September 23, 2025 • 52 mins
Welcome to the Actor's Guide to the End of the World Podcast, Episode 47! Apologies for the upload issue on last week's episode, it has been resolved and E-Kan and Rían are here with the big Emmy's recap- the big surprises, heartfelt underdog wins, and what was up with that Nate Bargatze bit?
You also will hear how it was for E-Kan sleeping in Central Park last week, and is he the Bear Grylls of the theater world?
E-Kan and Rían also discuss what's so captivating about the one hour drama and what our experiences were working on some iconic ones like NCIS and Chicago Fire. One was Rían's first job on US television, and E-Kan's... well, you'll just have to hear what happened when he had to speak Chinese in his callback.
New episodes every Monday, wherever you find your podcasts, including video on YouTube and Substack. Follow @actorsguidepodcast on all social media.
@ekansoong @ríansheehykelly
Opening Sketch Emmys - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pajwxwDLfao Nate Bargatze Opening Monologue Emmys - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d99zMO03yBs
Hidden Gems:
Letters to a Young Writer by Colum McCann - https://www.amazon.com/Letters-Young-Writer-Practical-Philosophical/dp/0399590803
@coconutcult - Yogurt, available in grocery stores
Time stamps:
(0:00) Intro
(2:05) E-Kan is the Bear Grylls of the theater world
(8:20) Rían vs the squirrels
(10:10) Nate Bargatze on the Emmy's
(17:00) Why Rían can't watch the Pitt
(22:30) E-Kan's auditioned for NCIS thirty five times
(27:00) When Rían booked Chicago Fire his first US tv job
(40:00) Could they handle success well at a young age?
(49:30) Hidden Gems
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
This was a role that was
(00:01):
kind of perfect for me.
The catch was I had
to speak Chinese in it.
I do not know Chinese.
Well, I'm there, 15 people
are on the couch, producers.
I freeze.
I literally forget all the Chinese.
I scream out gibberish Chinese.
Wow.
And there's an Asian guy,
(00:22):
an Asian producer
right next to the camera.
Hey everyone, welcome to the Actors Guide
to the Other World podcast.
I'm your host, E-Kan Soong.
And I'm Rían Sheehy Kelly.
How are you doing?
Follow us wherever you find your podcasts
at Actors Guide Podcast.
We're on all social media.
Follow us for fun clips during the week
at Actors Guide Podcast.
We're on YouTube.
We're on Substack.
(00:43):
What's up, buddy?
I'm good, buddy.
All right, so let's just get into it.
So to share about--
Well, before we do,
let's just get into the fact
that we have similar shirts on.
Let's get into that.
Let's look at that for a second.
For all of our audio listeners,
Irene and I are both wearing buttons.
I got stripes on mine.
(01:03):
Are you wearing stripes on yours?
I'm not wearing stripes on mine.
Mine's more of a linen-ish.
We are wearing collars and buttons,
which is very upscale for us,
for all the listeners out there.
Pretty upscale.
So this is our Emmys episode,
so we dressed up for you guys.
Well, we have an
incredible show for you today.
This is our Emmys recap.
We're gonna get into that.
(01:24):
We're gonna get into
all the underdog stories,
underdog winners of the Emmys,
Tramiel Tillman,
Katherine LaNasa, The Pit.
We also talk a little bit
about our own personal experience
on one-hour dramas.
He can't talk about a role he booked,
speaking fake Chinese,
and I talk about the first
US TV role I ever booked.
We're gonna get into
all of that and more.
(01:44):
Sit back, relax, and enjoy this episode.
And today's show is brought to you by
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(02:05):
There's a lot to get into,
but we know that the
audience is dying to hear
what happened last week
when I slept in Central Park.
So you lived, anyway,
that's what I'm hearing.
I have lived.
You didn't get eaten by wild animals.
I lived to tell the tale.
I slept in Central Park last week.
(02:26):
Also, we should preface this.
There was an issue for our
last episode on Apple Podcasts,
for whatever reason.
Our last episode was in
Apple Podcasts, "Hell",
for whatever reason,
was not on Apple Podcasts,
it was everywhere else.
So tune into that one.
I talked about sleeping in Central Park
(02:49):
because I was gonna get
Shakespeare in the park tickets
here in New York, closing weekend.
So that is what I'm referring to.
I didn't just choose to
sleep in Central Park,
although it is lovely this time of year.
I didn't just choose to sleep there.
There was a reason.
So hopefully you guys
will get that episode.
And we just wanna say, for
the record, it's not our fault.
That's completely on Apple.
(03:10):
It's not our fault.
We've tried and chances
are we're more stressed
about it than you are,
but episode 46 hopefully
will be on Apple soon.
That's absolutely the case.
Yeah, exactly.
And it's either by the
time this episode comes out,
the issue has been fixed, in which case
we're pretty relieved
or it hasn't been fixed,
which in that case we're furious.
(03:32):
Anyway, so to fill
you in, closing weekend
of Shakespeare in the
Park, star-studded cast.
I went into the belly of
the beast and I was like,
I'm going to New York
and I'm gonna do it.
Sandra O, Peter Dinklage, Lupita Nyong'o,
she performed with her
brother, who's also an actor.
This is star-studded
cast, Shakespeare in the Park.
They were canceled
last year for renovations,
(03:52):
so everyone's pent up
theater energy was raging.
If you haven't heard,
there's lottery tickets to show up,
you get tickets for free.
Years past, mere mortals could see
Shakespeare in the Park,
but no longer.
This is for only those
(04:13):
who are really in the game.
And when I say that, 3
a.m. was not early enough.
I showed up, thank
God, I showed up at 1 a.m.
There was 50 people ahead of me,
1 a.m. for the show the night after.
So just put that in perspective.
(04:34):
I have footage of it, I'm
gonna put it on YouTube later,
but 1 a.m., there was
50 people out there,
and people who showed up at 3 a.m.
probably did not get tickets.
This is Friday of closing weekend.
You'd be fumed, if
you showed up at 3 a.m.,
you didn't get a ticket, you'd be fumed.
Exactly, exactly.
I did have a line
buddy out there with me,
(04:55):
a friend I met, she's a lot of fun,
and it was great to have a partner,
but I was out there at 1 a.m.,
yoga mat, plenty of blankets,
I had five phone chargers
and two bottles of water,
so I was in it for the long haul.
And the challenge was
making sure I didn't drink
too much water so I would
have to pee on the street
while I'm waiting.
But survive long enough to 6 a.m.
(05:17):
when they led us into the park, so
there's a stage there.
But I survived, I was
there, cuddled up in my blankets,
later on watched the show,
and everything worked out great.
So essentially you're
the sort of bare grills
of the delicate theater
crowd, that's what I'm hearing.
Exactly, that's the
(05:39):
greatest way to put it ever.
(laughing) I have never felt so accomplished,
it didn't even matter how the show was,
I will say that the show was very good.
I hope so.
Peter Dinklage crushes, Sandra O.
Crushes, Lupita Nyong'o crushes,
it was 12th night for all the
Shakespeare geeks out there.
But honestly, it doesn't even matter
(05:59):
because I felt so
accomplished getting the tickets.
Peter, Shakespeare fan?
I'm a dabbler, I want
to stoke this desire
to read great writing, and
Leslie Kahn helps out a lot,
and we talk about
Shakespeare a lot at the studio.
And I'm not going to lie,
(06:19):
and this is going to sound,
I think the level, the
compliment I will give to the show
is it was acting and
directing of Shakespeare
that I actually understood.
Whether you know the plot or not,
there are so many times when
you see the performance of it,
it does not translate.
(06:40):
That's it.
I think that's the level of
great acting and directing,
and I actually understood
a good amount of display.
Sounds simple.
Exactly, it sounds simple
until you watch so much Shakespeare,
they were like, I have no idea
what the fuck they're talking about.
Anyway, if I'm
completely off base with this,
let us know in the comments
(07:00):
because I would love to talk to more
people who've seen it
and also are Shakespeare geeks.
Anyway, so I've never
felt so accomplished,
I feel invincible, I'm
looking for other challenges,
and send them our way,
Actors Guide podcast at Gmail,
I'm looking for more
things to conquer bees,
(07:20):
I'm absolutely invincible.
I think now that you've done that,
you should sleep out in
Central Park on your own
without the protection
of the theater crowd.
And just see how it goes.
Yeah, without
production of 350 people online.
Yeah. Yeah.
You're probably right,
you're probably right.
Just keep it going. That might be it.
That might be it.
It was lovely.
Granted, the first five
hours I was on a sidewalk,
(07:42):
so I had Yogan Mountain
and a couple blankets,
but you have trees above
you, it's kind of nice.
But you're completely
right, I was protected
with 350 theater-hungry audience members.
Anyway, so I'm looking
for the next challenge,
send them our way.
I wanna use my powers for
good, not evil, so please.
(08:02):
Tickle a bear, why
don't you tickle a bear?
Tickle a black bear, I'm
not talking about a grizzly.
Tickle a black bear under
the chin and see what else.
I haven't been to Central Park enough
to know how many bears there are,
but I will say the squirrels are
ferocious this year.
Dude, squirrels are getting cheekier
and more aggressive, I find.
(08:22):
The squirrels are not scared
of people in the slightest.
Oh, absolutely not, not in New York.
I've been squared up to
by a number of squirrels.
I don't know who's talking to them out,
I don't know who's
empowering them to be like this,
but they are, yeah, intimidating.
Also, a little note on squirrels,
I never knew that
ground squirrels existed.
They're sort of a, they're looking at a
(08:44):
chipmunk squirrel hybrid.
They, down in the bluffs here,
in Santa Monica,
right, by the ocean there,
this sort of Palisades Park,
which is down the bottom of the street,
has a load of ground
squirrels that don't climb trees.
They have like a system of
burrows, like in tunnels,
(09:05):
just on the edge of the cliff there,
and they just pop up,
and they're all over the grass there.
And the little ones are adorable,
they look like Disney cartoons.
But they look like squirrels,
but without the big bushy
tail, and they can't climb.
They just like stay on the ground.
How do you find this out?
What were you doing?
Well, I see them all the time,
so I looked them up, and I was like, what
are ground squirrels?
(09:25):
And they're like a kind
of a hybrid, you know,
a crossbreed of like,
I think it's like
chipmunks and squirrels,
but there's also regular squirrels,
tree squirrels running around,
and sometimes they kind of square off
against each other for food.
Yeah, they literally look
down on the ground squirrels.
They do. That's sad.
They don't get to climb.
I know, I kind of like
the ground squirrels.
(09:45):
You know they're not
just gonna like leap at you,
or run up your leg.
They're a little timid.
I've taken many
pictures and videos of them,
which I always go, oh,
maybe I'll post this,
and I'm like, I don't think anybody wants
to see my ground squirrels.
But if you do, let me know,
and I'll give you
ground squirrel content.
You shouldn't shy away about that.
I would love that.
I wanna see some
ground squirrels in action.
More ground squirrel content.
(10:06):
All right, well there you go.
I'm a big fan. It's coming.
It's coming, people.
Let's talk about the Emmys.
The Emmys was of huge jumping ratings.
Now, there's a lot of
shows that did really well,
that I'm a fan of.
A lot of great stories.
The Emmys was about the underdogs.
So there's a lot of
uplifting stories here
that we're gonna get into.
(10:27):
First off, I do wanna
talk about Nate Barghatzi.
I'm not gonna lie, I haven't
watched a lot of him, but--
I've seen a fan of him.
Yeah, for years, I mean,
probably through the pandemic,
he was literally the, you know,
whether you wanna call it
hottest or highest paid comic,
he had a stretch where he was the guy
(10:50):
touring everywhere,
making a lot of money.
I never saw a lot of his stuff,
so this is the first real time
where I got to see a lot of his comedy.
I don't know, did you see his
opening sketch?
He did an opening sketch? No, I didn't.
I like-- I like Nate Barghatzi though.
I do like Nate
Barghatzi. Okay, so you do?
He did an opening sketch
where he played the founder
of the television in the early 1900s.
(11:11):
It was cute, it was really funny.
It sounds similar, he
did a great SNL sketch
a while back where it was,
the Founding Fathers
coming up with measurements
for US measurements.
