John Leguizamo: From The Ice Age To The Odyssey

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All right, Dana, you know, I'm always dragging around.

I always got a five-hour energy on me.

I know that.

Yeah, they're either in my sock, in the car, they're somewhere.

You keep them everywhere.

I give them a little slurp.

I don't really shoot the whole thing like some people do on an empty stomach.

I think I eat a little bit, a couple sips, just like coffee.

Just keep something going every day.

Chug it.

I don't.

I'm actually,

I don't want that much energy at once.

It's five hours, so I kind of, you know, that's what most people do.

But I sip it overall.

There's a lot of different flavors.

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because i i i was the flavor that they were looking for sort of like a ghetto hood wrap

yeah you know i i had working against that because you know my acting teachers when i was 17 they were all like oh no one can understand you with that accent do you really speak that way and uh i good god felt like you know i was was like, I was like, that, yo, man, what you want?

What you need from me?

I'll be right there for you, bro.

What's up?

You know, I was, I talked like that.

It was so dope because they thought it was going to be a bomb.

They thought Ice H was going to be a serious bomb.

They had closed down Fox Animation because they thought it was over.

Like, I'm not joking.

They thought it was over.

There was no merchandise, no advertising.

This shit

or not.

It was blew up.

Cut the balls.

Work the shaft.

Cut the ball.

That's

right out of my playbook.

All right, we have a gentleman on here.

Yes.

You're a gentleman, but so is our guest.

Yeah, I'm a gent.

I was in a club in high school called Gents.

Would you like to be referred to as a gent or a class act?

David Spade, he's a gent.

David Spade, he's a class act.

Most like it, David Spade is a buffoon.

But that's common now.

You're called a buffoon.

You know, my last name is Spade.

You know this, right?

So it's not showbiz.

It's very real.

So when I played tennis in high school, I always wanted to be called the Spade of Ace.

That was like in the nickname, like in the Saguaro Saber Cap paper, like Spade of Ace wins again.

But the only thing that caught on was Pinky Dick.

I don't wonder that it was.

How did this turn out?

How were you not named Ace of Middle Name?

Oh, of Ace of Spades.

I don't know how people.

My middle name could have been UV

H of Spade.

But we're not here to talk about that.

We're not here to talk about that.

We're here to talk about John Legazamo.

John Legazamo.

And he's a good dude I've met probably very briefly in the past, but very aware of him.

You know, being in the comedy world and someone's out there doing one-man shows.

He was ruling HBO there for a while.

He has a new show, John Lake Zamo, Does America, and he gets into a lot of very interesting things.

You know, he's just a different world than us.

We're just straight stand-ups, and he's like a one-man performer.

Yeah, he does one-man shows.

And yeah,

he's been a fixture.

I'm just going to use the word fixture

in American entertainment.

Theater, movies, television.

Yeah, he works.

Tu Wong Fu.

Remember that one with Patrick Swayze?

Patrick Swayze and who else is?

Oh, Wesley Snipes, I think.

Anyway, very interesting movie in the day, probably 20 years ago, but he's always sort of pushing the envelope and doing things.

So

great to have a chat with this dude.

And yeah, here he is right now.

John Legazamo.

It happened to me.

When I was doing Smartless, they said, download Chrome an hour later with two guys on the thing.

It finally punted it.

Not going to happen.

Did it later, but yeah.

Chrome.

got on Zoom.

That was good.

That was like

what's wrong with Zoom.

Zoom never hurt anyone.

I never

hate it.

Yeah, they fucking hate it.

Why do people hate Zoom?

Why are they hating on Zoom?

There's no need to be hating on Zoom.

None.

Zoom got us here.

Zoom.

No need to be hating on Zoom.

I mean, Zoom walks me.

Right.

Zoom got us like, we don't have to go meet directors in person anymore.

We don't have to

talk to anybody in person anymore i mean zoom saved our you know our lack of when i when i talk to directors i go can i just not get the job from here

and they're like yeah we'll just say no here if you want to have a fake meeting i go i do want the fake meeting but then afterwards like the free food i'm not gonna lie i like the free food and if i'm a big fan of the director i like meeting them in person so i can just have that brag you know what i mean what's what's that like being in person i mean what happens you go you see him in a room or i i'm just on virtual so no i mean like i just met chris nolan for the odyssey we met it we met at the odeon you know the big uh uh 90s hollywood new york uh

restaurant and we met for two hours we chatted talked about life his biography mine and then i did the odyssey Well, wait a minute.

First of all, he's a genius.

That's a huge, huge, huge movie.

That's not just a regular director to me.

I mean, my God, Dunkirk, Interstellar.

I mean, what is Odyssey about?

I've heard about it, but what is it about?

And what are you doing in it?

Not allowed to say a lot, but I'll try to talk about

it, but I can, you know, obviously the Odyssey, the Homer, yeah, 800 BC piece.

He's doing it, period.

And Matt Damon's in it, and Tom Holland, and Ann Hathaway, Robert Pattinson, an incredible cast.

And it's, period.

It's a beautiful.

I mean, he's a visionary.

I mean, that, I mean, if I would have done it on Zoom, it would have been all right.

I mean, I was still, I still got the part, but

being in person to be, to have that, that sort of vibrations happen between you and it's wild.

I mean, it's a big difference.

