April 5, 2023 • 30 mins
You know him from Archer, Frisky Dingo, and The Adventures of Elmo in Grouchland... this week, our guest is voice acting superstar Lucky Yates! Lucky shares a hilarious showbiz tale involving an award show and an altercation with a leading man. Will Smith who? This is the slap before the slap. Lucky almost came to blows with the VP of Mustaches Burt Reynolds. Will McFadden is obviously President of the Mustaches.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
If even me does it call for a really ratty,
like decade old monkey puppet to stand up. They're smart
assing while another guy is trying to deliver a speech.
Don't do that. Yeah, you know, it's not always easy
(00:37):
being a host. Sometimes you talk too much and your
voice gets raspy and sexy, and you need a gargle
throat coat t and peptobismo. It works. Sometimes you're reading
a teleprompter and it's moving too fast or displays words
you don't know how to pronounce. And sometimes you make
one joke and someone storms the stage and attacks you.
Now you may think I'm talking about Chris Rock and
(00:58):
Will Smith, but I'm actually talking about Lucky Yates and
Burt Reynolds. Now, Lucky as an actor, comedian and vo
legend who you may recognize from Archer or Homestar Runner
or maybe the Adventure of Elmo and Grouchland. He's also
a host in a Puppeteer and that's where he found
himself catching smoke from the bandit himself. I'm your host,
(01:19):
Will Bearskin Rug McFadden, and this is hashtag Storytime brought
to you by iHeartRadio. So we're around like two thousand
and five area, all right of time, and it was
at the Atlanta Film Festival, which is now like a
(01:40):
really great, well respected film festival, right, yeah, prestigious, But
in two thousand and five, I'm sure it was just
getting it well. In two thousand and five they were
making the conscientious effort. No, that's not true. They were,
they were they were going in that direction. But I
think they were because it started as just this really
(02:02):
sort of cool indie I'm like, super indie, maybe local
staff or at least Southeast you know, filmmaking and all
that kind of stuff. And then as it went on,
it you know, started becoming the other thing that people
would submit to. And then it's sort of growing. And
so they were in this weird space of like they
were getting prestigious, but they still wanted to keep this
(02:25):
sort of raw, edgy thing about them. Yeah, right, and
so forever, for like the last twenty five years, I've
been working at a theater here in Dad's garage called
Dad's Garage Theater, and it's an improv comedy theater and
we also do scripted plays like actual theater. Yeah, so
(02:48):
it's you know, comedy, but then also comedy plays but
plays and then now we do all self produced work.
But back then anyway, always have been sort of the
naughty kid in town, you know, opened in nineteen ninety
five and just sort of the rise of South Park
and the rise of Dad's Garage were kind of happening
(03:10):
at the same time, and they people would relate like, oh, yeah,
they're like the South Park. If you like that, you'll
love Dad's Garage kind of thing. So they hired one
of my very best friends, I believe maybe even now
he wasn't he we was post us being roommates, but
we had been roommates for a while. One of my
very best friends, a guy named Sean Daniels, who is
(03:31):
huge in the theater world right now, and he was
our artistic director, and they hired him to host this
award show that was kicking off the Atlanta Film Festival,
and we were they were going to give awards to
big name people who for their work on independent film
(03:57):
in Georgia, right or I was under the impression that
it was independent film in Georgia and not any film
in Georgia, right. But they're basically trying to swear mister Reynolds,
and I differed in our opinion. I see they enter
mister Reynolds, but they're probably trying yet, but they're trying
to draw in, you know, a certain caliber of celebrity
(04:19):
with this move. Is that what? And they're giving awards
to Parker Posey. Fuck yeah, in indie film Darling Parker
Posey did stuff in Georgia. Uh they did? Uh? I
believe it was Ruby D. Both Ossie Davis and Ruby
D were here, Okay, but I want to say they
(04:42):
were giving the award to Ruby maybe both of them,
I can't remember, they were both present at the time. Yeah.
And then Burt Reynolds, which I guess they were using
Deliverance as the independent film hook, even though I don't
know when that film came out, but I was alive
(05:03):
when it came out, and I remember it being a
very big deal at the movies. Yes, and this is
two thousand and five, so I'm trying to think of
this as pre or post Boogie Nights at this point. Oh,
this was post okay, so he kind of already he
had already become a thing and then was sort of
really sliding back down. Right. This was Yeah, this was
(05:25):
not a good Burt Reynolds anyway, So when they approached
Sean back in these days, we were a couple of
real rascals together, and I am a puppeteer. It's one
of the performance It might be my favorite medium of
performance from all the things that I do. I really
(05:45):
love puppetry and we have I and we have always
done puppets at Dad's garage. And so when they were like, hey,
we want you to host this event, Sean, but we're
trying to get the stuffiness out of the room so
you can do whatever you want, Sean just goes puppets
and they're like, great, that's gonna be great. And so
(06:08):
he just tells me, hey, man, we're gonna host the
thing and bring a puppet. Bring Phineas the Monkey, which
was like my signature puppet at Dad's at the time
in our kids show. Like this also feels like Crank
Anchors time, you know, Like I feel like Crank Ankers
was in the late nineties, early two I guess maybe
maybe it was so like Phineas was from our Kids show,
(06:31):
but you know, it was a very smartassy kids show
that you could get away with back then, the best
kind like barely. Uh So, yeah, maybe Crank anyway, I
got crank anchors. It's truly on Burt Reynolds's radar. It's true.
It's very true. Now, so you know show it's like puppets.
