The Tim Ferriss Show - #150: Morgan Spurlock: Inside the Mind of a Human Guinea Pig

Starting point is 00:00:00 optimal minimal at this altitude i can run flat out for a half mile before my hands start shaking can i ask you a personal question now what is your appropriate time i'm a cybernetic organism living tissue over metal endoskeleton this episode is brought to you by ag1, the daily foundational nutritional supplement that supports whole body health. I do get asked a lot what I would take if I could only take one supplement, and the true answer is invariably AG1. It simply covers a ton of bases. I usually drink it in the mornings and frequently take their travel packs with me on the road. So what is AG1? AG1 is a science-driven

Starting point is 00:00:45 formulation of vitamins, probiotics, and whole food sourced nutrients. In a single scoop, AG1 gives you support for the brain, gut, and immune system. So take ownership of your health and try AG1 today. You will get a free one-year supply of vitamin D and five free AG1 travel packs with your first subscription purchase. So learn more, check it out. Go to drinkag1.com slash Tim. That's drinkag1, the number one, drinkag1.com slash Tim. Last time, drinkag1.com slash Tim. Check it out. This episode is brought to you by Five Bullet Friday, my very own email newsletter. It's become one of the most popular email newsletters in the world with millions of subscribers. And it's super, super simple. It does not clog up your inbox. Every Friday,

Starting point is 00:01:33 I send out five bullet points, super short, of the coolest things I've found that week, which sometimes includes apps, books, documentaries, supplements, gadgets, new self-experiments, hacks, tricks, and all sorts of weird stuff that I dig up from around the world. You guys, podcast listeners and book readers, have asked me for something short and action-packed for a very long time. Because after all, the podcast, the books, they can be quite long. And that's why I created Five Bullet Friday. It's become one of my favorite things I do every week. It's free. It's always going to be free. And you can learn more at Tim.blog forward slash Friday. That's Tim.blog forward slash Friday.

Starting point is 00:02:11 I get asked a lot how I meet guests for the podcast, some of the most amazing people I've ever interacted with. And little known fact, I've met probably 25% of them because they first subscribed to Five Bullet Friday. So you'll be in good company. It's a lot of fun. Five Bullet Friday is only available if you subscribe via email. I do not publish the content on the blog or anywhere else. Also, if I'm doing small in-person meetups, offering early access to startups, beta testing, special deals, or anything else that's very

Starting point is 00:02:40 limited, I share it first with Five Bullet Friday subscribers. So check it out, tim.blog forward slash Friday. If you listen to this podcast, it's very likely that you'd dig it a lot and you can, of course, easily subscribe any time. So easy peasy. Again, that's tim.blog forward slash Friday. And thanks for checking it out. If the spirit moves you. Hello, boys and girls. This is Tim Ferriss. And welcome to another episode of The Tim Ferriss Show, where each episode, it is my job to deconstruct world-class performers, to tease out the habits, routines, favorite books, serials, whatever it might be that you can test and apply in your own life. And this episode is an interview you've been asking for since before I started the podcast, Morgan Spurlock. He would also have been on my top 10 dream list when I was drafting up

Starting point is 00:03:31 potential guests for this podcast in the very beginning. Morgan Spurlock, at Morgan Spurlock on Twitter, is an Oscar-nominated documentary filmmaker based in New York, which is where we did this interview, in his office. He is a prolific writer, director, producer, and human guinea pig. His first film, which many of you will know, Supersize Me, premiered at the Sundance Film Festival in 2004, winning Best Directing Honors. The film went on to win the Writers Guild of America Best Documentary Screenplay, as well as garner an Academy Award nomination for Best Feature Documentary. Since then, he has directed, produced, and distributed a ton, multiple film, TV, and digital projects, including some that I love, arguably even more than Supersize Me, and I enjoyed that movie a ton, including the CNN series, Morgan Spurlock,

Starting point is 00:04:16 Inside Man, the FX series, 30 Days, and the films Where in the World is Osama Bin Laden, Confessions of a Superhero, Freakonomics, The Greatest Movie Ever Sold, which we talk about quite a bit in this podcast, and many, many others. Morgan's latest project is a tech startup called Collect, C-L-E-C-T.com. Check it out, C-L-E-C-T, like collect, C-L-E-C-T.com, which is a community for high-spending collectors with a one-stop marketplace where people can browse, sell, and buy collectibles of any type imaginable. And for a nerd like me, this is just heaven. Star Wars, Smurfs, comics, a Millennium Falcon made from motorcycle parts is one actual real example. If you go to the website, you can see that. Imagine Comic-Con meets Pinterest and eBay with a lot more thrown into the mix. And as someone who owns 10,000

Starting point is 00:05:05 polybagged cardboard-backed comic books at home, yes, I am a dork. In this episode, we cover a ton and I wanted to ask Morgan many of these questions for years. We talk about how Morgan got his biggest breaks and in some cases made his own luck. We talk about tips for aspiring creators and filmmakers, how to get people to care about important issues. That is a very tough needle to thread. Favorite books, documentaries, movies, etc. Morgan's thoughts on the future of media and storytelling, and much, much more. Before I recorded this episode, I threw up on Facebook and Twitter a request for questions from Morgan. And there were two links that popped up a couple of times

Starting point is 00:05:46 that I wanted to address because it underscores a scientific literacy problem that I want to highlight. So everyone listening, if you haven't read Bad Science by Ben Goldacre or the appendices, which are an excerpt from that in the four-hour body, you should read these because a number of folks asked, well, why are uh, are there particular articles that have trouble replicating the results that Morgan had in supersize me? The first one, which is related to a teacher who lost 61 pounds using caloric restriction, but with junk food, losing weight does not apply. It is fundamentally completely a different protocol so that you can just dismiss out of hand. And then the second one was related to a study by Frederick Nystrom in Sweden. And the article that was most often cited was actually preliminary data. And the preliminary data, as it turns out, just like

Starting point is 00:06:38 with split testing ended up getting flipped in a lot of ways when it got to the final results, which I tracked down. And ultimately the results are as follows. And this is from SkylerTanner.com, but it is a reprint effectively. Others suffered almost as much as Spurlock, with one volunteer taking barely two weeks to reach the maximum 15% weight gain allowed by the ethics committee that approved the study. And it goes on to say that these results are highly individualized. And this was a study that allowed exercise and i should highlight that is not what morgan did so again you need to be basically scientifically literate to assess when the media spins studies to serve their own

Starting point is 00:07:17 interests in the form of a headline very often so i feel very comfortable supersize me at this point and there are some people who said it's impossible to eat 5,000 calories a day. I would beg to differ. You can eat a lot more than that on a daily basis. You can read The 4-Hour Body for more on that. With all of that said, please enjoy my wide-ranging conversation with Morgan Spurlock. Morgan, welcome to the show. Thank you.

Starting point is 00:07:40 I'm stoked to be here. Yeah, I'm really excited to be in your offices finally. I know we've had a couple of lunches, a couple of dinners over time, and it's nice to see the operation. And I thought we were talking just before we started recording about breakfast, and you said, well, I don't usually have breakfast, but if it's a breakfast meeting, I can't be the guy sitting there kind of judging the other person. That's right.

Starting point is 00:07:59 Do you get that a lot after Supersize Me or the various experiments? What happens more than anything, whenever I'm at a restaurant, people will walk by and they'll look at what I'm eating. And sometimes they'll comment. And so they'll look at what I'm eating and sometimes they'll see what's on my plate. And then other times they'll walk by and be like, better than McDonald's, right? And I'm like, it's been 12 years. Like, I'm going to be, that is my, I'm married to that forever.

Starting point is 00:08:22 It's your thing, yeah. It's my thing. I'm okay with that. I was at the Russian Baths yesterday here here just about to pull off the underwear and uh there were two fans who walked up and they're like hey trying to get four hours for the sauna in 15 minutes and i was like yep i kind of deserve that i guess i'll be the four hour guy and definitely yeah uh when somebody asks you what do you do how do you answer that? I say I'm a storyteller. That's what I am.

Starting point is 00:08:48 I'm a professional storyteller. Where did that first start in terms of being bitten by the bug? Was there a particular experience or mentor who steered you in that direction? Yeah. I mean, my mom was probably the biggest one. When I look back as a kid, like I loved comic books. I started drawing and writing my own comic books when I was really young, just in a notebook like this. Like I would make the squares, draw the blocks in,

Starting point is 00:09:18 draw all the characters, tell the stories. And so, yeah, I mean, that was when I was like maybe eight or nine years old. My mom was really encouraging of that. So I think she was probably the first one. And then at the same time, it it was the 70s so the parents took you to see things you should never take kids to see in movie theaters you know we didn't wear helmets on bikes we didn't wear seat belts in cars you packed 10 kids into the back of the cutlass and took them to baseball cutlass and took them to baseball practice but like so my parents would take me to see movies like jaws the exorcist things you would never take a kid to see today. It's just wrong in so many levels. So they would take me to see these movies, but these were the movies that made me want to make movies.

