Speaker 1: Hi, my name is Robert John Burke and I played
Speaker 1: Bart Bass on Gossip Girl. Welcome back, listeners to your
Speaker 1: one and only source into all things gossip Grow you
Speaker 1: know you love it. XO x O. Hello, Hello, and
Speaker 1: welcome back to XO XO. With me Jessica's or today
Speaker 1: we have quite the treat. The famous Bart Bass, also
Speaker 1: known as Robert John Burke, is on the podcast. Now.
Speaker 1: We all know Bart was not the best dad, proving
Speaker 1: many times that you can't just buy a father of
Speaker 1: the Year award. But Robert could not be further from
Speaker 1: his character. I am telling you he's kind, humble, and
Speaker 1: self described more of a rufus. This was such a
Speaker 1: fun conversation. Robert and I talked about playing a character
Speaker 1: so different from himself, working with Kelly Rutherford and Ed Westwick,
Speaker 1: funny fan interactions, and of course what it was like
Speaker 1: to die, come back to life and die again. Supposedly
Speaker 1: you never really know with Bart. Here's Robert, now, can
Speaker 1: you hear me? I can hear you, I can hear you.
Speaker 1: I'm just really bad with technology. I just don't get it.
Speaker 1: I would wear it as a badge of honor, just
Speaker 1: I mean, it's just nuts. And it's so funny because
Speaker 1: now in this day and age, you feel like everything's
Speaker 1: at a click of a button and it should be easy,
Speaker 1: but there's always like fifteen buttons to that one to
Speaker 1: make it work, and I'm like, it's too much for me.
Speaker 1: So I was just on the phone with my twenty
Speaker 1: year old sons, one of whom took my Mac to
Speaker 1: the city today, and I'm like, dude, how do I
Speaker 1: do so unless I have those guys around, like my
Speaker 1: little tech men? Yeah. No, technology is certainly not making
Speaker 1: our lives easier. It's just promoting more stress. But that's okay.
Speaker 1: We're here. I can hear you, Yes, I can hear you.
Speaker 1: I'm excited to hear that very specific and beautiful voice
Speaker 1: of yours. Yeah, it's been so long. I mean lately,
Speaker 1: I've been seeing your face so much because I'm doing
Speaker 1: these rewatches, which have been quite interesting and fun and
Speaker 1: very wild to me because I just didn't I knew
Speaker 1: what we were doing, but I also really didn't. I'm
Speaker 1: on that same line. Yes, yeah, So wait, how old
Speaker 1: are your kids now? Because that age twenty is like
Speaker 1: very much what people still are very like dialed into
Speaker 1: the to the show. Yeah, there's a whole new generation
Speaker 1: I think dialed in. My oldest is twenty eight and
Speaker 1: my youngest is twenty two. Amazing. That's fun. Yeah, when
Speaker 1: my when my oldest was in high school, the show
Speaker 1: was on and that brought him. You know. He's like,
Speaker 1: he said to me one day, He's like, do you
Speaker 1: really have to be on that show? And I was like,
Speaker 1: what's the problem And he's like, I don't know. I
Speaker 1: just you know, I said, Oh, are you getting scrutiny
Speaker 1: or you getting He's like yeah, And I was like, dude,
Speaker 1: if my father was on television, I wouldn't have a
Speaker 1: problem with that, But apparently he's a very like low
Speaker 1: key guy, and uh he did not, Like, you know,
Speaker 1: you don't want anybody, I don't know if you're looking
Speaker 1: into your life in a certain way, especially when it's
Speaker 1: maybe a parent. But also like, this show wasn't just
Speaker 1: like a show where your dad's on TV. You were
Speaker 1: playing Chuck Bass's dad, Bart Bass, that's very flashy, very
Speaker 1: well known, and everyone was very obsessed with that family.
Speaker 1: So it was a very like big moment for you know, Yeah,
Speaker 1: it was. And so you know, I've uh subsequently found
Speaker 1: that you know, it's like there's a new generation of
Speaker 1: people turning onto the show, and certainly with the pandemic,
Speaker 1: people were watching and binging and so yeah, renewed interest
Speaker 1: and uh and I think it holds up actually the truth.
Speaker 1: So yeah, we keep finding that and each like each
Speaker 1: of these rewatches and going back and watching, we're like, Wow,
Speaker 1: there's just certain things where it was ahead of its
Speaker 1: time or a lot of storylines that people can relate
Speaker 1: to even outside of it being in this like flashy
Speaker 1: gossip Girl Upper east Side world. But I'm gonna introduce
Speaker 1: you quick, even though everyone on that the listening definitely
Speaker 1: knows your voice and your name and who you who
Speaker 1: you are, but just and because I'm just so excited
Speaker 1: that you're here. We have Robert John Burke, who played
Speaker 1: the amazing Bart Bass, this super rich, sometimes a villain,
Speaker 1: but always complex Bart Bass on Gossip Girl. You've been
Speaker 1: in television and film for over forty years, starring in
Speaker 1: classic shows and movies and just been around in a
Speaker 1: familiar face to so many people, and so many people
Speaker 1: are such a big fans of your work on from
Speaker 1: from a show like Gossip Girl or Tombstone to Good
Speaker 1: Night and good luck shows like Rescue Me. So what
Speaker 1: was your to acting? Why did you want to pursue
Speaker 1: It's just kind of a weird uh stumbling into it. Um,
Speaker 1: I wasn't much of a student in high school. I
Speaker 1: wasn't really passionate about anything, you know. I wasn't a
Speaker 1: good student history and English, yes, math and science is bad.
Speaker 1: And then we there was this experimental improvisation class in
Speaker 1: my high school. Um d Falco was like two years
Speaker 1: younger than me, and she was in the class with me,
Speaker 1: and so I kind of liked that. I kind of
Speaker 1: responded to that. And then I I auditioned for scholarships
Speaker 1: at different places and and I just oh, rather than
Speaker 1: go to my senior year of high school, I travel
Speaker 1: the country with this larked regional theater. And they couldn't
Speaker 1: pay me because I was a student, but they gave me.
Speaker 1: In seventy seven, they gave me a hundred and fifty
Speaker 1: dollars in cash a day to eat with. That was
Speaker 1: my per diem. And I was like, I couldn't. I
Speaker 1: couldn't eat ten dollars worth the food, you know, a day.
Speaker 1: So I came home with all this yea, and my
Speaker 1: dad all my sisters and brothers were in medicine. He said,
Speaker 1: what are you going to do? And I said, I'm
Speaker 1: going to be an actor, and and the three famous
Speaker 1: words where he said to me, he goes, A fucking
Speaker 1: what And I said an actor and he goes, we
Speaker 1: don't do that. We don't even know anybody who does that.
Speaker 1: I said, well, I'm gonna try. He said, can you
Speaker 1: go to school for that? And I said yes, And
Speaker 1: I went to a couple of different colleges, but then
Speaker 1: I settled at Sunni Purchase, which had a really strong
Speaker 1: acting conservatory, and yes, I graduated from there. And then
Speaker 1: I actually took five years away from acting. I was
Speaker 1: a contractor. I was school teacher. That's incredible. I didn't
Speaker 1: know you were a school teacher. I knew about being
Speaker 1: a firefighter. Well, no, that came later. I was a
Speaker 1: security guy at a club called Nels years ago. And
Speaker 1: so then a guy I went to college with named
Speaker 1: Hal Hartley. He was doing independent films. He was going
Speaker 1: to shoot his first and he said, would you like to,
Speaker 1: you know, do the lead? And I was like, yeah, sure.
Speaker 1: I was built being a deck down on the battery
Speaker 1: for a client. And I said, how long is this
Speaker 1: going to take? You said eleven days. I was like, oh,
Speaker 1: you know, that's a long time. So we did it
Speaker 1: and then Mirramax bought it and I went on a
Speaker 1: publicity thing and that was thirty six years ago. So
Speaker 1: I've been really lucky just in terms of swimming in
Speaker 1: the middle in my career and always working, you know,
Speaker 1: and I like the autonomy of being able to do
Speaker 1: what I want. You know. It's like, you can't play
Speaker 1: a cyborg robot. Sure I can, you know, or you
Speaker 1: can't play. So nobody really cared what I did, which
Speaker 1: was fun because I got to do different things. But
Speaker 1: that's also why they really did care because you know, yeah,
Speaker 1: I guess because I'm meaning how talented you are. Well, No,
Speaker 1: I've been, like I said, lucky. I think my luck
Speaker 1: is the residue of just preparation, you know, just being
Speaker 1: super prepared. That goes back to the conservatory training, never
Speaker 1: being late, trying to be early, even for technical things
Speaker 1: like this, which inevitably screw up on my end. It
Speaker 1: was like, how do I know you were good? Because
Speaker 1: trust me, you were fine. So yeah, that's how I
Speaker 1: fell and I kind of just fell into it. I
Speaker 1: was supposed to be a police officer. My parents were
Speaker 1: both from Ireland. We were raised in Washington Heights in Manhattan.
Speaker 1: So if you were like first generation Irish, like being
Speaker 1: a firefighter wasn't even held up to you. Just you're
Speaker 1: gonna You're gonna be a police officer and that's all
Speaker 1: there is to it. And I was like, okay, so
Speaker 1: I avoided that. I play a lot of police officers.
Speaker 1: But yeah, I was lucky. I was lucky to be
Speaker 1: an artist. I was lucky. Just so. I love your
Speaker 1: whole story and and like how you fell into it
Speaker 1: or got into it, or how you it became a
Speaker 1: passion of yours in a way, and how you did
Speaker 1: all these other jobs that you know, probably you learned
Speaker 1: so much from as an actor, but are also really
Speaker 1: great in life. You know. Yeah, I mean to be
Speaker 1: a firefighter. And the firefighter came in in two thousand
Speaker 1: and two. My best friend was a fire captain in
Speaker 1: the city who fell one and that really hurt me.
Speaker 1: That hurt everybody, obviously on a geopolitical scale. So I
Speaker 1: thought to myself, what can I do, Like, what can
Speaker 1: I do a p I'm not doing something bullshitty, And
Speaker 1: you know, signing a check and saying that I'm going
Speaker 1: to do something. I'm going to dedicate my life to
Speaker 1: his memory. And that's what I did. I took you know,
Speaker 1: in the volunteer Fire Service seventy percent. I think of
Speaker 1: the country's volunteer and after nine eleven, you know, Osha, them,
Speaker 1: Homeland Security, everybody piled on with all the certification and
Speaker 1: so you know, gone where the days when old Jimmy
Speaker 1: will show you what to do. And we have a
Speaker 1: tremendous academy here in Suffo County, Long Island. The instructors
Speaker 1: are all f D and Y guys, so you're getting
Speaker 1: great instruction and it's a passion. That's another passion that
Speaker 1: is so incredible though, Robert, I never thought I would
Speaker 1: have the opportunity to do this, and I've been doing
Speaker 1: it for twenty years now, so it's been great. That
Speaker 1: is beautiful. Yeah, I'm like, wow, I need to do
Speaker 1: are just volunteer and you just yeah, did you have
Speaker 1: a new little one? I do. I have a little
Speaker 1: little baby girl eighteen months. Congratulations a little Well, it's
Speaker 1: a life changing, amazing enough. Well thanks for two years. Yeah, yeah, wow,
Speaker 1: I know, it's it's so life changing and amazing. And
Speaker 1: that's also kind of why I decided to do this
Speaker 1: this podcast one, because the fans were so good and really,
Speaker 1: you know, love this show so much and gave so
Speaker 1: much support to us to the way they responded and
Speaker 1: acted to it. And I had a new baby and
Speaker 1: I was like, maybe I can do this with this
Speaker 1: production team and my heart and still be able to
Speaker 1: be by my baby girl instead of road so much
Speaker 1: with her. But yeah, so this ended up working out.
