The Three Questions with Andy Richter - Michael McKean

Episode Date: January 28, 2020

Actor, comedian, and musician Michael McKean joins Andy Richter to talk about earliest childhood memories, performing radio sketches with comedy team The Credibility Gap, featuring on Laverne & Shirley and SNL, and finding ways to love his most repugnant characters. Plus, Michael shares what’s next with the upcoming projects he’s most excited for.

Well, you've done it again. You've tuned in to the three questions with Andy Richter. I, again, am Andy Richter, continue to be, much to my chagrin. And I am very excited today because I have one of my favorite performers in the world. He just made a jerk-off gesture. I did not. He did, and it made me, it's thrilling. It's Michael McKean. Hi. How are you? I'm good, thank you. Good. I'm so glad you're here.

Well, I'm glad to be here. It actually makes me worry glad you're here. Well, I'm glad to be here. It actually makes me worry for you. You should have better things to do than be here. I have nothing. There's nothing better to do than this. Oh, that's good. Come on. Now, we have, was it the first time we met at Jeopardy?

Or had we met before? No, because, let's see, that was 09. Yeah. So we must have met in 01 maybe? Yeah. We did, shoot, may have been the same year, but I know it was right around that time. Yeah, yeah. And yeah, because we were on the same episode of Jeopardy, which.

We weren't, we didn't play. Or the same day. Yes, same day. Same day, yeah, yeah. They shot three of them, I think. Yeah. And were you on with Wolf Blitzer? We didn't play. Or the same day. Yes, same day. The same day, yeah, yeah. They shot three of them, I think. Yeah. Were you on with Wolf Blitzer?

I was on with Wolf Blitzer and Dana Delaney. Oh. Yeah. She's great. She was great. I like her. And I really, yeah. And Wolf did poorly.

Yeah. He did poorly. He needed some buzzer help, I think. Yeah. It is amazing how it is an athletic contest, but just with your thumb. Yes. Well, listen, two thumbs and you got the entire history of gaming. That's true. So, you know, we all started as a one-thumb game.

Right, right. It's like that joke that Gary Marshall used to do at shootings. When someone would come in for a retake, come in with the clapper board, you know, with the sticks. You got to bring the sticks in. Yeah. Gary would say to the audience, those are called the sticks. And when you do that, of course, this guy has been around for a long time. He started in silent pictures with one stick.

It's a really good joke. It is a good joke. And everyone always does it. Worth repeating. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. One of those repeatables. So, and you went on, didn't you go on to win the whole thing?

Won a million bucks for the International Myeloma Foundation. That's fantastic. I know. Who was in your final? I don't remember. Well, it was a two-day affair, as Alex likes to say. Alex likes to say. And it was Cheech Marin and Jane Curtin.

Oh, wow. So, yeah, those are two really smart people. You know what makes – And Cheech won the last game. Oh, he did? But I had won enough the previous day so that I edged him there. Oh, wow. Oh, so it was like a cumulative thing.

Yeah. Oh, wow. The final Jeopardy question I just, you know, browned out on, and there Cheech has it, you know. Yeah, yeah. That's a really, he's a really good poster boy for marijuana abuse. Because the lesson could be you can abuse it and you can still be really smart and know your shit. Yes. Well, absolutely.

And I do think what makes me particularly proud of it, of that grouping, is comedy people. It's all comedy people. Yeah, yeah. And if you hadn't dropped out to go on the road with Conan, you would have taken the money. Oh, I don't know about that. Absolute lebs, a freaking lebs. Oh, thank you.

Yeah, no, that day was the beginning of the tour that we did when we were between the Tonight Show and the TBS show and had to go do, which was a very interesting time for me because it was, I mean, you had a sample of what it's like as a touring musician. Yes. And this was about a two and a half month experience of that. And I realized I would be a 350 pound alcoholic. Yeah, yeah.

If I had to live that life. There was one show, we were on the road with Lenny and the Squig Tones. David Lander, myself, Chris Guest on guitar and some Murphy Dunn. You know Murphy Dunn from Chicago? I know the name, yeah. Second City guy, awesome guy. He was in the Blues Brothers band as well. Oh, yeah. You know. Murn from Chicago? I know the name, yeah. Second City guy. He's an awesome guy. He was in the Blues Brothers band as well. Oh, yeah.

You know. Murph and the Murph Murphs. Absolutely. Sure, of course. Yeah. But our drummer was a guy named Don Poncher, known on stage as Ming the Merciless. But I just walked by his hotel room one day. We were on our way to the sound check or something.

And we looked in there, and he was sitting on the edge of his bed, and he was eating potato salad with his toothbrush. That's the road right there. That's the whole story. That level of misery. Yeah, yeah. I just remember one day where we were leaving D.C. and going to, I want to say maybe Atlanta by bus with some sort of stop in between. And it was all this hustle and bustle to get – or no, it was Nashville.

Okay. The hustle and bustle to get to the next place. And then there was a stop. And I think there was some press thing. And then get there. And so it's this whole adrenal day, adrenalized day. And then I get to the hotel room. And I almost cried because I was like, it's another fucking hotel room.

Yeah, sure. Like it's just. Yeah, yeah. Oh, all of that to just come back to this sad room where I wake up in the middle of the night and don't know where the bathroom is. Yeah, and when they block book, sometimes you'll stay in three identical hotels. Yes. And then it's really like, now I'm just completely, Lord, I'm completely lost. And you have to keep your little key envelope so you remember where the hell your room is.

And you have to write a little note to yourself starting, dear Andy. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. If you don't miss it. 803. So you're a native New Yorker, sort of, yeah? Yeah, yeah. Sort of. Yeah, yeah.

In the sense that I was born there, yes. You were born. But I mean, but you grew up in Long Island, correct? Yeah, I lived in New York City with my folks. Yeah. Because we were very close at the time time until I was about around three. And then we moved out to Hicksville, Long Island. Oh, really?

And we were there for about four years and then moved to Seacliff on the North Shore, which is kind of my real hometown. Because when you're seven, you kind of start taking in the world a little bit more. Oh, yeah. Where you're born is just sort of incidental. It's miniature. Yeah, yeah. Because it only expands as you expand. Yes, precisely. Your knowledge incidental. It's miniature. Yeah, yeah. Because it only expands as you expand. Yes, precisely.

Your knowledge of what the world might be. Yeah. Yeah, but Long Island is kind of still my home. Yeah. Seacliff. Do you have a lot of family back there still? Like flies, they're dropping. Yeah.

But they're also most of the – my nephew lives there now, and my niece has moved up to Syracuse. Yeah. But that's pretty much it for the East Coast guys. Yeah. And was the move out to Long Island, was that just to raise kids? Yeah. Yeah. You know, my father started working at record companies.

He started, like, bringing home some pretty decent money, And he worked for Dictaphone for a year. He was really on the edge of that technology thing. But I mean, he was a copywriter. He was a guy who would, like he got, well, here's the facts. This is what a Dictaphone is. And he would write out all these paragraphs about how it's going to change your life. Yeah. And then he went into the record business because he loved music so much.

He was a big jazz fan. Yeah. And classical, too, but mainly kind of blues and jazz. Didn't he start Decca? Or when did he start it? No, no, no. Decca started in 37. He worked for Decca right after he got out of the Army.

I see. And he was on the, when they first started making LPs after the war. And Decca became the first big LP thing. That was his kind of entrance. Yeah. Did you meet a lot of musicians as a child? Not too many, but you knew who I met when I was six years old? No. Bob and Ray. Oh, really? Yeah. My father was a huge Bob and Ray fan, and he kind of helped them or got some phones to be answered about working at Victor when he was there. That was actually later.

But earlier on, he was just a fan who got in touch with him. And they came out to the house. They came out to my house in Hicksville. Yeah. And I met them. For some tipling, I'm sure. That's right. Oh, no, no, maybe.

And I told Chris, first time I met Chris, I said, I met your dad before you did. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, I, my first, well, one of my first sort of big jobs was on Cabin Boy. That's right. Yeah, yeah, yeah. The movie with Chris.

So that was always, you know, he, you know, he, it was when you meet multi-generational sort of people, heroes might be too much because I don't want him to get the kind of ego, you know, but, but, you know, multi-generational people that you've admired, it's really kind of, yeah, yeah. But the thing about heroes is I have never had a quote-unquote hero about whom I could say he can do no wrong. You are, right. Or she can do no wrong. Because I don't have one of those. Right.

You know, I mean, you can't say Bob Dylan can do no wrong. Yeah. He's done some wrong. Yes. But he's also like, he's Bob Dylan. Yeah, yeah. Same with Springsteen. Yeah.

Same with all, you know, our most heroic figures. Yes. Paul McCartney's written some crap. Right. You know? Well, and his inspiration. But unfortunately, he's Paul McCartney every single day. He really is.

And he keeps, like, his last album was like, that's as good as anything he's done as a solo artist. Yeah, yeah. That's, like, remarkable. Yeah. And again, and I don't think I'm speaking out of school here, a feather in the cap of marijuana usage. Once again. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

You know, I don't think that's any secret. No, no. But to keep that level of quality over all those years is really something. Yeah, the circle jerk with John. That was a secret. But not anymore. So we got to say aazal dov on that. Yes, exactly.

Yeah, that's a feather in the cap of circle jerks, too. Although I don't want the cap, circle jerks cap, I don't really want to go there. Yeah, yeah. So, and your mom was a librarian? That's right. Well, she was, she didn't have a job per se,, except as a mom, which is the hardest job in the world. Right. To use the cliche that happens to be completely true.

But when I was in high school, I guess my second year in high school, she started working in the office. Just because my little brother was going to school. It's like everybody was kind of busy. Keep an eye on you. Yeah. Well, yeah. I didn't realize that at the time. Yeah.

And after a year or so, she became the librarian, the high school librarian. She kept that job for a long time. Oh, wow. Yeah, it was neat. I always loved librarians. The librarians at school. Yeah. Absolutely.

They were like my best, well, not, you know, my best grown-up friends. Yeah. You know, my. Well, we had a great kind of prototypical, or stereotypical, I guess, librarian in my hometown in Seacliff, Mrs. Rohrbach, I believe was her name. And she was that spinster who lived with her mom, you know, her aged mother. Yeah. And very prim and hair in a bun and everything. And just, and she aged mother. Yeah. And very prim and hair in a bun and everything. And just, and she was awesome. Yeah.

