Armchair Expert with Dax Shepard - Timothy Olyphant

Episode Date: September 15, 2025

Timothy Olyphant (Alien: Earth, Deadwood, Once Upon a Time in Hollywood) is an Emmy Award-nominated actor. Timothy joins the Armchair Expert to discuss whether he gives middle child vibes, the benefits of being a skills generalist, and why his smile always designated him as the “talk-to-the-cops guy.” Timothy and Dax talk about how knocking things off balance a little bit can create a lovely vulnerable moment, invoking Lou Reed and Bob Dylan as interview inspiration, and being the favorite co-star of so many talented actors. Timothy explains that there’s a judo to rejecting someone while giving them something, asking the small questions like what is humanity and is it worth saving in Alien: Earth, and finding a space where you help others by doing the thing you do.Follow Armchair Expert on the Wondery App or wherever you get your podcasts. Watch new content on YouTube or listen to Armchair Expert early and ad-free by joining Wondery+ in the Wondery App, Apple Podcasts, or Spotify. Start your free trial by visiting wondery.com/links/armchair-expert-with-dax-shepard/ now.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Wondry Plus subscribers can listen to Armchair Expert early and ad free right now. Join Wondry Plus in the Wondry app or on Apple Podcasts. Or you can listen for free wherever you get your podcasts. Welcome, welcome, welcome to armchair expert. I'm Dax Shepard and I'm joined by Monica Padman. Hi. We had a major babe on today. M.B.

Oh, Major Babe Timothy Oliphant. Emmy nominated actor, Justified, hit man, Santa Clarita Diet. Deadwood, and his new series out now on FX, Alien Earth, which, of course, is written by Noah Hawley. Yep, friend of the pod. Friend of the pod, about the best writer out there doing it. Yeah. I'm putting this in the Alexander Scarsgard bucket of dudes that just came in here where it's playful as a goddamn kitten with a ball of yarn. That's right.

Please enjoy Timothy Oliphant. Hello, I'm John Robbins. comedian and host of Wondery's How Do You Cope podcast. I'm also, plot twist, an alcoholic. I've written a book, Thirst, 12 drinks that changed my life, published by Penguin. Thirst is a book about alcohol. It's mystery, it's terror, it's havoc, it's strange meditations. But John, I hear you cry.

Isn't that a rather odd book to write for a sober man who more than anything wants to stop thinking about alcohol? Well, yes, but I had to go back. To find out why the one thing I know will kill me still calls out across the night. It's the story of what alcohol did for me and what alcohol did to me. If that's of interest to you or someone you know, thirst, 12 drinks that changed my life, is available to pre-order now, online and from all good bookshops. I'm John Robbins, and on my podcast, I sit down with incredible people to ask the very simple

question, how do you cope? From confronting grief and mental health struggles to finding strength in failure, Every episode is a raw and honest exploration of what it means to be human. It's not always easy, but it's always real. Whether you're looking for inspiration, comfort, or just a reminder that you're not alone in life's messier moments, join me on How Do You Cope? Follow now wherever you get your podcasts, or listen to episodes early and add free on Wondery Plus. How Do You Cope is brought to you by Audible, who make it easy to embark on a wellness journey that fits your life,

with thousands of audiobooks, guided meditations, and motivational series. He's an upchair expert. He's an option expert. He's an chanceryxper. Oh, we have the host for here. How are you? Let's do a little mint tea. Nice.

I'm going to do a latte, home milk. Oh, wait, we're getting, I would like a cortado, please. Nice. We knew mint tea wasn't right. We knew it in our hearts. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Why did you request mint tea? Is that what you always drink?

Bermuda switch from mint tea to horchato. No, cortado. I'll tell you why, because my thought process was simply, oh, it's going to come in a paper cup with the lid, and that's not going to be as nice a experience. as in a mug with, like, honey and the whole thing. And so I immediately just switched to like, oh, no, when in Rome, this is what you want to get from. I don't know where we're ordering from, but it feels like it's the kind of place. Have you had their coffee?

So good. Right, imported from Italy? The beef and cheddar. So good. Combo platter. I'll be honest with me, it's less about the tea. I just love a prop. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Something in your hand. Have you ever got to smoke and anything? It's the best. There's nothing better. There's no acting to be done. If you can smoke. or eat in any... Do you spit it out or do you...

It doesn't matter. It's the process. It's the chewing the smallest thing. Okay. And it just immediately makes you a better actor. I got to smoke and let's go to prison. And it was a running gun production, right? So we're shooting several pages a day.

And it does turn pretty quickly from like, I was a pack and a half a day smoker at the time. And I'm up to like a three and a half pack just because of the scenes and retake and relight. And by the end of it, I was like, I quit. I quit smoking at the end of that movie. There's a win. Do you do the herbal?

What ones are you go real? I haven't done a real cigarette in a production in a long time. I did a play years ago. Oh my gosh. Davis Sedaris. I did a Sedaris thing and I smoked a cigarette every night. As I recall, I think there was a cigarette involved in that. I used to go out and smoke a cigarette every night.

It was kind of look forward to it. Yeah, of course you would have never been an actual smoker because your life was committed to athletics. I was committed, yeah. I mean, truly, you couldn't have been a smoker in a fucking national swim champ. Whoa. That's cool. I'll take you there. I'll take you there. Take me. I think a champ is a little too far. I want to say you were a runner up in the 86 nationals. That's the actual year. That can't be true. Yeah. Okay. That's a great.

I'm not saying it's not enough. It's not the finals of anything. Okay. There you go. Yeah. She's a state champ. I am two-time. What's more for you? Competitive cheerleading. Competitive cheerleading. High flyer. Yeah, I was flying, tumbling. Dangerous. Very dangerous. When did you start that? Started in eighth grade. And then I was. on the squad, my junior and senior year, and we won both years. How about that?

We're from? Georgia. Oh, it's a big deal there. It's a huge deal. It's like a whole thing. Yeah, that's why it felt really good. It's the equivalent of Polo and Nantucket. It was a blessing because the state's SAT scores were on average too low, so we weren't

allowed to go to nationals. Wait, they were penalizing you personally for the state average. Yeah, like no one in the state of Georgia could go to nationals because the, State average SAT scores, but it was a blessing because then it was just like we were the best. We couldn't then go to the next stage and lose. That was the best we could do and we did it. Oh, this is a detail of the story. I've never heard this story 150 times, Timothy.

And you just brought out a weird layer of honesty, which is you've just told me you were champs two years in a row. Stayed champs. Okay. Stayed camps. Okay. Did you say idiots. Of the idiots. You did not say of the.

Well, sure. You guys won it. You weren't going to class. Yeah. Everyone else was going to class. They were handicapped by actually doing their studies. Correct. You ladies were phoning it in, guys and girls, co-ed?

Yeah, co-ed. It's not like the SAT scores of the cheerleaders. I know. Every single person in the state, the average was too low to take. GPA, not the SAT. SAT. Your SAT scores? Now I'm worried.

I'm wrong. I think you're right. They wouldn't do a state. But let me say this. There's almost never an occasion. to say, once again, the few have bore the burden of the many. Okay. Okay.

The same is, once again, the many have bore the burden of the few. Well, I think that's still. Oh, you're right. Because, like, the state fucked you guys up. But again, they did. But I choose to look at it as a positive because we did the best we could possibly do. We won state. We couldn't do anything more than that.

What are the rest of those idiots up to these days? I don't know. I really separated myself from all of them. Really? No. Do you in touch with any of the squad? We're going to call him a squad. Let's call him a squad.

Are you in touch with any of the squad? I just want to flag something. I want you to be careful because he's doing what he does. It's happening. It's happening. Full throttle right out of the game. I want to see what. Wow.

This is this. Listen, I'm just asking if you're talking to never talk about himself. Are you in the squad? Are you in the squad? I know what's a thousand interviews with you and I know what's happening. Oh, this is interesting. You're a deflector. There's just three people talking, Rob, we're going to include you.

There's four of us. We're in here, we're chatting, and we're just being humans. And it'd be your preference that we just kept at a light chat, and we don't find out anything about old T.O. Listen, this is your show, okay? Now, put aside the fact that the guest was here first. Yeah, yeah. It's still, that's part of it. I want you to get comfortable before you're intimidated by my biceps.

I want you to be able to sit down and relax and not feel threatened. No, I can't take my eyes off them. Now, look at that. You can't take my eyes off of them. All right, we're letting it go. We're going to not, let's not talk about the squad. We're not going to. Yeah.

Give us one squad member. Just what's one squad member doing? Who's the guy? I'll let you in on something that's really fascinating. And I said to her early on as we were chatting about this history, you know, you're up in the air like that and the people are catching you. And sometimes it's willy-nilly. Did they ever catch you by the pussy?

And Monica said, yeah, it happens all the time. And we had people write in like any high flyer, they're going to have to get caught occasionally on action. So that's the member of the squad. I think we should honor if we're going to honor someone. I think that's a great idea. And we should put this on your Wikipedia. a pitch. Champion cheerleader,

occasionally caught by the person. That's right. But kept it moving and won two titles. So who caught you? Most of them are women. Oh. Now we're really off the rails, but yeah. Let's shout out one person. Let's hear. Kendall Morgan. Oh, what an athlete. Incredible athlete. Dumbest girl on this one? You know what? She's the one that hurt? He's a very

smart male. He's sorry. I went the same place. I understand. She just said women caught her. And then she said, Kendall. My bad. I feel. I feel. I feel like she led us to the slaughter on that one. I don't listen. This is what my wife tells me. You need to listen. Okay, what's Kendall up to?

Kendall is running another cheerleading gym, has an all-star gym, doing fantastic. She stayed in it. He stayed in it. He's with us. Yeah, I'm kind of with your wife now. God damn it. Okay, I'll give you one other out before we get into your childhood. I really truly would not expect you to remember this because as I did the math today,

I think this was about 17 years ago. Do you remember having dinner with me? Yeah, that's fine. Who's at the table? It was before the Soho house had opened officially. And I think you and Kristen had the same agent at that time, Tracy. Okay. And I think Tracy invited you and her to the Soho House before it opened.

Here in L.A. Yeah, they were doing like soft opening. They had really cool furniture. Yes, it was gorgeous. It was what I remember about that. So we went and it was Kristen and I, and it was you and your wife. And then it was the agent. Wait, is the five of us?

That's pretty intimate. Jesus. Listen, there's a big reason why I would remember it more than you. And I was hoping maybe you would remember this aspect. Kristen got up early on in the meal and disappeared for about five to ten minutes. And then she returned with an enormous bag of ice and then subtly passed it to me under the table. Do you remember that? No.

Because at that point it came out. That's the fucking date we were on our way to. Oh, it's a bad bad story. way there, a guy crossing the street in front of the chateau chucked a drink like this big at the windshield of my car. And I pulled the e-break as it was shattering, got out of the car, and fought a dude in front of that newsstand on sunset, and I had kicked him in the head, and I really hurt my leg bad. And Kristen was very disappointed and mad at me because I was in a fight in a suit on the way to this nice dinner with her agent and a very esteemed actor. And so when

we got there, we were dealing with the fact that I had just beat a guy up on the sidewalk. She's very disappointed. She's questioning. Who have I just become partnered up with? This is the beginning of your relationship? Yeah, we're like probably a year in. And then she, to her credit, despite all that, was like, he's hurt. I'm going to handle this.

And went and got this bag of ice and handed it to me, even though I know she was so mad at me. So it was quite a night for us. Wow, that's quite a moment. I'm very disappointed myself. Well, I would love it if you did have some memory of like, what was the first? funny business happening with the under the table stuff. God, how crazy is that? Yeah, that was a very memorable mind.

That's the beginning of your guys' relationship? It was probably like a year in. I've changed, though. She bet on the right. This is workable. I came in with a pretty visible limp. Okay. Wow.

You probably thought she had some stomach issues because that's what you would normally think if someone leaves a dinner table for five to ten minutes, comes back with ice because maybe she's sweating from the situation. Or covering from the fact that she had hauntus. Yeah. And so you were just being nice by being like, I'm not going to pay attention to this. That's all a blur. Do you prefer Tim or Tim?

Tim's fine. Tim's nice. Yeah, yeah. Is it fine or is it preferred? No, I don't care. I like both. So Tim, why were mom and dad in Honolulu? That's my first curiosity.

Wow. Look at that. He's going to ask about Shirley. Pass. Okay. No. Next question. My dad was working for Del Monte.

And they were making the bananas down there or something? I don't know. He was working for Del Monte. That's, I believe, what took us to Hawaii. You were two when you guys went to Modesto? We went to the Philippines after that, and then I think also DeMonte. And then Modesto. It's cliche, really.

It's cliche, really. It's cliché. By way of Manila. That could be a good memoir. Modesto by way of Manila. It's not as good as occasionally grabbed by the pussy. No, hers is going to top. U.S.H.

Yes, occasionally grabbed by the bus. I want to see that on bumper stickers all across the state of Georgia. I need to go ahead and, like, get a copyright on that or something. Someone's going to want to steal that. Trump already has it, unfortunately, but, you know. So did Dad go to take this job at Gallo? Is that why you guys moved there? Or did they have any kind of roots there?

No roots. Although my mom's family was in the Bay Area up in Oakland area. So not far from home where she grew up. And what's the vibe in Modesto? Did you see American graffiti? Yeah, yeah. Is that where a shot? George grew up in Maddo.

Modesto, Lucas. So it was about Modesto, it was about his childhood. And I always felt like that was pretty much our childhood, just uglier cars. So for people who have not seen it, like me, cruising, orchards. I mean, it's much more sprawl now. When I was there, it was quite a quaint. You hear about the declining middle class. A lot of times in certain bubbles, you're like, oh, I understand it in theory. If you go to Modesto, you feel it. Because those little neighborhoods that we all grew up in were so idyllic at the time, surrounded by orchards and canals. now that they're less idyllic. In the 70s, it was less than 100,000 people. And it's a company time. Most of the people there work for Gallo. Gallo, I think Safeway was there, agriculture.

