Latest / I Do, Part 2 / Surviving LA in the 90s, “Bill and Ted” Star Opens up about Making It in Hollywood

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Surviving LA in the 90s, “Bill and Ted” Star Opens up about Making It in Hollywood · I Do, Part 2

0:02
Speaker 1: Welcome everyone to this episode of Amy and TJ. I'm
0:06
Speaker 1: doing this one solo, but man, am I not unknown.
0:10
Speaker 1: I am joined by someone who all of you have
0:14
Speaker 1: to know very well at this point. He started out
0:17
Speaker 1: on Broadway as a child actor. He has been in
0:20
Speaker 1: some of the biggest movies that are probably the background
0:23
Speaker 1: to your growing up if you know Bill and Ted's, Yeah,
0:28
Speaker 1: that movie right there, one of the stars alongside of
0:31
Speaker 1: Keanu Reeves, his buddy. Well, they're back at it again.
0:36
Speaker 1: We're talking about Alex Winter, who is now back on stage,
0:42
Speaker 1: this time with Keanu Reeves, and they have just this
0:46
Speaker 1: week opened with Waiting for Goodough and I'm told it's
0:50
Speaker 1: a Broadway play about nothing, but you know what, Seinfeld
0:54
Speaker 1: made a heck of a career out of a show
0:56
Speaker 1: about nothing, and so why not a Broadway show with
1:00
Speaker 1: two amazing pals. We love to see working together. Their
1:04
Speaker 1: chemistry is palpable. And that's not all Alex Winter has
1:07
Speaker 1: been doing. He has so much to catch you up
1:10
Speaker 1: on and so much that you can consume. If you
1:11
Speaker 1: want more Alex Winter, He's got it for you. I
1:14
Speaker 1: just Alex and we just spoke briefly before we got
1:16
Speaker 1: onto the podcast. First of all, welcome, but I asked
1:19
Speaker 1: you how you feeling, I mean, doing a Broadway show
1:22
Speaker 1: and this is your first week, all the pressure, all
1:25
Speaker 1: the lights, all the critics, everyone looking at you. How
1:28
Speaker 1: you feeling, how you holding up good?
1:31
Speaker 2: It's it's been a lovely we you know. We finished
1:33
Speaker 2: two weeks of previews with with our opening night on Sunday,
1:37
Speaker 2: and we're working with the amazing Jamie Lloyd on our
1:43
Speaker 2: cast ensemble. It's a small play with just a handful
1:47
Speaker 2: of actors on stage, and we have Brandon Durden and
1:49
Speaker 2: Michael Patrick Thornton working with us, and two boys playing
1:52
Speaker 2: the kid on alternate night, Zaaning and Eric, and it's
1:55
Speaker 2: an amazing team. Jamie's kind of the best of the best,
1:59
Speaker 2: and his team are the best. So our rehearsals were
2:04
Speaker 2: so specific and rigorous that we were ready. I mean,
2:07
Speaker 2: our opening night preview, which can be quite a loose affair,
2:11
Speaker 2: was really very similar to our opening night show yesterday.
2:15
Speaker 2: So for me, having come from theater, I don't really
2:20
Speaker 2: get that jitters around like reviews and opening night stuff.
2:25
Speaker 2: I mostly get the jitters around the first night of previews,
2:28
Speaker 2: the first time you're taking that thing into in front
2:30
Speaker 2: of an audience, because this happens to me with my
2:33
Speaker 2: films too, but you really get it with theater. You
2:35
Speaker 2: just know, you just know, you know whether it works
2:39
Speaker 2: or not, you know whether the audience is with you.
2:43
Speaker 2: And so for me, the lovely night was the most
2:46
Speaker 2: lovely night was honestly the very first night of previews
2:48
Speaker 2: on the thirteenth of September, when we've been working on
2:51
Speaker 2: this thing, Keanu and I for over three years. We
2:55
Speaker 2: put this together with Jamie three and a half years ago,
2:57
Speaker 2: and we've been doing quite a bit of work on
2:59
Speaker 2: it in the run ups. So to go out on
3:01
Speaker 2: stage and be like, oh, okay, they dig it. You know,
3:05
Speaker 2: it's a it's a complex play and it's and it's
3:08
Speaker 2: a very emotionally intense play. It's funny that it's said
3:13
Speaker 2: that it's sort of the catchphrases that it's about nothing,
3:15
Speaker 2: which Beckett set himself and sorted a lot of critics,
3:17
Speaker 2: But it is kind of about everything. Actually, it's sort
3:20
Speaker 2: of the inverse of that. It's kind of all of
3:22
Speaker 2: life distilled in two hours. So you end up kind
3:26
Speaker 2: of emotionally, mentally and physically wiped out at the end
3:29
Speaker 2: of the night.
3:30
Speaker 1: Well, I was just going to ask, how can a
3:32
Speaker 1: show about nothing be so complex? If you could give
3:36
Speaker 1: folks out there listening just an idea of Sure. I
3:41
Speaker 1: know you said it's emotional and it's complex, and it's
3:43
Speaker 1: the arc of a life, but give us basically something.
3:47
Speaker 2: Rather Yeah, of course, Yeah, it's not hard. It's really
3:49
Speaker 2: not that hard. I mean, it's there's a reason why
3:51
Speaker 2: it's so famous. It's not that opaque, right, or nobody
3:53
Speaker 2: would ever want to put it on. The show has
3:55
Speaker 2: done play is done constantly. It's about two very old
3:59
Speaker 2: friends who probably perform together at one point. We don't
4:02
Speaker 2: know where in time they exist. They're kind of unmoored
4:05
Speaker 2: from time. So it's a surreal play in that way.
4:08
Speaker 2: And they're confronting their life, their regrets, their mortality, their loves,
4:13
Speaker 2: their companionship, and the meaning of life and why go
4:17
Speaker 2: on and the challenges of life and when it gets
4:19
Speaker 2: very hard, what keeps you going? What gives you hope?
4:23
Speaker 2: So it gets into spirituality, it gets into God, it
4:26
Speaker 2: gets into whether there's a God, It gets into sort
4:28
Speaker 2: of all of the aspects of the questioning of life
4:31
Speaker 2: that I think every human being goes through at one
4:33
Speaker 2: point or another, especially as you move along in life.
4:38
Speaker 2: So it is a play that questions and kind of
4:40
Speaker 2: interrogates all the big questions, but in a very grounded,
4:44
Speaker 2: emotional way. And it's a lovely play to do. And
4:48
Speaker 2: it's a lovely play to do with a close friend.
