Weird Al Yankovic

Weird Al Yankovic talks new biopic and more!

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
You're on with Mario Lopez Dril. Mario Lopez joined me
now on Zoom five time Grammy winning artist weird Al
Yanko Big welcome to the show Man. Thank you so much.
Man'm gone so nice to see you. I cannot believe
this is actually the first time we're having a conversation
where I'm interviewing you, being that I've you know, hung
around this business for a while now, and you're a

(00:21):
local l A guy, right, I'm sorry you're a local
Angelino correct, Yeah, totally look at you. Tell about my
plan I've been working here because you don't see that
too often usually. Um, we're a city of transplants and
people come from all over. But I've been a fan
for decades. I love that you're getting your flowers right

(00:42):
now and all this list love you look exactly the same,
So congrats on all that. And I know you wrapped
up a big tour with a very prestigious show at
Carnegie Hall. How did it feel? It was? It was
amazing and I was sort of nervous about it the
whole six months were on the road, and then when
we finally got kind of you fall uh, I was
really feeling it like I'm walking down the hall of

(01:04):
there's pictures of you know, Frank Sinatra and Judy Garland,
the Beatles, and I'm thinking, what am I doing here? This?
This is wrong. I shouldn't be here. But it was fun.
It was you know, I got a little choked up
on stage. You gotta tell you the truth because it
was just such a moment for me. And uh, but
I got through it a very professional but it was. Yeah,
I was definitely one of the take moments of my life.

(01:25):
I bet, I bet And congratulations. On the new movie Weird,
the Al Yankovic Story, which you co wrote, it's being
called a biopic parody. Why why choose uh that particular
direction for the movie. Well, yea, my actual life would
be interesting to maybe a handful of people. But as
my behind the movie, behind the music proved in the nineties,

(01:47):
I haven't had a very controversial life, not a lot
of drama really, uh And and we thought that if
we're gonna do a Hollywood biopic, they all have like drama,
like a lot a lot of ra We had a band,
wouldn't ben some that's awesome. Well, it seems to go
with the music. It makes all sense and Daniel. Daniel Radcliffe,
one of the nicest guys in Hollywood, is playing you did.

(02:08):
Did you get the opportunity to spend a significant amount
of time with him? Absolutely? I mean I had not
met him prior to casting him in the movie, but
once he showed up on set, I was there every
single day on set. We got to hang and we
were hanging out a lot. Now during the promotional tour,
we're seeing each other every day. So yeah, we were
getting too pretty good friends. That's awesome, that's good to hear.

(02:29):
And I didn't realize this, Al, I didn't. I didn't
know you were hiding the guns all these years because
Daniels out there run around shirtless, and I'm like, I
don't know, Ral here dialed it in? Is that historically accurate?
You know? The eighties are fuzzy to me, but if
Daniel seems to remember being me being totally ripped, I
will go along with them. Fair enough. Fair Enough's talk

(02:50):
a little music. There seems to be fewer mega hits
that everyone knows these days, So does that make it
more difficult to choose something to parody it? Does? You know?
I really done a parody of song cur sad since
my last album that was, you know, eight years ago,
now a pop cultural eternity. Uh. So I'm not as
focused on parodies as I used to be. But uh,

(03:11):
and and part of that is because it's a little
harder to determine what the big hits are. There's a
number of reasons, but let's go with that. No, it
makes sense. Um, You've had some artists actually deny your
request to parody of their songs, which I would take
is the ultimate compliment. Is there some of the vaults
that you wish h fans could hear? Well, I've never
recorded something without the artist's blessing, so there's not like

(03:34):
a bault full of songs that are yet to be
released because they haven't been cleared. It's like I will
pitch an artist an idea. Yeah, a lot of them.
I don't even write the song unless the artist has
proven that they have a sense of humor about it,
so I don't waste my time. Who said no? Can
you say yeah? I mean it's it's very rare. Actually, famously,

(03:54):
the only person who has consistently said no, uh was
Prince Uh. I approached them several times times, and I
had some pretty funny ideas, I thought, But he never
was into it. And people are like, oh, why don't
you like, like asked the princess state, maybe they'll let
you do it. And that's not the way I rolled,
because you know, I always respect the artist's wishes, and
Prince made his wishes pretty clear. I get that. I

(04:15):
can totally see that. Which song, by the way, we
when Doves Cry? Oh, that was one of them. Uh
let's go crazy? Uh kiss? What were you gonna say
for when Doves Cry? Well? I was just curious. Do
you remember Lyfe? I don't remember. It might have been
it might have been on spuds fry, like a past
food war, but I don't. I don't honestly don't remember.

(04:39):
It was too long ago. I love them all. I
love them all. What about family life? Um? Do you
have kids? I don't even know, I think so, yeah,
I have a I have a nineteen year old daughter, Nina.
She's a sophomore in college right now. Oh that's awesome. Okay,
so one girl. That's great. Is she into the entertainment
business at all? Not really, No, she's she's triple majoring

(05:00):
in English art and environmental science. So smart something something
there you go, there you go. And what about the
holidays where he's spending Thanksgiving and Christmas? Um, I don't
know if figure that out. Yeah, I think we might
be spending Thanksgiving just at home in l A. And
uh we we've got a place in a in Maury,
so we might we might be spending a Christmas in
a while. So a lottle sick nice man. Nice Well,

(05:22):
it was such a such a joy to talk to you, buddy,
and congratulations. I'm looking forward to checking out the film,
the doc all of you above you can watch, by
the way, weird the Al Yankee story on Real Cool Roku,
pardon me all. Thanks for hanging out, my pleasure. Thanks
fun with Mario A little bast