Where Everybody Knows Your Name with Ted Danson and Woody Harrelson (sometimes) - Megan Mullally and Nick Offerman

Episode Date: November 6, 2024

Ted Danson and Woody Harrelson welcome their first couple to the pod, Megan Mullally and Nick Offerman! Nick and Megan share with the guys about their unlikely meet cute, what it was like playing Ron and Tammy on Parks & Recreation, Megan’s band “Nancy and Beth,” and much more. Like watching your podcasts? Visit http://youtube.com/teamcoco to see full episodes. 

Summer of 69, no apostrophe. Laughter Music Welcome back to Where Everybody Knows Your Name with me, Ted Danson and Woody Harrelson, sometimes. Today Woody and I are welcoming our first couple to the podcast, Megan Mullally and Nick Offerman. Actually, they're more like a comedy and acting power couple, which is obvious if you saw them on Parks and Recreation as Ron and Tammy.

Woody and I have separately crossed paths with Nick and Megan over the years. Woody did a spell on Will and Grace back in the early 2000s. Mary and I have known them for several years. And I got to work with Nick on Fargo and Hearts Beat Loud. I'm very excited for you all to get to know them. So here they are, Nick Offerman and Megan Mullally. Nick Offerman and Megan Mullally. Megan Mullally, Nick Offerman, that's who we're sitting here talking to in case you didn't catch on.

There's going to be some kind of intro that we'll put in after the fact, dude. Yeah, yeah, I think so. You're not telling them anything new right now. Well, I was told to. I'm just trying to be a good boy. Okay. We hate intro. Oh, you're right.

You're doing the right thing. Now you'll know for sure. Nick, say. Good afternoon. Signature. Now we know who we're talking to. Are we? Anyhow, let's get back to them.

Yeah. So you guys met on Berlin Circle. Yes. Right. Two in the year 2000, ironically. Yeah. So I was between the second and third seasons of Will and Grace during the hiatus. I knew this guy who was the producer and he was like,

what are you doing? Do you want to read this script? Do you want to do this thing? So I thought, oh yeah, that seems fun. It's like an equity waiver play that we did called the Berlin Circle and Nick was living in someone's unfinished basement with no floor. And he would just like in the night, if he had to pee, you just go over in the corner and like pee.

Okay. You had to train that out of him though, right? I mean, that's one advantage. No, he still does it. One advantage of the dirt floor. By morning, it's gone, it's undetectable. In our bedroom now, in one little corner, it's just dirt.

Dirt. So you can. That's good, you put that dirt in the corner. He wasn't able to shake it. But I just wanna get into the, how did you guys, I mean, how did that all just develop? I know, it's funny, because on paper it doesn't seem like

it would have happened, but. Because, why do you say that? Well, he was driving a rusted out, is that what you were gonna say? Maroon convertible, what kind of car was it? A Chevy Cavalier. Chevy Cavalier, like what year was it? It was in 91.

Okay. And- One of the good years. And he was wearing like gold overalls that were his notepads. So anything he had to remember, he'd just write it on his overalls. The first time he went out to dinner,

he tucked his napkin into the bib of said overalls. So like I'm saying on paper, but he came up and introduced himself to me on the first day when we did a reading of the script. And he was like the only person because I think the other people thought like, oh, she's like on TV. We're just going to we're gonna ignore her before she ignores us, you know? And he came up and introduced himself.

And so I was like, okay, but he, I don't know, my previous type had been quite different from Nick, like very like skinny androgynous rock drummers. And so- Wow, I'm surprised we didn't hook up. Yes. You are very much my type. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, doesn't that just go for most women within a three state radius of you? Yeah.

I'm surprised. Yeah. Ted's every woman's type. I mean- For sure. Yeah. Yeah. So who in that moment of meeting sparks flu for whom first? You're looking at him.

Well, that's the way it has to be or should be. Nick, speak for yourself. Sure, yeah. I hate to belittle it as to be as conventional as, because I felt like we were on such different echelons like there's no way Megan should have done this play. She had just, she was about to win her first Emmy that fall, Will and Grace. So she had become this, you know, world comedy champion and she did a play for free with

strangers because she thought it would be fun, which just doesn't make sense. champion and she did a play for free with strangers. Cause she thought it would be fun, which just doesn't make sense. It that's not simply not done. And so, um, and so to meter, uh, it's there, I guess there were levels of sparks because at first I just was like, Oh, you're really funny. The, we, we, we had done our first read through and I was like, Oh shit, you're really funny. We had done our first read through and I was like,

oh shit, you're a genius. And then I've introduced myself and was like, oh, this is gonna be fun. And she then was like real with me and we just were friendly and cordial. I was like, oh, you're like a real person, but you're also like a Mel Brooks movie. And so I was fascinated and it was all kind of

magical and I had to get through a few different levels, I think, before I was like, Oh, I'm getting a boner also. This is, Oh, you're a human woman. I knew you're getting a boner before you knew you were getting a boner. Still do. As, as you are, yeah.

We haven't even gotten to the first commercial yet. No. Oh God, do we do commercials? I guess we do, don't we? This one will have to be about erectile dysfunction. Hey, hey, look, I told you that in private. All right, so then who made the first move? Keep going. All right, so then who made the first move? Keep going. I mean, come on.