Because, you know, it was just that kind of like very dourly saying, well, if you like this, I can suggest, you know, it was that kind of relationship. Yeah, yeah. Small town thing. Right. It was really nice. Yeah. And yeah.

And you, how many siblings do you have? I have none anymore, but my sister died last year. She was older. And my brother, who was quite a bit younger, has been gone for about 15 years now. Oh, I'm sorry. Yeah. You know, as he put it, one million cigarettes later. Oh, yeah.

You know. Cigarettes. Good guy, funny guy. Cigarettes. I know. Somebody asked me on just a little stab interview the other day, what advice would you give your younger self? I said, to all the younger selves out there, skip cigarettes. Yeah.

Give them a pass. Did you smoke? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, I did too. I smoked for when I was very young, 14 through 25 anyway, and then quit. And occasionally I would go back and say, oh, this is still addictive. Let's not do that anymore.

Oh, absolutely. I have experienced that because I quit for good in 2001, and I will have occasionally, and it's usually like in periods of duress in my life, somebody's, and I'm saying, yeah, give me one of those. And all it takes is one for me to realize, oh, this is, it's right there. Yeah. The monster is right there waiting to be satiated again. Well, the last time I smoked was on a movie set when I was doing The Lone Gunman, the not terribly well-remembered, you know, spinoff of X-Files.

Oh, right. And we were doing one. I lit up a cigarette, and I just thought, boy, does this not work. And I got really sick. Yeah. And I think it was maybe psychological. It was like, you know, those. Was it a real cigarette or one of those fake cigarettes?

And now I actually shot another scene a few years after that, and I insisted on the herbal kind. Yeah. And the smoke doesn't look good on, it's not heavy. Yeah, yeah. So they actually wound up snipping the scene because it was kind of smoke-centric, the moment. Yeah. So they cut the scene.

You know, we just never got it good. Yeah. I said, oh, I'm sorry. But I can't. I had to do a bit for Samantha Bee's show. Yeah. I had to do a bit for Samantha Bee's show that was sort of like all the president's men deep throat parody in a parking garage. But they – and I was the deep throat.

And they updated it with a vape, like a disposable vape. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And they wanted one that had a glowing end. And the only way that you do that is to get a real nicotine one. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And they wanted one that had a glowing end. And the only way that you do that is to get a real nicotine one. Yeah, yeah. So for multiple takes, I just, you know, it's got to work. And so it's just like I was vibrating for like the entire day just from, you know, however many years of no nicotine to all of a sudden. I can't even imagine. Repeated takes of just, you know.

Well, I used a vape cigar that looks exactly like a cigar when we were rehearsing Little Foxes a couple years ago. We used an herbal one on stage. Yeah. And they stink, but not as bad as they used to. Right. I did. And it isn't as bothersome, I mean, because I've never had those herbal cigarettes, those

sort of fake cigarettes. It's just when you're in the third row and you go, okay. Because it kind of takes you out of the thing. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So do you have memories of living in Manhattan? Like when you were-

Very vague memories. Do you have memories of living in Manhattan? Like when you were- Very vague memories. And I was so young that I think the memories are really made up of other people. Yes. Like my parents telling me something. I have plenty of those. Yeah.

You never know. But I have this memory. And again, it's like I've heard it anecdotally, but I think I felt it. There was a guy named Keys who was the handyman, the building, you know, superintendent's handyman in the building we lived in, you know, 116th, whatever it was. And he gave me a ride in his wheelbarrow. They were rebuilding some kind of wall,

doing cinder blocks and stuff. And he gave me a ride in his wheelbarrow. And my mother has told me that story, but I kind of think I remember it. Yeah, yeah. I kind of remember that thing. Am I being tipped too much? Is this what nobody's doing? Would I be really getting in a man named Keyes' wheelbarrow?

Why did he ask me if I like Gladiator movies? Get in the wheelbarrow, son. Don't ask questions. Yeah, today's lens, probably your mother wouldn't be like, yeah, go ahead, get in Key's wheelbarrow. Well, listen, when I was 14, my friends and I would go into New York City alone. Yeah. 14 years old. Yeah, yeah.

Get on the bus, catch the bus in Glen Cove, take you to Long Island City, then take the City alone. Yeah. 14 years old. Yeah, yeah. Get on the bus, catch the bus in Glen Cove, take you to Long Island City, then take the subway in. Yeah. Really? And where'd we go? We'd go to 42nd Street. Oh, really? You know, and we'd just walk around.

Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. Absolutely. Just hang out? There was no- We'd hang out. We would go into- There were great record stores then.

Oh, yeah. And the things were simpler back then. Uh-huh. But you'd go there and you'd just- If know, if you had a lot of money, which we never did, you know, you'd go up to, what's, what was the name of that place? Not Sam Goody. The place. Harmony?

No, no, not Harmony. It was on Broadway and Colony. Uh-huh. Yeah, that's what I mean. The Colony. Yeah, yeah, yeah. They were in business until just five years ago. Right.

And sheet music, too. Yeah, yeah, all that stuff. But we had, you know, we'd just go, hey, that's what I mean. The colony. Yeah, yeah, yeah. They were in business until just five years ago. Right. And sheet music, too. Yeah, yeah, all that stuff. But we had, you know, we'd just go, hey, I got this single. It was like buying singles and stuff. It was just fun. And when I got a little older, we'd go down to the village and hang out at, you know, the Folklore Center hoping that Bob Dylan would walk in, which he never did. Was it, did that the sort of thing that, like, did you know that he might drop in?

Oh, yeah, yeah. Well, my friends and I were- I mean, I don't know what the Folklore Center is. Folklore Center was run by a guy named Izzy Young. It was the second floor. It was at 6th Avenue, I think. But it was down in the village. And there were all these guitars.

It was like McCabe's now, but like a larger showroom, McCabe's. Excuse me. And people would just come in, and you'd pull something off the wall, and you'd play all day if you want. Oh, wow. And you'd get into conversations. So we would go there for hours. And just people like us, other 14-year-old boys would come in.

Yeah. And buy a capo or something and then just hang out for six hours. Yeah. One time, my friend says, it's Pete Seeger. And I said, oh, Pete Seeger. He looks up and says, no, no, Pete Seegle from the Even Dozen Jug Band. Oh, oh. Yeah.

Oh, yeah. Okay, yeah. He's a hell of a band. Mandolin. Mandolin player. Mandolin, wow, wow. Let me get his autograph. Who are you?

Yeah. So music was a part of your life from a very early age then. I mean, is that, you think it was because your dad's influence? Was your mother musical too? No, not really. She loved music. Yeah. But there was always music going on.

A lot of jazz, which I, of course, didn't get into until in my late 30s, really. Is that because it was Dad's thing? I think so. Yeah. It was Dad's thing. And also, when I was seven or eight, that's when rock and roll first started

being called rock and roll. Yeah. And I heard some R&B stuff, you know, some really kind of rock and stuff, you know, some really kind of rocking stuff, the blues stuff. But songs like Shake, Rattle, and Roll by Big Joe Williams. And then Elvis happened. And it was sort of like, ah, OK, that puts everything into this one thing.

And then the kind of explosion. And it was that kind of thing you have when you're seven, where you, I wish I was a teenager. Yeah. I'd give anything to be a teenager. Yeah, yeah. Right now because I, but when I was a teenager, it was okay too. Yeah, yeah.

Because there's a lot of other crap happening. It was very good. I kid, the notion of being a teenager now, it seems like a punishment. Yeah. You see Eighth Grade? Yeah, yeah, yeah. I think it's a wonderful movie. Yeah.

And I think she did a great job. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I think it's a wonderful movie. And I think she did a great job. And I think it's like the fact that that was actually written, it feels so improvised. Right. That that was really a scripted film done by really, you know, with concision. And it was really remarkable. I really liked it.

But my daughter, who is an eighth grader, was like, it's not accurate. Well, you'll always get that. Yes, I know. I met a guy who had been a hustler, a male hustler on 42nd Street. Yeah. And he told me, he said, yeah, Midnight Cowboy, that's bullshit. Oh, really? That wasn't your experience?

No ratso rizos in your life? And, you know, the same people who were in Vietnam will tell you that all of your favorite Vietnam stories are bullshit. Yes. And I think eighth grade is very much like Vietnam for a lot of kids. Absolutely. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, no, thinking back, I mean, I just, and I'll, like, I've told my daughter this. I said, the thing I just hated about childhood was that everybody could tell you what to do. Sure.

Just everybody could tell you what to do. Every adult outranked you. Yes. And they could just, and I just, even from a young age, the outrage that I felt about that. Sure. And I didn't turn into any kind of rebel. I just kind of turned into a mumbling smartass, youass. But also, there were a lot of different types. I mean, there were people, there were adults who told you what to do because they kind of had to because it was kind of their job.

Sure. And there were other people who just knew that I'm bigger than you. Yeah. And you're going to do what I say. Yeah, yeah. Or I'll tell your mother. Yeah. Whatever, you know.

What kind of kid were you? I was lazy. Yeah. Yeah, I wasn't really. Not a good student? Oh, well, I was good in some stuff. Yeah, yeah. I was English and.

The stuff you cared about. Yeah, exactly. I was the same way. Couldn't do the math. Yeah, me neither. They have, I think they're, it's at my high school, it's called the Michael McKeon Memorial Pass. Now, when you get to a certain degree of algebra and you still haven't passed it, you've taken three times and they keep finding, all right, now you're in track three B.

Yeah, yeah. So they finally, they passed me with a 58. Oh, really? No, I'm really an idiot. Just to get you out. Oh, wow. And then years later, 30 years later, I started doing basic computing, basic programming. Yeah.

And I thought, oh, this is algebra. If they had told me it would help me make a dancing mouse on my screen, then yeah. I remember in middle school being terrible at math, hating it. The homework was like kryptonite. I couldn't even stomach doing know, stomach doing it. And then when we would get to in sections, and I remember there was a progress board, like, for each section of it, how we all did. And I was always kind of, you know, near the middle bottom. Right.

