Record-Breaking Signings, March Madness Mayhem & A Severance Waffle Party with Ben Stiller | Ep 130

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It's my favorite scene in the movie.

How you doing, Tony?

How you doing, little Tony?

Bad.

Why are you?

Well, everything's falling down around me.

There's nothing I can do about it.

I'm sorry, I don't want to do your thing.

No, no, do it.

Please, please.

Yeah, everything's falling down around me. There's nothing I can do about it.
I'm sorry. I don't want to do your thing.
No, no, do it. Please, please.
Yeah, everything's falling down around me. There's nothing I can do about it.
Well, you know, whose fault is it? It's their fault. It's not my fault.
It's their fault. That's right.
It's their fault. You have failed.
Let's do this thing. Welcome back to New Heights.
Ladies and gentlemen, a Wondery Show produced by Wave Sports and Entertainment and brought to you by Nike. When the world says you can't win, Nike says so win.
We're your hosts. I'm Travis.
This is my big brother, Jason. Out of the University of Cincinnati.
Unfortunately, the Natty didn't make it in the fucking bracket, man. But still proud of the gang.
Is the other bracket still a thing? They still do the second-tier bracket? The NIT? Yeah. The second-tier bracket? You're fucking hilarious, Jason.
What am I? I'm just being honest. What else is it? I don't know.
Yeah. No, I think they do.
They're still doing the loser's bracket? Dude, I used to hate that when we were little in, like, baseball, like travel you didn't make it into like the final four or something you went to a loser's bracket just to play on sundays exactly i'm not trying to be in this fucking loser's bracket fucking losers pretty sure that's how everybody feels in the nit subscribe on youtube where one three plus wherever you get your podcast follow the show on all social media at new heights show with one s for fun clips throughout the week jason tell the people what we got coming up oh we got an incredible episode for you guys uh first of all we're gonna look into some of the biggest news around the nfl including free agency which is pretty much the only news happening right now in the nfl we're also going to kick off our first ever New Heights March Madness Bracket Challenge. That's right.
You guys will be playing for the coveted New Heights Golden Cup. That's right.
The winner is going to receive this 14-carat Golden Cup. Look at that.
That thing's pretty. Why is Jason the only one that has one of these? We got a bunch of them.
Do you want one? Can I fucking have one, Jason? Why are you asking me? I don't control these. I want a fucking golden cup.
Who's in charge of the golden cup? Everybody just sends all the trophies to Jason. You get the Stanley Cup, the Larry O'Brien, the fucking New Heights Cup.
Yeah, I don't know who controls the golden cup shipments, but we can get you a golden cup. We also are going to be getting the winner of our March Madness Bracket Challenge Gold Cup.
I think there's going to be two Gold Cups. There's going to be a Gold Cup for the men's NCAA bracket and a Gold Cup for the women's NCAA bracket, but we'll get into that in a second.
We've also got an amazing conversation with the one, the only. Oh, yeah.
The Audi of Ben Stiller is coming on our podcast. podcast that's right the director of the hit show severance is coming on new heights to talk about that among all of his other career accolades that we enjoyed growing up and since then we talk about heavyweights tropic thunder pretty much everything that you'd want to know from ben stiller we're going to get into it hell yeah also happy st Patrick's Day for those of you that weren't here at the top of the show, tuned in a little bit late.
It is Monday, so we are filming this on St. Patrick's Day, although it will be releasing, I guess, while you're watching this, it's Wednesday.
Let's get it started, Trap. Let's get it going, baby.
Time for new news. New news.
New news is brought to you by American Express. Yeah! Well, let's get to the biggest piece of New News, which is that we are, once again, an award-winning podcast.
That's right. We are the iHeartRadio 2025 Best Sports Podcast Award winners.
Thanks a lot, iHeart. Yeah, baby.
And most of all, thank you to all United 2 Percenters for tuning in each week and getting us to uh win this award this award is really just a representation of all you people that tune in each week to listen to us two idiots talk about nonsense so thank you for tuning in we sure love doing this podcast and uh the only reason we're able to do it is because all you guys listen so very much appreciate it. And it's an honor, I heart, to receive this award on behalf of the 92 percenters who make this podcast happen.
As well as our amazing production crew, Wondery, Wave, everyone involved in actually making this thing watchable. Well done, guys.
So yeah, let's move on to some free agency news. What do you think, Trav? Yeah, let's dive into it, big dog.
Alrighty. First week in NFL free agency in the books.
Again, this is being recorded Monday. So if something were to happen perhaps Tuesday or even Wednesday when the show comes out, we will not be talking about it in the show.
And really, it's Wednesday at about 1230. This is Monday.
This is is monday 12 30 eastern so there could be something that happens later today that we don't want to know about but either way to date there have been some interesting things uh we have a fan question about free agency from jenna xkc i think that's jenna at kc okay so i've wondered this do players not go to their new teams and tell their old teams plans? Like, how does that work? Actually, is there a rule or just common knowledge to respect the situation and nothing is discussed? I don't know if there's a rule that you're not allowed to disclose information, but I can tell you that everyone does disclose. And this is absolutely something that happens in the NFL, Yes.
Actually, a lot of the times you will see teams sign practice squad players one to two weeks before they play an opponent for this very reason. They want to get code words.
They want to get information on no huddle plays, coverage signals. All of these things are being tried to figure out.
Keywords that are set at the line. There's always information that they're trying to get out of players that have been in other organizations.
Yeah. I don't know if it gets to the point of like you're sharing all your notes that you took.
It probably does. It probably does get to that.
So I bet guys will bring in binders. I've never seen it to that point.
Yeah. I've never seen any of it, to be honest with you.
This all happens behind closed doors or something like that where like a coach or the player is going to meet with somebody i i've talked to certain guys on other teams like hey like i noticed that you do this blitz like what happens uh you know is there a tell when you guys are doing this game or there nine times out of ten it's not that useful what the defensive player is trying to give me. I will say this.
I was playing, I was playing, I forget who it was. And I think Chase Daniel was on the sideline.
I think it was Chicago. We might've been playing in Chicago.
Nagy was there. Maybe Tyler Bray might've been on the sideline as well.
I'm trying to remember who it was that called it out, but either Alex Smith or Pat Mahomes was up at the line of scrimmage and he signaled a quick route to me, like a hot route to me, essentially, or verbally said something to me to tell me to break off my route differently. And on the sideline, I see both of the quarterbacks screaming what that route was going to be yeah yeah and i'm just and in my head i'm like god you you son of a rock no yeah i think it was pre-season but at the same time like you're you're gonna do whatever you have to do to win in your current situation and if that's you know finding a tick here and there from your previous situation and helping out your teammates in that regard, you're going to fucking do it, man.
And I don't think there's any like Bush leagues. Like, I don't think it's like going behind someone's back or doing it like, I don't know.
Yeah, I'm with you. Like, I don't know.
I don't think it's wrong. If you hand over the entire playbook.

Yeah, that's different.

I think that's a little weird.

Yeah.

But if you're just talking ball and you're trying to give your guys a heads up on like an audible or something like that, I think that's all fair game.

I think stuff that happens.

I think I'm with you, Trev.

Stuff that happens at the line of scrimmage, verbiage, signals, all of that stuff is that does happen in the nfl good question and glad we got into it all right we also got some cowboys twitter fighting love when people fight on twitter just out in the open it's the best isn't it demarcus lauren signs with seattle shits on dallas on his way out the door he's just kind of being honest clearly a little bit unhappy with the way things ended. I believe he was quoted as saying Dallas is my home.
My kids are in Dallas. My family's in Dallas.
But I know for sure I'm not going to win a Super Bowl in Dallas. Yeah.
Strong words. Strong words.
I mean, I think he's just being honest, but Micah Parsons clearly didn't appreciate that. This is what rejection and envy look like.
This is some clown shit. Perfect.
Perfect. That's a good way to respond.
Demarcus Lawrence, calling me a clown won't change the fact that I told the truth. Maybe if you spent less time tweeting and more time winning, I wouldn't have left.
Oh, man. Yeah, that's the old Twitter beef.

Let me get you going.

What is the point of fighting on Twitter?

Just out in the open for everybody to see.

Well, you know, Jason, you're a professional.

Nobody fights on Twitter, right?

It's like when we were in high school

and the kids would pull the fire alarm

just so they could go out in the street and

fight in front of all the students do you remember that in front of the entire city yeah cleveland heights is on cedar and lee two of the biggest streets on the east side of cleveland you guys could just go fight you don't need to do this no i need an audience i need i want everybody to see and whoop his ass and they would do it in the middle of the street not just a street cedar like the biggest like one of the biggest ways into downtown cleveland is just completely blocked i got so bad they had to put the cops at the intersection yeah no well it was stopping traffic people were trying to just you know do their cars from their daily errands cars lined up blocks down trying to do things 4 000 kids out front watching a fight unfold in the middle of cedar road gosh man and then we just go across the street over to wendy's and get a frosty and some well then they then they stopped then they had to close close Wendy's. They wouldn't let kids walk into the Wendy's.
You had to go through the drive-thru. Oh, better times.
Better times. Love Cleveland Heights.
Gotta love the Heights, baby. Gotta love the Heights.
We got a breaking contract news. We got some news in the contract world.
The Bengals have fucking unloaded the Brinks trucks. Love it! And have

signed both Jamar Chase

and T. Higgins to four-year

deals. Jamar getting

161 with 112

guaranteed,

making him the highest paid non-quarterback

in NFL history, and then T. Higgins

getting 115

mil respectfully

in his first two years guaranteed, fully guaranteed. Good for the Bengals.
I did not think they were going to be able to keep both these guys, and they're paying a hefty price tag to do it. For those who are wondering, yes, Joe Burrow making $55 million per year, Jamar Chase making just over 40 mil a year, and T.
Hins uh making close to 30 mil a year that's over 125 million dollars per year in new money on just three offensive players when you say it like that that is fucking it's bonkers it's i'm not gonna say it's shouldn't be done. It's just never been done.

Yeah, but all of these things,

there's going to be a never been done

in a year or two years after this.

The salary cap keeps going up.

I think people don't realize often

how much the contracts continue to go up

for players over time.

