WEBVTT - Judd Apatow and Eric Fischl 0:00:02.480 --> 0:00:05.200 This is Alec Baldwin and you're listening to Here's the thing, 0:00:05.640 --> 0:00:09.360 My chance to talk with artists, policy makers, and performers, 0:00:09.720 --> 0:00:13.680 to hear their stories. What inspired their creations, what decisions 0:00:13.800 --> 0:00:19.120 change their careers, what relationships influenced their work. I look 0:00:19.160 --> 0:00:22.560 at every movie as a letter to myself, telling me 0:00:22.840 --> 0:00:24.720 something that I need to know about how to live 0:00:24.800 --> 0:00:27.480 my life. And I'm I'm only on some level making 0:00:27.520 --> 0:00:30.200 these movies to say, Judd, pay attention, Judd, live in 0:00:30.280 --> 0:00:34.960 the moment. She's actually my greatest, most clear scene critic, 0:00:34.960 --> 0:00:37.360 because she your most prevalent subject. If you painted her 0:00:37.360 --> 0:00:40.440 more than any other person. Yes, I've painted her in 0:00:40.440 --> 0:00:44.519 in disguised ways, and I've painted her in you know 0:00:45.000 --> 0:00:48.599 ways where you can see it's her. Artists often use 0:00:48.720 --> 0:00:52.760 their childhood and family life for inspiration. Today I talk 0:00:52.840 --> 0:00:55.560 with a painter and a movie director. Both men have 0:00:55.680 --> 0:00:59.760 drawn on their own families to create deeply personal art 0:01:00.040 --> 0:01:04.720 in very different styles. Eric Fischel was described in the 0:01:04.800 --> 0:01:08.200 nineteen eighties as a painter of the suburbs, but not 0:01:08.280 --> 0:01:12.119 the suburbs you might imagine. In a woman possessed, an 0:01:12.200 --> 0:01:17.160 unconscious female is sprawled out in a driveway surrounded by dogs. 0:01:17.800 --> 0:01:21.200 In Sleepwalker, a young man stands naked in a kittie pool, 0:01:21.360 --> 0:01:24.800 his hands between his legs. There's a lot of nudity 0:01:24.840 --> 0:01:31.560 Inficial's work, and not a lot of smiles. Judd Apataw 0:01:31.840 --> 0:01:35.240 is my first guest. His films include The forty year 0:01:35.240 --> 0:01:39.240 Old Virgin, Knocked Up and Funny People, which feature emotionally 0:01:39.280 --> 0:01:44.440 immature men forced to grow up after confronting sex, responsibility, 0:01:44.600 --> 0:01:51.520 and death. Okay, what kill me? What nobody knows? We 0:01:51.560 --> 0:01:53.960 know each other. You're a stranger. You can get away 0:01:53.960 --> 0:01:56.160 with this. I got a gun in the other room. 0:01:56.360 --> 0:02:01.440 It's untraceable. I'll give you fifty thousand dollars. Don't make 0:02:01.480 --> 0:02:07.280 me suffer. Please kill me, Ira, I'm begging you. Can 0:02:07.360 --> 0:02:08.760 you know it's give me like a night to think 0:02:08.800 --> 0:02:12.560 about it. Of all apataws movies, his most recent This 0:02:12.639 --> 0:02:16.400 is forty, released in December two thousand twelve, maybe his 0:02:16.480 --> 0:02:20.480 most personal. It stars his real wife, Leslie Man, and 0:02:20.520 --> 0:02:23.640 their own children, Maude and Iris, who play her kids 0:02:23.639 --> 0:02:28.280 in the movie. Here, Apataw's comedic point of view collides 0:02:28.360 --> 0:02:31.880 with marriage, work, and family. It sounds horrible, but do 0:02:31.880 --> 0:02:33.840 you ever wonder what it would be? Like if you 0:02:33.840 --> 0:02:37.640 your wife were separated by something bigger, will be death, 0:02:37.800 --> 0:02:40.280 like her death. I have given it a fair amount 0:02:40.280 --> 0:02:42.200 of thought, not any painful way, but just like a 0:02:42.240 --> 0:02:46.040 gentle floating off. It's got to be peaceful. I mean, 0:02:46.080 --> 0:02:47.920 this is the mother of your children. And then the 0:02:47.919 --> 0:02:50.200 new wifes would be great. God, I can't wait to 0:02:50.240 --> 0:02:53.320 meet my second wife. I hope she likes me better 0:02:53.320 --> 0:02:56.400 than this one. Judd Apataw began studying the art of 0:02:56.440 --> 0:02:59.240 making people laugh as a kid when he would rush 0:02:59.280 --> 0:03:03.079 home from school to watch TV, sometimes from three thirty 0:03:03.160 --> 0:03:07.079 until after midnight. On the weekend. He'd record Saturday Night 0:03:07.120 --> 0:03:10.680 Live on audio tape and transcribe the show later to 0:03:10.760 --> 0:03:13.640 figure out what made it so funny. In high school, 0:03:13.680 --> 0:03:16.840 he had a radio show in which he interviewed comedians 0:03:16.880 --> 0:03:19.440 to learn as much as he could about their craft. 