Speaker 1: But I think it's wild when you're talking about all
Speaker 1: these You played police officers a lot, and you know
Speaker 1: your firefighter, and then on Gossip Girl you play this
Speaker 1: millionaire this you know and I have a We had
Speaker 1: a lot of people right in asking did Robert model
Speaker 1: Bart bass on any real life millionaire or ceo. No,
Speaker 1: I'm gonna be very candid and say that I had
Speaker 1: trouble playing that character. Of all the characters I've ever played,
Speaker 1: I had the most trouble playing him. And the only
Speaker 1: reason was because I kind of my upbringing in our
Speaker 1: lives when I was young was so modest. Okay, like
Speaker 1: what would I say modest? Like we didn't have a
Speaker 1: lot of money, I mean modest and so there was
Speaker 1: some part of me as an artist that just didn't
Speaker 1: buy me as a billionaire, you know what I mean?
Speaker 1: And no, I don't know, because you did such a
Speaker 1: good job, like maybe he was insecure. Maybe Bart was.
Speaker 1: I mean, guys who have that much money and really
Speaker 1: need to um. There's an old saying he was an
Speaker 1: ego maniac with an inferiority complex. You know, there's that
Speaker 1: conflict always inside. But you know, I would have done
Speaker 1: a lot differently, I think now when I look back
Speaker 1: at hindsight, what do you mean though? You know, oh gosh,
Speaker 1: I'm not going to be speaking or or bemoaned or anything.
Speaker 1: But I just sometimes I look at some of the performances,
Speaker 1: I said, well, why were you doing that? You should
Speaker 1: have just done nothing. You should have just like you
Speaker 1: were pushing or you know what I mean. I just
Speaker 1: I don't know. I never had a full comfortable sense
Speaker 1: of the carrot. Well, no that's not true. That's overstating it.
Speaker 1: But I could have been more comfortable playing him. I
Speaker 1: was uncomfortable. I don't know. It's hard to say. I
Speaker 1: find that so interesting though, because it came across to
Speaker 1: so many people. Anyone that watches it this, you know,
Speaker 1: to me, you were that millionaire that's CEO. And when
Speaker 1: people were writing in to ask that question, like did
Speaker 1: he base anyone off of I didn't. I wasn't sure
Speaker 1: because I'm like, he might have went and dug super
Speaker 1: deep into some CEO you know that we all know of,
Speaker 1: because you just played it so well, the way you
Speaker 1: wore the suit, the way you talked. There was one guy, um, actually,
Speaker 1: Ian Schrager. He's an hotel here and at restaurant tour
Speaker 1: and I watched him once in a restaurant and just
Speaker 1: the way he held himself and looked I thought, oh,
Speaker 1: oh yeah, people work for that dude. And he was
Speaker 1: very relaxed and very graceful. I should say, Um, twice
Speaker 1: I was in an elevator where someone drunk got in
Speaker 1: and said to me, Mr Schrager, I worked for you once,
Speaker 1: and it's like, I'm the guys like fifteen years older,
Speaker 1: but him, I did. Yeah. I thought he had like
Speaker 1: a kind of an elan and you know, just this
Speaker 1: like a masterful kind of poiser. So no, nobody specifically,
Speaker 1: nobody specifically, right, Yeah, I just I felt like that.
Speaker 1: And even your relationship with Chuck and how that affects,
Speaker 1: you know, Chuck's how he interacts with people and his
Speaker 1: behavior and his kind of like insecurities and things like that.
Speaker 1: I feel like, we're so he did such a great
Speaker 1: job playing Chuck, but I think it was played off
Speaker 1: of how you brought part to life and such a
Speaker 1: in such a way that it was bleeding into Chuck's storylines.
Speaker 1: And we used to laugh when they yell cut. You know,
Speaker 1: I'd say something really like really hurtful to him and
Speaker 1: and he'd teld me to go, you know, f off,
Speaker 1: and they'd say cut, and we just start laughing, and
Speaker 1: it would be like fucking bost at Jesus uh, because
Speaker 1: what we're doing is we're commenting on the writing and
Speaker 1: how hurtful and how destructive and how dysfunctional, and of
Speaker 1: course Chuck's the way he is, you know what I mean.
Speaker 1: I mean it was just so it was deep and
Speaker 1: it was there was definitely dark moments where I was like,
Speaker 1: that's like hard. And I do feel like there's layers
Speaker 1: of that relationship of it kind of shows where it's like, okay,
Speaker 1: they they this kid drives a limo and can you
Speaker 1: know they have a private investigator on speed dial. I
Speaker 1: mean that's wild. Yeah, but that's the way those guys operate.
Speaker 1: I mean there's family fixers and you know, uh, we
Speaker 1: clean up the mess and me it ly and we
Speaker 1: pay very handsomely for it. So a lot of that
Speaker 1: running true, especially in um oh Brother where Bart though.
Speaker 1: I think he had that fixer, Yeah, Andrew Tyler. I
Speaker 1: think his name was, I can't remember his name. Yeah
Speaker 1: he was yeah, yeah, I think he was your p
Speaker 1: I and that's yeah. And then Ed tried to go
Speaker 1: or Chuck tried to go by him to say, hey,
Speaker 1: what what did my what did my dad want from you?
Speaker 1: Before he got in the car to go get Lily.
Speaker 1: And even the fixer for a price gives up the
Speaker 1: you know, it's like everything, everything is mercenary, everything is capitalistic,
Speaker 1: you know, and every man for himself. So I think
Speaker 1: Chuck gets what he wants, and the fixer guy he
Speaker 1: gets the money. And but yeah, Chuck, uh, Ed had
Speaker 1: his work cut out for him, just in terms of yeah,
Speaker 1: in general, in general, his mother dies early, his father
Speaker 1: kind of blames him for it, and yeah, always in
Speaker 1: the father's shadow, you when you contemplate that, of course
Speaker 1: he's going to be kind of a mess trying to
Speaker 1: struggle and scratch his way out of that. Yeah, but
Speaker 1: Ed did great and was it was like so compelling.
Speaker 1: You know, he had this this smoldering like he's going
Speaker 1: to explode him it. Yeah, he was. He was terrific
Speaker 1: and then you know, with an American accent and you'd
Speaker 1: all cut and then he'd have this British accent. I
Speaker 1: thought he just did a terrific job at all times,
Speaker 1: you know, I agree absolutely, And and his there's almost
Speaker 1: like there's a humor in his and Blair's storyline too,
Speaker 1: because they're like so ridiculous with each other, but yet
Speaker 1: you want them together so badly, and there's something to
Speaker 1: be said to now even talking to you, like he
Speaker 1: has this girl in front of him that loves him
Speaker 1: so much and they don't want to say it to
Speaker 1: each other, and then she kind of finally does. But
Speaker 1: he needs to pull away, like he he doesn't want
Speaker 1: to put all of his walls down and be vulnerable.
Speaker 1: And you can't blame him because of you know, him
Speaker 1: thinking it was his fault that his mom died. Now
Speaker 1: his you know, right right around now in these rewatches,
Speaker 1: now his dad died and he's you know, blaming Lily,
Speaker 1: blaming Dan, blaming everyone. And you know it's something that CC,
Speaker 1: the grandmother says at the funeral. It's okay for him
Speaker 1: to feel any type of way today. I mean, he
Speaker 1: just lost his dad. But let me ask you this,
Speaker 1: what did you know, like early on that this was
Speaker 1: going to happen or was this all of a sudden
Speaker 1: You got a script and you're like, oh, Bart's getting
Speaker 1: in an accident. Joe Lazarov came up to me because
Speaker 1: I got a minute. It's like yeah, So no, they
Speaker 1: came to me. I've had over the years, like in
Speaker 1: different shows, people call me and say, did you get
Speaker 1: to page thirty five? I get hit by a bus
Speaker 1: and I'm like, well, you're nobody on this show unless
Speaker 1: you come back as a ghost. Okay, you know what
Speaker 1: I mean, Like, uh, but yeah, Joe, Joe, one of
Speaker 1: the producers, Joe Lazarov, beautiful guy, came up to me, go, um,
Speaker 1: you're gonna die. It's like okay, So I said, you know,
Speaker 1: gracefully and yeah um and he said yes, and are
Speaker 1: you okay with that? And I said, uh, you know,
Speaker 1: as my wife would say, write your own show. I said,
Speaker 1: I have to be okay with that. I've had fun.
Speaker 1: I was doing two other shows at the time, or
Speaker 1: three even um and I would do this kind of triangle,
Speaker 1: you know, go from one show to the other, and
Speaker 1: it kept life interesting and kept art interesting. But he said,
Speaker 1: but we don't know if you really did. And I
Speaker 1: was like, okay, you know, like when you figure that out,
Speaker 1: let me know. And then he obviously came back and
Speaker 1: had faked his death and and all that. But yeah, No,
Speaker 1: they were very forthcoming. When I was killed that time
Speaker 1: or what was it, died in a car accident, I think, yeah,
Speaker 1: so they production and the producer did come to me
Speaker 1: and tell him, tell me what was going to happen.
Speaker 1: So I did know when you were first becoming Bart,
Speaker 1: like in the very you know, when Barts first introduced
Speaker 1: and you were meeting with Eric Damon and things like that,
Speaker 1: did you right away because everyone is so obsessed and
Speaker 1: like so grateful for how talented Eric was to you know,
Speaker 1: put all of our costumes and stuff together. Did you
Speaker 1: right away feel like everything that was pulled for for
Speaker 1: Bart was just right on point because he looks so elegant,
Speaker 1: so ceo, millionaire, billionaire, handsome. I think Eric would agree
Speaker 1: that I had really good wardrobe, karma stuff fit. It
Speaker 1: was his palette and and he say, what do you think?
Speaker 1: And I usually agree. He is a master. He was
Speaker 1: a complete artist. I would not want to have had
Speaker 1: his job on this show. No, No, I mean I
Speaker 1: show up with my one or two choices, you know,
Speaker 1: in terms of my acting, but he has to have
Speaker 1: you know, endless, endless. But he was terrific. He was
Speaker 1: just effortless options and yeah, just he was terrific. And
Speaker 1: he did. Everyone looked so so different. I mean, I
Speaker 1: know that's part of it because it's all different characters,
Speaker 1: but not really like in a show like this, a
Speaker 1: lot of people could have, you know, had similar styles.
