Cleared Hot - Powered By BRCC - Episode 376 - Douglas Taurel

Episode Date: March 3, 2025

Douglas is an actor, and the creator of the play The American Soldier. The American Soldier portrays fourteen characters, based on real stories and actual letters written by veterans and their family members from the American Revolution, all the way through current day Afghanistan. The story is told with a through-line and a strong message, but not chronologically. It examines the internal struggles and problems that soldiers face when returning home from combat and the sacrifice made by our veterans and their families. We see one character who represents all the powerful and beautiful things of the military – discipline, teamwork, and brotherhood. He is the only character who comes out more than once to share these lessons with us. All other aspects are only seen once, and they represent our glimpse of what sacrifice is for our veterans and their families. The play starts with our narrator sharing his lesson in discipline. We see a Revolutionary soldier freezing at Valley Forge, a grieving mother remembering her son and his story of how he died in Vietnam, our narrator sharing his lesson in teamwork, our Bronx WWII veteran suffering with the effects of PTSD from his experience in Iwo Jima, our African American Vietnam Vet, our Iraq veteran addicted to the adrenalin of war, a wife and son dealing with the father's absence while he is away at war on 3rd deployment in Afghanistan, a father in the wake of his soldier son's suicide from Iraq, a chicano soldier dealing with the loss of his limb and his wife helps him to stand up again, a WWI soldier sharing his love for his brother in the trenches, an eloquent Civil War Soldier writing his final letter to his wife (the Dear Sarah letter), and finally our narrator sharing his lesson in brotherhood. Learn more about The American Soldier here - https://www.theamericansoldiersoloshow.com/ Never Surrender Podcast Shirt- https://shop.clearedhotpodcast.com/products/no-surrender  Today's Sponsors: Montana Knife Company: https://www.montanaknifecompany.com/ LMNT: Get your free LMNT Sample Pack with any purchase- https://drinklmnt.com/CLEAREDHOT  

Ladies and gentlemen, welcome back. Before I forget, first podcast shirt of the year just came out. It's pretty simple. It says surrender with a line through it, meaning don't surrender. Link to it in the show notes, shop. At clear.com. Get one if you want, don't if you don't. My guest today is Douglas Terrell.

He is an actor, a thespian, if you will. And honestly, this is my favorite part about the podcast. This is what I enjoy the most. Being exposed to people that I probably never would have had the chance to be exposed to. sitting down, having a conversation with them about what makes them tick. Specifically, and I'm going to read this right from his website. He has a play called the American Soldier. His words from his website, which is the American Soldier Solosho.com.

To raise awareness of the struggles of veterans and military families face when they either come home from war, transition out of the military, and of course the invisible wounds of post-traumatic stress. More importantly, I want to help those who have more important, I want to help those who have no connection to the military, better understand what service to our nation sincerely means. He describes what the play is, so I'm not going to get into that. But it's fantastic. I love the concept. It spans multiple generations, multiple wars.

It's really cool. And he has a skill that I just will never have. The ability to get up and perform in front of people, the desire to be an actor, who, good, good on you. No way in hell. Am I ever participating in that? I don't know if there's anything that can make me feel more uncomfortable. And I don't really know why, but whatever, irrelevant when it comes to the show. Today's episode is going to be 376 with Douglas Terrell.

Before we get into that, give me a brief one minute. Let's pay the bills here real quick. Today's episode is brought to you by Montana Knife Company. Let's dive right into the website and see what they currently have to offer. Now, I've said this many times. If you're a friend, a friend, if you're a fan of, the podcast, you're probably going to have heard the episodes I've done with Josh Smith. He is the founder of Montana Knife Company, the youngest master blade Smith, real overachieving asshole, if you will.

The knives he make, the makes, are right down the road in Frenchtown, Montana, about 90 miles from where I'm sitting right now. Born and bred in Montana, Montana inspired, but truly, truly a global brand. They are exploding. I'm looking at right now the mini speed goat. their rotating banner across the top shows a small variety of the knives that they have to offer. I'm just going to rotate down and it's going to show you the stuff that they have in stock. Some of the versions are going to be sold out, but you'll tell immediately different blade types. Chef, butcher, meat eater edition knives, collaborations. This is a great chef knight, the meat church chef knife.

I'm just going to click View All and let's see what they have to offer. Actually, I'm going to go up here to just shop. knives, all knives, not the ones that are in stock. I'll talk about that in a minute. I'm just going to scroll through this. For those of you who are watching along on video, you can see the ridiculous amount of offerings that they have. You'll also notice that the vast majorities of these, say, sold out. And the reason for that is, is that they sell out within 60 seconds, 120 seconds. So be quick when you get the notification that they're back in stock. They're releasing them Thursdays and Saturdays. You can sign up for text and email notifications.

they oftentimes will do drops outside of those dates. Be fast. If you get the chance, get one. All I ask is this. First, support a really cool brand, founded by really cool people that are bringing jobs back into Montana. They're actually building a massive warehouse of Missoula right now production facility. Secondly, if you're going to buy something at some point in time in their purchasing portal,

they're going to ask you how you heard about Montana Knife Company. Do me a favor, put down cleared hot or Andy Stumpf, whichever one of those options actually present themselves because I'm not sure. or both. Or don't put anything down. It's up to you. But that's how you can help me, help them. Let's get back into the show. I'm looking at danger close now.

Yeah, the subways from a New Yorker. I mean, obviously, almost every day that goes by, that's not happening. Well, when you don't. So after 9-11, New York was the fucking safest place you could ever be in. How was it before? And actually, what brought you to New York? Are you from NYC? No, I'm from Houston originally.

Well, believe it or not, I was born in L.A. My dad was a merchant marine, lived there for about eight, nine years. And then my dad got tired of driving to Long Beach to the Union to get work. And so he decided to move to Houston where the union was closer. So he can ship out of Galveston and... Yeah, all the ships going out through the Gulf and all that. Yeah, yep. So we moved to Houston.

So I grew up in Texas, basically. My life as a kid was in Texas. And so I became an actor. I can go into that story, how I got into it. but when I got to, we moved, I moved with my girlfriend at that time in 2000. And so that's why I got to New York. And it was great, man.

It was really, New York was a lively place. It was exciting. It was fun, you know. And then, you know, 9-11 hit. And so after 9-11, like, the security in 9-11 was insane in New York. Post-9-11. Because everyone was looking, I mean, if you farted the wrong way, they were going to pull you to the side.

It was all about terrorism. It was all about, I mean, I mean, Apache helicopters parked on Brian Park. I feel like that should be Thursdays. Those things are awesome. They are awesome. They are awesome. And I remember looking at them thinking, fuck, man, am I, is this real?

Like, am I living in a movie? Because in the pretty close proximity to 9-11 that happened? Because I can't imagine they kept them there for a long time. No, but it's about six months, man. Okay, that sounds about right. Yeah, about six months. Six years later that you know, no, no, no. But my point was like all the subway stops had guys with AKs, every subway stop.

I mean, it was like- AKs or M-4s? I don't, what's the difference between an AK or M-4? Well, you may know, I wouldn't know. Other than almost everything. Okay. So an AK is a traditional European Eastern bloc. How about a big gun?

That probably would be, my guess is an M-4 or AR-based platform. 762 by 39 is an AK-47. a large round. And I think, what is it, 5, 5, 5, 5, I don't know, 35, something like that for a 2, 2, 2, 3 round. People are going to eviscerate me in the comments because I should know, but I never care. Because I just stuffed them in my magazine and never paid attention. My guess would be, if we were talking about police? Police and soldiers, and soldiers. If it was soldiers, U.S. soldiers, definitely an M4 platform, not an AK. Yeah. I mean, they were on all the platforms. So they were, so the place was locked down,

you know, and so, and then slowly, like you said, that kind of dissipated. I mean, I remember flybys around on the Hudson River jets for, and that went on for about a month. So that type of security kind of lasted for almost 10 years, really, because, you know, then the wars in the Middle East started. And then New York was like always the center for attention. And so you could, I mean, you could be completely comfortable. I was there in 2000 with my wife, now, a girlfriend then, three, four o'clock in the morning, walking by yourself, her walking by herself, not a thing that was going to happen to you.

Because there was cops everywhere. And there's like attention and everyone was looking. And if you look funny and then we had to deal with the anthrax or they're on the subway car. So it's a complete different world. And then COVID happened and you take cops away. And then you get people who gave people who gave them. burned alive on subways.

I had heard that as far as it, I mean, there's a horrible question to ask, but I had heard that jumping off of those platforms in front of the trains is one of the methods that people will choose to end their lives. That I don't know. I mean, yeah, I don't know. It'd be a rough one. That'd be a rough one. I'm sure if you're doing that, you have other issues.

I mean, I'm sure, yeah, I don't know about that, but I do know that that's not the way I want to go. Yeah. Getting in front of a moving subway. But, I mean, there are stories of people who have jumped on the platforms to save other people. There was a really famous story of a guy, a construction guy or a maintenance guy who, somebody who was having a seizure, and he jumped and fell on top of him, and the subway

went over him, and he saved him. In fact, and I think he was, I think he got invited to the, one of the inaugurates, not inaugurations, the presidential speeches. State of the Union? Thank you. And he got an award. or something. As it should.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Where were you guys on 9-11? So I lived in Hoboken, New Jersey, which is right across the river. It's, in fact, Hoboken probably lost more people from the five boroughs. So Hoboken is considered the sixth borough. It's in New Jersey, but it's literally right across the river from the Hudson.

So it's like from my door to Times Square is 20 minutes. Okay. So a lot of people lived in Hoboken. A lot of finance guys lived in Hoboken because it was so, it was cheaper. It was quieter. They travel in for work and out for home. Yep. Exactly.

So I was a personal trainer at that time. So I would take the path, which is a version of the Jersey subway. And I would go from there into the World Trade Towers. And that was my commute. I would wake up around, depending what client I had, I wake up at 6 or 7 in the morning, take the path. And all of them, all the trains, every subway line, the ferry, they all emptied out in front of the World Trade Towers. Like from underground, you'd come up the stairs and you'd at the base of them essentially? Yeah.

And my biggest regret, it's never taken a picture. of inside the World Trade Towers around 7 or 8 o'clock in the morning because it was like a sea of humanity. It's hard to... It's like every human being on Earth was there? Yeah, but no... Yeah, but no one is bumping into each other.

I mean, it's like, it's a choreography that everyone knows where they're going. Everyone's going to work, right? So you have your path, they have their path, you know how to dodge, and they had these stairs that went forever up. In fact, have you been to the night?

11 museum? Yes. Very, very moving. Hard to actually walk through. Yep. For me, too, especially being there and seeing the whole thing. Yeah. But they had, so they give a version of those stairs when you're going down into it.

I think it's by, you know what the blue wall is? Right there. But they went forever, right? And they were, I think, four and four. Four going up, four going down. Obviously in the morning, the four going up. Yep. and the four going out were empty and the four going up.

And so you would get up and get your coffee, you get your muffin. And that was my path. So I'd get into World Trade Towers in the morning. I'd get a muffin. I get a cup of coffee. I'd walk out. I'd walk from Cornwall Street all the way up to Whitehall Street, which is about a 10, 15-minute walk. And usually if the weather was beautiful, that's what I would do, specifically.

I was a big history buff. So there was Trinity Church right there. And so I would always go to Trinity Church if I had time and I'd read, I'd memorize monologues because I was in fact, I was, you know, fascinated and just addicted to learning stories about, you know, who was buried in that cemetery, you know, I think one of the Adams kids were buried there. And then you kind of felt like you're walking through American history. That's where America really started, really, you know, right there and around Whitehall Street at Trinity Church. And it's the beginning of Manhattan. And so, well, on 9-11, my first client was at 9 in the morning on that beautiful day. And to this day, I'll never forget that day because it was such a beautiful day.

I've heard that from a lot of people, like just crisp, beautiful, clear day. Yeah. In fact, whenever Scott Mann, I don't know if you've heard of Scott Mann, he came and saw my show. I feel like I have heard the name, but I don't know the context. Pineapple Express. Gotcha. So he saw my play up in Detroit and we went for dinner afterwards and I was telling him, he was asking me, you know why I wrote the play. And so I was telling him and I said, and I was describing the day and he was like, that's probably a version of PTSD that you have.