Starting point is 00:09:51 I loved horror films, and so the movie Scanners, when that guy's head exploded in Scanners, that was the moment where I said, I have to do that, whatever that is. Now, what was it about the head explosion? Was it just the shock value, the ability to grab someone's attention? And just the way that it looked.

Starting point is 00:10:06 Because when I was a kid, I originally wanted to be Rick Baker. I wanted to be Tom Savini. When I saw American Werewolf in London, it blew my mind. That's a great movie. It's a great movie. And what the effects did then, and these were all practical effects from his hand growing to his snout growing. There was no CGI. It was all things that somebody made and created and figured out how to do.

Starting point is 00:10:24 So that was kind of the bug that I had first first it was kind of wanting to be in that side of it and then once i learned you could actually go to college and learn how to make movies and you know direct movies and produce movies i said well that's the path i want to go on so you went to you attended film school i went to i went to film school first at at u i tried to get into usc's film school and i applied i got into the broadcast journalism school this was like in 1989 and so i said well i'll go to usc i'll go there because like if you're going to make movies you got to go to California you got to go to Hollywood and I grew up in West Virginia and so Hollywood was a million miles away good wrestling state good wrestling state great state for wrestling

Starting point is 00:10:56 um even especially when they're not family members but um so I went so I went to Hollywood because I said this is where I have to be And so every semester I would apply to film school at USC. And every semester I would get rejected from film school at USC. I applied five times. I still have all the rejection letters. I kept them all. And so finally the fifth time I was like, I can't keep putting all my eggs in this USC basket. And it was so stupid at the time.

Starting point is 00:11:19 I wouldn't apply to UCLA just out of principle, which is so dumb when you think about it. Because UCLA is in such a better part of town. It's such a more beautiful campus. You just adopted the rivalry as your own? Already. I was a Trojan through and through. I was like, I'm not going to go to UCLA. I'm not going to even apply to their film school. So I applied to NYU and I got into NYU. And so I moved to New York. And New York is so much better for me as a person. I think it suits my personality much more, not to mention my skin tone, but I'm spectacularly pale. Yeah. We're, but we're both on the pale end of the spectrum. How did it fit your personality?

Starting point is 00:11:51 I see. I think that I grew up in a, in a place and in a family and in a culture where you mean what you say and you say what you mean. And that's kind of how I was brought up. And I think that New York is very much a city that, you know that says what it says and means what it says and will tell you to your face. It'll stab you right in the chest and tell you like you suck and here's why and this is what we don't like about you and what you do, whereas in Los Angeles, it's the inverse. Yeah, it is the inverse.

Starting point is 00:12:17 In LA, at least, well, I should say in New York rather, if it's about money, you know how to interact with someone and if they're blunt, it might be abrasive, but at least it saves you time. And you know how to interact with someone and if they're blunt it might be abrasive but at least it saves you time and you know where you stand at least i know from the i know from minute one where i stand with somebody in new york city whereas in la you talk to somebody and the whole time they're talking to you they're like looking over your shoulder to see who more important or more interesting might be coming into the room that's so disconcerting yeah like my first few trips to la i was like what is happening right now? Like we're supporting voices. Is there somebody else here?

Starting point is 00:12:45 What about, what about me? I'm here. I'm here. Uh, the experience in film school, what were the most important lessons that you learned in film schools? Well, the cool thing was that, I mean, at NYU, when I was at film school, there is, it taught you the hustle. Like the thing about NYU is you had to raise your own money for your movies. You had to, you had to find by hook or by crook any way to make the film. So, I about NYU is you had to raise your own money for your movies. You had to,

Starting point is 00:13:05 you had to find by hook or by crook anyway to make the film. So, I mean, that was, it was so realistic. I mean, it was a much more independent mindset. I think of preparing you for life after film school,

Starting point is 00:13:14 whereas at USC, like if you were in film school there, they paid for your movies. You're pampered a bit. Yeah. And they, and they own your movies. Like,

Starting point is 00:13:20 so basically USC pays for your films. Then they own the films after. No idea. Yeah. Um, cause it's kind of part of their legacy. Like people who go through the directing program, we pay for the films, then they own the films after. Wow, I had no idea. Yeah. Because it's kind of part of their legacy. People who go through the directing program, we pay for the films, but now we own Ron Howard's movie, his student film forever. So I think for me, it prepared me much more for what was coming next, which was the hustle, what you have to do when you get out.

Starting point is 00:13:39 What was your first, in your mind, major project after film school? What was my first major project after film school um what was my first major project after film school i mean and by major i mean in your own mind in my mind i tell you that here's well there's there's an interesting thing that had happened to me after film school so um i got a job my first job was being a pa on the professional the lupus on film and so that's a pretty sweet gig it was a pretty sweet gig and so here i was was, I was 22, 23 years old. Yeah. And it was awesome. Like it was so exciting to get to be on this movie and kind of see him. And so I was kind of schlepping, you know, being a PA for the next three, two to three years working on any movie I could get on. So I was a PA on that movie. And then I was on, I worked on Woody Allen's bullets over Broadway and, um,

Starting point is 00:14:22 Barbette Schroeder's kiss of death death and so it was on kiss of death where um i got offered a job i got a friend of mine a job a girl named sarah casper who i went to film school with she produced my senior thesis film it's one of those things where you get out of film school you finish your senior senior thesis film you're like now i'm going to send this out to film festivals this is going to win all kinds of awards hollywood's going to come calling i'm going to get my big movie and then none of that happens nothing nothing happens you convince yourself that i'm going to finish this thing and everything's going to change and i'm going to get these big movie deals and of course none of that happens you know probably to point oh oh oh oh one percent that happens to

Starting point is 00:14:56 everybody else it doesn't um and so i got out you know that didn't happen so i was like just hustling through you kind of inching my way up the ladder of production. And I got a friend of mine, a job on this movie in the casting department. She was working for a woman named Tracy Moore Marable, who I, to this day, I look at as kind of one of my mentors because she changed my life completely by what happened next. Sarah was casting for this job for someone to be the spokesperson for Sony Electronics. She goes, so they, she goes, so yeah, she goes, I can send anybody in for this. You should go audition for this job. And I was like, I don't have an agent. She goes, I can send anyone. It doesn't matter. And so I went downtown to pick up film from set one day, dropped it off at Technicolor on my way

Starting point is 00:15:35 back to the office. Um, I ran an audition for this thing. And two weeks later I found out I got the job. And so everybody in the office was like, Oh my God, that's great. Congratulations. Here's a bag. See you later. Like everybody was so happy. I was in the office was like, Oh my God, that's great. Congratulations. Here's a bag. See you later. Like everybody was so happy. I was sleeping. It's like, they're like, good,

Starting point is 00:15:48 get out, peace out, get out of this, get out of this movie. Um, and so for the next two and a half years, I traveled around the country working for Sony as like this carnival Barker on stage. Like that went,

Starting point is 00:15:58 so they went to trade shows, they went to sporting events, they went to colleges, you name it. And they were one of the sponsors of the Bud Light Pro Beach Volleyball League. So it's sort of like Ron Pope Hill origins, like selling Sony from the States? It's a big show. It was this giant tour truck that when I first went on the road with it, it was all about Sony Auto Sound.

Starting point is 00:16:18 Like Sony had launched this big car stereo division. So it was all about getting people. And I didn't have to know anything about the product. I just had to get people to come over. And so I would just like on this stage say, come on over, check this out, blah, blah, blah. And people would come up and tour the truck and look at everything. And then the next year it became Sony PlayStation. Then the next year it became Sony Vio when they launched their computers. And while I'm on the road with them, my boss on this at the time,

Starting point is 00:16:39 a guy named David Lacks said, we need to make a video about this tour and what we're doing. Who should we have do that? And I said, you should have me do that i said i went to film school let me make that and so i made this film for them about this and then i made a bigger film for sony about minidisc then i made a bigger film about something else for them and then probably then my biggest project that i ever did with them was their kind of ces at the consumer electronics show in like 1990 like burning man for nerds totally it's like burning man for nerds is exactly what it is. It's super nerd prom. And so I made kind of their CES experience movie where you went into this theater and I mean, they spent millions of dollars on it and it was like the biggest thing I'd ever

Starting point is 00:17:14 done. So the biggest thing I did out of film school, the first biggest gigantic thing I did was that. Wow. And so, and it was so like off track of where I thought my career was going to be going or what I thought I'd be doing. But little did I know that all of those things that I was doing were ultimately putting me on a path where I am now. So this is a theme that recurs a lot in these interviews with, say, for instance, Jamie Foxx, where these things that were seemingly unrelated to his end destination prepared him perfectly for it.

