Podcasts about Groundling

Josh Banday is an LA actor appearing as Ivan on Amazon's Upload by Greg Daniels and also as Dennis on Not Dead Yet.  He has also appeared on The Big Bang Theory, Love, Rush Hour, Mom, Adam Ruins Everything, Man with a Plan, and on the series Pam and Tommy. He got his comedy chops appearing in shows at Second City, and the Groundling's Sunday Company.   Want to Watch: YouTube Meisterkhan Pod. (Please Subscribe)

IT'S RADIO WITH TVS TIM STACK -Featuring TV Writer Tom Maxwell A founding member of The Groundlings, Tom served as artistic director and head of the school from 1979 to 1989. After leaving the company, (and with the help of ex-Groundling, Barry Fanaro), Tom, and his writing partner, ex-Groundling Don Woodard, transitioned into writing for television. Tom and Don worked on several shows including ROOM FOR TWO, FLYING BLIND, DREAM ON and JUST SHOOT ME. In addition, they wrote and produced several pilots and did feature rewrites. Now retired, Tom and his wife Nancy (yet another ex-Groundling), live in Vermont in the summer and Florida in the winter. https://groundlings.com Host - Tim Stack Executive Producer - Jeremiah D. Higgins Senior Sound Engineer - Richard Dugan Tim Stack on Twiter @TvsTimStack Jeremiah D Higgins - https://linktr.ee/jeremiahdhiggins 
www.thejeremiahshow.com

David Crabb is one of the most talented people I know. He's a host and storyteller for both Risk and The Moth; he's the writer and star of his acclaimed one-man show, Bad Kid, about growing up Goth and gay in Texas, which is also a best-selling memoir; and he's currently a member of The Groundling's, one of America's premier improv and sketch comedy troupes based in LA. In our conversation, David talks about how and why he makes such hilarious -- and compelling -- art. Check out David's website!Watch the Bad Kid TrailerBuy Bad Kid the book; buy it at InterabangJohn Casablanca School of Modeling and ActingDavid Crabb's YouTube channel featuring:Rodney Bobbins Byron at Sephora The GroundlingsCranbrook Academy of ArtAxis Theater CompanyRiskThe Moth

It's a special bonus episode, as we mark our return from a seven-month hiatus! Join us for the podcast version of our recent “state of the podcast” LIVE show, in which we discuss what we've all been up to during our hiatus (spoiler: fezzes are involved for one of us!) and what's coming up for the show, before we open up for an “ask us anything” session with questions submitted by those who were watching live!   Other media mentioned in this episode: Blackadder: The Ultimate Edition (Amazon US: https://amzn.to/30sMUnN | Amazon UK: https://amzn.to/3BU2WoN) Phantom of the Paradise (Amazon US: https://amzn.to/3PmxxnZ | Amazon UK: https://amzn.to/44R2t4t) The Rocky Horror Picture Show (Amazon US: https://amzn.to/2Z8yU28 | Amazon UK: https://amzn.to/2Z5Nffp) Doctor Who and the Pescatons (Amazon US: https://amzn.to/3Po0m3x | Amazon UK: https://amzn.to/3R5SWmS) Dracula (Amazon US: https://amzn.to/3f4jq7F | Amazon UK: https://amzn.to/3syfBL6) Vault of Horror (Amazon US: https://amzn.to/3R5Td9o | Amazon UK: https://amzn.to/45AN9d9) Hell Drivers (Amazon US: https://amzn.to/3L8Vo8i | Amazon UK: https://amzn.to/3Epnt7i) The James Bond Collection (Amazon US: https://amzn.to/3FWn6kg | Amazon UK: https://amzn.to/3DQB4lR) Sex Education (http://www.netflix.com) Ncuti Gatwa in A Midsummer Night's Dream (https://bit.ly/3qTMnZR) David Tennant and Sir Patrick Stewart in Hamlet (Amazon US: https://amzn.to/3PpAGnb | Amazon UK: https://amzn.to/3r2wdNB) Doctor Who Am I? (Amazon US: https://amzn.to/3L8Vvke | Amazon UK: https://amzn.to/45WqGXK) The Great (http://www.hulu.com) Spaceballs (Amazon US: https://amzn.to/2WeS5WY | Amazon UK: https://amzn.to/3gqxe9O) Big Finish – The Ratings War (BigFinish.com: https://bit.ly/3sEtDy5) Dan Jones – The Templars (Amazon US: https://amzn.to/45x750L | Amazon UK: https://amzn.to/3r1R7MQ)   You can find the unedited original version of this on YouTube (https://bit.ly/3R7mlwY)   Finally, you can follow us and interact with us on our social media accounts - Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter. You can also e-mail us at watchers4d@gmail.com. If you're enjoying this podcast, please subscribe to the show, and leave us a rating or review.

