Where Everybody Knows Your Name with Ted Danson and Woody Harrelson (sometimes) - Will Forte

Episode Date: March 5, 2025

Ted Danson and Mary Steenburgen are joining forces once again, and this time they’re with their dear friend Will Forte! Will talks about Mary’s challenge to him while working on “The Last Man on Earth,” the importance of creative control, going from SNL to his dramatic turn in “Nebraska,” meeting his partner later in life, and more.To help those affected by the Southern California wildfires, make a donation to World Central Kitchen today. Like watching your podcasts? Visit http://youtube.com/teamcoco to see full episodes. 

they turn from Teddy to Ted or from Willie to Will. Right. But how is Mary not Mare? How are you not Mare? [♪ Music Playing. Welcome back to Everybody Knows Your Name. I am so, so happy to have my, well, the darling of my life here for today's episode, and by that I mean my wife, Mary Steenburgen, and not you, Woody, although you are a close second.

Mary and I thought it would be fun to team up this week since our guest is someone we both know and love, and that would be Will Forte. You know Will from Saturday Night Live, MacGruber, The Last Man on Earth. He's a tremendously gifted actor, writer, and comedian. I know this gets tossed around, but he also is truly one of the sweetest, most thoughtful guys in the business. And this time I need it. Not so much the other times. Anyway, so excited for you to hear them together, Mary Steenburgen and Will Forte. Is it already started? Yeah.

Oh, wow. Yeah. This all counts. Oh, great. Okay. So one minute down. Oh, wait, we started right at 11 too. I am five hours into my day, which is-

Because the little baby girl woke you up? No, I woke up earlier than that to go exercise this morning. What was the exercise? I did a rowing machine and it's all about my morning schedule, which is riveting. I'm on the edge of my seat. Yeah, my morning schedule, which is riveting. I'm on the edge of my seat. I woke up, I downed a coffee, rode it up, and then got the girls up and did the morning routine with them.

And then I'm the person who drops off Zoe at school. She said, Oh my God, school. Yeah. She said, oh my God, school. Yeah, and they say, have the parent that the child loves less, drop them off so it's easier for them to say goodbye. I've never heard that. I don't know. It's said no school ever. I might be paraphrasing, but that's essentially what I heard

when I was told that I was the drop off. Oh my gosh. And did she fuss when you dropped her off? That's essentially what I heard when I was told that I was the drop off. You were saying. Oh my gosh. And did she fuss when you dropped her off? No, she's now we're about a month and a half in. So the first couple of days are very tricky. I mean you guys have been through it? Yeah, heart wrenching.

Heart wrenching. Through it and now we get to have a version of it with our granddaughters. Oh yeah. The drop off, you're the bad guy. You're like, okay. Yeah. Although she loves, she does love school, but then, then I don't get to do the hero part where I pick her up. Right.

My wife takes that part. So it's like, oh, thank God, mom. Yeah. Yeah. All right. Let's just, we're not going to bounce all the way back, but let's bounce back to at least you and Mary meeting. Did you, on Last Man on Earth, did you, did she audition? Well, actually where I met her, I met both of you for the very first time at the, it was an award show,

it was 2013. Oh, Nebraska. The AARP Awards. Oh. And we were at the, the, the red carpet, and, and we met. I was there for Nebraska and you guys were there. You were nominated for singing the song, for best song. And I think you won, right? You won for, oh my God, I'm... No, that must've been Melissa Manchester's song. I'm not sure. But I thought I met you at a screening of Nebraska.

No? I just remember... I don't think so. Okay. I just remember being blown away by how good that anyone that could be as funny as you, and we can talk about it later, but you do make Ted jealous because you make me laugh so hard. It's true.

Yeah, he's not jealous of people who, you know, are like... That's crazy. Yeah, he just gets jealous when people make me laugh hard. Because there's nothing better than making Mary laugh. You're the king. You are the king and you're the queen. Like, in our world. Cheers is definitely my all-time favorite show.

Well, maybe I should pause and not run over that. Yeah, let it sink that in. Sorry, what did you say again? I said Cheers is my all-time favorite show. In fact, we were talking about it last night. Before the group that we were eating dinner with even knew that I was coming in to do your podcast. We were just talking about how amazing it is that you can, a show like that where you're just in the bar. I mean, every once in a while you go into the office

or you go into the pool room in the back. And every once in a while you go to somebody's, like Carla's apartment or something. But like you're, for the most part, just on that one set, and it's riveting. Like it's never boring. It's those writers, I mean, obviously the performers, but you know, as I started out as a writer,

so like just to be able to write stuff that's that funny and interesting and doesn't need all the moves to different locations and stuff, it's just amazing. That was a hell of a group. Well, I want to thank you for that little plug because you just satisfied the little cheers nod. So I appreciate that. Thank you so much. My pleasure.

Now let's go back to you and Mary meeting as far as last man on earth. Okay. Did she audition? Oh, no, no, no way. We, I didn't know that was going to work. But thanks for asking, Ted. I was just, uh, I was, uh, excuse me. I'll be right back.

She was, we have the same agent, Joe Yao. Yeah. And I knew this character was coming up and Joe pitched Mary and I was like, Mary Steenburgen would never do this. I'm like, I wasn't even thinking that. I just, and I'm like, do you think she would do it? And she said, well, I can ask her.

And so that was how that started. Everyone was, just couldn't believe that that was even a possibility. So we were very excited. Well, what happened was she and I went to a screening room somewhere and they started screening the pilot. And about, I think maybe two to three minutes in,

I leaned over and said, I don't care who the character is, I wanna do this. Cause it was so- It was a brilliant pilot. It was so wonderful. And so- It's your cheers. It is for me.