4:50
Speaker 2: It is about friendship at his heart, I think, and
4:54
Speaker 2: the value and significance of it. And to be able
4:58
Speaker 2: to do that on stage every night with Keanu, and
5:01
Speaker 2: the rapport, the rhythms that we share even off stage,
5:05
Speaker 2: off outside the bill and Ted movies, that has been
5:09
Speaker 2: very rewarding. I think.
5:11
Speaker 1: I was curious, So this is your return to Broadway
5:16
Speaker 1: four decades later? Is that correct?
5:17
Speaker 2: Yeah? Crazily enough. I went to the opening night I did.
5:20
Speaker 2: I did several long running Broadway shows back to back.
5:22
Speaker 2: I did King and I with Yo Brenner. I did
5:25
Speaker 2: Peter Pan for years on Broadway with Sandy Duncan, and
5:28
Speaker 2: Sandy came to my opening night the other night. I
5:31
Speaker 2: swear to god, I'm a pretty thick skinned guy because
5:33
Speaker 2: I've been in this business since I was seven. I
5:35
Speaker 2: started crying. I was so moved to see her and
5:41
Speaker 2: her husband Don, and like several of my friends from
5:44
Speaker 2: the show came to the opening night and like one
5:47
Speaker 2: of them sent me an email saying, I don't know
5:49
Speaker 2: if you remember me, but I was like, are you crazy?
5:51
Speaker 2: Like we lived in the same dressing room for three
5:53
Speaker 2: years during the most formative years of my life. Of
5:55
Speaker 2: course I remember you. It was very, very moving, much
5:59
Speaker 2: more so than I thought it would be.
6:02
Speaker 1: That's so cool. And I'm curious because obviously you are
6:05
Speaker 1: a Broadway veteran, but this is Keanu's first Broadway show,
6:11
Speaker 1: So what was that? Like, how was he doing? How
6:14
Speaker 1: did did he lean on you?
6:17
Speaker 2: I'm just right, I gotta tell you all during the
6:20
Speaker 2: run up, even during the years of the run up,
6:23
Speaker 2: and this kind of emblematizes our rapport. But I was
6:25
Speaker 2: just like, I was like, man, the guy's been studying
6:28
Speaker 2: Shakespeare as long as I've known him, like doing really
6:32
Speaker 2: heavy Shakespeare, likes camps and things like that with like
6:36
Speaker 2: season Stratford Shakespearean actors. He did Hamlet in Canada playing Hamlet,
6:42
Speaker 2: which is as hard as this play is. That's way
6:45
Speaker 2: harder than this is to do. It's four hours long
6:48
Speaker 2: and you're on stage the whole time. Pretty much, I
6:51
Speaker 2: kept saying to him, look, I'm not being cavalier. I
6:53
Speaker 2: understand the height of Broadway and the pressure of Broadway
6:57
Speaker 2: and the lens that's on you from Broadway. But at
6:59
Speaker 2: the end of the day, it's a stage and with
7:02
Speaker 2: people in it. And having done it a lot, and
7:05
Speaker 2: I did it, I did thousands of shows on Broadway,
7:10
Speaker 2: you get used to the fact that it's just another
7:12
Speaker 2: stage with more people on it, and you go on
7:13
Speaker 2: and you put on a good show. And said, you
7:15
Speaker 2: just got to get that out of your the Broadway
7:16
Speaker 2: thing out of your head, and just know that you're
7:18
Speaker 2: gonna walk on stage, gonna be a bunch of people
7:20
Speaker 2: out there, You're gonna either have a good night or
7:22
Speaker 2: a crummy night, and you're gonna leave. And that's it.
7:25
Speaker 2: So honest to God, he kept saying, He kept saying,
7:30
Speaker 2: are you crazy, Like it's Broadway.
7:33
Speaker 1: There are no take twos, there are no cuts, there
7:36
Speaker 1: are no again.
7:38
Speaker 2: Well, he's done theater, so he knows that world. But
7:40
Speaker 2: but it is I think I think ultimately that was
7:44
Speaker 2: his experience. I think we went on stage for opening
7:46
Speaker 2: a previews, and I think that the audience was with us.
7:50
Speaker 2: They were very engaged in the play, which is really
7:52
Speaker 2: all you care about, and uh, you could feel the
7:56
Speaker 2: the connection to them, and I think from then on
7:59
Speaker 2: he was like, oh, cool, like it. It's another stage
8:01
Speaker 2: with another audience. And he's been absolutely fine.
8:04
Speaker 1: That's awesome. That's awesome. And I'm curious because obviously I
8:08
Speaker 1: don't know if you can even compare what it was
8:11
Speaker 1: like working together doing Bill and Ted all of those
8:14
Speaker 1: series versus doing this Broadway show, this complex show about life.
8:18
Speaker 1: Are the two even comparable? And did you use any
8:21
Speaker 1: of those experiences in your exaurs.
8:23
Speaker 2: I mean, they are oddly comparable in a couple of ways.
8:27
Speaker 2: One is it helps a lot that we have a
8:31
Speaker 2: not only a friendship, but a working rapport. We just
8:34
Speaker 2: did another movie together a few years ago, right, so
8:37
Speaker 2: it hasn't been that long, and we're both very you know,
8:40
Speaker 2: I direct, he produces and has directed, and we're both
8:44
Speaker 2: very involved in the movies when we do them. So
8:47
Speaker 2: there's a ton of work going on, there's a lot
8:48
Speaker 2: of rehearsal, there's a lot of script analysis. So we
8:51
Speaker 2: have kind of a set working relationship. So we just
8:55
Speaker 2: applied that to this immediately. We're both rigorous and we
8:59
Speaker 2: just started working on this thing three years ago, like
9:01
Speaker 2: we would work. We took us twelve years to get
9:03
Speaker 2: Bill and Ted free off the ground. It was a
9:05
Speaker 2: ton of work on both of our part and so
9:08
Speaker 2: we just kind of went to work on this the
9:10
Speaker 2: way we'd go to work on one of those. But
9:13
Speaker 2: the physical rapport we have helps a lot. This play
9:16
Speaker 2: is very physical, and a lot of that gets used.
9:21
Speaker 2: And also, even though this is a very highbrow piece
9:23
Speaker 2: of great literature and theater, Bill and Ted at the
9:27
Speaker 2: end of the day is about language and the use
9:29
Speaker 2: of language, right, and the sort of interplay of language
9:32
Speaker 2: and physicality, and so is this. And we're both you know,
9:35
Speaker 2: pretty well read and like good stuff, so we've applied
9:40
Speaker 2: some of that. You know. The fact that we're two
9:43
Speaker 2: guys sort of throwing words back at each other very
9:45
Speaker 2: quickly is very similar to what we do with the
9:48
Speaker 2: Bill and Ted movies.
