"Ted Danson"

Speaker 2 Some like it hot, but for most, a little spice goes a long way.

Speaker 2 Doritos Golden Sriracha flavor tortilla chips are the perfectly balanced blend of yellow and green srirachas for a chip that's tangy and sweet with just the right amount of heat.

Speaker 2 Doritos Golden Sriracha are spicy, but not too spicy because Doritos knows bold flavor doesn't have to mean just heat. Try Dorito's Golden Sriracha for yourself.

Speaker 2 Look for them wherever Doritos are sold or find a store near you at Doritos.com. Doritos for the bold.

Speaker 2 Nobody wants to spend the holiday season clicking from one site to the next to get their hands on the best brands.

Speaker 2 But who knew Walmart has the top brands we all love, like the big names that your friends and family actually want and all in one place? Nespresso, Nintendo, Apple, you name it.

Speaker 2 Get the brands everyone loves at prices you'll love at Walmart.

Speaker 1 Who knew?

Speaker 2 Go to Walmart.com or download the app to get all your gifts this season.

Speaker 1 So hey guys, hey.

Speaker 3 Hey Sean.

Speaker 2 Hey, hey, what city are you in? Everybody's been traveling so much.

Speaker 1 Where are you at?

Speaker 3 I'm in the Los Angeles.

Speaker 3 Will is as well. In Los Angeles.

Speaker 2 I'm in New York.

Speaker 3 Now, Sean, Sean, you've been in New York for a little while, right?

Speaker 2 Yeah, I'll be home in a month.

Speaker 1 Wow. In a month?

Speaker 3 You just hopping around, just catching shows, eating dinners, and just enjoying?

Speaker 1 Yeah.

Speaker 2 Yeah, just anything I can stuff my face with.

Speaker 1 Are you doing

Speaker 1 okay?

Speaker 3 Let's keep it clean. It's the opening.

Speaker 1 This is an all-new Smart List, dude. Smart.

Speaker 1 Smart.

Speaker 1 Less.

Speaker 2 I ran out of Pop-Tart, so this morning I made an English muffin.

Speaker 1 Oh, don't worry. We read the internet.
We saw it.

Speaker 3 You made an English muffin?

Speaker 1 I lived on CNN, dude.

Speaker 3 What'd you stick in all the nooks and crannies?

Speaker 2 So butter, and then I made my own cinnamon like mixture. Cinnamon sugar mixture.

Speaker 1 Cinnamon and sugar. By the way, by the way, when you said made your own, meaning you put cinnamon with sugar.
Yeah, that's right. And then start.

Speaker 1 Okay, don't, don't talk like you. I went into the lab.
Yeah.

Speaker 1 Yeah,

Speaker 3 the disposable time you've got right now, Sean Hayes.

Speaker 1 It's incredible.

Speaker 2 It's incredible.

Speaker 3 I am so

Speaker 3 in fumes. I've gone back to bed twice already this morning.

Speaker 1 Oh, really? But Jay, but Jay,

Speaker 1 you just did a back and forth.

Speaker 1 You were overseas on a thing, and then you came back to LA, and then you went to New York a couple days, and then you came back, and then you come back. Why?

Speaker 3 Yeah, because I don't know. I literally,

Speaker 3 I almost canceled this today. I almost called in and said that I might have COVID or something.

Speaker 1 I'm so freaking out.

Speaker 1 Why did you fly back again this weekend? And I know you're going to say because I want to see the kids and stuff, but come on, man. You got to take care of yourself.
You can't do that.

Speaker 1 Well, you can take care of yourself.

Speaker 3 Because I got to come back.

Speaker 3 I'm editing. I edited yesterday, edit today.

Speaker 1 You know, it's like it's a lot. And were you up late editing?

Speaker 3 No, I went to bed at nine, got up at 4.30.

Speaker 1 So, and okay. You're just tired.

Speaker 1 But yeah, but it's just my closet let sean and me in it let's say boring high class no no no but let sean and i'll edit it'll be fun it'll be so new to you you'll be like what the

Speaker 1 it's a great new approach

Speaker 1 yeah

Speaker 1 huh um

Speaker 2 scotty and i i know jason loves this uh kathy and read this section of the show i do

Speaker 1 i've got my coffee here okay good so uh scotty and i were doing our will and testament you know like that you have to fill out you have to do the icky stuff. Oh my God, that sucks.

Speaker 2 Congratulations, you guys are, it's all going to you. We're in?

Speaker 1 Wait, but Scotty's out. Yeah, that makes sense.

Speaker 1 So, wait, so Shoni, so you and you and us.

Speaker 2 Yeah, so we did it, and the guy, it was just, it's stupid, but, you know, you have to go in there and you sit in this, you know, conference room with the guy, with this, you know, a state lawyer.

Speaker 2 And he goes, I said, I go, so wait a minute, let me get this straight.

Speaker 2 So if I die, and I was doing like before, what, and then after, but so I go, if I die, he goes, I'm going to stop you when you die. Go ahead.

Speaker 1 And I

Speaker 1 love that.

Speaker 1 And I was like, wow.

Speaker 3 It's coming for you. Yeah.

Speaker 2 I'm sorry. When you die.
Go ahead.

Speaker 1 And I was like, Jesus.

Speaker 1 But you know what, though? You know what, Sean? So I had on what is today. I had last weekend, I had all of our good friend Bradley over here, and we were watching some soccer and stuff.

Speaker 1 And he came over and I said,

Speaker 1 and as you guys know, because Jason takes fucking pictures of it, so does Paul McAlees, of my freezer and my treats that I have in there

Speaker 1 he sees my treats radley and i go oh yeah that's this like ice cream sandwich from this place out here called round swamp and they make chocolate chip cookies with ice cream round swamp that's the that's your colonist

Speaker 1 somebody just woke up

Speaker 1 that's so good

Speaker 1 so jealous colonist so uh so he goes are you gonna have a little piece of this i go hey man i'm not coming back here yeah i'm here this one visit Planetary.

Speaker 1 Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 1 I'm here.

Speaker 1 This is a one-time visit to this planet.

Speaker 3 And you're looking to shorten it as much as possible?

Speaker 1 No, I'm looking to enjoy it as much as possible. I'm not looking for it, it doesn't need to be a long, shitty time.
It just needs to be.

Speaker 2 Look, for every ice cream sandwich you eat, you just got to run an extra mile or something.

Speaker 1 You know, enjoy it, man. Because I don't want the end of the day when we're like, Jay, how was it? And you go,

Speaker 1 and we go, fuck, we got to take the tubes out. Why didn't you say we take this? Jay, how was it? And you go,

Speaker 1 come here. We're so fucking hungry the whole fucking time.

Speaker 1 All I can hiss out is. What did you take me around for?

Speaker 3 All I can hiss out is, do I look puffy?

Speaker 1 It's going to say on your tombstone.

Speaker 3 Puffy Bateman died with zero water retention. JB,

Speaker 1 JB, can I make it, can I get it out of you right now? If you happen to pass before me,

Speaker 1 will you let me put at some point on somewhere on your tombstone,

Speaker 1 do I look puffy?

Speaker 1 Absolutely.

Speaker 1 We were talking. Think about it.
Think about it. Think about it.
Don't tell me we were talking about that in

Speaker 2 the meeting with the estate lawyer, you know, Will guy. And he goes,

Speaker 2 I said something, you know, came up with the health initiative. Like, you know, I forget what it's called, where you can pull the plug or not, you know,

Speaker 2 and he goes, you know, you just got to make sure, like, if you're in a, if you have a feeding tube or something.

Speaker 1 And I go,

Speaker 2 I would hook up a feeding tube now.

Speaker 1 Sure, you would.

Speaker 1 Sure you would. Sure you would.

Speaker 2 It's such a shortcut.

Speaker 1 Sean, how quickly,

Speaker 1 if we installed, and then we got to get to our guests, but if we installed, if you came home and in your kitchen,

Speaker 1 there was a trough, but it was filled.

Speaker 1 It was filled with like donuts and all the stuff you love and Skittles and Hershey's syrup and Hershey's

Speaker 1 peanut butter cup and all this stuff that you want to eat and sloppy joe how how how long is the time from the initial uh disgust and and sort of like uh um you know feeling of of you know resentment and alarm right of the initial seeing it to you actually getting down

Speaker 2 and going to town yeah by the way a trough of just all your favorite stuff would just be incredible and be right so i'm I'm saying the gap is pretty short.