We're gonna bring Phineas. And I'm like, okay, great, let's
(06:53):
do this. Let's fuck around. And so we show up
and it's at the our Fox Theater, have Fox Theater here,
and there's a there's a few of them left in
the country, and they're the old movie palaces, right, They're
just absolutely stunning inside. And so it's in the Fox Theater,
in this grand ballroom, and we bring this dad's garage's
(07:19):
a tiny, low budget theater. We bring this shitty like
log set piece that I usually used in the kid
show for me to hide behind while Sean is standing
on stage like reading cards and just sort of making
fun of the events as we go along. We didn't
(07:40):
really know what to do. But the whole time, I'm like,
how are we justifying that a monkey is here? And
He's like, I don't know, and I'm like, well, we've
got to say something. It's so absurd, especially since we
have that piece of shit thig up there, Like what
are we gonna say? And so we were like, this
is probably fifteen minutes before we go on stair. I
(08:02):
was going to say, is this rehearsal or is are
we lying? You know the rehearsal. There is no rehearsal.
Shot submitted a script. Maybe, I guess. I don't know.
I was there to smart ass. That's what my job was.
So as as we decide like, okay, Phineas, I'm gonna
(08:27):
say that Phineas is a huge Hollywood movie producer. He's
from a giant studio and he's here to exploit the
indie film scene. He's here to grab some good ideas
and put in more car chases and more plane crashes.
Love it. It's basically the Michael by the Michael Bay
(08:48):
that a monkey, a monkey is a big time producer
in Hollywood. That's what idiots are. Yeah, brilliant. It was
either that or going on in the actual film theater
of the Fox Theater that night was Lord of the Ring,
which we should have gone with this, as I was
gonna say, I was, I walked into the wrong room,
but I was gonna stick it out here anyway. I
should have gone with the Lord of the Rings thing
(09:09):
instead of a Hollywood approach. But it's a film award festival. Yeah,
I tried. I tried to support indie film by making
fun of big Hollywood. Yeah that's perfect. Okay, So that's
(09:32):
our game plan. Sean has a little script that he
submitted that was very you know, like fun and fun
and weird and funny and weird and you know, a
little goofy. But nothing, nothing we did at all was anyway.
Like as as bad boys as we are, we're also
(09:53):
like goodhearted. We would never do anything mean or cruel
for any reason, and we didn't. That's the crazy part
about it. That being said, the monkey was not going
over well ever, Like when we brought the thing out,
there was just uh uh and we're like, oh shit,
(10:15):
we're in trouble. And I got to sit out there
the whole time with my arm up in the air
with a mic on, and I'm hot. I myself am
hidden from the audience. I'm behind this dumb tree log
thing with a monkey puppet. This I wish I still
had him. He rotted away. Oh no, So I come
up and I'm just like, I'm here to explain Hollywood
(10:36):
and then we give you know, we do bad jokes
and you know, I'm I'm making fun of how I was.
I had in the works. I was going to remake
My Dinner with Andre, which, for anyone unfamiliar with the
film My Dinner with Andrea, it's Wallace, Sean and I
don't can't remember who else. That's the only important part
(10:58):
is in her but is it is two people sitting
at dinner for two hours talking. That's the movie. And
so I was, I said I was going to do
My Dinner. I was. I was already had in the
works a big remake with of My Dinner with Andre
with Brad Pitt and Vin Diesel, and it was going
(11:20):
to be two and a half hours of a mumbling
conversation with car Chase in the middle. I'd watch it.
So that's the kind of shit we're throwing out there,
right right right. Parker Posey comes and gets her award. First.
She is, I don't know, maybe a little lit. Maybe
it's Parker Posey, so who knows? She's snarky. She she
(11:42):
gets up there, she looks over at the monkey and
I think I said something like I love you, Parker Posey,
and she just went, I just want everyone to know
there's a man sitting on the floor back there, and
I was just like yay, Parker Posey called it out. Yeah.
(12:03):
So I'm thinking like, okay, cool, this is like we
gotta good, good good. I'm being acknowledged, right, this is dumb,
gread this is funny that she gotta laugh doing it.
We gotta think to go with Ruby D. It was
ruby D because it was nothing but grace that so
she gets her awarded, it comes up and you know,
the whole thing, and then goes back and it sits,
(12:24):
and then and then Burt Reynolds and before going into
it though both Sean and I at this point huge
Burt Reynolds fans, Huge Burt Reynolds fans. Yeah. So Sean,
as a part of his pre written, pre approved speech,
goes on about how much he loves Burt Reynolds. In fact,
(12:46):
he said, I caught a lot of heat when I
was younger because I insisted that Cannonball Run two is
a better film than the original Cannonball Run. And you know,
like little applause from the audience. Burt Reynolds is taking
all of this as an attack, just like all of it.
(13:06):
So he he like, we go into like how much
we love him, say his name. He comes very slowly,
sort of sauntering up on stage because I don't know
how old Burt Reynolds was in uh two thousand and five,
(13:28):
but he looked like he was one hundred and eight
years old. Yeah, he had so much plastic surgery that
he did not look like a real human being. It
was weird up close. It was so sure. He's probably
sauced up too, you know, he's probably he was, you know,
the runk, the runk he gets. He gets to the
(13:51):
podium and he, I think, says one shitty thing about
Sean and myself, about how dare we or something like that.
Like he opened with a shitty line, to which the
monkey replied, I love you, mister Reynolds. And he looks
(14:15):
over at the monkey. I'm sitting on the floor and
I'm looking at him, but he never looked at me once.
He only looked at the monkey. He comes strolling slowly
over but aggressively as he grabs so phineas is as
(14:37):
like a sort of a muppety. It's called an arm
and rod puppet, hand and rod puppet, and you've got
your hand up in the head doing the mouth and
then you've got two rods and you're doing the arms,
and he comes in. He grabs Phineas's mouth, both the jaws,
and he's trying to pry I think he's trying to
rip the puppet into I think, yeah, never acknowledging that
(15:02):
there's a man, a much younger man, attached to the puppet.
