Speaker 1: Hi there here say listeners, ed helms here. I wanted
Speaker 1: to add this short prologue to the episode because I
Speaker 1: want to acknowledge a difficult situation. Since recording this conversation
Speaker 1: with Rob Reiner and Michael McKeon just a couple of
Speaker 1: weeks ago, Rob and his wife Michelle have passed away
Speaker 1: under very sudden and very tragic circumstances. I want to
Speaker 1: extend my deepest, heartfelt condolences to their family and all
Speaker 1: of those who loved them or were lucky enough to
Speaker 1: be loved by them. Rob meant so much to so
Speaker 1: many people, and I count myself among them. He was
Speaker 1: a hero of mine, and I don't mean that in
Speaker 1: an abstract way, but in a very real and literal way,
Speaker 1: in the way that certain artists shape you and sometimes
Speaker 1: even before you realize it's happening.
Speaker 2: Many of his classic movies.
Speaker 1: Emerged just as I was coming of age through the eighties.
Speaker 1: This is Spinal Tap, The Princess Bride, When Harry met Sally, Misery,
Speaker 1: and perhaps most of all, stand by Me. These movies
Speaker 1: they didn't just entertain me. They helped form my storytelling
Speaker 1: and comedy identity, my sense of flow and tone, my
Speaker 1: love of difficult but redeemable characters. Rob Reiner taught me
Speaker 1: that hard laughs and deep humanity can sit right next
Speaker 1: to one another, and they very often should. But he
Speaker 1: wasn't just a creative inspiration. He was also a human inspiration.
Speaker 1: He was the kind of person you both wanted to
Speaker 1: be and wanted to be around. He was warm and generous,
Speaker 1: gregarious and curious, a legendary conversationalist, and also deeply engaged
Speaker 1: in social issues. He cared about making the world a
Speaker 1: better place, about cultural values, democracy and political integrity. Rob
Speaker 1: had a conscience, and he put it to work. Listening
Speaker 1: back to this conversation, now, what really jumps out.
Speaker 2: At me is how much fun he's having.
Speaker 1: He's engaged, playful, generous with his insights, and clearly still
Speaker 1: delighted by the work even after a lifetime of extraordinary achievement.
Speaker 1: I'm incredibly grateful that I had this time with him,
Speaker 1: and I'm honored to share this conversation with you.
Speaker 2: Now.
Speaker 1: This episode is, in our own small way, a celebration
Speaker 1: of Rob Reiner. He will be profoundly missed, but his voice,
Speaker 1: his humor, and his spirit will always be with us,
Speaker 1: and that is quite a gift. I hope you enjoy
Speaker 1: the episode. Welcome to Earsay, the iHeart and Audible Audio
Speaker 1: Book Club. I'm Ed Helms and I am the host
Speaker 1: of another podcast called Snaffo and with Me is the
Speaker 1: host of yet another podcast. Here we go again, my
Speaker 1: dear buddy cal Pen.
Speaker 3: Hello, sir, how are you servain? I'm great, I'm great,
Speaker 3: You are great?
Speaker 1: Can I just say cal Pen is great? Everybody?
Speaker 3: Come on, what a nice thing to say.
Speaker 1: I mean, you're freaking funny and delightful and incredibly smart
Speaker 1: and insightful. And that's that's a killer combination of traits.
Speaker 3: I'm glad I don't have these traits at age eleven. Again,
Speaker 3: they were not helpful as an eleven year old, but
Speaker 3: I do enjoy them as an adult.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, that's not uncommon. A precocious child is actually
Speaker 1: a very charming adults. But man, man, are they annoying.
Speaker 1: I'm sorry to have dug up that trauma. All right,
Speaker 1: I'm gonna name some names here. I want you to
Speaker 1: tell me what these names have in common? Are you ready?
Speaker 2: Yep?
Speaker 1: Eric Stumpy, Joe Child, Peter James Bond, Mick Shrimpton, Richard Rick, Shrimpton,
Speaker 1: Joe Mama Besser and Scott Skippy Scuffleton.
Speaker 3: More than half sound familiar, and I honestly cannot place it.
Speaker 1: Okay, these are all drummers from the band Spinal Tap,
Speaker 1: who all met their very untimely demise. In the Spinal
Speaker 1: Tap lore there was a bizarre gardening accident. There was
Speaker 1: I believe some one of them spontaneously combusted, rather dramatic.
Speaker 1: This is Spinal Tap is, of course, the pioneering nineteen
Speaker 1: eighty four mockumentary created by Rob Reiner and starring Reiner
Speaker 1: along with Christopher Guest, Harry Shearer, and Michael McKeon. It
Speaker 1: spoofs the over the top world of rock and roll
Speaker 1: and heavy metal in the seventies and eighties, and it
Speaker 1: also spoofs the documentaries that venerate these rock stars. Kl
Speaker 1: do you remember watching Spinal Tap a very very long
Speaker 1: time ago? And I should also note it was like
Speaker 1: one of those two am in college kind of things. Yeah,
Speaker 1: kind of viewerships of course, huge Chris Guest Rob Reiner fan.
Speaker 1: But it has been a while.
Speaker 3: I need to revisit.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I have to say, Rob Reiner and Christopher Guest
Speaker 1: and all these guys. They live in a very special
Speaker 1: comedy universe, and it's so fun to learn about all
Speaker 1: of their history together and how their lives kind of
Speaker 1: interweave and overlap. And then of course Spinal Tap is
Speaker 1: its own ecosystem, like they've created an entire mythology around
Speaker 1: this totally fake band, and it is just beyond hilarious,
Speaker 1: and I have to say it's very much a part
Speaker 1: of my own comedy development. Listeners, if you haven't seen
Speaker 1: the original nineteen eighty four movie, you should definitely just
Speaker 1: stop right now and go see it. It is so
Speaker 1: damn and hilarious. But as a refresher, Rob Reiner plays
Speaker 1: Marty de Berghie, a documentary filmmaker who follows the fictional
Speaker 1: band Spinal Tap. Portrayed by Christopher Guest, Michael McKeon and
Speaker 1: Harry Shearer. Marty follows Spinal Tap and what I would
Speaker 1: call a series of escalating mishaps. It's definitely a cult movie,
Speaker 1: but one that has left a huge mark on pop culture,
Speaker 1: not the least of which is the Christopher guest line
Speaker 1: These go Out to eleven, a version of which made
Speaker 1: it into the Shorter Oxford English Dictionary in two thousand
Speaker 1: and two.
Speaker 3: That's an accomplishment right there.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I know, it's pretty cool if you can like
Speaker 1: affect the codified language. I also have to say this
Speaker 1: movie is widely considered the original mainstream mockumentary, and that
Speaker 1: of course spawned a vast ecosystem of great movies and television,
Speaker 1: including all of Christopher Guests subsequent movies like Best in
Speaker 1: Show and Waiting for Guffman and so many other great ones,
Speaker 1: and then of course the show I worked on, The
Speaker 1: Office That was a mockumidating, right. I fe like The
Speaker 1: Office and Parks and Rec and all these great mockumentary
Speaker 1: shows are descendants of Spinal Tap in a way.
Speaker 3: That must have been awesome. Then to have loved Spinal
Speaker 3: Tap so much and then get to work on The
Speaker 3: Office in I don't know if saying in the style
Speaker 3: of is even correct, but like, that's so cool.
Speaker 1: It was The Office was a dream in so many,
Speaker 1: so many ways, which is a whole conversation for another day.
