Mark Consuelos: From Acting to Emmy-Winning Talk Show Host

Mark Consuelos sits down with us for an honest conversation about his life, career, and family. He shares how movement and fitness have shaped him both on and off screen. Mark opens up about his upbringing, moving from Italy to America, and how an immigrant mentality fueled his drive. He reflects on his path from college soccer to acting, his early soap opera days, and the lessons learned on set. Mark also talks about meeting Kelly Ripa, working alongside her, and the transition from acting in Riverdale to co-hosting Live with Kelly and Mark. With stories about family, challenges, and what it takes to thrive in entertainment, this episode offers an authentic look at Mark Consuelos’ journey.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:05):
Hi guys, welcome back to Post Run High. I'm your
host Kate Max and this show is where we explore movement,
not just the kind that pushes us physically, but the
kind that keeps us moving forward in life. Today, we're
joined by Mark and Suelos. He's an actor, host and
forever student of reinvention. Mark takes us back to the
very beginning, how he got into acting, the leap of
faith that changed the course of his life, and what

(00:27):
those early years taught him about resilience. We also dive
into how he's continued to reinvent himself over the years,
from beloved TV roles to his current gig co hosting
Live with Kelly and Mark alongside his wife Kelly Rippa.
Mark opens up about the discipline that keeps him grounded,
what it's like to share both a marriage and a
morning show with your partner, and how he balances the

(00:47):
demands of career, family and personal growth. All right, let's
get our post Run High going. Mark Consuelos, welcome to
Post Run High.

Speaker 2 (01:04):
Thank you for having me. Is it okay that I'm
sitting on your velvet chair and I'm I'm still leaking here?
I am still sweating.

Speaker 1 (01:11):
You know what you're not.

Speaker 2 (01:12):
This is normal, right, this is normal.

Speaker 1 (01:13):
It's funny because this is our first summer doing the podcast.
We started back in the fall and it was a
little bit chillier out outside. People didn't get us sweaty.
And my dad walked in in the winter and he
said to me, Kate, velvet chairs are not a good idea.

Speaker 2 (01:24):
I agree, and I was so worried. I put a
paper towel underneath me because it's just just just to
lessen the dampness.

Speaker 1 (01:32):
That's so respectful of you. Yeah, so guys, for our listeners,
Mark is currently sitting with a paper towel on the
base of the chair, which I'm not. I'm fully sweating
into this, but I think it's okay because this is
the chair that I always sit in, so it gets
a little that's good. We just ran a couple miles
in Brooklyn. How are you feeling?

Speaker 2 (01:48):
I feel strangely really good. I haven't run in a
long time. It's been it has to be a few
months before I get on the bike a lot. I
hike and walk a lot, but I haven't really ran.
So this is the first time, and I kind of
feel great. I am getting that little like afterword, that
high that you get out of post on h that

(02:09):
thing right there.

Speaker 1 (02:10):
Well, Mark has had a big workout day because we
did our run, but right before you did a lift out.

Speaker 2 (02:16):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (02:17):
So I love knowing that working out is a big
part of your life. It's it's been a huge part
of my life for a long time. But let's talk
about how movement shows up for you.

Speaker 2 (02:26):
And yeah, you know, I I always worked out. I
was in sports and so I was always in the gym.
And I will say that probably in the last ten
fifteen years, I really got serious about it, about doing
it the right way. I work with a trainer. That way,
there's no guessing, you know, and we really talk about

(02:49):
what my goals are and what do I need to
what I'm looking to do, you know, within the next
three months, within the next year, what five years looks
like for looks for me? What want to try to
save what, you know, what kind of flexibility I want
to work on, because it's important as we age, because
I'm fifty four and you know, Kelly's also fifty four,

(03:10):
and our goal is to stay moving as long as
long as we can, you know, because our parents and
their generation didn't really do this wasn't part of their life,
and so I'm trying to avoid all like kind of
the the medical history that is looming for me. You know,
I have diabetes in my family, there's some heart issues,

(03:31):
and so I'm trying to stay as far away from that.
And that's a that's been a really big focus for me,
at least in the past decade of really trying to
focus on that. Also, I was on a TV show
like eight years ago where everybody was like twenty and
twenty one and like twenty two and ripped. They're like,

(03:52):
so we want you. You're going to have your shirt
off for this scene. I'm like, oh no, no, no, no,
I've got to I and I've got a stay in shape.
I didn't do that for one TV show. I kind
of like winged it a little bit. And then I
saw that and I told myself, I'll never look like
that again. It wasn't like it kind of stayed with me,
I know, And it's I don't see it as a

(04:14):
superficial thing. I just see it as for me, as
like I can do better for for I and the
fact that it's going to be on air forever or
streaming forever. I want to really focus on least if
I'm going to do that for a specific role, if
if if the role demands that, then I'm going to
do the best I can.

Speaker 1 (04:34):
And that part was Riverdale.

Speaker 2 (04:36):
Yes, okay, yeah, everybody was ripped.

Speaker 1 (04:39):
That was a really good looking cast.

Speaker 2 (04:40):
It really was.

Speaker 1 (04:41):
But it is so true, like you're on camera every day,
almost every day, three times a week, you know, filming
live shows. You've been on TV shows for years, so
you know, aesthetically it is important to look and feel
your best.

Speaker 2 (04:54):
You know.

Speaker 1 (04:54):
I feel like when you when you feel your best,
you perform your best. But I also love the component
that you brought in, which is the longevity piece, which
you know when it comes to working out and lifting,
and you know, they say lifting is like one of
the best things you can do.

Speaker 2 (05:08):
And it seems like you learn something new every day,
some new piece of information comes out and like, oh,
I was doing that all wrong and you should be
doing doing this. And I think you know, for me now,
you know, especially with the talk show, I think for
me the focus is I would say ninety five percent
longevity feeling feeling good, and if the other five percent

(05:29):
happens to be the aesthetic part, then great, but I
really don't at this moment. You know, when I'm not
on a TV show where they're asking me to take
my shirt off every other week, it's nice to just
focus on what you said the longevity part.

Speaker 1 (05:44):
What did your routine look like when you were getting ready?
For sure?

Speaker 2 (05:48):
First of all, the first thing I would I had
a great talk with the writers and I say, hey, listen,
when you know that I'm going to have my shirt off,
will you give me at least fifteen days? A fifteen
day notice is then I can really dial it in
and like, really you need fifteen days. I said yes,

(06:09):
because I'm a stay in shape, but the TV shape
is I need fifteen days. And that would be you
know training, you know, five ish six days a week,
a lot, a big rest day. Would always have a
rest day and just really kind of eating right, eating,
eating a lot. I would eat a lot and hydrating.

(06:30):
We had this, you know, my son is a wrestler
and they have to cut weight a lot, and we
had advice from a guy who was in the he's
still an MMA fighter and those guys have massive weightcuts
to make weight. And the one trick was water like
using you know, safely water loading your body, tricking it,

(06:53):
you know, drinking a lot of water and then started
slowly reducing the amount of water as the as the
day comes, and your body still thinks I think this
is how the science works. Your body still thinks it's
getting x amount as you're reducing, so you're still you're
still releasing and getting rid of all those fluids. And
so on the day you're down to like maybe like

(07:14):
a fifth of what you're drinking, you know, the the
week and a half before, but your body is still
expelling all that liquid. So there's like it was that
it came down to a science. If you only look
good like that for like five minutes, so I would say,
get the shot, let's do the shot, and then but
that it's not what I'm saying is it's not sustainable.

