Nick Offerman

Nick Offerman is going to play us his ukulele song. Amy hangs with her former 'Parks and Rec' costar and talks about why his mustache makes him talk slowly, his favorite 'Parks' episodes, and why you cannot step into the same river twice. Host: Amy Poehler Guests: Aubrey Plaza and Nick Offerman Executive producers: Bill Simmons, Amy Poehler, and Jenna Weiss-Berman For Paper Kite Productions: Executive producer Jenna Weiss-Berman, coordinator Sam Green, and supervising producer Joel Lovell For The Ringer: Supervising producers Juliet Litman, Sean Fennessey, and Mallory Rubin; video producers Jack Wilson and Aleya Zenieris; audio producer Kaya McMullen; social producer Bridget Geerlings; video editor Drew van Steenbergen; and booker Kat Spillane Original music: Amy Miles Use coupon code ‘EATCESAR10’ at Cesar.com for 10% off Visible. Live in the know. https://www.visible.com Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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

• 0:00Speaker 00

  Susan Collins was the deciding vote for Trump's Medicaid cuts. Collins was the deciding vote for Trump's Supreme Court justices who overturned Roe v. Wade. And Susan Collins voted to give Trump a blank check for his war in Iran while gas prices still soar. Susan Collins has voted with Trump nearly 96% of the time, and she's hurting Maine. Paid for by Win Senate, winsenate.org. Not authorized by any candidate or candidate's committee.

• 0:35Amy Poehler?

  Hello, everyone. Welcome to another episode of Good Hang. Boy, what a guest we have today. My brother, Nick Offerman, who, as you know, was instrumental in making Parks and Recreation the hit that it was and played the beloved Ron Swanson and is just a wonderful friend, person, actor. We talk about so many good things today. We talk about Parks and Rec, getting the job, how it felt to be on a show that meant so much to us. We talk about Cleopatra, how he feels about her and would he hit that. And we also talk about his book, Little Woodchucks, his amazing new book that is out now, and

• 1:19Amy Poehler?

  how he feels deeply about how important it is to make things. So, please, please get ready for Nick Offerman. But before we get to Nick, we always do this thing, right? We talk to somebody who knows Nick, we get a question to ask Nick. And we have the wonderful Aubrey Plaza joining us. Aubrey, April Ludgate, you know her, you love her. She's zooming in from New York. Plazie? This episode is brought to you by Zoom. Many of us have been there. The calls where you zone out for one second and miss six key points, the quick check-ins that are anything but quick.

• 2:02Amy Poehler?

  Because here's the thing, every conversation creates work. With Zoom, though, the conversation itself can actually move work forward. Zoom is now a full system of action that can actually complete work from the context of your existing meetings, calls, and chats. No more post-call panic, no more inbox avalanche. You talked about it, Zoom got it done. Visit zoomahead.com to learn more.

• 2:37Amy Poehler?

  Hello? Hello?

• 2:39Speaker 02

  Hi!

• 2:42Amy Poehler?

  Hi, Plaz!

• 2:43Speaker 02

  Hi!

• 2:43Amy Poehler?

  Hi! Thank you for doing this. I know you're about to go, I think you're about to go onstage.

• 2:50Speaker 02

  Oh, my God. Have you been sitting there since the last time I did your podcast?

• 2:54Amy Poehler?

  Yeah.

• 2:55Speaker 02

  I'm so sorry.

• 2:56Amy Poehler?

  I live here now.

• 2:57Speaker 02

  Oh, my God.

• 2:58Amy Poehler?

  And I know you don't have a lot of time, but I felt like there was nobody better to ask a question to Nick Offerman than you.

• 3:07Speaker 02

  Oh, I know. Well, first of all, you know that we are birth brothers.

• 3:13Amy Poehler?

  Yeah, talk about that.

• 3:14Speaker 02

  Nick and I have the same birthday, June 26th, the day that the Pied Piper led the children of the rats into the water. Real story, folks. And you can feel the Pied Piper energy coming out of both of us. Jason Schwartzman also has a birthday on June 26th. So does Paul Thomas Anderson, actually, but he's not in our club yet. But, um, yeah, so we have this, like, birthday text message chain, which I almost want to read out loud because it's so funny. Because we only write on it on our birthday, and it's always, it's always like in medieval talk.

• 3:51Amy Poehler?

  It's you and Nick and Jason Schwartzman?

• 3:53Speaker 02

  Me, Nick and Schwartzman, yeah.

• 3:55Amy Poehler?

  Can you read just, yeah, can you read just a little bit of it?

• 3:57Speaker 02

  Okay, hold on, I got my phone.

• 3:59Amy Poehler?

  Okay.

• 4:01Speaker 02

  This is like sacred territory. Okay, here's one that Nick wrote. Mighty power, this was a couple of years ago, mighty powers and health to you, my fellow birthday triplets. Let us dance under the moon and delight Gaia for another 12 moons with our dark chapes. And an emoji that I can't, don't want to describe.

• 4:24Speaker 02

  Um, this is another one from Nick. Dear my birthday beauties, it's 9 a.m. on our birthday in New Zealand and I'm sending you both a massive load of my fulsome, oh, ursine love. I thought it said urine when I read it on my birthday. But now I'm really seeing it. Now I'm seeing it clearly. I thought he said a massive load of my urine.

• 4:47Amy Poehler?

  Uh, that would, sounds like it could be him, but ursine love, which-

• 4:51Speaker 02

  Oh, ursine love.

• 4:52Amy Poehler?

  And ursine, I believe, is bear-like, right? Bear-like.

• 4:55Speaker 02

  Oh, the bear, right. I wrote back, and my load to you, my brother.

• 5:02Speaker 02

  But it was a different load that I was talking about.

• 5:06Speaker 02

  Um, that's just a little taste.

• 5:08Amy Poehler?

  A little taste, and it is how Nick talks. Do you remember meeting him for the first time?

• 5:12Speaker 02

  I think it was probably literally on set. I don't remember. I think he scared me, you know, at first. He scared me a lot.

• 5:21Amy Poehler?

  Why?

• 5:22Speaker 02

  In a good way. Um, I, no, just because I think, no, he was so funny, but I was always like trying to replicate his, like, behavior on set. Like, I'll never forget, I mean, you guys all taught me how to really be on set because I didn't, you know, I didn't really, I'd only done one job, so I didn't know. But like, I remember Nick kind of put, not put me in my place, but like, kind of reminded me of something. I'd probably tell you the story, but like, where I was like, you know how when you're on set, you get treated, like, actors get treated like babies? And it's so, such a weird vibe. Like, when I haven't worked for a while and then I go back, I'm like, this is so weird. No wonder why actors get so weird, because everyone treats you like a baby, like you can't do anything.

• 6:03Speaker 02

  And I remember, like, I was just sitting in my little chair or something, and I wasn't doing anything for a while. And one of the PAs came up and was like, do you need anything? And I was like, uh, sure, I'd take a coffee, or something like that. And then Nick was sitting next to me, like, reading a book or something, and he looked over and he went, "Don't forget that you can get up and get your own coffee. It's right over there."

• 6:28Speaker 02

  And I know that sounds kind of like an asshole thing to say, but I didn't take it like that. I was like, you're fucking right. I was like, I don't need that little P A over there to get to walk over there in my eyesight and pour me a cup of coffee. I'm like, because you get in that zone on set where you just turn into like a couch potato where you're like, ugh. And he remind, it like jolted me. I was like, I'm never gonna ask for coffee again, ever. And I never have.

• 6:56Amy Poehler?

  It's so, it's so, and you never have. And anytime anyone brings you coffee, you just throw it in their face.

• 7:02Speaker 02

  I slap it on the bottom so it goes, not only the liquid, but the cup, right on their forehead.

• 7:08Amy Poehler?

  The, he's, he's so, um, he is very paternal. And he was very paternal on set. Like, when Nick was there, he would know his lines. And he loved to goof around, but he wanted to get the job done. Like, he was daddy energy, for sure.

• 7:24Speaker 02

  Yeah, he was daddy. And, but he really did have, you, you both, though, you both had such a perfect balance of like professionalism, but, and fun. And I, and I, it was a very, very good for me to witness, because it was like, I wanted to, I wanted to be good for him and for you. Like, I always wanted to be prepared and, but then also be ready to fuck around. And, yeah. I love, I loved that about working with Nick.

• 7:51Amy Poehler?

  Yeah. And I have to say, like, the, the April and Ron stuff started early, I think it was season one, when you two started doing stuff together. And it was really helpful for both of your characters.

• 8:09Speaker 02

  It was so helpful. I think it, I'm trying to remember, I have one memory of like that, remember that episode when we were like in the grocery store?

• 8:16Amy Poehler?

  Mm-hmm.

• 8:17Speaker 02

  Or something? I think that was one of those early on ones.

