Latest / The Delicious Culture with Jon Francois / Hogwood From 'Sinners' Is Delicious w/ Dave Maldonado

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Hogwood From 'Sinners' Is Delicious w/ Dave Maldonado · The Delicious Culture with Jon Francois

• 0:00
  Somebody brought Tom Hanks pizza, and he kind
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  of playfully gloated. He was like, I have people
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  that bring me pizza. And I was like, I'm a superstar.
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  And he's like, yeah. He's like, have some. And
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  he shares his pizza with me. I was like, wow.
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  This is a very surreal moment that Tom Hanks
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  is sharing his pizza with me. Eating pizza with
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  Forrest Gump. Hey delishies, grab a plate and
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  taste the delicious culture. I'm your host, John
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  Francois. We are feasting on food, pop culture,
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  and lifestyle with, might I say a fantastic actor,
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  Dave. Maldonado. Dave, I literally got a chance
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  to look at your reel on IMDB and it's just insane.
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  The amount of talent you have. So thank you so
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  much. This means a lot for you to be on here.
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  Yeah, I appreciate it. Always. That's always
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  good to hear. So I believe you are from Louisiana,
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  right? Correct. And I know you had mentioned
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  in your bio when we like connected on pod match
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  that you had worked in the theater and film indie
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  scene and Lafayette, Louisiana. And those are
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  words that I never would imagine being associated.
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  Because obviously when people think theater and
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  indie film scene, they'd think like New York,
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  LA, maybe Atlanta. But, uh, can you tell me what
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  the theater and indie film scene in Lafayette,
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  Louisiana is like? Well, it's, it's, it's in
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  Lafayette. It's very small, very, uh, fledgling.
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  It's, you know, I did tons of community theater
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  and university theater. So once I started getting
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  into that scene, once I kind of got that bug,
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  I just, I started auditioning for every play.
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  Even if it was a terrible play, I just, you know,
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  dinner theater and goofy comedies and dramas
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  and all that. And the indie film scene is, you
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  know, it's very indie. It's, you know, it's a
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  lot of low budget, no pay films and student films.
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  So I kind of got started doing the local student
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  films and worked with a guy who's actually works
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  for Marvel now. So but at that time, it was just.
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  you know, struggling actor and a guy who was
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  editing for the local news station and we did
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  a film together, but now he's, we've moved on
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  to bigger and better things. Do we know the person
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  who now works at Marvel that you used to work
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  with? No, he's a very kind of, you know, he's
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  one of the suits. He's behind the scenes. Yeah.
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  Can I just get a general vibe of what it's like
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  growing up in Louisiana? Cause, um, I hear Louisiana
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  and I just feel it in my bones. Like the, the,
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  the humidity, if there is any, the, the, the
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  heat, maybe the food I know down South is, is
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  well known for the cuisine. What was it like
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  growing up for you as a person and also as someone
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  who wanted to become an actor? Because again,
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  you know, I kind of see Louisiana like almost
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  any other place that's not like New York or LA
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  where. you got to wonder like, oh, like I have
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  this ambition and maybe this is not the right
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  place for me. And I might want to move up to
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  the big cities. Like, I don't know, just describe
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  that, that entire upbringing for you, because
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  I'm fascinated by that. It's, it's, you know,
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  it's a very working class community. Um, the
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  Cajun culture is very much do it yourself, pull
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  yourself by your bootstraps. You know, you get
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  things done, a lot of hunting and fishing, that
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  sort of thing. Um, and so, but. As far as being
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  an actor there, there wasn't much opportunity
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  when I lived there. I got an agent and I did
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  a few commercials and things like that. But as
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  far as a career in theater or film, that was
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  the furthest thing from my mind. And I needed
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  to leave to kind of spread my wings and start
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  to work consistently. And when we moved, we moved
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  to Houston, which the humidity and the heat is
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  just as bad as Louisiana, if not worse. When
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  we moved to Houston, that's when the film industry
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  in Louisiana really started to kind of blossom
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  and start taking on a life of its own. So it
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  was the absolute worst time for me to leave,
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  but it worked. It worked out for me because Houston
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  has a really good, it's a good place to kind
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  of get started. You can get an agent, you can
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  start working on indie film, a lot of corporate.
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  videos and commercials and things like that.
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  So I kind of learned the process of how to audition,
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  how to get an agent, how to work with casting
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  directors and kind of build those relationships.
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  And then that's at that point, that's when I
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  started kind of tapping into the industry in
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  Louisiana. And it's been a long, very kind of
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  marathon. uh, journey for me, uh, working in
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  the Southeast and then Atlanta started kind of,
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  uh, really getting a, uh, important scene in
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  the industry. So yeah, it's, it's a great place
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  to, it's, it's not close to anything. It's pretty
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  far from Dallas and Austin, New Mexico, Louisiana.
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  Um, but it's kind of equidistance from everything.
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  So it still took me four to six hours to get
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  anywhere to work. It worked out. work out for
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  me. You said we earlier, who did you move to
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  Houston with for your career? My wife. We actually
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  moved for her job. I was on my way to an industrial
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  corporate video in Louisiana. and kind of texting
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  my agent. And I was like, kind of frustrated.
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  I'm like, I need to be doing something, something
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  more. You know, I need to tap into these industries
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  in different parts of the country. And she suggested
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  like, why don't you go to Houston? There's, there's
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  a pretty small industry there that you can kind
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  of get started. And I'm like, yeah, I'm going
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  to tell my wife that we're going to move to Houston
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  for my, my career. That's doesn't promise any
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  success whatsoever. Cause that is that, that
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  can be tough for a partner who's not in the show
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  business industry to move with you. that sake
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  because it's very unstable, but it works out
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  because as you mentioned, she just happened to
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  find some work in Houston and thought it would
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  also work for your benefit. Yeah. Yeah. And she
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  texted me the same day and said, Hey, how would
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  you feel about moving to Houston? Which to me
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  was like, Oh man, that's serendipity right there.
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  And I always encourage young artists and actors
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  to find someone who's not in your field that
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  has a stable income career that can kind of supplement
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  your... pursuit of your dreams that that's very,
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  very inconsistent, very unstable. I was in college
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  at the University of Louisiana Lafayette with
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  my then girlfriend, wife now, and we were talking
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  to some friends and they were like, so what is
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  your girlfriend's major in chemical engineering?
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  And they're like, Oh man, that's that's smart.
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  Good job. She's smart. She's going to make a
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  lot of money. Yeah. That's good for you. So,
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  and they were like, well, what about you? And
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  I had switched to general studies from an art
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  major. I was an art major starting out and I
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  said, uh, general studies. And they were like,
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  That's okay. I'm like, that's good. That's good
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  enough. I mean, that'll do. That'll balance out
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  with her more stable career. So, yeah. So she's,
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  she's been supportive over the last 20 years
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  and, and, you know, it's been a very slow burn
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  for me building, building this, this career.
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  So, and she's, she's been supportive every step
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  of the way. Not only for financial stability,
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  but like to be with somebody who does not work
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  in show business. I feel like there is a better
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  sense of like self -esteem and security. Cause
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  you probably know. I mean, I can't imagine like
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  how many fellow actors you've met who are very
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  insecure, maybe rocky emotionally. Cause you
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  know, the industry does invite that. Um, so with
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  two actors being in a relationship, it could
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  go either way. I mean, it could either just.
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  be like, Oh, yay. I found someone who gets it,
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  who gets that I'll need to travel, I don't know,
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  eight or nine months out of the year to shoot
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  a film or I'm constantly going on auditions.
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  I don't know when my next job is. And I have
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  someone to talk to about the business. That's
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  great. Or it could just be like, Oh my God, like
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  I'm with someone who's probably doing better
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  than me career wise. And I'm insecure about that.
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  And I got to compare myself to them. And so you
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  just never know what you can get. But, um, I
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  know what you mean. Cause like as you know, someone
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  who, uh, not only podcasts, but also I occasionally
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  act locally here in Vermont and have done stuff
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  in LA and such. Um, yeah, it is a very all over
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  the place thing. And my wife here in Vermont,
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  she has a pretty stable job as a veterinary technician.
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  She's president of a dog rescue. So to be able
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  to just have that grounded reality of like, all
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  right, there is more to life than show business.
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  There is a financial stability that she has,
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  and I thankfully have it as well, but more importantly,
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  you know, uh, just having a better sense of security
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  and grounded reality, like with someone who doesn't
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  work in show business, it's, it's really, it's
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  really a gift. So I commend you for, for choosing
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  well with your wife. Yeah, we, we, we got together
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  in high school and we're off and on in college,
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  uh, until she was like, all right, it's time
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  to quit playing around. Let's, let's, you know,
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  let's, let's do the deed or, or you could have
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  me. Are you going to have anybody else? So who
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  do you pick? I'm like, okay, I pick you. We have
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  a very good, we play off of each other very well,
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  especially with parenting. She's left -brained,
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  I'm right -brained, so I'm the more kind of artsy,
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  free -spirited, and she's more practical, engineering,
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  mathematics, that kind of thing. So we work well
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  together. It's kind of a role reversal for us
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  because I'm kind of, you know, I stayed with
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  the kids when she went to work and I was a stay
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  -at -home dad and I would work at night bartending
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  or doing whatever I could do to kind of contribute.
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  And we have different parenting styles. So, you
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  know, she's a little more old school, you know,
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  it's like rub some dirt on it. get over it. And
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  I'm like, well, let's, let's, uh, let's talk
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  about our feelings. Like, what's going on? So
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  it's funny because you had a profession, you're
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  in a profession where, um, not only are you expressing
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  your own feelings, but you're compassionate and
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  understanding of others through playing other
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  characters. So yeah, no, I get it. I get it.
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  That, that, that makes sense. That you would
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  be that type of person. A lot of actors are insecure.
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  We're neurotic. It's a funny thing. And a lot
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  of, a lot of actors, it seems to be a common
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  thing that we have a little more toys in the
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  attic. We have a little more stuff going on a
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  little more baggage mentally and yeah I think
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  it just helps me with the stuff that I deal with
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  kind of bring that to characters and kind of,
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  and it's kind of cathartic too as well to kind
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  of play that in a role and kind of helps me deal
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  with what I'm going through. Industrial corporate
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  video. I just want to get an idea of what that
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  is. Um, cause like I, you know, just to borrow
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  from my past acting experience, cause every now
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  and then as an actor, you take on things that
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  you never thought you would take. And I remember
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  being in a PSA for opiates back in college. Uh,
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  so when you say industrial corporate video, I
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  think of stuff like that, but that's probably
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  nowhere near what you're talking about. Can you
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  explain what the concept of it is? Yeah, it's
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  you know, Houston has a has a lot of industry.
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  Here they have a lot of, you know, oil and gas
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  stuff. It's usually very boring, very dry, uh,
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  stuff, some pharmaceutical stuff. You know, I've
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  done voiceovers where I'm reading like 10 pages
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  of pharmaceutical jargon and it's not my favorite,
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  not my favorite thing to do. And I've done like
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  spokesperson stuff for like here, you know, we
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  at our company, we do, you know, all this tech
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  stuff that I have no idea what I'm saying. All
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  these training videos that you watch, all these
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  people that are in these industries, they have
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  to watch training videos at work. And a lot of
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  times you'll, you'll see me in those training
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  videos. I did a run, hide, fight video, gosh,
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  more than 20 years ago. And run, hide, fight,
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  run, hide, fight is, is how you handle an active
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  shooter. So yeah, so we were playing these roles
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  of people in an office building that are having
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  to deal with an active shooter. And what do we
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  do? How do we handle that? I get messages all
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  the time of people that are at work like, Hey,
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  I just saw you in the run high fight again, you
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  know, and, you know, I'm sitting there with a,
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  with a fire extinguisher ready to, ready to hit
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  the guy when he comes through the door. So stuff
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  like that, but, um, a lot more lighter material,
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  you know, that we have, we do vignettes about
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  inner office. uh behavior you know how do you
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  how do you handle your co -workers and to avoid
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  uh lawsuits and that sort of thing. Like this
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  is what you do at work. This is what you don't
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  do at work. Those are a little more fun. The
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  spokesperson stuff where I'm looking at camera
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  and I'm either hearing through an ear prompter,
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  all the lines that I have, which could be like
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  10, 15 pages worth of stuff, or reading a teleprompter.
