Speaker 1: I need to let my hair down a little bit.
Speaker 1: I need to let loose. I'm gonna take my tie
Speaker 1: off and I'm gonna put on this turtleneck because I
Speaker 1: like this turtleneck. I look good in this turtleneck. It
Speaker 1: helps me move, you know, it helps you move obviously,
Speaker 1: and he let's go. Yeah. Yeah, it's a secret power.
Speaker 1: It's a it's a stretchable fabric. Oh yeah, it's hi.
Speaker 1: My name Mr Melt Tillman and I played mill Check
Speaker 1: on Severn. Hi everybody, and welcome back as always too
Speaker 1: off the beat. I am your host Brian baum Gartner,
Speaker 1: and oh am my giddy today I am. I am
Speaker 1: very excited. Um. You should know this that recently I
Speaker 1: have become obsessed with my new favorite show, Severance on
Speaker 1: Apple TV Plus. Now. If you're not familiar with Severance, one,
Speaker 1: you should be. But two. It's about a tech company
Speaker 1: called Lumen that severs employees work and home lives, essentially
Speaker 1: creating two versions of well, one person. It's a very
Speaker 1: fascinating and interesting take on office life, and man, it
Speaker 1: goes places that you would never expect, which brings me
Speaker 1: to why I'm giddy. Today's guest, the Amazing Trammel Tillman.
Speaker 1: Now he plays the super creepy but somehow charming lumen
Speaker 1: supervisor Seth mill Check his character is. He has some
Speaker 1: of the most interesting scenes in the whole series. And
Speaker 1: I am not gonna spoil too much today, but if
Speaker 1: you don't want to know anything about anything that happens
Speaker 1: in the show, maybe go watch it and then come
Speaker 1: back and then you'll run back here to listen to
Speaker 1: this episode. We dive into severance casting filming some of
Speaker 1: those iconic scenes. Did anyone say m d E? And
Speaker 1: we discuss the optics and design of the show and
Speaker 1: so much more. We'll also get into Trammel's background and
Speaker 1: why he believes that art changes lives. It is my
Speaker 1: sincere pleasure to introduce to all of you my new bestie,
Speaker 1: Trammel Tillman. Bubble and Squeak. I love it, Bubble and
Speaker 1: Squeak on Bubble and Squeaker Cookie at every month left
Speaker 1: over from the nut before travel. What is happening, my friend?
Speaker 1: What's going on? I am so happy that you're here.
Speaker 1: I've come clean about something. I love this show so much.
Speaker 1: I cannot tell you how much I was traveling and
Speaker 1: I finished the series, and I'm like, at thirty five,
Speaker 1: thou feet and I start firing off this missive email,
Speaker 1: I'm like, we gotta get tromel. I told Wendy Malick,
Speaker 1: the genius Wendy Malick and John Ham and some people
Speaker 1: that I've had the opportunity to work with before and know,
Speaker 1: and I told them that I started this podcast because
Speaker 1: I wanted to talk to them like I wanted. I
Speaker 1: wanted to get really deep in terms of their process
Speaker 1: and their story and and the moments that define them.
Speaker 1: But really it's I wanted to talk to you. I
Speaker 1: didn't know it at the time, but a little bit,
Speaker 1: but after after after seeing Severance, it was really about
Speaker 1: about you. We're gonna talk plenty about Severance, but I
Speaker 1: really wanted to learn a little bit about you and
Speaker 1: what sort of helped define you in in your earlier
Speaker 1: life and in your career and how you sort of
Speaker 1: got to where you are today. I understand you grew
Speaker 1: up in in Maryland? Is that right? I did? I did.
Speaker 1: I grew up in Largo, Maryland, UM, which is in
Speaker 1: p g County, and at the time in the eighties,
Speaker 1: it's was one of the richest black counties in America,
Speaker 1: and there's still pockets of PG County that that hold
Speaker 1: a high population of black affluents in that area. Okay, yeah, yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: there's a hop, skip and a jump into d C
Speaker 1: from d C. Okay, a lot of politicians there, tons.
Speaker 1: I mean, I was probably neighbors with a few of them,
Speaker 1: you know, like so far away. You know, there's a
Speaker 1: scene of a lot of excellence, if you will, in
Speaker 1: that community. I was neighbors with entrepreneurs and around principles
Speaker 1: and teachers, educators, you know, were like so everything was
Speaker 1: about growth, expansion and excellence. Okay, when you were ten
Speaker 1: years old, this is how the story goes. You were
Speaker 1: in a church Christmas production and you first got the
Speaker 1: bug about being an actor. Is that right? That's true.
Speaker 1: That's true. I was a very shy kid, and my
Speaker 1: mom recognized talent that I have of performing, and I
Speaker 1: would always perform by myself alone. She thought that it
Speaker 1: was very important for me to be involved in the
Speaker 1: church because she grew up in the church as did
Speaker 1: my father. There was an opportunity for her to be
Speaker 1: a part of a play, and she felt this was
Speaker 1: wonderful because there's so many characters in my family, and
Speaker 1: we all liked the Spotlight in one way or the other,
Speaker 1: whether or not we admit it, you know, um. And
Speaker 1: with that, they needed someone to play her son, and
Speaker 1: what better person to play her son than so right exactly?
Speaker 1: You know, I was kicking and screaming, you know, Brian,
Speaker 1: I did not want to do it. I cried, I
Speaker 1: boo hooed, But there was nowhere around it. Can't tell mom, no,
Speaker 1: especially age of ten. And I got on that stage
Speaker 1: and I had one line in one direction to say
Speaker 1: hello and sit on the couch. And from that moment
Speaker 1: it clicked. Really I didn't know what this thing was
Speaker 1: that that got me, but it did right then in
Speaker 1: the moment, and I wanted to do more of it.
Speaker 1: So then did you start auditioning for plays? You started
Speaker 1: doing plays as a young person. I continue within the church.
Speaker 1: I got my start in the church, doing a lot
Speaker 1: of theater, and eventually, you know, veering out and doing
Speaker 1: professional served as an extra on the wire. Yes you
Speaker 1: remember that show, well, yes, I remember that show. It's
Speaker 1: one of the one of the greatest shows of all time.
Speaker 1: How old were you when that happen? Yeah, I was
Speaker 1: about that age, I was about that age, I sat
Speaker 1: probably two rolls behind Wendell Pierce. It was a scene
Speaker 1: at a baseball game, you know. Wendell Pierce and I
Speaker 1: cannot remember the other actors he was sitting next to,
Speaker 1: but they were having a conversation and I was thinking,
Speaker 1: I'm sitting a couple of rows behind Wendel Pierce. Is
Speaker 1: that this is really cool? And tried not to still
Speaker 1: focus actors work. Yeah, it's amazing how quickly you You're
Speaker 1: no longer sitting two rows behind Wendell Pierce. If you can,
Speaker 1: if you're a distraction, I mean right right absolutely? Now
Speaker 1: I read you. You ended up going to Xavier University
Speaker 1: there in Louisiana. You were there when Hurricane Katrina decimated
Speaker 1: the city, which I want to talk about. But you
Speaker 1: were studying to become an orthopedic surgeon. Is this is this?
Speaker 1: Is this right? Yes? That is correct. So at this
Speaker 1: point you had given up, or at least temporarily put
Speaker 1: on hold, your desire to be an actor, and you
Speaker 1: wanted to be a smarty pants basically did that I
Speaker 1: wanted to be at Yeah? Well, the thing was, I
Speaker 1: was told at a young age that I would never
Speaker 1: make it. You know, they said that only two percent
Speaker 1: of actors or people aspiring to become actors have a
Speaker 1: thriving career in it. And I didn't want to wait
Speaker 1: tables for the rest of my life. That's what I
Speaker 1: was told. I was encouraged to find a career that
Speaker 1: would foster a steady financial lifestyle. So I was told
Speaker 1: that I should get into computers, into business, law, or medicine.
