Tony Nominee Christopher Abbott (‘Death of a Salesman’) Takes Center Stage

Christopher Abbott is one of the finest actors of his generation. He joins us this week from the Winter Garden Theatre, where he plays Biff Loman in the latest Broadway revival of Death of a Salesman opposite Nathan Lane and Laurie Metcalf. Fresh off nine Tony nominations, we sit with Abbott to unpack is volatile and vulnerable portrayal of Biff (3:00), the renewed relevance of Arthur Miller’s critique of the American dream (6:00), and how he produces his intense performance, eight shows a week (8:30). Then, we walk through his upbringing in Greenwich, Connecticut (16:00), the working-class roots that shaped his approach to acting (25:00), and why he kept walking toward the stage (27:00). On the back-half, we discuss Abbott’s lean years auditioning in New York City (32:00), his breakthrough role in Girls (42:19), creating work in the mold of John Cassavetes and Gena Rowlands (46:00), his journey to parenthood with Aubrey Plaza (1:02:00), and his lasting transformations in the films James White (1:05:00) and On the Count of Three (1:07:00). To close, we talk about his return to Girls in “The Panic in Central Park” (1:08:35), finding a home in the theater with Danny and the Deep Blue Sea (1:18:00) and now Death of a Salesman (1:20:40), and naturally, the New York Knicks (1:24:30). Subscribe to our new YouTube channel https://www.youtube.com/@talkeasypod. As always, our email: [email protected]. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Sam Fragoso?

  Would you rather the Knicks win a championship or you win a Tony?

• 0:04Speaker 01

  I'd rather the Knicks win a championship. I was already nominated for a Tony. That's enough.

• 0:11Speaker 01

  Of course, I want to win a Tony.

• 0:22Sam Fragoso?

  This is Talk Easy. I'm Sam Fragoso. Welcome to the show.

• 0:42Sam Fragoso?

  Christopher Abbott, welcome to the show.

• 0:45Speaker 01

  Thank you. It's a long time coming, I think.

• 0:47Sam Fragoso?

  It is a long time coming. We are taping this at the Winter Garden.

• 0:51Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 0:51Sam Fragoso?

  On stage. Usually, the only questions you get on this stage come from Nathan Lane and Laurie Metcalf.

• 0:58Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 0:59Sam Fragoso?

  So I'm hoping this is going to be a little less daunting for you.

• 1:02Speaker 01

  Well, I have rehearsed answers for that one.

• 1:05Sam Fragoso?

  Right.

• 1:05Speaker 01

  And this one, I don't.

• 1:06Sam Fragoso?

  We're completely unscripted.

• 1:07Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:07Sam Fragoso?

  Okay, so in 2026, you started doing this play. It marked 20 years of you living in New York.

• 1:17Sam Fragoso?

  You got your first Tony nomination. You're about to be a father.

• 1:22Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:22Sam Fragoso?

  And most importantly, the Knicks are in the NBA Finals.

• 1:25Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:25Sam Fragoso?

  I just want to start.

• 1:26Speaker 01

  Most importantly.

• 1:28Sam Fragoso?

  How are you doing? Like, what's going on day to day here?

• 1:31Speaker 01

  Yeah, there's a lot going on at once.

• 1:33Sam Fragoso?

  Okay.

• 1:34Speaker 01

  It can make one feel like it's some version of a simulation.

• 1:37Sam Fragoso?

  Can I recommend something?

• 1:38Speaker 01

  Sure.

• 1:39Sam Fragoso?

  You should buy a lottery ticket. The way things are going right now.

• 1:43Speaker 01

  I've never done that. I've never, but you think, start now?

• 1:46Sam Fragoso?

  Yeah, but I do get 10%.

• 1:48Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 1:48Sam Fragoso?

  If you win.

• 1:49Speaker 01

  All right. All right. You tell me which one. I don't know which lottery. Is it the New York Lottery?

• 1:53Sam Fragoso?

  No, you have to pick it because you're on the streak right now.

• 1:55Speaker 01

  It's going to be all Knicks numbers.

• 1:56Sam Fragoso?

  Great.

• 1:57Speaker 01

  All right.

• 1:57Sam Fragoso?

  What's Jalen Brunson's number?

• 1:58Speaker 01

  11.

• 1:59Sam Fragoso?

  So how are you doing, though?

• 2:01Speaker 01

  Genuinely, right now, you know, I'm tired all the time.

• 2:06Sam Fragoso?

  Okay. Because of?

• 2:09Speaker 01

  Because of the show. Yeah, because of the show. It's a fulfilling tired.

• 2:16Speaker 01

  In some way, it's a very specific kind of work. You know, you know, I separate acting from my normal day to day life. But I cannot deny that this show is taking a bit of a toll. And purely just, you know, even physically a bit. And, you know, I guess emotionally in some way, too, because when I go home, I'm pretty much dead to the world.

• 2:51Sam Fragoso?

  And how's your sleep?

• 2:53Speaker 01

  Not great. Not terrible. I'm a lifelong not great sleeper. So I say this about pretty much everything in life. It always, it could be worse. I'm doing OK.

• 3:06Sam Fragoso?

  That's good. And that's going to be the title of this episode, too.

• 3:08Speaker 01

  It's a good mantra to live by.

• 3:10Sam Fragoso?

  I heard you and Laurie Metcalf share this thing, which is if you believe there's a chance that at some point you will play a part.

• 3:20Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 3:21Sam Fragoso?

  And star in a production of a play.

• 3:22Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 3:23Sam Fragoso?

  You will not see productions of said play.

• 3:27Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 3:27Sam Fragoso?

  So at what point did you know, I'm going to do Biff and this play is for me? I'm fated to do it in some kind of way?

• 3:35Speaker 01

  I don't, it's not that active of a thought. It's more of a subconscious, it's something in the back of your, I think it's more something in the back of your head. There's a world where I could have played Biff, you know, 10, 12 years ago. I'm probably on the older edge of it now. I probably wouldn't, I, if I hadn't played it now, I would have eventually seen a production probably in about a year or two.

• 3:59Sam Fragoso?

  OK. Because you just turned 40.

• 4:01Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 4:02Sam Fragoso?

  So is this something you had wanted to do in the back of your subconscious mind?

• 4:07Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 4:07Sam Fragoso?

  And why is that?

• 4:09Speaker 01

  I, I think it's because I hold a certain reverence for the classic American.

• 4:16Speaker 01

  Plays like the ones that are in a canon, the canon. And I think it's connected to some level of nostalgia for me. It has something to do with the first things that I studied and worked on when I first came to New York. And that I have a nostalgia for that time of my life. You know, I went to HB Studio.

• 4:39Sam Fragoso?

  This is in 2006.

• 4:41Speaker 01

  And about exactly 2006, I went to HB Studio. I would, I would work on plays like this or Tennessee Williams, what have you. And those hold a certain special kind of place in my psyche. And I think that whatever I can do to sort of connect that part of my life to, to now is, is a tie that I like to tie. Yeah, I don't know. I just, I sort of, I sort of held out and I'm happy that I did.

• 5:12Sam Fragoso?

  The play was written in 1949 by Arthur Miller.

• 5:15Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 5:15Sam Fragoso?

  And at the time, it was a pretty searing portrait of a middle class in decline, an American dream dwindling.

• 5:22Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 5:23Sam Fragoso?

  And having watched it recently in this theater with a packed audience, it was amazing and kind of haunting how newly relevant it was, especially with the increase in AI, income inequality, et cetera. What do you think, Biff, and this play is telling us about this moment that we're in?

• 5:44Speaker 01

  When you talk about the play and you talk about the themes of the play, those themes aren't necessarily things I can play on stage, right? Like them, I can't, I don't know how to act the fall of the American dream, but, but.

• 5:55Sam Fragoso?

  Can I say?

• 5:55Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 5:56Sam Fragoso?

  Doing a pretty good job.

• 5:56Speaker 01

  I'm trying. Yeah, yeah, I can't, I can't actively do that. But the final, the final line, one of my final lines where he says like, I'm, I'm nothing, you know? And that the sort of acceptance of that, for me, that is.

• 6:14Speaker 01

  That is the thing as Biff in Death of a Salesman that I think has sort of carried over since 1949, you know what I mean? This, this feeling of, you know, we're all on this earth, sort of trying to compete and trying to be seen and in some, in some form or another. And that is the thing that is the most heartbreaking to me.

• 6:43Sam Fragoso?

  Hmm.

• 6:43Speaker 01

  And I think the thing that has held true throughout for Biff and all the, in all the productions.

• 6:48Sam Fragoso?

  But that line, "I am nothing."

• 6:50Speaker 01

  It's beautiful.

• 6:51Sam Fragoso?

  It could also be a line that your character in James White would say.

• 6:57Speaker 01

  Uh huh.

• 6:58Sam Fragoso?

  It's a line that you may have said in the film on the count of three.

• 7:01Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 7:03Sam Fragoso?

  Probably not in Poor Things because you were like a goat, but I think it's like that's been a through line for this past decade of film work as well.

• 7:10Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 7:11Sam Fragoso?

  Night to night, to play a guy that's saying, "I am nothing." And yet you have to do eight shows a week. How do you separate the fact that like, that's a really demoralizing thing to say about yourself? But do you feel any of that? Does that, does that?

• 7:28Speaker 01

  Of course.

• 7:28Sam Fragoso?

  Yeah.

• 7:29Speaker 01

  I absolutely, I mean, I relate to that so, so much.

• 7:32Sam Fragoso?

  Yeah.

• 7:33Speaker 01

  And I, it's a, it's something that I think everyone should relate to. It's, it's really, you know, it's sort of, I think maybe it comes from a place of dark humor of like, what do, what are we, you know, what are we doing? What are we all trying to do here really? Like, what is the point? Not, not to get too existential.

• 7:50Sam Fragoso?

  No, I think it's fine.

• 7:51Speaker 01

  But like, what is the, why are we, um, you know, I mean, other than the fact that we need to make money and we need to make a life, what are, what are we doing all of this for? I talked to you last night even, you know, not to bring this up, but like, you know, I mean, there's so much information and there's so much content and people are just trying to be seen left, right and center. And I'm like, at a certain point, I'm like, can everyone just shut up? Just stop it? Now that, I think this podcast is fantastic.

• 8:23Sam Fragoso?

  Thank you.

• 8:25Speaker 01

  But you have to, right, there's, there's a lot of, there's a lot of people talking, including myself right now.

• 8:30Sam Fragoso?

  It's true.

• 8:31Speaker 01

  But I can separate, you know, I'm, I'm now doing this for a purpose. So I can, I can, you know, I can come out of that for a second.

• 8:38Sam Fragoso?

  I, I have a question. If, if making a movie is like a band making a record in the studio.

• 8:45Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 8:46Sam Fragoso?

  Is theater like a band doing a live show?

• 8:49Speaker 01

  Yeah. I've, you've, this is analogy I've used before. It's, it's the, it's the easiest analogy I can, I can relate it to.