• 8:20Amy Poehler?

  I, I'm thinking, I think there was an episode in season one when he hurts his neck.

• 8:25Speaker 02

  Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 8:26Amy Poehler?

  Right? And he's stuck in the chair.

• 8:30Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah. And then I like go, I like go into his, I like stand in his office. And I'm like, I'm like kind of his assistant that day or something. And we, we barely say like anything to each other.

• 8:42Amy Poehler?

  Yeah.

• 8:42Speaker 02

  We just like stare at each other and then like, it's almost like we're telepathic, we were telepathic.

• 8:47Amy Poehler?

  Yeah, both of you are very good at saying little and talking slowly.

• 8:54Amy Poehler?

  And it's funny that he uses the word earth sign because he really is like, one could classify him as a bear. He is a bear.

• 9:03Speaker 02

  Yeah, he's a bear.

• 9:04Amy Poehler?

  And he's a, he's a man in a very, um, you know, you don't find a lot of like, men who can build things. I mean,

• 9:14Amy Poehler?

  in this profession.

• 9:15Speaker 02

  I actually, I wonder if, if, if he, if that's a lie.

• 9:21Speaker 02

  I don't think he can. I don't think he's actually doing it.

• 9:24Amy Poehler?

  It's so weird to say, I've never actually seen him build anything.

• 9:28Speaker 02

  You ever seen him with a hammer? I haven't.

• 9:30Amy Poehler?

  Nope.

• 9:32Speaker 02

  And I've seen where he does it, but there's other people in there.

• 9:36Amy Poehler?

  So true. And he comes in and says, I made this canoe. And it's like, when?

• 9:41Speaker 02

  Yeah. When?

• 9:43Amy Poehler?

  Yeah.

• 9:44Speaker 02

  When exactly?

• 9:46Amy Poehler?

  What question do you think I should ask him?

• 9:48Speaker 02

  What does it feel like when you jerk off to every episode of Parks and Rec when you're watching?

• 9:53Amy Poehler?

  Let's get a real question that I can actually ask him.

• 9:56Speaker 02

  All right. Okay. I have two questions.

• 9:58Amy Poehler?

  Okay.

• 9:58Speaker 02

  One, have you ever seen a ghost?

• 10:02Speaker 02

  I want to hear like, if he has any like,

• 10:06Speaker 02

  other realm stories.

• 10:08Amy Poehler?

  Ooh, interesting. I don't, I don't know where he would land on that in the, on the woo woo scale of being open to that.

• 10:13Speaker 02

  Me neither. Me neither. Like for real, I want to ask him.

• 10:16Amy Poehler?

  Yeah.

• 10:17Speaker 02

  Like, do you believe, like, do you believe in ghosts? Like, do you believe in that? Have you, have, do you have a good story? And do you believe in hell? No, don't ask him that.

• 10:28Amy Poehler?

  I won't. Believe me, I won't.

• 10:31Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 10:31Amy Poehler?

  Okay.

• 10:33Amy Poehler?

  How about, do you remember a good time we had working together?

• 10:37Speaker 02

  Sorry, sorry. You're right. No, you're right. You're right.

• 10:42Speaker 02

  I just immediately want to know like,

• 10:45Speaker 02

  if you had to haunt one person

• 10:49Speaker 02

  in the afterlife.

• 10:53Speaker 02

  Who would it be? And also, how'd you get started and show this? I don't know. Or am I, is this anything?

• 11:04Amy Poehler?

  Yeah, these are good. These are good.

• 11:06Speaker 02

  Okay, here's my real question.

• 11:07Amy Poehler?

  Okay.

• 11:09Speaker 02

  If Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure happened to you in real life, what time period would you go to? And who would you fight?

• 11:19Amy Poehler?

  Perfect.

• 11:20Speaker 02

  You know he's gonna have some stupid shit to say.

• 11:23Amy Poehler?

  Perfect, perfect question.

• 11:25Speaker 02

  Okay, good.

• 11:25Amy Poehler?

  That's perfect. Who would you fight?

• 11:27Speaker 02

  And would you take me with you?

• 11:29Amy Poehler?

  Yes.

• 11:30Speaker 02

  Because you know you want to. Because you know you want to.

• 11:32Amy Poehler?

  I mean, I have to say, you guys were like a strong duo for a million reasons, but both you and Nick have a fortitude, like a way where you could face... You guys are very emotionally and physically strong. I mean, you and Nick were the only two cast members to play on the Parks and Rec softball team.

• 11:53Speaker 02

  That's right. Still got my uniform.

• 11:56Amy Poehler?

  All right, well, we got our question. I don't want to keep you. You okay with time? All right, I'm gonna...

• 12:01Speaker 02

  I'm not okay with time.

• 12:02Amy Poehler?

  Okay.

• 12:03Speaker 02

  Actually, but, but why? Do you want to do something else?

• 12:07Amy Poehler?

  No, when you told me you only had 15 minutes. Okay, then I'm good.

• 12:10Speaker 02

  I'm out. Baby, I'm out. Watch me. In less than an hour, I'm gonna be on that stage ripping apart.

• 12:18Amy Poehler?

  What do you have to do between now and the show? I am interested before I let you go. What's your routine?

• 12:22Speaker 02

  I'm literally supposed to be there in like 20 minutes. I'm gonna get a shower. I'm disgusting right now.

• 12:27Amy Poehler?

  Oh, you're at home. Okay, you're not at the theater. We're, okay.

• 12:30Speaker 02

  I didn't time my day out very well.

• 12:32Amy Poehler?

  Okay, okay, okay. Thank you for doing this.

• 12:34Speaker 02

  But I can actually do anything.

• 12:35Amy Poehler?

  Yeah.

• 12:36Speaker 02

  If I really put my mind to it. It's gonna be a nightmare getting a cab. This is what I literally am going to do.

• 12:42Amy Poehler?

  Yeah.

• 12:43Speaker 02

  Get a shower in like the, in like two minutes.

• 12:45Amy Poehler?

  I believe in you.

• 12:46Speaker 02

  Then I'm gonna run to Sixth Avenue. And I literally mean it. I'm going to run. It's rush hour. And I'm gonna hail a cab. And that cab's gonna fly me up there. And it's gonna be exhilarating. And then I'm just gonna, I just hope I won't, you know? Hope I can get myself in character in time. I'll start in the cab.

• 13:04Amy Poehler?

  I'm gonna let you go right now. Codependently, I'm worried about you. And, okay, thank you for doing this. Thank you, Pauzy. Love you, miss you.

• 13:11Speaker 02

  Love you, love you and love Nick.

• 13:13Amy Poehler?

  Yeah.

• 13:14Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 13:15Amy Poehler?

  Okay, thank you.

• 13:15Speaker 02

  All right, I hope you get out of there sometime. Okay.

• 13:19Speaker 02

  Drink water.

• 13:22Amy Poehler?

  This episode is brought to you by Visible. Let's be honest, wireless can feel like a world of traps. Expensive bills, hidden fees, and promises that just don't hold up. You start to feel stuck. Don't fall for the trap. Escape to Visible, the ultimate wireless hack. Get unlimited data and hotspot powered by Verizon. One line, all for just $25 a month. Taxes and fees included. You heard that right, just $25 a month. Get great coverage and a reliable connection with Visible. Switch today at visible.com and start saving on wireless. Terms apply. See visible.com for plan features and network management details.

• 14:04Amy Poehler?

  Hold on, sit down on the mic. Get on the mic so I can... Oh my God, Nick. Okay, listeners, Nick has brought me a bag of treats.

• 14:13Speaker 03

  Well-

• 14:14Amy Poehler?

  God, I love... What do we got? What do we got?

• 14:16Speaker 03

  In case we talk about making things.

• 14:17Amy Poehler?

  Yes, which we will.

• 14:20Speaker 03

  This is... The first project in my book is a slapstick.

• 14:23Amy Poehler?

  Little woodchucks.

• 14:24Speaker 03

  Because, and I thought you would appreciate this. When Lee and I... Do you remember Lee, by the way?

• 14:29Amy Poehler?

  Of course, yeah.

• 14:31Speaker 03

  We've had so much fun. We go on tour and Lee does wood... She makes one of these onstage with a bench while I sing. And I'm a jackass. And when we were figuring out the projects for the book, I said, "Look, I'm... Any kid that you go in the woods with and you're like, 'Let's find a good stick. Let's make something,' a good percentage of kids are gonna be like, 'This is a sword or a gun,' or like, 'This is an implement of violence. Let's make war,' or whatever."

• 15:01Amy Poehler?

  Yeah.

• 15:01Speaker 03

  It's... We do... You know, I hate that about us, but we have it. So I said, "We have to have a weapon in the book, but I have a comedy weapon, the slapstick."

• 15:11Amy Poehler?

  May I see?

• 15:12Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 15:12Amy Poehler?

