Happy Sad Confused - The Lonely Island (Andy Samberg, Akiva Schaffer, Jorma Taccone)

Episode Date: May 23, 2016

Andy Samberg, Akiva Schaffer, and Jorma Taccone of The Lonely Island join Josh to talk about their latest hilarious film Popstar: Never Stop Never Stopping. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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See Golden Nugget Casino.com for details. Please play responsibly. Hey guys, and welcome to another edition of Happy, Sad, Confused. I'm Josh Horowitz, and this is my podcast where I talk to filmmakers and actors and comedians, and in the case of this week, my guests kind of fit all three categories. They guessed on this week's edition of Happy Set Confused are The Lonely Island. That is comprised of, of course, Andy Sandberg, Akiva Schaefer, and Yorma Ticone.

They're coming up in just a bit. But first up, let's talk to Sammy. Checking with Sammy. Hey, Sammy. Check one, one, two, one. No, I didn't even literally a sound check. I know it's working. Okay.

One, two, three. Lonely Island. This is good. So they have a new movie out in case you guys have not seen the trailers. The new movie is Pop Star. Never Stop. Never Stopping. And it is a very, very, very funny movie.

That's three varies. Wow. It opens June 3rd. No, seriously. this movie is one of my favorite comedies, I would say in recent years. I'll be honest. It really is. It's in the vein of, you know, this is spinal tap. It's a mockumentary. And Andy plays a character named Connor for real, who's definitely in kind of like the Justin Bieber kind of thing, the boy band member that's grown up. And, uh, Justin Bieber didn't come from a boy band.

Well, I know, but he's kind of an amalgam. So there's definitely Bieber-ish stuff. But, but Yorma and Akiva play the four. former members of the style boys, which was his boy band. The style boy. I mean, everything about it, everything about it is brilliant. There are great cameos from people like Seal and Ringo Starr and Mariah Carey. This is just off the top of my head. There's a thousand of them.

I highly recommend it. It definitely, it reminded me a bit of like a spinal tap, a little bit of Zoolander. It's definitely the best film expression of the Lonely Island yet. obviously they did hot rod which nobody saw at the time but people have come to appreciate I think this one will hopefully do better because you know it feels like it's right in the kind of the zeitgeist of having fun with how absurd music is today I don't know because I don't really follow music as you know yeah Josh does not just uh this is the context I asked Josh the other day uh what music he has on his phone and the answer was none no I said I'm not sure

if I have any. I don't know. No, and then you looked. I do. I do have some music. Oh, I'm sorry, everyone. He had some movie soundtracks on his time. I was actually, after the interview, Andy and I were talking a little bit about John Williams scores. He gets me. Why can't you? You guys really are. You guys were like a fearsome for some. It's basically like, like I said, I think on social media. It was like basically like four people talking, like the same person talking to each other four times. Because we're all basically the same age and we have a very similar sensibilities. They're slightly more successful than I am.

But we all wear glasses. There's that. Wow. You all have like a sandy brown hair. Yeah. There are a lot of points of comparison. Spotty facial hair. For context, I think it comes up to the interview, but just in case it's referenced and you don't know what we're talking about.

I had done a Q&A with them earlier in the day for AOL Build. If you want to check out a video interview of me interviewing these same guys, go to AOL Builds website. Um, and that was a really fun chat too. Um, so it was a lot of lonely island in one day. But hey, it's never enough. These guys are hysterical. They're great. Um, and I can't, uh, recommend their film, uh, enough. June 3rd, it comes out, go check out pop star. Uh, whatever stop, never stop.

That's right. Uh, what other business do we have to attend to? Um, um, oh, the prophecy came to pass for those that follow my interviews. I interviewed Jeff Goldblum recently. And I, I, I, I just asked him, you know, hey, why aren't you in a superhero movie? And he, uh, turned very cagey and said, oh, you may be onto something, Josh. And sure enough, apparently he's going to be in the new Thor movie. How great is that? That cagey Jeff Goldblum. The best part of that interview,

if you look it up, is he, uh, when I asked him if it was Marvel or DC, he gave a look that betrayed that he has no idea of any difference between the two. Yeah, but I don't want Jeff Goldblum to know the difference between the two. You know what I mean? That is the right answer for Jeff Goldblum to have no idea not to give a shit. Um, so that was wonderful.

Um, what else? Did they say who he's playing? They did. Um, they I believe it's a character called the Grandmaster? I might have that wrong. Do you know that or are you just agreeing? No, I like that. Okay. Yes.

I'm not well versed in the Thor villains, but please, he could play himself as far as I'm concerned and it would be wonderful. Yeah, but I don't want him to get, I don't want Chris Hemsworth to beat him up. Well, I mean, and Hiddleston will be in there too. Loki's going to be in there too. There's going to be a bunch of, oh my God, Goldblum and Hidleston together. You're, you should see Josh's face. right now

I can't take over Jessica Chastain's gonna come to take over the podcast I mean I can't do it All your best friend It's very exciting Lots of good stuff coming up Including we're in the thick of summer movie season

Guys coming up Neighbors 2 Well let's see Neighbors 2 is out Nice Guys is out I've seen both recommend Both particularly nice guys X-Men is coming out

