Happy Holidays from your friends at "Naked Lunch." To learn more about building community through food and "Somebody Feed the People," visit the Philanthropy page at philrosenthalworld.com.Episode Description.
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Speaker 1 (00:04):
Let's build the means to the fat. Food for thought
and jokes on tap. We're talking with our mouthsful, having fun,
BEEAs cake and Humble Pies, serving up class lovely. The
dressing on the side, it's naked lunch.
Speaker 2 (00:26):
Clothing optional.
Speaker 3 (00:29):
Twenty twenty five came alive when Phil and David appeared
at the Palace of the Fine Arts Theater as part
of SF Sketch Fest with the brilliantly funny Paul Riser.
Speaker 4 (00:36):
Paul has many projects right now.
Speaker 5 (00:38):
I can't even keep up with you. You're so busy.
You're like a young person.
Speaker 6 (00:43):
I was so much like a young person.
Speaker 2 (00:45):
Yeah, all the ways except for one your age.
Speaker 5 (00:51):
So he's got a special out.
Speaker 4 (00:52):
It's called It's called life, Death and rice pudding.
Speaker 5 (00:55):
And rice pudding. I got food in there for you.
Speaker 2 (00:58):
Tell us give us the rice pudding part, the rice pudding.
Speaker 7 (01:01):
Yes, how many watched this? Want to hear silence?
Speaker 8 (01:03):
Yes?
Speaker 5 (01:04):
How many people have seen my special?
Speaker 8 (01:06):
Yeah?
Speaker 4 (01:06):
Okay, well it is It is hard to It's on Al.
Speaker 7 (01:11):
Jazeera, which is not, which is not you know, the
widest platform.
Speaker 5 (01:16):
They give you quite an intro.
Speaker 7 (01:20):
Uh So the reason, the reason I can tell the story?
So the reason it's called rice pud. It's a long story.
So I told the whole story. Yes, we got okay,
so and then you don't have to see it, specially
because I'm talking about so the rice pudding comes from.
There's a story I told the story about. I did
a movie years ago with Peter Falk, who I idolized,
(01:44):
and and we were talking one day about comedy and
I said, what kind of what do you like? What
makes what do you enjoy comedy wise? And he said, well,
you know, I got to be honest. The things that
make me laugh they don't always make other people laugh.
I said, we'll give me an example. So he tells
me this story, which I thought was funny. But over
the years I've thought about this and I realized it
(02:05):
was more than funny. The story actually had the secret
of life hidden inside. So here's the story. Peter goes
to lunch at a deli, a New York style deli,
and the end of the meal, waiter says, would anybody
like dessert? Peter Fawk says that you'll have rice pudding.
The guy says, sure. Wait, Peter, good Way, before you
(02:26):
write it down. He does you have raisins? Guy says no.
Peter says, are you sure?
Speaker 2 (02:34):
He says yeah.
Speaker 7 (02:35):
He goes because if it has raisins, I can't eat
a raisin. If there's raisins in it, I don't want it.
I'll tell you very no raisins. I can't eat a raisin.
The guy said, mister falk I don't know how else
to put it. No, don't we don't put raisins in
the rice pudding. He says, great, I'll have it, goes
to the kitchen, comes back with the rice pudding chuck
full of raisins top bottom in the glass, dark with raisins.
(03:01):
Peter says, hey, hey, I thought you said there's no raisins.
And this waiter's been doing this one hundred years. He
just shrugged and he said, here and there you'll find.
Speaker 2 (03:10):
The rais Well, that's what life is.
Speaker 7 (03:16):
Nothing is all good, right, Even the things you love
have you don't want.
Speaker 5 (03:20):
Here and there you'll find the race.
Speaker 2 (03:22):
Yes, here and there. David Owen can confirm this, but
I believe that's the best Peter falk impersonation at twenty
twenty five sketchmen.
Speaker 5 (03:28):
Yeah, that's a very good Peter Fauk.
Speaker 7 (03:32):
That's the extent of my impersonations.
Speaker 5 (03:34):
But you got to work with him.
Speaker 7 (03:35):
I did, and it was everything you would ever hope.
He was just brilliant and and and he takes. I
think it was the last film he did just because
he said, fuck it, I'm not doing this again. And
that's how much he enjoyed working with me. No, it was. Yeah,
it was a few years before he passed, and he
would he took. He was so diligent and he cared
(03:57):
and people I had heard, you know, he's very he
can be really cranky and difficult, and I found the
only time he was got intense is when people would
interfere with his work, like I just like I remember
the director was moving the camera around and he found it.
Speaker 5 (04:16):
He found a we did it.
Speaker 7 (04:17):
It was about around around sitting around the table, and
the director did one take where he was just going
to keep moving the camera and Peter understandably said, why
I don't know where the camera is when you know
when I say this line, you might be behind me,
and the way the director just kind of insisted, well,
now this is how I want to do it, and
Peter resisted, and finally it was a huge oak table
(04:37):
and Peter who seventy six, went, I don't like it,
and all the said, wow, he just he just threw
a table at a big thick table. And then and
I went, we had to let the smoke clear. And
then to Paul, you you you go into his trailer,
you talk to him, and he was very nice to me,
and I went in. He was kind of he was ashamed,
and he just said, I just want to get to
(05:00):
see good. I went, that's all it is. He just
didn't want to not do well, and he was, you know,
off balance. So I had nothing but great love and
respect for his craft. And you know, after that career,
he didn't need to work that hard, but he did
and he was great. He was brilliant. The movie is
called The Thing About My Folks. You can find it
(05:21):
also on Al Jazella. I Have a I Have a Ball,
their favorite, Oh they love me.
Speaker 2 (05:26):
Paul, your story had the word diner in it, So
I have to mention that our on our podcast, in
Our World, in Phil's Life, I think it's true. Diner
is like our Citizen Kane. It is the most It
is the greatest American movie. In fact, a few weeks
after we had Paul on, we had Kevin Bacon on
and he had listened to Paul's episode. He goes, I
(05:47):
have no fucking Diner stories. Paul took all my stories Diner.
I don't know how many have seen Diner, even more.
Speaker 7 (05:56):
Than I have seen My Special Interesting.
Speaker 2 (05:58):
Exactly that movie What's it Mean in your life? Because
it played it.
Speaker 7 (06:04):
That was part Crazily enough, that was the first job
I ever had. I had never done anything, and I
got it by accident because I literally went with a
friend who was auditioning, and I was waiting outside in
the lobby, and after he was finished, the cast in
director said you're next. I went, no, I'm just waiting
for my friend. And I was trying to bow out
of it. She said, do you have a picture? I
(06:25):
said no, I'm not. I'm just waiting for my friend.
She said, come back tomorrow and meet the new first
time director, Barry Levinson. I went all right, And next
two weeks later, I'm in Baltimore and I knew nothing.
I knew nothing, so I tell you I would tell
the story about that my first shot. So I had
never done anything. I've never been on a TV show,
I'd never been in front of a camera and the
(06:47):
first week of the film.
Speaker 2 (06:48):
I didn't.
Speaker 7 (06:50):
I just the way this schedule was, I had no scene.
So I was for a week just waiting, and then
finally they said you're working tomorrow. And it was the
opening shot of the movie, which, if you remember, it's
on a steady cam, which was new to them and
Barry and never done. So they said, well, come in
the night before we're going to just rehearse it, and
they have a special camera. And all I could think was,
(07:12):
I'd like, can I have the regular camera that all
the other guys. I thought it was like the training wheels.
I thought they were like, give this idiot the foolproof camera.
But I didn't know that it was special and difficult,
and so that's how little I knew.
Speaker 5 (07:25):
But that was the it turned out.
Speaker 7 (07:27):
Well, it turned out well. That was like literally opened
all the doors. And I said, someday, maybe I play
the Palace of Fine Arts with Phil Rosenthal and look
how dreams come true.
Speaker 2 (07:39):
And we're not supposed to say this, but ever since
you travel with Mickey work NonStop.
Speaker 5 (07:44):
He's backstage right watching jacket.
Speaker 7 (07:46):
I don't go anywhere without Mickey, right, but you do.
Speaker 2 (07:50):
You are friends with a lot of the guys.
Speaker 7 (07:53):
Right, everybody but Mickey, No, no, not to any decision making.
But yes, but Steve Gutenberg, Kevin Bio Daniels hero, Steve Gutenberg, hero,
Steve Guttenberg, who has been instrumental in putting out helping
people in his fire. Yeah. I saw him just the
other day. He's He's a very sweet, special guy.
Speaker 3 (08:17):
Twenty twenty five was a huge year for Goo Goo Dolls,
but they still found time to have hot wings and
a great conversation with Phil and David Buffalo.
Speaker 5 (08:24):
You met when you were how oled.
Speaker 9 (08:26):
I don't know, like like like when we were about
twenty we met, yea, yeah, yeah, yeah, nineteen I was
I think I was nineteen.
Speaker 10 (08:34):
I'm younger than him a little bit. Yeah, but yeah,
and it was it was it was interesting how we met.
Which was you know, I was in college. I was
at the dorms and he came to I was supplementing
my income by selling drugs.
Speaker 2 (08:50):
And a grand tradition in rocket.
Speaker 10 (08:52):
Yes, it was. And uh, you know I was on
I was on the financial aid you know things. So
I was supplementing my income, but you know, selling a
little weed. And that's we met.
Speaker 9 (09:04):
That my cousin played in a band and John played
guitar in that band. Yeah, so I think my cousin
was looking to retire from the band and go to
school at nineteen, he was done with.
Speaker 2 (09:19):
His rocket band career.
Speaker 9 (09:20):
Yes, that that was the Boumont.
Speaker 10 (09:23):
Yeah, yeah, it was. It was just like a ridiculous
like hardcore. Yeah, it's called the Bay Time was like this,
but I've been not a woman in the audience. Just
a bunch of guys with their shirts off, beating the
hell out of each other. That was what that was
all about.
Speaker 5 (09:36):
But that's what you started playing.
Speaker 9 (09:38):
Yeah, yeah, I think my cousin was moving on, and
I think the plan was eventually I was going to
take over playing bass in the band, but they were
having me learn the songs on guitar, and John showed
up and I was playing guitar. That was a little
uncomfortable for a second, because I don't think they told
him about it.
Speaker 2 (09:53):
No, they didn't.
Speaker 10 (09:53):
And you like that music going in I mean I
liked being in a band like Okay, so.
Speaker 4 (10:01):
Because you were I saw the little documentary, Yeah, what's
called behind the scenes, Behind the Music, Behind the music.
Speaker 2 (10:08):
You didn't I'm in fourteen of them and I didn't.
You can't remember the name. So it used to be
a cultural No, I know, I know.
Speaker 4 (10:16):
It's behind the music, you behind the thing, you were,
you were. That's a Jewish way of saying, over there.
Speaker 2 (10:23):
That's an Israel. That's what the show is called. Behind
the thing, behind the thing with the songs.
Speaker 5 (10:27):
With the with the loud music.
Speaker 4 (10:30):
Uh, you were a nice accordion player. I was so
for for me to see that. That was my number
one question coming in today was how did you go
from accordion to playing pretty much heavy metal?
Speaker 5 (10:44):
Right?
Speaker 2 (10:44):
No?
Speaker 5 (10:46):
Sorry?
Speaker 2 (10:49):
Wow?
Speaker 10 (10:49):
How did I go from that?
Speaker 2 (10:51):
Okay?
Speaker 10 (10:52):
I grew up on the East side of Buffalo, which
at that time in history was all you know, Polish
Catholic immigrants, you know, and like a good Polish boy,
you go and take accordion lessons. Your mother makes you
take accordion lessons and.
Speaker 2 (11:09):
In lieu of a bar Mitzville polka.
Speaker 9 (11:12):
Yeah.
Speaker 10 (11:12):
So so when you're nine or ten and you're taking
accordion lessons, do you know how heavy an accordion is?
Speaker 5 (11:21):
Heavy?
Speaker 2 (11:22):
It's really heavy?
Speaker 5 (11:23):
And you were targeted a yessing of.
Speaker 10 (11:26):
Yes, the kids, the cool thuggy kids, and I had
this thing strapped across my back and.
Speaker 5 (11:31):
You're trying to run with like a turtle.
Speaker 10 (11:34):
It was like a yes, it was like a turtle
like that. And so one day I came home with
my my dented accordion and I remember getting really angry
at my mother and just being like, you can't make
me do this anymore. I can't take this ship, you know.
And if you weren't getting picked on, did you like it?
Speaker 7 (11:55):
No?
Speaker 8 (11:56):
I hated it.
Speaker 10 (11:56):
I the hell? What what what ten year old kid
in the late seventies wants to play Lady of Spain?
Speaker 7 (12:05):
It is not.
Speaker 5 (12:08):
A chick I think, would argue.
Speaker 10 (12:10):
Well, you know, but he's he's exceptional. He's an outlier
in the world of accordion players.
Speaker 11 (12:17):
You know.
Speaker 7 (12:17):
He is like he was like the.
Speaker 5 (12:18):
Elvis of a course. So you want it to be cool?
We all do.
Speaker 10 (12:22):
Yeah. My mom took took pity on me and so, uh,
let me trade in the accordion for a horrible, shitty
set of drums and then we put the drums in
the basement and that lasted about four days. And she
was just like my mom was. My mom was very
(12:44):
direct with her uh responses to things.
Speaker 2 (12:49):
The first rock critic in your life.
Speaker 7 (12:51):
Yes.
Speaker 10 (12:52):
So I was sitting downstairs and there was this song
called Wipeout, which I'm sure you're met.
Speaker 2 (12:56):
Of course, ultimate surf, the ultimate surf.
Speaker 5 (13:02):
Isn't that the audition for drummers.
Speaker 10 (13:03):
Yes, one of them. And uh and and so I'm
sitting there trying to play this song to the stereo.
And and then I remember I was went up to
hit a drum and I felt somebody pulled the stick
out and then stab the tom tom on the drum set,
stabbed it right through it.
Speaker 2 (13:23):
That was my mom. That's a statement.
Speaker 5 (13:26):
Yeah, it was a statement.
Speaker 10 (13:27):
Was a very direct response. And then uh. And then
so the drums were out, and then and then we
got rid of them, and.
Speaker 2 (13:34):
She got me.
Speaker 12 (13:36):
Uh.
Speaker 10 (13:36):
It was this guitar cost thirty dollars. It was a
thing called the k Kay guitar. And yeah, and that
was the guitar. And then I played that guitar until
and you mastered that time and I didn't master anything. No, No,
I'm still feeling around in the dark because I you know,
I mean, I I hired a couple of guys that
are like ringers, so whatever, I don't know, you know,
(14:00):
I say, hey, show me how to play this and
stuff I've written, you know, and I'm like, I can't
remember how to play that. Can you show me how
to do that?
Speaker 5 (14:08):
When you write? I mean I'm bouncing around.
Speaker 4 (14:10):
But when you write, are you writing on the guitar?
Speaker 2 (14:13):
Yeah?
Speaker 10 (14:13):
Yeah, yeah, yeah yeah or on piano?
Speaker 9 (14:15):
Most of the time.
Speaker 10 (14:16):
I'll pack out on a piano occasionally, like I can
play single note sort of lines things like that, and
uh and then and then yeah, I'll play mostly on
the guitar.
Speaker 4 (14:25):
So if the critics know you as the punk rock band,
then you come out with iris.
Speaker 9 (14:30):
Well name actually was Name was the one that sort
of broke.
Speaker 4 (14:36):
But it's a completely different sound.
Speaker 9 (14:38):
Yes, much much different than what I mean. We had
always been kind of doing.
Speaker 8 (14:42):
Stuff like that.
Speaker 10 (14:42):
Yeah, but it was.
Speaker 2 (14:45):
That.
Speaker 10 (14:47):
But Bob Bob guys okay, guys like well, like like
the clash, massive hooks, massive hooks, who'scod do? I remember
remember the first time I heard Who's could Do? I
was just like, Okay, this is a cacophonist fucking sonic assault.
(15:09):
But underneath it you could hear this beautiful, sensitive, sensitive
songwriting and and it was.