• 8:56Sam Fragoso?

  Okay, so can you give me an example of a performance recently or when you first started in March where there was, where there was a surprise? Like something happened between you and the audience or you and the actors where you thought, oh, my God, this, we didn't plan this.

• 9:13Speaker 01

  Yeah, I mean, it happens in little ways, pretty much every show.

• 9:16Sam Fragoso?

  Okay.

• 9:17Speaker 01

  I mean, there have been, you know, there have been events where we've had to stop the show, you know, for an audience member. It's either fallen ill or, or something like that. And that, and, you know, that's sort of, that's kind of interesting because like you're up here pretending and then all of a sudden, real life is happening in the audience. You know what I mean? And that, and that I always find a.

• 9:39Sam Fragoso?

  She fainted because the play was too good?

• 9:43Speaker 01

  It was because of my, yeah.

• 9:44Sam Fragoso?

  It was your performance.

• 9:45Speaker 01

  It was because of my performance. She's, he or she.

• 9:47Sam Fragoso?

  She said that to the ambulance.

• 9:48Speaker 01

  Just could not, yeah. It was so damn good. That's what I like to think. For my own, for my own ego, that's what I like to.

• 9:54Sam Fragoso?

  Speaking of ego, you've said on, you've said in the past, on camera is where I have the least amount of ego and I try to do it without shame.

• 10:04Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 10:04Sam Fragoso?

  Is the same true on the stage?

• 10:07Speaker 01

  Yes, very much, very much.

• 10:08Sam Fragoso?

  Tell me about that.

• 10:09Speaker 01

  I think the broader question of that is like, oh, why are you an actor?

• 10:13Sam Fragoso?

  Yeah.

• 10:14Speaker 01

  You know, I, it's, it's impossible to sort of achieve some sort of meta. Thing like that with every project. I don't, you know, you need, you need the writing and you need a good director. You, you, you need the material first to be able to then kind of, you know, make it to that next level thing. And that next level thing is ultimately my goal in every project I do that I don't always get to achieve because of, you know, whatever project doesn't allow me to have the outlet for it. But this play does and other projects of mine have allowed me to sort of have that outlet.

• 10:59Speaker 01

  But that's ultimately to kind of act without shame, without, you know, you know, to, I've used the word ugly before. Obviously, I don't mean physically, you know what I mean?

• 11:09Sam Fragoso?

  I mean, no, you're very attractive.

• 11:11Speaker 01

  Just to, thank you, to, just to act without vanity.

• 11:14Sam Fragoso?

  An actor without vanity, that seems like a contradiction to people who aren't actors, I imagine.

• 11:19Speaker 01

  I don't think I'm alone in that, wanting that. I mean, you know, we're, we're in a, we're in a profession where there's a lot of people that can say that they, this is their job. But, you know, but there's definitely less people that I think really do it. But I think that sort of goes for any profession.

• 11:37Sam Fragoso?

  Why don't we play a clip? This is from the show Death of a Salesman, starring Christopher Abbott as Biff.

• 11:44Speaker 02

  I stopped in the middle of that building and I saw the sky. I, I saw the things that I love in this world. The work and the food and the time to sit and smoke. And I looked at that pen and I said to myself, what the hell am I grabbing this for? Why, why am I trying to become what I don't want to be? What am I doing in an office, making a contemptuous, begging fool of myself? When all I want is out there, waiting for me the minute I say, I know who I am.

• 12:21Sam Fragoso?

  In Interview Magazine, you said, even before acting, I was a watcher. I observed. So I want to go back to Greenwich, Connecticut. You're in a six family house across the street from a funeral parlor. In what sounds like a very Italian way of growing up. Your family all living in the adjacent apartments.

• 12:41Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 12:42Sam Fragoso?

  And the first image that that came to my mind when I read about this was like the young kid, the young Henry Hill in Goodfellas, where he's like looking through the blinds across the street.

• 12:55Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 12:56Sam Fragoso?

  And I was like, this is, this feels like.

• 12:58Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 12:58Sam Fragoso?

  I'm not saying that you have mob ties, but I did wonder as a kid, when you'd open the blind, when you walk around the house, when you'd be in your uncle's apartment next door, what did you see? What did you take in?

• 13:11Speaker 01

  Yeah. You want to hear the first image that came to mind?

• 13:14Sam Fragoso?

  Yes.

• 13:16Speaker 01

  The first image that came to mind was, I was in elementary school and it was summer and the street I lived on, like you said, it was across the street from a funeral home, which, you know, I can, that's a whole hour of unpacking what that, like, you know, whatever Freudian thing that unpacks, but.

• 13:35Sam Fragoso?

  And you've unpacked it in therapy.

• 13:36Speaker 01

  I have, yeah. And then my elementary school was like down the street. And I remember this kid, I forgot his name now, but this kid I knew, he was like a great old and he was like walking by and I was just sort of, I think bored and wasn't hanging out with anyone in my apartment. And I remember the first image that came to my head was me like calling out his name. And then he was, he was on the street and I was like three levels up in my window. And I just kept calling, I kept calling his name and then he would look and then I would hide. And then, and I did that, I did that back and forth a few times. And eventually he like kind of rode his bike up close to my house and then he saw me. And he's like, what's up? And I was like, oh yeah, I was calling, I was calling you. And he's like, okay. You know, I didn't know him that well. And he's like, all right,

• 14:18Speaker 01

  bye. Anyway, that's the first image. It's, it's, it's, you know, mundane, but that, that's the first image that I had. But yeah, that sort of thing of looking out the window. Yeah, I still do that. When I talk on the phone, I look out the window.

• 14:30Sam Fragoso?

  Oh, yeah. I mean, I'm a big pacer.

• 14:32Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 14:32Sam Fragoso?

  On the phone. Around the house, what were your, what were your folks like? Your dad worked at a gas station?

• 14:39Speaker 01

  He did when he was younger, when he moved to America, Connecticut.

• 14:47Speaker 01

  His name is Orville.

• 14:48Sam Fragoso?

  From the Caribbean?

• 14:49Speaker 01

  Yeah, from St. Vincent.

• 14:50Sam Fragoso?

  And your parents were high school sweethearts?

• 14:53Speaker 01

  Sure.

• 14:55Sam Fragoso?

  Sorry, they started dating at high school?

• 14:57Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 14:59Speaker 01

  Yeah, there's a, there's a story where the, I don't know if it's true or not, but when, when they were young, he went to fill up gas at the gas station that he worked at, and he was a teenager, he was a teenager. His, his, his father worked there as well. And he, I think it was their first time they, their first date or whatever, and he left the thing in the gas tank and caught, caught fire. That was their apparent, allegedly, this is an alleged story. My, a lot, a lot of the stories from my past are unclear and vague, so, you know, I can't, I don't know how much that, how much water that holds.

• 15:36Sam Fragoso?

  Was that sort of symbolic of something?

• 15:38Speaker 01

  I don't know, that was before me, I have no idea, it could have been, it could, it could have been. Oh, God. Yeah. But, yeah, we, my immediate family lived in one apartment.

• 15:52Speaker 01

  I had an uncle that lived next door, my mom's godparents, my mom's aunt and uncle, my grandparents, my great grandmother, and another uncle in the sixth, in the sixth unit. Now, and, you know, Greenwich, it was, this was in an area in Greenwich called Chickahominy. And I, whenever, you know, there's a stipulation, I think, with growing up in Connecticut, or if you say you're from Greenwich, that you're automatically like a rich person.

• 16:17Sam Fragoso?

  Yes.

• 16:17Speaker 01

  And, you know, I, for years, and I probably still do, have a chip on my shoulder about, about that. I'm not saying I grew up in, you know, East New York, but I, by, by no means was it, was it affluence.

• 16:31Sam Fragoso?

  So what did you want back then? Did, did you have like any clear aims?

• 16:36Speaker 01

  I, I had different periods, I would say, I was like sports. I'd say my junior year was a pothead year. You know what I mean? I still played sports, but I, there was a lot of riding around.

• 16:46Sam Fragoso?

  That's right around the time that that should happen.

• 16:48Speaker 01

  Yeah, riding around in like an old, you know.

• 16:50Sam Fragoso?

  Yeah.

• 16:51Speaker 01

  Pontiac Grand Am or something like that.

• 16:54Sam Fragoso?

  Your version of American Graffiti, days and confused.

• 16:55Speaker 01

  Just exactly, sitting in, sitting in the back of baking, baking in the backs of cars.

• 16:59Sam Fragoso?

  Yeah.

• 17:00Speaker 01

  Um, but that was when the, you know, that was when the weed was, um, you can smoke a whole blunt.

• 17:04Sam Fragoso?

  Well, also it wasn't very serious then.

• 17:06Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 17:06Sam Fragoso?

  It now it got, it got too crazy.

• 17:08Speaker 01

  No, it's insane. I can't.

• 17:09Sam Fragoso?

  I don't know what happened.

• 17:10Speaker 01

  That's, that's.

• 17:11Sam Fragoso?

  It used to be fun.

• 17:12Speaker 01

  Yeah, I miss, I miss that.

• 17:13Sam Fragoso?

  I know.

• 17:14Speaker 01

  I miss that weed.

• 17:15Sam Fragoso?

  It was terrible.

• 17:15Speaker 01

  It was bad, but you can.

• 17:16Sam Fragoso?

  It was perfect.

• 17:17Speaker 01

  It was, it wasn't too much.

• 17:18Sam Fragoso?

  It was just enough.

• 17:19Speaker 01

  You know what I mean? It was just enough.

• 17:20Sam Fragoso?

  I wanna know, like, be- because I wanna make that distinction of where you came of age.

• 17:25Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 17:27Sam Fragoso?

  Which was like working, you know, pretty working class.

• 17:29Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 17:30Sam Fragoso?

  When you got that pair of, uh, white Air Force Ones, would you ever use white out?

• 17:38Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 17:39Sam Fragoso?

  To make them look like they weren't scuffed up?

• 17:40Speaker 01

  Yep. I definitely did that. Did, did you pull that or did you, did you just pick Air Force Ones out of, out of the air? Have I, I don't think I've ever mentioned Air Force Ones before.

• 17:50Sam Fragoso?

  You mentioned it once.

• 17:51Speaker 01

  Yeah. Yeah. I was, I was, I did that. And then like, I remember I got sneakers that, um, these like air, I remember I got these Nike Air Max sneakers that were like burlap. They were like aqua blue and burlap.

• 18:03Sam Fragoso?

  Mm-hmm.

• 18:03Speaker 01

  And I loved them and I never wore them, just cause I liked them so much.

• 18:07Sam Fragoso?

  In fear of fucking them up.

• 18:08Speaker 01

  In fear of fucking them up.

• 18:09Sam Fragoso?

  Hmm. You, like, you have this great quote, you said, movies, Hollywood, whatever you wanna call it, it had nothing to do with me and I had nothing to do with it.

