WTF with Marc Maron Podcast - Episode 626 - Jason Bateman / Bob And Barry

Episode Date: August 5, 2015

Jason Bateman wondered if he was done with acting. After finding success at a very young age, Jason thought about hanging it up. He talks with Marc about his career rebirth, from Arrested Development to his latest movie, The Gift. Plus, Marc’s friends Bobcat Goldthwait and Barry Crimmins stop by to talk about Bob’s new documentary, Call Me Lucky, which is about Barry. Sign up here for WTF+ to get the full show archives and weekly bonus material! https://plus.acast.com/s/wtf-with-marc-maron-podcast. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

LOCK THE GATE! Alright, let's do this. How are you, what the fuckers? What the fuck buddies? What the fucking ears? What the fucksters? What the fuckaholics? Hi, I'm Mark Maron. This is my show. This is WTF. I'm perspiring in my garage. I think I fucked myself somehow. I think I did myself in i almost died i almost died today oh i'm still trying to catch my i'm serious i almost died you know stay tuned for that story god damn it oh can i mention right out of the gate australia i don't know what time it is there ever i i think it's like uh five nine five, nine, 14 hours, 15 hours later than here. It doesn't matter. That's not the point. My date's in Australia. I'm going to be coming to Australia. I'll be in

Sydney on Thursday, October 15th at the State Theater. I'll be in Melbourne on Friday, October 16th at the Palace. Is it Palace? Palace? I don't know. Oh, no. I'll be in Brisbane on Saturday, October 17th at City Hall. I'm sweating right now. Tickets are on sale starting tomorrow, August 7th. Go to Ticketmaster.com.au. Apparently, all the tickets are on sale at the same place there. Looking forward to coming back to Australia.

It's been a long time. We got a pretty loaded show today. I got Jason Bateman. Had a blast with Jason Bateman. And then got a little, before Jason Bateman, I will talk to the wonderful Bobcat Goldthwait and Barry Crimmins about the documentary Call Me Lucky, which is about Barry Crimmins. It's a heavy film, but it's handled with a delicate balance of funny

and depth and pain. It's a hell of a documentary, that thing with a delicate balance of funny and depth and pain. It's a hell of a documentary, that thing. So we'll talk to them about that. Oh, my God. What did I do to myself? You guys, look, I couldn't even talk. I had to do phoners in Australia, and I couldn't even think properly or speak properly because I did. I tend to be a little not self-loathing but self-critical and i i tend

to uh you know uh judge myself harshly especially around body issues and i've been on the road and eating freely freely shoving shit into my mouth uh with no sort of control or responsibility sure i'll have a pretzel roll on the plane i'm flying class. I'm entitled to a pretzel roll and a cookie. And if you have ice cream, we're in the air. It's meaningless. It's erased automatically. Flying ice cream does not apply. Anyway, so I'm feeling a little doughy and feeling a little shitty. And there was a time in my life, people, I don't know if you know this, where I exercise pretty regularly. I went to yoga. I used to do that every Sunday. I'd eat healthy. There was a time where I do sit ups and core exercises and work on the ball a little bit you know what i mean resistance training i like to

think i was in pretty fucking good shape on a core level but that drifted over the last couple years it drifts it gets away from you you're like i got to get back to that yeah when i really think about it i haven't fucking been on a regular exercise regimen in years now this is fading memory that i hold on to like it was fucking yesterday so i'm beating the shit out of myself since i got home a few days ago from touring extensively and not really being at home to plant my ass into my life and i'm like i gotta get running again i gotta get it right and i think i talked to you guys about this before i was running the hills around here i was able to run these two massive hills in this little circle that i do and i got to that point where i was able

to do that but so now i've just been sitting around chipping away on the fucking lozenges again i had a guest interview today and then it was like around 12 30 one o'clock and i'm doing some other shit getting some shit done and then uh and then i'm like i gotta run i gotta run and when you're when you're on the fence about running when when the spirit moves you, you better get moving. You better put that spirit into some sneakers and take it outdoors and hit it. But I knew I should go to the gym because it's hot as fuck. I didn't know how hot. I didn't know it was 95.

I didn't know it was like close to 100 degrees out. But the spirit wanted to run and I was going to run with that spirit. This is not a complicated spirit. This is a very basic jogging spirit. So I'd get on my shoes. I do my stretching. I knew I should have gone to the gym. I didn't have time.

I had to be back for a thing. So I went out into the 95 degree heat to run my circle up the hills. And I haven't done it really in months. And it was a classic stubborn old guy bullshit thing to do. Just that, you know, you know, when your dad says, no, fuck it, we're driving. Or when the pilot says, I don't care. I got my own plane. I get this storm means nothing. It was one of those dumb, prideful bullshit things to do as a guy that's 51 years old. So I hit the hills, made the first one, ran it. Then I felt a weird numbness in my chest that spread through my arms, a sort of excited

numbness. I imagine excited numbness is what is the first symptom before the lights go out indefinitely. So I felt this weird, excited numbness in my arms. And I'm like, I've kind of felt that before. And I keep running and I'm like, whoa, I have a hard time catching my breath. And then like, you know, getting a little dizzy. And I'm like, all right, all right, dude, right, dude, you're not failing if you walk a bit. And I'm like, yeah, but I am.

So I keep running. And then I got no choice to walk because my legs have the excited numbness. So now I've got excited numbness in all my limbs that's coming and going. And I'm like, this is fucked up. But I stayed on it. I didn't run, but I walked the whole way. I had to sit down twice and I was sweating. And I thought the lights were going out, man. I texted my girl. I said, hey man, I'm in trouble. And she

called right away. She said, I'm at Whole Foods. Is there anything I can get you that'll help you? I'm like, I just, I don't know if I'm going to make it home. I just wanted to give you a heads up. I might not make it till later. And it's been fun. So I make it home, barely sit on the couch and just start sweating. I got a headache. I can't move. I start chugging water. I'm like, I think I need potassium. I start eating a banana, but it's no good. It's not ripe yet. It tastes bad. I ate yogurt because I looked up potassium and they said that has it in it. I decided I needed potassium. I ate yogurt. I ate cantaloupe. I just potassiumed out. Then Sarah came over. She's like, you need salt. Here's some olives.

I'm like, I'm not, there's no way I'm eating post-run olives. But it took me like an hour to get my shit together. Cold compresses. I think I had a little heat stroke because I was stupid. In my defense, I did do the entire circle. Did not run it. But I think I laid some pretty good muscle memory groundwork for the future.

But the lesson I learned is, dude, you're old. You're not that old, but you're too old to be running in 100 degree heat if you're not in the fucking Marines. Jesus Christ, almost died. Couldn't even talk to the guy on the phone in Australia. Could barely put words together.

Let us now go to my conversation with Barry Crimmins and Bobcat Goldthwait about Bobby's documentary, Call Me Lucky, which is playing in New York, D.C., L.A., and elsewhere this weekend. It opens in other locations throughout August. You can go to callmeluckymovie.com for theaters. And, you know, I love these guys, and I've known them a long time. So listen to us talk. I had some weird memory that I can't get out of my head of that back room at Stitches when you used to have your night at Stitches. What was it?

What night was yours? Sundays? Well, I was Thursdays. Half the Thursdays and half the Saturdays. So I was there on Thursday nights and then every other Saturday. And then you'd hold court in that little fucking ticket booth that was the backstage. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. So I'm in there and you're talking about racism and Hollywood.

I don't know what the hell it was. And I was shit-faced. And I'd gotten it in my mind, but somehow another because danny devito was so short that he was being used and it was similar to uh to to what you were talking about with racism and and i just remember at some point at some point barry just goes i don't know what the hell's going on marin says danny devito is racism and then I don't know where the conversation, how that happened. Like, I just remember you like,

it registered with you, but it made no sense. I don't think it did make sense. In my mind, it kind of makes a little sense. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That he was being exploited. Well, it's bigotry.

We have to stop. Right, it's bigotry because he's short. Yeah, yeah, yeah. We have to stop the exploitation of Danny DeVito. Right. Million dollars.

I'm all for that. Barry Crimmins, Bobcat, Goldthwait. Both people I've had on this show. I think, Bobby, I've had you on several times. Yes. Is that true? Many times.

Yeah. And Barry I've had on once, but it was a monumental event. Yes. Thank you. During that conversation, I remember we had a good talk. It was very intense. And then you came with me to the club and you did some comedy. Yeah. And then we hung out in the parking lot. And I had no plan. Yeah. It was very intense. And then he came with me to the club and he did some comedy. Yeah.

And then we hung out in the parking lot. That was great. And I had no plan. Yeah. I had no plan to talk about what I talked about. But that's you. You get, you know. But you had been talking about it. Yeah.

No, I'm very comfortable talking about the fact that I'm a rape survivor because I didn't do anything wrong. Right. You know, part of me feeling that Barry would be comfortable in making a documentary was me listening to him on your show. And I've got to say, that was a game changer doing that interview with you. And thanks, man. Yeah, you're welcome.

And I'll tell you, I heard from a lot of people, some of whom I was able to provide some assistance for, and that helps them continue healing. Oh, is that true? Yeah. We go back and forth. They would say, oh, nothing like that happened. It's amazing how people really don't.

You think everyone exaggerates. Most of the time I find that they start off sort of, well, you know, nothing like you went through. And then they tell you this heartbreaking story, and you go, look, man, we've got a few things to chip away at here. And then they tell you this heartbreaking story, and you go, look, man, we've got a few things to chip away at here. But the power it has to help people in terms of a thing that most people carry with them as a secret or they're ashamed of or they don't know how to speak about it is pretty profound. And you shouldn't, and that's the whole thing.

That's why I'm really, you know, I mean, people can get too strident about language pretty easily. But when someone says, oh, you admitted you were raped, look like i disclose i don't admit that makes me complicit and then one of the big tricks particularly with child sexual abuse or you know she was asking for it mentality is that you are somehow complicit in these crimes they're done against you you wouldn't say you admitted getting hit by a hit and run driver or held up at gunpoint, and it's the same thing. You're a crime victim. That's right. You're changing the language.

Yeah. But when you made the movie, Bob, I mean, the awareness that you were going to have to balance the story of his rape and also the humanity of his comedy. Right. I mean, what was the trickiest part of making the movie like that? Well, there was, yeah, I wanted to lay a bunch of pipe so people knew who Barry was and what he meant in the comedy world.

