"Paul Giamatti"

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Speaker 2 You know, Jason, have you ever edamame? Because I've ata daddy.

Speaker 3 I've never even met your mame.

Speaker 1 Oh, see, you did the joke, too.

Speaker 3 I do like, you know what I really like doing with the edamame, especially if I'm sitting across the table from my daughter's, is I like to take one of those edamame beans, like to fire, like to squeeze it and fire one of those beans right at one of my daughters.

Speaker 1 That's fun, right?

Speaker 3 And of course, you know, 16-year-old gets pissed off, but the 11-year-old, she opens up her mouth real wide and goes, yeah, try, try, try, I'll catch it.

Speaker 3 And that's fun. And then mom smacks me, and then dinner falls apart.

Speaker 2 Hey, remind me to skip sushi next time.

Speaker 1 Yeah, you should, or just wear a helmet. Welcome to Smartless.
Smart.

Speaker 1 Smart

Speaker 1 List.

Speaker 1 Smart

Speaker 1 List.

Speaker 3 What's the purple sex toy over your right shoulder?

Speaker 1 There? In the back. Keep going.

Speaker 3 The purple thing. Oh, it's just one purple thing.

Speaker 1 Right here? Even further back. Oh, this? Yeah.

Speaker 2 By the way, you know what that is?

Speaker 1 Should it be inside?

Speaker 1 Backroller. roller.

Speaker 2 That's the inside of like a like it's metal, but it's a record. It's like a sound thing.

Speaker 1 Oh,

Speaker 2 and you can also stick it up your ass.

Speaker 1 That's what we're getting at.

Speaker 2 Okay, so, but wait, I want to say something about Jason's food because I FaceTimed with Jay last week and you do eat a lot of stuff.

Speaker 2 It is kind of a joke, but it's not really because you do, for every cookie that goes in, it's like 20,000 pounds of nuts and bolts and twigs and sticks go in.

Speaker 1 That's right.

Speaker 2 but I FaceTimed you and you answered it and you were on the treadmill. And that's the other thing.
You constantly are on the treadmill, constantly.

Speaker 1 Well, we talked about it.

Speaker 3 It's not constant. It's just discipline.
It's one hour a day.

Speaker 1 No, I know, but it's a routine.

Speaker 2 And then I brought up the porn thing again because I can't believe you're the only male in the world that doesn't look at porn, but we already talked about that. And then

Speaker 3 have either one of you looked at any porn today?

Speaker 1 No. No.

Speaker 1 I don't need the eyebrows, Will.

Speaker 1 You don't need to like,

Speaker 3 what a weird question. You know, do you guys look at it daily or weekly, or what's the frequency?

Speaker 1 Again, more eyebrows.

Speaker 3 This isn't an

Speaker 3 what about is it once a week?

Speaker 2 More eyebrows. Well, I don't know, like the frequency of it, but I'm just saying that generally.

Speaker 1 Well, let's hear it.

Speaker 3 You say you don't know. Let's hear it.

Speaker 1 No, like male guys, every guy looks at point.

Speaker 2 Anyway, but the other thing was, I want to talk about the headband that you were wearing while you were running on the thing.

Speaker 1 Seems kind of corny. It was, no,

Speaker 2 I I had never seen you in that. I've seen you in other hats and stuff, but I've never seen you wear the headband while you're on the train.

Speaker 3 I still have that dumb long hair and I don't want it sweating into my eyeballs.

Speaker 2 That was astonishing. It was like Loverboy, like the 80s band or something.

Speaker 3 But it made you think of gay porn.

Speaker 1 Yeah. Yeah.

Speaker 2 No, I don't know. I just thought I'd never seen you in that headband.

Speaker 1 Will what's your word?

Speaker 1 Jason never would look at gay porn because he'd be too worried.

Speaker 1 Why? Why are my pants crowding? Yeah, why? Oh, no. Wait, what were you saying? What's my workout?

Speaker 3 Yeah, what's your workout get up?

Speaker 1 So, you know what? It's funny. Well, my hair is quite short right now, but if it's even a little bit longer, I have, it's the worst.

Speaker 1 If I'm so that I don't sweat, and I would never wear it outside because I'm embarrassed. It's old school bandana rolled and then kind of up here, and then my hair is kind of sticking behind.

Speaker 2 That's exactly what Jason was wearing.

Speaker 1 It's the worst, but I could never wear it. Like everybody who lives, kids, Alessandra, everybody looks at me like, dude, that is the worst.
I look like such a solid.

Speaker 2 Because you don't want to get zits. Is that what it is?

Speaker 3 You just don't want the hair dripping down his face.

Speaker 2 You don't want to sweat because then you get zits if you sweat on your face.

Speaker 1 Well, I'm 53.

Speaker 1 I'm pretty good on that, but

Speaker 1 it's more I just don't want to get the sweat in my face.

Speaker 1 You know what? I don't sweat out of my face.

Speaker 3 You don't sweat, period.

Speaker 1 You wet? I don't sweat out of your face. You don't have to sweat from my face.

Speaker 2 You know why?

Speaker 1 Because it's hard to sweat. I'm getting on my t-shirt.

Speaker 1 Boy, I'm getting in that t-shirt so quick i want to get to our guest because i can hear him really i feel badly for him that he's had to listen to the porn he's had to listen to the sweat i don't sweat out of my face um

Speaker 1 i don't i don't this is and he doesn't deserve it you know why because this is a guy

Speaker 1 i use do you like the term actor's actor i don't like he's the kind of actor and the way i look at it is he's the kind of actor that all us actors look up to. Yeah.

Speaker 1 You're like, yeah, this is a guy who knows what he's doing. I'm nervous.

Speaker 2 Well, the second you say actor's actor, you know, they're friendly.

Speaker 1 Yeah. And they're just like, they've just done so much stuff and they've done the dramatic stuff and they've done the comedy and they're good at all of it.

Speaker 1 And you don't begrudge them because you're like, they're so good at it that you're like, yeah, they do. And this is a guy who's got, he's got an Academy Award nomination.

Speaker 1 He's got, he's won two Golden Globes. He's won a Primetime Emmy.
He's won four SAG Awards. He's been in every imaginable.

Speaker 1 We were talking about one of his movies last night at dinner after you left, Jason,

Speaker 1 because one of his co-stars was was there from that film from years ago.

Speaker 1 He's been in, he's single-handedly responsible for the death of the Merlot business.

Speaker 1 He's played John Adams. He played Howard Steiner.
Oh, I love him.

Speaker 1 I love him. Guys, I love Mr.
Paul Giovanni.

Speaker 1 Oh, now, did I do this right? Okay. Yes.
Hello. Lord.
Yes. Well done.
I love you. Hello.
I love you guys. I absolutely love you.
Look at you. Fantastic.
Look at you. Wait a minute.
Talk about it.

Speaker 1 Can you hear me? Can you see me? Is this all like okay?

Speaker 1 Jason, Paul, Jason's very confused right now because of all the books behind you. Look at that wallpaper behind you.
It looks so textured. It's a green screen.

Speaker 1 It's fantastic. Wait a minute.

Speaker 1 That's a moth trap. That's actually a moth trap.
Sure. Very effective.
Works like a charm. So, listener,

Speaker 3 he's got at least 6,000 books behind him. And you've read all of them, I'll bet.

Speaker 1 No, no, I I haven't read them. A lot of them.
I haven't read. Well, some of them.
I've read some of them. Jason, name a book, quick.

Speaker 1 Where the sidewalk is. So no pornography, no books.

Speaker 1 It's pretty dry.

Speaker 3 It's just sugar and salt for me.

Speaker 3 Those are my vices.

Speaker 2 I want to know about the books.

Speaker 1 Why the books, Paul? Behind you.

Speaker 1 I have a kind of manic thing. Honest to God, I have a kind of collecting mania with books.

Speaker 1 I put all my manic behavior into books. I get that.
And you know what?

Speaker 1 If you had asked me to describe, say what would paul giamani's background be i probably would have said a bookshelf brimming with books i probably

Speaker 1 given a few guesses or or a bunch of different glasses frames

Speaker 1 or a selection of warby parker just all back there paul do you have a favorite bookstore

Speaker 1 uh in in new york i like going to the store i'm assuming you're in new york yes i am i like going to the strand bookstore that's a classic bookstore it holds up there's a good one out in la called illiad books that's a great iliad is very good.

Speaker 2 I know that one. But

Speaker 1 I was just at the strand two weeks ago, and it's really holding up, isn't it? It is. It's still there.
We still got it. Yeah, it's still there, which is nice.

Speaker 3 Wait, now, who was so, so what was the film that you were referencing last night that one of our dinner guests was in?

Speaker 1 Private Parts with Mary McCormick. Oh, yeah.

Speaker 1 Yeah. Absolutely.
Wow, that is deep cut. And we were talking about, God, I love that movie, Paul.
You're so great.

Speaker 1 Thanks. I appreciate it.
It's a good movie. It's a really good movie.
Betty Thomas directed that, right? Yeah. Have you worked with her?

Speaker 3 I have not, but I would like to.

Speaker 1 So

Speaker 1 let me ask you about Private Parts now that we're on it. How did that movie come about? Like, were you a fan or did you listen to Howard leading up to that at all?

