SmartLess
Hosted by Jason Bateman, Sean Hayes and Will Arnett
Original podcast
Let it cascade; it’s Kieran Culkin. Acting, not-acting, Jazz, meat, and no hobbies. All this could be yours. Welcome to SmartLess.
15,531 words · 7 speakers
Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.
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Guys, welcome to today's podcast. How are you both feeling?
Does somebody have a gun to your head?
Yeah, well, it's just out of frame. It's not so much a gun as a crossbow.
I've never seen you do this.
A crossbow.
Welcome to Smartless. Have you ever shot a crossbow? Oh. No. Did I blow it? Welcome to Smartless.
Surprise guest, give us a little snapper clap, please.
Oh, wow. They're on fire, Roland. The firecracker. Hi.
Hi.
Hi, how are you guys? How are you?
Can I just dive right in?
Yeah, do you mind?
Oh, you have some prepared material? Go ahead.
I don't have prepared material. Guys. I was in the fucking ER again last night. Here's what, here's what. I had a kidney stone. I thought I was having appendicitis or something. So I had a kidney stone and so I haven't been to bed yet.
Wait, how have you not, why did you not cancel this record?
No, I'm fine. I'm fine. I'm actually in a good mood.
That would have been such a quick text for me.
How, I hear that's the most painful thing in the world.
You can't even know. I haven't had one in years and years.
So you had one out or you had one put in?
I had one. So the pain was excruciating. I'm like, oh Scotty, I got it. Scotty, I got it. Out of the ER. It was awful.
Can you tell me where it hurts? Is it in the tinky or is it in the kidney?
No, it's in, it's in your side. Yeah, it's in, I'm gonna say it's in your kidney. Yeah.
Hey, hey.
And then I'm still a little bit on morphine. I still like have a.
Oh, that's, this will be fun.
That is kind of fun. That is kind of fun. Wait a second.
Which I've never had.
So Shawnee, so you're in the hospital last week or whenever it was for a couple, couple of times in a night.
Like a month ago, yeah.
Right, twice in that one night and then.
Yeah, yeah. And then this.
And then you're back and then you get the full scope thing that you went and had done and then you have this. And, and my question to you is this.
Yes, yeah, yeah.
Are you paying so much attention to your well-being and your condition that you're, you know what I mean?
What do you mean? No. That was a half a sentence. Yeah.
That, that, that because you're so, I'm not saying that the experience isn't real.
Oh, well, yeah, it's a fucking kidney stone.
Obviously it's real, but, but, but there is a lot of attention paid to, to your health and to your condition at all times.
Is he, is he potentially creating some of this stuff by having such a close look at it?
Because I've.
Psychosomatic?
I should, I should have prefaced it by saying I'm not a doctor and I think that you guys know that.
You're on morphine too, so.
Yeah, I am. And also not from a doctor.
But it's like a cycle. I know what you mean, but it's a cycle because if something happens to me, then I want, I fear that, I don't want that thing to happen again.
I'm not saying it's psychosomatic, but I am, but I am suggesting that maybe you spend so much time and energy thinking about your health and your own condition.
I know, I know.
That if you were to think about other things. Other people, you do think about other people, you're a very thoughtful person. But I wonder, do you know what I mean? I don't, again, I don't know, people are gonna.
I know, but he's being careless with the food that he eats, you know? So that's sort of like keeping his eye off the ball and being sort of lax.
That is true, that is true.
It's surprising for somebody who's so concerned with their health, because you are quite on top of it.
You should start smoking and, you know.
Like me.
You know what, though? I was lying there, I just had like bed head and I have these scabs in my ankles and I have this IV in my arm.
Not related, not related to the other stuff.
I looked at Scotty and I go, all this could be yours.
Can I ask you about where the scabs from the ankles?
Yeah, can I ask too?
They just.
Well, not to see him, just where they came from.
They're, I don't know, they just like, I don't know, just dry skin or whatever.
Wait, so now you've just got like old man scabs?
Yeah.
Yeah, he's got old man scabs.
I know.
Sean, I keep, I imagine walking into the gym at Sean's gym, walking into the men's locker room and he's, and he's got a hairdryer to his nutsack. He's one of those guys and you're like, fuck, man. Morning. Dude, how you doing? Like, fucking dude. These fuckers won't dry.
What are you?
That's funny. By the way, Jay, I switched the Nutcracker to the 21st if you want to go.
Oh, you did? Okay, great.
And Willie, please come if you want to.
I'm gonna go, I'm gonna be back on the, in New York.
Okay, and Jay, we're going anyway, so if you can go, great, if not, we'll do something else.
Jay, and are you, it gonna be just you or are you gonna bring your Nutcracker with you?
No, she'll be there.
It's just a great, it's a great, it's a great blow to the coffee chat and here comes our guest.
Wait a second, I just want to say one more thing, I was just thinking about this and I, and I, obviously I smoke from time to time and people are like, eh, don't smoke. I feel like I'm a world-class smoker.
Yeah, you're great at it, you are.
I really do, and I feel.
You never smell like cigarettes, you don't, you don't smoke a pack a day.
Thank you, thank you very much. Obviously, they're gonna play this clip at my, you know, TMZ will play this clip. But it should be noted, it's fine, it's so great, isn't it?
It's a hard thing to beat, although, you know, when I quit, they didn't have the vapes and the gums and the stickers and shit. So there are, there are things to replace it now.
There are things to replace it.
You know what, you're gonna, you got a lot of shit and you're, you'll, you'll get to it when you wanna get to it. No, no one's pushing you.
There are things to replace it, but there's nothing to replace our guest.
Oh, great.
You don't even know who our fucking guest is, but you're actually right, though.
Let Morpheum Molly go.
By the way, did you know I was about to say that?
No, no.
But one of my sort of cheap segues, um, by the way, I did move today from where I'm doing the podcast cuz I wanted to be a little bit cheerier.
Oh, okay, good. The truth is. Oh, yeah, yeah, you used to be in the whisper booth, now you're in your office.
Now in my office, just cuz I wanted, I just wanted to be in the, yeah, I wasn't in the jack shack. The jack shack, I forgot about my jack shack.
Remember the jack shack? The goo room.
I think it's, it's, the jack shack is, I haven't, it's covered in cobwebs, I think they're cobwebs. Okay, um, but you're, you are right, you are right that our guest today cannot be replaced and certainly won't be forgotten. Uh, I don't know why we'd even begin to forget because this person is so alive and vibrant right now and has been for a long time.
Snaps and clicks were great.
You'll like this, they were really good, they, those are the mark of, those are the kind of snaps and clicks of somebody who has confidence, the confidence of longevity in doing what they do. And I tell you, somebody who loves longevity is old JB.
And you're gonna love this guy because you have a lot, you have certain things in common in that both of you have been performing since you were really, really young, at a, on a professional level. And I love guests like this and particularly love this guest whom I do not know because they are so fucking talented.
Kurt Russell.
Funny and cool and smart, it's not Kurt Russell, but this person has been nominated for
Shirley MacLaine.
And won Emmys, Golden Globes, everything, you, you can't even imagine the number of films.
Sally Struthers.
You know him from Igby Goes Down, you know him from Scott Pilgrim Versus the World, you.
Michael Cera.
No, it's not Michael Cera.
Edgar Wright.
No, you also know him from Soderbergh's No Set And Move, but you're really gonna know him, uh, uh, really, really, really, really, really well from his new film, A Real Pain, but also mostly.
Jesse Eisenberg.
Succession.
Kieran Culkin.
It's Kieran Culkin.
Oh, damn it, finally got it.