• 18:17Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 18:18Sam Fragoso?

  I grew up only an hour and change away from New York, but it might as well have been two hundred miles.

• 18:24Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 18:24Sam Fragoso?

  So when did you start to have something to do with it?

• 18:27Speaker 01

  Yeah. I, uh, I, I loved movies growing up. That's about it. I worked at a video store for a long time, which is, you know, now obsolete, but, so I watched a lot of movies and I loved it. Um, but the idea of becoming an actor was not, um, it just wasn't anywhere in my brain or didn't feel like it was in my wheelhouse until. Strangely, community college, which was Norwalk Community College, which was the next town over. It was like Greenwich and then Stanford and then Norwalk was like another town over. And it was my second year in community college. Still, I had a bunch of jobs at home. I worked at the video store, wine store. I would do some landscaping work on the side. And, or I was interested in psychology. That was like the one thing I was sort of maybe leaning towards.

• 19:10Speaker 01

  Or, or landscape architecture. I had no idea, but it was still all prerequisites. And I, I switched up my classes, one on a whim and started taking a, and took a theater class. And then eventually did a, you know, a scene on stage. And then that's, it's something kind of clicked there for me.

• 19:29Sam Fragoso?

  I think the idea of you being 18 and interested in psychology and being this kind of like observing.

• 19:35Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 19:35Sam Fragoso?

  Taking it, take it all in kid. If you were to like write a page of a description of your mother and your father, what would it read like from that time?

• 19:47Speaker 01

  You know,

• 19:50Speaker 01

  there's this thing, it's funny how you mentioned before, Henry Hill, looking through, you know. I, I think I would, and, you know, not to like make myself sound like Cable Guy. But, you know, there is this blurred thing of, I think because of my love for movies and this sort of, and, you know, movies maybe as an escape sometimes. And this like blurred reality, you know, of like some old Scorsese movie and, and my own. But, um,

• 20:27Speaker 01

  that's a, what would that first page look like? It's a great question.

• 20:33Speaker 01

  Let me, let me sort of answer and give you something else. I'm, I've, years ago, not that I think I'm ever going to write a book, but it was under the recommendation of my analyst to, you know, try, try to. And, um, at least from, uh, on my dad's side, you know, I have this idea, I have this idea of, of relating three generations of men.

• 21:06Sam Fragoso?

  Hmm.

• 21:07Speaker 01

  Me, call it autofiction. It's it's nowhere near finished, so I I would hate to even label it yet.

• 21:14Sam Fragoso?

  Yeah.

• 21:14Speaker 01

  But for now, let's just say some sort of autofiction.

• 21:17Sam Fragoso?

  Sort of like Three Tall Women, but for men.

• 21:19Speaker 01

  Maybe, and yeah, yeah, and well, the the, you know, I'm

• 21:26Speaker 01

  you you sort of copy people you like, right? And there's, have you ever read W G Sebald? The Rings of Saturn?

• 21:33Sam Fragoso?

  Hmm.

• 21:34Speaker 01

  Uh, that's one of my favorite books. And that book, uh, it's it's autofiction. He's sort of going along, he's going on a walk along the coast of England. And um, he's like in hospital, the character, him, whatever. He's in hospital going along a walk on the coast of England, referencing like a port or something. And he goes off on a tangent, you know, by things he's observing. So um, he'll he'll he'll see this certain port and he goes off on a tangent on like the Chinese silk trade thing. And it kind of all comes back around to this walk and walk some, you know what I mean? It goes off, so I'm.

• 22:10Sam Fragoso?

  You'd want to do something like that.

• 22:11Speaker 01

  Something like that. But this sort of idea of these three generations of men and relating them to like bird migration.

• 22:16Sam Fragoso?

  Hmm.

• 22:17Speaker 01

  And this idea of like St. Vincent in the Caribbean, Connecticut, um, and Florida.

• 22:23Sam Fragoso?

  I guess my last thing on them, just because I want to have a sense of like the kid that goes to Norwalk, then moves to New York in two thousand and six. Do you remember having a conversation with your mother or your father saying like, this is what I'm doing? I'm I'm I'm taking the train. I've saved up enough money and I'm going.

• 22:41Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah, I had that conversation, but you know, they separately, um, you know, because at that time, they were separate.

• 22:52Sam Fragoso?

  They had divorced.

• 22:53Speaker 01

  Yeah. Yeah, I mean officially paperwork wise, but yeah, yeah, but yes, by like nineteen, nineteen or something like that.

• 23:02Sam Fragoso?

  And did it make sense to you why they divorced?

• 23:05Speaker 01

  Uh, yes.

• 23:09Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah.

• 23:11Speaker 01

  This is more common than than than the opposite. But they were both separately supportive in the sense. Well, just that, I mean, they were both separately supportive and I was sort of allowed to do what I wanted to do.

• 23:28Speaker 01

  Throughout high school and, you know, I just sort of, I sort of made my own, made my own way. So they were supportive.

• 23:34Sam Fragoso?

  When you decide to go and take that class, can you walk me through that day?

• 23:39Speaker 01

  The one in community college?

• 23:40Sam Fragoso?

  Yeah.

• 23:41Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 23:41Sam Fragoso?

  Can you tell that story?

• 23:42Speaker 01

  Oh, this may be conflating a couple of days, a couple of these classes, but here's my memory of it is the class took place in a, in, there was an actual theater in the, in the community college. And I was a little bit late and I walked into the back and then there was, there's, I remember there's a group of students doing some theater exercise in the class. I think it was something like becoming a tree or something like this. And I remember being in the, I remember being, I'm pointing towards the back of our theater now. I remember being in the back of the theater, seeing this on stage and, you know, and at that, at that time, you know, I was wearing like

• 24:23Speaker 01

  this, I'll go back to that, but, you know, I wore like fitteds and like chains and like I was, I did not look like an artist or a theater kid by, by any means. And I remember-

• 24:34Sam Fragoso?

  Spree Well jersey?

• 24:35Speaker 01

  Probably, yeah. I still have-

• 24:38Sam Fragoso?

  He was amazing.

• 24:38Speaker 01

  But they were like all pretending to be a tree on stage or something like that. And immediately I was like, I remember looking at it from afar. I was like, this is not good. I was like, I shouldn't, I shouldn't do this. But, you know, not to make it cinematic, but I was like, no, go, you know? And then just walk down the aisle and get on stage.

• 24:57Sam Fragoso?

  Cause the door closes behind you.

• 24:58Speaker 01

  Literally. Yeah, yeah. It's like-

• 25:00Sam Fragoso?

  And you can remember that door closing?

• 25:01Speaker 01

  That one of those, I don't know, metal things that make that specific sound. It closes. I don't even know if they heard it. Somebody might have glanced around. And I really was second guessing even doing this because I was like, I immediately, I was like, I don't want to do that. I was like, I don't-

• 25:15Sam Fragoso?

  The trees bit?

• 25:16Speaker 01

  I don't, I was like, this isn't me. I'm not, it's just not me. But I did. And I went, I went up and I, and I just did it.

• 25:24Sam Fragoso?

  Why do you think you kept walking towards this stage?

• 25:30Speaker 01

  Well, I think that I've always had a thing where I want to find out. I'd rather find out than not. And, you know, for better or for worse in life, you know what I mean? But I'd rather find out what the hell is going on. And I think that was a case of that. And that was the case for a lot of decisions.

• 25:55Sam Fragoso?

  Yeah.

• 25:56Speaker 01

  I want to know. I want to know yes or no for myself.

• 26:00Sam Fragoso?

  Well, why don't we talk about what you discovered on the other side?

• 26:04Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 26:04Sam Fragoso?

  That's coming up next with Christopher Abbott. Summer's getting closer, which means I've started thinking about time away. A trip, a long weekend, some time to breathe a little bit. The thing is, I do love planning travel. I just don't love the quiet anxiety of trying to calculate what it's going to cost me before I even leave. The amount of times I pick up my phone in the middle of the day, only to lose 20 minutes doom scrolling on an app. I don't even want to know the numbers on that. But the numbers I do want to know, the data that actually helps keep the wheels turning. Well, those come from Monarch. It's a personal finance app that brings everything together. Accounts, investments, savings goals and spending. So you can actually see your full financial picture in one place. What I like most about it is the clarity.

• 26:48Sam Fragoso?

  Monarch shows me where my money is actually going, not where I assume it's going. They even create cash flow visualizations to make it easy to understand spending patterns, plan ahead, and make smarter decisions without the guesswork. It shifts the feeling from vague, nebulous financial stress, which is personally what I feel, to something much more useful, a plan. Instead of wondering if I'm on track, I know that I am. And that makes planning, whether it's a summer trip or something bigger down the line, feel a lot less overwhelming. One of my favorite features is bill split. You just scan a receipt. Everyone claims what they ordered, settles up at the end. No awkward math when dinner's done. No tip coordination. It's a small thing, but it makes the end of the hang a whole lot easier and less uncomfortable.

• 27:32Sam Fragoso?

  So if you'd like to give it a try, use code TALKEASY at monarch.com to get your first year half off at just $50. That's 50% off your first year at monarch.com with code TALKEASY.

• 27:45Sam Fragoso?

  Coming back.

• 27:45Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 27:46Sam Fragoso?

  I want to talk about the two decades that you spent living and working in New York.

• 27:52Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 27:52Sam Fragoso?

  Because you moved here in 2006.

• 27:54Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 27:54Sam Fragoso?

  You were 20 years old.

• 27:56Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 27:56Sam Fragoso?

  Do you remember how much money you had in your checking account when you moved here?

• 28:01Speaker 01

  I remember I was doing pretty well. I would float, I would float around $3,000. For like, that was sort of my working, $3,000 was my working life amount of money for years.

• 28:16Sam Fragoso?

  You could live within that.

• 28:17Speaker 01

  I figured out how to live within that. Yeah.

• 28:19Sam Fragoso?

  I remember when I first moved to Los Angeles, I was 21. And by the grace of my friend Harrison and his father, David.

• 28:27Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 28:27Sam Fragoso?

  David Cameron, not the prime minister, different David. They let me stay at their house for very cheap.

• 28:33Speaker 01

  Right.

• 28:33Sam Fragoso?

  But I had this, I had this like, very vivid memory of a time where anytime I was asked to go to dinner.

• 28:40Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 28:41Sam Fragoso?

  I would go, okay, how much is in my checking account? And I know I'm gonna have to split the bill. And I don't want to be the person that goes, well, I actually only had a water and a side salad.

• 28:54Speaker 01

  Of course not.

• 28:54Sam Fragoso?

  And three fries and one cheese stick.

• 28:55Speaker 01

  I would.

• 28:56Sam Fragoso?

  So my, I would rather die.

• 28:58Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 28:58Sam Fragoso?

  Than be that person. But I remember I'd have to go to the bathroom just to check the checking, just to be like, okay, I can do this 200.