But I also wanted to kind of tonally put some things in there so it wouldn't be such a big, you know, jolt when we start discussing his rape. So it was very hard, you know, jolt when we start discussing his rape. So it was very hard, you know? I mean, but, you know, as soon as I say to him, I go, it was really hard making this movie. And Barry's like, really? Really? I'm awful worried about you.

Yeah, really, really. It's really killing me. He's been through it, absolutely. I think it was about as hard as, you know, when Barry disclosed on stage in Boston. It was during a show, and Steve Sweeney was going on. And Steve's a really funny guy, a guy that influenced me a lot, but was kind of insisting on closing.

Yeah. And Barry said, okay, go ahead. He's about to disclose. He knows he's going to do this, and Sweeney's like going, I got to close. And he's like, okay. Yeah, and then Sweeney got up there and he's just going, Jesus Christ. God, God. Barry Crimmins.

Let's hear it for Barry Crimmins again. But that was the interesting thing about the film, too, is that these guys who I knew when I was a kid doing comedy in Boston, these are working class dudes that come from a regional sort of disposition around homosexuality, around whatever it is. Right. All these guys were supportive. They were understanding that the community came around him. They felt bad. Right. Yeah.

I think I think that's basically it. I think some people were skeptical earlier because they're scared of the story, you know. Yeah. But there was amazing. So I have more than enough support. Bob was, you know, one of the first people I told, and he was amazing. And, you know, it was weird. He almost went like, all right, because it's like, oh, the Crimmins mystery is a little bit solved here, you know.

Right, right, right. Yeah. Finally, we know why. Yeah, right, right. Finally we know why. Yeah, because we were trying to figure this out, all this anger. Well, when he disclosed to me, it was a sense of relief. Here's a guy I've known and loved since I was 16 years old,

and I was like, oh, okay, this all makes sense. And then some of the tough shots in the movie. Yeah. It's 10clock in the morning and bob's going let's get you a couple beers i'm going it's 10 o'clock i don't drink a 10 so i think you gotta have a couple of well i mean do you want to know the real so when barry tells the the the stories of his rape yeah rapes rapes yeah um he the the first time he did it was like 10 10 30 in the morning and and um it's the first time he did it it was like 10, 10.30 in the morning and it's the only time I've ever done this

it was I said listen I think we're doing this movie for the same reason and I I go can we get Barry a beer I don't want a beer there's two beers then I give him another beer. I got to get another beer. There's two beers there.

I got to get him another beer. And I said, I need you not to tell the story. I need you to remember the story. And that's the take that's in the movie. When he goes into the basement. Yeah. Yeah. Well, no, that was.

Yeah, not when you went into the basement, when you told the story of it. Because when he went into the basement, we had a huge argument. I mean, a real fight. I didn't want him to go into the basement when you told the story of it because when he went into the basement we had a huge argument i mean a real fight like like i didn't i didn't want him to go into the basement every time there was a something and i mean you think when you make a movie an independent filmmaker yeah you're laying your whole career on the line every time you make a movie you might then ever get to make another movie if you fuck up so but yeah every time there was there was a chance there was a chance uh that it harmed me if he would he would see potential danger or harm to me or something good for the movie he was for the you know he was for me and then i ended up yeah and i was for the movie yeah so but i mean i wasn't going to go that. I wasn't going to go back there and allow that place to have that kind of power.

I wasn't going to think about that place for so many years and have it in my head and then be afraid to walk in there. I had to go in there as a child. I had no choice. As an adult, I can walk in there. And I also wanted to sort of demonstrate that there isn't some sort of supernatural power that these criminals have to imbue these stone walls with evil. It's a place I hope a lot of kids play. Only the Catholic Church has the power. Well, yeah, yeah, yeah. That's right.

We can get there real soon. They can imbue walls with evil quite easily. Just throw a stained glass window up there. Yeah, that's absolutely. That's right. Yeah, the production design. It's on purpose, I think. You know, what was great in the movie is that when you see the footage of you on TV

doing those jokes, that, you know, what I didn't remember was they were so accessible and they were also so relevant now that they were great jokes, and you were funny up there, and you had a whole angle, and it was all complete. You were the whole package.

And then it shows you down there performing for the Sandinistas. Yeah. And that was very moving. The thing that I think people should know about this movie coming into it is that it's not some movie where you're like oh my god how are we gonna you know like yeah yeah here we're talking about uh about you being raped as a child and and how you move through it but the balance that you were able to get bob with uh you know just the the the part of barry that enabled him to survive and function, which was his wit and his desire to help and perform, to use comedy as a way of expressing his anger, really kind of is a great part of the movie.

It kind of moves along. And then to see Barry at this age trudging through the winter in upstate New York is, you know, I don't think he I don't think you realize how hilarious you are. Oh, yeah. Well, that whole I mean, that whole thing. Let's just talk about that for a minute. So Goldthwait. Yeah. I mean, everybody knows I cut wood.

No. But the thing is, right before we shot two months before that, I got T-boned and my knee was broken in two places. Yeah. So he's got me hauling a maple log up the hill. How many beers did that take? Yeah. A maple log up the hill. And then I'm trying to split wood standing on one leg, and that knee's bad, too.

So I hadn't hit a piece of firewood and not split a free. Now all these people are contacting me to advise me on how to split firewood.'s like oh fuck yourself i know how to split fire right but when i turn to goldthwait and i say this isn't fucking working in the movie yeah i was saying okay we're not going to see this and of course now it's at the top of the movie you just wanted to establish the character yeah yeah that is very criminal that is very quickly the that your life, the life that you had as a comic and the important stuff you did as an activist, but now also being an advocate and a resource that you have been all through this since you- Disclosed. Disclosed, is now culturally identifiable and relevant and you're more available for yourself and for others now.

Sure, sure. And that's a great thing at any time. It's unbelievable. And helping others is a way to really know. And anybody who's in a 12-step program knows this. When you notice the progress you made when you're helping somebody else. Sure.

You see where you were a while ago and you feel fortunate for being that much further along. And I get that all the time, dealing with abuse survivors. And also you get the selflessness, the getting out of your own... Getting out of your own way. Yeah.

And that, to me, is... And really, everyone was so worried about me when I did the child pornography investigation. I didn't know about that. That, to me, was the most devastating part of the movie. Is that because you looked emaciated and like you'd been depleted. You went down this rabbit hole, but you changed legislation. What I did was I changed the corporate culture at AOL. They had to get

rid of what was going on there. They were making money. Back in those days it cost three or four bucks an hour to be online if you were online over 10 or 12 hours or whatever it was. All these guys are spending $1,000, $1,200 a month because they've never had a community.

Pedophiles and child pornographers. People who shared those things right and so i'm telling you all and they're playing it dumb because it takes a half hour to upload one picture and they're getting paid so they're making a buck and a half every time a picture gets goes but i'm one of the first people witnesses you know who saw in almost real time photographic evidence of a kid who was raped 10 minutes ago. It's terrifying. And I'm not getting, and they're playing it dumb with me. And there was, I went back and forth with them forever.

And then finally I ended up, because of my friend Lana Lawrence, hooked, she somehow, they knew they were going to do this hearing in Washington, but the hearing was going to be about kids and pornography on the internet. It was like my 16-year-old sons to Playboy magazine right it's like you know oh no but if i hadn't been at the hearing you would have heard the word child and you would have heard the word pornography but you wouldn't hurt them in a row you know so that's i didn't you know i cared about the children in the pornography and i and i saw it was this photographic evidence of rape and sexual assault and exploitation of kids. And if you've seen it, you would never call it kiddie porn, which sounds like the bunny hill or something.

I mean, it's tough stuff. If you know what it really is, it's tough stuff. And then I've talked to so many people who know they were photographed and whatever, and they talk to me about it. It's really heartbreaking because they'll be a 50-year-old man crying, saying, well, it was kind of a pine cabin. The priest used to take me there, and he was kind of bald. And they think that I saw it, and they're embarrassed with me. And I go, look, man, if I saw a picture like that, and I saw a lot of pictures like that,

if I saw a picture like that, all I saw were your eyes. I was trying to see, is this kid, how long does this kid have? What's going to happen to this kid? What's going to happen to him or her? That's all you see if you're there, if you're witnessing it for the right reasons. And if you're one of the monsters into that and if you're and if you're one of the one of the monsters is into that stuff you don't you would never recognize this person particularly as an adult that it doesn't even register with them so i mean i was happy that i could at least convey that to a lot of people but anyway we went in and they had a cocky lawyer from aol who just

figured he was gonna as a nightclub comic yeah Yeah, bring it on, shithead. But here's the thing, Mark, and this is Washington for you. I went into that hearing, and I gave my testimony, and clearly the AOL guy had been given my testimony because his printed testimony was direct responses to my testimony they asked for in advance. Nobody gave me, the kid defending the kids the advanced testimony of that of the other guy so someone did you know tipped you know get like leaked it yeah to him yeah and and i still you know false modesty aside kicked his ass and

by the end of that thing like there's one thing bob has in the movie where the guy's saying well barry doesn't care but he doesn't seem to believe parental control software works and i go link it works great if the parents aren't the rapists right but once the parents are the rapists it's kind of a useless thing now isn't it so uh um i and you can just sort of see by the end of this thing this guy would come in pretty cocky when he snaps at the end and tells the truth by mistake what do you do he said well we had i just want to stop you right there we at america online have a strict three strikes and you're out policy concerning child pornography and i was like you know i love baseball as much as anybody but you know that's not a three strike

offense in any fucking league, in any league. So when that happened, that was the KO. He was done. He was done. It was like there was no backtricks. He publicly said that they would allow people to stay there who had been caught. We don't have any fourth-time offenders on child pornography. Are you kidding me? So it was over.