Starting point is 00:17:39 Totally. And I was going to ask you a little later in our conversation about how you build rapport with people. Yeah. But let's dig into it right now. So if I watch, say, Inside Man, which I love, or 30 Days, I'm consistently impressed with how you get people to embrace you from different worlds and accept you and trust you. How did you develop that? Or have you always been hardwired for that? Well, I think the biggest thing you have to do is, is you just have to listen. The minute you

Starting point is 00:18:10 start listening, that's amazing how people will talk to you and how people will embrace you. We live in a culture where we don't listen to begin with. I think that's one. Um, and I think we also live in a culture and we live in a world where a lot of people aren't honest with each other and just don't kind of openly have conversations with you and talk about things that are hard to talk about or talk about things that may be difficult or hurtful or potentially hurtful. And I think that if you come into those types of moments, just, I think, wanting to understand and wanting to understand where somebody else is coming from, it doesn't have to be confrontational. It doesn't have to be ugly. You can have a really honest, above-board conversation that is meaningful.

Starting point is 00:18:51 And I think that's... So for me, I think that's the biggest thing. I think the best thing I do sometimes is shut up and listen. So if you had, let's just say, you were teaching, went back to NYU and you were giving a guest lecture to would be documentarians. Right. And somebody came up to you and they said, you know what? I just had this incredible opportunity. I'm actually going out this weekend to interview 10 people for my film for the first time. Yeah.

Starting point is 00:19:15 I've never done this before. How do I get them to open up? Right. What would you say to them? I would say first talk about things that they care about, you know, get them to talk about things that are meaningful to them in the beginning. Uh, things that they like,

Starting point is 00:19:26 things that they love. You don't want to go right in to like, so what's it like to have cancer? You don't want that to be the first question. You want to kind of work up to this cause you want to, you want to have, it's a, it's a relationship.

Starting point is 00:19:35 You're building a relationship with someone over the course of a conversation and you want to have them trust you. Um, and part of what you also want to do in that conversation is offer up things that are similar and kind of where they're coming from or experiences you've had that kind of put them in a, in a comparative level. And I think that then you kind of build up and build up and then you can start

Starting point is 00:19:56 chipping away at the information you really want, but you need to take the time to build that, that relationship. I think the, uh, the providing of... See, that's me ruining the podcast right there with my phone. No, that's okay.

Starting point is 00:20:07 This is cinema audio verite. The advice you just gave... I'm that guy in the movie theater every day. I am that guy. The advice you just gave about being... Well, I'm paraphrasing here, but being vulnerable yourself to illicit vulnerability was also something that was underscored for me by a guy named Neil Strauss, who's an author but wrote for Rolling Stone and New York Times did a lot of interviews.

Starting point is 00:20:31 And it's incredible how that gear shifts the entire dynamic. Why Warrior Poets? Why Warrior Poets? Yeah. So that's the name of your company. That's the name of my company. And it came a few years ago by, i'll give credit where credit is due there was a former assistant at the gersh agency who's now a full agent a guy named sean barclay who

Starting point is 00:20:50 right after supersized me i went out to la to have you know it's like when you go out and have the meetings like we want you to meet all these people the death star meetings you have all the meetings and so i'm being driven all around town meeting with all the studios meeting with all the folks and so i as i'm being driven around by then assistant Sean Barclay, we're just talking about what I want to do, what are we going to do next? And by that point, we'd already sold 30 Days. 30 Days was already going to be the thing we did after Super Size Me. And so we're just talking about kind of the path that I want to be on and the stories I want to tell and what's important to me. And then I said, I'm starting a new company. I need a new name because my old company,

Starting point is 00:21:28 this is, I'll have a quick aside. My first company was a web company. So we started off in 2000 with a web company. The idea as the bubble was exploding was I wanted to create a content company where we would create programming online and then springboard it off to film or television. So we created a company called the Interactive Consortium.

Starting point is 00:21:46 Terrible name. Terrible name, but it's had interactive in the title, so it must have been something. And it was a consortium of talented people that came together to tell stories. So there was logic in my mind, but the name was terrible. But we called ourself The Con for short

Starting point is 00:21:59 because we called ourselves The Consortium, and it was The Con. If you look at Super Size Me at the beginning, it says The Con. That's the title at the beginning, which i thought was a great name for a company not when you're trying to raise money it's not a good name for a company it's not a good when you're chasing financiers you don't want to be called the con um jd saliger and associates exactly jt marlin and associates and so this was so that was the uh so that was the previous name

Starting point is 00:22:21 of the company i said i want to start a new company. And so he said, well, what about Warrior Poets? And I said, as a big Braveheart fan and as a Scotsman, I said, what, because I'm Scottish and because of Braveheart? And he goes, Warrior Poets has nothing to do with Braveheart. He goes, that is a phrase that was stolen by Mel Gibson for the movie. He goes, Warrior Poets were around throughout history. Like these were people who, um, who were poets or who were musicians or who were, who were people who entertained the masses with their wit and their, and their, and their writings,

Starting point is 00:22:51 their music. But when time came to fight for what they believed in, they would lay down their instruments and pick up swords or pick up or pick up whatever they had to go fight for spears, to go fight for what they believed in, to fight for their country. And I was like, I said,

Starting point is 00:23:03 that's exactly what we are. I said, we are warrior poets. Yes, that's like, I said, that's exactly what we are. I said, we are Warrior Poets. Yes, that's the name. And so that's where it came from. And how do you choose your projects? Or to be more specific, how did you decide to do 30 Days After Super Size Me? Because, I mean, bam, suddenly the iron's hot. Yeah.

Starting point is 00:23:22 And this was before. So we got the idea for 30 days before supersize muse even finished so we were in post on the movie um we said i said i decided we just submitted the movie to sundance so we hadn't even gotten into sundance yet we just submitted the film and i said we should have a test screening of the movie just so we see what's happening and because that's what you did you had test screenings the studios all did it i said we should do what they do to be successful we should do that so we got clipboards because clipboards make you look 30 more official and we stood outside of the angelica right up the street on the corner of house and broadway and we said

Starting point is 00:23:51 excuse me as people are coming out of the movies we're like would you like to come to the test screening of a new independent documentary and people like oh yes i would that would be great and so we signed up like 50 people who came over to the gold crest screening room on the west side and it was myself and my two editors Julie Bob and Stella went over to the screening and the 50 people watched the movie and then after the film this one woman stood we came down front and we said anybody have any questions or anything this one woman said I just want to say thank you thank you for making this movie and showing the world finally how terrible these corporations are that they're screwing us and they're killing us and then a guy

Starting point is 00:24:26 on the other side of the room said hold on what movie did you watch he's like what are you you out of your mind because that's not what this movie's about at all and so they start you're crazy you're crazy you're crazy so they're yelling at one another and i just lean over to lean over to my editors and i'm like this is awesome this is this is amazing this is gonna be huge it's incredible but it but it elicited this awesome, visceral reaction in people. It really struck a chord. And so the next day,

Starting point is 00:24:49 when we were back in the edit room, I said, how do we do that every day? How do we do that every week? How do we transition this into something? Because the film, and the film was fast. I got the idea for the film

Starting point is 00:24:59 on Thanksgiving of 2002. And a year and a day later, the day after Thanksgiving 2003, I got the phone call that we got into Sundance. So I mean, it was fast. Wow. That's really fast. It's really fast for a doc. It's super fast. Like from, from idea to like delivery in the film festival, what happened on Thanksgiving that triggered this? I was sitting, I was sitting on my mom's couch and a spectacular trip to fan Hayes when a new story came on about these two girls that were suing McDonald's. Um, and so these girls said girls said we're fat we're sick and it's your fault and i was like

Starting point is 00:25:28 well that come on that's crazy said like you're gonna sue somebody for you know selling you food that you bought that you ate and then blame them for it i said how can you do that and then a spokesperson for mcdonald's came on and said you can't link our food to these girls being sick you can't link our food to these girls being obese our food is healthy it's nutritious it's good for you i was like i don't know if you could say that either. And I said, cause if it's that good for me, then shouldn't I be able to eat it for 30 days straight with no side effects? And I was like, that's it. That's it. And so that was the, that was the, that was the moment. And then, yeah. So then a year later we got into the festival and, and so as we were in the edit, I said,

Starting point is 00:25:58 how do we do that? How do we do that on a regular basis? And we said, let's make it a series. Let's make it a series where, and the original idea was it was going to be me in every episode kind of putting myself into these situations at which point my girlfriend said you're not going to have a girlfriend very long because it's basically then i'm gone for six months at a time when we do that six episodes of that show um but as soon as the movie exploded at sundance and we sold it i was on a plane to la and we sold that we pitched that show and sold it to FX the next week so it was a week after Sundance we'd already sold that so the movie wasn't even in theaters and we'd set up that show and in 30 days were there any particular shows or

Starting point is 00:26:33 proposals that you weren't able to make whether with that or Inside Men was there anything they got vetoed there was the only thing that ever got vetoed is when we were doing the immigration episode I wanted to have great episode by the way thanks no i mean i'm really proud of that really strong episode and for me the best episodes that show the shows that i'm not in like i understand why everybody's like no the ones that you're into the best but it's like but that's for me that's not the best because the best proof of that show is people who have to defend their beliefs and when somebody has to get in there and basically to people that disagree with them or contradict them to say here here's what I believe and why, and to have the courage to continue to

Starting point is 00:27:08 one, have those beliefs be questioned and also be open to kind of seeing the world in a different way, it takes a tremendous amount of, of, of courage. So, I mean, I think that's the, I love those episodes, but the immigration episode, when we first came up with that, um, I wanted to go across the border and have a coyote bring me over. I said, I want to go to Mexico. And I said, I want to come over with a bunch of illegal immigrants who are basically sneaking into the country

Starting point is 00:27:31 with a coyote and show how it's done. And big FX lawyer said no. And I said, well, come on. And then FX said, well, let's talk to the Fox lawyer. So then they went to the next person above them. Now, the coyote being the term for someone who facilitates this process. That's right.