Well, it's like being on a date.

It's different just talking, but when you get in the same room, you go, I can get a feel for someone.

I can, you know, there's, you're right.

There's a vibes, there's an energy, there's something going on or not going on.

Right.

If you get it,

as opposed to like having it there in person.

Exactly.

I always have one ready for a director in case it comes up.

Yeah.

But you, you're just meeting, right?

You were just, you don't, do you audition anymore?

I mean, you've done 100 movies from what I understand.

Minimum.

Oh, yeah.

Yeah.

I've done, I, I,

I, I don't audition.

I don't audition, but I do have to meet.

Yeah.

That's fair.

Meet up with people.

I guess, especially like Nolan has an incredible

asshole limit.

So he doesn't, he wants to meet people just to vet the assholes.

He doesn't want to work with people who are, and that's my new fucking barometer.

You know, you get to a certain age.

I just don't want to deal with motherfucking assholes or egomaniacs or sociopaths.

I just don't want to do that anymore.

No, I think you get to a certain point in your career, like Nolan, where he can pick and choose.

And on the way up, you do have to work with assholes.

That's just for all of us.

That's just the way it is.

And then at certain, at some, if things are going good enough, you get to say, I don't want to do that when I've heard they're a drag, or, you know, have a meeting and say, Are you a fucking drag or not?

Because I can't do this.

It's so hard anyway.

Oh my God, it's so true.

Are you going to be a fucking pain in my ass?

The most miserable experience I've ever had.

Are you going to play ball and make me shine, motherfucker?

The biggest one is when you realize the director resents you because the studio forced you on them and they hate you the entire time and are really actively trying to sabotage you.

Have you had that, John?

No, I've never had that.

I'm not at that level, but I've seen it happen.

I've seen it several times when the director wanted a real artist, you know, like Australia and the studio didn't want to go.

They wanted to go with some name.

Star, yeah.

Yeah.

But I wouldn't even say star.

Would they consider a name, maybe a lot of followers, which does lead to good acting?

I don't know how to get good acting from just having a lot of followers, but you know how the bullshit the studio system is.

You know, I had a meeting, John, where they said, you're kind of a name and you have a lot of followers, but you're not talented.

I go, listen, we're not going to get everything.

So let's just do this.

Two out of three is

not.

Meatloaf said it.

You're not funny.

You can't

sing, but those Instagram followers.

Wow.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

That's, that's the majority of that talent pool, not to diss them, but to diss them.

Yeah.

But they say we get a big star and surround them with TikTokers.

Right.

That tricky formula of like, you have this demo, they have this demo, and together it will collapse.

Basically, it makes no sense.

I mean, it makes no sense.

Talent is talent for a reason.

And influencers,

I mean,

it's a necessity of our modern world, but not something I go to.

I have a quick question.

When you were younger, weren't you in regarding Henry?

Oh, you got to bring that up, didn't you?

Is that bad?

Bring it down.

You know,

I was kind of humiliated by it.

I mean, I did it only because I wanted, because I got no jobs.

I mean, there were no jobs for Latin folk.

They just weren't.

I mean, I don't know if you remember the Ross report, because that's how desperate I was.

I would get the Ross report,

which managers and agents got.

Okay.

But so I, because there was no opportunities.

So you would get every Monday and they would list everything that was available in movie and television, every role.

But it was like Jim Crow.

I'm not going to lie.

It was like white doctor, white lawyer, white person, white lover, Latino drug dealer.

And then I would ask my agent, please, can they see me?

I want to do my monologue from David Mammoth, sexual person, Chicago.

Please, they'll fall in love with me.

They won't even see you.

so you know i you have to be mad resourceful you just had to be to try to get in in that room with folks well did freddie what did freddie prince mean to you if anything or paul rodriguez because i came up i always thought it was kind of weird oh there's a latino comic and there's one of them or two you know uh but he was a force of nature were you a for in your formative years when freddie was around oh yeah i mean i mean he he's way older than i am but as a kid to watch him on and chico and the man was like my god the only latino on television at the time i mean we had desiarnaz but he was in the 50s you know

they say every two decades we'll throw one out there yeah that's the thing is that when i saw uh chico and the man i guess as a kid it was just another funny show so i would have thought looking back hey maybe they should give more of the uh latinos a chance because this one's working really well this this show is very funny it fit right in no one said a word.

It was just like, oh, another funny show without even separating it.

It was like, hey, whoever's funny, throw them out there.

Because talent is talented.

People care whether you're black, Latino.

They just want to see great shows, but they just weren't casting us.

So when I got regarding Henry, it was a drug dealer.

I shoot this white guy.

And it was like, oh my God, I'm perpetrating what.

what they want to see, which is negative Latino images.

And I didn't want to participate in that, but I really wanted to meet Mike Nichols because he's one of the greats.

I mean, he's

celebrated Virginia Wolfe, The Graduate, Carnal Knowledge, some of my favorite films.

I did it because of that.

But then, you know, there I am with my half, my sloppy fro, and I'm in the drugstore.

I mean, in the Bolega, and Harrison Ford, and

I'm robbing the place.

Oh, even talking about it just gives me peace.

Right.

And I'm sorry about that.

I just sort of was like, Harrison Ford, Mike Nichols.

I was looking at that angle like to be on a set with them when you're younger must have been in some ways other than what you're describing.