  So for those that don't know, the word slapstick came from this. And this says "butt joint" on it.

• 15:19Speaker 03

  Which is a type of wood joint. It's not something prurient.

• 15:23Amy Poehler?

  You know, I've never used a slapstick.

• 15:24Speaker 03

  Many haven't. I mean, I had never heard of one.

• 15:27Amy Poehler?

  Yeah.

• 15:27Speaker 03

  It's from like, Comedia Del Arte or Punch and Judy shows use them. And it's... And the great-

• 15:33Amy Poehler?

  How do you do it?

• 15:34Speaker 03

  The great thing is, you can pretend to hit people, and it makes a noise, and you know, and so you make a reaction.

• 15:40Amy Poehler?

  Yes!

• 15:41Speaker 03

  And you have comedy. You can do spanking. You can do fake spankings.

• 15:47Amy Poehler?

  I want to talk about your book and all the stuff you make in it. And what before, well, hold on, you also brought a water bottle?

• 15:56Speaker 03

  Yeah, sorry.

• 15:58Amy Poehler?

  Is that your Offerman Woodshop water bottle?

• 16:00Speaker 03

  It is, yeah. But that, I, you know.

• 16:03Amy Poehler?

  I have that too. I have one of those.

• 16:04Speaker 03

  I just got rid of the one you gave me, that huge one from making it.

• 16:08Amy Poehler?

  Yeah.

• 16:09Speaker 03

  I finally wore it out like a month ago and I replaced it.

• 16:12Amy Poehler?

  Are you a big, um, we're going to get into a lot of stuff today, but how much water do you drink a day?

• 16:16Speaker 03

  Generally, I've been doing a lot of working out because I did a job where I had to work out.

• 16:22Amy Poehler?

  Brag.

• 16:23Speaker 03

  Uh, not, not a huge deal. Um, I got, well, I got super jacked for.

• 16:30Amy Poehler?

  How much can you lift? Like, what are you lifting these days?

• 16:33Speaker 03

  Um, two, I, I lift, uh, uh, cyber trucks. I do two cyber trucks.

• 16:40Amy Poehler?

  You go up to them and lift them up?

• 16:41Speaker 03

  And then I put people in them. But I, I, I got crazy, and then I did actual wrestling.

• 16:49Amy Poehler?

  Oh, my God.

• 16:50Speaker 03

  I trained with a wrestler.

• 16:53Amy Poehler?

  There's so many places to go from what you just told me because number one, I've wrestled with you in a small way on set and you're very strong.

• 17:01Speaker 03

  Thank you.

• 17:02Amy Poehler?

  Um, you have the body, like you have the carriage of someone who I feel like would be good at wrestling. Did you wrestle when you were in high school?

• 17:09Speaker 03

  I tried. I, I, my uncle was a wrestler and I, I tried wrestling and, and quite honestly, my dad was a, was great at basketball and baseball.

• 17:18Amy Poehler?

  Yeah.

• 17:19Speaker 03

  So I went out for wrestling, uh, one year. It was like, no, thanks.

• 17:23Amy Poehler?

  How come?

• 17:23Speaker 03

  It was really hard.

• 17:24Amy Poehler?

  Yeah, it's so hard.

• 17:25Speaker 03

  It's, and, and I wasn't, I wasn't great. Um, I was, uh, I didn't, I didn't have the fire.

• 17:32Amy Poehler?

  Yeah.

• 17:33Speaker 03

  To, to like, ah, to overcome to.

• 17:36Amy Poehler?

  The vision quest, if you will.

• 17:37Speaker 03

  Yeah, exactly.

• 17:38Amy Poehler?

  And in your 50s, though, when you have to get buffed, that's hard.

• 17:41Speaker 03

  I was unable to approach the lunatic fringe. But I've always loved being an athlete.

• 17:47Amy Poehler?

  Yeah.

• 17:49Speaker 03

  And so I've always maintained an athleticism. But it was actually pretty fun. I worked with this great trainer named Grant Roberts, who does this.

• 17:59Amy Poehler?

  Yeah.

• 18:00Speaker 03

  And he's super good at it. And it actually is only four times a week.

• 18:03Amy Poehler?

  Yeah.

• 18:04Speaker 03

  One hour each. And there was nothing crazy, a bunch of protein.

• 18:07Amy Poehler?

  But remember when Pratt was doing Guardians, like he had to eat crazy amounts of food all the time?

• 18:13Speaker 03

  The good thing is, I'm a former pro wrestler.

• 18:16Amy Poehler?

  And your character was.

• 18:17Speaker 03

  There's no like shower scene where I'm like languorously, you know, showing my Chris Pratt abs.

• 18:24Amy Poehler?

  Right.

• 18:25Speaker 03

  In fact, it's in my contract with that language.

• 18:30Amy Poehler?

  I'm glad we're talking about sports because I kind of want to start with young Nick Offerman today in high school in Manuka, Illinois. It's like athletic kid in the drama club.

• 18:42Speaker 03

  Well.

• 18:42Amy Poehler?

  And I'm not saying that those two things don't go together. It's just in the eighties. Like, what was it like being a drama kid and a sports kid?

• 18:50Speaker 03

  The thing is, I, there wasn't a lot of culture. And when I say this, I love my town and like, and my family, but like, there wasn't, um, there wasn't a lot of counterculture. Or, uh, so, so like, we had the Beatles, but only their first three records, you know? Like, when I got to college and they were like, check out the White Album. I was like, what?

• 19:13Speaker 03

  I already loved, please, please me. Um, and so there, like the, the drama kids weren't fully drama kids and the jocks weren't fully jocks.

• 19:23Amy Poehler?

  Yeah.

• 19:24Speaker 03

  Because I think the school and town were small enough. And there just wasn't a lot to do. I, I was definitely a polymath and I think it was just because I. I didn't, I hadn't figured out what I was gonna do.

• 19:36Amy Poehler?

  Yeah.

• 19:37Speaker 03

  And so I was just kinda trying everything.

• 19:38Amy Poehler?

  Do you remember what made you try out for your first play? Like, like, you know?

• 19:44Speaker 03

  I definitely, there's a famous, in my family, there's a famous, like, uh, super eight movie from our fishing cabin when I was like 11. And it was, when you go to the Cubs game and you get a free jersey, three quarter length, like, white body, blue sleeves, Cubs, and on the back was a Keebler Elf tree, and the Keebler Elves sponsored the jersey. And, uh, I'm in that jersey and, and the camera's going around every family member, and they're all like ducking away from the camera. And it gets to me, and I'm literally going, like, just pointing at myself and making faces like you have, if you have a camera, you, you've found the right.

• 20:26Amy Poehler?

  Isn't that funny that, like, you can see that sometimes in people where they're like, even just your reflection in a, in, in like the store window or a mirror, like, I used to do commercials on my bathroom sink in the mirror to myself, just like, one day.

• 20:40Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 20:40Amy Poehler?

  I'm gonna, someone's gonna be looking at my face.

• 20:42Speaker 03

  I mean, Meghan had the, my, my champion wife, Meghan Mulally, had the wherewithal.

• 20:47Amy Poehler?

  Big fan.

• 20:48Speaker 03

  She knew, like, when she was a kid, she would sit in her room and, and do Barbra Streisand records into a hairbrush, to the point where she could now perfectly, she's like a Broadway star because she did that.

• 21:02Amy Poehler?

  Yeah.

• 21:02Speaker 03

  I didn't have any, like, I knew I wanted to entertain, and I knew that I loved Jim Ignatowski, Christopher Lloyd's character on Taxi.

• 21:12Amy Poehler?

  Oh, yeah.

• 21:13Speaker 03

  Where I was like, that guy's so weird and like scary, but he's super funny. I feel like that's somehow, that's what I'm drawn to. But I had no, it wasn't until. Late and when I was trying to figure out where to go to college, that I was like, oh, you can, I can try and do acting as a job.

• 21:33Amy Poehler?

  And you know, very early on in your career and my career, we meet in Chicago and we're both kind of in Chicago in the early 90s, trying stuff, just like, you know, trying to get hired and, but how do you get to Chicago from, like, how do you move there?

• 21:54Speaker 03

  I had this crazy moment where I was, I took my girlfriend, who was a year older than me, to audition at the University of Illinois for their dance department. And to this day, it's so miraculous, I must have been loitering in the hallway, because these two theater students who I then came to know, I don't remember how it started, I wish I had a film of this, they were, somehow it was like, hey kid, why are you loitering in the hallway of the theater facility? And somehow we struck up a conversation and they said they were theater students and I said, what does that mean? And they said, you can study acting. And I was like, you gotta be fucking kidding me. Like, because I told my guidance counselor at school that I want to be an actor. And he was like, that's not

• 22:39Speaker 03

  available. You can't do that.

• 22:41Amy Poehler?

  Wow.

