Speaker 1: Welcome to Movie Crush, a production of I Heart Radio.
Speaker 1: Hey everybody, and welcome to Movie Crush Friday Interview Edition.
Speaker 1: And I'm here with the winsome and handsome if I
Speaker 1: may say so, Miles Gray, you honor me. Thank you
Speaker 1: so much. I am, although as I see your wonderful
Speaker 1: beer through the zoom screen, I'm reminded of my own
Speaker 1: just paltry uh you know, also ran type facial hair
Speaker 1: that I have going on there. It's you know, it's
Speaker 1: been a struggle, you know, for me being you know,
Speaker 1: on the other side of I'm almost forty in a
Speaker 1: few years, but like thinking of how long, I thought, yeah,
Speaker 1: like I'll probably have a like some cheekcare and I'm like,
Speaker 1: I got patches though. It's good though. Initial statue, thank you. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that's the one thing I can Yeah, that's just the mustache. Now.
Speaker 1: So you guys listening, they know, Miles, if you listen
Speaker 1: to the Daily Zeite guys, which was um kind of
Speaker 1: our landmark comedy show here at the Network when we
Speaker 1: first got things going really in earnest, and you guys
Speaker 1: are still killing it. I mean, how many years has
Speaker 1: have been now It's almost gonna be four it'll be wow,
Speaker 1: four years um in October doing every day and then
Speaker 1: almost two years now of doing it twice a day.
Speaker 1: So so what do you what is twice a day?
Speaker 1: What's going on with that that? Well, you know, because
Speaker 1: of before, when it seemed like the news cycle was
Speaker 1: somewhat manageable. During the Trump administration, it was easy to
Speaker 1: do a daily show, and then you know, on the
Speaker 1: back end of the administration, there was just so much
Speaker 1: happening every day constantly that we will find ourselves in
Speaker 1: a position to be like, oh, this isn't even gonna
Speaker 1: be in the episode that comes out tomorrow because all
Speaker 1: this news broke since we recorded. So like we'd hit
Speaker 1: people with like a quick middle of the day update
Speaker 1: just to see what's trending. So it's not always heavy,
Speaker 1: but you know, just just to make sure we're covering
Speaker 1: our bases. Wow, let's go in the extra mile. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1: And so like in a way, I'm like, I can't
Speaker 1: believe the amount of episodes that we've done, and in
Speaker 1: the back of my mind, I'm like, this is just
Speaker 1: right for some AI too then completely create who I Am,
Speaker 1: provided it thousands of hours of recorded audio. I can't imagine, man,
Speaker 1: I mean people talk to Josh and I about stuff
Speaker 1: you should know just twice or I guess with the shorties,
Speaker 1: not three times a week, um for all these years,
Speaker 1: but like that's twice a week feels like a vacation
Speaker 1: compared to uh, once a day, and now it's twice
Speaker 1: a day. Well, and when we first started back in
Speaker 1: the you know how stuff works days, when we were
Speaker 1: starting to show, you know, the head of the network,
Speaker 1: Connell was he was asking us if we were sure
Speaker 1: we wanted to do it daily show. And I get
Speaker 1: it because on the strength of all the other shows
Speaker 1: on the network like that are researched and take so
Speaker 1: much time to produce, We're even like, yeah, right, daily,
Speaker 1: that's a that is a pretty aggressive tick. But I
Speaker 1: think with Jack like writing daily even like sort of
Speaker 1: moderating cracked and for me, like having worked on daily
Speaker 1: shows and things like that, I was like, I think
Speaker 1: we can do it. So we may have also just
Speaker 1: locked ourselves into a frenetic workpace, but we like it. Well,
Speaker 1: it works and it's a funny show. And you're talking
Speaker 1: about Jack O'Brien, who uh his co host and jack
Speaker 1: Um was uh kind of the first comedy guy at
Speaker 1: the network. He came over from crack to dot com,
Speaker 1: which was a great website at least when Jack was
Speaker 1: running it. I haven't even been on that much since then,
Speaker 1: to be honest, but I always had a lot of
Speaker 1: respect for Jack and what he brought to the network.
Speaker 1: And and you, man, like, where where did you get
Speaker 1: your start? Did you start doing like sketch or stand up?
Speaker 1: What was your the beginnings in comedy? I mean, yeah,
Speaker 1: improv was my first love. I started improvising in high
Speaker 1: school because I had a theater teacher who was like,
Speaker 1: this is in l A. So yes, like a true
Speaker 1: I'm like the Billie Eilish of podcasting, you know, like
Speaker 1: I'm in it. You know. My mom's a film critic,
Speaker 1: my dad an artist. Yeah, so I've so Anyways, like
Speaker 1: in high school, I started doing improv because I was
Speaker 1: always just like to do impressions and just be funny.
Speaker 1: And then then I realized, oh, yeah, you can make
Speaker 1: a career out of that, so I was. I tried
Speaker 1: for a while to get into groundlings and was doing
Speaker 1: stuff at UCB for a little bit, but before all that,
Speaker 1: like I kind of got to that point where I
Speaker 1: was like, I need a career. I couldn't quite rely
Speaker 1: on comedy being a thing. And I think that's obviously
Speaker 1: coming from like a you know, having immigrant mom, black father,
Speaker 1: just sort of like try and get jobs that will
Speaker 1: pay you like consistently. So I was like, yeah, that's
Speaker 1: that's cool. And then I got into So then I started.
Speaker 1: I became a political consultant and lobbyists for a number
Speaker 1: of years. That's right, I remember that. Yeah, yeah, that
Speaker 1: was sort of my big boy college post college career.
Speaker 1: And then I soured on politics very quickly. I went
Speaker 1: into it a little overly idealistic and I realized what
Speaker 1: it was and then so I became, uh yeah, a
Speaker 1: little bit more radicalized after that. And then from there
Speaker 1: I actually did more than just comedy. Like I I think,
Speaker 1: you know, in the early YouTube days, I was just
Speaker 1: very much someone who had like a sketch comedy channel,
Speaker 1: who was like getting viral hits on Funnier Die and
Speaker 1: YouTube and things like that. And then I realized that's
Speaker 1: a hard that's again not an easy job to turn
Speaker 1: into consistent income. So I sort of turned that into
Speaker 1: a skill. I was going to companies with basically saying
Speaker 1: like Hi, I'm one of those people that can make
Speaker 1: viral content, and that was such a buzzword and like
Speaker 1: the early tens teens where it's viral viral, Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: this is good. Yeah, and like I'd be like, check
Speaker 1: out my links to these nonsensical comedy videos that have
Speaker 1: plenty of views to back up my claims. And so
Speaker 1: I started working in radio and making like content for
Speaker 1: radio stations, and then I worked at YouTube for a second,
Speaker 1: and then Playboy, and then Conde Nast and then Uh
Speaker 1: and then Jack after a while he was I had
Speaker 1: met him because my fiance worked at Cracked, so I
Speaker 1: had met him a few times there and he actually
Speaker 1: had me, um years ago audition to co host up
Speaker 1: a podcast with Robert Evans and then at the time
Speaker 1: it just didn't work out um, but Jack had always
Speaker 1: remembered that audition. So then when he started thinking of
Speaker 1: this idea, he came back to me and said, Hey,
Speaker 1: I know you're working at Conde, but like, would you
Speaker 1: want to do a podcast? And I was like, that's
Speaker 1: the call I've been waiting for. Um, So yeah, it's
Speaker 1: And now I think doing this daily shows like a
Speaker 1: true intersection of like all of my past work experience
Speaker 1: and like interests. So yeah, I couldn't be luckier. That's awesome.
Speaker 1: So Robert Evans is who also from our network behind
Speaker 1: the Bastards, Great great show which got really popular, which
Speaker 1: was cool. Robert's awesome. I need to have Robert on
Speaker 1: and Jack. Jack had been holding pulp fiction for Jack
Speaker 1: for you know, three years now, and we've tried a
Speaker 1: couple of times. When I was in l A, I
Speaker 1: always wanted to do it in person, but now I
Speaker 1: think we've all gotten so used to the zoom thing that, uh,
Speaker 1: I'm not afraid to do these anymore. I used to like,
Speaker 1: if it's not in person, then you know an you
Speaker 1: want to talk about, isn't it. But it's how much
Speaker 1: that's changed. Like I was, really we were really concerned,
Speaker 1: especially for comedy podcasts, the energy in the room is
Speaker 1: so important, like the timing of your responses. But I
Speaker 1: think like everyone got like a built in internet delay
Speaker 1: in their head or something to like yeah not or
Speaker 1: you don't do things like that, so yeah, which I
Speaker 1: just did you, I know, which is perfect illustrative. Well,
Speaker 1: you've got a great voice, so it doesn't surprise me
Speaker 1: that you worked in radio. Some but I'd love to
Speaker 1: know a little bit more about what you did in politics.
Speaker 1: It's really interesting, man. Yeah. So I started off just
Speaker 1: like like an organizer, and at a certain point a
Speaker 1: friend of mine asked if I wanted to help organize
Speaker 1: for a campaign around renewable energy, and I was like, sure,
Speaker 1: I think that's great. It was for a ballot proposition
Speaker 1: in California, and it was like very aggressive at the time,
Speaker 1: like asking for like over fifty of our fuel mix
Speaker 1: to come from renewable. So it was like a long shot,
Speaker 1: but for me, I felt like one of those things like,
Speaker 1: but this is where we need to be. And that
Speaker 1: campaign went well enough that um, that was my first
Speaker 1: sort of insight into how things work. Because this campaign,
Speaker 1: I thought was just about people of goodwill coming together
Speaker 1: to demand the state change the energy mix. And then
Speaker 1: this consulting firm reaches out to me and says, hey,
Speaker 1: we'd like to hire you. You did a great job
Speaker 1: on this other campaign that we were behind, and I
Speaker 1: was like, oh huh and then yeah, and I was
Speaker 1: like what do you mean. It's like, oh, yeah, so
Speaker 1: we have these investors and then you realize, oh, right,
Speaker 1: So this ballot proposition was for people who we're basically
Speaker 1: waiting first if this were to pass into law, immediately
Speaker 1: begin permitting the land to like beat everyone to the
Speaker 1: punch for renewables to get those contracts. So I was like, oh, okay, um,
Speaker 1: but I'm like, well, at least it's a good cause
Speaker 1: because it's renewable, so like it's not like, you know,
Speaker 1: totally messed up. And then from there, um, so I
Speaker 1: accepted the job because this was you know, this was
Speaker 1: two thousand and eight. There's just absolutely and I just
Speaker 1: got out of college. I'm walking through like a desert
Speaker 1: landscape in terms of like viable employment, and this was
Speaker 1: like a true shot to have like some kind of professional,
Speaker 1: white collar, middle class lifestyle in my twenties, and so
Speaker 1: I took it in yeah, very quickly. Uh. I began
Speaker 1: to see like the game and how consulting works, whether
Speaker 1: that was you know, doing things in service of like
Speaker 1: billionaires who had progressive agendas, but in the end of
Speaker 1: the day, like you know, I'm like, oh, cool, we're
Speaker 1: gonna make sure this this certain politician gets re elected.