Speaker 1 Like a little bit, you know, but not much. I wasn't any kind of big, because I didn't.

Speaker 1 I didn't realize, for instance, that that guy I was playing was a real guy until about halfway into my little tenure doing the movie, which was a couple of weeks.

Speaker 1 And they said to me, how'd you nail this guy so well? And I said, this is an actual guy and they were like yeah

Speaker 1 and I said I feel terrible now because I've made I'm made this guy look like the biggest asshole on the planet I thought this is a real person his children are gonna see this his wife is gonna see this this is horrible and I and it got me a little nervous I thought this is terrible but so did you meet him No, at one time I had to do in promoting something a few years later.

Speaker 1 You know, they would like, I was always the guy. They'd make me do the drive time radio shit.
They'd be like, will you do the promotion on the drive time radio, guys? And I'd like to say that.

Speaker 3 When did you start saying no to that?

Speaker 1 I shortly out only a couple years ago,

Speaker 1 but it was always me they may do that. So, because of private parts, so I was always talking to some fucking guys in Oakland or something like that.

Speaker 1 And one day they patched him through, they put him on with me, and it was just incredibly uncomfortable.

Speaker 3 But you struck me as a fella who's pretty diligent about researching your parts and whatnot. Are you

Speaker 1 erroneous mistake?

Speaker 1 It depends. Sometimes I am.
Sometimes it depends, But sometimes I do a lot of research and sometimes I just don't.

Speaker 1 And what is it?

Speaker 3 If you're playing a non-fiction character, you'll do the research and maybe if it's a side picture.

Speaker 1 It depends. Like I did a boxing picture.
I did a boxing picture and I was interested. Cinderella Manner.
Yeah, so good. And you were nominated for an Academy Award, which I was.

Speaker 1 I was. Thank you.
Yes, thank you. And I wanted to learn about how to wrap.
guys' hands and I wanted to learn all that stuff. And I learned all these old school tricks.

Speaker 1 They would hold a big cold silver dollar against a guy's bruise while they was fighting. I learned all that kind of stuff.

Speaker 1 Sean, you could have taught him because you're pretty good at wrapping guys' hands around. Well, around

Speaker 1 you later. Wait, what do you mean?

Speaker 2 What do you mean, the silver dollar? What are you talking about?

Speaker 1 It's like an end swell, right? Guys would get an end swell, meaning like

Speaker 3 that's like the real thing that they use to smear out a swollen eye or something.

Speaker 3 It's like a metal square that's got like a little ring on it.

Speaker 1 Yes, that's right. And in the old school, because that movie I did set in the 30s, they didn't have those things.
They would just have a freezing cold silver dollar and

Speaker 1 they push it against the guy's face.

Speaker 2 Oh, just to take the swelling down.

Speaker 1 Correct. Will,

Speaker 2 you got anything for Enswell?

Speaker 1 What is Enswell? Oswell. I think that's Oswell.

Speaker 3 But, Paul, but then

Speaker 3 what about my idea that you may be very, very well trained? I'm assuming you went to

Speaker 3 a Juilliard guy, a Yale guy.

Speaker 1 I went to Yale. I went to the Yale School of Drama.
Yes.

Speaker 3 Now, wasn't our friend Laura Linney over there?

Speaker 1 She went to the Juilliard, I believe.

Speaker 3 Was she Yale as well, maybe?

Speaker 1 God, I should know that. No, she went from Juilliard, actually.
She was Juilliard.

Speaker 2 Yeah.

Speaker 2 Hey, Jason, you remember you were in Ozark with her?

Speaker 1 Yeah, that's right. You were in the television's office.
Do you remember that? I've never been to Ozark. How was that? Did you enjoy that with her? What's that? She's completely blanked it.

Speaker 1 Yeah, I only can remember just an hour ago. No, she's about the best ever.
She is the best. So Paul, so you went to, you mentioned, so you went to Yale.
You were, you're, you're from New Haven.

Speaker 1 You actually were born there, right? No way. Yes, I was.
And your dad was, your dad was a professor there, ended up, ended up being, being the president of Yale. And

Speaker 1 oh my God,

Speaker 1 did your mom teach at Yale too?

Speaker 1 No, she taught at a private school in New Haven. Right, so your mom was a teacher.

Speaker 1 So both of his parents are in the hands of Yale tattoos.

Speaker 3 You should have a Yale tattoo.

Speaker 1 I should. I should have a big, I don't.
I should have a bulldog

Speaker 1 on my ass or a big y right on the side you should always have a bulldog on my ass

Speaker 2 but wait a minute what about um

Speaker 2 go back though before in order to get into yale you couldn't just it wasn't like your mom and dad were like come on i got you like you had a like high school you probably excelled right i did pretty good yeah i was i was i was pretty good academically yeah yeah

Speaker 1 did you go to high school in new haven No, I went to a high school. I went to a prep school.
I didn't board. I went to a boarding school, but I didn't board there.
So I went, you know.

Speaker 1 Willie, you went to a boarding school, didn't you? Yeah, did you? Yeah. I did up in Canada.
And then, and the day students, we call them, because it was all boys, but they were called day boys. Yeah.

Speaker 1 Day boys. Sean, anything? Careful, careful, Sean.

Speaker 1 I mean, this whole episode is. It's really, you're going to get a letter where

Speaker 1 you're going to

Speaker 1 be.

Speaker 1 Is it Canadian boarding school? Is it as like horrendous as the boarding schools seem to be in England? Well, no, but back then, did they cane you there?

Speaker 1 Did they like give you a good sound, good sound thrashing if you, you know? They didn't even bother grabbing the cane. They just went with the hand.
I'm not kidding. Easy shit.

Speaker 1 Yeah, I see it smacked in the back of the head.

Speaker 2 Oh, yeah. Are you serious? You used to get hit?

Speaker 1 Really? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I got hit in the back of the head a bunch.

Speaker 1 Was this like a Catholic school? Was it like Jesuits? It's an old school. It's a, it's a, uh, I went to this school that's like a very old school, sort of British-style boarding school.

Speaker 1 At the time, it's now Coetten. It's very different, and it's all changed.
And so I'm, but at the time, it was very much a old English-style all-boys boarding school.

Speaker 1 And our, our sort of brother's school was this school in Scotland called Gordonston, where, you know,

Speaker 1 a lot of the royal family went, et cetera, et cetera. So we had some members of those

Speaker 1 types of people came over to

Speaker 1 and went to my school as well. So the then Prince of Spain,

Speaker 1 Felipe

Speaker 1 of Spain. He's now the king of Spain,

Speaker 1 went to my school, yeah.

Speaker 3 So you struggled a bunch growing up, did you, Will?

Speaker 1 Well, I didn't.

Speaker 1 I had nothing to do with that.

Speaker 1 How did you eat? I was

Speaker 1 starving all the time. That's good.
Did you have a dad? I was a slow man on the total. Did people harass the Prince of Spain? Did you know the Prince of Spain?

Speaker 1 Yeah, I did. Boy, this is a terrible sentence, but he and I were on the same ski team.

Speaker 1 And I got bused.

Speaker 3 I got bussed to a school in downtown Los Angeles.

Speaker 1 Yeah, okay.

Speaker 2 Yeah, and I had a walk to school with no food.

Speaker 1 Yeah. No food.
No shoes, right, Sean?

Speaker 2 Both ways. No shoes.

Speaker 1 But anyway, we're back. So we could be Yale and

Speaker 1 the Prince of Spain. But

Speaker 1 your dad was a professor in the becoming president of Yale. So that I think that does help because I know other people who

Speaker 1 have parents were professional. Yeah, but I don't know what takes you so far.

Speaker 3 You must have done very well in high school.

Speaker 1 I did pretty good in high school. I was a bright kid.

Speaker 3 SAT score, I'll bet, was pretty good, and your essays and all that?

Speaker 1 I think probably they must have been. I don't remember what my essays entailed.
I don't remember what they were about.

Speaker 1 What were the extracurriculars going? They must have been pleasing. My extracurricular, that's interesting.
I worked on the school newspaper. I drew cartoons.
Really? School newspaper. Yes.

Speaker 1 And

Speaker 1 what else did I do? I did some theater there. And in the kind of the latter end of it, I did some theater.

Speaker 3 Were your parents more interested or excited about you becoming an academic or were they okay with you becoming an actor?

Speaker 1 I think they were okay with me becoming an actor.

Speaker 1 I think the extra, because everybody in my family going back was teachers. Like,

Speaker 1 it was ridiculous. Everybody's a fucking teacher.
So I think the idea, the assumption was one of their three children was going to be a teacher. And my brother and sister didn't do it.

Speaker 1 So, I think they thought this guy will do it. And then I just didn't.

Speaker 1 I could see, couldn't you see Paul in an Alexander Payne film playing a New Yorker cartoonist?

Speaker 1 And I don't know what the story is yet, but I'm working on it. I'm going to call.

Speaker 3 But now, wait, I might embarrass myself here, but didn't, where did you not do Crumb, the Crumb movie?

Speaker 1 Am I confused? I did a movie called American Splendor about a guy, this guy, Harvey Peeker, and Crumb did the drawings for his stuff because he couldn't draw. He couldn't draw.
Yes, sir. Yes, sir.