9:50
Speaker 1: What would you say? I mean, friendships like yours, working friendships,
9:53
Speaker 1: but also friendships behind the cameras, not just in front
9:57
Speaker 1: of the cameras. Are you don't hear about them too often?
10:00
Speaker 1: In Hollywood. It's a tough business and there are a
10:02
Speaker 1: lot of pressures and just falling out. How would you
10:06
Speaker 1: describe your friendship and what why it stood the test
10:09
Speaker 1: of time.
10:11
Speaker 2: Look at the end of the day, we're just close
10:12
Speaker 2: friends and you have we have we both have a
10:16
Speaker 2: kind of a small but lasting band of friends that
10:21
Speaker 2: we've both had our whole lives. Some of those intertwined,
10:24
Speaker 2: some of those are completely different, right obviously. And the
10:28
Speaker 2: thing I love about Kean it was that he's the
10:30
Speaker 2: same guy that I met in nineteen eighty seven, and
10:33
Speaker 2: I'm the same guy, and we're both pretty grounded, and
10:35
Speaker 2: we've both done you know, I think a lot of
10:38
Speaker 2: work on ourselves to stay grounded in different ways. But
10:42
Speaker 2: through all of the Michigasi's been through and the sort
10:46
Speaker 2: of the hyper attention that he's had on him. You know,
10:50
Speaker 2: I spent a lot of my life behind the camera
10:53
Speaker 2: and by design, and I you know, I don't love
10:56
Speaker 2: the spotlight that much, and I love what I do,
11:01
Speaker 2: but it's you know, I've been I've kind of marveled
11:03
Speaker 2: at his ability, his determination, because it takes work to
11:07
Speaker 2: stay the same person and have the same friends and
11:10
Speaker 2: be the same guy. And most people that I know
11:13
Speaker 2: that meet him, who work in the industry, or when
11:15
Speaker 2: they you know, when they say, oh, I've met Reeves,
11:18
Speaker 2: and I was astounded by how normal he was. I'm like, yeah,
11:20
Speaker 2: he's the same guy he's been since we were in
11:23
Speaker 2: our early twenties. And and I think that's what's kept
11:27
Speaker 2: us friends, is like I'm you know, we're like two
11:30
Speaker 2: brothers almost, and neither of us has really changed very much.
11:35
Speaker 1: That's really cool to hear. Obviously, Yes, fame changes a
11:39
Speaker 1: lot of people.
11:39
Speaker 2: Most people, it does, and you have to work very
11:41
Speaker 2: hard for it, not because it will. It will pound
11:44
Speaker 2: on you, it will work on you, and you have
11:47
Speaker 2: to work very hard to remain grounded through that. And
11:52
Speaker 2: you know, some people don't care about being grounded. They're like,
11:54
Speaker 2: bring on the champagne and the beach house and like
11:57
Speaker 2: I'm going to change friends like I changed my underwear.
12:00
Speaker 2: They're super happy to be in that world that way,
12:02
Speaker 2: and they're very transactional. And you're right, like Hollywood is
12:05
Speaker 2: filled with those people.
12:06
Speaker 1: So it all comes to an end, and then who
12:09
Speaker 1: are you with because ultimately does come to an end
12:11
Speaker 1: for almost everyone. Meryl Street.
12:14
Speaker 2: Yes, I mean and that this play gets into that idea,
12:16
Speaker 2: like it will definitively come to an end at the end, right,
12:19
Speaker 2: And that's not a life I'd want to look back
12:22
Speaker 2: out and say, well that that just has no value
12:24
Speaker 2: to me. It's empty. So it isn't for everyone. But
12:28
Speaker 2: I do like the fact that his values are about
12:31
Speaker 2: being normal and mine are about being I mean, I've
12:33
Speaker 2: raised a family and lead of extremely boring suburban life
12:37
Speaker 2: by design, but I had to work very hard to
12:40
Speaker 2: possess that.
12:41
Speaker 1: Well, that was a choice. Were you ever tempted to
12:44
Speaker 1: go into that other world where everything at your beck
12:48
Speaker 1: and call no.
12:50
Speaker 2: I never liked it, and I got out pretty fast
12:52
Speaker 2: when it started to blow up in that way. And
12:55
Speaker 2: even like one of the things that about Keanu and
12:57
Speaker 2: some of the other friends I have in the business
12:59
Speaker 2: who I'm still friends with, is even then at the
13:01
Speaker 2: height neither he and I were. Neither of us were
13:05
Speaker 2: both pretty bohemian and normal, and even during the height
13:08
Speaker 2: of the Bill and Ted stuff, we weren't like at
13:10
Speaker 2: like huge Hollywood parties, And like Jet said it, it
13:14
Speaker 2: was like we led very normal lives and kind of
13:19
Speaker 2: thespian working actor kind of lives. But as things got
13:24
Speaker 2: more intense, I kind of stepped away a little bit
13:27
Speaker 2: from it wasn't great for my headspace.
13:30
Speaker 1: It was a choice you made and when i'm yes,
13:34
Speaker 1: I do not.
13:34
Speaker 2: Yeah.
13:36
Speaker 1: So this this play is sixteen weeks correct from beginning
13:40
Speaker 1: ten Yeah, sixteen weeks of How often do you perform
13:45
Speaker 1: a week? Is it eight shows a week?
13:46
Speaker 2: Eight shows a week? Yeah?
13:48
Speaker 1: How do you have this?
13:49
Speaker 2: Like?
13:49
Speaker 1: Honestly, I have always moreveled. I'm a huge Broadway fan.
13:53
Speaker 1: I love the Great White Way, but I am always
13:55
Speaker 1: in awe of actors who can go up on that
13:59
Speaker 1: stage and get if they're all that much for that long.
14:03
Speaker 2: Well, I did say this, Keanu at the very beginning
14:06
Speaker 2: three and a half years ago. I said, the hardest
14:07
Speaker 2: thing about this is going to be the physical endurance.
14:11
Speaker 2: And that's what movie and TV actors often miss with
14:13
Speaker 2: with doing Broadway, and they then they get wrecked, their
14:16
Speaker 2: bodies get wrecked. So I started training physically for this
14:21
Speaker 2: over three years ago and my days are filled with
14:28
Speaker 2: recovery every day.
14:30
Speaker 1: So what does what chofrey look like?
14:32
Speaker 2: Pilates, acupuncture, massage, the whole nine every day? Yeah, Yeah,
14:39
Speaker 2: I'm passive.
14:40
Speaker 1: I need to get on on on that swing because yes,
14:42
Speaker 1: it does take it toll, especially when you're in your fifties.