And then when it got to word problems, I was top. Yeah. Like if they could just, all the math, if you just put it into words, I would be, I could get it. Sure. And I could figure it out. But that's where, that's where you really started. Yeah. Because it's like, well, this is what I do.

And this is what I love to, this is what I understand. It's what I love to do. Yeah. It's like people say, well, you're not a gamer, are you? I'm not a gamer. I just, I stink to do. Yeah. It's like people say, well, you're not a gamer, are you? I'm not a gamer. I just stink at it. Yeah. And it's like I can't even watch other people play for more than a little bit.

Right. It's just not interesting to me. But they say, but I play word games. I play Scrabble and Word Welder and all that stuff. And that's kind of where my level of amusement is. Yeah. And also, I think, too, the manual dexterity that gaming does, you play guitar.

It's a similar sort of thing where you're, you know, and it is, you know, music is kind of math, too. It's, you know. Yeah. Yeah. Well, that's my English teacher who was also our drama coach in high school. He told me, he says, well, look, now someday, I know you're having trouble in math.

And they kept calling on him to, would you do something about it? You've got to graduate him somehow, you know. Yeah, yeah. He says, well, look, maybe someday you'll play a mathematician. And I just nailed him with a look. And he went, yeah, you're right. That's close. Mr. Bruce Mooney.

Yeah. Yeah, he was awesome. You can just fake it. You don't need to know. You just say the lines. Yeah. Yeah, he was awesome. You can just fake it. You don't need to know. You just say the lines. Yeah. Yeah. So, I mean, but you were, were you like a good kid?

You were not a troublemaker? Oh, yeah, I think so. I think so. I don't think I was very good to my little brother. Yeah. Because as I was getting older and more sophisticated, he was still a little kid. What was the age difference? Seven years.

Oh, okay. So, we were never in the same school together. Yeah. You know, all that stuff. And I think I was just, I probably wasn't a great big brother. Yeah. It was my intention to be, but he was such a pain in the ass. Like all little brothers are.

It's their job. But it's, I, there's, there is something I, I mean, and I still feel just terrible about this. But when I was my, I have a younger brother, they're my half brother and sister, they're nine years younger than me. Yeah. And when they were about five or six, they were running, chasing each other in a circuit through the house. And I was sitting on the couch watching TV and they passed me once and they passed me twice. And on the third time, I stuck my leg out and tripped both of them. And they looked at me with like this horror of like,

why would you do that? And I had no answer. I was like, I don't even know, but you just kept running by and the meanness came out, you know? Well, we, it was pretty funny though. I'm sure it was nothing funnier. Yeah. No, we... It was pretty funny, though. I'm sure it was. Nothing funnier. Yeah. No, come on. But, I mean, about 10 minutes ago, we answered that question. You were bigger than them.

Yeah. And you were being a prick about it for just a second. Yep, yep. No, I did the same thing with my brother. Did you, I mean, but you made up for it later? Yeah. You were good. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.

You had a good relationship later. No, he was an odd guy. He was great. He lived in Austin, Texas. Oh, wow. He moved out to LA. Didn't love it here. Yeah.

So then he moved to Austin, Texas with his boyfriend. And started getting involved in, he'd always been very funny. And so he got involved with a troupe called Esther's Follies, which are still going on 6th Street. And he was a satirist. He would do political satire. He would write satirical songs. He would do sketches and stuff like that. Oh, wow.

And it was kind of a vaudeville show. They'd also have jugglers, and they'd have drag acts and stuff. It's still a lot of fun. But they were very Texas politics. It was the years of Ann Richards and the Bushes. And it was really kind of a ripe time. Yeah. Yeah.

That's great. So there's two sort of musical comedians in the family. Yeah, sort of. Was your sister a performer at all? No. No? No. She became a mom at a very early age.

Yeah. Yeah. And left it to you guys to be the performers. She didn't, you know't deliberately hand it off. Yeah, yeah. So, I mean, as you said, you're a drama teacher. Obviously, you knew what your track was. You were set on being an actor.

Yeah. And this same guy, this Mr. Mooney, he said, you know, someday you might have to make a choice about whether you're a good actor, a real actor, or a comical actor. Yeah. And again, I mean, I didn't quite know what to say, but I thought about it. And then I said, well, what's Alan Arkin? Because he can do anything. And he's one of the funniest people who's ever acted at all. Right.

You know? And I realized that those two extremes who's ever acted at all. Right. You know? And I realize that those two extremes aren't really extremes at all. They're the same craft and the same chore. Yeah. And it's the same thing with songwriters. My favorite songwriters can break your heart or they can break you up. Yeah. Randy Newman.

Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Noel Coward. Yeah. Funniest songwriter of the 20th century, probably. Well, apart from Tom Lehrer. Cole Porter, too. Cole Porter, amazing. Willie Nelson. Loud Coward. Yeah. Funniest songwriter of the 20th century, probably. Well, apart from Tom Lehrer. Cole Porter, too. Cole Porter, amazing.

Willie Nelson. Loudon Wainwright. Yeah. You know, yeah. Or John Prine. John, oh my God, perfect example. Yeah, yeah. John Prine.

Richard Thompson. Do you know Richard Thompson? I sure do. Great, great songwriter. From Fairport Convention? He was originally with Fairport, yeah, yeah. When he was 19, he was playing like that. Fairport convention. He was originally at Fairport. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. When he was 19, he was playing like that.

Yeah. Yeah. No, I, I, I always am. I'm put off by musical acts that don't, and you,

they can be serious, but you just sense the ones that don't have any sense of humor about themselves. Yeah. Yeah. Exactly. And, and like for one,

you two has always been lost on me. And I think it's largely because of that. There just doesn't seem to be anything but this profound self-seriousness. Doesn't seem like there's any wiggle room. Yeah. And it just is kind of like, if you're not having fun, what do you do? I mean, that's my showbiz, you know, that's like my kind of like my beef with lots of areas of showbiz is you're, and I, cause I haven't done a lot of drama, but I've done a couple of TV dramas and it was, I was really struck by the kind of atmosphere

of like, we got to keep it serious. And it's kind of like. We did this thing on Clue, because Clue only works if everyone takes it very seriously. Yes, yes. So you get a bunch of funny people being very serious. And that is such a huge cult movie. It's the first funny movie.

So many people love that movie. But we kept doing it because we're just, you know, me and Mull. Yeah, yeah. And Chris Lloyd and Tim. Yeah. And the amazing ladies, man. Yeah, yeah. Holy shit. And with Eileen. Yeah, yeah. Holy shit.

And with Eileen and- Madeline Kahn. Madeline, yeah. Great Madeline Kahn. And we would just be kind of just digging life and laughing and stuff. And poor Tim had like five pages of straight monologue that he had to remember. So every now and then he had to say, quiet people, please. And I'd be like,, quiet people, please. But, you know, when it was

on somebody else, he was as goofy as anybody. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Greatest. So, but what we would have to do, because we'd all be laughing and everything, and then Jonathan Lynn would say, all right, we're ready to go. And then we'd say to each other, something terrible has happened. And then we'd say to each other, something terrible has happened. That became the mantra. Yeah, yeah, yeah. There's been a murder. A real murder.

Yes. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. So you got to do that some. But on the other thing, having a sense of humor about yourself is hugely important. Yeah. And Angus Young of ACDC, I read a great quote from him recently. And Angus Young of ACDC, I read a great quote from him recently. He said, I hate it when people say we've made 17 albums that sound exactly the same.

We've made 18 albums that sound exactly the same. That's great. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Absolutely. Yeah, and they all sound great, too. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's ACDC, man. Yeah, absolutely. I love the fact that they had the worst singer in the world, and he died, and they found someone worse.

I know. I think that is amazing. Yeah, yeah. And I wouldn't change a thing. I know. And how either one of them ever was able to speak after one concert. Oh, God. Just shredding their voice, yeah.

Can't you tell my love's a crow? Now, was there a point where you decided I'm going to be an actor more than a musician? Because obviously they were sort of a twin interest. And you are both now, you know? When trapped into it, I am both. Yeah, yeah. I don't know, really. I mean, I knew that I could write songs. Yeah.

Because I started writing songs when that I could write songs. Yeah. Because I started writing songs when I was in high school. And I wound up, the first piece of music that I ever wrote for, um, professionally. Yeah. Was for a product called Xanadu, which was a Fabergé. I thought the roller disco movie. No, well, long, long this was 1969 okay wow yeah a long time

and it was it was a Fabergé product it was a scent of some kind yeah cologne or perfume body spray yeah

and they had written a copy for me they had written this poem called Xanadu and I wrote the music to it yeah and would you like to hear

a little bit of it sure of course could you imagine like a lot of percussion a lot of like beaded curtains? Nice. Yeah. In Xanadu, we Xanadu it. Come and share my pleasure dome.

Flying high will me and you it. Sipping from the honeycomb. I'm not making this up. I know you're not. I did write the music. All the ancient games we'll play while we make them sweet and new. Terry something.

Terry? Yeah. Jesus. Mary, Terry, dream away. Yeah. Everything's big percussion in Xanadu. Well, the melody is lovely. Thank you.

But I cannot imagine hearing that and thinking, I want to smell like whatever that is. Because good Lord. All the time. Advertising from, I mean, there's still funny, corny ones, but Jesus Christ, some of them are just unbelievable. Yeah. That that was like, that wasn't considered like laughable because it's so hilarious. You know what was laughable?

I got $200 for it. Now, how did that happen? How did you end up being a jingle writer? I don't know. Were you out of college or? I was, I think I was out of college. I had just finished. I went to NYU for two years.

Yeah. And then I kind of farted around for a little while in Long Island, and then I went to LA in 1970. Okay. So I guess it was, I was out of college and just, you know, doing, and these things would come to me. You know, my father had friends in the business. Yeah. Didn't have an agent exactly, but I had people who would say, hey, you know, your kid Michael could be able to do this maybe. Oh, wow.

So – Because he was still – he just had enough advertising friends at that point that – or had he gone back into – Oh, he was back in the music business. He was back in – he was at Columbia for a good stretch of time. Yeah, yeah. Until the mid-'70s. Yeah. So – but he had all these friends that he had met along the way. There's a guy named John McClure whose wife was a session

singer. And he got me involved in singing like an LP of kids' songs, of nursery rhymes, with some other singers and stuff. So that's how I got my $800 to come out here. Oh, wow. Yeah. Wow.