And I never really thought about it to that point because I can describe it in detail, everything in detail. Not that I have PTSD, but the way he was explaining it to me because you know it so much in detail. And to this day, if I walk out on a beautiful day when there's not a cloud, weather's around 70, 72 degrees, spring or fall, you know, September, I'm right back there. I can remember everything about it. And I just remember that day, I went in early. I woke up, it was beautiful day. So I went in early, get a cup of coffee, and I was going to walk.

So you could either walk from the World Trade Towers or you could take a subway if you wanted to, to where I worked at. But it was such a beautiful day. I said, you know, I'm going to walk. I'm going to walk today. So I came out. First plane hit at 846. So I was at the, I was at the underneath the World Trade Towers.

And the World Trade Towers... You were underneath at the subway station when that hit? I was... No, I had just walked out. Okay. Did you hear the airplane coming? So not the first one. So I walked out around 8 o'clock in the morning, 8.15.

I got to the gym at about 8.30. And then the first plane hit, 846. I didn't even hear it, really. I had a client at 9 who came in early and he was freaked out. He had just walked out when the first plane. He was literally walking out when the first plane hit. And for people who don't know,

World Trade Towers were huge, massive. In fact, when they were up, you didn't even notice the Manhattan skyline. When they fell down, it was the first time you noticed the Empire State Building. So being in a quarter of a mile from them, they were just like towering. Towering over you.

In fact, when I first got to New York, I remember being really lost. I had a map trying to find my way to go to auditions. And this older lady said, son, where are you going? And I said, well, I'm trying to go to the north side of Manhattan. She said, well, let me show you something. You see those buildings over there? That's south. And if you know where south is, you know where north is.

And if you know north is, you know where west is, you know where east is. She goes, whenever you get lost, just look up and you'll see those two towers. and you could be, I mean, you could be all the way up in Spanish Harlem. You could see them forever, man. You could see them coming in from Connecticut driving. You could start seeing them. So I got to the World Trade Tower to my gym. I had just walked out of 9-11.

It was a beautiful day. I remember just walking on the side, just thinking, looking at the journey to church, drinking my coffee, eating my muffin, getting there. And then my first client at 9 o'clock was there early and he was all freaked out. And he's like, something happened. at the World Trade Towers. And I said, well, what happened? He said, I don't know if something's going on.

I go, well, let's train, man. I mean, sure it's nothing, dude. And at that time, everybody thought I was a Cessner. No one knew what it was. And so I started training. And then the second plane hit, which I believe was at 903 or 902. And that one felt like turbulence on a plane. That one you felt.

I don't know how it hit it or what, but you felt, I mean, everything shook. And then everyone stopped. And I remember putting the dumbbells down. And we walked outside and just, I remember the scene looking like, either that year or the year before Godzilla came out. And there's a scene in the movie of Godzilla where everyone's climbing over the taxis and looking at and looking at Godzilla and they're like, ah, you know. Problem is there's like 17 movies.

It was like the latest one in 2000. I think another one honestly came out this month. You want to talk about a franchise that's really getting its money squeezed out of it? Godzilla. That is Superman. They're redoing that one for the- I know. I can't watch Superman anymore.

So. What about Superman can't you watch? I just, I'm a Christopher Reeve guy and, you know, I was so, you know, being old and that's my movie. And I think I watched the second one after that. But then. With Cavill?

Yeah. Built dude. Yeah. He looked like freaking Superman. I mean, they both, Christopher Reed was pretty ripped too. When you look at him. Not comparatively. No, no.

But for that time, he was pretty ripped. For sure. It was pretty ripped. Yeah. But yeah, so I just remember crawling over the cars and thinking, man, it feels like Godzilla. And then just seeing the buildings up. And then people were, you know, panicking. Some people were crying.

You know, I was pretty numb through all that. You know, I grew up in a really kind of turbulent childhood and had a lot of insanity in my life. And so, you know, a lot of screaming in the house and stuff. And so I kind of develop a mechanism of going numb. whenever there's a lot of stress, I'll just go numb. Do you recognize when you slip into that place? Yeah, pretty fast. Is it intentional or subconscious?

I think it's subconscious. I thought about that times, but if there's a lot of something going on, I just go numb. I can literally feel my heart calm down. And I think a lot of it is hiding when my dad was screaming a lot, you know, and I would, a mechanism of trying to calm myself down and I would hold my little sister as well. How do you get yourself out of it? I think consciously I would just come out of it, you know. It's kind of weird.

It's like you feel it and you see it, but you're controlling it. You know, it's kind of like you're out of mind in a way. Almost like a third person view? Yeah, you become like kind of third person view. Like you can feel yourself getting numb. You know you're in a danger situation. I mean, it would happen on the subway sometimes. Like crazy shit would happen in the subway.

And I would just go, I would feel myself go numb. And I just start, I can notice my, my surroundings. groundings really well. And then I start thinking about an exit of some kind. Like, what am I going to do? What should I do? Yeah, and that's, and it's just something that I think I learned through trauma, you know. Yeah, and so I remember 9-11 being pretty peaceful, you know.

I knew things weren't right. Things were crazy. A lot of the girls were crying. They were freaking out. And what was really weird, I remember 9-11 because we were in a gym. so there were treadmills and all the treadmills had TV. So you could see what was happening on 9-11 on the TV, but you were right next to it.

So it would be kind of like us watching TV and some disaster going on over there. And you can see it on the horizon. Yeah, and then what you'd walk out the front doors, you'd like, shit, that's right here. And so I would go in and out, in and out from the gym. It was a big glass building. It was a beautiful building.

And I remember thinking, man, I wonder what's going to happen. So I walked outside. You couldn't call anybody. I couldn't call my girlfriend. and all the lines were locked up. Satellites were jammed. And I remember just standing outside and looking at the buildings

and thinking what was going on. Hold on a second. What satellites were jammed? Oh, I mean, phone lines jammed. But there were satellite. A tower, sorry, the tower. Yeah, the towers. The towers.

The fuck were you using satellites for. I had, do, do, do, do, do. Yeah. And, yeah. And so, you know, and then we started watching people jump. Yeah. It's not often talked about the number of people who made that choice. No, no.

And that was really surreal. And I remember being next to a female trainer, and she just completely broke down. And I grabbed her, and I said, let's go inside. It's okay. And then people were talking about it. In fact, the part of the 9-11 museum that I can't do is that part. They have a video section. And, you know, when you go through the museum on the right corner,

they have a video section showing that. And they show that lady who, the infamous lady who, she pulls her dress down for her last, uh, semblance of dignity. Yeah. And she jumps. And, um, where were you when they started to fall? Not the people, the buildings. So right there.

So I went back inside and I can't remember what time the first building fell, but I saw it on TV, falling. And I remember thinking, holy shit, that's right out there. And I remember I ran outside. The building had completely fall the time I come outside, but I saw the fume of smoke coming. And what I try to tell people is,

so it was a big glass building. Imagine this whole room just glass. And it'd be like someone just dumped a bucket of gray paint. And I remember seeing the smoke coming down, and I remember telling this guy Bernard, I said, but he was a trainer. I said, Bernard, put the towels. Again, that's kind of like my mechanism.

I started thinking about an out. And so I said, put the towels underneath the, underneath the doors, this shit's going to be coming in. So we started grabbing tiles, putting them in. Because I worked in construction when I was in high school. So I knew there was a lot of asbestos in the building. The shit you think about when you're under stress. And I was thinking, I don't want to breathe asbestos in.

So we put that in and then, it'd be like that current behind you. It just went gray. It just went completely gray. So, you know, you're dealing with that. You're trying to, you know, digest what happened there in 9-11. Did you hear them fall? No, I didn't hear them fall. I didn't hear them fall.

I can hear the rumble of the smoke. That's what I do. I can hear the rumble and the smoke and to this day the car alarms. As the smoke, every car alarm went on. Doodoo, do, do it's going on nonstop. You can hear that. And you can hear, because the debris had hard stuff in it and it was hitting glass, breaking glass.

It was like it wasn't smoke. It was literally like a, you know, a blob of metal coming at you. And it was just you could hear that noise. So we closed the doors. really pandemonium was really breaking out back then. I remember thinking, fuck, what are we doing? What's going on here? I mean, this is kind of crazy.

And, you know, you try to talk to people. You know, I remember talking to a guy named Vishnu, he was Indian. And he was really, you know, freaked out about it. And I said, look, man, we just got to keep everybody in here. Let's don't let anybody out until someone says, let's get out of the building. And then we saw the other building fall down. And then I was like, holy shit. And we put more towels in.

And then we just sat there, kind of like everybody went numb. Everybody in the building went numb. We were trying to figure out, you know, what does this mean? You know, what do we do? You couldn't call. You couldn't get a line out. And you just, we just, I remember everybody got around two or three treadmills because you couldn't see outside.

You didn't want to open the doors. and also people were banging on the glass doors to get in. So we would open the door to get in and smoke would get in. And after the second building, I remember an African-American woman. She had blood down her face. She had one shoe on. I remember that heel. And we let her end.

And she was just completely just emotionally distraught. And we sat her down on. We had a bench on the side. We sat her down on the bench. We gave her water. And she was just, she didn't know what happened. And so we went back. to the TVs to see like what the fuck is going on.

You know, you start, you know, by then we knew it was a terrorist attack. And we stayed there for probably an hour. And then I remember a fireman, a big dude came, busted the door open. And he was a big dude. He was probably like 6, 3, 6.6, 4. You know, and, you know, fire guys. They got all the fucking gear on and they look even bigger with all the gear on.

And he just said, I want everybody get the. fuck out of here right now and he had this look and i'll never forget that don't fucking question me don't fucking ask me a question get the fuck out of this building now everyone jumped we said yes sir we grabbed our stuff everybody started grabbing i grabbed towels and i started giving them to people to put over their heads to cut through the smoke so they wouldn't breathe in the smoke was it clearing it all at that no no you're literally he kind of he had him and a couple other guys started leading us in the line and we were we were we're being led to the fdr which is on the east side of manhattan and so i grabbed my two clients i had a nine and a ten o'clock and they were my guy was really

freaked out he was a small guy he was a lawyer uh his name was david i haven't talked to him in years but i hope he's doing well um he was really nervous great guy and i grabbed him and i grabbed this other client of my name marlena and they didn't know what to do because they both lived in in New York and they had basically sealed New York from 34th Street down. You couldn't go anywhere. So I said, look, I lived in Hoboken. So I said, look, and everybody was being evacuated to Hoboken and Jersey City. They're the two cities on the west coast of Manhattan going west.

So all the ferries were there. They were bringing ferries from Connecticut. And so they were basically ferrying everybody from 34 down all the way across to Hoboken, New Jersey. So I grabbed them. We left. We went through the smoke. I remember walking on the FDR thinking, this is what it must be like to be a refugee.

I mean, this has to be like it. I mean, we were walking with towels. No one was talking. We were all just walking up side of FDR silence. You would hear crying in the back. You'd hear some yelling and screaming. But for the most part, Everyone was just marching, marching up.

We were going to a spot to get on the ferry to go back to Hoboken. I grabbed my clients. And that was the first time I saw Manhattan without the World Trade Towers because we were on the Hudson River. And so we were seeing things from the TV. We saw the towers come down. But we didn't get a perspective until we got on the ferry until we were on the Hudson River. And I remember the Hudson was got, the ferry got in the middle of the Hudson.

Hudson and I remember just looking back and just not seeing the towers, which was surreal, right? Because for so long, you just always assumed that these buildings were there. And then you couldn't really see the skyline because the smoke was just, I mean, it was just like, I always described it. It looked like some big giant brought a habachi grill and it was just smoking all of lower Manhattan. And that smoke lasted for months, man, for six months, for a year. I mean, the fires went on for almost two years down there below. They were so hot, 1,600 degrees Fahrenheit.

And so I grabbed my two clients, and I took them home. They had made, I can't remember, I think they, I believe we had cell phones. I can't remember how they called, but they had called family. They had gotten on a call out, and they were waiting for them in New Jersey, and they got picked up. both of them got picked up by friends and family. And then Hoboken's only a square mile. So I brought him home. They left.

My wife was there. Girlfriend then. She was like, oh my God, you know, the whole thing, you know, hugging me. Yeah. And so, and then she goes, are you okay? And I said, yeah, I'm good, man. And I remember the other thing I remember is being starving. Because I hadn't eaten anything.

And my adrenaline just kicked in. I think my adrenaline finally had come down. I'm fucking starving, man. Let's go get some food. You know, and emotion hits people in very different ways. And I just remember thinking, I'm hungry. I want to go eat. And there was a great Italian bar right next to an apartment.

