Happy Sad Confused - Paul Bettany, Vol. II

Episode Date: May 14, 2026

Paul Bettany is back and so is Vision with the upcoming Marvel series, Visionquest! But first up for the actor is the Starz series, AMADEUS, co-starring Will Sharpe. Here Paul chats about all of it including the unlikely film that landed him his Marvel role, whatever happened to the MASTER & COMMANDER sequel, his memories of Heath Ledger and more. Plus, Benjamin Wagner joins Josh to talk about his new documentary, FRIENDS & NEIGHBORS, in which he confronts the chronic stress epidemic and his own personal journey with it. Watch FRIENDS & NEIGHBORS now on VOD! SUPPORT THE SHOW BY SUPPORTING OUR SPONSORS! Rula -- Rula patients typically pay $15 per session when using insurance. Connect with quality therapists and mental health experts who specialize in you at ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://www.rula.com/happy⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ #rulapod Quince -- Go to ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Quince.com/HAPPYSAD ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠for free shipping and 365-day returns. Limited Time Offer–Get Huel today with my exclusive offer of 15% OFF online with my code happy15 at ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠http://huel.com/happy15.⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ New Customers Only. Thank you to Huel for partnering and supporting our show! UPCOMING EVENTS! 5/17 -- Billy Eichner in NY -- ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Tickets here⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ 5/18 -- Power Ballad w/Paul Rudd & Nick Jonas -- ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Tickets here⁠ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

I remember just Whedon, I was as on my knees firing a blast from my forehead or something. It's in the first film and he was like, so, how did it, how do you feel? You good? And I went, how does it feel? I, what do you mean? I have no, does it look cool? I'm not, I'm No, I'm pretending to fire a laser beam out of my forehead. I had no idea how it feels. It feels a bit silly, but then, you know, the laser beam on there. It's pretty cool. Prepare your ears, humans.

Happy, sad, confused begins. Hey, guys, it's Josh. Welcome to another edition of Happy, Sad, Confused. Today on the show, Paul Bettney, talking Marvel, Amadeus, and so much more. This is a fun one. Thanks, guys, as always, for checking out the podcast. Remember to hit that subscribe button on YouTube. Spotify, however you're doing it. Don't miss a single episode. We do about two of these a week

usually, so there's a lot to enjoy. Later on in the episode, I do want to mention this. So we have Paul Bettney as the main event. Later on, stick around because we have a special little bonus conversation with an old friend of mine, an old co-worker who has directed a great new film called Friends and Neighbors. His name is Benjamin Wagner. This is a great new film about dealing with chronic stress in his own personal life and how we all are and how through connection, hopefully we're all kind of getting through the collective stress we're all dealing with today. That's coming up later after the Paul Bettany conversation. Okay, so before we get to that, though, Paul, consummate actor, a consummate charming man.

He's the ultimate charming man, right? Come on. He can do it all, including play vision in all the different Marvel incarnations, including the upcoming Vision Quest, some nice teases about that upcoming show. And also a deep dive into his role in the new Amadeus, mini-series. This is the newest adaptation of the play by Peter Schaffer that of course inspired the great film in the 80s. Paul is always a great conversation and this one certainly lived up to that. As always, check out our Patreon. Patreon.com slash happy, say it confused for discount

codes and early access to all our episodes, discount codes to our live events. We do a ton of them. We've got a lot coming up in May and June. All the information is in the show notes. Check it out. Patreon.com slash happy, say it confused. Okay, it's a pack show, so I'll shut up for now so you can hear the two guests. Later on, Benjamin Wagner, check that one out. But for now, here is me and Paul Bettney. Paul, we're doing it. Are you ready for this?

Let's do it. Were you going to swear at me? Yeah, let's fucking do it. Let's fucking do it. Let's fucking do it. Paul. We can do it. It's fucking podcast.

Do it now. Yeah. Hey, welcome back, man. It's good to see you. That's lovely to be here. Congrats on all things. We're going to talk, Amadeus. We'll preview some other, this visiony thing, whatever.

We'll keep talking about that, some other things. But first of all, I track everybody by their Instagram. So based on your Instagram, here's what Paul Bettney is up to lately. Some skiing? Yes. Yes. Went skiing in Switzerland? Amazing.

You vouched for this. It sounds in theory like that would be fun. It is my happy place. Really? Yeah. Scheme's like flying in your dreams. And I, well, as close as you can get to it. And I just, I love to, I love to ski.

Have you ever had an injury? I feel like I haven't skied. in a number of years and I worry in my old age now that I'm Oh no, what I love about it, we were skiing with people, we were skiing with a three year old and an 80 year old. I mean, you can you can, and the 80 year old

ripping it. Really? Yeah. So yeah, it's really, I don't know if there's another sport that multi-generational. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And then I saw some dog content. We were talking before he walked in. Yes, Wallace as potentially the love of my life. She's certainly the love of Jennifer's.

How long has Wallace been in your wives? Wallace is nearly seven. And just... Who is Wallace's favorite? Jennifer. Yeah. My dog, too. My wife.

For sure. Yeah, yeah. It's not even... They are... And when Jennifer's at home, they're inseparable. Yeah. And she's a golden retriever. And they're, you know, they're leaning.

They just, wherever Jennifer is, she's lent against. Jennifer. Were you always a dog person or? Yes. Well, I love cats too. But, um, uh, yeah, I love, I love dogs. All right, we've been laying. We don't deserve dogs.

We really don't. Yeah, we got ours about five years ago, Lucy, and she's a pit mix, and it's just like all of. It's absurd. It's just the best. We're going to continue this on the dog show another time. But, and then I see a lot of photography, maybe your muse now is, is one of your children, is one of your children, Stalin? I feel like he's been photographing Stalin a lot.

Oh, yeah, well, he was just here, and we were out in some, we went for a walk in Red Hook, and it's, Red Hook's weirdly photogenic. And so. And how Stalin is he photogenic as well? Not really, I know. He takes after his mother. And he is, yeah, so we were just taking, I love to take pictures. That's the other thing that I love to do.

And I have a beautiful, expensive camera with expensive lenses that make me look like you know what you're doing. Yeah. And I mean, they're so expensive that I have lied to Jennifer about how expensive they are. That's the major indulgence. I told my son that if I die, he should inform Jennifer not to sell those cameras at the price I said they were. Double it, at least.