And he made the most inhuman sound I have ever
heard in my life, which which was this, like he
was full of rage, full of old man rage. Who
(15:27):
if he would in a hand while he was trying
to rip my hand apart, like trying to rip the
monkey's face apart with my hand in it. And all
I could think was, oh my god, Renalds is so weak.
(15:48):
It's a weak old man. And so I just I
just closed my hand and rolled and rolled the puppet down.
It got him into my lap, and then he went
stumbling back to his podium, and like for the next
ten minutes, it was a long, rambling speech. If it
wasn't ten minutes, it seemed like ten minutes long. Starts
(16:11):
with laying into us and how dare we make fun
of Hollywood? And how dare we make fun of cannonball run?
It made this much money in the theaters, and seng went,
I said, I loved Cannonball Run. But Burt Reynolds didn't listen,
(16:34):
and he how dare we go after Brad Pitt? Do
we know how much Brad Pitt is worth? You people
don't have any idea, And then just like sort of
touches on his film work in Georgia, but he mostly
(16:55):
talks about Smokey and the Bandit, which then leads to
his very long rant about Sally Field and how she
was really the one and he let her get away
and he should never have done that, and there was
might have been a couple of Lonnie jabs in there.
(17:16):
Like it went on and on and on and on,
and I'm behind a log underneath like the audience can't
see me, and I'm looking upstage at my partner, Sean Daniels,
who has to stand upstage and just take it all
(17:40):
fully in front of everybody, just standing and I'm just like,
oh my god, and he's just looking at me like
shut up, shut up, and I'm just like, what are
we doing. We gotta get out of here. I never
bought the puppet back up, like it just was Sean
for the rest of the time, and afterwards, we couldn't
(18:02):
book the fuck out of there fast enough. And as
I was walking past Burt Reynolds on my way out,
I heard him say to the crowd around him, I
think it might have gone a little far up there,
and I was like, Oh my god. At the time,
(18:26):
I was working at a local radio station, ninety six
Rock and on the morning show and it was the
Regular Guy Show, and it was the biggest radio morning
show in Atlanta at the time, and I went in
there with the story the next day with this huge
scoop and dude, the story took off. Sean and I
(18:51):
are doing radio interviews all over the country. We're doing
all these phoners about Burt Reynolds attacking the Monkey. Then
Nash Inquirer runs a piece that our fight stats as
the Burt Reynolds and Phineas J. Monkey had a boxing
match coming up, their fight stats and everything like that
(19:13):
and what pitted, and then a little article about what happened.
Oh my god. And then I get a I think
it was an email from somebody that was producing the
Daily Show at the time with John Stewart, and they
were like, hey, we heard about this Burt Reynolds story.
Is there any way you can get a tape of it?
And I was like, I'll find out. I know people
(19:34):
in town. Let me give me a couple of days.
And then I found a news agency that was there
and they had a tape and they're like, yeah, we'll
give you a tape of it. So I tell Sean,
I'm like, dude, we can go on the Daily Show,
like I can fuck Like what if we got Phineas,
I'm gonna put a black eye on him and put
his little arm in a sling. And all he wants
is an apology, that's it. He just wants Burt Reynolds
(19:56):
to apologize, like he clearly mistaken. We don't know how
Figs went wrong, but we were talking about how much
we actually loved Burr Reynolds and we just want him
to apologize. It was yet and the board because we're
a nonprofit theater and we were getting a lot of
attention because of it. But the board I think probably
(20:17):
wisely said, you know what, before we get on the
Daily Show and cause more trouble, let's just stop this here.
Let's not due. I am heartbroken, but I understand, like
we could have turned this into gold, but also we're
(20:38):
not in control of that show, so who knows. Yeah,
pretty fun. And then he died, and then everybody was
coming out about what absolutely horrible shit human being he was,
and so I was like, oh cool, now, now don't
feel so bad about my story about him attacking a
monkey puppet I was operating, And I believe he thought
(20:59):
that talking monkey was real, yeah, because well, first of all,
it's insane that he was essentially trying to just like
dislocate your thumb. I honestly think he was. He thought
he was going to rip the puppet apart, right, I
think that's what he was going for, Like he wanted
to rip its face or maybe it's head off or
something like that. But I mean like he'd like had
(21:21):
old grandma strength. It really was like a two year
old came up to you and tried to pry your
hand apart, and I was like, what are you doing,
little boy? Like, oh my god. I think while I
was rolling down in Phineas's voice, the only thing I
said was my career, and I just sat there. If
(21:42):
he really did think it was a real monkey, then
that's even more disturbing that he was like actually trying
to murder like Peter would be all over it. He'd
never looked at me once. I was looking at him
right in the face as he was trying to rip
that he has had a part, and he never acknowledged
(22:03):
me that. On the walk over it, he was looking
right at the monkey like during the part he was
trying to Like Now, granted, he's a pro, right right,
he's part of the show. The show is the monkey,
not the man underneath it. He might not understand how
it works, even though I'm right there make it with
my lips moving. I'm not a ventriloquist. I have to hide,
(22:28):
and so I really don't know. At the time, I
was convinced he thought the monkey was a real talking monkey.
I think I think this has to go with that
because it's the plays best on the radio. I think
it's a testament to how great of a puppeteer you are,
that you actually fooled Burt Reynolds into thinking seventy five
(22:50):
year old drunkard but the monkey was real. Yeah, that's impressive.
That is that takes real skill. It will learn us
how many pain killers the man was on at that point?