We rented. Everyone was in it watching TV. It was an old place called Leos. Had been there from, you know, the 50s. And we went in, people were watching. And people were, you know, trying to kind of grasp the news. And I sat down. I ordered a spaghetti bowl and A.

order lasagna and I would her two beers. And I remember my wife got a beer and it was flat, my girlfriend. And she wanted to complain about it. And I said, not the day. That's what I told. I said, Erica, look at the TV. Drink the fucking beer. Yeah.

And I think she didn't, she just, she snapped, you know, she was not there where everybody was at, you know, because she didn't experience it. And then once she kind of snapped, like, oh, I know, what was I doing? It was a very nearly impossible thing to compute. Yeah. Yeah. And so we, yeah, and we ate. And then, you know, that's kind of where, and that was 2001.

I only been in New York for, you know, one year, you know. And then you go back and I had thoughts of leaving. I'm like, well, you know, I came there to be an actor to pursue my dream. I'm like, well, I don't, maybe I should leave, you know. Maybe this is not what I want to do. Why did you choose New York over L.A.? And let me tell you, I don't know much about the acting scene. Yeah.

But for most people, and maybe this is something from TV and movies, where do young people go when they want to be discovered? They head to the West Coast to L.A. Because why you chose New York over that. Well, back then, there was earlier two cities. There was New York. I mean, there was New York or L.A. Those were the two cities you would go to. Same industry, though?

Like same kind of sitcom type stuff, movie type stuff was existing both? Yeah, for the most part. I mean, film and TV, like, if you have no passion in theater, you're going to go to L. and if you have passion for theater, but both film and TV mechas are, it's New York or L.A. Well, it was easy because my wife was going to grad school. And we were just dating at the time.

And she's, you know, I was ready to get out of Houston. And I said, look, listen, I can't do this. And I want to get out. And I was going to go to L.A. Because I was born in L.A. And she said, listen, you know, I'm going to go to grad school. Why don't, wherever I get accepted, let's go together. And if it doesn't work out, you know,

we're in a city that we both want to be in. You know, we're not in, you know, Topeka, Kansas. And I said, yeah, sure. So she got accepted. She got a full ride to NYU. So, okay, let's go to New York. And, you know, I had success going east always as a young man.

I got a scholarship to go to Ole Miss from Texas. My first acting job was in North Carolina. My parents actually met in New York. So I thought, I'll just keep going east. You know, maybe east is my direction. And, yeah, and so that's why we were in New York. And so that happened. And then, you know, you try to, it was, you know, it was so surreal.

And I remember what we were talking about, camaraderie before we started, that's when New York was magical. It was really the most magical place you could have ever been in. People would stop. They would help you. And I remember on the west side, and this went on for a long time, all the fire trucks going back and forth, right? And people clap, kind of like COVID, but in a more sincere. year away. You know, everyone had an American flag. It was the most patriotic, you know, the country had ever been. It was just, it was a wonderful place. You know, people were looking out, you know,

it was a scary place too, because you would read on the paper, you know, okay, Taliban is choosing next targets, anthrax in the subways. And you'd be on the subway going, oh, fuck. You know, and you look at it, you look at people like, you know, you know, don't make a funny move, dude. You know, and so it was a great place. It was a great, it was wonderful, man. It was just, it was, gosh, it was just really fun and it was safe. It was kind of a love fest. People wanted to help each other.

And then, and that's kind of how I got really addicted to what was happening in the Middle East, because ironically, my father was very patriotic. He was a Syrian Jew, Argentinian Syrian Jew. And he was always grateful to this country. And he was always grateful to this country. to what America did on the Second World War. And he was very proud American. And I got my patriotism through him,

which is ironic because we had a kind of a turbulence relationship. And he would always watch this. I don't know if you remember this documentary called The World at War? I don't think so. Yeah, it was an old documentary. And he watched it. It was basically the Hitler documentary. And he would watch that over and over.

used to drive me nuts. In fact, I would lie on the couch sleeping when he would watch that. So, yeah, so I, you know, I felt really, I wanted to find out what was going on in the Middle East. I was always the character, you know, I always had the character. If you punch me, I'm going to punch you back. So I wanted revenge, you know, I wanted those guys to be punished. You know, I was one of the people who, you know, who wanted the Iraq War. So was that?

Yeah. Time and context as a bitch. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Not a good decision. Yeah. And it's hard.

You were directly tied to the monetary value of the military industrial complex. Yeah, unless you were part of Halliburton. You did well. I think they did okay. Yeah. Yeah. Shareholders might have been happy for about two decades. Probably still are to some degree.

For sure. For sure. Why did you leave New York? Because I was asking where you came from here today and you said back in Tejas. Yeah, well, I mean, COVID, just couldn't do it anymore. They changed the city that much? Oh, dude, it's Joe Rogan left. The reason why Joe Rogan left L.A. is the reason why everybody left.

It's hard to explain to people the insanity that happened there on both coast. I mean, you see what's going on in the fires, in the California fires right now. And when you read why they're happening, you're like. But one of the main reasons why they're happening is the Santa Ana wins, which are uncontrollable, but they're a yearly event. True. And I used to experience them because I lived in San Diego. When those suckers would turn on, it feels like a hair dryer coming out of the eastern California mountains. But having your water reserves filled would help.

It would. Would help. Yes. I don't mean, man. Yeah, of course. Undoubtedly, it would help. I'm reading reports of 80, 90 mile per hour sustained wind. I don't know if there's enough water in the world to stop that.

Well, that I don't know about it. I mean, that I don't know about it. But when you read that what was happening, like the insubstained. of the decisions that were going, the budget cuts and all that, you're just like, and then, you know, I mean, you couldn't breathe, man. I mean, you couldn't breathe. I mean, they were, I mean, they were in your living room. They were in your kids' classroom.

The theaters, everything was shut down. You were fighting with everybody. You were yelling with everybody. Your friends that you thought were friends were not your friends anymore. It's really hard for people to understand the isolation that happened. When you weren't part of that mantra, you got kind of pushed out. And, you know, that's why so many people left both coast and they're still leaving. But yeah, that was 2022.

Yeah, you just, it's really, for me, it's actually quite emotional. I was really, I loved New York. I mean, I, I mean, I built my career there. My kids were born there in Hoboken. I raised my family there. I made my mark as a as a guy there, you know. I experienced the most probably traumatic thing besides maybe Pearl Harbor or something firsthand. The people are great in New York, you know, besides the politics, they're fucking phenomenal people, you know, hard work in, you know, Irish, Italian, all over the place.

The city, the energy is amazing, especially if you're in the arts, if you're an actor, you know, that's, you know, that's where do you want to be, you know. I mean, I would study, I studied a Carnegie Hall, you know. I was next to the history, you know. I'm again, I'm a massive history buff. So, you know, where I studied in Carnegie Hall was a half floor. The building had half, half floors. And it was below Marlon Brando's apartment, his old apartment. And I would touch that.

And so it was, I mean, there's, it's just, it's just, it's hard to explain, but it's, New York is an amazing place when it's functioning, when it's being run right. It's crazy. Like you can put up with the insanity when the insanity doesn't come in your bedroom and doesn't fuck with your kid's school. And when everyone leaves you alone, right? You know, I mean, there was, New York is always crazy.

I mean, you have to be insane to live there to pay in those rents and to be on the subway. I mean, you have to, there has to be a payback, right? So, yeah, so, you know, that's, so I did that and then, you know, I started getting really, I started reading the paper every day and I started getting really addicted to what was happening in the Middle East

and then I guess around 2007, 2008 I started reading stories about guys struggling and guys who couldn't pay their bills about guys you mean soldiers? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Because they were in the paper all the time, you know? Really? Yeah, yeah, yeah.

I have never been a huge fan of, I guess I consume it digitally. And, you know, the Times never had a subscription even on digital. Yeah, yeah, no, paper guy. Yeah, the New York Times. Well, I mean, back then the New York Times was considered the New York Times. You know, it's gone, you know, off course, to say the least.

But back then, you read the New York Times. Like it was also as an actor, they had this great thing that they would have the upcoming off-Broadway, off-Broadway and off-Broadway and Broadway plays. They were coming up, and they would review them. And so when I was, I love research. I'm addicted to research. And so I would read that section. I would see who the playwright was, who the director was, and I would research them. I'd find their contact, and I'd reach out to them.

And that's how I would find work, right? And I would say, hey, you know, this is how I saw your, congratulations on a great reading. You know, I'm in a great review. You know, I think I'm right for your work. You know, I'll love to send you my stuff. And you would, and that's how I would network. And that was so I would read that. And then you would read what was going on in the Middle East.

And so, So, yeah, I started collecting clippings and stuff that moved me a lot. And then I decided like around 2007, 2008, you know, maybe I should write a play. I didn't think it was going to be a one-man show. I said, I'm going to write a play. So I would go to the New York Library and I would research stories about veterans, just war stories. And I started with the revolution, ironically enough. And my idea was, because I think it was 2007, 2008, Iraq was, they had elections, and it was a big deal in Iraq.

I think Saddam had already been, had fallen. And I remember videos of people like using their thumb, I mean, their finger to vote. And I remember thinking, gosh, man, these people are, you know, at that time we were thinking, you know, we're liberating them and they're getting to vote, you know. And here in this country, no one votes. You know, no one votes, man. Don't they understand the sacrifices going on? We should vote. We should vote.

So I had this idea of kind of writing a play and reminding people of the revolution. Excuse me. I'm just going to, I like tears. And, yeah, so I would go research the revolution. You know, when you research, I mean, I would literally go look at microfish. You know, and I started, you get into a rabbit hole of research, and then I started reading about the Civil War. Then I started reading about, you know, Vietnam.

and then I started reading about, you know, all the wars, you know. And then I would see stories what was happening in the Middle East. And I started reading this thread about how we haven't been taking care of our vet since the revolution. You know, I mean, Joseph Plum, he fought in the Continental Army under George Washington. And he talks about how they never got paid. And a lot of Minutemen, when they came back after the revolution, they became indentured servants because the pay they were promised they never got. And so to survive, they basically became indentured servants to blacksmith.

And then the Civil War, same thing. So I started kind of like, fuck, what the fuck is going on, man? So I started researching. So it led me into a rabbit hole. And so I started collecting and I would Xerox letters and I would Xerox. And then I started, I got into microfish, which if anybody doesn't know what microfish is. There's a lot of people that don't know what microfish is. It's pretty fun.

I mean, you can go in a rabbit hole because you can. Michael? Do you know what microfish is? No. We're so old. Yeah, yeah. But you could look up any year, any day, from any newspaper all over the world, all over the world for the most part. And you can read what was going on.

And I have this fascination about the past. I just, I've always have. People always ask me, if you can go 100 years forward or 100 years backwards, where would you go? Hmm. And what would you go? Do I take, do I get to take the knowledge with me? or is it a clean slate? You can take the knowledge with you.

I'm going backwards. That'd be so rich. Okay. But only to experience. Only to experience. Like, they're going to put you in a bubble case or bubble. So I can only watch. You can only watch.

Yeah. Forward. You go forward. Why would you go forward? Because I can't put my finger on the pace of our evolution and trajectory. I just am fascinated to know where. it leads. Yeah. You know, I'd be interesting to learn what it was to be like in the early 1900s. We kind of know what that was like. But to really look at it. Sure. First hand. But you can gather

some information about it now. True. Forward, you can gather none. I'd rather be a cosmonaut. Go forward. Well, what if I said you can go back to like 1500? Are you, obviously. I'm obviously. I'm obviously. Obviously, stupid question, I was going to say, are you a military buff? But are you a, I'm not. Are you a history buff? I am neither a military buff nor a history buff or the combination of the two, a military history buff. Okay. Just because you serve in the military, it doesn't necessarily mean you are steeped in all the knowledge.

No, no, no. No, but maybe at that you might have a passion like generally and Ulysses Grant battles or something. Resoundingly no. No. George McClellan. Okay. I still think I would go forward because that's the true unknown. Even the 1500s, we could make an approximation based off the information that we do have because we do have information.

Yeah. We don't know about tomorrow, though. And I'm telling you, with technology, the pace that things are evolving, I got to see it a little bit. Yeah. No, I hear you. Yeah. So I would- The problem is you'd be in your little bubble and somebody would come cut you in pieces with your lightsaber and you wouldn't be able to come back within the information.

