Seth Rogen

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Question Love Supreme is a production of I Heart Radio.
Wait what stop stop stop the theme keep it going?
Stop with me? Wait you said that if you sit
next to Seth Rogen, you're gonna be rich, like on
the first of January. Yes, if I start the year

(00:21):
sitting next to seven, yeah, I'm gonna be Okay, here
we go, all right, Suprema Surema, roll call, Sema Suma,
roll call, Suprema role called, Suprema quest Love here thinking Yeah,

(00:44):
which is which? Yeah? Maybe I need to switch my
seat so I do can get rich roll call. I'm
just saying Suprema roll call Sua Sugar. Yeah. Yeah, I'm
a mess. Been smoking way too much Pineapple Express roll

(01:10):
Primama roll call. This is boss Bill. Yeah, back again
my friends. Yeah, this is the third line. Yeah, and
this is the end o Suprema Surema Rollmum roll call

(01:31):
Yeah with Seth of course. Yeah. I don't know what
to tell you. Yeah, this will be better than the
horse you went to a dark place Roma s roll call.
My name is Seth. Yeah, I'm feeling old. Yeah, hand
in New York. Yeah, I'm fucking cold. Frema roll call

(01:58):
sure roll. This is how we're going to start as

(02:19):
the God saw to it that we should have no
more theme. Keep it. Uh, ladies and gentlemen, Uh, this
is the newly rich new Voute Reese Quest Love another episode,
Happy New Year. This is January one. Everybody, how do
you feel good? Old and cold? How is your How

(02:41):
was your h holiday? Your festivities? It was old and cold? No,
we had a great time, of course, Okay great. Remember
did the checks come through? Yeah, the checks cleared. I'm
actually shocked because whenever um, any of your brethren come
on this show, you're you're you always, your role call

(03:03):
is usually geared towards roll. Yeah. Yeah, started incorporating the
Jewey Park, but just left it with the stone up.
I think. Yeah, I'm about to say, I think are
pretty like there's a lot of overlaps. Bill would not
approve anyway. I'm your host Quests Love joined the day

(03:25):
by my croonies, La Boss, Bill Sugar, Steve unpaidal surprisingly
isn't here? Yeah he? Or is he not coming? Or
is he we call him? Did we let him know?
Let him? You know, he does play sesame streets and stuff. Okay, son,
enough bagel jokes. We can make it out anyway. Uh,
not to staallymore ladies and gentlemen. We have comedian, director, producer, actor, writer,

(03:51):
leading man cannabis connoisseur um also uh advocate for sleeping
in the bed room under sixty seven degrees. We will
we will later, I guess uh Philadelphia music culture fan voice,

(04:13):
a man in the roots, Uh ladies and gentlemen and
in hip hop head and Canadian ladies and gentlemen. Please
welcome to the show. Seth Rogan wait, I gotta all right,
we this this is a show of rabbit holding. Let's
just start, all right. I'm a little I'm miffed, alright,

(04:35):
so I have to explain that I was very fortunate.
I was very fortunate to attend uh sets uh hilarity
for charity. Um shout out to a Venetian and Mary
Ellis Museum. Yeah. Yeah, so I went there and the

(04:57):
discussion of how much sleep does a person need to
have a healthy brain? Yes, yes, No, I learned a lot.
I learned that. As of lately, I'll say the last
two months, I've been back into the eight hour range
of sleeping because right because people were always like, when

(05:18):
do you sleep? When do you see? I was three,
I was three to five hour guy, and I was
told that you don't even reach r e M state
until six hours and forty seven minutes and for your
body to heal. And you know, I'm adjusting my lifestyle
right now. I'm trying to get back to a healthier place.
I gotta do somewhere between eight to ten hours for

(05:41):
the magic to begin. So but then you guys left
me with this, this gym of the room has to
be cold. Yeah, you sleep best if the room is
freezing before in the sixties, well yeah, my girlfriend took
that the heart and now reading night, Yeah, it's cold

(06:01):
as hell. It's been sixty degrees in the bedroom. Are
you sleeping better? No, I'm sleeping well. But it's not
like I needed to be Africa hot. My wife, Well,
that's why my wife likes it much colder than me.
And that's why they have heating path that's what we're
talking about. There's there's pads from mattress where you can

(06:22):
set the temperature so you can keep your side hot
and her side cold. And it's something that's through it's perfect.
I'm sorry, it's exactly right, but no, it's fun. And
I think I think as bed get older, they get
colder and as we would get older. Yeah, yeah, me

(06:44):
and my wife have kind of We were just talking
about how we like crossed over, like when we first
started dating, I was always hot and she was always cold,
and now I'm always cold and she's always hot. And
we probably had like three years where we were both
the same temperature. And how good that time was until
it was gone. No, it could be really problem problematic
because I'll get up, I'll reach my limit at exactly

(07:06):
like four seventeen am, and you're freezing you, I'll sneak up.
Remember it all right? You remember same s the green
guy in the in the in the trench coat that
used to always sell ernie like a letter hey, but yeah,

(07:31):
letter dealer, right, So like his little creep music, the
creeping tiptoe music. Yes, exactly. So I'm in my own
house that I pay for creeping, putting that ship back
to like something normal like that. I don't go below

(07:52):
six years, and that that's where we've landed. My wife
Lauren would go to the like low sixties. You got
to go to sixty six, bro for just put on
another blanket and then make it hot underneath. You know
what I'm saying, that's the goal. Think about it. What's
the what's the logical on keeping the cold or what's
the physics of the thing? Is that? Um, your your

(08:14):
brain is divided into two parts. There's the conscious brain,
and like the conscious brain is like, hey, I'm gonna
go to work, I'm gonna go to work later today,
I'm gonna take the subway home, I'm gonna lose weight,
I'm going to ask that girl out. And then it's
the subconscious which does stuff like I'm gonna make sure
your heart's beating, make sure your waste. So it's the

(08:35):
it's the part of the brain whoa yeah, what do
you say? And so of course, and so your body
has to be totally knocked out. So you get to
that r M state at exactly six hours and forty

(08:56):
five minutes. When you're that sleep, then you're right out
of their brains, like waking up like all right, he's asleep,
let's get to work. And so then that's where the
fat burns. That's where like all the things that you
want to help have happened for your life to be good,
your your brains like all right, they're knocked out. Now,
now we can get to work. But the thing is

(09:17):
that most of us don't get that much sleep, so
it's we're doing ourselves a disservice by only sleeping six
to seven hours. It's terrible for you. You didn't answer
my question. Why is it not to be cold? Probably
because people It probably cause it was cold at night.
You're you mean like before, Yeah, like it's probably like

(09:38):
we're conditioned to sleep in colder environments that I think. So,
so okay, can we just agree that this entire hour
is this I'm kind of when your side of the fence,
why does that have to be so damn cold? No,

(10:00):
I mean, I'm just asking, no, no, no, I'm asking.
I'm what's the scientific part of I don't think coldness helps.
I don't know. That's what I want to know. Where
we change the subject, I'm just going to suggest everybody
hop on Google, Yah, Google, and then we can continue anyway,
let's talk about movies. Where are you? But you do

(10:21):
sleep better when it's cold, and that's that's uh. Give
We don't need wise? Are we giving wise? We're just
giving answers here. It's been completely up substantiated information scientists.
Scientists record and said we had a doctor he substantiated it. Yeah,

(10:44):
kind of believe me and my curiosity exactly. So you
were born in Vancouver, Vancouver, British Columbia. Hume the hip
hop national anthem. Wait who else was Thelphia Chang? Because
he's like, yeah, episode has air manager. Yeah, I think

(11:06):
I've been her over the years. Actually she'll be on
in future episodes anyway. Yeah, I know The Rascals are
a hip hop group from Vancouver that were the Rascals.
They were called like and uh Northern Touch. Yeah, Rascals, Checkmate,
Cardinal and Thrust Chock Clair. How do you know this?

(11:28):
How do you know that? Very no American knows that song?
I do my research. Well, maybe you can help it
straight up to steal the beat of that song for
a song. Yeah, there is a DMX song with the
exact same beat as Northern Touch, and I think if
you're Canadian it's very jarring. But you're like, oh this
there's a good beat. Darnet, I can't express bt express

(11:54):
sample that. E p m D used no, no, no
for uh uh you know what I'm talking about. Get
the bows No. Eb m D was first, yes maybe,
and then DMX came and just took it Um, did
you did you know that your your hometown is also

(12:16):
uh what I consider the national anthem of hip hop?
Did you know that Apache was created in Vancouver? Apache? Yes,
Apache was recorded and created in Vancouver. Really, yes, I
did not know that. Yes, that's one of my favorite
factoids about That is a very good fact with Vancouver
and the other and Hard Wars from Vancouver is the other. Yeah,

(12:39):
your interviews with him are great. Have you interviewed I've
been interviewed by him once. Have you ever seen a
a non SAVORYNRD War interview like a lot of the
earlier ones where they don't you know if he's trolling
them or not. Oh? Yes, so, I mean I grew
up watching him, so I've seen like so many How
long has he been doing this, like thirty years like something. Yes,

(13:05):
he's younger than me. No. There's actually an amazing Nardwar
interview with Nirvana, like backstage at the p n E Forum,
which is the place in Vancouver from like three or something,
and like Courtney Love is there and it's like a
very long interview that's filmed and throughout it's like forty
minutes or something like throughout the course of it, you
see Kurt Kopai like slowly realized he's a genius, and like,

(13:27):
at first it's this thing where it's just like, why
is this fucking guy here bothering me? And then he
slowly like clues in the house. Yeah, he totally does. No,
but I've seen because now people know who he is. Like,
but for years I would watch interviews where famous musicians
would just get interviewed by him and be like, who
the fuck is this guy? And even still some people don't.