0:03:19.720 --> 0:03:22.840 I think talk about your type of comedy that you do. 0:03:23.560 --> 0:03:28.239 Comedians such as Gary Shandling, John Candy and Jerry Seinfeld. 0:03:28.560 --> 0:03:32.720 Some people just tell the joke like an observation and 0:03:32.760 --> 0:03:37.800 that's it. When you add a whole new dimension on it, Yeah, well, 0:03:37.800 --> 0:03:41.760 it's one thing to see something, you know, and I 0:03:41.760 --> 0:03:44.440 think the next step is to do something with it. Now, 0:03:44.480 --> 0:03:47.520 in his mid forties, Apatow seems to have had his 0:03:47.640 --> 0:03:51.600 hand in nearly every successful comedy of the last seven years. 0:03:52.120 --> 0:03:55.960 He was a producer of Anchorman, super Bad, Bridesmaids, and 0:03:56.120 --> 0:03:59.600 is currently an executive producer of the hit HBO show Girls. 0:04:00.080 --> 0:04:05.160 But John Apatow still craves reassurance. I need constant approval 0:04:05.520 --> 0:04:08.480 of my writing as I'm doing it, So I will 0:04:08.480 --> 0:04:15.000 show people the first scene, the first ten pages people, anybody. 0:04:15.240 --> 0:04:19.160 I will show anybody. I literally will send it to friends. 0:04:19.760 --> 0:04:23.520 You know. Jake Kazan, who directed and produced on Freaks 0:04:23.520 --> 0:04:26.159 and Geeks and Undeclared, is one of the first people 0:04:26.160 --> 0:04:27.640 I show things too. But I'll show it to the 0:04:27.680 --> 0:04:30.440 studio because I don't like that moment when you have 0:04:30.440 --> 0:04:32.839 a finished script and you go, I wonder if they'll 0:04:32.880 --> 0:04:35.440 like it. So if I send them thousands of pages 0:04:35.480 --> 0:04:38.320 over the course of two years, they're so confused that 0:04:38.440 --> 0:04:40.560 there's not a moment of truth, and to bury the 0:04:40.920 --> 0:04:43.840 exactly and when it when it really gets down to it. 0:04:44.600 --> 0:04:47.640 Lena Dunham and I were working on Girls that was 0:04:47.680 --> 0:04:50.039 happening parallel to me making This is forty, so we 0:04:50.080 --> 0:04:53.520 would literally spend two hours breaking girls stories and then 0:04:53.560 --> 0:04:57.600 two hours talked about this is forty and then near 0:04:57.640 --> 0:05:00.839 the end I'll get the courage up to send it 0:05:00.880 --> 0:05:06.960 to like Eric Roth and James L. Brooks and Cameron. Yeah, 0:05:07.000 --> 0:05:10.919 he's probably the biggest influence. I think his whole approach 0:05:11.000 --> 0:05:14.400 to stories is just imprinted in my mind from my 0:05:14.520 --> 0:05:18.080 childhood watching Mary Tyler Moore and Taxi. That's how I 0:05:18.120 --> 0:05:22.600 feel like stories work. Normal people with everyday, normal problems, 0:05:22.600 --> 0:05:24.680 trying to get along, trying to make their jobs, in 0:05:24.760 --> 0:05:28.320 their love and their life work. And his work always 0:05:28.360 --> 0:05:32.360 ends us some beautiful grace note which is always hopeful 0:05:32.600 --> 0:05:36.120 yet realistic. And I remember them from when I was 0:05:36.160 --> 0:05:38.320 a kid. How you know? There was a Taxi episode 0:05:38.360 --> 0:05:42.240 where Louis d Pamo was dating a blind woman and 0:05:42.279 --> 0:05:44.080 he was so in love and then she was having 0:05:44.080 --> 0:05:46.200 an operation to get her sight back, and he thought 0:05:46.240 --> 0:05:50.040 she's gonna dump me, you can see, And then of 0:05:50.080 --> 0:05:52.640 course she loves him and thinks he's beautiful, and as 0:05:52.640 --> 0:05:55.560 he walks out of the room, he throws something in 0:05:55.600 --> 0:05:58.360 the garbage and he says, I guess I gotta get 0:05:58.360 --> 0:06:02.920 a real ring. And I love how he would pull 0:06:02.960 --> 0:06:05.600 that off, so he's very helpful. And in the middle 0:06:05.640 --> 0:06:07.839 of this is for you, I emailed James Brooks and 0:06:07.880 --> 0:06:11.240 I said, remind me what the movie is about. Again. 