Obviously, it's kind of a sore subject, but just interesting to see them on a real set and how it works.

Oh, yeah, of course.

I mean, just to be anywhere near Mike Nichols and Harrison Ford is always when he sees me, he's so lovely, you know, and I'm like, oh, wow,

he's such a great dude to be around these folks, you know.

But

I love Harry Ford.

I do.

I really enjoy Harry Ford and Mikey Nichols.

Both of them.

You're the guy from the bodega.

Did anyone ever say to you,

John?

Can you laten it up a little more?

Was they ever like, oh, yeah, yeah,

they didn't have to say that to me as much because I

was the flavor that they were looking for, sort of like a ghetto hood rap.

Yeah, you know, I had been working against that because, you know, my acting teachers, when I was 17, they were all like, oh,

no one can understand you with that accent.

Do you really speak that way?

And I

talk like, you know, I was like, I was like, that, yo, man, what you want?

What you you need from me?

I'm going to be right there for you, bro.

What's up?

You know, I used to talk like that.

And I don't, you don't really hear that anymore.

They go, that's what we're looking for.

That's our man right there.

Yeah.

They throw down the sand.

And this is the person that becomes.

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And like, you know, the first pitch to the game winning fireworks.

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It's like, it's like really cool.

You know, I think it's great.

It's good that John Travolta came by.

Yeah.

Why?

He's taking over my space, David.

I don't like that Travolta is coming in and reading my copy.

You know, Will, because like they wanted me to do it, you know, it wasn't my idea.

I mean, David called me last night and I said, okay, I'll be happy to reach something for you over here.

I actually thought that was an old number.

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You play the Spanish squirrel in Ice Age.

What's going on?

By the way,

very funny.

What is a sloth?

It's a sloth.

It's a slash.

Dude, Ice Age is a killer.

I did research.

I did research because I give the guy like a thousand voices.

I was like, you know, I was like, what if he's from South Sea Station and he talked like this?

And he said, no.

What if he's from the deep, deep south?

And he talked like he goes, nah.

I said, what if what if he's hood and talk like that?

He said, nah.

So I did research on the Discovery Channel and I got all this footage on sloths and they store the food in the cheap pouches, you know, and it ferments.

Oh, great.

And I was like, oh my God, this, this is my character.

This is it.

And it's a hit.

Yeah, I say it is such a smash.

That's great.

My celebrity worth.

it's 90 of your celebrity on google i'm fascinated by celebrity net worth not that but what did you get for the first ice age what percentage more did you get for the sequel was well

it was dope it was so dope because they thought it was going to be a bomb they thought ice age was going to be a serious bomb they had closed down fox uh animation because they thought it was over like i'm not joking they thought it was over there was no merchandise no advertising this

or not It blew up.

It was so huge.

And then when they wanted to come back for us for number two, we got, I took them to the cleaners.

Yeah.

The best position to be in.

Did you actually indicate to them that this is my number or I don't do the sequel?

Because your character was essential at that point, I believe.

Oh, yeah.

No, we negotiated hard, man.

I got, I bought a country house.

I bought a massive apartment.

I bought a pool.

Jesus.

I bought a pool.

Do you have any idea of any animated movies that are coming out?

No, I'll

say something in my mouth.

I'll talk like whatever they want.

I mean, you know, anyway, just if you have anything, just DM me.

I'll keep an eye out.

Listen, I'm waiting for Hotel Transylvania five.

Ooh.

Yeah.

When they get

how much does that bring you, bro?

I got a waiting pool.

Boil pool.

But I know.

Aiding for a pool?

No, I think by five, I should get a pool.

It was, listen, it's very, it's a very fair paycheck.

I mean, it's not fair to the real world, but it's great.

And then it usually goes up increments.

I'm not as crucial as you would be in Ice Age, but it's really fun to be a part of it.

Also in the way that when I see kids, it's a good relatable thing because they see them.

But dude, I get the, I get the, for me, it's a weird experience when I meet the kids because parents come up to me and they go, oh, hey,

I'm a huge fan of mine.

Can I introduce you to my son?

I go, yo, it's not going to go really well because

that.

And that voice is, and they really relate.

And then the parents come up and I go to the kids and I go, hi, how's it going?

And the kids are like horrified.

Oh, I know.

I don't

song and dance explaining to the child so they're not traumatized for them.

Yeah, they don't get it and they don't love it.

It starts to

better on the phone.

They don't love it.

It's fascinating.

And I can understand it.

I mean, I'm not, I wouldn't force myself, you know, on these poor kids.

I'm like, please don't do this to them.

Does I Sage have a ride?

Are you a ride?

Are you a ride yet?

I know.

I know Kanto, Bruno, there's a ride

because that's Disney.

You know what I mean?

Disney.

Yeah, Bruno and Canto is Disney.

Sorry, that's another animated.

Oh, and Canto and Canto.

Yeah, you don't talk about Bruno.

The biggest hit song that Disney has ever had.

Yeah, Dana.

Oh, yeah.

Oh, Brabra.

Thank you, John, for explaining it.

No.

No.

Let me see.

I have more questions for this.

Most talkative.

I love that in school.

Yeah.

Chatterbox.

High school.

That's chatterboxes too.