Speaker 5 (15:21):
It just it was it.
Speaker 2 (15:22):
Blew was called Workshop, the solo record he made and
work Book, work Book, Work, work Book. And all I
remember is the first time I heard that, and I
just thought, like, that's what I was hearing, you know,
that exactly, that was underneath And that just.
Speaker 9 (15:36):
Is just a very unique way of playing the drums,
you know.
Speaker 10 (15:41):
I mean they had to sound like like no other,
but you had to you had to really listen, you know.
And and and I love that. Ben Westerburg was obviously
a huge influence on me, you know.
Speaker 2 (15:52):
And but you wrote you wrote long distances because I
have a weird thing of I love Westerberg. And I
interviewed him once and I hung out with him in
London once, and I have no memories of it. I can't.
Of all the people I've known, he was like elusive
he was. And I thought, it's even perfect that you
wrote a song with your hero. But it was long distance, right, yeah?
Speaker 10 (16:12):
Was it?
Speaker 2 (16:12):
Just like?
Speaker 10 (16:13):
Yeah? I I I sent him a piece of music
and and and I was like, I would really love
to write a song with you, and and uh, and
we did it through the mail, and I remember the end.
He wrote me a note and he signed it see
you in church, and which which is code for funk
off basically. You know, I think so in that context,
(16:37):
I think it was fuck.
Speaker 4 (16:38):
You but express, which means I'll never see you again.
Speaker 2 (16:45):
Yeah, it's kind of Jewish code.
Speaker 10 (16:47):
Yeah, you know, but but it was it was he
was for me, him and Bob Mould and the Clash
and the Ramones. The Ramones were big for me because
because I could actually play those songs, and the Ramones
inspired an entire generation of musicians. I think because it
was like, oh, I took two guitar lessons, right, and
(17:10):
I can play every Ramone song.
Speaker 2 (17:13):
Okay. They changed my life. The first review I ever
wrote for my middle school paper was a review of
the Sex Pistols and the Ramones. I did the dual
review and I completely came down on the side on
the Ramones. Then I went to Cornell. They played Bailey
Hall in Cornell. It was one of the first concerts
that changed my life. They were just you know, maybe
(17:33):
it was forty five minutes, forty five songs, and it
was just unbelievable. But because of that and the Clash,
like you mentioned, like, they were incredibly important to me. Yes,
my break. The first TV performance I ever put together
and suggested I was a new kid at the Grammy's like,
I've done it twenty four years, this will be twenty
(17:53):
five coming up. But early on I was there and
when Joe Strummer died, I said, guys, we got to
do something for Joe Strummer. And all the people working
on the show were like fifty five sixty and they
were like, who's Joe's truer? Yeah, and I said, well,
it's to clash and we got to do and he goes, well,
what would you do? They were, to their credit Kenderlick,
(18:14):
thank god, and Walter Miller and Pierco said. They said,
well what would you do? And I said, London calling.
And they said who would play it? And and I
literally said my middle school wet dream. I said Bruce
Springsteen because I knew he loved the clash. I said
Elvis Costello, Dave Grohl, who was the guy of the moment.
(18:34):
We needed, we needed someone, you know, another guy. And
then literally that ended up being I said Bowie too,
just because he was very influential on yeh. Bowie said
yes to doing it, but then backed out. But that
was the London calling when Joe died that we did.
That's the first time I ever got to.
Speaker 10 (18:50):
Can I see that on?
Speaker 2 (18:51):
You could see it on YouTube at anytime, and it
was life change me for me. Wow, And that's why
I fell in love with Like, oh, TV can be.
Speaker 10 (18:58):
Powerful, Yes, obviously it can be powerful.
Speaker 2 (19:02):
Well, it's very powerful when you know somebody, if you'd
fill and everybody's raiment.
Speaker 3 (19:20):
Phil and David were thrilled to have Tim Matheson come
to lunch in their podcast studio at Phil's Animal House.
Speaker 2 (19:25):
I think I'm so lucky.
Speaker 4 (19:26):
You probably feel the same way that when we were
becoming adults. When we were teenagers, these milestone movies that
changed culture hit us at the perfect age.
Speaker 5 (19:38):
For them to hit.
Speaker 2 (19:39):
We had Kevin Bacon on it, and he goes, yeah,
he asked us, I think how old we were the
perfect age to watch Animal House?
Speaker 5 (19:45):
Yes, seventeen eighteen, And.
Speaker 2 (19:46):
It was what a what a game changer that was.
It was a game changer obviously in your life, but
it was a game changer for.
Speaker 4 (19:52):
Every movies, every the culture.
Speaker 8 (19:55):
It was the first comedy I think written by young
people for young people.
Speaker 4 (20:00):
Is that really true?
Speaker 7 (20:01):
That?
Speaker 5 (20:01):
I mean?
Speaker 4 (20:02):
It certainly felt like a seismic change, like, oh my god,
this is for us and it's coming out at the
same time, like Saturday Night Live is happening on TV,
and this is you know, Belushi has just scored big
on that and now he's the star of this, and
you know it is like the inmates are going to
run the asylum here when we're watching that movie. So
(20:24):
you got to take us through you're casting of that
and working on that, because that's just I mean.
Speaker 8 (20:30):
Well, you know, it's like it was that big of
a moment in my life because I was, you know,
I've finished doing the quest I did. I'm you know,
I was playing regular kind of nice guy parts on
TV episodic, playing you know, as a guest actor here
and there, and I was working and I just was
(20:51):
bored with the kind of character. There wasn't any edge
to it. There was no great humor fun. For whatever reason,
I couldn't like get in you know, I did a
roda maybe, but I wasn't It wasn't my skill set
to you know. I mean, I I love doing live shows,
but you know, I didn't do too many of those.
And then I saw the script and it was like,
(21:14):
oh my god, this is the most this is the
most unique, brilliant, typical lampoon, so smart, so funny.
Speaker 5 (21:22):
Could you laugh out loud?
Speaker 8 (21:23):
Reading?
Speaker 5 (21:24):
I laughed out?
Speaker 8 (21:25):
I think I sat up all night reading. I read
it twice. Called my age the first thing in the morning,
said I have got to be in this movie. I've
just got you know. And he's what party is an otter?
I mean I was born to play this part.
Speaker 2 (21:38):
Yes.
Speaker 8 (21:39):
And the thing was I had been studying improv because
I wanted to shift gears and try, you know, to
a new approach to acting.
Speaker 5 (21:48):
Best thing for any actor to take it.
Speaker 8 (21:49):
I couldn't agree absolutely every human being, Yes, absolutely right,
whether you're acting or not, get in there. Because life
always throws you a curve. You gotta go with it,
that's right. So but they wouldn't they. I went in
a methic casting director Michael Chinich and and he said,
when when the word came back, now, no, no, he's
(22:10):
not right. He's a prep. He's not a preppy. He's
he's a cowboy or a surfer. He's not. He's not
East Coast preppy.
Speaker 4 (22:18):
And just because of your hair or something, my hair was.
Speaker 8 (22:20):
Here, you know, and I hadn't really done anything, you know,
like that, And so I begged the studio. I knew
Tom Mount, who was one of the junior executives there,
and I said, just let me get in a room
if I if I, you know, screw the pooch and
I don't get the job. That's fine, I can live
with it. But I just got to get in the
room once. And fortunately I was auditioning with Peter Riegert,
(22:44):
who played Boom, one of.
Speaker 2 (22:45):
The greatest You're I don't understand how there's not a
series of Buddy pictures because the two of you, and
by the way, Animal Houses in my all we did
an all time top ten, and Animal House is in
my top ten, and the Local Hero is in my
top ten. But the two of you were just unbelievable together.
Speaker 8 (23:04):
Well, thank you very much. I mean, you know, it
was so smart and adroit of the writers. Each character
had their own style and sense of comedy. I was
kind of verbal and funny, and you know, Rakish and
and and Peter Reger was kind of like Groucho a
little bit with you know, and he was always doing
in a love story. And and Laurel and Hardy were
(23:26):
you know, flounder and Pinto right and and Belushi was
they described him as sort of the The Cookie Monster
meets Harpo.
Speaker 2 (23:34):
Marx.
Speaker 5 (23:34):
Harpo is perfect, isn't it It is?
Speaker 4 (23:37):
That's a perfect But I would I would. I think
he had maybe more ball than cooking.
Speaker 2 (23:44):
I love Flushi so much growing up. He was sort
of my hero. And I'm sort of afraid to go
back and watch performances in case I don't like things
as much as I think I do. But I did
go back and watch Animal House this weekend for the
first time a little while, and there are scenes he
does like you you don't ways how much is silent.
It's like he had Harold Lloyd like skills, like well,
just the eyebrows. I mean, there's those scenes where he's
(24:07):
just like in the dining you know, in the dining
hall and all that, where he's really not even using
the verbal skills he has.
Speaker 4 (24:13):
Are you guys just the face up? Are you blowing takes?
Because you're laughing during that movie.
Speaker 2 (24:17):
I think I think.
Speaker 8 (24:19):
I was in character enough when I was working with him,
you know, not to not to blow a take. But
but there.
Speaker 4 (24:24):
Is an improvised element there, right, well a little bit.
Speaker 8 (24:28):
I mean it's probably like you know on your show
you you you stick to the script. And but there
were scenes that and I would watch I'd be standing
right now, such an.
Speaker 5 (24:38):
Anarchy happening right.
Speaker 8 (24:40):
So, yes, but watching him do because he didn't have
much dialogue. It was all physical, you know, like you know,
stealing the lunch, you know. It was just to watch
that and it was like one take, you know, I mean,
we didn't have a lot of time to shoot three
or four takes of anything.
Speaker 4 (24:55):
I've become friendly with land this over the years, and
was how much of the success of that.
Speaker 5 (25:02):
Movie is due hit to him?
Speaker 8 (25:04):
John Landis is greatly responsible for the success because he a.
Speaker 5 (25:09):
Great comedy director.
Speaker 8 (25:10):
He's a great comedy director. He understands physical comedy understood.
Here's how deep John goes. We shot in Cottage Grove,
which was a town near Eugene where we were shooting
most of the movie. One whole week. We shot the parade,
the finale of the movie, one whole week and in
Cottage Grove. So he wanted us to know Cottage Grove.
(25:32):
So he showed us the only other movie ever made
in Cottage Grove on a Sunday before we went, which
was called The General starring Buster Keaton, which he directed
and I think it cost a million dollars then, which
would be like I don't know one hundred million dollars today,
who directed Buster Keaton? I'm sorry, but so Landas showed
(25:53):
us that's that was made here, I don't know, seventy
years ago or right or fifty years ago, and and
we're going to shoot our movie here too, So it
was like kinship with the filmmaker, history history, you know,
that's Landis. He knows, he knew, he just knew. And
he he was always off stage throwing stuff through a
scene through you know, throwing a cup of water over here,
(26:15):
you know, or props because so you see stuff flying
through the scenes. That's the landers amazing and the prop
guy throwing it too, you know what I mean. But
just so there's constant chaos, yes, and yeah, it was.
It was. And Ivan Wrightman, I must say, fought long
and hard against the studio to get the money, to
get everything so that Landis could make the movie he
(26:37):
wanted to make. And I even wanted to make that.
He had that movie developed so he could direct it.
He wanted to be a director, and the studio goes na, na, na, na,
you know we've seen youry thing with women in cages
or whatever the heck it was. You know, and you
know you're not ready for this.
Speaker 5 (26:50):
So Landis had done.
Speaker 4 (26:51):
I believe Kentucky Fried movie, yes, which is a series
of sketches.
Speaker 8 (26:57):
Pretty much done schlock and Kentucky Fried movie was thin
in production then i't think anybody's seen it. And they
showed cuts of it to Ned Tanna and at Universal.
Speaker 5 (27:06):
And then he hired Landers R rated comedy.
Speaker 4 (27:09):
Yeah right, so he's the perfect sensibility.
Speaker 5 (27:12):
Absolutely, they knew that.
Speaker 4 (27:13):
Kids just being our age seventeen eighteen, we want to
see certain things beasts, right, yes, we want to see
And what if you work all that into the comedy,
then you have you've got You've got the ultimate teen
movie and you're gonna make a fortune.
Speaker 2 (27:31):
Yeah right, and there you do it right, and there's
Judd Apatow. There's like the whole film but changes if
you don't.
Speaker 5 (27:37):
Have to know Judd apata without this.
Speaker 10 (27:39):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (27:42):
Her husband Brad Paisley wrote the Naked Lunch theme and
in twenty twenty five, Phil and David were thrilled to
finally welcome Kimberly Williams Paisley to the show. And now
you can see Kimberly starring weekly on nine to one
to one Nashville.
Speaker 5 (27:53):
I want to hear father Bride stories.
Speaker 13 (27:55):
Oh yes, I'm sorry, I want to hear you were
talking about child.
Speaker 4 (27:58):
You're nineteen. You come on and there's Steve Martin, and
you know who.
Speaker 5 (28:02):
That is already by that time, right, he's already.
Speaker 4 (28:05):
Oh my gosh.
Speaker 13 (28:06):
I was a huge fan of Steve Martin. So basically,
I'm a sophomore at Northwestern and I am just interested
in finding my way to Chicago on the L train.
I have this audition, yes, but I'm nineteen. Getting married
is the furthest thing from my mind. There's no way
I'm getting this part.
Speaker 11 (28:23):
You know.
Speaker 13 (28:24):
I've done like a couple of auditions and and done
like an ABC after school special which was very highly rated.
No it wasn't. No, I know, it's terrible. I did commercials,
you know, for stride X and Obi tampons and all
the embarrassing especially that yeah funny thing. Yeah, I did
a Pizza Hut commercial. But anyway, so like that's the
(28:46):
furthest thing from my mind. So I was just thinking, well,
one day I'm going to be able to say that
I did a screen to Well, first of all, I
did the thing on the train. I get to the audition,
and then I was like, all right, I did that.
I figured out the l Then I get a callback
and they're like, we want you to fly out to
LA to audition and read with Steve Martin.
Speaker 4 (29:07):
And you know what.
Speaker 13 (29:11):
When I was a kid, I had gone to like younger,
I had gone to Universal Studios. I always loved I
loved being on a set. My friend Anna Holbrook was
on Another World in New York, and so I used
to go with her to work, and I just loved
being on set. And I loved doing the Universal Studios tour.
But no, I had never been to like an actual
(29:32):
and an actual Hollywood room, and not much time in
LA at all. And I could hear Steve's voice out
in the from out in the waiting room. I could
hear his voice in the room and knew that he
was right on the other side of the door. And
I just thought, one day, I'm going to tell my
grandkids that I got to hear Steve Martin's voice in person,
(29:54):
you know. And then he comes out and he'd been
doing that movie Grand Canyon, so he was he had
a beard, so he looked different and he was so
nice in the audition, and again, like I left, I
was like, well, I'm not getting it.
Speaker 4 (30:04):
But that was so cool.
Speaker 13 (30:05):
That was so fun. And then I went back to
school and then they told me I didn't get it.
And I went to they told me I didn't get it,
and I went to the journalism school at Northwestern and
I said, I am transferring out of theater. I don't
like this business anymore. I don't want to be an
actor anymore. I want to be a writer. My parents
were writers, and it was a much more respectable profession.
Speaker 2 (30:26):
And a great school at Northwestern and.
Speaker 13 (30:28):
A great school. And I was looking into internships when
they called back because I was going to get an
internship in Florida at a newspaper for a summer. And
they called back and they said, we want you to
fly out again for another audition.
Speaker 2 (30:40):
Do you know how that happened? You know what the
backstory is.