No, that's true. And what's even scary is if you go forward and you realize you don't even exist. I was going to say you go forward and it's just black and you're sitting there like, yeah. You're, can you go backwards 20 years? We're all we're all holograms. Yeah. Yeah. Or just the world's not there anymore.

That's even scary. Because we're idiots with nuclear weapons and somebody decided to let one off the chain. And yeah, you're just in the shadows like, can we rewind 20 years and you're still in the shadows like, shit. Can we rewrite 20 more? And just figure out exactly what happened and where. Yeah. We could warn people. probably so I don't know if they'd pay attention

No probably they wouldn't because people don't But yeah so I would I would collect this information and I would look at microfish And then I started getting really passionate I started getting really digging into The you know our history and how we treat our soldiers And so I had a I mean this went on from about 2007

2008 to all the way about 2013 Really and I would you know I'm like a dog with a bone You know, once I get into a project, I don't, I won't let it go. And so I would be in between auditions when I had time, I would go to New York Public Library. Also, I fucking loved it, you know, I loved reading about it. I love, you know, reading about stories of the Civil War and the revolution, like reading about how, you know. They were hard people.

They were hard people and they were strong. And then, you know, you just learned some fascinating things, like, you know, how illiterate a lot of the revolutionary guys were, you know. and I would read their diaries. You know, today I go eat mungfish. Tomorrow we eat mungfish. Looking forward to go marry, eat mungfish. You're like, it's fascinating, you know, reading that, you know. And then you come across somebody like Joseph Plummer, Ebenezer Fox,

who were really literate and they kept these amazing diaries. And you're like, holy shit, you know, or the same thing with the Civil War, you know. Well, I know that you're laying the foundation for the play that you wrote. What got you interested in acting in the first place? Oh, man. Well, I was dumped by a chick and I wanted to impress her. So, all right, so we'll go back. And so you landed on acting.

So, all right. Most people are like, I'm going to go to the gym, sculpt my guns. No. Get a beach body, an eight pack. Find a hotter chick. Yeah. And walk around with her. No.

You're like, hold on. Shakespeare. Well, I didn't have many skills going on, right? So when I graduate, so the thing is, so I'm blind in my left eye. And so when I- Always? Yeah. Like blind blind? Yeah.

So when I was four. So I had an accident. And so- Hold on. Do you think you're going to escape without talking about the accident? Yeah. Well, I mean, it's, I mean, my sister threw something and basically took my eye. Okay. And my dad wasn't there.

And so, yeah. So kind of that's how I grew up. But what I was going to say? So I played football in high school. And so when I graduated, when you play football in high school, you're always, you know, like all the recruits are trying to call you. Because you're like on this A list of recruits to get you to come and join. And I remember sitting out of waterbed. Did you ever have a water bed?

No. I'm going to gauge Michael's knowledge on this one, too. Have you ever experienced a waterbed? I mean, I know what they are. I don't know. I've never had one. Have you ever seen one in real life? No.

Okay. Yeah, just making sure. Yeah. His, I tell you what, his life experience compared to ours. I worry. Not about him, but I worry. Yeah, you worry? Even though, first off, here's a question.

Whoever thought that a waterbed was a good idea? Well, they were great because they would stay cold. Yeah, they would also destroy your back due to the back of support. I mean, when you're 14, 15, that doesn't matter. True. And there are also benefits that we both know about that. Are you talking about sexual benefits? Yeah.

in the tide. Yeah. I have no experience with that on a waterbed. I just, I think of it from the perspective of if I had to write a list out of things that I would not like accidents that I wouldn't want to have happened in my bedroom, about 100 gallons of water would be one of them. Well, the biggest, the biggest pain in the ass of a water bed is if you got an air pocket in the bed.

The biggest pain in the ass of a water bed is if it breaks. Yeah. Well, I never had one that broke, but yeah. Anyhow, I had a waterbed. So these recruits would call me and they would say, hey, you know, I heard you just, you know, you just finished high school and you played football. I think you'd be a great marine. You know, once you come recruit.

And I said, well, that sounds great. I just got to let you know that I'm also blind in my left eye. And he'd be like, oh, well. Maybe it's not for you. I think you're going to have a good life son, but I don't think maybe the Marines is for you. And then the, I don't know, a couple weeks later, the Army would call, same story. Yeah. And I would tell him, I think you're going to have a good life son, but I don't think the military is for you.

And I think the Coast Guard called. And I believe, yeah, I think in the Navy, in the Navy. And I remember I were getting these phone calls. So when that finished, I really thought that that was my last connection to the military. I was like, I'll have no connection to the military. I would never think about the military. But acting was not some burning passion. No.

It doesn't sound like there was a family history of people coming from that world. No, no. So what happened was, so I was always a good student in high school, but I got high. before my SAT, fucked that up. Not a good, I would advise you not to take your SAT high or drunk.

Can't you take it again though? I did, but I, you know, my parents didn't have much money. And so I just figured they're not, I'm not going to go to college. Walk me through that decision process of taking the SAT

and getting high first. You know, I know what? This is a really important test. So I'm just going to mellow out a little bit. I never, I never even studied for it. I never even prepared for it.

I mean, I just assumed I had to take it you had to take it yeah and I just remember thinking it doesn't matter I'm not going to do well in school I'm not going to go to college I didn't see I didn't see an opportunity for me to go to to go to college I just didn't see it so I just doesn't fucking matter and so of course that you know not a good decision but I my plan really was to go work with my dad you know on the ships I figured I'll just get a job make some good money he made okay money. And I thought, you know, you know, as a 17 year old, 18 year old, I'll be fine with that, you know. You mentioned earlier there was some trauma involved in your childhood. Yeah.

What was going on there? So my dad was kind of a verbally violent. He was also violent, you know, but he was very verbally violent in the house. How were his parents towards him? Where did he kind of grew up in the street, you know, he came to this country with nothing. He didn't, you know, in retrospect, as I look back, my dad passed now. He passed about five years ago. No, it's okay. But I'm just thinking when he passed. But I don't think he, I don't think he knew how to love, right?

I don't think he was ever taught to him. And you know, and for his mind, because he grew up in the streets, came to New York. I mean, he had some issues in New York, you know, and then he got a second chance and he kind of built a life. And for him, if you. had milk in your refrigerator and a stereo in your room, you were doing good, you know, and that was his version of success as a father to us. You know, I was one of five, four sisters, three were stepsisters. And my mother was Colombian, and she had come from her first marriage

with three daughters when she was 16. So there was just a lot of violence, a lot of yelling, some physical violence between my parents. That's kind of where you learn your mechanisms. You know, you learn how to, you just learn how to hide and you learn how to, you know, I think, I think when you ask, you know, is it conscious or subconscious? I think it's a part of both because I think you force yourself to ignore it, right?

To make it go away in some way, either hiding under, I mean, I would hide under, we had a bathroom sink and I would hide underneath the bathroom sink, a faucet, like a cabinet, you know, I would get inside of it. Or underneath the bed or in the closet. I would go in there and to things would subside. And then, you know, that shit proceeded through high school, you know, by then you get,

you like, fuck, here we go again. You know, you kind of, you know, you're like, fuck. Did you guys ever talk about it as you got older as a man? Did you discuss? Fuck no. Really? Between me and my dad? Yeah.

Fuck no. No, no. What do you think would have happened if you would have brought it up? I mean, you would have, I would have had to be more, we both would have to be more emotionally intelligent to do that. I don't know. I think he probably would have said, I did the best I could.

And he'd said that. He said that a lot, you know. And he did, and to a degree. I think the important part is what you just said to a degree. Yeah. Do you ever apologize for his behavior?

No. No. You know, I mean, it goes so deep, man, with my sisters because, you know, they were his stepdaughters. And so that caused a lot of stress. financially as well. You know, my mom was great.

My mom is the reason why I got to go to college and how I got my life. But I don't think she was, as you get older, you see your parents as people. You know, when you're there, and you kind of get retrospective and you start looking at it. When you're younger,

they're the answer to every question problem that you have. Yeah. How much distance do I have from this right here? Is this good? I think so. Michael, you let me know. Just a little closer.

Okay. He gets really like, get in there, you know. Yeah, as you get older, you realize your parents are 100% human being. Yeah. They were trying to... Fumbling their way through life just like you are. Yeah, and it was harder for them, you know, because things were harder.

You know, you think about what your mother had to do. She had to fucking wash diapers and shit, you know, and make baby food, you know, like, you know, life was much harder back then for... Especially for immigrant parents who were considered outcast, you know. Is your mom still alive? My mom is still alive. And my mom was also patriotic. I remember when I was in school, they would give you kind of like a census, you know, It was basic, you know, male, white, Hispanic or African American, something.

And I would, I knew I spoke Spanish. I speak fluent Spanish. So I would check Hispanic. And I remember I told my mom that one day and she said, don't you fucking ever do that again? I came to this country for you to be American. Don't fucking throw that away. Never click Hispanic again. You're an American.

You were born in this country. I had you in this country. You're an American. So, and it's funny, these little seas. your parents planning you, they flower in different ways as you get older, right? You don't, I said, okay, sure, I'm an American. So you're back down to football. Yeah, and so.

Hearts broken. Hearts broken. And so revenge will clearly be being in a play. So my mom was not going to allow me to go work with my dad. She goes, you're going to college. And so she basically, I partied a lot. I did drugs. I experimented with everything.

everything. And so she said, you're going to go to college and you're going to get away from your friends. So without me knowing, she had driven to Lufkin, Texas to find out how can she get her son enrolled in junior college in Lufkin, Texas. How did she pick there? I think she fucking threw a dart the furthest away. I was going to say, I mean, that is not near Hoboken. Well, no, I was in Houston. Oh, Houston. Yeah. I was in Houston. And so I remember she goes, you're going to Angelina college. I said, what? She's, you're going to Angeline to college.

You're going to get a two-year degree. And I said, okay. And she says, it's not even negotiable. You're going to college. You're not going to go work with your dad. If you want to work with your dad afterwards, you can. But right now you're going to get a two-year degree. You know, she came from that class where education was so important to her, you know.

And she wanted me to have an education. She wanted her kids to be college educated. So she fucking. We packed a duffel bag and a couple things. I can't remember what else. And, you know, football. I think I took a football with me. Fuck.

Who knows? In case I was going to throw football with someone. Takes up a lot of space in the suitcase. Yeah. And she dropped me off and she sat me in front of the dean, you know. And I remember and the dean said, well, if he keeps a, I had a, I actually was a good student. Besides my SATs, I had a, I had to be average. And I had a really passion for math.

And so I took, you know, advanced algebra and I was really good at it. And he said, well, you know, he's got all the core classes. And he seems he's got good grades. He says, if he wants to go to major college afterwards, and if he has to maintain a C average here. And if he maintains a B average, he can go into a major college without a four-year school without his SAT scores. So I said, okay, great, you know. So I was going to major in business as a business associate degree. it was like the first week of class

there was this black kid and he stood up and he says I'm going to be an actor his name was Marcus Wiley and I never forget him he's like I'm going to be an actor I'm going to be famous and I remember

I had just broken up with my girlfriend I dated her I dated her all through high school she was a junior when I was her freshman so I was kind of like damn you were swinging in the big leagues I was I was swinging in the big leagues and so I was devastated

and the irony about the story is that I broke up with her and then she got with someone else and I was like fuck what did I do that I should have never done that it teaches you be careful what you wish for

and you know I was full of myself and I learned life quick life quickly taught me a lesson of humility yeah and um so you heard this guy say I'm going to be an actor and famous and you're thinking

I'm gonna do it me too I'm gonna do it because she was going to Stephen F Austin which is not too far from Lufkin so it's only like 30 minutes away it's a four year school and not too far up and it was in a town called Nacadocious.

And I said, well, can anybody audition? And he said, yeah, yeah, man, you should audition, open auditions, right after class. So I went, I used to breakdance really bad. And my audition was to be an alligator. What? Yeah, well, it was a children's show. So she said, you know, can you, you know,

what kind of animal can you do? And so I used to do the centipede. Remember the centipede in breakdancing? Yeah. Are you aware that alligators don't move? like that? I fucking did I know. So I would do the centipede and I would make a noise as an alligator.

So anyway, she cast me. All right. So your first role is a centipede alligator. My God. Centipede alligator. Okay. And then before we get off, I want to give you this gift. Okay.