Speaker 1: And then you're like, oh, that's right, because they're on
Speaker 1: a a midie that directly relates to the industry of
Speaker 1: one of our clients, and by making sure that they
Speaker 1: know that this massive donor as part of their like
Speaker 1: sort of covert re election effort that helps keep the
Speaker 1: heat off of their industry. If someone proposes, let's say,
Speaker 1: an investigation into how pell grants work or something like that,
Speaker 1: Holy shit? How? How? What? What is your cynicism level
Speaker 1: these days with politics? Yeah? I mean, I'm I'm completely disillusioned.
Speaker 1: I mean, I know, I I worked in democratic politics
Speaker 1: enough to see that even when you're talking about things
Speaker 1: that are they pull well, there are a few people
Speaker 1: who are actually there to advocate for what that means
Speaker 1: on the other side of it, like it's renewable energies
Speaker 1: with the caveat of well, I'm gonna make all the
Speaker 1: money off of it when it happens, or I want
Speaker 1: this progressive politician re elected not because they're going to
Speaker 1: do something for working people, but because they're going to
Speaker 1: protect my near monopoly on this industry. Um and then,
Speaker 1: and I became really cynical because after a while, you know,
Speaker 1: you know, there's the dark money aspects and using these
Speaker 1: you know, there's a whole methodology that UM dark money
Speaker 1: groups used to use different kinds of nonprofit groups like
Speaker 1: five and one, C threes and C fours and certain
Speaker 1: ones don't have to reveal who their donor who their
Speaker 1: donors are, and that's those are. So those are the
Speaker 1: groups that come out with very like nebulous names like um,
Speaker 1: you know, American Families for Progress or something, and really
Speaker 1: paid by one guy, and you're out there saying, like
Speaker 1: preaching this very vague mission statement. So it seems like that,
Speaker 1: but you're there on behalf of some other person. And
Speaker 1: so once you see sort of the just sort of
Speaker 1: the the power dynamics of it and who stands to
Speaker 1: win and lose. You know, I was going in on
Speaker 1: very optimistic. Obama had just been elected the first black president.
Speaker 1: I'm like, wow, this is progress, Like I'm really glad
Speaker 1: to be part of this. And then I'm like, wait,
Speaker 1: but you know, this is like when Obamacare was coming up.
Speaker 1: We're doing a lot of research to try and talk
Speaker 1: about like the benefits of it and how this could
Speaker 1: be really monumental for expanding healthcare. And then pretty soon,
Speaker 1: like you saw, things get chipped away and you see
Speaker 1: people get seats at the table that should absolutely not
Speaker 1: have them. And I was like oh okay, whatever, So yeah,
Speaker 1: how do you approach and you know you don't have
Speaker 1: to get too personal, but how do you approach your
Speaker 1: your vote these days? Like when you have seen sort
Speaker 1: of the underbelly in that and the way it works,
Speaker 1: Like can you even I mean like excited? No? Um?
Speaker 1: And because I think you know, especially right now being
Speaker 1: black and Asian in this country, talk about a lack
Speaker 1: of change that's takes into account what the experience is
Speaker 1: or the experiences are of of us from any given group,
Speaker 1: and the glacial pace um that change curs in because unfortunately,
Speaker 1: the people who have the seats at the table, they're
Speaker 1: not the things that we're talking about aren't existential threats
Speaker 1: to them. So we're moving at a we're moving at
Speaker 1: a level of urgency for something like It's like it's
Speaker 1: the same with climate change. We have people like octogenarians
Speaker 1: who are like, I don't know, I'm not going to
Speaker 1: see the worst of it, So why would they're They're
Speaker 1: not incentivized to move quickly or um optimistically on how
Speaker 1: to change things. Um. So I mean I'm I'm really
Speaker 1: open on the show about how I feel and I
Speaker 1: always try and always relate my own experiences in politics
Speaker 1: to why I believe a certain thing or why I'm
Speaker 1: less optimistic about a given candidate. You know. Yeah, I
Speaker 1: think for certain people, progressives, leftists, they may look at
Speaker 1: Biden is just like you know, it's like what do
Speaker 1: you do? Do you hold your nose? Do you vote
Speaker 1: for this? And given some of the other, uh, political
Speaker 1: fallouts that have occurred over the last hundred days, UM,
Speaker 1: you'd you'd hope for a little bit better than what
Speaker 1: we're seeing. Um. But I mean, I think it's just
Speaker 1: one of those things until enough a plurality of people
Speaker 1: are either a able to see just how we lose
Speaker 1: in this like two party system, um or proposing some real,
Speaker 1: you know, revolutionary change in terms of how we conduct
Speaker 1: our governance in this country. I think this is what
Speaker 1: we're left with. And you hope that the words of
Speaker 1: activists and the news and people being a little more
Speaker 1: open minded about what the realities are of this country
Speaker 1: can at least help create like a very organic grassroots
Speaker 1: ground swell around this. But yeah, it's um, but it's
Speaker 1: it's hardening to see things slowly melt away over time. Yeah.
Speaker 1: So like if you were to talk to someone who's
Speaker 1: interested in getting into politics. Would you say, geez, don't
Speaker 1: do it, it's assess pool. You say, just stay local,
Speaker 1: and I would change, honestly, I would. I've I've talked
Speaker 1: about this a lot, and I have a few friends
Speaker 1: who are work at a state level, municipal level, and
Speaker 1: federal level and pre aaucracy, and they're all like, we
Speaker 1: need smarter people to work in bureaucracy because I think
Speaker 1: a lot of people look at you know, it's like
Speaker 1: the stars of politics are the elected officials, but there
Speaker 1: it's like, but the crew, Like if it's a movie,
Speaker 1: the crew it is the bureaucracy. And if the crew
Speaker 1: is lazy and unimaginative, they're not going to execute on
Speaker 1: a script you wrote, it's gonna come out all weird
Speaker 1: because no one's like So I would actually encourage people
Speaker 1: to get involved because I think, but knowing that, we
Speaker 1: need people who are looking at things differently, very much
Speaker 1: the established kind of politicians we have now, it's just
Speaker 1: their focus is once they're in office, is just to
Speaker 1: stay in office. So there's not a lot of risk taking,
Speaker 1: you know what I mean, there's no risk taking at
Speaker 1: all because their bottom linees like, well, I want to
Speaker 1: be the most famous person in my state is making
Speaker 1: this office. I don't care about what I'm there to
Speaker 1: do for my constituents. And I think that seems to
Speaker 1: be a real thing right now more than ever before. Absolutely,
Speaker 1: And I think we need more people who are willing
Speaker 1: to just go into office saying I'm here to actually
Speaker 1: I know what it means for a single parent to
Speaker 1: wonder how they're going to take care of their child,
Speaker 1: or if they're going to get tax credits for that,
Speaker 1: or if they need another job or that, and know
Speaker 1: that those are real lived experience of most people, and
Speaker 1: saying I'm there to actually relieve that stress for someone
Speaker 1: else rather than you know, who can I glad hand
Speaker 1: and collect donors for just to stay in for another
Speaker 1: couple of years. Um, yeah, sure. And you know, I know,
Speaker 1: like both sides are. I mean, I'm a liberal progressive too,
Speaker 1: and and both sides have plenty of issues. But it's
Speaker 1: really hard not to look at people like Marjorie Taylor
Speaker 1: Green and I read a Thing of the Day where
Speaker 1: they were talking about the fact that basically like people
Speaker 1: like her are there there. She's brand building. She's not
Speaker 1: interested at all in in constituents and doing anything for
Speaker 1: them or anything for the country. Even know, it's just
Speaker 1: building her brand as someone who can be a megaphone
Speaker 1: for owning libs and and what kind of book deal
Speaker 1: am I going to get at the end of the day.
Speaker 1: And I think it's like the same. Yeah, it's it's
Speaker 1: like when you see people on reality shows and you're like, whoa,
Speaker 1: It's like, well, they're trying to get a deal after
Speaker 1: the ships. You know, they're trying to get their influences
Speaker 1: account going when they leave the Bachelor. Like politics now, yeah,
Speaker 1: and I think it's seemed into every level where we
Speaker 1: don't have people who are there acting in good faith
Speaker 1: because they're interested in outcomes for their constituents. It's like,
Speaker 1: like we say in politics, it's what they called me flippantly,
Speaker 1: it's Hollywood for ugly people. Um, and it's the same
Speaker 1: level of egocentricity and narcissism involved, but it's it's just
Speaker 1: like even worse because like, no, you guys are actually
Speaker 1: there to like help people, but you're you're the mudsling.
Speaker 1: And you know, good for her she you know, she
Speaker 1: her father gave her a whole business that she could
Speaker 1: inherit and pretend she created her own business or whatever,
Speaker 1: and that's par for the course for this place. Oh boy,
Speaker 1: well that was depressing. Yeah. Well, well, first of all,
Speaker 1: I want to talk about your mom real quick again.
Speaker 1: Where's where's she from with your background? My mom's Japanese.
Speaker 1: So she she she's from Japan. She was born in Nigata,
Speaker 1: which is on the west coast of Japan, and she
Speaker 1: moved here, you know, in the seventies. Um my dad,
Speaker 1: he said, she's a film critic. Yeah. Yeah, so she
Speaker 1: started off as a translator and and like for a
Speaker 1: while she was like that translator in Japan, like Queen
Speaker 1: come to Japan and like, my like there's like footage
Speaker 1: of my mom like at their press conference like translating
Speaker 1: or like Rick James, like she's like she's lived Bob Marley,
Speaker 1: like for a while. If you came to Japan, my mom,
Speaker 1: and like there's a few other people who like had
Speaker 1: this intersection of knowing, like the promotional companies that were
Speaker 1: bringing the acts there or the TV media outlets, and
Speaker 1: then people who were sort of like western enough to
Speaker 1: be able to like hang and be a cool translator.