But when he said that if you look at him he's a beaten man at that point he had taken you know it was like the 14th round of a 15 round fight and he had they should have stopped it i think the other thing that that that makes the movie you know so beautiful is that you know outside just in talking about this stuff and the weight of it and and uh in talking about comedy a little bit though is the love that you guys have for each other for so long yeah that like there was an intimacy there you know around you know your trust of bob sure and bob is uh you know knowledge of you and his trust of you and and also you know the line uh that which you could operate at you

know not crossing each other's lines but then also learning new territory in terms of, you know, what you could achieve together. And it was a beautiful thing. A couple things there. Bob was, I mean, he was so protective and thoughtful towards me. I trusted him with my life. And then I stepped back. It was hard not to say, you know, I mean, you know,

your friends and these different people are talking about you all day. And I was never there because I didn't want to skew anybody. Tell them the truth. And so I had to, I mean, it took some self-control to not ask a bunch of questions. But then I got used to it. But I also, I trusted Bob. And it was a very wise investment on my part, and he made a beautiful movie.

And what I love about the movie, and Bob said some stuff to me early on that just came, you know, he said, look, I don't want it to be one of those documentaries where 38 people are sitting in front of the same bookcase. And they made this beautiful cinema. Bradley Stonecipher, the cinematographer, did amazing work. And Jeff Stryker, the editor, did amazing. And Bob pulled the whole thing together.

And the whole crew was tremendous. So, I mean, it was easy on one level. But on other levels, it was sort of like, well, I wonder what's going on in there. It was like being outside of the maternity room for a year. Also, Robin was my best friend. So the movie. Yeah, he got hit with a meteor in the middle of the thing. An emotional.

Yeah. And it sounds corny, but I honestly was like, oh, okay, well, you know, what would he want? And, you know, I assumed, well, he would want me to finish this movie. But it was just insane. The year was just divorce. Loss. Break up with a girlfriend, decorating a Christmas tree, and my best friend kills himself.

But at least I had a baby rape documentary to work on 10 to 12 hours a day to cheer me up. And I will say this. Go ahead. I knew he was going to work his way through. But, I mean, I knew because he's hours a day to cheer me up. And I will say this. Go ahead. I knew he was going to work his way through. But, I mean, I knew because he's such a hard worker that I just had – I knew that even though this is a tough story to tell and so on, that I was glad he had it to tell because I knew when I heard he was getting back to work, that that was the beginning of the path

to getting through the grief, the incredible grief. But the courage he showed and the professionalism to get off that deck and get it done so that we ended up at Sundance, it's fucking unbelievable.

And you know why you were both able to do this thing? Because you're fucking comics. Yeah, right, right. Think about it. I mean, you know what I mean? That's what we do. Watch me shut my emotions off. Yeah. It'll be the most entertaining

emotional shutdown you'll ever see. Yeah, I think it's my personal best. I think it really is. It's an amazing, unique movie and I'm happy you guys are seeing such success with it. Thanks. Can I say something really quick? And you can cut this out if you want, but you're kind enough to have me direct your new special, and I've seen you do stand-up over the years, but it was really great.

What I loved about the specials is that you really brought it. I mean, I really really i hope you're happy with your performances because you were really on that night like you were really dialed in well i i it was one of those times and you can't say that so i want to say that i appreciate it i would say he called me up and was enthused and san maran just absolutely i think uh my favorite moment was when i was laughing and I forgot to call cameras I'm like hey

hey dumb dumb you're directing stop watching the show well thank you man I think it came up great

thanks for coming by fellas well it's an honor to be on the show again yeah so relatively soon and it's an honor

to be on it with this guy and both you two yeah and I know you guys have been working on stuff together it's

it's all we're okay It's all pretty cool. We're okay. It's all pretty great, man. We're doing okay. This seems like the time for an untimely death. Yeah. Oh, you.

Gee, and I guess who that's going to be. That's when the space debris landed on the garage. The last truck of Skyline. All right, thanks, guys. Find balance between brutal, dark, emotionally devastating, and funny. Barry Crimmins lives in that.

And Bobcat Goldthwait understands that. And it's a pretty amazing movie. Again, Call Me Lucky is playing in New York and D.C. and L.A. and other places this weekend. And it's opening in locations throughout August. And all around the country, hopefully. You can go to callmeluckymovie.com for theaters. It was great to talk to those guys.

Heavy shit, but funny shit. Surviving, man. Surviving. And learning. those guys heavy shit but funny shit surviving man surviving and learning moving through and helping and also maybe driving yourself a little crazy jason bateman i've been very impressed with jason's bait jason's jason's bateman both of them the two of them I've been very impressed with Jason's work in movies lately and he's very funny he's a great straight man but I always wondered what kind of duty was and I read I actually reached out to him years ago at a phone number I don't even know if I talked to him about you know I'm not going to spoil anything I had a great time talking to Jason Bateman so now why don't you enjoy us oh and before you enjoy us I'm sorry before you enjoy us? Oh, and before you enjoy us, I'm sorry. Before you enjoy us, although that was a great segue,

Jason is in the new movie, The Gift, which is in theaters tomorrow, August 7th. Now, please enjoy Jason Bateman and myself. Was that grammatically correct? All right, don't just do it. Weasel and I were buddies for a while. We all went to school together. I don't know if I told you this.

No. We went to school together in eighth grade, I think. Oh, really? Yeah. To a Valley Professional School, which was a school where if you are professional, if you're pulling down a lot of auditions, you're going to want to free up your afternoon, right? So these guys take your probably 30 grand a year.

I don't even remember what it was because I was a 12. It was all actors and celebrity kids? Yeah. Janet Jackson was there. Really? I don't know what kind of audition she was doing. So how old were you at that point? This is eighth grade.

So I'm 14. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And so school is 9 to 12. Right. 14? Yeah, yeah, yeah. And so school is 9 to 12. Right.

So you can go home and bang out your sides, you know, and then, you know, get on a bus like I did with a skateboard. Right. And go down to Hollywood and do your audition. Uh-huh. So who else? It was Janet Jackson and Jweezil? Oh, a year. One year.

I don't remember. There were a couple of Olympic skaters. Sure. There? Yeah. Well, because they need to, you know, they got to get out there on the ice. Yeah. And they can't be after four.

Well, how many kids in this school? You know, 20. Oh, my God. So it was a racket. It was in a mini mall on Sherman Way in, like, Vineland. That was someone's big idea. Yeah, it was a racket. Definitely not an accredited institution.

Did you do any work? Mm-mm. No, I didn't. But you, you like basically grew up in show business uh from yeah i started when i was 10 and i did a lot of um of television work where'd you come from how'd you how'd that happen i was born in rye new york uh dad westchester right yeah yeah uh dad was a writer director producer and he uh in new york in new york yes and then boston were there we were there from when i was two till i was four what did he do like what i i don't know it's it's a little mysterious um but deals to say we had to keep moving around so we then went to salt lake city which could throw could throw you off the scent a little bit, right?

What kind of production is happening there? There was some post-production. In Salt Lake? It was like running a film lab. You weren't Mormons? No. Grandma and Grandpa were. Oh, they were.

So there was an actual connection. On dad's side, I think. But I don't remember any of that. How old? This is from four to seven. And how do you get out here? How does that happen? Again, another one of dad's moves to another better opportunity.

Yeah. I think, again, in post-production, perhaps. I don't know. And my mom was a stewardess for Pan pan am so her situation was a bit more fluid you know her job was to travel so she would she'd what would they call it deadhead to wherever her base was right right and then fly yeah when pan am was an airline yeah it's over it's over but before it was over we did a ton of traveling before I was old enough to really appreciate it. Europe and everything? Not so much Europe, but more Asia.

I think they were more, Pan Am had Asia down. So I did a lot of trips to Hong Kong and Japan. It was an inconvenience. They don't have, my buddies aren't here. My skateboard's not here. Just imagine your kids going on that trip now and what your parents must have gone through. Yeah. Where's Nick Jr., dad?

I'm not seeing Nick Jr. anywhere on the dial here. And Justine's older than you? Yeah, three years. And there's just two of you? There's just the two from this marriage. Oh, okay. There are two boys from the last marriage that dad had. Before you?

After me. Okay. And one boy from the marriage that dad had. Before you? After me. Okay. And one boy from the marriage that preceded. So he came in with a kid? He came in with a kid and left with two. Uh-huh. He's not around anymore? Dad's still here.

Oh. He's up north, though. He's in Oregon. What's he doing up there? Or Washington. Is it unclear? It's unclear. I have not been there yet, but he hasn't been here either.

So really, how long has it been this friction? There's no friction. There's just there's a we kind of had a very atypical upbringing, my sister and I, and that since dad kind of this uh somewhat of a bohemian contributor to the arts uh but unclear what that was unclear what you've not seen any of his work i smelt a lot of development fluid in the basement um and mom was you know flying around the world for pan am yeah uh we had christmas on the 23rd often and Thanksgiving on the 15th. Okay.

And then Justine and I started acting. And so there wasn't anything very traditional about the way in which we were brought up. And consequently, the dynamic between children and parents was not traditional. and parents was not traditional. Therefore, there isn't that obligatory draw to call every Sunday or visit where you live now or let's all get together for Christmas. So you're saying your parents were self-involved. I don't know if it's so much that. I mean, if I'm to look at it half full, I would say that they weren't hamstrung

by the traditional familial obligations. That's diplomatic. Because I mean, I have the same experience, whereas I don't... I feel like my parents are people I grew up with. I don't feel like there was this sort of like this intrinsic kind of like, you know, like nurturing going on. I just feel like, was this sort of like this intrinsic kind of like, you know, like nurturing going on.

I just feel like, yeah, they were these troubled or, you know, complicated people that were kids when they had me. And we all grew up together. And now we're kind of friends. Do you remember that transition that every kid makes where your parents become human and you stop that sort of that deferential dynamic where, you dynamic where mom and dad are, that's where I'm going. That's where I want to go. I want to be just as good as dad or just as good as mom. And you eventually get old enough or smart enough or enlightened

or insightful enough to see that they're just as flawed as you are. Oh, yeah, and I don't want to go there at all. Or I'm going to cherry pick the things that I want to emulate. Trim that a little bit. It's a really, it's a really it's a it's a heartbreaking and hilarious transition that i think every kid goes through sure yeah but i think that they usually they go through it when they're 40 and they don't know what the fuck's wrong with them yeah in that way we're like i don't know i don't know what it was what is the ideal age and

circumstance to go through that that sort of curtain pulling well i think that what happens if parents are good is that they allow you to sort of detach and and and have your own space in in a way that's still kind of like we still love you and and you sort of kind of gradually go into that and you as you sort of find your own identity but i think if if your parents are needy or they're actually emotionally detached you're're sort of on your own. And then usually that realization comes with a good heaping of like, well, fuck them. Fuck that. Right. Yeah.