Phil LaMarr is an actor known for being one of the original cast members of MadTV, Pulp Fiction, and his voice acting roles in Samurai Jack, Futurama, Beavis and Butthead, Family Guy, Teen Titans Go! and a host of other animated series.Show NotesPhil Lamarr on IMDB - https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0482851/Phil Lamarr on Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/phillamarr/Phil Lamarr on TikTok - https://www.tiktok.com/@phillamarrFree Writing Webinar - https://michaeljamin.com/op/webinar-registration/Michael's Online Screenwriting Course - https://michaeljamin.com/courseFree Screenwriting Lesson - https://michaeljamin.com/freeJoin My Watchlist - https://michaeljamin.com/watchlistAutomated TranscriptionPhil LaMarr:I was developing an animated show based on a friend of mine's web comic called Goblins. Okay. And my partner, Matt King and I, we are both performers, but we adapted the comic into a script. And I called a bunch of my voice actor friends, cuz we were, we were gonna make a trailer, you know, to bring these, you know, comic characters to life Yeah. In animation. And it was funny cuz Matt and I are actors. We had, you know, written the script and we'd acted out these scenes. And so in our heads, we, we thought we knew exactly how they'd sound. But then we brought in amazing Billy West, Maurice LaMarr. Mm-Hmm. , Jim Cummings. Mm-Hmm. Steve Bloom, Jennifer. And it was funny because when they performed the scenes we had written, they took it to a whole other level. Right. Beyond what existed in our, in our heads. Right. Like, oh my God, they made it so much better than I even imagined it could be.Michael Jamin:You're listening to Screenwriters Need to Hear This with Michael Jamin.Hey everyone, it's Michael Jamin. Welcome back to Screenwriters. Need to hear this. I, another, another. Cool. I got another cool episode. I, I was so excited about this. I, I tri over my own words. I am here with actor writer Phil LaMarr and this guy. All right. So I'm on his IMDB page cuz he going through his credits. Phil, I'm not joking. It's taking me too long to scroll through IMD,B to get through all your credits. It's nuts how much you work. But, so I'm gonna give you real fast an introduction and then we'll talk more about, what're gonna talk about but okay. So this guy does a lot of, a ton of voiceovers. I guess I think we met on King of the Hill and I know we worked together on Glenn Glenn Martin DDS, but fu you know, him from Futurama.From Beavis and Butthead family guy the Great North. All every single adult animated show, a ton of kids shows Star Bob's Burgers. That's adult, of course. Rick and Morty Bob Burgers, Bob's Burger's movie as well. I mean, I'm going through all your stuff here. It's nuts. You were a writer performer on Mad TV for many years. Mm-Hmm. . And I think the pro, I'm sorry to say this, but the, the coolest role that everyone knows you, that you maybe you get recognized most from. Right. We, you know what it is, is you were, you were in Pulp Fiction and you had your head blown off in the back of the car. And I remember watching like, oh my God, they killed Phil Phil LaMarr:.Michael Jamin:I mean, how awesome was that role? Oh man. But so Phil, thank you for doing this. Welcome, welcome to this. I want to talk all about your amazing career. But now tell me, so how did you get into acting? When did you decide you wanted to be an actor?Phil LaMarr:Well, it's funny because there are a couple of double steps in terms of how I started being an actor. And when I decided to be an actor and when I got into voiceover, both my first time performing was in eighth grade. My school was doing a production of a book that I loved. I didn't consider myself a performer. Right. It was the phantom toll booth. Right. And there's this little character towards the end of the Phantom toll booth. The senses taker who will take your sense of purpose. Your sense of duty, but he can't take your sense of humor. Right. And I wanted that part. So that's why I went and auditioned. But I wound up getting cast as one of the leads.Michael Jamin:Wow. Okay. AndPhil LaMarr:Opened a show alone on stage under a spotlight doing a two minute monologue.Michael Jamin:Okay. AndPhil LaMarr:It flipped a switch in my head. I'm like, oh, I love this. You were, that's what, so I started, you know, being an actor because I liked to bookMichael Jamin:. Right. But then, but okay. But it's one thing to be acting in as a kid in eighth grade and then to commit your career to it. What, what, what happened next?Phil LaMarr:Well, and it's funny because I didn't consider that a career or what I was doing. It's just, it's fun. Yeah. I get to play well, and also I went to an all boys private school. Yeah. So the time you got to see girls was when you did a playMichael Jamin:. Okay. That makes, now you're, makes sense. Now we know why you're being an actor, .Phil LaMarr:And I wound up graduating and I applied to colleges that had, you know, drama programs, Northwestern nor Carnegie Mellon, Yale University. But I wound up deciding not to go to Carnegie Mellon and I went to Yale. I was like, no, no, I just want to go to college. And I did not decide to pursue acting as a career. I just majored in English. It was on the flight back home to LA I said, you know what, maybe I should pursue this acting thing. I mean, I enjoy it. And you know, some people say I'm pretty good at it. I mean, I either gotta do it now or wait till my mid forties when I have a midlife crisis. Yes.Michael Jamin:But this is Yale undergrad. Yes. Yale's really not for the grad school of the school of drama. But youPhil LaMarr:Go back to thing. Cause when you were an actor and you say you went to Yale, people assume, oh, like Moral Streep and Henry Wiggler. It's like, no, no. I didn't know thatMichael Jamin:. But so after you got outta college and you got outta, we went to Yale and there was some pressure on you to are they Princeton over there? We're gonna continue, we'll continue our, we'll set aside our differences long enough to have this conversation. But so, but after college you're like, okay, I got a big fancy Yale degree and I'm gonna become an actor.Phil LaMarr:Right. And, you know, had I decided to be a comedy writer with a Harvard degree, that would've beenMichael Jamin:Yes. That would make sense.Phil LaMarr:A career path that made sense. Right. As a Yale, there were no famous Yales as writers or producers or anything. There were a handful of, you know, drama school actors. Right. But again, I didn't go to that drama school. So I'm like, okay.Michael Jamin:Yeah. There's no connect. People talk about the connections. No, there's no connection. Just because you, there's no inroad. Just cuz you went to Yale, you know, to No,Phil LaMarr:Yeah. No. The the only famous undergraduate actors at that time in the eighties were two women who were famous before they came to Yale, Jennifer Beals and Jodi Foster.Michael Jamin:Right. Exactly. Exactly. All right. So then you made this commitment to, or this, this leap. How long your parents must have been thrilled , how long before you started getting work and how did you start getting work, getting work?Phil LaMarr:Well, and, and this is another one of the double steps, Uhhuh I, when I made this decision, I already had my SAG card.Michael Jamin:How did you get that?Phil LaMarr:Because back in high school, a friend of my mother's worked for NBC Uhhuh. And I think my mother had dragged her to see a couple of my plays. And so she said, Hey, we're doing this cartoon and we're gonna use real kids for the kids' voices. Which back in the eighties was a rare thing. Yeah. And she asked me to, to come in and audition for it. And I got a job on the Mr. T cartoon in the mid eighties.Michael Jamin:Oh, wow. AndPhil LaMarr:That got me my union card. Now I did not, again, did not consider this a career path. I it was just a cool summer job.Michael Jamin:Yeah. Now, the thing is, cause I hear this a lot. People say to me, yeah, I, I can do a million voices and you could do literally a million voices. I, how do I get into you know, voice acting? And it's like, they don't seem to put the connection that it's not enough that you do voices. You have to know how to act. You have to be a trained, you have to, you know, know, be if you're trained or even better. But you have to know how to perform and act. And so yeah.Phil LaMarr:That's, that's what I always tell people who ask me that question. I say, the first thing you need to know is voice acting the term is a misnomer because the acting comes before the voice.Michael Jamin:Yes. Yes.Phil LaMarr:You know, that's why you have amazing people like Cree Summer, who has a really distinctive speaking voice, but she has the acting ability. Right. To make every character completely different and real. It's the same thing like, you know, a a movie star, it's the same face, but it's always a different character.Michael Jamin:But there's something else that you bring, and I say this because you are a consummate pro. You are truly a pro. It's well for what you bring to that other actors, that non-voice actors, I guess, I don't know what you would call 'em, but have, but what I'm directing a voiceover actor, sometimes if they haven't done avo, a lot of voice acting, they don't realize they're using their face or their body . And, and you say, no, no, no. I, I see you're acting the part I see you're playing mad, but I have to hear it in my ear. And so I don't look at them when I'm directing. I wanna hear it. And Right. And so to talk about that a little bit.Phil LaMarr:Yes, yes. I remember, cuz I started out, you know, even though I had that job in high school, I did not consider it a voice acting career. It was just a, a goofy summer job on a cartoon that nobody I knew watched. So I came home after college and pursued on camera acting and stage mm-hmm. . And so a few years later, actually it was after a several years of Mad TV where we did Claymation pieces and it got me doing multiple characters on mic as opposed to just multiple characters on camera, which I was also doing on Mad tv. And I remember I decided to actively pursue the voice acting thing. Cuz at this point, you know, in the post, you know, early nineties era when cable blew up, voice acting became a job. Right. You know, cuz when we were kids, it was just something that six guys that Mel Blanc and five other dudes Right.Voiced every cartoon of our childhood. Right. You know, Mel Blanc, dos Butler, you know, that was it. But in the nineties, once Nickelodeon had 24 hours of children's programming, there was a lot more cartoon voices. And so like, oh, this could be a path now. And I remember one of my early sessions, I fell into my on camera acting face, face acting mm-hmm. . And they said, okay, Phil, stop. Try it again. Do that line again. Angrier, I did it again. They said, hold on, we're gonna play them both back. And they sounded exactly the same. And I realized what you just said. Right. Oh my God, I just made an angrier face.Michael Jamin:Right.Phil LaMarr:And that's one of the, you know, skills of voice acting the same way that you have singers, singers can, you know, put forth feeling or fun or whatever through their voice.Michael Jamin:Right.Phil LaMarr:You know, dancers do it through their bodies.Michael Jamin:Right.Phil LaMarr:You know. ButMichael Jamin:When you perform, let's say you're doing something on camera, how much thought do you give? Do you, is it, is it just second nature to go, okay, now I can use the rest of my body? Or how much thought do you have to go in between different, you know skill sets, I guess, you know?Phil LaMarr:Well, the, the good thing is, you know, you do have to, you know, get a switch in your head because when you're on stage, it's the exact same job bringing this script to life. But you have to do it with different tools. Right, right. And the same thing when you're doing it on camera. And the same thing when you're doing it on microphone. You have to, you have to gauge. Okay. Cuz you know, you read the script, you see the character, you embody it. Yeah. But then it's how do you communicate it to the audience?Michael Jamin:Right,Phil LaMarr:Right. You know, and it's funny because with voice acting, you know, we learned to run the character through our, our ears. You know, when you see in the old days, you see, you know, announcers doing this. Do you know what that is about? No.Michael Jamin:What what is that?Phil LaMarr:It's because all of us, you know, regular people hear our voices from inside our heads. Right. We're not hearing what other people hear. But when you do this, you are channeling your voice.Michael Jamin:That's whatPhil LaMarr:Mouth into your ear. So you hear what your voice sounds like outside your head.Michael Jamin:Oh, I see. I, that's so funny. I thought they were stopping their ear, but they're not. They're just re redirecting the voice Yeah. Into their ear. Yes. Oh wow. I had no idea.Phil LaMarr:So you can hear the subtlety, you know, because if, if you don't do something with your teeth, you don't hear that inside your head. Yeah. It's only what people hear. But that's something you might want with a character. Right. You know, I always, when I teach workshops, I always try to tell people, like, there are things we hear. There's, it's the same thing with your face. Mm-Hmm. when you want to, you know, express anger. You don't just do your face flat. You, you know. And it's the same thing with if, if there's something about a character, let's say I'm doing this character, but then I see the drawing and the guy's got a big beard. Oh, well let me make him sound, let me make him sound beier.Michael Jamin:Right. Right.Phil LaMarr:Which isn't necessarily true, just growing a beard doesn't change your voiceMichael Jamin:Uhhuh.Phil LaMarr:But there are things that when we hear something, we get the sense of it.Michael Jamin:Right. Do you have a preference now, Kami? Cuz do you have a preference? You work so much in voice acting, but do you have a, do you prefer that overlap? You know, like on camera?Phil LaMarr:No, it's funny cuz you know, at Comic-Con, people will ask, what's your, you walk in so many media, what's your favorite? And the truth of the matter is, and this is what I tell them, it's not about the media, it's about the quality.Michael Jamin:Quality. The writing or, or what Yes.Phil LaMarr:Uhhuh Well, the, the, the quality of the writing, the quality of the directing, the quality of the experience. Because to me, the, the cartoon Samurai Jack, which is I consider a work of art that has more in common with pulp fiction. Right. Than it does with, you know, pound puppies or some like goofy little Saturday morning cartoon that's more focused on selling toys than on actually putting out story.Michael Jamin:Yeah. Right, right. But in terms of voice, a I mean, you don't have to get into hair and makeup. You don't have to memorize anything. And that's a whole nother skill as well. Memorizing the, the, the text.Phil LaMarr:Well, but that, that's actually harder because when you work on stage or on camera mm-hmm. , you get time to rehearse.Michael Jamin:Right.Phil LaMarr:You get to practice with a director helping guide you, your people, someone watching you, and you build the character over time. And then you don't have to make it work till the camera says, till they say action.Michael Jamin:Right.Phil LaMarr:But when you're doing voiceover, you're handed a sheet of paper, you're reading words off a page, and you have to bring those to life instantly.Michael Jamin:Yeah, that's exactly. Now do you, cuz when we work together on, on Glen, well we did King Hill first, but on Glen Martin, just so people know you didn't audition, we just, we call you up. Hey, we book you Theor agent, and you come in, you show up, you, you got the job, and you show up. And I remember approaching you saying, okay, Phyllis, the character, I remember the character's name was Rasmus, and the only thing you knew about him was that he had a milky eye. He was like seventies. He had a milky eye. And I go, what voices did you bring ? And you, you, you gave me like three different voices. And I think I said that one a little more gravelly and boom, that was it. You jumped right into it. Exactly. That was it. You're ready to go. . And that was the benefit of direction you got go .Phil LaMarr:Right. See, and we did that in a minute and a half.Michael Jamin:Yeah.Phil LaMarr:Had we been working on a movie, I would've had to go in for wardrobe, had them try on seven different outfits, had them send you the pictures, , you know, over two weeks. Right. While I was memorizing all the lines for us to come to that conclusion.Michael Jamin:But on most of the voiceover judo, is that how it is? It's just basically they book you for the day and you know, unless you're a regular, they just book you, you come on in and you spend an hour or two, and then that's it. Is that how it works for you? Mostly?Phil LaMarr:Well, ho hopefully. I mean, most of the time you get the script ahead of time, so you get to read the story, know the context. Right. But that's just one episode. You don't have the entire, you know, arc of the story. You know, don't know everything about the, you know, if you're playing the villain about the, the hero. So you learn most of it when you come into the session,Michael Jamin:But then there's another thing that you have to bring to the table, which is a whole, like, you okay, you're an excellent actor, but you also have the, the, when you do these voices, they don't sound like they're coming from you. Like, they sound like they're coming from 10 different people. And so the, how do you, like how do you approach that? How do you making voices that don't sound anything like the, any, any other voice that you do.Phil LaMarr:Well, it varies. I mean, there are, it's funny because now over the years, you know, people will bring up some old character. And I realize, okay, that sounds a little similar to that other one. But I realize it's not about, I used to think when I was younger, starting in voice acting, I used to think it was about no, no. Every voice should not sound anything like the other one. Right. You know? But I realize it's more about embodying the character. And the thing is, you know, these characters are all different. So I need them to, I want them to sound different.Michael Jamin:Right. I don't mean like, like when I first got the King of the Hill, I was shocked when you hear the voices that you've been watching the show forever, and then you see the actress playing, you go, whoa, that voice is coming from that person. That, that doesn't sound anything close to their, like, there's a transformation that you're able to do with your voice by, like, that's a different skill. I mean, forget about even, yes, I know embodying the character, but you're really playing with your vocal chords in a way that almost seems impossible to someone like me.Phil LaMarr:Oh, thank you. Well, I mean, in, it's, it's a, it's a skill set that not everybody has. Like I said, some people just like when on Samurai Jack, I worked with Mako Iwatsu Uhhuh, you know, an older Japanese actor who was an icon. He had starred in movies, starred on Broadway, you know, his name was above the title on a Stephen Sondheim musical. Right. But he had a very distinctive, you know, heavy, very textured, heavily accented voice. And I figured, okay, he's just doing his voice. And I remember there was one episode where they cast him as a secondary character mm-hmm. in the episode. And I remember thinking to myself, oh, Jesus, what are they doing? Uhhuh, his voice is so dis. I mean, that's like casting the rock in two characters in a movie. Right. You know, like, nobody's gonna get fooled. But he blew my mind and taught me a masterclass because what he did was, he did not completely transform his voice, but he acted the second character from a completely different perspective. You know, Lowe's dead, you know, complete, he performed it completely differently than he performed Aku the villain, Uhhuh . And I, and when you watch the episode, you can't tell it's him.Michael Jamin:You can Right. You can't tell.Phil LaMarr:Now, part of that has to do with the art, you know, because you're change your changing your voice, but they're also changing the drawing.Michael Jamin:Yeah. That, that's true. But I wonder how much work do you on your own at home? Like, how much do you think about other voice? Do you pra you go, do you hear a voice and you go, Hey, that's an interesting thing. Maybe I should, you know, do you practice at all? Do you, I don't know. Are you, are you constantly trying to invent new, new voices for yourself?Phil LaMarr:Well, I'm, I'm not a singer, but I've always had an ear. Right. For speech. It, I do a lot of impressions. Uhhuh, , you know, comedically and sometimes just job wise. Actually, weirdly, 10th grade, my second year of acting, I got the part in our, one of our high school plays. We did a production of Play It again, Sam.Michael Jamin:Okay.Phil LaMarr:And in 10th grade, I played Humphrey Bogart .Michael Jamin:Okay.Phil LaMarr:And I spent the entire production trying to do my best impression of Humphrey Bogart. If that plane leaves and you are not on it, you'll regret it. Maybe not today, maybe not tomorrow, but soon. And for the rest of your life. And so I watched a lot of, you know, videotapes of Humphrey Bogart. And I, and I also had to learn how to do that impression and projectMichael Jamin:It Right.Phil LaMarr:In a, in a theater cuz there was no microphone. But I think maybe that helped start me right on the, you know, aping People's Voices thing. Which, when I started doing sketch comedy Right. I leaned into that too. Oh, I'm gonna do a Michael Jackson sketch. You know?Michael Jamin:Right. Cause you, so how is that you're talking about, so that, that brings us to Mad tv. So there goes your, I dunno, how, how did you get that that audition? What did you bring, what did you bring to that audition, you know, for yourself?Phil LaMarr:Well, I, when I was in college I was part of a improv comedy group that started and I loved it, you know, having been taught that the, you know, the key to drama is conflict, but then being introduced in your late teens, early twenties to this concept of Yes.Michael Jamin:And, and yes. And yeah.Phil LaMarr:You know, improv is collaborative theater, make your partner look good. Right. Work together, you know, all of this very positive energy. It's like, huh, wow. This isn't just about performance. This is a great life philosophy. Yeah. So after graduation, and I came home to LA and I started taking classes at the Groundlings Theater mm-hmm. , the sketch, comedy and improv group. And, and I did that not for the career, but because I wanted improv back in my life.Michael Jamin:Right.Phil LaMarr:And doing improv that led me into sketch comedy and writing.Michael Jamin:Right.Phil LaMarr:Because that's what the ground wings do. It's like, okay, that's a great improv. Write it down.Michael Jamin:Right. .Phil LaMarr:Yeah. Now do that character again. Come up with another scene for him.Michael Jamin:And so that's what you, you brought to the audition, like what, three different characters or something?Phil LaMarr:Y well, by the time Mad TV came around, I had been doing sitcoms, you know, from the early nineties to the mid nineties. This was 95. Right. So I went to audition for mad TV and the people at Fox had seen me guest on a bunch of shows. Right. And in fact, I went to audition for Mad TV in what they call second place because I had done a pilot for Fox right before Mad. So it's funny because I went in there thinking, no, this pilot is gonna, is amazing. We're gonna be the new Barney Miller. Alright, fine agents, I'll go for this sketch thing, whatever. I've been doing Sketch for six years, but whatever. And so I went in and they said, okay, bring in some, some of your characters.Michael Jamin:What Century is calling ah, . That's your phone from 1970, right?Phil LaMarr:?Michael Jamin:Or is it an alarm clock?Phil LaMarr:Ah, no, it's, I forgot toMichael Jamin:What's your phone? It's your iPhone.Phil LaMarr:It's my agent calling. Oh, you, you don't need to talk to them.Michael Jamin:That's Hollywood.Phil LaMarr:Yes.Michael Jamin:I can't believe your agent actually calls you. Mine doesn't call .Phil LaMarr:Alright, let me, let me go back.Michael Jamin:Yeah.Michael Jamin:We're gonna put all this in. This is all funny. .Phil LaMarr:Well anyway, I went to audition for Mad TV having done several years at the Groundlings and having been voted into the main company of the Groundlings, alongside Jennifer Coolidge. So youMichael Jamin:Were perform Oh, so you were, that's great. So you were performing regularly on stage. Yeah. Okay.Phil LaMarr:So, so sketch comedy was solidly in my backMichael Jamin:Pocket. Yeah.Phil LaMarr:And, you know, I'd been, you know, I'd finally started making a living as an actor. I didn't have to do my day job, you know, just doing guest spots and whatnot. And I went in there without any sense of desperation. I don't need this.Michael Jamin:Right. I'vePhil LaMarr:Already got this pilot. And they said, okay, bring us your characters and a couple of impressions and we'll show you a couple of our sketches. You know, so there were three steps to each audition, Uhhuh. And it's funny because later after I got the job, I talked to the showrunner and he said, oh man, you were so relaxed. We loved it.Michael Jamin:Oh wow.Phil LaMarr:You know, cuz I remember when we had a, a callback and there was somebody from the studio. This woman was sitting there like this. And I said, oh, I'm sorry. Did I wake youMichael Jamin:? And then wow. I mean, good for you. And then, but what became of that pilot, it didn't go to seriesPhil LaMarr:The other. No.Michael Jamin:Boy, had you known that ? IPhil LaMarr:Know. Well, and when we, when we got the call back from Mad tv, I'm like, what the heck? And might have said, yeah. Yeah. somebody at Fox said, don't worry about the second position.Michael Jamin:Right. Oh wow. Wow. . So, right. So you did that for a number of years. And then, and what, what along the way, when did pulp Fiction occur during this?Phil LaMarr:Actually I did Pulp Fiction before Mad tv.Michael Jamin:Okay.Phil LaMarr:It's funny cuz the first episode of Mad TV had a Pulp fiction parody in it. AndMichael Jamin:Did you play yourself?Phil LaMarr:Yes. They pitched me playing myself. OhMichael Jamin:My God, it was so fun. I mean it's such a classic role. I mean, do, do you, and does, do people want to talk to you about that all the time?Phil LaMarr:Not, not really. What I, I find that people only bring up Pulp Fiction around the time when a new Tarantino movie comes out.Michael Jamin:Okay.Phil LaMarr:But I mean, there are some people who, you know, are big fans of it. But the funniest thing is there will be a friend, somebody I've known for several years, but it's the first time they've watched Pulp Fiction since we met.Michael Jamin:Right. OhPhil LaMarr:My God, Phil. I didn't realize that was you.Michael Jamin:That's so great. I mean, so Right. Just to remind people again. So that was a scene was, it was Samuel Jackson and and John Travolta. They, yes. I guess the, the pla that plot line was a bunch of like straight-laced kind of college kids, kind of up, you know, they, you know, good kids who probably made one bad decision. Right. But they weren't troublemakers. They were good kids. And then they owed money and then, and then I guess they, you know, so they shoot, I guess they come into the apartment Right. And they they wind up shooting up the place and they take you, I guess they, they're gonna take you to the big guy, you're hostage and then he, you're in the back of the car and they got a gun trained on you and it hits a bump and they accidentally blow your head off . Right.Phil LaMarr:Well, well actually, the backstory that Quent and I talked about is that cuz my character is Marvin, he's the kid who gets his brains blown out in the back of the car. Right. but we decided that the story was Jules Uhhuh knew somebody who knew Marvin and arranged for Marvin to, that's why Marvin gets up and opens the door.Michael Jamin:Okay. AndPhil LaMarr:Lets them in. He's on their side.Michael Jamin:Oh, is that right? Is that, I should watch that again. I don't, I didn't pick that up at all.Phil LaMarr:And so he's not, they're not taking him as a hostage. Cause actually, Sam's like, how many, because John asked him how many are in there? It's like, well, there's, oh,Michael Jamin:There'sPhil LaMarr:Five plus our guy.Michael Jamin:Oh, I gotta watch that again. I missed that. Okay. It's been a while. Okay. So,Phil LaMarr:So the idea is that Jules knew somebody who knew one of the kids that took Marcellus briefcase. So he made a connection and was like, okay, we figured it out. He's our man inside is gonna open the door for us at 7 45. We're gonna come in, we're gonna get the briefcase. But of course, in my head, the idea is that Marvin didn't realize they were gonna kill everybody.Michael Jamin:Right. Right. He thought theyPhil LaMarr:Were just gonna take the briefcase.Michael Jamin:Right. So he'sPhil LaMarr:Freaked out.Michael Jamin:And so how many days is, were you, how many days of a shoot is that for you? Is that a week or what?Phil LaMarr:I spent about two weeks. There was the car scene and the apartment scene. But the, the most ironic thing was I shot my scene after they had shot the Harvey Kittel cleaning up my body scene.Michael Jamin:Right. So whenPhil LaMarr:I came onto set, everybody was looking at me like they recognized me because they had been see, looking at me dead for two months.Michael Jamin:. But how? Wait, but but when you say looking at you dead was, were there photos or something or what? No, no.Phil LaMarr:They built, they built a dummy. The dummy. Oh. Because there's a se there's a sequence where the Harvey guy tell character comes to clean up Yeah. And then carry the body out of the car into the Tarantino character's apartment. YouMichael Jamin:Know, that must been freaky. SoPhil LaMarr:Everybody been looking at this body in the trunk body, you know, and then when I walked on, they were like, it's, it's the same thing of like, when you walk into a room and you forget you're wearing a name tag.Michael Jamin:Yeah. Did you know how great that movie was gonna be at the time? Yes. I mean, you, you can tell. How can you tell? IPhil LaMarr:Couldn't tell how successful it was gonna be because, you know, reservoir Dogs was really good. Right. But it wasn't, you know, it was a big indieMichael Jamin:Movie. Yes.Phil LaMarr:Right. But when you read the script for Pulp FictionMichael Jamin:Uhhuh,Phil LaMarr:It leapt off the page.Michael Jamin:Right.Phil LaMarr:It's funny because like, when I went to audition for it, after meeting Quentin Tarantino, we did a Groundlings improv show.Michael Jamin:Oh, is that right? BecausePhil LaMarr:He's, he was friends with Julia Sweeney, who was a Groundlings alum. Right. And she invited him to come do a show. I was in the cast. Right. And when he was casting pulp Fiction, he was thinking about Marvin. He told the casting lady, Hey, there's this black guy at the Groundling, he's go find him.Michael Jamin:Right.Phil LaMarr:And I remember preparing for the audition, reading through the scene three times. It jumped into my, I w I had it, I was off book by the time I memorized. Because the way it's written, even though it's not everyday life, every line follows exactly what the one before it would say. And it feels natural, even though it is such a heightened world he's created.Michael Jamin:Yeah. He really is. I mean, you know, he's a master with, with words. He doesn't, does he, he doesn't, I can't imagine allow much improv. I mean, it seems like he knows what he wants, right?Phil LaMarr:Oh, yeah. No, no, no. Yeah. The, the script is like a Rosetta Stone. It is carved, yes. Actually, the, the only two things that changed in the script were one a line of Samuel Jackson's character about porkMichael Jamin:Uhhuh ,Phil LaMarr:Because originally they're talking about a pig and he is like, oh, that's the Kerry Grant of pigs. And Sam was like, no, Manam my guy. I don't think this guy would ever think Kerry Grant was cool.Michael Jamin:Right. So theyPhil LaMarr:Changed it to the, the reference to the the at Albert showMichael Jamin:Oh, oh green Acres. Green Acres, yeah. Yeah, yeah. Right.Phil LaMarr:Yeah. It's like the pig on Green AcresMichael Jamin:. And,Phil LaMarr:And the o and the other moment that changed from the script to what, what we shot was because of what a thought that John had.Michael Jamin:Uhhuh GunPhil LaMarr:Travolta. Yeah. Oh. Because, because this was a low budget indie movie. They made this movie with all those stars for only 8 million.Michael Jamin:Are you kidding me? Really?Phil LaMarr:Yeah. And part of that saving money was we rehearsed the entire movie on stage before we started shooting. Right. And I remember going to a sound stage at, at cul in Culver City on Sony and meeting John Travolta and Samuel L. Jackson for the first time in rehearsal.Michael Jamin:Right.Phil LaMarr:And I remember walking in there and it's like, Quinn's like, oh, hey Phil, this John Sam, this is Phil. And John Tra goes, oh geez, this is a guy. I had to kill this guy. The eyes is gonna hate me.Michael Jamin:That's a pretty good Travolta sound just like him. . Oh, thanks.Phil LaMarr:And he just, I thought he was just joking. But eventually he talked to Quintin. Cuz originally in the back of the car, the gun is supposed to go off accidentally. Yeah. And shoot Marvin in the throat.Michael Jamin:Okay.Phil LaMarr:And then he sits there g gurgling while they go back and forth bantering, oh, dad, what are we gonna do? Right. Well, we can't take him to the hospital. Well, I don't have nobody in the valley. Well, alright. Put him out of his misery. When I, on the count of three, I'll hit the horn. And so John's character was supposed to shoot me the second time on, and John said, no, no. Quentin Quinn. Quinn. If my character kills this kid on purpose, it's gonna ha people won't, won't like him. And he was right. It would've negatively affected his sequence with Umma Thurman.Michael Jamin:That's absolutely right. But do you think he was, Travolta was interested in protecting the character or protecting himself as an actor? You know, like how people saw him? What do you think?Phil LaMarr:I think it was, he had a connection to the audience, which I guess was mostly through him, but also through the character. Because I mean, I mean, I guess, you know, Quintin's could have just said No, no, the character's just, he's a nasty, you know, junky. Yes. He does nasty stuff. But I think John was like, no, no, no. This whole sequence with the girl, he's not nasty.Michael Jamin:Right. So, right. I see. And andPhil LaMarr:Quintin agreed with John Yeah. His take on the character.Michael Jamin:Yeah. That's so interesting.Phil LaMarr:Isn't thatMichael Jamin:Wild? Yeah, that is. See, it's so funny listening to you, you can so hear like how thoughtful you are about acting, how mu how much, how it's not, it's a craft, it's a, you know, you, I really hear that from you, how much you put how passionate you are about the craft of acne. Not just being on stage, not just you know, doing voices, but the craft of it. You know? Exactly. Yeah. How do, do you miss, or do you get a chance to perform on stage a lot? Because that was your original lovePhil LaMarr:Mm-Hmm. . Yes. Thankfully. I'm still holding on to my performance foundation. My friend Jordan Black, who is another Groundlings alum Uhhuh about what, 12 years ago now, created a group. And we do a show monthly live on stage, an improv show at the Groundlings Okay. Called the Black VersionMichael Jamin:Uhhuh. It's,Phil LaMarr:It's an all black cast, and we take a suggestion from the audience of a classic or iconic motion picture, and then we improv the black version of it. ButMichael Jamin:What if you're not familiar with the, the classic?Phil LaMarr:Well that's the tricky part is our director Karen Mariama mm-hmm. , who was one of my teachers at the Groundlings and is now one of my peers, has an encyclopedic knowledge mm-hmm. , she can take a movie from the black and white era and know the entire structure or something that dropped that dropped on Netflix last week. And she knows everythingMichael Jamin:But you, but if you don't know itPhil LaMarr:Well what we do, what she does is she, she, as the director, she guides the scenes Uhhuh . Okay. Alright. Phil, you are gonna play this, you know, like let's say we're doing the black version of Princess Bride. Phil, you'll, you are this you know, swordsman who is incredibly skilled audience, what do you think his name? Okay. In Negro Montoya, that's your name.Michael Jamin:That's funny. AndPhil LaMarr:Like she'll assign the characters Right. And then guide us from scene to scene. But, you know, our choices, you know like when we did the black version of Princess Bride, it was called her Mama and them, and Prince Humperdink was Prince Humpty Hump. Right. You know, and sometimes the choices will change the, the, you know line, line of the story. But she tries to keep us, you know, take us through the iconic scenes.Michael Jamin:Right. And this is once a month you do this.Phil LaMarr:Yes.Michael Jamin:Yeah. That's a big commitment.Phil LaMarr:Yeah. And for 12 years. Yeah.Michael Jamin:Yeah. I mean, you must, you probably took a break during the pandemic for a little bit. Yes,Phil LaMarr:Yes, yes, we did.Michael Jamin:But Wow.Phil LaMarr:And recently we've you know, we've built an audience and a reputation and we've started booking on the road. We've we've played the Kennedy Center in Washington DC twice now.Michael Jamin:So you take it on the, and, and how were you able to sell tickets on the road? I mean, so easily.Phil LaMarr:It's, I I think it's, it's the, the venues and also you know, somewhat just the, those of us in the group. I mean, Jordan was a writer on SNL and part of the guest cast on community Cedric Yarborough from Reno 9 1 1, and tons of other shows. SoMichael Jamin:Just your name. Just your name. So it's kind of just your names people like, Hey, we want, you know, we recognize these names, we wanna go see it. If you, you know this.Phil LaMarr:Yeah. I, I mean, I'm, I'm not exactly sure how we managed to sell out, youMichael Jamin:Know? That's amazing. All overPhil LaMarr:TheMichael Jamin:Place. That sounds like a lot of fun.Phil LaMarr:It's so much fun.Michael Jamin:Hey, it's Michael Jamin. If you like my videos and you want me to email them to you for free, join my watch list. Every Friday I send out my top three videos. These are for writers, actors, creative types. You can unsubscribe whenever you want. I'm not gonna spam you and it's absolutely free. Just go to michaeljamin.com/watchlist.Wow. I mean, is there a limit to how much you can, I mean, just organizing that to get everyone to get the time off. I mean, that's gotta be logisticallyPhil LaMarr:Gotta be hard. Yeah. The, the tours aren't that we don't do them that often because, you know, Gary Anthony Williams from, you know, Malcolm in the Middle and stuff, everybody in our cast works a lot. Yeah. So we can really only guarantee the show once a month. Right. but sometimes when we tour, not everybody goesMichael Jamin:Because Yeah, you have to, I mean, if someone books apart and you're shooting that at night, what, what are you gonna do? That's the way. Right.Phil LaMarr:Or you or you have to fly to Vancouver for six months.Michael Jamin:Yeah. Right. Right. And that's part of, that's, I mean, that's part of the, the plus of, of the do for you for doing a lot of voice acting is that, you know, you probably get to lead a pretty sane in life if for an actor it's, it can be very hard, you know, being onPhil LaMarr:Their Well, and, and it's also one of the wonderful things about the progress that has come since we started the show, because part of the reason Jordan created the show is because those of us in the improv world, you know, who are people of color, oftentimes spent the majority of our time being the one.Michael Jamin:Yeah.Phil LaMarr:But over the years, the, you know, the numbers, the diversity in the improv world, you know, expanded, it used to be a very suburban art form.Michael Jamin:Yeah.Phil LaMarr:But now, you know, I I I credit this mostly to Wayne Brady doing whose lives in anyway.Michael Jamin:Yeah. Right. Yeah. And so that really opens up more opportunities and more of what Yeah. That, that's, that's interesting that, you know, that really has changed a lot. How, how have you seen it change your opportunities in the past, I don't know, whatever, 20 years, 30 years, you know, however long?Phil LaMarr:Well, it's, it's, it's changed be in a lot of ways. One, when I got voted into the Groundlings in 1992, I was the first black person to get voted into the company in its 18 years of existence.Michael Jamin:You're kidding me. Yeah. That's crazy. That's crazy.Phil LaMarr:And now the pool of, you know black people, you know, who are Groundlings has expanded. It's not just one every 18 years.Michael Jamin:Yeah. Right. But, and in terms of more, you know, more opportunities for you even, you know, I mean, everything's, everything's really opened up for you. Right. I mean, I imagine Well,Phil LaMarr:Well, because we have, you know, the, those of us in entertainment have expanded. Yeah. You know, what we consider will work. You know, I was talking my son just graduated from NYU and one of his classmates is the son of the woman who directed the woman king. Okay. At Viola Davis, you know. Right. Action movie. Right. And I remember watching and thinking, oh my god, when I was 18, no studio in the world.Michael Jamin:Right. Would touch that. Right. Would'vePhil LaMarr:Would've, you know, green lit Yeah. A action movie, you know, about black women.Michael Jamin:Yeah. Right.Phil LaMarr:And, and the fact that, you know, it's out there now and is just another big movie. It's, it's not considered, you know you know, a once in a lifetime thing anymore. That's the progress and the fact that we have, you know, middle-aged women mm-hmm. leads of s of TV series. Yeah. You know, back in the old days, the only lead of a TV series was one beautiful person or one famous, you know, hilarious person. Yeah. But now they've opened it up.Michael Jamin:I wonder, is your son planning to going through the arts now that he graduated from nyu?Phil LaMarr:Yes. Yes. He's, he's musician. He oh, writes and sings and dances and raps and produces, and he's part of the Clive Davis recorded music program where they teach them music and the music business.Michael Jamin:Yeah. Wow.Phil LaMarr:One of his teachers was Clive Davis's daughter. Wow. Who's a lawyer.Michael Jamin:And do, I mean, it's, but it's, the music is different from what you do. I wonder, I wonder if you're able to, does it all feel like, I don't know how to help , you know? Yeah.Phil LaMarr:Yeah. There's a lot of that uhhuhMichael Jamin:Like,Phil LaMarr:Dad dead. Because when your kid goes into, you know, show business, you think, well, I've been in show business for 40 years, like, you haven't been in the music business. I'm like, you're right.Michael Jamin:That's true. So interesting. Wow. Wow. And, and, and so what about, I guess, you know what's next for you? Is you just, is it more of the same? Is there more, well, actually I know you have a pilot that you, that you were, you're working on, you know, you're getting into the writing side of the business. Yes.Phil LaMarr:More so. Yes. And that actually over the last couple of years has been a, a slight shift you know, having been performing. Yeah. You know, for so long now, since the eighties. I've also, and I've also been writing since the nineties when I started at the Groundlings. Right. I was writing sketches and I wrote on Mad tv. But just recently, earlier in this year, I took a job as a professional writer on a television show for the first time.Michael Jamin:Right.Phil LaMarr:And it was pretty wild to have 30 years of sitcoms under your belt and then suddenly see it from a completely different angle.Michael Jamin:And what, and what was your impression of that?Phil LaMarr:It, it was wild to cuz like you were talking about the way I look at acting and break it down. Yeah. And, you know, look at all the subtle distinctions. I had never looked at, you know, TV writing that way. Okay. But to suddenly be in a room with people who look at who see it that way for decades, you're like, oh wow. How do I feel like a rookie at 56?Michael Jamin:Yeah. Right. And so there's a lot of catching, a lot of catching up little Yeah. You know, that's so, and, and are, are you enjoying it as much or as much as you thought? Or what do you think?Phil LaMarr:Well it, the challenge part was, was a little bit, you know, tough. Yeah. But it was great to be working on a really good show with great, talented people and to be learning something new. It's like, yeah. Oh, like for me, like when we would write sketches at the Groundlings Uhhuh, you didn't think about anything about like, well, beginning, middle, and end. Right. Three minutes.Michael Jamin:Right, right.Phil LaMarr:You know, but now you have to think about, you know, character arcs and the, you know, okay, well if you introduce the character's father, we have to think about their entire family. Is the mother still a alive? You're like, oh, right. When you write a sketch, you don't have to think about,Michael Jamin:You don't think about any of that. Right. And when you, and when you're acting the part you, you know. Yeah. Yeah. And so it's, it's so interesting cause I always say like, acting and writing are really, they're two sides of the same coin. It really helps to study both whatever you want to do, study both. Exactly. it's all, and so yeah, that, that finding that emotional arc and, you know, it's all, it's all new for you, but yeah. I wonder, you know, but you're enjoying it.Phil LaMarr:Well and, and working alongside, I mean, cuz there were people who, you know, one guy at show run Will and Grace, another guy worked on Arrested Development. I mean like, you know, one guy was showrunner on five other shows to, to watch how they mm-hmm. . Cause for me, I would like, Hey, I would just pitch out a joke. I'm just gonna say something I think is funny. Right. But they had this like s you know, Superman MicroVision where they could take that joke and see Yeah. How it could affect the mm-hmm. the entire scene, the entire episode and the entire season.Michael Jamin:Yeah. Right. It's like, where does that, but offPhil LaMarr:The top of their head.Michael Jamin:Right. And where does it go? Where does that moment go into the script, into the, you know, is it act one or is it Act three? And so that Yes.Phil LaMarr:Yeah. That yes. I mean I'm sure you have that, that x-ray vision too. Yeah. Where you can look at a script and see the act structure Yeah. And you know, and or just even the structure of just the scene. Yeah. Like what does this character, where do they start and where do they finish?Michael Jamin:Yeah, that's right. Well we were, we ran a show for Mark Maron for four years and you know, he was one of the writers in it and he would pitch an idea, cause I wanna say this, and then we'd put up Neck one and then I remember at one point , we were talking about it and we said, mark, I don't think this can go in Act one. Is it okay if we put a neck three? And he'd say, oh, I don't care where you put it is. Right. long as in the script,Phil LaMarr:I'm just thinking about what the character would say.Michael Jamin:Yeah. That Right. I was like, was like, oh, that's a relief. I thought you were gonna get mad for, you know, you didn't care about that. So funny.Phil LaMarr:Right. Yeah. Just cuz as performers we are not looking at the app structure.Michael Jamin:Right, right. You know,Phil LaMarr:Most of us, I, I may imagine there are some people who do like, well I wanna build up from act two to act three, you know? Yeah. But most of us don't. We're just, what is the guy feeling in this scene right now?Michael Jamin:Right. And how to get to that, the truth of that, how difficult is it for you to make yourself vulnerable like that on stage to like, to go there, you know, whatever, maybe it's crying or whatever it is. How difficult it is for you just to allow yourself to go there?Phil LaMarr:Well, it's not necessarily easy. It's definitely something that I had to, you know, a skill set to build Uhhuh . You know, I was not one of those people when I started acting who could make themselves cry on cue, UhhuhMichael Jamin:,Phil LaMarr:You know. But I remember I had to do a scene on a, a Steven Boko show called Philly. And it's like, okay, well this character is really, you know, emotionally, you know, I gotta figure out how to make sure I'm putting that out there. Right. So I thought about something sad and let it, you know, something different than what the character was thinking about mm-hmm. . But it's again, like, you know, with the voice acting like what sounds bey you also have to think about your face, what looks Yeah. Sorrowful and how do you make yourself look sorrowful. Right. You know, although one of the things that helped me learn where to, to try to go was working on Pulp Fiction with Samuel L. Jackson.Michael Jamin:What he what? Go on. He gave you some great advice or what?Phil LaMarr:No, he just, what he showed because you would stand there offset talking to this cool old guy who was amazing, you know? Yeah. He's just talking about golfing or his daughter. But then when the camera started rolling Yeah. The person you were just talking to disappeared. Right on set. I looked over and I was looking into the eyes of someone completely different than Samuel L. Jackson. Right. And I remember standing there in my twenties thinking, oh my God, he transformed himself internally. And so that it shows externally. Yeah. That's like, I gotta learn how to do that.Michael Jamin:And then how did you learn how to do that?Phil LaMarr:Well, I, I'm still haven't gotten to his level , but what I learned is you have to figure out one, how you look and how you get, it's, it's like a map. Mm-Hmm. , you know you know, if you figure out how to guide your internal self to a place where your external self does what's on the page, that's what acting is. You know, otherwise you would just be reading words to be or not to be. That is the question. You know, it's not just about the words. It's how do you express the feeling? And Sam taught me there is a way where you don't have to do nine minutes of to get into character.Michael Jamin:Okay. IfPhil LaMarr:You know the root within yourself, you can do it like that. Right. So I, I realized it was about learning your internal, you know, where do, where do you put your sadness? Where do you put your anger and where's, what's the difference between your anger and this character's anger? Guide yourself there and then, you know, connect the two.Michael Jamin:And do you have moments where you feel like, I I didn't do it. I didn't get there. You know. Well,Phil LaMarr:I mean that's the, the one good thing about on camera work and what we were talking about about the rehearsal Uhhuh is you can find, take the time to find it, but yes, no, there's, there's always, you know, not every job is a home run. Mm-Hmm. , you're like, oh, I wish I had gone a little bit deeper with that. Right. You know and sometimes you feel it there. Yes. Other times you don't realize it until after you see it. And maybe it's, they picked a take that Right. You didn't No. That wasn't the best one. Why didn't they, you know, not nothing is ever perfect.Michael Jamin:Right, right. YouPhil LaMarr:Know,Michael Jamin:And, but do you, like sometimes I'll watch, I'll be on set and I'll watch an actor do something. Usually it's drama and or a dramatic moment. Right. And, and they let it all out. And after you, you'll cut. I'm always like, I wonder if they need a moment alone. You know what I'm saying? It's like Right. I mean, what are your, what's your take on that?Phil LaMarr:Well, I mean, I'm not a, a method guy. I don't put myself into, because Yeah. You, you hear a lot about that, about a guy's like, yeah man, I had to play this character and my girlfriend hated me for a month because when I went home I was still part of that dude. Yeah. You know? And I don't know if it's my improv and sketch background where I take my character off like a hat,Michael Jamin:Uhhuh . IPhil LaMarr:Don't take them home and, you know, I, I try to embody it during the performance, but I don't feel it's, you know, required to have to be the character.Michael Jamin:Right. But if you spend a whole day as a character,Phil LaMarr:It can, it can be draining.Michael Jamin:Yeah. Right. It can be draining. Right. You have to wash yourself up that if, if you don't like that, you know, if you don't like that person, you have to wash yourself of that. Right. And how do you do that?Phil LaMarr:Yeah. Well, I mean that's, that's about, you know, when you leave the set mm-hmm. , you leave those feelings behind, although some actors don't, but you'veMichael Jamin:Just experienced, you spent the whole day experiencing that mm-hmm. that whatever it is, and yes, I understand you left it, but you spent the whole day angry or, or mournful or bitter or whatever it is. Like how do you, you still have to wash yourself from that, don't you? Well,Phil LaMarr:But I mean, the, for me, I'm not fooling myself. I'm not trying to convince myself that the script and the character is real and me. Cuz that's the thing. Like, if you spend all day with your drunken uncle who's nasty on Thanksgiving, that's not fun.Michael Jamin:Right.Phil LaMarr:You know, and then when you leave, you're like, ugh. You can, you can still be right, you know, upset about it, but you're, you're con but because you're connected to that person. For me, it's about, that is fiction. Right. I only, you know, I'm connected to the fiction while performing. I don't feel like I have to be, you know, like when I play Hermes on Futurama, I don't have to speak in a Jamaican accent for the entire season.Michael Jamin:Right.Phil LaMarr:You know?Michael Jamin:But are there moments, and maybe this is less so for a voice acting, but when you're, when you're on, when you're on camera, are there moments when you're like, you're cognizant that, oh, I'm acting now. Mm-Hmm. , you know, and then you, and you have to, oh, I gotta get back. You know, and you're, you're delivering your lines right in the middle of the line, you realize I'm acting.Phil LaMarr:Well, it, it's interesting because I think part of this mental philosophy I have is, you know, comes from watching Sam Jackson Uhhuh because he wasn't method, he wasn't acting like Jules, you know, acting like a gangster, a man with a gun the whole time.Michael Jamin:Right.Phil LaMarr:And he showed me that. And it's funny because while he was doing that, Frank Whaley who had worked on the doors was telling anecdotes about how when Val Kilmer was playing Jim Morrison, he was the exact opposite. Right. He, before they started shooting, he sent out a memo. Everyone is to refer to me as Jim or Mr. Morrison.Michael Jamin:Right.Phil LaMarr:You know, and he had a tent set where he would, you know, work to be in character and would only come on set as Jim Morrison. Right. He was ne They never s they never spoke to Val.Michael Jamin:Right.Phil LaMarr:Right. So, you know, what about, yes. It's definitely difficult for some people if that's their approach. No, no. My approach is I have to live this character.Michael Jamin:Right. You know, so you're, so you, okay, so that's not your problem. You don't have to worry. That's not something you have to Yeah, no. Interesting. I, I'm so interested in the, the actor's approach to the material, you know? Yeah. Because, you know, we write it, but how do you guys do, how do you guys do it? Because there's a difference. There really is a difference. You know, we hear it one way we envision it, but we can't do it. Do you know what I'm saying? Yeah. We can't get it out of our heads onto, into reality, but you can. And so I'm always like, how did you do thatPhil LaMarr:? Right. Well, it was, it was, it was interesting experience, you know, from the writing, acting, you know, crossover. Mm. I worked on a, I was developing an animated show based on a friend of mine's web comic called Goblins.Michael Jamin:Okay.Phil LaMarr:And my partner, Matt King and I, we were both performers, but we adapted the comic into a script. And I called a bunch of my voice actor friends, cuz we were, we were gonna make a trailer, you know, to bring these, you know, comic characters to life Yeah. In animation. And it was funny cuz Matt and I are actors. We had, you know, written the script and we'd acted out these scenes. And so in our heads we, we thought we knew exactly how they'd sound. But then we brought in amazing Billy West, Maurice La Marsh. Mm-Hmm. , Jim Cummings. Mm-Hmm. Steve Bloom, Jennifer. And it was funny because when they performed the scenes we had written, they took it to a whole other level. Right. Beyond what existed in our, in our heads. Right. Like, oh my God, they made it so much better than I even imagined it couldMichael Jamin:Be. Right, right.Phil LaMarr:And it was wild cuz I'd heard writers, you know, express a similar kind of thing. It's like, oh my gosh, you guys did such, such amazing with, and, but to have it, you know, as someone who'd been a performer, to have someone take your and do that miracle with it was an eye-opening experience. Like, ah, butMichael Jamin:There's something else that you do. Cause you know, there's a handful ofri actors, voice of actors, they always work. You're one of them. But pro you call 'em in and it's, it's knowing, especially in comedy, knowing where, how to hit the joke. I mean, we always say, can they hit a joke? And knowing where the laugh falls, not just somewhere, but which word makes it, makes it funny, you know? Mm-Hmm. , you know. And do you think that's your instinct? Or is that just something you've gotten better at?Phil LaMarr:Yes, I think that's something that has grown from performing, especially in the sense of, in the sense of comedy. Because I remember, you know, starting out on stage doing, you know, plays, then doing, doing improv, which is specific comedy cuz when you're doing a play mm-hmm. , the writer has decided which moments are funny, which moments are dramatic, you know. But when you're doing improv, you and the audience are deciding what's funny. Right. And, and I remember coming, you know, back to LA and pursuing acting and then starting to get work on camera and doing comedy. And I realized, huh. Oh wow. I don't have an audience.Michael Jamin:Yes. And youPhil LaMarr:Have, you have to create a gauge in your head for, is this funny? Because when you're on stage and you're doing a funny bit, you're, you know, you can feel from the audience whether, oh, I need to push that up a littleMichael Jamin:Bit. Right.Phil LaMarr:But when you're working on camera, this, the crew is not allowed to laugh outMichael Jamin:Loud. Right.Phil LaMarr:You know, so you have to create an audience inside you, an internal audience in your head to help, you know, is, is this the timing of this?Michael Jamin:Right.Phil LaMarr:And, and it's funny because I've developed that and a couple of years into it, I remember I got a job working on N Y P D, blueMichael Jamin:UhhuhPhil LaMarr:Playing a guy who was being questioned, you know, interrogated in the police station and then gets roughed up by Ricky SchroederMichael Jamin:Uhhuh.Phil LaMarr:But the, the lines, because this guy's on drugs. And I remember like, oh wow, I gotta be careful. This could be funny . Cause he's like, you know, like, you know, cause Ricky Schroeder, you know, sees blood on his, on his clothes, like, take your clothes off. It's like, and the guy take my clothes. What you wanna do? What you ain't gonna put no boom on my ass. Right. And I remembered I have to gauge the funny way to do this and not doMichael Jamin:That. Yes. Right, right. Because,Phil LaMarr:You know, there was, I, and I realize no, no. Pull back the tempo and lean into the anger, not the outrage.Michael Jamin:Right. Right. So, andPhil LaMarr:Then it'll be, then it'll be dramatic, not comedy.Michael Jamin:It's, again, here you are approaching it really from the craft. It's not Yeah. I just wish it's, when I hear people, I want to be an actor. Okay. Take it serious. Are you gonna study? Are you just gonna, do you wanna be famous? Which, what is it you want? You know?Phil LaMarr:Right.Michael Jamin:And well, let's talk about that for a second. What, what's your relationship with, with fame? How do you, you know?Phil LaMarr:Well, that's a very interesting thing because I feel like that has changed mm-hmm. from the generation, like when you're our age, when we were growing up pre-internet mm-hmm.Michael Jamin:Phil LaMarr:Fame only applied to stars.Michael Jamin:Yeah. Right.Phil LaMarr:Now, you know, I mean, nobody knew voice actors, only voice actor anybody knew was Mel Blank.Michael Jamin:Right.Phil LaMarr:You know, people to this day still don't know what Das Butler looks like. Right. But the now anybody who appears on anything, even a YouTuberMichael Jamin:Right.Phil LaMarr:Has some level of fame. Right. You know, and, and it's wild because, because of the internet, the, you know, it now matters what you say. In the old days, if you were a television character actor, like if you were Richard MulliganMichael Jamin:Yeah.Phil LaMarr:It never, nobody was ever gonna post what you said about something.Michael Jamin:Right.Phil LaMarr:It was only if you were Joan Crawford. Right. Or