Starting point is 00:27:44 So yeah, the coyotes are the guys who bring you across over the border illegally. And so then I went to big Fox's attorney and big Fox's attorney was like, absolutely not. And so that was the only thing that, uh, that I really wanted to do for the show that we wouldn't, because they basically said, if I,

Starting point is 00:27:57 if I, and I did, if I did it against their will. And I just, cause I said, why don't I, why don't we just do it? We'll just go shoot it and we could put it in the show.

Starting point is 00:28:04 And they're like, if you do that, then, you know, they're, they basically threatened to like cancel the show and take us off the air and not insure us. And so I said, all right, we won't do that. You're like, ah, and they're like, if you hadn't asked us, plausible deniability, but now you've gone and screwed both. Now you've gone and brought it up. Yeah. So now it's a, I'm a real believer in that. It's better to beg forgiveness than ask for permission these days. Yeah. What, uh, for someone who's unfamiliar with your work, if you had to choose say two or three films or television episodes that you would, if you could make mandatory viewing

Starting point is 00:28:40 for all Americans, what would they be? Um, let's think, I mean, it supersedes me. I feel like everybody's seen. for all Americans, what would they be? Let's think. I mean, to supersize me, I feel like everybody's seen. So I feel like everybody, I'm stopped by people all the time who've seen that, which is still mind blowing to me. But I think in 30 Days, I love the prison episode of 30 Days, I think is a great episode people should watch, especially as we live in a country where we're still sending people to prison and we've turned prisons into profit.

Starting point is 00:29:06 I think it's a, it's a, it's a great episode to watch and it will make you so angry. So I think that's, that's one. I love greatest movie ever sold. I think greatest movie ever sold in just the conceit of that film is spectacular for people who haven't seen it.

Starting point is 00:29:19 I'll just give you the quick rundown. It's a movie about product placement, marketing and advertising where the whole film is paid for and made possible by product placement marketing and advertising very meta it's spectacularly meta it's so good um main and tail one of my favorite sponsors of all time is a sponsor of that movie for those you don't know what main and tail is main and tail is a magical shampoo that is for both horses and people so yeah which i which i also love i love because because you know, how many times have we all been there where we're in the shower with our horse and we say, why, why do I need to

Starting point is 00:29:53 why are, why is there just not one shampoo for both of us? I'll tell you, I'll tell you a quick story, which is my favorite things. And we were making that movie because when I saw this, I found it and you see, you see in the film, when I i find this in a store like i had no idea this existed and i find this product and i'm like it is one of the greatest days of my life that i have found this product that i'm and you read the label and it gives you like the instructions on the back of a bottle of main tail are amazing like as it tells you how to use it to wash your horse it's ridiculous and so i keep so i start calling devin katzevvin, who is now a very good friend, and he's the president of the company. So I'm calling him.

Starting point is 00:30:30 I'm stalking him, trying to get him to return my call to be in the movie, to be in the movie. And finally, he calls me back. And he goes, so just tell me, what is this movie about anyway? So I explain to him what the movie is. And he goes, so how would you see us in the movie? Because we don't pay to be in movies. We don't do that. So how would you see it? And I said, OK, well, here's how movie is. And he goes, so, so how would you see us in the movie? Like, how would we, because we don't pay to be in movies, you know, we don't do that. You know? So, so how would you see it? And I said, okay, well, here's, here's how it is. So now picture this. So it's a close up on a bottle of main and tail, and the camera slowly starts to pull back. And as the camera

Starting point is 00:30:56 pulls back, you see me washing my little boy's hair. Then the camera pulls back a little bit more. And then you see me and we're in a bathtub and you see me washing my hair in the bathtub. And then the camera pulls back a little bit more and it pulls back more. And then you see me turn to my left and I'm washing my Shetland pony. And the guy goes, and then the phone is silent for a minute. And then he goes, that's the greatest integration I've ever heard in my life. That's amazing. He goes, Oh, that's fantastic. Oh, for a minute there, I thought you were going to do something weird with the product. But then he goes on to tell me. He goes on to tell me because apparently it was in the Will Ferrell movie Blades of Glory.

Starting point is 00:31:33 And he said, so I said to Will, I said, listen, I just want to make sure, like, you're not going to do anything like masturbate with it, are you? I was like, I love that. That's where he draws the line of what's weird. So like Will Ferrell masturbating with mane and tail in blaze of glory would be weird. Me in the bathtub with a horse. Totally fine. Oh my God. Yeah.

Starting point is 00:31:52 It's amazing. So wait, so back to the result. So there's that movie inside man. There's so many episodes of inside man that I love the season one of inside man. We do an episode about elder care and this is on Netflix. All three seasons of inside man are on Netflix. All three seasons of inside man are on Netflix. All three seasons of in of 30 days are on Netflix. Um, season one of inside man, we do an episode about, uh, about elder care where I move in with my grandmother and it is it for me, it's one of the most raw, honest and powerful things I've ever made.

Starting point is 00:32:21 Yeah. Awesome. Yeah. Uh, the, the marijuana episode also super, super strong, such a good show. And it's like that guy, Steve D'Angelo and what they're doing up at Harborside medical in, in Oakland is phenomenal. Like, cause you go there, you have these visions of what dispensaries are going to be. And everybody thinks they're like dodgy and shady and it's going to bring crime to the neighborhoods. And this place is beautiful. It looks like a health clinic. You are, and they run it like a health clinic. They have, they have a health instructors who are there. They have Reiki instructors. They have psychiatrists that you can meet with, not to mention all the product that you can buy there. I mean, and it's run like a proper clinic and it's phenomenal.

Starting point is 00:32:56 Like that's how every clinic in America should be. Like every dispensary should be. When did you go, just since we're talking about health, I think it was inside man, when you went to Thailand, Bumrungrad, Bumrungrad, yeah. Bumrungrad in, in, in Thailand, which is an incredible facility. It's phenomenal. Would you ever, why or why not? Would you go to Bumrungrad for medical treatment yourself? I mean, I would, I would go back after being there. I had such a great experience and depending on what I had to have done, like if I had to have surgery that had real serious recuperation where I was going to be laid up for like weeks going there and having the surgery done and then knowing that I'm going to, uh, be on a beach for like the next four

Starting point is 00:33:37 weeks in a place that's going to cost me a fraction, um, I think is worth it. And, uh, and I've spoken to people who since that episode have gone there for medical procedures um just because they saw that show and they're like it's half of what it was going to cost me in the states um or less you know it's it's remarkable yeah particularly i mean uh if you're doing say an elective surgery or something that doesn't have you're not having a brain tumor treated right necessarily or might not be covered or might not be covered exactly i mean i went to nicicaragua at one point. This is when I was writing The 4-Hour Body and realized, wait a second, if I just do,

Starting point is 00:34:10 say, my full panel of blood testing at what is considered sort of the highest end, and I don't necessarily recommend Nicaragua for everybody, but while I'm there on vacation, it will pay for my vacation. Yeah, that's right. Which was incredible. That's right. And not only that, but they did STAT, which means for people who aren't familiar, you get your results back in 24 hours. So it was like literally turned around everything in the hospital in four or five hours.