Speaker 13 (30:42):
Well, Nancy Meyers said that she had the flu when
she saw my first audition, so there was like from
the first audition to the callback, there was a long
break too, And that she said was she blamed it
on the flu, that she wasn't really paying attention, and
then later on she was like and I don't know
it was Nancy or Charles who later on was like, Hey,
we should take another look at that girl. And then
(31:04):
they just it was a huge casting call. They just
had so many people that they were seeing and Phoebe
Kates was originally cast, but then she got pregnant and
that was awkward. They couldn't have a pregnant bride walking
down the aisle, So then no, I would love to
I would love to meet that child. So yeah, and
(31:24):
I don't know why. Then they it was like probably
a few weeks when they called me back again. That
was a screen test and that was like, you know,
hair and makeup. That was the first time I had
ever really done anything this huge. They had the whole
It was on a sound stage. I'd never been on
a sound stage, and I remember it was so bright
outside and I walked into the sound stage and it
was pitch black, and you know how that is when
(31:46):
it's sunny out in California and you walk in you
can't see anything. And I heard Diane Keaton's laugh. That
was the first thing I heard.
Speaker 14 (31:52):
I was like, ah, oh, I was such a.
Speaker 13 (31:54):
Fan of hers. Annie Hall was like one of my
favorite movies. And my dad had told me that I
reminded him of Diane Keaton, and I always thought that
was the biggest compliment. I just loved her so much.
Speaker 2 (32:06):
I have never met her, and I worship Oh.
Speaker 5 (32:10):
I've had dinner with her a few times. Yeah, we
have mutual friends. She's phenomenal. You keep in touch.
Speaker 13 (32:16):
I when I see her out and about. I love
seeing her, but I don't I don't see her regularly.
But yeah, and they were so nice and that was
that was it. And then they made me do some
basketball outside after, just to make sure I could bounce
a ball. And that was it.
Speaker 5 (32:32):
That'd be funny if you blow it on the basketball.
Speaker 14 (32:34):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (32:48):
In twenty twenty five, the legendary chef Thomas Keller brought
an unforgettable lunch to Naked Lunch.
Speaker 4 (32:53):
When we go to the French laundry, and this is
you know, it's it's aspirational. I think to eat at
the French laundry, it's it's it's it is fine dining
at its highest level in the United States. You cannot
get a better meal in the United States of Oh,
thank you of find literal fine dying. And yet when
(33:15):
you go, yes, it costs money to do this, and
it costs, you know, more money maybe than most people have.
But you will never leave there thinking I didn't get
my money's worth. I didn't get You got beyond. Every
time I've been is beyond.
Speaker 5 (33:32):
The experience is beyond.
Speaker 4 (33:33):
And if people watch the Chef's Table Legends, they will
see what the experience is. And as beautiful as it
looks on TV, I can tell you it's much better
in person. And because first of all, you're eating it,
and second of all, the sense of generosity, it's overwhelming.
(33:55):
You feel nurtured, you feel taken care of. You know,
it's it's an not a short meal, and it can
go on and they'll come over and they'll say to you,
how about you take a break and take a walk
in the garden for a while, or go just sit
out there with your drink and relax and enjoy the space.
Nobody's rushing you.
Speaker 15 (34:15):
Yeah, we want we want to extend people's experience at
the French Any for a couple of different reasons. Number one,
you know they don't they don't often get there right
so they're there maybe once a year, yes, maybe once
a lifetime.
Speaker 12 (34:26):
Right.
Speaker 15 (34:27):
Whatever we can do for them right to extend their experience,
then that's what we want to do. We want them
to enjoy their time at the French Chundry.
Speaker 4 (34:34):
The thing that the show doesn't cover is that it's
not just about this exclusive experience at the laundry. You
also have ad Hoc, which is a fried chicken place.
Speaker 15 (34:48):
Nearby family of style of food yep.
Speaker 4 (34:50):
And is first of all best fried chicken you've ever had.
I mean, it's spectacular, but that's for everybody. And Beaucham
is closer to that as well as a beautiful Beast.
Speaker 5 (35:00):
Road experience.
Speaker 15 (35:03):
And then the bakery right right there.
Speaker 4 (35:05):
Absolutely, and we tried to show that in our episode
of Somebody feed Filled. When we went did San Francisco,
we got to explore Keller World up in Napa, which
was fantastic. But I want people to know that there's
this whole other side. It's not just about the fine
dining and your generosity has now extended to everyone. There's
(35:29):
a price point for everybody.
Speaker 15 (35:30):
Yeah, well, we you know, we wanted to bring diversity
to our town, yes, right, and we wanted to have
people come there again, right, to experience our town and
keep them in town, right by offering these different opportunities
for them to enjoy food, whether it's whether having a
breakfast croissant and a cup of coffee in the courtyard
of Bouchon, right going to wherever? I mean, you talked
(35:51):
about ad Hoc. You know, we talk about Bouchon and
these restaurants. So it's really, you know, I feel blessed, right,
I was gonna say lucky, but you know this is
truly I'm a truly blessed person. I have some extraordine
It's like, who knew?
Speaker 2 (36:06):
I knew? Who knew?
Speaker 15 (36:07):
Right, here's a young kid barely got out of high
school right more more in mid century, barely got out
of high school? Right, No, no, no, no, no, no
future plans right for anything. I wasn't thinking about that.
I wasn't thinking about my future. Who ends up working
as a dishwasher for his mother, right, becomes a.
Speaker 2 (36:28):
Cook because that's a recipe for success, right.
Speaker 15 (36:30):
Because because his mother needs somebody to cook and his
brother is already cooking, so he teaches him how to
do some basic things.
Speaker 4 (36:37):
How long do we the dishwasher before?
Speaker 15 (36:39):
Probably a year and a half, maybe Yeah, something like that.
I learned my I learned my six disciplines washing dishes, Yes,
when I was fourteen to fifteen years old. But yeah,
and then then you meet a you meet a chef
in nar Aganster, Rhode Island, at a private beach club
who asked you this kind of what you think of
now is it's like this absurd, out of place question. Yeah,
(37:01):
and he answers it, and that one moment in time
gives you right the influence and inspiration to actually embrace
this profession in a way that you're you're totally committed,
you one hundred percent dedicated to it.
Speaker 2 (37:18):
And without that, you don't go to France.
Speaker 15 (37:21):
None of that stuff. Yeah, none of that stuff happens. Yeah,
none of that stuff happens.
Speaker 3 (37:28):
Love may stink, but having Rocker author and rack On
tour Peter Wolf and the great TV writer Mike Scully
clearly does not.
Speaker 4 (37:34):
Can we jump right in because there's something at the beginning.
You're a kid, your parents take you to the movie
and somebody comes and sits next to you. Can you
tell that little story?
Speaker 11 (37:44):
Well, yes, we were visiting. My sister was in the
hospital and the news wasn't very good, so my parents
decided to get their minds off of things to take
me and themselves to a film. Now, my parents were
very political, they were very progressive, shall we say, and
(38:05):
so they decided to choose I was about eight years old,
maybe nine. They decided to choose a film, and it
was a French film, a foreign film called He Must Die.
And the premise of the movie was that if Jesus
Christ came back to Earth, the church would probably be
the first one that wanted to get rid of him
(38:26):
because he was such a revolutionary. And it was all
in subtitles now here. I am about eight years old,
and I was old, you know, eating Eminem's, bored And
as the movie's starting, this couple comes into the farthest
end of the row where we were sitting, and somebody
(38:47):
sits in front of them, so they moved closer, and
the woman sits right next to me. It was a
man and a woman. And I start smelling the most
exotic perfume I've ever smell in my life. I never
realized that perfume could be so intoxicating. And I was
(39:07):
eating some Eminem's and I dropped the box and as
I bent down to pick it up, I realized that
the woman sitting next to me was wearing house slippers,
and she had a fur coat on, and underneath the
fur coat was just a nightgown. And as you know,
going to the movies like that was kind of really unusual.
(39:30):
And as I was reaching for the eminem she kicked
the box you know, to her, and she picked it up,
turned it to me, turned towards me, handed me the
box with this big smile, and she had a kerchief
around her head and sunglasses on, dark sunglasses, with this great,
beautiful smile. And so I thanked her, you know, nodded
(39:53):
to her, and as these subtitles you know, across the screen,
I slowly felt her head slowly bending towards my shoulder
till she actually fell asleep on my shoulder, and so
(40:14):
I froze. Didn't want to wake her because she seemed
so nice, and she also retrieved my candy. I'm sitting
there also getting bored, and slowly, slowly I fell asleep
on her shoulder, and we were both fast asleep until
(40:35):
we were both awakened by this voice saying, honey, honey,
get up, let's go. The lights are going to come on.
And in the theater. She jumped up, she pulled her
fur coat around her and walked out and people as
the lights went up, people started screaming, it's them, it's them.
And she turned back to me at that point gave
me a big smile, and it was Arthur Miller and
(40:59):
malm Monroe, and so I slept with mallem and Mondoe.
Speaker 5 (41:06):
That's the best story ever heard. That's what a punchline.
That's fantastic.
Speaker 2 (41:11):
But Phil, that's the first of about eight hundred meetings
of fascinating people. I tried to write it down.
Speaker 11 (41:18):
You're going to say, that's the first of eight hundred
different fascinating women I slept with.
Speaker 2 (41:24):
That's not even the only actress, a great actress ever
to retrieve your candy. But no, this is true. So
but let's I mean the ones you saw Louis Armstrong,
which is unbelievable, but you were essentially. Was it Norman
Rockwell who like baby sat you slightly or how did
that happen?
Speaker 11 (41:45):
Well, my dad worked with the Robert Shaw Corral and
up entangled. There was a concert and so we had
very little money, but somebody provided us a place to
stay and we were living there for several weeks and
my dad was doing chores and I believe it was
Stockbridge or uh the town there were this. Uh, he
(42:08):
was had to do a lot of errands. So he
took me to this uh up these steps, to this
gentleman's studio that was a painter. And I was very
much into painting ever since I was I could remember
I was scribbling over walls, anything, any kind of service surface.
I would you know, draw, and then my parents' books,
(42:30):
you know, the paper became like pads and I would
be scribbling on everything. And so uh he took me
to this gentleman's studio and the gentleman uh gave me
paper and pencil and uh he said he had a
son named Peter, who was, you know, a year older
than me. And I was watching this man and years, years,
(42:52):
many years later I found out that the gentleman was
Norman Rockwell, and so uh I had I didn't know
who Norman Rockwell was, but years later I found out. Naturally,
about twenty five years after, I went to visit where
the studio was, and it all came right back to me.
(43:13):
The steps where we walked up, and I think it
was closed, but I think it's now turned into a museum,
the actual studio.
Speaker 2 (43:24):
And do you have any theories on why? Because you know,
you go to school and the guy you need, you
need an apartment, your roommate is David Lynch. You go
to you know this, You go to New York and uh,
you know, you go to a sort of folk gathering
place and you hear a guy named Bob Dylan in
the other room, and you know who becomes not only
(43:45):
eventually a friend enough to write a blurb on your book.
And and you know, do you have a theory on.
Speaker 5 (43:52):
I saw this movie. I think it's called zell ll Yes, no.
Speaker 11 (43:56):
No, no, no, no, you know, you know this was
all most of the stuff was, you know, by chance,
by apsent, you know, serpendipity. Would that be the correct word?
Speaker 5 (44:07):
Is serendipity?
Speaker 4 (44:08):
Yeah, but most people don't have this kind.
Speaker 5 (44:10):
Of serendipity because well this is just the tip of
the iceberg.
Speaker 4 (44:14):
You met Tennessee Williams, Is that right correct?
Speaker 5 (44:17):
Tell us about him?
Speaker 11 (44:19):
Well, first of all, I think from seeing Streetcar Nade
Desire the film, I became infatuated, you know, through the
model and Brando with Tennessee Williams, and he was in
the newspapers a lot when I was you know, young, uh,
And I don't quite can't remember what year street Car
(44:41):
came out, but some recently. When it came out, I
had seen it and Brando is just you.
Speaker 8 (44:47):
Know, so powerful, unforgettable.
Speaker 11 (44:51):
And then it was preceded by you know, on the
Waterfront and things. So I started dwelving into going to
the library and taking up all of Tennessee Williams's plays
and Summer in Smoke and suddenly Last Summer, and you know,
many of them I didn't quite understand, but I just
(45:12):
became infatuated with him.
Speaker 5 (45:14):
You're very young at this time, this is.
Speaker 11 (45:17):
Oh, yeah, I was young. But as years went on,
I just kept you know, I bought all his poetries.
Caten In put out a recording of him reading a
short story called Yellowbird. And when I was married to
Faye Dunaway, she was in the twenty fifth anniversary premiere
(45:42):
of Streetcar named Desire. Oh, and so I was in
the green room, sitting in the corner waiting for the show.
Faye was backstage getting ready for the performance, and I
was sitting in a corner by myself and somebody I
was holding a glass of white wine. And somebody walked
past me and knocked the wine, and the wine spilled
(46:03):
all over my pants. And this gentleman comes up to
me and goes, mah mah. You know, even while sitting
on paraphrasing, I sit in the book, even while sitting
all alone, you know, trouble can't happen ors, you know.
And I looked up and staring at me through those
(46:26):
thick sunglasses of him was those wonderful eyes of the
great Tennessee Williams. And the lights were going on and
off and meaning the show was about to start. And
it turned out I was sitting next to him in
the theater.
Speaker 5 (46:43):
Wow.
Speaker 11 (46:44):
And so here is, you know, Tennessee watching twenty five
years after first performance of Streetcar. He's watching Streetcar and
there's the scene where they're playing cards. Stanley's playing cards,
Blanche and Stella out and there's some jokes being told
(47:06):
during this card game. Tennessee starts laughing loud, you know,
and the people around them are saying quiet, and he's
you know, you know, just you know, just laughing loud.
You know, there's loud this laughter that he had which
(47:26):
was so infectious and Finally, one of the matrons of
the theater, one of the ushers of the theater, had
to say, sir, if you can't be quiet, we're going
to have to remove you. And I started laughing because
they had no idea who they were talking to. Yeah,
so that was quite some. But Tennessee, I had I
(47:50):
don't know if this was mentioned in the book, but
what actually bonded us as friends was he was a
great admirer of D. H. Lawrence and I had found
years ago a book of the paintings of D. H.
Lawrence and it was a very rare addition and there
was only a few printed up. And so the last
(48:13):
time I next time I saw him, I presented to
a gift and he was ever grateful, and we spent
many nights because Fay was interested in turning one of
his short stories into a film, and then he would
come up to Boston for debuts of some of his
(48:35):
later plays. One particularly was called Red Devil Battery. I
don't quite where devil battery syndrome a system or I
don't quite have it right, but it's there. I hate
to say they're in the book, but it is. But
it was a play with Anthony Quinn, and he was
(48:57):
one of the plays in Anthony Quinn and Fay were
Anthony Quinn Fay. Her first film was with Anthony Quinn.
Right and being with Tennessee again, he starts laughing in
the audience and they almost kicked him out. And while
I was up at my apartment, I had him had
(49:19):
a tape recorder and had him read some of my
favorite poems. He was just somebody that, as I say
in the book, he was like a fine you know,
Cardier wristwatch, where constantly his mind was moving and he
was so so funny he was, and he also was
(49:42):
the kind of person you just wanted to have a
tape recorder going twenty four seven because he was so
witty and his observations on things was so point on.
That he was somebody I truly, you know, a treasure
getting to know and not all the time. As I'm
sure David, you know that sometimes the people you admire
(50:06):
for their art and for what they achieve aren't exactly
people that you there's sometimes disappointing when you get to
know them.
Speaker 2 (50:17):
I'm familiar with that process. That's how he feels about me, exactly.
I'm very much let down by these two.
Speaker 11 (50:22):
I'm sure during your long time of interviewing people on
writing about people, you've had that. But Tennessee was one
of those people that the more you got, the more
at least I got to know them, the more enchanted
I was by them.
Speaker 3 (50:48):
Early in twenty twenty five, Smokey Robinson and Brad Paisley
discussed songwriting and so much more on a very special
Naked Lunch.
Speaker 2 (50:55):
So, but how did you come across Brad? Is it
just that you, as a songwriters keep up on all
the young.
Speaker 12 (51:03):
Tide come across him because I love music and I
grew up hearing all kinds of music. Man, you know,
so I love music, I know music people, and I
know the people are doing the great music. You know.
So there he is that I come across him. Well,
who doesn't know him?
