Where Everybody Knows Your Name with Ted Danson and Woody Harrelson (sometimes) - Charlie Day

Episode Date: August 20, 2025

Actor, writer, and director Charlie Day talks with Ted Danson about the process of creating “It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia,” why he sometimes goes by “Charlie Trombone,” overcoming typecasting, meeting his wife Mary Elizabeth Ellis, his relationship with Guillermo del Toro, and working with Ethan Coen on the new film “Honey Don’t!”Like watching your podcasts?  Visit http://youtube.com/teamcoco to see full episodes. 

I flipped, I turned, I started interviewing you, which I know is not what you wanted, but... No, it is. It is. Okay, good. Welcome back to where everybody knows your name. Today, I'm talking to a super talented actor, writer, director, and executive producer, Charlie Day. He is a co-creator and co-creator. Star of It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia, the longest running live-action sitcom in history.

If you're a fan of the show, you also know that he's an insanely creative musician. He plays piano, trombone, guitar, and harmonica. Charlie has an impressive career in film as well, from Pacific Rim to horrible bosses to Monsters University. Now he's starring in a new dark comedy film called Honey Don't, written and directed by Ethan Cohen. It opens in theaters this week, August 22nd. Without further ado, Charlie Day. Thanks for coming in. Oh, man, I'm so happy to be here.

No, you're pissed off because you ran into a pillar downstairs. Because I backed into the wall. Man, you know, and I was being so cocky, too. I thought I got this. I'll just spin it around, no big deal. And then I go through phases. This is one of them. I have banged into the wall at my house because we have to park on the street.

And I've done it twice now in the last week. I'm not sure why I'm doing it, but I am. They're making cars bigger. This is the problem. I am driving a honker. I'm driving in Rivian. Yeah. Yeah, that's a lot of car.

Yeah. I'm not a supercar guy, but I got a old vintage car because I've always loved them. It's fascinating how much smaller. I mean, they're just so much smaller. Inside, taboo. Everything. Yeah, everything. Can we talk about what you do have?

What kind of car? It's a 1970 9-11 Porsche. 9-11 T. The S was like the fancier one. The T was a little bit more of the just sort of everyday, if there is an everyday Porsche. But it's great. I love it.

Although I haven't been driving it a lot. I almost drove it down here. And now, since I've backed into a wall, I'm glad I didn't drive it down here. I was about to say you must be really pissed. Oh, no, no. No, no, no. And that's under a tarp in my driveway.

Oh, all right, good. Yeah. I don't want to buy a car that if I don't put the dings and dents, which I will, and then it makes me upset, I don't want that car. That's right. You know, I want to be able to ding it at my pleasure. Because it's going to happen, especially in this town. Yeah.

Trouble is when you reach my age and you start dinging things, people go, oh. Oh, boy. Oh, boy. But that's why you have to keep a record of how many things you dinged prior. So you say, it's got nothing to the age. Look how off, it's just me. Yes. About five years ago, I started doing joke trips.

I would trip. Oh. Purpose to as a joke, figuring that I could gracefully move into the real trips and people would still think I was making a joke. Yeah. Although it comes to an age rate where I'm not going to say it. But, you know, you should be a little bit careful with those joke trips. Yeah.

The joke trips. Because suddenly people are flying in from out of town because you did one little joke trip. Hey, I have to start this off. just to be whatever. I can't hold things back, especially at my expense. I have had two or three little encounters with you, one dinner with a lot of people around your wife. I've worked with your wife for two years,

and I need to talk about her for a minute as well. But I've always gone, Jesus, Charlie Day, he's got the guy reeks of confidence. He's like this amazing man. I hadn't seen anything that you had done. I could tell. You know, you know, you can tell. You can tell, and now you're going to really tell it,

because Jesus, Lord, you were talented. You did your homework? Yes. You're all caught up? No, I'm not all cut up, but for a week I've been glued to you. Oh, that's what you to say. And you are amazingly talented, Charlie. You're a nice man, and continue.

I shouldn't cut you off. Go on, go on. No, I will. I will. And Mary, Mary came in and started watching with me, and, you know, her sweet spot is nine-year-old boy humor. She was riveted, and we will, I don't know how many, 170 episodes of... Yeah, I think we're up to 178 or maybe 180 something.

Yeah. I know. It's wild. Well, we are going to watch them. You're going to watch them all? Yeah. Yeah, because you are funny and you make us laugh. I love that.

On top of that, while you're doing that, you are so talented at your instruments, your music, your songwriting, you're singing, everything about that is really fun to watch. Well, it's all up there on the screen. There's not a lot of talent beyond what you see. I just dumped it all on screen and, like, let me get all my tricks in so I can get the maximum amount of credit, which I'm receiving right now. So it was worth it. Yeah.

Yeah. We'll move on to you, not right now, but you're directing. So you're all over the place. You write the show? Yeah. Right? Mm-hmm. And you direct them now or no?

No, no, we don't direct them. Who directs? Do you have somebody come in? We have multiple people throughout the year. You know, we got to a point where, as you know, I'm sure, you know, when you're your show running a show, you're calling so many of the shots, right? You're picking the props. Yes.

You're casting it. You're signing off on locations. You're in the editing. room, you do the final cut. So we got to the point where we thought, well, if we're directing them all too, we're taking a job off the table for somebody else. And so every season we have a couple people direct the episodes. And that way, you know, we have a lot of friends who've been doing it now for years. And they count on those jobs a year. And each episode counts. So I kind of don't want to steal any of them.

And are you doing, how many cameras do you have up and running when you do it? We always have three tiny little handheld cameras, which we started with. In fact, when we, I don't know how many of your listeners know, but I'm just going to gloss over it, assume they know, when Rob and Glenn and I got together and started making the original version of the show, which was just like us shooting in our apartments, I don't know if you know about this. I read about it, but tell me. Well, you know, we were all acting.

