482 -- Not Pretentious and Contrived -- with the cast of The Rise of King Asilas

Creativity can be a solo act, or it can be a room full of friends. What matters is the joy in the process, the pride in the outcome, and exactly who ends up with Adrian at the end.

Guest: The cast of The Rise of King Asilas and other projects

Promo: OctoberPod's Guide to Fishing
Disclaimer: Jennifer, Haunted Happenstance
Art: Troy Larson
Music: Jake Pierle -- https://jakepierle.bandcamp.com/

Ignorance Was Bliss online: https://linktr.ee/iwbpodcast

Sponsor: Bath By Bex (code CBDkate for 25% off)
Sponsor: Komuso Design (code bliss15 for 15% off)
Sponsor: Horrific Hope Film Festival 2024 (code bliss24 for 15% off submission)

Episode Transcript

(00:01):
Big fish like to live in badplaces. Mark could be talking about a
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That's how they get to be bigfish. Take on those river monsters
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(00:24):
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(00:50):
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(01:15):
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(01:38):
This podcast involves topics such as violence, sex, and mental illness. If
this might disturb you or those aroundyou, please reconsider listening. It's okay.
Privacy and confidentiality have been protected,with personal information removed whenever possible.
If you, or anyone you knowever feels unsafe suicidal, please call your

(02:00):
local crisis center, emergency services,or national hotline. In the US,
the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline is eighthundred two seven three eight two five five
You matter. Hey, this isKate. People ask me sometimes if I

(02:28):
have a favorite style of recording.Like they know that I won't list a
specific episode as a favorite, butmaybe they can find out. Do I
like one on one conversations or doI like humorous? Or do I like
heavy? Or do I like monologues? And you know, I'll tell you
as a hint there, I hatemonologues. I'm just so uncomfortable, even

(02:52):
with inchos and all shows. They'reso hard. But I'll do them once
in a while, as you know. But otherwise the answer is no.
I don't have favorites. And thereason that I don't have favorite is because,
so like tonight, I just finishedrecording with an author and it's a

(03:15):
fairly serious topic and I'm not readyto do the intro and the outro for
it yet because I always let thempercolate for a little while and I have
to figure out, just like whichfacets of this conversation do I want to
highlight, in which ones do Iwant to let you find on your own,

(03:37):
And then I go immediately into thisepisode that I'm editing that you're listening
to right now, which is completelydifferent. It's me talking to three guys,
one of whom I know well,two of whom were total strangers to
me up until the moment we hitrecord, and it gets wacky and silly

(04:00):
and the other times serious and sometimesboth at the same time, and was
totally unpredictable to me. And that'sfun. Like they're both my favorite.
It's hard, it's hard to explain, but that's why I'm still doing this.
It pushed in five hundred episodes,so anyway, this episode now is

(04:26):
with my friend Jav Torres, whois the creator of the Rise of King
Asilas, which is a podcast anda bunch of other stuff, because he's
one of those guys that just hasideas and thoughts and creativity and music and
he acts and just he's you know, I, now that I think about
it, maybe I'd hate him ifI didn't love him, you know what

(04:47):
I'm saying, Like, some peoplejust are too good at too many different
things. It's not fair. Ialso got to meet Adrian and Tony,
who are involved in both the Silassort of franchise, as well as some
other stuff. They'll describe. They'reworking on films, and that's just neat

(05:09):
stuff and also silliness and just unpredictability. Are you sure you really want to
know? This is ignorance? Wasbliss? I am j V Torres.

(05:56):
I think my third time on yourshow, and every time time that I've
been on your show twice the twotimes before. Um, it's just such
a fantastic experience. You don't haveto suck up, You're already on the
show. You what you only bythe head? Okay, So I was
telling my friends here about you injust conversation. Wasn't really something that that

(06:20):
that was planned out, you know, and so I wanted to share this
experience with my friends who happened tobe actors, and I'll let them introduce
themselves to you. Hopefully they actlike they want to be here. Hi,
I'm Adrian ugly is. Nice tomeet you, Kate. Hi.
I've worked with JV on a coupleof different projects, and not only on

(06:46):
not only doing some acting, butwe've also done some music together as well.
And I'm also pleased to be heretonight and looking forward to the rest
of the show. Yeah, I'myou too. You got one more,
the one that's smoking, the liveanimal if I recall the chicken smoker take.
Nice to meet you, Tony Hatzegergallis, how are you. I'm well,

(07:08):
thank you, thank you for havingme. This is gonna be uh.
We were looking forward to this quitea bit. We've heard great things
about the podcast, so thanks forhaving us. So you you you all
met through. I was when Ifirst came to Baltimore. I was looking
for a band. I was tryingto put together a band, and I
put an ad out looking for adrummer, and I called this guy and

(07:28):
so I went to his house.He was living with some people in this
big house or was it overally?I think I was yeah, and I
mean we we clicked right away.We became friends right a woman. We
have been friends since I got here. But believe it or not, we
actually never were in a band together. Because when I think I finally started
putting the pieces together to put thisband, I said, okay, now

(07:51):
I'm ready for my drummer. Hewas spoken, let me get Adrian to
join the band. But by thattime he had always hooked up this guy
to my left. They had alreadygotten a band together, and so he
was off off the what would bethe right way to say that he was
off the market? Off the market. You're an Adrian Steeler, that's what

(08:13):
you are. Well, we remainedreally good friends. Me and Adrian have
been really cool friends. And Imet Tony through him, and me and
Tony became really good friends. Andum, we played maybe a couple of
shows together. We played in Phillytogether, we played here in Baltimore a
few shows together. But he wasjust like a sit in type situation.
It was never like where he wasa part of the band. And then