Speaker 14 (51:22):
Oh well we.
Speaker 2 (51:23):
Can walk down the street.
Speaker 7 (51:27):
Show you that.
Speaker 2 (51:30):
Now.
Speaker 16 (51:30):
I think the beauty of of you know, getting to
know guys like Smokey is that we realize. I think,
all of us who make music in my generation and
even younger, that we are building on the foundation that
you built. And and it really and you must you
(51:52):
must know like you must when you listen to it
because you are the type I think that you know,
you're not in a cave and hiding from modern music.
You are absorbing it and enhanced by it.
Speaker 8 (52:03):
And you must.
Speaker 16 (52:06):
Feel your influence. I hope when you hear these grooves
and these things kids are doing, and you know you
have influenced everyone in every genre, I think.
Speaker 12 (52:15):
Well, that's nice to hear, man, and it's good for
me to hear, because as a songwriter, that's what I
want to be, you know, I want to be a songwriter.
I want to be somebody like I tell people all
the time, and I want to write a song. If
I had written it fifty years prior to coming out,
(52:35):
it would have meant something to people, right and currently
it's gonna mean something, and fifty years from now it's
gonn mean something.
Speaker 7 (52:42):
You know.
Speaker 12 (52:42):
I would like to be a writer like Beethoven. You know,
you're still playing Betos five six hundred years. They're still
playing Beethoven, They're still playing Bach Well wrote.
Speaker 2 (52:51):
Like them, though you're touring Beethoven this day.
Speaker 12 (52:57):
In fact, Man, I read a thing about Bait and
they banned him from playing live in a few few
cities and stuff like that. You know, why. They said
his music was too provocative. Really, that's what they said.
It was too provocative. It incited the young ladies too much,
so they banned him from playing in the seventeen Yeah,
(53:20):
can you imagine that Beethoven, It was too provocative. It
was so they listening to it was those fast numbers.
Speaker 2 (53:28):
I guess so. Man, Well, speaking of provocative your career,
you know you have stayed so interesting in that you're
not just still doing it, which listen, it's amazing that
you're still doing it at such a high level that
you sound as great as we just heard on be
Thankful for what you got and the whole new album.
But what's amazing is as an artist you keep doing
(53:49):
interesting things. The last album was called Gasm, which was
definitely provocative. I ain't getting exactly, I promise, and it
was great and sexy and just like I think the
whole idea of Saturday night, Sunday morning, sin in Salvation.
Your next your new record is inspirational in such a
(54:10):
cool and different way. Can you tell us how you
came up with the idea of doing this record, because again,
as one of the greatest songwriters who ever lived, you
cover some other songwriter.
Speaker 12 (54:20):
I really didn't come up with the idea to do this, man,
This idea was brought to me. It was brought to
me actually by the people in the Primary Wave who
are my publishing partners and stuff, and so all the
songs that are on there, I love. I love those songs,
and I love the fact that they are inspirational. Especially
(54:41):
in the day's world. We need inspiration, we need love
among ourselves. We need love. We need love on each
other because we are living in a time where it's
just frantic.
Speaker 8 (54:52):
You know what I mean.
Speaker 12 (54:53):
So, and the leadoff song for me to just be thankful.
I've been hearing a song a guy named William du Vaughn,
and first one in fact, when I first heard it,
I thought he was Courtis Mayfield, you know. And I
used to have a radio show on the Clear Channel,
and so I would play it. I wasn't paying attention
to what it was saying. I thought it was about
(55:13):
a pimp, diamond in the back sun rooftop digging the
scene with a gangster lean. I thought it was about
a pimp, you know. So you know, I play it okay, cool,
you know. I wasn't paying attention to what it was saying,
until they brought me this project and we're playing it
on my channel on clear channel. We're playing William Duvon's version,
and so one day I'm just listening to it and
(55:34):
I said, God, this is an inspirational song. This is
telling people be thankful for what you got. You know,
there are some people who don't have what you have.
You may not have much, but you got more than
a lot of people, you know. So I was very
inspired by that, and so that's that's why I recorded
that song and the other songs, like I said, they're
(55:55):
just treasures.
Speaker 2 (55:57):
Well you do lean on me. Bill Weathers was one
of Fortunately my career has brought me the chance to
be around like you some of my heroes. Bill Withers
was one I never did get to meet until very
close to the end. Kennerrola who you know who. I
went to the We went to see the eagles and
we're outside and Bill Withers are standing there and he,
(56:20):
unlike you, he disappeared really from the industry. As great
as his career was, at a certain point he stepped
away from He.
Speaker 12 (56:28):
Became a real estate broker. Bill and I were very
close man. We talked all the time. In fact, I
made up a word for him. I said, Man, I say,
have you ever heard the word righting this?
Speaker 8 (56:39):
He said right?
Speaker 12 (56:40):
I said yeah, right now. He said what do you
mean by that?
Speaker 11 (56:43):
Man?
Speaker 12 (56:43):
I say, you are to writing this dude, to write
a song. Because he was incredible man, genius, absolutely.
Speaker 2 (56:53):
And I never met him until outside the Eagles show.
I meet my hero, which was great enough just to
shake his hand and say thank you. You change my life,
like you changed my life. But then what happened was
he got a call from his wife saying she was
gonna be late to this pre show party. So he
went to me, this guy who never did interview, so
I never got to talk to him one of my
(57:15):
rolling Stone or anything. And he goes, David, I hate
being at parties without my wife. Will you sit with
me and we can just talk for an hour? And
so I got to ask him every question I ever
had and he was an amazing.
Speaker 12 (57:26):
Guy, amazing, absolutely he was man.
Speaker 2 (57:28):
And lean on me. Is that a song? That's a
that's a song that will live, you.
Speaker 8 (57:33):
Know, for for forever.
Speaker 12 (57:35):
It's one of those songs I was talking about. Absolutely,
that song says so much. But like I said, he
was a great writer.
Speaker 8 (57:42):
Man.
Speaker 12 (57:42):
Any time dude comes up with an idea, keep on
using me till you use me up my race me.
Speaker 3 (57:53):
We end part one of our twenty twenty five best
of with an unforgettable story from comedy samurai and Seinfeld
writer Larry Charles. It's about directing borat Listen and tune
in next week for part two, and remember you can
revisit these episodes on a podcast platform near you or
on Phil's YouTube channel, Phil Rosenthal World.
Speaker 2 (58:09):
Well, I would like to give you the job of
reading a bit of a page if you will take
the assignment. This has any water, but yes, we will
get you. I will get you.
Speaker 5 (58:18):
Nice you let him read?
Speaker 2 (58:20):
Yes, yeah, this is I was wondering in the middle. Maybe,
but even during the middle.
Speaker 4 (58:26):
Of this, it's the first time we've done a reading.
Speaker 6 (58:28):
Yeah, huh, I feel very privileged starting.
Speaker 5 (58:33):
From imagine you're in a little sound class.
Speaker 6 (58:36):
Yeah, I wish I was. But even okay, and how
far you want me to go?
Speaker 2 (58:42):
Well, I don't think there's a better sentence to end
on in.
Speaker 6 (58:45):
History the Yankee, the face, the face or suffocating, Yes, suffocating. Okay,
it's pretty long excerpt, Go ahead, but even during the
stage I would go overboard sometimes the movie the comedy
had to be intense and hard, and I was determined
(59:07):
to make the stage scenes as real and in your
face as the so called unstaged.
Speaker 5 (59:12):
One we're talking about Boratz.
Speaker 6 (59:14):
One example was during the climax of the hotel room
portion of the naked fight. We had worked out the
choreography for the corpulent Asimat to wind up sitting on
Borat's face and trying to smother him. There was a
lot of nakedness in that room, and many discussions of
what body part would go where, and how that was
to be accomplished. For instance, ball placement had to be
(59:37):
accounted for. Sasha was understandably concerned about hygiene, specifically the
hygiene of Asamat's ass, so there were abundant wet wipes
on the scene. Sasha also realized that a wipe simply
wouldn't be sufficient. We came up with a way to
place a surgical mask over Sasha's face and then lower
(01:00:01):
Ozamoh onto him so Sasha's facial orifices would be protected. Further,
we worked at a signal for when Sasha could no
longer breathe he would essentially tap out if he tapped
three times. We were to yank Ozamaa's Azamoh off his
face immediately, but I was looking to capture that magic,
(01:00:23):
that X factor, that lightning in a bottle. And once
the mask was on and Ozamah was lowered onto him,
the cameras and I were right on top of them,
capturing the action like a live sporting event. We were
all on the bed, bouncing up and down and I
was screaming to keep going, keep going. Somewhere during this
(01:00:45):
I saw Sasha tap out, but I knew he wouldn't
want to do it again and I would have to agree.
But that meant I had to be sure we had
enough footage. I knew this would be an important, one
of a kind moment, so wh I ignored the TapouT,
Sasha began to tap more furiously. He was suffocating.
Speaker 4 (01:01:06):
Oh my, that's the best thing I ever heard in
my life.
Speaker 2 (01:01:10):
That's on page one sixty three.
Speaker 4 (01:01:12):
Okay, So, so for those of you who don't know,
Larry Charles directed one of the funniest movies ever made Borat,
and he's talking about maybe the funniest scene in one
of the funniest movies ever made. Maybe I saw the
movie with my father, who only liked Old Jack Benny
movies like.
Speaker 5 (01:01:33):
Like to Be or Not to Be.
Speaker 4 (01:01:34):
That's his favorite, his favorite movie. But I'm taking him
out to se Borat and right away he's laughing at
the Eastern European jewishness of Borat. And when it got.
Speaker 6 (01:01:47):
I probably recognized the Hebrew.
Speaker 4 (01:01:49):
Absolutely the Yiddish, and yeah, great, great great. Meanwhile, boar,
it's totally anti submitted characters.
Speaker 5 (01:01:56):
Hilarious.
Speaker 4 (01:01:57):
It's such a great comic invention.
Speaker 5 (01:01:58):
I have to talk to you a lot about this.
Speaker 4 (01:02:00):
But my father was a joy in my life to
see him laugh that hard at that scene, which should
in most cases send an old man screaming from the theater.
Speaker 5 (01:02:14):
This is too much.
Speaker 4 (01:02:15):
This is vulgar, this is it. But it was so
vulgar that it transcends vulgarity.
Speaker 5 (01:02:22):
It did it, you did.
Speaker 2 (01:02:24):
That's the alternate title for Larry's book, Transcendular.
Speaker 4 (01:02:28):
That you never really, Yes, you saw as butt, but
you never. It wasn't graphic in the way that lots
of things are graphic. It was still somehow innocent in
its playfulness and outrageous it was. It's truly a work
of genius. That that bit, and then that that it
(01:02:51):
extends out into running down the hall the elevator.
Speaker 6 (01:02:55):
There happened to be people in the elevator when we
ran in. Well, you know, my mother was very proud,
and she was like, you have a movie coming out. Yeah,
I'm gonna take She was living at Boyd and Beach. Yes,
and I'm gonna take all the girls from the module. No,
and I'm gonna take them. We're gonna be the first
ones online. And I'm saying, Ma, you know you'll be
the scourge of the condo if you bring your friends
(01:03:16):
to see this movie.
Speaker 2 (01:03:16):
I would not do that.
Speaker 6 (01:03:17):
And she's like, oh, don't be silly, don't be silly.
And she went and she brought all her friends, probably
twenty people Early Special to see The Early Bird Special
and they all loved it. And that's what we kind
of knew it was going to be a hit because
people like your dad and my mom, even my daughters.
You know, everybody loved that movie.
Speaker 4 (01:03:37):
It's undeniable. The movie is undeniably funny. I can still
watch it over and over. From the first notes of music, yes,
that laughing, You're like, it's already hilarious.
Speaker 2 (01:03:50):
Yes, I watched it last night. You did. I'm always
afraid with something you love that much, is it gonna
hold up? It gets better and better. It's just unbelievable.
Speaker 6 (01:03:58):
So that's one of the keys, though, is the opening,
the music and the logo that made people. That was
the greatest icebreaker for a movie, was so people were
laughing already before they even saw a Borat.
Speaker 4 (01:04:11):
Well, you're coming in. For those of you who knew
the character from his show, Yes, there was always a
Borat segment in the show, The LG Show, which was
always my favorite. And now you've given the the reins
to this maniac and it's gonna and here's his world. Yes,
and it couldn't have been better. I'm gonna jump around
(01:04:34):
on the subject. But he has said he's not gonna
do more Borat movies because the he's known by too
many people and so he can't have that relationship with
strangers that he had, so right, right, But my feeling
is the character is so good that who cares that
(01:04:58):
some of the funniest stuff is scripted anyway?
Speaker 5 (01:05:01):
That's very true.
Speaker 2 (01:05:02):
Can fight was exactly.
Speaker 6 (01:05:04):
There's no pranking anybody until he gets out until they
get out into the mortgage convention.
Speaker 4 (01:05:08):
Yes, which you can still Yeah, it's still a naked
guy running through your thing.
Speaker 6 (01:05:13):
You could stay. You're right, You're right. I agree with you.
Speaker 4 (01:05:15):
He could be Inspector Clusa in different adventures that why
not you please talk to him or you don't talk to.
Speaker 5 (01:05:23):
Him and we don't talk anymore. That's part of the
book too.
Speaker 2 (01:05:25):
Oh yeah, right, right, yeah, I agree, But I agree
with you.
Speaker 6 (01:05:29):
Though I do agree with you, there was no reason
we thought about a sequel at the time. He was
absolutely aghast at the very idea of doing the sequel
at that time. And then years and years went by.
By that time, we weren't talking anymore. He did that
one a few years ages. But I agree with you.
I mean, to me, he is a comic genius. I absolutely,
(01:05:50):
I believe that more than anybody standing right next to
him for so long. He could do all kinds of things.
He has to sort of discipline himself to give that
kind of performance, learn lines, staging, hitting marks, stuff like that.
If he could do that kind of stuff, he could
do anything he wants. He's a Peter Seller's level talent.
Speaker 4 (01:06:09):
Absolutely, That's why I mentioned that.
Speaker 2 (01:06:11):
But listen.
Speaker 4 (01:06:13):
It could still be loosely written. Yes, and you have
good actors like on Curb who can improvise with him.
Speaker 2 (01:06:21):
Great.
Speaker 4 (01:06:21):
By the way, the audience probably wouldn't know who's real
and who's not.
Speaker 5 (01:06:24):
They don't in borrow it.
Speaker 4 (01:06:25):
They don't they don't know that Pam Anderson is in
on it, right.
Speaker 6 (01:06:29):
That's right. It doesn't really matter if if like you said,
if it transcends in some way and people just are
erupting with laughter. They don't care what the reality is anymore.
They just care that it's funny.
Speaker 4 (01:06:40):
Let's get him on the phone. Let's get it, because
I think the world needs this character. It's his best invention.
Speaker 6 (01:06:47):
It's very interesting, isn't that. I mean, because you're tapping
into that innocence too. That was the thing that really
made people love him, despite the anti semitism, despite the
fact he's a rapist, he's incestuous. All those are true.
Speaker 2 (01:07:00):
And yes, you're making you sound like it not a
great because.
Speaker 4 (01:07:03):
It was in on the jow that he satirized anything
that right.
Speaker 6 (01:07:08):
We know the audience knows, and they accept it. They
are willing to roll with that. They were from the
very beginning of the movie. From the screaming music and
the logo people were ready to troller Coaster.
Speaker 14 (01:07:20):
Yes.
Speaker 3 (01:07:21):
Naked Lunch is a podcast by Phil Rosenthal and David Wilde.
Theme song and music by Brad Paisley. Produced by Will
Sterling and Ryan Tillotson, Video editing by Daniel Ferrara and
motion graphics by Ali Ahmed. Executive produced by Phil Rosenthal,
David Wilde, and our consulting journalist is Pamela Chella. If
you enjoyed the show, share it with a friend, But
if you can't take my word for it, take Phil's.
Speaker 4 (01:07:42):
And don't forget to leave a good rating and review.
Speaker 5 (01:07:45):
We like five stars.
