Pod Insights Armchair Expert with Dax Shepard Allison Jones (Award-Winning Casting Director) About this episode Allison Jones (Freaks and Geeks, The Office, Veep) is an Emmy Award-winning casting director. Allison joins the Armchair Expert to discuss growing up an Irish twin in Massachusetts, her first casting job on Family Ties, and how her love of TV prompted her move to California. Allison and Dax talk about the cast of the Golden Girls actually only being in their 50s, how the highlight of her career was meeting Quincy Jones while casting The Fresh Prince of Bel Air, and why jumping a car over another car is less scary than doing standup comedy. Allison explains the number one mistake actors make in auditions, why McLovin is still the most difficult role she’s ever cast, and how she stays hungry and dialed-in after over 41 years on the job.
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Transcript 24,501 words · 7 speakers
Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.
0:00 Dax Shepard? Welcome, welcome, welcome to Armchair Expert, Experts on Expert. I'm Dax Shepard, joined by Lily Padman.
0:06 Speaker 01 Hi.
0:07 Dax Shepard? Per your request, you spearheaded this, and I'm so grateful you did.
0:10 Speaker 01 Yeah.
0:11 Dax Shepard? She was so delightful.
0:13 Speaker 01 Allison Jones.
0:14 Dax Shepard? Allison Jones, she comes up a bunch over the years. Uh, she's helped numerous people in their careers.
0:20 Speaker 01 She's a casting extraordinaire.
0:22 Dax Shepard? Yep, she's an award-winning casting director. Just, you know, a few of her impossibly long resume. Uh, Barbie, Veep, The Office, Freaks and Geeks, Curb Your Enthusiasm, Parks and Rec.
0:35 Speaker 01 She does all Mike's stuff.
0:37 Dax Shepard? Basically, any impossibly great comedic ensemble where you're like, where did they find all these geniuses? It's almost always gonna be Allison Jones.
0:45 Speaker 01 It is, it's, it's, her track record is so insane.
0:48 Dax Shepard? Yeah.
0:49 Speaker 01 And it goes so far back. I didn't realize that. It was fun to learn about like the early.
0:53 Dax Shepard? Golden Girls.
0:53 Speaker 01 Yes.
0:54 Dax Shepard? Yeah, really, really cool. And then just a sweetheart.
0:58 Speaker 01 Love her.
0:59 Dax Shepard? So please enjoy Allison Jones. We get support from Quince.
1:03 Speaker 01 Okay, can we talk about the fact that the holidays are already here? It's crazy. I feel like I blinked and now we're in gifting season, which I'm not really mad about because I do love giving gifts and Quince is making it so easy to find something great for everyone on my list, including myself, because let's be honest, self-gifting is a love language.
1:23 Dax Shepard? Quince is seriously the gift that keeps on giving. Their high-quality staples are made with premium materials like 100% Mongolian cashmere, 14-karat gold, and Italian leather. Full-on luxury quality at prices that won't wreck your holiday budget.
1:39 Speaker 01 It's the dream. The cashmere sweater, starting at $60, down jackets, wool outerwear, cashmere accessories. You and everyone on your list are staying cozy and looking incredible all season long.
1:50 Dax Shepard? Well, I'm gonna tell you this, it just got chilly for the first time this year in California, and I'm so excited, and I'm wearing my Quince cashmere right now.
1:57 Speaker 01 It's great.
1:58 Dax Shepard? Yeah, and I am going to gift this to some of my friends. I hope they're not listening.
2:02 Speaker 01 Quince is also more than clothing. They've got fine jewelry for your significant other, leather bags for your bestie, hotel-quality bedding to set up your guest room. Chef grade cookware, that's an amazing thing they offer here. And it's such a good gift because people don't like buying cookware for themselves, but it's very important. And they also have five star luggage, another good gift that people don't like buying for themselves.
2:24 Dax Shepard? Give the gift of quality this holiday season. Download the Quince app for app exclusive offers or go to quince.com. Get free shipping on your order and 365 day returns. Now available in Canada and the UK too. And when Quince asks where you heard about them, let them know it was Armchair Expert. It's the best way to support the show. This episode is brought to you by McDonald's. The Quarter Pounder with Cheese with Medium Fries and a Drink is now $8.
2:55 Speaker 01 What?
2:56 Dax Shepard? Okay, I need to talk about something that doesn't get enough respect. The Quarter Pounder with Cheese. This is not a casual burger. This is a crafted burger. We're talking 100% fresh beef cooked right when you order it. No artificial flavors, no fillers, no preservatives, just beef doing what beef is supposed to do. And here's a detail I love. There's a cowbell sound in the kitchen. When somebody orders a Quarter Pounder with Cheese, a cowbell goes off and the grill master throws a fresh patty down. That's like having your own entrance music at McDonald's. I want a cowbell for everything in life. The onions are hand topped by someone who just knows the right amount. Two slices of cheese laid out in a star pattern. So every single bite gets cheese and two pickles side by side. So you're never in a pickle desert.
3:40 Dax Shepard? Every bite is accounted for. Someone engineered this thing with love. I love a Quarter Pounder.
3:46 Speaker 01 Me too. That's my order is a Quarter Pounder with Cheese. I love it. I didn't know they put so much effort that they did a star formation. I should have known because you can taste it.
3:58 Dax Shepard? You can taste it. Yeah. The love. Don't tell anyone this, but I'll put two of them back.
4:02 Speaker 01 Yeah, I'm not surprised.
4:04 Dax Shepard? The Quarter Pounder with Cheese with Fries and a Drink now $8 for a limited time only. Only at McDonald's for a limited time only. Prices and participation may vary. Prices may be higher in Hawaii, Alaska, and California and for delivery. Fresh beef not available in Alaska and Hawaii. Offer not valid for delivery.
4:37 Dax Shepard? Many, many people that you would think wouldn't be nervous.
4:40 Speaker 02 Are.
4:41 Dax Shepard? Bill Lawrence, who was just here, he's done a million and a half interviews. Very gregarious guy.
4:45 Speaker 02 Yes.
4:45 Dax Shepard? You would not think he would be nervous.
4:47 Speaker 02 No, I would not. And I'm working with him now.
4:49 Dax Shepard? Are you?
4:50 Speaker 02 First time I met him.
4:50 Dax Shepard? For Bad Monkey?
4:51 Speaker 02 No, for New Steve Carell Show.
4:53 Dax Shepard? Oh, okay.
4:55 Speaker 01 Look at you, already, I'm already in, it's already tasty.
4:58 Dax Shepard? Okay, well, I don't want you to be nervous.
5:01 Speaker 02 Who knew this one was... I did not.
5:03 Dax Shepard? I did.
5:04 Speaker 01 That I was feisty?
5:05 Dax Shepard? Uh huh, yeah. I had the original eye for Monica. I was the casting director for Monica.
5:10 Speaker 02 You were?
5:11 Dax Shepard? Yes.
5:12 Speaker 02 But you first worked for Kristen, or did Dax find you for that?
5:15 Speaker 01 Well, no, sorry, I first worked for them as a nanny. So I worked for both of them originally.
5:19 Speaker 02 Maybe I did know that a while ago.
5:20 Dax Shepard? And she was in our friendship group, but kind of a newer member.
5:24 Speaker 01 Periphery.
5:25 Dax Shepard? Yeah, and I said, "That gal's really smart." Like, she's a very smart, interesting person. Every time I talk to her, we argue, and she's a worthy adversary. Then she started babysitting, and then full-time nanny, then started working with Kristen, then became Kristen's writer, producer, everything.
5:43 Speaker 02 It was before Good Place?
5:45 Dax Shepard? No, because House of Lies...
5:46 Speaker 01 It was before, because House of Lies, as House of Lies was ending, kind of, is when I started taking on more stuff.
5:51 Dax Shepard? Suffice to say, Kristen was entirely dependent on Monica, to a degree you can't imagine.
5:56 Speaker 01 Oops.
5:56 Dax Shepard? And then we started this, and then it was accidentally very successful, and then I had to say, "I'm gonna have to steal her full-time," and she, of course, was generous.
6:05 Speaker 02 But to be like an on-mic person, an on-camera person, I asked him if the audio could be broken today, but the fact that you film this is scary.
6:14 Dax Shepard? Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.
6:17 Speaker 01 The camera stuff is new for all of us, actually, here, but you forget.
6:20 Dax Shepard? Yeah, the first two episodes, we were a little... Bill was one of the early ones. He might have even been the one that kind of broke it, where I was like, "Okay, I'm comfortable here, I like this. I can pretend this is my living room." But Alison, this is a great first question. So you have spent the last, I don't know how many years, since 82...
6:37 Speaker 02 Are we starting?
6:37 Dax Shepard? Oh, yeah, we're always rolling.
6:38 Speaker 01 We call it ABR, always recording.
6:41 Speaker 02 Let me get this coffee, okay. Oh, God. Okay.
6:45 Dax Shepard? Okay, this is wonderful.
6:46 Speaker 02 He's so sweet.
6:47 Dax Shepard? You've spent from 82 to 2024, so that's 42 years of watching humans walk into a room with a ton of anxiety, maybe the peak anxiety they'll have.
6:57 Speaker 02 83, thank you.
6:58 Dax Shepard? 83? Okay, okay.
7:00 Speaker 02 One less year than that.
7:02 Dax Shepard? Wasn't Family Ties 82?
7:03 Speaker 02 But I came in season two.
7:05 Dax Shepard? That makes sense. 41 years.
7:06 Speaker 02 Yeah.
7:07 Dax Shepard? Of watching people come in nervous. And I guess maybe the layperson would assume that would inoculate you to nervousness, like you would somehow. No.
7:17 Speaker 02 The higher up the food chain you go in terms of auditioning, I get as nervous as the actor does. And when it's like a final audition, you'll hear my voice quiver like you hear it quivering now.
7:26 Dax Shepard? Oh, really?
7:27 Speaker 02 Oh, gosh.
7:28 Speaker 01 Just because you care, obviously.
7:30 Speaker 02 Probably. And I want to get the job done, too, and I want them to do a good job.
7:33 Dax Shepard? Yeah, what percentage of that nervousness for you when you've gotten to that last layer of the audition process?
7:38 Speaker 02 Yeah.
7:39 Dax Shepard? Is you rooting for someone that you are championing versus I really want the people that employed me to be very happy with where we've gotten?
7:47 Speaker 02 That's a good question. I would say that we always want to do a good job, but also I really want the people I'm bringing in to do a good job and that we pick the right person.
7:56 Dax Shepard? Yes.
7:57 Speaker 02 My biggest fear is we don't pick the right person. That's a common casting director fear was that they're going to pick the boner in the group or something.
8:04 Dax Shepard? Yeah, yeah, yeah. I have a million questions about exactly that coming later. But I want to start in Massachusetts. I have a hard time saying, but you grew up in a Boston suburb?
8:13 Speaker 02 I did. Needham, Massachusetts.
8:15 Dax Shepard? And what did mom and dad do?
8:16 Speaker 02 Mom was a housewife, which is what women were wont to do back then, and my father was an insurance executive. Very nice childhood, kind of predictable.
8:24 Dax Shepard? A Norman Rockwell painting? Not that. We wouldn't go that far.
8:28 Speaker 01 That's not real for anyone.
8:29 Speaker 02 No, that would have been a few of the neighboring towns like Wellesley, but a lovely town, and my best friends are still my high school friends.
8:35 Dax Shepard? And do you have siblings? Oh, no, I know this. You're the second youngest of six.
8:38 Speaker 02 I am. I have five siblings.
8:39 Dax Shepard? Boys, girls?
8:41 Speaker 02 Three boys, three girls.
8:42 Dax Shepard? How wonderful of your mother to nail it like that, the ratio.
8:45 Speaker 02 She would let us know that.
8:46 Dax Shepard? Was it every other one?
8:47 Speaker 02 No, two boys, two girls, me, and then my younger brother.
8:51 Dax Shepard? Was it just chaos in a very fun way?
8:53 Speaker 02 You're such an optimist. Yes, it was chaos. In a fun way, mostly, yes. When I was growing up in the 60s and 70s, Boston, Mass was filled with huge families, Irish Catholic families, Italian families. Six was very common.
9:07 Dax Shepard? Oh, wow.
9:07 Speaker 02 Yeah. What about you guys? Can I ask you back?
9:10 Dax Shepard? I'm one of three. You're allowed to ask as many questions as you want.
9:12 Speaker 02 Monica?
9:13 Speaker 01 Two, me and my brother. He's eight years younger than me, though, so.
9:16 Dax Shepard? They both have only child syndrome.
9:18 Speaker 01 Yeah, exactly.
9:19 Speaker 02 Two would have been controversial where I grew up. It was like, two, what happened?
9:22 Dax Shepard? She must have some kind of, uh...
9:23 Speaker 02 Yeah, what's going on?
9:25 Speaker 01 And it definitely would have been her.
9:26 Dax Shepard? Yeah, of course. All men are virile.
9:28 Speaker 01 Mom definitely has some sort of issue.
9:29 Speaker 02 Most of my friends from high school came from very large families. And we would have synchronized brothers and sister ages. My younger brother was best friends with my best friend's younger brother.
9:39 Speaker 01 Yeah.
9:40 Speaker 02 We can still talk about antics and all that kind of stuff back from the early days.
9:45 Dax Shepard? What about dating older siblings' friends? Was that ever an issue that popped up?
9:49 Speaker 02 I would have been terrified.
9:50 Dax Shepard? Okay.
9:51 Speaker 01 Me, too.
9:51 Speaker 02 I can't say I may have wanted to.
9:54 Speaker 01 Sure.
9:55 Speaker 02 The more interesting thing was my two older brothers possibly going after the same.
9:59 Dax Shepard? Oh, yeah.
10:00 Speaker 02 Like, high school cheerleader.
10:01 Dax Shepard? Were they Irish twins?
10:02 Speaker 02 They were, in fact. And my younger brother and I, very close in age, 13 months.
10:07 Dax Shepard? Okay. What's the age gap between the oldest and the youngest?
10:10 Speaker 02 The oldest and the youngest would be about 11 years, I think. My mother had three kids, took a little break, and then another three.
10:16 Dax Shepard? It took like a season, maybe?
10:18 Speaker 01 A hiatus.
10:18 Speaker 02 I think so. A hiatus, yeah.
10:21 Dax Shepard? Did you have fantasies about show business as a kid? Or how did this all come to be?
10:26 Speaker 02 No.
10:26 Dax Shepard? How did you end up at Pomona College?
10:28 Speaker 02 Well, I applied to a lot of fancy colleges and didn't get in. I wanted to go to school in California because I would watch shows like The Newlywed Game and The Dating Game and Gidget, which was like, oh, my god, that girl gets to surf after school! I can't believe it. So in the 60s and 70s, everything was happening in California.
10:47 Dax Shepard? Right, it was like big surf culture.
10:49 Speaker 02 Music, serial killing, free love. Everything was happening in California. So I was like, I gotta go.
10:54 Dax Shepard? That's where it's at.
10:54 Speaker 02 And also, in those days, you didn't do the regimented thing of visiting colleges and spending a fortune on SATs and on applications. I just said, I gotta go to California. It's super cool out there. So my parents wouldn't let me.
11:07 Dax Shepard? Okay.
11:08 Speaker 02 So I went to University of New Hampshire for a year and then transferred to Pomona College. Somehow, they magically let me go. I think back on it, it could have been, it probably fit their budget better to wait a year and then I could go to California. But I had never been to California at all.
11:22 Dax Shepard? You just had seen it on TV.
11:23 Speaker 02 Exactly.
11:24 Dax Shepard? Did you love TV?
11:25 Speaker 02 God, yes.
11:26 Dax Shepard? I didn't have access to it unless I was at my dad's every other weekend or whatever, once a month, because we lived kind of out in the sticks. We didn't have a good antenna. I had to go to a friend's house if I wanted to watch Dukes of Hazzard. But when I was at my dad's, my brother and I, all we did from the second we got up until three in the morning.
11:42 Speaker 02 And where was that?
11:43 Dax Shepard? Detroit.
11:44 Speaker 02 Oh, Detroit, okay.
11:44 Dax Shepard? Yeah, yeah, in Atlanta.
11:46 Speaker 01 Yeah, suburbs.
11:46 Speaker 02 I was the early TV generation, for sure.
11:49 Speaker 01 For me, TV, I was obsessed. And now, when it's like screen time, that was not a thing. My parents were like, you can watch as much TV.
11:57 Speaker 02 Oh, no, we were clocked in front of the new color TV, we would have called it. Oh, no, we were TV kids. What else are you gonna do with six
12:04 Speaker 01 Yeah, exactly.
12:05 Speaker 02 ungrateful children and no nannies. In those days, nannies, no, unless you were a Kennedy or something, but no nannies.
12:10 Speaker 01 TV shows were the babysitters. But for me, it was such a fantasy world. Like, I could go in and I could pretend I was in Full House and the whole thing. Did you have that with TV? Like, you were using it as an escape or not really?
12:23 Dax Shepard? It was so new.
12:24 Speaker 02 I don't know, I just loved it. Movies were not cinema the way it is now either. My parents would bring us to movies. My father brought us to every Peter Sellers movie and Walter Matthieu Jack Lemmon movie that came out, to whom I owe my appreciation of that kind of humor. But, I don't know, I never broke it down, but I would say, yes, definitely, and probably still the reason. And also, I love, you know, we would beg to stay up to see Johnny Carson's monologue. Get in the monologue and we see the monologue.
12:48 Dax Shepard? Okay, so when you get to Pomona, is this true that at Pomona, you find kind of a comedy geek culture?
12:55 Speaker 02 They weren't self-aware of being a comedy geek culture. There probably is now. That sort of didn't exist at all. They just happened to be the pure, unadulterated, brilliant, science major, pre-med major, law major geeks who loved Monty Python and who loved Fire Sign Theater. And it was like, what are they talking about? But those are the first people I met that I was really tuned into that comedy. They were beautiful, smart, probably at the time highly unpopular geeks. Now they've come to the fore.
13:28 Dax Shepard? Now they run the world.
13:29 Speaker 02 Now they run the world.
13:30 Dax Shepard? Yeah, remember Revenge of the Nerds was like this preposterous scenario where the nerds would just Feet the jocks and now the world is.
13:37 Speaker 02 And even then, that was like, oh, it was preposterous, but you got to see, you know, Jamie Cromwell laughing.
13:42 Dax Shepard? Yes.
13:43 Speaker 02 You know, and Anthony Edwards. That was the first turning point of making Geeks in the title of anything.
13:49 Dax Shepard? Yeah. So you had a visual arts major there. And what was your goal with that?
