The Dan Le Batard Show with Stugotz - South Beach Sessions - Patton Oswalt

Episode Date: April 24, 2025

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Choose from a world of destinations, if you can. Air Canada. Nice travels. Welcome to South Beach Sessions. I'm very excited about this one. You are, you seem like, I've never met you, but you seem like a delightful person, both jagged and huggable. It's a tough thing to pull off. Wow.

Patton Oswalt with us, actor, comedian, writer. I imagine you identify most as comedian, right? Although. Comedian, yeah. I wanna talk to you about so many different things, but the first thing I wanted to start with is your father as a military man named you after a World War II general.

He did, an insane World War II general. He did, an insane World War II general. He must be so disappointed in you. You know, he's the opposite because he, my dad was a Marine, he did three tours in Vietnam and I remember him saying, because I never ever want you or your brother going to war or joining the military forces. So he was, when I veered into comedy, he was very happy.

He was like, you're doing good. Like, because he always loved, I mean, he loved Jonathan Winters and some of his brothers and David Letterman, all that stuff. So the fact that I went into comedy, I think made him very, very happy. When and how did you go into comedy?

I went in the summer of 88. It was, I'm sure you've experienced, everyone's experienced this, a version of this. The summer between freshman and sophomore year of college when you start to realize, oh, I need to figure my life out. I better figure out what I'm gonna do with myself. And I just started doing a bunch of different jobs,

and none of them were clicking. They were all doing fine, but it was like, if I lost this job I wouldn't care. And then I went and did a couple open mics in DC, and I just loved the hang and the world and the people, the fact that I was upstream of all the humor, I was at its source and seeing where it was coming out, I just loved it.

So you loved the people being in the back of the restaurant or the bar. And watching them sit around and kind of volley back and forth, a vague idea that would then keep getting refined and bounce around until it turned into a bit. It was like, oh, people create stuff out of thin air. I, there's not, there's no they, there's no them that's separate from us

because these guys would come in and they'd bitch about a parking ticket they'd gotten or, oh, you know, I was, my fridge broke and half my food is spoiled. And then they would sit and write jokes. Like it was, that wasn't their whole, some people that I knew that was like, their life and the hassles of it was their life.

You know, and these were like, I still have those same hassles and then I create stuff on top of it. And there was something really, there was like something even more human about that, that in the face of every other hassle that every other person is facing, I'm gonna also think of something funny

and try to make money off of it. Well, that's what you're still doing, right? Yeah, yeah. I imagine your mind doesn't stop very much. I imagine you're always sort of doing material as you're driving around and the world happens to you. Yeah, I don't. You are doing that amazingly by the way.

In the first two minutes that we've been on together in the clearing of your throat, it's been the clearing of the throat of a 400 pound lumberjack. Nice. If they're listening to it on audio, it is just you're clearing everything out. Hell yeah. All right. By the way, I'm swinging kettlebells while we do this. If you're just listening, there are kettlebells being swung

and I'm eating a giant stack of pancakes because I gotta go top trees up in Coos Bay. Yeah, I'm always, but I'm not, I wish I could, I don't have that ability to sit down with a notebook and just write jokes. I, as you said, I drive around and deal with my day and while I'm walking around and dealing with my morning or my afternoon, I'm thinking of things. And so it's very, very conversational.

However I'm talking to you off stage, I kind of go on stage and I'm still talking that same way. I just try to make it funny. So, I mean, it's just the way I think about the world. I don't even, you know, it isn't even a defense mechanism at this point, it's a comfort zone that I have to be in. Because if I get to, I was thinking this this morning, by the way, the fact that I really have realized,

I hate the phrase that comedians are the truth tellers and the philosophers. It's like, shouldn't we be comedians and our politicians and philosophers and journalists should be the truth tellers standing up for people so that the audiences I perform for, I can say silly shit that I made up that amuses them in this better world they're living in.

We shouldn't be in a world where, well, hopefully, because that means we're living in medieval times. That means the king is just sitting there going, well, I just passed a law where I get to sleep with all your daughters, and I know that feels terrible, but here comes a corn cob, the farting dwarf, and he's gonna say that I'm fat and that'll balance it all out.

Like, that's not how, no, there should be people setting that stuff right so that I can do jokes. You don't want the responsibility because I understand wanting to be the- It's not that I don't want the responsibility, but why is it all on, how is it switched so badly that it's the comedians that are pointing out the truth more than, yeah, I mean, by the way, there were people, you know, Lenny Bruce and George Carlin were also pointing out the truths, but they were doing it in a world where then you know that that was

the setup for, and then the press and government will also step in and hopefully try to right these wrongs. And that's completely reversed now. I understand how it is. The government is openly, people in power are just openly bragging about, oh, we're absolutely breaking laws. Do a funny joke about it to make these people feel better

while we do it to them. I feel like I'm abetting them screwing people over by giving people a temporary laugh. But it's like, I'm not equipped to affect policy and make change. I know how to tell really good jokes and that should be where my responsibility begins and ends. It's still a responsibility,

but we've become so skewed. I don't know. I was thinking about that this morning while I was getting ready to come here. I was just like, why are we the, somebody, I think they wrote on like Blue Sky, like the comedians are the last truth tellers. I'm like, we should be the first truth tellers in, and then eight other truth tellers pick up the,

take the ball from us and run it into the end zone, and that's not happening anymore. It seems kind of perfect in the apocalyptic times that we are, that we would put the court jesters in charge, but I do blame Jon Stewart for this. He became the trusted newsman as the media fell apart and the anchors fell apart. But in his defense, he kept screaming at the top of his lungs,

you should not be getting your news from me. You should be watching whatever news you can, however good it is, however bad it is, it was never great. And then I should be Eric Severide who comes on after Walter Cronkite and goes, here's what all this means. But I shouldn't be your source of news. But yeah, it became the source of news and then news had to become entertaining and funny. I'm curious how you stay out of hopeless in this regard

because I saw you perform, I've seen you perform recently in Miami and I saw you perform at the Largo and at the time, you and Marc Maron were both doing things and both of you as truth tellers are people who I rely on their sensibilities in the world to amuse me and also inform me. But I imagine that you can feel hopeless given what's presently happening right now.

Yeah, there's days I'm completely hopeless. But instead of, hopelessness is like a day that you cheat on your diet. You can't throw it all the way because you had one bad day. Like, okay, I had a bad day, I sank there, I'll show up again tomorrow with something. It's weird you mention Mark, because I text him all the time about the state of comedy,

and I'm way more wound up and angry about it. And he's like, you just sit and stew about this, and make yourself get angry. He's hit this level, I wouldn't say it's despair, but it's like this, I know what I can do in the world and I also know what I can't do in the world and I don't let that absence make me throw the whole thing out the window.

I show up and do what I can. What was the thing that Cory Booker, I'm sure he was paraphrasing somebody, but he said, just because you can't do everything shouldn't mean that you don't do anything. Do something, you know. Obviously no one can do everything. But show up, I mean, just in terms of it

being a life force of like, I'm still alive and I'm still here. And yeah, some days I feel like Steve McQueen floating on the coconut to the end of Papillon just, I'm still alive you bastards! But sometimes just being alive is a victory. Well, but the two of you basically, as I recall, gave us eight to 10 years, not as a country,

but as a planet. I believe the two of you arrived in consensus on- I think he actually gave us longer. I think when I was in Miami, especially, that was two months after the election, I think I said, when society does collapse, and let's be honest, February, I think I gave it like two months.