Okay, but that's his type of humor?
Yeah, yeah, he's also a
pretty safe choice for them.
(11:32):
He's a bit of an anomaly in
that he plays big stadium shows
and he's a clean comic, you know?
He doesn't swear in his comedy.
That's very good,
that's what I was hearing.
He's a sort of a unique kind of figure
in today's comedy scene today.
I guess Tom Siggur is dirtier.
He's very different to Tom Siggur, yeah.
Oh, really? Yeah, yeah.
(11:53):
He's just a different style.
He's very much an everyman kind of a--
Maybe I'm just being racist
because I feel like
they kind of look alike
except the age difference.
I think they look alike.
Yeah, like their beard is
similar, Tom is bald though,
but it looks like Tom Siggur is like
Nate Barghatzi in like 20 years.
(12:14):
Strongly disagree with that, but carries.
Wow, Rean, you don't see color.
That's amazing, it's so beautiful.
They look like the same guy to me.
You don't see that? No.
Wow, okay.
Well, either way, yeah,
we'll put it side by side
on the video.
So Nate Barghatzi's big bit here,
(12:34):
I don't know who came up with this.
To be honest, it was kind of polarizing.
Did you hear about
this bit that he donated
to the Boys and Girls Club?
No.
Okay, so his big bit this show,
whether he came up with it for real
or whether they came up with it together,
he was gonna donate
$100,000 to the Boys and Girls Club
(12:54):
and the challenge was for every second,
over 45 seconds for
the acceptance speech,
they're going to deduct $1,000
from the Boys and Girls Club.
I'm not joking.
This was the challenge.
I know, I know.
I wanted to say this because everyone
talked about it online
and I was trying to
wrap my head around it
(13:15):
and I also don't know if it was a joke
and I also didn't know if
it worked or if it didn't
and everyone hated it.
There was a bit in his opening monologue
there's no way I can get you guys,
you guys earned it, you guys worked hard,
enjoy your award speech.
Just know that every
second you're over 45 seconds
we're going to deduct $1,000 from the
(13:37):
Boys and Girls Club.
I'm going to-- That has to be a joke.
I know, exactly, but it
affected the entire show.
The problem is no one knew it was a joke
and they had a timer
for every award speech.
Meaning no Wylie's accepting his award
and Gene Smart is accepting their award.
They see a timer on their speech
(13:57):
and they're thinking about the money
that they're taking away
from the Boys and Girls Club.
This is the problem.
I'm not joking, this is not a joke.
I'm sure there's a timer for every award.
There is, but they set the tone
and it affected the two hour show.
So this is my point where I don't know
if it was a big swing
(14:17):
bit that kind of went wrong
but it was funny at the time.
So he has, he donates $100,000 to the
Boys and Girls Club.
Everyone cheers and then he
tells them what the game is
and everyone kind of laughs.
And then you go two hours
of everyone referencing it
in their monologue or in
their acceptance speech
and you're like, oh, this
(14:38):
is kind of cringy, okay?
This is not a knock
against Nate Barghazi.
It's just, hey, for all those people
who actually were
watching it live, you're like,
yeah, this is making
me feel a little weird.
I mean, it's so the
elephant in the room saying,
hey guys, enjoy your
time, take your 45 seconds.
But it kind of became cringy.
(14:58):
Anyway, the kicker is
because I wanted to see
if it was real or not.
The kicker is that
whether it was a joke or not,
it completely affected, oh, by the way,
it was a complete deficit.
So he lost money.
It was like negative 26,000 or whatever.
The kicker was they
donated $300,000 anyway.
(15:20):
Yeah, so that's, yeah.
Exactly, my point is is you just took
everyone's award show.
Now here's the thing,
whether you care about celebrities
giving their award speeches
and how much they really fought
and their chance to speak
about it, that's one thing.
But the point is is it was a joke
and everyone kind of
lost in the end because,
(15:41):
hey, it doesn't matter what the timer was
because we're giving
$300,000 away anyway.
That's my take and I just realized
I had to look it up for myself.
How much money was there at the end?
Was this real?
And there you go.
So you can decide what yourself,
but I can't go buy all the
click bait articles online
about whether people hate it or liked it.
(16:02):
I just saw it for myself
and I'm like, okay, I get it.
People enjoyed the
show for the most part.
That's never an easy spot to be in.
People hate the host.
There's always some people
that love it, they hate it.
You need to go with
someone who's safe for the Emmys.
And I think for the most
part, they got some good laughs.
All right.
Yeah, so there you go.
(16:24):
I wasn't aware of that.
I'm basically just filling
in read on this entire show.
So we're gonna get to the next part.
Yeah, I did.
So the next part, and this is funny.
So the pit was a big winner.
Huge winner. And ironically,
you can take our word for it.
It's a great show because you absolutely
(16:44):
will never watch that show.
There is so much blood in it.
Why?
I don't mind blood.
I just don't like little girl ghosts or--
Wait, you told me you don't like needles.
Well, I don't like needles.
Oh, that's what I'm talking about.
Oh, you'll see needles.
Blood, I don't give a fuck about blood.
Like I'll watch blood on screen.
(17:05):
There's something to do with veins,
needles going into veins.
It's a vein thing.
I just--
Oh, well, you definitely
will see a lot of needles
and going into skin.
Yeah, I don't like that.
It's veins, it's up to the veins.
And I don't like, if I
get blood drawn or whatever,
as long as I don't see it, it's fine.
It's not painful.
(17:26):
Yeah, it's not particularly painful.
It's like a little
pinch, but just the idea.
(laughs) Even talking about it now, I'm like, ugh.
And the mad thing is, and it's funny
because nurses will tell me,
anytime I get any kind of injection,
oh, you've lovely big veins.
And I'm like, ugh.
And I do it like I'm very vascular.
You can see that, but I have very
prominent veins in my arms.
(17:46):
I actually have large veins too.
It's like people who, all
the nurses just love to just--
Oh, they're thrilled.
Yeah, they're just like,
oh, you've lovely big veins.
And I'm like, don't say that.
My mom is a
hematologist for 30 plus years.
Actually was one of the best.
She never stopped working.
She was one of the best.
And she was actually
detecting diseases in blood.
She was analyzing it.
(18:06):
And also she took pride in.
She was the best one
to take people's blood.
And she actually took our blood
and analyzed our blood
when she went out to work.
Just for fun?
Yeah, just for fun.
Just for fun days.
So I'm getting free blood work.
I was just getting
free blood work as a kid
for all those years.
I had no idea what
she was doing, but yeah.
(18:28):
Shout out to my mom.
She was great at what she did.
Oh, speaking of, shout out
to all the first responders
and people who work in the hospital.
The pit was a big winner.
They shocked severance.
They shocked severance for best drama.
Noah Wiley took best lead.
Yes, he did.
(18:49):
And shout out to Catherine Linassa.
Catherine Linassa, if
you didn't watch the show,
I don't know if you're familiar with her,
but I only found this out recently.
Obviously the more that
she's getting rave reviews,
but she won.
If you saw her
performance, she has so much heart,
(19:10):
so much humor, and I
will give a shout out,
a friend of the podcast
and a friend of ourselves,
she actually does remind
me a lot of our friend,
Mary Nederkorn, and Mary
Nederkorn gets that a lot.
I believe that she should
be on the pit like tomorrow.
Anyway, Catherine Linassa actually has--
She's in LA.
She could do it.
Yeah, there you go.
She's ready.
Catherine Linassa
(19:30):
actually also battled cancer.
So she already has lived a full life
and has this dream role on the pit.
She won supporting
actress, whether it's this,
a continued push for, hey,
let's love on some LA shows.
We also talked about last week,
the pit production
(19:50):
assistants just unionized.
So that is a very big,
it's community on the pit.
You talked about Noah
Wiley wrote a letter
to all of the cast on the
show about the community
and environment that
he's trying to build.
So if you haven't watched the pit,
I've seen most of it and it's great.
(20:13):
Well, I don't watch a lot of, do you
watch medical shows?
I know that you-- No.
Okay, well, yeah, we
talked about the whole--
I mean, I grew up
watching Casualty on BBC
because my parents
watched it, but I don't watch,
like I didn't watch Grey's Anatomy or--
Did you go watching ER?
Not really, I was aware of it,
but I didn't get into it, no.
(20:35):
The pit is kind of a throwback to ER.
I didn't watch a lot of ER,
just it was a bit
intense for me growing up,
but the pit, each
episode is one hour in the day.
So it's kind of
brilliant if you think about it.
If you remember the Keith
Rossello and show, the 24.
Sure do. Each episode was an hour.
And so this is one, the
entire season is one hour,
I'm sorry, 15
episodes of a 15 hour shift.
(20:57):
And you see what these
first responders and doctors
are going through in this entire day.
It's incredible, really great acting,
really great director.
Yeah, it is interesting
that the sort of preoccupation
with shows that involve
cops or fire departments
(21:19):
or hospitals and like, they
seem to just always do well,
no matter what the country
or, you know what I mean?
It's a great environment for a TV show
because people can come in and out.
Chicago Fire, PD and Matt
have been going for, you know,
years in Chicago now.
You know, that's a great point.
And you look at the news,
(21:41):
it's a way to glorify these people,
especially coming out of the pandemic,
these people who
actually do real incredible work
and it's a way to glorify real people.
Yeah, there's something for
everyone in entertainment,
whether it's fantasy or,
you know, video games, anime,
it's great, there's
something for everyone.
(22:02):
But personally for me,
it is nice to appreciate
and get lost in real
people who are doing,
who are literally saving lives
as opposed to a lot of the other things
that we audition for.
So anyway, that's my two
cents, but you're right.
The one hour procedural is
never gonna go out of style.
Yeah, what was, NCIS,
(22:25):
yeah, what was just procedures
in general, what's been, you know,
your experience of
working on a procedural,
how did you find that?
The one thing I will
say about, first of all,
looking back on it,
because that was a couple,
a handful of years
ago, when you're on a show
that has been on for 20 plus years,
it means that you're gonna get paid.
(22:47):
(laughing)
You don't make as much
residuals from a show
that gets canceled every year.
So just, you know,
people take it for granted,
say a one hour procedural,
like law and order or NCIS.
I don't know if I
ever told you the story,
but I'll get through it real quick,
because I don't know
when it will ever come up.
I have a soft spot in my heart for NCIS,
because I literally
(23:07):
auditioned for that show 35 plus times.
I lost track, I'm talking about literally
over the course of eight, nine years.
I lost track and this is in person.
I was going into
callbacks with the producers
in a tiny room with 12, 15 producers
(23:29):
on two couches getting recorded on video.
It was never less stressful,
and I was getting in there
20 plus times for callbacks.
And I was going, every
time I said to myself,
I'm going to die
before I'm ever on the show.
(23:50):
So this was part of my
eight, nine years of life.
I don't really care
what I do in this industry.
I just don't know if I'm
ever going to be on the show.
And you never know when that
show's gonna get canceled too,
but here we are, it's still on.
Anyway, the other funny thing is,
is of all the roles
that, big roles, small roles,
(24:12):
comedic drama, it was a compliment that
they kept calling me in.
This was a role that was
kind of perfect for me.
The catch was I had
to speak Chinese in it.
I do not know Chinese well.
Every time I learn Chinese, I have to
drill it with my mom,
and I'm literally drilling
a foreign language that I,
(24:33):
just like you, or if
you're practicing a dialect
or a foreign language, I'm drilling that,
and then also trying to be a good actor.
I'm drilling it, drilling
it, I'm going to callbacks,
and this is the tea, I
got a lot of adrenaline,
this is the moment, I
literally am performing,
and I've been embarrassed
to say this story publicly
for all these years
because it is embarrassing.
(24:55):
I'm there, 15 people are
on the couch, producers,
and I get ready for the Chinese part.
I freeze, I literally
forget all the Chinese,
and I literally, I
scream out gibberish Chinese,
literally gibberish
Chinese, I made it up.
I just said gibberish
that came out of my mouth.
(25:16):
In a take?
For the producers, with
15 people on the couch.
Oh sorry, sorry, sorry.
