The Harland Highway - 758 - ZIKA VIRUS madness. CRAZY goat story. MOVIE talk.

Episode Date: April 14, 2016

Harland talks about behind the scene movie stuff. Crazy goat story. The ZIKA virus is here, watch out. Out n a B-out!!! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hello, everybody, and welcome to the Harland Highway podcast. Today we will be talking about the end of the world and diapers. No, we won't. Hi, I'm Harlan Williams. What was that all about? Sorry, that was like 1940s announcer dude. Hey, folks, ladies and gnarble blarbtins. This is Harlan Williams.

You are listening to the Harlan Highway podcast, and today, a crazy news story. that lately they've been evolving farm animals. And today is another crazy farm animal news story. I think will make you laugh. Also, we're going to be discussing there's a new virus that's going around the world. And it's kind of creepy and kind of sexual. It's called the Zika virus. And wait to you hear about kind of the weirdness of the old Zika.

Yeah, we're going to be. be talking about that. Also, we're going to take some of your phone calls. I always love it when you guys call into the show, so we're going to play some of your phone calls. And one phone call in particular leads to a lot of talk about movies, the art of movie making and some

behind-the-scenes material that I will go into depth on from some of my movies. So let's do it. Here we go. This is the Harland Highway. Where are I? What is this? Some kind of a joke or something? Welcome to the Harland Highway.

What you're talking about Williams? Son, you got a panty on your head. Shut up and sit down, you big ball fuck. Oh, God, what's happening here? What's happening? Hey, Harland, it's Shelby. You just made a wrong turn. On to the Harland Highway.

We choose to go to the moon in this decade and do the other thing. Not because they are easy, but because they are hard. That is fantastic. Yeah. What's wrong with everybody in this crazy place? The Harland Highway. What is it? The opening.

To what? To another dimension. This is Harland Williams. You're a bad man. You're a very bad man. That is fantastic. Okay. I keep hearing about it.

It hasn't gone away. I keep thinking it will. But it's not. And I think, you've heard about in the news now they're saying it's all over like brazil where they're going to be home the olympics the zika virus zika if you've heard of it the zits it's in the news the zika virus apparently it's a sexually transmitted disease carried by mosquitoes If you get bit by a mosquito,

you know, you could get this Zika virus in certain areas of the world. You know, first we had Ebola, then we got, you know, this and that, and typhoid fever and measles, and now we got Zika. We got sexually transmitted diseases from mosquitoes. I mean, come on, man. Now, I don't know how many of you men out there have such a delicate touch that you could find your way into a mosquito, if you know what I mean. And first of all, I guess you'd have to have a very small man part. But, you know, if you're getting sexually transmitted diseases from mosquitoes, maybe you're having sex with the wrong.

I don't even want to picture that. Oh, my God. Come here. Come here, my little blood sucker. Yeah. Let me grab those wings. I'll hold you by the wings. Yeah, right there.

Oh, yeah. Here we go. Oh, yeah. Don't move. Don't move. Here we go. Yeah. I got you.

Oh, yeah. Pop. Blood everywhere. All right. I'm just saying. Okay, bad case scenario. But it is weird that mosquitoes are flying around with sexually transmitted diseases. How do you explain that to your wife?

You know, you go fishing with the guys for the weekend, you share a tent, you're camping, just you and four other dudes, and you come home with gonorrhea? Oh, honest, honey, we were just, uh, we were just fly fishing. Oh, I'll say you were fly fishing all right. Sounds like you opened somebody's fly. You know, you go, uh, You go up for a walk in the woods and come back with herpes. What the hell's that all about?

Get the off on, man. Now you've got to spray your junk. Imagine that spraying your junk with off. It burns. Oh, my God, it burns. So pretty freaking weird, man. Honey, how did you get the vaginal warts? Oh, listen, baby.

I was just down at the Olympics in Brazil, man. You know, that's all that is. So you're telling me you got vaginal wards from the Olympics? Yeah, you know, I was just sitting in the stands, baby, and I felt something biting my neck, and I woke up the next morning with, like, vaginal warts all over my junk. Oh, okay. You want to go camping? Not really. I don't want to get the clap.