I mean, I had no hope at that point. He still has, I think the reason he's saying seven to eight years is because I think he wants to give himself time to get by property up in Canada and get out of here, you know, where I'm just like I think it's just too late. We're all going to be stuck at the border trying to get out. Okay, great. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. So if you want some hope, listen to Marin because my timeline is way harsher. How do you enjoy at this age what I would imagine

from over here to be the most confident you've ever had in what it is that you do and perhaps who you are? I enjoy the fact that I know, just again, you can't, how do I put this? I think a lot of people in this business destroy themselves because they're like, why aren't I at this level or why aren't I this person, why aren't I filling this arena and they forget the fact that if you are making

a living just by telling jokes, you have won, you have absolutely won life's lottery. And so you see these people that go insane, or like I was going to be a movie star, like I was the lead in a movie and it tanked. It's like, okay, then go be a character actor. Getting character actor in sidekick roles in movies is fantastic. Still, 99% of people don't get to do that.

So I don't know why you are eating yourself alive. Like you still get to live a creative life. That, I mean, again, I'm only saying this now because when I was younger, I was absolutely wound up with something like that. I was gonna say, it's interesting that- And I absolutely would burn myself down because of that. And now I'm like 56 years old.

I get to, I got to do an episode of Star Trek. I get to go on the road and do shows. My friends are all comedians or writers or creative people. My life is books and movies and cups of tea. I'm happy, I don't know why. Like I'm trying to be as happy as I can and then also try to give a little bit back to like this society, this whatever you wanna call it,

this country has been very good to me, why not give a little bit back because I've got something good here. But how'd you arrive there? Because comedy is very competitive and it's always a mental health challenge everybody listening Or watching this there's a mental health challenge and looking at what everyone else's life looks like especially with social media and comparing yourself You wake up in the morning and you open up that phone. It's like let me invite

Chaos and despair into my morning. I haven't even had, I haven't bitten a single strawberry, but I have consumed 8,000 megabytes of chaos. What kind of mourning is that? Yeah, I mean, I think that especially to younger comedians, if you are going, if you're comparing and despairing and getting on the, I kind of, and I know this is gonna sound kinda mean, I think you actually have to go through that.

I think you have to like go through the drink too much, smoke too much, realize how bad it is so that you can come out to the other side. I don't think you can fast forward wisdom. You also, and when you get older, you shouldn't white knuckle your youth. You should also accept the fact that, okay, I'm older now. I'm not the hip person. I'm maybe not, you know, no,

maybe I don't have anything to, or yes, I have something to say to 20-year-olds, but they don't want to hear that right now. They want to be alert. There's something so frustrating, especially about boomers and to a lesser extent Gen X, where we always wanna go, but I'm trying to prevent you from making the mistakes. I'm just like, I want to make those mistakes and I should be allowed to. So don't try to, you know, when someone is in their 50s and you're in your 20s, you're like,

well, let me tell you, it's like, let me go find out for myself. Even if I totally screwed up, can't I just go find, because you did and you're alive. That sounds nice philosophically. I don't imagine that you're able to always do that with your daughter. Sometimes, no, there are times when I go,

would you just please, I'm telling you. But I do try to approach it from the, listen, I know exactly why you wanna do this, because you have to, and you're probably going to experience it anyway, even though I really, really don't want you to, but I, and I don't, I know, but spoiler alert, this is where it'll end. And I'm just telling you this is where it'll end,

and I'm only saying this because I had that, I had it totally mapped out, I saw the mistakes people before me made, I'm not gonna make those mistakes, and you're still gonna make them. So maybe you should go make them, but I'm just letting you know, when you come on the other side of this, I'm not gonna be there going, I told you so.

I'm gonna be there going, welcome. Welcome to no man's land, I'm here. When did you learn this though? Like when was there a shift for you on who I am and what I am is enough, and I'm going to not be the person who welcomes chaos. Again, there's not a permanent shift. There are still days when I see something

that someone is doing and I get, God damn it, and what the fuck is that guy? That will never totally go away, but my reaction to it is now different. What I used to have was just being angry and resentful and living an enemy-centered life. Now, I still have the initial angry and resentful reaction, but I have more options of how to process it than I'm older.

And I can wink and laugh at the, oh, you could totally go down this road. There actually is some benefits to living vengefully sometimes. You know, especially if you're like, I'm going to lose 30 pounds, you motherfuckers. You know, or I'm going to, look, some, there have been some genuinely great things done out of vengeance. They just, there just have been. I'm sorry. There have been great things done out of vengeance. Great art has come out of vengeance. The last, Michelangelo's Last Judgment has this amazing, there's this amazing demonic figure painted with it, this fat donkey ears

and a snake around his belly. He's in the lower right hand corner of the painting. And he was, that was a guy, he was the Pope's master of ceremonies and I cannot remember his name right now. Cesare or Cesuri, anyway, he was tormenting Michelangelo while he was painting that, the last judgment because he was a failed painter and a failed sculptor

and very, very jealous of Michelangelo. He's like, well, now I'm in charge of this, so I'm gonna make him, and he would go back to the Pope and go, well, he's painting Jesus without a beard. And the Pope's like, well, now I'm in charge of this, so I'm gonna make him, blah, blah, blah, and he would go back to the pope and go, well, he's painting Jesus without a beard, and the pope's like, well, you gotta go tell him, you know, and just, you know, in other words, it was his way of going, I, it's, Michelangelo and I are doing this painting,

even though he's a fucking loser. So, Michelangelo finally had it, and he painted the guy, Biagio de Cezna? Anyway. He put him in it? they painted him as this horrifying demon, pot-bellied, and it's so clearly his face, donkey ears, and then he went back to the Pope and was like, he's painted me as a demon in hell, and at that point the Pope had had enough of it,

he goes, I have no jurisdiction over hell, and just basically told him, you're fucked for eternity. Everyone's gonna see this painting forever and you're this pot-bellied donkey ear demon with a snake around your belly. Like, so it's that, but again, that's a beautiful aspect of a beautiful piece of art that was absolutely done out of vengeance.

I mean, Dante's Inferno is all vengeance. It's all petty revenge on people that fucked him over. And so is Joyce's Ulysses was all settling scores with local people in Dublin. You proved your point. Yeah, exactly. Vengeance can be okay. Were you in fact living in an enemy centered life?

There have been times when I've lived in it. There's times that I've done bits or jokes that without saying it, it's in response to a bit or a joke that I thought was lame or like, why the fuck would you, that's so stupid, so I would go the other, or, you know, what did Chris Rock say, don't get mad, get funnier. So sometimes getting funnier is a form of vengeance. You know, just be funnier. So, yeah funnier is a form of vengeance. You know, just be funnier. So that everyone can do that one. No, but there's way you can become better

at whatever it is you are. And that's how you and also then the, the, the, I mean, if we're just going to stay with vengeance, the ultimate vengeance is actually becoming happy with what it is you're doing and you're just ignoring the other people. The way to truly dismantle a narcissist is just to go, I don't care, that's fine. Yeah, but I'm doing this, great, not what I wanna do. I mean, that's the thing that I've always thought about in the movie Animal House at the end, except for Otter punching Greg Marmalard.

Remember, he punches him, but that's the only actual physical revenge. Otter punching Greg Marmillard. Remember he punches him. But that's the only actual physical revenge. All the other, at the end of it, the deltas just leave the college and go live their lives successfully, and then all the omegas go and live their lives, and it all goes to shit. And sometimes that's how you win,

is just going, I'm fucking leaving and going doing something cooler and more fun. I don't need to do all this shit. Well it seems like that is where you've arrived. Again, I've been watching your career from afar for a long time but I believe it tells quite the story through turbulence, through self-awareness, through grief, through hardship and it just,

it seems like your act is crafted in a place that has total confidence in it. Well, I'm confident in, being on stage is one of the few places I feel confident. So, yeah, that confidence is gonna come through. But I'm also confident in accepting the fact that whatever turbulence comes my way, because I've come out the other side

of so much genuine pain and loss and turbulence that some things now that people take as life-ending, you know, like massive onage on the internet or people attacking you, I'm like, that's just electrons. I don't, you know, like I just wanna do what I think is right and what I feel is the right decision and if people are either happy with it or not, but if they're not, it's just electrons, it doesn't matter.