Starting point is 00:34:35 It was just phenomenal. Well, that's what I love. When I was at Bummer and Grad, you'd get a blood test. Everything's in one building. So you'd get a test done downstairs and then I'd go upstairs to see my next doctor. And whether it was anri or a blood test or other other panels they were doing in your blood test i'd get it done downstairs and by the time i got upstairs the doctor already had all the results like in real time they were getting the results done because they also process the blood in the hospital so it wasn't being sent out to a lab like they do here in the states you didn't go down to the what are those lab clinics that you always end up going to they're all pop-ups oh lab core lab core yeah you go to like a lab core where it's like a guy in like a basement with like well you feel like you're going to a methadone clinic it's rough

Starting point is 00:35:12 so dodgy but it's like everything everything in one place and you and part of the reason they said why we can do it so cheaply is because everything's under one roof we're not kind of third partying anything and it's like and i'm there and i'm like why can't we just do more of that here why can't that just happen here medical tourism that's i feel like i should i should uh well people can watch the episode can people watch that episode yeah they can watch it it's uh it's uh season three of inside man bum run grad b-u-m-r-u-n-g-r-a-d correct and uh people will be very very impressed it's it's it looks like four seasons not at all yeah exactly it's not what you would expect at all yeah uh one of the questions that came quite a bit from my fans was

Starting point is 00:35:49 how do you get people to care about important issues in an environment where there's such a deluge such a barrage of noise yeah how do you accomplish that yeah that's a great question because it's like every day we feel like, are we doing anything that actually, are people paying attention? You know, you hope that you make things that will make a difference or that people will listen to or at least create some level of empathy and change a viewpoint for someone. And I think that the hardest thing is, one, getting people just to watch. So I think once you get them to watch, I think that the way that I hope people get affected is because when we tell these stories, I get affected by them. Um, once you get immersed in them and I mean, you know, this better than anyone is once you kind of get into these worlds and see

Starting point is 00:36:32 it, it's a part of you forever. Like that becomes a part of your life. And whether it's me going to a foreign country for medical tourism or, um, you know, me was, I was doing in, in, in this past season where I'm just like eliminating toxins from my house, all these like poisons and cleaning products and stuff that we use every day that we just don't even realize. I think that I think for me, it's, it's taking people on this vicarious journey with me. And so long as I am open and honest with you, then you're willing to pay attention. And I think that's a big one. Um, a friend of mine a few years ago gave some, gave me some good advice where he said, uh, he said, you can't be afraid to show your scars. He goes, that's, that's, that's what you, that's who you are.

Starting point is 00:37:15 And he goes, and you can't, you have to continue to stay true to that. And I think that's, it was some of the best advice I ever got. What would you consider some of your scars? I think it's just being open and honest about your life. I think it's, you know, talking about the fact that, you know, I'm divorced talking about the fact that, you know, I, um, you know, kind of what led to that and, and, and being open and honest about your life and the things you've experienced and not being afraid to talk about that, you know, your upbringing and how that affected you. I think the more you can have those, the, that, that honesty in those relationships that you build with people that creates a trust and it creates a trust, not only with the people who watch the show, but with the people that you're talking to.

Starting point is 00:37:52 If you are looking at a particular idea that you want to put forth in the world or explore, and it could be adapted to documentary format or television format, What are the factors that lead you to choose one or the other? You mean whether it's movie or TV? That's right. I think it's about, I think it's, it's, can it sustain one? Because there's some movies that are meant to be some ideas that have been to be movies. And there's, and you see this a lot of time when you watch documentaries, when 45 minutes in, you're like, this should be done now as, but, but everybody wants to make a feature movie. Like, no, no, I'm going to make it a feature. And it's like, no, this should have been about 40 minutes, 45 minutes, 50 minutes.

Starting point is 00:38:28 But they end up making it 75, 80. And that last 30, you're just like, oh, it's just trudging along and should have been over. So for us, we avoid that by never kind of putting ourselves there. And so we say there's things that are meant to be 90 minutes because they're big, big, deep explorations. But especially now, there's other ones that you can take to TV and I can have an even deeper exploration. If I can do two to three episodes on it, there are four episodes on it, um, that are hour long. And then you can have a real deep dive into these topics. Um, I think that, uh, so for us, I mean, this was, that's why it's great. Like I love being a storyteller right now. I love being a content creator,

Starting point is 00:39:01 being a filmmaker, a director, whatever you want to call it, because there are places now to tell all these stories, whether it's 90 minutes or 30 minutes or 20 minutes or 10 minutes or three minutes. Like we made an amazing bunch of movies, um, a few years ago, uh, called focus forward, um, that GE paid for where we basically made these three minute short films that were all about innovators around the world, people who are doing incredible things. Um, and each one of these movies were three minutes long and they're powerful. They're, they're so beautiful and, and inspiring. And now like they've seen, like they've been seen like a hundred million people around the world because it's one of those where anybody will give you around the boxing. Like

Starting point is 00:39:35 anybody will give you three minutes. And once you watch one, then you'll watch two, you watch three. What we saw is whoever, if you, if you made it through one, you watched five the average was five which is awesome so going back to the the guest lecture at nyu yeah so i'm gonna they're gonna be calling me soon now now i know and i'm saying hey uh we heard the lecture we heard the podcast and tim's right you should come to a guest lecture just incepting exactly the administration at nyu and so you have all these bright-eyed bushy-tailed students who are, say, fixated on the feature film documentary. And they say, I know you say that we could do these short things, but I'm really, really obsessed with this idea of doing a feature. What warnings or advice would you give them? And I just want to repeat one thing that you mentioned before we got started.

Starting point is 00:40:20 We were looking at the audio equipment I have here, which is very simple. It's a Zoom H6 with XLR cables that plug into Simple is good. Yeah, simple good. SM58 Shure mics. And we were talking about fancy. Every time I try to get fancy, Did they give this to you

Starting point is 00:40:34 or did they get a free plug there? I hope they gave it to you. No, no, no. Zoom, that one's on me. Next time, call me. And you said, once you get fancy, fancy gets broken.

Starting point is 00:40:43 That's right. And it's just such a nice mantra i think to keep in mind and that could really help someone what did what warnings or advice would you give to aspiring documentary i mean i think the biggest thing is we we try to over complicate things when you start making movies or even tv shows whatever it is like you you have these grandiose ideas of everything that you need and everything that has to has to be done and especially today like the youtube of occasion of content creation and content consumption has shifted our concept of what, what it means to make something good or palatable. Um, we are infinitely more forgiving

Starting point is 00:41:15 of stuff that looks dodgy for good story. You can sacrifice quality for great story. So for me, it's like, it's all about the story. It doesn't matter. Like I'll watch shaky camera footage. Now I'll watch somebody's like shitty thing on their phone. So long as it's a great story so for me it's like it's all about the story it doesn't matter like i'll watch shaky camera footage now i'll watch somebody's like shitty thing on their phone so long as it's a great story and i'm engaged because we've gotten to the point now where we are past that we're forgiving of all that it's true of audio too yeah it's true of audio like you'll you'll so long as i can hear it and it's not just the whole time i will i will be i will still be forgiving of it um and i think that's what i tell i tell young filmmakers all the time is story first it's all about the story it's like everything else about what you want it to be or how long you want it to be. It should be as long as it needs to be ultimately, but it's all about

Starting point is 00:41:52 the story. And if you've gotten a beginning and middle and an end, and you've told your core in 40 minutes or 60 minutes, then don't stretch it out because now you're just putting, you're just, you're dressing up something and doesn't need it. If you wanted to give people examples or resources for masterful storytelling, are there any particular books, films, resources? I mean, for me, the best, the best resources are the movies themselves. Like, I mean, I am such a, I am such a movie freak, um, for nonfiction movies. Like if you're watching nonfiction films, like my favorite nonfiction film of all time, which kind of pushed me to seeing documentaries,

Starting point is 00:42:27 excuse me, seeing documentaries as like a viable outlet for my creativity as I got older was it was when I was in college, I saw the Joe Berlinger and Bruce Sanofsky film brothers keeper, brothers keeper, brothers keeper, which is one of the greatest films ever. This is like,

Starting point is 00:42:40 see, this is New York city. As you guys can hear, this is what happens in New York. We get a train going by, you can hear everything rumbling in the office. Sounds like an earthquake. It's an earthquake.

Starting point is 00:42:48 Like all the glass is shaking. It'll stop in a second. This is New York. So it's a film called Brothers Keeper. And I saw it in a movie theater because I heard everybody talking about it. And I was like, I have to go see this film. And it was the first time I think I probably ever paid to see a documentary in a movie theater. Because I was in film school, so we were watching a lot of docs in school, but never, but never in a actually where I bought a ticket.

Starting point is 00:43:10 And so I bought a ticket, went to see this film and the film is so good. It's so dark and it's so creepy. And it's about these three brothers where one of them is accused. It's an upstate New York. So it's like these three country brothers where one of them is accused of murdering another one and as it goes on in the trial of this guy being brought up for on murder charges that there was like there was like incest and it's like i mean it gets dark and weird and so good but that's one of those films where that that there's there were so many levels of emotion you feel when you're watching that and it was so beautifully shot and when years later

Starting point is 00:43:43 when i got to meet joe and bruce i just i mean i gushed over them like this movie i was like that movie changed my life like it is one of the greatest movies i've ever seen in my life and to this day i mean i'm still such a fan like when i see people i'm a little fan boy when i see somebody that i look up to it's like i will go over and just like and just like cover them with fangirlness yeah who else falls in that i mean errol morris is a genius like what was that errol morris errol morris errol morris who is like that guy his the amazing here's the thing about if you if you go to errol morris's website errol morris is such a craftsman could you describe who he is i apologize so errol morris is the errol morris did the fog of war which i still haven't seen

Starting point is 00:44:19 errol morris did the thin blue line like years ago errol morris was one of the guys who started putting like real dramatic produced recreations in movies like when he did thin blue line. Like years ago, Aaron Morris was one of the guys who started putting like real dramatic produced recreations in movies. Like when he did thin blue line, people attacked the film. And this is crazy to think about back when he made this in whatever 80 something, they're like, this isn't a documentary.