Speaker 3 (01:07:46):
You know, thanks for listening to Naked Lunch, a Lucky
Bastard's production.
Let's build the means to the fat. Food for thought
and jokes on tap. We're talking with our mouthsful, having fun,
BEEAs cake and Humble Pies, serving up class lovely. The
dressing on the side, it's naked lunch.
Speaker 2 (00:26):
Clothing optional.
Speaker 3 (00:29):
Twenty twenty five came alive when Phil and David appeared
at the Palace of the Fine Arts Theater as part
of SF Sketch Fest with the brilliantly funny Paul Riser.
Speaker 4 (00:36):
Paul has many projects right now.
Speaker 5 (00:38):
I can't even keep up with you. You're so busy.
You're like a young person.
Speaker 6 (00:43):
I was so much like a young person.
Speaker 2 (00:45):
Yeah, all the ways except for one your age.
Speaker 5 (00:51):
So he's got a special out.
Speaker 4 (00:52):
It's called It's called life, Death and rice pudding.
Speaker 5 (00:55):
And rice pudding. I got food in there for you.
Speaker 2 (00:58):
Tell us give us the rice pudding part, the rice pudding.
Speaker 7 (01:01):
Yes, how many watched this? Want to hear silence?
Speaker 8 (01:03):
Yes?
Speaker 5 (01:04):
How many people have seen my special?
Speaker 8 (01:06):
Yeah?
Speaker 4 (01:06):
Okay, well it is It is hard to It's on Al.
Speaker 7 (01:11):
Jazeera, which is not, which is not you know, the
widest platform.
Speaker 5 (01:16):
They give you quite an intro.
Speaker 7 (01:20):
Uh So the reason, the reason I can tell the story?
So the reason it's called rice pud. It's a long story.
So I told the whole story. Yes, we got okay,
so and then you don't have to see it, specially
because I'm talking about so the rice pudding comes from.
There's a story I told the story about. I did
a movie years ago with Peter Falk, who I idolized,
(01:44):
and and we were talking one day about comedy and
I said, what kind of what do you like? What
makes what do you enjoy comedy wise? And he said, well,
you know, I got to be honest. The things that
make me laugh they don't always make other people laugh.
I said, we'll give me an example. So he tells
me this story, which I thought was funny. But over
the years I've thought about this and I realized it
(02:05):
was more than funny. The story actually had the secret
of life hidden inside. So here's the story. Peter goes
to lunch at a deli, a New York style deli,
and the end of the meal, waiter says, would anybody
like dessert? Peter Fawk says that you'll have rice pudding.
The guy says, sure. Wait, Peter, good Way, before you
(02:26):
write it down. He does you have raisins? Guy says no.
Peter says, are you sure?
Speaker 2 (02:34):
He says yeah.
Speaker 7 (02:35):
He goes because if it has raisins, I can't eat
a raisin. If there's raisins in it, I don't want it.
I'll tell you very no raisins. I can't eat a raisin.
The guy said, mister falk I don't know how else
to put it. No, don't we don't put raisins in
the rice pudding. He says, great, I'll have it, goes
to the kitchen, comes back with the rice pudding chuck
full of raisins top bottom in the glass, dark with raisins.
(03:01):
Peter says, hey, hey, I thought you said there's no raisins.
And this waiter's been doing this one hundred years. He
just shrugged and he said, here and there you'll find.
Speaker 2 (03:10):
The rais Well, that's what life is.
Speaker 7 (03:16):
Nothing is all good, right, Even the things you love
have you don't want.
Speaker 5 (03:20):
Here and there you'll find the race.
Speaker 2 (03:22):
Yes, here and there. David Owen can confirm this, but
I believe that's the best Peter falk impersonation at twenty
twenty five sketchmen.
Speaker 5 (03:28):
Yeah, that's a very good Peter Fauk.
Speaker 7 (03:32):
That's the extent of my impersonations.
Speaker 5 (03:34):
But you got to work with him.
Speaker 7 (03:35):
I did, and it was everything you would ever hope.
He was just brilliant and and and he takes. I
think it was the last film he did just because
he said, fuck it, I'm not doing this again. And
that's how much he enjoyed working with me. No, it was. Yeah,
it was a few years before he passed, and he
would he took. He was so diligent and he cared
(03:57):
and people I had heard, you know, he's very he
can be really cranky and difficult, and I found the
only time he was got intense is when people would
interfere with his work, like I just like I remember
the director was moving the camera around and he found it.
Speaker 5 (04:16):
He found a we did it.
Speaker 7 (04:17):
It was about around around sitting around the table, and
the director did one take where he was just going
to keep moving the camera and Peter understandably said, why
I don't know where the camera is when you know
when I say this line, you might be behind me,
and the way the director just kind of insisted, well,
now this is how I want to do it, and
Peter resisted, and finally it was a huge oak table
(04:37):
and Peter who seventy six, went, I don't like it,
and all the said, wow, he just he just threw
a table at a big thick table. And then and
I went, we had to let the smoke clear. And
then to Paul, you you you go into his trailer,
you talk to him, and he was very nice to me,
and I went in. He was kind of he was ashamed,
and he just said, I just want to get to
(05:00):
see good. I went, that's all it is. He just
didn't want to not do well, and he was, you know,
off balance. So I had nothing but great love and
respect for his craft. And you know, after that career,
he didn't need to work that hard, but he did
and he was great. He was brilliant. The movie is
called The Thing About My Folks. You can find it
(05:21):
also on Al Jazella. I Have a I Have a Ball,
their favorite, Oh they love me.
Speaker 2 (05:26):
Paul, your story had the word diner in it, So
I have to mention that our on our podcast, in
Our World, in Phil's Life, I think it's true. Diner
is like our Citizen Kane. It is the most It
is the greatest American movie. In fact, a few weeks
after we had Paul on, we had Kevin Bacon on
and he had listened to Paul's episode. He goes, I
(05:47):
have no fucking Diner stories. Paul took all my stories Diner.
I don't know how many have seen Diner, even more.
Speaker 7 (05:56):
Than I have seen My Special Interesting.
Speaker 2 (05:58):
Exactly that movie What's it Mean in your life? Because
it played it.
Speaker 7 (06:04):
That was part Crazily enough, that was the first job
I ever had. I had never done anything, and I
got it by accident because I literally went with a
friend who was auditioning, and I was waiting outside in
the lobby, and after he was finished, the cast in
director said you're next. I went, no, I'm just waiting
for my friend. And I was trying to bow out
of it. She said, do you have a picture? I
(06:25):
said no, I'm not. I'm just waiting for my friend.
She said, come back tomorrow and meet the new first
time director, Barry Levinson. I went all right, And next
two weeks later, I'm in Baltimore and I knew nothing.
I knew nothing, so I tell you I would tell
the story about that my first shot. So I had
never done anything. I've never been on a TV show,
I'd never been in front of a camera and the
(06:47):
first week of the film.
Speaker 2 (06:48):
I didn't.
Speaker 7 (06:50):
I just the way this schedule was, I had no scene.
So I was for a week just waiting, and then
finally they said you're working tomorrow. And it was the
opening shot of the movie, which, if you remember, it's
on a steady cam, which was new to them and
Barry and never done. So they said, well, come in
the night before we're going to just rehearse it, and
they have a special camera. And all I could think was,
(07:12):
I'd like, can I have the regular camera that all
the other guys. I thought it was like the training wheels.
I thought they were like, give this idiot the foolproof camera.
But I didn't know that it was special and difficult,
and so that's how little I knew.
Speaker 5 (07:25):
But that was the it turned out.
Speaker 7 (07:27):
Well, it turned out well. That was like literally opened
all the doors. And I said, someday, maybe I play
the Palace of Fine Arts with Phil Rosenthal and look
how dreams come true.
Speaker 2 (07:39):
And we're not supposed to say this, but ever since
you travel with Mickey work NonStop.
Speaker 5 (07:44):
He's backstage right watching jacket.
Speaker 7 (07:46):
I don't go anywhere without Mickey, right, but you do.
Speaker 2 (07:50):
You are friends with a lot of the guys.
Speaker 7 (07:53):
Right, everybody but Mickey, No, no, not to any decision making.
But yes, but Steve Gutenberg, Kevin Bio Daniels hero, Steve Gutenberg, hero,
Steve Guttenberg, who has been instrumental in putting out helping
people in his fire. Yeah. I saw him just the
other day. He's He's a very sweet, special guy.
Speaker 3 (08:17):
Twenty twenty five was a huge year for Goo Goo Dolls,
but they still found time to have hot wings and
a great conversation with Phil and David Buffalo.
Speaker 5 (08:24):
You met when you were how oled.
Speaker 9 (08:26):
I don't know, like like like when we were about
twenty we met, yea, yeah, yeah, yeah, nineteen I was
I think I was nineteen.
Speaker 10 (08:34):
I'm younger than him a little bit. Yeah, but yeah,
and it was it was it was interesting how we met.
Which was you know, I was in college. I was
at the dorms and he came to I was supplementing
my income by selling drugs.
Speaker 2 (08:50):
And a grand tradition in rocket.
Speaker 10 (08:52):
Yes, it was. And uh, you know I was on
I was on the financial aid you know things. So
I was supplementing my income, but you know, selling a
little weed. And that's we met.
Speaker 9 (09:04):
That my cousin played in a band and John played
guitar in that band. Yeah, so I think my cousin
was looking to retire from the band and go to
school at nineteen, he was done with.
Speaker 2 (09:19):
His rocket band career.
Speaker 9 (09:20):
Yes, that that was the Boumont.
Speaker 10 (09:23):
Yeah, yeah, it was. It was just like a ridiculous
like hardcore. Yeah, it's called the Bay Time was like this,
but I've been not a woman in the audience. Just
a bunch of guys with their shirts off, beating the
hell out of each other. That was what that was
all about.
Speaker 5 (09:36):
But that's what you started playing.
Speaker 9 (09:38):
Yeah, yeah, I think my cousin was moving on, and
I think the plan was eventually I was going to
take over playing bass in the band, but they were
having me learn the songs on guitar, and John showed
up and I was playing guitar. That was a little
uncomfortable for a second, because I don't think they told
him about it.
Speaker 2 (09:53):
No, they didn't.
Speaker 10 (09:53):
And you like that music going in I mean I
liked being in a band like Okay, so.
Speaker 4 (10:01):
Because you were I saw the little documentary, Yeah, what's
called behind the scenes, Behind the Music, Behind the music.
Speaker 2 (10:08):
You didn't I'm in fourteen of them and I didn't.
You can't remember the name. So it used to be
a cultural No, I know, I know.
Speaker 4 (10:16):
It's behind the music, you behind the thing, you were,
you were. That's a Jewish way of saying, over there.
Speaker 2 (10:23):
That's an Israel. That's what the show is called. Behind
the thing, behind the thing with the songs.
Speaker 5 (10:27):
With the with the loud music.
Speaker 4 (10:30):
Uh, you were a nice accordion player. I was so
for for me to see that. That was my number
one question coming in today was how did you go
from accordion to playing pretty much heavy metal?
Speaker 5 (10:44):
Right?
Speaker 2 (10:44):
No?
Speaker 5 (10:46):
Sorry?
Speaker 2 (10:49):
Wow?
Speaker 10 (10:49):
How did I go from that?
Speaker 2 (10:51):
Okay?
Speaker 10 (10:52):
I grew up on the East side of Buffalo, which
at that time in history was all you know, Polish
Catholic immigrants, you know, and like a good Polish boy,
you go and take accordion lessons. Your mother makes you
take accordion lessons and.
Speaker 2 (11:09):
In lieu of a bar Mitzville polka.
Speaker 9 (11:12):
Yeah.
Speaker 10 (11:12):
So so when you're nine or ten and you're taking
accordion lessons, do you know how heavy an accordion is?
Speaker 5 (11:21):
Heavy?
Speaker 2 (11:22):
It's really heavy?
Speaker 5 (11:23):
And you were targeted a yessing of.
Speaker 10 (11:26):
Yes, the kids, the cool thuggy kids, and I had
this thing strapped across my back and.
Speaker 5 (11:31):
You're trying to run with like a turtle.
Speaker 10 (11:34):
It was like a yes, it was like a turtle
like that. And so one day I came home with
my my dented accordion and I remember getting really angry
at my mother and just being like, you can't make
me do this anymore. I can't take this ship, you know.
And if you weren't getting picked on, did you like it?
Speaker 7 (11:55):
No?
Speaker 8 (11:56):
I hated it.
Speaker 10 (11:56):
I the hell? What what what ten year old kid
in the late seventies wants to play Lady of Spain?
Speaker 7 (12:05):
It is not.
Speaker 5 (12:08):
A chick I think, would argue.
Speaker 10 (12:10):
Well, you know, but he's he's exceptional. He's an outlier
in the world of accordion players.
Speaker 11 (12:17):
You know.
Speaker 7 (12:17):
He is like he was like the.
Speaker 5 (12:18):
Elvis of a course. So you want it to be cool?
We all do.
Speaker 10 (12:22):
Yeah. My mom took took pity on me and so, uh,
let me trade in the accordion for a horrible, shitty
set of drums and then we put the drums in
the basement and that lasted about four days. And she
was just like my mom was. My mom was very
(12:44):
direct with her uh responses to things.
Speaker 2 (12:49):
The first rock critic in your life.
Speaker 7 (12:51):
Yes.
Speaker 10 (12:52):
So I was sitting downstairs and there was this song
called Wipeout, which I'm sure you're met.
Speaker 2 (12:56):
Of course, ultimate surf, the ultimate surf.
Speaker 5 (13:02):
Isn't that the audition for drummers.
Speaker 10 (13:03):
Yes, one of them. And uh and and so I'm
sitting there trying to play this song to the stereo.
And and then I remember I was went up to
hit a drum and I felt somebody pulled the stick
out and then stab the tom tom on the drum set,
stabbed it right through it.
Speaker 2 (13:23):
That was my mom. That's a statement.
Speaker 5 (13:26):
Yeah, it was a statement.
Speaker 10 (13:27):
Was a very direct response. And then uh. And then
so the drums were out, and then and then we
got rid of them, and.
Speaker 2 (13:34):
She got me.
Speaker 12 (13:36):
Uh.
Speaker 10 (13:36):
It was this guitar cost thirty dollars. It was a
thing called the k Kay guitar. And yeah, and that
was the guitar. And then I played that guitar until
and you mastered that time and I didn't master anything. No, No,
I'm still feeling around in the dark because I you know,
I mean, I I hired a couple of guys that
are like ringers, so whatever, I don't know, you know,
(14:00):
I say, hey, show me how to play this and
stuff I've written, you know, and I'm like, I can't
remember how to play that. Can you show me how
to do that?
Speaker 5 (14:08):
When you write? I mean I'm bouncing around.
Speaker 4 (14:10):
But when you write, are you writing on the guitar?
Speaker 2 (14:13):
Yeah?
Speaker 10 (14:13):
Yeah, yeah, yeah yeah or on piano?
Speaker 9 (14:15):
Most of the time.
Speaker 10 (14:16):
I'll pack out on a piano occasionally, like I can
play single note sort of lines things like that, and
uh and then and then yeah, I'll play mostly on
the guitar.
Speaker 4 (14:25):
So if the critics know you as the punk rock band,
then you come out with iris.
Speaker 9 (14:30):
Well name actually was Name was the one that sort
of broke.
Speaker 4 (14:36):
But it's a completely different sound.
Speaker 9 (14:38):
Yes, much much different than what I mean. We had
always been kind of doing.
Speaker 8 (14:42):
Stuff like that.
Speaker 10 (14:42):
Yeah, but it was.
Speaker 2 (14:45):
That.
Speaker 10 (14:47):
But Bob Bob guys okay, guys like well, like like
the clash, massive hooks, massive hooks, who'scod do? I remember
remember the first time I heard Who's could Do? I
was just like, Okay, this is a cacophonist fucking sonic assault.
(15:09):
But underneath it you could hear this beautiful, sensitive, sensitive
songwriting and and it was.
Speaker 5 (15:21):
It just it was it.