(13:50):
I feel like, don't get it. I feel like people
all right, So that jay Z interviews the jay Z
didn't seem to appreciate I warned him about it. I
thanked him to do it, and then Forrell doubled down.
So he did it. Because if we say it's a thing,
then jay Z is just one of them. Fomo. I
don't want to miss out ye anyway, um and so,

(14:18):
but I'll say that the first time he interviewed me,
I was paranoid because he just knew ways. Oh it's weird,
too much information. He knew sh about me. That was
he brought out your books. Yeah, he had my high
school your books. Literally, he like new people. He he
knew names that I hadn't heard in like, yeah, twenty

(14:38):
five years back from the shot that your mommy story. Yes,
literally that it's totally crazy. It would freak me out.
It was super fucking freaky. But his knowledge is bizarre.
He's always trying to get to Kanye. He's like that's
his holy grail. He like emails me and trust me
not at all. I can see that going very bad.

(15:01):
He somehow thinks that I have the magic touch to
get him to the Obama's Wow. Yeah, that's a big
step in a much better direction. Somewhere somebody sit online
that that when you get to the Pearly Gates of Heaven,
it'snrd war that he's the one that's reviewing. So speaking

(15:27):
of your hometown, are you is every time I ask
anybody from Vancouver, are you uh knowledgeable the Lacasa Gelato
or is that just for tour suckers like me? It's
the place that has like hundreds of flavors of Yeah,
it's near. It's on like the like north end of

(15:50):
kind of the east side of Vancouver. It's my favorite
place ever. I might it's not somewhere Highlight grew up going,
but it's somewhere that I've said, so again it's suckers.
You might be kind of a you know, trying like
palmic vinegar. Yeah, it was one of the first places
to start doing like weird flavors of ship like that
basically ice cream like a tobacco one or something like

(16:13):
that for a while. Yeah, I mean some of the
some of the weird ones I liked, Like they have
black pepper vanilla. That's weird. How is Jeddar cheese that?
Um well, that's the thing. You you basically you sample
all the weird ones and you get the rocky Road.
That's you know, that's a purely like North American thing

(16:33):
is sampling ice cream. But like, uh, what I was
considered rude? Well I was in Italy and uh, not
to brag, was really in a gelato shop and there
was like a rush of Americans left, and me and
by wife for the only people in the restaurant, and
the woman behind the counter like very quietly looked at
us and goes, can I ask you a question? We're like, yeah,

(16:53):
how come American always ask the taste? And she's like
this like no where else And I was like, you're
right when you put it like that. It is pretty
fucking weird, like nowhere else would be like can I
try that sandwich piece? That's what I said. I said,

(17:13):
I think it all roots back to this one place,
bast Robbins, or they encourage people to do it, and
that ruined ice cream all over the ya. I know
that the Sun you are cute? Yeah, they combined with
Duncan donuts. No, yeah there, that's the thing though. I
know that the Sun inherited um the empire, and because

(17:38):
you know, like generations are the opposite of what their
parents were, the Sun wasn't like you know, he didn't
He was concerned about the cows they were using and
wanted free range, and so instead he took the family
money and did this expose on how like ice cream
companies are ruining cows the environments like ice cream succession.

(18:03):
So they no, I'm just in the industry, which probably
explains why they had to partner with with that Margarita.
Still there is good Margarite ice cream. Have a Margarita

(18:23):
had it forever? Good to condition children at a young
age to develop a taste from Margarita's. So twenty minutes
into this interview, let's start um so you being born
in the early eighties in Vancouver, Um, what was the

(18:45):
what was your environment like in your household? My household, Um,
I lived on the East Side of Vancouver, which in
like a one like East Indian neighborhood, So it was
it was great. It was like I would walk around
a lot. I was just arguing with my parents. Their

(19:06):
memory was that I never walked around alone, and I
definitively did all the time. I would take the bus
all around the city. But yeah, but I went to
school on the West side. I grew up. I started
stand up when I was young, like twelve or thirteen,
and I would started writing around then too, and I
smoked weed a lot, and not much just changed in

(19:26):
my life since I was twelve. So so the myth,
the myth of super Bad and you crafting this at
such a young age is yes, for for sure. Yeah.
Me and my partner Evan who I still work with
uh men in bar Mitzvah class when we were twelve
and then started writing together not long after that, and

(19:49):
we had Yeah, we probably finished the draft of super
Bad when we were like fourteen or fifteen. Yeah, by then,
but we started we were like thirteen and there is
some and it's like it's what the things were. It's
almost sad that, like, I'm not that much smarter or
funnier than I was when I was years old, because
there are some jokes in the movie that like we
wrote when we were thirteen that are still in the movie,

(20:10):
or that are in the movie that like that held
up and that are still Yeah, you'd like to think
you got better in that amount of time. Professional I'm
trying to say. I asked my mom to buy me
Final Draft, which was the script writing software, and she did.
My parents were like super supportive because I also didn't
stand up, so they saw that like I would work hard,

(20:31):
you know what I mean? Yeah, this is probably ninety
five or ninety six or something like that. Yeah, ninety five,
I would say, yeah, Like all right, I'm curious. And
this leads back to the conscious subconscious. When you're subconscious,
it is convinced some of something. Yeah, then your body
does it, which which explains why you know, Kanye uses

(20:55):
outward affirmations I am the greatest, yes, and then everything
happens for him, the same way with Trump, the same
way with Diddy, the same way with Ja. Remember they
remixed and called it a secret. I have six million
dollars in right now, so I'm curious what what inside

(21:21):
you gave you the the balls to even be like, yo,
let's write a movie now, Like it didn't even start
with like let's start with community theater. Hey, how do
you do this? Or did you see a movie one day?
It is like I could do literally that's what happened.
Like what movie did you see that set you off?
I can't remember? And we are we love? That was

(21:43):
like no, like that was something. I had a pulp
fiction poster on my bedroom door, like throughout if you
were a teenager in the nineties, you had Yeah, I
mean that came out in nine four maybe I was twelve,
so we saw it around then, and it was it
was also the era of like independent. It was like
the resurgence of this independent film like Rushmore and West

(22:05):
Anderson bought a Rocket, so there was oh, yeah, we're
obsessed with them. And it's also one of those things
that was my parents loved movies and my they were
just huge movie fans, so they would like watch a
lot of movies and collect movies. Vancouver. They made some
stuff there, so it's not like Hollywood, but like you
would see movie sets around and so there was like

(22:28):
it wasn't this like completely unobtainable thing. And then in
high school, our high school was right across the street
from to video store, like uh giant video stores, and
we would rent movies, like we watched. All we would
do is like smoke. We didn't watch movies basically, and
and when you watch enough movies, you start to think,
maybe we could do this, and if we write something

(22:49):
that's like cheap, then maybe that was always the thought was,
like it was said in high school, super bad and
we were like worst comes toorist, like this becomes something
we like we made movies with our like you know,
we had a video camera. We were like, we could
technically make this ourselves if we wanted to. You know what,
what was your north star in terms of Okay, So

(23:11):
now now it's just hitting me that because I had
family that worked at an independent movie theater back in
so I always have free tickets. But you know, we're
seeing Al Marachi, We're seeing like all these indie films,
which I mean at the time I didn't realize it,
but it was grooming me too, geared towards art house

(23:34):
stuff that's supposed to mainstream stuff. But for you, what
were your Were you a film snob or were you
just like you? I got poorgies and hot dogs? Yeah
we Yeah, Hamburger, Hamburger. There a Hamburger movie. I gotta

(23:58):
see it. It was amazing. Out TV. There's specific like
ce movie VHS section, anything that was on HBO late
night and like midies. We would just rent movies based
on what the cover of the box looking garbage. Anybody
can find the garbage. Well, it's funny. Dolmight movie just
came out. I haven't watching, but we were. We were
obsessed with Dold Bite because like it was one of

(24:19):
those reads that like purely based on the color. Were like,
what is this? We did? We did the same We
did the same thing. Like every Friday night, we would
all meet up at this Mexian restaurant in town and
then we would all like caravan over to the video store,
argue for about half an hour about what video we're
going to pick out. You would argue for hours. We
spent more time in the video store than we would
watching the movies we rented at the video Like that
was the activity was going to the video store and

(24:42):
we argue over what we did. We called it tasteless
movie night. We would try to find the most tasteless
movie we could find in the video stuff and we
would just go to my friend Darren's basement and watch it.
And just like it was a commentary, it was perfect commentary.
No we involved, I'm sure if there had been, Well
his mom was a teach us that would never So
what were you go? Two films? Uh? Well, I think
it's like one thing I look at is like the movies.