14:46
Speaker 1: You weren't the spring chicken that you used to be.
14:48
Speaker 2: Yeah, I turned sixty in July, so and Keanu was
14:51
Speaker 2: sixty thank.
14:52
Speaker 1: You, Yeah, to be kidding me. Never in a million
14:54
Speaker 1: years would.
14:55
Speaker 2: I a thank you. Yeah, Keanu was sixty one now
14:58
Speaker 2: he just turned sixty one early September.
15:01
Speaker 1: That you just blew my mind. You just blew them.
15:03
Speaker 1: I thought we were all the same age. That's wild
15:06
Speaker 1: fifty two. So, I mean, look, I love seeing people
15:09
Speaker 1: who are a little bit ahead, still killing it and
15:12
Speaker 1: doing it in a healthy way mentally and physically. That's amazing.
15:16
Speaker 1: I'm curious. You started on Broadway at seven?
15:20
Speaker 2: No, I started acting, but professionally. I started doing theater
15:25
Speaker 2: at around six, seven years old. I started acting professionally
15:27
Speaker 2: at ten, doing commercials in theater. I was on Broadway
15:32
Speaker 2: by thirteen.
15:33
Speaker 1: How did you like? How does that happen? Was it
15:36
Speaker 1: a choice your parents made? Is it a choice you made?
15:39
Speaker 1: Is it something that you found in you?
15:41
Speaker 2: Like?
15:41
Speaker 1: I don't even who knows what they want to do
15:43
Speaker 1: at five or six?
15:44
Speaker 2: I know it's crazy. I made a documentary for HBO
15:47
Speaker 2: about children in show business and interviewed a lot of
15:50
Speaker 2: people all the way through the history of show business,
15:52
Speaker 2: going back to the turn of the century. In the
15:54
Speaker 2: first child Star who was still alive. She was one
15:56
Speaker 2: hundred when I interviewed her. And what was interesting was
16:01
Speaker 2: the was that disparity because otherwise most child actor experiences
16:06
Speaker 2: are very similar. But the disparity is what you just said.
16:09
Speaker 2: Because I have three, three kids, and I wondered if
16:12
Speaker 2: there any of them were going to get that bug,
16:14
Speaker 2: because I really didn't want them in the business. But
16:16
Speaker 2: there's a kind of kid that you can't help putting
16:18
Speaker 2: in the business because they are so impersonally driven. And
16:22
Speaker 2: that was me. My parents were modern dancers. They weren't.
16:26
Speaker 2: They weren't show business people. They were in the arts
16:30
Speaker 2: and the performing arts. But modern is very, very, very
16:32
Speaker 2: different from I was a tap dancing singing get me
16:36
Speaker 2: on stage. They were like, who even is this person? Right?
16:41
Speaker 2: So they just responded and they let me do my thing.
16:43
Speaker 2: But it was driven by my own desire and I
16:47
Speaker 2: wanted to go on stage. I wanted to end up
16:49
Speaker 2: doing bigger shows. I wanted to do other stuff. I
16:52
Speaker 2: wanted to go to film school and make films. And
16:55
Speaker 2: you know, they were we weren't income from a lot
16:56
Speaker 2: of money, so they were like, you got to earn
16:58
Speaker 2: money and do that is what I did. I put
17:01
Speaker 2: myself through film school. But when I was doing the
17:05
Speaker 2: show the doc I interviewed a bunch of kids, and
17:08
Speaker 2: there were certain kids like that, not many. Cameron Boyce,
17:10
Speaker 2: who sadly has passed away, who I interviewed, was like that.
17:14
Speaker 2: Cameron was like unstoppable at five, and you looked at
17:17
Speaker 2: home movies of him and you're like, if you had Cameron,
17:21
Speaker 2: you have to let him do his thing, right. If
17:23
Speaker 2: I had a Cameron as a kid, I would have
17:26
Speaker 2: gotten the hell out of his way and let him
17:28
Speaker 2: or her do their thing. But I was kind of
17:31
Speaker 2: grateful that my kids didn't want to do that.
17:35
Speaker 1: So I love that's so interesting you did a documentary
17:40
Speaker 1: on this, because it is all too often most child actors,
17:44
Speaker 1: a lot of them, I shouldn't say most, but a
17:46
Speaker 1: big percentage of them do turn to that life of drugs,
17:49
Speaker 1: do turn to that spotlight and get sucked into the
17:53
Speaker 1: madness that ensues, and they believe their own hype and
17:57
Speaker 1: they fall prey to it. How did you avoid that?
18:00
Speaker 2: Or they get crushed by it. It kind of goes
18:02
Speaker 2: one of two ways. You can believe your own hypey. Also,
18:05
Speaker 2: it's a very insecure childhood by design is about learning
18:09
Speaker 2: who you are and the insecurities that you have in
18:12
Speaker 2: your teens coupled with being you know, Cameron talking and
18:16
Speaker 2: I talked about this a lot because he came up
18:17
Speaker 2: during the Internet era and he was just like I
18:19
Speaker 2: had twenty five million Instagram followers all through my teens.
18:22
Speaker 2: Every pimple, every rejection by a girl, every awkward stage
18:27
Speaker 2: was documented, and he had such a good head on
18:30
Speaker 2: his shoulders. You know, I say this to parents because
18:34
Speaker 2: I've directed a lot of stuff with kids in it
18:36
Speaker 2: over the years, a lot, and I like doing stuff
18:39
Speaker 2: with kids, and the parents always ask me what you
18:41
Speaker 2: just asked me, and I tell them, honestly, I'm like,
18:44
Speaker 2: your kid will face consequences. It's inescapable. It doesn't matter
18:49
Speaker 2: how granded they are, doesn't matter how great you are
18:51
Speaker 2: as parents. They will one hundred percent face consequences for
18:55
Speaker 2: acting in a professional world when really they should be
19:00
Speaker 2: as people. And for me, I certainly faced consequences, but
19:05
Speaker 2: I had the snap, thankfully, to kind of get out
19:09
Speaker 2: of acting in my mid twenties, like right after Bill
19:11
Speaker 2: and Tedtoo and another film I made after that and
19:14
Speaker 2: just go into normal world. And so I kind of
19:18
Speaker 2: spent my late twenties into early thirties doing the development
19:21
Speaker 2: I missed in my teens. And you find a lot
19:26
Speaker 2: of people do that. Either they get crashed and they
19:28
Speaker 2: have to do it, like certain big stars you've heard
19:30
Speaker 2: of who just like bottomed out and they end up
19:32
Speaker 2: doing their growing up a little later, or you kind
19:35
Speaker 2: of figure it out and you go do your growing up.
