SmartLess - "Sigourney Weaver"

Episode Date: December 5, 2022

The illustrious Sigourney Weaver trains us to breathe underwater, look into camera, and make chocolates for agents. “Get off my mountain!” It’s another rib-tickling episode of SmartLess.Please support us by supporting our sponsors!See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

I'm Sigourney Weaver, and I just want to say, hey, buckle up. Here comes a new smartlist. This is, listen, we're panning Sean's billiard room at his house that's now become your office. Wait a second. Pan that again. He has such a beautiful office. I put a pool table in this room because like an old pool table that was cheap, because Don't, don't, don't try.

So it's true. Yeah. It was cheap. I got the cheapest yacht I could find. It floats. It's got a beautiful sail. No, no. And so I was like, because, because it was like this little room that was an office and

I was like, I don't need an office. I just need, where's he? Is he in Toronto? Yeah. He's at his parents place. Oh, there he is. Listener, Arnett is late, but he's clearly on Toronto time. So that's okay.

Are you and, you're in mom's, we were just talking about Sean's billiard room and now you're in your parents' study or library, is it? Yeah. I'm in my, I'm in my, sorry. I'm in my dad's study. Sorry. Really? Okay.

So you all have, you know, I'm just in the room above the garage. Yeah, right. I'm just keeping things real. Oh yeah. You keep it really real. Yeah. Really real. What else is, what's near that room?

Is your workout room and your sauna near that room? Well, I have a bunch of things in this one small little space. Yeah. I mean, I got to move the microphone out of the way. If I want to, you know, work out in this room and then if I want to get dressed or shower, I've got to, you know, move the workout stuff out of the way. Hey, you know, you know, my dad's name is Jim, right? Jim Arnett.

Congratulations. And did you guys know that he likes to drink highlighters? It's a mug of highlighters. It's a mug of highlighters. It's holding up a mug that says Jim on it. A mug that says Jim and then. What are you doing in Toronto, Will? Just robbing your folks place.

I'm just doing, I'm doing a little thing here for my, my friends over at Freedom Mobile, which is a great place. If you're looking, you know, to get a great deal on one of their big gig unlimited plans is on our freedom mobile.ca. Is that what you're doing there? You're working? Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. Sometimes I make myself laugh. Do you? Yeah. Just need me. That's it. Well, you get all driving around all day.

You get a lot of you, you get a lot of you. You guys, I went on a haunted hayride the other day. Sounded out. Yep. Haunted hayride. Yeah. Have you guys ever been to that one in Los Angeles? The hayride?

Well, I think when I was six or seven. Oh, come on. It's fun. Yep. No. Abel did it a couple of weeks ago. It's fun, right? So somebody not yet a teenager.

We're 12. We're 12. And so how was it, Sean? It's fun. It's like, you guys, I think you would like it. It's like, you know, you're getting a wagon with a bunch of people and, you know, you go through Griffith Park and they scare the crap out of you. It's kind of fun.

Really? It's like a haunted hayride. Like they, the people run out of the bushes and stuff. Yeah. Yeah. You know, speaking of bushes in Griffith Park, this is your story. I used to run outside. Now I, now I run here in the, my small little closet of a room here with a treadmill.

But I used to run through Griffith Park and, and I'd tell, I tell my friends, boy, you know, I did the friendliest people in Griffith Park, you know, I kept running by these guys. They just kept waving at me and they said, you know, what, what time of day do you run it? I said, boy, I don't know. Like right around, you know, late morning or early, like around lunchtime. Yep, at lunchtime at Griffith Park, famously supposedly you can just take a walk or a jog and find any dude you want by a bush and he'll, he'll give you an HJ, a BJ, whatever, it depends

on how much money you're holding. But there's a section there in Griffith Park where it's just hooked up central. That's why when I asked Sean for a good place to jog, he said Griffith Park and I said, he said, cause it's very handy and you thought it was just centrally located. Yeah. I have never heard of that story. Yeah. All right.

So let's get to our guests, which I'm so excited, but it's a wonderful segue. Great. All right. So I, I know I'm always excited for my guests, but this one is a kind of like a mic drop. Okay. Your eighties childhood dreams are going to come true. Your nineties childhood dreams, your 2000 childhood dreams. And your current dreams.

This woman is at the center of all your favorite iconic franchises that we'll talk about there. Born and raised in Manhattan. She went to the same two schools I did, Stanford and Yale. So of course she speaks three languages. Sure. I don't know what they are, but she loves gardening and is afraid of elevators. As far as her work goes, as far as her work goes, if you don't blink, she was in Annie Hall for like six seconds.