And I never really went back. Never really went back. Didn't you go to Carnegie Mellon, too? I did. Yeah. And was that, did you? That was 65, 66. And was that, so you went two years there and two years?

No, one year, just one year. Oh, just one year. One year there. Yeah. They asked me not to come back. Well, you get Pittsburgh. You got to get to Pittsburgh at year there. Yeah. They asked me not to come back. Well, you get Pittsburgh. You got to get to Pittsburgh at some point. Pittsburgh's gotten a lot better.

I know. At the time, it was a really, really, you know, very sooty city. Well, Carnegie Mellon's an amazing school. It is. I did like a college date there. Yeah. Years and years ago. And I was honestly the sort of like just that the auditorium where I was at like the

technology involved in that or it was better than our tv show well that they that started I was only there for one year like I said yeah and is that in in acting yeah oh I didn't know they're known as an acting school oh my god oh I didn't know that yeah yeah yeah a lot of people you know like um because I think of it now as such a technical school because it's. All of the Hill Street Blues people, a lot of them came from there. Wow. Because Charlie Haid and Bochco, the creator of the show. Oh, really?

You know, and he put a lot of his pals in there, you know, and started them up. David Lantz, where I met Dave Lander. Oh, okay. We were both acting students. Wow. Yeah. So were you guys, did you come as a package deal? Or did it just happen?

What do you mean? Like at Laverne and Shirley, like? Well, we, the two of us, were part of another group called The Credibility Gap with Harry Shearer. Yes. And Richard Beebe. Yes. And we put a couple of albums out, and we did play the college circuit playing, you know, what they called coffee houses, which was usually kind of a roped off section of the cafeteria that they kept open after eight. Glamour.

I'll tell you. And yeah. And so that we were together. But those two characters, we had done those two characters since we met, pretty much. Yeah. Because we both went to public school in him in the Bronx and me on Long Island. So you knew those guys. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

So that's kind of how that came to be. Now, were you studying acting at NYU, too? Yeah, yeah. NYU, I got studying acting at NYU too? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. NYU, I got kind of like a little more serious about it. I think being in New York kind of helped because you were able to actually go places and see people doing big boy theater. Yes.

And I imagine you're being taught by professionals that are also somewhat involved in the, you know. This is very true. The actual doing of it. At Carnegie, there were more people who were kind of on the academic side. Yeah. A couple of rogues. One of our acting teachers was really definitely kind of a real guy

who just knew his onions. A lot of other people were just pretty good at teaching it. But at NYU, I had Olympia Dukakis. Oh, wow. I had Peter Cass, who was a great stage director and teacher. Hubby Burgess, who was our circus teacher, who went on. Circus teacher. Yeah, we took circus classes.

Like juggling and. Juggling. Balancing things on your chin. Just kind of, yeah. Trapeze, but not flying trapeze, but just trapeze with holds and stuff. Yeah. Yeah. Unicycle, I could never master.

Yeah. I could juggle a little bit. Guest was pretty good on the, that's where I met Chris, was at NYU. He was pretty good with the juggling and unicycle. While you're doing that, are you thinking, when am I ever going to use circus skills? Or are you just thinking it's fun, and what the hell? I don't, I'm not sure I've really put all that together yet. I've still never done anything.

You know what, I used a little bit of juggling on the Burnin' Shirley one time. Yeah. But there were people, Peter Scolari is a pal of mine, and he's a serious juggler. Yeah, yeah. I mean, he's a pro juggler. Right. He's amazing. But, no, not so much.

Yeah, because I took some, I took a couple of straight acting classes as opposed to improv. And there was a lot of stuff that I just, like I always remember, and I think I've mentioned it on here before, Charles Grodin wrote his first book, which is, I think it's called called It Would Be So Nice If You Weren't Here. And I just always remember that his experience with acting class was that he was just a pariah because he would go, why? Like they'd say, let's do this. And he'd say, why? Why are we doing that? What does that have to do with memorizing lines and selling emotions? And I can kind of relate to that.

Yeah. Because, yeah, I mean, but also, too, that wasn't, you know, becoming a stage actor was obvious. It just wasn't. I thought maybe, but then I ended up, I went to film school and I ended up being, I wanted to be an actor, but I wanted to be a film actor, which is a different sort of, I mean, there's a lot less technique, I think, in film acting. You can just kind of wing it in film acting. Before I came out here, I think all I wanted to do was stage acting. Yeah. Because, you know, I thought, well, there's going to be a lot of competition.

All these people look like movie stars, and I really don't. Yeah. Oh, come on. Well, I'm not fishing. You know, and I thought, I think I might want to be a stage actor. You can be all kinds of people. You can, you know, I'd just seen Christopher Plummer in two things in a row. One of them, he played an Aztec Indian chief.

And another one, he was like a sophisticated English guy. And I was going, that's what I wanted. I want to do what he does. I want to do what Arkin does. I want to do what, well, there were just tons of them. Yeah, yeah. Jason Robards was one of my great heroes. And he was always pretty much the same.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. He was always Jason Robards. Yeah, and that's all you wanted to be. Well, I just, you thought, man, well, sure, if I was Jason Robards, I would be the happiest man in the world. Yeah, yeah. But I'm not, so I got to think of what I'm going to do. Yeah. But that's all I

kind of really wanted to do. And then I got out here, and it was like, still, I was just still on the stage, you know, kind of as a cabaret guy, or on the radio. Yeah. Because Credibility Gap did a ton of radio. Yeah. Yeah. And, I mean, did you – was your family – because you didn't obviously finish school.

Didn't finish college, no. And did you – and, I mean, was that a scary thing for you? Was it just – No. Or did you just feel like – I think I'd had enough school. Yeah, yeah. And I loved my teacher, this guy named Omar Shapley, who was an original member of the Compass Players, which came before Second City.

In Second City, right. Yeah. And so he was a guy who knew his onions and had a great sense of humor. Yeah. And we did exercises that, you know, on the surface, they seemed like you got to play by the rules. Right. And everyone took that to be kind of a thing where you bear down on the rules. But every time one of us wise guys would take it into a funny direction, he would love it.

Yeah. He would eat it up. Yeah, yeah. He would say, look, that's improvisation too. You didn't exactly break the rules. You didn't break the fourth wall. But you slid under this person's tag. And I got to admire you for it.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. So I think that was definitely a great lesson. Yeah. But for the most part, it's like you get out here and it's like, no, no, I'm a performer. What do I really do? And they start giving you parts and you start doing those parts. Now, why did you choose LA over if you had wanted to be a stage actor? It was 11 degrees when I left JFK, and it was 64 degrees when I got here.

Wow. What year was that? February 11, 1970. Wow. And my friend Dave Lander's wife, Taya, picked me up at the airport in her little Nash Metro, and she stuck a lit joint in my mouth and said, this is where you live now.

And I said, I think you're right. All right. Well, when you put it like that, it seems to make sense. So did you couch surf for a while? That's how they greet you in Austin now. Yes, right, right, right. Did you couch surf for a while, or did you have a, you know? No, well, I stayed at a, I sublet from a friend who was in Hawaii doing Fortune in Men's Eyes. Okay.

Just to fill you in on all the details. Yes. So I stayed there for a little while. It was me and my new girlfriend who became my first wife. And my, another friend we had just met, very tall man named Malcolm who lived in our back room. Okay. He was very, very nice. Yeah. He played guitar too.

So we had a little, you know, guitar going, little guitar action. So yeah, that's where I was for a little while. I started working with the credibility app on a, you know, sometimes basis. Yeah. Then they got to KPBC and which was, it's now KROQ. That's their, you know, it's 106.7. Yeah. I believe that was KPBC, which was, it's now KROQ. That's their, you know, it's 106.7.

Yeah. I believe that was KPBC. And yeah, so we worked on the radio a bunch. Oh, wow. And we started making a little bit of money. On a regular basis? Yeah. The credibility gap?

The credibility gap on every day. Oh, wow. They were on KRLA radio for two years. And who was that? Harry Shearer. Yeah. Richard Beeer. Yeah. Richard Beebe. Yeah.

Who was kind of the oldest member in years. And also, he had been at the station. What happened was, station KRLA had this news department. And there was this guy named Lou Irwin and another guy named Tom. These names. Anyway, first the knees, then the names. Right, right. Sure.

That's a John Glover quote. And Len Chandler, who was a folk singer. And they kind of did this news thing. And then Harry came aboard. And Harry was sort of like, maybe something more than this. Maybe let's write some really good sketches. Right. Because Harry came from radio as a kid.

Yeah. you know, radio as a kid. Yeah. And then David L. Lander got hired because he worked on a, he worked on an answering service, something they don't have anymore. Yeah. Before we had little machines. I remember. There was answering services.

Yeah. And people would call and say, yes. And he leaves, he left a message. And it's very important that you call back at this number. You know, it was a person that you had kind of a relationship with. Yeah. So one of his clients was this woman named Sally Smaller, who just became a pal. And so you're really funny.

You should audition for this show. So he sent in a tape, and he got hired by the credit company. Oh, wow. So those people, Sally Smaller. Oh, that's great. Remember those people. Yeah, yeah. Remember Ron Silber, the guy who turned down a part in a TV movie, and the part went to me, and I wound up working with Annette O'Toole for the first time. Yeah, yeah. Remember Ron Silber, the guy who turned down a part in a TV movie and the part went to

me and I wound up working with Annette O'Toole for the first time. Oh, wow. And yeah. Yeah. And I'm still delightedly suffering from that. And still grateful to him. Oh, my God. Every time I saw him after that.

Yeah. Lovely guy. Yeah, that's great. That's great. So was it hard to come up with sketches every day? I mean, how much time did you have to fill? Well, they kept cutting it down. We did a six-minute broadcast.

We did a 10-minute broadcast. They wanted to get everything down to three minutes. But it would be, it was like we'd find a new story that was ripe for something or not so ripe and we'd just make something up. Yeah. If there was a story about a strike, a picket line, we would do a sketch with characters called the Three Scabs. And they were all, it was exactly what you think. Right, right. A lot of sound effects and everything.