When I first got into the league,

league minimum was $375,000. That's still a lot of money.
Now it's over $700,000, this league minimum. The average per year for the highest paid centers when I was getting my first deal done, my third year in the league, was like $6 million a year.
Now the average of all the top centers is over 12. So in 10 years, it's doubled.
Newsflash, this is going to get broken in another year or two just on how the salary cap keeps going. I've never heard of this much of the salary cap being allocated to three offensive players.
The Cowboys did it with CeeDee Lamb, Dak Prescott, and they're going to do it with Micah Parsons. That's three offensive players.
Okay, three offensive players. Sorry.
I'm sorry. Yeah.
Well, the Eagles got to be pretty dang close with A.J. Brown.
Devontae Smith is going to be up for a contract soon, and Jalen Hurts. Get ready to see that one, or they're going to let Devontae Smith go.
I don't think that's happening. Yeah.
Devontae Smith isn't making 50 mil. You don't think Devontae is going to get close to what T.
Higgins is making? The only reason AJ isn't making 55 is because AJ got redone a couple years ago or last year. I hear you.
All right. He's still only making 30.
They're going to be up again here in another year or two, and I bet it gets close to this. We'll find out.
Yeah, we're going to find out. I don't think they stay.
It all happens like this, dude. I'm telling you.
this is only gonna, I bet it gets close to this. We'll find out.
Yeah, we're going to find out. I don't think they stay.

It all happens like this, dude.

I'm telling you.

This is only going to – I bet this very metric gets broken within three years. I bet you it never gets close that 125 mil per year –

To three offensive players.

No, and that percentage of what the cap is right now.

Well, we don't know –

That percentage will never be just three players ever.

Well, and this is another will never be just three players ever well and this is another thing that i would like to stipulate we don't even know what the percentage is for this year these are the numbers of this arbitrary tweet that brandon and jake have decided to put into average per years nobody right here knows what they're actually being accounted for for the cap nobody knows what the cash is nobody knows what the guarantee somebody somebody can figure that out it's all and they will and i think that i hear what you're saying i'm just saying that all i'm saying is there's a huge disservice to the nfl free agency every i it pisses me off so much listening to all of these people just say the average per year is this when all they did is divide the total money by three. Look at this.
Look at this. By extending Jamar Chase to the Bengals, the Bengals will actually lower both players' cap hits this season.
Okay? So this is my whole point. People have no fucking clue what these numbers mean.
And they just launch into these arbitrary things of like how much money. Anyways, just saying.
Don't be misguided, people. You got me.
You got me. It sounds pretty ridiculous, but you got me.
I really do. And Trav, we talked about this.
I think it'd be good to bring on somebody who really understands the salary cap and all, because I want to know it. I want to hear like what all these structures mean.
Cause I was talking to somebody the other day and they said, it's all about cash and like how much eventually that cash comes due and whatever you're paying, but there's ways to manipulate it. And it gets manipulated and signing bonus, in roster bonuses.
Every team does it. Some teams have more cash to divvy out up front.
I don't really know all the ins and outs of it, but I would love to have somebody on to explain to me, you, and the 92 percenters what all these numbers mean. Should we do a NFL salary cap educational episode? Or should we go and find somebody else? Or should we just have a fun conversation with a former player and just stick around like always? Yeah.
You guys let us know if you guys want to learn this stuff. All right, cool.
All righty, last bit of new news. Shout out Kyle Frazier, the kid who puked working out with Aaron Donald, but still finished a workout, according to him.
He tweeted referencing the social clip that we released about Aaron Donald and him working out. He said, definitely a workout I'll never forget, but you forget the part where I got back and finished.
Ooh. Yeah.
That's what I'm fucking talking about, big dog. I fucking love that boy kyle apparently this guy he's got freaking plays college football now that's pretty awesome where's he at i don't know brandon do we have that information georgia southern playing college football down there that's hot tell you what i don't want to be in a georgia southern training camp.
That's ridiculous. I'll be puking a lot.

Well, he had some experience about fighting through the pukage of what kyle um and that does it for new news brought to you by american express yeah baby all righty let's talk about the holy grail of candy reese's peanut butter cups that's right's right. You know them.
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Yes.

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My least favorite part of traveling is probably the flight.

Nice.

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Or, I mean, I would just say transportation in general.

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I think it's time to check out this interview you guys have been waiting for. Let's do it.
Just so you know, this interview was taped before episode nine came out of Severance. So we won't have anything from the most recent episode, but we do have some nice talking points and show references as well as a whole lot of other Ben Stiller anecdotes in this episode.
So you're going to want to watch this. Enjoy.
Our guest today is from New York City. He's a 12-time Teen Choice Award, 13-time MTV Movie Award, MTV Generational Award, and Emmy winner.
You know him from Heavyweight, Zoolander, Tropic Thunder, Dodgeball, Meet the Parents, and now the executive producer and director of Apple TV's hit show, Severance. Please welcome to New Heights, Mr.
Ben Stiller. Let's go.
Thank you. Thank you.
Thanks, man. Welcome to the show, Ben.
I appreciate you jumping on with us. It's great to be with you guys.
It is so hard to figure out these intros when you have as much of a like. Yeah.
I don't know. As much of a inventory of just hit movies.
Well, let's just. Those are some pretty heavy awards credits there.
Yeah. This was totally.
Yeah. I mean, there's some pretty.
Those are the big ones. Not screwing around there.
It's. Yeah.
You guys. You guys are doing good with this podcast.
You're having fun. Oh, for sure.
Yeah. We started this thing up just trying to get our brotherhood out there.
A lot of people see us as complete opposites, but you get us in a room, you'll see we're a lot more similar than what we are. And you're a little bit older.
What's the age difference? Two years. Two years.
Almost exactly. October 5th, November 5th.
All right. I'm November 30th.
Nice, Scorpio right up there. We just talked about we're big astrology guys.
No? No. Yeah, I don't understand the astrology thing because it's like you have your sun sign, but then there's the rising sign and the moon and it can, right? You got like really three signs or something like that.
Right, right. And I don't know.
And how does it really, I mean, let's not get into it. My sister is really into it.
Oh, okay. Yeah.
I guess we can move on from astrology and move over to, we are going to give a, at some point we will talk about severance. Yeah, we got to.
So we might have some, so if you're, when we get to that section, we'll give you a warning because we don't want to ruin anything. The show is absolutely fantastic.
And there's tons of things going on. We don't want to spoil anything for anybody who might be just getting into it or isn't all the way caught up.
But before we get into that, we're going to talk about your first bit of cinematic excellence, which maybe it's not, but it's definitely the one that sticks with us the most. And we quote nonstop, which is heavyweights.
Yeah. Did you know, first of all, before I said the movie, did you know I was going to say heavyweights? I had seen, I think I saw you had like a Perkis power shirt.
Oh yeah. Shout out to Brett V for that one.
And I'd heard some, you know, rumblings that you guys were into it, which was pretty cool. Oh, into it? It was my life.
It was, listen, I was a heavyweight growing up. Jason, he didn't get fat until he went to the offensive line.
We switched places. We switched places growing up.
So Jason's more newly founded into it. So seriously, you were dealing with weight issues.
You were chubby. I think I was just, yeah, I was dealing with my love for honey buns.
I think that's what I was kind of dealing with more. But no, I saw heavyweights and was like, oh man, Camp Hope is like, if there's a camp out there like that, I want to go to it.
Just kids that can be fat together and hide candy in their beds and, you know, kids that never like really lived up to the excellence of their brother and just the expectations that their parents set for themselves. Yeah, yeah.
I mean... Are you kidding, the blob? Was it go-kart? Yeah, yeah.
Like that was everything a kid wanted to do it. It was sort of, yeah, like a dream camp but then you know, this guy comes in who's never really dealt with children before.
Yeah. one of the funniest intros it was really fun to do we had a great time i mean i remember the summer shooting the movie very well uh we shot it down in near ashville north carolina i'm still buddies with the guy who's my trainer when i was doing the the the movie mickey marino shout out to mickey Hendersonville.
Yeah. It was just, but like, yeah, today, first of all, the fact that that was a Disney movie.
Is it? It is. It is kind of crazy.
Yeah. That was.
I'd chuckle at it every time I see Disney across the top. Yeah.
Yeah. It's an edgy Disney movie for sure.
It's not Little Mermaid. And I don't even think they were aware of it at the time.
It was a different time, right? It was pre-social media. I think there was less of a sort of a moment-to-moment awareness of, you know, if you're doing something right or wrong and all that.
So it was, you know, and Judd Apatow was producing it. Judd and I were friends and been working together uh on a show we had done and i had gotten canceled and uh i had gone and directed a movie my first movie and he said hey we're gonna go down steve brills the director really funny guy we're gonna go down to ash ashville and do this fun you know this camp company you could play this like mean guy who you know is mean to these to these kids who were overweight.
And, um, and it seemed fun and funny. In, I'm in.
Yeah. It's right there.
And it was like, and it happens to be Disney, whatever. And I think they went off and they made the movie and Disney looked at it and was like, uh, this isn't quite, you know, this is down the middle for the Disney brand.
And they kind of put it out there or whatever. And then that was it.
You must have seen it on video, right? Oh, 100%. A few years after it came out or something.
Because it's 30 years old. Exactly.
Yeah. But then it's had this life.
I saw it later in the 90s for sure. But yeah, it never would have gotten made today.
Why do you say that? I think just because the characters being so mean to these kids who are dealing with weight issues that I don't think that but don't think that's getting off the drawing board i understand but i feel like the movie also inspired more people that were overweight like it really ends up being something that most of the people that i knew that were overweight or it was like a healthy relationship with that at the end of the day i do agree that tony was not the nicest to the kids no i think tony is dealing with his own weight issues oh for sure very clear and um and his own feelings towards his parents and also that he's a kid who never he never interacted with other kids and you know he wants to be famous and you know i i feel for tony i feel like he's the most sympathetic character in i was like where did he where did tony come like where did you find him is there any inspiration um there was inspiration? There was a little bit of Tony Robbins in there. Oh, okay.
Tony Robbins, the motivational guy. Just in terms of the voice and how he talks.
And his kind of weird sort of like, you know, Tony Robbins had this thing where he could sort of like. Yeah, he could kind of like hypnotize you with his eyes.
Yes, yes. And I don't know,'t know and then we just sort of like played around

and i it's funny like because i look at back at clips i saw a clip like behind the scenes on it

and i was like god we were so young back then too just like kind of just doing it you know what i

mean and just kind of going for it and you don't really think about it that much and the kids were

so much fun and it was you know kind of like every day we're just and my folks were in it playing my

parents and we had we had just had had the best time. Don't let somebody sign your checks.
Oh, yeah. Don't let anybody sign your checks.
Best advice I ever got. So I guess how much of that movie of Tony was being scripted and how much of that is you off the cuff? Just ripping it.
Yeah. I don't remember.
I think like we were, we were improvising all the time.

It's sort of,

I feel like there were

some improv moments there.

I think like that little moment

where Tony goes and talks to himself

when he's weighing the kids.

So he brought this up.