I did it for her years. She's actually said that, you have said that. No, but it is my kind of humor. It's so, well, cheers. I was a massive cheers fan, so much so I married you. But I, no, I thought it was, it's so weird and I do like weird, it's so weird and I do like weird. And I, it was so...

Nine year old boy. Yeah, my nine year old boy, it lives so strongly inside of me. It was so happy to be on that set every day for four years. I mean, that was, it was, I look back now and it is a magical period, but it also was, I look back now and it is a magical period, but it also was, it was very tough going through it just because it was, I had never really, I started out as a writer, but it was,

I started acting before I had gotten too far up the writing chain. So I didn't really know all the responsibilities that came with the, you know, being up at the upper level stuff. And it was just a crazy amount of work. So, so I would, I think I turned into a little bit of a crazy person. I was definitely drinking too much. You were very sleep deprived. Very sleep deprived. We almost did an intervention, not about your drinking, but about your lack of sleep and your fatigue.

Oh, yeah, yeah. No, I mean, the drinking was more just like, you'd get to the end of the day, and it'd be like midnight. And I knew I had to wake up at six, but you're just, you've been going so hard that you're like, how do I go to sleep? How do I go to sleep? So I, you know, take a shot of whiskey or two and just go to sleep. And then it became, you needed that to, that was just the way it became routine. So, and then it became routine in other ways, which were not great. But anyway, the end of it was-

He's very healthy now to all the people who love him. He's doing just great. Just morning drinking, I think. Yeah, it was just a little bit of that and a little bit of midday and brunch drinking and afternoon drinking. Isn't that first cup of coffee like, oh my God, this probably is illegal. It makes me feel so good. Ted and I accidentally got locked in our bedroom the other night. And-

How did that happen? It's too long a story, but it was pretty, we were intensely locked in there. Like we were trying- Yeah, we weren't getting out. We spent about half an hour trying to get out and we couldn't get out. And-

I don't think we were stoned either, but go on. And we were not worried about anything, except we were frantic about tomorrow morning's coffee and how do we get to it? We figured somebody would find us around noon the next day. But we wake up so early, we're like, what will we do? This was in your room. This is in our own house, in our own bed house.

There's this beautiful kind of iron sliding door things with, you know, ripply glass and stuff. And so it has this an old-fashioned little thing that you had to turn, but it somehow broke. I saw something scary on TV and I locked us in and I thought I could open it, but we couldn't. And we were so freaked out about our coffee situation. And then finally- We macgrubbered. We really did. We macgrubbered it. I looked at it and I said, there's two screws here.

Let's fashion a screwdriver. And we did that. Fashion went out of my tweezers and we were off and running. Yeah, we together, it took both of us. That's amazing. But we got ourselves out of there. Now how did this become about us?

Anyway, let's get back to you. When you said that last man on earth was Mary's Cheers, it literally was in that. Oh, I was. The camaraderie of the group, the laughter, the funniness, the right upper alley sense of humor wise. But the fact that how many years later,

we can't wait to have game night or travel with you. Olivia is like this dream boat that we adore. You know, so that comes out of four years of something very special. Let me put it that way. Yeah. Oh yeah. I loved everyone on that show. That was such a great cast of wonderful, crazy wackos.

Oh, yeah. And it was just, it was so, we, the read-throughs, and this may be a failing on your part, we never got the scripts ahead of time. So the read-throughs, literally the pages were hot when you would get them, and it was a cold reading for each of us. I would get so tickled during the read-throughs that I had to wait a few seconds to compose myself before I could continue. I remember specifically one time when it was revealed that your middle name was Tandy and that we were going to call you Tandy from then on. And I don't know why, but that just set me off for quite a long time. She's a terrible giggler.

I'm sure you know. Oh yeah. And you're not. You're a very serious, funny person. I am a non-breaker. Yeah, I never saw you break. I never did see you break. But the one she talks about the most was you tuning your guitar to sing a song for the group, and you tuned it for probably two and a half minutes airtime, right? Yeah, your character Tandy took a long time to tune that guitar to play this song you'd written called Closure. And then you launched into it and all you did was wrap the guitar with your knuckles. You never played it. Never touched the strings. And that, like, I remember us filming that and me like trying so hard to at least make, the camera was behind me and I thought,

well, just don't shake your freaking shoulders and maybe you won't ruin the scene. And then finally I started bargaining with you to get out. I said, couldn't Gail go, you know, pour herself some wine and be not be in this scene, you know, but. The biggest bummer about the tuning is, yeah, ideally, if we were on a streaming platform, we could have played... Because that was one of my favorite things, was just taking forever to tune the guitar

and then never even strumming anything, just using it as a drum. But then, you know, on Fox, you have to edit it down to 21 minutes, 39 seconds, and 18 frames, or whatever it is. And you try to keep a long version of the tuning in as long as you could, and then you're like, you just got to, you would have to take little bits of time, and then soon it was just like 10 seconds, when ideally it would be two minutes of doing it. God, it was so great. That was... Yes, that was, and it was usually my fault

for the scripts being in so late. But it was just, it's crazy, because like you're, it is the amount of, you know, they're like, oh, you need to edit this at the, all at once it'd be, we need to get a cut of this in, writers are waiting to finish the outline, you have to do music. So it's like, there are three things

that all need to be done right now. How do I do it? That's why I would always have to stay up super late because there just wasn't enough time. So somebody was always waiting around for me. But I will also say that when you talk about this special group of people, like all this, I was driving myself crazy and getting very little sleep, but the stuff that all made it really fun was just when I'd go, get to go down

and just have the day acting with all you guys. That was just the really fun part that got me through. Everything was just like hanging out with you guys and getting that, you know, it was a little family we had. Obviously our cast, but then that crew and just, you know, Mary and Kia and Curtis and Sandra and, you know, it was just a delightful group we get to be with. I've never heard, just so you know,

any stories coming home with Mary about you being grumpy, for real. About you being tired and exhausted and having terrible flatulence, but never. A little flatulence. Yeah, the flatulence was, that's a whole other story. That was-