0:06:11.600 --> 0:06:17.080 I forgot, and he sent me a long email saying, 0:06:17.240 --> 0:06:19.279 this is what your movie is about. So you kind 0:06:19.279 --> 0:06:21.039 of I'll let you say this, but it sounds to 0:06:21.080 --> 0:06:23.279 me like you swim in kind of a pool or 0:06:23.320 --> 0:06:26.040 a stream with a lot of people who make films, 0:06:26.080 --> 0:06:27.960 and you're and you're open to their suggestions and you're 0:06:27.960 --> 0:06:30.919 open to their ideas. If you talk to a multitude 0:06:30.920 --> 0:06:33.720 of people for their ideas, which ones do you? I mean, 0:06:33.720 --> 0:06:35.760 in the end, you decide. In the end, you choose. 0:06:36.120 --> 0:06:38.799 I've always had faith in my ability to make that call, 0:06:39.520 --> 0:06:41.400 so I don't mind a lot of feedback. It doesn't 0:06:41.440 --> 0:06:44.599 confuse me if everyone says something different. I mean, I 0:06:44.680 --> 0:06:48.280 come from television and rooms of people arguing about story, 0:06:48.360 --> 0:06:51.280 and my formative years were spent at the Larry Sanders Show, 0:06:51.880 --> 0:06:54.680 where you were a great guest and I one of 0:06:54.680 --> 0:06:56.719 the great early moments in my career was I wrote 0:06:57.200 --> 0:06:59.560 a bunch of those scenes and in the episode You're 0:06:59.600 --> 0:07:01.360 in and just saw it on TV the other day. 0:07:01.400 --> 0:07:04.840 I was home my favorite line, which was when Chandling 0:07:04.880 --> 0:07:06.880 goes to the wings of the stage when I'm on 0:07:06.920 --> 0:07:10.360 the set and I'm not quoting it properly, but rip says, 0:07:10.360 --> 0:07:12.280 what's the matter? He says, I can't help it. I 0:07:12.360 --> 0:07:15.760 keep seeing him having sex with my wife and he says, 0:07:15.760 --> 0:07:19.160 and she's on top, and Rips says, the lazy bastards. 0:07:19.680 --> 0:07:23.840 That's that is. I wrote that joke. I know I 0:07:23.840 --> 0:07:26.680 wrote that joke because I was so proud of that joke. 0:07:27.360 --> 0:07:30.280 And I remember when you came in to the first 0:07:30.360 --> 0:07:34.200 day of shooting and to do the quick rehearsal, and 0:07:34.240 --> 0:07:36.960 Gary was given you ship from the second you walk 0:07:37.080 --> 0:07:38.960 in the doors, like Alex, you need a lozenge, you 0:07:39.000 --> 0:07:41.560 need a lozenge, and you said, all right, that's how 0:07:41.600 --> 0:07:44.160 it's gonna be, Gary, That's how it's gonna be. And 0:07:44.440 --> 0:07:47.160 it's one of the great episodes. So so I think 0:07:47.160 --> 0:07:49.760 that was not your first job though. My first job 0:07:49.960 --> 0:07:52.840 I used to write jokes for comedians. I wrote jokes 0:07:52.840 --> 0:07:56.800 for Rosanne's Nightclub act for one. Why did you did 0:07:56.800 --> 0:07:59.240 you do stand up periodical? I did it for for 0:07:59.280 --> 0:08:01.720 seven years. It's all I wanted to do. But I 0:08:01.880 --> 0:08:06.680 very quickly realized I was better at creating sketches or 0:08:06.760 --> 0:08:09.200 dramatic situations to get my point across, and as a 0:08:09.360 --> 0:08:14.760 straight monologist, I wasn't interesting the way my roommate Adam 0:08:14.840 --> 0:08:19.040 Sandler was or Jim Carrey. Just as a fan, I knew, oh, 0:08:19.120 --> 0:08:22.280 I'm not these guys. You really felt that were oh yeah? 0:08:22.320 --> 0:08:23.760 Because and then we were in l A. At the 0:08:23.800 --> 0:08:25.560 time I was in l A. I lived in North 0:08:25.560 --> 0:08:30.800 Hollywood with Sandler and how it was