Yul Vazquez - Painter / Photographer / Musician / Actor

Yul Vazquez
Take a walk with me down Fascination Street, as I get to know Yul Vazquez. Born in Havana, Yul and all of the women in his family escaped Fidel Castro's Cuba to make a new life in Miami Beach, Florida. In this episode, Yul and I chat about how difficult it was for his mother, and grandmother to relocate to a new country with two children: having no money, no job, and not speaking the language. He shares how impactful those women, that experience and those early times were in influencing his life moving forward. I bring up some of the thought processes behind Yul's work as a painter, and as a photographer. We even discuss some specific pieces that I am madly in love with. Next. I pepper him with questions about his music career, where he was signed to TWO different major record labels, under TWO different bands; all before he even thought about becoming an actor. Also, I get him to tell me how he became such good friends with some of music's most iconic players. Yul is great friends with so many of the folks that we all grew up listening to, including: Judas Priest's Rob Halford, The Cult's Ian Astbury, and Maynard James Keenan (Tool / Pucifer / Sessanta 2.0). Yul shares tales of how he came to be the guitarist for the bands Urgent & Diving For Pearls; before being told by a psychic that he would become a successful actor! We go all over the place in this interview. I question him about his member ship in a character actor dinner club that is comprised of about a dozen of his friends; some who are previous guests of my show are. I even get Yul to tell me what he got his wife for their 23rd wedding anniversary, which was about a week after we recorded this conversation. We talk about what made him and some other Latino actor friends start The LAByrinth Theater Company in New York. Finally, I ask all the questions I can about his work on Seinfeld, Magic City, and of course Severance. Yul is such an amazing talent in all areas. Check out his website YulZavquez.com for more insight into his painting and photography and catch Yul on just about every television show or film out there. (Side note, we do talk a bit about a baseball cap that he designed, that I think is slick, and stylish. For more information about that, you may need to hit him up on Instagram.)

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
This is Jule Vasquez and you're listening to Fascination Street
Podcast with your host, the great Steve Owens. Yeah. Yes,
the amp.

Speaker 2 (00:15):
Visual down the most interests street in the world with
my voice Steve, Fascination Street.

Speaker 3 (00:20):
You already knows when you went for the Fascination Street.

Speaker 2 (00:23):
Welcome back to street Walkers. This episode is with Yule Vasquez.
Youle is a Tony Award nominated actor who you have
seen in everything from Seinfeld to Severance, to Magic City
and so much more. I do bring up those specific
three projects because those are all near and dear to

(00:44):
my heart. But you is also a painter, a photographer,
and he has created one of the coolest ball caps
I've ever seen. We do talk about the hat, and
we talk about his painting and his photography, as well
as getting to know how he came to be an actor.
Born in Cuba, Yule, his mother, his sister, and his

(01:06):
grandmother escaped Castro's Cuba and You just wanted to be
a guitar player. He just wanted to be Jimmy Page
when he grew up, so naturally, as with all talented people,
you can't hold him back. He was in two different
bands signed to two different major record labels before he
even became an actor. So we talk about some of

(01:27):
that life and the music part of his life, some
of his friends that he has met along the way,
which blew my mind. And then we talk about his acting,
how he got into acting, who helped him get there,
and what it was like on some of the sets
of the projects that I mentioned. And also, as we
record this, just a couple of days away is the
twenty third anniversary of him and his wife, Linda Larkin.

(01:49):
You know her as Princess Jasmine. That's right. Not only
is Yuovaskiez an amazing actor, guitarist, painter, photographer, hat designer,
but he's also married to a real life Disney princess.
Good lord, this guy is amazing. We had so much fun.
We talk about everything. He shares stories, I share stories

(02:11):
about his stories. It's so weird. I probably shared more
stories about his friends than he did. Yule Vosquez is
an amazing talent. I love this dude, and this is
my conversation with guitarists, painter, photographer, and actor Yule Vasquez.
For credit, be fascinating Forgreda, be fascinating.

Speaker 1 (02:37):
For Creda be fascinating.

Speaker 2 (02:41):
Welcome to Fascination Street Podcast. Eule Vasquez. How you doing,
tod Amen?

Speaker 1 (02:45):
Hey man, I'm really good, brother. How you doing?

Speaker 2 (02:49):
I cannot complain, Ladies and gentlemen. This is the great
and powerful Wizard of Oh no, this is yule Vosquez.
The same thing. This dude's amazing and y'all can't see it,
but he's wearing one of my favorite hats. Is that hat?
One of your creations? Did you make that?

Speaker 1 (03:04):
It is on the side. You see what it says
on the side.

Speaker 2 (03:07):
Yeah, love is the law. It's A three or five,
so it's three oh five the area code for Miami
it is.

Speaker 1 (03:12):
It's where I grew up.

Speaker 2 (03:13):
All right, let's get there. What I like to do
is I like to start from the beginning. Man. It
helps us understand how the guests got from where they
were to where they are. So where were you born
and raised?

Speaker 1 (03:23):
I was born in Havana, Cuba, and I was raised
in Miami Beach, Florida. And I say Miami Beach because
it really is quite different than Miami and it's a
market difference, especially when I grew up there, you know,
was not as chic as it is. Now you know
it was not as like slick.

Speaker 2 (03:41):
Okay, So growing up in Miami, if I understand it's correctly,
your mom and you and your sister y'all escaped from Cuba, right.

Speaker 1 (03:53):
Yeah, and my grandmother and your grandmother.

Speaker 2 (03:55):
Was with you. Okay, cool, I have so many questions.
This is crazy. Okay. Now, you never wanted to be
an actor, but your mom was part of a theater company.
And was it really comprised of exiled Cuban actors? Is
that true?

Speaker 1 (04:10):
Yeah? You know they didn't speak English very well, or
some didn't speak English at all. They had just sort
of come over from Cuba. My mother spoke some of
this because you know, she learned in English and school there.
But my mother was an actress in Cuba. So when
they came over, she knew some people from her community
and they were in Miami and they had a theater
company that was called Brontelli, which I don't even know

(04:33):
if it's around anymore or what, but it was, it existed.
She was in this company. You know, they did plays,
and you know I was the I think the only kid,
like the default kids, so I would get put in
play sometimes for that. But I didn't want to be
an actor. You know, all my heroes were British guitar players.
I wanted to be Jimmy Page. Basically, Jimmy Page is

(04:55):
the in many ways, the catalyst launches me to any
artistic endeavor.

Speaker 2 (05:01):
Really, well, Dad, and your mom and your grandmother.

Speaker 1 (05:05):
Yeah, exactly, yeah, yeah.

Speaker 2 (05:07):
Your my grandmother worked at the box office for a
movie theater. Was it for thirty five years? Is that right?

Speaker 1 (05:13):
Yeah?

Speaker 2 (05:14):
Is that where you became interested in movies? Not becoming
an actor, but falling in love with TV and film
in general? Was it from her?

Speaker 1 (05:20):
When I was a little kid, she would talk to
me about a lot of actors, you know, like a
lot of these were Mattine idols and stuff like that.
So she would talk to me about that. But you
have to understand that my head was like in a
rock band. I was this kid had long hair, and
I was like, that's what I'm doing, man, you know,
it's interesting. So my mother worked in the theater, which
my grandmother also worked in. There's a theater on Flagler

(05:44):
Street and in Miami. It's been knocked down now. It
was beautiful like art deco they would do. There was
like a comedy show. My mother was in the comedy
show and they had a live band. There was nobody
to leave me with. My mother would bring me to
the theater and I would sit in one of the seats,
you know, next to the drummer and the band. I

(06:04):
could see him. I started playing guitar because I started
playing drums first. So I watched this guy play the
drums and I was like, that looks cool. I like that,
you know, So I started doing that on boxes. I
was like maybe a five or six. I started playing
doing that on boxes and like then literally boxes and pencils,
And then my mother bought me a drum kit, which

(06:25):
the whole other story.