That was a good morning, Mary. It was, it felt like your weird way of giving me a tribute every day. That was, there was, now, I don't remember exactly how we started it. I do remember at some point- From your butt, dude. From my butt, it was, now I don't remember exactly how we started. I do remember at some point. From your butt, dude. From my butt.

It was started from my butt. But like there was some day where it was, it was, I think even a challenge. At some point I had farted and I'm like, I'm so sorry. That was, you know, you're tired, you're snacking all the time to get energy. And I'd put on like 20, 25 pounds during the whole season. But like, it goes in and to, you know, it's like exhaust coming out of a car. You just got to go somewhere. And you said, oh, don't worry about it.

You know, I don't want to out you here, but you said, you know, our family was big on farts. You cannot faze me with farts. And it turned into a challenge. I challenge you to fart in front of me every day or something like that. Or I can't remember who instituted the challenge. This is good to know. But that became the thing. And so it was always very fun when I'd come up to Mary

and just say, Mary, I have to talk to you over here. She knew what was coming. No, sadly, I fell for it so many times. It's embarrassing how many times I, because you're such a good actor, in addition to great control of your butt, clearly. But I fell for it every time. And in your defense, it was mostly just audibly shocking.

Not you know. I didn't want to put you through the smell side of it. No. I would take you there. Really? Usually? We'd get it out of the way. It was like very perfunctory, very businesslike. Yeah.

And then we'd get back and get to work. We would. PG farts, PG farts. Yeah. Yeah. And you'll be happy to know that like, I'm eating better and farting less. I'll verify that with Olivia, but anyway.

Hey, while we're still here on this, before we go backwards in your life, was it bizarre and did you get a lot of feedback from fans that the end of your, of the story, you're leaving people hanging because you didn't know whether you were coming back or not. But the whole world shutting down because people, no, being wiped out because of a virus that started in what year? 2020 in your story. Wasn't it the exact same time that COVID started as far as dates?

It was, there were a lot of things we got pretty close. You know, I look forward to that. I look at the Kristen Wiig episodes where, you know, each time we'd bring in a special guest, we'd jump backwards in time. And with her, we would see the virus kind of slowly creeping in. I guess we'd see that with everybody, but with her, there was the moment

where everybody's walking with masks on the street, which now you'd look at and it'd be like, oh, yeah, but not a huge deal. That's the way it was. But back then it just seemed like, oh, this is over the top. And then she had to go shopping and she made her own, uh, you know, her own basically PPE gear and. You know, we wrote it as a joke.

She's in a bunch of garbage bags. And then you saw in, in some of those hospitals, that was kind of what they did. So it was very interesting. And there are even people that I've talked to, like I went to a high school reunion the other day and this guy came up and said that his brother, who I also went to high school with,

and brother's friend think that I have something to do with the virus. Like, they actually do believe this. It's not like a fun thing. Oh, wow. They are convinced that I am, you know, was part of this conspiracy to bring about the virus, which I guess I can come out and say, I did not have anything to do with this virus. This was just a fun little show. Crazy world we live in. It is a pretty crazy world.

Crazy world. Yeah. Yeah. Well, I recommend everyone go back and watch this, binge it again or see it for the first time. It really is unlike any other show. And let me say, give you more compliments on this, that Mike Schur, who is a fan of yours, but Mike Schur created all these wonderful shows, including The Good Place.

And The Good Place was kind of far out and different from than any other show on TV. And he credits watching Last Man on Earth and going, oh, wait a minute, on network TV, you can take an audience to a new place and it's okay. So you did have an impact on him. Yeah. Well, you know, I was at SNL when he was there. I mean, he was just the smartest. He's so smart. He's so funny. He's so smart.

Northern California, born and raised, right? Yep. You guys are both... Born in Oakland. You're both named after your dad. Sorry to interject. I see you're the fourth. So you were named after your great-grandmother.

Orville Woods, Forte the fourth. And I see you're the fourth. So you were named after your great-grandmother. Forte the fourth. And wait, you're Edward Bridge. Stanson the third. You're the third. Yeah, yeah. It doesn't have the same weight behind it that it did in the 50s, but now it's just annoying.

Have you been Ted your whole life? Were you Teddy? Yeah, I was Teddy. I was Teddy. Yeah, please call me Teddy. When did you switch to your whole life? Were you Teddy? Yeah, I was Teddy. I was Teddy. Yeah, please call me Teddy. When did you switch to Ted from Teddy? I think I was always introduced myself as Ted, but my mom who loved me called me Teddy.

And so my childhood friends all called me Teddy. But yeah. It's interesting that like when men get to a certain age, they turn from Teddy to Ted or from Willie to Will. Right. But how is Mary not Mer? How are you not Mer? Well, I do get called Mer a lot.