Bateman, Bateman, you ruined the intro when it's just constant guessing.
Sally Struthers was close though.
Sally Struthers was not a bad guess. That was not, Shirley MacLaine was pretty close too.
I thought, yeah.
Oh, Karen, I'm so happy to see you there.
It's crazy. This is really exciting for me. This is one of my favorite shows.
This has been a long time coming. We had a few times where we were gonna have Karen on and then, and then we couldn't for various reasons that we won't get into, but anyway.
This is Karen, yes.
So he's.
And look, I canceled for bullshit like a month ago. And Sean, you can't, you didn't even cancel. You were in the emergency room?
Yeah. What, Jay, what were you gonna say?
Well, I just, I just was, wanted to frame up these 90 second delay on Sean there going, "Oh yes, it's Karen. Just then."
Fucking morphine is strong, right?
No, no, because I remember he was supposed to be on, I didn't know who it was, but you must have been that guest that we had an issue with.
Yes, yes.
Yeah, mine was not kidney stones.
No, but it was, but it was beyond his control. Have you ever had a kidney stone or you ever seen one?
Uh, no, to me, that's my biggest nightmare. But I, I thought the, like you said, I thought the pain came from the pee pee, not the.
No, it starts, it starts in your back in the kidney. That's why it's a kidney stone. And then it works way through to the bladder. And now it's out, so it's sitting in my bladder. So I have another painful thing coming when I pee it out.
No, no, no.
Cause you're gonna pee it out.
Yeah, cause when you pee it out, that's when it hurts. But it only hurts for five, you know, two seconds, cause you're.
They break it down, right? Don't they like, right?
If it's big, this one wasn't big.
I think they also have a small tool that can spread your aperture there at the end of your tinky.
Stop it. Worst thing I've ever heard.
The miatus, the dime slot?
It's a clamp.
When does that come in?
A reverse clamp.
It's a dime slot.
When does that come out? When is that? Do you just like wait until you're.
That comes out January 15th, right? Is Presidents' Day weekend? Is that what?
Buy a new mattress, pee out of kidney stone, yeah.
Yeah, we're gonna, it's gonna be a huge opening weekend.
Wait, Shawnee, is that, is that truly the, the next stage is the breakdown and then the pee out?
Your body breaks it down. I mean, no, your body doesn't break down. It just passes through. What is that? The thing that, the tube that goes from your kidney to your bladder?
Penis.
No, that's the, your penis hole.
Tube, pee tube.
Oh, God.
Something like that. Anyway, and it hangs out in the bladder. Anyway, Karen, how are you?
A bunch of doctors. This is great. We're doing, we're doing so well.
Welcome to our show.
This is, I love, I love this. This is exactly what I thought it'd be, talking about a bunch of bullshit. I got my, uh, wife, or rather Santa Claus got my wife a hoodie last year that said, "Explain it to me like I'm Tracy."
No, come on.
Are you serious?
You guys should sue because I didn't buy it through you. That's like, that's merch money that you guys aren't getting.
Is that an Etsy? Is that an Etsy thing?
It was like some, I think, I think it was, or like Redbubble or one of those fucking things, you know?
Wait, hang on a second, Karen. I don't want to interrupt you.
Explain it to me like I'm Tracy. I want one of those.
Hang on, I do want to say one thing.
I can also talk at the same time.
No, you can't. I can't believe that JB knows about Etsy. That's the thing that I'm most shocked at.
How do you know about Etsy?
Dude, where do you think I get my throw pillows?
I, I don't know.
Karen, my sister is a big fan of yours, by the way. As am I.
Wait, Tracy's, no.
That's Tracy.
You haven't seen anything of mine, right? Haven't you guys not watched Succession or something?
I'm gonna make a sweatshirt that says, "Find somebody who loves you the way that Tracy loves Karen." Why don't, why don't we just say that?
Get that one.
Karen, I, I do want to get this out of the way. I am very embarrassed to say I am the only person on the planet that has yet to start. Only because I'm very serious about my ingestion of quality product. Yeah. I'm waiting till I can sit down and just suck it up like the addict that I am.
It's one of the, it's one of the biggest shows ever.
Everybody I know loves it. I've never heard a bad thing about it.
And I'm embarrassed to say, I started it and then I got, and then I was like, okay, I gotta restart it. And I haven't. And, and, but the, I did see most of season one. You are so fucking funny, dude, and so facile and so quick. You can tell that it's, obviously it's really well-written and there's a great cast, but you have a facility to you that is really unique and really, like, impressive.
It really, it seems very, I have seen enough clips of not only that, but everything else you've ever done. I've seen those things. You do seem very comfortable with what you do.
Yes, you are.
And that's like, it's fun to watch.
That's lately.
Well, nah, well, then you were a great, a greater actor than I thought you were because you always looked like you're having fun. You're not working too hard in the best sense of the, of the phrase. And as a viewer, you're just, you're relaxed watching you do your thing because it looks like you're having fun and you're not stressing about your performance. And are you hitting your beats and you know?
Oh God, no, I don't hit beats, yeah, or marks or any of that stuff.
Yeah, you're right. You're right. I can't, I can't wait to see Real Pain.
About like 10 years ago, my, my wife sort of made fun of me. I was doing a play and I was like, I need to go to work. And she would, work. What you do is literally called play.
Right. No, my wife's the same thing. Doesn't give it up. Yeah.
But she, it's like.
But I was like, she's kind of right. Maybe I'll go out there and just have fun with it and just stick around. This is not extra serious. This is just us, you know? I don't know. I'd like to go out there and play.
And do you think that that level of comfort and ease is because you started so young and it was not really ever framed initially to you as like an occupation, a job, a way in which to make a living?
Or was it though? Or was it, or was it framed as a way of paying the rent?
There's a lot of, there's a lot of stuff that I think because I started doing it at six, uh, like that, that's helped me now is like, I learn lines incredibly fast. I know I've listened to the show a lot, Jason, I know you're the same way.
Yeah, that's like Jay.
I often like on, on a real pain. Do you guys know Jesse Eisenberg?
Oh, not yet.
No.
Oh, no, you should meet him. He's just, he's.
Seems awesome.
Anxiety personified. Um, and nothing caused him more panic than me walking to set and going, what are we shooting today? And he's like, what? No, I, I wrote, there's like a whole page long speech. What's wrong with you? I was like, I learned the lines fast. Don't worry about it.
And I don't like to rehearse and I just sort of like look it over really quickly and go, oh, those are the words. I'll just, you know, I'll probably.
Right. Reliant instinct.
Yeah, just go.
I'm with you.
Yeah. JB, JB's really good at that. I, I think that that's could be, obviously it works for you and it's very freeing, right? So that you're not, yeah, you're not stuck into a.
But there are certain parts, if I was more courageous, I would take on some parts that probably deserve a lot more research, study, practice.
But I do really enjoy kind of not.
Acting, I think we've talked about this before, right? I love watching actors that do act.
We enjoy not acting too. As much as possible, believe me.
We're all rooting for you.
I like being the audience as opposed to being, you know, the character.
Jason, do you take it personally when everybody keeps encouraging you to direct more?
Yeah, it's starting to wear on me.
But wait, but Kieran, what about on Succession, those big scenes where there's lots of people?
Fucking speeches and shit.
Dialogue and like, I mean, you almost have to memorize everybody else's lines too, right?
Uh, yeah, sort of, and I couldn't do that fast. There was, you know, I've done things like that. Like Sarah Snook and I had a really good rapport. So sometimes I would say, hey, can you just take my lines? Or, you know, vice versa. We even did, we even did a scene once for like, by like the third take. Uh, I just jumped in and stole her line and gave her a little side eye. And then she looked at me like, all right, game on. And then later on she took mine, you know?