But I don't know. I like the idea of cherry picking. I mean, it seems a little easier than just that. Because you end up having those elements. Your parents are like, oh, God, how do I get that one? Right. And by definition, you have it in yourself right yeah as you can see it well yeah because they wired you you know they put the board in

do you have those things oh yeah i'm loaded with all the things that i think we're i think we're all loaded with the things that we don't want from our parents and our ability to become a quality human being is is is our ability to kind of navigate and kind of neutralize those elements, right? Because they're there. They're in you. They're literally in your DNA. So what makes us good people is the ongoing struggle to destroy our parents' influence.

To tamp down the remnants of your parents, I suppose, and accentuate the parts that you do like. But so you talk to your dad? Yeah, yeah. Oh, okay. And your mom's still around? Yeah, yeah. So I talk to them both.

But not in the traditional frequency. Like once a week. We have a call. We don't do that. No. Yeah, it's once a month. Sure. And sometimes it's email.

Yeah. It's not forced. And I will give them that. It's a great thing that they don't jam you. Yeah, but they have a relationship with your kids and stuff? No. Not letting that happen. Don't go that far.

Although my mom's a little bit better than my dad, but I'll attribute that to her being in the same state. Oh, she's here. Yeah. Yeah, I don't have kids, so I don't have that. But it's an odd thing. But it's not a choice. You're like, no, they're staying away from my kids.

I'm not keeping them away. And they're not making an effort to stay away. It's just more like, hey, if we met going down the street, would we hang out? Now, I don't know if that's a relationship between you and my parents. I'd say that's more, I think my sister and I have that really kind of healthy relationship where it's like, hey, man, you know, like, we don't have to be every day, every week, every month, every holiday just because we're brother, sister. It's like, well, let's earn the relationship that adults should or could have that is not,

that is not, you're not handcuffed because of the blood. But you do, you get along with her then. She has a relationship with her kids. Ish, yeah. And my ish with theirs. So they got cousins? They got cousins. I'm not sure they know their names, but they officially do have cousins, yes.

Where is she though? She's about a mile from my house. I hope they don't listen to this. I could be a better uncle, brother, son. Mark, you've got it. You've done it. You've pulled it out. Very early in this interview.

But it wasn't easy being you, right? There have been some challenging moments but i i i i think i'm kind of i'm weathering it pretty well i i don't know if you ever really know whether you're really happy or not because you honestly cannot compare it to anybody else like wouldn't it be great to be able to get into just anybody's mind yeah it doesn't matter whether they're they're they're sick or healthy or you know happy or sad just to get a little bit of perspective about well i might be like euphoric right compared to everyone else right everybody might just be just beat to shit inside you know yeah or i might be the most or the darkest cloud kind of. I have no idea.

I think it's all about how you interpret your daily weather and your traffic, right? I think so. No, but I think there is a way to sort of like, you can assess peace of mind. Yes. You can assess like, you know, how much fear you're living in. Yeah. How much anger you have. Yeah, that I think I'm really honest with myself about i

i i i bet you i'm i'm i'm i'm a i'm a real happy camper yeah you seem good i mean i like the i think there was the weird thing was like one years ago when i first started this show i think janine garofalo love her yeah she said you got to get uh bateman on you gotta you gotta call him yeah yeah he said you gotta call him. And she gave me some weird toll-free number. Is it 1-800-BLOOD-JOB? Yeah. Was that the wrong number? Yeah, I've discontinued that.

I was getting like really weird fucking calls. I don't know why. Yeah. It doesn't make sense to me. You know, JasonBateman.com was a gay porn hub. It was? Hub. Really?

For a while. Until I had to buy it. One of the gay writers on a show i was doing he said hey man can i talk to you for a second and he said he said uh my partner and i were doing a little surfing the other day and so he told me about this and i said you're are you lying he said no he said check it out so i went I went there and it is not a site. It's a hub from which it's like going to like, you know,

the Tom Bradley terminal. You can go anywhere in the gay world from JasonBateman.com. Are there pictures of you? No, I think it was just like, well,

what name would really resonate with our gay community? Do you have a lot of gay following? I think I might. You must. They must love you. That's what this is telling me. Yeah.

But yeah, so we snatched that um and how much did you have to pay to not be a gay hub i don't remember i i seem to remember it being pretty affordable oh that's good yeah but no but garofalo gave me this number and i called it because it was like at the beginning and i wanted to get gas and and uh there was no i don't remember what it was but i left this message hey man uh jason it's mark maron and i think we i don't know if you're still with dave becky but at that time i was with dave becky yeah yeah and i like i couldn't get through to him and then at some point i just he was representing you you could not get a hold of very difficult but i'm no longer with him but we're okay him and i are fine we'll get to a point i mean you must know you've been in the business a while where,

where if you're not really doing anything, they don't know what to do. Right. And, uh, it's a, don't get me started. Yeah.

You've got to help them help you. Oh, they'd have no idea. And, and, and if they can't, if they don't have any traction with you, you're not,

you're not a bargaining chip. You're, you're like, can you do me a favor? Like you're that guy. Like he'd have big clients. And I know what happened was like, Hey,

you know, you got Louie for that thing. You think Marin, you got anything guy. He'd have big clients, and I know what happened was like, hey, you got Louie for that thing. You think Marin, you got anything for Marin? It's crazy. I don't like knowing about it. Yeah, but it's pretty common sense. It's like the market dictates whether you're going to get hired. Sure.

An agent can't get you hired. I don't want to belittle what an agent does, but you could be the best agent in the world, but it's not about advocacy, you know? Right. Because if it was, our mothers would be our best agents. Sure. Right? It's not about picking up the phone and saying, hey, Mark Maron's fantastic. You got to hire.

That doesn't mean shit. So it doesn't matter really what agent you're with. Yeah. It's if the marketplace wants you, if you're hot, if you're relevant, or yada, yada. Yeah, if they have something to work with. Right. If they're like, oh, we can run money through this guy. Yes.

You have to give them the bullets to fire, which means you need a job before they can get you one. That's right. And the problem is, if you don't have that and you've been with them a long time, it becomes like this weird marriage.

You're sort of like, I don't know what to do, but I don't want to be an asshole. I can't stop representing him. I can't kick him out of here. Yeah. So they just stop calling. They just stop calling calling and they wait maybe something will pop for that guy they try to get you to fire yourself they try to get you to call them and say hey man i gotta make

a choice we know i gotta move on right and and then they kind of have to say whoa whoa really and then i gotta spend 10 minutes trying to talk you out of it, but not too emphatically. And then you leave and then they're like, oh. Thank God. Thank God. Well, I was with him since the beginning.

I mean, I was with him like for 20 years. So like, like I knew him. That's the weird thing that you realize about Hollywood after a while is that they all come up together. You know, they,

you got your agents, you got your managers, you got your publicists, you got your talent. And generationally, they sort of like come up and they make it and they don't make it. And if they make it with their guys, then they have a lot of whatever. But there's a bit more of a natural ascension, sort of a perpetual, you know, an escalator almost in a lot of the other channels and lanes.

And in acting, like there isn't, if you put in 35 years, you don't get that sort of entitlement of a raise or promotion, you know, job security. No. No. It actually works against you. It's terrifying. Oh, we know him. Now, we're tired of that. Sure, sure.

We want somebody with no experience whatsoever. Somebody fresh. Yeah, somebody no one knows. Yeah. You mean a rookie. Right. In any other profession, it's a negative. But you've been in it since you were 10?

Yeah. So how does that start? Like, I've talked to a couple of actors who have been doing it that long. Yeah. And, you know, I know that it's tricky that once you sort of play out of the young roles, then you get that weird, like, what? What does he know? I just talked to Jason Segel the other day. Yeah.

But you were really young. So how does that start? Your parents? Well, uh no you're looking at your phone down there not really no play with the cord playing with my penis no um give me some privacy do you want me to turn around i'll bet it has you do night sessions in here not since jasonbateman.com closed down um so what happened? So dad, as I said, was a writer, director, producer. And so his passion was movies.

And so he would take- But you never, he saw nothing. You've seen none of your father's work. No. Well, yeah, he did. He made one. But he knew about them. He knew what it takes to make a good one.

And so he turned that on in me. He showed me what was a good film, what was a bad film, and why. What was a good director, what a bad director was, actor, et cetera. I love that you still call him a writer, producer, director, film guy, but you have no evidence of anything. But it still stuck with you. The myth still holds tight in your head. He drilled it home for me. He made one movie.

You don't know what that is. It is true. It's true. You just kind of keep saying it. My father was in- He keeps saying it. It's like Fox News. He'd just keep repeating it.

He'd just spit it out enough times. So he made you watch like what? He sat you down- Anything that was playing at the New Art, which is an art house here in LA. You'd go see it. We'd go see stuff that had, most of them had subtitles. Right. Which was just after I started to learn how to read.

So I'm surprised it didn't kill movies for me. Do you remember anything from that time where you're like, holy shit. I remember, what was the, Fitzcarraldo. Do you remember that film? Oh yeah, yeah. The Herzog movie. Right. And what was the, Fitzcarraldo. Do you remember that film? Oh, yeah, yeah, the Herzog movie. Right. And what was the guy?

Klaus Kinski? Yeah. Wasn't there a scene where he was, burned in my head, I think either he or one of the actors was having sex with a woman at the base of a tree. Uh-huh. And he was in a squatted position and she was in a seated position on his squatted body with his back against a tree oh that's yeah and i take some that takes some i mean yeah but i mean i well he's got the bag he's

got the tree for the support right and then he just needs to move up and down which i would imagine that now that's hurting your back i would imagine i'm thinking that through but anyway that that to me was like the most i couldn't believe how terrible that was that just scarred me uh so i do remember fitzcarraldo my grandparents took me to see deliverance by accident oh yeah when it came out so i wasn't even 10 well you know i was surprised to see the release date on jaws the other day was 75 and i was six and i remember seeing that in a movie theater you can't take a six-year-old to jaws because i because I wonder where my fear of sharks comes from. I can't swim in a pool at night.