Cheri Oteri Live on Game Changers With Vicki Abelson Fun, fun, fun, and more fun. A long-time huge fan of Cheri Oteri's work - I'm now a huge fan of the human. I loved every second in this Emmy nominees' great company. As animated as Cheri is on screen, she's all that and a truck full of fun in conversation. From early days in Philly imitating soap actors, her nana, and Laura Ingall's, aspiring to rock stardom, landing at A& M Records in publishing and promotion, moonlighting studying at The Groundlings, eventually making the company, until her manager insisted she quit her day job and focus on auditions. Her first gig… Saturday Night Live! Getting there with fellow Groundling, Will Ferrell, soon to be joined by Chris Kattan, Cheri tells the tale of the journey in all his magnificence. From her audition (Jennifer Coolidge was also part of their Groundlings entourage), her callback, the character she brought with, Rita! And how she worked Joy Lipton in, writing her own sketches, writing with Will, how the cheerleader came to be, Morning Latte, how in her first season a number of A&M artists appeared on SNL––Sting, and Blues Traveler for two, hysterical there, how this non-impressionist to hear her tell it, started doing them, beginning with Barbara Walters. Great story and insights there. Judge Judy, more fun there. Moving on after five years to that Emmy nod on Just Shoot Me! Cheri's delight with that process, we jumped to her current passion project, which she wrote and is set to roll in September with our friend Mark Maxey producing––potential actor strike permitting. My takeaway… Cheri's fantastical! I have added appreciation for her craft and the laughs. She's crazy talented and downright delightful. I can't wait to see all that comes next. And. I wanna be her best friend. Cheri Ann Oteri Live on Game Changers With Vicki Abelson Wed, June 21st 5 pm PT, 8 pm ET Streamed Live on The Facebook https://bit.ly/42UUoL0