So, I mean, we began the ways, as I'm sure you guys are aware, that sort of backstage or off-screen friendship when you are with like-minded performers and you have time on your hands. And in the theater, I think it's, for me, it's a lot more like when you're in church and you're, you are giggling with your friend or your cousin because somebody farted in the middle of church. It's that sensibility.

So whispering filthy things to each other by way of making friends before we're about to enter a scene on stage is a great bonding category. And so we were doing that. And it really, I mean, it took me by surprise because I had a class problem. I was a broke actor living in a basement drinking too much bourbon. And so it took me a while to swallow the idea that there could be chemistry, that I was like, oh, she is treating me like I'm legitimate. And I was terrified, I had the worst butterflies,

but it was clearly heating, the heat, the brew, the goulash was warming up. And one day after rehearsal, she was pulling out in a gorgeous Range Rover. And even that was like a flying saucer to me. And I went over and opened the passenger door as she was about to pull into the street and got in to simply to say to her, that this is, I'm not crazy, right? There's something here, right? And she said, I don't know what you think is happening,

but you can get right back out of this vehicle. And I said, well, hear me out. And so, I mean, I think that was kind of the first official overt move. That seems like about the worst thing you could hear. I don't know what you think is happening, but you can get out of this vehicle. Yeah.

It's, it doesn't seem like it. I think I said that you can get out of my Range Rover, to be clear. Oh, well, that makes sense. Yeah. Get out of the Range Rover. Yeah. No, I mean, I had started thinking he was funny. And the other thing that dawns on me

is that I had only done these two seasons of Will and Grace and any kind of success or any kind of like having a Range Rover was very new to me. And so I was sort of still in a mindset of like doing a play for $7 a week and. And talking to the peasants. Yeah, talking to the, yeah. And so that's why I think it never really occurred to me

that he, it's just that when you look back on it, it's funny, like it seems like there would have been this huge divide, but there really wasn't. And I had started thinking he was funny. Not for you. No, and I,'t. And I had started thinking he was funny. No, and I, yeah, and I had started thinking he was funny and that was the attraction and then, yeah, so I think that's how it all evolved.

And I think my saying, get out of the Range Rover was more about not wanting to rush into something, especially since we were doing this play together. And yeah, wanting to take it really slowly. Which we did. It should be noted that I did not, in fact, get out of the Ranger. You did.

I mean, I did, but we were cord, you know, you basically intimated, yes, maybe something is going on here, now get the fuck out of my Ranger. Yeah. That'll do, though, that'll do. Yeah, yeah. You got out with a spring and you stepped. Exactly.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I was in for the long haul. Yeah. No, I wasn't being brutal. I was just being cautious.

Koi. Koi. Yeah. The rules. No, not that. That's dumb. Wasn't that, wasn't that a book, The Rules? I didn't read it.

I don't know. Um, let me back up didn't read it. I don't know. Let me back up just one second because when I first met you guys, it was like, oh, they're actors. Saw you in Will and Grace. She's an actor, I got it, I'm an actor. Yeah, we're on the same thing here. And when I met you on Fargo, it was the same thing.

Oh, I got it, he's an actor. Really good, both really good, but I'm like you. And then I see you, Megan, do, what was it, Megan? I know, Nancy and Beth. And I have never, which was song, dance, but to say that brings it down a notch because it was the most extraordinarily creative thing I've ever seen. It was just mind-boggling.

And so I was like, oh, shoot. All right, she's an actor. Now she's like this genius talent, dancing, singing, and knocked me for a loop. Then I find out, Nick, that you have your own woodworking shop and you build your own canoes, you build tables, you have a for real going business of being a woodman, a woodworker. And you write the most incredible books, you are a humorist, it's like, y'all left me in the dust,

so I almost don't know how to begin asking you questions, but you are truly a remarkably creative couple. Thank you, Ted. Yeah, I have this band called Nancy and Beth. Nancyandbeth.com, if you'd like to check it out. I'm my manager. It's the shit.

And yeah, so it's being reinvented right now for a variety of reasons, but yeah, it's going to be better than ever. We have a record that's going to come out next year. Thank you though. Savannah, will we do all covers and I choreograph it, choreograph every song. Yeah, it's a little bit, I think it's a little avant-garde, but it's very crowd pleaser at the same time. What were you gonna say? Oh man, I can't wait to see this. But, cause you did the, you really started in ballet like when you were a kid and like I didn't know

anything about that. Like then you were in Oklahoma City ballet and then you went into the, what was the one in New York? Oh, New York City Ballet, and then you went into the, what was the one in New York? The American. Oh, New York City Ballet, yeah. School of American Ballet, which is New York City Ballet School.

I studied there, yeah. So you were really thinking, I'm gonna be a ballerina. That was your focus. That was what I was gonna do until I realized it was too motherfucking hard. It was like my toenails were falling off and I was like, no thank you, this is too much. So I decided that I liked this sort of acting,

like the couple of ballets that had the lead and what I really liked was the acting part of it. But my main thing always, even more than that, is I love to sing, so that was sort of my first love, was just music, anything involving music, yeah. How would you describe Nancy and Beth, the movement? Because when you say you sing and you dance, but it's not just dance.

