Jake Johnson

This week Brian welcomes actor, podcaster and Chicago sports fan Jake Johnson. After a deep dive into how the Bears will (or won't) sneak their way into the playoffs next year, Jake discusses his early days in the NYC sketch comedy scene, how a half-remembered urban legend became fodder for the creation of Drunk History, and how his love for absurdity influenced the growth of his character on the hit sitcom New Girl. Listen to Brian’s episode on Jake's podcast "We're Here to Help" - available now wherever you get your podcasts. 

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Ian wasn't like, that's my guy, right, He was like, Okay,
the people in here think he's the guy you this way?
Did you get to it again with less of your instincts?
Is there any way to do that with a different
voice and a different face. Hi, I'm Jake Johnson and

(00:28):
I'm excited to talk to Brian after the Packers choking
the playoffs.

Speaker 2 (00:40):
Hello, Hello, one and all, Welcome back to another episode
of Off the Beat. It's me everybody. Brian Baumgartner with
me today. As you just heard, is a fantastic and
very funny man, Jake john and he started out as

(01:01):
a writer, as a production assistant and slowly moved in
front of the camera to become the actor that everybody
knows today. Of course, Jake played Nick Miller on New Girl,
Gray on Stumptown, Doug on Minx. He is silly, he
is shady, he is sleazy. He really does it all.

(01:25):
And he has a podcast too, We're Here to Help,
very funny podcast with his friend Gareth Reynolds. They give
sage advice to listeners who call in with questions they
need help with, and he sometimes hosts super handsome celebrity
guests like me or actually me. See, I was just

(01:49):
on an episode. I had an amazing time. I answered
a question from a listener that I promise you this
you do not want to miss, so go check it out.
We're Here to Help with Jake, with Gareth and well
with me. So now that I've been on his podcast,
it's only right that he comes on mine and shares

(02:11):
his stories with all of us. Jake is a great guy,
very thoughtful, very smart, very funny. It's my pleasure to
have gotten to know him. Here he is Jake Johnson,
Bubble and Squeak. I love it. Bubble and Squeak. I

(02:33):
know Bubble and Squeak. I could get every mo lift
over from the night before. What's up, Jake?

Speaker 1 (02:52):
Hey man, how are you?

Speaker 2 (02:54):
I'm great? How are you?

Speaker 1 (02:55):
I'm doing awesome.

Speaker 2 (02:57):
It's good to see you again. I mean, look at this.
It's been it was years, and now it's like twice in.

Speaker 1 (03:02):
A row, the podcast era of.

Speaker 2 (03:09):
I have been thinking about it all day. For those
of you who don't know, I was just on the
We're Here to Help podcast with my new good friend
Jake and Gareth. I have to ask you, has there
been any follow up on the question that we got
asked on the podcast brief set up, they ask their

(03:32):
listeners we give advice there on the We're here to
help podcasts, and someone came in and asked a question
about a potential pornographic tape that she believed her parents
had made and no one had looked at. Did they
send you the tape? Have you reviewed it?

Speaker 1 (03:50):
They have sent the tape. Okay, we are reviewing, I
believe next week because Kevin is getting it switched over
right now so we could review it.

Speaker 2 (04:03):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (04:03):
The show is a call in advice show, and we've
kind of found the more ridiculous the calls, the more
fun for us and for the audience. And this one
was a woman found a tape in the attic of
her parents that said, you know, I think it was
you remember more than me, Brian, But it was like
wedding come a porno or sex or something that was

(04:23):
like it was like.

Speaker 2 (04:24):
An eight her eighty year old grandmother's like birthday party.
But then there was a note that said X rated.

Speaker 1 (04:33):
X rated That's what it was. Yeah, so we're gonna
be watching it next week. The follow ups have been
the key for fun for us to the longevity for
it because the callers become characters that we care about,
and we talked. We've now talked to certain people like
five times, and when they call in, we're like, you know, hey, Connor,

(04:54):
how are you what's going.

Speaker 2 (04:55):
On with the roommate?

Speaker 1 (04:56):
And he'll be like, let me tell you, it's been
mad at Florida. Fun.

Speaker 2 (05:01):
Man, Oh that was that was very surprising, but a
lot of fun. If you haven't checked out, we're here
to help, or specifically, I mean me, we're here to help.
Legendary episode. I some someone said it was the best
episode ever. I don't know if that was you.

Speaker 1 (05:22):
I think all of us, it was all the fans.

Speaker 2 (05:25):
It could have been my publicist, the studio. Well, let's
talk about you today. My most favorite subject you you. Uh,
we didn't talk about this too much when we talked
on your program there, but you do hail from Chicago born, raised,

(05:47):
big Chicago sports fan. I'll right, we've got a bear
smug you.

Speaker 1 (05:55):
Remember that on our show we were talking you. I
was asking you questions about the office. Yes, I was
talking about like the inner personal dynamics and who you
hit the hardest with. And Gareth goes, yeah, I've got
something interesting, and I was like, don't turn change the
subject because you know, as a guy who like you know,
honest sitcom and love sitcoms, I love the insider baseball

(06:18):
of it, right. I find those dynamics so fun, and
as an actor, it's great. But what he told me
off air was that you and Aaron Rodgers are good boy.
He's like, you guys are buddies.

Speaker 2 (06:28):
Yeah, I mean I'm a Packers guy. He and I
play some golf together. How do you feel about the
Bears this year? Do you let me ask you this?
Because I love I love to destroy hope. How are
you feeling hopeful now about the Bears? Very?

Speaker 1 (06:46):
Very Arry?

Speaker 2 (06:49):
Very oh very I thought you said Barry.

Speaker 1 (06:52):
No Chicago, Barry. I'll tell you why I am. Okay,
I am so Ryan Poles our gm uh huh he.
At first I was not sure. I was like, you know,
you always poach, and you go like, well, look at
what they did with the Chiefs, look at what they
did with this other team, and you go, we all

(07:14):
know the way businesses work. There's like one or two
people making the decisions and there's nine other people getting
the credit. And I'm like, look, because you had the
logo of AT and T didn't mean to create the eight,
and so he came over. I was not overly excited.
He made a couple moves that I thought, like, all right,
we got rid of Mac. We got Chase Claypool for

(07:36):
our second round. I was like, I'm not loving it.
That Carolina Panthers trade is going to go down as
one of the greatest trades in the last few decades
because we had Justin Fields and he's a quarterback. I like, so,
I've heard a lot of trash on him, but he's
he's a very good quarterback. He's really fun to watch. Yes,

(07:58):
we kept him for a year, which I think was smart.
We traded the number one, which no Bryce Young' school.
But I'll take Caleb Williams over him. And then we
got everything else we got, including Dj Moore, including you
know Durrell right, including Tyreek Stevenson the cornerback, including next year.
Second I'm like, ooh, Ryan Poles, let him cook. And

(08:22):
if you have a great GM, and now you've got
a top ten defense, and now you got wide receivers,
and now you got Caleb Williams, who's a potential star.

Speaker 2 (08:32):
I don't know. Brian Where do you finish this year?