Right, sure. Yeah. Yeah, so that's kind of what they would do. Sam Yorty was the mayor of Los Angeles at the time, and he was this complete bozo. I mean, he was a real case for study. And Harry just did a great Yorty. So they do these great sketches. And Nixon and Agnew.

Harry did a brilliant Nixon, and Richard Beebe did a great Agnew. And, you know, it was really fun times to be doing satire. Yeah, yeah. But, you know, you'd have to make decisions really quickly. Yeah. You know. And the first sketch I ever wrote with them, and I came in as a guest with Dave. He was, hey, come on, work a day.

You get a, you know, you join the union, you get da-da-da. Because I wasn't even an after at the time. And how long is this after you've come to L.A.? Minutes. Wow. Because David – That's great. David – I was on the phone with him.

He says, yeah, A, I got married, and B, if you come out here, I think I can – you can work with – Get you on the radio. On this show, yeah. Yeah. I think you're really – I've been told the guys are hyped about you, you know, all this stuff. So I went and I did a day. And I had a really great time and laughed a lot. Yeah.

And Harry was the fastest typist I'd ever seen. Excuse me. The fastest typist I'd ever seen. So we would just kind of like go. Yeah. And we'd just make fun of whatever we wanted to make fun of that was more or less about the story. Yeah, yeah. And then Harry would fly it in there. And then we'd get up and we'd do it.

Wow. Put it on tape. It was really fun. And how long were you at the station every day? Well, we'd get there kind of 10-ish or so, have the first show on by noon probably, or maybe it was a later in the day show. And they would rerun them during the day. So it was like last night's show would be on. Right.

So I went there and there was a story about how everyone's depressed in Cleveland or in Detroit because unemployment, da, da, da, da. Yeah. And the team stinks up the place, you know, whatever was going on. So we just had a bunch of guys sitting around in a bar in Detroit talking about how terrible Cleveland is. Just like, Cleveland is so terrible. And it was literally that. Right.

You know, and so I got a couple of laughs from the guys. And it went into the script. And it went on the air. And I felt famous. That's great. It was awesome. That's wonderful. Yeah.

And that's amazing that you, like, well, I mean, it's nice to have people that you know here. But to come here and immediately start to feel some sort of creative vitality because, you know, one of the questions, I mean, it's a question that I always think about with performers, especially in there. And that's when I moved to L.A. Right. Is, are there doubts? Are there moments where you feel like, oh, I don't know if I'm going to pull this off? I think maybe doubt is my fallback. Oh, yeah?

Yeah. But so much that I don't even notice it anymore. Oh, wow. I've been able to handle pretty much everything. Yeah. Because I know enough not to go near stuff I couldn't do. Yeah. They wanted me to read for a part one time.

And it's one of the only times I've ever gone in for a, you know, been offered, you know, a shot at a part with an artist I really, really liked. Yeah. A director, in this case. And I read the part, and it was something I just could not do. And I said, I'd love to meet you, but I don't want to be a tease about this. It was a guy who molests his own son. And I said, I don't think I can do this. And it was just, it's that level of doubt.

It's not, it's just knowledge about yourself. Yeah. I don't generally go to doubt, just like I don't go to regret, because I think they're both useless. Yeah, yeah. You know, the only thing you do is fall forward. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Well, that's good. I mean, it's not, well, I guess, too, because you enjoyed that success early on, you know, or I mean, and not, you walk into your theater, you meet five people, you know, who are in other shows. Yeah, yeah. He's going over the, you know, the Brooks Atkinson. Yeah. I'm going down here to the Neil Simon. And just, it's like, there you are, full, you can see who's, you know, had enough of this show they're doing. You can see who's between shows and I'm just walking with so-and-so.

It's a society you're in. And here, travel is solo, more or less. Unless you carpool, which is a good thing. Now, at about this time, how soon did you get married after you came out here the first time? About eight months. Eight months. Wow. Yes, I was very young.

I was a week short of my 23rd birthday. Wow. And Susan was 18. Wow. Yeah. Different times. Different times, indeed. Yeah.

Were you engaged when you moved out here? Nope. Or did you, no, wow. No, no. Yeah. No, she was a girl I had met at the O'Neill Theater in Connecticut. She was kind of a townie, a summer townie. She lived in Orange County.

So we just, you know, it just eventually kind of happened. Yeah. And we stayed married for 22 years. Wow. Yeah. And you had started a family? Oh, yeah. Yeah, yeah.

How soon after? A while. We waited a while. Oh, that's, yeah. And then now I'm on my final wife, which is how I put it. Does she love to hear that? I don't think, if she's hearing this now, it might be. I think I've referred to her as my final wife once before.

In front of her? Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, I mean, it's like, babe, I'm turning 72 in three weeks. You look pretty goddamn good for 72. No, you don't. I'd say you look, you know, 70. So Robert Benchley used to say this, and this was not a racist comment.

But I have to say. It's fun to preface it with that. Well, I say it in front of my family all the time. Yeah. I say, I am the oldest living white man, especially at 6 o'clock in the morning. Now, when Benchley said it, it was a common phrase. Yes. Because they were always finding Indians and people living in Mexico and Africans and people living in the islands and the West Indies.

And they would always say, in the old newspapers, they would say he's the oldest living white man. He's 104, whatever. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So anyway, it made me laugh at the time. And then I said it to somebody and they said, that's not a very nice thing to say. No, it's actually fine.

Yeah, yeah. It's a comment on something that's not, you know, current. Right, right, right. Because I'm very careful about it. Yeah, oh, you have to be. And I mean, you have to be, and not just because you could get caught. It's because, no, you, you know, it's, the reason that the good thing about times being different is that we're aware of the feelings of people that we weren't aware of

before. Right. Exactly. That we just didn't, that we're just forgotten and neglected and, you know, and treated pretty shittily. No shit. Yeah. So.

Also, at the back of your mind, you really have to know, my father put it this way, sort of. He said, you know, there's angels and assholes from all walks of life, from every color, every race, every creed, as they used to say. No matter what your religion, what your sexual orientation, everything, you can still be a blazing asshole, but we got to take you on one at a time. Because that is the great equalizer. Yeah.

That is, we're all capable of all of that. Yeah. Some of us are terrible at it. Yeah. Some of us are pretty good. Yes. No, and we can, you know, I think of like Caitlyn Jenner. Right.

Kind of very brave, you know, the transition and stuff. And then it's kind of like, oh, well, she's just back to being an asshole. But that's absolutely true. You know, there was that moment where I was like, I admire her. And now it's kind of like, oh, Jesus, you're still a Republican? The odds are that one of the Hollywood 10 was a real jerk off. Yes, absolutely. Maybe even more than one.

Well, so is Laverne and Shirley your kind of first big thing on TV? Oh, yeah. It's my first SAG job. Oh, wow. Yeah. Wow. They had to audition one other guy for my part in order to give me the part. Yeah.

Because I didn't have a card. Oh, wow. So I, you know. So they wanted you. Well, they knew that me and David, we had created these characters. Yeah, yeah. And so.

Who's they? Is it Gary Marshall? Gary and Lowell Ganz and Mark Rothman, who were the showrunners. Yeah. And, you know, everybody else. And they were just aware of you from town? They were aware of us through Penny and Rob.

Okay. Rob Reiner and Penny Marshall. They loved these characters that we did, but we never even did them on stage until 1975. Uh-huh. We were working live with the Credibility Gap, but there was no, those guys couldn't comment on the news. Right.

Those guys didn't really belong in the kind of show that we did. They don't care about the news. No, they don't even know what the news is. Yeah. So, but we started kind of show that we did. Because they don't care about the news. No, they don't even know what the news is. Yeah. So, but we started kind of bleeding them in just as, you know, a couple of pieces. Yeah. And they always worked like crazy. But around this time, Penny, you know, had just, she was doing, she had done The Odd Couple.

She had done these episodes of Laverne and Shirley, sorry, of Happy Days. Yeah. Or an episode, and their characters really kind of blew up. So they were going to do the show. Great, we got this thing. So to celebrate this show, she and Rob invited David and me and Harry, who were at the time the credibility gap, to a party at her house celebrating this thing. She's got a show. And some of the producers were there at the show. And Rob, at one point, the credibility gap, to a party at her house celebrating this thing. She's got a show. And some of the producers were there at the show.

And Rob, at one point, he just goes, do those guys. Come on, do those guys. Wow. So as David puts it, and I think it's accurate, he said, we went into a piece that we had never done before and we have never done since. It was the two guys discussing whether or not to enroll in a butler school. Was it something you had actually worked on? Never.

Oh, yeah, it was just totally improvised. No, I don't know where it came out of David Lander's ass. Yeah, yeah. And this one, one must follow. Yeah. And it just, it was, I mean, everyone really loved it. Yeah, yeah. And then Monday morning, we got a call.

They said, come in and meet Gary. Wow. So we came in and met Gary Marshall. Went to a party and ended up auditioning. Yeah. Wow. Yeah, yeah. Did you have a sense when you were doing it like this?

Were you just doing it for fun? Well, I don't know. I guess in the back of our minds was like, these people who are laughing right now are the ones you want to laugh. Our job givers. Yes, exactly. Yeah, yeah. Because then they'll give you a job where everybody can laugh at you.

Yeah, yeah. Yeah, kind of. But I don't, mainly I just, I didn't want Rob to have introduced a dud. Yeah. You know, because I really liked Rob a lot. And I just kind of just got into no penny and she was awesome. And they just couldn't have been more supportive. Yeah.

We came in. She says, guys, we'll hire you. You're not in the writer's guild. No. Well, we're going to hire you. You'll join the writer's guild. But right now, we're going to hire you as apprentices. And we're going to put you on the show.

See if you can write yourselves into the first episode. OK. And we did. Yeah, yeah. And then we wrote ourselves into every other episode. And then people- Did you can write yourselves into the first episode. Okay. And we did. Yeah, yeah. And then we wrote ourselves into every other episode. And then people- Did you write your own stuff in most of those? We wrote a lot of our own stuff.

We would write- And were you credited writers on the show? No, no, no. Oh, that's too bad. Never until, well, we wrote an episode with Harry. The three of us wrote an episode because he was on the staff too. Oh, wow. Yeah.

