WTF with Marc Maron Podcast - Episode 813 - Griffin Dunne / Bill Burr

Episode Date: May 21, 2017

Griffin Dunne caught the acting bug at a young age and had early success with movies like American Werewolf in London and After Hours. But tragedy struck when his career was ascendant and his whole family channeled grief into activism. Griffin tells Marc about that journey, as well as the moment he finally felt comfortable in show business. Plus, Bill Burr stops by because the new season of 'F is for Family' is coming out, but actually he's all worked up about drums. 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.

It's a night for the whole family. Be a part of Kids Night when the Toronto Rock take on the Colorado Mammoth at a special 5 p.m. start time on Saturday, March 9th at First Ontario Centre in Hamilton. The first 5,000 fans in attendance will get a Dan Dawson bobblehead courtesy of Backley Construction. Punch your ticket to Kids Night on Saturday, March 9th at 5 p.m. in Rock City at torontorock.com. Hi, it's Terry O'Reilly, host of Under the Influence. Recently, we created an episode on cannabis marketing. With cannabis legalization, it's a brand new challenging marketing category.

And I want to let you know we've produced a special bonus podcast episode where I talked to an actual cannabis producer. I wanted to know how a producer becomes licensed, how a cannabis company competes with big corporations, how a cannabis company markets its products in such a highly regulated category, and what the term dignified consumption actually means. I think you'll find the answers interesting and surprising. Hear it now on Under the Influence with Terry O'Reilly. This bonus episode is brought to you by the Ontario Cannabis Store and ACAS Creative. Lock the gates! all right let's do this how are you what the fuckers what the fuck buddies what the

fucking ears what the fuck is stanney's what is happening i'm mark maron this is my podcast wtf welcome to it let me just tell you who's on the show today. Griffin Dunn is here. He's on I Love Dick, that show that Jill Solloway's doing, the one I talked about with Kevin Bacon. And special guest, Bill Burr. Bill Burr's going to be here in a few minutes because his new season of season of f for family the animated netflix thing that's starting up on may 30th but um isn't it nice it's a weird thing and and you know obviously most of you i think will understand but uh now that the president is uh away for nine days i i really had this look i i didn't grow up this way, but I really had the feeling, I think a similar feeling of relief if you have like this shitty, horrible dad or stepdad and he goes out of town on a business trip.

They're sort of like, whew, maybe we got a few days, a few days of somewhat relief. of somewhat relief. So I'm back from Chicago and had a great time shooting another episode of Easy with Swanberg. It was me, Michaela Watkins, Jane Addams. And it was pretty cool. It was pretty great. I'd never really worked with Michaela.

She's been on the show here. But it was pretty uh it was fun it was there were some local uh Chicago actors it was great and I'm in Chicago and some of you know that my cholesterol is a little high and I've been eating better and I've been on the pills and I don't know if they're working or not because I haven't had time to go to the fucking doctor but um but it's it's interesting that slippery slope you know because I'm in Chicago yeah you know I got to get Lou Malnati's pizza. And then Joe Swanberg likes to go out for these dinners.

And the place in the hotel was good. And by the end, I'm eating steaks. I'm fucking just, it's just weird how in certain people's minds that, I'd like to live a relatively long time, you know, naturally. I don't know what outside circumstances could bring that all to an abrupt close for many of us, maybe all of us. Who knows? Exciting times. But but like the slippery slope from like, yeah, you know, it's like, hey, don't the statins mean I can eat? Or then it's just a slippery slope from, you know, doctors.

They don't they don't know everything. I mean, I'm not going crazy. I'm just it's just for a week. And then, you know, a slippery slope from, you know, doctors. They don't they don't know everything. I mean, I'm not going crazy. I'm just it's just for a week. And then, you know, right from there to, you know, there's you know, I mean, things get get get get hazy in the beliefs that you believe what you want to believe that will accommodate your own fucking needs at that particular moment. It just depends where your brain's going. Maybe maybe there is an Antichrist.

Maybe there's some validity to this end times prophecy uh you know it's it'll all be okay it'll be okay fuck it i'm i'm eating some ice cream it just it's a slippery slope there you know what i'm saying do you know what i'm saying so right now my buddy bill burr and me talk about his new season of F for Family on Netflix. Premieres May 20th. He stopped by. I always like talking to Bill. It's a night for the whole family.

Be a part of Kids Night when the Toronto Rock take on the Colorado Mammoth at a special 5 p.m. start time on Saturday, March 9th at First Ontario Centre in Hamilton. The first 5,000 fans in attendance will get a Dan Dawson bobblehead courtesy of Backley Construction. Punch your ticket to Kids Night on Saturday, March 9th at 5pm in Rock City at

torontorock.com Death is in our air. This year's most anticipated series FX's Shogun only on Disney+. We live and we die. We control nothing beyond that. An epic saga based on the global best-selling novel by James Clavel. To show your true heart is to risk your life.

When I die here, you'll never leave Japan alive. F-X's Shogun, a new original series, streaming February 27th, exclusively on Disney+. 18 plus subscription required. T's and C's apply. Me and Burr. Congratulations on the child. Oh, thank you.

I think I said that to you at the club, but I have only seen you once. I believe as you walk away, you said good luck with that thing. Yeah. Sweating and i just laughed i love comedians i thought that was funny as hell because i didn't take that as an insult it's just like we don't know how to we don't know how to be in that moment well i don't have them you know i've i you know and i it was never i i've avoided it somehow and i'm not i i don't know i i wasn't trying to be cynical, but I can only base it on my own experience and how I came out. Yeah.

I mean, there you go. There you go. I mean, I think that's actually a very evolved thought. Yeah. No, I obviously want you to. I hope. Is it amazing? Yes.

It is every cliche. Do you talk about it much? No. On stage? Because it's just been awesome. So there's really no reason to... You're not looking... I actually...

I've more been making fun of his other parents who talk about how difficult it is. Yeah. Now, look, obviously, if you're broke in your 20s and you have a kid, yeah, that's going to be like a difficult thing. But the bottom line is we've been having babies since they've been in caves. And that's when it was harder. Sure. That's the bit.

It's basically some woman laying on a rock, giving birth with no drugs as you're fighting off a pterodactyl. Yeah. And now you're in a house or an apartment where you can control the weather. Yeah. And there's a lot of books you can read and there's different devices and things and carriers. However, single moms and all that type of stuff. Yeah, all that type. They still have to work.

That's obviously hard. But I'm talking about like, you know, white women who are married and they're living in nice houses who every day at four o'clock go, oh, you know, only two classes and then you're not an alcoholic. You know, those people, they go to a cheesecake factory. There's a trolley at the mall where they go to. Yeah, like they- They're all right?

No. Like the level that they complain complain i can't listen to that i can't listen to them complaining right right yeah you drive off in some 60 000 suv with some nasa level car seat for your kid yeah yeah just trying to get the kid to the to the sitter so you can go to yoga you have no idea just how tiring. She's just, shut up. So how old is the daughter, right? Yep, she's a little over three months. And this is what my proudest dad moment I have is numerous people have said how chill, relaxed, and happy she is. And I swear to God, dude, like I joke, like I come home,

I go into like, like, like I'm a big fan of Tom Bergeron. Yeah. Like, like that guy's like his ability. Like I watch him on Dances with Stars and he has to deal with some lunatics on there. And he has this ability to be there, but not be there, but he's there. Sure. He doesn't give a shit, but he does.

Yeah. And he just, it's like like he is in this Zen mindset. I go in there and I'm like, like, I just think of that guy. He would come in smiling and, you know, no matter what happened, he'd be like, oh, it's going to be right back after this. He has the, like, that is an, I'm not shitting on the guy. It's an incredible skill. He's a Boston guy, right?

Didn't he start in Boston? Which is even more impressive that he grew up in that angry soil and he can come out of that and it's just like like that's the guy I so want to like it just rolls off his back

my wife watches that show and there was just somebody clearly after every dance trying to get a 12 picture movie deal

right rather than just killing the dance and just standing there like a human being yeah she's like doing all this shit,

this stuff, right? All this crazy, over-the-top stuff that was hard to watch 40 years ago and he just sat there going, well, okay, well, I guess I didn't need

that shirt. All right, blah, blah, blah. Where I would immediately be like, you know, will you get the fuck off of me, you fucking lunatic? People saw your dance, you're ruining it now.

Like, I would have done that. And then I would have looked like the asshole. That's why you're not hosting that show yes that's what i am hosting a show when i come home which is i pretend that i am not a complete lunatic so i've already worked it out the first time i know when i'm when i snap in front of her yeah and she's able to communicate that that's what happened i'm just gonna own up to it be like you're right this is you're planning this is something thank you for calling me out i've been waiting for this moment yeah no i'm i'm working on this okay you got to help me out because you know you know you're learning how to ride a bike like

daddy's learning how to do this so i come so i'm not not approachable so she can look at me in the moment of anger you know know, flipping out over, you know, updating my iPhone. Right. You know, all the serious stuff in life that's worth getting angry about. I like that you're preparing

for this already. That it hasn't happened, but when she's able to understand and talk and everything, you know you're going to do something angry and inappropriate. Because I know myself. Yeah.

Well, that's good. I know myself and I am hardwired. Like, dude, I walk around at a six. Yeah. So to get up to a 10, like my resting, like having a great day, I'm like at five and a half. Yeah. You're already halfway there.

