September 5, 2026 • 23 mins
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
There may be a more conservative friend of Abe. There
may be a more conservative member, resident practitioner in Hollywood.
But there's not a more successful conservative in Hollywood. And
he is unabashed. Nick Searcy, he's been in Fried Green Tomatoes,
(00:23):
Cast Away, The Fugitive, Moneyball. He's been in TV shows,
American Gothic, From the Earth to the Moon. CSI, and
so many more. He is probably the most immodest person
I've ever met in my life, and I love him
for it. Nick Searcy.
Speaker 2 (00:41):
Michael, how are you?
Speaker 1 (00:42):
Well, how are you? I know you're jet-lagged from your
flight back from Japan. How are you holding up? Did
you just get up for us? It's 7 o'clock there.
Speaker 2 (00:50):
I woke up. I don't know whether I'm coming or going.
I woke up about 5.30 after going to bed about
2 o'clock. I don't know.
Speaker 1 (00:59):
Did you have a good time in Japan?
Speaker 2 (01:01):
Oh, we had a blast.
Speaker 1 (01:02):
You vacationed in Japan?
Speaker 2 (01:04):
Yeah, the whole family went, me and my wife and
my two kids.
Speaker 1 (01:08):
Who vacations in Japan?
Speaker 2 (01:11):
Well, the way it happened was that my wife has
been studying dance with a Japanese dance teacher out here
who's a very kind of revered and famous dance teacher
named Hama. And he's from Japan, and he went with us.
And so we sort of had our own kind of
personal tour guide.
Speaker 1 (01:29):
He only has one name?
Speaker 2 (01:32):
He only needs one name.
Speaker 3 (01:33):
Oh, okay. All right.
Speaker 1 (01:34):
Okay.
Speaker 2 (01:36):
Yeah. Well, he does have two names, but he goes
by Hama. It's sort of like Luigi in New York,
you know, who just passed away.
Speaker 1 (01:44):
I didn't know if I should feel bad when you
said his name and I didn't know it. So I
thought I'd make light of the matter.
Speaker 2 (01:50):
Well, you'd almost have to be a dancer, Michael.
Speaker 1 (01:55):
Which, as you know, I am not.
Speaker 3 (01:58):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (01:58):
Well, see, I am, and that's why. Right.
Speaker 1 (02:01):
You're a man of many talents. You have the acting
school and a fancy house and a heated pool and
the whole deal.
Speaker 3 (02:06):
All right.
Speaker 1 (02:07):
So you can't ruin it for our many listeners that
did not get a chance last night. They were doing
their taxes, or as in my case, we were celebrating
Nandita's birthday. So I won't get to see it until tonight.
So we're not going to ruin it. But let me
ask you, now that, I mean, you've been, when did
y'all wrap up filming for Justified? A couple months ago?
Speaker 2 (02:25):
Yeah. Yeah, kind of right at the end of February.
Speaker 3 (02:28):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (02:28):
You posted a, for you, a very sentimental tweet of
you and Timothy Oliphant, who plays, of course, Raylan Givens,
and something to the fact of, I'm going to miss you, buddy,
or something like that.
Speaker 3 (02:42):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (02:43):
Well, you know, Tim and I have become friends over
the years. And really, I told him when I saw
him at the last party, I said, you know, for
a guy like me that's basically made a living playing
second bananas. You know, you're the best first banana I've
ever acted with.
Speaker 1 (03:01):
Is that true?
Speaker 2 (03:03):
Yeah, it's really true in so many ways. I mean,
I just think he's such a great person as well
as a really, really dedicated, generous actor. I mean, he's
always the first one there in the last lead. He
works with everybody just as hard as, you know, from
the one-day walk-on part to Sam Elliott. He worked with
(03:27):
everybody just the same way, just as hard all the time.
And he's just the best I've ever really worked with.
Enjoyed him very much.
Speaker 1 (03:37):
His name, when you read the credits, occupies many positions.
And I know sometimes that is the way that a
show pays respect to a guy. It's almost like another
form of compensation for but to what extent is he
really directing and producing? I mean, how much of a
role did he have outside of doing his lines and
(03:59):
playing his part?
Speaker 2 (04:01):
Well, he had quite a bit of input into storylines
and into character arcs and decisions, and he really fought
for that. He didn't start out that way in the
first season, and he really... you know, agitated to get
more input. You know, he wanted to have a say
(04:23):
in how the show went. And he was really valuable
in that regard. I mean, he was really faithful to
Elmore Leonard's work and really steeped himself in it. And usually,
you know, he had some great ideas. And I would
sort of use him as a conduit. When I had
a good idea, I'd run it by him first and
make him present it to the gang.
Speaker 1 (04:44):
Yeah. Let me ask you, is that the first film
you worked with Sam Elliott on?
Speaker 2 (04:51):
Yeah, that was the first time we ever worked together.
He was great. He was so gracious to me when
I first met him. He said, Nick, how is it
that we haven't worked together in all these years? And
I'm like, you've got to be kidding me, Sam. You're
one of my heroes. And he says, well, I sure
have enjoyed your work over the years. Wow. He was
(05:12):
just fantastic. Yeah, he was a great guy. We had
a ball.
Speaker 1 (05:16):
Did you tell him you cried in that scene in
Roadhouse where Patrick Swayze comes in and he's got the
dagger through the middle of his belly?
Speaker 2 (05:25):
No, I didn't tell him that.