(08:35):
I didn't know you as a musician. I met you as No, we
never spoke as a musician. Whatme and a musician. I was already
I had already figured that I wasn'tgoing to make any moves or any waves
and music, and so I gotinto podcasting, and I realized that that
was a that was a better fitfor me in my personality, and I

(08:58):
kind of took off the podcast role. And that's how you and I'm at
for King of Silists. And thenwe met up in Boston that during the
show. But to make a longstory short, Adrian, what I told
Adrian I was thinking about doing myfirst movie. He volunteered to say,
let me be a part of thatmove. Let me be a part of
your movie. And so I kindof tailored the character around him, and

(09:22):
I thought, you know, ifI just made the character fit how he
was, that it would be amore natural, organic field. It worked
out really well the movies on Amazon. And then Tony comes along and says,
hey, I want to be inmovies too, And that's how we
just slid it. I mean,we just came back together. I mean
we were always close, we werealways friends, but you know, Tony

(09:43):
got married at kids and all thatsort of thing. Kids ruined everything,
you know, it gets in theway of stuff. But he's a proud
father and a good husband. Buthis wife is kind enough to let,
you know, rent him out forthe night so we can come here.
Only we had to pay serious money, right guy. Okay, so he's

(10:05):
here now because you know, hey, he really wants to get give it
a shot and and and show business. And as musicians, you know,
we just have that drive in usto be in front of the spotlight and
somehow or be under the lights.And me as being the director, I'm
more than happy and delighted to havebrought my friends along to be working on
projects with people you actually like.And its people that you call your brothers,

(10:30):
kind of like the characters I playon King of Silence. You know,
they're my brother my brothers. Youknow, in real life I do
have brothers. And these two sittingnext to me all my brothers, right,
which is very cute. Let's don'ttake a moment to accept that that's
very the whiskey talking either. Notyet, but you know, you know,
if we if we record long enough, it could become Louiski, Like,

(10:54):
I have faith. I have faiththat you could do this. So
let's let's start with Adrian the studentat a time because when we have three
men's voices, it can be alittle confusing for listeners. Adrian, music
and performing and acting have always beenyour thing or is that an adult thing
for you? Well, with themusic, I've always um, I was

(11:16):
doing music as a child, youknow, so it was always around in
the house. So that's what Ialways was, was just a musician for
the most part. But when Javwas talking about the project he was doing
with the film, um, Idon't know, it's just a natural reaction
to want to be a part ofit. And it turned out really good.
Well, and I've seen it actually, which is a little bit creepy
that like, I'm not like I'vealways been watching you, but I have

(11:39):
actually watched your show on my actualphone, so I don't remember. And
again I get an interject here,please the interject. The comment that the
Kate said to me was, youknow, JV, when you when you
shared this movie with me, Iwasn't expecting it to look good. I
mean that affect I might have shotnicer than that, like me not didn't

(12:03):
solve me, but more like ashot buddy two thumbs up. I wasn't
because I wasn't expecting it to lookthat good. I think that's what she
wasn't expecting. A young George Clooney, Yeah, he has my first movie.
Everyone expected it to be trash,you know, but it didn't turn
out there. And Adrian's humility couldchoke a donkey when he says he uh,

(12:24):
he says. A musician, he'sa phenomenal drummer and percussionist in every
shape and form, but also alyricist for many years when we were younger,
and it was when it was whenit was formidable. He was probably
the greatest lyricist that I knew.Rap was allowable for us in the nineties
and such when we dabbled in theraf um. Yeah, Adrian always had

(12:50):
like the greatest just you know,bars severe creativity, always a great cadence
as a rapper and as a asa performer. And then that went to
you know that that's the dre andI'm met I'm at add twenty five years
ago with drums and rap over apool table or something. I mean,
once once you're a percussionist. AlwaysI'm saying, I get it. I

(13:11):
hear you. Did you know thatI played drums? I didn't know you
played not anymore? I'm talking toJavie. I'm sorry, sorry, I'm
talking to Javie like like you cantell you can't tell, of course you
can't look down here, but yeah, the boy I've gone death. So
I don't I don't dare let otherpeople rely on my musical rhythm or abilities

(13:35):
or picture any of the things.Like most music is, you know,
pretty percussive heavy, and you knowthat's that's sort of the backbone of the
of the band. And I don'tdare do that. But once a percussionist,
you man, it's always there.Here's a thing, okay, I
think I think the transition from musicto the film wasn't really a big one

(13:56):
because we were used to practice andwe're used to studying songs, we're used
to writing stuff. We're used totaking these things step by step, learning
the rhythm of it, if youwill. Movies are in a lot ways
like that. You have to learnthe kind of the rhythm and go with
it and feel the vibe of itand become that character, you know.
And we're all original musicians as well. I'm sorry, as you were saying,

(14:18):
no, I saying, we alloriginal musicians, So for us,
um, you know, we're oldschool storytellers in our our target genre,
if you will, sorts when wewhen we write, we tell stories,
even even to the point where Iused to tell the guys and then he
says this, So then he doesthis, and I'm speaking of the character
that I wrote. But that's howto detached you are from the story itself,

(14:39):
so at least for us, Idon't know. I feel like musically,
we always wanted to tell a story. So when we got to play
other characters, Adrian made it lookeasy. So we all just want to
be a part of it. Youknow. Yeah, if you can do
it, I can do it,right fair. I wish it was that
easy. Well, when I didthat project though, and I was telling
jv on that we had to getthe word to Tony that we were you

(15:03):
know that. Um, I justthink he's a natural. He's a natural.
Well here's how this played out,Okay, And we're gonna get to
the King of silas part now becauseme and me and Adrian we meet up
for breakfast. Monster. I'm Tonytoo, but on this particular morning,
when you find out about it,they invite you. That's what you just
launch. In seven minutes, theyclearly want me there. This one day,