The respect and love and admiration she gets in this business of ours is as tall as she is. Guys, it's one of my favorite actresses of all time. Sigourney Weaver. Whoa. Sigourney Weaver. Sigourney Weaver. It is Sigourney Weaver.

There she is. It's so glamorous. Hi, you guys. I'm so excited to be here. Oh, how cool. By the way, you, you look beautiful and, and you know, you didn't have to like shush up for us because nobody's going to see that. Oh, I didn't.

Yeah. No, she's doing something important after this. You watch. This is the way I look. You know, when I'm vacuuming the house and doing the dishes. Unbelievable. Oh, I did it. It's my favorite response to that.

Sigourney, have you ever been to Griffith Park? I have, but I think I was on a horse, so I missed all the fun. So was I. Don't take a sip after that. Yeah, you're not allowed to take a little comedy sip. Sigourney Weaver, welcome to the show. My God, this is such an honor to have you. It really is.

Oh, well, that's very sweet of you. But by the time our segment is over, I don't know that you'll feel like that, but it's very kind of you to say. No, I, I've been a big fan of this show and of each of you, and I'm delighted to be here. Well, it's impossible in place wise. I didn't know, you're probably so sick of talking about this. I didn't know your real name was Susan Sue. Wait, what?

Yeah. Yeah. Sue and Susie. And does anybody call you Sue or Susie? Well, they, you know, you can't change your destiny. I did change my name to Sigourney when I was about 13, but now everyone calls me Siggy. So, you know, I was trying to get a longer name because by that time I was almost six feet tall when I was 11.

So I thought Susie is too diminutive. And Susie Snowflake. There's Susie Snowflake. Yeah. Yeah. Or wake up little Susie or all those. You know. Or Susie cream cheese.

Yes. Yeah. And from the great Gatsby, right? Is that what you thought of me? That's right. I saw it. It's mentioned once. What is Sigourney?

I think it's Jordan Baker's aunt is mentioned and it's like Mrs. Sigourney Fay or something like that. And I just looked, it was an S case. I liked the initial and it just went on for a long time. And then why, which I think is very up to. And your parents? Yeah. What did your parents say?

They were like, Hey, we give you a nice name and now you've decided. What kind of thanks is this? Yeah. Yeah. They did call me S for a long time in case I changed it again. But ironically, my mother was named Desiree because they'd had like eight boys and finally they had a girl. But everyone called her Liz and my father was named Sylvester.

But because he was a little redheaded kid, he and his brother, they were called Pat and Mike. So he was Pat. So they couldn't say anything to me. You come from a long line of people who are not happy with the names they were given. Exactly. What about your middle name? It begins with a name.

Alexandra. Alexandra. Oh, that's a beautiful name. It's my mother's name. It's a bit long. Yeah. But Alex is a great short for a woman. But I knew a really obnoxious girl named Alex at camp.

So I couldn't do that. What about brothers and sisters? Were they equally unhappy with their names? Well, no. My father was a rumored history nut. So he named my brother Trajan after a really wonderful emperor. And he wanted to name me Flavia, which my mother said. Now that I would have changed.

Flavia. Yeah. Oh my God. That sounds so close to something else. I know. I know. This is a very rich history. This is an incredible, it was happening at your house.

These are interesting people. I know. I'm dead serious. I like it. I'm sorry. First of all, my mother's name is Alexandra. My partner's name is Alessandra. And my son's first name is, his real first name is Alexander.

Well, Alexander the Great. So Alexander the Great. And do you know that a woman traditionally spelled Alex when they shorted with an I? That's how you differentiate between- Oh, Alex. Yes. I understand that. I see that.

What, A-L-I-Ax? Yeah. My mom spells that A-L-I-Ax. Does she really? Mm-hmm. Wait, Sigourney, how many brothers and sisters did you have? I have one brother. One brother.

And then growing up. So what was growing up like? That you could just be like, I want to change my name and they're like, great. Was it like, crunchy in 60s and love and whatever? Well, my father was working, he was head of NBC in the 50s. Oh, wow. So he produced show of shows and created the Today Show and the Tonight Show. Come on.

He did? All of that. Hang on. Wait a minute. This is your guest. This has got to be covered on the Work of TV page. I didn't know this. I didn't know this.

Yeah. Higher will. What's his name? Sylvester. Sylvester Pat Weaver. Sylvester. Sylvester. And she just said it.

I didn't know that. And Jimmy Fallon just said nice things about him the other night when, you know, they think of him as their, the father of the Tonight Show. Sylvester Weaver. Yeah. Yeah. Sylvester Pat. Okay.