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  Haven't done those in a while. Thankfully I've
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  been able to do some, you know, some film and
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  TV stuff since then that is a little more rewarding
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  and more my speed. Yeah, yeah, the, uh, the,
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  uh, what is it called? The run, hide, fight,
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  uh, video? Run, hide, fight. Yes. Yeah, it seems
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  like it's like the modern day equivalent of like
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  those eerie black and white PSAs that you would
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  see back in the day of like, oh, in the event
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  of like a nuclear attack or whatever, duck under
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  your desk in a classroom and stuff like that.
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  But yeah, no, I mean, unfortunately in America,
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  mass shootings are very common. So like those
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  type of videos that you do are very important.
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  And because it just hits so close to home, so
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  to speak, because it's something that we could
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  see in the news. Did you get that eerie feeling
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  going into it? Is it just another job to you?
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  What's that experience like? No, it's just another
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  job. It's pretty much just like working on a
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  set for a film or a TV series where there's violence
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  or there's all these things going on. I'm not
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  much of a method actor to where I embody the
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  character to the point where it's... crushing
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  my spirit. I just kind of roll with the, with
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  the dialogue and, and the circumstances and act
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  as if this is happening. And yeah, it doesn't
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  affect me too much. In my opinion, that's the
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  way that should be done. Cause like when I was
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  younger, as most young actors are around that
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  high school college period of time, like you
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  look at a, I don't know, you look at a Marlon
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  Brando or Daniel Day -Lewis, like those iconic
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  actors that have done the method and you think,
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  Oh wow. Like that's an authentic actor. Like
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  that's the person that I want to be. So I remember
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  doing a um, uh, the, the school shooter play,
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  bang, bang, you're dead. I don't know if you're
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  familiar. Sounds familiar. Yeah. Yeah. And I
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  was the lead in that in high school. So I was
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  like, all right, I got to get into the mindset,
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  into the mood of a school shooter. So I got to
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  listen to heavy metal music beforehand. I really
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  got to distance myself from everybody else. Like
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  I took it really intensely and seriously when
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  I was younger. And then over the course of time,
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  uh, when I've seen myself become emotionally
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  affected by diving deep into the method, I took
• 14:15
  a break from acting and then I came back into
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  it and just. I mean, I saw it similarly to how
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  you saw it. It was like a mixture of, okay, this
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  is a job that I'm here to do, but also, I get
• 14:26
  to play pretend. Like, this is a fun thing, and
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  I can step in the character for about two hours
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  on stage or two hours in a movie, and then I
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  could just step out of it and go back to my real
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  life. It doesn't have to be that serious, so...
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  Yeah, I like that. Yeah, I mean, and, you know,
• 14:43
  it works for them. Daniel Day -Lewis, people
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  like that. that embody the character for the
• 14:49
  entire time they're on the film and want to be
• 14:51
  called Abraham Lincoln or whatever, works for
• 14:54
  them. And for me, there's a fine line between
• 14:58
  embodying a character and going too far to where
• 15:01
  having something like Keith Ledger, where he
• 15:02
  just engrossed himself in this role and it...
• 15:05
  You know, it killed him. So you gotta, you gotta
• 15:07
  keep a balance between those, those two worlds
• 15:10
  so that you can kind of function in society and,
• 15:13
  and with your family and things like that. So,
• 15:16
  yeah. Yeah. I think with Heath, um, if I'm not
• 15:18
  mistaken, he already had substance use issues
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  and wasn't sleeping well going into preparing
• 15:25
  for the Joker. And I remember reading something
• 15:27
  where, like the guy would just lock himself in
• 15:29
  a hotel room for God knows how long isolate himself
• 15:32
  from his real life of his partner. time i think
• 15:35
  michelle williams and his and his kid and i think
• 15:37
  he would journal and probably like dive into
• 15:39
  like batman joker comic books yes it's an iconic
• 15:42
  performance obviously like when most people think
• 15:44
  of like the best joker they they will think of
• 15:46
  heath lexer's performance but at what cost you
• 15:49
  know what i mean because like the guy's no longer
• 15:50
  here with us to give us more performances you
• 15:55
  did have a role. I would say a pretty important,
• 15:59
  memorable role in the Academy Award winning movie
• 16:02
  Sinners. And you had mentioned your upbringing
• 16:05
  in Louisiana and I think Sinners shot in Louisiana,
• 16:08
  correct? It did. Yeah. So is that how you got
• 16:11
  the easy connection to audition? Like how did
• 16:12
  you... Well, first of all, can you tell us for
• 16:15
  the audience who needs a refresher, what is your
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  character in the movie? Well, I'm Hogwood in
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  the film. Not very popular character, very popular
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  with my friends and family that went to the movies
• 16:25
  with me. to see it. The people in the audience
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  were a little taken aback when I showed up and
• 16:29
  our whole row started cheering. They kind of
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  looked and was like, what is wrong with these
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  people, you know? And we had to explain afterwards
• 16:36
  like, oh, this is Hogwood. He was in the movie.
• 16:39
  It's like, oh, OK. But yeah, it's Hogwood is
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  a not so nice grand dragon of the clan who sells
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  the sawmill to smoke and stack for their juke
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  joint. but doesn't have very good intentions
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  in the end. And you have a very, I would say
• 16:59
  almost viral YouTube scene that I literally watched
• 17:01
  before I got on with you. The moment where, um,
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  uh, I believe you first meet the Michael B Jordan
• 17:07
  twins, smoke and stack. And I think the, uh,
• 17:10
  the dialogue that anybody can quote now is you
• 17:13
  boys twins. Nah, we cousins. You're that guy.
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  You are the extremely, uh, racist white guy that's
• 17:21
  trying to sell the Jews. joint to these black
• 17:24
  gentlemen that's coming from, I think, Chicago.
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  They're coming down south to try to make a juke
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  joint business happen. And then, I mean, sorry,
• 17:33
  spoiler alert. I mean, the movie's over a year
• 17:35
  old right now, but you have a pretty memorable
• 17:40
  death scene at the end with... I forget which
• 17:43
  one of the Michael B. Jordan twins ends up being
• 17:44
  alive. Was it Smoke? Was it Stack? Who kills
• 17:46
  you? Good question. I'm having trouble remembering
• 17:50
  now. I think the more... free spirited one. So
• 17:53
  stack was like the more like animated, energetic,
• 17:57
  charismatic one who eventually gets infected
• 18:00
  by the white racist vampire of it all. And he,
• 18:03
  and he dies and smoke the more reserved of the
• 18:06
  twins is left standing. And he has vengeance
• 18:09
  that he wants to take on anybody who is racist
• 18:13
  and white in this movie, including yourself.
• 18:16
  So yeah, so yeah, he shoots you down like a motherfucker
• 18:18
  at the end when it's discovered that you were
• 18:21
  wrongfully trying to take advantage of these
• 18:23
  guys. And I mean, so it was shot in Louisiana,
• 18:29
  the entire movie or most of the movie, do you
• 18:31
  know? They probably did some stuff on a soundstage
• 18:34
  somewhere in LA, but I wasn't a part of that.
• 18:36
  All my stuff was shot in Louisiana in the heat
• 18:39
  of summer. Yeah, so, and that's another aspect
• 18:44
  of the film that gets a lot of cheers in the
• 18:47
  theater when my... My my gun down scene starts
• 18:53
  and then we shot that we shot that scene first.
• 18:55
  So that was the first thing we shot How does
• 18:58
  that was my introduction? Can I ask how it feels
• 19:01
  to be in a theater and to know that your character
• 19:04
  is going to be very hated and when you get killed
• 19:06
  people are going to cheer like are you prideful
• 19:09
  because it's like oh people are feeling these
• 19:11
  intense emotions about my character that means
• 19:12
  I did my job right or is this kind of or does
• 19:15
  this invoke some weird feeling of like oh my
• 19:17
  god I wonder if someone's gonna berate me after
• 19:19
  the theater showing because they really hated
• 19:21
  my character and they think that I'm my character
• 19:23
  and like what does that feel like? Yes I mean
• 19:25
  sometimes audiences have a have a hard time distinguishing
• 19:29
  between somebody I play on, on a film or TV show
• 19:31
  and, and who I am in real life. I've gotten a
• 19:34
  little bit of some messages from people here
• 19:35
  and there. It's like, I can't believe you did
• 19:37
  that. And I'm like, Hey, that's just a, it's
• 19:39
  a movie, but this, this is awesome. I love it.
• 19:41
  I love when people cheer when I die and talk
• 19:43
  about how, Oh man, you were so terrible. I was
• 19:46
  like, yes, you know, I, I did my job. Yeah, absolutely.
• 19:51
  Love it. Because you already have that local
• 19:52
  connection and upbringing to Louisiana, how did
• 19:56
  the whole process begin with you getting centers?
• 20:00
  Was it an audition? Was it an offer because you're
• 20:02
  local? How did that all process start? I was
• 20:04
  here living in Houston, so I was still pretty
• 20:07
  far distance from Louisiana. But the casting
• 20:10
  director, Megan Lewis, I had been working with
• 20:14
  for probably 10 years or so. So we had a really
• 20:17
  good relationship. This was just another audition,
• 20:20
  to be honest with you. I get so many, and a lot
• 20:24
  of times I don't really know. I don't have time
• 20:26
  to research everything associated with the film.
• 20:29
  I get the sides, I get the scene that I'm doing,
• 20:31
  and I try to build a character within a few days
• 20:33
  and give it my best shot. And that's pretty much
• 20:36
  what happened. I think I taped. I sent a tape
• 20:39
  first, I usually do, although I don't remember,
• 20:42
  but I went to New Orleans for a callback and
• 20:45
  didn't know anything about the film, didn't know
• 20:46
  who was starring in it, didn't know who was directing
• 20:49
  it, none of that. I had the scene that I was
• 20:51
  doing, I prepared for that and I went in and
• 20:54
  read for Megan Lewis and Ryan Coogler at the
• 20:58
  time, who I didn't realize was Ryan Coogler.
• 21:02
  Like, I went in the room with him, and I'm like,
• 21:04
  hey. Mr. Black Panther and Fruitvale Station.
• 21:07
  I knew all his movies, but I didn't connect the
• 21:10
  dots to where, like, oh, that's the guy who did
• 21:11
  that. Which is good. I prefer that. I prefer
• 21:15
  just going in and just seeing another human being.
• 21:19
  It's like, oh, you got an audition in a few days.
• 21:22
  Uh, you're going to meet with Martin Scorsese
• 21:24
  and you're going to meet with this right now.
• 21:25
  I don't want to know any of that. Just, just
• 21:27
  give me the scene. Let me go in and do my thing.
• 21:29
  So I went in and, and I did the scene a couple
• 21:32
  of times. He gave me some, some redirection and
• 21:35
  I did it again and went really well. I got a
• 21:38
  little hug from him and I left and I'm like,
• 21:40
  all right, cool. I think that, I think that went
• 21:41
  well. It's taken me a long time to kind of approach
• 21:44
  auditions that way, you know, to go in and do
• 21:46
  my thing and leave and forget about it. But,
• 21:48
  uh, later on I met I'm at my sister's house in
• 21:51
  Baton Rouge and I'm just scrolling on my phone
• 21:53
  and I see Ryan Coogler and Michael B. Jordan
• 21:55
  set to film outside New Orleans on this. I'm
• 21:58
  like, oh, cool. That's the guy I met today. Michael
• 22:03
  B. Jordan's in this. Oh my God. Wow. I hugged
• 22:07
  him today and Michael B. Jordan's in it. Cool.