Yeah, that's great. I love that. I love that.
That's pretty cool.
But we ran it like, we started did it like a play. There wasn't really a lot of rehearsing. We would go in there, we would always run the full scene like three, four, maybe five times. Cameras were always vaguely somewhere. Uh, there was no such thing as like coverage, pick up shots.
Really?
I love that. Wow.
I remember like in the camera system, like he showed up, it was like a new guy. And, uh, we were kind of rehearsing. He put a mark down and I just looked, I stopped the rehearsal and looked at him and said, first day?
Yeah, that sounds like Arrested Development. You got multiple cameras and they're just sort of tagging different stuff on each take. And by the time you run it three or four times, it's fully covered, everything.
That's why that show was so fricking alive. I'm on my third viewing of that show. That show was great.
We were never, yeah, but it's true. We were never really aware of the cameras in that way. And talk about a sense of play, truly, you, we had that same feeling, which was it was super fun. And you could kind of do anything.
It's so alive that that's why like, because you, you guys were connecting and like, you guys were very live. And that's what people respond to, I think, when they're watching.
And we didn't learn, we also didn't learn our lines before. We would, we would kind of do it. We'd have, we'd have a sort of a camera blocking as it were, it was pretty loose and, and we would just kind of. Everybody would just kind of throw it out there and right JB?
How many times, do you remember that time we would come back to shoot that extra, the first Netflix season and the whole, the first day, Jason and I had a 12-page, two-man scene, which was just, just, do you remember that? And then we were walking towards the stage and Mitch Hurwitz comes up to us and he goes, "Hey, guys, um, so I kind of rewrote the thing." And we're like, "Uh huh." So he gave us, and we're just going like this, on the way, he's going, "Uh huh, uh huh." And then, "Okay, you're gonna come in here, you come in the front door, all right, I'm gonna go there, you're gonna go there," and rolling, and here we go.
Perfect.
And you just kind of fucking go.
So fun.
Yeah, your back's against the wall, you gotta go.
And Karen, do you, do you, are you, are you, um, excited to find another project that is, that is similar to that? Is it, is it now a way in which you love to work that you'd love to replicate on all future jobs? Or do you want something like the polar opposite, you know, where it's very, you know, specific and measured and what do you think?
That is a really good question, because I think like when I started working on Succession, I had to throw everything that I used to do out the window. Because I'd never done a TV show before, my thing was like be off-book months before, learn everyone else's lines, be extremely prepared, and then because it's the nature of a TV show where you don't know the next episode, and also our show, we were getting rewrites on the day, some of it, what you just said, um, I had to abandon that and just go fly by the seat of my pants. But it lent itself to that character because he was the kind of guy who, um, could sort of talk his way in and out of any situation, so he didn't really have to think before he spoke. So it was sort of like, he was that guy. So I've been trying to mentally prepare for like, as it feels like going backwards, like, you know, doing a job with coverage and pick.
And so when we started doing A Real Pain, I sort of thought we were going to do that, which we did kind of on the first day or so. But the character in that movie is like the most spontaneous sort of surprising person. It's the kind of thing where just when you think you sort of have him down, just to spite you, he's gonna give you a different reaction than what you're expecting.
Which is a great counterbalance to, to, to Jesse's character, correct?
Exactly, yeah. And he's, and you know, and he wrote it, he directed it, he like shot this, the whole thing. Before I got there, he like shot it on his phone, playing my character, and he would tell me things like, "Okay, so in this scene, you sit over there," and I would go, "How do you know?" He's like, well, what do you mean? How do you know? Well, we haven't tried. He goes, well, why can't you sit there? I said, maybe I could, but we haven't tried. What do you mean? Why doesn't it work? I'm sure it works. And we talked way in a frickin' circle for a while.
I love you get you get to set the first day. He's like, hey, I gotta cut of the movie right here.
You were great. We're just doing pickups today.
So then was it? How was it? What like you would say like, well, yeah, maybe I don't sit there. Maybe I'd stand over here. That way he would just like throw out all of his coverage and just be like, oh, fuck.
He kind of abandoned it on like the second or third day.
Wow.
Really? You forced him to?
Well, because, yeah, well, we had to shoot this sequence that he had mapped out. But the whole idea of it was like, we're gonna, I want my picture taken in front of the statue. And then I start gathering the other people in this tour group to come with me. And he had planned it all out. And I was like, well, isn't sort of the point to just for me to get them into the idea? And we're all gonna take a photo together? And he's like, yes, do you mind if we just try it once? And then he basically just told the cinematographer like, never mind, fuck the shot list, pick up the camera.
Dude, that's great, though. How cool is that? Because then you guys ended up creating something together. It was much more collaborative. And I wonder if, and JB, you can kind of maybe address this a little bit, having directed so much now. Having that for Jesse, I don't know, we should ask him. Having that sort of set, that shot list, everything the way he wants to see it. And he was so ready and so regimented. You come in, you kind of throw a wrench in that whole thing. And I bet you freed him up in a lot of ways.
Maybe I think it freaked him out a lot, though.
I'm sure it freaked him out.
I think it scared the shit out of him, but yeah.
Yeah, cuz the clock is ticking. You got this call sheet you gotta get done in 12 hours. And it's like, now I got a fucking pain in the ass actor that's throwing it all up in the blender.
We ended up getting our scenes a lot faster, actually. That's how I felt anyway. I'm sort of like, well, you know, let's just run the whole thing a couple of times instead of picking up these little pieces. And then, you know, you get to shoot it how you want.
And we will be right back.
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And now back to the show.
Kieran, now you're going to take all of that, that way you're working, all that kind of stuff. How is this going to be different? You're now going to go and you've, you've worked, obviously you've, you've done theater before, but you're going back to Broadway. Is that right in the, in the spring?
Yeah, I am. Glengarry Glen Ross.
Glengarry Glen Ross.
Yes, but no, it's already cast.
What about you? Need an understudy?
Sure, you can be my understudy. Uh, Bob Odenkirk's in it, Bill Burr, Michael McKean.
Okay.
Look at that.
That's gonna be great.
What a fucking cast.
I'm terrified. I thought I was, yeah.
When do you, when do you open?
I don't know. They don't even have a theater, but they keep telling me that, uh,
I think you'll be fine. Try the Tabasco. It's spicy. It's big.
It's a great theater, Tabasco, home of Goodbye Oscar. And it was a great, huge.
Good night, Oscar.
Are you about to ask Sean, are you about to ask me about funny theater stories?
Yes, if you have.
Funny things that happen?
If you have any, please share them. I love it. But, um, look, Kieran, you can't be.
Let him tell a theater story.
No, I wasn't actually prompting myself for a funny bit. I just know that Sean likes to ask that. Like, or it's audition stories or?
Yes, jump in. I love that. Those are my favorite stories if you have one.
I could, I got a really quick. One, which is I did a play 10 years ago with Michael Sarah.
Nice.
Uh, this is our youth and I had food poisoning and
Already funny.
The moment the show started and lights came up, I realized, oh, I'm fucked. So I spent like an hour just trying not to vomit. And by the end of the first act, we, I had this whole speech and I realized I can't open my mouth. I'm going to vomit. And I have this whole speech where I have to get the money. There's an amount and what I'm spending it on. And I stood up next to the, to the door to leave the apartment. I'm wobbling. And I had the speech and there's like a five, six second long pause that's not supposed to be there. And I hold my hand out and I just went, money. And he put the money in my hand. I ran out and the stage manager, I guess, had put a bucket right next to the door.
