Matt Borlenghi - Actor (Cobra Kai / Can You Feel The Beat: The Lisa Lisa Story

Matt Borlenghi
Take a walk with me down Fascination Street as I get to know actor Matt Borlenghi. In this episode, we chat about growing up in Los Angeles and attending the famed Beverly Hills High School. Then we discuss his godfather Jerry Vale and Matt's thoughts on nepotism in the industry. Jerry could have helped Matt along in his career, very early on, with an introduction to Martin Scorsese; but Matt turned him down. So, I dive deep on whether Matt has changed his mind about favors from friends and family. Next, we talk about how Matt's best friend seemingly changed almost overnight, once the friend got famous. Matt was a breakout star on All My Children as Brian Bodine, after having delivered a well noticed performance on the cop drama Hunter. So naturally we cover his time on the soap opera, and how his leaving, led to Kelly Ripa and Mark Consuelos marrying and building their empire. Then I ask Matt why he has personally participated in over 50 autopsies in Las Vegas. That's a wild story. Matt i part of the cast of the new film 'Can You Feel the Beat: The Lisa Lisa Story'; which is generating a lot og buzz about the iconic female musician. We close the episode by touching briefly on a few projects that Matt has been working on lately, and then focusing on the skateboard culture themes streetwear clothing line that he has come up with, and why he decided to move forward with it. Check out Matt in these and other projects and follow him on all the things! 

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
This is Jule Vascus and you're listening to Fascination Street
Podcast with your host, the Great Steve Owens.

Speaker 2 (00:08):
Yes, Yes, the ampe visual down the most into the
street in the world with my voice Steve, Fascination Street.
I already know it when you went for the Fascination Street.

Speaker 3 (00:23):
Welcome back, Street Walkers. This episode is with Matt Burlingy.
Matt Berlinky is an actor, a producer, and a creator.
We talk about all of those things. We talked about
him growing up in the Hollywood scene and even going
to nine oh two one of Beverly Hills High School.
What and then we talk about some of his jobs,

(00:45):
how he got into acting, some of his roles on Hunter,
All My Children, Cobra Kai, and even some of the
projects that he has created. And he tells me why
he participated hands on in over fifty two autopsies. There's
a reason behind it and it is a fascinating one.

(01:08):
Matt Morlingy is famous for being the pawn shop guy
in the Cobra Kai TV series, but also more recently
he is in Can You Feel the Beat? The Lisa
Lisa Story, which is all about Lisa Lisa and Colt
jam and how they got started and some of the
obstacles that it took to get on top of the world.

(01:28):
I raised the question of a potential memoir written by
Matt because he has led such a fascinating life, and
it turns out he has already started it. So that
is a fun bit of happen stance. And finally we
talk about another one of Matt's creation's Skate Rat. It
is an upcoming skate themed line of apparel. And this

(01:50):
is my conversation with actor, producer and skatewear apparel creator
Matt ORLINGI for better be.

Speaker 1 (01:58):
Fascinating, regretit me day, forgredit me that day.

Speaker 3 (02:09):
Welcome to Fascination Street Podcast, Mad moor Lane. Yeah you're
doing today, man?

Speaker 1 (02:14):
I am doing all right. It's Friday. How bad can
it be?

Speaker 3 (02:19):
Oh my god, it's so Friday and.

Speaker 1 (02:21):
At the beginning of the Memorial Day weekend, which has
always overshadowed my birthday, which is on Sunday, the twenty fifth,
so you know, it kind of sucked. When I was younger,
I was like, hey, you know, I think I'm going
to have a party, and I was like, oh.

Speaker 3 (02:39):
Yeah, nobody's coming, right.

Speaker 1 (02:44):
Have fun, you know, have fun out of town.

Speaker 3 (02:47):
But the good news is everything is closed on your birthday,
and they sometimes they do fireworks. I don't happy fireworks
to day. I don't maybe right, Yeah, my birthday was
a couple of days ago, May twentieth, So holler. So,
I guess you're what a Gemini?

Speaker 1 (03:05):
I am?

Speaker 3 (03:05):
Gross? Yeah, we're tourist is here? Baby?

Speaker 1 (03:09):
I'm a double Gemini.

Speaker 3 (03:12):
I don't know what that means.

Speaker 1 (03:13):
Double Gemini Gemini rising means there's four of me instead
of two.

Speaker 3 (03:20):
You know what. I was going to clean my glasses,
but thank you, thank you for helping me out there.
I thought it was my glasses. So, Matt, what I
like to do is I like to start from the beginning.
It helps us understand how the guests got from where
they were to where they are. So if you don't mind, man,
where were you born and raised? Where'd you grow up?

Speaker 1 (03:36):
Originally I went to a party with my dad and
left with my mom.

Speaker 3 (03:43):
WHOA that took me a second and a calculator, but
a holy shit, that's amazing.

Speaker 1 (03:54):
Wow. My folks emigrated from Italy. I was the first
generation Italian American, first in the family tree that was
born in the States. They had gotten together in Los Angeles,
and then at a certain point, my dad took off
and he went back to Italy, and then my mom

(04:17):
and I went back to Italy and they got back together.
Then they went back to where they knew, which was
La So I was primarily raised in Los Angeles, different
parts of La Alta, Dina, Hollywood, Beverly Hills. Went to
Beverly Hills High School for two and a half years.

(04:37):
You know, I guess sent to a boarding school as
a freshman because I was a naughty boy. Then went
to Beverly High as a sophomore junior, got kicked out
for again being a naughty boy. So I went to
Palisades High School for a semester and then completed, you know,
the reconciliation. Whatever I had to do to get back,

(05:00):
I can. So I was allowed to go back to
Beverly High and graduate from there.

Speaker 3 (05:05):
So, if I understand correctly, Beverly Hills High School, they
have a working oil pump on the property. Is that right?
They still do an oil Well? Yeah, that's wild.

Speaker 1 (05:16):
I'm not sure too many high schools have that.

Speaker 3 (05:18):
I'm gonna go with zero. According to Aaron Brockovich, Oh really,
I don't know if it was a whole movie or
if it was just a big expose. This is probably
not gonna sound awesome to you, but she did this
whole thing about like all of the medical issues that
have come from the people who have graduated from there
because of the oil.

Speaker 1 (05:39):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (05:41):
Are you feeling okay? Buddy?

Speaker 1 (05:42):
I don't think that it expected anyone at all. I
love it.

Speaker 3 (05:47):
See y'all can't see this. He's having visual tics. Yeah,
so maybe that's why you were such a bad boy
in schools because of all the oil fumes.

Speaker 1 (05:56):
Yeah, thank you for finally giving me an out on that.

Speaker 3 (05:59):
I can't believe it took so long for you to
get one. Man.

Speaker 1 (06:03):
You know, there are no hall passes in life anymore.

Speaker 3 (06:07):
That is the truth. So what did you want to
be when you grew up? Man? What was the plan?

Speaker 1 (06:15):
Yeah? Where did it all go wrong?

Speaker 3 (06:16):
You mean exactly? That's the thing. You're speaking my language?
You know what.

