Girl on Guy with Aisha Tyler - girl on guy 177: jessalyn gilsig

Episode Date: March 24, 2015

join jessalyn gilsig of vikings, glee, and nip/tuck and aisha as they sail through summering in Ireland, nonverbal communication, blind ambition, on set bravery, off-set kindness, breaking patterns, surrendering to the moment, and not being ready for success. plus jessalyn abuses the hell out of an answering machine. the machine had it coming. girl on guy is headed for valhalla.

This is Girl on Guy. Hey, everybody, welcome to Girl on Guy, 177. Welcome to the show. I am actually recording this in my dressing room at Who's Line Is In Any Way, where we are busy, furiously making season three of Who's Line Is It Anyway, which you may or may not have recently discovered, debuts Friday, April 17th. That is coming at you like a speeding train, like a bat out of hell, like a juggernaut, like an asteroid from near-Earth orbit.

So get ready for that. Season 3 of Whose Line is going to be massive and dominant and extraordinarily delightful. And the boys are at the top of their game. So that's happening. We're making it now, and it premieres in a month. Very exciting. So that's news.

This is an advertising free episode of Girl on Guy, which I'm very happy to be bringing you this week. And so all I will say, pursuant to that is to go visit me at Aisha Tyler.com. Say hi, learn more. Follow me online. And get your Girl on Guy gear. Go to girl and guy.net. Click on the store where you can get all of your girl and guy,

Armywear, t-shirts, posters, books, stickers, and more. So go check that out. And you can follow me at the variety of social media outlets where I post, including Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr. There's more. I'm sure there's more. Who say? There's so many. Too many for me to maintain, which you may discover when you visit them all. But follow me because I try to spread information across all of those. No stand-up dates, as I've mentioned previously. Well, very few stand-up dates, but there is one. It is Saturday, May 9th at Bullseye Comedy Night at the BAM Festival in Brooklyn. That is one of very, very few live dates I will be doing in 2015 as I worked very hard on launching Courage and Stone.

So I encourage you to go to that if you're anywhere nearby. But other than that, I will be keeping you posted on the machinations and developments behind the scenes at Curzon and Stone where we are working so hard to bring you premium cocktails that you can open, pour, and enjoy at home. home without ever having to muddle, shake, or do anything complex or difficult. It's such a fun process. And if you follow me at Facebook.com slash courage and stone or Twitter.com slash courage and stone, I will be posting at those places, mostly cocktail pour now, but more about the process as time goes on. So those are all exciting things. Let's get right into this show. This episode is with the incredibly lovely and delightful actress

Jesselin Gilsing, who you will know from two very iconic roles. She's done lots and lots of things. actually three very iconic roles. Like I said, she's done a lot, but she has three really, really prominent and pretty extraordinary roles, including one on the show, Niptuck, where she played a very complex and tortured character. One on the massive show, Boston Public,

which was also a big deal. Oh, actually, she was on Glee. She's done a million things. Why am I trying to diminish her CV? She's done a lot of shit. But right now, she's on her. on a pretty amazing show that I really love called Vikings. And it's on the History Network.

And I was so excited because I just love when I love actors and I see them doing something totally different from the last role that made them well known. And she just transforms this role into a totally different character. Her physicality, her look, everything is so different. And she's just badass on this show. If you haven't started watching Vikings,

it's in season three right now. It's not a heavy lift to go back and watch her from season one. I think the episode, the seasons are like, you know, something between like six and 13 episodes. I think the first season was like maybe seven. So it's entirely worth watching everybody in the show is amazing. And if you follow me on Instagram, you know that I actually went to Ireland last August

and shadowed on the Viking set and hung out there for a week, which was really cool. I met the whole cast. There's a bunch of cool photos on my Instagram feed from that show. I'm a big fan. It was amazing to hang out there. It's a period show. It's about Vikings. I got to see them to all kinds of kick-ass Viking action and sit behind the directors and ask

questions, which was great for me, because if you've been listening to this show, you know that I have been directing a lot of short things and eventually want to direct features. And I just got to hang on on the set of a show that I love, and the actors were all incredibly nice to me. Jocelyn wasn't there then, so I got to spend time with her on Girl on Guy. But we had met years ago when we both did nip-tuck. And she is even more lovely than I ever could have hoped, a sweet and forthcoming and a great storyteller, and I want to kiss her face.

If you are cut up on Vikings, you know that there was a big real. this past week that we'll address in this episode. So spoiler alert, if you're not caught up, you may find your world, at least marginally rocked at one point. But she's amazing. The show's amazing. I highly encourage you to watch it. And she's pretty rad. Ladies and gentlemen, this is Girl on Guy 177 with the gorgeous, talented and lovely actress Jesselin Gilzig from Boston Public, Niptuck, Glee, and the Kick-A-Show Vikings coming at you. Straight out of the Girl on Guy Mead Hall. and right into your face. I just had a moment.

Jocelyn Gilsig, welcome to my show. Thank you for having me. I'm so excited. I'm more excited, I think. Thank you. Hemelman had a little, I found out a little bit. We're going to do this in very linear fashion,

but just full disclosure for people out there in Geogee Land. I worked on a show on which Jesselam was a massive, star nip talk. I did one episode of that show. She was amazing on the show. Now she's on another show of which I'm a huge fan. So I will try to hold my shit together as we move through the show. Well, it's like a mutual admiration society. Good at us so excited. And then she came in and I was like, I was like, should I tell you about the show? She's like, I've listened every episode. And then I died. So anyway, welcome, welcome. Thank you. Now, first of all, do you live here? Where do you live? Oh, okay, good. And we'll get into

like details down the road. But do you go back and forth to Ireland to shoot the show? Yes, exactly. So we shoot six months in Ireland, just outside of Dublin. And it's, yeah, it's, I mean, to be perfectly honest, the first year, I thought I could commute. Yeah. No, but I get it because it's not a miserable trip. It's long, but it's not like. Well, I mean, it's really nice if someone else is paying for your ticket. Right. Seriously. And then putting you in business class. If you're paying for your own ticket and you're doing that 17 hours, it's like night and day. The two things don't, I mean, they're like entirely different experience. But I actually originally thought that it was a miniseries. And I actually thought that I was basically in a summer in Ireland.

Right, fabulous. A trip to Europe and I'll do a few episodes. I thought I was a genius. Oh, no, we'll be overseas this summer. We're filming in Ireland. Summering in Wicklow. Yeah, exactly. I've been.

I visited the set. And you love Penny Dreadful as well. Yes, I am looking. We share so much of the crew. Yeah. Oh, yeah. Because, so Penny's down the road from you guys. Exactly.

You guys are at Ashford and they're at Ardmore, like 20 minutes apart. I don't know anything. This, it's, it's, I sound creepier than I am. A little bit. It's a little bit. But, no, exactly. And it's, I mean, if you visited, you understand it is, I mean, I'm changed by the experience. There's no doubt.

I'm changed by the crew that we worked with, by, I've never worked so intensely on location for such a long period of time. obviously it's a it's a the subject matter is just so engrossing I mean you had to kind of when I got the job actually I have to be honest I thought have they seen glee

because why what did okay but did you audition for that role? Yeah I put myself on tape and and I was really excited because I knew it was Gabriel Byrne and it was Michael Hurst who had done the tutors and also the Elizabeth films and so I just

thought oh this is amazing company you know how cool Well, that would be, but I'm never, I mean, we had to do, the direction for the, putting yourself on tape was to do a hybrid of an Irish, Scandinavian British accent. Oh my God. What is that? To this, I mean, if that tape ever surfaced. It is horrifying. But for some reason, I got the job. And I showed up and I thought, everyone else, other than Gabriel Byrne, was incredibly talented, but probably not familiar to audiences.

And not that I'm so familiar, but, I mean, Glee was, you know, a lot of people team Glee. And I thought, we would like three big series kind of in a row and Boston publicly, Boston, Boston Public, Napoli goes, yeah. And NipTuck. So yeah, I mean, people knew who you were. People might be like, oh, that's that girl. So I thought, like, they're going to be doing this incredibly engrossed Viking scene in the Great Hall. And then Terry Schuster's going to come out. And it's just going to, like, destroy everything. I was really nervous about it. So I actually, when I got there, I said, you know, I think we need to dye my hair. Like, we need to do something because we can't have any of this. link back to glee. Right. Totally sync the series. And so it was fun because you had to let go of all your vanities. You know, you were like, okay. That is not a vain show.

Everybody is covered in dirt. Yeah, exactly. And having visited some of them, dirt they brought to work with them. Showering is not a requirement. No, working on Vikings. People show up dirty. It's like super method. It's very method.

You're absolutely right. But I was hung on about it. But I just, it's because I'm a fan. I'm excited to be talking about it. I remember seeing you, and I don't even know how, I mean, because I'm kind of like a Game of Thrones person. I had heard some great things about Vikings. And I remember seeing you and being so excited for you because it was so different from anything you'd ever done. And you were fucking killing it.

Oh, you can me too. Sometimes, sometimes you see somebody and you're excited. They're like, oh, this is different. And I was just like, oh, my God, you were just transformed. Oh, thanks. And then it's such a juicy role, too. And it has gotten so much juicier over time, which has been amazing to watch. I mean, again, and I'm not blowing anybody up because I'm huge fan of the show.

But there were some people for whom the accent was a struggle. Yeah. There were some people were still doing that hybrid Irish, Scandinavian accent. We always laugh about it. We always like, well, we justify it because my character speaks. This is how my character speaks. But we're all sort of all over the math. No, I think for the most part, everybody's great.