I was doing a multi-cam with Luis Guzman, who I just ran into it in New York. He's a wonderful actor. Oh, he's the best. Wait, what were you doing? The Louis Show. We did 10 episodes for Fox and we got canceled after airing three. And I remember hanging out with Rob and saying, man, we really should make our own show. And then a few weeks later, he and Glenn had come up with an idea to shoot this scene where Glenn comes over to my house.

to ask for some sugar and I tell him that I have cancer and he has to take that info in but still figure out how to ask for his sugar because I don't offer the sugar at any point. Right. So I was thinking, man, how can I consult this guy but still get my sugar? And that essentially became what the show became. So those guys went off and I think maybe wrote a first draft based on that sketch and then brought it to me. And we got these cheap little cameras. It was called a Panasonic DVX 100A. And we shot it ourselves, you know? Like, I would hold the camera and you would say your line.

And you had the good mics and all that. So it was looking professional? We had a mic screwed to the top of it, which was good enough. You know, that camera looked semi-professional. It looked better than what a digital camera looked like previously. to that. It looked like film, or cheap film, like, almost like Super 8 film, or 16mm. Yeah. And I think it made all the difference. And we still shoot on those cameras. Only we have the HD version now, which I can't stand. But it's still these cheap little handheld cameras. And always three roving around, almost like a documentary. Back up one step. How did you guys have the wherewithal guts to think? Oh, we can make something that, and this.

This will, something will come of this. Well, because that's not a normal actor thing to do. We normally wait around and, you know. We normally wait around. Mr. Rob Mack, his name was Mackleheny, but he dropped that old henny, and he's now going by Mac, Rob Mac. Rob is an inspiringly tenacious person.

And I think Glenn and I probably would have just kind of kept farting around and auditioning and trying to make things happen that way. But Rob has a fire under his belly, which is either saying, hey, let's make a TV show guys and really pushing us to do it or saying, hey, I think I'm going to buy a soccer team with Ryan Reynolds.

It's fascinating. The guy's incredible. So that's a big part of it. That's a big part of it. I think he really wrangled us in. So you make that first little, was it a complete show episode? Yeah, we made.

one episode and I'd been shooting a bunch of really funny home videos just for fun with my roommate at the time a guy, an actor named Jimmy Simpson, great actor. And so I had experience like shooting things and

so we we shot that and it was a full episode and we thought oh this is okay, not great. But since it costs us nothing, let's redo it. And a couple weeks later we started reshooting

the whole thing all over again Rob actually at the time wasn't playing himself and so our friend David Hornsby who's written with us for years and stars in the show occasionally as Rickie Cricket

the priest turned homeless man he was playing Rob anyway they swapped out and we shot it again and it looked pretty good. We thought, boy, this is really funny. We're starting to hit a tone here. And we were stealing from Ricky Jervais's The Office,

the way it was shot. It was so loose and handheld. And a little bit, I think maybe the first season of Kirby Enthusiasm was out. So we were stealing that really natural, cheap way of doing things. We were not attempting to make it look like cheers. We were not attempting to make it look like friends. You couldn't do that.

At best, maybe it could look like. like waiting for guffman or something, you know. So we had this one episode and we showed it to our agents. You know, we weren't just like, we were in the business. We were working. We were auditioning. We had all, Glenn had gone to Juilliard and I gone to Williams Town Theater Festival. Rob had an agent. So we were all, and we had the same manager. We gave it to our manager and we said, what do you think of this? They loved it. They said, yeah, let's try to attach a big producer to you guys to help package thing. Well, we waited for months and months and months for anyone to watch it. And, you know, no one was watching it. And we had a few general meetings, but no one was saying yes. And Rob being

the tenacious guy that he is, says, I think we should shoot another one, shoot episode two. And we're like, well, we don't have anything else to do. So we shot a second episode. And did you write this one or did you kind of improv your way through it? It was always the same process as it is now, which is, it's fully scripted, but we also improv our way through it. So we'll write a scene and then we'll shoot it, but then we say, can we throw this all away and come up with something better? Not all away, but can we improve upon this? We shot that second episode. Now we really thought we had something.

We talked to where we're... Sorry, and you had two cameras or three going at that point or still just one? At that point only two. But what we leave- Friends who said, yeah, I'll shoot it for you. Yeah, yeah, we had a friend helping hold it, you know, and I would sometimes have the boom or Glenn would have the boom. And the key, really, from a comedy standpoint,

is that no one was ever off-camera. So it's gold for comedy because you're catching the little awkward moments. We could talk all over each other, which is so much more natural, and we could be loose and improv and not have to, recreate that improv when we turn the cameras around what happens though i mean that's kind of blake edwards ask in that he didn't do a lot of coverage he'd do that roving you know master they would become as you know single and something for but sure there's no editing that's uh but there's no editing yeah so if you're seen sucks or it's not quite funny are you stuck with

it or can you cut in and around it if everyone's on camera the whole time you can because the way we do it, it's a little bit more just like cross-shooting a scene. So you have two separate angles. And then we repeat the scene from the same angles. So if I like something you did in the second take, we can cut that in with the first take because the blocking hasn't changed.

But anyway, we got that second episode, and we thought, this one's really funny, even funnier than the first one. and eventually we got fed up with waiting on the meetings and I think Rob threatened to fire his agent and they set up meetings around town and we had a few offers

I think MTV offered to make it and Comedy Central offered to rewrite it but FX which was where we wanted to be said we'd like this there's something here we'll give you guys a real budget and by real budget I mean 300,000 to shoot an actual pilot. And then we re-shot it with a real budget.

What changed? More cameras, more lighting, more lighting, more crew. It was a little bit frustrating for us because we thought, oh, I want to move the camera over there. And now I'm not allowed to touch the camera. So I have to tell a guy to tell a guy, you know. But then what happened? Then, yeah, then they watched it and they liked it, and they said, we're going to offer you guys seven episodes.

We said, great, who's going to run it? And they said, you guys are going to run it. And we thought, oh, right, right, of course. No one's going to come now do it for us. You know, in hindsight, that seems crazy. Like, of course you were going to do it. But, I mean, I was 27 years old at the time. And, you know, still doing it.

I'm 49 now, so a good chunk of my life. But, and then it was just trial by fire. We were just trying to figure out how to write seven episodes. And, you know, we brought in directors and stuff. And this guy, Dan Adius, came in, did a few. And he brought a new sort of look to the camera that we thought, oh, that's really interesting. And it just kept growing and growing and growing.