Yes. More than halfway there. Yeah. So I've been meditating. I've been trying. You have? I can get it down to like a three. My wife already knows now.

She goes, you haven't meditated lately. And that actually bugs me. You've been meditating? Yeah. How does that go? It's good. But like, it's the classic thing where it's an app that you listen to the head the head headspace yeah you've been using headspace yeah which i'm sure is like a hacky thing but no they sent it to

me and you know i've been talking i've been talking about it on stage too my my the one time i had the experience uh of meditating successfully but i I- There is no success when all you have to do is try and just trying and just being. Yeah. That's what they do. And that's the kind of thing that you guys,

like you and me, how we're wired. Yeah. It just, yeah. See how you're gritting your teeth as I'm talking to you right now? I didn't even like your version of that voice. Well, that's the hardest thing about headspace

is as you start to get relaxed and everything, the dude keeps talking. Right. And you want to be like, will you shut the fuck up i'm there just yeah he's up but you have to just have it be like oh this is just like why am i why am i having this reaction to this guy you gotta let it go by right you just gotta let it you don't hang on to it because the problem mark don't you see uh with the person you're sitting across from is I have two emotions yeah not angry and angry what about sad well if when I'm sad it goes right yeah it's like I'm literally I'm a one-trick pony like remember those sad immediately is put through the filter it's immediately put through the

transformer and turned into anger but wait but so tell me about the meditation practice well you're trying to do it every day yeah but i like five minutes ten what yeah i've gotten up to like 20 and like there's this thing like this uh i over 20 years ago i started meditating yeah and just out of pure ignorance yeah i was able to kind of get to this place where it literally felt you know as you were just imagining you know your your diaphragm basically breathing in and out yeah all of a sudden if you feel like you're floating and it feels like your stomach is like you know nine miles like yeah it feels like it's across the room yeah it was amazing so then had a body experience almost sort of yeah so then i felt like oh i have this down so then i'm like okay i just need to do this this this and this and then i'm up here again and now i can't do it then it becomes frustrating and then it becomes like I didn't do it good I

didn't do it as well as the last one yeah and and it's it's uh it's so challenging I'm finding it so freaking challenging but like the bottom line is even if I don't get to that point which is most of the times when i'm done i kind of have like that fuzzy feeling between the ears of like i just kind of like kind of you know ejected everything out oh man so it doesn't build up that's that's the thing if it the fact that my after me just doing it for two months i stopped for a month my wife could tell after three weeks she goes you haven't been meditating lately and of course that bugged me you know yeah yeah she knows me that well i'm like wait wait i'm like all right now you're right you're right i have it she goes i can after three weeks. She goes, you haven't been meditating lately. And of course that bugged me, you know, that she knows me that well.

I'm like, wait, wait a minute. And I'm like, all right, nah, you're right. You're right. I have it. She goes, I can tell.

Already defensive. You know she's right. And you're like, what are you talking about? Yeah. How dare you know me? That means I'm vulnerable right now. Oh, I know what I'll do.

I'll get angry about it. I'll ruin it. Back in the day when you had your phone, you just, you could decide, I don't want to update it. Right. And you could keep the phone forever. Right forever i used to take pride in that you got the seven i still got the four until it got so slow yeah it was like the size of like one of those

school bricks you know you couldn't do anything that was the problem because i don't do shit on it but talk and text so it will so it wouldn't yeah it wouldn't fill up right i mean obviously i get emails and stuff but where do you put the Headspace app? Well, no. So now what it is, now the new thing- Yeah. Is if you don't update it, then all of a sudden your texts come in like half. They forced you to do it. So you fill up the phone.

So then you then turn it in and then they sell it to some kid in a third world country. They just, they can never have enough. And it just, there's something- They got to keep you buying it. Yeah. That's what I don't like. Well, that's capitalism. So maybe you should work towards it. No, I understand. No, but there's something to keep you buying it yeah that's what i don't like well that's the well that's capitalism so maybe you should work towards it no i understand no but there's there's options sure what happened to stuff that just lasted a lifetime that's the big question repairman

disappeared and that became that thing where people people are stuck in this mindset of like well you know it's going to be cheaper to buy a new one right than the old one that's right i i agree planned obsolescence is a is a horrible thing because nothing you don't have you can't believe in any products anymore no and then it all ends up in the fucking ocean or in a landfill oh yeah the swirling you're the one who told me about the swirling iron island of garbage yeah you know what it is also one of the driving forces too for me and i'm really i'm getting much better at this shit is getting control of my anger issues is uh is that's really the only thing my wife has on me yeah you know it's a big fucking thing but if i could eliminate

those moments to level the playing field then it's just like what is the problem i'm making a great living i got all this free time i'm killing it as a dad yeah you know i always tell i always tell her how beautifully she is and how much i love her i mean if i if I just, you know, wouldn't stab my laptop with the... Everybody's got their Achilles heel. Right. Yeah. You want that moment where she's got nothing. When she comes at you, you're like, you got nothing.

What do you got? I'm perfect. What do you got? Yeah, everything's good. Yeah. So like I said, I'm going to Mexico four days with the buddies. Yeah. With the fellas.

What are you going to say? What do you want? So the new season of F for Family. F for family yes sir that's what's happening you think you finished it season two season how long did it take you to do that a year and then uh it comes out may 30th and if it gets the amount of stars or thumbs up whatever netflix is doing doing another one yeah and the writer's room starts up in june so it's taxing a lot more work huh yeah but you know what unfortunately i work the people i work with are fucking hilarious i know i met those guys they're good guys i don't know your writers but i know the production company well mike price

the great mike price from the simpsons is hilarious he's just such a nice guy yeah he's just a great guy thank you you know uh dave richardson all these guys that we work with over there everybody is is um it's a fun room to work in and there's a lot of ball breaking none of the none of the ego yeah pecking order shit everybody's just sort of shitting on each other and uh and you know the table reads are fun who do you got doing voices over there this year uh same as we have we got uh laura dern um does the uh the voice of uh susan and um got justin long we got sam rockwell we got mo collins does so many she's so funny from mad tv i remember her she kills it hayley reinhardt um who I forget what show she was on

she's a singer she was on one of those shows and she came in she does the voice of little Bill and that's one of the hardest things is to have

a little boy voice before you know his balls drop it can be really annoying but she's got that raspy thing so it sounds like she sounds like

she does such a great job Debbie Derryberry David Koechner I mean it's just so it sounds like she sounds like like she does such a great job um uh debbie dairyberry uh uh david kechner i mean it's just um just monster monster like you know yeah i learned watching seinfeld but he was like i surrounded myself with the sure the best talent i could get and people that i felt like i could get along with and that's what we've been doing so they've been propping me up yeah and uh But voices are fun. People have fun doing them. You know, because you've got a lot more, you know,

when you get into that booth and you can just, you know, keep doing a bunch of different versions, there's nothing at stake, there's no film, there's no crew, you know, it's just a guy on a board. That's the best one. Before anybody's drawn anything. Yeah. And then they're going to draw to what you did.

Yeah. That's when it's the freest. But with each version, you know know the walls start closing in so you so you got to make sure you're there you do it you know what i mean you do you you actually do a uh uh like a radio play first well yeah you you do the table read you know you see what happens you know what works what doesn't and then uh then you go into the booth, you record the episode, and then you listen to the episode, you take the best takes,

and then you splice together the audio, and then you send it out, and then the guys in Ottawa Big Jump, they animate it. So then it comes back, and it's really in the rough form. Right. So, and then this is, you know,

all the work starts coming in where it's just like, it's not like a lot of the stuff that you do on your show where it's like, okay, I'm going to be sitting here and this person's over there. Yeah. They don't know that. So they just start putting people in the scene. So if it's like, why is Frank in the kitchen? He should be, you know, sitting down on the stool.

So they got to redraw that and, you know, have him move his arm more when he says this word. It's weird. Then it becomes like, wow, this is so much work. And then with each one word it's weird then it becomes like wow this is so much work um and then with each one it's it's more drawn there's more layers to it and it becomes more locked in and then it gets to the point where you're almost getting ready to lock the thing is now if you don't if a line isn't working yeah you have to come up with a line that's the same amount of syllables oh yeah it's the mouth that's moving. So it's definitely creatively a challenge.

And there's no way I could do it if I wasn't working with the people. And I got to tell you, you know, Netflix gives great notes. They're great notes. They make sense. And, you know, the people that I work with over there are actually cool. Industry people, actually cool. I've hung out with them at comedy festivals. They're a great hang and i feel

like you know i i really you know hit the lottery so i'm trying not to mess this thing up so now is this kid gonna age you're gonna stay in the same world no no but what it is it's kind of cool it's like every uh every season is basically a semester of school oh okay or maybe like a season i think is we're gonna when we do like winter and then it's you know fall and like we started last year we were like in the fall so yeah i think yeah we got to do halloween and all of that and into christmas and now this year we're doing like sort of uh we jumped ahead a little bit but it's the winter time there's a little bit of snow in the ground and um you know kevin's getting more into his band. Bill gets a paper who wants to try out for hockey. And just like stuff that either I did or my brothers did

or people down the street did. And Frank lost his job on the last one, so now he's hunting for a job. So I just wanted to have them be standalone episodes, just like The Simpsons. And it was Netflix's idea to serialize it. And at first i was like i don't want to do that and then it took the writing to a whole other level right

where everything had to be connected and it's just like i mean the show wouldn't have been you know i don't think half the show that it is if it wasn't serialized so once again that goes back to netflix giving good notes so i'm really thankful that they said that because my dumb ass was like who wants to see that? Then we started writing. I was like, oh, wait a minute. This is awesome. This is kind of amazing. Right. Well, that's great, man. Congratulations. And how's the drumming coming? Oh, it's going good. I sold all my Bonham fanboy stuff. I said, yeah, Dino, show me. You got Dean selling it for you. Yeah, because Dean's the best. And somebody bought it, and I just finally realized,

you know, I had that. It was a 1970 Green Sparkle Ludwig kit, 26-inch bass drum, 14-inch rack, and then 16, 18. I had, you know, the superphonic snare. I had a Rogers hi-hat. I had the pasty cymbals that he used, all the same size. And guess what I sounded like? What?