I think I was because I was in a bad sort of area where

I think I read you felt like you might get beat up when you were growing up.

And I was in the same area, if that's true, I was in an area that was, and I was a little pip squeak, which you would never believe, but,

and I wasn't as tough as I am now with these quads and how I work out all the time.

So I would just go to school and go, I'm going to get beat up today or pushed into a wall.

And so I would try to joke my way out of it.

And I, and also my dad had taken off.

And I think when I look back, I'm trying to joke around and make friends because sort of to get some happy stuff going, just to talk and talk and have fun.

Oh my God, that's kind of like me.

It was like my house was really difficult.

My house situation was, there was a lot of aggression and violence.

My dad basically would edit out the humor.

out of the home movies.

It was like there was a fun free zone in my house.

So I was always trying to bring humor and light and life to every situation.

Plus my neighbor was really tough.

So I was always fighting all the time.

But let me correct, not fighting.

I was getting beat up.

Thank you.

A few times, but not a lot.

But I did have a good right punch and I could knock people out.

But I got beat up a lot.

Yeah, it was school.

I got people took my lunch money.

They would pick on my brother, so I'd have to try to defend my brother too.

So yeah, there was a lot of fighting going on at home and in the streets, which which prepared me for Hollywood.

Hollywood ain't got shit.

They can't take me down.

I'm in.

Yeah, I'm invincible now.

You try to keep it light at school, try to keep things fun because you want to be like valuable as funny so you don't get beat up all the time.

So you're like, we like this guy.

He's kind of a clown.

Yeah.

That was my angle.

Like, just leave me alone.

I'll joke around with everyone.

I'll stay out of your way.

But I didn't back down though.

That was my problem.

I didn't have that thing that I could back down if people cornered me.

I wanted, yeah, I don't know.

I needed to, I guess I had a lot of aggression and anger.

So I needed to get it out.

I do have that thing.

So I do back down easily.

Dana?

We all have similar childhoods.

It was not fun at home.

There was a monster in the neighborhood.

In the neighborhood, there was a monster, a scary monster.

And then, and the monster was my dad.

How is he a monster?

You know, if you,

he would, if you did something he didn't like, there were five kids, you know, he'd gather everyone around, you'd have to go get his belt, and then he would snap it, you know, snap that belt, and then you'd have to grab your ankles, and then he would ask your siblings how many lashes.

And then he'd just wail on you.

Yeah.

But I learned to be like a mouse.

I learned to be, you know, not seen or heard because of the threat of violence.

So anyway, I kind of concur with you.

I'm only fascinated that you had a right hand that could knock people out.

I just needed to know how old were you?

Were you like fifth grade knocking people out?

No, no, I was 13,

14.

Yeah, no, no, no, no.

I mean, the fights that I had before were like stupid little kid fights.

You know, you just wail on each other, you know, like that kind of fight.

Right, sure.

But then by the time I got 13, you know, I hung out with some tough kids who would protect me because I make them laugh.

So I hang out with them and I'd do their homework too because I was a ghetto nerd.

so they would protect me but then i got you know i got

i think i think i had so much rage and fear when kids some kids would corner me and try to beat me up i would talk a lot and i'll go hey dude i'm sorry and i'd look down and i'd be like i'm so sorry i didn't and then i'd suck a punch him and knock him out with one punch

I like that.

That's, you know, I was kind of a puss, so I didn't get that.

And I just had the rage build up, and it just stayed.

So that's why my neck hurts.

Other than that,

wait, I want to hear a little bit about Legazamo Does America because I also want to ask about some other movies too.

But can you tell us a little bit about that right now?

Yeah, you know, our first season was at MSNBC, number one original show for the last three years.

So we got a season two out of it.

And basically, I go around the country looking for Latin excellence, Latin brilliance, Latin genius, Latin ingenuity.

And I celebrate it, you know, and I go to six different cities every year.

And, you know, last season I went to LA, New York, Miami, Chicago, the big Latin places.

Right.

And then this time I went to Raleigh.

People down there.

And

New Orleans, NOLA, San Antonio, obviously a big Latin population there.

And Phoenix and Denver and Philadelphia.

Shit.

Yeah, I'm from Arizona.

So when you go to somewhere like that, do you have like a crew you kind of scout out or do you kind of walk out in the world and just start talking to people or how does it work?

Oh, no, no.

It's very heavily planned.

Okay.

You know, I have a great team, my director, Ben De Jesus, my showrunner, Carlos Salvedra, and, you know, and then producers for each segment.

And, you know, we find the best people and then we walk and we do all these, you know, like an anti-bourdain, but of Latino culture.

I know, okay.

What have you doing this show?

Has there been surprises to you or

experiences of learning or is it you're just showcasing people from a little bit of a lot of people?

A lot of learning is happening for me.

Yeah, I mean, when we Philadelphia, I learned that, you know,

it's a big center of American,

the colonies and the nation.

And I learned that 10,000 unknown Latino patriots fought in the American Revolution.

And then I went home when I got that news and I started reading it and researching.

And

I found out that there were 80,000 troops.

And then I realized we were one in eight.

We were one in eight.

And then Juan de Miraez funded George Washington.

They had a bromance and he gave him two million dollars from Cuba, Mexico, and Spain.

General Bernardo Galvez got an army of 3,000 Puerto Ricans, Cubans, Mexicans, Native Americans, and freed slaves.