Title: SNL Hall of Fame: Celebrating the Life and Laughs of John BelushiIntroduction:Join us as we take an unforgettable journey through the life and career of legendary comedian John Belushi. With our insightful guest, Justin Renwick, we explore Belushi's early beginnings, his rise to fame with Second City and the National Lampoon, and his undeniable charisma that made him one of the most iconic comedians of all time.Chapters:- (0:00:08) SNL Hall of Fame Podcast: Introduction and overview of the episode, including John Belushi's early beginnings and his rise to fame.- (0:12:44) John Belushi's Career and Charisma: Exploring Belushi's journey to Second City, his success with the National Lampoon, and his charismatic stage presence.- (0:17:12) The Brilliance of John Belushi: Examining Belushi's confidence, his ability to immerse himself in characters, and his incredible comedic timing.- (0:24:37) Belushi's Impact on SNL and Comedy: Reflecting on Belushi's unforgettable performances, including his iconic Samurai character and the chemistry he shared with fellow castmates.- (0:34:24) Remembering John Belushi's SNL Sketches: Diving into Belushi's memorable sketches, his impersonations, and the impact of his comedic skills.- (0:46:42) John Belushi's Legacy: Discussing Belushi's influence on future comedians and whether he is the greatest SNL actor of all time.Keywords:- John Belushi- SNL- Second City- National Lampoon- Comedy- Chevy Chase- Samurai character- Animal HouseTranscript0:00:08 - AnnouncerIt's the SNL Hall of Fame podcast with your host, jamie Dube, chief Librarian Thomas Senna, and featuring Matt Bardille And now Curator of the Hall, jamie Dube. 0:00:42 - jDAll right, thank you so much, doug Denats. It's JD here, and welcome to the SNL Hall of Fame podcast. It's a weekly affair where each episode, we take a deep dive into the career of a former cast member, host, musical guest or writer and add them to the ballot for your consideration. Once the nominees have all been announced, we turn to you, the listener, to vote for the most deserving and help determine who will be enshrined for perpetuity inside these hallowed halls. You won in and I can let you in, but not until you wipe your goddamn feet. That's right. Wipe your feet at the door, you filthy animal. How are you doing today? I am, i'm actually really great. Thanks for asking. We've got a barn burner of a show today. It is Justin Renwick joining Thomas Senna in conversation about the very intriguing John Belushi. This should be a good one. I can tell you that the conversations I've had on Reddit, this is probably the most anticipated episode of the season, based on feedback that I've been getting about who we haven't seen nominated in the hall. Now, in case you're curious the way things work, we work together with a committee and choose who will be nominated each year from a pool based on the parameters that have been outlined by the SNL Hall of Fame. Once those selections are made, we sort of piece them together and produce a podcast and we make that show and we put them out every week and you get to listen And that's great. But the real key here is the voting, and the voting is coming up real soon. In fact, next week we are nominating Amy Poehler on the show and then Tuesday, the 23rd of May, voting will begin and it will run through to June 17th. So you will have from May 23rd to June 17th to cast your votes, to cast 15 votes, 15 votes up to 15 votes, i should say, for the SNL Hall of Fame. It's exciting. After Amy Poehler we'll do a few roundtables and then we'll do the reveal, and the reveal is quite exciting. I'm really curious to see if any of our legacy holdovers make it this year. There's Dave Grohl is really close. Lonely Island is super close and Lonely Island should be on. It should have been, you know, a first ballot Hall of Famer as far as I'm concerned, but I don't control the vote. So there's that If you're looking to register to vote, what you want to do is you want to go to SNLHofcom and click on the voting tab and click register to vote. You can do that right there and you will get a ballot on the 23rd emailed to you and Bob's, your uncle, from there. So there's that. Let's go over and talk to our friend Matt in his minutiae minute corner and learn a little bit more about Mr John Belushi. Oh, matthew, hey, hi, jimmy, how are you doing? 0:04:21 - MattI'm great. How about you, matt? I'm good. Thanks, i'm good. Really excited to talk about one of the classic cast members here today, john Belushi, the one and only five. Five foot eight, born January 24th 1949. He credit his grandmother, his Albanian grandmother, for getting him into show business. She didn't understand English, so she would have him act things out for her which made her laugh, and thus a career was born. He actually had very humble beginnings in the start of his career, which was as a youth instructor at a theater camp, the Shawnee Summer Theater of Green County. But from there he went on to become a member of the West Compass Trio, second city in the National Lampoon Lemmings. Prior to joining SNL, he attended the Southern Illinois University in Carbondale, which is where he actually got the college shirt, as seen in Animal House. There's a gift shop there in an area known as the Strip, which is still operating today if you wanted to go and get one for yourself. So while living in New York, he was next door neighbor to SNL fixture Elliot Gould, who we've talked about in the past. He is a huge nerd, or he was a huge nerd. He was a fan of many things, from Lucille Ball, whose entire career he committed to memory And this is something that actually seems to come up a bit. He had a razor sharp memory. He was also a Star Trek fan and with Kirk in particular, to the point Shatner said he preferred Belushi's take on Kirk And he was a big Marvel fan. On one visit to their offices in New York He could summarize any specific issue. Just by looking at the cover. He could people say, well, that's this one. He's like oh, this is the issue where Spider-Man is fighting the Green Goblin and so on and so dies, which must have made him really happy when he and the not ready for primetime players were featured in a Spider-Man comic And he ends up having stolen the Silver Samurai sword and used it in the sketch, so that my wife got that for me, actually that issue. It was shockingly inexpensive for a double memorabilia whammy, but she got that for me from our anniversary last year. That's very cool. Now he was well known for being very judgmental. One of the ways he would evaluate people is by borrowing $20 and seeing how they reacted, so you know if they're kind of a jerk about it. You knew, oh, they were a jerk, but he just gauged how they behaved, that's a good trick. Yeah, yeah, it was an interesting one. I have to remember that Now he was a heavy metal fan, which I did not realize. But when he met Dan Ackroyd, having performed together, dan tried to entice him onto the SNL cast At a Speak Easy, because of course, with those two is at a Speak Easy. Dan put on a blues album which stirred a fascination in John that became career defining, because he had never listened to blues before that meeting and then went on to create the Blues Brothers together. Now he was such a huge star. There were a bunch of roles that he was supposed to be a part of in films. Peter Venkman was originally written for him. He was replaced by James Woods in Once Upon a Time in America on his passing and was to appear in an adaptation of Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas with Ackroyd. Many more projects, but one of the more interesting, given it kind of ties back to his time on SNL. Harold Ramis was guest hosting an episode of Siskel and Ebert and discussed how it was John's dream to play Ludwig von Beethoven in a film, which is a weird one, but given he played him on the show, i guess that could have been a technically SNL spin-off. Now, sorry, go ahead. So he had the nickname of America's guest, as he had a habit of knocking on strangers' doors, entering their homes and eating things from their refrigerator and then crashing out on their couch. This never resulted in any problems because he was so well known, but speaks to how different the 70s were from today. Now he required an income of between $500,000 and a million dollars a year to maintain his lifestyle and his entourage. Now, while he would often make use of strangers' generosity, he himself was also very generous, lending large sums of money to friends and family Towards the end of his life. His manager pushed him to start collecting on these debts, but John refused. Now he is buried in Martha's Vineyard, where his epitaph reads he made us laugh and now he can make us think, but his grave was so popular with visitors, they moved his casket to an unmarked grave in a quiet corner of the cemetery, after which his fans posted a new epitaph based on his catchphrase. He could have given us a lot more laughs, but no, that is John Belushi. 0:10:21 - jDThat's great. Take it away, Thomas. 0:10:48 - ThomasAlright, Justin Renwick is joining me today. Thank you so much for joining me here on the SNL Hall of Fame. 0:10:54 - JustinIt's my pleasure. Thank you for having me. 0:10:56 - ThomasYeah, so this one is a big one to me. This is probably to a lot of people The legendary John Belushi will be talking about. So he was on SNL 1975 to 1980, part of the original cast. He seemed to be made for sketch comedy and had a lot of reps before he started at Saturday Night Live. So you talk about his path to SNL and his prior work in sketch comedy. 0:11:23 - JustinSo we could go way back to high school, which is where he caught the acting bug. He was a very accomplished athlete. He was a football player, he was a drummer, he was in a band that actually released a single believe it or not And to show what a small world Chicago and the greater Chicago area is, because he grew up. He was born in Chicago but he grew up in Wheaton, illinois. He knew Dick Lesucci, who was somebody he would also work with at Second City, and Dick Lesucci went on to SCTV as a writer, which I think he formed an alliance with Joe Flaherty at some point, which is how that came about, but we're getting a little bit off topic. So yeah, john, when he was in high school, did drama and his drama teacher noticed something. He's like there's something special about this kid And if anyone's read the book Wired this is where I know this story from. Apparently, this teacher took him to. If I'm remembering correctly, he took him to. I know it was Indiana, but I don't know if he went and auditioned somewhere else, but basically he got into summer stock in Indiana a year before most people were eligible when he was 17. Like that's how preternaturally talented he was And they did a whole series of plays there That went very well. He enrolled in when he graduated from high school, enrolled at the University of Wisconsin And I was doing drama there, but left after a year and then wound up going to the College of DuPage in West Chicago. Somewhere along that period he went to see Second City and had an epiphany, just realized this is what I was put on earth to do and formed the West Compass Players, which was a reference to the pre-Second City Compass Players, with his friends Tino Insana and Steve Bachecas who people that watch John Belushi on Saturday Night Live will be very familiar with that name because he brought it up a lot in his vits. So the three of them were able to audition en masse for Second City And I think it was Bernie Salons that auditioned them And he saw John's potential right away, saw something in Tino Insana. Well, i think Tino was put in the touring company or asked to take some more classes, but he wound up joining as well. But yeah, john went into Second City. I believe he went right into the main stage cast, which at the time had Brian Doyle, murray, harold Ramis, joe Flaherty, so he was punching well above his weight. I don't know if that's the right term to use, because that sounds more like he was not very good, but was somehow anyway he did very well, but he was young at the time. 0:13:51 - ThomasSo, like you know, being able to be in that company at his age says a lot about it. I think, it's fair to say, at that time punching up above his weight. 0:14:00 - JustinYeah, you're right. Yeah, he wouldn't have been around 22. Joe Flaherty was. I think he was in his late 20s at that point. He was a good 10 years older than the STTV cast, but anyway, that obviously went very well. He made a real reputation for himself there And through that got involved with the national ampoon, so much so that he moved to New York after he'd been in the Lemmings review with Chevy Chase and Christopher Gast, which is one of my favorite comedy albums of all time National Ampoon's Lemmings, which was a takeoff on Woodstock and was where he did Joe Cocker among. he also played the, the MC. But then, yeah, through that world of national ampoon and then writing, producing and performing for the radio hour, that's what brought him to the attention of Lauren Michaels through Chevy Chase and Michael O'Donoghue when they were putting Saturday Night Live together. 0:14:47 - ThomasEven at the National Ampoon's radio hour. that's where he came across with Bill Murray, gilda Radner, some of his future SNL cohorts, just a who's who working on that show at the time. Richard Belzer was even part of that. So it was just a really, really talented cast And, would you say I know a lot of them had their gifts and talents, but there was something magnetic about Belushi that even stood out amongst that type of talent. 0:15:14 - JustinBelushi has that thing like. The charisma is just unbelievable. But he has that mischievous glint. Jimmy Fallon has it as well. Many other people do where you're even if you know not only his stage presence. Right Just the minute John Belushi walked on to stage, eyes were drawn to him. John Candy had the same thing. Anyone that's tall I mean, john Belushi wasn't tall, but anyone that has a big presence and can exude that kind of charisma right away stills focused. But he always wanted to see what he was going to do next. Same thing with Jimmy Fallon When he was fucking around in a sketch and messing up. You wanted to know, oh, you know what's. He got up his sleeve What's going to happen next? And that was very much John Belushi too. This electric performer is the word that comes to mind. 0:15:53 - ThomasThat's why a lot of us watch live sketch and SNL in particular is because there's I mean there's that element of you don't know it's going to be a live show, you don't know what's going to happen. There's almost that danger involved in. Belushi really did personify. He did bring that energy to the show. Yeah. 0:16:11 - JustinAnd he has like Kate McKinnon is the same Melissa McCarthy just fearless performers that you can throw anything at them And they'll. You know, like even something as simple. I'm sure the tomato was cut beforehand, but like the samurai deli, when he throws the tomato up in the air and chops it with no-transcript, there's a million ways that can go wrong on a live TV show. But I don't think it bothered him at all, he just knew. 0:16:35 - ThomasSo he, like I said, he started with. You know he was an original cast member at SNL. They started in 1975. Where did you become familiar with Belushi's work and kind of what stood out to you? 0:16:46 - JustinNot to get too deep into the archives, but my introduction to Saturday Night Live was a friend's Mr Bill t-shirt in 1979. I'm like what's Mr Bill? Oh it's this thing that's on Saturday Night Live. It's really funny. Oh, it's this show, it's on Saturday nights, it's live, ha ha. Anyway, i asked my mom about it. She knew she was a big Second City fan so she'd been watching Saturday Night Live since day one And yeah, they let me stay up and Mr Bill was the gateway. But then in between the sketches I'm trying to think the first thing that really stood out with me, stood out for me with John Belushi, was probably I'm going to say the Bs, because this was 1979. So they were still back then. The reruns weren't just shows from the current season, they were showing shows from the first season on. So I got to sort of catch up over that season. That's probably the first thing that stood out. But it's just, it's that confidence. He was so confident. It's really magnetic, like it really draws you in. I mean, to be a performer on Saturday Night Live you have to have a certain degree of confidence. But there's different levels. Like if you look at somebody like Dan Ackroyd, who was incredibly talented, really funny and just able to like rattle off details. You know, at a moment's notice there's a difference between sort of him and Belushi, which I think is why they complimented each other so well. Dan Ackroyd is more of a technical actor, whereas to me anyway, john Belushi is a little more instinctive. 0:18:06 - ThomasYeah, what stood out to me a lot, when you know rewatching a lot of his sketches and everything, was just how he would dissolve into a character And then he just gave off this. Really, the audience knew that they were in good hands with him up there because he exuded just like you know, i'm supposed to be here, i'm doing Don Corleone impression and I'm the one who's supposed to be doing this and I'm good enough. And he did have that confidence, definitely, and his relationship with some of his castmates, from what I've read, really played into that, especially his relationship with Chevy Chase. 0:18:42 - Speaker 1Yeah, And how he viewed. 0:18:43 - ThomasChevy Chase, getting attention early on. 0:18:46 - JustinIt's funny that they weren't. you know, they didn't get along very well, even in the lampoon days, And when Chevy was still smart enough and got over his own ego, it was him and Michael O'Donoghue that suggested him. I think I mentioned that before to Lauren. But yeah, that of course, when Chevy took off in the first few episodes of Saturday Night Live, yeah, John Belushi was not happy about it. 0:19:07 - ThomasNo, i think maybe John looked at Chevy is getting you know, maybe I don't know if it's cheap laughs, but he's certainly got a lot of mileage off falling prat falls. And I think what Belushi felt that he did was maybe more elevated than what Chevy did. So I think each Belushi thought, from what I've read, belushi thought that he was supposed he was the star of the of the cast. Yeah, not Absolutely. 0:19:30 - JustinChevy Chase is. That's a whole lot of problems to unpack that that guy has, but let's just suffice it to say I he is, is incredible at what he does. You know what I mean? Like to you were saying the falling, the falling down, like the mimicking people behind their back, just the, the sort of boyish humor and the looks. The looks helped as well, the dimple chin and the sort of he had a glint in his eye as well. But yeah, he's miles away And I'm pretty sure Chevy Chase will be the first one to tell you that in the acting realm from John Belushi. 0:20:02 - ThomasWhen Chevy Chase played Gerald Ford, he didn't sink into Gerald Ford. That was Chevy Chase just calling himself Gerald. 0:20:09 - JustinFord, which made it even funnier for some reason. 0:20:12 - ThomasYeah, it definitely worked for sure, but then, if you know, belushi played a character, belushi just really transformed into that character And I think that that was a lot of acting chops, like you mentioned. 0:20:25 - JustinI think the other amazing thing about Belushi and another reason, a big reason that would put him in the the Hall of Fame is not only could he, he's an incredible mimic, He has a great comic timing, like Jackie Gleason is one of his heroes, and it really shows. And, yeah, he can sink into a character and become somebody else, But at the same time you put him on update as himself and it's unbelievable, Like he's still amazing Just playing. You know, as a comedian's play slightly heightened versions of themselves. He was comfortable playing himself as well as playing other characters which we're going to. We'll use the same analogy. Dan Ackroyd was more comfortable sinking into characters. You saw his season on Weekend Update with Jane Curtin. He never looked very comfortable playing himself. 0:21:09 - ThomasBelushi on those update pieces. It was incredible He would. He would start off, just, you know, even kill. I think that was the most Belushi, the most human, for lack of a better term that I would see Belushi on the show. But then he would go from zero to a hundred and like two seconds The whole. The luck of the Irish rant, the famous one that he had on Weekend. 0:21:29 - Speaker 3Update. 0:21:30 - ThomasAnd you know it starts off level headed. 0:21:33 - Speaker 8Well, it's that time again. St Patrick's Day has come and gone, and well, the sons of Ireland are basking in the globe. You know, when I think of Ireland I think of a lot of colorful Irish expressions like top of the morning to you, kiss the Blarney stone. May the road rise to meet you. May you be in heaven. An hour before the devil knows you're dead, i'd like to smash you in the face with my shillelie Danny boy begora. Whale of the banshee. Whiskey for the leprechauns, whiskey for the leprechauns. But the expression I think most people identify with the Irish is, of course, the luck of the Irish. 0:22:09 - ThomasAnd Beluce, he's just kind of this nice guy just saying what he has to say and then he just, he just is like a bull in a china shop. 0:22:15 - Speaker 9I said bye man. I said hey man. I never even seen $5,000 in my life. So don't ask me for it Now watch, ask your mother which is a dumb thing for me to say, because his mother just died. Now I got, right now I got this drunken Irish junkie who wants to kill me because of what I said about his mother being in terminal dreamland. You know, one thing would just get me out One thing They love their mothers, boy. Oh, they love their mothers. It's Mama Diff and Mama Dan. Oh, my Irish mother. I really must be heaven because my mother comes up there. Ah, ah, ah. 0:23:01 - ThomasHe would do like a, like an army, roll off the desk and then you would never see him after that, until the next sketch. Yeah, yeah. 0:23:10 - JustinAnd again that's on. That's on live TV again. There's so many ways that could go wrong. 0:23:14 - ThomasJust don't no fear no fear, yeah, totally fearless, i think. I think that's such a great way to put it. An element of Belushi that I love too was that he reminded me of like a Charlie Chaplin or a Buster Keaton in a lot of ways, and one of the examples, one of, yeah, just a very expressive face and he didn't have to have any lines necessarily to convey something to do really great sketch work. And one of the things that really pops out to me, his most famous character, the samurai, is like the perfect example. John reminded me of Charlie Chaplin or Buster Keaton. Like I said, in those sketches It just really was striking, just like the physical ability of him to convey something. 0:23:56 - Speaker 3All I know is that the third quarter net of Kentucky Mines was up 6.2%. 0:24:00 - Speaker 1Look at this graph. 0:24:02 - Speaker 3Look, it went right up here And what happened September, October, November into the well-known toilet. 0:24:09 - Speaker 9I love her over there. 0:24:10 - Speaker 10Who's here? Who? Who Did Who Who? I don't know what you mean, but I need security. 0:24:23 - Speaker 9That's the point. 0:24:23 - JustinI'm sure you're aware of this, and other listeners maybe as well that that was based on Toshiro Mifuni, his character in Yojimbo, and they called his name with samurai futaba And that was his audition piece for Saturday Night Live. The Samurai Pool Hustler I don't know if it was his, probably his wife and it remembers was saying that yeah right, he was in the apartment messing around with that character for a while with a bathrobe and he'd grab the dowel from the like the clothes rod, from the closet, use it as a sword And, if I'm not mistaken in the audition he used that obviously as a pool cue. 0:24:55 - ThomasWell, i could see why he got the job then. I mean, that's such a Got the gig. yeah, i think I underestimated how much I enjoyed the Samurai until I took a deep dive into Belushi over the last few weeks And I could see why it was held in such high regard. I mean those facial expressions, the interplay he had, mostly with Buck Henry but with a few other hosts. it was just incredible to watch. I couldn't take my eyes off of Belushi during those sketches. 0:25:23 - JustinI just read today. apparently it was Buck Henry who turned it into a recurring character because he first played the Samurai with Richard Pryor. Apparently, when Buck Henry came in, it was his request to be in a sketch with the Samurai, And it went so well that every time Buck came back they would bust out another Samurai sketch with Buck playing the same character. 0:25:42 - ThomasThey had such good chemistry. I think, belushi, he had good chemistry with some of the other, the hosts that did the Samurai with him. Oh, samurai Hotel, that's what it was. It was the Samurai Hotel, okay. 0:25:54 - JustinYo. 0:25:54 - ThomasMama-san. Yes, he and Richard Pryor. Yeah, that was awesome. Another example that I had just about Belushi being a great silent actor like just he didn't have to speak one word was he and Gilda had this sketch where they met in the laundromat and they share a washer at the laundromat and they begin to flirt, and that was just all the no dialogue. They share a cigarette at the end They share a cigarette at Belushi's pouring champagne. At one point That was just such great comedic acting without having to say one word. 0:26:26 - JustinI don't have any proof of this, but that kind of strikes me as what's known as a trunk piece. I would imagine and again, i could be very wrong. I would imagine either Gilda or John may have brought that from Second City, so there was a few of those in the first season. like there's a Dan Aykroyd Gilda Radner sketch where Dan Aykroyd plays a mechanic and he's putting his daughter to bed and she wants to hear a story and he's tired and wants her to go to bed, so he just makes up a story that involves all these car parts or whatever. That was definitely something that two of them had done in Toronto. But yeah, i'm getting a little ahead of myself here. It's speculation. 0:27:00 - ThomasYeah, no, that definitely makes sense. I think when they were doing Second City stuff and it's a lot like SNL in that they have to come up with idea after idea after idea, And a lot of it tends to be slice of life kind of things, Like you find the funny bits in these seemingly ordinary slice of life kind of things. So in this example they were at the laundromat and they want to both use the same washer, the work. Can we go from there? That does strike me as an idea that they would have used at Second. 0:27:26 - JustinCity. It feels very much like, yeah, it feels a lot like a Second City or a Groundling sketch. I mean they still do that today Not, i doubt, as often. but I know Melissa McCarthy the first time she hosted when they did the Focus Group on the Hidden Valley Ranch. I didn't know it at the time. I only learned this about a year ago that that was a sketch she was doing every night at the Groundlings that she'd written. So shout out to Melissa. 0:27:47 - ThomasThis isn't about Melissa. Yeah, she finds it. She finds it, though I think there's a lot of Belushi spirit in Melissa as a performer. 0:27:55 - JustinOh, 100%, yeah, definitely She's also fearless and she's also a really good actor. Yeah, And that's John. like John Belushi's secret sauce is what a great actor he was. Being funny is one thing, but being a good actor is like 70, 80% of it. 0:28:10 - ThomasHe was an animal house and he wasn't the lead. I think hindsight tells people that Belushi was the lead in that film but he wasn't. 0:28:18 - JustinOh yeah, But he totally commanded attention in that movie, even the first scene when he's holding the beer and he pisses on Thomas Hulse's leg. It's like I want to know what this guy's doing next. I know the food scene in Animal House where he's stealing all the stuff out of the cafeteria. John Landis has said he was off camera like guiding him and saying, like I want you to be Cookie Monster, basically. 0:28:43 - ThomasWhen you're watching that movie. You got excited when Belushi would get on the screen. I mean when the hippie guy was kind of playing the guitar on the stairwell and Belushi just takes the guitar Poor Steve Ambition, Yeah. He takes the guitar and smashes it against the wall And then he just kind of looks at him and goes, sorry, And then walks away. 0:29:03 - JustinI mean, He doesn't even say it like, it's not even snide, it's like sorry, it's like it's this thing I had to do. It's not personal, yeah. 0:29:12 - ThomasYeah, nothing against you, It was just I had to do this. Yeah, yeah. So people I think, looking back at Animal House, think that that was a Belushi vehicle And it kind of wasn't. I mean, it was very much an ensemble but there were definitely leads that weren't Belushi in the movie, but that just speaks to the presence that he had about him. 0:29:29 - JustinWell, to speak again to the Chevy, John Dilemma, let's call it. You probably know they wanted Chevy Chase to play Eric Stratton, which was Tim, Tim, what's his last name? Anyway, the guy that played Eric Stratton, it was Otter and, yeah, Otter was the character's nickname, I think. Anyway, that was supposed to be Chevy And he didn't want to be second fiddle to John Belushi again, even though technically, yeah, he would have been. I guess you'd say he was the lead and they wanted Dan Ackroyd as D-Day, but Dan apparently was not ready. He felt he wasn't ready to make movies yet, which is weird because he'd made them in Canada. 0:30:04 - Thomasbut be that as it may, Yeah, that would have been such a perfect role for Ackroyd too. He would have just slid right in. 0:30:11 - JustinWell, the guy that I can't remember the actor's name, but the guy that played D-Day did a great job, bruce, yeah. 0:30:15 - ThomasBruce McGill. Yeah, he was really good in that. Belushi set a template too for we were talking about. I see a lot of him in Melissa McCarthy. I see a lot of him, of course, the comparison when Chris Farley got on the show that comparison was just out there for the taking and Chris Farley idolized John Belushi as well. He wanted to be Belushi We'll get to this but unfortunately he was like Belushi in a lot of ways good and bad, but Belushi, yeah, but Belushi, just he definitely set a template for a lot of performers as far as how they performed and as far as also what SNL was looking for in cast members going forward. I think a lot of times they were trying to find a Belushi sort of role when they were trying to feel a cast going forward. 0:31:00 - JustinWell, there's a through line with John Belushi and a lot of the other similar actors. I mean Bill Murray sort of has that kamikaze kind of go for it, fearless attitude as well. John Candy and Bill Murray and John Candy are also both incredible actors, and even Chris Farley, the through line. There is a guy named Del Close who was in the Compass Players. I think he was in the St Louis. There was an offshoot in St Louis And then eventually everything morphed into Second City And Del also worked with Second City for quite some time And then years later, when often started in Provolympic with so Sharna Halpern, they all received the tutelage of Del Close And I think he helped. I mean, stuff is there, but I think he helped bring that out in them as well. 0:31:44 - ThomasYeah, for sure, del Close, like a lot of people look at him as the godfather of improv, especially he worked with so many great improv and sketch actors. So a lot of these conversations point back to Del Close in a lot of ways, for sure. And I think you know, when they hired Farley, of course everybody said you know, they found their Belushi When the Horatio Sands started on the show. I think people made a lot of those comparisons And even Bobby Moynihan they said, oh, that's the Belushi or Farley archetype. So that's just, you know, john Belushi setting a template and just an example for the show, as far as what works on the show and what Lorne was trying to find. So what are some other characters or sketches or performances on SNL that you think our listeners should familiarize themselves with when discussing Belushi? 0:32:37 - JustinSo, getting back to the bees, i mean the bees weren't a great sketch, they were just stupid. But it was just funny seeing everybody dressed up in bees costumes. But the good thing that I think that came out of the bees was King Bee, john Belushi and Dan Ackroyd is a. You know, it was kind of a proto-Bloose brothers. They're dressed up in the bees costumes. They got the shades on Dan's playing the harmonica. They're playing with the Howard Shore band It was a Saturday Night Live band at the time And they do Slim Harpo's King Bee, and you know, john in the middle starts doing cartwheels and all kinds of other acrobatics And then it ends with him doing that when your man is doomed, when you're about to do Getting crazier and crazier and then getting up and falling off the stool. 0:33:30 - Speaker 10Want you to be my queen. 0:33:35 - Speaker 8We are together, we can make honey baby, but we'll never see. Okay, let's buzz a while. 0:33:54 - JustinYes, that's the place to start. I think there's there's other sketches that are that are worth mentioning, where he would try to show off his acting, you know, in the early days of Saturday Night Live and even further along, but they don't really do them anymore. There were always these little almost one-act plays, you know. Some of them were dramatic, didn't even have any any comedy in them, and John seemed to be featured in a lot of those. He was. There's one he did on the Sissy's basic show, which I think was in the third season. That's worth watching when that didn't work, that didn't help you find your manly powers. 0:34:24 - Speaker 9I started thinking about dead people and And if dead people secretly watched to see if you go to their funeral, you looking at certain parts of my body and You thinking the word dead. 0:34:38 - Speaker 8Well, no wonder. If you're wondering why there is no wonder, well, there is no wonder. You know I have been with if you know what I mean a semi-professional singer. I've had adult relations with a semi-professional singer, not to mention many others. Only mention the one that proves to a man who has been to Houston and left behind a satisfied semi-professional. 0:35:11 - JustinHe goes toe-to-toe with with Sissy and they both come out looking very good. 0:35:15 - ThomasYou get the sense that John, you know, relished being able to play opposite those great actors. I'm reminded of the dueling Brando's one that he did with Peter Boyle, where they traded Brando impressions. 0:35:30 - SketchI could have been a contender, could have been somebody instead of a bum, which is what I am. Let's face it, charlie. 0:35:40 - SketchI got him a son of the callion governor. 0:35:46 - ThomasAnd you can tell Belushi was probably just having such a good time trading those with Peter Boyle, peter. 0:35:51 - JustinBoyle, another second city, chicago, alum, yeah they're probably super comfortable working with each other and there's that, and Joe Cocker, of course, and especially the Joe Cocker he did to Joe Cocker. 0:36:04 - ThomasThat's right. Yeah, one of the first kind of celebrities who gets impersonated walk-ons In SNL. Yeah, that that kind of became a thing a lot in the 90s. Yeah, that Joe Cocker was great. He did that really early too. You said that he had auditioned with it. He did that first in the third episode of season one, yeah, the Rob Reiner episode. 0:36:24 - JustinAnd there's another thing I was just gonna bring up That's also from the Rob Reiner episode when they They're dressed up as the bees and Rob has to tell them the bee sketch has been cut. 0:36:32 - SketchI'm sorry if you think we're ruining your show, mr Reiner, but See, you don't understand. We didn't ask the Beebees, you see, you, you've got Norman Lear and a first-rate riding staff, but this is all they came up with for us. 0:37:01 - SketchDo you think we like this? 0:37:04 - SketchNo, no, mr Reiner, but we don't have any choice. 0:37:15 - JustinThat's one of the first time he did one of those. I don't. I don't think there was a but, no, in it, but there could have been. That was leading, you know, laying the groundwork for those care, for those bits that he would do where he'd become increasingly frustrated with somebody. I could have gone out and done this, but Yeah, oh my gosh. 0:37:34 - ThomasAnd there's also in season three, The Olympia Cafe. I think that's another one that one of his famous ones from SNL that we should probably hit it was him. Bill Murray Played a great role in that. What do you remember what watching him in the Olympia Cafe sketches? 0:37:51 - JustinI love the history of those sketches. I think it was not. Novello had come in as a writer in season three and he brought that idea because he and John were both Familiar with the, the tavern in Chicago that was based on I think it was the Billy Goat Tavern. That's basically what happened. You know, cheeseburger, cheeseburger, no, no, fries, chips, no, coke, pepsi, all that kind of stuff, and John could also draw on his Background because his father was a restaurant owner, so I'm sure a lot of it came from that as well. But even the, the decision to make the owner Greek, and he appeared in a season two sketch as That character on one of those Jane Curtin talk shows. Even before they did those sketches and, yeah, i know in the history of the family they were Albanian and apparently in you know, chicago in the 40s or 50s That was still considered too ethnic, so they would often poses Greek to avoid, to avoid trouble. Yeah, i didn't know that. Guess that's where that comes from. Yeah, yeah, the only sketches were very, very ambitious, like to have a working grill and that you've ever been a studio 8h like it's? it's not huge, no no, it's not. 0:38:56 - ThomasYeah, rewatching those because I was fortunate enough to be able to, in the spring of 2022, go see SNL in person for the first time, and so it's kind of you? 0:39:05 - Justindid you dress for the or the or the? 0:39:07 - ThomasWe saw a dress rehearsal, getting a perspective of actually how small that studio is and then going back to watch sketches and, like you said, with the Olympia cafe, for example, they've put a working grill, they had, you know, it seems like elaborate for how small that studio is for sure. And John, in those sketches He seemed to me like he was the run, the one who was anchoring the sketch and kind of running things and taking it. Oh for sure, you're to there, you know, and he would interact with maybe Jane Curtin as an annoyed customer or Bill Murray is the sheepish Worker, but it was John sketch that he was just controlling. 0:39:43 - ThomasI'm sure he's playing a version of his father there. 0:39:46 - JustinOh yeah, Absolutely you can tell that's, that's just effortless. 0:40:11 - ThomasAnother sketch that it's a pre-tape. That's just lived in my brain since I was a kid. Inside that sort of showed Belushi's more kind of human relatable side was the little chocolate donuts. 0:40:30 - SketchA lot of miles training for that day and I'm down a lot of donuts. It tastes good and they've got the sugar I need to get me going in the morning. That's why a little chocolate don'ts have been on my training table since I was a kid. 0:40:48 - SketchLittle chocolate donuts, the donuts of champions. 0:40:55 - ThomasAnd that was more so because I don't feel as a viewer and this is a compliment to Belushi because, like I said, he would sink into his characters but I never felt totally like I knew who he was as a human being in a lot of ways Contrast that with Chris Farley, whose human nature just oozed out, but with little chocolate donuts. That was one of the times where I kind of saw relatability in Belushi. 0:41:20 - JustinYeah, i think my first was I think it's during the first season. They would do bits sometimes, i guess, maybe to fill time, like they'd have Gilda Radner do her You know what Gilda ate segment. Or just say, you know, hey, ma'am, you can go to bed. I'm not in the show this week, but there was one where John Belushi came out and tried to sell a bunch of his old records. Yes yes, but it was just him playing himself honestly with, i'm sure, albums that he owned, yeah, and that's yeah. I kind of got a better sense of him from that. 0:41:48 - ThomasRe-watching a lot of his stuff. I love getting those, those moments here and there of like, oh, i think that's Belushi, i think, yeah, i think that's hit, who he really is kind of coming through. But he was think he was Consciously, didn't. You know? I think he liked to play characters rather than I'm gonna play a version of myself, which is a testament to him. My gosh, like we said, he was so, so great at that. So unfortunately, after SNL he didn't have much time. He had two movies that came out after SNL that he starred in. It was continental divide and neighbors. I don't know if you've ever seen either of those. 0:42:23 - JustinI've seen neighbors. I've never seen continental divide. I've always wanted to but just haven't got around to it. But I only recently saw, even to go back, old boyfriends from 1978 where he plays Basically a more spiffed-up version of of Jake blues. He's just this guy that works for the local. I think it's the local flower shop that tell you Shire, who's the lead was. You know, she knew him back in high school, yeah, and he's got this band that he fronts at nights. But anyway, it's a shame that Him and Don Avello's movie noble rot didn't get made. 0:42:54 - ThomasDo you know what? what was the premise behind the movie with the that Don Avello was working on with him? 0:42:59 - Justinnoble rot It had something to do with. It wasn't abscam, but it was something like that. It was a, not a Ponzi scheme, but something along those lines. Reading a fuller outline of the of the premise, it sounded like it was gonna be a really good movie. But I think the film company was forcing John to be in the national ampoune's joy of sex. But she didn't want to do and they said well, if you don't do this, you don't get to make noble rot. But unfortunately none of it came to pass anyway, sadly. Cuz cuz of a speedball. 0:43:30 - ThomasSo yeah, march 5th 1982 he unfortunately passed away only 33 years old, gosh, i mean that I'm yeah. That must have sent shockwaves through the comedy world and through Hollywood in general. 0:43:43 - JustinI can't imagine. And even the people like the people that were there that day, like Robert De Niro was there, robin Williams was there. Robin Williams credits it with helping him stop taking cocaine, so at least something good came out of it But yeah, you can only imagine. And also the guilt like somebody like Lauren Michaels. How would you feel? See, i should have intervened, i should have helped. I'm just using his and him as an example. I'm not trying to put any guilt on him or anything, but yeah, like, not only is it a warning sign, maybe you should Curb your lifestyle a little bit, but also you should also try to help people that are, that are in trouble. But in the 70s, 70s and 80s, you know, people didn't really do that, we didn't have the equipment. It even happened to. You know, ten years later, with Kurt Cobain, nobody knew to just put the brakes on and say just stop for a while, go away, get your head together. See somebody talk about your feelings, whatever. 0:44:36 - ThomasBut yeah, it was just go, go, go And it was so prevalent around that time too. There's always stories about how SNL in the late 70s, there was a lot of cocaine, everything like that. So it must have been hard to tell somebody like Belushi that they have a problem, when he could just look and say, well, i've done this with you. Like, who are you to tell me? 0:44:57 - Justinthat I have a problem. It's a little different from the same bowl here, buddy. Yeah, so it must have been hard to intervene with somebody back then when it was just so prevalent. Nobody wants to be the parent right. 0:45:09 - ThomasYeah, yeah, exactly. And you know what's interesting to me? He was going to be in Ghostbusters And that was so unfortunate that we didn't get to see him in that form in Ghostbusters. But the monster Slimer, I believe, was modeled after Belushi. I don't know if that's apocryphal. 0:45:27 - JustinNow that you say that it sure looks like him. 0:45:30 - ThomasYeah. I think I believe that I've read that they kind of modeled Slimer after Belushi, And when you look at Slimer you can maybe see a nod to Belushi. What kind of career do you think that Belushi could have had had he? 0:45:44 - Justinkept clean. I think it would have been very similar to Bill Murray's. Oh, yeah, i think he would have continued doing comedy, obviously Like who's not going to hire him to be in a comedy. But even with Continental Divide, which is sort of a again, i haven't seen it, but from what I know it's sort of a comedy drama almost. You know what I mean. It's not balls to the wall, animal house or Blues Brothers with jokes and explosions and gags and everything. But yeah, i could see him doing a lot more dramatic roles And then maybe being like what happened with Bill Murray being taken on by somebody like Sophia Coppola who would bring him in every time because she knows he can deliver. 0:46:19 - ThomasOr somebody like Wes Anderson. Maybe there could have been a cool partnership with someone like Wes Anderson, like, yeah, belushi was that talented He could have. I think I could have seen him in more dramatic roles like Lost in Translation or something like that, like Murray got to do for sure. That's definitely not a stretch. So what is your final case if you had to sum it up, for John Belushi to be inducted into the SNL Hall of Fame. 0:46:42 - JustinTotal commitment. Larger than life persona, hugely talented actor, The first major star to emerge from the show post Chevy. Natural charisma, being a member of the first cast ever, I think, puts him above a lot of people, setting a template for many to follow, Best example being Chris Farley that we've discussed. But unfortunately, some of those habits also bled in The ability to upstage others with his mere presence on stage, the eyebrow cocking the one eyebrow. It's amazing what he could do with that. Unbelievable comic timing, preter natural talent, given that at the age of 16 or 17, a drama teacher at a high school was like there's something here That's very rare. Being a great actor and having it serve comedy, which doesn't happen, is a hard thing to do And it's more than half. The battle really is being a good actor, as we mentioned earlier, And I'd say a lot of people have come close to his level, like we said earlier Kate McKinnon on another area of the spectrum, Somebody like Dan Ackroyd, But I don't think anyone's reached that height yet. I think he is the greatest Saturday Night Live actor of all time. 0:48:06 - jDSo there's that. I want to thank Justin Renwick, i want to thank Thomas Senna, i want to thank Matt Ardill. I want to thank you for listening, but before we go any further, i want to listen to a sketch. I want to listen to something that Belushi did that seals the deal, that makes me feel that he is a legit, absolute Hall of Famer. I think that Justin's comment that he's the greatest SNL actor of all time is a bold statement. A bold statement There have been a lot. One who joined just three years after Belushi left is Eddie Murphy, and I don't know how you get bigger than Eddie Murphy. So is Belushi a Hall of Famer? Yeah, i think so. Is he a first ballot Hall of Famer? Likely, like, very likely. Is he the greatest of all time? I don't know, maybe that's another podcast for another time, but let's listen to this sketch now and get a better sense of what Mr Belushi brought to the table. 0:49:28 - SketchI guess this is my style. Well, they all thought I'd be the first to go. I was one of those live fast, die young and leave a good looking corpse type, you know. Well, i guess they were wrong. There they are, all my friends. This is a not ready for prime time cemetery. Come on up. Well, here's Gilda Radner. She had her own show on Canadian television for years and years the Gilda Radner show. At least now I can see her on reruns. Here's a button. God bless her. Here's what Lorraine is, they say. She murdered her DJ husband and moved to the valley in California and had a pecan farm. She was this big when she died Jane Curtin. She married a stockbroker, had two children, moved upstate New York. She died of complications during cosmetic surgery. Here's Eric Morris. Eric went to the show and worked in the black theater for years And he died of an overdose of heroin. Here's Bill Murray. He lived the longest, 38 years. He was happy when he died, though He just grown his mustache back, probably still growing. Here's Chevy Chase. He died when that was first movie with Goldie Haan. Over here is Danny Ackroyd. I guess he loved his Harley too much. It clocked him at 175 miles an hour before the crash. It was a blur. I had to be called in to identify his body. I recognized him by his web toes. Well. Saturday Night Show was the best experience of my life. Now they're all gone. I miss every one of them. Why me? Why did I live so long? They're all dead. I'll tell you why Because I'm a dancer. 0:53:10 - jDThat was Don't Look Back in Anger, directed by Tom Schiller. You didn't get to see it, but it features an old John Belushi. If you're listening to this podcast, you're a big enough fan of SNL that you've seen the sketch, but if you haven't check it out, it's worth watching as well. It works on an audio level but it certainly is worth watching to see Belushi's chops as he is dressed up as an old man. It's very eerie. It's a great place to see that old man come Here. He is lamenting his deceased co-workers and reminiscing that it was the best time of his life. We never got to experience that old man Belushi and get to hear that from his lips. Schiller created a premonition. In a sense It's a wonderful piece of art. You can check it out for sure. That, my friends, is what I have for you this week. Make sure to register to vote. S and l h o f dot com. Click on the voting tab, click register to vote and you'll be in. Voting begins the 23rd of May, wraps up the 17th of June And on the 19th of June we will induct the class of season three. So on your way out, if you do me a favor, as you're walking past the weekend update exhibit turn out the lights, because the s and l hall of fame is now closed. 0:54:56 - AnnouncerThanks for listening to the s and l hall of fame podcast. Make sure to rate, review, share and subscribe to the show. Wherever you get your podcasts, follow us on social media at s and l h o f. This is Doug Denance saying. This is Doug Denance saying see you next week. Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/snlhof/donationsAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