And you then, did actors want to come play at the number that they are clearly now? everyone and their uncle wants to be in this. No, nobody wanted to be in it, except for young aspiring actors like us, you know, who are looking for any job. But we did seven episodes, and they were mixed reviews, I'd say. The ratings were okay,

but we were doing this so cheaply, so absolutely dirt cheaply, that FX said, you know, if you can get a name attached, we think we can get more eyeballs on this and we'll give you a second season. And John Langraff had worked with Danny DeVito at Jersey Films. And Danny's kids had watched that first season and liked it.

And so we went after Danny and Rob decided it'd be better that it's not all three of us there, just that Rob goes and talks to him. So Rob went and talked to him and Danny said he liked it and wanted to do it. And then Danny... You presented him with, this is who you'd be, what you'd be. Uh-huh. And we kind of came up with the character. and then we shot Danny in 15 days.

We said, and here's the icing on the cake here. We'll do all your scenes first for season two, and then we'll go do the rest of the season without you, which was a continuity nightmare, but we did it. But he had so much fun and fell in love with the process that, you know. You too seem to me, this is the outsider, like kindred spirits. you both have this Italian I mean I don't know what it is

but I'm sitting here going I imbue you with so much knowledge so much macho so much everything man every you know without even knowing you just listening to you and I do the same thing with Danny he's like the godfather he really is

well he certainly has been to me yeah I clicked with Danny immediately and I'm so in love with him as a person and a friend and in some ways a father figure. And there couldn't have been a more perfect example for someone to work with. And also as you started to, as we all started to become more recognizable, to learn how to handle that and how well he's handled that.

And yeah, I don't know. I think there's a rascleness to both of us. And an irreverence. There's an irreverence to the material. to importance. No, fuck importance. Let's just have the best... Stick your thumb in the eye of the powers that be.

I don't know. I mean, also, here's the other thing. I love, and as does Rob and Glenn, I love entertainment. I love movies. I love TV. I've seen every episode of Cheers. I'd seen every episode of Taxi.

I've seen every episode of Nightcourt. And like, I loved how grimy nightcourt felt you know so that when we were making a sitcom i was like i want to make a grimy one that's rough for all the edges i want characters that drink and you know uh that are a mess and i don't know i think we grew up on on classic like the best i think the heyday of do you think curb helped in some way because it kind of blew uh like you did i mean they're like sitcoms on acid. I mean, it's so changed the form of what you

could get away with. Yeah, curb was big for that. But you were coming up the same time? Was that roughly? I think we're about a year later. The British office was really big for that. The British version, I don't know if you've seen Rick Jervais's version of the office, but it blew us

away. And just the edge and the tone and that sort of awkward comedy. Have you bumped into him since this? No. I think, no, actually. I've been in the same building with him, but I don't think we met.

Right. I haven't either. Also, you know, that sort of edgy go after the system, like the Daily Show was big with John Stewart when we aired. He's back now, but the original, you know, let's take everyone and everything down and laugh at all that and ourselves in the process. So that style of comedy, I'm sure, was a heavy influence.

How many you've done, what, 17 seasons? Yeah, the 17th is airing right now. And are you back next year? Do you know? Yeah. Yeah, we're going to start the Writers' Room in October. I don't know. It's crazy how we're doing it because the last year we wrote all eight episodes in eight weeks,

which was not enough time. And there was a lot of writing on the weekends. And then shooting takes how long for you guys? Two and a half months. I mean, it's so fast. Yeah. The whole thing maybe is six months. But, yeah, we're going to do it at least one more time.

I know that much. Well, let's jump over now to Mary Elizabeth. Oh, well, we don't have enough time here. You're right. She's spectacular. I love your wife. She's extraordinary. and you know you really you're interviewing the wrong person here you got the second banana

when it comes to charisma and talent and uh by the way she's great on your show and i love your show she is so good on the show and so sweet and kind to me she she she'll i could watch her when i ask her the same question that i asked her a couple days beforehand and i see her eyes cool a little sad and a little sweet and then she takes care of of me. She's always taking care of me like what she is, you know, like my, as if she were playing my daughter. Yeah. Constantly. And she's so down. She's great. And then, you know, she's great on our show and she's great on your show. And I loved her in Lickrish Pizza. I don't know if you saw. I didn't see that. It's great. It's worth seeing. And she, you know, she just pops in and out of that

movie, but she's fantastic in it. I had, I think the first clip I watched this week with the two of you, in Reno 911 plain incestuous brother and sister well you know we went on an audition and I got an audition for that and I said Mary Elizabeth's coming with me or maybe we both somehow got the other

I don't recall but we said let's go into the audition and tell them that we're brother and sister and that they don't know what you're going to do you sort of improv the audition and we lied and told them we're brother and sister and then sort of went into that you know arguing turning into making out

which they thought was hilarious. And then, yeah, that was up. So that way, that was not on the page. No, I know. We came up with that. Oh, that's so good boy. That is palsy. Yeah.

Well, that was what that show was, I think, too. But I watch her, it's like, oh, wait, I have her pegged wrong. She's not just this sweet, kind, you know. Oh, no. She's a biker chick from hell. Yeah, she's such a good performer that she's, yeah, got you thinking that she's just that character, your daughter, No, I mean, she's wildly edging.

It's incredible. Yeah, I catch a little bit every once in a while. Yeah. Enough to go, I don't want to ever piss your wife off, ever. Oh, no, no, no. No. She's, she's strong-minded, for sure. She's a little bit like Ria, Perlman.

Oh, yeah, I could see that. Don't want to fuck with Ria either, you know. Yeah. I like that. I'm into a strong woman, especially when there's, like, something I don't feel like dealing with. She's all over it, you know, like, even when we're, or young, if, like, somebody said something, you know, inappropriate in a bar or whatever, I would just kind of, like, kick back by, oh, buddy, you stepped in it. Good luck.

How'd you guys meet? When? This is great. We, uh, long time ago, 2000, December 2001, we were in New York. I was doing a play. I lived there, and she was in town doing a play a friend had written. And, um, I think she was only, um, I think she was only, only in for a month. And she came and saw a show that I was in, and we had one mutual friend in common. And I met her after the show, and she was wearing like a crazy, like, puffy jacket, and she had painted a star in her cheek. And I was like, who is this wild person? And I talked with her for a minute, and then we all went out to a bar, and then I was over with my friends, and then there was some drunk Irish guy hitting on her. And so I pretended to

be her boyfriend for a minute to get the guy to go away. Actually, first I arm-wistled my buddy to see which one of us was going to go and flirt with her and I beat him. And then I said, okay, it's me. And then so I went over and I had to interview her boyfriend, which she enjoyed. And then I invited her to come hang out with me after and she said yes. And I don't, you know, that was how many years ago? 24 years ago. 24 years And, yeah, not a day's gone by since, you know, I've never not spoken with her every day since. And how long before you got married? Well, we started dating, like, right away. And she lived out in California.