(25:04):
It's obviously something I've thought about, you know, is like
the movies my parents owned, Like they owned like forty
movies on like vhs that they would like there was
like three movies to a VHS. They would tape them
off TV where they came on and like would you
ever watch them all the time? And these movies are
like cemented in my brain. I know every word to

(25:25):
every one of them. And I also bet that if
I like made a list of all those movies, they
like directly correlate to the movies that I've made since
then basically like well, it's like Ghostbusters, they and movies
like that. My dad loved Bill Murray Um they also
loved like Woody Allen and like Independent like they like
they had like Hannah and Her Sisters and like all

(25:47):
movies like that, and I would watch those movies a lot.
And then they had like Albert Brooks movies and my
dad loved Billy Crystal and so like it was a
lot of that stuff. And my mom though, loved action movies,
and so we had like die Hard and Total rec
Hall and um, like Under Siege Iron Member we had
right when it came out, and Lethal Weapon was like,
it's like one of my mom's favorite movies. And so

(26:08):
I would watch these like emotionally driven kind of comedy
drama movies and like the most violent and saved action movies.
And that's kind of a lot of stuff we make now.
Uh yeah, And so all those movies like we loved.

(26:29):
And then when yeah, and then went pulp fiction in
those movies started to come out, we became cessed in
Reservoir Dogs we loved and like um and then we
got really in a Sam Ramy and Peter Jackson's early
movies like Army of Darkness we watched over and over
and over again, and Dead Alive we watched, We watched
a lot and like, uh yeah, and then to see
those guys go on that was another thing. Is like

(26:51):
you'd see like, oh, like Sam Ramy's directed in Spider Man,
and like these guys who like we were already fans
of for making like the weirdest ship ever, were then
crossing over and becoming really successful and I think making
big things. And that was also I think something we
always liked and that was interesting to us. But no,
I mean we just like devoured Vancouver had much of

(27:12):
a social or nightlife because I'm almost I'm almost thinking
of I'm thinking that Vancouver is almost like alright what
Minneapolis was to print, yeah, and how there was a
scene there, but because there's not much to do. Yes,
he had a lot of time to hone his craft
music a lot, Yes. And the weather stand in Vancouver

(27:36):
is a city where people sit, like go to someone's
house and smoke weed. That's like the activity that is
like what people do there, or and when it's nice out,
you go to a not a nature place and smoke weed.
It's like a very like weed was like super prevalent
and like it's a huge It's like one of the

(27:56):
most progressive cities in the world when it comes to weed,
even though in your chat in the night you've never
been arrested for the right. When I moved to l A,
I got arrested because I didn't understand how much more
strict it was, uh than it was in Vancouver. Like
all throughout high school, if we got caught with weed,
the cops wouldn't would just take it. They wouldn't even

(28:16):
always take it. They would just be like go away,
like like it was such row on prior like on
on the priorities, because Vancouver had like a terror terrible
heroine problem and it was like had a really rough
drug problem, and so weed very early on became deep
prioritized and decriminalized. And from when I was a kid,

(28:38):
there was a coffee shop you could go smoke weed in,
and there was like um indoor like places you go
inside and smoke weed and it's like seth, you never
know we would see I have. But yeah, when I
first moved to l A, we buy pounds of Mexican
weed virsion here was I mean lots of seeds and

(28:58):
I mean reggie, so it's called it reggie regular weed.
But to me, if Vancouver has been in the hierarchy
of the weed game. I would just assume that, like
you're like hydroponic. Do you don't want to? You don't?
It takes you. That's a sterile part to wait. I
don't know if that's true. I don't know if they're sorry.

(29:22):
Why are you? That's That's what I'm saying. Why is
it taking three years for me to really wait? How
are you just gonna let you come here and drink
your milk? Seats? All of our parents smoke weed with
seeds in them, and we stold them we had to
pick them out, and it pops in burns the seats
and seats this leather, true, they fall, It falls out
of the joint sometime. My dad's a Colford all the time. Like, damn,

(29:44):
daddy's always smoking in your car. Look at them hose. Sorry,
sorry daddy. That you started standing up at a young age. Yeah,
thirteen or fourteen? Okay? So the only person I know

(30:07):
they had the experience with Chappelle. How I think Eddie
Murphy started around that? Yeah? How much better? How do you?
How do you even negotiate your way into a club? Yeah?
Um My mom helped, she would talk to She drove
me to every show literally because I couldn't drive, uh

(30:27):
and um yeah, And what's funny is very early on
it's one of those like happy coincidences. I did a
show that I did a fundraiser when I was like fourteen,
a small one that the premier who's like the governor
kind of British Columbia, was at and my mother cornered
him and was like, if my son's performing at a bar,

(30:48):
can he be in the bar? And the guy was like,
legally yes, And she caught his office to send a
letter saying that as long as I was performing, it
is legal for me to be in the messis and
I would have to leave right after. So like I
would sit backstage and I would show it to the club.
There was only four clubs anyway, but once they had
all seen it, they would let me perform there and

(31:10):
and then I performed like regularly, and I was like,
I was like pretty good, Like I wasn't what was
it check? Like a day age? Did you get a check?
Every once in a while, I would like open for
a comic and I'd get like a hundred fifty bucks
or something like that, which when you're did you use
your your kid them did you use your youth? I
tried not to. I I tried to. I would talk well,

(31:31):
at first, I didn't at all, and I because I
was so sub conscious about being like gimmicky that I
would try to tell you things like I was very
neuronic and I didn't want to be like the kid comics.
So I tried to write jokes that that any comic
would write that were like more like observational humor, but

(31:53):
were I was blue. I did it actually at first
at all also, but then I remember this comic Daryl Lynx,
who still does stand up and he's great. Um. He
was like, I was telling you, like like all the
cogs would make fun to be excited joke about like

(32:14):
crazy glue, what's so crazy about it? And it was
like the dumbest like observational of all time. And then
and then Darryl I remember, like sat me down and
I was like fifties and he was like, dude, like
you are the only one of us who was like
experiencing all these things like in real time, like you're
trying to kiss girls for the first time, you're trying

(32:36):
to get your driver's license, you're trying to buy beer,
you're trying to go to parties, you're trying to sneak
into strip clubs, like right, jokes about that, like that's
something that like everyone's gone through in some way and
you're living it like right now, and and I was like, okay.
And then that was also one of the things that
really influenced Super Bad, where at first it was more like,

(32:56):
let's write a high school movie, and then we were like, no,
that's rite, like whenever something happens to us, let's put
it in the movie, and let's make us the characters
in the movie, and let's like structure it. So those
things happened to you guys in super Bed, not all
in one night, but almost a lot of the stuff
in the movie happened like in some form or another,

(33:17):
like and everything you grind it up against the grown
that happened at a school dance. Yeah, that that that
actually And in real life, I was one of the
guys like it played out almost verbatim as it did
in the movie, except one of our friends was the
Joda character in real life, and I was one of

(33:38):
the guys who was like, what is that, Like what's
on your leg there? And and that's what and so Yeah,
it was a school dance and we all put our
stuff in like the locker room, in the gym locker
room like before, and we were getting it after the
dance and yeah, and like one of our friends was like,
did you spill it yourself? And we were there like
looking at it and then and then what happened? And

(33:59):
we kind of allude to this in the movies. We
noticed on the other side of the locker room there
was another group of guys having the exact same conversation
and they were all like looking at their friends leg
poking guy and be like what is that? Did you spills?
Like the two groups like locked eyes from across the room,
and it was like this, guys are so safe moment,
but it was like, oh no, I think we have

(34:23):
a situation on our hands. And then there was a
lot of like cross referencing who they had danced with
and wait, I got a preface for two people who
haven't seen that scene Super Bad. There's there's a crucial
scene where, um, there's a dance sort of grinde dance
moment which a girl rubs her crotch on Jonah Hills.

(34:48):
I think it's pronounced anyway, mb knows that Jonah Hill
is thighs or his jeans are now Maroon five their
bloody period. You're just getting that now, I thought he

(35:12):
I could remember if I came on himself or on
the table, as you know. My favorite my favorite thing
about I visit a lot of local comedy houses in
New York. My favorite thing is actually watching uh people

(35:38):
bomb fail, no, no, no, only because like now I'm
entering the stage in my life where I have to
give a lot more public addressing, and it's always how
you handle yourself in that moment that separates the men
from the boys. So a lot of times, like if
you watch if you go to like I love going

(35:59):
to the store in l A. When it's the like
the one m show, the very last show, and usually
like the last three people are always like the doorman,
the bell guy like okay, I'll let you go up
and do five minutes, like everyone's left the room. I
performed there at that time when I was like sixteen
years old, because I feel in my mind that whenever

(36:21):
I'm watching them, then I believe at one point either
not Gerard Carmichael, who's the guy that I liked um America,
Jamar neighbor. Jamar Neighbors was one of those guys and
he's hilarious, Like he's one of Gerard Carmichael's dudes. But
like it's always the last three people on the late

(36:41):
the Graveyard shift that I love watching them the most
to see how they adjust to it. Have you, when
you were in sort of developing your skills or whatnot,
have you ever had to resort to what they would
call the uh, what's the syndrome? Uh, like aristoc at syndrome,
or when you know that you've done a bad set

(37:03):
and you just performing for your buds, Like, yeah, sud
up In always did everyone do the aristocrats? It was
at another thing where I never did that specifically, but
there was I mean, yeah, ship would go bad and
then and there would be times yeah, where you would
just kind of throw it all out and it was like,

(37:25):
uh yeah. Like I think managing the audience's discomfort is
something that is a lesson that I learned at a
young age, and that like you can carry with you
across many different avenues of life, and I think that
that's something that is very valuable. And I did it. Yeah,
I remember doing My friends could never come watch me.