(15:26):
this one morning, it was justme and him and we were eating
and we're having coffee and whatever,and I said to him, I go,
you know, I'm really thinking aboutdoing a movie about the King of
silas podcast the story and King ofSilence. I said, but I don't
want you to say anything to Tonyand I'm thinking about casting him to play
the King. Do you remember thatconversation? And I asked him, what
do you think about this? Before? I don't want to go any further

(15:48):
to him and I had this conversationand the conversation went sort of it went
I don't remember verbat him what wesaid, but kind of we were talking
about it like Tony would be bercuIt was. It was a trainer.
It was a no brainer. Itwas a no brainer. We think of
anybody better in any other case thatif they were talking about any other character

(16:11):
to play. You have to understanda huge Tony. Tony is a is
A is A is a big personality. You have to understand I admire love
this man. I do with allmy heart. I do. He knows
it. He just has a reallybig personality and you kind of need that
if you're going to play the Kingof the World, I'm sorry, are
we I'm sorry? Are you usingeuphemism right now? I just want to

(16:32):
make sure personality is Latin for ohno, But okay. I originally I
was overwhelmed too when I started itbecause I saw Adrian right out the gate
to a movie and I'm watching this, so yeah, we got we finished
the film that it was like anafterthought. And then I watch it and
I'm thinking, what are they doing? I did never be a part of

(16:52):
this. It's like they're pros alreadyhow to get this late in the game.
So I asked for us to beum anywhere they would yeah, any
any part man. Then in theinterim, I've played an angry boyfriend who
died unjustly, who was who wasmisunderstood. I think Troy was missing.
Will go down on being Hills godown in history? Is being misunderstood?

(17:17):
And then um, then I playedsomething that really changed my view on acting,
which was which was deteriorating Clone Zombiethree. That was probably That's when
I knew, like this silent eighteenhours of filming in paint Uh is where
my passion is. And that wasmy you know, that was my Law
and Order episode of being a corpse. I didn't say anything, I didn't

(17:42):
do much. There were a coupleaggressive looks. I worked out in the
parking lot a lot to that.And then and then we came to the
conversation of a mystery and you knowwhat, one of the irony about that
whole zombie story. He shot itin this very same room where right now
we are in was where I was. You're painted up saying it's fantastic,

(18:04):
great effects and makeup team. Let'sjust post please, You're wonderful. Oh,
I see how this works now I'veseen you too. Anyway, go
on, n thank you. No, it's okay, You're you're doing You're
doing quite Listen, but Tony,did you let me reword it? Because

(18:26):
it's obvious that, yes, you'veyou've been involved in music and acting for
a long time. But it soundyou made it sound at the beginning like
you had stepped out and returned.No, I've never acted in my life.
I always it was always a bucketlist item, like I wanted to
either be in plays or uh domy terrible five minutes of stand up,
Like there was one more thing inperformance that I wanted to achieve, and

(18:48):
that was, Um, you know, I'm the I'm the writer of our
of our lyrics and melodies, andalthough we do everything together in our band
in analog, I write the words. I tell a story, right,
So, um, I just thought, what if I could try that in
some element to portray that, butone more way where I could be the

(19:10):
vessel for that, not just myvoice, but but somehow acting as well.
So to be able to do itwith two guys that I've made music
with in the past, and I'mso close to it's ideal. It's very
fortunate. Does music and acting paythe bills for any of you? Yet?
Wouldn't that be nice? Doesn't paythe bills? No? Maybe maybe

(19:32):
you paid my phone bill? Thisis what I'm saying. Like, and
let's be clear that, like Itell people all the time that as a
podcaster, the hobby pays for itself. Now and now I've reached a point
where I work full time hours forpart time pay. That's what I do.
And so you know the number ofcute little podcasters little most of them

(19:57):
rich funnies, your old girls.They're really cute, and they're like,
I'm gonna start a true crime podcastand I'm gonna make money, and I'm
like, well, I believe partsof that. For me, it's you
gotta understand, I'm a publisher inthe publishing world. You know, I
have a number of books out,you know, some of them in the

(20:17):
public domain now, and you know, I just got lucky on a couple
of a couple of books that Iput out, so a lot of my
projects are funded from that, soit doesn't really dip into my personal pocket
per se. The podcast does makea little bit of money, I'm not
gonna lie. It does. Thefilm that I put on Amazon chipped in

(20:40):
a little bit now and there,But most of the money that I earned
from the book sales is where Iput into my personal projects. And my
films are well, they're low budgetfilms, but they're still being paid for
by other creative projects that I have, which is kind of ultimately the goal
when I look at these cute littlecoals and they're like, I'm gonna make

(21:00):
money, and I'm like, okay, look here's what we want to start
with. You want to start withreaching a point after a lot of work
where one artistic project funds another one, yeah, or funds itself. After
you reach that, come back andtalk to me and tell me how much

(21:21):
money you've made. But until then, like, it's great, it's a
great goal. But like in thesociety that we're in late stage capitalism,
like everything sucks and we're all goingto die. That's do you a shot
a whiskey. It's fine, Istill have to say this year. I
think naturally, if you're whatever yourpassion is, whether it's acting or music,

(21:45):
or writing or whatever it is,as long as you're doing what is
feeding that need to do that,whether it be acting or music or whatever,
directing, you know, anything Ineed to create right in the podcast,
whatever you're doing, you're doing whatyour passion is. And sometimes,
as you know, it's not evenabout the money as much as it is