Speaker 1: I enjoyed science. I thought it was really cool. I
Speaker 1: love the idea of helping people, so that was the
Speaker 1: route that I figured I would go in. And I
Speaker 1: was around so many doctors, especially black doctors, and they
Speaker 1: were always the pinnacle of success in the community. So
Speaker 1: that was the route I wanted to go in, or
Speaker 1: so I thought. But what was interesting, Brian, is that
Speaker 1: performing was always there. You know, even when I was
Speaker 1: in high school, I was still performing. When I was
Speaker 1: at Xavier University, I got sucked into doing a musical,
Speaker 1: a random musical, like for a play at Xavier University.
Speaker 1: I still very much loved it, but I knew that
Speaker 1: it wasn't something that was gonna feed me financially, and
Speaker 1: I was scared to walk into it. So I said,
Speaker 1: you know, being a doctor isn't so bad it could
Speaker 1: you know, it's not like it's hard, right, So that's
Speaker 1: the easiest path you could take, right, Like, what, it's
Speaker 1: no problem totally. It's funny. My dad was a doctor,
Speaker 1: and so for me it was the reverse. I was like, yeah,
Speaker 1: that seems like a lot of school. I don't know,
Speaker 1: that seems like that seems like a lot of school.
Speaker 1: And I did not have the interest in science, and
Speaker 1: it sounds like you did. So yeah, I decided pretty
Speaker 1: young that that was not for me. So explained to
Speaker 1: me what happened, So the hurricane had did Xavier shut
Speaker 1: down or did you decide you needed to get out
Speaker 1: of there? Or what happened? So, okay, we gotta back up.
Speaker 1: So there's a whole meeting story within that. So while
Speaker 1: I was at Xavier University, I was studying biology PREMIT.
Speaker 1: I was doing better in biology PREMIT than many of
Speaker 1: my colleagues who are doctors. Now that's right, that's that's wild.
Speaker 1: But I hated chemistry LAP. I had a kim lab
Speaker 1: and I hated it. I did not want to do this.
Speaker 1: And the best thing about kim lab was the fact
Speaker 1: that I could watch the color's check age. So from
Speaker 1: there I had decided that there's there's gotta be something
Speaker 1: else that I can do. But then I remembered in
Speaker 1: high school I was very involved in like doing social events,
Speaker 1: so I figured, okay, publicity. So I changed my major
Speaker 1: into mass communications, so I would figure that I would
Speaker 1: get into advertising and publicity and so and so forth
Speaker 1: and so on. Unfortunately, we hit a financial snag. My
Speaker 1: mom had gave me a phone call and said, I
Speaker 1: can no longer help you financially with college because we
Speaker 1: lost our home, homeless work closed, basically we lost everything.
Speaker 1: With that, I had to find a way to finance school.
Speaker 1: Xavier University, while it's a wonderful university, was just so
Speaker 1: out of my pocket because it's a private Catholic school,
Speaker 1: you know. So my mom suggested, along with my sister
Speaker 1: who was in Mississippi, Jackson, Mississippi, to go to Jackson
Speaker 1: State because they have a communications program you could be
Speaker 1: a part of and it's cheaper. I was hesitant about that.
Speaker 1: I wanted to go to Howard University. I got accepted
Speaker 1: into Howard University, but I didn't get a big enough
Speaker 1: scholarship to go to Howard University. So right before Katrina hit.
Speaker 1: I said, you know, I'll go to Jackson State. I'll
Speaker 1: give it a year, but then I'm gonna come back
Speaker 1: to Xavier because I really love it there. So I
Speaker 1: ended up going to Jackson State. Hurricane Katrina came along,
Speaker 1: and it not only hit Xavier, not only hit New Orleans,
Speaker 1: but it came up to Jackson, Mississippi. So it's almost
Speaker 1: like the storm just followed me right on up, you know.
Speaker 1: And that's not funny. I don't know why I laughed
Speaker 1: at that. It was the image. It was yeah, yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: yeah yeah, but it was devastating. Was also incredibly ironic.
Speaker 1: And what was interesting is that while I was at
Speaker 1: Jackson State, there was some students that came up to
Speaker 1: Jackson State from Xavier to continue their education because they
Speaker 1: were offering those kind of programs across Xavier students. They
Speaker 1: were most sister schools that were set up. You know,
Speaker 1: there are people who went to Brown, Harvard, you know,
Speaker 1: Howard and the like. So I had friends from Xavier
Speaker 1: that were experiencing Jackson State along with me, which made
Speaker 1: it a great time. And I ended up falling in
Speaker 1: love with Jackson State and have such an appreciation for
Speaker 1: the school and the education the environment there. Yeah, and
Speaker 1: you graduated from there. I did. I graduated summa cum
Speaker 1: laude Jackson State University. See there's this body pants thing again.
Speaker 1: I knew it. Yeah. So you graduate from Jackson State
Speaker 1: with your mass communications degree and then what you decide
Speaker 1: that maybe you're not done with acting. No, it's still there.
Speaker 1: The acting bug is is still around. And while I
Speaker 1: was while I was that Jackson State, I was connected
Speaker 1: to the head of the acting department, Dr Mark G. Henderson.
Speaker 1: And I remember while I was doing a speech competition
Speaker 1: with my fraternity, he came along and helped me with
Speaker 1: the speech competition, ended up winning the competition. I'm under
Speaker 1: his tutelage, and he asked me, why are you not
Speaker 1: part of the drama program here at Jackson State. And
Speaker 1: at that time, Brian, because I believed and getting heavily involved.
Speaker 1: That was my upbringing to get involved as much as
Speaker 1: you can. I was in s g A. I was
Speaker 1: part of the Out five Fraternity Incorporated organization. I was
Speaker 1: part of the Kids College Freedom School projects, so I
Speaker 1: was working with kids. I also had part time jobs.
Speaker 1: I had so much going on, I didn't have time
Speaker 1: to do any acting and I was involved in the
Speaker 1: church at Jackson, Mississippi, New Horizon Church. You know, I
Speaker 1: don't have time. What When I graduated, I got offered
Speaker 1: a job working with kids college Freedom School Project, and
Speaker 1: as wonderful as those kids were, I hated being there.
Speaker 1: And I hated being there because I wasn't doing what
Speaker 1: I love to do. And what I love to do
Speaker 1: was form, tell stories, act, seeing dance. Right. So, I
Speaker 1: remember having a conversation with Dr Mark G. Henderson and
Speaker 1: he sat me down and he said, Trammel, you don't
Speaker 1: look happy. Are you happy? I said no, Why are
Speaker 1: you not happy? He asked me, and he said, if
Speaker 1: I had to wager our guest, I don't think that
Speaker 1: you are doing the thing that you love to do.
Speaker 1: You light up when it comes to performing. And I said, well,
Speaker 1: I can't do this. I'm not gonna have the money
Speaker 1: for this. I'm not going to have this. I'm not
Speaker 1: talented enough. I don't you know all of these excuses.
Speaker 1: And then he said, are you done? And I said, yes,
Speaker 1: Go do the thing that you love to do. Go
Speaker 1: do the thing that you love to do, and everything
Speaker 1: else will fall into place. And he encouraged me to
Speaker 1: go to grad school. And in order to getting grad
Speaker 1: school you have to audition, right, So then in order
Speaker 1: to audition, I was a part of urda's which is
Speaker 1: the United Residents Theater Association casting call for graduate schools.
Speaker 1: So I auditioned for that in Chicago. Ended up getting
Speaker 1: a lot of attention from the grad school programs there,
Speaker 1: got the attention from the University of Iowa, received a
Speaker 1: full scholarship to go to the University of Iowa. At
Speaker 1: the last minute, Brian, when I was supposed to get
Speaker 1: on the plane to leave or get in the car
Speaker 1: and leave, I don't even know how I was going
Speaker 1: to get to Iowa. The financial portion fell through, and
Speaker 1: it wasn't from the institution what it was. It was
Speaker 1: for me. All of a sudden, like all the money
Speaker 1: was gone. I called the head of the program at
Speaker 1: the University of Iowa and said, listen, this is my situation.