under two years 0:08:31.320 --> 0:08:33.800 and I mean it was the most fun time ever. 0:08:33.880 --> 0:08:35.640 Every time we see each other were like that was 0:08:35.720 --> 0:08:39.120 the best. You know. We were just so into doing 0:08:39.400 --> 0:08:44.959 stand up and back then Sandler wasn't famous, so he 0:08:45.040 --> 0:08:49.959 was really silly all the time and very obnoxious and 0:08:50.040 --> 0:08:54.080 trying to make strangers laugh. He really engaged the world 0:08:54.520 --> 0:08:57.440 for his own amusement, less to protect that he does now. Yeah. 0:08:57.480 --> 0:09:00.680 He he just loved, you know, asking pulling people over 0:09:00.679 --> 0:09:02.880 to ask for directions in the car and doing something 0:09:02.880 --> 0:09:05.840 crazy to them. I mean it sounds ridiculous, but he 0:09:06.000 --> 0:09:09.040 was the guy that would fart in the elevator and go, Judd, 0:09:09.120 --> 0:09:13.239 come on, we're in an elevator. Uh. And that disappears 0:09:13.240 --> 0:09:15.000 when you get famous. So you brought up up there, 0:09:15.000 --> 0:09:17.400 you know, well, but you brought this up and I'm 0:09:17.440 --> 0:09:20.440 I can't say I'm glad you did. But in your movie, 0:09:20.840 --> 0:09:24.280 Paul Rudd is in bed with your wife. Yes, yes, 0:09:24.640 --> 0:09:27.439 he's in bed with his wife, and to torment her, 0:09:27.480 --> 0:09:30.240 he just rips off a series of well placed like 0:09:30.280 --> 0:09:32.640 he's turning over cards in a game. He's like, he 0:09:32.760 --> 0:09:35.959 rips a couple of parts there. But you that's not 0:09:36.040 --> 0:09:39.080 how you live, right, Well, it's a that's a complicated scene. 0:09:39.080 --> 0:09:42.480 And what's funny about that scene is, uh, they're having 0:09:42.520 --> 0:09:46.120 a very serious conversation about their finances, which are not good, 0:09:46.640 --> 0:09:50.080 and they're watching security camera footage waiting trying to figure 0:09:50.080 --> 0:09:52.319 out who's stealing from them, and they see Megan Fox 0:09:52.360 --> 0:09:55.040 fooling around with someone at work and then Leslie says, 0:09:55.040 --> 0:09:58.360 at least she's getting some. And his reaction, after a 0:09:58.400 --> 0:10:02.000 few moments of feeling attacked is to just fart. It's 0:10:02.000 --> 0:10:04.000 like a monkey. It's kind of like saying, you know, 0:10:04.320 --> 0:10:07.480 screw you. And Rudd did it as an improv. It 0:10:07.520 --> 0:10:10.000 wasn't in the script. Yeah, it wasn't in the script. 0:10:10.120 --> 0:10:12.640 And Leslie knows, okay, if anything happens off page I 0:10:12.720 --> 0:10:15.200 need to go with it, and she's furious and you 0:10:15.240 --> 0:10:18.239 see it in her eyes and she's really genuinely disgusted, 0:10:18.640 --> 0:10:20.560 and you get kind of a real sense of what 0:10:20.640 --> 0:10:24.040 marriage is like. That's how complex marriage is. Yeah, and 0:10:24.080 --> 0:10:26.160 now the other question I have a propos of the 0:10:26.160 --> 0:10:29.760 movie was so I'm thinking, Rudd, it's either the highest 0:10:29.880 --> 0:10:32.920 honor or he's the goat because you're you know, you're 0:10:32.960 --> 0:10:34.559 lying in bed with your wife who has made a 0:10:34.600 --> 0:10:37.920 lot of great films and funny films, and you say, uh, 0:10:38.120 --> 0:10:40.640 what's your nickname for your wife? Can I ask called 0:10:40.720 --> 0:10:42.960 les Is it les Leslie? Well, the funny thing is 0:10:43.080 --> 0:10:45.120 I always call it Leslie And then she's like, Judd, 0:10:45.240 --> 0:10:49.960 my name's Leslie. It's not I literally say her name, 0:10:50.840 --> 0:10:55.840 it's Leslie. Leslie is when I'm in Cambridge now exactly. 