• 29:07Speaker 01

  I relate to that.

• 29:08Sam Fragoso?

  And it was so, in retrospect, like, uh, you know, so fortunate in so many ways. I had so many privileges.

• 29:18Speaker 01

  Would you have the pride to not, to still split it?

• 29:21Sam Fragoso?

  I would split it.

• 29:22Speaker 01

  Yeah, exactly.

• 29:23Sam Fragoso?

  I couldn't.

• 29:23Speaker 01

  Because you didn't want to look, that's, that's the thing about, you know, not having money. Or I think, you know, when you grew up and you don't have much money or whatever.

• 29:31Sam Fragoso?

  I would have rather got hit by a car outside.

• 29:33Speaker 01

  Yeah, you want to look, you don't, you don't ever.

• 29:35Sam Fragoso?

  Than to be at that table and go, I can't split $135.

• 29:38Speaker 01

  100% and you would do, and, and the annoying thing is, you didn't, you purposely didn't eat.

• 29:44Speaker 01

  So that you didn't, just in case.

• 29:45Sam Fragoso?

  I was planning my in and out order after.

• 29:47Speaker 01

  No, somebody else, somebody else had to be like, Sam, Chris, no, no, Sam, you just, you just had a drink. You don't, get out of here. Like, give me next time. You're like, okay. But then no one says anything. What a nightmare. No, you know, and you just put your card down and you sweat.

• 30:02Sam Fragoso?

  Sweat, yeah. So those years, like, cause there's five or six years between you landing on girls. Those are pretty lean years, I imagine, for you.

• 30:12Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah.

• 30:13Sam Fragoso?

  Did you have any moment where you thought, I gotta, I gotta go and do this landscaping business back in Connecticut? Like, this is not, this is not working out.

• 30:23Speaker 01

  Well, the thing is, like, okay, so I saved enough money that I didn't have to get a job right away when I, you know, I think I saved, like, from, cause of those three jobs and living at home, I wasn't, I didn't have any overhead for that year and a half in community college. So I think I came to the city with like, probably like nine, 10,000, you know, $10,000. And I was like, and, and I just right away started just going to school and just taking as many classes as I could. Now, I went to HB because it was cheap, you know what I mean? But it was also turned out to be a good school for me also, but it was also very affordable classes. That's why I went there.

• 30:58Speaker 01

  And then, you know, thank God for like a certain level of naivete about how this business works and, cause I just, I mean, it was all hustle. Really, like, I can, I can safely say that for myself.

• 31:11Sam Fragoso?

  And what did that look like?

• 31:12Speaker 01

  It looked like, like, I would go to a bunch of these EPA auditions, which were like basically cattle for theater, like cattle call auditions where you would, I would go and you would sign up as a non-equity member to maybe get seen after all the equity members. So I would get there early at like 7:00 AM and maybe get seen by 5:00 PM by like the casting director or maybe like a casting director's assistant. And I would just go to a bunch of those. I would.

• 31:43Speaker 01

  I would turn up on like, I would see movies filming in the street in in New York. And, you know, I didn't know how it worked then. So I would go to what I know now is a P A. And say like, hey, is there any way I can be in this movie? Or whatever. And they're like, trying to direct traffic or whatever. They're like, what? And I'm like, I'm like, or can I talk to someone maybe? And they're like, I'm, you know, they take their ear. They're like, I, you know, and they're like, no, they're like, just move, like move, you know? But I would just, you know, I would show up to auditions that I wasn't asked to be at. Cause I would heard about, I heard about it from a friend. I haven't like, kind of an embarrassing one where I turn, I remember turning up to an audition. I didn't, I wasn't, I didn't have an agent or anything. No one sent me there.

• 32:28Speaker 01

  I would, um, but some, a friend told me about it. I said to the, uh, to the girl sitting there, I said, can I have, I lost my sides. Can I have them? But I knew like, there was a part for my age range or whatever. And then, so I was sitting there, room full of actors. The elevator opened up to the waiting room immediately. I was sitting there and then I was looking at the sides, just trying to like, learn them. And, and the, the girl I remember called me out and she was like, hey, I'm sorry. Who, who are you with, um, again? And I was like, what's up? And she was like, who, she's, I, I just, you, you wrote your name down, but who? I guess your manager, agent or whatever. And so, and there, and all, you know, this obviously turns the heads of every, felt like 20 other actors in the room. So I walked up to her just to keep the conversation kind of tight. And I was like, what's up?

• 33:14Speaker 01

  And she was like, she's like, did you said, did, I don't know what, who's your representative? I was like, no, I was like, no, she didn't do it. I was just saying vague things and she's like, what? And I was like, she, I was like, what, why, what do you need? She's like, who, she's like, who made your appointment for you to come here? I was like, um, I don't have, you know, I, and she, she was like, I'm sorry, you can't audition. And that, I remember that elevator, like, can the elevator member opened up to the waiting room? It took forever. And I just had like my shoulder bag. And I just remember like the eyes of 20 actors just be like, oh, this sad sack. You know what I mean? Just trying to like sneak in whatever. But that's, it was a lot of shit like that. A lot, a lot of just, you know, just going, just trying.

• 33:57Sam Fragoso?

  So how the hell did you hold on?

• 33:59Speaker 01

  Well, I think like, you know, I think the naivete helped, you know, and this sort of belief. I like, you know, you have to, you have to have some ego and belief that you're really good. And I think I did, you know, I had, I had a lot of some, or at least some amount of pride in myself. And I thought I was a really good actor. And so I was just like, it'll happen eventually. It's sort of blind, blind belief.

• 34:26Sam Fragoso?

  You know, in that time, when you're starting to do something like this, when you're trying to become an artist, I have like this distinct memory of like the little wins.

• 34:36Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 34:37Sam Fragoso?

  That no one talks about, like, they kind of keep you going, like what you don't get paid for, like, like a normal job. A small compliment, a small person you respect going, you're on the right track of something. Was there anyone early on that we can like credit now?

• 34:54Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 34:55Sam Fragoso?

  Who was like, okay, I see some, I see something going on here.

• 34:58Speaker 01

  Yeah, it was teachers that I had, like Austin Pendleton.

• 35:04Speaker 01

  Anne Jackson was a teacher, you know, Anne Jackson was, has passed away now. She was married to Eli Wallach.

• 35:09Sam Fragoso?

  Oh, okay.

• 35:10Speaker 01

  For a long time, she was a teacher there. She, um, here's, here's a quick funny story. This back and, you know, my friends, you know, um, and also, and I'll, I just to quickly add to that before I tell the story. It's like friends in school too, you know, like, like Mona Fastfold, who's a, who's a one of my oldest friends, who's now, you know, doing a director and making great movies. And I worked with her on her movies, you know, she was one of my first friends in New York and I met her at that school.

• 35:38Sam Fragoso?

  Testament of Ann Lee. You introduced her to Brady, right?

• 35:42Speaker 01

  Yeah, I mean, not like with the intention of being a romantic relationship, but yes.

• 35:47Sam Fragoso?

  I think you get the credit.

• 35:48Speaker 01

  I do get, I do get, yeah, I'm the godfather.

• 35:50Sam Fragoso?

  Really?

• 35:51Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 35:51Sam Fragoso?

  She should cast you in a part where you're not.

• 35:54Speaker 01

  As a not abusive husband?

• 35:55Sam Fragoso?

  Yeah.

• 35:56Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah, I'm waiting for that too.

• 35:57Sam Fragoso?

  Okay.

• 35:58Speaker 01

  I, that's, I've played abusive husbands in different time periods in all of her movies.

• 36:02Sam Fragoso?

  Howard, this is how you're thanking him?

• 36:03Speaker 01

  In different accents, yeah, yeah.

• 36:04Sam Fragoso?

  After all you've done introducing you to this life?

• 36:07Speaker 01

  It's coming, the next one.

• 36:08Sam Fragoso?

  Okay.

• 36:08Speaker 01

  Yeah, I think I paid my dues.

• 36:10Sam Fragoso?

  Okay, we'll keep this in the tape for sure.

• 36:11Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah.

• 36:11Sam Fragoso?

  We'll send it to her.

• 36:13Speaker 01

  But I remember doing, I was working on a scene, I was thinking I was working on the seagull in that class with Anne Jackson. And she was a great teacher and very, and very sharp and.

• 36:26Speaker 01

  You know, can be very cutting. She was getting older at this time, right? And little senile.

• 36:33Sam Fragoso?

  Yeah.

• 36:34Speaker 01

  I didn't know that yet. So I do this scene of the seagull and she says,

• 36:41Speaker 01

  she's like, that was the best that I've ever seen that done. And I wept, coming from her, because like, I never heard her say anything like that and whatever. And she went on and like my friends, Mona, Michael, my friend Michael congratulated me like my, they were like crying too, like the fact that you get this sort of praise from this teacher, this like hard, but really good teacher.

• 37:06Speaker 01

  And that's why I said what I said before, because about a week or two later, in the class, I was watching someone do a monologue, some Shakespearean monologue. I forgot what it was, but it, there was a line in the monologue, come stand upon this mole hill here. And it was terrible, in my opinion, and most people's opinion.

• 37:23Sam Fragoso?

  And what was the actor's name again?

• 37:25Speaker 01

  I don't, I genuinely do not remember. And then, and you know, we were, we were dicks at the time too. So we're basically stifling laughter in the back of the class. And then he sits down to get his notes, which I couldn't wait for. And then I remember Anne Jackson going, that was the best that I've ever seen that done. And I was like, no, I was like, fuck. I was like, God. And my friend Michael, like, we talk about it all the time because he couldn't stop laughing. Because, you know, I was like, damn it, she's lost it.

• 37:55Sam Fragoso?

  That's amazing.

• 37:56Speaker 01

  Yeah, but I adored, I adored her as a teacher and Austin, but yeah, yeah.

• 38:00Sam Fragoso?

  Good God, that's amazing.

• 38:01Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 38:02Sam Fragoso?

  You know, so much was written about, um, once you get on Girls and then you leave Girls after two seasons. I know you have like some distance from it now.

• 38:12Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 38:13Sam Fragoso?

  And especially in this moment where Lena, and I think the show is kind of having this like amazing reappraisal. Why did you feel like you needed to go?

• 38:25Speaker 01

  This is, this is what I was talking about, the thing that they're gonna pull, they'll pull some fucking line out of. Look, it's not, it's not even that dramatic. I'm, I'm only tired of talking about it because it's so long ago.

• 38:36Sam Fragoso?

  I didn't mean like, what, was there a kind of work or a kind of part or a kind of work that you wanted to make?

• 38:43Speaker 01

  Well, not like, not in particular. It was just, you know, like, um, my, my, I've talked about this, you know.

• 38:54Speaker 01

  My, my personality is like, I get bored very easily. And like, that was, that was, it had nothing, I think, I think Lena was a great writer and

• 39:04Sam Fragoso?