Speaker 4 (05:28):
I think I did.
Speaker 2 (05:28):
I was ashamed to tell Sam Elliott that I'd ever
cried in my life.
Speaker 1 (05:32):
Well, that's a good point. Whose bright idea was it
to have him shave the mustache?
Speaker 2 (05:38):
Well, you know, I don't know. We didn't talk about it.
I was afraid to bring it up.
Speaker 1 (05:43):
It was awkward. It was really awkward.
Speaker 2 (05:46):
I didn't want to go, what's up? What's up, Sam?
Speaker 1 (05:48):
My dad wore a beard my entire life. And then
one day, DuPont, the plant where he was working, made
him shave it all off. And we'd never seen my
dad's raw skin, you know, on his cheek and his
upper lip. And it was, you know, it was unnerving,
you know, for a little while. And I couldn't help
but just, you know, study the top of Sam Elliott's
lip after all these rolls. You never saw it.
Speaker 2 (06:11):
Yeah. No, I... I've heard that before, yeah. A lot
of people were kind of disturbed by his lack of
a mustache.
Speaker 1 (06:18):
But it made his character– it took him out of being–
it took the Sam Elliott out of it, which was good.
The Avery Markham character, in my opinion, was a great–
it wasn't Wim Duffy, but it was a great addition
to the season. Nick, I know you've got a number
of things going on in your career, but can we
just geek out on Justified for about five minutes?
Speaker 2 (06:38):
Oh, sure.
Speaker 3 (06:39):
Sure, sure.
Speaker 1 (06:39):
Tell me the moment in the script writing– where y'all
all gathered together and you looked at it and said, oh,
I'm not sure that's going to work. I don't believe
Ava would shoot Boyd or you name it. What was
that moment?
Speaker 2 (06:56):
Well, you know, let's see. There were a lot of
discussion back and forth about, you know, how the series
would end and who should shoot who and, You know,
and it was back and forth. There are many, many
different theories that were put forward by many different people.
(07:17):
And since you haven't seen it, I can't tell you
what decision was made.
Speaker 1 (07:21):
No, that's all right. But before that, I mean, I mean,
there were six seasons. There were a lot of things
that there were characters that were killed off that maybe
could have hung around for a while.
Speaker 2 (07:30):
Yeah, I mean, I think probably the most shocking one,
I think, was, of course, Max Bennett at the end
of season two when her character was killed off. Such
a massively interesting character and so popular. And it was
really quite a shock to everybody. I think even to Margo,
(07:51):
they gave her the script and said, you know what,
this is it. But yeah, killing her off, I think,
was a a very big it was shocking to me.
Speaker 1 (08:01):
Well but you know I think things like that are
necessary as a fan of the show to make it
I mean there's some punch to that oh they're not
playing around I'm just dragging this.
Speaker 2 (08:11):
Thing out no that's true and it gives a real
tension to the show I think much like in Game
of Thrones you know in season one when they killed
off Sean Bean you know it's sort of like wow
okay that was the.
Speaker 3 (08:23):
Lead guy he just killed him you know Is there
as much sexual tension on the set as there is
when people at home are watching Ava Crowder?
Speaker 1 (08:34):
Her character is what, Ramon? That's a fair question. That
was a good question. Sorry, go ahead, Nick.
Speaker 2 (08:42):
Well, there's a lot of sexual tension between Tim and I,
but that's mostly his fault.
Speaker 1 (08:48):
You can't blame the fella. You're a dashing man.
Speaker 2 (08:52):
Right. I mean, people look up to me in so
many ways. I know. The thing about Joel is, you know,
Joel and I did a movie together before Justified in 2006,
I believe. So I've known Joel for a long time.
Speaker 1 (09:06):
Oh, you told me about this. This is the guy
that's out, like, in Montana, out on his own?
Speaker 2 (09:12):
He's in the woods in North Carolina.
Speaker 1 (09:15):
That's close to Montana, isn't it?
Speaker 2 (09:17):
Yeah. But it's called Cold Storage, and this kind of–
retarded fellow or intellectually challenged fellow that lives in a
cabin in the woods, finds a dead body on the
side of the road, dead girl who's killed in a
car accident, takes it home with him and makes her
his girlfriend. In a very platonic way. It's very pure.
(09:43):
But anyway, Joelle plays the dead girl's sister who's kind
of coming and looking for her and stuff. Basically, it's
a long story. The dead girl ends up cheating on
me with some other intellectually challenged hillbilly in the next
cabin over. so I don't like her anymore. So then
when Joelle shows up, I kind of want to make
(10:03):
her my new girlfriend. She talks too much, and I
like them really still. So I try to kill her.
It's quite a movie.
Speaker 1 (10:14):
It sounds like it. I was reading a... A review
by a guy named Adam Epstein at Quartz.com, and it says,
a eulogy for Justified, the most underappreciated drama of our time.
Pretty strong comments. Do you feel like Justified did not
get its due? Because for me, I've never understood why
(10:36):
it's not the number one show on TV. And I'm
not just saying that because I'm talking to you. I
say that to anybody who listens.
Speaker 2 (10:42):
Yeah, I don't know either. I do agree that it
hasn't gotten the credit that it deserves. And I think
part of that is just because the subject matter is
not sexy to kind of voting academy members on either coast,
you know, because it's about the middle of the country.
It's about a bunch of rednecks, you know. And I think,
(11:05):
you know, in some ways that contributes to it.