13:54 Speaker 02 Didn't really have one. I just liked it. After Pomona, I worked night shift at a newspaper in Glendora for a year.
14:01 Dax Shepard? You're inching your way towards LA.
14:03 Speaker 02 I'm inching my way. Yeah.
14:05 Dax Shepard? For people that don't know, Pomona's like 60 miles out and Glendora is like 35 miles out.
14:09 Speaker 02 And then I went to UCLA Business School, mostly because my father was a businessman and I thought, I think I can get a good salary after I go to business school. I truly was clueless. In those days, we did not put the pressure on ourselves that these poor kids do now.
14:21 Dax Shepard? Right.
14:22 Speaker 02 I don't have a goal now. I mean, I certainly didn't have a goal then.
14:25 Dax Shepard? Yeah. So you leave there. How on earth do you end up at Family Ties as a casting director?
14:31 Speaker 02 Well, I have a very good friend named Lydia Woodward from business school. A little core of us were just so not meant to be in the business world. I think we're all there for the same reason, just to get a job.
14:41 Dax Shepard? Buy some time and get a job.
14:42 Speaker 02 Buy some time and get a job. Yeah. I was living in California at the time and I think I only paid 750 a trimester to go to UCLA Business School as a resident. What a bargain. I got my MBA for two years for like three grand.
14:57 Dax Shepard? Wow, that is incredible. I totally think that's true because even when I graduated in 2000, all in was 3,800 bucks a year.
15:04 Speaker 02 It was amazing. Anyway, so I get out of business school and a friend of mine, Lydia, was going right into film school at AFI. As a producing fellow is what we called it then. And I was working in advertising in New York City at the time. My year right after business school, I went to work on Madison Avenue in New York City for an agency called Doyle Dean Bernbach, which was mentioned in Mad Men quite a bit. That's why I love Mad Men so much. I was the tail end of when Mad Men would have ended, or maybe a few years after.
15:30 Dax Shepard? People were still smoking and drinking all day long?
15:31 Speaker 02 And they had so much makeup and high heels. It was my first time ever spending much time in New York City. I was not cut out for advertising either. But my friend said, Allison, you should come to AFI. It is up your alley. You can get a loan for a low rate. So I did. In the producing section, again, no goals, just said, that'd be fun. I think I'll do it.
15:50 Dax Shepard? Yeah, you're just following the next thing in front of you.
15:52 Speaker 02 And so I went to AFI, loved it. I've never met people like that before in my life. You're ending up with, oh, that person's uncle is somebody famous and that. Anyway.
16:01 Dax Shepard? Yeah.
16:01 Speaker 02 In the student films, I enjoyed the casting part of it. And again, the same friend, Lydia, said, I think you can get a job in casting. I was like, no way. That's a real job.
16:11 Dax Shepard? Your friend is like your guidance counselor.
16:13 Speaker 02 She is my guidance counselor. She's a great friend. She's a very successful writer, producer. But yeah, we hit it off because we both flunked one of our tests together and we were singled out.
16:22 Dax Shepard? It's a bonding.
16:23 Speaker 01 Yeah, that sure is.
16:24 Speaker 02 It was a total bonding thing. Yeah.
16:25 Dax Shepard? It's like friendships forged in war.
16:27 Speaker 02 Yeah, totally.
16:29 Dax Shepard? Do you remember what about the casting process interested you?
16:33 Speaker 02 I just dug it. We were casting a student film. In those days, AFI had sort of a little SAG connection, but not really. We're talking 1982 or 81. You really had to pester people to get anything done in those days. There was no email. As you know, it was just calling people up and getting hung up on that kind of thing. But every time I watched a TV show, like I would see somebody on Marcus Wel BMD and then I'd see her in a Spearmint gum commercial. It's like, oh, she's doing a commercial. How does that work? I didn't know what casting was as a kid, nothing.
17:00 Dax Shepard? That's why I think this episode will be so fascinating because you just are presented with this show. You're very far removed from Hollywood. In the best case scenario, you're just buying into the notion, these are real kids in high school in Beverly Hills, 90210. You're not even considering, oh, that's an actor.
17:13 Speaker 02 No, no, no, no.
17:14 Dax Shepard? The notion that there's a whole rung of this industry that's in charge of scouting, finding and getting those people in.
17:20 Speaker 01 Hugely important, especially for the talent. You don't really realize that until you come here and you're like, oh, wow, casting directors and casting is a huge component of this.
17:30 Dax Shepard? Yeah, the first big gate.
17:33 Speaker 01 Yeah.
17:33 Dax Shepard? That's being cast.
17:34 Speaker 02 You guys appreciate that, but not many other people.
17:36 Dax Shepard? Yeah, right, right.
17:37 Speaker 02 Or even know it.
17:38 Speaker 01 Yeah, they don't know.
17:39 Speaker 02 Yeah. But anyway, I thought the casting process was really cool and creative and required a certain level of discernment and taste and realizing, wow, one actor can completely change a student film versus another actor. I went to Larry Edmonds or something and got a little catalog of casting directors and producers and I started typing my letters to casting directors. And I think I sent out like, you had to put a stamp on the envelope and mail it out. And then I think I got two answers. And one woman hired me, Judith Weiner.
18:11 Dax Shepard? She was the casting director for Family Ties?
18:13 Speaker 02 Yeah, she was. And that was at Sunset Gower. And I remember walking in on the Gower entrance on Sunset Gower and looking to my left and there was the Hollywood sign. So it was like, wow, this is cool.
18:21 Dax Shepard? Yeah.
18:22 Speaker 02 Again, goalless, but just like, this is bitchin'.
18:25 Dax Shepard? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
18:26 Speaker 02 A word I never heard till I moved to California.
18:29 Dax Shepard? Made very popular in Fast Times at Ridgemont High.
18:31 Speaker 02 Yes, exactly.
18:32 Dax Shepard? Okay, so you start working on that show, and I imagine you're doing a lot of the work that's not picking.
18:39 Speaker 02 The first thing you do as a casting assistant, back then, it was answering the phones. And my first office job was with Judith, and we shared an office with the late Tim Flack, who was the casting director. And they were doing the pilot of The Cosby Show.
18:51 Dax Shepard? Wow.
18:52 Speaker 02 And we were working on a show called Benson, all at Sunset Gower, which was an amazing old historic studio to work at, because even today, it looks the same as it did probably in 1925. Literally, inside, if you've ever shot anything at Sunset Gower, looks like you're in the 1920s. The old school payroll windows and stuff. It's really, really cool. And they shot some magnificent old movies there, including The Three Stooges, which was my big comedy influence, growing up as a kid with a bunch of brothers. We hit each other all the time. And it was all because the... Very physical comedy. We were joking and not joking.
19:25 Dax Shepard? Yeah, I think it led to a lot of trips to the emergency room that show. I know my brother and I would try that, like, because you go like this, and the defense was this. But I was five years younger, so those fingers were longer than this, so...
19:36 Speaker 02 Yeah. But that was what we worshipped.
19:38 Dax Shepard? And people are calling, I'm sure, and they're pitching people.
19:40 Speaker 02 They're calling. Those days, I was learning how to put people on hold and say, "Hold, please," and get back to someone. And my boss would say, "Don't keep anybody on hold for more than two seconds." So I'd be going back and forth, "Hold, please, hold, please, hold, please." It was like, oh, my God, there's a big agent on the phone. What do I say to a big agent? So it was a lot of answering phones. It was nowhere near as hectic as it is now.
20:00 Dax Shepard? Oh, it's gotten more hectic.
20:01 Speaker 02 Much more hectic. You have tenfold more agents, managers, representatives calling you all the time. So much so that you can't get your job done. So we've had to pretty much switch to email and texting. But back then, in the early 80s, we were working on a show called Benson. Was doing the pilot for The Cosby Show and we were doing a show called condo and a pilot. So there was a lot of casting sessions to set up and in those days you had called the agent, talked to the agent's assistant, give the time, the place, leave the sides at the Gower Gate for the actors to come pick up. In the days, there was no facts.
20:33 Dax Shepard? Sides are the lines for people who don't know.
20:35 Speaker 02 Oh, yeah, the sides are the lines. I still, I assume they called sides because it's two sides of a playbill or something. I'd never figured that out. Me either.
20:43 Speaker 01 We'll find out for the fact check.
20:45 Speaker 02 I think it has to do with one side, two sides of something.
20:47 Speaker 01 Interesting.
20:48 Dax Shepard? Now, this huge explosion in the amount of managers and agents and whatnot, is it proportional to, because when you were on Benson, you're casting The Cosby Show, there's only three networks. The three networks only have five days of airing and four shows. So you're talking 20, maybe 60 shows are on television and now we're at, I don't know, hundreds of shows. So do you think it's proportional or does something else happen?
21:11 Speaker 02 That happened way before we came into streaming.
21:13 Dax Shepard? Okay.
21:13 Speaker 02 I mean, managers started getting busy on us about 25 years ago, I think. Actors, for some reason, they decided they needed an attorney, they needed a manager, they needed an agent as well. And so I remember sometime in the 90s when suddenly The Breakdowns, which is a service that sends to agents the parts that we're casting and then they submit headshots.
21:32 Dax Shepard? And an 18 to 24 year old.
21:34 Speaker 02 Yes, exactly. And that is how they disseminated the casting calls, basically. For every new project that came along, it was Breakdown. There's kind of a monopoly on that one company. Suddenly, for some reason, I remember the first manager I ever heard of was Keith Addus, who represented Sting. He never would bother any of us, but it was like, oh, what does a manager do? Anyway, so then for some reason, there was just like an onslaught of managers who started to call us. You'd have an agent calling about the same client that a manager would call about.
22:01 Speaker 01 What are they saying? Like, hey, you should really think about my client. And you're like, yes or no. And then they call back and say, actually, you really should.
22:08 Speaker 02 All the time. And then the manager would call and say, this is the person.
22:11 Dax Shepard? Okay, so when you were at Family Ties, I'm gonna ask you some juicy questions.
22:15 Speaker 02 Please.
22:16 Dax Shepard? Famously, Leonardo DiCaprio was on Family Ties, right?
22:19 Speaker 02 No, he was on Growing Pains.
22:21 Dax Shepard? Growing Pains, I fucked that up.
22:23 Speaker 01 That's sad. You wanted to ask about an early Leonardo DiCaprio.
22:26 Dax Shepard? Yeah, I want to know.
22:27 Speaker 02 Young River Phoenix was.
22:28 Dax Shepard? He was on Family Ties? Maybe that's who I'm thinking of.
22:31 Speaker 02 And Tom Hanks.
22:31 Speaker 01 Oh, and Tom Hanks.
22:32 Dax Shepard? And Tom Hanks.
22:33 Speaker 02 Yep.
22:33 Dax Shepard? And you already had Michael J. Fox.
22:35 Speaker 02 And this was all my boss Judith Weiner and her associate at the time, Donald Deline, who's now a big producer.
22:39 Dax Shepard? My favorite person in show business. He produced Without a Paddle.
22:43 Speaker 02 Oh, he did, right!
22:44 Dax Shepard? What a gentleman!
22:45 Speaker 02 He's hilarious and was just as funny then.
22:47 Dax Shepard? Wait, Deline did the pilot of Family Ties?
22:49 Speaker 02 He was the associate at the time.
22:50 Dax Shepard? Really?
22:51 Speaker 02 I think he was the one who probably turned Judith on to Justine Bateman as being a good one in the group, because sometimes associates would pre-read the people, which doesn't so much exist anymore. Now you'd call it self-tape as a pre-read.
23:02 Dax Shepard? Yeah, I got a question about that.
23:03 Speaker 02 Anyway, many, many young people came through the Family Ties coffers. Joseph Gordon-Levitt, I think as a seven-year-old, played a bully with the...
23:10 Dax Shepard? Ah!
23:11 Speaker 02 Do you guys even know Family Ties?
23:13 Dax Shepard? Yeah, I grew up watching Family Ties.
23:15 Speaker 02 You didn't?
23:15 Dax Shepard? I did.
23:16 Speaker 02 Reruns, I assume. I don't think you can get it anywhere now. And it's a show that would catch on because of the conservative-liberal thing.
23:22 Dax Shepard? Yeah, it would.
23:23 Speaker 02 Right?
23:23 Dax Shepard? Because Alex P. Keaton was a conservative.
23:25 Speaker 02 And Michael.
23:25 Dax Shepard? And the dad was liberal. The whole family was liberal, right?
23:27 Speaker 02 It was great.
23:27 Dax Shepard? Yeah, it was really funny.
23:28 Speaker 02 And it was Gary David Goldberg's family story, basically. He was liberal and a hippie, and his kids were conservative.
23:34 Dax Shepard? Ah!
23:34 Speaker 02 I believe so.
23:35 Dax Shepard? Oh, that is very interesting. You know, that was 82 to 87? No, 89, so I was seven till 12.
23:43 Speaker 02 So you loved Alex P. Keaton?
23:45 Dax Shepard? I liked Justine Bateman, I liked Alex P. Keaton, then he was in Back to the Future. Who was Skippy?
23:49 Speaker 02 Mark Price.
23:50 Dax Shepard? Yes, of course.
23:51 Speaker 02 He's literally the definition of the goofy friend next door.
23:53 Dax Shepard? A few years later, you're on Golden Girls.
23:55 Speaker 02 Yes, with Judith, we did the pilot.
23:57 Dax Shepard? You would be privy to one of the great, kind of funny debates now that happens with the Golden Girls. A, the Golden Girls is this enormous thing, right?
24:05 Speaker 02 Yes.
24:06 Dax Shepard? Like, it's had all these different lives, which is great. And I watched it as a kid. But again, I was seven to 12. They look like grandmas to me. Now that I'm 50, or closing in on it, everyone points out, some of the cast members were in their 40s or 50s.
24:20 Speaker 02 Yeah. Estelle definitely made herself look like an old granny.
24:23 Dax Shepard? So what was the conversation behind closed doors about what age you were going to cast as the His grandmothers.
24:30 Speaker 02 It was not even discussed. The women that were considered were all probably in those days considered elderly and they were in their 50s.
24:38 Speaker 01 It's the reality of the times. It's not like anyone was kind of.
24:40 Speaker 02 No, it's the reality of the times.
24:42 Speaker 01 Yeah.
24:42 Speaker 02 You still see that from time to time, though. But then it was not even a question. There was just people in their 50s were going to be the elderly people. But Estelle came in to audition for Something on Family Ties. I keep everything in my storage units and I went back to see the way we got to Estelle. And she had auditioned for Something on Family Ties. I saw the producer session, which I typed on a selected typewriter and then you make copies of it and then you pass it out. She had come in for a part that she did not get, but then about a week later Judith brought her in for Golden Girls just to pre-read her. We didn't tape or anything. We had to bring them back in person for all the producers, Tony Thomas and Paul Witt. Susan Harris didn't come to the sessions.
25:16 Dax Shepard? Sam Harris's mother.
25:17 Speaker 01 That's right.
25:18 Speaker 02 Wait a minute. Oh, Sam. I'm sorry. What does he do now?
25:20 Dax Shepard? Sam Harris has an enormous.
25:22 Speaker 02 Other than the comic who's not that Sam Harris.
25:24 Dax Shepard? Right. He became a neurologist. He has a huge podcast, but he has also famously on Bill Maher all the time arguing. He got into hot water arguing Ben Affleck about Islam. He is a very outspoken, provocative intellectual.
25:37 Speaker 01 Wow.
25:37 Dax Shepard? Most people go the other way, by the way. Most people know Sam and I'll say his mother invented Golden Girls.
25:43 Speaker 02 Sam. I think the reason she got into writing was because she had to support Sam.
25:47 Dax Shepard? Yes, single mother.
25:48 Speaker 02 Yeah. She said, I can do that stuff. And she wrote a spec script for one of their shows at the time and then she just got huge. She created soap and she was a very, very important person, not just female, very important person in comedy.
26:00 Dax Shepard? A titan, yeah, and that kind of.
26:01 Speaker 02 And she and Paul Witt made the greatest comedies in the 80s and 90s and they had the third floor on Sunset Gower.
26:07 Dax Shepard? So by the time we get to 1990, I guess I'm wondering, so you already pointed out something that happens, which is fascinating. You come in for one thing, you're not right for it. And that's its own thing that actors need to understand.
26:18 Speaker 02 All the time. It's almost the rule, not the exception.
26:21 Dax Shepard? It took me directing things and casting people to really fundamentally understand what's going on in the room. I wish I would have started directing because it would have taken so much of the pressure off of auditioning, which is like, you're kind of right or you're wrong. You have some range of talent, but.
26:35 Speaker 02 Exactly.
26:36 Dax Shepard? What can happen, which is encouraging, is. You, as a casting director, go like, well, they're terrible for this role, but they're good. I wanna keep a mental note of them.
26:45 Speaker 02 Oh, we're keeping that in our heads.
26:47 Dax Shepard? If you starred in 83, and by the time we get to Fresh Prince, you had seven years of kind of accumulating people that you've liked.
26:53 Speaker 02 Seeing every movie and every TV show and memorizing every actor. Anytime I'd go to a movie, this was before Internet Movie Database, I have a ton of little notebooks. I stay at the end and I would write down all the cast. I noted like Roseanne Barr. Her first bit was on Johnny Carson and I wrote, Roseanne Carr. And then I wrote, riding vacuum cleaner.
27:12 Dax Shepard? That was her bit.
27:13 Speaker 02 So I remember her bit was riding vacuum cleaner. And then I ended up seeing her at the Comedy Store. Anyway, everything was handwritten those days. So I had tons of writing down everybody. Ellen DeSomething, I didn't think I could spell her name, but I wrote it down.
27:25 Dax Shepard? DeGeneres?
27:26 Speaker 02 Yeah.
27:27 Speaker 01 Oh, this is so funny.
27:29 Speaker 02 Yeah, so I have all kinds of little notebooks.
27:31 Dax Shepard? And you don't have a computer, so it's not like you can put all this in a spreadsheet and break it into categories and stuff. So anytime you have a new project on your hands and you've got 13 roles to cast, how do you keep track of this huge handwritten stack of paper?
27:45 Speaker 02 I would say that most of the folks I started out with, Sally Steiner and Meg Lieberman and Donald, who started in casting, we just had scraps of paper everywhere. Later, I would get Time Out New York, when that started, and I would rip things out about the comedy people that they would talk about. That's how I remembered people like Rory Scoville and Ben Schwartz. I still have their little things ripped out of the Time Out New York.
28:06 Speaker 01 Some of these things, like, I think should be in the Smithsonian.
28:08 Speaker 02 Oh, God.
28:09 Speaker 01 Ellen DeSomething? That's fantastic.
28:13 Dax Shepard? I think the Smithsonian has a whole TV thing to it.