Starting point is 00:44:34 It's like, you got, you got, you got fake, get actors in there doing things. You got stuff that you staged, you stage things in a movie. That's not a documentary.

Starting point is 00:44:42 And when you look at that, like the movie is gorgeous, but it, but it set the tone and it's like, it basically changed what we think of what a documentary could be. And so, um, you know, the same thing happened years later. I remember when I was on a panel with Al Maisels and Al Maisels, this was like right when Super Size Me came out and Al Maisels told me, um, he goes, he goes, yeah, what you do that because what you do isn't documentary.

Starting point is 00:45:01 He goes, you don't, he goes, well, you don't make documentaries. And I, and again, it was like, there was a transformational a transformational moment um of i think what people's interpretation of what a doc could be was why did he say that because he saw it being like from a first person standpoint he didn't see like me telling a first person story as being a documentary um same thing he didn't think michael moore made documentaries um and so he so that was so that was kind of his idea but like Errol Morris, you know, back to this amazing craftsman, like his stuff is so beautiful. And if you go to his website, like how Errol Morris like really pays the bills as he makes commercials. Um, cause it's not, it's not like we're going out and buying boats, making documentaries. So let's be honest,

Starting point is 00:45:37 like we don't have like a fleet of Ferraris outside. It's like you, you make these movies because you believe in them and what they represent. But if you go to his website, it's like, and I think it's errolmorris.com. I'm not sure. If you go there, it's like it has like all these commercials that he's made and just experiments that he does with the cameras, which is awesome. And you see like how he will take somebody's crazy commercial money and do something he's never done. And then once he tries that, he starts to apply those tricks and transplant it to his movies. That's cool.

Starting point is 00:46:02 It's so cool to see. But it's like he's a he's a talent like i have mad respect for him and then there's somebody like steve james who i think steve james is just a great storyteller steve james did hoop dreams he did stevie he did life itself um apart from steve james just being an epic human being like he's a magnificent human like i'd say all the time like when i grow up i want to be ste Steve James because he's a, he's just a great individual who treats people well, you know, is, is, you know, will return anybody's phone call, talks to anyone is the last guy to leave when students are asking him questions. You know, I, I, I really admired that. And so there's, there's things like that,

Starting point is 00:46:38 that I take from people, but, but he's also a great filmmaker. You know, he really believes in what he does. And so I think when you look at his films and he's one of those guys who makes movies over years, you know, like he'll make a movie for like five, seven, eight years. And,

Starting point is 00:46:51 and that type of dedication, I really, I really look up to. That's a huge commitment. That's right. And on the, on the point of films. So do,

Starting point is 00:46:59 do you still, why still make films? And the reason I ask is that when we're talking about formats and say the future of media, I think about this quite a lot. There are people who say can create very, very popular blogs and then get courted by the big publishers

Starting point is 00:47:15 in New York City and publish books. And the book still to this day, for whatever reason, occupies a unique part of mind space in human beings it just carries a level of gravitas that is not associated with the internet right quite wrongly i think yeah but people can become sort of part of the cultural zeitgeist and have a real impact with books in a way that is very difficult with something that is viewed as ephemeral online yes do documentaries still have that and maybe it's just something I perceive,

Starting point is 00:47:46 but that difference compared to say TV, or is that, am I making that up? No. I mean, I think that what's happened though now is there's been a couple of things that have happened one on the heels of like HBO and Netflix and Showtime and especially Netflix, where more people I think have seen things I've made on Netflix than anywhere else, which is fantastic. I think that they have created a larger audience for documentaries than ever before. And I think that type of hunger is what's also starting to drive this push into smarter nonfiction television, both from a Netflix standpoint and from a television standpoint. Because what happened in television is there were all of these people, all these networks, and it started with like FX. First it was HBO,

Starting point is 00:48:23 who raised the bar for scripted television and started making scripted television beyond what any of us thought was possible for TV. I mean, they just started crushing it. And so then other people said, well, we should be creating that level of television. That's when I was working with FX back in the day, John Landgraf, brilliant guy, one of the smartest TV people you'll ever meet in your life, um, said that that's what we like. We want to be HBO for, for commercial television. And that's what he created to be, HBO, for commercial television. And that's what he created.

Starting point is 00:48:46 He was the champion that made that and raised that bar for FX. And then Showtime did. And now if you look across the spectrum of TV, every network has at least one amazing show. USA has Mr. Robot, which is spectacular. You go down the line, everybody's got one big fiction show. But nobody had smart nonfiction. Everybody kind of left that down here it was

Starting point is 00:49:05 lowest common denominator so while the rising tide lifted all the ships for fiction it didn't happen for non-fiction and now people are realizing as as they're abandoning ship with these all these crappy tv shows that we're missing the boat there's higher expectations from our audience and now they're starting to push that you know as hbo did with the jinx and again hbo leading the charge of let's jinx was great. It was fantastic. They said, let's show people that you can make smarter nonfiction. Talk about dark, dark,

Starting point is 00:49:29 so dark. And so then there was that there was making a murderer on Netflix. And now everybody's like, Oh, people want to see smart nonfiction. We should be doing that. Um, which is great for us.

Starting point is 00:49:38 It's great for people like Alex Gibney. Um, who's that? Alex Gibney, who did smartest in Ron smartest guys in the room. He did the scientology movie going clear going clear oh god another creepy one alex he's he's a great person you should talk to on the podcast he's an amazing filmmaker and again somebody i really look up to

Starting point is 00:49:54 because i think he's he's incredibly cerebral very smart that was a i mean the amount of data crunching and just review yeah required to make going clear was so evident in the making of the film and he's he is a deep researcher and i really i i think he's fantastic but uh but it's one of those things for people like us who've been kind of living in the space and making this type of content for a long time it's fantastic because now it just opens up and broadens the spectrum so for me i feel like there's still a place to make movies. And now there's more places to make smarter TV, which I think is really exciting. What do you think you will be, if you had to speculate, what do you think you'll be creating in five or three, five or ten years, whichever you want to choose? I think we're about to start doing some really awesome VR projects.

Starting point is 00:50:43 That'll be this year. We're going to be doing some incredible stuff. We've held back. I didn't want to jump in early as everybody else is jumping on this VR bandwagon. We've been smart about what we've been navigating through and the projects that we want to make. That's going to be something that's going to be real. I think that VR has the ability to become an empathy machine. I think it has the ability to put you in places

Starting point is 00:51:05 and experience things and feelings in a way you never have before. So that's super exciting for me as somebody who believes that you can actually start to chip away and make the world a better place with entertainment. I think movies and TV shows have a profound impact on our belief system.

Starting point is 00:51:21 And I think that there's just something we can do there. So for me, I think that's where we'll be. I think we'll be doing, I mean, it's in five years, probably won't be exactly five, maybe closer to 10, but there's going to be one pipe that delivers everything. There's gonna be one pipe where I watch everything, whether it's on my TV at home, um, on my, on my tablet, on my phone, it'll be everywhere. It's gonna be one pipe that feeds everything. And that's going to be an exciting time for a couple of reasons, because now anything I want to see is suddenly going to be right at my fingertips wherever, whenever, wherever I'll be able to watch anything. Awesome. But simultaneously,

Starting point is 00:51:51 you're going to be to the point of still back to the YouTube of vacation of our viewing habits, where, how do you now, how do you now bring eyeballs? How do you let people know it's there? And I think that's the next step. You know, there were three stages of, of real shifts in entertainment that I think were big. And one of the first one really helped me because it made supersize me possible. And there was like this democratization of production, democratization of cinema, where suddenly anyone with a camera and a computer and a good idea could make a movie that was huge. So now suddenly everybody had access to the tools. Um, you could put in the sweat equity, you could make something really cheaply and easily get it out for the world to see.