(37:48):
Now because I was a kid and they weren't allowed
into the club, so it was always strangers. But I
had times when just group tables full adults would get
up and leave. It was terrible, um and they I
remember performing at the improt. I remember coming l a
to audition for the Just for Last festival when I
was like fifteen and going to the improv and Jerry
Seinfeld decided to drop in at the Just for Last

(38:12):
stand up comedy showcase went on right before me. Fucking
annihilated when that happened, When when the big star comes
in and like comedy show Yes on a fucking showcase?
He did to you yes, He could not have been
more indifferent. And then I went up after him and

(38:37):
I literally, like to this day, remember standing on the
stage and it being so quiet. I could hear the
electric hum of the and I I've been doing stand
up for years at that point, and I had never
heard that sound. I remember like thinking to myself like, wow,
like have the speakers always been making that sound and
I just haven't heard it? Or did these one had

(38:58):
like a particularly loud I just remember hearing like I
was like that's a new one. Uh yeah, I was brutal.
So at the time, I didn't get into the Juster
Last Festival. So yes, could you explain how you got
inside of the I guess the mafia of the what

(39:22):
I called the app MAA, uh yeah, I mean it
was all I. I was doing stand up and I
got an agent through stand up and I was like
sixteen or seventeen until high school was like going to end,
and I like, I was not going to go to college.
So I was like, I should I need money, so
I should start trying to audition for things. And my plan,

(39:46):
if you asked me that point where my plan was,
I'll be like, oh, I'll moved to l A after
high school and I'll try to do stand up. And
so you wanted to be a straight up stand up comming, yeah,
And then I thought maybe I'll get like on like
a sitcom. That was kind of like the only precedent
of that in that time. That was like the thing
that seemed the most achievable because it was like Seinfeld
was on, like everybody loves Raymond and Martin like that.
Like at the time, it seemed like if you were

(40:07):
a successful stand up, you got a sitcom. And I
always liked movies more and so that was always something
that I like wanted, but it wasn't as like it
didn't seem it seems like the types of movies I
wanted to make at that time especially were like very small,
independent movies, and at that time Super Bad seemed like
it would be like like Rushmore, you know what I mean,

(40:27):
like not in its artfulness, but just in its scope,
you know. Um, And I think that. Then I moved,
so I I auditioned for Freaking Gas. Was a second
audition I got out sent out on and they auditioned
kids out of Vancouver like they did international. Wait you
are no, they did international. So they auditioned in New

(40:48):
York and Chicago and Boston and Toronto and Vancouver. And
I like, I went in for an audition one morning
in Vancouver and and then I got it. And then
I moved to l A. And uh, just the same
people watched I watched that show in the first one.
Don't let people. I know people now like to revision
it like yo, man, freaking Geeks with my ship Man,

(41:09):
You're like, oh, yeah, well it was then? Why well
I watched it because during the time of us recording, Uh,
do you want more there was always a TV on
the break, so that's how I remember freaking geeks. That
was my favorite. I thought, oh man, this is way
better than my so called life years Like dam I

(41:31):
was just thinking about that if he was talking away
like were you excited of the critical claim at got
and did you? I had no, Like I was like
a seventeen year old podhead from Vancouver who like I
had no concept of any of that ship. Like I
remember people being like, you're in a businessman yet and

(41:53):
I just didn't. I think I was so um I was.
I was really confident and I felt like everything, like
when someone's like Years, everyone loves your show, like it
has a good reviews. I was like, yeah, it's fucking great,
Like it wasn't like real, it was like, of course
we're putting out great ship, like there's nothing like this

(42:14):
on TV, like of course everyone like and if anything,
that made it more frustrating that no one was watching it,
because like we knew it was good. And that's like
I look back on and think, like I didn't even
think of the quality of the show when I went
and did it, Like I it could have been the world,
Like I was just like a job, I'll take it.
And then I remember getting in l a and to

(42:36):
shoot the pilot and it wasn't even until then that
I got the full script, like the day before we
started filming, and then I remember reading it and being like, oh,
there's like jokes about shrooms in here and ship like that.
And then we rehearsed for one day and they were
like what would you say here? And then all of
a sudden we were improvising and they were letting us
add jokes about Hitler and all this stuff, and we
were like, this is really different. And then when we

(42:58):
started shooting it, we were again like the director was
from the independent film world, Jake Kasiden had just made
Zero Effect, which was a movie I was a big
fan of. So it was like, oh, yeah, we have
like these writers and directors who were like doing the
exact stuff that I liked. So when it turned out great,
it was like agad I was. So I was really

(43:21):
like spoiled at that time because I was just like, yeah,
you make something like together, like oh, the creator Larry
Sanders show has this new I knew that, but I didn't. Again,
I didn't realize I think, how like I didn't realize
a how just because you did something good before doesn't
mean you'll keep doing things that everyone appreciates. Like I

(43:42):
was a fan of the Larry Sanders Show, a huge fan, um,
and grew up watching it and um, but I didn't,
like I think when I took that when I first
got cast on the show, I had no idea Judd,
and even I didn't know Judd was Judd worked on
the Larry Sanders Show. There was no IMDb at this time,
Like there was no way to look up who you

(44:03):
were working with. Even Yeah, like I had no idea
the internet. Yeah, there was no like maybe there's IMDb,
but I didn't know to use it. Yeah, there was
no like organized way of checking any of that ship.
This is like did James Franklin didn't even hit the
soap ship? Right? Like no, it was like no one
had done anything. And so yeah it was. But then
it started airing as we were shooting, and then they

(44:23):
just were like, no one's watching this ship and it
was on Saturday night at eight or some ship like
that against Cops. I remember just like joking like cops
beats us, We're fucked, and then cops beat us and
it was like no, so we about Undeclared? Um no,
because again I was you feel like, okay, well we'll

(44:44):
do it better. I was like, oh, this time, we'll
do like a more commercial version and we kind of
work out the kinks and like again, it was like
the exact same thing happened where it was like very
critically acclaimed and then no one watched it. But but that,
but I was. I was thrilled, honestly like the writer
and an actor on Undeclared. I was eighteen years old,
Like it was, Um, you know, it was like a

(45:06):
very exciting thing for me to be doing. So, uh,
how hard is it living hand to mouth in that period?
Because I was are you, well, did you ever have
a regular job or any well? I after Undeclared, I
didn't work for like three or four years. Basically what
did you do? I fucking spent very little money but

(45:30):
had to work. I would help Um Judd was very
nice and he would get these super high priced rewriting
jobs and then he would give me a little more
than to help him do it, so like I helped
rewrite Bad Boys Too. As an example, time wait time out.
First of all that happens out it's like a secret thing.

(45:55):
We wrote that joke in that was in the trailer
where they're singing the song and they forget the world.
They like don't know the world. Oh yeah, yeah and
yeah it was like, yeah, we that was one of
the many things we did maintenance. So what else did
you do? Little things here and there, like uh, one

(46:15):
of the Big Mama's House movies I helped on for
a few days. Wait, so stop in this moment because
I was saying this because I know my whole family
gonna get mad at me. But in this moment, are
you understanding your white funny man? Because you know that
you are like, like, this is a seriously, that's a
serious question. Like nobody else. If you hear the struggles

(46:38):
of other comedians and things and other colors women, there's
never a moment where they haven't had to like serve
or do something that they didn't want to do. But
it seems like since you were fourteen years old, you
was on it. You needed final draft, you had it,
you needed the camera, you had it. You this any
moment did you realize this? I was super Yes, I

(46:59):
was I was very Yeah. I was never felt particularly
downtrodden I was very I felt lucky. I was very
I always felt lucky and was very fortunate and like
and and got that. Yeah, I mean there was a
time when I was maybe gonna like there was a
moment I was like I might have to move back
to Vancouver because I was just running out of money

(47:20):
and couldn't afford to live in l A anymore. And
that's when I got hired on the LG Show and
that like continue that, like, yeah, it was like a
great It was like a great job to have because
like it was even it was like it sounded great
in a room, Like it was like when we went
on meetings and we were like, oh we got yeah,

(47:43):
we got nominated for Emmys. That was great. Like it
was something that like basically I haven't stopped working since that.
It was like, uh, that was like the thing that
kind of kept me going because his because his brand
of comedy sasa baron corne because he's such a rogue
kind of archie comedian. How do you find his voice?