Speaker 2 (06:27):
So that band was it was it a jazz band?

Speaker 1 (06:30):
Yeah, it was like an orchestra band that plays during
a variety show. You know.

Speaker 2 (06:34):
I love that. And then that led to your mom
actually buying you a drum set in your tiny apartment.

Speaker 1 (06:39):
That's correct. You bought me a drum kit and we
lived in and they call him in Mimmy Beach Efficiencies,
which is like a studio apartment that has like a
little kitchen, the little tiny dining room. All four of
us lived in that apartment. I was the youngest, I
shared a bed with my grandmother and my sister had
her on bed and my mother had like slept on
a cot. Wow, it was pretty crazy. Man.

Speaker 2 (06:59):
That is a find a way make away generation. You
know your mom and your grandma.

Speaker 1 (07:04):
Oh yeah, man, I can't even comprehend the sort of bravery.
We're just a staggering balls. You have to have to
leave a country and go to another country where you
don't speak the language as a single mom. My parents
were divorced at that time, two kids. I wouldn't do
that now as a dude with no kids, right, you know.

Speaker 2 (07:22):
Me, I wouldn't move to another country that I did
speak the language if I didn't have a job already
you know what I mean, or some money. Sure, that's crazy,
but you know.

Speaker 1 (07:32):
My story is not unique. That's the cumanum or the
immigrant story is legion. I'm one of millions.

Speaker 2 (07:39):
Oh sure, that's why I said, that's a generation of
a makeaway, find a way it is. Let's talk about music.
So you wanted to be Jimmy Page. You're listening to
Bebop Deluxe and all the cool stuff. When was it
that you first got on stage, like in front of
people with the band, like how did you when did
you first experience?

Speaker 1 (07:58):
I joined the band of fourteen, so I knew these
two guys, the Ramos brothers. They were putting a band
together and I knew them because our mothers were friends
and they had a band. And then I joined, so
we formed a band. I was fourteen. I started playing
guitar at twelve, and we rehearsed in the garage, their
parents' garage, Alex Ramos, Ariel Ramos, paul O Rango on

(08:22):
bass and Mayan guitar, Alex on guitar and sang and
Arion playing drums. And I still know those guys really yeah,
oh that is so cool. It's completely crazy.

Speaker 2 (08:32):
Yeah, do you ever play with them?

Speaker 1 (08:34):
I haven't played with them since then. But my friend
Robert Lamont, who wound up playing in a very successful
band called Luke Loveldez, is one of my best friends.
I know him since I'm fifteen. I'm so friends with
all those guys him I played with. You know, the
guys that I jam with or gone into music with,
had been way later, like I mean, I played in
bands and made records and then acting came in or

(08:55):
you know, returned. One could say, and I haven't been
in a band in ages, but I'm I'm friends with
a lot of guys in bands.

Speaker 2 (09:02):
Yes you are. Oh well, let's talk about some of that.
How did you become friends with the great and powerful
Rob Halford? Oh my god, from Jews Priest? How did
you become friends with that guy?

Speaker 1 (09:11):
So the streaming for Vengeance record was made in Miami,
and I was playing in a band, in a heavy
metal band, and we would do a whole set of
Judas Priest. It was a cover band. Back when there
was a live music scene, a very hard rock live
music scene in Miami that's kind of gone. There was
a barn hollandale As, a very famous rock bar, and

(09:32):
we played there all the time, and we would do
a set of Juwis Priest. And my friend George met
Halford and Miami somewhere they made that record in Cocanut Grove, Miami.
He said, Hey, you should come see my friend's band.
They do a whole set of Jewish Priest. So he came,
kept coming back and then he would get up and
sing the set with us.

Speaker 2 (09:50):
Oh wow.

Speaker 1 (09:51):
And then that spread around town and then the people
would jam into that place and it was just fucking insane.
So my girlfriend at the time and my myself became
really good friends with Rob, and I stayed friends with
him since then. It's an unbelievable story, you know. And
then Tom Allam, who produced a lot of the Judas
Priests records, wound up producing a record that I did

(10:12):
with a band that I was with called Urgent, that
we were on AMI with. I knew Tom because I
knew him through Rob and Glen Tipton and those guys,
and when we were going to make that second record,
I suggested that we talked to Tom, you know, even
though it wasn't his heaviest Priest but Tom had made
a lover Boy record and anyways, so everything just kept
going back in a circle. So I just actually was

(10:34):
just texting with Rob the other day. You know, he's
a dear friend and an extraordinary, extraordinary human being. I
was interviewed for his book. He asked if I would speak,
you know, because I was there through some of his
darkest moments that we won't go into. But you know,
so I.

Speaker 2 (10:48):
Grew up with my dad. He was in hard rock
heavy metal bands as well. He played bass and sang
and they did a lot of Judas Priests, so I
grew up on Judas Priest and I loved it. Yeah,
I do want to point out, even though my last
name is Owens, I am in no way related to
Ripper Owens. So none of that's my fault.

Speaker 1 (11:06):
You know, that's a complicated story. Man. The Ripper a
whole thing is crazy.

Speaker 2 (11:11):
That is nuts. One of the things that brought me
great joy within the last twelve months was Dolly Parton
released an album of rock songs and she had a
duet with Rob Halford on it. My wife did not
grow up listening to Juwas Priests, and so she was like,
who's this guy? And I said, well, let me explain
it to you. And then I put on some Judas
Priests and she was like, holy shit, have I never

(11:32):
heard this before? And I'm like, well, now you have.

Speaker 1 (11:35):
His musical palette is insanely diverse. Man. I mean I
remember back in it he used to listen to Michael Jackson,
loves Annie Lennox, he loves incredible singers.

Speaker 2 (11:45):
Well, I think that real artists are like that. They
listen to everything, cause you can find art anywhere you
look or listen. And I think that if anybody is
really just kind of siloed into their one thing, then
I don't really think that that that open minded, earthly
creative of an artist. That's my personal opinion.

Speaker 1 (12:02):
I agree.

Speaker 2 (12:04):
You're also friends with Ian Astenberry from The Cult. Now,
before I ask you how that happened. In nineteen ninety five,
my best friend and I went to go see The
Cult live in San Antonio. We were so excited. Oh
my god. They got on stage, they played. I don't
think that they were having a good time. Ian did
not seem like he was having a good time. He
seemed like he didn't want to be there. That was

(12:26):
in March of ninety five. Two weeks later they broke up.
So I was right, they were not having a good time.
But you know, as a kid, you're constantly trying to
make sense of things, and so I was just like,
oh no, I'm bad luck I broke up the Cult.
How did you become friends with Ian Astenberry from The colt.

Speaker 1 (12:48):
Ian Ashbury lived in New York for a long time.
A girlfriend at the time who was represented at an
agency that I was at as well. One day there
was a car a flyer for a play that she
was doing and it said produced by Ian Asberry, and
I went what we put this here? And I was like,
oh it was It was laky. So I went back
and I said what is this? He goes, yeah, that's

(13:08):
where clients play and I said, ian Asbery from the
call said yeah, Ian, I go okay, I need the Meetian.
I listened, just said I need to. You got to
make that happen. So she did. That was two thousand
and seven. So Medy N had dinner with Ian. We
hit it off. We went back to his apartment that
night start playing music.

Speaker 2 (13:29):
The first day you met Ian Asthma you got to
play with him.

Speaker 1 (13:32):
Yeah. I was like, I'm a guitar player and he
looked at me like okay. And then and then I
was like here, let me play something and he was
like oh shit.

Speaker 2 (13:39):
He was like, oh great, another actor who thinks he's
a guitar player.