I really enjoyed X-Men It got kind of mixed reviews the first kind of wave of reviews, but yeah, I don't know, I had a really good time with it. I think it's solid and the ensemble's great. They've added some new actors and characters to the mix, some cameos from some

certain favorites. Take over the podcast intro. There's that. What else? There's Warcraft, which is going to be an interesting test to see how big a movie that can be. Our buddy, Joanne Johnson and Kevin Hart has Central Intelligence,

I've seen I can't talk about, but I think you guys, you know, I think, I think, I think, I think, I think, I think, I think it will satisfy. That's all I'll say. Um, and things like Independence Day. Wow. I forgot about that. I know, there's a lot of good, and Ghostbusters. Soon we'll be talking about Ghostbusters, soon we'll be talking about ghostbusters, I'm really, I'm fascinated by, I mean, it's a longer discussion for another podcast, but this whole, like, weekly, like, discussion about Ghostbusters and, like, the rampant misogyny online. It's kind of fascinating. And I hope. It's kind of fascinating. And I hope, my greatest hope is that the movie turns out to be great and shuts everybody up. Exactly, right?

Anyway, that's my soapbox discussion for this week. Anything else to get off your chest, Sam, before we dive in? No, I'm very excited about this. I'm ready to go. I'm upset. I didn't get to look at them when they were in the building. I'm sorry. I didn't get to ride the elevator with any of them.

So I'm really, I'm as blind to this as any of you guys are, so I'm really excited. You get my solemn oath that this is an entertaining 40-minute chat. Enjoy. The next voices you'll hear will be my familiar Prattling on, and Andy Sandberg, Norma Ticone, and Akiva Schaefer, aka The Lonely Island. Lonely Island. Let them do the singing. They're professionals. Very good idea. What if you could repeat the most important day of your life until it was perfect? Replay, a new original comedy series on Go-90, follows Allison Lee, an aspiring. DJ who gets more than she wishes for when she's stuck repeating her disastrous 25th birthday party over and over again. Allison is forced to choose between impressing notorious Vegas club

promoters Sven and Sophie or keeping her friends and faces the hard reality that sometimes you can't have it all. Replay stars Lindsay Fonseca from Agent Carter, Tyler James Williams, from Everybody Hates Chris, and Serena Fialo from Glee with special guest star YouTuber Mamry Hart. New episodes appear every Wednesday. You can stream replay only on Go 90, a free mobile entertainment app available on iOS and Android. All you have to do is go to www.replayseries.com to watch the first episode of replay right now. Check one, two. Oh, yeah, I sound good. My mic sounds nice. That's Andy Samberg doing a mic check? No, it's not. No.

My mic sounds nice, check. This is me, Andy, hi, check, check, check. You could have a really good mic check. Andy Lates, let's hear you. My mic sounds nice, check two. That's solid. And my mic sounds nice, check three. This is not your first rodeo, guys.

No. We love mic checking. We're familiar with mics. That's why I brought you here is to teach me the ways of the mic. You just got to get right up on it and just be like, here's my voice. Tell us about this show and like where it resides and things. all the fun stuff. The show that you're on right now,

the show that's launched. Yep. This is being a simulcast in 155 countries right now. Love it. Why are you laughing? It's the Oscars of podcasts. You just not believe

that I have that kind of reach. You shouldn't. I do believe it. That's why I laughed because I was delighting in your success. I don't think that many countries speak English, right? This is translated simultaneously.

It's other languages as well. That makes a lot of sense. They have a little translator your thing from the UN. It's like the, yeah, the Klingon translator kind of a thing. I go Star Trek. Did the UN take that from Star Trek?

I think so, right? Let's talk about it. This week on this, on this show. The UN stole a lot from Trek, I feel like. Yeah. Were you a Trekkie growing up? Not massive. I was Star Wars fanatic.

Wait, explain that friggin' nerdiness that you guys both completely understand? Shut up. The universal translator thing that was in the ear? I think that they stole that from the Babelfish from a Hitchhiker's Guide of the Galaxy. Oh, so you just out-nerded us. You went even... Yep. He asked that question specifically

So he could name drop something Yeah You know what I was thinking about The whole time you guys were having that conversation Pamela Anderson's boobs and Baywatch Oh man This guy's a real jock Did you get bent nerds

I guess he's gonna steal our lunch money Right after this Did you guys ever see Barb wire? Remember Barb wire? Yeah of course Okay good I didn't see it Yeah

Box office smash Barb wire everyone saw it This guy was reading Hitchhags Gers and there's going Re-Reading Re-Reading What were the first naked boobs that you recall seeing

Your Honor. Yeah, you were my mom's, you know me? But after that. Still, my mom's. Honestly, like, I saw my brother being born when I was four and a half years old. So what non-mom boobs, though? Your mom's, burn.

I did like that. Thank you. You liked that fast. Yeah, well, I didn't like the first two, so I was ready to hate the third. But then I was, like, boom. Well, good one. I think the first boobs I saw was 14 years old.

Oh, real ones? like that you're real ones that I select he was just looking for fast times at Ridgemont High that was the right answer sorry guys that is kind of the right answer BBK it's the right answer to every question or keys in Kim Katrall kind of thing

I don't know if they were actually hers but it was through the through the locker room people yeah welcome to four white guys in their wait 30s talking about old movies I recently rewired is that the name of this podcast thanks for finally talking I'm actually 40 so it doesn't

I wanted us to talk for 35 minutes and then you introduce the show at the very end anyway that's been the show is do you know with the name of the show you're on? Nope. You don't know? No.