Not enough? Yeah, but it his rant like the Sally
Field thing. He really went on and on and about
(23:12):
how she was just the one and he had messed
it up, and it was just like it was un comfortable.
This isn't therapy, Burt, but yet so funny for me
because I had just sat there, look at Shawn stand
there and the whole time and just go like, now
you have to go talk again. He had more show
(23:33):
to do. I wasn't in the rest of the script.
That was supposed to a smart ass and that was done. Now,
Oh my god, poor guy. He succeeded. Yeah, he turned out. Okay, yeah, no,
it didn't kill either of our careers. What would you say,
What would you say was the moral of the story?
What did you take away? What did you learn from that? Oh? Know,
(23:55):
your audience, don't bring a puppet to a knife if
if it really doesn't call if the day, if evening,
does it call for a really ratty, like decade old
monkey puppet to stand up there smart assing while another
guy is trying to deliver a speech. Don't do that. Yeah,
(24:19):
that's your fractured fairy tale. Thank you, thank you, I mean, no,
your audience. The real beauty of puppeteering, though, is that
that separation between the performer and you know and the puppet.
And it really is like my intro into Dad's garage
theater was do a improvised soap opera every season. It's
(24:41):
called Scandal, which is a title that has been ripped
off a very successful television show. Yeah, we were doing
it first, of course anyway. Uh and uh my very
first season in Scandal, I played a mischievous imp from
the ninth dimension called boot Boozy, the imp who had
(25:01):
ruined the career of a Hollywood star named Chick Starley,
who was based on Burns Chick Starley. Chick Starley played
by the brilliant Chris Blair and Chicken Boozy were a
huge hit, and I did it overtly. Boozy was like
this little plastic Mikhail Gorbachoff talking like it was. For
(25:25):
some reason in the eighties, some company thought it would
be fun to make a little stuffed Michail Gorbachoff dow Yeah,
with a very nice, realistic looking head. Realistic good for
like a baby doll style head of Michael Go with
(25:46):
the birth mark and everything up and I think, and
a moving mouth and that was attached to like a
squeeze thing in a stuffed body that for some reason
was wearing like a leather biker jacket with CCCP written
on the back. You know, Michael, he loved biking. But
when you pushed the thing to open his mouth and
(26:09):
make him noise, he just went huh, like what. So anyway,
it dismantled that that painted it like purple and then
made this weird imp character that was a huge hit.
And he was a bad influence on Chick and they
they just were always getting into trouble together and the
audience lending. And I did it overtly. I was just
out there with this thing on my arm with you know,
(26:29):
it's body in front of me. I was I were
this little diamond mask and I would just be there
the entire time, and it's like the audience doesn't even
know you're there. They're just like that puppets crazy. It's
the craziest thing. And you know, I'll talk to him
afterwards and all that kind of shit. I was like,
this is the best. Is Dad's garage still a thing?
(26:52):
Is it still a company? Yeah? Absolutely? Oh my god,
I want to go check this out so bad. Yeah.
So it's been around for him thirty thirty five years,
thirty years, twenty seven something like that. Nineteen ninety five
is when it opened. That's awesome. I'm a big I'm
a big theater twenty seven years theater guy. Myself and
I was a part of the The Actors Gang Theater
Company in Culver City, which is oh yeah right yeah.
(27:14):
Tim Robbins founded it and I was there for ten years. Great. Yeah,
but kind of similar, kind of similar vibe where it
was like they came out of this real punk rock
scene and they were doing really like in your face,
politically charged, socially conscious theater, you know, in the moment
talking about what was going on. So yeah, but yeah,
(27:35):
Dad's garage sounds like that's fun. Yeah, come check it out.
I would love to really come check out of Atlanta.
It's really going on here. Man. All right, well I
just needed an invite. Oh I don't have a place
for you to stay. It's all win big room. You
could stay in the Magic spacebox. I guess don't have
much privacy. It sounds like some night farter, I am.
(27:57):
Did you just admit it being a night fart? Yeah?
I mean, no shame. What else am I supposed to find? Yeah?
I saved them all to yourself, baby, for the middle
of the night, you know, fart farting night, that's right. Um,
well that was awesome man, Thank you so much of course. Thanks. Yeah,
it was just fun. That was a doozy. And hopefully,
(28:20):
you know, one day in the in the afterlife, you
and Burt will be reunited and probably in Hell, I'm guessing.
I say, I can only hope I can do somehow.
There will be a monkey up there for me to years.
It was so mister, it's good to see you. Well, well,
what a fancy meeting you here. My jaw has never
(28:41):
been the same. I'm thinking you the Heaven Court. Heaven
Court is a great this is a great shop. Yeah,
where it's you. You try and settle out with crime
stops when you go to heaven, but it does not.
Heaven Corny is all the cases and yeah, God is
(29:04):
the judge or yeah, Jesus, I don't know, Saint Peter,
Yeah why not. Well that about does it for this
week's episode of Hashtag Storytime, huge thanks again to Lucky Yates.
Make sure to check out the description for all those
sweet sweet links. Please take a second and hit that
subscribe button so you don't miss next week's episode, We've
Got TikTok superstar Adam Ray. Okay. I remember going home
(29:26):
one day and I had already hit a million. I
was so excited and I walk into my house. My
mom's watching my videos, and it was the one where
I was literally making fun of hurt. Give us a
call at the Storytime Hotline at three two, three, seven
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to be featured on an upcoming Listener Tales episode. If
(29:47):
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helps us out a lot, and I literally read every
single one of them. Hashtag Storytime is produced by iHeartRadio
and Curativity Productions, Hosted by Will McFadden. Sound designed by
Tony maddox, written by Will McFadden and Jason Shapiro, Produced
by Jason Shapiro, Danielle A Mora and Jourdan Elijah Michael.