Speaker 1 (08:37):
I think this year we sneak into the playoffs. Okay, okay,
I think we could wildcard it in. I think we
go for a run. Caleb Williams has to learn a
little bit. It's his first year. I think Rome Dunes
is going to be a stud, but this is his
first year. I think Keenan Allen, our wide receiver, will
be a one and done. But I think we will
figure it out. Our defense will take a step forward.

(08:59):
We're gonna win some big games. We're gonna go on
a run in the middle of the season where we
win like three in a row. Okay, and then I
think we sneak into the playoffs and we'll see what
happens there.

Speaker 2 (09:08):
So in the North, yeah, do you beat out the Lions?

Speaker 1 (09:12):
Well, we split with the Lions last year.

Speaker 2 (09:15):
That's not wasn't my question.

Speaker 1 (09:16):
Uh, I would say, I don't. I don't fear the
Lions as a Bears fan.

Speaker 2 (09:22):
Do you finish ahead of the Packers?

Speaker 1 (09:24):
Yeah?

Speaker 2 (09:25):
Yes, yeah, But wait a second. At the beginning of
this conversation, you already we were saying you're gonna sneak
in as a wild card. So you're Minnesota you scared.
You're scared of Minnesota. J J.

Speaker 1 (09:39):
McCarthy.

Speaker 2 (09:42):
No, I'm just trying. Well now, I'm trying. Now I'm confused.
You sound like a Bears fan. I love this so much.

Speaker 1 (09:49):
I love Okay, I don't think the Vikings. I like
their head coach. I think what they're doing is interesting.
I love Brian Flores. I think he's a great coordinator.

Speaker 2 (10:00):
Okay.

Speaker 1 (10:01):
I don't know about Sam Darnold. I don't know if
JJ is the guy, and if he is for a while.
I think Jordan Love is good. I think he's a
little overhyped. I think the way Packers fans, what I
say to Gareth is there the team that the belief
with the Packers is the goal is is to go
far but not win at all. So they're always really good,
but they're not like a top tier team.

Speaker 2 (10:21):
Wow.

Speaker 1 (10:22):
But the goal with the Packers is to go far
and then lose the big games.

Speaker 2 (10:27):
I don't think that's the goal. I think that's I
think that's what what it maybe has happened a few
too many times. I don't I disagree that that's the goal.

Speaker 1 (10:37):
No, I always say that that's what Gareth Reynolds my partner,
you're here to help. Who has a Packers tattoo? Okay
literally said, well, we're text.

Speaker 2 (10:47):
What is his tattoo? Is it just a G? Please
tell me it's just a G? It's just a G.

Speaker 1 (10:51):
I mean, it would be better if it was like
a G with like him holding it up. But we
were texting and being mean to each other the way
we are when the season goes on, where we just
abuse each other.

Speaker 2 (11:05):
Right.

Speaker 1 (11:05):
One of the things he said is because I was
getting at them about how you guys do notoriously choke
against the great teams in the playoffs. You do great
in the regular season. You guys are regular season killers.
And then when it gets tight, you know, you bet
against the Packers. And he said the goal of it
is to go far. And I thought, you just summed

(11:25):
up the Packers.

Speaker 2 (11:28):
Yeah, I disagree with that. By the way, if you
bet on the Packers last year in their last game,
you win. By the way, you think they choked in
their last game last year, I think they missed a
field goal. Yeah, not choking, No, I don't think.

Speaker 1 (11:43):
I think when I'm talking more of the choking. It
was every year leading up to that, in the last
few years where every year during the regular season, the
Packers looked unbeatable. And now the forty nine ers are
just a better tea. They're just now better teams than
the Packers. But there were years where I didn't see
a better team in the NFC than that, and then

(12:05):
they would get to the playoffs and then you would
see a better team. But last year, you know, when
they beat the Cowboys, I didn't expect that. And then
who they lose to? They lost to the forty nine ers.

Speaker 2 (12:15):
Yeah, they should have won. Yeah, but the.

Speaker 1 (12:16):
Forty nine ers were just a better team. And so
oh I remember that game. Yeah, they did choke. They
were kicking ass until the last six minutes of the games.

Speaker 2 (12:23):
The field goal, Yeah, but.

Speaker 1 (12:25):
Then Jordan Loved threw that like dog shit pass across
the field where he just got nervous and weirded out.
He just packered it. He just went like the game
was going great and then he just went.

Speaker 2 (12:35):
Like the goal is to go far and went, I
loes you see, you think that this bothers me, But
let me tell you something. The fact that you have
hope this year. I love, I love. What do you think?

Speaker 1 (12:51):
What do you think?

Speaker 2 (12:52):
You know? Just like the song says, the Bears still suck.
The Bears still suck.

Speaker 1 (12:57):
And so what do you think in terms of this
team if you actually look at their roster.

Speaker 2 (13:02):
I think that you don't know until until you get there. Yes,
you said Caleb Williams, there's potential huge, But what is that?
What is that we haven't seen him play a game yet?
I agree? I mean what our situation last year it
kind of wasn't close Stroud and Bryce, yes, and who

(13:25):
became the star?

Speaker 1 (13:26):
Yeah. Look, I'm not disagreeing that we haven't seen him play,
but as a betting man, I'm betting that Caleb Williams
is going to do pretty well.

Speaker 2 (13:34):
Okay, So the Bears win the division.

Speaker 1 (13:36):
You know, I think it's going to be close. Look
when I said I'm not scared of the Lions we
split last year, I don't know they you know, I
think it's going to be a three team race, Okay,
I think, and.

Speaker 2 (13:48):
Honestly, with congratulations for getting into the race, congratulations.

Speaker 1 (13:57):
But I think in terms of what's going to happen
with the NFC North, the truth is with the Vikings,
if we're being totally honest, they don't scare me. But
they have a good head coach and they have a
great defense, and Brian Flores is a real like I
liked him as our head coach when he was available,
we went Fluse. So I'm just starting to kind of

(14:18):
wrap my head around because he seems to be a
culture guy, and Florence seems to be less of a
culture guy more of a confuse your offense guy. And
he seemed meaner, and he seemed more Chicago, and I
was interested, okay, And so what he's done in Minnesota
is really fun on defense. So I think there's a
chance we could all beat each other up in the North,

(14:40):
and if we don't win the division, we could sneak
into the wild Card. I could see any of the
four teams getting in, and I could see any of
the four teams having a real dog shit turn.

Speaker 2 (14:53):
Interesting.

Speaker 1 (14:54):
I don't fully, but I don't think anybody from the
NFC North is going to the super Bowl.

Speaker 2 (15:00):
There you go, you've heard it, hot take here on
off the beat. No NFC North team is going to
the super Bowl.

Speaker 1 (15:06):
What do you think of that? Brian? You think the
Packers are going to the super Bowl?

Speaker 2 (15:10):
I think their schedule is very difficult.

Speaker 1 (15:14):
Do you think they're better than the forty nine Ers. No,
you can't. You can't. Tough to say means not a chance.

Speaker 2 (15:20):
It's tough to say because they're not.

Speaker 1 (15:23):
It's tough to say the truth they're not.

Speaker 2 (15:25):
It's tough to say. It's tough to say.