Yes. Was Stellan named after Stellan Scarsguard, by the way? He was, yeah. That's amazing. So you worked, that was Dogville way back when, right? It was way back when he had Dogville and another movie, incidentally, called Kiss Kiss, Kiss, Bang, which not the Downy Kiss Kiss, Kiss, Bang, but another Kiss Kiss, Kiss, Ben, and I've just fell head over heels in love with Stalin. And he became a real, mental for me and yeah yeah I got a chance to tend a bit of time with him over this last award season I mean how great was he in it was amazing amazing and the film is just fantastic obsessed with it yeah yeah yeah but what is he why did he I mean this is a dumb question

but why was he why did he stand out to you at that time as someone that he's he was incredible well A in one he was incredibly honest about acting and very excessive when to talk about acting and was really generous in a way that I think at times older actors find it hard to be with the younger actors and and he is he's just a is a very kind and hilarious man and none of his humor comes from cruelty, and that's hard to do. Right. Right. All of mine does.

I went the other way. I just thought it. They're the Don Rickles of the MCU. Yeah. Yeah, I went the other way. Yeah, he is, he's very, he's brilliantly funny. And I thought, what a, what a great namesake for Stal. My son. I did see one of your buddies recently. I caught up with, was he awesome?

Yeah. I asked her what she had to say to you because you guys haven't spent enough time. She was really focused on your beauty regimen and how you're aging in reverse and she seems to really resent. She had talked nothing about your talents as an actor, nothing about you as a human being,

just wanted to talk about it. My beauty version. Yeah, just what do you do? Well, it's basically a bottle of wine. And that's so rude. It's genetic. Damn you. Yeah.

Yeah, I don't know. I don't do anything. I don't do anything. What? I don't do any. Maybe some moisturiser. I don't know that I steal off my wife. That's very kind of her.

Is there a constant contact with Lizzie or is it a weekly text? What's the, what's the cadence of your conversation? It's not. Our cadence is more monthly. If she's in town, you know, we'll go and get a dinner with her and a husband. We'll all go, Jennifer will. and she's great company and she is I always look forward to getting to work with her because she is so fastidious and I am and timely I love her she's always on time

how is she yeah she's um so so many actors aren't and she is a good student she's She's so prepared and I love it. She seems, in my experience with her, also a bit of the neurotic, and I say this with love. Like, she seems like a little bit of just, like, there's a lot going on up there. There's a lot. Yeah, there's a lot happening up there,

but I find, really, because I find it quite self-possessed in that way. Okay, well, you would know better. Yeah. And not somebody who catastrophizes or, or dramatizes things. I mean, um. So you're the drama queen in the pair?

100%. I don't, you know, I think I both of us have been doing it long enough that I, I don't, I don't get nervous. You know, I don't, you know it's gonna, it's gonna come out on the wash. It's gonna be fine. I guess my worry is are we gonna get there in the end? But I don't, I don't feel anxious in front of a camera and she doesn't seem to, either and and but I really and I really mean this not only is she talented she's

also really prepared and I there are so many times you work with people and you're in the makeup trailer and you look down and you see the person learning their sides yeah their lines and I think wow and then when you show up on set you go to this you know the studio and then you know they come in and say to the director, I've had an idea and I think, yeah, on the fucking golf cart, you hadn't, I had some half-baked idea and now we're going to have to listen to it. And I find that a little irritating because I think it's what the thing that has really been, I've noticed in my time as an actor is the thing that gets really squeezed is time.

That's all to that. You know, when I made a movie right at the beginning of my career called Gangster Number One, we had 12 weeks on an indie movie. Wow. I remember because I was listening to our last podcast, which, believe it or not, was for Shelter, the film you directed. Wow. Wow. I know.

We've obviously talked since then, but not the podcast. And we talked about time in respect to that film. I believe you shot that in 21 days. 21 days. So think about that, juxtaposition for already started in the indie world. 100%. And when you squeeze time like that, you need to be prepared. You need to have, you know, there isn't, there's not enough space to allow you to come in and figure it out on set.

Yeah. On set. I can't believe he called out Anthony Mackey like that. Just, I mean, it's just not. Anthony terribly well prepared to. Giuliar. He's got it. Come on.

He's got it down. As he'll remind you. We'll be right back with more Happy Say I Confused. From the parents behind law and order comes a mystery the whole family can enjoy. Patrick Pickle Bottom Everyday Mysteries. Step into the whimsical world of Patrick Picklebottom, a precocious 11-year-old with a love for reading and an uncanny ability to solve mysteries. Inspired by the beloved children's book of the same name,

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praying the darkness chooses someone else tonight. But in the shadow dark, the darkness always wins. This is old school adventuring at its most cruel. Your torch ticks down in real time. And when that flame dies, something else rises to finish the job. This is a brutal rules-light nightmare with a story that emerges organically based on the decisions that the characters make. This is what it felt like to play RPGs in the 80s. And man, it is so good to be back.

Join the Glass Cannon podcast as we plunge into the shadow dark. every Thursday night at 8 p.m. Eastern on YouTube.com slash the glass canon with the podcast version dropping the next day. See what everybody's talking about and join us in the dark. Let's talk Amadeus. Congratulations. Oh, thank you very much. This is a new interpretation, of course, for those that don't know, I'm sure everybody does. The classic play inspired by real life events, maybe real, maybe not. I believe Peter Schaffer was the playwright. Um, I mean, that film adaptation made a major impact on me as I think. Meelish Foreman.

The last great Milosh Forman movie, I think. It's one of my top 20, I think, a whole time. It's a fantastic movie. Unbelievable. And Tom Hulse, F. Murray, Abraham, you are now, Salieri. This is Big Shoes to Phil. But look, the great works maybe don't demand, but they invite reinterpretation. Talk to me a little bit about the challenge and excitement of an iconic part.

like Salieri. Well, you're right. It's an iconic role in the same way that Iago is a iconic role. And many people play Iago. So I didn't, I'm never shy of looking at other people's work that have played roles, but I didn't need to because I've seen that movie so many times. And it's such a a brilliant performance by F. Murray Abraham. But it didn't ever give me pause in the same way, because Hamlet, Hamlet, Batman. It's like you can.

So I didn't worry about that. What I worried about was, are we going to do something different? But A and one, it is not based on the film. Right. And the play is different. And so that, but I do feel that the major difference, of course, is five hours. Well, you're talking about space before.

Here it is. Right. And so you get to dig into both Mozart and Salieri's domestic life. And I find that interesting and reason enough to look at it again. And also the play and the film to a certain extent, but the play certainly is very much from the point of view of Salieri. Salieri talks to the audience in the play. And this has Mozart on more equal footing in terms of who the, the show is about.

Yeah. And I thought that was interesting because, and I think Will is a great person to play that role. As Will Sharpe. Will Sharpe. Yeah. Because he is a bit of a genius. And it's, I think genius is quite hard to play.

And I think it's hard to relate to. Yeah. And what I love about Salieri is he's so relatable. He is. Because he is a step away from genius. And there are two sides of Salieri, right? There's the side of Salieri. There's the side of it, which is every office in the world has a Salieri who comes out of the meeting.