Speaker 3 You'd have a savory trough and a sweet trough, right? I mean, you'd kind of have a lever that would kind of like a train track. Like a dog, the tube, like the little thing that would be, yeah.

Speaker 2 Yeah, that's true.

Speaker 1 That'd be so good. Sweet trough and a savory switch.

Speaker 3 And a trade track switcher.

Speaker 1 Yes.

Speaker 2 With my mouth just hanging on the bottom.

Speaker 1 That's what I'm saying.

Speaker 3 I'm going to have Maple draw that.

Speaker 2 Please.

Speaker 2 Just the design of it, the engineering of it.

Speaker 1 Yeah, let's get some people. Let's get some top design.
Let's get Johnny Ives on this or somebody. You know what I mean?

Speaker 3 So, Will, this is all a tee up to your classy guest.

Speaker 1 Sort of the classy guest who's had to endure all this. Well done.
But you know what? He's a classy guest, but he's also no,

Speaker 1 no stranger to having a laugh. Oh, boy.
Because he likes to laugh, but he's also made us. laugh.
This guy,

Speaker 1 he's another one of these people.

Speaker 1 I can't say anything that he's done because you're immediately going to know who he is because he's such a part of the fabric of our lives, especially the three of us, because we are such admirers of what he has done over the years and how much he's made us laugh and doing the stuff at the highest level that we're like, oh my God.

Speaker 1 And I would, and I would say this, not just doing stuff at the highest level, for me, potentially doing.

Speaker 1 What I would consider, and no offense to either of you, the greatest American sitcom of all time, because it just took me through so many, and it just always made me laugh.

Speaker 1 I got to talk to him about it recently with one of his co-stars. He's done a million different TV shows, but he's the best.

Speaker 1 He's, you know, Mayday Malone, Sam Malone, he's also known as Ted Dan. Oh, it's Ted Dancing even.
Ted Dance. Hello? Good morning.

Speaker 1 What are you doing?

Speaker 1 Sam, Mayday, Malone. You guys, with this format, should somehow find a way to have a camera on the guests while you're doing your thing.
Because

Speaker 1 catching yourself.

Speaker 1 I'm putting my hand over my mouth. You are so fucking funny.
It's so stupid.

Speaker 2 Ted Danton, hello. I was just with Jimmy Burroughs last night and Debbie Burroughs, Scotty and I at the Hollywood Bowl, and we were talking about you just last night.

Speaker 2 And Scotty and I, every single, every, like I would say, three or four years, we watched from the beginning to the end. No joke, every episode of cheers.
What?

Speaker 1 Every several years.

Speaker 2 Every episode, over and over.

Speaker 1 Call me next time you do that. Ted, So, Ted, I had the, you know, Ted and I don't really know each other.
We have a lot of people.

Speaker 3 Ted said three words so far. We're mute.

Speaker 1 No, but that's good. Trust me.
That's very good.

Speaker 1 So, Ted, and I, you guys, you and Woody invited me on your podcast, Woody very, very kindly had me on. And I got to, and I had just watched a bunch of episodes.

Speaker 1 And so I went crazy on you guys with cheers stuff.

Speaker 1 But I want to talk to you about, I'm so interested in that moment. So cheers is such a big thing, especially our generation.
We grew up with it and

Speaker 1 we weren't little kids, but we loved it.

Speaker 1 What was

Speaker 1 that moment, that first time you got the script for cheers?

Speaker 1 I love this more than anything. I'm sorry, I barely heard what you were saying because I loved watching the first question of a podcast as you're trying to formulate how do we get him talking.

Speaker 1 Sorry, you're very good at it, Will. No, thank you.
Very good. No, I want to know about cheers.
I want to know about cheers.

Speaker 1 So just recap, when did I know the first moment that what was the first moment that you laid eyes on the script for cheers?

Speaker 1 Wow.

Speaker 1 I was doing

Speaker 1 a last-second replacement on Taxi. Wow.
And I was there, and Jimmy and Les and Glenn had an office down the way at Paramount, and they were working on Cheers.

Speaker 1 And Jimmy had remembered me from,

Speaker 1 was it Best of the West? Do you remember that?

Speaker 1 Western sick.

Speaker 1 Yeah. Anyway, um i auditioned for it didn't get it and he remembered me and called me down and um

Speaker 1 i guess we had a conversation before i got the script and then read it and then i auditioned two or three times and they said to me

Speaker 1 okay don't don't take another job without letting us know and i went oh that sounds so is it is it you're saying it's my part no just uh just don't you know just don't take another job yeah and i went out the back door and literally up the front door, coming up the stairs to the front door of the office was like every actor in L.A.

Speaker 1 I think I got chairs because of Shelly Long, because she just,

Speaker 1 she really nailed that part right out of it. Brilliant.
She was amazing. And we got teamed up together when we auditioned.
Oh, well, then that was as couples.

Speaker 1 That must have just sealed it because you and Shelly had the most incredible sitcom

Speaker 1 chemistry. Chemistry.

Speaker 1 Yeah, really magic. Chemistry, but was magic.
I mean, Ted, you must have, you guys must have felt that must be one of those things. It was instant, right? There was just no, it was inescapable.

Speaker 1 You just had to. You know, it was great.
I mean, I am always, always the worst.

Speaker 1 My first reaction to Shelly while we were auditioning was, oh, no, no, that's a bad, bad idea. Oh, really? Horrible? Yes, horrible.

Speaker 1 Why? Why? I just, I don't know.

Speaker 1 We're so different. Our styles, our approach, our everything is really different, which is why I think it worked because it was like this fair fight.

Speaker 1 You know, it was hard for us sometimes to be in the room together, but when we started working,

Speaker 1 it was...

Speaker 1 It was just fantastic because you'd smack her and she'd smack you back harder. She was just brilliant.
Did you always want to do sitcom like television comedies? Because

Speaker 1 you haven't just made a career out of it.

Speaker 1 And again, at risk of embarrassing you you've been at the top of always television comedy for for like 40 fucking years yeah to this day when you were when you were a kid were you like I want to do a television company was that the thing that you wanted to do

Speaker 1 no no

Speaker 1 I didn't think about it until Stanford and then I discovered acting and I was just life made sense I was

Speaker 1 not an academic. I came from like scientific

Speaker 1 people in my family. my father my sister is incredibly bright and i just faked my way through school i just

Speaker 1 you can't fake your way into stanford hang on now you know you could back then really you really and i was geographically interesting i came from arizona flagstaff my all my friends were hoping navajo kids and ranchers, sons and daughters, and galloping here and there.

Speaker 1 And then went to a private school in Connecticut, Kent School for Boys.

Speaker 1 And I think I got there for that reason. And then that's kind of interesting.
And then

Speaker 1 truly, I was a horrible student. The first two weeks at Stanford,

Speaker 1 I was sitting in an English,

Speaker 1 and this is going to sound weird. It was an advanced placement English class because I lucked into it because I.
because I'm not very bright, I test wonderfully because I don't give a shit.

Speaker 1 You know, I just kind of wing it and make it a game and have fun.

Speaker 1 But I was sitting there going, not only do I not understand what the professor just said in response to this question, this girl sitting next to me said that I have no, and I just pretty much dropped out,

Speaker 1 wanted to play basketball,

Speaker 1 nowhere near talented enough. So all my dreams kind of fizzled.
And then a little while after that,

Speaker 1 trying to

Speaker 1 take some young lady out and have a cup of coffee and she told me about five minutes in because I don't think she was enjoying it. I have an audition I have to go to.

Speaker 1 And I said, can I come along? And off I went and to stay in the room, it was like a Bertolt Brecht play and to stay in the room, they said, well, just make do something.

Speaker 1 And I got up and I heard people laugh. And it was like, oh.

Speaker 1 Wait a minute.

Speaker 1 You know, and literally. This drug.
Yeah, I took my first acting class and was in some productions.

Speaker 1 And I I pulled my station wagon with a sleeping bag in the back and never left the theater until somebody said you should really go back east and study. So off I went to Carnegie.
But there you are.

Speaker 1 Wow. Hey, let me take over.
Let me take over for a minute. Yeah, you go.

Speaker 1 Will Arnett, thank you so much for being our first guest. You really did us a good turn.
And we're all in the radio

Speaker 1 and all of that. That's so great.
Thank you. Thank you.
Really appreciate it.