Me. Bought all of that. And then I was just like, just from doing stand-up, I was like, I'm literally trying to do somebody else's act right now. Right. That's when the epiphany finally hit me as I came home with, you know, I even have a picture of John Bonham like near the drum kit and shit.

And one day I just pictured, what if John Bonham somehow came back to life and for whatever reason came over to my house and i was like hey man i'm a big fan come on check out my drum kit i think when if he saw it it would have weirded him out he would have slowly backed out of the room on like some single white female shit that's when you start to walk down that road that you're playing shit that other people play can play easily but they're like why does that sound so much better than when i do it which is where i've lived my entire drumming right yeah i do the same thing with guitar you find your thing and you're just sitting it and you're not gonna you're not gonna open it up until somebody shows you something i mean sometimes it's

just little things like if i go do conan o'brien jimmy favino will always come in and show me a few licks i'll be like holy shit that's how you do that yeah and i don't do it at home you know but when he shows me one i'll work the shit out of it just that little bit of new information you're like it's a whole new world yeah that's amazing i have such like i'm such a obvious fan boy of um of the musicians that can sit down at their instrument and play in the moment what they're feeling. Yeah. And it's flowing out of them the way a comic riffs on stage.

Right. Like, you know. Yeah. Like, I've had a lot of great, like, comedy music conversations with Dave, and the overlap of the two art forms is, it's the same thing. Having a craft in place to do what you want to do yeah it's get out what you want to get yeah there's those drummers that you're going to go see who are going to you know live with the band are going to play it the exact same way right

and i remember i used to love those guys when i was a kid when i go to the hair metal concert and then i would get upset when the guy changed the solo right like he didn't play it right and it wasn't until now i realized like he probably played it that one way that one time yeah that one fucking time the one asshole said fuck that like that's the way to do it yeah the way he did it that time and it's just like no the reason why that solo sounded so great was that's how he felt in that moment and that's the way it came out and then like you know art is not recreating what you already created right there's an art form to that yeah some cover bands are amazing but like i don't want to live in that part of art i've done that yeah and i became john bonham's single white female

and i've and i i i occasionally have a panic attack like because i dreamed of owning that kit yeah and i got to play it at the roxy on Sunset and shit, and it sounded fucking amazing and all that, but it just, it wasn't me. It's stupid, dude. It'd be like if you went out to a club and you had the Eddie Van Halen guitar. Sure. If anybody's a musician in the crowd's gonna be like,

all right, what are you gonna play, Eruption now? Yeah. Like, why don't you just tattoo, Eddie Van Halen was a huge influence on me, and it's like, you're not gonna have your own voice. Like, I think I would probably be a snob fucking musician. And if I saw that, I would give the guy like a minute to impress me. And then I would go up to the bar.

I would walk out. Yeah. Well, it's a good point, though. But, you know, it's also realizing that, you know, sometimes we take for granted the work we put into what we did because we just didn't have any choice. And we were on those stages doing that shit. And then you finally get to a place where you're like, I'm not afraid and I can say whatever the fuck I want.

And if it doesn't go well, doesn't matter. I can get out of it. Yeah. You know, and now like to take it to another sort of form, which is music or drums and then starting to put that shit together so you can sort of surprise yourself, you know, and have those moments. Elitch showed me this Tony Williams tony williams drum solo that he does he goes just watch this guy right now he's completely in the moment he goes watch

this right now he plays this thing on the snare and then tries to mimic it on the bass drum and he goes and he completely eats shit yeah and he does it in front of a live crowd and he is like whatever the fuck he does and then he goes it just fucks up on the bass drum and you see him he continues to play he just makes this face of like that didn't fucking work and it's just like and it blew my mind it's like this is like a comedian trying to joke and it bombs and you just make fun of yourself and then he just kept going yeah where and i was just like wow so this the same way there's like comedians who like word for word write their stuff out yeah and it's just like i always open with this and then it goes to this and then it goes to that and then we all did that at some yes yeah and that is an art form to

do that but i didn't realize that when there was guys taking drum solos they were also doing that yeah like wait they had this all worked out i just thought they would just like right it's like well some of them do but some that i feel you know reach a higher plane of like they they felt something started playing it, and then that made them go to the Raktom. And then that made them go over here and all of that. I just feel like it's so much easier to do that as a comedian because it's like you've been talking since you were a baby. Yeah, yeah. So it's like you're always doing this. But for them, they had to learn a whole new fucking language.

And then they can speak on that instrument as fast as i can sit here talking to you yeah that's to me is like that's what keeps me coming back watching all those drum videos guitar videos and i swear to god i'll literally watch somebody play a trumpet if they can fucking kill it you know what's funny is i i try to like i'm trying to do this with comedians but i can do it more with music as i just look like if this person is just trying to be a pop band yeah i'm looking at it like that yeah no that's a good thing so that's trying to make the hit songs was great yeah it was great yeah but uh everybody's oh that's fucking lame fucking jimmy hendrix they named the same fucking 12 bands it's like dude you're naming shit that everybody agrees yeah yeah it's great yeah you just got to put people

into context yeah that's what i'm trying to do. Good talking to you, Bill. Always a good time, man. This was like the perfect time. It's like a quarter to 12. I know I can cruise home. Yeah, no worry. And you don't got to go far. No, I don't. You're close by. Absolutely. Always great seeing you. Alright, thank you, buddy. Bill Burr. So

Griffin Dunn. Griffin Dunn will be here in a second. And I think my entire house smells like salmon. It's weird. I've got a vent coming out here into the garage that doesn't really work. But I had them build an air conditioner line when I got the system put in years ago to just run out to the garage. So, the actual venting is outside getting heated up by the sun. So it basically comes in heat. But if I cook anything in the house, it just infuses the garage with the worst of that smell. Whatever's cooking,

it seems to pull out the worst of it and dump it right here into the garage. So there's a fine salmon mist happening in here. So Griffin Dunn, he's been through a lot. And many of you remember After Hours, great movie, American Werewolf in London. But he's doing an amazing job on this new series, I Love Dick, on Amazon with Kevin Bacon. But it's always good to see Griffin Dunn. It's good to see someone you haven't seen in a while on screen and off. I'd met him a few years back many years ago but uh he's doing well and it was uh it was a real uh real privilege to to sit down with griffin and this is me and griffin dunn

chatting chatting as we do here in the garage So you were around then? Yeah, I was at the comedy club. Comedy store? Comedy store. Really? During the Kenniston reign? Yeah, and I was doing a, I was researching a,

I had a deal at Warner's to play a stand-up comic and I was developing the story. So I would go there a lot. Yeah. But Sam was always there. He was always screaming my name whenever he saw me.

It was very exciting. Yeah, he could do that. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, he had that. And it made me feel very welcome. Yeah. But Sam was always there. He was always screaming my name whenever he saw me. It was very exciting. Yeah, he could do that. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, he had that. And it made me feel very welcome. Yeah. And then... That was a very loaded welcome.

Yeah, it really was. There's always a price to pay for that welcome. Absolutely, and I paid it. Yeah, and then I went around to a club called Sir Laughs A Lot in Memphis. Oh, really? Yeah. What were you doing in Memphis? That was what, I had the studio,

you know, I was like research, so I was like, let's go to that one. I love the name. To Memphis. Interesting. Yeah, well, Sir Laughs A Lot was the first appeal, and then Memphis was just the gravy. Right.

But like, what happened to that project? You know, you had another undeveloped development deal. Yeah, but like what was the angle? Oh, the angle was a story that's been told many times since of a struggling comic for years, what goes on. Yeah, yeah. You know, finding your voice, finding your act. Yeah.

your voice finding your act yeah and just the the unglamorous life of being um you know on the road and driving yourself from gig to gig yeah all that matters is to stand up and the rest is just dirty absolutely it was so dirty it was so dirty and i stayed in the motels with the with the guys yeah yeah chicks and the hookers did you stay with condos? Did you do comedy condos or all hotels? These were motels. Good for you. Yeah, you got in it, huh? Well, you got a taste and then you got out. Absolutely.

One chick told me, she goes, I'll go with you, but I got the clap, you know. Yeah, yeah. And then, as if that was a negotiating point. You did? No, I didn't go. Oh, good. I didn't really want to get the clap. It was a weird period of my life.

Back when that was all you had to worry about. Yeah, that's right. The clap. That was my biggest problem. Back when VD had a cute name. Exactly. Oh, just that? Oh, you got the clap?