19:37
Speaker 2: But there's no escape from consequences if you're an adultified
19:41
Speaker 2: high stress environment. As a child, there's just not as capable.
19:44
Speaker 1: That makes perfect sense. You said you made the decision.
19:48
Speaker 1: Was there a moment? Was there a low moment you
19:50
Speaker 1: could snap you snapped out of it? Was there a
19:53
Speaker 1: defining moment?
19:55
Speaker 2: It's funny. I was talking to Ethan Hawk about this
19:56
Speaker 2: last night. I was at an opening of a film
19:59
Speaker 2: he had and we were talking because we came up
20:01
Speaker 2: at it around the same time. And in the early nineties,
20:05
Speaker 2: things in La got kind of dark. You know, River
20:08
Speaker 2: Phoenix died, who we all knew Downy was struggling. There
20:12
Speaker 2: was a lot of drugs, like really heavy, hard drugs,
20:15
Speaker 2: and the vibe was really kind of dark and I
20:20
Speaker 2: just got out, and Ethan said he got out at
20:22
Speaker 2: the same time. He just we just left Hollywood and
20:26
Speaker 2: I moved back to New York and then I started
20:28
Speaker 2: a production company in the UK, and I just separated
20:33
Speaker 2: myself from that world. And I think it saved my backside.
20:36
Speaker 2: I really do. I just had a gut survival instinct
20:40
Speaker 2: that I wasn't gonna be alright if I didn't leave.
20:46
Speaker 2: I didn't come back for till like five I didn't
20:49
Speaker 2: come back for twenty years.
20:51
Speaker 1: So twenty years, what did you do? I said, you
20:53
Speaker 1: went behind the scenes.
20:54
Speaker 2: But yeah, I started directing and writing. I made a movie.
20:57
Speaker 2: It went to cann I started a production company. I
20:59
Speaker 2: started doing more and more narrative, and then I started
21:01
Speaker 2: training to act again because I knew I wanted to
21:03
Speaker 2: come back to acting, but I wanted to do it
21:04
Speaker 2: on my own term. So I started working with all
21:07
Speaker 2: the best acting trainers, kind of one by one and
21:11
Speaker 2: doing Shakespeare and doing all kinds of killer work and
21:14
Speaker 2: vocal training and physical training, and then I was kind
21:17
Speaker 2: of ready to come back to acting again.
21:19
Speaker 1: That is so impressive. I've never heard someone's story quite
21:23
Speaker 1: like yours, making those choices, being intentional and then wanting
21:27
Speaker 1: to redevelop yourself as an actor. That's impressive and because
21:32
Speaker 1: most people don't have I don't want to say the humility,
21:35
Speaker 1: but maybe that is what I'm saying to say, I
21:37
Speaker 1: still need to learn. I need to reacquaint myself. And
21:40
Speaker 1: with all the training and all the experience you had,
21:43
Speaker 1: that's remarkable that you had the wherewithal to do that.
21:46
Speaker 2: Well. I started so young. I didn't really know what
21:48
Speaker 2: training I was training, but like, you know, my parents
21:51
Speaker 2: would throw me in dance class or like a kiddy
21:54
Speaker 2: acting class, you know what I mean. It was. And
21:55
Speaker 2: then I ended up in a really high level working
21:58
Speaker 2: with really good actors, and I thought, I don't I don't.
22:02
Speaker 2: I haven't done the work they've done, you know, And
22:05
Speaker 2: so I wanted to do that and I kind of
22:07
Speaker 2: did it, not even knowing if I would do it professionally.
22:09
Speaker 2: I just wanted to do it for myself at first.
22:11
Speaker 2: And then it's a weird thing. It's like if you
22:13
Speaker 2: build it, they will come right. Like because once I
22:17
Speaker 2: had trained, it was like opportunities started showing up and
22:20
Speaker 2: that was a little unforeseen frankly.
22:23
Speaker 1: That's but that's awesome to hear that hard work pays off,
22:26
Speaker 1: that you go and put in the work, and that
22:27
Speaker 1: it actually does result in the outcome you were hoping for.
22:31
Speaker 1: You returned what in your forties.
22:33
Speaker 2: I was in my forties.
22:35
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's that's scary, diver. I don't know that women
22:38
Speaker 1: would feel comfortable. You're just lost out on the probably
22:41
Speaker 1: like the most physically.
22:44
Speaker 2: Yeah, sure, I was, even as a guy, like I
22:47
Speaker 2: wasn't cute anymore, Like in a way that was like
22:49
Speaker 2: that was like a burden that was removed. Like I
22:52
Speaker 2: was like, I'm not going to be a leading man,
22:54
Speaker 2: like I'm gonna and I love character acting. That's my
22:56
Speaker 2: always been my thing. So I was like, if I
22:58
Speaker 2: do anything, I'll be doing character work, which is my
23:00
Speaker 2: favorite thing to do. But I agree with you, Yes,
23:04
Speaker 2: it is. It is. There is that pressure. You're walking
23:06
Speaker 2: into rooms and you're not the young, hot ingenoux anymore.
23:11
Speaker 2: And I mean, and with the way women are judged
23:15
Speaker 2: and all of that, I mean, believe me, it's you know,
23:17
Speaker 2: I don't. I am not unaware of the fact that
23:21
Speaker 2: as a middle class white guy, I felt probably safer
23:26
Speaker 2: doing that than I would as a person of color,
23:28
Speaker 2: as a woman, where there is so much more bias
23:31
Speaker 2: and pressure. But I also didn't I didn't have any stakes.
23:35
Speaker 2: I had a whole other career, So I was kind
23:36
Speaker 2: of like, I'm not I wasn't you know that worried
23:40
Speaker 2: about it one way or the other. I think that
23:42
Speaker 2: might have been helpful too.
23:43
Speaker 1: Oh absolutely, I yes, that's it's so true. When you
23:47
Speaker 1: can if you're doing it because you love it and
23:50
Speaker 1: doing it because you want to do it. You put
23:51
Speaker 1: in the work and you're not invested in the outcome,
23:54
Speaker 1: magical things.
23:55
Speaker 3: Happen it you can yeah, or yes they can?
24:01
Speaker 1: And what made you want to go back in front
24:12
Speaker 1: of the camera after all of those choices that you
24:16
Speaker 1: made beforehand?