Speaker 1: He said, we've gave We've given you all the money
Speaker 1: we can give you. I don't know how we can
Speaker 1: help you. He asked me, said Terrell, are you coming?
Speaker 1: And I said, I don't know how to get there.
Speaker 1: He said, well, I have to resend the offer. So
Speaker 1: after the entire church community congratulated me on leaving to
Speaker 1: go the University of Iowa. I ended up not going
Speaker 1: to the University of Iowa and just stayed in Jackson,
Speaker 1: Mississippi and worked and worked and worked until I could
Speaker 1: have enough money to get out of Jackson, Mississippi to
Speaker 1: go pursue my dreams on another level. But it gave
Speaker 1: me an opportunity, Brian, because that I was able to
Speaker 1: work with New Stage Theater to get some regional theater credits.
Speaker 1: I was able to work with j V Productions and
Speaker 1: they offered me more training and more the legs to
Speaker 1: grow and find to my craft experience experience, Yes, yeah,
Speaker 1: And how long were you there? How how long did
Speaker 1: you end up done staying in Jackson. I got there
Speaker 1: two thousand five and I left in two thousand eleven.
Speaker 1: And you went to Tennessee and I went to Tennessee.
Speaker 1: And I went to Tennessee because the head of acting
Speaker 1: there saw me at Urda's in two thousand nine and
Speaker 1: thought I was too green, which he was right. I
Speaker 1: didn't want to admit a time, but he was right.
Speaker 1: He reached out to me early two thousand eleven and said, hey,
Speaker 1: we may I don't know if you remember me from
Speaker 1: the University of Tennessee, but we may have a slot
Speaker 1: for you. I said, Hey, okay, let's go. This is
Speaker 1: my opportunity. It's my ticket to move on and get
Speaker 1: and get some grad food training. Two weeks go by,
Speaker 1: I didn't hear from him. He then reaches out and
Speaker 1: says to me, Oh, I'm sorry, the position has been filled.
Speaker 1: We don't have a slot for you. So I'm devastated.
Speaker 1: So that I get I put myself on this plan, Brian,
Speaker 1: I said, this is what I'm gonna do. I am
Speaker 1: gonna save up money and I'm gonna put myself on
Speaker 1: a little tour. I'm gonna go to New York. I'm
Speaker 1: gonna go to Atlanta, I'm gonna go to New Orleans,
Speaker 1: and I'm gonna submit my resume and just see what happens.
Speaker 1: So I'm saving I'm taking jobs after jobs after jobs
Speaker 1: after job, and would you believe June of two thousand
Speaker 1: and eleven, who calls me the head of acting at
Speaker 1: the University of Tennessee. Edie says to me, Hi, I
Speaker 1: don't know if you remember me, but I'm the head
Speaker 1: of acting at the University Tennessee. I've been thinking about
Speaker 1: you for six months. What do you mean if I
Speaker 1: remember you, Edie said. He said, listen, I know I
Speaker 1: kind of pulled your leg earlier, but I'm serious. We
Speaker 1: do a slot. You would start in the fall eleven.
Speaker 1: If you're interested, come on up to Tennessee and let's
Speaker 1: go from there and audition and let's go from there.
Speaker 1: So I said, you know what, let's give it a shot.
Speaker 1: And in July I went up there and I auditioned
Speaker 1: and they offered me a slot right then on the spot.
Speaker 1: That's awesome. M What did grad school gift to you?
Speaker 1: I would say confidence. I would say the development of
Speaker 1: a thick skin. Because my graduate program was connected to
Speaker 1: the Clarence Brown Theater, so it's a regional theater and
Speaker 1: part of their mission is to connect students with professional artists.
Speaker 1: So we had the opportunity to work with professional artists
Speaker 1: all across the country and work with professtorve, directors, artisans, producers,
Speaker 1: so forth and so on. And with that, it taught
Speaker 1: me how to prepare myself in the rehearsal room, how
Speaker 1: to conduct myself backstage, how to treat my fellow cast members,
Speaker 1: how to speak to a director. Grad school gave me
Speaker 1: a plethora of tools to add to my arsenal, the toolbox,
Speaker 1: speaking of severance. A lot of what I learned in
Speaker 1: grad school I utilized in crafting this role, in crafting
Speaker 1: milk check. So I'm I'm sure you t is really
Speaker 1: glad to hear that. Well, I've talked about this before,
Speaker 1: so I'm not gonna I'm not gonna hammer the point,
Speaker 1: but I think that what you're talking about so many
Speaker 1: people don't get. And you're speaking specifically about the theater,
Speaker 1: but obviously it applies to film and television as well
Speaker 1: as that experience, that confidence, that knowing how to behave
Speaker 1: in certain situations. That just breeds confidence with the people
Speaker 1: other people that you're working for or working with, showing
Speaker 1: up on time, knowing how to behave, what your job
Speaker 1: is and what the specific processes you know, for a
Speaker 1: variety of directors. I think that experience. You can't say
Speaker 1: enough about about that. Oh yeah, it strengthens you like
Speaker 1: you're going, like you're leading with Everyone is not the
Speaker 1: same everyone, every process is different. You know, I've been
Speaker 1: on a few sets now and every director operates very differently.
Speaker 1: And being able to manage different energies and and and
Speaker 1: different egos if you will, and different projects within that
Speaker 1: is crucial. Yeah. I have an old friend. I'm not
Speaker 1: going to mention his name in case he would get embarrassed,
Speaker 1: but he called me. He had gotten a cameo in
Speaker 1: a movie, had a few scenes, and he said, do
Speaker 1: you have any tricks for memorizing lines? I mean, this
Speaker 1: is not an actor. And I said, well, first of all,
Speaker 1: you need to know this that you're going to know
Speaker 1: every single word and you're gonna show up and they're
Speaker 1: gonna tell you where to stand and how to move,
Speaker 1: and the camera is going to be there, and you're
Speaker 1: gonna have fourteen people staring at you behind that camera
Speaker 1: and you're not going to remember. So as well as
Speaker 1: you think you know the words, you don't, you don't.
Speaker 1: I gave him a couple of tricks. I don't even
Speaker 1: know if it worked out, but but yeah, that that
Speaker 1: is is so difficult. Um, you you graduate from Tennessee,
Speaker 1: where do you decide your home should be? Well, I
Speaker 1: haven't decided where my home should be at that time,
Speaker 1: but I do go to New York. Okay, okay, in
Speaker 1: New York because at that time I didn't know what
Speaker 1: I should do. You know, the program did not have
Speaker 1: a lot of connections in l A. You know, so
Speaker 1: our showcase was in New York, and the head of acting,
Speaker 1: Jed Diamond at the University of Tennessee, suggested that I
Speaker 1: go to New York. He's like, listen, go to New York.
Speaker 1: Give it five years. If you don't like it, you
Speaker 1: can leave. Five years is a hell of a long
Speaker 1: time to be in a place that you are nervous
Speaker 1: to be in. I was terrified about going to New York.
Speaker 1: I didn't want to have seventeen roommates in a shoe
Speaker 1: box apartment eating Ramen noodles every night. I was like,
Speaker 1: I just did not want to do that, because that
Speaker 1: was what I was told would happen as an actor
Speaker 1: if you go to New York. But when I went
Speaker 1: to showcase and I had a couple of days to
Speaker 1: just absorb the city and watch people navigate these spaces
Speaker 1: and realize that these people are at the same age
Speaker 1: as me or younger than me, and they're doing fine,
Speaker 1: I said, oh, well, I could do this. I can
Speaker 1: make this happen, like, let's go, you know, And it
Speaker 1: worked out. It was one of the best decisions I've
Speaker 1: ever made. Nice by the way, I couldn't do it.
Speaker 1: I found other places. I always would go to New
Speaker 1: York when I had a job, But yeah, that that
Speaker 1: image for me as well. I couldn't get over it.