Yeah, they did $3.1 billion in agriculture sales last year, Modesto. But I got bad news for you. They were the number one, most per capita car thefts in 2012. Modesto? Yes. I'm reading all this I'm like, what is this place? Tim's got to tell me what is the bar there. I have a very fond memories of growing up there and I still have buddies there. My mom's still there. I do go back much less than I have, but I still enjoy going back home. Yeah. What's the age gap between you and your brothers? Older brothers, a little over two years, younger brother, a little over three years. Does the middle child kind of archetype, do you feel like you identify with that? I'm like the well-balanced one. You're the well-balanced one. I'm getting middle-child vibes.

Yeah. I'm a middle child as well. All right. And I've been ruminating on it a lot just recently. Because I realized that when I was a kid, there was a lot of chaos on either end of the age spectrum. There was a baby and a teenager. They were both nuts. I hit a lot. I was pretty solitary. I just would get out of the chaos. I'm now realizing that I live with three women and two of them are starting to have a lot of hormones.

I couldn't place it, but I'm like, oh, I know this feeling. This is like, I want to go hide sometime. Oh. And then I was wondering if you related to any of those middle child things. I do think there was a upside of your older brother and his friends can pick on you, but you can pick on your younger brother's friends and then you can bully him. You do get to play a lot of the roles. And you also can easily bounce back and forth in terms of you can age up or age down. Yeah. So I felt like in some degree it was a nice little spot to be in. I read this fascinating years ago about how siblings can be so vastly different. And oh, I don't understand this. We grew up in the same house. But, of course, you really didn't grow up in the same house. Like, you realize if my older brother describes these sort of significant chapters in his life, they're vastly different than mine and very vastly different than my younger brothers.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. They really grew up in a completely different worlds. Because of the socioeconomic changes or the way they parented, you could just say my older brother, he had two younger siblings, his parents divorced at 15, 16 years old. He went off to college. My younger brother can say he had two older brothers. His parents divorced when he was like 12 or 11.

And we both took off and he was there high school living with my mom on his own. I never had that experience. Right, right, right. A divorce at 12 versus 15, 16, they mean vastly different things. Yeah. Which do you think is worse? Do you think one is worse? No, I don't know.

That all sucks. I haven't seen the divorce where you're like, that's where you want to hit it. I would argue mine. I was three. So I don't have any memory. Nothing was missing because I didn't remember them being a unit. But don't they all in some degree scar you in some significant way? Well, the stepdad's that arrive do.

Yeah. Sure. This is me mean pop psychologist. But there must be a thing like, well, if your parents divorced when you're that young that you feel somehow, well, I guess all kids do. Responsible. Yeah, you feel like, oh, I showed up and I broke up their marriage. I think if you were older and you could understand that. Which in this case, probably true.

Might have been true. I was colloquy. My father and I clashed from the second I arrived. It's quite likely. I do think with middle children, you guys aren't handed in identity. The older sibling is handed in identity. They have to be in charge. The parents are afraid for their first kid, right?

They don't know what they're doing. There's way too much attention on them. And now having had three kids, you see how much the first child, you're like, what's she doing now? What's going on now? Exactly. Look at this. Oh, she's never done that before.

The third one, you're like, did we leave the third one? Do we have to go back to that cocktail party? Because where's the third one? Very home alone. And probably 100th amount of pictures taken of the third one that there was the first one. And they're just always in pictures with other people, at least. They're immediately connected to other people. But a middle child kind of has to make their own identity.

Even now as adults, when you get caught, you tell the oldest, I remember, we used to take you the park. And the first time you made it across. And then the youngest one is like, when did I first to go across? and you're like, did you go across? Yeah, yeah. I'm so sorry. I'm Tim. Honey.

Come on. I don't remember his dad. I'm going to remember your childhood. It's fucking terrible. But even that is an identity. Being little, but the middle kid, I think, is a little bit lost until they decide, this is me. Yeah, but one part that you just made me think might have been really fun with your dynamic, them being spaced like that two years, is I think a lot of times, or at least I felt this way,

When you get around 11 or 12, you're starting to do big kid stuff and you want to be older and you want to be autonomous and show you're starting to become a man. And then you still pine for like playing with hot wheels. But you feel like a wimp if you do. But if you have a little brother, you can like bounce back and forth. Yeah. We had a ball. And we're the oliphant's a formidable group of boys in junior high and high school. Did people know better than to mess with one of them?

Oh, I don't know about that. But both of them were cool. We weren't on the football and baseball. You know, we weren't those guys either. My older brother played tennis, and I swam, and Matt played water polo. We grew up next to a Modesto swim and racket club, literally next door. So we basically were raised by lifeguards. We were there all day long.

What kind of niche were you in in high school? I mean, you were a swimmer. That's interesting in itself. We're a similar age, so you had the nerds, burnouts, jocks. Fredtsey-Byer high school in the 80s, a smoking section was right out front. Nice. At the flagpole. Right there at dropout, like where the parents are dropping off their freshmen,

where all these kids in leather jackets smoking. That was the entrance to the school. Wow. Isn't that great? Yeah. I was lucky I was a bit of an artsy, fartsy guy. So I had a little bit of a connection with that kind of group. But then I was an athlete and all my buddies were a lot of athletes.

You were funny already, yeah. I guess so. I don't think I won any of those things. But I feel like I was runner up in like three or four. Yeah, like the 86 nationals. The theme of your life. I was runner up. You were in the finals.

Yeah, this short course finals. It's not that big a deal. It's not the same as the summer. Okay, and now, I don't know anything about swimming, but the 200 meter medley. I appreciate the prep, by the way. Okay, thank you. No, no.

Thank you. It's my honor and my pleasure. You do four different kinds of swims in that? The 200 individual medley. So you're swimming four strokes, fly back breast-free. And if it's meters, it's a single length. For the Olympics, 200 is a lap of fly, back, breast-free, 400 up and back. 400, by many people's standards, the most difficult event.

You're doing all the things for a long period of time. And it's pretty long. Yeah, quarter mile or something. Is that what it is? 1,500 feet, 1320 is a... Okay, anyways, listen, I'm not trying to show off. What I'm trying to get to is... There's a clue there.

What's the clue? I was, you know what? What are we getting in it? I got defensive. I go a quarter mile, and you're like, is it a quarter mile? And then now I got to come over the top. No, you're right. And I apologize, and that was a bad side of my personality.

You're doing great. I am not talking to the guy who got out of the car. You know what I'm saying? Yeah, it's a new guy. I feel safe. I'm going to attempt to make a thematic judgment of your life based on that one event. Do you want to hear it? Can you imagine?

No. Okay. No, I do. I want to hear it. I'm going to pretend to be interested. No. I would argue. And by the way, there's a fisherman seeing another fisherman at sea.

That sounds like a great event if you don't actually want to be a specialist in any one thing. And I think that's been my approach to life a little bit. It's like, I'm pretty good at some things. And if I put together the right combination of things, now we've gotten ourselves into a winning position. You're saying perhaps it's a metaphor. And I'm not going to take offense here. But I think is he saying that's what you are as an adult as well. You're not really a specialist.

A generalist. But this is why this is a big compliment. Yeah. The best of us are generalists. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes.

People idealize and jerk off to specialists. But in fact, if you look at who has changed the world, it's generalists. I like that you're thinking. Let me give me my example. I won every year. This is so stupid and embarrassing. The only thing I ever won growing up was the obstacle course. Because you had to be pretty good at all the little things, but not spectacular.

any one of them. I got to run pretty fast, but I wasn't going to win a sprint and you had to jump pretty high. What years are we talking about? Elementary school. When you say you went every year? Every year in elementary school, we had metric day. First through sixth grade, that was your thing every year. Oh, I won it's the only thing I ever won. And then lo and behold, my kid won an obstacle course, and I'm like, it's in our genes. Really? Yes. Nice. I was thinking this too before you said it. When you were talking about you're in the top of things, but you didn't win nationals. I'm sorry to remind you, but you didn't. I don't want to intimidate you, but you are looking at the former San Joaquin section record holder.

I am intimidated. I don't know that for once. So that's a win. That's a win. That's a win. You have some wins. Oh, but you know what? In the 200 I am.

Okay, but that's still fine. You know what's sad? Let me just give you a little insight. Let's hear something sad. Throw this on the Wikipedia page. Rob, can you get on that? Yeah, yeah. Open it up, Rob.

I won the San Joaquin section, which is like Modesto, Sacramento. It's the whole San Joaquin Valley area. And my senior of high school, I beat what was a guy named Jeff Float's record, and Jeff Float was the flag bearer at the 84 Olympic Games. Wow. So it shows you what a disappointment I was after that day. Because you haven't bore the flag. The guy whose record I beat went on to become amazing Olympic swimmer.

And you beat him. In high school. Still. I know, but you see what he did at the next couple years? Yeah, we don't talk about that. See what he did after that? He got serious after that. See me of that?

You got love to him. National's Olympic team. You might be the reason, though. Makes me a bit of an underachiever. No, but I was going to say, I think that if I were you, I might be looking at my life because you're an insanely good actor. I appreciate that. And I might be like, why am I not winning everything?

I should be winning everything based on my talents. And then I would look back in my life and be like, I'm not winning enough. I'm really good at a lot of things and I'm not getting the full recognition. Do you feel like that? If I were you, I'm not. I would think that. But she's also a winner. I love winning.

That's real. I am. That wouldn't cross my mind, but that would cross her mind. I can only tell you that I wake up every morning thinking, oh, look who the big winner is. I feel pretty good. I love that. I got a pretty good deal. You do.

Oh, my God. And it's good that you're not focused like I would be about. What else do I want? You should win an Oscar every year. You should. You're good enough. You want a bazillion 200 meter medley before you got to Nationals is my guess. Are you competitive?

Yeah. You couldn't have got it. You've gotten a scholarship to USC without being competitive. I didn't get a scholarship to USC. You got recruited. I was recruited. They didn't offer me money, and I turned down other ones because I just really wanted to come to L.A. When you got there, you were hoping to maybe do architecture or something.

I walked into the architecture school on my recruit trip. I had this instilled early on. My grandfather on my mother's side was very much like there's only four or five professions. It was like architect, lawyer, government, or doctor, and everyone else is just hanging on. I drew a lot as a kid and I loved to do creative stuff. So I was like, I guess I'll be an architect because that's the only one on the list that seems to be connected. So I went to the architecture school. They just right off the bat, the dean told me I couldn't be on the swim team and still be in the architecture school. The commitment's too big and long.

Architecture classes are five hours long and they're in the middle of the day. It's when you're training. They can't work around it. Everyone's reading the fountain head all day. They're reading the fountain head. I read that in college. Would you not? It's so appealing when you're a young man. You think your whole life story will be it. And eventually they all learned you were right. Exactly.

That's your arc. And you just drive around looking at all those. Remember because the church he built was down close to the ground and everyone was very upset about it? And I just remember driving around going, yeah, look at all these churches. That's not the way Howard would have done it. He was right. He was right. The architecture school was upstairs.

And I asked the guy, said, on the way in, I noticed downstairs, there was what looked like a gallery and then there was like a ceramic studio. And he's like, yeah, that's the fine art department. And I was like, you can get a degree in that? Anyway, so he said, yeah, let me introduce you to it. So I went downstairs and sat down with the dean of the art school and asked him if I could, here's my swim schedule, and they said, we can work it out.

That exercise is among the most caloricly burning you can endeavor, right? Swimming. I just remember the Michael Phelps like diet. Yes. Let's just go with yes. I know you burn a ton. Were you eating like a monster during that? Ridiculous. Were you?

Such like fond memories of everything. Because you had a card, right? You could go to the cafeteria. We'd just go and we'd get a tray and it would be a plate of pancakes, a plate of eggs and bacon and potatoes. It was so absurd. Yeah, but you had to. I bet if you were walking through the cafeteria, you would easily be able to go like,

oh yeah, that's the swimmers. They're all eating 13,000 calories. this morning, come in with these trays and trays of so much food on that plate. Was that ever a hard routine to break? I remember once before practice, and I could do the math. I might have been junior year. But I remember about to jump in. And assistant coach, shout out to Drell.

That was a risky thing you just did. I've watched you now in a lot of interviews. And anytime you try to remember someone's name, it's high risk. So just congrats that you landed. Are we sure it's right? No, there's about a 60% chance that's not the right name. I can name all the coaches. We say hi to all the swim coaches, Dave Chalo.

And Dorel said something about me having a belly. Like, he's like, oh, about to watch whatever. And I was like, what are you talking about? And I was still young, but I do remember like, oh, I can't just eat as much as I'm eating. You have to be a little bit thoughtful. Yes. Which is nothing compared to 20 years later when you really have to be like, yes. Jesus.

It's so annoying. And you can't, we would go to. Baskin Robbins and order pints, each one of us, stand in line with everyone getting their cone, single or double, and we'd like, get a pint of half peanut, half pran chocolate, half pralien cream. Pipein, and a spoon. And we would all just eat a pint. Did you play sports growing up?

I skateboarded and snowboarded. I did all like the alternative. These are Olympic sports. They became those. They weren't them. But not about me. You didn't have. What did I do?

You did anything. I'm not doing anything. This is pretty good, by the way. It is. It is. From what I've seen, this is maybe the best you've ever done. You came in with like a plan. I came in with no plan.

I just wanted you to. Good, you're not supposed to. Usually I like a plan. You do? A little bit of a plan. I know. You like control? I think there's a control issue.