Speaker 1 You're welcome. So you're close to draw it all.
I'm very close.

Speaker 1 Were you able to use some of your

Speaker 1 talent as a cartoonist whilst doing that film? Nope, he couldn't draw, so I couldn't

Speaker 1 just

Speaker 1 drew for him.

Speaker 1 Yes. No, I didn't get to do any of that.

Speaker 1 I wish I had wanted to be a cartoonist like an animator was what i kind of wanted to do but that's did you know that guy was real when you were doing that movie i did yeah he did yes indeed i did i yes i i was yeah no i was i was i was confronted with the actual man so there was no question he was real and and he was

Speaker 1 doodle do you doodle still to this day yeah not as much i wish i did i i don't draw as much as i used to i think when i decided to be an actor i stopped drawing and it was a just a kind of different part of my life.

Speaker 1 And I stopped drawing. I still do sometimes, but nothing.

Speaker 3 Yeah, what is your go-to doodle? I think everybody's got one thing that they do know how to draw well.

Speaker 1 Yeah, well, I do a lot of, it's faces mostly, and it's kind of angry old men, mustachioed old men, balls.

Speaker 1 You have portraits of Jason in your house.

Speaker 1 Exactly.

Speaker 3 My 11-year-old, a daughter, is very, very good at drawing. And I was looking at some of her work the other day and I said to her, I said, I said, honey,

Speaker 3 you know, I notice a lot of the faces that you draw, there's a lot of tears coming out

Speaker 1 of the eyes. Is everything okay? She goes, yeah, dad.

Speaker 3 And I go, no, no, I mean, I just, you know, I'm trying to be a good dad here, and I'm just saying that that's a flare for me. And I just want to make, just want to check in with you.

Speaker 3 She's like, no, it's just really fun to draw.

Speaker 1 Jason, do you think that she was

Speaker 1 so shocked that you noticed anybody other than yourself?

Speaker 3 That I knew my way to her.

Speaker 1 Out of your own that didn't have to do with show business. Something that wasn't stuck to the front of the television that that I noticed.
Yeah.

Speaker 1 She was at the Dodgers, and that it wasn't Dodgers or Dolph-related.

Speaker 2 Do you still get a chance to do theater? Do you like doing it? Do you prefer, like, now that you are on this trajectory of 800 movies and TV shows, you're like,

Speaker 1 I haven't done a play in a while.

Speaker 1 I do like it. I do prefer it.
You're doing a play right now.

Speaker 3 Yo, Sean would like for you to take over for him.

Speaker 1 What do you think?

Speaker 1 He's very tired.

Speaker 1 You know, Paul actually was quite famously in a play with a very good friend of ours and a friend of the podcast, Billy Crudup in Arcadia years ago. Oh, no, right.
Oh, was he? Yeah.

Speaker 1 I did a couple of plays with Billy. I did three plays with Billy.
Oh, wow.

Speaker 3 Billy just took $15 off me this weekend because his Yankees took two out of three from my Dodgers.

Speaker 1 Oh, you're gambling with Billy.

Speaker 3 But I only sent him $14. I kept a dollar back for the damage that

Speaker 3 Aaron Judge did to our bullpen fence. Did you see any of that footage?

Speaker 1 He ran right through the wall, taking a scoring fly ball away from us.

Speaker 1 Aaron Judge had a very exciting weekend here in Los Angeles. You know, obviously this podcast is airing later than that.
But Paul, I don't know if you're a big baseball fan.

Speaker 1 I know that baseball reds in the family. It does.
I'm not a huge baseball fan, but I occasionally follow things like this happening.

Speaker 1 Well, tell Sean, because I don't know, Sean, you know Paul's involvement with baseball, which is quite, you know, goes without saying.

Speaker 1 And we can cut it too if you don't want to talk about it. No, no, no, no, no.
After being in academia, my father ended up in professional baseball. And he

Speaker 1 ran the National Baseball League not for very long.

Speaker 1 And then he was the commissioner of baseball also not for very long. He was the commissioner of baseball.
He was a commissioner of Major League Baseball for like.

Speaker 2 He was like the god of baseball.

Speaker 1 Basically. Well, yeah, kind of.
That's crazy.

Speaker 1 It is crazy. And so he didn't, he didn't, he did neither one of those things for very long.

Speaker 1 Did you go to a lot of games in that time? Was it because it was kind of the family business in a way? Yeah, I mean, I did. I went to some playoff games.
Now I can't even remember what ones I went to.

Speaker 1 I wish I did. I wish I was paying more attention.
I wasn't paying that much attention. But I did go to some.
Yeah. And

Speaker 1 but, but not enough. I wish I'd gone.

Speaker 2 That's why I asked you about extracurricular in high school. Like, you know, like, like, I was on the swimming team.

Speaker 1 I was on the swimming team.

Speaker 2 Swimming team. Oh, okay.

Speaker 1 Swimming team.

Speaker 1 That's about as, well, is it interesting? It is

Speaker 1 it's like to picture you swimming in high school is kind of interesting it is interesting you know I had hair I had hair I had a little speedo so you did have hair I did have hair I actually had hair but for swimming you know you would shave you would actually shave your head and stuff of course yeah they would shave your whole shave you probably shave your whole body you shave your whole body right shave your whole body yes did you um

Speaker 1 Paul,

Speaker 1 you just said I wasn't paying attention, and I was actually thinking about this concept recently, about this idea of as we get older, and I've been doing a lot more reflecting lately about this idea of like this stuff.

Speaker 1 I just, I feel like now I'm much more aware or cognizant and I want to absorb everything much more now than I did when I was a younger man.

Speaker 1 All these things that we took for granted, these experiences that we would have. Yes.
Right. Have you guys had any of that recently? Well, but even just saying what I was saying to you, I regret that.

Speaker 1 I mean, I was in college and I was kind of checked out and I was sort of like, eh, not dealing with my dad and stuff like that.

Speaker 1 And I very much regret it now because he passed away very shortly after doing all of that. So I definitely regret that.
And

Speaker 1 very much so. But I very much feel the same way that I need to be taking everything in way more than I did.

Speaker 1 And I wonder if my kid, my kid will remember shit or regret shit the same way I did, but hopefully not. How old is your kid? How old's your kid? He's 22.
He just graduated from college. Oh, wow.

Speaker 1 So he's the age I was when my father died. I don't want to bring the whole show down by talking about my father's death.
No, this is good. But he's the age my father was.

Speaker 1 He's the age my father was when my father died. So it's interesting to me to think.
Yeah.

Speaker 3 I remember I worked with Marcus, with your brother, on a very, very shitty football movie.

Speaker 1 No, I remember that movie very well. I first enjoyed it.

Speaker 3 I remember, yeah, I remember just dorking out with him about your dad and just

Speaker 3 pickpicking his brain about it.

Speaker 1 He's a huge baseball fan. He's like a fanatic.
He's such a good dude. I really like my time.

Speaker 3 He is a good dude.

Speaker 1 I loved that movie. What was the movie?

Speaker 3 It was called Necessary Roughness, this football movie back in the day with Scott Bakula.

Speaker 1 Scott Bakula. No, Sid Bad goes on.
Yes, Sid Bad, Kathy Ireland. Kathy Ireland.

Speaker 3 Who else was in that?

Speaker 1 Yeah, it was a lot of fun.

Speaker 3 Victor Elizondo.

Speaker 1 Victor Elizondo. That's right.

Speaker 1 Jay, did you take the moment during Necessary Roughness and really absorb it?

Speaker 3 Oh, I sure did absorb it.

Speaker 1 Wait, well, wait, we're talking about two different things now.

Speaker 1 What were you absorbing?

Speaker 3 Well, we shot it in Dallas, Texas. There was a lot of off time.

Speaker 3 They paid some nice ballet in Dallas.

Speaker 1 Absolutely.

Speaker 1 We'll be right back.

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Is that stupid? I think it's great.

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Speaker 4 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?

Speaker 1 That's right, ma'am. You have rooms 201 and 709.

Speaker 4 No, we cannot be five floors away from our kids uh the doors have double locks they'll be fine when you want connecting rooms confirmed before you arrive it matters where you stay welcome to hilton i see your connecting rooms are already confirmed hilton for this day

Speaker 1 all right back to the show

Speaker 2 paul since we're kind of going through and i want to there's so many movies we could you know because behind every movie there's a there's a story about making it and stuff like that i could talk to you for hours about so many things that i love you and but um is there one?

Speaker 2 Because we're kind of like going through them now. Is there one that stands out that's really, really, really meaningful to you that you will, speaking of

Speaker 2 holding on to things and remembering things, that really, really sticks to your soul and you have great memories of?

Speaker 1 Well, there's a lot of them I really remember nicely that way, you know, and it's not necessarily the movie, it's the experience. Experiences.
Right, right.

Speaker 2 Is there one in particular?

Speaker 1 There's a movie I did called The Illusionist, which is this sort of, it's about a magician and stuff like that.

Speaker 1 I really liked making that movie. It was in Eastern Europe.
It was in Prague, which was fun to be in.

Speaker 1 And

Speaker 3 I enjoyed making that movie. That was for Nolan, was it?