I mean, it's like this amazing movement to the music. So it is dance, but how would you describe it? Well, I think it's just very like, I try to like take each song and create like a little world for it. So the movement styles are a little bit different from song to song and of course you know I'm too old to do you know anything crazy dance-wise but I feel like you can really do so much

without like doing anything crazy like anything too aerobic or anything like involving a lot of like jumping or so I feel like I would just like listen to each song and get in front of a mirror and we have one little room in our house that has one little wall of mirrors so like listen to the song listen to the song and just let it kind of come out so I want to express the lyrics in a way that's either kind of, you know, and or funny, or moving, or thought provoking, or kind of like reinvent the movement

to go with each song. And like using, we would do a lot of, I do a lot of choreography using a chair, where we are like, sit on a chair, lay on a chair, do a lot of crazy things with that. We had one song that was more of an old-fashioned, like a hat and cane kind of song. So it's just a big variety of just depending on the song.

The key to the band for me is picking the right songs and then coming up with how to interpret them through singing and movement. Right. Well, if you're gonna do the chair song, you gotta do, I'll feed the same mine head. Oh! It was a fine affair.

That's my favorite. I love Cabaret. I love Cabaret. I love Cabaret. 100%. And her stuff would fit very well. Yeah. It's of a piece with the Cabaret. Because each, I was gonna say,

you make each song like a piece of theater. Thank you. Yes, thanks. That's a good way to say it. Yeah, I'm trying to create a little world. Each song is its own little world. Yeah. Now, will you be able to go with Megan? Cause I know you sometimes join up and do stuff together.

Yeah, whenever possible. I mean, we have a lot of fun where I step into the dad role and I drive the tour truck, like, so I'll be her driver. You know, when we've been on tour before, we've done, like, longer tours that were more like, you know, six weeks or seven weeks. He'll come out, you know, at a certain point, you gotta introduce the band, right? It's a great band, like five other, so seven people total, and he'll come out and introduce the band, and of course, you know.

People go wild. They love it. They love it. And he does like really funny intros for everybody, it's really great, yeah. Well, I mean, I need to earn my keep. Now, one thing I haven't seen and I wanted to check out,

but it's you guys also do a song and dance thing together, don't you? That's separate from what you're talking about. Well, yeah, we, I mean, we've, we toured, uh, we did a tour where we kind of combined our chocolate and peanut butter. The name of the tour was Summer of 69, no apostrophe. It's every summer in our house. Yeah, or just summer. When we got married in 2003, I don't know why, I was like, we had a little small wedding in our

backyard, it was only 20 people total. But then we were gonna have a reception, which never happened, and invite everybody. And I was like, I got it into my head that I wanted to do to choreograph Nick and I doing Carly Simon, Nobody Does It Better. And so then I did for the tour. So it was pretty involved.

Nick Tours is meniscus at one point. But we were doing like lifts and like running around in a circle doing grunge-tays. I mean, it was pretty crazy. Yeah, it was really fun. Is that a one offer? Do you think you'll do that again? You have to talk to the boss. Yeah, I was really fun. Is that a one offer, do you think you'll do that again?

You have to talk to the boss. Yeah, I wanna do it. I wanted to do, I wanted to have a big party, and I wanted to do a flash mob where we'd get other people to dance, and we'd just play it, and then we'd have, Nick and I would start, and then 15 other people would join in. Yeah, we like to have fun. And I wanted to say thank you for

complimenting my other work earlier and the answer to that is, when you're not the lead of a TV series or film, you have a lot of time on your hands to build canoes and write books. So you two never become great book builders. I love it. That's funny. I just admire it. I know. You know, I started recently, like for Christmas, I gave my family and friends,

I would give them either, I made spoons and I made chopsticks. Now this is obviously small potatoes for you. It involved a lot of sanding for me though. It's huge. To take a stick and turn it into something that will carry soup is a superpower. Thank you. It's fantastic.

I thought you might demean and instead I feel lifted up, so thank you. That's not my bag. But I was also going to say that Nick, so when we met, we met in 2000 and then he was working as an actor, but it was pretty sporadic and he didn't get Parks and Rec until 2009. So rather than just like laying around the house, he got this space and he created a wood shop and he started like making furniture all the time and then hiring people to work there and turned into a whole thing.

I mean, this is big time. This is not me in my garage whittling or trying to make a stool. Well, he has, how many people are working in your shop right now? Four now, yeah. But it has been as many as, how many? Six or seven, yeah. But it has been as many as, how many? Six or seven, yeah.

And you're filling orders not just for friends or for your own canoe, right? Right, yeah. So what is it you make? I know I've seen some of your tables. Zach Galifianakis has a beautiful dining room table that you made. Thank you. We call that Zeus's Wagon Wheel.