It's my favorite scene in the movie.

He's asking this question.

How you doing Tony?

How you doing little Tony?

Bad?

Yeah.

Who are you?

Why are you?

Well, everything's falling down around me.

There's nothing I can do about.

I'm sorry.

I don't want to do your best.

No, do it.

Please.

Everything's falling down around me.

Thank you. No, do it, please, please.
Everything's falling down around me, there's nothing I can do about it. Well, you know, whose fault is it? It's their fault.
It's not my fault, it's their fault. That's right, it's their fault.
It's their fault. You have failed! You have failed! Yeah, the thing that's kind of funny to me about that scene is, it wasvised.
But you know, if you've ever been in therapy or gone to therapy, that's, you know, a lot of people talk about talking to your inner child, you know, and finding your inner child, connecting with your inner child. And over the years, I have been in a therapy session where the therapist says, like, you should go, like, let's talk to your inner child.
And I literally feel like I'm just doing a scene from heavyweight. So I always feel like it's just this is kind of silly because I've literally done this in a movie where it actually made sense that Tony was able to talk himself into understanding that he is not the problem.
They are the problem. And he helped himself.
So in a way, it's a healthy connection that he's having with himself. 100%.
With himself. Maybe not with the kids, but with himself.
No, and I think the kids also, like let's face it, the kids were cheating. They should have been following the rules.
Right? It's an interesting way to reevaluate this movie. They were the problem.
They were the ones hiding candy and not hustling. If you go to a camp where you want to lose weight, you got to play by the rules, right? It's like if you guys show up at training camp, right? If you're not going to put the work in, nobody's going to be able to force you to do it, right? You got to have the mindset.
Yeah, I definitely go to Chick-fil-A during camp, though. I'm not going to lie.
I don't go to the meal room. I know some guys that are probably hitting some stuff in their beds.
So it is kind of like being at camp when you go to training camp. Oh, 100%.
It is a little bit. 100%.
Well, he still goes away for camp. Right.
Most teams don't go away anymore. I'm living in a dorm room.
Yeah. Cement, white cement brick walls.
You get a single or a double? They actually put the double together. Two singles together to make it.
That's why I mean two singles together. Right.
It's kind of a bit of like a it's an experience like back in time. And I'm not like a super football guy, but I know you guys plays.
You have to like learn all the plays at training camp. And then those can be the plays for the rest of the season.
For the majority of it, yeah. You learn like the base installs so that everybody can get brought up to speed and from there you still create plays based off of the team that you're playing yeah and what they've been doing you try and scheme them up week by week so the uh the playbook definitely expands after the after training camp but for the for the most part you get all the the verbiage and all the you get the understanding of like formations and stuff and then from there all the plays kind of just get is it different every year like the coach will come in with a new yeah i joke about coach reed coming in with like a index like stack like this big just like a rubber band around and you just see plays drawn up on them and he's just like i got some good stuff but there is there is a lot of carryover the staples are still, say, the same.
And the way the football coaches do, they have to teach it to all the new guys as well. So especially when you've been there for a long time, you start from square one in the offseason and during training camp.
So at two different times of the year, you'll learn what we call this gap, what we call this technique, what we call this play in every minor deep. So he's had inside zone installed to him.
I could go up there. Over 35 times.
You know what I mean? What is inside zone? Inside zone is when you give it to the running back at a more steep angle down hill. He reads the front side B gap to the back side A gap.
Reads the really, they're trying to run it towards a three technique to where we can get a double team up to the Mike Backer. Hopefully you're.

Yeah, no, no, no.

I knew that.

I was just saying for this kind of inside zone.

Yeah. For me, for me, I'm typically on the backside of the inside zone.

And you double back.

You definitely double back every time to the.

There we go.

That's right.

That's right.

Always.

There's always a double back.

Better be.

There we go.

It's incredibly complicated, isn't it?

It.

I think it's.

Or is it?

It's complicated.

More still football players.

It's not.

It's not.

It's not.

It's not.

It's not.

It's not.

It's not that complicated but no no but honestly i did i did once when uh we were doing zoolander two aaron rogers came to italy and that's a complicated man yeah yeah that's a guy that knows a lot but i asked him like okay you, how do you do that on the line when you're having to make those split second decisions? And he said like, it's really not, it's not as like complicated as they make it sound on TV. And I was like, yeah, but you're Aaron Rodgers.
So it's probably, it's a little bit, but it sounds like the same thing you're saying, which is kind of like you guys just have it for so many years instinctually, you know it. Yeah.
There's a lot of carryover. You learn it over and over again, so it becomes second nature, especially the verbiage aspect of it.
But it's the speed. Aaron is another level of the intellectual ability for the game.
Right. So obviously, it's very much easier for him than a lot of other guys.
But I do think that at the end of the day, there's carryover, the plays. You've run them a long time now, whether you start in college or high school or even before that.
So you tend to retain all that knowledge. So it sounds complex to somebody who doesn't understand it.
But I mean, a lot of it's just common sense. If you're running a play where there's too many guys who run a play, it's like, yeah, we shouldn't run the ball over here.
Let's go run the ball over here. It's like numbers and leverage ultimately come down to like what makes it football.
And surprise of it, right? Yeah. I mean, that's a huge aspect of it.
Catching the defense off guard, not being predictable. Can I ask you one other question about football? Are you kidding me? Keep going with this.
I love this. No, this is as a fan.
It's the pain aspect. Okay.
As we watch numbed out, watching watching our tv sets being entertained all across america and the world you guys are just like smashing into each other and you just take it for granted as an audience member but when you really look at it enjoy it but like what is i mean like what is the reality of that in a game because you know you see it when you see the play where a guy gets twisted around and you see, God forbid, an awful braids on it. And you're like, oh my God, this is horrific.
But first of all, what does that feel like? And second of all, could a normal human being, and guy like me- Yeah. I don't even mind imposing it.
There's only one way to find out, Ben. I don't know't know if you could, Ben, but Tony Perkis could definitely get out on the team.
I would Tony Perkis do. He has the insecurities necessary to achieve his football genius.
Yeah. But seriously, what is the level of what's happening there? Well, especially when you get the ball, it's like you're like, you ever seen the bird scooters that go like 15, 17 miles an hour, and you're just kind of flying around town? It's like riding one of those and then jumping off.
And it's just like you take little collisions like that

throughout the day and it's just fun. It's fun.
And I feel like when you have pads on and you

have the excitement of like the team and everything, you don't really think of like

the camaraderie of the team and doing something for a bigger purpose other than yourself. Like

you find like fun in competing with guys doing this. And um I don't know I think when I when I when I was playing quarterback growing up I didn't really have that much love for it but once I moved to tight end obviously my skill set was more suited for that but I had more fun catching the ball and like kind of enjoying those moments where I could be physical I could I could kind of like hit a guy because you don't get to just walk down the street and blindside a guy, right? You get to have fun assaulting somebody, you know, it's like, yeah, it's encouraged.
So it's like, you don't really think of it as like pain, although you do feel the discomfort after a game and after like a season, you feel the wear and tear for sure. But there's, so the adrenaline is, that's what I'm saying.
In the middle of the game, the adrenaline is so intense. You'll feel a little bit of pain, but it's not something that's going to be like that.
But you're like on the line. You're just every play.
Oh, yeah, for sure. Yeah.
Yeah. I don't have any joy.
You see this guy's neck? What's wrong with it? It's pretty thick. It's barely there.
Oh, yeah. That is just.
Oh, you're showing off right now? Well, I also think about the concentration that it takes to catch the ball, knowing there's a guy coming, you know, 30 miles an hour. I think that's more intimidating than anything Olaiman do.
I like to make them think that I don't know he's coming. Okay.
Interesting. I reverse it on him.
Yeah. But I'm also known for, like, not even running my route, always like to keep them second guessing.
Keep the surprise. Right.
Yeah. Keep the surprise.
Did you ever want to play football? You know, I grew up in New York on the Upper West Side of Manhattan, not in a sports oriented environment. I used to love to play basketball.
Nice. You've had some pretty iconic basketball scenes.
Yeah. Yeah.
I love basketball, but I didn't have the height or the you know i'm jewish i can't sound we're just not allowed yeah i mean so i wasn't like in that kind of environment small upper west side private school didn't even have a football team had a basketball team i didn't make the basketball team i think 14 kids tried out and they 12 kids made it and i didn't make it um but i it's okay i um i've been cutting before too jason's never been cut he doesn't understand this i've never been cut but then i you know owen wilson's buddy of mine and he played sports growing up and he always said i could have been like a little scat back type of guy do you think you get a yard in the nfl i could not no but i i i literally wonder what would happen like if I could survive a play.

Well, I think we could get you a yard.

The O-line could get you a yard. I think so.

You got enough athleticism.

You guys couldn't get Judge Drake a yard?

After that yard, I don't know what's happening here.

If I'm behind you.

All right, man.

Do tush push with me?

There you go.

We'll get that.

We'll get that.

I was about to say.

That's a for sure yard.

It's got to secure the snap.

You could probably like tush push me, just pick me up and throw me into the end zone. Tush throw.
Push tush throw over the top. Just turn Ben into the football.
I guess, yeah. We might have just invented a new version of the tush push.
Still a tush push. Okay.
So we talked about heavyweights. You said it couldn't be made today.
Well, it could. Yeah, I don't think it would be made by disney today you know what i mean but i think it could be made independently sure if somebody wanted to go out and do it bob ivers not not backing that i don't know man we should go and see um yeah what about tropic thunder tropic thunder yeah i've been asked this question before you know i i think it would have a tougher time getting made today for sure.
I love you so much. Yeah, just because, first of all, like, you know, big comedies with big budgets like that aren't really being made as much, if at all.
And Tropic Thunder did, you know, have some pretty edgy elements to it. At the time, it was edgy.
Edgy is a great word. But did anybody complain? I don't ever remember anybody complaining about it.
Oh, yeah. Really? You didn't.
Never mind. I'm going to go back over here.
No, no, no, no. You didn't think that? No, no, no.
You didn't think that a bubble. But in a different way, it was, again, this is, what is it, 15 years ago or something? Yeah.
It was 2008 or something? It was like a different sort of reaction to things that wasn't as in the moment and as much of a kind of a waterfall of, you know, reaction immediately. Yeah.
No, I mean, my character that I played, Tug, was, you know, playing this character of Simple Jack. That was, you know.
Yeah, that won't be tough. That got some blowback from people.
You know, I showed the movie to the NAACP in LA, uh, before we, we released the movie to, just because of Robert's character. Of course.
And to me, the, the joke in the movie always was that these actors are trying to do anything they can to win an award and be taken seriously. So that, to me, that was why it was always clear to me.
That's the joke of the movie. Correct.
And I think people who get the movie get that. But you definitely want to get a sense of how people are reacting to it.