Speaker 1 (06:21):
Ever, since I was seven years old, I wanted.

Speaker 3 (06:24):
To be an actor since you were seven?

Speaker 1 (06:27):
Yeah. Yeah, Because my folks had a friend, an Italian
gentleman who was a film director, and he presented me
slash use with this vision of making a Western, you know,
a grand sweeping Western. It was going to be kids though,

(06:47):
like literally cowboy and I was going to be his cowboy,
riding off into the sunset and everything. And then he
passed away.

Speaker 3 (06:57):
Oh my god.

Speaker 1 (06:58):
Yeah, and I was left with that image of myself
right up into the sunset, that longing. Yeah. So, you know,
it was silly. I you know, I would be walking
along on the sidewalk on my way home from school
or whatever, and you know, not still at seven a
little older, and I would have this idea that you know,

(07:20):
this big Hollywood producer was going to pull up in
a limo saying, you know, you belong in pictures. That
type of silly thinking. And you know, now it's if
a car pulls over, I had a kid walking, you know,
that kid better run. So yeah, different times. So I

(07:40):
kind of always had that thing. And then, you know,
then I fell in love with soccer. And I played
soccer my whole childhood here in the States, here in
the States, and I was pretty good. I was a
state goalie. There was interest from Pepperdine University to play
goalie for them, but at the time, gone was the

(08:01):
idea of the prescient thinking you know, and then looking ahead,
you know, if I stuck with it and then went
to Italy and played soccer there and then maybe the
Italian national soccer team, that you know, I might spend
the rest of my life driving Ferraris on the Amalfi Coast.
It was that, Hm, I could go play soccer Pepperdine,

(08:24):
or I could be an actor because that's you know,
that's always been my thing. And so you know, the
acting won out. Bye bye went the Ferraris on the
Amalfi Coast.

Speaker 3 (08:35):
Well that's a lot less sweating while you're practicing the
one versus the other.

Speaker 1 (08:40):
Well, not so much for people with stage fright, which
I don't have.

Speaker 3 (08:45):
Oh, thank goodness, I do, do you Well? I used to, Yeah,
I mean, I guess I still would if I was
on a stage. I used to be terrified of talking
to people. I don't I don't really know why.

Speaker 1 (08:57):
You're familiar with the fact that the biggest stat the
biggest fear of all people surveyed, was the fear of
speaking in public, like to a crowd. I don't get that.

Speaker 3 (09:08):
There's only two fears that people are born with, and
this is weird, and one of them is public speaking.
Scientific fact.

Speaker 1 (09:17):
It's crazy. What's the other one?

Speaker 3 (09:19):
Snakes?

Speaker 1 (09:21):
I was gonna get spiders, but yeah.

Speaker 3 (09:24):
Snakes real quick. Going back to Beverly Hills High School
a few years ago, like at least like six years ago,
I was interviewing this guy, Jared Bunch. He was a
first round draft pick for the NFL back in the
early nineties. I was interviewing him because he's super cool.
And then like after I interviewed him, but before the

(09:45):
episode came out, he called me back to let me
know that he did get the job as the head
high school football coach for Beverly Hills High. Really, that's
my only attachment to Beverly Hills High. I don't know
if he's still there, but that was cool.

Speaker 1 (09:59):
Yeah, that is cool. He was an NFL player in
the early nineties.

Speaker 3 (10:05):
Yeah, he was a first round draft pick, and I
think it was ninety one. I think it was ninety one.
He was a super cool guy. He was also an actor.
Really yeah, yeah, yeah, nineteen ninety one. He was a
first on draft pick.

Speaker 1 (10:17):
Do you remember which team he was going to?

Speaker 3 (10:20):
He played for a couple of teams. I don't remember
which ones because I suck.

Speaker 1 (10:27):
I'm sorry. I like to stump the host every once
in a while.

Speaker 3 (10:30):
Sorry, good job and thanks, way to go, and scene
and scene. Okay, so you have grown up in Hollywood.
Let's say, and I have a question about Hollywood. And
this could go a couple of different ways, so take
your time. Okay, how do you feel about nepotism in Hollywood?

(10:51):
And have your feelings about that changed over time?

Speaker 1 (10:55):
That's actually a really relevant question for me. My godfather is.

Speaker 3 (11:03):
So since you're Italian, whenever you say godfather, you have
to hold your hand up to your mouth like that.
My godfa The real ones don't oh oh shit, there
you go. But to make you happy, Oh I got it,
Thank you very much.

Speaker 1 (11:22):
My godfather was Jerry Vale. No shit, yeah, such a
sweet guy. But any Marty Scorsese movie, you know you'd
always see, you know, like a lounge ACKed singer in
the background or featured somewhere, and you know he was
in all of them. Jerry used to ask me. He'd say, hey,
I can talk to Marty. It went on for a

(11:45):
while and I was so against it, you know, because
I always there were so many doubters when I said
this is what I want to do. I want to
be an actor. I want to be director or producer.
But this is my thing, and there was so many doubters,
including you know, my folks. At the time, I had
a chip on my shoulder. I wanted to prove that

(12:07):
I could do it myself and not have Jerry call
Marty in retrospect, what an asshole? Am I? What an asshole?
I mean I have a back door to Martin.

Speaker 3 (12:24):
I don't need your help. I'm me.

Speaker 1 (12:26):
Yeah, in retrospect, why would you not let your godfather
tell Martin scorsees about you? So who knows what could
have happened, But you know what, the sum of my
experiences equals who I am today. So any different decision
would have had a different result. And you know what

(12:48):
ifs are okay, regrets or not, there's no point in
regretting shit thinking what if that? What if that? Yeah, whatever,
as long as it's just a you know, kind of
a butterfly thinking. You know, one thing that really bothered
me on the topic of nepotism is we're no longer
friends for you know, a long time now, because you know, frankly,

(13:10):
he got too famous for himself and the relationship went
really sour. But we both had nothing, you know, at
the time, you know, really struggling. And then you know,
I got all my children and I knew he was
still super struggling, and I went to the producers of
All My Children. I said, listen, my best friend, my

(13:31):
blood brother back in la is having a tough time.
I needed to make my best friend on the show.
The EP's reaction was, well, you know, Matt, it takes
some time, you know. To I said, no, I need this.
I need you to make him my best friend. And
she said, well, you know what, you get him out here,
we'll do it. And when I called him, he said, nah,

(13:55):
I don't really want to do a soap opera. And
I'm thinking, what a fuck an asshole? What who I
just got you? You know, I did the impossible right. Well,
fast forward to after I've left all my children and
I have a pilot at NBC and he is a
pilot at NBC. Mine ends up going to upn his

(14:17):
ends up becoming one of the most popular sitcoms of
all time. Rip not Him, not Him? Another one of guys,
really the other one?

Speaker 3 (14:31):
Yeah, oh that's interesting, we're going to talk about that. Okay,
go ahead.