And he left after. We wrote one show kind of for us, which was the show about how we wound up in the same building as the girls. So he wrote that one with us. Yeah. And then he says, you know, guys, I think after this, I'm not happy here. This is kind of not my thing. Yeah.

And so he went off to pursue Harry Shearer business, which has turned out rather well. Just fine, yeah. So, but anyway, so we wrote that one together. And then, yeah, I forgot the point I was trying to make, but I don't remember. No, I mean, you wrote all your own stuff. Not all our own stuff.

You know, there were certain writers, Chris Thompson, Dana Olson, there were certain writers who really went, oh, babe, I can do this. You know, everyone could write Penny. Yeah. No one knew how to write Cindy. Yeah. It was such a tough thing. How do you keep her from being this pain in the ass?

Yeah. You know, she's got to be this kind of persnickety kind of, you know, but adorable. Yes. Little gal. And funny, not just straight. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But she's a hugely funny actress. Yeah, yeah.

As well as just being a good actress. Did you see that Law and Order she did about five years ago? No. Holy moly, she's good. Yeah, yeah. She's a really good actress. Yeah. So anyway, but they really, every now and then someone would really get,

be able to lay a racket on Lenny and Squiggy. Lowell was pretty good at it. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. Once he came back for a little stretch toward the end of our – and he kind of got things on track again before it all fell apart. Yeah. wanted to sort of be, you know, a more diverse kind of actor that you're going to get pigeonholed as sort of a character comedian type? I think I lucked out there.

Yeah. Because the next two jobs I did after that, because I didn't do anything in the interim. Yeah. You know, I just, I wanted to hang out. I just, you know, I didn't. You didn't push to get outside stuff. No, and I got a lot of job offers, especially from ABC because they liked me at ABC. Yeah. You know, I just, I wanted to hang out. I just, you know, I didn't. You didn't push to get outside stuff. No, and I got a lot of job offers. Yeah.

Especially from ABC because they liked me at ABC. Yeah. For, to do essentially the same thing. Yeah. Or I got like five offers to do the love boat. Yes. And I would say goofy, goofy guy. As kind of a Lenny type, yeah.

Yeah. Best friend of Bruce Boxleitner. Right, right. You know, it was like that kind of a Lenny type, yeah. Yeah, a best friend of Bruce Boxleitner. Right, right. You know, it was like that kind of thing. And it was like, no, I'm going to hang with my guys, my dogs, everything, you know. So anyway, so then I didn't really do anything else until, well, we did used cars. We did 1941 and used cars, David and I together. So it wasn't really an issue.

It wasn't really something I thought about. But after Laverne and Shirley, I was really, really lucky to do Young Doctors in Love, which is kind of an airplane-type hospital drama. Yeah, yeah, I remember that. It's got some funny stuff in it. Yeah. It was Gary Marshall's first film as a director. And then Spinal Tap.

So I thought, look, even if I died now at age 36 or whatever I was, no one could say he could only do one thing. Yeah. So I just thought that was a real lucky thing. Because you don't get typecast from your first role. You get typecast if your second role is the same as your first role. Is the same as your first role, yeah. So you've got to be careful. Yeah.

I remember when I first came out here, I was just – it was with a live stage show that was – had gotten some – it was a silly show called The Real Life Brady Bunch. Oh, sure, yeah. Where we just did Brady Bunch episodes. There was a girl who was on that – she wound up on SNL. Oh, Melanie Hutzel. Melanie. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, exactly.

But I – from that, we did it in – it was started in Chicago, went to New York. I got an agent, which I – I played Mike Brady and I was the announcer in the game show that preceded it. And I just couldn't – like I'm getting an agent for saying, honey, I'm home? But all right, I'm not going to question it. And then that agent had a sort of sister agency in Los Angeles. So I came to LA sort of with representation already. Yeah. And I was really happy with them because they sent me out for all kinds of different things.

Good. And then I got the part in the movie Cabin Boy. Right. Where I play someone with an IQ of about six. Yes. And then- Charmingly, I might add. Thank you.

Everything I got after that was the idiot. Sure. Like I never went out for anything else other than the idiot. And I couldn't be choosy. That was your reel at the time. Yeah, I was just, and I was like, okay, I guess I'm just going to, I mean, there's worse things. You know, the idiot is usually pretty funny.

Yeah. But, you know, I – People like Bill Daley. Yeah. Made a really nice living for 20 years being the dumbest guy on the show. Yeah. It's, you know, but, yeah, it's nice that you got to do that. I mean, I think then Spinal Tap must have kind of then just opened up you to this kind of new-ish kind of filmmaking in movies that Christopher Guest made. Right.

Yeah. But there's a little stretch there between 1984 when Tap came out and Waiting for Guffman, which was three years later. and waiting for Guffman, which was three years later. And I was, you know, I was, originally I was going to be involved in doing Guffman, but I got, I wound up, you know, doing SNL and another job. Actually, I did the Brady Punch movie. Oh, that's right.

That's right. I forgot about that. And that was a hit. So after that, I got a lot of that guy. Yeah, yeah. I got a lot of, how would you like to play this guy? I just did that guy. Yeah, yeah. No, he's a high school principal now.

Oh, okay. Okay, yeah. I said, make an offer. And they offered it to Eugene. So anyway. Yeah. Be careful. They say, make me an offer.

Right, right, right. How was your SNL experience? You know, as I've said before, it wasn't a marriage made in heaven. Yeah, yeah. And I was really, you know, I got along great with, you know. What year was that? It was 94. Okay.

Was that when Chris Elliott and Janine Garofalo were on TV? Yeah, yeah, yeah. No, well, yeah, 94, 95 was that. Yeah, yeah. Boy, I'd have to look at it. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I had a calendar. Because it was right when we got, when the late night show started.

That's right. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. But your experience there, how? You know, I got to know people that I liked very much. Yeah. When Rob Schneider was still there, we wrote some funny stuff together.

Yeah. Some of it got on. Some of it didn't. I worked with Dave Mandel a lot. Oh, he's great. Once we came back from, yeah. And he was, and Franken. Yeah.

You know, so Al and I would write stuff together. I'd write stuff with Dave, which was really fun because he has so much energy. You know, he's so much like, you can see it in his hands. Yeah, yeah, yeah. He's throwing, taking things out of his head and throwing them in your face. Yeah, yeah. You know, and they're usually pretty good things. Right.

So we wrote some funny stuff together. Yeah. And it was okay. And it's like, I didn't really, really have a footing on anything. Yeah. I had only, there had only one character. A little older than you. I was quite a bit older.

Yeah, yeah. Was that weird for you to kind of? No, I knew what I was. I was roughly Phil's age. And Phil was leaving the show. And that's one reason that they brought me on. I see. His last six shows with SNL were my first six shows. I see. There was definitely, and it was like, okay, now you're going to be David Spade's dad. Yeah, yeah, yeah. In this sketch. Yeah. And it was like, okay, now you're going to be David Spade's dad. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

In this sketch. Yeah. And it was like, okay, good. Yeah. Of course, they also wanted me to play Clinton, which I didn't like because I wasn't very good at it. Yeah. And I was following, I was following Phil's.

Yeah. Which was amazing. No one need go near that again. Yeah, yeah. And then after me, Daryl came in and did an amazing job. So it was like, sort of like I was the, the worn out hammock, a couple of high points there. I interrupted you when you were going to say you, there was a character that you, that you. There was only one character that I had done before with The Gap. Yeah. Which was,

his name was Frank Stern originally, but they made it Frank Prescott because I was also doing Howard Stern. Yeah. So it was like that. And he was just an old John Ford style director, working with an actress, working with Helen. It was Helen Hunt. I wrote it for Helen Hunt basically. And just basically he's this pig who is directing this very sensitive actress

and kind of traps her into being brilliant and passing out. It was like a very, it was the first, and I wrote it and it went in pretty much as was. And I thought, I'm not a writer on the show. I'm gonna get writer credit on the show, but I've written a good sketch here. And Helen knocked it out of the park. Yeah, yeah.

And so it was really cool experience. But there were a few of those. And as a writer, I got, or a co-writer, I got about 20 sketches on out of 26 shows. Yeah, that's great. You know, and it was mainly- That's a really high batting average. It is. And it was mainly because of who I was working with.

Yeah. You know, Al's stuff really had an angle to it. Yeah. Dave. Dave's stuff was just, I mean, he's a comedy writer. He's brilliant. He writes comedy. He writes really good comedy sketches.

And he writes really good long form, obviously, with Veep and, you know. Seinfeld, he was there. Wasn't he on Seinfeld? He was on Seinfeld, but he was also on Curb Your Enthusiasm after the first, I think maybe third season on, second season on. No, he's a good guy. Yeah. Yeah, I remember just because I knew Chris at that point. Yeah.

And he did not have a good experience. He was not happy, no. He was not happy. And Janine Garofalo was a friend of mine at the time. I remember one time going to – because having – working in the same building, being in a different class in the same high school, basically. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You know, the SNL after parties were, you know, I could just stroll into them.

You know, my then wife and I could just stroll into them. Yeah. And we would go to them plenty. And also we knew a lot of people. Yeah, sure. It was fun. But I went to one and I walked. Chris was sitting eating and I was happy to see him. I hadn't seen him in a while and I went up one, and Chris was sitting eating, and I was happy to see him.

I hadn't seen him in a while, and I went up, and I said, I went up, and he was eating, and I put my hand on him and said, hey, man, how are you? It's good to see you. And he looked up, and he just said, and with a mouthful, I fucking hate myself. I went, all right, you know what? I'm going to talk to you later. I'm going to leave you, let you finish your meal, and then go. No, I remember when Chris said to me, it was toward the end of that season,

and Chris said to me, are you thinking of coming back? And I said, yeah, this is a good gig for me. I'm actually doing fine. I'm getting a few things on. He said, there's no reason for me to come back. This is Janine had already left. Yeah. Mike had left.

Rob was gone. Yeah. You know, it was like there had been the house cleaning. The chores were posted. Yeah. It was definitely a transitional year. Yeah. And I got to say, apart from, you know, from all the writers were decent writers and everything.