24:16
Speaker 2: To I felt I felt that there were things about
24:20
Speaker 2: my acting that I had not been able to explore
24:23
Speaker 2: in public, that that I was doing in private scene
24:28
Speaker 2: work and another work that I felt I would like
24:30
Speaker 2: to be able to do professionally, and even if it
24:34
Speaker 2: was really small. I was like, I have really good
24:37
Speaker 2: agents for my directing side. I said to them, to
24:39
Speaker 2: the talent department, like I really don't care how big
24:42
Speaker 2: a part is. If the project is good, I don't
24:43
Speaker 2: care if it's tiny. And I still feel that way
24:48
Speaker 2: like if I did a film that's coming out next
24:50
Speaker 2: year with Robert Pattinson for A twenty four My part
24:53
Speaker 2: is is really interesting but fairly small, and it's one
24:56
Speaker 2: of the most satisfying things I've ever done. So so
25:00
Speaker 2: it's for me. I just wanted to do good works
25:02
Speaker 2: and I didn't care about, you know, the scale of it,
25:06
Speaker 2: but I really did want to be able to get
25:08
Speaker 2: back out with other actors and do work again.
25:11
Speaker 1: That way, we get that and you're doing it well
25:15
Speaker 1: and you're doing what you love. I have to say,
25:16
Speaker 1: I watched Adulthood and it is such a good film.
25:21
Speaker 1: It's streaming now and you all sent me a screener.
25:25
Speaker 1: But where is it streaming.
25:26
Speaker 2: It's everywhere. It's Amazon, Apple, It's doing really well on
25:30
Speaker 2: Prime right now, which I'm very grateful for. It's on Apple,
25:32
Speaker 2: It's on Amazon Prime. It's all over, and then it
25:35
Speaker 2: goes into rentals, I think now, and then in January
25:38
Speaker 2: it'll hit a big streamer and be even more visible.
25:41
Speaker 2: So we have a lot of life in front of.
25:42
Speaker 1: Us, which is so well written, it is so well acted.
25:46
Speaker 1: I was because I didn't know anything about it, and
25:48
Speaker 1: obviously Josh gadd I was like he is, You're not
25:51
Speaker 1: used to seeing him in a more serious role, and
25:54
Speaker 1: yet he still delivers comedic lines when you get a
25:57
Speaker 1: little relief from the tension. But if you would, for
26:00
Speaker 1: people listening, I'd love for you to describe this movie
26:01
Speaker 1: because it's I mean it is it's a thriller, it's
26:04
Speaker 1: a comedy. Is it a horror comedy? Is it a
26:06
Speaker 1: thriller comedy.
26:07
Speaker 2: It's it's a crime job. It's a black comedy, I mean,
26:10
Speaker 2: a very pitch black comedy. Would I would argue if
26:13
Speaker 2: your if your humor is as dark as mine, you
26:15
Speaker 2: will find it funny all the way to the end.
26:17
Speaker 2: But not like not like Will Ferrell funny. Right, it's
26:22
Speaker 2: a different kind of humor, but it is, you know,
26:25
Speaker 2: it's looking at the challenges of living as an adult
26:28
Speaker 2: and what happens to us at that age where we
26:31
Speaker 2: go from being kind of young adults to sort of
26:34
Speaker 2: anchored adults, and you realize you've kind of become your parents,
26:38
Speaker 2: and you have your parents are in front of you
26:40
Speaker 2: and they're aging, they're getting old, they maybe dying. You've
26:42
Speaker 2: got kids coming up behind you, and that what that
26:46
Speaker 2: means and the challenge and sometimes the crisis of that realization,
26:50
Speaker 2: and people sometimes refer to it as a midlife crisis,
26:52
Speaker 2: but for me, it's it's usually much more about the
26:54
Speaker 2: responsibility and just the sort of the aging pattern of life,
26:59
Speaker 2: the cycle of life which is inescapable. So to me,
27:03
Speaker 2: that's quite deep and can be quite tragic, but it
27:08
Speaker 2: can also be uplifting, but it can also be incredibly funny.
27:11
Speaker 2: So that's what we wanted to mine with this, and
27:13
Speaker 2: I was so lucky to have this cast. I had
27:16
Speaker 2: a dream ensemble. It's Josh Gadd who's a genius Kyascodlario
27:20
Speaker 2: who I've loved since she was like fifteen years old,
27:23
Speaker 2: who's incredibly gifted, and Billy Lord, who I've been chasing
27:27
Speaker 2: for stuff for years. And Anthony Kerrigan, who is, you know,
27:30
Speaker 2: arguably one of the greatest actors going period right now,
27:33
Speaker 2: and he was in Bill and Ted three with me
27:35
Speaker 2: and I love him dearly. It was just an amazing cast.
27:38
Speaker 2: We had a great time and it was hard. Shooting
27:40
Speaker 2: indie movies is challenging and fast and hard, but very
27:45
Speaker 2: very happy with it. We had a premiere at Toronto
27:48
Speaker 2: a couple of weeks ago, went really well and I've
27:50
Speaker 2: been really happy with the response so far.
27:52
Speaker 1: It's a brilliant film. I love how you talked about
27:55
Speaker 1: the premise of it, you know, not necessarily mid life crisis,
27:58
Speaker 1: but dealing with getting old there and all the responsibilities.
28:01
Speaker 1: But what you left out, which is the hilarious plot
28:04
Speaker 1: that ensues, is that as they're going to take care
28:07
Speaker 1: of their mother who just suffered a stroke, they realize
28:10
Speaker 1: that there is a dead body of their neighbor. This
28:13
Speaker 1: murder mystery that had haunted this town and haunted this street.
28:17
Speaker 1: They find their neighbor, they recognize her track suit, her dead,
28:20
Speaker 1: decomposing body in the wall of their mother's basements.
28:26
Speaker 2: It is a literal skeleton in the closet. I mean,
28:28
Speaker 2: it's a skeleton in the closet movie, right. Yeah. It
28:34
Speaker 2: is a very wild premise and they have to make
28:38
Speaker 2: a decision very early on what do we do with
28:41
Speaker 2: this body? And what would going to the police do
28:43
Speaker 2: to our mother who just had a stroke, in our
28:45
Speaker 2: family's reputation. They're both skating on the edge of financial calamity,
28:49
Speaker 2: like almost everyone in America today, no matter who you are,
28:52
Speaker 2: and like any good noir, they make one very bad
28:57
Speaker 2: decision that leads to many, many terrible decisions, and that
29:03
Speaker 2: is that's kind of the clockwork mechanism of the plot.
29:07
Speaker 1: And look, I am a huge Anyone who listens to
29:10
Speaker 1: this podcast knows that TJ and I are both like
29:12
Speaker 1: horror movie aficionados, and we love horror, comedy thriller. Like
29:17
Speaker 1: just that bending of genres is so fun because just
29:20
Speaker 1: when you're scared or just when you're wondering what's going
29:22
Speaker 1: to happen next, you burst out laughing. And the timing
29:26
Speaker 1: and the writing. I mean, it's just and it's so good.