And I started violently loudly vomiting in this bucket. They were trying to drag me away, but I couldn't. I was just holding on to this bucket for dear life vomiting. I asked Michael afterwards, I said, could you guys hear me? He goes, are you fucking kidding me? It was the most surreal shared experience I've ever had with a group of people of listening to a grown man vomit in a bucket.
I'm just imagining Michael's just dry takes out to the house while everyone's hearing it, just like.
He said he grabbed a comic book and started trying to casually read a comic book as if this wasn't happening.
Until you made your re-entrance?
I, no, the understudy came in in act two.
Wow, really?
While I spent, yeah, I was vomiting upstairs for the next few hours and they somehow dragged me home for hours more vomiting.
That's the best theater story we've heard yet, Sean.
That's really good, Sean.
That's really great. I love that.
So wait, so this was in London then?
No, that one was in New York, but Wikipedia is correct. I did do that play in London, uh, like eight years before that.
No, no, no, no.
Well, you're the one who had time to actually do the research.
I actually do know that you did This Is Our Youth also in London. Uh, I have a very close relationship with This Is Our Youth because the original cast, uh, Missy Yeager was in the original cast, whom I lived with at the time. She was my girlfriend, uh, in the nineties.
I knew that, yeah.
I remember when they first did it and she and Kenny first did it and with, uh, Mark and, uh, Josh Hamilton. I saw it about 42 times.
Yeah, it's an amazing play.
Great play. It's such a, it's such a brilliant play.
I, I can't. Let it go. Like I played it as the character Warren in London and I I felt like I never got it right. So I spent like years trying to do it again and then realized I actually was right for the other part. I just had to spend years convincing Kenny Laundergin that I was right for that part. And then I got to do it like in Chicago, Sydney.
That's right.
I can't seem to let it go. Yeah.
Oh, that I did not know. Would it would it make a good movie?
I I don't know. I've always tried to crack that one. I I don't think I I don't know.
What about that? What about what about directing a movie?
Directing?
Or anything?
I don't know. I don't have that thing.
You don't have a directing thing?
I'm not that ambitious or curious.
That's true. I doubt that's true.
I I
You've been around. You've been around film and you've been making films since you were, as you said.
Six.
Well, first of all, what was the first? Let's get into this. What was the first professional experience you had working in TV, film, etc.?
Professional experience I had was a commercial when I was six and I actually don't quite know what it was for. But it was like for something to do with learning disabilities. And I remember that I was put, the the concept was I'm standing in front of a chalkboard with chalk in my hand and I don't know how to solve the easy thing in front of me. And the and the kids in class are supposed to be calling me dummy and stupid all that. And I have a distinct memory of being there and the director going, okay, he's like, action. And he starts going, dummy, idiot, stupid.
Oh, my God.
And like even then, even then, I'm thinking like, you know, I get it. I'm six. Like, stand here and look sad. I'm not fucking method. I'm six. What's wrong with you?
Right, right, right.
I think he was just getting out of stuff.
I have this image of you. I can't remember what I was watching where you were either you hosted or your brother hosted SNL and
Oh, good. I thought you were gonna say I have this image of you on my hard drive. Okay, keep going.
Well, that's yeah, that's it. But wait, why were you on? What was I watching where they did a zoom in on you and you were like onstage on SNL or something?
I I I hosted SNL a couple of years ago and it was thirty years.
Oh, that's what it was.
It was thirty years almost to the day. It was like a couple of days shy of being thirty years from when my brother hosted. And I got to be in like three sketches. So they had like, I got to be there for the good nights and stuff like that.
That's really cool. That was so cool.
Was that surreal?
That really was. And I it was one of those things I thought would never ever happen, but was there's very few like things I um.
Like I said, I'm not very ambitious. Uh, I don't like have these big aspiring dreams, but like hosting SNL was like that one. That one and like voicing the Simpsons, which I still haven't done yet. Those are like the two things I've always wanted to do.
Here they come.
I remember, I remember one time, I remember when JB got, uh, was asked to host the first time. This is a true story. And, um, you probably don't remember this, uh, and you were first, uh, you got asked to do it. And this was in, uh, you did it in like January of 2005, I think.
It wasn't after like the first year or second year?
Second year, yeah. So, yeah, it was January 2005. And I remember you going, dude, they just asked, I'm gonna host SNL. I go, that's fucking great. And you go, I mean, it's like a dream come true. And I was like, yeah, no shit. Obviously it's a fucking, what do you think you're fucking this? This was a dream come true for me. Oh, is it?
No, but a lot of people, but there's a lot of people and I won't, I won't mention their names here because maybe they, they're not excited about it. But, um, that they, they will never host SNL because it's so frightening to them.
I've heard that, yeah.
It's like the thing they would least like to do. And they've turned it down a million times. There's, there's tons of them.
Yeah, I guess.
I've heard that one.
Probably where it's coming from.
Okay, that's a good defense.
My favorite, my favorite good nights stories, you know, like, cause when you, when you do the good nights at the end, all that's on the cue card is like the musical guest and anybody else that showed up. And like, while you're like five seconds of TV, Lauren goes, okay, uh, enjoy. And I go, what do I say? He goes, anything you want. And walks away. And all I'm doing is looking at the cue cards and then, you know, but I said the normal good nights, but my favorite I've ever seen was Liam Neeson hosted, like in early 2000s. And the camera cuts to him and he just goes, modest mouse.
And then it's just quiet. And then they just start playing the music. It's so good.
It's just reading the cards, not doing anything more.
Literally just read the cue card. Modest mouse.
I love it.
Karen, you can't, you can't be you and not be super smart. Like, you seem hyper intelligent because while you talk fast, like I usually do, not today on morphine, but you talk, but you, it seems like you're firing in all cylinders.
Did they say that you had to smoke the morphine? I don't get it. So they gave you the option and you're like, no, I wanna...
I still have a, what is it called, a drip going?
Track marks.
But, but you seem really like, you talk fast, which means you think fast, which means you can probably, like, when Will was talking to you or Jason was talking about directing, it seems like people who fire in all cylinders all the time can do stuff like that. So if you don't wanna do that, what do you do to like?
Occupy all that extra bandwidth.
God, I don't, I don't know, drive my wife crazy? I don't even have like hobbies.
Crosswords?
I don't like, not even, I do like, you know, wordle, kwortle bullshit, like I know you guys do.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Isn't it weird that I know stuff about you because I listen to your show too much?
Will, pull him in. There's that empty seat. Have you guys ever filled my seat?
Yeah, no, we haven't.
Better way to say that.
We still play every morning, yeah.
Wordle, kwortle, and ock turtle.
Ock turtle.
Ock turtle I haven't done in a while, yeah. I also like to speak, it's kind of my favorite. In a while? What a dipshit. Yeah, you just said I'm smart and I speak fast, not correctly, but quickly.
I will say, today was really tough and it was a bust. We had three busts.
Oh, wow.
On kwortle today, which was a big, it was sending shockwaves through our ock turtle, kwortle, wordle, what we call nerdle.
Now, Karen, I find it hard to believe...
There's nerdle too, nerdle does exist. It's a math one.
You're really saying you do not have a hobby. I don't, I don't buy it. What, tell me, just tell me what your day is.
Are you a New York guy?
I live in New York full-time, but also like, I'm amazed that people do things in a day. Like, I just don't, I don't get it. Like, how do you find time to... Exactly.
You get the kid off to school, how many kids you have?
That's it. That's the whole, I just woke up and then suddenly like, I'm already getting ready for bed. How did that happen? What did I, what did I do?