Speaker 1 (14:35):
Sorry, So he used to always brag about the you know,
because they did so much stunt casting on that show
and you know, friends and relationships and relatives, and he
used to brag about the nepotism employed in casting at
the show. And the one time I asked him, I
had already read for it, gone on tape and everything,

(14:56):
and I went to him, I said, for friends, yeah,
I said, you know, I already auditioned. If you could
just whisper in the producer's ears to you know, give
an extra look at my audition, He said, I don't
really feel comfortable with that. All I could do is
look at him and say, I had a role created

(15:19):
for you on my show. You talk about nepotism, Are
you fucking kidding me right now? You know I never
forgot that. You know, I never forgot that. But when
I was doing well, I wanted every like exampled by
me getting a role created for him on my show
if he wanted it. I've always wanted everyone around me

(15:41):
to be doing well. And he was always competitive. You know.
We had met originally on some show that he was on,
and I never forgot. He told me after the fact
that when he first saw me on set, he went
to his you know, producers and was like, who's that guy?
What's he doing here? You know, he saw competition rather
than you know, And after that, I mean, he opened up.

(16:03):
He told me that story after we had become really tight.
We were best friends, and I'm not kidding about the
blood brothers thing. I mean, we did everything together and
it all fell apart because I got steamrolled by that
k U n T. Maria minudos on a story that
entertainment Tonight's story that I got suckered into doing. It

(16:26):
made him look bad because they tricked me and you know,
made it a hack piece on him in the specific way.
He just got too famous and I wasn't going to
be one of his many yes men, you know what
I mean? Sure, So you know, it's an interesting question
that you asked me. You know, I have nothing against nepotism.
I mean, if you have an opportunity to help someone

(16:48):
that means something to you, that should be alive in
all walks of life, you know.

Speaker 3 (16:53):
Sure.

Speaker 1 (16:54):
Granted, if your relationship person is person A and a
complete Ciger's person B, and person B is more qualified
for the job by skill, education, whatever than by all means.
But why not give person a the opportunity to compete
for it. I agree.

Speaker 3 (17:13):
If you're going to a job interview in any profession,
and somebody else was walking in the building, why not
hold the door open. You're both up for it. Hold
the door open. Unrelated to that story, you just told
a friend of mine who's a writer in Hollywood who
grew up in the Boston area, went to high school
with one of the guys from friends and apparently this

(17:34):
guy was a total fucking asshole in high school. Huh,
since we're talking about unrelated friends, I just heard this,
I think yesterday I heard it. You know the movie
Chasing Amy? Yeah, Ben Affleck, Right, Well, apparently the studio
did not want Ben Affleck in this movie because they
were like, who's this idiot? This blows me away? Instead

(17:57):
of Ben Affleck, they were really pushing Kevin Smith to
cast David Schwimmer.

Speaker 1 (18:02):
Really what, Huh?

Speaker 3 (18:05):
That would have been a wildly different film. I think. Yeah,
that is nuts.

Speaker 4 (18:12):
Hey, street Walkers, here's a word from our sponsors. Let's
get back into it.

Speaker 3 (18:23):
Okay. A long time ago, there was a TV show
I did not miss any single episode. I loved it
so much. It was my favorite TV show when it
was on. It started fred Dreyer. It was called Hunter.
Tell me about your experience on Hunter. I already interviewed
one guy. He's been on the show a few times.
His name is Tony Winters. Pretty Tony Winters. He played

(18:43):
the Emmy on Hunter back in the day. Tell me
about your Hunter experience. I love Hunter.

Speaker 1 (18:49):
Hunter was funny, all right. So my old best friend
were at his apartment. We just, you know, ripped a
couple of big bombs hits, right, And I happen to
check my answering machine at home, because you know, it's
those days still. There's a message from my agents saying

(19:09):
you need to call me back. You have a last
minute appointment straight to producers. And I'm like, ah my,
how are you? So I call, I get the info.
They say, get up there, get up there. So I say, hey,
why come with me. I have a last married audition.

(19:30):
I'm kind of cooked. So we hop on our Harley's.
We ride up in Hollywood to the Stephen J. Canal building,
walk in, get the script pages besides, and I'm looking
at it, and you know, I see how it's written,
and I was like, you know, what f this? I
am cooked. I'm not acting all nervous and scared. You know,

(19:53):
I see what's happening. I'm being interrogated.

Speaker 3 (19:56):
Hold on, I'm gonna pause you. I think it's hilarious
that you're you're auditioning to be a character who's being
intimidated by the police or or whatever, and in the
moment your highest balls and you still can't act nervous.
That's so fucking funny, because in a real police station,
you'd be sweating bullets because you're high. Shit.

Speaker 1 (20:15):
Yeah, yeah, totally.

Speaker 3 (20:18):
It's awesome.

Speaker 1 (20:19):
So I make my choice. I was like, F Hunter,
F everybody, you know. So I go in and I
just play the scene like I don't care. I didn't
do this, so whatever, I don't care. This was last minute,
screw it. I kicked my feet up and I, you know,
I just had this total arrogant attitude, and he was bothered.

Speaker 3 (20:43):
Fred.

Speaker 1 (20:44):
Yeah. I left there, and I got the call that
I booked it, and I show up and when we're
filming it and the director's telling me, you know, just
everything you did. I was like, okay, So now on set,
there's the table, you know, in front of me and everything,
and I just slid my chair back and kicked my
feet up on the table as I was talking, basically

(21:07):
telling him, you know, in their language, suck my dick.
And he was incensed and he you know, and it
fed him. You know, it brought out his dramatic chops.
He you know, knocked my feet off the table and
got all tough and everything, and if I remember right,
I kept going, let it react a little bit, and
then I just put my feet back on and you know,

(21:30):
just went through this. So it was a fun time.
And you know, afterwards, he wasn't a man of many words,
but you know, Fred was like, good job, thanks, and
I understood that. It was like, thanks for pushing my
buttons and making that work.

Speaker 3 (21:47):
Thanks for playing in the sandbox.

Speaker 1 (21:49):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (21:50):
Was this like deep into the show's run or was
this the early When was it?

Speaker 1 (21:54):
It wasn't super early, because I knew the show. I mean,
I was like really excited about it, and if I
hadn't been cooked at the time, I might have been
a little bit nervous. That's funny, you know. So it
was totally opposite. It was like, this is last minute
where they expect from me. I'm just going to go
do my thing. It just happened to work out.

Speaker 3 (22:14):
You walk in, You're like, hey, you guys fucking called me.

Speaker 1 (22:17):
Yeah, exactly.

Speaker 3 (22:19):
Exactly.

Speaker 1 (22:20):
What was wild about it was that the episode aired
and the next morning I got a phone call from
my agents saying, we just got a call from Casting
and Production at All my Children and they saw you
on Hunter last night and they want to audition and
screen test you for a contract role on All my Children.

Speaker 3 (22:43):
Now, they had been looking for somebody for a while
for this role. Right, three months, that's a while.

Speaker 1 (22:49):
I'm surprised, you know that.

Speaker 3 (22:50):
But that's like one hundred episodes in soaproper.

Speaker 1 (22:54):
World, exactly. It is. They had screen tested like thirty people.
And over the years I met some of the people
who had screen tests and they're like, yeah, you got
my role. I was like, no, I got my role.