(48:04):
Like how do you it was like and the type
of stuff he does it more strolling. It was kind
of uh, it was hard, and I think he liked
and I think it was good that we were so
young and malleable at this time when we were working
for him, like we were like twenty two or something
like that, and so like he could really I think

(48:25):
without some of like the kid gloves you would use
with older people, being like, here's what you have to do,
here's what we do. Do exactly fucking this and nothing else,
forget everything, you know, just do this, like and yeah,
and and and he would literally lock us in a
room and be like, right, two hundred interview questions for

(48:46):
me to be interviewing like an environmentalist in a tree,
like and like, don't come out of that room until
you've written me two questions. Yeah, we came on for Bruno.
We and then we went on the road with him.
We went to spring Break. We did all the spring
break stuff with Bruno. It was insane. He almost got killed,

(49:06):
Like what happens when you like Daytona Beach. Yeah, Um,
it was crazy. What's funny is I had to kind
of hide because I was not famous, but I was
like one in every hundred. People knew me from freaks
and geeks, and so I was kind of had to
like I was like relegated to the hotel room because

(49:28):
like they were. He was just like the chance that
someone sees you and puts two and two together is
like two great. So like we would travel from city
to city and me and Evan would literally just sit
in a hotel room and whatever city we were in
and like, pray they come back and last yeah, exactly,
And then they would come back and they would show
us the footage of what they had done that day
and we would all just laugh hysterically. It would be

(49:48):
amazed that they had gotten killed and like it was, uh,
it was fun. Yeah, it was great. Wow. Um, all right,
So I have so many questions about your movies, but
I'm afraid we'll just get stuck in one of them.
But well, I mean there's so many, but I'll say

(50:11):
that for you know, four year old Virgin was to
me like, how how much input are you given for
scripts or how open is Judge to having you guys
adjust the comedy because the way that it looked, it
almost seemed like this gotta be on the spot, and

(50:33):
he just said keep the cameras rolling. A lot of
it was improvised, Yeah, I was. I would say, like
because super Bad had been written and no one would
make it, and same with Pepress, so you were still
shopping it actively. And me and Evan and my especially
because Evan was in college at the time and wasn't

(50:53):
there all the time. Like I was always like, people
want to see a movie where people talk like this,
like more than anything. That's what I had a strong
feeling of, was like, they want a comedy where people
where it's conversational and not so like plucky and jokey,
and it just feels like people talking, they're swearing a lot,

(51:14):
and and and like it's like taking like again because
we grew up loving pulp fiction and clerks, and we
were just like, if you can really gear that towards
like comedy in like in a great way, and and
since no one would make super Bad Judd like and
me and him together just thought that if we could
make these the guys who work in the store kind

(51:36):
of be almost like it's Almos almost like a weird
testing ground for like that type of conversational comedy, whereas
Correll's character was this like sweet kind of like island
in the middle of the movie, we were like, if
we can make these guys like, why don't we try
this where we improvise and have it be very conversational
and you guys can swear a lot and say all

(51:57):
the sick ship you say to each other that makes
each other laugh behind the scenes, but we never say
it on camera because always like that's too much and
that's too crazy or people don't like that. But we
were like, what if we do that on camera? You know? Um?
And that was really like the first time that any
of us had done that, I think, like, um, it

(52:18):
was they had done Anchorman, where it was it was
different though, because the movie is totally not real, so
like it's not They improvised a lot, but it wasn't
like actual conversations because there's it's like under this umbrella
of like a false reality, you know. Um. But this
was the first time where it was literally like you
can just say whatever you think you would say in

(52:38):
this situation and there's no rating, like and we had
never played in that environment before and it was really
the first time where we were all like, oh, we
can really let it rip. And I remember the I
had improvised that thing about going to Tijuana and like
seeing a woman fucking a horse and it's like it's

(52:59):
like he comes into the or he comes. It's like
Correl comes into work and he explained making an egg
salad sandwich and he's like, what you do this weekended?
I'm like, whit what? Wanda would see this woman a
horse and like it was not that cool, Like it
was kind of gross and and I remember like and
it was like pretty. It was like on the scale

(53:19):
of like the types of things people were saying in
movies at that time, on like the very far end
of the spectrum, which the aristocrats exactly. Yeah, so that
and we were just making each other laugh and I
remember before the first screening we were like if people like,
if that works, then like then we're fine. Like then

(53:41):
all these instincts we have of like what people want
might be right. And I remember like it was like
like like that moment was like a life changing moment
in many ways, like sitting in the feeder when that
part came on for the first time and seeing the
audience just like explode in laughter and like you could
see it was just like shocking to them but also

(54:04):
funny and also felt kind of real. I remember so
many people come up to me after when we came
out and be like, you remind me so much of
a guy I used to work with, and you remind
me so much of this weirdo who was in the
back room at this place I would go to and
like and and and you could see that we were
kind of like tapping into this like relatable form of
comedy that people, you know, at that time, it was

(54:26):
like Dumb and Dumber, which I love, like it's one
of my favorite movies ever, but it is not relatable,
naturalistic conversational comedy. You know. It's huge, crazy gags and
very specifically like written and staged bits and very smart.
Can I just give you credit to for putting actor

(54:47):
in there a lesser known name heaven Heart Hart was
I would say his name right, Jerry by Indian guy
who's is he? Okay? He is? Okay? The other guy
not okay? He was like Jerry's fine, kept saying nasty ship. Yes,

(55:13):
mixed up with the other guy. Not another guy who
might still be in jail. I think he is in jail, okay, okay, yeah,
making sure he's making sure. I think. Yeah. Kevin Hart
was great. Attempted. He didn't succeed, though, Damn it's a
shame that happened, because murder is bad, and I do

(55:35):
not like murder. You know the conversations on South when
you have to explain you're feeling is murderers. Baby, let
me just clarify murders back, okay, sex. What do I
want to ask is when you got the pitch, when
you got the pitch for forty virgin? Yeah, I'm when

(56:00):
you got the pitch for knocked Up? How is it
pitched to you so that you wouldn't take it personally?
Because the thing is because because the underhand tone of
what knocked Up really is is we're gonna pair this
hot girl with like you, I told it's something, it's

(56:24):
a joke. I was because I was in on the joke, right,
That's the thing. How do you not? I think? And
what I always I was actual thinking. Like one of
the first other pieces of advice a stand up comic game.
Me when I was like thirteen, was like whatever he
What's funny is this stand up comic looked exactly like
Garth from Wayne's World. Like he was like a super

(56:45):
skinny dude with long blonde hair and glasses, and he
was like whatever, He's like, you have to let the
audience know that you are self aware or they'll be uncomfortable.
And he's like, so if there's something about you that
reads very obviously like, don't ignore that thing, like let
them know you are more aware of it than they
could ever imagine. And he was like, he's like, my

(57:06):
whole opening five minutes is about that. I looked like Garth,
Like I fucking get it. And so I was always
aware that I came across as like a schlubby, kind
of stonery loser, and I was not. I wasn't in
any whales way self conscious about representing myself like that
because I knew I was not. That you got super

(57:26):
confidence was highly productive. I could date women like that
that were that were well out of my league on
a physical level. Um, I like I I had a job,
I was getting I had a nice apartment, I had
a nice car, like I was like at that point,
like getting successful, you know. So it was not it

(57:48):
was funny to me And I remember jud we kept
pitching these like crazy movies. Me and we were trying
to make Pineapple Express. Were like wanting a big action
movie and he was like that, like he's like, you
first just have to make something that like establishes who
you are in the most like normal, relatable type of setting,
and he just said it conversationally one day. It was
literally like like like if you got a girl pregnant

(58:09):
on the first date or something like, that's the type
of movie we should make. And it was one of
those things where it was like, Oh, we actually could.
That's actually really good idea. What would that be? Like?
Like um and him and his wife had got pregnant
very early on in their relationship, and I think had
to make some quick decisions as to whether or not
they were going to kind of stay together and give
it a go, you know, um uh I just or

(58:31):
what the just what the dynamics of the relationship were
gonna be, do you know what I mean? I think
they weren't planning on having a kid at that time.
From my understanding, yes, exactly. Leslie's great, very funny and
and so it was Yeah, so it was personal. It
was personal to me because and I think the way
that we were able to represent my living situation especially

(58:53):
was highly personal to me. And all the roommates and
Um and all those guys were actually my friends and
I actually had lived with almost all of them at
one point or another, and so like it did seem
like a really yeah, yeah, I was totally happy with
it and thought I would be funny with it, you know. Um,
and there was a thing where I was just I
remember being like, oh, I can just make this guy
like worse and worse and worse and like like just

(59:14):
dumber and dumber and dumber. And it's almost like the
boer inappropriate, like the worst thing I could say on
a date almost is like the funnier the whole movie becomes. So, yeah, okay,
did you and Katherine circle back and become besties? No,
we've run into each other, but yeah, I know, yeah,

(59:36):
I wish you the best. Let's get that. Yeah. Well,
I mean, okay, well I guess I'll ask. Okay, you
don't have to. No, it's not that I'm just saying that.