Speaker 1: I couldn't get over it. So I'm I'm certainly glad
Speaker 1: you did. I mean, it's not for everybody. Um, you
Speaker 1: make your Broadway debut in twenty nineteen in the Great
Speaker 1: Society starring Well. I don't know if living legend is
Speaker 1: too much, but certainly an American and European gem. Brian
Speaker 1: Cox tell me about that experience of landing that role
Speaker 1: and working with him. I was for lower to be
Speaker 1: a part of this production. Was an absolute fan of his,
Speaker 1: especially with Succession. I was a little terrified because he
Speaker 1: holds he does not hold back in succession. But he's
Speaker 1: a he's a delight, he's a teddy bear. He's just
Speaker 1: the sweetest, genuine man that had the pleasure of working
Speaker 1: with and so brave Eve. I think this project. We
Speaker 1: put it up and maybe about three weeks Brian was
Speaker 1: committed to being off book. They were suggesting like maybe
Speaker 1: he should be on book for to play lb J
Speaker 1: but he said, no, I want to be completely off book.
Speaker 1: So he took the charge and he was an absolute
Speaker 1: inspiration for me. And uh, it was a wonderful, trying
Speaker 1: production in the in the context of the story that
Speaker 1: was being told. You know, it was a companion piece
Speaker 1: to All the Way, to Robert Shenkins All the Way,
Speaker 1: and that peace ends in triumph, whereas the Great Society
Speaker 1: ends in tragedy. And what we were watching on stage,
Speaker 1: or what the story we were telling on stage and
Speaker 1: mirrored what was happening in the world in so it
Speaker 1: was hard to take it and it was hard to
Speaker 1: live in as well. But the cast was one. They
Speaker 1: were wonderful. Well. I don't know if you are aware
Speaker 1: of this, this would have been when you were in school,
Speaker 1: But about being off book, I had the opportunity to
Speaker 1: do the American premiere of a Connor McPherson play called
Speaker 1: Rum and Vodka. I loved it. It was one of
Speaker 1: the best experiences in my life. He had the world premiere.
Speaker 1: I'm pretty sure it ended up starting in London and
Speaker 1: came here of another Connor McPherson one man show, which
Speaker 1: was genius if you don't know it, and even longer.
Speaker 1: I think it's full two hours. So doing a scripted
Speaker 1: play for two hours and you're the only one on stage,
Speaker 1: he learning lines must not be him, I guess. I
Speaker 1: guess that's the lesson. Don't don't get in a learning
Speaker 1: line contest with Brian Cox. I think you don't. You don't.
Speaker 1: You don't want that heat at all. So you're working
Speaker 1: at this point, you're doing other productions and you start
Speaker 1: doing some stuff in film and television. Now, how was
Speaker 1: that transition for you? You know, mostly, if not exclusively,
Speaker 1: a theater actor, theater trained actor, and transitioning and beginning
Speaker 1: to work in film and television. How how was that
Speaker 1: transition for you? And it was that something that you
Speaker 1: knew that you wanted to do or ye, talk to
Speaker 1: me a little bit about that. It took a different
Speaker 1: set of skills for film and television because I hadn't
Speaker 1: had a lot of experience with that. My experience was
Speaker 1: the theater. And although I remember watching a lot of television,
Speaker 1: probably too much television and film, uh, and reenacting the
Speaker 1: scenes that I would see there, did you do that?
Speaker 1: Oh god? Yes, Oh my god. Me and my best
Speaker 1: friend in Lago, Maryland, we would re enact scenes all
Speaker 1: the time. That's fascinating. I will just share this with you.
Speaker 1: Greg Daniels, who was the creator of the Office, he
Speaker 1: told me a story about as a writer doing sort
Speaker 1: of the same thing, except he would transcribe the words.
Speaker 1: He would write down the scripted words in television, sort
Speaker 1: of like what you're talking about, for you to begin
Speaker 1: to hear the rhythms and and acting these things down.
Speaker 1: He would do it so that he could see the
Speaker 1: structure and began to study the structure of how scenes
Speaker 1: were put together, how episodes were put together. So I
Speaker 1: find that very interesting. Sorry to interrupt you, but no, no, no, no,
Speaker 1: that's that's fantastic. That's that's amazing. I thought we were
Speaker 1: just being kids, but literally, you know, we're like But
Speaker 1: it was also specific scenes. I remember we would me
Speaker 1: and my friend we would re enact bad Boys. Remember
Speaker 1: that scene where Martin Layres is about to give run
Speaker 1: over and Will Smith comes in the middle of the
Speaker 1: street and picks them up and takes him off to
Speaker 1: the other side, and he said, don't ever say that
Speaker 1: I wasn't there for you. I We would re enact
Speaker 1: that scene constantly, and if anyone is listening, Please don't
Speaker 1: do what we did, because we would actually wait till
Speaker 1: the traffic came up the hill and then trying to
Speaker 1: do it. We do it with live cars. That's not what. No, God,
Speaker 1: don't do don't follow my example. Please follow no at least. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that was a game that I used to play, and
Speaker 1: it was one time I got hit by a car.
Speaker 1: But that's another story. But so don't do don't do
Speaker 1: what I did. Don't do that. Don't do that. What
Speaker 1: was the question I said? I got off topic. We so, yeah,
Speaker 1: it's okay. I took us off the rails. I'm sure
Speaker 1: you know you had so much experience at this point,
Speaker 1: mirroring quite frankly again my experience of theater, and then
Speaker 1: you begin to transition into film and television, and just
Speaker 1: talking about that transition, did you get an agent? Did
Speaker 1: you start working? How was that for you that time?
Speaker 1: So when I moved to New York in while we
Speaker 1: were doing a showcase, I got the attention of an
Speaker 1: agent who wants to with now Jenna Winette of both
Speaker 1: Winette Agency. Yeah, I love Jenna. I loved the team
Speaker 1: there and continue doing theater because I was my wheelhouse.
Speaker 1: But always wanted to dip my toe into television, and
Speaker 1: the only way to get into it, or the only
Speaker 1: way to get good at it, is you have to
Speaker 1: get into it. And then you know, it's kind of
Speaker 1: like this wheel around, you know. You know, they only
Speaker 1: want to hire you unless you got the credit. You know,
Speaker 1: to get credit, you gotta work that kind of thing.
Speaker 1: So but I was able to do a small part
Speaker 1: in Difficult People where I was the good Samaritan, uh
Speaker 1: and that was fun. And then did diet Land and
Speaker 1: Hunters and so with that. Because I didn't have the
Speaker 1: training in television and film, I used my future colleagues
Speaker 1: because I didn't know them at the time, as basically masterclasses.
Speaker 1: I would study people on screen. I would watch television
Speaker 1: film and just watch how they moved there eyes, how
Speaker 1: they speak, how they hold their heads, intonation, everything, and
Speaker 1: use that as my class when I couldn't afford to
Speaker 1: go to these three classes with some of these top
Speaker 1: casting directors and acting teachers, you know, and being one set,
Speaker 1: having the experience, and you know, I was able to
Speaker 1: get stronger and more confident and understand how to translate
Speaker 1: ideas and emotions on screen that may or may not
Speaker 1: work on stage. Because there are different mediums. Right, Your
Speaker 1: audience in theater maybe three hundred, whereas your audience on
Speaker 1: film maybe one, So you have to kind of translate.
Speaker 1: It's it's all learning. Was all learning from me. How
Speaker 1: did you find out about SAT France? Is this an
Speaker 1: audition that came in from your agent? Oh my gosh, Brian.
Speaker 1: So I was doing The Great Society two thousand nineteen, right,
Speaker 1: we had just got wind that we were going to close.
Speaker 1: We closed early, unfortunately, and I remember going in and
Speaker 1: auditioning for this piece, and I had no idea what
Speaker 1: this was. All I knew is that Ben Stiller was directing,
Speaker 1: and I said, okay, sure, why not, let's give it
Speaker 1: a shot. I went in an audition for it. Fine.