How many kids you have?
I have two, a three-year-old and a five-year-old. So that's my hobby, I guess, is that's, any, anytime I'm not, like, this is really lovely and I really want to be here, but I... I feel like any time I'm doing something, I'm just trying to get home to be with the kids.
Oh, that's great.
Are you like me? Do you put on the PJs as soon as you're home if you know you're not leaving again the rest of the day? Even if it's 1:30 in the afternoon?
Yeah, yeah. I mean, like my walking around, like it's a pair of shorts and a big T-shirt, but yeah, it's the same idea. Yeah.
And then, so then is it, is it television? Is it a book? Like what are you, you're not just sitting on a couch staring at the wall.
God, I haven't read a book since I had a kid, so that would be five years ago. I mean, yeah, I forgot. You're not a reader, because the words just keep coming at you, right, Jason?
Yeah, TV.
Yeah, it's just too much.
Because you were watching TV?
The words just keep coming at you.
They really do. They just, it's relentless, like, you know. Almost no time for TV or movies unless like I can put it like in a schedule. I don't know.
So when, so when you're done with us today, you, you, you log off and then what? What happens?
I have like a little Zoom meeting right after you and then I have to go do some, I'm still doing press for the movie. So then like about an hour after that Zoom, I go do a press. I actually don't know what the thing is I'm going to. I stopped looking at the itinerary. They tell me to like get in the car at 11:30. I get in at like 12:15 and hope for the best.
I literally, this, this happened a couple of weeks ago. I got in the back of a car about 45 minutes late. And the guy said Delta Airlines and I went, I don't know. And he said, he goes JFK and I said, beats me, man. I really don't fucking know. You probably know. And then we literally, I wasn't even sure if I was going to the airport, except for that I had a bag that was already packed. I got to the airport, I put my passport in the machine and as I put it in, I realized I don't know where I'm going today.
Yeah. And it was a good thing too, because it was a long flight. I was going to Warsaw. I'm glad I brought my passport.
Why were we going to Warsaw?
Warsaw?
The movie was shot in Poland.
Oh, this movie. Okay, sorry.
Yeah, this movie. It was shot there, had like a.
How did you like Warsaw?
Yeah, I was about to say.
I hardly saw it. I was, we were shooting like six day weeks.
More like no saw.
All right. Yeah, that was fast. That was good.
Good for you, Will. It's, Poland I hear is a very, very beautiful country.
Oh, you've been hearing that?
I have been hearing that. I have not yet visited yet. Yeah. I'm hearing it a lot.
On the grapevine or?
Text threads.
Really nice parks. My wife, my wife's from London and she always brags about how the parks in London are the best in the world. But the best parks she's ever seen were in Warsaw.
Yeah. So she went with you, the kids went with you?
At the beginning. They were there for the first like 11 to 12 days and then, once they left, I was, yeah.
And how long, how long were you alone, uh, without them?
25 days. Uh, that was, yeah. Oh no, that was murderous, yes.
25 shooting days? That's five weeks?
Full, no, 25 full days.
25 full days, alright.
And actually, yeah. I tried to actually back out of the movie once I saw that that was the schedule. Jesse didn't know about that.
Cause I had recently, I don't know if you guys have these rules, like I just did, when I was doing Succession, I had to do eight days away and I was like, that was tough but manageable. And then I had to do 11 and went, I can't do that. Eight, eight is my, that's my new rule.
Wait, you live in New York, the show is shot in New York, why?
Jason, that's the opposite of your rule, right? Which is it's minimum six months away. Or you're out.
Well, they're just so noisy, these kids. What about, uh, wait, where did you have to go for Succession that took you out for eight and 11 days away from New York?
Uh, a lot of places, you know, like there's usually like once per season, watch the show, uh, that we ended up somewhere else.
You know, Italy, Norway.
Sean's never seen development and, and we've been doing this podcast and we've been friends for 20 years.
I know, still?
I've watched it three times. I haven't seen Ozark, it's okay.
I always say I've seen it as much as they've watched Will and Grace.
I've seen a lot of Will and Grace and I was fucking on Will and Grace.
You were on Will and Grace.
Yeah, so why don't you fucking, when you're sitting there passing your stone and nothing else that you can't do, fuck all. Watch a couple of episodes. So, so, uh, you guys shot in incredible locations for Succession, that I do know. You guys shot like in...
Croatia, Tuscany, yeah.
Norway, we were all over the...
I know, how good is that?
But it wasn't that, no, it wasn't that like nice. I remember like, uh, at the end of season two, my wife was like, heavily pregnant. It was August, she's back in New York and she was basically complaining about how hot it was and she was alone and all this stuff. And she's like, and you're on a yacht in Croatia. I'm like, I'm not on a yacht, I'm on a fucking set. It's not like I'm going swimming between takes and all that. It's like... That's the thing when we travel to all these places, unless you can specifically get some time off after, you're not really seeing the stuff.
I don't know.
Right.
Wait, wait, Karen, so you've always been a New Yorker. I want to get back to this because I saw a video, something of you recently, not even, not even in anticipation of doing this, I just saw it out in the world of you revisiting your childhood apartment.
Oh, wow. Yeah.
Oh, yeah. That was on CBS Sunday Morning, which is a great show.
Right? That was a great.
Yeah. And it was really cool. And I loved you going in and then seeing your former neighbor and.
That was not planned at all. We were just like, they were setting up a camera outside and he was like, oh, hi Karen. I looked up and it was Alice. Oh, thanks.
Talk a little bit about like growing up in New York and, and auditioning for stuff and what that was like. And, and now, as I mentioned in the, in the lead in, that Jason, we often talk about people about being able to have that longevity and be able to kind of take what you be a child actor and have that translate into becoming an adult actor as well is, is, is really rare.
Yeah. I feel like, I feel like other than what I mentioned earlier about like learning lines fast and knowing like that stuff, I feel like everything I did as a kid, like I don't think I apply any of the acting stuff I used to do as a kid to what I do now. So I think it's the, yeah, because I, sometimes I see that in former kid actors. I don't know if you know what I'm talking about where they, there's sort of like bad habits you could sort of pick up along the way that you have to be mindful to.
Right. You mentioned, and Igby, the director was like, I'm seeing the kid tricks. Just fucking knock it off and be better, basically.
Yeah. Stop showing me what you're doing, you know? Stop, you know? Yeah. Stop trying to show me what the character's doing or stop showing me what's happening in the scene. Like, you know, that's my job.
Yeah. Force us to lean in and read your mind, right?
So you, you kind of, you shifted what you did. Like Jason, I'm sure a lot of stuff that you used to do, like on Growing Pains is now different.
No, no, no. That's Kirk Cameron. Well. Sorry. Can I talk to you for a second? Yes.
This whole time?
The whole time, I've never been, yeah. But now Karen, did you have the same level of panic and horror?
Yes.
When you start thinking about, my God, am I going to be able to transition my ability to make a dollar into adulthood? Or should I go to college? Should I get something where I have a diploma and I have a reasonable expectation of sort of a base salary and some consistency and predictability in my life?
God, I don't really think all that often. So all I know is, like, I suddenly found myself at like 20. And I remember my manager, who I'm still with, I've been with her for 30 years. She like used the word career and I kind of panicked because I've been doing it since six, but it's like, a six-year-old shouldn't really pick their occupation for the rest of their life. That's not really, they're not really qualified to do that, you know?
So I think I kind of panicked and was like, okay, well, I don't know if this is what I want to do. So I think I spent many years trying to figure out what I want to do and
But at that point, you're 20.