And they kicked the British all out of the South so they couldn't ambush the New England Patriots, the revolutionaries, not the football team.

Not the team?

Okay.

That's interesting.

Yeah.

Well,

very interesting.

is the alamo a sore point for people from latin america because it's kind of like john wayne did the movie and remember the alamo but from the other side of the fence is it yeah i mean being a latin person and the alamo yeah is kind of uh because

you know all these latin people it was first of all it was mexico and latin for like ever and then we let all these white people come in thinking that, you know, maybe we could, the people in Texas could become a country on their own and they would ban.

And so they worked with the Texans, the whatever the white people that started coming in there, and they freed themselves from Mexico.

But then the Texans

turned on them and took their, you know, their land, their political power, and then started massacring and lynching all the Latin people there.

So the John Wayne movie wasn't a fan favorite of yours, or

you know, I didn't know, but I was rooting against myself.

He likes it.

Yeah.

Well, until you know something, it's hard to do.

John Wayne.

I bet you, Dana, I bet you do the killer as well.

Yeah, Dana, where's your killer as what?

Duke, come on.

All right.

Here's my John Wayne.

Yeah.

John Wayne and Walter Brennan.

The thing I do like about John Wayne is not that he had no fear.

He was furious at the idea that anyone else would have any fear.

So, you know, well, let's attack them, Pappy.

No, Duke, there's 10,000 of them and 40 of us, Duke.

We're going to die.

I said, attack, Pappy.

You'll attack when I tell you.

Don't make me do what I did last time.

What'd he do?

What are you doing?

That's how he ends it.

He never says.

No, everyone goes, oh, fuck.

I don't want to have a bad thing.

Let me do one more.

And then I want to ask you about your very first stand-up bit because this is one of my earliest stand-up bits.

I would say, Lucy Oball in 1952.

Oh, Ricky.

Lucy O'Ball today.

Well, oh, wait, no, sorry.

Sorry.

It goes like this.

It goes, John Wayne, 1952.

Well, let's go over the ridge.

John Wayne today.

Well,

let's go over the ridge.

Lucy Oball 52.

Let's go.

Come on, Ricky.

Lucio Ball today.

Well, let's go, Ricky.

I didn't do it very well, but it killed.

It sounds like there's something there and we're still going to work.

It always killed.

So, your first stand-up bit that really worked for you.

You have five seconds.

Oh, fuck.

You have 25 seconds.

You know, I was part of First Amendment comedy troupe where Bruce Willis used to come in New York City and Robin Williams, come down, rest in peace.

And I was part of the seat company.

And the great thing about it is there was a lot of cute women.

And

that was

comedy was wonderful back then for me and uh yeah

when was was it mambo mount that wasn't your first one was it that was my first one-man show 1990.

okay because i remember hearing about that was that hbo yeah then it went to hbo but i was doing it in in the performance art spaces downtown and then i did it at the american place theater where sam shepherd Arthur Miller, Al Pacino, George Plinth.

I don't know if you all remember who he was.

Alexis

Jonathan Jr., rest in peace, all came down and were in my tiny, tiny theater, bro.

I had 70 fold-up seats because they would lift my little tiny platform out of the way for the real show.

I wasn't even a real show.

I was like a sideline.

So they all came down and watched you do that.

How cool.

And so HBO hears about this.

You get some buzz.

And that's how they come in.

And they, yeah, yeah, like they hear about a stand.

They hear about something and they want to see what's going on, so they throw it on HBO, and that must have blown you up a little bit, right?

Huge, what happened then after that was I wasn't in tiny spaces anymore, now I was in big ass theaters traveling around the country, and especially because Latin people now found me because they were getting the bootleg HBO, they couldn't afford the regular HBO.

Yeah,

I know, I know, because everybody told me I got the bootleg, uh, and I was like, oh, great, I didn't get it from that.

Um, but yeah, then I then all of a sudden we met each other, and it was beautiful, man.

It was like religion.

I mean, I think my audiences have always kind of kept me going against all odds, you know, because you know, we land people at 20% of the U.S.

population, but less than 3% of the leads in Hollywood, less than 0% of the executives are stories being told.

It's just, it's so crazy, you know.

But that's

27% of the population.

Oh, really?

You'd be a a good executive, actually.

Dana?

Yes.

Would you be Lucille Ball as an executive or John?

Well, John Laguziamo.

Well, he does the one-man shows.

Just him all the time, Pappy.

Is he good, Duke?

He gets Emmy nominations and all kinds of stuff.

Well, I don't know, Pappy.

Don't make me do what I did last time.

Sorry.

That's

what did you do last time?

Yeah.

You're the only one who likes my John Wayne.

That's what I'll tell you.

I like it too.

I like the Lucio ball part better.

Well, I don't know.

I'm available for parties or whatever, you know.

Lucy, don't do that to me.

You got a lot of shit.

Let me ask you a question about

Desi Arnaz Jr., this is supposedly

a thing I heard from a crew guy.

that, you know, he liked the ladies and Lucy and the marriage and the whole thing.

And she's wandering around in this backstage in the studio, Ricky, Ricky.

She comes along, sees him up in the slats, up in the whatever, and a woman is performing oral sex on him.

He sees Lucy and goes, Get out of here, mom.