Speaker 1: This everyone was very different, you know it it was,
Speaker 1: and I think it helped everyone bring their their characters.
Speaker 1: And I never, I don't remember ever seeing something where
Speaker 1: you say to yourself, ridiculous doesn't work. Never, either it
Speaker 1: was the actor or actress who was selling it and
Speaker 1: making it work beautifully because of their character or but
Speaker 1: I don't recall anybody whereas you know, you sit there
Speaker 1: as a as a a fan or just watching go
Speaker 1: Up does totally doesn't work totally. It never not worked.
Speaker 1: I mean, no matter who showed up wearing what, it
Speaker 1: looked great. I always thought, so that was Eric's artistry.
Speaker 1: I think I thought it was so great. Did you
Speaker 1: like filming in New York? I mean, I know you
Speaker 1: had before, and oh yeah, you learn that's I was.
Speaker 1: I was the local. I mean I loved it. I
Speaker 1: could come home, I could coach basketball, I could coach
Speaker 1: little league. I loved it. It was a ten amount
Speaker 1: to nine to five. We shot at the Palace Hotel
Speaker 1: a lot, and I remember that time he brought me
Speaker 1: up to this room at the top. It was, you know,
Speaker 1: a guest lounge that no one ever used, that had
Speaker 1: its own chef and its own barista. And this was
Speaker 1: for the hotel. And and the owner of the hotel said, so,
Speaker 1: you're the actor playing the owner of the hotel. I
Speaker 1: said yes, And he jokingly handed me a bunch of
Speaker 1: his cards, and he's like, I'm leaving for an hour.
Speaker 1: You know you're you're in charge. So one time his
Speaker 1: assistant came to me and said, Ms. Burkan said, would
Speaker 1: you like to just relax up? I said yeah, I
Speaker 1: didn't know where I was going. And he brought me
Speaker 1: to this lounge and you know, big buffet and overlooking
Speaker 1: the city, and I was up there. I was up
Speaker 1: there for like, I don't know, three or four months.
Speaker 1: And then one day Chase and Ed come happening into
Speaker 1: the room where they're like, you fuck when you've been
Speaker 1: up here the whole star And I was like, oh, dude,
Speaker 1: you know what's up. We're sitting down in our trailers.
Speaker 1: You know what's going on. I was like, yeah, you know,
Speaker 1: you just punched two two two four and today, yeah,
Speaker 1: you'll be and we were laughing, and then you know,
Speaker 1: the secret was at So that was only when we
Speaker 1: were on location at the Palace Hotel. But it was fun.
Speaker 1: It's always fun to to shoot in New York. Albeit
Speaker 1: there were the young kids who would show up on
Speaker 1: the set and that was daunting, I think sometimes for production.
Speaker 1: And I remember one time it was either Chase or
Speaker 1: Red or pen and something. They opened their camper door
Speaker 1: and the kids who were outside let out this shriek
Speaker 1: that was allah, you know, the Beatles kind of shriek.
Speaker 1: And I was like, oh, that's what that sounds like,
Speaker 1: you know, in real life. And so, you know, another
Speaker 1: aspect of shooting in New York and the fact that
Speaker 1: they were using social media to say hey, gossip or
Speaker 1: shooting on you seven and second or wherever we were
Speaker 1: at the time, and we'd skip around down to Soho,
Speaker 1: Upper East, Upper West, you know, the museums. It was fun,
Speaker 1: it was it was fun. Yeah, I learned. I mean
Speaker 1: it became like my favorite city. But I also was like,
Speaker 1: before I ever did the show, I wasn't well traveled.
Speaker 1: I didn't have the money to to travel. So when
Speaker 1: people would be like, oh my god, New York is
Speaker 1: just it's the best city in the world. There's something
Speaker 1: so special and magical and the energy, I'd be like, okay, cool. Yeah.
Speaker 1: And then when we got to do this show, I
Speaker 1: and then I got to travel more. I got it
Speaker 1: when we were there, I'm like, wow, this really is something.
Speaker 1: There's something very special here. But then when I went
Speaker 1: to other cities around the world that were also beautiful
Speaker 1: in their own way and special, they didn't have this
Speaker 1: energy that New York has. There's something very different about
Speaker 1: New York. And then I understood it that one day
Speaker 1: I'm like I was in Europe and I'm like, Okay,
Speaker 1: this is awesome and beautiful in its own way. But
Speaker 1: now I completely understand the hundreds of people that told
Speaker 1: me New York is its own thing. You're exactly right,
Speaker 1: And I feel the exact same way no matter where
Speaker 1: you go. And we were lucky too, because this was
Speaker 1: pre you know, pandemic and all the stuff that's happening now,
Speaker 1: all this stuff, it was really, uh, you know, when
Speaker 1: we look back, a really special time and yeah, so
Speaker 1: so to have experienced it in that way, um, certainly
Speaker 1: it was special, so special. Speaking of filming around the
Speaker 1: city and all that, where some are your favorite storylines
Speaker 1: because watching these and the fact that we were doing
Speaker 1: twenty two episodes and just the spider webs of all
Speaker 1: the intertwining situations and relationships and all the stuff that
Speaker 1: just kept going and going and going. I mean, it's
Speaker 1: just so crazy. Even in the episodes that I'm at
Speaker 1: right now and the rewatch I get to the end
Speaker 1: and I'm like, I feel like, now, that would be
Speaker 1: like four episodes of a show on HBO. This was
Speaker 1: one episode of twenty two. You know what you're so
Speaker 1: they packed so achin. They packed it in like you
Speaker 1: were on the steps of the Metropolitan. You were here,
Speaker 1: you were there, you were in the loft, you were
Speaker 1: back out of the loft, you were at some amazing gala,
Speaker 1: you were back. You know, it was a lot of
Speaker 1: production value for a show runner, for a cast and crew.
Speaker 1: But you're right, so I was just because there's always
Speaker 1: so much. I'm like, how do you even pick a storyline?
Speaker 1: Or I'm sure you had so much fun working with
Speaker 1: Kelly because she's just such a lovely person. But was
Speaker 1: there anything, anything in particular, it was one of your
Speaker 1: favorite storylines that kind of stick out, maybe not your
Speaker 1: favorite because it's so hard when there were so many.
Speaker 1: I mean, even where I'm at and the rewatches there
Speaker 1: there's someone who dies, there's a potential, you know, a
Speaker 1: new relationship that comes to life. Um, someone's possibly pregnant,
Speaker 1: someone else's tells them they love each other. I'm like,
Speaker 1: this is all in one hour. I rewatched a Brother
Speaker 1: where Bart thou and and I had the exact same impression.
Speaker 1: So so Bart dies and it's his funeral, but Serena's
Speaker 1: going to Brazil. Who's the new guy? Is okay with it?
Speaker 1: Rufus is like angling the information dropped, Jenny's making address
Speaker 1: for for the Jenny's Margaret and Wallace are getting married. Yeah,
Speaker 1: meanwhile Whillace, his son is the one dating Serena. That's right,
Speaker 1: and this is all within Yes, it's a lot. That
Speaker 1: were two minutes. You were getting your money's worth out
Speaker 1: of that show. For sure. It's an interesting observation that
Speaker 1: perhaps they don't pack so much in that you could
Speaker 1: have gotten three or four episodes, you know, in a
Speaker 1: modern day episodic. But no, it was. It was fun
Speaker 1: because it was like, you know, when that opening narrative
Speaker 1: would happen, you were pretty much obliged to like, you know,
Speaker 1: tighten your seatbelt because you know, you don't know where. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it was, and it was. It was a total and
Speaker 1: it was gonna look great and it was gonna you know,
Speaker 1: the visual in terms of the you know, shooting on
Speaker 1: location was going to be great. So it was definitely
Speaker 1: going to be It's rawling for people who are wondering
Speaker 1: what that lifestyle was, like I suppose yeah, And I
Speaker 1: feel like because there was it was so flashy. But
Speaker 1: then I really feel like, especially going back, everyone just
Speaker 1: did such a great job with their with their roles.
Speaker 1: Like you know, I know everyone listening has has heard
Speaker 1: this many times in these episodes but you know, these
Speaker 1: dynamics and the little humor and just just they did
Speaker 1: so good. So it was not just like about going
Speaker 1: in and watching this teen drama or just watching New
Speaker 1: York City as a character in there. Everyone really brought
Speaker 1: something super special to it. And maybe you know, at
Speaker 1: the time, there was nothing like this on TV, you know,
Speaker 1: and even when you went back to different shows like
Speaker 1: nine O two one oh Beverly Hills, it's still there's
Speaker 1: a different flavor and vibe because of New York City.
Speaker 1: You know. It's like acting when you when you understand
Speaker 1: your character and everything, and then you're asked to just
Speaker 1: throw it away. So here you have these characters, these
Speaker 1: situations against the backdrop of New York which is its
Speaker 1: own character in the drama, and yet you're asked to
Speaker 1: throw in a way like you know, you hail that cab,
Speaker 1: or you walk up those museum steps or you know
Speaker 1: whatever it is. You know, it's you wear it loosely
Speaker 1: like a like a garment, and you're comfortable with it.
Speaker 1: So that I think everything like complimented everything, you know,
Speaker 1: in just in terms of advancing the story, but again
Speaker 1: like really cemented these actors were in their characters. You know,
Speaker 1: Blair very complex, Serena very complex in her own way,
Speaker 1: you know it very consistent in terms of who she
Speaker 1: is as a person. And then when she does have conflict,
Speaker 1: you really see it, do you know what I mean?
Speaker 1: In lieu of the money, in lieu of the fashion,
Speaker 1: in lieu of the environment, she's still somebody you would
Speaker 1: want to have as a friend. And then Blair mercurial all.
Speaker 1: You know, I just Laten's acting. I always just enamored
Speaker 1: and obviously Blake too, but they really just I I
Speaker 1: just um just so compelling to watch them read the
Speaker 1: phone Book to tell you the truth right, and and
Speaker 1: the way they play off each other because they are
Speaker 1: their characters are so different, like on paper, you wouldn't
Speaker 1: put them as best friends almost, you know what I mean,
Speaker 1: totally buy that they were together forever, that they really
Speaker 1: are friends. And that's kind of It's very unique sometimes
Speaker 1: because other well for me, for you were actors. We
Speaker 1: we read into things, but they had an effortless relationship.
Speaker 1: It was just so complimentary and uh it was it
Speaker 1: was awesome. It was awesome to watch, you know, I
Speaker 1: couldn't agree more. Yeah, how what are your thoughts of
Speaker 1: Chuck and Blair's relationship. Chuck was his own worst enemy.