Speaker 1: And that was my mom for a while. Yeah, and
Speaker 1: then someone said like, hey, you know, there's an opportunity
Speaker 1: at this magazine, you know, for they need someone in
Speaker 1: l A to be a correspondent um who can essentially
Speaker 1: interview people for the movie industry and like but then
Speaker 1: report back in Japanese about the American film industry. And
Speaker 1: my mom was kind of already doing some translation stuff
Speaker 1: and she was like, yeah, I'm gonna try that out.
Speaker 1: And she's been with a magazine it's called road Show UM,
Speaker 1: and it's like you know, Japan's like prim it's like
Speaker 1: Entertainment Weekly of Japan. It's like the one film magazine.
Speaker 1: And then eventually like it went out of print like
Speaker 1: many things did and went purely digital um. And so yeah,
Speaker 1: and then and she's also a member of the Hollywood
Speaker 1: Form Press Association, was getting a lot of heat at
Speaker 1: the moment um. But also like, I have an interesting
Speaker 1: perspective into that too, because for all of the focus
Speaker 1: on this organization, it also allows like Hollywood to turn
Speaker 1: a blind eye to its own transgressions in terms of
Speaker 1: not being a very inclusive industry. And I find it
Speaker 1: odd to come after a group of foreign journal these
Speaker 1: aren't this isn't an American body of journalists. It's a
Speaker 1: group of foreigners of immigrants who have come here to
Speaker 1: talk about the industry. And now the criticism, why aren't
Speaker 1: there any Black American people in this thing? It's like
Speaker 1: there's not even Americans. There's like only a couple and
Speaker 1: that's because they're like like dual nationality, people are bilingual.
Speaker 1: And why agree that the h f p A could
Speaker 1: be more inclusive. It absolutely needs to be, and I
Speaker 1: think it's imperative that they help, like you know, in
Speaker 1: France or other countries that have large, you know, diasporic populations,
Speaker 1: that they could say, yeah, we want to bring more
Speaker 1: black French journalists out here. But unfortunately, the membership of
Speaker 1: the h f p A I think is a reflection
Speaker 1: of the print industry in the respective countries where these
Speaker 1: people represent the industry. Um. But yeah, anyway, all that
Speaker 1: to say, uh, she's always we've always had movies on
Speaker 1: in my house. Uh, And she's always had a very
Speaker 1: critical tone about movies, which only made me a little
Speaker 1: more like aggressive as a kid, Like this movie sucks
Speaker 1: and I couldn't explain why, but it's just from Osmosis.
Speaker 1: Um he's a Yeah, he's an artist. It's a black
Speaker 1: guy from l A. My parents met at a Michael
Speaker 1: Jackson album release party in the eighties. My dad used
Speaker 1: to be Michael Jackson's personal photographer for like six years
Speaker 1: back when he was black. Um. This was like in
Speaker 1: the late seventies. The last video he worked with Michael
Speaker 1: and was beat it Um. But yeah, and so you know,
Speaker 1: he's a just an artist. And I had always i
Speaker 1: think because he was just a very politically minded, you know,
Speaker 1: black man in America. He always raised me with a
Speaker 1: very like, very sober analysis of what the news was
Speaker 1: or what was happening or why things were happening. And
Speaker 1: I remember like one of the first times as a kid,
Speaker 1: I saw like an un housed person. I said, like,
Speaker 1: what how come some people like don't like they have
Speaker 1: to live like by the freeway? He said, He said,
Speaker 1: Ronald Reagan. That was his He said, Oh, that's because
Speaker 1: Ronald Reagan. And I'm like, what I'm I'm six years old,
Speaker 1: I have not I don't know what to do with that,
Speaker 1: but that's how he'd respond to me. And then later
Speaker 1: on I'm like, oh wow, he was giving me the
Speaker 1: adult answer, but I'm like, thanks for that. Distilled progressive
Speaker 1: answer dead. That's really cool man. And it's funny now
Speaker 1: that like I know some of this background, so much
Speaker 1: of what I hear from you on the show makes sense,
Speaker 1: Like it's it made sense anyway because I knew you
Speaker 1: were a smart guy who who knew a lot about
Speaker 1: politics and knew and was funny. So like I always
Speaker 1: knew that, I always came through as Miles, But I
Speaker 1: guess I just this feels like it's just d n A.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, I mean even further back, Like you know,
Speaker 1: my mom's dad was German, was a professor of German
Speaker 1: philosophy in Japan, and he was like one of the
Speaker 1: foremost experts of like Grota's philosophy, and he during World
Speaker 1: War Two, the Japanese government was like relying on not him,
Speaker 1: but a few other Japanese people who understood German culture
Speaker 1: to understand the Nazis UM because of the axis, you know,
Speaker 1: the relationship there of like you know, what do Germans
Speaker 1: mean if they're saying this, because you know, when the
Speaker 1: Japanese people speaks like they're the intent of language is
Speaker 1: a little bit different and culturally different, UM, but similar
Speaker 1: in many ways to UM. So yeah, like everyone's kind
Speaker 1: of been out there kinda Yeah, I've been having I've
Speaker 1: been lucky enough to have out their vibes running through
Speaker 1: my veins. That's a cool, man. I'm always a little
Speaker 1: I mean, I'm not slackly my family everything, but I'm
Speaker 1: always a little jealous when I hear about these people
Speaker 1: that have these really interesting childhoods. And my parents were
Speaker 1: both teachers and it's very admirable. They were public school
Speaker 1: teachers and stuff. So I'm not knocking it, but it's
Speaker 1: not exciting as translating for Bob Marley or hanging out. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean I wish to beat a record release part right, Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's a different bay. I wasn't there, so you know,
Speaker 1: but I will say Iggy Pop did almost kill my dad,
Speaker 1: so there's that. Oh is there a story there that
Speaker 1: you can tell. Yeah, they were roommates and he was dude,
Speaker 1: this gym as you know, as he's known. Uh, was
Speaker 1: just so my dad's friend. He was like the connective
Speaker 1: tissue between him and Iggy Pop. And my dad had
Speaker 1: like this room available in this apartment that he had
Speaker 1: and he said, Hey, this guy Jim, he's like you
Speaker 1: know him, blah blah, blahs like he just needs a
Speaker 1: place to stay for like a month and he's gonna
Speaker 1: move out or whatever. And he's not into wearing shirts,
Speaker 1: and he's like he might be, you know, cooking heroin
Speaker 1: on your stove. I don't know, but my dad he
Speaker 1: essentially he was getting ready you to do a photo
Speaker 1: shoot and you had to like you know, he was
Speaker 1: like asleep early and then I guess Jim is in
Speaker 1: the house and he was like trying to cook something
Speaker 1: like turn the stove on, and the pilot light didn't
Speaker 1: click on, and so he just left the gas running
Speaker 1: in the house. And then my dad like woke up
Speaker 1: in the middle of the night to pee or something,
Speaker 1: and he just like was like it smells like gas
Speaker 1: in here and runs down and realizes like the stoves on.
Speaker 1: He's like turning it off, and then you know, Jim's like, hey,
Speaker 1: what's going on. He's like, dude, he left the stove on.
Speaker 1: He's like what, And he's like trying to in his
Speaker 1: stupor trying to get up and light a cigarette, but
Speaker 1: like fly across the room. He's like no, Um, So
Speaker 1: you know, I may have been I could have been
Speaker 1: not even here where fateful light strike blown up. Do
Speaker 1: you have kids now? No, no, no, not yet. I
Speaker 1: think that's that that will be on the horizon, you know.
Speaker 1: I feel like we got a little bit of living
Speaker 1: to do. Yeah, but um yeah, that's that's that's all
Speaker 1: on the horizon. You got. We're getting married in a
Speaker 1: little bit, so that's great stuff. One. Yeah, congratulation, thanks.
Speaker 1: I see that sweet Rickenbucker bass in the background. Yeah.
Speaker 1: Do you play, I guess yeah, yeah, yeah. I grew
Speaker 1: up playing trumpet actually because I was named after Miles Davis,
Speaker 1: a terrible self fulfilling prophecy, and I always liked music,
Speaker 1: and I grew up playing trumpet. But for a while
Speaker 1: trumpet wasn't like cool. And then like after the SKA
Speaker 1: era died out, so you know, I didn't really have
Speaker 1: much to play anymore, Like I was. I played in
Speaker 1: a lot of jazz ensembles and marching bands as a kid,
Speaker 1: and orchestras, and then guitar hero came out and I
Speaker 1: got so good at guitar hero I was like, I
Speaker 1: should probably try a stringed instrument, right, And then I
Speaker 1: and just because my dad had a loose bass somewhere
Speaker 1: like in our garage and I just like I picked
Speaker 1: that up and I couldn't. I really loved playing bass
Speaker 1: and that turned into like making beats and things like that.
Speaker 1: So he played with a with a band or anything
Speaker 1: right now. Yeah, it was in a band for a
Speaker 1: little bit actually for a few years, um up until
Speaker 1: like a couple of years ago, and then yeah, just
Speaker 1: kind of it was sort of a pobby where everyone
Speaker 1: kind of had a job and then yeah, it kind
Speaker 1: of sort of it ran its course at that time.
Speaker 1: But now I've kind of come back to just making
Speaker 1: music on my computer because I music is like such
Speaker 1: a huge part of my life and I don't probably
Speaker 1: I don't talk about that as much on podcast, but
Speaker 1: it's been something I've done since I was a child,
Speaker 1: and I've always made music on my computer, not to
Speaker 1: like release out there. It's like someone who like journals
Speaker 1: or something. I just do that with like making like
Speaker 1: music loops and things. Yeah that's awesome, man, you listening
Speaker 1: to these days? He got some good res Oh man,
Speaker 1: I could go. I mean I love River tiber Um.
Speaker 1: River Tiber is a great Canadian producer artist. Um. I
Speaker 1: don't know if you've heard that group bad Bad, not good.
Speaker 1: Um No, I'm so like, so like bad bad not
Speaker 1: good is like this Canadian jazz funk soul like new
Speaker 1: jazz kind of group um, and they're so funky and
Speaker 1: like they're so good on their instruments and like they
Speaker 1: have like more minimal compositions, but they're so solid. And
Speaker 1: River Tiber collaborates with them and he has his own
Speaker 1: solo stuff that's really good. And then the other band
Speaker 1: I'll always tell people about is Hiatus Coyote. Um. They're
Speaker 1: one of my favorite bands from Australia. And you know,
Speaker 1: there's plenty of like artists that I like that are solo,
Speaker 1: but I like to recommend like bands that really make
Speaker 1: me as a musician like envious because I'm like, oh, yeah, man,
Speaker 1: they're so good and like they're so solid on their
Speaker 1: instruments and like they're so good at like their compositions. UM.