Speaker 3 (11:08):
I mean, they.
Speaker 2 (11:09):
They're more inclined to give awards to kind of the
more urban kind of sexier shows, you know, with nice
costumes like Mad Men and stuff.
Speaker 1 (11:19):
Yeah, you're probably right. Let's talk about you, Nick Searcy.
There's an interview, The Telegraph. It just went up today,
and it talks about you and your politics, and they
quote you as saying, bullies on the left, they want
to call you names and categorize you and make you respond.
They want to make you say, why are you saying that?
(11:40):
I'm not that. So when Breitbart passed away, you talked
about when Andrew died. So suddenly I just sort of
had this moment where I asked myself, why am I scared?
Why am I letting these people do this to me?
Now I'm not.
Speaker 2 (11:55):
Yeah, I mean, that's pretty, that article is actually kind of,
a good article about me. It's pretty fair. I don't
like the headline.
Speaker 1 (12:04):
It's not fair. It's glowing. Somebody's a huge fan of you. Well,
I don't think that person who wrote it wrote the
headline because the headline is Justified Finale is Nick Cersei
Hollywood's Angriest Conservative. And then it goes on to just
absolutely love you.
Speaker 3 (12:22):
Right.
Speaker 2 (12:23):
Yeah, but I'm not angry. I mean, everybody always thinks
I'm angry on Twitter. I'm not. I'm laughing my head
off most of the time.
Speaker 1 (12:31):
Well, they talk about your tiff with Sean Penn, and
I love this. It says, Cersei worked with Sean Penn
on the 2004 film The Assassination of Richard Nixon, and
they appear to have got on well despite having diametrically
opposed political views. All that changed, however, when a journalist
writing about conservatives in Hollywood asked Cersei what it was
like working with liberal Sean Penn. His email reply, which
(12:54):
he insists was nothing but complimentary, was forwarded to Penn.
Sean Penn sent Cersei a furious email of his own,
and to cut a long story short, Cersei ended up
telling the actor, quote, congratulations on your Oscar. Now do
me a favor and shine it up real nice and
stick it up your ass so you can see it
when you wake up in the morning, because that's where
your head is.
Speaker 2 (13:14):
Yeah, that was a little extreme. But, you know, I mean,
I had known you, Sean, a little bit, you know,
and we... He'd almost cast me in a movie that
he directed. And then, you know, and then I wound
up working with him in that movie. And we'd always
got along. We'd never talk about politics. I mean, because,
(13:36):
you know, back then and even now, I mean, when
I go to a set, I'm not there to debate
somebody on Crossfire. You know, I didn't come to get
a fight. We're here to make a movie. Let's stick
with that, you know.
Speaker 1 (13:49):
You realize you make yourself sound very old referencing Crossfire.
Speaker 2 (13:55):
That's true. That's true. Everybody 25 years old is going,
what the hell is Crossfire?
Speaker 1 (14:00):
And that, too, they brought it back, ill-fated. They brought
it back a few years ago. But the one with Buckley,
that was actually good TV.
Speaker 2 (14:08):
Firing Line.
Speaker 1 (14:09):
Oh, he was Firing Line. Yeah, you're right.
Speaker 3 (14:11):
You're right.
Speaker 1 (14:12):
See, you are old. I was too young. I was
a mere child when all that was happening.
Speaker 2 (14:17):
Right.
Speaker 1 (14:17):
There was a big news story recently about a movie
that has not even begun, but his involvement in it. brought,
I think you would use the term gravitas, Nick, to
the project about Dr. Kermit Gosnell. Folks, whether you are pro-choice.
or pro-life, whatever your position on abortion, what this guy
did is so beyond the pale. He is serving a
(14:41):
life sentence for his awful misdeeds, and it's all facts.
This isn't the pro-life community dreaming this stuff up or
making it up. It's all there in the investigation. It's
all public information. Nick, why are you involved with this project?
Speaker 2 (14:57):
Well, the producers, you know, I've known them for a
long time. And when they said they were going to
raise the money, I kind of got involved and I
helped them. I did some promo videos and went on
the Bill O'Reilly show and talked about it. And when
they got the money and said they were going to
make the film, they asked me if I knew any directors.
And I gave them a couple of names that I thought,
(15:19):
you know, recommended a couple of people and they didn't
work out for whatever reason. And then, uh, they came
back to me and I said, well, you know, I
directed a film myself a few years ago. You want
to see it? You know, and I showed it to them.
And so, uh, you know, they looked at that and
we talked about what they were interested in doing with
the movie. And, uh, we ended up, uh, they ended
up deciding that I was the man for the job. And, uh,
(15:43):
you know, I haven't directed in, in a few years, uh,
except for my acting school video, of course. Yeah. But
it's just a story that, you know, that people are
afraid to tell. And I'm kind of attracted to stories
like that, you know. I like stories that are challenging
and that are not the usual thing. And also, you know,
(16:06):
I have my own personal views on this, which, you know,
led me to want to direct the material, too.
Speaker 1 (16:15):
So where is that? I know I read the story about,
I think it was Indiegogo, and you all raised about
$ 2. 5 million, and that was back in March. Where is
that project?
Speaker 2 (16:26):
Well, we're kind of finalizing our duty.
Speaker 1 (16:28):
That's probably just your fee, right? That's all just your fee,
and the rest goes to production.
Speaker 2 (16:32):
Well, we're going to have to go in and raise
more money after they pay me.