Speaker 1: But today we're talking about the new audio book A
Speaker 1: Fine Line Between Stupid and Clever, the Story of Spinal Tap.
Speaker 1: It's written by Rob Reiner with Christopher Guest, Harry Sheer
Speaker 1: and Michael McKeon and voiced by Rob Reiner, although they
Speaker 1: all appear in the audio book as well. It's a
Speaker 1: history of how the movie and the band came together,
Speaker 1: the film Unexpected Afterlife, and how forty years later everyone
Speaker 1: got the band back together for the sequel, which is
Speaker 1: out now. It's called Spinal Tap two. The end continues,
Speaker 1: I mean, come on, is that not the best title ever?
Speaker 2: It's great.
Speaker 1: The audiobook also includes an in universe oral history featuring
Speaker 1: all the actors as their respective characters. It's called Smell
Speaker 1: the Book for the uninitiated. That's a bit of wordplay
Speaker 1: on one of Spinal TAP's albums from within the movie,
Speaker 1: called Smell the Glove, and what that means God only knows.
Speaker 1: But this is an absolutely ridiculous and delightful and wonderful
Speaker 1: component of the audiobook, and it features all of the
Speaker 1: main players just doing their over the top stick cal
Speaker 1: I'm super excited for this one. I get to talk
Speaker 1: to not one, but two of the core people who
Speaker 1: made Spinal Tap, and this audiobook happen incredible.
Speaker 3: I am jealous. So I'm just going to get out
Speaker 3: of here and we'll talk again after the interview's over.
Speaker 1: All right, I'll see you later. Now here to get
Speaker 1: into a fine line between stupid and clever. The story
Speaker 1: of Spinal Tap is the audiobooks author and voice Spinal Tap,
Speaker 1: creator and director and co star director of stand By Me,
Speaker 1: When Harry Met Sally, The Princess Bride, and so many
Speaker 1: more great movies. Rob Reiner also joining the show. One
Speaker 1: of the great comedic actors of all time. He is,
Speaker 1: of course, in the movie Spinal Tap, as well as
Speaker 1: Spinal Tap.
Speaker 2: The end continues.
Speaker 1: He's incredible in the great show Better Call Saul. He's
Speaker 1: in other movies like Best in Show, and just an
Speaker 1: overwhelming resume of tremendous comedy over so many decades. Rob
Speaker 1: Reiner and Michael McKeon, welcome to ear say, it is
Speaker 1: truly such a pleasure to have you join our audio
Speaker 1: book club today.
Speaker 2: It's a pleasure to be here. Ed nice to be giant.
Speaker 1: Well, of course, Uh, you are part of the incredible
Speaker 1: team behind Spinal Tap. Rob, you directed that legendary movie. Michael,
Speaker 1: you are part of the band. This is such a
Speaker 1: thrill for me because that movie means so much to me.
Speaker 1: I remember it came out in nineteen eighty four. I
Speaker 1: was ten years old. I was not aware of it then,
Speaker 1: but very soon after when it landed at Blockbuster Video,
Speaker 1: I was like, I'd been hearing about this from the
Speaker 1: older kids at school, and like, this is a thing
Speaker 1: I had to and I got it. I forced my
Speaker 1: dad to rent it for me, and he was like,
Speaker 1: what the hell is this? He was looking at the
Speaker 1: hard rock picture on the front, and he's like, what what? Okay, fine,
Speaker 1: and we get home, we start watching it, and I'll
Speaker 1: be honest, as like a twelve year old at that time,
Speaker 1: I don't think I got half of it.
Speaker 4: I got half of it. Yeah, you got exactly half
Speaker 4: of it, and we know which half.
Speaker 1: Yeah, But my dad was howling, he was yeah, And
Speaker 1: I realized, like, this is important, this is something I
Speaker 1: have to lad down to, and so of course I
Speaker 1: just rewatched it over the years, and it's become very
Speaker 1: much a part of my comedy. DNA truly, and I
Speaker 1: want to thank you for that.
Speaker 2: Dannata, our pleasure. You're totally welcome.
Speaker 1: Do either of you have a favorite scene from the movie.
Speaker 1: I mean, that's an impossible question, but do you does
Speaker 1: something jump out?
Speaker 2: I used to say.
Speaker 4: That my favorite thing because I had nothing to do
Speaker 4: with it, and it's brilliant. It's about a minute and
Speaker 4: a half, maybe two minutes. Rob could Robbie tell me
Speaker 4: of Chris just soloing on the stage with you know,
Speaker 4: with all the feedback, and then the violin, and.
Speaker 2: My favorite moment in that moment is he picks up
Speaker 2: the violin and uses it again, you know, but then
Speaker 2: at one moment he just tools a little the peg. Yeah,
Speaker 2: just tunes a peg a little bit too to get
Speaker 2: it just right. It's it.
Speaker 4: It's great pantomime, noisy pantomime. I guess you'd call it.
Speaker 2: It's fabulous. Well, my favorite, my favorite scene, and it's
Speaker 2: become the title of the book that we that we
Speaker 2: put out called a fine Line between Stupid and Clever,
Speaker 2: And my favorite line in the movie is a fine
Speaker 2: line between stupid and clever. And it's a scene where
Speaker 2: Spinal Tap is their gig has just been canceled, and
Speaker 2: they were sitting in the hotel and the lobby there,
Speaker 2: and all of a sudden, this very big famous rock musician,
Speaker 2: Duke Fame, walks in and they say hello, and he's
Speaker 2: a big shot and he's got a manager played by
Speaker 2: Howard Hessman, and Howard says, listen, I wish I could
Speaker 2: talk to you guys, but I have to go in
Speaker 2: the lobby and wait for the limo. I don't have
Speaker 2: time to talk. I love that. And then he leaves,
Speaker 2: and then everybody says, what a wanker that Duke Fam.
Speaker 2: He's a wanker. There we used to he used to
Speaker 2: open for us. He people booh with. He was terrible.
Speaker 2: And then the manager says, I don't understand Dupe Fame's
Speaker 2: got it because they had an album that they couldn't
Speaker 2: release called Smell the Glove, which had a sexist cover
Speaker 2: and they couldn't release it. And he says, well, I
Speaker 2: understand dupe Fame. He has an album cover where he's
Speaker 2: naked and there's all these women that are whipping him
Speaker 2: and something. And then Tony Hendrew plays the matter says, well,
Speaker 2: you don't understand the difference is he's the victim. See
Speaker 2: in your album, she's the victim because she's on all
Speaker 2: fours and she's being made to sniff a glove. And
Speaker 2: then the guys are like they're puzzled. Here's oh, I
Speaker 2: see what they did. There's a twist they turned around
Speaker 2: and one guy says, yeah, there's a fine line between stupid,
Speaker 2: and then Harry says and clever. And I love that
Speaker 2: and to me, that's the essence of spinal top, fine
Speaker 2: line between stupid and clever. I think you're right.
Speaker 4: And it's also something that happened on the moment. It
Speaker 4: happened conversational. I mean, the entire film is improvised, but
Speaker 4: it was one of those things we were all kind
Speaker 4: of thinking on this same track and it just kind
Speaker 4: of spilled out, right.
Speaker 2: Yeah. And it's interesting because we shot the film with
Speaker 2: one camera. We shot maybe a scene two or three times.