• 22:09
  It's like, wow, this is cool. I think I got a
• 22:12
  decent shot to do this movie. And a few days
• 22:14
  later they said, hey, we want to have you come
• 22:17
  in for a table read which is just you know the
• 22:19
  cast and everybody just sitting around and reading
• 22:21
  the movie out loud so everybody can hear it and
• 22:24
  kind of get an idea of what it sounds like and
• 22:26
  what it's gonna look like I figured they hadn't
• 22:28
  offered me the role yet but I figured that was
• 22:29
  a pretty good sign that if they wanted me to
• 22:31
  come in for the table read that I was gonna had
• 22:33
  a good shot of booking it so I go in there and
• 22:35
  I'm reading And you read for a couple of different
• 22:38
  roles. If you have a smaller role that's like,
• 22:40
  Hey, can you read for this and this and this?
• 22:42
  It's like, yeah, sure. So I'm thumbing through
• 22:44
  the script and I'm like, and they have me singing
• 22:46
  in the table read. And I was like, I looked at
• 22:49
  Megan, I'm like, you got me singing. So I was
• 22:51
  like, all right, I'm just going to, I'm just
• 22:52
  going to wing it. And I'm sitting there and Haley
• 22:54
  Steinfeld sitting across from me and I'm, I'm
• 22:56
  singing what ends up being really beautiful.
• 23:01
  amazing performances in the movie. I'm singing
• 23:03
  it really, really badly in the table read across
• 23:05
  from Haley Steinfeld. So, and then later on in
• 23:08
  the script, it's like, and the vampires arrive.
• 23:10
  And I'm like, I looked around the room. I'm like,
• 23:13
  seriously? You didn't know that this was going
• 23:17
  to be a vampire heavy movie going into it. Hadn't
• 23:19
  read the script or anything. So that was the
• 23:21
  first time reading it. I was very taken aback
• 23:24
  by that. And I was a little skeptical to be honest
• 23:26
  with you. I was like, okay. It's like, I know
• 23:28
  you did, you know, Fruitvale and Black Panther,
• 23:31
  but this is a whole different animal. And, you
• 23:34
  know, it's like, I hope you can pull it off.
• 23:35
  And thankfully, they did. Yeah, because when
• 23:37
  I first heard about this movie, I think it was
• 23:40
  someone sort of casually talked about it as like
• 23:43
  this vampire horror musical experience. And I
• 23:46
  was like, huh? But, you know, you see the name
• 23:49
  Ryan Coogler, you see Michael B. Jordan attached,
• 23:52
  and then, of course, all the critical and audience
• 23:54
  buzz happening with Sinners while I was still
• 23:57
  in theaters. My wife and I were curious, and
• 23:59
  we saw it, and, of course, it was a phenomenal
• 24:01
  piece of work, and I had to see it again to,
• 24:04
  you know, reflect on it when all the Academy
• 24:07
  Award nominations came out, and it ended up winning
• 24:10
  a good amount of awards. So I remember talking
• 24:14
  about it on this very podcast with my sister
• 24:15
  and her friend, and... Yeah, I mean, so I remember
• 24:20
  you not singing, but did you even sing? So this
• 24:26
  was like an original thing that was gonna be
• 24:28
  tested for the film, but it didn't end up in
• 24:29
  the final cut, because I was like, wait, did
• 24:31
  he sing in the film? I was reading for other
• 24:33
  characters. Oh, okay, that makes sense. Not just
• 24:36
  Hogwood. So I was singing... you know, uh, the
• 24:38
  other roles, I guess the, the, the vampires,
• 24:41
  you know, like the group of the three vampires
• 24:42
  that I'm going to pick Robin clean. Yeah. Okay.
• 24:45
  Yes. I think I did sing the pick for Robin clean
• 24:49
  in the, in the, in the table read. And you thought
• 24:51
  that you didn't do a good job or how? I mean,
• 24:54
  it was, it was, it was awful. I didn't know.
• 24:56
  I didn't know the song. I didn't know how it
• 24:58
  went. I just was, uh, I'm sure it was humorous
• 25:03
  to the rest of the cast. Just listen to me. Are
• 25:05
  you a trained singer at all? Have you sung? Oh,
• 25:07
  no. Okay. Absolutely not. I can carry a tune
• 25:10
  in a bucket. That's about as far as I can take
• 25:13
  it. I remember reading going to a Southeastern
• 25:18
  theater conference to go to audition for all
• 25:21
  these theaters all over the country. And musicals
• 25:23
  was a big thing. And I definitely handicapped
• 25:25
  myself going in. when I was like, yeah, I don't
• 25:27
  sing, I don't sing. And I still read for these
• 25:30
  theater companies and they were like, so do you
• 25:32
  not sing at all? Can you just sing me Happy Birthday?
• 25:36
  So I did that a few times. Thankfully, I got
• 25:39
  cast in an outdoor drama in Ohio where it was
• 25:42
  like the frontier. type stuff and I didn't have
• 25:44
  to I didn't have to sing I could just right I
• 25:46
  had to learn how to ride a horse bareback but
• 25:48
  I didn't have to sing oh god yeah wow riding
• 25:50
  a horse bareback you know I I was literally watching
• 25:53
  something where I saw someone running uh at at
• 25:56
  the speed with the with the horse whatever you
• 25:58
  call it galloping or whatever the fuck And I'm
• 25:59
  just like, Oh my God, I would be, uh, I would
• 26:02
  probably piss my pants if I had to do that. So
• 26:04
  yeah, because like you have to, like, I would
• 26:09
  imagine develop a chemistry with the horse, the
• 26:11
  horse has to trust you like that whole thing.
• 26:13
  And you don't want to fall off. Right. Yeah.
• 26:15
  And I fell off. plenty of times learning. Um,
• 26:19
  and it, it's, it's, it's, uh, it is terrifying
• 26:22
  because, and I just did a motorcycle course.
• 26:24
  So I learned how to ride a motorcycle, which
• 26:26
  that you have a little more control of, of the
• 26:29
  machine. You control the throttle and the steering
• 26:31
  and all that. And a horse is like, it's got a
• 26:34
  mind of its own and it's spooked. Something happens.
• 26:37
  You know, I just remember when we were When we
• 26:39
  started to get more advanced in our learning,
• 26:41
  we just stood at one opposite end of a field
• 26:44
  and one of the trainers was like, all right,
• 26:46
  we're going to take these horses full speed.
• 26:48
  down the length of this field and it was just
• 26:50
  like this anxiety but this exhilaration of like
• 26:53
  okay it was fucking amazing just running and
• 26:56
  we had to go down like a lower ravine and and
• 26:58
  we were running full speed and if i would have
• 27:01
  fell off that thing who knows what would have
• 27:03
  happened but we got to the end and it was like
• 27:04
  man that was amazing it's a scary thing because
• 27:06
  the older you get i rode when i was younger And
• 27:09
  you can handle that a little bit better when
• 27:11
  you're younger, but when you get older, man,
• 27:13
  you're high up on that horse, and the ground
• 27:16
  looks so far away. So when you fall off a horse,
• 27:19
  when you're getting up in years, it's a little
• 27:21
  harder on your body and it's a little more scary.
• 27:23
  I would imagine. rest in peace to Christopher
• 27:26
  Reeve, but like literally anytime I think about
• 27:28
  like doing any activity on a horse, I get scared
• 27:30
  that I might end up like how he unfortunately
• 27:33
  ended up before he passed away. And it's like,
• 27:35
  you got to be careful. I mean, it's, it's, it
• 27:37
  takes a lot of trust and patience and, and chemistry
• 27:39
  and, you know, with the horse. So I commend anybody
• 27:42
  who, who is able to get on a horse and, and make
• 27:45
  it happen. Um, so I mean, I'm just kind of fascinated
• 27:49
  by how you land an audition with this giant movie.
• 27:53
  Cause I would assume that like you, I mean, hell,
• 27:57
  looking at your IMDB and looking at your reel,
• 27:59
  like you have racked up an impressive list of
• 28:01
  credits leading up to centers and you have an
• 28:04
  agent and based on the credits and the agent
• 28:08
  that you have, they're able to connect you with
• 28:11
  auditions for big movies like this. And as you
• 28:16
  had mentioned, yeah, it was very hot. I remember
• 28:18
  talking to my sister and her best friend about
• 28:21
  the stories about how, like... disgustingly hot.
• 28:24
  It was like, and I forget, like it was the Hollywood
• 28:26
  reporter had some reference about how hot it
• 28:28
  was in New Orleans shooting that film. But, um,
• 28:31
  when you're shooting in that kind of heat, is
• 28:34
  it just absolutely miserable or in a way does
• 28:38
  it add to the, um, dramatic intensity tension,
• 28:43
  so to speak of the film? Like, can, can you talk
• 28:45
  about that? It was disgustingly. hot. There was
• 28:48
  nobody coming up to me and spraying me to make
• 28:50
  sure I looked sweaty. I was sweating through
• 28:52
  multiple wardrobe changes. You always see those
• 28:55
  old movies with, you know, they're in a club
• 28:57
  and everybody's sweating and the ceiling fan
• 28:59
  is turning really slow. You know, it's like,
• 29:01
  why don't these people turn the fans up high?
• 29:03
  Like what's going on here? This is Cuba or wherever
• 29:06
  it is because it is a miserable, a miserable
• 29:08
  scene. And I also had a dip in my mouth the entire
• 29:11
  time. What does that mean? Like tobacco like
• 29:15
  a like not chewing tobacco, but like school like
• 29:18
  your character or yes, okay So I kind of prepared
• 29:23
  I went and got some some school at the gas station
• 29:26
  and and I ran my lines You know smoked a couple
• 29:29
  cigarettes and got that nicotine in my brain
• 29:31
  while I was running the line so that I could
• 29:33
  kind of prepare myself because you do kind of
• 29:35
  get a Head rush and it changes you physically
• 29:40
  Did they want you to smoke real tobacco for the
• 29:41
  film or can you like get away with like fake?
• 29:44
  No, they they didn't want me to do real tobacco
• 29:46
  They actually gave me beef jerky to kind of just
• 29:48
  stick in my lip and and and do that And I did
• 29:51
  the scene a couple times and I'm like I had this
• 29:53
  skull with me I'm just gonna do that and they're
• 29:55
  like, okay Yeah, whatever you whatever you want
• 29:57
  to do and I wanted it to look real. I wanted
• 29:59
  it to feel real I wanted it I wanted my spit
• 30:02
  because you know, he spits a couple of times
• 30:04
  They a lot of people experience in that I'm like,
• 30:07
  oh that was so symbolic when you when you spit
• 30:09
  at that particular time. And I'm like, guys with
• 30:12
  the dip in their mouth, they spit. And it did
• 30:14
  say in the script a couple of times, he spits
• 30:16
  here, he spits here. The spit coming out, this
• 30:18
  brown glob. And there was one of the times when
• 30:21
  one of the smokestack twins says, did you clean
• 30:24
  these floors? And I was like, what was on them?
• 30:28
  And I told Ryan, I was like, it would really
• 30:31
  be funny if I spit right when he says, what was
• 30:34
  on these floors? Did you clean them? And he kind
• 30:36
  of laughed. And it ends up in the movie and it's
• 30:40
  a kind of a humorous kind of situation where
• 30:43
  I'm like, this is what I think of you too. And
• 30:45
  this is what I think of this place. And I'm like,
• 30:47
  just give me my money and let me be on my way.
• 30:50
  So it sounds like Ryan is always open to suggestions
• 30:52
  from actors like ad libs or improv suggestions,
• 30:55
  so to speak. And you came up with that spit.