ABC is about to launch a fun new series, Not Dead Yet. From creators David Windsor and Casey Johnson ("This Is Us," "The Real O'Neals") and starring Gina Rodriguez, "Not Dead Yet" follows Nell Serrano (Rodriguez), a broke and newly single self-described disaster, working to restart the life and career she left behind 10 years ago.  Josh Banday plays Dennis, Nell's boss who happend to be bi.  Josh also happens to be bi. He is an LA actor who appeared as Ivan on Amazon's Upload by Greg Daniels. He has also appeared on The Big Bang Theory, Mom, Adam Ruins Everything, and will appear on the upcoming series Pam and Tommy. He got his comedy chops appearing in shows at Second City, and the Groundling's Sunday Company.   With co-host Brody Levesque 

ABC is about to launch a fun new series, Not Dead Yet. From creators David Windsor and Casey Johnson ("This Is Us," "The Real O'Neals") and starring Gina Rodriguez, "Not Dead Yet" follows Nell Serrano (Rodriguez), a broke and newly single self-described disaster, working to restart the life and career she left behind 10 years ago.  Josh Banday plays Dennis, Nell's boss who happend to be bi.  Josh also happens to be bi. He is an LA actor who appeared as Ivan on Amazon's Upload by Greg Daniels. He has also appeared on The Big Bang Theory, Mom, Adam Ruins Everything, and will appear on the upcoming series Pam and Tommy. He got his comedy chops appearing in shows at Second City, and the Groundling's Sunday Company.   With co-host Brody Levesque 

A multi-talented comedic composer, vocalist, actor and the creator of the irrepressible Broadway Barbara, whose showbiz tales and classic show tunes have made her a social media sensation. Leah is an alumni of the renowned Groundling's Sunday Company and a founding member of the Transcendence Theatre Company, which earned her a Broadway World “Person to Watch” nomination and the opportunity to open for Rita Moreno and Ben Vereen in concert. She also sang alto in the premiere top 40 vintage trio The Beverly Bombshells. Leah's national tour credits include: Radio City Christmas Spectacular, 42nd Street and Happy Days. Regionally she has graced the stages of Paper Mill Playhouse, Goodspeed Opera House, Falcon Theatre and Eugene O'Neill Theatre. She has made television appearances on Maron, Jimmy Kimmel Live and Blackish. Find out much more by visiting @BroadwayBarbaraOfficial on Instagram and TikTok.