Speaker 1 (07:36):
Do you feel like, you know, outside of looking good
on camera and all that, do you feel like working
out for you as a stress relief because you live
such a busy life.

Speaker 2 (07:43):
Yeah, that's one part that I didn't even talk about,
would be like the mental part of being able to
work out, And that's I would say, now for me,
that's really really big focus. I know, this is what
I'm doing for an hour. I don't even know where
my phone is. I put it in my bag. I
don't care who's calling me. They know how to get

(08:04):
me if there's an emergency and I'm you know, nobody
can you know. I'm just focused on that part, and
I kind of it's almost like a meditation for me.
I don't talk a lot during the workout. You know.
If I have a trainer, he just points me in
the right direction, say we say probably six words through
the workout, and that's it. I'm just focused on that.

(08:25):
I think for me mentally, it's if I don't work out,
if I'm traveling or something's coming up and I'm not
working out, it does have an effect on my like
stress level and my mental state. I miss it. I
kind of need it.

Speaker 1 (08:53):
Well. We like to talk on the show about movement physically,
of course, and we always start with a run, but
then we also like talking about how movement translates into
people's lives mentally, emotionally. And you are somebody that has
shown the power of movement and the success that follows
when you just keep going. So for the purpose of
this interview. I just would love to tell your story,

(09:16):
and I would love it if you could take us
back to the beginning and talk to us a little
bit about your early life where you grew up.

Speaker 2 (09:21):
Oh. Yeah, born in Spain and we moved. I was
just my mom had all three by all three of
us in Spain. But then soon after that we moved
to Sardinia. So I lived in Italy and I think
that was just for a couple of years, and then
we moved to the region of Pulia for the next

(09:43):
three three and a half years. And then after that
it was in the mid seventies and Italy there was
a lot of stuff going on in Italy. There are
a lot of uncertainty and there's there was some violence
happening with some political stuff going on. And my dad
was an American citizen. He said, maybe I should get
stationed back in the United States and we should raise
the kids in the United States. So we moved to

(10:04):
a little town in southern Illinois called Lebanon, Illinois, thirty
two hundred people. I think there's still thirty two hundred
people there. It's very small, it's like a little farm town.
Really cool main street and that's where I spent ten
years of my life from first grade until the end
of tenth middle of tenth grade, and then we moved

(10:25):
to Tampa for the last two and a half years
of high school. And that was a huge culture shock.
I went from a town of thirty two hundred people
to the schools almost that. The high school was almost that.
It was a big high school and Flora's a completely
different lifestyle down there. And yeah, just went to high

(10:47):
school there, went to college and in the Midwest for
a couple of years, transferred back to Tampa to finish
my school. Got into acting really really late. I was
a marketing major, talked about this on the run and
like I think, probably like the last few months of college,

(11:09):
I decided that I may want to give the acting
thing a run out of nowhere, and they started doing
productions down in Florida. During that time, there was a
few TV shows. They thought was they were going to
bring a lot more of the industry down to like
the Orlando area, and so that you could get an
agent there. And I got an agent and she sent

(11:31):
me on an audition to New York one weekend and
I never never came back. That was it. So I got.
I got really like I graduated like I think maybe
two months later I got my first job.

Speaker 1 (11:44):
Wow. Yeah, and that was your breakout role.

Speaker 2 (11:46):
Yeah, I was a soap opera called All My Children.
I met my wife. It was amazing.

Speaker 1 (11:52):
Well, I'm excited to get to meeting Kelly and that story.
Before we get there, I just want to back up
a little bit and dive a little bit more into
your early life when you moved from Italy your first
language you talked about on the run, but was Italian?
What was it like moving from Italy and then kind
of being in America? Did you have to did you
already speak English? I guess your dad was No.

Speaker 2 (12:13):
We spoke of tiny in the home my dad. My
dad's American. He's from Mexico, but he was an American citizen.
Remember the transition, like.

Speaker 1 (12:22):
You feel like it?

Speaker 2 (12:23):
I was. I think when we when we moved, I
was the one kid who wasn't necessarily in school at first,
so I was at home with my mom and I
was waiting to get into school, and we watched TV,
American TV all day, and I think the soap operas
are on, so I think I learned just by watching
TV and I don't remember struggling to learn the language.

(12:44):
Is that wild? I don't remember that at all.

Speaker 1 (12:47):
It's impressive how quickly kids learn. Did you ever feel like,
you know, compared to your peers in this small town,
that there was like a bicultural kind of thing going on,
right because you moved from Italy. There are these like
kids in this small town in Illinois. Like that feels
look like a culture shock. When I think about small
town with their two hundred people, I think honky Tonk,
like country music.

Speaker 2 (13:09):
Southern Illinois. Know, it's really really charming, you know, quintessential Midwest,
super nice, super polite, good values. We like literally walked
to church from our street. That's how close we lived
to our church. Community sports, you know, no football team
because the town was so small, but like basketball, baseball.

(13:32):
You know, it was really really great. But the one
thing I did to your point, the teachers knew that
I spoke Italian, and so they would ask me to
say things in Italian. And I remember feeling really self
conscious about that. I don't know why, but I was like, now,
if you know, I think it's a great skill, and
I you know, I use it for for for work
and for other things, but I was really I kind

(13:53):
of wanted more. I more wanted to fit into what
how they were than to stand out in any way.

Speaker 1 (14:00):
And you were the youngest of three in your family
family dynamic wise, Like, what did success look like in
your household?

Speaker 2 (14:07):
H I would say it's probably your typical immigrant mentality.
You know, school, excel do better.

Speaker 1 (14:19):
I love the immigrants for more.

Speaker 2 (14:21):
Yeah, part time job, sports, excel do better. We were
you know, I don't remember like being like obnoxiously pushed,
but that was just kind of what we did. Brothers
a doctor, sister's a lawyer, so that you know, there
was always there was always very you know, that was

(14:42):
kind of like the it was unsaid, but that's what
we did. That's that was kind of the vibe.

Speaker 1 (14:48):
Yeah, I feel like it's a common theme. We've had
a lot of people on this show that come from
and I'm sure you've talked to so many people that
come from immigrant households and backgrounds, and the one commonality
is definitely the hard work and like knowing how to
work hard. And I feel like it's cool that your
brother's a doctor and your sister's a lawyer, because I
feel like those traditional paths are also typically pushed.

Speaker 2 (15:09):
Yeah, I'm glad they took those roles. So when it
came to me when I when I came out with this,
like I'm going to be an actor, you know, deal,
they didn't freak out at all. And I think it's
also being just the youngest kid. I think that by
that time that your parents are a little more I
don't know if they're broken down.

Speaker 1 (15:27):
Yeah, what's the age app like, how much older?