Pat Weaver is really what he's called. So what's so crazy is I met you once for two seconds backstage at The Tonight Show. When I was like 27 years old. And just three years ago. Really made a real imprint on her. Yeah. So we passed each other in the hall in the back. I just think that's wild.

I was like, oh my God. Hi. Nice to meet you. And you were like, hi. Nice to meet you. So then does that mean your childhood was around show business? And is that where you got your taste for it or was that later? I was very shy.

So I don't think I imagined even developing a taste for it. But what I must say is my father would come home after the day, I guess before he went back for the night shows. And he always seemed in a good mood. He was always laughing. And I thought, and we had lots of, you know, we had, we had those people come in and out like Red Skelton and Jackie Gleason did their, you know, this is your life. So he was working with people who sounded absolutely wonderful to me.

So it took me many, many years to say I want to be an actor for various different reasons. But I guess I was always maybe trying to head toward a little area of that world because I knew it was hard work and unpredictable and often unfair, which I think is a great advantage to know that going in. But I also knew my father laughed a lot during the day. But wait a second. What an interesting thing though, so he creates the today show and the tonight show. And he's doing them simultaneously, working on them.

Well, first he was running the network. And so he had the regular shows, like show of shows, but then the network, the world could not imagine having any kind of TV on in the early morning. And they couldn't imagine TV on at night. So it sort of went from, I don't know, five to eight. It was very limited in those days in the early 50s. So when he pitched to the general Sarnoff who owned RCA and NBC that he wanted to do this morning show, people should wake up in the morning, be able to turn on TV, find out

what happened overnight, get a few laughs from Dave Garroway and all that stuff. The general was horrified and my father pushed it through anyway and it's still running. And maybe you can answer that because I remember hearing once years ago that the idea of the late night program, i.e. the tonight show was part, that it was empty airways, but also so that the last thing people did was leave their TV on that channel so that the next day when you turned your TV on, it was they had, they already had your attention. That's right. Did you ever hear that from your dad?

I did. Yeah. I'm not talking to you. He wasn't telling me the secrets of NBC, but it's a good idea. I'm Sigourney, sidebar. I'm doing a play on Broadway next year. What's it called? I'm playing Oskar Levant and the play takes place backstage at the tonight show.

Wow. Yeah. Can I do a walkthrough? Yes, please. Like a ghost. Now wait, I didn't know that, so when I was in college, we were obsessed with Christopher Durang. Yes.

I was like, oh my God, let's do a Christopher Durang play because it was the, he was kind of like the Neil Simon of our generation, right? And I would look at the opening of all his plays, I was like, it would be like starring Sigourney Weaver. And I was like, wait, the movie star was on in play. Like as a first time at such a young age, I realized, oh, as an actor, you just weren't, you couldn't just be one thing. You could do all the things.

But I was blown away to see your name as the original cast in so many Broadway plays. Yeah. I think you said starring. I think we just had our names. Oh, well, yeah. The characters. Right. That's what I mean.

Yeah. No, but that's how I, you know, that saved me because I was quite discouraged at drama school. And luckily, when I came to New York, even though I was looking for a job in a florist store or anywhere, you know, a cake store, anywhere but a show business because I'd been so discouraged, you know, I kept working with Chris and all our friends and all of Broadway. And I'm so grateful that that is how I started with about five years of drama. And all those comedies.

Yeah. They were all comedies. And Albert in a rotto and all the, all the gang. Do you still do a bunch of theater? Do you have, even have time to do want to? I did. We did Vanya, Sonya, Masha and Spike on Broadway for a year, just about in 2013. And then since then, I've been doing avatar avatar and some other stuff.

For them. I haven't heard of it. Wow. When does that come out? Avatar two is coming out December 16. And did you, didn't you shoot the third one at the same time? Well, there's like five. Yeah.

Two and three. There will be five. It's all part of one long story about this family. I love it. It's so great. You know, it's so funny because the, you know, the avatar came out to such fanfare and success and was, you know, really well received critically and at the box off, et cetera, to then have this follow-up, this film that's been made as you can attest to for a long time.

And there's a lot of surrounding it to just call it avatar two seems sort of, sort of unceremonial. No, it's the way of the water. The way of water. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. Well, and cause James Cameron has this like fascination with water.

We don't, I don't, I, you know, hopefully he'll come on the show one day. Yeah. But wait, but tell me about, didn't you have to like learn how to breathe? And didn't you film underwater for like a long time? She learned how to breathe underwater. Tell us about that. Yes. I'll just show you my gills.