Yeah baby! We're closing out the year with none other than Groundling alum and fellow wig lover, Mindy Sterling. You Might Know Her From: The Goldbergs, Desperate Housewives, Drop Dead Gorgeous, iCarly, The Grinch Who Stole Christmas, ConMan, and the Austin Powers trilogy. We go deep with Mindy on her iconic lesbian role, Frau Farbissina, but also dig into the lesbian subplot lurking beneath Ron Howard's Grinch film. Plus: working with kids and dogs, her repartee with the late, great Leslie Jordan in the Alan Tudyk web series, ConMan, the surprising generosity of Teri Hatcher, and why Jim Carrey was more method than Mike Myers. It's a doozy of a way to close out 2022. Shagadelic!  Follow us on social media: @damianbellino || @rodemanne Discussed this week Natalie Zea interview (Episode #71 of YMKHF) Guinevere Turner interview (Episode #6 of YMKHF) Meghann Fahy in White Lotus Fahy was in The Bold Type  Fahy can sing! Mink Stole (Ep #64 of YMKHF) cosigned my lesbian trope, Guinevere Turner didn't Christine McVie, Irene Cara, Kirstie Alley all passed this month RIP For Richer or Poorer trailer Kirstie Alley is in The Last Don, not Bella Mafia Fat Actress  Rachael Harris interview (Ep #62 of YMKHF) Celine Dion announcement Did Clarnella raise the Grinch with a sister or a gf? Was Baranski in prosthetics for that movie? Has been on the ABC sitcom The Goldbergs for 6 seasons  Plays Mitzi on Desperate Housewives opposite Drea de Matteo Lesley Ann Warren told us (Ep #78 of YMKHF) that DH toxicity was at a 12  Teri Hatcher asked crew to get Mindy a mat for her pratfall Workshopped Austin Powers character with Mike Myers at The Groundlings (Julia Sweeeney brought him in) Austin Powers Super Bowl commercial  Recurred on A.N.T. Farm and iCarly and played grandmother on The Dog Who Saved Christmas Emmy nominated for ConMan (Alan Tudyk's web series that went to Syfy) Worked with the late Leslie Jordan and they were so good together Dad was comedian Dick Sterling and mom was a dancer named Booky  Played a drunk in Spring Breakdown. Bridesmaids stole the ending from that movie Parker Posey as Freda Black in The Staircase  Jim Carrey was more method than Mike Myers (Jim was post Man on the Moon) Mom and Two Faced Toaster in The Brave Little Toaster Phil Hartman a good guy.  Credited as “additional voices” while looping for Despicable Me  Grilling sausages in Saved by the Bell: The College Years Timmy from Passions was Baby Grinch (not Jonathan Lipnicki) Joyce Van Patten talked to us about Desperate Housewives (Ep #36 of YMKHF) Seth Green a good guy Anne reads her fan letter to Jenna Elfman in the Frances Turner interview (Ep #28 of YMKHF) Do you bring up the unexplained death of Natalie Wood during this interview?

On this episode of Sofa King Podcast, we talk about the life and laughs of Will Ferrell. This juggernaut has made some of the greatest comedies of all times and helped to launch the careers of many other comedians. He started as a Groundling and soon moved to Saturday Night Live; it was a time when ratings were at their all-time low, and Lorne Michaels himself thinks Will Ferrell was the only thing that brought it back to life. He left it to make movies like Anchorman, Old School, Elf, and Talladega Nights. But he also co-founded Funny or Die through which he produced things like Between Two Ferns and Drunk History. His life has taught us one key lesson: stay classy, Sofa King Podcast!   Visit Our Sources: https://www.biography.com/actor/will-ferrell https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0002071/bio https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Will_Ferrell https://www.thefamouspeople.com/profiles/john-william-ferrell-3179.php https://wealthygorilla.com/will-ferrell-net-worth/ https://www.factinate.com/people/43-facts-will-ferrell/ https://www.ranker.com/list/will-ferrell-facts/coy-jandreau https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elf_(film)

Jackal Onassis Backstage Party It's been nine months since Henry's seen Casey. With Ron gone to Soup R' Crackers, Henry's in charge of the crew, and Casey's a last minute substitute. It's a backstage party for glam-Goth rocker, Jackal Onassis, who's bored with his superstar life. With Henry's okay, Jackal removes his makeup and switches places with Roman, who thinks that now he'll score with gorgeous women. Jackal's behind the bar, enjoying every ordinary moment. Ron shows up dressed like a lounge-lizard with an underage sexpot in tow. She wants Jackal's autograph; is this Roman's big chance? And how will Casey and Henry sort things out? Precious Lights Pre-School Auction Ron needs a job, so Henry obliges and puts him on the crew. It's a silent auction for an elite preschool: Annie, the woman organizing the event, needs a success in order to get a letter from the headmistress, the stiff-necked Nora, that will enable her son to go to an exclusive elementary school. As a former Groundling, she bonds with Casey. While the staff screws up (Casey keeps her phone on as she negotiates for a part, Kyle and Roman chat endlessly with each other about a sci-fi character, and Ron and Lydia pick the wrong time to punk Henry), Casey hatches a plan to get Annie to her goal; Leonard Stiltskin, an agent whose wife is auctioning lunch with Tom Hanks, is her mark. Send us your comments, questions, feedback and suggestions at CurbPostman@gmail.com Follow us on Twitter: @asinensky @achester99 @PrettyGoodCurb Give us a 5 Star Rating and Review: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/pretty-pretty-pretty-good-a-curb-your-enthusiasm-podcast/id1497313159 Give us money: https://anchor.fm/pretty-pretty-pretty-good --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/pretty-pretty-pretty-good/support

Teri Bolo joined by to discuss the lack of Groundling representation on my podcast; her first vivid memory of seeing Peter Pan on TV; going to see Pollyanna and being told she looked like Hailey Mills; her and her aunt going to Gary Austins improv class, which became The Groundlings; what it means to teach improv or to take improv classes; the rules of improv; whether characters are created or fine-tuned in improv; Laraine Newman; "Tunnelvision"; "If You Don't Stop You'll Go Blind"; The Dating Game; The Gong Show; her role in "Carrie"; being on a big time movie set; the famous shower scene; working with George Burns and John Denver in "Oh God"; being cut out of "Animal House"; going to movie locations while on vacation; Gary Austin; Del Close; improv being collaborative and not competitive; Robin Williams; Fred Willard; "The In Laws"; "Mommie Dearest"; my dad meeting Faye Dunaway and my mom meeting the bank robber from the "7-Ups"; making out with a girl for a scene i "Scarface" that you can only see her arm in; "Pee Wee's Big Adventure"; being a stand in for Julia Duffy and The Love Boat; the Newhart episode where she and Julia Duffy played twins; Bob Newhart not getting recognized at the gate; Don Rickles visits Newhart set; 24; "Little Miss Sunshine"; when to approach celebrities;

Roger Eschbacher joined me to talk about his early influences; Romper Room; Monty Python and original SNL, making videos with high school classmates including Tom Kramer; going to college to study communications; getting a job as a PA on Fridays; working with Andy Kaufman; getting a job on Not Necessarily the News; having Conan O'Brien tell him about the Groundlings; working there with Lisa Kudrow and Will Ferrell; working on a George Carlin special; Sunday Comics; Candid Camera; Cheers; Please Watch the Jon Lovitz Special; writing a story for Star Trek: The Next Generation; "Wagon's East"; writing for Aah, Real Monsters; The John Larroquette Show; Detention; Friends; Wendy's commercials; writing for Scooby Doo; Tracy Newman; wrote two books for children; writing young adult science fiction novels; reading them as a kid; the difference between hard sci-fi and soft sci-fi Amazon.com: Dragonfriend: Leonard the Great, Book One eBook : Eschbacher, Roger: Kindle Store Amazon.com: Ghost Star (Ghost Star Adventures Book 1) eBook : Eschbacher, Roger: Kindle Store Road Trip: Eschbacher, Roger: 9780803729278: Amazon.com: Books

Subscribe to The Locher Room: https://bit.ly/TheLocherRoomEmmy Award-winning actress, author and animal advocate Carolyn Hennesy joined me in The Locher Room to reminisce about her incredible career dazzling audiences with her various daytime, primetime and film roles. On television, she played the deliciously vicious “Penelope Ellis” on ABC's critically acclaimed series Revenge. She also joined the cast for the fifth season of the sleek vampires-meet-world saga, True Blood, and fast became a fan favorite as Rosalyn, the ageless vamp with a Texas twang. Prior to Revenge and True Blood, Hennesy was best known for her memorable work as “Barb” on ABC's Cougar Town and for her (twice) Emmy nominated work as “Diane Miller” on ABC's General Hospital. She has also guest starred on a long list of prime time favorites including Champions, NCIS, The Cool Kids, The Mindy Project, MOM, and Liza on Demand. Kids across America know her as the hilariously haughty Mrs. Chesterfield on Disney Channel's Jessie. On the big screen, Hennesy's credits include Click, Legally Blonde 2, Terminator 3 as well as starring in the horror film, St. Agatha (directed by SAW's Darren Bousman,) the recently released comedy Swing of Things and the soon to be released Relentless for Lifetime…but the biggest recent large screen news is her role in J.J. Abrams Star Wars: Rise of Skywalker as fighter pilot Demine Lithe. Online, she's starred in the independent series' Take it from the Top and These People, Business Doing Pleasure for TBS, Two Sentence Horror Stories for Time/Warner, and The Bay for Amazon Prime in the role of Karen Blackwell...for which she received her Emmy Award and the 2016 Indie Series Award. Most recently, she starred as Gloria in Sean Kanen's series, Studio City for which she received Emmy nominations two consecutive years. Hennesy received her training at the American Conservatory Theater in San Francisco and the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art in London. Her razor sharp comedic timing was honed as a member of The Groundling's Sunday Company and in ACME Theatre's main company. Hennesy has appeared in over a hundred stage productions worldwide, most recently and to great acclaim as Maria Callas in Terrence McNally's Master Class at the Garry Marshall Theatre for which she received the LA Stage Alliance Ovation Award for “Best Actress In A Play” for the entirety of Los Angeles, 2017-18. Among other accolades, the LA Drama Critics Circle has distinguished her with the Natalie Schafer Award and the LA Stage Alliance honored her with her first Ovation for THE FAN MAROO. For the last three years, Hennesy hosted the red carpet reception for the Daytime Emmy Awards for NATAS, FB, and nearly all social media platforms. Hennesy's creative endeavors also include a successful career as a writer; she created the wildly popular “Pandora” (Bloomsbury USA) children's book series and penned the New York Times Bestseller “The Secret Life of Damian Spinelli” (Hyperion). When not on set, Hennesy is privileged to lend her time to a number of causes but she focuses on veteran affairs and particularly animal rescue, preservation, conservation and advocacy as an ambassador for American Humane and her own Los Angeles Zoo. She hosts her advocacy podcast “Animal Magnetism” back episodes of which may be found on YouTube. On January 2nd. 2017, Hennesy crossed something off of her bucket list: she rode on a float (Lucy Pet Foundation) in the Tournament of Roses Parade. Now she simply has to go into space (difficult) and fly over Disneyland as Tinkerbell to set off the fireworks (impossible). She lives in her native Los Angeles with four dogs and one cat, rescues all, and…in what spare time is left…she flies trapeze. Seriously!Original Airdate: 8/18/2021

Josh Banday recently joined host Elias in the cave! You can see Josh as Ivan on Season 2 of 'Upload' now streaming on Amazon Prime Video. He has also appeared on The Big Bang Theory, Mom, Adam Ruins Everything, and appeared recently on the series Pam and Tommy. He got his comedy chops appearing in shows at Second City, and the Groundling's Sunday Company. You can watch this interview on YouTube https://youtu.be/WOVJS4R2Gww Have a question? Email us  themccpodcast@gmail.com Follow us on Social Media for the latest show updates  www.twitter.com/themccpodcast www.instagram.com/themccpodcast www.facebook.com/themancavechroniclespodcast www.themccpodcast.com  https://www.youtube.com/c/TheManCaveChroniclesPodcast  

Josh will be returning as a series regular in Amazon's hit show UPLOAD coming to our screens from March 11th, josh has appeared in so many great shows and we have such a great chat with this talented actor about his journey in the industry. Don't forget to check out the video interview on our YouTube channel. Keep safe and stay super!. Josh Banday is an LA actor appearing as Ivan on Amazon's Upload by Greg Daniels. He has also appeared on The Big Bang Theory, Mom, Adam Ruins Everything, and will appear on the upcoming series Pam and Tommy. He got his comedy chops appearing in shows at Second City, and the Groundling's Sunday Company. --- This episode is sponsored by · Anchor: The easiest way to make a podcast. https://anchor.fm/app

On this episode of The Bill Alexander Show, Bill talks with Tracy Newman. Newman is a founding member of the improvisational theater troupe The Groundlings (as is her sister, Laraine Newman). She was co-creator and executive producer of the sitcom According to Jim (2001–2009). She is also a singer-songwriter and lead singer of Tracy Newman and The Reinforcements.*The TV program I meant that featured Courtney Thorne-Smith was "Day by Day" not "Step by Step"*For more information on Tracy go to her website www.TracyNewman.com

On this episode of The Bill Alexander Show, Bill talks with Tracy Newman. Newman is a founding member of the improvisational theater troupe The Groundlings (as is her sister, Laraine Newman). She was co-creator and executive producer of the sitcom According to Jim (2001–2009). She is also a singer-songwriter and lead singer of Tracy Newman and The Reinforcements.*The TV program I meant that featured Courtney Thorne-Smith was "Day by Day" not "Step by Step"*For more information on Tracy go to her website www.TracyNewman.com

Teressa Strasser is once again filling in for Gina Grad on today's pod. The guys open the show talking about stripper rules, dealing with a drunk partner, and more details from Gina's wedding. Adam then goes on to discuss why Gina is a much better step-parent than what he grew up with, and he tells Teresa about the time he bought his dad a $3,000 trumpet. Later, Adam explains how he changed his schedule to watch Natalia play volleyball, and the guys take a call from Cassandra Peterson to talk about the origins of Elvira. She also talks about her time as a Groundling, going from radio to television, and ultimately becoming a sex symbol and icon. Before the break, Cassandra talks about the impact Elvis had her on, her thoughts on Phil Hartman, and being in a relationship with a woman for the last 19 years. Please support today's sponsors: CandidCo.com/ADAM enter ADAM UprisingFood.com/CAROLLA SimpliSafe.com/ADAM TRICOCatsAndDogs.com Geico.com PlutoTV

Adam welcomes comedian Rosebud Baker to the podcast, and they talk about filming her debut comedy special. They also joke about why nurses get too much appreciation, whether or not Rosebud wants kids, and the origins of her name. Later they discuss the Roast of Alec Baldwin, and Teresa reads news stories about R. Kelly, ‘hospital rage', Skittles, David Letterman, and a woman who called in two bomb threats to spend more time with her boyfriend. As the show wraps up, the gang comments on a couple more news stories about Will and Jada Pinkett Smith's relationship, and what are expected to be the most popular Halloween costumes this year. Please support today's sponsors: CandidCo.com/ADAM enter ADAM UprisingFood.com/CAROLLA SimpliSafe.com/ADAM TRICOCatsAndDogs.com Geico.com PlutoTV

Discipline, to spank or not, stopping breastfeeding, weird TikTok wormholes, how moms smell, and more.... Jen chats live with Monika Casey, actress, stand-up comedian, co-host of "Jeff Lewis Live" on Sirius XM... and self-described "C plus single mom." Subscribe to our mailing list for exclusive content, new videos, giveaways, and free nannies. (Okay, that part's a lie...): http://eepurl.com/SJxVjSUBSCRIBE on Youtube: http://goo.gl/QSV97mFollow us on Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/MomCaveTVLike us on Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/MomCaveTVPin with Us: http://www.pinterest.com/MomCaveTVInstagram: http://www.instagram.com/momcavetvTikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@momcavetvOur blog/giveaways: http://www.MomCaveTV.com----------------------------------------------------------------------------------Read the full blog with video and transcript here:https://www.momcavetv.com/monika-casey-on-momcave-live/-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------Monika Casey's Bio:Monika CaseyAs a California native, she obvi wanted to be an actress, duh! At 5 years old she landed the lead male role (with a mascara mustache) in Twas the Night Before Christmas. After Performing in several Conservatory Theatre Ensemble productions a Tamalpais High School she attended Arizona State University, where despite all the partying she somehow received her BFA in Theatre. Monika is a former Groundling, Upright Citizens Brigade, and Second City, performer. She has been doing stand-up at famous comedy clubs all over Los Angeles, The Comedy Store, Laugh Factory, and the Hollywood Improv. TV credits included Shameless, CSI, and Fantasies. Not only did she get to flash her boobs in the feature film SEX Ed with Haley Joel Osment in 2014, she also produced it. Shortly thereafter she became a mother to a baby girl and has since created momedy sketches like My Own Milk featured on YouTube. Recently Monika's projects include executive producing and starring in Miles, with Molly Shannon and Paul Reiser, and developing a series based on her life after divorce, starring Margaret Cho. She spends her mornings doubling up on espresso shots and appearing as a regular co-host on the hit radio show ‘Jeff Lewis Live' on SiriusXM radio. 

Discipline, to spank or not, stopping breastfeeding, weird TikTok wormholes, how moms smell, and more.... Jen chats live with Monika Casey, actress, stand-up comedian, co-host of "Jeff Lewis Live" on Sirius XM... and self-described "C plus single mom." Subscribe to our mailing list for exclusive content, new videos, giveaways, and free nannies. (Okay, that part's a lie...): http://eepurl.com/SJxVjSUBSCRIBE on Youtube: http://goo.gl/QSV97mFollow us on Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/MomCaveTVLike us on Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/MomCaveTVPin with Us: http://www.pinterest.com/MomCaveTVInstagram: http://www.instagram.com/momcavetvTikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@momcavetvOur blog/giveaways: http://www.MomCaveTV.com----------------------------------------------------------------------------------Read the full blog with video and transcript here:https://www.momcavetv.com/monika-casey-on-momcave-live/-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------Monika Casey's Bio:Monika CaseyAs a California native, she obvi wanted to be an actress, duh! At 5 years old she landed the lead male role (with a mascara mustache) in Twas the Night Before Christmas. After Performing in several Conservatory Theatre Ensemble productions a Tamalpais High School she attended Arizona State University, where despite all the partying she somehow received her BFA in Theatre. Monika is a former Groundling, Upright Citizens Brigade, and Second City, performer. She has been doing stand-up at famous comedy clubs all over Los Angeles, The Comedy Store, Laugh Factory, and the Hollywood Improv. TV credits included Shameless, CSI, and Fantasies. Not only did she get to flash her boobs in the feature film SEX Ed with Haley Joel Osment in 2014, she also produced it. Shortly thereafter she became a mother to a baby girl and has since created momedy sketches like My Own Milk featured on YouTube. Recently Monika's projects include executive producing and starring in Miles, with Molly Shannon and Paul Reiser, and developing a series based on her life after divorce, starring Margaret Cho. She spends her mornings doubling up on espresso shots and appearing as a regular co-host on the hit radio show ‘Jeff Lewis Live' on SiriusXM radio. 