Theme song by Scott Simons
If even me does it call for a really ratty,
like decade old monkey puppet to stand up. They're smart
assing while another guy is trying to deliver a speech.
Don't do that. Yeah, you know, it's not always easy
(00:37):
being a host. Sometimes you talk too much and your
voice gets raspy and sexy, and you need a gargle
throat coat t and peptobismo. It works. Sometimes you're reading
a teleprompter and it's moving too fast or displays words
you don't know how to pronounce. And sometimes you make
one joke and someone storms the stage and attacks you.
Now you may think I'm talking about Chris Rock and
(00:58):
Will Smith, but I'm actually talking about Lucky Yates and
Burt Reynolds. Now, Lucky as an actor, comedian and vo
legend who you may recognize from Archer or Homestar Runner
or maybe the Adventure of Elmo and Grouchland. He's also
a host in a Puppeteer and that's where he found
himself catching smoke from the bandit himself. I'm your host,
(01:19):
Will Bearskin Rug McFadden, and this is hashtag Storytime brought
to you by iHeartRadio. So we're around like two thousand
and five area, all right of time, and it was
at the Atlanta Film Festival, which is now like a
(01:40):
really great, well respected film festival, right, yeah, prestigious, But
in two thousand and five, I'm sure it was just
getting it well. In two thousand and five they were
making the conscientious effort. No, that's not true. They were,
they were they were going in that direction. But I
think they were because it started as just this really
(02:02):
sort of cool indie I'm like, super indie, maybe local
staff or at least Southeast you know, filmmaking and all
that kind of stuff. And then as it went on,
it you know, started becoming the other thing that people
would submit to. And then it's sort of growing. And
so they were in this weird space of like they
were getting prestigious, but they still wanted to keep this
(02:25):
sort of raw, edgy thing about them. Yeah, right, and
so forever, for like the last twenty five years, I've
been working at a theater here in Dad's garage called
Dad's Garage Theater, and it's an improv comedy theater and
we also do scripted plays like actual theater. Yeah, so
(02:48):
it's you know, comedy, but then also comedy plays but
plays and then now we do all self produced work.
But back then anyway, always have been sort of the
naughty kid in town, you know, opened in nineteen ninety
five and just sort of the rise of South Park
and the rise of Dad's Garage were kind of happening
(03:10):
at the same time, and they people would relate like, oh, yeah,
they're like the South Park. If you like that, you'll
love Dad's Garage kind of thing. So they hired one
of my very best friends, I believe maybe even now
he wasn't he we was post us being roommates, but
we had been roommates for a while. One of my
very best friends, a guy named Sean Daniels, who is
(03:31):
huge in the theater world right now, and he was
our artistic director, and they hired him to host this
award show that was kicking off the Atlanta Film Festival,
and we were they were going to give awards to
big name people who for their work on independent film
(03:57):
in Georgia, right or I was under the impression that
it was independent film in Georgia and not any film
in Georgia, right. But they're basically trying to swear mister Reynolds,
and I differed in our opinion. I see they enter
mister Reynolds, but they're probably trying yet, but they're trying
to draw in, you know, a certain caliber of celebrity
(04:19):
with this move. Is that what? And they're giving awards
to Parker Posey. Fuck yeah, in indie film Darling Parker
Posey did stuff in Georgia. Uh they did? Uh? I
believe it was Ruby D. Both Ossie Davis and Ruby
D were here, Okay, but I want to say they
(04:42):
were giving the award to Ruby maybe both of them,
I can't remember, they were both present at the time. Yeah.
And then Burt Reynolds, which I guess they were using
Deliverance as the independent film hook, even though I don't
know when that film came out, but I was alive
(05:03):
when it came out, and I remember it being a
very big deal at the movies. Yes, and this is
two thousand and five, so I'm trying to think of
this as pre or post Boogie Nights at this point. Oh,
this was post okay, so he kind of already he
had already become a thing and then was sort of
really sliding back down. Right. This was Yeah, this was
(05:25):
not a good Burt Reynolds anyway, So when they approached
Sean back in these days, we were a couple of
real rascals together, and I am a puppeteer. It's one
of the performance It might be my favorite medium of
performance from all the things that I do. I really
(05:45):
love puppetry and we have I and we have always
done puppets at Dad's garage. And so when they were like, hey,
we want you to host this event, Sean, but we're
trying to get the stuffiness out of the room so
you can do whatever you want, Sean just goes puppets
and they're like, great, that's gonna be great. And so
(06:08):
he just tells me, hey, man, we're gonna host the
thing and bring a puppet. Bring Phineas the Monkey, which
was like my signature puppet at Dad's at the time
in our kids show. Like this also feels like Crank
Anchors time, you know, Like I feel like Crank Ankers
was in the late nineties, early two I guess maybe
maybe it was so like Phineas was from our Kids show,
(06:31):
but you know, it was a very smartassy kids show
that you could get away with back then, the best
kind like barely. Uh So, yeah, maybe Crank anyway, I
got crank anchors. It's truly on Burt Reynolds's radar. It's true.
It's very true. Now, so you know show it's like puppets.