But I think subliminally a lot of them were looking for the next Wayne's World. Yeah. A lot of them wanted to create a character for Adam or for Chris Farley or for Spade that would, you know, buy them that house and be there or whatever. Or just, you know, whatever. Or a two-room apartment in New York City. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, you know, I just think, and it was, that's not a knock. It's like, it's very good business sense to have been the person who invented, you know, so-and-so.

Yeah, yeah, the catchphrase guy. Yeah, exactly. But it's not, it's not an appealing way to work. No, and that was not a healthy time for the show. Yeah. It's not an appealing way to work for me. I mean, I certainly would not, you know, you always kind of want to, the thing you're trying to chase is the funny, you know, like to just chase like doing good work and feeling good about it. And if you're trying to buy a house, it's, you know.

Well, I know. I'm speaking out of school. No, I know. I know. I know. But I mean, I'm not saying in particular that's true about these people, but I do think that there was a good amount of time on that show where it did seem where they were looking for the next copier guy or the next Night at the Roxbury guys or whatever. Well, I suppose.

I suppose. Yeah, yeah. And they take these big swings like, you know, the ones that didn't work. Yes. I was in one called Coneheads. Oh, yeah. Which is a really kind of a funny movie. Yeah, yeah.

But I think people had just said, really? Conehead? That's a, I don't know. Yeah, yeah. But it's a very funny movie. Yeah, yeah. But I think people had just said, really? Conehead, that's a, I don't know. Yeah, yeah. But it's a very funny movie. Yeah, it is. Yeah, it's, you know, it's, sometimes it is, you know, I always think sometimes sketches are meant to be sketches. Absolutely.

Yeah. Yeah, exactly. They don't need sequels necessarily. They sure don't. Now, we've talked, we've been talking for a while, so I definitely want to get to Better Call Saul and how you got to that. I mean, how that happened. Well, I think how it happened was that Vince Gilligan forgot how old I had gotten. Because they really should have hired a younger guy to go back.

The flashbacks were difficult. Oh, you know. And they kept showing, well, here's how we're going to make you. We're going to do it with computer magic. And I said, all right, whatever. Like smoothing your face or something? Yeah, and if they did, I had never noticed. I haven't seen a lot of them anyway.

Do you not watch yourself much? There are a few I haven't seen that I'm in, and then I'm way behind in the rest of the story. Yeah. Because I need some time to put my feet up and get through them because it's such a it's such an amazing show really great amazing it's it's one of my favorites you know like mine too yeah yeah short list of favorites yeah I mean if I had not been involved in this show I would still be a huge fan yeah actually and I would have seen them all yeah this time. Yeah, it's a nice situation to be in, you know, because there's the alternative, which is like something you're in that you're not that much a fan of.

That's right, yeah. Yeah, I was a big Breaking Bad fan of Vince. I'd worked with Vince on X-Files. He and Frank Spotnitz created a character that I played in a Vince on X-Files. He created a character, he and Frank Spotnitz created a character that I played in a string of X-Files and had a nice time and I got to know him a little bit. And every time he had anything going, Vince, after that, he would call me to, you know, come in and read. I can't read. I'm got to, you know, I'm on my way to New York to do a play or I'm not going to be able to do that. It just never worked out.

Yeah. And it's so good that it never worked out. Yeah. Because when it finally did, it was like, well, we're doing this prequel to Breaking Bad, which had just finished. Yeah. It was already, this is one of the greatest series, maybe the greatest dramatic series of all time. Yeah. And it had the perfect ending.

It nailed that ending like a ballerina. It sure did. And they don't always. No, they don't. The big prestige series. And even when they come close, you're disappointed. Yeah. No, but this couldn't, as I told, because I was working with Brian at the time, I said,

you know, you couldn't be redeemed. That was the one thing you had going in yeah but you found a way to find to let others redeem themselves yeah

on your way out yeah it was awesome yeah no you wanted him to go out to a song by a band that included two suicides yeah

so wow that's right yeah that's right yeah I asked Vince once because just the episodes where you get to see Walter with the people that like he had worked with at that startup. Yes.

And that you realize that he. Jessica Hecht. And I can't remember the guy. I can't. But that he had self-sabotaged and you got the real sense of he's a sociopath. Yeah. And I asked Vince, I said, when you were writing the pilot, did you know he was a sociopath? And he said, no.

Absolutely. As time went on, I figured out, which I just was so, I found that so thrilling. I found that so thrilling. And just like what a testament to the quality of that show that there was actual organic growth, even in the creative process of it. Well, in Better Call Saul, and he's said this publicly, and Peter has said this publicly, Peter Gould has said this publicly, they didn't know what the relationship between these two brothers was until they had seen us on the screen for a few episodes. Yeah. And then it became, what if this guy ain't so helpless? Yeah, yeah. What if this guy has an agenda that's really going to make us shit ourselves?

Yeah, yeah, yeah. How about that? How about he's the guy with the sandbag in the dark alley? Yeah, yeah. You know? And they called me up to tell me. He says, well, things are going to change a little bit, and we're going to go. I think you're going to find it really interesting.

And then he's kind of spelled out who Chuck really was at that point. And it was, oh, boy, OK. Yeah, it's got to be exciting. Yeah, yeah. When can we get on it? Because he's such a pitiful, awful person in a way. Like, he really is to be pitied, but then he also is to be reviled. Yeah.

You know, just because. Well, I'm the only person who ever had to love him. Yeah. And I did. Yeah, yeah. So I did my job. I can see that, yeah. You have to do that to some extent.

A few years ago on stage, I played a Southern colonel, the most racist, disgusting, he should die right now human being you've ever seen in your life. A play called Father Comes Home from the Wars by Suzanne Laurie Parks. Lots of racism, I imagine. It was just, it was horrible. It was like, you know, just, but I had to find a way to love him as much as he loves himself. Yeah. And I, of course, I don't drink, but alcohol was certainly helping him love himself as

much as he did. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So that was a way in. Yeah. But you have to. You have to love your person. Even if your person is a self-loathing person, you have to find a way to love him enough to keep him

from blowing his brains out. Anyway. I'm going to put that in the what have you learned column. Okay, yeah. So, well, now, I mean, unfortunately, So, well, now, I mean, unfortunately, you immolated on Better Call Saul. Yeah. I mean, are there flashbacks this year or anything?

Did you do anything this year? No, not for the fifth. They just wrapped the fifth season today. Oh, that's just what I saw on somebody. No, I'm not in the fifth season. Yeah. But fortunately, everybody else is. Yeah, yeah.

Everybody who counts. Well, now, I mean, are you, I know you have a sort of like a travel show, right? It's a. No, it's a food show. A food show. That's what I mean. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, it was really fun.

For five seasons, we did it. Yeah. One little bitty season, and then they got longer and longer. And it's called Food Factor Fiction. You can find it on the Cooking Channel, I think, and the Food Channel. They're all reruns now. Oh, and it's over now? Yeah, I know. I think we're probably done.

But it was such a good time. Yeah. It was so much fun and so easy to do on my part. My God. And my daughter, Nell Geislinger, who's a wonderful actress and writer, she kind of became my producer because she was helping me rewrite stuff. Because I would get copy. And it's like, it's a better actor than me to bring this to life. Yeah, yeah.

So we started rewriting all that stuff. Yeah. Because it was very dry. It was very about the facts and everything. And so Nell and I would be doing it over the phone. I'd be in New Mexico, and she'd be back in LA, and we'd be working on the phone, fixing the scripts. Yeah.

And then, so finally, after the two seasons of that, they said, why don't we just hire Nell? So she became a writer-producer on the show. Oh, that's great. Segment producer, yeah. The guy named Tony Sam, they were kind of partnered for a lot of stuff. Yeah.

And also a very funny writer and comic. And so anyway, it was really a fun gig. Yeah. And then we'd shoot the thing. We would shoot. We shot 26 shows of the stuff that just features me in the kitchen in four and a half days. Oh, wow. Because I had to get back east for something.

I forget what. Oh, wow. Because I had to get back east for something. I forget what. Oh, to do, I did a play last year with Edie Falco and Peter Scolari. Yeah. So it was like, I'm out of here. I got to get on a plane. They're starting rehearsals without me, you know. Is that, do you have a preference now? I mean, as time, ongoing, like, do you?

Until there are physical reasons keeping me from doing both, I got to say that I love them in different ways. And I imagine they inform each other in a way. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, I think to some extent, yeah. Yeah. The great thing about theater is you never have to get up before 10 o'clock in the morning.

If you want to have a little lie-in, you just say, let me see. Oh, I got to work nine hours from now. Yeah, yeah. Get some coffee, some chiclets. Yeah, I'll be fine. Yeah, yeah. It's also probably nice to have an excuse to kind of be bi-coast now. Yeah, yeah. Get some coffee, some chiclets. Yeah, be fine. Yeah, yeah. It's also probably nice to have an excuse to kind of be bi-coastal. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

And yeah, the New York means a lot to me. Yeah. It really does. You know, I don't vote there anymore. But when I'm there, I live there. And when I'm there, nothing is a weird, stupid thing. But I'm an out-of-towner as well as being a hometowner when i'm in new york and when i when somebody stops me on the street and asks for directions

when i can give them great directions i feel so grown up yeah great yeah yeah my son just started school there and where's he going parsons oh excellent sure And I just dropped him off a month ago, and I just saw him this weekend. And it is, I mean, I left there in 2001. Right. And there's so much of like, boy, it was different when I was here, you know, walking around. Sure. Especially San Gennaro was last weekend, so we went down there. Oh, my God. Just on some of the side streets.

Did you have the sausage and peppers? I had sausage and peppers. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's such a good thing. It's so good. It's never as good except when you're at the sandwich. Absolutely. It's just the best sausage and peppers.

Well, and the bread is just, and it's kind of like you can't go wrong. No. Like, it's not like you're going to, one sausage and peppers is going to be that much better than the other ones. No. I mean, they'll tell you different, but it was pretty funny, too. There was a parade that just just and i mean it's a narrow shoot of a street oh sure yeah yeah you know with with food stands and you know and just like weird you know yoga pants stands you know like all the all the weird sort of but there's

a parade that comes down the middle of that narrow street that two cars can barely pass on anyway with just police walking head going get out of the way you're gonna get run over yeah yeah and so you have to step back and the most hilarious thing was there was a cavalcade of five convertible cadillacs which i there's i don't even know if i've seen five convertible Cadillacs, which I don't even know if I've seen five convertible Cadillacs in the last 20 years, but one after the other. And the guys that were in them were just what you want of a little Italy parade and guys in a convertible Cadillac. It was so great. Oh, it's the best. Yeah. But no, I find when I've gone back there for a week, two weeks, within, because I go for a couple of days and I still feel like I'm visiting.