Speaker 1 (16:36):
Right, exactly.
Speaker 2 (16:37):
We've only got a few bucks left to make the
movie as business. But, um, yeah, we, uh, we're hoping
to go into pre-production in June and shoot in July. Um, that's,
that's pretty ambitious, but that was what we're trying to do. Um,
we're finalizing the, uh, shooting script right now and starting
to hire people like line producers and things like that,
(16:59):
put together, you know, put them, put the movie together.
It's like building a little army. So that's what we're
doing now.
Speaker 1 (17:06):
That sounds like fun.
Speaker 2 (17:08):
Yeah. It's really, it's, It's one of those things, it's
all engrossing. I mean, when I decided that I was
going to do this, I really, the first thing I
had to do is talk to Leslie about it and go, look,
do you think it's going to be okay if I
just kind of disappear for like three months? Because that's
really what it's going to be. Even if I'm home,
I'm not going to be here. I'm going to be
thinking about this 24 hours a day for at least
(17:31):
three months. And can you manage without me? And she said, yeah,
we've been married almost 29 years. I'm about sick of
you anyway. So go ahead.
Speaker 1 (17:39):
Yeah, go away. The lovely lady, by the way, who
plays your wife on screen as the wife of Art Mullen,
who was angry at Raylan when you got shot and
is in the car with him when they're on the
way to the hospital, which is cool because I guess
(18:00):
she was an actress herself?
Speaker 2 (18:02):
Yeah, we met in a play in New York. We
got together and we were both struggling actors in New
York and She kind of got to the point where
she was sick of it before I was. And she decided,
you know, she was going to become an exercise physiologist.
And she went back to graduate school. And then all
of a sudden I started getting work, which she said,
(18:24):
she's always told everybody, she was never counting on me
actually having a career.
Speaker 1 (18:30):
She fell in love with you despite that.
Speaker 2 (18:32):
Yeah. Well, I always tell her, you know, You knew
I was going to be rich and famous, didn't you?
And she's like, no, I never thought it would work
at all.
Speaker 1 (18:41):
Let's talk about that film because I think that this is–
I mean obviously you've thought this through. But it would
seem to me, and you tell me, that there is
an additional pressure when you make a movie that has
a built-in audience that wants to see it and has
a built-in audience that wants to see it fail. It
(19:02):
seemed to me there's a lot more pressure in sort of–
I wouldn't call it an advocacy movie, but there's an
increasing number of these. God is Not Dead and Dinesh
D'Souza did a few of these. Do you feel that?
Speaker 2 (19:15):
Yeah, I do. I mean I feel a responsibility. Plus,
I mean this movie was crowdfunded. Almost 20,000 people donated.
So there's a lot of people– maybe 30,000. I may
have that figure wrong. But a lot of people literally
are invested in seeing this movie and seeing it done well.
And so, yeah, I do feel the pressure of that.
(19:35):
But I also want to make a movie that's not
necessarily a sermon. You know, I don't want to immediately
drive away people who might be affected in a way
that they weren't expecting when they see it. So, you know,
I basically I want to tell the truth about what
happened and let people make of it what they will.
You know, you can be whatever spectrum on the political
(20:00):
scale you want, pro-life, pro-choice, whatever. There's value in this
for you in facing what happens here with this man
and why it was allowed to happen. No matter what
side of the issue you're on, you should be concerned
about that.
Speaker 1 (20:13):
Nick Cersei is our guest. Do you take extra pride
in the fact that you don't just read lines and
go home to your heated swimming pool, but that you
have put yourself into the public fray in the marketplace
of ideas and battle with people?
Speaker 2 (20:32):
Well, you know, it's just me. It's just who I am.
You know, I've always kind of been that way. I've
always been sort of a smart aleck. I've always wanted
to engage people on that level. And, you know, it's
just after, with Andrew Breitbart, I keep going back to
(20:53):
Andrew because he's really an inspiration to a lot of
people out here, but he's sort of I was never
really even that aware that there was such a bias
against conservatives in Hollywood. You know, I didn't think about it.
My career started in North Carolina, and there it wasn't
such a big deal. Some actors were Republicans and some
were Democrats. You didn't think anything about it, you know?
(21:14):
And then when I got here, by the time I
figured out that it was a big deal if you
were a Republican, it was too late, and I'd already
told everybody. So when Andrew kind of, the way I
just thought, you know, I'm not going to be I'm
not going to act like I'm ashamed of what I
think anymore. You know, it's ridiculous. People ought to be
able to deal with the fact that I have a
(21:34):
different opinion than they do about certain things. And if
they can't, then.
Speaker 1 (21:39):
I'm sorry, but I am against a break. We need
to have you back out to Houston soon. We appreciate you.
Keep being you.
Speaker 2 (21:44):
Love you, Michael. Thanks for having me.
Speaker 1 (21:46):
Take care.
Speaker 4 (21:49):
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(22:10):
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(23:05):
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There may be a more conservative friend of Abe. There
may be a more conservative member, resident practitioner in Hollywood.
But there's not a more successful conservative in Hollywood. And
he is unabashed. Nick Searcy, he's been in Fried Green Tomatoes,
(00:23):
Cast Away, The Fugitive, Moneyball. He's been in TV shows,
American Gothic, From the Earth to the Moon. CSI, and
so many more. He is probably the most immodest person
I've ever met in my life, and I love him
for it. Nick Searcy.
Speaker 2 (00:41):
Michael, how are you?