Just go to the doc. I know. Go to the doc for the clap. Yeah, before that, it was the vapors, you know? So, like, you don't live out here, do you? I don't. I live in New York. Right.

You're like a full-on New York guy. I'm a New Yorker, but I grew up out here, do you? I don't. I live in New York. Right. You're like a full-on New York guy. Full-on New Yorker, but I grew up out here. You did? How did that work out? Were your parents together? My parents moved from New York to here when I was about two years old. Why? My dad got a job as a television executive.

Oh, right. He was in live television. Right. And then he came out here and started a company called Four Star. Charles Boyer, David Niven. David Niven. Yeah. I mean, incredible.

A gig young. Four stars started this studio. But your dad was from here, though, right? Yeah. He was from, well, he's originally from Connecticut. Right. He worked in New York in live television, I said. And then he came out here in about 59. though right yeah he was from uh well he's originally from connecticut right he was a you know worked in new york and live television i said then he came out here in about 59

and loved this place and he's a movie producer and yeah he started off in television and became a movie producer so you grew up in the business oh very much because my dad on top of everything else was also an incredible schmoozer and socialized yeah and uh that's how i he never that was always him yes yeah i mean he was he would give parties exhausting my mother yeah at least you know once a week they went out six nights a week and this is the 60s and 70s so hollywood is still like spectacular well you know small townie it's it's very small yeah um but it it doesn't know what it's gonna what's gonna hit it um you know it's like which but which thing you know dennis hopper right there on your wall it's about to rock their world i mean that was before so it's

pre-69 yes so you're saying hit the that period yeah they they think Dr. Doolittle is the way of the future. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Musicals, too, right? Yeah, musicals. Everybody loves a musical. We just need another Oklahoma. You know, since I've become, I was so young. You know, I was like, you know, from six to about nine. I wish I knew as much about movies then as I do now.

Because, I mean, I'd love to. George Stevens would be at our house all the time I'd love to talk to him about Giant right you know William Wyler, Billy Wilder they were there yeah just hanging out just hanging out

he drew an incredible crowd of of the greatest filmmakers in Hollywood it's so funny because I talked to guys you know who like oddly the one who gave me the biggest insight into that era into the shift was Ed Begley Jr. Oh yeah

sure. Because he was just running around No we talk about that all the time. Oh you do? Yeah he's older than me but the overlap is right there. Right because his dad was a character actor but he also was like kind of a wandering soul and was doing the party circuit in the early 70s. Because his dad was a character actor, but he also was like kind of a wandering soul and was doing the party circuit in the early 70s.

Yeah, no, he was totally on the scene. Yeah. You know, I remember. Before he was an actor. Oh, absolutely. Yeah. No, and a much in-demand dude because he was so fucking funny.

Yeah. I can't say that, right? Sure you can. So funny. Like he has a story about finding himself out at the spawn ranch. Wow. Yeah. Oh, I haven't heard that. Yeah, like has a story about finding himself out at the spawn ranch. Wow. Yeah.

Oh, I haven't heard that. Yeah, like, I don't think he met Charlie or hung out with Manson, but he went out there for something, to pick something up, to do something. Yeah, well. And you forget that. It was like, well, Charlie was around. Yeah, he was around, yeah. Take one of his girls.

He won't mind. That's exactly right. He always brings the good chicks to the party. That's who he was. Yeah. Yeah. That's what that was his deal. Kato my god there's always those people in this town absolutely this that service the darker needs yeah i know well i i'm not on their mailing list no i

don't know who they are anymore well now it's all very insulated because there's just too much social access it's all you know yes there's a lot of uh things that have to be signed for anything to transact absolutely we're so like growing up it was you and you have what you had a brother and a sister got a brother and a sister and uh and you're all out here living the life you got a pool you got a pool uh in the hills no we're in the flats and the valley or out Or out here in Beverly Hills? In Beverly Hills. Uh-huh. And, you know, had a house that looks like a house you'd see in, like, Greenwich, Connecticut. Oh, really? Or more Hartford, Connecticut, really, which is where my dad was from.

That's why he bought the house. Now, was your dad one of these guys, like Mayflower family type? No, no, no. Irish. Irish. A great-grandfather came over, famine. Oh, okay. 12 years old. Right.

So not old money Connecticut. No, no, no. It all came from him, though. He's an extraordinary man who became, he's like a Horatio Alger figure. Oh, yeah? Yeah. At 11 years old, he was sweeping out the grocery store, and then within 10 years, he bought it and parlayed that into buying a bank.

Ended up getting knighted by a Knight of Malta from the Pope, and schools are named after him in Hartford. No kidding. Yeah. He was like a much beloved guy. Oh, wow. He came over illiterate, and then he became also a great, you know, passionate about literature and would read to his children, you know, Yeats and all the Shakespeare.

So that's an amazing story. Yeah, and he just infused my, particularly my uncle and father with this love for literature. And your uncle became the big writer. John Grady Dunn, yeah. And your uncle became the big writer. John Ritter Dunn, yeah. And your aunt's Joan Didion. Correct. So you had quite a life on both coasts. I did indeed.

I did indeed. It's funny. One was like the zenith and decline of the 60s with my parents. In Hollywood. In Hollywood. And then with John and Joan, they were like in the hot spot of the 70s. With the sort of literature. With the literature and filmmakers.

This past six years, I've been making a documentary about her. Really? Yeah, I'm just about finished. Really? That's a hell of a passion project. It sure is. Well, she's worth it. Yeah, so how are you putting it together?

project it sure is well she's worth it yeah so how are you putting it together well um we started off with um kickstarter and then got more money since then and now i'm you know you're doing good come coming to a close so you have you been interviewing her over the last six years or are you using a lot of archival i'm using a lot of archival cavit appearances and stuff no no she never did to cavit she never did no she wasn't doing talk show stuff so much as as uh uh but she did a lot of press both she and john and there's a there's a lot of archival stuff and a lot of stuff we've dug up and um but also you know at the center of it is an interview that uh i did with her uh over a period of a few days yeah some years. Yeah, and what did you find out about her that you didn't know? What was revealed to you in terms of the relevance, importance of your Aunt Joan Didion?

Well, a number of things, but one of them is how important and deep an impression the landscape of California and of Sacramento and that sort of homestead morality and work ethic lives within her. It's made her survive this long. And she's outlived all when she was at Vogue at the age of like 21 or 22, a piece called On Self-Respect. That has become sort of a, I don't know, a guidebook for how to live your life and how to be able to sleep in your own bed. Yeah. How to live without shame. To be a woman, too. And to be a woman.

Yeah. And it was particularly embraced by the by the the women readers yeah and she really hasn't changed at all it's the same it's the same person all the way through despite all the things that um that life has dealt her uh-huh um yeah i think it's her um innate western sensibility that that's kept her in the room longer than anybody else that's great and and i imagine that she must uh enjoy the time that you know to to be involved and to you know have you hanging around she she but also yeah what also keeps her most alive is his work but so when did you like when did you go back to new york and start the, well, I imagine you got the acting bug pretty early. You were living in it here.

Well, yeah. More I had the New York bug. I remember going to New York when I was about, I don't know, eight or nine. And I just knew I was going to live here. Yeah. I lived there. Yeah. I just loved the energy of the city.

And my dad had a funny sense of humor or dark sense of humor. of the city and my dad had a funny sense of humor or dark sense of humor and you know um he uh we were standing in a street corner and this um and people were so brusque and rushing around yeah you know we went there because they were researching panic in needle park yeah which my dad produced and john and joan wrote and so uh needle park was like all junkies and i thought this was even then i thought that looked glamorous yeah uh but it was all seedy and so unlike the clean look of beverly hills and we were crossing the street and this like old lady you know needed help and my dad watched me just take her elbow and and help her across the street and he goes, you know, you're way too polite for this town. And he goes, did you get her purse?

You're supposed to get her purse. And I don't know, I just loved it. At that point at the scene, you're like, this is both darkness and goodness. That's right. I can make this work. The darkness. I can bring them together.

Yeah, yeah. Yeah, because I imagine in L.A. at that time as a kid, the darkness didn't seem as tangible and menacing, though arguably it was probably more so. There was an underlayer that as I got older, it's all I can see of what was really going on. Therapy, huh? Yeah, there we go.

Lots of it. So when did your family move back to new york they never did i was really one yeah oh is that true yeah well what happened was uh i i moved to new york and um uh in the 70s i went went when i was 18 uh after a very unsuccessful career in high school which was what being kicked out uh-huh and then i moved to new york yeah why'd you get kicked out in high school. Which was what? Being kicked out. And then I moved to New York. Yeah. Why'd you get kicked out of high school? It's a pot.

Like right now I'd be given an award for it. Really? Yeah. Like a stupid joint. Really? Boom, you're out of here. In 1970? In 74. Oh my God.