Speaker 3 (23:07):
Sorry yeah, sorry, no, you didn't get my rottle.

Speaker 1 (23:14):
Yeah. From the night that Hunter aired, I think within
three weeks or so, I was living in New York.

Speaker 3 (23:21):
Oh wow, olly, that's fast.

Speaker 1 (23:24):
It happened fast. I went and met casting. I did
what I did a few days later, I was in
New York screen testing. Back then, the screen test, you know,
it was done after hours I think it still might be,
but it was done after hours. They had to pay
overtime to all the crew. It's a big production, so
it you know, cust them like ten grand to do

(23:44):
the screen test and they had done like thirty.

Speaker 3 (23:47):
Already, so they that is so many. That is a lot.

Speaker 1 (23:50):
And you know, I just brought something different, very specific
and very different, and I know that's why I got
the role, you know, just something that I started the
whole scene off with. But it was very fat. I
was at the airport waiting to come back to LA
and I checked my answering machine. It was them. I

(24:12):
called them back. They said, so how quickly can you
get packed because we need you back here next week
to start filling the nice Yeah, you know, I had
a few days to find a place to live, get
a phone line, set up power. So it was a whirlwind,
but it was a fun ride.

Speaker 3 (24:31):
When something like that happens. Do they have people that
can help you with all of that other stuff? Like
do they have people who can help you find an apartment,
help you get all your utilities and all that set up?
Like is there a person who like is a liaison
or some sort of a concierge help in that area.
Because you're on the other side of the country. You
don't know any of those things.

Speaker 1 (24:49):
You know what, everything was happening so fast. I never
thought to ask.

Speaker 3 (24:54):
That makes sense.

Speaker 1 (24:55):
They put me up in a hotel for maybe two
weeks or two give me time in between filmings. You know,
I was walking around looking for realtors and looking at
classified ads, and you know, I ended up getting cool
studio apartment in a fifty four story high rise on
the thirty third floor. Nice apartment, number thirty three C.

(25:18):
I'll never forget that.

Speaker 3 (25:19):
I'll check you out.

Speaker 1 (25:21):
Yeah, one four West sixtieth Street, right across from Florida University.

Speaker 3 (25:28):
This dude, look at this guy remembering stuff.

Speaker 1 (25:30):
It was a milestone.

Speaker 3 (25:32):
Yeah it was. Okay, so let's talk about milestone. So
you were sharing an apartment with your at the time
best friend, this hunter Airs, and then you get this
all my children thing. Maybe that's why he got mad,
because you got all my children and he got a commercial.

Speaker 1 (25:52):
Well, you know what, that was a cool commercial. I mean,
I fucking love that commercial.

Speaker 3 (25:56):
But I'm not gonna lie. That's a cool commercial.

Speaker 1 (25:59):
Cool, But you know, it was a cool commercial. Just
to clarify, we weren't sharing an apartment at the time.
The day of the Hunter audition, I happened to be
hanging at his apartment, got you, I remember, right. I
had moved back in to an extra room at my
mom's for a while because I just couldn't make ends
meet degreasing car motors and.

Speaker 3 (26:21):
Whatnot, Hey listeners for a time in between jobs. Matt
decreased car engines as a job. What does that mean?

Speaker 1 (26:30):
What auto detailing? But getting a little more into it,
you know, before you had all these really soup to
nuts high end you know, even mobile detailing things where
they come and basically fucking fumigate your car if you want.
I used to go to like rental car agencies with
another buddy and we would you know, try and make

(26:52):
a package deal and we would be in there with
you know, toothbrushes, just literally scrubbing every nook and cranny
a motor, you know, with decreasing formula and all that,
you know, to give that feeling of having cleaned it
from the true inside out.

Speaker 3 (27:08):
Should have knocked on Jay Leno's door, Geez can still
be there?

Speaker 1 (27:13):
Okay, I could have probably financed my own Megalopolis if
I had become his right hand man.

Speaker 3 (27:22):
I'm sure. Okay, all my children? How long were you
on all my children?

Speaker 1 (27:26):
A little over two years? Now. I had to originally
signed a two year contract. The standard was three years,
but I was a little hesitant about. You know, again,
I was twenty three when I started, so I was
a little hesitant about that three year commitment. That would
have been the longest relationship of my life at that
point outside of my parents, you know. So as two

(27:49):
years was coming to an end, and you know, it
was always so much drama with Kelly Rippa. I love
you Hailey, but please Haley. It was, you know, saying
I love you Haley, like forty teen times as a day.
The drama was too much and the attention was really
too much for me. I mean when I wanted to
be an actor, I wanted to be an actor. I've

(28:10):
never been in this to have that you know, Tom
Cruise experience where you can't go anywhere without being Tom Cruise,
you know what I mean.

Speaker 3 (28:20):
Yeah, he was here yesterday, was he? Yeah? In San
Antonio right dropping by the movie theaters and yeah, telling
everybody thank you and whatnot.

Speaker 1 (28:28):
Yeah, you know what a pure dynamo. That guy is.
There's only one Tom Cruise. We got so much attention
in New York back then. I mean, the stories were
the shit. Susan Lucci was bigger than movie stars, you
know what I mean. Yeah, on a daily basis, walking
from a studio to my apartment at the end of

(28:48):
the day, I would just get swarmed and it was
just too much attention for me. I couldn't process it.
And then when I started getting too personal fan mail,
you know, it was just too much for me. And
when they kind of assumed that I was going to
stay there, I mean, we were so popular, who in
his right mind would leave at the height of his popularity.

(29:12):
Right when they didn't approach me like early about renewing
the contract and all that, part of me just figured, well,
I guess it's not that important to them. But also,
my friend and PR Cindy, just wants to just bonk
me on the head all the time, because I guess
the idea of doing PR and interviews and all that

(29:36):
is to pump the products.

Speaker 3 (29:38):
The brand.

Speaker 1 (29:39):
Yeah, yeah, but it drives nuts sometimes that I like
a very humble under the radar mentality and life and everything. Yes,
I've had some interesting highs, I've had some very awful lows,
and I just want the peaceful glide. I didn't really

(30:02):
understand how valuable I was to the machine at the time,
because I didn't see myself as you know, mister hotshit.
I just, you know, saw myself as a guy lucky
that he's doing what he loves to do, being able
to ride his hardly onto a baseball diamond for a

(30:24):
you know, a charity softball event and having these cool experiences,
but kind of wanting to shun the attention. So anyway,
I mean, that's a lot of verbal diarrhea for you know,
the people who haven't already said, you know what, fuck
this guy. He talks too much. I didn't recognize my

(30:45):
value to the machine, and so they were very upset
when they came saying, hey, it's time to talk. I
was like, I'm leaving in like two weeks. No, what
are you talking about. So I ended up having to
give them a little extra time so that they could,
you know, And the pressure was coming from everywhere the network,
from you know, William Morris at the time, Agnes Nixon,

(31:08):
Capital Cities. Everyone was saying, you can't leave but I
was like, yes, I can. They were able to find
someone for the interim to at least finish out the
Brian Boudine storyline. Then you know they had to cast
a new love interest for her, a new character, and
you know they named him after me. My real name

(31:29):
is Matteo and that was Mark Nzuellos. So, as I've
said several times, Kelly, Mark, you're welcome. You owe your
empire to me quitting the show.