28:15 Speaker 01 Yeah, they have the Archie Monkers chair.
28:17 Dax Shepard? Oh, right. Then they definitely do.
28:19 Speaker 02 But it was all scrap paper. Our walls were covered with little thumbtacks with somebody's name.
28:23 Dax Shepard? Names.
28:24 Speaker 02 Yeah.
28:24 Dax Shepard? Every time you're watching something, you're on the lookout for someone that's talented. Does that ruin seeing stuff? Are you too preoccupied?
28:31 Speaker 02 No, it doesn't ruin it for me, because I still love it. But at those days, you had to stay. Sometimes I'd have to see a movie twice, because you can't go to IMDb, and I'd have to look at the...
28:39 Dax Shepard? And it's going fast.
28:40 Speaker 02 Yes, and it's going fast.
28:41 Dax Shepard? And the lights might not even be on yet.
28:43 Speaker 02 Yes, exactly. So I would have to go sometimes twice. And there's many people who I would bring In the next week and they got apart.
28:50 Speaker 01 Wow.
28:52 Dax Shepard? Okay, so that's one approach is you're paying attention to who's and what. Are you also going to comedy clubs?
28:58 Speaker 02 Oh, all the time. That was then. You had to do it on your feet. You had to go into the Comedy Store. When I was working for Judith, she let me do some sort of new, which never really aired, late night comedy show that NBC wanted to put on adjacent or after SNL at the time. Talking 1980s. That was my first flat-out comedy thing. I had to learn comics like I learned my multiplication tables in the 60s.
29:18 Speaker 01 Wow.
29:19 Speaker 02 I went to the Comedy Store and improv every single night for weeks. I'd park up above the Comedy Store. I never went to the main room because those were the acts that everybody knew, Robin Williams. But I would go to the back room and sit there from like 8 o'clock to 2:00 in the morning. And I would see always like a 19-year-old, 20-year-old Jim Carrey. It was the same lineup half the time I went there. It was like Jim Carrey and then it was Jeff Altman, Damon Wayans, who was very young at the time, as I recall. I just sat in the back. I had to have a two-drink minimum, no comps back then, and I was just a casting assistant. So I would sit there and I would sit until the end. And usually, I think it was Sunday night, I forget when Sam Kinison would come on at 2:00 in the morning and be screaming.
29:56 Dax Shepard? Yeah.
29:56 Speaker 02 And then I would leave and go home and do it the next night. I just made a point to do it solid for like two or three weeks so I could learn comics. You had to do the legwork then. And I have very fond memories of that kind of stuff.
30:09 Dax Shepard? Okay, so that's positive because for every Jim Carrey, you're also wading through two or three that are pretty rough and people are bombing. Some people are thinking like, oh, I'd go to a comedy show every night.
30:17 Speaker 02 No.
30:18 Dax Shepard? If they're rough.
30:19 Speaker 02 And that was in the days preceding you, maybe not, where the goal of a comic was to get a deal at a network.
30:26 Dax Shepard? Right.
30:26 Speaker 02 First of all, to get a spot on Johnny Carson.
30:28 Dax Shepard? Yep.
30:28 Speaker 02 And to get called to sit on a couch. Second of all, I remember we would also go back and sort of go to the ladies' room and then the comics were always out back in the hallway smoking and talking about their sets.
30:38 Dax Shepard? Yeah.
30:38 Speaker 02 God bless the comics, but they're insecure. And these are now the biggest comics in the world.
30:43 Dax Shepard? They're pretty mean, too.
30:44 Speaker 02 The Marc Maron and the biggest stand-ups in the world were all back there at the age of 21.
30:48 Dax Shepard? Yeah.
30:49 Speaker 02 Yeah, gossipy and mean.
30:50 Dax Shepard? Insecure and scared.
30:52 Speaker 02 Very few females, they even had just a female night. That was all you had for the female comics. I think it was the Belly Room. I remember when Whoopi Goldberg first came, it was like, oh, my God. Remember Donald Delaine telling me, there is this comic, this female, who is unbelievable. You should go see her. Her name is Whoopi Goldberg. And I was like, okay, Whoopi, Whoopi, okay.
31:09 Dax Shepard? Yeah, yeah.
31:09 Speaker 02 Whoopi Goldberg.
31:10 Dax Shepard? And you put her in The Color Purple.
31:11 Speaker 02 I wish.
31:14 Dax Shepard? Did you get good at delineating who's gonna work? Cause it's a big leap between stand-up and acting. And it goes very well for some and it goes really bad for others. Do you feel like you got good with your thin slicing or your radar? Was there anything you could tell on stage that was gonna be predictive of whether they could do it or not?
31:31 Speaker 02 For me, the bar was how funny they were. And for example, I did not know how good Jim Carrey would be as an actor, but I brought him in. I did not know how good Dennis Leary would be as an actor. There's an actor who needs a better career.
31:45 Dax Shepard? Yeah, yeah.
31:45 Speaker 02 He's got a good one, but deserves it better because he's unbelievably good actor. As most many comics are good dramatically. What is more terrifying and difficult than stand-up comedy? Nothing. Nothing.
31:58 Speaker 03 Stay tuned for more Armchair Expert if you dare.
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34:39 Speaker 01 Okay, can we talk about how November is basically survival mode between the holidays, the travel, the hosting, the cooking, the everything? Sleep is the one thing keeping me from completely unraveling.
34:49 Dax Shepard? It really is the foundation. And I think people underestimate how much a bad mattress is quietly ruining their day. You wake up stiff, your back's angry, you're already behind before your feet hit the floor.
35:00 Speaker 01 That was me before Helix. I took their sleep quiz, which is so fast. It took me like two minutes and they matched me to a mattress that actually fits how I sleep. Not a guess, not a firm or soft coin flip. It's a real match. I have a midnight mattress and I really like it. I was noticing it because I actually had to sleep in one of my other beds recently. That doesn't have a Helix mattress on it and I really could tell a big difference in my sleep.
35:23 Dax Shepard? Temperature was all over the map.
35:24 Speaker 01 It was a mess. I need a new one.
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37:35 Dax Shepard? I've said it before, but I'll tell you. I had a scene in this movie I directed where Kristen and I are in an off-road race car and we've got to drive through a barn door. And it's a real barn door. We're gonna break through a barn door and on the other side, there's ramps that are this wide. And then we're gonna jump two cars. And I'm directing, so I'm actually doing the whole thing. And it's dark inside the barn. It's gonna be very bright when we crash through the thing. And then I gotta hit these little ramps. And we're sitting in the car right before we're about to go. And the stunt coordinator, my friend, a caster, goes, "How are you doing?" I go, "I'm good." He goes, "How nervous are you?" And I go, "If stand-up is a 10, I'm at a 4." And that's a real comp for me. Jumping a car over other cars is like 40% as scary as stand-up.
38:14 Speaker 02 Yes, wow. I have always admired stand-up. Also because their hearts are on their sleeves. No matter how tough their act is, or how tough and edgy their jokes are, every new line, they're scared about.
38:24 Dax Shepard? It's just you. And when it goes bad and you know you have another 18 minutes, there's really nothing like it.
38:31 Speaker 02 I admire them greatly. I also sort of relate to their insecurity and all that kind of stuff. Most people who gravitate to Hollywood, I think, have a lot of insecurity.
38:39 Dax Shepard? Yes, totally. Yeah, looking for a lot of approval.
38:40 Speaker 02 Because the one thing I find about Hollywood and kind of Los Angeles in general is it's for accepting of all the freaks. And I like that.
38:47 Dax Shepard? Yeah, big time. That's very true. You might think it's gotta be a town of a bunch of people who really thought they were awesome.
38:52 Speaker 02 Completely not the way it is.
38:54 Dax Shepard? No.
38:55 Speaker 02 Completely the opposite.
38:56 Dax Shepard? Okay, so by the time you get to Fresh Prince, my question about that is, the show starts with Will Smith?
39:02 Speaker 02 Yes, it started with Will Smith and the late, great Quincy Jones. I mean, the highlight of my career was getting to meet Quincy Jones.
39:09 Dax Shepard? Right, cuz he was the producer of that, right?
39:10 Speaker 02 He was the producer and the creator. I think he grabbed Will and said, "What can we do?" My partner in crime, we casted this show together, Sally Steiner, we drove up to Quincy Jones's house, I think it was Mulholland, but we were so starstruck.
39:21 Dax Shepard? Oh, absolutely.
39:22 Speaker 02 I was always starstruck, and I still am starstruck.
39:25 Dax Shepard? You are still.
39:27 Speaker 02 Come on. But I only met you once on an audition years ago and you don't remember, I'm sure. But you came in.
39:32 Dax Shepard? Wanna hear.
39:33 Speaker 02 Pitched from Endeavor as the guy from Punk'd.
39:38 Dax Shepard? Sure.
39:38 Speaker 02 And those are the days where it was like, you sort of didn't do that if you were a sidekick on Punk'd. Now, everybody and their brother from a TikTok video wants to be seen.
39:46 Dax Shepard? Yes.
39:47 Speaker 02 You had much longer hair.
39:49 Dax Shepard? Yes, I did.
39:50 Speaker 02 And it was probably about 2003 because I remember I just finished the pilot of The Office and Mitch Hurwitz had asked me to do the pilot of Arrested Development and I couldn't do two pilots at once. It was too torture, so I couldn't do the pilot. Deb Barilsky did the pilot. Many podcasts named me as the person who did the pilot of Arrested. I just did the seasons. After season one, she did the pilot and a beautiful job she did.
40:09 Dax Shepard? Oh, my God. What a cast.
40:10 Speaker 02 I was doing a pilot. John Landgraf was the producer. It was FX, the early days of those places like FX. And it was called DICKS, D-I-C-K-S. And I just remember thinking, DAX, D-A-X, coming in for six.
40:24 Dax Shepard? That's a lot, yeah.
40:25 Speaker 02 Visual learning. You came in and you were very good. And I remember thinking, oh, wow.
40:30 Dax Shepard? I find that so hard to believe. This is exciting. I'm blown away that you would remember that.
40:35 Speaker 02 Of course. I remember specifically the agent pitching you when it was Endeavor.
40:38 Dax Shepard? Greg Siegel, it would have been.
40:39 Speaker 02 Yes, he would have said the guy from Punk'd, which of course I didn't know what it was.
40:43 Dax Shepard? Right, of course.
40:44 Speaker 02 But I had known Ashton Kutcher because there's all these stories that you could connect everybody to everything when you start out.
40:50 Dax Shepard? Yeah.
40:51 Speaker 02 I had met him on a wonderful pilot called Advances in Chemistry that the very brilliant Richie Rosenstock did, again, ahead of its time. But he came in to audition for The Handsome Kid and he didn't get it because, God bless him at the time, not an actor. He was only 20 or 19. And then Meg Leremin brought him in for that 70's show and that rest is history. Within like two days.
41:10 Dax Shepard? I was gonna say, I think his story is, and we're very good friends.
41:13 Speaker 02 Oh, you are? That's so cool.
41:14 Dax Shepard? Oh, yeah.
41:15 Speaker 02 How do I not know that?
41:15 Dax Shepard? We stayed very, very close. You want to talk about casting? So I didn't make it through any of the rounds at MTV for Punk'd. I was in a discarded pile of tapes that didn't get advanced to the producers and Kutcher had seen everyone they had basically circled and he's like, no one has the vibe. Let me see the people that were rejected. And I was one of the people rejected. So my entire career.
41:35 Speaker 02 Ashton had done that? No, he hadn't done that.
41:37 Dax Shepard? He had done 70's show. He was like, and he had done Just Married. So he was like, newly a movie star. He was kind of hot at the time. Oh, enormous. Definitely physical.
41:44 Speaker 01 Hot at the time. He also is in the zeitgeist.
41:47 Dax Shepard? Yeah. So he dug me out and so, yeah, my gratitude for him is off the charts. But what I wanted to own my baggage with casting directors.
41:56 Speaker 02 You do?
41:56 Dax Shepard? I do. I'll tell you why. It's all my insecurity, which was, I was auditioning for nine years in commercials and I couldn't get them. I just couldn't book anything. I booked two in nine years. I came to view casting directors as people who didn't get me. I'm like, they don't get me. I can't get through this layer to anybody. And then the time that I finally did break through, it turned out, if we believe Ashton, I still hadn't gotten through the casting directors. So I just had it in my mind, they don't like me, but I have to believe hopefully these creators might like me. Yeah.
42:29 Speaker 02 Yeah. That's in everybody's head about everything.
42:31 Dax Shepard? Yes. I was so insecure. I had been almost a decade.
42:34 Speaker 02 That in the world.
42:35 Speaker 01 I know. It's so true.
42:36 Dax Shepard? I just had it in my mind because I was so insecure that for whatever reason, they don't like me.
42:42 Speaker 01 And then maybe you were also going in and because you thought they didn't like you, you might have been being mean.
42:46 Dax Shepard? I don't think I was stupid enough to be mean.
42:48 Speaker 01 But you might not have been warm.
42:50 Dax Shepard? I don't think I was dumb enough to not be warm. I just really had it in my head.
42:54 Speaker 02 Yeah. So did you have a chip on your shoulder, would you say?
42:57 Dax Shepard? Uh, yeah. I felt like casting directors knew people I was friends with and no one really knew me and I was so insecure. And so I got it in my mind, I've got to get to the other people.
43:07 Speaker 02 Yeah, right, right, right.
43:08 Speaker 01 Go past these people.
43:10 Dax Shepard? Somehow I gotta jump over this gate that's in front of me and get to those people. Because again, when I finally got hired on a TV show, it was from the creator of the show.
43:18 Speaker 02 Oh, yeah.
43:19 Dax Shepard? I got such limited data and I'm telling this huge story based on this very limited data and I'm completely wrong. And then I come to find out like, you're saying you liked me, which is.
43:26 Speaker 02 Oh, yeah. I was like, wow, this kid from Punk, he's really actually a good actor.
43:31 Speaker 01 That's so funny. I had the opposite feeling towards casting.
43:35 Dax Shepard? Well, we talk about them all the time. Like you know the names of so many casting directors.
43:38 Speaker 01 I knew about you way before I moved to LA. I was like, oh my God.
43:41 Speaker 02 That is shocking to me.
43:42 Speaker 01 She's the person and if I could get an audition, like even just getting an audition with, I remember when it happened and I was like, oh, this is the craziest day of my life. I was so excited. But to me, casting directors were almost. Like teachers, the teacher I wanted the approval from, the person who was gonna give me an A plus. And obviously I wanted the job, but I really wanted the casting director to like me so much.
44:06 Speaker 02 Yes.
44:06 Speaker 01 Which I think backfired a lot, cause like then I wasn't just me. In commercials, this is probably bad to say, I did really well in commercials because I didn't care that much.
44:16 Speaker 02 Yeah.
44:16 Speaker 01 I just went in and did it. And then lo and behold, you do pretty well when you don't overthink, or you can just be you. Yeah, I had the, I was like, "Casting directors, please love me."
44:25 Speaker 02 She's a good actress, though.
44:26 Dax Shepard? Oh, yes, I've hired her.
44:27 Speaker 02 Oh, yes.
44:28 Dax Shepard? Yes, I put her in Chips.
44:30 Speaker 01 Sure did.
44:30 Dax Shepard? And I put her in the only commercial I ever directed.
44:32 Speaker 02 I love Chips.
44:32 Dax Shepard? But I can't do it. Oh, God bless you. Okay.
44:34 Speaker 02 Nobody did.
44:36 Dax Shepard? Curb Your Enthusiasm, 99, you were still on to the end.
44:40 Speaker 02 I started in season three. Jeff Garland is a good and wonderful friend. He brought me on in season three. And then I was on for many, many seasons, except for a couple of seasons where I wasn't available.
44:50 Dax Shepard? But were you there when Monica got to do Curb Your Enthusiasm?
44:53 Speaker 01 Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Very sweet.
44:55 Dax Shepard? So jealous.
44:55 Speaker 02 Her the best. You would've had to play yourself on Curb.
44:57 Speaker 01 Yeah, exactly.
44:58 Dax Shepard? I don't think I was famous enough to play myself, and then I was too famous to play.
45:02 Speaker 02 Now you're too famous, you can't not play yourself.
45:03 Dax Shepard? Now the show's over.
45:04 Speaker 02 Yeah.
45:05 Speaker 01 Yeah, I got in the sweet spot, right before it ended, too.
45:08 Speaker 02 But I did a lot of my self-education then, too, cause I tried to know every improv person in the universe. Cause I was lucky enough to be doing The Office, Curb, and Arrested Development, starting with season two. If you go back and watch then, you'll see the same season, everybody does Curb, everybody's Arrested, all the same people. That was when, from my own history in comedy, nobody got improv actors, nobody brought them into the fore until it was like Judd Apatow and Paul Feig. For me, it was all casting sitcom pilots, and it was always tough. Tough to find anybody funny, tough to find anybody who can pull off the sitcom, and in those days, tough to find anybody great-looking enough for a network to approve them.
45:45 Dax Shepard? Right, you had to have a lot of things.
45:47 Speaker 02 Yeah, you did have to have a lot of things. So that was when Judd and Adam McKay and Paul Feig, they started appreciating the fact that most improv actors or comedians who then got into improv was not in the fore of comedy either when I started. Again, it was all stand-up comics.
46:01 Dax Shepard? Right.
46:01 Speaker 02 Improv was still Second City, and it was Groundlings, which were sort of character-oriented.
46:05 Speaker 01 Yeah.
46:05 Dax Shepard? You're right. There was this huge talent pool that no one was really looking at.
46:09 Speaker 02 No one until sort of Second City started to move. I was trying to pluck people out of Second City in the early 90s. I remember going there to see Second City the first time when we were looking for Carlton on Fresh Prince of Bel Air.
46:19 Dax Shepard? Oh, no kidding.
46:19 Speaker 02 And they said, can we just go to Chicago and look for some of these kids? Because I don't know. And so I went to Second City for the first time, and that's when I met Jeff Garland. But on main stage at that time was Steve Carell, Stephen Colbert, and Amy Sedaris, and Paul Donello, Jeff Garland. It was crazy. And Mitch Rouse. Anyway, that history of comedy. But when I started to do a lot of comedy shows and bringing a lot of the improv comedy was when The State had started and when Kids in the Hall had started.
46:45 Dax Shepard? Yes.
46:45 Speaker 02 That stuff all came through, basically, what was then called the Comedy Channel, I think, was Comedy Central, but at the time it was called something else.
46:53 Dax Shepard? The Comedy Network. There was a great little boom because it was Kids in the Hall, and then The State, and then Ben Stiller had a sketch show, and then you had Mr. Show.