0:10:56.200 --> 0:10:57.880 So you're there with her and you say to her, 0:10:57.920 --> 0:11:00.240 I'm just envisioning this scene where you look her and 0:11:00.320 --> 0:11:04.600 you say, baby, who's the guy that you like most 0:11:04.640 --> 0:11:07.240 want to have sex with? It was like, and just 0:11:07.280 --> 0:11:08.960 be honest with me. We've been together while we have 0:11:09.000 --> 0:11:11.520 two kids. You know, it's me. I'm making a film, 0:11:11.640 --> 0:11:13.520 and she says god, Paul Rudd, and I mean that 0:11:13.559 --> 0:11:16.320 you crossed his name off the list. I know he's 0:11:16.360 --> 0:11:18.719 never doing my film. Or is it like you put 0:11:18.800 --> 0:11:20.839 him in or do you say to baby, who's the 0:11:20.840 --> 0:11:23.240 guy that you view as like a brother, Like if 0:11:23.240 --> 0:11:25.720 you had sex scenes with him, this wouldn't mean be 0:11:25.760 --> 0:11:28.640 like like fooling around with your brother, Paul Rudd, that's 0:11:28.679 --> 0:11:32.960 where you go hire him. She's disgusted, uh, and and 0:11:33.000 --> 0:11:36.439 that makes it okay to watch them fool around. I 0:11:36.440 --> 0:11:38.640 I'm always disgusted when she fools around with anyone. I 0:11:38.640 --> 0:11:40.840 remember when we shot the Cable Guy, she kissed Matthew 0:11:40.880 --> 0:11:43.560 Broderick and then when they parted, I saw it in 0:11:43.600 --> 0:11:46.600 the dailies there was like a spit string that connected 0:11:46.640 --> 0:11:51.800 them for like a foot. And and so yes, I'm 0:11:51.840 --> 0:11:54.800 glad that unless they're lying about being disgusted by each other, 0:11:55.080 --> 0:11:57.559 because I may be the fool they are lyned. And 0:11:58.040 --> 0:12:00.959 that's terrible because I know because I've heard before, I've 0:12:00.960 --> 0:12:04.400 had my ex wife has got you know, Russell Crowe 0:12:04.400 --> 0:12:07.040 has got his tongue into her spinal for it, and 0:12:07.080 --> 0:12:09.800 she's like, no, no, it's just nothing, it's nothing. Well, 0:12:09.840 --> 0:12:12.920 the day I had a back surgery for a herniated 0:12:13.000 --> 0:12:17.440 disc back in the year two thousand. Leslie couldn't be 0:12:17.480 --> 0:12:23.440 there because Leslie, Sorry, Leslie, I couldn't be there because 0:12:23.440 --> 0:12:27.600 she was. She was shooting a scene where she was 0:12:27.679 --> 0:12:31.360 making love with Jeff Goldbloom, and you just know he's 0:12:31.360 --> 0:12:34.560 all handsy in between takes the fly. You know he's 0:12:34.559 --> 0:12:37.200 just for pushing buttons and a woman and you don't 0:12:37.200 --> 0:12:40.320 even know we're there exactly now. When you start a 0:12:40.360 --> 0:12:43.280 film like this, is there a fear when you begin? 0:12:43.400 --> 0:12:45.080 Do you think to yourself, Oh God, this is the 0:12:45.120 --> 0:12:47.160 one on all the wheels are going to fall off? 0:12:47.800 --> 0:12:51.199 Like what's your disposition when you start shooting? You know, 0:12:51.240 --> 0:12:53.160 I want to succeed because I just want to be 0:12:53.200 --> 0:12:57.840 allowed to continue making movies. I also have a rebellious streak, 0:12:57.840 --> 0:13:00.240 which is I do have some sense of what makes 0:13:00.240 --> 0:13:04.120 a very commercial movie, and I'm working partially against that. 0:13:04.679 --> 0:13:07.240 Like as the attention span of the audience gets shorter, 0:13:07.760 --> 0:13:10.199 I want to make longer movies to say there's something 0:13:10.200 --> 0:13:13.800 wrong with you that you can't sit for two film. 0:13:13.920 --> 0:13:16.319 I deliberately do it with all of them because I 0:13:16.920 --> 0:13:18.640 feel like, you know, this is the only time we're 0:13:18.640 --> 0:13:20.840 going to get with these people? Why do you need 0:13:20.920 --> 0:13:23.520 to rush to get home? And I like movies like 0:13:23.600 --> 0:13:26.280 Jerry McGuire and in terms of endearment and movies that 0:13:26.320 --> 0:13:28.560 were over two hours, it takes an extra twenty minutes 0:13:28.559 --> 0:13:32.439 to explore, you know, more dimensions of people. So and 0:13:32.520 --> 0:13:34.880 said to me, you're basically saying these people are worth 0:13:34.920 --> 0:13:37.280 your time. And sometimes I watched the movie because I 0:13:37.320 --> 0:13:39.040 