Forties, fifties, thirties, late thirties, like what age were you where that perspective, or adult? The thing that I'm telling you right now, this perspective is maybe a week old, and a week later, there'll be an even better perspective. I'm at that stage now where there aren't gigantic epiphanies, there are awarenesses, and then there are the,

oh, I can choose to react to this awareness, but all this other stuff about me is never gonna totally go away. You just have to learn to manage it. You just have to learn to this awareness, but all this other stuff about me is never gonna totally go away. You just have to learn to manage it. You just have to learn to manage it. One of the most important movies that I think that came out in 1999 and for a long time is the movie The Sixth Sense because at the end

of the movie, the kid is not cured of seeing dead people. What he learns is this is never going away. This will be here. How can you manage it? Bruce Willis's character says, what do you think these people are trying to say to you? And the kid is like, maybe this has nothing to do with me.

Maybe it has to do with them, and I can actually help them, and I can actually go live a life. So he's still, he's living a better life at the end. He's still seeing these people. I feel like I'm living a better life. the end, he's still seeing these people. I feel like I'm living a better life, I still get resentful, I still get jealous,

I still get wracked with self-doubt. That stuff will continue to happen, but it won't own me. It'll be a thing that's there, I'm like, oh, there you are again, okay, what's going on? All right, we're gonna do this then. Oh, there's real serenity though in the awareness of knowing you are not your thoughts, you're the one observing your thoughts. Especially with someone like you though,

I imagine your mind has rewarded you in a great many ways. It took me a long time to realize my mind was poisoned. It took me so, so long to separate myself from, oh my God, if I have this thought, then that must be who I am. No, you're allowed any thought. You know, that's the thing you're, and again, so many great works.

Do you think Thomas Harris created one of the most horrifying serial killers ever, fake, but still horrifying, Hannibal Lecter, but when he thought of him, was he like, do I wanna kill people? And he, no, but when he thought of him, was he like, do I want to kill people? And he, people, no, but he's, but your mind is allowed to imagine horrible things without it being you. That's, I mean, that's the basis of all creativity, you know?

But so many people, I think, and I think we've been so poisoned with social media, which is like, everything that you tweet, that's who you are. Or that's, if you retweet it, that's who you are, or if you retweet it, that's who you are. People forget at the very beginning of the, especially Twitter, you could retweet somebody saying something ridiculous, and it was understood

that you're just holding this up like, can you fucking believe this? You weren't endorsing it. And then somewhere along the line, it shifted, and people are like, you are obviously, that's how you feel. So, and I got in some trouble with that because there was a guy, I think his name is,

like Steve Saylor, total white supremist dude, and he said something about like, like, something like, political correctness is a war on noticing. Like something, it was so ridiculous. And I just tweeted that, but it was, I was still in the mind of like, look at this fucking idiot.

And then people were like, oh, so I guess you, you know, so like, oh, something shifted and I didn't realize I was too slow to see that, you know, you can't do, we were, look, we were way too slow to see that the, pointing out racism by being ironically racist or being like, that doesn't't do. We were way too slow to see that the pointing out racism by being ironically racist or being like, that doesn't work anymore. There's no abstract thought left in anybody. So you have to actually either point out

that something sucks, but you can't personify it the way that like a Ricky Gervais or an Albert Brooks used to do, or even a Don Rickles. I think that people, when people forget about Don Rickles, it was so brilliant about him and he never explained it because he didn't have to, was, he's a Jewish guy in showbiz. He has seen racism you can't even imagine.

So he would always personify the worst of these people that he saw, but he didn't bother to add that, and you know this is terrible. He would just say that with the assumption that, you know this, I'm saying the dumbest shit imaginable, and also this guy never wins, he always loses, he always gets the, people get the better of me,

that's what I'm making fun of here, you know? But, and then things, again, we lost abstract thought, and then near the end of their lives, people like Joan Rivers, who laid across the fucking barbed wire for people to cross and get to do dangerous comedy started attacking her. It's like she did the, she's the one that, anyway, sorry.

Man, we went way off topic. I hope to- We were talking about dolphin fishing. What were we talking about? I hope to do more of this. I wanna go way off topic with you and to- We were talking about dolphin fishing. What were we talking about? I hope to do more of this. I wanna go way off topic with you and I also wanna bring you back. You said Sixth Sense and 1999.

I wanna know about this time in your life where you were clearly addicted to movies. Oh yeah, yeah, yeah. This is 95 through 99. Yep, four years. You watched, do I have the number right? 720 movies that you've put a number on the number of movies you were going to see at the cinema.

Yeah, 720 films in cinemas. What was happening? Other than a lot of film. It was a kid who was, always loved movies growing up, but had very limited access to them or had them only on videotape. There weren't a lot of rep theaters in Northern Virginia.

There were in DC, but it was hard to get into DC. I couldn't, I had to like, you know, sometimes I would, a couple times I did skip school, I would fake an illness and then sneak into the city and go to the Janice or the Biograph. And you know, it was like a Kurosawa film. But that wasn't, but now I'm in LA and there are at the time in the 95,

it was rep theaters everywhere. Tales Cafe, New Beverly, it was all over the place and I could just go and consume these movies and not just watch movies, but I could watch them with an audience. That's what was the important thing, was watching what still landed with people and what didn't anymore. and that was something I had

never really gotten to experience the way that I wanted to so and I just got really really addicted to that thrill to being wired into that mind and this was before the internet where that's where you went to really be wired into the zeitgeist and you know I couldn't get enough of it. Can you explain to us sort of where and how it shaped you creatively, this particular period of intense study really? Because you're not even watching movies just to be transported, you're watching because you wanna see the art of how things get made. Yeah, I mean one of the ways it really, really affected me creatively was there were always moments

in films where they would cut off and I'm like, no, show that part. Why aren't you showing that part? That should be the start of a movie. And then that kind of became how I wrote a lot of my comedy was about these weird, non, I was also very much influenced by Brian Regan. Brian Regan is the king of looking at those moments

in life where you're like, this is an absolute waste of time. This is something that you block out because it's something you gotta do so I can get to the creative stuff. And he realizes, no, there's actual real life happening right here, like ordering a dozen donuts. There's kind of cosmic significance to this.

And he would explore that. So I, because I'd watched so many movies and see so many movies would follow the same rhythm and the ones that didn't and the ones that went other places made me so happy that I would remember those moments and then try to put those moments into my writing, into my comedy.

Now I do comic books and a lot of those are about, because I read a lot of comic books and there's a lot of superhero comics that look at part of my, show the parts that you're not showing, that would be so much more fascinating. How does this person like live with these powers and what would that be like?

So I always want what is going on in the margins or what is, how does real life actually, there's a great movie called The Matador. Pierce Brosnan and Greg Kinnear and oh my god Hope. She was in Ghost World. I'm blanking on her name this is so embarrassing. This happens with age. Yeah with age. And there's a lot in there. There's only so much room for the stuff in your head. Some of it's gonna some of it's gotta go to the side. This is also sad. 20 minutes from now, I will come up with her name.

Well, you'll do it during this. You will not leave this pot. You will drive home frustrated if you don't come up with this name. I'm gonna have producers working around the clock the rest of the time that we're here to find what Hope's last name is for you. But I don't think that'll satisfy you either

because you wanna come up with it yourself. I wanna come up with that. Anyway. Stay with that. Anyway. Stay with me. But there's a great moment where the first half of the film, Greg Kinnear's on vacation, he meets Pierce Brosnan who's a hit man, who's kind of like losing his mind and on his last job.