Speaker 1 (15:29):
You think the Packers are better than the Chiefs if
they get there.

Speaker 2 (15:32):
I think it is sort of an obvious argument that too.
Potentially there's that word again. Two of the best three
teams in the NFC are in the North. Yeah.

Speaker 1 (15:46):
So you you're a big So you like the Lions
a lot, you like the Packers a lot, and you
usually don't.

Speaker 2 (15:51):
I'm not saying I'm not saying who. I'm not saying
what I like. But I think in terms of the
roster and the construction and the teams that are out there,
I mean, who knows, Philly's probably going to be way
better this year than that.

Speaker 1 (16:02):
I was just about to say, you've missed out Phi.
I think it's a yeah, okay, I think Philly and
the forty nine ers are just roster wize and obviously
we all see once the season starts, you could build
a dream team. It's the same with our business. You
can get an unthinkably great cast with a great cool
director and a great script, and that movie and that

(16:24):
show is dog shit and I don't know what. And
by the way, it wasn't because anybody was like a
locker room cancer. It just didn't work. Yeah, so there
has to be whatever that magic is to work, and
that you don't know because every single season is different.
But constructra wise, the North is all pretty deep. But
I don't think anybody's top tier. I think construction wise,

(16:46):
I go Egles forty nine ers, but I think the
forty nine ers are better, and I don't think anybody's
even near the Chiefs, which leads me back to the
Packers goal. The goal was just to go far.

Speaker 2 (16:58):
Well that's Garret's comment. That's not okay, fair enough? All right, Well,
there you go, it'll be exciting, it's coming.

Speaker 1 (17:08):
Oh what do you think about your buddy's jets.

Speaker 2 (17:13):
I think they got a chance.

Speaker 1 (17:15):
And what do you think about him not going to
Mini Caamp.

Speaker 2 (17:17):
I think he had something to do. Now you know,
I try not to get on my soapbox here, and
this is with no insider information. He was there every
single day of voluntary camp. Every single day he didn't
miss a day. He had something he needed to do.

(17:38):
What he had to do is quite frankly, not anybody's business.
So that's very overplayed as far as I'm concerned. I mean,
he literally was there every day. Yeah, and everybody knew
that he wasn't going to be there. It doesn't it's
not like he didn't show up.

Speaker 1 (17:53):
Not a surprise. I got the media made it seem
like a surprise, but it's not.

Speaker 2 (17:57):
Yeah, it was ridiculous.

Speaker 1 (17:58):
And what did you think about the way your Green
Bay Packers treated Hall of Fame and your personal friend
Aaron Rodgers.

Speaker 2 (18:13):
I think it was time for a parting of the relationship.
I think it just and by the way, I mean
the Jordan Love situation triggered it multiple years before it
because he was playing so so well. That's why it
didn't happen sooner. And look, you know, he let them

(18:33):
know that he wanted to stay there, and I think
he would have enjoyed to stay there. I don't want
to speak for him. I think he's been pretty clear
about that and it was signaled that that wasn't going
to happen. So I think a restart for him for
them probably as well worked out for the best, and
you know, look, he had a tragic, tragic situation on the.

Speaker 1 (18:55):
New turf of the new stadium because he was kicked
out of his home by your team, Cora's achilles at
the moment of his career where he should be celebrated
and put on the shoulders of the fan base, but
instead he's kicked.

Speaker 2 (19:08):
To the curb. I'll tell you something. This is not
a joke. I know you're making jokes. I was there
that game on September eleventh, and I am telling you
before it happened, I have had the great, great fortune
of being at a lot of fantastic sporting events. It
was the most excited, energy filled stadium that I have

(19:34):
ever experienced, September eleventh, New York, after a whole knocks,
hard knocks, all the press, the hope, yeah, and then
it was one of.

Speaker 1 (19:44):
Those I'm an old Cubs fan, so we grew up
with this idea of a jinx. Yeah, And I don't
really believe in the jinks. I'm not deep into. I
find it fun to talk about jinxes and think certain
people are jinxes and organizations have the black cloud. I
was cheering for the Jets because of hard knocks. It

(20:05):
was just so fun. I like that coach, I like
the feeling I would I like whatever. That DB's name
is Sauce Gardner.

Speaker 2 (20:13):
Oh yeah, And I kind of.

Speaker 1 (20:15):
Wanted to see Aaron Rodgers because I did not like
I don't like the way qbs are treated, and I
don't like the way veterans are treated in the NFL. Yeah,
you make an organization so much money that the guy
finish his career. If he's got two more years, he's
playing at an MVP level. I'm excited to see him
have a great year. I still thought the Chiefs would

(20:37):
probably beat him in the end, but like I thought
it was gonna be a lot of fun. That first
play or second play injury almost felt like it wasn't real.
I was like this camp in New York, and you
knew it wasn't like a sprain. You were like, nah,
Aaron Rodgers is pretty tough. This is just to go like,

(20:57):
oh as an organization, as a fan, but I did
feel like that one. You guys got a little bit
of a.

Speaker 2 (21:02):
Jinks on you. Yeah. Look, I think their roster is
better this year. I think their schedule is you know,
it's not easy with a lot of the primetime games
that they have, but in terms of at least how
the teams were the last year, how maybe they're expected
to be. They've got an advantageous schedule. I mean, it's

(21:24):
tough not to see eleven twelve wins there and we'll
see what happened.

Speaker 1 (21:27):
If the problem with the NFL right now, and I'm
a big fan, I really like it, but it reminds
me of the Jordan era of basketball, where you go like, yeah,
I could definitely see eleven wins. I could see twelve wins,
but I cannot see them beating the Chiefs in Arrowhead
in the snow. Yeah, you go like all those teams,

(21:48):
you'd be like, the Trailblazers are looking good. They are stacked,
and they are gonna run through all the teams they play,
and then they're gonna see a guy named Michael Jordan
has a good buddy pit. They're not gonna do any
and you would go, oh, I think we are in
the And it's not like I'm saying a huge statement,
but we are obviously in the Patrick Mahomes era in

(22:10):
the NFL. They just keep loading up, they keep getting better.
They know how to win. I'm like, I don't see
any of these teams knocking them off.

Speaker 2 (22:21):
No one's ever won three in a row. Yeah, I
mean the Steelers, Yeah, never won three in a row.

Speaker 1 (22:27):
That's interesting.

Speaker 2 (22:29):
The Cowboys never one three in a row. I'm talking about,
you know, in the.

Speaker 1 (22:32):
Old Yeah, yeah, yeah, you're talking about when guys could
like rip cigarettes on the sidelines.

Speaker 2 (22:37):
Yeah, you're talking about there was a salary cap. Yeah.

Speaker 1 (22:41):
Well you're talking about a guy who was a lineman
and in the off season was a legit carpenter. You know,
when sports were just the greatest. How about with Jim
Leland of the Pirates used to rip SIGs in the
dugout and I remember it. It was the nineties where you'd
be like, used to smoke these like cigar cigarettes, and
I'm like, pretty cool.

Speaker 2 (23:01):
Now now they're not supposed to have HBBA even chewing tobacco, said,
bubble gup.