Speaker 1 It was a lot of fun. I love talking to you and Woody so much.
I mean, you know, again,

Speaker 1 I'm going to get off cheers at some point because I've gotten off on it so many times before. Guys,

Speaker 1 see what you did there. But I love it so much.
And

Speaker 1 I made Ted and Woody listen to me go on about one of my favorite moments, which I've said before, but I'm going to say it because I haven't said it here. One of my favorite moments.
I think

Speaker 1 the funniest moment for me in TV history, for me, me, is this moment where Shelly Long goes, you'll never see me again. You'll never see Diane Chambers ever again.

Speaker 1 This is the last time you'll ever hear from me.

Speaker 1 And

Speaker 1 what do you know? Those guys are saying they're like, they're all watching. She makes this grand farewell.
She walks out.

Speaker 1 And then all of a sudden you see the door open and she realizes she forgot her coat and you see her arm come in and start to reach for the coat, the coat rack. And

Speaker 1 Carla's standing there and as she sees the hand come she's just said you'll never see me again hand in feeling for the coat and Carla just grabs the coat rack and pulls it just out of reach so her hand hand hand hand and then finally she falls through the she falls through the door and Carla goes hey everybody look it's diane

Speaker 1 I don't know why that fucking every part of that joke to me, every bit of it just fucking works. It just makes me laugh.

Speaker 1 Because you know it's coming too and you just you're sort of like in awe of the way they're still getting it through the hoop knowing that it's coming the staging the thing the all of it it's amazing jimmy you worked with jimmy a lot sean jimmy burrows yeah every single episode of willing grace every

Speaker 1 every episode he did almost every episode of cheers right about 20 of them went to some elsewhere but yeah he did tons of them but his his physical sense of physical comedy incredible

Speaker 3 we we four have been so lucky to work so much in a multi-camera, you know, in front of a live audience. I mean, how much do you do you guys miss it?

Speaker 3 There's no better job, at least for an actor, than multi-cam television, I think. Writers have it pretty tough, as we said earlier, they're up pretty late.

Speaker 3 But man, and especially on a show that Jimmy's directing, where you usually don't work much on Mondays and camera blocking day is done at lunch. Yeah,

Speaker 3 it's a it's a real sweet ride.

Speaker 1 Did you all do three weeks on, one one week off? Yeah. We didn't.
I mean, that's amazing. It's the fucking, it's the greatest.

Speaker 3 It's unbelievable.

Speaker 1 The only time I ever got mad at Jimmy was, remember, Sean, he wanted to switch the tape nights from Friday to Tuesday nights.

Speaker 1 And I loved the idea that Friday night when you were done, then you had no homework for the weekend. Right.
Right.

Speaker 1 And I always felt when you had to tape on Tuesday, you're like, ah, you're thinking about because, you know, Monday, you got to camera block and do all this shit. I love that.

Speaker 3 That's when you're sharing the crew with another, with another show, or they got to flip the stands around for the other side of the stage.

Speaker 1 I like Tuesday nights. I like Tuesday nights because I could soak up the lines over the weekend.

Speaker 3 Are lines a tough thing for you to remember?

Speaker 1 Yeah.

Speaker 1 I'll have to say, I mean, I started off with a slow, dumb joke, which is a great living. Sam Malone's, you know, it's the funniest, easiest way for the laugh.
And you're not doing

Speaker 1 Fraser or Diane fast, you know, brilliant,

Speaker 1 you know, complicated. And I've moved on to having some of the most difficult lines to say with Mike Shore in the good place.

Speaker 1 Yeah.

Speaker 1 You know, it was so elevated. But

Speaker 1 it's not hard for me to learn them. It's hard for me to retain them.
So this year I had the best time with my youngest daughter, Katrina. She would come to work with me.

Speaker 1 And I never had to worry about lines because she was there kind of jamming them into my brain. Because literally, if the camera's turning around and there's that 15, 20 minute pause or whatever,

Speaker 1 I need to make sure I reload the lines. You know, so I don't have to worry about them.

Speaker 3 So they don't fall out of your head in 20 minutes.

Speaker 1 So she'd run lines with you and stuff?

Speaker 1 Yeah, constantly. She's really good at it.
We had a great time.

Speaker 1 We'll be right back.

Speaker 1 Today's episode is sponsored by Ashley. They don't just sell incredible furniture.
They're also making an impact in vulnerable communities. Here's a tough fact.

Speaker 1 Over 7 million kids are affected by the welfare system and over 368,000 are currently in foster care.

Speaker 1 So together with Ashley and SiriusXM, we made a donation to four others, an organization working to end the child welfare crisis in America.

Speaker 1 You know, partnering with Ashley in our live show, First of all, they just made our set look really good.

Speaker 1 They made us really comfortable and they kind of made us look legit because otherwise it would have been, you know, milk crates and, you know, cardboard boxes.

Speaker 1 And Ashley made it look like a real, kind of looked like a living room, made it really comfortable, made our guest, John Mayer, really comfortable. And then he thought that maybe we're professional.

Speaker 1 We're not just a bunch of clowns. To be honest, there was a point where I got so comfortable, I forgot that I was in front of an audience.

Speaker 1 I was sitting back on that nice Ashley couch and I was just hanging out with my buds in my living room.

Speaker 1 Anyway, Ashley offers timeless, well-crafted furniture with white glove delivery right to your door. Visit your local Ashley store or head to ashley.com to find your style.

Speaker 2 Life is full of choices like deciding whether to try that new food trend, which celebrity story to believe, or if the latest show is worth a stream or a skip.

Speaker 2 At State Farm, their goal is to help you make decisions that you feel good about. And when it comes to choosing coverage, you can feel the same.

Speaker 2 The State Farm Personal Price Plan can help you create an affordable price when you choose to bundle home and auto insurance. You have options to choose from to help best fit your needs.

Speaker 2 It's about giving flexibility, offering coverage that makes sense, and supporting smart decisions for both today and tomorrow. So planning ahead feels easier and empowering.

Speaker 2 Talk to a State Farm agent today to learn how you can choose to bundle and save with the Personal Price Plan. Like a good neighbor, State Farm is there.

Speaker 2 Prices are based on rating plans that vary by state. Coverage options are selected by the customer.
Availability, Availability, amount of discounts and savings, and eligibility vary by state.

Speaker 2 This is an ad by BetterHelp. Have you ever had someone that you haven't reached out to in a long time and you're just like, you know what, just do it.

Speaker 2 I just did that recently and it was such a wonderful experience. We had a great lunch, a lot of catching up, and I'm so glad we did it.
It was great.

Speaker 2 As the seasons change, shorter days don't have to weigh you down. This season, BetterHelp encourages you to reach out, check in on friends, reconnect with loved ones, and remind them you're there.

Speaker 2 Just like it takes a little courage to send that text or grab coffee with someone you haven't seen in a while, reaching out for therapy can feel difficult too, but it can be worth it.

Speaker 2 It can leave people wondering, why didn't I do this sooner? With over 30,000 therapists worldwide, BetterHelp is one of the leading online therapy platforms. BetterHelp therapists are fully qualified.

Speaker 2 BetterHelp does the initial matching work for you so you can focus on your therapy goals. This month, don't wait to reach out.

Speaker 2 Whether you're checking in on a friend or reaching out to a therapist, BetterHelp makes it easier to take that first step.

Speaker 2 Our listeners get 10% off their first month at betterhelp.com slash Smartless. That's betterhelp.com slash Smartless.

Speaker 3 And now back to the show.

Speaker 1 Ted, you had the good fortune of working, you mentioned Mike Schurr, whom we all know and are friends with, and

Speaker 1 you got to work with him on the Good Place. And now you and Mike have a new show.
Yep.

Speaker 1 Is that right? Netflix.

Speaker 1 You know what? I think the name is changing as we speak.

Speaker 1 But it came from a documentary out of Chile, out of Santiago, Chile. Sure.

Speaker 1 Yeah. They're very funny.
Sean just watched a five-part miniseries on Chile, on the food, not the country.

Speaker 1 He said he's...

Speaker 3 Versus beef versus beef.

Speaker 2 And then I had a five-part meal.

Speaker 1 He was riveted.

Speaker 1 I do love chili.

Speaker 1 When do you guys do it?

Speaker 3 Now, is that a good thing? Are you guys?

Speaker 1 Sorry, are you guys not on camera as far as what people get to see? No, this is all. This is all YouTube.
YouTube? No.

Speaker 1 No, no, man. Well, you guys are idiots.
No. You are so fucking funny.
People don't want to see this. They can hear it.