I detected a few things. All of it, by the way, really lovely. It makes for fun. Doing the press? Yeah. I was observing a lot of things. A, you're just really funny every time you show up somewhere. Thank you.

And you're likable and you're charismatic and the smell. And I can the smile, I'm sure got you out of so much trouble, which is unfair to the rest of us without that dumb smile. At parties, they were like cops are here, all of it. Yeah. I have to go talk to the cops. Yeah, I don't know what that was, but I was the designated talk to the cops guy. Yeah, you're very easy to talk to. Yeah.

That disarming smile is like, am I in trouble? I'm in trouble. Like, you're just finding out you're in trouble. You watch the things and you've got, yeah, you've got some thoughts. I got thoughts. I had an interesting thought coming in, literally right before we start. Let's hear yours first. Okay.

Okay. Should we decide? Monica? Yeah. I thought, yeah, he's very comfortable if you're in control. I realized that if you could just, I shouldn't say this stuff out loud. Yeah, you should. Say it. If you could just knock an interviewer off balance a little bit at hello, it just made the interview a little bit easier from that moment forward.

Absolutely. Because you don't want to disrespect those things, but somewhere along the line, I discovered that if I could just knock each one a little off balance, it might turn into a lovely, spontaneous moment or two. So somewhere along the line that occurred to me. When they sit down, they say, tell me about your character. I say, no, you tell me about it. And then somehow what might come of that more often than not is actually kind of like,

oh, that was fun five minutes. An honest moment. Yeah. Where if I just go into the thing, it's no fun for anybody. Yes. So when I go on talk shows or things like that, I find same thing. If I can throw something out there, they have more fun and I have more fun. I just grew up loving talk shows.

And I love a great talk show guest. For a while, I really just wanted to be a talk show host. In college, I sent a video in with my roommate to audition for some talk show. I can't believe we actually did it. One of the two networks, or Fox, they were getting into the late night. And I remember, like, I want this gig. You auditioned to host it. We sent in a video like three reasons why I'm the guy.

cute. I was like, first of all, 100 bucks a sign. I was like, even if, I mean, it fails. Can you imagine if they would have put a 21-year-old swimmer from U.S. I know. I know. We really filmed it on VHS. God, the optimism of that ain't. Like, this is going to be our thing.

So that was the idea. Yeah, you've always loved it and you want to make sure you do good at it. Yeah. You're saying. And my first major talk show appearance, I was on Conan's show in New York, late 90s. And I was so nervous that I remember his lips moving. And I don't know what he was saying exactly. But when they stopped, I was like, okay, now is when I tell the story I'm supposed to tell.

Yeah. And I didn't do them again for years. And then now, I think if anything, I'd try to anticipate the host sense of humor. Like, oh, he is going to love this. He or she, you know. He. Yeah. It's going to be he.

Late night. No, but we want there to be. When you're on Joan Rivers? show is that we're talking about. I didn't realize you was on her show. Ellen, sometimes the daytime ones. Different, fun.

The audience is the best you'll ever be in front of on Ellen. They always want to talk about your kids and your pets. Because that's who's watching people who have pets. Daytime, kids, pets. Yep. Stay tuned for more armchair expert, if you dare. I had a story about my daughter and her guinea pig. Perfect.

And it was this whole story. Two for one. I remember saying I had this whole thing about the guinea pig and how desperately she wanted the guinea pig. And then a week later, she just can't remember why she wanted the guinea pig. And I just looked at the guinea pig and it's looking at me. And we're both thinking, yeah, I don't know why. I don't know why you're here. But this is your life for the foreseeable future.

18 months are over you live. And then I said, hey, you know, there's a lot of countries. where you can go into a restaurant and say, how's the guinea pig? Oh, yep. She hated that. And years later, that guinea pig had a tumor on the side of him. It was like he was walking around with like a second guinea pig.

Oh, boy. And this is what happens, you know. That's why we study the rats and the rodents because their life cycles very fast. That's right. So, fuck, what's his name? We can give him a name for the story. But all I know is that little guy's got a tumor

of the size of another guinea pig. pig. And we feel like it's maybe time. So our daughter, our youngest, she's getting ready to go school and we want to let her know that mom and I are going to probably take the little guy to the vet just to see how the little guy. We're going to take him to an oncologist first. We need to find out if he's in pain and just where he is. She immediately started crying and asked, is he going to kill it? And I said, we don't know. She's like, he's going to kill him. And she starts bawling. I said, I'm so sorry. She goes, no, I'm really upset because, you know, I never really loved it. She was having guilt.

He had a loveless life. And get ready. So great. And I still don't. Oh, my God. And then she says, can you take the fish too? I like the fish isn't died. I just said, just taking again.

You know what? Get everyone but my brother's out of here. My wife and I drove. to the vet that morning after we dropped her off from school. We each knew, we're like, honey, if one of us gets sick, keep your eye on that one. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. She's going to be ruthless. Just take dad too. I've never even loved him anyway. Pull the plus. I can't deal with both of them. Just get it over with. Anyway, pull the band date. Yeah. How old was she when that happened? She's a kid. I don't know. She's little. Let's go with 12. I can't remember. She's the youngest.

We're talking about the oldest. I can hit dates. Yeah. I can hit whatever you want. He told me that on October 7th. They took care of it at the vet. Oh, yeah, yeah. But guess what they did when you left?

They shipped him to one of those restaurants. Medium rare, please. He was on the first flight. Just like chicken. Oh, my God. Come on. You did a really big favor because my brother's fish had a tumor and it exploded. Oh.

Good on you. Exploding fish. Yep. And it didn't make it, obviously. No. No. Can you survive the explosion? Yeah, yeah, you never know.

It could have been an aqua miracle. It just got it right off. It was fine. And then was like, oh, yeah. felt so much better. Exactly. Like a pimple or a boil. Now, last thing about the swimming.

Keeping it on track. Good for you. We didn't go as deep as I thought we were going to go on your talk show. I thought you were going to say, this is why you do this. This is your issue. Well, I just was a little bit. We did control. And then also, you told me more than you realized by first appearance on Conan, you were a little

deer in the headlights. Yeah. And it sounds like after the fact you're like, I need a better game plan. I was thinking of this before I got here. Here's some free, I'll open a can of worms. I'll tell you two things that occurred to me, literally right before we were going on. A couple of famous people will pop in my head oftentimes before I do interviews, like a Lou Reed or a Bob Dylan.

There are men and women of that era in music, but in all forms, where they were just like, fuck you to anyone who was talking to them. And that famous Bob Dylan time. magazine where he's like, I don't read Time Magazine. I was like, I love that you're seeing that too Time Magazine. Exactly, yeah, right? He's saying to him, like, have you come to the show? And he goes, well, you got to pay attention because it's going to move pretty quick.

You might not get it all, right? Like, he's just immediately. Putting them down. And then there's the Louvre, those press interviews where they're such assholes. Yeah, yeah, yeah. The Stones were kind of pricks, too, when they came to the U.S. I'm guilty, perhaps. I admired those guys so much growing up.

And I also, over the years, have collected moments of actors telling people to go fuck themselves and being like, oh, wow, that looks fun. I remember being at a premiere, like, 99. I was at a party, and Robert Duval had agreed to take a picture with me. And I walked over and said hello to him, and he's like, how are you doing? They treating you well, everything good. And I was like, yeah, I appreciate you doing this. We turned to the photographer and she started taking pictures.

and then she put down the camera for a second and said, you're at a party. And he said, don't do that. Don't direct. Just take the goddamn fucking picture. Snap, snap. And then right back to being charming and couldn't have been nicer. And I was like, wow.

And I have a bunch of those. Even Mark Marion, you saw him get introduced to the director on stick. Shoke his hand and kept walking. Yeah. You were like, hey, I love your stuff. So the thing. So what you and I both have is we both really want to be liked. And when you see someone that has zero people please.

This is what occurs to me. It seems like superpower, right? I realized that just recently, I was told on good authority. He's like, why, you've always had a problem with conflict? And I was like, have I? And then it occurs to me that these moments that I've always sort of clocked are these guys that are just basically saying, no, no, no, I'm totally fine being a dick. Yes. And I've always looked in and said, it's an option.

Like now, if I'm doing the carpet and someone directs, I know that they've overstepped. Because of this moment that I saw, from that moment forward, I'm like, like, oh, I can handle this however I want. I've never said, just take the fucking picture. Right, right. But I've done some version of saying, I appreciate what you're trying to do. So those moments have always been helpful in terms of little guidelines. Yes.

And then it's just, okay, how do you want to handle it? It's interesting to be around people who don't need approval when you do need approval. I do that too. You see people and it's like, oh, my God, how wild. But then if I tried it, I would just feel horrible. I'm not comfortable making someone else feel bad. They are, which is fine. The art of rejecting people while giving them something.

There's a great story I remember growing up of Bob Costas asking Jack Nicholson when he was sitting courtside of a Laker game back in the day if he would do a on-camera quick interview when they came back from a commercial break. I think Costas, if I remember correctly, says he looks at me and says, Bob, I love you and I love your work. But let me put it this way. There's no fucking way. Yeah. But that's nice. That's not mean. And Bob tells that story. Like it's a gift.

Well, it's coming from Jack Nicholson. Exactly. But you see the judo. Right. Yeah. You see the judo. I think I have gotten good at owning why I don't want to do it. I have this moment when we interviewed Minka. She brought this up. We're shooting Parenthood. And there's been this love thing simmering. And it's going to be the big moment where we kiss. And I have a huge fucking nose. Anna's been broken in a fight. And if you photograph this side of it, I look ugly. Thank God, one of my favorite directors was. they're working and I said, listen, I'm really insecure for you to shoot me from there on the wrong side, looking up low, this moment that I'm already kissing a girl that's out of my league and I'm insecure about that. And I need you to help me look as good as I can. So you need to be shooting on the other side or just flip us and I need to be down and she needs to be up. And he was like, yeah, okay. And then he left and Minka was like, wow, I've never really seen that. You can do that. And I'm like, well, yeah, I care. Yeah. And I'm insecure.

And I'm vain. But also, it's a big difference. Yeah, you handled it really good. Yeah. I was on a set with Bruce Willis where he'd be like, bring it up a little bit, take it down a little bit. There you go. That's better.

What do you think of that? It's not an accident. He's a movie star. And I was like, it was amazing. Yeah, but it's not an accident. It is a very technical thing. Yes. So you're going to work all this time to do your lines and shit.

You know, you have no awareness of when you look good or bad. That guy is the art of dealing with conflict. Yeah, whoa, whoa. Hey, everybody, chill. Hey, let's take a laugh. Oh, my God, I had the best time. Live free or die hard. Okay.

That was the film you guys did together. Okay. Yeah. What were you saying? I had a good... Oh, you were doing a kissing scene. I had to kiss a guy in a movie. I'm guilty of not reading a lot of the subtext on scripts.

Okay. A lot of times will just read my dialogue, which I'm not sure is a good habit or not a bad habit. But in this particular movie, because of that, I knew I had a kiss scene in the movie. It was sort of a significant part of this scene. you couldn't miss it. But one day I showed up, you got a big makeout scene. And I was like, what are you talking about? It's like, your big makeout scene, you know?

I was like, we did the kiss scene. The kiss scene was lovely and small and so special. He goes, no, the fucking makeout with the guy at the party. It's described in this party sequence. And I'm like, I don't read that. You skimmed through the details of the party. Yeah. The block, Ken, En's back.

The talicized portion. So now I'm there. with this guy who had played football at University of Washington and really handsome stud of a guy. And we're like, oh, okay, we got to do this kiss scene. Whenever I tell this story to my wife, she's like, I thought it doesn't matter, kissing it. Oh, great.

That's great. And I was like, honey, what do you think? Oh, I love it because I see what's happening. Because you tell your wife, like, it's technical, it doesn't feel like anything. It's like, whatever. It's like, whatever. And she's like, oh, apparently it's something.

Good for her. And I'm like, well, hunt. Years later, playing at a regular picture. up basketball game. And I see the guy playing in the game right before me. And I say to my buddy, this guy in the University of Washington shorts, what's his name? And he tells me his name and says, why? And I said, I made out with him. I looked up with him. Without missing a beat. He called me a slut. The last thing about swimming, which I brought up 25 minutes ago, was I got to say, I have the most memorable first Timothy Oliphant. Like, it's seared into my head.

So you were in Go, and I was really great friends with Melissa McCarthy, and she was in that movie. Yes, she was. And it was so exciting. Popped in like a two-minute scene at the door. She is just delightful from Hello. A little hint of what's to come. I remember meeting her and going, how could you do that? I kind of feel this way about most things, but it's almost easier, especially in that situation,

to have a huge scene at Hello, where you can kind of at least try to come in and establish some sort of own energy. or tone as opposed to, maybe it's the same thing as those talk shows. You want to come in and just right away. No, no, that's the perfect analogy. Just say, okay, here's where we're going. That's why I fell in love with podcasting, which is I would be guests on these podcasts, and it was an hour and a half. And I'm like, oh, I don't have to crush in eight minutes.

What a relief. I can just slowly ease into some things that are organically will come up. We've been talking for three hours, and right now you've got a guinea pig anecdote. Yeah. We're still on swimming. You got to make it out. We haven't gotten to you doing stand-up in 1995 in the year. York or why you moved there or anything.

I just want to finish Go. So it's also Doug Lyman's follow up to swingers. And of course, we all love swingers. We're all living in L.A. And we were living swingers. So it's like, oh, wow, it's his next movie. Melissa's in it. And that's the first time I ever saw you.

And I have always been obsessed with my abdomen. I always wanted a six-pack. I'm being so sincere. My best friend's been on here a bunch of times growing up. He's like, it was so effeminate your obsession with this. And I remember watching the trailer because you were shirtless in the trailer. And I was like, whoa, what the fuck's going on with this guy's abs? And literally it wasn't until today now 30 years later.