Speaker 1 (00:42):
Well, how are you? I know you're jet-lagged from your
flight back from Japan. How are you holding up? Did
you just get up for us? It's 7 o'clock there.
Speaker 2 (00:50):
I woke up. I don't know whether I'm coming or going.
I woke up about 5.30 after going to bed about
2 o'clock. I don't know.
Speaker 1 (00:59):
Did you have a good time in Japan?
Speaker 2 (01:01):
Oh, we had a blast.
Speaker 1 (01:02):
You vacationed in Japan?
Speaker 2 (01:04):
Yeah, the whole family went, me and my wife and
my two kids.
Speaker 1 (01:08):
Who vacations in Japan?
Speaker 2 (01:11):
Well, the way it happened was that my wife has
been studying dance with a Japanese dance teacher out here
who's a very kind of revered and famous dance teacher
named Hama. And he's from Japan, and he went with us.
And so we sort of had our own kind of
personal tour guide.
Speaker 1 (01:29):
He only has one name?
Speaker 2 (01:32):
He only needs one name.
Speaker 3 (01:33):
Oh, okay. All right.
Speaker 1 (01:34):
Okay.
Speaker 2 (01:36):
Yeah. Well, he does have two names, but he goes
by Hama. It's sort of like Luigi in New York,
you know, who just passed away.
Speaker 1 (01:44):
I didn't know if I should feel bad when you
said his name and I didn't know it. So I
thought I'd make light of the matter.
Speaker 2 (01:50):
Well, you'd almost have to be a dancer, Michael.
Speaker 1 (01:55):
Which, as you know, I am not.
Speaker 3 (01:58):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (01:58):
Well, see, I am, and that's why. Right.
Speaker 1 (02:01):
You're a man of many talents. You have the acting
school and a fancy house and a heated pool and
the whole deal.
Speaker 3 (02:06):
All right.
Speaker 1 (02:07):
So you can't ruin it for our many listeners that
did not get a chance last night. They were doing
their taxes, or as in my case, we were celebrating
Nandita's birthday. So I won't get to see it until tonight.
So we're not going to ruin it. But let me
ask you, now that, I mean, you've been, when did
y'all wrap up filming for Justified? A couple months ago?
Speaker 2 (02:25):
Yeah. Yeah, kind of right at the end of February.
Speaker 3 (02:28):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (02:28):
You posted a, for you, a very sentimental tweet of
you and Timothy Oliphant, who plays, of course, Raylan Givens,
and something to the fact of, I'm going to miss you, buddy,
or something like that.
Speaker 3 (02:42):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (02:43):
Well, you know, Tim and I have become friends over
the years. And really, I told him when I saw
him at the last party, I said, you know, for
a guy like me that's basically made a living playing
second bananas. You know, you're the best first banana I've
ever acted with.
Speaker 1 (03:01):
Is that true?
Speaker 2 (03:03):
Yeah, it's really true in so many ways. I mean,
I just think he's such a great person as well
as a really, really dedicated, generous actor. I mean, he's
always the first one there in the last lead. He
works with everybody just as hard as, you know, from
the one-day walk-on part to Sam Elliott. He worked with
(03:27):
everybody just the same way, just as hard all the time.
And he's just the best I've ever really worked with.
Enjoyed him very much.
Speaker 1 (03:37):
His name, when you read the credits, occupies many positions.
And I know sometimes that is the way that a
show pays respect to a guy. It's almost like another
form of compensation for but to what extent is he
really directing and producing? I mean, how much of a
role did he have outside of doing his lines and
(03:59):
playing his part?
Speaker 2 (04:01):
Well, he had quite a bit of input into storylines
and into character arcs and decisions, and he really fought
for that. He didn't start out that way in the
first season, and he really... you know, agitated to get
more input. You know, he wanted to have a say
(04:23):
in how the show went. And he was really valuable
in that regard. I mean, he was really faithful to
Elmore Leonard's work and really steeped himself in it. And usually,
you know, he had some great ideas. And I would
sort of use him as a conduit. When I had
a good idea, I'd run it by him first and
make him present it to the gang.
Speaker 1 (04:44):
Yeah. Let me ask you, is that the first film
you worked with Sam Elliott on?
Speaker 2 (04:51):
Yeah, that was the first time we ever worked together.
He was great. He was so gracious to me when
I first met him. He said, Nick, how is it
that we haven't worked together in all these years? And
I'm like, you've got to be kidding me, Sam. You're
one of my heroes. And he says, well, I sure
have enjoyed your work over the years. Wow. He was
(05:12):
just fantastic. Yeah, he was a great guy. We had
a ball.
Speaker 1 (05:16):
Did you tell him you cried in that scene in
Roadhouse where Patrick Swayze comes in and he's got the
dagger through the middle of his belly?
Speaker 2 (05:25):
No, I didn't tell him that.
Speaker 4 (05:28):
I think I did.
Speaker 2 (05:28):
I was ashamed to tell Sam Elliott that I'd ever
cried in my life.
Speaker 1 (05:32):
Well, that's a good point. Whose bright idea was it
to have him shave the mustache?
Speaker 2 (05:38):
Well, you know, I don't know. We didn't talk about it.
I was afraid to bring it up.
Speaker 1 (05:43):
It was awkward. It was really awkward.
Speaker 2 (05:46):
I didn't want to go, what's up? What's up, Sam?