Oh yeah, no, no, this is
literally in the callback.
Oh, well that sounds
like you were probably safe.
Hold on, I was not safe because I freeze,
I scream gibberish Chinese,
I'm talking about
literally gibberish Chinese.
(25:38):
I hold my head up
high and like a gymnast,
I just stay strong and I
plant the landing, right?
And I look to the camera
and there's an Asian guy,
an Asian producer
right next to the camera,
and I look at him dead
in the eyes and I go,
oh yeah, he sees I'm full
of shit, yep, he's Chinese,
(25:59):
he knows I'm completely full of shit,
but I hold my head up high,
screaming gibberish
Chinese, I leave like I did that
on purpose, and I walk to my car,
kicking and crying
because I blew another callback
for this show.
I took a hot bath and just thought about,
(26:21):
well, there's always next
time, there's always next time.
And then of course, the next
day I got a call from my agent
and I got it.
Like no pin, no veil,
they just call me I got it.
So long story short, it
was a very special moment
of that show that it didn't even matter
how the experience
(26:42):
was, I was just so happy
to finally get that show.
Anyway, that's my thing.
So that's what, because it's funny
because I've had the
experience where like I full
of that, that was
joy, and then you get it.
But I also, when I booked Chicago Fire,
(27:03):
which was my first US first American TV.
I didn't realize it was
your first American TV.
It actually qualified me, yeah, yeah.
And it qualified me for SAG membership,
that was my first, that was my job.
That was good job, that
qualified me for the union.
But I remember leaving the audition,
I remember leaving the callback,
(27:24):
and the director of the episode,
who's a really lovely guy, Sandy
Bookstaver is his name,
he has directed a lot of
Chicago Fire and PDE and that.
He was just really nice in the audition,
made a great chat, made a good laugh,
and like, I'm trying different things.
And I remember doing, he said to me,
he goes, "Try it in your own accent."
(27:46):
Because the character I was playing
is a doctor on the show, and like,
he could have been Irish, you know?
And I was like, "Oh, cool."
And I was like, "Are you sure?
"You want this guy to be Irish?"
And he's like, "Yeah, give it a try."
And then he tried, and he's like,
"Yeah, I don't know if
they're gonna go for that."
But anyway, like, we had a great time,
and I came out of the audition,
(28:07):
I remember driving away from--
Oh, that was in the audition,
he told you to try it in the action.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, well,
it actually also happened.
Wow, okay, why?
But I remember driving
away from the audition,
it was down at Cinespace in Chicago,
where they shoot the show,
and that's where the casting office was.
It was Claire Simon casting at the time,
(28:28):
but I remember driving away,
and I remember being at a light,
just kind of coming out of
the thing, a traffic light,
and I was like, I just
booked my first American TV job.
Like, I knew, but still, which was weird,
because I had planned on moving to LA
around that time, it was 2018,
and I had tried to
(28:48):
move earlier in the year,
and it didn't work out, so
I got a short-term lease,
and I'd plan on going
towards the end of the year.
And that day, I don't
know if it was that day
or the next day, but I went
down to the leasing office
of the building I was living in,
and I was gonna, you
know, I could either extend
for a few more months,
for another six months,
or I could, you know, say I was leaving.
(29:09):
I remember asking them, I was like,
is there any chance I can
stay for a couple of months,
because I wasn't too sure, you know?
And they're like, no, it's
got to be like a six-month
or a year lease, so I
was like, all right.
So I said, okay, I think I'm gonna leave.
So I made the decision, I told them, I
was like, all right,
I'm gonna move out at
the end of the month,
or whatever, next month.
And about two hours later, I got a call
from my agent going,
(29:30):
you booked, you booked
it, you booked Chicago Fire,
and I was like, oh, what are the chances?
So, it was a, it was a
mad, it was a strange time,
because like, I was leaving Chicago,
and I'd lived in LA for
a year, years previously,
10 years prior to
that, and I was going back,
because I just, part of my
thinking coming back to LA
was like, I just didn't want
(29:51):
to live the rest of my life
not knowing. Yeah, of course.
What if I'd gone back? Of course.
And then I ended up
doing, I think I ended,
I ended up doing two
episodes of the show,
but I was also put on hold
for a third episode in between,
and then I didn't end up doing that.
But I thought there was a chance that
maybe that character
would sort of recur.
Yeah, you never know.
(30:12):
For a little bit, but
yeah. Yeah, why not?
Well, that's the thing, yeah,
because I only, I was
only supposed to be one,
you know, like it was one episode,
you know, small co-star role,
and then they ended up
writing me into another episode,
and whatever, so like,
I didn't know, you know,
I was like, oh, this could be great.
But on my, the day, the first day on set,
(30:33):
like they recorded,
they did a take where,
well, first of all, the director came up,
and I was doing a scene with Kara Kilmer,
who was one of the
series regulars at the time,
and the director,
Sandy, came up and he's like,
"Just for a laugh, like both of you do,
"like a really strong Irish
accent, just for the laugh."
And I was like, "Oh,
mate, I just got here.
"Like, please don't make me make a joke
"in front of everybody."
(30:55):
That's funny.
If I was a bit more
established, I would have been,
"Oh, brilliant."
But like, we both did it,
and I could see the crew going,
"What?
"What just happened?"
(laughs)
So I'm kind of, I don't
have to joke it in land,
I don't think that way.
Well, the whole thing is, is credit to,
that's also the sign of
a really fun family set,
where they are willing
(31:15):
to play to even do that.
So that's where you go.
Yeah, and he's a great
director and a great guy,
he was really fun to work with.
But I was just like, "Oh my God,
"Sandy Bookstaver is the
name, Sanford Bookstaver."
Yeah, he's a, he drags a lot of TV.
He's a really nice guy and
like a really good director
to work with, but he, I was like,
(31:35):
"Oh man, I just got here, please don't
make me make a joke."
Because I was just, you
know, it was my first US TV job,
and I'm like, "Well."
But I had a great
experience on it, I loved it.
And I loved going back
for the second episode,
I really enjoyed it, and
like, ah, it was class.
And everybody, I mean,
it could have been nicer.
It's like a really good
atmosphere on that show.
(31:56):
Let's say how to, for all of
our friends across the pond,
let's talk about Stephen Graham,
let's talk about Owen Cooper,
because adolescence really
struck it big that night.
Stephen Graham went to
the podium three times,
best lead actor, he went up for actor,
I'm sorry, writer and producer,
(32:17):
and then they also won,
I best, they didn't win,
I'm trying to remember.
They won best limited or anthology
series, that's right.
So it's not drama series,
but best limited series.
So shout out to adolescents.
No, best limited series.
A lot of one takes,
incredible cinematography,
they have full on scenes.
All one takes.
Yeah, exactly, full on one takes.
So let's talk about Stephen Graham,
(32:38):
because I thought that
was really inspirational.
Now I know that you--
So I have a little Stephen Graham story.
Yeah, so I moved to,
when I moved to LA in 2007,
and I ran into him at
an Arctic Monkeys gig,
and I was very intoxicated,
and I was like, "Oh my
God, Stephen Graham!"
And I got in the picture with him,
(32:59):
but I think he was probably like,
"Who the fuck is this?"
He's got a crazy Irishman.
I think I was highly intoxicated,
and I was like, "Oh, I love him!"
Because I had, you know,
"Snatch" had been a big
movie, was it "Lok Stock" too?
No, "Snatch."
Anyway, "Snatch" was a
huge movie at the time,
but he, but I was like kind of really
(33:21):
starstruck to see him,
and also pretty drunk.
So I have a picture of me and Stephen
Graham from like 2007.
I actually, funny enough, I tried to,
so there was a screening of
"Adolescence" and Stephen Graham,
and I think the director
were doing a Q&A afterwards,
a SAG-AFTRA foundation sent out an email,
and I responded right
away, and I was like,
(33:42):
"Yeah, absolutely."
And I got an email back saying, "You're
on the waiting list."
So it was obviously a
pretty popular screening.
And also it being Emmy's week, so I
didn't get to say it,
but it was on this last Wednesday.
You could be like, "Hey,
I was that drunk Irish guy
at that Arctic Monkeys concert.
You don't remember me?"
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
(34:02):
Dude, we've all been there.
His grandfather was Jamaican.
I don't know if people knew that.
Yeah, that's right.
Yeah, I'm just a mixed-race kid.
So working class mixed-race person last
year from Kirby or something?
From the flat to Kirby.
Going that accent all day, I just
completely butchered it.
But he's a mixed kid.
Oh, come on.
I didn't even know you
were doing an accent.
I'm just a mixed kid
in the flats of Kirby.
Sorry.
(34:22):
That's not good.
Right.
Don't ever do that one again.
We'll cut that.
No, no.
Don't cut it.
Stephen Graham, also,
incredible heartfelt speech,
but he also made a point
in one of his speeches.
He was there up on the stage three times.
He made a point saying
that it didn't matter
whether you were one on
the call sheet or 101.
(34:43):
Everyone mattered.
Producers mattered on that show.
The person cleaning, the toilet mattered.
It was all family, and that
was the type of set that it was.
And I think this is the type of thing
that we like to echo,
because you've been on some good sets,
you've been on some bad sets,
but it's nice to hear good sets win.
You have the pit win, and
you have adolescence win.
(35:03):
Yeah.
He's one of those actors that I think I
think of as an actor,
like a real actor.
You know the way people talk about, oh,
he's a comedian's comedian.
I think he's an actor's actor.
I know that's a bit of
a weird, vague phrase,
but I think of him as a real actor.
I completely agree.
Because I've seen him in so many things
where he's brilliant.
(35:25):
You know what I mean?
This is England.
He's just in so many things.
I never even heard of him.
I literally never even heard of him.
That was the break of the roll.
It's great.
It's great.
Yeah, yeah.
That's exactly what I was feeling,
because here we are in 2025 with the
industry the way it is,
whether you are scared or not.
(35:46):
But this is an actor's actor
who had an incredible career.
And can we get over this need
for fame exposure limelight?
Because here's Stephen Graham
after this incredible career,
and he's on the Emmy stage
three times in one night.
And let go of this need, because all
those questions are about,
oh, who am I?
Am I ever going to be famous?
(36:07):
Am I ever going to be on a billboard?
Why does anyone care what I say?
And these are the people who said, hey,
they didn't think they were going to be
on the stage either.
They didn't know they were going to
accept a lead actor, Emmy.
But they kept doing the
work, and it didn't matter,
because they loved what they were doing,
and they kept putting out great work.
And there you go.
Yeah, and a very humble guy.
(36:27):
And I think of him-- he
holds his own with heavyweights
on the screen, like in The Irishman.
He's a fantastic actor.
He's in Gangs of New York, The Irishman.
He tells a story about in The Irishman
where he's doing that
scene with Al Pacino,
and they're sitting across
the table from each other.
(36:48):
And I think he told the cameraman
he was going to knock
something off the table.
I think that was the only person he told.
He told the cameraman.
He didn't tell Al Pacino or whatever.
And he did it during the scene.
And Pacino kind of jumped
back, and after the take,
he was like, whoa, the kid frightened me.
He frightened me.
He was thrilled that he
(37:09):
was able to be surprised.
Oh, of course.
Well, you know Pacino loved that.
Yeah, which is a ballsy
move, you know what I mean?
To do that.
You know what's so funny?
In a scene where a real heavy--
You know what's so funny?
You say that?
Obviously, I mean, we would dream
about being in that position.
I would be more open to doing it in front
of Pacino than De Niro.
(37:31):
I don't know if that makes sense to you,
but Pacino is a little--
That's fair.
Pacino's a little on
the playful, kookier side,
where De Niro--
you know, anyway.
Yeah.
I hate this career.
Also, shout out to little Owen Cooper.
Little Owen Cooper wins.
It is pretty adorable, because he just
talked about how he's
(37:52):
like, yeah, I was just in acting classes.
And who knew that this could happen?
And you're like, oh my
god, this is so sweet.
Anyway, we'll put links to
all these speeches in there.
Yeah.
Yeah, he had no idea.
It's interesting to--
He had no idea.
This is an underdog Emmy.