What are you doing?

What are you doing?

He's pretending he's being attacked by the woman.

Get away from me.

What are you doing?

What are you doing?

That's what I heard from a guy who's on the crew.

Could that be true?

Have you heard the one about Stallone that he left the speaker on in the trailer?

Oh, he was mic's?

And he was like, and he was like, Yeah, yeah.

And he was going, cut the balls, work the shaft, cut the balls.

That's

right out of my playbook.

You know what I'm talking about?

Yeah.

It's a good technique.

I mean, it's functional.

People don't know outside of Hollywood, you have a mic on, a lavalier mic, and you don't turn it off sometimes.

And a lot of bad stuff can happen with that but that they always say they can't they can't hear you when you walk away from the set i go that's the biggest lie i would just listen to people that would be so fun they always go once you get to this i go i'm having a meeting i don't want to take all this off can you just turn it off they go sure

yeah that happened with with uh betty davis the director i can't remember what his name is right now worked really hard to get her into uh i think was it jezebel one of those big southern ones

then she left her mic on and she was telling the producers to fire him that she couldn't stand the director.

Oh my God.

That's what happens.

Alec Baldwin and Kim Basner were

either fighting or getting it on or something in a car, like between takes.

I mean,

Carrie Grant, his was on, he was doing North by Northwest, you know, and he was with the producers.

And he said, I don't believe it.

Hitchcock is a hack.

He couldn't direct a way out of a paper bag.

Get that dumpy freak out of here.

No more Hitchcock for me.

I knew that set set you into a bit.

That was just too much.

Nobody does,

you know, Karen Grant anymore.

Nobody wants to do it.

Nobody wants to even think about it.

There.

I've got John Wayne and Karen.

Okay, here's my last one.

Only from John.

Here's my last one, and it's the worst one.

This is Madonna

on the last day of her 180 city tour.

Holiday.

That's it.

Because she's all her voice is so.

Dana, you still have one.

No, it's the same joke.

Very much Lucille Ball.

But you can have it.

You're my friend.

If we took a holiday goodnight, fuck it.

That's the last show.

No, because I heard a video of her in Japan, and when she was singing holiday, she was bottomed out a little bit.

But listen, let's not over talk about how good that impression is.

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My wife's in-laws came to visit and they're in their 80s and they're Irish.

And they didn't, we wanted to put them up somewhere.

And so we got an Airbnb

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They could walk around the little town and we didn't have to put them up here and have someone say, do you know, could I, where would I get a towel if I needed a towel?

You know, that kind of thing.

Where do you keep your shale?

Could I get a washcloth, please?

But anyway, where do you keep your potatoes?

They were really,

this goes goes to Ireland, you know.

No, but they're, they're incredibly sweet and they had a great time.

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I want to know,

look at all my notes on John.

I want to know.

When you did Romeo and Juliet, was Theo coming off of like Titanic?

Was Leo huge at that point?

No, this was was before Titanic.

Oh, shit, was it?

Yeah, yeah, before Titanic, but he was living large.

I mean, I don't want to speak out of turn or, you know,

but we were living large.

We were living crazy.

I mean, we were in Mexico City and, you know, he had a crew.

It was a lot of male actors and we were just

acting like old Hollywood.

Yeah, I'm sure.

You can leave it at that.

Nobody does that anymore.

You can't do it.

You shouldn't, shouldn't be doing that.

Good.

I like that you added that.

You should not be doing that.

Yeah, we're not quite sure what you're talking about, but anyway, uh, was Leo did Leo have a vibe then?

Did you think, hey, that kid's gonna be a superstar?

He was just another

so good in the movie, man.

And he was amazing, like, as

another actor, you know, there are actors that are really mad, selfish, and they just take care of themselves and they walk off, they don't even try to hang or even do off-cameras.

A lot of actors will walk off.

He would give the same or better performance off-camera for us, and

I was, it was so generous and so beautiful.

And he was incredible.

The kid was incredible.

And

he like gathered all the actors.

He's only 19 and he brought us all together.

I was almost 30.

And the other actors were like in their late 20s, Dash Myhawk.

I can't remember all the other actors because I'm old.

Who else is there?

Claire Danes?

Was Julia?

She was 16.

She was mad young.

She didn't hang with us.

Did you see the movie Titanic with Leo?

I didn't see it.

I don't see commercial movies.

Yeah, good job.

I was just curious because there was a problem I have with the movie.

It's brilliant, but ask me.

Well, when the ship is going down, you know, it's Jack and Rose are the characters.

He's Jack.

And they say each other's names over and over again throughout the whole going, running around the ship.

You know, Rose, Rose, Jack.

Jack, you know, I mean, every Jack, go this way.

Rose, come over here.

It's never, hey, you, or let's go.

They say Rose or Jack like 200 times.

Just, I watch a lot of movies.

I like that observation.

I watch too many movies.

You wanted them to just go, hey?

Well, just don't.

It'd be like me saying, John,

David, hey, John, David, David, John.

It was about much.

It's kind of like bad writing.

Like,

you want to, you want to get your character names in early and then let's go.

But I want to ask you, because

what movies blow your mind?

I mean,

is what are your favorites and what are your favorite directors i i just curious oh i'm a cinephile uh

well so i like a lot of old amazing movies like carl dreyer's joan of arc

it's an amazing movie silent film uh where he took the actual transcripts of the lawyers and from the 1400s

and turned it into a movie.