Speaker 3 (31:40):
Did you get invited to the wedding?

Speaker 1 (31:42):
No? What? No?

Speaker 3 (31:45):
Oh, I'm going to make a call right now.

Speaker 1 (31:48):
Yeah, you know whoever it didn't invite me? That person
but shall be sacked. I think you know, listen, there's
such a powerhouse couple. It's you know, you don't see
that very often most never. Yeah, I'm so thrilled for them,
And yeah, what if I had stayed on the show.
But do I regret No, Again, some of my experiences

(32:11):
makes me the person I am, makes me the dad
of three kids that I love more than anything. So
any different decision, I don't have my kids, and I
think that's a fair trade.

Speaker 3 (32:24):
Love it.

Speaker 4 (32:28):
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Speaker 3 (32:32):
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(32:53):
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Speaker 4 (33:13):
Let's get back into it.

Speaker 1 (33:18):
Now.

Speaker 3 (33:19):
If you had said yes to all my children to extend,
they would have made you a literal millionaire. Do you
ever regret I mean, I know you don't regret the
decision as a whole, but sometimes so you just wish
you'd stayed down for a little bit longer.

Speaker 1 (33:35):
I mean, again, that's one of those what is And
I'm you do your research, Steve, and that's pretty cool.
I mean, how you know that's the second or third
time that you've brought something up that was spot on
and fact. Yeah, I would have been a literal millionaire.
But you know what, not too long ago, my sag

(33:58):
earnings history and everything, because that's available online towards pension
and all that. Over the course of my career, I
did make over a million dollars as an actor. So
it was over many years, but I'm able to say
that as an actor, I'm one of those very, very

(34:19):
very few actors who literally and actually made over one
million dollars just acting. So it was kind of a
kind of a cool thing for me to realize. And
I mentioned it to my wife. She's like, yeah, where
is it.

Speaker 3 (34:35):
I was like, don't ask me, ask uncle Sam. Yeah,
there's a bunch of things I want to talk about.
So we're going to have to We're going to have
to move past all my children. As awesome as it was,
this is a weird thing for me to say as
a whole sentence, but you participated in fifty two autopsies.

(34:56):
Why you know that too. I know everything about you
man currently.

Speaker 1 (35:02):
Why because I created a docu series type show that
originally I had TITLEDDA The gist of it was what led.

Speaker 5 (35:13):
Up to this person's death, and I thought that the
most interesting thing would be the Las Vegas coroner and
the stories that happened out of Las Vegas.

Speaker 1 (35:25):
And you know, a good friend of mine at the
time lived there. Once I laid it out for him,
you know, then we started. He started handling a lot
of the stuff in Vegas. And Mike Murphy was the
coroner that we approached, and part of getting the trust
of the coroner's office and to see that, you know,
I was a legit person, you know, that wasn't trying

(35:48):
to do an exploitive thing. It was about not just
the people and the remains of the people coming through
the coroner's office, but the people at the coroner's office
and how re experience affected them in different ways. Part
of that research and trust building was actually being gowned up,

(36:11):
gloved up, masked up, hairneted up everything and being in
the autopsy suite participating, you know, not just filming before
the actual show, and you know, the big budget stuff
came in filming with my little personal camera so I
could put together a sizzle reel. But actually, you know,
holding the organs, experiencing those moments, and you know, there

(36:35):
were some tough ones. You know, the suicides were tough,
The toddlers were tough, the overdoses. A couple particular suicides
that I remember vividly and made very heavy impressions on me.
And then you know, two toddlers in one day, and
you know, drownings when all the police are there too

(36:56):
because it's a child we are talking about, and they
have to be able to rule out family. So I
mean tough days. I remember one suicide over a woman
and you all, just his own personal mental health issues
and just leaned onto a shotgun with his chest and
just liquefied himself inside. It's just to get into their head,

(37:19):
and you know, just try to put yourself in their
head and think that's what it came to, to lean
onto a shotgun barrel and reach down and pull that trigger.
It aired as a one hour special on A and
E Networks LMN. They renamed it. You know, once it
was sold to A and E. You know, I was
executive producer and creator, but they don't give you the

(37:41):
creative credit in reality TV series. But it's called post
Mortem in Vegas. I think DA was a cooler name.
Post Mortem in Vegas is a little wordy for my taste.
But I actually I have it still and I watched it,
you know, in the last year. Again, it's still just
a fascinating show. And Mike Murphy was such a fascinating guy.

(38:04):
He retired now, but he cared so much about these people,
and you know, the unsolved were the ones that just really.

Speaker 3 (38:14):
Hit him up.

Speaker 1 (38:15):
Yeah, So if you're interested in those kinds of shows,
I'd be happy to send it to you and you
could watch it.

Speaker 3 (38:21):
It's it's an hour cool as hell. Yeah, definitely send
that to me for sure. My wife and I watch
the Datelines in the twenty twenties and the shits like that,
So Forensic five, yeah, I think that'd be super cool.
We're going to switch to a different beat. Okay, We're
going to switch to can You Feel the Beat? The
Lisa Lisa's story. Tell me how you became involved in

(38:43):
Can You Feel the Beat that Lisa Lisa. Now, this
is Lisa Lisa from Colt jam Right.

Speaker 1 (38:47):
Yeah, it's the true story of Lisa, Lisa and Colt
jam and her and Tony Minaj, their childhood, their aspirations,
the tough childhood home, LIFs that they had, lives that
they had. It just was presented to me as a
Lifetime movie, and you know, Lifetime is pretty cool, but

(39:11):
you know, they're known kind of as far as there
are movies for like titles like My ex Poison, my
Dog or you know, stuff like that. So I wasn't
too sure, let's just put it that way about the project,
until I learned that it was you know, really it
was part of this series of women in music, and

(39:33):
there were going to be three movies and one was
going to be about Lisa. Lisa in Cultchum and you
know that was my era. I remember, you know, all
the songs, at least all the more popular songs. When
I learned that it was a true story and I
would be playing a version of a real person, I thought,

(39:53):
hell yeah, let's go for it. It was really cool that,
you know, the real Lisa Vellez and Tony Mana were
involved in on the production side of it as well,
and Lisa played her own mom in the movie love
that your Nest Corciado was just great as Lisa Breezy,
you know from I Think Empire and whatnot. She played

(40:17):
Tony Minaj, and you know, I was convinced that she
actually hated me for you know, most of the production.
It was really cool to be able to go to
Lisa and Tony and say, look, as it's written, this
guy feels very weak. I've never used the word darling
in my life. It's very British and you know, very

(40:41):
forties movies. Darling, what do you think of this darling?
You know what I mean. I would go to them,
I'd say, look this part here are you okay with
kind of making him more manly and more more of
an asshole, and there were please, yes, please do anything.
You know, your vibe is so right on, go for it,

(41:01):
go for it. So it was really cool to have
that kind of freedom because I wanted to, you know,
this was a retelling of their experience. I wanted to
if I could, you know, make it even a little
bit more emotional for them. But I also had to
walk a fine line because the guy had in real
life had passed away already, and you know, if his

(41:23):
family was going to be watching. I didn't want to
present him as a total asshole. I wanted to, you know,
almost make him like a guy you love to hate,
you know, where you could have a laugh with him.
So when I improved stuff, you know, gave him a
certain energy that wasn't scripted. There was one thing where,
you know, he had lines that sounded so pussified, like

(41:48):
you know, oh my gosh, I was almost assaulted by
a group of youths.