Speaker 1: Didn't really hear back. Probably about two weeks later. I
Speaker 1: think it was right before the holidays. I hear that
Speaker 1: they that I've been selected for a callback to meet
Speaker 1: with Ben Stiller and Dan Rickson, the writer and creative.
Speaker 1: So January comes around, I'm getting ready to go to
Speaker 1: my callback audition, and I am running like hell to
Speaker 1: get there on time. I get on the bus, the
Speaker 1: buses running late. The Google Maps tells me that I
Speaker 1: should wait for another bus, but I don't have time
Speaker 1: to wait for another bus, so I'm running down through
Speaker 1: this industrial neighborhood of the Bronx. There's people driving with
Speaker 1: old refrigerators on carts, passing me, looking at me like
Speaker 1: I'm crazy because I have this fool suit on and
Speaker 1: I'm sweating, you know. I turned the corner and there's
Speaker 1: these group of guys. One guy looks at me and say, hey,
Speaker 1: you want to see me kick this dude's ass. And
Speaker 1: I was like, okay, maybe later when I come back,
Speaker 1: and they laughed. And then I'm across the bridge, running
Speaker 1: across this bridge like trying to get there. I get
Speaker 1: to the lot. The audition happens to be on the
Speaker 1: other side of the lot, which is an acre long,
Speaker 1: so I'm running down down to the other side of
Speaker 1: the studio and I finally get there, and it turns
Speaker 1: out they were running late, so no one knew that
Speaker 1: I was late, so it was fine. And I remember
Speaker 1: doing the audition and making Ben laugh and I said
Speaker 1: that has to be a good sign I made that
Speaker 1: this is huge. And he told me that they have
Speaker 1: to do auditions in l a Um so they'll see
Speaker 1: what happens. And then I don't hear anything for a while,
Speaker 1: I hear nothing, and eventually Rachel Tennor calls my manager
Speaker 1: Tigren and says, oh, you know, Tremille got the role right,
Speaker 1: Like wait, like just like going off, just like yeah,
Speaker 1: you know you got it. You know he booked it right. Yeah,
Speaker 1: he's great. You know he's great. He's great. Yeah, he
Speaker 1: got it. And the deer calls me and I'm like
Speaker 1: jumping up and down or running around at the apartment.
Speaker 1: And then the rest, as I say, is history. Yeah
Speaker 1: that's so. By the way, Rachel Tennor shout out to
Speaker 1: Rachel Tennor, who's one of the best. Yes, fantastic. So
Speaker 1: how much of Severance before you started filming? How many
Speaker 1: episodes were you able to see? Was it U is
Speaker 1: the first one? Like normal? Or or did you know
Speaker 1: the journey? I guess that's a better question. How much
Speaker 1: of his journey did you know before you started filming? Well,
Speaker 1: so this is what's really interesting, because we started right
Speaker 1: before the pandemic was right, So it was like and
Speaker 1: I remember after a fitting getting the note that we
Speaker 1: were shutting down for two weeks, and in the back
Speaker 1: of my mind, I said, this is no way it's
Speaker 1: gonna be two weeks. There's no way it's gonna be
Speaker 1: two weeks. Then six months later we picked back up.
Speaker 1: I start in October. So by that time I got
Speaker 1: the script and I started to understand the premise of
Speaker 1: the show, what was happening, and you know, so forth
Speaker 1: and so on. What was interesting for me, it was
Speaker 1: really key, was really trying to figure out who the
Speaker 1: hell is milk Check in the midst of all of this,
Speaker 1: you know, and how does he feel into this world,
Speaker 1: and what is he gaining from this? And you know,
Speaker 1: what is his motivations behind it? So that was my
Speaker 1: homework to kind of really build a character that makes
Speaker 1: sense in this world, right, you know, in the world
Speaker 1: that doesn't make sense? Right? Yes, though it makes so
Speaker 1: much sense to me. But yeah, so all right, So
Speaker 1: let me ask you this specifically, how much did Dan
Speaker 1: or and or Ben share with you about where your
Speaker 1: character was going or did you just more talk about
Speaker 1: just that first episode At that time, there was definitely
Speaker 1: a conversation between Ben, Dan and I. They did not
Speaker 1: fill me in about where he's going. It was more
Speaker 1: it felt more like improv So what was helpful for
Speaker 1: me was understanding where he came from. That was a
Speaker 1: process in a discussion between myself and and then like
Speaker 1: I had my own backstory, and then they had a backstory,
Speaker 1: and then we kind of, you know, conferred about that,
Speaker 1: and then we went from there, which was really fun
Speaker 1: and how interesting our backstories were very similar, and reading
Speaker 1: it was just you really just kind of you played
Speaker 1: what was on the page. Now. This was also an
Speaker 1: exercise where the character mill Check knew more than Trammel. Yes, right,
Speaker 1: that's right. Tramail has no idea what the doats are
Speaker 1: about where Miss Casey is going. I have no idea,
Speaker 1: but mil Check you know what I mean? You know,
Speaker 1: so it's like all of these things that you know,
Speaker 1: you really have to just dive in and make a
Speaker 1: choice as to what does mil Check no and what
Speaker 1: does he not know? Which makes it fun. It's so fun.
Speaker 1: And I think you said something that is what I
Speaker 1: was really thinking about the second time watching it through,
Speaker 1: which is is your brilliance in the show is you
Speaker 1: are always in the moment and whatever your specific job is,
Speaker 1: you are fully committed to that in the moment. And
Speaker 1: that's what's so disarming about it because nobody is that way, like, right,
Speaker 1: in real life you're always no. But I'm serious, like
Speaker 1: you're always guarded or putting on a facade, or and
Speaker 1: not that mill chick may not be putting on a facade.
Speaker 1: I wrote this down. There is an efficiency to you.
Speaker 1: There is empathy you there you are empathetic and caring
Speaker 1: at times, and you're also a psychopath, like all three
Speaker 1: things simultaneously. At least within most episodes, you can do
Speaker 1: those things. And I was thinking, it's like, I'll be honest,
Speaker 1: I couldn't think of the third part, but it isn't
Speaker 1: a weird way. And I started thinking, like, is this
Speaker 1: why I'm responding so strongly to him? You are in
Speaker 1: a way part Dwight Shrewt Like there is a there
Speaker 1: is a commitment to the job, maybe better than like
Speaker 1: a job efficient Dwight Shrewd slash prison guard. Because I'm
Speaker 1: fascinated by, I'm sorry, just the mind fuck of the
Speaker 1: situation where you are dealing with people who have the
Speaker 1: same intelligence, the same general knowledge that they should have,
Speaker 1: but they have no history except the history with you,
Speaker 1: and you're like all of their mommies and Daddy's rolled
Speaker 1: into one in a way, right, I mean, you know
Speaker 1: you are introducing them and guiding them through this new world.
Speaker 1: It's fascinating the way that everyone responds to you throughout
Speaker 1: the journey of the show and how you interact with them.
Speaker 1: And I think that what you said is so key
Speaker 1: is that you are in the moment, always in the moment,
Speaker 1: and performing the job that you have. Absolutely, were you
Speaker 1: ever surprised about his journey? As you continued, were you
Speaker 1: ever like, wait, that's what it was later on? Um,
Speaker 1: I'm trying to remember what it was like when I
Speaker 1: first got the script versus like the first episode. I
Speaker 1: was absolutely intrigued. And as an actor, you know, we
Speaker 1: do our part to fill in the blax right, because
Speaker 1: we want to create these full dimensional beings, right, because
Speaker 1: that's what makes it fun to play and also fun
Speaker 1: to watch. But as these ideas that I had, or
Speaker 1: these thoughts or ways about mill check, they all kind
Speaker 1: of faded away as I stepped through as I continue
Speaker 1: to go through the season. You know, the music dance experience. Yeah,
Speaker 1: we're going to talk about the music dance experience at
Speaker 1: a second. Don't don't jump that, No, you're not up.
