great. Yeah, I actually also didn't watch it. Oh, okay. But he was a big actor on, on that show. And he's also an expert in crypto. And he was just on. What's he, what's his holdings? Which ones is he into?

Well, he's actually pretty critical of it. Oh. Oh, he's a hater. Well, he's just mad he didn't get in when Bitcoin was. Maybe, maybe. Yeah, he's just jealous. He maybe, but I do. You have a podcast?

I do. Yeah. Are you? Are you Lebanese? Oh, no, I'm not. I'm not. I'm not. I'm sure.

I'm, yeah. Do you think only Lebanese people have podcasts? That's an interesting leave. Hey, I got to go Tonka. Oh, that's what you parked in a lot called Tonka or something? That's when you poop in your car. Oh, you're going outside to poop in your car. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Fuck, yeah, can I come? Oh, you're, your interest. Well, that could salvage the whole. That could. Yeah, fuck, that sounds rad. I just got, I got perked up. Yeah, that's right. Can I come?

It would probably be a crypto guy that was into it. Yeah. So it all makes sense, you know. Tradeoffs. Yeah. Everyone, no one's perfect. You're not going to get it all. No one's perfect.

You got to get the right things. Anywho. I mean, full honesty. Oh, Rob, he might be here. Lucas or the breast milk guy? Breast milk guy. Closurum, man. Rob is going to pick up another drink for us using his ID.

That's not alcohol. Full honesty. Yeah. I'm on a date. Yeah. And the girl goes, if you excuse me, I have got to go shit in my car. Dude, I would be so into that. No.

I would. I would be like, wow, who's this person? You would not. Yes, I would. You would be like, who is this person? Yeah, I'm intrigued. You'd be intrigued. Yeah.

But you would not on a first, you would be like she's crazy. Well, no, I would have some follow up questions. Okay, so tell me you. Oh, my God. I'll be right back. Okay. Do you mind waiting? I have to, oh, God, I have to go Tonka.

What's Tonka? It's when you poop in your car, okay? And I have to go right now. Oh my God, you have to poop in your car right now. I do, I do. Do you mind waiting? Well, I don't mind waiting, but can I just ask you a quick question? I can see it's pressure.

Yeah, yeah. It's kind of time-centered. Why go in your car and not the bathroom here? Oh, I'm just like so uncomfortable. I'm really uncomfortable pooping in front of other people. Oh, sure. And, yeah, people have that. I just have, like, a privacy thing.

And I know I'm not going to make it home. How often do you do this? Every time you got to go to a normal bathroom? It only happened once. It almost happened to get it. And I can tell it's going to happen right now. Okay. How about I come out and I'll just hang by the camera

and make sure no one bothers you? No, because you don't want anyone like knocking on your window. Or if I see a dude peepin, I'll be like, bro, fucking give her some privacy. Okay, that's really, really nice. But the whole, it's- And I can hold your bag to it. Oh, you don't have a, it's no bag. You just like poop on the seat.

But that bag next to your feet. Oh, oh. Do you want me to hold that while you're? That's really kind. Yeah. I, I, the whole, let me look out for you. Okay.

No. Okay. The whole issue is privacy. Okay. I'm going to look the other way, though. Okay. You're being, you're being a little pushy.

Oh, you think I'm a weird now? I'm going to tell you something. You're about to go shit in your car. So why don't you fucking back off the judgments, Tootsie? No, let's go. Grab your bag. Oh, my God. This is a great date, dude.

It's so memorable. And he would be, like, cut to the three years later. I can see him with a microphone in his hand and his tuxedo on. And I'll go, I knew there was something special about Monica when on our first date, she looked at me and said, if you'll excuse me, I have to Tonka. And for those of you who don't know, Grandma Jane, Grandpa Bill, Tonka is when a woman uses her car to defecate it. As a toilet. And I thought, I should get out of here and run. No, I'm going to provide lookout services.

and I'm so glad I did. Oh, people would cry. People would cry. They would also throw up. Mm-mm. Not the people like your wedding. Fuck, I hope this all goes down, man. This sounds like a great.

Can you please knock on wood? You better not hope that on my date I have to Tonka. That is literally worst case scenario. Unless he loves it. And then you guys have fast forwarded to like such a level of intimacy and trust and connection. I mean, if he has a tonka, yeah. Interesting. Not me.

I don't want to be the girl that poohs in her car all the time. Okay. It happens one time. Not all the time. No one wants to be that all the time. You're kind of manifesting it for me. You wanted me to put a bag in my car. Trash bag.

Why not? You just act like that's where you put your trash. No, that's manifesting. That's manifest destiny. Do you know if you're driving together your meeting there? Okay. That's supposed to be the safe thing to do? I don't know if it's safe or not, but one time I was on a date where the man picked me up.