29:28
Speaker 1: I just cannot say enough good things about it.
29:30
Speaker 2: Thank you.
29:31
Speaker 1: I really truly enjoyed it, like incredibly so. And the
29:35
Speaker 1: thing that you're juggling all of this is coming out
29:37
Speaker 1: all at the same time. It's really I find it
29:40
Speaker 1: so refreshing to think for anyone who's in any business
29:43
Speaker 1: that you can be intentional, that you can take a
29:46
Speaker 1: break from something but choose to keep educating yourself, choose
29:49
Speaker 1: to keep working on your craft, and then come back
29:51
Speaker 1: in an even bigger and better way than you ever imagined.
29:55
Speaker 1: How would you describe this phase in your life?
29:58
Speaker 2: Look, I think that a lot I talk to a
30:01
Speaker 2: lot of kids and to me now because I'm older kids?
30:04
Speaker 2: Is everyone up to about forty?
30:05
Speaker 1: But I talked a lot of I get it, you
30:08
Speaker 1: know what I mean?
30:08
Speaker 2: Yes, people like, oh, I'm turning forty, I'm getting so little.
30:12
Speaker 2: I'm like, shut up, you're a kid.
30:14
Speaker 1: But uh uh.
30:16
Speaker 2: You know, I talk to a lot of people in
30:18
Speaker 2: film school, a lot of acting students and things like that,
30:20
Speaker 2: and parents of kids who are acting whatever, and they
30:22
Speaker 2: always ask me like, how do you have a sustainable
30:26
Speaker 2: career in this industry? How much is luck involved? And look,
30:29
Speaker 2: I can't speak to this luck thing, though. I bristle
30:31
Speaker 2: whenever I hear veterans in the industry say oh, I
30:35
Speaker 2: was just lucky, because I'm like, come on, I mean
30:38
Speaker 2: in a way, I don't know if people do this intentionally,
30:40
Speaker 2: but it's a way of almost saying I don't want
30:42
Speaker 2: you to know the secret because I don't want your
30:45
Speaker 2: competition because that's just that's so unhelpful, right, Like, okay, great,
30:51
Speaker 2: So I'm just gonna sit around at stobs waiting to
30:53
Speaker 2: be discovered, like you know, like a Rita Hayworth or something.
30:59
Speaker 2: That's not what I mean it is. Luck is the
31:01
Speaker 2: cliche that luck is hard work meets meets opportunity. Hard
31:07
Speaker 2: work perseverance presents opportunity that you're then ready for. You know,
31:13
Speaker 2: Keanu had the idea of doing Waiting for Godo, and
31:17
Speaker 2: then I helped find the director. But when he called
31:20
Speaker 2: me and said, do you want to do Beckett with
31:22
Speaker 2: me and try to get it on Broadway? If I
31:25
Speaker 2: hadn't been training for the last fifteen years, if I
31:27
Speaker 2: hadn't been doing all this vocal work and acting work
31:30
Speaker 2: and physical work, I would have said, I love it,
31:32
Speaker 2: but thank you, There's no way I can do that,
31:34
Speaker 2: you know, There's just no way. Like I'm a dad,
31:36
Speaker 2: I got three kids, I got a directing career. It's
31:38
Speaker 2: not going to happen. But I knew I was ready,
31:41
Speaker 2: And you have to stay in the game. If you quit,
31:47
Speaker 2: it's not going to happen. If you stop working on
31:49
Speaker 2: yourself and studying and trying, it's not going to happen.
31:52
Speaker 2: And God forbid, if it does happen, you're not going
31:55
Speaker 2: to be ready to meet it. So that's really it
31:58
Speaker 2: really does matter. Persevere parents is kind of key, but
32:01
Speaker 2: the undergirding of training and the hard work will help
32:07
Speaker 2: you meet those moments and honest to god, every person
32:11
Speaker 2: I've ever met in the industry who's kept going, they
32:12
Speaker 2: all do those things. They all do the same thing.
32:15
Speaker 2: They all just stay at it and work really hard,
32:17
Speaker 2: and then they say, oh, I don't work very hard.
32:19
Speaker 2: The money came and the fame came, and it was
32:21
Speaker 2: just luck. You know.
32:24
Speaker 1: I love hearing you say that as someone. Look, I
32:28
Speaker 1: did not obviously get into acting, but the career I
32:31
Speaker 1: chose has required a significant amount of work and reinvention
32:34
Speaker 1: and all of that. But my daughter just graduated from
32:36
Speaker 1: NYU Tisch School of the Arts Theater and that's where
32:40
Speaker 1: I went.
32:41
Speaker 2: Oh really, that's so I went to film, but I
32:42
Speaker 2: went to TISH and my son just graduated from music
32:45
Speaker 2: at NYU last year.
32:46
Speaker 1: I wonder if they know each other. But my daughter
32:48
Speaker 1: literally is hustling for twenty bucks a show, I think,
32:51
Speaker 1: but she's got a beause she's produced and direct she's
32:54
Speaker 1: actually not in it. But at Improv Theater off Broadway,
32:57
Speaker 1: I watched this girl buster ass work three side jobs
33:00
Speaker 1: to try and do her art, which he's not really
33:02
Speaker 1: getting paid for yet, but getting her foot in the door.
33:05
Speaker 1: But I think it's so important, especially you know, with
33:08
Speaker 1: those young the kids coming up. But I do think
33:11
Speaker 1: that there's this impression that things just happen, especially in
33:15
Speaker 1: this day and era of social media and influencers all
33:19
Speaker 1: just put some content online and then I'll be a star.
33:23
Speaker 1: And maybe that can happen for some people, but it
33:26
Speaker 1: won't be lasting because the talent, the hard work, that
33:29
Speaker 1: is what keeps you in a career, not just getting
33:32
Speaker 1: lucky for one offs.
33:34
Speaker 2: Yeah, and if you really care about the arts, like
33:36
Speaker 2: your daughter does, that's not your dream, you know, and
33:40
Speaker 2: that can feel really hollow, Like your dream isn't to
33:43
Speaker 2: just become an Instagram star, and like we have forty
33:48
Speaker 2: million Instagram followers who may just like minnos, leave you
33:51
Speaker 2: one day and go find the next. You know, it's
33:54
Speaker 2: just it has no it's not what you dream about.
33:57
Speaker 2: It's not the passion that drives you. So it feels
33:59
Speaker 2: like a like an empty bag of potato chips. You know,
34:02
Speaker 2: it's very hollow. No, the work takes work, it does.