The boss has said, that new assistant is, she's fantastic. I want her in every meeting right and then he got the sallieri comes out of the office and goes I don't know what you did to piss him off But you know come to me with your ideas first right and you know So there's that side and then there's also this sort of broken little boy that I see in sallieri who just Can't believe that his dad has picked the other son right and all I want is to please you, is to deliver this. It's a prodigal son's story to a certain degree.

And he is, and he's, he's broken by it. There's this amazing moment for, um, where Will and his, his son has died and he's written a piece. So beautiful for his, uh, his wife to sing that she will be able to talk to their son in heaven again. Because God will listen. And it's a, I'm truly astonishing piece of music. And Salieri sits there and what he hears is God has chosen him. Right.

That's all he can hear. That's all he can hear. He knows it to be true. And that's, you know, that's, it's, it's, I just, I just feel that's so eminently relatable. Where are you at when it applies to your craft in terms of like God-given ability versus the craft versus learning how to act? Like how much of it is innate, how much of it can be taught? I think it differs with, I think it really differs with different people. I mean, I feel like, and it sort of doesn't matter.

It's the only thing you can control is preparation. Right. You know, and yes, I've seen people come in and, you know, some, you know, kid off the street come in, just be breathtaking. And you're catching lightning in a bottle and it's extraordinary. But I've equally seen a lot of unprepared people come in and not do that. So I would, I mean, I don't think one, you can't control whether they're, they're, It's the same as I feel about when I, you know, was auditioning is the, I can't control whether somebody more famous and therefore more bankable, more better looking, more appropriate to the part, more talented can come in. But what I can control is I will be the most prepared one.

Right. And then when that actor drops out. of that role at the last minute and they're like who was that kid that came in and and not it out of the park yeah who will make my job easier who came prepared and who came yeah and and and and it takes i mean it takes a lot to keep doing that as a young actor when you're pretty certain you're not getting the job yeah because they're going to go with whomever of course they are but um but to be be the person when that can step into those shoes when that guy drops out because he gets a better gig.

Right. That's, that's real. And I don't know how I feel so bad, like, I can't imagine what self-types. I mean, I'm so glad that wasn't my era, you know, my era was, was you went into a room, you, you, you had a connection. You made a connection with them and made them, and made them, made them laugh, made them want to spend six weeks with you, whatever it is. And they're poised to get, and you haven't even read the thing yet, you know. What was the most life-altering audition you can think of, whether you got the role or not? Like, is there one or two that jump out at you of like that connection, meeting a filmmaker, being in the room, being energized by that experience?

Yeah. I mean, there are a few things. I mean, I learned an amazing lesson on my... I auditioned. I didn't audition because Mel Gibson wouldn't let actors read. He just wanted to meet you. And at the end of it, he said, okay, you're in Braveheart.

And I went, I'm in Braveheart. I went, yep, you're in Braveheart. And... That's years before... As you've probably noticed, I'm not in Braithy. That's years before, Night's Till. That's like five or six years prior.

Yes. I was still at drama school. And he, and what, what, it taught me a really good lesson, which is that the biggest star in the world, as he was then, really. And the director of the film and the producer of the film can say you're in a movie. And still studio. And not be in a movie. Yeah. So that was a really good lesson.

And, wait, what was the role? Was it, Robert. Yeah, the prince. Yeah. Oh, right. Prince. Wow. Did that affect your relationship to watching that movie for a while?

No. I mean, it was very different in the script, but, um, very different character in the script. But no, that so that there was that and there was also Brian Helgland, who stood by me and stood by me. It wasn't for Knights tale. It was a film before that. and he auditioned me.

He saw a tape that I had done for the casting director, and then he flew to London, and he, you know, did a proper audition, and the studio went, we don't get it. And he did it again, and they went, we don't get it. And then he refused to make the movie. And I was like, Brian, don't die on the self for me. Don't do that for me.

And he went, it's not for you, yes. And he's right. It was probably quite self-aggrandizing. He went, if I fold on you, I'm going to fold on everything. Right. And then he wrote a Nightstale with a part in it for me. And I, and then he called me into audition. I auditioned.

The studio went, we don't get it. And then he flew me back. He had me stay. He must have flown me three times to Los Angeles. And let me stay in his house. and finally he was like, well, then I'm not going to make the movie because they just didn't get it. And they, because he had had previous, you know, for absolutely saying,

no, I'm not going to make the film. And they had a film with a young Heath Ledger star in it. And they went, all right, we'll let them have it. Rest is history. That's 25 years ago, and they still came out. Is that right? Wow. And see, that, that taught me another lesson,

that there are good people who will stand by you. And then I think prior to that was gangster number one. Right. And which was really the first big moment for you as a lead actor. Yeah, and it sort of became, it was a calling card for me. I don't, not sure lots of people saw it, but I think filmmakers saw it. Right. Right.

Yeah. And I still love that movie. You know, it, there's, there's, There's no actor, arguably, that comes up more. There are two actors that come up on this podcast constantly. It's Philipsumer Hoffman and it's Heath. It's Heath Ledger. The impact Heath has had on your contemporaries, but also this generation that has come since,

is remarkable. Yeah. The way he carried himself, the choices he made, his actual performances. I mean, what do you think his legacy is as a performer? I don't know. I, it's, it's, he is, I, I, I think, I, I, I, I, he is, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, he is, I, I, I, I, I, I, spend so I spend I suppose I whenever I think about him I find myself sort of overwhelmed with sadness when I have to sort of remember I have to remember that he's dead

he was an incredibly creative force and I find myself mourning the things that he didn't make not just as an actor he was just an incredibly created human being And I've said this before, I'm so, I think these sort of narratives and almost an industry gets built around, around the narrative of him as a, like a torture genius kind of thing. Yeah, yeah, yeah, I get it. It just wasn't like that. Yeah, yeah. He was just shining and when you were with him, it was like having the sun on you, you

couldn't, he was, and he was just so full of life and joy, you know. Yeah, I mean, and, and, and. the kid couldn't sleep and that's it. Yeah. That's the story. Heartbreak. I can't even. Yeah.

A fantastic actor. Do you remember seeing him in the dark night? That must have blown your mind to see your friend in that context. Yeah. Yeah. You know, it was heartbreaking. Yeah. Jumping ahead.

I'm sorry for bringing it down. No, no, no. It's a good remembrance. More happy say confused coming up. I'm Andy and I'm Melissa. and this is Moms and Mysteries. We're two Florida moms obsessed with true crime, from infamous cases like Ellen Greenberg

to shocking Florida stories like the Dan Markell killing. With 55 million downloads, we bring you new deep dives every Tuesday and Thursday. Listen to Moms and Mysteries on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts. Oh, please, not that music. That music gives me nightmares from my childhood. Could we get something a little bit lighter?