This is an underdog Emmy.
It must be mental to be that young
(38:14):
and have that kind of
exposure and success.
I really--
You wonder?
You know, I wonder
what that's like to be.
There's a kid-- so my pal,
Carl Shaban, friend of the show
and avid listener, is in a show on Irish
TV called Show Kids.
And the lead of that show
(38:35):
is a kid called Flynn Gray,
a young actor called Flynn Gray.
And he also plays--
I think he plays Owen
Macken's son in the show, Borderline,
which is like a cop show.
But he's now in the new Star Wars movie,
because they just released a photo of
Ryan Gosling and Flynn
(38:55):
Gray in the new Star Wars movie.
I think Sean Levy just
posted this, the first photo
from the set.
And it's like Ryan Gosling leaning
on a weapon of some
description or something,
leaning on something,
and this kid, Flynn Gray.
So there is like a
career that's just gone,
you know, into the stratosphere.
Yeah.
(39:16):
I-- at 15, I was too busy
hating all the drama kids
in school and thinking they were so
annoying and narcissistic.
So at the age of 15, I
was in another-- literally
another world.
I think there's a lot of fear
when you're that age too of--
(39:37):
Dude, 100%.
Being different.
Are you kidding me?
It's like here--
You don't understand that.
We're adults, and the average adult
is hesitant about
posting on social media.
Think about being on a
billboard for Star Wars at 15.
It's like-- I don't think--
(39:57):
in all honesty, I wouldn't
want to be famous as a kid.
Absolutely not.
I could barely handle this.
I don't think--
I wouldn't handle it well, I don't think.
I don't think I would
have handled success well
when I was younger,
in my 20s or 30s even.
Certainly my 20s.
(40:18):
I don't think I would have
handled it particularly well.
I wasn't equipped to.
Now I feel like I'm more
equipped to handle whatever--
I was such an idiot in my 20s.
It is nice to be a grown ass man.
I feel like I am much more
able to handle the ups and downs
of whatever this shit
(40:39):
show we are in right now.
Actually, perfect segue.
Speaking of shit shows,
we do have a bright spot.
Steven Colbert won for late night show.
He had a great speech.
It was very heartfelt.
(41:00):
And it's just interesting the timing,
because the news about Jimmy Kimmel
getting indefinitely
pulled from the air--
now, obviously, these are very connected,
however you took the news.
When Steven Colbert was
fired, we're like, oh, OK.
(41:20):
And then we just heard
news about Jimmy Kimmel.
We're like, what the fuck?
But the tie in between all of this
is a lot of people didn't know that
Steven Colbert actually
thanked Jimmy Kimmel, because Jimmy
Kimmel was campaigning
for everyone to vote for
Colbert during this Emmy's push.
He actually put out a
(41:41):
billboard for Steven Colbert.
So I have only heard great
things about Jimmy Kimmel,
but also the family of all these late
night hosts, the support.
It's just interesting the timing,
because we just got news that Jimmy
Kimmel was indefinitely
pulled from ABC and his late night show.
Steven Colbert won the
Emmy, whether it was campaigning
(42:02):
or not, and whether there
was a lot of love in the room.
And you really wonder at this-- we're not
going to get into this
too much-- but you really
wonder how much leeway
these late night hosts are
going to get when it comes to the vested
interests of the corporations.
Yeah, I'm a huge Colbert fan.
(42:24):
I loved the Colbert Report.
And I just-- I've heard--
there was a podcast
episode where it's like,
go to work for a day with whoever,
and they choose different people.
They talk them through their work day.
And Steven Colbert
works so hard, so hard.
I mean, he is just on top
of absolutely everything.
And that show, he was on top of
(42:45):
everything, and all the writing,
and all the production.
And also, he came out of
Second City in Chicago,
which is a guaranteed--
guaranteed like for me,
because I love that place.
It's such a wonderful environment.
And I went through--
I did the Improv Conservatory.
Yeah, that's right.
I was living in Chicago, and I loved it.
(43:06):
It's such a cool--
It's such a warm family, too.
The second city--
It's a brilliant vibe.
You could tell it's different than UCB.
It's different than all the other ones.
But there is a very loving
vibe from the Second City people.
But I love seeing it.
I see-- sometimes I'll
see people that were--
I was in classes with at Second City,
or that I sort of knew
from around that time.
(43:26):
And I'll see them on shows, and I get a
real buzz out of that.
I'm like, yeah.
It means a lot.
It means a lot.
Get in class.
You see actors that you rise up with.
I mean, there's a community.
There's a community here in LA, too.
Also, just because we've
been talking about the pit,
like I said last
week, you watch the show,
and we know five actors on it.
I know five actors.
(43:46):
Also, shout out to Ashley Romans.
Well, at least.
Oh, Ashley's on it.
Ashley has a huge
recurring guest in the show.
People we've been in class
with are doing incredible work
on this TV show.
One of the teachers at
Lezecon is on it, Tyler Poel.
Anyway, yeah, we can go all the way on.
But the pit, keeping LA production alive,
(44:10):
and it's going strong.
Where does it shoot?
Is it-- you know how it shoots?
Is it all in a studio?
Is it in a--
It's actually on the studio.
So I want to clarify.
I didn't put this in
last week's episode when
we were talking about it.
It's not the same set as ER,
but it's the same studio as ER.
So that's kind of cool.
So the same studio that ER was shot on,
(44:31):
they're on the same lot,
except it's a different set.
So I believe it's Warner Brothers.
But we'll-- yeah.
Interesting.
So it's there.
Because when I moved out here, when
I moved to LA the first time in 2007,
I had, through a friend of
mine, got to know a little bit
one of the actors on the
(44:51):
show, Scrubs, John McGinley.
John C McGinley.
Oh, yeah.
He's great.
And when I moved to
LA, I gave him a call.
He was so gracious and
generous with his time.
And I called him when I moved to LA, and
I was like, I mean--
because I had met him in Ireland.
Wait, he's actually Irish?
His family-- well, his family
going back are from Ireland.
So they're from Donegal in Ireland.
So the McGinney name--
(45:11):
I mean, that name is really Irish.
So when I moved here, he was really--
yeah, he was really lovely.
And he brought me up
to the set of Scrubs.
But at the time, it was shot in--
it was the last day of
shooting before the writer's strike
in 2007.
So this is the last
production day before the strike began.
The last day?
Oh, my god.
(45:31):
Yeah, yeah.
So it was shot up in what was
formerly the North Hollywood
Medical Center at the time.
And I got to watch
them shoot some scenes,
and I met some of the cast,
and I met the creator, Bill
Lawrence.
And it was brilliant.
It was such a wonderful-- it was such a
lovely thing for him
to do.
How many seasons were
(45:52):
they on at that point?
I think that was--
he gave me a signed
script from season five.
So it was at least
five, if not six or seven.
OK, OK.
That makes it a little more--
Dude, that would have
been a tense day right
before the writer's strike.
That's amazing that
they even brought you in.
Well, Bill Lawrence gave a speech.
He talked about how they were hopefully
going to get back soon.
(46:13):
And John was very generous.
He was like, we'll try and get you in.
We'll try and get you apart.
And for various reasons, the
strike went on a long time.
And I went back to Ireland.
It didn't happen.
Now, I don't know if it
was ever going to happen,
but it was nice of him to
say that, you know what I mean?
And I was like--
Oh, of course.
And in my 25-year-old mind, I was like,
oh, LA is real easy.
This is what happens.
(46:35):
But it was--
That's funny.
Yeah, but actually, the
timing of it's interesting.
Because there is
currently a Scrobes reboot in--
you know, that they're casting right now,
and is either in
production or going into production.
And it's shooting in LA?
It's shooting in LA.
And everybody's back.
Well, there you go.
A lot of--
A lot of--
It could have been shooting in Dublin.
Thank God it's shooting in LA.
Moving on.
(46:57):
Shout out to the Hacks.
Well, not the Hacks,
but shout out to Hacks.
It's the Hacks.
Shout out to the Hacks of the world.
You're like, which one?
Am I right?
Where would we be without Hacks?
The show is a hit.
Jean Smart has won an Emmy
each season that it's been on.
It's almost-- I mean, at
this point, Jean Smart just
(47:17):
hand her the Emmy.
And then Hannah Einbinder
finally won for Best Supporting.
I never even brought this up because it's
been a whirlwind over here.
I saw Jean Smart do her
one-woman play, Call Me Izzy.
She did it over the summer.
Absolutely remarkable.
Like, it's one of those things where
(47:37):
you go into a one-woman
show and you're like, OK, well,
you know, obviously, I didn't--
you just never know
what you're going to get.
And it's like, it's a lot to ask for.
So riveting, so funny, so heartbreaking.
I was so happy to have watched that.
And a lot of people don't know this.
She actually broke her knee.
She actually mentioned
in her acceptance speech,
(47:57):
she actually is
recovering from a knee injury.
In New York, she actually broke her knee,
had to take two weeks off of the show.
And in this one-man show, obviously,
you have to move to different set changes
and move to different positions.
I want to say she still
continued to do the show
while she's recovering
from her knee injury.
So anyway, so shout out to Jean Smart.
(48:19):
On the comedy side, Studio just weaped.
We kind of knew that.
We kind of knew that
that was going to happen.
But as far as
supporting actor, Jeff Hiller
won for Somebody Somewhere, HBO show.
Yeah.
My pal, Heidi, was in the
first season of Somebody Somewhere.
He upset Harrison Ford.
He upset Ike
(48:40):
Barrenholtz, all these people
who were essentially in the running.
And his speech was adorable.
Also on that note,
Tramiel Tillman on Severance.
This was another underdog story.
First black and gay
actor ever to win that award.
There you go.
We saw history.
Incredible actors that we
(49:00):
did not know three years ago
have their time in the limelight.
Should we get to Hidden Gems?
Yeah, I've been racking my brain.
I don't know if I have one for this week.
You think me and Rian
are scratching the surface
coming up with Hidden Gems,
but we really had to think hard
for some really nice Hidden
Gems for you for this episode.
(49:22):
So do you want to go first?
Yeah, so mine, which I had
to think about for a sec,
but there's a brilliant
book by an Irish writer
called Colin McCann, who's just a,
he writes fiction, he writes novels,
but he's a really brilliant writer.
He's my mother's favorite writer.
So she turned me on to
(49:43):
him, but he has written a book
or he has a book called
Letters to a Young Writer.
And it's kind of a
collection of essays on writing,
on actually his theory on writing.
And it's so helpful for
anybody who's thinking of it.
It helped me think about
writing in a different way.
Because writing is
something that I'm so in awe of
(50:06):
in some ways and really enjoy when I do,
but it's kind of, I go
into it often feeling like,
I don't know how to do this.
And Letters to a Young
Writer really helped me
kind of understand writing a bit more.
And I would recommend it to anybody
who's a writer, is an aspiring writer,
is thinking about writing.
(50:27):
It's a truly excellent book.
But that's my hidden gem.
I love that.
I'll check out that book.
Sounds great.
So for my hidden gem, I
do wanna give a shout out
to a brand that is just,
they actually just did a
pop-up here in New York.
And it's this past week,
I've literally been going
(50:48):
to this pop-up every day.
They had a hard release this past week.
It's really clever.
It's called Coconut Cult.
It's actually a yogurt brand.
So they're launching.
And this activation was
called the Collab Lab,
where they actually
launched and collaborated
with a lot of other super
foods and other food brands.
And they created this really
(51:09):
fun thing here in New York.
I'm not going to lie.
It's so addicting because
they have a claw machine.
They have a claw machine in there.
And you actually get to win a prize.
You get to play once a day.
Me and my sister, well, my sister mostly,
but I'm so addicted.
We are so addicted to this claw machine.
It's such a fun time.
So check out Coconut Cult.
This claw machine was a special fun thing
(51:31):
because they
collaborated with a New York artist.
She hand-sews all
these, essentially plushies.
She hand-sewed all these plushies.
Like literally, there's
over hundreds of plushies.
She hand-sew them.
I don't know how she did it.
Her name's a Lucy
Sparrow, but they're so cute.
(51:51):
We've been playing this
claw machine like it's our job.