Speaker 2 (15:29):
My brother's just a few years older than Okay, a
year and a half older than me, so we're close
close enough in age, right, you know.

Speaker 1 (15:36):
I mean you went to Notre Dame, so you were
obviously a smart kid.

Speaker 2 (15:39):
I was smart enough to get in.

Speaker 1 (15:40):
And then why did you end up transferring to the
University of Southern.

Speaker 2 (15:43):
Florida like that? You know, I really I think I
realized I wasn't going to play soccer. I went through
to play soccer, and I realized that, you know, I
would have been a good kid that did a gap year.
I needed. I needed to grow up a little bit.
I needed more of you know, I needed to be
it was never really on my own and moving out
and going to another school far away and it was

(16:04):
pretty cold up there I was living, you know, I
was living in Florida at the time, so that was
a shock, and so I decided to come back, and
I was toying with the idea of trying out for
the team at USF. They had really they had a
pretty good soccer team in their Division one as well.
And my parents smartly said, you did that. You didn't

(16:24):
work out, And it was a very short conversation, like,
you're not doing that, You're going to You're going to
finish you did, you had your chance, You're going to
finish school, and then just you know, more of this.
I was like, okay, and I didn't really I didn't
really argue with it, and I'm glad. I'm glad I
chose that path.

Speaker 1 (16:43):
I also feel like when you I mean, I have
two brothers that played D one lacrosse and I was
on track to play D one lacrosse, and I'm kind
of happy that it ended up not working out that way,
just because playing a D one sport, as you know,
like it just takes up so much of your time.
And I feel like it's cool that you were able
to then go to call like you were able to

(17:04):
have that experience, know what it was like, and then
go to University of Southern Florida and explore.

Speaker 2 (17:09):
I didn't really get you know, at Notre Dame, I
really I didn't get the full you know, I never
dressed for a game and it was just too you know,
we had turnover. We also had a coach. We had
a different coach by the second season, so there's a
big there was big turnover and just you know it
was it didn't work out. But you know it's funny.

(17:30):
I really never This is the most I thought about
it in a long time. I really don't. I don't.
I don't really think about that time so much. But
because look, everything, everything that happens, it doesn't really happen,
you know. I think it pushes you towards another another hallway,
another door. And who knows. If I was still at
Notre Dame, I was Air Force r OTC as well. Yeah,

(17:53):
so if I didn't switch, I who knows I would
have had a career in the military. Really, you know,
there's no way I would have gone into acting. That
was going to be my trajectory. Wild So I'm glad.
I'm so you.

Speaker 1 (18:07):
Have lived so many lives. I feel like you've tried
so many different.

Speaker 2 (18:11):
Things, different things.

Speaker 1 (18:11):
Yeah, when you switched to the University of Southern Florida,
what was you I know you were a marketing major.
Did you ever think that you would pursue a traditional
career path or did you know in your gut that
you were meant for something else.

Speaker 2 (18:23):
It was funny, you know, when I made the switch
and I talked to like I said, I talked to
my advisor, and they're like, I said, what's the easiest
track in business? And they said, marketing, it's the easiest
as much as there's the less math. I said, which
one has the less math in the business in the
business school? I said, they probably marketing. And it was
fun It was cool, and I didn't really you know,

(18:46):
I was nearing graduation and I just knew I didn't
want to wear a suit and tie. I kind of
wanted to figure something else and which in which? Which
is ironic? The last like few jobs jobs I had.
That's all I did, is I was wearing suits and
ties like I played a senator, a GM of baseball team,

(19:06):
a lawyer, you know, mob lord in Riverdale. So I
was always and it was it wasn't lost on me
that I became an actress. I didn't have to do that,
but that's all I wore. So I don't know if
that was a good enough, good enough reason why not
to go into business, was that I didn't want to
wear a shirt, a suit and tie.

Speaker 1 (19:26):
And then let's talk about the journey into becoming a performer,
like how did you start, you know, putting yourself out
there performance wise? Like how did you start getting into acting?
Because you know that the hard thing about acting, I
feel like is there's some people that have been in
it for so many years, and then there's people like
yourself that do get into it, you know, post college.
And we interviewed Henry Golding and he randomly became casted

(19:48):
for the lead role in Crazy Rich Asians, So you
do hear about those stories, So like, what was the
entry way for you.

Speaker 2 (19:55):
I a buddy of mine was going to this weekend
acting on camera acting course in a strip mall outside
of Tampa, Florida, and he said, come with me. I
think it'd be cool. And I said, I think this
is a scam. He's like, no, it's cool, man. There's
got this real casting director from New York. He's gonna

(20:16):
come and he's gonna, he's gonna You're gonna get discovered.
I'm gonna get discovered. It sounded like a scam. It
was such it was such a scam. I went and
but it was great. He was I thought the teacher
was really really cool. And if you're if you're beginning acting,
I think I would advise probably not to start with
on camera stuff. Maybe you know, get into some some
more scene stuff. The camera stuff is completely different, I believe,

(20:39):
and I think kind.

Speaker 1 (20:40):
Of the confidence of even just performing, get.

Speaker 2 (20:42):
Into movement, to get into you know, breath, breathing, moving,
learning how to stand. But if you're just thrown in
front of a camera, you know, I that's that's just
that's my opinion. It's probably not not the right way
to start, uh, if you if you really will, really
want to get good. Anyway, So I did it and
it was like a long weekend. At the end, the

(21:04):
teacher said, hey, this this was something that you like
and it seems like to be working for you. I
gave me a number of a teacher in Tampa who
had a theater group, and so I went there next
and I said, this guy sent me here. She said, great.
And that opened my world up to like the craft
and how you work. And I wouldn't say it it

(21:28):
was like a method, but it was sort of a
method type of performance preparation for acting. And I was
really fascinated with that, and through that, I got an
agent quickly, and and like I said, a couple months
after I graduated college. So the whole like acting, I'm

(21:49):
going to do this for a living thing was probably
like a five month journey. And what's funny is I
came up. It was quick. I came up to New
York for a wedding. Uh actually was in Pennsylvania, but
we had some It was like a short drive over
to New York. And this is before I graduated college.
I said, I'm going to research some of the studios

(22:12):
here in the city, some of the you know, the
Meisner Studio or HB Studios or I had a list
and I went and visited and took information. My goal
was to, you know, get a job at a restaurant
and study, like study during the day, get a job
at you know, work at night, and become like a
real actor. I had no interest in going to Los Angeles.

(22:34):
I thought New York was like where I would I
would do it. And actually I was able to stay
on the couch of one of my buddies that I
went to school with at Notre Dame. He was working downtown.
He said, come up, you can come over and stay
with me and you go look at schools and we'll
hang out for the weekend. And I remember walking into
one of these studios and I had like a little

(22:59):
brown bag of food with me because it was like lunchtime.
And I just walk in and I interrupted a meeting.
There was like a meeting going on, and I knew that,
and like, I said, hi, and like, how can we
help you? I said, oh, And they see that I
have a brown bag, like it looks like food, and
they oh, is that? And they thought I was the

(23:21):
delivery guy bringing them the lunch for this meeting. I said, oh, no, no, no,
I'm just from I'm from Tampa and I'm here to
you know it was it's one of those high flutent schools.
I'm not going to tell you which one it is.
I probably should, but I don't. I I don't have to.
And they said, I'm here to get some information on
your program because I want to be an actor. And

(23:44):
this guy read me. He said, first of all, you've
interrupted a meeting. Okay, this is not the time or
the place. There's a two year waiting list for the
privilege to audition to get into this place. Okay, so
maybe should do your homework before you you you you
should do your homework about that man. You should go
back to Tampa and maybe do your homework, he read me.