No, but I, we did, we actually worked with Kirk Crack who teaches the Navy SEALs. And Jim doesn't do anything by have. So he really wanted us to be comfortable in the water and be able to do scenes underwater. So we studied for a whole year with Kirk and we all had to do breath holes, which you trained to get up to and I was able finally to do a static breath hold for six and a half minutes. Oh my God. I can't, that's unbelievable.

But anyone can do it if you have Kirk Crack. My husband was with me because he trained with me. We both did it that day for six and a half minutes and neither of us can believe it. Wow. And we will be right back. This is supported by Audible, you don't ride an elevator for the music or pick an airline for the movie. So when it comes to audio entertainment, it makes sense to choose Audible.

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That's S-T-O-R-Y-W-O-R-T-H dot com slash smartless to save $10 on your first purchase. Storyworth dot com slash smartless. Thanks Helix for their support man do we love Helix over here at smartless they've been on this ride with us since early days and we love them not just because that but also because we all sleep on Helix mattresses and we all love them. I got the Helix Midnight Lux mattress, Sean got the Helix Dusk Lux mattress and Jason also got the same thing I did the Helix Midnight Lux mattress. What's better than sleeping on a Helix mattress knowing what Helix mattress your buddy sleep

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with cooling technology that help regulate your body temperature whatever the season and these guys they got it all Helix is offering up to $200 off all mattress orders and two free pillows for our listener go to helix.com smartlist with Helix better sleep starts now back to the show now can I ask you a potentially tacky housekeeping question if if you're obligated to train for a year for a film before you start shooting are you paid for that year of training that's a very good question and we were shooting at the same time we were training so we got there in the summer of 2017 and started doing a lot of parkour yeah and I would I actually play one of the kids in avatar too so I had to do everything the

kids did and at the same time we started training she'd like shoot in the morning and then train the afternoon I'm trying to remember we had about two months of training and then when you weren't shooting they would bring you over to the little tank in Manhattan Beach and you would do more and more challenging stuff and then eventually they took us to a final sort of rehearsal off the big island and we learned how to swim with sort of underwater vehicles which would then represent other species that we might meet in the crazy she's being very careful not to reveal I should be very very careful and so Gordy Jason would love to get a hold of your day out of days maybe the one line or two yeah and if he could

get a number on the first day D just so we could work on his hardouts that would be great I need to know your turnarounds and things like that because I'm sensing there's some overtime that could be okay but wait Gordy but don't you have to do a lot of in addition to the water stuff and maybe for the other ones and I know for the first one all that motion capture green screen stuff right well may I just say yes every one of the world thinks we still do green screen I haven't done a green screen since a pickup for the first Ghostbusters that long ago so I've never done green screen that one time this is all performance capture you know like any circus yeah and it's actually kind of a wonderful

theatrical experience you don't have to worry about lights or makeup or you know it's just you and your little black suit you're a little so explain that to it to our to our Tracy's out there that no idea what that first of all green screen is something where if you stand in front of a big piece of green fabric they can later cut out all the green stuff behind you and put in a picture of mountains or whatever they want to put you in front of charging rhinoceros right now a days they have you act in front of what and and and you are wearing a suit that captures cameras tied to your head in your side right so you're in a big empty space called the volume and you may have basic sets built to run up and

down and jump over this or jump over that they all represent parts of Pandora drawn in later like topography of the yes exactly topography so we can do the scene running through an approximation of that landscape and you have a suit on with various I don't know ping pong balls a little receptors receptors and you have a helmet that has two cameras facing you which must be just an awful angle I do it's for the dream for well for a little China ball on a third arm there and then I think there's also one facing the person you are talking to and that's all for what a digital in New Zealand spends I wish I knew the exact time and amount of money but it's like to make an avatar it's it's all CGI it's

all CGI and and how do you how do you dumb actor question to actor how do you connect to the material when you're just a dumb person dumb person to say Sean is quicker how do you from Sean to Sigourney how do you connect to the material when you're not in the thing and you're not and everybody's dressed like you when you're looking across and you can't probably see them because there's a camera in your face that's why I feel it's like an early theater rehearsal where you just have an empty stage and you've read the script and you know who's playing what and you just are there as actors making the scene work and it's not for any camera it's literally for you know for each other yeah and of course