Speaker 2: And it because, like Michael says, it's improvised. You don't
Speaker 2: know what's gonna come out on what's you know, it's
Speaker 2: not going to be matched. It's not going to write
Speaker 2: like a script when you say the same things, so
Speaker 2: different things would come out. And in that case, the punchline,
Speaker 2: which is Harry saying and clever is off camera. Now
Speaker 2: you normally would you know, you'd focus on that, Yeah,
Speaker 2: you pick it up. But we found this in the
Speaker 2: cutting room and I said, well that works in the
Speaker 2: tracks and so and it works. The joke works even
Speaker 2: though the Punchline's not on camera.
Speaker 1: It's the title of this book and audiobook, And I
Speaker 1: think you're right. It captures not only what's so fun
Speaker 1: about the spirit of the movie, but also to me,
Speaker 1: what you have done as the creators of Spinal Tap
Speaker 1: is to create these characters that are so oh.
Speaker 2: Beautifully stupid, thank you.
Speaker 1: They're right at this sort of like nexus of confidence,
Speaker 1: obliviousness and stupidity. But to execute that and to improvise
Speaker 1: that with such precision and consistency takes a profound cleverness.
Speaker 4: Well, we had our work cut out for us, because
Speaker 4: the people we were doing, the people we were embodying,
Speaker 4: take themselves very very seriously, of course, and if you
Speaker 4: do that, if you're on the level, that's where the
Speaker 4: funny comes from. Because there's something about the audacity of
Speaker 4: someone who's got a very dim bulb up here telling
Speaker 4: everyone else what's what, and also their philosophies of life
Speaker 4: and how deep and profound they are. Yeah.
Speaker 2: Yeah, what's wonderful is we have, you know, these great
Speaker 2: albums where you know, rock and roll creation and all
Speaker 2: these very high falutin ideas about these guys thinking about
Speaker 2: how they've really got a grasp of the way the
Speaker 2: world works and the universe works. And to be honest,
Speaker 2: you know, there were a lot of heavy metal rock
Speaker 2: musicians that were very upset with us because they did
Speaker 2: take themselves seriously and they're making fun of us. You know,
Speaker 2: that's not right. You know, we really do make great
Speaker 2: music and all this stuff, and they do make great music,
Speaker 2: but it's not as high fallutine as they think it is.
Speaker 1: Isn't that the sort of highest compliment though? Doesn't that
Speaker 1: mean that you've really punched the button if they're feeling
Speaker 1: a little agitated at the parody of self importance?
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think so, And a lot of them over
Speaker 2: time got to really dig it. Sure. I mean they
Speaker 2: accepted it and they said, oh, this is really cool
Speaker 2: and they love the fact that we were making fun,
Speaker 2: ye know, sincere Form of Flattery and all that.
Speaker 1: So I had heard that. I've read about some of
Speaker 1: the blowback at the time from people like Ozzy Osbourne
Speaker 1: and Steven Tyler. How real was that? I mean, did
Speaker 1: they hold grudge for years? Was this something that affected
Speaker 1: your lives?
Speaker 4: Well, here's the thing. Blowback used to be a different
Speaker 4: sized animal than it is now. We encountered Steven Tyler
Speaker 4: and this was his thing. It was like too close,
Speaker 4: too close, and he would smile a little bit, but
Speaker 4: mainly it was like this hurts.
Speaker 2: It's so close.
Speaker 4: Yes, and we heard that Ozzie isn't didn't like it,
Speaker 4: but it was the same thing. It was like I
Speaker 4: felt uncomfortable, yeah, because I felt spied on. But that
Speaker 4: came down as they didn't like it, right, and it's
Speaker 4: like nonsense. I met Ozzie years later and he was
Speaker 4: adored the movie and he was great about it. But
Speaker 4: now it's like somebody says anything and you'll get thirty
Speaker 4: thousand people.
Speaker 2: Said did you hear that?
Speaker 1: Yeah?
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, So it's a different world. I mean, the
Speaker 2: same thing happened with actual Rose and then Slash basically
Speaker 2: said to him, Oh, it's funny they're making it, and
Speaker 2: then Axl Rose, Oh yeah, I see, I get what
Speaker 2: they're doing. And same thing. When I first met Sting,
Speaker 2: he was just you know, hitting with the police and everything,
Speaker 2: and he said, a listen, I watched this movie over
Speaker 2: and over. I don't know whether to laugh or cry. Yeah,
Speaker 2: you know. I mean so that was like, you know,
Speaker 2: a great compliment.
Speaker 1: The movie is affectionate and this is what I think
Speaker 1: elevates certain comedy from other comedy. You're not really punching down.
Speaker 1: There's a genuine affection for these characters, as oblivious as
Speaker 1: they are and as self important as they are, and
Speaker 1: you're sort of having fun with their hubris. But I
Speaker 1: never felt like there was ridicule baked in there.
Speaker 2: And we we're the first generation that grew up on
Speaker 2: rock and rolls right in the fifties, and we love
Speaker 2: rock and rolls. Of course, we all grew up with that,
Speaker 2: so you know, it was a love of the music
Speaker 2: and also could find what's funny about it too, exactly,
Speaker 2: So you know, you try to mix those things.
Speaker 4: So when you're sixteen, your favorite band is printed on
Speaker 4: your forehead.
Speaker 2: And it's like it's who you.
Speaker 1: Are, and every article of clothing that you wear, that's right,
Speaker 1: that's right, and it's all about that.
Speaker 4: And it's like you look at yourself, what a stupid
Speaker 4: kid I was? And boy I was happy. Yeah, I
Speaker 4: love the music. So I was been listening to the
Speaker 4: Kinks a lot lately. That's kind of my pet third band.
Speaker 4: You know, everybody loved the Beatles, everybody loved the Who
Speaker 4: and the Stones and all that but the Kinks were
Speaker 4: always like so.
Speaker 2: On the money to me.
Speaker 4: And I know I wasn't an English guy, you know
Speaker 4: from Muswell Hill.
Speaker 2: I was this American kid.
Speaker 4: But there's something about those days which when you're sixteen,
Speaker 4: that's what you do. You take on that coloration, you know,
Speaker 4: and it stays with or it stays with me. I
Speaker 4: showed no signs of growing up.
Speaker 2: Amen.
Speaker 4: But I just bought A King's album about a week ago,
Speaker 4: so you know, there you go.
Speaker 2: You know, one time I was at this party once
Speaker 2: for Nick Polgie was his birthday, ninetieth birthday party. And
Speaker 2: his stepson, Max is a musician. He's a guitarist. Now
Speaker 2: he plays with Taylor Swift, but he was with Kesha.
Speaker 2: He's played with a lot of different bands. Nick says
Speaker 2: to me, you know, he's got a spinal tap tattoo
Speaker 2: on his back. No, really, get out of here. I
Speaker 2: go over to him and I said, Max, Nick told
Speaker 2: me that you have a spiral tattooth. He takes down
Speaker 2: his shirt and in the back he has the cover
Speaker 2: of Shark Sandwich tattooed to his back, which is the
Speaker 2: sandwich with a little fin coming out of the Wow. Yeah.
Speaker 2: So yeah, So you talk about having your favorite band
Speaker 2: tattooed to your forehead. He literally had a tattoo.
Speaker 1: All right, I want to talk a little bit about
Speaker 1: the creative process. The audiobook details Schnedling tell us what
Speaker 1: exactly that is and the role it plays in the
Speaker 1: sort of writing and execution or even in the origin
Speaker 1: of the movie.
Speaker 2: That's a term that Chris guessed first throughout long time ago.
Speaker 2: He referred to the back and forth of improvisation as
Speaker 2: you're snadling with each other. You just kind of riffing,
Speaker 2: riffing with each other.