Speaker 1 No, that's

Speaker 1 the prestige. Yes.

Speaker 1 At the same time, two magician pictures came out

Speaker 1 simultaneously. At the same time.

Speaker 3 How did you like working in Prague?

Speaker 1 Man, that is a beautiful time. I loved it.
It was fantastic.

Speaker 3 What film do you think, and this would be a very hard thing for you to answer, but which film do you think was the most helpful to you in your career?

Speaker 1 Because

Speaker 3 I feel like every single job you've done has been extremely prestigious and really, really like,

Speaker 3 did Will say you've been nominated only once for an Oscar?

Speaker 1 For an Oscar.

Speaker 3 But I feel like every single job.

Speaker 2 But like 12 Years a Slave, Romeo and Juliet saving Mr. Banks, Dalton.

Speaker 1 Well, those are all amazing. And 12 Years a Slave was an amazing movie to me.
Yeah, one of those really like

Speaker 1 that.

Speaker 3 But any one of those jobs, you would think an actor would go, okay, now my career is made.

Speaker 1 Right. You know? I I guess so.
But I mean, I think something like Private Parts actually was the first time I ever did anything with real.

Speaker 2 Just for my sister, Tracy, Private Parts is the Howard Stern movie about his life, just so short.

Speaker 1 And where Howard, Howard, really convincingly and to great acclaim, plays himself, which is very good. He was

Speaker 1 really good.

Speaker 1 He was really great at it.

Speaker 1 He was terrific. Paul, it does occur to me that Private Parts actually was a kind of a kicking off point.

Speaker 1 Of course, you were a working actor, but that kind of opened you up to a whole because it was such a big commercial success. Yeah, I'd only really done theater stuff up until then.

Speaker 1 I'd done little bit parts and a lot of stuff and a lot of TV shows and TV movies and stuff like that. So that was the first time I had anything substantial to do in a movie.

Speaker 1 Did that lead to Saving Private Ryan?

Speaker 1 I don't remember which one of those came first. Maybe.
But Saving Private Ryan was...

Speaker 3 I was years after Private Parts.

Speaker 1 Was it? I don't even... This is what's weird.
It's like, and then this is where I feel like my mind, my brain is going.

Speaker 3 You're also a guy, I bet every single film would love to have you be a part of that film because of what is a part of.

Speaker 1 You're a year apart. I just looked it up.
Really?

Speaker 3 What it says to the community or the industry about what our film is. Like, we have Paul Giamatti in this film, okay? So don't even submit your, you know,

Speaker 3 this person or that person.

Speaker 1 I appreciate that, and I like it, but I don't see it. I mean, that's very humble of you to say.
I feel the same thing about you, gentlemen. I feel the same way about you.
Don't even try.

Speaker 1 No, no, I'm not. I'm sincere and honest.
I really do.

Speaker 3 I'm a little bit of a moth protector back there.

Speaker 1 When they say I made a movie, they're like, oh, great. It's going straight to video.
That's good. Now we know it's going straight to video.
I've been in plenty of stuff.

Speaker 1 I've been in plenty of stuff like that. That's for sure.
But, Paul, you know,

Speaker 1 what's funny is...

Speaker 1 And I love, and I feel like there have been all these, through the decades that you've been working in film, there have been all these motions, like Saving,

Speaker 1 Private Parts,

Speaker 1 and then in the 2000s, it was sideways, which really

Speaker 1 was so, and I joked that it killed the Merlot business single-handedly. It did, actually, but it kind of did, right? It did, yeah.
It actually did, I think. Yeah, see, how so?

Speaker 1 I've seen that, I've seen that movie 50 times because of how disparagingly you guys talk about Merlot, yeah, that it's just sort of like for the Philistines, yeah.

Speaker 1 Oh, dude, dude, what, yeah, what Paul,

Speaker 1 you're even at the mention of Merlot, the look of disgusting, guy loses his shit. The guy goes crazy.
Yeah.

Speaker 1 Which, yeah. I have no idea.
Yeah. Yeah.
And I knew nothing about wine. I know nothing about wine.
I don't, you know, I don't know. You don't drink?

Speaker 1 Not particularly, no. Yeah.

Speaker 1 Kind of gives me a headache.

Speaker 2 What's the drink that you like?

Speaker 1 What do you like?

Speaker 1 I like tequila. I like Mezcal.
Those are the two things that I like a lot.

Speaker 1 Paul, is it a problem? Go ahead, Rebecca. Drinking? Yeah.

Speaker 1 That's true.

Speaker 1 Do you love it? At this juncture, I do love it. And at this juncture, it's not a problem.
I still still am in the loving. I'm still in the love phase.

Speaker 1 I'm in the honeymoon phase still with Tequila and Miss Cal. So

Speaker 1 everything's fine. I took a sniff out of somebody's.

Speaker 3 Somebody had a beautiful glass of tequila on the rocks yesterday that I took a sniff of.

Speaker 3 I swear to God, I went into a time machine.

Speaker 1 You've never watched me.

Speaker 1 By the way, I watched Jason put his nose in the glass.

Speaker 3 I was knee-deep into my 20s. I was pretty fast on a highway, and there were all kinds of things in my pocket.

Speaker 1 You had a candle on the dashboard. Candle on the dashboard.
Remember that?

Speaker 1 Paul Jason used to drive with a lit candle on his dashboard.

Speaker 1 Why? Because he wanted the cops to stop him so bad.

Speaker 3 I should have put a kojak light on my

Speaker 3 roof.

Speaker 1 You should have had the little light to just pop up on the roof.

Speaker 1 Why are you driving a lit candle? What was the idea? Just for nighttime or was it lit all the time?

Speaker 3 Paul, it was just, you guys, I just, I was blind to my doucheiness and I was looking for Atmo.

Speaker 1 Jason,

Speaker 2 when you smelled that tequila thing and it was like a time machine,

Speaker 2 is there like a desire to drink it? Are you just like, yeah, it was nice to smell it, but I don't have any desire?

Speaker 3 Yeah, no, not anymore because I did it. And I was thinking about it.

Speaker 3 At the time, I was thinking, let's do this until you're sick of it because you don't want to be doing this when you're in your 40s or 50s.

Speaker 1 Oh, that's interesting.

Speaker 1 At the level I thought. That's what you thought at the time.
At the time, you thought that you thought that was the thing. Really? You had that foresight to say, get it out of the way now.
Yeah.

Speaker 1 Can I be honest with you? That's how I feel about when I.

Speaker 2 I'm going to eat make sure a little bit, too. Whenever I make a cake, I eat so much.
I'm not even kidding. I eat so much of it so that I don't ever want it for a long, long time.

Speaker 1 It also makes all the cake go away so you can't have any more.

Speaker 1 No, do you gentlemen, do you drink at all now?

Speaker 3 I don't drink anymore. Willie, the three of us don't.

Speaker 1 No, I don't. None of you drink anymore.
That's how. Sean doesn't.
No.

Speaker 3 Wait a second.

Speaker 1 Sean, you don't drink? How do I not know that?

Speaker 2 Jay, because of, because New Year's Eve two years ago.

Speaker 1 Oh, right.

Speaker 1 When you're playing games.

Speaker 1 Sean was doing bit. Paul, this is true.
We were at our friend's house, and we kept pimping Sean out to do various bits. So he's standing up.
It's true.

Speaker 1 And Sean's doing bits, and he's dancing, and he's doing all these moves, and he's doing impressions of people. And then we're all sitting at the table like a monkey, but he was hilarious.

Speaker 1 We were dying. And then all of a sudden, he wasn't around.
And somebody goes, where's Sean? And he went to the hospital. Oh, my God.
Yeah, he had Scotty Jeff. Do you have palpitations? What happened?

Speaker 1 Did you have like worse?

Speaker 2 I get AFib brought on by alcohol.

Speaker 1 Oh, my God.

Speaker 2 So I would just deal with it. I wouldn't know when it comes on.
Like, it would come on once or twice a year.

Speaker 1 I could get a grocery store. So you would have it regularly.

Speaker 2 Like, once or twice a year. And I could be at the grocery store.
I could be at a party. I could be anywhere.

Speaker 1 I could be at church because I go to church.

Speaker 1 He's got his own entrance at Cedars. He's got a special bath.

Speaker 1 It's in the dock.

Speaker 1 And now Jimmy Kimmel calls me paddles because I went over so many times to the ER and they would, you know, clear, conk and get my heart back to regular yeah and then he FaceTimed back to the party and he says guys I'm okay it's just on schedule here so you should shoot quietly you just quietly took yourself off to the hospital yeah yeah that's beautiful his set was done that's very thoughtful of you he's been known to he's Paul he's been known to in the middle of the night

Speaker 1 go to the hospital and not even wake his husband Scotty up and then come home and then he tells Scotty the next day that he was at the hospital for

Speaker 1 because you've had these heart palpitations. Well, amongst others.

Speaker 2 Atrial fibrillation. But amongst others.

Speaker 3 He's a hypochondriac. He likes to be taken care of.

Speaker 1 That doesn't sound like hype, but this sounds like a real thing. No, no, Paul.

Speaker 3 They had his own podcast called Hypochondriac. Okay? He's a hypochondriac.