But, yeah. So she loved what I did. She cast me in another children's show. And then she said. Or you then, like a giraffe horse? I played a monkey. played an alligator, a monkey. And then I played,

I was another animal. I played a parrot. Okay. What was the first human being you played? Well, so then what happened was, so she goes, you know, you're really good as an actor. If you major in theater,

I can give you a theater scholarship, you know, and it'll pay for your books, you'll give you a little bit of money. Okay. So I thought, sure. And so I told my mom, she was, do it, you know?

And so I was able to keep my business associate degree and major in theater. So I started studying acting. And I never thought myself as an actor. Studying and acting? Yeah. Do you study people? Do you study mannerisms?

Do you study dialect? It's everything. You start reading plays. You start studying playwrights. You read the classical plays. You read Shakespeare. You work on, you know, how to move your body. You know, basic acting stuff, you know, how to, you make weird noises.

And basically what they're trying to do is get you to out of yourself. The self-consciousness? Yeah, but I, because, so I moved a lot too. You know, I lived in, I was born in L.A., then I moved to Buenos Aires, Argentina, then I moved to Bogota, Colombia, then I moved to Houston. So I was the, I was the new kid a lot. And then a lot of, then there was divorces, separations, then I would go to another school.

So my self-mechanism was being a jokester. Extrovert, yeah, the forced extrovert. Yeah, and so I would always make people laugh. And I became a really good of studying behavior. I knew who to stay away from and who I can kind of become friends with. And so it was acting, being a jokester was really easy for me. And so then the second year at Angelina, she cast me in a real play. I played a drunk, it was a play called The God's Favor by Neil Simon.

It's a really well-known play. but it's the modern story of Job where Job loses everything, and I played his drunk son. And they would have these competitions and you would do these plays against other junior colleges around the state. And I got best in acting.

And it was, the play was, you know, putting on a glove, I knew how to be drunk. I knew how not to get along with my dad. I knew how to, you know, be depressed about it. I knew how to be, I knew how to yell about it. So it wasn't a hard stretch, but they loved it, you know, and I was awarded. And so, but what was really cool about it is I never really saw myself as an actor. And that second year, all like the staff, they started to look at me like a real actor.

And so then that year finished, I was going to go work with my dad. And we were having these competitions where everybody was going to audition for major universities. and I went and again, I guess my lack of confidence, I didn't prepare anything for it. And my theater director then, he goes, well, you're going to audition for the schools, right? And I said, no, no, no, his name is Mr. Vaughn. And I said, no, I think this was great.

I was able to pull the wool over people's eyes. I got some money, but I think I'm done with the acting gig. He goes, you're, fuck you are. get up in my hotel room you're going to memorize this monologue and you're going to audition and i said are you sure he goes yeah you're going to memorize it tonight and you're going to audition tomorrow and the play the monologue he gave me was a play from tally and son it's a dead vietnam soldier who comes back to his life he's dead and he's he kind of watches his family move on um oh that's a rough optic it was it was it's a beautiful play and some people are depressed some

people have moved on. And it's his whole interaction watching his family. That's the second act. So he gave me that, which is ironic, right? Because this is what I do now is telling stories of dead soldiers. Today's episode is brought to you by Element. Now, some people see this and they say LMNT, just like on the can that I am holding up in front of the camera. And some people call it that. It's called Element or actually call it both. It doesn't really matter. What are we talking about? We're talking about electrolytes. We're talking about salt. We're talking about. talking about potassium. We're talking about magnesium. We're talking about really easy, portable in these little travel containers. You can hear the shake, a variety of flavors. And now they have

sparkling element. This stuff is awesome. There's a refrigerator in the studio. Off camera, obviously, it would make no sense to have it on camera. Stock full of those. Both Michael and I, after a nice day of jiu-jitsu, we try to do jiu-jitsu and then come in and do the episodes. We both are slamming one of those things. And it drastically helps. I do remember what recovery felt like before and I remember what recovery felt like after. And because I'm an idiot, I ignored the advice of my good friend Rob Wolf, who is one of the co-founders, who was talking about all the benefits of rehydrating with an electrolyte beverage, to which I of course said, yeah, and didn't do that. So I felt like I got run over by a steamroller every time that I trained

Jiu-Jitsu. Now, I still feel like that to a degree, but my recovery is faster and my brain works better in the days that I train, that I sweat, that fluids are pouring out of me, and I rehydrate with element. My brain just works better. I'm not a scientist, but it feels like the electricity is moving through my body in a much better fashion. They do seasonal stuff. They do stuff where you can get hot chocolate. It's a variety of different types of salts. 1,000 milligrams of sodium, 200 milligrams of potassium, 600 or 60, I should say, milligrams of magnesium. That's just in one of these little packets. Looks like it's the exact same. same thing on the sparkling. I highly recommend these. I would say dilute it more than you necessarily

think. I personally think they're recommended dilution is still a little bit strong for me. And I'm also trying to increase my hydration. So I double that. I'll pour half of that into a bottle of water, slam it, half of it, nurse that one a little bit longer. And that works for me because I'm killing two birds with one stone. It's used by athletes. You could use it for keto or paleo diets. It is very adjacent friendly to those type of diets and it makes an absolute difference in performance and recovery. If that sounds like something you want to mess around with or explore, go to drinklmintee.com slash cleared hot. Here's what you're going to get. A free element tea or element, like I said, sample pack with any purchase. And don't forget to try the sparkling, the element sparkling. It's 16 ounce can of

sparkling electrolyte water. And there's a variety of flavors, just like in the packets at well. So that is drink LMNT, drink lemamik, Novembertango.com slash cleared hot. Let's get back to the show. I did that play and I got a scholar. I got a full ride to Ole Miss. So I went to Ole Miss. They called me up. They said, we love what you did.

I think you'd be great here. And I went up to Ole Miss. I had three other offers and I went to Ole Miss. And if anybody knows Old Miss, it's a big party school, Oxford, big football town, beautiful place in Mississippi. You had to wear a tie, got there. I went to a football game with a bunch of girls

and I called my mom and said, Mom, I'm going to Ole Miss. I said, I'm going to take out some money and I got some money from the scholarship and this is where I'm going. And so I went there. I always kept that monologue in the back of my pocket. And that's really where my acting career

kind of really took off. Now, I didn't really become a train actor yet. I was still fucking fucking around and still doing my thing. And anyway, I went through college. What are they, what's considered to be a trained actor? Movement, voice.

You know, you study the classics again. You keep studying the classics. That's the basics. Playwrights. You have pieces under your belt. You've done a lot of training on voice, vocal projection. So I'm just trying to array this against Hollywood. What percentage of the actors that people are generally seeing on the big screen would be considered a trained act?

Now, today, shit, probably zero. I was just going to ask that because I swear I just saw, I think it was Russell Crowe. He was asked about an acting method. And his answer was, I don't know what that is. I just figured it out. Yeah. Now, I've heard him say that, but in fairness, there's probably a thousand people that tried that path to for him to be in that spot to be able to say that.

Yeah. And he'd been acting since he was a kid. Okay. Really young. Well, not as a kid, but as a teenager. And so his, quote, no method. Figuring it out. Figuring it out was doing work for a long time.

And being mentored probably by people who had figured it out yet. Yeah. And working with other people. So why do you think in the modern era most people are not trained actors? Are they in this figure it out train as well? Because everybody wants to be famous, man. No one wants to train anymore. Do you think it shows in the final product?

I think so. I mean, what do you think of modern cinema? Is it dog shit? I don't think it's dog shit, but... And here's the litmus test. This is probably the most important question I'll ask you today. Maverick. Good movie or bad?

The last top gun? Correct. Answer carefully. With a seal. Pete Mitchell is a fucking national treasure. Okay, I was going to say, I liked it. I mean, it's Tom. You know, it's Tom, it's Tom Cruise, man.

It's good, you know? I mean, his movies are, I mean, what are you like the guy as a human being or whatever? His personal life is. His movies are entertaining, man. Yeah. You know? And I've, no, I'm messing with you. It's my wife's least favorite movie.

so I put it on TV all the time. Really? Yeah. Oh, it's so good, man. It's so good. I mean, it's a great movie, man. I mean, I watched Top of Gunn when it first came out, you know, and so... She has one question about it, and there's no real answer to it.

Why would they pick some guy who'd been in the military forever? Aren't there younger pilots who could be doing this? Why does it have to be him? Because he's top... Because he's Tom Cruise, honey. I know. I try to explain that. But she's like, no, really.

How does it really work? I'm like, there is no Pete Mitchell for real. That's an animation of like 100 people. Yeah. Yeah. No. That's a good way. I mean, I think cinema's great now, man.

I just don't think, you know, people... Look, I'm sure... So is there still value to the traditional acting path then? If they're able to create what they're create now without it? I mean, the world has changed so much now, Andy. I mean, the whole world's so different now. Yeah. I mean, I'm sure you see it in the military.

You probably look at it sideways how it's different now. Different, but I don't judge the difference. I just acknowledge that it is. You know, it's not for me to say better or worse, but it certainly is different. Yeah, for us, I mean, everyone is on this phone now, you know, and so... But is that better or worse for actors? And also, what does it mean to be an actor?

Because you see people who certainly have no training in any traditional sense of the world, but they might have millions upon millions upon billions of people who are watching them. I mean, does that make them an actor or actress? I mean, I don't know the answer to that. No, I mean, that's the thing. Everyone wants to be famous. I mean, fuck, right now, man, you could be a YouTube star or TikTok star or an only fan star. and you can be famous, rich, and you've never,

you don't even know who Shakespeare is. Yeah. You know. That's fair. So it's just a different world now, you know. I'm, you know, I don't want to age myself, but I'm in an older demographic. And so I love studying art, you know, I love the through line. I love, I mean, one of the beautiful things about my play is I love seeing the audience and the footlights, just seeing their heads silhouetted.

I just, you know, I love creating character and I love, but I mean, there's more of us out there. It's just different. Also, theater's dying. Theater is struggling right now. COVID didn't help. Their reactions to COVID didn't help. People are stuck to their phones. Getting, you know, butts in seat is always difficult.

It's just a very different world. And to be honest with you, as an actor, I don't know where it's going. I don't know. Theater specifically? Just the whole business. You know, everything is streaming. Everyone is freaking out. You know, money's getting tired of projects.

I mean, you know, I don't know if you saw the gold. Just not forget AI. AI. I'm talking about being able to damn near do anything from face to voice to background to extra. Yeah, everything. And, you know, people's attention span is not good. You know what I'm saying? I think it's better than most people would give it credit for if they can find something

that's compelling. Well, like this medium. This medium seems to have penetrated. You can do this for two, three hours, right? What do you think that is? Meanwhile, you know, I don't know anything about TikTok. So what I'm about to say is based off what I've heard other people say, it's a 15-second churn. That's a big gap between the couple hours that you and I will sit down and talk. And I think people, a person could be a fan of both. I think people have the ability to have a longer attention span than they're given credit for. They're just constantly bombarded with shorter attention span stuff. Yeah, I think, well, I think we're, at the end of the day, we're still human and we want to

learn. I mean, I'm sure you still have a hunger to learn. Constantly. Constantly. I actually, I started jujitsu six years ago, and what I love about it is it can't be mastered. Yeah, and I want to do jitutsu, and I'm dying to get into it. What's holding you back? Don't sit here.

If you're about to say, I have to get in shape first. No, no, I'm going to have Michael come over there and get you. No, I'm okay, shave. It's just, like, I don't, you know, I've got, sort of. many aches and pains from working out so many, I'm like my shoulder fucking hurts, my back, my knees. Like, Jiu-Jitsu will fix all those. Yeah, I'm sure. I'm sure. It's a zero-injury sport. There's no wear and tear. So I'm like, I mean, do I have the time? I mean, I've seen my friends have taken Jitza walking around with black eyes. I'm like, do I want to do that

right now. It's a gentle art. Yeah, it's a gentle art. So that's the only reason. But I, my son wrestles and he's a good wrestler. I just enjoy that it can't be solved. Yeah. And a lot of people, I think get lost in the winning or losing. I think it's more about just constantly getting better. And if you can't, if you can't master it, that means that your ability to microscopically get better because you might have to reduce your optic down to that size to notice the improvement, then it's still there. And I think that's pretty awesome. Yeah. Well, I mean, that's, I think that's why this medium works because people want to learn. I mean, that's how I found you. I found it really interesting. I found, again. How did you find it? Did you get somebody share a clip with you or? I don't know if I've ever, have we ever asked anybody how they found the show, Michael? I don't think so

I think it can't see it I'm curious I think I found you Have you ever been On Megan Kelly's podcast? Not that I'm aware of If I have I'm sorry Megan

For not remembering Yeah I don't think I have I was Someone shared your clip to me Again Because what I do With my play

And vets People share me All kinds of crap Oh I bet And so I came across it I loved your intro Clear Hot

And I love the beginning I remember thinking Oh the radio call Yeah I love that And I remember thinking, huh. And so. I've had all four people who claim to be. So it's a person.