(22:07):
being true to what you want todo. When you know as an artist,
as an artists, it comes tothe point where you make money off
of it. Obviously that great,but I think when you have situations like
um local artists, um, localfilmmakers or whatever, you know, it's
just the need to get out thereand create, so you never know what

(22:29):
can happen, but you're still doingwhat you feel that you need to do.
Certainly, I fully agree. Ifully agree that the like it's just
the number of people if you getinto say podcasting or acting or music to
make money. Nah, don't youknow what I mean? Like exactly,

(22:52):
it's it's it's hard work. Andyou know, we don't live in a
society that really rewards the arts.And so I'm trying to speak diplomatically here
on that because I just hard workfor the Island boys. I just had
a child graduate art school, soas you can guess, they don't do

(23:17):
art through living right now. Butyou just nailed it on the head,
right. What is your definition ofsuccess is very dependent on its source.
Your definition of successful on a podcast. Your definition of art also can be
extremely perspective based. And so forme, I may look for something and
then I say, Okay, ifI can make money from it, that's

(23:40):
great. But sometimes I call theseguys and I'm like, I have this
song inside me that I need toget out, Like can we just get
to a practice. And our guitaristis very close to us as well.
We'll have one riff like barely prepared, like three notes, and I'd be
like, yes, that give methat. Let's start writing immediately, and
we have written songs in moment it'slike in like ninety minutes in their entirety,

(24:03):
not necessarily some of our bangers.But uh, I also want to
take this moment for our sponsors,the pizza delivery guy who's here exciting.
Yeah, so they're not here.I want, I want, I want
the audience to understand that they didn'tsend pizza to me, right, just
in case they were curious. Youwant some pizza that I absolutely do know

(24:26):
recording, I will get pizza afterI Okay, I'm married an educator.
I understand that you're broke, butjust to kind of put a cap on
what we were just discussing on eightyand I have been musicians for a long
time and we've seen, and I'msure Adrian will Will will agree, over
the years, the amount of moneythat was paid to musicians and bands playing

(24:49):
and venues just continuously declined, tothe point where some players actually charge bands
to play there. No, lie, these venues actually charge are a band
to come in and set up andplay their music. Like this is absurd.
Put so much time common here.I mean I live in Boston,
said Boston. Yeah, I'm notgoing to go through the trouble learning songs

(25:11):
or playing songs, and then Ihave to pay you to listen to I
don't think so that's just not good. So okay, my background and the
reason that I know a little bitabout the Boston scene, and it's a
little bit, is that I'm notI haven't been in touch in years,
but I used to be buddies withthe guys in God Smack. Yeah,

(25:36):
so my okay, it's complicated.Ex boyfriend played hockey with their bassist in
the way that these things do rightwhere everybody's got connections, and so there
were times where like Robbie or SullyErna or whatever would be like, Hi,
what are you doing tonight? AndI'm like, you need another body

(25:57):
in the audience, don't you,And they're like, yeah, if we
don't have enough people show up,then they charge us. But if enough
people show up, then at leastit's a zero some kind of deal.
And so, okay, well withyou, I'll share story. I had
something very similar buddy of mine whowas was doing like he was managing this

(26:22):
this bar, the thirteen four builda little team, nice place, great
place, calling me up and saysay, can you come up here and
hang out with us for a while. I'm gonna going, Oh, it's
kind of busy. Why what's goingon? He goes to Chris Barrett is
here the guy from the Spin Doctors, his badest player. He goes,
it's from upstate New York. Yes, he's here. I'm like okay.
So I went right and sure enough, there was like maybe three or four

(26:47):
people there, and there's the guyfrom the Spin Doctors once, you know,
the best selling album in the world, touring with the Rolling Stones.
But he's sitting in this bar andthere's three or four people are So when
they finished their set, of courseI had to talk to him, you
know, shooting the ship with him, and it was it was a cool
vibe. It's a cool dude downto earth. And we talked for a
while and then I had to dip. It's like, dude, okay,

(27:08):
you the Spin Doctors. I gottago. Good for you. Good get
see you. Yeah, he's meetingyou, man, Yeah understand. I
love the guy. Man. Istill get emails from him once in a
while. He's promoting shit all thetime. Oh that was a humble brad
Jesus Christ. No, No,it's not like he's said him to impress

(27:30):
you, guys, if you're notimpressed that I know a spin doctor,
No, no single singular spin door. You never mentioned him dynasty, You
never mentioned him meeting the other one. You mentioned one fine spin doctor falsely
advertised. Don't put that out pleasesingle. Also, he's like a dentist,
you know what I mean. Soit's not like a big doctor.

(27:52):
It's like it's like in the room. Okay, I have I have a
profound fear of dentists, like aserious foe, generally anesthesia for for like
for cleanings. Not a fan.But I have learned to suck it up
and bring the kids to their appointments. So for mine, I'm still knocked
the fuck out, but for thekids, I have to go and do

(28:15):
the mom thing and drive them upto their appointment. Well, if I
was leading by example, i'd notall four kids out, which I'm considerable,
So thank you about that before youBut you know, it's just it's
one of those my choices for myselfare either have myself knocked out or don't

(28:36):
go. And I did. Theydon't go for a real long time,
and I feel like that's probably notgreat. So I'm up at my kids'
dentist. This is the second yearthat I've started my my podcast and still
kind of coping with the fact thatI had merch and in that I was

(28:56):
it was just starting to pay foritself, but just completely break even pay
for itself, like if my mykid broken or if like my my tumbler
had broken, I'd have been sollike I would have had to buy it
myself. So I'm up at mykids' dentist, having steeled myself up.
They go in for their appointments andthen I send them, one at a