Okay. so there you go watch out for mosquitoes you don't want the zika it's such a goofy name too zika virus reminds me of that drink back in the in the 90s zima remember that stupid they had a stupid like it's like a wine cooler called zima now now they got zika hey baby can i buy a zika no thanks i already have vd and vaginal warts Sorry, I meant Zima Oh, well I guess the cat's out of the bag Sure, I'll take a Zima

Yeah, no thanks, I gotta go Um So anyways, watch yourself, be careful And I hope you don't get any Freakin Zika You're such a fuckass What? Please

Did you just call me a fuckass? Elizabeth, that's enough You can go suck a fuck Oh please tell me, Elizabeth, how exactly does one Suck a fuck. You want me to tell you? We will not have this at the dinner table. Stop.

The Harland Highway. Crazy news story. That's weird. Wow. That's strange stuff. Okay, let's do it. Let's do it. Crazy, crazy news story. Here's the headline.

Okay. I don't know if you've ever been in jail, but here's the headline. Goat. Goat arrested in India for grazing. in judges' garden. Oh, my God. Here's the story. It's ridiculous.

A goat has been arrested in India, accused of repeatedly damaging a judge's garden by eating flowers and plants. The animal called Babli and its owner, Abdul Hassan, were taken into custody after the judge, who was a neighbor, filed a complaint to the police. Mr. Hassan has been charged with damaging and destruction. destroying others' property and trespass and faces over two years in prison if proven guilty. The judge had been angered by the goat's trespassing and issued an arrest order as officers sprang into action.

He claimed the black goat often scaled the boundary wall and devoured flowers and vegetables on his property. The animal and its owner faced charges of causing mischief and damage to property but were later released to bail. I'm sorry, Your Honor, I cannot control my goat. What can I do about my goat? It likes to eat the flowers, and I cannot control it. Mr. Hassan admitted the goat's guilt. and promise the animal would not damage the garden again.

My goat has been brought to the police station. It ate up the flowers and vegetables on the lawn of the judge, he said. I mean, holy smokes. Can you imagine this going to, you know, the courtroom? There's the goat sitting up there in the witness box. he's being grilled by the prosecution now mr goat tell me the truth have you been eating the flowers of the judge's garden please and the goats just you know they have those eyes those goat eyes just staring back and the lawyers getting mr mr goat please don't stare at me like that it's very intimidating

Did you or did you not eat to the judge's flowers? And the goat's just like, Yeah. Don't raise your voice in this courtroom, please. Okay, the goat is eating the microphone. Why is the goat eating? Okay, I need, we will have some order in this courtroom. Order in the court.

Somebody bring this dumb goat some flowers quickly. I mean, good Lord. Can you imagine the jury sitting there? Yes, we want to charge the goat, but please, that is what the goats do. They eat plants and flowers. So I don't know. So apparently TV footage showed up. The goat now tethered to stop it from escaping.

The goat owner has been told several times by the judge's representative not to let the animal graze on other people's lawns. The goat would eat up all the plants. We received a written complaint from the judge's office on the basis of which we have registered a case. An investigation is on, and the goat has been arrested. All right, I need you to put all your hoofs behind your back. I don't want any problems. Your hoofs behind your back, please. Stand up against the wall.

Get off the roof. Get off the roof. Stand up against the wall, please. Do not headbutt me. I don't know why you are headbutting me. If you headbutt me again, I will tase you. I best All right

I'm going to Taze you So You don't see that On any episode of cops I'd really like to see that So there you go Crazy freaking headline

Goat arrested in India For grazing And judge Poor goat man I mean How's that goat gonna do in jail It's bad enough when you're a dude You know, you're somebody's bitch.

You're in there, and it's like, hey, Bubba, you've seen the new meat? Yeah, I've seen him. You think of what I'm thinking? Yeah, he looked real nice and nice and hairy. He looked real tight. Look like a goat. I think it is a goat. Oh, that's even better.

Let's get that thing. Let's get us some. Bha! Bha! Oh, well. photo world. Hello? Hello?

Hello? Roger, patch me through. I have something, I have something to say to heart. Roger. Roger, God damn it, I swear to God, I'll just, just, okay, okay, fine. I'll take care of that thing of yours. Just do it. Thanks.

Ahem. Hi, I'm Jesus' age Christ. and you're listening to the only podcast that rocks my manger all night long, the Harlan Highway. He'll turn your water into wine, baby. Hello. Um, peace out, Harlan.