have to watch it hundreds of times, I think, wow, 0:13:39.080 --> 0:13:41.960 this is long. I'm really putting people through it. So 0:13:42.040 --> 0:13:45.800 on day one, I'm both trying to figure out, like 0:13:45.920 --> 0:13:49.640 marketing wise and concept wise, a way to make it 0:13:50.120 --> 0:13:55.440 sell while thinking I'm sneaking some John Cassavetti's Robert Altman 0:13:55.520 --> 0:13:59.679 aspect into a mainstream comedy. When when when you do 0:13:59.720 --> 0:14:04.440 a home like this as knocked Up begets this film? 0:14:04.600 --> 0:14:06.880 Does this film just right away? Do you start thinking 0:14:06.920 --> 0:14:10.439 of other ideas whether you do them or not? Just absolutely? 0:14:10.520 --> 0:14:13.800 I think that about most of the characters, I especially 0:14:13.800 --> 0:14:16.439 coming from TV. I love that there was Rhoda after 0:14:16.520 --> 0:14:19.520 Mary Tyler Moore or Fraser after Cheers. So anytime a 0:14:19.640 --> 0:14:22.600 character works, I could watch it, you know, I could 0:14:22.600 --> 0:14:26.280 watch uh, either of the leads of super Bad go 0:14:26.360 --> 0:14:29.680 off on their own, Michael Sarah's character or Jonah Hills 0:14:29.760 --> 0:14:33.120 or the cops. Once it exists, I'm kind of more 0:14:33.240 --> 0:14:36.800 depressed that we're not doing more stories. And that's just 0:14:36.880 --> 0:14:38.800 my whole thing. I don't like to let go. So 0:14:39.080 --> 0:14:40.920 if someone said they're gonna make a movie about what 0:14:41.000 --> 0:14:43.920 happened to Albert Brooks's character from Broadcast News, I'd be 0:14:43.920 --> 0:14:46.800 the happiest man in the world. Had you known Brooks, 0:14:46.800 --> 0:14:49.640 had you been acquainted with him and had worked with 0:14:49.680 --> 0:14:52.000 him before, and you did this movie with him. I 0:14:52.040 --> 0:14:55.440 met him in the early nineties when I was working 0:14:55.440 --> 0:14:57.720 at the Lark Sanders Show. I had dinner with him 0:14:57.720 --> 0:15:00.160 a couple of times with Gary, and I was and 0:15:00.760 --> 0:15:04.480 awe to be around him because his Saturday night live 0:15:04.520 --> 0:15:06.840 movies were really big influence on everything we did at 0:15:06.840 --> 0:15:10.040 the Ben Steelers Show. And obviously, you know, defending your 0:15:10.040 --> 0:15:15.440 life in modern romance and real life, you know, was yeah, 0:15:15.560 --> 0:15:19.560 it's the template for a certain type of you. And 0:15:20.480 --> 0:15:22.920 in the same sentence again, I was so excited to 0:15:22.920 --> 0:15:25.040 meet Albert that afterwards I went home and I wrote 0:15:25.040 --> 0:15:28.120 down every joke he said at dinner, like I still 0:15:28.160 --> 0:15:31.640 have like the journal entry where he's making jokes about 0:15:31.640 --> 0:15:34.560 the Menendez case. You don't kill your parents and buy 0:15:34.560 --> 0:15:38.640 a Rolex. You don't do that. So I wrote the 0:15:38.680 --> 0:15:40.760 part just for him, hoping it could be good enough. 0:15:41.080 --> 0:15:43.240 I never want to ask anyone that I look up 0:15:43.280 --> 0:15:45.360 to to be in my movie if I don't think 0:15:45.360 --> 0:15:47.320 it could be as good as their movies. You know, 0:15:47.320 --> 0:15:50.320 I don't want to be their crappy movie. Now when 0:15:50.440 --> 0:15:53.160 with Brooks, when you work with people like that who 0:15:53.200 --> 0:15:56.400 are veteran, if you will are very experienced and have 0:15:56.520 --> 0:15:59.920 a bead tremendous success, what's that experience like for you? 0:16:00.080 --> 0:16:02.880 Was a director? Meaning? Do you do they come in 0:16:02.960 --> 0:16:05.440 and they just start riffing and and are they rewriting 0:16:05.440 --> 0:16:07.840 and improvising and you just let it go? Or do 0:16:07.880 --> 0:16:10.080 you sit there and you do find a way, a 0:16:10.160 --> 0:16:12.520 politic way to sit in My brother, to confine ourselves 0:16:12.520 --> 0:16:14.800 to this what's on the page, not