(29:18):
time out to the car. Hopefullythey go to my car. I don't
really care, and you know,and then I go and I talked to
the dentists to find out just howfucked up at their deed this time,
and the answer was, oh no, they were good, no cavities.
But I have a question for you. And I'm like, don't ask me
questions, Like I'm sure you area lovely, lovely person, but don't

(29:41):
ask me questions. Please. CanI go sit in the car with the
kids, And he's like, no, I just have a question real quick.
Do you have a podcast? AndI was like, what I don't
even know how to cope at thismoment right now, because it was my
first sort of sighting in the wild. He's like, I've been listening to
this podcast and I realized the otherday and I think the host is you,

(30:03):
and I was like, oh mygod, the callers coming from inside
the house Like I was just like, oh, it's me. I don't
know how to deal with this.So that that may be like as famous
as I ever get. But mykids scentist recognizes my voice. My kids
Scentist listens to me more than mykids do. So talk to us,

(30:27):
Jabe, talk to us about what'scoming next with King of Silas. So
the King of Silas series is comingto an end. The story is ending
King of Silas and all his cronies. I'm not going to spoil it for
you, but something happens to allof them and the show the story ends
there for him. Now, weare going to do a season seven because

(30:52):
we're going to chronicle some of thecharacters and fill in the gaps for the
story that you know, we neverreally delved into. So the show will
continue. It just it's kind oflike we are it's kind of we already
know do not like when the StarWars, not like a prequel. We're
just gonna look at another character andjust take them all the way to the

(31:15):
end again. So we're gonna inone season go from the beginning to the
end from the perspective of one character. That character differences Monaica And you're how
many other thousands as a podcaster andcreator? How many other thousands of projects
do you have laid out before you? So I just got tapped to do.

(31:37):
I'm directing two films for a personwho wants to He works for Netflix,
and he's trying to shop some ofhis own material for Netflix because they're
doing a indie film stream part becausethey're in the water. They're underwater and
they're trying to save their channel.Who knows what they're doing, but anyway,

(31:57):
so I'm gonna be doing that.I've casted this guy, Adrian for
one of those films. Uh,try the way. I gotta get your
script to that. So, um, if only you knew of another male
lead for another The other one isI'm working on Excepted. The other The
other movie was I Was I summoned. The other movie is predominantly African Americans,

(32:19):
so I'm gonna be the lead.Obviously you'll have to be like the
dirty cop or something. You know, you'll have to have a I give
that you'll be relegated to a minorrole if that's okay. Well, you
know, it really depends on okay, skirting lightly here. But if you're
a person of color, the dirtycop can be a very major character.

(32:42):
Yeah, I'm a person of bloodpressure. It's a reddish dark. Uh.
You get the vibe. It's nice. It's you could go either way
and go. You're not planning onending up on the headlines in practice?
Oh no, I'm not running forall anytime. Accellent. You had a
production meeting last last weekend. Youknow, there's all this talk about stuff,

(33:06):
and I really wanted to film theend one way, and they were
adamantly against it because they didn't wantthe cop to shoot this African American at
the end, Although that would bethe logical, that's what happened. Ending
that I thought that historical we're takinga data historical inch. It would be
like yes, and a people aregonna be angry and like what the fuck,

(33:28):
And that's do you not want peopleto do that when they watch your
stuff? Some people might be likethat tracks I get it. Yeah,
I thought it was a great idea, but they like I feel like you
may want you may want to pisspeople off, or you may want to
smooth things over, and either wayis like, I am both a podcaster
and a knitter, right so,as a podcaster, I'm all cool with

(33:49):
making people uncomfortable. As a knitter, not so much so. I had
a knitter, literally knit one whoknits professionally. I'm assuming sponsored or how
does that? Oh I should beno, not sponsored right now. It's
it's actually a more expensive hobby thanpodcasting. Why I ask is because um,
I have a six and a halfyear old that's asked me to look

(34:12):
into crocheting. Were her words.Crochet is a little easier. There's only
one hook, knitting is two.Yeah, there's there's a big difference manipulating
a single hook at this point.So yeah, so I dig it,
I dig it. I don't knowthis class in itself, but yeah,
I like it. Here you gothat it mean it create like it's and

(34:34):
now to be to be clear,I'm good enough at knitting that I could
probably sell shit and I could probablymake money. I have probably the equivalent
of a ranch house by this point. To be real, like, I've
been knitting for twenty years, soI could you want to little critters that
you made, and it was likea ball preacher. You made one and

(34:54):
I got one this little thing.It was like a year. You're absolutely
I'm not a toy kind of knitter. So maybe on commission, I don't
know, maybe I was high.It's possible these these are whiskey, you

(35:15):
know. Yeah, no, Inot that I recall. I've mostly kept
knitting and podcasting separate. And here'sokay, so now I'm having the streams
cross. So for one to finish. The prior thought is that I'm good
enough at knitting that I could sellit, but then it wouldn't be fun
anymore, and so I would preferto just take on the costs of it

(35:37):
and give it to people when Iwant to. In that way, if
they're like, hey, can younit me at blanket, I can be
like nope and keep going and there'sno guilt there, you know. It's
it's entirely up to me based onwhere my life. It's like the video
at work, but I keep buggingher to make and she's like yeah,
I'm not gonna make them. That'snot gonna happen. Yeah, a lot

(35:57):
of work, Molly, you makegreat tamales. I'm not gonna make any
of this week. I'm like,shit, it's a thing. I feel
like anytime you want to, youknow, show any type of grace and
you're received by what's in it foryou. It does take a lot of
the value out of it. Right, So if you if you're doing this,
it brings you some kind of joy, It brings you piece to crochets,
like a hyper focus that's in it. And then also the end result