We don't even ask it over and over. Do you have any guesses? I'm a guess. The drip down. Yeah, the drip down. You got it. It's the drip down. It's the D down.

Are you checking? Oh, I thought you were checking your Twitter feed or something for a second. No, I was going to look up your schedule so I can tell you what the name of the show. Here, wait. I can tell you, you know, I can just tell you. No, no, no, no, let Andy do it. I'd like you to ask me when it's over because I think I'll have a better idea. Squawk and pooch, squawk and pooch in the morning.

These are good names. Squawk and pooch. You want me to ruin it for you, Andy? Or do you want me to test how good it you are at recalling or checking your email? The squawk man asking Andy a question. Happy, sad, confused. That's correct. Oh, I'm not.

With Squawk and a pooch. Oh, God. Now, when you're doing a press tour, like the one you've been on, you do do a bit of the squawk and the pooch. One might argue we've done too much press. I don't think anyone can tell. I don't think anyone can tell. What aspect of the press cycle do you enjoy the most? Do you enjoy some kind of weird hating yourself level doing the morning shock-chalk radio thing?

I enjoy those because they're generally so nice because people don't come to see them anymore. They're always so like, hey, thanks for coming. I exist. I'm real. Yeah. And I guess especially people that aren't like pushing music to just do the rounds and do radio, especially when you're on like a multiple state tour. Sure. We also weren't booked on anybody that was super obnoxious.

We easily were more obnoxious than most of them. That's easy, though. That's not such a challenge. To be more obnoxious than morning radio, it feels like could be a challenge. But we rose to that challenge. And then some. If you were to start your own morning radio show. It would be called Squawk Man and the Poochinaater.

Which one's the Squawk Man and which one's the Poochinaer? We all are. We're all the Squawk. And the Poogeman does not exist. No, sorry. They're both Yorma. Yeah. Nina Keeva will not take part in this.

I'll be like a cowbell, maybe. Right, right. Do you guys consume much in the way of a podcast? We were talking. You did Pete Holmes. I did the six-hour podcast with Pete Holmes. Why is it so long? It's so crazy.

That's his deal. They just talked and... Where is you doing it? I do comedy bang bang with Ackerman. I've done that a bunch of times. I did WTF once. Did he get into your soul as well? Mark's pretty good at that.

It was fine. Honestly, we didn't... It didn't feel like super... probing, but it was very pleasant. Did you feel the same way? Because Andy did, uh, Stern this morning. Did you feel the same way about WTF as you did about Stern, like a little nervous going in?

Like, ooh, boy. I was less nervous about WTF, but I was nervous, yeah. Yeah. Just because they are, you know. They get in there. Yeah. They get in there and they've had so many massive people. Now, when you did the pooch or, you know, squawk man.

Squawk man. Yeah. I can tell you're not, I can tell you have no respect for me because you're not nervous at all. You're reclined in your seat. Like nothing can possibly come. I did an interview with you like an hour ago. That's why I'm comfortable. But I was saving the gold.

We have rapport. Do we? Is that what we call it? I consider you a friend in the business. It's very sweet of you to say. For those at home, Josh moderated a Q&A session for us at the AOL build. Thank you. We don't understand why he says we did an hour.

We don't need to hype other outlets. I mean, I respect AOL. I'm just fine. Well, just that's more. People learn you know you're hoaring it up all over town. Hey, it was just a pay. For my man, it was just a paycheck. All right.

I showed up A. Well, I don't care what the venue. Did you see the wad of cash They gave me on the way out? It was pretty impressive. We gave you 17 AOL bucks. But then he's sweet. He's back here at his little labor of love.

This is it. This is it. A free email. Wash cycle repeat. With Joshua Lewis. Usually, this is the first podcast I've done in an actual studio. I only did this in the studio

because there's so many of you and upstairs in my office, there's a single microphone which would just rob the listeners. I kind of love this. It feels more pro. You're in this building, though? I'm in this building.

This was not that far for you. No, but I'm saying... I mean, no need for the waterworks, you know what I mean? I'm not crying. I'm just saying, I enjoy doing it in my office because I feel like it reveals a little bit of me and that way. But you guys kind of, I think, have a sense of me.

This is, like, what's on the walls in there? What would you guess would be on the walls of my office? Probably like... Cool cars you're into? Like a Destiny's Child poster. Yeah, check. Yeah, like Mustangs and Lambo. Lernery and the Sundance Kid figurine.

Oh, that's smart. Like one of those little, like, cartoon-y versions of, like, a horror movie where it's like The Shining Jack, but it's like a little cartoon version of him is a little thing. Maybe, like, yeah, maybe like a Wu-Tang pillow. Oh, that's really, now you're getting, now you're drilling into it. And then I think in the bottom drawer, you have like all of Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. No, no one likes that shit. Oh, he's got like Doctor Who stuff.

I'm going to puke thinking about this office. I've got a Back to the Future poster up. Oh, that's good. A color of money poster up. Okay. Oh, we're pretty close. I have a birdman action figure. Yes.

Okay. Oh, we're really, we're getting pretty close. Yeah, yeah. We like film. This feels more right because it feels like we're in the padded room of an asylum. We've got a good podcast wooden table. Yeah. Yeah.