• 22:42Speaker 03

  And then I said, I want to be a musician. And he was like, come on, what are you going to do with that?

• 22:47Amy Poehler?

  That'd be really interesting to dig into this guy's forgotten dreams.

• 22:51Speaker 03

  For sure.

• 22:52Amy Poehler?

  Sounds like there was a lot going on with him.

• 22:53Speaker 03

  But they had told me, you can't be an actor. So then I met these students that were like, we're going to the university, like this great state school, they have a conservatory program. And I said, okay, so you become an actor, then what? And they said, you can get paid to do plays in Chicago. And I was like, I took them by the lapels of their coat and was like, are you fucking kidding me? You told me you can't.

• 23:18Amy Poehler?

  I heard no one makes any money.

• 23:20Speaker 03

  I did. I had no idea that this was happening.

• 23:23Amy Poehler?

  I just wanted to say I relate because I didn't know anyone who was an actor growing up. And although I wasn't discouraged in that way, it just didn't seem like a job. It was like, what do you mean? Like be an actor?

• 23:34Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 23:35Amy Poehler?

  Like it just seemed like that's stupid. And so we meet in the early 90s in the attic of a house.

• 23:43Speaker 03

  That's right. All I remember is that you always loved to punch me in the arm.

• 23:49Amy Poehler?

  Yeah, I have a thing about.

• 23:50Speaker 03

  Which I took as a compliment.

• 23:51Amy Poehler?

  Big time. It's a love tap, really. But, you know, I think, you know, and again, this might be revisionist history, but I remember when we met, you felt very familiar to me, even though, you know, we hadn't, we didn't know each other, even though at the time you were in, kind of in deep character for a play.

• 24:12Speaker 03

  Oh, right. That's right. Because it was during Clockwork Orange at Steppenwolf. And I was riding a big motorcycle and I had a shaved head. I was experimenting with what Nick was going to turn out to be like. I had a shaved head, but I kept the front inch of my hair.

• 24:31Amy Poehler?

  Right.

• 24:31Speaker 03

  Down into a full beard and I dyed it different manic panic like punk colors. So it looked really scary.

• 24:39Amy Poehler?

  Really scary. And it is the thing about you that's so great to the Jim Ickedowski of it all, which is like, you are able to look scary, but you're not a scary person at all.

• 24:49Speaker 03

  Which I've learned to appreciate. There was a time when I'd be like, shut up. I'd pull my knife out on you if you said that.

• 24:58Amy Poehler?

  Yeah.

• 25:00Speaker 03

  And then I'd apologize.

• 25:01Amy Poehler?

  Yeah. I mean, I remember talking to you, I guess punching you in the arm. I remember talking about the play that you were in. I remember that company. And, you know, at the time in Chicago, there were like different ways into the same creative experience. I feel like they are kind of a big soup now, but at the time it was very important that like serious theater and then improv and sketch and they were like Never the Twain Shall Meet.

• 25:24Speaker 03

  I'll tell you something. So this is like early to mid 90s. I was so ignorant even then that if I had, I had no idea that. Like, I was a big fan of SNL as a kid. If I had any idea that there was a pipeline, that you, you know what I mean?

• 25:41Amy Poehler?

  Yeah.

• 25:41Speaker 03

  That you guys even could get an audition or anything. I had no idea. In fact, I remember just thinking like, you guys, so you guys make stuff up in a bar? Like, we're performing works of literature.

• 25:56Amy Poehler?

  Yeah. Believe me, we felt that vibe. And we were like, yeah, we know. It's, we have some notes. It's three hours long.

• 26:04Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 26:05Amy Poehler?

  I have to say, if I may, just digress. You have some of the best posture.

• 26:10Speaker 03

  Wow, thank you.

• 26:11Amy Poehler?

  Of any friend of mine. And it feels like that.

• 26:14Speaker 03

  Thanks a lot.

• 26:14Amy Poehler?

  And that feels like it comes from a core training, like a, you have great posture.

• 26:19Speaker 03

  I do, I mean, I, um, thank you. I, it's something that I do have to think about, especially after our show. Everything I got offered was like somehow overweight barbecue master. And it's all these guys in their tighty whities in the mirror crying.

• 26:40Speaker 03

  And the first couple, I was like, this is interesting. And then I realized, oh, I need to, I need to stay in shape.

• 26:47Amy Poehler?

  Uh huh.

• 26:48Speaker 03

  So that I can get a variety.

• 26:49Amy Poehler?

  It's interesting. You love to transform your bod.

• 26:52Speaker 03

  I do for sure.

• 26:53Amy Poehler?

  You are. You come from a physical body place with a lot of your characters. And, and, and I do feel like it's, you know, so Ron Swanson on Parks and Recreation had a physicality to him that felt like you understood really early on and played with. And you talked about it a lot. It's really interesting to me. But before we get to that, because I do want to talk about that, let's just talk about you getting that part. I know you've spoken about it a lot, but I think the physicality was part of the part was like what you understood really fast about him. Because you're right, if you, in the wrong hands, he's a joke. He's a total clown.

• 27:32Speaker 03

  Sure. Um, I'm sorry, I'm being a little moved by, uh, we've never talked about our show. And I also haven't seen our show.

• 27:42Amy Poehler?

  Wait, are you crying?

• 27:43Speaker 03

  No, I'm not crying.

• 27:45Amy Poehler?

  I thought you were gonna cry.

• 27:47Speaker 03

  I was thinking about this pork dish.

• 27:52Amy Poehler?

  We haven't talked about our show.

• 27:53Speaker 03

  No, we haven't, and it's.

• 27:55Amy Poehler?

  I mean, we've talked about it with each other all the time.

• 27:57Speaker 03

  For sure, but, but not in this.

• 27:59Amy Poehler?

  No, not publicly. I mean, where do we even start?

• 28:02Speaker 03

  People totally like it.

• 28:03Amy Poehler?

  Can you believe it?

• 28:04Speaker 03

  I just came here from a book tour in the UK.

• 28:08Amy Poehler?

  Yeah.

• 28:08Speaker 03

  And guess, and guess how I close every show? I play 5,000 candles. And I had these incredible, these two sisters named Flo and Joan opening for me. You would, they're these super funny sisters who do funny songs. And I mean, when you say, I'm in a crowd, a theater of 2,000 people, and you just say Parks and Recreation or Ron Swanson, the roof flies off the place.

• 28:32Amy Poehler?

  I know.

• 28:32Speaker 03

  And you're just like, you guys, that was a long time.

• 28:35Amy Poehler?

  That was a long, you know, my son just turned 17, which is when we started the show. 17 years ago.

• 28:41Speaker 03

  Holy cow.

• 28:41Amy Poehler?

  And I know, think about that. And the fact that there's still, people are still dressing up for Ron Swanson at Halloween. And people said that you got us through the pandemic. And people are saying, my kid's just starting it. And like, it's, it's unbelievable. I don't, I mean, I know we knew, I gotta say, and I, I think I can speak for us both. We were old enough, and I don't know, maybe a little, like, we knew what we had at the time, you and me, we really did.

• 29:11Speaker 03

  For sure.

• 29:12Amy Poehler?

  And we tried to enjoy every minute of it. But like, Ron Swanson is, would be in the hall, is in the Hall of Fame of characters. I mean, he is, he is this person that people feel, what is it like

• 29:28Amy Poehler?

  almost 20 years later, interacting with that kind of work? Like, how do people interact with you?

• 29:34Speaker 03

  It's interesting. I mean, mostly, first of all, I'm so stupidly grateful, like, from start to soup to nuts. And also, people are so.

• 29:45Speaker 03

  Nice to me and respectful. I think of Ron, like, people approach me with a deference and also a little fear.

• 29:53Amy Poehler?

  Yeah.

• 29:54Speaker 03

  But they're, they are really polite to me where I, I usually have to say, please call me Nick or, you know, because they're shaking and they're scared.

• 30:03Amy Poehler?

  Mr. Swanson, if I may.

• 30:04Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 30:05Amy Poehler?

  May I approach Mr. Sw- may I approach the bench?

• 30:08Speaker 03

  They do. And, and so I'm, for all of that, I'm, I'm super grateful. It's certainly weird too. There, there are thorns on the rose or, or pits in the peach of like, Ron's politics or Ron's, what Ron represented sort of as a paradigm.

• 30:30Speaker 03

  Some people with poor reading comprehension were like, oh, he's, he's a shotgun guy. Like finally, so that, so they mistook Ron for sort of things they wanted to represent in themselves.

• 30:45Amy Poehler?

  Yeah.

• 30:46Speaker 03

  And usually it was something old fashioned or right wingish, like misogynistic or,

• 30:51Amy Poehler?

  Yeah.