Natasha is an American actress, singer, comedienne and writer who made her American cinematic debut in 2006 in M. Night Shyamalan's movie Lady in the Water. She is known for playing the role of Matilda on the HBO show Curb Your Enthusiasm opposing Larry David and now for playing the iconic role of Yolanda Saldivar on the Netflix show Selena: The Series . Perez's character, Yolanda Saldivar appears in limited capacity in Season 1 and now she solidifies her role as one of the main characters in Season 2. Selena: The Series chronicles the life, career and untimely murder of Tejano singer, Selena in 1995. Her success and rise to stardom was cut short at the hands of Saldivar, an RN and president of Selena's fan club. Perez realizes the delicate nature of her true life character and her intention in doing interviews is not to glamorize or glorify Saldivar. As an actress she is proud of her work and honesty in portraying this complex character and hopes that this series continues to honor and pay homage to the talented, intelligent and beautiful human being that was Selena. Perez played a villain for the first time on 2019 on the Prime released teen comedy movie Baja along Mark Margolis, Kurt Fuller and Jake Thomas. Perez has appeared in funny sketches alongside Channing Tatum and Guillermo Diaz on Jimmy Kimmel Live and as a teenager in primetime shows like The District and ER. Although comedy has been Natasha's focus in the past few years, she is also versed in Drama as an alumni of The Lee Strasberg Acting Studio in Los Angeles. Pre-covid, Perez was part of The Groundling founder's troop Dog Bread and you could also often see her performing at UCB, The Pack and Second City in Los Angeles where she is based, even sharing the stage with starts like Jason Alexander or Helen Hunt as part of the Turbine Collective. Natasha - of Italian descent - was born in Venezuela and her acting career started very early under the guidance of her family of entertainers and advertising legends, with whom she began acting, playing music, and composing. She was nine months old when she shot her first commercial. Her performance in Paloma, a musical short film produced and starred in by Steven Bauer, earned her a Best Supporting Actress award at the Washington World Music & Independent Film Festival. La Opinion referred to her as "The number one female voice in Spanish in the U.S." because Perez has been the voice of almost every advertiser one can think of. One of the stars of the PBS documentary Now en Español for her role as a lead dubbing-actress on ABC's Desperate Housewives, Lost and Grey's Anatomy for Spanish speaking audiences in the United States among many other dubbing roles in film and television. Natasha has been dubbing since she was a teenager but has done voice work since she was a toddler. Currently, her voice can be heard on shows like Nickelodeon's Hobby Kids Adventures, Bojack Horseman, Tuca and Bertie, and Casa de Papel. Perez holds a Bachelor's degree in Communications Science from Catholic University with a specialization in audiovisual studies and a minor in Performance Arts. Natasha's exposure to Los Angeles Latino audiences began when her voice awakened Angelinos as the host and producer of the second largest Pop & Rock Latino radio station in L.A. at the time: VIVA 107.1 FM. As a singer-songwriter, Natasha has placed her songs in different media from TV shows like Amazon's Sneaky Pete: and HBO's Entourage, to movies like the Argentinian film Cuestión de Principios, and the Venezuelan film La Hora Cero. She has scored plays like Damien Calderon's Huellas for the Frida Kahlo Theatre and co-created over dozens of jingles for commercials. For the past couple of years, Perez has been exploring a new sound - a mix of comedic indie, jazz- autochthonous textures and pop. She is currently working with producer Rudy La Scala to release a tribute cover track of one Selena's songs. Natasha Pérez is also a published writer. She has participated in several comedy festivals with her solo piece Summer Camp, a 10 minute musical show written and performed by her and directed by Rick Najera (CBS' Diversity) and Arianne Price (Bridemaids). The book Hembravecidas was launched in Mexico and released in Los Angeles under the title Antología Bi-Nacional (Bi-national Anthology) where she collaborated with several female identity stories. As a journalist, Natasha has written countless of articles in publications like El Metropolitano in Caracas, Hoy Newspaper and La Banda Elástica in LA.

Natasha is an American actress, singer, comedienne and writer who made her American cinematic debut in 2006 in M. Night Shyamalan's movie Lady in the Water. She is known for playing the role of Matilda on the HBO show Curb Your Enthusiasm opposing Larry David and now for playing the iconic role of Yolanda Saldivar on the Netflix show Selena: The Series . Perez's character, Yolanda Saldivar appears in limited capacity in Season 1 and now she solidifies her role as one of the main characters in Season 2. Selena: The Series chronicles the life, career and untimely murder of Tejano singer, Selena in 1995. Her success and rise to stardom was cut short at the hands of Saldivar, an RN and president of Selena's fan club. Perez realizes the delicate nature of her true life character and her intention in doing interviews is not to glamorize or glorify Saldivar. As an actress she is proud of her work and honesty in portraying this complex character and hopes that this series continues to honor and pay homage to the talented, intelligent and beautiful human being that was Selena. Perez played a villain for the first time on 2019 on the Prime released teen comedy movie Baja along Mark Margolis, Kurt Fuller and Jake Thomas. Perez has appeared in funny sketches alongside Channing Tatum and Guillermo Diaz on Jimmy Kimmel Live and as a teenager in primetime shows like The District and ER. Although comedy has been Natasha's focus in the past few years, she is also versed in Drama as an alumni of The Lee Strasberg Acting Studio in Los Angeles. Pre-covid, Perez was part of The Groundling founder's troop Dog Bread and you could also often see her performing at UCB, The Pack and Second City in Los Angeles where she is based, even sharing the stage with starts like Jason Alexander or Helen Hunt as part of the Turbine Collective. Natasha - of Italian descent - was born in Venezuela and her acting career started very early under the guidance of her family of entertainers and advertising legends, with whom she began acting, playing music, and composing. She was nine months old when she shot her first commercial. Her performance in Paloma, a musical short film produced and starred in by Steven Bauer, earned her a Best Supporting Actress award at the Washington World Music & Independent Film Festival. La Opinion referred to her as "The number one female voice in Spanish in the U.S." because Perez has been the voice of almost every advertiser one can think of. One of the stars of the PBS documentary Now en Español for her role as a lead dubbing-actress on ABC's Desperate Housewives, Lost and Grey's Anatomy for Spanish speaking audiences in the United States among many other dubbing roles in film and television. Natasha has been dubbing since she was a teenager but has done voice work since she was a toddler. Currently, her voice can be heard on shows like Nickelodeon's Hobby Kids Adventures, Bojack Horseman, Tuca and Bertie, and Casa de Papel. Perez holds a Bachelor's degree in Communications Science from Catholic University with a specialization in audiovisual studies and a minor in Performance Arts. Natasha's exposure to Los Angeles Latino audiences began when her voice awakened Angelinos as the host and producer of the second largest Pop & Rock Latino radio station in L.A. at the time: VIVA 107.1 FM. As a singer-songwriter, Natasha has placed her songs in different media from TV shows like Amazon's Sneaky Pete: and HBO's Entourage, to movies like the Argentinian film Cuestión de Principios, and the Venezuelan film La Hora Cero. She has scored plays like Damien Calderon's Huellas for the Frida Kahlo Theatre and co-created over dozens of jingles for commercials. For the past couple of years, Perez has been exploring a new sound - a mix of comedic indie, jazz- autochthonous textures and pop. She is currently working with producer Rudy La Scala to release a tribute cover track of one Selena's songs. Natasha Pérez is also a published writer. She has participated in several comedy festivals with her solo piece Summer Camp, a 10 minute musical show written and performed by her and directed by Rick Najera (CBS' Diversity) and Arianne Price (Bridemaids). The book Hembravecidas was launched in Mexico and released in Los Angeles under the title Antología Bi-Nacional (Bi-national Anthology) where she collaborated with several female identity stories. As a journalist, Natasha has written countless of articles in publications like El Metropolitano in Caracas, Hoy Newspaper and La Banda Elástica in LA.

       On Episode 58, Pete is thrilled to speak with friend, former colleague, and comedy writer and actor with The Groundlings, Michael Aspinwall. Mike and Pete talk about Mike's formative years involving comedy, his inspirations, his days with The Groundlings, what he looks for in good comedy writing, his incredible run on WWE as Dr. Shelby, and some of his own writing and writing process.             Michael Aspinwall was inspired to move to Los Angeles and become an actor after a very successful performance in a Paris Gibson Middle School play entitled Tied to the Tracks in his home town of Great Falls, Montana.  Many of his mom's friends said he was good, and Michael took them seriously.  He went on to high school where he really fell in love with theatre, which further solidified his desire to act, direct, and write professionally, while simultaneously solidifying his social position in the caste system that is high school.  Michael attended UCLA's School of Theatre, Film, and Television, and while there, he studied performance primarily, in John Hall's Musical Theatre Workshop.  He appeared in John's productions of Andrew Lippa's The Wild Party and West Side Story (not by Andrew Lippa).  He was the 2004 recipient of the Carol Burnett Award for Outstanding Male Performer.  In 2005, Michael earned his Master's degree from UCLA's TFT under the guidance of Dr. Pat Harter.  He created a program that paralleled the California Arts Bridge program, using theatre and art to help younger students access the core curricula.  After college, Michael began his career as an actor by waiting tables at the Bubba Gump Shrimp Company, where he performed Forrest Gump themed trivia nightly, and acted as though he cared about whether the temperature of the guests' fare was to their liking.  He worked a slew of odd jobs, became a certified yoga teacher and a credentialed high school English teacher, and eventually found his home as an actor at The Groundlings' Theater in Hollywood.   Michael found The Groundlings at a moment when the LA audition process was taking its toll.  That place and the people in it breathed life back into a ten-year-old kid who used to stay up to watch SNL, then perform Mike Myers's bits in front of his fourth grade class.  At The Groundlings, Michael met his sketch group, Big Boss Comedy, and a slew of other mind-blowingly talented people he gets to call his friends.  Since his turn in the Groundling's Sunday Company, Michael continues to write and produce original work with his writing partner and fellow Sunday Company Alum, Patric Cagle.   He has toured Southern California with Kevin Broberg's Quote/Unquote show, was a featured performer at Chicago Sketch Fest 2014 with Big Boss Comedy, and he appeared on television as WWE's anger management specialist, Dr. Shelby.    Allusions and References from Episode 58   Mike Aspinwall's IMDB Page   Dr. Shelby's Wiki   Dr. Shelby talks about Kane & Daniel Bryan's progress getting over their anger issues during the commercial break of Raw (Video)   Dr. Shelby “Enough” Meme At about 3:20, Mike talks his early influences, including his hilarious father and his lifelong love for Saturday Night Live   At about 6:45, Mike talks about his early forays into writing comedy sketches   At about 8:00, Mike talks about his early innocent humor and how he realized the pull of dark comedy, too   At about 9:20, Mike talks about early comedy influences   At about 10:15, Mike talks about observational humor and its draw   At about 11:50, Mike talks about gratuitous humor, lowbrow humor, and different kinds of comedy   At about 13:30, Mike discusses crafting a joke without making people think about it too much, thereby lessening the humor   At about 14:45, Mike recounts the story of a “eureka” moment when he felt much more confident that he could do comedy work-the “oasis” that was The Groundlings-with a story involving the great Mikey Day   At about 18:45, Mike talks about his comedy training at The Groundlings   At about 20:00, Mike uses the example of an everyday observation through a Trader Joe's trip as an an illustration of comic voice and tone   At about 24:45, Mike talks about taking reactions to autobiographical comedy “personally,” and the gift of “sitting in silence,” and being resolute in one's comedy, as seen with friends and colleagues Allison Dunbar and Stephanie Allynne    At about 28:20, Mike shouts out some of his favorite comedy writers, like Tina Fey and Jordan Peele, Danny McBride   At about 30:35, Mike and Pete discuss the comedy ethic of “punching up, not down”   At about 33:00, Mike helps out Pete, who has always wondered what exactly it means that “the writing is so good” in a tv show, etc.   At about 36:00, Mike talks about his thrilling run as Dr. Shelby on WWE   At about 40:45, Mike talks about the incredible adrenaline rush involved in taking part in WWE   At about 43:20, Mike talks about the later iteration of Dr. Shelby, including his being immortalized as a meme   At about 46:00, Mike talks about the video for Funny or Die that he performed in and wrote-“Baby, It's Cold Outside”   At about 49:30, Mike talks about the sketch that he wrote that plays off the questionable lyrics of “Alone,” covered by multiple artists   At about 54:50, Mike talks about whether or not some laughs are undesirable and problematic, and how he likes “losing people at the turn” in the sketches he writes   At about 57:50, Mike reads from his storytelling piece, “Surprises are Foolish Things,” and he also discusses some of the background of the piece   At about 1:09:15, Mike discusses upcoming creative projects   You can now subscribe to the podcast on Apple Podcasts, and leave me a five-star review. You can also ask for the podcast by name using Alexa, and find the pod on Stitcher, Spotify, and on Amazon Music. Follow me on IG, where I'm @chillsatwillpodcast, or on Twitter, where I'm @chillsatwillpo1. This is a passion project of mine, a DIY operation, and I'd love for your help in promoting what I'm convinced is a unique and spirited look at an often-ignored art form. The intro song for The Chills at Will Podcast is “Wind Down” (Instrumental Version), and the other song played on this episode was “Hoops” (Instrumental)” by Matt Weidauer, and both songs are used through ArchesAudio.com.

ABOUT NATASHA PEREZNatasha is an American actress, singer, comedienne and writer who made her American cinematic debut in 2006 in M. Night Shyamalan's movie Lady in the Water. She is known for playing the role of Matilda on the HBO show Curb Your Enthusiasm opposing Larry David and now for playing the iconic role of Yolanda Saldivar on the Netflix show Selena: The Series. Perez's character, Yolanda Saldivar appears in limited capacity in Season 1 and now she solidifies her role as one of the main characters in Season 2. Selena: The Series chronicles the life, career and untimely murder of Tejano singer, Selena in 1995. Her success and rise to stardom was cut short at the hands of Saldivar, an RN and president of Selena's fan club.Perez realizes the delicate nature of her true life character and her intention in doing interviews is not to glamorize or glorify Saldivar. As an actress she is proud of her work and honesty in portraying this complex character and hopes that this series continues to honor and pay homage to the talented, intelligent and beautiful human being that was Selena.Perez played a villain for the first time on 2019 on the Prime released teen comedy movie Baja along Mark Margolis, Kurt Fuller and Jake Thomas. Perez has appeared in funny sketches alongside Channing Tatum and Guillermo Diaz on Jimmy Kimmel Live and as a teenager in primetime shows like The District and ER. Although comedy has been Natasha's focus in the past few years, she is also versed in Drama as an alumni of The Lee Strasberg Acting Studio in Los Angeles. Pre-covid, Perez was part of The Groundling founder's troop Dog Bread and you could also often see her performing at UCB, The Pack and Second City in Los Angeles where she is based, even sharing the stage with starts like Jason Alexander or Helen Hunt as part of the Turbine Collective.Natasha - of Italian descent - was born in Venezuela and her acting career started very early under the guidance of her family of entertainers and advertising legends, with whom she began acting, playing music, and composing. She was nine months old when she shot her first commercial. Her performance in Paloma, a musical short film produced and starred in by Steven Bauer, earned her a Best Supporting Actress award at the Washington World Music & Independent Film Festival.La Opinion referred to her as "The number one female voice in Spanish in the U.S." because Perez has been the voice of almost every advertiser one can think of. One of the stars of the PBS documentary Now en Español for her role as a lead dubbing-actress on ABC's Desperate Housewives, Lost and Grey's Anatomy for Spanish speaking audiences in the United States among many other dubbing roles in film and television. Natasha has been dubbing since she was a teenager but has done voice work since she was a toddler.Currently, her voice can be heard on shows like Nickelodeon's Hobby Kids Adventures, Bojack Horseman, Tuca and Bertie, and Casa de Papel.Perez holds a Bachelor's degree in Communications Science from Catholic University with a specialization in audiovisual studies and a minor in Performance Arts. Natasha's exposure to Los Angeles Latino audiences began when her voice awakened Angelinos as the host and producer of the second largest Pop & Rock Latino radio station in L.A. at the time: VIVA 107.1 FM.As a singer-songwriter, Natasha has placed her songs in different media from TV shows like Amazon's Sneaky Pete: and HBO's Entourage, to movies like the Argentinian film Cuestión de Principios, and the Venezuelan film La Hora Cero. She has scored plays like Damien Calderon's Huellas for the Frida Kahlo Theatre and co-created over dozens of jingles for commercials. For the past couple of years, Perez has been exploring a new sound - a mix of comedic indie, jazz- autochthonous textures and pop. She is currently working with producer Rudy La Scala to release a tribute cover track of one Selena's songs. Natasha Pérez is also a published writer. She has participated in several comedy festivals with her solo piece Summer Camp, a 10 minute musical show written and performed by her and directed by Rick Najera (CBS'Diversity) and Arianne Price (Bridemaids).The book Hembravecidas was launched in Mexico and released in Los Angeles under the title Antología Bi-Nacional (Bi-national Anthology) where she collaborated with several female identity stories. As a journalist, Natasha has written countless of articles in publications like El Metropolitano in Caracas, Hoy Newspaper and La Banda Elástica in LA.ABOUT SELINA: THE SERIES, SEASON 2 (FROM SCREENRANT.COMThe trailer for part two of Netflix's Selena: The Seriesforeshadows Selena's (Christian Serratos) tragic murder. Part one of the Netflix series loosely told the real-life story of the first twenty years of Selena Quintanilla's life, highlighting her rise to fame as a bonafide singing sensation. The part one finale concluded in the year 1990, with an introduction of the evil Yolanda Saldivar (Natasha Perez). Part one stopped short of when Selena truly found her voice, before it was tragically silenced in 1995.The part two trailer poses the question to Selena: "When you're gone, how do you want to be remembered?" It's a sad question in hindsight, but the trailer also highlights some of Selena's career triumphs, like her iconic "Bidi Bidi Bom Bom" performance. Check out the full Netflix trailer below:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jMhS0UfY_o4The trailer looks exciting and highlights some of the struggles Selena had to go through in her personal life and career as a recording artist. Part one of Selena: The Series was criticized for not focusing on Selena herself enough. Hopefully part two will remedy that by keeping the spotlight on the star herself. That way fans old and new can appreciate and respect the legacy that the legendary Queen of Tejano Music left behind after her tragic murder at the age of 23 at the hands of her former fan club president, Yolanda Saldivar.Selena Quintanilla's life was cut short way too soon, but the legacy she left behind continues to remain strong to this day. Hopefully part two of Selena: The Series will pay proper tribute to the woman who blazed a powerful light during her life. As Selena says in the trailer, "I just want to be remembered as someone who gave it her all." Part two premieres on Netflix on May 4th.

K & E share thanksgiving memories, the marriage of Charles and Diana is unpacked, and we learn the definition of a Groundling.

In Ep108 we sit down with good friend and actor Becky Jo Harris! We talk about acting, auditioning, Groundling classes, favorite actors, recent projects like her VO work on a new video game, plus much more!  For a free sticker, email us at: thebogcastwithkeithandbryan@gmail.com Subscribe to Becky Jo Harris' Youtube channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCydzmdbPOwy7IrKyQsiy7ig Find Becky Jo Harris: IG: https://www.instagram.com/itsbeckyjoharris/ Becky Jo's VO work on "Sweet Sins Superstars": https://apps.apple.com/us/app/sweet-sins-superstars/id1495958515 Find us on Social Media: IG: https://www.instagram.com/obitwan66/ https://www.instagram.com/bryanmcclay/ For Exclusive Clips from this Episode plus much more, Support us on Patreon at: https://www.patreon.com/thebogcast Get some Bogcast Merch: https://teespring.com/stores/the-bogcast Checkout The Bogcast CBD Store for All Natural CBD from Mellow By Design https://bogcastcbd.com/ #thebogcast #beckyjoharris #phoenixpodcast #podcast #arizonapodcast #thebogcastwithkeithandbryan #phoenix #bogcast #actor #acting #sweetsinssuperstars #wherethefuckismcclay    

Nikki Bon is a delight.  Very funny stand up, improvisor and one of my favorite IG's to follow.  You'll love her too and you should follow her on IG before even listening to this episode.   This episode is brought to you by The Four Seasons Total Landscaping.

After dark paranormal hosts Jordan & Vicky dive into the rich history of the Groundling theatre and all things paranormal! We will also be covering our covid-19 policy and event details!