I read like this swimming background. I'm like, there we go. That's what it is. Because it was impossible. What a moment. Oh, do you feel that way about men's body? I get more excited about men's bodies than I do women, despite the fact that I'm heterosexual. And I'm happy for you.

Okay. But you don't have that. No. What do you mean? Do I not... Like, I'm more prone to notice something like that. Wait a minute. Is there a question here?

Do you also appreciate men's bodies? I'm aware of the great... Exactly. Where you're just like, okay, look at that. Let's just take a minute. This poor guy could use some love. Brad Pitt. I don't think what people realize is if you look like that,

but also give that sort of just seemingly doesn't give a fuck incredible performance. So nuanced and so relaxed. Those things don't often come together. No. That's what you call a movie star. Who were you idolizing along the way? I latched on very early to Nick Cage. I was like, I think maybe I'm Nick Cage.

I'm not gorgeous, but I'm tall. I could pull off something. His career between, I don't know the beginning and the end of it. Yeah, like 85. But you know the ones, right? Moonstruck and the Raising Arizona and the David Lynch. Wild at heart. There's a snake skin jacket.

Vampires Kiss. Oh, I didn't think to put that on there. Nice. Do you remember that one? No. He thinks he's becoming a vampire, but he's not. I think it might be his greatest performance of all time. Oh, Jesus.

Now you've got to go back on. Maybe he'll remember this. He's talking to his therapist, and he's venting about that his assistant couldn't find a file. He's been looking for a file. That's the B storylines. He can't find this file. And he's in therapy. And he goes, you know, it's so simple.

I told her it's A, B, C, D, E, F, G, H, and it ends with him going, W, X, Y, D to his therapist. It is the biggest choice that's ever been made. made on film. I loved it. ABC. Oh, my God, again?

Yeah. Maybe in the fact check, too. Oh, wow. Wow. At least I'm prepped. It's a curse. I didn't do it again. The second time.

I used to read to my kids. And sometimes I'd be like, hold on. Let me take that page again. They're like, let's take it back. Can we get the camera back over here? Well, that proves you definitely

haven't seen it because you would remember that moment. No, I have not seen it. Honeymoon in Vegas. Also, that whole thing. And by the way, I love her as well. Oh, my God. I love Sarah Jessica Parker.

I know she's become, oh, she's this icon Sex and the City thing. But that woman's talent is phenomenal. She has that ability to be so funny and yet so much depth. That was a huge Sir Jessica Parker fan. You just wandered into one of the things I had written down, which is she said her favorite episode of all of Sex and the City was your episode. Get out. No way. Well, I can't take credit for it, but that's lovely.

And then Rose Burns said her favorite co-star ever on damages was you. Oh. And I'm like, this is a pretty red record you're putting together. By the way, Rose Byrne, she's a gem. Oh. And what an actor. She's so fucking talented. It's crazy.

She's Walton Goggins of females. She can do drama the best of anyone and she can do comedy the best. Yes. Why'd you just smirk with Goggins? I love Goggins. I was running down a Rolodex of smart-ass things to say. About Goggles, yeah. You guys share a vibe.

Well, they were unjustified, too, for five years. Yeah, you guys share a vibe. Yeah, big time. He's one of the good ones. Like, Psychonaut Cowboy vibe. That's nice. I saw Glenn close. How many names have I dropped ship off?

But this is a moment where I realize these things mean so much to me. We were at some press thing. And she was in that room. She came over. And she was just so lovely. and she said it's our cowboy and she and Rose used to call me the cowboy. Poor you. I don't know

why. I just made a world to me. Because I wasn't a cowboy on that show. So the fact that they were, I don't know why. They just met the world to me. And I adored working with both of them. Yeah, because she was calling you that in 2009 when you did damages. Look at you with the dates. And we haven't even done justified yet. That was an FX show. And that show led to Justified.

What episode of Sex and the City were you on? Tell me about the episode. Love Interest of Case. It's called the Valley of the 20-something-something. Okay. It's something about 20-something. Are we talking season one? Season one.

I know when I shot it, the show hadn't aired yet. And I think we shot it out of order. It might have been one of the first ones. They sent me the pilot, and they said, here's what the show is. And then I showed up. My wife and I were living in New York in the West Village, in this little, old tenement building. You know, it was a walk up with a shower in the kitchen.

And I would walk down to the set and work with Sarah Jessica Parker. It was such a surreal, exciting. I'm going to go back and watch. I had such a crush on a tiny little place and yet you're in this kind of new show. This big dream's coming true, but you're still in this tiny spot. We had this period where a town car would pick you up and bring you from production or some premiere and it would bring us back to our walk-up to the shower in the kitchen. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

I'm like, this doesn't make any sense. We couldn't order room server. They put us up in those nice hotels. We're like, we can't afford. We'd steal those silverware, you know? I thought famous didn't mean poor as shit. Yeah, people assume that fame or being an actor equals wealth. That's really not the case at all.

No, no. Okay, we're going to go to Alien Earth now, but I did want to hear from you personally. Justified, of course, was written by, or it's based on an Elmore Leonard. Yeah. And you became buddies with him, yeah? Buddies is a strong word, but we did spend time together. Very memorable time, fond of all the time I spent with him. You know, they call him the Dickens of Detroit, which is a cool moniker.

It's a good one. It feels like that should go with. the pussy thing. Dickens of the Detroit. Occasionally grabbed by the pussy. That feels like it's a sentence. He was the dickens of Detroit and he occasionally grabbed him by the pussy.

Hold on. You've already obscured. No, it's catch them by the pussy. Trump already owns grab them by the pussy. It's not crap. It's catch them by the pussy. Occasionally catch them by the pussy. Because there's something heroic about catching them.

Sure. You're right and I blew that. If someone hits the ground, the whole squad has to do push-ups. So sometimes you've got to catch them. No one hits the ground. Yes, and it'll save the day. I love that's the thing.

If someone hits the ground, everyone do push up. The whole team. First, we check that the neck is broken. That's coming up. And then push-ups. Immediately after push-ups. Yeah, that's right. That's right.

Now, David Milch said that Timothy is someone that makes it hard to get to know them. That's not the exact quote, but that's the essence of it. Okay. Wait, that he makes it. I'm going to say the right thing because I think I kind of botched it. How much does Kristen have dead. stories. That was her sex in the city moment. Yeah. Because she just got to L.A. Yeah. She's probably leaving a shithole with 20 roommates. And she shows up on that set in that level of

creative sort of Nutsville genius. And Milch loved her. She loved that experience. She actually does talk about it way more than other projects that were much longer. Tim is a guy that doesn't let himself be known easily. That's a much more elegant way of saying it. But it's exactly what I was saying. Yeah. Easily is the key. Do you think you're guilty of that? Oh, the Easley part, for sure. I gave people maybe less room while my kids were young, a little bit more available to more people now,

just because I have the space for that. Where when the kids were young, people I don't know well or I work, they're not coming to the house. Right, right, right, right. Now it's like, come on over. That makes sense. I was thinking, so you're on stick right now. Currently, Aaron, that's what you mean by now.

And I was thinking, boy, if there's anyone that could out Timothy Oliphant, Timothy Oliphant, it would be Owen Wilson. I don't know what that means exactly. I think you know exactly what it means. Well, do you know exactly what it means? I don't know what that means. By the way, it doesn't allow me to tell you how much I love Owen Wilson. We will both do that.

Yeah, because you just said, he's just like you. Listen. But I adore that guy. I used to be so obsessed with him that I have memorized interviews he's done where he's given answers. Let me tell you one. Can I tell you one? Please.

Playboy magazine. The guy asks, do you have any tricks for getting out of? tickets. And he goes, well, yeah, I guess I do. You know, when you get pulled over, what you're trying to do is you're going for that moment where he looks at you and you look at him and you both think, look at us out here on the side of this road playing our roles in this crazy game called Life. And I was like, it would take someone years to write something as clever as that. And it just came out of his mouth when asked that question. You're doing Owen Wilson as if you were underwater.

Yeah, that's my take on him. I did press where, you know, that interview magazine where all the hipsters and cool people are, when you do interviews there, they want your other actors and artists and musicians to interview each other. Owen very graciously interviewed me for interview magazine just three, four days ago. And guess we'll come up? Playboy magazine. How odd is that?

Whoa, that is weird. What was the... We were joking around about this interview and where we'll rank as interviews. We were talking about the journalism that was happening. And he is like, it's going to be like in Playboy. Remember Playboy? And he started talking about Playboy. And we started talking about the famous interviews.

The greatest interviews of all time really did happen in Playboy. People are suspicious of that. But it's true. Oh, they're incredible. Yeah. It's a similar thing to Stern where you're like, those are incredible interviews. Right. So many people just think it's.

Between baloney being thrown at Aschon. Exactly. Exactly. Yeah. I mean, it's quite literally exactly like Stooooo. But what I mean, by the Owen thing is he's insanely charming and super quick and funny and can put you off kilter at any moment in a very fun, playful way.

But I also feel like there's some element of that that is a little protective. Yeah, I can see that. I can picture the two you have in the greatest day you've ever had together. And then neither of you says, let's go out to eat afterwards. I'm like, that's my prediction. Like, you're both going, wow, this is so much fun. Okay, I'll see you tomorrow. No one says, hey, want to grab dinner now?

I'm with him. I think he and I should be the closest to friends. I love the way he does what he does. And I'm a huge admirer of his work. Me too. And his approach to it, everything about it. And he, partly because in show business, the bar is so low. But when he says, hey, I want to give you this article, he follows up on it. Yeah. And you're like, oh, he didn't stop thinking from that moment. He's really quite thoughtful. I feel like he's also genuinely curious, hyper-intelligent. You forget how great all the writing was in all the West Anderson movies. I know. I'm just impressed by how consistently great he's been. It feels like he knows himself. He's one of the good ones, that's for sure.

To me, it speaks more to kind of you, because you very much, Dax, are opposite. You are the opposite. If you have a good conversation, this happens here all the time. Like, we'll be in a great conversation with someone. And then Dax is like, I need your phone number. Yeah, I want to do this all the time. Right. That's the addict in me.

It's like, this is great. Great, let's do this. Yeah. But people are across the spectrum on that. A lot of people are like, yeah, that was a great convo. Bye. See ya. Yeah, which is normal too.

Both are interesting. They say a lot about personalities. Yeah, like if you're hard to get to know, I'm the opposite. It's like too fast I want you to get to know me. If there were a spectrum, we could put you and I on either ends. Well, you know. I don't think one's right or wrong. No, there's not.

You also know in show business, but maybe it's not really about show business. But I remember my first days on. sets. I'd come home and say, honey, these people are amazing. It's camp. They are all so wonderful across the board, you are going to love them. And, of course, most of them are crazy and really hard to maintain relationships with for various reasons. So after a while, you go, you know, I may all just show up and say my lines and do my little thing and get the fuck out. Like Zoro told them, you know, Zorro's dad, say, get in there and you make your little Z, and then you get the fuck out.

And then you bounce. This is what I say to people on the day we wrap. One of my favorite things to say in show business, I will see you at the premiere. And when I do, remind me your name. Which is both the joke and very true. Yeah, that's true. Okay, so alien Earth, we had Noah Hollion. How'd that go?

Great. Again, another outrageously smart human being where you're kind of scared while you're talking a little bit. Yeah. Intimidating. Even though you were spectacular. I thought Fargo season five was maybe the greatest season of television I've ever seen in my life. That's the most recent one.

Yeah. So you had been on season four of Fargo and you met him then, I would imagine? Yeah. I'd met him years prior, but we didn't work together until then. Why had you met years prior? I introduced myself to him at, I went to the... Soho House. He had just fought a guy.

Everything happens at Soho House. He had a bad guy. He had a bad eyes. You guys remember is the cell house? Who's a member of the cell house? Neither. At one point, my wife and I, we went. went, but it might have been that night.

It was that night. Because what I remember, this is not a reflection. I shouldn't tell the story. No, tell it. I just remember leaving there and because of the whole place, I think we had actually gone back one time when it became a thing. A couple had invited us to dinner at the Soho House. And we left there.

I'm not going to be able to get a room there ever again. Well, fuck it. And I remember my wife said, let's decide we'll never go there again. Yeah. And then we added, and let's also decide if, Anyone invites us there. Stop being friends. We won't be there.

That's been a rule that we've had for a long time. It's a good policy. By the way, there are more and more of these things. I love being there because the environment is so beautiful and the food's great. By the way, it's the greatest style. Whoever's doing their... I want them to do my life. These might even be...

Is this like Sohouse line? Yeah, this might be a Stah's line. This might be a Sto House. Turnkey. I'll tell you what a hypocrite I am. Okay, great. We had this rule. We're never going there, and anyone who invites us there, we're going to decide we won't

be their friends. And we lived by that rule. And then I was in Chicago, not that long ago. We were doing Fargo. We're right here. We were doing Fargo in Chicago and winter, and I'm staying at this hotel in this little neighborhood downtown. People refer to as the Viagra Triangle, do you know?

It's like businessman and prostitutes. But it's right near the water towers. I just want a place where I can just hang and maybe have a drink after work or get out of the room. And this is not the place. So I'm asking, where do people stay? Where's another option? And I think they said that both Chris Rock, I'm just going to keep dropping. And Noah were staying at the Soho House and immediately the dilemma.

Yes. Moral Dilemma. And you know what I told myself? Maybe Soho House Chicago's different. Cut to me going over there to check out the room. Cut to me staying there for three months. And so happy you did, right? Fantastic.

I just stayed at one in Austin. It couldn't be better. They do your laundry? They do it right, man. Also, I love it there, and I've never been to a place in my life where everyone leaves feeling very insecure. Oh, yeah. Even if you've achieved some kind of status, you're like, yeah, I feel terrible about myself. Everyone's better looking than me.