Okay, thank you for that. You know, we're arresting goats, but this, this person is free to walk the streets? Dullo. By the way, I loved it at the end when you use Dullo. I think I told you guys about that a couple of podcasts back where I invented a new catchphrase. Okay, where I combined, you know when people go, duh, and then sometimes people go, uh, hello, so I splice them together.

It's kind of like, you know how you have, in the south you have y'all? So I added D. Duh and hello together, and I got, uh, Dullo. Dullo. It's kind of like an extra emphasis on like, are you stupid and hello, I'm here? So I was really happy to hear you use that. Hello? Although the rest of the phone message was a little creepy and weird and out there, but I got to be honest. I kind of like that too.

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Hello? Hello. Hello. Hey Harland. It's McAllister from Florida. I heard your podcast. That's the sequels. and one of my favorite movies is yours of Employees the Month I think one of really funny movies and that would be one that I would like to see a sequel to that one it's a great cast you know a funny role in it

is pretty much every scene is always packing me up I pretty much know all the lines to it maybe if you could tell some stories that I employed the month to just see if that one had any opportunity to become a sequel. That would be cool. Thanks, man. Hello. Well, excellent question there, McAllister.

Thank you for that phone call. And I'm glad you enjoyed Employee of the Month. That was a very fun movie to do for sure. And it was something we shot in New Mexico. And we had a really fun cast. You know, we had Dane Cook and Jessica Simpson and Dax Shepard and who else, Andy Dick. Just some really fun people. And I'll get to the sequel part first.

There was no talk of a sequel, but there was talk of possibly turning it into a TV show, a TV show about all these characters that were. worked at like a big store and it never really came to fruition and now if you look on TV, I think there's actually a show on TV now called Big Store or something like that. It's very similar. It's pretty much like Employee of the Month on TV. It's a bunch of oddballs that work at a big bulk item store like we did in the movie. So they might have missed an opportunity there. But nonetheless, we had a great, time doing the movie.

There was a lot of fun stuff. It's one of the movies, if you have the DVD, they did leave a lot of funny outtakes at the end of the DVD. You can actually watch some of the outtakes and some of the ad libs I did and some of the other cast members ad libs and you can see all the fun we had. And, you know, it was really hard for me because, you know, as an actor, you really have to focus, you know, you really have to know your lines and you have to create this character and you have to have a character in your head.

And I always try to bring, you know, my own thing to every character. And one of the things I brought to this character, which I'm sad they didn't let me get away with, but my character Russell, by the way, who was originally named Harland in the script, They wrote the part for me and they wanted to use my name. And I said to the director and the producer, I said, guys, I said, you can't use my real name because, you know, this is a movie. And when I do a movie, I get into character. And I said, if I hear my real name, it's going to pop the bubble for me. I'm going to hear my own name and it'll feel like I'm not a character and a movie.

And so they changed my name to Russell. and then Dane, as a joke, gave me the last name of Porpoise, which I thought was hilarious. So Russell Porpois was my full name. It was Harland. And it was a fun character. I always try to bring little things to my characters, little add-ons and little things that helped me bring the character to life.

And one of the things I brought, because this guy wore cover-alls and was kind of a maintenance handyman, you know, forklift driver guy. I had a, if you look in the movie, I think you'll see like a tape measure on my waist most of the movie. And unfortunately they'd use it,

but a lot of the scenes in the movie, I would take the tape measure out and measure people's faces and measure, you know, I'd measure, first I'd measure up from their chin to their forehead, then I'd measure across their eyes. And I kind of made it a running gimmick that throughout my scenes,

I was, not every scene, but where I felt it organic and appropriate, I would measure things. And it was a lot of fun, but I guess maybe they found it too much of a distraction in the final cut, and they never left it in. There might be one scene where they left it in, but I always look for little comedic vices

to not only help me find my character, but help sell the character and give the character something funny to do. I always think it's important that a funny character acts kind of funny too not in a big like you know sticky way like you know doing schick and play into the camera but you know as you develop a character as an actor you you want to figure out what what are this guy's ticks what are this guy's habits what what is it that this guy does that is real normal to him but if someone was watching him would

probably start to chuckle or laugh and I thought maybe this guy like just loves you his tape measure and he's constantly, you know, measuring things. Also, early on at the beginning, I tried to do a bunch of stuff where I always had my eyebrows up. I kind of, I wanted to distort my face somehow. So this guy always looked like he had, I don't know if you ever watch the old Star Trek, but Mr. Spock and Dr. McCoy, it seems like they always had their eyebrows up in the air, like really high climbing up the halfway up their foreheads. And so I decided Russell Porpoish should have like these big, one of his eyebrows should always be up. And I didn't say anything.