But you went from Mary Nell. That's true. To Mary. I was Mary Nell. That's my middle name. Oh, I know. Here's my question, kind of broad question. Looking back at those early preteen or early teens,

can you spot or see that Will or Willie as you saw that, could you see sorry, that you would someday be Will Forte, Saturday Night Live, Last Man on Earth. Where did you, when did you start to go, oh, I'm funny or let me make use of funny? When did you become that person?

I was always energetic and loud. And I was very extroverted and would have no problem with doing things that other people wouldn't do. Like, if you dared me to do anything, I would do it. And I don't know that, and I was, I guess I was funny, but I don't know. But back then, I was a huge fan of comedy, and I was, I guess I was funny, but I don't know. But back then I was a huge fan of comedy and I would watch a ton of comedy

and you would think, oh, that'd be fun. Oh, these people get to do that for a living. But it just seemed so far away, you know, you're like, oh, but I'm gonna do whatever I do, you know, but, but wow, what, how about these people who get to do that? And I was just a fan of all that comedy, you know, grew up watching those early Letterman's and big fan of SNL, obviously, and Monty Python and Steve Martin was my hero back then.

And just all the SNL cast, just everybody. So I went to UCLA, so then you're down in the area and you're still, you're thinking, oh, this is, you know, this is just something other people do. You know, I also wasn't in drama class, theater class. I was just a history major. But every once in a while, I would have friends who were trying to act,

and they would, like, say, oh, I have to go in and audition. They said to bring a couple friends. So then I would go, I'd be one of the friends that you would pick, and then I'd go and I would get the audition. And, and then I went on an open casting call for a Coke commercial once. And I got the, and I booked, so I was two for two for commercials. And then I was just thinking, oh, I mean, maybe it just kind of happens like that. I'll

just be walking down the street and somebody will discover me. It's like, that doesn't happen for schlubby, you know, 19 year olds. So, it's after, as I graduated from college, that was, I was trying to do what my dad did at first. And I was working at this brokerage firm, doing cold calls for this guy, and Brett Zatcheloff, who is a delightful man.

But I was just realizing, oh, this is not making me happy. And somebody had told me about the groundlings. And I just thought, why not just take a shot, that's, you know, see what happens. And that was, from the second I went to the groundlings, I knew that I had found the right place and that I was doing the right thing.

Cause it was, even if no success had ever come from it, it was just, I felt so differently being in that place and I was just happy all the time as opposed to hating life. Did you develop characters before you went there and then did an audition with those characters or how did you even get into the Grand Lanes? Well, it's a, you do have to audition to go in,

but it's like an improv audition. So you don't really develop stuff. It's funny because I don't know anything about anything back at that time. I mean, it's questionable whether I do know anything about anything now, but back then you just think, I have to audition for this place? I have to go through four levels of classes?

Can't I just go up to the final level? And yeah, it's like, they must know I'm fun. You know, but it's how little I knew about the process and every single step of the way, I needed that process and you're learning all these different things. And I had never been on a stage really before. I had, you know, one scene in a drama class, my sophomore year of high school,

and then I MC'd a talent show my senior year of high school. And that was it basically. So, but then, you know, I think like, oh, I can just go straight to, I don't know. So anyway, I went through that process and loved it. While you were still doing your day job, I read that you wrote a script, a film script. So writing was already-

Well, while I started at the Groundlings, I started also trying to write. And I was writing with this really good friend of mine, Ann Blunden at the time, Hutchinson now. And I started writing stuff while I was at the Groundlings. And then one of the things, got an agent through these things I wrote, who's still my agent, Matt Rice, who I went to UCLA with.

And then one of the sketches that I wrote at the Groundlings got me a job at the Jenny McCarthy sketch show. So that was my first job. That happened as I finally made it into the performing company of The Groundlings. So I'm starting to perform and writing on the side. And then I went to Letterman, got to write for one of my heroes for nine months, came back and started working on sitcoms, the Army Show, this show called Action. And then went to Third Rock from the Sun

and then 70's Show from there. And during that period, right before Third Rock from the Sun, I had written this thing called Dos Hermanos, which was about these two dipshit brothers. And then when 70's Show, when I was still performing at the Groundlings during hiatus periods for the sitcom, and got the SNL job, and Carsey Werner,

my bosses for 70's Show said, we'll let you go, but you have to write a movie for us. Wow. And I was like, oh my god, that's great. I get a, this is, that didn't seem like punishment at all. And they said, what about turning Dos Hermanos into a movie? So I worked my butt off to write that up into a script and then it turned into the Brothers Solomon.

Right before you came, we watched the trailer, and dying to watch it. That's a, was it received well? It would look very funny. I don't know that I've ever done anything that was received well, except for Nebraska. Right. Or, and Last Man on Earth,

I feel like was received pretty well. And yes, and MacGruber, come on. Right. And Last Man on Earth, I feel like was received pretty well. And MacGruber, come on. I mean, MacGruber is, to me, my favorite thing I've ever done. It's, it's, which sounds weird because, I mean, Nebraska is right up next to it. I've got a chance to have done something like that, like, endlessly grateful to Alexander Payne. And it's like, it's apples and oranges, but there was something about that MacGruber movie that we just somehow loved very dearly and we're very proud of.