Some lighter music here. Are you a fan of true crime TV shows? And what about all that? Unsolved Mysteries, the show that jumpstarted all of our love of true crime. I'm Ellen Marsh. And I'm Joey Taranto. And we host I Think Not, a True Crime comedy podcast covering some of the wildest stories from your favorite true crime can't be TV shows all the way to Unsolved Mysteries. Baby, you will laugh, you will cry.

You'll think about true crime in a whole new way. And you'll also ask yourself, who gave these people, mics? New episodes of I Think Not are released every Wednesday with bonus episodes out every Thursday on. Patreon. And every Monday you can listen to our true crime rundown where we go over the top true crime headlines of the week. So come and join us wherever you listen to your podcast. Did we ever come at all close to the master and commander sequel? It was talked about for so many years. Was it just you guys being asked by people like me or was there a real talk at some point? No, I think there was real talk at some point. And I think that Russell had a really good idea.

The problem with that movie is that it didn't make enough money for people. You know? It did well. It made its money back and it made some money. But it just wasn't enough. And I think that's a shame because I think there was a real life in that as a, yeah, as a movie we could have, some characters we could have kept making movies about. Speaking of Russell, is this true? I forgot this.

And not to bring it down again, but like, were you cast in Le Miz? Were you going to play the Javert part in Le Miz, the film? No, I read for it. Oh, is that it? He weren't actually like, no. Okay. Because you've never done the movie musical thing. I haven't.

I haven't done that. And I love to sing. This is what I'm saying. Was that the closest you came to like a major musical like that? Yeah, I think so. Yeah. Yeah. I guess people don't see me that way.

Well, come on people. It's not too weight. Mamma Mia three is just sitting right there for you. Mama Mia three. How's your Abba? You know, my Abba's great. I'm very much for asking. Sounds like a medical condition.

How's your Abba doing? Oh, it's fine. A little bloated. Who do we credit? Who do we credit, we know I can credit Favreau for casting you as Jarvis way back when. Who do we credit with the, that leap to vision? Was that a Joss idea? Was that a, yes, yes.

Yeah. Actually, that's a pretty great story because I'd made a movie called a priest and it attacked. and because it was supposed to, well, I mean, there may be many reasons why priest tanked, but just one of them was that it was supposed to come out in January and they had a problem with Green Lantern and they realized they would lose less money if they put Green Lantern in our spot and us in Green Lantern spot and then we came out between Thor and something else. a movie, it was like being in a Prius crushed by two, you know, SUVs. And we're like, wait, this is not the right time for this, you know, whatever it was, $25 million vampire movie. And so that happened. And, you know, you're sitting there unable to get hired because you've been in this film that's tanked.

And then when just... Jos Whedon asked me to do it, I found out that when he taught it through with Kevin and Coe, they were like, they were like, yeah, I mean, he's so fun, he's fun and, you know, they really enjoyed working with him, but can he, can he play a superhero? And they showed him priest. And so this movie that I thought, you know, had been the career, but it actually was your test tape. Exactly. And life is curly, and you just don't know what, you know, what's coming down the pike. I have this vague memory. Correct me if I'm wrong, because I've been interviewing. Pipe.

Pipe? Pike, pipe. Something with a Pipe. Must be a pipe. Way back away, because I probably interviewed you for priest and Legion in those films. And that was around you when you were doing the Jarvis voice. And I feel like you told me you hadn't even watched the Iron Man films. at that time. Is that true? Like by a time before you actually played Vision?

Yeah, but that, um, it was, I think that I don't watch a lot of my movies. Okay. So it's never seen, I've never seen dog film. You know, I'm never, um, there are a lot of movies that, um, so yeah, that was nothing to do with, I have subsequently, okay, watched them all because, you know, when I was gonna play vision, it became, um, it became, um, became more important for me research-wise than right lizzie said that you were basically the early conspirator to kind of like bring that relationship to the floor when you got started to do stuff on screen that you were basically like if we build something and in the subtext here there might be something for us yes well i mean also joss was really helpful in there yeah you know um he wanted

But it was just begun in looks. And I think that I thought it would be a pretty helpful and fruitful vein for us. Because there's nothing else like that in those films. You know, and it's it's a really, it's a great, it's great to have your own lane. Yeah. You know. Is it true? How true is it that the, your death, one of a couple deaths,

death at the end of Infinity War was kind of built on the spot. Was totally real. Yeah. So I understand. I mean, I kind of do, knowing what I do about Marvel, but like what was on the page? What did they say to you? How was it developed? I can't remember what was on the page now from what we made up.

But it was the, you know, the Rousseau's were like, so, um, just, uh, just, I don't know, just improvise this bit. And I went, wait, what? And, and, and, uh, you know, we, we were both really terrified. I went, improvise being a robot and having a stone removed from my head. Like, like, I keep that in drum school. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, do, do that. Just do some, just say some stuff. All right. So what I see on the screen there, those lines are essentially...

Yeah, I mean, I think there were lines there. I'm sure there were lines there, but definitely, I think there was like one line. And like, you know, yeah, but I don't think all of that, like, we're out of time and all of that stuff was on the page. So what's the sense of satisfaction? I get, talk about having some space. You had some space at a giant movie to create something and then to sit in the theater, that premiere, to see that kind of scene realized

and see it work in that way. Must be amazing. Yeah, I mean, relief. Yeah, really. Because I just, I mean, I think both she and I finished it. You know, you have to imagine it without the effects. Right. And without the.

score, you know. And she's doing her witchy stuff. And I'm going, I'm there sort of beatifically dying with a which might. Must look really cool.

And there's just silence. Are we wrapped? Yeah. And then we finished. And she looked at me and I looked at her. I was like, I don't know.

Yeah, it worked. When I, when I interviewed Harrison Ford when he was Red Hulk and the last Captain American movie, I asked him, like, how do you silence the part of your brain that tells you, like, a crazy person, unsaid? And he said, that's what the money is for, basically. That's funny. Yeah. I mean, yeah, I mean, I remember just Weiden, I was as on my knees firing a blast from my forehead or something. It's in the first film. And he was, he was like, so. So how did it, how do you feel? You good? And I went, how does it feel? I, what do you mean?

I have no, does it look cool? I'm pretending to fire a laser beam out of my forehead. I had no idea how it feels. I feel a bit silly, but then, you know, the laser beam on there is pretty cool. Oh my God. I hope you're not sick of talking about this because it's such an important moment to so many is the line in Wanda vision, which has become this iconic piece of pop culture. or forget comic books.

It's just so meaningful to so many people. What is grief if not love persevering? And I know you've told the story a bit, but for those I don't know, not quite improvised, but built. Oh, it's the opposite of improvised. I mean, I think that line was built by so many people. Right.

And it kept being close and I was like, gosh, it's just missing. It's missing something. And they kept going back and they kept going back and they, and they kept going back. Then it was Jack's assistant, came in with the coffees. And she went persevering. And we all went, that's it.