Speaker 1 (23:07):
The world has changed to the point of we would
use have a cup of coffee in the morning at
an afternoon game, rip some stags. Now they're all putting,
dipping and pretending it's bubble ishoes. You're like, yeah, we
still see.

Speaker 2 (23:19):
It, guys, all right, well, that's sports with Jake and Brian.
We'll see you next week.

Speaker 1 (23:27):
Traffic on the nine.

Speaker 2 (23:28):
Yeah, let's talk about you a little bit. Chicago. You

(23:49):
grew up there, now I heard read you know, we've
got an amazing research team here on off the beat.
You went to school for writing. Yeah, University of Iowa, which,
by the way, I know this is no joke, a
excellent writing program. What's it called the I actually know.
I spent a summer there.

Speaker 1 (24:10):
Oh, I mean I don't. I don't know if it's
ever the extual name of it. But the great writing
program was the graduate program. No, no, no, at uh
oh at Iowa. So then the undergrad had a good
ye were taught by the graduate students. But the graduate
creative writing program at Iowa, it is like, was like
we created novelists, you know, every year famous.

Speaker 2 (24:33):
Yes, yes, So you wanted to be a writer, Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 1 (24:38):
Well I started off. You know, we were talking a
little bit of this on ours. But like the pursuit
of acting, what it used to be, what the whole
goal was. I didn't have a way in to understand
what it was, or really what the goal was. I
grew up outside Chicago, so we had the second city.
You know, Bill Murray and the Murray family was raised
in the town right next to ours, so everybody knew,

(25:00):
like where the Murray house was, the golf course. They
created Caddyshack out of John Cusack was from the same town.
So you had enough people who had broke through, but
I didn't quite have a clear path at it. And
then in high school plays kind of started, and it
was the beginning of like theater and then what's kind
of cool about theater? And that's when like the David

(25:22):
Mammets and the Sam Shepherds and the John Patrick Shanley's.
I started reading those plays and I just thought they
were so cool, and I thought I could write one
of these and do these. I can't write and do
TV or movies that felt too you got to go
to Hollywood and you need some producer in a big
studio to give you a bucket of cash, right, and

(25:44):
I could put on a play. And so I just
started writing plays, and then we were all putting them
on and that became the beginning of it.

Speaker 2 (25:52):
What was performing of interest to you.

Speaker 1 (25:54):
Always but always, but acting acting never really was okay.
So it was performing in terms of getting laughs and
getting the story out. But the dream of being like
a chameleon actor and doing Shakespeare in the Park and
the craft of acting was never as exciting as storytelling

(26:16):
and being in it and the energy of a crowd
and hitting a moment. So it felt like as I
got older and met more and more actor actors, I
was like, Oh, that's a different skill set you have
that I respect, But that was never my main passion.

Speaker 2 (26:30):
Is it now?

Speaker 1 (26:31):
No, it's still all the same. It's the I love
being in an ensemble. I love having when you were
talking about the office and you'd say, like, the people
near your seats you form bits with. I love finding
rhythms and bits, and I love being on a team
and feeling like as a goal, we're all trying to
hit this. But I never if I get sent scripts

(26:55):
and I'm thinking of taking a job, I never think
too much about the character. First. I think to the
whole project, the whole story, and everybody else around. I've
never had to talk with my agents of like, you know,
I'm interested in playing a serial killer. That's the last thought.
And it took me years to realize, like, oh, everybody
doesn't do it this way, right, I felt like, Oh,

(27:17):
because they're more pure actors and it's a different animal, right,
because you're you started off as an actor, act like
you were doing you were saying you were doing theater
in Minnesota.

Speaker 2 (27:25):
Yeah, we're Yeah, we're totally different in that way. Yeah,
and so much so in fact that I yeah, even
the idea and you talk and I guess that that
makes a lot of sense. I mean, you know, when
you're a kid, then slightly older, Yeah, I mean Cusack,
Bill Murray and then the theater scene there in Chicago
with Steppenwolf and Shepherd and Mammot and all the guys

(27:48):
you mentioned, I guess maybe, and being in Chicago as well.
And now it's changed. You know. I grew up in Atlanta. Honestly,
the idea of movies and television and that it was
not there was not any no, it wasn't even like, oh,
I can't achieve it. I just didn't even think about it.

Speaker 1 (28:07):
Yeah, totally.

Speaker 2 (28:08):
It wasn't a part of my consciousness. I loved, yeah,
creating characters and thought that's what I would do in
the theater for the rest of my life. Yeah. Interesting,
I read you in New York. You went to NYU,
and you had a sketch comedy group called the Midwesterners
by the way, awesome name, thank you. Was that something
that was important for you and your development getting on

(28:31):
stage working with them.

Speaker 1 (28:32):
So the Midwesterners we called ourself sketch comedy because we
didn't know what else to call it. Okay, at first
called it sketchy comedy because the beginning of it was
we were going to fringe festivals. We ended up at UCV,
but we weren't playing, and that wasn't the goal. The
goal was write a play, and the arc of the
play has a bunch of different characters who get you there,

(28:56):
and a bunch of small scenes, and me and him,
my buddy Oliver and I we're just playing all the characters.
So we viewed it more like a one act play,
that it was a thirty minute play with five scenes
or five little acts. And while we were doing it,
we would rent little theaters in the Lower East Side
of New York like Pink Pony or Collective Unconscious or

(29:17):
all these like cool little spots in the late nineties
or Surf Reality. And as we were putting it done,
our audience were friends of ours and friends of friends,
so it was a young group of people in their
early twenties, and we would do a scene that would
be heavy and everyone would hate it, and then we
would do a scene that was funny and everybody would

(29:38):
love it, and then we would all go to a
bar afterwards and you would hear the feedback. So with
each show it just got more and more and more comedic,
and it became what it was. And then somebody from
UCB saw it and gave us a run. And when
we were at UCB, we were like, oh, we are
just doing sketch sketch now because all the stuff that

(29:58):
used to work at a fringe festival that was celebrated there.
And that's a weird transition. A scene that might not
have as many jokes per page, but you're actually acting
a little bit, and you're creating moments, and you're creating tension,
and you're playing with the theater that wasn't as celebrated
UCB was. It's funny, those are good characters. How many

(30:18):
jokes can you get? And so that we kind of
were changing what we were doing with the audience.

Speaker 2 (30:25):
But it's very interesting in a way. I mean, this
is probably reductive to what you were trying to accomplish.
But if you think about I don't know a lot
of Tarantino's work. I mean, there's others where it feels
like I've never talked to him specifically about how he
constructs an overall movie. But the idea of creating sort

(30:47):
of set pieces, right, a set piece meaning like I'm
speaking for some people listening, like a set piece might
be an extended scene that exists. And then I feel
like what a lot of people attempt to do is
find that connective tissue which brings you from scene to scene.
But there's something almost yeah, like some of Tarantino's work

(31:11):
where it's just like, Nope, that's the scene. Yeah, and
then the next one is something totally different with totally
different characters. And then by the time we get to
the end, we've got some callbacks, we've got some references
to that. That's a very interesting way to me of
creating a piece of theater.