Cameron has about 14 guys hidden around the set doing shots of different people and when Jim and I won't be able to explain this well Jim created a camera for the first avatar which kind of looks like course he's holding a dowser and when you're there you can actually look over at a specific screen and see your roughed out avatar being and and how much taller they are than humans and how they relate to the landscape so that's a kind of very rough guide to go oh I see I'm twice as tall as the boy I like you know in the the next story and then you just you forget about all that and you just work on these beautiful very compelling scenes that Jim Cameron has written about this family so you don't you play a teenager

in this one or something at some point I do crazy yeah she said are you listening Sean you know it's called an imagination you should look into it and because she has obviously a very vivid one and she doesn't need all your tiktoks to get inspired now have you seen have you been able to see all the stuff that he said will eventually be wrapped around you i.e. what your character looks like what the world looks like have you seen a rough cut of it or will you see it when we all see it because it takes so long to finish he is taking long time to edit it down to three hours because of course he has a lot of material so I'll see it when we go to the is it called a royal premiere maybe one of the royals

will want to come see it we start the promotional tour in London so we'll have to see if it's Prince Charles Prince William King Charles King Charles yes well there goes a royal premiere we can cut that part out so go on yes please get things are safe but wait anyway so I will see it when when the world sees it wow I do want to ask you because I've never met you just just a couple questions about alien I know you probably do you remember meeting him back so he wants to get back to that I'm sorry he's probably forgotten he has that wait I just want to ask you something like alien or avatar or something I was wonder with actors like you in massive franchises are you as these guys are gonna go nuts are you as into

the mythology and like the back stories and science of it all as we as the audience are or do you really just think of it as a job you're focusing on your character or you kind or do you get into it at all you know I kind of treat them all the same yeah it's just the script I'm on this you know when I first did alien I couldn't understand why I was working in such beautiful sets and when I wasn't on I could roam through this world and I remember thinking it's so nice of Ridley and Fox to create these worlds that we can just walk through when we're off camera and feel like we're still on the planet I thought they did it for us and I was very touched by that and then of course I realized this over the camera

but the truth is is that you have done some really iconic science fiction work and maybe Sean is wondering is that is that just did you gravitate towards that or did it just find you in other words do you have like a passion for science fiction no I'm cast excellent I was on a short list for Ripley and I told Ridley I didn't like the script and I got the part I want to talk about that yeah against your against your better judgment you did it but I will say this let me as a follow-up even though you don't have a sort of a natural draw or whatever it is to science fiction but because you've been part of all these incredibly iconic science fiction pieces do you have a sort of an appreciation for it like over

the years have you come to embrace it and appreciate it for what it is absolutely it's an amazing space to work in because it's always in the future and that's it is about you know about being human and what our future is so I think that's why the younger audiences love it it's still relevant you know took me a while I mean listen once you've done all these really a ricocheting around the future I totally get it I love it and especially working with Jim Cameron who is either thinking underwater or out in space you know we're in Alpha Centauri I guess is our our solar system for Pandora no it's fascinating it's fascinating I love it I'm so lucky yeah and Ripley and Ripley is like this iconic character of like sort

of the embodiment of sort of like toughness and kind of grit and somebody who's you know do you do you wear that well do you do you like am I like that no I scream at a spider no I wasn't gonna ask I didn't mean that I meant more how do you feel when people sort of project that on you or how do you like that mantle do you like it or do you kind of shirk it you know I consider it Ripley's mantle and I try to I feel like I have to then throw that to her I feel that way about Ripley too and in fact about the woman I based Ripley on she's still like that even though she's on earth so I feel like a you know I'm a vessel you know and I was very very lucky to be able to tell these stories I was very

lucky to have the writers who decided to make the lone survivor a woman it's very lucky to have guys working me who like you know strong women but it was all a commercial decision to make the survivor a woman because they just thought you know story wise no one will ever suspect that that's gonna happen interesting I remember being so was it which which alien was it when when you shaved your head was that that's three that's three was it I just found that so I don't know it's something about that time period or that moment right there it seemed like such an incredibly brave and courageous and forward thing for this huge female movie star actor to do something is you know sort of traditionally unglamorous

as to like shave your head did it feel more frightening or did it feel like this is something that's that's kind of cool and courageous and let's do it and was it and and and did you do it yourself or tell me about that it was David Fincher yeah he just done Vogue you know and he was asked to do right on a video yeah and and so we were at this meeting with Fincher and some of the suits and it ended and we all got up and someone at Fox probably the head said so David how do you see Ripley and we were on our way out the door and he turned around he said I don't know how do you feel about bald and I said sounds great to me and we just went off and did it no really wow I had a baby and I had