Speaker 1: He he wanted the love, but he just to me,
Speaker 1: it just seemed like he didn't know how to get there,
Speaker 1: you know what I mean. Blair is like, I'm here,
Speaker 1: I'm here. He's like, I know, I just don't know
Speaker 1: how to get there. And once I'm there, I don't
Speaker 1: know how to stay there because he didn't have the tools.
Speaker 1: You know, his mother was gone, his father was a jerk.
Speaker 1: Uh tumble, tumble tumble, so he never he was never
Speaker 1: given those tools. He never saw it in his home.
Speaker 1: There's a Shakespeare speech, you know, I spy a far
Speaker 1: off shore where I would wish to be, and I
Speaker 1: yell at the seed that keeps me from it, you
Speaker 1: know what I mean, I just don't know how to
Speaker 1: get there. And and she's like the siren going he
Speaker 1: come here, come here, and he's like, I know, but
Speaker 1: I just I just don't know how to get there.
Speaker 1: Because I'm my own worst enemy. I was never shown
Speaker 1: you know what true love is and uh and and
Speaker 1: they just tore it up. They just totally tore it
Speaker 1: up in terms of playing that that dance of going
Speaker 1: back and forth and wanting to like they wanted each other,
Speaker 1: but they wanted to tell each other no even though
Speaker 1: they really didn't want to say no. If that makes sense?
Speaker 1: Is there any better? Is there any better kind of love?
Speaker 1: I mean, you know, that's where the passion comes. It's
Speaker 1: like tearing piece of paper, one pieces going one way
Speaker 1: or the other. And that sound you here in the
Speaker 1: middle is like is somebody's heart. It's like every time
Speaker 1: they would do that, it was just you know, just
Speaker 1: just like you know, I'm a grown man and yet
Speaker 1: I'm sitting here going, oh, maybe it's tonight, you know,
Speaker 1: I like, yeah, but you know it's It's sweet because
Speaker 1: I think everybody on whatever level of whatever kind of
Speaker 1: relationship you've ever had, elementally you identify with some aspect
Speaker 1: of their relationship. But the writing was impossibly good for
Speaker 1: those two. I must say that also. It was so
Speaker 1: on point, and the way they did it was also
Speaker 1: like just nothing was missing for that. It kept you
Speaker 1: going even even now, like right around where I'm at,
Speaker 1: they're still like not fully together, and I'm like any
Speaker 1: other show or any other characters, i'd be like over
Speaker 1: watching it. But they did such a good job that
Speaker 1: I'm like, I could keep doing this. You know, I
Speaker 1: I rewatched brother ware art or Barta And at the
Speaker 1: limo when she's like when she says, I love you
Speaker 1: and I mean Layton, just the simplicity, you know what
Speaker 1: I mean, she's she was such a great actress that
Speaker 1: she would let you do the crying. It was just
Speaker 1: the simplicity of it. I'm here and before you and again,
Speaker 1: you know, in lieu of the fashion, in lieu of
Speaker 1: the setting, in lieu of the limo, and and none
Speaker 1: of that matters. Well, the only thing that matters is
Speaker 1: her love for Forred of her Chuck. She says to him,
Speaker 1: we're Chuck and Blair. Blair and Chuck. The worst thing
Speaker 1: you've ever done, the darkest thought you've ever had. I
Speaker 1: will stand by you through anything. I mean. And he says,
Speaker 1: and why would you do that? Why would you do that?
Speaker 1: Because I love you? And he says, I'm no, don't
Speaker 1: tell me. Well that's too bad, too bad, you see,
Speaker 1: that's just that's just immaturity. That's someone who who doesn't
Speaker 1: have the tools, he's going to push away. The reason
Speaker 1: people do that is fear, as as as as animals
Speaker 1: as we're gonna fight, we're gonna run or we're gonna
Speaker 1: do nothing, and he he pushes her away because he's afraid.
Speaker 1: He It's it's almost like telling him, Chuck, I know
Speaker 1: your dad just died. I know you have all this
Speaker 1: stuff on your shoulders. Oh would you mind jumping off
Speaker 1: this cliff and fall in love with this girl. He's
Speaker 1: not going to do it because he just doesn't trust
Speaker 1: himself or life. Life just kept kicking in the teeth,
Speaker 1: so he's developed no trust. And uh, but the writing there,
Speaker 1: that's what I meant. I didn't write like that for
Speaker 1: Bart I'll tell you. Uh, you know, that was just
Speaker 1: the simplicity, the beauty, the poetry in it. It was
Speaker 1: just really kind of neat. It was. And if you're
Speaker 1: a young gall or guy or whatever watching the show, yeah,
Speaker 1: let me just as a sidebar, say, I've had like
Speaker 1: a lot of young guys like I guess they'd be
Speaker 1: in their thirties. Oh dude, gos girl. Yeah, I love
Speaker 1: the show. Like really, good for you, Good for you
Speaker 1: for saying you know, yeah, did you have people come
Speaker 1: up to you and say, you know, I know someone
Speaker 1: who was based off your character? You're based off my
Speaker 1: dad's character. Because I found people in New York for
Speaker 1: saying that to all everyone all the time. And we're like,
Speaker 1: it was off of a book, you know, based off
Speaker 1: a book. The books were written books I had friends
Speaker 1: of mine. I never read the books. Actually was it
Speaker 1: books or book? It was books? Yeah, books, and I
Speaker 1: never read them. And you know, people would tell me
Speaker 1: things like, oh, Chuck's character had a monkey, and I'm like,
Speaker 1: we see, that's why I'm not reading it. Um. But
Speaker 1: you know what, I can't say that somebody ever said.
Speaker 1: It's been a while too. But yeah, But speaking of like,
Speaker 1: you know, storylines and working with you know, some of
Speaker 1: the other casts, what was it like and what were
Speaker 1: some of your favorite storylines with Kelly? Because that's heavily
Speaker 1: with Kelly, and any storyline with Kelly was fun. She's
Speaker 1: she was this lovely human being, do you know what
Speaker 1: I mean? Mature, graceful, gorgeous, prepared looks you in the
Speaker 1: I a kind of acting, do you know what I mean?
Speaker 1: And I used to love to play with her, you
Speaker 1: know what I mean just in terms of like, well,
Speaker 1: my acting teach and once said, because I was getting
Speaker 1: so serious, he goes, why do you think they call
Speaker 1: it a play? And I was like, Okay, yeah, that's
Speaker 1: what we're doing. We're playing. So to play off off
Speaker 1: of her, to play opposite her, it was just so
Speaker 1: much fun. You were you knew you were gonna you
Speaker 1: knew you were going to just achieve something in the scene,
Speaker 1: and it just felt very good as an as an
Speaker 1: actor to be opposite somebody like that. So she was
Speaker 1: lovely and any you know, any time I was I
Speaker 1: would say anytime I was acting with Kelly Rutherford was
Speaker 1: a good day. We would have these galas where this
Speaker 1: there would be these great things going on and she
Speaker 1: and I would be having some kind of conflict or
Speaker 1: resolution of conflict. There was always duplicity. There was always
Speaker 1: some type of you know, hidden agenda, and I like
Speaker 1: that because when there's more than one thing going on,
Speaker 1: it just makes it more interesting for the actor, hopefully
Speaker 1: for the But she was great any any I don't
Speaker 1: specific can't speak specifically to any one storyline, but pretty
Speaker 1: much any storyline with her was just fun. You know.
Speaker 1: I have a question about this. There was a couple
Speaker 1: episodes ago with might have been I can't even remember
Speaker 1: which episode now, but Eric has a boyfriend in the
Speaker 1: episode and you're having some big party again at the
Speaker 1: vander Woodson Loft, and you kind of tell the boyfriend
Speaker 1: you know, I'm not sure if you want to come
Speaker 1: or not come, And you know, we kind of talked
Speaker 1: about it, like do we think you were doing that
Speaker 1: to actually protect Eric and the boyfriend so that it
Speaker 1: didn't come out publicly for their sake or was Bart
Speaker 1: kind of doing it to cover for Bart? Because I
Speaker 1: was like, I don't think. I think he was doing
Speaker 1: it to protect the kids in a sense of like
Speaker 1: you it should be on you, guys, and this is
Speaker 1: just I mean, this is all about a story in
Speaker 1: the in a in a TV show, so we don't
Speaker 1: really know the answer. But I was wondering if you
Speaker 1: even remember that episode or like what you thought of that,
Speaker 1: because I think I think Bart, as much as he
Speaker 1: was hard and stuff like that, I do feel like
Speaker 1: he had a big heart. There's a lot of times
Speaker 1: I'm like, Oh, he's doing a really great thing and
Speaker 1: then you go and pull some dossiers out on the
Speaker 1: family and have this whole you know, you know, everyone's
Speaker 1: secrets and stuff. But then you would do something where
Speaker 1: I'm like, Wow, he's being he is sweet. He just
Speaker 1: has a hard exterior kind of like Chuck, Yeah, you know,
Speaker 1: if you're playing in New York billionaire, um, and I
Speaker 1: think he was a billionaire. I think it's that he
Speaker 1: was a billionaire, not a billionaire. Anyway, it speaks to
Speaker 1: your having some sophistication, your worldly you're accepting, you're accepting
Speaker 1: of someone's sexual orientation. However, what you're not accepting of
Speaker 1: is anything that could damage the family name and the
Speaker 1: family fortune. You're also being patriarchal in terms of these
Speaker 1: kids don't know what they're talking about. They're leaving themselves
Speaker 1: exposed to ridicule, to bigotry, and so there could have
Speaker 1: been an element of that. I never specifically new. I
Speaker 1: think I was. I was protecting the family and myself
Speaker 1: visa V telling them, you guys are not on time
Speaker 1: right now. You gotta at this be a little more chill,
Speaker 1: because you don't want to hurt yourselves, you don't want
Speaker 1: to hurt the family. So I think his motives are
Speaker 1: a lot more selfish and self serving than they are altruistic,
Speaker 1: and like, oh, I'm accepting of your sexual orientation, and
Speaker 1: I don't think there's much of that, although you know,
Speaker 1: I think it's all about the bottom line and the
Speaker 1: company right, and and again speaking of working with everyone,
Speaker 1: what about how how is that? How is the love
Speaker 1: try and go? Basically is what I'm trying to ask
Speaker 1: with you with you Rufus? And and how was it
Speaker 1: working with Matt Matthew and that? Like I know, because
Speaker 1: if you guys couldn't have played two more like total
Speaker 1: opposite characters. Yeah, I mean like in real life, I'm
Speaker 1: more like the Rufus guy. I never had the money,
Speaker 1: and I was like, hey, you guys got a nice personality,
Speaker 1: maybe you should go out with it. Um it was
Speaker 1: fun because you knew it. Just it just creates tension
Speaker 1: and dynamic and conflict. And these are the things like
Speaker 1: you don't have to you didn't have to manufacture it.