Speaker 1 He loves it. I understand.
I think I used to be one. I'm kind of a recovering one.
I'm not as bad as I used to be. Really? Yes, I used to be.
How'd you get over it? I'm not exactly sure.

Speaker 1 I think I outgrew it. Well, what is a hypochondriac?

Speaker 3 Like, officially, it's somebody who's irrationally afraid of germs. No, no, no.

Speaker 1 Or worried about their health, concerned with their health. Yeah.

Speaker 1 And a kind of constant monitoring of your health. And making sort of these leaps if they have a sort of a, and

Speaker 1 I fight against, I think everybody has that

Speaker 1 to a certain degree. And I've had it over the years.
I'm older you get too.

Speaker 1 And I had this thing recently where I had, Jay, I was telling you about, remember I didn't play golf and I was had this sort of pain. I was like, and I'm like, you know what, motherfucker?

Speaker 1 It's just gas and relax and give yourself a break. Oh, yeah, what was it? Away.
You're joking. Oh, really? Like in that moment, it just vanished.

Speaker 1 And I just took it easy for a couple days, and I was just like, you know what? Just stop giving it so much fucking credence and stop thinking about yourself and doing something.

Speaker 3 But you also said you had a three-minute fart that

Speaker 3 on the backside of that, you felt great.

Speaker 1 That is true. So

Speaker 2 if I eat hummus, that happens.

Speaker 1 You have a terrible gas.

Speaker 3 The valve just gets stuck open

Speaker 2 for the longest one forever.

Speaker 1 Yeah.

Speaker 1 I would love to go with you to the Mediterranean somewhere and just get you into onto a hummus diet and watch it all fall apart.

Speaker 1 I would be.

Speaker 1 Please excuse my friend. I'm so sorry, Paul.

Speaker 1 That's amazing. Paul, I was going to,

Speaker 1 the other thing I wanted to bring up was. Sure.
Yes, please. And going through all, and I don't want to go through all your credits, but one of the things.
God knows.

Speaker 1 And I've been such a fan of yours for a long time. And I even, and I'm a fan of yours despite the fact that you're friends with Thoreau.
And Oh, that's like

Speaker 1 I've made a little bit of Thoreau.

Speaker 3 He's one of our best friends, but we love to throw as much at him as we can.

Speaker 1 We really should have a lot of people.

Speaker 3 I like to have your best material now.

Speaker 1 No, that's interesting. Throw it at us.
Beautiful. No, no, no.
I haven't seen him in ages. I haven't seen him in a long time.

Speaker 3 You're better off.

Speaker 1 Probably. I think I probably am too.

Speaker 1 He adamantly will not return my calls, my texts, nothing.

Speaker 1 Does he do this to you guys?

Speaker 3 No, you may have a wrong number for him.

Speaker 3 He's actually pretty good.

Speaker 3 He likes contact and connection.

Speaker 3 He loves doing text bits.

Speaker 1 Not losing.

Speaker 3 He loses bits on the text.

Speaker 1 Not with me. Not with me.
He doesn't. Jason gets really mad with text bits, I've noticed.
Well, it's just, I don't want to participate.

Speaker 1 I mean,

Speaker 3 I'm happy to observe, but then I'm constantly feeling like, oh, God, everyone is contributing and emojiing and double-click thumbs up if you're doing it.

Speaker 3 And if I don't, I'm a dick.

Speaker 3 I hope that people just assume I put my phone down.

Speaker 1 No, no, I know that. I feel the same way.

Speaker 3 But I put my phone down. And so, right?

Speaker 1 So that they just think I'm not seeing it, right? I agree. Yeah, I agree.

Speaker 2 Pauli, any good.

Speaker 1 Oh, we got to have a Polly now. Yeah.
Yeah. Paulie.
No, that's fantastic.

Speaker 1 I want to be a Paulie. No, no, I appreciate it.

Speaker 2 Give me one good theater story. Just something went horribly wrong.

Speaker 1 That's a tough thing.

Speaker 3 Did you ever forget your lines, Paul? Go ahead, Sean.

Speaker 1 No,

Speaker 1 a guy, speaking of heart attacks, a guy had, I was doing a show once, and a guy, I was in a little black box experimental theater in Seattle, where I lived, where I moved out to Seattle, and I started acting out there.

Speaker 1 And a guy

Speaker 1 got up in the second row. I was watching him, and I was on stage doing this long monologue, 40-minute monologue.
Oh, my God. Doing the monologue and watching the guy.
Yeah, that was.

Speaker 1 No, I had an eye on the guy because he was getting really, he was getting really dopey looking.

Speaker 1 And I thought something's wrong with this guy. No, it was close quarters, a little,

Speaker 1 shitty little experimental theater. And he got up and climbed over the guy in front of him, came up on stage, pissed and shot himself, and dropped.

Speaker 1 No way.

Speaker 1 And he'd had a heart attack. I didn't realize he'd had a heart attack until, and I was playing.
You thought it was just your performance?

Speaker 1 Well,

Speaker 1 people thought it was the same, because in the performance, I was playing a,

Speaker 1 what do you call it? The guy who puts his hands, you know, faith healer. A healer.
A healer. I was playing a healer.
And, you know, and I suck at improving and things like that.

Speaker 1 I could have, it could have been a golden moment for me, but I didn't. But I sort of knelt down and they came up and got the guy off.

Speaker 1 I heard later, actually years later, I didn't even know that he'd had a heart attack, a small heart attack.

Speaker 1 No way.

Speaker 1 That's about it, Sean. That's not a great idea.
Wait a minute, wait a second. That's amazing.
That's amazing. Like one of the best ones we've ever had.
And you're like, I don't know if I got anything.

Speaker 1 I had a guy having having a lot of time. Shitting and pissing himself was the reason.

Speaker 3 Now, is that common, by the way, when you have a heart attack to empty?

Speaker 1 I think he was also kind of having a... Yes, that's true.
Is it? Do you evacuate fully? I mean,

Speaker 1 you have a cardiac event?

Speaker 3 I've never heard about pooing when you have a heart attack.

Speaker 1 I think

Speaker 1 it can happen.

Speaker 2 Well, yeah,

Speaker 2 you might lose

Speaker 2 your faculties or whatever.

Speaker 1 But that's just

Speaker 3 a whole different thing, though.

Speaker 1 I think he did, yes. Yeah, okay.

Speaker 2 Well, he was on stage with you. Did he?

Speaker 1 He was on stage with me for a while. Yeah.
That's fine.

Speaker 1 I don't know if there's anybody who enjoys pooping or talking about it more than Bacon. Baby says to me today, he texts me, he goes, Hey, can you play golf on Thursday?

Speaker 1 I said, No, I can't because I'm getting a colonoscopy on Friday. So Thursday is my prep day.
And I said, Let me know. I'm going to be at home in that prep phase.

Speaker 1 And I go, Let me know if you want to come by and observe. And he wrote,

Speaker 1 Very kind.

Speaker 1 What's the latest to let you know?

Speaker 1 I'm just not sure if my Thursday is going to fill up, you know.

Speaker 1 You finally had one? Did you have it? I'm having it this week. I'm on Friday.
Oh, you are? Yeah. It's actually fantastic.
I can tell you, I enjoy the hell out of it. It's a really, I enjoy it.

Speaker 3 That little twilight thing they send you off into, and you wake up real chatty, too. I heard a bunch of jokes for the doctor.

Speaker 1 And then the rest of the day,

Speaker 1 are you exhausted the rest of the day? You're good. But you feel fresh.
I felt very fresh.

Speaker 2 Paul, I've I've said this on this podcast a couple of times. You will need a shower, Will.
But when I got my colonoscopy and my bare ass was hanging out,

Speaker 2 right when they put the anesthesia in my arm, they said, count back to 10, I go, 10, 9. Oh, I feel it.
Right when I pass that, I go, whatever you do, don't touch my asshole. And then I pack it up.

Speaker 1 And you got that out. That all got it out.
You said that.

Speaker 2 And I heard laughing as I went out.

Speaker 1 Beautiful. Will,

Speaker 3 it reminds me of one of my favorite jokes, right? Guy walks into a

Speaker 1 push. He's going to ruin it.
I know that. I think I know the show.
No, come, please, please, please.

Speaker 1 I like this joke, too. I think

Speaker 3 the guy leans over the table and he drops his pants and he's ready for his exam. And the doctor comes in, and the doctor says, okie doke, Jerry.
This time, no hard on. And the patient turns around.

Speaker 3 He says,

Speaker 3 my name's Andrew. And the doctor says, I'm Jerry.

Speaker 2 No, that's not even close, Jason.

Speaker 1 That actually confused me.

Speaker 1 It was confusing.

Speaker 1 No, I'm confused now. It wasn't the joke I thought it was going to be, and I'm confused now.
Oh, no, we don't know what you're doing.

Speaker 1 You should know we both got quiet because we wanted to let him hang himself because he has tried to tell this joke 30 times. It's my favorite joke.
And it's so embarrassing.

Speaker 1 On this show, or is this like 30 years ago? Oh, on the show, on the golf course, at dinner. And he does it all the time.

Speaker 1 One time he taught it. He went like this.
One time he said, he goes, and the guy comes in and he says,

Speaker 1 don't get a heart on, Kevin. And Kevin says, my name's not Kevin.