(36:20):
is a fancy sweater. If youthen start doing that, you monetize that
it does kind of cheapen the elementof I don't know, peace that comes
from it. As far as I'mconcerned, it's well. And people bitch
about it too, because realistically,you know, knitting to me is a
skilled, you know, a fiveaverage skill in a dying skill. And

(36:42):
so are you gonna pay me minimumwage for my advanced skill that is slowly
dying out? Or are you gonnapay me not much more? But let's
say fifteen bucks an hour. Fifteenbucks an hour means that you're gonna pay
me about seventy five bucks for ahat. Do you want to spend seventy
five dollars for a hat or doyou want to say cool, thanks or

(37:07):
no problem? Based on you know. And that's the thing is that I
could spend all of my time fightingwith people to be paid what I am
owed. Would I deserve? That'sdone, you should wear it? And
then it's like multi dimensional. Yeah, And I thought you were gonna say,

(37:30):
I'll pay for a hat, andI'll be like, all right,
well then I'll let you goddamn hat. But you know, I see how,
I see why your priorities are.I see this, I see this.
It's good. It's good with theKing of Silace logo on it.
That would be awesome. A blankwell, it took me a full year
to make a full size blanket intwenty twenty one. But you you,

(37:52):
I'll put on a list. Icould put in a list. You know.
I've got a couple of babies thatnot my own, thank god,
But I've got a couple of babiesthat I have to knit for this year
and then reemptively, you know,planning for the eminent success of the movie.
I'm willing to either pose with thatblanket and or signed. I don't

(38:14):
know if that's a promise or athreat that I appreciate both are both are
ambition, said Blant a week andthen give it to someone, take photographs,
especially essentially chainting said blanket with mywith my you know, go ahead,

(38:34):
you can finish that. You canfinish it's right there, right there.
What are you gonna chaint it with? You can say? The followers
might say, this guy, youknow, finally I'd get the honor of
visualizing a silas, But what wouldbe better than to have his musk on
a blanket that then you crochet andthen this whole Do you see what I

(38:59):
mean? Everything I do. You'reyou're very capitalistic. I appreciate that.
Absolutely takes ability, value takes ability. This is this is creative. That
that's a word for it. It'screative. So as a background for you
guys for Tony interview, there wasa like I've attended a more you know,

(39:25):
non fiction interview style Cohn out inChicago in the summer of twenty nineteen,
and I was like, Wow,that's a lot of work. It's
really hard to hype your own stuff. And but my oldest did all of
my artwork, and so I kindof felt obligated. Then there's going to
be an audio fiction Cohn called Podtalesthat was held at Leslie University in October

(39:53):
of twenty nineteen. Well, no, I have to attend that because Leslie
is where my eldest went to school. So okay, cool, cool,
find no big deal. And thena former acquaintance I've completely lost touch and
that's for reasons to go off,Mike. I can tell you the deeds,

(40:15):
but it's past tense that particularly.But I was asked, hey,
can you can if you're going togo to this, I'll pay for the
table registration fee and then you couldrun my table for me and like hype
my show. And I was like, okay, at least then I know
I'll have a place to sit down, right, and a place to keep

(40:37):
my ship all day instead of havingto carry it around. And it's so
much easier to hype somebody else's workbecause all you have to do is say
all the positives and you don't havethat voice in the back of your head
going okay, yeah, but they'regoing to find out. We Also,
when you're hyping somebody else, youdon't feel pretentious or contrived. You're like,
this guy's great as soon as youstart going I'm great, and you're
like, ah shit, that doesn'tthat's our good look, you know.

(41:00):
So I think it's a lot easierto always be a fan of other people's
and that's listen. We could godeep into the stigma that's in society where
people would rather be a fan ofpeople that they'll never meet or that they'll
never interact with, and be theirown fan. But I think one big
important thing about these three guys isthat we're happy to be our own fan.

(41:35):
First, we're proud first fan.I'm I'm my biggest fan, I'm
his second biggest, and I'm hissecond biggest, which puts me in a
really good spot friend wise, youknow what I mean. I would think
I would think, I please pleasedon't confirm this on video, But you're
all wearing King of Silas underwear rightnow. We are sucks, and sucks.

(41:58):
I didn't assume. So, likeit's warmer down there. The King
doesn't know where he just doesn't.That's that's cannon. Now. Maybe he
doesn't, maybe he doesn't talk aboutit. Maybe he's like, oh,
didn't talk about it. He's notinvolved. Maybe he's not. Maybe he's
wearing some new stuff you don't evenknow exist because he's the king, you

(42:19):
know what I mean, Like there'ssome new design. I don't know.
This is the hardest thing. Thishas been the hardest thing for me,
Kate to bring him to, tryto try to ask, so this guy
in reeling him in because I go, have you met yourself? The king
is well? Because I have?And in reeling you in can be a
little bit of a thing sometimes,I think. So they're pointing at each

(42:45):
other. I think he's got somebodyelse. So wait, it's it's like
the character that I play Bony onTurbot, like you throw up, thrust
all the way to like eleven,that's ours, goes to eleven. Yeah,
Tony goes pushes all it eleven ship, He'll go to twelve if you

(43:07):
let him. How we joke aboutit, but this was like if we
can get serious for a moment.When I remember the first time they presented
this to me, I had justseen a King of silas he sent me
the podcast year For the first firstcouple of times, I wasn't able to
really get an objective view on itbecause it was his voice. So my
first thing was like, I'm soproud of my friend, Like this is
so creative, this is such agreat story. That I didn't really get

(43:30):
as involved with the character. SoI glazed over the first few episodes,
truthfully, because I was so inall with the process. I couldn't believe
this, this in depth, wellthought layered thing was created by someone that
I played music with. So justbecause you don't see the work version of
your friend, and you don't seethe friend version of your coworker often,