Because it's like a Lazy Susan, right? As well. It's pretty astonishing. You could park a Hummer on that thing because he's very green and he took this warehouse in Venice and they were going to turn it into a living space, but he wanted to reuse all of the materials they pulled out, which included these gigantic laminated wooden beams. And he said, can you make us a dining table out of these giant beams? And we said, sure. It'll weigh three tons. Like you'll need a forklift to move it around. But so we, I mean, so we make bespoke pieces, custom pieces, but then also we work with a great program called Woodworks downtown that teaches people living with homelessness. We teach them woodworking skills so they can then get a job

reference and help them get back on their feet. So with that program, we make cutting boards and coasters, things that are simpler, but they're also more affordable. So if fans want to get something, our tables are stupidly expensive. If you need any guidance on chopsticks, let me know. I will. We'll maybe work a joint venture. Yeah, we'll do like a seminar, a workshop. Have you been able to track whether or not any of the kids that came into the workshop, it actually was a springboard for them into something else? Do you know what I mean?

I mean, yeah. Our main, the most badass woman in my shop right now is named Diane and she had a woman in my shop right now is named Diane and she had a life of misfortune and just a lot of abuse and found her way into this program and now she's our she desperately wanted to learn woodworking she loves it and now she's like the leader she's our number one woodwork. It's kind of like what I did with Nick. It is. Shape him, form him. Megan rescued me in 2000. She got me my shots. Gave you a bath. Took me to J.Crew and bought me a bunch of sweaters. And here we are. This has been a great day. This morning we were with Jimmy Burroughs. Oh, nice. I love Jimmy.

Yeah. Sweetheart. It was cool. You worked with him for a long... How many did he do? He did the whole... 246 episodes. He did every episode of Will and Grace. Wow. He didn't miss one. 11 seasons. That's six more than he did every episode of Will and Grace. He didn't miss one. 11 seasons. That's six more than he did on Cheers.

That's great. Fuck him. Yeah, I know. Yeah. I wish I had known that before we did the interview. We were all over him. We love you, Jimmy. We love you. Yeah, we love you. And now...

Is he one of your favorite directors? Yep, absolutely. He's the best. And he gave me total freedom. Like the thing about Jimmy is I don't think he ever said to me, don't do that. He only said do it, do that, but do it more. Yeah. He said do that. And then what else can you add on to that? But you never said don't. You did something I've never seen, which is, you know, when I watched the pilot, you'd speak differently than you started in the next episode. Yeah, I think it was. I think we talked about this back then. I think so, yeah.

Tell me how you saw the pilot and you had a revelation or? No, it hadn't aired yet. I think what happened was when I auditioned for it, I had always gone into auditions kind of like the acting version of that band, Nancy and Beth, that you were talking about, where I would come in with something so crazy that I knew in my heart was amazing and they knew in their hearts was definitely not what they wanted. So I think when I auditioned for Will and Grace, I thought, okay, I'll just like kind of, the pilot was written,

it wasn't, I don't know, in my opinion, it wasn't a very interesting, it was kind of like I'd seen it before kind of sidekick thing. And just my opinion. And so when I went in, I thought, okay, well, I'll just do it the way it's written. And then I got the part. And then as it was going along, I was like,

I'm just gonna start like zhuzhing this up a little bit, episode by episode. And I think by episode 10, it was kind of there. Like I had sort of like gotten it more or less where I wanted it. And then, yeah. So I think it was like of there, like I had sort of gotten it more or less where I wanted it, and then, yeah. So I think it was like a subtle thing where, I don't know if they necessarily

were noticing incremental. This is a pretty stark difference if you look at the first episode from It is crazy. What it became, which I just was like, oh my God, I didn't even know you could do that, but it just, you can't argue with the result. Yeah, in the pilot, I felt very eggy,

which is the term in showbiz, right? You know, eggy, where you feel like you've got egg on your face, and I felt it was very eggy. And then as it went along, I was like, okay, yeah. This egg is good egg. Yeah. Yeah, so it became that. And then they really like jumped on board, they being the writers, and they started like writing to it. And then they would come in with something I hadn't thought of,

and then I would play to that. And then we always started building on each other's, on the writing and the acting and it all started coming together really well, yeah. That was a huge show. I mean, politically in every way. Yeah, it was groundbreaking in a lot of ways. And yeah, and as for Jimmy, like I really, I really love him for giving me the leeway to do what I needed to do.

And then I feel like sometimes in other things since then when directors try to give me a lot of, they try to like, if I have an idea that I think will be good and it's very early on and they're like, no, what are you doing? Like, no, I see it this way. I'm always like, where's Jimmy? Where's Jimmy?

And I just did a movie that Larry Charles directed and he was amazing also in that same way of like, go, you know, do it. So I love that. Yeah, I think some writers, if they didn't write it, it's very hard to pitch them another idea because, no, that's not my idea. Yeah.

Oh, right. And you know, back in from our day, it was all like you had, there was no way that anybody would ever have improvised anything. And it's so different now, like everybody improvises and people want it. Yeah, which has good and bad results.