47:00 Speaker 02 He started it all as well.
47:01 Dax Shepard? Yes.
47:02 Speaker 02 I mean, Ben Stiller, very important in comedy. And I think they owe the biggest debt to Mr. Show.
47:08 Speaker 01 Yeah.
47:08 Speaker 02 To Bob Odenkirk and David Cross, which would air at midnight on HBO.
47:12 Dax Shepard? A whole new genre.
47:13 Speaker 02 Yes.
47:14 Dax Shepard? Yeah, we had Jack Black on, and I was telling him, you know, I used to go to the live tapings of that show, and it seemed like just the most penetrable.
47:20 Speaker 01 I passed him today on the street.
47:21 Dax Shepard? Oh, you did?
47:22 Speaker 01 I did.
47:22 Dax Shepard? Was he in tie-dye?
47:23 Speaker 01 Yes.
47:23 Dax Shepard? Yeah.
47:24 Speaker 02 He's hard to miss. I had cast him in a couple of day player roles when he was first starting out. And he was very singular, Jack Black. And he could deliver one line and you'd remember it.
47:33 Dax Shepard? Yes.
47:34 Speaker 02 And he was with the Gage Group very early on in his career. In every casting office, you have people that you remember and keep bringing in and bringing in until they get the part that really propels them into a long career.
47:44 Dax Shepard? So that was going to be one of my questions. Do you get a swell of pride when you see like a Chris Pratt?
47:50 Speaker 02 I do.
47:51 Speaker 01 You have to.
47:52 Dax Shepard? Yeah, yeah. You cast Parks and Rack.
47:54 Speaker 02 Yes.
47:55 Dax Shepard? If it's not obvious, you're the only casting director we've ever invited in.
47:58 Speaker 02 Oh, thank you.
47:59 Dax Shepard? And largely because I have someone who didn't learn about casting directors like Monica did. I started noticing, I'm like, this Veep cast is impossible. Who on earth figured out that all these people were this level of brilliance? And that's why I think Veep, when I was like, oh, it's you, you're, and then I was like, oh, and right. And the other impossible cast would have been Parks and Rec. Wow, you did that. And you've had several of those.
48:23 Speaker 01 It's insane.
48:24 Dax Shepard? It's just impossible, the level of collective talent and unknown. And I realized, oh, you're a big, big, big piece of that. It's kind of like for me, when I realized, oh, John Bryan, the composer, might have as much to do with the Paul Thomas Anderson movies that I like. Because Eternal Sunshine, I also like in the same way, and he has composed both. That's like a revelation. Oh, maybe I love John Bryan.
48:47 Speaker 01 Yeah, when all of your favorite comedies, you look and it's you who's casted.
48:51 Dax Shepard? What gets suspicious.
48:52 Speaker 01 Wait a minute, yeah, I think this might be about her.
48:54 Speaker 02 The music connection is interesting, though. I do love certain soundtracks, starting with Alfred Hitchcock movies. And they are what connect your fandom, I think, a lot of the time. That's a great point. In features, casting directors always get credited, it seems, the card right after the music. The music editor. And I love that.
49:11 Dax Shepard? Okay, so you do, you get a swell of pride when Chris.
49:13 Speaker 02 Oh, God, yes. And I bore people with all the stories I'm boring you with now.
49:17 Dax Shepard? No, I love it.
49:18 Speaker 01 It's fantastic.
49:19 Dax Shepard? I guess here's my question, because Kristen and I were at a hotel once, and he and Annie were there. And we ended up hanging out for three days. I'm like, this guy's so radical. He's so real. He's from Oregon, he was a wrestler, he's a hunter, and he's funny.
49:31 Speaker 02 Pickup truck. He needs to show his funny side again.
49:34 Speaker 01 I know. I've been thinking that a lot lately.
49:37 Speaker 02 And Jack Black needs to show his dramatic side. We have all these thoughts, casting people, we talk about this all the time.
49:42 Dax Shepard? Yeah. What does Kristen need to do? Keep on keeping on?
49:45 Speaker 01 She's doing pretty good.
49:46 Speaker 02 No, keep on keeping on, but she would be great in a down and dirty drama.
49:50 Dax Shepard? Okay.
49:50 Speaker 02 Wouldn't she want to? I would think she'd want to.
49:53 Speaker 01 She's such a good dramatic actress.
49:54 Dax Shepard? She would, and then I always talk her out of it.
49:55 Speaker 02 Do you really? Why?
49:56 Dax Shepard? I don't talk her out of it. I remind her of what life she wants, which is she wants to be at home seeing her kids. She does not want to be on location. She wants manageable hours. She wants to know she can drive the kids to school if she wants to. So going away to, you know, Georgia for four months is a down and dirty drama.
50:13 Speaker 02 Universe for Kristen. She should be do a real movie, indie movie or something. Queen pins was great for her.
50:20 Dax Shepard? Uh huh, you cast that?
50:21 Speaker 02 I did.
50:21 Dax Shepard? We love Kirby.
50:23 Speaker 02 Oh, Kirby's the best.
50:24 Dax Shepard? Kirby's a diamond.
50:26 Speaker 02 Kirby, we've hired forever. The richest talent pool is comedy.
50:30 Speaker 01 Yeah.
50:30 Speaker 02 Frankly, my argument, and you would, I think, agree because you've directed now is so many drama actors. Some of them are brilliant at comedy. Going the other way, comedy to drama is much more frequent and much more a surprise.
50:42 Dax Shepard? Yes.
50:43 Speaker 02 Sacha Baron Cohen is very good in Disclaimer.
50:46 Dax Shepard? Yes.
50:47 Speaker 01 Yeah, I think it's because comedy requires you to be.
50:50 Speaker 02 It requires a lot of pain.
50:51 Speaker 01 It does.
50:52 Speaker 02 And a lot of experience and a lot of beating yourself up and a lot of stuff to draw from.
50:57 Dax Shepard? And I'm gonna add, and people will be mad about this. Comedy is straight up harder than drama.
51:01 Speaker 02 Beyond straight up harder than drama.
51:03 Dax Shepard? There's so many tools that can be employed in a drama to help you. You could have no look on your face and do the perfect push in and the right song.
51:12 Speaker 02 People think you're a genius.
51:12 Dax Shepard? Yeah.
51:13 Speaker 01 Yeah, exactly.
51:14 Dax Shepard? There's no cheating a joke. You can't cheat a laugh. You can put a fart noise in or something, but in general, it works or it doesn't work. There's no manipulating it. You can't put the perfect song in and all of a sudden it's funny.
51:24 Speaker 02 Though they try.
51:25 Dax Shepard? They do try. And it's generally generic. Okay, can you think of some people that you really went to the mat over? That didn't get it, that then turned out to be huge? Do you feel like you've got some great vindicated stories?
51:39 Speaker 02 You should have a group casting director thing because people would be shocked at how many people slumped first and then got the big, it's tenacity, tenacity, tenacity. It used to be in pilot season, the people who didn't get the roles, the next season would get the roles. And the next season, the people who didn't even get as far as the network would get the roles.
51:56 Dax Shepard? That's good to know.
51:56 Speaker 02 It's a cycle, though. It is tenacity.
51:58 Dax Shepard? Can you think of someone that you were like, you just battled and lost?
52:01 Speaker 02 Oh, yeah. Battled for Elizabeth Banks to get many things. It was mostly like women whose studios didn't think were pretty enough, like Elizabeth Banks. We finally got her in.
52:12 Speaker 01 She's like a forty year old virgin.
52:14 Speaker 02 Is her pretty enough?
52:15 Speaker 01 Yeah, I know. What the fuck?
52:16 Speaker 02 Yeah, or Amy Adams.
52:17 Speaker 01 Oh, God.
52:18 Speaker 02 Or funny enough. Both, by the way, wickedly funny. Elizabeth does a lot of comedies, but Amy needs to get back to some good comedy. Because she's wickedly funny.
52:25 Dax Shepard? She needs to just have some fun, maybe.
52:26 Speaker 01 Yeah.
52:27 Dax Shepard? For a few months.
52:28 Speaker 02 I'm sure she would like to. Comedy is a little bit in a coma now these days.
52:32 Speaker 01 Yeah.
52:32 Dax Shepard? It's not a great time.
52:33 Speaker 02 So not many opportunities. Brie Larson is who I was gonna mention.
52:36 Speaker 01 Oh.
52:36 Speaker 02 Was never, I mean, this is a gorgeous, talented girl. And she was never good enough for a studio to approve her. They just didn't think she was the leading lady. And then, boom, an Academy Award later and all kinds of stuff. Yeah, that I do love.
52:49 Speaker 01 It would be so hard for me for them to be passing on Brie Larson and Elizabeth Banks and Amy Adams. I would be like, guys, why are you doing this?
52:56 Speaker 02 Wait a minute, you're approving Seth Rogen and you're passing on these people?
52:58 Speaker 01 Exactly. I would be saying it.
53:00 Dax Shepard? Yeah, you've navigated lots of different eras in this business.
53:04 Speaker 02 We say it all the time.
53:04 Dax Shepard? So if you're working with a director, they're casting their third movie or show, and you've cast hundreds. How do you manage not saying like, you're wrong, you're gonna have to trust me, this is my expertise?
53:19 Speaker 02 I try never to go there because once I said you're wrong to somebody and I got screamed at. Don't you tell me I am wrong.
53:26 Dax Shepard? Uh huh. You deal with a lot of egos, yeah.
53:28 Speaker 01 Yeah, you do.
53:29 Speaker 02 Yeah. Don't you ever say I'm wrong and I'm not wrong.
53:31 Dax Shepard? I've never been wrong.
53:32 Speaker 02 And by the way, you was dead wrong.
53:33 Speaker 01 Yeah, exactly.
53:35 Speaker 02 And that actor became a huge star.
53:37 Speaker 01 Yeah, and you deserve to have the ego. Your resume.
53:41 Speaker 02 No, we, casting directors fight, fight, fight so much for actors. I brought this up recently. I wish actors could appreciate how much we do fight for them.
53:48 Dax Shepard? I gotta tell you this, this is the truth. Generally, I research people. And then in the process of researching them, there's some curiosities that kind of surface. I've never sat down and just had questions like I have for you.
53:59 Speaker 02 No, please.
54:00 Dax Shepard? Have you developed a radar for who's gonna be problematic? Like, they might be genius level in the room, but do you think you've gotten good at going, yeah, this person's talented, but is not gonna be worth the work?
54:11 Speaker 02 You can tell when certain people are annoying in the room when they're auditioning, that they're maybe a little rough on a director. Directors can tell that, too. Somebody will read and ask questions or ask the wrong questions. The way you can read people in general, even though somebody who waits on you at McDonald's is like that little prick.
54:27 Dax Shepard? Yeah, yeah, right, right. I bet she's a great mom.
54:30 Speaker 02 Exactly. The way you can read people, it's just a people-reading thing. And yes, I do. I believe I have instincts for that. Though, in terms of behavior in the past, I don't ever repeat it unless I've seen it, or it's been on a movie that I've worked on. Like, somebody will say, "Don't ever hire that actor, they're difficult."
54:44 Dax Shepard? Yeah.
54:44 Speaker 02 I want to make sure it's accurate. So many actors get a bad rap because they didn't get on with the director, or a producer, and it's actually the director who is the problem.
54:53 Speaker 01 Yeah.
54:53 Speaker 02 It happens so much to women.
54:55 Speaker 01 Yes.
54:55 Dax Shepard? Oh, is that true? So more often you'll hear, "Don't work with her than him."
54:59 Speaker 02 This woman is difficult, and, come on, you know.
55:01 Dax Shepard? Because she has an opinion.
55:02 Speaker 02 And then you hear the director's name, it's like, come on.
55:04 Dax Shepard? Right.
55:05 Speaker 02 Women still do not have a leg up.
55:07 Dax Shepard? What pisses you off the most in the casting process?
55:10 Speaker 02 I'll never work again. All the casting executives, the levels of people that we have to go through.
55:14 Dax Shepard? Right.
55:15 Speaker 02 And the levels of people that we have to CC and update.
55:18 Speaker 01 And you're talking about in a studio?
55:19 Speaker 02 I'm talking about in a studio or film, television. There's so many levels, and it really throws me off my game. And this has been for decades, frankly. In casting, you need, like what we're doing now, we're tracing people back for 30 years.
55:31 Dax Shepard? Yeah.
55:31 Speaker 02 We need to do that in our brains. And if you're constantly concerned, as I am, about, oh my god, I forgot to put a name on a list. Oh my god, this person thought of this person. Oh my god, this person's cousin wants to be seen. Oh my god, this person's manager asked me to see this person. You have absolutely the shortest synapses you could possibly have. You lose that long-term thinking of, who is this person? I loved in that show, and I can't remember who it was. That's what I want to spend my brain power on. And we are exhausted by the end of the day, and that is the only time we have to do it. It's so much more difficult now to actually be creative.
56:04 Dax Shepard? Yeah. Okay, what are your thoughts about improvising in an audition?
56:08 Speaker 02 Only if you know it's okay. Do a little bit of research. People see me and they think I can improvise, but I will, I will say, okay, this one, don't improvise.
56:18 Speaker 01 Oh, yeah, that's good.
56:19 Speaker 02 You know, because some actors will do it. All these beautiful comics, most of the time, they come up with funnier stuff than is on the page. People like Jed Appetow and Paul Feig and Mitch Hurwitz and Adam McKay, they appreciate that.
56:29 Dax Shepard? Yes.
56:30 Speaker 02 They want that, Larry David wants that. But I will warn them before coming in, or tell their agent, and I pray to god the agent tells the manager who tells the assistant who tells the assistant who tells the assistant to the actor to the actor, "Don't improv."
56:43 Speaker 01 Yeah.
56:44 Dax Shepard? Right.
56:44 Speaker 02 There is a line between comedy people who want to hear every line they write, and comedy people who don't care. And they say, "You can't make a wrong step, just do whatever you want." So, you should ask.
56:55 Dax Shepard? Okay.
56:56 Speaker 02 Please ask.
56:57 Dax Shepard? Okay.
56:58 Speaker 02 Otherwise, they'll think you can't ask.
56:59 Dax Shepard? Do the thing.
57:00 Speaker 01 Right.
57:00 Dax Shepard? Which, maybe I can't.
57:02 Speaker 02 No.
57:02 Dax Shepard? I've kind of gone like this, and again, I'm not giving this advice to any actor at all. I don't think this is a good strategy. Here's what I told myself. At some point, I'm like, I'm better if I can make this thing a little bit mine. I'll be different. It might anger you, but I'll be memorable. I've got to be me because this is who you're gonna deal with. So actually, it's a favor for all of us if we find out now. There are other people that are much better at this. If that's what you want than I am. Here's the thing I can do well. Maybe that'll appeal to you or not. Like, at some point, I feel like, and maybe it was just an attempt to get some control over the experience, which feels very powerless, of like, I'm gonna give you what I am, and maybe you'll like it, maybe you'll hate it.
57:39 Speaker 02 Yeah. I think that's great. I do, depending. If you're in there for Judd or somebody, you should absolutely do that because I find myself, I'll publicly apologize to Beck Bennett now because once he came in for a pilot of Brooklyn Nine-Nine, and after the audition, I said, wait, Mike, can he do it again? Because he can be better. It just came out of my mouth. Bring it way down, something like that. And then he was great. He had chosen to make the character big, and I love Beck Bennett.
58:06 Dax Shepard? Yes.
58:06 Speaker 02 Get the guy a major movie and a major show, if I'm allowed to say that.
58:09 Dax Shepard? And when you say Mike, you're talking about Sure?
58:10 Speaker 02 Mike Sure, yes.
58:11 Dax Shepard? We love.
58:12 Speaker 01 The best of the very best.
58:13 Speaker 02 That's why his shows are spectacular. Plug for the new Ted Danson show, which is spectacular. You guys are gonna love it.
58:18 Dax Shepard? Kristen just did a little thing on it, I think.
58:20 Speaker 02 I know. I didn't get to go to that, but I know she did a little bit. But yeah, Mike Sure is a director who's a dream because he wants to see who you are. And he doesn't care about the words. He does ultimately, but he doesn't. Because you find stuff there that you would bring to it, or that Beck Bennett would bring to it, that is not on the page, and you do need to show them who you are.
58:37 Dax Shepard? And you gotta be able to do the thing. I totally get it.
58:39 Speaker 02 You have to be able to do the thing.
58:40 Speaker 01 I think a mix is always good. Like, if you, for the most part, stick to the sides the whole time, but maybe you improvise on the button, or you add a little something.
58:48 Speaker 02 You better ask.
58:49 Speaker 01 Okay, great. Okay.
58:50 Dax Shepard? Yeah, yeah, yeah.
58:51 Speaker 02 They will say, I've had major comedy people go, he changed my line. And I'll always be defensive of the actor, always.
58:59 Dax Shepard? Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.
59:00 Speaker 02 Like, I don't like it when they make fun of an actor. I just, I'm always defensive.
59:03 Dax Shepard? When they leave, yeah, yeah, yeah.
59:05 Speaker 02 Come on.
59:06 Dax Shepard? Okay, what do you think about coming in character and foregoing the chit chat?
59:12 Speaker 02 What are actors like? Because I always try to make an actor feel at home when they come in, but I realize I should ask the actor, do you just want to come in and do it and then talk?
59:20 Dax Shepard? It's gotta be project-specific, right?
59:22 Speaker 02 Drama, no chit-chat.
59:23 Dax Shepard? I've come into things, I remember I almost got on True Detective. So I go into that and I'm like, you know what, I want to get to the acting as quickly as possible because I am funny in real life and I'm joyous. And then I don't want to have that huge radical shift. For you, I'd rather just come in, be polite, and do the thing and let you see that I can be a badass and then leave. But I don't know, I feel like it's project-specific.
59:46 Speaker 02 I mean, I've always just been, I think, empathetic to actors when they come in because no matter who it's in there, it's a dead room and coming in to audition for comedy is ridiculous. You're in a vacuum and you're trying to be funny.
59:57 Dax Shepard? And they've seen it 45 times.
59:58 Speaker 02 Exactly, and it's a ridiculous task. So that's why I also think self-taping is beneficial.
1:00:03 Dax Shepard? Great, that was one of my questions.
1:00:05 Speaker 02 But you come in and then I should ask actors, can I say something and make a joke? I always try to just make some sort of joke or mention, I just saw them in something, but I do have a feel for if they kind of just want to start. Because what I am cut off from is, I appreciate it, but how much preparation you folks have done and how you've talked yourself out of it and how you beat yourself up.
1:00:25 Dax Shepard? The whole car ride there. The lobby is the worst. The lobby is, you're listening to other great comedians.