Speaker 1: If Rufus came into the room, I would wristle, do
Speaker 1: you know what I mean? It just bristled, like like
Speaker 1: no words even in my head. I would just want
Speaker 1: to like just send out Prana to to get rid
Speaker 1: of him. You know, he so threatened me. And the
Speaker 1: fact that he didn't have money, and you know, they'd
Speaker 1: say like, oh, he comes from Brooklyn, you know, like
Speaker 1: like Brooklyn was some filthy place you know as if
Speaker 1: you could afford to live in Williamsburg these days. But
Speaker 1: at the same time, right exactly, so that that conflict
Speaker 1: was built in and it was fun as hell, and
Speaker 1: why part of me, part of Robert Berkeley's why I
Speaker 1: couldn't literally have both, I mean really, but yeah, she
Speaker 1: was great the way she would pain of what kind
Speaker 1: of what her and I talked about last week. Oh,
Speaker 1: really like her head and her practicality. You know, she
Speaker 1: wants the dough and she wants like the good life,
Speaker 1: but you know what, maybe she wants to love too.
Speaker 1: So it's like, you know, good for literally for keeping
Speaker 1: all possible options open to when we get the phone
Speaker 1: call or when we see that there's a phone call
Speaker 1: on something really dramatic has happened or tragic has happened
Speaker 1: to Bart. That's like a devastating thing. As a viewer,
Speaker 1: I feel like watching because now I'm dialed in removed
Speaker 1: from the show years later, and I'm like, wait, Bart
Speaker 1: can't leave. This is like not okay, Yeah it was.
Speaker 1: It was kind of weird. Yeah, And and again I
Speaker 1: don't know if they were onto something back then, like oh,
Speaker 1: if you do, you know, kind of kill off someone
Speaker 1: that everyone enjoys watching whether people didn't agree with some
Speaker 1: of the things you did as a dad and stuff
Speaker 1: like that. That makes a show interesting still though, you
Speaker 1: know what I mean, watching colors that you were bringing
Speaker 1: to the scenes with Ed and with Lily and Rufus.
Speaker 1: But it was now people are killing off main characters,
Speaker 1: you know, season one and a show. So to me,
Speaker 1: I'm like, were they doing this for you know, a
Speaker 1: shock value to you know, have everyone's mouth drop even
Speaker 1: more so than they were the entire episode. I was
Speaker 1: still like that he can't he can't go away. You know,
Speaker 1: it was weird to me, and it was it still
Speaker 1: kind of is weird in the story was they throw
Speaker 1: Bart on the sword. Okay, now that said shock waves,
Speaker 1: you know what I mean. But then they have Bart
Speaker 1: back and then they throw him on the sword again,
Speaker 1: and I was like, why are they I'm the old
Speaker 1: guy on this like kids show. It's like, why have
Speaker 1: I that you know, the crucible that upon which you know,
Speaker 1: the drama gets shattered and the repercussions are felt thereof um,
Speaker 1: I didn't mind. I I understood that for what it's
Speaker 1: going to do to Chuck, this is going to have
Speaker 1: lasting repercussions, and and so you know, as an actor,
Speaker 1: I've been around long enough to know to appreciate every
Speaker 1: moment I'm on the set, and then to say to myself,
Speaker 1: you know, if this should continue, great, If it doesn't,
Speaker 1: that's fine too. So when when Bart had to go,
Speaker 1: Bart had to go, you know, I go onto the
Speaker 1: next thing. And I'm always very grateful for having been
Speaker 1: but I could see the wisdom in it in terms
Speaker 1: of making the drama that much more compelling. You know,
Speaker 1: people are texting, oh, Chuck's dad is dead. I'll tell
Speaker 1: you a funny story that combines my fire service with
Speaker 1: Gossip Girl. We had a false alarm in a hotel.
Speaker 1: The hotel is emptying out. People are in their pajamas.
Speaker 1: These girls are in their pajamas, and I'm walking in
Speaker 1: with the hook like the big pole and the water can.
Speaker 1: I have all my gear on. And as I'm walking
Speaker 1: into the hotel, this girl is like she's two inches
Speaker 1: from my face, walking past me, and she looks at me.
Speaker 1: She goes, she goes, are you Chuck's dad? And I
Speaker 1: looked at her so quickly. I looked at her, and
Speaker 1: I literally a fire happening and that's her question. So
Speaker 1: you Chucks. And I look at her and I go,
Speaker 1: Chuck's dad is dead. And I keep walking and she
Speaker 1: was like all right. She starts screaming and she like
Speaker 1: kind of tripped and and fell, and her girlfriend's caught
Speaker 1: her and she's pointing in my direction. She's like it's
Speaker 1: and and her. I can hear the converse the friends.
Speaker 1: What do you mean? What are you talking about? You know, Sharon?
Speaker 1: Are you okay? Whatever? And and so finally I saw
Speaker 1: her on the outside by the fire truck. I came
Speaker 1: around the opposite end. She could never see me again,
Speaker 1: and I left, you know what I mean. But when
Speaker 1: she said to me, are you Chuck's dad, like just
Speaker 1: like that, and I said, Chuck's dad is dead, like immediately,
Speaker 1: she just freaked. Anyway, So I always remember that one.
Speaker 1: By the way, did everyone everyone was okay in that fire?
Speaker 1: There's no fire. It's just a false alarm. We were
Speaker 1: just emptying out, you know. It's like, oh a FUSSI alarm. Okay,
Speaker 1: that is hilarious, automatic alarm. And that happens like over
Speaker 1: the years, like you'll show up and they're like, hey,
Speaker 1: you look like the guy from Special But whatever. And
Speaker 1: so when I first started, you're a schnook if you
Speaker 1: don't say, oh hello, you speak to the people. And
Speaker 1: then other firefights like dude, we're like twenty minutes like
Speaker 1: getting back because you're like, I'm like, dude, you're the
Speaker 1: one who told them that. And so now if somebody says, wait, wait,
Speaker 1: is that the guy and and my guys they'll say, oh,
Speaker 1: no, no no, he looks just like that guy. Yeah no, yeah, no,
Speaker 1: that's not him. It looks just like him. He looks
Speaker 1: just like bar Pass, but it's not him. Um, a
Speaker 1: guy one night leaning on the side of the road,
Speaker 1: he's like, are you Mickey from Rescuing me? And I
Speaker 1: was like, I said, it's three thirty in the morning.
Speaker 1: I was driving the ambulance. I said, if I was
Speaker 1: Mickey from Rescue, why would I be here with you?
Speaker 1: And he goes, wow, he goes, you look just like him.
Speaker 1: And he goes and you sound like him too. It's like,
Speaker 1: oh god, yeah, it happens. But I'm sure you know
Speaker 1: that is just hilarious. Are you Chuck's dad? No, Chuck's
Speaker 1: dad is dead. And she just she just her hands
Speaker 1: went up to her face and started shaking like shaking.
Speaker 1: It was. It was so weird. And then she was
Speaker 1: trying the poor thing. She was trying to explain what
Speaker 1: she had seen to her friends, and they were just thinking,
Speaker 1: something's wrong with this something is wrong with this girl. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and it was really bad. I wish I could just shook.
Speaker 1: I wish a videotape of that. That would have been.
Speaker 1: But anyway, hilarious, that is that is funny. It's it's
Speaker 1: this show just affected so many of the fans in
Speaker 1: such a way like it's actually quite sweet and you know,
Speaker 1: but that's wild. There's an alarm going off and that happened.
Speaker 1: Oh my goodness. I think I think that, like Serena
Speaker 1: and Blair their relationship, just I think there was just
Speaker 1: so much identification with it for two girls, girls at age. Yeah,
Speaker 1: for girls at age, even irrespective of their affluence, because
Speaker 1: the things they went through were just relevant and identifiable
Speaker 1: at any you know, well, yeah, yeah, I really think that.
Speaker 1: And you wanted to know that that these things have
Speaker 1: somehow you were finding out that these things happen with
Speaker 1: rich kids, poor kids, you know, and how they navigate
Speaker 1: their world and their problems are just as real as
Speaker 1: anybody else. A relative and real. Yeah, and it was
Speaker 1: there was so many things. It was like their relationship
Speaker 1: and their competitiveness, sometimes as best friends and then having
Speaker 1: each other's backs and betraying each other but yet still
Speaker 1: being each other's number one fan. And then you know,
Speaker 1: mixed families and divorce and death, and it was it
Speaker 1: was all there. It was all there, and how did
Speaker 1: they how did they get through it? And it was
Speaker 1: usually like, well, I think that's Serena's part, just honestly,
Speaker 1: you know what I mean. She was always very honest,
Speaker 1: opened and fourth right, she was not very duplicitous a
Speaker 1: lot of the time. And if you pushed her and
Speaker 1: like bothered her, she was going to push back and
Speaker 1: stand up for herself. So there was a sense of
Speaker 1: self worth. And you know, Blair was always a little
Speaker 1: more mercurial and duplicitus somehow, but always wound up understanding
Speaker 1: the lesson or you know, in life. And I just thought,
Speaker 1: you want to talk about two actresses, two actors, actually
Speaker 1: I should say who stepped into these roles? I mean
Speaker 1: glove Fit day one, Yeah, from the pilot, Yeah, from
Speaker 1: the pilot. It's just so it's so strange, it's beautiful,
Speaker 1: to see actually, yeah, it's great. Yeah, And and then
Speaker 1: even to like what the how different the three guys were.
Speaker 1: I mean, you take you know, Dan to Chase, to
Speaker 1: to Chuck, Dan, Nate to Chuck. It's this kid from Brooklyn.
Speaker 1: And then you still have these two rich kids and
Speaker 1: you know a lot of family stuff going on, but
Speaker 1: there was a softness to Nate, like internally and externally.
Speaker 1: And then there you know, them playing best friends. I mean,
Speaker 1: they just did a great job. And then you kind
Speaker 1: of had, you know, Jenny and I from Brooklyn, one
Speaker 1: wanting to fit into that world so so badly, one
Speaker 1: not wanting to and not getting it. So there was
Speaker 1: that piece to the puzzle over here. And then I
Speaker 1: really thought even and Kelly and I were just talking
Speaker 1: about this last week, the dynamic of the parents so
Speaker 1: to speak. You know, we were all adults at that point,
Speaker 1: but I mean, they're still so young. But that the
Speaker 1: parents in the show, they really did a good the humanity,
Speaker 1: like what they did in all of the relationships there
Speaker 1: were great even to the relationships with the kids, their
Speaker 1: kids and their stepkids and each other and their parents.
Speaker 1: Like Lily's relationship with CC is a whole another thing,
Speaker 1: you know. C C. I think was only in about
Speaker 1: ten episodes, and she's so memorable. She's she makes to presents.