Speaker 3 (41:54):
The young toughs. They almost got me.

Speaker 1 (41:57):
Yeah, yeah, And I went to Lisa.

Speaker 3 (41:59):
I was like, I can't, I can't, I can't say
these words come on now.

Speaker 1 (42:04):
Yeah. And so what I'm thinking, because I walk in
on her in mid conversation at the character Lisa, I'm thinking,
you know what about like, this city's so crazy. I
almost had to scrap with you know, a bunch of
thugs or whatever the word was that I used outside.

Speaker 3 (42:22):
The hoodlums and ruffians.

Speaker 1 (42:24):
Yeah, whatever the word words. But you know, walking in
it felt very like kind of Ari on Entourage, you know,
you know, where he's just kind of like always like
this and whatnot. So I walked in saying this city's
so crazy. I almost had to scrap, you know, and
turn it into you know, and it made it funny

(42:47):
when you're watching, but it's so changed. You know that
the intention was still the same, but it's so changed.
You know, there's like feeling like, oh my gosh, I
was terrified to hey, let's go for it, throwing contracts
in front of her son. You know, it just made
it a much more fun character to play. And I'll
end it by saying, you know what, watching it, I

(43:09):
was proud of the end product, and it was a
cool experience and proud, you know. I mean, these are
legends in their own right in the music business. To
be part of telling the Lisa Lisa story.

Speaker 3 (43:21):
Cool beans, that's amazing. For all of the listeners who
happened to be in the academy, feel free to nominate
our boy for an Emmy. Let's get it done, son.

Speaker 1 (43:33):
The cool thing was, you know, I was nominated for
an Emmy for All my Children back then in ninety three,
and I had already left the show by then, so
I didn't really have all that much insider support, if
you know what I mean, because yeah, I'm sure two
months earlier I had won the soap opera di just award,
and again in my total lack of awareness as to

(43:56):
the machine part of it and everything. You know, I
was so shocked, number one, that I won over some
of the daytime heavies as it were back then, that
as I was giving my speech instead of just saying
thank you and that and it's been a great time
and everything, I'm sitting there, you know, stroking the award

(44:16):
like it's you know, like it's phallic, and I'm sitting there,
you know, she whiz and you know, a lot of
you may know that. You know, I decided to leave
and go see what else is out there, and you know,
not the way I would have done it. Again, let's
put it that way. If I had won the enemy

(44:36):
back then, it would have been a much more uplifting
instead of depressing speech. So the thing with the Emmys
is that my category is a very convoluted category. They
include short form series. So like this adolescence series that

(44:57):
people are raving about, and you know, I I saw
a couple of episodes of it and it's really and
you know, Brad Pitt is one of the producers. I mean,
it's like this heavyweight, you know, short form series eight
or ten episodes. So you have movies, the short form series,
and special programs all in one category. So how is

(45:19):
the guy on a lifetime movie supposed to compete with
a Brad Pitt production that the kid in the adolescent
series is, you know, being ballyhood as potentially the youngest
EMI winner of all time. It's like, you know, why
wouldn't movies have their own category? Make it a little

(45:40):
more fair. Let's face it, too many Apple TV series
and high profile projects are competing with little old me,
But I am in their lifetime for your consideration, and
it would be really really cool just to be nominated.
I would never expect to win, but just to be nominated.
I kind to bring that bull circle from you know,

(46:03):
nineteen ninety three to twenty twenty five. Yeah, I call
it a comeback, you know, because I was kind of
gone for a while there several years ago. But fortunately,
you know, between Cobra Kai and other things, you know,
I've been working fairly steadily, or at least making appearances

(46:24):
fairly steadily over the last few years. So you can't
rely only on acting as an actor. I mean, my
life and I both do health and life insurance sales,
which gives me the opportunity to actually help people outside
of just entertaining people. You know, I do have projects

(46:44):
that are in the works. There's a pilot that's out
there being shopped right.

Speaker 3 (46:48):
Now with Big Daddy Kane.

Speaker 1 (46:51):
Yeah, and if things come together as everyone hopes, you know,
then I'm a serious regular again. And there's another pilot
that you know, I'm also a producer on. There are
two others actually called Townsend and Letters to Addie. Townsend
I played the title character, and Letters to Addie I
played a supporting role both of those. You know. I

(47:13):
was asked to be a producer as filming progressed. And
there's an unscripted thing that I created and wrote and
we'll start pitching once I find the right literary agent
to work with, say unscripted, No, it is scripted. Oh okay,
this is a scripted thing, a one hour crime show

(47:34):
atf ATF Yeah. Yeah, wow, okay, okay.

Speaker 3 (47:42):
A couple of quick questions, because like I feel like
I'm taking up your whole day. Are you in the
middle of writing a memoir? Are you halfway through writing
a memoir? Tell me about if you're ever going to
write a memoir.

Speaker 1 (47:54):
I am about eight or nine chapters in What. Well, yeah,
I kind of for a while because I wasn't sure
it's something i'd want my kids to be reading at
a certain age because I don't hold anything back.

Speaker 3 (48:09):
Oh cool, send me those pages.

Speaker 1 (48:15):
There's a lot of very poor lifestyle choices that I'm
very candid about. There are definitely versions of me that
don't exist anymore but still are part of my history.
I made bad choices, I did bad things, And if
the right situation comes along that warrants my writing the

(48:36):
rest of it, then I will the right publishing deal
comes along. My kids are older enough now at least,
you know, the boys aren't ten anymore. They're fifteen now.
My daughter's nineteen now, about to turn twenty in a
couple of months. So if the right circumstances fall into place,
because there's a certain value to it as far as no,

(49:00):
not just a memoir, but a million little pieces less
than zero, that type of thing. I haven't read Matthew
Perry's book. You know, I watched a really interesting documentary
on him, and you know, there was a lot of
voiceover from his book in it, but not that much.
So I don't know how far into it. He got,

(49:22):
you know, as far as like I imagine there was some
pretty dirty shit that he was, you know, involved in,
because it kind of goes with that, you know, lifestyle.
But I know how far I go into it and
how dirty the life that one can live when mixed
up with the kind of things I was mixed up with,

(49:43):
can be. So the title alone is okay. So I'm
not sure if I want this out there because it
would be very easy for someone to steal. But I'll
tell you what it is.

Speaker 3 (49:54):
I'll bleep it. Oh, kick ass. That is an enticing title.

Speaker 1 (49:59):
Yeah, we see that on the bookshelves and the bookstores.
You're like, what's that?