And then I came out for pilot season and crashed in her house for like a month until her roommates kicked me out. And then I moved out to L.A. maybe the next year or later that year. and we got married in 2005. So, yeah, we did it for a few years. Yeah. Nice. It's been good. It has.

Yeah. But she just left me. She found someone great and, no, no, no. An Irish dude or something. Yeah. No, we've been on a, we've been really lucky and fortunate and, you know, raise a son together and. Russell.

Yeah, he's 13 now. who by the way I showed or Mary Elizabeth showed stepbrothers speaking of Mary liking dark comedy she's so funny in that and that movie holds up I haven't seen it a long time

it's hilarious Richard Jenkins and she are married a married couple in this with the two crazy and they're they looked at each other the second day of watching John C Riley and Will and they went

What are we doing? We can't compete with this. But that was not their job. Their job was to allow the audience into, no, this is real. These are these people are real and they're insane and we will somehow take you through this journey. They have to anchor the insanity, otherwise it doesn't work. Yeah. And they did that brilliantly.

They really did. But they're not funny in their own right. No, yeah. They're just one notch above sane, you know. And that movie's great. Now I know what kind of parents you are. How old was Russell? Now, 14 when he watched?

That was this year. He's 13. 13. It's okay. It's just borderline. I think it is PG. That was maybe a rated-in-R movie. Oh, yes.

The ball sack. That's right. That's right. Well, that changed this year. I think prior to this year, we were kind of a little bit careful. And then there was the other day he, he, I was a couple months ago, He comes up to me and goes, Dad, how did you feel about me watching Squig Game?

And I go, oh, I don't know, man. Let me talk to Mom. Maybe we could watch it with you. And then I was looking at his face and I go, did you watch Squig Game? He goes, yeah, I might have watched Squid Game. So, you know, I think there's protecting and then there's overly protective.

And then there's a certain point where they reach an age. where you're like, well, the cat's out of the bag. You know, they're on their own. The ship is sailing. Let me back up. So you grow up Rhode Island? No. And your parents are both very musical.

One's a professor of? Yes. My father was a professor at Salve Regina University, which is the college in Newport, Rhode Island. And my mother taught at a little private school. She taught kindergarten through eighth grade music. And did they have instilled? instruments that they played or was that they both played the piano and there were always instruments

in the house because my mom was the music teacher so then you know the guitar and the box of uh uh recorders and you know a zither or something might be lying around and i did fiddle with everything you know when when this is before uh the internet and phones so you know i found ways to kill time by noodling on things. And I took some formal piano lessons. I kind of quit at like 10. Then I switched into trombone. I took that till high school and I was like,

I'm not going to get caught dead with the trombone here. So I've already screwed myself in junior high. In fact, I had a sweatshirt where they say your banishment in your name and mine was Charlie Trombone. And sometimes I'll check into a host. hotel, as I guess I won't now, but as a Charlie Trombone, and I'll get the call, you know, from the front desk, like, Mr. Trombone, but you're like, so I got to stop doing that. But, and then, and then in high school, on my senior year, I picked up a guitar, and I was like, oh, I want to learn to play this because I, A, it will be fun, and B, I think girls will like it if I do. And did you sing? I think I was

Because you learn more guitar If you're trying to play a song You do tend to stick with the guitar I had a Neil Young book And it was like Neil Young decade And I learned all the I had the CD too So I learned all the songs along with it

And those are good ones for beginning There's a lot of D and E minor And then there's a funky chord That you're like oh what's that So I kind of got capable on that And the harmonica too and then in college I would sort of like

hang out and make up funny songs about people you know as they came in and out of the room so just a little bit of a precursor of what I see when I watch Philadelphia yes when you're performing and singing and doing musicals for sure

for sure I mean that's always been in me and then I switched back to the piano too and started noodling on that as well and I got to the point where is a pretty good noodleer. Like, if you didn't know a ton about music, you'd be like, wow, he's really good.

I did. That's what I did. Well, yeah. Okay. Well, that's, it's all smoking mirrors. Because if you're an actual musician, you're like, his left hand is doing, is playing two notes. And the right is, there's a lot of flare there, but, you know, it's like a facade and a movie set where it would have fall down

and there's, you know, nothing but little boards holding it up. But I'm passable on instruments. and making funny songs up is that that came from college years and yeah that came from college years and then i went to the place called the williamstown theater festival how i got my foot in the door to acting and this great guy david hornsby who i mentioned earlier who um writes with us and sunny he was he was there uh at the festival and we used to improv a musical

called the paper boy and it was just about a paper boy moving to the big city from a small town and it, you know, just dumb jokes, but we would gather a group of people and we would just sort of improv a musical as we went along and then, you know,

some of the songs were pretty great, some were pretty terrible, but that's the nature of those kind of dumb musical gags did make its way into Sunny. And was that in front of an audience or was this workshop-y kind of

an audience of our peers so that was like after the plays were done gather a group of people in this one area of maybe a dorm or administration building i forget where we were and drink a few beers and we'll make you guys laugh did you did you earlier before that no oh i want to become an actor was that a moment or was it just something you slipped and slided into i knew i liked it i knew I knew I'd done a play or two as a kid at school. And then I did a play in my senior year of high school. And it was one of the few things that felt like it was coming natural to me on like math or science or reading or sports or anything. I didn't feel like I had to convince anyone to put me in a play the way I had to convince somebody to put me on a sports.

So it was nice that it was coming easier. But when I got to college, I kind of started to get interested in it. And when someone introduced me to the Williamstown place, it blew my mind because not only were we in these professional plays with real career actors, some of them I didn't think were very good. And I thought, well, wow, if that guy can do it, maybe just maybe there's a reality. to it. But prior to that experience, I never met a professional actor in my life as far as I knew an actor was being Tom Cruise. How do you just go straight to Tom Cruise? And seeing every day working Broadway actors made it seem attainable. So yeah, that is really where it all. And were you smitten? Oh, immediately. Yeah, me too. It's like joining the circus. It's like, oh, God, I'm in.