Speaker 1 And I go, Kevin says, my name's not Kevin.

Speaker 3 Wait, but I think I was conscious of that this time, and I think I said it right.

Speaker 1 No, I don't think you did.

Speaker 2 The guy's on the table.

Speaker 1 I was puzzling about that.

Speaker 1 The doctor walks in.

Speaker 3 The doctor walks in. What happened?

Speaker 2 The doctor walks in and he says, and the guy says,

Speaker 2 Okay, Jerry, don't get a heart on this time.

Speaker 2 And the patient goes,

Speaker 2 my name's not Jerry. And the doctor goes, no, my name is Jerry.

Speaker 1 Very good. I just punched it up.
I said, we can throw an extra name in there.

Speaker 1 He confuses it.

Speaker 1 I have to say, I'm Jerry is good. I like just I'm Jerry.
That's funny. By the way, leave it to baby.
He made it longer and more complicated. And unfunny.

Speaker 1 I'm Jerry. It's funny.
It's a funny joke. I have to say, it's a very funny joke.
If you give it to me,

Speaker 1 it's a hard on Jerry. And Andrew, who's actually related, who grew up with Jerry's cousin, they went to this, they're from the same town, says,

Speaker 1 this is why we need our writers. This is why we need our writers.

Speaker 1 You really feel the lack of writing. Don't you? We do need our writers.

Speaker 1 We do love our writers. We do love our writers.
Jason, who told you that joke?

Speaker 1 You? Sean.

Speaker 1 Sean told you the joke. So speaking of our writers, one of the things I love, so this is what I was getting at before.
And again, it goes without saying how much I enjoy watching you perform.

Speaker 1 I appreciate it. I'm a legit fan.

Speaker 1 But in the last couple of years, the thing that I've really loved watching you in is Billions. And I think that that is a performance that is so

Speaker 1 just deserves so much more acclaim. And

Speaker 1 there's a specific, and for people who haven't watched, it's really great, and

Speaker 1 it's Paul, and it's Damian Lewis, and amongst a million other really terrible.

Speaker 1 So great. So great.
I know. And I love me some Damian Lewis, too.
I think he's just outstanding. Yeah, he's great.

Speaker 1 But you, Paul, have this moment in the end of one of the seasons

Speaker 1 where you're left on the bed. I don't want to ruin it.
I mean, it's a few years old, but you're left on the bed and you are crying because it seems like your world has imploded.

Speaker 1 And as the camera comes around, it reveals that you're laughing. And it was one of the great, I thought it was such an incredible device.
It was a device, if you will. Smart episode, yeah.
But it was

Speaker 1 a fucking brilliant episode.

Speaker 3 it was it was such a small target for you to hit yeah because an actor would read that in the script and then you'd you'd have to think okay well how could i how could i laugh that could believably sound like crying it was tricky

Speaker 1 fortunately some of it was on my back yeah that's actually what made some of it easier was it was on my back so it was like i could do sort of like making it look like i was hunched over laughing or something but i i think actually part of it is too when i start laughing i start crying actually so it actually it wasn't the you know because if I and I can get I have I'm able like making yourself laugh is tricky.

Speaker 1 Yeah, actually it can be but I feel like it's like faking a sneeze or something like that like it's hard to fake it make it make an authentic sounding sneeze. No, it is hard to do it.

Speaker 3 Are you a good crier? Can you cry on cue?

Speaker 1 Sometimes I'm not necessarily I'm not one of those people that can do it on cue and I'm not one of those people that's like, which eye do you want kind of thing.

Speaker 1 Laura Linney knows how to do that. Laura Linney can.
Oh my God.

Speaker 2 My mom could nail that in a second.

Speaker 1 Oh, hey, Paul.

Speaker 2 But wait a minute. Because she only had one eye, Paul.

Speaker 1 Oh,

Speaker 1 but wait a minute. Did she have tears out of the fake eye? No, it was a fake eye.
I wouldn't have to speak.

Speaker 1 Where the ducks?

Speaker 3 That one came with a pumpkin.

Speaker 1 There was a hole in her head.

Speaker 1 There was a hole in her head.

Speaker 1 I'm sorry. Did she lose the eye in some way?

Speaker 2 When she was two years old, she had cancer.

Speaker 3 Tracy found it and brought it to the show.

Speaker 1 We actually had,

Speaker 1 we've both, we've all three of us have held her eye. We did it on stage

Speaker 1 in Wisconsin. Actual eye and formaldehyde or Galasi, I see.

Speaker 1 Wow, that's amazing. Paul, do you, is there like a

Speaker 2 do you do are you somebody who seeks out, like develop things for themselves?

Speaker 2 Are you just an actor who's just like, you know what, my agents, just call me when there's something that you feel is right.

Speaker 2 Otherwise, I'm not going to go find a writer, put this thing together, right?

Speaker 1 It was more that kind of thing for a long time.

Speaker 1 I made some like

Speaker 1 not unsuccessful attempts to produce some stuff, not even necessarily stuff for me to be in. And I managed to make some movies.

Speaker 1 And I did a television show that I then appeared in called Lodge 49 that nobody watched. And it's a nice show.
Yeah, tell me. Tell me about it.
It's a really good show. It's a really good show.

Speaker 1 And yeah, it was on for two seasons on AMC and nobody watched it, but it was a good show.

Speaker 1 And just because the writer, I met the guy and I read the thing and thought, oh, wow, somebody should help this guy make this thing because it's really great.

Speaker 1 But, but I haven't only lately now, and as I finished billions, I've actually been doing a podcast because for the past couple of years, which I was going to get to, yeah.

Speaker 1 And that was something that I, that I did develop with a guy that I know who's a philosopher and there's animation in it and stuff like that.

Speaker 1 That's kind of the first thing that I feel like I really did on my own. Oh, that's cool.
Podcast is chin wagging. Is that it's called chin wag.
Yeah. Chin wag.
Chin wagging. What does that mean?

Speaker 1 What is a chin wag? It's like a, I think it's a British term for like just shooting the shit.

Speaker 1 Oh, I never heard of it.

Speaker 1 Yeah. Wagging shit.

Speaker 1 And it's a, it's a comedy podcast, but you, you get into all sorts of different areas. You got, you talk about

Speaker 1 UFOs and ghosts and Bigfoot and shit. I'm in like that.
I mean, I mean, yeah, because I like stuff like that. And I was like, you know what?

Speaker 1 I'm tired of not, I'm tired of not talking about Bigfoot and doing shit about UFOs and ghosts. Do you watch?

Speaker 1 I really was. I really am.

Speaker 2 Really? Do you watch Ancient Aliens?

Speaker 1 I do watch Ancient Aliens. I love it.
I love it. I love that show.
I love it. What about how the universe works?

Speaker 1 No, no, I haven't seen that.

Speaker 3 What's ancient aliens?

Speaker 1 Yeah, what is ancient aliens?

Speaker 1 What's it on? It's on the history channel.

Speaker 2 It's all about conspiracy theories about why civilizations just died out. Like the Mayans, it's like.
Right. Or the Egyptians, it's like all this stuff happens and then it's just done.

Speaker 2 It's like chariots of the gods.

Speaker 1 It's all about UFOs visited Earth back in the day and they built the pyramids and all this kind of stuff.

Speaker 3 So we have legitimate people sort of espousing on these theories and yeah?

Speaker 1 Fairly legitimate in their field. They're legitimate in their field.
Is that a degree you can get fairly legitimate

Speaker 1 at history channel level? Shatner actually was on it. Was Shatner on Ancient Aliens? Okay, I mean he's been on the ship.
Yes, he was. He was

Speaker 1 a bad person. He was the captain of a spaceship, so yeah, he's quite legitimate.
Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 1 And we will be right back.

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Speaker 2 And now back to the show.

Speaker 1 Paul, do you, so what have you, what have you gleaned from these episodes about, say, for instance, UFOs? Are they,

Speaker 1 what's your feeling about?

Speaker 1 Well,

Speaker 1 I'm a believer. I've never seen anything like this, but I'm a believer.
And stuff is super weird now. I mean, all the weirdness now of the government saying they exist.

Speaker 1 They just opened up a new division. They just did, yeah.
They did, but I'm confused.

Speaker 1 It's like, on the one hand, a bunch of guys say they're real, and then they walk that back very quickly, and it's really confusing. And NASA just, is it in NASA that they just opened up a new thing?

Speaker 1 I don't know.

Speaker 1 Jason's right. I read that, too, that there's some part of the government is opening a newspaper.

Speaker 3 And if it had any teeth to it,

Speaker 3 if they were really curious about it I would think they would not tell us they would let us know when they were done you would think here's like the intelligence community it's i don't know

Speaker 1 we we had neil degrasse tyson on our show uh ages ago right one of the first episodes we did and he made the point that if these things these uh supernatural or extraterrestrial visits or all these things were actually occurring we live in a time where people take something like

Speaker 1 a billion photographs a day and videos pointed in every direction and yet there's no there's nothing because they don't because they don't want to be found lots of actual there's lots of videos that they can't they are the navy and well the navy the navy videos are pretty but don't yeah but don't you think we live in a world now too that if it was if there was actual proof you could hide it that people would be people no well no i don't i think we live in a culture now where people would be like yeah that's kind of cool anyway what are you guys doing for they could do a bit of shit well actually just bury it it would just get buried in the avalanche of shit that's out there all the time time.