The male. And at first I was like, oh, I like that. Yeah. And as soon as he picked me up, I hated it. Oh. I was like, I really don't like being trapped in the car. I don't, now I'm aware of how he's driving me, precious cargo. Yeah.

And at one point he was just staring at you. And I didn't. Then I was like, you need to look at the road. I didn't think any of it. So we're just going to meet there. Okay. Right. What though, how do we handle a nighttime?

He's not, or not do it. Hold on. You guys can kiss. He drives you home. Then he's got to get out and like open your door and clean out the tonka from your back seat. It's going to smell. So bad. And then he might want to give you a kiss good night before you go inside.

If he wants to kiss me after I've tonked. Yeah. Yeah, what a stud. Well, a stud and kinky. He's kinky. That's pretty cool. Yeah. Yeah.

It's pretty cool. We like it. It's pretty cool. Okay. All right. Anyway, some facts. Let's do some facts. Okay.

Okay. She talks about Halfman, the show, and you've since watched it. I'm glad you're bringing this up. Yeah. She was dead right. She loved it. I love it. And now I even see what she was saying.

Because at the time, remember, I think I said, like, yeah, you and I watch things. differently, like you're recognizing when someone's being represented. Right. That's important to you and you'll always notice it. But anyone would notice it. Yeah. Like the show is that type of show. Yeah.

Where it is, it's exploring some weird shit that goes down in most boyhoods that I'm aware of. Yeah. Just weird boys are so fucking. I don't. Yeah. I don't think girls know how weird boys are little boys. There's like a whole window where they're so bizarre. I can't tell you how many of these boys were constantly trying to show me their penises and they wanted to sword fight and stuff.

Yeah. They just don't, they have these penises and they don't know what they're doing. They don't know what to do. They want to get them out. Yeah. Smack them around. I was just like, I'm not into all this sword fight. You weren't?

No. Oh. Because you were already molested. I think because I had already been molested. Yeah. It was like, I didn't like the whole thing. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. But when we were in like hunting and gathering and we were naked all the time, I bet they weren't playing with them. It was like it was just normal. This is when I read this really interesting article and it was about how cultural everything is to the degree of molesting. Yeah. Here it means one thing. It's always inappropriate and it's always some kind of like deviant sexual behavior. Whereas they were paralleling it with this group, this hunting and gathering group, that like when they see little kids, they juggle their balls. Right. As a greeting. Oh, wow.

The dudes aren't perverts. Right. There's nothing sexual going on. Yeah. They do the same activity that here we would, it would be trauma. Yeah. And it's just so interesting how the power of. I know.

And it's all about does it induce shame or not. And in that culture, it doesn't because everyone is getting greeted by getting their bulls. fondled. I know, but that is weird, though, because innately, though, it is sexual, because that is also a way to get aroused. But again, because the culture is so strong and the context is so strong, it's not. They don't get aroused. It's not a sexual activity. I didn't grow up there, so I have my thing. Right. Anyways, I'm off on a long trajectory here. I can't remember what we left base, but half man is so good. Yeah. With similar tones being explored as DTF St. Louis. Like that relationship between Bateman and Harborough was so intimate.

Yeah, it was. They're constantly hugging and stretching each other, breathing on each other. It's just like this level of intimacy that certainly I didn't see on TV growing up. Right. And by the time I did see it on TV growing up, it was explicitly sexual between two homosexuals. Right, exactly. This is this weird zone of this, yeah. Even though it wasn't represented for you, you still did it with Aaron.

Yeah, so like Aaron and I had a very, very intimate, very physically touchy friendship. Yeah. But no penis business. Right. But you like snuggled. Yeah, but not. No penis. No, I know.

There was no weird sexual component. Right. I'm talking about the behavior that had all. Oh, I see. It was like this weird sexual. Well, Bateman and David Harvard didn't have any sexual. They didn't, but it was confusing. And there were times where it seemed they were both confused by the intimacy.

Sure, sure, sure. And then he's even going to hook up with a dude or he's like, He's open to, if he can give a guy an erection, he'll like that. Right. Just because he'll be desired. Right. So just getting into all this fun gray area. So Nate and I loved that show, of course, as did you.

I loved it. But we were talking about it at lunch. And he goes, dude, the other show that's even more extreme than that, that I've been watching, I want you to catch up so we can start watching together is Halfman. So I did. And then I did. And then last Friday when we had the day off, Nate and I went to lunch. And then we came and got in the theater room and watched two episodes back to back. And it was so fun.

Oh. You remember me like being in my 20s or something? We were just watching TV. I love that. That's really fun. Okay, quickly. Is Adam Osseri, the one on Instagram with glasses who sends updates? I mean, I think so.