Speaker 1: And yeah, Hiatus Coyote is just one of those bands
Speaker 1: that is very like avant garde but funky and still
Speaker 1: manages to be like familiar at the same time. So yeah,
Speaker 1: that's amazing. So I just wrote all those down. I'll
Speaker 1: check those out. That's the thing that I performing live.
Speaker 1: Obviously I've missed a lot, but just going to UH.
Speaker 1: I finally went to a baseball game last night, so
Speaker 1: I got a sporting event under my belt. But seeing music,
Speaker 1: I think. My my friend and I went UH and
Speaker 1: saw Bonnie Prince Billy right before the shutdown, and then
Speaker 1: the last show I saw in Atlanta, UH, my wife
Speaker 1: and I went to Michael Kiwanuka a couple of weeks
Speaker 1: before it shut down, and um, it's just it's been
Speaker 1: such a hole in my life and I cannot wait
Speaker 1: to get back and see some bands again. I know.
Speaker 1: I think I'm just gonna be sobbing, like just overcome,
Speaker 1: like if especially if it's a band I want to
Speaker 1: see too, because I'll go to any show at this
Speaker 1: point because I just do want to see that, right,
Speaker 1: But if there's like time to like if I saw like,
Speaker 1: you know, Portishead right now, I think they'd have to
Speaker 1: take me down like in an ambulance. I'd be like.
Speaker 1: I've had some emotions lately, with some experiences out of
Speaker 1: nowhere that I like. My wife and I went to
Speaker 1: dinner for the first time the other night and sat
Speaker 1: outside at this place and uh, I was I started
Speaker 1: sucking crying, man, and I was like what is going on?
Speaker 1: And and I'm an emotional guy anyway, but I didn't
Speaker 1: anticipate that coming and it just started happening, and I
Speaker 1: was like, all right, feel the feeling. Yeah exactly. Uh,
Speaker 1: you know, I've spent forty nine years doing stuff like
Speaker 1: this and one year off and it was a big deal. Yeah, no, seriously,
Speaker 1: And it really kind of brings things back into focus
Speaker 1: those moments, because yeah, for the first time I went
Speaker 1: out to eat two and you know, over a year,
Speaker 1: and I couldn't believe it. It felt surreal. But then
Speaker 1: you're sort of like you kind of reflect on the
Speaker 1: year and like people that lost and just all the
Speaker 1: pain and things, and yeah, I was sort of in
Speaker 1: the same moment. I just I cheered and it took
Speaker 1: me like a good eight seconds before I sipped my
Speaker 1: drink because I was just like, because you had that lump, yeah,
Speaker 1: and I was like, oh wow, yeah, okay, but yeah,
Speaker 1: a nice experience on the left. That's good man. Well,
Speaker 1: I can't wait to get back out to l A again.
Speaker 1: And uh, yeah, come see you guys, it'd be a
Speaker 1: lot of fun. So you picked mall rats after all
Speaker 1: this high falutin talk about the politics and the film
Speaker 1: critic mom and artist's father got to come at me
Speaker 1: with fucking mall rats. I was surprised by her pick
Speaker 1: a little bit, um, and I guess I'll just go
Speaker 1: ahead and kick it off by saying that I was
Speaker 1: a very, very big Kevin Smith fan. Early on. I
Speaker 1: remember seeing Clerks in college at the theater, and um,
Speaker 1: it was it was unlike anything I had seen before,
Speaker 1: and it really stuck a struck a chord with me
Speaker 1: because it was clearly super low budge made by somebody
Speaker 1: like me. Uh, somebody actually even looked like me. And uh,
Speaker 1: I just I sort of fell in love with the
Speaker 1: aesthetic and his his world building of these sort of
Speaker 1: weirdos that were clearly just his friends, clearly just writing
Speaker 1: these movies too, sort of in a Richard Link ladder
Speaker 1: way to kind of like there are two guys who
Speaker 1: always wrote for themselves and not for characters. It's like
Speaker 1: every character is just saying Kevin Smith stuff. Yeah, there's
Speaker 1: no way to discern who's saying what because they all
Speaker 1: this dense dialogue you've ever heard. Uh. And then my
Speaker 1: rats came along and it was basically like, all right,
Speaker 1: we're gonna give you a lot more money, and he
Speaker 1: was basically like, I'm going to make the same exact
Speaker 1: kind of movie, and I kind of respected that at
Speaker 1: the time, I think, yeah, and he got destroyed for it.
Speaker 1: Everyone was like, oh boy, They're like, this is your
Speaker 1: King the Sun Dance Winner with Clerks just made a
Speaker 1: nonsense film about people at a mall with the weirdest humor,
Speaker 1: like when I think he's Siskel or Ebert like just
Speaker 1: completely killing it. Yeah, And then I mean everyone did that.
Speaker 1: I read the Ebert review today and it was he
Speaker 1: was not too kind. What's your deal with Kevin Smith
Speaker 1: and your history here? And then you were obviously younger. Yeah,
Speaker 1: but I think I I was always a kid who
Speaker 1: was punching above their weight with what they read or
Speaker 1: watched or listened to, because you know, like any kid
Speaker 1: over ten, I was like just such a snob and
Speaker 1: defining my life based on what I wasn't into. So
Speaker 1: if everyone is into that, I wasn't into that because
Speaker 1: I'm into this. I'm like, oh, you're not reading the
Speaker 1: Illuminatis trilogy, and I'm like, I am, but yeah, I
Speaker 1: don't know what I'm reading, but I'm not going to
Speaker 1: read this other thing. Um, and so Clerks was like
Speaker 1: one of those things where like an older family friend
Speaker 1: showed it to me, and because I thought they were
Speaker 1: so cool by Osmosis, I was like, Okay, Clerks is cool.
Speaker 1: And then like as I got like around thirteen, Clerks
Speaker 1: made a little more sense, and then I was like okay,
Speaker 1: Like I'm kind of fully into the view Askew and
Speaker 1: view aske universe as I used to call it back
Speaker 1: in the day. And I like loved the idea of
Speaker 1: him being so down for Jersey because me being from
Speaker 1: the San Fernando Valley, I've always felt an affinity like,
Speaker 1: you know, New Yorkers look at Jersey like it's like
Speaker 1: New Jersey, you know, at the bridge and tunnel people
Speaker 1: get out of here type thing, much in the same
Speaker 1: way like people in l A, Like there's a snobbery
Speaker 1: of looking down at the San Fernando Valley. Um, and
Speaker 1: I'm always like, no, like, okay, I'm with you. I
Speaker 1: like this the Jersey, you know, the Jersey Trilogy or
Speaker 1: whatever he was building at the time. And and then
Speaker 1: Mall Rats I think really resonated because mall culture was
Speaker 1: just so big sure for me in the San Fernando
Speaker 1: Valley too. It's like malls or where where it was.
Speaker 1: And I was at malls malls constantly, and so this
Speaker 1: idea of like the Kevin Smith treatment of like losers
Speaker 1: at a mall. At the time, I was like, this
Speaker 1: is perfect, this is exactly who I am, and like
Speaker 1: they're using you know, vocabulary that like I will pair
Speaker 1: it incorrectly constantly after this, And I think that was
Speaker 1: the appeal of a Kevin Smith film was like for
Speaker 1: especially someone like my age, it was just like moment
Speaker 1: to feel like you're just punching above your weight intellectually
Speaker 1: and like you kind of get like what he's trying
Speaker 1: to say. So it app that appealed to sort of
Speaker 1: like the you know, want to be adult kid in
Speaker 1: me at the time. Yeah, And I lived in New
Speaker 1: Jersey post college um in nineteen I moved to New
Speaker 1: Jersey for like four years because my college roommate had
Speaker 1: his family lived there and he was just sort of
Speaker 1: his stepdad was a well to do out in the
Speaker 1: sort of rich suburbs of New Jersey business guy. And
Speaker 1: they got transferred to Australia for a few years. Didn't
Speaker 1: want to give up their house, so they talked to
Speaker 1: him and said, Hey, would you like to come live
Speaker 1: in our house and take care of it for a while,
Speaker 1: live rent free, keep up the bills and all that stuff.
Speaker 1: And he said sure, And I had just graduated. I
Speaker 1: was like, oh, I'll go with you because I got
Speaker 1: nothing else to do and I wanted to hang out
Speaker 1: in New York for the first time in my life
Speaker 1: a lot. And so I moved to New Jersey weirdly
Speaker 1: out of college and these two twenty four year old
Speaker 1: or whatever, we're living in this you know, three thousand
Speaker 1: square foot probably even bigger kind of executive not McMansion.
Speaker 1: It was just a nice big house out in the country.
Speaker 1: And everyone like, people didn't move to this town. This
Speaker 1: is in central New Jersey, in Bernardsville, and no one
Speaker 1: moved there, Like after college, you don't move to Bernardsville,
Speaker 1: New Jersey. And so we were a bit of a
Speaker 1: like the two weirdos. Like I got a job waiting tables,
Speaker 1: he got a job bartending, and everyone was like, who
Speaker 1: was this English guy and this Southern kid who like
Speaker 1: moved Oh right, yeah. It was a really weird sort
Speaker 1: of duo. And um, I really both of us really
Speaker 1: kind of fell in love with New Jersey and the
Speaker 1: people and just sort of the culture and the the
Speaker 1: weirdos there and so these movies mall rats and clerks
Speaker 1: and the I guess what was the third one was, yeah,
Speaker 1: Chasing Amy, which is probably the best of the three actually,
Speaker 1: if you're talking about pure like good Movin's, um, we
Speaker 1: knew these people and we we knew these guys and
Speaker 1: it was he he just he lived that world because
Speaker 1: that was his world, and he had no problem really
Speaker 1: accurately like throwing on a movie screen. I always really
Speaker 1: like that about those early films of his, Yeah, exactly,
Speaker 1: And there was just the the the way he would
Speaker 1: be able to like synthesize these sort of worldviews into
Speaker 1: like very cutting just one liners and things were like
Speaker 1: uh something that like I was sort of awe struck
Speaker 1: by because I think it just you know, I think,
Speaker 1: like a lot of kids who grew up around the industry,
Speaker 1: like at a certain point you always dream of like
Speaker 1: making a movie, um or writing a film and things
Speaker 1: like that. And Kevin Smith's like writing sort of helped
Speaker 1: me think of like, oh, like you can do things
Speaker 1: like this. Not that I felt like he was making
Speaker 1: it easy, but at least inspired me to think, like,
Speaker 1: you know, this guy is just sort of quite literally
Speaker 1: describing or doing a sensational version of his own personal
Speaker 1: history or his experiences. And there was something too that
Speaker 1: that like was always kind of catching me. But then
Speaker 1: that's total and they sorted started getting a little bit
Speaker 1: less good over time. So I like to focus on, like,
Speaker 1: you know, the good day. Yeah, I mean fair enough,
Speaker 1: but they you know there is something there because I
Speaker 1: remember feeling the same way, like I grew up in
Speaker 1: a situation where I didn't know that you could make
Speaker 1: movies as a career. Like I didn't. I didn't have
Speaker 1: parents in the industry or on the fringes of the industry,
Speaker 1: and I just it was I was in suburban Atlanta,
Speaker 1: and I just I didn't know that you could do that.