Speaker 1 (05:48):
My dad wore a beard my entire life. And then
one day, DuPont, the plant where he was working, made
him shave it all off. And we'd never seen my
dad's raw skin, you know, on his cheek and his
upper lip. And it was, you know, it was unnerving,
you know, for a little while. And I couldn't help
but just, you know, study the top of Sam Elliott's
lip after all these rolls. You never saw it.
Speaker 2 (06:11):
Yeah. No, I... I've heard that before, yeah. A lot
of people were kind of disturbed by his lack of
a mustache.
Speaker 1 (06:18):
But it made his character– it took him out of being–
it took the Sam Elliott out of it, which was good.
The Avery Markham character, in my opinion, was a great–
it wasn't Wim Duffy, but it was a great addition
to the season. Nick, I know you've got a number
of things going on in your career, but can we
just geek out on Justified for about five minutes?
Speaker 2 (06:38):
Oh, sure.
Speaker 3 (06:39):
Sure, sure.
Speaker 1 (06:39):
Tell me the moment in the script writing– where y'all
all gathered together and you looked at it and said, oh,
I'm not sure that's going to work. I don't believe
Ava would shoot Boyd or you name it. What was
that moment?
Speaker 2 (06:56):
Well, you know, let's see. There were a lot of
discussion back and forth about, you know, how the series
would end and who should shoot who and, You know,
and it was back and forth. There are many, many
different theories that were put forward by many different people.
(07:17):
And since you haven't seen it, I can't tell you
what decision was made.
Speaker 1 (07:21):
No, that's all right. But before that, I mean, I mean,
there were six seasons. There were a lot of things
that there were characters that were killed off that maybe
could have hung around for a while.
Speaker 2 (07:30):
Yeah, I mean, I think probably the most shocking one,
I think, was, of course, Max Bennett at the end
of season two when her character was killed off. Such
a massively interesting character and so popular. And it was
really quite a shock to everybody. I think even to Margo,
(07:51):
they gave her the script and said, you know what,
this is it. But yeah, killing her off, I think,
was a a very big it was shocking to me.
Speaker 1 (08:01):
Well but you know I think things like that are
necessary as a fan of the show to make it
I mean there's some punch to that oh they're not
playing around I'm just dragging this.
Speaker 2 (08:11):
Thing out no that's true and it gives a real
tension to the show I think much like in Game
of Thrones you know in season one when they killed
off Sean Bean you know it's sort of like wow
okay that was the.
Speaker 3 (08:23):
Lead guy he just killed him you know Is there
as much sexual tension on the set as there is
when people at home are watching Ava Crowder?
Speaker 1 (08:34):
Her character is what, Ramon? That's a fair question. That
was a good question. Sorry, go ahead, Nick.
Speaker 2 (08:42):
Well, there's a lot of sexual tension between Tim and I,
but that's mostly his fault.
Speaker 1 (08:48):
You can't blame the fella. You're a dashing man.
Speaker 2 (08:52):
Right. I mean, people look up to me in so
many ways. I know. The thing about Joel is, you know,
Joel and I did a movie together before Justified in 2006,
I believe. So I've known Joel for a long time.
Speaker 1 (09:06):
Oh, you told me about this. This is the guy
that's out, like, in Montana, out on his own?
Speaker 2 (09:12):
He's in the woods in North Carolina.
Speaker 1 (09:15):
That's close to Montana, isn't it?
Speaker 2 (09:17):
Yeah. But it's called Cold Storage, and this kind of–
retarded fellow or intellectually challenged fellow that lives in a
cabin in the woods, finds a dead body on the
side of the road, dead girl who's killed in a
car accident, takes it home with him and makes her
his girlfriend. In a very platonic way. It's very pure.
(09:43):
But anyway, Joelle plays the dead girl's sister who's kind
of coming and looking for her and stuff. Basically, it's
a long story. The dead girl ends up cheating on
me with some other intellectually challenged hillbilly in the next
cabin over. so I don't like her anymore. So then
when Joelle shows up, I kind of want to make
(10:03):
her my new girlfriend. She talks too much, and I
like them really still. So I try to kill her.
It's quite a movie.
Speaker 1 (10:14):
It sounds like it. I was reading a... A review
by a guy named Adam Epstein at Quartz.com, and it says,
a eulogy for Justified, the most underappreciated drama of our time.
Pretty strong comments. Do you feel like Justified did not
get its due? Because for me, I've never understood why
(10:36):
it's not the number one show on TV. And I'm
not just saying that because I'm talking to you. I
say that to anybody who listens.
Speaker 2 (10:42):
Yeah, I don't know either. I do agree that it
hasn't gotten the credit that it deserves. And I think
part of that is just because the subject matter is
not sexy to kind of voting academy members on either coast,
you know, because it's about the middle of the country.
It's about a bunch of rednecks, you know. And I think,
(11:05):
you know, in some ways that contributes to it.
Speaker 3 (11:08):
I mean, they.
Speaker 2 (11:09):
They're more inclined to give awards to kind of the
more urban kind of sexier shows, you know, with nice
costumes like Mad Men and stuff.
Speaker 1 (11:19):
Yeah, you're probably right. Let's talk about you, Nick Searcy.
There's an interview, The Telegraph. It just went up today,
and it talks about you and your politics, and they
quote you as saying, bullies on the left, they want
to call you names and categorize you and make you respond.
They want to make you say, why are you saying that?