So we did.

But that's what comedy is. You got to take chances.

You got to put it out there.

And yeah, we got a little bit of blowback.

But as long as you're clear where the joke is and that you're clear about your intention,

then I think you can hear criticism and it can be valid. But you know where you're coming from and you can stand by it, which I do.
I still stand by the movie. And I would hope that we could make another Tropic Thunder.
Oh my gosh, that is so good. I tried to show it to my kids.
My oldest is five. Jesus.
I wasn't trying to show it to her. I was just putting it on.
the girls walked into the room uh what was the review it was not good it was during the talk he just lost his hands oh my god it was early on intestines are all over the place uh kylie i forget kylie's exactly do you remember what kylie said other than turn this off right now? You'll be getting the therapy bill from your kids in about 15 years. No doubt.
Do you have a favorite comedy movie you've made? Oh, that I've made? I mean, Tropic Thunder for me was like one of the most fun experiences just because we were all together. It was such an amazing cast just to be with those guys.
And it was an idea that I had had from back in like 1987. Yeah.
And then we finally made the movie in 2007. So literally had, had, had been sort of gestating that long.
So to actually be making it was sort of surreal that we were finally doing it. So for me, that experience was one of my favorites.
Um, and yeah, but like, you know, doing meet the parents with Robert De Niro is all, will always be, uh, thing that happened you know to just and kind of surreal because i just love him so much yeah um and yeah and then getting to yeah i mean i don't know it's it's every time you're in it it's always different i don't know if you guys are like this when you're you know when you're doing your thing but like you're in it and it's sometimes it's hard to appreciate it when you're in it because you have to be be focusing on what you're doing. Yeah.
Yeah. I'm right there with you.
Cause they always say like football or even any athletes say like, go out there and have fun. Is that, is that a real thing? I feel like I play my best when I'm out there just enjoying the moments with the guys and it's 100%.
I don't like to kind of look at things as it's complete or like I'm more in the moment trying to think about the next play, trying to think about the next like way we're going to attack them, how I'm going to handle this situation. And think about that than I am like, man, this is sweet.
I do think, though, that's why they tell you to have fun. Because it's so easy to lose track of the fact that we're all playing a game and this should be fun.
You get bogged down in where you're at and trying to remember the play or the moment, let's sit down in distance, all these things. You lose track of the fact that like, if you guys are genuinely enjoying being out there and having fun, there's an enthusiasm and an energy that permeates and makes everybody usually perform better.
And I think that's one thing that I watched Trav. I've always been like, for some reason, it always looks like he brings that out on the field.
And there's certain guys that have a tendency, you just watch a game and people gravitate towards them. It makes them feel like they're kids again.
And as a player, for me, I oftentimes wasn't that. I always appreciated playing with those guys because it made me feel like I was playing in the backyard with my buddies again.

Right, yeah.

And even though we're in front of this huge stadium or whatever.

Right.

And you see the joy that you have when, like, I mean, obviously end zone celebrations or just when first down or something like that. But I think, you know, that that enjoyment of connecting with your teammates and doing doing the work in the moment and like it working when you like you know complete a play that that works i have that same appreciation when i'm working on a movie that that the enjoyment of the process and actually for me that's my favorite part of all of this is is the is being in process with something or sitting in the editing room and cutting together a sequence, putting some music on it and feeling it come together.
That to me is the best. And that is important, I think, to have that appreciation of the process because with a movie or something like that, it comes out and then people either like it or they don't like it.
And you have no control over that. It's just going out into the world.
But the process is what you experienced and what you, you know, what you own. And so you have to enjoy that because the rest of it is sort of then you're at the whim of like, you know, what people thought.
And that's, by the way, that's like trial and error for me over the years. Oh, 100 percent.
I've learned that throughout the course of my career. I came in wanting to have all the stats, wanting to have all the acknowledgement of he's a great player.
And I mean, I've been fortunate to like get a lot of those stats and have successful years and win Super Bowls. But at the same time, when I'm like kind of like in it, like I find more love building that piece than I am just kind of looking back like, oh man, that's awesome.
Like it was more just like the feeling of doing it with them in the moment that just like really that's where it's most enjoyable for me. I actually remember when we were doing Tropic Thunder talking to Robert Downey about it because at that point, I think he had just done Iron Man, but he it hadn't come out yet, you know, and he had this interesting trajectory to his career where, you know, he had a lot of acclaim and he went through a lot of challenges and then you know and then iron man came out and kind of like revitalized his career yeah um but as an actor he's always been like one of the best actors ever uh and i remember talking when we were doing the movie about this sense of sort of like we've worked you and you you and i we've all worked really hard over the years because this is you know we'd already been doing it for whatever like 25 years probably or whatever and so the enjoyment of knowing that you put in a lot of work and then having a freedom to then go and put something out there and try things and do your thing with a sense of man that That had to be such a relief to just be able to cut it loose like that yeah an appreciation of that say like yeah i have put this work and it's not like an ego thing it's more like hey okay we're here and we've done this a lot and it's what you were saying about putting those work in on those plays your whole life then you kind of can go out there and let go in a way and appreciate the fun of that, too.
Right. While you still are locked in and trying to do something new and hit the next level.
And I think that's an important thing in the process to appreciate. You fucking hit it, dude, because that movie is classic.
How did you get Tom Cruise to jump in on this? I mean, the star started. Yeah.
Like, this is a crazy one. I mean, Tom and I knew each other a little bit because we had done, you know, I'm a fan my whole life.
Yeah. You know, just watching his movies forever.
And I'd met him a few times over the years. And we did a little short for MTV Movie Awards.
This is like 25 years ago, I think, because I was on my honeymoon. We came back from our honeymoon in Australia to do this thing with Tom where I was a stuntman.
I pretended I was a stuntman. Oh, yeah.
I remember this. It was so good.
It was Mission Impossible 2. And we had so much fun doing that.
And then a few years- Finish your own sentences. Yeah.
Yeah. Finish your sentences.
Right. Yeah.
It was so fun and weird doing that. And then, you know, we stayed in touch.
And this was, again, a few years by and um actually i i we'd been talking about trying to figure out something to do but you know hadn't figured it out and then i was working on the tropic thunder script and i had actually done a home movie for my wife for her birthday that was a takeoff on the show 24 and it was called 17 or 17 minutes long and it started my brother-in-law brian taylor who happens to be here today who's not an actor brian is the worst actor ever which can also be really good at times yeah um they have an alarm company in allentown pennsylvania he's not a professional actor so the fun of the joke was let's put him in a movie with like real actors. And he was obsessed with Tom's speech from A Few Good Men.
Oh, yeah. You know, or the Jack Nicholson speech from A Few Good Men that he gives to Tom Cruise where he says, you know, you can't handle the truth, right? I said, Tom, we're doing this home movie for Christine.
Would you maybe come and do like a scene in it where my brother-in-law is going to recite the Jack Nicholson speech to you. Oh my.
And he said, yes. And there's video evidence.
Yes, there is video evidence. And he came down and he was so professional and like it blew my mind.
He was so good. And Brian did the speech to him.
And then we had so much fun doing that, that the Tropic Thunder came up. I called him.
I said, look, let's maybe are you interested in this movie? And he looked at me, said, you know, you make fun of the actors. You make fun of, you know, everybody in the agents and all that.
But you don't make fun of the studio heads. You should have a studio head.
So it was his idea. Oh, my gosh.
That character. What? That character did not exist before he suggested it.
I i feel like it is such a good and then it became such an important part of the story and this was three months before we started shooting the movie and we rewrote justin thoreau and i were working on it etan cohen and and justin and i rewrote these scenes and and put them in and then tom said also i feel like i want to dance in the movie i just want to dance so this was purely like i have a body suit yeah and then and and then we did a makeup test and go crazy yeah and we put him in the makeup and we and he started dancing in the makeup test we gave him some diet cokes to crush and then we put uh and then i think i put get back by ludicrous Oh, yeah. And I was like, this could be really fun.
So good. So good.

And yeah, he came in and just, yeah.

So, it was pretty crazy how that happened. That's awesome.
That is crazy. How did Brian do in his speech? Brian, well, he was perfectly bad as he should have been.
That'll work, Brian. Goddamn, that was good stuff.
I got to ask you more about your basketball love or your basketball level your sports love so you were at the oscars not too long ago getting hype about the next win yeah let's go not sure if it was even an important game it was just like are you you watch every game like that i do watch every game i do yeah i'm i'm you know the last few years like i my whole life i've been a knicks fan last few years have been pretty exciting so many years in the wilderness especially like the last like 10 years before this yeah yeah i i watch i try to watch every game and i now have realized i have to actually put the games into my schedule even if i'm not going to them just to watch them just to catch them not like plan a dinner because i start to resent that i'm at dinner yeah so i knew that the game was happening during the oscars and then i but i was focused on doing the thing at the oscars and then like once it was done i i was leaving um and after i'd done my thing i was going back to my hotel and i realized oh my god the knicks game is on so then i like checked it because i hadn't checked it the whole day or even been aware of it as much to be honest i wasn't i knew but i knew it was happening and then i saw the knicks had won i was like oh this is great i just finished my baby oscars and the knicks won i'm happy knicks win yeah yeah and then i guess somebody picked up the fact that i have been like throw your backstage right now but i mean i genuinely do you know i i went to the lakers game where brunson got injured. And, you know, I genuinely love going to the games.
I feel like. I've always told myself I want to go to a game in Madison Square Garden.
It was actually a big reason why we went to or I went to Cincinnati was because the Big East Championship is in the garden. I've always imagined the garden as like obviously the Mecca, but it is like the top of like the basketball culture.
You came to a game, right? It, right? No, I haven't been to a game yet. Oh, okay.
And I've been telling myself I'm going to go when the Knicks are good and it's rocking. And it's just been like.
You have to come to a game. I have to, I know.
Why don't you come to a game? I'm going to, I'll tell you what, the Cavs meet the Knicks in the playoffs. Yeah.
Because that thing, I want it to be like the Knicks. I don't know if it's like that every single game, but know when it's an important game that thing is like it honestly like you can see it on tv when it honestly when any game if it's a good game it goes crazy yeah like it's just so intense yeah um but you know the playoffs there's like nothing like like when they beat philadelphia in the playoffs last season oh yeah um and dante di vincenzo hit that shot i don don't know if you remember that play, but like it was just – it was – I never felt anything like it.
Yeah. Heck yeah.
Yeah. Me and Jason talk about it all the time.
There's no better ticket in sports than courtside at an NBA game. There's nothing better, right? It's so close to it.
You're so – yeah, you're right. That was the first time I ever – I went back.
Travis had courtside tickets at the Cavs for the second half of the season every year. When Brown was there.
Yeah, when the Browns. So he lets me borrow a couple of tickets.
I go there. And that was my first time realizing, oh, my God, these guys are like so much better athletes than football players.
They're moving so fast. They have springs on their feet.
Yeah. It was just in the size.
Yeah. I think it's harder when you're brought back from it to really realize how big and athletic those guys are.
You don't. Yeah.
For sure. For sure.
But when you're on the court, it's like, oh, that guy is high. Yeah.
Yeah. Yeah.
For sure. I mean, even just seeing LeBron in person, you know, like I was watching the other night.
I mean, it's just, he's just so big. Yeah.
And he's so strong. And he gets the ball and all of a sudden it's just like the tension