Speaker 1: You know where that where that what that word means
Speaker 1: exactly or where it can It's a made up word,
Speaker 1: just a made up word.
Speaker 2: Okay, here's a great story. You got you like this.
Speaker 2: So we've been trying there's a guy in prison in
Speaker 2: in that's not the funny part, not so far, not
Speaker 2: so far. But there's a guy in prison in Texas.
Speaker 2: His name is Nan and Williams. And this guy has
Speaker 2: been in we've been trying to get out for a
Speaker 2: long time. He's a great guy. He's in there for
Speaker 2: crime he didn't commit. He's got three master's degrees, he's
Speaker 2: written books, he teaches all these young inmates, and he
Speaker 2: asked me, he said, you know, I send me a book,
Speaker 2: send me one of the books, you know, fine line
Speaker 2: between stupid. So I sent him the book. We talked
Speaker 2: about it and he read some You know, these kids,
Speaker 2: they don't know who's spiled happens. They don't know who
Speaker 2: I am, they don't know any of it, but they're
Speaker 2: listening to it and they picked up on schnadling. Says, hey,
Speaker 2: what's that We stopped, and they start, we gotta start
Speaker 2: snadling with each other. So you got these prisoners down
Speaker 2: and down in Houston snadling. I love it. That's awesome.
Speaker 1: That's therapeutic for sure.
Speaker 2: Oh man, that's fantastic. Yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah, So schnadling is essentially improvisation. There's an anecdote in
Speaker 1: the audiobook about a video shoot that you guys are doing,
Speaker 1: and the schnadaling sort of starts during a.
Speaker 2: Like an over shot.
Speaker 1: There all everybody's lying on the floor.
Speaker 2: Yeah, we were doing a takeoff of our debut. Yeah,
Speaker 2: this was a takeoff of Midnight Special was part of
Speaker 2: a TV show that had a satire of all kinds
Speaker 2: of different things on television. You know, we had sitcoms
Speaker 2: and telethons and commercials, and one of the things we
Speaker 2: did was this midnight special. I came out as Wolfman
Speaker 2: Jack and I introduced for the first time Spinal Tap,
Speaker 2: England's loudest band, and they came out and they played
Speaker 2: a song called rock and Roll nutt or pore of
Speaker 2: it was live and part of it was kind of
Speaker 2: an MTV video, like cheezy video, yeah, really cheap. And
Speaker 2: there was one part where they had this, I guess
Speaker 2: a foger or a smoke, a b smoke or something,
Speaker 2: and it kept leaking hot oil on them. Yeah, and
Speaker 2: we had them on the floor. We were trying to
Speaker 2: do like a Buzzby Berkeley kind of thing with the
Speaker 2: legs going, you know, right.
Speaker 1: But you're getting like a medieval torture, the torture yeah,
Speaker 1: h yeah, yeah, of some sort.
Speaker 2: But they started, you know, they started making fun and
Speaker 2: they started, you know, schnadling, they started doing stick and
Speaker 2: those characters. And then we said, Jesus, these guys, we
Speaker 2: should find something else for them to do, not just
Speaker 2: lie on the floor and get hot oil board on them.
Speaker 4: Although although that's all that's a conversation. Another conversation that's fabulous.
Speaker 1: Now, when you guys are schneedling, especially while the camera
Speaker 1: is rolling, are you breaking a lot? Are there any
Speaker 1: bad laughers in your group?
Speaker 4: Well, there were a few scenes that ended slightly early,
Speaker 4: and Paul Benedict, who was one of the great guys ever,
Speaker 4: who plays the hotel clerk, and he gets into a
Speaker 4: contractant with Tony who's making cracks about his sexuality and everything.
Speaker 4: And it's like Paul comes in for a day and
Speaker 4: just lays all of us out. He's so brilliant, so funny.
Speaker 4: Tony Hendris, the manager, is always carrying around this cricket bat,
Speaker 4: so he puts the cricket bat up on the counter
Speaker 4: while he's talking to the guy get these rooms straightened out,
Speaker 4: and Paul, the hotel clerk, just points to the bat
Speaker 4: and he goes, well, you can't take that to your room,
Speaker 4: and Tony goes, innocently enough, why not, And Paul said, well,
Speaker 4: it's enormous, that's all there was to it.
Speaker 2: It makes no sense, no, but the little story that
Speaker 2: we told ourselves in our heads at that moment started
Speaker 2: laughing before he even got the rest of the word out.
Speaker 4: And there's no reason why that's so brilliantly funny, but
Speaker 4: it was. And Fred Willard also had away. He was
Speaker 4: one of the best improvisers. And you can see in
Speaker 4: this one scene where he's telling him about the gig
Speaker 4: they're going to play on the Army base, and you
Speaker 4: can see Chris Guest kind of ducking behind somebody because
Speaker 4: he's starting to go and you just want to rule
Speaker 4: the take. And there was one that I actually went
Speaker 4: and that was Chris totally surprised me. He's playing a piano,
Speaker 4: very quiet, kind of classical piece, and I go, that's interesting,
Speaker 4: you know, that's something very different from what you normally play.
Speaker 4: He says, well, it's you know, it's a classic comedy
Speaker 4: Mozart and Bacchus called mock piece. It's in D D minor,
Speaker 4: which I think is the saddest of all keys, and
Speaker 4: it's just simple lines intertwined. And I said, well, what
Speaker 4: do you call this?
Speaker 2: He says, lick my love pump, and I went, I went,
Speaker 2: we had to do that all scene over and see. Yeah. Yeah.
Speaker 1: I was notorious on the office for ruining takes, for laughing,
Speaker 1: and there were, like you described, Chris, there's a scene
Speaker 1: in a Christmas episode where Steve Krell is being so
Speaker 1: funny that I have to duck behind a plant, and
Speaker 1: I'm behind the plant for the majority of the scene.
Speaker 2: But it's part of what's.
Speaker 1: So fun and frustrating about improvisation, right, is that the
Speaker 1: best stuff can get ruined so easily.
Speaker 4: Yeah, yeah, I mean that's how things happen in a
Speaker 4: good improvisational company. And there are a few, and there
Speaker 4: have been many over the years. The mistake you can
Speaker 4: make is to look for that punchline instead of living
Speaker 4: in the scene. Yes, because that's amen some of the
Speaker 4: Peter Bonders is one of the best improvisers I ever saw,
Speaker 4: and I never saw him crack a joke or anything
Speaker 4: like it. He just existed in the scene. Anything he
Speaker 4: was doing was completely absurd. But he took it dead
Speaker 4: seriously and he was hilarious and he would never break
Speaker 4: in a million years.
Speaker 1: That is the secret. Yeah, just to take take it
Speaker 1: all dead seriously, take it all bitch, and not chase
Speaker 1: the not chase the punchlines. There are a lot of
Speaker 1: scenes that feel in the movie completely improvised, Like.
Speaker 2: They're all improvised. Every all the dialogue is improvised completely.
Speaker 1: I guess that's my question. Like there's the talking about
Speaker 1: the drummers that have died, and Chris breaks in that,
Speaker 1: by the way, on the vomit line, yes, which I think,
Speaker 1: which he says, and he starts to chuckle, but he
Speaker 1: saves it. Yeah, and he keeps it in character more
Speaker 1: or less right, just enough, But.
Speaker 2: I love it.
Speaker 1: It's just a little glimpse under the veil. But then
Speaker 1: there are scenes like the legendary amp that goes to eleven,
Speaker 1: which clearly was prep.