Speaker 1 (13:43):
Correct. Then we did a gig together. We did an
acoustic set. You can see it. It's on YouTube. Just
look up ian Asberry and you've asked us and it'll
come up. So we did a gig together as like
a fundraiser for the play he was producing for his girlfriend.
I actually helped him put chairs out for the play.
So I knew the playwright, which blew his mind because

(14:03):
I was one of the founding members of Labyrinth Theater
Company and John Patrick Shanley was a member of Labyrinth.
So I was like, you know, I know the guy
who wrote down play, Like you think he would come
and go, Well, you know, I'll talk to him. I
don't know there's that he'll come. So became friends with Ian,
became fast and furious friends with Ian, been friends with
them ever since. We talk a lot, we communicate. He
just had a baby.

Speaker 2 (14:23):
Oh okay, this is the last fanboy one. Okay, Maynard
James Keenan from Tool, Come on, you're friends with him too?

Speaker 1 (14:31):
Yeah. I just saw him the other night. He was
here in New York. In fact, I posted a photo
I think of me and Maynard and Maynard is wearing
a Cult T shirt.

Speaker 2 (14:38):
Oh my gosh, because the.

Speaker 1 (14:40):
Cult just played with Tool in Mexico City.

Speaker 2 (14:44):
Have you been to Geronimo? Have you been to Maynard's
place in Geronimo?

Speaker 1 (14:47):
Jerome?

Speaker 2 (14:48):
It's Jerome. I was there. It's not called Geronimo, No,
it's Jerome. I'm talking about the winery, right, like the vineyard.
I mean at the top of the mountain.

Speaker 1 (14:57):
And yes, I've been to all that.

Speaker 2 (14:59):
I have his w downstairs to do see us everybody.
I have his wine downstairs. And I this whole time,
I thought it was yeah, Oh my god, what an idiot.

Speaker 1 (15:11):
I've been there. Everything he has in cotton wood which
is really extensive. He has a Strataria, the whole empire. Man,
it's amazing. He's a brilliant guy.

Speaker 2 (15:21):
Oh, he's a genius. How did you guys know each other?
How did you become friends?

Speaker 1 (15:25):
I met him through Sam Rockwell oddly enough, and Sam
didn't know who he was really, you know, And I said, Sam,
he's one of the most important artists of my time.
So I'm the one who wanted to becoming a really
good friend with Maynard and not Sam, which is really interesting.
That was in twenty sixteen, and I've been friends with
him ever since. And he should literally just here the

(15:45):
other night. We're good buddies. I'm going to Toronto to
shoot something and I'm going to go see him. The
Cessanta two point zero is playing in Toronto. You know
he's got three bands.

Speaker 2 (15:54):
Sure, why limit yourself exactly?

Speaker 1 (15:57):
Yeah, Well, limit yourself to three D bands and in
a winery. You know. I mean, he's one of the
greatest minds I've ever met.

Speaker 2 (16:05):
One of the things that I find about creators, the
more that I talk to them, is that they're never
just creative in one path. Like you yourself. You're a guitarist,
a painter, a photographer, creator of one of the dopest
ball caps I've ever seen, and an actor. And it
sounds like Maynard is too. Like you guys just can't
contain yourselves. Man, you have so much creativity. It just
bursts in so many different avenues. And I love that

(16:26):
about the creative.

Speaker 1 (16:27):
People's Thank you man. I think it's important to stay
like fluid.

Speaker 2 (16:32):
Sure you can't keep that bottled up.

Speaker 3 (16:37):
Hey, street walkers, here's a word from our sponsors. Let's
get back into it.

Speaker 2 (16:47):
Ladies and gentlemen. We haven't mentioned it or vaguely, but
you'll was a guitarist for Urgent and diving for Pearls,
which were both signed to two different major labels. And
that was before he even became an actor. This dude
is the bee's knees on that note, Will you tell
me how the great Holly Levied and Bill Esper changed
your life.

Speaker 1 (17:08):
Yeah, I was diving for Pearls and the singer in
the band Golfriend at the time worked for Holly Levied.
Oliver Stone was casting a film about the doors. I
wasn't diving for Pearls. We had gotten dropped from Epic
and we were trying to shop another deal and we
were trying to write music to get another deal. Never
an easy time for a band. And I used to

(17:29):
talk to her, this woman, Camille Serio, about acting because
I always loved acting, because acting was, you know, it
was in my life and my mother and my you know.
So she said, hey, you know, oliver Stone's casting is
worried about the doors. They're looking for band dudes, you know.
And I had long haired. She said, why don't you
come meet my boss and said we'll send you off

(17:49):
for an audition for the All of a Sudd movie.
And I went and I went, okay, sure, I'll come
to Dog one. So I went down and I met
Holly Levit and I think I brought an acoustic guitar,
you know, I don't know to play a song. I
don't even remember. Yeah, I think I played a song
for her. So shit and we're very close to this day.
How you looked at me and so listen. I don't
know if you can act, but she're kind of interesting.

(18:10):
I'll send you in for this audition. So she did.
She sent me in for this audition to a casting
director call Billy Hopkins, who became very instrumental in my life.
Ended up giving me my first job as an actor,
which comes like six months to a year after that
meeting for the Doors movie. So I didn't get that
Doors job, and Holly said to me, goes, look, if

(18:31):
you're serious about acting, I'd like for you to take
a class. She connects me with Bill Esper. Bill Esper
then sort of changes my insights in interesting ways, you know,
like I started becoming happier as a person. I was
unhappy in the band. I don't really talk about that
time a lot, but you know it wasn't a great
situation with a couple of those guys as well. And

(18:53):
you know it was a dark time trying to get
a deal. That's always very hard to come back. So
this acting class is like feeding me this amazing energy.
I'm learning a lot about myself. I have a teachers
this man, you know, as a kid who grew up
with no father. This man understands things about me that
my own father never understood, you know what I mean? Right,

(19:16):
And I'm beginning to come to life like I'm becoming
a happier person. So I basically quit the band and
I stay in the acting class, and six months later
I have my first job, which is a film called
The Mambo Kings, through the same casting director that had
brought me in for the Doors movie. Oh okay, so
that class changed my life in a couple of weeks.
That's also where I meet Sam Rockwell, who was best

(19:38):
man at my wedding.

Speaker 2 (19:39):
So you met him in that class.

Speaker 1 (19:41):
Yeah, it's quite a journey. I think maybe one day
I should write a book or some shit.

Speaker 2 (19:45):
Do you think?

Speaker 1 (19:47):
I mean? You know, you got to sit down and
write it, man, you know what I mean, Steve, It's like,
who the hell wants to sit down and write anything.

Speaker 2 (19:55):
Well, one of the things that you can do is
put together, or have somebody else put together some of
these stories from all these interviews that you've done. Because
you've already told the stories, you just need somebody to
write them down.

Speaker 1 (20:06):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (20:06):
I think you should call your book The Worm Interesting?
Why because that's what the Cuban refugees who went back
were called when they visit.

Speaker 1 (20:15):
Correct, they call us worms.

Speaker 2 (20:17):
That's what I think you should call it. The worm
like Cuban story done good or whatever, like you made it.
You're Jesus Christ. I said, I wasn't gonna fan way out,
so I'm not going to come.

Speaker 1 (20:27):
On, Steve. We know each other a while, now, come on,
and you know all my fucking friends.

Speaker 2 (20:32):
Oh. Speaking of which, I have a question for you
from a previous guest and fellow CAD. Oh and I quote,
do you blame yourself for Julian Wattley's the social disease
not being a bigger hit? And did you feel intimidated
by working with the great Spencer Garrett.

Speaker 1 (20:50):
You know, I'll tell you nobody's asked me to join
the cads. That's their thing. And I'm not in the cat.

Speaker 2 (20:56):
You're not in it.

Speaker 1 (20:57):
I have not been invited, oh no, to join the cat.
So you tell Spencer that I said that I love
Spencer so much and I love Dana, his colfriend is incredible. No,
I do not feel responsible for a social disease, you know.
On a sad note, Julian lost his house in the
Palisades Fires. Yeah, Julian has become a painter since then.

(21:19):
Not only is he a painter, he makes his own pigments.
He grinds his own dog. I mean, it's unbelievable.