There's somebody who's not there anymore whose accent was really. Oh, I love it. I'm not going to. You know exactly what it is. There's somebody who is in a different movie. But for the most part, it's so immersive. And I just remember being like, oh, fuck yeah. Jesslyn's killing this.

This is so good. And I think when people see you, it's hard when people see you a certain way. Like you say you came in with that same concern, right, that people saw you as this other character. And it's funny, you know, when you are a performer, I don't, you know, I didn't start out, even everything that I would come to L.A. You know, I was actually talking to somebody yesterday because they were doing interviews with agents. And I was remembering when I got out of school and I interviewed with agents. And I was so precocious.

I was horrendous. I remember meeting with the sky, Gary Krasny. I'll never forget this guy, Gary Krasny. And I started telling him everything that I wouldn't do. That is fabulous. That is so good. I have real clarity. Real clarity about what boundaries.

And I was like, let me tell you what I won't do. I won't do soap operas. I won't do basically television. I'll do merchant ivory films, and I really want to do regional theater. I love it. And I'm sure he was like... And also what you won't do is make money. Yeah, get the fuck out of my office.

And he literally said to me, I'll never forget this because I said, this is a true story, I said to him, and I won't do Baywatch. And he said to me, God bless Gary Krazen and he goes, you think you have the body for Baywatch? Fabulous. Oh, yes. He was like, too-shay. He's like, don't play casting director. to town, get to work. I love it.

So I had never thought about that idea of being heavily identified with the role. I mean, you thought of being an actor is actually, as you say, like immersing yourself. And so when I, actually, when I left Lee, for as useful as it is to think about what you'd want to do next, which really has nothing to do with what you end up doing next. But I remember thinking, oh, it would be so awesome to get on one of these sort of cable ensemble shows where people are really creating the world in that feeling like I think that you get with something like Mad Men or Breaking Bad or these shows where you're, You feel like even when you turn off the TV, the town still exists, that everything is still going on.

The world is there. You don't feel kind of the edges of the set. And so when Vikings came up, I thought, oh, this actually is, this reminds me of why I became an actor. That idea, especially in that first season, I didn't have that many lines. Right. And I actually kind of loved it because I thought, well, it's about existing

without telling people constantly that you're there. It's about the fact that even when you're in a room and you're silent, yours is fully present and is, as, you know, cognizant and you have as many ideas as anybody else. And I have to, and I said this many times, Gabriel Byrne absolutely made that first season for me because I remember that first day, I was so nervous to meet him. And we were waiting basically backstage to come into the Great Hall. So we always sort of felt like we were waiting backstage. And I had introduced myself when we'd spoken for a moment.

And then I thought, okay, I'll give him some space. Right, right. And we walked out and we sat down in our thrones, and the first thing he did was look at me. Oh, yeah. And I thought, oh, God, it's on. Yeah. And from then on, we would talk constantly about power couples, and we talk about, you know, the Chalchescus and even, you know, the Clintons. And we would talk about how, you know, one of them decides to be the mouthpiece, but it's always collaborative.

And he would say to me, I don't think there's anything I say, the great hall that you haven't told me to say. Oh, God, that's incredible. Isn't that amazing? Amazing. So here you are. You look at the script. I don't have any lines this week, whatever.

And then you have this guy who's saying, you actually have all the lines. And I'm going to look to you because you're going to cue me every time I speak. And so even once his character was gone, he had said basically without saying it, you still have the power. You know, this was a shared rain that we had. And so then I got to keep that. alive for the rest of for the rest of the time. You also did so much. I mean like contextually that helps me kind of see the show like kind of in a new way, which is really lovely. But I also remember feeling like your intensity and your desire for power was evident even when you

weren't speaking. Do you know what I mean? And there was a part and I don't mean like in a side long calculated like you know sneaky eyes way. But just it was there. It was like emanating out of you. And there was something so interesting about Siggy because she's both very calculating and manipulative, but really vulnerable, which I also think is really hard to play. Really hard to play, you know? I think people go like, I'm evil. Yeah. It's so funny. Especially with women.

I think people just want to say, oh, you know, she's exactly. She's just manipulative. She's just duplicitous. And I would think, well, she's ambitious. I mean, Ragnar is ambitious, too, by the way. Oh, incredibly ambitious. You could see it another way. You could say who's this upstart, who's upsetting a stable system.

Right, exactly. You know, to what end when, you know, things are functioning. Big mouth hot shot, you know, who comes in. Yeah, and yeah. Kind of. Chop some guy's lungs out of his back. Yeah, remember that? Remember that?

Who's the asshole now? But it is funny when you play, it really unsettles people when you, as a woman, I think, where there's sort of like you have to be either or. Yeah. And, of course, none of us are either or. No, no one is. Yeah. And actually, on this podcast, Will Wheaton said,

the villain is the hero of their own story. You know what I mean? In their mind, everything they're doing is meaningful and genuine. Absolutely. Absolutely. I mean, the way I would think of it is every time I walk into the Great Hall, and it's a really fun role because everyone else is the new generation, and I'm the last of the old generation.

And so every time I come in and everyone's like, you know, debating something or arguing something, and I'd always think, I'm just looking at them thinking, I've already lived this. Right. Three or four times. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah, exactly. And I love that. It's funny I just saw Into the Woods recently, and I had used this before because I was always a fan of the Broadway show, the way the witch says, you're so nice. You're not good. You're not bad. You're just nice. Right.

I'm not nice. I'm just right. Oh, yes. And it's really helpful to have that and be like, this might not be fun to hear, but I happen to be right. Yeah. And it's a different place in your body. Right.

It is a different physicality. Like, and also it's a brutish, brutish. I mean, what's been so interesting and so good for me about Vikings is, you know, it's obviously fictionalized about a people in a culture that we don't know a lot about. I know it's been really meticulously researched, but like, you know, the Vikings didn't write anything down. There's no written history. There's none. I mean, it was all deliberately erased.

Exactly. You know, and everything we know about them that has been written was written by the people that they were killing. Right. Right. So, but what I've loved is it doesn't feel romanticized or glamorized in any way. I mean, it was a very brutish, short, cold, hungry, painful life. And so, I mean, Siggy's doing what she has to. Yeah.

There's no what to. Yeah. What would you do? Yeah. What's the alternative? And I love, you know, for me, the way I think about, there are a few things that I have to do, you know, I mean, obviously you get so much from the wardrobe and the, and I mean, you've been to the same. set so you've seen. I mean, we are just surrounded by livestock

and open flames. Goats and chickens everywhere. Everywhere. Everywhere. Everywhere. And, you know, our hair's constantly catching on fire because there's just open flames everywhere you turn. And then I remember like sometime in the first season, when we were going to Uppsala and it said in the script, you know, they climb the waterfall. And then you got to set and they were like,

all right, start climbing. You know. I remember like, for some reason, women carried everything. Right. And you're like, golf cart? Yeah, yeah, basically. We've no golf course. There's no creature comforts. There's tea.

We do have a lot of tea. But I would also think about, and you think about it a lot, I think about a lot as a woman. I mean, because I would think about somebody like Hillary Clinton or, you know, Condoleezza Rice or something. And I would think how they would never walk up to a microphone and be like, hi. Yeah, exactly. Hey, guys, sorry, can I, you know, they come up and just say what they got to say. And I feel like, you know, based on my. conditioning, you know, I still am fighting against that impulse to apologize for my presence.

And that is not, Siggy feels no sense of apology for her existence whatsoever. And to kind of, I've had a couple characters like that. And they've been really helpful because they've actually helped me see like the other way of being. Right. And that that's just obviously more preferable way of being, but it's not the way we've necessarily been conditioned to show up in a room, you know. And that's what's fun as an actor. to explore, okay, what if I was really this woman who said, yeah, you know what?

I want to get, that's what I always think about was saying, I'm going to get back on that throne. That's my destiny. That's my purpose. Yes. That's my vow to my people. That's not something I want. That is where I belong. That's where I'm going.

Yeah. Yeah. She's so great to watch. I want to talk about likings, but I want to talk about you first. Oh. Where were you born? Montreal. Canada.

Did you grow up in, so I've been to Montreal several times. Are you, but I feel like they're like French speaking families in, you, you, English-speaking families. Correct. So I am an English-speaking family, but my dad worked for Itro, Quebec, like the electrical utility company. And my mom was a translator. She translated things from French to English. So we were always raised with the understanding that we had to speak French. So we did grow up in English community, but my sister and I are both fluent in French. And in fact, friendly enough, I have a daughter who's eight now, and I sent her to. French school.

Oh, that's awesome. Here in L.A., which has been great, too, because she went to school, they have them all over the world. Yeah. So she went in Dublin. Yeah, that network. Yeah. Also, so she goes in Dublin when you're there. Oh, that's nice.

It's wonderful. It's great. And it's just, I don't think I really appreciated what it was like to grow up bilingual until I started looking for schools for her. And I kind of go on these school tours and then you sort of think like, that's it. Right. You know? Yeah, it's like an after.

Well, typically it's an afterthought, right? It's like a side piece if you'd like to. Yeah, like a party trick. Yeah. Yeah. If you want to, your, you know, transcript for college. Exactly.

Take Spanish. Yeah. Exactly. In 11th or, you know, seventh grade or something. So, and, you know, I think that what it gave me more than just the ability to speak French, which is a kind of fun party trick. But it's just, when you grow up in a culture, you know, we grew up in an English country in a French province.