• 30:57
  That's awesome. Yeah. Yeah. He really put me
• 31:00
  at ease. Both those guys, man. I can't. say enough
• 31:04
  about them as artists and they're so talented
• 31:07
  and brilliant, but really, really super solid
• 31:10
  human guys. They're just super, uh, Ryan is so
• 31:13
  chill. You know, very, very chill guy. He put
• 31:15
  me at ease from the beginning. It's always a
• 31:17
  little bit overwhelming when you get on a set
• 31:19
  of that size and you're working with an A -lister
• 31:21
  and, you know, a big time director and it can
• 31:24
  be overwhelming. Even though I've done lots of
• 31:26
  stuff, every new project is a new experience
• 31:28
  with new people and new personalities, the way
• 31:31
  they want to do things and you have to learn
• 31:33
  on the fly. But he did let us play. And once
• 31:36
  I get comfortable, I kind of just throw things
• 31:37
  out there and sometimes they keep it, sometimes
• 31:40
  they don't. But yeah, it's always nice when they
• 31:42
  find a little nugget that you've contributed
• 31:45
  and decide to keep it in. Talk about the, because
• 31:47
  I've heard so much about how there is a tremendous
• 31:50
  amount of patience involved when you're a film
• 31:52
  actor on set, because you could be doing multiple
• 31:54
  takes. There could be like 12 or 13 hours where
• 31:57
  you're in your trailer and you're waiting to
• 31:59
  be used. What was that like? Like, did you have
• 32:04
  to do multiple takes? Did you get it in one or
• 32:06
  two takes? What was it like to do that kind of
• 32:09
  a, I would assume, long day with people of Michael
• 32:13
  B. Jordan and Ryan Coogler's caliber? Like, what
• 32:15
  did you experience? There is a lot of hurry up
• 32:18
  and wait in the film industry. It's a little
• 32:21
  bit harder when you only have like one scene
• 32:24
  and you're sitting in your trailer. Or even worse
• 32:27
  a honey wagon, which is the really tiny trailers
• 32:29
  That's what like the day players and things the
• 32:31
  smaller rolls get enough i've stayed in plenty
• 32:33
  of those and they're cramped and they're uncomfortable
• 32:36
  And you're just you're just sitting in there
• 32:38
  running your lines for six eight hours And finally
• 32:42
  you get your shot to go to set and rehearse it
• 32:44
  and shoot it Um, and and sometimes it's a magic
• 32:47
  hour where okay, we got the sunlight just right
• 32:49
  So we need to get this right on the first couple
• 32:52
  of takes. I'm like, okay, uh, but for this I
• 32:55
  really got comfortable, uh, you know, being on
• 32:58
  set and being there all day long. Uh, you know,
• 33:00
  there are, there's still lots of times where
• 33:02
  you get, you know, you gotta bring a book and
• 33:04
  sit, sit off to the side and keep yourself busy,
• 33:07
  uh, while they're, you know, setting up explosions
• 33:11
  for, you know, six or eight hours. So it's, it's
• 33:13
  stuff that you're not involved in. But the thing
• 33:15
  about centers, it was, there were so many complicated
• 33:18
  shots, you know, when you shoot, when you're
• 33:19
  shooting twins, Michael would, he would play
• 33:21
  one character. He played one of the twins. and
• 33:24
  go and change into the other character, come
• 33:27
  back and we would shoot the opposite scene. And
• 33:29
  everybody's under a lot of pressure. They want
• 33:32
  to make a good movie. They want to make it on
• 33:34
  time. They want to make it under budget. All
• 33:36
  these things with all these complicated shots
• 33:38
  in the heat. Can you be specific as to how hot
• 33:43
  it was? What was the temperature? What was the
• 33:45
  humidity level? Give me a picture. I mean, I
• 33:48
  don't know if you've ever been to Texas or Louisiana.
• 33:50
  I have not. I've heard it's terrible in the summer.
• 33:53
  Yeah, it's oppressive. I walk the dog in the
• 33:57
  morning and in the afternoon, and there's no
• 34:00
  reason to take a shower unless you know you're
• 34:02
  not gonna go outside anymore. It's like, if I'm
• 34:05
  gonna go outside and walk the dog at four o 'clock,
• 34:08
  then I'm gonna take a shower after that, but
• 34:10
  it is... It is oppressive. I mean, you get used
• 34:14
  to it. You really got to, we just moved my daughter
• 34:16
  in to her Frisco apartment. She just graduated
• 34:19
  from Texas A &M. My wife and I and her took it
• 34:21
  upon ourselves to move all our stuff from her
• 34:23
  dorm at A &M to, to her Frisco apartment. And,
• 34:27
  you know, we're moving stuff. We've got the dolly
• 34:29
  and we kind of taking a break in the, uh, in
• 34:31
  the apartment. It's brand new apartment. So that
• 34:33
  a lot of the things didn't work quite right.
• 34:36
  There was still kind of some glitches and things
• 34:37
  they were trying to fix. It's like, yeah, I need
• 34:39
  to, I need to go downstairs and get some water.
• 34:41
  My wife's like, yeah. We can get water in a second.
• 34:43
  I'm like, no, no, I need water right now. Yeah.
• 34:47
  Before I do anything else. It's like, you know,
• 34:49
  you really got to in Texas and you really got
• 34:51
  to listen to yourself and hydrate if you're going
• 34:54
  to be doing any kind of work like that. So yeah,
• 34:56
  I can't explain it to people unless they've experienced
• 34:59
  it. It's you walk outside and it's just like
• 35:01
  this burst of heat that just knocks you on your
• 35:05
  ass. Yeah. So to pay the bills, I Uber and Lyft
• 35:09
  drive in Burlington, Vermont, and I was taking
• 35:12
  a couple of Arizonians back to the airport so
• 35:15
  they could go home. And to hear them describe
• 35:18
  100 degrees as beautiful, that's when I knew
• 35:20
  that humidity, like, really makes a big difference
• 35:23
  because I mean, I don't, I mean, have you experienced
• 35:26
  a dry heat 100 versus a humid 100 and like, or
• 35:30
  has it only been humidity for you? Cause it's
• 35:32
  been humidity for me, you know, Midwest. Yeah.
• 35:35
  I've, I've worked in, in New Mexico quite a lot.
• 35:38
  And, and yeah, to me, it's beautiful. Like I
• 35:40
  never felt uncomfortable in New Mexico. I, you
• 35:44
  know, at night, when I wasn't prepared for the
• 35:46
  cold at night, that, that was, that was a wake
• 35:49
  up call. But yeah, when people say, oh, Arizona
• 35:52
  heat, I'm like, yeah, you don't know heat, Texas,
• 35:54
  Louisiana. It's, it's a whole other, whole other
• 35:56
  animal, man. It's it's New Mexico is beautiful.
• 35:59
  compared to Texas and Louisiana, not so much.
• 36:02
  Yeah. I mean, the heat is just great places to
• 36:05
  live, but yeah, you gotta, you gotta, you gotta
• 36:06
  adjust and stay hydrated for sure. When you succeed,
• 36:10
  as you did with the audition for Sinners, did
• 36:15
  you take a moment to sit back and reflect on
• 36:18
  what it is about your audition that made Ryan
• 36:22
  Kluger say, yes, that's the right guy to play
• 36:24
  Hogwood? Can you deduct what that might have
• 36:28
  been? I honestly don't think about it too much.
• 36:31
  I overthink about it before the audition. I try
• 36:34
  to prepare, over -prepare, and try to get as
• 36:36
  ready as possible. once I go in there and I do
• 36:39
  my thing and for me it's very important to stay
• 36:42
  in the moment when you're when you're you're
• 36:44
  auditioning because all these all these nerves
• 36:46
  and anxiety can kind of get in the way of what
• 36:48
  you're trying trying to convey to try to convey
• 36:50
  this gift that I think I've been blessed with
• 36:53
  to this this talent that I think I have you really
• 36:56
  have to be comfortable with yourself and and
• 36:58
  be in the moment when you do that once once I
• 37:01
  do my thing and I know it I feel like I did well
• 37:04
  whether whatever they think is not up to me so
• 37:06
  go I'll go in there and I do my thing and I'm
• 37:08
  confident that I gave a good performance and
• 37:11
  I prepared well. And once they say you booked
• 37:14
  it, then I'm like, all right, on to the next
• 37:15
  thing. I don't really think about what happened
• 37:17
  leading up to it. I do kind of second guess myself.
• 37:20
  I'll look at old tapes of stuff that I didn't
• 37:22
  book and I'll be like, what did I do wrong or
• 37:25
  what could I have done different? And a lot of
• 37:27
  times I just watch the tape and I'm like, yeah,
• 37:29
  I like what I did. Like it didn't, it didn't
• 37:31
  fit their idea of what they wanted or, or sometimes
• 37:34
  it's, it's, there's all these factors that aren't
• 37:36
  in your control. You know, I'll read you something
• 37:38
  and, and it comes out and it's a woman. Or it's,
• 37:42
  it's somebody older, somebody younger. So there's
• 37:44
  so many things that are out of your control.
• 37:45
  You really have to just trust yourself and give
• 37:47
  your interpretation of what you think is on the
• 37:50
  page. That mindset will sustain you for enacting
• 37:53
  for years to come because it's so easy and almost
• 37:55
  a rookie mistake for an actor to audition for
• 37:58
  something. They don't get it. And then they take
• 37:59
  it personally. Like, Oh my God, it was something
• 38:01
  about the way I looked or the specific way I
• 38:03
  said this line and that line. They make it about
• 38:05
  themselves. Like I I'm a terrible person because
• 38:08
  they did not choose me. for this role. And yeah,
• 38:12
  it has nothing to do with you. Like you are still
• 38:15
  talented and they're just simply looking for
• 38:18
  something else. And maybe they'll keep you in
• 38:20
  mind for something else. Just being able to remove
• 38:23
  yourself from the casting process and know that
• 38:26
  it's out of your control. And the only thing
• 38:28
  you can do is give the best audition that you
• 38:30
  can as yourself. Like, yeah, that's, that's,
• 38:33
  that's the golden thing. Yeah. And a lot of times
• 38:35
  they want to get to know you. So it's like you
• 38:37
  go in for an audition and they're like, we have
• 38:39
  a good rapport, you know, you have to show them
• 38:41
  your personality. So sometimes they just, we
• 38:44
  don't, we don't hit it off personally. And that,
• 38:46
  that could be something had nothing to do with
• 38:48
  your performance. And that's, that's the thing
• 38:49
  about that. I missed of going in the room because
• 38:52
  that does, that hasn't happened nearly as much
• 38:54
  since COVID. There are a lot of tapes. We said
• 38:56
  tapes, uh, we don't get to go and travel and
• 39:00
  be in the room with those people and have a connection
• 39:02
  and an interaction where you can say, How about
• 39:05
  I try this? Do you mind if I say the lines like
• 39:08
  this? Can we try that? And they're almost always
• 39:11
  open to that. They're like, yeah, yeah, let's
• 39:14
  see what you think. Cause a lot of times they
• 39:15
  don't know what they want until it comes in and
• 39:18
  delivers something that they hadn't thought about.
• 39:20
  And that's happened to me a few times too. Tell
• 39:22
  me your reaction when Sinners got the recognition
• 39:25
  from the Academy that it did, because at first,
• 39:28
  I mean, the nominations came out and it literally
• 39:30
  broke the record. I believe it was like the most
• 39:32
  nominated film in Academy Award history. So there's
• 39:35
  that. And then there's the actual ceremony where
• 39:38
  Michael B. Jordan wins best actor and Ryan Coogler
• 39:41
  wins. Best Original Screenplay, and I forgot,
• 39:44
  there was a wonderful woman, I believe she won
• 39:47
  Best Cinematography? Yeah, Arkapal won Best Cinematography.