And then they hang out together and Pierce Brosnan kind of takes him on a hit, doesn't kill somebody with him, but shows him here's how you would kill somebody and literally walks him through this sequence, it's so well done, and that's the first half. And then Greg Kinnear goes back to his suburban life in Ohio somewhere.

And then Pierce Brosnan is in some kind of trouble, he either botches a job or something, I forget what that part of it, and he goes and finds Greg Kinnear like to go hide out with him and Comes in the house and Greg Kinnear is like oh This is the guy that I was telling you about and you see Pierce Bros his character like I better think of like you can See him almost about to go. I am a carpet salesman, you know, and then and then hope goes

Oh, this is the hit man you hung out with. And like a lesser movie would make it like, yeah, he's a carpet sales, and then they gotta do all this bullshit. No, you would go home and go, I was in Mexico on this business trip, and this guy, he was a hit man, and he showed me how to, I didn't kill anybody,

but he like, that's what he does. It was really weird, and you would just go back to your life and like, no, obviously, neither of you were gonna report it. I don't wanna be killed, but it was just a weird thing. And then she goes, oh yeah, that's that hit man you were with. And then the movie proceeds from there.

Rather than doing all this tired ass stuff, it goes in such a totally different direction. And it just made me so happy. Like moments like that, where you're like, oh, or there's an issue of Animal Man where a villain comes to Animal Man's house and he's wrecking the place, and then he's about to kill Animal Man,

he goes, oh, because Animal Man, the guy is in his boxer briefs, and he goes, go put your costume on, I'm not gonna shoot you in your underwear, this is stupid. And then the wife comes in and goes, what are you doing? What, you wreck someone's house, get out of here. And the villain goes, oh, frick this, and he just leaves. He's just like, this is,

and that's kinda how that would go. You're in my house in this stupid costume, you're breaking things, leave. I'll call the cops. And he's, all right, fine, and he just leaves. That was so, more moments like that. I think we keep being pushed toward, oh you gotta have the big moments,

the big epiphanies, the big dramatic Instagramable stuff but the real growth and the real, real deep memory stuff happens in the uncinematic clumsy moments. That's where you actually, if you can slow down and look at how both you and other people around you are acting in the boring moments, in line at a bank, stuck in traffic, you learn so much more about yourself in those moments

if you're able to slow down and pick that up and not go, dude, we're wasting time, I should be having experiences. You are having experience. Folks, Miller Lite, celebrating 50 years. When I think of Miller Lite, I think of my dad. I think of me. I think of vacations.

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I didn't have a bad childhood. I had a fun childhood. I had a really fun childhood. I had friends. My parents were great. We would go on adventures and do weird stuff, but it was just like, I get to have this fun reality and then there's all this, then there's augmented reality. Then it's also like, if I'm sitting here, I can read a book and it's a whole other world, or I can watch a movie, and like, why would you not add to that? I mean, if you wanted to, you could eat raw starch,

raw protein, some citrus, and fluid, and saline, and lib. You're like, no, you can also have this and this and this. And some of it's bad for you, but it still tastes good. And you'll recover from it. Like there's shitty TV, there's terrible movies, there's awful concerts to go to. There's bad people you're going to encounter. You can recover from that.

So just living, you were just living. You were enjoying stimuli, all sorts of- And also just people create stuff. I get to read it. This is great. We get to, as people, we get to do this. This is a great thing that humans do. All animals do is run around and try to survive. Every second, they're just trying to survive and we can sit and just, I'm going to,

I'm on another planet right now. And all I got to do is open this book and you open a book and sounds and smells and sensations flood your brain. I don't think people realize how miraculous opening a book is, what it does to you. You're literally just, you're trip, you're microdosing on just symbols on paper. That's fucking insane that we get to do that. And you've always liked it?

Like it was, you wanted, like early on in life, because you said freshman, sophomore year, you're still searching, but you realize at some point. I wanted to do something creative. I mean, I wanted to be a writer and I was always writing through high school, but I didn't know like how am I gonna make it pay or something and I just, it was just that,

I was having those lost years and I'm being kind of protective of my daughter right now, of her, cause she's in ninth grade and she goes, yeah but this thing will look good for college. I'm like, you have some lost years, you can just mess around. Not everything has to be for college, for the CV, for the gram.

Just have moments, just do things. They don't have to mean anything right now. Oh, but if she grows up in your household, I would imagine ambition would be something that's- Well, yeah, but there's ambition, but then there's also, actually, yeah, I can't judge it that much because I was very driven and ambitious from a very young age.

Once I realized comedy is what I wanted to do, I was driven. But it just seems to me that we are now living in the vengeance of people who just were grinding from an early age and never, because yes, I was grinding, but I was also experiencing stuff. I was traveling, having wasted nights with friends, just doing stuff.

And now you're, but now we seem to be at the mercy of all these tech bros and crypto bros and people that, and there's nothing wrong with like, I want to make as much money as possible if that's what turns you want, absolutely do that. But they're now hitting their 40s and they're realizing, I don't really have any memories, I don't really have any interests. And I think that they suspect the people that hang out with me are hanging out with me

because I have a house full of toys and a cool yacht, but they wouldn't be doing this, they wouldn't come over to my shitty apartment and play video games with me, because there's no me here. So then they're trying to, they're insisting on, they're insisting on coolness as if the world owes me this.

I have the most money I should be thought of as cool. I don't even need to name names. You know who I'm talking about right now. I imagine you're watching these people who have come by Money, Power, and Influence and you see high school playing out all over again for them where it's just silliness. You've arrived, yes I know who you're talking about,

but whoever's keeping score with money, that it feels like there's some really overt high school insecurities on display in adulthood. It reminds me of the kids in school that would be like, I have perfect attendance. If you don't have straight A's, you shouldn't brag about having perfect attendance because it means nothing.

It just means that you showed up every day like a rat hitting a lever, but it also means you didn't learn anything, you know? If, I don't know why people brag about perfect attendance if you don't have straight A's. You know, I skipped school and I have better grades than you. And when I skipped school, I would either, I'd stay home all day and watch movies, or I'd sneak into the city, or my friends and I would go,

you know, I didn't skip school all the time. I wasn't a bad kid, but it was just like, go have a, it was really telling, it was really telling when that footage leaked, they called it a leak, of AOC in college on that rooftop with her friends, dancing and being a goofball, and they were like, of AOC in college on that rooftop with her friends dancing and being a goofball. And they were like,

that's the end of her political career. That's, this is it. It's like, and everyone, anyone else watching it was like, that's what we, that's what you do in college. You hang out with your friends, you know, and you realize these people never did that. They never did that. Or, and it wasn't that they were ever excluded

or ostracized. They got invited to parties, but they're like, I gotta grind, I gotta grind, because then I'll show these people and then they'll all think I'm cool. And then they get to that point where they're like, they have all the money, but there's nothing to talk about. They own a $100,000 rare sound system,

and then you look at their LP collection and it's the best of U2, best of Blondie, best of, like, are there any actual albums or groups that you like that the album itself means something to you? But I have the best of all their stuff, and I'm playing it on the most expensive thing. But you're not getting any pleasure from this, you know? And nobody wants to,

so we're gonna have to live through that vengeance right now. We're gonna have to live through. And again, I hope a lot of the, I'm not hoping, wishing ill will on any of them except for the ones that are like actively damaging people out of vengeance because they're angry about their horrible, and again, it wasn't that they were,