• 30:52Speaker 03

  or violent or anything like that. And so that's been weird too, where people love the character. And I've even had people argue with me online where they'll say something about, like they'll say, Ron definitely would have voted for this jerk. And I'll, and I'll be like, hang on, hang on one second. And I'll call Mike, sure. The main creator and writer and say, this, somebody said this, do you? And he would give me a, you know, he would whip out a perfect paragraph of, that's hilarious.

• 31:25Amy Poehler?

  Right.

• 31:25Speaker 03

  But also why Ron? For example, anybody that went from the world of business to the world of politics, Ron would think was a fool. Because Ron's like, what are you doing? You're a capitalist.

• 31:38Speaker 03

  And so then I would, you know, this is back when I used to participate when social media wasn't just a cesspool.

• 31:46Amy Poehler?

  Yeah.

• 31:46Speaker 03

  But I would go back and say, here's what Mike Schur says.

• 31:50Amy Poehler?

  And they'd say, nope.

• 31:52Speaker 03

  They would say, no, you guys don't know, you guys don't know shit about Ron Swanson. And I was like, well, I'm just gonna leave it there.

• 32:00Amy Poehler?

  Yeah.

• 32:02Speaker 03

  I thought I did, but I guess you got me on that one.

• 32:05Amy Poehler?

  Do people come up to you and say, people call me Ron Swanson?

• 32:09Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 32:10Amy Poehler?

  I get that a lot with Leslie Knope. People say, I'm like Leslie Knope. And usually that means like, to your point, it can mean a bunch of different things. It can mean I work hard and I'm fighting the good fight. It can mean I kind of drive everybody crazy and I talk too much and I'm, you know, like it can mean a million things.

• 32:29Speaker 03

  Sure. I, I mean, I feel like when I think of Leslie Knope, I think of her ebullience the most, like that, that sometimes, and sometimes when people are like that, it's a very heroic characteristic, but it can be too much.

• 32:43Amy Poehler?

  Yeah.

• 32:43Speaker 03

  Because you're like, okay, like I, I'm doing what you asked me to do. And when people say that to me about Ron Swanson, it's like, it usually means they're taciturn.

• 32:57Amy Poehler?

  Yeah.

• 32:58Speaker 03

  Like, and, and they're like, you know, like I imagine a husband in the grocery store, carrying like 112 pounds of stuff and his wife's like, let's just get a cart. He's like, no, I got this. I got it. Just keep going. And so being too stubborn or like relying too much on.

• 33:18Amy Poehler?

  I could just remember us doing scenes together and I would have a hundred words to your one. And I would just circle around you in that office, just like, and you would just sit and watch me. And it was like old archetypes of like the, you know, different animals, two different animals in the same room, basically. And that was what was so fun is playing those energies. And then as we got more comfortable, like flipping those energies and having fun with those energies. But like those early days of just being able to just kind of come in and buzz around while you stood your ground was so fun.

• 34:02Speaker 03

  It was a really fun game and, and just picturing that, you describing it and me picturing it.

• 34:09Amy Poehler?

  There's a giggle.

• 34:10Speaker 03

  Of Shauna Malway tweet on B cam on a Scooty scooter.

• 34:15Amy Poehler?

  Yeah.

• 34:15Speaker 03

  And she, she, we would always make her laugh and she would slam into the wall.

• 34:20Amy Poehler?

  Yeah, the camera operators were in the room with us a lot and they, we, they were part of the family for sure.

• 34:25Speaker 03

  Oh, God.

• 34:25Amy Poehler?

  And we would make them laugh. And you talk pretty, you don't talk as slow, you, you talk differently than Ron, but you talk pretty slow.

• 34:32Speaker 03

  I'm the slowest talking, like.

• 34:35Amy Poehler?

  How do you do that?

• 34:36Speaker 03

  I don't know, anything that I see myself in, even now, I'm like, pick it up, man. Like, what is your deal?

• 34:42Amy Poehler?

  Oh, my God, I'm the exact opposite. I'm like, babe, take a breath, dude. I mean, now that I have a podcast, I hear myself and I'm like, and I'm like, whoa.

• 34:52Speaker 03

  It's weird to, especially when people enjoy, when people like praise some acting work. And I'll, and you know, I, I have to watch everything like, like, like watching your baseball swing to make, you know, see what's working. And every time I speak my dialogue at this pace.

• 35:12Amy Poehler?

  Could you, I feel like I can do an impression of you. Can you do an impression of me?

• 35:16Speaker 03

  I, I would never want to.

• 35:18Amy Poehler?

  Really? I'm gonna do you right now to your face.

• 35:21Speaker 03

  I don't have it in me.

• 35:24Amy Poehler?

  Well, I have it in me.

• 35:31Amy Poehler?

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• 36:04Amy Poehler?

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• 36:48Amy Poehler?

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• 37:30Amy Poehler?

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• 38:02Amy Poehler?

  When you were playing Ron on the show, what did you do? Like, what were some like ways to get into that character? Like, was it wardrobe? Was it the mustache? Was it?

• 38:13Speaker 03

  I mean, it's funny. Meghan, we've been together for 25 years. And only about five years ago, God bless her. I mean, you've seen the crazy ways. I never get cast as like, good-looking people. So I get cast as, I'm like, okay, great. I'm gonna shave the top of my head off and have like Larry from The Three Stooges hair. And Meghan's like, there was one time I was doing a play and she wouldn't let me get in bed because I looked so upsetting. And I slept on the couch for two nights before I figured out I could put on a stocking cap. And then I got in. But she, five years ago, she finally said, you know what?

• 38:57Speaker 03

  I really don't like your facial hair.

• 39:00Amy Poehler?

  Oh, my God, bless her heart!

• 39:02Speaker 03

  I know. After 20 years of it. She's, I mean, I think she has liked it at times.

• 39:08Amy Poehler?

  Sure.

• 39:08Speaker 03

  But it's a practical thing where she said, it's a mouthful of thistles.

• 39:12Amy Poehler?

  Yeah.

• 39:13Speaker 03

  Like, when we're getting into it. And I was like, well, when you put it that way, it is like a bristle brush. It's like the kind of brush that people, farmers have to get the mud off your work boots.

• 39:26Amy Poehler?

  Yeah.

• 39:26Speaker 03

  It's a really stiff bristle.

• 39:27Amy Poehler?

  And if you have sensitive skin at all and you have make-out sash, you can just be totally red-faced.

• 39:32Speaker 03

  Right.

• 39:33Amy Poehler?

  Yeah.

• 39:33Speaker 03

  And so, and so now we negotiate. So I've got some work. And so I'm maintaining a mustache for the moment. But in a couple of weeks, I'll be shaving it.

• 39:44Amy Poehler?

  Yeah.

• 39:45Speaker 03

  And something I've noticed is, my talking changes. When I have the mustache, I call it my constipative rictus. It's like a sort of invisible clamp comes over me. And things become more stentorian and more like Sam the Eagle from The Muppets. Like where I can feel my brow more. And when I shave, I look 15 years younger. And I just become boyish. Where I'm just like...

• 40:14Amy Poehler?

  Okay, guys!

• 40:15Speaker 03

  Yeah, what's up?

• 40:18Amy Poehler?

  But do you give free mustache rides until you shave your mustache?

• 40:23Speaker 03

  I don't.

• 40:25Amy Poehler?

  You've always charged for mustache rides.

• 40:26Speaker 03

  I've always charged, yeah.

• 40:28Amy Poehler?

  And I've always thought that was rude. So we do this thing where we talk to someone who knows our guest to get a question from them. So we talk to Aubrey.

• 40:38Speaker 03

  Oh, Jesus.

• 40:40Amy Poehler?

  I know. And there's nothing we can use. It's barely usable.

• 40:46Speaker 03

  Born on the same day.

• 40:48Amy Poehler?

  She speaks of that. And she might read us a little bit of some text that you guys had back in fourth. Nothing bad. Nothing bad. You guys share a birthday. And I feel like there was, you know, there's so many people that talk about on the show, obviously, that we worked with and that we love. But Ron and April's relationship to me, especially in the rewatch, is very special.

• 41:15Speaker 03

  Most of the podcasts so far, I'm willfully not crying, by the way.

• 41:21Amy Poehler?

  Yeah.

• 41:21Speaker 03

  Like, I know that you would like some crying.

• 41:24Amy Poehler?

  I don't, I don't care either way.

• 41:28Speaker 03

  Like, if you just say Ron and April.

• 41:32Amy Poehler?

  I know.

• 41:33Speaker 03

  I'm in trouble.

• 41:35Amy Poehler?

  Ron and April.

• 41:38Speaker 03

  I have a lot of love for all of this subject matter. Man, my fucking shit.

• 41:45Amy Poehler?

  Wait, I have tissues. Don't hit me with the slapstick. Look, I have good hang tissues. I'll just keep them here just in case.

• 41:59Speaker 03

  You were saying, so Ron and April.