You find your people and... Yeah. And I still love it. you still lot? Oh, passionately. Yeah. Truly. I want to do this the rest of my life. I want to know what it's like to be funny at every age possible. Let me ask you this. How do you, how did you, because I guess enough time has passed, how did you wrestle with being a television character so known and so recognizable because you're in people's homes? You were in it for what, 12 seasons on shows? 11, yeah. you're such a staple of American television society and as this one character.

Did that ever, was that ever a challenge for you? I wouldn't say it is so much for me, but sometimes, sometimes I'm like, oh, did I overstay my welcome here? Am I only ever going to be this character from Sunny? But how was that for you? First off, the transition was easy. because I blew my personal life up so badly in that moment of leaving that I didn't even

dawned in me that I'd quite left cheers for months because I was just dealing with myself and my personal stuff. Do you think that I imagine those were related in some way, if not subconsciously? I think I left cheers because I went, well, I'm blowing shit up in my life for the better. You know, I was changing for the better and working really hard at that. So I thought, might as well jump completely, you know, off the cliff. And a little bit of if I don't leave now, and this is not for you, if I don't leave now, I may not know if I could do anything else,

and I want to see if I can do other stuff. Yeah. But I do the whole typecasting thing is I think in your hands, it's not, you know, there are little bumps in the road where critics or people don't want you to be what anything else because they discovered you and loved you how you are

but if you don't pay any attention to that and you just keep trying to be around the most creative people and you've already done that you're working with directors like Guillermo del Toro

give me a break right Ethan Cohen and you're directing yourself so if you're staying at such a high level and from my vantage point of creativity

that that's not even something you should think about no it's I mean It's not so much. But then as we were, actually as I was driving over here, I was thinking about asking you that. Also, I was the audience way into Wacky World. So I wasn't part of Wacky World. Sam Malone was, you know, the way.

Sam Malone, my job was to love every character in the bar. Yeah. In regard, unconditional love of everybody there. And that allowed the audience into that wacky world. That's how Jimmy Burroughs described it. that's right my job you know so that's a different it was easier

to not be Sam alone than probably it was some of the other characters yeah I would imagine I would imagine you know well not to get too much into cheers but that's okay it was it was such a I mean it was it was

the show yeah it certainly was for me writing too it was like the writing was just superb yeah I rewatched the pilot but not that long ago. And it's so strong and it holds up. Although there was one shot.

I saw, I was like, out of focus. I was like, wow. Oh, no. How do they have an out of focus shot? Tons. Yeah. Because there are four cameras zooming around. Right.

It was pre-video playback, pre-video. You had a film camera. Yeah. Yeah. And Jimmy would, Jimmy Burroughs, who directed almost all of them during the camera blocking day. he would look through the lens and go, yeah, that's it and all of that. But they were also zinging around because it was a huge kind of proscenium arch stage that bar.

So they were being pushed all around and, you know, slamming into their position at the last second. There was tons before they had video playback and he could sit in one place and watch everything. There was a lot out of focus, which is, I think, a testament to the joke. Yeah, yeah, yeah. The joke was so good. It was so good that you're saying it's worth leaving it in. Yeah. Yeah, and I think that's the priorities were in the right place there.

Yeah. Yeah, I think, well, that's why it was an all-time great show. Thanks, yeah, it was. Very lucky. Good upbringing. Okay. I flipped it. I started interviewing you, which I know is not what you wanted, but.

No, it is. It is. Okay, good. Just give me a little break. minutes about me okay okay here we go how's your health oh shit can we change your good it's good good my health is good thanks for asking yeah um yours yeah solid good great okay so tell me about Guillermo del Toro oh my god because that's a big huge that was Incredible. Just an incredible thing. I think I was on set of Sunny, and I got a, it must have been my agent, I assume. It was a call saying, are you familiar with Guillermo del Toro? He's like, yeah, sure. And he's like, well, he wants to meet you. Great. They're like, we don't know what it is. We don't know. Yeah, I think he has a project coming up. You know, will you go meet him? I said, yes, get off the phone. I'm going.

So I went to Bleak House, which is his office up in Westlake Village, and I was told that he has a monsters galore. Yeah, a Monsters galore house. Yeah. And I'm driving around West Lake Village, and for your listeners, Westlake Village is maybe an hour out of Los Angeles, and it is an area probably constructed within the last 50, 60 years. and it looks like a town from Leave It to Beaver, right? Or like a Disney set. So I'm looking for the dark castle, and I'm not seeing one.

You know, I'm driving down the road, and I'm like, where, what? I thought it was here. And I get to the end of the roads, and I turn around, I'm going back, and I notice that one of these Leave It to Beaver houses has all the windows blacked out. And I go, oh, okay.

It must be that one. And then as I get closer, I notice there's like a black muscle car in the driveway. I'm like, okay, okay, this is a spot. And as they get close, so I notice the doorbell is like a gargoyle. I'm like, great, I got it. And he opens the door. And the first thing he says to me, he goes, are you a geek? I don't know how to answer that.

I don't, and I think, sadly, no, like not to the level of geekdom that. And do you mean geek, like in this circus definition? You're kind of right. Yeah, I think in the definition of like I know everything about every monster and comic book, which I don't. But that doesn't mean I don't enjoy and appreciate all that stuff. So it was great to be in that space. And he showed me his room. He had a little writing room with like a rain machine, I think where he wrote Pan's Labanth.

It was incredible. But, and then asked me to be in that wonderful movie. And it was a great experience. And we made one deal exchange. and he said, I want to be on Sunny. He said that in advance. In advance. Oh, my God.

That's amazing. And that was an easy yes for me. That would have been funny if you'd walked away from that. I think he's done. Yeah, no, no thanks. Good to meet you. I think he did two episodes of Sunny. Yet, I've only done one Guillermo del Toro movie,

so it doesn't totally feel fair. I think he owes me one. Listen to up, Guillermo. Yeah, he's just been the greatest guy and a good mentor. And every now and then when I'm working on a thing and I get stuck, he's been very willing to let me ask him some questions. Maybe too much. Maybe I might have burned him out.