We're gonna bring Phineas. And I'm like, okay, great, let's
(06:53):
do this. Let's fuck around. And so we show up
and it's at the our Fox Theater, have Fox Theater here,
and there's a there's a few of them left in
the country, and they're the old movie palaces, right, They're
just absolutely stunning inside. And so it's in the Fox Theater,
in this grand ballroom, and we bring this dad's garage's
(07:19):
a tiny, low budget theater. We bring this shitty like
log set piece that I usually used in the kid
show for me to hide behind while Sean is standing
on stage like reading cards and just sort of making
fun of the events as we go along. We didn't
(07:40):
really know what to do. But the whole time, I'm like,
how are we justifying that a monkey is here? And
He's like, I don't know, and I'm like, well, we've
got to say something. It's so absurd, especially since we
have that piece of shit thig up there, Like what
are we gonna say? And so we were like, this
is probably fifteen minutes before we go on stair. I
(08:02):
was going to say, is this rehearsal or is are
we lying? You know the rehearsal. There is no rehearsal.
Shot submitted a script. Maybe, I guess. I don't know.
I was there to smart ass. That's what my job was.
So as as we decide like, okay, Phineas, I'm gonna
(08:27):
say that Phineas is a huge Hollywood movie producer. He's
from a giant studio and he's here to exploit the
indie film scene. He's here to grab some good ideas
and put in more car chases and more plane crashes.
Love it. It's basically the Michael by the Michael Bay
(08:48):
that a monkey, a monkey is a big time producer
in Hollywood. That's what idiots are. Yeah, brilliant. It was
either that or going on in the actual film theater
of the Fox Theater that night was Lord of the Ring,
which we should have gone with this, as I was
gonna say, I was, I walked into the wrong room,
but I was gonna stick it out here anyway. I
should have gone with the Lord of the Rings thing
(09:09):
instead of a Hollywood approach. But it's a film award festival. Yeah,
I tried. I tried to support indie film by making
fun of big Hollywood. Yeah that's perfect. Okay, So that's
(09:32):
our game plan. Sean has a little script that he
submitted that was very you know, like fun and fun
and weird and funny and weird and you know, a
little goofy. But nothing, nothing we did at all was anyway.
Like as as bad boys as we are, we're also
(09:53):
like goodhearted. We would never do anything mean or cruel
for any reason, and we didn't. That's the crazy part
about it. That being said, the monkey was not going
over well ever, Like when we brought the thing out,
there was just uh uh and we're like, oh shit,
(10:15):
we're in trouble. And I got to sit out there
the whole time with my arm up in the air
with a mic on, and I'm hot. I myself am
hidden from the audience. I'm behind this dumb tree log
thing with a monkey puppet. This I wish I still
had him. He rotted away. Oh no, So I come
up and I'm just like, I'm here to explain Hollywood
(10:36):
and then we give you know, we do bad jokes
and you know, I'm I'm making fun of how I was.
I had in the works. I was going to remake
My Dinner with Andre, which, for anyone unfamiliar with the
film My Dinner with Andrea, it's Wallace, Sean and I
don't can't remember who else. That's the only important part
(10:58):
is in her but is it is two people sitting
at dinner for two hours talking. That's the movie. And
so I was, I said I was going to do
My Dinner. I was. I was already had in the
works a big remake with of My Dinner with Andre
with Brad Pitt and Vin Diesel, and it was going
(11:20):
to be two and a half hours of a mumbling
conversation with car Chase in the middle. I'd watch it.
So that's the kind of shit we're throwing out there,
right right right. Parker Posey comes and gets her award. First.
She is, I don't know, maybe a little lit. Maybe
it's Parker Posey, so who knows? She's snarky. She she
(11:42):
gets up there, she looks over at the monkey and
I think I said something like I love you, Parker Posey,
and she just went, I just want everyone to know
there's a man sitting on the floor back there, and
I was just like yay, Parker Posey called it out. Yeah.
(12:03):
So I'm thinking like, okay, cool, this is like we
gotta good, good good. I'm being acknowledged, right, this is dumb,
gread this is funny that she gotta laugh doing it.
We gotta think to go with Ruby D. It was
ruby D because it was nothing but grace that so
she gets her awarded, it comes up and you know,
the whole thing, and then goes back and it sits,
(12:24):
and then and then Burt Reynolds and before going into
it though both Sean and I at this point huge
Burt Reynolds fans, Huge Burt Reynolds fans. Yeah. So Sean,
as a part of his pre written, pre approved speech,
goes on about how much he loves Burt Reynolds. In fact,
(12:46):
he said, I caught a lot of heat when I
was younger because I insisted that Cannonball Run two is
a better film than the original Cannonball Run. And you know,
like little applause from the audience. Burt Reynolds is taking
all of this as an attack, just like all of it.
(13:06):
So he he like, we go into like how much
we love him, say his name. He comes very slowly,
sort of sauntering up on stage because I don't know
how old Burt Reynolds was in uh two thousand and five,
(13:28):
but he looked like he was one hundred and eight
years old. Yeah, he had so much plastic surgery that
he did not look like a real human being. It
was weird up close. It was so sure. He's probably
sauced up too, you know, he's probably he was, you know,
the runk, the runk he gets. He gets to the
(13:51):
podium and he, I think, says one shitty thing about
Sean and myself, about how dare we or something like that.
Like he opened with a shitty line, to which the
monkey replied, I love you, mister Reynolds. And he looks
(14:15):
over at the monkey. I'm sitting on the floor and
I'm looking at him, but he never looked at me once.
He only looked at the monkey. He comes strolling slowly
over but aggressively as he grabs so phineas is as
(14:37):
like a sort of a muppety. It's called an arm
and rod puppet, hand and rod puppet, and you've got
your hand up in the head doing the mouth and
then you've got two rods and you're doing the arms,
and he comes in. He grabs Phineas's mouth, both the jaws,
and he's trying to pry I think he's trying to
rip the puppet into I think, yeah, never acknowledging that
(15:02):
there's a man, a much younger man, attached to the puppet.