• 39:53
  Yeah, she won as well. Yeah, take me through
• 39:55
  your reaction to Sinners getting all these accolades,
• 39:58
  and is the entire cast and crew, including yourself,
• 40:01
  or do they get invited to the ceremony? Like,
• 40:04
  what's your relationship as an actor involved
• 40:06
  in this film when it gets this big praise from
• 40:09
  the Academy Awards? Yeah, I mean, I am a little
• 40:11
  lower on the totem poles for those people. I
• 40:14
  didn't get invited to everything. I didn't get
• 40:17
  invited to the premiere, which was awesome. Awesome.
• 40:20
  Yeah, so that was cool. When I went to the premiere
• 40:22
  in New York, you know, I had never been to a
• 40:26
  premiere there. And you know, so I walked to
• 40:29
  the theater and I'm wearing my son's cowboy boots.
• 40:32
  I had this outfit picked out to wear like, yeah,
• 40:34
  I don't want to be a pretentious kind of Hollywood
• 40:36
  guy and wear something kind of flamboyant. I'm
• 40:39
  like, hey, I'm a Texas guy. I'm going to wear
• 40:41
  sport coats and boots, and I'm going to be Texas
• 40:43
  chic for this thing. I looked quite a bit different
• 40:46
  than I did when I was in the movie. I had lost,
• 40:48
  thankfully, like 20 pounds and had the goatee
• 40:51
  and nobody knew who I was. So I show up to the
• 40:55
  premiere and I'm like walking to the red carpet.
• 40:57
  And of course, security is like guys with earpieces
• 40:59
  that look like Navy SEALs are all standing around,
• 41:01
  you know, and I'm like, okay. And I just kind
• 41:03
  of very timidly, you know, like, Hey, I think
• 41:06
  I'm supposed to be over there. It's like, they
• 41:08
  look at me and they're like, no, no, no, you
• 41:10
  have to go over there. I'm like, okay. And I'm
• 41:12
  calling my agent like, I can't get on this red
• 41:15
  carpet. Like I don't know what to do. And my
• 41:17
  wife is a lot more forward. She's like, just
• 41:19
  tell them who you are. Exactly. Name drop yourself,
• 41:24
  you know? Yeah. So after a couple of attempts
• 41:26
  that were unsuccessful, I finally walked up to
• 41:29
  a guy and I'm like, I really think I'm supposed
• 41:31
  to be on the red carpet. And he's like, well,
• 41:32
  do you have any credentials? Like, who are you?
• 41:35
  And I'm like, I pulled up the IMDB and I'm like,
• 41:37
  well, that's me. I'm in the movie. He's like,
• 41:40
  oh, okay. Come on in and I go in and I'm and
• 41:44
  then I thought oh give them your name like they
• 41:46
  might recognize your name So I got thankfully
• 41:49
  when I got in they were like, yeah Oh Dave, yeah,
• 41:51
  and they gave me a little envelope with my tickets
• 41:53
  and everything and did the whole red carpet Thing
• 41:56
  people taking pictures like we don't know who
• 41:58
  he is, but he might be somebody let's let's let's
• 42:00
  I sticks pictures of him in case he ends up being
• 42:03
  important I did a couple of interviews on the
• 42:05
  red carpet and we did I did one for letterbox
• 42:07
  I didn't know what letterbox was. Yes a website.
• 42:10
  I'm not familiar with it. Yeah But apparently
• 42:13
  it's kind of important in the industry and apparently
• 42:16
  we're with letterbox. So there's a letterbox.
• 42:19
  Yeah, so Like give us give us your four favorite
• 42:24
  movies so they come it was kind of they spring
• 42:26
  it on you and so I gave my my four movies and
• 42:29
  You know and and then they shared that the interview
• 42:32
  later, you know with all the stars saying their
• 42:34
  favorite movies and now had like Esoteric kind
• 42:37
  of films like foreign films like oh you got to
• 42:39
  see blah blah blah from it's a French film. It's
• 42:42
  magnetic and I was like, oh, Caddy Shaq, Goodfellas,
• 42:46
  you know, these kind of things. Yeah, iconic
• 42:47
  movies that a lot of people have seen and loved.
• 42:49
  Yeah. And I threw a couple of comedies in there.
• 42:51
  I'm like, people forget about comedies. They're
• 42:53
  important films, you know? Right. The Jerk with
• 42:57
  Steve Martin is an important film in the industry.
• 43:01
  And then they ended up sharing it. And I was
• 43:03
  like, oh, I made it into the interview. And my
• 43:05
  daughter texted me. She's like, oh, my god, you
• 43:07
  did an interview for Letterboxx. I'm like, yeah.
• 43:10
  I don't know what that is. When your kid knows
• 43:12
  what letterbox is, that means you're cool and
• 43:13
  you're hip. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. She wanted to go
• 43:18
  to the premiere. My wife came with me to the
• 43:21
  last one I went and my daughter was like, so,
• 43:24
  you know, mom went to the last one. Michael B.
• 43:25
  Jordan's in this one. When am I meeting him?
• 43:29
  I can only imagine the reaction that the audience
• 43:32
  and the critics that night at the premiere had
• 43:34
  because given how Sinners was received well later
• 43:38
  on, like, can you kind of describe the feeling
• 43:40
  in the room when the movie? Oh, man. I didn't
• 43:42
  really have any expectations. While we're filming
• 43:44
  it, you don't really know how something's going
• 43:46
  to turn out. People put their whole heart and
• 43:48
  soul into a project thinking that it's going
• 43:50
  to be this amazing thing, and it just falls flat
• 43:53
  sometimes. So you don't really know. how it's
• 43:55
  going to turn out. But I sat in the theater.
• 43:57
  I had to move out of the way for Chris Rock,
• 43:59
  who went past me to go sit in the same row. And
• 44:01
  I'm like, man, this is crazy. Just some guy named
• 44:04
  Chris Rock. Yeah, Chris Rock. He's not important
• 44:06
  at all. So the film starts and there's music
• 44:13
  throughout, you know, and I just found myself
• 44:15
  just kind of nodding my head and just being engrossed
• 44:19
  into this film. When it was done, I felt this
• 44:21
  overwhelming sense of of just pride and amazement
• 44:26
  and the sense that this is, my first thought
• 44:29
  was this has never been done before. This film
• 44:32
  is so unique. So many different genres that are
• 44:36
  just molding into one another and the music was
• 44:38
  incredible. Nobody has ever done a movie quite
• 44:41
  like that. And that was my first feeling. And
• 44:44
  I knew then that like, yeah, I think it's going
• 44:46
  to be, it needs to be busy during award season.
• 44:48
  I have that feeling in the pit of my stomach
• 44:50
  and I knew it was going to be something special
• 44:53
  and I was right. It's a record number of nominations
• 44:56
  and yeah, just couldn't be prouder, man. The
• 45:02
  show Your Honor, because you were in that, the
• 45:05
  drama with Bryan Cranston, where he's the judge
• 45:07
  that does very illegal, non -judge -like things.
• 45:12
  Talk about your experience with that and what
• 45:14
  role you played, because my wife and I were big
• 45:16
  fans of that show. Yeah, I played another not
• 45:18
  -so -nice, somewhat racist... guy, law enforcement.
• 45:23
  The funny thing about that is I had read for
• 45:26
  Breaking Bad more times than I could count. You
• 45:28
  know, people say that. They're like, oh, more
• 45:29
  times than I can count. I lost track of how many
• 45:32
  times I read for Breaking Bad and never booked
• 45:34
  it. Came close a couple of times. So yeah, that's
• 45:37
  another Bryan Cranston show. What did you read
• 45:39
  for? What characters? Oh, like, yeah. tons, tons
• 45:42
  of characters, you know, small roles of day players,
• 45:45
  bigger roles. And it just, it didn't work out.
• 45:47
  So that was like my white whale. And I was like,
• 45:50
  Oh, well, I guess it's not going to happen. And
• 45:52
  right after that, I read for a movie called Trumbo
• 45:55
  about Dalton Trumbo. And I booked that. I was
• 45:58
  like, okay, well, this is my, this is my God
• 46:02
  saying, okay, that, that door closed. And this
• 46:05
  one opened. It's like, this is my opportunity
• 46:06
  to work with, with Brian Cranston. So that was
• 46:09
  incredible. What did you play? Um, it was it
• 46:12
  was like this so the cool thing about that was
• 46:14
  it was uh You know, it's it's all about hollywood
• 46:17
  and and and and you know the blacklisting of
• 46:20
  of mccarthyism and all that blacklisting of all
• 46:23
  these actors and directors for being communists
• 46:25
  I was an actor playing an actor inside of a movie
• 46:29
  inside of the movie So very meta which was so
• 46:32
  cool I mean it was so so cool because you had
• 46:35
  all the cameras all the modern cameras and everything
• 46:38
  and inside that you had all the old time 1930s
• 46:42
  and 40s cameras and the smoke. And it was like
• 46:45
  this film noir kind of scene. And Michael Stolbarge,
• 46:50
  who I had seen, who's also in Your Honor. He
• 46:53
  plays like the mafia boss. Fantastic actor. Love
• 46:56
  him in Boardwalk Empire. Call me by your name.
• 46:58
  Fantastic actor. Fargo. Amazing. Character actor
• 47:03
  just really brilliant. And I had seen him on
• 47:05
  Broadway like 20 years before in a play called
• 47:08
  The Pillow Man, which I don't know if you're
• 47:09
  familiar with. Incredible play. dark, kind of
• 47:13
  disturbing subject matter, but amazing. So I
• 47:15
  had seen him on Broadway, and then 20 years later,
• 47:18
  I'm getting to work with him. And I'm like at
• 47:21
  the fitting for the movie. And it's like, oh,
• 47:23
  I'm working with Michael Seward. It's like, you
• 47:25
  know anything about it? It's like, yeah, he's
• 47:27
  really good, but he's very temperamental. So
• 47:29
  you got to kind of be careful about this. And
• 47:30
  I'm like, oh, okay. So I was kind of on guard.
• 47:33
  And I'm in the makeup trailer and he comes in.
• 47:36
  introduces himself and he's just the they couldn't
• 47:38
  be more wrong uh he was the sweetest guy they
• 47:41
  may be they may have been trying to mess with
• 47:42
  me a little bit i don't know but he was a super
• 47:45
  super sweet guy comes full circle i get to work
• 47:47
  with both of them again on uh on your honor i'm
• 47:50
  reading the script and i'm kind of delving into
• 47:52
  this character a little bit and um the first
• 47:55
  ad comes over to me and he's like so this guy
• 47:57
  uh geez sack he's he's he's a bad guy huh and
• 48:01
  i'm like is he it's like I don't know. I was
• 48:06
  more interested in finding out why he was the
• 48:09
  way he was. What history did he have in that
• 48:11
  city with the people that he's interacting with,
• 48:13
  with the people that he treats badly? Like, what's
• 48:16
  the history there? I think that's a lot more
• 48:18
  interesting than just saying, look, he's bad,
• 48:20
  he's racist, his this or that. Another key to
• 48:23
  being a good actor is that you don't just automatically
• 48:25
  judge the character you're playing. Even if they
• 48:27
  turn out to make bad choices, you dive in deeper
• 48:31
  and figure out like, oh, how did they come to
• 48:34
  be where they came to be? And a lot of the time
• 48:36
  you're very compassionate and understanding of
• 48:38
  why they came to be what they came to be. Yeah,
• 48:42
  yeah. I mean, those actors of that caliber, I
• 48:46
  just I mean, I apologize. It's been a while since
• 48:49
  we've watched Your Honor. But I don't know if
• 48:51
  you share scenes with them, if you have any thoughts
• 48:53
  about just observing how they acted, how they
• 48:59
  handled their craft on the set of that show.
• 49:02
  Yeah, it's weird because when you're in the moment,
• 49:05
  when you're on set and they're doing these things,
• 49:07
  it's very difficult to decipher how it's going
• 49:09
  to look later on, especially with Sinners. When
• 49:12
  Michael's playing these two people, I didn't
• 49:14
  see a whole lot of difference in the characters.