Because sometimes you'll go along with a movie and you'll go, that's a good story. Oh, there they go. Yeah. A little fancy turn. Yeah, you gotta be good at it. It's rough when you're doing scenes or whatever. There's one person who really can't improvise, right? Or maybe more than one, but often there'd be one person, but then they never stop throwing

in new bad lines. They just keep and they say, how do we continue? They call me improviser killer. I will improvise with you and I'll be having fun. It'll be great. And then I get scared like someone's chasing me and I freeze and scream and I do scream. Yeah. And that's usually the end of the impromptu. I mean, I'm fun to have around. It's good to have limits. Yeah. Let me talk to you for a second because we share a director, writer, creator, Mike

sure that's right. Yeah. Parks and rec. Tell how did, was that the first kind of big leap for you acting wise? Yeah, I mean, I was very happy. I was Mr. Mullally, I had a wood shop, and I was working regularly as guest star jobs

and Sundance movies. And we were big fans of The Office, The American Office, and I have known Rainn Wilson a long time, and I said to Megan, if I'm ever gonna make it, if I'm gonna break out, it's gonna be on a show like The Office in a role like Dwight Schrute.

And then I auditioned for Mike for a part on The Office, and I couldn't do it. So he ended up, when he then created Parks and Rec, he remembered me and wanted to put me on it. So that's exactly what happened was, if Ron Swanson was like any other character,

it was similar to the Dwight Schrute paradigm. From the get-go, it's just that thing where he saw me, he saw through the facial hair to a spark of charisma where he's like, I think I can turn you into something palatable to an audience. And by God, he did. Pete Slauson Oh, that was a great, great, great character. to an audience and by God he did. He said, if you just say these words in the right order, by God, they'll laugh. And he's this wonderful, great hearted guy. CB Mike Schur you're talking. RM Mike Schur, yeah. I think my second book dedicated to him and said, thank you for showing me

how funny we can be while saying, I love you. That's kind of his thing. He's a highly intelligent guy came through the Harvard comedy pipeline following our shows other creator, Greg Daniels, who was Harvard roommates with Conan, uh, and who, you know, under whose auspices we, uh, we, I think we're drinking his water right now. In fact, Yeah, you are. This is Conan's water. It's good. It is good. It's clean. Yeah. Um, it's, it's from Iceland. Uh, but I mean, so he's in, I love these people that are, that go to, you know, Ivy league schools and could become like captains of industry, but they say, you know, it'd be really fun. What if we make people laugh?

Yeah. What if we tell stories and they're medicinal and Mike is one of the greatest examples of that. I mean, your show is a show about morality. Pete Yeah. Who knew? It's taught. The Good Place is taught in some universities as part of their ethics. Pete Really? Pete Yeah, literally. Notre Dame had a, I don't know if it's still going on, but they taught, we had on speed dial, we had like three or four ethics professors who would talk to the writers daily to make sure what

we were talking about was right. Was ethical? Yeah, it was ethical. It wasn't. Sometimes it's good to get a second, third opinion. It is. Sometimes it's good to get a second, third opinion. But now, I hadn't seen this, but there's a clip of your relationship, you and Megan's. Phil is all in on the relationship, but it was the funniest, hottest.

Oh, right. Oh, was this when you guys toured together? No, no, this is on the show on Parks and Rec. You came in as her, as his. Tammy too. On again, off again. His ex-wife, Tammy too, yeah. My second ex-wife, yeah.

All of his wives were named Tammy. But it was violent, it was passionate, it was insane. Oh, in the diner. Yeah. Yeah, so that first episode was so fun that we shot, the first Tammy episode, the very first scene that we shot was like, oh, it was so early, it was like 6.30 in the morning,

and we were shooting in Burbank, some location, it was a motel, and we were supposed to Burbank, some location, it was a motel, and we were supposed to be like desperately trying to get to this motel so that we could like get it on. And so we're in this crazy car, supposed to be Ron Swanson's car, whatever it was, Nick was driving and I was in the passenger seat and I was like, I'm going to take my bra off.

So I took my bra off and then they were like, and this is, and then they were like, action. Yeah. This is off camera. I took my bra off and I had it and they were like, action. So he like screeches into this parking lot and I like throw my bra out the window of the car.

We get out of the car, slam the doors, run in and I pulled my sweater off and they had to put like a circle, like a dark circle to block out my boob and we ran into the motel. Just the one. And then like this guy comes over and he's like, hi, I'm the director. Like I hadn't met anybody yet. He introduced himself. Who was it?

Troy Miller. Troy Miller. He's like, hi, I'm Troy. I'm the director. And it's like, nice to meet you. Great first take. And they used it, right? And then that same day we went to a diner and they, at a certain point were like just do whatever you need to do and so we were like wildly like making out on the table and throwing things that they had you know atmosphere people as customers throwing food at people we asked them first if we could do it and then Nick at one point was so like, Ron Swanson is so like riled up on testosterone

that Nick actually pulled the, we were in a booth at this diner. He pulled the table out of the wall, the real table. He pulled it out of the wall. It was some of the best. Have you seen that kind of compilation of your relationship? Yeah. It's amazing.

It really is. I mean, Megan, when Megan, when they came up with the idea and Megan agreed to do it, she took me out in the backyard for kissing practice. Like violent, disgusting, kissing. Glory graphic. Glory to God. We had to come up with new ways to kiss that would freak people out.