And he made the most inhuman sound I have ever
heard in my life, which which was this, like he
was full of rage, full of old man rage. Who
(15:27):
if he would in a hand while he was trying
to rip my hand apart, like trying to rip the
monkey's face apart with my hand in it. And all
I could think was, oh my god, Renalds is so weak.
(15:48):
It's a weak old man. And so I just I
just closed my hand and rolled and rolled the puppet down.
It got him into my lap, and then he went
stumbling back to his podium, and like for the next
ten minutes, it was a long, rambling speech. If it
wasn't ten minutes, it seemed like ten minutes long. Starts
(16:11):
with laying into us and how dare we make fun
of Hollywood? And how dare we make fun of cannonball run?
It made this much money in the theaters, and seng went,
I said, I loved Cannonball Run. But Burt Reynolds didn't listen,
(16:34):
and he how dare we go after Brad Pitt? Do
we know how much Brad Pitt is worth? You people
don't have any idea, And then just like sort of
touches on his film work in Georgia, but he mostly
(16:55):
talks about Smokey and the Bandit, which then leads to
his very long rant about Sally Field and how she
was really the one and he let her get away
and he should never have done that, and there was
might have been a couple of Lonnie jabs in there.
(17:16):
Like it went on and on and on and on,
and I'm behind a log underneath like the audience can't
see me, and I'm looking upstage at my partner, Sean Daniels,
who has to stand upstage and just take it all
(17:40):
fully in front of everybody, just standing and I'm just like,
oh my god, and he's just looking at me like
shut up, shut up, and I'm just like, what are
we doing. We gotta get out of here. I never
bought the puppet back up, like it just was Sean
for the rest of the time, and afterwards, we couldn't
(18:02):
book the fuck out of there fast enough. And as
I was walking past Burt Reynolds on my way out,
I heard him say to the crowd around him, I
think it might have gone a little far up there,
and I was like, Oh my god. At the time,
(18:26):
I was working at a local radio station, ninety six
Rock and on the morning show and it was the
Regular Guy Show, and it was the biggest radio morning
show in Atlanta at the time, and I went in
there with the story the next day with this huge
scoop and dude, the story took off. Sean and I
(18:51):
are doing radio interviews all over the country. We're doing
all these phoners about Burt Reynolds attacking the Monkey. Then
Nash Inquirer runs a piece that our fight stats as
the Burt Reynolds and Phineas J. Monkey had a boxing
match coming up, their fight stats and everything like that
(19:13):
and what pitted, and then a little article about what happened.
Oh my god. And then I get a I think
it was an email from somebody that was producing the
Daily Show at the time with John Stewart, and they
were like, hey, we heard about this Burt Reynolds story.
Is there any way you can get a tape of it?
And I was like, I'll find out. I know people
(19:34):
in town. Let me give me a couple of days.
And then I found a news agency that was there
and they had a tape and they're like, yeah, we'll
give you a tape of it. So I tell Sean,
I'm like, dude, we can go on the Daily Show,
like I can fuck Like what if we got Phineas,
I'm gonna put a black eye on him and put
his little arm in a sling. And all he wants
is an apology, that's it. He just wants Burt Reynolds
(19:56):
to apologize, like he clearly mistaken. We don't know how
Figs went wrong, but we were talking about how much
we actually loved Burr Reynolds and we just want him
to apologize. It was yet and the board because we're
a nonprofit theater and we were getting a lot of
attention because of it. But the board I think probably
(20:17):
wisely said, you know what, before we get on the
Daily Show and cause more trouble, let's just stop this here.
Let's not due. I am heartbroken, but I understand, like
we could have turned this into gold, but also we're
(20:38):
not in control of that show, so who knows. Yeah,
pretty fun. And then he died, and then everybody was
coming out about what absolutely horrible shit human being he was,
and so I was like, oh cool, now, now don't
feel so bad about my story about him attacking a
monkey puppet I was operating, And I believe he thought
(20:59):
that talking monkey was real, yeah, because well, first of all,
it's insane that he was essentially trying to just like
dislocate your thumb. I honestly think he was. He thought
he was going to rip the puppet apart, right, I
think that's what he was going for, Like he wanted
to rip its face or maybe it's head off or
something like that. But I mean like he'd like had
(21:21):
old grandma strength. It really was like a two year
old came up to you and tried to pry your
hand apart, and I was like, what are you doing,
little boy? Like, oh my god. I think while I
was rolling down in Phineas's voice, the only thing I
said was my career, and I just sat there. If
(21:42):
he really did think it was a real monkey, then
that's even more disturbing that he was like actually trying
to murder like Peter would be all over it. He'd
never looked at me once. I was looking at him
right in the face as he was trying to rip
that he has had a part, and he never acknowledged
(22:03):
me that. On the walk over it, he was looking
right at the monkey like during the part he was
trying to Like Now, granted, he's a pro, right right,
he's part of the show. The show is the monkey,
not the man underneath it. He might not understand how
it works, even though I'm right there make it with
my lips moving. I'm not a ventriloquist. I have to hide,
(22:28):
and so I really don't know. At the time, I
was convinced he thought the monkey was a real talking monkey.
I think I think this has to go with that
because it's the plays best on the radio. I think
it's a testament to how great of a puppeteer you are,
that you actually fooled Burt Reynolds into thinking seventy five
(22:50):
year old drunkard but the monkey was real. Yeah, that's impressive.
That is that takes real skill. It will learn us
how many pain killers the man was on at that point?
Not enough? Yeah, but it his rant like the Sally
Field thing. He really went on and on and about
(23:12):
how she was just the one and he had messed
it up, and it was just like it was un comfortable.