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, well, yeah, we had the we had the prop.
Speaker 2: We knew that we were going to have an AMP
Speaker 2: that went to eleven, but we didn't know how we
Speaker 2: were going to get to it, or how it was going.
Speaker 4: To be revealed, or what we were or how you
Speaker 4: feature something this big, yeah in a movie that's a documentary,
Speaker 4: or what.
Speaker 2: We were going to say about it. And my favorite
Speaker 2: moment in there is Chris is showing me around all
Speaker 2: the different guitars and then he shows me this amp
Speaker 2: that goes up to eleven and I said, well, I
Speaker 2: don't see why do you have it to go well?
Speaker 2: He said, well it's one louder, isn't it. I said, well, yeah,
Speaker 2: but I mean couldn't you make the top number be
Speaker 2: ten and just make that a little louder? And he
Speaker 2: had no answer for that. I hit him with something
Speaker 2: that I basically painted him into a corner. He made
Speaker 2: a long, long pause and he goes, well, this goes
Speaker 2: to eleven. Yeah, he had no answer for.
Speaker 1: The honesty of his performance in that moment is so perfect.
Speaker 4: There's another little tiny moment that Chris does. It's when
Speaker 4: we're in the airport and Janine has taken over the
Speaker 4: management of the band and she's laying out all this
Speaker 4: shit about you know, astrology is telling us to go
Speaker 4: to this city and not this one. She's rearranging everything
Speaker 4: and Chris, who was wearing a cowboy hat for the
Speaker 4: only moment in the film he's wearing that, She says,
Speaker 4: have you got this? And he just, without even really
Speaker 4: looking at her, he kind of tilts his head and
Speaker 4: holds up the same thing she's reading it from and.
Speaker 2: Then puts it down.
Speaker 4: And think about that moment that just says everything, how
Speaker 4: about you go to hell, but without actually saying it,
Speaker 4: and don't worry about me, I'm out of here anyway.
Speaker 2: It's great.
Speaker 1: Laden that's fabulous. There's one moment, I have to know
Speaker 1: if it was improvised. And it's the fabulous scene with
Speaker 1: Bruno Kirby as the limo driver, and I know that
Speaker 1: what you shot was actually much longer than what made
Speaker 1: the movie. But the bit where he starts to go
Speaker 1: off on Frank Sinatra and the window between the limo
Speaker 1: driver cab and the passenger section just slowly rises.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think that was one of you guys just
Speaker 2: did that or something. No.
Speaker 4: I think going into the scene we said, when he
Speaker 4: starts going on about stuff, just shut.
Speaker 2: Him out of the world. Yeah, but we didn't know where.
Speaker 1: So funny, it's just so funny, and Bruno Kirby's reaction
Speaker 1: was perfect.
Speaker 4: Yeah, there's an outtake of scene where we get his
Speaker 4: character really high and he winds up singing my way
Speaker 4: into a chunk of pizza and in his underwear, in
Speaker 4: his underwear, and then he passes out. He nearly killed him.
Speaker 4: So missed the desk by like this much in the
Speaker 4: hotel room. Wow, but it was awfully funny. But it
Speaker 4: was just, oh, if we go there, we'll be there
Speaker 4: for ten minutes.
Speaker 2: Yeah, we had some great stuff that wound up. As
Speaker 2: they say on the cutting room floor. My favorite thing
Speaker 2: was and it's it just it was a great joke,
Speaker 2: great stuff, but it just took too long to unfold.
Speaker 2: There was a band that opened for Spinal Tap at
Speaker 2: one point called The Dose, which was kind of a
Speaker 2: punk band, and the lead singer was Sherry Currey from
Speaker 2: from the Runaways. And you see then Nigel and her
Speaker 2: are kind of noodling a little bit, and the next
Speaker 2: scene Nigel has a herpie sore on his lip and
Speaker 2: we don't make much of it. The next thing you
Speaker 2: see David, you know, played by Michael, and he's also
Speaker 2: making out with her, and the next and Viv and
Speaker 2: the next scene herpee story. It makes it way all
Speaker 2: the way around. And then there's a band meeting where
Speaker 2: five of them are sitting around deciding they're gonna vote
Speaker 2: whether or not they're going to keep The Dose on
Speaker 2: the tour. And before there's four guys with herpee stories.
Speaker 2: They saying, I think we should draw I think so,
Speaker 2: and the drummers.
Speaker 4: The only guy without a herpe story, he says, I
Speaker 4: think they're gonna think them.
Speaker 2: But it just took so long, and the only remnant,
Speaker 2: the only thing left is there's a scene where you
Speaker 2: see Nigel and David, they both have herpe st. We
Speaker 2: never explain it, no, and it gets a laugh for
Speaker 2: some reason. I don't know. I never know to this
Speaker 2: day why I got that laugh.
Speaker 4: For one reason, there's this little undercurrent about how close
Speaker 4: Sneigel and David really are and always.
Speaker 2: Have been, you know. Uh, and it's God. So you're
Speaker 2: saying it's a gay thing, that's what you're saying.
Speaker 4: I'm saying it's it's a gray area. It's a gay area.
Speaker 4: But Richard Curtis, the wonderful screenwriter and director, I've met him,
Speaker 4: and he said, you know, Spinal TAP's my favorite romantic comedy.
Speaker 4: He says, it's got it's got the same structure. It's
Speaker 4: you guys belong together, and you know, everything else in
Speaker 4: the world is kind of a distraction because you're looking
Speaker 4: for that moment when you were two little assholes on
Speaker 4: the street corner playing skiffle music, you know, and so it.
Speaker 2: Was like, Okay. Ricky Gervay said the same exact thing
Speaker 2: when I interviewed him. He said, it's a romantic comedy.
Speaker 2: I love that. I hadn't thought of that.
Speaker 1: So Spinal Tap is obviously a parody band. The songs
Speaker 1: are insanely funny, but they're not exactly a joke themselves.
Speaker 1: Let's let's listen to a clip.
Speaker 5: Okay, So the songs are hilarious, but they're also objectively
Speaker 5: great songs.
Speaker 2: That was the goal. The goal was the humor would
Speaker 2: come out in the lyrics, never in the music. They're
Speaker 2: all great musicians, they all take it seriously, and the
Speaker 2: music is good, like you say, so, we never wanted
Speaker 2: the music to be the thing that got the laughs.
Speaker 2: It was always the lyrics.
Speaker 1: I'm just curious how you arrived at that. I remember
Speaker 1: a debate we had on the Office. My character was
Speaker 1: in a production of Sweeney Todd in the World of
Speaker 1: the Office, and there was a debate in pre production
Speaker 1: at Scranton Community Theater do we want these actors to
Speaker 1: be bad and for it to sort of be silly?
Speaker 1: And I felt very passionately that even community theater actors
Speaker 1: are oftentimes extremely talented and they're extremely committed, and that
Speaker 1: that isn't what's funny about the scene.
Speaker 2: It's it's a very tricky line to walk because they
Speaker 2: can't be sensational actors, sure, but they can be adequate, proficient.
Speaker 2: I mean you're not.
Speaker 1: Finding humor in how bad they are.
Speaker 2: No, but Chris Guess made this thing about community theatical
Speaker 2: waiting for Guffman, of course, and it's kind of perfect
Speaker 2: because they're, you know, they're doing their thing. But it's
Speaker 2: just like the line that we have to tread with
Speaker 2: Spinal Tap. We love what they do, but we also
Speaker 2: can make fun of it.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I have the book and the audiobook, and obviously
Speaker 1: this podcast is about the audiobook. Both the book and
Speaker 1: the audiobook contain this fabulous kind of little surprise at
Speaker 1: the end Smell the book, which is the oral history
Speaker 1: of Spinal Tap, where you guys basically just live inside
Speaker 1: the mythology and make up new memories.