Uh-oh. Wait. I don't know what's under there. We've got to talk afterwards. Do explain what a pool is. I know. I know it's not logical. It's not rational.

But I think I had this conversation with my girlfriend the other day. A lot of people forget that Betamax, like videotapes were introduced at a certain point. So like the memory of Jaws, like she thought it was her childhood, but it was 10 years before. It was because videotapes. Everyone saw it.

Like, remember when videotapes first came out? You saw everything again. You saw everything. But you saw it in the theater. You're pretty sure. I'm positive. I saw, I remember the movie theater. So he got me into into

acting i got me excited about it and then a neighbor of ours was an actor he took me to an audition i ended up sneaking into that audition for the for the for the kid part and i got that part so i thought it was good then i had my dad take some pictures of me and send them into an agency so i could like start doing commercials and selling burgers and stuff and that worked for about a year and then i uh they send you out for tv shows after you do a few commercials so your agent was like he's hot we got one yeah exactly this guy can smile right so um so then i uh started doing uh tv comedies like uh silver spoons and it's your move and or actually a little house in the prairie was the first thing that i did

which was a very, very special drama. Yeah. It was a one-hour drama. Yeah. I remember that one. Michael Landon. Michael Landon. And you did a lot of those?

I did a year of that. Really? The final year before they all went away. So you were a kid? Yeah. You were one of the kids? I was adopted into the Landon family, the Ingalls family. You showed up.

Were you like an abandoned kid? I was. I was a kid. You showed up, were you like an abandoned kid? I was. I was a kid. The storyline of this very special two-parter that ended the one season and triggered the season that I was in with a little sister. Her name was Missy Francis, played my sister Cassandra.

I was James. And the story was we were in a stagecoach with my parents and they they had like a sick horse or something and so Charles Ingalls you know Michael Landon's riding by in his stagecoach and they say hey could we get a lift or a pole or a tug or whatever it is and he says sure but maybe the kids should write with me so me and the girl get in the back of Landon's stagecoach we start going down the steep hill and of course the brakes go out and our parents stagecoach, we start going down this steep hill and of course the brakes go out and our parents stagecoach and there's this terrible like scene that's really viscerally

shot of their stagecoach going over the edge of this mountain. With them in it. Yeah, just terrible barrel rolls down the side of this hill and my sister and I, you know, running, screaming, you know, walking up, you know, dramatically into cameras.

The camera's dolling towards us and we kind of meet in this hard close-up of us just screaming, crying, Mama, no, Pop, no. And then, you know, like turning to Michael Landon, you know, like, well, what now? And like, you know, then a push in on him, like, I guess I'm going to have to adopt you too. It was kind of the shock. I guess. Right? And then that's what happens.

We get adopted into the family. So he fucked up on the toe? He gave an improper tug, which will get you in trouble at jasonbateman.com. So that was it. That was it. So you cried? I cried well. I remember auditioning for Michael Landon in his dressing room while he was shooting an episode.

And we read a scene together. It took me into his dressing room. It was just the two of us shutting the door behind him like a trailer on a set. He's a big dude too, right? Big dude. And I'm a small little 10-year-old. And that was a little scary. And I just had to basically lay down on the bed because we're going to play a scene where I'm tucking you into bed.

And these are the sides where you need to cry. And you say, I don't want to go to that adoption agency tomorrow. And the crying and the drama of that needs to kind of trigger in him this desire, well, fuck it. I'll just adopt these kids. And I cried. You did? At 10. Can you make yourself cry not really

it's a hard thing to do i don't know how actors do it so easily i've come up with this terrible method of you know now with with iphones which i didn't have back then i don't know how i did it then uh but i'll just look at pictures of my daughters and imagine terrible terrible like going over a mountain in a stagecoach. And that'll make me start to cry a little bit. And I have to time that out with, you know, guessing when they're going to call me ready for the scene. You ready?

And then you're like, hold on. No, that's what I do. I walk onto the set and I'm looking at a, they think I'm checking my email. Look at this dick actor walking onto this really important scene and he can't get off his fucking iPhone. I just saw the trailer for The Gift and like, it looks like you're really broke down there's i did that a ton of times in that movie all those tears are because i have fresh in my mind my daughter going into a blender you know with like some song in my in my hair in my head you know

while i'm looking at it that's hilarious but when you were 10 you just summoned it yeah i probably just pinched my leg hard or something. Really? You don't remember? Because it is kind of hard. It's hard. And you didn't take any acting classes or anything? My dad taught a little improv.

Hey, man. Where did he teach you improv? He's got to make some scratch. Sure, buddy. He taught improv on Ventura and Woodman. Yeah. This is way before the improv craze. This is way before the improv craze. This is way before the improv craze.

Yeah. He was ahead of it. Yeah. But it was actually, it was very beneficial. Who took those classes? Nobody of any sort of. Oh, my God. So your dad's teaching improv.

Your dad, the filmmaker. You got to add that to the list of things. Acting coach. Yeah. Acting coach, improv teacher. What was it? Did he know what he was doing? He did.

He actually did teach me everything I know, to be honest. He started me with sort of this proper perspective on what this bullshit thing is of acting. Like what? Because no one's ever really been able to tell me. What do you remember? I mean, I'm sure that I've morphed this into my own kind of thing but basically the way i see it now is that it's really not to belittle what the real actors do right now the daniel day lewis's of the world um but it's the easiest thing to do in the

world because we all do it like you're doing it right now. I'm doing it right now. I should be crying. But, like, you know how you're different with, you know, your mom versus your best friend. Right. It's just behavioral manipulation in order to fit the person that you're talking to. In order to convince them that you are genuinely interested. Or if you really are interested you might goose it a little bit to get them to to tell me more about that story or it's just it's just being engaged yeah and everybody has a keen sense of their of the way in which they come across right

and that's all acting is unless you're morphing into a character that's completely outside of your goalposts. Have you tried to do that? Yeah, when I was a kid and I look at that stuff and there's just a lot of acting going on. Yeah. And I'm a little cynical about that. And I'm not saying that acting and playing these eccentric parts is a bad thing, but for my own taste, for some reason,

I've become a little cynical about that and i for yourself yeah and i don't or even as a as a moviegoer i don't like to see a lot of acting i really appreciate it when when actors or actresses are are somehow funneling whatever character is written on a page into their their their their abilities a part of themselves yeah yeah and of course you want to put that you know at one end or the other to make it to their abilities, a part of themselves. Who they are. Yeah. And of course you want to put that at one end or the other to make it interesting because you don't want to just kind of just sleepwalk through it. Right.

But it should still be inside your skill set so that you don't have to get outside of it and therefore start acting. Right. So knowing your limitations as an actor is important and knowing who you are and what you can do. And if you're kind of fucked up and you've got multiple personalities, it's helpful. It's beneficial. Yeah.

Do you? I'm sure, yeah. Well, because look, if you start acting at an age before you really know who you are, which is like 10 until, what, 18, you're developing, as convincing as possible parts of yourself that have just as much right and uh and square footage as as the part that may one day actually become who you are right so you're kind of developing schizophrenia these these racehorses are running at the same speed sure especially no one's taking the lead yet like what 20 episodes or something i mean how many how many of those little houses did you do i was a full season so that was uh 23 22 22 or 23 and that well 22 plus a very special two-parter mark so after that you

you felt like i'm going this is it it's happening yeah i mean i i think so i mean i wasn't that deliberate with you know here's my career plan. Was your dad? Yeah. He became my manager. Mom became our manager. My sister started acting a few years after that. And, you know, there's somewhat of a necessity to that in that you need a babysitter, literally.

You need a legal guardian on the set. Right. And so you can either hire one that's over 18 yeah effectively a babysitter uh or if your parents have flexible hours like mom did where she's only flying two weeks every every four yeah um and dad who's pumping out you know citizen kane in the basement you know and he can do that on the set you know i guess as well as he could do it in the basement right so why not collect 15 while you're doing? He was down there working on that movie. Yeah. The ethics of it in hindsight are a bit troubling, but I'm still looking at it half full.

Well, that's good. Yeah. All right. So you do the Silver Spoons, which I didn't watch it. That was the Ricky Schroeder vehicle. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. I think I was a little old for it. Yeah.

Like I graduated high school in 81 So I was on to other things Yes Yeah But that was the big one for you The first That was Yeah That was a really good one

And then that got me my own show Which didn't last a year Which one was that? That was called It's Your Move Yeah And then after that Was the Hogan family Which lasted five years

That was the Valerie Harper vehicle Oh you worked with Valerie Harper That became the Sandy Duncan vehicle. Oh, really? Yeah. You worked with both of them? Yep. They were great.

I loved them, but Valerie pissed off the brass and then she got burned in a very special two-parter in a house fire. And for some reason, they went ahead and shot the episode where I ride my moped up to the burning house.

And she's your mom? And the fireman, son, do we have an accident up here? But that's my house, sir. And ripping through the police tape and running into the house. And it's just so cheesy and bad where you go all the way upstairs like and literally grab a photo of me and mom together and you pick up the photo and it crumbles into ashes into your hand i mean it's like oh my god i checked all the boxes you went through a lot of shit as a young actor i mean you had to watch your parents go over the cliff and the stagecoach i was a faucet of tears with no crying

talent whatsoever a fire god now they just sort of replace people. And people are so stupid, they're like, we get it. You're right. That actor's gone. We saw it on Entertainment Tonight. Let's jump six months. Yeah. No reason for closure or explanation now.

None. No, they really had to hammer it in. Yeah. And so Sandy Duncan shows up as the new mom? Almost Sandy Dennis. Sandy Duncan shows up as the new mom? Almost Sandy Dennis. Sandy Duncan shows up as the sister to dad. And she's just like one of my favorite people in the world. Is she still around?

Yeah, yeah. Oh, good. So after the Hogan family thing, what happens? After the Hogan family, things got quiet because there was that transition thing you're talking about where, well, if you're like a teen actor or whatever, what are you at 20? Right. And how did you ride that out?