specifically with him, 0:16:14.800 --> 0:16:16.800 but with any of them that come in, Well, I 0:16:17.160 --> 0:16:19.920 precious arre you about what you've written. Well, I'm never 0:16:19.960 --> 0:16:24.000 precious about anything other than my intention. So with Albert, 0:16:24.000 --> 0:16:26.600 obviously I'm terrified because I'm working with someone who's clearly 0:16:26.600 --> 0:16:29.160 more talented than me. So I'm trying to figure out 0:16:29.200 --> 0:16:33.160 how to manage my idea for the story and tap 0:16:33.280 --> 0:16:36.200 him for everything that he's worth. So I want him 0:16:36.280 --> 0:16:39.360 writing and thinking and pitching me. I mean, I spent 0:16:39.440 --> 0:16:42.360 a year in a room trying to think of an 0:16:42.360 --> 0:16:44.960 original character that he hadn't done before but that would 0:16:44.960 --> 0:16:48.600 still use, you know, his great comic sensibilities. And then 0:16:48.680 --> 0:16:51.280 I brought him into a rehearsal and we did the 0:16:51.320 --> 0:16:53.920 scene as written, We did ideas that I had, and 0:16:53.960 --> 0:16:56.080 then I just let him play and improvise and pitch 0:16:56.160 --> 0:16:58.160 me things. And obviously, at the end of the day, 0:16:58.680 --> 0:17:00.520 if you were to like write down which are those 0:17:00.520 --> 0:17:03.840 lines are Albert's, you know, it becomes the majority, which 0:17:03.880 --> 0:17:07.280 is the intention to give him a space where he's 0:17:07.280 --> 0:17:10.879 comfortable enough to email me at night a better line 0:17:11.040 --> 0:17:12.879 which you would do with the die. Before any scene, 0:17:12.880 --> 0:17:15.720 I get a little email from Albert what if he said, 0:17:15.760 --> 0:17:21.720 did it? And it's always better than my joke in 0:17:21.760 --> 0:17:25.560 a minute, more from Jed Apatow, who's always thinking ahead. 0:17:25.800 --> 0:17:28.399 I have these like age issues. So I my friends 0:17:28.400 --> 0:17:31.680 are all forty five fifty, Okay, what is the movie 0:17:31.720 --> 0:17:34.399 we would make in our fifties and I'll five years ahead, 0:17:34.480 --> 0:17:39.960 begin to start flushing, start planning. I'm an like Baldwin. 0:17:40.080 --> 0:17:43.040 And here's the thing. Take a listen to our archive 0:17:43.520 --> 0:17:48.920 more unexpected conversations with artists, policymakers, and producers like Saturday 0:17:49.000 --> 0:17:54.000 Night Lives Lord Michael's. Producing for me, anyway is like 0:17:54.040 --> 0:17:56.840 an invisible art. If you're any good at it, you 0:17:56.960 --> 0:18:00.960 leave no fingerprints and you own way you prove your 0:18:00.960 --> 0:18:03.840 worth is you leave a body of work and people go, oh, 0:18:03.920 --> 0:18:08.199 that accident happened there again, Oh I see. So you know, 0:18:08.280 --> 0:18:11.040 you try and get the best out of people. If 0:18:11.040 --> 0:18:14.119 you look around the room and you're the smartest person 0:18:14.119 --> 0:18:17.480 in the room, then you're in the wrong room. Here 0:18:17.520 --> 0:18:20.960 more from Michael's and those he discovered like Chris rock Aways. 0:18:21.040 --> 0:18:23.760 I haven't been having a poor day since I met 0:18:23.840 --> 0:18:29.560 Laura Michaels and I've never been broke. And here's the thing, 0:18:29.760 --> 0:18:43.560 Dot Org. This is Alec Baldwin and you're listening to 0:18:43.640 --> 0:18:47.280 here's the thing. When my guest Judd Apatow directed The 0:18:47.280 --> 0:18:50.520 forty year Old Virgin, he collaborated with an actor who 0:18:50.600 --> 0:18:55.600 dances on the fault line between insecure, juvenile and unapologetic adult. 