Speaker 3 (50:05):
That sounds awesome?

Speaker 4 (50:06):
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(51:20):
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(51:43):
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(52:04):
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Speaker 4 (52:21):
Let's get back into it.

Speaker 3 (52:26):
We didn't talk about it really, but ladies and gentlemen
more recently and more notably, you know Matt from Cobra Kai.
He's the pawn shop guy in all of the seasons.
I think there was one season you weren't in, but
you were in the rest of them, and you were
even in the last episode if I understand correctly, right.

Speaker 1 (52:44):
Yeah, I was, so I wasn't in season four for
storyline purposes. Johnny didn't need my help or money or whatever.
But you know, the cool thing about that role is
while it was you know, always like one episode of
season one scene, really you know, one of them had
two scenes in the same episode I think if I

(53:04):
remember right, and then two episodes in season six. The
cool thing about it was that the scene that I
had with Johnny in every episode always kind of informed
his path from that point forward, the overarching storyline for
him for that season. So it was really really cool

(53:28):
use of me. I never expected to be more than
the first season, to be honest, but I guess, you know,
the way I played this guy, they liked it enough
that they wanted more. You know. I feel very blessed
that people reacted so strongly. And funny story last night,
one of my sons and my wife and I went
to uh Pitzeria twenty five minutes from our neighborhood. The server,

(53:53):
young lady was like, oh, hey, you know, I know you.
You know you've been in here a bunch of times,
haven't you, And I said, no, this is our first time.
You know. I just have one of those faces and
left it at that, because first time someone says something
I'm not you know again, I'm very under the radar.
I'm not like, oh, well you must watch Cobra Kai

(54:16):
or you maybe watch it, you know, I just that's
not me.

Speaker 3 (54:19):
Whenever that happens to me, I just tell them we
went to high school together.

Speaker 1 (54:23):
Right.

Speaker 3 (54:23):
They could be thirty years older or younger than me,
and I still say the same thing, like, now, we
went to high school together. That's where you know me from.

Speaker 1 (54:30):
Yeah. On the flip side, typically I'll be like, well,
I don't think we went to high school together and
leave it at that. But towards you know, the end,
when I was asking for the check, she said, you know,
it just it's driving me crazy, you know, because I
know I know you. And my wife spoke up and
she said, do you watch Cobra Kai And she was, oh, yes,

(54:53):
I knew it. I knew it. That's you're the paunch
up guy. And I ended up doing a selfie because
she was talking about her parents love the show and
she can't wait to tell them. And my wife said, well,
whyn't you do a selfie? And you know, a selfie
turned into what are your parents' names? You know, I
did a selfie video and I was like, hey, something

(55:13):
in Maria Beneferio or something in Maria. Hey, it's Matt,
your friendly neighborhood Cobra Kai poundshop guy. I'm hanging out
here with your daughter Jackie and she's awesome, And thank
you so much for watching the show. So to have
you know, that kind of like mellow and cool interaction
from a role that wasn't really supposed to initially be much.

(55:36):
I've been really grateful and the fact that they had
me in the season finale when they really didn't have to,
you know, in my opinion, again humbly thinking they don't
need me. I mean the show will and just fine
with the big finale and everything for them to go
to the lengths they went to to rent a space
and hire ninety extras or whatnot, and you know, make

(55:59):
this whole seeing around just me and you know, the
mini Mark Guy character, just us watching the big contest
and the big finale on a bar TV and all
that stuff. I mean, it was just that's me beating
my chest like out of gratitude. That was an enormous

(56:20):
honor to me and the characters. How much we meant
to the show for them to do that and go
to all that trouble just to have us one more
time on the series beIN Holly episode.

Speaker 3 (56:33):
I love that. I think the only other person I've
had from that show is Jesse Cove, Marty's kid. Right,
There's one last thing I want to talk about before
I let you go. Skate Rat. Oh, tell me about
skate rat, my man.

Speaker 1 (56:47):
All right, So skate rat. I used to skate when
I was a kid with my buddies and me too.
We were skate rats and we knew it.

Speaker 3 (56:56):
Who was your guy?

Speaker 1 (56:57):
I'm a mix of all three, cool, crash and dumpy.
I am a mix of all three. I mean, injury prone,
thinking I'm cool, you know at the time, and then
you know, always kind of a mess. I mean, I'm
I'm looking down and you know, I don't even know
how I cut myself, and I've just realized I have

(57:17):
blood on my shirt. You know, I'm always a mess
in one.

Speaker 3 (57:20):
Where I wasn't gonna say anything.

Speaker 1 (57:23):
Well, you know, I don't hide why I'm right here
and playing sight. So skate rat was always kind of,
you know, a derogatory term that I came to learn later,
and I thought, why, you know, And one day I
was driving years ago. I was driving and I look
over and I see some kids, you know, doing their
tricks on you know, on a street corner with some steps,

(57:46):
and I was like, look at the the little skate
rats and I thought, you know what, Yeah, I need
to do something finally, you know, because my kids were
at the age where they were watching Backyardigans a lot,
and I thought, you know what if I create these characters,
and there is the intention the t shirts and stickers

(58:07):
and everything, if the fan appeal, you know, if the
user friendliness proves to be what I think it will be,
or hope at least it will be, then yes, an
animated series where the rats go on an adventure every
episode and learn some kind of valuable life lesson and
come away from it a little better than they were

(58:30):
at the start of the episode. You know what I mean.
It's not rocket science. You look at most kids shows
and all that, and you know there's always that kind
of formula adventure, lesson, move on, happy to have learned it.
So I think the skate Rats are really cool. And
you know, you got to have Sweepee. I used to

(58:50):
call my daughter Sweepy, so when I was thinking what
am I going to name the girl at Sweepye, I
think they have a lot of appeal. And I went
to at skate park a few weeks ago now with
some stickers, just as a tester. I only had one
sticker made of crash love it, you know, like a
board sticker, whatever you want to do with it. Now,

(59:12):
I have a sticker on my rear window, my wife's
rear window, my daughter's were a window, mother in law's
were a window. So I went to a skate park
and I took the stickers, and I took images of
each of the characters, and I asked kids and their parents, hey, listen.
It didn't hurt also that they were recognizing me from

(59:33):
Cobra KAII sure, So I was asking them, Look, I
just have a question for you. Yeah I'm on Cobra
Kai and thank you for watching. But I've created, you know,
these characters and these buddies, and I want to make
being a skate rat cool instead of like a bad word.
What do you think of these characters? Who's your favorite?

(59:54):
And if you saw T shirts and stickers and skate
shops and everything, would you get them? They all to
a t. You know that even the parents were like,
we like them, Yeah, those are great. You got to
do that, and I was like, thank you so much.
I want to give you. How many stickers do you want? Well,
you put these on your boards and they're like hell yeah.

(01:00:16):
And every kid I gave out like twenty five thirty.
Every kid put them on their boards as they were
there at the skate park. That's kind of a big thing,
you know. I remember when I was doing board stickers.
You only put on the stickers that meant something to you,
just put one on for the sake of having a sticker.
You took your time to decide what's going to make

(01:00:39):
the board.