(59:57):
Is there ever fear? Okay, I go to thirty University,
so and all that entails, you know. So I'm in
in the iva storm of it's it's a university assess
and now it's a big giant campus cathedral to which
entertainment is built. So when you're how hard is it,

(01:00:19):
in your opinion, how hard is it for women to
get a seat at the table insanely hard harder, and
in light of what's happening now and how comedy sort
of has to reexamine itself and what was cool in
two thousand six, Mike get a raised eyebrow? Now, how

(01:00:44):
has that? We get a raised eyebrow out? Yea? So
how does that affect not not how does it affect
your world, but how does it affect the creative process?
The fraternity process is a woman in the in the team.
We have women on our team and we But are

(01:01:07):
you more or is it the climate right now in Hollywood?
Are they super aware of it now? Or they say
they are. But I don't think a lot has changed.
And if you look at the movies that come out,
almost all of them are made by white dudes, like
you know, like it's very like not that the actual

(01:01:28):
like decision to spend hundreds of millions of dollars in
a new social direction has not happened. I don't think.
I think people are talking about it, and it's like
a topic of conversation that's fun for people to say.
And I think there's they're like inching towards that. But
have I seen like, oh, all of a sudden, if
you look at the slate of every major studio and
they're all more equally distributed between men and women. No,

(01:01:52):
that's not the case at all, But yeah, and I
think that that. But I think for us, I think
we're lucky with comedy for us because we never like
pedaled in that I don't like, we never peddled in
something that I would have considered to be like, you know,

(01:02:14):
I think our comedy like I'm never complaining that, like
about like people being PC or like we can't say
the stuff that we want to be able to say.
Like to me, that is like not an issue, and
like you're either the type of person that like you
want your you know, your work reflects who you are
no matter what, and so if you have your sensibilities

(01:02:38):
trying to be in the right place at any given moment,
then your work will reflect that. And I've found myself
not really having to defend that much of what I've
done in the moment that it has come out. I
acknowledge that again a week later you look back and
you're like, WHOA, that's age poorly Sometimes you know, um, like, yeah,
I think there's jokes and sausage party that like twenty

(01:02:59):
four hours after it came out, were inappropriate maybe twenty
hours before it came out. But I think that you know,
we we try not to be offensive, We try not
to exclude people in our work. We we try to
be inclusive as possible, and and and we ourselves are
those types of people. So it isn't this like chore

(01:03:21):
to weave that into our work um, and so are
hyper aware that that has to happen or that has
to be a thing, whereas you know before you don't think, like, Okay,
it might be inclusive, it might have been in this
group or that group. I think we're trying to be
aware of for the last few years. And I think

(01:03:43):
Neighbors is the first movie that we really made really
trying to go into it acknowledging that traditionally, especially that
type of relationship that means rose like a husband wife
relationship in a movie is like always done us certain way,
and we had to not do that, and like it's
always based on the fact that they hate each other

(01:04:04):
and that they're not happy, and that there's all this
conflict in their relationship and that she's fucking lay most
of the time, and that like he's like the carefree
fund one, and she and like, so that was I think,
And it was before all this, you know, all the
current you know kind of revelations that are happening. But
even then we were like, just how do we not

(01:04:25):
do this in a lame way? You know? Um? And
how do we And also like, we want the actors
in the movie to be proud and happy with their work.
And I think, as someone who is both an actor
and a writer and a director and a producer, like
I understand what all those jobs entail, and I understand
what it takes to make all the people doing those
jobs feel like they're really doing something that they can

(01:04:47):
be proud of and and happy with. And that's something
that was just started to become very important when I
started to realize, like, oh, like if we cast Rose
Burn in this role, we have to make it good
and funny, and we have to make her excited to
come into work every day, and we have to make
it that when she leaves work at the end of
the day, she really felt like she was as funny
as anyone else, and given the opportunity to be as

(01:05:09):
funny as anyone else, like she was told like you
tell us to shut up as we say, funny ship
over here? You know what I mean? How does that work? Okay?
So how does that work? Like break it down like
we'd in third grade? All right, So if you're heading
a project, um, and you have to write for a
specific character that you might not really have put a

(01:05:31):
lot of effort, you know, like what's their background? And
first of all, when you write for a character or
right for a movie, does each character have to have
their own bio in your mind? Like to some degree
I think like backstory? Yeah, I think to some degree,
I think it's it depends on how in like what's

(01:05:51):
funny is like in this is the end? Like none
of us really have any backstory. We're kind of just
who you assume we are and you slowly and the
emotional conflicts are very of the moment. It's based on
you know, you're seeing it play out in real time basically.
So um. But in general, yes, like some sense of

(01:06:11):
backstory is is helpful and and the more you can
think of, the more it's probably good. But for I
think for something like Neighbors, the conversations were literally like
how do we create a plot and a flow of
events where that isn't contingent on these two characters having
conflict with one another and instead is contingent on these

(01:06:32):
two characters really being on the same team as one another,
and right away that allowed both characters to be outrageous
and silly and stupid and and neither one was trying
to control the other. If anything, they were always like
encouraging the other to do stupider and stupider ship kind
of um. And so it's more understanding the dynamics going

(01:06:55):
in and what the result that will produce. So it's like,
if we go into the movie with this type but dynamic,
the result will be this, And if we go into
it this typ dynamic, the result will be this. And
so that's something we were aware of, is like, if
we want the result to be this, the dynamic has
to be very specific going into it, you know. Um.
And that that's what we tried to do. So kind
of a three part question all right now, Now in

(01:07:19):
your career, Uh, what is your preference would you rather
lean towards directing a project or writing a project to
get to someone else to direct or what I would
just say blind job as in doing a project that

(01:07:42):
you neither had no directing or no hand in writing it. Um,
I do that less and less, like I don't act
in a lot of other people's movies, and I don't
get asked to act do a lot of other people's
movies but a vehicles. But yeah, so it happens, and

(01:08:06):
I do do it. Sometimes I think what I'm what
I really enjoy is writing something with the hopes that
I will direct it and act in it, which has happened.
You want to wear all three hats? Yeah? Is that
a nightmare? No, it's it's almost at a weird thing
We've also found is, in some ways, the more control
we have over something and the more jobs we are feeling,

(01:08:26):
the less stressful it ultimately is because most of our
strepps comes from fear that other people are gonna funk
our ship up, And so as long as we are
controlling it, I'm not that worried. I'm more worried is
the director going to ruin this thing? This leads to
what have you learned? What have you learned about? Actually

(01:08:47):
I want to do too, what have you learned about?
Green Hornet and the Simpsons? Which I think for a
comedy writer is sort of like this, this honor of Wow,
I'm doing this I'm telling a Simpsons episode. So what
lessons have you learned in those two instances that you
would have changed now or major wiser? Yeah, I mean

(01:09:11):
green Hornet was and I'm not a no no, no, yeah,
it's not really like I think a few things when
I look back at that h One is I really
overestimated like our control at that point in our careers.
Like I think that at that point we had kind

(01:09:31):
of always been able to do whatever we wanted, you know. Um,
And I didn't predict how much a bigger budget like
but all the movies we've made at that point, where
million dollars in Green Hornet was like a hundred and
twenty million dollars, And I didn't quite predict what that
hundred million dollars would do to the process and how
before I would we literally wouldn't talk to the studio. Ever,

(01:09:53):
all of a sudden, we were having meetings where we
go through like every page of the script basically, and
how like destructive that was is to the process and
how and like the biggest the biggest thing was was
like we had an idea going into it that was
slowly like completely you know, de constructed and and built
into something else. And it's one of those things that

(01:10:14):
happened so slowly that like and and said, well, we
need to change this to make this exactly what if
we did this, Oh, we need a big actor for
this role, and went about this and we need this
and like but then with Condri directing, Yeah, whom I
thought would be good, I think what he and I've
seen him since then, Like, I think what he didn't
predict also was the scope of it and how And

(01:10:36):
that's what because I think with artists and you probably
can relate to this, Like I think the more you
do your craft or whatever, the more you realize it's
not only what you are doing, but it is how
you were doing it. Like, if you're a painter, you
not only want to choose what to paint, you want
to choose what paint you use, and you want to
make your own canvas maybe, and you want to choose
where you painted and all this stuff, you know what

(01:10:58):
I mean. With film, it's sometimes that gets wrestled away
from you, where it's like, here's the shot I want
and here's how I think we should do it, and
they'll be like, Nope, too expensive, here's how you're gonna
do it and and that and that ruins the process,
especially when you have a director like Gundry. And what
I realized, I think what he realized is like his
whole magic is not only in what he's doing, it's

(01:11:20):
how he's doing it. It's the materials used literally, um
and that did not always apply to this scope of
filmmaking basically and uh and it was just like uh,
an inorganic combination of elements. And then there was a point,
I think where you're just kind of like, this seems

(01:11:42):
like it's going poorly. I slept terribly throughout the whole thing.
You felt you felt even in the process like this
might not for sure. It was like because it was
rocky for like the year leading up to it, and
there was a point And this was also something I
would probably do differently now, Like we had just went
years working on it, and there's a moment where you're
like do we stop or just keep going, because like

(01:12:04):
after years it was it felt weird to just stop anywhere.
It was just like, I think we just have to
see this through, like and and that is something that
I probably wouldn't do now. Honestly, I think after that experience,
I would just be like, let's just pull the plug,
and maybe we all wasted three years, but maybe we
all learned a lot in that three years and have
some good experiences. But I think like that's something at

(01:12:26):
the time that I wasn't prepared to do, which was
just say like, you know what, like let's not do this,
you know. So my parallel question to you is, Okay, now,
as a person that's been doing what I've been doing
at least what I'm known for uh years, um, you know,
we kind of had this discussion like are we sabotaging

(01:12:46):
ourselves but not like wanting to go to bigger houses,
Like we're now in the place where it's like, hey,
you guys, do know that we could book a night
at blah blah blah if you guys had the album
in time whatever. In my immediate thing was fear like, no,
I don't want to play you know, seventeen thousand Dadada,
because I feel like my zone has always been in

(01:13:09):
smaller theaters. So for you, is is a nine figure
budget sort of like a dragnet horns or not? It's
like would you attempt to really go big or do
you feel that you know when you do lower budget stuff.