I kind of, I didn't. I mean, I took the opportunity, I mean, I tried to keep working, but when things were quiet, I took the opportunity to party and catch up for all the working I did as a kid. Hollywood party style? Yes and no. I mean, I'd go to all the, you know, the cheesy clubs and, you know, do all the drinking and the drugging and all the sort of that kind of living for about 10 years. Yeah. And then luckily for me, when I'd kind of caught up

and wanted to have a career again, Arrested Development was the thing that came kind of right around that time. Well, how many years was that, dude? Which? Like that break. Like 10 years. Yeah, it was a long time.

That was at the beginning of your question, you know, when we first started talking. That was a tough period, you know, like is the rest of my life going to be anticlimactic? Like there was a time where I thought, well, should I just liquidate what little i do have left and start over somewhere else literally go down to the airport and and just look up on the ticker board and and with like with like a like a duffel bag full of you know

right dollar bills so that was it so that in your mind that was the choice is like i'm washed up it's time to disappear yeah or or before i really kind of get sucked into this depression of the only thing on tv is entertainment tonight and i'm not on it right um why don't i go and you know buy a coffee shop in fucking spain sure and like learn spanish and uh i'm 20 you know like that's where people are getting out of college. They're starting their lives. Right. So like, you can still do it.

Right. And I don't have a wife. I don't have kids. I, you know, got this, you know, distant relationship with my parents and my sisters. Like I've, I'm untethered. I'm out. Let me go. And I got a little, like maybe, did you think like how many people are going to know me

over there? Like that was always the, like, I always always wondered about that that weird thing where you get to a certain point in show business and you really can't stop just out of pride because what are you going to do you're going to work at a stereo place and people are going to walk in and go like hey yeah and pride gets gets in the way of a lot of really good decisions definitely in general right that that being one of them like how do you how do you rebuild and i've got a lot of really good decisions in general right that that being one of them like how do you how do you rebuild and i've got a lot of friends that that that that did not make great decisions with that you know and well you know screw it if i can't get this job then i won't work at all and

i'll just party all night and sleep all day because there's no reason to wake up and they're still at it i think so i think a couple of them are and it's you know it's sad this is a it's a this is a tough town to business it's a tough business and the town is a lot of the business and if and if you're you know on the fringes of of relevance um or and access uh it can be really challenging and you were you felt yeah it's it's it's uncomfortable sometimes just to socialize um because you do feel pressure of, you know, what are you doing? Oh, not much. You know, and it's a very, it's a benign sort of just question. But it's so loaded to you.

But it comes loaded. And it's a, I feel for people because all of those people are filled with talent. They just don't have, you know. Right. Everyone's a job away. For me, it was Arrested Development. Like, I didn't take a talent pill the morning I went in and read for Arrested Development. Well, how much were you partying?

I was partying a lot, but I was still making it to the few auditions that I was getting. And you were doing little parts here and there? Yeah. Yeah. I was still definitely a working actor. Right. I wasn't, you know, living on the streets. Right.

I was still, you know, I had a house and a car and and it would you know things were things were good i was a working actor for sure but you know this was this was definitely on the back side of of a bit of a of a fame peak that uh that that was around when i was what 19 or something and your sister was huge yeah justine wasine was big, big, big, big. Right? That show was big. Yeah. Family ties was enormous.

And were there times where she was huge and you weren't? Oh, yeah. That was all the time. Yeah. But for some reason, the jealousy or competitiveness never really flared up between us. Yeah. Probably mostly because we weren't reading for the same parts. Right.

There was maybe just sort of this unsubstantiated blind confidence and ego that i had that like yeah don't worry about it i'll be back cocaine will do that yeah exactly that's what i kept doing it yeah keep that confidence going yeah the sweaty confidence yeah yeah yeah it disappeared when the sun comes up that's right and you talk yourself out with some dude who like spend a you know nine hours talking about his new car. Right. Yeah, yeah. Oh, yeah.

Had it all figured out. Oh, yeah, again. From two to six in the morning, we had all the answers. Yeah, see you later, man. We even wrote them down. Ever wake up to those? Quick, tear them up. The screenplay idea?

Yeah. Dude, let's just workshop this a little bit more. Let me get one more of those and then we're going to get into act two oh that's if you're not playing scrap that's right right is there any more booze do we have anything call his pager again yeah oh no that's how long it's been i was saying to somebody the other day last time i scored any cocaine there were still pagers and payphones oh yeah right yeah that was a... You see a payphone now, it's like some weird relic from the past.

Who uses those? Yeah. Oh, yeah. You should try to buy that. Yeah. Put it on our living room. Yeah. Oh, pagers.

Waiting for the guy. Yeah. Oh, is the guy coming? Worst. But it's been a while. I'm getting all gassy just talking about this. I don't crave that one anymore. No, me neither.

It's just like it's done. Yeah, I'm getting all gassy just talking about this. I don't crave that one anymore. No, me neither. It's just like, it's done. Yeah, I don't really crave, I don't crave the booze or I don't crave any of it anymore because I did it. And there was a little bit of the method to the madness there that like, let's make sure I get all these boxes checked because I know I want to be a dad.

I know I want to be a husband. And I know I want to have a career. Yeah. And so let's... You're aware of that? Yeah. And I knew that at, you know, I'm 46 now. Like if I were to be a husband and I know I want to have a career. Yeah. And so let's. You're aware of that? Yeah. And I knew that at, you know, I'm 46 now. Yeah. Like if I were to, you know, start scratching itches now. Oh, it's fucking a disaster.

It's not a good look. Oh, it'd be a disaster. So like you were practical enough to know what you do learn in the program where it's like, dude, once you start, there's no ending. There's no, like, you know, if you're in it. Right. Like, you know, it's never going to be satisfied so for for me for me it was i'm for me i i did get it out of my system or at least the

curiosity was answered so that i'm not susceptible to any sort of well you know i never did that right let me try that and meanwhile you know i got to drop my kids off at school like it's not good and he saw i imagine he saw friends go down yeah i mean we yeah everyone you know, I got to drop my kids off at school. It's not good. And I imagine you saw friends go down. Yeah. I mean, everyone in this business, you see people go down. Yeah. Yeah. And people, I've said this before, but it's pretty apt.

The things that allow you to feel good about yourself are pretty, they're slippery. You know? Sure. So it's got to be locked up inside. And also, like, not unlike you were talking about limitations and knowing what your talent's limitations are when you have it and being responsible that way as a professional, you know, you also have to realize those things.

You know, some things, you live with discomfort. Yeah. And that's grown up. Right. Like, you don't get to be like a child, like, help me. I need something to make me feel better. It's like, no, sometimes it's just uncomfortable. Right, yeah.

I was trying to. You said it very well. I didn't say it half as well to my eight-year-old yesterday, but it was basically that thing like just because you want it doesn't mean that you can have it. That doesn't mean life's not fair. That's just life, right? And your ability to navigate the things you don't get is kind of, kind of defines the quality of the life

that you're going to have. Your character. If you're going to be all petulant because you can't get everything, then you're just not being realistic. That's a drug addict. Right, yeah. So my job as a parent is to let you know

it ain't all going to work out and that that's normal. Yeah. Right. That's not a that's not a that doesn't signify the thing that you're a failure. Right. Just normal. Did you tell her like that? No. I wouldn't tell you this. I need to run that for her. You know, it's just sort of like give up your dreams. You're eight. There's no reason to think things are going to work out for you. Right. Or just temper your expectations that's right that's right that's right i want you to shoot for the stars but yeah know that the moon's okay yeah yeah yeah that's true that's good too it is yeah do you have a pen sure i'll send you the thing it's very tricky you know because like especially when in this business where where you know like like i can't like you know when you go into auditions or something and you just you know because like especially when in this business where where you know like like i

can't like you know when you go into auditions or something and you just you know in the casting uh office usually a temporary one when the temporary casting office you just see stacks of hundreds of headshots yeah and you're like what i know it's like because it's such a childish dreams i'm gonna be i'm gonna be a movie star it's like like the whole drive of this business on that side of the camera is it's infantile. Yeah. And they tell you to really follow your dreams and be passionate. Yet that is counterproductive because if you go in there with a whole lot of passion, they can smell it. And then they're not giving it to you.

It's a fine line between passion and desperation, though. Right. But it's a guy that walks in there with a sexy indifference that gets it. I don't know how you genuinely get that indifference without not really caring. And so how can you compete in something that takes full dedication if you kind of don't really care that much. It's like that, it's a mind fuck cocktail that's a challenge for a lot of people that have not been at it for a while.

And sometimes it's hard to stay at it long enough to kind of get that because you'll be broke by the time you kind of get that. Broke in a lot of ways. Broken and broke. Yes, yeah. That's why it's keep your day job oh god damn it this is great this is uplifting this can be helpful to young actors

get out is the message shots going off now get out so so uh arrested development was like a lifesaver yeah but you didn't know that going in. No. How did that audition happen? Because people love that fucking show. Yeah. I had an agent named Lee Brolstein. She was at ICM, and we had just parted ways. And a couple of months later, to her credit, she called me and she said, I'm seeing in this breakdown for this great pilot that I read that you haven't been in on it yet. And I know we don't work together anymore, but I think it's really great for you you should go in on it you should tell those new agents of yours

to send you in and so i asked my new agents about it and they said oh yeah you know what the cover sheet on this thing says that uh if if you're not interested in in really kind of living in a bare bones environment yeah you know shitty there's really no dressing rooms, no makeup, no lights, no marks on the floor. It's kind of a documentary style kind of thing. They were downplaying it. Yeah. And it was, it was,

it was very sort of progressive and, and, and provocative, I suppose. And so they just didn't think that it was going to get picked up. It was, it was very, very risky.

And so why send it to you? That, that was their spin on it. And I said, you know what, send it to me anyway. At this point, you'd done some movies though. You were still. Yeah, a little bit here and there, but I was real, very risky, and so why send it to you? That was their spin on it. And I said, you know what? Send it to me anyway. At this point, you'd done some movies, though. You were still...