And yeah, it's been, the lines had a life of its own. I have to say, you know, I never see actors think editors, and they should. As somebody who has directed and edited a movie, let me assure you actors, absolutely should be thanking their editors when they accept awards. Thank you for cutting my shit bits out. But one of the things that is amazing about that moment is it's not played on me. Right.

It's on her. It's played on her. Yeah. And I think that's, that's, look, it's a great light. But I think that what makes it really moving is seeing it land. Yeah. With her. And that's a lesson to an actor too.

Like a young actor, maybe with an ego, be like, oh, why didn't they use me? Why didn't they like? I'm, whenever somebody has cut me out of anything, I'm convinced it was because I was being bad and I've been saved. I really mean that. So I've never ever had that feeling. I do love that line though. And I am, you know, when you go around to the convention,

or whatever, but the real meaning that it had for people, I can't tell you the number of people that come up. I've seen people with tattoos of it and it's a lovely thought. It's very well wrought line. And it's very little to do with me. And I mean it. I mean it's just a very well written line. And then the show. She's doing all the acting. So I get all the credit. Wanda Vision was a huge swing and it connected. We're going to be talking soon more about Vision Quest, but to tease it a little bit. Terry Metallis, I was talking before, I'm a big fan.

He's the showrunner this time around. In relation to Wanda Vision, how big a swing is this one, you think? Huge. Yeah, huge. It manages to feel very much. like it's a part, it's, it's somehow a part, a part of that world of those, you know, an end to a trilogy of sorts. Yeah.

But whilst also being very much its own thing. And it is, um, just really good. I'm really proud of it. I've been, we've been in an editorial for a long while now. and I keep seeing cuts of it that just are getting better and better. And then as all the effects get placed in, and really, yeah, it's funny, it's moving, and it's super exciting. And he did a, he did a grand job.

And we get Spader back in the mix. It's been a long time. He got some Spader back in, yeah. And he is delicious. Of course he is. He's Spader. He is one of one. He is so, he's so funny in this. It's so delicious to watch him. And we loved working together. I, I loved it so much. Wait, what form of Ultron? Am I seeing James Spader's face this time? Am I seeing a physical manifestation of Ultron? I think that would be beyond my pay grades to tell you.

But worth sticking around for. Worth sticking around for. And it's, you know, it's largely a story. The story largely revolves around that relationship. And it's, it's, it's, it's, it's real fun. It's fun stuff. I'm very, very excited. And last thing on the marble front, you have teased that, if not doomsday,

perhaps secret wars might be. coming for for you i think so i mean i think that you um you know as much as um touch word as much you know keeps the kids in private school um as much as much as you know anything going on at marvel no as much as a or they or they change their mind or they you know or you know you just you just you really do never know. I mean, it's true that you never know, by the way. I mean, when when

a wheel died, we found out that day. Right. On Infinity or when you were... Yeah, they took us into like a trailer with, with, with previs. And everybody was sitting watching the screen going, oh,

I die. Nobody knew. We didn't know. Is there a parting gift? Like a goodie bag they walk out of this head with? Just get out of here, kid. Thanks for your time. Yeah, yeah. No, so, no, it was, it was, uh, so you really don't know.

They really do keep this stuff very secret. Right. So it's more of kind of like a hold this space, potentially, we think, and script pages will come when they come. Yes. Right. I got you. What's up with the Harry Potter thing?

Are I going to see you as Voldemort? Is there truth to this rumor? I've heard nothing about that through any official channels at all. Okay. That's just a rumor. These are just rumors. You haven't heard from David Heyman of the whole. You know it from.

Okay. No. I mean, I think it's amazing, you know, I like, I like the IP versus what people say. Yeah. But, yeah, I don't know. And maybe that's enough prosthetics for me in my life. No. It's been a lot.

Again, the skin is glowing. Maybe it's good for you. Maybe that's what it is. Maybe that's preserved by by a darnish that they've put on my face. Just be vision. So you're not, you're,

you're ambivalent about losing your nose for the sake of a job the next 10 years. Sure, that'll be AI now, right? And I don't know. Yeah. Have you thought about if that, if that phone call comes in,

like how seriously to take it and what your take could potentially even date? No, no, not yet. I haven't, I mean, because of, it's literally a rumor. And I think that that stuff is how you go mad as an actor. Right, right.

If you followed every internet Reddit rabbit hole. Oh, God, I'm going to be James Bond. Speaking, why has the James Bond conversation never really happened for you? It feels like you've never had been in that list. You should have been. Was it timing? Was it? No.

No, no, no, no, no. I don't, I don't, I don't know. I don't think anybody ever says no to Bond. Right. So, you know, they find out before even starting cut those conversations, how interested you are in that sort of a franchise, you know. So I don't know that you ever get to, if they're talking about you, it's because they want you.

And you've said, I would be interested. You know what I mean? Right. One thing I want to tease also, so besides Vision and Quest, I'm very excited. You work with Tom Ford, who does not direct very often. Yeah. This is just, I believe, his third film. Yeah.

And I think his first two have been exceptional. Yeah. How was the experience on the new Tom Ford film? I really adore him. Yeah. He's, uh, he, he, he, he, He's also delicious, you know? Yeah.

He's so naughty. Yeah. So, it's, uh, he's, yeah, he's like, he's, he's got a similar deliciousness that James Spader has where James Spader will say the absolute worst thing that he can to make me laugh. And I love it. Yeah. And so, yeah, it was a really, it was a really, um, fun to go and hang out with him in, in Rome.

And it's, hell of a cow. It's what he does now is he doesn't have anything to do with his Tom Ford business. And he wants to make movies and so he should because he's really very good at them. Yeah. And he's so relaxed on the set and so easy to work for and so excited. And, um, and, and just hilarious. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah, the smartest thing, I clocked it after I interviewed him a couple times for the last film is like every time I would interview him, he would compliment me on how I was dressed. And then I would hear him say to everybody. I'm like, oh, Tom Ford knows what to say. And it comes from Tom Ford. That's clever. All right. We're going to end with this, Paul. The happy say I confused profoundly random questions for you.

Okay. You ready? You kind of alluded to this already, but let's do it. Dogs or cats? Both. Okay. What do you collect? guitars is it more than what was the other thing that Jennifer's not fond of

oh my cameras cameras there's that too yeah yeah um I have too many guitars and I give guitars away in fact I was at a friend's house um the other month and I was playing their guitar and I went I love this guitar I should get a jumbo Gibson he went this was your jumbo Gibson he gave it to me. And I went, it was. So I have a habit of buying guitars, realizing I have too many guitars and then giving them away. And then, and then getting jealous when I play it, like, God, this is such a good guitar. Where did you get this guitar? Yeah. If there's a guitar in New York City, it's probably been owned by Paul Bettany at some point. That's right. Yeah, guitars and cameras.