34:08
Speaker 1: I love hearing you say that, and from someone who
34:10
Speaker 1: is as successful as you and as good at your
34:13
Speaker 1: career as you've been. I mean, just it's such a
34:16
Speaker 1: cool thing for I think people to hear and listen
34:18
Speaker 1: to and to understand how what's your son going to
34:20
Speaker 1: do well.
34:21
Speaker 2: He's a jazz trumpet player and he's crazy dedicated, so
34:25
Speaker 2: we'll see. And my eldest who's in grad school, is
34:29
Speaker 2: a painter, and my youngest is i think, heading to
34:32
Speaker 2: film school, so we'll see what he does. My wife
34:36
Speaker 2: and I are very kind of not hands off, but
34:37
Speaker 2: we're like, let them do go where they go, whether
34:39
Speaker 2: they do the art, whether they do something else, it's
34:41
Speaker 2: all good with us. But it's you know, it's it's
34:46
Speaker 2: nice to see them and none of them are trying
34:48
Speaker 2: to get famous. They're just doing their work. So we'll
34:50
Speaker 2: see what happens.
34:51
Speaker 1: You just nailed it. I think in so many of
34:54
Speaker 1: these industries, and mine included, so many people get into
34:57
Speaker 1: them to be famous. Yeah, that usually is not almost
35:02
Speaker 1: never is a recipe for success.
35:04
Speaker 2: Now now, it's certainly not the kind you want, and
35:06
Speaker 2: it's certainly not the kind that will make you a
35:08
Speaker 2: healthy person.
35:10
Speaker 1: This has been such a fascinating conversation. I appreciate Alex,
35:16
Speaker 1: just your and I love that you give back, that
35:19
Speaker 1: you talk to parents, that you talk to students, that
35:21
Speaker 1: you talk to budding artists who want to actually create
35:26
Speaker 1: art and are interested and passionate about doing it well.
35:29
Speaker 1: And I just think that's so cool that I don't
35:32
Speaker 1: think enough people talk about that part of the industry,
35:35
Speaker 1: and that it doesn't always have to be the spotlight
35:37
Speaker 1: on you. But being a part of a creation something
35:40
Speaker 1: you can be proud of is so cool. What is next?
35:43
Speaker 1: I'm sure you've got ten projects that you just mentioned,
35:45
Speaker 1: a movie with Robert Pattinson. What else do you have
35:48
Speaker 1: coming down the pike that we can look forward to.
35:51
Speaker 2: Well, I'm working on another film that I want to direct,
35:54
Speaker 2: and we're writing that script right now, and we'll start
35:57
Speaker 2: trying to put that together as the show's winding down.
36:00
Speaker 2: But I got to tell you, like, doing this play
36:03
Speaker 2: is one hundred and fifty percent of my life and energy,
36:07
Speaker 2: and I want to enjoy it. I want to be
36:09
Speaker 2: present for it. So I really have taken a kind
36:12
Speaker 2: of hiatus not developing other documentaries. I am working on
36:16
Speaker 2: this film that's not going to take a huge amount
36:19
Speaker 2: of time, but we are developing the script, and then
36:21
Speaker 2: obviously Adulthood has got to roll out all the way
36:23
Speaker 2: through into New Year. That will take some work. But
36:27
Speaker 2: normally I would be juggling a lot of stuff, and
36:29
Speaker 2: by design, having the opportunity to do a play on
36:32
Speaker 2: Broadway with Keanu I am, I am not multitasking.
36:39
Speaker 1: You're taking a high hiatus from all of your crazy
36:42
Speaker 1: multitasking and multiple to do a Broadway play.
36:47
Speaker 2: Yeah. Nice, I think let's let's let's meet the moment.
36:50
Speaker 2: How about we do that. Yeah. I don't want to
36:52
Speaker 2: look back at this at these four months and go,
36:55
Speaker 2: oh that was great. I did that, and I developed
36:56
Speaker 2: the doc and I did this, and well I was like, no,
36:59
Speaker 2: I went to the I prepped, I got on stage,
37:02
Speaker 2: I went home. I want to do that for the
37:03
Speaker 2: next I want to enjoy that.
37:05
Speaker 1: One last question for you, Alex, and I hope you
37:07
Speaker 1: don't mind me asking, but how do you juggle all
37:10
Speaker 1: that you do at the level you do it with
37:13
Speaker 1: three kids and a wife? How has your marriage? You know,
37:16
Speaker 1: how long have you been married?
37:18
Speaker 2: We've been together almost almost twenty years, like nineteen almost
37:21
Speaker 2: about about eighteen nineteen years now.
37:23
Speaker 1: Yeah, I would love to know how you would describe
37:27
Speaker 1: how you have managed to make that a lasting, beautiful relationship.
37:33
Speaker 2: Well, we're both in the industry. Ramsey's an animation and
37:38
Speaker 2: has a high level job herself in that world. And
37:43
Speaker 2: I'd say a couple things is we love parenting, and
37:49
Speaker 2: we lead of normal life, like we kind of like
37:52
Speaker 2: away from the industry where we live in La. Our
37:54
Speaker 2: kids went to public school for the most part and
37:59
Speaker 2: aren't in like Hollyoo with oriented private schools, and their
38:03
Speaker 2: friends are normal and don't really think about the industry
38:07
Speaker 2: one way or the other. We go home at night
38:10
Speaker 2: and we're not immersed in the industry. So I think
38:13
Speaker 2: it's you know, I think we're both similar in that
38:16
Speaker 2: we both sort of hungered for even earlier in our
38:18
Speaker 2: lives before we met, for kind of having a normal
38:21
Speaker 2: life in tandem with the work life. And that's real,
38:25
Speaker 2: Like it's just what we do, you know, And that's
38:28
Speaker 2: kind of kept things normal. Like my like I say,
38:30
Speaker 2: like it's my work life is very vibrant, but my
38:33
Speaker 2: day to day life is as boring and suburban as
38:36
Speaker 2: can be. And that is like drive my kid to school,
38:38
Speaker 2: I pick them up from school. I'm like, you know,
38:41
Speaker 2: I'm like a suburban dad basically.
38:43
Speaker 1: Well, a suburban dad who's starring on Broadway, has a
38:46
Speaker 1: megahit of a movie out streaming, and has a long
38:50
Speaker 1: story career that is continuing with incredible success. So Alex Winner,
38:54
Speaker 1: thank you, thank you being on the podcast with us,
38:57
Speaker 1: and we appreciate your time and just will continue to
39:01
Speaker 1: watch and root for you and cheer you on because
39:04
Speaker 1: we love what you do.
39:05
Speaker 2: I really appreciate it was great to chat with you.
39:07
Speaker 2: Thank you so much