Because Brother Solomon was an experience, the first experience I had, so I didn't know when to, you know, you try to pick your battles and just, that was an experience of like losing control of something and it just kind of turned out differently than you thought. And then, but MacGruber was, Lorne really like just protected us

and built this wall around us and said, do, you know, basically do whatever you want. And you know, the people who let us make the movie, Lorne and then the company that let us do it, were very good about just letting us make all the decisions. And we had to fight for some, but usually they let us win those things. So this was, you know, something that we actually got to control pretty much from beginning to end. And certainly there were things that we wish were a little different, but like budgetary stuff where,

oh, you can't do this, so you got to do this instead. And a lot of times, some of those changes that we're forced to do were things that we think probably were even better than what we would have done had we had a bunch of money. But that was why it's such a great experience because it's tough when you cave in on things and then the movie comes out and it doesn't do well and you just think, oh, what could have been? But this was one, it still didn't do well, but it was like, oh, there's such a different feeling when you know that the movie was exactly what you wanted it to be. Yeah. When it doesn't do well, you, you really can

kind of rest. Yeah, it's your, it's your job. It was completely your, yeah. Yeah. Can we go back to Nebraska? Yeah. Because I knew you, not knew you, but I knew your work before Nebraska. Yeah. Because I knew you, not knew you, but I knew your work before Nebraska. So I was first kind of startled that you were in it and then I was absolutely... Right, as were we all. But blown away by how effortlessly really, really good you were. You were amazing. It comes so naturally to me. It's so, I mean, very talented. I see. Take the compliment. You were amazing in that and actually it's a great movie. I love that movie. Bruce Jern is so magnificent in that movie.

Everybody is. He's so great. And your relationship with him off-screen was pretty important for you at that moment too, right? Oh, yeah. I mean, no, I mean, I made a joke. It was a terrifying experience because... I mean, it's hard to go from the Groundlings to SNL because your, you know, faces you make on stage, you probably ham it up just because you're trying to get it across

to people in the back row. Well, at TV you gotta learn to like, oh, you can be a little more subtle with that stuff. So you're constantly learning. And then you get to the end of SNL and you're like, okay, I think I kind of have this down. And then it's like, you get a shot to be, okay, let me step this out just a teeny bit more. If that's alright.

No, I want to know how you got it and what that was. So the end of SNL was, we had in 2009 made McGroober. At the end of the season 2010, the end of that season, the movie was coming out a week later. So the movie came out and just shit the bed, just did tremendously badly. And it was tough for a couple of weeks. And then me and John and Yorma, my other buddies who made the movie,

we all made the movie together. We all just got together and said, you know what, we're proud of this thing. If there's no, you know, at some point let's, we gotta try to do another chapter of this and whether it's on our iPhones or whatever, we just gotta, we can't let this be the end of it. And then over the next couple of weeks,

I just realized, with the help of my agents and manager they said look you can go back to SNL but like you're not gonna get to make another SNL movie that's just not gonna happen so like at some point you're gonna have to leave we think this is probably a good time to leave." And I'm like, right? After laying a major egg in the movies and they're like, yeah, it's always gonna be,

you know, you're just gonna have to do it at some point. And it started making sense. I had just turned 40 and I thought, yeah, okay, I guess they're right. And I wanted to be closer to my sister who just had her first kid. And so I decided to leave SNL. Lauren was awesome about it and he's fantastic.

But the plan was like, try to just see if you can get small supporting parts in comedies and see if you can kind of make your way back up to a point where you could maybe get a kind of a bigger role in a comedy movie. And so for, so I just didn't do anything for about a year and a half and then Adam Sandler and Andy Samberg reached out about being in That's My Boy and that was a thrill because I was like you know I there was part of me that's like I may never work again, which was fine, because I love writing.

And so I was thinking I can go back and write if I need to. But there's part of me that wanted to act, for sure. It was really fun doing it. And so that was a big deal when they gave me that job, that meant a lot, and that gave me a little hope. And then right after that Akiva was directing the movie which became The Watch and I got to do a part in that.

So that was also a big deal. And then it was like, okay, I'll just try to keep doing some kind of small supporting roles. And then this Nebraska came up and it's like, all of a sudden, I got a chance to be in a movie that was kind of more on the dramatic side and be one of the main people. And it was just came out of nowhere. It was something I thought would never happen or take 30 years to do. And it just, I mean, it was, I still don't know how it happened. And I thank my lucky stars.

It was just out of nowhere. I would have never expected it. I still, I mean, everything in your life kind of makes sense when you look back. But at the time it was like, this is going to be taken away from me at some point. Up until, even after the first week of shooting, I'm like, are they going to bring in somebody? Are they going to fire me and just reshoot the first week? And then by the time we were like halfway through, I started feeling like they were too financially invested to turn back.

But like that whole experience was just terrifying. Like I mentioned having to retrain yourself to make faces, you know, more subtle faces for SNL. And then I got to do this thing I've never really done before for one of the best directors out there. And with Bruce Dern, it was terrifying. So Bruce Dern just was the best. He was a constant teacher.

He wouldn't say, hey, do it like this. He would just say, you know, it's all about, he'd just say little things like, eh, just, you know, you're looking for the truth of the scene. That's it, or, you know, just be honest. Or, and a lot of times I would, in the early going, I go like, it sounds like some, you know, mumbo jumbo acting philosophy stuff.

And it really sunk in later that was like, oh, that really is kind of all it is, is like, that's what you're doing for any acting. Like even for the, you know, weird, absurd comedy stuff, you're like finding whatever the truth of that particular character, that crazy, zany person is. Well, for this is just like, oh, you're trying to like, authentically be this more subtle person.

I don't know, it all made sense, but more than anything, he just would tell me all these fun stories and we became friends and that relaxed me and he was just a very giving person and I mean everybody on that set was, but like he's, I'm spending every day just in a car next to him and we became tight and you know what, I haven't talked to him in a while and I think about him all the time and this is reminding me that I just want to reach out to him because he was it was a very special relationship my mom from that I went to dinner with her now a couple couple months ago now

but but I really want to reach back out to him because he, I mean, that was the experience of a lifetime. He's kind of an actor's actor. He really is. You know, everyone respects. Yeah. His daughter is one of our dearest friends. The best.