No, I bet not. I met him. I can't remember where coming and passing in a hallway or somebody. And he called out my name and I went, oh my God, this is it. Yeah. You know, this is my chance. And he was very sweet. And we talked and talked and wanted to have.

dinner with me and Mary and of course, of course. Basically, he was using me to get to my wife, Mary, who he did cast in Nightmare Alley, which was spectacular. And she had this amazing part in it. But I think he felt bad poorly, and he knew I liked tequila.

So he told me that his doctor said, or he decided not to drink any more tequila, but because he's Guillermo del Toro from Mexico, everyone in the world gives them the best tequila, the most incredible. He said, I can't drink it anymore. If you'd like some, meet me or come out and something, and it never quite work. And then finally, this was crazy, let's meet. There's a gas station on sunset and PCH.

I meet you there in half an hour, he said to me, jump in my car, soon back. And it was literally like a drug deal. His car came in one way in my car and we put our trunks next to each other and he popped his trunk and out came the most amazing two or three boxes, cardboard boxes of tequila.

One from that was made in his name and had a monster like case that was opened up. But anyway, I scored. He was the most fascinating person I've ever worked with in many ways. The level, the level of detail on his sets

I've told the story to a few people but in Pacific Room there's one sequence where I'm being chased by this giant monster and I'm running through the crowded streets of Hong Kong and we're filling this indoors in Toronto in a huge hangar and they built like two city blocks and there's rain machines everywhere by the way the rain wasn't in the script

that was a real bummer to be like it's going to be raining on me constantly but I go to get out of the rain between takes and I go into one of these restaurants and I go about eight tables back and the menu on the table is covered in little blue fingerprints and there's an aspect of the story that these monsters breathe blue

and people have face masks with blue on them and I'm sorry they bleed blue and there's blue and just the thought it occurred to me is like wow he or somebody had the thought to say hey people probably have blue all over their hands and so if you've been holding a menu there's probably going to be blue fingerprints at a table that the camera was never going to see

but the level of detail and how rich that world has an impact on your acting oh yes I mean the acting is you know it's so easy to just sort of dip right in But it certainly just had an impact on my thinking in terms of, you know, how, to what degree you can influence the art, you know, the storytelling. I don't think I'll ever achieve that level of, but that's his own thing. That's his own magic. In fact, at one point, they were shooting some CGI thing, and he was scratching the lenses of the camera or he's having someone do it. Did I tell you this? No, I read something, please, I want to hear it.

He said, you know, I want the audience to see something imperfect before they see the perfection that is CGI. So that man's mind works in an amazing way. You mean what he was shooting right before the cut would be to see? So as you're seeing the CGI, you're seeing it through a scratch lens on the camera. So you see something, I guess, analog and imperfect over the top of the... To allow you, the audience from the imperfect world into that. Yeah, to feel as though they're seeing something real. They say, I know I'm seeing something real for a moment.

I don't know if it's an interview I saw you give, but you said something about how intimate it was for such a huge project. The actual acting in the scene was very intimate. I don't know if you said that or I'm making that up. But I watched Mary shoot a scene, and his chair was like, you know, 10 feet away. He wasn't looking at a monitor. He was just looking at you. Oh, yeah.

And it was so big, old huge movie, but the moments were so, you felt so watched by him. And every detail, like you were talking about, Mary was saying, every detail of the art and the costume and the world that he created was so specific. that you couldn't help but just leap into that imaginary world you were being asked to act. It's a dream for an actor, you know, to know that you're stepping into someone who has a fully realized vision and that, you know, when they ask you to do X or Y or Z, you know that that fits into this thing that they're building, and that's why they're asking it. At the same time, there were several times where he was like, okay you're going to be running from this monster

and I'm going to be flipping these cars over you because the monster is thrashing the cars don't trip I'm like okay yeah I'm like how come he's like because if you trip you of course die so there were a few aspects who was directing that were like wow I'm really getting shot

out of a cannon here In fact, I was wearing the sort of honey, I shrunk the kid's kind of head contraption. And every time I put this thing on, I swear I felt this sharpest edge going into my ear. And I did not say anything because I, hey, I didn't want to get fired. B, I wanted this guy to like me. And C, I was like, I don't want to blow the take. So we would start the take and the little lights would flare up and I would be mind melding with the monster or whatever. And man, I'd feel like someone was sticking a knife in my ear.

and then we finished the take, I'd take the thing off. And then I kept looking for the jagged edge on the machine, but I couldn't find it. And then my science partner is actor, Byrne Gorman, has to wear it in one scene. And Byrne pops it on, and they start the take, he goes,

ah, this seems electrocuting me, man. And the props guy's like, oh, yeah, there's a loose wire. So I was getting electrocuted in almost every take. you know so there were certain things where you're like this is a this is an unruly amount of just wild things happening but i mean i'd do it all again in heartbeat okay Ethan Cohen oh man you're too astounding director yeah i a dream come true for me i think uh i don't know if there's another i'm sure everyone's a big fan but i am a massive

of Cohen Brother Nerd. So much so that not only have I seen all their movies, I've seen all their interviews. I've scoured the internet for every interview they've ever given. A, to learn how they think and what they think as a filmmaker, I'm sure if you wanted to go through every episode of Sunny and analyze it compared to Cohen Brothers things, there's so much that has either been stolen or accidentally repeated.

I just absolutely love the way these guys make. movies. So to get to work with him was it, or just Ethan at least, was a huge... This was like last year, right? This was last year. So this was a huge dream for me. But additionally,

it was such a great experience because I had the sort of big boy realization of I'm going to ask him all the questions I want to ask him for two reasons. One,

I've never worked with the same director twice so he's probably not going to cast me again anyway and two because you got to kind of at a certain point you get to an age where you're like you've got to let go of the fears of like what if this person doesn't like me I'm not going to be a jerk about it

but like I have questions I want to ask him and things I'm curious about and mostly about writing and maybe how they did this I felt as though I at this point could ask very educated questions that wouldn't be a nuisance to get asked and he could not have been more forthcoming

with all the information that he gave back to me while shooting well mostly before we were shooting we had a little bit of rehearsal time and some downtime between the rehearsals and you know once we were on set just focus on the work and gets work.