1:00:30 Speaker 02 And you see the same people. Can I tell a small anecdote?
1:00:33 Dax Shepard? Yes, please.
1:00:34 Speaker 02 Donald Lyon's movie, he did a movie of Yogi Bear.
1:00:36 Dax Shepard? Yes, yes.
1:00:37 Speaker 02 Which was lovely. People should discover that for their kids or put it on Netflix. And I was bringing in the greatest comedy people ever. Dan Aykroyd was willing to come in and read for Yogi Bear. He was perfect. But of course, the studio thinks they have to hear him do it, which is ridiculous. That's the other thing. I'm like, just hire this person, but that never works. He came in and then Rob Corddry came in and he said, I have to follow Dan Aykroyd? And I instantly was like, God, I know.
1:01:04 Speaker 01 Yeah.
1:01:05 Speaker 02 Cause my generation, I was starstruck to even meet Dan Aykroyd.
1:01:08 Dax Shepard? Yes, of course.
1:01:09 Speaker 02 But you see who's coming in, who came in before you.
1:01:12 Dax Shepard? Oh, it's so rough.
1:01:13 Speaker 02 It's the worst.
1:01:14 Speaker 01 It's such a mindfuck.
1:01:15 Speaker 02 Yeah.
1:01:15 Dax Shepard? Yeah, you're already nervous and then you see, these four guys are definitely better than me.
1:01:19 Speaker 02 I have to cut myself off from her else I'll just be too much jelly of sympathy.
1:01:23 Speaker 01 I was gonna say that.
1:01:24 Speaker 02 Is how much preparation and when they leave, it always just blows me away. Somebody who gives an incredible audition and who you can tell worked on it so hard. That is impressive. That is how you audition.
1:01:35 Dax Shepard? Right.
1:01:35 Speaker 01 Yeah, you can't take on everyone's ener- the amount of energy, oh my God.
1:01:40 Speaker 02 But God bless actors from A to Z.
1:01:43 Dax Shepard? It's very gracious.
1:01:44 Speaker 02 Honest to God.
1:01:44 Speaker 01 It's gracious.
1:01:45 Speaker 02 Well, some of them come in not prepared at all.
1:01:47 Dax Shepard? Right.
1:01:47 Speaker 02 And then you're like, just leave. You're a jackass. Yeah.
1:01:50 Dax Shepard? Yeah. What's the number one mistake you see actors make?
1:01:53 Speaker 02 I would say, not with me, but when you're in with a big director, a big producer, doing it and saying, "Oh, I didn't like that. Can I do it again?"
1:02:00 Dax Shepard? Good tip.
1:02:01 Speaker 02 People can do it, but sometimes.
1:02:03 Dax Shepard? You better be fucking great that next adjustment you gave your.
1:02:06 Speaker 02 I think so, and I think sometimes you sort of want to wait for the director to do that. Get a feel for the room, be prepared and don't come in, and I know you can be nervous and I will try to help. Is that the camera? That's what actors do.
1:02:18 Dax Shepard? Yeah, yeah, yeah.
1:02:19 Speaker 02 I would say just sort of read the room sometimes.
1:02:21 Dax Shepard? Yeah.
1:02:22 Speaker 02 And don't come in and say, "I just got the sides last night, so I'm not prepared." That's an old trick some actors have done for decades.
1:02:28 Dax Shepard? Right.
1:02:29 Speaker 02 I will already know which actor's gonna come in and go, "Oh, I just got the sides last night."
1:02:33 Dax Shepard? Yeah.
1:02:34 Speaker 02 Yeah.
1:02:35 Dax Shepard? Okay, great. These are great tips.
1:02:36 Speaker 02 And don't chew gum in an audition unless it calls for it. A lot of people are insecure and they'll eat food or chew gum in an audition.
1:02:42 Speaker 01 Eat food?
1:02:43 Speaker 02 All the time.
1:02:43 Dax Shepard? Bring a big sandwich.
1:02:44 Speaker 02 Oh, you asked me about, what do you think about coming in in character?
1:02:47 Dax Shepard? Yeah.
1:02:47 Speaker 02 Yeah.
1:02:48 Dax Shepard? I can see freaking people out or I can see it really working.
1:02:51 Speaker 02 And you mean coming in in character, being the character, not dressed like a policeman or something?
1:02:55 Dax Shepard? Well, that's two questions, I guess.
1:02:57 Speaker 02 Well, self tapes, I think it's fine to look like the person because studio executives who approve these parts, you're in a cop uniform, they're gonna think, oh, he can be a cop.
1:03:04 Dax Shepard? Yeah, it does a lot of the work.
1:03:06 Speaker 02 God bless them, but most of them think surface things.
1:03:08 Dax Shepard? Yeah, they're juggling different things.
1:03:09 Speaker 02 Yes, exactly. And then you do have a group of executives who are unbelievably tuned into the creative part of it, but many are not. But I would say come in in character with comedy, I think it's okay. I wouldn't say you have to. But for example, JB Smoove came in to audition for Curb as the character he had made up. And he came in, Larry, Larry David.
1:03:30 Dax Shepard? Yes.
1:03:31 Speaker 02 He came in instantly, Larry was on the floor.
1:03:33 Dax Shepard? Right.
1:03:34 Speaker 02 He had the part immediately, basically.
1:03:35 Dax Shepard? Yeah.
1:03:36 Speaker 02 So you gotta be pretty confident when you do it. You gotta be good and you gotta be confident, because then it won't hurt you, in my opinion.
1:03:42 Dax Shepard? I could see someone going, this is a little scary, I need to know the real person.
1:03:46 Speaker 02 Yeah, exactly. Frequently also, when the scene is done, you get a feel for the person.
1:03:50 Dax Shepard? Yes.
1:03:51 Speaker 02 The way in Borat, Ken Davision, who played his assistant in Borat, in the first Borat movie, came in with Sasha did not know, but with a very authentic Eastern European accent. And then after he was done, after he got the part, we told him he was American.
1:04:06 Dax Shepard? Oh, wow. Oh, that's great.
1:04:07 Speaker 02 So that was smart, and Sasha was blown away, because we ALG'd him, I mean, we...
1:04:11 Dax Shepard? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay, what's the hardest role you've ever had to cast? Meaning you read the most amount of people and traveled the greatest distance?
1:04:19 Speaker 02 McLovin.
1:04:20 Dax Shepard? Oh, really?
1:04:21 Speaker 02 Everybody knows what McLovin is. Yes.
1:04:24 Dax Shepard? Oh.
1:04:24 Speaker 02 I would say it was the toughest role ever to cast, because it took months and months. Pre-internet, I think we did some sort of a MySpace thing, that was the first big internet thing, right? MySpace?
1:04:35 Dax Shepard? Yes.
1:04:36 Speaker 02 And it turned up nobody. Those are the days you still put up flyers in high schools and things like that. And I knew I wasn't turning up a good geek, you know? I know I can recognize a good geek. And Judd was like, no, no, no, no, no. Michael Cera first came in from McLovin, and then it was apparent he was perfect. That was right after he finished Arrested Development, so he wasn't a star yet. We still had to read every kid in town to play Seth and Evan. Judd first only wanted kids who were actually 18 or 19, so at the time, Jonah was a little bit too old. We wanted him to do the table read, and no, Judd wanted kids younger. I sort of ignored kids who were older than 19 or 20, and then it did dawn on Judd, wait a minute, Jonah looks like a baby, of course he can do this. And then Michael Cera came back and read as Seth, and of course, wait a minute.
1:05:16 Dax Shepard? Or Evan.
1:05:17 Speaker 02 Or Evan.
1:05:18 Dax Shepard? Yeah, yeah, one of the two.
1:05:19 Speaker 02 But McLovin, I wanted to find the most amazing nerd ever Greg Mottola did too. And I knew I wasn't turning anybody up. Casting people know when they're not delivering, you had to keep looking. And so we put up flyers in high schools and I still have a copy of my flyer. It was that, "Attention nerdy high school boys. Call this number or fax, fax your picture to this number." The little headshot of Christopher Mintz-Plasey came through a bad fax. His forehead was stretched out.
1:05:47 Speaker 02 Okay, we're gonna see this kid. We had sent, and my associate at the time, Delia Frankel, had looked up improv classes in high schools. So we had sent them around to high schools and they were calling us. And I think the way he got was one of his friend's mothers said, "There's a flyer for a nerdy high school kid, Christopher. I think you should submit it." So he came in, Judd saw it instantly. Other people did not. I did, Judd did. The reason I thought he was funny is because part of the scene was he had to name his character McLoving. He said McLoving and instead of McLovin. It cracked me up just the way he said it. Those are the little things you recognize in comedy.
1:06:22 Dax Shepard? Yeah.
1:06:22 Speaker 02 And he was just like Coke bottle glasses kind of a kid. The same way that Martin Starr was. He read for all three male roles in Freaks and Geeks, all the geek roles. And he was just like, bingo, he's one of them. And knew what he was doing. He came in and he was like, wow, look at the way this kid looks and he can act.
1:06:38 Dax Shepard? Right.
1:06:39 Speaker 02 Same with Tim Simons when he came in for Veep. Thank you for that compliment, by the way. Veep and Parks and Recs knocked me out, those casts. And I'm not saying it to pat myself on the back.
1:06:48 Speaker 01 They're unreal.
1:06:49 Speaker 02 It's all an act of faith, all of it. And they knocked me out.
1:06:52 Dax Shepard? We heard he was a casting assistant.
1:06:54 Speaker 02 He was at some point. I think he was, I don't know specifically.
1:06:58 Speaker 01 But not for Veep.
1:06:59 Speaker 02 But, I mean, you know, Tim. The way I found Tim, and it's a great sort of casting story. I should get into the Phyllis story too. Am I taking you over too much time?
1:07:06 Speaker 01 No, we love it.
1:07:07 Speaker 02 One of my associates at the time, Peter Kusakas, who's now a great manager at Mosaic. He said, "Would you meet my friend, Tim Simons? He's in..." Did you see that Abraham Lincoln commercial? When she says, "Does this make my butt look big?" And I said, "Oh yeah, that tall guy. He's cool. Of course I would see him. I'd love to see new people, of course, as all casting people do." And I met him, I think we just... Brought him in to read for something and it was like, oh, he's really good. We put that in our headbank and I brought him in shortly thereafter, I think, for one thing that he didn't get. And then I brought him in for the Veep pilot, which was written as like a short, stalky chain smoker.
1:07:39 Dax Shepard? Right.
1:07:40 Speaker 02 Any good casting director, you don't really read the writer's description because you need to just bring in good people.
1:07:45 Dax Shepard? Yes, yes.
1:07:45 Speaker 02 So he came in and he was killer funny. We read great people for the Veep pilot because that writing is Amande Unuchie. And Julia came in for the sessions and read with people.
1:07:55 Dax Shepard? Yeah.
1:07:55 Speaker 02 So that was very enjoyable, but Tim came in and killed it. But his competition was stiff and when we got to the network at HBO, he was great. And after talking, I was able to hear how they came to the conclusion that Tim Simons was the way to go. And again, against some very big comedy people. And Julia would talk about it and how she wanted to act with these people. Julia was a large part of picking that cast. She said about Tony Hale versus the competition for Tony Hale, "I would not be embarrassed to ask Tony Hale to get me a Tampax."
1:08:25 Dax Shepard? Right.
1:08:25 Speaker 02 And that's how he decided he would be the perfect bagman.
1:08:28 Speaker 01 Yes.
1:08:29 Speaker 02 She said, "Tony would not embarrass me. The other person might embarrass me." And it turns out that we ended up using all the runner-ups in recurring roles on Veep.
1:08:36 Dax Shepard? What a frigging cast.
1:08:37 Speaker 01 Wait, do you want to tell Phyllis?
1:08:38 Speaker 02 Oh, Phyllis. I don't know if this is generally known. I think it is that Phyllis was my associate for seven or eight years. And we were casting the pilot of The Office. With Ken Quappas, we were in the room reading. We had two days of final testing for all the different combinations we could use for The Office. I was reading and Phyllis was filming. And Ken Quappas just sort of tiptoed over to me and said, "Let Phyllis read with the actors because I think she might be good in the background." It was like, of course she would. Look at the people in the British office in the background. They're real looking people.
1:09:07 Dax Shepard? Yeah, yeah.
1:09:07 Speaker 02 And so, yes, we let Phyllis read. And she went in to read with the test between like Krasinski and Jenna and a lot of other people. I had previously been reading with Steve and a few other people. And she was great. We were so excited. And then Greg, when he faxed over the pilot, and there was one line for Phyllis. We went.
1:09:24 Dax Shepard? How exciting.
1:09:25 Speaker 02 Because at the time, Phyllis was going to make like $630 for the day. And that was exciting, SAG-Scale.
1:09:31 Dax Shepard? Yes.
1:09:31 Speaker 02 Yeah, in 2003, right about the time I met Dax Shepard.
1:09:38 Speaker 03 Stay tuned for more Armchair Expert if you dare.
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1:13:56 Dax Shepard? Well, I mentioned a new thing. This wasn't one of my questions, but it just occurred to me talking about technology. Clearly now, a big driver of who gets cast is like what their following is.
1:14:05 Speaker 02 Not in what I work on.
1:14:06 Speaker 01 Okay, good.
1:14:06 Dax Shepard? Okay.
1:14:07 Speaker 02 I wouldn't have a clue. And if somebody says to me, oh, they have so many followers or they're this on TikTok, it's not a negative for me, but it means, well, they're not a trained actor.
1:14:15 Dax Shepard? Uh huh.
1:14:15 Speaker 01 Yep.
1:14:16 Speaker 02 Maybe they're funny. I'll look at a clip and it's like, that person's not gonna be able to act. And I've been wrong many times.
1:14:21 Dax Shepard? Yeah.
1:14:21 Speaker 02 But usually, it's a version of that.
1:14:23 Dax Shepard? How about this? What percentage of the roles on the shows and movies that you're casting already have stars attached?
1:14:31 Speaker 02 Almost 100%. Movies have to have a star attached to get it made. To get any financing, you probably need two or three, no matter how low the budget. Even maybe the lower the budget, you need the financiers to say, we got Kristen Bell, you know?
1:14:43 Dax Shepard? Right.
1:14:43 Speaker 02 We got Deck Shepherd.
1:14:44 Dax Shepard? Right, well, let's not play it too fast and loose.
1:14:47 Speaker 02 We got Monica Padman and Deck Shepherd.
1:14:48 Speaker 01 That's a good comment.
1:14:49 Speaker 02 Now we're talking.
1:14:50 Dax Shepard? We're adding up to like half a Kristen Bell.
1:14:52 Speaker 01 Kristen in the mix, all three. It's looking pretty good.
1:14:54 Speaker 02 And TV frequently now, for the streamers, they probably have a project attached to, like I'm currently doing Bill Lawrence's show with Steve Carell. But we're casting everybody around him.
1:15:02 Dax Shepard? Yes. So what is your preference? Do you like to start with a clean slate? Or do you like that it-
1:15:06 Speaker 02 Oh, I'd love to start with a clean slate. The Office, we started with a clean slate.
1:15:10 Dax Shepard? And would you prefer to break unknowns?
1:15:12 Speaker 02 In comedy, for sure.
1:15:13 Dax Shepard? It's gotta be more rewarding for you.
1:15:15 Speaker 02 It's so much more rewarding to give someone a break.
1:15:18 Dax Shepard? Yes.
1:15:19 Speaker 01 Earlier, you said, I love meeting new people, as all casting directors do. But I don't think that's true. I think you're an exception. I think a lot of casting directors, they don't necessarily want to see anyone new. They want reliable people they already know. And I think it's special.
1:15:33 Speaker 02 I don't know about that. I couldn't speak for other people.
1:15:35 Speaker 01 Well, I think it's special.
1:15:36 Speaker 02 You may be more of an expert in that than I, but I know that we all have our favorites based on how we perceive the talent and how they can deliver and how they haven't been given a shot to do it yet. I'll read something and think, oh, this is perfect for Monica Padman, or this is perfect for Rory Scoville or something. And they haven't been given that huge shot yet.
1:15:52 Dax Shepard? Yeah.
1:15:52 Speaker 01 Yeah. But I think that's an exception. I really do.
1:15:54 Speaker 02 You really do?
1:15:55 Speaker 01 I do.
1:15:55 Speaker 02 I don't know.
1:15:56 Speaker 01 I think it's special.
1:15:57 Dax Shepard? Have you had people who you know are so talented and you've seen them be so talented, and they just can't audition?
1:16:03 Speaker 02 Oh, plenty, especially in comedy.
1:16:05 Dax Shepard? And is it heartbreaking?
1:16:06 Speaker 02 It's heartbreaking because my job then is to talk the director into it and to show them stuff or another audition where they've done it. Sometimes it works and sometimes it just doesn't. People will listen to you and then people won't listen to you.
1:16:18 Dax Shepard? Yeah, I gotta say, one of the, I think, more difficult things about this job is I don't know how good Daniel Day Lewis is as an auditioner.
1:16:25 Speaker 02 He would probably be the worst auditioner.
1:16:27 Dax Shepard? He probably would be. It's a different skill set. It's almost the closest they'll get to stand up. They don't have any of the environment, they don't have the other actors.
1:16:35 Speaker 02 There's the reverse. There are people who are great auditioners who then on the set, you don't get anything more from them.
1:16:40 Dax Shepard? Yeah.
1:16:41 Speaker 02 Yeah, you get the line reading from the audition. However, a kid who was great from the time he was 12, Leonardo DiCaprio.
1:16:46 Dax Shepard? Wow. Okay, so let's talk about Once Upon a Time. I gotta say, in the last 10 years, the performance that has blown my mind more than any other, and I watch the movie all the time, is Once Upon a Time. Leonardo DiCaprio in that movie is so next level. I don't think people are recognizing that he's playing three levels of actor. He is an actor, playing an actor, who's okay sometimes, and then he has a moment where he's great. But he's not as great as Leonardo DiCaprio can be great. He's as great as that actor can be great. When you see what's going on in that scene and what he's having to juggle, it's so impressive.
1:17:19 Speaker 02 He has never given a bad performance. He's always almost better than some of the movies he's in. Killers of the Flower Moon, any other actor in that part would have been like they were doing a role from a sketch in Hootenanny. You know, it was like, are you kidding me? He was heartbreakingly good in that role. And he was so over the top. And the version of that in comedy is like Steve Carell as Michael Scott. So over the top, but still unbelievably real and good. You gotta be a genius to pull those off.
1:17:46 Dax Shepard? Well, Allison Jones, this has been such a delight.
1:17:49 Speaker 02 And a delight for me. I could talk to you guys for hours.