(24:08):
I don't know if that's exactly what he said, but
it was along those lines, along those lines, yes. And
so I walked out of that that studio and I
started having this conversation with myself and I said, what
do you are you crazy? You can't do this. This
is you're you're such an asshole like you this this

(24:31):
is a crazy idea. You have no idea what you're doing.
This is not going to work. You know all this
doubt like this is clearly clearly not You should have known.
This is you humiliate yourself. You have no idea what
you're doing. And I get to a payphone because there
was no cell phones. Then I get to a payphone,
I call my buddy that I was staying on his

(24:53):
couch and I said, hey man, and it was like
happy hour. He goes, how's it going. I go not good.
I said, Lisk, are you done with work yet? And
he said, yeah, Let's go have a drink. He'll be okay.
Tell me what happened. And so I hang up the
phone and I and this young guy a little bit
older than me. Back in the nineties, he'd be a

(25:15):
quintessential actor. He had like a leather jacket and like
a satchel off to the side and cool hair. And
he stopped me and he said, you were just in
blah blah blah studio And I said, yeah, he was.
I was there. It was a production meeting for we're
doing a performance. Listen, I'm in that program. The guy
has a cabin an asshole, and he apologized for that.

(25:38):
He said that he shouldn't talk to you like that.
Maybe that place isn't the right place for you. But
if you I when I first came to New York,
I studied with this coach. If you don't mind, I'll
give you her name, and it'd be a good place
for you to start. And don't pretty much like, don't
listen to that guy. It's gonna be okay. And he
wrote it down and he gave it to me, and

(25:58):
that change then that changed that whole negative thing back
to like, yeah, he's an asshole.

Speaker 1 (26:06):
He's a quick like sequence of emotions in this one day, all.

Speaker 2 (26:09):
In one day, I could have I was ready to quit,
Like I was ready to quit and not move on.
And I hadn't graduated colleg yet. So I was like,
that's crazy, this is a crazy idea. This New York's
never going to work for me too. Oh it can work.
And that was the moment that I don't know, it
was like an eight to me. It was like this
angel like like just came out of nowhere. I was

(26:31):
walking down it was like a block away. How did
he find me?

Speaker 1 (26:34):
I mean, it's it's so nice too knowing that that
all happened in the course of one day, because for
some people, like and I think there's so everybody goes
through periods of self doubt, and sometimes those periods of
self doubt can be months long. It's nice that for you,
in that one day, you got you know a little
bit of like a slap in the face and then
somebody being like, let's lift this guy back up, like

(26:55):
he wants to get into acting. It's okay, I've been there.
Sometimes you just need people to tell you that, like,
I've been in your shoes before, and if you really
want this, it's gonna work out.

Speaker 2 (27:03):
I wish I knew who that kid, that guy was,
that'd be amazing.

Speaker 1 (27:06):
Yeah, I was thinking that in my head. I'm like,
should I ask him if you ever ran into it again?

Speaker 2 (27:09):
No? No, I never saw him again. I never really
ever saw him.

Speaker 1 (27:13):
He really was an angel.

Speaker 2 (27:14):
Yeah, it was well, he was. He definitely like saved
the day and then went back and you know, had
a good time. And then literally two months later, I
was back in New York, you know, testing for a
job on all my children, and had skipped the whole
studio process. But you know, I think the fact that

(27:36):
I didn't have a more traditional education, you know, I
didn't study theater, and I didn't really I was kind
of just thrown into it. I worked, work, worked, and
from job to job to job, and that's how you
learn a lot too. And a lot of times I
would be on set and you're sitting around with your
castmates and one guy went to you know, Carnegie mel
and the guy went to Yale, another guy's Juilliard, and

(28:00):
there was a part of me that, and there's probably
still a part of me. I mean, maybe I'm over
it now that always thought. Man, I wish I would
have done that. I wish i'd have done that instead.
I wish I would really like I went into you know,
and and spend some time and and and studied a
more traditional path. And that's where the imposter syndrome starts coming.

Speaker 1 (28:18):
Everybody has impossible, Yeah, of course.

Speaker 2 (28:19):
And this is before this years ago. I would talk
about this like all these guys have like you know,
big you know, MFAs bfas and they've studied and they've
done they when they're talking about plays, I have no
idea what they're talking about, you know, or doing a
certain role on I don't know what they're talking about.
But but you're right. So it's the one. It's the

(28:41):
one once you're on set and as long as you
can do the job, it's it's the great equalizer, I guess.

Speaker 1 (28:48):
Yeah, nothing beats experience. You know, you can have all
the schooling in the world and get on in front
of a camera and freeze when you were dealing with
imposter syndrome though in those days and sitting next to
people like that that do have these Juilliard degrees, and
I mean that is intimidating, Like how did you deal
with that? Because obviously you went on to have this
incredible career.

Speaker 2 (29:06):
I just again, I'm just I have a big proponent
of just faked until you feel comfortable, just keep going comfortable,
just fake it until you just keep moving forward, just
keep moving forward. And I didn't dwell on it too much,
but I would. I would sometimes think about it and like, wow,
you know, and my my youngest uh was you know,

(29:29):
he did four years, got to do great Michigan and
studied theater, and you know that we had some conversations
about like, hey, do I really need to do this?
Can I just go study and like at a smaller
studio and just start auditioning? And I said you could.
But my recommendation is that, you know, have those four years,
take some time. You're still going to be doing the

(29:51):
young jobs when you get out, like you're not going
to miss you're not missing anything. You know, get get
get a good foundation.

Speaker 1 (29:57):
It's nice knowing that your youngest son is is getting
into acting and is an actor and you were able
to kind of give him your wisdom of being like
you know what I really do think like I was
in your in your shoes one time and I wanted
to have the education. I didn't have it, so do it.

Speaker 2 (30:13):
But it's some part of me also thinks like, yeah,
you could probably could have done two years and he'd
be still doing like he could have jumped. I don't know.
You never know. You never know.

Speaker 1 (30:21):
What did your parents think, you know at the time
when you were deciding to become an actor, like were
they all for it or did they ever have moments
of doubt?

Speaker 2 (30:30):
Like no, no, they were no doubt. They said, you
have your degree, you did what you did, you got
your degree, and go do what you want to do.
And they I think they they they tell me they
never worried, they knew, they knew one way or another,
I was going to figure it. If it didn't work out,
I would try something else. But they weren't concerned. They
didn't try to stop me. They didn't really talk about

(30:52):
a backup plan or plan B. They just said, you
got you got your degree, go do what you want
to do.