Speaker 2 (21:25):
Really.

Speaker 1 (21:26):
Yeah, he's that kind of brain though.

Speaker 2 (21:27):
Like old school.

Speaker 1 (21:29):
Oh yeah, wow. When you tell Spencer, I'm still waiting
for my cat invite before Kim.

Speaker 2 (21:34):
Oh, I'm going to make sure that happens. I'm gonna
get all the cads in on this. This is nuts.
I can't believe you're not a cad.

Speaker 1 (21:41):
Oh, that is crazy, I think. So.

Speaker 2 (21:45):
I want to talk a little bit about your artwork,
ladies and gentlemen. If you go to ulvascos dot com,
you will find absolutely nothing about his acting, but what
you will find is a shitload of amazing photography and paintings.
I have heard you describe your photos as documentary street
explain what that means and how you go about taking

(22:06):
your photos please.

Speaker 1 (22:07):
I go about my day. Well, this year, there's two
cameras right here, okay that I work with, and then
there's a closet there with a lot of film cameras.
So what I do. It's me going about my day,
and the things I photograph are things that are explain this.
I see something and it creates a feeling in me,
or I see something and it reminds me of something,

(22:30):
and I photograph that. I'm not looking for specific things,
and walk by people, I'll take their picture. I'll share
down a phone so I'll take his picture, and I
work real fast with small, fast cameras. You know. Sometimes
I ask people, man, I take your photo, you mean,
and some people say yes, and some people say no.
And that's cool too. You know. I've had I've taken
photos of people and they're like, hey, man, you took

(22:51):
my photo. It's weird because I like to get close.
So it is documenting me going about my day, you know, Maan.
I'll photograph out of the window of an uber going
to whatever, downtown or some shit I don't know. I'll
look at a building and I'll take a picture of that,
and they're about spirits. I see things that speak to me,
and then it may not speak to somebody else, but
I see there's a feeling produced, and then that's what

(23:14):
I try to capture with the camera. Sometimes you capture it,
sometimes you don't.

Speaker 2 (23:18):
A few years ago, I guess, oh my god, it's
ten years now. Holy shit. My wife and I were
in Toronto. We were on the Maiden of the Mist,
which is the boat that takes you, you know, on
the Niagara Falls. Sure, so we were, you know, on
the Canada side. So we were looking up at the
cliffs and the waterfall. It was absolutely gorgeous, and I
took this photo with it was the first smartphone I

(23:40):
ever had. It was a Samsung S three, and so
I took this photo and I was just like whatever,
you know. And then I got back home and I
was flipping through all the photos from the trip, and
this photo. I loved it so much. It was just
so pretty. It had rainbows and the people and the
waterfall and just it was just gorgeous. And so I
took it and I had it up to like three

(24:01):
by four feet, like huge. And what really surprised me.
And the reason that I mentioned that phone was because
that was the first picture that I took where I
blew it up and it didn't lose any of its integrity,
you know, like it didn't get all pixelated and shitty. Sure,
And I took it to have it framed because it
was just a pretty, and the guy said, he goes, yeah,
well we can put a border or whatever those things are,

(24:23):
we can put that around it. But you're going to
cut out some of these people up here. And I go, real,
I don't know them, Like, knock yourself out. I don't
give a shit.

Speaker 1 (24:30):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (24:30):
And so that photo that I blew up and had
framed is hanging in my bedroom above my TV for
like the last ten years, and it's like my favorite
photo I've ever taken.

Speaker 1 (24:39):
That's awesome. That's a great place.

Speaker 2 (24:41):
Oh, the Niagara Falls, Yeah, that I've been there.

Speaker 1 (24:44):
That place is crazy.

Speaker 2 (24:45):
It is insane.

Speaker 1 (24:46):
There's a photo of it when it was dry. Oh really, yeah,
there was something going on they stopped the water. I
think there's a photo where it's fucking dry.

Speaker 2 (24:54):
I bet that looks insane.

Speaker 1 (24:56):
Crazy. Yeah.

Speaker 2 (24:57):
I want to talk about your painting. This right here, Yeah,
this is canvas. This is a painting done by a
local street artist here in San Antonio, and it's obviously
one of my favorite things because he did it for
me and it's right here all the time. Yeah, tell
me about your paintings now. You have described your paintings
as remembrances from your childhood I have a favorite painting

(25:19):
of yours from your website. I don't know what they're called.
I would assume this one was called let There Be Light?

Speaker 1 (25:25):
Is it Tesla?

Speaker 2 (25:26):
It's this one? Yeah, So can you explain, like how
you go about your paintings and how are they remembrances
from your childhood if they still are. I don't know
if that's an older quote.

Speaker 1 (25:36):
Some of them more than others, that particular when you
have there, I have an obsession with Nikola Tesla, speaking
of Niagara Falls, a lot of turbines he had up there,
the westing House and all that.

Speaker 2 (25:47):
Oh, I'm gonna interrupt you real quick about Nikola Tesla.
Every time my wife and I go to New York,
we stay in New Jersey because who can afford just
in New York, and so we stay in Rawway, New Jersey,
which is like six stops away on the train. And
if you go to the train station in Rahwei, New Jersey,
there is a statue of Nikola Tesla in front of

(26:07):
the train station, like it's there. I guess he used
to live there or some shit like that. But it
blew me away that there was a statue of Nicola
Tesla New Jersey. I was like, where am I?

Speaker 1 (26:17):
Yeah, I lived down the street from one of his
laboratories here and just called the Radio Wave Building, and
he had a lab in there. He had a couple
of labs, and then he had a giant sort of
Tesla coil in Widencliff and Long Island that they've since
you know, taken down, but it's a museum now. But
that's the photo of Tesla in one of his labs
that I found and I brew up the photo and

(26:39):
I printed the photo and then I painted over the photo.
That painting is that and that painting is gigantic.

Speaker 2 (26:46):
So is that him sitting in the chair?

Speaker 1 (26:48):
That's Nikola Tesla sitting in the chair.

Speaker 2 (26:50):
Wow.

Speaker 1 (26:51):
Yeah. But some of the other paintings, they have a
lot of scribbles and stuff that is from my childhood
because my mother was into some ideas, you know, so
I grew up with this sort of alternative religions.

Speaker 2 (27:03):
In my house was the Centerrhea.

Speaker 1 (27:05):
Yes, so that is the iconography of that stuff. I
was never into it, but it was very important to
my mother. So it reminds me of my mother. It
reminds me of things I saw written down as a kid.
And then those things find themselves into the painting. Maybe
I'm trying to work out some childhood shit, Steve.

Speaker 2 (27:23):
Aren't we all?

Speaker 1 (27:24):
I'm doing the best I can, man, you know what
it can.

Speaker 2 (27:27):
Bro Okay, So, as we record this, we are two
days away from your twenty third wedding anniversary.

Speaker 1 (27:36):
That's correct.

Speaker 2 (27:37):
I know that's correct. But this won't air until after
that obviously. So what did you get her?

Speaker 1 (27:42):
You know, the actor Josh Charles, Yes, I do. His wife,
Sophie Charles, is a fantastic jewelry company, and she's a
jewelry designer. It's called Mad Fine. And I bought a
necklace for my wife. In fact, I picked it up
yesterday from Sophie. My wife is a noble My wife
could come in that door at any moment.

Speaker 2 (28:01):
Well, we won't bring it up again.

Speaker 1 (28:03):
How about that?

Speaker 2 (28:04):
That's really cool? Shout out Josh Charles's wife, Sophie. That's cool.

Speaker 3 (28:11):
Hey, street walkers, here's a word from our sponsors. Let's
get back into it.

Speaker 2 (28:21):
So my wife and I we got married the same
year as you, just like two months later, like in July.
Here in San Antonio, there's a jazz club called Jazz
Texas and last year, like the week of our anniversary,
they did a special tribute to a documentary film called
buena Us The Social Club.