(11:40):
I'm not that. So when Breitbart passed away, you talked
about when Andrew died. So suddenly I just sort of
had this moment where I asked myself, why am I scared?
Why am I letting these people do this to me?
Now I'm not.
Speaker 2 (11:55):
Yeah, I mean, that's pretty, that article is actually kind of,
a good article about me. It's pretty fair. I don't
like the headline.
Speaker 1 (12:04):
It's not fair. It's glowing. Somebody's a huge fan of you. Well,
I don't think that person who wrote it wrote the
headline because the headline is Justified Finale is Nick Cersei
Hollywood's Angriest Conservative. And then it goes on to just
absolutely love you.
Speaker 3 (12:22):
Right.
Speaker 2 (12:23):
Yeah, but I'm not angry. I mean, everybody always thinks
I'm angry on Twitter. I'm not. I'm laughing my head
off most of the time.
Speaker 1 (12:31):
Well, they talk about your tiff with Sean Penn, and
I love this. It says, Cersei worked with Sean Penn
on the 2004 film The Assassination of Richard Nixon, and
they appear to have got on well despite having diametrically
opposed political views. All that changed, however, when a journalist
writing about conservatives in Hollywood asked Cersei what it was
like working with liberal Sean Penn. His email reply, which
(12:54):
he insists was nothing but complimentary, was forwarded to Penn.
Sean Penn sent Cersei a furious email of his own,
and to cut a long story short, Cersei ended up
telling the actor, quote, congratulations on your Oscar. Now do
me a favor and shine it up real nice and
stick it up your ass so you can see it
when you wake up in the morning, because that's where
your head is.
Speaker 2 (13:14):
Yeah, that was a little extreme. But, you know, I mean,
I had known you, Sean, a little bit, you know,
and we... He'd almost cast me in a movie that
he directed. And then, you know, and then I wound
up working with him in that movie. And we'd always
got along. We'd never talk about politics. I mean, because,
(13:36):
you know, back then and even now, I mean, when
I go to a set, I'm not there to debate
somebody on Crossfire. You know, I didn't come to get
a fight. We're here to make a movie. Let's stick
with that, you know.
Speaker 1 (13:49):
You realize you make yourself sound very old referencing Crossfire.
Speaker 2 (13:55):
That's true. That's true. Everybody 25 years old is going,
what the hell is Crossfire?
Speaker 1 (14:00):
And that, too, they brought it back, ill-fated. They brought
it back a few years ago. But the one with Buckley,
that was actually good TV.
Speaker 2 (14:08):
Firing Line.
Speaker 1 (14:09):
Oh, he was Firing Line. Yeah, you're right.
Speaker 3 (14:11):
You're right.
Speaker 1 (14:12):
See, you are old. I was too young. I was
a mere child when all that was happening.
Speaker 2 (14:17):
Right.
Speaker 1 (14:17):
There was a big news story recently about a movie
that has not even begun, but his involvement in it. brought,
I think you would use the term gravitas, Nick, to
the project about Dr. Kermit Gosnell. Folks, whether you are pro-choice.
or pro-life, whatever your position on abortion, what this guy
did is so beyond the pale. He is serving a
(14:41):
life sentence for his awful misdeeds, and it's all facts.
This isn't the pro-life community dreaming this stuff up or
making it up. It's all there in the investigation. It's
all public information. Nick, why are you involved with this project?
Speaker 2 (14:57):
Well, the producers, you know, I've known them for a
long time. And when they said they were going to
raise the money, I kind of got involved and I
helped them. I did some promo videos and went on
the Bill O'Reilly show and talked about it. And when
they got the money and said they were going to
make the film, they asked me if I knew any directors.
And I gave them a couple of names that I thought,
(15:19):
you know, recommended a couple of people and they didn't
work out for whatever reason. And then, uh, they came
back to me and I said, well, you know, I
directed a film myself a few years ago. You want
to see it? You know, and I showed it to them.
And so, uh, you know, they looked at that and
we talked about what they were interested in doing with
the movie. And, uh, we ended up, uh, they ended
up deciding that I was the man for the job. And, uh,
(15:43):
you know, I haven't directed in, in a few years, uh,
except for my acting school video, of course. Yeah. But
it's just a story that, you know, that people are
afraid to tell. And I'm kind of attracted to stories
like that, you know. I like stories that are challenging
and that are not the usual thing. And also, you know,
(16:06):
I have my own personal views on this, which, you know,
led me to want to direct the material, too.
Speaker 1 (16:15):
So where is that? I know I read the story about,
I think it was Indiegogo, and you all raised about
$ 2. 5 million, and that was back in March. Where is
that project?
Speaker 2 (16:26):
Well, we're kind of finalizing our duty.
Speaker 1 (16:28):
That's probably just your fee, right? That's all just your fee,
and the rest goes to production.
Speaker 2 (16:32):
Well, we're going to have to go in and raise
more money after they pay me.
Speaker 1 (16:36):
Right, exactly.
Speaker 2 (16:37):
We've only got a few bucks left to make the
movie as business. But, um, yeah, we, uh, we're hoping
to go into pre-production in June and shoot in July. Um, that's,
that's pretty ambitious, but that was what we're trying to do. Um,
we're finalizing the, uh, shooting script right now and starting
to hire people like line producers and things like that,
(16:59):
put together, you know, put them, put the movie together.
It's like building a little army. So that's what we're
doing now.
Speaker 1 (17:06):
That sounds like fun.