This is nice. This sells it. This feels comfortable. They sell this at a, you know, pottery barn. Rusted podcast. Podcasts are prevalent enough. They probably could make a decent fortune out of that. You know it takes just as long to make one as it does to listen to one.

That's the beauty of the podcast. At least the Pete Holmes one, yeah. This is the Pete Holmes version. It takes three and a half hours to make. So, take me through... Script notes. I listen to script notes. Stop cutting him off.

Okay, I'm just saying... How did I just started listening to that? Is that by Craig Mason and John August? Nope, nobody doesn't listen to that. Okay, well, it's great. It's about screenwriting. I do like John August. He's a fine screenwriter.

Yeah, yeah, he's great. Speaking of screenwriting, you made a film. Yes. What's it called, Andy? Pop Star, never stop, never stopping. Was it difficult to come up with a title? What was the second runner-up? What was the first runner-up?

We had been calling it... Our working title. Yeah, the working title was Connor for Real. That's my character. The number four, real. Yes. Yeah. And did you test that?

Did the Universal Big Wigs say in Middle America, they don't want... No, ours was the only movie they didn't test, actually. They just were like, yeah, it seems great, and whatever you guys want to do. I don't know if they actually test the time. I just know that they went, we want a different title.

And we went, it's your money. Is that what the email said? It's your money, dot, dot, dot. Yeah, yeah. Vagely threatening and then like a knife emoji. He just used the, it's your money bitmojy. It's in a bag. It's a money flying way.

It's a little used bit emoji, but it's there. They said this, they pitched a bunch, and then this one was funny to us. So we were like, oh, okay, we could live with that. Yeah, and Jed also really liked it. Yeah. So, what, Warren produced the first film, produced Hot Rod.

Judd produced this one. Is there? Stirring up some shit. All right, let's get into it. No, no. I don't mean it that way. I'm just curious, like, what the, like, what is Judd?

Obviously, Judd brings a lot to the table, but what does a producer in the case of a Hot Rodder, in the case of a pop star, do for you guys? I mean, you obviously know what you're doing, so it's not like... In both cases, one of the most valuable things that both of people at that stature can do is that they have genuine personal relationships

with the top, top people at the studios that they're working with where they could text the head of the studio to be like, you need to give us more money, or, you know, don't give them notes on this, I'm going to handle it, or just anything that you could see being why people would tell horror stories about a studio, like we have zero. We're like, studio seems cool, I don't know, because any conversations were going through him,

and he was filtering it, and we don't know what he had to do to get the money for the movie, or... Yeah, as many buffers on your side, you can get advocates or in this case even just one in both cases if it's somebody like lorn that can just call right gray and go hey here's how what i need it how i need it to go or jed sure like that was super invaluable on both of those similarly no you know what they say like you need that five pound gorilla in the room you know what i mean yeah that little toy stuffed animal five pound gorilla just that five pound gorilla comes in is like i'm going to put my foot down

and i was like what was that cute little town gorilla small but he makes an impact yeah yeah um What was the first film that you guys tried to get made? I mean, I would think there were other things before, even Hot Rod, that you were trying to... I don't think we ever, like, took one out and pitched it, though, right? No, well, Mustang, hi. We had just written stuff. We were just...

Get some around, right? In our early 20s, in L.A., just doing odd jobs and then working. And so we had read screenwriting books and stuff where they tell you about how bad your scripts are going to be. And we literally, I remember having covers everywhere. I'm like, we just need to start writing a bunch so that we can get these bad ones done that everybody says you're going to write.

And so we did, and they were right because they weren't good, probably. We'd have to go back and read them, but I'm sure there was some funny stuff here. So we wrote a bunch, and we would always secretly halfway through, go, I think this might be really good. Maybe this, maybe you kept,

there's always that hope that when you turned it into like a manager, they go, wait a second, then they send it to a studio and all of a sudden, you get a $100,000 paycheck or something. So I'd say we had high hopes for them every time while realistically knowing they weren't going anywhere? Was it off one of those kind of spec things or stuff that you were self-producing that got you agents?

How did you guys get representation in the first place? From stuff we shot, right? Yeah, from making short films. In today's day, it would be that you have a really popular YouTube channel. But back then, it was that we literally would just make them. We'd put them on the web, but they couldn't even watch them. And so we'd make DVDs and VHS tapes. And through these guys were PA's at Spin City,

getting food for, like, writers. So there were agents there. Every time there was a show night, there'd be agents in the house. And there's all the writers who all have agents. So they were able to show our videos to those people. And then those people took pity on us and went, this is actually good.

Why don't I show this to my agent? And that's how we got it. So for you, Andy, was the ambition, like, did you definitely want to both create but also perform on camera? Was that always part of it? Or was it just sort of that? No, always, yeah.

I was doing stand-up. I started doing stand-up by junior year in college in NYU, and I had wanted to be on SNL, basically, since I was a little kid. Right. But the main goal that we had when we moved to L.A. was to have our own sketch comedy show. And we came close. Where did you come close?

Like, in what way? We made a pilot for Fox called Awesome Town. That was a sketch show. Pilot presentation. Pilot presentation, yeah. Yeah, that was meant to be seven minutes, and I think it ended up being like 19. Yeah.

719. It's all the same. They gave us money for seven, though. It was right. It was the summer. We finished it the summer before we got SNL. So it was like the year before we got SNL. That's kind of what we were working on.