0:18:56.160 --> 0:18:59.159 He was the perfect muse for Apatow's film about a 0:18:59.160 --> 0:19:02.520 middle aged man quest to finally have sex. I want 0:19:02.520 --> 0:19:04.560 to go out with you, guys, Okay, I don't need 0:19:04.600 --> 0:19:06.760 your help. Okay, fine, you don't have to go out 0:19:06.760 --> 0:19:08.159 with us if you don't want. You know what, I 0:19:08.240 --> 0:19:12.120 respect women. I love women. I respect them so much 0:19:12.160 --> 0:19:16.400 that I completely stay away from Okay. I was producing 0:19:16.920 --> 0:19:20.240 on Anchorman, and I hadn't directed a film before, but 0:19:20.320 --> 0:19:23.000 I knew that Steve Carrell was one of the funniest 0:19:23.000 --> 0:19:25.520 people I've ever seen. He was crushing so hard every 0:19:25.600 --> 0:19:28.240 day on the set that all the actors were baffled 0:19:28.280 --> 0:19:31.120 and how how funny he was. And he wasn't someone 0:19:31.119 --> 0:19:33.600 that was in line to be the lead of a movie. 0:19:34.040 --> 0:19:38.080 He was just one of the great, hilarious supporting actor people. 0:19:38.760 --> 0:19:42.679 And I always like, I like those guys to be 0:19:42.760 --> 0:19:45.480 the lead. I always want, you know, I want to 0:19:45.520 --> 0:19:49.520 see yeah, yeah, Well beyond that, I want to see 0:19:49.760 --> 0:19:51.480 George Went. I want to I want to I like 0:19:51.560 --> 0:19:54.080 seeing I like because that's who I feel like. I 0:19:54.080 --> 0:19:56.280 feel like the side guy, and I always want to 0:19:56.320 --> 0:19:58.760 follow them home. And so I said to Steve, do 0:19:58.760 --> 0:20:01.160 you have any ideas for mo vies, because you definitely 0:20:01.240 --> 0:20:04.480 could carry a movie. And he said, there was a 0:20:04.480 --> 0:20:07.520 sketch at Second City we did once that we never 0:20:07.600 --> 0:20:12.000 quite finished, which was about a poker game where they're 0:20:12.040 --> 0:20:15.240 all telling sex stories and it's clear that one guy 0:20:15.359 --> 0:20:17.440 has never had sex, and everything he says, it makes 0:20:17.440 --> 0:20:20.040 no sense. And he's saying, yeah, you know, like when 0:20:20.520 --> 0:20:22.760 it's such a girl's breast, it feels like a bag 0:20:22.800 --> 0:20:25.400 of sand and you go down your pants and there's 0:20:25.400 --> 0:20:29.720 all that baby powder, and and he said, so, you know, 0:20:29.720 --> 0:20:32.920 I'd love to play a forty year old virgin. And 0:20:33.600 --> 0:20:36.320 just because I'm such a nerd and so insecure and 0:20:36.400 --> 0:20:40.720 ashamed of everything in life, I just immediately understood what 0:20:40.760 --> 0:20:43.200 he meant and that you could do something very sweet 0:20:43.240 --> 0:20:47.800 and and riotously funny. So we wrote it together. Now now, 0:20:47.840 --> 0:20:51.040 so when you direct the film, how is the technical 0:20:51.560 --> 0:20:54.840 challenge for you? Or how is the technical aspects of 0:20:54.880 --> 0:20:57.680 it for you? Grown? Because it is filmmaking, and are 0:20:57.680 --> 0:21:00.439 you I like, do Mr and Mrs apple House sit 0:21:00.560 --> 0:21:03.639 in the screening room at nine and watch Citizen Kane 0:21:03.720 --> 0:21:06.240 and look at that there is a man. Look at 0:21:06.280 --> 0:21:09.200 the rack focus? You know, do do you watch scenes 0:21:09.240 --> 0:21:10.960 from films and say, that's what I want. There, It 0:21:11.080 --> 0:21:15.160 is right there, Leslie. That's not me at all, because 0:21:15.200 --> 0:21:16.800 I came from being a stand up comedian. It was 0:21:16.880 --> 0:21:20.240 all dialogue, it wasn't visuals, so I never tuned into that, 0:21:20.720 --> 0:21:23.119 and I have no brain for the technology, so I 0:21:23.200 --> 0:21:26.520 can't remember the lenses and what they do even now, 0:21:26.640 --> 0:21:29.679 Like what do you do? I hire people who are 0:21:29.720 --> 0:21:32.520 really good, like surrender all that to other people. Well, 0:21:32.920 --> 0:21:35.400 it's not a total surrender, because I will show them 0:21:35.440 --> 0:21:38.280 what I like. You know. I always I'm trying to 0:21:38.359 --> 0:21:41.720 model my work after movies like the last detail of 0:21:41.760 --> 0:21:44.600 the how Ashby movie or Coming Home. I like movies 0:21:44.640 --> 0:21:48.080 that feel almost like a documentary. I want you to 0:21:48.080 --> 0:21:49.879