And then his first movie, because it was made from Nitroglycerin, the film back then, it blew up.

So he had to go back into the editing room and take all his b sides and reconstruct the whole entire movie it's amazing that's the kind of shit i like

literal silent films

films great them for sawa ozu um

quirkies

you know fellini pozzolini all the eenies

all the eenies

all the eenies fagatini

Yeah, yeah.

Okay.

What's the

worst

example of whitewashing out there?

Oh, wow.

I'm sure there's a handful of people.

What do you know about period pieces?

And, you know, I was pitching a lot of Latin period pieces because I had a lot of great stories.

And they kept telling me, no, John, sorry, we're not doing any period stuff.

And then all of a sudden, the crowd comes out.

All of a sudden, a thousand

period pieces with only white folk comes out.

And I was like.

But then, you know, here, that's why Nolan is such a visionary.

I mean, Lupita Nyongo's in it.

I'm in it.

Corey Hawkins is in it.

Zenday is in it.

I mean, you can do period and have people of color.

We've been here for, you know, for hundreds and thousands of years.

It works.

It doesn't have to be just a whites-only show.

Do you know what I mean?

Well, Odyssey seems like it's going to be a monster.

I think a lot of people are looking forward to that.

Oh, yeah.

If it's Chris Nolan, I'm going.

Primes.

Got to see that.

Got see his movies if it's nolan i'm going if it's nolan i'm going if it's stayed i'll stay away no no that's not a saying

that's something that happens but it's not a common saying uh well let me see we've got dane anything else for this lovely young man Did you do anything with Arnold Swarsenego?

Yeah, yeah, I loved Arnold.

I did this terrible movie called Collateral.

It wasn't terrible.

Collateral?

you know i think i either did collateral damage i did the one with arnold not the one with tom cruise oh yeah that was collateral i think collateral damage yeah yeah collateral damage i was it was between me and jamie fox with the tom cruise one but uh i i messed up my first callback ah

so i arnold i ended up with arnold the constellation prize i did the other okay how did he how did he pronounce your name

he didn't pronounce my name he didn't call me by my name he he go hey dog

oh he never tried because I just thought his accent with your last name would have.

I love,

I mean, he's so, he's so fun, man.

He's a funny ass dude.

He had me rolling all the time, like, he's a crazy funny guy.

He's the most positive.

He let me use his gym.

I go, Come on, are you kidding me?

Yeah, all the ways are so massive.

I couldn't pick anything up.

I was like, I'll just stand in the corner and look because, yeah, John, no offense, but you're a little bit of a girly man.

You know, your arms are puny like little chicken sticks.

Your buttocks are like marshmallows.

You're lucky I don't have a campfire here.

Me nude.

Boy, you have such a resume.

I was blown away by how much you've done and how varied it is.

And you're still going full bore.

So

it's amazing.

We've not had a guest like you with this many things.

It's like

so much going on here.

You're crazy.

That's what immigrants do.

i work my ass

and

four jobs at the same time yeah that's good

yeah you got two wong fu you've got it was what it was wesley snipes

yeah wesley snipes and and rest in peace patrick swayze patrick swayzey okay that's right

and the original ahead of its time the original oh yeah way ahead of it yeah that was that was bold that was a bold move for by you guys oh my god especially for the two of them because they were action stars yeah for them to play um uh uh uh drag queens what we call them back then that was a huge risk for me nobody really knew who i was so for me it was just i gotta steal this movie from them

that was my only objective

yeah

i think you did look exceptionally good

it's shocking you don't know how good a guy will look in drag and some look horrible and some look great as a girl it's crazy can't really predict it I mean, uh, well, you know, Wesley was still working out.

I stopped working out like six months before the movie and went vegetarian, so I could lose all my muscle.

And it just makes a difference.

You know, I committed like crazy to it.

I wanted to do it, but right, and yeah, I wanted to steal the mood from them.

That's smart.

When I go to a movie, I don't do anything ahead of time.

Then the day on the movie, I go, What's this one?

And then I pick up the script, then I look at it.

Technique, that's uh, yeah, that's something approaching things.

Yeah, uh, Brando would never, he's had lines everywhere he'd have he'd open an orange and read the line and brando wanted to it's inside the orange yeah it's inside the orange damn come on you're gonna have a brando come on i know you're gonna have

brando out there he worked hard enough at that point he just goes just make it easy on me come on

everybody does that i mean uh brando and apocalypse now brando and superman the first original superman is a man that was sad but he got eight million dollars he needed the cash for the island.

Hey, Day, streetcarding desire on the one.

Nobody can touch him.

Nobody can touch him.

Stud, stud.

The way I got Trump initially was I did Brando and I mixed in Regis Phillman.

Do it.

Do it.

Do it.

Do each one of them.

Are you an assassin?

What are you talking about?

And you walk your way toward Regis a little bit.

You do the two together and you got him here.

We're going to do a lot of good things.

We're going to do amazing things.

Are you ready for this?

Okay, blade it up.

That's fire.

That's fire.

It was, I, everything was better when I first did it.

But anyway, Super Mario Brothers is a classic.

Super Mario Brothers 92.3.

That was huge.