And I actually have a very good friend who with 100% certainty and specificity knows exactly who it is. So there's the person in that radio call, which for everybody listening to this, it's not me. I've never claimed it to me. I've had no less than four people reach out and tell me that that person is them. And none of those people were the person that my very good friend knows well. Yeah, well, I think it's a badass intro. It's one of the best.

It's a pretty sweet intro. Yeah. And if you're like military and history, you're going to get addicted to it. Yeah, especially modern era. Yeah. And so, yeah, I think that's how I came across you. And I just thought, this is really interesting, you know. Well, here we are.

Yeah, and here I am. And I've always looking for platforms to share the play because of how important I feel that it is. It's become this new artistic mission of mine. And it's hard to get pressed now, man. It's really hard to, people just don't care. They don't want to talk about it. You know, the world's become so politicized now that's, unless. They don't want to talk about theater in general or the subject matter of your play.

The subject matter of the play. Well, let's get into. Talk to me about the play, so we can kind of unpack maybe why that is. Well, so the plays, what happened with the play is based off the letters from vets, from the revolution through the Iraq and Afghanistan. And so I kind of put it together. and I'll just take a one step back and how the play became the play.

When I finally got it up in 2015, a lot of festivals had told me no, and one festival was a whole journey. I couldn't find a director, no one knew what to do with it, and I even threw the play in the fucking trash can. My wife pulled it out.

She said, stopped being a baby. Once you just memorize a monologue, go find a director, show them what you do. So I did that. And so, you know, I did it for five people. they're like, yeah, it's kind of interesting. And then when I finally got like a 20-minute version of it, I did it at the Bowery Poetry Club at the Lower East Side

for a festival called Mono Amano, which actually had denied me earlier. All the festival had denied me. And so when I finished the play, it's based off a letter from vets from the Revolution to Iraq and Afghanistan. When I finished the play, I was just so happy, man, that I fucking got this project up

because I've been researching it since 2007. and I didn't know what to do with it. I couldn't find it. And I was getting so frustrated. I mean, I would talk to directors and they would say, I don't think anybody's into it. You know, I don't know what you want to do with that. You know, and they'd have all kinds of different ideas.

So how do you do it? Are you playing a character that is the person writing the letter? No, I play 14 characters. Okay. And each character is trying to come home, either spiritually, physically or emotionally. So this is through the lens of 14 different soldiers throughout the history. Except one.

One guy comes three times. He's kind of like the narrator of the play. He starts the play in the beginning. beginning. He talks about discipline. He goes, I learned three things in the military. First thing I learned was discipline. And he goes through a monologue and I do a scene. Does he get up at 4.30? What's that? Does he get up at 4.30 in the morning? Well, we don't know, but we can assume he gets before 30. He gets yelled at a lot. It gets yelled at that. Is his name Jocko?

Are you out there playing Jock? Yeah. I played. I sound like Jocko in that first monologue. Okay. He is well known for his approach to discipline and waking up at times that I prefer to be sleeping. Yeah, you know, I even shared the play with him. When he first came on Twitter, I shared it with him, and we follow each other. And every once in a while we'll send a message, and I told him about the play.

Please tell me he sent you a one-word response of good. Good. He said good. Or I once asked him, you know, what about, it was a couple years back. I said, man, what about, no Netflix? He goes, negative. Negative.

He is a bespoke human being. Yeah. Yeah. He's stoic. He is that definition of modern stoism. Yeah. All right. So through the lens of soldiers, except for guys there, three times.

Three times. And so, but when I first performed it, when I thought that that was going to be the end of it, um, a, a gold star sister came up to me. She had lost her brother in Afghanistan. And she was really, really emotional. And I really had thought, Andy, that that was going to be the only time I was going to do this play. That was it. And, um, she said.

I don't know if you know what you're doing, but I hope you don't stop because it's really important. And she had told me about her brother. And that was, you know, I thought, hmm, maybe I'm kind of on to something. It was only 20 minutes, you know. It was a lot of guys there in the time. You crank through that many people in 20 minutes.

Say what? You were able to make it through all those characters in 20 minutes? No, at that time, at that time it was only like six characters. Okay, I was going to say. Holy cow, that's like two minutes per letter. Yeah, I know. And the end. The end.

Which might work today with people's attention. No, the play now is 90 minutes. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. I was even say, my goodness. Yeah, no, it's 90 minutes, man. And so anyhow, my director, who I had paid to come on board, he was like, well, maybe

you're on to something. He goes, what, do you want to keep going? And I said, yeah, man, I think, you know, maybe I can find another festival. and I like to do this play. He says, well, let's work on it a little bit more together. Let me ask you this. You wrote this. You put the time in to do all of the research,

which I bet felt more like a passion project anyway or an addiction or something, just a gravitational pole for you. Yeah. You're the one up there performing. It's a single person's show. What is the role of the director if you're the only person up there

and you did all that legwork? Oh, a lot. You know, he's, I should give him a shout out. I'm not saying it negatively. I'm just curious. No, no, no. I mean, you know, you know, go here. I think you look, this is a good move for you here, sit here. So objective outside

feedback. Yeah, to a degree. Sometimes if you're struggling with a piece, you know, I think what this character is going through is this. You know, I think this is, you know, asking questions. Okay. Like, why is he doing that? You know, and you're like, I don't know. Well, you need to figure that out. I think that's what, that's what you're struggling on. You don't know why he's saying those words. Okay. And so they kind of, you know, kind of like a shepherd, you know. But at the end of the day, it's your butt on the, it's, it's your ass on stage. So we did it. We flush it out to 50 minutes.

Again, I thought this was just going to be a passion project. I had struggle with it. I would, I mean, I would sit in bed every night saying, please help me find a director. Please, I believe in incantations. And so I would just tell myself, please let me find a director. And I don't know. I, is that like witchcraft? Kind of, but it works, man.

Like, if you want something... Does it always work? It does. It does. I don't think that's true. No, I think if you, if you're something you want, Andy, and you stay in bed every night and you say it, it'll happen. Why do you have to be in bed? Is this like a kink?

No. No, you don't have to be in bed, but you need to say it. You just said you're in bed, so... But I think if you put it out there, it comes, it comes to you. I really do believe that. So, anyhow, I found my director. I think there's a lot of people out there saying every night in bed that they want to be rich and famous that are not. It might argue against that particular premise, but that's neither here nor there.

Yeah. Well, I can dive into that. But I think if you tell yourself you want something enough and you believe that that's what you're going to do, thought leads into behavior. Behavior leads into action. Action leads into character. Character leads into results. That I can buy into.

Right. And so, yeah, if you just sit there and you're eating juicy fruits and bonbons and you say, I want to be a billionaire. It's a classic pairing, though. Yeah, if you jelly donuts, I want to be a seal and all you don't do shit, you know, you're not going to be a seal. You have not seen the fat seals that I have seen. Are they getting fatter?

I don't know, but there are guys I worked with that if asked to find their dick with their clothes off. But that's now. It would be a search and rescue mission. That's post seal, right? No. You mean while in combat? No way. Yeah.

Really? Yes. So everybody has this. everybody has this perception that, you know, at least when you're in combat or you're in the military as a seal, when you're enlisted. Now, we're talking people who have an extraordinary amount of PSI tension on the belt buckle and top button on their pants. What is the pressure? You mean pressure? I mean, their stomach, their belly pushing out.

How the fuck can you be a seal when you're fat? That is a good question. because supposedly there's standards that are supposed to be... But when you were in combat, was anybody fat next to you? Yes. Really? Yes. I'm not saying it was the norm.

Chubby or fat? I mean, out of shape? Both. We're talking land whales. Am I blowing your mind right now? Fuck yeah. Fuck yeah. I mean, as a civilian, you have this perception.

Soldiers, I can see that, but you have a perception. that special op guys, Green Berets, Rangers, seals, that you guys are going to be in the tip top, tippity, tip, tip, top of your shape. From a performance perspective and ability, you know, to shoot, move, and communicate, I'd say that that's true, special operations at large.

I can only speak for the community I came from, but I'm going to reach out tonight to some buddies of mine that span the special operations community, and I'm going to ask him, did you ever serve with anybody that was fat? And I hesitate to use terms like always and never, but I feel like there's a really high level of certainty

having to get some feedback that, you know, Meal Team 6 or Gravy Seals, we're not the only people dealing with that issue. Oh, well, I would have never thought that. I would have never thought that is. It's just people, man. Well, yeah, but I mean, you know, certain disciplines require certain things, right?

It's a grind. Well, that I do believe, but I mean... And at some point and time for people, they just give up. I wouldn't say they give up. I'll say their standards are more, on a slide rule than etched into stone. Yeah.

Well, I mean, I guess I can understand the grind to a degree because I used to be, you know, when I trained and I, you know, I was always really lean, really in shape. I was addicted to it. But I would have these, like now we have two kids, you know, I was like, you know, give me the mechen cheese. You know, like I've done dieting. But so I understand. Maca cheese is a gift from heaven.

Oh, dude. I'm not a religious man at all, but it's a gift from heaven. Yeah, with lobster. Now you're talking my wife's language. She's powerfully Italian. Yeah. Is your wife Italian? Yeah.

You ever watched the old movie, Tron movies? I didn't, actually. Okay. Their outfits, you know, it had like the neon. And it's actually funny. If you go back and look at it now, the special effects were just absolute dog shit. Oh, yeah. But they would drink from the water and it would make them glow more.

And I feel like that's lobster mac and cheese for my wife. Oh, she glows? She could just, a pasta, she could be having a shit day or like a hard day on the match. She's a jiu-jitsu coach. Oh, is she really? Yeah. She's a world champion black belt. Oh, gosh.

And, but like if she's having, she's had a day and, and you get some mac and cheese, a little lobster mac, and she just starts glowing. Is that how you guys met to jih Tzu? Yeah. She used to beat my ass. Oh, really? Yeah. You have kids? I have three kids from her previous marriage.

How old are your kids now? 21, 19, and 16. Oh, that's cool. 15 and 11. Yeah. It's wild. Yeah, it's definitely while watching your kids grow up. Watching my son, yes.

What's really wild is sitting here watching me blow your mind about fat seals. I'm so happy that I can provide this optic for you. Yeah, no, that definitely blew my optic. But, yeah, I just would have never thought that. But so I, anyhow, I took to play. My wife is from Scotland, and so I had performed in this festival called the Edinburgh Festival French. It's a huge festival for theater. Broadway goes there. West End goes there. Are they looking for things that perhaps they want to bring back? What's the purpose of the festival?

Everything. It's everything. You know, when I did it in 2005, there's 1,500 shows. When I did it in 2015, there's 3,500 shows. And I think it's even bigger now. I mean, everyone's going there for all kinds of reasons. But it's three weeks. It's in Edinburgh, Scotland. And so... I've been there. It's a beautiful place. Oh, it's beautiful. I got married there at the Royal ICM Theater. Yeah, yeah. I used before my mother-in-law passed away,

but we used to go there all the time to see her. And it was a second home to me, Scotland. So my wife said, I was going to do it at this festival called the New York Fringe Festival. And they went bankrupt. So I didn't have a festival. And she goes, let's just take you to Scotland. You've performed there. We could stay at my parents' house.

You can do it there. It'll be great. So that's what we did. I took it to Scotland. I didn't even have a name for it. I called it the American soldier because you had to put a name down to apply to a theater. Blank would probably be tough. Yeah.

It was called Brothers Keeper, Brothers in Arms. And then it just didn't feel right. And my wife just call it the American soldier because that's what you're doing. You're doing the American soldier. What do you call it? Yeah. It's the American soldier. It stayed there.

It just stayed that way. And so I performed. And so what people don't know about the French is like it's very acceptable. if you suck for people to get up and walk out of the theater. It's kind of cool to go there. That is what I am talking about. Yeah. And you can say anything on the way.

They don't really say anything, but they're quite happy walking out with their pint of beer. You can bring a pine in. And if you suck, they just, you can literally see people. Real-time feedback. Real-time feedback. We don't like your play.