(01:13:30):
Then I think now in order, we're writing a movie
now that would be expensive, like a pretty expensive movie. Um,
not quite Green Her, but I mean like a popcorn
film like but like us Summer Yeah, but like, but
we're really trying to make it have all the stuff
that we like out of movies, but we're trying to
make like it's some more. It's still like an R

(01:13:53):
rated like action comedy basically. But um, we're the types
of movies that are in theaters have changed, and I
think that's something that we're also aware of, is we
like a lot of what are It's like we work
backwards to some degree from like audience reaction, and we

(01:14:13):
go to movies and we sit in theaters and we
you know, what makes people cheer and what makes people laugh,
and what makes people shocked, and what makes people scared,
and that changes over the course of years. You know, um,
like the things. You know, there's some movies that have
come out that ten years ago got a certain reaction

(01:14:34):
in theaters and that same thing would not seem very
exciting by today's standards, and that shocking by today's standards.
And so we are trying to evolve. We instinctually must
evolve with the climate. And and we like making movies
for theaters, and we creatively think backwards a lot from
what would make a theater full of people have like

(01:14:55):
this experience, Like what would make a theater full of
people be on edge and then excited and then laughing
and then sad and and and in or. But the
theater part is the tricky part because a lot of
movies like Super Bad today, for example, probably wouldn't be
in theaters. Be hard to get it in theaters, you
know what I mean. Knocked Up even would more likely

(01:15:16):
be a Netflix movie today. It's just people talking in
rooms like there's no you know, there's no big action
in it, there's no like it's literally people sitting and
talking for two hours. You know. Um Like, organically it
wouldn't happen. But I mean, you gotta admit that you're
coming from the canon of the Aft town a Town Mafia.

(01:15:39):
So even by six degrees of separation, like you know
you would you personally would have to you would. I
would think you have to release eight bona fide below
t Rotten to me a row before I'm like, I
ain't seeing seth you know, not all hard movies do well.

(01:16:00):
I mean, like even then I I'm aware of it,
it's still yeah, there's still something where it's like it
might be good. Yeah, you know, it's out there, but
it's still like, um, it's harder to get movies in
theaters and it's harder to compete for the cultural attention
like that, I think, And that to us is very
important also is we like it when we make We've

(01:16:23):
seen that in the past. We've made movies that like
work their way into culture and their referenced in rap
songs and in other movies and on TV shows, and
we like that, like we And that's not always a
one to one thing with like success, it's just you know,
it's something that only happens though. Really with movies that
are in theaters, like movies on Netflix, it's are just

(01:16:45):
streaming movies. It's much harder for them to capture a
piece of the culture. And a movie like Mid Nineties,
which was seen probably by one iota the amount of
people that sees the average Netflix movie, captured the cultural
attention in a way that very few Netflix movies do
because it was in theaters and when people saw it,
they turned their phone off for two hours and they
sat in a dark room and they actually watched it.

(01:17:06):
And you don't do that with Netflix movies. And I
think that is going to become when I look at
why I want movies and theaters, that is it like,
but that's not all the way true. Those stuff I
was gonna tell you, Like, some certain movies command you
to turn off the lights, watch, watch, like when The
Irishman was one of those. This season Dodamite was one
of those seasons. It just depends I think for some
I think for some people they choose to watch everything's

(01:17:30):
going to have And there's a million people watching The
Irishman like as they're on Twitter, and and if it's
in the theater, you don't even have like you have
to watch it. And I think Netflix and I love it,
And I think when you put a movie in the theater,

(01:17:50):
you're telling culturally, you were saying, like this is worth
you putting your phone in your pocket for two hours, like,
and you're asking people to do that, and it is
a big ask. And I think that to that end,
that's why we're writing a very expensive big fund. We

(01:18:10):
understand what we're asking is not a light ask. We're
asking you to give up your dimond court and and
and in order to do that, we have to repay
you with something that is worthy. So can I ask
at mafia question? And for that reason, I'm gonna go
back to something that I wanted to ask you guys
when you all were having the back and forth. Do
y'all ever consider because as a woman of color, being

(01:18:32):
a fan of what you guys do, I love it.
Wouldn't change it, blah blah blah. However, time to change it,
and not for nothing. I would be curious to see
how a woman will be written to some of these situations, right,
because when you look at the majority of the movies
that you guys do, Like you said, I know you
introduced the Roseburn situation, but not really so have y'all
started considering maybe maybe the next thing. Maybe I don't

(01:18:55):
know yet, but you're working on something, yes, very much.
I mean it is. It is prevalent topic of conversation,
but not on prepect. I don't want you to do
it just because oh my god, everybody's demanding that we
have a woman and then we have to have a
woman of color. But just because you see that, hey,
wait a minute, that would be funny to get that
perspective in this storyline and like, yeah, I mean it's
something that's Yeah. I mean the more perspectives and the

(01:19:18):
more different people you have working on your material, the
better it all is. Uh yeah, I mean we produce
the show Black Monday with Don Cheetle and yeah, and
we've just seen and and it is in Preacher exact
and we've seen it's very rewarding and and and and
it and people get great. You know. It's the more

(01:19:40):
representation the better. I would never argue otherwise. And I
want to see you like I got I love the
Don cheat on the Regina Hall, but I was like, man,
I want to see that'd be great. I'm in so
in the hindsight, the like I was paying attention to it,
but I don't recall I remember the email fallouts with Sony. Yeah,

(01:20:01):
the interview. Did was it worth it? Uh? Yeah? Because
it was crazy and like and was there damaged? What
did we see? Not to us like other people, I
mean talking about sexism, Like the only real person to
be horribly damaged by it was Aiming Pascal, her boss,

(01:20:23):
Michael Linton. He wasn't damaged, but she was terribly damaged. Wait,
just correct me if I'm wrong. The the fallout, the
fallout with the damn with the interview was if you
guys released this, we'll hack into your emails. And then
eventually they had her. They had already hacked into Sony
and they eventually threatened to like bomb movie theaters that

(01:20:45):
played the movie basically, and that's why they pulled that. Okay,
So it was released or was it Google Play? I've
seen it released for where Google released it and then
Netflix released it all within like Google released actually the
day it was supposed to come out in theaters, and
the Netflix released it two weeks later. Okay, And um again,

(01:21:10):
was it was it worth it? It was? I mean
it was like it was a really interesting exercise, like
I don't know the result of which is still fascinating.
And I don't even when you say is it worth it?
I don't even I'm not even sure anyone knows what
the funk actually happened. Like there was a big article

(01:21:32):
in the Hollywood Reporter the other day that was like
what really happened in the Sony hack? Can you read
the article and you're just like, there's no what happened?
I don't know what happened. People don't. They're not sure
North Korea did it, they don't like no people some
people so like it's hard to it's hard to retrospectively

(01:21:52):
gain a lot of insight from something where you're honestly
aren't even sure what the funk happened like as a movie, Honestly,
to me, the most the biggest bubber is that the
movie got pretty shitty reviews and that doesn't happen to
us that often, and that that on me out like, honestly, yeah,
it was like for us, like pretty bad. And so

(01:22:13):
that to me was the thing that if I look
back it could change something. I'd be like, oh, I
wish the second act had like a better set piece
in it, and I wish like we rounded out the
third act more emotionally. But I but like because that
was the stuff that was in my control, you know
what I mean, Like the actual product the film was
the thing we were in control of. And what I'm yeah,
what I don't love is that it just wasn't received

(01:22:34):
as well as movies. It's just hit me, and I
know we're gonna wind up pretty soon, but uh, it
just hit me that you're one of the cameos in
one of yelks last pieces. Yes, uh makes him know
I'm about to call it fight for You right too. Yeah, yeah,

(01:22:55):
there was an INTENTI version that was called fight for
You right resual? So how did that? How was that
picture come together? Just? Man? Were you guys aware at
the time what his condition was? And this was sort
of like their swan song. We kind of got that
sense as we were shooting it, Like I knew he
had been sick, but I there was kind of like
the public word on this on the street was that

(01:23:16):
he was getting better, you know. And then he just
called me. One day, I got a call from Adam Yeah,
and it was just like the greatest fucking phone call
you ever got, a huge BC Boys fan my whole life. Like, um,
I'd met him once or twice before at like south
By Southwest, I think, and yeah, and he was just like,

(01:23:37):
we're making a music video and I want you to
be Mike d And that was fucking great. And then
we shot that video for three days, which is crazy
for a music video, and and every famous person ever
was in and I think it was like halfway through
day two where I was like, oh, this is like
a kind of like a big last ter um and

(01:24:01):
and then it got kind of sad and bitter sweet,
but was also fun and like when when I look
back and think of was like he was just telling
like it was literally like we were all his like
g I Joe Toy said, he was just playing with us,
and it was like for your birthday, here's all your
favorite comedians and they'll do whatever the funk you tell