it wasn't that they had horrible childhoods, they chose horrible childhoods, thinking there was some kind of reward at the end of it. It's like, no, the reward is doing all your crazy shit when you're young and 15 and have the ability to recover, and that's when you get to have your crazy adventures. You can't wait till you're in your 60s and then demand some kid be your blood bag so then you can have your 20s and your crazy adventures. You can't wait till you're in your 60s and then demand some kid be your blood bag

so then you can have your 20s and your 70s. That doesn't make any fucking sense. You mentioned Star Trek and I imagined that Mystery Science Theater was something as a project that would have been super personal and fun for you. Loved that show. When I was really young, that show was such a, really shaped how I approach just creativity

and life. Because when you think about that show, oh fuck, okay, that show actually mirrors our current situation because think about that show. There's two billionaire evil scientists, Dr. Forrester and then Frank, his sidekick, and they own everything and they're gonna take over the world and they're fucking miserable. They hate each other, they don't know how to have fun, they've trapped this guy on a satellite

and they're sending him shitty movies to break his spirit and then they're watching him and the robots having fun and making jokes in their horrible situation and it drives them like, we should be the ones who are happy. I think it's the same thing like when rich Weird rich white billionaires like look at You know like a little DIY punk show or like some little Hip-hop show in a small space or people just doing and they're like how the fuck are these people happy?

in a small space or people just doing it and they're like, how the fuck are these people happy? It's like because they have a thing that they actually love doing. Nothing makes them angrier than watching a little independently owned bicycle store. Like, that's all you do is fix bikes and you have just enough money to live in a shitty apartment and eat shitty food.

Yeah, and I'm real, and they look at their face and go, that guy is so fucking, how the fuck is he happy? I have the most expensive Wagyu beef in my house. I have this painting, it's a piece of shit, but I paid 10 million and that should be respected. You know, this motherfucker, like they, it drives them crazy because they don't, they never learned how to access joy.

And that's what, if you watch Mystery Science Theater, that is the tension of that show. It's these two guys who are in, they're the jailers, but all they have is, they have more liberty than Joel, they don't have more freedom than Joel, and it's driving them insane. The question I was asking is about projects that gave you the most joy to do.

No, clearly this summit, I figured that that would be one of them, because to, yeah, but what else would you put on, your resume has a lot of different stuff on it. What are some of the things that most honor you, because you're like, I can't believe I got to do that. Yeah, I mean, I just always wanted to do stuff that I thought was interesting. A lot of my metrics are, well, if I'm gonna be really honest, my two metrics are, I'm always wanted to do stuff that I thought was interesting. A lot of my metrics are, well, if I'm gonna be really honest,

my two metrics are I'm in this for the money and the anecdotes. I want really cool stories and I'd like to make some money. But I also love getting a project where you're like, how are they gonna pull this off? I have to say yes to this. So when like Boots Riley sends me, sorry to bother you, I'm like,

there's horse mutants and there's, I'm someone's white, how the, I have to do it, you have to do that. Or when there was a group called Five Second Films and they did this amazing movie, it's called Dude Bro Party Massacre, part three. And it's been one of those, it's like this love and hate letter to all these 80s slasher movies.

Like I can't even describe how brilliant this thing is. And it had this tiny release and it's slowly one of those things that like, everyone that sees it is like, oh my God, this thing is brilliant. And it's, and I had to like, yeah, always say yes to the weird, interesting thing. Because again, it just gives you better memories too.

Also, say yes to the thing that's gonna be a really cool adventure. Like, obviously I would love to work with a Scorsese or a Tarantino or a Catherine Bigelow, but I'd also kinda like to work with Yui Bol just cause you know that's gonna be an insane, you know, or Harmony Corrine just for the stories, like something truly brilliant's gonna happen.

But you also embrace weird in a way that most people don't. Well, because weird isn't weird to me. The weird people, the weird people to me are the people that are trying to act so normal. Those are the ones that always make me put my, you know, my Spidey senses up,

like you're being a little too normal. It's the people that, and the quote unquote weird, are never, they never think that they're weird. Like someone like Maria Bamford or John Waters, they think they're the normal one. I'm actually reacting to this world, based on what the world is, this is a sane reaction to it. This is not weird at all.

So that kinda, I'm so much more attracted to that kind of living design. Do you have though a project that you think of when you think of this made me happiest to do or while I was doing it? Your TV career began with Seinfeld. I don't even know how much you actually like some of this stuff because it's got all sorts

of restrictions that comedy and standup doesn't have where it's just you and you don't have to collaborate. I am all, this is going to sound weird, I am all for restrictions. I don't understand everyone that's like, you should be able to say anything. It's like guys, no. The restrictions are there for you to find clever diabolical ways around it and then get to say it. If everything is allowed then there's no danger or fun to it. You've got to have, I want that outlaw element, you know, and all this sort of cancel culture. Who the fuck has been canceled? Now everyone that they talk about has been canceled is filling arenas. The only people that have been canceled are the ones who have actually committed like sex crimes. They're not, but they haven't been shut down because of what they said, because they're fucking rapists.

So, you know, Lenny Bruce wasn't raping people. He found a way around getting shit, you know, saying what he wanted to say until he was unfortunately crushed. But there's ways, I'm not making a good point here, but like, have some of the, it drives me crazy when people say like, you couldn't make Blazing Saddles today. Okay, that is such an insult people say like, you couldn't make Blazing Saddles today, okay, that is such an insult

to Mel Brooks, he couldn't make Blazing Saddles then and he found a way to make it, and he'd find a way to make it now, because he's fucking Mel Brooks. Not the restrictions I was talking about, I was just talking about waiting six hours to get on set to do a line opposite Costanza. Even with those restrictions, those frustrations, a lot of people turn away from acting

because they're like, I gotta sit there for eight fucking hours. Well, you can find a way to make that creative for yourself and find a way to bring something interesting to every single scene that you do. Despite the sitting and okay, no, we gotta do it this way, no, we gotta do it this way, you gotta, you know. I mean, I can't, I've really enjoyed everything

that I've ever done, even when it wasn't, even when the thing itself wasn't great. I've enjoyed being there and watching people. I'm with creative people that are doing their goddamn best. Even bad movies I've been in, people broke their ass to try to make it work. I just love being around people who care about something. So, but I mean, if you're talking about the ones

that gave me the most satisfaction doing them, I mean, the run that I did on Justified was fantastic. That was just getting to work with Timothy Oliphant and all those cast members was incredible. There was a show that I did, two shows that I did that both got canceled prematurely, one for sci-fi called Happy with Chris Maloney, one of the best shows I've ever done.

So amazing. Brian Taylor, director, just an absolute visual genius and one of the most free and unrestricted imaginations I've ever encountered as far as writing is concerned. And then another show for Showtime called United States of Tara. Not only because I liked my role, but like getting to work with people like Rosemary DeWitt and especially Tony Collette

and watching them like at table reads, Tony Collette like cold reading a script and going into eight alternate personalities at the drop of a hat and the whole table just like, the fuck are we seeing right now? Those experiences to me really, really meant a lot. You feel small with those kinds of actors, right? I'm not even sure how much you could possibly feel

like you belong given what she's dedicated her life to. It makes you feel like you don't belong, but it also makes you make the decision, all right, I gotta step up or I gotta fade away. When I did Young Adult, I was working with Charlize Theron, who's one of the best actors alive, and it's like you had better show the fuck up or just accept the fact that you're gonna be a blur

on the edge of the screen with this actress. And not just with her, with Colette Wolf plays my sister. She has one of the best scenes in the movie, I think, is between Colette Wolf and Charlize Theron. It's incredible. So I always play with people that, I'm never the funniest person in my group, and I don't wanna be, I wanna be around people

that are funnier than me, cause then I up my game. You know what I'm on? I'm on like. It can't be true that you're never the funniest person in your group. I mean I've never felt that way, and I'm not saying that out of, I don't believe in false modesty,

I'm a funny motherfucker, but I'm as funny as I am because I always have this chorus of people in my head that are like, oh, what's the different angle I could go here? It makes it fun for me. It doesn't mean that I can just go, oh, here's the obvious joke. And I just love that.