And we're the godparents to her son. So yeah, they're all special people. Her mom is well. So, you know, that was a great person for you to encounter because he knows what he's talking about. And he's not pretentious about acting. He's just really such a great, truthful actor. Both of them, Diane Ladd and Bruce.

They're both come from that tradition where acting is genuinely a noble profession and they care about it and take it very seriously. Oh yeah. Now, oh my God, he has the best stories. They're so fun, listen to his stories. And Laura actually came toward the very end. I think she came a couple of times, but at the very end,

you're at the end of the shoot, and so, you know, the end of our production schedule, all the acting scenes and the dialogue scenes are done and the end of it, Alexander Payne had bought the RV from the Jack Nicholson drives around in about Schmidt. So for a week, after all the dialogue scenes were done, we got into the car, Bruce and I were driving, we simulated the road trip that we were doing in the movie,

driving from Billings, Montana to Lincoln, Nebraska. And they followed us. They mounted a camera to the front of the car on a crane and they just followed us and would pull up next to us and just film us for this whole time and just grab these beautiful scenery shots. And this was the best way to end this experience because you become friends with all these people and all the pressure's off, and you just got to enjoy these people for a solid week without any stress. And we're stopping in a new place every night,

and you're just making this beautiful trip with these wonderful people. And Laura was part of that journey. So it was a really amazing way to end that. That is cool. Yeah. Yeah, very cool. And you are what?

You are not going to believe this. I did not fart in that car even once. You know. So I don't know. I believe that actually. I can analyze what this means about me and what that means about Laura and Bruce and how you've held me. I'll think about it later.

I'm gonna think about it too. That trying to make my wife laugh with your farts. That's just, by the way, I do the same thing. Do you know what? I would not, if I was in a car with you. Yeah. Don't say, don't say you wouldn't. Unless given express permission, I would not flatulate in a car with you. Yeah. Don't say don't say you wouldn't. Unless given express

permission I would not flatulate in a car with you. Well that's such a lie. I want any person I part around to have an escape zone unless it is like my sister. I want her to stew in it. Okay, we're going to jump around. Let's talk about, this is me and this is probably, I shouldn't even say, but it's like when I met you, I went, oh, I'm not sure he'll get married and have kids. And then you get married and you have kids. The most brilliant woman and it was the most natural. You know, I now look at you and it's like, I can't imagine you not married without kids. I really can't. I still can't imagine you married to anyone else, by the way. Yeah.

Other than Olivia, you really, really did. She is amazing. And she totally adores and celebrates you and doesn't put up with any nonsense either. She's very patient. She's amazing. And we were honored to be at your wedding, which was in Albuquerque and... I was so excited you came. It was so much fun. It was a kind of surprise wedding.

Oh, yeah, it was very last minute. Well, look, I was, I had gotten to the point, late, late 40s, right? I just thought, oh, maybe that thing that I've always heard that love is, maybe that just doesn't exist. Like I've met, I've dated a lot of wonderful people, but it just, I don't know, just maybe I was,

bad timing, bad, whatever, it just, I was... Bad timing, bad whatever. It was never really the right thing. And then I was just thinking, maybe it's just not out there. Maybe it's, you know, maybe I won't have kids. I always thought that I have kids early. And then she came along and it just... It's crazy how quickly it can happen.

Like it just, all this, it's crazy how quickly it can happen. Like it just, it just was, you know, you hear how from people who it's happened to, how easy it's supposed to be. And that was just the way it was. It was like, oh, this is, oh, it's not, I don't even have to, you don't even have to think about it. It's like, oh, this is the person I'm supposed to be with. It's so obvious.

And I mean, sure, there's hard times throughout it, but like, it's just, there's never any part of me that's like, oh, I'm supposed to be with somebody else or not be with her. You know, it's just like so natural and having these kids is so it's the it's the best. I know can you imagine now having your life without those two little girls? Oh my god it's nuts it's yeah it's it's uh it's just it's it's almost an out of body experience like

It's almost an out of body experience. Like, it's crazy. You're like, wait, this is, I created this little angel devil. Yeah. Yeah, it's crazy. So I got really lucky. It's just another thing. I'm very, I It's just another thing. I'm very lucky person, so I'm very thankful.

You are. You are. We all are. Does it change your creativeness in any way? Have you, now that you're a father, happily married and. Does that, is your creative process any different? Is it less important, more important, the same? Has it had any impact that way? Well, I mean, I'm more tired,

so it's harder to find times to do it, because everything's about your windows. Like, okay, now it's, I know I'm gonna wake up at seven in the morning every morning. We're lucky that our kids sleep till then. Amazing. Yeah, I know that's gonna happen. Then I drop off Zoe at school and I get home at nine.

And then usually my daughter, Cecilia, that's around her nap time. So I know I've got probably an hour and a half there to get done with, you know, either exercise or do some writing, but usually it's like just cleaning up. It's everything's every window of time gets, you know, so then she gets up and then you're kind of with her until the next nap. And then you have a little bit of time and then Zoe gets home from school and they're both up until you put them to bed so you you're just in it until you know 730 or 8 o'clock and then you're you're like okay I can write or I can go exercise if I haven't done that yet, but you just are like,

or I can do the dishes and the laundry and then sit around and watch TV cause you're exhausted. So it's, I'm trying to, that's why this morning was the first time I'm like, I'm gonna try a new schedule, try to get, be more on task. But like in terms of,

has it changed my creativity in terms of like do I want to do things that my kids can watch? I don't really care. By the way, your kids never want to watch your stuff. Yeah. We can't get our kids to watch our stuff. Exactly. So you're safe. She's, it's really fun introducing her to new music, but I mean, yes, it would be fine if I could do something they could watch.