This isn't therapy, Burt, but yet so funny for me
because I had just sat there, look at Shawn stand
there and the whole time and just go like, now
you have to go talk again. He had more show
(23:33):
to do. I wasn't in the rest of the script.
That was supposed to a smart ass and that was done. Now,
Oh my god, poor guy. He succeeded. Yeah, he turned out. Okay, yeah, no,
it didn't kill either of our careers. What would you say,
What would you say was the moral of the story?
What did you take away? What did you learn from that? Oh? Know,
(23:55):
your audience, don't bring a puppet to a knife if
if it really doesn't call if the day, if evening,
does it call for a really ratty, like decade old
monkey puppet to stand up there smart assing while another
guy is trying to deliver a speech. Don't do that. Yeah,
(24:19):
that's your fractured fairy tale. Thank you, thank you, I mean, no,
your audience. The real beauty of puppeteering, though, is that
that separation between the performer and you know and the puppet.
And it really is like my intro into Dad's garage
theater was do a improvised soap opera every season. It's
(24:41):
called Scandal, which is a title that has been ripped
off a very successful television show. Yeah, we were doing
it first, of course anyway. Uh and uh my very
first season in Scandal, I played a mischievous imp from
the ninth dimension called boot Boozy, the imp who had
(25:01):
ruined the career of a Hollywood star named Chick Starley,
who was based on Burns Chick Starley. Chick Starley played
by the brilliant Chris Blair and Chicken Boozy were a
huge hit, and I did it overtly. Boozy was like
this little plastic Mikhail Gorbachoff talking like it was. For
(25:25):
some reason in the eighties, some company thought it would
be fun to make a little stuffed Michail Gorbachoff dow Yeah,
with a very nice, realistic looking head. Realistic good for
like a baby doll style head of Michael Go with
(25:46):
the birth mark and everything up and I think, and
a moving mouth and that was attached to like a
squeeze thing in a stuffed body that for some reason
was wearing like a leather biker jacket with CCCP written
on the back. You know, Michael, he loved biking. But
when you pushed the thing to open his mouth and
(26:09):
make him noise, he just went huh, like what. So anyway,
it dismantled that that painted it like purple and then
made this weird imp character that was a huge hit.
And he was a bad influence on Chick and they
they just were always getting into trouble together and the
audience lending. And I did it overtly. I was just
out there with this thing on my arm with you know,
(26:29):
it's body in front of me. I was I were
this little diamond mask and I would just be there
the entire time, and it's like the audience doesn't even
know you're there. They're just like that puppets crazy. It's
the craziest thing. And you know, I'll talk to him
afterwards and all that kind of shit. I was like,
this is the best. Is Dad's garage still a thing?
(26:52):
Is it still a company? Yeah? Absolutely? Oh my god,
I want to go check this out so bad. Yeah.
So it's been around for him thirty thirty five years,
thirty years, twenty seven something like that. Nineteen ninety five
is when it opened. That's awesome. I'm a big I'm
a big theater twenty seven years theater guy. Myself and
I was a part of the The Actors Gang Theater
Company in Culver City, which is oh yeah right yeah.
(27:14):
Tim Robbins founded it and I was there for ten years. Great. Yeah,
but kind of similar, kind of similar vibe where it
was like they came out of this real punk rock
scene and they were doing really like in your face,
politically charged, socially conscious theater, you know, in the moment
talking about what was going on. So yeah, but yeah,
(27:35):
Dad's garage sounds like that's fun. Yeah, come check it out.
I would love to really come check out of Atlanta.
It's really going on here. Man. All right, well I
just needed an invite. Oh I don't have a place
for you to stay. It's all win big room. You
could stay in the Magic spacebox. I guess don't have
much privacy. It sounds like some night farter, I am.
(27:57):
Did you just admit it being a night fart? Yeah?
I mean, no shame. What else am I supposed to find? Yeah?
I saved them all to yourself, baby, for the middle
of the night, you know, fart farting night, that's right. Um,
well that was awesome man, Thank you so much of course. Thanks. Yeah,
it was just fun. That was a doozy. And hopefully,
(28:20):
you know, one day in the in the afterlife, you
and Burt will be reunited and probably in Hell, I'm guessing.
I say, I can only hope I can do somehow.
There will be a monkey up there for me to years.
It was so mister, it's good to see you. Well, well,
what a fancy meeting you here. My jaw has never
(28:41):
been the same. I'm thinking you the Heaven Court. Heaven
Court is a great this is a great shop. Yeah,
where it's you. You try and settle out with crime
stops when you go to heaven, but it does not.
Heaven Corny is all the cases and yeah, God is
(29:04):
the judge or yeah, Jesus, I don't know, Saint Peter,
Yeah why not. Well that about does it for this
week's episode of Hashtag Storytime, huge thanks again to Lucky Yates.
Make sure to check out the description for all those
sweet sweet links. Please take a second and hit that
subscribe button so you don't miss next week's episode, We've
Got TikTok superstar Adam Ray. Okay. I remember going home
(29:26):
one day and I had already hit a million. I
was so excited and I walk into my house. My
mom's watching my videos, and it was the one where
I was literally making fun of hurt. Give us a
call at the Storytime Hotline at three two, three, seven
four one, eighteen seventy three and tell us your story
to be featured on an upcoming Listener Tales episode. If
(29:47):
you're enjoying the podcast, please leave us a review. It
helps us out a lot, and I literally read every
single one of them. Hashtag Storytime is produced by iHeartRadio
and Curativity Productions, Hosted by Will McFadden. Sound designed by
Tony maddox, written by Will McFadden and Jason Shapiro, Produced
by Jason Shapiro, Danielle A Mora and Jourdan Elijah Michael.
Theme song by Scott Simons
Host
Will McFadden
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