Speaker 1 But then Will would have to stick his hair on. I mean, look at them, you know? I have to put my shoes.
No, you don't.

Speaker 1 You know what I mean?

Speaker 1 All right, let me take over again. What are you directing, Jason? Why are you so exhausted?

Speaker 1 What are you doing?

Speaker 3 It's called Black Rabbit.

Speaker 3 It's about dog tracks.

Speaker 3 No.

Speaker 1 It's like, wait, what?

Speaker 3 It'll be out in like a year.

Speaker 3 Another one of these sort of like moody, dark, people die kind of things.

Speaker 1 Is it eight episodes? Ten? It's eight, eight, eight and done. Eight and out, right? Yeah.

Speaker 1 Isn't that slightly disturbing? Because we all did 22, 24 episodes, and now they say you have eight, and you go, well, they must hate us. Right.
Or what am I going to do in the rest of the world?

Speaker 1 I have no faith in us.

Speaker 3 Hey, I want to go back to one when you said you, so you kind of started with the acting kind of on a lark to fill time unused by your studying English and stuff and basketball.

Speaker 3 So I would imagine it was a very natural thing for you to do.

Speaker 3 In other words, you weren't complicating yourself with any sort of learned technique that came later what tell me about that so you probably it started feeling very natural we're just playing pretend and it came to you very easily and then you go into learning how to act and all the technique that comes with those classes

Speaker 3 would did you did you have a place for all of that technique or did you kind of go ah that's good to know and everything but i just this kind of feels natural to me and how complicated is acting to you did did you allow for it to become something different once you went into class

Speaker 1 yeah i think there was a point at Carnegie which I loved. It was the only acting I knew.

Speaker 1 So a lot of other people had come having acted before or studied before, and they had their judgments about Carnegie. I just was lapping it up because it was the first and only time I've ever done it.

Speaker 1 So it didn't matter to me.

Speaker 1 Then I went to New York and I was terrified. And, you know, when you come out of Carnegie, you're supposed to go into the repertory system.

Speaker 1 And there's, I think they're called TCGs, where you go and you audition for all the companies around the country. And none of us got in at all.
We went, well, shit.

Speaker 1 All right, we'll all go to New York. And that's what we did.
But it terrified me so much that I went to John Hausman at Juilliard and said, I want to enroll.

Speaker 1 Having just graduated from Carnegie, I wanted to be back in a system to protect me in New York somehow.

Speaker 3 Like Juilliard was some sort of

Speaker 3 easy track there.

Speaker 1 I mean, yeah, but at least was like you were cocooned in, you know, and he very sweetly said, well, if you still feel that way a year from now, come back. But so off I went.

Speaker 1 And then I studied, I did study

Speaker 1 names, woof,

Speaker 1 neighborhood playhouse,

Speaker 1 famous, famous

Speaker 1 Sandy Meisner. Thank you.
I did two years of a Sandy Meisner student teaching a version of that, which

Speaker 1 really is what I think

Speaker 1 propelled me out the door acting-wise, as far as technique, because it stopped being about

Speaker 1 showing your technique or demonstrating how good you are. And it got me out of my head and started focusing on the other person, which is kind of the whole point of acting.

Speaker 1 Well, it's interesting because, well, you know, Pete Giles went to Sandy Meisner for two years too, a friend of Oliver's, and a bunch of people that we know.

Speaker 1 But what I found is what's interesting is

Speaker 1 you go and you study theater. You went to Carnegie Mellon.
You can go to lots of, there are a lot of great places around the country.

Speaker 1 But what's the most valuable is when they start talking to you about what to do when you're trying to get a job. You know, because all that stuff is really great is sort of great theoretical stuff.

Speaker 1 But it's so much different when you start to get into trying to get a job.

Speaker 3 You mean like how to audition and how to like.

Speaker 1 Well, how to audition and

Speaker 1 how to audition and how to do it in the moment.

Speaker 1 You know, they don't have, it's like they don't have time for you to go through your fucking process when you're, when you're a young actor and you've only got a couple lines and you got to show up.

Speaker 1 You got to show up and deliver. You know why? Because as you guys know, because they got to move on.
They got to get your fucking reaction or your whatever your stupid thing is.

Speaker 1 And they got to get after this other scene. So they don't have time for you to go like,

Speaker 1 do you think that my character would, it's like, dude, shut up. Yeah.
So you're like, and deliver. And that's the scariest part, right?

Speaker 1 I mean, mean, when you walk in and you're the new guy, how scary is that? Right. Am I right?

Speaker 3 And you want to score,

Speaker 3 but then, yeah, you don't want to overplay it either, I'll bet.

Speaker 1 Right. I was really lucky when I got to L.A., which was, I mean, I did,

Speaker 1 I understudied an off-Broadway show for a year and a half. I did a soap opera and I did.

Speaker 1 I did anything I could. I would be an extra in a commercial and be just as happy.
I didn't care. As long as I was working, doing something, I was thrilled.

Speaker 1 And even just being in an acting class was as exciting as being paid. It didn't matter to me in the beginning.
And then when I came to LA, I was lucky enough, because LA, you're just there to make it.

Speaker 1 There's no other reason to be in LA except to make a second season. Let's do it.
Right. And I was, a friend of mine had started something called the Mastery.
It was a...

Speaker 1 uh the actors institute and it was a one weekend kind of transformational it wasn't a how-to to act but it was kind of more about this is how you're presenting yourself.

Speaker 1 Is that what you want to be doing? Because this is what happens when you walk in the room. You got a big fuck you on your shoulder or whatever it is, you know,

Speaker 1 that you don't really know what you're walking in with, and then you put acting on top of that or something. And he actually

Speaker 1 kind of a not a flim flam man, but he, well, he is in that he said, Ted, I want you to anchor this

Speaker 1 project that I'm doing, this Actors Institute here in LA, and we'll do it by you teaching acting.

Speaker 1 And I was, he convinced me that I had to do this.

Speaker 1 And I would throw up every night before teaching a class. It was the hardest, most painful thing.
And I can't, it's not a happy ending like, you know, all my students became famous or something.

Speaker 1 I hated it, but it took my mind off of auditioning.

Speaker 1 It was so much more fun to go audition than teach a class.

Speaker 1 And one of the things he taught me was,

Speaker 1 you know, it's a good, it's a good chance for you when you go into audition to check out whether or not you want to be working with those people.

Speaker 1 You're always trying to impress them to work, you know, to hire you and to like you, but do you like them? And not in an arrogant way, but just heads up, make sure you're looking at them.

Speaker 1 And the other thing is, they want you to be good. They so want you to be good.

Speaker 1 They desperately want to cast this part.

Speaker 1 I was just i was just talking about that yeah you walk in not literally and not with arrogance but you walk in with uh relax i'm here yeah this is going to be really good i i get how hard this is for you and then you do your little scene you know and then at the end of it without literally saying it without being arrogant you go thanks that was a lot of fun but i have something else i have to go to but anyway good luck see you later so that the whole attitude has no desperation sexy indifference sexy Sexy indifference.

Speaker 2 Yeah.

Speaker 3 I would always say, good luck with this as I lean, as I laugh.

Speaker 1 Oh, that's disgusting. Wait, what did he mean?

Speaker 1 Of course he said that. Of course you said that.

Speaker 2 Hey, guys, good luck with this.

Speaker 1 That's really funny.

Speaker 1 Wait, did I ever tell you guys? Hope it pans out. Yeah.

Speaker 2 Tell me, Jason, well, tell me, stop me if I said this on the show before, but I once went to, and Will's like, stop.

Speaker 2 I once went to,

Speaker 2 I had an audition for,

Speaker 2 to play like a dental assistant. So I needed a white lab coat because I was like, I'll dress the part, right? It was for a commercial.

Speaker 2 And at night, I was doing sketch comedy in this theater and that we would kind of rent out at night. But during the day, it was a massive acting class, right? And with like 200 people in the class.

Speaker 2 And so I was like, oh, on the way to the audition, I'll just run and get my prop, my little white jacket, to go to the commercial audition at the theater.

Speaker 2 I had no idea it was being used during the day. I walk in and I open the door in front of 200 people and a guy's teaching the class.
And I was like, oh my God, oh my God, I was so embarrassed.

Speaker 2 I was like, I'm so sorry.

Speaker 2 I do a show here at night. And then he was like, it's already too long of a story.
He's like, what do you need? And I was like, I just have to get some.