Speaker 1 It would just end up as just like a really non-consequential, like TikTok. Like, I went with my family this weekend and we saw a UFO.
Yeah. You know, in that mechanical voice.

Speaker 3 I love when I stumped that smart scientist to Grass Tyson on my whole mirror.

Speaker 1 How'd you do that? Oh, you should go back to him. Listen, it's a real great listen.
Jason,

Speaker 1 did you tell him the hard-on joke and see if he understood it?

Speaker 1 I had not yet heard. Here you go, scientists.

Speaker 1 See if you can figure this one out.

Speaker 3 Who's named Kevin and who's Andrew? Smart man.

Speaker 1 Jason was trying to figure out.

Speaker 1 He was trying to figure out about figuring out if you could

Speaker 1 time travel and if you put a mirror far enough away, could you see

Speaker 1 about the speed of light? The speed of light, and would you be able to see it?

Speaker 1 But the question was so long and involved, you could see Neil deGrasse Tyson, who really is a big brain guy, who figures out a lot of stuff

Speaker 1 glazing and really becoming quite confounded.

Speaker 3 And then you can see he's getting angry that he was almost angry with a dumb dumb.

Speaker 1 And at which point I said, Neil, do you think that they could build a telescope big enough that you could go back in time through mirrors to see the beginning of Jason's question?

Speaker 1 Nice. That he liked.
We earned him back on that. We earned him back.
Very good.

Speaker 2 I'm so into that, Paul.

Speaker 1 So Billions is over. Yeah, take a listen to it.
Billions is over.

Speaker 1 Yeah. Yes, it is.
Now it's ending. Yeah, we do end up.
Now it's ending. Because you guys kind of, you stuttered, stopped, you stopped, and then you guys did another season.
Is that clear?

Speaker 1 Yeah, Yeah, we had a well, the COVID thing, you know, shut everything down.

Speaker 1 And so we had in the middle of the fifth season, then we finished that half in the sixth, and then we just did the seventh, and now it's wow, it's good for you.

Speaker 1 Was that a great, good, positive experience working in New York? Yeah. Oh, yeah.
It was great. I mean, I was 15 minutes from my house here in Brooklyn, which was great.
And my, you know, it was nice.

Speaker 1 I could be around my kid. He was a teenager, and all of that was great.
Yeah. And the people were great.
There was no assholes anywhere on it. It was great.
Good for you. That's great.

Speaker 2 Yeah.

Speaker 2 You know what I always say? If you look around, you can't find the asshole on a set, it's probably you.

Speaker 1 Yeah.

Speaker 3 You do say that.

Speaker 1 You do say that a lot. I do say that.
Once a day. I'm looking forward.
This reminded me of my colonoscopy. It was all about my asshole.
Yeah. You know?

Speaker 3 Great. Way to bring it all back, guys.

Speaker 1 We have a classic guest with us.

Speaker 2 Paul, what are you doing when you're not asking? What are you doing to fill the time?

Speaker 1 God, it sounds like you're just reading that.

Speaker 1 No, I'm just running out because you're a robotic, Paula. What do you do when you're not asking?

Speaker 1 It's It's a little eerie.

Speaker 2 No, because I want to know because I know you're doing the podcast, but like, what else?

Speaker 1 I do the podcast now, and

Speaker 1 I read a lot. I don't know.

Speaker 1 It's a little bit like I'm kind of... I don't have a job now, and I am a little anxious about it because I am a little bit, I think, of a workaholic.

Speaker 1 What will you do for the summer?

Speaker 1 Okay, again,

Speaker 1 I have to do this podcast.

Speaker 1 You want to do the podcast? Yeah,

Speaker 1 and then I don't know. This is what's terrible.
I get all flummoxed. You walk across the Brooklyn Bridge.
This is what I imagine your day is. You walk across the Brooklyn Bridge.
You go get coffee.

Speaker 1 You go to the Strand. You might meet somebody for lunch.

Speaker 1 You walk back. You'll take a nap.
You'll go for dinner. Maybe you'll go to Williamsburg.

Speaker 1 That's actually pretty accurate.

Speaker 1 That's terrifyingly accurate. That's actually pretty close.

Speaker 3 The thing that is very nice of what you do is that

Speaker 3 you work all the time so that we get to watch you.

Speaker 3 Like, I love that I can count on you being in something once a year at least. You know, like

Speaker 3 these great high-quality actors that are like so goddamn, like,

Speaker 3 I only want to work, you know, once every five years.

Speaker 1 But they're picky. That's not a bad thing.

Speaker 1 You're very picky, though, too.

Speaker 3 It's just, I feel like you.

Speaker 1 I think there's been more things that

Speaker 1 you haven't treated yourself to watching that I've done that are not

Speaker 1 of the highest quality.

Speaker 1 There's plenty of people. Paul, I know you're aware of that.
I appreciate that, but I'm not terrible. I should have been pickier in some way.
No, you're being very modest.

Speaker 1 And I will say, and I think what Jason is getting at is that you are,

Speaker 1 if I look at a film or a show that's coming out of some, and I see Paul G, your name, I'm like, all right, this thing has a certain look.

Speaker 3 I mean, good hit. I appreciate that.

Speaker 1 Yeah, it is true. It's a true.
Now, saying that,

Speaker 1 here are the lists of things that you've done that I have not liked.

Speaker 3 Because we like to end the show.

Speaker 1 Oh, I like that. I'm going to have to go alphabetical because the list is like.
Excellent. No, no, but Paul, but I was going to say, you've done so many things.

Speaker 1 And we often ask people here, we're like, oh, what have you done? Like, you've done a lot of this. You've done a lot of that.
What would you like to do? I mean, you've kind of done comedy.

Speaker 1 You've done drama. You've done period.

Speaker 1 You've explored a lot of areas.

Speaker 1 As an actor, is there one zone that you like that you feel really comfortable in that excites you still?

Speaker 1 Well, I'd like to do more theater. That would be nice.
I would like to do

Speaker 1 goofier comedic stuff,

Speaker 1 which I used to do a long time ago, and I haven't really gotten to do something like that in a long time. I'm not comfortable necessarily doing that at all.
But goofy,

Speaker 3 I'll bet, I'll bet not winking, though, right? I'll bet like authentic, sort of like Cohen Brothers type of eccentric characters that are very funny, but they don't know they're funny.

Speaker 1 Yes, that would be nice. Something like that.
One of you wants to wink, man. No, it would be with you and the non-winking characteristics.
And winking would be like, what do you mean?

Speaker 1 Super broad and sophomoric.

Speaker 3 And

Speaker 3 you're overqualified for that.

Speaker 1 You think so? I don't know. Super broad and sophomoric.
Do you guys still love to perform on film and TV? Do you still love it? Do you still feel like it gives you the thing it always gave you?

Speaker 1 Do you feel such a good question?

Speaker 2 I was going to ask you the same thing.

Speaker 1 That's a good question.

Speaker 1 I'm curious.

Speaker 3 I love a set. I just think it's, I'm so comfortable on a set.
I love how many people it takes to make a set.

Speaker 3 I know, but I really, but I didn't know then how complicated it is to make fake life and how many people you need to actually get it done you know that it's not just the yeah i love it love it love it and you love the process of it and all that and you more than the product uh-huh

Speaker 1 I get that.

Speaker 2 You know, to answer your question for me, I think at this age, it really now, finally, for the first time in my life, it really, really matters what it is.

Speaker 2 Because if I'm going to spend all that time, energy, resources, all of it,

Speaker 2 I'm going to give 110%.

Speaker 2 I agree.

Speaker 2 And if it works great, if it doesn't work great, that's fine. But as long as I believe in it, I think that's my answer.

Speaker 1 I feel the same way. I feel like, yeah, and life and kids and also just sort of

Speaker 1 feeling content on a day-to-day basis is, I put such a premium on that and being happy, I put such a premium rather than on

Speaker 1 work.

Speaker 1 And

Speaker 1 the last couple of years, I have not really done anything.

Speaker 1 I've not said said yes to anything in a long time until this year.

Speaker 1 And that feels good. That's felt good.
It feels really good. And there were things I maybe should have done, but I was just like, ah, it just didn't feel.

Speaker 1 But you don't regret it. No, and luckily was doing other stuff.
And so I could continue to make a living and could afford to say no. But I just wasn't feeling it.
I mean, you know.

Speaker 1 And Jay, I know that you feel

Speaker 1 because you're doing so much more directing and you've had the opportunity, again, I don't want to to speak for you, but it's as an observer that you do a lot of like, I don't want to do,

Speaker 1 you just want to do the stuff that excites you.

Speaker 3 Yeah. Yeah.
I want to be, I really like being challenged because I know there's going to, I've had enough periods in my life where I'm not

Speaker 3 confident or

Speaker 3 I'm not feeling up to a challenge. And I know those times will occur again.
So while I'm feeling eager to take off possibly more than I can handle, I want to take advantage of those moments. Yeah.