Speaker 1 (28:39):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (28:40):
Have you seen this film?

Speaker 1 (28:41):
This documentary, the documentary called Buenavus the Social Club.

Speaker 2 (28:44):
Yeah, did you see the documentary?

Speaker 1 (28:46):
Oh? Yeah, of course. And I saw the Broadway Show
the other night. My friend is a producer on the
Broadway Show. Oh, kick ass, it's a fucking hit show here.
Really yeah, yeah.

Speaker 2 (28:55):
Well it should be. That's awesome. Jazz Texas did a
tribute to the movie because that think it was like
twenty five years I think last year anyway, so we
went to see that. That was our anniversary kind of
present to each other. It was just amazing. So you
doesn't need to notice, but everybody listening, if you ever
have a chance to see either the documentary buenevis Ra
Social Club or like I guess there's a play or

(29:18):
a show, go check that out if you're anywhere around, Like,
just look up the movie. It is such a compelling movie.

Speaker 1 (29:25):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (29:25):
I know that you have gone back to Cuba and
you hold I think you hold two passwords. But well,
when you're in Miami, do you still ride your bicycle? Everywhere.

Speaker 1 (29:33):
It's weird. Man. I've been writing it less because a
lot of these people in Miami drive now they're on
their phones. I started wearing a helmet on my bike,
which is just something I never did my whole fucking life.
But I do write it. But I'll write it like
in areas where I because I just want to enjoy
the ride. But you know, it's become problematic. You know,
people are on their phones. I almost got clipped a
couple of times by some person that stops signing to

(29:56):
look at the phone, and then they look this way
and then they take off. But I'm here. I mean,
it's like they don't care. It's like, dude, it's terrible,
you know. I mean, I don't need to tell you.
That's how. You know, let's go have any hit in
Manhattan and scooters into this.

Speaker 2 (30:10):
I don't know, that's crazy. You gotta be careful out there, bro.
My mom was walking downtown in San Antonio, walking like
past the exit for a parking garage and same thing.
The guy wasn't looking and he just hit my mom.
She was a pedestrian and he hit her like he
just ran over, Like what the fuck?

Speaker 1 (30:25):
I mean? But that's what's going on. Man, people distracted.

Speaker 2 (30:27):
Man, it's crazy, ladies and gentlemen. I mentioned you'll has
an anniversary coming up. He is married to a real, legitimate,
actual princess, Princess Jasmine Linda Larkin. Oh my gosh, I
can't tell you how many times I've seen that movie.
My son was born in nineteen ninety two and that
movie was just on repeat. Dude, love that movie so much.

(30:49):
How did you guys meet?

Speaker 1 (30:50):
We had a mutual circle of friends. We can't even
actually place the exact time we met, but we were
all in a circle of friends. So we were friends
for us for probably like three years, you know, and
then that sort of developed into something else, you know.
But it's cool, you know, because we were friends, so
I knew that she was cool and I liked her.
You know, she's a good person, and you know, that's
always helpful.

Speaker 2 (31:11):
It is always helpful. My mom introduced me to my wife,
and you know, we're twenty three years into this, so
good job.

Speaker 1 (31:17):
Mah wow, your mom, Yeah, that's.

Speaker 2 (31:20):
It, that's it. Okay, we've been married twenty three years now.
She is the most amazing woman.

Speaker 1 (31:24):
There.

Speaker 2 (31:25):
You go, all right, we're going to talk about acting.
Now I got to know this is this a true story?
Did a psychic at the Grandmasy Park Hotel really tell
you that you were going to be an actor long
before you even wanted to be one?

Speaker 1 (31:37):
That's true?

Speaker 2 (31:37):
How what were you doing there? What happened?

Speaker 1 (31:40):
Friend of mine knew the psychic who came into town.
It was sting psychic psychic work for staying in Trudy.
And I'm going to tell you, man, this is a
long time ago, way before acting was even on the
sort of radar. And the guy said to me, basically,
you're going into acting and this is this and this
and this, and I was like, I looked at this guy,
this is a fucking crock of shit. You know, this

(32:02):
is a colossal waste of money. You know he was
fucking right, Yes he was. It's really crazy, you know,
I mean really crazy.

Speaker 3 (32:11):
You know.

Speaker 1 (32:11):
It's funny because I always loved watching actors and you know, performances,
you know, but I was so obsessed with playing guitar
and certain guitar players that were like I studied and
I you know, I would would shed man and I'm
you know, I'm surrounded guitars everywhere I'm always playing the guitar.
So the fact that anybody would tell me that was
Jeff Foreign's like. I was like, no, no, but thing

(32:32):
is Steve. You never know what life throws in your way.
You know, you can go a certain way and signposts
are coming up and you can look at them or
you cannot look at them. And I enjoyed the acting
and studying with Bill Esper, changing my existence as a human.
I spoke to Bill when I was going to leave
the band. I said, listen, I'm thinking of listen. He
looked at me, he said, look, I can't tell you

(32:52):
what to do. You've been in a band since you're
fourteen years old. But if you're asking me if I
think you have talent as an actress, the answers yes,
but you have to make their own decision. And that
was that. Really.

Speaker 2 (33:02):
You mentioned earlier that your mom was part of this
theater company. Was she a founder of it?

Speaker 1 (33:07):
I don't think she was a founder. I was. I
think it was already in existence, and then she joined
it because I knew the company and I knew this
actress called Billy and Martinez in it. At the time,
Billy and Martinez was quite up there in years. But
she had been a formidable actress in Cuba. So you know,
you have to understand a lot of these folks they fled.
They were actors, you know, and they had careers in Cuba,

(33:28):
and now they they're fish out of water. They don't
really speak English. You're in Miami, which at the time
was not You weren't going to be cast in anything
out of Miami, just like when I was playing in
a band in Miami, you weren't going to be signed.
Your band's not going to get signed out of Miami, right,
You had to go somewhere. That's how I leave New
York Is because my then go friend I was in
a cover band, as I told you, and we played

(33:49):
our own music, but I'd taken that as far as
that could possibly go in Miami that was maxed out.
And she said to me, if you stay here, you're
going to fucking rot here and nothing will become of
you as a guitar player. And she had a friend
who was looking at this band called Urgent. That band
wind up signing manhattany am I, but at the time
Epic was looking at that band, and they were like,
you know, the thing they might want to change guitar play,

(34:11):
and she got me this audition, and I came to
New York to auditions for Urgent. I remember I got here.
I went to the managers. They gave me a set
and learned like three songs, and then I went to
an audition. I all remember exactly where it was, and
they hired me. They fucking hired me. Now I've lived
in New York, you understand, Like I never lived that
far away from my mom. I was a foreign thought

(34:34):
to me. Man. I've always told people, I said, my
entire life really is a series of well executed decisions
by very smart women, starting with my mother deciding to
leave Cuba and come to the United States and say
I'm not going to live here under this. I'm not
doing this. That's number one, you know. And then from
there it's literally you could string them all along. Tell

(34:54):
you exactly how I wind up here, you know. Holly
Levitt another one who said there's something of about you.
I don't know, it's crazy, but I'm telling you the
fucking truth. That's it.

Speaker 2 (35:04):
I love when people who have an effect on you
get their due. You were co founded the Labyrinth Theater
with the Philip Seymore Hoffman and John Leguizamo.

Speaker 1 (35:12):
What led you to down Laguizamo General teze Oh.

Speaker 2 (35:15):
John wasn't part of that.

Speaker 1 (35:16):
John was a member early on, and then John Leguzamo was.
He was around, but.

Speaker 2 (35:20):
He wasn't a founder.

Speaker 1 (35:21):
No, the founders really are and there's a couple of
guys missing from the Guy Perez and David Devlin jer
and Paul Calderon. Paul Calderon that he left too, but
those other guys are still around.

Speaker 2 (35:32):
What led you guys to start this theater company?