Speaker 1 (31:31):
Yeah, well it was also we were really young, was
also really excited, and it was very inexpensive because we
weren't building sets right, So the whole changes were the
small costumes we put on and our performances. But I
think my buddy who ended up going to Berlin to
do a Kenneth Laundergren play and I ended up going
out to LA. Was we realized we were loving different stuff, okay,

(31:56):
And what I was loving is we can create something
that can affect this audience, and we as like a room,
are one thing and we all kind of it all
peaked at this one moment together. But the details of
how we got there, I think are interchangeable. And so
to me, the meat and potatoes and the thing that

(32:17):
was really exciting was not like I entered this character
and I lost myself and I really understood what we
were trying to say by doing the same thing over
and over and really nailing it, which I see the
art and I think it's really cool. To me is
it was? There was a weird magic in this room
and everything went a little different than expected and we

(32:40):
didn't even know, but they were part of it too, right,
Ben finishes and You're like, wow, that was I was like, Oh,
that's what I got addicted to.

Speaker 2 (32:49):
Yeah, you moved to LA and you were working as
a writer and a PA. Yeah were you pursuing writing? Yes?

Speaker 1 (32:58):
So when I what, I moved out so I I'd
done a my buddy Bill and I. We'd created a
low budget documentary type thing. It was two thousand and three,
so it's kind of before the reality TV explosion. What
we had created was just a reality show. We just
didn't know it. I'd gotten some money from a random
guy in Oklahoma. I was there writing a script with somebody,

(33:19):
and the guy, my writing partner's uncle, took us out
and he was just flexing on us all night about
how rich he was, how successful he was, and how
we have to work harder and just not like smoke
weed and drink beer pretend to be writers.

Speaker 2 (33:31):
Like.

Speaker 1 (33:32):
Because he was buying the dinner, we had to take it.
But at one point I said to him, well, I've
gone a project. That's all set, we just don't have money,
and I kind of improvised pitch to him an idea
called Project Joke. And the reason it was called Project
Joke was because the whole thing was a joke. I
was making it up as I went. But that is
Bill and I were going to travel the Midwest and

(33:52):
we were going to write a sketch show as we went,
And so every night we were going to perform in
a different venue, either a sketch venue or a stand
up you. We were going to interview people of what
they wanted in the sketch show, and then on the
last day, we were going to perform in Chicago to
a sold out audience, and you were going to see
how a show is written, and you were going to

(34:12):
feel how much an audience at the Funny Bone in
Omaha hates us because they did. And you know, Jerry
Seinfeld did Comedian where he was showing what it's like
on the road, but he was Seinfeld. And when you
were totally unknown, audiences hate you in a different way, right,
and audiences hated me. And I was like, I would

(34:33):
go up there and I would try something new. If
you did something you knew was going to work, they
liked you. But once you start failing and you're you know,
you keep pushing, they hate you for it. And I
get it. And so he said, what do you need
to make this happen? And I said, our budget's ten
thousand dollars and he wrote me a check for ten
grand and so I kind.

Speaker 2 (34:54):
Of at least said twenty if.

Speaker 1 (34:57):
I honestly, Brian, I had no idea about budgets. I
had no concept of money.

Speaker 2 (35:02):
I could have had a hot house and to travel
the Midwest. That seems slow.

Speaker 1 (35:06):
Yeah, whoa it was. It was a very uncomfortable trip. Yeah,
it was very poorly planned. So anyway, we went and
we did the trip, and we performed every night. We
interviewed like the mayor of Saint Paul, We interviewed kids,
We went to a library, and like, we did everything
we could to make it happen. And I moved out
to LA with the raw footage of that, hoping to

(35:27):
find an editor, hoping to like make it work and
have Round Howard by it and say, wait a second,
you're a star kid. This isn't project joke, this is
project Hollywood. You're and you know it didn't happen, But
I like met a group of friends who I then
ended up working with the people I showed the stuff too.

(35:48):
We ended up writing a show that we sold that
new show to NBC. Then I got agents and managers
and started acting. And then the writing kind of faded
with the acting jobs because actings faster, you get paid
a lot.

Speaker 2 (36:01):
It works. Has anyone seen this? No? It's still is
it sitting unedited? Still?

Speaker 1 (36:09):
You know? I had I had edited like a forty
minute version of it at one point, and then the
tapes which were those like you know those old school
little Cassetts, they were.

Speaker 2 (36:20):
In shell out whether garage.

Speaker 1 (36:22):
Well, I said, yeah, something happened with them. Where my
buddy And after I got a new girl, I had
some money and I called my buddy and I'm like,
let's just hire someone to cut it together. And we
were in touch with somebody, and then there was something
that was happening where the footage was didn't melt, but
like they were having a hard time converting it, and
my buddy wasn't passionate about it, and I thought like,

(36:44):
why am I still beating this weird drum? What am I?
What's my point? What's my goal here? I'm the only
one going like wait a second. I was like, haven't
I done that enough in my life?

Speaker 2 (36:57):
Eventually you got a role on Derek and Simon in
the show Director Pirk by Bob Odenkirk. Now I understand
The Midwesterners was inspired in part by Bob and David
Cross's show, Mister Show. Was that just then amazing to
be able to work with him on that.

Speaker 1 (37:16):
Yeah, So that started. When I moved to LA I
was at the Lost Palmas and Hollywood right by, like
the old cat in the Fiddle.

Speaker 2 (37:23):
Oh yeah.

Speaker 1 (37:23):
I was living with a roommate and there was a
guy in the building who was just a legend and
you know, six foot six, three hundred pounds, always wore
a fridge. Jersey was driving an old Seabring convertible and
just ran that place. And he came knocking on my
door one day and was like, hey, man, want to

(37:44):
take some pills and go get some Hamburgers. And I'm like,
I do. And that guy turned out to be the
great actor Eric Edelstein, and so wow, Instantly I was like,
I'm just in his car. We're driving around in some
convertible and he's telling a million stories. He won his
car on a game show. He was hosting something for

(38:04):
some TBS show where he's like, I'll buy you shirts, man,
I got money, and I was like, you're the funniest
guy I've ever read.

Speaker 2 (38:09):
I love you.

Speaker 1 (38:11):
And he and I started deciding to do a show together,
which we ended up doing called This is My Friend,
and he was in a crew and in that crew,
Derek Waters was in it, Simon Helberg was in it,
and they were all at the Second City. Okay, through Eric,
that group came in and Derek put me in that,
I think because I was Eric's buddy.

Speaker 2 (38:31):
Okay, you mentioned Waters. Is this true? You were the muse,
you were the inspiration behind drunk History.

Speaker 1 (38:40):
Yes, oh my god. Yeah, but josephs mused is the
right word, Brian, because it's not you know who was
that woman who said, h Dana Fox, who was the
muse for uh that great like me where she said
she was the muse for uncut gems? Right, and you
know you're like, but you weren't in the creative discussion, right,

(39:02):
It wasn't partners. You guys were maybe hanging. I was
the equivalent of that. I just got drunk and told
a long winded story and Derek thought of the whole
show as I was talking.

Speaker 2 (39:14):
That's and that's true.