(43:51):
so it was it was a beautifulelement. But right when I saw this
drawing of this King of Silas drawingthat he did, and it was this
this um, this bearded, gruff, strong character, and more so than
I thought, man, I'm thatguy, I thought, I want to
be that guy. I want tobe that guy so bad. But I

(44:12):
love the way he he's his presenceis so so effortlessly commanded. I love
that character and it's it's um inits broad range of romantic to sociopath.
It was such a fill in between, and so I've been challenged by it,
I've been humbled by it, andI'm learning so much from the guys
around me, and I hope justdesperately to do a good portrayal for the

(44:37):
people that have been a fan ofthem for you know, a few years
now. So well, not tomention that character in general. Um,
Tony did um a character in oneof JV's films called The Implant, where
the comedy aspect of the character literallyI had to leave the room on some
shots because made me laugh, youknow. And here's the thing I wouldn't.

(44:58):
I wouldn't. I would know thelines that were coming up because we're
all working on the same project andwe all read lines. So even though
I knew what he was gonna do, it still made me laugh, like
I was the first time I everseen it. So that that aspect of
that character he played in The Implant, and then the character he played in
Um Crisis Counselors, Um, whichwas which we got to be in together.

(45:20):
Yeah, awesome thing. That wasreally cool. You're Tony, this
is your first movie. You getit with your best friend. Well,
the character, the character he playsin Crisis Counselors has um um not a
mean streak, but he's his charactersin art he loves understood, So don't
want anybody to go down the recordhere to think that Troy's a bad guy.
He's a great guy. And ifyou've met him prior to him being

(45:42):
killed, he was a wonderful gentleman. He's got a little bit of a
hot streak because maybe he came froma broken home, you know what I
mean, So he got a littlelouder. He didn't get the attention he
wore as a kid. I'm sorryyou and that too, also didn't see
a guy like that. You can'tsee a guy like that who maybe who
maybe at eight and the order toan eight and a half when he walks
around, but he's got his owninter securities. You know, you don't

(46:05):
cheating a gentleman like that. We'llnot kill him with kindness. That's what
you do. That's you can justshove him out of this screen if you
need to, like you have afull permission. I'll never tell a character
King of Silas in the movie.That character himself has a lot of sides
to him, like you know,so I think the character, you know,

(46:28):
the work that he did in inthe other films that JB had is
the reason why he's a no brainerfor that that character in the movie He
was Appreciate a Silas movie. BecauseI mean, obviously, I know this
character very intimately, since I've playedhim for seven years and wrote him and
wrote him. He is he hashe has a quirkiness to him, or
he's just he's fucking goose. Sometimeshe just is he just it comes out

(46:52):
goofy, comes out and dumb,because you know, he's a human being.
After all, he may be asociopath, he's he's a sociopath with
some humanity the first time. Ithink you're trying to encase this person who
should feel rightfully that he is justifiedin every movie makes and still he finds
a minute in the data, havea little bit of self self doubt,

(47:14):
a little self reevaluation, and belike, am I gonna? I know
I'm supposed to do this right?You know. So it's it's just a
lot to be the character that ishiding beyond the character. It's brilliantly written,
and I'm I'm chasing him. I'mchasing him as we speak, to
try and try and get to thething that I try to avoid. And
it's insert to the comedy element becauseI think most people, most people are

(47:37):
okay with seeing him as narcissist.But it's an easy play. It's an
easy play, believable, you know. I want to steer people away,
and I think that's the thing thatintrigues. I think that's why some people
are just still fan after all theseyears. They still want they listen to
the show religiously. He can stillsurprise you because you know where he's going,

(47:59):
you know where you know, buthe can still surprise you. I'm
just I'm surprising years later, peoplestill want to listen to the show.
Sometimes it's super dark surprises and you'relike, Wow, that dude's a piece
of shit. And other times it'sjust clever stuff. I don't know.
I don't know, man. Ileave that up to the audience to decide
whether they want to love or hatehim, or love to hate him.

(48:21):
He's a big dude. I thinkyou can only love or hatim. There's
no one between. With the silence, think it's sort of offsets the seriousness
a lot. It offsets the seriousnessof his actions. Was there act?
I don't know. You know,I spoke to lenty of other paths and
I don't know if you've met mymother, but she's got no sense of

(48:42):
humor. But so there's that.But um, you're you're you're probably better
or at at evaluating something like thatthan me, because I don't deal with
people who murder like that. Idon't I don't talk to them. They
don't talk to murderers, so Idon't really know how do they think.
I don't really know what they howthey react. So I have to invent

(49:04):
all this shit, you know.I try to imagine what it must be
loved. In my mind. Ifantasized about shit, and that helps me
maybe build this character over time,to help me build this character. Um,
I don't know. I've had murderousthoughts. I think everyone has.
Um but let's get that out there, you know, before we get famous
that I'm entirely you said you incase. You know, I never thought

(49:31):
that he'd be capable of it,but he did say eleven years agoing on
the podcast he had murderous I hadmurderous thoughts. I've had murderous stots.
That's going somebody's got to use thatas their ring tone. Sit over here,
right, I would never killed myfriends. Come on, not twice,

(49:53):
not again, don't care? Friends? Come on? Well, I
mean, but that's the answer,and it's a simple, and it's an
answer that irritates a lot of people. Is there's no such thing as what
a murderer is, Like, Okay, there are as many different ways to

(50:15):
want to kill someone and reasons towant to do it as there are ways
to enjoy someone. You have youhave your work friends, and you have
your home friends, or do youhave your band friends and you have your
acting friends and your podcasting friends andthat kind of thing, Like we just
have different facets. We agree thatpeople murder others for a myriad of reasons,