Yeah, I know. Yeah. Anyway, so I came to, so I moved to New York. And then while I was in New York, a lot of misfortune happened, self-inflicted misfortune happened to my dad in terms of losing all of his money. And his life went into haywire. Really? And he had sold all his belongings, and he moved to oregon how do you lose that much money that quickly the bottom just fell out no lots of booze helped oh um lots of enemies

oh no kidding he he alienated a lot of people and uh he was washed up as they say in this town and uh he moved to oregon so So he moved to Oregon only because his car broke down in front of this motel. And so anyway he lived there and and then afterwards after he'd written a book he moved to New York so then he was the next person to go and he lived down the street. That's very jarring so you're like you know 18 or 19 and all of a sudden like everything you grew up in is just gone and dad's in a hotel. Well my mom my mom who had you know my mom is just gone and dad's in a hotel my mom my mom who had you know my mom was comfortable but but dad was because they had gotten divorced before he lost

everything oh yeah oh so okay good so she left him at the peak she she also had most of the money too but uh um yeah he you know he was in a what does she do uh she's um she She's no longer alive. She was a daughter of a cattle rancher, and the ranching family did quite well, so she didn't really work. She had MS for most of her life, and so she spent the last half of her life in a wheelchair and eventually bed and

incredibly strong, beautiful woman. You got some tough genes. Yeah. Cattle ranchers and Irish. No shit. I know. I'm very proud of that.

So you, so anyway, then, then he moved to New York and, you know, started over, lived in an apartment smaller than I had. And I was a waiter at Beefsteak Charlie's.

Beefsteak Charlie's. Oh yeah. Oh yeah. Charlie's? Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. All-you-can-eat salad bar. Yeah. Were you guys close? Yeah, well, when he came back, we were very close. When he moved to New York?

Yeah. He lived in the village. He lived down the street from me. And, you know, when I moved to New York, I had this, like, the boxer kind of a, you know, I wanted the whores on 7th Avenue to know my name, you know, and I wanted all the... You romanticized the decadence. Absolutely. You know, the wanted the whores on 7th Avenue to know my name, you know, and I wanted all the... You romanticized the decadence.

Absolutely. You know, the Bukowski characters. And I wanted them to all go, hey, Griff, you know, and all that stuff. Yeah. So my dad had only been living there about two months. We were in an outdoor cafe in the village. And, like, drag queens and hairnets go, hey, hey, Dominique, hey, Dominique. And, you know, hey, know hey nick nick and every village

character damon run you nescago i've been living here for two years how do you know these people and he just went the rooms oh yeah and he was legendary you know as a storyteller you know and so his so he got sober sober. Oh, yeah. His rehabilitation was remarkable. It was really rising out of the ashes. And. Stayed sober the whole rest of the life? Oh, always. Oh, wow.

Yeah. Yeah. Except pot. He was really into pot. Yeah. But, you know, he became a writer and a very successful one. And so then my aunt and uncle moved. So we all ended up in new york right

um but i was i was the first to move and when did the acting start the acting started a few years after i arrived did you train i went to the neighborhood playhouse that was your place and what was it a class situation it was like a pretty much of a school you know you had modern dancing yeah ballet dancing you wore a dance belt there was a teacher who um was uh uh studied under martha graham yeah and she took it very very seriously and i had a very hard time taking modern dance very very seriously i looked so ridiculous and tight were you there to dance or there to no it was like to get an all-around thing. I mean, I think there was even fencing.

Sure. It's important. Very important. Yeah, movement. And so I would, but I would just make up dance moves on the spot. Autobiographical dance moves. Thank you very much. A memoir of movement.

A memoir of my feet. They should have appreciated that. You would have thought. Who was your acting teacher? Sanford Meisner started the school. Was he still around? And he was just on the final year of his life. He actually had his larynx removed.

So he had one of those machines. Oh, wow. So it made a graph of you moving it. And it was like, oh, shit, I'm just a year too late. You know, because I didn't get to just the cusp. I had no sympathy at all for his problems. I was like, I'm getting this, all right. And then I go, I can't.

My timing. He's dying and I'm about to have him. Son of a bitch. But you weren't able to glean anything from him? No, he was pretty much. Done? Done. But I had a wonderful teacher afterwards.

With the Meisner method? Total Meisner method, which is basically using your imagination to pretend. You don't need to dig in and look at your dead wife. Anti-method. You make it up, asshole. Yeah, exactly. Right. Pretend it's cold.

Yeah. And this guy named Freddie Karaman was my acting teacher. Yeah. Huge inspiration. What now, like, sometimes when I talk to actors now, like, I'm curious, because the Meisner thing, Meisner exercises are sort of legendary, the repetitions. Exactly. You know, and I've talked about this on the show, but what's interesting is, like, are

there things, because now with I Love Dick, love dick which i watched i think five of them oh wow like you and kevin are very different actors i think but what do you use from that time like because it seems to me when i talk to actors there are things that happened in the first year that they learned how to act that have sort of ingrained as part of your process. So when you do it, what do you do first? Yeah. Well, it all goes back to the simplest thing. I don't know why I spend thousands of dollars.

Because you've got to teach you this. To learn how to. All you'd have to do is listen and be present. Yeah. And boom, you're there. Yeah. is listen and be present yeah and boom you're there yeah and then um you know you you arc a performance and you i i think you are can mean that you see the end yeah you you you kind of see where this character this journey is going right no matter how long the piece is yeah and but you

don't play the end right you just play the moment so the trick is getting present listening and and still making choices i imagine do you do the choice thing i do the choice and then and then hopefully i've uh you know the incredible thing on this uh on on the series was you make a choice then she and jill will go or andrea the director they'll go okay you made the choice now let's try something different let's try something i. Let's try something. I love different, different, different, different things. There's no mistakes. There's no, we're not in a hurry.

You know, have fun. Yeah. Those are my favorite directions. Well, the funny thing about you is that like I hadn't seen you on screen in a while. Yeah. And, you know, my, you know, my knowledge of you for, you know, was sort of initially, you know, pounded in with American Werewolf in London. And then After Hours. Those are the two big Griffin Dunn movies.

I know you've done a million movies. But as a kid. I know. It's true for everybody. Right? But what I always like when I haven't seen someone in a while is that you have a very specific aggravated intensity. Shit. There's a way you lose your shit that hasn't changed.

Right, no, Sanford Meisner didn't teach me that. I'm like, there he is. That's the same guy that was freaking out in both of those other movies, in every movie if you have the opportunity. I only know how to freak out one way. But that's good because that type of acting to me is appealing because that gives me hope that you are fundamentally dealing with your own emotions. Yeah.

Yeah. Oh, yeah. That's all I got. Yeah. So when did you start working as an actor? No, it took me a while. You did the full program at the Neighborhood Playhouse? I did a year.

And then I studied with Uta Hagen. You did? Yeah. Who was terrifying and brilliant. I talked to someone else who did that as well. What was her method? Her method was, well, the way I got into the class

was by sheer lying. Yeah. I did an audition from Catcher in the Rye. I forgot every word when I got up there, and I just talked like Holden Caulfield about it and told a story about being on the subway and coming up. I just made it up. About phonies?

She goes, yes. Yeah, yeah. But it was like me doing Holden. Uh-huh. And she goes, I loved it. Oh, darling, darling, you're wonderful. And she could tell I was a little out of my league. Everybody else was working actors.

But her thing was, if she liked what you did, she would terrify you. She would scream at you. Uh-huh. Because she cared so much and go, what were you thinking when you did this?

And the worst thing that could happen would be if you did your scene and she went, oh, darling, that's wonderful. Okay, who's next? No, she didn't care anymore. Is that what that meant?

That was devastating. Right, you wanted her to yell from her chair. You wanted her to, yeah, you wanted to get her out of that chair and come over and mock you in front of the whole class. Right. Because that meant something. Acting teachers in chairs. Yeah, yeah, absolutely.

Not what you want. And, you know, students would, and these were professional actors, people would like vomit before they did their scenes. Oh, for Uta? Yeah. I think there was a period, it was very fashionable in uh in acting circles um for the teacher to break you down i guess in preparation for how tough life will be outside of class yeah but um but that was the the kind of every class i knew everybody was studying had a teacher that would just like fuck with their head.

Yeah, destroy the ego. Destroy, yeah. The throbbing mass of talent and sadness. Exactly. And Uta wasn't like that. Yeah. It was a different thing. But I was thinking, you know, I haven't taken a class in a while, but people I know who do, there's a much more, everybody has a much softer approach

now. Everything's more supportive. But you do a lot of directing. Yes, I do. And you do a lot of sort of community-oriented theater stuff, right? Mm-hmm. So you are in a position to educate. Absolutely.

I try to, in a supportive way. Yeah. Right. And yeah, I don't subscribe to that school of terror acting and making people scream and yell and making people afraid. Well, I think there was a period there where not unlike post, what was it, the group theater and then the method and then Meisner and then Uta and then Strasberg and then all these kind of like the teachers themselves became these stars. Absolutely right. These mythical stars. Absolutely.

And you wanted to be abused by them. Exactly. It was like a cult, you know. I went to one in New York. I can't remember the guy's name. His first name was Mark. He was an old guy. And he was like a Meisner.

He was that generation. I wish I could remember his name. But he was of that ilk where you know just this older man who sat in a chair with all these young people around and you waited for him to yell at you yeah well it was an honor to be yelled at just watching like one after another you know sort of like um childlike grown-ups you know moving towards tears that was like absolutely that they took you there yeah and i don't know to what end i that's what i mean too and and and i wish i had a little movie of these abusive teachers what they're like when they get home you know yeah in their tiny little

apartments and they're you know well they they're a lot of them are failures right well exactly exactly that's why all that rage comes out and they take it out on their students. Yeah. But some people learn things. I think the guys, the people that develop the ideas, like it seems like the movement of, you know, whatever created, it was the group theater, right? New York. Yeah, yeah. Harold Klerman. Yeah, like the guys who pulled Stanislawski from Russiaussia into a sort of socialist idea yeah that crew yeah

clifford odette's yeah and um you know justin um john garfield yeah and stella adler right the other one teacher oh really you study with her you did study with her for a summer in new york no and out here because she's the one who came out here she was uh she was west coast method she she would she came out here she'd do a stand out here? Because she's the one who came out here. She was West Coast method. She came out here. She'd do a standout here, and then she'd go back to New York. And when she got really excited about something, and she's in her 80s, when she got really excited about something, she'd grab her blouse and pull it down. You'd see her tits like this for like one second.