Yeah, a little bit here and there, but I had some baggage on me as being... Teen Wolf baggage? Yes. Some of that hair was still on me. And a lot of the sitcom kind of stink was on me, and this was not that. This was not only had television kind of moved, television comedy had moved camera yeah um and away from that studio audience multi-camera stuff but this was even a step beyond that and that it was kind of this mockumentary style and it was you know it was ron howard was the executive producer and he was actually doing the voiceover on it so it

kind of had this great pedigree and i thought well they don't want my baggage on this thing and like you were just like a they you thought they saw you as a hack exactly I mean that was my you know this this is this is my perception myself after I'd wake up after you know the coke nights I'm just a childhood sitcom star yeah Teen Wolf killed me exactly so I didn't think I was going to get an audition for it but luckily for me the guy who created it this guy mitch hurwitz good guy a great great guy right so he remembered me from from some audition i had with him years and years earlier you don't know for what it was it was for some multi-camera show for for a pilot uh i don't know five or six years earlier he was doing that that that he liked what i did and so he said yeah

yeah i'll read that guy i thought i think he good, which was lucky for me. And then another luck was that I guessed right when I went in there as far as how they wanted the character to get played. Yeah. What do you mean you guessed right? Well, you can read a script and there's no right or wrong way to play a character. It's just words on a page. So you got to go in there and have your take on it. So you were sort of the one guy who had his shit together in the cast, in a way. You were the anchor.

My character was, yes. But the way in which I played that was a guy who didn't hate his family, but was kind of frustrated by his family. And there was a seething and a comedic boiling that was perhaps, I guess, is what they saw. And so he followed me out of the audition room after i read um and he said he said hey he said that was great um so tomorrow you have an audition

for the other show that i'm executive producing right the one i forget what it's called and i said i said yeah yeah he said he said right he said, right. He said, but this, right. This one. I said, yeah, I love this. He goes, yeah. He said, don't come in for that one tomorrow. I said, okay. I said, why? He said, I don't want the network to see you. You know, I don't want, I want to, I want the one.

I want you for this one. Cause you love that one. Yeah. And like, this is just like, you know, an actor's just wet dream for, you know, to get good feedback in the room for the guy to actually follow you out and then say, don come in for the other one tomorrow because i want to protect you for so i like called my agent leaving there and i said i'm feeling very bullish about this this this this could be good and then of course your old agent the one that set you up like no it was a new one and then once i got the job i called and thanked thank the old and when i when i won the golden globe i thanked her

on the stage oh yeah first and foremost i was like. Oh, that's sweet. I was like, you know, this is. Yeah. So then the show got picked up and we were waiting for us to get axed, you know, any day because it wasn't getting great ratings. But the critics really saved it. The critics put a lot of pressure on the network to keep it on because they were saying this is great and you, Fox, would be dumb to cancel it. So they hated us. They hated the critics. And they kept us on as long as...

How many seasons? Six? No, no, no, no, no. Two and a half. Oh, that was it? Yeah, yeah. Wow. And then you did the new ones.

Yeah, the new ones were these episodes on Netflix that were meant to be the first act of a three-act story that Mitch had in his head. Right. And the second two acts, the second, Act Two and Act Three, are still yet to be told. And he thought that it would be fun

to do the first act in some episodes. So that's what that was, yet Netflix called it Season Four. Of the original show. Yeah, which was a little disingenuous because it it you know it implied that the show was coming back and and we did it and and uh these guys are so and and that's not what the show was because each episode was about an individual character and so i think it was a little confusing and underwhelming ultimately frankly for the audience and so

that was unfortunate that it wasn't wasn't I think, honestly or correctly, I should say. So was there a plan to do more? There is no plan to do more. There is those remaining two acts that I don't know what format that they'll take or if it'll ever happen. So Arrested Development pulled you out. It gave you a whole new um cultural relevance yeah because the people who hand out jobs were watching it america wasn't watching it but people here in la were and it raced your past in a way it did yeah it hit the reset button and and

uh and i've been trying not to screw it up ever since well it's interesting like you you know in in in how you're cast in in movies you know a lot of the comedies like they're you're sort of it's that guy there you relied upon give or take some assholeness yeah yeah yeah well you know i think the rest of development guy had a lot of heart but sometimes you get cast as just a full-on dick right yeah right but but ultimately he usually is us he is the audience he's the center he's the protagonist and and i really like that that role because it's it's a it's a it's a vital part for the comedy that i like yeah to have right because things need to be grounded it needs to be relatable and tangible sure You need a proxy as an audience.

And you got sort of in with that crew, the comedy crew, like Vince Vaughn and those guys. Yeah, they invited me in for a couple of their parties. It was a very, that was nice of them. It's funny. Because that helped validate me as well. And also, I never really thought that there were these camps, but there's definitely movie comedy camps. You know, there was the Stiller, the Apatow, and then the Vaughn crew and those guys. There's definitely the guys who make the big comedies.

Yeah, and it is a bit insular. They do stick with one another, and you're lucky to be a part of any of them. Yeah, yeah. Well, you're steady, man. You're a rock with the thing you do. You know what I mean? Thanks, man. It's good, right?

I love it, yeah. And now you're doing like this, the new movie seems crazy. Like I watched, it's not a comedy. This, yeah, the thrill of the gift. Like I watched the trailer and I'm like, holy fuck. Yeah, it's a, Joel Edgerton, who's an actor I just really admire a lot, not only for his talent, but he's just cool as shit. Oh, he's the guy who plays the bad guy, or the scary guy.

Yeah. Oh, it's his thing, huh? Yeah, so this is his first film as a director, and I had just finished doing my first film as a director. Which one was that? finished doing my first film as a director which one was that uh it's called bad words and and he he asked me to to to be in this and i thought well i i i so appreciate what a what a how important is have a game actor yeah trying to trying to help make things work right when you're trying to direct something and act in something right it's hard right yeah i mean it's just you're really appreciative of people that are that are there and they're willingly and and and trying to direct something and act in something. Right, it's hard, right? Yeah, I mean, it's just, you're really appreciative of people

that are there and there willingly and trying to be proactive. So I said yes immediately, and I'm glad I did, because he did a really, really good job with the movie. It doesn't need to be as good as it is, because it plays a little bit in that genre world that as long as you scare somebody

you know they're going to be satisfied yeah um but there's a lot of sort of you know sorry for the word but you know some sophisticated uh execution here with with the way in which it's shot and scored and and edited and uh he did a really really tasteful job well it's nice that you guys are supportive of each other. Yeah. As a director, you've done a lot of directing. You've done some TV, right? I started, yeah.

I started doing TV when I was 18, and I just finished doing my second film as a director a couple of months ago. I didn't see bad words. I'm sorry. Oh, that's fine. Not many did. Did you like it? It was a small movie.

Yeah, loved it. yeah loved it i loved it i gotta watch it i think you'd like it it's about it's about this asshole that i play uh who crashes a kid's spelling bee finds a loophole in the rules and and um it's a hard r um and he's uh it's it's fun um and you wrote it no no no just, no. Just directed it? Yeah, yeah. Is that something you, is that how you want to go out in a way? Yeah, I mean, look, you know, we were talking about before about you put X number of years in something, you'd like to either have job security, promotion, or raise all three. Right. Or maybe even a job that is more challenging than that which you started in. that is more challenging than that which you started in.

Sure. Because of your exposure to the apparatus and you kind of know how to do other people's jobs or are familiar with them or would like to challenge yourself to do those. And for an actor, it's directing. Yeah. And it's a really complicated thing to do to shape an audience's experience, you know,

beyond just kind of the acting part. Right. You know, as a director, you kind of have to play with multiple departments and kind of four wallet for people. And you got to trust your DP. Yeah. And you got to have people like, you know, like it's a collaborative thing.

Yeah, you got to delegate, but you also have to lead with a certain amount of specificity where that, when you delegate's it's a safe delegation you know right it's not like i'm not sure what the look is right you know can you give me some options yeah you gotta you gotta inspire them in in some sort of specific world and it's my first time doing this can we all just uh can you guys put some cool shit together and and put it on my desk because i mean look i mean a lot of directors do it that way and you can you know you can just basically say yes or no to the results of other people's work right um you can get it done that way but you need a need a long schedule for that and what's uh what's the new one about is another

small movie it's another small movie it's more of a drama it's about i play um uh nicole kidman and i play brother sister and we're looking for our parents that have gone that have gone missing and we're not sure whether they're murdered or whether they're hiding as part of their latest performance art piece. They're these old hippie performance artists, and we think they might be faking their death. Who wrote this? that was then adapted by this Pulitzer Prize winning writer, David Lindsay-Aber, that Nicole Kidman had it and she had him adapt the book. And it's a really, really cool, trippy script that I read and made a run at. And then she saw Bad Words and said, great, let's go. Wow.

Yeah. It sounds cool. It's great. Chris Walken let's go. Wow. Yeah. It sounds cool. It's great. Chris Walken plays our dad. Oh, man. And he's just perfect for a guy that would be an irresponsibly passionate performance artist. It sounds like this might be kind of close to home in a way.

You've been listening. Mark, those cans are working. might be kind of close to home in a way. You've been listening. Mark, you have those cans are working. Yeah, there's a lot that I was passionate about in the movie. Yeah. I mean, my parents aren't nearly as bad as this, nor am I, and is nor is nicole um but you know you got to heighten things a little bit to to entertain people it'd be great to see uh walking in a non-ironic part you know it's been a long time since he wasn't sort of hired because he's this character right and he said he said as much i don't think i'm talking out of school for you

know for me to say that you know he doesn that he doesn't want to be the crazy uncle. Right. I think he recognized the fact that he is an eccentric guy that has a very unique style that lends itself to some very interesting and colorful characters. Right. But he doesn't want to just be known or pursued for that. Right. Yeah, and have scripts manipulated.

Oh, we got Chris Walken? Well, let's do a rewrite. Yeah, yeah. Let's make it really fucking crazy. He's sensitive for that. Right. Yeah. And have scripts manipulated. Oh, we got Chris Walken. Well, let's do a rewrite. Yeah. Yeah. Let's make it really fucking crazy. He's sensitive to that. And I think that's good of him. And how'd he do?

He's amazing. Yeah. He's like, he's just, he doesn't do anything the way any other actor would do it. Right. And it's not just contrived. Right. I mean, he just has a different rhythm. Yeah. Oh, it right and it's not just uh contrived i mean he just has a different rhythm yeah oh yeah and it's genuine he really just hears things differently and we'll and we'll

shape it in a way where it's like well yeah that's the way you'd say that line well if you're that guy if it's amazing because like if you watch him in even in the in the bit part nanny hall and then you watch him in deer hunter that there was a sensitivity in deer hunter the sensitivity of that care i mean it's it's mind-blowing it's authentic right so like if if you were if you were to take that through in my theory of like of acting then then that would shortly take you to well chris has got a very a very interesting makeup right like goalposts are pretty wide. Right.