Speaker 1: I thought other people made movies and is that even
Speaker 1: a job? And Kevin Smith, I remember just feeling sort
Speaker 1: of inspired early on. I was like, wait a minute,
Speaker 1: you can actually scrape together fit thirty grand or whatever
Speaker 1: he's been on clerks and and make a career out
Speaker 1: of it. And he was, And it's it's more commonplace now.
Speaker 1: But in nineteen when did Clerks come out, was that
Speaker 1: like or something that just wasn't really happening much. So
Speaker 1: it was a big deal to get that Mirrormax deal.
Speaker 1: And for this regular guy who's like just basically typing
Speaker 1: out his his musings about Star Wars and the mall
Speaker 1: and girls, like, it's like, this is what all of
Speaker 1: our friends just sit around talk about it, and he
Speaker 1: did it and it's making money at it because I
Speaker 1: think the appeal to was I remember, because everyone's why
Speaker 1: is clerks in black and white? And it's like, it's
Speaker 1: because he made it himself, you know, the budget to
Speaker 1: do it like that, and I was sort of like
Speaker 1: the mystery, the mysterious quality of like wait till the
Speaker 1: idiot asks why this isn't black and white and you
Speaker 1: get to slam them with your Kevin Smooth No, it's
Speaker 1: right now. Yeah, I mean clerks look cool, like the
Speaker 1: aesthetic it looked homemade, and it was homemade. Um mal
Speaker 1: rats was his sort of fast times at Ridgemont High.
Speaker 1: I think, uh yeah, sort of unabashedly. You know, he's
Speaker 1: never been shy about his influences, which is always I've
Speaker 1: kind of been admired. I think, yeah, and it's just
Speaker 1: like it's it's It's funny when I like, I this
Speaker 1: was like one of those tapes I would watch over
Speaker 1: and over and over again. And it's funny how it's
Speaker 1: probably been ten years since I saw it last, because
Speaker 1: I just watched it again just to kind of refresh myself.
Speaker 1: And it's funny how many lines of dialogue I was
Speaker 1: still able to like reflexively just say back, like under
Speaker 1: my yeah, and I was like, oh god, it's just
Speaker 1: it's just in there. Well, also like realizing like this
Speaker 1: is a very interesting view of like what the comic
Speaker 1: book nerd guy trope is could be or what how
Speaker 1: I look at that with my twenty first century view
Speaker 1: of this too. Um. But there's also just like these
Speaker 1: like interesting moments too in the opening credits, because you
Speaker 1: know a huge comic book fan, and obviously Jason Lee
Speaker 1: is in it, and you did have Stanley, but like
Speaker 1: the they did like sort of comic book treatments of
Speaker 1: like every person in the film, and I like how
Speaker 1: they sort of like forced foreshadowed Ben Affleck as Batman,
Speaker 1: except his was called butt Man, and I was like, this,
Speaker 1: maybe Kevin had an idea of where Ben was going
Speaker 1: with this that was he related to Stanley at all. Yeah,
Speaker 1: Jason Lee is Stanley's son? What? Yeah? Is that true?
Speaker 1: I believe? So I'm gonna just double check that for you.
Speaker 1: But um, I'm not doubting you. I had just never
Speaker 1: he's I thought, I think he has some maybe not.
Speaker 1: Let me just make sure is he related at all?
Speaker 1: We should leave all this stuff in no relation. Thank god?
Speaker 1: Oh really? Oh no? Oh? Well, And see that's funny
Speaker 1: because that was I think that was like a rumor
Speaker 1: that people said in the pre internet era of just
Speaker 1: watching a movie and the last names matched and you're like, yeah,
Speaker 1: that's that's his kid. Believe Yeah, I did, I did
Speaker 1: too until just now. Well, he was a big comic
Speaker 1: book guy though. And it's funny that that. Like Stanley's
Speaker 1: part in this movie, you know, he has a great
Speaker 1: scene is the wise sage that Kevin Smith immediately like.
Speaker 1: It's kind of the one sweet moment in the movie
Speaker 1: where he's talking about true love and then afterward Kevin
Speaker 1: Smith sort of just yankster rug out from under him
Speaker 1: because it turns out it was a set up for
Speaker 1: by Jeremy London just to get him think a weird grift.
Speaker 1: You're like, hey, man, my buddy's not doing too well,
Speaker 1: you might pumping up for a couple of bucks or
Speaker 1: something exactly. Um, but this was It's hard to remember
Speaker 1: a day where Stanley wasn't a part of the m
Speaker 1: c U and making all these great cameos in these movies,
Speaker 1: Like because watching it this afternoon and I was like, oh, yeah, Stanley.
Speaker 1: Of course, you know he's in every Marvel movie now
Speaker 1: and we all love Uncle stan But like back then,
Speaker 1: the even I think, felt the need to explain a
Speaker 1: little bit in the movie who Stanley even was because
Speaker 1: among comic books people, of course they knew who he was,
Speaker 1: but the public at large wouldn't know who this old
Speaker 1: guy was with the dark And it's funny because I
Speaker 1: didn't really either, and for being someone I was, I
Speaker 1: was really into comic books too, but I was into
Speaker 1: the Jim Lee version of X Men, so and for
Speaker 1: the longest time I thought Jim Lee and Stanley were brothers,
Speaker 1: because you don't think I had. I had this very
Speaker 1: childish way of discerning if people were related where you're
Speaker 1: like the last name. I remember as a kid asking
Speaker 1: people if they were related to so ands because they're
Speaker 1: like even random people I knew that weren't even famous,
Speaker 1: and they're like, no, I don't know that person. I'm like, ah,
Speaker 1: weird you related to Spalding Gray right exactly. I wish
Speaker 1: I was or not, but no, Kobe Bryant is my cousin.
Speaker 1: So at that end, see, I'm glad to know, I'm
Speaker 1: honored to be here with I'm gonna give you shit
Speaker 1: about that for the rest of your life. Every time
Speaker 1: I see you, I'm gonna like find someone with the
Speaker 1: last last name, same one. It's like this you um
Speaker 1: but yeah, like I I didn't know until like another
Speaker 1: friend who was really in the comics was also like no,
Speaker 1: like that's like he invented everything. And I was like,
Speaker 1: oh yeah, and I was like I didn't realize that.
Speaker 1: And then it really like it kind of sent me
Speaker 1: back into like my nerd like learning of like Okay, well,
Speaker 1: I cannot embarrass myself by asking a question like that.
Speaker 1: I will now ingest some more standley material and shame
Speaker 1: some other people. But that's how you learned. I mean,
Speaker 1: you don't know ship until um friend tells you about it.
Speaker 1: The unactually was the process for learning and the and
Speaker 1: then for many people, and then it turned into a
Speaker 1: toxic habit decades later. I mean, let's talk about Jason
Speaker 1: Lee for a minute. He's an actor that's like I
Speaker 1: don't think anyone at whatever accused Jason Lee of being
Speaker 1: some great actor, but there was something about him. He
Speaker 1: had this charm that like, I was a big fan
Speaker 1: of my name is earl Uh that show he had.
Speaker 1: I really really loved that show. And he's kind of
Speaker 1: gone away a little bit now, but like he was
Speaker 1: just this cool guy. He was a skater and like
Speaker 1: he was sponsored and like had a like a career
Speaker 1: as a skater and then started being in these movies
Speaker 1: and I don't know, man, there was just something about
Speaker 1: him that was super likable. I saw him at a
Speaker 1: couple of shows when I lived in l A that
Speaker 1: like like really cool bands that I like, Like I
Speaker 1: saw had a Grand Eddie show and he stood right
Speaker 1: next to me as I'm ade a flaming lip show.
Speaker 1: I was like, yeah, man, Jason Lee, Like he's fucking
Speaker 1: cool dude, and he's just he didn't even try to act.
Speaker 1: He just gets on screen and as Jason Lee. Yeah,
Speaker 1: he's I think that's why I like, you know, it's
Speaker 1: funny because him and Ethan Suppley are both together in
Speaker 1: this and then later on in My Name is Earl,
Speaker 1: Like I wonder if that. I'm sure maybe they built
Speaker 1: a relationship there, but yeah, he yeah, he was sort
Speaker 1: of effortlessly he helped sort of embody this like personality
Speaker 1: type or energy of like this mid nineties person that
Speaker 1: I thought it was really cool doesn't give a ship.
Speaker 1: He sucks, but he's also like has a razor sharp
Speaker 1: wit and like so that helps offset his shittiness um
Speaker 1: in a way that felt like earned, because he was
Speaker 1: smart enough to throw, you know, insults back, like saying
Speaker 1: I can't explain myself monosylibically enough for you to understand
Speaker 1: and things like that. Yeah that's good Burnham Jason, But yeah,
Speaker 1: he's a smart guy. You could tell. And this character
Speaker 1: Brodie was smart, but it's like it's that character that's
Speaker 1: that's smart, but it's kind of just tossing it away,
Speaker 1: like he's using his intelligence to explain the intricates he's
Speaker 1: of them all. Yeah, uh, to comic effect. But like
Speaker 1: you get the feeling that if Brodie got a ship together,
Speaker 1: he could kind of do whatever he wanted. He's no dummy,
Speaker 1: Yeah exactly, because even like there's something about even his
Speaker 1: like you know, obscene comic book collection because he like
Speaker 1: lives in like a cave that's about to collapse on
Speaker 1: him of old comics. He just has this like yeah
Speaker 1: that he he he just helped embody that snark of
Speaker 1: the nineties that I think for me as a young kid,
Speaker 1: like that's the kind of adult I want to be,
Speaker 1: which wasn't a great example, but at the time I
Speaker 1: did the the I guess relatively intelligent version of that.