Speaker 1 (35:34):
There was a play on Broadway at the time, an
Ariel Dorfmann play called Death and the Maiden, and it
was about a family in Chile, and they cast all
these American and British actors in it. And when they
were asked why there was no Latino actors in New York,
you know, this play on Broadway, and they said, well,
we couldn't find any good ones. So that shocked people

(35:57):
into saying, oh, okay, well we're going to start a
coming and we're going to do plays, and we're going
to cast ourselves in these plays. And that's a very
simple cliff note way how Labyrinth starts.

Speaker 2 (36:09):
And I understand that you're not really a part of it. Now.
I don't need to know why, but how long have
you not really been a part of it?

Speaker 1 (36:16):
You know, I'm adjacent. When Phil passed away, I just
felt the need to. Uh. I was sitting on the
board at the time, and I just felt like I
needed to take a step back from it. Phil's loss
was pretty fucking devastating. Not only just Phil's loss, but
we lost two guys within three weeks. There's another guy,
a very instrumental guy the Labyrinth who produced a lot

(36:37):
of the events, and a guy who really was a doer,
guy called Ed Vassallo, who was a dear friend of
mine and put maybe my wife Linda's best friend. He
died three weeks after Phil. And now the really bizarre
thing is that Ed was sick and had leukemia, and
he had been good for a couple of years and
then had returned and then he had a bone marrow
transplant and that didn't really work. He was quite ill.

(37:00):
But Phil dies very suddenly. As you know, Ed was
at Phil's funeral, which is not anything that really made
any sense. And then three weeks later Ed passed away.
So it's two guys from the company, and I was
just like, I need to like, I need to step back,
but I'm going to do this charade event for them
coming up on Monday. Oh but you know, I'm friends
with many people in the company. Sure, I just couldn't

(37:22):
be in the victorial or board position. It's too much
for me.

Speaker 2 (37:26):
That makes sense. Yeah, leukemia is a bad motherfucker. That's
what got my mom.

Speaker 1 (37:30):
I'm sorry to hear that. Man.

Speaker 2 (37:31):
Thank you. We're supposed to be talking about acting Steve,
not Laukemia. I'm so sorry, my bad.

Speaker 1 (37:37):
We're talking about live Steve. Is it all life? That's true,
It's just life, man.

Speaker 2 (37:41):
Yeah, let's talk about Puerto Rican life, your Cuban I am.
You played at Puerto Rican three times on Seinfeld? Did
you catch any shit from your Cuban friends? No?

Speaker 1 (37:51):
I think people responded to the just the madness of
that character. That was fun to do, man, and an
interesting time. That changed the land scape of things for.

Speaker 2 (38:00):
Me, did it?

Speaker 1 (38:02):
Yeah? I'd never watched seinfeldt.

Speaker 2 (38:04):
Have you watched it since? Like, did you ever go
back and watch it?

Speaker 1 (38:06):
Oh? Yeah, yeah, I've watched it. I've watched it and
and I've run into Jerry and the crazy thing about
it was. I was in la and Holly Levitt says,
there's a last minute audition. You have to go now
to CBS Radford because a lot of these situation comedies,
the characters are written and they're like, this works tomorrow,
let's try and find the act. I mean, it literally
moves that fast. She says, they've written this character. Could

(38:29):
you go over this? I go over there. I drove
to CBS Radford and I get the size and I'm
sitting there's a bunch of people there and it's called
Bob the intimidating gay guy. You know, I didn't think fast,
and I thought, well, I'll just do an impersonation of
my mother, who was a very intimidating person. So basically
it's an impersonation of my mom. So I did it
for Jerry and for Larry David. They were in the

(38:50):
room and they were like, what the fuck is that?
And I go, it's my mom. Like we'll do it again.
So I did it again and they're like, okay, go
sit outside. And then I got the job, so I
mean again, Holly Levin had an enlightened moment.

Speaker 2 (39:02):
Did your mom ever get to see that?

Speaker 1 (39:04):
Yeah? My mom saw that because that my mom passes
away in two thousand and nine, Okay, and I do
the first one of those, I do in ninety five.

Speaker 2 (39:12):
I think it was ninety five.

Speaker 1 (39:13):
Yeah, yeah, I think it was.

Speaker 2 (39:14):
Two in the same season, right.

Speaker 1 (39:16):
Yeah. The Ribbon, the Age Walk episode hilarious, It's completely insane. Yeah.

Speaker 2 (39:23):
I have had multiple people from Seinfeld on here before.
I had Clint Howard on.

Speaker 1 (39:27):
You know Clint, Sure, I don't know him personally, but
I like him.

Speaker 2 (39:31):
He's a really good friend of mine. I love that
guy so much.

Speaker 1 (39:34):
He seems like a nice guy.

Speaker 2 (39:35):
He is the like that whole family is just salt
of the earth. And it started from the top down.
Rats Howard their dad. Yeah, he was on Seinfeld twice
and he was on my show too, right before he passed.
He was a great guy as well. And then John Kappelos.
You know who that guy is? Is he a friend
of yours?

Speaker 1 (39:53):
I don't know John, but I know who he is.

Speaker 2 (39:55):
Yeah. So John was on, and so was a Tim
Deckay who played Bizarro Jerry. I love all those guys.

Speaker 1 (40:01):
I think John Capelos is in a movie called Internal Affairs.

Speaker 2 (40:05):
That sounds right, I mean, I grew up with knowing
him from breakfast club and sat candles and shit like that.
But he's pretty sick.

Speaker 3 (40:15):
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Speaker 2 (40:20):
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(40:41):
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Speaker 3 (40:58):
Spoiler alert, it is, let's get back into it.

Speaker 2 (41:05):
Weird question out of nowhere? Do you still have the
nineteen sixty two reissue dot Nick three thirty five Gibson
custom shot.

Speaker 1 (41:12):
If Russell gave you, oh, yes, it's in the closet,
of course, I would never give rid of the guitar.
I could never Russell gave me that. I mean, it's
in the closet. It's incredible.

Speaker 2 (41:20):
How many guitars do you have?

Speaker 1 (41:22):
I mean, at present, I probably have about sixteen seventeen,
which is not a lot. It's a lot for a
guy who doesn't play in a band, hasn't been in
a band in fucking years.

Speaker 2 (41:31):
Why is that? Why won't you go in the band?
Why won't you do it? Michael imperially does it.

Speaker 1 (41:35):
I would do it if somebody came to me and said, hey,
you want to do this, but it would have to
be the right situation and the right guys or else.
It's a lot of work. I just made a short
film that is being mixed out. Maynard gave us a song.
He gave us a pussyfer song.

Speaker 2 (41:48):
Wow.

Speaker 1 (41:49):
Very generous. Maynard and Matt Mitchell and careering around in
their boat organization, gave us a song free to use
in the film. In the original score, I composed with
guitar and synthesizers. So when that's finished, you'll see that.

Speaker 2 (42:02):
Oh my gosh, I can't wait.

Speaker 1 (42:03):
Directed by Sarah Seligman who did a block of Hotel Cocaine.
I measure on that and very smart, very brilliant, and
produced by de Wi o'hanian, who is a producer in
Prontavista Social Club. So you see how it all goes.

Speaker 2 (42:16):
Like this, a producer on the play on the play correct,
Oh wow, that's sick.

Speaker 1 (42:22):
Correct.

Speaker 2 (42:23):
Yeah, Everything that's connected, isn't it.

Speaker 1 (42:25):
Everything is everything, my friend, Everything is everything.

Speaker 2 (42:27):
And I think that if you follow that one rule
that's on the side of your hat, everything just falls
into place right exactly.

Speaker 1 (42:33):
Just try to love people and don't be a dick.

Speaker 2 (42:37):
You were on a TV show that was one of
my favorite TV shows that I've ever seen. It is
called Magic City. Tell me how you came to be
involved with that and was it as amazing to be
on the set as it appears to have been.