• 42:00Amy Poehler?

  No, but Ron and April, because, because if we're gonna extend the mommy daddy metaphor, definitely Aubrey slash April was our daughter on that show. And we, both of our characters kind of helped raise her and loved doing it. And by doing it, like any good parent, you learn something about yourself by doing it. Like, you know, Leslie learned that like her kind of pushy ambition it needs to be replaced with like a gentle listening as to what people want and need from her. And Ron learned what?

• 42:37Speaker 03

  Ron didn't learn anything.

• 42:41Speaker 03

  Ron learned what rap music was.

• 42:43Amy Poehler?

  Yeah, yeah. What, but I mean, what was it like doing scenes with Aubrey?

• 42:48Speaker 03

  I mean, it was, it was so fun because she, you know, she could, she could meet me in my own game. She took my, because one of the things, one of the formative things when we started the show was, I said to the guys, I mean, I just couldn't believe it. I couldn't believe that they created a part for me. Like, I was so aware that if someone had said to me, "Write your dream part," I would have written something so much stupider. Because I'm not, Mike, sure, you know, like, I would have been like, okay, he's got a fucking, he's got a motorcycle.

• 43:30Speaker 03

  And he always wears t-shirts with no sleeves. Like, it would have been like some 12-year-old's version of like, it's, he's like David Lee Roth.

• 43:40Speaker 03

  And it would, and it would have been very superficial. And in my final audition with you, which I, you know, I had to audition for five months to get the job.

• 43:51Amy Poehler?

  Wow, I didn't know it was that long.

• 43:53Speaker 03

  Yeah, it was, well, it started with, it started with Adam and I were brought in to read for a role named Josh. And it was, it was chemistry reads with Rashida.

• 44:05Amy Poehler?

  Right.

• 44:06Speaker 03

  And, you know, if you're going in to read of chemistry for a TV show, guess who you don't want to walk in the fucking door?

• 44:13Amy Poehler?

  Adam Scott, fucking chemistry. Fucking charisma. Believe me, I had to do scenes with him. I was like, this guy.

• 44:20Speaker 03

  I'm his, I'm like his plumber, if I'm lucky.

• 44:24Amy Poehler?

  And gorgeous, both of you have gorgeous hair, though.

• 44:26Speaker 03

  Yeah, they were.

• 44:28Amy Poehler?

  And people should know, this is your hair.

• 44:31Speaker 03

  It is, but they also photographed the fleshy parts. But so, so that was crazy and that didn't work. And somehow Mike and Greg also were stuck on me. Thank God. I mean, they called my agent and said, "It's not going to happen."

• 44:48Speaker 03

  If you can imagine, we're not going to cast you as someone who Rashida has to kiss.

• 44:54Speaker 03

  If you can wrap your head around that. But we really want you on the show. And there's this part of Amy's boss that should have really been like 20 years old.

• 45:04Amy Poehler?

  Yeah, yeah. I think they were thinking a lot older in the beginning. Yeah.

• 45:08Speaker 03

  But and I was and I was like, great, whatever. And so then they had me come in and they read every guy in the world. So then finally, it the net got as wide as possible. Then it narrowed, narrowed, narrowed. And they brought me in one more time for like, and Mike said, OK, we're looking at like eight guys. And then you came to town and Mike said, all right, we're going to have you come in and and read with Amy. And this is it. This is going to be it. And it was one of those things. This happened to me a lot where I got the job and it blew my mind.

• 45:47Amy Poehler?

  Also, you cried. We called you and you cried.

• 45:49Speaker 03

  Oh, I sobbed my eyes out. I mean, I said to Mike.

• 45:52Amy Poehler?

  On the phone.

• 45:52Speaker 03

  I'm gonna, I was like, I'm gonna, I said, I'm gonna openly sob, but I want to stay on the phone.

• 46:00Speaker 03

  I was 38 years old. Like, I'd been through a lot of experiences where I almost got a life changing job. And this one was so much better than any of them had been.

• 46:11Amy Poehler?

  Before we get off of Park, so I do want to talk about the other stuff that you have done and are doing. Favorite episode. I know it's hard to pick, but just like, you know, pick one. Don't overthink it.

• 46:23Speaker 03

  I have two answers in there, and it's funny, but one is called Ron and Tammy, and one is called Leslie and Ron, I believe. But I mean, you know, Meghan is just the most wickedly funny person I've ever met. And getting to, again, the alchemy of what Mike and the writers came up with for her to do, you know, the two of us banding together against this evil librarian slapping her face with like a big cock of beef jerky, like, we're just like.

• 47:01Speaker 03

  Mike knew that, you know, he was like, do you think Meghan would?

• 47:05Amy Poehler?

  I still have people come up and go, you really got the library right. Those people over there, I'm like, what? The people that run the library are like, Tammy? That's insane.

• 47:14Speaker 03

  That's so funny.

• 47:15Amy Poehler?

  But they, they know that, yeah.

• 47:17Speaker 03

  But then the, you know, the entire series paying off in this episode that was such a gift. There was like this crazy one act play.

• 47:27Amy Poehler?

  Yeah.

• 47:29Speaker 03

  Oh, God.

• 47:30Amy Poehler?

  Oh, here it comes.

• 47:35Amy Poehler?

  I loved that episode so much and it was so like senior, our senior year. That was the other thing. It was like senior year, we got to be in that, we got a whole week together in that room.

• 47:45Speaker 03

  That whole thing that they did with, uh, where, where, you know, Ron, that, the, that whole story going into that last season was so gorgeous. Because they had laid so much pipe.

• 47:58Amy Poehler?

  I know.

• 47:59Speaker 03

  For Ron to like swallow his pride and come to ask you for a job and, and then the way it all went down. Um, that was possibly the greatest thing about the show for me was the history of, of me and Tammy bred so much hilarity. But then what developed between Ron and Leslie, um, was, was the first time in my life that, you know, that I was counted on by a show to, you know, to carry some emotional weight.

• 48:30Amy Poehler?

  Yeah. And it was, and also I think just like a great example of like the different kinds of love. I mean, we really lionize romantic love and we'd make a lot of art about it, but there's so many different ways to love.

• 48:42Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 48:43Amy Poehler?

  And love, platonic love and friendship and the idea of like being there for each other and being, going through things with each other and like mentor, mentee, and then equals and then, and just, and also just the idea, if we're to really widen out that people don't have to agree to treat each other with respect.

• 49:03Speaker 03

  Totally.

• 49:05Amy Poehler?

  Remember that?

• 49:06Speaker 03

  Yep.

• 49:08Amy Poehler?

  Okay, speaking of beautiful roles, Nick. The Last of Us. Oh my God, let's both get a tissue. That was so good, Nick.

• 49:19Speaker 03

  Well, thank you.

• 49:21Amy Poehler?

  That was so beautiful. I mean, I remember texting you right after. And congrats on winning the Emmy.

• 49:27Speaker 03

  Yeah, crazy.

• 49:28Amy Poehler?

  I mean, it was so, how did you get that part?

• 49:31Speaker 03

  Well, I wrote a joke about this. They needed a guy who could use a shovel. And there are only three of us in Hollywood.

• 49:40Speaker 03

  Harrison Ford passed and Jane Lynch was not available.

• 49:46Speaker 03

  I, Craig Mason, who wrote that, I mean, that everyone knew. When you read that script, you were like, this is going to, if we don't fuck this up, this is going to

• 49:59Amy Poehler?

  Yeah.

• 50:00Speaker 03

  win awards or whatever. For many years, my godson had a Little League team and I sponsored it. It was the Offerman Woodshop Little League team. And Craig was one of my Little League dads. So I was just friends with him from a pretty wholesome place.

• 50:21Speaker 03

  And we had expressed some mutual affection for each other's work over the years. But he got ahold of me and was like, I'm sending you something and you have to do it. And I read it and it was funny because Meghan and I had just had a talk about that I still to this day, my vice is that I overload my calendar

• 50:41Amy Poehler?

  Yeah.

• 50:41Speaker 03

  with fun.

• 50:42Amy Poehler?

  I have seen that in real time. We worked on Making It Together, a really fun show together. You would tell me your year and I would think, this too shall not, this isn't gonna hold.

• 50:51Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 50:51Amy Poehler?

  Too many things.

• 50:52Speaker 03

  The problem is, it's, I love it.

• 50:55Amy Poehler?

  Yeah.

• 50:56Speaker 03

  It's all, but that's, that's my vice. That's my problem.

• 50:59Amy Poehler?

  Yeah.

• 50:59Speaker 03

  And Meghan and I had just had a talk about where I was like, okay, I'm gonna

• 51:03Amy Poehler?

  Take a break.

• 51:04Speaker 03

  I'm gonna do less. And this thing came in and they needed me in Calgary for a month. And I didn't have the month.

• 51:12Amy Poehler?

  Yeah.