Speaker 1: But there's references to the break room Adam Scott's character
Speaker 1: is sent to the break room, takes over for Helly,
Speaker 1: you know at one moment, and so you see this room,
Speaker 1: but you don't know what happens in there. So until
Speaker 1: you got the script for what happens in the break room,
Speaker 1: you didn't know because the breakroom scene didn't materialize until
Speaker 1: episode was an episode three into four. I believe that's right,
Speaker 1: that's that's exactly, that's exactly what. So if you're reading
Speaker 1: episode one and two, I believe there has made mention
Speaker 1: of the break room, there is or made mention of
Speaker 1: Mr Millichick is not as nice he can you know,
Speaker 1: he's yes, nice all the time. Yes, that's right. So
Speaker 1: I was like, there's those clues that pop up, but oh,
Speaker 1: we don't know how real it is. And so the
Speaker 1: day I'm opened and then you see it, you know,
Speaker 1: you know, it's occurring to me like I'm sounding like
Speaker 1: a rube who's never worked in television before, thinking that
Speaker 1: you had all the scripts before you started. I am
Speaker 1: well aware that that's not normally how it works. The
Speaker 1: world here, though, is so fascinating and confusing. It makes
Speaker 1: me even more impressed with your performance that you were
Speaker 1: not aware of everything at least that was going to
Speaker 1: come in the future. I say empathy, which some people
Speaker 1: could argue with if they've seen the show, because I
Speaker 1: feel like, you know, unlike Cobel, played by the genius
Speaker 1: Patricia Arquette, who is in my favorite underrated I always
Speaker 1: call it my favorite underrated movie of all time true romance,
Speaker 1: Cobell is not nice. There is not anything nice or
Speaker 1: sympathetic about her, including um, without giving any spoilers away,
Speaker 1: how she behaves in the audie world as we call it.
Speaker 1: But I find I find a humanity within you at
Speaker 1: times that is that's heartbreaking for me, and I think
Speaker 1: makes it even more terrifying. I want to ask you this,
Speaker 1: how many employees do you think are severed at luman
Speaker 1: Oh my gosh, you're gonna get me in trouble. No, like,
Speaker 1: how many do you think there are? It's so hard
Speaker 1: for me to answer that question because this world is
Speaker 1: so unexpected. And wait a minute, so you know, but
Speaker 1: you can't tell. Is that what you're saying. I can't
Speaker 1: even answer that likes it's like, you know, it's like,
Speaker 1: it's it's so bizarre, I will say, I will say,
Speaker 1: and this is what I've actually loved about reading, listening,
Speaker 1: and experiencing people's theories at this show. Usually whatever we
Speaker 1: think is happening is not happening. Yeah, that's a bullshit
Speaker 1: answer that. Listen, that's a bull don't You can't bullshit
Speaker 1: answer me. I'm not a reporter. I'm not a reporter
Speaker 1: that you can give a bullshit answer to Listen. If
Speaker 1: anyone understands I can't answer that question, I'll accept that.
Speaker 1: Let me let me, let me, let me ask this
Speaker 1: in another way. And I'm trying to think about things
Speaker 1: that Cobell said, like do you think that this is
Speaker 1: your group because you're around a lot, But again, who knows?
Speaker 1: You're right? Maybe you've got seventy people you're dealing with.
Speaker 1: You're sure, you sure spend a lot of time with
Speaker 1: macro data refinement. Well you also got to remember you
Speaker 1: also got to remember this O and D. No, of course, no, no, no,
Speaker 1: of course, I know there's not just four. I apologize, yes,
Speaker 1: of course, but it doesn't seem like you are with
Speaker 1: them in the same way. So maybe you are. I
Speaker 1: don't know. I mean, it's it can be misleading because
Speaker 1: we only focus on m DR. You know what I mean, right,
Speaker 1: And there there's a lot of time they're working that
Speaker 1: we don't see. By the way, I was involved for
Speaker 1: ten years in the television show where we saw us
Speaker 1: do work exactly zero percent of the time. So I
Speaker 1: get I get that, Like when was paper actually sold?
Speaker 1: I'm not sure we only see the moments in severance
Speaker 1: where they're not actually taking the numbers. All right, I'll
Speaker 1: bail on that. M d E. The music dance experience, Uh,
Speaker 1: the most talked about seeing look at you right now,
Speaker 1: he's dancing right in front of me in a similarly
Speaker 1: creepy way than he danced. Is that your go to?
Speaker 1: Are those your go to moves? Or where they improvised?
Speaker 1: In the moment, it was totally improvised, So that means
Speaker 1: that was your Those are your go to moves, Those
Speaker 1: are mill checks go to moves. You know that's not
Speaker 1: That's not you know what I'm saying. I'm more of
Speaker 1: a hip guy. Yes, this was more of a this
Speaker 1: was more of a shoulder chicken. I was thinking, it's
Speaker 1: a little chicken e. But someone you have, you have
Speaker 1: seen him behave in such a horrifying and that is
Speaker 1: what is unsettling about your performance. And in some regards
Speaker 1: to show. You have seen him behave in such an
Speaker 1: unsettling way towards these people, and yet in this moment,
Speaker 1: everyone has five minutes to just dance and have fun.
Speaker 1: A little frivolity goes a long way. I want to
Speaker 1: ask you about the turtleneck that suddenly appears. Is that
Speaker 1: is that mil Chick's relaxed look? You know, I think
Speaker 1: the music dance experience brings a different flavor, so he
Speaker 1: wants to, you know, dress it down a little bit.
Speaker 1: Like you also got to remember, like, dude, yes, mill
Speaker 1: Chick has been doing some very questionable things and in
Speaker 1: a moral things, but he's under a lot of pressure too.
Speaker 1: You know, things went south once Helly came along and
Speaker 1: Pete disappeared, and he's had to kind of he's had
Speaker 1: to basically fix it. He had to be the fixer.
Speaker 1: And every every episode things just get worse and worse
Speaker 1: and worse and worse. So this music dance experience is
Speaker 1: just as much for him as it is for them.
Speaker 1: So I think it's like I need to let my
Speaker 1: hair down a little bit, I need to let loose.
Speaker 1: I'm gonna take my tie off and I'm gonna put
Speaker 1: on this turtleneck because I like this turtleneck. I look
Speaker 1: good in this turtleneck. It helps me move, it helps
Speaker 1: you move, obviously, and he let's go, yeah, it's a
Speaker 1: it's a stretchable fabric. But I have this, uh, this
Speaker 1: water cup. It's basically a classic clear plastic. It is
Speaker 1: the most utilitarian water glass in the world. It's just
Speaker 1: that there. It is. It's clear, there's nothing about it.
Speaker 1: And yet if you push the bottom of the water
Speaker 1: glass there are flashing lights show up and make the
Speaker 1: water turn like red and green and purple. This was
Speaker 1: given to one of my children. I don't know why
Speaker 1: we have this water glass, but I was thinking about
Speaker 1: the music dance experience, and in some ways, Lumen in
Speaker 1: that way, it's everything is so clean, lines utilitarian, and
Speaker 1: ben still are by the way, like he emphasizes this
Speaker 1: in his direction, so well, everything is that old, like
Speaker 1: big chunky sixties seventies. I don't even know everything plugs in.
Speaker 1: It's all so utilitarian. And then it's like Lumens, like,
Speaker 1: you know, we want everything like this because nobody has
Speaker 1: a history. We are just living here in the moment.
Speaker 1: But just every once in a while, let's turn on
Speaker 1: the light on the bottom of the water glass and
Speaker 1: let it get a little funky. For no reason. I
Speaker 1: love that idea. I just I love it talking about
Speaker 1: being severed. The show is political. It is fascinating to me.
Speaker 1: We talk all the time about work life separation or
Speaker 1: integration or the balance between work and your home life.