Speaker 2 (17:08):
Yeah. It's really, it's, It's one of those things, it's
all engrossing. I mean, when I decided that I was
going to do this, I really, the first thing I
had to do is talk to Leslie about it and go, look,
do you think it's going to be okay if I
just kind of disappear for like three months? Because that's
really what it's going to be. Even if I'm home,
I'm not going to be here. I'm going to be
thinking about this 24 hours a day for at least
(17:31):
three months. And can you manage without me? And she said, yeah,
we've been married almost 29 years. I'm about sick of
you anyway. So go ahead.
Speaker 1 (17:39):
Yeah, go away. The lovely lady, by the way, who
plays your wife on screen as the wife of Art Mullen,
who was angry at Raylan when you got shot and
is in the car with him when they're on the
way to the hospital, which is cool because I guess
(18:00):
she was an actress herself?
Speaker 2 (18:02):
Yeah, we met in a play in New York. We
got together and we were both struggling actors in New
York and She kind of got to the point where
she was sick of it before I was. And she decided,
you know, she was going to become an exercise physiologist.
And she went back to graduate school. And then all
of a sudden I started getting work, which she said,
(18:24):
she's always told everybody, she was never counting on me
actually having a career.
Speaker 1 (18:30):
She fell in love with you despite that.
Speaker 2 (18:32):
Yeah. Well, I always tell her, you know, You knew
I was going to be rich and famous, didn't you?
And she's like, no, I never thought it would work
at all.
Speaker 1 (18:41):
Let's talk about that film because I think that this is–
I mean obviously you've thought this through. But it would
seem to me, and you tell me, that there is
an additional pressure when you make a movie that has
a built-in audience that wants to see it and has
a built-in audience that wants to see it fail. It
(19:02):
seemed to me there's a lot more pressure in sort of–
I wouldn't call it an advocacy movie, but there's an
increasing number of these. God is Not Dead and Dinesh
D'Souza did a few of these. Do you feel that?
Speaker 2 (19:15):
Yeah, I do. I mean I feel a responsibility. Plus,
I mean this movie was crowdfunded. Almost 20,000 people donated.
So there's a lot of people– maybe 30,000. I may
have that figure wrong. But a lot of people literally
are invested in seeing this movie and seeing it done well.
And so, yeah, I do feel the pressure of that.
(19:35):
But I also want to make a movie that's not
necessarily a sermon. You know, I don't want to immediately
drive away people who might be affected in a way
that they weren't expecting when they see it. So, you know,
I basically I want to tell the truth about what
happened and let people make of it what they will.
You know, you can be whatever spectrum on the political
(20:00):
scale you want, pro-life, pro-choice, whatever. There's value in this
for you in facing what happens here with this man
and why it was allowed to happen. No matter what
side of the issue you're on, you should be concerned
about that.
Speaker 1 (20:13):
Nick Cersei is our guest. Do you take extra pride
in the fact that you don't just read lines and
go home to your heated swimming pool, but that you
have put yourself into the public fray in the marketplace
of ideas and battle with people?
Speaker 2 (20:32):
Well, you know, it's just me. It's just who I am.
You know, I've always kind of been that way. I've
always been sort of a smart aleck. I've always wanted
to engage people on that level. And, you know, it's
just after, with Andrew Breitbart, I keep going back to
(20:53):
Andrew because he's really an inspiration to a lot of
people out here, but he's sort of I was never
really even that aware that there was such a bias
against conservatives in Hollywood. You know, I didn't think about it.
My career started in North Carolina, and there it wasn't
such a big deal. Some actors were Republicans and some
were Democrats. You didn't think anything about it, you know?
(21:14):
And then when I got here, by the time I
figured out that it was a big deal if you
were a Republican, it was too late, and I'd already
told everybody. So when Andrew kind of, the way I
just thought, you know, I'm not going to be I'm
not going to act like I'm ashamed of what I
think anymore. You know, it's ridiculous. People ought to be
able to deal with the fact that I have a
(21:34):
different opinion than they do about certain things. And if
they can't, then.
Speaker 1 (21:39):
I'm sorry, but I am against a break. We need
to have you back out to Houston soon. We appreciate you.
Keep being you.
Speaker 2 (21:44):
Love you, Michael. Thanks for having me.
Speaker 1 (21:46):
Take care.
Speaker 4 (21:49):
If you like the Michael Berry Show and podcast, please
tell one friend. And if you're so inclined... write a
nice review of our podcast. Comments, suggestions, questions, and interest
in being a corporate sponsor and partner can be communicated
directly to the show at our email address, michael at
(22:10):
michaelberryshow.com or simply by clicking on our website, michaelberryshow.com. The
Michael Berry Show and Podcast is produced by Ramon Robles,
the King of Ding, Executive Producer, is Chad Nakanishi. Jim
(22:31):
Mudd is the creative director. Voices, jingles, tomfoolery, and shenanigans
are provided by Chance McLean.
Speaker 1 (22:41):
Director of research is Sandy Peterson.
Speaker 4 (22:44):
Emily Bull is our assistant. Listener and superfan contributions are
appreciated and often incorporated into our productions. Where possible, we
give credit. Where not, we take all the credit for ourselves.
God bless the memory of Rush Limbaugh. Long live Elvis.
(23:05):
Be a simple man, like Leonard Skinner told you. And
God bless America. Finally, if you know a veteran suffering
from PTSD, call Camp Hope at 877-717-PTSD and a combat
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