Speaker 2 (15:22):
Blew was called Workshop, the solo record he made and
work Book, work Book, Work, work Book. And all I
remember is the first time I heard that, and I
just thought, like, that's what I was hearing, you know,
that exactly, that was underneath And that just.
Speaker 9 (15:36):
Is just a very unique way of playing the drums,
you know.
Speaker 10 (15:41):
I mean they had to sound like like no other,
but you had to you had to really listen, you know.
And and and I love that. Ben Westerburg was obviously
a huge influence on me, you know.
Speaker 2 (15:52):
And but you wrote you wrote long distances because I
have a weird thing of I love Westerberg. And I
interviewed him once and I hung out with him in
London once, and I have no memories of it. I can't.
Of all the people I've known, he was like elusive
he was. And I thought, it's even perfect that you
wrote a song with your hero. But it was long distance, right, yeah?
Speaker 10 (16:12):
Was it?
Speaker 2 (16:12):
Just like?
Speaker 10 (16:13):
Yeah? I I I sent him a piece of music
and and and I was like, I would really love
to write a song with you, and and uh, and
we did it through the mail, and I remember the end.
He wrote me a note and he signed it see
you in church, and which which is code for funk
off basically. You know, I think so in that context,
(16:37):
I think it was fuck.
Speaker 4 (16:38):
You but express, which means I'll never see you again.
Speaker 2 (16:45):
Yeah, it's kind of Jewish code.
Speaker 10 (16:47):
Yeah, you know, but but it was it was he
was for me, him and Bob Mould and the Clash
and the Ramones. The Ramones were big for me because
because I could actually play those songs, and the Ramones
inspired an entire generation of musicians. I think because it
was like, oh, I took two guitar lessons, right, and
(17:10):
I can play every Ramone song.
Speaker 2 (17:13):
Okay. They changed my life. The first review I ever
wrote for my middle school paper was a review of
the Sex Pistols and the Ramones. I did the dual
review and I completely came down on the side on
the Ramones. Then I went to Cornell. They played Bailey
Hall in Cornell. It was one of the first concerts
that changed my life. They were just you know, maybe
(17:33):
it was forty five minutes, forty five songs, and it
was just unbelievable. But because of that and the Clash,
like you mentioned, like, they were incredibly important to me. Yes,
my break. The first TV performance I ever put together
and suggested I was a new kid at the Grammy's like,
I've done it twenty four years, this will be twenty
(17:53):
five coming up. But early on I was there and
when Joe Strummer died, I said, guys, we got to
do something for Joe Strummer. And all the people working
on the show were like fifty five sixty and they
were like, who's Joe's truer? Yeah, and I said, well,
it's to clash and we got to do and he goes, well,
what would you do? They were, to their credit Kenderlick,
(18:14):
thank god, and Walter Miller and Pierco said. They said,
well what would you do? And I said, London calling.
And they said who would play it? And and I
literally said my middle school wet dream. I said Bruce
Springsteen because I knew he loved the clash. I said
Elvis Costello, Dave Grohl, who was the guy of the moment.
(18:34):
We needed, we needed someone, you know, another guy. And
then literally that ended up being I said Bowie too,
just because he was very influential on yeh. Bowie said
yes to doing it, but then backed out. But that
was the London calling when Joe died that we did.
That's the first time I ever got to.
Speaker 10 (18:50):
Can I see that on?
Speaker 2 (18:51):
You could see it on YouTube at anytime, and it
was life change me for me. Wow, And that's why
I fell in love with Like, oh, TV can be.
Speaker 10 (18:58):
Powerful, Yes, obviously it can be powerful.
Speaker 2 (19:02):
Well, it's very powerful when you know somebody, if you'd
fill and everybody's raiment.
Speaker 3 (19:20):
Phil and David were thrilled to have Tim Matheson come
to lunch in their podcast studio at Phil's Animal House.
Speaker 2 (19:25):
I think I'm so lucky.
Speaker 4 (19:26):
You probably feel the same way that when we were
becoming adults. When we were teenagers, these milestone movies that
changed culture hit us at the perfect age.
Speaker 5 (19:38):
For them to hit.
Speaker 2 (19:39):
We had Kevin Bacon on it, and he goes, yeah,
he asked us, I think how old we were the
perfect age to watch Animal House?
Speaker 5 (19:45):
Yes, seventeen eighteen, And.
Speaker 2 (19:46):
It was what a what a game changer that was.
It was a game changer obviously in your life, but
it was a game changer for.
Speaker 4 (19:52):
Every movies, every the culture.
Speaker 8 (19:55):
It was the first comedy I think written by young
people for young people.
Speaker 4 (20:00):
Is that really true?
Speaker 7 (20:01):
That?
Speaker 5 (20:01):
I mean?
Speaker 4 (20:02):
It certainly felt like a seismic change, like, oh my god,
this is for us and it's coming out at the
same time, like Saturday Night Live is happening on TV,
and this is you know, Belushi has just scored big
on that and now he's the star of this, and
you know it is like the inmates are going to
run the asylum here when we're watching that movie. So
(20:24):
you got to take us through you're casting of that
and working on that, because that's just I mean.
Speaker 8 (20:30):
Well, you know, it's like it was that big of
a moment in my life because I was, you know,
I've finished doing the quest I did. I'm you know,
I was playing regular kind of nice guy parts on
TV episodic, playing you know, as a guest actor here
and there, and I was working and I just was
(20:51):
bored with the kind of character. There wasn't any edge
to it. There was no great humor fun. For whatever reason,
I couldn't like get in you know, I did a
roda maybe, but I wasn't It wasn't my skill set
to you know. I mean, I I love doing live shows,
but you know, I didn't do too many of those.
And then I saw the script and it was like,
(21:14):
oh my god, this is the most this is the
most unique, brilliant, typical lampoon, so smart, so funny.
Speaker 5 (21:22):
Could you laugh out loud?
Speaker 8 (21:23):
Reading?
Speaker 5 (21:24):
I laughed out?
Speaker 8 (21:25):
I think I sat up all night reading. I read
it twice. Called my age the first thing in the morning,
said I have got to be in this movie. I've
just got you know. And he's what party is an otter?
I mean I was born to play this part.
Speaker 2 (21:38):
Yes.
Speaker 8 (21:39):
And the thing was I had been studying improv because
I wanted to shift gears and try, you know, to
a new approach to acting.
Speaker 5 (21:48):
Best thing for any actor to take it.
Speaker 8 (21:49):
I couldn't agree absolutely every human being, Yes, absolutely right,
whether you're acting or not, get in there. Because life
always throws you a curve. You gotta go with it,
that's right. So but they wouldn't they. I went in
a methic casting director Michael Chinich and and he said,
when when the word came back, now, no, no, he's
(22:10):
not right. He's a prep. He's not a preppy. He's
he's a cowboy or a surfer. He's not. He's not
East Coast preppy.
Speaker 4 (22:18):
And just because of your hair or something, my hair was.
Speaker 8 (22:20):
Here, you know, and I hadn't really done anything, you know,
like that, And so I begged the studio. I knew
Tom Mount, who was one of the junior executives there,
and I said, just let me get in a room
if I if I, you know, screw the pooch and
I don't get the job. That's fine, I can live
with it. But I just got to get in the
room once. And fortunately I was auditioning with Peter Riegert,
(22:44):
who played Boom, one of.
Speaker 2 (22:45):
The greatest You're I don't understand how there's not a
series of Buddy pictures because the two of you, and
by the way, Animal Houses in my all we did
an all time top ten, and Animal House is in
my top ten, and the Local Hero is in my
top ten. But the two of you were just unbelievable together.
Speaker 8 (23:04):
Well, thank you very much. I mean, you know, it
was so smart and adroit of the writers. Each character
had their own style and sense of comedy. I was
kind of verbal and funny, and you know, Rakish and
and and Peter Reger was kind of like Groucho a
little bit with you know, and he was always doing
in a love story. And and Laurel and Hardy were
(23:26):
you know, flounder and Pinto right and and Belushi was
they described him as sort of the The Cookie Monster
meets Harpo.
Speaker 2 (23:34):
Marx.
Speaker 5 (23:34):
Harpo is perfect, isn't it It is?
Speaker 4 (23:37):
That's a perfect But I would I would. I think
he had maybe more ball than cooking.
Speaker 2 (23:44):
I love Flushi so much growing up. He was sort
of my hero. And I'm sort of afraid to go
back and watch performances in case I don't like things
as much as I think I do. But I did
go back and watch Animal House this weekend for the
first time a little while, and there are scenes he
does like you you don't ways how much is silent.
It's like he had Harold Lloyd like skills, like well,
just the eyebrows. I mean, there's those scenes where he's
(24:07):
just like in the dining you know, in the dining
hall and all that, where he's really not even using
the verbal skills he has.
Speaker 4 (24:13):
Are you guys just the face up? Are you blowing takes?
Because you're laughing during that movie.
Speaker 2 (24:17):
I think I think.
Speaker 8 (24:19):
I was in character enough when I was working with him,
you know, not to not to blow a take. But
but there.
Speaker 4 (24:24):
Is an improvised element there, right, well a little bit.
Speaker 8 (24:28):
I mean it's probably like you know on your show
you you you stick to the script. And but there
were scenes that and I would watch I'd be standing
right now, such an.
Speaker 5 (24:38):
Anarchy happening right.
Speaker 8 (24:40):
So, yes, but watching him do because he didn't have
much dialogue. It was all physical, you know, like you know,
stealing the lunch, you know. It was just to watch
that and it was like one take, you know, I mean,
we didn't have a lot of time to shoot three
or four takes of anything.
Speaker 4 (24:55):
I've become friendly with land this over the years, and
was how much of the success of that.
Speaker 5 (25:02):
Movie is due hit to him?
Speaker 8 (25:04):
John Landis is greatly responsible for the success because he a.
Speaker 5 (25:09):
Great comedy director.
Speaker 8 (25:10):
He's a great comedy director. He understands physical comedy understood.
Here's how deep John goes. We shot in Cottage Grove,
which was a town near Eugene where we were shooting
most of the movie. One whole week. We shot the parade,
the finale of the movie, one whole week and in
Cottage Grove. So he wanted us to know Cottage Grove.
(25:32):
So he showed us the only other movie ever made
in Cottage Grove on a Sunday before we went, which
was called The General starring Buster Keaton, which he directed
and I think it cost a million dollars then, which
would be like I don't know one hundred million dollars today,
who directed Buster Keaton? I'm sorry, but so Landas showed
(25:53):
us that's that was made here, I don't know, seventy
years ago or right or fifty years ago, and and
we're going to shoot our movie here too, So it
was like kinship with the filmmaker, history history, you know,
that's Landis. He knows, he knew, he just knew. And
he he was always off stage throwing stuff through a
scene through you know, throwing a cup of water over here,
(26:15):
you know, or props because so you see stuff flying
through the scenes. That's the landers amazing and the prop
guy throwing it too, you know what I mean. But
just so there's constant chaos, yes, and yeah, it was.
It was. And Ivan Wrightman, I must say, fought long
and hard against the studio to get the money, to
get everything so that Landis could make the movie he
(26:37):
wanted to make. And I even wanted to make that.
He had that movie developed so he could direct it.
He wanted to be a director, and the studio goes na, na, na, na,
you know we've seen youry thing with women in cages
or whatever the heck it was. You know, and you
know you're not ready for this.
Speaker 5 (26:50):
So Landis had done.
Speaker 4 (26:51):
I believe Kentucky Fried movie, yes, which is a series
of sketches.
Speaker 8 (26:57):
Pretty much done schlock and Kentucky Fried movie was thin
in production then i't think anybody's seen it. And they
showed cuts of it to Ned Tanna and at Universal.
Speaker 5 (27:06):
And then he hired Landers R rated comedy.
Speaker 4 (27:09):
Yeah right, so he's the perfect sensibility.
Speaker 5 (27:12):
Absolutely, they knew that.
Speaker 4 (27:13):
Kids just being our age seventeen eighteen, we want to
see certain things beasts, right, yes, we want to see
And what if you work all that into the comedy,
then you have you've got You've got the ultimate teen
movie and you're gonna make a fortune.
Speaker 2 (27:31):
Yeah right, and there you do it right, and there's
Judd Apatow. There's like the whole film but changes if
you don't.
Speaker 5 (27:37):
Have to know Judd apata without this.
Speaker 10 (27:39):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (27:42):
Her husband Brad Paisley wrote the Naked Lunch theme and
in twenty twenty five, Phil and David were thrilled to
finally welcome Kimberly Williams Paisley to the show. And now
you can see Kimberly starring weekly on nine to one
to one Nashville.
Speaker 5 (27:53):
I want to hear father Bride stories.
Speaker 13 (27:55):
Oh yes, I'm sorry, I want to hear you were
talking about child.
Speaker 4 (27:58):
You're nineteen. You come on and there's Steve Martin, and
you know who.
Speaker 5 (28:02):
That is already by that time, right, he's already.
Speaker 4 (28:05):
Oh my gosh.
Speaker 13 (28:06):
I was a huge fan of Steve Martin. So basically,
I'm a sophomore at Northwestern and I am just interested
in finding my way to Chicago on the L train.
I have this audition, yes, but I'm nineteen. Getting married
is the furthest thing from my mind. There's no way
I'm getting this part.
Speaker 11 (28:23):
You know.
Speaker 13 (28:24):
I've done like a couple of auditions and and done
like an ABC after school special which was very highly rated.
No it wasn't. No, I know, it's terrible. I did commercials,
you know, for stride X and Obi tampons and all
the embarrassing especially that yeah funny thing. Yeah, I did
a Pizza Hut commercial. But anyway, so like that's the
(28:46):
furthest thing from my mind. So I was just thinking, well,
one day I'm going to be able to say that
I did a screen to Well, first of all, I
did the thing on the train. I get to the audition,
and then I was like, all right, I did that.
I figured out the l Then I get a callback
and they're like, we want you to fly out to
LA to audition and read with Steve Martin.
Speaker 4 (29:07):
And you know what.
Speaker 13 (29:11):
When I was a kid, I had gone to like younger,
I had gone to Universal Studios. I always loved I
loved being on a set. My friend Anna Holbrook was
on Another World in New York, and so I used
to go with her to work, and I just loved
being on set. And I loved doing the Universal Studios tour.
But no, I had never been to like an actual
(29:32):
and an actual Hollywood room, and not much time in
LA at all. And I could hear Steve's voice out
in the from out in the waiting room. I could
hear his voice in the room and knew that he
was right on the other side of the door. And
I just thought, one day, I'm going to tell my
grandkids that I got to hear Steve Martin's voice in person,
(29:54):
you know. And then he comes out and he'd been
doing that movie Grand Canyon, so he was he had
a beard, so he looked different and he was so
nice in the audition, and again, like I left, I
was like, well, I'm not getting it.
Speaker 4 (30:04):
But that was so cool.
Speaker 13 (30:05):
That was so fun. And then I went back to
school and then they told me I didn't get it.
And I went to they told me I didn't get it,
and I went to the journalism school at Northwestern and
I said, I am transferring out of theater. I don't
like this business anymore. I don't want to be an
actor anymore. I want to be a writer. My parents
were writers, and it was a much more respectable profession.
Speaker 2 (30:26):
And a great school at Northwestern and.
Speaker 13 (30:28):
A great school. And I was looking into internships when
they called back because I was going to get an
internship in Florida at a newspaper for a summer. And
they called back and they said, we want you to
fly out again for another audition.
Speaker 2 (30:40):
Do you know how that happened? You know what the
backstory is.
Speaker 13 (30:42):
Well, Nancy Meyers said that she had the flu when
she saw my first audition, so there was like from
the first audition to the callback, there was a long
break too, And that she said was she blamed it
on the flu, that she wasn't really paying attention, and
then later on she was like and I don't know
it was Nancy or Charles who later on was like, Hey,
we should take another look at that girl. And then
(31:04):
they just it was a huge casting call. They just
had so many people that they were seeing and Phoebe
Kates was originally cast, but then she got pregnant and
that was awkward. They couldn't have a pregnant bride walking
down the aisle, So then no, I would love to
I would love to meet that child. So yeah, and
(31:24):
I don't know why. Then they it was like probably
a few weeks when they called me back again. That
was a screen test and that was like, you know,
hair and makeup. That was the first time I had
ever really done anything this huge. They had the whole
It was on a sound stage. I'd never been on
a sound stage, and I remember it was so bright
outside and I walked into the sound stage and it
was pitch black, and you know how that is when
(31:46):
it's sunny out in California and you walk in you
can't see anything. And I heard Diane Keaton's laugh. That
was the first thing I heard.