Sam De Surra from legendary improv group The Groundlings drops by the studio to talk about Brave Little Toaster, a film that is either an optimistic movie about determination or a treatise on mortality and servitude. Or maybe it's just Toy Story? Either way, there are a lot of Groundlings in it. Watch the brave little toaster at https://archive.org/details/thebravelittletoaster1987720pupscale (the sequels are on Disney+). You can take Groundling classes, even in a pandemic! You just have to do them online, www.groundlings.com/school/onlineclasses Do you have feedback or an idea for an episode? DM us at @stillgoodpod, check out our old episodes at stillgoodpod.com, and stay tuned after the credits to see if anyone makes any new theme songs.

Welcome Back? To an episode of the modern moron!  It feels strange to say that after saying it once a week for about a year and a half.  I stopped doing this podcast in March and, I can’t remember why… did something happen around March that I’m missing?  Actually I did have a reason to stop doing this program and I will get into that another time.  Because my guest on this episode is an old and very dear friend from, you guessed it, my days in Los Angeles chasing the elusive career in the entertainment business. The friend I speak of is Mike Schwartz.  Mike was a senior classman at the the Groundling’s Theater school and it’s Sunday company when I came in as a freshman.  Mike went on to become a writer and producer for the very successful show Scrubs and for those of you who are big fans of Scrubs, Mike also played the character Lloyd.  Lloyd, if you remember was a recurring character who was an EMT, a delivery guy, and also a patient at the hospital.  There’s even a wiki page for Lloyd and I will put the link to that at the bottom of the description. But a big break for Mike came long before that and I got to be around him when it happened. I ask Mike about Billy Crystal.  Mike had the good fortune to be the writer’s assistant for Billy Crystal’s staff during some of the years he hosted the Academy Awards - specifically ‘97 and ‘98 when the best picture films were The English Patient and Titanic. Now if you’re nestled right into our demographic you remember what a great job Crystal did as he’s hosted the Oscars 9 times, second only to Bob Hope who hosted for a total of 19 Academy Award programs.  Billy won 2 Primetime Emmy awards.  If you’ll remember, Billy was known for opening the show with a montage of scenes from nominated films that were put together where he would show up in each scene and then he did a musical number mentioning all of the nominees as well.   Mike was the writer’s assistant for those broadcasts and he tells a great story or two about being backstage at the Oscars, because they would write jokes on the fly as events happened during the telecast.  He has a particular memory he shares for I believe the 1998 Academy Awards which was it’s 70th Anniversary.   Side note, one of Mike’s comedy idols was and is Albert Brooks who has done so many great films you know him from... like Broadcast News, Modern Romance and Lost in America both of which he wrote, and of course the voice of Marlin in Finding Nemo… SO, Mike does a great Albert Brooks impression and Billy Crystal knows and loves Albert as well, so that was sort of the gateway of establishing a special place in Billy Crystal’s heart.   Mike also tells a story about comedian Richard Lewis who was speaking at a reception following a funeral for a mutual acquaintance that involves Billy Crystal as well. There, is that enough context for you?  Now it’s like you and Mike are good friends with an unspoken bond.  Good.  Now I’m stealing Mike’s Albert Brooks impersonation. We begin the call with Mike revealing to me that he just finished a therapy session and I immediately try to delve into his therapy with complete abandon and intrusiveness.  Not a very polite thing for a host to do, but we’ll see what happens.  It’s my friend Mike Schwartz on the Modern Moron and as always, thank you for listening… Scrubs Fan Page - Lloyd Slawski   Billy Crystal 70th Annual Academy Awards - YouTube  Olivia de Havilland presenting the 75th Past Oscar Winner Reunion - YouTube

Jason chats with Cassandra Peterson, the actress and branding expert behind the unforgettable Mistress of the Dark, Elvira. As she puts the final touches on her upcoming autobiography, Cassandra talks about the creation of the character, the headaches of writing a movie commentary show, and reminisces about Vincent Price and fellow Groundling comedian Phil Hartman.

Jason chats with Cassandra Peterson, the actress and branding expert behind the unforgettable Mistress of the Dark, Elvira. As she puts the final touches on her upcoming autobiography, Cassandra talks about the creation of the character, the headaches of writing a movie commentary show, and reminisces about Vincent Price and fellow Groundling comedian Phil Hartman.

In this episode, we discuss the Groundling Theatre Company's current production of Julius Caesar; the genius of Moya O'Connell, André Sills, and Michelle Giroux; and the influence of Nicholas Hytner. This production is heavily inspired by Nicholas Hytner’s 2018 production (which we discussed here) of the play, featuring similar approaches to gender-swapping characters, as well as much of the same blocking and sets. Directed by Chris Abraham, the Groundling production is in the round in a large space with high ceilings, often with the effect of it feeling like an intimate arena. Unlike Hytner’s production, this is very much Cassius’s show, and Moya O’Connell regularly steals every scene she’s in right out from under Johnstone’s Brutus. André Sills, as Casca, also shines, having been given short shrift as Coriolanus in Stratford’s Coriolanus. And Michelle Giroux, who previously played Marc Antony at Stratford in 2018, shines in a series of smaller parts, including as Brutus’s wife. Groundling is an independent off-shoot of Ontario’s Stratford Festival, featuring many of the same actors and directors that appear at Stratford; their productions are mounted during Stratford’s off-season. Last year, Groundling produced a revelatory production of Lear starring Seana McKenna. For a history of past productions, visit their website here. For detailed show notes, visit: https://21stfolio.com/2020/01/27/ep-28-groundling-theatre-julius-caesar/‎ Host: Alex Heeney (@bwestcineaste) Guests: Mary Angela Rowe (@lapsedvictorian) Editor: Edward von Aderkas Follow the 21st Folio on Twitter @21stFolio, or visit our website at 21stfolio.com Find out more about Seventh Row at seventh-row.com

Dan and Kevin return with our new favorite recurring Wildcard episode where we go into the field and ask civilians a series of increasingly difficult Shakespeare trivia questions.  www.noholdsbard.com noholdsbardpodcast@gmail.com patreon.com/NoHoldsBard @NoHoldsBardCast facebook.com/NoHoldsBardCast   Kevin Condardo c/o No Holds Bard P.O. Box 170004 Brooklyn, NY 11217

Who is Jeff Michalski: JEFF MICHALSKI Improv practitioner, teacher, and actor, he is featured in over thirty films, most recently The Laundromat playing opposite Meryl Streep. He has taught all forms of improvisation for over twenty years, as well as developed his own long-form techniques. He has performed across the United States, Canada, and Ireland in theatres and nightclubs and has directed Second City companies in Chicago, Los Angeles, Kilkenny, and Toronto. Founder of the Second City ETC, he also helped create the Second City Training Program in Chicago and Los Angeles. As a producer, director and performer, he has worked with Dan Castellaneta, Chris Farley, Amy Sedaris, Mike Meyer, Steven Colbert, Ryan Stiles, and many more. Jeff worked in comedy clubs across the country with the Original Comedy Rangers and was a member of the Groundling in Los Angeles before settling with the Chicago Second City in 1980. During his years with the Second City, Mr. Michalski studied with Paul Sills and his historic Story Theatre. While traveling the country with Second City's National Touring Company he continued training with Second City founder Paul Sills, and artistic directors Del Close, Fred Kaz and Bernie Sahlins. Jeff has also written for comedians and television shows including Emo Phillips and "Exit 57". He has also been a director of the Cats’ Laugh International Comedy Festival in Kilkenny, Ireland. Who is The Real Deal: The Real Deal is a spiritual teacher to the Hollywood elite who believes we are all holograms, His influences by Marshal McCluhan, Joyce and Chompsky although he is completely original. 

Halloween Horror Nights at Universal Studios Hollywood is Piper’s favorite event of the year, but this time was ToTaLLy over the top because we have an interview with DAN AKYROYD! We asked about working on #Ghostbusters2020 and The Second City vs. Groundling and bridging comedy and fright! (Watch for the The Second City vs. Groundlings question. The sincerity and admiration Mr. Akyroyd has in his response so heartfelt.) We’ve even got a question about Christmas with the Kranks thrown in!  Following the interview, we’ve got a walkthrough of the Ghostbusters Maze at Universal Studios Hollywood! That may have been our favorite one this year! Slimer was all over the place. It’s incredible to see how much detail goes into the mazes! We’d love to do a behind-the-scenes on how the mazes are planned and constructed, but that just might take away from the paranormal magic at the event! #HalloweenHorrorNights is definitely a must-see event where you get to walk the backlots where endless classic movies (and monster movies) were filmed! There’s lots more to come from this event, so stay tuuuuuuned! *****MAJOR ANNOUNCEMENT***** Hot Topic is now carrying Piper’s Picks T-SHIRTS!!!! https://www.hottopic.com/creators/piper-picks-tv/  We’ll be picking pics from you guys wearing them to share on social media and on video! Watch for more info in the video! Thank you so much for watching, guyz!

Jeff Michalski is an actor, director, improvisor, teacher, mentor and so much more. He worked in comedy clubs across the country with the Original Comedy Ranger and was a member of the Groundling in Los Angeles before settling with the Chicago Second City in 1980. During his years with the Second City, Jeff studied with Paul Sills and his historic Story Theatre. While traveling the country with Second City’s National Touring Company he continued training with Second City founder Paul Sills, and artistic directors Del Close, Fred Kaz and Bernie Sahlins. In 1984 Michalski and his wife, Jane Morris, founded theSecond City ETC. His directorial debut , “Cows on Ice” made the ETC an instant hit and was followed by the even larger success of “Mirrors at the Border”. His achievements brought him to the Second City Toronto where he was nominated for a Dora Award for his direction of “Who’s Tory Now?” Michalski continued as director and Artistic Director of the ETC until 1988 when his success in Chicago led him to be chosen as director of the premiere production of the Second City in Santa Monica, also a critical success. While still in Chicago with the ETC, Michalski also helped found the Second City Training Center, a comprehensive training program from which the next generation of Second City players are chosen. He also founded the Second City Training Program in Santa Monica. Mr. Michalski and Ms. Morris founded the Upfront Comedy Showcase in 1990, and The Comedy Underground in Santa Monica in 1998. He is currently teaching people from all walks of life to improvise at the fanaticSalon in Culver City. As a producer, director and performer, he has worked with Dan Castellaneta, Chris Farley, Amy Sedaris, Mike Meyer, Steven Colbert, Ryan Stiles, and many more. Jeff can be seen in the upcoming film The Laundromat with Meryl Streep.

Dan and Kevin debut what will hopefully be a recurring Wildcard episode where we go into the field and ask civilians a series of increasingly difficult Shakespeare questions.  www.noholdsbard.com noholdsbardpodcast@gmail.com patreon.com/NoHoldsBard @NoHoldsBardCast facebook.com/NoHoldsBardCast   Kevin Condardo c/o No Holds Bard P.O. Box 170004 Brooklyn, NY 11217

Sandy Helberg, an original Groundling, sure's got the gift of the gab. From his early days coming over from Germany, there's his dad, who survived the camps and took over Toledo Ohio, boasting about his son, Spielberg's partner, not, Gopher on Love Boat, sorta; a great story teller, no doubt. Sandy sure is. The whole family's doing it... like his brother, the doctor. Not. But practicing. You can't make this shit up. Well, you could, but it wouldn't be as funny. Stories about Mel Brooks, Rick Maranis, Jeff Goldblum, Laraine Newman, Lorne Michaels, Lily Tomlin, Freddy Mercury and Queen, Mick Jagger, Ringo Starr... being the dad of the Big Bang's Simon Helberg, his casting director wife, Harriet, and their granddaughter, Lily, who they adopted and are raising as their daughter. There's booze, drugs, lies, neglect, great love, and the funny, always the funny. Sandy Helberg Live on Game Changers With Vicki Abelson, Wed, 7/24/19, 7 pm PT/ 10 pm ET With Michael Kohl Live on The Facebook Full show replay http://bit.ly/2GpqOWj All BROADcasts, as podcasts, also available on iTunes apple.co/2dj8ld3 Soundcloud http://bit.ly/2hktWoS Stitcher bit.ly/2h3R1fl tunein bit.ly/2gGeItj This week's BROADcast is brought to you by Rick Smolkeke of Quik Impressions, the best printers, printing, the best people people-ing. quikimpressions.com And, Nicole Venables of Ruby Begonia Hair Studio Beauty and Products for tresses like the stars she coifs, and regular peoples, like me. I love my hair, and I loves Nicole. http://www.rubybegoniahairstudio.com/

Long-time Groundling, Cathy Shambley Baer, has built an impressive resume in the world of comedy and of entertainment as a whole. To say that she's got a few stories to tell would be the understatement of the century. For my first hour-long interview on the show, Cathy and I sat down at her home to discuss her over-thirty year history with the Groundlings theater in Los Angeles, as well as her work writing and acting on several hit TV shows. We also talk about her time leading character and improv workshops with the Mira Costa High School Drama Department in Manhattan Beach, CA. Lots to unpack here, folks so give it a listen!

Jay Sukow and Landon Kirksey are joined by Brian Palermo, seasoned Groundling and teacher, to talk about failure, writing sketch, and what happens in that brainspace of yours when we're improvising. 

Alexei's joined by Groundling alum Patrick Bristow who not only appears as Bolton, the Virtucon Tour Guide in Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery AND as the Beat Poet in So I Married An Axe Murderer, he's also starred in many many many more of your favourite comedy things ever (Seinfeld, Mad About You, Ellen, Friends, Whose Line Is It Anyway?, The Drew Carey Show, Curb Your Enthusiasm, Malcolm in the Middle... even more). Patrick's a really fascinating guy with a great insight into the comedy we love so this is a real special episode for us.    Join the Patreon for our podcasts to get some bonus pods HERE Check out our new pod TOTAL REBOOT where Cam & Lex talk about reboots, remakes and rip-offs in cinema HERE Facebook Twitter See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Annie Sertich talks to Robby and Will about her unique start on skid row to her upcoming one woman show! Annie tells stories of her time on The Office, Silicon Valley, and encounters with Larry David and Harold Ramis. Let’s not forget her long running comedy career and one on one scene with Denzel Washington - and you will never guess who she calls a piece of S#!t...

On the Air— Gary’s unique style easily allows him to navigate through Politics, Sports, Entertainment, and today’s Social Issues with wit and a sense of humor. Gary’s interview abilities shine on “The Express,” his weekly podcast where he keeps his skills honed interviewing newsmakers from all walks of life. Short Notice? Not a problem! Gary utilizes modern technologies to broadcast on iPDTL.com, the new ISDN. Gary is a seasoned broadcaster with a history that spans over 30 years...A native of South Florida, Gary has worked at great stations like the legendary WAXY. In addition to his Radio work on various South Florida stations, Gary carries and impressive list of credentials. Gary was a side line reporter for the Orlando Predators of the Area Football League, hosted the pre and post game shows as well as play-by-play. Gary has done it all! On The Stage— In addition to his substantial broadcast background, Gary is a trained improvisational talent, and a former member of the LA’s famous Groundling improv troupe. He is an Accomplished impersonator, sought after nationwide for his Jay Leno impressions. Gary has also done stand up comedy, performing regularly throughout Las Vegas and quickly became a local favorite!

Sean Hogan, actor, writer, Groundling, Improv and Comedy Sketch writing teacher and my man, joins me for a long conversation. We're keeping it really, real; talking about everything from how Sean overcame painful shyness and a childhood trauma to become a Comedian, why mistakes are meant to happen, how to survive the devastating feeling of failure and why it might be good for you? to defining your {not someone else's} version of success, oh and you know, we touch upon that little topic of the afterlife.  seanhoganwriter.com

Actor, Writer, Jordan Black talks about moving to LA at the age of 17 and not getting murdered, only to play a murdered guy on his first SAG Acting job.  We discuss his experience as a Groundling and his work as a writer for SNL. Funny Real Conversation Enjoy!

Patrick Bristow has remained one the top character actors since the 90s (Ellen, Curb Your Enthusiasm, Seinfeld, Austin Powers, Showgirls, Transformers) the former Groundling now has his own school The Improvatorium and tours with the adults only muppet show, Puppet Up. Patrick and Kelly discuss improv doctrine as a way of life and his, Patrick's philosophy of 'letting the mystery be', and their mutual experience of loving someone who struggles with addiction.

Alex Ryser has done acting, Groundling, YouTube and now this podcast.

This week, Tim and Greg speak with Sandi McCree, celebrated actress, comedian and sexual icon. Ms. McCree talks about Baltimore, how she got on the unquestionably greatest television show of all time (HBO's The Wire) and her journey to becoming a Groundling. Find us on Twitter and Instagram @moronpodcast. Email us at moronthatlater@gmail.com. Rate. Review. Subscribe. Share. Sponsor.

The first course exhibits all of the ingredients necessary for a truly bland evening: a series of guest cancellations; half-baked Groundling auditions; bodily shame euphemisms; and a series of rants against 7x7 magazine. (Which - now that we're in the future - will be consummately repealed in a forthcoming episode) Next comes the crudities. We wander around the topic of Burning Man and Fly Ranch while Babette regales all with a short story about hot sauce as a self defense. Pete confesses to a transgression from his younger days. And Lizzie comes to the defense of paganism. After an amuse-bouche of Bridal Fitness Coach and Mike's Surf School we arrive at the main course: ASK BABETTE. We start with a simple question (What would Babette change about SK?) It starts with talk about excess hair (Head and nose), mouse infestations, punctuality, OCD, and ends with - as is often our want - potty talk. The podcast was rare this week in that it was no where near well done.

Legendary actor, improvisor, Groundling, director and teacher Patrick Bristow (Showgirls, Ellen, Transformers, Family Guy) sits down with Kiff and shares his views on improvisation, chasing "the moment", how to get out of your head, and a bunch of other amazing things that you should really just listen to rather than read in a hastily written summary. Check out all things Patrick at www.patrickbristow.com and see Patrick LIVE with "Puppet Up" 

Legendary actor, improvisor, Groundling, director and teacher Patrick Bristow (Showgirls, Ellen, Transformers, Family Guy) sits down with Kiff and shares his views on improvisation, chasing "the moment", how to get out of your head, and a bunch of other amazing things that you should really just listen to rather than read in a hastily written summary. Check out all things Patrick at www.patrickbristow.com and see Patrick LIVE with "Puppet Up"

Carrie Aizley is our guest today on ADD Comedy. I love this person! Carrie is a former Groundling, and was one of the creators of “Campus Ladies” on the Oxygen Network. She’s been in TWO Christopher Guest films, not to mention a bunch of commercials directed by Mr. Guest. We chatted about working with her “comedy camp friends,” naming babies, the challenges of auditioning, and the joy of filming commercials. It CAN be joyous. Oh, and there’s a great story at the very end of our chat. Stay tuned for that. Meantime…enjoy.

I took Kae to the airport and said fair well for now! Went surfing in Malibu and shot straight back for my final class! I did not pass! (more to come on this later... after a think.) After finding out our results, we went to the pub for a bevy and I pressed play on me recording thingy. ENJOY!

Tracy Newman started playing guitar at 14 with dreams of becoming a folk singer.  In the early 70s, she joined an improvisation class taught by Gary Austin, which became The Groundlings.   Tracy is a founding member, and besides being in the show, she began teaching and directing there. Her sister, Laraine Newman was the first Groundling to be discovered there by Lorne Michaels for Saturday Night Live. It was at the Groundlings that Tracy met her future TV writing partner, Jonathan Stark. They started on Cheers, and worked on many shows, including Bob (Bob Newhart), The Nanny, Ellen, The Drew Carey Show and Hiller and Diller (Richard Lewis and Kevin Nealon.) In 1997, they won the Emmy and the prestigious Peabody Award for writing the ground-breaking -coming out- episode of Ellen. In 2001, they created the ABC comedy, According to Jim, which recently completed it’s eighth and final season of production. Tracy has been writing songs all along and is once again performing full-time. She has three CDs:  “A Place in the Sun,” “I Just See You” and “I Can Swing Forever,” (which is for children). www.TracyNewman.com

The Barbican Production of Hamlet is here! On August 5th, Benedict Cumberbatch is stepping onto the stage for what is sure to be an amazing production of Shakespeare’s Hamlet, under the direction of Lyndsey Turner. Listen to the extended cut of the conversation between consulting fan fffinnagain and Hilary Justice, professor of English and author of The Groundling's Guide to Shakespeare's Hamlet.

Dean is the first to admit that he is a stand up comedian and even a comedic actor, but appreciates all forms of comedy. Today, he sits down with a brilliant Improv actor,Groundling and Second City alum, Cody Dove

Drew Droege, or as you may know him, the Internet's Chloe Sevigny.  Seriously, Google it.  He's a Groundling, has been on Hot in Cleveland and Chelsea Lately. He joined us last year to tell us about his encounter with the erotic world of horror.   Get ready for our next live show, coming to Los Angeles April 11. Visit Donttellmymother.com for tickets and upcoming shows. Our theme song was written and performed by Steve O'Reilly with lead vocals by Karen Rockower Glass.