(01:24:22):
them to do for three days straight on this New
York City backlot and like that's literally he would just
be laughing at Daddy kicked the store in, throw this
beard at him, you guys, Dad's with the cop car
and like and he would just be like laughing his
ass off as we were just like what, like there
was no questions there was they were like why would

(01:24:43):
I do that? He was just like sure, yeah, whatever,
whatever the funk you want, we're it and like we
and it started to kind of imitate the video itself
because we were there all the time, Me and Danny
and Elijah who were the Beastie Boys, and then other
cameos would come in for like a couple of hours
and we were like this mindset. It was like crazy.
We were just like so geared to just do whatever

(01:25:05):
we were told to do with Eddie, like if they
were just like body slam Laura Dirt. I was like
all right, was like like I was just like in
this like state of like I'll just do whatever the
funk this guy tells me that's what we're here for.
And you can see people would come in and be
like this is crazy, like what are you guys doing
in here? This is like you've you've got nuts and

(01:25:26):
that really like we were just spraying beer, a fake
beer on everyone's faces, like throwing like we Yeah, it was.
It was a mad Danny McBride must be like he
writes too correct. Yeah, he writes he spound it down
in the Righteous Gemstones must be awesome to work in
my mind, everybody who was in this at the end
in a way to do their own writing, but who
it's like awesome to write with. It blows your mind

(01:25:48):
and you just like the fun you come up with
that ship. They're all great in their own ways, like
um yeah, Like Danny Jonah is truly the one like
on set is like it's pretty remark able to watch,
Like he's he's like he gets like very locked in
and is like it's like a pretty miraculous thing. From

(01:26:09):
time to time, Danny is very loose and and biting
and like he's the comedian that kind of the other
comedians are a little afraid to improvise with because yeah,
because in that movie, but he's very sweet and nice.
But it was like because I just felt like he

(01:26:32):
don't know, you know, he's very sweet and such a
nice dude and like not and what it is one
of those funny things where like he created those characters
as a way to make fun of the guys he
didn't like growing up. Basically, that is who he is
and his biggest fan base is probably which is a videos.

(01:26:57):
How how did Kanye contact you to do uh bound? Well,
he did. He just did it on our own and
then he did yes, and then he did ask. He
just released it, released it. He did it. No, he
just did it. He released his video and literally within
an hour of seeing it, I was like, we're recreating it,

(01:27:22):
and we had ours up like twenty four hours later,
Like it was you know what it was. I've never
seen Kanye's version. Oh that's funny. You just saw our
fun fat I've never seen you say that. You wait,

(01:27:51):
what's what's okay? The film not Don Roscoe's way. You
really end way when you think they're going to get
away with it, He's like, no, you go over here,
you just Banco. Yeah, shy, he stabbed you. Alright, No,

(01:28:15):
I'm sorry. I've seen the college drap out one, but
I haven't seen post that. No, but he did ask
us to come do it at his wedding. Franco. Yeah,
I don't understand. He called us and was like, will
you come do that at my wedding? And we'll know,
Like it was one of those things were like, throughout
the conversation, I like him to realize how uncomfortable it

(01:28:38):
would be, which he slowly did. He and I was
just like, we just he's just like he's like, as
I say this, I realized how fucking uncomfortable that. He's like,
it would be funny for ten seconds, but he's like,
I've asked you to fly to her side for like
literally ten seconds of ship Like he's like, we shouldn't
do it. But so, I mean, I mean, you you lived,

(01:29:04):
you lived a charm sort of buget listy life. I
want to know did a project ever get away from
you that you had your eyes on that you wish
you I wish you had a chance to right or
direct blah blah blah. But there are things like no,

(01:29:27):
I mean, yeah, did Lynn Manuel come up to get
away from your kids? No? Uh. There are things that
like that we that came across our desk that then
became very successful. But I don't think when I look like, oh, like,
should we have really like spent like two years making

(01:29:48):
like you know, like Hobbes and Shawls, Like I don't know,
like maybe it would have been fun, Like yeah, I mean,
I don't know if it was like outwardly offered, but
there was a point where it's like come in, you
want to meet on the Hobbs and chart movies like
Deadpool Baby years ago, like a very long time. But
like I think that it's not It just wasn't our thing,

(01:30:10):
you know what I mean, Like what we weren't like, uh,
the idea of like plugging in. I think that's what
Green Hornets scared us off of more than anything, was
like plugging into this like yeah exactly, and plugging into
like an I P that is like very uh yeah,
already established and having to like work within that. So
like like and working with like a big company is

(01:30:30):
like just scary, like working with like a Marvel or
you know, like and not to say we wouldn't do it,
it's just it's just scary, you know. And and I
think and making like a friend, yeah, like making like
a Hobbs and Shot type movie where it's just like,
this movie's gonna get made no matter what. We're just
the people like you know, serving you the dish, the
silver lining of green Hornets that you got your health

(01:30:50):
in check, yes, and I started working out, I got yeah,
I know that, and you maintained it. Yeah, I know.
It was a lot of good and we learned like
so much like we that movie was made in the
way movies aren't made anymore, Like we built everything. It
was practical effects, it was visual effects. There was there
was huge stunt teams. There was like literally the stunt

(01:31:13):
team that did Indiana Jones did the movie. Like we
got to learn from these like amazing people and and
Gondry himself with someone who was amazing to learn from.
And even though the result was debatable, like I think
very few experiences made us understand the production process and
filmmaking in general more than that movie. Because it was

(01:31:33):
as logistically complicated a movie as as exists in the world,
and we had like a front row seat to every
step of the process. So that was really interesting. Yeah,
I wish it made a better movie quick because I
remember famously listening to you on Staring one day and

(01:31:53):
he was asking you about working out and working out
why you were smoking, and he was like, yeah, I
take a couple of toes. You do that, I've done
it in this little weird everything. Number one, I want
you to give advice a young stone, because I think
you have to graduate to that level, and I wanted
to know when you got to the point where you
knew that you could do everything. Ston't that's um, it

(01:32:19):
takes a while. Tell babies exactly the thing. Most people.
I'm always telling people to smoke a little bit of weed,
like to take one hit of wheat. That's what like
I I just I was just with David Cha got
his Netflix show, and like we went around smoked all

(01:32:40):
day and I just the whole time was like one
little tiny hit and that I'll get you going for
You'll be fine and like like or set a timer,
take one hit and then see if you feel in
twenty minutes and then maybe have another hit. But like
most people just make way too much weed and who
don't smoke a lot of weed, and weed is super
strong and one hit is enough liter um. And I'm

(01:33:02):
also I'm also why do you I'm yeah, well I
prefer that. I'm like so new. I'm literally like seven
months into this, so we've been trying for thirty years. Yeah.
But but the thing is, when I do it, it
always hits me at the most inopportunite moment, like I'll

(01:33:24):
do it all right. One time I did it at
night and it felt a little weird, like, oh god,
let me just sit down and relax. I fell asleep
right and woke up in the morning. It was like,
oh damn, I didn't get high. That was a waste.
And then and then twenty minutes into my day, right
when I got on the drum set of fallon weird

(01:33:47):
from the night before. That's weird, Yeah, weird. Well, see,
how do edibles? I don't. I don't smoke on edible.
I do edibles very sparingly because they're wildly unpredicted like that,
like they're they're hard to it's hard to get. Yeah, yeah,

(01:34:11):
it's hard to get the dose are dried. It's hard
to time them. Sometimes it depends on what Sometimes they
take an hour to kick in, two hours, depends if
the stone is around you. Do you ever see Steve
eating his weed? If you eat your weed, there's none
left to smoke. I'm sorry forgive me again, my my

(01:34:34):
My final question is uh, oftentimes, Like right now I'm
watching the Morning Show, which is notably everyone. I've knew them.
I knew them from the world the comedy world. But yeah,
they're doing drama. Like would you consider because you did
Steve Jobs correct the movie? No, I did Steve Job. Um,

(01:35:07):
would you want to further explore into the world of drama? Yeah? Um?
And what role are you? What is your like, your
fantasy thing that you haven't done yet that you really
want to do? We're writing that. I mean that. That's
what's nice about being able to write your own movies
is like I have no one to blame but myself,

(01:35:28):
or if if my career seems limited in scope as
an actor, like, um, yeah, I mean what the thing
we're working on now I'm obsessed with like Buster Keaton
and Jackie chan and so like I've always wanted to
make like a highly physical like action movie like our
action comedy, like something that is almost entirely predicated on

(01:35:52):
action and not a lot of talking at all. And
that has just always been something that I always enjoy
shooting that type of stuff. Um, and so that's something
that we want to do and that's what we're working
on right now. You're kind of like a really violent
Mr Bean. All right. Well, you know, Seth, we really

(01:36:14):
thank you. Dan. We didn't even get to your your
hip hop. It's well, I love it anyway. You know,
we really want to thank you for coming. Yes, I'm
gonna be app of Sugar Steve and I'm paid Bill
and Boss Bill and light in Fante. This is quest Love.

(01:36:37):
You've been listening to quest Love Supreme. Thank you very much, Seth.
We will see you on the next go round. New Year,
Happy New Year. It's a little bit of weak, just
a little m m hmmm. For more podcasts from my

(01:37:06):
Heart Radio, visit the I Heart Radio app, Apple podcast,
or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.

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Laiya St. Clair

Questlove

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