Okay. Favorite. Or not cameras, lenses. What's your favorite video game of all time? I don't really play video game. Never as a kid even? You weren't like just old school, Miss Pac-Man, nothing? No. Okay. Didn't do that stuff. Okay.

More importantly, the Dakota Johnson Memorial question, she asked me, I ask everybody. Would you rather have a mouthful of bees or one bee in your butt? Fuck in hell. I think a bee in the butt. Yeah. I think so. I think that's medically the way to go. I think, yeah.

Yeah, I think I'm going, uh, butby. Okay. We'll see to that after the taping. Right. Thank you. How do you know there's not one there? Needs a friend. Um, what's the wallpaper on your phone?

Oh, it's my, uh, son and his, uh, girlfriend. Um, last actor you were mistaken for. Oh my gosh. Did it ever happen nowadays? Doesn't, really happen nowadays. I have it back in the day I have signed before you know I just I guess before people had cell phones the whole time you know yeah yeah I got mistaken somebody clearly recognized me as you know knew I was sort of famous but not and they were

like Jude Jude and so I signed for Jude law um There are worse people to be. Oh no, he's super handsome, yeah. Yeah, I was terribly flattered, I think. Yeah, but not really. Your height is a differentiating point. You've got the height over most of your contemporaries. I tell you who does mistake me for someone else.

That's Don Cheadle. Don Cedle and I were laughing. I find him so funny. is so funny. And I, we were shooting, um, maybe it was infinity war. And I was like, oh,

darn, I hate that this is coming to, and I, you know, and one day I'd just really like, you know, we should make a movie together. And he went, we are making a movie. Yeah, I went, no, another one, you know, outside the Marvel world. He went, we, we did.

I, I cast you in my movie about Miles Davis. I went, that's you and McGregor. I went, you're not you and McGregor? It's a great joke. Great joke. It's good. What's the worst known a director has ever given you? Oh, I don't know about me, but I remember I being on set when a director, it was his first film.

And he said to the actress. who I was playing opposite who will remain nameless he went you're God I just I really I really want you to be good in this

and you're being bad and I went well that's lunch everybody then spent an hour putting this poor woman back together and like her ego basically so yeah that was

that was unhelpful how's he doing now how's she doing now are they both in the business yes both still in the business and both very good actually amazing

and in the spirit of happy second fuse who's an actor who always makes you happy oh wow that's a great question oh Ryan Gosling yeah yeah come on my god he's funny

Project Hail Mary I mean everything I thought he was great I haven't seen that yet yeah yes but no he just he also just makes me happy when I come across him being interviewed in

he's just so do you know the story about he did on Graham Norton about him him being massaged by this guy and he was like and he's trying to put his foot and his hand together behind his back and then he went and he had this really

hairy belly and his belly went in my mouth and you know when you've there's something in your mouth and your tongue tries to figure out what it is and it's just Just the funniest story.

It's really great. Self-deprecating and I love his humor. It really makes me laugh. What's a movie that makes you sad? A movie that makes me sad. Oh. No. Does it make me sad?

I feel like the deer hunter makes me sad, but not just in the way that I feel. the way that I feel the courage of having, I don't know, 50 minutes of a Polish wedding at the top of your film and the truth of how engaged that makes you with the rest of the film. Yes. You spend the time, you invested that group of men. And we don't do that anymore. Yeah, we don't have the patience. It's a What's the next set piece? What's the next? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It's a classic. And finally a food that makes you confused. Oh, yeah. This is easy.

Peanut butter and jelly. Like, what are you all doing? Right. What's going on in your head? That's a good idea. And I feel the same way about bacon near pancakes with maple syrup. What are you? What is going on for? I've lived here for 20. 23 years. There are a lot of puzzling things about there are a lot of amazing things about America. I am an American. But what in God's name are you doing with peanut butter and jelly and and and maple syrup and bacon? Right. It's just not it's just not okay. So the issues we're having maybe politically forget it. What's really bringing this country down first Iran and now this. Still the iceberg. Yeah.

Great Paul, great hot takes from Paul Bettney. Thank you, sir. All right. Take some pulled up. Coming full circle, let's remind folks, Amadeus, as always, great piece of work. Five parts on stars beginning May 8th. You and the exceptionally talented Will Sharp, check it out. You kill it as always.

It's really, it's a really good one. It's a good one. The UK beat us to it, but we're catching up here in the States. Excellent. Thank you, Paul. Thanks for stopping by, as always. It's good to see you, man. Lovely to see you.

Okay, as promised, it is time for a little bonus material and happy, sick, and fuse. And I can't think of a better person to have than my long-time friend. He's not a neighbor anymore, sadly, but he is Benjamin Wagner. He's the director. He is the subject to a degree of his new film, Friends and Neighbors. Benjamin, welcome to the podcast. It's good to see. Thanks, man.

Thank you for doing it. Thanks for having me. Of course. Congratulations on the film. We should remind folks at the start. We'll remind them later. I believe as we tape this, as you guys are watching or listening, friends and neighbors are going to be available on VOD, I think May 15th.

Correct. Exactly right. That's right. Apple, Amazon, et cetera. And streaming right now on PBS app. So lots of ways to see this. Congratulations. This has been a long road I know in an important subject.

Give me the elevator pitch. This is a film that deals with chronic stress, your own, and is a prism through which you're looking at our collective chronic. stress I would gather. So what do you say to folks that this film's about? Of course, listen, man, I'm not good at elevator pitches. The long story short is I was diagnosed with post-traumatic stress at sort of in the height of COVID. And I was like, what are you talking about? I'm not a soldier or a cop. It didn't register. And then the guy explained a little bit of it to me in terms of these things called adverse childhood experiences and what trauma was and

what chronic stress is and complex trauma. And like immediately I saw it happening all around me. Like, like, you know, culture was slash is kind of going bananas, you know, people are acting out all over the place. I saw that the me story was a we story, you know, reportage of anxiety and depression, like in the 40 percentile, like, you know, liquor stores booming in COVID and people acting out in airplanes and shootings and all kinds of stuff that were. seen every day in the news and in our algorithms. So I immediately saw the me was a we. And

you know, you know, my first film was Mr. Rogers and me. And so Fred's like a mentor, a neighbor, a real neighbor. And so I, you know, I knew enough about Fred to think, oh, this is a way in for a zillion reasons, which we can talk about, but not the least of which is, Fred always told us to look for the helpers. And I, in this moment of duress, personal duress, I said to myself, I'm going to go look for the helpers. I'm going to go find the people who can explain this to me and who can help me understand what I can do about it with myself and what we can do about it as a culture. So, I mean, like, you're wearing a long elevator ride. No, no, it's a good one. But I mean, you're, you know, you're wearing a lot of hats and something like this. Forget for a second,

like the filmmaking of it and kind of being front and center, but, you know, you've dealt with these issues. Obviously, these are issues that are ongoing. So, like, I guess my question is, Does making a film about PTSD and chronic stress help your own PTSD and chronic stress? Yes. Well, whether the making of it helped is tough to tell, right? Because I'll never know. I did it really concurrently. You know, I've lived my life kind of in public for a couple of decades in a small way, right?