Speaker 1: It's wild. I looked that up the other day and
Speaker 1: I was like, well, she must have been and it
Speaker 1: was I think it was ten or something twelve. It
Speaker 1: was something shocking because it felt like it was like
Speaker 1: a couple of seasons and it wasn't even a full season. Yeah,
Speaker 1: you must have done like quite a few. Yeah. I
Speaker 1: mean I was in in and out like I was
Speaker 1: ten of thirteen for four and a half seasons. Yeah,
Speaker 1: but I mean some of the episodes Robert I had
Speaker 1: come in and you know, go hand Nate a letter
Speaker 1: and then like leave. Yeah, no, I believe me. I
Speaker 1: used to call those the perfect crime, you know, because
Speaker 1: I was getting paid whether I was there one scene
Speaker 1: or forty two scenes, to get paid the same. So
Speaker 1: it was a trip and I'd be liking to make
Speaker 1: on the beach sometimes on my God, I know, the
Speaker 1: perfect crime. We call it rescue me. Once I had
Speaker 1: one word and and my buddy Lenny had one word,
Speaker 1: and it was like din Sleary's characters up on top
Speaker 1: of the bridge and we're like Tommy, no, he says Tommy,
Speaker 1: and I say no, and we did it four times
Speaker 1: and that was it, and he looked at me said
Speaker 1: perfect crime. See you in the next episode. I was like, dude, wild, Yeah,
Speaker 1: I was just gonna say it just was all you
Speaker 1: know this, this is why I love doing this podcast,
Speaker 1: because just talking to you is bringing back different feelings
Speaker 1: and memories of the show. And also what's really neat
Speaker 1: is you are character has never really worked together. There
Speaker 1: was probably you know, one or two or you know,
Speaker 1: a dozen gallons galas. I mean that we were probably
Speaker 1: you know, my character had just walked out, well Bart
Speaker 1: walked in or something, and we you know, we crossed
Speaker 1: in the makeup room or something, but there wasn't a
Speaker 1: lot that Vanessa and Bart. I don't think Bart spoke
Speaker 1: to Vanessa. Yeah, I really don't think so either. So,
Speaker 1: I mean, I know you and I talked on set
Speaker 1: and you playing you know, Chuck's dad. You were there
Speaker 1: a lot, and we've definitely crossed. But it's just so
Speaker 1: nice to like hear and talk to you about because
Speaker 1: even when we were doing the show, if you and
Speaker 1: I had a conversation on on set, we weren't sitting
Speaker 1: and talking about our characters and about what we're on.
Speaker 1: You know, what you have to where are you? You know? Yeah,
Speaker 1: what are you doing in New York? Is it fun? Yeah?
Speaker 1: It is. It is interesting to hear it, and you know,
Speaker 1: and because we're so removed, it's been so long that
Speaker 1: it's kind of like different things come up. I'm like,
Speaker 1: you know what I felt. Kind of I didn't know
Speaker 1: I felt this way about Vanessa until now, or I
Speaker 1: didn't know that I liked Blair and Chuck so much,
Speaker 1: or you know, there's like a soft spot I have
Speaker 1: for Bart. So it's it's kind of interesting too, like
Speaker 1: there's there's something that I think when I returned to
Speaker 1: the show, I can't remember. It was like the fourth season,
Speaker 1: at the very end, and Blake said, oh, I heard
Speaker 1: you didn't like this show, And I said, what she said,
Speaker 1: I think that's what somebody said, And you know what,
Speaker 1: I I really thought long and hard about that. What
Speaker 1: I had shared with a couple of people was certainly
Speaker 1: not that I didn't buy the show, but they didn't
Speaker 1: buy me on it. That's what I think she heard,
Speaker 1: and that hurts that. I was like, I felt bad.
Speaker 1: I was like, oh, you know what, maybe I should
Speaker 1: not even share that with anybody. But like going back
Speaker 1: to the beginning of our conversation, I always had this
Speaker 1: like nagging like, oh, why you know, never with the
Speaker 1: character and not that we're never satisfied with anything. But
Speaker 1: I I when I look back on the way I
Speaker 1: trained art, I thought, oh, you're pushing you know, and
Speaker 1: and I don't know, maybe it's just over speaking it.
Speaker 1: But anyway, yeah, I I always felt that that she
Speaker 1: had gotten like, you know, misinformation. Yeah, you know, that's
Speaker 1: the game of telephone. Yeah, someone accidentally said something else.
Speaker 1: But because listen, somebody said to me, oh, you don't
Speaker 1: like gospel, I said, are you out of your mind?
Speaker 1: I'm wearing a beautiful suit, i have a drink in
Speaker 1: my hand, and I'm talking with beautiful women. What the
Speaker 1: hell are you? And I'm getting paid and like my
Speaker 1: c in New York City, I'm home, I'm coaching, I'm
Speaker 1: with my boys. And I said, there, if there's a
Speaker 1: downside here, I don't know what it is. You know,
Speaker 1: never having never having you know, heavy heavy dialogue or
Speaker 1: heavy schedule. And I've been on shows where people have
Speaker 1: been like worked into the ground and their health is
Speaker 1: compromise and stuff like that. So for me it was
Speaker 1: just ideal. I come in, I touched the door, I
Speaker 1: put on this beautiful suit and h and everyone. I mean, honestly,
Speaker 1: you did so great with bart like you can't. I
Speaker 1: mean now, at this point, it's just implanted in our head,
Speaker 1: like your face, your body, your tone of your voice,
Speaker 1: the way you know you had hit the walk. So
Speaker 1: we obviously all of us, the cast or the fans
Speaker 1: or viewers watching, you can't picture anyone else playing them.
Speaker 1: But you know, us as artists were always our own
Speaker 1: worst critic. Like you know, I say that sometimes you
Speaker 1: can watch it, you know something back, Sometimes I don't
Speaker 1: like watching stuff I do. But I said it was
Speaker 1: like watching a soccer game. Back, I could have taken
Speaker 1: the ball all the way up and crossed it and
Speaker 1: passed it beautifully or scored, and I still will be like,
Speaker 1: why I should have passed it, you know, took one
Speaker 1: step less. So we're our own worst critics. So it's
Speaker 1: you know that I totally understand you you thinking about
Speaker 1: that in that way, But me telling you as like
Speaker 1: a colleague or a friend or someone who you know,
Speaker 1: me working with you. You made so many people happy
Speaker 1: from the studio, to the people watching, even your co
Speaker 1: stars like Kelly speaks so highly of you and Ed
Speaker 1: speaks so highly of you. So but I also think
Speaker 1: when we're hard on ourselves and think, oh, we should
Speaker 1: play this, I think it also helps us grow. But
Speaker 1: an acting coach one said to me too, don't be
Speaker 1: too hard on yourself. But don't ever think you just
Speaker 1: knocked it out of the park either. So I'm like, okay, yeah,
Speaker 1: and very very rarely when I think that you or
Speaker 1: I would think that we not get out of a park.
Speaker 1: It's just not I don't know if I've ever really
Speaker 1: had that. It's not the nature of what we do.
Speaker 1: It's art, and you're going to have a good day
Speaker 1: with it or you're gonna have a bad day. Because
Speaker 1: that's like even with auditioning and things like that, I'd
Speaker 1: always say to myself, good day or bad day, no
Speaker 1: big deal. It's just art. And some days the painting
Speaker 1: turns out well and some days not so good. And
Speaker 1: it also depends on who's looking at the painting because
Speaker 1: it's so you know, so subjectively one thinks it totally
Speaker 1: totally and m but we're just so lucky to get
Speaker 1: to do it. You know. That's what my bottom line
Speaker 1: has always been. Yeah, yeah, yeah, I tell the story.
Speaker 1: I was on Gossip Girl day long day, sixteen hour
Speaker 1: day gala, and you know how they keep reapplying makeup, pancake, pancake,
Speaker 1: you know, and a little anti shine, and so I
Speaker 1: had eighty layers of this stuff on and I got home.
Speaker 1: I didn't even wash my face. I have to my car.
Speaker 1: I drove home and a fire alarm happened, and I
Speaker 1: got to the station and then I hoped in the
Speaker 1: truck and this firefighter sitting opposite me, and he was
Speaker 1: gonna ask you a question, and I go, yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: we're on the way to a legitimate fire. And he goes,
Speaker 1: he goes, do you have makeup on? And I go
Speaker 1: yeah yeah, and he goes, oh yeah yeah, yeah no right,
Speaker 1: like that's what you do, right, yeah, yeah yeah. And
Speaker 1: I thought to myself, who in their career is ever
Speaker 1: gonna like be in the situation. It was just so
Speaker 1: funny the way he said it. And then he tried
Speaker 1: to like back off, but he's like, well, yeah, that's
Speaker 1: what you do, right. It's like to dot and in
Speaker 1: his shoes. You can't blame him for thinking that's like
Speaker 1: me and looking at me and look at me. It's like, bro,
Speaker 1: do you have like makeup? And I was like, yeah,
Speaker 1: I got tons of makeup. Um. But anyway, another little
Speaker 1: funny sidebar of both of those lives intersecting. Yeah, you know,
Speaker 1: looking at old brother ware bart out again. Yeah, and
Speaker 1: the masonsm the whole scene of the funeral or at
Speaker 1: the graveyard, and you know, I've seen a lot of
Speaker 1: pictures of Gossip Girl and Gallus, but there was something
Speaker 1: about what people were wearing that was just so iconic
Speaker 1: to me. It was so I hate to use the
Speaker 1: expression it was a funeral, but everybody looked everybody looked
Speaker 1: so fucking cool. The style is timeless. I'd wear whatever
Speaker 1: anybody was wearing today. It was just going back to Eric.
Speaker 1: He was really iconic. And that was just so that
Speaker 1: was such a home run the Black Loves. It was
Speaker 1: just everything. But so Ei don't looked great. They looked beautiful.
Speaker 1: I mean they look like off a runway going to
Speaker 1: It was just it was fantastic. It was fantastic. But
Speaker 1: you would expect nothing less. Well, yeah, there you are.
Speaker 1: You know, although you know what now that you say
Speaker 1: at one folk pah. I couldn't stand it. And Eric
Speaker 1: went to the wall at Lily and Bart's wedding and
Speaker 1: he made me wear tails. And I said, Eric, Eric,
Speaker 1: listen to me, listen to me, and I said, I'm
Speaker 1: not tall enough for tells me. He said, you have
Speaker 1: to wear tails. I was like, why, why, why can't
Speaker 1: I wear just like a you know, a cocktail jacketer
Speaker 1: or a tucks or They said no, it has to
Speaker 1: be tales and I said, please please, And in my
Speaker 1: head Robert Burke the actor, told himself that unless you're
Speaker 1: like six ft two or three or four, tails are
Speaker 1: just you know, not happening. And I had to wear
Speaker 1: the tails, and I was just like, oh, this is awful,
Speaker 1: this is all. Did you end up loving it? And ya? No,
Speaker 1: I never was. The one thing I hated him for
Speaker 1: it was the tails. But I was like, I feel
Speaker 1: like Liberaci, oh my god, please please don't and he's like,
Speaker 1: they want this, They've approved it. Everything is. I was like, okay,
Speaker 1: for you all, do it, but well you you're also
Speaker 1: you were and are still in such good shape, so
Speaker 1: you those suits didn't just fit because they were like
Speaker 1: fitted to you and they are brilliant amazing, very detailed suits.