lots of hair then and so I tried to cut it in little because they see black and white I tried to cut it off in little stages so I didn't frighten her you're bald at the same time it's chilly otherwise I think it's a really cool look it's so cool and I mean just what a beautiful look to and that sort of postmodern look to did the studio freak out when they saw the first footage that oh my god they weren't they weren't kidding no I think they were delighted I think I was the one my wig that has to work in the beginning was sort of you know like a dog trying to run off my head and so that was that was the greater concern I think than how I look bald was how I looked with the wig on and did that match

you know the Ripley we last saw but it wasn't alien your first feature film ever well basically yes yes the first week they had to say really kept saying you know can you stop looking in the camera and I said well I'd love to stop looking in the camera but you keep putting it right in front of me and I just had to ask I asked a couple of the actors I said how do you deal with that you know how do you deal with it right being there and it's right there so but what are the odds I mean my god your first one out of the gate how did that happen you know but it was you have to remember it was a very small budget movie you know it was Ridley Scott's second movie I mean I decided very quickly that I didn't

have to worry about any of it because it was just like being off off Broadway I just was going to be in a different medium but the stakes were low it was you know it was fantastic story but you know no one even thought about franchises there then maybe and it was all in a state and it was all in a stage too so it was in a small area right it was probably felt really contained and at Sheperton yes how did they how did they find you what being your first movie had you been doing a bunch of television shows or no I had I had gotten my first job at the public theater on a John Guare play where I played a maid who was cleaning the glacier a year before and and I feel very lucky and so you know I'd been meeting I was

up for a Mike Nichols movie I you know I was up for a Bob Fosse movie I hardly had an agent people really didn't know what to do with me and I even was part of this depressing class where actors sat around and thought about how to get agents attention like should you make some chocolates put them in a box sure and you eat them all and then you have your 8x10 underneath that sounds like a classic Shanay's I didn't I didn't do anything like that all the time but I did write what the agent who finally accepted me I wrote something like love Sigourney in parentheses it's a crime that I'm not working weaver was the Bob Fosse film that you read for was it all that jazz I think it was the one with Maryl

Hemingway 1981 or yeah one of those star 80 star 80 yeah you know when I was in just a little sidebar thing and when I was in high school I watched I saw you in gorillas in the mist and you were like amazing and after that movie because the trailer would keep running on TV all the time I mean the commercial for it and so my go-to joke as a kid to anyone that was bothering me or teasing me was your line from gorillas in the mist which was get off my mountain I would say that all the time I love it I'm gonna use that it's much more fun to say than get away from her you bitch you know my mountain still works yeah there must have been there must have been in that time a lot of are there any films from that

era that we all that you regret passing on or not doing that yeah that at the time you thought I can't get my head around this or I don't get it and then later you went I wish I'd been able to get my head around that there are a couple of you know in the 70s and 80s there were a lot of what I would call male fantasy movies like body heat in place those were quite common that kind of and I just didn't get them I just felt that if I couldn't relate to the character and if there was not much character to relate to I would have been too insecure to just try to look good and sound fascinating because I don't think I'm charming enough to to maintain that kind of focus if I don't believe in what I'm doing

and that that's just me I just couldn't relate to it and speaking of that like because a lot of your character do you do you ever include yourself in the process of writing with the writer or do you ever kind of like change some dialogue to fit your vision of the character because it just seems like something you might be interested in or do because it's so everything you say it seems so real and honest oh well that's very nice of you yeah that is I guess our job the only time I've really contributed stuff like that is when the script does not continue to be good and then survival and then it's cutting and rewriting a little so you can manage yeah very diplomatically put by the way most people would be like yeah

that script was terrible and I rewrote the whole second act is your is your husband in the business Jim ran the flea theater for 20 years downtown got you he's an absolutely amazing director yeah and I feel very fortunate since we hardly knew each other when we got married that I had I ended up marrying someone who totally got what I did respected the time it took really enjoys working with me on the occasional script we have to be right or just working on working on you know I can run lines with him we talk about stuff so I like to hit the ground running I have the same relationship actually that's great with her husband with her husband yeah yeah does she know I'm I'm revealing it right now we'll be right back