Speaker 1 (42:52):
It was even more amazing to be on the set.
It was the most extraordinary sets I've ever seen in
my life. Very expensive show created by a guy called
Mitch Glazier, who to this day is one of my
best friends. He's like a brother to me. So Mitch
and Jeffery D. Morgan also was not far from here,
and is what my brother Christian Cooke, Dominique Garcia, who
played my daughter, whose father is Andy Garcia, was a

(43:15):
very good friend of mine. Kelly Lynch, all those folks
became very close. We have a text threat together. And
you realized that show there's only two seasons in twenty
eleven and twenty twelve.

Speaker 2 (43:24):
Sadly, that broke my heart. There was only two seasons.

Speaker 1 (43:27):
It broke everybody's heart. Mitch has another show, and that's
incredible that he's been trying to get going. But Mitch
is a genius, and that show is about Mitch's childhood.
Mitch grew up in Miami Beach, so you know when
Mitch Caspy and the show, he had no idea that
I was from Miami Beach, oh wow, or that I
was even Queuan, which is really crazy. I was here
in New York. I was doing a play. I had

(43:49):
made an audition tape and Mitch saw it and then
they wanted to bring me out to La to do
a chemistry read with jeff But I couldn't because I
was doing eight shows a week on Broadway.

Speaker 2 (43:58):
Is that the show that you were nominated for a
Tonio word?

Speaker 1 (44:01):
Correct? Okay, So they had to just make a decision
whether to Caspi or not because I wasn't going to
be able to go to the chemistry reading. You know,
I don't know who else they were looking at. But
Mitch is now, fuck it, I want him. I want
him for this. It's not until we're all in Miami
that he realizes that the guy he took a shot
on is from Miami Beach and he's Cuban. So he's like, what,

(44:24):
I'll go, Yeah, bro, I thought you knew that. He's like, no, dude,
I didn't fucking know that. I'm like, well, it's a
good thing you cast me.

Speaker 2 (44:32):
I love that.

Speaker 1 (44:33):
That show was extraordinary, extraordinary, stunning, beautiful show. Shot by
Gabrielle Bearstein. We used special lenses, these special ball tar
lenses which we use on the God. I mean it
was you know, it was a very expensive you could tell,
and very rich.

Speaker 2 (44:48):
Oh you could tell it was expensive.

Speaker 1 (44:50):
It was gorgeous.

Speaker 2 (44:52):
That was one of the things that attracted me to
it in the first place was how beautifully it is. Shot.
It's a period piece, but it doesn't look like it
was a period piece created later. It looks like it
was of that time. It looks like it was made
back then. It's so pretty well.

Speaker 1 (45:06):
The production designer may He Rest in Peace got go
Carlos Barbosa, production designer. And this is incredible because the
hallways to those hotels back then, you know, maids carts
were enormous, So hotel hallways were not these narrow things
we know now because you know they try to jam
pack as many rooms. They were fucking wide. And our
hotel set was just like that. And the AC and

(45:28):
the set was practical, It wasn't fake. It was connected
to the actual AC. There was stuff on the maids carts,
there was matches, there was shit that you were never
going to see that was there. That made it also
fucking real. And that set with the portholes and the
barn back, that's a set that's based on the eden
Rock Hotel that was built. That's water tank that was built,

(45:51):
and there was mermaids in there swimming. I mean, it
was beyond comprehension. How incredible. This was so fucking incredible
that the all even form pressed came down, like they
brought them down to look at the and the costumes
were like real shit. They weren't like Repro. There was
some repro ship, but for the most part it was
all vintage legit pieces because in the HD, you know,

(46:14):
you can see the fabric, right, a shitty fabric NHDS
looks horrible. Nobody wants to see that, that's true, just
like a shitty wig. Yeah, yeah, you see the wig lace.
You see like it just doesn't look right.

Speaker 2 (46:27):
That minute detail, like talking about the match books and things.
It reminds me of Ron Howard. He made the Grinch movie, right, Yeah,
that movie was so detailed that they actually printed money,
like paper money and coins that were for the Whoville money.
It was like, and I have some like I have
some frames, but you're never gonna see that. That came

(46:47):
out before HD. So I was just like why And
he was just like details matter.

Speaker 1 (46:51):
I was like details matter man. Mitch Glazier is the
brains behind Magic City. I mean there was details there
that nobody would have known. There was a thing on
Lincoln Road where I grew up, where Mitchells grew up,
and there's a Sacks Fifth Avenue store and the entrance,
there was this hole that would missed perfume. So as
you walk by this fragrance, that's in the fucking show. Dude,

(47:14):
that's in the show. Wow, what, Mitch did? I've been
on some amazing sets, bro, yes you have. This was
another fucking level. Like we had two hundred thousand square
feet of stages. Oh my god in Miami. This was opulent. Man.

Speaker 2 (47:30):
Wow, everybody go check out Magic City. You will not
be disappointed, except that when you get to the enders
no more.

Speaker 1 (47:36):
You never know.

Speaker 2 (47:37):
I come back, Steve, Oh, that'd be amazing.

Speaker 1 (47:39):
I'd like to try and bring that show back.

Speaker 2 (47:40):
Well, I would love for you to do that. It
would really be awesome for me as a viewer. I
know we don't have a whole lot of time here.
I'm taking up your whole day, but I want to
talk about sevence Real quick.

Speaker 1 (47:50):
Let's do it.

Speaker 2 (47:51):
First. Tell me what it was like to work on
Severance with b Arthur.

Speaker 1 (47:56):
I love b Arthur. I got on a b Arthur
kick when I was doing that. Don't know what, you know.
We had to wear all the masks. It was right
the height of COVID, literally height of COVID September twenty twenty,
So no vaccines. That was testing, but it wasn't you know, extraordinary.
You had to go into a trailer and the whole thing. Listen,
man again, you know you can never predict what something

(48:17):
is going to be. I've known Ben Stiller for a
really long time. You know, we've been friends. We get
along great, our wives are friends. But I never worked
with Ben, and then this opportunity came up. This is
really crazy. I was doing reshoots on a movie in
la and I was flying to Miami March twelve. I'll
never forget March twelfth. I fled to Miami because I

(48:37):
was going to have my first art show. And I
get to Miami, I was like, I don't feel well,
Like literally, I was like something I'm not, this is weird.
I had COVID. No if I find out I had COVID,
I had like og COVID. So the whole world shuts down. Obviously,
the art show is not going to happen. Nothing's going
to happen with TI Worldshop. So my wife and I
are in Miami and we're stuck in Miami. You know,

(48:58):
we have a home in Miami, so thank god we
were home. But no one's going anywhere. So I'm just
kind of going along with the flow of what's happening
in the world, you know. And then my agent says, hey,
Ben Stiller wants to have a zoom with you about
the show, and I go, great, I love Ben. We zoomed.
We had like a work session. He sent me the scenes,
you know, we had these ideas for it. And then

(49:19):
I did it, and I knew I was doing four.
I knew exactly what my job there was, as opposed
to the other folks that didn't really know what was coming,
you know, in the upcoming episodes. I knew what my
function was, that I was going to do it. One
of the greatest experiences I've ever had making a TV show.
I love Bend as one of the most talented human
beings you'll ever encounter, and as good an actor as
he is, he's as good of a director, I mean,

(49:41):
and he's a very specific part of what detail that
show is like. I mean, the detail is just extraordinary.
And then the woman who shot it, Jessica League, and yay,
it was brilliant. It's a big part of how that looks,
you know what I mean. So again, no one could
imagine what it was going to be. It was bizarre,
but bizarre in a delicious way. Like it was. It's
just kind of amazing. I love this character. When I

(50:03):
read it, I was like, fuck, this is so good.
This is so well written. The letter that I read
to Mark thank you for you know, the greatest niece
card whatever, you know, world's greatest niece. You know, even
you know that piece of writing is there's a letter
he reads that I write to him, you know. But
I wrote it on a car that said World's greatest niece.
That's all I had, all PD had. And then Ben

(50:26):
gave me a lot of freedom to make the map,
the PED map. And now that you know my art
and you look at the PD map, you can see
the references between my artwork and the PD map. And
I got to play guitar in it.