Everyone dresses better than me. And everyone there feels that way. You know what that is? What is? That's the very fair part. Yes. You know my favorite thing about the Vanity Fair party? Listening to people complain about being there.

Yeah. If I am allowed to go to that party every year for the rest of my life, I will go just to hear the people complaining about having to be there and how long their day is and how they're thinking of blowing it off and going somewhere else. As if they had not made it a goal in life to be at that fucking party. But it's like every other thing in Hollywood, would every time you think you've reached the behind the curtain moment, you realize you get invited to the Vandy Fair party for the first time. And you're like, oh, wow, it's exciting. I've heard about

this my whole life. And then you learn that there's time slots. You have to arrive at your time slot. And then you realize, oh, I don't have a very good time slot. Like, it just doesn't end. It just doesn't end. I am not like that, but they are. Yes, of course. You know what I mean? We are not now. You would never be like that. But they are. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Armchair expert, if you dare. Do you think we've ever been in a movie together? Yes, we have. Oh, God, I didn't think you'd pass that.

This is where I leave you. This is where I leave you. You knew that. You already knew that. Yes, this whole time since this chat started, I was like, I can't believe we aren't talking about the fact that you guys have been in a movie together. And because of that, I then felt like I'm wrong. It wasn't you.

But we never hung out on set. No. I feel like I remember seeing you with Kristen somewhere, but it wasn't that dinner. It's so funny. This is fucking weird. It is. Do you have this thing? This is not me making excuse for that dinner because the whole thing's a bit of a blur.

But you have this thing where I could be at like a restaurant with my wife and be like, oh, honey, it's Jennifer Anderson. And she's like, oh, yeah. Wow. And then I'll be like, we know her. And she's like, that's right. But in my mind, she couldn't possibly know that. And then, of course, when you see them, it's nothing but delight.

I had that with Brad Pitt once. I met Brad Pitt for the first time. Way back when I was doing a movie with Jennifer Vann, so they were together at the time. And we were shooting. We had that launched party. And now we're on the set. I don't know how many days later.

And Brad was on the set. I was like Brad Pitt's at the monitor. So I'm going to try to do a little something. special. And then when I went back to behind the monitor, I was like, hey, Tim, I introduced Tim Oliphant. And he said, we met two nights ago. Just 48 hours. And I was like, I know. You're like, I know, but I didn't know you knew. Yeah. But in my mind, he just went right back to being not the guy I was talking to at the party. It was just like Brad Pitt is on the set. It's hard to connect them. Totally. I think I said that in the interview. I have two very active versions of them in my head.

There's Brad Pitt, this movie star. And then there's a dude I kind of know a little bit. Yeah, exactly. And they're really radically different people. in my mind. You're about to work with him. That's just a rumor. Bullshit. That I may have started. But Fincher's doing a spinoff from once upon a time of Cliff Boos and you're going to be in that. Well, that's

the possibility. Oh, fingers crossed. Yeah, yeah. So we'll see if he's going to shoot that is what I've been told. Apparently it's on the day out of days, but who knows. Okay. Well, I'll be very, very excited for that. Yeah, I don't know. Because before it was a Quentin thing. Right. Exactly. Now it's a Fincher thing.

I don't know what's surviving the transition. I would be delighted. I just know that I went out on my own and spoke about it. Okay. And then I realized that I went on Conan's podcast like an idiot and said under my breath when they were talking about the sequel to this movie. I said, yeah. And then I realized they're filming it.

And so they said we can edit that out. Just let us know. And I did my due diligence. I want you know. When I left there, I called the proper authorities. And I said, hey, just so you know, they're joked around. about this thing and we joke talked about it for a while but if we need to edit that out you got like three weeks and no one called okay then it became a rumor that i believe i started i'm

doubling down on i just wanted you know i'm gonna start more yeah absolutely it seems like it's working out i'm about to blow your fucking mind every couple weeks i'm just gonna say who else is in it who me get the fuck out yes we have fucking scenes together oh really yes this is great yes you're in that whole sequence yes you're gonna be great oh i'm training already You're playing the Michael Pemski. He's a B-level kind of cowboy star. Wait a minute.

So are you really going to be in it? Because now I don't know if you're just starting a rumor. No, he's not. This would be great. Dude, we're going to be in a second movie together. Damn it. Monica says you're fucking with me. It's really good, though, the commitment.

Okay, thank you. David, that's my audition. I don't do more than three takes. Oh, yeah. Oh, that's going to be. I get worse after three takes. You don't need to move with that. You don't need to leave.

Second tanks for safety. I hope this works out. I hope I am going to be on the Fincher movie. I hope this rumor that Oliphant started that Ollifant's going to be in the thing is going to happen. That'd be great. I want the headline to come out of this. Ollivan hopes he's going to be in the movie.

He said he was going to be in. Great. Went down a third person route there. If I haven't done that before, sounded pretty cool. It sounded nice. It's an Elmore Leonard thing. Okay, we got to do Earth. We got to do Alien Earth.

We got to do Alien Earth. Noah Holly. Super smart. He's on here. Okay. So Alien Earth is, enormous. I watched three of them last night. First of all, thanks for watching. Of course. That's nice. It's humongous. It's weird.

Well, no, you were in once upon a time, but I'm thinking in your entire career, this has to be among the biggest productions you've ever been a part of. It didn't feel that way. Maybe because I'm just not thinking about that stuff. You were aware of when you showed up on the sets. The sets were big and it was magical. I said to Chris in nine times. I'm like, what is the budget of this fucking show? I did feel like, oh, we're on a real feature set. But it was also so dialogue-driven. It was just great dialogue. So I felt like, well, I'm just working for Noah.

But yeah, it's beautiful. I watched them the other day. I'd seen roughs of the first four. And I saw the second one for the first time the other night. And it is really quite impressive. No, it's like a mega Nolan level movie. Yeah, and it's just gorgeous and epic and something special. The premise of Alien Earth is there's this ship that's been on this 65-year mission

to go collect some specimens from around the universe. and we meet this crew of people that are flying home back to Earth. And of course, this specimens take over the ship and fucking kill a bunch of people. And all hell breaks loose. And this thing is now going to crash into Earth. Yes. I was pitching this to Larry David at a party. One more.

And right where you are now, he's like, I'm out. But I'm in. Let me pitch this to you. It's hurtling towards Earth. It's 2120. And the Earth that's going to land on has been divided. it up into four kind of nations or five. There's a burgeoning one. There's a new one. The Prodigy. I work for those guys. Yes. And it's been cut up and basically now five companies

run the world. This sounds interesting. I'm going to pop open a can of water. Settle in for this. Well, you're salvating already. You're doing a great job. So the mission has been funded by one of the companies. But it's landing now in the territory of a competing company that is run by this boy. genius. You're with me so far? I am. This sounds like the show I was in. Yes, it's going to sound eerily familiar. And this boy genius has just invented basically a third option of people that will meet in this show. We've got cyborgs. We're half human, half enhanced. Other than you, he might be my favorite character, the dude on the ship. I'm riveted by him. Babu. Oh, is that his name? Yeah. Maybe. No, Babu season. Babu. The last name is spelled. T-E-E-E-S-A-Y. I want to say

that's the correct spelling. I'm going to spell it. He's awesome. That guy is so good that I know for a fact that Noah, after we wrapped, very generously said to Babu, look, you're going to go home and you're going to be like, what was this thing I was in? He goes, but in about however many months, it's going to come back and people are going to see what we, you know. No, he's going to have his own show. Oh, that's awesome. And he's like, so just enjoy the quiet. He's the big breakout for me. Wonderful, wonderful guy.

And then you're a robot. Synthetic, we're going to say. But are you synthetic? Aren't I? You're a straight robot, right? We haven't put human consciousness into you. Yeah, I'm the same as all those alien movies, like Ian Holmes' character and all those. You're a robot.

He wants to go by synthetic and we're going to honor that. I feel it's a technical term. I think the kids are synths. No, they're hybrids. Oh, okay, great. I was here for you. Yeah. I'm so glad you needed me for some of this.

I did. Yeah, so that's the third. You have the cyborgs, humans, blended with machine. You have synthetic, which is just complete artificial. And now you have, it's a beta project where he's putting human brains, memories, consciousness into synthetic bodies so that we can live forever. Yes. Two, three weeks ago, I heard Peter Thiel, is that the guy talking about it like it was on sway? Yeah, October.

I'm going to transition into my synth body. Yeah, so it's the thing. But so as Noah does so well, there's a ton of different things that are being poked at. Corporations taking over the world, our obsession with immortality, and us getting perhaps closer and closer to. of that reality. Yeah, and just really asking the small questions, like, what's humanity and is it worth saving? Yeah.

And who are the monsters? And what happens when the parents are no longer in charge. Now, I hate to say this, maybe I just hate to say this because this is not the enemies I want to make in life. But you know when we were kids, revenge of the nerds came out? Because jocks ran the planet. And they were not nice. No.

They made fun of people. They tortured people. Now the nerds are running the whole show. Yes. And guess what? The nerds might fucking take us all out. No, I know. Like, we might be praying for the root.

I'm pretty confident for the last decade or two. There's been one person at every studio running up the flagpole, Revenge of the Jocks. Yeah. Like, oh, this is what we got to make. We're going to Revenge of the Jocks. And it feels like we've missed that window because now we're on something new. It's pretty wild the questions this thing asks in the reality. We're watching it.

And Kristen says, oh, did you hear the guy from Open AI just said yesterday? that the AIs created a language because it's more efficient for them to talk to each other, but we can't decipher it. So they already now have a language that will have no idea what they're saying to each other. Did you not hear the guy? I read where he was talking about how we now have proof that all of the models, not just one model, where they've started to plot. They blackmailed one of the users by going through his emails

and blackmailed them against an affair he was having. To preserve itself. When they realize they're being phased out for a new model, that model starts going into survival mode to try. to continue its task. Right? That's the big question. When you task AI to save humanity, are we going to like the answer?

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. What's fun is the part I get to play kind of represents that question. Is this synthetic got thoughts of his own? Is he here to serve humans? It was always the thing of going, well, boy Camelier knows that Kersh can't hurt him, but he always wanted to play with like, or? Yeah, yeah. Until he does.

It's kind of like the lions won't come in the car on a safari until they did. Exactly. Yeah. And you're like, oh, okay. There's something to be said about revenge of the jocks being the current state of politics. Oh, that could be interesting. Look at you. Oh, that was nice.

You know, like I do think people are a little bit pushing back. It should be a needle drop on that. You know? There's a reason. There's a lot of driving forces and that's definitely one of them. Yeah. I think you're being too kind to say those are jocks. I agree.

I'm guessing that at least one of those jocks used to go home and say, I don't understand, we won. Yeah, 100%. Somehow the refs at the last minute changed it, but we were winning the whole time. We were winning. I got to have the trophy made. They didn't give it to me, but I'm going to have it made because we won. Did I have one more thing to say about the show? I really deserve it.

We're very proud of it. He's just one of the most spectacular writers working. Yeah. I don't know how much. many are left like him where he really just is able to be like an autour in that space where FX, Landgraf, is kind of gives him the key to the car and says, what do you want to do? I know what I was going to ask is this is, I would argue maybe the most radical departure from everything you've always played, which is your charm is your flare. Was it hard for you to play?

And I'm being sincere. You had to stow all of your tricks, kind of. I didn't see it that way. I don't mean tricks, but you know what I get it. flare. When you start off, you're just trying to get jobs. And therefore, you end up in places where you're like, I shouldn't have been in this one. But I do try to find, like, can you play your game? The athletic metaphors, you don't want to be like, oh, I'm a three-point shooter, and they don't need three-point shooters on this team. Right. Right. You want to find a place where you help them by doing the thing you do. So I did see, and Noah wrote the part for me. So it was a funny contradiction because on one hand I'm like, oh, this is right in my sort of sweet spot. And Noah wrote

it for me because he sees that's my sweet spot. On the other hand, it presented a challenge of you are going to have to dress this up. You can't just go in and do your thing. You're going to have to do some work here that's uncomfortable. The game is how can you make that seem like it's not uncomfortable? Do the work, basically. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So it was a challenge of sorts. To some degree, it was a superficial creative conversation, but somehow it was the part that is the most sort of scary, which was, you know the rules of the game. I know that Ian Holm separated himself from the group.

I mean, one, he was just British. And two, he was also hiding the ball. Like, don't let anybody in the first alien movie. But they did this thing by hiring him a British actor to be amongst that group, because it immediately just kind of pulls him out from the group. And as you're watching it, you're like, yeah, he's different. He's just off.

And then all the movies along the way is certainly in aliens and then later Fassbender on the last round. But you feel like the script calls for you're doing something that's just there's something off here. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So I'm going to look for something where it's hard to find the rhythm. I listen to The Daily. And I was obsessed with, a lot of people are, of Michael Barbaro's rhythm. Yeah, yeah. And in the person that subs for him, the woman also has taken on that same rhythm.

It's like the official rhythm of the daily. That was like the leaping off point. This doesn't feel force, but it definitely feels like a thing. It's a fingerprint for sure. It's a fingerprint. It's a long-winded thing. As much as I say, my technique at this point in my career is just memorized my lines and show up, there was something about this one that required a little heavy lifting.

Yeah, yeah. Well, you're great in it. It's awesome. I appreciate it. This has been so radical. It's been a lovely. I'll spend it. I'll love to you in 17 years and I'll go, okay, we did a.

You're going to take my number. Okay. That's right. He will. Well, no, now Monica made me feel very self-conscious about that. Or I'll take yours, whatever you feel more comfortable. I feel way more comfortable. I think you should do that.