Speaker 1: Talk to me a little bit about your thinking about
Speaker 1: Severed and the ramifications of that, or the positives of that,
Speaker 1: or why you think that Dan chose that. You know,
Speaker 1: I get the question a lot of whether or not
Speaker 1: I would go through the severed procedure, and I enthusiastically
Speaker 1: say no, no, of course it's not for me, But
Speaker 1: there is there's an understanding behind it, like I get it.
Speaker 1: Does that empathy we use that word before, where people
Speaker 1: we're going through so much pain or turmoil, frustration, or
Speaker 1: where we need a little relief and we don't want
Speaker 1: to take that turmoil into work, as we see with Mark,
Speaker 1: you know, he's grieving. So with that, I can understand
Speaker 1: why people need to just that we need to just
Speaker 1: put it away. Myself as an actor and how I
Speaker 1: pull so much of my own history, my own personal
Speaker 1: experiences into my work, I wouldn't be able to do
Speaker 1: that if I was severed and informs so much of
Speaker 1: what we do. I don't know of any actor who
Speaker 1: would be able to do that, you know, a effectively. Now,
Speaker 1: if I was an accountant, you know, maybe you know,
Speaker 1: it's you know, all different story that that will hope,
Speaker 1: that that richness, you know, all of that, you know,
Speaker 1: the good, the bad, the ugly, the in between, the uncertainty,
Speaker 1: all of that. It feeds so much of who we are,
Speaker 1: and it influences our decisions. I wouldn't want to take
Speaker 1: that away, but I if there were family members and
Speaker 1: friends who wanted to do that, you know, of course
Speaker 1: I would be supportive of their decisions, but it's not
Speaker 1: for me. Yeah, there's something that you just said that
Speaker 1: triggered this thought, and I'm at least going to share
Speaker 1: it with you. I don't know that it fully applies,
Speaker 1: but you know, in life, kind of what I talked
Speaker 1: about before, there's always a facade, or not always. There's
Speaker 1: often a facade, or you behave differently around different groups
Speaker 1: of people. When you're interacting with someone, your objectives may
Speaker 1: be quite different from that person's objectives, even though you're
Speaker 1: both pretending at the same time. That you both want
Speaker 1: the same things, Like right, this is a part of life,
Speaker 1: this negotiating moments. And I don't know if it fully relates,
Speaker 1: but I just had a conversation with Jenna Elfman. She
Speaker 1: talked about she loves the moment on set when someone
Speaker 1: calls action because it's it's only in that moment. It's
Speaker 1: the only time she feels like in life where you
Speaker 1: have a hundred hundreds of people who are all everyone
Speaker 1: agrees on what the objective is until someone says cut.
Speaker 1: Everyone is working toward getting the shot, about playing your
Speaker 1: specific role. You know what you're playing. The wardrobe people
Speaker 1: knows the look, the makeup people knows whether there's sweat
Speaker 1: on the brow or not. Like the lighting, everyone is
Speaker 1: looking for the greatest angle. And it's all of these
Speaker 1: people working together with no outside objectives happening in that moment,
Speaker 1: and it's one of the only times in life that
Speaker 1: everybody is sort of on the same page. And she
Speaker 1: loves that. And I told her I would never forget it.
Speaker 1: And I'm thinking about it somehow now, thinking about the
Speaker 1: severed world and and separating those two things, and it
Speaker 1: seems to me that that's what you know, the Egans
Speaker 1: and Lumen are are sort of going for anyway, Let's
Speaker 1: try to create an environment where there is no other
Speaker 1: history outside of it, so that for these eight hours,
Speaker 1: everyone is working to do just one thing because they
Speaker 1: don't know of anything else, right, which is such a
Speaker 1: sick way to achieve that goal. But it seems to
Speaker 1: me that there's something in it there, right, like, let's
Speaker 1: eliminate all history, all opinion, all politics, all religion, all everything,
Speaker 1: and just put these people there and have them do
Speaker 1: a job. That's a very idealistic way of looking at
Speaker 1: it that I think that would be true if there
Speaker 1: wasn't the Egan philosophies. You know, there's so many of
Speaker 1: these images and these sayings. And of course that's that's
Speaker 1: where the threat of the book from Mark's brother in law. Yes,
Speaker 1: that's the threat of when Ricken's book shows up, because
Speaker 1: now these are new ideas and these are new concepts,
Speaker 1: and we can't have outside philosophies. There's that idealistic idea,
Speaker 1: But with the whole I guess mind bending, mind control,
Speaker 1: it kind of has a different edge to it. Yeah,
Speaker 1: for sure. And part of the missive email that I
Speaker 1: wrote from thirty five thousand feet after finishing your show,
Speaker 1: I I really said, this is the new The Office
Speaker 1: in a way. I mean obvious, Lee, It's totally different.
Speaker 1: The tone is totally different, the style is totally different.
Speaker 1: It's not it's very funny to me, but it's not
Speaker 1: a comedy at all, but in a weird way. The
Speaker 1: central character of Michael Scott on The Office, his entire
Speaker 1: journey was about finding work life balance, like that is
Speaker 1: what it was for him, and that the Office existed
Speaker 1: as his personal life. He had nothing else outside of it.
Speaker 1: There's echoes, there's similar things sort of happening as our
Speaker 1: favorite employees at at Lumen and Macro Data Refinement began
Speaker 1: to search for for other things. I find that interesting.
Speaker 1: Obviously I'm not the only one who is enjoying severance.
Speaker 1: It's gotten a lot of critical acclaim. How has that
Speaker 1: impacted you? I've been blown away how people have embraced
Speaker 1: this show. You've been in television, you know, there's no
Speaker 1: specific formula. We never know if a show is gonna
Speaker 1: work or if it's going to be successful. I knew
Speaker 1: that I wanted to be a part of it because
Speaker 1: it was different. It's a new idea. There's so many
Speaker 1: elements to it. There's comedy, there's there's a romance, there's thriller,
Speaker 1: there's psychological elements to it. It's it's fantastic, but to
Speaker 1: see how many people have flocked to it and have
Speaker 1: found themselves implicated and it is really rewarding. And also
Speaker 1: like the top pieces that have surfaced. You know, New
Speaker 1: York Times wrote an article about it, The l A Times,
Speaker 1: you know, all of these local newspapers have talked about
Speaker 1: blogs have gone about severance and what it has meant
Speaker 1: to them, and it's a part of a national conversation
Speaker 1: and even international as well. I didn't realize how it
Speaker 1: impacted me individually until I was in l A at
Speaker 1: a f y C event and I remember getting out
Speaker 1: of the car. We had Harmony Gold, and I remember
Speaker 1: getting out of the car, by the way, that's for
Speaker 1: your consideration, that's a for your consideration, and I'm I'm
Speaker 1: letting everyone knows, yes, we're talking MS here now, which
Speaker 1: I've promised to get trammel one by the way. So
Speaker 1: so I remember getting out of the car and seeing
Speaker 1: a group of people behind the gate standing with what
Speaker 1: looked like to me signs. So immediately in my mind.
Speaker 1: I'm thinking this is a protest. They're protesting. Oh gosh,
Speaker 1: what's go I was. I was like, okay, alright, it's
Speaker 1: a revolution, let's go, let's raise our I walk. I
Speaker 1: walk into the venue in this like grassy area that
Speaker 1: has a bar and all these tables, and the people
Speaker 1: are standing outside the gate and they're screaming our names.
Speaker 1: They're screaming our names. And immediately I go into shock
Speaker 1: because I'm thinking, what is going on? What's happening? What
Speaker 1: you know? They're calling my name? And I was like,
Speaker 1: do I owe somebody money? Like somebody coming get me?
Speaker 1: Like what is having it like? And my manager calls
Speaker 1: me and he says, hey, can you come get me.