So you're always hoping to, and it's very common to only have like five people in your play, three people in your play, I mean, in the audience. Is that tough as a performer to have that small of a crowd? Fuck, yeah, it's tough. And there's an old saying, you know, if there's, if there's more people on stage and there is in the audience, you should probably shut down your play. But because it was a one-man show, I could get away with it.

Yeah. I mean, you'd have to have a very small audience. Yeah. And so, but before I went to Edinburgh, you needed press to go there. And so there was this one off-broadway theater in New York called the, it was called 59 East 59th, and did a festival called, eastbound to Edinburgh. And any play that was going from New York to Scotland, you could perform for a week in there,

and anybody who didn't want to go to Scotland could see the plays that were going from New York there. And so they heard about my play, and they said, we'd love to have you in the festival. Would you like to do it? And I said, yeah, let's do it. So I did it. And I was still thinking that this is not going to be much,

and I was nervous. And I remember a, a reviewer from the Huffington Post. She was reviewing another play, and she saw the name of the play, The American Soldier. Now this is 2015, we were deep into the Middle East.

She goes, I like to review your play. Can I get a ticket? And I remember thinking, fuck, I don't want my play reviewed because it's going to, she's going to hate it

because I still didn't have my confidence in me. The last time I did it was for those eight people on the lower east side of Manhattan, and I was really just trying to get this play up. And it was really for me. You know, it was just for me to do it. and she gave me a fucking crazy review positive.

She just loved it. So I was able to take that to Scotland and put it on, you know, use it as press, use it in the magazines because there's so many shows that people are trying to filter out what not to see. And so I was using flawless and powerful by the Huffington Post everywhere. At that time, the Huffington Post was a big piece of media. Still is in some circles. Yeah, some circles. So it was three weeks we're on.

first week, I had about more people than normal because I had family there. My wife's family was there and I had some friends there. So I would always get eight, nine people in the audience, you know. And that piece of post brought in a somebody from the Amnesty International Award for the United Kingdom. And they go around watching plays for theater excellence and they give a voice to the voiceless. So she saw my play on the end of the first week. and after that my place sold out and I was nominated for an Amnesty Award and out of 3,500 shows,

I was shortlisted in the top 100 place to go see so the place was packed and everyone was seeing it. And what was really cool there is that I didn't, I was always nervous doing the American soldier but what I didn't understand there is that a lot of Aussies, Scots, and Irish were dealing with PTSD as much as Americans were. For sure.

And they were fighting in the same battles we were. And I would finish the play and I would just get swarmed by these guys and families. And they were like, and they would share their stories with me and they would be emotional. And they were saying, you know, I fought here and I fought there. And gosh, you know, I know you're doing the American soldier, but this is our story, you know. Is it more nerve-wracking to perform in front of a small? audience or a packed house? For me, it's more, probably, I don't know if it's more nerve-wracking.

It's more, you have to really drum yourself up for a small house. You have to kind of focus and like, you know, why am I doing this? Do you get nervous when you go on? I don't. I don't. I can go back to that ability. I've always had an ability. In fact, actors have come up to me.

I mean, when I was studying with Wynn Handman, I very well-known acting teacher, I was, in class with Gretchen Mall. She was a very well-known actor. She was the girlfriend to Matt Damon and Rounders. I don't know if you saw that. Oh, yeah. I know who you're talking about it. She was in my class.

Chris Cooper was in my class. So I was in class. Rounders is a good movie. Great movie. It's a sleeper. It's a sleeper. It's a great movie. But, I mean,

actors would always tell me, you know, you always had to present your work in front of a in a scene. And people always say, me, fuck. like actors would look for drugs to take to calm their nerves down. Really? Yeah, swear to God. Man, I don't know if that's a great profession to pursue.

No, I remember one guy particularly because I get so nervous. I don't know how you do it, you know? And I'm like, just breathe, man. It's just, you know, people ask me that. I did an interview not too long ago, but I experienced so much trauma that making a full of myself in front of people was the least thing that I was worried about. Like, it just didn't even hit your. radar. It wasn't even on the spectrum. Like, if I fail, to this day, if I fail, I've had a good run. It's all about the journey for me now. I mean, obviously, I've been able to develop some, some understanding of where my life is going now and some perspective, you know, about the journey. Like, here I am, you know. My acting has brought me in front of a Navy SEAL. I would have never been in a fucking million years. I wouldn't put that much on a pedestal. Well, I will.

tell you some stories where you might rethink your orbit of the world for that job title. Well, for me, it's a great pleasure and honor to be in front of you. Also, I'm not a seal anymore. That was over almost a decade and a half ago. Oh, X seal. Vet, hero, veteran. Definitely not a hero. Okay, veteran.

Fair enough. Fair enough. So, but it's all about the journey, right? And so I always had the ability not, I mean, you know, I had a little bit of anxiousness coming here. Sometimes at the Kennedy Center, I have a little bit of anxiousness. You know, but, you know, I just, you know, I look at perspective. I tell myself something that I learned when I would get a little bit anxious or a little bit nervous.

I said, these are energies and just kind of, you know, enjoy them. And, you know, imagine that, you know, this is going to be the last time you're going to have a conversation with this guy or this person or this moment. and make the most of it. And so that will always calm me down. But yeah, so I never got nervous, so to say. Anxious, yeah, you get a little bit anxious, natural human being. But you focus. But having nobody in the audience or three people in the audience.

That's got to be tough to put it on in like an A plus performance. Yeah. And so you have to kind of like, you know, hmm, you know, like, you know, what am I? I'd say switch the opt to, like, listen, this is a practice. but we're going to give to everything. Yeah. You know what I mean?

Whatever you got to do, talk yourself into it, for sure. How do you do the play? Do you go sequentially through time? Do you bounce around a little bit? I bounce around. So I start off with the, I start off modern, the guy would discipline.

He says, I learn three lessons in the military, and he goes through discipline. And then I go to the revolution, and then I go to Vietnam. And I go to a mother who says goodbye to her son, Eleanor Wimbish, who I know the family now. son died in 68 in a helicopter crash and she goes to the wall

and she says bite her her son and then after the Vietnam piece I go to I'm sorry after after the Vietnam after the second after the first lesson I go to the revolution

oh I did revolution then the Vietnam piece then I go to second lesson and after the second lesson that same character comes back out and he talks about teamwork what I learn is about teamwork he makes fun of a soldier

and then he realizes, you know, what I've realized, that we're all in just together and no man's above another man and the way you survive is by helping your fellow man. And that's his second lesson he learns in the military. And then I go to World War II. I do an Iwo Jima letter. And that kind of gives the realities of war. It's a really graphic piece.

And then I go from there, I go to Vietnam, Vietnam Johnny, smoking a joint, talking about what being in the, jungles like talking about people marching and protesting back home but also wanting to get back home and after Vietnam I do a jacked up guy from Iraq who doesn't know which way is home he wants to be there with his guys he wants to come back home can't no matter what his wife says it's so meaningless and senseless in some of the lines you know I try to explain this to my wife and my friends, but they'll never understand. They'll never understand. I go to that piece, Iraq. And then I play

a, um, uh, Afghanistan, I play a woman who she's alone and her husband is on three deployments to Afghanistan. And she talks about, you know, I'm making dinner tonight. And I realize that, um, I forget that when I'm preparing dinner, that Mike is leaving us tonight and then we're going to have to sit alone at the dinner table. And then I play her son who talks about I miss my dad. I miss when he goes away. It's not really, it's hard for me to say bye to my dad. I promised him I'll be really strong.

I don't think I'm doing a really good job. And then I play a father who loses his son to suicide, Kevin and Joyce Lucy, who I know really well now. And then I play a female vet who loses her eye in combat, Nancy, who I met during COVID. And then I go to the Civil War. And then I go to back to a,

Afghanistan. I play a one-arm soldier who loses his arm in combat. He's Hispanic. And then I go to World War I, Irving Greenwald. I wrote a play for the Library of Congress and a lot of his materials from that play. He fought in the Lost Battalion. And then I go to World War I. And then I finished to play with the last monologue, the same guy comes out again. And there's a guy he was making fun of in the middle and he talks about now that guy loses his life in Afghanistan by an IED and he's an army ranger and when they say the goodbyes, they all put their ranger tab at the memorial for their fallen soldiers. And then he says, I realize now I'm part of an amazing history. But what I realize now is I'm part of a brotherhood and he marches away. And that's the play. out of all those acts is there one that's more difficult for you to do than others yeah the son the father who loses his son that that one is always in my play there's always a father's son through line again this life is weird it's a love letter to my dad even though i didn't get along

well with my dad um i guess it's that looking for that um looking for that father's son relationship you know so those were pieces that always spoke to me really emotionally you know when the mother says goodbye to her son you know I so I have a great relationship with my son and I made a point of breaking the cycle that I had with my dad not uncommon yeah well there's basically two ways it goes yeah you stop the shit from rolling downhill or you keep it up picking up and you start hucking even more yeah that's a great way to put it you hook you even more so we you know you know In fact, today my son called me, and he was telling me his time on the 40-yard dash. She played sports.

And he got, I'll say it on this podcast, he got the highest English. He's a really smart kid. My wife's really smart. But his English teacher pulled him aside and said, you got the highest score on the English final exam out of the whole. He's in ninth grade, out of the whole ninth grade. That's awesome. Yeah. And he was really proud.

And he told me. And I said, yeah. And I said, it's fucking badass son. Yeah. Are you doing uniform changes? What are you wearing a plus? So I wear kind of a version of a costume, you know, combat boots, you know, green pants and a green fatigue t-shirt and a version of a version of a dress-up Army shirt. And that's kind of my only costume.

Okay. I use props a lot. I use props. I use... What kind of props you got out there? Cups, whiskey bottles, beer cans, candles, a diary. So what's on the stage? Is it a largely open stage?

So the stage is usually, it's a flag behind me, six by nine American flag. Are there pictures of this online? Yeah. Michael. What would Michael put into Google to pull that up? Because we can look at it on the TV and you can describe it for the viewer. Yeah, www.

The American Soldier Solosho.com. I mean, that would probably be a good place to start. Michael's a master Googler. God, this TV does weird shit. I know. There you are. Okay, yeah. There you go.

Yeah. You can scroll down. I'm trying to think where I have my more images. Yeah, as you come down, you'll see images. It's got to be while being up there just by yourself. Yeah. You might be impressed with the job title of Navy SEAL. I would rather get shot at over and over and over and over and over and over again

than get up on stage by myself and have to do some shit like this. Yeah. I always left because I used to reach out to, can you scroll the other way? No, the other way. Yeah. Yeah. Right there. Again, my life, I find it funny that that guy is going to be the DOD.

Hagsith, yeah. We think. And I think... How do you think that'll play out? I think he's going to become the DOD. I don't think it'll be easy, but I think he'll... The margins will be in his favor.

Yeah, I think so. I think with what's happened with the, like, the women getting burned on the subway in New York, I think people are realizing... That's not really a DOD issue, though. No, it's not, but it's the culture issue that is pushing the other direction that people are going to try to push away from.

I do believe that... that life and politics intertwined is a little bit like a pendulum. Yeah. And I do believe that the reason that the outcome of the election was what it was and the color changes on the map were what they were is because people, whether they were vocal or not before, during, or after the election, they voted in the booth. And they voted. Your pocketbook.

Well, they voted that the pendulum may have gone to touch too far, so we're going to course, correct. Yeah. And I think that's why he'll get through. Yeah. Keep on scrolling down there. Let's see what we got. Yeah. Yeah, you can...

There's links, you know. That's a great story right there. So that... So I did the play in New Jersey once. And that's been the... I've become friends with all these vets. I mean, I get messages from vets all the time, you know? And that's been why...

I mean, I can tell stories about vets who were really broken down in the Q&As, but this one was a very... I was in New Jersey. And I finished a play. I did a Friday, Saturday, and Sunday performance. and I remember I saw this older lady, her name is Rose,

and I saw her off the show, and she gave me a big a hug, and she was really complimentary of the work. I saw her on Saturday as well. I said, didn't I, were you here yesterday? Because, yeah, I needed to see it again, son. I just think what you're doing is so special, so beautiful. Then I saw her on Sunday with two friends. She had brought two older ladies as well,

and they were all civilian nurses who went to Vietnam to help the Red Cross. to help the Red Cross. And she wrote me this note. I have this letter, and so I asked her permission. Everybody who I have here, I have their permission. And I said, she said, if you ever hear a bird singing in the trees, that's me singing your prayers. And I was, I mean, okay, of all the things people could ever say, I did not think you were going to say that.