Speaker 1 (39:15):
We were.

Speaker 2 (39:16):
It was about Otis Redding's death, yes, which, by the
way I looked this morning at what his death was,
it doesn't seem that complicated.

Speaker 1 (39:24):
It was a fine crash.

Speaker 2 (39:26):
Yeah, So that's kind of it. Right.

Speaker 1 (39:29):
So the story I heard from the same guy Bill,
who I did project joke with. Okay, when we were
growing up in the nineties, pre internet, which means a
good story, you're not going to the library and looking
it up. You trust the narrator.

Speaker 2 (39:44):
Okay, this is a it's a conspiracy theory.

Speaker 1 (39:46):
St Well, these days we would call it that. Back
in the day, it would just be totally called a
great story. Okay, you remember when conspiracy theories were cool.
I do. Now it's different. They used to be cool.
But he told me the story when I was growing up,

(40:08):
and that is Otis Redding and his wife used to
write the songs together. She wasn't very credited because it
was back in the day, and you know, the sexism
or what have you. The day he died, they were
driving to the airport. She drops him off. He gets
out of the car, he stops, He comes back out,
and he says, promise me, no matter what happens, you'll

(40:28):
always be true. She goes, you're crazy. He says, promise me.
They do, They give each other a big kiss. He
gets on the plane. He dies. I told that story
and with the alcohol, it took forty five minutes, and
I was doing everybody's voices. And the way Derek was
looking at me during it, my thought was his mind

(40:49):
is just blown by a great American storyteller, an all
time banger. And that wasn't the case he had imagined.
As I was telling it, Otis reading standing behind me,
going like, man, would you shut the fuck? None of
them happened you drunk? So he said, can I The

(41:13):
next day he called and he said, can I come
over with Jeremy Connor, another friend of ours, and can
we get you drunk and film you telling that story?
And I said why.

Speaker 2 (41:29):
Well, no, no, you said absolutely, why of course?

Speaker 1 (41:36):
And then the dust settled of them, of course, And
I said why and he said, because I want to
get actors to reenact it, and I want Otis to
be in the room with you and whenever you lie
and like look at camera. And then at the time
I was a commercial actor, did you start doing commercials
with your career? No, you just started booking because you

(41:56):
were doing theater.

Speaker 2 (41:57):
Yeah, but I did the commercial thing. You did the
commercials I mean, I mean when I when I finally
moved to LA so we.

Speaker 1 (42:03):
Do that run and getting the auditions are so important.
Having your commercial agent think like now that's a good actor.
That really matters, right right. What I think about my
commercial agent thinking is like this guy who's not in
the union is for sure a drunk hobo. I'm like, no,

(42:25):
you got to think of me as like a serious
actor who's not getting black out drunk on a Tuesday
and line about it is reading.

Speaker 2 (42:32):
In the morning in the morning on a Tuesday.

Speaker 1 (42:37):
I was like, no, no, no, I'm professional. I will be
at that TJ Max commercial at eight am, right, I'm reliable.
I told Derek. I was like, no, man, I'm not
your guy. And then he was like, ah, come on.
I was like, no, I can't get drunk on a video, man.
And then he got another one of our friends, Mark
to do it and then called me up and said,

(42:57):
will you be in it and play Aaron or with
Mike Sarah and Mike Sarah At the day it was
pretty super bad. He was just in our group as well,
and he and I did the first one together where
we did like a duel, and then that one blew
up on YouTube and Derek got really started wow, you know,
and it was fun to watch it. Derek is such
a fun ideas guy, so to this day, whenever he calls,

(43:20):
he'll pitch like five ideas and one of them I'm like, Derek,
that's one of the best ideas I've heard. Man, he
still got it.

Speaker 2 (43:46):
We got to talk about New Girl.

Speaker 1 (43:48):
Yep.

Speaker 2 (43:48):
Now you had worked with Elizabeth Merriweather on film No
Strings Attached. Did she approach you about this or was
this like a straight audition situation?

Speaker 1 (44:00):
You know we had. I don't remember the origins. I
think she was working with Max Winkler on a movie
because he and I had done a movie called Ceremony together.
And I believe she was with Max and had seen
either Daois or something, because when uh, No Strings Attached
came along, I was auditioning for it with Ivan, rightman,

(44:25):
and she you know, when somebody in the room wants
you yes, Ivan for sure was not sure.

Speaker 2 (44:33):
Right.

Speaker 1 (44:34):
Ivan wasn't like that's my guy. He was like, Okay,
the people in here think he's the guy.

Speaker 2 (44:43):
You do.

Speaker 1 (44:45):
It again with less of your instincts. Is there any
way to do that with a different voice and a
different face.

Speaker 2 (44:55):
Let me walk you through a bit by moment by moment,
how I want you to say every word?

Speaker 1 (45:01):
Yeah, I think you're great, I'm happy you're here. I'm
trying to go like that, and I'm gonna have somebody
else do it. In ADR, but Liz was the big
champion for me. Okay, so when we did that movie,
she and I had a lot of fun and she's brilliant.
She's so funny. And what I love the most about her,
going back to the Midwesterners, is I like knowing what

(45:24):
the audience is. Some artists actors are really pure and
they do not think of the audience, and if they
think about the audience, they think that makes them hack.
They're just thinking about what they're doing and they really
hope the audience connects. I don't feel that way. I
like thinking about the audience. I like knowing where the
zone is. And the beauty of Liz for me is

(45:46):
she is such a clear, confident sense of humor that
she knows exactly what she likes and when she gets it,
she laughs right. So I was like, I don't know
exactly what the point of this scene is, what the
director wants, what the producer wants with paramounts, I don't
know all those answers, but I really want Liz to

(46:07):
be happy. And so when Liz and I would find
a group, she and I could text each other pitches
and she would say something like really funny. She was like,
I was really hoping there was gonna be like whale
sounds during the sex scene. I'd be like, you're insane,
but everything became we became buds. And so when that
movie opened, Fox picked up a new girl, which was

(46:28):
called Chicks and Dicks at the time, and she said,
I can't offer it to you per the networking studio,
but if you'd be willing to audition, I would love
you to do it. We'd love to talk to you
about it. And so she was a real champion and
really helped nice. Yeah, really quick to you though, how'd
the walk me through the office again?

Speaker 2 (46:50):
Well, I just landed into town. My line was, I
mean I identified the show. I was a fan of
the British version. I knew the sensibility. I got it,
and I said, they're looking for unknown people. And my
agent at the time her line to me was, well,
they're looking for unknown people, but not you unknown, not

(47:15):
like like not totally unknown. And now, of course I
totally know. At the time, I was like, what are
you talking? Now I get it. It's like they were
looking for you know, I don't even know if it's
true about him or not or whatever, but like Keckner
or someone like who had been in a thousand times

(47:38):
and just hadn't landed something that nobody in America knew
who they were, but there was like there fan base
in the Yeah, exactly do.

Speaker 1 (47:48):
You remember who you do? You remember who you were
going against?