level goes up and the defender gets up on whoever it is because it's like lebron's got the ball and

he's like he can impose his will still that's and he's 40 years old doing it yeah so he did a spin

move and a dunk and i was like i've never seen that before yeah it's like no yeah it's very

impressive would you rather win an academy award or next win win the NBA championship? I don't know. I mean, I think the Knicks, you know, realistically, I think the Knicks winning a championship is in the cards.
All right, all right. So, I'm definitely down for that.
Yeah. But if I was forced, like, definitely, and I've heard, John Stewart was asked this question, and question and he said Knicks too.
So I'm not going to not say Knicks. All right.
But I also feel like I really think like at the end of the day, if I knew that I had the choice, I would give it to the Knicks because I knew at least I had the choice. Yeah.
In this weird, this weird, weird, hypothetical real situation. But it means a lot to a lot of people too.
No, no like you're it's like i don't care yeah the knicks winning a champion like it's so it's still a little bit like it seems a little bit like oh my god i can't imagine that but yeah we're just starting to feel like it but then always something happens where yeah no yeah i mean i mean cleveland was there for forever too so i get it cleveland is having an incredible, I'm fired up. Yeah, incredible year.
We're just talking about it. Jason's kind of like here right now with basketball, and I'm just like, dude, just watch the Cats.
You keep telling me. I got to get back.
And Donovan Mitchell is a New York guy too. Yeah.
He's just incredible. Stuck.
Yeah. So, and they've got a great thing going on.
See, we kind of got on the basketball kick. I got to talk about one of my favorite scenes that you directed in Cable Guy with Jim Carrey, him coming into the gym.
The basketball. Yeah, the basketball scene with him coming into the gym.
I don't know if you understand. You had everybody trying to jump off of their friend's back to dunk the basketball.
And I just remember it never worked. It's not like in the movie, he was like a trampoline.
Like I was like, oh my gosh, if I could do that. Like I was, I thought that was a little bit heavier.
I was always like twice the size of all my friends. And I was like, dude, just get on all fours.
I'm gonna jump off your back. It really makes no sense, that move.
Yeah, but it was so funny.. I remember we had, well, we were like, you know, like Jim, we wanted to come up with like some insane set piece where Jim would just be, you know, just the biggest kind of asshole guy who comes in to play a pickup basketball game.
Yeah. And Jack Black, I guess, is like he's like he runs up on Jack Black.
But I remember we put like an Apple box or something next to Jack. It was very tech there was no like like if we did it today there would be like cg and it would be like yeah it probably it was just a very like kind of like uh simplistic way of doing where he's like on an apple box right behind him when he jumps up um but then yeah and then he shatters the backboard but we had such a good time making that movie and Matthew Broderick is so funny in it.
And yeah. Yeah.
And Jim is just insane. Have you ever had him on the podcast? He's so funny.
I mean, he's like one of those guys who'll just do something to make you laugh and then he'll just keep doing it until you stop laughing. You know, it was fun to just be working with him at that moment where he was just sort of like willing to like take any chance and just do whatever he thought could be funny.
And we were just having a great time together. Hell yeah.
We kind of touched on it before in terms of writing for for yourself or for guys that kind of just have like those instincts of like improv. How much of it is hard as a director to control that, to and keep it keep the script the script you know how much like how much do you juggle with that as a director i did a movie once uh mystery men and dude are you kidding oh i just did it yeah just one time.
But one of the actors was not as into improv. And a lot of the other actors were.
And we were kind of figuring it out as we went along. And that ended up sometimes being a thing.
Okay. Yeah.
Where that actor would want to just like, hey, can we just. Can we just do what we planned? And by the way, a great actor.
Just it wasn't his process as much. Yeah.
You'd be surprised. You do it on the football field too.
Really? Yeah. Oh yeah.
Like you sound like B. Go Dick Tom improv.
Does the coach get mad or not? Oh yeah. Sometimes.
You get that look, he gives you the eyebrow look. But daddy gets happy sometimes.
Never do that again. When it works.
He's happy when it works. Right? Little handle on the side.
Oh yeah, just don't ever do that again Travis. Got it.
He's got a good commercial career going, too. Yes, he does.
He's a Hollywood guy right there. You know what I mean? He gets it.
He gets the entertainment aspect of it. Sure.
Yeah. Speaking of severance, it is time that we put this disclaimer out.
All right. We're at the point of the show where we're going to talk about severance, folks.
We're going to do it in a segment called We Gotta Ask. You don't have to answer.
Which I think there's going to be a lot of these you probably aren't going to answer. Basically, we're going to ask you a bunch of questions to tell us what you think of it.
You can tell us to fuck off, whatever you want. And since you've been a great guest, we're going to get to this section while having our very own waffle party.
Oh, yeah! What was the inspiration behind the waffle party? This is Dan erickson who wrote the pilot and is the creator of the show and we've been working on it together over the years he has a brilliant mind and waffle party being some i don't know where that came from his mind as the you know the celebration when you have the reward when you get to a certain point it's not a pizza party it's a waffle party waffle party. He's a little raspberry.
But for a long time in season one, you know, we didn't know what the waffle party actually was. Eventually we defined it in the like, I guess, like the second to last episode.
But it was fun to think about, like, what is a waffle party? What's the metaphor? What is the, you know, what does that mean? What does mean what does it mean well i mean i think it's more than just waffles yeah is what i i feel okay like what would be the best reward you could have if you're working in this place every day and you don't get to leave and you know you're a human being and so somewhat party aspect i don't know yeah yeah i mean i love it i'm about to start having waffle parties start having waffle parties all the time now with no underlining. Great.
Wow. It was just so funny because it felt like childlike.
Yes. And these are grown adults who are subjected to, in some ways, slave labor as innies.
Well, they're kind of like kids because they've only had consciousness for a short amount of time. Right.
And they don't really have any freedom. And they're told, yeah, a waffle party is like the best thing.
This is it. These are good, though.
I'm just going to butter it up just a little bit. Are waffles on your training camp menu? I'll tell you what, there was a waffle house next to Lehigh Valley where we had training camp back when it was remote.
That was our Chick-fil-A. That's where we would go.
Now, a lot of the shots in several, we're talking about symmetry. That's, I mean, the opening episode, everything is just so like, I just feel like it was so thought out in the colors that you chose.
The building blows my mind. Is that a real, how much was it of it was like a studio set and how much of it was like an actual building that you guys found because the inside of that building was so big the shots yeah seem so massive and it seems so epic yeah that building is a real building it's and it is huge it even is bigger in real life when you go there and then it feels i think when you see it on the show because it's it'silings are so freaking it's in new jersey it's in holmdale new jersey and uh it's um it was uh it's now like kind of like an office complex in a mall but it used to be the head of bell uh with the headquarters of bell labs okay and they they developed the transistor chip there i think in the 60s so it's pretty that's why the water tower there has that interesting shape where it kind of looks like a transistor.
Yeah. And when we found it, Jessica Lee Gagne, who's our cinematographer, we were Googling stuff and she found this place.
And we looked at it from above and it looked like this giant sort of like almost like an egg shape with this. But the building was there and then the parking lot was like an egg shape oval around it and we're like this is so crazy this view and this shape and then we went there and it was just gigantic and kind of empty so and nobody had filmed anything there that was the that's so when you're making movies and you find a location you get so excited when you find a really cool location that nobody's ever filmed at because you don't want to have something that's been in another movie yeah yeah and so when we found that that was the first thing we found and then we designed the sets and all the interiors and everything are on sound stages that we shot up in the bronx but um but that was like the design sort of uh the first sort of um inspiration for the rest of the show yeah and yeah it was it was a guy named eros saan, who's an architect in the 50s who made that building.
Did you always imagine the characters having that fun kind of comedy banter? Because it's a very serious show, or at least it feels very like- No, you're right though. When I read the script that Dan wrote, it was a pilot he wrote, a spec pilot on his own that he brought to our company.
When I read that banter, it reminded me of shows I love, like The Office or Parks and Rec, this back and forth thing that they had. And what was so fascinating to me was, oh, these guys are like doing this kind of funny office humor.
But yet they don't know who they are, why they're there, what they're doing. It's so good.
Yeah, they don't know any. It's like, so that's like this weird sort of Twilight Zone aspect to it.
And it's very surreal and kind of abstract in a way of like, well, what is going on here? So that humor and that office workplace thing is actually, for me, always been sort of the core of what the show is. And then it's definitely developed into what it is.
That's awesome. Are you surprised by the fan base the show has built up sorry i do not want to take away from the waffles yeah no that raspberry butter strawberry butter i haven't had a waffle and i think since we shot the waffle i was about to say you had to jump in there we shot the waffle party we had these waffles and i was like i gotta have a Yeah.
And I was like three years ago. For old time's sake.
Yeah. It's crazy because we were off the air for three years.
Oh, I remember. Yeah.
And- It was incredibly infuriating as a fan of the show. Well, I appreciate that you were a fan from the first season because a lot of people didn't discover it until now.
I told so many people, have you guys seen this show on Apple TV? It was like all I could think about. Thanks.
And you did a great job of leaving on that cliffhanger with Mark at the birthing cabin. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
He's at Devin and Rick and he's like, she's alive. Yeah, that's right.
And the, I'm like, when is this next episode gonna come out? When is the next season? I know. I know.
When we got hit with the strike, there was a writers and actors strike. And it took us a little bit of a while to kind of like regroup after that.
And the show, I think we shot for 186 days on season two. Yes.
So there's a lot of shooting and editing and editing takes a while. But thank goodness that the audience was there when we came back on.
I mean, it almost built the suspense up even more. Yeah.
Everybody's kept talking about it. Yeah.
And the challenge was just to get people who hadn't seen the show to watch the first season. So Apple did a really good job I think of getting the word out and we did as much press as we could.
But also three years later, Apple TV Plus is actually a different, it's a different situation there now because they have more viewers too. Because when we started out, we were one of the first shows.
That's a good point the first shows that's pretty cool talking about uh kind of doing some promo for it was the uh the art museum setup wasn't it even at an art museum it was like a pop-up like office setup oh yeah was that like the weirdest promo you've ever done for a show yeah that was really crazy we set up the office cubicle in a glass cube in grand Central Station. That's where it was.
Grand Central Station. And it was an idea that they had.
And Adam Scott said, well, if the actors, the real actors can go in there and do it. And the fact that they were willing to go in there.
And I said, they have to do it for like at least three hours. Because like, it just has to be enough time that people can be walking by and just go, what's that? Yeah.
Oh, my God. People going home from work.
Like, wait a minute. Like, people who knew the show, people show people who didn't know the show and of course people started filming with their phones and stuff and it became it did become a viral thing and that i think ended up probably getting more attention than if we had just done a premiere or something yeah yeah exactly and because it was so organic and it was so much fun to watch them just in this cube because the actors just started improvising and i stuff.
I was going to say, was there a script? Were they even like told to talk about