Speaker 1 (31:07):
When you were on All My Children for the first time,
which was considered a sitcom or no a soap opera.
Soap operas have a from what I was reading online,
there is a pretty rigorous filming schedule, right, Like it's
kind of comparable to what you guys do now with
Live with kelleam Mark or is it even more intense?

Speaker 2 (31:26):
Man? No, it's sixty pages of dialogue. You do one
an hour of show a day, where one hour shows
now at nighttime shows take eight days to ten days
to shoot.

Speaker 1 (31:40):
We do it in one day every day, so Monday
through Friday, Friday your.

Speaker 2 (31:44):
Show and sometimes parts of other shows.

Speaker 1 (31:47):
So you got thrown into it pretty quick, and.

Speaker 2 (31:51):
It was the great best school, really good training ground
on camera work, scene work, learning, how to memorize line lies,
a lot, a lot, a lot of lines. And then
when you move on tonight time, you're doing like you know,
you're doing like a few four or five pages, four
or five pages, six pages, seven pages. That's that's a

(32:14):
lot usually, you know, I can't think, I can't remember
how many pages four or five pages a day of
dialogue or maybe six six pages would be typical, but
not forty you know, sometimes I had forty pages of dialogue.
So you know, once you go from that to that,
you're like or if they now and then like we're
gonna change this scene. We're gonna change these lines. Is

(32:36):
that okay? I'm like, yeah, please, I can. I can
look at it and I can do it. Yeah.

Speaker 1 (32:39):
You get your reps in, you become a pro. What
do you feel like in those in those early years
that were filming the show, Like what did you have
to learn and have to learn quick? Was it memorizing
the lines?

Speaker 2 (32:48):
And yeah?

Speaker 1 (32:49):
Maybe what else I.

Speaker 2 (32:50):
Would say if all those fails, just know your stuff
frontwards and backwards, and it.

Speaker 1 (32:56):
Teaches you how to show up, to have to go
to something Monday through Friday. It's kind of an I
think because you had peers, you know, like your friend
from Notre Dame that are working downtown in Manhattan. It's
it's a good thing.

Speaker 2 (33:04):
I slept on that couch really for the first six
months after I.

Speaker 1 (33:09):
Got that job and you were dating Kelly.

Speaker 2 (33:11):
Yes, I remember, I slept next to a turtle. There
was a turtle in a little what do you call
it a little glass?

Speaker 1 (33:18):
Yeah, like a yes, yeah, whatever cage situation.

Speaker 2 (33:22):
Yeah, And I was on that couch because every twelve
weeks they can decide not to pick up your option,
so you can have like a year or two year deal.
But every twelve weeks they could say, eh, we're the stories,
We're gonna move this story in a different or they're
gonna replace you. So I was so I was so
new and so green, and I was not. I didn't

(33:44):
think I was good. So I was like, well, they're gonna,
They're definitely gonna, They're gonna, They're gonna find out. I
have no idea what I'm doing, and I wasn't until
I felt comfortable. It took six months for me, six
months for me to feel comfortable on that show, and
I finally got my own apartment, I got a lease.
I'm like, okay, I think I'm here for you.

Speaker 1 (34:02):
Kelly's like, finally, this guy's not on the couch anymore.
We talked about it a little bit in the beginning
of the interview. You touched on it, but let's dive
into how you and Kelly met, because it is like
the craziest love story I think I've ever heard.

Speaker 2 (34:16):
I flew in for the screen test. They flew me
in from New York to screen test, and I was
rehearsing the day before and she walked in to the
rehearsal hall where there's like coffee machines, like you know,
big tubs of coffee and still bagels and stuff. It's

(34:39):
where they did, you know, people would hang out. And
I was just kind of rehearsing there with with somebody
from casting. They're like, you know, and they were just
showing me around. So I kind of had some familiarity
with where I was going to be doing the next day.
And she walked in and we met, we said hello,
I said hi, and she said she was great. And
then I the next day or maybe over the weekend.

(35:03):
After the weekend, I read with her for the screen
test and she was great. And it was me and
a bunch of other guys. I you know, people asked me,
was it love at first sight? I got to tell
you that I was so out of my element, and
I was twenty three years old. And the idea of

(35:24):
being like on the make during like an an audition,
like the idea of me saying, oh, this girl is interesting,
I should probably try to get her phone number, or
oh my god, I'm blown away. I was so out
of my element. I was surviving, and so none of
those things were even like a reality for me. It

(35:46):
wasn't even part of like like I can't think about anything.

Speaker 1 (35:50):
No, you were in boy world and you were just
trying to make it work in New York. But I
love Kelly's version of it, where she was like, I
knew I was going to marry him the moment I
saw him.

Speaker 2 (35:58):
That's correct, that was her version, Yeah, And I was like, no,
I'm just trying to leave Tampa. I'm trying to get
this job and come to New York and do the
thing that I love and that I want to do.

Speaker 1 (36:10):
You know what, though, what I love about Kelly's version
of it is she's a Jersey girl, and us Jersey
girls know what we want, and she was like, I
saw Mark and that was it. I knew he was
my person now.

Speaker 2 (36:21):
Once I got the gig and we were working together
and I kind of relaxed into the job a little
bit and I felt more secure, and then we spent
so much time together and then I was smitten. I
was really into smitten.

Speaker 1 (36:35):
And you guys knew pretty quickly. You guys got married
pretty soon after, right, was it a year or later?

Speaker 2 (36:40):
Half a year and a half later, it's quick. Yeah.

Speaker 1 (36:43):
The beauty of how you guys met and now, in
terms of what you guys do. Now you guys met
working together, and now you're this power couple that I
think we were talking about this before, but you're one
of one of the first couples to host a live
show to show yeah, a talk show, I guess.

Speaker 2 (37:06):
Yeah, No, it's wild, it's wild. And this this iteration
is so much easier. I would say, it's a piece
of cake compared to doing twelve hours on a on
a soap opera and dramatic storylines and just getting married
and like really, you know, like navigating through that whole

(37:28):
thing was wild. Having a kid, our first kid. We
were twenty five years old, twenty six years old.

Speaker 1 (37:33):
Well, you guys got married young.

Speaker 2 (37:34):
Twenty five, had a kid at twenty six, and we
were just you know, just moving forward. So now the
beauty of us working together at this stage, all three
kids are done with college, they're out of the house,
and you know the past.

Speaker 1 (37:53):
They smile.

Speaker 2 (37:54):
Yeah, but also.

Speaker 1 (37:56):
It's like, I'm young, we're in the prime in our
christ through out of the house.

Speaker 2 (38:00):
You know how to get cut?

Speaker 1 (38:01):
Came is good?

Speaker 2 (38:02):
Do you give me fifteen days? I know how to
get cut?

Speaker 1 (38:05):
You know what that is? Fifteen days is very impressive.
We need like I'm getting married in September, we need
like the bridal breakdown on fifteen days.

Speaker 2 (38:12):
No, but I think now that we I don't know,
it feels like we have had this whole like life
and we're back to working together. It's I really, I'm
super grateful and I probably appreciate it more now than
I did when we were going through life in the beginning. Yeah.