Oh, yeah. Okay, he has glasses. That's definitely what she's talking about. He makes tons of posts directly to camera, letting users know of new features. Yeah, regularly post direct updates about that platform. He's so fun. He's so cute. cute. He said we were his favorite food. He's so smart too. He is. Who is the model with the

Gap Tooth name Lauren? Lauren Hutton. A iconic model. Something came up and you said everything worth having, like everything worth having whatever. It's hard. Yeah, basically. And it reminded me that in high school, Callie's mom got her this little compass necklace. It was from Coles. and on the back it said there are no short cuts to anywhere worth going. Yeah, okay, guys. And I loved that. And then they bought me the necklace because I loved it so much. Oh, that's nice.

And I love that saying. There's a dude in A.A. who has a similar saying that he says all the time. Almost every share he says it, and I love it every single time, which is, I found out that the shortcut is the quickest way to the back of the line. I like that. Similar. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Shortcuts is the quick.

way at the back of the line. Although it would be quicker to just go to the back of the line before you do the shortcut. So it's not, it doesn't hold up. Yeah, because like if you're, if you're cutting the line, which is the shortcut, you're not at the back. Well, the point is the shortcuts never work and you always have to go back and start the way you're supposed to. Okay. Yeah. We'll stick with yours. I like mine. What was yours? There are no shortcuts to anywhere worth going. Oh, okay. I love it. Coles cash, man. Oh, Callie also got a tattoo of a compass.

That was her first tattoo. She got a compass on her ankle. It was in college. She has since gotten a remote. Oh, she has. She didn't like the way it looked in pictures when she was, like, in heels and stuff. Okay. Okay.

Compass is a very popular tattoo. Is it? Yeah. I don't know anyone else with one. I mean, I don't know a lot of people with tattoos other than you. Not your scene. Uh-uh. And her.

And Anna. Okay. I know a lot of people with tattoos. Probably, Rob. Natalie. Natalie. Everyone has tattoos, actually. Erica.

Wow. Yeah, Charlie. Okay. Matt. Whoa. At least half. Mike Nichols. Yeah, at least half my friends.

That's probably right. Mike Nichols says about conversation. A conversation falls into three categories. A negotiation, a seduction, or a fight. A negotiation, a seduction, or a fight. This isn't. This is in theatrical realm, right? This isn't...

Every scene or conversation. Yeah, yeah. It says or conversation falls in one. It has to be one of those three things. A fight of seduction. But life doesn't have to. A lot of the conversations. Doesn't have to.

But I think he's kind of saying like it is. Like he's representing life. And like that is what happens in life. Life as we know it. Yeah. Okay. The catchphrase from our AT&T commercial, Rob said it in the interview,

Just Okay is not okay. She thinks there's another. That's what I'm seeing too. I think I'd found another one too after. Let me see. Your way right away? More for your thing spots, I think was her. Oh, get more for your things.

Let me see. That's not a good phrase. That's not a good phrase. If AT&T wants to hire me, I will say the shortcut line. Okay. Only that line. Yeah. Oh, wow.

I'll say anything you want AT&T. Actually, I will too. Not to out-compete you, but... Yeah. Oh, God. God. You could hire Monica. You should know she's only going to say one sentence.

They should hire me because a long time ago, I think, have I done an AT&T commercial? I'm sure you have. But I do know one of the commercials I lost was an AT&T commercial. And it was down to me and this my nemesis. And she was my nemesis. I lost, I lost, um, a couple roles to this girl. Okay. She wasn't Indian or Lebanese.

Did you end up knowing her? Um, I like. Your chat with her at auditions. Um, hey, you beat me out about, but you beat her out a few times too. Maybe. I forget her name. She was like up in, she was like becoming a thing. Uh-huh.

Um, and I forget her name. Okay. But she beat me out for this. AT&T, I think like campaign. Okay. So many spots. And I was upset. And I knew the directors well.

I had worked with them a couple of times, really loved them. Uh-huh. And so that was upsetting. Yeah. That was a hard one. Yeah. He lost a couple hundred grand probably. Fuck.

Anyway, so they should make up for that. Oh, AT&T. should. And hire me now. As a voiceover artist. And like, now you're getting bigger bang for your buck. I only say one thing, but you're getting a bigger bang for your buck. That's right.

Yeah, tradeoffs. I have a voice for radio and AT&T commercials. That's what they say. That's what they say. Yeah. You have a face for AT&T commercials. Oh, yeah. I have a face for radio.

Okay. I have a face for radio and a voice for AT&T commercials. That's what they say. That's what they always say. Yeah. All right. Well, that is all. Those were the facts.

That is all. Well, I love Lena. Me too. Great app. I love her. Great app. Love her. She's so lovable.

She is. She's very smart and wise. Yeah. And interesting. And accomplished. And accomplished. Accomplished is cool. Yeah. She's good chatter. All right. Love you. I love you.