Doing this in the meantime? Yeah.
At that point, you're 20, so you could still kind of start college. You'd be a 20-year-old freshman, which is not cute, but you still could have done it.
I'm a high school dropout as well. I don't really, you know?
Well, but like Jason, you asked, remember, we asked this recently to Carrie Russell? And she was like, no, I had no thought about making the leap from being a, you know, a child actor to, like, she didn't worry about it at all.
You did. You were cognizant of it.
I did, but I still didn't do anything to mitigate the risk. In other words, I wasn't taking like night classes in real estate, you know? Like, it was just, I mean, it's really fucking stupid what I did and what you did, Karen, what Carrie did. Like, we're still at this, I'm 55. I'm still running sort of Wild, great show, by the way. You know?
That was me and Carrie Russell.
Like, if this doesn't work out in the next, what, six months, things could go completely dry. At any point in any of our careers, and we don't have a diploma or a degree in something that says, no, no, no, I'm knocking on the door. I should, give me a job.
But isn't that the thing that drives you? Is that fear? Like, I got it.
Yeah, but it's this anxiety that's behind all the time.
I think a really good anecdote to that also for me has been Rich Parents.
Yeah, you fucker.
I'm kidding, I'm kidding, they're not.
That must be really nice, yeah.
I'm being, I'm being flippant.
It's true.
It's not true, it's not true.
I remember my, my grandma, like about 20 years ago, she was in North Dakota, she asked me like, she goes, "You still acting?" I said, "Yeah." And she goes, "When was your last job?" And I said, "Oh, God, like a little over a year ago." And she goes, "You should get into meat. People always need meat."
Really? Really? Your grandma's in the...
Not terrible, not terrible.
Not terrible advice.
Yeah, people will always eat it.
We'll be right back.
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And now, back to the show.
Forgive me, is it just you and McCauley that were actors? Or were there other people in your family?
Uh, my brother Rory, actually, at some point, we were all sort of like, given the opportunity to act and some of them just didn't take to it, some did.
And, and then?
Of all seven of us.
And then, parents and-
Seven, seven kids.
Seven kids.
Seven kids, yeah.
In that small little apartment.
Sorry, where do you fall in that?
Right in the middle, yeah.
But I don't really have that middle child thing.
Uh huh.
Alright, cuz I was like, the favorite.
Yep, there you go.
I don't, I don't really believe in birth order as much as other people do.
You had, you're one of four, right, Willie?
Yep.
I was the baby, like, my whole, I was the baby for almost 10 years then my brother was born, so, uh, you know, two older sisters, and I don't know, I just don't buy into it.
Yeah, you make of it, you make of it what you will, like, any, any-
Yeah, exactly.
Whatever you want.
We're capable of anything.
Will, real, real quick, their names?
Hallam, Jack Watt, and-
No, Chakwa. We'll let you come back on that.
Okay. I do love them, I think.
Look it up.
Sean, you have a question for our guest? No, I was just saying, so, but then, as far as, as far as the lineage of,
the lineage of the Culkin family- Love it if Sean just threw up right now.
Who's?
And the kidney stone comes out my throat instead of my penis.
Guys, I passed!
Um, no, but, parents and grandparents and like, or did it, or did this acting bug start with you, the kids of the, of the Culkin?
I, it's like, my, I think my father and his siblings did it as kids. That's sort of my understanding, cuz actually, I only know that cuz a few years ago, we went through an old storage unit and I found this, like, pamphlet of, uh, I guess what his parents were trying to like, I don't know what exactly what it was, but it was like, hey, we have a son that's an actor and we have this other son that's a magician.
Oh wow.
And it was like, sort of like, we have these performing arts kids.
Wow! Isn't it amazing, the, the stuff you find out about your parents way later?
Like- Yeah.
I grew up, I grew up without knowing anything about my mom, or obviously my dad, but my mom- Your dad was such a great driver.
I know. Do you know the make of the car? At least?
I guess your dad didn't own a ma- You didn't know that your dad didn't own a map, I guess?
He had a bad memory, or he had a bad memory.
Wait, do you guys remember that car, the MG? The MG, the old Ford's car? My dad owned that.
No kidding.
He built, a car built for one.
Built for barely two people. And he had five kids. That's the first sign, man.
You should have punctured the tires.
I know. Isn't that the truth? Isn't that the truth? Like, that's such a red flag.
Oh, God. The joke never gets old.
You know what the other, you know what the other red flag was? When he said, "I'm fucking out of here."
Oh, man.
So fucking funny.
So, so weird for me because it feels like, like, you're just meeting me, but I feel like I'm hanging out with my old friends that are just fucking with each other.
You are, we are.
My wife used to tell me for months, she was listening to the show before I listened to it, she would, this happened on more than one occasion, she'd be like, "Oh, my friend said blah, blah, blah the other day. We were having this chat." And I said, "Which friend was it?" And she'd then go, "Oh, fuck, that was smartless." It happened all the time. "Who was that? Was that Shams? That was..." No, I know, she actually, like, a couple of months ago, we were at this, uh, because her favorite episode is the one you guys did with, uh, Matthew Reese. And, uh, she loved it. She listened to it more than once and she, so we're at this party and she goes, "Oh, Matthew's here, let's go say hi." And she started dragging me over. And I was like, "Matthew who?" And then she, right before we got to him, she stopped me and started pushing me away. She goes, "Never mind, we haven't met and we're not friends. Oh, my God, that was smartless."
I love her, I love her already. What is her name?
Sweet. Jazz.
Jazz.
J A Z Z. And it's not short for anything. Actually, right when, when I met her, that was one of the first things I said. It's not, it's dumb. I, when I first met her, I shook her hand and I said, uh, I said, "What's your name?" She went, "Jazz." I said, "J A Z Z? You like the music?" She went, "Yeah." I said, "Well, that's fucking stupid." It just came out of me and I went right away. I was like, I blew it, but instead she laughed. So it worked out all right.
Where were you when you guys met? Tell us the story. Is it a meet cute?
At a bar. But that was it. I mean, what I love about the story is it's fast. That was pretty much it. The only other thing was when I walked into a bar, I was with a friend.
Is that your ride?
Yeah, that's, um, this is New York City.
You're like, I don't know where the car's taking me, but yeah.
It's my dealer.
That's my dealer. I walked in a bar. I saw her and I yelled, holy shit.
And I
What city? What city? New York City?
New York. And I was with this dude and I said like, hey, we need to go stand near this girl, which I realize now sounds kind of creepy. And so we stood near her.
It's what we had to do before these dating apps. You just had to like kind of circle.
You show up.
Fucking easy now, right? This was 13 years ago. She was sitting at a table with some dude and the moment he got up to leave to go to the bathroom, I just jumped in there and stole his seat.
No way.
And I literally, like, all I did is I sat down and said, sorry, I just stole your friend's seat. And she went, that's okay. I said, was that your boyfriend? She said, no. I said, do you have a boyfriend? She went, no. I said, then I'm Kieran.
I've never been that forward in my life.
And then she said, I'm jazz. And you said, that's fucking stupid.
And I said, that's fucking stupid. And
And then what are you drinking?
You guys have been making music ever since.
Where, what part, what part of town were you in? Do you remember?
It was, uh, what the hell was the name of the place? It was on Seven and A. It was called Cabin Down Below.
Oh, nice.
Do you know that one?
I don't know if I know Cabin Down Below.
Seventh and A, that, so that is Lower East Side, I want to say.