Speaker 2 (47:53):
I do. That's another So when Steve left the show,
Neilson Jones, casting director, came to me, I'll never forget
this and said, so, I've been looking. She keeps everything.
She's like a pack rat in the greatest way, like
every piece of paper that's ever been written on sign

(48:13):
in sheets, all that, And she said, I was looking
for something to give to Steve, like from the audition.
I didn't really find anything, but I thought you would
be interested in this and it was just a singular
piece of paper. I still haven't And there were three
names Mine, Eric stone Street, and Jorge Garcia interesting, so

(48:37):
it kind of worked out for everybody, which is why
it's a good story to tell.

Speaker 1 (48:41):
It's a great story. Yeah, but that's those are really
an interesting three.

Speaker 2 (48:47):
Yeah, which would have been all would have been totally different.

Speaker 1 (48:50):
Yeah, but also totally it would have been a totally different.

Speaker 2 (48:52):
Show totally, And that's a good example of like, in
our world of acting, it's not all like who's the best,
it's like who offers something that fits kind of what
we were talking about before, It fits into this ensemble
in a specific Well, that's what.

Speaker 1 (49:09):
I was loving the most about when you were telling
me on Mine about the insider baseball of doing those
bits together. Because if you go back to New Girl,
once it kind of started and we started to build
a little bit early on, we were still trying to
figure out what it was right, and then they're just
we had we did such long hours, which you guys said,
you guys did too, Yeah, that we were always there.

(49:30):
I can pretend to be a professional actor who's serious
and ready to be there. I can do like nine hours.
And then when you start getting to like your fourteenth
hour on your third day, you're like, I'm nine years
old again.

Speaker 2 (49:46):
And I was a bad student.

Speaker 1 (49:51):
And you go like, now we're just cracking jokes, and
then the crew's joking with you, and then cast members.
Everyone's getting slap happy, and then the shit you're laughing
at off camera gets dumber and dumber, right, and then
there's a rhythm that somebody does, if it's an actor
or a crew member. We have this guy Joey Perla,
who was in wardrobe, who was just the funniest guy

(50:13):
on our set. Yeah, and the more tired we would get,
he would do something where he would walk over and
tell you about your shirt not being tucked in right,
and you know, Max and I would die laughing. And
then thirty seconds later they're calling action, but we still
have tears in our eyes. Right, And because it's running late,
everyone's going like, all right, let's go, let's go. So
you're going like all right, and then you're saying to

(50:34):
each other like shut up, shut up, like don't say
anything besides your lines, and then this scene starts and
instantly one of you says one thing and you're both
biting your tongues and you really want to laugh, and
then it creates a whole new rhythm.

Speaker 2 (50:48):
Right.

Speaker 1 (50:48):
And for what was lucky about us with that show,
which is why when I'm looking for something that piece
is important, is Liz was never mad at that. As
long as the material was funny, she was happy. She
wouldn't say like, hey, you missed this one line that
the writer did, asshole, pull your shit together. This is
your job as a professional actor. Which it is. And

(51:11):
if somebody says that they're right, but what she would
do is she'd be like, good, then she would yell
out say this instead, and then the whole crew would
laugh and you'd be like, now we're all just finding
it and this is the audience while we're part of it.
And you would have moments where you would go like,
we'd finish the scene and video Village would be laughing,

(51:32):
the crew would be laughing. We would be laughing, and
you would know that's gonna cut together.

Speaker 2 (51:37):
That is funny.

Speaker 1 (51:38):
Yeah, And when it happens like that, which is very rare,
that to me makes it like, oh man, this like
weird group all formed the crew, the vibe the right
you're like, it just becomes perfect. And if it's not
that I've realized now I don't like to play the
game as much. It feels like, if it's sports, it's

(52:00):
not always just basketball. If you have the wrong coach
and the wrong offense, it's that much fun to play basketball.
But if you can play in the right offense right,
it's like just the best game.

Speaker 2 (52:11):
Yeah. One hundred and forty six episodes, seven seasons. Your
first time you're playing the same character Yes, for an
extended period of time. You know, your world, your interest,
your focus coming from sketch where you're changing characters mid show.
Was this something that you enjoyed the longevity.

Speaker 1 (52:34):
Yeah, because the character changed. Okay, when I started the show,
my character, the description was the smartest guy in the room,
but two insecure to say it never been described as
that in my life. Comedically, I don't know what that is.
My character was. He passed, he got his law degree,

(52:57):
but the law of the land just didn't hould him in.
So he just went internal. Don't get that guy. What
I'm in new is conspiracy theories, so like, for example,
on that show. And I've told this before, but Zoe
was really funny from the start. She knew exactly who
Jess was. The writer knew Zoe's character. Max Greenfield as Schmidt,

(53:20):
was very clean comedically from the start. He knew tonally
he was going to be different. Lamorne was as lost
as me. We didn't know what we were doing. We
were just happy to be there. My character was kind
of the straight guy a lot where a lot of
it I was like looking at somebody, especially Zoe and
being like, God, damn, you're perfect and having like one
line of like you did what well? Your dress looks great?

(53:45):
And so I thought it'd be really funny if my
character had a best friend who was essentially like just
a random dude in the park, and it was discovered
by the roommates that I would be hanging out with
this old guy in a park and having full conversation
and it's later revealed the guy never talks. So you
just see like Nick hanging out with this older guy

(54:08):
who's his best friend, right, and then Nick thinks he
got like great advice and it's later revealed the guy
doesn't speak, and so you just then go like that
person's crazy. I fitched it to Liz, and to her credit,
she's like yes. And then to the writer's credit, they
did this whole arc where he like takes me to

(54:30):
this bath and he like cradles me in his arms.
But the character Tran became Nick's like best friend. He
never speaks in the show, but when my character would
have like a big conflict, I'd like go to the
park and be sitting on a bench and be talking
to him. That ability to change a character and grow
with him, and then have to do a scene where

(54:50):
Zoe walks in and I'm holding a rose and I
go like, you're as pretty as this. I'm like, I know,
but the scene before you saw me talking to a
guy in a park who doesn't speak, and that, to
me is when TV gets to do that. That is
really fun acting. But the idea of saying like this
thing was written eighty years ago and your job is

(55:12):
just to put your interpretation of these words. I thought like, well,
that's never what I thought acting was. I just realized
as I got older, everybody else disagrees.

Speaker 2 (55:25):
That's fascinating. I mean I love that perspective and also
your ability to make your own imprint. I mean it
sounds like Liz and the writing team not only allowed
you because sometimes you're not allowed.

Speaker 1 (55:43):
Most of my career is not allowed. Yeah, Or they'll
go like, I love it so great, here's what we're
gonna do. We're gonna do the scene, but we're not
gonna have the weird guy in the park who doesn't
talk right, And then they're just appeasing you. And you know,
when you're first starting up, then shut your mouth and
do your thing. But then there is a point of
your career where you go, I don't want to run
the story. That's your job. I don't want to give

(56:06):
notes on other characters. That's your job. But let's have
a discussion about this so that I can give you
the best of what I can do and you can
get the best out of your show because it's yours, right.
But that's not everybody, And that's a credit to Liz.
I didn't really appreciate her enough while we were doing
it because I didn't realize other people weren't like her.

Speaker 2 (56:27):
Did you think that it was time for the show
to end when.