• 49:17
  There's some nuance here. But when you see the
• 49:19
  French product, you're like, wow, it really pops
• 49:22
  off the screen, the difference between the two
• 49:24
  brothers. I didn't interact a whole lot with,
• 49:27
  with, uh, Brian Cranston. We did like off, offset
• 49:31
  and, and, and, you know, but I didn't really
• 49:32
  have any scenes with him. He was the judge when
• 49:35
  I was like on the stand testifying. Um, but most
• 49:38
  of my, most of my interaction was, uh, was with
• 49:41
  Michael Stuhlbart who, uh, yeah, it is amazing.
• 49:44
  He's just really, really kind. It's really nice
• 49:46
  to see people that are incredibly talented and
• 49:48
  brilliant. And at the same time, just, just really
• 49:51
  good people. That's, they're refreshing. That
• 49:53
  person who may or may not have messed with you,
• 49:56
  uh, in terms of saying that Michael was temperamental.
• 49:58
  I wonder if maybe they, uh, if, if in fact they
• 50:01
  were, they were not kidding. Like they caught
• 50:03
  him on a day where he was like really intense
• 50:05
  into a character thing or... Well, that's the
• 50:07
  thing. He does, he does get into those spaces
• 50:10
  where he has to have a really intense scene.
• 50:13
  Like I remember us shooting the scene where he
• 50:15
  had to go in and identify his son's body. And
• 50:18
  then he comes out of there and he has a conversation
• 50:20
  with me. On that day, he was in the... character
• 50:23
  he was really preparing trying to get into that
• 50:26
  space and he kind of apologized to me he was
• 50:28
  like I just want to let you know today is is
• 50:31
  gonna be one of those days where I'm you know
• 50:33
  not talking much I'm not but he you know he prefaced
• 50:35
  it with that so yeah he prepared me and I totally
• 50:39
  understand that Absolutely. Again, looking at
• 50:43
  your IMDb reel, I've seen that you've worked
• 50:45
  on stuff with Chris Pratt, J .K. Simmons, Stephen
• 50:49
  Graham, who I recently... I mean, not only also
• 50:52
  phenomenal on Boardwalk Empire, but I saw him
• 50:55
  on Adolescence on Netflix. He was phenomenal
• 50:57
  on that. And you worked with him on Greyhound.
• 51:00
  Can you... Again, much like Bryan Cranston and
• 51:04
  Michael Stubart, can you tell me the roles that
• 51:05
  you played in those other projects and what it
• 51:07
  was like to work with Chris and JK and Stephen,
• 51:10
  if you had much time to work with them? The Tomorrow
• 51:13
  War with Chris Pratt, that was a really cool
• 51:16
  experience because Chris was just, I mean, we
• 51:19
  met and he hugged me the first time we met and
• 51:21
  welcomed me. To the project and and he's a super
• 51:26
  cool really really good human being I was playing
• 51:28
  like a government official in that so a lot of
• 51:31
  the when I auditioned They're like, oh this is
• 51:33
  gonna you have to get your passport ready because
• 51:35
  we're shooting in Iceland and we're shooting
• 51:37
  in in South America I think or somewhere I was
• 51:40
  like, oh cool. I get to go to all these places
• 51:42
  and film didn't get to go to any of the else
• 51:44
  places because I'm the guy in the government
• 51:47
  building. So all of my stuff was done on a soundstage
• 51:49
  or in an Air Force base when I'm kind of addressing
• 51:53
  the whole... the group as a whole. So I was kind
• 51:56
  of disappointed in that like all these guys are
• 51:58
  going off to Iceland and they're building these
• 52:01
  relationships and fighting aliens and you know
• 52:04
  going to these little pubs in Iceland and just
• 52:07
  kind of having a good time and I'm like yeah
• 52:09
  that's would like to be in Iceland you know that's
• 52:11
  all right. Yeah right that would be a cool experience.
• 52:14
  Yeah so but let's see what was the what was the
• 52:18
  other movie you asked? So that was with Chris
• 52:22
  Pratt and then J .K. Simmons and Stephen Graham.
• 52:26
  Yeah, Tom Hanks. Tom's really cool. He's very
• 52:30
  down -to -earth, very kind to everyone, speaks
• 52:33
  to, you know, they had some background people
• 52:35
  that would come up and ask him questions and
• 52:37
  he was happy to share anything that he had. It
• 52:40
  was one time when we were on Battleship in Baton
• 52:43
  Rouge, the USS Kidd, and, you know, we're in
• 52:45
  between takes and I'm sitting there talking to
• 52:46
  a few other actors, Tom included, and I was like,
• 52:50
  man, I'm getting kind of hungry. But the craft
• 52:51
  services was all the way on the other side of
• 52:53
  the ship. So I was like, I don't want to go all
• 52:55
  the way over there to grab a snack and have like
• 52:57
  a PA come and looking for me. It's like, oh,
• 52:59
  we're ready to shoot. So I was like, okay, I'm
• 53:00
  just going to, I'm going to hold off. And somebody
• 53:02
  brought Tom Hanks pizza and he kind of playfully
• 53:06
  gloated. He was like, I have people that bring
• 53:07
  me pizza. I was like, I'm a superstar. Yeah.
• 53:12
  I was like, I'm trying to think of, of something
• 53:14
  clever to say back to him. And he's like, yeah,
• 53:16
  he's like, have some. And he like, shares his
• 53:19
  pizza with me. I was like, wow, this is a very
• 53:22
  surreal moment that Tom Hex is sharing his pizza.
• 53:24
  Eating pizza with Forrest Gump. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 53:29
  And then with with JK Simmons is also very cool.
• 53:34
  I'm glad I have my first couple of experiences
• 53:36
  in the industry I kind of worked with a couple
• 53:38
  of assholes and I was like, yeah, and I didn't
• 53:40
  know what the hell I was doing So, you know,
• 53:42
  they were they were kind of mean to me and I'm
• 53:43
  like, okay Well, I guess this is just how it
• 53:45
  is. People are people are jerks sometimes But
• 53:48
  I find that that that has been that hasn't been
• 53:51
  the case. Most people are very very nice treat
• 53:53
  you with kindness and respect and I worked with
• 53:57
  uh, jk simmons on a movie called national champions,
• 54:01
  which is about college football, which I was
• 54:03
  like, oh my i'm a huge college football fan and
• 54:05
  I played one of the suits That that is dealing
• 54:07
  with this bowl game that we and we have this
• 54:09
  meeting with jk simmons And I also got to do
• 54:12
  some improv in that as well, which which you
• 54:14
  know That was that was a lot of fun and worked
• 54:16
  with uh, david, uh, dave keckner Who is is the
• 54:19
  cowboy in the uh, ron burgundy movies? Okay,
• 54:23
  yeah, he was in he was in the office space. He
• 54:26
  had done mainly comedy and this is a drama. So
• 54:28
  he was like a little bit insecure about that,
• 54:31
  you know, like asking me like, hey, how was this
• 54:34
  scene going? How do you think this is going?
• 54:35
  He did great. But yeah, that that movie is like
• 54:37
  it didn't get a whole lot of publicity or a lot
• 54:40
  of but it's it's it's it's really really well
• 54:43
  done, especially if you if you like college football
• 54:46
  and you and you know the ins and outs of of the
• 54:48
  bowl season and all that stuff. So it was yeah,
• 54:50
  he was a lot of fun. A lot of fun to work with
• 54:52
  both those guys. Have you seen J .K. Simmons
• 54:54
  in whiplash? He was freaking intense in that
• 54:56
  movie. Yeah, I did. Yeah. Yeah. You have a sigh
• 55:00
  as like like you reacted the same way my wife
• 55:02
  and I reacted. Like, yeah, he was he was a very
• 55:05
  abusive music instructor in that movie. It was
• 55:07
  it was intense. Yeah. Brilliant. Brilliant performance,
• 55:10
  man. I think he won the Oscar for that, didn't
• 55:12
  he? Sounds about right. Sounds about right. I
• 55:14
  just remember him with an acceptance speech and
• 55:17
  I can't imagine that it wasn't for that. That
• 55:19
  seems like, and I mean, and he was also in Tomorrow
• 55:21
  War. He played Chris Pratt's dad in Tomorrow
• 55:23
  War. So I never got to work with him, but he
• 55:27
  was off with his son fighting aliens on a mountain.
• 55:30
  So didn't get to interact. I did ask him, I was
• 55:34
  like, what did you think about Tomorrow War?
• 55:35
  You know, I was on a national champions with
• 55:37
  him and he was like, I wish you would have been
• 55:39
  in a theater because this was like right in the
• 55:40
  middle of COVID. So I don't think theaters were
• 55:43
  really open yet. So everybody was streaming it
• 55:46
  at home. So thankfully, hopefully people will
• 55:48
  be able to see it in a theater at some point
• 55:51
  when it's like a re -release or something like
• 55:53
  that. I'm curious about your mental health journey,
• 55:58
  because speaking as someone who's going through
• 56:01
  therapy, meditation, I've recently gotten back
• 56:03
  on antidepressants. Like, it's always nice to
• 56:05
  hear someone's mental health story, and especially
• 56:07
  you working in a profession where your mental
• 56:10
  health could easily go on the rocks. Like, what
• 56:13
  has that journey been like for you? Yeah, it's
• 56:15
  been rough at times, you know? It's like... And,
• 56:19
  and with a lot of my mental health stuff was
• 56:22
  just anxiety and a lot of times associated with
• 56:25
  work, with auditioning, with, with showing up
• 56:27
  to set and trying to do a good job and just feeling
• 56:29
  overwhelmed, feeling, you know, that imposter
• 56:32
  syndrome, like you don't really feel like you
• 56:34
  don't really belong. And even after a hundred
• 56:35
  credits, you like show up and you feel like,
• 56:37
  are they going to think I'm, I'm no good? You
• 56:39
  know, it's like, And I also, you know, got some
• 56:41
  treatment for, for substance abuse and I got,
• 56:44
  you know, was able to overcome that. Uh, and
• 56:46
  that was not helping mental health at all. It
• 56:49
  eases that, that anxiety and that depression
• 56:51
  in the moment, but just comes back the next day,
• 56:55
  uh, much worse. So really. So you did like sort
• 56:58
  of a rehab program and it just wasn't, it wasn't
• 57:00
  long -term, uh, in terms of. Yeah. Oh yeah. It
• 57:04
  was definitely helpful. Um, when you're in the
• 57:07
  middle of it when you're suffering from addiction
• 57:09
  or if you're using alcohol or something to numb
• 57:12
  that anxiety or that you know, to feel comfortable.
• 57:15
  The next day it just comes back worse. So it's,
• 57:18
  it's really takes a long time to kind of train,
• 57:20
  train your mind and train your spirit to kind
• 57:22
  of adapt to those things. It's taken a long time
• 57:24
  for me to get to the point where I'm not overcome
• 57:27
  with nerves and anxiety when I go in for an audition
• 57:30
  or to go on set and just to really trust myself
• 57:33
  and not do it for anybody else, just to go in
• 57:35
  there and present. what I prepared with confidence
• 57:39
  and security that I know that I have a gift that
• 57:42
  I want to present to you. You can do with it
• 57:44
  whatever you want and leave there and knowing
• 57:46
  that I did my job in that particular situation.
• 57:50
  But yeah, it's taken me 20 years to get to that
• 57:53
  point. So a lot of people quit before that breakthrough
• 57:59
  happens. So I'm thankful that I stuck with it.
• 58:01
  I'm thankful that you stuck with it, too, and
• 58:03
  that you're here today to talk about it. Let's
• 58:06
  get to the three delicious questions that I ask
• 58:08
  all my guests. First off, what is a delicious
• 58:10
  meal that you've had lately, Dave? I've put some
• 58:12
  thought into this. OK, good. Because because
• 58:14
  I am from South Louisiana. I love all that food.