(50:37):
whether they're good reasons or bad reasonsor really crazy reasons. But there
are reasons, not necessarily like thereare well, or at least there are
people who can't articulate their reasons orthey're just impulsively mean, like maybe they're
driven, sometimes impulsive, or sometimesyou're like what the hell did you do?
And they're like, yeah, Iknow. But maybe they don't have

(51:00):
a reason per se, But thereis a reason, maybe on the exterior
that a third person could see andthat would be the reason, Well he's
impulsive or she's in pulsive, oryou know, they have something triggered them.
I think I don't know that we'reall trained to understand our own underlying
reasons for things. You know thatlike if you I mean picture a playground

(51:24):
full of kids and some of themwill you know, like each one of
those kids is going to throw ahandful of sand at another kid. But
each one of them is motivated forsome other reason. One of them might
be angry, one of them mightbe trying to play, one of them
might be trying to see like,okay, you step back farther and I'll

(51:45):
see if I can get it allthe way to you. Like, kids
do things for their reasons. Murdersare not that they're just bigger kids,
right, And so when I weighedthat out in the writing process, you
know, I try to come upwith a reason for these characters to commit
the heinous things that they do inthe case of silence, and I'm telling

(52:05):
you, if I've had many conversationsabout the king and what drives him to
be so vicious and murderous as heis and still be like, you know,
hey, everybody's gonna have dinner.Um, He's driven by things that
when we when we evaluate life,and you know, in our own way,
I think we all look at thingsin the world and say, yeah,
you know, the world would bebetter if these things weren't there,

(52:29):
or if these people would not dothis, or et cetera, et cetera.
And so he's just in that frameof mind, well, you know,
he has the power and the authorityto do it, so he just
doesn't. He eliminates people that hethinks are causing the deterioration of humanity.
But I think the big secret isthat humanity is what it is, and

(52:52):
you can't you can't kill certain peopleor eliminate certain people and think that well,
now, now humanity is going tobe clean. He manages gonna be
good. We're all gonna you know, sing together and hold hands. That's
just not going to happen. Aslong as you have two people on this
earth. There's gonna be something that'sgonna There's gonna be some friction somewhere.

(53:13):
There's gonna be some disagreement, andthose things lead to all kinds of problems,
eventually murderous problems at times, murders. The last man is standing.
That's just my take on it.Before I hit stopped because we're hitting up
to an hour and I want tolet you guys eating that kind of deal

(53:35):
before I hit stopped though, Isthere anything that I didn't ask that you
want to get on the recording?Well, I have two of the films
that are in the film festivals rightnow. I can't share them yet because
they're in film festivals. A lotof these places don't want them out in
the public yet until I do havethe one film that's on Amazon. That
one features mister Adrian utterly. Hestars in that film and he does a

(53:55):
really good, really good job forbeing our first time absolutely um, and
I'm really pleased and happy as youcan imagine that Amazon accepted. They may
be cut some things out, butoverall it's essentially the same film. But
then we're we'll be. The onebig one that we're doing is this film
called The Visceraate and that stars Tonyto Adrian is in it too, And

(54:19):
one small caveat is Tony is sorry. Adrian is playing a character that I
originally casted him for in the audiodrama, but for whatever reasons, he
couldn't commit to it, and Icast at John Dobe, who passed away.
So Adrian is coming back to playthat role in the film, which
I thought was just poetic in someways. And yeah, I mean,

(54:43):
we're gonna be doing some other films. There'll be there'll be other films in
between. Season six is the finalefor the series, the conclusion of the
story. We get to see whathappens to Silence at the end. That's
coming up in June. I'm gonnabe releasing the first novel based on that.
It's probably five years late. Idon't know people who can fucking bothering

(55:05):
me about it for years. I'mlike, what do you just raise the
film the book already? So thisbook is finally going to come out right
around as the show ends, andthen we're gonna go into movies. That's
what we're gonna do. The nextphase is we're gonna make movies about this
series. So it's not like Iever don't pull back the curtain, but

(55:31):
to pull back the curtain a littlemore than usual. I recorded with these
guys on February eleventh, and aboutfive days later, I was hospitalized for
the first overnight. And by thistime I had already been in the er
a couple of times with this CastroParesis thing, and so the moral is

(55:52):
I was really, really sick,And what was magical for me was that
for this hour or so that Ispent with these guys, I wasn't sick,
I wasn't miserable. I was ableto laugh and tell stories and legitimately

(56:13):
enjoy myself. Like, if I'mreally doing badly, like you're never going
to hear an episode of me fakingit. I suck at faking it.
I'm I'm not an actor. Soif I'm really feeling badly, I reschedule,
and then I feel guilty about rescheduling, but that's its own thing.
Here is a case where I didgive thought to maybe I should reschedule.

(56:37):
Maybe I'm not really hyped enough forit. I know JV's a high energy
kind of guy, and maybe Ican't meet them where they're at, and
I don't know. And I recordedwith them anyway, and I'm so glad
that I did. It was sofun. So JV, Adrian and Tone

(57:00):
thank you guys so much for yourtime and for that break in the middle
of a really rough couple of months. For me. It was just a
lot of fun. And I hopethat you continue to build out your franchises
in books and novels and films andthen I can say, hey, I

(57:21):
knew you win. Thank you guysfor listening. I have absolutely no idea
from day to day when I'm goingto be well enough to record versus not
right now, so just it's alittle surprised. It'll either show up in
your podcatcher in two days or youknow not. But I'll be around.

(57:46):
I've got a bunch that's the backcatalog, and I have so many,
so many cool people that I've talkedto that I really want you to hear.
So I'll be back as soon asi'm able. I hope you're taking
good care of yourselves. You matter.