Who's that? They put newspaper down in the house. That's right. Better to get outside. That's right. The dirt area wasn't big enough in the bedroom. Mike Scully wrote that episode and he sadly had an acrimonious divorce,

but he then openly said, but here. It's all in this script. This is you, darling. It's a really funny script, yeah. Wow. So did that, when did Parks and Recs kind of open up more leading man film feature stuff? I mean, you know, when the show kind of caught on in the first couple of years,

it was just one of those things where it changed, where a certain much larger audience was like, oh, that guy with the mustache. But it's interesting because I don't know, I still feel like I'm kind of an underground property, you know, I didn't become You know, Steve Carell or something But but shows like Fargo like Noah Hawley got a hold of me and said, yeah, how would you like to do something?

Which is how we met Yeah, and so I've been really grateful for the way it went because that show was a blast, it was very well received, and then it became even exponentially more popular in the time of streaming. So young people now don't realize that it actually was never a hit. It was critically well received,

but only then later it became like a comfort show. Is that right? Yeah. That's crazy, right? Yeah. Yeah. We had no idea. We were not, uh, nom, like we didn't get awards.

We didn't, in fact, we were almost canceled every year. It was always a question mark. That's right. I remember hearing that. How many seasons? Uh, seven seasons. Yeah. Well, so we had a great run.

Um, and I'm very grateful, but I'm also glad that it, that the world still allows me to do other roles. Yeah. Forgive me. I'm forgetting the name of the movie that you so graciously asked me to do with you. Hearts beat loud. Hearts beat loud. I was so impressed with you. It was like, because you you do and the work before this comes across as a character actor, you know, and I think this was your first full-on romantic lead. Sure. And you just hit it out of the park. You were so good. Yeah, really lovely. Thank you. Brett Haley made that film. Yeah.

And Keirce Clements who plays my daughter, kind of steals the movie. She, we have a band together and she sings. And it was so, you and I had become friendly, but not good buddies. Yeah. And so it was a little bit of a flyer where I called you out of the blue and, and asked you if you

would come to Brooklyn and do like three scenes as my buddy. And you agreed to do it without reading the script, which is incredibly generous. Or just smart. You said you named the amount of marijuana you required. Yeah.

I called Woody first and he said, this is what is okay to ask. Going down to the words 8271, San Monica Boulevard. Anyway. You were magnificent in that. Yeah. I felt like our relationship was cemented forever. It was so fun. It was so fun to have you play my bartender. Yeah. As everyone can attest.

It's so funny, whenever I'm asked to get behind a bar, whether it's charity or in your film, scares the crap out of me. I start to sweat. I feel just, you know. Sure. I don't know why, but anyway, PTSD from Cheers, something. Well, we all wondered, you know, do I still have it? Yeah, I think that's it. Can I still shake it?

Can I still cut a lemon or two? What's in it? Rum and Coke. What the hell? Can I still cut a lemon or two? What's in it? Rum and Coke. What the hell? I got one for you. Your books, when did you know you could be, you know, your writing is, you really are a humorist and your writing is so wonderfully worded.

It's not everyday language. It's an elevated language, and you're talking about, and last one I read about, you know, the environment, about our parks, and about beauty and being out in the wilderness, but you write like, you know, you're a buddy of Thoreau's, you know, it's amazing. When did you know you had that ability? CB Thank you. I really appreciate that. I don't know. When I was in high school, I wrote one paper for my senior final in English class where the teacher taped a poem on the board and you had like three hours to write an essay, he said, you

know, here's your subject matter, you got three hours go. And it was a piece of masking tape. And so I made up a history of masking tape that was very smart ass. But I just had this idea and he was in, and I was a good student, but not exemplary. And my teacher had like read it to the school. He was like, we have an original voice here. And he thought it was brilliant and funny. Do you have it? I don't. I should have. When that was happening, you must have been so psyched. I was really stoked because I come from a small farm town, very conservative, and so it was me

taking a Megan Mullally swing of like, I want to do something weird here. I'm going to take a chance. But I'd never aspired to writing books only later. I had the opportunity and I said, well, I think I could take a swing at this. Uh, I love Bill Bryson and Garrison Keeler, uh, and of course Mark Twain, but like, I was like, I think

my family's funny and they're bucolic and folksy and so. And not in an attempt to take credit for your writing career, but I always thought, thinly veiled attempt, I always thought that you and even just your emails and stuff I'd be like honey this is so good Like if I had anything important that I needed to write in an email back in the day, I'd be like, could you write it? Because he's just a natural. Not only that, even before email, I used to always leave. I'd get up early to go to the shop and I'd leave a post-it for Megan and she'd come home and she'd be like, this Post-It is really- KS And listen, I saved every single one. I have everything he's ever written on paper saved.

Every single thing, every note, every card, every Post-It. CB It almost has a language of your, it's like not of this moment. KS I know, sad. I know, it freaks me out. I appreciate it. And it's something that I don't take for granted, to have the opportunity to have a readership and try to like, in whatever I'm trying to learn about, I try to do that with my audience.

And I'm very grateful I try to do that with my audience and I'm very grateful I get to do it because it also keeps me curious, it keeps me young because I'm still trying to learn. I'm very interested in people making things with their hands like spoons, but also people knowing where their food comes from and getting back in touch with farming and understanding farming and forestry. So to remain in that conversation helps us live better, helps us all keep an eye on citizenship. CB. Did you see, Woody, what is the movie you did the Soar on? KISS THE GROUND. Did you see, Woody, what is the movie you did the, uh, kiss the ground.