There's a lot there. Right. He's a really interesting guy, really kind, thoughtful, professional, fair guy that is not simple in the best way. Right. It's like watching, when was the last time you watched Dog Day Afternoon? Sure, yeah. These guys, when they were young and they're wide open and all sweet and sensitive and like really putting it out there right insane yeah it's got to be a part of them like yeah it's all in there

tend that that's right and they're being kind of it's an overused word i apologize for but they're being very generous right right like to me joaquin phin Phoenix does that nowadays. Oh, yeah, yeah. That guy just lets you see right through every part of him in an effort to be genuine. Are you friends with him? Yeah. Did you come up with him or are you a little older? Well, no. I mean, I knew River a little bit. River and I worked together a couple of times.

And Joaquin's his younger brother. I knew him a little bit via that. But I know him more now just through another mutual friend. Oh, that's cool. Yeah. And who plays your mom in this thing? Her name's Marianne Plunkett. She's a Tony Award-winning actress and just really tasteful.

Did you feel intimidated to be working with Joaquin? Sure, yeah. So you're directing, too. Yeah. And you've got to act alongsideicole who can kind of you know she knows what she's doing too yeah so but you know my style of directing if i have one is just you know figure out what an actor's trying to do with with their you know it's their prerogative to play the character any way they want i i truly think i think an actor if you're going to

contribute yeah you kind of you read this you read the the part and and then you kind of make him or or her who you want her to be as long as you're in the same movie as everyone else right you know we have a mutually agreed upon finish line for the movie or for the scene or whatever and how you get there is up to you that's your artistic contribution so the the directors i really like are those that that recognize what it is you're going for and help you kind of stay there and not drop the ball. As opposed to trying to give you notes that get you closer to doing it the way they've always imagined it. Micromanage. Well, but control you into playing the character the way they've always seen it and heard it. Right.

Because, you know, a director's been with the script a lot longer than you have. Right. They probably developed a portion of the script. They then were in pre-production. It's informed a lot of their decisions, how that character would kind of behave. Right, sure. And then you show up on the first day and you're playing the character in a completely different way. That's frightening for a director.

And it sets off- Because now they're like, now we got a problem. Well, yeah, but it's a false negative. Right. Because the audience, you know, we're watching the movie, we haven't read the script. Right. We have no preconceived notions.

So I'll go wherever you're gonna take me, actor. Yeah. As long as you don't drop me. Right. It's a tough thing to ask a director to do because you're asking them to give up control and part of their job is to keep things on the rails. Yeah.

So it is somewhat of an actor's obligation to make a case for taking things a different way. And I'm sensitive to that. So I'm not just obstinate with it, like, fuck you. I'm going to play it the way I want to play it. If they're uncomfortable with it, you do kind of have to— Negotiate. Yeah. Collaborate.

So how far along is that film? We're done. Oh, really? Yeah. Now, as a director, that means you oversee the soundtrack and everything. It's so cool. That's really, editing it is a lot of fun, and you can kind of unfuck things if something's really kind of wobbly.

It's amazing what you can do in editing, huh? Yeah. Yeah, yeah. And then you can augment things. You can support things. You can juxtapose things. And then you put the music on it. And now the music can really help support something

that maybe wasn't delivered on the day. I never knew that until I did the TV show. Like how, you know, I directed a couple episodes of my show. Yeah. And it's just weird. And when you're acting in it, like when you've got a bunch of takes, I mean, you can be in editing and, you know, you see what you prioritize. But then in the back of your head, it's like, didn't you're acting in it like when you've got a bunch of takes i mean you can be in editing and you know you see what you prioritize but then the back of your head is like

didn't we do one yeah yeah and and all of a sudden that one that was garbage in your mind it saves a fucking thing right yeah right because now you've mixed a new cocktail now i'm actually oh i don't really like what that actor is doing so i'm gonna have to i'm gonna have the the camera on the guy that's listening right so now when i come back into this guy's take, I might actually like that piece that he did because it now works in this new recipe. Ah, it's exciting. Yeah, but it's very, it's a lot of work.

Well, I'm happy for you. It's more work than the shooting, right? But I'm happy for you. It sounds like it's engaging. I love it, yeah. I'm very lucky to be doing it. You don't do any writing? Mm-mm.

You don't have any desire to do that? I mean, I did a little bit when I was a lot younger and desperate, frankly. I mean, I was trying to write my way back in. Movies or TV? Yeah, I wrote a script, and no one's ever going to see it because it's garbage, but it was good for me to go through the process. I'd like to know what that script's about. The concept's not bad, but it's garbage.

But the process of trying to fill a blank page is... You've got to give me the story, Jason. It's really daunting. You've got to give me the story. What's the movie? What's the movie about? It's just another one of those kind of like, you know thatbert brooks um defending your life yeah it's it's one along those sort of lines you know one of those existential sort of like guy for a minute

yeah if i could do it all over that garbage okay um so how old are you when you wrote that uh 21 maybe yeah just when you know when you know zero. And everything just sounds so good. When was the last time you took a look at that script? I don't know. I don't know if I ever. I will. I will. But I'm super brave.

But there's so many precious. With a storyline like that, there's inevitably a half dozen, if not a dozen scenes where there's some really important shit said. Yeah. Yeah. You know? Yeah, yeah. And it's just, I will, it'll just. The arrogance of it, just as youthful. It's so precious, yeah.

Oh, God, it's great. But what it did for me was it really, I'll never forget how difficult that is. Right. So what it did for you is like, I'm not doing this. Or I just really respect right what an what a writer goes through i mean it's you literally need to stare at a wall yeah and and and get yourself really quiet and eat a lot of bad food yeah and just like pace around the discipline is insane so when you do a movie like um was it the the the rotten bosses movie

a horrible bosses horrible bosses so you like, how does that work? Rotten Bosses didn't clear. Oh, it didn't? No. No. Horrible Bosses, right? Yes, sir. The second one.

There was two. Yeah. And the first one's funny. First one's funny. First one did some money. Second one was garbage as far as box office goes. Who knows whether it was on the merits or when they released it,

but it did not do any money. But when you get an offer like that, you know what the score is. Oh, yeah. No, that's a paycheck for everyone. Yeah, everyone's getting paid. It's a freebie, and it's the audience's fault.

Don't go out and buy a bunch of tickets for the first one unless you want a second one because we don't have any discipline in this town you know it's a path of least resistance and but when you get offered something like that there's no party that's sort of like let me see the script you're like how much yeah you don't want to be that guy you know well i don't know i mean what now in in our defense though uh, we did, we, you know, the three, Charlie and Jason and I are, we're pretty cynical about this. I mean, we had this conversation like we're having right now. Like, we can't just make it suck.

I mean, everyone's going to know it's a layup. Yeah. But let's at least try to make it, let's let it hold up to some cynical scrutiny you know let's make sure that it's plausible perhaps and that let's make sure we play our characters dumb enough to justify these shitty decisions right we we tried to make sure it wasn't full of holes and so we worked really hard on the story um and uh and and had a really good time shooting it. You did? Oh, God, yeah. Like, I don't know.

But when you watch it, like, it had a hell of a cast. I mean, they were really banking on something. Yeah. Listen, I love both of them. I think they're both really, really good. It's just a question of, did anybody really care? Right. About the movie.

Yeah, I mean, a lot of people saw the first one, but there are plenty of films that made a lot of money that no one is interested in seeing another one. It's interesting. When something like that tanks, I mean, does it come back to you at all? It come back to me in the sense like that's a ding. Yeah.

Yeah, I'm sure it does in some some respects but you're somewhat insulated in that it's an ensemble and sure that's right people are paying it on jamie hang it on kevin hang on i have to think that you know well hang on a second jason bateman's in it i'm not seeing that shit you know i have to i have to assume that that i'm not the sole repellent. Right, right. I think it was, it had to have been basically people just weren't interested in seeing another one. Right. We saw the first one. We had fun. But I don't need to go see a second one.

And it's Thanksgiving and I'm with my family. And I'm not going to take my mom and dad to go see, you know, cock jokes. Yeah. For two hours. I guess there is a reason R-rated comedies don't get released during a big family vacation. Sure. But you had a good time making it. I did.

I did, yeah. Because we shot it here. Oh, yeah. So it was easy. It's rare. You got to hang out with your family. And the family's good? You're happy?

I could not be happier. I'm very, very lucky. Knocking on the wall. Well, I'm happy for you. It's a hell of a story. And that movie you just directed sounds great. What's it called? Family Fang. It sounds like a dog movie, but that wasn't the name of the book. Well, I'm happy for you. It's a hell of a story. And that movie you just directed sounds great. What's it called? Family Fang. It sounds like a dog

movie, but that wasn't the name of the book. When's it released? We don't know. We're going to sell it in the next couple of months. Great. And the gift looks compelling? Yeah. That's a great movie. I think people will really, really dig that. I mean, no one bleeds in it, so don't go in thinking,

oh, great, it's a horror film, slasher film. It would underwhelm that sort of drive. Well, but it's got that menace. The trailer seems menacing. Oh, it's very suspenseful, and it's a thriller, and you will be scared. But it's not a slasher film. Right. All right.

Well, it was great talking to you. You too, man. I'm really glad to be here. Thank you for having me. It was great talk. Thanks, man. That was fun. Was that man. That was fun. Was that fun?

It was fun. Jason Bateman's fun. I like him. Good dude. I appreciate him coming down. I appreciate you listening. Go to WTFpod.com for all your WTFpod needs. Get on the mailing list.

Get a little merch if you like. The posters, the books are gone, but the posters are there. Get some JustCoffee.coop while you're there. You uh you can see the episode guide is helpful if you're new to the show wtfpod.com slash guide that's everyone who's been on what else australia i'm coming sydney on thursday october 15th at the state theater melbourne on friday oct October 16th at the Palace. Brisbane, Saturday, October 17th at City Hall. Tickets are on sale starting tomorrow, August 7th. Go to Ticketmaster.com.au. I didn't even prepare to play guitar.

I'm not even prepared. Hold on. Thank you. boomer lives