I love that those are the people that I've surrounded myself with. Did your childhood or home have a lot of funny in it? Oh yeah, my dad loved comedy. My mom, we would always watch Carol Burnett and then when I got a little older, I would watch SNL and then I discovered SCTV that my dad also liked and my dad loved Letterman

and yeah, and Monty Python, all that stuff. And my dad would always have comedy albums, he loved comedy. How much military was there in your upbringing? I mean the only military was if my dad got re-stationed somewhere and we had to move, or there was one year he got assigned to Japan and we didn't go with him, so for a year he was gone.

Which was a bummer, but he tried to keep the military out of it, he was like, the military was my way out of my situation, but I wanna make it so that these guys don't have to do that. Discipline though, was there a lot of? It was just like, don't be an asshole, like, do your, but also, I wasn't this crazy rebellious kid, I mean, I would, except for a few times playing hooky,

I wanted to do well in school so I could go to college and have a life. I liked reading, I liked, you know, there were certain things I wasn't good at math and science, very good at reading and history, so I'm like, okay, that's what I'm gonna focus on. There wouldn't be many places that you fit, though, quite as easily and as well as we're behind the kitchen

or the bar in the comedy club. And this group of people is my group of people. I connect here and there's a shorthand. Once I got there, I was in the back room of this place called Garvin's in Washington DC and we watching comedians, like watching them form a bit. There's a moment like that, and I'm so glad this got captured on camera

in the Seinfeld documentary, Comedian. Such a good documentary. Well, here's what's, it's a good documentary and it's also a really valuable documentary, and this is why, because there's a sequence where he's working on a bit about think tanks, and he shows himself on stage with the early version of the bit, and it's not working. He hasn't found it, but you can tell from his energy, he knows something's there, but he hasn't found it. Then we cut to, he's at a table, I think he's at the olive tree.

George Wallace is there, Colin Quinn, and they're just batting, he's like, I got this thing about a think tank, and how do you get fired for a think tank? And they're batting it around. And then George Wallace goes, you know, Frank, sometimes you don't think. And you just see the light go on for Seinfeld.

And I just had so many nights like that where I'm like, I'd go up and the bit wasn't working. And then someone would go, what about this? I'm like, that's where, yes, that's where it is. So like you add, and having that resource is always amazing, you know, with other comedians, hanging out with them and batting jokes around. That's where your friendships are?

Your friendships, most of them can be found around the work? A lot of them are comedians, also other writers, other people in showbiz. Like I like, it's not that I'm only exclusive, but I like, people tend to be friends with people who share their interests and share their mindset. So those are my friends. You didn't imagine a career in acting at any point, right?

That sort of happened to you? No, I imagined a career in writing. Then I stumbled into comedy and was like this, and then comedy just led to acting. That's when people ask me like, give me some advice. I can give people advice on how to act. I can't give them advice on how to get into acting

because that just kind of happened without me realizing it. It just happened, I mean, I was in the movie Magnolia because I came off stage at the Largo one night and went back into the kitchen and Paul Thomas Anderson was standing there. He was like, hey, you want to be in a movie? I'm like, yeah. And then, I mean, I knew who standing there. He was like, hey, you wanna be in a movie? I'm like, yeah. And then, I mean, I knew who he was.

He was hanging around at the Largo. Doing boogie nights at 27 years old. Yeah, just like, hey, you wanna be in a movie? Like, fuck yeah, I wanna be in a movie. So, you know, I mean, that movie, his movie, Heartache, which I know he wanted to be called Sydney. I've seen that movie like 10 times. I think that is just, I mean,

out of the gate, that guy knew exactly what he wanted to do. That's hard to believe though. What he was doing in his 20s, it's just, it's asinine. You can mean something to people with that. I was, I mean, I don't know. I feel like it was his first time on stage, but he says it wasn't. But the first night I went on stage at the,

at Garvin's in the summer of 88, Dave Chappelle went up that night. He was 14, I was 19. And he was one of those guys that I remember from the get go, his, oh this guy's gonna be huge. Like he had that energy like he'd been doing it for 30 years. Just killed. Like oh, this guy's gonna be huge.

And so now you just know. Again, you're just letting that fly. I love that about you. You're totally relaxed and I'm enjoying that you're just releasing. I want everything that's in there. I want you to give it all to us. Were there, how much doubt was there along the path? Like struggle, hardship before you arrived at something that felt right to you? Not only was there constant doubt, but then there were those rug pulling moments where I thought I'd gotten over the doubt

and then ran into something that made me have to rethink everything. And the biggest one for me was, started in 88, moved to San Francisco in 92. In those four years, I'd learned to become a very, very good road comic. I was starting to feature, but it was just, I was doing stuff that I was pre-thinking audiences would already like.

There was nothing of me in that. And then I remember I went, moved to San Francisco and did a show at the Holy city zoo and I was there and it was like these amazing comedians going up. Jeremy Kramer and Greg Barrett, Lankin Earl, Laura Milligan, Margaret Cho, just doing stuff I'd never seen, stuff they really, really, that they liked, whether or not the audience liked it. That's what they liked to do.

And it was so, and I went up and did my killer road stuff, and it's not that it ate it, but it was mostly comedians. They were just like, well yeah, that stuff, that works. And I just realized, it was this weird like, fuck, I gotta up my game, you know, and I had to like scrap my whole act and start from zero again.

And having that happen and having it not be the end of the world the next day gave me a lot of courage. But that courage came from facing some genuine fear and failure. I should tell folks that you can get tickets, pattenoswalt.com is where you go, because you're still grinding, you're still on tour, and, but it must be because you love it.

I love doing it. I love it. Even though you don't love being on the road, because I feel like you're a curmudgeon who would like to be at home and not necessarily, and in bed by 10 o'clock and maybe some melatonin and just shut it down. You're not exactly getting to Miami and having sex with Miami. You're getting on an early flight. At that same, at the same time,

I still do some theaters, but this past year and a half, I've discovered, I've rediscovered comedy clubs, getting into a city on a Thursday, doing one show Thursday, two Friday, two Saturday, and I'm getting so much writing done, and in these smaller rooms, because you're so much more wired to the audience, you're so much more present.

I just shot my newest special in a tiny comedy club in Madison, Wisconsin, this place called Comedy on State, because I did it last year and it was like, I had not had sets like that. I mean, when you're in theaters, you have good sets in theaters, but there's a moat of darkness. And in a comedy club, you're right there.