So we were like, we were English. English Canadians, but a minority in a French majority, you unconsciously are used to not always knowing how the interaction is going to go. And you learn to kind of adapt, you know, I feel like, and you learn, you learn very quickly that this is a multicultural experience. Right. And I really wanted that for my daughter. I really wanted to have this feeling of like pluralism and this feeling of, look, sometimes you're not always going to, things aren't going to feel familiar. Right. And you can figure it out.

You know, you just got to listen a little more deeply. And I feel like that's what growing up in that province really gave me. And I'm really grateful for it. It's a gorgeous place to grow up. When you were growing up, did you like, I wonder how, because the country is bilingual, right? So when you go, all the signs are in English and French, no matter where you are. You know, if you're in Vancouver where nobody speaks French, everything's in English and French as well. Yeah.

But in my experience there, and I did a series in Toronto was like, you know, most Canadians speak passable, if functional French, you know what I mean? Yeah. And a lot of people don't speak any French at all. Absolutely. So I guess where you were growing up, where you were in the French province, what was school like? Was it like Alisei?

Were you doing half your subjects in French and in English, or did you just have French classes? No, my school was English. Oh, okay. And we had French. I mean, probably more French than, we must have had more French because we all came out bilingual. Right. I mean, lots of my friends went on to French University.

Okay. They go to University of Montreal and Rebbeuf, the French, one of the French Seijs. So we came out all bilingual. I can't believe I'm getting so old that I actually don't really remember. You know, I don't remember how the date. I don't remember this morning, so don't feel bad. I did go to school. I remember that.

And then as I say, it was actually really, not all my friends, some of them kind of stayed a little more isolated, I think, but my parents were really adamant. I think that speaks to... My parents were both... My mom is from England originally, and she came over as an adult, and my dad, his parents, came over from Eastern Europe.

Okay. And so we were really first generation. And so there was a real feeling of... A real belief of assimilating. Right, right. That was a big drive in my family was, you know, you adopt the culture that you live in. And both of my parents,

think always felt like this wasn't necessarily their home, but this, they had adopted it. And so we had to adopt it as well. Right. Right. Did you go, and you, were you like a theater person? Were you like an actress when you were a kid? I was. So I wanted to be, um, I always wanted to be an actress. And I, uh, and I remember because we had like this old fashioned typewriter in the basement and I would write like, hi, my name is Jocelyn and I'm seven years old and I'm nobody special, but I want to be an actress and my parents are horrible because they say I have to wait till I'm 18 and then I'd like, you know, leave it somewhere so that my parents could find it. I love that there was this interesting kind of like combination of like anger and insolence

combined with some humility. You're like, I'm nobody special. Yeah. But look, I have, yeah, but I deserve to follow my dreams here. Well, I'm Canadian. So you always, everything has to be prefaced with, I'm not special. I never said I was special. But then actually my parents relented when I was 12. I had read about an audition at the National Film Board, and I went to the audition, and the audition was for a voiceover, and I sang happy birthday,

and I got it. And that sort of started a voiceover career. And so I would dub all these cartoons, and I would, you know, into French or English? And a lot of them came from Asia, some of them came from South Africa, I remember, such as the Little Bush Baby.

Oh, gosh, that's an image. One that I was really proud of. It's not quite in translation. Yeah, exactly. I don't know. It's not quite right. So I did that for really all the way through school and actually made a shitload of money because you make about 70 bucks an hour.

Yeah. Oh, yeah. So that's like a great job to have in school, right? It was just like making pizza for eight bucks. My sister worked at the library and she made 273 an hour. Jesus. And I'd be like, I was like, you know, just like making it rain. It was terrible.

It was so bad. But the flip side of it was I actually wanted to be a painter. That was like my, I really wanted to be a visual artist. And so when I finished high school, I went to art school. In Montreal. In Montreal. And then, I don't know, seems so ill-guided now. But I basically got to this point where I thought, I really want to be a painter, but I've never made any money as a painter.

So I guess I have to be an actor. And so then I decided to go to grad school. school and I took that money from the cartoons and that's how I ended up moving to the states. But I think everything was always in hopes of supporting a painting career. Really? It's just, it's haunts me to this day. There's so much irony in like, well, I can't make money being a visual artist. So I guess I'll be an actor. Yes, your safety job, your fallback job was acting. I mean, you know, like somebody's like, I'm going to get a corporate job. I'll be an actor. Exactly. Because that's sort of how it had come that easily to me because I had stumbled into this voiceover world, which was pretty lucrative.

Yeah. Even not for being a kid, but just for being a English actor in Montreal. And so I think I was naive enough to think, which explains why I then go into the agent's office and start listing all the things I won't do. I love it. It's just horrible. Oh, the hubris of youth. Unbelievable. But literally, like, I'll do period pieces and regional theater.

And he's like, well, 10% of nothing is nothing. Yeah, exactly. Thanks for coming in. I mean, it was so, the poor guy. You must have been, it's just so obnoxious. But I imagine that you weren't the first or the last person to come in with like an overinflated sense of like what was possible at that age. We all have that. We do.

And I think theater school, yeah, of course, because I see it now with kids, you know, I mean, even on Vikings, some of those kids in there. And I was like, guys, just be grateful. Yeah, it's a job. Yeah, totally. Just go with it, you know. But they're like, it doesn't seem fair that I, blah, blah, blah. But the thing you never, when you're young, you just never have a, there's no, you haven't experienced contrast yet, right? You've only had things go well. And I just was coming in this conversation with someone today about like, you know, people have explosive early success and then something doesn't go their way. And they're indignant rather than realizing like the nature of things is that things are not going to go your way at some point.

Well, and I think that that even, I mean, even beyond work, that's life. life, right? And it's funny being a parent now because part of you want so badly to kind of, you know, support all their interests and create an environment that's fully supportive of them, like, going full force into life. And then you reach that point in life where you're like, you know what, no matter how hard you plan and no matter how hard you work and no matter how good your intentions are, there's just a good chance that you're going to get hit by a semi on the 405. Yeah, yeah. This is how life happens. Yeah, this is just the nature of things. the nature of things. My dad used to get fucked up. My dad was always like, life isn't fair.

And I was like, no, it is because everybody shares and everybody waits their turn. Right, exactly. But why do we even teach that in kindergarten? Because it's actually not true. No. Don't wait their turn. And people don't share. No, and they won't share with you. And it's nice to teach the skill or like, you know, the desire to share. You know, just so that everyone, you can offer half your donut and the person will take the whole thing, you know, run down the street laughing at you. I'm not that I'm bitter, but I'm just saying, yeah, it just, so you're right. And I guess I think of that because I actually had the same thing, school, I remember school came really easily to me until it didn't. Right.

And when it didn't, it was, I wasn't prepared because I'd always been, well, she's a great student. I've looked at my report card since with my daughter and it's like, everything's like glowing, glowing, glowing. And then suddenly like, okay, she's obviously not trying. Struggling, right, yeah. And it just wasn't coming as easily to me. And with regards to my career, it wasn't, the only thing was because I moved to the states and I had to work because that was what my visa said.

Right. I always had a pretty strong, I had to support myself. I had no choice. So I was really kind of up for anything. And I think people had, I think working as a kid, working alongside adults, they had given me, they'd been very generous with, you know, their experiences and they had prepared me a little bit for that idea. Because I remember coming out of school and maybe more of my friends waiting for the right job. Right.

You know, and I just didn't have the luxury to do that. So ultimately, I was like, you got a commercial, you know, you got a one-act play. You know, I'm there. I'm down. Yeah. And I think having the pressure of the visa and the need to support myself actually helped me get that kind of weird, like you said, hubris of youth. Yeah.

Out of, yeah, like set it aside. Yeah. And I mean, I do think that also, I mean, it's hard. It's like, you know, I'm sure you've heard this phrase like work but gets work, you know, but there's something almost ineffable, intangible about someone who's, working where their confidence is a different kind of confidence, which is like self-knowledge. You know what I mean? It's like... Well, yeah, you feel it. I mean, it's just, it's such a mind fuck, you know, to, you know,

if you go in a room and you're already on a show, you're just going to present yourself differently. You're going to be received differently. And then if that show gets canceled and you go in the room the next day, the energy is, it's just unreal. And you can, you know, you can sit in your car before you walk into that room and try and like, you know, sort of dance yourself into a different mental, you know, remember, you really did have a parking passments, you know, but you still is really, really, I mean, that never ceases to be difficult, I feel. It's like, you know, it, I mean, I don't want to use like hippie-dippy language, but it's like, it's like, it's like it's almost hard to extract it from how you're feeling about yourself

and how you present yourself when you're feeling confident about, like, where you are and where you're not. And that confidence is not even cockiness. It's just, it's like the confidence in the room to make choices that you wouldn't make if you were so, like, you needed the job so badly that you would just, you know, you hedge all your bets creatively. Well, that's why it goes back to kind of like what we're talking about with Vikings. It's like, then you look at a character like Siggie and you think, well, she never, like, she never showed her hand. Right. Yeah. Yeah. And so the, the upside of being the actor is you can kind of say, okay, this isn't how I'm feeling. Right. But I'm telling their story. the story that this writer has given me so at least I can kind of take a vacation for my mental state for the next, you know, what ends up being about 45 seconds.

Right, right. And sort of live in this other reality. And if you can really kind of commit yourself to that and really convince yourself that it is not about you in the least, not even one iota of your presence in that room is about you. And it's really about helping the writer hear their words and really about elevating their material for them. you know, helping it to shine. Yeah, exactly. Then you're suddenly out of that sort of narcissistic obsessive. Right.