We knew we had this little deal with Fox and we were making sketches and stuff. I mean, do you guys ever think about like one of the silly kind of what ifs and like if you're five or ten years older and could come around in a slightly different environment like what your career trajectory would have been? Because your careers are so tied in with that kind of revolution of digital, etc. et cetera, and being able to produce your own stuff when it was slightly economical, what would the path have been, had you been a little older, you think? Not really, because we're just like in it. Well, the SNL part of it. Yeah, the digital part, like the online stuff was after we got hired at SNL.

Yeah, so it would have been just like anybody else who had been hired who had been hired at SNL and did their seven years at SNL before the digital age, I guess. But it is kind of night and day in terms of... But then once we got there and... How many platforms there are now, as opposed to then... I mean, like, you know, there weren't that many places we could go after, like, you know, Fox, and then we took a day at like MTV2, like that kind of thing. And now there's like every possible place to have a show.

The difference if he was asking what it would be like if we were 10 years younger and we're doing it now, if we were 25 now trying to do it, that would be a world of difference. Because we were right on the edge of it. So our success, like our career trajectory before... SNL is almost identical to before the internet. Like we were passing out DVDs, we were doing VHS tapes, we got SNL, there wasn't even SNL

website yet that had streaming video, it was really identical, and then it changed that. You basically created SNL's digital platform, and that's when they figured out how to use it. They had to catch up to our videos because they were on YouTube and then they didn't understand, and they were like, do we take them off YouTube? But then we don't put them on our site

because our site can't even handle videos, or are we supposed to leave them there and let this YouTube make a lot of money off of all of our You know, IP. They also just didn't know if they wanted anything that they made to be on the area. Yeah, because it was going to mess up how they sell reruns, honestly. And they're like, if we do it there, we're not going to be able to sell it. But then it was like, oh, there's no fighting this.

And it took them years. We were really the guinea pigs. So we got a lot of the shine off of all that because it was exciting and new. But we also got, like, there was no path. So we got a lot of the, like, our stuff taken down. And a lot of the annoyance of being the first ones. Everybody understood that they wanted things to be viral, so to speak. but then they would immediately quarantine them.

Like immediately, just because they didn't want to not make money off of it. And don't let people in other countries watch it because they've sold the rights in a different way there. No, I mean, I remember that even in, like, I hear at MTV for years putting up our videos and getting hate tweets all the time from, like, the UK or whatever. It's just, like, all that on Saturday. Yeah, yeah. But if it was now, not that we really have to talk about, but, I mean, that's one that I do wonder about. Like, if we were 23 now, we just moved to L.A., and there is all this noise.

And on the plus side, there's a million ways to get your video and stuff out there. But you could get lost. You could shoot it on your phone. You can do it so easy. And you can just make a YouTube channel, which is so awesome. We would have killed for that and twittering and all that stuff. But you could just be lost completely. So that is interesting.

And prior to SNL, just jumping around, was one of the first gigs writing for movie awards for MTV? Yeah. We wrote for the movie awards two years. We wrote for G4ia one year. was there anything else in terms of like paid writing gigs i mean we got paid by comedy central to like write a pilot right like like yeah yeah that was an awesome town a different one called the lonely island but to be clear the comedy central deal was like 12 grand that we split three ways and it took us six months to do so we got like three grand four grand each that we had

and we had to pay our agents and stuff and then what were we what were we making an MTV movie movie awards we got a thousand dollars a week that we had to divide between the three Between the three, so $333 each, and then still have to payout taxes, agents, management. So that's about a two-year-bought lunch. No, no, they waived their fee on that. Oh, did that? Yeah, so we're going to remember us all laughing about it because they were like, we're not going to take this $16 each of you guys.

So we made like $250 each a week. Amazing. Yeah, every time we bought lunch, it was super painful. Yeah, like, oh, damn it, $15. So, I mean, flashing forward to today, where, like, you know, you obviously have some juice, as they say in the business. Is that what they say still in the business? I would say, I'd almost say, we're like a two-pound grill.

It's definitely what they say. It's definitely what, who is it, Bokkeem Woodbine? In the movie, Juice. Yeah. Right, that's what I'm quoting. That's Bokkeem would say. Tupac didn't say it, but you got the juice now, Q. Well, Bishop, Bishop had the juice.

Oh, yeah. Q. No, no, in the end, Q has the juice. Bishop was gone. We've got to go watch juice again. I'm a little rusty on my juice, guys. I'll be honest. You don't have a juice poster up in your office?

Not unfurled for the public to see. I love the. you soundtrack had that so so where you're at now does it feel like there are their own unique challenges because I mean it would seem like you could you know you you can do a lot of things you if you come to a network or a digital platform and say I've got this fucked up weird idea they'll probably give you a little money to do it or a lot of money or whatever like what are the challenges now that you find creatively um that keep you up at night or or make you cry that's a good question uh you can be

You have none, and you just have to be very boring about just like time management. Finding time, yeah. It's a very good problem to have, is that trying to figure out what to spend time on and wanting to say yes to so many cool things and having to prioritize and decide, like, what you're going to do. Because there must be opportunities that come around now that you say, you have to, you feel you should or have to say no to that would make your 25-year-old brain melt. Yes.