Lower East Side. It was one of those places where I kept getting like turned away because they kept, every time I tried to go there, they were like, it's a private party. Cause I didn't, I wasn't dressed cool or I wasn't famous. But they, they knew my wife. Like there was one time I went there and I was with a couple of like, I'm not meaning to name drop. I was there with a couple of like famously people. And I walked up first and they were like, sorry, private party. And I looked back at one of my friends. It was, I'll just tell you who it was. It was a Scarlett Johansson. She's like, I got this. And she walked up, she goes, hi, they're with me. And he looked at her and said, It's a private party.
Oh.
And then he looked, he looked up and went, he looked up and went, jazz? And she was like, yeah, I was like, oh, are they with you? And she would, yeah, come on in.
Ah, jazz for the win.
Fucking people, she's like.
That's one of those New York fucking jazz.
Jazzy jazz.
She's just one of those people, man. She makes friends everywhere.
Now, now, since you guys are, since acting is generational, um, what about the three year old and the five year old? What are you thinking?
I'm not against that.
You gonna support it?
Yeah, I mean, I, I had a really nice experience with it growing up.
Me too.
You did, yeah, I was, it was nice.
However, it is that thing, getting back to that other point, it's like, are you going to, at some point, you, I, I would imagine you would say, now, would, do you wanna kind of, uh, kind of, uh, help your odds a little bit by going to college at the same time, maybe?
I would probably encourage an education. I never got one, but, um, I don't know. Yeah, I would probably encourage that. But I don't really know. And I've also heard of people, this is something I kinda wish, I, it, it hasn't come to bite me in the ass really, but I, I remember doing like a lot of press as a kid, and I feel like I would maybe try to protect them from doing that a bit. Cause sometimes I, I'll get quoted on something stupid I said, I'm like, I was 13, that's not what they actually think, like, I don't, you know?
What about?
Sean, remember that, Sean, remember that time you paid that guy to bite you in the ass?
Sorry, it just reminded me of that story.
Surprisingly cheap too, wasn't it?
Yeah, I mean, he was, he, he lowered his rates for me. Um, that's really funny.
There's also the part about like, there's also the part about like, training yourself to, to, to believably be someone else at a time when you're trying to figure out who you are, like, starting to act when you're a little kid, did that ever screw you up at all?
Uh, no, I think other things probably screwed me up. I don't know if that was it. You know, what, what fucked you guys up?
You feeling pretty balanced now? Have you, the self, self, self-analysis or, or professional analysis?
Therapy, therapy, therapy?
No, therapy, I prefer to go undiagnosed.
Oh, I love, I love therapy.
Just, I, I should, I know, if you guys, ugh, sound like.
Long walks work too.
Uh, yeah.
Sean, you go to therapy?
We're all a work in progress.
I go to therapy every week.
Oh, yeah, you do.
It's like, instead of dumping it all on Scotty, I just pay somebody to listen.
Again, again, I think Sean.
Damn it, you beat me to it.
Oh my god.
All right, Karen, what about are we a sports fan, television show fan? You've said no.
No, you don't watch TV.
No hobbies. I don't do anything.
Zero.
Wait, it's so like, it's, yeah, I don't understand it.
I don't know. I just don't have time. I don't even get to the gym.
So do you go, do you meet people for coffee? Do you like?
No, I don't really even have friends anymore.
What will you click and you just hang up?
Kinda.
What will you do after this, Karen, after you're done with this little?
He's got to Zoom and then he's got to go do more press.
I got like a press thing and I got the thing, you know? I like doing this. Hey, this is, this is kind of a new one. I think I need therapy because I like doing, I like flower arrangements now.
Do you really?
Okay, there you go. That's great.
That gives me some calm.
What about a garden on the roof of your apartment?
That's such a nightmare. It's New York. That's not gonna be nice, no matter how you frame it.
There's public gardens. You can, you can rent a public square, a garden in a public.
Bit of a bummer too, I find.
I'll do, I'll do crafts with you till we fucking.
Careful, Karen.
All the time.
Until, until what?
Yeah, I don't know, but let's, we could get macaroni and glue and make stuff on a paper plate.
I can do that with my children, but yeah, please come on over.
Don't have him over the house.
You can join us. We got all that stuff.
He's turned into a morphean addict. He's gonna steal your silverware. It's not.
I'll never leave him alone with the kids, but yeah, he can come over and supervise.
Now, when do you start rehearsals on the play?
Oh gosh, February or something like that. That terrifies me because.
Can we, can we, can we get a commitment? Can we, can the three of us come to the opening night of your play?
Yeah, you're invited. Of course you can.
The public is inviting my stupid ass.
No, I'm asking.
You got your own publicist. You need me to like give up one of my five tickets to you three?
I mean, I could. Yeah, fine. Fuck it.
Yeah, no, leave him alone, though.
I'm sure you have connections yourself, but fine. You three are my guests.
We wanna come.
No plus ones, though. No.
Now, is jazz in the business as well?
No, not at all. Um, no.
But she understands enough about what you do to?
It's taken a while. She used to, eh, no. She used to think that like, she goes, I don't understand why like actors get awards and things. She's, she's literally thought that like directors puppeteered the actor, told him where to sit and the cadence on how to speak. So that's literally what her point of view was on it. She had never been on a set or anything around it, but she's, she's come to understand it a bit now.
Where'd she grow up, Chet? Yeah, like what's going on?
London, but yeah.
Closer than than here.
Oh, I do like London.
You guys spend a lot of time over there as a result of?
We do. I, I, yeah, I, I love it out there. That we always.
I do too.
I noticed the, the throw, the throw pillow behind you.
That's what that is and, you know, that's what we do here.
Look at Sean, look at Sean's right eye is at half.
Oh, my God. Is it open?
No, no, the whole show, it's just been half open. The left one's fully open. The right one is really tired.
Like that?
Sean was just, this morning Sean spent forty five, he, he spent forty five minutes bent at the waist outside of Sean's door this morning. And that hunch over.
It's so true. I was at the ER at Cedars and there's like, it was a seven hour wait.
What?
What is wrong with you? Why are, why didn't you cancel?
Uh, because I had, there's no other option.
Was Scotty with you?
So you didn't, you didn't take the, the driverless cab this time?
I told him, I'm like, fuck off, I'll just take the thing.
That's sweet.
What's it called again?
Waymo.
Waymo. And you did have a good experience, right?
Yeah, I love the Waymo.
Do they have that yet in New York, Karen?
I, I would, I've never heard of it.
Driverless, it's the, it's the driverless.
Oh, that scares the shit out of me. No, I haven't seen any here. No.
How do you get around New York? Are you a bike rider?
Oh, God, no, I don't do that either. See, that would fall under hobby probably, or at least exercise, and I don't do that. Yeah, no.
Are you a subway guy?
Subway, yeah, yeah. That's the best way to get my kids to school and all that stuff.
And if it's raining, you'd take a cab.
Yeah. No, it's not today. It's rainy today.
How do you, what do I, you know what I've never figured out about the subway is once you come up out of the stairs after you've reached your destination, I can't figure out whether I'm looking north, south, east, or west, because I can't find the sun.
Because you're used to getting in the backseat and your driver just taking you places?
Sir, can you change your radio station?
A whole host. I actually requested nobody talk to me on this ride.
You know how you know a lot of the times JB is because on the avenues, certainly on the avenues, you know which direction they go, whether they go uptown or downtown, so you gotta get a sense of that.
You can look at the numbers. I think if you can count, you can sort of figure it out.
Yeah, but you, that, that necessitates walking a block to see if the numbers are going up or down. That's, that, that's my problem.
Yes. You might walk one block out of the way.