And that's not about me. It's about, yeah, serving the material. Exactly. So when you first got, this, so when you got here, this was after undergraduate school. And you came here for graduate school? So I went to the ART at Harvard for grad school. And then I moved to New York. Mm-hmm.

After that, and I lived in New York for five years. And then I came here. I'd done a play in Seattle and thought, oh, I'll go check out L.A. Mm-hmm. And I came and I checked it out. And that's when I met David Kelly. And I actually... On an audition?

I had actually done an episode of the practice. And he... It's so funny now. It's like a different life. Right, right. Like a million years ago. A million years ago and like a different person. Right.

Because I really wasn't... I mean this to a fault. I just wasn't looking for it. Right. You know, I didn't know, I didn't even grow up really knowing that LA existed. I didn't think about, and we didn't watch the Oscars. I didn't do stuff like that. God, help freeing.

I know. I really wanted to do, you know, a Shakespeare festival. That basically was my ultimate, that seemed like great, a great goal for me. And I'm still, you know, considering it. But so I met David Kelly. I had done an episode of the practice, and he came to my dressing room. And I remember them, they were, like, David Kelly wants to be. to talk to you. And he came to my dressing room and he said, I'm creating a show and I want you

to be the lead. And you thought, what the fuck? But actually, I had, the play I had done in Seattle with Julie Harris was going to Broadway. So I said, well, thank you so much. Ah, gentlemen. Come on. Yeah. I turned you down. That's what I wanted. I wanted to do a play on Broadway with Julie Harris. So, I mean, it's so nuts now. And so I quit the play. I mean, I went to New York. We started rehearsing the play.

And the producer, something happened with the money. And it turned out that it wasn't there. And I remember, because I'll never forget, Julie Harris was such a talk about a force. I mean, she was so petite, but she was like a rock of a woman. And I remember her getting up. I'll never forget it. She got up in rehearsal because they told us, and she was wagging her finger.

And she was probably, you know, like five foot two or something. And she just kept saying, you cannot do this. These are actors. You cannot promise them work and take it away. I mean, she knew that one of our castmates was pregnant and, you know, newly married. And I don't even think I had told anybody about the David Kelly thing. But she knew that we, you know, to. Everybody had made sacrifices to be there.

Exactly. And none of us were making bank or anything. In New York especially. And so I remember I got back to my little apartment on the Upper West Side and the phone rang because this is pretty cell phones. And it was David Kelly. Wow. And he said, I heard your money fell through. Oh, my God.

So he had his heart set on you. Yeah. And so I came out. Oh, my God. I came out here. And I remember I rented an apartment. I thought, oh, I'll never even be able to rent an apartment. So I sublet an apartment in Venice that basically was made.

of cardboard. Like the whole thing, the walls, I don't know what exactly had happened, but something had happened. And so they had decided to, instead of using drywall to use cardboard, but it was by the sea, so it was moldy. Oh my God. And then I lived by this woman who had all these Dobermans, and I came to realize maybe had been dealing drugs. And everything had bars. So, you know, I remember feeling like, it was just one room. Yeah. It was just my bed. And I remember just thinking like, I can't believe I got it. because in New York, you can't get an apartment to save your life. Totally. Oh, my God.

And so, yeah, so that's sort of how I ended up out here and doing Boston Public. And that show went for five seasons? I only did it for two. Oh, okay. Yeah, so I did it for two years. I can't believe I'm going to tell all this. Yes. I asked to leave.

Oh, my God. And I went back to New York. And tell me what. So tell me, because I have left of series before. And I sometimes even wonder about what the psychology is behind that. Me too. For myself, like why I did it and what I was thinking. So I want to ask you what you were thinking at the time.

But what I will preface it by saying is that, you know, it's hard because this is a business. So it's just hard to get work. And there is a big part of this town that doesn't understand when people leave series. But it is so traumatic to leave a show. It can be very painful and scary too. That, like, I remember when I left Ghost Whisper after the first season. Okay. And I remember thinking it was exactly the right thing for me to do and that I loved it there,

but that I had other goals and that they would be completely, you know, put aside maybe permanently. If I didn't leave, I had an opportunity to go. And, you know, it was like, it was amicable. You know what I mean? I wasn't like, I quit. My contract was up. And I wanted me to sign a really long contract. And I thought, I really love it here, but there are things I really want to do with my life.

and I had a film that was going to go, like that kind of thing. But I remember once I made the decision, crying off and on for like three weeks. Right. Because I was like, what after leaves a hit show? You know, like, well, who does that? Right. So it wasn't like I was like, you know, fuck you, bitches and flipped a table. You know, it was very difficult.

Yeah. So I'm curious. I wish I had done. Amazing. So I'm curious about like what led up to the decision and then how you felt about it. Well, I have a. on this, I had to reflect on this for a long time because it was, as you say, it was really painful. I really, I really think I was not ready. I just wasn't prepared. And I, I, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's really,

I had to, I feel like I came out. I remember them sitting me down at this big table, like all these executives. And I remember them saying, because Allie, Bill was, you know, really big at the time. And Callista Flockhart was, you know, being, you know, hounded. And I remember them saying, now, look, you're going to have to get, brace yourself because your life's about to change. And I mean, this is hilarious to talk about this now. But they would even say, people are going to talk about how much you look like Michelle Pfeiffer, which, by the way, nobody has ever since. And, you know, this is, your life is never going to be the same. And I remember thinking, you guys are going to be so disappointed.

Oh, no. Because nobody's going to care. Oh. And I just thought, I'm not that girl. Right. I'm not, that's not who I, I mean, I'm not, and I, and I, I, I wasn't raised to be that person. I'm nobody special. I just want to be an actress.

Basically, yeah. I mean, that's, that's, that's something that I, I, I, it took me years to even admit that I, wanted to be the person who got the job. Right. Because that seemed so narcissistic. That seemed like for so long I was sort of like, it's, I'm, it's a selfless act to be an actress. I'm giving myself to the human experience.

Yeah, you know. I love it. That's how we were. We were like, you give yourself to the playwright. And so then to come out and be like, I'm going to put extensions in my hair and I'm going to be in a photograph where they blow wind in my face. It was like, what the, what the, not like, not that I'm even judging it. It just like, it's not in me.

It's just not, like, it's not. I mean, it's like this social media thing. Like, I just don't know how to do it and to be the best to support the work and to support the team, but to not like constantly try to say, look at me. I'm so different from you. I'm in the Riviera where I've never been, but like that feeling, you know. Yeah. So I just got up in my head and it got, I really felt like every week that I was, I was a disappointment.

And then there are there are other, some factors that, you know, involve other people. people so I won't get into them but um ultimately I think I was I mean I was so unhappy I had made so much money um you know for what I had expected to get out of acting that I remember my accountant calling me and and he said wear your checks and they were under my bed in a shoebox because I just I couldn't fathom bringing in these checks every week and deposit into the bank I was embarrassed like in front of this it's it I just wasn't meant to prepared at all for it. And I didn't really know that many people out here. And then I was immediately launched in with people who were, you know, there were parties and there was the scene and there was,

I mean, I was a disaster. I just, I had no idea that any of this was. I mean, I'm embarrassed to talk about it now because, oh, I don't think there's any reason to be embarrassed because I don't, you know, also this was pre, I mean, not like super pre-per internet, but definitely pre-social media. No, it was, yeah. So the sense of like the life that people have such a, your picture of now. Yes, now everybody's prepared for it. Yeah, now I get on Vikings and people are like, they've already built their Twitters and they're getting their brand going and all this. Exactly. And you've got to tweet every day and you've got to push this stuff out. I don't think that there was a sense of that back then. And I think there were also not, not only was there not a sense of

it, but there wasn't a sense of the falseness of it too. Like I think people are also more perceptive about the fact that a lot of this is show. Right. Do you know what I mean? Yeah. And so, you know, that, you know, people curate their Instagram page, so it does look like they're always in the review. Really, they're just at the fucking grove, you know, like having a job issues. I know, yeah, I guess it's true. So, yeah, you know, it's hard. And I think it can be very scary to feel dissociated from your life that quickly in that way. I, I, I, the only time I was happy was when I was on set.

That was the only time, you know, when I was actually between action and cut, I felt like, okay, okay, okay, I know I'm here. And then everything else I felt like I'm just bombing. I'm just bombing. Did you feel like they were trying to place you in situations, red carpet things or party things and you felt like I don't want to be here, I don't want to do this? You know, in their defense, I think they tried in the beginning and I think I bombed. I really do and I think they stopped asking me. And then I realized like, wow, they're not asking me anymore.

I mean, I think I was so, I just almost had decided it wasn't going to work before we got off the ground. Right. So I went to David and I said, that, you know, you know, you've made me, you know, wealthier than I ever anticipated as an actress. And I know that I'm not serving you. And I'm asking you if you'll let me go. And we were pretty friendly. And so, and he did.

So, I mean, I guess they weren't feeling like, wow. I mean, I think at that point, Shy McBride had sort of, he was really carrying the show. Was David, what was David's response to you? I mean, without, like, you know, digging into the, you know, his emotional life, I mean, was he shocked? Was he, because he obviously always cared about you. Yeah. I think he knew.

I mean, he's a very, he's an incredibly attuned person. And I think it was pretty obvious that I was, I mean, I was like, you know, I had, I remember one producer coming to my trailer, or my, we had dressing rooms, actually, but coming to my dressing room and just being like, you, you got to eat. Like, this is, it's showing. I was thin. I was, I just was. I was catatonic, you know.