I'm not joking around.
I'm going there later this afternoon.
I'm not joking out.
They have been here all week.
If I ever see a claw machine,
I'm probably going to be addicted.
I'm probably going to
play the claw machine.
That's really impressive.
It really made you want to
blab about the collab lab.
(52:12):
It sounds fab.
Anyway, all right, I'm
just getting hyped up.
Here we are wrapping up.
All right, well, there you go.
That's our hidden gems.
Hope you enjoy the gems.
Gonna go out into the Capital One Cafe
and grab someone to shake
their shoulders and scream.
Get out there and activate.
Exactly, exactly.
I probably should shout
out to this Capital One Cafe
and go to the collab lab.
(52:33):
Anyway, that's our episode, everyone.
Hope you enjoyed it.
See you next week.
See you next week, guys.
This was a role that was
(00:01):
kind of perfect for me.
The catch was I had
to speak Chinese in it.
I do not know Chinese.
Well, I'm there, 15 people
are on the couch, producers.
I freeze.
I literally forget all the Chinese.
I scream out gibberish Chinese.
Wow.
And there's an Asian guy,
(00:22):
an Asian producer
right next to the camera.
Hey everyone, welcome to the Actors Guide
to the Other World podcast.
I'm your host, E-Kan Soong.
And I'm Rían Sheehy Kelly.
How are you doing?
Follow us wherever you find your podcasts
at Actors Guide Podcast.
We're on all social media.
Follow us for fun clips during the week
at Actors Guide Podcast.
We're on YouTube.
We're on Substack.
(00:43):
What's up, buddy?
I'm good, buddy.
All right, so let's just get into it.
So to share about--
Well, before we do,
let's just get into the fact
that we have similar shirts on.
Let's get into that.
Let's look at that for a second.
For all of our audio listeners,
Irene and I are both wearing buttons.
I got stripes on mine.
(01:03):
Are you wearing stripes on yours?
I'm not wearing stripes on mine.
Mine's more of a linen-ish.
We are wearing collars and buttons,
which is very upscale for us,
for all the listeners out there.
Pretty upscale.
So this is our Emmys episode,
so we dressed up for you guys.
Well, we have an
incredible show for you today.
This is our Emmys recap.
We're gonna get into that.
(01:24):
We're gonna get into
all the underdog stories,
underdog winners of the Emmys,
Tramiel Tillman,
Katherine LaNasa, The Pit.
We also talk a little bit
about our own personal experience
on one-hour dramas.
He can't talk about a role he booked,
speaking fake Chinese,
and I talk about the first
US TV role I ever booked.
We're gonna get into
all of that and more.
(01:44):
Sit back, relax, and enjoy this episode.
And today's show is brought to you by
tired of looking up
at your romantic lead?
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kiss your romantic co-star?
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You're gonna go from
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(02:05):
There's a lot to get into,
but we know that the
audience is dying to hear
what happened last week
when I slept in Central Park.
So you lived, anyway,
that's what I'm hearing.
I have lived.
You didn't get eaten by wild animals.
I lived to tell the tale.
I slept in Central Park last week.
(02:26):
Also, we should preface this.
There was an issue for our
last episode on Apple Podcasts,
for whatever reason.
Our last episode was in
Apple Podcasts, "Hell",
for whatever reason,
was not on Apple Podcasts,
it was everywhere else.
So tune into that one.
I talked about sleeping in Central Park
(02:49):
because I was gonna get
Shakespeare in the park tickets
here in New York, closing weekend.
So that is what I'm referring to.
I didn't just choose to
sleep in Central Park,
although it is lovely this time of year.
I didn't just choose to sleep there.
There was a reason.
So hopefully you guys
will get that episode.
And we just wanna say, for
the record, it's not our fault.
That's completely on Apple.
(03:10):
It's not our fault.
We've tried and chances
are we're more stressed
about it than you are,
but episode 46 hopefully
will be on Apple soon.
That's absolutely the case.
Yeah, exactly.
And it's either by the
time this episode comes out,
the issue has been fixed, in which case
we're pretty relieved
or it hasn't been fixed,
which in that case we're furious.
(03:32):
Anyway, so to fill
you in, closing weekend
of Shakespeare in the
Park, star-studded cast.
I went into the belly of
the beast and I was like,
I'm going to New York
and I'm gonna do it.
Sandra O, Peter Dinklage, Lupita Nyong'o,
she performed with her
brother, who's also an actor.
This is star-studded
cast, Shakespeare in the Park.
They were canceled
last year for renovations,
(03:52):
so everyone's pent up
theater energy was raging.
If you haven't heard,
there's lottery tickets to show up,
you get tickets for free.
Years past, mere mortals could see
Shakespeare in the Park,
but no longer.
This is for only those
(04:13):
who are really in the game.
And when I say that, 3
a.m. was not early enough.
I showed up, thank
God, I showed up at 1 a.m.
There was 50 people ahead of me,
1 a.m. for the show the night after.
So just put that in perspective.
(04:34):
I have footage of it, I'm
gonna put it on YouTube later,
but 1 a.m., there was
50 people out there,
and people who showed up at 3 a.m.
probably did not get tickets.
This is Friday of closing weekend.
You'd be fumed, if
you showed up at 3 a.m.,
you didn't get a ticket, you'd be fumed.
Exactly, exactly.
I did have a line
buddy out there with me,
(04:55):
a friend I met, she's a lot of fun,
and it was great to have a partner,
but I was out there at 1 a.m.,
yoga mat, plenty of blankets,
I had five phone chargers
and two bottles of water,
so I was in it for the long haul.
And the challenge was
making sure I didn't drink
too much water so I would
have to pee on the street
while I'm waiting.
But survive long enough to 6 a.m.
(05:17):
when they led us into the park, so
there's a stage there.
But I survived, I was
there, cuddled up in my blankets,
later on watched the show,
and everything worked out great.
So essentially you're
the sort of bare grills
of the delicate theater
crowd, that's what I'm hearing.
Exactly, that's the
(05:39):
greatest way to put it ever.
(laughing) I have never felt so accomplished,
it didn't even matter how the show was,
I will say that the show was very good.
I hope so.
Peter Dinklage crushes, Sandra O.
Crushes, Lupita Nyong'o crushes,
it was 12th night for all the
Shakespeare geeks out there.
But honestly, it doesn't even matter
(05:59):
because I felt so
accomplished getting the tickets.
Peter, Shakespeare fan?
I'm a dabbler, I want
to stoke this desire
to read great writing, and
Leslie Kahn helps out a lot,
and we talk about
Shakespeare a lot at the studio.
And I'm not going to lie,
(06:19):
and this is going to sound,
I think the level, the
compliment I will give to the show
is it was acting and
directing of Shakespeare
that I actually understood.
Whether you know the plot or not,
there are so many times when
you see the performance of it,
it does not translate.
(06:40):
That's it.
I think that's the level of
great acting and directing,
and I actually understood
a good amount of display.
Sounds simple.
Exactly, it sounds simple
until you watch so much Shakespeare,
they were like, I have no idea
what the fuck they're talking about.
Anyway, if I'm
completely off base with this,
let us know in the comments
(07:00):
because I would love to talk to more
people who've seen it
and also are Shakespeare geeks.
Anyway, so I've never
felt so accomplished,
I feel invincible, I'm
looking for other challenges,
and send them our way,
Actors Guide podcast at Gmail,
I'm looking for more
things to conquer bees,
(07:20):
I'm absolutely invincible.
I think now that you've done that,
you should sleep out in
Central Park on your own
without the protection
of the theater crowd.
And just see how it goes.
Yeah, without
production of 350 people online.
Yeah. Yeah.
You're probably right,
you're probably right.
Just keep it going. That might be it.
That might be it.
It was lovely.
Granted, the first five
hours I was on a sidewalk,
(07:42):
so I had Yogan Mountain
and a couple blankets,
but you have trees above
you, it's kind of nice.
But you're completely
right, I was protected
with 350 theater-hungry audience members.
Anyway, so I'm looking
for the next challenge,
send them our way.
I wanna use my powers for
good, not evil, so please.
(08:02):
Tickle a bear, why
don't you tickle a bear?
Tickle a black bear, I'm
not talking about a grizzly.
Tickle a black bear under
the chin and see what else.
I haven't been to Central Park enough
to know how many bears there are,
but I will say the squirrels are
ferocious this year.
Dude, squirrels are getting cheekier
and more aggressive, I find.
(08:22):
The squirrels are not scared
of people in the slightest.
Oh, absolutely not, not in New York.
I've been squared up to
by a number of squirrels.
I don't know who's talking to them out,
I don't know who's
empowering them to be like this,
but they are, yeah, intimidating.
Also, a little note on squirrels,
I never knew that
ground squirrels existed.
They're sort of a, they're looking at a
(08:44):
chipmunk squirrel hybrid.
They, down in the bluffs here,
in Santa Monica,
right, by the ocean there,
this sort of Palisades Park,
which is down the bottom of the street,
has a load of ground
squirrels that don't climb trees.
They have like a system of
burrows, like in tunnels,
(09:05):
just on the edge of the cliff there,
and they just pop up,
and they're all over the grass there.
And the little ones are adorable,
they look like Disney cartoons.
But they look like squirrels,
but without the big bushy
tail, and they can't climb.
They just like stay on the ground.
How do you find this out?
What were you doing?
Well, I see them all the time,
so I looked them up, and I was like, what
are ground squirrels?
(09:25):
And they're like a kind
of a hybrid, you know,
a crossbreed of like,
I think it's like
chipmunks and squirrels,
but there's also regular squirrels,
tree squirrels running around,
and sometimes they kind of square off
against each other for food.
Yeah, they literally look
down on the ground squirrels.
They do. That's sad.
They don't get to climb.
I know, I kind of like
the ground squirrels.
(09:45):
You know they're not
just gonna like leap at you,
or run up your leg.
They're a little timid.
I've taken many
pictures and videos of them,
which I always go, oh,
maybe I'll post this,
and I'm like, I don't think anybody wants
to see my ground squirrels.
But if you do, let me know,
and I'll give you
ground squirrel content.
You shouldn't shy away about that.
I would love that.
I wanna see some
ground squirrels in action.
More ground squirrel content.
(10:06):
All right, well there you go.
I'm a big fan. It's coming.
It's coming, people.
Let's talk about the Emmys.
The Emmys was of huge jumping ratings.
Now, there's a lot of
shows that did really well,
that I'm a fan of.
A lot of great stories.
The Emmys was about the underdogs.
So there's a lot of
uplifting stories here
that we're gonna get into.
(10:27):
First off, I do wanna
talk about Nate Barghatzi.
I'm not gonna lie, I haven't
watched a lot of him, but--
I've seen a fan of him.
Yeah, for years, I mean,
probably through the pandemic,
he was literally the, you know,
whether you wanna call it
hottest or highest paid comic,
he had a stretch where he was the guy
(10:50):
touring everywhere,
making a lot of money.
I never saw a lot of his stuff,
so this is the first real time
where I got to see a lot of his comedy.
I don't know, did you see his
opening sketch?
He did an opening sketch? No, I didn't.
I like-- I like Nate Barghatzi though.
I do like Nate
Barghatzi. Okay, so you do?
He did an opening sketch
where he played the founder
of the television in the early 1900s.
(11:11):
It was cute, it was really funny.
It sounds similar, he
did a great SNL sketch
a while back where it was,
the Founding Fathers
coming up with measurements
for US measurements.
Okay, but that's his type of humor?
Yeah, yeah, he's also a
pretty safe choice for them.
(11:32):
He's a bit of an anomaly in
that he plays big stadium shows
and he's a clean comic, you know?
He doesn't swear in his comedy.
That's very good,
that's what I was hearing.
He's a sort of a unique kind of figure
in today's comedy scene today.
I guess Tom Siggur is dirtier.
He's very different to Tom Siggur, yeah.
Oh, really? Yeah, yeah.
(11:53):
He's just a different style.
He's very much an everyman kind of a--
Maybe I'm just being racist
because I feel like
they kind of look alike
except the age difference.
I think they look alike.
Yeah, like their beard is
similar, Tom is bald though,
but it looks like Tom Siggur is like
Nate Barghatzi in like 20 years.