That's great. But, you know, at some point they'll be adults and they'll, you know, watch the more risque stuff and be either way, they're going to be embarrassed of their dad. And, Welcome to the harsh critic. Yeah. There's no way around it. Yeah to be embarrassed of their dad. Welcome to the club. Harsh critic of his work. Yeah.

There's no way around it. Yeah. Yeah. That's funny. Yeah. It's so fun getting into the, like, introducing them to, I mean, introducing them to anything is fun, but it's, we've been, she's really into the Beatles right now. Cause I'm a huge Beatles fan and we just getting her into it. She's just hitting some Diana Ross stuff and loving, she loves upside down right now.

She's just upside down. You're turning me, giving love instinctively. She's loving that. And it's just fun, but it's also like, oh, there's an owl or moons, you know, the moon, what's the moon all about? Or it just, everything is just so fun to look at the world through their eyes and go, that's right. I didn't know what the frigging moon was for a long time. And I still just kind of know it's up there and it affects the tides and I got to brush up on my moon stuff. You got a brush up on the moon.

It kind of makes me a smarter person. It makes me realize just how little I do know because when you have to explain it to a kid, you're like, yeah, I know. I've been taking a lot of stuff for granted. I know. They do open up the world to you, make it more intense and more questions, more curiosity. It's really amazing. Have you ever, I always said,

Connecticut Yankee and King Arthur's Court. Do you remember that book where somebody goes back to all the way back hundreds of years? Sometimes I fantasize, boy, if I knew what I know now, but I was living in the 1600s, can you imagine? Then I realized, yeah, electricity. Ah, sorry, no idea. Gunpowder, nope, got nothing.

It's like... I mean, in a lot of ways, that's what Last Man on Earth was one of our things, was like, what if the world ends, except for a couple of people, but nobody knows how to do anything? Because it's like, ends except for a couple people, but nobody knows how to do anything. Right. Because it's like, most of my friends would have no idea how to do anything,

but yeah, it's all, that's my, it's Mark Twain, right? I must have read that way back in the day, but yeah, I mean, I love thinking about that. Just how do dumbasses come together and figure stuff out? Or just, you know, dumbasses. My character had to perform surgery. Oh yeah. An emergency appendectomy, which she totally was completely,

I can't even remember why I was chosen. Was it because I was a chef? You had, I think you had like, you had to give somebody stitches. Oh yeah. And you were- And I was pretty good at that. Yeah, you were just, we're like, oh, F it, I'll do it.

You know, and so you did it and you just kind of became, you were the closest thing to a doctor because nobody knew anything. So you had to do it. And yeah, I mean, all that stuff, excuse me. Cause I think back to like caveman days, like what would you do when you have a toothache? Like now that's the worst pain,

but you can go get a root canal back then. What do you do? You probably didn't have to worry about it because your lifespan was about what, 18 years old? Was that it? No, I don't know. I'm making that up. But hey, can we switch?

I know you're, and this, I don't know when the podcast will come out and all of that. And I know we're doing something together with you, fundraiser. Oh yes. Like we did there're doing something together with you, a fundraiser. Oh yes. Like we did there. You want to talk about, is it the Boys and Girls Club of America? Yes, the Boys and Girls Club. I've for years and years gone to this fundraiser every year for the Boys and Girls Club of Venice. My friend Katie Tucker was big up in the organization.

And so we'd always go there and to their dinners. And then when I met Olivia, my now wife, she was blown away by it and said, I wanna get involved. So she has now become really instrumental in the fundraisers and this gala and is raising all this money. So last year, you guys came to, we had such a good time, you were the hit of the entire event. Who wrote our material?

I wrote your material, but you delivered it. I mean, but that was the joke of it was I was getting this honor for this, for my work with the Boys and Girls Club of Venice. This was the conceit. The conceit of it was, that was not a conceit. That was actual, that was an actual, you know, I didn't get an award. I was honored. But you agreed to introduce me.

And so the conceit of the bit then was that you wanted to write stuff for me, but I said, no, don't worry. I don't want you to go put yourselves out. And you said, no, no, it's not. It's no trouble. We'll do it. And I said, no, no, no, I will write your speech for you. And so, and then you, and I seal it up in an envelope so that you can't change it. We open it in front of the audience and begin to read what you

wrote for your own introduction. Discovering it as we go. Yeah, which was highly insulting of us actually in its own weird way. Didn't it even mention our lovemaking or your lovemaking, something? is highly insulting of us actually in its own weird way. Didn't it even mention our lovemaking or your lovemaking, something? Hey, you guys, that was your introduction. Oh, so you guys were so funny. Give a plug though. Why are you doing this?

Tell me about Boys and Girls Club a little bit. The real impact it has. Well, I mean, it just gives a place for kids to go, you know, in the community after school. It's just amazing. You can do sports there. You can do art. You can do music. And it's just a place to go if kids don't have a place to go after school.

It's a really great safe place to go where these wonderful mentors are there looking after them and helping them learn stuff or just be with them and you know everyone who works there is. Yeah we were really impressed. It's such a great organization and it was such a fun yeah. It's such a great organization. And it was such a fun night. And it's such a great gala. And the two actors in us dined off of that moment for the longest time. Yeah.