I remember I went back to acting classes to try and, you know, get some kind of coaching into how to, I just was so in the weeds. So they let me go and I went back to New York and I did a play and I stayed there for a year. Did you feel differently about yourself

and your life almost immediately? I did, just being in rehearsal and it was a funny play because I remember actually spoke to Vikings because it was the 5th of July and the character that I played, she basically, the entire first act is trying to get everybody to leave the house, but nobody leaves for a whole act. So it was a lot of being on stage, not speaking,

or every now and then saying, hey, guys, are we going to go. And so you had to really learn, go back to that sense of being present and finding your storyline and finding what your contribution is without necessarily having the big sort of speech that explain the narrative or that kind of thing. And I just, yeah, I think I felt the, the, the collective that I had missed and that sense of ensemble. And then I really thought that I would stay in New York. But, you know, then I got Niptock. Right.

Did you audition in New York for Niptock? I didn't. I actually had come back because I still had sublet my place here and so forth. And then the truth is with Nptok. It was, Niptok was amazing because the reason I got it was Elity Keen, who had directed a few Boston Publix. She was directing that episode. And I remember, I remember.

I think she directed my episode. Did she? Yeah, she was amazing. Amazing. Wonderful, wonderful. She's also, she was an editor for many years, so she's like that kind of director where you feel like when she says she's got it. She knows.

She knows, yeah. And she, I remember the part and I remember thinking, but just one of, you know, sometimes you just read something and you know exactly what you want to do with it. And I think for her, I mean, we've spoken since, I think it was kind of fun for her to see me go in a different direction. Yeah, yeah. And the thing with Ryan is you feel with him like he's so specific, he's so deliberate, he's so controlled. And at the same time, because of that, you're so free.

Yeah. He knows what he wants, but he knows what he wants before you start. And I think he's very clear if you're right for the part. He's going to give you what you need. Yeah. And there is something about his confidence in a material and in you that is freeing because he's like, absolutely. Yeah. Like you got this.

That's why I hired you. So go do what you do. And I remember and there's something about. We're talking about Ryan Murphy. Sorry. Yeah. We were just talking about it. I was like,

doesn't everybody call him my first name? Well, I think much of the, I mean, so many people now do know. You know, Nicktuckily, American horror,

popular and then he's so much more coming out. But he, yeah, he, he, yeah, I remember, I was going to say also,

you probably had this experience too. The set that he creates. I mean, you get that. I've talked to people since who have guested it on shows of his. And they, guesting is the most lonely job in the world, right? And you're just tiptoeing in there. Yeah. That is

the experience of tiptoeing out to the microphone and going, Hi, I'm sorry, guys, can I say it really fast? Okay, these are lines. Just don't listen, is it my mark? Is my mark? Okay. Oh, like that whole time, that's how you feel all day long. Exactly. Is it okay. Is it lunch? Can I stand and kind of way? I'm catering. I don't mind waiting. I don't know. Everybody's steep before me. Exactly. I'm even sorry I came. Wear my own clothes. It's fine. But then that compounded with like you got to get naked because you're in these scenes with Julianne. You're supposed to have sex. And then he's going to like humiliate you. And you know. That's what every script is. Character comes in. Fucks Dr. Christian. And then he humiliates her.

Basically. Yeah. And then you're and as you say, you're like, it's okay. I'll just eat. I'll eat lunch in the alley. It's no problem. I brought a sandwich. Yeah. I'm fine. I'm just kidding here at the corner. I brought you a sandwich. I made sandwiches for everybody. I don't even need a trailer. I would just. Sit on set in the corner. Yeah. So, but when you work on a Ryan Murphy show, it's not like that at all. I mean, from the moment they call you, they make you feel like you're absolutely a part of the team. And there's, the communication is amazing and the welcome is amazing.

And you go into the hair makeup trailer and everybody knows your name. He's been using the same people forever, which I think is a testament to him that he's loyal to his people and they're loyal to him. Absolutely. Absolutely. And the consistency of that crew. And, and, because I, um, spoiler alert. but I did Glee the other day. Yay!

And, you know, much of the same people are there, and they're operating exactly the same level of professionalism and passion as, you know, when we started the show. It really is. I did a pilot for HBO last year, and it was like all the people I worked with on NMTUK and all they were like, we were made from Nurtukk, Glee,

and, you know, the same thing. Just that, that familial. And then again, everybody wants to win. Everyone's working very hard. Well, that's it. Then everybody does their best work, you know, because they feel seen and they feel appreciated. And so for me, with NipTuck, I feel like, ironically, even though I had sort of gone back to New York to try to reconnect with why I had become an actor, it was actually Niptuck that gave me that.

Because I really felt like, oh, this isn't about, I think that Boston Public, I felt like the space between the character and myself, I couldn't find it. And I kept trying to kind of generate it. In fact, I have this really embarrassing story where at some point I started, I came up with this idea that I always would like hold the wrists of my sweaters. You know how like girls do that? Like they're cold all the time? It was just stupid. I was just trying to come up with physical things. It would make her,

it was just a train wreck. And so, but with Niphtak, it so wasn't me. I mean, I'm like barely ever out after eight o'clock. You know, like there's no part of me. So it really felt like, okay, I'm not trying to find this distinction or I'm not even trying to worry about whether or not I'm enough. I just have to tell this woman's story because it's such a compelling story. And he did such an incredible job.

with her and she was so rich and Julian was so receptive to the storyline and just the whole environment and in that sense I something clicked I'm sure it was just getting older too where I thought just stop thinking right you know let it go don't worry about this shit I mean do it just do your best job right do the best you can and then go home yeah exactly like you said then take the next job and right it gets work and and it was just so great to kind of and so then by the time glee came along and we were doing all these red carpets and all these things I just had fun. Right. And I just was like, oh my God, this is so cool. I get to go to the Golden Globes. Right. This is amazing. And again, like a part of that is just experience. A part of that's just

living, you know, through ups and downs realizing that the ups aren't, don't last and the downs don't kill you. You know what I mean? And and that kind of everything is important and yet not really that important at all. Exactly. And the, and the, and the, for me, the best place I can get to is when it comes to this kind of, you know, promoting things is that you can really say, look, I love everybody that I work with and I have such deep respect and I know people are giving their heart and soul in every department. So whatever I can do to keep everybody employed, that's cool. I'm totally down to doing that. And an element of that is some kind of promotion for the thing that you're working on. And that it's less about, because you can be made to feel

and human beings, whatever, that's how our brains operate anyway. I mean, we're like self-preservation. animals. So of course it's all about us on some level because that's just the way we work. Right. But you can be made to feel that it's all about you. But the way you put it is so perfect, which is I love this show and I love these people and I'm here to make sure people watch the show. That's why we all killed ourselves to make it, you know, some more than me. You know what I mean? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Somebody puts lipstick on me. You know what I mean? Exactly. Exactly. Yeah. And they don't, that's just a part of your job. Right. To help everybody stay employed. And one way you can do that is to kind of make

people feel like they have access to you. And there have been a lot of upsides, too. I feel like where, you know, I feel like the social media has in a way taken out that artifice, you know, where you actually can have a conversation with somebody directly with a fan. Directly who's really getting it on a deeper level and where you don't have to sort of manufacture this,

oh, but no, it's so marvelous. We were out at this, like, five-star, whatever. You know, you're just like, yeah, no, you're right. That scene was really tough. Right. And, you know, was really well-written. I agree with you. You know, and you can actually have more of a creative exchange.

Um, niptuk was, uh, and I thought a really like emotionally rich and like difficult show to watch and to do. I mean, you know, I remember my one little episode. I had a, I had to cry for like seven hours essentially and just left with this like like, you know, when you were a kid and you cried all day, like a hot. Right. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That headache. Right. Like sweaty, hot headache. Yeah, like just everything hurt, you know. And, you know, it was just the one episode.

Not only did it, I did, I also did to fuck Christian because everybody fucks Dr. Christian Troy. I could come in and be like, I don't have a vagina. He didn't have a vagina. He didn't just stall a vagina. And then that's a sending way episode. I don't have a vagina. They gave me a vagina.

And then Christian fucked it to make sure it work. Yeah, that was my episode. Yeah, that's pretty great. So, and he's such a sweetheart. I mean, it was like, I laughed the whole time. Yeah, yeah. He's really good about it. He's really good.

Yeah. And obviously knows. this kind of like running irony of the show. Right, right. It's so emotionally rich and then everybody's fucking. And his camp, yeah, exactly. But I wonder if how that was for you because it could be so challenging. And I kind of got just, you know, I just remember watching some of these like episodes and thinking as an actor.

God, that had to have been hard to shoot. You know, it's funny of the, so I had a gang bang episode. I wasn't going to bring up the gaming episode, but I'm really glad that you did. Perhaps it was referring to. Thank you. Because there are other examples, like the time that I hired the woman who looked like me to have sex with him. And I would watch and then I had to orgasm simultaneously. Oh.

But the gang bang, the premise of which was that I wanted to get pregnant again. And apparently sperm is competitive. So if you put sperm from multiple donors? Donors, thank you. There's another way to do it. I would imagine rather than actually having the men in the room. Yes. Having a lot of unprotected sex with strangers.

basically. That was Gina's big plan, that that would increase the chance to be getting pregnant, and our baby, quote unquote, our baby was in the room. Yes, in the room in like a stroller or something like that.

Yeah, he was in the crib, yeah, exactly. I want to hear everything you're going to say, so don't forget any of it, but I just remember watching that and thinking how fucking brave you were as an actor and how fucked up Gina was. Yeah. and how

I had like loved her and hated her and like alternate times in the series but how much I loved her then because she was so fucked up. So I felt like well first of all I remember after doing that I remember a friend saying to me

when you get the scripts do you ever say no I had never thought of it we're like wait can you can you? What? Is that? I know that's not a thing.