(12:14):
Strongly disagree with that, but carries.
Wow, Rean, you don't see color.
That's amazing, it's so beautiful.
They look like the same guy to me.
You don't see that? No.
Wow, okay.
Well, either way, yeah,
we'll put it side by side
on the video.
So Nate Barghatzi's big bit here,
(12:34):
I don't know who came up with this.
To be honest, it was kind of polarizing.
Did you hear about
this bit that he donated
to the Boys and Girls Club?
No.
Okay, so his big bit this show,
whether he came up with it for real
or whether they came up with it together,
he was gonna donate
$100,000 to the Boys and Girls Club
(12:54):
and the challenge was for every second,
over 45 seconds for
the acceptance speech,
they're going to deduct $1,000
from the Boys and Girls Club.
I'm not joking.
This was the challenge.
I know, I know.
I wanted to say this because everyone
talked about it online
and I was trying to
wrap my head around it
(13:15):
and I also don't know if it was a joke
and I also didn't know if
it worked or if it didn't
and everyone hated it.
There was a bit in his opening monologue
there's no way I can get you guys,
you guys earned it, you guys worked hard,
enjoy your award speech.
Just know that every
second you're over 45 seconds
we're going to deduct $1,000 from the
(13:37):
Boys and Girls Club.
I'm going to-- That has to be a joke.
I know, exactly, but it
affected the entire show.
The problem is no one knew it was a joke
and they had a timer
for every award speech.
Meaning no Wylie's accepting his award
and Gene Smart is accepting their award.
They see a timer on their speech
(13:57):
and they're thinking about the money
that they're taking away
from the Boys and Girls Club.
This is the problem.
I'm not joking, this is not a joke.
I'm sure there's a timer for every award.
There is, but they set the tone
and it affected the two hour show.
So this is my point where I don't know
if it was a big swing
(14:17):
bit that kind of went wrong
but it was funny at the time.
So he has, he donates $100,000 to the
Boys and Girls Club.
Everyone cheers and then he
tells them what the game is
and everyone kind of laughs.
And then you go two hours
of everyone referencing it
in their monologue or in
their acceptance speech
and you're like, oh, this
(14:38):
is kind of cringy, okay?
This is not a knock
against Nate Barghazi.
It's just, hey, for all those people
who actually were
watching it live, you're like,
yeah, this is making
me feel a little weird.
I mean, it's so the
elephant in the room saying,
hey guys, enjoy your
time, take your 45 seconds.
But it kind of became cringy.
(14:58):
Anyway, the kicker is
because I wanted to see
if it was real or not.
The kicker is that
whether it was a joke or not,
it completely affected, oh, by the way,
it was a complete deficit.
So he lost money.
It was like negative 26,000 or whatever.
The kicker was they
donated $300,000 anyway.
(15:20):
Yeah, so that's, yeah.
Exactly, my point is is you just took
everyone's award show.
Now here's the thing,
whether you care about celebrities
giving their award speeches
and how much they really fought
and their chance to speak
about it, that's one thing.
But the point is is it was a joke
and everyone kind of
lost in the end because,
(15:41):
hey, it doesn't matter what the timer was
because we're giving
$300,000 away anyway.
That's my take and I just realized
I had to look it up for myself.
How much money was there at the end?
Was this real?
And there you go.
So you can decide what yourself,
but I can't go buy all the
click bait articles online
about whether people hate it or liked it.
(16:02):
I just saw it for myself
and I'm like, okay, I get it.
People enjoyed the
show for the most part.
That's never an easy spot to be in.
People hate the host.
There's always some people
that love it, they hate it.
You need to go with
someone who's safe for the Emmys.
And I think for the most
part, they got some good laughs.
All right.
Yeah, so there you go.
(16:24):
I wasn't aware of that.
I'm basically just filling
in read on this entire show.
So we're gonna get to the next part.
Yeah, I did.
So the next part, and this is funny.
So the pit was a big winner.
Huge winner. And ironically,
you can take our word for it.
It's a great show because you absolutely
(16:44):
will never watch that show.
There is so much blood in it.
Why?
I don't mind blood.
I just don't like little girl ghosts or--
Wait, you told me you don't like needles.
Well, I don't like needles.
Oh, that's what I'm talking about.
Oh, you'll see needles.
Blood, I don't give a fuck about blood.
Like I'll watch blood on screen.
(17:05):
There's something to do with veins,
needles going into veins.
It's a vein thing.
I just--
Oh, well, you definitely
will see a lot of needles
and going into skin.
Yeah, I don't like that.
It's veins, it's up to the veins.
And I don't like, if I
get blood drawn or whatever,
as long as I don't see it, it's fine.
It's not painful.
(17:26):
Yeah, it's not particularly painful.
It's like a little
pinch, but just the idea.
(laughs) Even talking about it now, I'm like, ugh.
And the mad thing is, and it's funny
because nurses will tell me,
anytime I get any kind of injection,
oh, you've lovely big veins.
And I'm like, ugh.
And I do it like I'm very vascular.
You can see that, but I have very
prominent veins in my arms.
(17:46):
I actually have large veins too.
It's like people who, all
the nurses just love to just--
Oh, they're thrilled.
Yeah, they're just like,
oh, you've lovely big veins.
And I'm like, don't say that.
My mom is a
hematologist for 30 plus years.
Actually was one of the best.
She never stopped working.
She was one of the best.
And she was actually
detecting diseases in blood.
She was analyzing it.
(18:06):
And also she took pride in.
She was the best one
to take people's blood.
And she actually took our blood
and analyzed our blood
when she went out to work.
Just for fun?
Yeah, just for fun.
Just for fun days.
So I'm getting free blood work.
I was just getting
free blood work as a kid
for all those years.
I had no idea what
she was doing, but yeah.
(18:28):
Shout out to my mom.
She was great at what she did.
Oh, speaking of, shout out
to all the first responders
and people who work in the hospital.
The pit was a big winner.
They shocked severance.
They shocked severance for best drama.
Noah Wiley took best lead.
Yes, he did.
(18:49):
And shout out to Catherine Linassa.
Catherine Linassa, if
you didn't watch the show,
I don't know if you're familiar with her,
but I only found this out recently.
Obviously the more that
she's getting rave reviews,
but she won.
If you saw her
performance, she has so much heart,
(19:10):
so much humor, and I
will give a shout out,
a friend of the podcast
and a friend of ourselves,
she actually does remind
me a lot of our friend,
Mary Nederkorn, and Mary
Nederkorn gets that a lot.
I believe that she should
be on the pit like tomorrow.
Anyway, Catherine Linassa actually has--
She's in LA.
She could do it.
Yeah, there you go.
She's ready.
Catherine Linassa
(19:30):
actually also battled cancer.
So she already has lived a full life
and has this dream role on the pit.
She won supporting
actress, whether it's this,
a continued push for, hey,
let's love on some LA shows.
We also talked about last week,
the pit production
(19:50):
assistants just unionized.
So that is a very big,
it's community on the pit.
You talked about Noah
Wiley wrote a letter
to all of the cast on the
show about the community
and environment that
he's trying to build.
So if you haven't watched the pit,
I've seen most of it and it's great.
(20:13):
Well, I don't watch a lot of, do you
watch medical shows?
I know that you-- No.
Okay, well, yeah, we
talked about the whole--
I mean, I grew up
watching Casualty on BBC
because my parents
watched it, but I don't watch,
like I didn't watch Grey's Anatomy or--
Did you go watching ER?
Not really, I was aware of it,
but I didn't get into it, no.
(20:35):
The pit is kind of a throwback to ER.
I didn't watch a lot of ER,
just it was a bit
intense for me growing up,
but the pit, each
episode is one hour in the day.
So it's kind of
brilliant if you think about it.
If you remember the Keith
Rossello and show, the 24.
Sure do. Each episode was an hour.
And so this is one, the
entire season is one hour,
I'm sorry, 15
episodes of a 15 hour shift.
(20:57):
And you see what these
first responders and doctors
are going through in this entire day.
It's incredible, really great acting,
really great director.
Yeah, it is interesting
that the sort of preoccupation
with shows that involve
cops or fire departments
(21:19):
or hospitals and like, they
seem to just always do well,
no matter what the country
or, you know what I mean?
It's a great environment for a TV show
because people can come in and out.
Chicago Fire, PD and Matt
have been going for, you know,
years in Chicago now.
You know, that's a great point.
And you look at the news,
(21:41):
it's a way to glorify these people,
especially coming out of the pandemic,
these people who
actually do real incredible work
and it's a way to glorify real people.
Yeah, there's something for
everyone in entertainment,
whether it's fantasy or,
you know, video games, anime,
it's great, there's
something for everyone.
(22:02):
But personally for me,
it is nice to appreciate
and get lost in real
people who are doing,
who are literally saving lives
as opposed to a lot of the other things
that we audition for.
So anyway, that's my two
cents, but you're right.
The one hour procedural is
never gonna go out of style.
Yeah, what was, NCIS,
(22:25):
yeah, what was just procedures
in general, what's been, you know,
your experience of
working on a procedural,
how did you find that?
The one thing I will
say about, first of all,
looking back on it,
because that was a couple,
a handful of years
ago, when you're on a show
that has been on for 20 plus years,
it means that you're gonna get paid.
(22:47):
(laughing)
You don't make as much
residuals from a show
that gets canceled every year.
So just, you know,
people take it for granted,
say a one hour procedural,
like law and order or NCIS.
I don't know if I
ever told you the story,
but I'll get through it real quick,
because I don't know
when it will ever come up.
I have a soft spot in my heart for NCIS,
because I literally
(23:07):
auditioned for that show 35 plus times.
I lost track, I'm talking about literally
over the course of eight, nine years.
I lost track and this is in person.
I was going into
callbacks with the producers
in a tiny room with 12, 15 producers
(23:29):
on two couches getting recorded on video.
It was never less stressful,
and I was getting in there
20 plus times for callbacks.
And I was going, every
time I said to myself,
I'm going to die
before I'm ever on the show.
(23:50):
So this was part of my
eight, nine years of life.
I don't really care
what I do in this industry.
I just don't know if I'm
ever going to be on the show.
And you never know when that
show's gonna get canceled too,
but here we are, it's still on.
Anyway, the other funny thing is,
is of all the roles
that, big roles, small roles,
(24:12):
comedic drama, it was a compliment that
they kept calling me in.
This was a role that was
kind of perfect for me.
The catch was I had
to speak Chinese in it.
I do not know Chinese well.
Every time I learn Chinese, I have to
drill it with my mom,
and I'm literally drilling
a foreign language that I,
(24:33):
just like you, or if
you're practicing a dialect
or a foreign language, I'm drilling that,
and then also trying to be a good actor.
I'm drilling it, drilling
it, I'm going to callbacks,
and this is the tea, I
got a lot of adrenaline,
this is the moment, I
literally am performing,
and I've been embarrassed
to say this story publicly
for all these years
because it is embarrassing.
(24:55):
I'm there, 15 people are
on the couch, producers,
and I get ready for the Chinese part.
I freeze, I literally
forget all the Chinese,
and I literally, I
scream out gibberish Chinese,
literally gibberish
Chinese, I made it up.
I just said gibberish
that came out of my mouth.
(25:16):
In a take?
For the producers, with
15 people on the couch.
Oh sorry, sorry, sorry.
Oh yeah, no, no, this is
literally in the callback.
Oh, well that sounds
like you were probably safe.
Hold on, I was not safe because I freeze,
I scream gibberish Chinese,
I'm talking about
literally gibberish Chinese.
(25:38):
I hold my head up
high and like a gymnast,
I just stay strong and I
plant the landing, right?
And I look to the camera
and there's an Asian guy,
an Asian producer
right next to the camera,
and I look at him dead
in the eyes and I go,
oh yeah, he sees I'm full
of shit, yep, he's Chinese,
(25:59):
he knows I'm completely full of shit,
but I hold my head up high,
screaming gibberish
Chinese, I leave like I did that
on purpose, and I walk to my car,
kicking and crying
because I blew another callback
for this show.