But in three or four days, I feel like I'm right back into it. Well, there are stations of the cross. When I go down to, I say, you know what's playing at the film forum today? Yeah. And I go down to the film forum and I go, okay, here I am. I'm home. Yeah. Doing the go down to the film forum and I go, okay, here I am. I'm home. Yeah. I mean.

Doing the same thing you were doing. Yeah, exactly. A lot of those places are gone, you know. I'm so burned up. I, you know, I loved a lot of things about NYU, but the fact that they bumped the bottom line out of that building, which is still enrages me. Yeah, yeah. And they've done nothing with it.

Is it a gap now? I mean, it's some. Yeah. And it's just really pisses me off. Yeah, yeah. But I've done nothing with it. Is it a gap now? Probably. Yeah. And it just really pisses me off. Yeah, yeah. But I love you, NYU. Yeah. Sort of.

Sort of. As your sort of alma mater. Yeah. So, well, you know, I bet you get asked for advice, which is sort of our what I've learned sort of thing. And I mean, it can, I mean, it doesn't, I wonder, well, I wonder with somebody like you that has had such a varied and very rich career, I think, you know, like you've gotten to do a lot of different things. I mean, what, how does that inform your life? Like, how does that inform just sort of like your own personal philosophy and, you know, or vice versa for that matter?

I just keep, the lesson I keep learning is that we are all equal, but we're all 100% different. So everyone comes up a different way. Yeah. all 100% different. So everyone comes up a different way. You couldn't have handed me an instruction booklet that contained all the stuff that I actually did. It's too complex. Like I say about Ron Silver not showing up for this movie or passing on this movie, and now I get to work with Annette O'Toole and we fall in love and we get married. I'm the happiest man in America because of that. You can't see that stuff coming. So make plans, but pack some almonds. I don't know. And never pass up a chance to take a leak. That's the other

one. Even if you got to force it. Yes. I told that to my wife. This is a very important thing. And she says, you know, you never have to say that to a woman. They already know that. They don't need some jerk actor telling them. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Alan Arkin's wife told me this. And she didn't do Alan's voice when she did it.

Yeah, yeah. But it was so Alan. Maybe he was sitting there eating or something. We were shooting this film in Mexico. And she goes, well, I got really angry at him one time because he was moping around the house, just hating the business and not getting. So I said, why don't you do this?

Why don't you sit down at the computer and make a list of everything that you know to be true? So I came back and checked on about an hour later. And I said, what do you got? And he showed me on the screen. And it says, in Alan's voice, there's no such thing as too much garlic. And that was it.

That was it. That was it. That was as far as he got. Excellent Alan Arkin, by the way. Oh, thanks. Yeah. Yeah. Well, everyone wanted to be Alan Arkin.

All my Wiseguy friends wanted to be Alan Arkin. He's so good. He was so brilliant. Yeah. He was in a play called Love. It was him and Jackson and Eli Wallach. Yeah. Okay.

It's a very funny play. Yeah. That I don't think, I keep wanting to revive it. My daughter, when she was acting in regional theater, I said, look, if you can sell them on you, and she had these two friends who were perfect for the other two people. Yeah. I will come and direct it. Yeah. Because it's one of my favorite plays.

And, you know, but she kind of left regional theater around that time. Yeah. So it never happened. But it's a really, really funny play. And I had a recording of it. My father was at Columbia at the time and Columbia was putting out all these, they did Virginia Wolf. They did, you know. Probably multi LP. Yes. Yeah.

They did stuff with Robards and, you know, Dylan with, with, with Alec Guinness. Oh, wow. That I saw on Broadway. I had a recording of that, too. But just listening to Alan play this part, I can't believe this is happening to us. Not to Harry and Edith Boleyn.

But she started growing a mustache. Well, you should have given her love and attention. I should have given her shaving cream. It's a very funny play. Yeah, yeah. But hard to do. Yeah. Mike Nichols directed it.

Oh, that's great. Yeah. Well, is there anything you would like to plug, as they say? Yeah. Well, yeah. My friend, yeah. I can't tell you exactly. There's a thing called breeders.

Keep your eyes open for breeders. We don't have a, it's going to be on Sky in Britain. Okay. And it's going to be here too, but we don't really know exactly where or when or that I can talk about. And it's Martin Freeman and Daisy Haggard are this lovely couple who are just never, never do they have an unexpressed thought. And they're both brilliant actors and very funny people. And I'm Daisy's long gone dad from America.

And so I'm in that for a little stretch, which was really, really fun to do. That's great. Yeah, I've been working there a lot. I did Good Omens there in 2017. Oh, that's right, yeah. Which is so much fun. I just started watching that. It's really fun.

It's lovely. It's a lovely show. Good group of people, too. Yeah, you get to hang out with the best. Yeah. Yeah. Anyway, so keep an eye out for that. Keep an eye out for that.

I did a stretch of Grace and Frankie's, which was really fun to do. Yeah. You know, I've known Lily for a long time. Yeah. And Jane was like a new element. Yeah. Wow, I'm working with Jane Vonda. I'm living large here.

And she's as awesome as you would assume. Yep. And Sam Waterston, who I did King Lear with about six, seven years ago. Oh, wow. And he's an awesome guy. And Marty Sheen and Peter Gallagher. It was really, really fun. Yeah.

And I did a film with Kelly O'Hara. Excuse me. Kelly O'Hara is my other pal in New York. Kelly Oxford. Oh. She directed it. She just directed it. Yeah, I know Kelly.

Yeah. And I had a great time with that. Being married to Marcia Gay Harden, even make-believe. That's great. It was very cool. And what's it called? I should Kelly. Yeah. And I had a great time with that. Being married to Marcia Gay Harden, even make-believe. That's great. It's very cool. And what's it called? I should know. It's called Pink Skies Ahead at this point.

Yeah. And there are probably another, it might have another. Title by the time it gets around. Yeah. Yeah. And Jessica Barden is our leading lady who was born within, I'm not exactly sure where she was born. She's an English woman.

Yeah. And she's hilarious and a great character in her own right. Yeah. Doing a fabulous valley accent and really doing a good L.A. girl. That's great. Yeah, she's terrific. And yeah, I guess that's about it. It seems like I'm working a lot.

Yeah. But I also like to chill a little bit sometimes. Don't we all? Yeah. My wife is up in Vancouver right now shooting her show. She does a show for Netflix called Virgin River. Okay. It's kind of a contemporary romance thing.

She's working with her old pal Tim Matheson. Oh, that's great. Yeah, so she's doing that, her second season of that. Hasn't been on the air yet, but they picked up a second season. Oh, wow. That's always so weird. So I get to go and hang out there and be her fancy man. Oh, that's great.

Unoccupied. It's always nice to be the one that's not working. Yeah, we try and give each other that gift from time to time. It's nice. Keeps us out of Star is Born territory. When we were first married, we used to say, now, who's Norman Maine this week? Yeah.

Who's going to walk into the sea because of career problems this week? Because we would go back and forth. Sure, sure. But it's good to have a wife who has a job. Yeah. And then when she doesn't and you're working, it's very cool. Yeah, that's great. Well, it's been very cool having you here.

Same here. And thank you so much for coming in. It was really a treat to get to talk to you. Oh, thanks. This is the longest we've ever talked. I know. We talked at the wrestling show for about five minutes. That's right.

Yeah, we went to- A couple weeks ago. What's it called? It needs to catch your name. Baba. Baba, yeah. Lucha Baboom. Lucha Baboom.

Lucha Baboom, yeah. Lucha Baboom. Blaine Kepatch has asked me to- Yeah. It's a crazy burlesque combo lucha libre show. Yeah, exactly. And it was like you guys, it was like you're the mystery science theater guys- Yeah.

Commenting on something that had no business. The color commentators. Yeah, yeah. It's really a fun show. Blaine is one of the funniest brains. He's great. That ever lived. So funny, yeah.

Love that man. Really great guy. Well, thank you so much. My pleasure. For coming in. Go Dodger Blue. Go Dodgers. Go Cubs, too.

I'm split. I'm 50-50. Listen, I gave them. In 2008, I was doing a show in, I was doing a play at Steppenwolf. And we got to come to the stadium and everything. And one of the Kate Buttigiegs who was in the play, she got to sing the national anthem. And I got to sing Take Me Out to the Ballgame. It was a really fun night.

But it was sort of like, as I said then to the crowd, I said, I'm a Dodger fan, but I got to say the stars seem to be aligned. I think I jinxed them in 2008. Because it was 100 years after the last time they won one. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And I said, if there's any better place to be in the baseball universe than Wrigley Field right now. I'd have to hear about it from a burning bush. It seems good. No, whenever the Cubs come here, I try to go and I wear – because I'm a – you know, I have to admit, I live here.

So I do want to – although I don't have cable, so I can't see the Dodgers. So I end up watching more Cubs games. And it was funny because the last time I went just a couple months ago to see Cubs-Dodgers, the Dodgers won. And I was really surprised how pissed I was. And it made me think like, all right, I guess I'm more 60-40 than 50-50. Well, I rooted for the Brooklyn Dodgers when I was a little child. Oh, wow.

Before they moved. How convenient. And then, you know. Yeah, and then 15 years after that, I come out, I follow them out. You follow them out. Well, thank you so much for coming. And thank you out there for listening.

We will check in with you again with another episode of The Three Questions. Bye-bye. I've got a big, big love for you. The Three Questions with Andy Richter is a Team Coco and Earwolf production. It's produced by me, Kevin Bartelt, executive produced by Adam Sachs

and Jeff Ross at Team Coco, and Chris Bannon and Colin Anderson at Earwolf. Our supervising producer is Aaron Blair, associate produced by Jen Samples and Galit Zahayek, and engineered by Will Becton. And if you haven't already, make sure to rate and review the three questions with Andy Richter

on Apple Podcasts. This has been a Team Coco production in association with Earwolf.