Starting point is 00:52:24 Next was kind of this democratization of distribution where now I didn't need to have, you know, Sony or Paramount put out a movie in a movie theater. I could put it online. Now anybody in the world could have access to my content, you know, via YouTube or via Vimeo. But now how do you get people to see it? That's the problem. So it's out there, but it's invisible. Now comes the next big step, which will be huge as the pipelines converge, which is almost like this democratization of curation, this democratization of marketing, how do now we point people towards what matters. And that's where it's going to be influencers

Starting point is 00:52:54 are going to be people like you. It's going to be people like me who people trust. And those voices are going to be even more resonant as we move forward because people are going to trust in them even with even more i think importance here here yeah i agree i i was a vr skeptic until i had a demo with the htc vive with running valve software yeah in seattle where i was fully kitted out and in maybe a 20 by 20 foot space and where you can walk around and the walls come up yeah oh my god and what just what struck me as someone who for long long time listeners of this podcast know maybe i may or may not have dabbled in various types of plant medicine or other molecules the time distortion yeah that i experienced in that immersive vr which is still model t by comparison looking towards say what's going to exist three years from now yeah i thought i was in for five

Starting point is 00:53:51 or six no no i thought i was in for five or six minutes and i was in for almost 25 minutes wow and i that's when i was like okay there is something really fundamental going on yeah and you said this empathy machine i mean just like the simulacrum and uh the ability to elicit emotion is so far beyond anything coming from a flat screen that's right it was just mind-blowing yeah no i was just at i was just at google this past week and meeting with their vr guys and seeing some of the stuff they're working on and you it's like you're in the matrix like suddenly it's like it's the closest thing I could imagine to suddenly being Neo and taking the pill and being thrust into the machine that, that, that I could. And it's, I mean, what's

Starting point is 00:54:32 coming is incredibly exciting. Yeah. And it just, as, and as a, and as a content creator and a storyteller, it just makes you realize we've barely begun to scratch the surface of what's possible. Like it is, as you said, it's a Model T. Like it is so early and that excites me. Like we've always been a very early adopter of technology. We've always tried to be a little ahead of the curve and what we use, the tools we use to tell stories. And so for me, I think this is going to be incredible. Which filmmakers out there do you feel are pushing the envelope

Starting point is 00:55:00 in terms of technology or innovations in the space because i know for instance like james cameron james cameron's phenomenal i mean james cameron i think invented the camera that he used on the last movie like it was him and his partner created the pace camera and camera to use on avatar like they changed the whole box that made that movie it's bonkers he invented the technology that created the Chrome Cop in Terminator 2. Everybody's like, we can't do this. He's like, I'll fund it myself. What's so cool about that

Starting point is 00:55:32 is we created Lightstorm to basically do that technology. Correct me if I'm wrong, because you'd be the person to correct me, that the Abyss, which I enjoyed but was not, I understand, a commercial success, is where he honed that technology that later enabled him to to create that use it in Terminator 2 that's exactly right which is such an awesome story and it was out of that yeah because it was out of that where he that's where

Starting point is 00:55:52 he got the idea of what could happen with this other character and what it could be and he poured all his own money into making that a reality which I love I mean I'm somebody who fly I mean I'm a real believer that you should always bet on yourself first. And pre when we made supersize me, I remember I was, uh, because this was right when we sold our show to MTV, the first show we created online when, you know, from the interactive consortium, when we had that company, so here's the con. So when we created the first show we created under the con was a show called, I bet you will. And so we sold that show to CBS and then to MTV and then nine 11 happened. So we had proof of concept. We proved that we create, could create programming online and springboard it off. So we created the first show to CBS and then to MTV and then 9-11 happened. So we had proof of concept. We proved that we could create programming online and springboard it off. So we created the first show to really

Starting point is 00:56:28 go from the web to television as a series, sold it to MTV, then 9-11 happened. Everything stopped. Production just came to a standstill in New York City. So we had no money. I was evicted from my apartment. I was sleeping in a hammock in my office. So every morning I would get up and go to the gym around the corner of the New York Sports Club to shower and work out. I was in great shape because I didn't have a choice. And then I would come back to my office. And I still had people coming to work. And to make sure that they could pay their rent and pay their bills, I took out credit cards.

Starting point is 00:56:54 And so I was basically paying their rent with credit cards. I was paying their bills with credit cards. I was paying credit cards with credit cards. And I amassed about a quarter of a million dollars in credit card debt in about a year. Wow. But I still had an office credit card debt in about a year. Wow. Yeah. And so, but I still had an office and I still had a business and I was like, I'm not, I was like, you know, I'm still betting on us. And so that's when MTV greenlit the series and we did 53 episodes of that show. And during that time I paid off like $50,000 worth of that debt.

Starting point is 00:57:20 And then when they canceled it, I had another 50 grand in the bank and I was like, well, I could either pour this $50,000 into that bottomless pit of debt, or we could make a movie because we owned all the equipment. Again, it was the same thing. We had the cameras, we had the computers, let's make a film. And that film was supersized me and it changed everything. Yeah. So I, so that's why, I mean, like James Cameron is one of those people that I really look

Starting point is 00:57:37 at and admire because he will always bet on him and he'll always bet on his ability. If you haven't read the New Yorker article about James Cameron, when he was making, um, when he was making avatar, not only is he a genius, but he also is a bit of a bully and says like some terrible things to people who work for him. Like there's some of the greatest lines that you'll ever hear him say to

Starting point is 00:57:57 human beings, which there's a guy who's like rigging lights. Um, and he says to the guy and he goes, watching you lights, like watching a monkey, fuck a football. And he yells to another guy. He's like watching you lights like watching a monkey fuck a football. And he yells to another guy.

Starting point is 00:58:06 He's like, hiring you was like firing two good men. And it's like some of the lines are phenomenal. It's like, and I work with, but here's the thing. But it's like, I mean, part of me is he may be saying this. And I worked with a guy years ago, a guy named Gene Licht, who ran a printing shop back when I was in college. And I worked for Gene through a friend of mine at NYU who worked there, ran the print shop. And so I would go to this print shop, and Jean was one of those guys who would basically yell and scream at the top of his lungs and say terrible, insulting things that I thought

Starting point is 00:58:37 it was spectacularly funny and really entertaining. And so for me, but I also think he did it in jest to be funny, even though he was mean about it. But he was also saying it in jest to also make other people laugh, which I feel like James Cameron's doing the same thing. But it's so Gene, you know, rest in peace. He was he was a phenomenal guy. James, this is a quick side note. I remember. Has he done the podcast?

Starting point is 00:58:59 He hasn't. I would love to do with him. I've met him once. I went on a zero gravity, like a zero G flight. Yep. Where the like the payload was ridiculous. I mean, we're really fortunate the plane didn't go down because it was like Elon Musk, James Cameron, like you go down the list.

Starting point is 00:59:12 It was nuts. Amazing. And I had a chance to get some swag, avatar swag, because it was, obviously I paid for the flight. Yeah. And brought a reader along actually, who won some type of competition I'd thrown. And we all got t-shirts that had been given to the staff, uh,

Starting point is 00:59:32 and the crew working on avatar. And the shirt was great. The shirt said, and I might be getting this slightly wrong, but it was in huge font right across the check. And it's a chest. It said, hope is not a strategy.

Starting point is 00:59:43 Luck is not a factor. Failure is not a strategy luck is not a factor failure is not an option hyphen james cameron and i was like wow it's like setting the tone setting the tone for production and i wore that shirt when i was writing the four-hour body which like just about killed me literally and kind of figuratively yeah but one experience yeah and it's you know it's like is there anybody you know who is that exacting and forward thinking who isn't brutal in some respect i mean i think no because part of me it feels like you have to be so steadfast in your belief you have to because if you don't drink the kool-aid nobody drinks the kool-aid um i mean it's got to be who's the other person that's probably in that same type of state? Like Kanye, is Kanye there? And I mean, Kanye's probably

Starting point is 01:00:28 on even a different level than like James Cameron, but comparable, I think, and kind of maybe a mega maniacal way. But I think that, I think you have to, you have to believe in you first. Torre, he's a great writer, commentator. He told me the story where he went to Kanye's house once. And so he's in Kanye's house. And inside Kanye's house, there's a big giant poster of Kanye, like right inside the living room. And so Torre said to him, he goes, Kanye, why do you have a giant picture of you on the wall? And he goes, well, I got to cheer for me before anyone else can cheer for me. And I was like, there's some fantastic logic in that.

Starting point is 01:01:13 That's actually a good response. There's some good logic in there. I don't know if I can stomach the grief I would get for putting a huge like Tim Ferriss. Yeah, like Burt Reynolds centerfold kind of. I don't know if you've ever seen White Chicks. There's this one, Terry Crews. I don't know if you've ever seen White Chicks. There's this one. Terry Cruz. I don't know if my friends will let me get away with that.

Starting point is 01:01:30 Well, as you come into my office and there's posters of the films that I've made in the wall. So it's like, that's my Kanye moment there. Gotta cheer for yourself first. That's right. I know we only have a few more minutes. Sure. So just a couple more questions and then hopefully we'll do a round two sometime.

Starting point is 01:01:45 But I'm not going to go through all my usual rapid-fire questions, but one I would love to ask is, what is the book that you've gifted most to other people? Oh, I tell you what. I gave the Bhagavad Gita to a lot of people. This was right after, I guess it would have been right after my son was born. And then right after I got divorced, somebody gave it to me and, and I got a lot out of it.