Speaker 1 (56:30):
It ended, Well, no, we were going to get Our
show wasn't like The Office in that I know you
guys started slow and then you exploded. We didn't explode.
We exploded during the pandemic. So we never had the ratings.
We were never a popular show. La never loved the
show when we finished, Conan didn't have us all on

(56:53):
in director's chairs, you know, like there was no late
show where everyone's like, God, the public's gonna miss you.
It was We weren't that show, and we knew it right.
So season six, the show was gonna get canceled by Fox.
And it wasn't like a mean cancelation. It was like

(57:14):
you guys, we were good for the network. I know
they were like launching shows off us. At the beginning,
we had like a Tuesday night lineup, and so they
were like, I think Liz wrote to Zobe nine and said,
just respect, just so you guys know, they're probably going
to cancel it simply because the numbers are terrible. But
if we all wrote letters to Dana Walden, she does

(57:37):
she wants.

Speaker 2 (57:37):
To be cool.

Speaker 1 (57:38):
So we all wrote personal letters saying, can we at
least finish the season or the show? And then they
gave us like we had to like contractually sign something
because the guarantee is thirteen episodes and I think they're like,
we can give you eight, right, And so we finished
it them so by the end it was time to go.
But we knew it was like a ship with a

(57:58):
big hole in it, and that was that whole was ratings.

Speaker 2 (58:01):
You mentioned it during the pandemic. You Exploded became extremely
successful in streaming. Now with this new rabid fan base
for the show, I'll ask you the question that is
super annoying that everyone asks me every forty five seconds.

(58:22):
Would you return to it in some form if the opportunity.

Speaker 1 (58:25):
Rose, you know I've really honestly, first of all, what
would you do?

Speaker 2 (58:30):
Well, it sounds like your feelings about Liz are my
feelings about Greg. That if Greg got an idea around
it and he was a part of it, then it
would probably be an easy yes for me.

Speaker 1 (58:42):
Yes, that's exactly it. If Liz called and said, are
you ready to enter back into insanity, We're going to
do it as like a movie or whatever. Let's just
weird out. Let's go back to the huge hours, Let's
go back who it's like dating an old girlfriend. You're like,

(59:03):
there's a lot great, but like you know, things got
really weird and you know, let's go back to that
phase of life. If she's like, I fully get how
to make it work, and Zoe called and Max called
the morning Hannah and everyone's like, I'm in. If you
guys are in, I for sure would not be like

(59:23):
I will never revisit like sure, but it would have
to be. It couldn't start with an executive at like
Roku being like we have a way to do a
special on Roku and we're gonna throw buckets of money
at you. You go like, now, I don't want to
ruin the good thing. Nobody in that show. If you

(59:44):
do TV long enough, you don't need the paycheck. So no,
we can't just cash out and ruin for the audience
or take anything away. There was a loyalty to that
show from the base. We appreciate it. If it's going
to ever come back, it's got to be because create
Liz really feels like this is a story I gotta tell, right,

(01:00:05):
and then I would love to go back and be
texting all the time about Nick and battling stuff out
and figuring it out and going back to how we
shoot it and all that fun stuff.

Speaker 2 (01:00:15):
I love that. I Uh, I literally could talk to
you forever. I have so many pages here that we
haven't even touched. I of course do want to mention
we're here to help. The podcast that you're there very
close to me appeared in literally me. It is a

(01:00:39):
lot of fun. Everybody check it out. Well, let me
ask you about the Penis Show really quickly.

Speaker 1 (01:00:47):
Through me for a second.

Speaker 2 (01:00:48):
I heard your kids called the Penis Show. Yeah, yeah.
Is it going to have a life somewhere else? No?

Speaker 1 (01:00:58):
I think it's dead. I dead, Yeah, I mean it
was honestly one of those Llen our showrunner It was
fucking brilliant. Rachel Goldenberg our director of the pilot, and
the one of our EPs was great. Ben Carland was great,
one of the writers. The cast was awesome. The premise
was so fun. It took place in the nineteen seventies.
It was around a smut magazine. It was essentially the
first playgirl. Yeah, and it was I played a smut

(01:01:22):
publisher what's that bag who realized that there's an entire
market in porn that hasn't been tapped into, and that is,
let's show some hogs. Yeah, And I thought, what fun?
And I thought the writing was fun. We were on
HBO Max and then we were part of those tax

(01:01:45):
cuts where that ear where a bunch got cut off
and we were canceled, I think, and season two I
can't remember all the deed we were shooting the show.
We were just about done with two when we got
canceled and they hadn't even seen the creative And then
Stars bought us and we went there and we couldn't

(01:02:05):
promote because it came out during the strake and I
was like, you know, at a certain point, you just
gotta go. This one's not meant.

Speaker 2 (01:02:12):
To be everything.

Speaker 1 (01:02:14):
But they're like, okay, so you can you can't promote it,
but what you can do? And I was like, everything's
got to stop, everybody, this is madness.

Speaker 2 (01:02:21):
Yeah, I had one of those two. It was incredibly frustrating,
like you just got it's like, okay, here's a brand
new show, very different that nobody can talk about. Good luck, okay,
good luck.

Speaker 1 (01:02:37):
And then but then the beauty of our business in
my opinion, in this era, and it's slightly changing now
post strike, but we were in a great era where
there was so much being made so that like if
you wanted to play this game, you could, and you
could experiment around and if people didn't see it and
it didn't work, because of that, there was enough to

(01:02:58):
be had. And so I was sad about that one.
But also once the strike happened, I was like, you
know when the cast is like should we all get together,
and I'm like, guys, it's over, Like there's nothing. You
cannot promote it and it's on a new street, the
union rules, we got emails, it is.

Speaker 2 (01:03:20):
What it is. Well, I know that you're going to
be creating more content one way or the other, writing, directing,
come back on. We'll talk we'll talk. Well, actually, we
should make a day to talk after the season, really,
just because I want to see your tears. I want

(01:03:41):
to see your tears. And I'm guessing now, based on
this conversation, a whole hell of a lot of excuses.
That's really, that's what I'm predicting.

Speaker 1 (01:03:53):
After the Packers lose to the forty nine Ers in
the playoffs and I go, well, be I'm lot of
the team, as you go, No, no, it was a
missed field goal.

Speaker 2 (01:04:06):
Jake Johnson, thank you so much. It's always good to
see you. Let's do it. Let's do it soon. I
love it all right, Thanks Jake, that was great. Thank

(01:04:31):
you so much for coming on today. And as I
said before, it has been a pleasure getting to know you. Listeners,
go listen to my episode of We're Here to Help,
and then listen to all the other episodes too. That
should give you plenty to do until next Tuesday, when
you're going to come back here with me. Understood. Awesome.

(01:04:55):
Until then, everybody, have a great week off. The Beat
is hosted and executive produced by me Brian Baumgartner, alongside
our executive producer Lang Lee. Our senior producer is Diego Tapia.

(01:05:15):
Our producers are Emily Carr and seth Olanski, and our
talent producer is Ryan Papa Zachary. Our theme song Bubble
and Squeak, performed by the one and only Creed Breadth