  And she is.

• 39:05Speaker 01

  And the show, and it still is, and the show, and the show was great. Just from my own personal thing, that was my fir-, that was the first time I had ever gone back to anything.

• 39:13Sam Fragoso?

  Right.

• 39:14Speaker 01

  Like, I never done, you know, um, multiple seasons of anything. You know, I would always do a move, I'd done like some indies and a play, and then you do, you do it and you're done. And that's it. So I just, it's, it's my own, it was really, it's my own sort of maybe impatience.

• 39:30Sam Fragoso?

  Fear of commitment, yeah.

• 39:31Speaker 01

  Yeah, a little bit fear of commitment, like signing, you know, I don't like signing on to long-term things. I'm like, I don't, I don't know what I, you know, I don't know what I want to eat tonight. How, how the fuck am I, I don't know if I, this is what I want to do next year, or whatever, you know? Or, and then that goes for anything. So, I mean, it wasn't like, it wasn't that dramatic. It was just, uh, yeah, it was just really, I want to, I always want to do different things.

• 39:56Sam Fragoso?

  Would it have been easier for you to do six seasons of the show than to spend the last decade being asked constantly?

• 40:02Speaker 01

  I think so. Yeah, it would have, it would have been, because it, it totally, I mean, because that sort of backfired. You know what I mean? I'm like, I, I want to go like hide, I don't want to, you know, and all, and all of a sudden that, it became like a, at the time, it became like a news thing. And it wasn't, you know, there was all these articles written about, about, you know, what it had. Like, I remember one, it was like I stormed off set, and like, that was never, never true. That's not the case at all. It was, it was really just a lot of back and forth at the time, and just coming to the agreement that, like, that's good.

• 40:32Sam Fragoso?

  At the time, you said, um, the world that Lena wrote was very real, especially in New York, but it wasn't as relatable to me on a personal level.

• 40:41Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 40:41Sam Fragoso?

  It's not that I only like to play characters that I know to a T.

• 40:44Speaker 01

  Yeah, it's, it's.

• 40:45Sam Fragoso?

  But there's something satisfying about playing parts where you really relate to the characters.

• 40:49Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 40:49Sam Fragoso?

  And I'm thinking, after Girls, you go do that Lucy Thurber play.

• 40:53Speaker 01

  Yeah. Uh. First of all, that quote, it's a terrible, like, of, of, I'm saying of myself.

• 40:58Sam Fragoso?

  Okay.

• 40:59Speaker 01

  It's not, it's not a very clear, you know, I sort, I sort of, I think I was dancing around, you know, I don't, I don't even know what the fuck I'm talking about.

• 41:05Sam Fragoso?

  Okay.

• 41:06Speaker 01

  I don't even know, I don't even know what that means right now.

• 41:08Sam Fragoso?

  I didn't really know either.

• 41:09Speaker 01

  Looking back at myself. I was, I think I was just talking around, I was talking around basically just saying like, I, there's, it's, I, I don't, I just want to do something else.

• 41:19Sam Fragoso?

  Yeah.

• 41:19Speaker 01

  Like, that's all, like, that's all. You know, it wasn't, it wasn't. Big deal. Fucking leave me alone.

• 41:27Sam Fragoso?

  That'll be the full quote.

• 41:28Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah, exactly.

• 41:29Sam Fragoso?

  We can leave it at that. I, I, I do think, though, that you said early, you know, in high school, you didn't have like a big grand plan or anything. But I always think of your work kind of being molded in the spirit of a Cassavetes, Peter Falk, Gino Rollins, like, that's the aspiration.

• 41:45Speaker 01

  Very much.

• 41:46Sam Fragoso?

  Is that the kind of work you wanted to make?

• 41:49Speaker 01

  Yeah, very much. I mean, and still, and still has always been and still is. I mean, you know, we, you can only control what you can control, you know, and I have to, again, wait for a certain opportunity to then exhibit this,

• 42:05Speaker 01

  call it, style, or, you know, or really give myself over. Because, you know, there's a lot of good actors, right? And there's a lot of actors that have a lot of skills. And, you know, you have, you have, and technique, and that's great. Then, from after that, what makes one unique is what I think, I think is what one's own life experience, or, or, you know, idiosyncr- idiosyncrasies that you can bring to something.

• 42:35Speaker 01

  And I feel that, that Cassavetes world, all, all I saw was, you know, behavior in a way that felt unique and real, and I hadn't seen anything like that before. And, you know, for me, more than just being a good or in something, or like doing a good performance, what means something to me is somebody saying like, I never seen that before.

• 43:02Sam Fragoso?

  Yeah.

• 43:02Speaker 01

  I never seen, you know, I thought that was something that only existed in my memory or my life. You know, like, something odd, or, you know, I, those are the things, those are the things I strive for, if, if there's an opportunity to do it.

• 43:20Sam Fragoso?

  Before we go to another break, I want to do a segment called the fact check.

• 43:24Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 43:25Sam Fragoso?

  Especially in the age of misinformation, disinformation, bullshit.

• 43:29Speaker 01

  Sure.

• 43:29Sam Fragoso?

  We like to try to get things right.

• 43:31Speaker 01

  I like it.

• 43:31Sam Fragoso?

  I hope you feel like we've gotten things right so far.

• 43:33Speaker 01

  Very much.

• 43:35Sam Fragoso?

  One of the first films you were in was a project called Hello, I Must Be Going.

• 43:39Speaker 01

  Uh huh.

• 43:40Sam Fragoso?

  Which was actually shot in Westport, Connecticut.

• 43:42Speaker 01

  That's right.

• 43:43Sam Fragoso?

  About thirty, forty-five minutes from where you grew up.

• 43:45Speaker 01

  Yep. Todd and the Wiseau.

• 43:47Sam Fragoso?

  When the film screened at the Westport Town Hall.

• 43:51Speaker 01

  Uh huh.

• 43:52Sam Fragoso?

  Your father wrote this.

• 43:56Sam Fragoso?

  Have you read it?

• 44:00Speaker 01

  I never read this before.

• 44:02Sam Fragoso?

  Can you read that for people?

• 44:03Speaker 01

  Yeah, it says, my son, has my name in quotes. I don't know if that's.

• 44:07Sam Fragoso?

  Yeah.

• 44:08Speaker 01

  My son Christopher Rabbit plays the young man in that film, also a CT native, born and raised in Greenwich slash Stanford. I will probably attend in support. Orville Abbott, February tenth, two thousand thirteen, that's, which is coincidentally my birthday.

• 44:26Speaker 01

  I don't, I have no idea. Oh, and this, yeah. I will probably attend the support, but I don't even remember that screening. I don't, I don't think I was there.

• 44:37Sam Fragoso?

  I know, I don't think you were.

• 44:38Speaker 01

  No. But quite a quote, isn't it?

• 44:42Sam Fragoso?

  When I read that, I, um.

• 44:49Speaker 01

  I love, it's, it's just a funny, it's just a very funny thing to have written down because, you know, whenever you see, whenever you see quotes written down, they're, you know, usually, uh,

• 45:01Speaker 01

  you know, have some, like, some poetry or like, you know.

• 45:06Sam Fragoso?

  I, I think.

• 45:06Speaker 01

  Seeing something printed out that is as, uh, sort of matter of fact and banal as that is very funny to me.

• 45:12Sam Fragoso?

  Okay, but can I say?

• 45:14Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 45:14Sam Fragoso?

  The reason I bring it up. And I do, I don't mean. I laughed and I also thought it was really fucked up.

• 45:22Speaker 01

  The word probably?

• 45:23Sam Fragoso?

  Yes.

• 45:23Speaker 01

  That's, of course, that's the funniest thing in there, of course. My friend Gerard would also say, you know Gerard, right? He would, he would love, I want to call him and read him this. He'll, he would crack up. We should do that during this thing. I will probably.

• 45:38Sam Fragoso?

  We can call him if you want to call him.

• 45:39Speaker 01

  We can.

• 45:39Sam Fragoso?

  I will probably attend in support. It's funny and dark and I'm sure he was proud, but it seems like you guys had some shit.

• 45:50Speaker 01

  Well.

• 45:52Sam Fragoso?

  I don't want to project anything. I'm just, you know.

• 45:54Speaker 01

  Yeah, I mean, I'm, I'm, you know. It's not that I'm afraid to get into any of this. It's just that, you know, I'm always, I'm always hesitant to like air out.

• 46:12Speaker 01

  Cause it's, it's very, it's nuanced. It's very, it's very, it's very nuanced and it's not like, it's not, there's nothing that's all bad or all good. I mean, it's, it's very nuanced. It's not, there's, there's love there and, and there's a lot of mystery and, and, you know, part of the reason why I want to write what I'm, my therapist told me to write because there, there's a lot of, uh, there's a lot of story and history there that going, going back generations, you know?

• 46:41Sam Fragoso?

  You know, I, I'm excited to read it when you do write that.

• 46:43Speaker 01

  And it'll, it's gonna, if, if I, it's gonna take like 40 years.

• 46:47Sam Fragoso?

  Okay.

• 46:47Speaker 01

  So hopefully, hopefully I make it.

• 46:48Sam Fragoso?

  Okay. Speaking of Gerard Carmichael.

• 46:50Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 46:51Sam Fragoso?

  You're starting two films with him, On the Count of Three and Poor Things.

• 46:55Speaker 01

  Right.

• 46:55Sam Fragoso?

  Gerard said in Interview Magazine that you're a good mimic. How would you mimic Gerard Carmichael?

• 47:03Speaker 01

  It's, when it requires some amount of blackface or something like that. He would appreciate that.

• 47:09Sam Fragoso?

  It's like a Z way question.

• 47:10Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah, exactly. I'm really good at mimicking a very weird group of like indie musicians and like what they sound like.

• 47:21Sam Fragoso?

  Now's the time.

• 47:22Speaker 01

  I was doing, I do this backstage sometimes. When, when you're put on the spot, it's hard to do impressions.

• 47:26Sam Fragoso?

  Come back around to it.

• 47:27Speaker 01

  Well, I'm gonna come back around. I'm gonna go practice in the bathroom, then I'll come back.

• 47:30Sam Fragoso?

  Okay, let me take a break. You can do that.

• 47:31Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah.

• 47:31Sam Fragoso?

  And do your Julian Casablanca or whatever else you want to do.

• 47:38Sam Fragoso?

  In 2014, I need my phone for this.

• 47:41Speaker 01

  Here you go.

• 47:43Sam Fragoso?

  Oh, it's right here. Right. In 2014, you performed in Sam Shepard's Fool for Love.

• 47:48Speaker 01

  At Williamstown.

• 47:49Sam Fragoso?

  At the Williamstown Theater Festival, which is making a comeback because of our pal Jeremy O'Harris and a bunch of other people who are working hard.

• 47:57Sam Fragoso?