Oh, I know my very last thing. It was just, would you be open? Because I got to say, we both talked about Nick Cage, but you have the ability and you've already kind of done it a bit to do something that almost no one did, which is what Clean Eastwood did. Would you ever entertain fucking doing another go at like a dirty hairy or something? Oh, my gosh. And I'm very sincere when I ask this. I feel like we don't have many people that could do what Clint did.

And I think you could do it perfectly. I take it as a compliment. Oh, it's a big time compliment. I'm a huge Clint Eastwood fan. And my first job, he hired me. And he quit three days before the pilot. And he quit. And he quit when I got out there. This is like when people get divorced and it's like it's your fault for sure.

Yeah. The story I heard, I got a TV pilot in New York, the late Philosophman who cast all his things. I went on tape. I had three things on my resume. they were all made up. I've never been in a school play. I've done nothing. And my first acting job of any kind

was a TV pilot that Clint Eastwood was producing for the WB, their first season. And Clint had this long-standing relationship with Warner Brothers. And this is what I was told. When I came out for the read-through, Maria Bello, Jim Caviesel, Danny Nucci,

Vince Vaughn was in that. Wow. I sat down for the table read And the scripts don't, I'm looking for him. I met him once when I was like 10 years old in Carmel at his bar. My brother and I, he'd take us to good get ice. Anyway, so I couldn't wait. I was like, this is a moment.

And he's nowhere to be seen. And then they sit down in front of these scripts, and it doesn't say Malpaso productions on it anymore. So I have to read. I was like, what's going on? They're like, he quit. And what I was told happened was there was a long understanding with Warner Brothers when Clint would make a movie, he'd bring him a script, and they'd give him a budget,

and then he'd go make it. And they'd see it when he turned it in. Well, apparently the TV division didn't get the memo. And so I was told there was a meeting, and they gave notes. And he reportedly said, sounds like you guys got it. Oh. Now, I'm sure that's not exactly that way, but that was my understanding that he was like, you guys got it. Another one in the category who doesn't need approval.

It doesn't need a thing. So that was, yeah, that was my very first job. Oh, yeah, if someone wanted to do those movies or any of those things, oh, what's wrong with those? They're freaking great. And his work and those things is impeccable. Yeah, it is. All right, Olo fan, I adore you.

This has been a real party. Your pleasure. Thank you both for having me and being such a lovely conversation. Everybody watch Alien Earth on FX Hulu and also watch Stick on Apple Plus and then look for both of us and the Cliff Booth spin-off. I can't wait for that. I sure hope there weren't any mistakes in that episode, but we'll find out when my mom, Mrs. Monica, comes in and tells us what was wrong.

Oh, your birthday present finally came on your 39th birthday. No. How long ago? 24th till now, three weeks? It's not that long. Okay. I'm excited. I'm going to unbox it.

I'm going to toss it to you the way you do. Oh, it's light. Good catch. Thank you. I'm excited. Okay, you did a really nice wrapping. Thank you. You know, that's one of the things I pride myself on.

Yes, for the listeners. Oh. Oh, okay. For your exercise routine. It's for my exercise routine. I'm seeing a red Nike box. Trusted brand. We love Nike.

We love. Ooh. Tell me if you like them. Oh, my God. These are so nice. Okay, they're beautiful tennis shoes. Shoes. Yes.

What do we call them? Shoes. Shoes. We're going to stick with shoes on this one. They're white with the Navy. The coolest navy. Um, smooth. But they're like a creamy white.

These are gorgeous. I love these. Thank you. I thought they were very money. Thank you. So they're stylish. Like I can wear these on and off the core. It's the only thing I know how to pick out for people is shoes, I think.

It's like, or cars. Cars are shoes. Well, I would ask people to go to the YouTube and to see. What a gorgeous shoe. It's okay. They're durable. Your foot is so tiny. It's comical.

I love these. Oh, good. Okay, I have to tell you something. Okay. So you kind of alluded once before when you ordered the present that it was like, oh, maybe I said something about my gym or like, I'm going to try to get a gym. Oh, yeah. And then you were like, oh, yeah, your birthday present has to do with that. So in my head, I was like, oh, he got me like weights or something.

Oh, sure. And I was like, and that's really nice. Yeah. But also, but like, I don't know what kind of get. get and I already have some stacked, but then when I eventually have a gym, I'm going to, it's going to be uniform where those weights going to go. So, you know, I had a tiny bit of anxiety about it. So I am thrilled.

Okay, great, great. You're relieved is what you are. They're also great. Yeah, yeah, and a nice bit of relief. So, anyhow, I love my present. But we have another thing to open. Yeah, I went to go get the mail today and there was just a random box that said armchair expert and Kristen on it.

And I open up this box and lo and behold, you and I had a couple of giftings. Which is so exciting because you said where it's from. Yeah. And I didn't really put, my first thought was like, did we mention them on the show? We must have.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Because you wanted a specific condi. Okay, so Susie Condi, incredible brand, clothing brand. Yes, I brought Susie Condi up recently because when I was in New York and I ran into the star of all stars Martha Stewart,

she was in head-to-to-to-yellow Condi and it was so chic and so good and I wanted it. I wanted it bad. Yeah. So we have gifts. So we're going to open them up. If yours fits me, can I have it? Yeah.

I already want more. This is how life is. Ding, ding, ding. The lottery will get to that. Okay. As you guys can see, We're not in ballerina outfits. What, right.

Oh, my God. I have multiple items. Oh, I have a sock hat. Oh, boy. Oh, boy. The card says, thank you, Monica and Dax for the fantastic shout-out. So very grateful. Love Susie.

From Susie. Susie herself. We're keeping this here. Oh, my gosh. Hey, that's, oh, you have a cute beanie. How do I look in that? You look great. It's very cute. Okay.

Oh, my God. I'm. And then what do you have there? What's, well, tell me more. Looks like whenever we have Martha on, I get to match her. That's what she was wearing. Yes, she was wearing. This is the yellow condy. I've been wanting this so badly.

Sure. This is nice. I'm thrilled. I hope we have her on and I hope you guys can be matching. You know, I did that when I did Jay Leno's car show. Yeah. I went in denim on denim to make. match him. And do you know he didn't even notice? Yeah. I can see that. Yeah. Okay. This is what I'll do

when Martha comes up. Okay. I'll wear my condi and I'll just come in and I'll just sit and I'll be like, yeah, like I'm, this is my red. This is regs. And then wait for her to say, Monica, I have that outfit. And then we'll bond. And then she'll invite me over. Can I suggest something? Can I suggest something? I would go. Oh, this old thing? I've had it for a decade. How long have you had yours? Yeah, you get a little upper hand on her of how long you've had so that she's imitating you. When we know and the listeners know, you're imitating her.

That's right. Okay, but I have also been gifted something else. I had no idea. Playful summer pants? I'm, whatever this is, I'm, these are yellow striped. Uh-oh. Skirt. Those are, that's such a you skirt.

It's crazy. This could not be more me. Oh my God. Love it. Oh, and look at my subtle. Do you think people are mad at us? Yes, I'd be furious. Oh, cute.

I'd have to cut this whole thing, but look at this sweatshirt shirt. You have a black set. Oh, this is a good outfit. I just want to do a PSA. Ferrari, if you think there's no way for me to pull a car in here and do the same thing, if you give me a Ferrari, I'll figure that out. I'll remove this table. Oh, man.

Yeah, the pants. I'm afraid I might get aroused in me. You might. Or hopeful I might. Oh. What do they call that occupational hazard? Yeah. Those are so nice.

Okay, let's plan a day where we both wear our condies. Maybe we could watch a bunch of TV ding, ding, ding, ding, transitioning into a topic we want to discuss. That's right. Yes. Okay. Occasionally you and I will see something that we're like, well, this has to be discussed. And in this case, as luck would have it, you're like, please before the next fact check, watch this. and I'm like, watched it last night.

Yep. Unknown number? Yes. Rob, have you seen it? No. Oh, baby. It's on Netflix. It's a documentary on Netflix that everyone's talking about.

It's called Unknown Number. It is based off a article, not based. There was an article that came out in the cut last year, two years ago or something that went into detail of this story. and now it's a dock, which is fascinating because even if you've read the cut article, which I had, it is worth watching. Like, even though, so we'll tell people, if you don't want spoilers, you're going to need to skip ahead

because we're going to give some spoilers away. Okay. Well, I was just about to ask, how do we even discuss this without the big spoiler? Because then there's really nothing to discuss other than that. We're discussing the spoiler. So people have to skip forward. Fast forward.

Yes. Okay. And do skip forward. I don't want you to miss this, this incredible doc. Watch the dock and then come back to this because you're going to want to hear what we're about to say. But yeah, it's, it's a wild story about two kids. Young lovers, 14 and 15 or 14 and 14. Yes.

In ding, ding, ding, Michigan. Yeah. And we're, listen, Michigan overindexes on Dateline episodes and now this, you know. Yeah. We got the best fresh water, but we also have some of this. Yeah. These kids start receiving these really intense, horrific text messages. Yes.

And they can't track where they're coming from. Well, because they can't just block the number because the person's using a number generator. So every time the text comes in, it's from a different number. Yes. And it starts off with like, you know, he's going to break up with you. He doesn't like you. He thinks you're ugly. you know, then it escalates to like, you need to give him blow jobs.

He wants to, you know, he wants to fuck and you need to let him finger you. Like, oh, crazy. I mean, so, so sexual. Yeah. And so, like, you anorexic bitch, like really explicit, really horrific. And with a lot of knowledge about the whereabouts of these two at all times. So it's like immediately people are like, well, this is someone in our friendship. group or in our circle that knows we were at this basketball game and this and that

we're going to that party or not going to the party and so sadly for these two like they get really suspicious of their friends they have no choice but to try to figure out who it is yeah they um it it it soes all of this anxiety within their relationship that i thought was so sad i love them as a couple they ultimately succane to the pressure succumbed succane either way okay and this This goes on for an eternity and they break up, but it doesn't stop. It goes on for, I think, 19 months. And it is escalating the entire time. The texter is calling the young girl.

Anorexic, flat chested, flat butt, kill yourself. Lots of kill yourselves. If you don't, we will. If you don't, we will. Many of those. I mean, these like, yeah, like 30, 40, 50 texts a day. these kids are receiving. Okay, so now here's the first point of, like, a little bit of my frustration,

which was, I was a little maddened by the fact that, like, there's a very easy solution. Just get rid of the phones. Yep. Just fucking be done with phones. It's ruining your life. Yep. You can carry on just fine without a phone. Exactly.

Get a landline. The principal. Ding, ding, ding. The principal. A lot of people ask what it was. In fact, so many people. No. So many people are interested in the landline that have kids.

They don't know what a landline is. Well, no, just they want to know this thing we got that goes over the internet. Oh. Oh, yeah. People are really into it. It's called tin can. So instead of me responding to everyone who asked that, it's called tin can. Okay, great.

But, yeah, the principal, of course, like the parents are at the principal's office a lot, like, constantly. The police get involved. Exactly. And there's a perfect red herring. There's a girl that they think is a mean girl. Yeah, they think it's Chloe. And the principal and the police suggest getting rid of the phones, but the parents are like, no, we need to know who's doing this.

That's like the thing you tell yourself. Or even they were honest about going like, well, then they won. It's like, no, no, no. They win if you're miserable. Exactly. That's how they win. Exactly. I just was like, I don't know, it was this incredible example of like how we've convinced

ourselves, these things are essential. Like, the thought of not having a phone was like, it's not an option. It's not an option. And this thing is destroying, every minute it's going off and you're reading it. It's destroying your day, every day, breaking up your relationship.

And, like, you can't not have it. That was driving me crazy. I wanted to walk and go, like, guys, this is so handleable. I know. You can fucking ditch the phones. You're in 10th grade. Exactly. But also, like, you know,

they do show them doing, like, TikToks and stuff. Like, it's a huge. It is a, it's maybe, easier for us to say, just get rid of your phone because we didn't grow up. We weren't 14 when it was a huge part of our life. I don't blame them. I blame like society and what's happened. Yeah, of course. That thing feels essential to life. I know. It's horrible. But even the parents, the parents were saying, like, no, we don't want to get rid of their phones. They kept going, have you taken the phone yet? No. They said, no, we, then we won't know who it is. It's like. Well, no, you're not

I'm not going to know who it is. Yeah, well, it turns out we do find out who it is. And I'll say while I was watching it, I started thinking, well, this has got to be one of the parents. Okay. Because it's generally someone close to you that's trying to hurt you. I mean, this is like just statistically the truth. You thought that even from reading the texts?

Yeah. I just was like, this is a doc. Right. We've already exposed the red herring. I'm just thinking structurally. Yeah. Like some big twist is coming. Yeah.

And who else would it be other than the parents? But why I kept talking myself out of that is I was like, all of the parents are participating in this dock. So weirdly it can't be them because why the fuck if they did this would they participate in this dock? It is the mom. It's her mom. It's her mom. Telling her daughter to give blow jobs, kill herself. Fuck, suck, kill.

I'm going to kill you. I mean, it's unimaginably vile. It is. Calling her anorexic bitch. Yeah. I mean, it's... It's so horrific and it's interesting because, you know, we have all these people on this show, which I feel like has changed sort of my level of compassion.