I took a hot bath and just thought about,
(26:21):
well, there's always next
time, there's always next time.
And then of course, the next
day I got a call from my agent
and I got it.
Like no pin, no veil,
they just call me I got it.
So long story short, it
was a very special moment
of that show that it didn't even matter
how the experience
(26:42):
was, I was just so happy
to finally get that show.
Anyway, that's my thing.
So that's what, because it's funny
because I've had the
experience where like I full
of that, that was
joy, and then you get it.
But I also, when I booked Chicago Fire,
(27:03):
which was my first US first American TV.
I didn't realize it was
your first American TV.
It actually qualified me, yeah, yeah.
And it qualified me for SAG membership,
that was my first, that was my job.
That was good job, that
qualified me for the union.
But I remember leaving the audition,
I remember leaving the callback,
(27:24):
and the director of the episode,
who's a really lovely guy, Sandy
Bookstaver is his name,
he has directed a lot of
Chicago Fire and PDE and that.
He was just really nice in the audition,
made a great chat, made a good laugh,
and like, I'm trying different things.
And I remember doing, he said to me,
he goes, "Try it in your own accent."
(27:46):
Because the character I was playing
is a doctor on the show, and like,
he could have been Irish, you know?
And I was like, "Oh, cool."
And I was like, "Are you sure?
"You want this guy to be Irish?"
And he's like, "Yeah, give it a try."
And then he tried, and he's like,
"Yeah, I don't know if
they're gonna go for that."
But anyway, like, we had a great time,
and I came out of the audition,
(28:07):
I remember driving away from--
Oh, that was in the audition,
he told you to try it in the action.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, well,
it actually also happened.
Wow, okay, why?
But I remember driving
away from the audition,
it was down at Cinespace in Chicago,
where they shoot the show,
and that's where the casting office was.
It was Claire Simon casting at the time,
(28:28):
but I remember driving away,
and I remember being at a light,
just kind of coming out of
the thing, a traffic light,
and I was like, I just
booked my first American TV job.
Like, I knew, but still, which was weird,
because I had planned on moving to LA
around that time, it was 2018,
and I had tried to
(28:48):
move earlier in the year,
and it didn't work out, so
I got a short-term lease,
and I'd plan on going
towards the end of the year.
And that day, I don't
know if it was that day
or the next day, but I went
down to the leasing office
of the building I was living in,
and I was gonna, you
know, I could either extend
for a few more months,
for another six months,
or I could, you know, say I was leaving.
(29:09):
I remember asking them, I was like,
is there any chance I can
stay for a couple of months,
because I wasn't too sure, you know?
And they're like, no, it's
got to be like a six-month
or a year lease, so I
was like, all right.
So I said, okay, I think I'm gonna leave.
So I made the decision, I told them, I
was like, all right,
I'm gonna move out at
the end of the month,
or whatever, next month.
And about two hours later, I got a call
from my agent going,
(29:30):
you booked, you booked
it, you booked Chicago Fire,
and I was like, oh, what are the chances?
So, it was a, it was a
mad, it was a strange time,
because like, I was leaving Chicago,
and I'd lived in LA for
a year, years previously,
10 years prior to
that, and I was going back,
because I just, part of my
thinking coming back to LA
was like, I just didn't want
(29:51):
to live the rest of my life
not knowing. Yeah, of course.
What if I'd gone back? Of course.
And then I ended up
doing, I think I ended,
I ended up doing two
episodes of the show,
but I was also put on hold
for a third episode in between,
and then I didn't end up doing that.
But I thought there was a chance that
maybe that character
would sort of recur.
Yeah, you never know.
(30:12):
For a little bit, but
yeah. Yeah, why not?
Well, that's the thing, yeah,
because I only, I was
only supposed to be one,
you know, like it was one episode,
you know, small co-star role,
and then they ended up
writing me into another episode,
and whatever, so like,
I didn't know, you know,
I was like, oh, this could be great.
But on my, the day, the first day on set,
(30:33):
like they recorded,
they did a take where,
well, first of all, the director came up,
and I was doing a scene with Kara Kilmer,
who was one of the
series regulars at the time,
and the director,
Sandy, came up and he's like,
"Just for a laugh, like both of you do,
"like a really strong Irish
accent, just for the laugh."
And I was like, "Oh,
mate, I just got here.
"Like, please don't make me make a joke
"in front of everybody."
(30:55):
That's funny.
If I was a bit more
established, I would have been,
"Oh, brilliant."
But like, we both did it,
and I could see the crew going,
"What?
"What just happened?"
(laughs)
So I'm kind of, I don't
have to joke it in land,
I don't think that way.
Well, the whole thing is, is credit to,
that's also the sign of
a really fun family set,
where they are willing
(31:15):
to play to even do that.
So that's where you go.
Yeah, and he's a great
director and a great guy,
he was really fun to work with.
But I was just like, "Oh my God,
"Sandy Bookstaver is the
name, Sanford Bookstaver."
Yeah, he's a, he drags a lot of TV.
He's a really nice guy and
like a really good director
to work with, but he, I was like,
(31:35):
"Oh man, I just got here, please don't
make me make a joke."
Because I was just, you
know, it was my first US TV job,
and I'm like, "Well."
But I had a great
experience on it, I loved it.
And I loved going back
for the second episode,
I really enjoyed it, and
like, ah, it was class.
And everybody, I mean,
it could have been nicer.
It's like a really good
atmosphere on that show.
(31:56):
Let's say how to, for all of
our friends across the pond,
let's talk about Stephen Graham,
let's talk about Owen Cooper,
because adolescence really
struck it big that night.
Stephen Graham went to
the podium three times,
best lead actor, he went up for actor,
I'm sorry, writer and producer,
(32:17):
and then they also won,
I best, they didn't win,
I'm trying to remember.
They won best limited or anthology
series, that's right.
So it's not drama series,
but best limited series.
So shout out to adolescents.
No, best limited series.
A lot of one takes,
incredible cinematography,
they have full on scenes.
All one takes.
Yeah, exactly, full on one takes.
So let's talk about Stephen Graham,
(32:38):
because I thought that
was really inspirational.
Now I know that you--
So I have a little Stephen Graham story.
Yeah, so I moved to,
when I moved to LA in 2007,
and I ran into him at
an Arctic Monkeys gig,
and I was very intoxicated,
and I was like, "Oh my
God, Stephen Graham!"
And I got in the picture with him,
(32:59):
but I think he was probably like,
"Who the fuck is this?"
He's got a crazy Irishman.
I think I was highly intoxicated,
and I was like, "Oh, I love him!"
Because I had, you know,
"Snatch" had been a big
movie, was it "Lok Stock" too?
No, "Snatch."
Anyway, "Snatch" was a
huge movie at the time,
but he, but I was like kind of really
(33:21):
starstruck to see him,
and also pretty drunk.
So I have a picture of me and Stephen
Graham from like 2007.
I actually, funny enough, I tried to,
so there was a screening of
"Adolescence" and Stephen Graham,
and I think the director
were doing a Q&A afterwards,
a SAG-AFTRA foundation sent out an email,
and I responded right
away, and I was like,
(33:42):
"Yeah, absolutely."
And I got an email back saying, "You're
on the waiting list."
So it was obviously a
pretty popular screening.
And also it being Emmy's week, so I
didn't get to say it,
but it was on this last Wednesday.
You could be like, "Hey,
I was that drunk Irish guy
at that Arctic Monkeys concert.
You don't remember me?"
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
(34:02):
Dude, we've all been there.
His grandfather was Jamaican.
I don't know if people knew that.
Yeah, that's right.
Yeah, I'm just a mixed-race kid.
So working class mixed-race person last
year from Kirby or something?
From the flat to Kirby.
Going that accent all day, I just
completely butchered it.
But he's a mixed kid.
Oh, come on.
I didn't even know you
were doing an accent.
I'm just a mixed kid
in the flats of Kirby.
Sorry.
(34:22):
That's not good.
Right.
Don't ever do that one again.
We'll cut that.
No, no.
Don't cut it.
Stephen Graham, also,
incredible heartfelt speech,
but he also made a point
in one of his speeches.
He was there up on the stage three times.
He made a point saying
that it didn't matter
whether you were one on
the call sheet or 101.
(34:43):
Everyone mattered.
Producers mattered on that show.
The person cleaning, the toilet mattered.
It was all family, and that
was the type of set that it was.
And I think this is the type of thing
that we like to echo,
because you've been on some good sets,
you've been on some bad sets,
but it's nice to hear good sets win.
You have the pit win, and
you have adolescence win.
(35:03):
Yeah.
He's one of those actors that I think I
think of as an actor,
like a real actor.
You know the way people talk about, oh,
he's a comedian's comedian.
I think he's an actor's actor.
I know that's a bit of
a weird, vague phrase,
but I think of him as a real actor.
I completely agree.
Because I've seen him in so many things
where he's brilliant.
(35:25):
You know what I mean?
This is England.
He's just in so many things.
I never even heard of him.
I literally never even heard of him.
That was the break of the roll.
It's great.
It's great.
Yeah, yeah.
That's exactly what I was feeling,
because here we are in 2025 with the
industry the way it is,
whether you are scared or not.
(35:46):
But this is an actor's actor
who had an incredible career.
And can we get over this need
for fame exposure limelight?
Because here's Stephen Graham
after this incredible career,
and he's on the Emmy stage
three times in one night.
And let go of this need, because all
those questions are about,
oh, who am I?
Am I ever going to be famous?
(36:07):
Am I ever going to be on a billboard?
Why does anyone care what I say?
And these are the people who said, hey,
they didn't think they were going to be
on the stage either.
They didn't know they were going to
accept a lead actor, Emmy.
But they kept doing the
work, and it didn't matter,
because they loved what they were doing,
and they kept putting out great work.
And there you go.
Yeah, and a very humble guy.
(36:27):
And I think of him-- he
holds his own with heavyweights
on the screen, like in The Irishman.
He's a fantastic actor.
He's in Gangs of New York, The Irishman.
He tells a story about in The Irishman
where he's doing that
scene with Al Pacino,
and they're sitting across
the table from each other.
(36:48):
And I think he told the cameraman
he was going to knock
something off the table.
I think that was the only person he told.
He told the cameraman.
He didn't tell Al Pacino or whatever.
And he did it during the scene.
And Pacino kind of jumped
back, and after the take,
he was like, whoa, the kid frightened me.
He frightened me.
He was thrilled that he
(37:09):
was able to be surprised.
Oh, of course.
Well, you know Pacino loved that.
Yeah, which is a ballsy
move, you know what I mean?
To do that.
You know what's so funny?
In a scene where a real heavy--
You know what's so funny?
You say that?
Obviously, I mean, we would dream
about being in that position.
I would be more open to doing it in front
of Pacino than De Niro.
(37:31):
I don't know if that makes sense to you,
but Pacino is a little--
That's fair.
Pacino's a little on
the playful, kookier side,
where De Niro--
you know, anyway.
Yeah.
I hate this career.
Also, shout out to little Owen Cooper.
Little Owen Cooper wins.
It is pretty adorable, because he just
talked about how he's
(37:52):
like, yeah, I was just in acting classes.
And who knew that this could happen?
And you're like, oh my
god, this is so sweet.
Anyway, we'll put links to
all these speeches in there.
Yeah.
Yeah, he had no idea.
It's interesting to--
He had no idea.
This is an underdog Emmy.
This is an underdog Emmy.
It must be mental to be that young
(38:14):
and have that kind of
exposure and success.
I really--
You wonder?
You know, I wonder
what that's like to be.
There's a kid-- so my pal,
Carl Shaban, friend of the show
and avid listener, is in a show on Irish
TV called Show Kids.
And the lead of that show
(38:35):
is a kid called Flynn Gray,
a young actor called Flynn Gray.
And he also plays--
I think he plays Owen
Macken's son in the show, Borderline,
which is like a cop show.
But he's now in the new Star Wars movie,
because they just released a photo of
Ryan Gosling and Flynn
(38:55):
Gray in the new Star Wars movie.
I think Sean Levy just
posted this, the first photo
from the set.
And it's like Ryan Gosling leaning
on a weapon of some
description or something,
leaning on something,
and this kid, Flynn Gray.