I just started doing it by about day two, the director like came over and some of the other actors. What are you doing with your eye? Put the eyebrow down. And I was hoping I would get away with it, but I never did. And, you know, when you're an actor and you're finding a character, all you can really rely on is your comedy instincts. And I feel like maybe that that instinct would have worked, but they weren't sure what I was doing. And I don't think they had the vision for it that I had.

But looking at the movie, I feel like if they had let me get away with doing that face and left it in the movie, I think over the course of the movie, it would have been quite funny. But nonetheless, you always need to be respectful of your director and the producers. and if they feel something doesn't work, you can fight for it.

And if they still reject it, you know, you got to remember they're paying for the movie. And so sometimes you win the fight, sometimes you lose them. One of the big fights I won is I'll just jump over to another movie I did was Rocket Man. And it was a Disney movie, and there's a scene where my character finds out he's been selected to be one of the first astronauts to go to Mars. And they had it that when that was announced at the press conference, my character would faint. And I argued with the director and the producer.

I said, this character wouldn't faint. This character, this is the news he's waited for his whole life. He loves outer space. He'd be so excited that he got selected to be one of the few astronauts to go to Mars that he would literally scream the way the girls scream when they win the Miss Universe contest. You know, the trembling hands and the quivering lip and the tears and the euphoria.

And they were like, all right, we'll give you one take. You can do one take of that. And then we're not buying it. And I said, trust me, it'll work. And I told the sound man, I said, dude, turn down your headphones because I'm about to scream like a girl. And, of course, I did one take and the, you know, it was probably one of the funniest scenes in the whole movie, Rocket Man. They used it in the trailer.

I mean, people still come up to me and talk about that scene. So that's the art of not only doing comedy of movies, but with any movie. You really have to kind of figure out who your character is what he or she is capable of. And I say she because I've played, I've done a few movies where I was completely. completely in drag, and I had to play a woman. But you have to kind of figure out your character's perspective, and you have to give your character attributes, and you have to give your character flaws and personality, and, you know, what are their hobbies, what makes them happy, what upsets them, what are their quirks?

You know, all that, all that stuff, and that's, to me, that's the real beauty of acting. I love finding those characters, and I usually, I usually don't let that happen until I'm on set. You know, I know a lot of characters do a lot of, they like to, you know, figure it all out before they get there. And I don't know, maybe if I got the call to do like a real serious drama and, you know, the directors and producers were shooting for an Oscar, I would, maybe I would do that.

But the real joy for me is to let the character discover me as much as I discover it. And I kind of get ready on day one. I just kind of let myself go and let the words come out and let this character evolve and emerge from me. And along with all these quirks and, you know, personality trait. So it was really fun to do that character. Like I said, I initially had planned to do a lot more with them. But I think the producers and so on wanted to.

to play it a little safer. But as I said, in retrospect, I think it really would have worked had they had they let me just cut loose with that. But nonetheless, at a great time, it was really fun. And, you know, one of the things as an actor is, you know, focus as a performer as an actor who is memorizing lines of working with other people in scenes. You really have to focus. And this movie was probably the second toughest movie I've ever had to act in. in terms of containing my laughter. One of my co-stars in Employer the Month was Andy Dick,

who's just organically funny. I know he's had his troubles, and he's a bit of a character, but I know Andy quite well, and he's a friend, and I got to know him even better on this movie, and he's just organically super funny. He's one of those guys you just look at him, and he makes me laugh. And so throw onto Andy,

I don't know if you remember, but Andy in the movie had to wear these super, super thick Coke bottle lens glasses. And his eyes were huge. They were like giant owl eyes. And so I already had enough of a hard time looking at Andy and not laughing.