Speaker 14 (31:52):
I was like, ah, oh, I was such a.
Speaker 13 (31:54):
Fan of hers. Annie Hall was like one of my
favorite movies. And my dad had told me that I
reminded him of Diane Keaton, and I always thought that
was the biggest compliment. I just loved her so much.
Speaker 2 (32:06):
I have never met her, and I worship Oh.
Speaker 5 (32:10):
I've had dinner with her a few times. Yeah, we
have mutual friends. She's phenomenal. You keep in touch.
Speaker 13 (32:16):
I when I see her out and about. I love
seeing her, but I don't I don't see her regularly.
But yeah, and they were so nice and that was
that was it. And then they made me do some
basketball outside after, just to make sure I could bounce
a ball. And that was it.
Speaker 5 (32:32):
That'd be funny if you blow it on the basketball.
Speaker 14 (32:34):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (32:48):
In twenty twenty five, the legendary chef Thomas Keller brought
an unforgettable lunch to Naked Lunch.
Speaker 4 (32:53):
When we go to the French laundry, and this is
you know, it's it's aspirational. I think to eat at
the French laundry, it's it's it's it is fine dining
at its highest level in the United States. You cannot
get a better meal in the United States of Oh,
thank you of find literal fine dying. And yet when
(33:15):
you go, yes, it costs money to do this, and
it costs, you know, more money maybe than most people have.
But you will never leave there thinking I didn't get
my money's worth. I didn't get You got beyond. Every
time I've been is beyond.
Speaker 5 (33:32):
The experience is beyond.
Speaker 4 (33:33):
And if people watch the Chef's Table Legends, they will
see what the experience is. And as beautiful as it
looks on TV, I can tell you it's much better
in person. And because first of all, you're eating it,
and second of all, the sense of generosity, it's overwhelming.
(33:55):
You feel nurtured, you feel taken care of. You know,
it's it's an not a short meal, and it can
go on and they'll come over and they'll say to you,
how about you take a break and take a walk
in the garden for a while, or go just sit
out there with your drink and relax and enjoy the space.
Nobody's rushing you.
Speaker 15 (34:15):
Yeah, we want we want to extend people's experience at
the French Any for a couple of different reasons. Number one,
you know they don't they don't often get there right
so they're there maybe once a year, yes, maybe once
a lifetime.
Speaker 12 (34:26):
Right.
Speaker 15 (34:27):
Whatever we can do for them right to extend their experience,
then that's what we want to do. We want them
to enjoy their time at the French Chundry.
Speaker 4 (34:34):
The thing that the show doesn't cover is that it's
not just about this exclusive experience at the laundry. You
also have ad Hoc, which is a fried chicken place.
Speaker 15 (34:48):
Nearby family of style of food yep.
Speaker 4 (34:50):
And is first of all best fried chicken you've ever had.
I mean, it's spectacular, but that's for everybody. And Beaucham
is closer to that as well as a beautiful Beast.
Speaker 5 (35:00):
Road experience.
Speaker 15 (35:03):
And then the bakery right right there.
Speaker 4 (35:05):
Absolutely, and we tried to show that in our episode
of Somebody feed Filled. When we went did San Francisco,
we got to explore Keller World up in Napa, which
was fantastic. But I want people to know that there's
this whole other side. It's not just about the fine
dining and your generosity has now extended to everyone. There's
(35:29):
a price point for everybody.
Speaker 15 (35:30):
Yeah, well, we you know, we wanted to bring diversity
to our town, yes, right, and we wanted to have
people come there again, right, to experience our town and
keep them in town, right by offering these different opportunities
for them to enjoy food, whether it's whether having a
breakfast croissant and a cup of coffee in the courtyard
of Bouchon, right going to wherever? I mean, you talked
(35:51):
about ad Hoc. You know, we talk about Bouchon and
these restaurants. So it's really, you know, I feel blessed, right,
I was gonna say lucky, but you know this is
truly I'm a truly blessed person. I have some extraordine
It's like, who knew?
Speaker 2 (36:06):
I knew? Who knew?
Speaker 15 (36:07):
Right, here's a young kid barely got out of high
school right more more in mid century, barely got out
of high school? Right, No, no, no, no, no, no
future plans right for anything. I wasn't thinking about that.
I wasn't thinking about my future. Who ends up working
as a dishwasher for his mother, right, becomes a.
Speaker 2 (36:28):
Cook because that's a recipe for success, right.
Speaker 15 (36:30):
Because because his mother needs somebody to cook and his
brother is already cooking, so he teaches him how to
do some basic things.
Speaker 4 (36:37):
How long do we the dishwasher before?
Speaker 15 (36:39):
Probably a year and a half, maybe Yeah, something like that.
I learned my I learned my six disciplines washing dishes, Yes,
when I was fourteen to fifteen years old. But yeah,
and then then you meet a you meet a chef
in nar Aganster, Rhode Island, at a private beach club
who asked you this kind of what you think of
now is it's like this absurd, out of place question. Yeah,
(37:01):
and he answers it, and that one moment in time
gives you right the influence and inspiration to actually embrace
this profession in a way that you're you're totally committed,
you one hundred percent dedicated to it.
Speaker 2 (37:18):
And without that, you don't go to France.
Speaker 15 (37:21):
None of that stuff. Yeah, none of that stuff happens. Yeah,
none of that stuff happens.
Speaker 3 (37:28):
Love may stink, but having Rocker author and rack On
tour Peter Wolf and the great TV writer Mike Scully
clearly does not.
Speaker 4 (37:34):
Can we jump right in because there's something at the beginning.
You're a kid, your parents take you to the movie
and somebody comes and sits next to you. Can you
tell that little story?
Speaker 11 (37:44):
Well, yes, we were visiting. My sister was in the
hospital and the news wasn't very good, so my parents
decided to get their minds off of things to take
me and themselves to a film. Now, my parents were
very political, they were very progressive, shall we say, and
(38:05):
so they decided to choose I was about eight years old,
maybe nine. They decided to choose a film, and it
was a French film, a foreign film called He Must Die.
And the premise of the movie was that if Jesus
Christ came back to Earth, the church would probably be
the first one that wanted to get rid of him
(38:26):
because he was such a revolutionary. And it was all
in subtitles now here. I am about eight years old,
and I was old, you know, eating Eminem's, bored And
as the movie's starting, this couple comes into the farthest
end of the row where we were sitting, and somebody
(38:47):
sits in front of them, so they moved closer, and
the woman sits right next to me. It was a
man and a woman. And I start smelling the most
exotic perfume I've ever smell in my life. I never
realized that perfume could be so intoxicating. And I was
(39:07):
eating some Eminem's and I dropped the box and as
I bent down to pick it up, I realized that
the woman sitting next to me was wearing house slippers,
and she had a fur coat on, and underneath the
fur coat was just a nightgown. And as you know,
going to the movies like that was kind of really unusual.
(39:30):
And as I was reaching for the eminem she kicked
the box you know, to her, and she picked it up,
turned it to me, turned towards me, handed me the
box with this big smile, and she had a kerchief
around her head and sunglasses on, dark sunglasses, with this great,
beautiful smile. And so I thanked her, you know, nodded
(39:53):
to her, and as these subtitles you know, across the screen,
I slowly felt her head slowly bending towards my shoulder
till she actually fell asleep on my shoulder, and so
(40:14):
I froze. Didn't want to wake her because she seemed
so nice, and she also retrieved my candy. I'm sitting
there also getting bored, and slowly, slowly I fell asleep
on her shoulder, and we were both fast asleep until
(40:35):
we were both awakened by this voice saying, honey, honey,
get up, let's go. The lights are going to come on.
And in the theater. She jumped up, she pulled her
fur coat around her and walked out and people as
the lights went up, people started screaming, it's them, it's them.
And she turned back to me at that point gave
me a big smile, and it was Arthur Miller and
(40:59):
malm Monroe, and so I slept with mallem and Mondoe.
Speaker 5 (41:06):
That's the best story ever heard. That's what a punchline.
That's fantastic.
Speaker 2 (41:11):
But Phil, that's the first of about eight hundred meetings
of fascinating people. I tried to write it down.
Speaker 11 (41:18):
You're going to say, that's the first of eight hundred
different fascinating women I slept with.
Speaker 2 (41:24):
That's not even the only actress, a great actress ever
to retrieve your candy. But no, this is true. So
but let's I mean the ones you saw Louis Armstrong,
which is unbelievable, but you were essentially. Was it Norman
Rockwell who like baby sat you slightly or how did
that happen?
Speaker 11 (41:45):
Well, my dad worked with the Robert Shaw Corral and
up entangled. There was a concert and so we had
very little money, but somebody provided us a place to
stay and we were living there for several weeks and
my dad was doing chores and I believe it was
Stockbridge or uh the town there were this. Uh, he
(42:08):
was had to do a lot of errands. So he
took me to this uh up these steps, to this
gentleman's studio that was a painter. And I was very
much into painting ever since I was I could remember
I was scribbling over walls, anything, any kind of service surface.
I would you know, draw, and then my parents' books,
(42:30):
you know, the paper became like pads and I would
be scribbling on everything. And so uh he took me
to this gentleman's studio and the gentleman uh gave me
paper and pencil and uh he said he had a
son named Peter, who was, you know, a year older
than me. And I was watching this man and years, years,
(42:52):
many years later I found out that the gentleman was
Norman Rockwell, and so uh I had I didn't know
who Norman Rockwell was, but years later I found out. Naturally,
about twenty five years after, I went to visit where
the studio was, and it all came right back to me.
(43:13):
The steps where we walked up, and I think it
was closed, but I think it's now turned into a museum,
the actual studio.
Speaker 2 (43:24):
And do you have any theories on why? Because you know,
you go to school and the guy you need, you
need an apartment, your roommate is David Lynch. You go
to you know this, You go to New York and uh,
you know, you go to a sort of folk gathering
place and you hear a guy named Bob Dylan in
the other room, and you know who becomes not only
(43:45):
eventually a friend enough to write a blurb on your book.
And and you know, do you have a theory on.
Speaker 5 (43:52):
I saw this movie. I think it's called zell ll Yes, no.
Speaker 11 (43:56):
No, no, no, no, you know, you know this was
all most of the stuff was, you know, by chance,
by apsent, you know, serpendipity. Would that be the correct word?
Speaker 5 (44:07):
Is serendipity?
Speaker 4 (44:08):
Yeah, but most people don't have this kind.
Speaker 5 (44:10):
Of serendipity because well this is just the tip of
the iceberg.
Speaker 4 (44:14):
You met Tennessee Williams, Is that right correct?
Speaker 5 (44:17):
Tell us about him?
Speaker 11 (44:19):
Well, first of all, I think from seeing Streetcar Nade
Desire the film, I became infatuated, you know, through the
model and Brando with Tennessee Williams, and he was in
the newspapers a lot when I was you know, young, uh,
And I don't quite can't remember what year street Car
(44:41):
came out, but some recently. When it came out, I
had seen it and Brando is just you.
Speaker 8 (44:47):
Know, so powerful, unforgettable.
Speaker 11 (44:51):
And then it was preceded by you know, on the
Waterfront and things. So I started dwelving into going to
the library and taking up all of Tennessee Williams's plays
and Summer in Smoke and suddenly Last Summer, and you know,
many of them I didn't quite understand, but I just
(45:12):
became infatuated with him.
Speaker 5 (45:14):
You're very young at this time, this is.
Speaker 11 (45:17):
Oh, yeah, I was young. But as years went on,
I just kept you know, I bought all his poetries.
Caten In put out a recording of him reading a
short story called Yellowbird. And when I was married to
Faye Dunaway, she was in the twenty fifth anniversary premiere
(45:42):
of Streetcar named Desire. Oh, and so I was in
the green room, sitting in the corner waiting for the show.
Faye was backstage getting ready for the performance, and I
was sitting in a corner by myself and somebody I
was holding a glass of white wine. And somebody walked
past me and knocked the wine, and the wine spilled
(46:03):
all over my pants. And this gentleman comes up to
me and goes, mah mah. You know, even while sitting
on paraphrasing, I sit in the book, even while sitting
all alone, you know, trouble can't happen ors, you know.
And I looked up and staring at me through those
(46:26):
thick sunglasses of him was those wonderful eyes of the
great Tennessee Williams. And the lights were going on and
off and meaning the show was about to start. And
it turned out I was sitting next to him in
the theater.
Speaker 5 (46:43):
Wow.
Speaker 11 (46:44):
And so here is, you know, Tennessee watching twenty five
years after first performance of Streetcar. He's watching Streetcar and
there's the scene where they're playing cards. Stanley's playing cards,
Blanche and Stella out and there's some jokes being told
(47:06):
during this card game. Tennessee starts laughing loud, you know,
and the people around them are saying quiet, and he's
you know, you know, just you know, just laughing loud.
You know, there's loud this laughter that he had which
(47:26):
was so infectious and Finally, one of the matrons of
the theater, one of the ushers of the theater, had
to say, sir, if you can't be quiet, we're going
to have to remove you. And I started laughing because
they had no idea who they were talking to. Yeah,
so that was quite some. But Tennessee, I had I
(47:50):
don't know if this was mentioned in the book, but
what actually bonded us as friends was he was a
great admirer of D. H. Lawrence and I had found
years ago a book of the paintings of D. H.
Lawrence and it was a very rare addition and there
was only a few printed up. And so the last
(48:13):
time I next time I saw him, I presented to
a gift and he was ever grateful, and we spent
many nights because Fay was interested in turning one of
his short stories into a film, and then he would
come up to Boston for debuts of some of his
(48:35):
later plays. One particularly was called Red Devil Battery. I
don't quite where devil battery syndrome a system or I
don't quite have it right, but it's there. I hate
to say they're in the book, but it is. But
it was a play with Anthony Quinn, and he was
(48:57):
one of the plays in Anthony Quinn and Fay were
Anthony Quinn Fay. Her first film was with Anthony Quinn.
Right and being with Tennessee again, he starts laughing in
the audience and they almost kicked him out. And while
I was up at my apartment, I had him had
(49:19):
a tape recorder and had him read some of my
favorite poems. He was just somebody that, as I say
in the book, he was like a fine you know,
Cardier wristwatch, where constantly his mind was moving and he
was so so funny he was, and he also was
(49:42):
the kind of person you just wanted to have a
tape recorder going twenty four seven because he was so
witty and his observations on things was so point on.
That he was somebody I truly, you know, a treasure
getting to know and not all the time. As I'm
sure David, you know that sometimes the people you admire
(50:06):
for their art and for what they achieve aren't exactly
people that you there's sometimes disappointing when you get to
know them.
Speaker 2 (50:17):
I'm familiar with that process. That's how he feels about me, exactly.
I'm very much let down by these two.
Speaker 11 (50:22):
I'm sure during your long time of interviewing people on
writing about people, you've had that. But Tennessee was one
of those people that the more you got, the more
at least I got to know them, the more enchanted
I was by them.
Speaker 3 (50:48):
Early in twenty twenty five, Smokey Robinson and Brad Paisley
discussed songwriting and so much more on a very special
Naked Lunch.
Speaker 2 (50:55):
So, but how did you come across Brad? Is it
just that you, as a songwriters keep up on all
the young.
Speaker 12 (51:03):
Tide come across him because I love music and I
grew up hearing all kinds of music. Man, you know,
so I love music, I know music people, and I
know the people are doing the great music. You know.
So there he is that I come across him. Well,
who doesn't know him?
Speaker 14 (51:22):
Oh well we.
Speaker 2 (51:23):
Can walk down the street.