It was good material. It was really good. People still talk about how funny you guys were. It was great material. Well, hopefully we can catch lightning in a bottle again. But this year will be really fun because Jason Sudeikis is coming out and Shal is going to do something. Oh great.

Kristen Shal. And then a special surprise guest. Really? I'll tell you guys after, but I can't. Surprise. When do you think this would come out? Not before February, March. Weird Al is coming out.

Oh, right. Oh, so I can say the whole thing. I'm in the process of writing that. I haven't written your thing yet because I know that's just going to be in the envelope and that will be, I can do that after. This is like, going to have singing involved and, you know, I just need to get the okays on all this stuff. Your stuff is like, you know, pretty easy to wrangle.

So I'll, you know, probably end of this week. It does not involve an accordion in front of Weird Al. I am not. No, it does not. It does not. Unless you wanted to do that, obviously. I'm a little curious why she mentioned it, but... No, because I don't trust him.

And because he made me play the accordion a lot of times when I wasn't prepared. What was the song? Reformer? Informer. You know, so Daddy must knowomi, I'm gonna blame, I like it boom boom down, Detective Mani Sese Mari. No, Detective Mani Sese.

No, what is it? Detective Mani Sese. Oh, fuck it, I forgot it. But I could do it for the longest time. I cannot believe that you remember that much of the song. Well, that's the least of it. I had to figure out how to play that on the accordion, and you gave me like 24 hours notice.

Weirdo. She did cuss. She did cuss every once in a while. I did complain about you a lot. But the truth is, you are a magical being, Will Forte. I have to say, you are. You are one of being, Will Forte. I have to say you are. You are one of the most bizarrely, like you'll go anywhere. You'll remove any part of your clothing. You will shave half your beard and your eyebrows and God knows what else.

I thankfully don't know. Like, and we, and then we went to like the people's choice awards and you had half a beard and only eyebrows on one side and half your head was shaved. And you know, you're, you won't go anywhere and do anything. And you are also the person that has to say hello to every single person in the makeup trailer in the morning. Then you don't leave the makeup trailer until you said goodbye to each of those people.

And you're unfailingly kind. And even though you're also unfailingly weird, you're just one of the most remarkable people I've ever known. Will fly across. Every second I spent working with you, I treasure it. Because you're just, there's no one like you, remotely. So there. That's a good outro. Amazing.

Top that, sucka. By the way, no, all I will say is one of the great joys of my life has been knowing you guys. Like, I look at you guys and you're, I tell everybody, you know, ask anybody, I say, coolest couple in the world. I mean, you're the coolest individuals. You remove yourselves from your couple, from your couplehood and you're the coolest individually.

And then together, you're just the best couple out there. So it's a real, it's a real lesson to me, like before when I was like, oh, am I gonna find the right person? It was like that what I wanted was what you guys have, and how you treat people and how, you know, so. Right back at you. And you did, and you did.

That's what you got. I got lucky. And were you 40 really when you met her? No, I was, dude, God, I was 49 probably. Oh, okay. Yeah. I was 40 when I met Ted, but I had said, I guess I'm not good at love.

I guess I'm not good at this. And I have two amazing kids and I'm done. I'm done, I'm good. I'm not gonna forget it. And then that's when I met done. I'm done. I'm good. I'm not gonna forget it. And then that's when I met him. So sometimes like you almost described giving up, you know, it's just not gonna, I guess it's not gonna happen.

Sometimes that's when it does happen, you know, but anyway. Love your will for good. Some stuff is, but you know, it's just meant to be. Yeah. It just, you know, you could, I feel like, you know, you hear about sliding doors, and I've not seen the movie, so I just, what I think sliding doors is,

is like you make one little choice, and your life is completely different. But I think there are some things that like, you're just, you know, everything's going to work itself back to the same place. It's like, I went to a heart doctor the other day just to, you know, generally check up on it. And he said something about, like, if your heart, your stuff is pretty amazing in there, your veins and I don't know, he's did a better job of describing this but

there's it is amazing how if you have like a little blockage your can't your heart kind of just finds another way around it and can kind of just it's you know obviously people have heart attacks and stuff as though you know but but like if there is it just reminded me of what life can be. It's like, it's just like, it's gonna go to that place. It just might sometimes arc around a little clot and get back in there. I like that, see? Mary doesn't know what you're talking about

because she doesn't think about her body. But I like that. But you think about her body all the time. I do. All right. Now we'll go out on that weird note. Really? No, we'll cut it right after he gave

that amazing compliment to us. We'll go, cut. Hey, love you. Thank you so much for coming in. Well, thank you in advance for coming to support the Boys and Girls Club and anything for coming in. Well, thank you in advance for coming to support the Boys and Girls Club and anything for you guys. Thank you so much to Mary and Will for joining me this week.

I love you both in very different but equally special ways. That's all for this week's show. Thanks to our friends at Team Coco. If you enjoyed this episode, please send it to a loved one. Just a reminder, you can watch us on YouTube by visiting youtube.com slash team coco. As always, subscribe on your favorite podcast app and give us a great rating and review on Apple Podcasts. That is, if you want to be on the right side of history.

We can cut that later. No, keep it. No, cut it. Cut it. But maybe keep it. We'll have more for you next week, 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 Leal. Executive producers are Adam Sacks, 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 Grohl. Talent booking by Paula Davis and Gina Battista. Our theme music is by Woody Harrelson, Anthony Gen,

Mary Steenburgen, and John Osborne. We'll have more for you next time where everybody knows your name. ["The Star-Spangled Banner"]