or even could they even be heard? They couldn't be heard. So they knew that.
So they had that

freedom and they knew that they were going to be in character. So they're actually doing,

you know, Dylan and Mark. Yes.
And Patricia came in as Miss Cobell and she started throwing stuff

at Adam and made him stand in the corner. And there's just like so many funny moments.
But I knew as actors, I knew they were just going to sort of fall into it because it's like what you do. So like, it's like for them, it's like, okay, this is like a performance art piece.
And they had so much fun with it. And I was just like watching, taking pictures.
And yeah, it was awesome. What's it like directing something as complicated in some ways meticulous as Severance? I mean, it just becomes, you know, I've been directing for like a lot for most of my life, I guess.
And I love it so much. It's such a collaborative, uh, experience.
You're working with cinematographers, you know, the production designer, costume designer, actors, editor, all these people, it's a, it's a group just, I love the process, what we were talking about earlier. So for something like this, when you have everybody who's sort of like focused on this vision that Dan laid out in his script, everybody's working sort of like towards the same goal.
And you want to get people to just be as creative as possible and work with people who you want to bring as much of their own um personal sort of inspiration to it sure so i think that's like a big part of it and then it's become it's basically been my full-time job for the last five years and i've loved it it's just um you go to work every day you know and you have your you know whatever scene you're going to approach i, is harder, honestly, you know, when you have to get in front of a camera and like show up in the morning and do an emotional scene where you're going to break down crying in your car or whatever it is. That's, you know, that's challenging.
As a director, you can come set up the camera, try to help the actor as much as possible, create an environment, but they have to do that thing. And so for me, using that part of my brain as a director, I really enjoy because in a way, I feel like, you know, every day I kind of know what I'm going to be doing.
Acting stresses me out a little more because, you know, it's like, oh shit, I have that scene today where I have to pull that up. And I really admire, it's made me admire actors so much more as a director, just working with them, you know, because I just see when you're doing both, because a lot of over the years I did it, I acted and directed in a lot of movies.
I mean, when you're really just directing, I think you can just focus on what you're doing, be there for the other actors more, and be connected to the crew and sort of adjust things. And I love the process of it.
And by the way, I just have to say, have other great directors jessica lee gunnier our cinematographer directed the our episode seven that just came out cool shots in this like i'm just blown away by some we have amazing people working on the show and come back with harmony clubbell yeah oh my gosh that was i don't know if anybody saw that portion of it coming because there wasn't a lot of hints to that. Oh, to her going back to her? Yeah.
I don't know what, but yeah. What is, I don't know.
I feel like there's more questions now than there were before. Exactly.
But that's kind of the fun of, and I can only imagine how fun that is trying to keep that question in the air, like the underlying meaning of everything and the theories. Have you heard of any like fan theories that you're like, oh, that's a good one.
think of that yeah there are there's so many on this show people and people put out there's so much fan art and fan edits and and and theorizing and podcasts about it that i don't i try not to get into a lot of yeah yeah i try not to because we have to focus on what we want it to be but of course you hear ideas that are like really interesting yeah and You you go, oh yeah, that could actually be something. But you don't want it to really influence like what we're doing.
But yet you are aware of the audience. You want the audience to enjoy the show.
But everybody seems to have a different way into the show too and different things that they love the Mark-Helley relationship. They love the Mark-Gemma relationship.
They love Ms. Cabell or Milchick.
So what's interesting is you make the show. We made the season.
We basically locked the season and finished in, I'd say, like September, October. And I was doing some mixing and visual effects stuff through the fall.
But it's done. So, you know, as you're watching people react in real time, it's not like, you know, like, oh, you're watching a sports team where you go, you know, they really should have this guy play that position.
Or that position or yeah you can't make any changes it's all it's all set in stone yeah so i'm watching people react and they go oh this episode was the best episode or i really didn't like that episode or i wonder what's going to happen you know or they should do this or that i'm like well it's just it is what it's gonna be yeah next week is gonna come out you're gonna find out i mean that has been something like especially you you go knee deep in the theories each week's fun to watch. Oh, well, that didn't end up panning out.
Now we're on to the next theory, right? Exactly. Yeah.
And so we know what it is and like what we've done for the season. And I'm just watching in real time because it's not a binge show too.
It's coming out week to week. So that's very different too, as opposed to, you know, if you're watching something where you can watch every single episode, people can then go like, oh, me i'm gonna watch the next episode and i get the answer i wanted but here you get people for like a whole week going like oh you know that's is gonna go this way is it gonna go that way or that frustrated me so it plays out differently than i think once the show's out uh in a couple weeks then people will be able to binge the whole thing and that'll be a different experience it, too.
Yeah. I have two people, three people who I show the show to when we're in process, which is my wife, my son and my daughter.
Nice. So they have all the answers.
Well, they see it as like I'll show them a rough cut. Oh, Brian, too.
Brian, I'm sure. Right.
Yeah. And so I'll get feedback from them.
But you can't show everybody the whole series. So you can only pick a few people who go, okay, do you want to watch cuts as we go along? Yeah.
Oh, that's going to be exciting. Yeah.
Talking about some characters, Adam Scott. Yes.
Absolutely kills it. He's amazing.
Was he always kind of the first choice? I don't want to bring that. He was always the first choice for you? He was always the first choice for me from the second I read the pilot script that Dan dan gave me and um and i think dan had been thinking about him too and i reached out to him immediately and then um apple had some other ideas about about uh about casting it and i was very firm like i really felt adam was the guy and adam luckily stuck with it and stuck through with me and ended up doing it.
And I'm so happy because I did it.

And again, for that same reason of like the office workplace comedy vibe that he brings. But I also know he has this deeper thing underneath.
Oh, yeah. And to watch him really embrace that over the course of making the show.
And even just the way he approached playing Audi Mark and Any Mark, his voice, his physicality, it's all so different, you know, and he really works so hard to do that. And he's also like this crazy, like robot actor guy who can do anything like he.
And I mean that in a good way, because I guess you say robot actor, but like he is so specific and so precision in terms of being able to make an adjustment. yeah you know like he can make an adjustment that's sort of just like a you know a thing where you like you know if you could just like lean a little to the right because the camera sees this behind you and still do the moment or you know just he's amazing where yeah that's awesome all of the actors are fantastic yeah and john tuturo and uh never worked with him before and he's just an intense great guy The outdoor episode um oh yeah the cat skills yeah yeah yeah that moment with heli and speaking of like even heli and helena yeah the facial expression change no brit this year oh my gosh yeah this year brit having to play helena and heli and again the same thing adam has doing, but these actors are thinking about the characters so deeply,

uh,

that they,

they always come in with so many great ideas.

And I really listened to them,

uh,

even in,

just on story level,

uh,

you know,

just tone,

everything they,

they,

they understand it so well.

So,

you know,

we'll be talking about an idea for a scene and Adam will say like,

you know,

I don't know if that really feels like severance to me,

you know,

and it's hard to define it sometimes,

as thing they they understand it so well so you know we'll be talking about an idea for a scene and adam will say like you know i don't know if that really feels like severance to me you know and it's hard to define it sometimes but it's that kind of thing also when you're trying to push the boundary a little bit and take some chances like we've done in season two you know you're trying to define like okay does this still feel like the show and i think when you trust your actors and you know that they have a sense of who they are in the show yeah you know i really rely on that a lot yeah yeah well let's ask the biggest question maybe would you get severed would i get severed you have potentially more information for where this goes i personally oh yeah yeah yeah the idea of it does not seem like a great idea it's a lot of control you're giving out yeah i feel like you know yeah so for me it's no because like i want to remember i want to experience my life the life that i have left with right because like we're here for not so long like i want to feel it all yeah um i feel like there's so many metaphors for severance in life though right in terms of how we suppress or cut off you know yeah yeah yeah exactly and i feel like you sorts of ways. And I, you know, and I probably do that in my life in a lot of different ways.
I had a great text from a really good buddy of mine who played in the NFL, also served the United States army. He said, you won't accomplish anything worth having in life unless it was hard getting it.
And it's basically, it's kind of like, you know, I feel like severance, a lot of the themes are like, and it seems where it's going is being severed from all of these painful, traumatic things, but you lose sight of the fact that these painful, traumatic things are part of living life and they're necessary to have. And it's, it's undoubtedly no answer for that reason.
But yeah, I think that's very much about what the show is, you know it's this life is you know pain is such a big part of our experience and of course there's that duality thing of like well you can't have you know pain and and and enjoying life you know these things are separate right yeah uh pleasure and pain but like you can't have pleasure without pain what is is pleasure without pain? Yeah. What is it, Jason? I don't know.
Please tell me. I believed you when you said that.
Is Cobell officially a character we're rooting for now or is this still a part of the evil? I mean, that's the fun. Again, I think that's the fun of the show is that you have people like Milchick and Cobell.
For sure. And Helenaena and you know all these people that you don't quite know right yeah and i like that she's always kind of had her own severed version of even though she's not severed that she you know that she's miss selvig and playing his you know she's kind of imagining a life as a normal person too when she's living next door to yeah mark um so yeah the duality thing is a big part of the characters.

And I think that's fun for the audience to sit in.

Okay.

Can I ask you one more?

Is Irv, is there more to the Irv and Bert relationship that hasn't been, I'm assuming yes.

Okay.

I'm sorry.

I don't want to push you.

I don't want to push you.

I really don't.

When is this thing going to be on?