1:17:51 Dax Shepard? Oh, same.
1:17:52 Speaker 02 You're the best.
1:17:53 Dax Shepard? You're so sweet and wonderful. And I'm, well, I guess my single last question is, you refuted my claim of 42 years, but it is 41 years.
1:18:02 Speaker 02 Might be 41 and a half, but just say 41.
1:18:07 Dax Shepard? How on earth have you kept your stamina to stay hungry? And your job is so hard, the hours are so crazy. How have you stayed hungry and dialed in?
1:18:17 Speaker 02 Only because I like it. However, the past 10, 15 years, it's a different business in terms of what we do and in terms of pressure you get from top heavy things. And things have changed completely.
1:18:27 Dax Shepard? You're like a doctor that has to do managed care now with a insurance provider.
1:18:31 Speaker 02 Exactly.
1:18:31 Dax Shepard? Yeah.
1:18:32 Speaker 02 Perfect. And even since streaming has started, it's incredibly different. You go to one of these streamers and we become just data entry people. Everything's put into algorithm. I hate the word algorithm. They've algorithmized creativity and you can't do that.
1:18:44 Dax Shepard? Yeah.
1:18:45 Speaker 02 But they have and they've tried in terms of payment and who to cast and what's going to appeal to a certain group of people overseas or here. Netflix is doing that a little too much, I think, just in my very humble opinion.
1:18:55 Speaker 01 It's not a humble opinion. Your opinion, again, if you look at your resume is insane. I was right to be so excited to get an audition from you.
1:19:06 Speaker 02 Well, you're so kind.
1:19:06 Speaker 01 You're a legend.
1:19:07 Dax Shepard? Yeah, we're super honored that you could have chatted with us.
1:19:11 Speaker 02 My assistant Hannah freaked out when I told her I was doing this.
1:19:14 Dax Shepard? Well, she did.
1:19:15 Speaker 02 Yeah, I'm afraid I'm not a podcast person either and I should be because I'm a true crime person more than anything.
1:19:20 Dax Shepard? Oh, then you're missing out on the.
1:19:21 Speaker 02 I know, but I Googled armchair expert and I typed too fast and it said arm hair expert. I'm not kidding.
1:19:28 Dax Shepard? That should be a, another show we do.
1:19:31 Speaker 01 Arm hair expert.
1:19:33 Speaker 02 I need one.
1:19:33 Speaker 01 I have Arm A. It's literally insane.
1:19:36 Dax Shepard? Fuck, I forgot one question I want to ask. This is a nosey question, but when you have a track record like yours and someone wants to cast a comedy, starting with you is like starting with Jimmy Burrows.
1:19:48 Speaker 02 Thank you.
1:19:49 Dax Shepard? Do you get to participate ever in the success of a show?
1:19:53 Speaker 02 No, and I wish I had on a couple of indies I have.
1:19:56 Speaker 01 You mean financially.
1:19:57 Speaker 02 One of them has paid off extremely well, but casting directors, we can't even get paid ads. I mean, we just don't get anything because studios don't care and they don't understand.
1:20:06 Speaker 01 That's insane.
1:20:07 Dax Shepard? I feel like you should be a participant.
1:20:10 Speaker 01 You should be so rich.
1:20:12 Speaker 02 You can on indie movies because they do need you to attach some of their leads. Like that, but no, on television, never. If I had residuals on shows like Boy Meets World, Fresh Principality, or The Office, I'd be retired right now and I'd be very happy.
1:20:25 Dax Shepard? Yeah.
1:20:26 Speaker 02 But no, we do not, and I wish we did. That's the next step. This year, I was able to help negotiate with the AMPTP and the Teamsters. And it was fascinating, and we can only go baby step by baby step. But when we could ever participate, especially in a cast like The Office, which you do do from scratch.
1:20:43 Speaker 01 Yeah.
1:20:44 Speaker 02 And people do know your value as a casting person.
1:20:46 Dax Shepard? Yes.
1:20:47 Speaker 02 In a comedy, basically, I do know I have value.
1:20:49 Dax Shepard? Yes, of course.
1:20:50 Speaker 02 Creatively, anyway. But thank you for asking that, because no, we almost get paid within the same pay range, too. I don't get paid much more than...
1:20:57 Dax Shepard? Anybody else. It's kind of like when you're a director of a TV show, you get the DGA minimum. It doesn't matter if you've had a great career. Now, if you're Burrows, you can obviously negotiate ownership of the show to do the pilot.
1:21:07 Speaker 02 That's how they make money, right? The ownership of the show. Anybody who gets to do a pilot, very good. Jim Burrows is so wealthy.
1:21:13 Speaker 01 Yeah, oh, my God.
1:21:14 Speaker 02 To get a pilot, he's done.
1:21:15 Dax Shepard? Warner bought the fucking Red Sox.
1:21:16 Speaker 02 Yeah, I know, I know.
1:21:18 Dax Shepard? Yeah. Although, again, that, too, has changed.
1:21:20 Speaker 02 What do you mean, it's changed?
1:21:21 Dax Shepard? Well, Seinfeld would sell into a cycle of syndication for $800 million. And in the streaming world, none of these shows that have been on the air for six years get sold into syndication. People don't get... Like, Mike Schur, one of my questions, I said, "Mike, do you ever lament the fact that if you had the exact same career you had in the 80s and 90s, you would have $800 million?" He goes, "Yeah, I think about that a lot."
1:21:44 Speaker 02 One of my very early pilots was for a very big, then-TV producer named James Comack, who did Sanford and Son and did all the cool shows. And he had a big home in Beverly Hills that he called Casa Syndication.
1:21:55 Speaker 01 Oh, my God.
1:21:58 Speaker 02 So, come on. Yeah, yeah. But that's a lovely question to ask about if we participate, because no, and I wish I did.
1:22:03 Dax Shepard? No, and you should.
1:22:04 Speaker 02 And I wish I had. It'll never happen.
1:22:06 Dax Shepard? It's kind of bonkers.
1:22:07 Speaker 02 Not in my lifetime.
1:22:08 Speaker 01 It's crazy to me.
1:22:08 Speaker 02 Or it's stock options. I'll take stock options, too.
1:22:10 Speaker 01 Yeah, you just have something.
1:22:12 Speaker 02 Netflix, okay, don't pay me, but give me a mutual fund of Amazon. Put a mutual fund out and pay us that way.
1:22:18 Dax Shepard? Yes.
1:22:19 Speaker 02 And then, when you get rich, we get rich.
1:22:21 Dax Shepard? Okay, well, Alison, I look forward to seeing you again. We adore you. This has been so fun. I'm so glad you agreed to do it.
1:22:27 Speaker 02 Likewise.
1:22:27 Dax Shepard? And I hope your nerves dissipated.
1:22:29 Speaker 02 It's dissipated. I was so excited when you emailed.
1:22:32 Dax Shepard? You're definitely getting called back to producers. I can tell you in the room.
1:22:35 Speaker 02 Thank you so much.
1:22:36 Dax Shepard? Yeah, yeah, yeah. All right, be well.
1:22:39 Speaker 02 Thank you.
1:22:42 Speaker 05 Stay tuned for the fact check. It's where the party's at.
1:22:49 Speaker 01 Yeah, but it's fine.
1:22:51 Dax Shepard? I think he's a, I don't know what the word is.
1:22:54 Speaker 01 Sturdy?
1:22:54 Dax Shepard? I was gonna say fighter. That's not right. I don't, clinger. Like, maybe he's, because I wouldn't call a sloth a fighter. By God, can they hang upside down indefinitely?
1:23:03 Speaker 01 That's true. That is true.
1:23:05 Dax Shepard? So maybe he's sloth-like?
1:23:06 Speaker 01 He wants to show up for his friends.
1:23:08 Dax Shepard? And for the holiday.
1:23:09 Speaker 01 Yeah.
1:23:10 Dax Shepard? What is that thing, Monica?
1:23:13 Dax Shepard? Is that a person or a reindeer or a ram? Those horns are, should be kind of informative.
1:23:20 Speaker 01 I think he's a bear reindeer.
1:23:22 Dax Shepard? It's just a big old rein, with two big horns. Or those are his ears? Or hers. I shouldn't genderize.
1:23:28 Speaker 01 I think those are ears and then he, and then...
1:23:31 Dax Shepard? Some antennas.
1:23:33 Speaker 01 Whore.
1:23:33 Dax Shepard? I see some metal antennas on...
1:23:35 Speaker 01 Those were reindeer horns. That's our hat.
1:23:40 Dax Shepard? Yeah, and to put it on the very top, made it leave frame.
1:23:44 Speaker 01 Yeah, so he's just sitting on some branches.
1:23:46 Dax Shepard? Yeah, he's almost, he's almost summited that tree.
1:23:49 Speaker 01 He's a he.
1:23:50 Dax Shepard? Yeah, he's, let's, let's call it what it is.
1:23:53 Speaker 01 Yeah, it's festive in here.
1:23:55 Dax Shepard? Okay, so we just, we just scrambled, right? Because we're setting up for the holiday episode.
1:24:02 Speaker 01 Yeah, which we should tell, we have a holiday episode coming up. It's a bonus episode.
1:24:07 Dax Shepard? It's a bonus extra episode.
1:24:09 Speaker 01 Yes.
1:24:09 Dax Shepard? On the 20th.
1:24:10 Speaker 01 That's a coming.
1:24:12 Dax Shepard? That's the 20th, this one is coming.
1:24:13 Speaker 01 It will be on YouTube, though.
1:24:15 Dax Shepard? Of course, it's gonna be everywhere.
1:24:16 Speaker 01 I think people should watch it on YouTube.
1:24:18 Dax Shepard? Oh, big time. You're gonna have some A-list singers dropping through, gonna have some present reveals, gonna have a lot of decor. This is only a taste of what Wobbly Wobb's got more stuff planned.
1:24:32 Speaker 01 Great.
1:24:33 Dax Shepard? As he does. This tree has been stolen from my daughter's room. So, I had a really great meditation this morning.
1:24:43 Speaker 01 Great.
1:24:44 Dax Shepard? It's been a long time since I had a great one.
1:24:46 Speaker 01 What constitutes a great? Meditation.
1:24:48 Dax Shepard? I think what adds up to it is like, can I stop ruminating? Can I not think about our employers during my meditation? Can I achieve that goal? And so I got kind of, I took a different tactic with my mantra a little bit, which was no one's, and we don't need to get this in detail, but I was just literally like, say, you have to say the mantra five times. And just concentrating with some limited thing, then I could buy myself five more. All to say, when it's really great, I lose a sense of my body, which is really fun. Like, I know how I'm sitting, but I can't really feel my hands or my legs anymore. I can tell them to kind of detach from my body. And then I'll often get blasts of light.
1:25:31 Dax Shepard? I'll start seeing like lights in my, there's a word for this. In TM, but I don't know what it is. I heard, I've heard Howard talking about it. But I'll get some light activity in my detached state from my body. And anyways, when I came out of it, and that's why I'm telling you about it, is when it ended all by myself in my room, I said, hey, y'all, really great meditation.
1:25:50 Speaker 01 Wow, that was the first thing out.
1:25:53 Dax Shepard? It was.
1:25:54 Speaker 01 That's great.
1:25:55 Dax Shepard? That's the power of TM. It opened up my creative channels enough to go, hey, y'all, really great meditation.
1:26:00 Speaker 01 That's good.
1:26:01 Dax Shepard? And then I thought, of course, need to have an app that just at the end of your thing, you hear, hey, y'all, really great meditation.
1:26:09 Speaker 01 That would be great. People would buy it. Are you done with your Christmas shopping?
1:26:14 Dax Shepard? Oh, man, I'm afraid to even think about that. I mean, I know I've gotten a bunch and I've certainly forgotten people and it's gonna.
1:26:22 Speaker 01 Yeah.
1:26:23 Dax Shepard? As much as I, this is my holiday, as you know, it's my favorite. God, do I cherish every day of it. In fact, I hate that it's coming.
1:26:33 Speaker 01 Yeah.
1:26:33 Dax Shepard? I hate that there'll be a day where it ends.
1:26:35 Speaker 01 Yeah, I know.
1:26:36 Dax Shepard? And so the girls will be like, they're in a hurry. And I'm like, no, no, guys, just pump the brakes.
1:26:40 Speaker 01 Enjoy it.
1:26:40 Dax Shepard? Enjoy. It's so much more fun anticipating it. But the only part I can't stand about it is the test of your love for others by your, how thoughtful your gift was. And then I was thinking, I got a little cynical for a minute. I was like, they, they really got us with this racket. I mean, what an incredible racket.
1:26:59 Speaker 01 Yeah.
1:26:59 Dax Shepard? For consumerism, it's like you have to go buy something for everyone you care about.
1:27:06 Speaker 01 Yeah.
1:27:07 Dax Shepard? That's the rules.
1:27:09 Speaker 01 Well, it's not always the rules. You can make new rules like secret turkey. We have to make our gifts. You don't have to go out and buy. It's just, it's just taking time to think about people.
1:27:20 Dax Shepard? Yeah. What if at Christmas morning, everyone sat around and you go, I thought about you. Like that was the present.
1:27:26 Speaker 01 That would be nice.
1:27:28 Dax Shepard? Well, that'd be like the Grinch who stole Christmas. Maybe Christmas doesn't come from a store.
1:27:32 Speaker 01 Wow. Dr. Seussian.
1:27:34 Dax Shepard? Seussian.
1:27:35 Speaker 01 Yeah. Your favorite word.
1:27:36 Dax Shepard? You know, this, this is a blast from the past, but um Crosby's houseboat, which was in Sausalito Harbor in real life.
1:27:46 Speaker 01 Okay.
1:27:46 Dax Shepard? The first time we ever shot on it, it was an actual boat. And then of course, it was on a soundstage down here, but it was originally in Sausalito. Two boats over from Crosby's boat was Dr. Seuss's boat. He had a houseboat in Sausalito.
1:27:57 Speaker 01 And he still had.
1:27:58 Dax Shepard? It was still his boat. I guess it was his wife's at that point.
1:28:00 Speaker 01 His wife's still alive?
1:28:02 Dax Shepard? She was in 2000, but whatever year we filmed the pilot.
1:28:05 Speaker 01 Whoa.
1:28:06 Dax Shepard? Wobbly Wobb, give us a update on Mrs. Seuss.
1:28:10 Speaker 06 His second wife.
1:28:12 Dax Shepard? Okay.
1:28:13 Speaker 06 Died in 2018.
1:28:15 Dax Shepard? Yeah, that's way after we shot. Another blast from the past. Are you ready for this?
1:28:19 Speaker 01 Yes.
1:28:20 Dax Shepard? Some scholarly detective armcherry. People, a lot of people know this whole thing because they came in and COVID. My endless fucking thing about the American soldiers getting the English woman pregnant during World War II.
1:28:36 Speaker 01 Yeah.
1:28:36 Dax Shepard? They found the book I'm talking about. You know who wrote it?
1:28:39 Speaker 01 Dr. Seuss.
1:28:41 Dax Shepard? Dr. Sees. No, Margaret Mead. That's a Margaret Mead book. It's almost impossible to get. There's like five libraries in the country.
1:28:49 Speaker 01 What's it called?
1:28:50 Dax Shepard? I could tell you. Tell you right frigging now, but not only did am I not insane that I imagined that whole thing. It's Margaret Mead, Godmother of Anthro. It's called The American Troops and the British Community, an examination of the relationship between the American troops and the British by Margaret Mead.
1:29:08 Speaker 01 Is this the pumping the brakes thing?
1:29:10 Dax Shepard? Yes.
1:29:10 Speaker 01 Yeah, okay.
1:29:11 Dax Shepard? That her conclusion was culturally in America, women have the brake pedal, men have the gas pedal, but in England, men have the brake pedal, women have the gas pedal. You get a couple of folks with a gas pedal. I had an anecdotal experience with a gal.
1:29:24 Speaker 01 You did?
1:29:25 Dax Shepard? Who I adore.
1:29:26 Speaker 01 Yeah.
1:29:27 Dax Shepard? What a gift.
1:29:28 Speaker 01 Yeah.
1:29:29 Dax Shepard? Yeah.
1:29:29 Speaker 01 And we used to ask all British people if they agreed with this and pretty much no one did.
1:29:35 Dax Shepard? Well, I I remember it as being like 50 50, but.
1:29:38 Speaker 01 Oh, okay.
1:29:39 Dax Shepard? And then there was, but in my pursuit of figuring out what the hell I had read, of course, I stumbled upon a bunch of other academic papers on this same topic because there's this huge term war babies. There was like this, yeah. And so one of the theories or conclusions was another element is that in America kissing is nothing. Anyone will kiss, kiss on a first date, whatever. But that in the steps of progression in England in 1942, kissing was very far down the road. You'd have held hands, you'd have done all this other stuff. Like, I guess kissing was like, you're there. You've committed to kissing, you're pretty much committed to banging. And so there was some miscommunication there. Where the Americans, she has, they're like, let me put one on you. And then those gals
1:30:24 Dax Shepard? were like, oh, my God, this, I think we're gonna have.
1:30:27 Speaker 01 Oh, wow.
1:30:27 Dax Shepard? Sessual intercourse. This is so intimate. Not as intimate as holding hands.
1:30:32 Speaker 01 Yeah. For me, the most intimate is holding hands. I have to basically be about to marry you in order to hold my hand.
1:30:43 Dax Shepard? That would be so weird. To be dating you, had have made out, rolled around, lots of sex, go to grab your hand and you always pull it away. That would be freaky.
1:30:53 Speaker 01 Well, this happened. I went on a couple of dates with someone and they held my hand and I
1:31:00 Dax Shepard? You were ready.
1:31:00 Speaker 01 Was like, what are you doing?
1:31:03 Dax Shepard? Yeah, like, let's do anal, but let's not do this.
1:31:07 Speaker 01 Way too intimate, way too intimate.
1:31:11 Dax Shepard? Where do you think that stems from?
1:31:13 Speaker 01 I guess the only real memory I have of having my hand held is as a kid from my parents.
1:31:20 Dax Shepard? Yeah, sure.
1:31:20 Speaker 01 Or my grandparents or someone like making sure I was safe.
1:31:25 Dax Shepard? Yes.
1:31:26 Speaker 01 It wasn't just, no one in my family just holds hands.
1:31:31 Speaker 01 They don't. Yeah, I think it's on too, but it's my life. So my parents don't hold hands or anything. So it wasn't, it wasn't a symbol of like romantic affection. It was a symbol of safety. And that's extremely intimate.
1:31:47 Dax Shepard? Yeah.
1:31:47 Speaker 01 So unless you're about to propose, you're not allowed to hold my hand.