Speaker 1 (38:31):
I mean, it's such a cool chapter to be in,
and you guys do such a good job together. What
I think is so impressive too about those early years
is not only were you managing this new career and
learning how to you know, do your job and do
it great, but you were also a first time parent
and you know, a first time husband, right, Like this
is your first time being married. So you guys are
managing you know, work while also real life and a

(38:54):
lot of a lot of life. Right, It's not just
like you're in your twenties and living for yourself. You
had a whole family.

Speaker 2 (39:00):
Our son now who's twenty eighth night. Yeah, I grew
up like this is I'm pretty much the third person
in your relationship and like, what are you talking about, Michael?
He goes we grew up together.

Speaker 1 (39:11):
Oh my god.

Speaker 2 (39:12):
Oh yeah, we didn't grow up together, but I see
how you feel like we were young when we had you,
and you probably deserve better.

Speaker 1 (39:20):
No, it's so cool having young parents. Over the years,
you've done so many different types of acting gigs. We
should talk a little bit about Riverdale because Riverdale was
Was that the first time you played a villain in
a show?

Speaker 2 (39:33):
Let's see a villain villain? Yeah? No, I think that was.
I was starting to veer because initially it was all
good guys, and then later on it started each role
I got started veering towards a little more complicated guys, like, wow,
this guy is kind of a jerk. This is awesome.

(39:55):
And so I think the he hire a lodge on
Riverdale I would say was the pinnacle of that moot.
That trajectory for sure.

Speaker 1 (40:05):
What is it like going into that kind of a role, Like,
was that exciting?

Speaker 2 (40:08):
After so much fun?

Speaker 1 (40:09):
It's fun.

Speaker 2 (40:10):
It's so fun because you have license to explore all
these things that you would never you know, because playing
the good guy and playing the hero of something is awesome.
That's great, you know, you get to be the hero.
But it's also it can be a little one dimensional
or you know, two dimensional. You know, playing a bad
guy you get to be sometimes sometimes they people love
you and they hate and they hate to love you,

(40:32):
and they you know, they love to hate you, and
and you know, sometimes they understand. Oh, now I get
why he's doing this, and then just gives you more
license to do that. No, I think it's I think
it's a lot more fun.

Speaker 1 (40:43):
Yeah. And the fun thing about Riverdale too was Kelly
started in a scene, right and your son, So you
guys got to even work together.

Speaker 2 (40:51):
Then to have my son Michael, you know, it's funny.
He was he was interning in Los Angeles at the time,
and I was doing I think a comic con in
San Diego. I think we were doing a comic con.
And Roberto, I think this is maybe I'm getting this wrong,
but this is all seems kind of like the wrong.
The right time, he said, hey, listen, we're going to

(41:12):
do this flashback episode where we have a young Hireum,
your son's not it. It's too bad your son's not it.
As is not an actor because he looks just like you.
I said, well, he has a sad card because he
did some voice over work as a young kid does.
He goes, oh, he has a sad card and I'm
like yeah. He said, well you think he would audition
for it? I said, let me ask him, and so

(41:33):
I called him. I said, Michael, do you want to
do you an audition for to play younger me for Ribello?
He said, well, I'm in Los Angeles. I'm is it
is the audition. I said, just down the road. And
so he went and he calls me. He said, Dad,
all the guys here that are reading for this part
look just like you. I go, that's the point, Michael,
that's but I think you probably like me. Yeah, you

(41:56):
look the most like me. And he got the job,
and he had in the first time he did it
was just a small, little, you know, group scenes and
it was kind of a small role. And then they
did the higher origin story where they asked him to
come back and he my god, he got to kiss
the girl, beat up the bully, you know, fight with

(42:19):
his dad.

Speaker 1 (42:20):
You know.

Speaker 2 (42:20):
He had the whole hero's trajectory in one episode. So
he had like a career in one episode. And it
was I think for me on that show. I had
a lot of highlights on that show. For me. That
was the highlight to be able to work with my son.
And on the days that we didn't work together, I
would sometimes come and watch and he wouldn't know I'm there.
I was there. I'd be way way way in the

(42:42):
back and I was And we didn't have scenes together.
I would just sit there and watch on the little camera,
you know in video village, and he had no idea
and I was just like, wow, I'm so proud of him.
He did such a good job. A highlight for me
to have that that we we will always share that together.

Speaker 1 (42:55):
And you guys were filming in Canada, right Vancouver, Vancouver.

Speaker 2 (42:58):
That was the great part of Also, Kelly and I'd
be able to work together now for seven years, or
for eight years, I was either in a different state,
different city, or a different country working and that's a
lot of time. Time, it's a lot of time, and
I think that the opportunity to do what we do now,

(43:20):
Like I said, I'm super grateful that we get to
spend this chapter together.

Speaker 1 (43:23):
Yeah, And I think like the thing too about like
working a part, it's hard, but at the same time
it makes you value being together so much more, which
kind of makes it nice. So now that you guys
are at this point where you're working together, it is amazing.

Speaker 2 (43:34):
I was gone so long. I would come back and
she Kelly had took my side of the bed and said,
you realize this is She said, this is not She said, no,
you don't live here. You live in Canada. Oh my god,
you're in Canada.

Speaker 1 (43:47):
She's like, it's colder on the side of the bed.
I'm officially is that.

Speaker 2 (43:50):
That's right. The air conditioning would hit that side and
she didn't like that, so she got on the other side.
And plus it's closer to the door so she can
get up to go to work in the morning. And
I just I had to come to terms with it.
I'm like, wait, she's right, I don't. I don't this
is I hear so you know so little that I'm
losing my side of the bed. So it's nice and
I got she's wait, she still has the side of

(44:11):
the bed. Now, she's still She kept it.

Speaker 1 (44:12):
I'm currently in a situation where I'm partitioning for the
other side of the bed because it's closer to the
AC and I like being cold.

Speaker 2 (44:18):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (44:19):
Yeah, girls, girls are like extremes, Like I like a
piping hot shower and a really cold room to sleep.

Speaker 2 (44:26):
In Kelly's piping hot shower, and if the AC was
never on, she'd be happy.

Speaker 1 (44:33):
Okay, Well, before we get into hosting, going from acting
to hosting, let's touch on this really quick. What was
the most challenging role for you to play as an
actor and how did it help you grow?

Speaker 2 (44:43):
I think they were all. I mean, I would say
that they were all pretty challenging.

Speaker 1 (44:49):
Maybe what's one that like taught you the most? And
it could be the soap opera where you're folding.

Speaker 2 (44:54):
I think the one I want, the one where I
learned the most, I think would probably be the show
I did Alpha House. There was two. I did two
shows back to back. I did Alpha House, and I
got to work with some great actors, John Goodman being
one of them, and I learned so much about just

(45:15):
you know. And I would watch him do these scenes
and all the other guys do the scenes. But every
time he did a take, it'd be a little bit
different than than the one before. He'd always was toying
with it, and I was like, oh, I should do that.
I should really like, Okay, I've got my way of
doing this, and maybe play maybe gave a few different
like in every time it was different and so so

(45:40):
so uh interesting. And then I did another show after
that called Pitch, where it was a It was again
a great cast, great writing, and I learned a lot.
I everybody brought their a game every single day, all
the actors. It was a competitive situation, but the writing

(46:02):
was so good that that everybody was just good and
everybody was really like prepared and they were trying to
like just it felt it felt like that, and I'm
you know, and again, let's see, I would say those
two I learned, I learned. I learned a lot. And
obviously Riverdale, you know, I learned how to do twenty

(46:25):
two episodes a year. That was a lot for for
a few for four years, five years, I forget how
many years I was on that show. That was. That
was a long I learned, I learned. I definitely learned
a lot there as well.