  You're the, uh, your co-star of the play, Sam Rockwell.

• 48:00Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 48:01Sam Fragoso?

  Had a question for you.

• 48:02Speaker 01

  Ooh.

• 48:03Sam Fragoso?

  And it may be the most important one yet. So here.

• 48:05Speaker 01

  Oh, my God.

• 48:06Sam Fragoso?

  Is what he sent me this morning.

• 48:07Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 48:08Sam Fragoso?

  Okay. This is from Sam.

• 48:09Speaker 01

  Hey, man. See, that's, I can, I can mimic, so.

• 48:11Sam Fragoso?

  That's exactly it.

• 48:12Speaker 01

  Yeah. Yeah.

• 48:15Speaker 03

  My question to him is, what did we drink during our production of Fool for Love in Williamstown? What was the drink of choice?

• 48:25Speaker 01

  Was it, uh, did he give the answer?

• 48:26Sam Fragoso?

  No, he, he needed you to do it.

• 48:28Speaker 01

  I think it was tequila.

• 48:29Sam Fragoso?

  That makes sense.

• 48:30Speaker 01

  It made sense for the, for that play. And I think, yeah, let's get it. I think it was tequila.

• 48:35Sam Fragoso?

  He does do a hey, man.

• 48:36Speaker 01

  Yeah, that's, that's, that's my, that's my word in, as a Sam Rockwell. Hey, man. I'm nasally, I can't do it.

• 48:42Sam Fragoso?

  No, it's, it's dead on the money.

• 48:44Speaker 01

  It's not so much a mimic as much as getting into the, you know, the core of somebody.

• 48:49Sam Fragoso?

  In 2023, you starred opposite Aubrey Plaza in Danny in the Deep Lucy.

• 48:55Sam Fragoso?

  I was told and, and saw that you broke your leg.

• 48:59Speaker 01

  I tore my meniscus.

• 49:00Sam Fragoso?

  Okay. How did that happen?

• 49:03Speaker 01

  I got up off the floor.

• 49:05Sam Fragoso?

  Okay.

• 49:05Speaker 01

  In a weird way. It's funny. Like, I, I do a lot of sports. I still work out. I still do all those kinds of things. And of course, I tear it. I, I was on my knees on the ground and I went to stand up and something happened and I felt it. And that's what, that it's, yeah, it's not, it's not, it was dramatic, but it wasn't, it didn't happen in dramatic fashion.

• 49:25Sam Fragoso?

  But you kept performing before you had the surgery and then after you had the surgery.

• 49:30Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 49:31Sam Fragoso?

  Why?

• 49:32Speaker 01

  You know, old school theater shit. The show must go on. It really worked for the play. It became like another version. And talk about like going back to like being, like getting bored easily. It's like all of a sudden, like I wasn't bored of doing that play yet, but like all of a sudden it became a new thing. And I was like, this isn't, this is kind of interesting. Yeah.

• 49:52Sam Fragoso?

  Previews of Death of a Salesman began March 6th.

• 49:55Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 49:55Sam Fragoso?

  The play opened April 9th and has been going strong here at the Winter Garden.

• 50:00Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 50:01Sam Fragoso?

  Through the entirety of the NBA playoffs. Given the overlap in start times, the games are usually 7:38, your plays start around 7. Do you watch Knicks games on your phone during the flashback scenes between Biff and Hap? Or just during intermission?

• 50:19Speaker 01

  I'll give you, I'll give you what's been, what normally happens when the game's on while I'm doing the show, which is often.

• 50:24Sam Fragoso?

  Okay.

• 50:25Speaker 01

  It depends on the start time. So if a show's at 7, again, it'll, it's, it's never, it's not ideal if the show and the game start exactly at the same time. I'll, I'll say that because by the time I have my intermission, they're at halftime. That's been the case. But I'm usually, I'll, I'll watch as much as I can watch before the show starts. I do, I do my first bit downstairs. Matt, who is one of, one of our sound guys, he's got his whole setup over there, his sound setup, and he also has a TV.

• 50:57Sam Fragoso?

  Amazing.

• 50:57Speaker 01

  So I go down there and I watch whatever I can watch before I come up and for that first flashback. And then do the, do the next scene. That's the first act. And then I have a pretty good break. Intermission into the second act where that's where I will watch the chunk of what I can watch.

• 51:13Sam Fragoso?

  And have you ever almost missed your cue to come back because you were watching the game?

• 51:22Speaker 01

  No, not, I wouldn't, I wouldn't say like, I mean, I'm definitely watching to the last, I'm like, I know when, because you know, my dressing room's pretty far up there. So I gotta, I gotta come down some stairs. I would, I would, no, I'm, but.

• 51:35Sam Fragoso?

  You're a professional.

• 51:36Speaker 01

  Put it, I'll say I've rushed.

• 51:37Sam Fragoso?

  Okay.

• 51:38Speaker 01

  I've rushed down before.

• 51:40Sam Fragoso?

  Your partner, Aubrey Plaza, was really good at basketball before she had an injury. Her sister was also good. I think she still plays.

• 51:48Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 51:49Sam Fragoso?

  I've been told no matter the gender of the child, that you two are debating between a few different names. Jalen Brunson, John Starks, or Landry Shamet.

• 52:01Speaker 01

  How did you know, how do you know?

• 52:04Speaker 01

  It's hard. We're trying to, I'm trying to figure it out.

• 52:07Sam Fragoso?

  Deuce?

• 52:08Speaker 01

  That's sick. I love that. That would be sick.

• 52:13Sam Fragoso?

  Deuce Abbott or is it Deuce Plaza or is it Deuce Abbott Plaza?

• 52:17Speaker 01

  We're figuring, we're.

• 52:18Sam Fragoso?

  I think honestly, the kid should have neither name.

• 52:20Speaker 01

  We're figuring.

• 52:21Sam Fragoso?

  Let them have their own.

• 52:21Speaker 01

  We're figuring all this out. I'm, I'm, I'm very big on syllables.

• 52:28Sam Fragoso?

  Yeah.

• 52:29Speaker 01

  So I just need it. I'm, what's important to me is that it, there's a nice cadence. Landry?

• 52:36Sam Fragoso?

  I don't think, I mean.

• 52:37Speaker 01

  That's the problem. It's hard.

• 52:38Sam Fragoso?

  We want your kid to succeed. I don't think Landry is gonna work.

• 52:42Speaker 01

  I know.

• 52:43Sam Fragoso?

  Night to night, before we take our break, I'm thinking about the people who've played this part before.

• 52:50Sam Fragoso?

  Funny enough, Sam Rockwell in 1985 auditioned.

• 52:53Speaker 01

  Yeah, this, this was his, the monologue was, he would tell, he talks about that.

• 52:57Sam Fragoso?

  Yeah, from, from the Malkovich version, version. Are you channeling an actor or more Jalen Brunson night to night?

• 53:04Speaker 01

  Well, I don't, I wouldn't say I'm channeling anyone, but as far as inspiration goes.

• 53:09Sam Fragoso?

  Yeah, yeah. Like, what's the reservoir?

• 53:11Speaker 01

  I'm not gonna lie, the reservoir is like, there is a certain energy I get when the Knicks are playing. And, and, but I've, I've, I relate doing theater to sports a lot also. It's not like, I know, I know I use the, um, the live band analogy, but it, it does feel like a sport, you know? So I, I do definitely draw inspiration from the Knicks.

• 53:33Sam Fragoso?

  We're gonna take one last break. Coming up next, Chris Rabbit. I've been trying to be a little smarter about traveling this summer. Not exactly traveling less, just thinking more carefully about how to make it all work. Because once the summer starts, it feels like everything happens at once and all of a sudden it's Labor Day. Weddings, family visits, long weekends, work trips, and somehow every flight is way more expensive than you thought it was going to be. So I started thinking a little bit differently this time when I'm away from home. Instead of just locking the door and leaving it, what if my vacant place could actually help cover part of the trip? That's why listing my space on Airbnb makes a whole lot of sense. If you're already planning to be out of town, it could be a simple way to earn some extra income while giving someone else a spot to stay.

• 54:18Sam Fragoso?

  It's one of those ideas that feels so obvious that once you do it. You start to think, why didn't I do it before? Why not let your home work for you while you're already away? And during the summer, when travel picks up, just about everywhere, this may be the perfect time to try it. If you've ever considered hosting, let this be your sign. Your home might be worth more than you think. Find out how much at airbnb.com/host.

• 54:45Sam Fragoso?

  MUBI is a global film company bringing great cinema to the world and to you. Everything at MUBI is handpicked with an emphasis on visionary filmmakers and movies worth discovering. One new movie is called Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma, from writer-director Jane Seanbrin, who made the film I Saw the TV Glow. The film stars Hannah Einbinder and Gillian Anderson. It follows a young director tasked with resurrecting Camp Miasma, a once-beloved slasher franchise that, after years of sequels, has fallen out of favor. Looking for inspiration, she visits the reclusive actress who starred in the original film. But what begins at an attempt to revive the franchise soon pulls the two women into a blood-soaked world of desire, fear, and delirium.

• 55:29Sam Fragoso?

  It's a world-expanding, genre-bending movie for one of the most distinctive filmmakers working today. Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma is now streaming exclusively on MUBI. You can try MUBI free for 30 days at mubi.com/talkeasy. That's M U B I dot com slash talkeasy for a whole month of great cinema for free.

• 55:52Sam Fragoso?

  I think a lot of us are going to spend the next few weeks looking for gifts online. And while I like finding something thoughtful for the people in my life, the process can get a little ridiculous. You've got a dozen tabs open, you're comparing prices, and you're trying to remember which store had that one thing you saw that has a deal, and you flagged it, and you saved it, and now you can't find it. Anyway, that's what I like about Shop. Shop brings all kinds of stores together in one place, so you can search for what you're looking for across different brands while discovering new ones along the way, plus tracking all your orders without jumping in between websites. And just in time for the holidays, they're celebrating the all-new shop.com with a pretty extraordinary giveaway.

• 56:34Sam Fragoso?

  1,000 shoppers will win $1,000 in Shop Cash. That's $1 million in total, which you can put towards gifts for other people or maybe something you've had an eye on for yourself. You don't have to buy anything to enter the giveaway. Enter to win the $1 million Shop Cash giveaway from now until November 1st. Just go to shop.com. There are so many ways to win and that's shop.com. Shopping designed around you. No purchase necessary. Restrictions apply. Official rules available at shop.com.

• 57:10Sam Fragoso?

  Before we wind our way back to Salesman.

• 57:12Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 57:12Sam Fragoso?

  I want to talk about a couple of movies that I think are just like fantastic that I don't think enough people saw. One of them is James White, where you play this titular character whose father just died, his mother has cancer. And in creating a performance, he said once, "My aim is not to mimic other movies or other performances, but to draw from something in real life." I want to know, in thinking about the stage and the screen and both, how, how do you do what you do?