Speaker 2 (50:38):
Yes, we're going to get to that in a second. Ladies, gentlemen,
The reason that I referenced b Arthur is because you'll
it wasn't just a mask, but he also had to wear.

Speaker 1 (50:47):
The shield shield.

Speaker 2 (50:49):
He named his shield be Arthur. Yeah, and have you
seen the credits? Did you watch any of the credits
of Severance The Pilot did you watch the credits. In
the credits, there's a line and I guess Ben put
it in there, but it says it says Yule's shield
be Arthur.

Speaker 1 (51:08):
No, are you joking?

Speaker 2 (51:10):
I am joking. That'd be pretty cool, though.

Speaker 1 (51:12):
I'd be amazing.

Speaker 2 (51:14):
Listen, I'm an Apple TV Severance. Everybody knows it. A
couple of seasons so far. I'm sure another one's coming.
You'll played p D Kilmer, the woman who plays his daughter,
June Cassidy Layton. Those two the characters p D in June,
they play Metallica's inter Sandman on Severn's and the way
that they incorporate that into the funeral of your character

(51:35):
is just fucking mind boggling. Whose idea was it for
you to play inter Sandman?

Speaker 1 (51:41):
I have a hunch it was Ben's. Really yeah, so
you want to see how everything is everything. The music
supervisor they got called George Draculios, who you should follow
on Instagram. It's big producer produce the Cult, Tom Petty, okay,
and that's Ben's guy. So the Cult comes back and
I'm playing a gretch white Falcon which is with Billy

(52:04):
Duffy from the Cult place and she's so sanctuary. So
I chose the guitar I wanted. Oh, in this particular case,
it's a black Falcon, which I wanted to buy, and
I mentioned it and the propmaster. Somehow snickily forgot that
I had mentioned that I wanted to buy the guitar.
At the end, I should talk to Ben about that,
because I'm sure it's still show assets. But Ben wanted

(52:25):
enter her Sandman. So we learned it. We learned it
and played.

Speaker 2 (52:29):
It, so you and Cassidy correct.

Speaker 1 (52:32):
Cassidy played bass and sang it.

Speaker 2 (52:34):
How much do people talk about that scene like in
your everyday life? How many people just bring up the
fact that you crushed in her Sandman on severance at
your own funeral?

Speaker 1 (52:46):
You know, there's something here that could show you. Nobody
really talks about that scene so much to talk about
the chip in my head, But there's something here. It's
a prayer card from Pete's funeral.

Speaker 2 (52:56):
Oh my gosh, they made prayer cards.

Speaker 1 (52:59):
Oh dude, whole stack of prayer cards. I mean, talk
about detail.

Speaker 2 (53:03):
That is sick.

Speaker 1 (53:05):
Oh.

Speaker 2 (53:05):
I love that so much.

Speaker 1 (53:07):
I wish I had more. I only had one of these.
If I had more, I'll send you one. But I
only I should have taken a stock of these. I
only had one. Wow, isn't that crazy?

Speaker 2 (53:15):
That is really cool?

Speaker 1 (53:17):
I also bought some fan art. Somebody made a quilt
of the map, the PD map.

Speaker 2 (53:22):
Somebody made a quilt out of it. Oh my gosh.

Speaker 1 (53:25):
Yeah, and they bought it. So they put it up
on a reddit. There's a reddit forum that's what about severance? Yeah,
but somebody made a quilt and I saw it on
the reddit thing and I said a message. I said, hey,
would you sell me that? And she did and I
have it?

Speaker 2 (53:38):
So you have it?

Speaker 1 (53:39):
Oh?

Speaker 2 (53:39):
How cool is that? Was she so excited that it
was you?

Speaker 1 (53:41):
I don't know. I mean, I mean, maybe does she
know that it was you? Well? At first I said,
did I talk about Pete? And I wrote, Hey, Dan
was on there, Dan the writer was on there. He
would answer questions and I went on there. And at
first they didn't believe it was me, and I was like, no, dude,
it's me. And then when people go, wait a minute,
the same guy from Seinfeld, than their heads explode.

Speaker 2 (54:02):
Yeah, I'm sure they do.

Speaker 1 (54:04):
They're like, how can this be the same two people?

Speaker 2 (54:07):
Okay, a couple of quick things and then I'm gonna
let you go. I promised. But right now, a year
in New York, Right, I'm in New York City. I
heard a rumor and I need you to help me
with this. Is this true? Is CBGB's coming back?

Speaker 1 (54:20):
I don't know, my god, that would be amazing.

Speaker 2 (54:22):
I heard it's coming back. I heard they're going to
reopen it.

Speaker 1 (54:24):
I hope, so that would be fucking amazing. I played
CBGB's when before sting afteresting, You're like, way interesting.

Speaker 2 (54:36):
Who were you with when you played there?

Speaker 1 (54:38):
Pearls?

Speaker 2 (54:39):
What was it like? Was as the biggest ship hole
as everybody says it was? Was it just gross?

Speaker 1 (54:43):
But the greatest sound system in New York City?

Speaker 2 (54:45):
Really?

Speaker 1 (54:46):
Yeah, it was grungy, but it had the greatest sound
system in New York City. It was way more sound
system than the room needed. So it was a very powerful,
crazy low end. I mean, it's just a fantastic sound system.

Speaker 2 (54:58):
I love that you got to play there. That is
sick as hell.

Speaker 1 (55:00):
Yeah, I played CBS Are Not Crazy, played the China Club.
That's what Diamond Brols got signed out of the China Club.

Speaker 2 (55:06):
Oh snap, yeah, Oh that's wild. Oh my gosh, you
I have taken up so much of your time. You
are gracious beyond words. I love you so much.

Speaker 1 (55:15):
My pleasure brother, my pleasures. Dude.

Speaker 2 (55:17):
It has been a pleasure going back and forth with
you on social media. You are a delight and uh
hearing pretty damn good jokes too.

Speaker 1 (55:24):
We have to send a shout out to Ari who
really organizes this.

Speaker 2 (55:28):
Absolutely.

Speaker 1 (55:30):
She really keeps my head on straight, which is and
I wouldn't say it's that.

Speaker 2 (55:34):
That I would it's at least keeping your hat straight.
How's that it's keep my hat straight? Happy anniversary, my friend,
to thank you and you brother. I'm so excited for
you guys to hit the twenty.

Speaker 1 (55:46):
Three likewise to you twenty three years for you too.

Speaker 2 (55:48):
Right, Thank yeah, thank you very much. We're excited to
have a great rest of your week. Dude. Thank you,
thank you, thank you so much. I appreciate you. You too,
my brother, Thank you so much for taking the time
and hang out with us on Fascination Street so we
can get to know a little bit more about you.

Speaker 1 (56:01):
Man.

Speaker 2 (56:02):
You are the bees' knees. Keep painting, keep photographing, keep
creating the dopest art in every platform. Dude, You're the man.

Speaker 1 (56:11):
Very kind of you, Steve. Thank you so much for
my brothers, my pleasure to be here with you today,
and let's do it again. Baby.

Speaker 2 (56:17):
You know I'm gonna ask again. I will reach out
to thank you so much.

Speaker 1 (56:20):
Man.

Speaker 2 (56:20):
You take it easy, peace, brother, bye buddy. Opening music
is the song fsp theme, written, performed and provided by
Ambush Vin. Closing music is from the song say My

(56:43):
Name off the twenty twenty one album Underdog Anthems, used
with permission from Jack's Hollow. If you like the show,
tell a friend, subscribe and rate and review the show
on iTunes and wherever else you download podcast. Don't forget
to subscribe to my YouTube channel. All the episodes are

(57:04):
available there as well. Check me out on the video
at Fascination Street Pod and TikTok at Fascination Street Pod
and again, thanks for listening.