Speaker 3 (01:00:40):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (01:00:40):
So the fact that you know, all these kids were
like oh yeah, oh yeah, and you know, just slapping
them right on it gave me a nice feeling of
optimism that there's a future for the rats.

Speaker 3 (01:00:53):
What is your plan? How do you plan to release these? Like,
what are you gonna do?

Speaker 1 (01:00:57):
You know what, I have a really well presented business
plan for it. But I've always been kind of the
you know, the grassroots kind of thinker. You know, I
welcome ideas if you have them. But you know, Cindy
wants to talk to like QVC, have me go on
QBC showing samples and see it. You know see about

(01:01:20):
building that. Cindy is a big thinker, and you know,
I really liked the idea of going to a skate
park and seeing what the you know, real immediate reaction was,
and that gave me the you know, the confidence that,
you know, whatever Cindy wants to try, I'm game because
it's not like we can fall flat on our face.

(01:01:42):
But then again, this is based on one two hour
session at a skate park. I need to do more
of those, you know, if you have ideas, I'm open
to ideas.

Speaker 3 (01:01:54):
I certainly don't yea, I might do.

Speaker 1 (01:01:58):
A crowd fun thing, but I don't really know what
I would offer other than you know, merchandise. I have
a friend from high school who has been in this
business for years and years.

Speaker 3 (01:02:14):
And the clothing business, yeah.

Speaker 1 (01:02:17):
Clothing, T shirts. He launched a really big brand for
a while called Kickwear Kik. You know, he does his
other stuff now and he's also a consultant to a
lot of companies. He said, listen, who is the team.
I mean, that's the biggest thing. It's going to cost
some money and if you raise the funds, yeah, I'm in.

(01:02:40):
I'll help you build this and we'll team up together.

Speaker 6 (01:02:43):
So as with anything else, it's always some kind of
funding issue, you know, whether it's getting ATF put to
film or getting skate rat launched, there's always you know
the issue.

Speaker 1 (01:02:57):
Of funding and trying to figure it out. So I
need to put him together with a guy I know
who might be interested in actually funding it, so that
they can see, all right, there's enough experience and money
to make this firm thing. And then I maybe I
don't have to, you know, try going to big stores

(01:03:17):
right away to get attention, you know, because you still
have to fulfill orders.

Speaker 3 (01:03:21):
Yeah, where can people find out more about skate rat?
And is it? Is it our att it is?

Speaker 1 (01:03:27):
It's a skate rat with tut's. The website is not
live yet. The domain is live with just you know,
like a placeholder until I'm ready to actually start putting
the money into a real website with a commerce aspect
to it, you know, being able to sell online. I

(01:03:47):
believe right now Cindy is talking with and that's Cindy Meisch.
I believe Cindy is talking with a T shirt printer,
you know, near her in Wisconsin. Years ago, I hired
an artists to put to paper the pen in my
head and what I want, and then I have the
artwork that can be applied. You just send it to

(01:04:09):
a printer, like the way I had the stickers made,
just you know, a couple of months ago. So I
will speak more about skate rat when there's more to
speak about Gotcha.

Speaker 3 (01:04:20):
Is there a social media component to skate rat like
does is there a skate rat Instagram or anything like that.

Speaker 1 (01:04:25):
There is a Facebook page just skate rat capital as
capital are Gotcha and then it shows the images and
a little quick blurb about how I came up with it,
But you know, I didn't get into, you know, the
character breakdowns on the page. Again, as more comes to

(01:04:46):
talk about, then I'll put more out there in the world.
But I really love the skate rats, and I think
that what I've seen of the way kids react to them,
I think a lot of people are going to love
them eventually.

Speaker 3 (01:04:59):
Love it. Matt bor Langy from everything from all my
children to Hunter Cobra Kai and even can you Feel
the Beat the Lisa Lisa's story? My goodness, dude, this
has been a blast. Where can people find more about
you on social media and the things you're working on?

Speaker 1 (01:05:17):
What on Facebook, I'm just Matt Borlangy b O r
l E n g h I. On Instagram Cobra Kai
Pond Guy TikTok same thing, Cobra Kai pon Guy Blue Sky,
Cobra Kai Pond Guy Red's Cobra Kai pon Guy. I

(01:05:39):
don't do uh. I xed x a while ago. But yeah,
that's it. I do have a YouTube, the Cobra Kai
Podcast page, because I've thought for a while now of
you know, doing some kind of podcast myself. I just
know too little about it. I just don't know what
I would do, but I wanted to make sure to

(01:06:01):
own Cobra Kai.

Speaker 3 (01:06:02):
Podcast for sure. Yeah. Well it's not hard. You can
do it. It's fun, it's easy.

Speaker 1 (01:06:08):
He's gonna want to talk to me, you know, I mean.

Speaker 3 (01:06:11):
Everybody who's in that book. Oh my gosh, Matt Merlingy, dude,
thank you so much for taking the time out of
your busy day and your hectic acting, creating skate merch
and writing your own memoir schedule to hang out and
let us get to know you a little bit better
on Fascination Street Man. I really appreciate it.

Speaker 1 (01:06:32):
I am grateful and present and honored to be here
with you, Steve. And that's a big thing being present.
I cut out all the bad stuff of the past,
and I'm proud of it. And the biggest thing is
just trying to be best dad and husband and I
can be. And you know, the rest of it was
into place the way it's suposted.

Speaker 3 (01:06:53):
There was a podcast a while back called The Nerdist
who was hosted by Chris Hardwick and a couple of
other dudes, and one of the things that they really
talked about focused a lot on They would say, enjoy
your burrito, and what they meant was enjoy the moment,
like be present in the moment, Like if you're eating
a burrito, enjoy the burrito while you're eating it. Don't

(01:07:15):
be doing something else. And then be like, what, I
ate a burrito and I wasn't even paying attention. So
I love that you're enjoying the present, you're in the
moment that you're at that place in your life. And
if we could all get there, Oh what a wonderful world.

Speaker 1 (01:07:28):
Happy belated birthday again.

Speaker 3 (01:07:32):
Oh thank you, Happy birthday in the future to you,
my friend. Thanks, Happy prelated birthday. I don't that's not
a word now eluded.

Speaker 1 (01:07:42):
Oh yeah sure, but yeah, thanks for thanks for taking
time with me. I'll talk to you again another time, verybody.

Speaker 3 (01:07:50):
We'll keep in touch. Thank you so much, Matt. It
was one hundred percent of my pleasure and you have
a grave rest of your week. Man, Bye, buddy bye.
Opening music is the song fsp theme, written, performed and
provided by Ambush Vin. Closing music is from the song

(01:08:15):
say My Name off the twenty twenty one album Underdog Anthems,
used with permission from Jack's Olive. If you like the show,
tell a friend, subscribe and rate and review the show
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to subscribe to my YouTube channel. All the episodes are

(01:08:38):
available there as well. Check me out on the vero
at Fascination Street Pod and TikTok at Fascination Street Pod
and again, thanks for listening.