I wish I had a whole other life to spend on like the dumbest possible projects. Like anytime like anything like like Kung Fury happens or like I'm like, this is the best. I have to do this and it's like what am I doing with my life? Slash, this is also great. But you did do that. I did do that. But like that was crazy. I was a month out of like having my first child be born and I decided to fly Sweden for a day to like my wife was not thrilled about that.

Yeah. That was very hard. I just wish that I have more time to do, like, dumb shit. What are, like, the big aspirations for you outside of, obviously, it seems like you guys are always going to come together when it feels right, and you're going to keep coming back and forth working together, but you obviously each have your own aspirations, whether it's directing or acting or writing, et cetera. Do you feel like there is a lot of uncharted territory for you as filmmakers, as writers,

as performers? Give me a sense. Yeah, always. I mean, this movie, honestly, was a big one, like, getting to do a movie that, number one, And we wrote from the very start, you know, where you went, well, could the character be called? You know, like, with Hot Rod, it was great, but it was already a script. It had been written for Will Ferrell. It had been around.

It had gone through a lot of rewrites in different directions. And they just kind of gave it to us and we're like, if you want to make a movie, you can make this one. And we were like, good opportunity. And we did heavily rewrite, obviously. And it was our, I felt like it was ours. But it's a different writing challenge. So one of our goals was always that something we had conceived, like the digital shorts at SNL where we would make, do them from top to bottom, but get to do a movie.

that way. We had just never tried it before. Never gotten to do it. And that's a challenge, because it is a documentary format, it meant that there's a lot of different ways it could go, both in, like, the shooting and editing of it. Like, there was a very long editing process, and it was a challenging one in a good way. But it was, like, because

the story is a little bit more malleable. Well, I mean, infamously, like, I mean, one of the biggest touchstones, I think people were going to constantly bring up for this film is Spinal Tap, obviously. And Spinal Tap, I'm sure was a different approach. I mean, like, you could read volumes of books about how they made it. Like, they shot, like 140 hours of improvised

scenes and I assume that's not what you guys did here it's not what we expected to do but in hindsight we did have yeah we did have hundreds of hours oh yeah no that's true yeah I think going into it we were like that's not us we're not big improvards we're going to be much more on the script and then we would and this is insane they didn't because I haven't done my research but

we had the main script and then every day we'd go okay we're going to be in these two locations what's every other scene we wrote that could take place in these locations And because it's doc style, you have multiple cameras, you'd shoot what was written, and then very quickly go, all right, what were some other fun stuff we had? And either shoot a scene that was completely different or variations on the scene. And it's not that different from a Judd movie, but the difference is that we didn't have to, like, light scenes for two hours to get them done. We could light scenes for 10 minutes or just go outside and shoot in broad daylight because it's real.

So we ended up with, like, what you're saying, hundreds of hours and choices. But there's still less improv overall in terms of all. There were margins for scenes. Yeah, written alts. And are you, yeah, because I've seen, like, Judd and Adam McKay do that thing where they are on the bullhorn shouting out lines at each other.

Is that sort of what the three of you are doing, basically just huddling up and kind of figuring out alts and then kind of... There's not a bullhorn. No bullhorn. There's a little more intimate than that, but, yeah. Yeah, you get it, like, with the sort of

main script a couple of times until you're really happy with it and then just start trying different stuff. Yeah. So what, I'm curious also, like, for, like, the interviews in the film with like people like Ringo Star, et cetera. Like are those fully scripted too?

I mean, do you kind of like interview them in character or give them kind of like this is like who Connor is and this is your relationship to him or do you say or do you actually give them specific lines? It was kind of both. There was, you know, we start with 10 minutes of like just describing the movie to them so they understand the world and kind of giving them

touchstones like you can think of Connor and he's a mix between Timberlake Justin Bieber, Drake, Kanye, McLemore, you know, just like take all these people and just put them in a pile That's kind of him. And then you go, he was in a band called the Style Boys. Think about like the Beastie Boys mixed within sync.

They're more rapper, party, fun time band. And you just give people kind of that. And then you tell the basic story for 10 minutes. And then we got started and we would have, like, written out questions and answers and basically like ask a question, show them a possible answer and then have them like do it in their own words. And Rodney Rothman, who was one of the producers on it, would help us with those a lot. Actually, he would write a ton of extra. Altson, whatever.

and jokes and stuff, and we even had other friends help us with it sometimes. And then I've, like, people like that. And a few people came in with their own ideas that they really wanted to do. Rizza had one that was hilarious that's on the DVD extras because it didn't quite make it, but it was like, you know, he wrote his own thing that was, yeah, gangbusters. Do all the musicians make the cut? I mean, because I would think that would be a hard call to make to say it to Mariah Carey, sorry. She's in.

I know she's in, but it was a bummer though. We definitely had to, like, write some apologetic. Did you really? Yeah. Like Ed Sharon's not in a movie. And you're like, that's a big. big dude and he was great stuff was really funny and just didn't fit storywise right well and also frankly you guys i think are smart and you know it's i don't know what the exact running time is

but it feels it's like it's under 90 yeah yeah i mean it's like it feels right you know um who's the a lot of inspirations for for this film obviously do you feel like do you like know all this stuff inherently or do you have to kind of like do some boy band research at all for something like a little both yeah we keep up on that stuff but i i To get inspired, we sort of did a lot of back research. Yeah. What was the most fun film or book or whatever thing you got? We particularly liked the One Direction documentary.