Speaker 1 (46:35):
Do you feel like a commonality with acting too, is like,
you know, because you're surrounded by some of the best
actors out there, is like the consistent or commonality amongst
them that you know, everybody consistently shows up and tries
their best, Like, do you think that's what makes them great.
What is kind of the key thread that you've found
with people?

Speaker 2 (46:54):
I would definitely say that. I would say that just
showing up and doing and being prepared and the one
coming out with the really really really good ones. I
often saw how kind they were to everybody and and
really like wow, really just you know, professional on set,

(47:14):
professional offset And I feel like sometimes it's the people
that are the most comfortable with themselves.

Speaker 1 (47:21):
Yes, and the most confident with themselves, Like if you
do the work, it's easier to show up and just
be a good person.

Speaker 2 (47:27):
Yeah, And they're not trying to prove anything, and they're
so normal. And I've been lucky enough to work with
a lot of really kind people.

Speaker 1 (47:44):
Let's talk about going from acting to hosting. Also, you
stepped into Ryan seacrest shoes right in a way. What
was it like getting going into that position?

Speaker 2 (47:54):
Like, and you know, I would say, since I had
subbed in, Yeah, I subbed in. I think they said
it was like over one hundred times, So I knew.
I knew, I knew, like I knew what this job
was about. But there was a level of I guess
weight when I when I signed on to be the

(48:15):
full time replacement and her partner and her co host.
Then it felt it felt different. It felt like I
had a huge responsibility. I didn't want to ruin. There's
something that she's been a big part of, you know,
and and you know, arguably built over the last twenty
four years, you know, took part of and also made
it her own. I didn't want to be responsible for

(48:38):
taking that show off the air. What if I sucked?
What if I did? You know, what if I did something?
What if I what if it didn't work? You know,
we're married, Like, this is not good.

Speaker 1 (48:48):
This is now when you came in and gave it,
you're all and guys, I have to shout out Mark
really quick because you started in twenty twenty three. By
twenty twenty four, you won an Emmy for what is
it the Best Daytime?

Speaker 2 (48:59):
Yeah we were best Hosting. Yeah we did. We We
got lucky. That's she's so good. I mean, she's one.
I don't know how much she's won so many times.
I think she you know, whatever doubts I had, she said, no, no,
this that people love this and you know when when
and I will I will say when. They when they
initially brought the idea to us, We thought it was

(49:21):
a really bad idea. I thought it was a horrible
this is bad. You like it because I fill in
every now and then and people dig it and it's
funny and we have a great we have a great relationship.

Speaker 1 (49:31):
And you guys are self deprecating though, yeah, well, because
it was a great idea and you guys are so
good together.

Speaker 2 (49:37):
But but then we thought, well, what if every day
that people will get tired of this? And what if
it's this is and what if it if God God forbid,
if it affects our marriage and you know, and you know,
but then when we sat with it for a few
weeks or a month or two months or how long,
the decision process was like, you know what again, you know,

(49:58):
I haven't been home for seven years. I'd love to
be home. We can do this, you know. We made
the pros and cons list, and we said, we've never
shied away from doing anything. Ever. We've like every decision
we've made was pretty ballsy, from eloping to you know,
we've always kind of like gone for it. I said,
let's go for it and see what happens. And it's

(50:19):
been it's probably been the fastest two years of.

Speaker 1 (50:21):
My life going from acting to hosting. We talked about
it on the run, but it's very different. What would
you say was like the biggest challenge for you that
you had to.

Speaker 2 (50:29):
The biggest challenge was looking straight into the camera and talking,
because as an actor you don't do that. Have rarely,
rarely Sometimes they say look down the barrel and like,
but that's rarely. Do you break, do you go? Do
you look directly into the camera. It's almost never, So
that was a really big challenge. Also, I do this

(50:50):
thing which is a cut in in the like at
eight twenty eight in the morning, I do a quick
twenty seconds on the ABC local news in New York
City and they say, Hey, Mark, what's gonna Who's coming
on the show today? I said, well, today we have
blah blah blah, and we have John Goodman, and we

(51:10):
have this person, and we have this person and then
we have the inbox all right, and from and still
to this day, me being live on the local news
in New York freaks me out.

Speaker 1 (51:22):
It is freaky.

Speaker 2 (51:23):
I don't know why it freaks me out.

Speaker 1 (51:24):
Yeah, I feel like it's because we grow up watching
the news, right, and the idea that like so many
people are in their house is watching the news like
it's kind of something that's always on.

Speaker 2 (51:33):
And I want to be live on national TV like
the next in thirty minutes, and that does not freak
me out at all, But being on the local news
is every day I'm like, oh gosh, I'm nervous. What
if I say something stupid?

Speaker 1 (51:45):
Yeah, you don't want to mess it up. You don't
want to be one of those.

Speaker 2 (51:47):
I'm literally reading off a teleprompter looking into a camera,
and that's another thing reading, that's an adjustment off the time.
I'm not a good reader. Neither am I definitely undiagnosed learning.

Speaker 1 (52:01):
Just like the words jump around all over the place.

Speaker 2 (52:04):
Yeah, you know I see things, aren't you know? I'm
like what that happens a lot. So that's a skill
that I've had to get used to.

Speaker 1 (52:13):
Yeah, being word personally funny.

Speaker 2 (52:15):
Sometimes there's a producer her name is Shuley, and she's
next to the camera when I'm reading off the teleprompter,
and sometimes I say the craziest stuff and she and
she all of a sudden she'll turn on she go
because she knows what's written there, and she'll look at
me like, what are you doing?

Speaker 1 (52:35):
She's like, and you just said it so confidently.

Speaker 2 (52:38):
And then we'll go to commercial and she's like, what
what was that?

Speaker 1 (52:42):
But those miss hops, you got to make it a
little bit youse sometimes, you know, Oh for sure. Well,
I have one question for you that I just have
to ask because I've been watching Kelly for years. I
loved watching her with Ryan. I love watching her with you.
You're her partner, so you know her better than anybody.
She on camera is just she's so funny, She so quick,
She's got that Jersey energy in the best way. Is

(53:04):
Kelly as funny off camera as she is on Hilarious?
She is so funny.

Speaker 2 (53:09):
Yeah, she's funny. I mean she's is she funny?

Speaker 1 (53:11):
Like living with Kelly, I feel like it is the
funniest thing.

Speaker 2 (53:14):
She's She's super super I mean, listen, it's not like
she's making a joke every second. She's very serious and
she reads a lot, and she talks about heady things
and she does. She's very curious and she's whip smart,
and so we have a lot of those conversations. I
will say that when I go to a dinner party

(53:35):
or I know, I know, I'm gonna have like the
funniest partner at the dinner party. Like she is. She's
so such a good storyteller.