It had never crossed my mind. And it's Ryan. I mean, it's just something about him. I just trusted him implicitly. I felt like he was appreciating, you know, the characters were supposed to be two episodes. And he had just continued to write for this woman. And then the other thing was that, and listen, when you do those sex scenes, I mean, everybody has different ways of talking about how they do those sex scenes. They take a lot out of me.

I do go home and I have to take a long shower and I question whether or not this is how I want to spend my life. Like it's awkward to rob up against another person. Yeah. And to do it, because look, you know, we've all seen sex scenes that weren't that satisfying. And I'm not talking about sexually. I'm just talking about emotionally. It didn't feel real to you. It didn't feel authentic.

And that's because the actors were having our time being present because it's hard to be present with a stranger's pressing their genitals against you. In a room full of straight. Other people that you know pretty well, but they're not family. Right. You know, that guy who operated camera and the other day. What's that? We're talking about movie making that. Yes, exactly.

Like, you know, the crew, like a bunch of guys always. Like, you know, who are like eating a tuna sandwich on the camera. And looking at their watch. Or looking at your tits. One of the other. And then to look at your robes so quickly between takes that it's almost highlighting the fact that you're naked. Right. Do you know what I mean?

Yeah. Get the rope. Right. And they're trying to protect you. Stop pointing out that I have no clothes on. And I know. Yeah. And you've seen it.

So like, everybody's seen it now. I know. I know. I know. It's torturous. So there is something just that you brought up just now, which is like you want to say to to yourself, if I'm going to do this, I really have to surrender. Right.

Fully surrender. Absolutely. Not just to serve the show, but to serve myself as an actor. I don't want to leave and feel like I sabotage that scene because I couldn't be fully present in it. Yeah. Exactly. But it can't help but affect you. Yeah.

I think it does. I mean, I know that it has affected me and I've gone into, you know, the older I get, the less I'm asked to do it, which is sort of a blessing, you know. But the thing with Gina and that, because I think it is all, you know, always ends up being about the context is that, that she had become really important to me. And I really felt like, I had somebody in mind, you know, when I was playing her. And it felt so familiar to me that that idea of a person who has so much drive and wants something so much. And it's so driven by emotion.

I mean, it was truly, it wasn't, you know, she wasn't after money. She wasn't after, I mean, I know there was a period she wanted fancy things. but she was after this picture in her head of this man and this story, and yet she just kept running the same pattern over and over and over again. And that's so I know that. I know that when you're talking to your girlfriend and she so doesn't have what she wants and she keeps saying, but I, but I, and you want to say, but honey, you keep driving the same track.

You got to get off that track. But it's so human. You know, it is just so human. I mean, if only we were all like characters in TV, shows who could who could wrap it all up in an amazing speech and then and then make a life change. But I mean, life changes are are so minute. Incremental. They're so incremental.

They're so tiny. And people don't, people, the other thing is it's what I remember being struck by by her and what I think is very true of most people and what's true of what you're saying like you're talking to your girlfriend is like an utter lack of self-awareness. Totally. Cannot see your patterns. Cannot see that you keep making these decisions. So no sense of like, I mean, for Gina like she was so.

self-destructive in a way that for her felt like she was seizing power. Like she thought like, do you know what I mean? She was the conviction was. And that I think, you know, speaks a lot to the, you know, to the attic brain is really that I, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the narrative is so real. It is as, is as real as anything else. So to try and, um, and then I think also the ability of the mind to adjust and not realize that you're adjusting. And so eventually you're.

You're humiliating yourself or whatever it is or you're debasing yourself, but it's so, it seems so justified in your own brain. It seems like an utter clarity about the fact that this is the right thing to do. Exactly. There, I don't know if I've ever meant. It's not, I don't make this term up, but like the concept of cognitive dissonance, when you want something so badly and the world is not adjusting to you. So you slowly adjust your, you know, your thinking so that whatever you need fits in the slot. the world's provided for you. So it's like even people who are, you know, like who know they shouldn't smoke.

Right. They just kind of work on the way that they see the world until like smoking isn't bad for them anymore because that's how they can keep putting cigarettes in their mouth. That concept is so scary to me. And I feel like I've seen it manifest so many times that I think I overcom. Which probably ends up putting me in exactly that same. You know, it can really, you can really get into a mind fuck about it about like, am I in control of my environment?

Right. I seeing things clearly. Yes. Am I perceiving these things the way that they truly are? Am I perceiving myself clearly? My own behavior clearly. Exactly. You know?

I think, again, that's the nature of the human animal to blame mothers. Yeah. And again, that doesn't make you a bad person. That's just how we work, which is like, you know, they would say like you see like a little kid and then they trip. And then they may look around for who tripped them. You know what I mean? It wasn't me.

Or they even blame the ground. Exactly. Like the grounds in it. That's just the way we operate. Yeah. But I just remember feeling so tender towards her because she was just so broken. Yeah, she was broken. Yeah.

And, you know, I guess I feel like, I mean, and I'm so nervous to say this because I'm not trying to sound, you know, pious or like that girl in Gary Krasny's office. But I do think that's my job. You know, I think that your job is really, is not to win or to look the prettiest or to, you know, your job is to, you know, your job is to, is to, you know, your job is to, is to, is to, you know, is to. I mean, you're presuming to tell somebody's story. And it's so presumptuous to do that that you really have to get out of the way to do it. And I feel like with Ryan, that's really what he asks. That's, to him, that's his art. It was funny working on Glee because she was, Terry, I don't know if you watched Glee.

I haven't watched everything, but I've watched a good amount of it. So she was really unpopular character. And, um... Interesting. Yeah. So the way I got Glee was Ryan called me one day. I was working on heroes. And Ryan called me and he said, listen, I have this pilot and there's this part and it's

really difficult and we can't really seem to find somebody who can do it. I think you can do it. We have a look at it. And I called my reps at the time and I said, oh my God, this is crazy. But Ryan Murphy just called me and he, I think he wants me to do his pilot. And they said to me, don't worry. We've already told him you're too old and you can't sing. Oh, my God.

Oh, no. Don't worry. We've got the sudden control. We've already killed the job for you. No need to kill yourself. You go back to your guest bar because we are. We've put that. We've got it.

Oh my God. So then all this pressure went on me to actually call him and say, listen, fuck my representation. No, like I'm being pressured to tell you. Basically, no, this was really literal. People, they call me and they said, he thinks you're younger than you are. I don't care what he thinks.

I know. He wants to work with me. What is this? Because Matthew Morrison, I think, was 30, and I was like 37 or something. And they said, he doesn't realize how old you are. Like, this is how people were yelling at me. They don't realize you're old. Oh, my.

You have to tell him. Oh, my God. So I had to call him. And I said, Ryan, I'm being told that I have to tell you that I'm much older than you seem to think I am. Oh, no. He said to me, this is what I know. you're somewhere between 30 and death and that's what I need for this part

we have to go to his house and kiss him on his mouth even though he wouldn't really enjoy it but he's so fucking great I would make him take it right just hold him and then you can kiss him on the mouth be his ultimate nightmare I think of fact as a gift I will not do that

and he will thank that so then he said why don't you come in and meet Matthew and you tell me what you think and so I went and met Matthew And that's the thing about Ryan Murphy. He's like, he doesn't, this town is so obsessed with what or not you're 40 or where you are in relationship to 40. And, you know, with women. I was like, well, a woman over 40 can't possibly be with a man under 40.

That would be like against science. Right. It would be against God's law or whatever. And, you know, and of course I went into Matt Matthew and he was fantastic and we played a scene together. And he was like, just, you know, let's just go to work. Yeah. And then he said to me that, because he said, you know, it's going to be tough because people are not going to like this woman because somehow we have to make it okay that he. he cheats on her and moves on, which I think they did pretty effectively.

But he gave me such a gem one day. He walked by me when I was on set and he just said, poor Terry, she's always right. And it's true. It's the same thing. Like she wasn't crazy. He was leaving. He was like putting his energy into a Glee Club that wasn't going to move them forward as a family.

He was falling in love with this other woman. She just didn't know how to write the ship. Right. You know, she took all the wrong tool. Yeah, exactly. No idea. No idea. But she wasn't wrong.

Yeah, exactly. And so every time I play here, I always think, Terry's right. She's just right. Yeah, that is a gift. That's just like one kind of glowing thought to have the entire time you're playing the character. That's how he is, though. He just drops those little things.

And suddenly you've got, you know, all your whole role is just like laid out in front of you, you know. He's so good that way. He's so good that way. Yeah. Where were you in your work life when you auditioned for Vikings? Like, where were you in the world? What were you doing? So what happened was I got divorced.

And when I got divorced, I... Were you living here in L.A.? I was living in L.A. And I have a child. And she was, I guess, like three and a half. and I wasn't on Glee anymore. I had always known that Glee was going to be just two seasons. And so I started looking for work.

And everything that I was being asked to consider shot outside of L.A. So I just kept saying, oh, thanks, no thanks. I'm looking for work in a life. Because everything shoots outside of L.A. now anyway. But I had been so lucky because I hadn't really had that experience. I had pretty much all the series that I had done had been here. So I was kind of slow. really slow. I was two years slow to get the information. So literally. And so I was just passing

left, right and center because I wasn't going to leave my daughter. I was in school. Yeah. And so by the time Vikings came along, in fact, I was broke. And which happens, I mean, I remember once years ago, in one of my, a couple of times when we ran out of money, being like, let's just burn this fucking gas. And leave you that way. Oh, the things I have considered. I mean, yeah, I mean, I'm like, Panopi, get in the car.