Speaker 2: As you go, and it's wild.
Speaker 1: After all these years, it just it feels like all
Speaker 1: these fake stories have just taken on the weight of
Speaker 1: actual rock and roll cannon.
Speaker 2: Before we started the first film, we had a bible.
Speaker 2: I mean, we knew who these characters were, because when
Speaker 2: you're improvising, especially David and Nigel, if they were kids
Speaker 2: together from Squatney, they have to have shared experiences and
Speaker 2: so we improvised. But we also have the background of
Speaker 2: knowing who left the band, who joined the band, we
Speaker 2: knew all those things. Yeah, so we could we could
Speaker 2: riff off of that rather than just have to make
Speaker 2: all that up. Right.
Speaker 4: We did do a little cramming right before we did
Speaker 4: the interviews for the book, where we said, let's go
Speaker 4: over this again. Okay, yeah, are we going to get
Speaker 4: to lesson Mary Chiswick or whatever? You know, there are
Speaker 4: three dozen names we can pick up, you know, we
Speaker 4: can throw in of course, and we all shared this history.
Speaker 4: We weren't going to get to it all, but it's
Speaker 4: nice to have it there. Yeah, like a Giddyon Bible
Speaker 4: pretty much.
Speaker 1: Sure, when you're in those sort of schnadling moments, do
Speaker 1: you find yourself in a flow state?
Speaker 2: Ever?
Speaker 1: Do you ever find that? It just you feel like, oh,
Speaker 1: this is definitely gonna make the final cut.
Speaker 2: This is the I never know. I never know what's
Speaker 2: going to make the final club. All I know is
Speaker 2: just stay in the moment. Stay in the moment, because
Speaker 2: I'm working with brilliant minds and brilliant comedians and brilliant improvisers,
Speaker 2: and something's gonna come out and I don't know what
Speaker 2: it's gonna be. I never know.
Speaker 1: So it's been forty years since the original Spinal Tap
Speaker 1: forty one actually forty one now yeah, or.
Speaker 2: Is the spinal theft people would call the golden anniversary.
Speaker 1: So finally with the film sequel out now Spinal Tap two,
Speaker 1: The End Continues, which is just one of the greatest
Speaker 1: comedy movie titles of all time. I'm wondering, after such
Speaker 1: a definitive first film, talk about some of the challenges
Speaker 1: and opportunities that presented themselves in revisiting these characters. Was
Speaker 1: it truly effortless kind of slipping back into.
Speaker 2: This, Well? Did it take a lot? The effortless part
Speaker 2: was the way we interacted with each other that always
Speaker 2: is there. We always had fun with that. But the
Speaker 2: idea of doing a sequel to something that we all said, no,
Speaker 2: we've done it, let it be. It's a high bar,
Speaker 2: you know, it's a really high bar, and we're old.
Speaker 2: But as we talked, something came out of it that
Speaker 2: was very real, which is, first of all, the guys
Speaker 2: hadn't played together in fifteen years, so we said, well,
Speaker 2: what's that about? Is there bad blood? Are they not talking?
Speaker 2: What's going on? And then the idea of older people
Speaker 2: still touring or still performing that was out there. Paul
Speaker 2: McCartney was in the movie. He's still performing. You see
Speaker 2: the stones, you see so who is out there doing it?
Speaker 2: And the Eagles and Oasis back together, So that's a
Speaker 2: real thing. And then we had to think, well, what's
Speaker 2: the reason why weren't they talking and what's the reason
Speaker 2: that throws them back together. Once we had that, we said, okay,
Speaker 2: it's a story that could stand on its own. You
Speaker 2: don't have to have seen the first one. Obviously better
Speaker 2: if you have, you'll get some of the references. But
Speaker 2: if you haven't. And we had screenings where half the
Speaker 2: people had never seen the first one and they they
Speaker 2: went with this, they thought this was great.
Speaker 1: Yeah, well huge, congrats on just the universe that you've
Speaker 1: created and now expanded on even further with Spinal Tap two.
Speaker 1: It's it is a hell of a treat and I
Speaker 1: hope you make maybe at least three or four more.
Speaker 2: Do you have it in here's the thing and we
Speaker 2: can tell you because it's not a secret. No, well,
Speaker 2: it's been released to the press that after we finished
Speaker 2: Spy Tap Too, The end continues. We were approached by
Speaker 2: the Heritage Foundation in England to do a concert at Stonehenge,
Speaker 2: at the actual Stonehenge, Oh my god. And so it
Speaker 2: was an impossible thing not to say yes to. And
Speaker 2: we got together. We went over to England and did
Speaker 2: a concert in front of in front of this Stonehenge
Speaker 2: and you know this. Eric Clapton came on and performed,
Speaker 2: and Shanaiah Twain came on. And my favorite thing, bel though,
Speaker 2: was Josh Grobin sings a Bitch School And it's worth
Speaker 2: the price of admission.
Speaker 4: Yeah, yeah, it's pretty amazing. Yeah yeah, will that be
Speaker 4: that'll come out next year? That'll be visible next year?
Speaker 1: Oh fantastic.
Speaker 2: Yeah. And that one's called it's called Spinal Tap at Stonehenge,
Speaker 2: the final finale per But don't give away the ending,
Speaker 2: rob No, I'm not, I won't do that.
Speaker 1: Isn't redundancy always funny?
Speaker 2: Listen.
Speaker 4: We wrote a song called tonight I'm gonna rocket tonight.
Speaker 4: How do you think we feel about that?
Speaker 2: Yeah? There it is.
Speaker 1: Okay, we're gonna take a quick break, but we'll be
Speaker 1: right back.
Speaker 2: All right.
Speaker 1: We're gonna jump into a section of the interview called
Speaker 1: plot twist, where I'm just gonna just fire.
Speaker 2: At you some questions.
Speaker 1: All right, Spidal tabs infamous custom Amps famously went one
Speaker 1: louder to eleven. What in your lives have you turned
Speaker 1: up to eleven?
Speaker 4: That's a good question. Milee's your time. It's approaching one
Speaker 4: hundred percent, and I'm delighted.
Speaker 1: You've turned it down to eleven.
Speaker 4: No, no, no, I just listened. Rob and I are
Speaker 4: the same age. We've all been doing a lot of
Speaker 4: things for a long time, and it's like really appreciating that.
Speaker 4: It sounds very corny, very hallmark, but I really do
Speaker 4: think that me not doing much of anything on a
Speaker 4: really nice day is.
Speaker 1: Better than anything that's fabulous.
Speaker 2: Listen. I'm probably of the four of us, I would
Speaker 2: say the most driven. I'm crazy driven, and in my mind,
Speaker 2: I haven't gotten the eleven yet. I mean as close
Speaker 2: as I ever got with you. Know it's a cliche,
Speaker 2: but you're the birth of your children. I mean that
Speaker 2: is like, ooh, that can't get doesn't get any better.
Speaker 2: But in terms of my work and stuff, I still
Speaker 2: feel like there's an eleven out there somewhere.
Speaker 1: Amazing.
Speaker 2: Oh I love that.