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smartlist not only will you receive 20% off your first purchase but enjoy free shipping on any U.S. orders over $75 and free returns go to Viori.com slash smartlist and discover the versatility of Viori clothing. And now back to the show. Let's get back to you guys got married before you knew each other this was sort of an arranged thing we're making news today you guys. Well I was older and I went to the Williamstown Theater Festival and on the very first day I was there I saw this cute guy chain smoking in the student union in front of like a stack

of books on check off and I went oh boy was it me and then I didn't really speak to him and at the end of wait was that your strategy you were gonna you were gonna kind of ignore him a little bit no it was Diane Wiest and I were in a pinter play on the main stage and Jim was sort of directing the the non-ex the non-equity kids and you know he ran the bar and this guy sounds really hot you know he he looked like a player and I thought he's not for me right yeah I don't need that and so then at the end of the summer I was sitting at the sort of party next to Diane Wiesty and I said see that guy over there across the room I saw him the first day I'm gonna go over and ask him to dance and she went

oh go Ziggy go because we both were unattached that summer and all we talked about was like you know just by the name of your biography go Ziggy go and so you walk over so you go over there you saunter over let's go well maybe maybe I tried to saunter I got up to the guy who was standing with his friends and I said hi you want to dance and he went no and I just was like now I have to get across the room so I just remember going toward Diane kind of you know getting closer to the ground every second he caught up with me and he said I'm so sorry of course I want to dance with you but I couldn't look at him I had been deflated so entirely and then months later I had a Halloween square dance birthday

party when we started shooting Ghostbusters and I I went through the book and I thought all right give him another try again and he came and he had such a good time even though he didn't know anyone and about two months later we decided to get married we've been married 38 years that's really cool I think part of it is that you're not with each other all the time I was often away filming another alien or something but no he's so great he's from Hawaii he's filled with Aloha he's just I'm so lucky you know that's amazing did you guys ever decided to have kids or things just too busy no we have a wonderful daughter yeah is now 32 I don't know how she still looks 12 but well she's got such terrible genes you

know did she go into the business as well she teaches oh right yeah amazing in fact they're non-binary and they teach a gotcha not not acting academics yes digital storytelling and role-building and things like that oh that's awesome that's awesome what a cool family yeah very cool family you know we may give that impression but no I mean Sean watches TV and eats sour patch kids all day you could have had one of those you know true and just watch all your movies on a loop and you think I'm kidding but we would have been delighted to have you absolutely but but speaking of weddings didn't you officiate because you love dogs as much as I do I think we all own dogs yeah right and didn't you officiate a dog wedding

once or something come on yes yes our our daughter was 10 yeah and we decided to breed our little Italian greyhound and char said well if she's going to have babies she has to get married and I said well absolutely so we had pedals in a little beautiful wedding dress that we bought at Zidamers we had the groom we had a best man who brought the groom in char was the minister we had a pre-pup-tual agreement wow and we had it was covers and I must say they seemed quite in love and then the honeymoon they couldn't figure out how to get together I heard well I heard they couldn't keep their paws off each other by the way laughing guys dumbest shit anyway so now we have actually in during COVID we we did those two dogs are

rested in peace long ago and now we have a little a beautiful little Italian greyhound named cosy fang tutti because she is an Italian greyhound the Mozart opera yes with a G yeah cosy fang that's right Sean thanks yeah Sean good that was a good catch wait so I want to know it's more just a few more things about avatar before we let you go yeah now when you guys so was there talk about filming them all at the same time are you guys this is like more of a Bateman question are you guys contract contracted to do all of them so you cannot do other work you have to remain available full fight you mean all five yeah yeah like you have to block out the next five years of your life did they pay for first position go ahead sick or

yeah I don't know but I was just curious like to know like do you have to keep yourself now available for that franchise for you know five six seven eight nine Sean has a one act he'd love for you to read so two's coming out yeah two years three will come out probably after three when Jim can imagine going back to this after you know creating a few more submarines we will start four and five and we will shoot them together and then eventually they will come out so the last one will come out in 28 where I'll be you know walking the cane and how long does it take to shoot each one well I think I was on it working regularly a year and a half but I think Jim probably he had to do the live action which is with actors

you see that was another year and a half so I'm sure it caught it's like three three years to just shoot it and meanwhile what it takes about five years to trans you know transform it wow so it is a big colossal no I have no they have to work around my schedule yeah there you go where do you do that it's in Manhattan Beach for the performance capture and and then in New Zealand for the live action now it doesn't a nice quick run off Broadway or going back to Williamstown doesn't that sound a little bit more manageable I mean what if we slide one of those like right in the middle of one of these well I do I do try to obviously you really need to you know go to the opposite end of the spectrum

and do small you know I've done about three small movies that are all coming out this year too and and they they keep me sane yeah so we watched may I just say I we were just devotees of Ozark which was so terrifying guys were so amazing in it but I have one suggestion uh-oh yeah this is good we are locked at the very end yeah I think it should have been your daughter because we assume that she's escaped all of this and she might have a normal life maybe right and if she had killed him we would have gone oh my god everyone is gonna be in this I think I think a lot of people agree with you security would have been way better William Goldman's already written a book about it it's called how Ozark could