Speaker 2 He's like, well, be quick about it, you know, and go get your thing, whatever you need. I was like, so sorry.
So I go in the back and I'm rustling through and I'm making all this noise.

Speaker 1 And he's like, can you please be quiet?

Speaker 2 I'm teaching a class. And I was like, I'm so sorry.
And I keep going and I'm making more noise, more noise. And he goes, Are you for real?

Speaker 1 I go, Why don't you act like I'm not here?

Speaker 1 And

Speaker 1 I got my stuff and I ran out. They all fucking hated me.

Speaker 3 Hey, Ted, when you were in New York and you're doing all these auditions and stuff, I'd imagine you're doing something during the day.

Speaker 3 Were you waiting tables in

Speaker 1 sort of a classic way?

Speaker 1 No, I always. Were you selling dope? Hey, Ted, were you selling dope?

Speaker 3 Yeah,

Speaker 1 Tom said.

Speaker 1 Are you selling dope and dying bags? What's going on. No, I don't have that's that's Woody.
Sorry.

Speaker 1 You got Woody in the van. Exactly.

Speaker 1 I am such milquetoast. Anyway,

Speaker 1 I always had enough.

Speaker 1 Back then, you could work a day on a commercial and make a nice whatever to pay your rent, but then the next day you could go collect unemployment.

Speaker 1 So between working little teeny things, I never actually

Speaker 1 had to fucking unbelievable. You liberal actors sucking off off our system.

Speaker 1 Classic. You knew it, you liberal, you elitist.
No, it's fucking, give me a second here because I want to tee off on the liberal elite.

Speaker 1 Great gig, by the way.

Speaker 3 There's no way you went to Stanford with no plan.

Speaker 1 What were you going to study at Stanford? Oh, no. I am the guy sitting in the back of the pickup looking

Speaker 1 behind where the pickup is going, going, wow. Well, look at that.
Golly. I never turned around and focused and said I want this I'm gonna go

Speaker 1 no aspirations

Speaker 1 until I met Mary and then or shortly before I met Mary that's why you're I will say that's why you're so chill you have a really great vibe I will say that yeah everybody

Speaker 1 seen my psoriasis commercials

Speaker 1 hey listen

Speaker 1 I'm a Skyrizzy guy so don't get me going yeah yeah wait I don't even know I just see those ads all the time on MSNBC my friend always has this joke he's like we're a skyrizzy family.

Speaker 2 But Ted, you know, going to the bottom.

Speaker 1 By the way, could I just say this?

Speaker 1 I mentioned Pete Giles before.

Speaker 1 JB, you've played golf with Jalese before over the years.

Speaker 3 The great Pete Giles.

Speaker 1 The great Pete Giles. And Sean, you know him very well.

Speaker 1 It just reminded me that any time he would get on the green, and, you know, sometimes some guys go, hey, you know, because your ball is on the green, you're dancing.

Speaker 1 And he would for years say, oh, you're Ted Danson.

Speaker 1 For years, he would say, when your ball got on the green, you're Ted Dancing. Yeah.
One of my best friends of all time. Yeah.
It just made me think of these guys.

Speaker 3 The green's a dance floor.

Speaker 1 Go on, Hayes. Yes, thank you.
Good story.

Speaker 2 You have this crazy ability. I know off the top of my head all of

Speaker 2 the hits shows that you've been on. And so you have this crazy ability to.

Speaker 1 You just said it. So name it.
Okay, ready? No, you just fucking said it. So now I'm going to go.
No, it's it. Well, obviously cheers.

Speaker 2 Obviously, Cheers. Becker.
I remember Becker. I remember, well, Good Place.
You did. I remember Creep Show.

Speaker 1 I remember CSI.

Speaker 2 You were on CSI.

Speaker 1 Which was very damages.

Speaker 2 Damages.

Speaker 2 You've done so many hit shows.

Speaker 1 It's unbelievable.

Speaker 2 By the way, I did audition for Inc., which was a short-lived sitcom. I did not get the part.

Speaker 1 Yeah. Well,

Speaker 1 you know, good for you. Still waiting.
I heard the star didn't care for you.

Speaker 2 But how do you, do you, is there a process by which you have like a filtering system?

Speaker 2 A filtering system for how to pick the right project? Because you seem to always do that. Hondos first.

Speaker 1 The trick is to spend all your money

Speaker 1 to go to work. Yeah, exactly.

Speaker 1 No, you know, you, oh, come on. I am here talking to you because of Les and Glenn Charles and Jimmy.
That is literally why I'm a here.

Speaker 2 Yeah, but then, but then you pick hit massive hit shows.

Speaker 1 Well, people think, well, the good writers tend to come your way because of cheers. I mean, literally, I'm not playing humble pie.
I'm here because of cheers. And it was a remarkable.

Speaker 1 I was talking to somebody who was going,

Speaker 1 we need to win the jackpot, you know, and it was like, yeah, to tell the truth, I did win the jackpot.

Speaker 1 Playing Sam Malone on cheers

Speaker 1 for 11 years is certainly a jackpot.

Speaker 3 But also, you know, the guys was talking about it earlier, you know, but your vibe is, is, it is infectious. It does come through.

Speaker 3 You do have an ability to put your thing into whatever character you're playing, even if it's, you know, a crabby character, which you play really well, is there is, there is a Ted Danson humanity that you're able to communicate to the audience.

Speaker 3 And it's just, it's great to be with. And I'll bet it's great on set too.

Speaker 3 I'll bet that, you know, you in that leadership position create this, you know, environment where everybody, you know, kind of goes, oh, well, maybe I should bring that part of me too.

Speaker 3 And all of those things sort of add up and it becomes this really enjoyable thing to be a part of as a viewer.

Speaker 3 And I'll, you know, you're being very humble, but I'm sure that's a lot of the key to your success too, why every show works when you're a part of it.

Speaker 1 For sure.

Speaker 1 Yeah, but I mean, no,

Speaker 1 I won't do humble pie, but

Speaker 1 you all know that it's the writing. I mean,

Speaker 1 you can be really good at.

Speaker 3 But an asshole can fuck up good writing.

Speaker 1 Yes, that's true. Or not, you don't want to be around them.
I do love going to work. I do love actors.
I do love writers. I do love the whole process.
I am as starry-eyed as I was.

Speaker 1 I love going through studio gates and crossing the

Speaker 1 Jimmy Stewart Avenue and passing, you know, that's so good to be able to do it. And working with that crew, too.

Speaker 3 I mean, think about all those cameramen and Dolly Grips, and you know, that always follow Jimmy around too. And Jimmy keeps-I mean, it's just a family that's

Speaker 1 a good job, yeah, and also

Speaker 1 it's also wonderful to be part of this tribe of funny. Yeah, you know, I'm not, I I am not,

Speaker 1 um,

Speaker 1 you guys are really quick and really funny. You really, truly are.

Speaker 1 I, if I have funny material, I will indeed be funny, but I don't, I don't have that thing that you guys have, but I am part of the tribe of funny and it makes me so happy.

Speaker 1 You know, I, I got to shake hands and hug Mel Brooks. How fucking cool is that? Yeah, yeah.
You know, I worked with Mary Tyler Moore. It's like, yeah.

Speaker 1 Ted, I hate to break it to you, man. You're on the fucking Mount Rushmore, okay? So like, I got a news flash for you.

Speaker 1 And there's no, and, and, and maybe it's because of Jimmy and the Charles brothers, but they, they wanted you for that same reason that you described before. They wanted you to be good, and you were.

Speaker 1 You were so fucking great, man. And

Speaker 1 I wonder, I wonder if you, when you come out of something like Cheers, I can't imagine because, well, I can,

Speaker 1 when, when you have something that has such where there's such great chemistry and it really works and the writing is really good and the performers are really good and you have a shorthand and you know when you're really dialed in, that is so fucking fun.

Speaker 1 And I've had a few of those moments and one of them was really when I was the most dialed in and felt like I was in a work environment in that way was working with that guy right there with JB when we did arrest development.

Speaker 1 There were a few months in there in my life where I was like, fucking fuck, we are dialed right now. This feels great.

Speaker 1 And it's, and it's hard, but you guys did that at a level for years.

Speaker 1 What's that like when you go from that? And, and what, what's the morning after like? Is it like,

Speaker 1 when you ended up going and doing amazing things after, but I mean, the morning after a show like Cheers. What was that like?