Speaker 1: But he's there's I think it's also his like skater
Speaker 1: cred to you know, because he legitimately wasn't he in
Speaker 1: like one of the early police Academy things like just
Speaker 1: as like a skating extra. Oh, I don't know, that
Speaker 1: wouldn't surprise me. I think he's like in anyway. But
Speaker 1: like he's even because I remember just skate culture is
Speaker 1: also huge too, like in southern California. So like him
Speaker 1: and then hearing like you know he's like was like
Speaker 1: a solid skater also just helped you. Like this guy's
Speaker 1: he's the real thing. Yeah, totally triple threat. Uh. And
Speaker 1: you know then you have Jeremy London, who, you know,
Speaker 1: God bless him. Jeremy London is not a fine actor.
Speaker 1: And that's the thing I kind of always admired about
Speaker 1: Kevin Smith though, is that he was clearly interested in
Speaker 1: putting people he liked and friends of his in these movies,
Speaker 1: at least early on, maybe at the expensive you know,
Speaker 1: auditioning a bunch of people like you never felt like
Speaker 1: early on he cared a lot about the real filmmaking
Speaker 1: process except for the writing and and probably you know,
Speaker 1: shooting it with his friends. He's never fancy as a director,
Speaker 1: and and like I said, probably did an audition to
Speaker 1: a thousand people. He's like, well, let's just use these people.
Speaker 1: Kids are fine. Yeah, He's like honestly, like, get Walt
Speaker 1: Flannagan and Scott Moser like my friends to just be
Speaker 1: in the film. And then you're like, well, now you're
Speaker 1: part of the established film universe, so yeah, I guess
Speaker 1: are gonna keep bringing you back. And that kind of
Speaker 1: became the because I was a full on Kevin Smith fanboy,
Speaker 1: like like I would watch every frame of like, oh
Speaker 1: that's Scott Moser. Oh he's this guy, and he's the
Speaker 1: snowball guy from Clerks and all this other stuff, and
Speaker 1: it was always like very Yeah, there was like a
Speaker 1: loyalty about it too that I felt like, yeah, I
Speaker 1: wonder if I just got checks to make films. I'm like, look,
Speaker 1: maybe you're a terrible actor, but I'm you're You're the
Speaker 1: guys that I like working with, so let's kind of
Speaker 1: keep this going. I mean, even like with Jason Muse,
Speaker 1: you know, like he's stuck by Jason Muse for a
Speaker 1: really long time and has had like all kinds of
Speaker 1: ups and downs and actor either, but he when he's on,
Speaker 1: he's so on, Because there's moments even in Mall Rats
Speaker 1: you're like, dude, don't like it's almost like you're trying
Speaker 1: to pre mouth the words of the persons, like don't
Speaker 1: I'm also like Kevin, like, why don't you direct that?
Speaker 1: A little bit? Um? But yeah, but there's just like this,
Speaker 1: I think there was just this really authentic quality about it.
Speaker 1: I think for a while that just resonated in the
Speaker 1: nineties so much more than like the polish that we
Speaker 1: were used to. Well, yeah, and he did something like
Speaker 1: not many directors had ever done or have even done since,
Speaker 1: which was created a cult of fandom around. I mean,
Speaker 1: there's like the Tarantinos and stuff, that sort of have
Speaker 1: a little bit of that. But Kevin Smith like really
Speaker 1: built this world, like you said, the view askew world,
Speaker 1: and he created this fandom around a production team and
Speaker 1: directing that like no one did stuff like that, Like
Speaker 1: he really And I don't think he was like, let
Speaker 1: me build my personal brand either. I think I think
Speaker 1: it was a little more pure than that, especially early on,
Speaker 1: and I think later he probably realized, like, wait a minute,
Speaker 1: I can and not in a gross way. I can
Speaker 1: still make money because I can go around and speak
Speaker 1: and I can just talk about my relationship with mus
Speaker 1: and and I have I have built this sort of
Speaker 1: cult of of fandom that and exploited such a bad word,
Speaker 1: but I mean it in the in the right way
Speaker 1: to energize it. Yeah, energized, I think because you know
Speaker 1: in a way like now that you're saying like that,
Speaker 1: it's almost like he's just sort of mirroring what he
Speaker 1: experienced as a comic book fan, you know of like
Speaker 1: because I again, I was his website, like I had
Speaker 1: content most people didn't, you know, there would be for
Speaker 1: a production company. There were like little clips back when
Speaker 1: you would like it would take forty minutes to download
Speaker 1: like a twenty meca byte quote time file or like
Speaker 1: what's a real video clip on there and gave people
Speaker 1: what they wanted. Yeah, and then he even had like
Speaker 1: a quiz section to like so you could actually test
Speaker 1: your fandom of like your knowledge of the view ask universe,
Speaker 1: like all that kind of stuff. And that got me hooked,
Speaker 1: like when I was younger, because I wanted to like
Speaker 1: to the point where I had done the quiz so
Speaker 1: many times I knew all the what, all the questions
Speaker 1: were already, and it for me created like this like
Speaker 1: sort of validation or like measure of my devotion to
Speaker 1: like these films for whatever it was. And yeah, I
Speaker 1: mean oddly enough, like I met him three years ago
Speaker 1: at Comic con Um. Yeah, well just like and it
Speaker 1: was just off of super off chance, like he was
Speaker 1: hosting like the IMDb yacht when they were doing that thing,
Speaker 1: and he was doing some stuff there, but we were
Speaker 1: staying in the same hotel and once we got through
Speaker 1: like the section we had to show your card to
Speaker 1: get to like the guest elevators. Like I had my
Speaker 1: back turned and he just walked up and I was like, oh,
Speaker 1: like I see this big hockey jersey wearing pulling up
Speaker 1: on and I saw him and he looked at me,
Speaker 1: and I was like, I just kind of gave him
Speaker 1: a head nod and I was like, dude, snoots to
Speaker 1: the fucking boots, bro. And he's like yeah, he's like oh,
Speaker 1: and I was like I was. I felt so, I'm
Speaker 1: so glad I took a big fanboy cringe swing like
Speaker 1: that and it connected and he just sort of reciprocated
Speaker 1: and I was like, Damn, that kind of went down
Speaker 1: exactly how I hoped it would. Um. But yeah, I
Speaker 1: think it's like I think there was a lot of
Speaker 1: influence just from his own fandom as a comic book
Speaker 1: guy that I think he really did a good job
Speaker 1: of finding ways to sort of like see himself as
Speaker 1: like not that he's like Stanley, but he's like, well,
Speaker 1: this is the kind of stuff I was into. Maybe
Speaker 1: that's my responsibility to offer the people that like my stuff. Yeah.
Speaker 1: I mean he he created, uh, something much bigger than
Speaker 1: a film director, you know, uh in a in a
Speaker 1: resume of movies that he's made, which is super smart.
Speaker 1: But again, I don't think he ever had this like
Speaker 1: cunning business angle to it early on. I think it
Speaker 1: was pure and and that kind of loyalty that he
Speaker 1: has especially to Muse. Yeah, it really speaks to me
Speaker 1: because that's just a loyalty is a really big deal
Speaker 1: in my life as as a Pisces. Not to get
Speaker 1: too fruity, but all my all my homies are Pisces
Speaker 1: for good reason. Ye March, I got like two friends
Speaker 1: who were born on the exact I'm both on the
Speaker 1: same day year, March twelve. Cool, are you Pisces too? No,
Speaker 1: I'm a virgo. Okay, I'm okay, all right. Ben Affleck
Speaker 1: is great in this movie and early on in his career.
Speaker 1: I was like this guy because, especially because dayson confused
Speaker 1: to I was like, he plays an asshole better than
Speaker 1: almost anyone I've ever seen. He was so good at it, Yeah,
Speaker 1: the best. Like I hated him, like I hated I
Speaker 1: hated Ben Affleck for a long time because of this,
Speaker 1: And I was like, when I watched Goodwill Hunting, I'm like, no, dude,
Speaker 1: that asshole from Mars done it. This guy because he sucks.
Speaker 1: I mean, he made a smart move by kind of
Speaker 1: getting away from that, but he was so good at
Speaker 1: it in this Shannon, this character, God, I just fucking
Speaker 1: hated his guts and even watching it today, I wanted
Speaker 1: to jump through the screen and nothing redeeming, like you know,
Speaker 1: Kevin Smith wrote him as like the app. That's why
Speaker 1: it's kind of interesting too, because it's from Kevin Smith's perspective. Obviously,
Speaker 1: Brody is him and tss him and how he sees
Speaker 1: him in relation to like the sort of accepted form
Speaker 1: of like you know, a mainstream masculinity, which is guys
Speaker 1: who don't read comic books. They address it. They work
Speaker 1: at Fashionable Male and they're into anal sex or whatever
Speaker 1: like proclivity, but it's this this. So it was there
Speaker 1: were moments like that too where it was more than
Speaker 1: me just being like I hate Shannon. I was like, oh, right,
Speaker 1: this is Kevin Smith like writing his view on like
Speaker 1: like the world he was in at the time. And
Speaker 1: then I was like, yeah, man, like we have so
Speaker 1: many Shannon's around us like that that are just so
Speaker 1: that would just be our tor mentors or for a
Speaker 1: while you think like, oh that's what I ought to
Speaker 1: be to be like successful or be attractive or whatever,
Speaker 1: and yeah, it's like they turned that on its head
Speaker 1: and be like this guy sucks. Yeah, and I bet
Speaker 1: you anything that Kevin Smith today is still that guy,
Speaker 1: and he's still in the industry, especially sees those douchebags
Speaker 1: and and just has nothing but loathing for those For
Speaker 1: those guys, I don't think you can like wear a
Speaker 1: hockey jersey into a serious pitch meeting and say that
Speaker 1: you like you actually respect what these people get like
Speaker 1: to think about you. You're like he he just I
Speaker 1: think he just like I'm I'm just doing my thing.
Speaker 1: I don't care what this other stuff is. It's it's
Speaker 1: all artificial. I mean, he's always been his own servant
Speaker 1: to his own self, and that's I may not love
Speaker 1: like a lot of the movies that he made after this,
Speaker 1: but I don't know, man, there's this weird admiration that
Speaker 1: I've always had for him just sticking to his guns
Speaker 1: and doing what made him happy and give ing the
Speaker 1: finger to critics and just being like, listen, this is
Speaker 1: who I am. I never claimed to be the best
Speaker 1: filmmaker in the world. Like I remember one of his
Speaker 1: quotes when he made Oh it may have been Jay
Speaker 1: and Silent Bob strike Back and the budget. He was
Speaker 1: laughing about how much money he got to make it.