1:31:53 Dax Shepard? Grab that hand when it's time to propose. I hold hands on the ride to school every morning.
1:31:59 Speaker 01 Yeah.
1:31:59 Dax Shepard? If I'm in the car with them and they're in the front seat, we're holding hands.
1:32:03 Speaker 01 Yeah. I feel like you hold your, you hold Kristen's hand, you hold people's hands.
1:32:07 Dax Shepard? I hold Erin's hand.
1:32:08 Speaker 01 Um, yeah, yeah.
1:32:11 Dax Shepard? Hand holding is very nice.
1:32:12 Speaker 01 I think it's very nice.
1:32:13 Dax Shepard? Yeah, very intimate for you.
1:32:16 Speaker 01 It is. It is. Um, okay. Do I have my Christmas presents done? Not really. This year, I didn't feel like I got the, there was a perfect gift for anyone, really. So I didn't really, so far I haven't got the satisfaction that I normally get in buying presents. But that's okay. You can't win every time.
1:32:43 Dax Shepard? Right. And so you, you, what I'm grateful for is you have experienced how I mostly experienced buying presents. I hope they like this. This'll do. They'll know I thought of them.
1:32:53 Speaker 01 Well, I know everyone will like it.
1:32:56 Dax Shepard? Sure. You got good taste.
1:32:57 Speaker 01 Yeah.
1:32:57 Dax Shepard? Yeah, yeah.
1:32:58 Speaker 01 But I, it wasn't, I wasn't like, I'm not feeling like, I'm so excited for everyone to open their gifts.
1:33:05 Dax Shepard? See their faces.
1:33:06 Speaker 01 And they're gonna, and it's so thoughtful. It's like, not as thoughtful this year, but you know, it's okay.
1:33:11 Dax Shepard? I've already had some mixups, so. Use your gift guide. Everyone should.
1:33:17 Speaker 01 A lot is sold. You said a lot was sold out and I was thought you were just being nice, but then I went on to buy some, to send some stuff to my mom to buy me. And because she needs, she needs a written list.
1:33:29 Dax Shepard? Yeah.
1:33:29 Speaker 01 And a lot was gone.
1:33:32 Dax Shepard? Oh, yeah.
1:33:32 Speaker 01 I wanted stuff off of that.
1:33:33 Dax Shepard? Virtually nothing. The only thing I could get is when I'd be on the website and then I'd start sniffing around for other items. Those glasses, those adorable glasses, which they didn't have the first time I was at that website.
1:33:48 Speaker 01 Oh, they got back in stock?
1:33:49 Dax Shepard? Then I was there for some other business. So anyways, I sent them to my sister in law.
1:33:54 Speaker 01 Cute.
1:33:55 Dax Shepard? And they arrived and they just opened up the box and then she sends me a text. I like these. I'm like, well, how could you have thought? You didn't have to wait till Christmas.
1:34:04 Speaker 01 Well, she.
1:34:05 Dax Shepard? But, but it's not her fault. It's not her fault. Slow down. Slow down, Dex. She goes, oh my God, I'm so, your brother feels terrible. So what happened was the box came, my brother just opened it. He knows I didn't get him fucking set of glasses.
1:34:19 Speaker 01 Yeah.
1:34:19 Dax Shepard? So he just said, I had to, thanks, guy, these glasses. But, um, but clearly it's Christmas. You want to hear the gross thing I did too?
1:34:27 Speaker 01 What'd you do?
1:34:28 Dax Shepard? She's like, oh, I like them. And then I'm like, I need her to know they're not kids. I didn't get those at my. I didn't get them at a fast food restaurant. I'm like, those.
1:34:37 Speaker 01 They're nice.
1:34:38 Dax Shepard? I respond, yeah, those are Monica's fancy glasses. Like I, I, I enlisted you. I was like, yeah, she'll, she knows if I said these are Monica's, she's going to go like, ooh, he spoiled me.
1:34:50 Speaker 01 Oh, that's nice. Uh, that is really nice.
1:34:54 Dax Shepard? Is that store not in America?
1:34:56 Speaker 01 It's not.
1:34:57 Dax Shepard? Okay, great. So this is a grievance I have. I went nuts there. And they use DHL, which I guarantee is a phenomenal service. This is no shade of DHL, but it's, I think it must work easier in Europe. This is a ton of texts and it just standard is a signature. No.
1:35:14 Speaker 01 I know.
1:35:15 Dax Shepard? Fucking standard is no signature, guys, unless I say signature. So then I gotta go, every single item I bought from that place, which is a lot. I had to go and fill out the forms to make sure that they could be left on the porch, but after, but I have my texts from DHL. I probably have 40 texts from DHL in the last week. And every time I think, no, no, this one's just an update. It's not the consent form for the no signature. I already did that.
1:35:38 Speaker 01 Oh, boy. Yeah. The signature can get very stressful.
1:35:44 Dax Shepard? Listen to my complaints in life.
1:35:46 Speaker 01 What?
1:35:46 Dax Shepard? I just got completely ashamed of my complaints.
1:35:49 Speaker 01 Yeah.
1:35:49 Dax Shepard? Like, we live in an era where I can see something that's gorgeous and then it'll arrive somewhere. And I'm like so flummoxed.
1:35:54 Speaker 01 Like, I have to sign for it.
1:35:55 Dax Shepard? I had to click my phone twice.
1:35:58 Speaker 01 It's true. It's true. But this is what happens with technology. We just get accustomed.
1:36:05 Dax Shepard? To it being quicker and quicker and quicker and easier and easier.
1:36:07 Speaker 01 Yeah. And we want it to be, I mean, again, we've talked about this a lot, but like, the amount of minutes my brain has spent on wishing there was teleportation and really wishing, like thinking like, I think that's coming and that needs to come now.
1:36:21 Dax Shepard? And like, it's about time. Like, actually frustrated.
1:36:24 Speaker 01 Yeah.
1:36:24 Dax Shepard? Where is it?
1:36:25 Speaker 01 Yeah.
1:36:26 Dax Shepard? Yeah. When I try to explain to the kids that like, yeah, I had a cassette tape. It was 60 minutes long. If I wanted to listen to my favorite song over and over again, I had to rewind forever. And then who knows where you land?
1:36:38 Speaker 01 Who knows?
1:36:39 Dax Shepard? You can't land on your song.
1:36:40 Speaker 01 No.
1:36:41 Dax Shepard? You're always gonna be listening to the back half of a song you don't wanna listen to.
1:36:44 Speaker 01 Sure. I know. Wild. Um.
1:36:47 Dax Shepard? You're in all black today.
1:36:49 Speaker 01 Well, I think these are.
1:36:51 Dax Shepard? You look great.
1:36:52 Speaker 01 Thank you.
1:36:53 Dax Shepard? Yeah, very smart outfit.
1:36:54 Speaker 01 Thank you. But I think these are actually dark navy.
1:36:57 Dax Shepard? I don't wanna do this.
1:36:59 Speaker 01 They are. They are.
1:37:00 Dax Shepard? Let me guess, your shoes and socks aren't white. They're titanium white.
1:37:04 Speaker 01 I bought these at a store and when I bought them, they were navy.
1:37:11 Dax Shepard? On the description.
1:37:12 Speaker 01 I think so.
1:37:14 Dax Shepard? Okay.
1:37:14 Speaker 01 I want to be honest and say, I don't really remember, but I'm pretty sure they were.
1:37:18 Dax Shepard? I'm ensnared in it. Here we go. There's no way those are navy.
1:37:24 Speaker 01 Hold on.
1:37:25 Dax Shepard? I can't sit here and have you saying those are navy. It's the same color as your shirt.
1:37:28 Speaker 06 On the TV, it kind of looks navy.
1:37:30 Speaker 01 It does?
1:37:30 Dax Shepard? Here we go. This is a constant double cross from Wabi.
1:37:34 Speaker 06 I don't know if in person though. Well, blown up. It's just kind of shimmery.
1:37:38 Speaker 01 Yeah. Thank you, Rob, for being honest, speaking your mind.
1:37:44 Dax Shepard? You have something on Rob. There's something behind.
1:37:47 Speaker 06 You both have gray points. I think it could be both.
1:37:50 Speaker 01 Look, I will say, I know. I will say that normally I'm more, it's navy. Like, I feel very definitive about it.
1:38:00 Dax Shepard? Yeah.
1:38:01 Speaker 01 I'll give you that these, a couple of times I've thought, are these black? But then they're not.
1:38:10 Dax Shepard? Okay. I would prefer you, you go like, these aren't navy. That's the kind of reaction.
1:38:16 Speaker 01 You prefer me to say, these aren't navy than are these black?
1:38:20 Dax Shepard? Yeah, I just think it's funny to go, like you've been duped years ago. These aren't navy, just to yourself.
1:38:28 Speaker 01 Right.
1:38:29 Dax Shepard? You don't think that's funny?
1:38:30 Speaker 01 I just think it's literally the exact same thing. This is like what happens on sets where there's a line written. And some, the person, normally the writer says like, oh, this is the best way to say it.
1:38:44 Dax Shepard? Writer.
1:38:45 Speaker 01 Sometimes me.
1:38:46 Dax Shepard? Yeah, me. Sometimes me.
1:38:47 Speaker 01 Exactly. And says, well, no, this is, I've dissected that this is the funniest way to say it.
1:38:54 Dax Shepard? Yeah.
1:38:54 Speaker 01 And then the actor, whoever will say the same line. And then the original person is, is like, oh, no, no, no. Can you go back? Can you say?
1:39:08 Dax Shepard? Well, unfortunately, that's actually the script supervisors.
1:39:10 Speaker 01 Navy?
1:39:11 Dax Shepard? Job, which is so unfair because they don't give a fuck what you say.
1:39:14 Speaker 01 I don't care.
1:39:15 Dax Shepard? And they're pitted right between the actor and the writer.
1:39:18 Speaker 01 Yeah, this isn't Navy and is this black?
1:39:20 Dax Shepard? Those are pretty substantively different.
1:39:23 Speaker 01 No, they're not.
1:39:25 Dax Shepard? I think so.
1:39:25 Speaker 01 No, they're not.
1:39:26 Dax Shepard? Like, if you had written the line, say your line again.
1:39:29 Speaker 01 Are these black?
1:39:30 Dax Shepard? That's really good. You sold it this time. So I'll try that. I'll do, I'll do one your way and then you pick in the edit.
1:39:35 Speaker 01 Okay.
1:39:37 Dax Shepard? Are these black? That's kind of a new read on it, yeah.
1:39:42 Speaker 01 New read. Oh, is this Navy?
1:39:44 Dax Shepard? It was like an acting exercise. I didn't want to do exactly how you did.
1:39:46 Speaker 01 Do the Navy one now.
1:39:47 Dax Shepard? Oh, didn't I? No, I was doing yours.
1:39:50 Speaker 01 Oh, but I want you to do both so I could pick in the edit. My God, you told me, you set this up.
1:39:56 Dax Shepard? That's lunch, everybody.
1:40:00 Dax Shepard? We didn't get to it.
1:40:02 Speaker 06 I was leaving for lunch.
1:40:04 Speaker 01 Oh.
1:40:11 Speaker 03 Stay tuned for more Armchair Expert if you dare.
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1:41:00 Dax Shepard? Let yourself run. Explore the new Peloton Tread Flex at onepeloton.com.
1:41:13 Speaker 01 Oh my god.
1:41:15 Dax Shepard? I like the idea of that Rob leaves for lunch.
1:41:16 Speaker 01 That was like, oh, that was such a Rob joke.
1:41:20 Dax Shepard? Yeah.
1:41:22 Speaker 01 It wasn't a pun though, but it was like a behavioral pun.
1:41:25 Dax Shepard? A baby, a baby pun, a baby behavioral pun.
1:41:28 Speaker 01 Yeah. Wow, that was, that was great. Okay, wait, so.
1:41:31 Dax Shepard? Back to why you're in all black. No real reason, just that's your outfit.
1:41:34 Speaker 01 Yeah, this is just like.
1:41:34 Dax Shepard? No one passed.
1:41:36 Speaker 01 No, no, no, no. It's, I just thought it was chic.
1:41:41 Dax Shepard? Yeah, yeah. Dressed to impress, dressed to impress.
1:41:43 Speaker 01 Yep, I did, I do that. People wanna.
1:41:46 Dax Shepard? Why did you look down at your?
1:41:48 Speaker 01 Cause I have a fuzz.
1:41:49 Dax Shepard? Oh, okay. I go, dressed to impress, and you go?
1:41:54 Speaker 01 This is my outfit.
1:41:54 Dax Shepard? I'm just repeating what, what just actually happened. We could rewind the tape.
1:41:58 Speaker 01 Okay, I looked down, this is my outfit, and then I saw I have a bunch of fuzzies on.
1:42:03 Dax Shepard? Tell me I dressed to impress, even though you know where it's going.
1:42:07 Speaker 01 You dressed to impress.
1:42:15 Dax Shepard? Wouldn't that be a wild?
1:42:17 Speaker 01 If for me to, for me to look at my outfit and not look at my boobs, I'd have to like.
1:42:24 Dax Shepard? Okay, fair, fair.
1:42:25 Speaker 01 I feel so conscious now.
1:42:27 Dax Shepard? Oh no, I'm sorry, I'm sorry. I'm sorry.
1:42:32 Speaker 01 Um.
1:42:33 Dax Shepard? I'm sorry if that was inappropriate.
1:42:34 Speaker 01 Anyway.
1:42:35 Dax Shepard? Anyway, I know where we're at. Really great meditation.
1:42:40 Speaker 01 That was so long ago. Um, yeah, well, I'm glad you had a great meditation.
1:42:45 Dax Shepard? Good, me too. I watched A Christmas Story last night.
1:42:50 Speaker 01 Okay.
1:42:51 Dax Shepard? No one will watch it with me. I mean, the kids won't watch it with me.
1:42:54 Speaker 01 Got it.
1:42:55 Dax Shepard? And I was like, why don't they, they know good shit. Why are they acting like they don't like this movie? I really couldn't accept it. And then I was watching it and they weren't there. And I was like, yeah, it's probably a little slow for them. I could admit that. And it made me very nostalgic for back when there was like a downtown and it was decorated. Cause when I was a kid, Detroit still had like Hudson's did a big Christmas display. You could go meet Santa and you go to Saunders Ice Cream and have a cream puff. And there was a whole thing. There was a, there was a parade and then Cobble Hall had this thing. And I, you know, that opening shot where they go, it's a wide, it's in Cleveland in the 50s. Higby's, you remember they had their, their department store was Higby's and it was lit up, lit up beautifully and a really great window display with train sets.
1:43:39 Speaker 01 Yeah.
1:43:40 Dax Shepard? It made me so nostalgic and sad.
1:43:42 Speaker 01 Oh, I'm sorry. Well, also to them, like the 50s is like the 1900s to us.
1:43:50 Dax Shepard? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
1:43:52 Speaker 01 I don't want to watch a movie about the 1900s.
1:43:54 Dax Shepard? Yeah. And you know what? Instead of like trying to get my kids to like it, what I do, I go, oh, my father-in-law was born in Cleveland and this is the era of his childhood. So I'm like, hey, do you love A Christmas Story? He's like, who doesn't? I go, yeah, but you particularly, you grew up in Cleveland. And then he was like, is it set in Cleveland? Then he sent me this whole thing. He's like, oh my God, you're right. Higby's. I used to go to Higby's every, and then he had a whole story about Higby's.
1:44:16 Speaker 01 That's cute.
1:44:17 Dax Shepard? Yeah.
1:44:17 Speaker 01 So then you just text it throughout the whole movie?
1:44:20 Dax Shepard? Because it's slow and boring. It's not a good movie. No, it's so good. And Ralphie, if anyone's gonna, has yet to watch it and they're still gonna watch it, what I want people to dial in most specific, the cutest thing he does, Peter Billingsley, i.e. Ralphie, his tongue is so busy in that movie and it is one of the cutest things I've ever seen. Like when he's doing the decoder ring and he's like, eh?
1:44:48 Dax Shepard? And they, and they know it too, because they always use go to extreme close up of his little mouth with that little tongue darting around. And anytime he's reading out loud or he's thinking, he's in front of his class, he's like having this fantasy that his teacher loved his essay. And she's on the chalkboard right, A plus, A plus. And they go to him and he just wistfully thinking of this. He's like, His little tongue is darting around his face. Oh, is it cute?
1:45:12 Speaker 01 Acting used to be so easy. All you had to do is move your tongue around.
1:45:16 Dax Shepard? Dart it around.
1:45:17 Speaker 01 And it was considered good acting.
1:45:20 Dax Shepard? No, he's, he's impossibly good for a nine year old in that movie. It's crazy how good he is. But just anytime he's thinking, the shepherds, we stick our tongue out when we're concentrating really hard.
1:45:29 Speaker 01 You do?
1:45:30 Dax Shepard? You've not noticed that?
1:45:31 Speaker 01 Uh uh.
1:45:31 Dax Shepard? I don't have it quite as bad as my dad and my brother and my uncle, but yeah, if I'm really going after something, my tongue comes out.
1:45:38 Speaker 01 Really?
1:45:38 Dax Shepard? And we all do it. Yeah. So his just seemed like the thing he does when he's like distracted.
1:45:43 Speaker 01 Hold on. Do a roll. Do it. Do it as if you're, yeah, I want to see it.
1:45:52 Dax Shepard? This would be out all of a sudden.
1:45:53 Speaker 01 It's a little out. Yeah. Oh, yeah.
1:45:56 Dax Shepard? Like I'm expressing like, like I wanna.
1:46:02 Speaker 01 I guess I have seen that face.
1:46:04 Dax Shepard? This is kind of become an inappropriate fact check and I want to apologize to the Christmas listeners.
1:46:07 Speaker 01 Why?
1:46:08 Dax Shepard? Cause of my previous thing about you going like this. And then now I'm just going like, like it always in that look kind of inappropriate and I just want to clean it up for the holidays.
1:46:16 Speaker 01 Since when do you want to clean it up?
1:46:18 Dax Shepard? It's the holidays.
1:46:20 Speaker 01 The holidays are sexy. What are you talking about? People love to have sex.
1:46:24 Dax Shepard? For singles.
1:46:25 Speaker 01 And for people in couples, they have sex by the fire and stuff.
1:46:30 Dax Shepard? Yeah, it's great for singles and couples, not people with children. It's all about children for us.
1:46:37 Speaker 01 Yeah, but for even, right? People with children, like, don't they still have sex by the fire?
1:46:43 Dax Shepard? You have sex, your days of having sex by the fire are completely over the day your first kid arrives.
1:46:49 Speaker 01 What about if they're asleep?