Questions like, can I ask? I was so curious about the writing process, which I had famously heard that they don't outline. And that seemed impossible to me, especially with how plot-heavy and twisty-turning certain films are, like Fargo or Miller's Crossing. And his answer to me was that they were editors first and that they write like editors.

They think of, well, what's the first thing that you will see? and what will we cut to next? And then when we've written that, we say, well, what will we cut to next until we just sort of feel as though we've reached an end? And he didn't say sometimes they will be going towards a thing, a plot device that they know they want to get to. But it was so sort of simplistic,

but also freeing in a way and freeing to hear him say that. And I do think I was able to, because I ask, not unselfishly, I ask to become better at what I'm doing, right? This is why I asked. And it was freeing a little bit, going into the reddish room of Sunday this year and writing the episodes and being like, wait, let me get back to a little bit of that style of writing,

which I think was sort of how we began, which is almost more like how improvisational in a way. Yes. You don't know what's coming next. Yes, right. Not so perfect in the, like, we have to get the math of this right. we have to map this out so perfectly that you can't be a little bit loose with the writing and just let the writing take you where it's going to take you. Which is not to say that we didn't outline all of sunny we did, but there was like one episode

that we got stuck on that we just threw away. And then over a weekend, I just sat down and wrote and said, let me just see where it just takes me and that process was just as good. So, yeah, I've been very lucky to get to work with people like both those guys who are certainly heroes to me. And then to get to be close enough to ask them about how they do what they do so that I can do what I do better. Did Fool's Paradise that you wrote and directed happen after Guillermo and before Ethan? After Guillermo and before Ethan. And that was a long and crazy process

oddly a script that I written in 2014 just sort of as a little one-off and then shot in 2018 and then realized I'd made

the deadly mistake of you know if you're going to play a silent character and you're going to ask the audience to watch that and you're not going to

go full Charlie Chaplin and do all the gags in the middle of it you know you're going to piss a lot of people off, which I did. But then I had another problem with that, which is that original movie was called El Tonto, and it was a very edgy satire about how this white guy keeps failing up in Hollywood and how this Mexican family who takes them in watches this happen.

Now, to hear that told now in 2025, that seems like, wow, what a good, poignant message to say. but when I was trying to sell the movie in 2020 and this was right when all the George Floyd stuff was happening it was like I was going to get canceled and never work again so I sort of that Guillermo helped me with the rewrites of that and we sort of

I concocted this version of it that follows Ken Jong that was not my original movie did you reshoot stuff I reshot 27 pages wow years later same cast same cast and most everyone came back Adrian came back and Kate came back and Ray came back How did you get that amazing cast? Sorry, but I mean it had to be off a really interesting good script

Yeah I think the the original script I think Which was a little bit stronger than what I ultimately wound up with Red really really really funny And it was fun for people to say hey I'm going to work a few days and come and play these roles. And then there's a piece of me that wishes I just put the original version out in 2018, but the stuff that we did with Ken,

it became a different thing. And I'm okay with it. And in fact, it's crazy now because I have people coming out to me almost on a daily basis, be like, you know what? I really love that movie. I can't wait to see it.

I just saw it from the trailer, which I saw today. I cannot wait to see it. It looks really good. There's a lot of great stuff and great performances in there. And I love the movie. But it's a little bittersweet because I definitely got roasted when the movie came out. And it wasn't originally what I was intending.

But I'll get right back on the horse as soon as I raise the money for the next one and make another one. I can't wait. Great. Yeah. Because that's what you're going to do, isn't it? Write and direct. Yeah, but I'll still show up and acting somebody's thing. I love that.

No, act in the stuff you're writing and directing. I think so. I mean, I know he's become a bit of a social pariah, obviously, but I loved Woody Allen movies. And I loved that he was in them. And there was something about, or, you know, Albert Brooks, who was at one of these dinners with Guillermo, same kind of thing.

I liked when a movie came from a director and a writer, and they were in the movie, and you said, oh, this is this particular voice. It's saying something. and it has a point of view that's uniquely itself. I've just been a fan of that, and if I'm lucky enough to keep doing it, I'll keep doing it. And it's not that you're a one is a control freak or something,

but it is nice to know that you are going to get to be able to, I mean, I don't like to watch my work because, well, for many reasons. First off, that's a normal actor. No, it is. Because what delight, you know, when I watch you, I am delighted and surprised, and I do not, did not see that coming. Well, I feel the same watching you. Right.

But when you watch your own work, it's like, saw that coming, saw that coming. So, you know, it's impossible to be delighted by it. I got broken of that stigma because on it's always sunny, we have to watch ourselves. No, that's what I'm saying. You get a, you also get a vote. You also are part of the, you're still part of the creator. You can't disassociate from the creative process because you're doing it all. Yeah.

And in fact, I think that's really satisfied. I fell more in love with it, you know, or equally in love with it. Because to get to work with Gamow, to get to work with Ethan and Trish, like, it's a similar thing. It's different because it's not mine, but then there's a joy because I get to be a part of someone else's vision. That is very thoughtful. Both of those people are very thoughtful. thoughtful. Yes, absolutely. So that's super satisfying. But even though, even the more sort of popcorn kind of bigger, fun, funny movies like horrible losses, those are great too. I don't know.

I like it all. Of course. I like to get to do it off. That doesn't mean they're not thoughtful, meaning somebody's put a lot of thought into it. It's not, it's not a committee coming up with something. It's not a committee. I haven't done anything good made by a committee. I feel that way with Mike Shore. I feel in such caring, thoughtful hands that I could work with him forever. Yes, and all his shows, you know, they have that voice that is singular to him and his collaborators.

You know, it's no, and that's the other thing with the acting in a movie or whatever that you work in. It's not, there's no one person, right? It's a group of people that you get a team together of either cast and crew and then you go make it. It's the best gig in the world, making movies. The greatest job. I mean, sometimes getting the work, that's the hardest part whether. Or promoting it.

I've learned, I've come around to learn to really enjoy that. Good. I have. I think in the beginning I was more self-conscious about it. And now I'm like, what a, it's a, I think I also really enjoy it now because of this format. But we're having like a real in-depth conversation and it's not 30 or two minutes on a talk show where you. You need one good joke and a ha-ha. You need some ha-has, which is fun too, but that's a different thing.