Speaker 1: He said to make a two hour inside joke with
Speaker 1: my friends. And there was something I always kind of
Speaker 1: admired about that was like, you know what, Kevin Smith
Speaker 1: is just being Kevin Smith, and like he's he's a
Speaker 1: maverick and like not in a Robert Altman way, but
Speaker 1: in a Kevin Smith way. Right. Yeah, it's just a
Speaker 1: it's an it's there. There's just this rebellious quality to
Speaker 1: it that It's what's funny because at a certain point,
Speaker 1: like I just got really disheartened by that, like his
Speaker 1: output and just kind of I was just like, yeah,
Speaker 1: the thrill is a little bit gone after the trilogy,
Speaker 1: um and yeah, but it's it's like one of those
Speaker 1: moments where I just completely uh yeah for whatever reason.
Speaker 1: It was like it's like Star Wars where it's like
Speaker 1: I only like to early trilogy stuff, right, not into
Speaker 1: the other stuff. But to that point, it's like it's
Speaker 1: that he wasn't really making stuff like I'm never going back,
Speaker 1: and like these are the best movies anyone has ever made.
Speaker 1: These are like really great contributions from this creator in
Speaker 1: this moment in time. And he had a very specific
Speaker 1: philosophy which was yeah, like really much to say like
Speaker 1: I'm gonna make a you know, million dollar inside joke. Um,
Speaker 1: there's something about that that kind of feels, you know,
Speaker 1: he's missing. Yeah, and you can't, like, if you're really
Speaker 1: having an honest conversation about film history, you gotta throw
Speaker 1: Kevin Smith in that conversation at a certain point to
Speaker 1: represent what he represents. What he represented, especially at the time,
Speaker 1: which was really helping to break in the cinema open
Speaker 1: in a big way, uh, to make these super talking
Speaker 1: movies that weren't like what he alan talky, because those
Speaker 1: were always a little high salutin and intelligent and talking
Speaker 1: about you know, art and philosophy and stuff. And he
Speaker 1: was like, I'm gonna do that, but I'm gonna talk
Speaker 1: about Star Wars and and stink palm jokes, right, which
Speaker 1: is still a funny part of that movie. I think
Speaker 1: even then too, like you have to credit him on
Speaker 1: some level for making comic books cool because I didn't.
Speaker 1: I didn't really care about Superman until I heard Kevin
Speaker 1: Smith was possibly going to be writing a Superman film
Speaker 1: and there yeah, and I was like, whoa what And
Speaker 1: then that's when I was kind of like this is interest,
Speaker 1: Like it almost are like, oh, maybe his end game
Speaker 1: is really to get into the comics that he loves,
Speaker 1: because he's really those seemed to be offering him those opportunities,
Speaker 1: and when that stuff fell through, I was like, ah,
Speaker 1: this kind of sucks. But I think that also for
Speaker 1: him at the time, because he did have cred um
Speaker 1: within the industry for him to be focusing on like
Speaker 1: a comic book film. I think made a sort of
Speaker 1: this is like in nineties six. I remember like when
Speaker 1: he was talking about these like Superman films that on
Speaker 1: some level, I feel like this, we have to tip
Speaker 1: our hat to that because you start of mainstream that
Speaker 1: um and really always made comics like like sort of
Speaker 1: ever president sort of theme throughout his his work. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean those that the stories around that Nick Cage
Speaker 1: Superman development our legendary and you know they're part of
Speaker 1: Hollywood lore at this point, so many great stories. And
Speaker 1: then you know, the since the documentary stuff has come
Speaker 1: out with some of the behind the scenes stuff with
Speaker 1: the screen test and the weird suits, and then Kevin
Speaker 1: Smith went on all I was speaking tours uh as
Speaker 1: a really engaging you know, you know, he's a guy
Speaker 1: that like he's a bit of a blowhard in a
Speaker 1: certain way, but he can also spend a good yarn
Speaker 1: and if like good for him, if someone will pay
Speaker 1: twenty five dollars to go sitting in auditorium and listen
Speaker 1: to Kevin Smith tells stories for twoever, Yeah, it's a
Speaker 1: little bit much. Yeah, that's why it's kind of funny,
Speaker 1: because he is a bit of he's a sort of
Speaker 1: a double edged sword, because there's there are things about
Speaker 1: him I just like bother me that I just not
Speaker 1: fully like. I think I used to be like whatever
Speaker 1: he does, I love no questions asked, and then over time,
Speaker 1: like I think I had to kind of like, uh no,
Speaker 1: Like also the way he kind of like sort of
Speaker 1: masturbatory like ways will speak about his work at times,
Speaker 1: like sort of felt like not the Kevin I thought
Speaker 1: I knew. But yeah, I think it's like anyone, there's
Speaker 1: always a sort of a balance to them. Yeah. I
Speaker 1: think the only thing that annoyed me more later was
Speaker 1: when he started smoking weed and he acted like he
Speaker 1: was the first guy who ever smoked. Yeah, and then
Speaker 1: and then it got bad, like I did you ever
Speaker 1: see that like web series he did about like the Dispenser,
Speaker 1: Oh no, it's like one of those eightest things he did.
Speaker 1: It is I can't even I don't even know where
Speaker 1: I saw it, but he made this like attempt at
Speaker 1: a workplace comedy about people who worked at a weed
Speaker 1: dispensary and really on some level on TV or was
Speaker 1: it like a web show? It was a web show
Speaker 1: type thing. Yeah, let me just interesting. I'm looking at
Speaker 1: that up right now. Spoilers. No, that's not it. Oh Hollyweed. Yes,
Speaker 1: so that was a few years ago. No, good, it is.
Speaker 1: That's when I like those. It's it's it's projects like
Speaker 1: that that make me question. I'm like, was he bad
Speaker 1: this whole time? And then like he just kind of
Speaker 1: hit it, like he just kind of broken clock thing
Speaker 1: like he in the moment, he was right on these
Speaker 1: couple of things. Because there's certainly other ones I look
Speaker 1: at I'm like, oh boy, but Hollyweed is truly like
Speaker 1: it's like the worst version of him because it's like
Speaker 1: it's just super wordy dialogue, but it's with like performers
Speaker 1: who can't even do it any service, so it just
Speaker 1: feels like if you even try, And like I was
Speaker 1: high watching, I was like, no, a panic attack from
Speaker 1: all this top, like, please, oh no, that's ultimate test.
Speaker 1: What what are your some of your favorite Mallrats moments?
Speaker 1: Oh my god, I mean I love the when they
Speaker 1: talk about their plan to bring down the stage. Um
Speaker 1: where man, Yeah, those are some about him. He cras
Speaker 1: me up. Uh, I love that. I love um god,
Speaker 1: the the stink palm scene. I really loved it. So
Speaker 1: dumb and over the top, so dumb and again me
Speaker 1: being you know, twelve at the time being like, yeah,
Speaker 1: that's a that's the thing you can do in real life.
Speaker 1: That's what's that's what's sort of tough about Kevin Smith film.
Speaker 1: Their adults wool watch and be like, oh, this is
Speaker 1: great comedy. On the other side of that are young
Speaker 1: kids who are like this is a blueprint for life,
Speaker 1: Like I will dig in my ass and shake someone's
Speaker 1: hand because I don't like them. I can never bring
Speaker 1: myself to do it because it's just like the thought
Speaker 1: of it and then it's on your hand too. Yeah,
Speaker 1: but that did kick off a long run of me
Speaker 1: eating chocolate covered pretzels. Really yeah, it's like so weird,
Speaker 1: Like I took on these things that Brody did as
Speaker 1: like parts of who I was as a person. Like
Speaker 1: I only ate chocolate covered pretzels for a while, Like
Speaker 1: if seven eleven coming out, I got a bag of
Speaker 1: flips or whatever at the time, and like trying to
Speaker 1: drink out of the smallest paper cup, like it was
Speaker 1: a kind of thing to do. Um. So in a way,
Speaker 1: like I'm kind of mad at Kevin Smith because he
Speaker 1: kind of ruined my brain. Um, but yeah, like I
Speaker 1: love that moment um at the time. Like I wasn't
Speaker 1: smoking weed because I was young, but I was like, oh,
Speaker 1: this is this is interesting, Like the power of weed
Speaker 1: as like some magic tool that's only jay and silent
Speaker 1: and deployed for their own needs. Um, those are really
Speaker 1: awesome too. Um. There was a lot more slapstick in
Speaker 1: it than I remembered when I watched it today. Yeah. Uh,
Speaker 1: kind of really silly stuff that I think was his.
Speaker 1: You know, I think he was kind of throwing the
Speaker 1: whole kitchen sink in there. He was like, I'll do
Speaker 1: some three stooges shit. Yeah, Like the scene with him
Speaker 1: crashing through the the dressing room door was very silly slapstick.
Speaker 1: And the scene where he's he's you know, he's going
Speaker 1: after La Fleur with a suck full of quarters and
Speaker 1: the kid rolls his little skate out there. It's just
Speaker 1: really silly kind of fun stuff that you know. I
Speaker 1: think Jay and Silent Bob, especially as characters, there was
Speaker 1: just something about him that you liked and it was
Speaker 1: fun seeing them outside of the clerk's world. Yeah, And
Speaker 1: I think this is the film that really made them. Yeah,
Speaker 1: as much as like Jason Lee and Shannon Doherty and
Speaker 1: like Claire for Lonnie, like these big actors are in them.
Speaker 1: This was the reason why I really watched the film
Speaker 1: was for Jay and Silent Bob Um. And I would
Speaker 1: so many lines, like when they're talking to Ethan Supply,
Speaker 1: the whole Ethan Supply magic. I arc. He's like one
Speaker 1: of my favorite things too, Like I just love his
Speaker 1: reactions to things like when he yells at the kids
Speaker 1: and ruining the easter was like there is no easter
Speaker 1: bunny over there, that's just a guy in a suit,
Speaker 1: or when they beat up the easter bunny too for Brody.
Speaker 1: This is for Brody. Kids jump in. It is such
Speaker 1: a mess. Um, But they were. And I think but
Speaker 1: the reason I will say this with the Ethan subbly thing,
Speaker 1: I remember as a kid, I could not for the
Speaker 1: life of me ever get one of those magic I
Speaker 1: had things to work, just didn't. I didn't understand. What
Speaker 1: I did do was just don't focus your eyes when
Speaker 1: your ten. I don't know what that means. Sure that
Speaker 1: close my eyes. I don't. I don't have like the
Speaker 1: sort of coordination to be able to sort of understand it.