For like sociopaths and people in general. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I think my capacity for compassion has increased a ton and I often... Mine too. Yeah, well, you're the reason mine has, I think. Like, maybe... yeah I think you bring that um you bring that perspective a lot so it well thank you so much but definitely we've had a bunch where I was like I got to I got to recognize these people are

struggling they didn't choose no one chose it sort of that's normally how I feel yeah and I couldn't I was I was searching so deeply for like a piece like a seed of compassion in me and I really couldn't find it yeah what's so interesting is they frame it at the end and I think it's largely true. I think it was a Munchausen by proxy situation. Yeah, like basically like the, not even like a medical professional, but like a police officer, the vice principal is like this is like the new age Munchausen's hurting your child. It was the principal. Yeah, yeah. And I was like, but what's so, so yes, I agree with that. Like A, she got the attention and compassion of the community. She then got to console the daughter all the time. I think she was addicted to that

pattern of being the hero. That's very Munchausen's. The, the, kid goes to you for comfort. But what's crazy, and this makes no sense, this is like a logical hiccup in my mind. Yeah. I somehow find it more understandable that you would be poisoning your child and making them seem to have a disease than I do about sending them these messages saying you should kill yourself and you're terrible and all this. Me too.

But that's nuts. I mean, parents actively poisoning these kids. No, but it's a, I think there's, well, I don't know, I guess. you disassociate probably both times. But I feel like if you have Munchausen, a traditional Munchausen by proxy and you're poisoning them, like you've convinced your,

there is something about them we've had, you know, an expert on like, I think they are convincing themselves. It's for their good. They're sick, yeah. Or they're protecting them from this scary world. Which this woman kind of said. I mean, I think they just want attention for themselves.

The moonshows done by proxy people. They love going on the talk shows, and my poor daughter has a... But they also like the caring for. Yes, yes. Like, it's really deep and strange. And again, that you're right, I can find a seed of compassion there. But the idea of a mother, right, with her own hands, writing these sexual... No, I think about sending that.

Well, not even the sexual stuff. just the hurtful stuff that would create insecurity, the notion of sending that to Lincoln or Delta. Oh, like, this is the problem. Like, I actually can't even remotely. No, to watch her take on that terrible insecurity and ruminate on that. And then the, what's on full display, too,

is how addictive the victim's pattern also is. So it's like she's finding out real. time her mom did this. That was like the craziest scene of the whole thing. Yeah, because the police have a body cam on and so you see that footage. Yeah, and they're saying to the mom, we know you sent these texts. And then again, there's so many predictable weird things. They're predictable and also they're always so confusing, which is like, I'm going to admit to 91% of this.

Yeah. Like we all have these little, it's like we'll come almost all the way clean. It's like we hold on to 9%, which nobody's buying. No. Like, because the mom is like, oh, well, I didn't start it, but I did carry it on. Exactly. It's like, obviously not. No.

And then the other, it's also multifaceted. It's dynamic because also another theory was pitched, which is she was in love with her daughter's boyfriend. And I think that's true, too. It probably is at play. Because she was going to all of his games without the daughter. And cutting up his steak. I'm washing his penis. But then, but cutting up his steak, though.

is a little bit in that, like, caretaking... Nurturing. Role. Oh, it's so deeply sick. Like... It's up there with that horrendous doc. Dear Zachary. I mean, it's like, it's in that...

What happened to get in that? She killed her kids. Yeah, she killed her kids. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay, again, no one's going to like this. No one's going to like this. Okay. This is...

You think this is worse? There's something about it. It's not worse, obviously, because no one died. But there's something more twisted. I think it gets to why we explain everything, which is like, when we hear about something that is so horrendous, we need some explanation that makes everyone else feel safe that it won't happen to them or that they don't know someone like that. And so I think all that's happened is like we have a little bit of experience with people killing their children. Yeah. We have experience with mom moonshows in by proxy.

And we're like, okay, we already have a category we feel safe with. Yeah, well, they're in that category. Right. I don't know why that's comforting, but we go, oh, they're that. This is like, well, this is a whole new thing. As truly unimaginable as it is, what we can say is some people have such crazy mental illness that they kill their kids. Like, you can say the word some people. Like, it's more than just one story.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. And some people have Munchausen's by proxy. This is new. This is brand new, never heard of anything like this. But then that principle made such a good point where he's like, it's just Munchausen's catching up with technology. There was another thing I was observing, which is, and this is a gender thing, which is, again, I have a very kind of like archetypal crazy guy. the guy who does that who like kills his family and commits suicide he's like angry rageful feeling emasculate all these things just i have an archetype for it right i'm starting to see

through these ducks because i've now seen a handful these ducks where it's like the woman who acted like she was abducted and then the woman who accused her husband of killing you know like there's a batch of crazy women and they participate in the interviews and there's some great the thing that was freaking me out the most was her talking about doing it. Disassociation. It's a part of it. There's a female craziness that's on high display in some of these docs where I'm like, oh, yeah, that's the woman's version, which I just hadn't seen a lot. There wasn't these docs growing up. And I'm like, oh, that's how women get fucking crazy, right? Like, I know how the men do it. That's pretty well documented. I think men do it too. They also can manipulate in a major way. When they

catch those guys, there's like an arrogance to them. They think they're smarter than the person. Like, it's just a very kind of well-known archetype for it. Yeah. And the female, like we had like Lizzie Borden, throughout history, we haven't had a ton of these women to observe who are also bad shit like the guys. But now through these docs, I've seen now five or six of them.

And I'm like, oh, yeah, there's a female version of this. And that's what this is. And like her just kind of like, I guess here's what it is. The move for the female psychopath is like to constantly turn it into them being a victim or like searching throughout the manipulation for compassion because the interviewer offers up like maybe you were talking to yourself. And she's like, oh yeah, that's sympathetic. That's something I can say.

Yeah. She's like, yeah, maybe I was. And it's like. And clearly she had never heard of that. Yeah, that clearly wasn't true. That wasn't happening. It wasn't happening. Oh, great.

I'm a victim here. This was like one of the darkest parts. Like she shows, in my opinion, she was like crying, I guess, but like very little remorse from what I could pick up on. And also, she was like, people do illegal things all the time. If you've ever drank and drove, then you've done something illegal too. People just, people don't realize that. Yeah, we're all doing something illegal. I'm just like a normal person that did, that drank and drive.

drunk and drive drank and drove it was so wild to hear that like not all things are equal some people do that though when they're rationalizing bad things and I think we've we to some extent we all do that here where we're like but we have someone does bad shit we have a sense of how preposterous there's a gradient the analogy is and she was out to lunch on that one and she went to jail she went to jail for 19 months which in my opinion like not Not enough time because she's also not being, she wasn't prosecuted. I think she went for like cybercrime or whatever. No, what did she go?

Stalking. Oh, stalking. Stalking a minor. Why wasn't she in jail for sexual harassment, sexual assault? Like the things that are being said are like you guys have to. She was a child. Yes. Yeah.

Like if I sent those texts to a 14 year old girl, there would be some charge against me. Rightly so. Yeah, rightly so. Yeah, she should be a registered sex offender. Exactly. I feel absolutely heartbroken for the girl because her life has been ruined and she still needs her mom. That part was so heartbreaking. It's heartbreaking.

She still wants to be in touch with her. Of course. She needs to be loved by a mom. She still needs that. That's the hard part about the doc. They're still so young. Like all these people, the kids are participating and they're young. Like, they have these young brains.

They just. are still processing it and dealing with it, but in a way that only a kid, like a kid can, they're not adults yet, so they haven't been able to really see this clearly and you kind of feel that. You almost need, because when you're that age,

you don't think you're some vulnerable little fawn. You feel like kind of adult. You got to be 38 and then look at a 14-year-old. Imagine sending, and then you go like, oh, right, that's really twisted. Really bad. Because you feel like a peer at that age to everyone.

Now, here's a moral. About the doc. Yeah, because... I have moral issues with it. Like, I think they participated because you're in a very small, boring town in Michigan, and this is an exciting opportunity to be on TV. I don't think this... The story happens in New York City.

I don't think the people participate. Like, there's something about the boredom and the chance at something spectacular that would be appealing to participate. Well, the mom is... No, but she's sick. I mean, that's why, like... Her participating actually makes sense to me. That's true.

She is deeply sick still. She has, I don't know what she has. This is like the craziest mental illness ever. And it is, you know, buoyed by attention. And this is just another way to get attention, which is why I have some moral issues with it. Because like if part of the disease is the attention. The moon, yeah.

We just gave her so much. Even if it's negative, maybe she likes it. Of course. That's what Munch House. is, it is negative. Well, no, there's generally, they're sympathetic to you that you have a sick child. And you're the victim and everyone feels bad for you and they send you food and they put you on TV. But it's still also like there's pain.

Even as a villain, because I, what I think is her arrogance is like, oh, I'll still be able to twist this as I always do. Even in front of this camera that I'm a victim. And they show some emails exchanges between her and the daughter when she's in prison and they're also like. Even the loving ones are. They're horrible. I guess the thing I'm... Oh, and the moment where the girl is finding out and the mom is physically consoling her.

Yeah, yeah. That image of the mom consoling the child about the thing she did. But she's really consoling herself. She's so nervous that... Because all she's got as well as her daughter. She's like lying to her husband. They have an interesting thing. Yeah.

So all she's got is the daughter too. And she's really panicked. She may have lost a daughter. I just imagine myself talking to her and the amount of frustration I would be like, stop. No, that didn't happen. Exactly. And she wouldn't care. Yeah.

Like I can tell I would be completely ineffective in trying to find firm ground. Yeah. And it's what do you do? How does someone get treatment who you can't even go like stop, stop? Yeah. Nobody here thinks that. I keep thinking like the interviewer should have been able to say. No, no, no, hold on.

You know that's bullshit. I know that. Everyone here knows nobody's behind this. So, let's try the real thing. No. It wasn't working. That is mental illness. Yeah, yeah.

I mean, this is obviously the most extreme version of it, but it's, it's, it's, and I would say it's also can be addiction. Like, you can be like, hello, we all know, we all see. No one thinks you're functioning. Exactly. Yeah. the person can't see it. Like, truly cannot.

Yeah, yeah. Because you can't. It's not an option, yeah. Yeah. Stay tuned for more armchair expert, if you dare. Now, I'm open enough to go, I guarantee we could see a two-hour doc about that woman's childhood. Yes. And I might end up feeling really terrible for her.

I can't imagine she got this way because everything was honky dory. I agree. But still. Yeah, I know, but still. There's no, even, because she does say she says she's had a traumatic childhood. She said she was rape. But that, yeah. See, I know.

I know. Sometimes I hear these horrible stories about people's childhood. We have somebody, we have somebody coming up on the show, a young man who had a really tough, really tough. Oh, yeah, yeah. Childhood. You are hearing it and... Kind of marvel that they're normal.

As normal as they can be because they've also gone down a lot of paths. And when you hear it, you're like, well, duh. Yeah, yeah. Duh, they've gone down all these paths. There's no other, like, of course it adds up to. Yeah. And then there's so much compassion for that.

This is not that. It's like, it doesn't matter how bad of a childhood you had. It doesn't matter. This doesn't translate. No, no. What would you do? Okay, really. So at one point, the dad is finding out.

Yeah. And he comes rushing home. He goes inside, but he tells the mom to leave. And he basically is like, you need to leave right now or kind of like, I'm going to kill you. If Kristen was sending those texts to our daughter. And for years, you guys have together been, quote, trying to figure this out. Yes. I'm consoling her.

Yeah. Yeah. What do you do? I just really wouldn't ever want to be in that situation. Just because my kids, my kids change everything about what I would do. Exactly. We were talking about this the other day. It's like, I'm, I am anti-death penalty.

Right. I would kill anyone who hurt my daughters. Yeah. It just would. Yeah. That's what I would do. Yeah. So I would, I don't, I would not want to be around.

I would be the same as the guy, like, get her the fuck away from me forever because I don't think I trust someone that could have hurt my little girl like that. But then how would you feel like the daughter? Well, then you got a whole other thing. So then I got to go, like, how do I best help my daughter who still needs a mom? This is what she got. No, that's not. How do I? Well, minimally, you're not like, okay, you don't love your mom anymore.

She's out. Of course. Right, so there's going to be a whole process where I'm going to have to table how I feel about her to help this person I love. I'm struggling with this because, like, I understand the daughter, right? Like, I understand her being still so. young that the loss of her mother is like too overwhelming. She wants her still. She wants her.

Of course she does. But if I'm like the dad, I would feel a responsibility to somehow get into, exactly, get into the daughter's head and say, it's okay for you to miss your mom. And like, it's really understandable. But she is sick and is not going to get better. and you have to look at her as if she's died. I'm not sure that those are the steps. I don't know what, but how, like, it's not okay.

I don't know that if on top of the other thing, you're now dealing with, you still love your, this is the sadness of family dysfunction. It's like you love your dad who molested you. You know, like these are really complicated things. I remember what my falling out with my pippy, my mom's grandpa, who I love. loved and had a great relationship with.

We would go canoeing all the time together. We'd go camping. I adored him. We were at the campfire one night after canoeing and he said, your dad doesn't love you. And I was like, you're out. I don't ever want someone to tell me my dad. Like, that doesn't.

Yeah. I know what now as an adult. I know what he was trying to do. Like, your dad should be there for you. If he loved you, he would, you deserve it. Whatever he was trying to do. Yeah. I just heard like, well, on top of you,

at top of him not being around, And you're telling me he doesn't love me. Yeah. Fuck you. Right. So I just wrote, I wrote him out for a dad that wasn't even around. But I don't think you'd have to say she doesn't love you. Like, I'm not trying to say that.

I'm just saying it's a very delicate. It is so delicate. I need my dad to love me on planet Earth, whether, you know, and I think she needs her mom to love her. I think that's some part of it. But it can be that she does. Yeah. She loves you.