That was unanimous choice. Morgan's the best one. Oh, that's right. He did direct that. The Lil Wayne Doc was pretty great, too. Yeah. He's an interesting character. I love that.

The docs that are unapproved are always a little bit more interesting to watch. Right. Right, right. But also the subjects. Yes, for sure. He's a pretty awesome over-the-top. You were talking earlier today. about Kanye and he's kind of like one of those

I'm sure for many artists but you guys in particular like he would be amazing to have involved in some capacity now see here's my issue because I don't I'll confess I know film but I don't know music and I don't really know Kanye's music so all I see

is the insanity right and the bravado and so for me he's like insufferable and I can't stand his existence on the planet you gotta get into his music yeah that would that even it out with then, I would understand it all. We are so into his music.

Explain Kanye to me as an alien from another planet that just doesn't know why he's great. He has a nice dichotomy of any person on the planet. It's amazing. One thing I will say by his music which is why, one of the reasons I love it so much beyond the individual albums that I also love,

but the sum of its parts is that kind of like the Beastie Boys where they kept changing their sound as they went along. And it kept them just fresh for so much longer. Where they could have just made another license to Ilb and said they went a whole different way with Paul's Boutique. And then they could have made another Paul's boutique,

but they went a whole other way with Check Your Head, and then Ill Communication went even further. Like, he's doing that. He obviously proved he knew how to make hits with his first, like, two or three records. He had hits all over him. And then all of a sudden he just does 808s and heartbreaks, and he gets kind of shit on for it,

but all of the radio now is copying that album, all the future, and all those guys doing autotune singing bad like using autotune to sound bad instead of good yeah um and then now it's a classic and he did it like the hollywood bowl start to finish you know and then he made uh i forget which one was next but you know he did uh beautiful doctor's which is like a masterpiece yeah and then and then all of a sudden took it really stark in ys in ysus and really like atonal and weird and then came around with this one that is my favorite album the year life of paulo and and and and he's changing when he was at the, you know,

it's not that I'm really comparing him to the Beatles, but it's like one of the only other people that I can think of, or bands that kept changing, not just going back to the well and doing the same thing over and over. Taking risks. Taking big risks, going into really hard into new sounds and pulling it off every time. Okay, I get it.

I apologize on behalf. That was a really good summary of why. Yeah, I feel compelled to actually give him a second look or first look. I agree with everything keeps that, and the other part of it is he just makes songs that when they come on, you want to, like, turn them up and sing along to them. Right. Which is really hard.

Yeah. And then on top of that, lyrically, he is super vulnerable. Like, and he's constantly, like, fucking up and his life is shit. Like, but he puts it all into the track and then apologizes for him. And he's super fun. Yeah. He's, like, genuinely funny. I always were like, we're always like, I wish you would do one with us because he's so funny.

But at the same time, he doesn't need to because he's already funny. Right. Do you guys, are you guys all in sync on both music, music comedy films? Do you feel like you are kind of generally speaking? I mean, everybody has different opinions and stuff, but, like, do you feel like you're in sync in all three aspects? Like, slight differences in turn. What's the biggest?

But it's like a five to ten percent difference. What's the biggest pop culture argument that you've had recently with each other? Andy really liked Carol. And I thought it was a bore and a half. I liked it a lot. And I go artsy. It's emotional. I'll get into some artsy stuff.

It affected me. Your really likes the 21 pilot song. I just love 21. I love, like, white, and. Manxie suburban shit. You know what I mean? I just have like a nostalgic throwback. Like, man, these guys are pissed at their moms.

Well, so you've thrown these two guys under the bus. Can we throw him under the bus? Is there anything that you guys? Well, I thought saying he like Carol was throwing him out of the bus. You're in the minority. People know Carol's great. Oh, my God. What's wrong with Carol?

He's lovely. He's so mad about it. Are you just emotionally closed off? Like, can you not feel? Kind of not feel? I was an hour in and nobody had felt a thing. There was nothing happening in it. That was the point.

It was about how reserved you had to be back down. Wait, Keith, will you do your impression about the shopping experience? It's been a long time now. What was it? God, I don't know if I, honestly don't know if I remember all my things. I just know that she was like, oh, what are these clothes? So I'll just... I'll have a cream spinach, please.

Oh, no martini. Oh, she walked out the door. There's nothing happening. There's nothing to it. What movies are you looking forward to? Besides seeing your own 15 more times. Besides San Andreas 2? I don't know. What are we most excited about it?

I'll tell you what we're not into. Not into Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. That guy. Take a hike, bozos. Is that opening against you guys? Oh, is it? I don't know. I think we'll see someone else, June 3rd.

I don't know. Maybe positive. I'm excited to see neighbors, too. I've heard it's really good, yeah. Yeah. I mean, just comedies or just in general? Anything. Star Wars?

Are you? Independence Day. I'm excited for. I'm a big Independence Day fan. Andy loves any kind of like post-apocalyptic shit. I like post-apocalyptic films. Like I like it too Like I love like

I wouldn't say I love it But like for instance The Postman I find You're talking to the right guy Yeah yeah But you're also getting into Costner territory Which is gonna be I'm gonna be into everyone

Well I like all his three and a half hour epics Wyatt Earp Yeah Yeah yeah Give me director's cut I need more more more Yeah yeah You're talking to a room full of water world

enthusiast I mean come on Yeah Quality What else is coming out That we're excited about I mean I am excited for all the new Star Wars films

That last one was so great It was pretty amazing, right? Yeah, I will say I wasn't shocked by that thing that happened. When it happened, I was like, eh, it's okay, we can talk about it. You're allowed to talk about it now? Spoiler warning right now. I was so impressed that nobody ruined it for anybody. Yeah, it was shocked.