So there is like a
career that's just gone,
you know, into the stratosphere.
Yeah.
(39:16):
I-- at 15, I was too busy
hating all the drama kids
in school and thinking they were so
annoying and narcissistic.
So at the age of 15, I
was in another-- literally
another world.
I think there's a lot of fear
when you're that age too of--
(39:37):
Dude, 100%.
Being different.
Are you kidding me?
It's like here--
You don't understand that.
We're adults, and the average adult
is hesitant about
posting on social media.
Think about being on a
billboard for Star Wars at 15.
It's like-- I don't think--
(39:57):
in all honesty, I wouldn't
want to be famous as a kid.
Absolutely not.
I could barely handle this.
I don't think--
I wouldn't handle it well, I don't think.
I don't think I would
have handled success well
when I was younger,
in my 20s or 30s even.
Certainly my 20s.
(40:18):
I don't think I would have
handled it particularly well.
I wasn't equipped to.
Now I feel like I'm more
equipped to handle whatever--
I was such an idiot in my 20s.
It is nice to be a grown ass man.
I feel like I am much more
able to handle the ups and downs
of whatever this shit
(40:39):
show we are in right now.
Actually, perfect segue.
Speaking of shit shows,
we do have a bright spot.
Steven Colbert won for late night show.
He had a great speech.
It was very heartfelt.
(41:00):
And it's just interesting the timing,
because the news about Jimmy Kimmel
getting indefinitely
pulled from the air--
now, obviously, these are very connected,
however you took the news.
When Steven Colbert was
fired, we're like, oh, OK.
(41:20):
And then we just heard
news about Jimmy Kimmel.
We're like, what the fuck?
But the tie in between all of this
is a lot of people didn't know that
Steven Colbert actually
thanked Jimmy Kimmel, because Jimmy
Kimmel was campaigning
for everyone to vote for
Colbert during this Emmy's push.
He actually put out a
(41:41):
billboard for Steven Colbert.
So I have only heard great
things about Jimmy Kimmel,
but also the family of all these late
night hosts, the support.
It's just interesting the timing,
because we just got news that Jimmy
Kimmel was indefinitely
pulled from ABC and his late night show.
Steven Colbert won the
Emmy, whether it was campaigning
(42:02):
or not, and whether there
was a lot of love in the room.
And you really wonder at this-- we're not
going to get into this
too much-- but you really
wonder how much leeway
these late night hosts are
going to get when it comes to the vested
interests of the corporations.
Yeah, I'm a huge Colbert fan.
(42:24):
I loved the Colbert Report.
And I just-- I've heard--
there was a podcast
episode where it's like,
go to work for a day with whoever,
and they choose different people.
They talk them through their work day.
And Steven Colbert
works so hard, so hard.
I mean, he is just on top
of absolutely everything.
And that show, he was on top of
(42:45):
everything, and all the writing,
and all the production.
And also, he came out of
Second City in Chicago,
which is a guaranteed--
guaranteed like for me,
because I love that place.
It's such a wonderful environment.
And I went through--
I did the Improv Conservatory.
Yeah, that's right.
I was living in Chicago, and I loved it.
(43:06):
It's such a cool--
It's such a warm family, too.
The second city--
It's a brilliant vibe.
You could tell it's different than UCB.
It's different than all the other ones.
But there is a very loving
vibe from the Second City people.
But I love seeing it.
I see-- sometimes I'll
see people that were--
I was in classes with at Second City,
or that I sort of knew
from around that time.
(43:26):
And I'll see them on shows, and I get a
real buzz out of that.
I'm like, yeah.
It means a lot.
It means a lot.
Get in class.
You see actors that you rise up with.
I mean, there's a community.
There's a community here in LA, too.
Also, just because we've
been talking about the pit,
like I said last
week, you watch the show,
and we know five actors on it.
I know five actors.
(43:46):
Also, shout out to Ashley Romans.
Well, at least.
Oh, Ashley's on it.
Ashley has a huge
recurring guest in the show.
People we've been in class
with are doing incredible work
on this TV show.
One of the teachers at
Lezecon is on it, Tyler Poel.
Anyway, yeah, we can go all the way on.
But the pit, keeping LA production alive,
(44:10):
and it's going strong.
Where does it shoot?
Is it-- you know how it shoots?
Is it all in a studio?
Is it in a--
It's actually on the studio.
So I want to clarify.
I didn't put this in
last week's episode when
we were talking about it.
It's not the same set as ER,
but it's the same studio as ER.
So that's kind of cool.
So the same studio that ER was shot on,
(44:31):
they're on the same lot,
except it's a different set.
So I believe it's Warner Brothers.
But we'll-- yeah.
Interesting.
So it's there.
Because when I moved out here, when
I moved to LA the first time in 2007,
I had, through a friend of
mine, got to know a little bit
one of the actors on the
(44:51):
show, Scrubs, John McGinley.
John C McGinley.
Oh, yeah.
He's great.
And when I moved to
LA, I gave him a call.
He was so gracious and
generous with his time.
And I called him when I moved to LA, and
I was like, I mean--
because I had met him in Ireland.
Wait, he's actually Irish?
His family-- well, his family
going back are from Ireland.
So they're from Donegal in Ireland.
So the McGinney name--
(45:11):
I mean, that name is really Irish.
So when I moved here, he was really--
yeah, he was really lovely.
And he brought me up
to the set of Scrubs.
But at the time, it was shot in--
it was the last day of
shooting before the writer's strike
in 2007.
So this is the last
production day before the strike began.
The last day?
Oh, my god.
(45:31):
Yeah, yeah.
So it was shot up in what was
formerly the North Hollywood
Medical Center at the time.
And I got to watch
them shoot some scenes,
and I met some of the cast,
and I met the creator, Bill
Lawrence.
And it was brilliant.
It was such a wonderful-- it was such a
lovely thing for him
to do.
How many seasons were
(45:52):
they on at that point?
I think that was--
he gave me a signed
script from season five.
So it was at least
five, if not six or seven.
OK, OK.
That makes it a little more--
Dude, that would have
been a tense day right
before the writer's strike.
That's amazing that
they even brought you in.
Well, Bill Lawrence gave a speech.
He talked about how they were hopefully
going to get back soon.
(46:13):
And John was very generous.
He was like, we'll try and get you in.
We'll try and get you apart.
And for various reasons, the
strike went on a long time.
And I went back to Ireland.
It didn't happen.
Now, I don't know if it
was ever going to happen,
but it was nice of him to
say that, you know what I mean?
And I was like--
Oh, of course.
And in my 25-year-old mind, I was like,
oh, LA is real easy.
This is what happens.
(46:35):
But it was--
That's funny.
Yeah, but actually, the
timing of it's interesting.
Because there is
currently a Scrobes reboot in--
you know, that they're casting right now,
and is either in
production or going into production.
And it's shooting in LA?
It's shooting in LA.
And everybody's back.
Well, there you go.
A lot of--
A lot of--
It could have been shooting in Dublin.
Thank God it's shooting in LA.
Moving on.
(46:57):
Shout out to the Hacks.
Well, not the Hacks,
but shout out to Hacks.
It's the Hacks.
Shout out to the Hacks of the world.
You're like, which one?
Am I right?
Where would we be without Hacks?
The show is a hit.
Jean Smart has won an Emmy
each season that it's been on.
It's almost-- I mean, at
this point, Jean Smart just
(47:17):
hand her the Emmy.
And then Hannah Einbinder
finally won for Best Supporting.
I never even brought this up because it's
been a whirlwind over here.
I saw Jean Smart do her
one-woman play, Call Me Izzy.
She did it over the summer.
Absolutely remarkable.
Like, it's one of those things where
(47:37):
you go into a one-woman
show and you're like, OK, well,
you know, obviously, I didn't--
you just never know
what you're going to get.
And it's like, it's a lot to ask for.
So riveting, so funny, so heartbreaking.
I was so happy to have watched that.
And a lot of people don't know this.
She actually broke her knee.
She actually mentioned
in her acceptance speech,
(47:57):
she actually is
recovering from a knee injury.
In New York, she actually broke her knee,
had to take two weeks off of the show.
And in this one-man show, obviously,
you have to move to different set changes
and move to different positions.
I want to say she still
continued to do the show
while she's recovering
from her knee injury.
So anyway, so shout out to Jean Smart.
(48:19):
On the comedy side, Studio just weaped.
We kind of knew that.
We kind of knew that
that was going to happen.
But as far as
supporting actor, Jeff Hiller
won for Somebody Somewhere, HBO show.
Yeah.
My pal, Heidi, was in the
first season of Somebody Somewhere.
He upset Harrison Ford.
He upset Ike
(48:40):
Barrenholtz, all these people
who were essentially in the running.
And his speech was adorable.
Also on that note,
Tramiel Tillman on Severance.
This was another underdog story.
First black and gay
actor ever to win that award.
There you go.
We saw history.
Incredible actors that we
(49:00):
did not know three years ago
have their time in the limelight.
Should we get to Hidden Gems?
Yeah, I've been racking my brain.
I don't know if I have one for this week.
You think me and Rian
are scratching the surface
coming up with Hidden Gems,
but we really had to think hard
for some really nice Hidden
Gems for you for this episode.
(49:22):
So do you want to go first?
Yeah, so mine, which I had
to think about for a sec,
but there's a brilliant
book by an Irish writer
called Colin McCann, who's just a,
he writes fiction, he writes novels,
but he's a really brilliant writer.
He's my mother's favorite writer.
So she turned me on to
(49:43):
him, but he has written a book
or he has a book called
Letters to a Young Writer.
And it's kind of a
collection of essays on writing,
on actually his theory on writing.
And it's so helpful for
anybody who's thinking of it.
It helped me think about
writing in a different way.
Because writing is
something that I'm so in awe of
(50:06):
in some ways and really enjoy when I do,
but it's kind of, I go
into it often feeling like,
I don't know how to do this.
And Letters to a Young
Writer really helped me
kind of understand writing a bit more.
And I would recommend it to anybody
who's a writer, is an aspiring writer,
is thinking about writing.
(50:27):
It's a truly excellent book.
But that's my hidden gem.
I love that.
I'll check out that book.
Sounds great.
So for my hidden gem, I
do wanna give a shout out
to a brand that is just,
they actually just did a
pop-up here in New York.
And it's this past week,
I've literally been going
(50:48):
to this pop-up every day.
They had a hard release this past week.
It's really clever.
It's called Coconut Cult.
It's actually a yogurt brand.
So they're launching.
And this activation was
called the Collab Lab,
where they actually
launched and collaborated
with a lot of other super
foods and other food brands.
And they created this really
(51:09):
fun thing here in New York.
I'm not going to lie.
It's so addicting because
they have a claw machine.
They have a claw machine in there.
And you actually get to win a prize.
You get to play once a day.
Me and my sister, well, my sister mostly,
but I'm so addicted.
We are so addicted to this claw machine.
It's such a fun time.
So check out Coconut Cult.
This claw machine was a special fun thing
(51:31):
because they
collaborated with a New York artist.
She hand-sews all
these, essentially plushies.
She hand-sewed all these plushies.
Like literally, there's
over hundreds of plushies.
She hand-sew them.
I don't know how she did it.
Her name's a Lucy
Sparrow, but they're so cute.
(51:51):
We've been playing this
claw machine like it's our job.
I'm not joking around.
I'm going there later this afternoon.
I'm not joking out.
They have been here all week.
If I ever see a claw machine,
I'm probably going to be addicted.
I'm probably going to
play the claw machine.
That's really impressive.
It really made you want to
blab about the collab lab.
(52:12):
It sounds fab.
Anyway, all right, I'm
just getting hyped up.
Here we are wrapping up.
All right, well, there you go.
That's our hidden gems.
Hope you enjoy the gems.
Gonna go out into the Capital One Cafe
and grab someone to shake
their shoulders and scream.
Get out there and activate.
Exactly, exactly.
I probably should shout
out to this Capital One Cafe
and go to the collab lab.
(52:33):
Anyway, that's our episode, everyone.
Hope you enjoyed it.
See you next week.
See you next week, guys.
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