Speaker 1 My technique, you know, I think I have a little bit of that, I don't know, my mother's

Speaker 1 spiritual, religious, whatever, you know, pride goeth before a fall and, you know, all of that, you know,

Speaker 1 it does smack of false humility.

Speaker 1 You know,

Speaker 1 here's how I handle cheers passing. I fucked up my life so publicly and so thoroughly that the actual passing of cheers was,

Speaker 1 oh,

Speaker 1 it's over. You know, it was that kind of,

Speaker 1 so I don't really know.

Speaker 1 I was more focused on trying to, you know, be better, Ted.

Speaker 1 And that was preoccupying me more than the end of cheers.

Speaker 1 I got you.

Speaker 3 Well, it sounds like your priorities were in check, yeah.

Speaker 1 And I really worked very hard on myself. And I don't think Mary would have even been walking down the same hallway as me if I hadn't.

Speaker 1 I don't think she would have even.

Speaker 1 seen me.

Speaker 1 But that's life. Man, I mean, we all handle things differently.

Speaker 1 Look,

Speaker 1 I can admit, there have been lots of situations in my own life where I haven't handled it the best way.

Speaker 1 It doesn't mean that in the moment, but over time where I've kind of acted out in certain ways that were not the best representation of me or the best version of me.

Speaker 1 And I've and I've you know, felt a lot of shame about that and I've been

Speaker 1 beat myself up about it and stuff. And at the end of the day, it's just,

Speaker 1 that's life. We're all kind of dealing with it in the moment, figuring it out as we go.

Speaker 3 Yeah, you find the lane by like hitting the guardrails on both sides.

Speaker 1 And if your intention is to, you know, wake up,

Speaker 1 then all these little,

Speaker 1 you know, wounds or whatever

Speaker 1 can be,

Speaker 1 you know, a godsend in a way.

Speaker 3 But then I would imagine that it would, that it was, because I, me as well,

Speaker 3 you know,

Speaker 1 somehow.

Speaker 3 It sounds like really challenging things in personal life kind of were at the same time as really good things or important things in the professional life and how those can sometimes help one another or fight one another.

Speaker 3 So then when the show ended, you were going, navigating a challenging time for yourself, question mark. And then what was, then that probably was somewhat scary for you to no longer have this

Speaker 3 cocoon of the show and the family and routine. You got sort of a new version of yourself coming online internally and externally.

Speaker 3 What was the, was there a gap for the next kind of hammock pole, if you will, by with a job that sort of brought you back up again and matched the growth you were doing personally with the success professionally?

Speaker 1 Well, you know, it came, once again, I think I was just,

Speaker 1 I was really excited to discover who I am, you know, and stop being a liar and being emotionally as you know this is ongoing process obviously but as being emotionally mature for the first time in my life or trying to be yeah I was fascinated I had an amazing mentor so that truly was what was preoccupying me but then right away I got a

Speaker 1 Sherry Lansing is actually responsible for Mary and I being together it was a terrible movie but we were both cast in it and

Speaker 1 you know we both came to each other.

Speaker 1 She had just broken up from a four-year relationship and was saying to friends, I know I look like I should be good at relationship, but I don't. I can't.
I'm not. Obviously, I'm not that person.

Speaker 1 I have two beautiful kids. I'll leave it at that.
I was going, well, truly, you can fuck up any relationship, and it's you, Ted, that's doing it. So maybe you need to just not be in a relationship.

Speaker 1 And we met.

Speaker 1 And we became friends, having declared to each other that same kind of feeling that we both had of being kind of flops at relationship and just fell head over.

Speaker 1 We fell head over heels. I'll speak for myself in love

Speaker 1 and, you know, have been inseparable

Speaker 1 ever since.

Speaker 3 It's been one of the more successful Hollywood relationships.

Speaker 3 I mean, how long has it been?

Speaker 1 29 married, 31 together. I mean, that's incredible.
No way.

Speaker 1 That's amazing. Yeah.
Wow. Yeah, yeah.
I can't believe how much money I lost on that.

Speaker 1 Sorry. And

Speaker 1 I hate admitting it. No, but

Speaker 3 the odds were just you couldn't avoid them, right?

Speaker 1 Well, yeah, you couldn't. I mean,

Speaker 1 look at that. She's so cute.
This is showing that

Speaker 1 Mary on his screen says. This is yesterday.
Come on. That is so fucking great, dude.

Speaker 1 Yeah, that's why my life really works. Truly.
Yeah. Yeah.

Speaker 1 We'll be right back.

Speaker 4 It remembers what you love, anticipates what you need, and makes it all happen. Whether you're using Echo, Fire TV, or any compatible device, Alexa Plus brings thousands of possibilities to life.

Speaker 4 Ready whenever inspiration strikes. Amazon.com/slash new alexa.

Speaker 2 Nothing goes with football like Sonic's new pretzel bacon Sonic Smasher.

Speaker 2 Two hand-smashed Angus beef patties, crispy bacon and onions, plus pub sauce, all on a buttery soft pretzel bun.

Speaker 2 It's perfect for watching beefy linemen, crispy corners, saucy receivers, and buttery smooth quarterbacks. Geez, did they write this for me?

Speaker 2 And together with the original Sonic Smasher, they're forming a new dynasty of burgers. The Pretzel Bacon Sonic Smasher.
Try it for a limited time.

Speaker 2 Sonic!

Speaker 5 The family that vacations together stays together. At least, that was the plan.
Except now, the dastardly desk clerk is saying he can't confirm your connecting rooms. Wait, what? That's right, ma'am.

Speaker 5 You have rooms 201 and 709. No, we cannot be five floors away from our kids.
Eh, the doors have double locks, they'll be fine.

Speaker 5 When you want connecting rooms confirmed before you arrive, it matters where you stay.

Speaker 1 Welcome to Hilton. I see your connecting rooms are already confirmed.

Speaker 5 Hilton, for this day.

Speaker 1 All right, back to the show.

Speaker 1 Ted, you know what's so funny is we often ask people when they come on here, we're like,

Speaker 1 Well, you've done this and what would you want to do? You've fucking done everything. You've done it all.
Like, you've done every genre. You've done Broadway.
You've done comedy. You've done drama.

Speaker 1 You've done film. You've done, like, you've done.
So I don't even know where to go with that. Like, which one do you think?

Speaker 1 I want to keep trying to experience what it is to be

Speaker 1 funny or explore the

Speaker 1 human frailty or whatever you want to call it. It can be drama as long as it has wit, you know, and humor somewhere in there.
But I want to know what that's like at every age. I want to keep acting.

Speaker 1 And I'm 77 in a few months. Wow.
It's different. It's different trying to figure out how to be funny.
Yeah. You look amazing.
Hey, you know what?

Speaker 1 We've been on this fucking podcast for like almost an hour and that's the first time anyone has said how good I look. You look fucking great.

Speaker 1 You look great and you are great. And what is it that you watch? Do you watch a lot of stuff? Do you devour other material too? Like what are the things that...

Speaker 3 Yeah, anything you're watching right now that's making you really laugh?

Speaker 1 Yeah.

Speaker 1 Hey,

Speaker 1 all three of you may have made me laugh so much over the years. And you do have different situations.
Not today.

Speaker 3 It seems like it's not today.

Speaker 1 Are you kidding me? You should have seen me while you all were bantering. I was doing spit takes.
They told me not to.

Speaker 3 You seem, you're so, you're so aware of sort of the, of, of the, of bullshit. And

Speaker 3 you seem so good about being not full of bullshit and being real, being honest with yourself. It seems like you really, or at least you really make me laugh when you play these characters that

Speaker 3 they act like they are smarter than they actually are.

Speaker 1 Damages to me was one of the funniest things I got to do.

Speaker 1 Because that's the epitome.

Speaker 3 Yeah, it's just exactly.

Speaker 3 It's sort of behaving like you're more confident than you actually are because you are aware of how fragile confidence and intelligence really is because you're honest with yourself about that.

Speaker 3 Is that kind of accurate? Like you like playing those characters that

Speaker 3 kind of have this kind of thin veneer that you enjoy showing the audience kind of cracks in?

Speaker 1 I love the silliness of men. I love being a silly man.

Speaker 1 Yeah, I love that.

Speaker 1 I would like to be, you know, it can be disguised, it can be, but, you know, we're silly. We're silly creatures, and I love that.

Speaker 3 Yeah, we're so flawed.