Yeah, we're done. We're going to go down, you know, the 10 and we're going to work in a dime. Like, it's, you know, it's not work that I'm afraid of. I just, I didn't want to leave her. And, but I had basically worked myself out of my career. And my reps called me and they were like, you're not getting it. There's no work here for you. And I said, well, you're not getting it.

You know, not that it's their problem, but it is so hard right now for a woman in my position because in order for me to provide for her, I have to leave her. And it has been the hardest, absolutely the hardest things. So when Vikings came up, I literally thought, oh, it's a mini-series. We'll go to Ireland for the summer.

Yeah. Oh, my God. And then I got over there. And I literally felt like I had walked myself into a prison and closed the door because I had to get her back to her dad. And I thought that they were going to let me go back and forth. But because the weather in Ireland is so inconsistent, they said, you really can't.

Right, because if you were gone and then there was a storm, you couldn't get back, they couldn't shoot. Exactly. I get it. I do all these exteriors with the guys, these battle scenes. But if the weather got so bad, then they'd have to pick up some interior scene. And the women are typically. Yeah. So we would stand by for weeks.

Oh, three weeks. You could just be sitting in your apartment in Ireland, like waiting and maybe never go to set. And meanwhile, my daughter's back here. Yeah. It almost killed me. And so eventually, you know, I sorted it out so that I could have her with me and would bring her back so she could see her dad. But the spoiler alert is that I, once again in my life, asked to leave the show. Really? Yeah. And is that because you feel like you don't like being separated from your daughter? It can do that. It's just too hard. And not that distance. Was she with you half the time in school, able to make that work? She would do about, like, she was with me for about four of the six

months. So, you know, I got the lion's share, but being that far, being overseas with the time difference, I felt like if she needed me, like last night, funnily enough, I was like doing a little bit of juggling but she was sick you know and it was sort of nursing her through the night and she's some kind of stomach thing and you just think you know she's nine she's eight yeah and you know and she's just saying you know mama mama mama and you think if they're saying that and you're not i mean i just couldn't i just couldn't do it and so god love michael hurst yeah he absolutely got it he's amazing and so i went to him and he was really uh lovely about it and uh but he got it everybody knew it from the time that they met me, that this was, that this was, I mean, it was breaking me.

I'm going to ask you a personal question, and then you can tell me you don't want to answer it, and then I'll try that out of the show. Because I've been married for a long time, and, you know, we've had periods of time where we thought we might not stay married. I know how fucking crazy that makes you feel, even if it's the right thing to do. You know what I mean? It just, you know, you think your life's going to be one way, and then it's another way. So to have kind of

divorce and then go away and be separated from your daughter, I imagine that you must have just felt like you're having an out-of-body experience. I literally felt like, yeah, I mean, I felt like from having been somebody who was kind of, oh, I mean, I don't even know how to describe it, I feel like I've always sort of been responsible. I've always been on time.

I've always, you know, worked my hardest. I've always, you know, tried to, of, you know, be professional and to show up. And I feel like I have sort of a realistic sort of expectations and, you know, all those kinds of things. I tried to kind of live my life honorably. And I felt like literally I was standing in the middle of 405 and I got hit by a semi. I mean, I just felt like my entire existence got redirected.

And I couldn't figure out how I had done that to myself, how I had managed to do it all, do everything wrong, everything, that everything that, that, everything that was important to me, I couldn't serve. You know, it was like this feeling of wanting to provide and give security to my daughter, and yet I had arranged my life in such a way that it was impossible to do that without leaving her. It just seemed like, honestly, I just thought I'm the stupidest person. Well, which is a natural human thought, but a crazy thing to think. Right.

Because we are, you know what I mean? Like a totally natural thing is like. I mean, if I was my girlfriend, I would have frame it that way. Wait a minute, but are you seeing? Because we are in, I mean, I always say this, like we're not down a coal mine, but we, it is, there's this natural duality to what we do, which is that you, you hell off all of this joy and, and what seems like glamour and control, but we're really in many ways, like very powerless. Yeah. You go where the work is, and there aren't a million choices. And especially above the line in front of the camera, because there's so few.

few jobs there. You know, if you're a grip or an electrician, your face isn't tied to the show. You could work on 10 different things in 10 different places and no one gives a fuck, right? If you're good at it, you're good. But for an actor, it's like the number of shows that are right for you and your look and your age and your ability and then that's like this many things. Yeah. So if the opportunity comes, it's the choice between eating and being separated from you. I mean, you did what you had to do. I did. And I give all credit. it to my daughter because she trusted me and she came over there and just rode into that experience like a pro. I mean, I remember like, in the beginning, we couldn't find a place to live. We were moving

from hotel to a hotel and we ended up in this one hotel and it just like smelled like roach spray. And I was like, I remember I had like used the free razor in the shower. And I had cut my shin. You know that thing when you put your shin? And I was like bleeding all over the hotel room. And I was just thinking like, I'm a failure. I'm such a valiant. Years of Mother. I'm such a disaster. And she was like, Mom, this is a very nice hotel room. It has a coffee maker.

Oh, God, I want to kiss her too. She was amazing. She was just like that. And then, you know, she jumped into school there. And she jumped into the experience and she embraced everything. And as far as she's concerned, Ireland is a huge, I mean, she's a big adventure. She actually told me when I finally, you know, broke the news to her. She was like, Mommy, I think you made a big mistake.

You know, because for her, that's life. For her, you know, recently I went up to Vancouver to. do a job. It seems like a more sort of reasonable commute. And I was like, baby, I'm really sorry. You know, I got to go away again. I'm really sorry. And she said, well, mom, what are you going to do? You got to work. Yeah. Yeah. And I thought, kids are resilient. There's so much more resilient than we give them credit for it. Yeah. I mean, because I told her, I'm like, girl, this is mommy's job. If we want to like live in this house and you want to go to that school and we're going to, you know, make it happen, then we're both going to have to give up some time together. I mean, it's just what it is.

Yeah. I hate it, though. Yeah. I hate it. Yeah. I don't, it doesn't feel natural. Right. And, uh, I'm still trying to figure it out. Yeah. And I imagine, I mean, I imagine that it is a struggle that any working parent, especially a working, I'm not trying to, uh, discount how men feel about being separated

from their kids, but. Well, we worked with men who had kids. Right. And it was different. Now, they also have partners at home. Right. I think it's, for me, it's kind of by the fact that I'm a single parent. Single parents.

So it's, that's different. You know, they're, they're, they're. wives are sending them pictures of the kids and stories and whatever. Not that my ex is like, I mean, we actually are quite good about that stuff. But regardless, we're not married. I mean, not going to talk. You know. Right. And, but it is so far different for the men that I've seen. Yeah. Different. So, you know, even if I say that it's different for working mothers and maybe you just extend that to different for working single parents, that, you know, it's something. And I actually have a man in my life who was a single parent. There is this thing that you always feel. like if you're serving yourself or not even serving yourself personally or which I think you deserve I mean to be a good parent you have to be like a fulfilled person it's a hard balance but you but if you're but let's just say serving yourself aside just serving like your work right and you're taking something away from your child and I don't think that anybody any parent ever gets over like the fact that they feel like that's a zero

sum equation yeah like something has to suffer you know she'll be 18 you'll feel that way that's yeah so and again that's like a natural way to feel um it doesn't mean it's not a terrible feeling to have. I think it just means that everybody kind of goes through it. I think, like, it's, look, we always romanticize, you know, what we don't have. But I think it's when you're a single parent is compounded by the fact that you're only having that conversation with yourself. Right. You know, you don't have anyone being like, well, just go and we'll see how it is.

You know, you're literally like, it's either or, and this will define her entire life experience. Yeah. And I'm not going to get to go back and undo it. I mean, these moments are, I'm creating a person. And every day I'm away is like. Which is great energy to have around a kid. Super good for her, too. It's very grounding.

She doesn't make her feel in any way. A little crazy pressure or anything. She sounds to me, she sounds amazing anyway. She's a rock star. I mean, honestly. She just, I mean, I remember dropping her off at that school in Ireland. And I remember looking at her and thinking, this would be inappropriate time to melt down.

Right. I would pick now. She just like, she just trusts to me. She just went, you know, if I said, and that's what I started to realize was that I had to be okay with the plan for her to be okay with the plan. Right. So I had to embrace it.

Right. And then once we did, of course, we had the most wonderful time. Yeah. And made, you know, relationships and had experiences that, you know, I could never actually have gone in search of. Right. Right. On your own. Yeah.

No, of course. Because who wouldn't? You'd be just, you know, home doing what everybody does, taking the kid to school and living in LA or whatever. Exactly. Exactly. Do you like Ireland? I loved it. Yeah.

And I loved it for her because, you know, we lived in a little, I don't know if you ever went to this village. called Dalke. I did go to Dalke. So Dalke is kind of halfway between Ashford and Dublin. And Dublin, exactly. And it's on the coast,

and it's this gorgeous little village. And we always live there. Every year we live there. And it literally has, you know, a fishmonger and a greengrocer, a butcher. And we had these little kick scooters because you could go up and down

the seashore and your razor. And I think she loved the weather. And I think she just felt that she could be more independent than she can in L.A. because I could say, you know, yeah, run along to the store and go get the papers or whatever. And I felt like she could do that. She could start to cross the road and have this kind of, you know, sort of start to separate ironically.