I was one of those bloggers back in the day. You know, I've had a podcast from Down Again. I'm a singer-songwriter. My first movie is Mr. Rogers and me. Personal storytelling has always been native to me. Michael Moore's film was the, you know, Spike Lee, Kevin Smith. These guys all are, were sort of folks I looked up to. And so it just made sense to me to do it that way.

It was my way through and in. I will tell you to cut to the subtext of your question, I feel incredibly alive and awake in a way that I didn't. know as possible. I didn't really know the type of dress I was in because I was like a frog in boiling water. You know, I lived in New York City for 25 years, working in some very stressful gigs. I was traveling the world for the Facebook journalism project. And until, you know, COVID, like, I think this is what was happening to a lot of us. When we got stopped in place, you couldn't outrun your feelings, right? And I had a lot of them. And a lot of them had been stuffed down for a lot of

years. And so as a friend recently said, you can go over, you can try and go around, but the only really way to do it is to go through. I had to get present with it. And so, man, I feel terrific. I feel alive and awake. I mean, from a diagnostic standpoint, there are data points that are used by psychologists and so forth to sort of assess the stuff. And all of my data is markedly improved. But more importantly, I can tell you, I feel radically present in my own life, which is like, A pretty good thing to be. I know the demarcation moment kind of about set you on this latest path is August 20, 21, where you get diagnosed with PTSD.

Is that like a rude? I mean, you know you've been dealing with issues over the years, but when you hear those words, what do you think? Well, my first thought was, what are you talking about? Because it's like, and I think this is what's so useful. And one of the reasons why I did it and I knew the me was a we is once you get this idea of like, oh, there's a physiology. to stress, like we embody our stress, which sounded like, I'm Gen X, man.

That sounded pretty hippie to me, like, I roll big sir stuff, you know? And as it ends up, like, sometimes our most fundamental truths are kind of eye rolls because they're counter, sorry, capitalism, empire, patriarchy, things like that. And there's a, their whole systems in place to keep us in these sort of norm. So, yeah, it was a rude awakening because I didn't really get it, but like it didn't take me, I mean, it was so immediate. it because it was all around us, man. And it still is, by the way.

But I think we're back to this busyness of life that enables us to kind of just be like, I can't do that right now. And I've found it's really worthy work. And as it ends up, is it hard? Yeah, of course it's hard. It's really tough to reconcile with like, I don't know, like, all kinds of garbage in my life. Most of us do. But it's really much less weight to carry once.

you again go through it. Go through. Yeah. Yeah. My sadly met a moment was watching this film last night. And I was so stressed like the last night anyway. I had just so much shit going on. So many like different stupid things. And I'm watching this and I'm like giving it my full attention. And I'm like, oh my God, this is this is my life. This is all our lives. Take a breath. I mean, I don't have the tools that you've found. But it is, I think it will inspire folks to kind of look for whatever tools will hopefully work. Well, I hope so. And listen, I think it's important to point out that I made a choice to take the time to find the tools. And I decided to take, I like really made a conscious effort. And I also have a certain amount of privilege that enabled me to do so just by

the color of my skin, sort of my station. And I think that's important to, to acknowledge. But the basic fundamental tools of healing, if you will, or of just becoming more present in your life is available to everybody. And you know, because I don't want to. spoil it. But like there's a very fundamental thing called the breath. And like a lot of us, when I was a kid, my mom would say, well, take a deep breath, honey, to calm me down. Well, ends up taking that deep breath in actually activates us, right? That actually gives us energy. It's the exhale that tells your body that you're safe because you can't exhale if you're trying to outrun a saber-tooth tiger or catch the seven train, right? Or a cab or what have you

or someone's yelling at you. So that exhale is like a, gateway and again i appreciate how this sounds man we have known each other a long time but like imagine like running a news meeting with a couple of deep breaths before you start the news meeting you know or or before you step on stage with stan tucci you know and perhaps you do that but it's very useful and it's a great gateway just to enter the space of like i got to get back in my skin because man we are in our in our devices we are in the chaos around us we're in these screens and they're awesome for doing this sort of thing. But they're not great for the sort of being in relationship with other humans and being

in relationship with ourselves. I mean, I should mention people can probably tell by the nature of our conversation. We do have a long history. We've known each other for basically 20 years. Yeah. Instrumental in the beginning of this career, whatever this is, getting to MTV where you were basically hired me. You went on a great guy named Michael Alex.

But I'm curious, like, that was a high-pressure media job. You went on to other high-pressure media jobs, including at Facebook. Yeah. Is it, you don't tie the stresses and the, and the PTSD to those jobs. I feel like it would have come out in other forms in other ways.

Don't you think? I mean, those are great. That's a great question. I mean, the answer is yes and. There's a body of research and a line of logic that says, my nervous system based on the adverse childhood experiences I had as a kid.

We moved, you know, seven times before I was seven. Yeah. My parents were never, they never really got along. They never really settled into the marriage. It was a very acrimonious divorce. There was violence. We experienced violence.

There was violence between my parents. Then I moved a thousand miles away from my father. So I'm kind of fatherless from nine to now. And then I get my jaw broken, which is kind of the icing. You know, I'm assaulted in a parking lot, as you now know, which is kind of the icing on the cake. So those are called adverse child experiences. and a certain number of those predispose you to certain outcomes. It was a great bit of research by a Dr. Folletti in the late 90s early aughts.

Why would I know this, right? Until you get this kind of diagnosis, I would say a lot of folks don't know this sort of thing. So that's the foundation that makes me sort of hypervigilant, high achievement oriented, high energy, all the things that can be a tremendous advantage when you're trying to run a massive podcasting empire or run MTV News, right? But then you have a tendency to sort of stay in that environment and you don't, I didn't have any way to come down except like, oh, we need to have a celebration for the team. Let's go out and have drinks, right? Or I'm going to go home after a while on day, about what day where I'm on up and I'm going to drink. So the coping mechanisms weren't terrifically healthy. Then I go to Facebook. I start traveling. Then I go through this really high stress thing, front page news around a product we were working on. Then I start traveling the world. Then COVID. So you really begin to see. like, oh, well, that adds up. And especially if you have, you don't know what to do with it. And you can't talk about it because we don't talk about this stuff for the most part.

We're pretty good friends. I've told you a lot of stuff. And I didn't know the degree to which this stuff was, you know, acting on me. And I also having heart palpitations. I wasn't sleeping. You know, it was really having effect on how it was showing up in my own life. And again, once I learned this stuff, I was like, oh, this is like everybody. It's like almost everybody.