1:46:50 Dax Shepard? Your parents, you can't fucking run the, well, why not fuck on the island in the kitchen?
1:46:55 Speaker 01 Why not?
1:46:57 Dax Shepard? No way. Robert, you and Natalie fucking in the open house at all?
1:47:02 Speaker 06 No, never.
1:47:03 Speaker 01 But do you have, do you have a fireplace?
1:47:07 Dax Shepard? We do.
1:47:09 Speaker 01 Well, you should fuck in front of it.
1:47:11 Dax Shepard? Buy all the clean up toys. Do you ever jerk off in front of that fireplace with no one's home? You know the thing I hate that I can't not think of, and I don't know if this is urban legend or or real, but allegedly rumor, urban legend, little boy who puts his tongue on the pole, gets it stuck to the pole, he did a porno when he grew up.
1:47:35 Speaker 01 Oh, no.
1:47:35 Dax Shepard? And I know that.
1:47:36 Speaker 01 They think it's because of that?
1:47:37 Dax Shepard? No, I don't think it's because of that, but I don't like that. I'm watching this movie, and all I can think of is this little boy grows up and does a porno, which, by the way, it's fine if you do pornos. I don't even ju- I don't even know why it's, I don't care if you've done a porno.
1:47:53 Speaker 01 I'm kind of curious why it bums you.
1:47:54 Dax Shepard? But I don't think when people go into movie acting, their goal is to then graduate to pornos. I think you probably come out here to do movies, you start in pornos, and maybe you graduate.
1:48:05 Speaker 01 Well, that's the whole thing when your parents are afraid you're going to move to Hollywood and then become a porn actor.
1:48:12 Dax Shepard? Yes.
1:48:12 Speaker 01 That's like the whole thing.
1:48:13 Dax Shepard? That's the stereotype.
1:48:15 Speaker 01 Oh, don't go become, you're gonna get sucked into porn.
1:48:18 Dax Shepard? Right. Unless it's a dad and a son. He's like, boy, I hope you find your way over to pornos.
1:48:23 Speaker 01 Well, maybe then, maybe you're just following his dad's dream.
1:48:27 Dax Shepard? Let me ask you this. Now, this one I I know is real.
1:48:30 Speaker 01 Okay.
1:48:31 Dax Shepard? Double check, Rob, so I don't get sued. But I do believe Screech was in an adult film.
1:48:35 Speaker 01 Yes, I was about to say that he was.
1:48:37 Dax Shepard? Yeah. And does it impact when you're watching Saved by the Bell? Are you thinking like?
1:48:41 Speaker 01 I haven't watched it since I learned that information, but yes, I can't, I wouldn't, I can't like see a picture and not think that.
1:48:49 Dax Shepard? That he did a porno.
1:48:50 Speaker 01 But I also, it's more than just like, oh, he did a porno. It feels dark. There's something that feels dark about it.
1:48:57 Dax Shepard? Again, like, it's not what they were wanting or aiming to do, and that maybe they were in financial straits, and then people knew that they would be a draw. It doesn't, it sounds like someone maybe compromised.
1:49:07 Speaker 06 Well, he put it out. He put out a sex tape called Screeched, Saved by the Smell.
1:49:12 Dax Shepard? Saved by the Smell?
1:49:13 Speaker 06 Yep.
1:49:13 Dax Shepard? What a classy title. Um, it's, I'm lucky I never ended up in one. I mean, let's be honest. I was unemployed for nine years.
1:49:21 Speaker 01 Oh, no.
1:49:23 Dax Shepard? And I was, you know, I was a party animal. I could have ended up in one and boy, God.
1:49:30 Speaker 01 What'd you really have?
1:49:31 Dax Shepard? I mean, I don't know. You're somewhere, you're drunk, you start, you meet like six porn stars at a thing. Everyone's having fun.
1:49:38 Speaker 01 I see you hanging out.
1:49:39 Dax Shepard? You got no money, you like having sex.
1:49:42 Speaker 01 No, you'd have sex with them, but you wouldn't have them film it.
1:49:46 Dax Shepard? On camera. I'm just saying that I'm, I'm lucky that never happened is what I'm saying.
1:49:51 Speaker 01 Have you ever filmed yourself having sex?
1:49:54 Dax Shepard? How dare you ask that question?
1:49:56 Speaker 01 Why? Why?
1:49:58 Dax Shepard? Have I ever filmed?
1:49:59 Speaker 01 People do.
1:50:00 Dax Shepard? Of course they do.
1:50:02 Speaker 01 Or not, or has, has, okay.
1:50:04 Dax Shepard? I had to really think about that.
1:50:06 Speaker 01 I'm surprised.
1:50:06 Dax Shepard? I think I've run some video on, you know, but I don't want to say anything because it's not, I don't want to say.
1:50:12 Speaker 01 Who? We're not saying who.
1:50:13 Dax Shepard? Yes, but I think I've run some video on some nudity in my day.
1:50:19 Speaker 01 Wait, what's the difference? This is like the.
1:50:22 Dax Shepard? I'll tell you the difference. Like, did I ever set up a tripod?
1:50:25 Speaker 01 Right.
1:50:25 Dax Shepard? And then.
1:50:26 Speaker 01 Yeah.
1:50:27 Dax Shepard? No, I didn't do that.
1:50:28 Speaker 01 What is running some video on nudity? What's that look like?
1:50:31 Dax Shepard? Well, you got your video camera out and you're like shooting in your thing and then your girlfriend's naked. And then you film her because you want to look at it later at some point.
1:50:40 Speaker 01 But it's not the act.
1:50:42 Dax Shepard? Right.
1:50:43 Speaker 01 Okay, okay, okay. I mean, I don't have any problem with people making a sex tape.
1:50:49 Dax Shepard? I think that's awesome. They're having fun.
1:50:51 Speaker 01 Having sex by the fire. On holidays. Like most couples do.
1:50:58 Dax Shepard? Like most married couples with household children do.
1:51:02 Speaker 01 All right. Well, this is for Allison Jones and this is our last episode of the year. I mean, sort of, we have a.
1:51:12 Dax Shepard? Smorgasbord of offerings.
1:51:13 Speaker 01 No, no, no, we do, but this is our last real episode. Then we have an Armchair Anonymous coming out on Friday and then we have our holiday special.
1:51:21 Dax Shepard? This is our last new interview of the year. How about that?
1:51:23 Speaker 01 Okay. And it was a great year.
1:51:27 Dax Shepard? It was a great year.
1:51:28 Speaker 01 Fantastic year.
1:51:30 Dax Shepard? Closed really strong.
1:51:32 Speaker 01 Yeah, yeah.
1:51:33 Dax Shepard? One after another.
1:51:34 Speaker 01 We added this location. That was a big deal. That was scary. That was a big change, a big challenge.
1:51:41 Dax Shepard? Yeah.
1:51:42 Speaker 01 And we're embracing it.
1:51:44 Dax Shepard? Yeah.
1:51:45 Speaker 01 It's nice.
1:51:45 Dax Shepard? I like how it's going.
1:51:46 Speaker 01 2024. Oh, my gosh. I can't believe I forgot to say this. Do you know that the Pantone color of the year was announced?
1:51:56 Dax Shepard? Okay, so I saw a comment yesterday.
1:51:58 Speaker 01 Okay.
1:51:59 Dax Shepard? That was like, when is Monica gonna talk about Pantone? They were like nervous and worried.
1:52:04 Speaker 01 Yeah, I'm so sorry it's taken me this long.
1:52:07 Dax Shepard? Yeah, okay.
1:52:10 Speaker 01 But do you know what it is?
1:52:12 Dax Shepard? A plaque.
1:52:14 Speaker 01 No, close.
1:52:16 Dax Shepard? What?
1:52:16 Speaker 01 It's called Mocha Moose, which is basically Mocha Mouse, which is basically Brown Mouse.
1:52:23 Dax Shepard? Is it the color of your skin?
1:52:25 Speaker 01 It's brown.
1:52:26 Dax Shepard? There's a lot of shades of brown.
1:52:28 Speaker 01 Okay, fine. No.
1:52:29 Dax Shepard? Hold up the Pantone color to your cheeks.
1:52:31 Speaker 01 It's not really, but, but no, that one's.
1:52:35 Dax Shepard? Modest Moose? What's it called?
1:52:37 Speaker 01 Um, it's called Mocha.
1:52:38 Dax Shepard? Miniature Moose?
1:52:39 Speaker 01 Mocha, Mocha Moose.
1:52:41 Dax Shepard? Mocha Moose.
1:52:46 Dax Shepard? It's not as dark as yours, so.
1:52:49 Speaker 01 I'm doing tongue.
1:52:52 Dax Shepard? This is a holidays. Do, do, do, and boppy de bop.
1:52:57 Speaker 01 Okay, but it's, it's a little more pink.
1:53:00 Dax Shepard? Yeah, yeah, yeah.
1:53:01 Speaker 01 But.
1:53:01 Dax Shepard? Yeah.
1:53:02 Speaker 01 That's a great sign.
1:53:04 Dax Shepard? That we're going into the Browns with Pantone?
1:53:06 Speaker 01 That.
1:53:07 Dax Shepard? That they.
1:53:07 Speaker 01 Brown Mouse?
1:53:09 Dax Shepard? Brown Mouse.
1:53:10 Speaker 01 That's a good omen.
1:53:11 Dax Shepard? That is a good omen. It's gonna be an incredible year.
1:53:13 Speaker 01 Yeah, I think so. For all, all of the people who listen, it's gonna be a great year.
1:53:18 Dax Shepard? What do you do with that color? Are you ordering items now in that color? Like, do you adjust anything in your life?
1:53:24 Speaker 01 Yes, that's the whole, you know, it's my background on my phone.
1:53:28 Dax Shepard? Okay, so that's one thing you do. That's an actionable step.
1:53:30 Speaker 01 That's the whole, that's what I do.
1:53:32 Dax Shepard? Okay, there's nothing else. It's not like, when they announce this color, are there collaborations where now different companies, you can order the Pantone?
1:53:39 Speaker 01 Yeah, sometimes.
1:53:40 Dax Shepard? Moose?
1:53:41 Speaker 01 Mocha Moose.
1:53:42 Dax Shepard? Moose knuckle?
1:53:42 Speaker 01 Brown Mouse. They'll do some collabs. Sometimes there's, there's often a mug. I might, I might get that this year.
1:53:48 Dax Shepard? Yeah.
1:53:48 Speaker 01 Um, and, and yeah, so I make the background of my phone.
1:53:54 Dax Shepard? Do you know what I would call that color? And again, I know this is xenophobic. It's not really, but nude. That color just looks like nude to me, like nude. Before they got wise to that's not what everyone looks like nude, but nude undergarments. Do you know what I'm talking about? It's almost like a peach.
1:54:15 Speaker 01 Yeah, that's more peach. That's more what this year's was.
1:54:20 Dax Shepard? That's this year? That's not moose knuckle? Oh, I thought you already had it.
1:54:24 Speaker 01 No, I don't get to put it on until January first.
1:54:27 Dax Shepard? Okay, okay, all right.
1:54:29 Speaker 06 They have a bunch of collabs already. They have Motorola phone, they have Joybird, Librotone headphones, all Pantone and all those brands.
1:54:39 Dax Shepard? Oh, wow.
1:54:39 Speaker 01 Oh, my God. Do they have the mug?
1:54:42 Speaker 06 Um, they have a, they have a million things. So, yeah, probably.
1:54:46 Dax Shepard? Yeah.
1:54:47 Speaker 01 Okay, great. Oh, I wish they made an iPhone case in it.
1:54:51 Dax Shepard? See, that's exactly what I'm talking about, like.
1:54:54 Speaker 01 That would be great because then the wallpaper, everything would be brown mouse.
1:54:59 Dax Shepard? Yes, yes, yes, yes.
1:55:00 Speaker 01 This is this year's, that's more nude to me. I mean, the color.
1:55:04 Dax Shepard? Yeah, the one you're holding up looks very nude.
1:55:06 Speaker 01 Yeah, and the mocha moose is nude for a brown person. Light brown.
1:55:12 Dax Shepard? Light brown person, colorism. It's even.
1:55:17 Dax Shepard? It's even.
1:55:17 Speaker 01 Whatever. I embrace this as me.
1:55:19 Dax Shepard? Okay, that, yeah. Wait, hold that up again. Now it looks darker.
1:55:24 Dax Shepard? Oh, this is much, what has happened? Are you sure? I think you might have held up the pink.
1:55:29 Speaker 01 I promise. It's because when you zoom in, it for some reason it looks.
1:55:33 Dax Shepard? Something goes, zoom out. It's like 10 shades darker. That's your, almost your skin color.
1:55:39 Speaker 01 Yeah.
1:55:39 Dax Shepard? That's great.
1:55:41 Speaker 01 Okay, two facts. One, she got her business degree for $750 a trimester at UCLA. Now, I made a mistake when I checked this fact before.
1:55:54 Dax Shepard? Okay.
1:55:55 Speaker 01 When I type in now, UCLA business degree cost, it says the total cost of the MBA program is $128,000 per year, including tuition and living expenses. The tuition is $78,000 per year.
1:56:14 Dax Shepard? Could it have quadrupled since the last time you Googled it?
1:56:17 Speaker 01 I must have, it must have been not the MBA program that I looked at. It must have been regular tuition. Cause I Googled this now like eight times because I was also confused. That's wild.
1:56:32 Dax Shepard? All right, let's just say the last time you looked it up, it was 22 grand a year.
1:56:35 Speaker 01 Yeah, so obviously I looked up the wrong thing. Yeah, so I don't know.
1:56:40 Dax Shepard? Who knows?
1:56:41 Speaker 01 But I.
1:56:42 Dax Shepard? Just go there and then find out. When they get, when you get the bill, tell us.
1:56:45 Speaker 01 All right, and then why are they called sides? In acting, sides refers to a specific part of a script given to actors for auditions because historically actors would only receive their own lines from a scene, essentially just their side of the dialogue, which helped protect the full script from being copied or shared with competitors, especially during Shakespeare's time when printing was limited, hence the term sides. We also discovered that he's married, his wife's name is Anne Hathaway.
1:57:16 Dax Shepard? That's crazy. Still adjusting to that info.
1:57:19 Speaker 01 That is shocking and I'm, I'm surprised that I didn't know that.
1:57:24 Dax Shepard? Cause you're an Anne Hathaway super fan?
1:57:26 Speaker 01 No, cause I took a lot of, I had to take a lot of Shakespeare.
1:57:29 Dax Shepard? Right, from your Shakespearean knowledge.
1:57:31 Speaker 01 I should have known that, maybe I did and I blocked it, I don't know. But Anne Hathaway, well, she is a style icon.
1:57:38 Dax Shepard? We need to interview her to get to the bottom of whether or not that was intentional or not.
1:57:43 Speaker 01 I agree, I agree.
1:57:45 Dax Shepard? It would kind of confirm the story I've made up about her in my head. Which I feel like she was just born to be an actor.
1:57:51 Speaker 01 Right.
1:57:52 Dax Shepard? Like, I feel like she's probably been acting since she was one years old.
1:57:56 Speaker 01 I mean Princess Diaries, she was just two years old.
1:57:59 Dax Shepard? Okay, is that her real age? No, I didn't see it.
1:58:02 Speaker 01 No, but she was young.
1:58:03 Dax Shepard? Okay.
1:58:04 Speaker 01 Not as young as Pepsi Girl.
1:58:06 Dax Shepard? No.
1:58:07 Speaker 01 I would love to interview her and ask her that.
1:58:09 Dax Shepard? Me too. Please, Anne. Even if the interview's 30 seconds and you tell us whether that was intentional or not, we'll take what we can get.
1:58:16 Speaker 01 Or if she wants to come in as Anne Hathaway, Shakespeare's wife.
1:58:21 Dax Shepard? I'll dress up as Bill Shakespeare.
1:58:23 Speaker 01 That would be cool.
1:58:24 Dax Shepard? Yeah.
1:58:24 Speaker 01 Who could, who could I be? They didn't, I don't think they have many brown. I will dress up as
1:58:31 Dax Shepard? Julia.
1:58:31 Speaker 01 A piece of poop on the floor.
1:58:33 Dax Shepard? What?
1:58:34 Speaker 01 Because, because they didn't have very many brown people.
1:58:38 Dax Shepard? You are.
1:58:38 Speaker 01 So I need to be.
1:58:39 Dax Shepard? You are so mean to people of color. And I'm here to be an advocate and an ally.
1:58:45 Speaker 01 We're trying to be true to the times.
1:58:47 Dax Shepard? I am very disappointed.
1:58:49 Speaker 01 I know who I'll be, a butler.
1:58:50 Dax Shepard? Okay. Camber maid?
1:58:52 Speaker 01 Cause they had Indian.
1:58:55 Dax Shepard? Servants?
1:58:56 Speaker 01 Yeah.
1:58:56 Dax Shepard? They did?
1:58:57 Speaker 01 I think. I'm pretty sure, I'm pretty sure, I'm pretty sure. I'm pretty sure back then, England, because they owned India.
1:59:07 Speaker 01 Listen, I'll be a poop, a poop.
1:59:09 Dax Shepard? No, no, no.
1:59:10 Speaker 01 A piece of poop.
1:59:10 Dax Shepard? No, you'll be a moose knuckle, pantommoose knuckle.
1:59:14 Speaker 01 Wow, all right. Well, we aren't gonna do this again until, I guess, the holiday special, but that'll be a little different.
1:59:20 Dax Shepard? Yeah.
1:59:21 Speaker 01 And then next year, 2025.
1:59:23 Dax Shepard? Brown mouse is again.
1:59:24 Speaker 01 50th year.
1:59:25 Dax Shepard? Oh my, so many good things. Even age number for me, I love that.
1:59:29 Speaker 01 Yeah.
1:59:30 Dax Shepard? Brown mouse.
1:59:30 Speaker 01 Yeah.
1:59:31 Dax Shepard? For you.
1:59:32 Speaker 01 And 2025 feels really sharp.
1:59:36 Dax Shepard? It's a quarter of a century.
1:59:37 Speaker 01 Yeah.
1:59:38 Dax Shepard? Yeah.
1:59:39 Speaker 01 Yeah, there's something about you being 50 and it being 25, that's nice.
1:59:43 Dax Shepard? Yeah, because I was born in 75.
1:59:46 Speaker 01 Oh!
1:59:46 Dax Shepard? Works out perfectly.
1:59:47 Speaker 01 25, 50, 75.
1:59:51 Dax Shepard? Yeah, all quarters.
1:59:54 Speaker 01 You should be more excited about that. All right.
1:59:57 Dax Shepard? All right, love you.
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