• 57:42Speaker 01

  Yeah. Well, I think that with James White, but also with this, like my approach is sort of, you know, it doesn't really differentiate too much between film and TV. I mean, there's technical things, but, but, you know, you, you do, you do the work. You do the, you know, whether that's baseline, technical stuff of like, know, just know your lines. That's kind of the easy stuff, you know? That's like the schoolwork kind of stuff. Know your lines, you know? You can think about character, think of, you know? Do whatever research you need to do. Do all that kind of stuff and then eventually throw it away. As the goal and be present and show up. Now, that's sort of my general approach to everything.

• 58:24Speaker 01

  With James White specifically, it's kind of like an amalgamation of that baseline of approach, approach to work, approach to what the work is. And like, you know, in terms of bringing some, you know, you always try to, you have character and then you have yourself and then hope ideally you meet somewhere in the middle in that gray zone. And that gray zone is where you live and play. Now, that movie, Josh Mon, who directed it, it's, you know, not completely, but somewhat autobiographical movie. And he was a friend, is a friend, and I spent a lot of time with him.

• 59:01Sam Fragoso?

  Yeah.

• 59:01Speaker 01

  And so. Character, just spending time with him, some, there's a lot of character that creeped in for that part. That was him.

• 59:09Sam Fragoso?

  Yeah.

• 59:09Speaker 01

  And, you know, going back to what you're saying about little mimicry, there was a little bit. You know what I mean? And even in like, you know, like little, I remember like little improv moments in that, in that movie. Like, do you remember in that movie when like he's asking the, the assistant to charge his phone?

• 59:27Sam Fragoso?

  Yes.

• 59:28Speaker 04

  Uh, he wanted to know if you have the copy test?

• 59:31Speaker 05

  No, but I can, can I just maybe email that to him later?

• 59:34Speaker 04

  Yeah, absolutely.

• 59:35Speaker 05

  Can you do me a favor, actually? Can you just give this to me? I'm not, he doesn't have to read it all, but it's just to get him started.

• 59:41Speaker 04

  Sure.

• 59:42Speaker 05

  Just a couple of things. Can you do me one more favor, actually? Can you, um, can you just charge my phone? My phone died, maybe I'll just grab it when, uh, when I'm leaving. Is that cool?

• 59:51Speaker 04

  I can plug it in.

• 59:52Speaker 05

  I really appreciate it.

• 59:53Speaker 04

  I'll be out in a few.

• 59:54Speaker 05

  Maggie, right?

• 59:55Speaker 04

  Yes.

• 59:55Speaker 05

  Thank you.

• 59:58Speaker 01

  I remember Justin didn't want that because he was like, no, it's stupid. I was like, but you do this all the time. This thing where he's like showing up and he's late and he's like, because it's for whatever reason, this phone was never charged. And he's always charging it at places. And that's such a specific character trait. And I was like, we need to have this because it's like, it tells more than anything that you can write. It's behavior, it's behavioral stuff that you, that really paints a picture of character. You know?

• 1:00:22Sam Fragoso?

  For a film like Black Bear or On the Count of Three, whichever one you want to talk about. What, what, what did you bring to those two?

• 1:00:33Speaker 01

  Well, um, different things. I mean, like, well, On the Count of Three was special for me too. A, because, you know, Gerard, who, um, directed it also and was in it with me is a very good friend. And what makes that movie work and the dynamic work between those two is that their chemistry. And we had to, you know, and for me and Gerard to sort of naturally bring in some of our own chemistry into that. And, uh, whether that was through some improv around the script or around the scenes or just, uh, how there's a rapport there. You know, like that's, that's a little bit, you know, there's little moments where life meets art sometimes. And you can, I like when those things overlap.

• 1:01:15Sam Fragoso?

  You know, the bottle episode of Girls, Panic in Central Park.

• 1:01:18Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:01:19Sam Fragoso?

  It just celebrated, I'm told, its 10 year anniversary. And The Atlantic recently included it in its list of, quote, "eight perfect episodes of TV." So, you know, congratulations.

• 1:01:32Speaker 01

  Thank you very much. Thanks, Atlantic.

• 1:01:35Sam Fragoso?

  It is such a haunting. I rewatched it last night. It really is a lot. And even the title, Panic at Central Park, is in reference to the film Panic in Needle Park.

• 1:01:49Speaker 01

  Right.

• 1:01:51Sam Fragoso?

  Which starred Al Pacino in like 1971.

• 1:01:53Speaker 01

  Right.

• 1:01:54Sam Fragoso?

  And, and we talked about this earlier, but like you kind of reaching back and holding on to this idea of a kind of movie, of a kind of actor, of a kind of work that is very 70s American cinema. And I wonder like how you grapple with the fact that the movies that we probably both love.

• 1:02:16Speaker 01

  Mm hmm.

• 1:02:18Sam Fragoso?

  And the careers that I think we both admire and you have done your damnedest to do a modern version of.

• 1:02:25Speaker 01

  Don't exist anymore?

• 1:02:27Sam Fragoso?

  Yes.

• 1:02:27Speaker 01

  Is that really where you were going?

• 1:02:29Sam Fragoso?

  Yes.

• 1:02:30Speaker 01

  Yeah. Yeah, it kind of sucks. But you just got to do your damnedest, you know, to, to try.

• 1:02:37Sam Fragoso?

  How do you grapple with that?

• 1:02:38Speaker 01

  Well, I mean, I don't know. I mean, life is short and you're, you're, I'm, you know, I'm, it's not anything I can complain about. It's like I, I don't think that big picture, you know, on a day to day.

• 1:02:54Sam Fragoso?

  Right.

• 1:02:54Speaker 01

  Level. Like, um, you know, whether I'm too existential or whatever, but I'm like, we all, we're all on borrowed time here. And like, make, make out of it what you can make, you know? So to, to, I don't, I don't feel, I don't feel like that emotional about like, oh, there's no parts that for me like I want. Like, I'm not, like, I wouldn't complain about that.

• 1:03:16Sam Fragoso?

  I think I don't really care about the whiny, pouting, like, woe is me version.

• 1:03:20Speaker 01

  Right.

• 1:03:20Sam Fragoso?

  I think the thing I want you to talk about, or I would like to talk about is like. The kind of work you have made in and the count of three. Black Bear, James White, they are examples of a thing that were, that was a lot more common in the seventies.

• 1:03:36Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:03:36Sam Fragoso?

  And like, what is that work that you want to keep making? And why does it matter?

• 1:03:41Speaker 01

  Yeah, okay. Yeah, I mean.

• 1:03:43Sam Fragoso?

  No, no one needs to hear two of us whining.

• 1:03:45Speaker 01

  Exactly. I'm not, I don't, I don't want it to sound like I'm, I'm whining about, yeah.

• 1:03:49Sam Fragoso?

  I mean, look at where we are here.

• 1:03:50Speaker 01

  Oh, exactly. Who cares? I know, we're at the theater I'm doing a Broadway play at.

• 1:03:55Speaker 01

  I think for me, I need to have, other than working, right? I'm, I'm, sometimes I'm just trying to work and, and make a life. But the, if, if there is some broader artistic goal, it is to get as close

• 1:04:13Speaker 01

  to the precipice of feeling like I'm doing something beyond just good acting or a good performance. And.

• 1:04:24Sam Fragoso?

  What, what do you mean?

• 1:04:25Speaker 01

  For me personally, what that feels like and looks like is once in a while, you can kind of, it doesn't even have to be a whole performance. It can be a moment in something that like, you know, it, you, it's, it's, it's, you're using your skills as an actor, you know? And I, I preface this by saying, I make fun of acting all the time and actors and, you know? So it, I don't want, I'm really, I'm trying to avoid to sound self-indulgent, but I'm, I have, I do have to at least say for myself is I do the work. I really do. I make fun of it on the outside, but I really do, do, I do the work. I do.

• 1:05:06Sam Fragoso?

  And why, why, why do you make fun of it?

• 1:05:09Speaker 01

  It can be so, often it can be so silly. You know what I mean? And.

• 1:05:14Sam Fragoso?

  It's entirely silly.

• 1:05:15Speaker 01

  I mean, because.

• 1:05:16Sam Fragoso?

  I mean, right? I mean, to, to give your life to try to make something, to play someone.

• 1:05:22Speaker 01

  Well, because there's a lot of, there's a lot of bad out there. There's a lot of bad actors. There's a lot of bad movies. There's a lot of bad TV shows. There's bad plays. There's bad everything, right? So it's like, even calling myself an actor, you know? I, I have to remind myself of the ones that I love and that are really doing the work, work as opposed to so and so that is an actor that, you know, that.

• 1:05:50Speaker 01

  I don't know, at least my opinion, so and so is not really an artist or whatever. You know.

• 1:05:54Sam Fragoso?

  Do you want me to name some names for you?

• 1:05:56Speaker 01

  You do that. Yeah, obviously, I'm not gonna do that.

• 1:05:58Sam Fragoso?

  We'll blank it out?

• 1:05:58Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah. Yeah, the audience can sort of pick, you know, choose your own adventure of who that is. Anyway, but just kind of circle this thing back. It's like, once in a while, like, all I want is, my artistic, quote unquote artistic goals is to find, if you can get it in a whole performance, fine, but like, moments in performances that are beyond what's in the script and beyond, something that only Chris, me, can bring to something. What makes me unique, you know, as a human being? Like, if I can find moments where I can bring that to something, a moment, a scene, or whatever, that is ultimately the goal.

• 1:06:42Speaker 01

  And ultimately, my goal, and I think most actors' goal, is to be some sort of reflection for the audience. Whatever the audience is. And if that reflection isn't true, if they don't buy it, then you're not doing your job in some way, you know? And my job is to try to reflect something back to them that, like I said before, ideally, maybe they haven't seen it before in a movie, or maybe they've only seen this in real life. And it becomes, even if it just becomes a memory for them, you know? Of like, a lasting memory, that's, I think that's, I will have done my job in some way.

• 1:07:27Speaker 01

  And then ultimately, who gives a shit?

• 1:07:30Sam Fragoso?

  I knew you were gonna wander my back.

• 1:07:31Speaker 01

  Yeah, and who cares about anything?

• 1:07:33Sam Fragoso?

  Yeah.

• 1:07:33Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:07:34Sam Fragoso?

  But isn't that like, the who cares? The act of caring?

• 1:07:39Speaker 01

  Exactly.

• 1:07:40Sam Fragoso?

  It's like, the buy-in is the thing.

• 1:07:42Speaker 01

  Right. And that's what's actually moving. That's what's moving. That's what's moving to me, you know? Like, even doing this play, you know what I mean? You have, you know, all adults on stage, you know? Actors have been doing this for a long time, and they're all buying into this made-up story.

• 1:08:04Speaker 01

  That's beautiful.