It would be like at restaurants and someone would be like about it, even though we'd all already seen it. But to be like, there might be another table nearby. I felt like the whole world got the memo. I feel like I saw like a bumper sticker, though, at some point on the internet. Like something about like. Yeah. If you haven't seen the film, Luke Skywalker dies at the end.

No, no, no. Did you see the film? I'm just kidding. Jesus. Well, your joke landed great. Let's wrap up our special time together with some random questions picked out up an Indiana Jones fedora that's behind me. Isn't that really graceful? That's why they pay me the big bucks.

I love that. You lost one. Is that the winner? Wait, are we grabbing these or what? Grab whatever one you feel like. Okay. Can we get to ask each other? This is however you want it to be.

I don't want to answer that one. Okay. What was so personal? No one is. That was a boring question. Describe my perfect movie-going experience. I've had this a few times, but not for a long time, which is when I was in high school or around college age,

so we'll go like 16 to 23, where we would go opening weekend to a big movie. Like I did this once for the wedding singer, and once for there's something about Mary, where we would get 40s, obviously, of malt liquor. Obviously. What were we drinking, Gabe? What kind of 40?

I would assume usually it was old English. It was O.E. Yeah, and then we would go to the movie theater. This is not like a unique experience, and we would have it, but it's my perfect movie-going experience. Yeah, that's the question, yeah. And we would go to the theater, and we'd sit there, and we'd drink it, and it would be a packed house.

And honestly, I wouldn't know if it was the booze or the movie, but, like, when I watched The Wedding Singer, the way it made me feel was the way that you would dream as a filmmaker of making a comedy would make somebody feel. Just euphoria for two hours, where I was just so happy and just laughing. It's a beautiful thing. That's a very nice. Did you see, did both of you guys see,

Twister with us? Like, did that with me? No, I did. Because I remember cheersing our 40s and we were in the front row and having the light from the screen bounce back and have everyone see us like cheering our 40s. And I was like, man, I'm going to get kicked out of here. And this is so fast. I do remember being at one though where we were near the back and then it was that we

had brought six packs. Oh, yeah. A bottle fell and rolled the whole way. Yeah, like an empty one went and you just heard roll, roll, roll, roll, roll. That happened when I saw days of confused in the theater that happened. That sounds about right. When I saw days and confused five minutes. Everyone in there was in high school and they were all drunk.

And you heard bottles rolling around the whole time. And then a girl got up to go to the bathroom and fell down the whole stairs. And it was in Berkeley. So, like, everyone was like, oh, shit. Oh, shit. Oh, shit. Oh, shit. Oh, shit.

And she, like, ran out crying. It was horrible. Dude, we saw, me and my buddy Rob saw eyes wide shut at UCLA. It was, like, only a couple of us in theaters. He got so drunk that he took his shirt. off halfway through. And then when the out, and then he passed out, and the lights were coming up, and then all these people just started

filing past us, and they're just this drunk shirtless dude. Like, frat boy. Yeah. Hard to watch that movie. Drunk. My question. Favorite Childhood TV show, Alf, moving on. Wow. Nailed that one. Do you think Alf can be rebooted? And what would you do with Alf? I think it can be. By the way,

watch it on Amazon. It's $4 for the first season. It's amazing. It holds up. I feel like if you were going to reboot it, it would have to be like it's still set in the 80s. Right. Studio audience still. Like Fuller House did it like, what if it was now? Right. But I think it just...

Frozen in time. Yeah. You want... You want... Same cast. Original scripts. Digitally, get them younger. That's really good, yeah. My question... You went by the way, for the record, you went through about 15 questions. Yeah, and this one still isn't good because it's so easy.

The most interesting person in the world is the guy from Dosecchi's commercials. No, I... Yeah, but... You believe that? That's what it said on the commercial It's not like a trivia question It was more of an opinion question You said

So you think that that's the most interesting man in the world It says it on the commercial You should not be on like these panel shows or something Like because your opinions are really horrible Jolette is the best a man can get Yeah In terms of razors, yes Oh no

God Okay He's just very trust It's not like I think that like they would make great pants But I mean Yeah and when it comes to razors yes, it says it's the best a man can get. So you believe that.

The way you're talking now makes me like your movie less. I kind of agree with him on that. I hate the movie now because you're a part of it. No, that's fair. Forgive the fact that one of the Lonely Island members is, I don't know, has some kind of warning disability or something. The movie is great. Pop star, never stop, never stopping.

Thanks. They said it all dramatic, and that made me like it again. I'm auditioning for my via. Exactly, exactly. Thanks for coming by, guys. It's always good to see you. Good luck with a film. And I'll see you in the next one.

Sweet. Thanks. We did it. This has been an Earwolf production, executive produced by Scott Ackerman, Adam Sacks, and Chris Bannon. For more information and content, visit Earwolf.com. American history and full of legendary figures whose names still resonate today. Like Jesse James, Billy the Kid, and Butch and Sundance, Sitting Bull, Crazy Horse, and Geronimo,

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