Speaker 1: You also the way they fit your body, because you
Speaker 1: you you have a great not to make it weird,
Speaker 1: to be weird, you're very You're in very good shape,
Speaker 1: so everything looked even better on you. So my first day,
Speaker 1: my first day there, and we're going to do the fitting.
Speaker 1: On the day it's the first episode, the agent calls.
Speaker 1: He said, this is an offer, this is the show,
Speaker 1: this is who you're playing. And I said, yeah, okay,
Speaker 1: sounds okay, and I go there. It's at the Palace Hotel.
Speaker 1: It's this luncheon and they give me the suit and
Speaker 1: my twin brother. I have a twin brother who he's
Speaker 1: a big clothes horse. I'm not you die if you
Speaker 1: saw what I'm sitting in now. Anyway, he like, I
Speaker 1: forgot that you're a twin Yeah. So he's like, you know,
Speaker 1: Italian suits, London shirts, you know this. I mean, he's
Speaker 1: just all over it, all over it. To this day,
Speaker 1: he's all over it. So he comes with me on
Speaker 1: my first day and they put on this suit. I
Speaker 1: can't remember who it was, it's just he's like, bro, bro.
Speaker 1: I was like, he said, this is just incredible, and
Speaker 1: and I was like, yeah, it's really nice stuff. So
Speaker 1: that was funny because that first day he's like, whoever
Speaker 1: is you know doing your wardrobe really understands what's happening.
Speaker 1: And then I was going. I remember having a fitting
Speaker 1: at j Press one day on Madison Avenue and you know,
Speaker 1: j Press, and I show up with like, you know,
Speaker 1: dirty sneakers and dirty shorts and the baseball cap and
Speaker 1: they're like hello. So but then but then I hopped
Speaker 1: into the dressing room and I hopped back out and
Speaker 1: I said, cleaned up pretty well. So anyway, wearing the
Speaker 1: stuff that was the armor, that was the aesthetic armor
Speaker 1: that that Eric was providing. And once I put the
Speaker 1: suit on and the double winds are not and the
Speaker 1: whatever it was, the handkerchief in the pocket and everything
Speaker 1: and the pocket square that was that could be Bart
Speaker 1: right there. Then I just started to feel like him
Speaker 1: because I'm I'm not a suite guy. If I dress
Speaker 1: up in a suit like my blade, that's wild to me.
Speaker 1: He just looks so good. Oh well, it was fun,
Speaker 1: I mean, but again, all praise and honor to Eric.
Speaker 1: Eric uh he and you know what, Mike Fittings, chump, chump, chump, chump.
Speaker 1: It was just so quick. Very rarely did he say no,
Speaker 1: this is awful or this is a disaster. This can
Speaker 1: you come back later and I'll pull more stuff. It
Speaker 1: was always like, you know what, I had the same
Speaker 1: experience with him. I don't think in all four and
Speaker 1: a half years, I ever even was like I just
Speaker 1: you always trusted him, And even if there was something
Speaker 1: where I was like, whoa, this is like really out there,
Speaker 1: he still somehow would be like then pull out an
Speaker 1: earring and something else, And by the time it was done,
Speaker 1: I'm like, I can't believe how you just even shape
Speaker 1: that and it already looked good before, like he just
Speaker 1: really had. It's definitely art. I mean, it's you know,
Speaker 1: but but it's also your wardrobe karma I call it.
Speaker 1: You know, if you have a good wardrobe, commrade, that
Speaker 1: will chase you from job to job. And it's a
Speaker 1: prooduct of of your saying in shape too, Jessica, I mean,
Speaker 1: you know what I mean, and and seriously and being
Speaker 1: able to think certain sizes and and and and then
Speaker 1: having a certain posture or eylan or you know, to
Speaker 1: manifest the look. Yeah, I agree. You know what's funny
Speaker 1: that you say that I really do have a good
Speaker 1: experience with wardrobes on all of my jobs. Knock come
Speaker 1: wood now, but I'll tell you what I do. Feel
Speaker 1: like you might be right that follows you job your job,
Speaker 1: but i'll tell you right now. The tech stuff doesn't
Speaker 1: even if the email is script. It's like half the
Speaker 1: script comes when I'm doing this podcast, like someone's mic
Speaker 1: isn't working. So I'm good in the wardrobe department. When
Speaker 1: it comes to like emails and tech and all that
Speaker 1: I've I've lost there and i'd rather the wardrobe. You see,
Speaker 1: I'm sixty two. I can pleade like I'm an old
Speaker 1: guy who knows nothing. I just don't get it. But
Speaker 1: I'm telling you it produces stress. It's like, yeah, Bob,
Speaker 1: they'll they'll be dialing in at two o'clock and you'll
Speaker 1: be this, okay, okay, okay. And I'm trying to be
Speaker 1: amenable to whatever the not at all. Certainly podcasts, but
Speaker 1: I thought, you know, I do a lot of fire
Speaker 1: service podcasts and first responder stuff and for charity this
Speaker 1: stuff the other. But like the minute you know, oh
Speaker 1: here's the link, and the links not opening, and I
Speaker 1: just really it's just it's it's stressful. It's professionals, and
Speaker 1: we want to do a good job. We want to
Speaker 1: be earlier. And you know, yeah, I have no pretense
Speaker 1: as to, oh I'll get to it when I get
Speaker 1: to it, or I'm gonna be late. I would die before,
Speaker 1: you know what I mean. I still want to do
Speaker 1: the right thing. That's my emotional style. And even today
Speaker 1: I was like so like, oh no, you know, and
Speaker 1: but you were still you were still early on like
Speaker 1: it was all good. The thing is is I almost
Speaker 1: think on some of these like links and websites and
Speaker 1: and all these apps and all the platforms whatever, I
Speaker 1: almost think they try to make it so easy and
Speaker 1: so many clicks that it's almost like backfires. Because even
Speaker 1: still when you try to go on these apps and
Speaker 1: and TikTok and Instagram and this and that, it's not
Speaker 1: just like this filter and this is how you blow
Speaker 1: the thing. It's like fifteen different things you gotta hit.
Speaker 1: And I'm like, yo, this is too much. I'm good.
Speaker 1: I FaceTime my two sons and I'm pointing in the
Speaker 1: FaceTime at the screen. I'm like open the mic and
Speaker 1: he goes with the mouthful of sandwich. He goes pres
Speaker 1: you know, and I'm like where He's like down left,
Speaker 1: I'm like, thank you. So those are my tech gers
Speaker 1: um without, whom I hate. When they get indignant, they're
Speaker 1: like move that's all they say, move right, Let me
Speaker 1: just do it. My mom's like, well show me, show me.
Speaker 1: I want to learn. I'm like, Mom, we gotta watch
Speaker 1: my younger sister do it. I don't know. Oh my god,
Speaker 1: it is what it is. You know, we we we
Speaker 1: stumble to the goal. And you know it's no, it's
Speaker 1: no reflection on anybody. If you're not tech savvy. Like
Speaker 1: I said at the beginning, I where you know you
Speaker 1: should wear it as a badge of courage. I'd rather
Speaker 1: sit down with a good book, a real book, not
Speaker 1: in the book. Right. Do you want to talk about
Speaker 1: any of your charities or anything you want to us
Speaker 1: to know about that you got going on, or that
Speaker 1: we should can look into um for you before we
Speaker 1: wrap up, because you just you have such an interesting
Speaker 1: path and journey and life and and I knew that
Speaker 1: about you, but there's it's also what also I think
Speaker 1: it's so amazing is that there's things like no one
Speaker 1: did know, like you know the reason of why you
Speaker 1: went to become a firefighter. Like that's a really touching
Speaker 1: you know, it makes me want to tear up. Twenty
Speaker 1: years later, twenty one years later, and I get emotional
Speaker 1: when I speak about it. It's this, how how much
Speaker 1: that man he was the godfather of my children? Like
Speaker 1: the room I'm sitting there in here now is like
Speaker 1: this converted office space. And when I rented this house
Speaker 1: like thirty years ago, I subsequently bought it, this was
Speaker 1: his room, you know what I mean. So, like he
Speaker 1: was such a like a he was like a Buddha.
Speaker 1: He was marine in Vietnam. He was at black belt,
Speaker 1: he was a golden glove boxer. He was a yogi.
Speaker 1: He was doing yoga before anybody was ever doing yoga
Speaker 1: down at Jeebuk Mouti. So he was this beautiful human
Speaker 1: being and we had this great friendship and it really hurt.
Speaker 1: And like somebody once said, I read, No I don't
Speaker 1: know who said it, but I read it was the
Speaker 1: thing that transformed my life. It said, grief is love
Speaker 1: with nowhere to go. And so I figured I'd find
Speaker 1: somewhere from my love for him to go. And it
Speaker 1: was in the fire service. You know, why should it
Speaker 1: be Joe. Why should it be Jim? Why should it
Speaker 1: be Why can't it be me? These guys are all
Speaker 1: putting down their job and their life and their family
Speaker 1: to go and help down power lines, gas leaks, automatic alarms,
Speaker 1: cardiac arrest, whatever it is. And I was forty one
Speaker 1: and the people I went through the fire Academy with
Speaker 1: for two years like twenty one, twenty three years old,
Speaker 1: twenty four years old, and by virtue of my being older,
Speaker 1: I was listening. Oh my god, I was listening. And
Speaker 1: I'm not like a mechanically you know, inclines like oh
Speaker 1: the psaw and the coupling and the you know, the
Speaker 1: four I'm like, oh, ship. But I kept going and
Speaker 1: I got through. I mean I didn't fine and then
Speaker 1: rose through the ranks. I just stepped aside after twelve
Speaker 1: years as a captain to let like a new guy
Speaker 1: come up. And I still instruct like do fire training.
Speaker 1: I was giving well. I went on a cardiac called
Speaker 1: the other night that was really really you know, kind
Speaker 1: of traumatic. But you know, I say to the universe, like,
Speaker 1: how did I get here? I'll tell you a quick story.
Speaker 1: When I when I was pushing my first fire, I
Speaker 1: was on the hose and I'm pushing down the hallway
Speaker 1: and I remember saying to myself, I didn't sign on
Speaker 1: for this, and my friend's voice came to me and
Speaker 1: he goes, this is exactly what you signed on for.
Speaker 1: I was like, oh, ship. And then when the pandemic happened,
Speaker 1: because I drive the ambulance, I was sent for the
Speaker 1: vaccine like before anybody, and I was like, that's weird.
Speaker 1: And when the pandemic came, I says, I'm going to
Speaker 1: transport people with COVID. And then then I thought to myself,
Speaker 1: We'll wait a minute. I didn't sign on for this.
Speaker 1: His voice came to me again and said, this is
Speaker 1: exactly what you signed on for. So if you get
Speaker 1: out of the way, you know what I mean, and
Speaker 1: your life opens up for you. And granted, uh, it's
Speaker 1: not that I'm following another person's path, but I am
Speaker 1: discovering and the opportunity, like because I think we're here
Speaker 1: just pretty much to help each other. That's just the
Speaker 1: way I am. The way my mother and father put
Speaker 1: me together is hey, you gotta get out there and help.