Did you see that? What do you think of regenerative agriculture? I love it. I own some cows in England. Like it's something that I'm a big cheerleader of. And they're just in a warehouse or they out on the field or how's that work? They're, uh, they are in a herd.

A friend of mine is a shepherd. And so, and he's, he's a popular nature writer and regenerative supporter. Oh, great. And so it's very grass fed. Is his name King Charles? No. Prince Charles is like the biggest regenerative agriculture guy, I think in the world. He is, no, it's Prince Charles. Prince Charles is like the biggest regenerative agriculture guy I think in the world.

He is, no. And their government does a much better job than ours does. Wait, can't James's name out there? Oh, James Rebanks is my friend. And he has great books called The Shepherd's Life. Beautiful farm up in Northern England near Scotland. Beautiful. Oh, wow.

Yeah. And in Kentucky, my favorite writer, Wendell Berry, is a great agrarian. So my last book was inspired by a conversation with Wendell just about that, about we no longer know where our food comes from and that allows corporations- It comes from the store, honey. Exactly. And so people take advantage of that and they sell us food that's not that good for anybody. Franken food. That's right. Woody, well, Woody's boy on the same page with you on that. Yeah, I really, I would like to see it all shift. The corporate agriculture has just become so...

It's disgusting, and especially the pesticides. I don, massive amount of pesticides put on our food. You don't think that this basically there's a nerve gas gets into you. CB And in some states, I think that you can't get a bank loan unless you sign on to Monsanto. You have to have Monsanto seeds and you have to obviously use the pesticides to go with those seeds, fertilizers and such. But before we get too depressed... Let's have a hamburger. Sorry, go on. No, sorry, go on. Anyway, it's amazing because both of you are so original at what you do. To have a couple here, but both of them are extraordinary. Usually it's one, let's face it.

One's amazing and a couple and the other person is kind of there, just kind of there for, you know, ballast or whatever. But you guys are- There should be a projection of Mary Steenburgen. Right, and her ballast. Me. This is my friend.

That's a bottom heavy tick. Now what about you guys? So you were raised Catholic and you were raised Episcopalian? Well, I went to Episcopalian school, but my mother was Catholic. No conflict? Yeah. And I mean, we both, I think early on when I was nine, I got in the car after Sunday school and I informed my mother that I wouldn't be returning or to church. And she had two nuns in full, this is back when

they wore the full black habits, come over and sit in our living room and I guess bless me so that I'd be good to go for life. And they gave me a little oval thing of the Virgin Mary that I still have. And it had a little teeny 16th of an inch square wrapped in tin foil in it and it was supposed to be a piece of the shroud of Turin. I was like, you guys are hooked up like these two nuns from some place in Oklahoma City. Got a hold of the shroud of Turin. Yeah. I thought they were going to give you the old lecture. You gotta go to hell if you don't. No, they like set me up for life. I'll say your mom said, come on in, do this.

And then let her. Yeah, cause she said, look, she's out. What do I do? And they were like, we've got this. And they came over and like. That's kind of sweet. I thought it was nice. Bon voyage and with love.

Yeah, it's like they put the spell on me. It worked. It's a good parenting style instead of saying, no, I'm gonna fight your impulse. It was really cool at my mom. Yeah, she was cool. And you, Mr. Catholic? My mom and dad are still very influential

in our hometown Catholic church. All the kids pretty much quit going, but I think we all have great values. I think, I don't know, for me, organized religion is not as effective as Eastern religions. I get a lot more churchy feeling out in the woods where I'm like, oh shit, this feels holy. As opposed to the drudgery, at least in my upbringing, church was a drudgery. I was like, man, you're talking about rapture and passionate feelings and faith and everyone's just kind of droning and can't wait to get to the football game. So I've remained very spiritual and my mom and dad just lead the most incredible lives of service. And I think me and my three siblings really aspire

to them without needing to bring any religious text into it. Right. Well, it seems like the whole Catholic thing, you know, I don't want to be inappropriate here, but Catholic and Episcopalian, it seems like, couldn't they zhuzh it up a little? I mean, could they make it more boring? It's so boring. And then in Catholic, you got all this stuff in Latin. It's like, okay. First of all, I don't know. Hey, do you know Latin? I didn't even know it was used for a glam.

I don't know, I'm not some, I'm not some, nevermind, I'm not. Yeah, I agree. It's true. Some churches in the South, you'd go, yeah, now I wanna be part of this. Oh yeah, they make it fun. Baptist.

Huh? Baptist. No, what's the one? Yeah, Southern Baptist, but also even further, starts with a P. Oh, Pentecostal, yeah. Pentecostal, you know, and they're shaking and speaking in tongues. Now that to me, you know, even if you don't believe it, it's good theater. We just lost the Midwest, but moving on. Have the decency to have a rock band.

I'm not saying I don't believe. Have the decency to have a rock band. Yeah, get a rock band up there, Christian Rock. If the phone rings and you answered, are you hoping for a playwright to call you or a book deal or a TV or a film? You have so many outlets. You don't seem like the type of people who wait for the phone to ring, though. You're doing stuff.