It feels so immediate. And now I kind of crave that. So in between the theater gigs I have coming up, I'm doing the Union Chapel in London in May, I'm doing the Elm in Montana. But, I'm doing the Elm in Montana, but then after I do the Elm in Montana, I'm going to the Rialto in Casper, Wyoming, two shows Friday, two shows Saturday,

little club wired in. I'm gonna go back to the Comedy Works, I'm gonna go back to the ACME. Now I can go do these comedy clubs and I get so much more writing done in those. And I love it. You're one of the great articulators in comedy. Can you explain the love, beyond saying you love it,

can you explain that connection to audience, the presence, what the laughter does for you, the validation of it? I think it's the same thing of I am searching for what is truly deeply funny and you can't do that by yourself. You always have to do it with an audience. It's like the truly great teachers are the ones who they, I hate that phrase, well those who can, can and those who can't teach. No, some people teach because they truly love a subject,

a book, a writer, a discipline, a science, something and they, but the only way for them to get deeper into it, they've learned everything they can learn about it, is to talk about it in front of fresh minds and see what perspectives come their way. And that becomes a search. There's something really beautiful and fulfilling in that. And I don't know why that gets so vilified and attacked

where when you see a truly great teacher, you're seeing a person who is on a deep, deep journey and they'll do it till the day they die. Like comedy is one of those things where you, deep journey and they'll do it till the day they die. Comedy is one of those things where you, I mean, the thing about sports, and it's something also very beautiful about sports is there is so much risk going on by these athletes. They're basically going, I am betting my life

on this body not breaking down and getting a few profitable years out of this body, not breaking down, and getting a few profitable years out of this before, I mean, and hopefully I can do things after this, but they are really putting everything on the line. Like a true athlete, there is something amazing about watching somebody push a body to its limit, not just doing it for the cars or the money. Obviously they should get all that, but I think it's the cars and the money. Obviously they should get all that, but I

think it's the same thing. But you can't do that forever. Whereas with comedy and rightly comedy, I saw the Seinfeld documentary with Maria Bamford. We saw it together and we came out. She was like, that's right. You can do this forever. And I was like, that's right. I can do this forever. Because I was like, that's right, I can do this forever. Because if I just keep being honest about whatever my point of view is, I was very honest when I was in my 20s, I'm never getting married.

I was very honest when I was in my 30s, I'm married, we're never having kids. I was very honest about I have this daughter, she's awesome. I have, you know, like, if you're just honest with whatever is going on right then, you can always reach people and you get to Do it forever were you or did you know that you were built for parenthood? Did you think you were built for?

Never thought that I don't think anyone truly thinks that they were built for Parenthood, I mean we're innately wired for it because otherwise the species would die out but All of the the more esoteric Existential shit about parenting. I don't think anyone's ready for that, but you go into it 70 or 80 percent ready and if you're willing to learn along the way and also tell your kids, ah, you know what, good point, I fucked that one up, you'll be okay. Have you been changed by it? Absolutely.

You're changed by everything you do or don't do. You're changed by everything. So to say that, I don't know why people put such a big emphasis on, oh, your parenting really changes you. Everything changes you. Everything changes you, big or small. And small changes are just as crucial in the long run as big, massive ones. So everything changes you. But how did this change you? Like how did you become less selfish, for example? It's not that I became less selfish. I mean, in some ways I became even more selfish

because I gotta provide for my kid. I gotta make things easier for her. I wanna make sure, and also I get very selfish of like, no, I don't wanna go do this shit. I wanna hang out with her. Like I want, you know, I turned her. I turned down a very specific movie and a very specific TV show because they both would have required me

being away for like nine months. And it was during that time when she was like a year and a half old, like every day she was growing, and I'm like, I can't miss that chunk. I just can't, and I sacrificed those two things. Why are you being purposeful about not naming the shows? Are they shows you wanted to be a part of?

Because I don't want to say it as a brag. They were things I very- They were shows you wanted to do. Very much wanted to do, but the cost would have been missing this amazing chunk in her. And I'm not, it wasn't like it was an agonizing decision whether I'm not making myself a, oh my God, I mean,

no, it was just like, I'm not missing this. I'm not making myself a plan. Oh my God, I mean, no, I was just like, I'm not missing this, I'm not missing this. That's, you know, so, and then the people who got those roles were so good that it was one of those things, too, where it's like, maybe that would have sucked if I'd been in it. Maybe it was good that I turned that down. So, that's not, there's no regret there.

But, stuff that I used to think, there was, there are certain things I used to think of that were very important, especially about like, status and stuff like that, that I used to think, there was, there are certain things I used to think of that were very important, especially about like status and stuff like that, that I'm like, that doesn't fucking matter. What matters is just showing up every single day. Some days as a parent, the day sucks. You make a shitty breakfast, let's go do this activity.

The activity doesn't quite work out. You come back, the, oh shit, the car ran, I get you like, but the kid is like, I got to spend time with you, and you still showed up, and they saw you trying, and that's what matters, just show up and try. Because some people just absolutely go, I'm not gonna try, I'm not bothering. There's wisdom in that. How did you go from being resolute in your conviction

in your 20s that you weren't gonna get married, to married, resolute in your conviction in your 20s that you weren't going to get married to married, resolute in your conviction in your 30s that you weren't going to have kids to having Alice? I met people and and had experiences that changed my mind. You know everything that you say oh my god so resolutely but you're gonna meet stuff that changes your mind whether you want it to or not and just roll with that. Yeah I used to think that way now I don't think that way. I thought it was beautiful that the way that you honored

your late wife super unique to be able, I mean, to help catch a serial killer. I mean, all I did was shepherd that, I mean, I handed that book over to an investigator and a journalist and go, please help me do this cause I was still so wrecked and they helped see it through. But she definitely, it was very funny.

We all had a lot of laughs watching at the press conference when, because she came up with the name, the Golden State Killer. Before that he didn't, and this is gonna sound really sick, but another cop, this guy Paul Holes, was like, yeah, he was never given a cool name, and that does hamper investigations.

If there isn't a name that lands with the public, Zodiac, Night Stalker, then sometimes these cases fade away. So when she came up with Golden State Killer, something very evocative and weird and creepy about that name that she came up with, that did help reopen the case. Now, obviously, yes, other investigators

brought that case home. She also did suggest using familial DNA, which they ended up doing, but whatever. But it was very funny to watch them at these press conferences. Someone was like, what about the work of Michelle McNamara? And he was like, Michelle McNamara's work had nothing to do with us catching the Golden State Killer. And we're all like, you literally just used the name that helped.

Anyway, but yeah. But that was like satisfying for us to watch. I mean, all of it, to the degree, to find any funny around any of it is a tribute to your ability to find comedy wherever it is it presents itself. But as a way to honor her work and her passion and enter in a new form of entertainment, really, that has just become really popular during dark times, it must have been gratifying to you somewhere in there to be a part of that. However tangentially to honor her,

something she cared about like that. Yeah, I just, the thing that I, the thing that I wish was more, that she really wanted to be more focused on, and I'm seeing it in a lot of these, but not in all of them is, what she wanted the focus to be on was the investigators and was the victims.

Rather than making these serial killers have to be these dark anti-heroes. You know, serial killers are zilches. The reason that they're killing people is because they're zilch in life. They're not contributing anything, so I'll take something. There's zilch in life, they're not contributing anything, so I'll take something.

So, the fact that she was able to do something to put the focus on the people that are trying to bring justice to the powerless, or the voiceless, in this case, the dead, or the people that survived, or the voiceless, in this case the dead, or the people that survived and or, you know, survived to testify and still put themselves at risk with these, because a lot of these,

if you relook at the Ted Bundy case, like the way that he was treated, like, oh my God, it's so tragic, this bright young guy with a, could have been a lawyer, he was a fucking idiot. He flunked out of every, but he's a good looking white guy. And everyone's like, oh my God, we got, you know. And when the judge sentenced him, he's like, I feel terrible.

Like, you know, you just took a wrong path, buddy, but I would have loved to have had you in my court. Like, can you imagine being one of the survivors going, what the fuck is going on here? This guy is getting all the, you know. And his final statement was like, this is like a Greek tragedy, you know? Like the wrong guy, you're like,

what fucking world are we living in? Well, what do you make though, the world we are living in, what do you make of the social commentary that you could form around murder as a podcast form, you know, serial series, mysteries and investigations, all of this dark material for a dark time. I mean one of the reasons I think we love mysteries is because at least the ones who have a solution and we can see, oh, there

was a form of justice was served here because right now in our world very blatantly and very in our face and very flagrantly, justice is not being served and evil, opportunistic, just weak villains are being rewarded day after day after day and we seem, and no one seems to be willing to do anything about it. So yes, I'll take a fictional world where yes,

even though evil's done, evil gets punished. People need that. How did you go, and this is a complicated question, how did you go from the depths of grief to being able to fall in love again and help heal yourself, some at least. I mean I had a lot of help from other people that had gone through this, the grief group that I went to

and they just said, this is gonna sound really weird but right now all you feel is despair and that's all you feel like you can feel. And then you're gonna get to a point where you go, well I can function, and thankfully, you will be thankful for the fact that you can't feel anything. That will feel like a relief.