Yeah. And go, ah! And then she'd pull it back up. She goes, that's acting! And we'd go, did I just just see that is that a good thing but she was an incredible teacher i loved her so okay so you're working with uh with uda and then how what do you so anyway uh i i get i i i get this um i get this play it it's called The White Album, and I got some attention from it. Yeah.

Sidebar, when it went on to a bigger production, for whatever reason, Yeah. Kevin Bacon was in the same play, and not me. But that's when I first heard of you two. That's when we first heard of each other. Really? Because, yeah, he was in New York,

and you guys were contemporaries for all this time. We started within minutes of each other. Have you guys talked about that? Oh, sure, sure, he was in New York, and you guys were contemporaries for all this time. We started within minutes of each other. Have you guys talked about that? Oh, sure. Sure. Sure. And so, anyway, then I go to an appointment. What was the White Album about?

It was by a guy named David Rimmer, who sadly just passed away. And it was about four kids in the 60s. Yeah. And when these two albums kind of came out around the same time a beach boys album but pet sounds on the white out yeah and how it affected these two group of kids oh yeah there's uh four kids uh a beautiful beautiful play uh-huh um so anyway i get sent to this audition uh i meet this guy named john land, and we talk for about 15 minutes. And he says, I only got one question for you, claustrophobic. And I said, no.

He goes, okay, cool. And I figured, well, that movie's about a guy trapped in an elevator or something. Yeah, yeah. And then my phone rings, and it goes, hey, Griffin, I got an armed guard. He's coming outside, and he's going to hand you a script, and I want you to read it, and then call me right back. And I read it, and it's American World from London. And I loved it. And I was so hoping to play Jack.

I loved that part so much. And I call him up. He goes, do you like it? And I went, yeah. He goes, do you want to play Jack? And I went, yes, yes. He goes, I got to ask you again. Are you claustrophobic?

I said, no, I'm not. And he meant, of course, because my head was going to be in plaster. Right. For the plaster cast, it just breathed out of two little straws in my nose. So no reading, no nothing. He'd never seen me. He'd never met me. He gave it to me for whatever reason in those 15 minutes he saw the part.

And then next thing I know, I'm in England, and I'm shooting this amazing movie. That was the first movie that you ever did? Yep. And that was such a great movie. It was. They had no idea how great it was. It was ridiculous. Was it menacing and fun at the same time?

Yeah, it was like, it really, other movies have been given credit for it, but it really was the first movie to combine combine horror and humor yeah so you were really in you like you're right away you're you're somewhere else you're doing big makeup i mean like six hours of makeup you know i and i must say i loved rick baker i hated that damn makeup oh really well it was a different they they do it differently now, but they glued it onto your face and they'd have to keep, and it would shrink and pull on you. Yeah, yeah. And it always had to be touched up.

And then the worst part was taking it off. It took like an hour then to take it off. Right. And it hurt. And so then that movie was successful. It was not. It was. To our chagrin.

No, it became successful when, you know, VCRs came in and then people rediscovered it. It was like people were annoyed. Well, critics particularly were annoyed how dare humor find a place in the horror genre. Really? Yeah. Like who, like Pauline Kael?

Across the board. You could read it all across the board i think i remember the names of it but i would have vincent canby or whoever was doing it at the time that was their beef those fucking uh yeah yeah those authorities yeah yeah those high brow motherfuckers on the genre of horror they wanted to protect the horror genre really they felt very deep that at that point no one was even giving a shit about yeah and then of course then like ghostbusters will come out and they'll go, this is brilliant, the way they combined the two.

You know, like, you fucking assholes. It was right there. But it was a real disappointment. Yeah. You know, I mean, it was my first movie. It was exciting. I wasn't devastated. Yeah.

But, you know, all that time, I was, because I was not working very much as an actor. Yeah. And I really love working. I'd actually been producing, you know, with maybe the chance of giving myself a part. And Amy Robinson, my producing partner for many years, and Mark Metcalf. What was the name of your company? Triple Play Productions. Now, was your dad helping you out?

No, no, he was still slumming it. Oh, really? But no advice? Be careful, son. They will kill you. Actually, quite honestly, it was kind of terrifying to kind of get into the business closer

knowing that this is the same business that right destroyed him was a little different because they'd gotten over that hump of the set the sick weight 60s and so now it was a different field it was a different field a different generation and all that kind of stuff but but you know there's still some overlap but you know with um you know bob evans and sue mangers and all those people that became his arch enemy were still in power. They made the transition. Yeah, they survived. Yeah.

He made The Godfather, but he's staying right where he is. That's right. And so you produced a film. I produced a film called Chili Sins of Winter. And I had a small part in that. And actually, that's how I got my first acting job. That was by giving myself the acting job. And then American Werewolf came after that.

Okay. And then what else did you produce? Baby, It's You. Oh, the John Sayles movie? John Sayles movie. Michael Bauhaus shot it. It was his first movie. That was a sweet movie.

Yeah. Yeah. What happened to Vincent Spano? I know he's been directing. And I haven't been in touch with him for a while. He still pals with my pal Matt Dillon, and so I hear about him from them. Like the smart guys get into directing. Yeah, that's where we go.

Yeah, yeah. TV or whatever. Well, it makes a lot of sense that actors, of course, become directors. You just know how to. directors you know you just know how to i i i've always noticed that many of the directors i've i've worked with and you know have spoken to they talk passionately about every aspect but the talking to the actor scares them the most or or it's it's the foreign most foreign to them really um well that had you know i hadn't here um walter hill oh god yeah i love him man he said something straight for me sort of

like this idea that that people have that the director is somehow guiding the actor it's just not true i mean really what what you know we're hiring someone to do a job exactly you know and it is sort of like it kind of it didn't blow my mind but to to hear it in that sort of nuts and bolts thing and so of course that's why you hire them. This idea that these great actors are guided by directors is really, for the most part, a misgiving. It's like, you know,

you cast somebody because they do the job. A director does not want to see a doe-eyed actor go, tell me what to do. It's got to be a nightmare. Yeah. And, you know, Woody Allen

will write a 15-page scene. He wants to do it in one take. Right. No direction. And you just better have in one take. Right. No direction. And you just better have your shit together. Right. Have you worked with him? I never have.

There's time. Yeah. It's a resurrection. Yeah, it's a total resurrection. It's Griffin Dunn's time again. Woody, I'm back. It's the fourth time around. It's right.

It's exactly how I look at it. Again? I didn't get another shot? Oh, oh my god please don't let me fuck this one up well so after hours well that was like you know I guess you know I mean it's no mystery I don't know how much you talk about it but you know the tragic loss of your sister must have been like a horrendous time in terms of like you know career and personal and everything else yeah it was a terrible obviously a terrible thing but it was it was a you know something um it was a it came at a time of um professionally a lot of very of good fortune and you were just starting I was starting and everything and and I was so and my mother also at that time was was was was quite ill with MS

yeah so it was a something I've gone to a lot of therapy about was was you know that that terrible feeling of of having something good happen yeah something people you love something terrible has happened and and they're happening at the same time and you so you can't enjoy one thing and you feel bad if you do and you you know it's it was um and everybody knew about it it was it was like it wasn't like some you know personal inner family tragedy it was a horrible event that that was you know international news and it was uh and something that i refused to talk about and in certain unless it was you know family or friends. But my father and my mother, they both took this tragedy and made it a source of power.

My father and mother became an advocate for victims' rights. It led to my father becoming a journalist, writing about murder trials. He was the OJ guy. And he was the OJ guy. He was the Menendez brothers guy. He covered all the big trials. I can't imagine, no matter how public the tragedy is, that the sense of justice not being served when it was clearly, you know,

that it should have been. Yeah, no, it's outrageous. You can't, like, what do you do with those feelings? And that happens, you know, all the time. It does, it does. And that, you know, that guy who murdered your sister, you know, walked away and lives in the world that, you know, the only way I guess that your parents and the family could reconcile that is to become active. That's right. And, you know, they put their – my mother's responsible for something called Marcy's Law.

Yeah. Which is where you have to um the parole you'd think they didn't need a law but the the parents of of um whoever the criminal has has killed yeah that if they're out on parole they have to let the family know right that the killer's out back on the streets again you'd think right that that would be because it would happen over and over again you You'd see the killer in the supermarket, you know? Right.

Anyway, and then... So they put their energy into that. My energy on the advocate level went into and continues to be my passion.

I've been involved for a long time is gun violence prevention and gun control. And I've been working... Well, I'm now with Brady. I work with Brady. Oh, you do?