Speaker 1 Because I know I'm going to be a coward later again.

Speaker 2 Call, what about you? The same question to you.

Speaker 1 Yeah, no, I think I feel a lot of the same things that you guys are just saying, but I feel like I'm a little bit in the place that you are, Will, where it's like, I think I just want to,

Speaker 1 and you, and all of you guys,

Speaker 1 I just want to do the thing that is really going to matter because it's otherwise I don't have the energy. I'm old.
I'm getting old, man. And it's like, I'm just,

Speaker 1 it's like, so I have to just, it's got to be something I really, really want to do. But it's been interesting doing other things, too.
It's like, I'd like to, I would like to draw again.

Speaker 1 I would like to try to write. I don't know if I can fucking, I read all the fucking time, but I don't know if I can write something, you know?

Speaker 1 I would like to try. I'd like to try different things, you know.
So I think I need to say no more. And I think I need to just do the things I want to do for sure.

Speaker 2 Well, how about this? When you're done with your walk across the bridge to get the coffee and the dinner, like Will said, you should write a couple pages.

Speaker 1 I would try, I think, you know, you should do.

Speaker 3 You should get over there to the Velasco Theater and see Shawnee and Goodnight Oscar.

Speaker 1 I would like to see you. I would very much like to see that.
We're going to get you some house. I would very much like to see that.
I would love to see that. Here's what's going to happen.

Speaker 1 I'm headed east at the end of this week, and I'm going to come to the city. We're going to go and have dinner, or we're going to have lunch.
I would love that.

Speaker 1 Downtown, and then we're going to talk about what you're going to write.

Speaker 1 I would love it.

Speaker 1 For 3%, Will? You're offering his agenting for 3%. No, no, I'm just going to help him.
It's going to be his idea, and I want to. He doesn't have a right to be able to do that.
That actually would be,

Speaker 1 I would welcome that. That would help me to meet.
It would help to me. I know.
He's going to have a conversation to get ideas going for himself. So he doesn't need my album.
That would help me.

Speaker 3 You're just offering your muse and a

Speaker 1 muse for hire.

Speaker 2 Why don't you call it, Paul?

Speaker 1 Why don't you call it Mothcatcher?

Speaker 1 I like it. I like it too.
Mothcatcher. Fantastic.
That's a start. That's a great start.

Speaker 3 Moth Protector. Is that what I call it? Moth Protector.

Speaker 1 It's a catcher. It's a Moth Trap.
That's a Moth Trap.

Speaker 1 Moth Trap. Moth Trap.
Moth Trap. Moth Trap's actually a very good one.
That's a good title. That's a mouse trap.

Speaker 2 That's a

Speaker 1 techno thriller. What was the last book that you read

Speaker 1 that you were excited about that you really liked? Do you remember? I read a lot of crappy mysteries is what I read. I read a lot of crappy thrillers and crappy mysteries and spy novels.

Speaker 1 Oh, I love spy. I read a lot of spy novels.
I do too. I read a lot of stuff like that.
That's the funny thing. I don't read much highbrow stuff, actually.
I read a lot of spy novels.

Speaker 1 Yeah, I enjoy that stuff a lot. I really enjoyed it.

Speaker 1 Do you ever read any of those Lynn Dayton books?

Speaker 1 Yeah. That's what I just read.
Are you kidding me? Actually, I was going to say what I just read was a fucking Lenny Dayton book. It's uncanny.
It is uncanny. I'm just interested there.

Speaker 1 So the Bernie Gunther series, right?

Speaker 1 So I read all nine of those. Yeah.

Speaker 1 A couple of people. Those are fantastic.
You guys are fantastic. Yeah, those are great.
I can see Sean, right? Are you guys going to have a good lunch? We are. I just read a book.
I can see this.

Speaker 1 You would be a great fucking Bernie Gunther.

Speaker 3 Clowns sitting

Speaker 3 on the Brooklyn Bridge, each with a book, sitting on a bench, not even talking to each other.

Speaker 1 No, no, no, like some great old books.

Speaker 1 So if you love those Lindite, I've got another series for you. Oh, bring them a book.

Speaker 3 That would be fun. Bring them a book.

Speaker 1 That would be lovely. That would be lovely.

Speaker 1 Oh, my God. I'm going to.

Speaker 1 Please. By the way.
Please. Paul, now, what are we looking at just before we let you go? What are we looking at for the summer?

Speaker 1 If everything is kind of shut down,

Speaker 1 are you going to hit the beach? Are you going to get in the water? Are you going to, what are you going to do?

Speaker 1 You know, you're on the swim team. Yeah, I was on the swim team.

Speaker 1 I'd like to get back in the water. Maybe I'll go up to Cape Cod or something like that.
I don't have a home up there, but I would go up there, a Maine or something like that.

Speaker 1 Maybe somewhere like that. That would be a good idea.
Well, let me just say this. There are a lot of people, a lot of really bougie people who listen to our shows.

Speaker 3 Give me your email.

Speaker 1 If you've got a real nice play, if you've got a nice spread up there in the Cape or one of the islands, in Vineyard or Nantucket, and you'd like to have Paul Giamatti as your house guest for a few months.

Speaker 1 Yeah, let us know on our Instagram. That'd be terrific.
Somebody could host

Speaker 1 it.

Speaker 1 And he's going to spend a lot of time during the day. Don't bother him.
He's reading Lynn Dayton books and he's going to be at the pool. But then for dinner time,

Speaker 1 give him a nice glass of miscall. He's not going to drink your wine, but give him a nice glass of miscall.
And then he'll discuss whatever you want. Awesome.
Paul, you're wealthy. That's good.

Speaker 3 We've set up your seminar.

Speaker 1 That's fantastic. Thank you.
Thank you. By the way, by the way, all jokes are.

Speaker 1 You're going to find yourself on a fucking yacht in the Mediterranean because of this. This is going to be incredible.
Oh, shit. That would be great.
That's the demographic? That's the audience?

Speaker 1 It's all yachty. That's what's fishing right now?

Speaker 1 It's a real yachty crowd.

Speaker 1 Fantastic.

Speaker 2 Paul, it is so nice to see you again. And

Speaker 2 to echo what Will said, I'm here in the city for quite a while, so

Speaker 1 maybe we could grab a bite or something.

Speaker 1 Nothing would make me happier than

Speaker 1 have lunch with you. I'm going to get your contact info from our guys if that's okay, Paul.
I'm going to reach out. Absolutely.
Fantastic. It'll be a pleasure.
Okay.

Speaker 1 And Jason, when I'm out there something.

Speaker 3 Yeah, you guys FaceTime me from your lunch. Sure.

Speaker 1 Please. Jason, we love you.
We love you.

Speaker 1 But, Paul, I can't wait. We love you, Jason.
But, Paul, can't wait. It's going to be episode 10.
Likewise. Likewise.

Speaker 1 Thank you, Paul. Give you my best.

Speaker 3 It's a pleasure to meet you, my friend.

Speaker 1 Yeah, real pleasure to meet you. Thanks for doing that.
Thank you very much. Excellent.

Speaker 1 My pleasure. See you down the road.
Bye, pal. Bye.

Speaker 3 Well, Will,

Speaker 3 it was worth the wait.

Speaker 1 Did you know him, Will? No,

Speaker 1 I feel like I met him briefly.

Speaker 1 I knew that he was friends with Thoreau. They're old friends.

Speaker 1 And

Speaker 1 like I said, I've always just been such an admirer of his.

Speaker 2 Yeah, the credits are just endless.

Speaker 1 And that's what I meant, right?

Speaker 1 He's an actor's actor. Like we all as actors, we're like,

Speaker 1 you know, if you were doing something, they'd go, oh, yeah, by the way, Giamatti's going to do it. You'd be like, oh, man, this thing is really...

Speaker 1 Like a big ship event, we got to do it.

Speaker 2 Totally.

Speaker 1 And I met him once at the Golden Globes years and years and years ago.

Speaker 2 But I didn't get, you know, I didn't chat with him until right now. And talking to him at length now, you feel like he's one of those people, like, oh, I feel like I've known him forever.

Speaker 1 Like,

Speaker 3 he's the guy you'd give any part to.

Speaker 1 Yeah. Yeah, he, he really does have that just, there's something about him when he inhabits a character, you're just with him.
Yeah. Yeah.

Speaker 1 And he brings so much sort of pathos to every character.

Speaker 3 I even enjoy watching his Verizon commercials when he's playing Einstein.

Speaker 1 Yeah, me too.

Speaker 1 I know. I can't believe we didn't bring it up.
I was going to.

Speaker 2 I was going to, but I was like,

Speaker 1 I totally forgot.

Speaker 2 When he plays Santa Claus, right?

Speaker 1 Because his service was capable of.

Speaker 3 No, he's playing, he's playing Einstein, you stupid fucking.

Speaker 1 Oh, Einstein. I thought it was Santa Claus.

Speaker 3 I wish we would have brought it up and you would have said. So when you play Santa in the Verizon commercial, you stupid dick.

Speaker 1 You stupid fuck.

Speaker 2 Listen, you know what, though? I didn't know he was in Brooklyn.

Speaker 1 He lives so close to the Bulasko.com.

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Speaker 1 This episode was recorded on June 5th.

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