Speaker 7 (51:27):
Show you that.
Speaker 2 (51:30):
Now.
Speaker 16 (51:30):
I think the beauty of of you know, getting to
know guys like Smokey is that we realize. I think,
all of us who make music in my generation and
even younger, that we are building on the foundation that
you built. And and it really and you must you
(51:52):
must know like you must when you listen to it
because you are the type I think that you know,
you're not in a cave and hiding from modern music.
You are absorbing it and enhanced by it.
Speaker 8 (52:03):
And you must.
Speaker 16 (52:06):
Feel your influence. I hope when you hear these grooves
and these things kids are doing, and you know you
have influenced everyone in every genre, I think.
Speaker 12 (52:15):
Well, that's nice to hear, man, and it's good for
me to hear, because as a songwriter, that's what I
want to be, you know, I want to be a songwriter.
I want to be somebody like I tell people all
the time, and I want to write a song. If
I had written it fifty years prior to coming out,
(52:35):
it would have meant something to people, right and currently
it's gonna mean something, and fifty years from now it's
gonn mean something.
Speaker 7 (52:42):
You know.
Speaker 12 (52:42):
I would like to be a writer like Beethoven. You know,
you're still playing Betos five six hundred years. They're still
playing Beethoven, They're still playing Bach Well wrote.
Speaker 2 (52:51):
Like them, though you're touring Beethoven this day.
Speaker 12 (52:57):
In fact, Man, I read a thing about Bait and
they banned him from playing live in a few few
cities and stuff like that. You know, why. They said
his music was too provocative. Really, that's what they said.
It was too provocative. It incited the young ladies too much,
so they banned him from playing in the seventeen Yeah,
(53:20):
can you imagine that Beethoven, It was too provocative. It
was so they listening to it was those fast numbers.
Speaker 2 (53:28):
I guess so. Man, Well, speaking of provocative your career,
you know you have stayed so interesting in that you're
not just still doing it, which listen, it's amazing that
you're still doing it at such a high level that
you sound as great as we just heard on be
Thankful for what you got and the whole new album.
But what's amazing is as an artist you keep doing
(53:49):
interesting things. The last album was called Gasm, which was
definitely provocative. I ain't getting exactly, I promise, and it
was great and sexy and just like I think the
whole idea of Saturday night, Sunday morning, sin in Salvation.
Your next your new record is inspirational in such a
(54:10):
cool and different way. Can you tell us how you
came up with the idea of doing this record, because again,
as one of the greatest songwriters who ever lived, you
cover some other songwriter.
Speaker 12 (54:20):
I really didn't come up with the idea to do this, man,
This idea was brought to me. It was brought to
me actually by the people in the Primary Wave who
are my publishing partners and stuff, and so all the
songs that are on there, I love. I love those songs,
and I love the fact that they are inspirational. Especially
(54:41):
in the day's world. We need inspiration, we need love
among ourselves. We need love. We need love on each
other because we are living in a time where it's
just frantic.
Speaker 8 (54:52):
You know what I mean.
Speaker 12 (54:53):
So, and the leadoff song for me to just be thankful.
I've been hearing a song a guy named William du Vaughn,
and first one in fact, when I first heard it,
I thought he was Courtis Mayfield, you know. And I
used to have a radio show on the Clear Channel,
and so I would play it. I wasn't paying attention
to what it was saying. I thought it was about
(55:13):
a pimp, diamond in the back sun rooftop digging the
scene with a gangster lean. I thought it was about
a pimp, you know. So you know, I play it okay, cool,
you know. I wasn't paying attention to what it was saying,
until they brought me this project and we're playing it
on my channel on clear channel. We're playing William Duvon's version,
and so one day I'm just listening to it and
(55:34):
I said, God, this is an inspirational song. This is
telling people be thankful for what you got. You know,
there are some people who don't have what you have.
You may not have much, but you got more than
a lot of people, you know. So I was very
inspired by that, and so that's that's why I recorded
that song and the other songs, like I said, they're
(55:55):
just treasures.
Speaker 2 (55:57):
Well you do lean on me. Bill Weathers was one
of Fortunately my career has brought me the chance to
be around like you some of my heroes. Bill Withers
was one I never did get to meet until very
close to the end. Kennerrola who you know who. I
went to the We went to see the eagles and
we're outside and Bill Withers are standing there and he,
(56:20):
unlike you, he disappeared really from the industry. As great
as his career was, at a certain point he stepped
away from He.
Speaker 12 (56:28):
Became a real estate broker. Bill and I were very
close man. We talked all the time. In fact, I
made up a word for him. I said, Man, I say,
have you ever heard the word righting this?
Speaker 8 (56:39):
He said right?
Speaker 12 (56:40):
I said yeah, right now. He said what do you
mean by that?
Speaker 11 (56:43):
Man?
Speaker 12 (56:43):
I say, you are to writing this dude, to write
a song. Because he was incredible man, genius, absolutely.
Speaker 2 (56:53):
And I never met him until outside the Eagles show.
I meet my hero, which was great enough just to
shake his hand and say thank you. You change my life,
like you changed my life. But then what happened was
he got a call from his wife saying she was
gonna be late to this pre show party. So he
went to me, this guy who never did interview, so
I never got to talk to him one of my
(57:15):
rolling Stone or anything. And he goes, David, I hate
being at parties without my wife. Will you sit with
me and we can just talk for an hour? And
so I got to ask him every question I ever
had and he was an amazing.
Speaker 12 (57:26):
Guy, amazing, absolutely he was man.
Speaker 2 (57:28):
And lean on me. Is that a song? That's a
that's a song that will live, you.
Speaker 8 (57:33):
Know, for for forever.
Speaker 12 (57:35):
It's one of those songs I was talking about. Absolutely,
that song says so much. But like I said, he
was a great writer.
Speaker 8 (57:42):
Man.
Speaker 12 (57:42):
Any time dude comes up with an idea, keep on
using me till you use me up my race me.
Speaker 3 (57:53):
We end part one of our twenty twenty five best
of with an unforgettable story from comedy samurai and Seinfeld
writer Larry Charles. It's about directing borat Listen and tune
in next week for part two, and remember you can
revisit these episodes on a podcast platform near you or
on Phil's YouTube channel, Phil Rosenthal World.
Speaker 2 (58:09):
Well, I would like to give you the job of
reading a bit of a page if you will take
the assignment. This has any water, but yes, we will
get you. I will get you.
Speaker 5 (58:18):
Nice you let him read?
Speaker 2 (58:20):
Yes, yeah, this is I was wondering in the middle. Maybe,
but even during the middle.
Speaker 4 (58:26):
Of this, it's the first time we've done a reading.
Speaker 6 (58:28):
Yeah, huh, I feel very privileged starting.
Speaker 5 (58:33):
From imagine you're in a little sound class.
Speaker 6 (58:36):
Yeah, I wish I was. But even okay, and how
far you want me to go?
Speaker 2 (58:42):
Well, I don't think there's a better sentence to end
on in.
Speaker 6 (58:45):
History the Yankee, the face, the face or suffocating, Yes, suffocating. Okay,
it's pretty long excerpt, Go ahead, but even during the
stage I would go overboard sometimes the movie the comedy
had to be intense and hard, and I was determined
(59:07):
to make the stage scenes as real and in your
face as the so called unstaged.
Speaker 5 (59:12):
One we're talking about Boratz.
Speaker 6 (59:14):
One example was during the climax of the hotel room
portion of the naked fight. We had worked out the
choreography for the corpulent Asimat to wind up sitting on
Borat's face and trying to smother him. There was a
lot of nakedness in that room, and many discussions of
what body part would go where, and how that was
to be accomplished. For instance, ball placement had to be
(59:37):
accounted for. Sasha was understandably concerned about hygiene, specifically the
hygiene of Asamat's ass, so there were abundant wet wipes
on the scene. Sasha also realized that a wipe simply
wouldn't be sufficient. We came up with a way to
place a surgical mask over Sasha's face and then lower
(01:00:01):
Ozamoh onto him so Sasha's facial orifices would be protected. Further,
we worked at a signal for when Sasha could no
longer breathe he would essentially tap out if he tapped
three times. We were to yank Ozamaa's Azamoh off his
face immediately, but I was looking to capture that magic,
(01:00:23):
that X factor, that lightning in a bottle. And once
the mask was on and Ozamah was lowered onto him,
the cameras and I were right on top of them,
capturing the action like a live sporting event. We were
all on the bed, bouncing up and down and I
was screaming to keep going, keep going. Somewhere during this
(01:00:45):
I saw Sasha tap out, but I knew he wouldn't
want to do it again and I would have to agree.
But that meant I had to be sure we had
enough footage. I knew this would be an important, one
of a kind moment, so wh I ignored the TapouT,
Sasha began to tap more furiously. He was suffocating.
Speaker 4 (01:01:06):
Oh my, that's the best thing I ever heard in
my life.
Speaker 2 (01:01:10):
That's on page one sixty three.
Speaker 4 (01:01:12):
Okay, So, so for those of you who don't know,
Larry Charles directed one of the funniest movies ever made Borat,
and he's talking about maybe the funniest scene in one
of the funniest movies ever made. Maybe I saw the
movie with my father, who only liked Old Jack Benny
movies like.
Speaker 5 (01:01:33):
Like to Be or Not to Be.
Speaker 4 (01:01:34):
That's his favorite, his favorite movie. But I'm taking him
out to se Borat and right away he's laughing at
the Eastern European jewishness of Borat. And when it got.
Speaker 6 (01:01:47):
I probably recognized the Hebrew.
Speaker 4 (01:01:49):
Absolutely the Yiddish, and yeah, great, great great. Meanwhile, boar,
it's totally anti submitted characters.
Speaker 5 (01:01:56):
Hilarious.
Speaker 4 (01:01:57):
It's such a great comic invention.
Speaker 5 (01:01:58):
I have to talk to you a lot about this.
Speaker 4 (01:02:00):
But my father was a joy in my life to
see him laugh that hard at that scene, which should
in most cases send an old man screaming from the theater.
Speaker 5 (01:02:14):
This is too much.
Speaker 4 (01:02:15):
This is vulgar, this is it. But it was so
vulgar that it transcends vulgarity.
Speaker 5 (01:02:22):
It did it, you did.
Speaker 2 (01:02:24):
That's the alternate title for Larry's book, Transcendular.
Speaker 4 (01:02:28):
That you never really, Yes, you saw as butt, but
you never. It wasn't graphic in the way that lots
of things are graphic. It was still somehow innocent in
its playfulness and outrageous it was. It's truly a work
of genius. That that bit, and then that that it
(01:02:51):
extends out into running down the hall the elevator.
Speaker 6 (01:02:55):
There happened to be people in the elevator when we
ran in. Well, you know, my mother was very proud,
and she was like, you have a movie coming out. Yeah,
I'm gonna take She was living at Boyd and Beach. Yes,
and I'm gonna take all the girls from the module. No,
and I'm gonna take them. We're gonna be the first
ones online. And I'm saying, Ma, you know you'll be
the scourge of the condo if you bring your friends
(01:03:16):
to see this movie.
Speaker 2 (01:03:16):
I would not do that.
Speaker 6 (01:03:17):
And she's like, oh, don't be silly, don't be silly.
And she went and she brought all her friends, probably
twenty people Early Special to see The Early Bird Special
and they all loved it. And that's what we kind
of knew it was going to be a hit because
people like your dad and my mom, even my daughters.
You know, everybody loved that movie.
Speaker 4 (01:03:37):
It's undeniable. The movie is undeniably funny. I can still
watch it over and over. From the first notes of music, yes,
that laughing, You're like, it's already hilarious.
Speaker 2 (01:03:50):
Yes, I watched it last night. You did. I'm always
afraid with something you love that much, is it gonna
hold up? It gets better and better. It's just unbelievable.
Speaker 6 (01:03:58):
So that's one of the keys, though, is the opening,
the music and the logo that made people. That was
the greatest icebreaker for a movie, was so people were
laughing already before they even saw a Borat.
Speaker 4 (01:04:11):
Well, you're coming in. For those of you who knew
the character from his show, Yes, there was always a
Borat segment in the show, The LG Show, which was
always my favorite. And now you've given the the reins
to this maniac and it's gonna and here's his world. Yes,
and it couldn't have been better. I'm gonna jump around
(01:04:34):
on the subject. But he has said he's not gonna
do more Borat movies because the he's known by too
many people and so he can't have that relationship with
strangers that he had, so right, right, But my feeling
is the character is so good that who cares that
(01:04:58):
some of the funniest stuff is scripted anyway?
Speaker 5 (01:05:01):
That's very true.
Speaker 2 (01:05:02):
Can fight was exactly.
Speaker 6 (01:05:04):
There's no pranking anybody until he gets out until they
get out into the mortgage convention.
Speaker 4 (01:05:08):
Yes, which you can still Yeah, it's still a naked
guy running through your thing.
Speaker 6 (01:05:13):
You could stay. You're right, You're right. I agree with you.
Speaker 4 (01:05:15):
He could be Inspector Clusa in different adventures that why
not you please talk to him or you don't talk to.
Speaker 5 (01:05:23):
Him and we don't talk anymore. That's part of the
book too.
Speaker 2 (01:05:25):
Oh yeah, right, right, yeah, I agree, But I agree
with you.
Speaker 6 (01:05:29):
Though I do agree with you, there was no reason
we thought about a sequel at the time. He was
absolutely aghast at the very idea of doing the sequel
at that time. And then years and years went by.
By that time, we weren't talking anymore. He did that
one a few years ages. But I agree with you.
I mean, to me, he is a comic genius. I absolutely,
(01:05:50):
I believe that more than anybody standing right next to
him for so long. He could do all kinds of things.
He has to sort of discipline himself to give that
kind of performance, learn lines, staging, hitting marks, stuff like that.
If he could do that kind of stuff, he could
do anything he wants. He's a Peter Seller's level talent.
Speaker 4 (01:06:09):
Absolutely, That's why I mentioned that.
Speaker 2 (01:06:11):
But listen.
Speaker 4 (01:06:13):
It could still be loosely written. Yes, and you have
good actors like on Curb who can improvise with him.
Speaker 2 (01:06:21):
Great.
Speaker 4 (01:06:21):
By the way, the audience probably wouldn't know who's real
and who's not.
Speaker 5 (01:06:24):
They don't in borrow it.
Speaker 4 (01:06:25):
They don't they don't know that Pam Anderson is in
on it, right.
Speaker 6 (01:06:29):
That's right. It doesn't really matter if if like you said,
if it transcends in some way and people just are
erupting with laughter. They don't care what the reality is anymore.
They just care that it's funny.
Speaker 4 (01:06:40):
Let's get him on the phone. Let's get it, because
I think the world needs this character. It's his best invention.
Speaker 6 (01:06:47):
It's very interesting, isn't that. I mean, because you're tapping
into that innocence too. That was the thing that really
made people love him, despite the anti semitism, despite the
fact he's a rapist, he's incestuous. All those are true.
Speaker 2 (01:07:00):
And yes, you're making you sound like it not a
great because.
Speaker 4 (01:07:03):
It was in on the jow that he satirized anything
that right.
Speaker 6 (01:07:08):
We know the audience knows, and they accept it. They
are willing to roll with that. They were from the
very beginning of the movie. From the screaming music and
the logo people were ready to troller Coaster.
Speaker 14 (01:07:20):
Yes.
Speaker 3 (01:07:21):
Naked Lunch is a podcast by Phil Rosenthal and David Wilde.
Theme song and music by Brad Paisley. Produced by Will
Sterling and Ryan Tillotson, Video editing by Daniel Ferrara and
motion graphics by Ali Ahmed. Executive produced by Phil Rosenthal,
David Wilde, and our consulting journalist is Pamela Chella. If
you enjoyed the show, share it with a friend, But
if you can't take my word for it, take Phil's.
Speaker 4 (01:07:42):
And don't forget to leave a good rating and review.
Speaker 5 (01:07:45):
We like five stars.
Speaker 3 (01:07:46):
You know, thanks for listening to Naked Lunch, a Lucky
Bastard's production.
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