have been better I'm sorry I don't mean that to be no you know I'm with you it's a great group we all thought I you know it's a funny I emailed him that exact same suggestion but anyway Sigourney we've taken up too much of your time we love you thank you for being here it's so cool you decided to do this yes well I'm so grateful to you for thinking of me and I we love your show and you guys are awesome and I love the way you do ads too oh yeah we gotta do some of those today I think I wanted to do an ad for you you want to yeah why don't you do it no no I don't have one text or just what about a hey hey buckle up here comes a new uh smart yes yes yes that you do an intro oh my gosh yeah we

should do an intro and just that something like that yeah you don't make it make it your own just let's just have fun with it here we go rolling introduce yourself and then introduce the show yeah hey um who are you today who is that over there I'm Sigourney weaver and I just want to say hey buckle up here comes a new smartness thank you Sigourney thank you guys so much thank you thank you thank you thank you love you bye bye bye bye what a what a what a pleasant way to start the day oh my gosh yeah I mean I truly who doesn't when you're scrolling through the thing I can see aliens on just sit and watch it all right every time Sigourney weaver is I didn't accidentally say I've been in love with her my entire life

did I that didn't come out you did not stayed internal great did you did you I think about all the movies we could have talked about go we didn't even talk about Ghostbusters no I know and that's and that was probably on purpose my because that that's where it really started for me I know and you know because obviously who you're going to call well I guess oh it will by the way I did want to mention to her because somebody once accused me and she needs to know I ain't afraid of no ghost okay well he just did it again oh no but I wish that I let her know no ghost okay no well you're really you're really I'm adamant your conviction yeah I'm adamant about it but you know would you when you guys

have people like that on that you're super fans of aren't you kind of afraid to ask them about you know the things that made them famous because you think they're just sick of talking about it but yeah but you kind of want to know right well yeah that's that's what that's our little sort of like gift our little privilege we're so lucky to be able to just say hey excuse me sir can I see a question yeah exactly yeah I love that Jason you always want to know like schedule and you always want to know do you get Fridays like what did you do how did you get out you're always looking for the out you get portal to portal right or you know there's a show there's a show called I don't know if I think

it's on Netflix maybe it's called the movies that made us do you know this show no and they and it's all these iconic movies and they get some of the people that worked on them to talk about it and they do they have behind the scenes clips nobody's ever seen and one of them was aliens and I just watched it like a month ago and the I wanted to talk to her about it about all of the it was just kind of a mess and everybody was yelling at each other and screaming and it got shut down for a while and then they went back and think I think I didn't ask her when we just had her on the show no I know but I mean what are you doing any other exciting questions you want to ask anybody else hey you got anything

that you want to ask Dax our first guest ever a couple hundred and maybe you worked up a good database of post interview questions actually also did you you guys find like a tear in the space time can do where you and Scotty finding all this time to watch all this shit holy crap I mean at night you watch a lot of your night started on 330 leave how many documentaries and stuff you've seen I just watched the one on Shanae O'Connor I thought that was pretty good wait you guys are always tell me will it's the same as you reading ten books a day that's true I get I do neither what am I so busy doing I got it I can I can I start no I wasn't listening a response at all quiet you know I'd love to see I'd love

to see Alex come back in right through that rear door there it's time for mom to do another yeah special guest spot when you're when you're done there visiting and working and stuff it's it going to be hard to say oh here it comes just to say bye bye I don't think we can ever use just why not why not lazy well here's the thing here's the thing I mean as well as much I want here because I live here I grew up here but then I moved to New York and now I live in LA but I have a place not close so technically I'm still not great like we've used that one a million no we might hear by the way so here I'm here with I'm here my dad's study and my dad went to the university of Manitoba and Manitoba I'm here

my dad study my my parents are you don't need to you didn't need to reset yourself we're gonna cut we cut no we're not gonna cut it we're gonna keep in that you've you've reset yourself still rolling so I'm here because I wanted to include I'm here in my parents place oh yes I am will you're reading from Manitoba which they have you know the animal that's got a brand new brand new slate is the bye son bye what did he just say oh manitoba is a Canadian bison is that what he said no that's the province and that their their provincial animal is just a wipe out and then the music starts we'll talk to you next week listeners that's all we got let's you say bye right now goodbye everybody pasta smart smart smart

endless is 100% organic and artisan Lee handcrafted by Michael Grant Terry rub arm jarv and Bennett barbaco smart loss our next episode will be out in a week wherever you listen to podcasts or you can listen to it right now early on Amazon music or early and add free by subscribing to Wondery plus in Apple podcasts or the Wondery app.