And you'll go, this is how I'll exist. I can exist at this point, and that's how I was. I'm like, I'm just gonna take care of my daughter, and I don't need to feel anything. And then they said, and despite all of that, you will feel joy and hope and love again. You don't know when it's gonna happen, but when it happens, run at it.

Like go run at it, it's there for a reason. And there were people in my group that are like, I remarried six months after my spouse died and everyone judged me for it. And there's a lot of people going, I remarried eight years after my spouse died and everyone judged me for it and there's a people going I remarried Eight years after my spouse died and everyone judged me for it. So there's so get all that shit out of your head It doesn't matter. You know, there's gonna be there. You're not you're not grieving to make them comfortable You're not recovering to make them feel comfortable. You'd have to live whatever life is being put in front of you and I met this

Genuinely extraordinary woman that I don't think I would have realized is as extraordinary as she is if I hadn't been in love with and spent all those years with Michelle to really show me what extraordinary in a person means. You know? So there was almost like that was the gift from her.

That was the one gift was losing her, having that torn away from me so horribly, but in a way, the tearing away burned the memory of what a truly amazing person looks and feels and acts like, and I was able to recognize it when it came around again. You felt numb for how long, or the relief of pain free? Or like how long a period was this

where you viewed it as an accomplishment to simply not be in crippling pain? I felt numb for like half a year, just nothing. And before that were a couple of months of just, April, April, May, most, some of June was just, it's not pain, it's, April, May, most, some of June was just, it's not pain, it's, C.S. Lewis put this so well, grief feels like terror. I was in terror 24 hours a day.

I was terrified of everything, terror. And then, so that's why I was so happy to hit numbness. And I was like, I'll live here forever, I'll take numbness over terror. And then it just turned into meeting someone who I was not, again, I wasn't, it was just, it was a weird, we had friends in common. I didn't know who she was, but we have a friend in common,

this actress, Martha Plimpton, and my wife, Meredith Salader, they've been friends since they were teenagers, you know, like acting, they were both child actors. And so Martha would do these dinners where she would gather various people, different people just to bring them together and just have a salon, everyone just talks and meets.

And so I was invited to one and I didn't, I was traveling or something and then Meredith like posted or she messaged me and said, you missed the best fucking lasagna dude. Like, and then I just said, ah, story of my life, maybe we'll go to Arby's or something, just joking. And then, this is all on Facebook, just messaging back and forth for like three months. We never spoke on the phone, never met in person.

It was just somebody at the end of the day that I could talk to in the dark, lying in bed, which is what I would do with Michelle. We'd just lie there and just talk in the dark and go about our day and go over our day and go over the world. And then without it becoming romantic or anything, it then became romantic.

Just having someone to talk to and then it turned into, and then we finally, God, we didn't meet face to face until May 20th and we started talking, texting on Facebook at the end of February. And it was just, and there was a time where like maybe we just should never meet, let's just talk like this. And then we was like, oh no, we should meet. And then that's just how it went. What was the nature of the terror

and how are you a father during all of that? Like you still had to be a father. Yeah, you hide the terror in front of your kid. Your kid can't see you crying and having panic attacks. So it was very much like a performance of getting up, making sure her breakfast is made, lay out her clothes the night before, get her to school. She immediately wanted to go back to school

because she wanted normalcy. I understand that and my counselor was like, whatever she wants, let her lead the way. If she doesn't want to go back to school for three months, she just shouldn't go back to school. If she wants to go back Monday morning, take her back to school. So it was very much like't go back to school. If she wants to go back Monday morning, take her back to school. So it was very much like me.

And then I would drop her off at her school and then I would park on the street outside the school and just sit there until three o'clock. Just sitting there crying or just freaking out or just listening to music and just being in terror. But like, well, this is mitigating the terror because I'm within arms reach of her and if anything happens, they can run right in.

For like a month, that's what I did. That was my day, I would just park and just sit. Terror is such an interesting one, though what were you afraid of? That the whole world was death now, that everyone I loved was gonna die. That everyone I loved was gonna die. That everyone I loved was gonna die. That she was gonna die, that my parents were gonna die,

that my friends were gonna die. It just felt like if this person who was so extraordinary and so, like, so much brighter and so much more in the world than anyone else I had encountered in the world, if they could be taken away, then nobody was safe. Like everything was just teetering on a precipice and I was powerless to stop anyone from being taken away. So that's what the terror felt like to me. But that's what the biggest love always risks, right?

Exactly. Love always risks right like that that size of loss is like it's it's almost baked into the everything of it like I when I think about that the mortality of it I don't know how much your atheism atheism serves you here right because there's not a there's not an something you can grab that feels comforting I but but how comforted would I have been if I believed in a loving and beneficent God and then this thing had happened? Would I have been in even more terror? Would I have been in even more existential shock and doubt? Maybe the atheism saved me.

Because also, you know, Michelle's whole thing was she hated the phrase, everything happens for a reason. Now, she had studied and researched crime long enough to go, things happen for no friggin' reason. And it was her phrase, and I said it in my special, it's chaos, be kind. And there's days where I fail at that, but try to keep reminding yourself of that

and try your best to be kind in the chaos. What kind of goals you got in front of you professionally and personally here with the rest of your career and life as you have this mortality come visit you in a way that sort of must make time more valuable than it felt before that I would imagine. A lot of my drive and like multi-pronged ambition went away.

It was more about let's focus on just a few things that really matter to you. So I really want to get into like making films. I'll always do stand up. I'm just not one of these guys that's like, oh, I'll eventually stop. And then if I'm lucky enough to get to keep acting in things, interesting things, I'll act when that comes along,

but it won't be anything that I'm gonna pursue in that crazy way. I just like doing interesting little films. The film industry seems to be going through a very weird spasm right now, which I think is a good spasm. I think the people that are gonna be left making truly good films, the people that actually care about it,

the same thing that happened with when the boom ended in the early 90s, and it was just the people that are gonna be left making truly good films the people that actually care about it the same thing that happened with Come when the boom ended in the in the early 90s, and it was just the people that actually cared about doing comedy So yeah, it's pretty cool that you're going to these small venues small cities like you're really getting back to the you're getting back To the core of what it is that you do for the reasons that you do I just did the comedy Attic and Bloomington and Oswald. One of the four best shows I've done in a long time. Loved it. It's nice seeing you. Thank you for spending this time with us.

Thank you for clearing your throat one last time as gymnastics punctuation Patton Oswald. Is there any way to edit that out during this? Because my god. I want to put more of them in here. It's like my interview with Doc Holliday. PattonOswald.com is where you go for tickets for tour dates for information Resplendent as always sir. Thank you

Splendent. Yes radiant. Look at you. Look at him glowing. All right. Happy travels, man. Thank you, sir in Miami Yes, I hope so. All right seeing you really appreciate the time and all the work. You are quite the magician Thank you. ["Miller Lite Theme Song"] Folks, Miller Lite, celebrating 50 years. When I think of Miller Lite, I think of my dad, I think of me, I think of vacations, you cheers him with your friends, it's always with the ice cold Miller Lite.

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