But before that, I've been, you know, just working with gun control for a long time. Yeah, it's important and it's not going to get any better. It's not getting any better. It's getting worse. Everything's going away. It's one of those, it's yet another, you know, sidebar tragedy of shithead tragedy of American culture and politics yeah you know no it's mystifying to me why there's no never any traction on it

it's powerful lobby I guess it really is they are formidable yeah and they're just like you know sometimes I start to think that the way that capitalism has metastasized requires a turnover at any cost. So whether it's guns or denying people health care, the system in its cynical way just allows for it. Well, it is, as you said, a very powerful lobby in industry. And I was listening to your excellent interview with obama and you know he brought that up how how gun sales go up after all these all these mass shootings no it's just a it's just a cash cow yeah and always this over this this thing hanging over the the gun people is that they're going to take them away and no one is no one is ever trying to take it.

It's just, you know, how Trump could put out something on a Twitter and then because it's on Twitter, it's true. It doesn't require it. Mobilizes a movement in the whole world. Exactly. And there's no background. There's no follow up. There's no, nothing's based on truth. There's no follow-up.

There's no, nothing's based on truth. You know, what is happening to the, to our language? Yeah. A breakdown of what intention is and what to believe. Yeah, and just, you know, sort of like taking the time to process and source and, you know. It's very alarming. I don't know if this will, you know, pass on to generation to generation because, you know, people could just be talking about nothing to each other and just making outrageous. And then you say something hateful to somebody, but it's all been said so many times you don't even feel the anger about it anymore. Yeah, there's no.

So then you start losing your feelings of love and hate. Yeah. And it's just all words. Yeah. These words that come back to just endure everything and everything's so immediate like my belief is that because of the immediacy of platforms and everyone's access to you know having a way to put their immediate feelings and reactions and hostility or whatever out there that the you know tolerance is what begins to kind of fade away. Erode, absolutely.

Erode, that's the word. But in looking at some of the things you've done, and I want to talk about After Hours, but you've never stopped working. Yeah. You do movies that maybe are questionable in quality. Sure, no, I've had to decline. Well, let's talk about after

hours first i mean because that's an odd little movie and i remember because i was sort of a film head in high school and it came out well i was in college i guess 85 but i was definitely into film and it was definitely some sort of departure uh you know for did scorsese directed or just produced it or did you do it directed it yeah uh amy and it. Right. That was our third movie after Baby at Chill. It was an interesting movie for him because it was really, you know, it was a comedy, you know, full on. And there was a lot of interesting elements. It was sort of a journey, you know, like almost like a picaresque process of, you know, moving through these different lives. But it was menacing.

Yeah. And, you know, and then you but you never got the sense that you know it wasn't a comedy but there was definitely some things in there that were uh kind of specific to the time you know the the stuff with rosanna our cat and that oh that stuff with the with the medication and the burns so how did that come about? Well, the script was written by Joe Minion, who was a, it was basically his graduate, film graduate thesis script.

And he worked for a director named Dujan Makaveyev who brought the script to Sundance, not the festival, but the workshop that happens over the summer. Makaveyev was an important filmmaker. He was. Like an experimental filmmaker. Yeah. Not the festival, but the workshop that happens over the summer. McAvay was an important filmmaker. He was. Like an experimental filmmaker.

Yeah. And anyway, he said, my assistant has this crazy script and that's my sir back. Yeah. That's all right. And so Amy read it,

couldn't stop picturing me in the role and called me up and she sent it to me and I read it. It't stop picturing me in the role, and called me up, and she sent it to me, and I read it. It caused me such anxiety. I had to read it standing up with the script on the floor, and I turned the pages with my toe and just walk away and go, oh, my God, oh, my God. Yeah. So we optioned the script right away. Amy had been an actress for Scorsese in Mean Streets.

And so she got the script to him. He was about to start shooting what would be Last Temptation of Christ. He was on the serious decline because Marty had just done King of a Comedy, which we all know is brilliant now, but it was a huge disaster then. And he was unbankable.

And he's about to start doing this movie aiden quinn was going to play christ and they pulled the plug and so on the on his way back from morocco yeah this our script was on the top of his pile and uh we had to make it for a million and a half dollars nobody thought he could make a movie for a million and a half dollars or thought he was funny, by the way. But we knew differently. And so he said, yeah, I want to do it. And we introduced him to Michael Ballhouse, who just passed away. We worked with him on Baby, It's You.

And he's also responsible for the AD or no he's the DP sorry DP yeah and and also responsible it became became a huge collaboration a long collaboration with with Marty and a lot of the menacing and the tone you're talking about is because of the camera angles there yeah and movement that that Michael and Marty came up with and you, we had like, I don't know, 30 days and all nights. And I got the grip guys to black out my windows in the apartment I was living in. And, you know, I come home. So it was real indie filmmaking. Oh, it was real deal.

And in New York, of course, Soho, you could lie down on the street, you know, at that time of night. Yeah. And, I mean, it was quiet as a tomb yeah and very menacing yeah and uh you know uh marty had this uh he was allergic to cigarette smoke oh he's asthmatic he's asthmatic yeah and uh and we were shooting a scene where i dropped to my knees and scream up in the sky what do you you want with me? I'm only a word processor. I'm just trying to get laid. And this lofts are on all sides.

All the lights are out except for one. And we're on like the fourth take. What do you want from me? And this woman throws up the loft, her window, and goes, shut up, just shut the fuck up. And without missing a beat marty goes tell that lady to put out a cigarette and did that like in katherine o'hara yeah like in terry gar right terry gar katherine o'hara was terrifying it was just like you know what what i remember

about that movie is this those weird during that period in time where you would find yourself in apartments with women and not know anything about them no and also you know what i remember the part that killed me because i read so much into it but i don't it's good that you're here because i i have this thing that i do now it seems with with actors is that you know like there there are parts of movies that that stay with me for specific reasons and I don't know if there's intent there. And some actors won't tell me, even if they know.

These weird secrets. I'm like, did you mean? And they're like, I made a choice, but I'm not gonna, it's happened twice. But the scene where you end up in that gay guy's apartment and you're up against the wall and it's a brick wall and you're ranting

and i thought to myself that's a stand-up comedy show like there's a brick wall and in my mind i'm like that's there for a reason that that was a reference was it um i i didn't know well the loft was the loft the brick wall came with the loft yeah and it was really a loft right that like an apartment rather right and uh i hadn't thought of that i just because because i was doing comedy and i'm like of course that brick wall is exactly it's like a it's a riff on comedy that the the guy you know he's and and also playing for a man who thought you know he was going to have romantic interlude and you're just this straight guy with problems to an audience

that could give a shit and i'm like that's a metaphor you're like you're like i built it in my mind but i can leave it at that no i'd like to re-answer that question you know when i was doing that yeah and i saw that wall yeah uh i asked for the wall by the way i said marty i want i'm thinking of stand-up comedy oh yeah okay okay so we're cutting it i'm so stealing that it just i just gave you a new part of your public narrative thank you for that what we were thinking really and i don't know if anyone picked up on it okay you know you do these make these choices that maybe no one will notice maybe they will it doesn't matter you know it's part of my process all right so you keep working and like you know and obviously producing but is it is it because you like to work uh yes i mean i mean i have that uh i have that uh little hamster heart

that if i'm not if i'm not working i get really worried about myself. You're up to no good. Yeah. And, you know, but I also hate when I'm working on something and I hate what I'm doing. Or I hate what the thing is. Right. And I remember once, you know, having gone from After Hours, you know, years had gone by, not that many. you know, years have gone by, not that many. And I'm in Toronto and I'm doing a movie and I'm playing either an android or a Martian and I don't give a shit.

You don't even know what you're playing. I don't even know what it is. And I'm going, this can't, how did this happen? And so I started- How did it happen? I made some bad choices. Kind of what we were talking about before, I kind of- Got away from you?

But also, I had a very bad relationship with success. And at the cost, it sort of came. I couldn't, I made some very destructive choices. Well, what did success do to you? What was your reaction to it? Well, it was also, you know, that thing we were talking about. Did you get cocky? Oh, yeah, yeah.

And I made, I just made, I made very bad acting choices. I also, I also, and I'm not saying this is good or bad, but at a time where I probably had the highest visibility as an actor, I decided to become a producer. And so running on empty, I decided to become a producer.

And so, running on empty. I went into, from After Hours, instead of going on to the next big movie, I turned down some very good movies. I went to be behind the camera and helped Sidney Lumet make one of his better movies. And I was off the range. That's amazing. He directed Running on Empty? Yeah. Like, he's like, that must have been range. That's amazing. He directed Running on Empty?

Yeah. Like, he's like, that must have been amazing. It was amazing. And I learned, all of it paid off later on because I became a director and I learned so much from Sidney. What did you learn? Because, like, I watched,

Sidney Lumet did The Verdict. Yep. And, you know, I've watched that two or three times in the last couple of years, you know, coming back to it. You know, what he did, and I remember there was a risk there, you know, to cast Paul Newman like that. But, like, to me, he was one of the best. Yeah, he sure was.

And what did you learn from him as a director? I mean, like, you were producing the thing. Yes. Well, when I became a director, the first feature I made was called Addicted to Love with Meg Ryan and Matthew Broderick. And all of it set in one loft. Right. And what Sidney used to do was get the exact dimensions

and put it out on tape. And he'd rehearsal the actors and he'd get the props that they're going to do and uh and he'd rehearse for like a week now there's no time to do any of that stuff and there's no money and anything but at that time i had the money or warner's at it and so i had a chance to take that technique and work with the uh we worked out all the problems with the script beforehand so when we got to the set, it was like completely familiar. Saved a lot of time. So it's practical, utilitarian, kind of like this is how you do it.