Speaker 1: And I remember getting so mad because kids would see it,
Speaker 1: and I was like, so I also just subly I loved.
Speaker 1: I was like, I get it, man, it's bullshit. Is
Speaker 1: it a schooner or a sailboat? Who have you still
Speaker 1: never seen a magic And I think successfully, I'm not
Speaker 1: even try and it's still the It's like one of
Speaker 1: those weird secret failures that like, you know, I'm sure,
Speaker 1: like I'll have a grandkid like, yeah, Grandpa, look at this.
Speaker 1: What is that a magic eye book from me? Luckily
Speaker 1: that that stuff sort of went away. It had its moment,
Speaker 1: and I think it's like the mid nineties was sort
Speaker 1: of at its peak. Yeah, but that was like peak
Speaker 1: peak mall stuff too, like, so I just love those
Speaker 1: things that were really sort of implanted there um And
Speaker 1: I just like, again the things I learned to say,
Speaker 1: like from this like, I hope your pants get caught
Speaker 1: in a blood bath ensues. I didn't know how to
Speaker 1: use the word ensue properly until that line where Brodie
Speaker 1: is watching this kid tug at an adult's leg while
Speaker 1: sitting on an escalator and he's just so he's screaming
Speaker 1: at a kid. I hope your pants get caught in
Speaker 1: blood bath ensues. Yeah. Yeah, he's always mistreating children. Kevin
Speaker 1: Smith movies absolutely funny. It still he became a dad, right,
Speaker 1: and then mistreated them by being like, okay, your name
Speaker 1: is Harley Quinn right, Oh that's right. That is his
Speaker 1: daughter's name. Right, that's pretty funny. I do have a
Speaker 1: lot of respect for his his devotion to his family.
Speaker 1: I think he seems like a good dad. And yeah,
Speaker 1: it's always had had his kids in his film. Was
Speaker 1: like his wife wasn't even in Jane Silent Bobs right back,
Speaker 1: that's right. I remember that was like again, being such
Speaker 1: a fan, was like, whoa, she's not even a performer
Speaker 1: and she's in it like that? Well, he was like
Speaker 1: none of my friends ever were either, so why not? Yeah? Absolutely?
Speaker 1: Now is he still putting some of those guys in
Speaker 1: these movies? I haven't kept up lately. I feel like
Speaker 1: I saw Brian O'Halloran and something recently really and I
Speaker 1: don't know if it was him. I don't know. I
Speaker 1: mean again, like I've definitely found my way slightly away
Speaker 1: from the recent stuff. But like Jason Muses in um Hollyweed,
Speaker 1: oh is he Yeah? So, but I don't know, like, yeah,
Speaker 1: what happened to like the Scott Moser's of the World
Speaker 1: on the Wall, Flannagans the world who like end up
Speaker 1: being character names but also literally his friends. I'm not sure.
Speaker 1: I did see like an article that was sort of
Speaker 1: like mall Rats cast, where are they now? Like years on,
Speaker 1: but it was mostly like the people you know, It's like, yeah,
Speaker 1: Michael Rookers and the Guardians of the Galaxy exactly. Yeah,
Speaker 1: everyone did pretty well relatively after that. Yeah. Oh Rooker's
Speaker 1: great too. I forgot he was. He was funny in
Speaker 1: this movie. Yeah. And again another person who I just
Speaker 1: sort of saw as not existing until mal Rats. So
Speaker 1: then I remember, like looking at other films Michael Rooker
Speaker 1: like had been in that predated Marats, and I was
Speaker 1: it was so jarring for me. I was like, I
Speaker 1: thought that was his debut. Yeah, totally. He was the
Speaker 1: Truth or Date asshole. Yeah, that showed his ass. Yeah,
Speaker 1: quite literally didn't. You're like, what was that again? There's
Speaker 1: like so many of these weird slapstick moments that are
Speaker 1: like head scratchers, like I get it, which is like
Speaker 1: you're being an ass t s and then it's cut
Speaker 1: to him and he's falling out of his tally see
Speaker 1: has asked? Well, Like even like Ivana the fortune teller
Speaker 1: who had the Third People the bit at the end
Speaker 1: where she reveals it's like a prosthetic third nipple and
Speaker 1: then puts it in her mouth like it's chewing. I'm like,
Speaker 1: it's very weird. Who was that? It was that directed
Speaker 1: or was that improv Like I don't know, man, that's
Speaker 1: an in the moment thing. It felt like, yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: that was pretty funny. I forgot about all that stuff.
Speaker 1: I had scratchers there. But I'm like, she was in
Speaker 1: Three's Company. She was one of the sort of later
Speaker 1: Threees company Susan summer replacements. I think, oh, that, okay,
Speaker 1: that makes sense. I can't remember her name, but she
Speaker 1: was one of the roommates later on kind of when
Speaker 1: the show The Barnes, I think, right, after she had
Speaker 1: hit hit the peak. I forgot about the third nipple
Speaker 1: thing until today. Yeah, it totally had like wiped up
Speaker 1: from room and it was like such an eighties like
Speaker 1: you know type movie that Kevin Smith probably watched when
Speaker 1: he was younger, because like there was like you gotta
Speaker 1: have bare breasts in it for some reason, like you know,
Speaker 1: Joey Warren Adams whether she's changing or this third nippled
Speaker 1: fortune teller like, yeah, it's very funny. Uh well, dude,
Speaker 1: I think this was I think we did it. I
Speaker 1: think it was a lot of fun. Uh. We did
Speaker 1: what I hoped we would do, which was get into
Speaker 1: the sort of the Kevin Smith thing a little bit
Speaker 1: um even more so than mal Rats, because he is
Speaker 1: someone who is larger than his film output. Yeah if
Speaker 1: that makes sense. Yeah, it's like almost to the point where,
Speaker 1: like I said, but it makes me question like what
Speaker 1: trying to like weigh his impact is it the films
Speaker 1: are like that he for him being as prominent at
Speaker 1: the time, Like what that signal to other people as
Speaker 1: what a film could be. Yeah, it's it's it's a
Speaker 1: it's an interesting, interesting discussion for sure. Yeah, maybe I'll
Speaker 1: meet him one day. I've gotten the Kevin Smith looked
Speaker 1: like things so many times over the years that I'd
Speaker 1: like to think that at some point someone has said
Speaker 1: you look like Chuck from stuff you should know. But
Speaker 1: maybe I think at this point it's safe to say
Speaker 1: that that that pendulum may swing to your direction pretty soon.
Speaker 1: For sure. I'm not looking for that, but hey, if
Speaker 1: you say so, I don't know. Here, what we what
Speaker 1: we need is the stuff you should know, hockey jersey
Speaker 1: for you to wear. Oh no, we'll start, We'll start
Speaker 1: reverse engineering it. And like every picture I rotake, I'll
Speaker 1: just go like this, yeah, because he has that same
Speaker 1: look at all exactly, which is exactly the face he
Speaker 1: had when I forced him to take that selfie at
Speaker 1: Comic Con. Oh oh you got a selfie? Yeah? I
Speaker 1: I honestly, like I said, I was so obsessed with
Speaker 1: him when I was younger, and I had not really
Speaker 1: and I completely fell off and being like following his work.
Speaker 1: But when I saw him, I immediately just like I
Speaker 1: you know, I time traveled to me being a kid,
Speaker 1: and I'm like, that's so cool. Oh it's me and
Speaker 1: Kevin Smith here, Like there's that photo. Oh nice, man,
Speaker 1: it was exchange and I have a goofy smile because
Speaker 1: I'm just so nervous, Like its worst. I know, it's
Speaker 1: the worst smile I've ever had because part of me
Speaker 1: couldn't believe I was like I had arrived in thirteen.
Speaker 1: Twelve year old Miles had reached the summit of his fans. Yeah,
Speaker 1: oh that's sweet man. Maybe I'll hear this you never know.
Speaker 1: Uh well, thanks Miles. Where can people follow you aside
Speaker 1: from listening to The Daily Zeite guys, which they should
Speaker 1: be doing. Thank you so much for having me. Yeah,
Speaker 1: you can find me on my other PI have another
Speaker 1: podcast called four twenty Day Fiance where I just talked
Speaker 1: about ninety Day Fiance, one of my favorite reality shows.
Speaker 1: And yeah, you can find me on social media Twitter, Instagram,
Speaker 1: at Miles of Gray, g r a y and yeah,
Speaker 1: like you're saying, Chuck. If people want to hear me
Speaker 1: talk news in a funny way in politics and culture
Speaker 1: and all that, please check out the Daily see Geist
Speaker 1: right here the same networks, really great show. Maybe you'll
Speaker 1: have me on one day, Yeah, we gotta have you
Speaker 1: on the other time we've had josh On and he
Speaker 1: like didn't have a camera on it was a very
Speaker 1: joy like one of the last times we had him.
Speaker 1: I think maybe the Yeah you've had Josh a few times?
Speaker 1: Do you have had me on once? We're gonna right
Speaker 1: this wrong. I don't know what happened. I don't know
Speaker 1: what happened, but I'm allod to this now. All right,
Speaker 1: I'm gonna do it. Okay, all right, we'll do a
Speaker 1: trade sees. I'll have me on Daily's like guys, and
Speaker 1: I'll get Jack on for pulp fiction. Maybe he's waiting
Speaker 1: on that. He was because I told him today I
Speaker 1: was thinking I'm about to do a movie. Chrise. She's like,
Speaker 1: oh what. I'll send him an email because I'm still
Speaker 1: holding pulp fiction for him. Like someone even asked. I
Speaker 1: was like, I can't do it, and I claimed it.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, he's what a year from movies? All right? Man,
Speaker 1: this is a lot of fun and uh, it's good
Speaker 1: talking to you. Yeah. Likewise, Manna take care. Movie Crash
Speaker 1: is produced and written by Charles Bryant and Roel Brown,
Speaker 1: edited and engineered by Seth Nicholas Johnson, is scored by
Speaker 1: Noel Brown. Here in our home studio at Pontstey Market, Atlanta,
Speaker 1: Georgia for I heart Radio. For more podcasts for my
Speaker 1: heart Radio, visit the iHeart Radio app, Apple podcast, or
Speaker 1: wherever you listen to your favorite shows.