Speaker 1: I'm on the other side of the gate. So I
Speaker 1: go get him and I look in his eyes and
Speaker 1: he's like, Tromel, are you okay? You like you look
Speaker 1: like your friends with And I was like, you know,
Speaker 1: come on in. So I talked to him. I was like,
Speaker 1: this is intense. They started screaming my name and I'm
Speaker 1: like I don't know what to do. And it's like
Speaker 1: and he says, Tramel, they're fans. They're fans of you,
Speaker 1: and they're of the show that they love your autographed
Speaker 1: and I'm like, wait what and so totally over my head,
Speaker 1: I'm like thinking, this is the upheaval and you know,
Speaker 1: social unrest. So I eventually calmed down and I go
Speaker 1: over and I signed and and take pictures behind the gate.
Speaker 1: And it was wonderful. There was sweet everyone was great,
Speaker 1: and it had nothing to do with them. It was
Speaker 1: just me, you know, responding to it. But you know,
Speaker 1: here I was in this space of enjoying the animmity
Speaker 1: and now you're walking around in the streets of l
Speaker 1: A and people recognize you if they recognize you, because
Speaker 1: I'm a little fortunate here because I can. I have
Speaker 1: a mask one so you can't see if I have
Speaker 1: my mustache, and my hair is different and my energy
Speaker 1: as milk Check is different than Tramil, so I can
Speaker 1: kind of blend in a little bit. Yeah, yeah, good luck,
Speaker 1: good luck with that. Although I guess you're a little
Speaker 1: better than I am. Here's my one piece of advice
Speaker 1: for you, because you're going to get this a lot. Yes,
Speaker 1: you can thank me later when someone comes up to
Speaker 1: you and says, are you milk Check? Do me a favor.
Speaker 1: I'm starting a revolution just answer sometimes that's all you
Speaker 1: need to say is sometimes because it's the most awkward
Speaker 1: question in the world, because I all, I struggle with
Speaker 1: this still to this day. It's like, well, yes, I
Speaker 1: am hello. They're like, it's so like weird saying no.
Speaker 1: It's accurate, but still the rude. So I say, I
Speaker 1: say sometimes you talked earlier about studying your future colleagues
Speaker 1: to try to hone your craft in film and television.
Speaker 1: I mean, you're working alongside well, some of my heroes
Speaker 1: in the business as well, Christopher Walkin, Patricia Arquette, John Tuturo,
Speaker 1: just to name three out of a whole slew. How
Speaker 1: has that been for you working with those people that
Speaker 1: you used to watch every day to get better. It's humbling.
Speaker 1: There are moments where I am completely awestruck that this
Speaker 1: is happening, you know. And what's so beautiful is that
Speaker 1: each of those persons that you named and everyone else
Speaker 1: the part of this cast has been an absolute delight
Speaker 1: And they don't have to be you know, there's just kind, genuine, warm,
Speaker 1: loving people and I am so grateful to not just
Speaker 1: be a part of this show, but to also just
Speaker 1: share space with these beings. Just sit, stand back and
Speaker 1: sit and watch them play. Some of my favorite scenes
Speaker 1: on set is when I say nothing and I'm watching
Speaker 1: them work. It's fantastic. One that's awesome, and too, that's
Speaker 1: so great to hear. I know you do a lot
Speaker 1: of advocacy work. Talk to me a little bit about
Speaker 1: what the arts has done for you and why it's
Speaker 1: so important for you and the work that you do.
Speaker 1: The arts saved my life. Man. It gave me a
Speaker 1: voice when I felt I didn't have a voice. It
Speaker 1: gave me a sense of empathy and compassion for other
Speaker 1: people's situations. It taught me to listen. The arts taught
Speaker 1: me to listen to people, how to listen. I dealt with,
Speaker 1: and I still deal with, depression and anxiety and PTSD,
Speaker 1: and the arts gives me a footing, a grounding, a
Speaker 1: way to connect with people in a way that I
Speaker 1: don't think I would have had. I remember when I
Speaker 1: was doing a Christmas Carol at the Clarence Brown Theater.
Speaker 1: It was the same time as the Sandy Hook shooting.
Speaker 1: I was playing Bob Pratchett and I will never forget
Speaker 1: the scene of Christmas Yet to Come where Tiny Tim
Speaker 1: dies And before that show I remember looking at CNN
Speaker 1: and watching this massacre and watching these children being carted away,
Speaker 1: and the absolute anguish of the faces of the teachers
Speaker 1: and the parents, and I wept in my dressing room
Speaker 1: for twenty minutes before I did that show, and when
Speaker 1: we did Christmas Yet to Come, when that scene came up,
Speaker 1: I kept thinking about those stretchers and those bodies, and
Speaker 1: those families that would never get to hug their children again.
Speaker 1: And I walked on stage and immediately I was filled
Speaker 1: with grief and a pain that I wasn't really too
Speaker 1: familiar with. And in that audience, it was as if
Speaker 1: we had never experienced this moment in Christmas Carol before.
Speaker 1: I mean Christmas Care as a show that people come
Speaker 1: with their families and they watch it all the time
Speaker 1: and they know what's coming. But it was in this
Speaker 1: moment where I felt that we all breathed together as
Speaker 1: a community and mourned the loss of those children and
Speaker 1: those teachers, right there on that stage, and no one
Speaker 1: said a word, no one had to authenticate the moment.
Speaker 1: It was just right there. And I remember at the
Speaker 1: corner of my eye the gentleman playing Scrooge, David Cordmaier
Speaker 1: was weeping in a way I've never seen David Cortermyer
Speaker 1: week And at the end he came up to me
Speaker 1: and he said, Christmas yet to come, and I nodded
Speaker 1: and he nodded, and we never said anything else about
Speaker 1: it from there, And it was that moment that I
Speaker 1: realized the transformative power of theater of storytelling, of how
Speaker 1: it connects all of us and unites people of many
Speaker 1: different generations. Social economic status is racial identities, sexual identities, orientations,
Speaker 1: It connects us. And my hope is that with my
Speaker 1: continuation in the arts, that we will establish a platform
Speaker 1: for people to have conversations much like Severance incorporations, and
Speaker 1: conversations about well being and mental health and gun control
Speaker 1: and abortion and LGBT rights and educational equity, all of that.
Speaker 1: That's why I do what I do, and I love it,
Speaker 1: and I believe in the power of what it can do.
Speaker 1: That's awesome well for what it's worth me too, So
Speaker 1: thank you for that and that story. I wish you
Speaker 1: nothing but the best in your future in your continuing
Speaker 1: role on Severance. Your performance is genius. You are a chameleon,
Speaker 1: but a delightful chameleon that it makes it impossible for
Speaker 1: me at least to keep my eyes off you. So
Speaker 1: I wish you all of the best in your upcoming
Speaker 1: f y see events. It's it's my new favorite show
Speaker 1: on television and you are a huge part of that.
Speaker 1: So thank you so much, thank you for joining me,
Speaker 1: and good luck to you and uh, I can't wait.
Speaker 1: I can't wait for new episodes. Yeah, me too, looking
Speaker 1: forward to it. Thank you so much, Brian, Thanks T Dramel.
Speaker 1: It was such a pleasure talking to you today, meeting
Speaker 1: you and of course hearing about severance. Trust me when
Speaker 1: I say that I will be rewatching this show until
Speaker 1: season two comes out. I can't get enough, and I
Speaker 1: swear I noticed something new every single time. Listeners, I
Speaker 1: cannot recommend seven rints to you more, so make sure
Speaker 1: to check it out if you haven't already. And as always,
Speaker 1: thank you for joining me today on Off the Beat.
Speaker 1: I will see you soon for another conversation, same time,
Speaker 1: same place, next week. Can't wait. Off the Beat is
Speaker 1: hosted an executive produced by me Brian Baumgartner, alongside our
Speaker 1: executive producer Langley. Our producers are Diego Tapia, Liz Hayes,
Speaker 1: Emily Carr and Hannah Harris. Our talent producer is Ryan
Speaker 1: Papa Zachary. Our theme song Bubble and Squeak performed by
Speaker 1: my great friend Creed Bratton, and the episode was mixed
Speaker 1: by seth Olandski