It'll be on the day the last, or the week the last episode comes out. Oh yeah, okay.
We will have answers by Wednesday. Yeah, yes, all shall be revealed.
Okay, fair enough. Nice.
That is good, that is good. Yeah.
Because it feels, I mean the- Well, I feel like where we are now- The elevator painting with the Gemma episode all of a sudden reveals more like, oh, there's another floor to this that, all right, all right, I'll stop, I'll stop. I'll stop, I'll stop, I'll stop.
Listen, I'm telling you, I'm all over the city. I can't tell you, the spoiler thing, but I...
Yeah, I just had an idea, but I'll tell you that later. Okay, perfect.
I will tune in regardless. Okay.
Are we gonna have to wait for for three years for season three to come out? No, no. The plan is not.
Definitely not. Let's go! Yeah, yeah.
No, the plan is not. And hopefully, we'll be announcing what the plan is very soon.
Awesome. That will not be that.
All right. Well, I'll be at Grand Central Station for it.
Let's go sit in a cube together and see what happens. Don't you threaten me with a good time.
I'm just going to have it courtside at the Knicks game. By the way, I went to a Knicks game with Taylor.
She was there. This was like 10 years ago.
And I was there with my son. And she literally, we FaceTimed my daughter, who's a huge Swiftie.
Oh, nice. She's 23 now.
And we had the best time. She was incredible.
Oh, yeah. I appreciate that.
I think it's perfect yeah you're right maybe we can get uh taylor to another next game yeah well this is the time you should definitely come though if you want to i mean i can hook that up say no more say no more you're the man i'm sure you would need help getting i mean i mean it's always a little smoother when you get all right well let's do it come on i'm in dude dude Thank you thanks man i am this is a dream come true man you've been one of the idols of everyone from the 90s growing up and and all the amazing movies you did but now it's just so cool to you know see that you're every bit of a great dude as you are a great actor and director thanks man well it's fun for us you know I was like talking like I was talking like the Sandler like we were working on Oh yeah. Happy Gilmore and you know it's a kick because like you guys like when you were kids watching this stuff and that it resonated and we enjoy watching you guys do your thing.
Yeah. Super cool.
I can't wait to see what Hal's got in store for us and Happy Gilmore 3 or Happy Gilmore 2 again. It's insane.
I can can't wait dude well thanks again brother man thanks ben yeah great talking to you great talking to you and thanks for the waffles nice great waffle party my first one look forward to that next time we'll have a cantaloupe with your face on it okay long live dogs yeah that's what they say over at the farmer's's dog because they want all dogs to live a long, healthy life. Why should highly processed food be the standard for dogs? Dogs kept at a healthy weight can live up to two and a half years longer than overweight dogs.
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slash audio. Yeah, thanks for stopping by, Ben Stiller.
How about that? Man, what a guy, man.

Thank you. See dkng.co slash audio.
Yeah, thanks for stopping by Ben Stiller. How about that? Man, what a guy, man.
There's just some people that it's just, it's fun as hell to talk to. And the whole time you're talking to him, like, I can't believe I'm talking to fucking.
Yeah. Ben Stiller.
It's amazing. Dude, I love how he brought up Mystery Men right at the end there.
I forgot all about that movie. I even told him.
I was like, I forgot you did that. But that was a funny movie.
That one's actually on. It's on cable TV a lot more than you would expect.
Really? I'll just be searching the guide on like a cable network, and I'll come across Mystery Men every now and then. It's just fucking press.
I'll just click. You know, this isn't a ben stiller movie but whenever i think of like the superhero movies the ones that are like off the beaten trail like it's like clearly they were like kind of poking fun at the superhero movies what's the is it mr blank man what's the one with doug do you know what i'm talking about that's my favorite superhero movie of all time i'm sorry to like wayne's brother dude yeah i'm sorry to segue out of blank man was fucking hilarious dude that movie is fucking amazing now that's one that's what i'd have to re-watch i know we're on ben stiller i know we're on ben stiller i'd have to i'd have to re-watch blank man i haven't seen that one in fucking forever.
What's Blank Man on Rotten Tomatoes? Oh, it's got to be Through the Roof. 12%! Critic review.
It's only funny because I didn't expect it to have a high Rotten Tomato review, but still a classic. I don't care what the critics say.
That movie fucking great undeniable classic uh anyways mystery men great movie ben stiller's the best all righty let's get in some march madness the march madness brackets brought to you by reese's peanut butter cups that's a kelsey favorite right there i definitely did get my reese's backpacks and my Reese's varsity jacket. I am not in Kansas City, though, right now.
I really like the seasonal Reese's cups that are the egg version. Yeah.
Oh, I don't like white chocolate. These.
Oh, no. These.
There they are. There they Any of the...
They're a little bit thicker, a little bit more protein, a little more

peanut butter to chocolate ratio.

Have you tried these? Have you tried

these? The sprinkle ones? I have not. I didn't see

that one in there. I'm going to try that one out.

All right. If there

was a bracket of Reese's,

Jason, what's in your final four?

Final four of Reese's.

Everybody keeps saying, like, why do they say Reese's?

I don't know, guys. That's how we fucking say it.

I don't know which one to say it. This is how I've always said it.

Thank you. Jason, what's in your final four? Final four of Reese's.
Everybody keeps saying, like, why do they say Reese's? I don't know, guys.

That's how we fucking say it.

I don't know which one to say it.

This is how I've always said it.

Everybody knows what we're talking about, so can we stop acting like it's that big of a deal?

Yes.

Just because we have an accent?

Reese's that I'm saying it incorrectly sometimes.

I'm not sorry.

I'm not sorry at all.

Obviously, original Reese's peanut butter cups have to be in it.

Yeah, I think they're the number one, and they win it. I don't think they win it.
Reese's pieces, or as we would call it, Reese's pieces, Reese's pieces. Reese's do not sleep on Reese's.
I like Reese's pieces better. I love Reese's pieces.
I like Reese's pieces in like ice cream and shit. I can't just do them just straight up.
You're fucking out of your mind. Go eat some Reese's Pieces.
You'll fucking be able to eat it. I know exactly.
I'm in my mind, and my mind is telling me that's not how I want to enjoy my Reese's Pieces. I mean, it's great as an additive as well, but it's also great on its own.
They're fantastic. Reese's Pieces.
Fast break? Are you putting that up there? No. No? Take five? Let's take five of Reese's.
I think it is, right? Yeah, but I'm just not up there. Take five is great.
You guys are out of your mind if you're not putting Take 5 in there. I'm not saying it.
It's not a Reese's product. I think it got switched.
I think Reese's bought it. Yeah, Reese's bought it, but it's not a Reese's.
Yeah, now, but that's just because they own the market. It literally says Reese's Take 5.
I'm putting Reese's Take 5 in my top four because the Take 5 is fantastic. You out of your mind if you don't have it up there you put Reese's all right so Reese's take five you're right you're correct I'm just going off what the nice people at Reese's sent me as a document god damn it Jesus I know my Reese's I know my Reese's have you said eggs yet have you said eggs yet not yet that was gonna be my fourth be my fourth one.
I was going to say Reese's eggs, not like the

actual egg. I'm talking about like the

Reese's cup.

The one thing you ate the most

of Reese's was Reese's puffs.

So you have to put

Reese's puffs in there.

You ate, that was the only

cereal you ate, Jason.

No, you're right. I did not, in my brain,

I did not equate Reese's

peanut butter

puffs as

Thank you. It's the only cereal you ate, Jason.
No, you're right. I did not.
In my brain, I did not equate Reese's Peanut Butter Puffs as the candy bracket. But I think you're right.
We didn't say it was a candy bracket. You're right.
We said it's a Reese's bracket. So I think you're right.
All right. So I got Reese's Original, Reese's Pieces, Take Five, and Reese's Peanut Butter Puffs.
Dang. But I like the specialty holiday Reese's.
The egg is, is nostalgic and it's the best. The egg or the Christmas tree, any of that stuff where it's like a new, because it becomes a little bit thicker and I just like the ratio better, but I can't take out the original and I'm definitely not taking out.
I guess I'll take out take five. Gosh, I like to take five, though.
Back to basketball. March Madness is coming up.
Man, sports fans, we love filling out these brackets, baby. And as we said last week, we're doing it for the first time ever.
New Heights Bracket Challenge. That's right.
It is brought to you by Reese's or Reese's for those who want to fucking get mad at us. The men's bracket deadline is this Thursday, March 20th at noon Eastern.
And the women's bracket deadline is Friday, March 21st at 1130 Eastern. I don't know why we didn't just make them both the same time on two different days, but fill those fuckers out.
Yeah. Have some fun, ladies and gents.
I think we've limited it to one person per bracket or one bracket per person. So this isn't just you fill out 100 brackets.
Yeah, improve your odds. Yeah, improve the odds.
Yeah, just put in fucking one bracket, guys. Don't be weirdos.
Jason, have you filled out your bracket yet? I have not yet. Good.
Well, you have until Thursday. Yeah, I got time, but I would like to go over it do we have a bracket yeah we got some brackets uh how do you make your picks since you don't watch any college basketball well as you know playoffs always come down to the same things like it's all you know taking care of the the basketball you gotta like you know how well do you operate end of game situation two minute drill like this is what it comes down to in playoff basketball so you're going you're going turnover margin i go physicality all right toughness height physicality you look at the height of the roster like i already know where's michigan state at where's michigan state i'm putting them all the way through to the final four i don't even need to see where they're at i don't even need to see because i know tom is so it's going to have those guys playing hard and physical i saw that they aren't the best three-point shooting team so i was like they're in because every all college basketball wants now is to fucking shoot these three-pointers and tom tom is is going to to come.
They're going to be undercutting their legs. Like, dude, you know how you stop a three-point shooting team? You foul the fuck out of them on that first three-pointer.
Yeah, give them a couple free throws. It's going to throw off the rhythm, and it's going to make them nervous every time you come out there.
Right? Yeah, it's a good, yeah. You got to make these guys pay.
Impose your will. You got to impose your will on finesse players.
This is true. Don't let these small shooting guards beat you in the tournament.
How physical the fuck out of these dudes. Jason, you're the three-point equivalent to an offensive lineman, though.
Yeah, that's what you might think. I'm not, though.
I am the undersized center. I'm the Dennis Rodman of offensive line football.
That's right. I'm the Draymond Green of offensive line.
Ooh, nice. Michigan State.
Yeah, that's right. I'm not the biggest guy.
Michigan State. I'm going to get in a mental capacity.
That's cold. Nice.
I like that. right i'm not the biggest guy but i'm gonna fucking i'm gonna i'm gonna get in a mental that's cold nice capacity and i'm gonna impose my will on you in a weird way jaymon green who else we got we got a bunch uh all right so this is the east east okay so obviously duke yeah i mean well you got the four uh play-in games, too.
So can't forget about those.