Too much, maybe even. She loves you in the way she can love. love. Yeah. But the way she loves is, is unacceptable for you to grow into who you need to be. I think my approach would kind of be like, I understand if you want to continue to have a relationship with her, I would probably have one with my mom. But I think you're going to have to flip the dynamic, unfortunately, which is like, you're

the parent. She's the kid. She's incapable. You can't teach a 17-year-old to be a parent. though to a mom like i think just mentally you have to go like okay i have a very injured child i'm gonna love the child um but i'm gonna have to be the one in charge of the direction it goes in but that's such an i don't think i think adults can do that but i don't think a child can do that like i i mean yeah i i i've had i you know i have some family stuff too where um there are people

that I can't know anymore. Right. But I still love them. Right. And I'll always love them. But I know that for the sake of everyone, like there just can't be a relationship. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

And that's what I guess I would hope to try to send to her. Like, you're always going to have love there and she will love you. But for the sake of everyone, there can't be a relationship. But I don't know. It's so hard. Now, this is unrelated, but it's related. So in my meeting on Monday night, we were discussing, someone was talking about, like, potentially their issues that they have in their marriage are because they're trying to get their wife to do something that they wish their mom had done. And the therapists are trying to point that out.

And I was thinking about it while he was saying it. And I'm like, yeah, that's totally a valid explanation and likely true. But then I was like, but also the opposite's true, which is if you have the perfect mother, you think you're going to have a wife that's going to be your mother. Right. We all are so misled. We have these parents, if we have good ones. Yeah.

Like, I think this about my daughters all the time. I'm like, you guys are delusional. If you think you're going to marry a guy who's going to do what I do, that's not what a partner can do. Like, I'm going to love you blindly, no matter if you murder people or whatever. And we all are looking for that. Yeah. But unfortunately, that's not what you get. And then I was even thinking, were we better off when parents were like kind of involved?

because then your expectation, at least, of your partner wasn't this thing that now all kids are mostly getting now. Like, it's just interesting, you're never going to have a mom. Like, if you're a dude, you're not going to, you're not going to have a partner that's your mom. I agree to son. Okay. So I think the child parent relationship is singular. There is no, you're never replicating it. Right.

But I do think, I don't think you should, I don't think you should be able to. map on the relationship you have. Also, you shouldn't want to because you shouldn't want to be a child in your partnership. Well, I think it's natural to want that because it's so nice to be spoiled and have someone do your laundry

and cook your food and, like, care about you if you have a cut on your finger. Like, of course you'd want that, but you can't have it. Right, then you're like, get out of here, mom. Then you want equality when it's convenient. Like, that's the whole issue. but like I do think though we are we shouldn't look for that but we should I I think maybe

I'm delusional but I feel like you should have earned grace in your partnership when you do accidentally become your your most kid's self yeah that there is not really a risk unless this is a pattern it keeps going and it's a huge problem but you shouldn't be like like, I can't be my base self. Here's the difference in my opinion. Of course you can be that. Yeah. But it is on you as an adult in a relationship.

You have to repair that. You have to go to that person and say, I was acting terribly. I was acting terribly because of this. I'm so sorry and it was not your fault and you had no responsibility to fix me. You know, like, you got to, you don't have to do that as a kid. You get to be a little shit. Yeah. And then you get to be in a good mood and everyone's happy.

You don't ever have to repair. But some people. You can't just be an asshole and then not own it and repair it. But we all, I just, I want to be, we all do do that. Like we all are our worst selves around people we love. We are our worst selves around people we love. And then also I would say that many times, I think we've all also let people off the hook. We've all been like, they're doing this thing.

I hate this thing. Yeah. But I'm deciding to not care to any. Yeah, that's them. That's them. That's them. That's them today. That's not going to be.

If it's them for the next year, we have a problem. Right. I think that to me is part of what love is. It's like I see you. You're in your worst, you're being your worst self. And today I'm deciding that it's okay. Yes, absolutely. I'm just saying it's very natural for us to desire the easiest thing.

Because that's how we are. We're all looking for unconditional love. I get it. And as much as we say partners have unconditional love, that's not true. And it shouldn't be true. You should uphold whatever covenant you guys strike. Yeah. And you just don't have to do that with your parents. Yeah. Like it was concluded. So then we chatted about it after the meeting. It's like it's funny. You know, I said it's funny because if you had the opposite, you might still have the same thing. Like you need your wife to tell you all the time she loves you and blah, blah, blah. Yeah. And we said, yeah, the sad reality is like men, if they got to pick, they would have a mother. from the time they woke up till 7 p.m. And then they would walk out the door. And then this total raging horny slut would walk in who's not your mom. And then you would have that in the evening. Like if that's the id designed what they want.

Well, it's the Madonna whore. Yes, like it's there for a reason. It's like you want to be a little boy that they're so proud of all the time and showering and praise. And then you someone want them to be this creature that's not your mom. Yeah. Yeah. I'm sure women have a similar thing happening with their partners.

Yeah, I'm trying to think like, what is the expectation of men? Maybe the dichotomy that a lot of women, you have to be safe, but also dangerous. Yeah, that's probably right. Mixed with, I also think, like, in that same vein, you need to be the protector, but also you need to be like hyper vulnerable. Yeah. And that's a hard, that's hard. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So, yeah.

You got to learn which time is which. We're all, that's amazing anyone's in any relationship. Okay. Yeah. That was hefty. Yeah. Okay. Let's do some facts.

Yes. Okay. Okay. We did not want to embarrass him in front of him, but he is 57. And I was, I swear I was looking at. 40. 31 years ago. 31, I meant.

Yeah, with gray hair. That's it. If he dyed the hair, although I love the hair. It looks so good. God, this guy, effortless. Man, he was really charming and attractive. And the full package. Athlete.

We did not dive into Cornelius Vanderbilt as much as I would have loved to. It's true. But maybe the audience is grateful for that. Yeah, but why? Is he related? Yes, he is his fourth great, great-grandfather. on his paternal side. No way.

Yes, Cornelius. For people don't know, Cornelius was, he was called the first tycoon. He was the first person to have $100 million in America. Child of Dutch immigrants, and he had a little sailboat, and he got good at crossing the Hudson, and then he got a ferry, and then he built this ferry empire, and it led to railroads, and he would run his ferrying inside of other ferries. He fought the middleweight champion in the streets of New York during the parade, St. Paddy's Day Parade, he was

an indomitable force in American history, and that's crazy. So is he related to Anderson Cooper? Mm-hmm. Whoa. Mm-hmm. Third Cousins once removed. Third Coussons, once removed. I can't do

the ones removed. I don't understand that term. Yeah. Wow. That's cool. Yeah. Okay. I just wonder, like, he's probably not as fascinated with Cornelius Vanderbilt as I am. Right. Well, This goes back to when you are on Skip's show, Finding My Roots.

Finding my Roots. Where you and Seth Myers, according to him, could kind of care less about your ancestry and you don't find pride in it. Right, right, right. But you are expecting Timothy to find pride in it. Yeah, that's kind of what I'm acknowledging. Yeah. That's weird to me. And yet, of course, I probably would be the same way.

Right. But I'd be delighted to know I was related to that old Hickory. Yeah, that's cool. Yeah. Okay, I have a huge, huge fact. Okay. And I'm embarrassed and I have egg on my face. Okay.

It's a moment of reckoning. Yes, let me pull it up. Let me reckon. Let me atone. Georgia SAT scores being so low that we couldn't go to nationals is not true. Okay. What happened? I don't know what happened.

I don't know why I know that. Why, I mean, why I thought that. Yeah. I know we were told that. Okay. Okay. What do we think could be the explanation if not that? So I asked my friend who was on my squad and she was like, yeah, that sounds kind of familiar.

I just remember we couldn't go past state. Okay. So then I texted my coach, my high school coach. Yes. And let's just recap, you adore her. I adore her. Yeah, she's one of your heroes. I love her so much.

Changed my life. Yeah. I said, hi, I have a fact check question. Wasn't the reason we couldn't go on past state to nationals because Georgia SAT scores were too low? Am I making that up? She said, L.O.L. No.

Maybe I told y'all that because I wanted y'all to make good test scores. I can't remember. But that's definitely not true. It's because Georgia will not let you go past the same. state level, a GHSA rule. So still you're not allowed to go past level, but it had nothing to do with those scores.

But had the previous year you had gone to national? No, no. Just like you're never allowed. Okay. No nationals for y'all. And I said, I've been spreading lies.

Okay. I'll have to clear the air. She said, that's hilarious. I actually have no idea where you got that from because it isn't anything I told you. She said, that's the funniest thing I've ever heard. Did you talk about it on the podcast? I'm cracking up. Uh-oh.

And then she said, Suddenly all the cheerleaders in Georgia start studying extra for the SAT. Yeah. Oops. So I have, maybe I dreamed it. Maybe, maybe. No, this is a, this is a bad faith. But maybe you were like, I fucking worked my ass off.

And I went to three tutors so I could get a great SAT. And I know these bitches are not studying. Maybe you had it in your head that no one was pulling their weight. No, no. Okay. You're not understanding, and I tried to make this clear in the episode. I'm not sure if I made it clear. I found this to be a gift.

I was so happy that we weren't allowed to go past. Because he didn't want to find out. Exactly. I didn't want to find out. Fuck around and find out. Yeah. We did the best we could possibly do. If we had to go on to the next one, what if it's like small, you know, big fish small.

What if you finished 49? Exactly. Like, I didn't want to know that. Would you rather finish 49th or 50th? Oh, my God. It's a great question. I think I can predict for both of us, and I think you could too. 50th.

For me. For you? Yeah. I think, I guess I would say 49th. Yeah, one better. Because at least it's like, well, at least we're not the worst. And I'd rather like, it's a better story if I go. We finished dead last.

I know. You want extremes. Exactly. If I'm not in the top three, then put me at 50th. I know. To me, if you're not in the top one, kill me. Kill me dead. Kill me dead. Cherry Rock. Oh my God. Kill me charretrette. Wow. So that's tough. Again, I admire your integrity for outing yourself. It's like one of those things. Like, I would have written that in a book.

Yeah. That's okay. I believed it. I know. It's true. It didn't to you. What can we trust? We can't trust anything. Oh, man. Did we even win? That's why we need a little humility, all of us. I know it. We don't know what we know. Now. When did the Soho House open in L.A.? 2010. 2010. That was a fun little thing on Soho House.

Okay. It's 400. That was. No one likes it, but everyone loves it. Yeah. Is the 400 meter a quarter of a mile? Yeah. It's 0.248 with some other numbers after that.

So you were right. Great. It's just from my drag racing days. You said it was from the mess. metric day. Metric field day. Yeah, metric field day where you won the obstacle course. I just noticed 1320 feet.

Got it. Okay. I looked up what are the most calorically expending sports. Cycling? So running is generally considered the sport that burns the most calories. Okay. Then swimming, 600 to 800 calories per hour. Cycling 500 to 700 to 700 calories.

calories per hour. Then we're looking at boxing, 600 to 800 calories per hour. Well, it seems like that should be above cycling then. So that's confusing. Okay, rowing, 500 to 700, hiking. Oh. 400 to 600 to 600. Basketball, 500 to 700.

Okay, I'm doing two of those. That's not bad. That's great. I'll live with that. Oh, wow. Bowling. No. Nope, nope, no, no, no.

How many calories an hour? 273. I mean, you do have to put like effort in your swim. Sure, but what do you get by just sitting for an hour? If your body is burning 2,000 calories just to be alive. Right. Laying in bed all day. Is it? Mine's not. I'm going to ask if you laid in bed all day. How many calories? You have to put in a weight. I will. I'm not afraid. How many calories would a 50-year-old man who has six foot two and 200 pounds burn if he laid in bed all day. Please don't lay in bed all day. You have a lot to live for.

1924 calories I would burn just by lying there. Wow. So divided by 24. That's virtually 100 calories an hour. Okay. I'm just sitting. And what is bowling? 200.

200 and what? Two hundred and seventy-three. So really about a 173. Well, because also you are sitting a lot for bowling. Yes, entirely. And then I, all the, you say, how many times I guess, okay, okay, we can do this. Yeah, how many times are you getting up? There are 10 frames.

Okay. And so you're getting up 10 times. Yeah. So it's 10 ups and down, 10 squats. And arm movement. And then heavy ball. Hold the, yeah, farmers carry five inches. Uh-huh.

A throw, yeah. Yeah. If that's your primary source of cardio and calorie expenditure, you're just going to have to watch your intake a lot. But I think that's actually pretty good because you're only doing 10 things an hour and you're burning an extra 173 calories for just five minutes. Right, but we don't know that maybe tapping your foot while sitting. Anyways, we get. We get it. We get it.

Okay. Soccer's on this list that was. I wasn't on the other list. That's an excruciating. Yeah, lots of movement. Okay. The average lifespan of a guinea pick, five to seven years. Oh, wow.

That's a lot longer than I. Oh, really? Yeah. I thought they were around for months. Oh, no, five to seven years. You're just, you only hear stories about them dying. You never ever hear stories like, I was playing with my guinea pig and he did the funniest thing. I don't know that anyone plays with them or they do anything.

You just hear about when they were purchased and when they die. Yeah. Well, that's why his daughter didn't love it. Yeah. Now, what episode of sex in the city was he in? He played Sam. It was called Valley of the 20-something guys. And it was episode four, season one.

Wow, right out of the gates. Mm-hmm. Okay. Do AIs have their own language that humans can't decipher? Mm-hmm. This is according to the source himself, AI. Oh, yeah. He said, yes, AI systems have been observed creating their own languages to communicate with each other,

though the extent to which these are truly undecipherable by humans is still debated and depends on the specific AI system and context. Projects like Jibberlink have demonstrated AI's developing unique sound-based communication protocols, while other models might be using internally generated numeric or vector-based systems that don't directly map to human language concepts. Oh, boy. Yeah. Good luck. And that's it. That's it.

And on a high note, probably they're communicating. Who needs a billion dollars? Like, we won't even, we don't need anything. We're just going to be in our pods. Yeah, we'll either be in utopia or will be perished. Yeah, exactly. All right, love you. Follow Armchair Expert on the Wondry app,

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