You're making your own magic, right? Yeah. I mean, both of you, you're doing, what's it matter if the phone rings? Great if the phone rings, but like you're, you're doing your own thing. Yeah. Can I ask you about my project that you found your mom's letters in a truck? I was thinking about that when you said that a minute ago. So I found when my mom died, I found two giant barrels that they would ship things in like China and like big giant barrels that would come like three feet high and maybe like two feet around, stuffed with letters. And they're all from the 30s and 40s primarily, yeah,

30s and 40s, thousands of letters, right? Okay, so my mom saved all of her letters from the time she was, and her mom had saved all of her letters from the time she was like seven or eight years old, like writing a letter to her grandparents or whatever. Okay, so she has all everything she ever wrote, all of my grandmother's letters that my grandmother ever wrote to her, all of my aunt's letters, etc., including 732 love letters that were written to my mom. Some of the guys, like there weren't,

like my mom wasn't like a big famous prostitute. Wasn't 732 guys, was it? No, it was, so some of the guys, so some of them, like say 300 of those are like wannabes, like also rands, right? But then they were like the main guys that she, like she was engaged to a couple of different guys. So 400-something guys were not to also reign.

No. So some of the guys, so say there were like 10 guys that she dated from the time she was like in high school until she met my father when she was 26, right? So for 10 years, she dated maybe like 10 different guys. Like she was in college and she was seeing like one or two guys like at the same time. No one's judging. She wasn't, I know, but they were all virgins. Everybody was a virgin, right?

And it was so chaste. And so some of the guys wrote like a hundred letters. So that's how it all added up. Anyway, I wanted to, I want to, I'm getting ready to write something, to write a podcast where I also have all of my dad's letters, but that's a whole other story. I wanted to do a podcast where each episode is a different suitor of my mom's. And because I'm telling you,

these letters are so heartbreaking. These guys were so, I also have photos of all of them, and they were so huge. They all look like movie stars, it's crazy. My mom was beautiful. They were all totally in love with your mom. Totally, my mom was the most beautiful girl in Tulsa, Oklahoma, I mean, gorgeous.

She was a model for a while in New York, but like, she's a sweet person and so like, the girl next door. But anyway, I wanted to like focus on a different guy for each episode. And the letters are just heartbreaking. They're so funny and sweet and insightful. And then, you know, the joke is that she met my father who was hideous. And for some reason, that's the one she picked. He was just heinous, heinous person. So there you go. Is that how you feel about Pops?

Yes. Not a good dad. No. He was a really bad alcoholic and he cheated on my mom constantly, so he wasn't great. But I mean, he had moments where he was really funny, so he had moments of being funny, but I mean, he had like moments where he was, he was really funny. So he had moments of being funny, but no, not good. I felt my mom, my poor mom was so nice. Well, this would be a kind of a wonderful honoring of your mom and her happy love life. Yeah.

That's cool. Yeah. Are you gonna do it? Mm-hmm. I wanna write, it has to be written though, because it's not that, it's not a loosey goosey. You really have to like- It's not all cohesive.

Yeah, you really wanna like make it right and get it all in there. That's exciting. It's also pretty incredible and kind of a bummer in a way to see what young people's correspondence used to be like. Like these kids, their handwriting is gorgeous, but they also would write a three page letter that has now become three emojis or whatever. And it's astonishing. Megan would read me these letters. It's like a 22 year old guy on a ship. And I'm like, Jesus Christ. It was also wartime, war war too.

It's gorgeous. Yeah. Yeah. And great, great letters. Fantastic. Great letters. Like you would not believe. I want, I'd love to read some of these. There were a few, well, I'll send you some.

There were a few guys that I got to the end, like I knew there were only three more letters or whatever, and I cried. I was like, why? Why didn't you pick this guy? But then you wouldn't be here. I don't care. Isn't that a catch-22? It really is.

Mom, you picked the wrong, well, hold on now. It's inexplicable. And yet. Well, we just so grateful you guys came here. Oh gosh. This is so fun. I love seeing you. I love seeing you guys together.

I've, we've never seen you guys together even. Yeah. Cute couple. Thank you. You should have seen us in the bathtub earlier. The bathtub was great. I would have loved to have seen that. Yeah.

I think our relationship definitely took it. It's in another level now. Yeah. I'm curious. Yeah. I'm curious. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Ladies and gentlemen, Nick Offerman and Megan Malali, thank you guys for coming in and talking with us. Special thanks to our friends at Team Coco and to you for listening. Once again, tell a friend about us

and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts. If you're on Apple Podcasts, perhaps you'd like to give us a great rating and review. It actually helps a great deal. Thank you. If you like watching your podcasts, full episodes are on Team Coco's YouTube channel. I'll see you next time. Where Everybody Knows Your Name.

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. Executive producers are Adam Sachs, Colin Anderson, Jeff Ross, and myself. Sarah Federovich is our supervising producer. Our senior producer is Matt Apodaca. Engineering and mixing by Joanna Samuel with support from Eduardo Perez. Research by Alyssa Graw. Talent booking by Paula Davis and Gina Bautista. Our theme music is by Woody Harrelson, Antony Gann, Mary Steenburgen, and John Osborne.

Special thanks to Willie Navarrete. We'll have more for you next time, where everybody knows your name.