• 1:08:07Speaker 01

  Adults playing pretend and really believing in it. The notion of that is absolutely beautiful to me. Because it's playtime, it's children. That is the most beautiful thing to me. I mean, the beauty in doing this play with these actors on stage that I admire very much is more than, I think they're all fantastic and great actors and doing great performances. But what's moving to me, being on the inside of it, is watching these other fully grown adults that have lives for a few hours a night pretend to play a character.

• 1:08:46Sam Fragoso?

  Yeah.

• 1:08:47Speaker 01

  As if they were a child. You know, and I will forever find that gorgeous, the act of doing. And all the jobs I've done, whether it's movies or theater, I never remember a good performance. You know, I'm really talking about plays now. I don't, you know, when I think back of all the plays that I've done, done a lot of plays, I never think back and go, I remember that performance, that was great. I remember when mistakes are made on stage, I remember backstage, I remember the time spent with people. And ultimately, that also translates to doing films and TV too, whatever. The only thing I can really take home, other than money, is the memories of the time spent.

• 1:09:31Speaker 01

  You know, do the work, do your best to be good in said thing, be there and do the job. But the only memories I have are, you know, usually the times between doing the work. And that's ultimately what I take home.

• 1:09:46Sam Fragoso?

  The last time you did the work onstage, it was in that play we talked about, Danny in the Deep Blue Sea.

• 1:09:52Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:09:53Sam Fragoso?

  By John Patrick Shanley. It was opposite Aubrey Plaza. And you said, quote, "This could be my swan song in terms of the angry young man thing."

• 1:10:03Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah.

• 1:10:04Sam Fragoso?

  But bringing us back to salesmen, is Biff your swan song and all of that?

• 1:10:10Speaker 01

  To Angry Young Men.

• 1:10:11Sam Fragoso?

  Is this the end of the road for the kind of angry young guy that you kind of perfected?

• 1:10:17Speaker 01

  Is this my version of Daniel Day-Lewis saying, "This is his last movie, and I just keep doing Angry Young Men until I'm 48 years old"?

• 1:10:25Sam Fragoso?

  You did reference Charlie Rose earlier.

• 1:10:26Speaker 01

  Yeah, maybe.

• 1:10:29Speaker 01

  Not quite. I mean, I don't, I don't think Biff is a stereotypical angry young man. I mean, he's, he's, he's not really mad at the world. You know, there, obviously, there's a lot of scenes of me and Willy Loman that we're, we're at odds and we're fighting. But it's only moving if it comes from a place of love. You know, and he loves his father so much that it drives him to these sort of dramatic angry heights. You know what I mean? So I wouldn't classify it as angry young man, but you're not, you're not, you're not wrong in that observation.

• 1:11:06Sam Fragoso?

  He, he, he's a little upset from time to time.

• 1:11:08Speaker 01

  He definitely gets mad.

• 1:11:09Sam Fragoso?

  Okay, what's the scene that you most look forward to doing every night?

• 1:11:15Speaker 01

  I don't, you know, you would think it would be like the climactic end, but it's, I don't particularly look forward to doing that.

• 1:11:22Sam Fragoso?

  The contemptuous, begging for.

• 1:11:23Speaker 01

  Somebody asked me, do you enjoy doing this play? You know, are you enjoying yourself? I was like, no, I was like, I can't. I was like, what does that mean? I don't know what, like, I don't even know what enjoy, I know what enjoy means, but like, I don't know if I've ever done that.

• 1:11:39Sam Fragoso?

  Enjoy something?

• 1:11:40Speaker 01

  Yeah, I mean, I, I enjoy food.

• 1:11:43Sam Fragoso?

  Enjoy the Knicks?

• 1:11:45Speaker 01

  Enjoy, I guess I just don't like the word enjoy.

• 1:11:47Sam Fragoso?

  Okay.

• 1:11:48Speaker 01

  I don't like that word.

• 1:11:49Sam Fragoso?

  So, so let's get rid of enjoy. How about the one that?

• 1:11:52Speaker 01

  I said it, you didn't even bring it up.

• 1:11:54Sam Fragoso?

  Yeah, I know, exactly, but I was taking the bullet for you. This is the part in the episode that they're gonna hear and see something.

• 1:12:00Speaker 01

  Okay, so for me, for me in this play, the thing I look forward to, the scene, section I look forward to doing the most is probably,

• 1:12:11Speaker 01

  it's in, before the end of the first act, it's when I come downstairs, Lori, Lori's downstairs. Nathan has just left. That whole section.

• 1:12:24Sam Fragoso?

  Literally right here.

• 1:12:25Speaker 01

  Yeah, right here. And then that whole, that whole section of when, when Lori's talking to us, you know, it's like the attention must be paid scene. Through Willy coming back into the house. That whole section is probably my favorite because it's the most.

• 1:12:43Speaker 01

  It has, it has, for me, it has the most curves in it, in the whole play. I mean, like, the end is great, but the end kind of has like a very steady build to it. This, this section to me has the most like ups and downs and arounds. Like, if, if we, if we do the feet on stage, the, the thing that happens in the audience is my favorite. Cause it's laugh, laugh, laugh, and then, and like that, that's my favorite section moment.

• 1:13:12Sam Fragoso?

  Well, this is a clip from Death of a Salesman, starring Christopher Abbott, Laurie Metcalf, and Nathan Lee.

• 1:13:16Speaker 06

  Everybody likes a kidder, but nobody lends them money.

• 1:13:20Speaker 02

  I'll get some myself, Biff. I'm sure I can.

• 1:13:22Speaker 06

  I see great things for you kids. I think your troubles are over, but remember, start big and you'll end big. Ask for 15. How much you could ask for?

• 1:13:32Speaker 02

  Gee, I don't know.

• 1:13:32Speaker 06

  And don't say gee. Gee is a boy's word. A man walking in for $15,000 does not say gee.

• 1:13:40Speaker 02

  All right, 10, I think, would be top, though.

• 1:13:42Speaker 06

  Oh, don't be so modest. You always started too low. Walk in with a big laugh. Don't look worried. Start off with a couple of your good stories to lighten things up. It's not what you say, it's how you say it, because personality always wins the day. Oliver always thought the highest of him. Will you let me talk?

• 1:14:02Speaker 02

  Come on, don't, don't yell at her, Pop, will you?

• 1:14:04Speaker 06

  I was talking, wasn't I?

• 1:14:05Speaker 02

  I just don't like you yelling at her all the time. I'm just telling you, that's all.

• 1:14:08Speaker 06

  What are you, taking over this house? Really? Don't take his side all the time, goddammit!

• 1:14:18Sam Fragoso?

  My last question. I keep thinking about the like night to night experience of you doing this, eight shows a week. I love that someone asked you, like, are you enjoying it? Something that would take, and everyone here that worked on this show, I, I met a bunch of them today. It's like a family, and, and like any family, it's a pain in the ass, and it's hard, and you give yourself, and you do it.

• 1:14:41Speaker 01

  Right.

• 1:14:41Sam Fragoso?

  And I, I want to ask you, not just how you do it, and, and, and why. But before I do that, I just want to read this quote. The writer E.L. Doctorow, someone once asked him, how do you get to the end of a novel? How do you know where you're going? And I have this quote, I thought maybe you'd want to read it. Here it is.

• 1:15:05Speaker 01

  Should I read it out loud?

• 1:15:06Sam Fragoso?

  Yeah.

• 1:15:07Speaker 01

  Okay. So you said, the question to him was, how do you get to the end of a novel?

• 1:15:11Sam Fragoso?

  Yeah, like, how do you know where the hell you're going? How do you finish?

• 1:15:14Speaker 01

  And he said, "It's not a terribly rational way to work. I have found one explanation that seems to satisfy people. I tell them it's like driving a car at night. You never see further than your headlights, but you can make the whole trip that way."

• 1:15:30Sam Fragoso?

  I mean,

• 1:15:30Speaker 01

  I mean, yeah.

• 1:15:31Sam Fragoso?

  Biff eight times a week on this stage,

• 1:15:34Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:15:34Sam Fragoso?

  scene to scene in the dead of night, seeing as far as the headlights can take you.

• 1:15:39Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:15:40Sam Fragoso?

  Moment to moment, is that how you do this?

• 1:15:43Speaker 01

  You have to. Yeah, you have to. I mean, first, you know, I'm not, this isn't my own quote, but like, you know, you, you, you do every show once. You know, it's not like, it doesn't, they don't, there's no, they don't lay over. You know, you do every show once. And for me, you know, you get, you, you do all this work and then you get to the point that ideally, when you start the play, you, you say your first line and then you go and you let it take you. And you let the play, the play is, has been done many times and is a classic for a reason. Because if you, if you let it take you, it'll take you there. And as long as you commit to it, it'll take you there.

• 1:16:27Speaker 01

  The more you work on it, the less work you have to do.

• 1:16:30Sam Fragoso?

  This June, would you rather the Knicks win a championship or you win a Tony?

• 1:16:36Speaker 01

  I'd rather the Knicks win a championship. I was already nominated for a Tony. That's, that's, that's enough. That's, of course I want to win a Tony. Of course I want to win a Tony. You know, like, like, I'm not, you say you're not in this for, like, you know, I'm not in this for awards. And that's what every actor says. And that's true. But once it's flirted with, you're like, well, now, you know what I mean? Because it's funny, because you can have a, you can sort of wear a shield of like, if you don't get recognized for stuff, I'm like, well, people don't understand me. You know what I mean? Like, they don't, and then once you get a little recognized and you're like, okay, I guess they do. So then you're like, how do you, you know, what's your next?

• 1:17:20Sam Fragoso?

  Do you understand me? Do you like it?

• 1:17:21Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah. What's your next shield after that? You know?

• 1:17:25Speaker 01

  But no, but I, in that if toss up, I'll take the Knicks.

• 1:17:30Sam Fragoso?

  I'm rooting for both.

• 1:17:31Speaker 01

  I appreciate that.

• 1:17:32Sam Fragoso?

  You have a performance to do at seven o'clock and I just want to say thank you for having us here in this space. It's like.

• 1:17:40Speaker 01

  Sam, thanks for being my first official podcast.

• 1:17:42Sam Fragoso?

  This is the first one?

• 1:17:43Speaker 01

  It really, first long form I've ever done, yeah.

• 1:17:46Sam Fragoso?

  Do you think your dad's gonna like it tonight?

• 1:17:48Speaker 01

  I hope so. I think so. He's coming with some friends.

• 1:17:54Speaker 01

  We'll see. I don't know if he knows the play.

• 1:17:56Sam Fragoso?

  He's about to.

• 1:17:57Speaker 01

  He's about to find out.

• 1:17:58Sam Fragoso?

  Congratulations.

• 1:17:59Speaker 01

  Thank you, buddy.

• 1:17:59Sam Fragoso?

  Christopher Abbott, thank you.

• 1:18:00Speaker 01

  Appreciate it. Thanks, Sam. Hey.

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