And yeah, I mean, but, you know, this is the thing about kids. You know, it's tough as a divorce parent, you know, when you don't want to, you don't want to kind of keep sort of tapping into their resilience to make things work. You feel terrible doing that. You feel just horrible saying, I'm going to ask of you. huge thing, which is that you now have to live between two homes and you have two beds and two environments and two smells, you know, like two laundry detergages. I mean, there's such a sense of permanence as a child that to actually ask this of them is just, oh my God, don't even get me started. But at the same time, I do think that there's even a narcissism in that. I remember

I had a girlfriend say to me at one point, she said, it's her story now. It's not your story. You keep making it about you. It's her story. So if you've decided that this is her story, you have to support it. And that was right. You know, it's her story. She's going to tell it the way she lived it. And I'll say it. I would not ever say that my experience was universal, but what I will say, as a child of divorce,

kids are so much more perceptive than we give them credit for. I knew what my parents were going through. I knew they tried to work it out. I knew they loved me. I knew they couldn't stay together. You know what I mean? Like I wasn't like, why is my life being really? I had a totally clear picture of what was going on.

Your daughter seems like she's probably more perceptive than I was at her age. My God, she said to me the other day, it was hilarious. She was like, why does Kermit love Miss Piggy? And I went as this whole thing about, well, Kermit is an introvert and Ms. Piggy's an extrovert. And, you know, sometimes the opposite's the track, but they can't really be together. And she got quiet. And she said, so you're Kermit and Daddy's Miss Piggy? And I was like, I would have saved so much in therapy if someone had just told

us that we were Kermit and Ms. Biggie and there was love, but we weren't meant to make it. Like, why didn't somebody tell me? This was so obvious. Nobody picked up on this. We even told her dad, and he was like, oh yeah, that's, that's, that totally makes sense. Thanks, Benelope. Glad we had you so you could explain us to ourselves. Seriously, so you can shrink us. Yeah. Thank you. Well, she sounds like a belay. I definitely think that, that, um, you made a really good point, which is I think we're always agonizing about creating imperfection for other people. And, um, um, And typically they're not looking for perfection themselves.

Right. You know, I think we do that in relationships. I think we do that with their family members. You know what I mean? And it's almost like the more you learn, the more you delude yourself into thinking that you can create things, when in reality, of course, I mean, she's looking at things to the eyes of an eight-year-old. So why would.

And this is her experience, right? And it's not like she's comparing it to like, well, you know, yeah, she's just how she's living it. Yeah, exactly. She sounds rad. She's all right. I think it's time for self-inflicted wounds. Oh. Yes.

Wee. Okay, well, the one that I thought of, I don't know why I thought of this because I hadn't thought of it in many, many years. But it's just sort of self-inflicted wound in the sense that it's humiliating. And it haunts me because the person it involves is incredibly famous. and so I am aware of them almost on a daily basis. And so it's a story that lives on for me. I can only assume it does not live on for him.

But basically when I was in college, I was in a relationship for five years, so all the way through grad school and into moving to New York. So I had never really been, this is how I explain it to myself now, I had never been really single kind of as a young person. So when I found myself single at like 25 in New York, this actor lived in my neighborhood. And I was walking home. I was doing a play midtown. And I was walking home one night.

And I bumped into him. And we had known each other. We had done some volunteer work in New York at the same time. So we'd sort of known each other just a little bit. And he said to me, oh, you know, how's it going? I said, oh, good. And he said, we should get a beer sometime. And I said, oh, yeah, that will be great.

And then we parted ways. And then I went home and I thought, I don't know if I'm ready to get a beer with somebody. I should probably tell him. So somehow I got his phone number. And this is obviously predate cell phone. So I called his home and I left a message. Basically that I sent like, hey, thanks so much for asking me for beer. I should explain that I have been in this relationship for five years and it's pretty fresh that it's over.

So I'm not really sure that I'm ready. But, you know, I'm not sure if I'm ready to get a beer. I feel like I have to think about it. But, you know, thank you so much for inviting me. And then, you know, a few days passed. And I thought, no, I think I am ready to get a beer. So then I called Smishy. I said, hey, it's me.

You know, I actually have been thinking about it. And I think it would be great to get a beer. You know, I mean, just let me know. around here's my number and uh you know thanks so much for asking me i'm just kind of excited to get back out there and and have a beer a few more days past and he didn't call so then i called again i said hey i don't know i didn't i hope i didn't scare you off with my first message um but uh you know i i i don't want you to worry about that at all let's you know let's definitely get a beer that would be cool didn't call me oh so i continued to call with the kind of like hey so i just feel like hey so i just feel

like when you do ask someone for beer. Oh, no. No, it's so bad. Continue. I want to hear one more. I want to hear one of my message. Oh, God. I mean, so then I think it was just, I think it got to the point where I was like, you know,

I just, I feel like when you ask someone if they're going to do something, you have someone to do something. And then you follow up on it. Oh, my God. It's so wonderful. It's like I feel, I'm feeling some actual, like, physical. pain, like, on your behalf, because I'm sure I've done something as ridiculous as this. But, like, days, okay?

No, weeks probably. And I didn't see him for months. Right. And saw him at this, like, place where we volunteered. And at some point, we ended up in front of each other. And he was like, hey, you know, sorry, sorry that I'm called. I was out of town on a job. So he just got them all.

Came home. You have 15 messages. Oh, God. Oh, everything hurts. Nonstop. He luckily has gone on to win Oscars. Oh, no. Do you want to say who it is?

No. Okay. He knows who he is. He knows who he is. It's so good. It is so embarrassing. It's so horrible. It's so good, though.

painful. But I think it really was like, I think that, you know, I just didn't know what dating was. Like I thought, oh, well, when somebody has you for a beer, you will now live with them and be with them for five years. And then you will come to the question of whether or not you want to get married. And when you decide you don't want to, you'll get separate apartments. Like that was, I figured that was all in the invitation on the corner of like 70 second in Broadway. That was everything that was going down. Oh, my God. Oh, that is epic. That's epic. That's a self-inflicted. I mean, I still feel the wound. Oh, yeah. Oh, I felt it a little bit just now. I have a little bit of a tummy ache. Now we all. Oh, God, bless you. But I want to tell you that is just so excellent. It is just like, because it's just like self-immolation. Like I built the pile of wood, and then I got in the pile of wood, and then I put gasoline on the wood, and then I let a match. The match didn't get it going enough.

So then I got like a lighter. I'm not burning fast enough. I douse myself in tallow, just like over and oh, it's so. It's great. Couldn't quit. Oh, it's good. So painful. And then he handled it like... Beautifully. Oh, right? Like, didn't, you know...

But which almost made it like worse because without saying it, he was like, you're fucked in the head and don't ever come... But he didn't. But he almost hurts more that he was so elegant about it. That's what I mean. Right? Obviously, he was a mature, evolved human being.

No, he was just like, hey, I was out of town, but, you know, it's good to see you. Meanwhile, to his friends, he's like, stay the fuck away. I've actually wondered if he ever tells the story in reverse. Like, let me get it. You want to hear about crazy actresses? I'll tell you about a crazy actress. Oh, God.

And then, like, he still has that old answering machine. It's like, Tamp. And it carries it around. Oh, that's a really good story. That's a really good story. Thank you. I am so happy they came into my show. Seriously.

Thank you. I'm such a joy. I'm a huge fan. And even more now that I can spend time with you. I'm quite sure I'm a bigger fan. Thank you. Mutual admiration. Yay!

That was Jess Lynn Gilsick. Wasn't that great? And I thought her self-inflicted wounds was awesome. I'm not going to tell you who the person was in that story, but I will tell you it was, she did tell me afterwards, and it was awesome. She's awesome. She was so great to tell that story. She's so sweet and lovely and so genuine.

And, God, I always love it when you love someone and you also, you see them winning, and then you see them winning again, you know. She was so amazing and so brave on Niptuck. I remember that. I remember as a fan I felt that way. And then when I was an actor on that show, I felt that way that she had a really difficult role to play that required an insane amount of bravery and confidence and just badassery. And she was just always so incredible on that show. And she's amazing on Viking. So I encourage you to watch the show. There's no upaloja for today. There's none. I haven't been apologizing lately, mainly because I'm too busy. Is that awful? You guys are amazing to listen to my show. You know I do this all by myself. I don't have a big, you know, production staff. And sometimes they get slammed. And a lot of times I'll be like, I'm really going to come up with a great apology for the show. And then sometimes be like, eh, I think the show was pretty fucking awesome. And it was. And she was. And so there. You guys are the greatest who are my army. Come follow me, friend me online, Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, Instagram, who say, there's more,

but I can't remember it all. At my three official handles, Ayesha Tyler, Courage and Stone, Girl on Guy. Come say hi at Girl and Guy.com. Write me a letter. You know, if you come into the website and you click on the Amazon banner, you can shop on behalf of Girl on Guy and everything you spend on Amazon, a cut of that will come to the show. You spend no more, you pay no more. The costs are no higher, but a cut of what Amazon makes. It comes back to Girl on Guy. A very easy, safe, fun way to support the show and make sure to get your Girl on Guy gear at Girlengi.com at Girlongi.com. Clicking on the store. There will be so many more ribbled and exciting hijinks awaiting you in 2015, including activities at E3, our annual fan. appreciation event at Comic-Con and the launch of the premium cocktail line, courage and stone. So get ready for all those things. Ready your body. And thanks for listening. You guys are my army. You are magnificent. You are unstoppable. And you are a Legion. I'll talk you in the next one. Late. Girl on Guy is a production of Hot Machine, blowing shit up since 2009.