• 51:12Speaker 03

  And so, but I read the, so I had Meghan read the script and she was like, guess what, buddy? You're going to Calgary.

• 51:22Amy Poehler?

  Um, okay. We, I mentioned it, we made a really fun show called Making It about makers and like the process of making it. You have Little Woodchucks, the book that's all about like your guide to tools and tomfoolery, but it is, the idea of making things has always been very important to you. You've spoken about it a lot, the spirituality of it, like how important it is for your life, your peace of mind. You work primarily with wood, but all different types of material. Why are you writing, and you've written many, many books. This book is for little people. Why is, how do you get little people, young people, to get interested in making things? And why is it important for them to do that?

• 52:05Speaker 03

  I just took my mom and dad on this book tour with me in the UK, and we were just talking about how they brought me and my siblings up in a house where it wasn't talked about. They just taught us all to sustain the family. Like, part of the family was we make things together, whether it's a meal, or, you know, if we are mending our clothing, or building, making firewood, building out buildings. We'd gardened. And woodworking is a great way to think about, what's this made of?

• 52:36Amy Poehler?

  Yeah.

• 52:37Speaker 03

  And that it's true of everything. Who's making this? Who made this car? Who made these shoes? Who made this pie? Are they having a good time?

• 52:44Amy Poehler?

  Yeah.

• 52:45Speaker 03

  Are they being cool with our resources, the way they're making this car? Or, you know?

• 52:50Amy Poehler?

  Yeah, beautiful. I, you can feel it in here. It's awesome, Nick. So, I love it.

• 52:54Speaker 03

  Thank you. People are responding really well to it.

• 52:57Amy Poehler?

  Yeah, it's great.

• 52:58Speaker 03

  Because all of us, I'm, I'm a kid who looks at a screen too much. Like, we all understand that. And making things with each other, whether it's your family, or your neighbors, or your co-stars, is a great way to not look at a screen and still have a delightful life. Can I show you a prop?

• 53:17Amy Poehler?

  Yes. Of course.

• 53:19Speaker 04

  The thing sitting in my shop is, so I wanted to make a guitar.

• 53:24Amy Poehler?

  Wow.

• 53:24Speaker 04

  Because I tour and I do songs. And I thought, if I do that with a guitar I made.

• 53:30Amy Poehler?

  Amazing.

• 53:30Speaker 04

  I'm done. I can just do that for the rest of my life.

• 53:35Speaker 04

  Guitars are daunting, so I started with a ukulele.

• 53:39Speaker 04

  So this is a mahogany ukulele. And I've got.

• 53:43Amy Poehler?

  Wow.

• 53:44Speaker 04

  12 of them sitting in my shop that are just the bodies and the necks waiting to be put together.

• 53:52Amy Poehler?

  This is beautiful.

• 53:53Speaker 04

  It's instrument, so I think probably instruments and boats.

• 53:57Amy Poehler?

  Can you play the ukulele? Can you play some of those?

• 54:00Speaker 04

  Let's see if it's in tune.

• 54:09Speaker 04

  Would you like to hear my ukulele song?

• 54:11Amy Poehler?

  Yes, please.

• 54:14Speaker 04

  Whiskey you were sent from heaven above. And Ben Franklin said that beer is proof of God's love. But too much of either will earn me a shove from my wife, whom I'd like to stay the husband of. I love beer and whiskey, perhaps a bit too much. Given the chance, I'd fall off a bar stool daily to keep me out of the pub and also out of Dutch. I make things like this soprano ukulele.

• 54:52Speaker 04

  I'll give you one more verse. Everywhere I go, people staring at a phone. Sitting in a crowded room, completely alone. It gives me more willies than the Twilight Zone. My brains are hooked on that shit like a dog on a bone. Put down your gadget and look me in the eye. So our interaction can proceed more gaily.

• 55:15Speaker 03

  Silence your tablet and ejaculate aside to the sweetly strumming sounds of ukulele.

• 55:24Amy Poehler?

  Oh, Nick, that was so good.

• 55:29Speaker 03

  There's, there's more, but that felt like enough.

• 55:33Amy Poehler?

  Now you're gonna get me going. Now you're gonna get my waterworks going. Okay, we're gonna end our, um, our interview today with a speed round. And, um, you know,

• 55:46Speaker 03

  You got, you got the wrong guy for a speed round.

• 55:48Amy Poehler?

  I know. Why do we need you?

• 55:51Speaker 03

  I should just do one snap or two snaps. That should be all I'm allowed.

• 55:57Amy Poehler?

  Um, but you mentioned hot takes and people having hot takes and how we don't really need hot takes. I want your hot takes on history and philosophy.

• 56:05Speaker 03

  Okay.

• 56:06Amy Poehler?

  Because I know you love history. You love philosophy. I'm gonna try lightning round today, but I'm gonna only ask you questions about history and philosophy.

• 56:13Speaker 03

  Okay, I'll try to go fast, but it's, it's pretty, pretty daunting.

• 56:17Amy Poehler?

  Okay, I know. Well, don't worry. It won't be hard. Aristotle, smart or weird?

• 56:23Speaker 03

  Smart.

• 56:24Amy Poehler?

  Kierkegaard used different pseudonyms to debate. What, what would be a pseudonym you would use to debate?

• 56:30Speaker 03

  Oh, um, Pilotos.

• 56:35Amy Poehler?

  Freud, yes or no?

• 56:38Speaker 03

  Uh, no.

• 56:40Amy Poehler?

  I say no too. Okay. Um, true or false? The unexamined life is not worth living.

• 56:50Speaker 03

  Uh, true.

• 56:51Amy Poehler?

  I think, therefore I am. True or false?

• 56:55Speaker 03

  False.

• 56:56Amy Poehler?

  Ooh. You cannot step twice into the same river.

• 57:03Speaker 03

  Oh, true. That's a, that's a huge one. That's, that's on my, that's on my, up on my board.

• 57:08Amy Poehler?

  Is it?

• 57:08Speaker 03

  Oh, yeah. It's, it's something that, that occurs to me a lot. Um, you know,

• 57:16Speaker 03

  there's nothing, you can never recapture, especially in our business.

• 57:22Speaker 03

  You know, if, like, if, if we ever, uh, had cause to do some sort of reboot or something of Parks and Rec.

• 57:28Amy Poehler?

  Yeah.

• 57:30Speaker 03

  It was not the same river.

• 57:32Amy Poehler?

  Different river.

• 57:32Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 57:33Amy Poehler?

  Can't step twice into the same river.

• 57:34Speaker 03

  No.

• 57:35Amy Poehler?

  I'm a joker, I'm a smoker, I'm a midnight toker.

• 57:38Speaker 03

  True.

• 57:40Amy Poehler?

  Now we're moving on to history.

• 57:42Speaker 03

  Okay.

• 57:43Amy Poehler?

  What was the coolest thing Egyptians invented?

• 57:48Speaker 03

  Man.

• 57:50Amy Poehler?

  In your opinion?

• 57:51Speaker 03

  This is a guess, because I don't, I'm not sure if that was Egyptians. I was gonna say irrigation.

• 57:56Amy Poehler?

  Yeah, I think so.

• 57:58Speaker 03

  But, yeah, they did. If people disagree with that, they're wrong.

• 58:02Amy Poehler?

  Cleopatra, smash or pass?

• 58:05Speaker 03

  Uh, pass.

• 58:07Amy Poehler?

  The Vikings got to America before-

• 58:09Speaker 03

  That shit is tired.

• 58:10Amy Poehler?

  Yeah.

• 58:13Amy Poehler?

  The Vikings got to America before Columbus. Why doesn't anyone talk about that?

• 58:18Speaker 03

  Um, because, uh, because the Vikings did not have good PR.

• 58:24Speaker 03

  Columbus had a great press rep. Columbus didn't even set foot on the mainland. He like hit an island.

• 58:34Amy Poehler?

  Um, okay, and now we get to Aubrey's question for you. So Aubrey had, she had a few questions. Her first one was, do you believe in ghosts?

• 58:41Speaker 03

  Okay, uh, no. But, but I don't disagree. When people do, I believe them.

• 58:49Amy Poehler?

  Ah, well said. Do you, uh, do you believe in hell?

• 58:53Speaker 03

  No.

• 58:54Amy Poehler?

  Um, and if you could go back in a Bill and Ted kind of way, where you could basically, you could get zapped back to any point in history, and, um-

• 59:03Speaker 03

  This sounds like a good movie.

• 59:06Amy Poehler?

  And she's never seen Bill and Ted.

• 59:07Speaker 03

  I missed a lot of stuff.

• 59:08Amy Poehler?

  Oh my god, fun. It's a great one. Well, anyway, they zap back in like a time machine, um, right? And a Bill and, yeah, and they go back and they're just Bill and Ted in different, and they're just two dummies. It's like Dumb and Dumber in a time machine.