Speaker 1: Two very different answers, Yes, all right. The band had
Speaker 1: numerous spinal tap moments, like getting lost backstage or the
Speaker 1: monumental Stone Hinge prop being extremely tiny. Have you experienced
Speaker 1: a moment in your professional or personal life that felt
Speaker 1: like a true spinal tap moment?
Speaker 4: Eighteen eighty four, when the film came out, we played
Speaker 4: a handful of cities, and some of them, the New York,
Speaker 4: LA Chicago, and Boston were really well attended. Boston was huge,
Speaker 4: but the film played for a year in Boston. It
Speaker 4: became like this is what we when we go to
Speaker 4: the movies, this is what we do. So we were
Speaker 4: really kind of hot. And we played it a place
Speaker 4: called the Channel Club. And I've had this corroborated by
Speaker 4: people who were there, said, man, I was there the.
Speaker 2: Night you played, and it did.
Speaker 4: It really rain on the stage? And yeah it did.
Speaker 4: It was this terrible storm outside and the stage was
Speaker 4: drenched and we're there with electric instruments and I'm wearing
Speaker 4: boxing shoes, wearing boxing shoes which have this little kind
Speaker 4: of you know, just the thickness of Barbara Walter's skin. Yeah,
Speaker 4: and it was like, well, if we go here, at
Speaker 4: least we were a hit in this town, you know.
Speaker 4: But it really was it was like and Chris and
Speaker 4: I are looking at each other, going good bye.
Speaker 1: Maybe wait, so this is your spinal tap moment in
Speaker 1: your life? Is also an actual spinal tap?
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean we've I've had little things.
Speaker 4: Uh, you know when we did all the way with
Speaker 4: this play that I did in New York, what we
Speaker 4: did in Cambridge.
Speaker 2: First, by the way, I loved that play.
Speaker 4: Oh, thank you, thank you, ye that was great, and
Speaker 4: Bryan Cranston played LBJ. The first scene is he's having
Speaker 4: this vision about what what I'm no, I'm the president.
Speaker 4: All of a sudden, Jfksman killed, I'm the president.
Speaker 2: What am I going to do? How am I to
Speaker 2: do this?
Speaker 4: And then his desk rises out of the floor and
Speaker 4: he goes behind his desk and begins the scene proper
Speaker 4: with other people. Well, opening night, it got halfway up
Speaker 4: it's stone in and so they said, well, maybe we're
Speaker 4: going to reboots. So everybody's standing on the stage and
Speaker 4: they lower it again and bring it up again, and
Speaker 4: then it just breaks and he goes, Gugu no yeah,
Speaker 4: And so then it's like dealing with that, but those
Speaker 4: are in the moments they're happening. It's horrible stuff, but
Speaker 4: you know what, tomorrow and I will come back and
Speaker 4: try it again, you know, that's all you can do.
Speaker 2: Amen. Well for me, I mean, I've had a million
Speaker 2: of those kind of things on stage where stuff goes wrong,
Speaker 2: but one that just popped in my head. I was
Speaker 2: in the Summer Theater in Plymouth, Massachusetts, and Albert Brooks
Speaker 2: was in the company with me. We were doing a
Speaker 2: production of Mary Mary, you know, which is a comedy,
Speaker 2: and we're eighteen years old. We're playing people in their
Speaker 2: forties with the corn starch and the hair and all
Speaker 2: this stuff. And you know, they had shows once a week.
Speaker 2: You know, they turned the show over every week. So
Speaker 2: you do a show for a week, you take the
Speaker 2: set down, put the other set back up. And they
Speaker 2: didn't get the set quite ready for the first performance
Speaker 2: of Mary Mary. And Albert and I are on stage
Speaker 2: and we're doing, you know, back and forth, back and forth,
Speaker 2: and then he goes to make an exit and there
Speaker 2: was supposed to be some sque eight stairs, and he
Speaker 2: just he just went off the edge and gone in. In
Speaker 2: other words, I opened the door, he walked out the
Speaker 2: door and just disappeared. Oh no, And then he comes back.
Speaker 2: He comes back in. His head was just on the
Speaker 2: floor above the thing and he and he goes bye
Speaker 2: bye like this, and he had a wife. So yeah,
Speaker 2: those those kind of things happen. I love the best,
Speaker 2: all right.
Speaker 1: One of my favorite little tidbits in the audio book
Speaker 1: describes how the creative team used Grimsby card h yes,
Speaker 1: which were cards with the stern news anchor Roger Grimsby's
Speaker 1: headshot on one side.
Speaker 2: Yes, Harry Shearer was going with a woman who worked
Speaker 2: at ABC News at the time, and Roger Grimson was
Speaker 2: a broadcaster. He was on camera and they had a
Speaker 2: whole stack of like promotional cards where they had picture
Speaker 2: Roger Grimsby on the front and was empty on the back.
Speaker 2: We used these cards. We had a big bulletin board
Speaker 2: and anytime we have a scene that we thought, well
Speaker 2: this could work, we put it up on the pulling
Speaker 2: board and it got to be where if we had
Speaker 2: an idea and we thought maybe it was good or
Speaker 2: should it be in the movie or not, we would
Speaker 2: say does this merit a Grimsby? In other words, should
Speaker 2: we commit this to a Grimsby? And so if it did,
Speaker 2: if it got on the board, it was a Grimsey.
Speaker 2: When we did the sequel, Michael goes, where did you
Speaker 2: get those pictures, Michael, you.
Speaker 4: Got I just grabbed it off the internet. He got
Speaker 4: off the internet. There was a picture ros A Grimsey
Speaker 4: and the had a whole stack of so we could,
Speaker 4: you know, keep the tradition alized.
Speaker 1: Oh that's fabulous. I feel like somebody needs to sell
Speaker 1: Grimsby cards to screenwriters.
Speaker 2: Oh my god, the money will come rolling in. Yeah,
Speaker 2: I mean, what a million dollar idea.
Speaker 1: Oh guy, this is our next adventure, this is our
Speaker 1: next step. Here we go all right, Well, you know
Speaker 1: it's it is such a fun, clever creative technique. Do
Speaker 1: you have either of you have an unexpected or unusual
Speaker 1: method in your own creative process.
Speaker 2: God, I don't know. I wouldn't even know how to
Speaker 2: begin to describe where things come from.
Speaker 4: I just have to keep remembering to breathe, you know,
Speaker 4: because sometimes if you're kind of waiting for something to happen,
Speaker 4: you kind of lose the reality because a real person
Speaker 4: is going to be breathing. I've just sometimes I got
Speaker 4: to remind myself okay, and it just helps you stay
Speaker 4: with them. I don't know, I don't have any other style.
Speaker 1: That's a hell of a good answer.
Speaker 4: I've always liked making these guys laugh and and they
Speaker 4: they know I'm a soft.
Speaker 2: Touch when it and he does all the time. I mean,
Speaker 2: that's the thing about Michael and his brain. Will you know,
Speaker 2: all three of them, their brains work in different ways,
Speaker 2: but very fast, and they come at comedy in different ways,
Speaker 2: and you just never know how it's going to work.
Speaker 2: I'm you know, I'm George Burns, I'm you know, I'm
Speaker 2: my dad to mel Brooks. I tried to you know,
Speaker 2: I'm the straight guy hopefully get the best out of them.
Speaker 2: And it's pretty easy when you're working with them. I'm
Speaker 2: telling you it's pretty easy. They come prepared to get
Speaker 2: goodwood on the ball every time.
Speaker 1: Amen. You guys have incredible chemistry. And it is so
Speaker 1: fun to see it still, just to see those sparks
Speaker 1: flying forty years later. It's it's just as alive as
Speaker 1: it ever was. It's it's so so great.