Yeah. Yeah. But I mean, I can tell other stories, too. you mean, if you go, I mean, if you go up to the menu, I'm sorry, I forgot. Michael. Michael. I don't know why I was going to take. Michelle.

Michael. If you go to, oh, I'm sorry, scroll down. Keep going down veteran letters. Keep coming down. I'll tell you this. Just keep smoothly coming down. Keep coming down. Keep coming down.

Keep coming down. Keep coming down. Right there. Go up. Right there. So you would read. Veteran testimonials right there. Yeah, click that.

And if you go up a little bit, see that chopper? Yeah, that chopper one on the far left. The Apache, yep. Yeah. So that guy, no, not that one, far left, that was the Vietnam. She was a very powerful message. She saw me in Iowa. So I kept his, he asked me to hide his name.

I did it in the place taking me everywhere. I mean, I've done chocolate factories, the Kennedy Center. I did her Bannerman Island right across from West Point. Yeah. How many times have you performed it now? Man, I've done the play now. Ten years now, but it's been in over 40 cities, 35 states. Do you want to continue doing it?

Are you thinking ahead the future to a new project? Or can you do both simultaneously? I think you do both simultaneously. For a long time, I was wondering if the message was not wanted anymore. It's going to Wayne and Wax. I definitely believe you, Wayne. When you say Wax, you mean like crash? Eb and flow.

Yeah, that's a good way to put it. That's what's happening. But I keep getting bookings. People keep wanting to see. And that was kind of what I reached out to you because I've seen it's been really interesting. The play has so many different layers. But it's been really interesting when I go to small towns, two more Iowa, Champaign, Illinois,

is a red hook New York. A lot of the people who love the play who want to see the play are an older demographic that are trying to remember the America that doesn't kind of exist anymore and they're holding on. And they're in these small towns that has, that it's been hollowed out by all the manufacturing.

They're gone. There's no jobs there. And all the young people have left. And I've kind of, have noticed this layer in the past couple of years, you know, as I've been doing three, four years now. I've been doing the play in these small towns. I mean, I did the Canning Center this year, which was D.C., big, you know, city. But it's been really fascinating me to see the, what we've done to the small town with the manufacturers, all the jobs being shipped away.

And these small towns now are being held by old Americans, American veterans from V. Vietnam, Korea, some from Iraq, you know, and they're trying to hold, and they're trying to hold on to a, they're trying to remember or hold on to a version of America that has, it's been forgotten or is being ignored. And I find that parallel really fascinating to me now because as we ignore vets, vets are struggling, especially with the debacle of Afghanistan recently, now it's the same parallel what we've done with the manufacturing jobs in our town and these small towns that are being hollowed out, completely hollowed out, because the young base is leaving because there's no work there because there's no jobs there. And so the only thing that's left there basically is old Americans

who grew up there who haven't left and immigrants who, you know, the waiting tables or whatever. and they're the ones who are holding the town together in a weird way. But slowly these towns are really dying out, you know? And, I mean, I was just in Bloomberg, PA. I did it twice there. They brought me back. And, I mean, I was the fire mars. I mean, they made me the parade marshal.

I don't know if that's a good thing or a bad thing. It was cool. But then, you know, they had like the high school kids and they did the Pledge of Allegiance and they did the, they sang the Star-Spangled Banner. And so it's small towns that are trying to hold on, you know. And then when they see the play, they're like, why doesn't everybody see this play? How come does it know this play?

So I have found that, and I don't know what the answer is or what that means, but I found that a parallel track between how we've treated a lot of our vets and what we've done to our manufacturing jobs in our small towns. Does that make sense? It does. I can see some parallels there, yeah. Yeah. I mean, you know, we've lost, you know, when NAFTA started probably around a million jobs that have been kicked out, you know, two out of three jobs are overseas now.

So I don't know what that means, but I do know that it is kind of cool doing the play in these small towns and giving these guys, I don't know what, hope or feel good, you know, making them feel good about, you know, what they did, what they served, what the country. means to them. Yeah. I mean, that's kind of... I think it reminds people what the cost is. Yeah. Yeah, I think... I mean, well, I think that that's what's really...

You asked me about them, you know, can I keep going? And I wonder about that, you know? What do you want to? Where I get really turned on is when, at the end of the play, vets are coming up to me and sharing me their stories. That's... The play is really... It's 90 minutes, but it's kind of like two acts.

You have the first act, which is the play. And then we have a Q&A afterwards, it organically because I couldn't get off stage because people wanted to find out what my deal was. You know, did I serve, which I did not. Why am I doing it? Where did you get the material from? You know, what's the deal? I wonder if you could almost create an extension of it or another play based off the interactions you've had with vets after. Yeah. Because you're probably bombarded with stories. Oh, dude. It's endless. I mean, I've had stories. I mean, I guess we can talk. I mean, so this guy right here. So when I did it at a Bannerman. Jayce? Jayce. Yeah. His name is. We'll just

His first name is John, but... Easy. Don't be doxin people. Big dude. Big guy. He's probably 6-4-6-5. And I was outside in front of Bannerman Island, and he was standing like this. In the back, it was outside performance. And I remember thinking, this guy is going to fucking give me the right act. Like, you know, this guy's going to tell me, who the fuck do you think you are doing these letters? Just guess people are big sometimes. Doesn't mean they're scary.

Yeah, well, when they don't smile, it kind of, it leans into scary. That's called an R-Barr. What's an RVF? RBSing bitch face. Oh, resting bitch face. It's taught in the military. Yeah, so he was a medvac crew chief gunner. And anyhow, he came up to me and he says, can I talk to you?

And I said, yeah. And he just broke down in tears. This big old dude hugging me, crying. And then we sat down, we talked. And he told me his son was serving in Syria. and he was dealing with PTSD and he was worried about him and we talked about the play

we talked about what it meant and he's a great guy he that was in 2017 he texts me all the time keep doing what you're doing keep doing what you're doing yeah and then there was another

I mean there's I mean if you go back I can I mean I know all these stories you know candy clothes she talked about PTSD scroll down a little bit. So this guy here, so he saw me in New Hampshire. He took his life, unfortunately. Rest in peace. But he, you know, saw me in New Hampshire, told me a story. Yeah. And his mom called me and let me know that. Is that Arlington on the left? Yeah. Yeah. Have you been? Yeah. Fuck yeah.

Plenty of times. I don't have the words for how overwhelming that sea of white headstones is. Oh, man. It's, it's quite somber. It's quite hollow, hollow ground there. Yeah, I've been there many times. Every time I go to D.C., I try to go. Yeah. So, you know, these people, they write me their stories. You know, they write me in their letters. And I've become friends, you know, with, you know, Kevin and Joyce Lucy.

They lost their son. He took his life. And he fought in Iraq. And that was a crazy story because when I was performing it, they, throughout the whole time, someone would always say, hey, I know that. I know that letter. And I said, and then I thought, fuck. by chance, did I pick this guy's family or something, you know?

And then he says, no, but it's like my grandfather. It's like my mother or like my dad. But in Cape Cod, this guy stands up because I know that family. Those are the Lucy's. And I was like, holy shit, that is, because I know the character's name, Jeff Lucy. And he says, they would want to meet you. and so he hooked me up with them. The father wrote a book,

and I was nervous when he called me. And a lot of, especially the Gold Star families, they're just really grateful that I'm keeping their families. The name's not forgotten. Yeah, the name's not forgotten. And they text me all the time to every Christmas, every Thanksgiving. I get a beautiful message from Kevin, Kevin Lucy.

They came and saw my play for the first time in Connecticut last year, I think it was, which was kind of, that was kind of scary doing his, his son's story, his story about his son in front of them. I bet they loved it. They did. They did. They were, they're beautiful people, man.

They're so supportive. And they always tell me, you know, thank you for not forgetting. And then, you know, Eleanor Wimbish, you know, Deer Bill letter was a very famous letter. So, you know, I do these letters and by, you know, you do the play long enough and you start knowing the family. and they start reaching out to you. And yeah, and so you wonder, you know, do I keep going, you know? But, you know, I mean, 30,000 vets have taken their lives since 9-11. Far more than killed in combat, for sure.

Yeah, seven around, I think seven, at seven or a little bit more than seven died in combat. I think it's in the low eights, but, I mean, seven or eight. I should say it's very, very, very safe to say that suicide deaths have eclipsed that. Yeah, it's times four. Yeah. It's times four. And one of the things that a lot of the veterans. have always told me,

um, who have seen the play, I've said, the play is really important because it reminds people what, like you said earlier, what the sacrifice was. Yeah, the cost.

The cost. And they want people to know, but they can't say it. And so I think that's been the success of the play. The success of the play has been that it, it depicts reality. It's a clear version. I mean,

I have veterans, I've become friends with a lot of veteran therapists as well, equine therapist, and, uh, they've all said, you know, this play is so great because it's the only, way I can explain to people what PTSD is. It's the only way I can explain it. And so how it keeps

going. I mean, I was in Texas just last year and when I finished to play, I was talking gab with people in the theater and I saw this guy up and sitting down and he was just staring at me. This was just last year and Thanksgiving, I'm Fredericksburg, Texas. And I'm, uh, I'm I just, I looked at him to the corner of my eye and thinking, I said, are you all right, man? I said, do you want to talk? So a lot of times they just want to talk to me privately. And he started walking down the theater down the steps and he just literally fell in my arms and broke down.

And he had done like seven deployments. He was a Marine. And he told me all of his buddies have taken their lives. He was the only one left. And so I never know what to say, really, besides. It's nothing you can say. Yeah. I told him not to give up.

I told them to talk, find passion. And I tell them, you know, like I have a line in the letter, you owe it to the guys who didn't come back to stay here. I mean, what do you say? I mean, any suggestions? I listen, usually. Yeah. Try to remind people that nothing is permanent unless you make it. Nothing lasts forever.

High points, low points. It might seem like it's going to, but it doesn't. Yeah. Unless you make a really shitty choice. Yeah. I get that question a lot. Yeah, you know, it starts with being able to listen, hear them out, hear how they're feeling. Yeah, it's a tough one.

It's a tough one for sure. Yeah, so you wonder, you know, how much important the play is. But like this year, I mean, so I'm supposed to go back to Virginia to the American Revolution Museum. I just got called, and they want me to perform it for, what's the base on Kentucky and, Tennessee. Is that the 82nd? Could be. I'm not super familiar with your own basis. Yeah, there. They want me to bring the play there. Apparently some generals want to see it. Where else am I going? The Citadel. Well, we can do better than that. I mean, unfortunately, I got to get you back to the coffee shop in like the next 10 minutes. Great.

Where can people reach out to you? To that website, the American Soldier.com. Is there a contact down there? Like, if somebody hears this in their interest, they want to bring it to wherever they are. that's the place to do it? Yeah. Okay. What do you want to leave people with closing thoughts-wise? I think before close, I want to give you this.

What is it? All right. So. That would not be a dildo wrapped inside of that. Damn it. I have a friend of mine who hunts. He's a big-time hunter. And he makes these knives.

Okay. And, oh, fuck, I left the card. Oh, anyway. You don't need the card. If only we were connected via electronic means. Yeah. but it's at squidloch creations.com. I told him I gave it to him.

I give him a shout out. But it's a really good medal. He's a big time hunter. I can tell you, if I had time and tell you an alligator hunter, we used to go out. It's very sharp. We used to go gator hunting.

Please tell him thank you for me. That's awesome. Yeah. Yeah. So at squidlow creations.com. Okay. And so I wanted to give you that. Thanks for having me here, bro.

Of course. What do you want to lead people with? I, thank you for everyone's service. I think it's important. that we keep these stories alive. I think it's critical as a society, that we remember those who are willing to raise their right hand to fight for us

and not forget because, you know, as a nation, if we forget these stories, I think, in a way, kind of like we was talking about the towns, we start hollowing out ourselves as a nation. I agree. And I think it's important. And the Greeks knew that. You know, the Greeks used to, the Greeks would have ceremonies.

The Cherokees knew that. And so it kept the fist of the society and the fighters together. And they were able to always be connected and they always understood each other. And so when they had to do service or sacrifice, they were willing to do it because they knew the people behind them were going to knew their sacrifices. And I think that's important. So, yeah, I think that's what I would like to leave. I'm just grateful to be here, brother. I'm glad you made the trip, man.

Yeah. We'll do it again for sure. Thank you for coming out. All right, man. Bye, bye.