Speaker 1 Yeah, and I do love humor that comes out of sadness. I do love that it's so so much fucking suffering.

Speaker 1 And if you can find a way to laugh while acknowledging the sadnesses of life, that I am so happy when you get to do that. Well, then

Speaker 1 you're going to die laughing if you read Sean's Wikipedia page. Hey, listen.

Speaker 1 Wait a minute, Ted.

Speaker 2 Wait, I was looking through your earlier credits, and I see that you did an episode of BJ and the Bear. That sounds like something right at my alley.
Yes. Oh my gosh.

Speaker 1 No, it's not, Sean. It's not.
What are you talking about? BJ and the Bear. No, no, no.
It's It's not BJ with the bear.

Speaker 1 It's not BJ. It's not BJ from a bear.

Speaker 1 Hey,

Speaker 1 you guys are like a basketball team of

Speaker 1 three-pointers. You know, one of the shooting guards gets hot, and the rest of you just sit alone and let him run.
Way to go, Ted. Now you got Sean thinking about a basketball team.
Hey, listen.

Speaker 1 Oh, man.

Speaker 1 Teddy, anyway.

Speaker 1 By the way, he's done every, he's done, he guest starred on every TV show. Look at, look at him.
I know. It's amazing.
It's fucking insane. I'm a tramp.
I'll do anything. I really will.

Speaker 1 Pretty much do anything.

Speaker 3 You're so lucky you get to work so much in Los Angeles, too.

Speaker 1 I know. That is amazing.

Speaker 1 You know what I forgot about? You did those three men and a baby, right? Remember that? Those are great. You must have remembered.
You were in them.

Speaker 1 What was that?

Speaker 1 success. Those were huge hits, right, Ted?

Speaker 1 One was.

Speaker 1 The first one was like gangbusters. I don't know.

Speaker 1 Huge, huge amount of millions. And then the second one, which was pretty well done.

Speaker 1 And I remember having lunch with Jeffrey Katzenberg and saying, because it was about to come out, three men and a little lady. And

Speaker 1 we're going to do great. We are keeping our eye on this other show, kind of small show coming out called

Speaker 1 Home Alone. But I think we'll do great.

Speaker 1 the same weekend? Yeah.

Speaker 1 Lewis out of the water. Wow.
That was 1990 or something like that?

Speaker 1 No.

Speaker 1 Oh my God. But those, I mean, those were, what was the biggest, what was the

Speaker 1 hardest part on those movies? Because you're working with the baby. Was it working with the baby or waiting for Tom Select to glue on his mustache? Because I would imagine.
Oh, leave that man alone.

Speaker 1 It's one of the things. I'm kidding.
I'm kidding.

Speaker 1 I love the guy. Are you kidding? I love him.
I'm joking. He's one of the true true gentlemen in our business.
He really is.

Speaker 3 I've never heard a bad thing about him.

Speaker 1 No, that's why I made the joke. He's great.
If he sucked, I wouldn't.

Speaker 1 He's incredible.

Speaker 1 Magnum PI for me was the fucking greatest.

Speaker 1 I lost a job

Speaker 1 due to Magnum PI. The first year of Magnum, I played a murderous schmuck husband.
who's getting the shit beat out of him on a boat by Tom Selleck.

Speaker 1 And it was the first time I realized I had a big ball spot on the back of my head because there was an overhead shot of, you know, this incredible hulk of a man, handsome guy, beating the shit out of this wimpy, murderous husband with the ball spot.

Speaker 1 And I swear to God, this is true.

Speaker 1 Please,

Speaker 1 Steven Spielberg listens to your show, I'm sure. Oh, a lot.
But my version of, and I hope it's true, was he was talking to me about Poltergeist.

Speaker 1 Then he happened to, within a week or two, see the Magnum PI episode, and I heard he was no longer interested.

Speaker 3 Well, but then he hires Craig T. Nelson, who's no Sasquatch, you know?

Speaker 1 I mean, God bless.

Speaker 1 Yes, you're right. You're right.
He was thinning. He was thinning.
Yeah. Yeah.
So maybe I made that up. Maybe I'm wrong.
Maybe he just didn't like my work. That could well be.

Speaker 1 I just like the no Sasquatch as well. Yeah, he's no Sasquatch.

Speaker 1 It's not like a term people you, hey, look at this guy. He's no Sasquatch.

Speaker 1 What?

Speaker 3 I'm just auditioning it. Can we

Speaker 1 keep it? Wait, wait, Ted, before we let you go. Ted, before we let you go.
No, I'm on a roll. I don't want to go.
No, you don't have to go. Please, we love having you.
What was the last,

Speaker 1 do you remember the last audition you had?

Speaker 1 I mean, it had to have been pre-series.

Speaker 1 It was probably for a feature. I think it was probably, it was a really funny movie.
The first 10 minutes didn't work, and then it just took off. I think it ended up coming out called The Amateurs.

Speaker 1 It was called The Moguls for a while. It was Jeff Bridges in the small town, and he decides the only way to put the town on the map is for them to do the whole town to participate in an amateur porn.

Speaker 1 And that was going to put us all in the map.

Speaker 1 You probably didn't see it. It's really kind of wonderful.
But I auditioned for that.

Speaker 3 I feel like the last audition I had was Hudsucker Proxy.

Speaker 1 Oh, wow. Cone Brothers film.
Oh, wow. I remember it.
Really?

Speaker 3 I bet it wasn't the last one I did, but it was the last one I really remember because, boy, I wanted that bad.

Speaker 1 I don't think auditions are bad, though, because don't you want to make sure you're right for the part?

Speaker 1 Yeah, exactly.

Speaker 3 There's nothing. You get an offer, and then the first time anyone sees your plan for the character is right before you shoot it, while you're rehearsing the scene.

Speaker 3 And you can take a big swing, and they go, you can hear the silence, you know, and there's no time to recast you or to give you a note to put you on a different track.

Speaker 1 It's tough. Yeah.
Yeah, Sean, last audition, do you remember?

Speaker 2 Uh-oh. Some Jake Chillinghall movie years and years and years ago.

Speaker 1 I can't remember what isn't it. Yeah.
Willie?

Speaker 3 I feel like there's a BJ and a bear joke coming in here.

Speaker 1 No, no, no, no. That was an offer.

Speaker 1 I mean, I think it was. I mean, it was because it was

Speaker 1 through a bush. It was through a bush, and it was just, hey,

Speaker 3 just a bunch of cash in a low voice.

Speaker 1 And they hand the papers through the bush, through the bushes. You got to have an answer.
Come on. What's the answer? I know, I know, I know.
I'm just trying to think what it was. I think I.

Speaker 3 How about arrested development?

Speaker 1 Well, that audition was great. I was with Tony Hale and you, the last one.
We were all in the room together.

Speaker 3 You, me. Crushed it.

Speaker 1 Jason, you auditioned for that too. I just kind of assumed it was you.

Speaker 3 No, no, no. I auditioned hard for that one.
I was very surprised I got an audition for that.

Speaker 3 In fact, the only reason Mitch Hurwitz read me for that is because he remembered me from auditioning for some pilot like a few years earlier that I didn't get, but he remembered liking me for.

Speaker 1 Wasn't it the hockey one?

Speaker 1 Perhaps.

Speaker 3 I'm not sure. But boy,

Speaker 3 that show saved my life.

Speaker 1 Yeah. You all have made me, I get to say this, don't cut it, have made me laugh so hard, not only today, but in everything you've done over the years.

Speaker 1 and likewise such a joy to sit and uh and a lot this hour too thank you so much

Speaker 1 thanks for being

Speaker 1 said i'm going to say this and i don't i don't i don't throw this term around lightly

Speaker 1 you know because it doesn't come in your way you know no well you were you're going to say you're a world-class jerk off no i'm not going to say that i'm going to say i'm going to say you're a fucking national hero yeah you really are you're a fucking you really are dude you are a treasure And

Speaker 1 I just couldn't think any more highly of you. I just think that you're a great guy and you're so great at what you do for so long.
I got you. And keep doing it.

Speaker 1 And I'm glad you're doing a show with the great Mike Schwarr, who, whom we adore and is an unbelievable talent in his own right. And just thanks for doing this, man.

Speaker 1 What a thrill to be able to sit here with you

Speaker 1 and talk to you. Honestly, it's just an absolute thrill for me.
So thank you. Podcasts are cool, man.
Podcasts are cool. Thank you for showing and congrats on yours.
Yeah.