Speaker 2: Now.
Speaker 1: Last question, what are you listening to or reading right now?
Speaker 1: And and or what's next on your list?
Speaker 4: I'm reading the new Mark Twain autobiography, which is just
Speaker 4: thick and amazing.
Speaker 1: I'm sorry, the new He just put out a new one.
Speaker 4: No, no, not the new and it's not an autobiography.
Speaker 4: It's Ron Chernow's biography. Oh oh fabulous, and it is. It's
Speaker 4: it's amazing. And what am I listening to? I'm listening
Speaker 4: to a couple of things. I got a book called Consciousness.
Speaker 4: What is Consciousness? So this is fascinating and so I
Speaker 4: listened to it at night. It puts me right to
Speaker 4: sleep bad.
Speaker 1: I can tell.
Speaker 2: It's a really good book. But I lose consciousness. It
Speaker 2: should be called unconsciousness.
Speaker 4: Unconsciousness, yes, yeah, but it's a cool book. And yeah,
Speaker 4: I listened to I listened to a lot of different
Speaker 4: kinds of things. I'll tell you my favorite guy. There's
Speaker 4: a guy named Bill Homewood, like home h O M E.
Speaker 4: Wood Homewood, British guy. And he did a fifty two
Speaker 4: hour unabridged reading of the counter Monte Cristo. It's one
Speaker 4: of the greatest things I've ever heard.
Speaker 2: It was.
Speaker 4: It's like, I can't wait to get in the car
Speaker 4: and just drive nowhere just so I can listen to
Speaker 4: this and do nothing but this.
Speaker 2: He's brilliant.
Speaker 4: He also did The Three Musketeers and Tom Jones and
Speaker 4: a couple of other things like that.
Speaker 1: Wait, how long did that take you to listen to fifty.
Speaker 2: Two hours Michael. Do you listen to books more than
Speaker 2: you read them, or do you read more than you listen.
Speaker 4: I'm starting to listen more than I read, but I
Speaker 4: still love to just park myself with a book. But
Speaker 4: at night, you know, if I'm kind of trying to
Speaker 4: chill out, I'll plug into something like that. And there's
Speaker 4: a woman named Shanade Dixon who does most of Dickens
Speaker 4: and it's amazing Shaned Dickens, you should call her so amazing.
Speaker 4: And Maria Marghleys also does a great there's a lot
Speaker 4: of great Dickson stuff.
Speaker 2: You know. I love blues music, I love country music,
Speaker 2: I love bluegrass. I like to watch Instagram and what
Speaker 2: I like about it because I'm old. They you know,
Speaker 2: in TikTok, they'll give you two seconds, they'll give you
Speaker 2: a full performance of somebody. So if like Billy Strings
Speaker 2: comes on, I'm like, oh good, I can hear a
Speaker 2: whole Billy Strings number. Or if it's Linda Ronstat harmonizing
Speaker 2: with Dolly Parton and Emulou Harris, you know, I'll listen
Speaker 2: to all that or Christable whoever it is, and I
Speaker 2: love I will just listen to those kinds of things.
Speaker 2: That's what I love listening to. And any blues guitars
Speaker 2: go from one.
Speaker 1: To the other amazing. Yeah, we're in the same sort
Speaker 1: of musical loops there.
Speaker 2: I love it.
Speaker 1: Any audio books or books, well books Right now, you see,
Speaker 1: I'm in the midst of finishing up a book based
Speaker 1: on this podcast that I did last year about the
Speaker 1: jeffk assassinations called Who Killed jeffk We.
Speaker 2: Did it on iHeartRadio with so with Solo Dad O'Brien. Yeah, yeah, yeah,
Speaker 2: and it got like ten million downloads and people like this.
Speaker 2: So Simon and Schuster asked us if we would write
Speaker 2: a book, so we started working on it, the two
Speaker 2: guys that I work with on the podcast. So I've
Speaker 2: been writing on that. So I still I'm reading. There's
Speaker 2: a book that came out about what happened to Darthy
Speaker 2: cle Gallen, and so I just keep reading more and
Speaker 2: more stuff about that. Right now, I'm kind of still
Speaker 2: immersed in that world.
Speaker 1: Wow, that's a good one. That's a juicy one. Well,
Speaker 1: Rob Reiner, Michael McKeon, it was truly excellent having you
Speaker 1: on Earsay. Thank you so much for coming on.
Speaker 2: Thanks for having us. Yeah, thank you, Ed, thanks for
Speaker 2: having us on. Yeah, absolutely anytime.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I wish we could. Wish we'd just be hanging
Speaker 1: out having a beer right now.
Speaker 4: We're allowed to you. I'm going to continue hanging out.
Speaker 4: You just might not be there.
Speaker 1: You'll just keep talking into your microphone for the next
Speaker 1: forty five minutes.
Speaker 2: Well, truly a pleasure, guys, Thanks a lot, Thanks a lot.
Speaker 3: Well, that was awesome.
Speaker 2: This was like such a.
Speaker 1: Dream for me to just pick their brains and hear
Speaker 1: so many of the stories. As a person that works
Speaker 1: in comedy, I just love to hear how other people's
Speaker 1: brains work, Yeah, and like and how their process works,
Speaker 1: and especially material that I've appreciated so deeply for so
Speaker 1: many years. Just to get under the hood and just
Speaker 1: see how that sausage is made. It's really a privilege.
Speaker 3: Especially when it makes you laugh.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 3: I just find such joy in being able to go
Speaker 3: into the brains of other weirdos in the best way possible.
Speaker 1: As a weirdo.
Speaker 3: Yes, exactly.
Speaker 1: It's fun to learn about other weirdos totally, and you
Speaker 1: and I are very proud to be Weirdoh. Yes, of course,
Speaker 1: it's a badge of honor. All right, well you can
Speaker 1: find the new audio book A fine line between stupid
Speaker 1: and clever, the story of Spinal Tap at Audible. Thank
Speaker 1: you for tuning into this episode of Earsay, the Audible
Speaker 1: and iHeart Audio Book Club.
Speaker 3: On the next episode, we're diving into a supernatural romance
Speaker 3: co authored by Nicholas Sparks and m Night Shamalan. There's
Speaker 3: a haunted house, a ghost love story, a mystery that
Speaker 3: must be solved. You don't want to miss this.
Speaker 1: Yeah that sounds quite saucy.
Speaker 3: Yeah, extremely Yeah.
Speaker 1: Well we'll see you then and if you had fun
Speaker 1: with us today, consider following the show wherever you listen. Hearsay,
Speaker 1: the Audible and iHeart Audio Book Club is a production
Speaker 1: of Iheart's Ruby Studio.
Speaker 2: We're your hosts.
Speaker 3: Ed Helms and Kelpenn. Our executive producer is Matt Schultz,
Speaker 3: with theme music and post production by Marcus Bagala.
Speaker 1: For Ruby Studio. Our managing EP is Matt Romano, our
Speaker 1: EP of post production is Matt Stillo. Our production coordinator
Speaker 1: is Abby Aguilar.
Speaker 3: And of course a big thank you to our friends
Speaker 3: at Audible. Don't forget you can listen to what we're
Speaker 3: listening to on the Audible app or at audible dot com.
Speaker 3: Sign up for a free thirty day Audible trial, and
Speaker 3: your first audiobook is free. Visit audible dot com slash
Speaker 3: ar say.
Speaker 1: Until next time, Thanks for listening.
Speaker 2: Foo,