Starting point is 01:02:13 And again, it's, there's been multiple, multiple interpretations, multiple writings of it. Um, um, but, uh, there was one in particular interpretation. I can't remember who the writer was. Um, the guy who, the guy who basically did this translation. But I gave that book to, I don't know, a couple dozen people who they're like, yeah, I'm just like, I'm having a hard time right now. I don't know what to do. And I was like, you should read this book.

Starting point is 01:02:34 This is one of these books that has come up so many times in my life that I have not yet read. So this might be the final. I'm going to send you the translation that I read. Cool. Yeah, I appreciate it. It's kind of like the Tao Te Ching. It's like I put it off for...

Starting point is 01:02:47 I didn't put it off. It just never took the step to read it for decades and decades. Cool. This is good. This is a nudge that I need. And we talked about technology earlier. You have a lot of irons in the fire. Yeah.

Starting point is 01:02:59 Would you like to tell people about what you're up to in the tech space? Yeah. So this is a great thing i was just out at jason calacanis's launch in san francisco where big event we had a we had a company that had been in his incubator slash accelerator for the last four months called collect and this is a a company you can go to you can go to collect.com or you can download the apps in the itunes store but it's a it's a a company that is spelled as you would expect c-l-e-c-t yeah yeah so it's the whole genesis of this and what it is it's basically like a a geek collectible marketplace so anything that is geek anything you

Starting point is 01:03:35 would imagine at comic-con that you love from you know walking dead to whatever you know posters to action figures whatever those geeky things you love vinyl like. I collect a lot of vinyl caricatures made by pop artists. So anything, no matter what it is, you can find it on Collect. And so I was being chased by, I was finishing a movie in London, and the founder of the company, this guy Steve Brumwell, was chasing me, chasing me, chasing me. And he finally said, and I said, what is it? He goes, you're the only person that's going to get this. You you'll understand. And a couple of years ago I made a movie with Stanley

Starting point is 01:04:07 and Joss Whedon about comic-con. And then two years before that I made the Simpsons 20th anniversary special for Fox. Like, so I'm a, I'm like a geek to core into my core. Um, and so I said, what is it? Show it to me. So he showed me just like a flip deck of what it was. And I was like, I love this. And so we sat down, we talked about the company. I came on board as one of the, one of the founders early on, um, put money into the company. And it's one of those where I just, I believe in this. Like of the, what is it? I think it's $18 billion a year that's spent on eBay. A third of that, 6 billion is everything that lives within this geek space. So I think there's a great place to give people a better experience where you can actually have a geek to geek experience. So

Starting point is 01:04:42 there's kind of a great social atmosphere to it, but then there's also the ability to buy, to sell, to trade with fellow geeks and feel like you're actually getting something you love. So that's awesome. Do you have any particular favorite categories or items that you've seen on the site? Oh my gosh, there's so much fan art. There's so much stuff that people create on their own, which is awesome. And so I love seeing the stuff that people draw on their own, which is awesome. And so I love seeing the stuff that people draw on their own posters.

Starting point is 01:05:05 They create a, it's, it's spectacular. So for me, I love seeing things like that. Um, I love the people who have stuff that's still in the original packaging that's been on their shelves since like 19.

Starting point is 01:05:15 So people have like original star Wars toys from like when you and I were kids, it's still an original packaging. I'm like, that's, that is dedication. A lot of dedication, a lot of self control too.

Starting point is 01:05:23 I mean, I was a little kid. I still have all my old Star Wars toys, but the heads are gnawed on. Oh, yeah. The hands always got chewed off because I was a little animal. Yeah. I still have my original Darth Vader carry case that's in my kid's room that I wouldn't

Starting point is 01:05:37 let him play with for years until last year when I knew he wouldn't totally junk all the toys. So now he can actually play with the action figures. So collect C-L-E-C-t.com correct yeah and so uh yeah we just went through we just went through like our our kind of seed round it's it's it's exciting it's a cool thing and it's it's like i love having had my first startup you know which i started you know what was that 16 years ago and was going around and doing all the angel meetings back then i mean for me it was exciting to kind of be back in that space and it is it is a very similar hustle to raising money for movies. Um, you're just talking to, I think a lot

Starting point is 01:06:08 smarter people, like when the people that live and breathe in that space or people who, or people who pretend to be a lot smarter. That's right. That's true. That's true. You meet, you meet a lot of them as well. Yeah. Uh, okay. Last, last question before we, we wrap for this, this round one is if you could put a billboard anywhere with anything on it, not an advertisement necessarily for anything you're doing, what would you put on it? Oh, I feel like right now

Starting point is 01:06:32 it would have to be something Trump-related right now. I would have to have something with his tiny little hands and remind people what that means when he gets to the White House. Do you want these little hands on the button? I feel like I want people like what that means when he gets to the white house do you want these little hands on the button i feel like i want people to decide do you want these puckered lips yelling at foreign dignitaries do you want these little hands on the button that's right oh please

Starting point is 01:06:56 god yes it's it's it's becoming for reals right now it's like it's terrifying it's unbelievable yeah i'm in i'm in awe. I'm speechless. I'm absolutely speechless. I feel like it's... It takes a lot to make Morgan Spurlock speechless. But I feel like I'm in the middle of a reality show. You're watching this like, how is this actually happening? I don't understand how this is happening. Yeah.

Starting point is 01:07:16 Good golly, Miss Molly. Yes. These are scary, desperate, and surreal times that we live in. Completely. Where can people find you online, learn more about you, say hello on social? Yeah, on Facebook, which is just me, it's Morgan Spurlock. Then on Twitter, at Morgan Spurlock. Instagram's at Morgan Spurlock NYC.

Starting point is 01:07:38 Snapchat, you'll be able to track me down. I'm all over. I'm all over the social media. All over the interwebs. The interwebs. Which do you tend to use? What is your primary? I'm on Twitter all the time because'm all over the social media. All over the interwebs. The interwebs. Which do you tend to use? What is your primary? I'm on Twitter all the time because Twitter has become my news feed.

Starting point is 01:07:49 Twitter is my AP. Exactly. I'm on Twitter all day long, and it's just constant updates. I use it in the same way. Yeah, and I love that. It is a constant news source where I'll check into other newspapers along the day. I'll check in with the Times or Talking Points Memo or the New York Post or whatever because the New York Post is spectacular

Starting point is 01:08:07 and you have to. But the Twitter, I'm on Twitter all day long. Five, eight, nine, 12 times. At Morgan Spurlock. At Morgan Spurlock. And I'll give you, just since we're talking about tech,

Starting point is 01:08:19 one tip that I found really useful which is a service called Nuzzle, N-U-Z-Z-E-L, made by a friend of mine one tip that I found really useful, which is a service called nuzzle and use easy EL, uh, made by a friend of mine, which, uh, effectively looks for patterns among the people you follow.

Starting point is 01:08:33 And it will take, say the top five stories that are being spread and pushed out by the people you already follow. That's awesome. And create a digest for you. That's smart. So it's a really, really cool service that I'm surprised Twitter didn't make itself.

Starting point is 01:08:45 So you're saying I should stop following Kim Kardashian if I'm going to put it up for you? Well, it depends. It depends on who else you're following, I guess. You might want to stop following all of the Kardashians. That's right. Exactly. Well, this is great fun.

Starting point is 01:08:58 This has been awesome. Really fun to hang out. And to be continued and to everybody listening, of course, show notes, links to everything that we discussed, you'll be able to find at fourhourworkweek.com forward slash podcast. And Morgan, thanks so much for taking the time. Great to see you, man. Thank you. All right. Until next time. Thanks, guys. Hey, guys, this is Tim again. Just a few more things before you take off. Number one, this is five bullet Friday. Do you want to get a short email from me? Would you

Starting point is 01:09:31 enjoy getting a short email from me every Friday that provides a little morsel of fun before the weekend? And five bullet Friday is a very short email where I share the coolest things I've found or that I've been pondering over the week. That could include favorite new albums that I've discovered. It could include gizmos and gadgets and all sorts of weird shit that I've somehow dug up in the world of the esoteric as I do. It could include favorite articles that I've read and that I've shared with my close friends, for instance. And it's very short. It's just a little tiny bite

Starting point is 01:10:06 of goodness before you head off for the weekend. So if you want to receive that, check it out. Just go to fourhourworkweek.com. That's fourhourworkweek.com all spelled out and just drop in your email and you will get the very next one. And if you sign up, I hope you enjoy it.

Pet Camera - EBO Air 2

The Tim Ferriss Show - #150: Morgan Spurlock: Inside the Mind of a Human Guinea Pig

There aren't comments yet for this episode. Click on any sentence in the transcript to leave a comment.

Your Ad Here

Pet Camera - EBO Air 2

The Tim Ferriss Show - #150: Morgan Spurlock: Inside the Mind of a Human Guinea Pig

There aren't comments yet for this episode. Click on any sentence in the transcript to leave a comment.