Yeah, yeah. I love this too. And I do think what you're doing here really has an impact beyond just the, look, it's fun to go on a, do a video where you're taking a lie detector test or whatever these fun, goofy things they want us to do to promote a movie, that's fine. But, like, this is a real conversation. I think it reaches people in a way that...

I wrote a email to Mark Marin, who I'd done his podcast early on with Glenn and I did it early on promoting Sonny. And I wrote him when I heard that he was stopping, just a nice letter to say, the impact that he had had on me. And he wasn't he one of the first? Oh, yeah, one of the first.

But some of those interviews not only got me from my commute from the Fox Lot back to the east side of L.A., but really touched me in a way where he was open about himself and his experience. And then some of them I got a peek into people's minds who I really greatly admired. So there's something about this format that I think is great. So I'm glad that it is now a part of the promotion circuit. As I'm here promoting Honey Don't, which comes out August 22nd. August 22nd. And I just watched it today.

Oh, you got to see it. Oh, no, I watched the whole thing. Oh, great. Great. Yeah. And delight, I mean, I do. I'm an Ethan Cohen fan. I mean, you got to be.

And you're always, always Mary, who cannot watch violence, can watch an Ethan Cohen movie. Interesting. It could be concurrent, but there is something always slightly, I don't know, whimsical, ironic, surprising, it's part of a bigger, interesting moment, visual, you know, it's just always, it's not gratuitous. Sure, even there, say, like, heavier movies, like, no country for old men, which if you read the Cormac McCarthy novel, you know, is this weighty thing, has a levity to it, whether it's the haircut that Javier Bardam has. Or I was talking about that this this morning. I'm working on a thing with Yorma Tukomi's, one of the Lonely Island guys. We're writing this, and we're writing this action thing.

And we're writing this sequence, and we're talking about this sequence where Javier Bardem, he lights a rag in a car, and he lights it on fire. And you know the car is going to blow up, and he walks into a, like a CVS-type store or a pharmacy, and he grabs the medicine he needs to fix himself because he's been shot and then the thing explodes

in the background and there's just this there's a humor to it you know it's coming there's a drama to it but there's a humor to it the timing of it and I think it's because

they're just funny people those guys Fargo was one of the most violent and funny movies I think I've ever been in I mean watched and then both things are true and a hilarious movie

and they are they might not think this about themselves but this is why I watched their interviews. I find them hysterical. They're so dry and sometimes almost pain to be interviewed, but it's just incredibly funny. Were they both around or not? No, just Ethan. He just wrote and directed me. Yeah, just Ethan, yeah. So is it Margaret Quali? And Aubrey Plaza and Chris Evans. And they were all around. And there's a great cast. Amazing cast. And you're wonderful in it.

Oh, thanks. You are wonderful. wonderful. I finally got to play a cop. I'm like, I'm finally getting old and fat enough that I can pull this off, you know? I was at a baby vase, and I certainly have a baby's voice. Relentously going, someday you'll get her.

Some day she will not be a lesbian, and she'll come running to you. Yeah, Marty's not the smartest guy. And that's those guys writing. I mean, that's another really fun thing where I hadn't done something in a while where you don't change any of the words.

You know, and I missed that in a way where there's a level of focus to that where you're like, oh, right, this is written so word perfect that you're not supposed to miss an end or an, or a comma. Yeah, or a comma, just like in a great play. And the musicality of the writing is sort of what they do. And it's a little bit like Shakespeare in that it leads you to a character. say the words perfectly i mean i i think i did some of my best work in the not for them but in fargo the television show oh yeah you're great i had to every thank you every syllable i had to work on because there was a dialect i didn't know and everything was meant to be said in you know that same kind of cadence and way and it just freed me how about in a performance of yours that i love

and Saving Private Ryan, is that as specific with the words, or is Stephen a little bit more... I'm calling him Stephen because we're on a first-name basis now, but is Mr. Spielberg a little bit looser with that? I can't say I really know because I was only there for two days,

but I would say no. He knows what he wants. He wrote it very specifically. I don't know what it's like if you're Tom Hanks and carrying the entire movie whether that is true, but I would think so. He is so thoughtful. Yeah.

The husbands would take their wives who they never told their World War II stories to that movie so that they could see it without. And women would come out and wives would come out in tears. Wow.

Going, I understand now, I understand. I weirdly saw that movie with the actor Richard Kind. I love Richard. Yeah, he was up in Williamstine. He was doing a play. I didn't even know him. And I feel like there was a group

People are all, I must have just been near him. And he was like, I'm going to go see a movie. Who wants to go? And I'm like, well, let's go. And we saw that movie. And it was just a strange experience. But great movie. You're great in it.

Anyway, thank you. Really appreciate it. And the movie, by the way, is spectacular. Oh, good. I'm glad. I hope people go see it. And when do we get to work together? I got to put you in something.

Well, this is why I'm sucking up to you, Charlie, Day, because you're the writer-director. I'm a hired hand. I got a couple things I'm working. I have a few things. I'll put you in something. Please. Sounds good.

That's a deal. Take care. I'll give you the Guillermo deal. You put me in your podcast. Charlie Day, everyone. Be sure and watch them in Honey Don't, starring alongside Margaret Qualley, Aubrey Plaza,

Evans. It opens in theaters this Friday, August 22nd. That's all for our show this week. Special thanks to our friends at Team Coco. If you enjoy this episode, send it to someone you love. Subscribe on your favorite podcast app and maybe give us a great rating and review on Apple Podcasts, if you're of mind. If you like watching your podcast, all our full-length episodes are on YouTube. Visit YouTube.com slash Team Coco. See you next to. Where everybody knows, you're You've been listening to where everybody knows your name with Ted Danson and Woody Harrelson sometimes. The show is produced by me, Nick Leow.

Our executive producers are Adam Sacks, Jeff Ross, and myself. Sarah Federovich is our supervising producer, engineering mixing by Joanna Samuel with support from Eduardo Perez. Research by Alyssa Grawl. Talent booking by Paula Davis and Jane Boutista. Our theme music is by Woody Harrelson, Anthony Genn, Mary Steen Virgin, and John Osborne.