Absolutely. I also learned he would nap. He would take a nap for lunch break. He wouldn't just go lie down. And that's why he was in his 70s even then, you know, I mean, and he just had- And he'd already done like Serpico and like- 12 Angry Men. And Network.

Yeah. Yeah. I mean, the greatest movies. And he had the most, this guy had more energy than anyone I ever saw in my life, you know. He did The Pawnbroker. Yeah, he did. No, he went through live television right through the greatest period in movies in our time during the 70s, Dog Day Afternoon. Dog Day Afternoon. I mean, you know.

Networks of genius. Prince of the City. Like, oh, my God. You know, and then, you know, toward the end of his life, he made that incredible movie that, What the Devil Knows or something. Before the Devil Knows You're Dead. Right. I mean,

that was as hardcore as anything the Coen brothers ever did. Yeah. And he was well into his 80s when he did that. Yeah. I mean,

he was extraordinary. So, what did I learn? I learned about preserving your energy and inspiration and putting out, and the way he talked

to the actors, the way he loved his actors made him feel so good about what they were doing and rehearsing in the rehearsing yeah yeah so it was i don't know there was a so that was worth uh not taking the big absolutely it all that's what i mean is all choices i made then pay off later well you have to look at it that way after a certain point absolutely because at the time you don't you know what am i fucking done yeah it's like that old thing it's like uh you know where you know things will work out the way they're supposed to it's

like there's no that's bullshit it's like but as you get older you realize there's really no way to look at it yeah yeah you know everything happens for a reason that's the other one you can't think that way like you're gonna have to if you don't want to live be bitter but yeah absolutely yeah because otherwise i'm just going to track down the reason department and find the guy who runs it and beat the shit out of him that's a good one where'd you hear that i just made it up did you i swear to god just flew out of my mouth for the reason department that guy's up to no good i hate that fucker yeah he's just trying to fuck us every time every time putting out that ridiculous but but so like tell me so what happened and let's go

back so anyway in an alien outfit so i'm in the alien outfit and i start to uh i start to write a um a script i write a short script and uh and it's based on a party that my aunt and uncle gave in the 60s that I was 11 years old, and they let me come to. It was a party for Tom Wolfe. Okay, so for Bonfire? No, no, we're talking to you. This is candy-colored. Electric Kool-Aid acetate.

Electric Kool-Aid acetate. Okay. Had just come out, and they were giving them a party. They had a house in Hollywood Hills, this sort of rumbling, rambling, you know, rotting villa kind of a thing. Janis Joplin was going to come to the party. I was insane about Janis Joplin. You were what, eight? I was 11, 12.

And so I fretted. And my, John and Joan were always letting me go. And my mom was letting me go, and it was a school night. I couldn't believe it. So I was fretting about what to wear, and what am I going to say to Janice, and what if she finds out I'm there with my mother, and I'm never going to get to a motel, and she's not going to think I'm cool. Oh, I had such confidence in my charm around Janice.

Anyway, we get to this party in this i never got to meet janice and she not come she came yeah my mom took me home early anyway i wrote a short story about this night or a short short script and um and the producer of the alien movie um also had a deal for short films at Showtime and took this on and gave me, got me the money for it. And so I made

this short movie and I cast, you know, Uma Thurman and Tobey Maguire and Kiefer Sutherland and Elliot Gould and got this really, and got an Academy Award nomination.

What was it called? Duke of Groove. Okay. And it was, you know, very autobiographical and, you know, I even used some of the film in the documentary I'm making about Joan

because of Janice and Jim Morrison and all the people that she interviewed over the years come up in it. So how about that? That I went to the Reason Department, I thanked them for that. Yeah, oh good. I thanked them.

I sent them a fruit bag. That guy gets no love. One fruit pack says you got him in a long time. So anyway, that turned, then it got me out of the acting hole because now I could throw myself into directing. Well, there's a lot of reward of creativity from the ground up there.

Absolutely. And everything that I've been doing as a producer, I understood how to apply it as a director. Everything I'd learned as an actor helped me in working with the actors. And I'd never felt so at home on a set in my life. It was like all of this, everything made sense. Oh, that's great.

That's a good feeling. Elliot Gould, he's got stories. He sure does. I've worked with him on my show. He's one of those guys where you feel like the story's ongoing, even if you're not there, that he's still telling it. Well, it's really funny

because he's telling his story in this movie about Bob Dylan writing about a song writing for Nico. Because I've heard him tell stories, and I said, do that storytelling thing you do. And he just tells this total bullshit story about Bob Dylan writing I'll Keep It With Mine for Nico.

Yeah, you know, I'd like to interview Elliot. You know, it was weird being on set with him because, like, he really, like, there's a rise and fall. Oh, yeah. And, you know, and he knows why it happened. Yeah. You know, it's like restraint of pen and mouth

or whatever. Yeah, you know, I was a... I would go on lots, studio lots, and I lived not far from 20th Century Fox. When you were a kid? When I was a kid.

And I remember wandering onto one of the sets on the Fox lot and I saw Elliot Gould doing a scene with James Caan. Oh, yeah. For, what was that, Hiring Walter to Go to New York? Exactly. Yeah.

And they were so, well, Elliot particularly was so, the bad behavior was unbelievable. Yeah. And I was watching as a young actor going, oh, God, I hope I don't act like that. Or is that what I'm supposed to act like when I get famous? And it was just like watching, and he was slowing shit down and exasperating people and talking and then getting angry. And it was like, he's a totally different person now.

But it was like him at his highest and at his worst. Yeah. That was an odd little movie. I'm Harry. Really? Walter. They play like a pre-Vaudeville entertainment. Pre-Vaudeville, yeah.

Yeah. So, and now you're directing theater as well? No, no, I didn't direct theater. I just stuck with movies. I acted in a play, a guy named Howard Corder. Yeah. Search and Destroy. Yeah.

And I did that. That was on Broadway. That was later in the 90s. How was that experience? That was incredible. And it was a brilliant, brilliant play. And Marty produced the movie of it. Yeah.

And I played the guy in an independent film. Did you stay in touch with Marty? Oddly, through gun control. He called me. He knows I was involved with that. He had oddly through gun control um he he called me he knows i was involved with that he wanted to he had another person who was also involved and wanted to put us together and uh and he also interviewed joan um so we had that in common and uh it's interesting how like you know i always and i still do like like i, my life is not small, but, like, it's busy.

And, you know, people, you know, who have been around a while and have all these relationships and know, have been in movies or worked with all these people, there's, I want to believe everybody kind of keeps in touch, but no one keeps in touch with anybody. You have two friends. Yeah, it always blows my mind. You know, it happened, this thing, back to the I Love Dick. Kevin and Catherine, I'm quite certain, will always be in touch. Oh, yeah?

But I haven't had that feeling in a really long time. It's like also that thing like when you're just starting out and you're going on location in a movie, you're looking at the crew list and you're thinking, who am I going to sleep with? Who is it? Well, nobody. I'm sure that still goes on but i haven't seen it um and that's behind you buddy that's way behind so um but but you know

i remember one of the very first uh jobs i did also was a uh we were in poland and it was during gdansk the strike and strike all the actors became incredibly close and Rosanna Arquette who I would eventually work with later on and Tom Conti who became a really close friend and Eli Wallach was in it

and Eli Wallach was watching us and he was like obviously much older than everybody and he goes, you know you guys all think you're all going to keep in touch for the rest of your lives but i'm telling you once they say rap it's arrivederci baby and you won't hear from each other again and we all look at you with that's not gonna happen not here that's not and then eventually after about 30 movies it does happen you don't even see it happening yeah no i mean it takes less than that yeah right right but i think there's some there's some part of the experience of community on a set that is very genuine absolutely but it can't sustain itself

because the one thing you forget when you're on a set is that everyone's got fucking lives right and they've taken time away from that absolutely to do this it's a fantasy you know both in front of the camera and what happens on screen. Well, that's why guys who aren't actors who are married to beautiful actresses and they go in location, that's why they have nervous breakdowns. Of course, and they should. Yeah, and they should. It's all true.

It's all true. Everything you heard. Don't marry a famous actress do not well i tell you uh you know i i you know i'm a fan of jill soloway and i you know and everybody's in the cast is great and the world is unique and you know my uh you know my girlfriend's a painter so she sort of knows the oh yeah incredible artists they've dug up yeah but it's like it's a real world that that that has its own folly in it and its own ridiculousness and drama, and it's never been seen before,

certainly not in this way, and you're doing a great job, and I think it's an interesting and good show, and it's fun too. Sure, it's fun. Good talking to you, Griffin. Great talking to you too, Mark. Griffin Dunn beautiful beautiful talk nice guy

doing a great job on I Love Dick you can watch that on Amazon and you know that's it that's it for now is that okay

did we do enough where's my fucking pick you guys go see that Grateful Dead movie that documentary if you're prone to that if you've got a soft spot in your heart for the Dead,

go spend four hours and watch that movie. I don't know when it opens. I'm going to stick my earplug back in and play a guitar. Because it's one of the two things I like doing. The other one, you probably don't even know the other one. I know what you think it is. There's no Satan, right?

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