Yeah, you know, it was huge because the directors fought for me to be in the movie because they didn't want me.

And they fought really hard.

Annabelle Cankel and Rocky Morna, big props to them.

And obviously, me and Hoskins don't share any DNA.

We're playing.

It works.

Hey, yeah, yeah.

What is your name?

What are you doing in a fork me movie?

I don't know.

Bob Hoskins is great.

Oh, man.

He spoke cockney English, not English.

He didn't speak the King's English, the Queen's.

Right.

He showed

a mall sensation.

Oh, right.

Was that around Roger Rabbit?

And you shot me what to do with me.

You gotta put me in a movie.

You shot your idea of a fucking movie.

I needed subtitles for when I talked to him because I was like, I can't, I can't.

Did Roger Rabbit ever come to the set?

No.

That sucks.

Who played Roger Rabbit?

Charles Fleischer.

Yeah, you're right.

Yeah, comics.

Please, Eddie.

What a mug.

Yeah, that was a hit.

Fucking A.

John, listen.

It's called.

Thanks for talking to us, John.

John, Legazamo Does America,

and along with one million other things, he's MSNBC because I like specifics.

Yeah, Sunday, Sunday, Sunday

West Coast and 9 p.m.

East Coast.

Yeah, look at John and MSNBC.

Yes, it's like because when people say they got a show, I go, Where?

What platform?

Where are you?

Say it.

Make it easy.

I don't mind plugging myself.

Of course, why not?

That's what we're here.

You're the star of the show.

I mean, you're the host.

It's not like it's

thank you, John.

You're a good dude, and uh, it's nice talking to you.

It was a blast, man.

Great to see you.

Thanks for laughing at my goofy old impressions.

No, I love them, bro.

I love them.

I hope we run into each other, man.

I hope so, too.

All right, Dana.

So we just hung up with John.

Yep.

And

it feels, you know, I feel like I had met him in the old SNL days.

I feel like because, you know, he was out there.

That was right around those HBO things.

And I brought up mom by mouth because it was such a,

it was a big deal on HBO, and a lot of people saw that thing.

That was when HBO was, you know, HBO is really big now.

Euphoria, obviously, White Lotus, but HBO was big.

So you get a show on there, and that must have blown him through the roof.

That was, that was, yeah, everything was a lot bigger then because there were less venues to do stuff.

But yeah, that was big.

And this was one of those things where I didn't, I'd never really met him or hung out with him.

So it was, he's a really fun guy, got a big laugh.

And,

you know,

he's uh i don't know he's he's just a character he's part of yeah he's a charming dude i got off on the wrong foot asking about regarding henry but i was he understood mike nichols harrison ford how exciting i mean he's a bad guy in a movie but what a great movie that was a big deal i mean i remember regarding henry because later when i ran into jj abrams who wrote it he had the he had the porn version in his office called regarding heiney which if you get a chance,

it didn't follow the exact story perfectly, but close enough for me.

Well, that does sound like J.J.

Abrams, but maybe he's got a secret side.

I don't know about it.

No, someone gave it to him as a joke.

You know, you're famous when your movie gets turned into a porn.

I think.

I don't think they do it anymore.

Wayne and Garth are in a porn or something.

I don't remember.

They take the title.

You have to have a good title.

You have to have your ass licked park.

You have to have like a good title that kind of lends itself.

And basically, it's a porn with a dinosaur in the background.

You know,

they're not sticklers to the original screen.

Right, right.

So, anyway.

Yeah, you brought up

Hank Ford or Harry.

Harry Frank.

Oh, yeah, Hank Ford.

What did I used to say?

Oh, this is too old of a movie.

Bang the nun slowly.

That was an old joke.

I knew two comedians who just went back and forth.

It was part of their act.

It was kind of a teenager.

And they do porn movies.

They just do porn titles, fake porn titles back and forth.

It's very exciting.

Anyway, back to John.

He's done so many movies.

I heard he was.

Oh, I didn't ask about fucking Carlito's Way.

That's what I want to ask.

The Sean Penn Pacino

movie.

I just didn't want to step in shit again, but

I just remember Carlito's Way and Sean Penn was so hilarious in it.

It was such a cool movie.

Sean Penn is a brilliant character actor.

We got to get Sean on here.

He loves putting a wig on, an accent.

i mean he can

he was such a way singer in carlito's way it was yeah it was hilarious to watch like a coke snorting lawyer or something i don't know

anyway i think people i hope you liked it john uh legazamo and uh check out his show um the guy is a force to be reckoned with he's he's out there and he's always yeah i guess that the takeaway is like here's a guy who just started from where he started, scrambled for everything he got, and he still looks at it that way.

It's still going for it.

Yeah.

You know, after 100 movies.

100 movies

and you're presently in a Chris Nolan movie.

I mean,

that's as good as it gets.

Yeah.

Yeah.

So anyway.

All right.

Thanks for watching, guys.

Thanks for listening, and we'll see you next time.

Peace out.

Peace out.

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Fly on the Wall is presented by Odyssey, an executive produced by Danny Carvey and David Spade, Heather Santoro and Greg Holtzman, Maddie Sprung-Kaiser, and Leah Reese Dennis of Odyssey.

Our senior producer is Greg Holtzman, and the show is produced and edited by Phil Sweet Tech.

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