• 58:18
  I'm very hesitant to pick something from there
• 58:20
  because I'm so familiar with it all that it's
• 58:22
  like, oh, yeah, I can I can do that anytime.
• 58:25
  But. My wife cooks me, if it's for my birthday
• 58:29
  or for Father's Day, she always asks me what
• 58:31
  I want. It's like, oh, what do you want me to
• 58:33
  cook? And I always come back to the same dish,
• 58:36
  which is chicken and sausage spaghetti. Oh, I
• 58:40
  feel like that's something that my mom made during
• 58:42
  my childhood. Tell me more about that. It's so
• 58:45
  good. She makes it from scratch. bone in chicken
• 58:48
  and all that. But it's kind of almost like a
• 58:51
  Creole kind of spaghetti where it's a little
• 58:53
  more spicy. It's a little messy, but yeah, that's
• 58:58
  one of my favorite things. One of my favorite
• 59:01
  dishes that she cooks. So that's kind of my fallback
• 59:04
  when she asks me what I want to eat. So I had
• 59:07
  that for a few days after Father's Day. Yeah,
• 59:09
  God, it's so I've been trying to get my wife
• 59:12
  to make spaghetti with hot dogs. You're kind
• 59:15
  of like what you see on Lady and the Tramp because
• 59:17
  that's something that my mom used to make a lot
• 59:19
  in my childhood back in Connecticut. I'm here
• 59:21
  in Vermont right now with my wife. And her only
• 59:25
  reason for not making it is because spaghetti
• 59:27
  doesn't work well as leftovers because it gets
• 59:30
  all tangled up. And and I'm like, oh, my God,
• 59:33
  stop it. It's not about you. Well, yeah, it is
• 59:36
  because she's the one cooking. But like, yeah,
• 59:37
  chicken and sauce. spaghetti oh god I want that
• 59:40
  so badly that damn it can you ship that Louisiana
• 59:46
  I'll send you my wife's recipe and you can you
• 59:49
  know work work on the wife and see what she can
• 59:52
  you know see see if you guys can do a trade -off
• 59:54
  and see if she can pull it off because yeah Yeah,
• 59:57
  cuz we're always looking for ideas for for meals
• 59:59
  for the week and we're always like, oh my god
• 1:00:01
  We we don't have anything we can come up with
• 1:00:03
  so yes If you can send that recipe my way and
• 1:00:05
  I could try to convince my wife to to get back
• 1:00:08
  on the spaghetti bandwagon That would be that
• 1:00:10
  would be fantastic. Oh, it's better than hot
• 1:00:12
  dog spaghetti. I will Are you not a fan of hot
• 1:00:19
  dog spaghetti? I don't know if I've ever had
• 1:00:21
  hot dog spaghetti but Yeah, sometimes people
• 1:00:24
  put hot dogs in gumbo and I'm like, what are
• 1:00:26
  you, what are you people doing? Like you're,
• 1:00:29
  you're, you're, you're, you're, you know, you're
• 1:00:32
  destroying this, this amazing dish. It's like
• 1:00:34
  some people put seafood and chicken and sausage
• 1:00:37
  together. And I'm like, that, that is a huge
• 1:00:40
  mistake as well. You either have seafood or you
• 1:00:43
  have chicken and sausage. They don't, they're
• 1:00:45
  two completely different flavors. So you don't,
• 1:00:47
  you don't combine them. That's yeah. My god.
• 1:00:50
  Yeah. Yeah, I think both my mom and my wife have
• 1:00:52
  made like spaghetti with like shrimp and you
• 1:00:55
  know Put broccoli and maybe some Alfredo sauce
• 1:00:57
  on it. Like yes, that's that's also a delicious.
• 1:01:00
  Oh, wait Are you laughing because that's disgusting
• 1:01:02
  or like it sounded strange. It sounded strange
• 1:01:05
  to me It sounded strange. Well broccoli and spaghetti.
• 1:01:09
  Oh It tastes great. Okay. All right I'm gonna
• 1:01:15
  tell my wife that she seemed like what you know,
• 1:01:18
  so She just yelled, she's like, I'm not putting
• 1:01:21
  broccoli in spaghetti. Alright, fair enough,
• 1:01:26
  fair enough. How about meatball spaghetti? Are
• 1:01:28
  you a spaghetti and meatballs guy? Oh yeah. Yeah,
• 1:01:31
  absolutely. Plastic. Absolutely. Yeah, man. I
• 1:01:34
  mix the ground meat and get the, we have HUB
• 1:01:38
  is a grocery store here that has the meatballs
• 1:01:40
  already seasoned and made and my wife did the
• 1:01:44
  homemade meatballs because my mom used to make
• 1:01:46
  homemade meatballs when I was a kid. That to
• 1:01:49
  me, and I always think of that Goodfellas scene
• 1:01:51
  where he's like, the meatballs, he's like, how
• 1:01:53
  many different kinds of meat do you have in the
• 1:01:55
  meatballs? And he's like, oh, we got veal, we
• 1:01:57
  got pork, we got this, and he's got all this
• 1:01:59
  meat, all these different meats in the meat.
• 1:02:01
  Yeah, love it. Oh god, I haven't watched Goodfellas
• 1:02:05
  in like 20 years. I gotta do a rewatch of that.
• 1:02:07
  I remember watching that on my portable DVD player
• 1:02:09
  when those were a thing back in the day. And
• 1:02:12
  yeah, I mean, it's what you want. It's Robert
• 1:02:15
  De Niro, Joe Pesci, the late Ray Liotta in this
• 1:02:18
  very Italian mobster -like movie. It's just,
• 1:02:21
  it's a classic. Martin Scorsese directing it.
• 1:02:23
  I mean, it's everything that you want. Yeah,
• 1:02:25
  can't go wrong with that. Yeah. Delicious pop
• 1:02:28
  culture obsession that you have at the moment.
• 1:02:30
  Well, I... I had to ask my wife, I'm like, they're
• 1:02:34
  asking pop culture. Do I have a pop culture?
• 1:02:38
  Yeah, TV show, movie, podcast, book, music, play,
• 1:02:42
  just anything pop culture wise that you're watching
• 1:02:45
  and listening to that you really love. Well,
• 1:02:47
  I mean, I listen to all different kinds of music.
• 1:02:52
  But yeah, I mean, my daughter and I play this
• 1:02:54
  game movie grid. I don't know if you've ever
• 1:02:57
  played that. It's like. It's like a puzzle where
• 1:03:00
  you have different categories at the top and
• 1:03:02
  you have actors and Directors on the opposite
• 1:03:04
  side and you have to guess in these different
• 1:03:06
  things My daughter and I play that every day.
• 1:03:08
  But yeah as far as pop culture, huh? You know
• 1:03:11
  what? I think I'm more obsessed with unpopular
• 1:03:13
  culture Whatever is not whatever the rest of
• 1:03:18
  the world doesn't care about or mainstream media.
• 1:03:20
  I just like yeah Whatever is weird esoteric a
• 1:03:24
  kind of cultural Phenomenon that's you know,
• 1:03:27
  I really like metal music and and dark I don't
• 1:03:31
  like horror movies even though I just Even though
• 1:03:34
  you were in the most iconic horror movie of all
• 1:03:36
  time recently Yeah, it's it's that was the first
• 1:03:39
  horror movie I'd seen in a long time and really
• 1:03:42
  I have a group of friends here some peers that
• 1:03:44
  are in the industry and they're always like hey
• 1:03:46
  we're gonna go do another movie outing and Last
• 1:03:50
  one I went and saw with him was Back Rooms. And
• 1:03:52
  I was like, I would never intentionally go and
• 1:03:55
  watch that at a theater, or really at home. It's
• 1:03:57
  not like something, you know, with mental health
• 1:04:00
  stuff. I'm like, yeah, I don't want to rock the
• 1:04:02
  boat. Right. Yeah, tell me about that, because
• 1:04:05
  I know Backroom's an obsession, like those are
• 1:04:07
  two horror movies that are having a moment right
• 1:04:09
  now, because these Gen Z YouTubers made them,
• 1:04:13
  and Hollywood is all like, oh my god, Gen Z YouTubers,
• 1:04:15
  they're going to be saving the Hollywood box
• 1:04:17
  office, yay! So tell me what that movie was about,
• 1:04:21
  and I assume it was disturbing to watch. It was
• 1:04:24
  a little bit disturbing. So it's basically, so
• 1:04:27
  this guy is down on his luck. And he's got this
• 1:04:31
  failing furniture business and he's in therapy
• 1:04:34
  and he's trying to deal with that. He's estranged
• 1:04:36
  from his wife and he had a drinking problem.
• 1:04:38
  And he finds this kind of secret passageway inside
• 1:04:41
  the furniture store that takes him to all these
• 1:04:43
  different rooms. And it's basically like one
• 1:04:45
  big nightmare. Like he's all these things that
• 1:04:47
  he's encountering in those rooms. It's like something
• 1:04:51
  that you would experience in a nightmare. Just
• 1:04:54
  distortion of features of faces and all these
• 1:04:56
  weird kind of things are happening and it yeah
• 1:05:00
  it's disturbing it was it was well done i will
• 1:05:02
  give him that it was it was when i saw it i was
• 1:05:04
  like okay that was well done but i don't need
• 1:05:06
  to see that again i don't need to see obsession
• 1:05:08
  uh the last one they they invited me to go see
• 1:05:12
  evil burn evil dead burn or something like that
• 1:05:15
  in a new movie evil dead another horror movie
• 1:05:17
  and it's like dude what do you like first of
• 1:05:20
  all can y 'all go to a matinee once in a while
• 1:05:22
  you know it's like i'm It's like, I don't want
• 1:05:24
  to spend, I don't want to get out of the theater
• 1:05:25
  at 10 o 'clock, 11 o 'clock. So after seeing
• 1:05:27
  a horror movie and having nightmares. Right.
• 1:05:29
  Exactly. So they sent me, I was like, Hey, we're
• 1:05:31
  going to see this movie. So I watched the trailer
• 1:05:33
  and I messaged him back and I was like, well,
• 1:05:35
  after watching 53 seconds of this trailer, I'm
• 1:05:38
  going to pass. And he messaged me later and he
• 1:05:43
  was like, uh, yeah, you might not have enjoyed
• 1:05:45
  that. That was, that was a lot. You know, and
• 1:05:47
  I was like, was it, was it just not good? He's
• 1:05:49
  like, no, it was good, but there was a lot of.
• 1:05:52
  It was gory and a lot of violence and I'm like,
• 1:05:55
  yeah, I'm glad I passed on that. Yeah, understandable
• 1:05:59
  horror movies. It's definitely one of those polarizing
• 1:06:02
  genres You either are in love with it or you
• 1:06:04
  just hate it and want to stay away from it as
• 1:06:06
  much as possible As someone who rarely goes to
• 1:06:10
  the the movie theater I will say that watching
• 1:06:13
  a horror movie or an action movie like a spider
• 1:06:16
  -man and the theaters It's such a great community
• 1:06:19
  experience because you know I have my wife with
• 1:06:21
  me and we're reacting together to all the like
• 1:06:23
  the big moments and You get to hear the audience
• 1:06:26
  around you just react the same way. Um, we watched
• 1:06:29
  weapons in the theaters. I've watched get out
• 1:06:32
  and us from Jordan Peele in the theaters. Like,
• 1:06:35
  so I will say it's, it's definitely a memorable
• 1:06:37
  movie theater experience when you watch a horror
• 1:06:39
  movie. So there's something to be said for the
• 1:06:43
  theater experiences is it's different, you know,
• 1:06:45
  and there's some films that you just like we
• 1:06:47
  went and saw disclosure day in the theater. Like
• 1:06:49
  if it's a big movie, um, you kind of want to
• 1:06:54
  experience it in the theater. It's a whole different.