And now I had to look at his eyes magnified, you know, 500 million degrees. And I was like I was acting with a giant squid, you know, these huge eyes. And man, I just, I couldn't look at the guy. I couldn't make, I can't, there was times when I just could not find the focus

and if it wasn't looking at him, it was like if I had lines with him the second I heard his voice, because he's kind of got that voice, you know, Andy talks like this and he's kind of you know, you got, what are you guys doing? You know, and so just his voice would trigger

it and my God, his acting, his comedic acting, his timing, his ability is so good and funny that i don't know that and these as as of yet had a chance to really demonstrate the depth of his ability and his his uh comedic talents i you know maybe he has but i you know i would love to see him in a movie where he just lets it rip i think if you watched his old sketch show on m tv you got a real good look into andy's brilliance uh but he just slayed me.

And that's hard to do because, you know, I'm a comedian. I come from a comic background. And so I've seen it all. I've done a lot. I've worked with so many funny people. And to crack me up is not easy. And Andy just did it just from a glance or even a word. And as painful as it was, it was also pure joy

because it was the type of laughter where I was wheezing and I couldn't control it. And those are the best laughs in the world. So, you know, just adored working with Andy. And Dane was great. Me and Dane had been friends. You know, it was so great to see Dane because I had watched Dane kind of come up through the comedy club ranks. I was there when Dane first came to Hollywood,

and he'd worked the comedy clubs late at night. And he kind of went from a real unknown to a guy that, you know, suddenly he got a star of. role in a movie and you know i got cast beside them and i got to be there and watch that happen and i was very very proud of dane and and i thought he did an incredible job and uh and it was it was a fun setting the only the only downside to the whole thing was uh because we were shooting in a real cost go the cost go didn't close till 10 o'clock at night and then it opened at seven in the morning. So we had to shoot the movie from 10 o'clock at night to like 6.30 in the morning.

And that meant we had to sleep during the day and work all night. And that's almost impossible. If your body's not used to that, your brain's not used to it, it was rough. It was, you know, everyone suddenly had a very erratic sleeping pattern. And that part wasn't fun. I just did not like finishing work at 6.000. You know, you're up all night and it's six in the morning. Okay, time to go home and go to bed. We're like, wait, the sun's not even up yet. So that was a bit of a drag, but we had a blast.

And I'm glad you asked about it. As far as I know, there is no sequel planned. And I'm really glad you enjoyed that movie. I hope that little answer gave you a little more insight and gave you a little more depth to what went on. And as I said, if you want to see some of the really fun outrageous outtakes, just rent the movie on DVD and search the menu button for the outtakes because you'll see, you'll probably see me cracking up because of Andy and some of those outtakes.

So, hey, thank you for your message. I think we'll leave the show right there. I think that's a nice spot to end with a little, you know, a little Q&A about the movie biz. I do appreciate that. And, you know, let's wrap things up right now and do a few announcements before we go. By the way, if you want to call me yourself

and ask a question or leave a message, you can call me at 3-2-3-739-4-3-30. That's 3-2-3-7-3-9. 43330. I love hearing from you guys. You can ask me or record anything you want. Dullo! And I'm happy to listen to your calls.

And you might even get your call on the show like this gentleman did. So if you don't want to call me, you can write me at harlunwiams.com. There is a contact link there where you can write me emails. Always love to hear from you and also check out the store. We have a store at Harlan Williams.com full of all kinds of fun merchandise. We will mail out to you if you want to order something. Digital downloads, books, t-shirts, artwork, you name it. It's there.

Also, please, please, please get the Harland Highway app for your cell phone. Just go into your app store. type in the Harlan Highway in your app store and you can download the app absolutely free and if what you get you get the, when I say free, you get the most current 50 episodes of the podcast and if you need more, if you want more, if you are hungry for more,

you can become a premium member and for $20 a year, that's right, I said $20 a year, you can get all 750 episodes, of the podcast, right from when it started at the beginning. You also get extra bonus material, interviews with my characters, recordings of my live stand up, and also my whole other podcast called Let's Have a Fight, where comedians and actors have verbal throwdowns, and it is a lot, a lot of fun.

So, 20 bucks a year, you can become a premium member. People are loving it. I hope you get on board. and for those of you that are already on board, I really deeply thank you for supporting and I hope you're enjoying the premium membership content. So that's it right there.

We're going to hang it up and I hope you had a good time, everybody. Tell your friends to get on the Harlan Highway and until next time, chicken. Chau-Main, baby. Hello! Thank you.