Speaker 1: And that's like my sisters are all like burn Care,
Speaker 1: AIDS Care, Transplant, coordination cancer care, I mean heavy, heavy
Speaker 1: stuff and for years, like my sister and Margaret did
Speaker 1: um cancer care for forty one years. So there's that
Speaker 1: your life force. What makes you feel alive And you
Speaker 1: might not, well, oh it could be swimming, but like
Speaker 1: what really makes you feel alive, you know, like being
Speaker 1: a dad or being a mom. Of obviously that's just
Speaker 1: locked in, but then there are these other things. And
Speaker 1: it wasn't just the art, uh of acting. I found
Speaker 1: out that the firefighting was one of the things. I
Speaker 1: really enjoy it, the challenge of it, staying in shape,
Speaker 1: like putting the gear on, and you know, I'm like,
Speaker 1: oh boy, I wonder how many more years in this
Speaker 1: I have left? Anyway, So I feel incredibly honored and
Speaker 1: lucky and blessed to have had this path put in
Speaker 1: front of me. And I don't say that like in
Speaker 1: a smalty it's the that's my that's totally my truth.
Speaker 1: And I'm so lucky that I still like it because
Speaker 1: beautiful Robert. But I bitch and moan about it all
Speaker 1: the time because there's only two things, you know, uh,
Speaker 1: Like they say that acting there's only two times where
Speaker 1: we complain when we're working and when we're not. You know,
Speaker 1: but give an actor a job and they'll complain, Oh
Speaker 1: my god, isn't that what they say? With firefighting? It's like,
Speaker 1: but so yeah, that's that's pretty much. I worked with
Speaker 1: several firefighter foundations, the Leery Firefighter Foundation, the Joseph de
Speaker 1: Bernardo Memorial, Firefighter Nation for Firefighter Survival Training vet HACK,
Speaker 1: which is a veterans organization and probably leaving somebody out,
Speaker 1: but these are just guys who we get together, and
Speaker 1: it's always something very cognitive, like it's not just giving
Speaker 1: firefighters money, but it's training them on how to get
Speaker 1: out of a building. The contents of everybody's room. Fifty
Speaker 1: years ago, the contents used to be wood and cloth. Okay,
Speaker 1: now the contents is plastic. Plastic burns eight times hotter,
Speaker 1: and so the fire loads, that's what it's referred to,
Speaker 1: has changed, and so the methods and the tactics have
Speaker 1: to change, and it's a whole science. And the thing
Speaker 1: I love most about the fire service is that it's
Speaker 1: a learning culture. You're always learning, no nobody knows all,
Speaker 1: and you're constantly in a in a constant cycle of learning.
Speaker 1: And I love that because it's it's humbling, you know
Speaker 1: what I mean, to continue learning everything and helping people.
Speaker 1: There's I mean so many layers of that and helping
Speaker 1: people and probably the everyone in your unit work like
Speaker 1: how close you get. It's probably like a sport kind
Speaker 1: of means. It's so funny and learning from each other
Speaker 1: and helping each other. Then there's a sense of humor
Speaker 1: that goes along with that's just really like whoa you know,
Speaker 1: you hear people say anything. Sometimes you're like, uh, you know,
Speaker 1: too soon, you're too costic or to modeling, or really
Speaker 1: funny people who volunteer, because it's a lot to ask sometimes. Boy,
Speaker 1: when you know, when you're a paid firefighter, you leave
Speaker 1: the house and you go do your shift or you
Speaker 1: do a twenty four hour and your kids say goodbye
Speaker 1: to you. But when you're a volunteer firefighter, you're leaving
Speaker 1: from your house right and you're kind of in your
Speaker 1: own neighborhood, district, town, and your kids see you leave
Speaker 1: the house and they hear the page or go off
Speaker 1: and they hear that there's a working structure fire. So
Speaker 1: you're taking a toll your family too, you know, But
Speaker 1: that gets absorbed functionally, you know what I mean they
Speaker 1: always say, hey, you know, be careful, and I'm like,
Speaker 1: believe me, I will be right. But my friend was
Speaker 1: famously quoted to say, you can do everything right on
Speaker 1: this job and still get killed. And that's the truth too.
Speaker 1: So if nothing's ever what it seems, you should treat
Speaker 1: everything you know pretty seriously. And then on the E. M. S.
Speaker 1: Side of it, or even the fire side, you should
Speaker 1: treat everybody any house you respond to, they're calling you
Speaker 1: because they're having a super bad day, and and treating
Speaker 1: them as you would your family. It's a really great
Speaker 1: formula for for being a first responder. Yeah wow, this
Speaker 1: is like so incredible. Yeah, who knew bark bass shows
Speaker 1: up if you're in real bad trouble. Oh my god,
Speaker 1: Oh my gosh. Wait, I am going to go back
Speaker 1: and listen obviously, but that quote before you started telling
Speaker 1: me about all this grief is love? What did you say? Reef?
Speaker 1: Is love with nowhere to go? And so if you
Speaker 1: with I'm writing down, if you can find a place
Speaker 1: to put it, because you know, I've lost a lot.
Speaker 1: I'm sure you have, and you long and you yearn
Speaker 1: for the person, But if you can really super like
Speaker 1: put that love somewhere tangible where their spirit can see
Speaker 1: it and your spirit can see it or feel it
Speaker 1: or hear it or sense it. You're gonna be fine
Speaker 1: because it comes in waves, do you know what I mean?
Speaker 1: And you kind of ride the way. But again to
Speaker 1: find out how to do it, that's it's tricky, you know,
Speaker 1: it's it's a little tricky for sure. Man. I just
Speaker 1: I loved you said that quote, and then you got
Speaker 1: into telling me all about what you just did, and
Speaker 1: I was like, this is like amazing. I love that
Speaker 1: and and that is really what life's about. And you know,
Speaker 1: even people listening to this today, you will touch them
Speaker 1: in some sort of way with with just your story,
Speaker 1: like who cares about the whole Gossip Girl? Yeah, I
Speaker 1: mean they touched We act it's complimentary. They tuned in,
Speaker 1: they were fans of the show. They gave their energy,
Speaker 1: as you know, to us, and I think it's only
Speaker 1: fitting that we reciprocate by you know, deep die, We
Speaker 1: appreciate absolutely. They were like, it goes full circles for sure.
Speaker 1: But I love it because you would never expect coming
Speaker 1: on to listen to who played Bart Bath on XO
Speaker 1: XO Gossip Girl? You know, No, I'm serious. A lot
Speaker 1: of people are gonna be shocked and not because it
Speaker 1: can't be done. And you just don't really hear of
Speaker 1: people doing everything that you're doing or the reasoning why.
Speaker 1: And it's a really beautiful thing. And that's what I
Speaker 1: really like about life and about our jobs. I got
Speaker 1: to do a really fun, cool TV show with you
Speaker 1: in New York, and you're out here helping people and
Speaker 1: taking on other things and just just even you Wow, yeah,
Speaker 1: I don't I'm speechless. Well, I can't find the word.
Speaker 1: I'm speechless that that you asked me to come on
Speaker 1: and oh no, I'm so. I totally had fun. You know,
Speaker 1: it's always it's always the best play the bad guy.
Speaker 1: I was finally kind of boring to play the good
Speaker 1: guy because I've never hired to play the good guy,
Speaker 1: but like to come in there and really just you know,
Speaker 1: break you know, hearts, and break contracts and break deals
Speaker 1: and break trust with with actors like Kelly and and
Speaker 1: and the rest of the cast. It was just I
Speaker 1: had fun. It was fun. It was fun. Yeah, Well,
Speaker 1: we loved we love watching you, and everyone always had
Speaker 1: the best things to say about working with you and
Speaker 1: and uh yeah, it's it's you know, doing these walk
Speaker 1: down memory lanes and deep dives and stuff like that
Speaker 1: is always so great because it just you know, it
Speaker 1: also reminds me of like I never took it for granted.
Speaker 1: I was always so pleased and so blessed and very appreciative.
Speaker 1: But you know, when you look back and again, like
Speaker 1: what I'm saying is our paths crossing and you being
Speaker 1: able to share what, what and why you're doing everything
Speaker 1: is like what is so beautiful about that the show
Speaker 1: still has an effect on me personally. You get to
Speaker 1: hear you know, your story now and all the things.
Speaker 1: It's just it's really a beautiful thing that I'm very
Speaker 1: blessed and I'm like so honored and like happy that
Speaker 1: you came on and you so hopefully, well we'll see
Speaker 1: each other in New York sometimes at some point, and
Speaker 1: everyone that comes on is like, we have to actually
Speaker 1: like get together in real life, not you know, because
Speaker 1: everyone kind of may run, you know, I see Chase here,
Speaker 1: I see Laton here, you know, see Kelly there would
Speaker 1: be nice. Yeah, Chase with the boys right now, he's
Speaker 1: kind of like a comic genius. Like it's like it's
Speaker 1: so goddamn funny. I mean, it's just like we were
Speaker 1: watching the other night and uh, he is just just killing.
Speaker 1: He's killing. It's great. It's so much fun to watch
Speaker 1: it and everybody, you know, Yeah, obviously there's like everything
Speaker 1: she's doing her Yeah, yeah, Layton came on The Orville
Speaker 1: last season and worked with her, and then Taylor with
Speaker 1: her music, and Sebastian stand with the Marvel world and
Speaker 1: Pen with you and yeah, everyone's really killing it. And
Speaker 1: not just the main cast. There's a bunch of guests
Speaker 1: casts that came on that are doing their things, Tony's
Speaker 1: and you know, yeah, they were definitely some talent, a
Speaker 1: talented group for sure. Yeah. Well, thank you for coming on.
Speaker 1: I'll let you have your afternoon. Um, and I really
Speaker 1: really hope to see you in person and give you
Speaker 1: a hug one of these days. It would be great.
Speaker 1: Thank you so much, and best to you and your
Speaker 1: family and the continuation of this project and whatever else.
Speaker 1: Thanks Jessica, Okay, bye, Robert. Thank you so much Robert
Speaker 1: for joining me today. You are such a special person
Speaker 1: with so much knowledge about the world. Was a great,
Speaker 1: big heart that I wish everyone could just get a
Speaker 1: little feel for because you are awesome. I'm so grateful
Speaker 1: we reconnected and we need to make that happen in
Speaker 1: person very soon. And I want to thank all of
Speaker 1: you for listening. Make sure to subscribe wherever you get
Speaker 1: your podcasts, and meet me back here next week for
Speaker 1: an all new episode. XO x O. M XO XO
Speaker 1: is produced by Propagate Content and Meat Jessica z Or.
Speaker 1: Our show is executive produced by Lingley. Our producers are
Speaker 1: Diego Tapia, Kristin Romilia, Emily Carr, and Hannah Harris. Original
Speaker 1: music by Moxie and Lune, and the episode was mixed
Speaker 1: by Setho Lansky