I never worry about the play-in games.

If you got to make it into the tournament on a play-in game,

I'm not interested.

Go back up, Brandon.

Go back up.

We'll start at the East.

Who do you got coming out East? The play-ins are like 11 seeds.

They're like, they're not just the worst seeds.

If you got to be a play-in, you're out.

I'm not talking to you.

There shouldn't even be play-in games. All All the play ins get eliminated in my bracket round one after they get in.
Well, Texas and Xavier might have something to say about that. Damn it.
Texas is in there. I like Texas a lot.
Fuck. Well, rules are rules.
Rules are rules. I don't make them.
They just are what they are. Texas is out in round one.
All right. We got Duke against American.
Doesn't even have a logo in there. It's just a NCAA.
This is a play-in game. That's why there's a play-in game, Jason.
All right. I don't even need to see who they're playing in.
Duke's advancing. All right.
It's all matchups. I'm going to have to fill out a bracket and figure it out.
But I will make sure that you guys know. I'm a big fan of the SEC games or SEC teams.
We're doing it right now, Travis. No, we're not.
That's what this is. No, this is us just kind of going over our bracket from here.
I'm telling you who I like in these. I'm not going to tell you exactly who I have coming out, though.
Okay, fine. All right.
I'm not going to let you fucking just copy my bracket, Jason, because you know nothing. I don't want to copy your bracket.
I know more about mentality and physicality, and that's all that comes down. Basketball is all about physicality.
Well, physicality. Florida is one of the biggest teams in terms of height.
Florida is making it out of the West. Florida is back.
The Gators are back. Memphis, Colorado State.
Memphis is solid. I think the Terps.
Ooh. So this is the West has one of my favorite teams in the NCAA right now, and that's Drake.
Drake. Drake University, yeah.
Where is Drake? They have a fun story. Their coach is – and really four or at least four of their players are from Division II.
I think it was Northwest Missouri. Northwest Missouri State.
The coach brought them all with them? Yeah. They had a lot of transfers when the Drake coach from last year went to West Virginia.
A lot of the players that were on that team kind of went on their own or did their own thing. And then the new head coach was looking for players to bring in.
So he brought in his D2 guys and a couple of guys from Wyoming. They got some guys that could play.
Although I think Missouri is a really good team. That's going to be a tough game for them.
I mean, I got a lot of, that's like my Cinderella team this year. I'm rooting for them.
They're also older for a lot of the better teams at NCAA. Is that correct? Yeah.
Yeah. And then on top of that age, watching Texas Tech, I know Patty Mahomes is going to love hearing this.
If they can stay healthy and if they can, I think they got a fucking great coach. They got great players, a lot of athletes.
They can make a run at it. What about them Jayhawks down there? They're usually pretty good.
Yeah, Hunter Dickinson. I thinkinson i think you know kansas bill self they're always going to be a team that you gotta you gotta account for man they could uh they can they can pull it together and make a run um against anybody so you got to keep them in mind illinois kentucky versus troy ucla utah state tennessee wolford yeah dude you'd love this wolford has a guy that shoots the ball uh shoots free throws underhand.
UCLA, Utah State, Tennessee, Wolford. Wolford.

Dude, you'd love this.

Wolford has a guy that shoots the ball,

shoots free throws underhand.

No way!

I knew you were going to love this.

I mean, I love that,

but for that alone,

I'm picking Tennessee.

They're getting too... They're going against the trend too hard

for me to go with them.

They've gone... They're a little bit too gimmicky.
Got to pick Tennessee in that matchup. Oh, man, you're hilarious, dude.
Texas A&M versus Yale. Listen, as a rule, I might almost fill out my bracket based on GPA.
If a team has a higher GPA, I'm picking them to lose. And I might do that all the way through to the championship game.
Jason, we know that GPAs don't reflect actual intelligence. Oh, no, I think GPAs reflect athleticism.
And typically speaking, it takes – listen, if you're too smart, you're too hesitant to do stupid things. And you have to be willing to do stupid things.

You have to be willing.

You got to be willing to take a risk and take a chance and do something.

You got to be stupid enough to believe it.

There's no way that guy's going to try that move.

Oh, my God, that shit just worked. What the fuck? And that's how I got to the NFL.
Well, I'm picking Texas A&M versus them silver spoon fucks at Yale. That was so uncalled for.
What is Yale's, what is their mascot?

Is it just like a pencil?

I think so.

The Yale 2%. The Yale Bears?

I think it's a bulldog.

What is a Yale?

It's a bulldog.

Bulldog?

Handsome Dan.

Georgia.

Handsome Dan.

All right.

Texas A&M.

That's enough shitting on Yale.

All right.

Texas A&M.

What's this uncalled for?

They're going to be just fine. I think those Yale people are going to be just fine.
Yeah. Okay.
Ole Miss, Iowa State, Lipscomb. I'm going to go with Iowa State.
Lipscomb, baby. Lipscomb.
Iowa State is sneaky. They're the ones that kicked the Bearcats out of the Big 12 tournament.
I tell you what. I always fill out my bracket based on what school I think would win in a fight.

Like, if I think Iowa State would beat Lipscomb, I'm going to go Iowa State.

In a fight?

Yeah, I just think at the end of the day, the mentality of the university rubs off on the mentality of the team a lot of the times.

And I just like the mentality approach because I don't know shit about basketball. So that's my only thing I can go off of.
Marquette versus New Mexico. New Mexico's, that's a tough one because New Mexico is probably pretty squirrely.
Strikes me as a squirrely group. Marquette strikes me as...
Marquette's got one of the best basketball players in the country. Marquette strikes me as a little bit of a silver spoon-ness.
Where's Marquette at? Chicago, I believe. Chicago? No, no, no.
Is it? It's outside of Chicago, right? Wisconsin. Wisconsin? It's close.
It's close. It's close.
I don't know why I said Chicago. All right.
I respect Marquette if they're out of Wisconsin. One of our favorite actors ever went to Marquette.

Played rugby there.

Denzel Washington?

Denzel Washington?

Not even.

Not even close. Not even close.
Oh, God. What? No.
The answer is Chris Farley. oh shit i should have known that one i should have known that one it was now i gotta know where did zelco i'm pretty sure oh man Denzel went to Fordham

Fordham is Patriot League

oh man denzel went to fordham fordham fordham fordham is patriot league oh man that's fucking hilarious i know this is so fucking funny plays the hooper at fordham he was a hooper he didn't play rugby he's a hooper he's a basketball i don't know that pinky says he played football yeah you've seen that Wait. So Jason, we've only talked about the men's bracket.
Do you use the same metric system to figure out who's going to win the women's bracket? Like, do you just look at who, who would win the brawl? Oh, wow. I haven't thought about it that way.
No, I don't use the same metric women's. I just go with, I just putconn as the winner every single year i don't know they're the same i put uconn as the winner every single year and that'll be until gino retires and then i just go based on overall team height average whoever's the taller team then i just fill it out that way you're fucking hilarious i haven't even i haven't peaked at the women's as much.
Where's K-State? I know they won the Big 12. Nice.
They're up there. Five seed? Solid, solid five seed.
We do know that Juju Watkins is at the top of her game. Texas is, goddamn, they're, yeah, they're number one seed.
I think it's kind of fair to say they're, the number one seeds are. I feel like there's less upsets in the women's bracket usually than there are in like the men's bracket.
Is that fair to say? I think it's fair to say, at least for the number one seed, you don't see the number one seeds get kicked as much as you do in the men's brackets. In my extensive knowledge of both men's basketball and women's NCAA brackets, I like to make broad sweeping generalizations.

Yeah, can't forget South Carolina.

They've been at the top for quite a while now.

They're kind of like the UConn of the modern day.

They have a lot of talent there year in, year out.

Who's the tallest team women's college basketball?

Jason, this is supposed to be 45 minutes. Well, there's no single team in women's College basketball.
Jason, this is supposed to be 45 minutes. He did 45 minutes.
Well, there's no single team in women's college basketball. Duke and Florida State are often cited as having some of the tallest players.
Both teams average six, seven and a half. While there is no definitive tallest team in women's college basketball, Duke and Florida State are often cited as having some of the tallest players both teams averaging around seven six and seven six foot seven and a half per player putting duke and florida state where are they at those are my top two teams in women's college basketball outside of yukon where the fuck is duking there are two seed yeah duke's two seed no they're one one seed in my bracket.
Okay, great. Who's your other team?

Florida State?

Florida State.

Dude, I feel really good about this.

I don't know.

Jason's going with height.

I'm going to pick the stars.

I'm putting Gigi in the final four.

I'm going to pick the stars as well.

I'm picking the stars.

There's like five or six real bona fide stars in that women's bracket.

I'm going to go ahead and slide them on forward.

They're going to be a star until they meet that height. I'll let you know that right now.
Get that shot swatted. Juju's going to go in for that layup.
Paige's going to be just fine. No.
No. All right, now that does it for March Madness Bracket Challenge brought to you by Reese's, or Reese's, whatever one you want to call it.
Winning never tasted so good. Whether you're watching the games or filling out your brackets, feed your fandom with Reese's This March Madness.
To enter, go to the link in the description of the episode. Fill out your bracket and you can win a New Heights Golden Cup.
Maybe I can win one or get one of these days. And it will be filled with Reese's Peanut Butter Cups.

Mine's filled with

playing cards. I think they threw in some

Reese's Eggs, too. Who knows? Maybe

you'll get some puffs, some Reese's

pieces. But yeah, make sure you guys

fill those brackets out. Men's bracket

again, Thursday by noon. Women's bracket

Friday by 1130.

All Eastern time. Yeah, good luck to the crew, to the 92 percenters.
That wraps up another episode of New Heights. Thank you to Ben Stiller.
Make sure you're subscribed on YouTube to the New Heights channel and follow New Heights on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts. Please go check out our incredible guest episodes from last week, Matthew Stafford and Jason Sudeikis.
You can also listen to new episodes of New Heights early and ad-free right now by joining Wondery Plus in the Wondery app or on Apple Podcasts. Once again, New Heights, a Wondery show produced by Wave Sports and Entertainment and brought to you by Nike.
When the world says you can't win, Nike says so win. Follow the show on all social media add new heights show with one F for fun clips throughout the week.

Ben Stiller.

Thank you,

dude.

That was a fucking blast.

Thanks to our production and crew for making us all look great. Like we actually know what we're doing until the 92 percenters to see you guys next week.
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