So it's one thing to like lay your own soul bear in something like this. And like you have like, you know, explored through all your art, your music, writing. You've been, you know, you're open with yourself too. My soul has been bared before. I mean, but it's a beautiful thing. It's another thing to kind of like shine a light on the foibles of loved ones. And I know this has come up in the interviews you've done. And it's an unusual subject.

But I do have to say I get why people are talking about this because the first third of the film, There's a hefty chunk with you interviewing your parents individually and they split up long ago. And it's raw. It's real. It's the kind of conversation that I feel like everybody like kind of wishes they could have with their parents, but also doesn't want to ever have with their parents. I don't even know what my question is. But like in retrospect, I don't know. How do you feel about kind of going through that? What must have been an unbelievably awkward but powerful experience? I do think that, you know, you said it. Everybody, I think, has this wish to ask the hard questions. And in so many households, that's just for Bowden.

I mean, it took me, you know, my parents probably divorced 35 years ago or something nuts. A lot of 40 years ago, you know, 45. So it's been a long time. And it really was, it was like the third rail. You know, you just don't touch it. And yet I would touch it and raise it all the time because it was unsettled. It was unfinished. And I'm a kid. Nobody explains stuff to a kid. And so a kid makes it larger than life. So it was always present. I mean, it's in Mr. Rogers and me. In fact, Fred and I talked about it the day I met Mr. Rogers. He went right for it because he always went for the hard stuff. And to answer your question, it was wildly uncomfortable. My mom lives on the Upper West Side. My dad's in Midwest. It was wildly uncomfortable. I blamed my brother, my filmmaking partner, Christopher, who said, I told him this sort of premise. I said, it's a here.

Heroes Quest, I'm going to go and literally drive to all the places and we'll sort of intercut interviews with experts, right? That's the elevator pitch in a way. And he goes, you know what would really be messed up? You should interview mom and dad. I'm really glad I did. It was obviously very generous of both of them. I think everybody knew that it would hope that it would provide value and not be prurient, but instead again be a wee story. Because I don't think there are families of origin that don't have similar or related dynamics or dysfunction. Because we inherit this stuff. And until somebody sort of breaks the mold or the model, I don't know how we improve. And Fred said, this is another one of the great Fredisms. Feelings are mentionable and

manageable. Right. So like if you don't talk about it, it's certainly not going to change. So much credit to them. It was wildly uncomfortable. But I hung in there because I hoped that it would help. you know, and I haven't screened the film yet where somebody doesn't come up and share something of their own life. And that seems to me to be the idea, more of this, you know. Yeah. You mentioned like screening the film. You know, I often talk to filmmakers and actors who only kind of discover kind of what their film is about after the fact, whether it's just in the edit room or really even after the film's out through Q&As and interviews. Yeah. What are you discovering in this home stretch about your film maybe that you didn't. That's a great question.

that it, you know, I got to be honest, I think I intuited this, but that it's that it's about all of us. I just, I mean, I'm not, I'm not, my pitch all along was I'm the center of the bell curve. I'm just a regular person. And we want to believe that these are extraordinary extreme stories. These are the stories we often watch. I, you know this. I love, love, love movies.

Movies have been a refuge for me in times of chaos. I've always gone into a dark room with a community of strangers to laugh. and cry. Love, love, love. You know that's in the most stressful moments at MTV News, I would sneak out and no one would know where I was and I'd figure they'd think I'm in a meeting. I was at the movies. So I just think I intuited that like there's this process of projection when we watch this kind of thing and that if I was lucky, I could start a conversation like we're having, that we could start a conversation like this. Because I know we're not alone, but we feel so alone. Our brain tricks us. We're not alone. We're,

We're wildly relational creatures, you know. So I think that it's, it really is just, it's the story of all of us. I know you to be maybe one of the most compulsively creative people I know. Like it's like it's, it's, it's music, it's writing, it's films. And it's often a couple of those things at least going on at once. And I know you told me the other day, you have a book coming out coming out next year, which is really exciting. What can we tease folks?

Is it an extrapolation of this? It's a deeper, but if you can believe it, you know, this is a 70-minute documentary. The book will be 300 pages. It's sort of narrower and deeper. It does have, again, me as a runner, but it's really the we story, much more research, many more voices, more interviews. And it's specifically about men in mental health because men are particularly unwell at this point right now in history. And not that women aren't, but men are committing suicide at a rate of, you know, four X women, you know, every 13 and a half minutes, deaths of despair, addiction,

incarceration, men are not great. So it's a deep dive into that. Amazing. So I'll end by just saying, like, you know, I thought that it took me this long to see the movie. We've been talking about it forever. I was really impressed on so many different fronts. And I think you and your brother did like a great job. Also just like, you know, we like to nerd about movies. We're texting constantly about the people that are on my podcast, et cetera, and stuff you're seeing. It's really well, it's just so well done. I mean, like, you know, it's, it's, it's, uh, you guys should feel very proud of it just in terms of the craft, the storytelling. And I think it, it really connected with me. And I know it's, it's done with others. So congratulations, my friend.

That means the world to me. I literally, Josh was thinking about big swings. And one of my mantras. And I was thinking about it because of you, because you know, I'm a, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, avid, avid listener based on the amount of text you get for me, you know, an hour after you've dropped an app. And for us, this was a big swing in a whole bunch of different ways. Yeah. But we also wanted to be a step up from a production and an execution standpoint, cinematically, bearing in mind that the fact is we're a couple of brothers making movies in our free time, trying to just do what we can.

So I really, man, that means the world. No, mission accomplished. I'll remind folks again, friends and neighbors is the movie. Check it out on the PBS app, but also on VOD, everywhere as a couple hours from now. So check it out. And Benjamin, thanks for coming on the show. You're the best.

You're the best. Thanks, buddy. And so ends another edition of Happy, Sad, Confused. Remember to review, rate, and subscribe to this show on iTunes or wherever you get your podcasts. I'm a big podcast person. I'm Daisy Ridley, and I definitely wasn't pushing to do this by Josh. Life moves too fast, scrolling, swiping, headlines, sound bites. Nobody's really seen.

Even the people everyone thinks they know. I'm Evelyn. I'm a television producer and director, and I've spent decades behind the camera creating shows with people everyone knows. On the podcast, Repin, I sit down with actors, creators, and change makers to hear their full story. The risks they took. The moments, everything almost fell apart. and the lessons they live by.

These are real conversations, no headlines and no soundbites. Just stories that show the human behind the success and gives you insights you can actually use in your own life. Every conversation is jammed packed with inspiration and practical lessons. Repen is about courage. It's about grit. It's about being human first. Listen to Repen wherever you get your podcasts.