Well, but like, I shouldn't have to walk a block to figure out which way I'm going, you know?
Well, you also have like, smartie phones now.
Do you want to go to a council meeting in New York? Maybe you could be heard, you know what I mean?
What would you, what would you suggest? There's somebody at the, at the exit of every station telling you where to go?
In England, they take the time to paint on the road there, "Look left," you know, like maybe, uh, maybe New York can say, "You are facing north," on the ground.
Yeah, but it doesn't say which direction you're facing.
No, but I'm saying-
It doesn't say north or south.
Case dismissed.
Yeah. That's so you don't get hit by a car.
I'm saying, no, I understand, but I'm saying there are efforts that, uh, the infrastructure folks can go to, you know, to help out the people on the road.
This is real stuff.
Sean, Sean, remember last, you were having dinner at Richard and Jenny's and you came outside and I was bent over at the waist? This is true. And I said, and I looked at him and I go, "Yeah, hi, Alan." Do you remember that?
Oh, God, that was, I was one of the hardest ones.
It just reminded me, being hunched over at the waist.
You know, Richard, Richard Ehrlich?
Yeah. The world's best realtor. If you're looking for a house in Los Angeles area, contact Richard Ehrlich.
That's a true story.
That is true story. And Will, and we walk out to our cars, the night's over and we're walking out to the, to his driveway. And Will goes acting like he's completely bombed out of his mind. He goes, "Hey, hey, man, can I ask you something?" I go, "Yeah." He goes, "Do you know where I can, do you know where I can get some heroin? I'm just asking for a friend. I'm asking for heroin. I'm asking for a friend. I don't want, I don't want anything to do with it."
By the way, let's not make light of people who are struggling with it.
No, of course not. It was just a funny fun.
We're not, we're just having fun because Sean happens to be hooked on morphine.
Hooked on, I don't mean addicted to.
Karen, Karen, this is it.
We could just talk to you all day, knowing that you have nothing else to do.
No, he's gotta go do this all over again. He's gotta do it all over again, right?
Is there anything you want to ask Sean? Is there anything, because you've listened to a few episodes, is there anything you need to know, uh, from Sean? Go ahead, he's-
Ask him why he hates his colon so much.
Yeah, why is he always in the hospital? What is wrong?
No, cause my, yeah, well, I'm not, I just, my heart thing was the big, is the big thing, but it's all being taken care of.
Well, you know why, Karen? If you went, if you went to Sean and Scotty's house, every day, every meal, it's like a 12-year-old's birthday party.
This is true.
It's true, it's true.
Napkins on laps.
I kind of eat the same. I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm kind of the same when it comes to the food thing. Yeah.
Yeah, yeah.
You like the food?
I do, and I, and it's the shitty stuff. Like, my wife the other day reached in and- Grabbed some Cheetos that I was eating, was about to, and then she let go and said, "What am I doing? Wait, what are you doing? Where did these come from?" And I said, "They were in the house." She goes, "How? Stop putting this in our house."
How old, how old a man are you?
Forty-two.
And I can't be eating like that.
So you go to the, do you go to the, do you guys take turns going to the market and doing the shopping?
Yeah, and then, you know, I do that thing where I shop hungry and then I'm buying the, I find that they have like that chicken in a biscuit, you know, those like box crackers?
Yeah, two bits, yeah.
I'll buy like, I'll buy them by the case.
I love just pushing the cart row by row by row. No list at all, I'm just gonna go down each row, however long it takes, and look at everything and, and see what I want.
But you don't put anything in the cart, right? Cause you just eat salads, right?
JB, I love hearing you describe sort of normal, you know, everyday necessities for people as a novel idea. You know what I mean? It's like a fun-
Hashtag relatable.
You know what I like to do? I like to walk into an office and like, I go to all the places.
I like to pretend I have a job. Where's my coffee? Work, work, work.
Amazing, amazing. Uh, Kieran, what a delight you are.
You are an absolute delight. You guys are fun.
You're a good man.
You'd be a good dinner hang, well, maybe we'll hit you up for dinner in New York.
Come, come see the show.
Yeah, I wanna see the show, I really wanna see the show.
Let's all hang out and do the thing.
You guys never do repeat guests on your show either, right? Cause-
We have done it on live, when we did the tour, we did some repeats and had some friends-
I remember that, I watched that doc, it was great.
That's when I learned from you, Jason, and I think about it every time, I'm about to shake a salad, you said, "Don't shake it." Do you remember that? You put like, whatever you put the dressing in a salad, you went, "Don't shake it." And I think of it every time now, and I, and I go, "Oh wait, I'm not supposed to shake it." And I go, "Wait, why? What's wrong with you?"
Let it cascade.
Yeah, no, shake it, shake the thing.
You gotta, you gotta shake it to get it even.
You got it, yeah.
I'm a pretty vigorous shaker now.
Oh, you are, oh, you're a shaker.
What a T-shirt.
Let that dressing, let, see, merch, this is what you guys need, more quotes like that. Let it cascade, that's a sweater right there.
And the Tracy one. That's right.
Yeah, and the Tracy one, which she wears.
Talk to me like I'm Tracy.
You are a guy who you deserve all the success that you're having now, especially considering how hard you worked and how talented you are. Such a massive fan. Dude, honestly, what a thrill to have you.
Yeah, keep going.
This was a dream come true. I mean it. Thanks, guys.
KC, KC.
Big, big fan.
See you in a few months. Go get 'em.
Bye, guys.
Bye, Karen. Thanks, pal. And he's slamming it.
Uh, they told me to not slam it, but I'm slamming it.
Who says not?
No, no, no, don't slam it.
They said don't slam it.
Because you've got a redundant record.
Are you doing your record at home?
I am, that's why. I gotta do a thing. Wait, do I do a thing now and then I slam it?
Do your thing and then you can slam.
This is a great goodbye. I don't know how to do it. What do I do? What do I do with the thing? I don't know what I'm...
So if you bring your mouse to the bottom, do you see that little sound icon?
No. Um, yes, no, yes.
Click on that.
Yes, and then I hit stop?
Hit stop and then hit save.
You guys gotta use this as part of the goodbye. Okay, I press stop and then no, I just press stop. I don't see anything that says save. We're fucked. At the top left, file and save. Share, save.
So embarrassed.
Savesies.
Oh, my God, this is such a great goodbye. Yeah, use it. I'm done? Do I fucking slam it now?
Yeah, slam it.
Slam it.
Love you, bye.
Now, there's a nice young fella, Will.
There is a nice young fella. You're right. What a great guest.
That was a good guest. That was a good guest.
A good guest. I've been excited to have him. And like I said, we had a sort of, we had to reschedule and that was, you know, a whole thing. But I was like, oh, God, we were so close to getting him. So glad we had him on. He's so...
I've always wanted to meet him.
He was worth the wait.
The interviews I've seen him do, I used to like, God, that's a great guy. I wonder if they just got him on a good day.
Right, right.
You know? I hope he's really like that. And he really is. What a nice guy.
He really is like that.
I want to work with him. I want to hang with him.
Hey, Sean, now, as you, as you scan the buys...
Yeah, I wanted to, I wanted to talk to him about his...
I saw his eyes scan.
Well, I'm about to watch Home Alone again because I watch, we watch it every year and he's got a little part in Home Alone.
I love that.
Yeah, I bet you he's still getting residuals on that.
I probably.
They're not, they're not, they're not, they're not thick ones anymore, but, um, fun to see.
Actually, you know, you know what film he was in? He was in the first one and also the second one?
Which was what?
Father of the bride.
Bride. Bride.
That's pretty good.
That was pretty good.
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