Speaker 1 I can't wait to listen to that. Yeah.
By the way, yeah, you and Woody, you and Woody,

Speaker 1 it turns out you've got good chemistry. Yeah.
Yeah, because he's so, I'm the straight guy, and he's just all over the map. He's, he's such a...

Speaker 3 Love him.

Speaker 1 I love him so much. I do too.
Just quickly, and then we'll go goodbye. My favorite is Woody's during cheers.

Speaker 1 You know, if you were 15 minutes late, it was okay. If you're a half hour late, hey, we're, you know, by 45 minutes late, people get pissed.
And it was about 45 minutes late, no Woody.

Speaker 1 Somebody comes running in and says, oh, I forgot to tell you, Woody is in Berlin.

Speaker 1 The wall is coming down, and he didn't want to miss it. Oh, my God.
Literally. No way.

Speaker 1 The Floyd show. Yeah.

Speaker 1 No way. Good for him.

Speaker 1 He was like, fuck it. I'm not missing this.

Speaker 2 It must have been wild, Ted, to watch the evolution of Woody Harrelson from getting the part and starting out to

Speaker 2 at the end of the series to what he had become, you know, as a human being and as an activist and as everything as a movie star.

Speaker 1 He's a wonderful actor.

Speaker 1 Yeah, I love him. I love him.
And the more popular, or if he gets nominated, my little revenge is to watch his film on my cell phone. Yeah.
You know, just a big movie star. Yeah.

Speaker 1 Watching you on my cell phone. That's great.
I love that.

Speaker 1 Teddy, we love you.

Speaker 3 Love you.

Speaker 1 Enjoy the rest of your trip over there. Thank you for doing this.

Speaker 1 Can't rest. Good luck with your film.
Oh, you woke me up.

Speaker 3 This hour did wonders for me. Thank you so much.

Speaker 1 It did. Bye, guys.
Thank you. Bye-bye.
Bye-bye. Bye-bye.
Bye.

Speaker 3 No, he just lifted me up.

Speaker 1 I was just going to say,

Speaker 3 God, I love that guy's vibe.

Speaker 1 I mean, something else, huh? Easy breezy. Easy like summer morning.
I'd love to work. I don't think he and I have ever worked together.
I'd love to work with him. Says a lot about you.

Speaker 1 Well, but I mean, it's no, just that you don't, you're not sure is what it is.

Speaker 3 Well, but I guess what I'm saying is that we've had so many years in television together. I bet you

Speaker 3 we've been part of the same sort of like upfront.

Speaker 3 Yeah, or like charity, you know, coming to a telethon or whatever the fuck, you know?

Speaker 2 I do think it's funny. I do think it's a very funny thing in this town where I won't say who it is, but I ran into a

Speaker 2 person that is known in the world. And she said.

Speaker 3 Male or female, because I'll guess it.

Speaker 2 Female. And she said, I've got it.

Speaker 1 I said,

Speaker 2 I said, hey, how, I said, what's going on?

Speaker 1 She's like, have you ever been to to our house?

Speaker 2 And it's like, if I, if anybody from Chicago, where I'm from, you know, who's been inside of your house.

Speaker 1 But I don't know.

Speaker 3 I disagree with that. I've said a million times to people coming over, although I'm not much of a barometer, but, you know,

Speaker 3 I'll be surprised.

Speaker 1 You know, I'll say, like, have you not been over before?

Speaker 3 You know, because if I've been friends with somebody for a long time, you forget whether, you know, you're like over at your house or my house.

Speaker 1 He's just like assume. For sure.
Anyway, Teddy. Teddy's great.

Speaker 3 Teddy is a great guy. Teddy's great.
Teddy's great. Will, nice guest.

Speaker 1 He's so great. And yeah, and you know, Ted and Woody have their podcast, which he was alluding to, that I did the first episode of.

Speaker 2 Yes, it's very nice.

Speaker 1 By the way, now I'm taking credit. Like, I was on the first, I didn't even know.
Oh, you launched it.

Speaker 1 I launched the show that I launched.

Speaker 1 That they're doing is also on Sirius, like us.

Speaker 2 So

Speaker 2 we are right now on Sirius.

Speaker 1 We're all under the nice, beautiful roof of Sirius. Yeah.
Sirius XM. So check it out.
It's called Where Everybody Knows Your Name,

Speaker 1 which is, I guess, an allusion to

Speaker 1 alluding to something.

Speaker 2 The song, the song, the cheers song.

Speaker 1 I know, Sean. I know.

Speaker 1 You stupid ass. Right now I want to go where nobody knows my name after that.

Speaker 2 Anyway, you know, I was looking at a lot of

Speaker 1 fucking, here we go. I was looking at a lot of them.

Speaker 1 Listen to me. I know it's a good thing.
Sean, before you get into it, can I just say this? Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Speaker 1 So even if we haven't done a show in a couple of weeks. Go ahead.

Speaker 1 Yeah, yeah, go ahead.

Speaker 3 We can see you coming from across the street.

Speaker 1 I can see the ramp up. Yeah.
I can see, you know, you know, like when

Speaker 1 a soccer player gets ready to take a penalty kick? All the time, yeah. And I can, you know, they do that thing, they little sort of stutter step before they get into the ball.

Speaker 1 I can see you doing your little stutter. Stutter, stutter, stutter, stutter, stutter, step, stutter, and then you can get it.
I can hear your engines rep up, you know, like a semi-trucker.

Speaker 1 Anyway,

Speaker 1 I was looking at looking at Ted's credits. I was looking at Ted's credits, and I was like,

Speaker 2 And you tell me, you stop me when you hear something that you might want to know more about.

Speaker 2 He was on Help Me Help You. I remember that.
I remember that show.

Speaker 2 He was on Heist for two episodes. He was on something called Bye-Bye Benjamin.
Then he was on Knights of the South Bronx.

Speaker 1 Bye-bye Benjamin.

Speaker 2 And then our fucking. Was there one in there you want to know about?

Speaker 1 Tell me more about Bye-bye Benjamin. Yeah.

Speaker 1 Oh, yeah.

Speaker 1 That's the one. That was the worst.
What's it called?

Speaker 1 Still rolling. You want to go back to one?

Speaker 1 You want one more shot at that? It's called Buy.

Speaker 3 When you got to that title, you should have just hit it.

Speaker 1 I know.

Speaker 2 I was setting you up

Speaker 2 as a courtesy.

Speaker 1 What is happening inside of you? Do we need to send somebody over to the house to do like a fucking wellness check on you? What is happening? What's wrong with you?

Speaker 1 All right.

Speaker 2 There was a show called Help Me Help You, and then you did heist, and then you did a show called

Speaker 1 Bye, Bye, Benjamin.

Speaker 1 Why does it always need to go up into an octave that has never been established by any bird or

Speaker 1 Smart?

Speaker 1 Smart

Speaker 1 Less.

Speaker 1 Smartless is 100% organic and artisanally handcrafted by Michael Grant Terry, Rob Armcharv, and Bennett Barbico.

Speaker 1 Smartless

Speaker 5 For adults with Crohn's disease or ulcerative colitis symptoms, every choice matters.

Speaker 5 Trimphaya offers self-injection or intravenous infusion from the start.

Speaker 5 Trimphaya is administered as injections under the skin or infusions through a vein every four weeks, followed by injections under the skin every four or eight weeks.

Speaker 5 If your doctor decides that you can self-inject tremphaya, proper training is required.

Speaker 5 Tremphaya is a prescription medicine used to treat adults with moderately to severely active Crohn's disease and adults with moderately to severely active ulcerative colitis.

Speaker 5 Serious allergic reactions and increased risk of infections and liver problems may occur. Before treatment, your doctor should check you for infections and tuberculosis.

Speaker 5 Tell your doctor if you have an infection, flu-like symptoms, or if you need a vaccine. Explore what's possible.
Ask your doctor about tremphaya today.

Speaker 5 Call 1-800-526-7736 to learn more or visit tremphayaradio.com.

Speaker 2 You know those moments when you're trying to work through a complex problem and you can't stop until you've found the answer?

Speaker 2 That's where Claude comes in, the AI for minds that don't stop at good enough.

Speaker 2 Whether you're planning something big, researching a topic you're curious curious about, or just trying to work through a problem, Claude matches your level of curiosity.

Speaker 2 Try Claude for free at claude.ai/slash smartless and see why the world's best problem solvers choose Claude as their thinking partner.