• 1:06:57
  Yeah. Yeah, a friend of mine was saying that,
• 1:06:59
  like, Disclosure Day was, like, it was good,
• 1:07:02
  but, like, I was told how this is, like, the
• 1:07:06
  best Steven Spielberg movie ever, and when you
• 1:07:08
  come and work with High Expectations, they're
• 1:07:10
  only gonna go butt down. Like, how did you find
• 1:07:12
  Disclosure Day? Same, same, yeah. Really? Yeah,
• 1:07:16
  I... There was a couple of times where I looked
• 1:07:19
  over at my wife and I'm like, well, that's weird.
• 1:07:21
  I'm like, well, they could have done that. They
• 1:07:24
  could have done that better. It's like... What's
• 1:07:27
  it about when he's like, what's it about? Yeah.
• 1:07:30
  You haven't seen it yet. I've not. It's fine.
• 1:07:34
  I probably will never see it. You can spoil it
• 1:07:35
  for me. So, you know, they're basically gonna
• 1:07:40
  gonna all these government secrets about if we're
• 1:07:43
  alone in the universe, that's that's that's this
• 1:07:45
  is the day that they're going to disclose all
• 1:07:48
  that information that the government has all
• 1:07:50
  this stuff. And, you know, it was good. You know,
• 1:07:53
  when we were done, I texted my daughter, I'm
• 1:07:55
  like, Sorry, you know And that's not the feeling
• 1:08:00
  it's supposed to be a continuation of Close Encounters
• 1:08:07
  of the Third Kind movie the 70s. I'm not sure
• 1:08:11
  if that's the case But I mean I'm fascinated
• 1:08:13
  by that. I don't think we're alone. I think they're
• 1:08:15
  out there whether they have good intentions or
• 1:08:17
  not I don't know that's that's not a for me to
• 1:08:19
  worry about or decide so but um Yeah, it was
• 1:08:23
  just kind of uh, all right No, not exactly the
• 1:08:26
  feeling I had after Sinners where I was like
• 1:08:28
  my mind was blown. So yeah. Yeah It was just
• 1:08:32
  okay You know what to feel that good about a
• 1:08:34
  movie that you're in great cuz I can only actually
• 1:08:37
  I can only imagine if you were in Disclosure
• 1:08:39
  Day and you came out of that movie thinking like
• 1:08:43
  hey I guess I did I guess it was an okay movie
• 1:08:45
  that I was in yeah, yeah, I remember having a
• 1:08:48
  conversation with Kurt Russell on the set of
• 1:08:51
  Deepwater Horizon and And we were just talking
• 1:08:54
  about how sometimes movies just flop, you know,
• 1:08:57
  like you put all this work into it and they don't
• 1:09:00
  turn, they're not well received. And it's like,
• 1:09:02
  man, that's gotta be tough to deal with that.
• 1:09:04
  He's like, yeah, you get paid. It's like, there
• 1:09:07
  you go. You did the job. You got your money.
• 1:09:10
  That's all that matters. You move on. Yeah, absolutely.
• 1:09:13
  Last question. What is the delicious thing that's
• 1:09:15
  happened in your life lately? Well, celebrated
• 1:09:17
  two years sober a couple of weeks ago, which
• 1:09:21
  was great. My daughter graduated from A &M. We
• 1:09:25
  moved her to college. So, yeah, and I'm just
• 1:09:31
  happy and thankful to be doing what I love and
• 1:09:35
  sometimes barely getting by, but still succeeding
• 1:09:38
  to a certain level. And not a lot of people find
• 1:09:42
  that. I found it pretty late, but I'm thankful
• 1:09:45
  I found it eventually. And I'm able to do something
• 1:09:50
  I love that I think I'm good at and make a...
• 1:09:52
  make a decent living at it. So, yeah. I'm so
• 1:09:55
  happy for you. Congratulations on two years.
• 1:09:58
  I mean, is it a whole thing where you got to
• 1:10:00
  go to a meeting and get a chip that says two
• 1:10:02
  years or something like that? Or is it just a
• 1:10:04
  personal thing that? Yeah, you don't have to
• 1:10:06
  do that. I did that just so I could, you know,
• 1:10:08
  I could have that that evidence of what happened.
• 1:10:12
  But yeah, two years ago, it's like six months
• 1:10:15
  or a year out. It's like you never it's it feels
• 1:10:18
  like an insurmountable. uh, goal to have, but
• 1:10:22
  yeah, it's, it's really that whole one day at
• 1:10:24
  a time thing. It's like, build, build, make good
• 1:10:28
  choices day by day and, and they will eventually,
• 1:10:31
  uh, turn out to, to build the life that you,
• 1:10:34
  that you really want and that you're, you're,
• 1:10:36
  uh, you're destined for, you know, so that's.
• 1:10:38
  Yeah, it's pretty cool, you know, and it's a
• 1:10:42
  struggle still. When I go to places like if I
• 1:10:45
  go to a college football game or I go to a party,
• 1:10:47
  you know, it's still, there's still some of that
• 1:10:49
  unease that happens. But yeah, that goes away
• 1:10:53
  over time and you get more and more comfortable.
• 1:10:56
  And you start, it's crazy how you meet more and
• 1:10:58
  more people that are in your same situation that
• 1:11:00
  you can connect with. It's crazy how many people,
• 1:11:04
  I shared it online that I was two years sober
• 1:11:06
  and there's so many So many people reached out
• 1:11:09
  and, and, and people that I had no idea they
• 1:11:12
  were struggling with, with that. And they're
• 1:11:13
  like, Oh yeah, man, I'm in the same boat. I got,
• 1:11:16
  I got two years or I got 20 years. Uh, you know,
• 1:11:19
  people that I went to high school with. Um, so
• 1:11:22
  yeah, it's, it's cool to, and some people that
• 1:11:25
  found inspiration in my message saying that like,
• 1:11:27
  okay, he seems like he has it all together. Uh,
• 1:11:31
  but Yeah, that's not always the case. It's like
• 1:11:33
  we're all going through something. The face that
• 1:11:37
  we show the world sometimes is not how we're
• 1:11:42
  feeling inside. And yeah, everybody goes through
• 1:11:44
  that. We don't have it all figured out despite
• 1:11:47
  what appearances may look like. Agreed. Dave,
• 1:11:50
  this was a fantastic conversation. Do you mind
• 1:11:53
  letting people know how they can find you if
• 1:11:55
  they want to keep in touch with your work, how
• 1:11:57
  they can connect with you on social media? Yeah.
• 1:11:59
  You can just Google my name. Okay with Instagram
• 1:12:03
  Facebook IMDB I don't know what my handles are.
• 1:12:08
  Okay, but it's it's my name Wait, do you have
• 1:12:13
  your social media personally or do you have a
• 1:12:14
  team that does that for you? I do I do I wish
• 1:12:17
  I had a team because I'm really not I'm not as
• 1:12:21
  proficient or Discipline about it, you know,
• 1:12:24
  it's people you're supposed to post like Either
• 1:12:27
  every day or three or four times a week and and
• 1:12:31
  and for me I post when I have something exciting
• 1:12:34
  or I have something I want to share and I think
• 1:12:37
  a lot of people on social media post just to
• 1:12:40
  post and have you know to have some traction
• 1:12:42
  and and It's that's kind of one of my pet peeves
• 1:12:46
  I like to to share stuff when I think it's worth
• 1:12:49
  sharing instead of just something mundane or
• 1:12:52
  goofy Well, now that monetization has been brought
• 1:12:56
  into it, that is probably a big reason why a
• 1:13:00
  lot of people feel the pressure to post every
• 1:13:03
  day or a few hours, several hours every day because
• 1:13:06
  it's like... Not only do they want to be relevant
• 1:13:09
  or have a popularity with their audience, but
• 1:13:12
  oh my God, I can get paid for all the engagement
• 1:13:15
  that like it just, yeah. When you put monetization
• 1:13:17
  into it, there are some serious social media
• 1:13:20
  addicts out there because of that. Yeah. And
• 1:13:21
  I get it, you know, and I understand, uh, people,
• 1:13:25
  people gotta, people gotta pay the rent and,
• 1:13:27
  and I still haven't figured that out. I don't
• 1:13:29
  know. I don't know how to monetize. Uh, I looked
• 1:13:31
  into it and I'm like, You have to like what kind
• 1:13:36
  of business are you and are you a yeah? And you
• 1:13:38
  have to have like a certain amount of followers
• 1:13:40
  and it's a whole criteria thing I mean I did
• 1:13:43
  qualify for monetization on my Facebook But it's
• 1:13:46
  just hilarious when I look at my Facebook and
• 1:13:48
  I'm like, oh my god, like for all the posts that
• 1:13:49
  I put up I've made like a dollar and 29 cents
• 1:13:52
  Now I feel like one of those oranges a new black
• 1:13:57
  actors that unfortunately got their tiny residual
• 1:13:59
  checks that say they Thankfully went on strike
• 1:14:03
  for a few years ago. So yeah. Yeah, I get those
• 1:14:06
  too. I get those, you know, a stack of residuals
• 1:14:09
  that amounts to like four bucks or what's the
• 1:14:11
  smallest residual check that you got? Like what's
• 1:14:13
  the smallest? Well, I mean, I just got a couple.
• 1:14:16
  I had one that was a decent size check, but my
• 1:14:19
  other two checks, one was for a penny and one
• 1:14:20
  was for two cents. And I'm like, and they, they
• 1:14:23
  went through the trouble of printing it out,
• 1:14:25
  putting it in an envelope and sending it to me.
• 1:14:27
  And I remember going to the bank. I'm like, I
• 1:14:28
  don't know what else to do with this check other
• 1:14:30
  than. deposit it and i'm like talking to the
• 1:14:32
  teller i'm like yeah there's a there's a penny
• 1:14:34
  and i and i i'd like the penny and the other
• 1:14:37
  two cents in cash if that's okay yeah um i need
• 1:14:42
  some i need some spending money oh god yeah if
• 1:14:45
  you were going to a bank in like 1825 sure deposit
• 1:14:48
  a penny it would be worth something but nowadays
• 1:14:51
  Yeah, nowadays, especially I think that they
• 1:14:53
  stopped making the penny the penny is not even
• 1:14:55
  a thing that's made anymore like that's that's
• 1:14:57
  That's another thing. Are you allowed to say
• 1:15:00
  what the project was that you got a penny? I
• 1:15:03
  don't even I don't remember You know, it's in
• 1:15:06
  my wife it drives her crazy because she's the
• 1:15:08
  one who handles our taxes. Yep She has to handle
• 1:15:12
  all the w -2s from all these different companies
• 1:15:16
  and so it's a lot more complicated most people
• 1:15:18
  hire somebody for that but yeah she has to go
• 1:15:21
  through all the residuals and you know see, see
• 1:15:24
  where it was from. And, and when I have to pay
• 1:15:27
  my commission, we have to like, go through every,
• 1:15:29
  every residual and have two agents. I have one
• 1:15:31
  in Texas and one in Louisiana. So she's like,
• 1:15:33
  did you do, who did you do this for? Was this
• 1:15:36
  a Texas agent or what was this? And then sometimes
• 1:15:39
  I'm like, I don't remember which, which that,
• 1:15:41
  that was 10 years ago. So, you know, even though
• 1:15:44
  they're small, it's nice to get a check from,
• 1:15:45
  from 10, 15 years ago. When you say you have
• 1:15:47
  to pay your commission, what do you mean by that?
• 1:15:49
  So your agent, so they, they take. 10%. Yeah.
• 1:15:53
  It's still 10%. Right. Yes. Yeah. This was great.
• 1:15:59
  This was great. Thank you so much. And yeah,
• 1:16:00
  for the audience listening and watching, as always,
• 1:16:03
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• 1:16:05
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• 1:16:10
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• 1:16:13
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• 1:16:16
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• 1:16:18
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• 1:16:20
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• 1:16:23
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• 1:16:27
  For all of you out there, let deliciousness ring.