Speaker 1 (53:45):
And she's engaging with everybody.

Speaker 2 (53:46):
Everybody. Yeah, and she'll say, Mark, tell that story, and
I know that I'll get the first two sentences out
and then she'll take over, and I'm like, all right,
I'm not telling the story anymore. You tell the story now.
But we we we kind of we you know, we
play off each other really really well. And I will say,

(54:08):
what you see, what you see on the show is
what you get with her. She's and I think America
has a pretty good BS detector.

Speaker 1 (54:16):
Well I can say that too. Being with you, it's
so clear that you guys are it just.

Speaker 2 (54:21):
It makes sense.

Speaker 1 (54:22):
I mean, when you're live on television, you can't really
fake it. So no, but you guys are amazing, and
you know, yeah, you deserve all the kudos. Let's talk
a little bit about what's going on in your life
outside of Live with Kelly and Mark. You guys are
producing a documentary together. It's going to be one of
the first times we're seeing your family together on camera.
Comes out July twenty ninth on.

Speaker 2 (54:44):
ESPN, ESPN. Yeah, we bought We bought a piece of
a soccer club two and a half years ago, three
years ago, and the idea was to give back this
town their team that they had lost because the previous
ownership went bankrupt and the league, the federation sent this

(55:08):
team down to the fifth division, so they were in
danger of losing their soccer club. So that was like
and I was asked to get involved, and do you
want to be part of this? I said, this is
such a great story. I love this. Let's give this
city back their soccer team and we'll try to win.
And we won, and then we won again, and then
we made it back to where they were before they
were they defaulted. And during that time I got the sense,

(55:31):
this is such a good underdog story. And you know,
Kelly and I we had no connections on Hollywood. We
you know, our parents didn't know anybody at all. We
came in this as underdogs, and I felt sort of
kind of akin to this story. It made sense in
our brand. And we've had to work really, really really

(55:52):
hard for everything that we've done, and we've had great,
you know, great fortune and have been blessed, but we've
always had to work really, really, really hard. So we
felt the connection to this project. And you know, the
idea of making a follow doc capturing this side of us,
you know, owning this team was It started right when

(56:14):
we bought the team and we started developing the idea
and shooting some some footage to take to some some
you know, of the buyers, and luckily we convinced ESPN,
you know, to have a show on ESPN. As a guy,
for me, that's amazing.

Speaker 1 (56:30):
And as a soccer fan, as.

Speaker 2 (56:32):
A soccer fan, we produced a documentary for them. I
want to say probably about ten or eleven years ago,
maybe longer. It was about a high school wrestling team
in Florida. Yeah, it was called the Streak and it
was about the longest winning streak in the history of
high school sports was held by this team. And how
did I know the story. I went to that high

(56:53):
school in Florida, and so we went back and we followed,
and we took it to ESPN and we said, we
should follow this team. I think this is going to
end next year. We should we should watch it. If
a tree falls in the woods and nobody sees a fall,
did it really fall? And so they said let's do it,
and so we had it. We had a relationship with you.

Speaker 1 (57:09):
I'd love so not your first time.

Speaker 2 (57:10):
Doing it, but it's been a long time. It's been
a really really long time, and I love I love sports,
and I think it's you know, sports docks are metaphor
for life. They kind of has everything, as you know.
And I'm so excited that I can't believe we pulled
it off, that we got people to say yes. And
you're right. We would never do a reality show, my

(57:31):
wife and I we we've been asked to do and
we're like, we'd never do that, but under this content,
in this context, for this subject matter, it makes sense.
And by the way, it's usually it's just Kelly and
I at home now all the kids are gone. They
would never agree to do it.

Speaker 1 (57:46):
Are the kids in it?

Speaker 2 (57:47):
Lola does come in and out because she's a big
football fan, so she flew in from London.

Speaker 1 (57:53):
And does she live in London.

Speaker 2 (57:54):
She lives in London. London loves it and she flew in.
So yeah, that's the doc. It follows our first season
back in Sedia chi Was, which is the third division
of Italian soccer. It was a rollercoaster year. And you know,
as you know, in European sports, almost all the sports

(58:14):
that I'm aware of, there's relegation and promotion, so you
you're always at the risk of being demoted to a
lower division, which is catastrophic in many cases. So there's
that that that that that European sports has, unlike here
domestically in the United States, you know, the pro sports.
I guess you can get sold to another team or whatever,
but you're not going to a lower division. There's not

(58:36):
there's not that level of peril. So actually, I think
which makes European European football that much more interesting.

Speaker 1 (58:42):
Yeah, and I think it's so special for you too,
as somebody that grew up for a chunk of your
life in Italy. You've got Italian roots, right Bengo card No,
and now you are a co owner of a team.
I mean, it's amazing and I love the underdog story.
I think so many people can relate to that. I
also love knowing that you and Kelly, you know, we
didn't really but yeah, you didn't come from a family
that had actors and performers, and you made it happen

(59:05):
for yourself. And it's amazing knowing that Kelly did the same.
It's why you guys make such a good partnership. What
are you most excited for people to see in the documentary?

Speaker 2 (59:13):
I would I can't wait for you to see Kelly
Rippa curse so much when I take her to the
first soccer we'd been. We'd own this team for a
couple of years before she actually went over there, and
so I would go a lot. And so during the
season while we were shooting, we obviously she came over
this time as well, and I got to take her

(59:34):
to her first game. And it was a big rivalry game.
And we're in the stadium and the fans and the
other team are throwing like little pieces of dynamite on
our field boom, and then our fans are replying and
the curse words and insults, and she says, this is
just like going to a Philadelphia Eagles game. This is amazing.

(59:58):
It is that. And and Kelly, for me is are
for my money. Is one of the most competitive people
I know. It doesn't show she's so Jersey. She's so competitive.
And so I think seeing us experience Italy with this team,

(01:00:18):
why we're doing it. It's more of like a social
social movement, social project for this for this city, to
give them back something that they loved. And seeing us
on you know, seeing us at home a little bit too.
I think people will will appreciate that.

Speaker 1 (01:00:32):
Right. Well, the show is called Running with the Wolves.
It premieres July twenty ninth, and there's two other episodes
that follow. You said that Kelly's really competitive in the
Consoila household. Is our board games competitive?

Speaker 2 (01:00:47):
Oh yeah, she's playing maj On right.

Speaker 1 (01:00:50):
Yes, that's a hard game.

Speaker 2 (01:00:51):
It's it's not a board game, but it's a game.
So I'm learning. I'm gonna have to learn. I don't
think I have a choice. But she's super competitive.

Speaker 1 (01:01:00):
Well, this has been so fun. It's clear that in
all the chapters of your life, movement has, you know,
not just been a tool, but it really has been
an anchor for you. So thank you, so much, Thank you.

Speaker 2 (01:01:10):
This is great.

Speaker 1 (01:01:11):
If you guys are enjoying Post Run High, please be
sure to follow us on socials at Post Run High
and me at Kate Max and leave us a five
star review. Your support helps us continue bringing you inspiring conversations.
All right, I'll see you next week.