• 59:21Speaker 03

  Totally.

• 59:22Amy Poehler?

  Um, and, um, they, so what, if you could zap back in a time machine to any era, where would you go? Who would you fight? And would you take Aubrey with you?

• 59:32Speaker 03

  Oh, man. Um, yeah, if taking Aubrey is an option, of course, and weapons are involved, by all means. Um, I, uh, I suppose I would go, uh, to the Roman Empire and-

• 59:47Amy Poehler?

  I knew it.

• 59:47Speaker 03

  And I would have Aubrey fight them with her wiles.

• 59:51Amy Poehler?

  Mmm.

• 59:52Speaker 03

  And, uh, I would discover Cumberland sausage and take over the British Isles and become king.

• 59:58Amy Poehler?

  Cumberland sausage got, made people king?

• 1:00:02Speaker 03

  In my hands.

• 1:00:05Speaker 03

  In this narrative?

• 1:00:06Amy Poehler?

  You'd be the sausage king.

• 1:00:07Speaker 03

  You're goddamn right, yeah. Guys, we, guys? We could do this, or

• 1:00:17Amy Poehler?

  Follow me.

• 1:00:18Speaker 03

  You could try this sausage. Have you heard of caraway seed? Come with me.

• 1:00:24Amy Poehler?

  Um, why do you love history so much?

• 1:00:27Speaker 03

  Um, I don't, uh,

• 1:00:29Amy Poehler?

  Do you?

• 1:00:29Speaker 03

  I do, I'm, I'm, I mean, I think because I'm fascinated with what assholes we are, you know?

• 1:00:36Amy Poehler?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 1:00:37Speaker 03

  But also what incredible creatures we are.

• 1:00:40Amy Poehler?

  Yeah.

• 1:00:40Speaker 03

  Like it's, when you look at my own, anybody's, the foibles of your own life, uh, and you look at like, I don't know, a lot of what's going on in our, in our world right now, it's astonishing that the lights are on. Like, it's pretty crazy that, that a civilization has even lasted this long.

• 1:01:02Amy Poehler?

  Do you believe in aliens?

• 1:01:04Speaker 03

  I, I, I'm agnostic about all that. I, I, it seems like there is probably life in the universe.

• 1:01:13Amy Poehler?

  Yeah.

• 1:01:14Speaker 03

  But until I get to shake hands with them, or, uh, I don't mean to be racist, whatever their appendages are.

• 1:01:23Amy Poehler?

  Appendages are, yeah.

• 1:01:24Speaker 03

  Yeah. You know, all, all of those things. I, I think, I think there's a lot we will never know as humans, and I like dwelling in that. So if there are ghosts or spirits, uh, I don't, I don't, I don't think hell exists because that's a fiction written in a book by people. But, uh, that, that sensibility, whatever the afterlife is, um, I, I don't think anyone will ever know what it is. And so if some people are like, I speak to spirits or whatever, I have, I have no cause to disagree with that.

• 1:01:57Amy Poehler?

  Yeah.

• 1:01:58Speaker 03

  They just have never talked to me.

• 1:01:59Amy Poehler?

  That's a very Ron Swanson answer, actually. It's a very libertarian answer, basically, which is like, to each his own.

• 1:02:05Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 1:02:06Amy Poehler?

  Yeah.

• 1:02:06Speaker 03

  Everyone should be allowed, you know, their, their own trip and to, to like what they like.

• 1:02:11Amy Poehler?

  Um, and last question, Nick. What are you watching, listening? Where do you go right now to laugh? Where do you, where, right?

• 1:02:20Speaker 03

  There, there are two shows, uh, cause I feel like it comes up a lot that there's not a lot of great, it's not a great time for comedy on television. The big hits like Hacks and Studio, those are the, make us laugh quite a bit. But there are two that we've really loved that I, that are more obscure that I would love to, your listeners to know about. One's Australian and it's called Colin from Accounts.

• 1:02:48Amy Poehler?

  Yes.

• 1:02:49Speaker 03

  It's so funny and also so heartwarming.

• 1:02:52Amy Poehler?

  Yes.

• 1:02:53Speaker 03

  Really moves me. Then there's one in England called, I think it's called Such Brave Girls. Do you know that show?

• 1:03:01Amy Poehler?

  I do very well. Cat Sadler.

• 1:03:04Speaker 03

  And, and I think the credits, the opening credits are the words spelled out in pubic hair on a tile floor, on a bathroom floor. And that's, it's a great example of the, the tone of the show.

• 1:03:19Amy Poehler?

  Yes.

• 1:03:20Speaker 03

  It's so delightfully filthy and so funny.

• 1:03:24Amy Poehler?

  That is a great show. That's a hilarious show and those ladies are great. There's a lot of good stuff out there. You just gotta find it.

• 1:03:32Speaker 03

  You just gotta find it.

• 1:03:33Amy Poehler?

  Um, Nick, did we cover everything? I think we did.

• 1:03:38Speaker 03

  I think so, yeah.

• 1:03:39Amy Poehler?

  You know.

• 1:03:40Speaker 03

  Did we, did we weigh in on Aristotle? Yeah, we did.

• 1:03:42Amy Poehler?

  And you said pass on Cleopatra. You're not gonna smash.

• 1:03:46Speaker 03

  Yeah, come on.

• 1:03:47Amy Poehler?

  I love you.

• 1:03:51Speaker 03

  I'm not, I'm not gonna step in that river twice.

• 1:03:55Amy Poehler?

  I mean, you came all the way from England. You just landed. Thanks, buddy, for doing this.

• 1:04:03Speaker 03

  I know. Imagine how fast I would talk if I hadn't just gotten off a plane.

• 1:04:07Amy Poehler?

  Should we just try to do this like every month?

• 1:04:11Speaker 03

  Totally.

• 1:04:12Amy Poehler?

  Um, I love you. Thank you for doing this.

• 1:04:15Speaker 03

  I love you. Thank you.

• 1:04:17Amy Poehler?

  And, um, I can't wait to make something else with you soon, someday.

• 1:04:21Speaker 03

  Amen.

• 1:04:22Amy Poehler?

  Yeah, that would be awesome. But thanks for make, for doing this and making this. And thank you for my slapstick. Or is it, is it mine?

• 1:04:29Speaker 03

  If you would like it.

• 1:04:30Amy Poehler?

  Oh, oh, no, this is the one you travel with.

• 1:04:32Speaker 03

  By all means. It says, it says butt on it.

• 1:04:35Amy Poehler?

  It does say butt joint on it.

• 1:04:39Speaker 00

  It scares me a little bit.

• 1:04:42Amy Poehler?

  Thank you so much, Nick Offerman, for being here today. I love you, and it's always good to spend time with you. And for this polar plunge, I do want to just highlight something I didn't get a chance to talk to Nick about, which is, you know, we spoke a little bit about the physicality of Ron Swanson and how important it was for him to figure out that character. But do yourself a favor when you're watching Parks and Recreation, take a look at how Ron runs. It's one of my favorite things about Nick, is Ron Swanson runs in a very specific way. And sometimes he wipes out. And when he wipes out, it's beautiful. It's like stunt-level wipeout. But I can't explain it other than to say

• 1:05:20Amy Poehler?

  it just gives me total delight, the choice Nick made to run the way Ron runs. And I'm gesticulating for those listening, so you can't see, but it's just so funny. The tucked-in shirt, the way Nick sits when he plays Ron Swanson, the way he stares, all of that stuff is just like a masterclass, I think, in comedic acting and probably, you know, what a trained actor learns. And I wouldn't know. But, um, but anyway, look, he's that, he's a, it's a genius at work, watching Nick work. And so happy he could join us. Thank

• 1:06:04Amy Poehler?

  you for listening to Good Hang, and we'll see you soon. Bye.

• 1:06:09Amy Poehler?

  You've been listening to Good Hang. The executive producers for this show are Bill Simmons, Jenna Weiss-Berman, and me, Amy Poehler. The show is produced by The Ringer and Paperkite. For The Ringer, production by Jack Wilson, Kat Spillane, Kaya McMullin, and Aleia Zaniris. For Paperkite, production by Sam Green, Joel Lovell, and Jenna Weiss-Berman. Original music by Amy Miles.

• 1:06:34Amy Poehler?

  This episode is brought to you by Sephora. Holiday gifting can be a tough gig. You're frantically searching, second guessing everything, and accidentally buying your dad eye cream he's never gonna use. Thankfully, Sephora is here to save us from ourselves. Whether you're shopping for a total beauty guru or someone whose whole routine is hand soap, Sephora has the perfect gift for everyone on your list. And if you're still lost, don't panic. Their beauty advisors can guide you to safety. This holiday season, we all Sephora. Shop gifts at Sephora and give something beautiful.

• 1:07:06Speaker 05

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