Lena Waithe

22:39Oh, I love it. And that was a breakthrough for me because I used to think of it as the black episode of Master of None. Oh, interesting. Oh, we're going to have a black episode of Z? Oh, cool. Oh, yeah. A gay black episode. Yeah, yeah. And I just thought it was for the gay black folk. Gay black folk love the Thanksgiving episode. Sure. I think everyone loves those. But that's the thing. Yeah, yeah. That's the trick. Yes. Is that, yes, it's specific, but it's also universal. So, you know, I don't think you're preachy. I think you're telling the stories that are true to you. You're supposed to write what you know.

23:06Exactly. And you are in these two groups that inevitably are going to seem political. Oh, absolutely. But for me as an artist, my goal is to not separate myself from the things that make me who I am, but to get folks who don't look like me, love like me, come from the walk of life that I do, to be able to look at the work and not only see it through a particular lens. To say, hey, you can see yourself in this character. That's the way I see myself in the lead character in Baby Reindeer. Well, I was going to say, even when you listed the shows that you like right now, of course those are the shows that you like.

23:34Some people might go, oh, I'm surprised that she's watching that show. Oh, really? Yes. As a black woman, they're like, oh, you're not just watching Power and Girlfriend? Okay. You don't say nothing wrong with that show. Yeah, they did actually watch those shows. I also love Bait. Want to shout out Riz Ahmed on Amazon. If you haven't seen it, check it out. Oh, I heard it's great. Beautiful show. He's going to be mad you ain't seen it. I know, see? Exactly. Everyone's in trouble. How about assuming you've seen Bait, right? Exactly. But I'm also like, why have you not seen Bait? Okay? What issues do you have?

24:01Let's just start with everyone's in trouble. I know. To go to the thing about, like, me and straight men, I feel like I have really great relationships with straight dudes. And a big part of that, I think, is because sex is not on the table. So they don't feel this need to perform. Yeah. Because nothing's coming from it. And I think that's why I also have very interesting relationships with straight women, because that gets a little dicey because it's a level of, huh, you're kind of masked, but you're a woman. And I kind of like this energy. I'm kind of confused. It can get a little tricky. I'm going like, are we cool?

24:30Are you hitting on me? You are, but I don't know what's going on. And so I just hear what you're saying in terms of, oh, but if you couldn't like me, then what's my end? What am I doing? What's my value to anybody who wouldn't like me? Right. And the truth is, it's like there's so much value because that isn't all that you have to offer me. Yeah, I know it's stupid as I'm saying it, but it is the emotion I have, right, that I have to think through. That's super interesting. I go like, oh, I've got nothing to offer this person. They're not going to want to interact with me. And I got to step over that.

25:01I think that's super fascinating to me because I think for me when I approach, I'm just, I'm curious what's the energy going to be. I'm more curious about that because my brain isn't always there. I more so want to know, well, who are you? What's the thing? The word I dislike the most is assume. Anytime someone says it, what follows it is sort of like, so what you're saying is you didn't ask. You didn't go to the source. You came up with a narrative for yourself about a person. And by the way, there are people that have narratives about me that are completely based on nothing. I think I had created one.

25:36She won't like me. She'll think I don't care about anything. Why would she want to talk to me? I'm talking to her. Wow, she seems to like me. She's smiling. That's what a lot of our society is doing right now, which is why I think it looks the way it does. We assume things about each other rather than having that moment of like talking to each other and really hearing each other. Because even like what you just said, I try to be an active listener. That's why I was like, I heard a couple of things I said. I was like, OK, I want to address the activist thing. I was like, that's really interesting to me.

26:01It's not combative, but it's sort of like, oh, that's an interesting thing. I know that word's dicey. Like for me to even say activist, I know that's a loaded word. No, it's not at all. But to me, it's like, I get what you mean. It doesn't seem like an odd thing at all, what you said. But I think for me, it's helpful to hear and to kind of go, OK, I see how the work can be perceived that way. And because I have no control for how people perceive the work. But I think for me as an artist, it's always about, OK, that's how it can be seen. okay, cool, and how do I continue to make work that no one feels ostracized from?

26:32Because some people may go, I don't want to, because that's active. I don't want to just kind of chill. I don't want to be taught a lesson. Exactly. And sometimes work, especially by women or women of color, or if you have to add queer to that mix, there's this idea, this assumption. That you're going to be taught. This is going to be a lesson. There's going to be a moral here. This is about to be woke. Versus just, oh, that was just kind of funny and human and grounded. It can be a burden because even if you're saying something or you're making a piece of art that a white woman made straight, people might not be like, it's an allegory or it's a lesson or it's trying to teach me.

27:04That's part of the thing. I mean, sometimes we'll get in like debates here. But if I'm saying something, it's kind of like I'm speaking on behalf of always. Right, right. And not always. I'm just saying what I think. Right. But you have to always like identify that. Yeah. I'm just talking from my point of view. I don't represent everyone. And then that's exhausting. It is. Because no one else has to do that. I know if you don't do that, then people will be like, oh, so you speaking for us? You speaking for me? It's just like, oh, no, I'm not. I'm speaking for myself. That's a part of the way people do interviews.

27:29If you pay attention to it, they're like, I'm just talking about me. No offense to this person. No of that. I don't want to. I'm sorry I'm married and in a healthy marriage. I'm sorry. Because people at home are going like, well, fuck you. Just waiting for us. I know. What? It's like, Jesus, what? Crap. No, it got really out of control. No, but I like you. I have to get to know you. I have to meet you. Met your kid. I like you so much, too. I did it immediately. I didn't let any of that get in the way. It was just like passing thoughts as I consumed your art. We're programmed. So you were zero to 12 South Side of Chicago.

28:00Correct. And what was that like? Mom and dad divorced at three? At two. Dad died suddenly when I was 14. But I only saw him from like until I was like seven. And then like seven years kind of went by. He was gone. Was he an addict? Well, you know, it's crazy because I want to get his death certificate because I didn't know anything about how he died. and he was actually killed by someone, but it was sort of in self-defense. So it wasn't a situation like that. But the coroner did show that there was cocaine in his system. There is a history of addiction. My dad loved cocaine. And then I grew up to love it too.

28:31It smells so good. This is why my grandmother told me. She said, the grandma's not going to say, it's in your blood. So be mindful, be thoughtful. A lot of us kind of got told that. They told me that too. Oh shit, you didn't. They told me. You got it, but let me just see what's up. I got to find out for myself. Oh, they were right. Did you see the Chevy Chase doc? Yes. Jesus Christ. I would love your analysis. I thought it was quite fascinating. I thought it was quite human. I'm a person that's done a documentary about a person who was no longer here. Being Mary Tyler Moore, that can be a little bit trickier.

28:59I don't want to say there's more pressure, but her widower was kind enough to give us the life rise in the space to tell that story. Took us about five years. Just going through a lot of interviews and things like that. Obviously written the memoir when I was much younger and just obsessed with the Mary Tyler Moore show and Dick Van Dyke and all that kind of stuff. But it's tough to kind of create a portrait of a person. And obviously that person is still here and he's being interviewed. And, you know, I've heard the stories. I think a lot of us have. And they're in the doc. Yeah, exactly. It's pretty unflinching on his many, many outbursts and shittiness.

29:29I learned a lot of things that I didn't know, which I think is the point of a documentary. Childhood didn't sound great. No, not at all. It's tricky because it's not about making excuses, but rather about giving you context for a person. It's an explanation, not an excuse. That's what I like to say. Those are different things. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. But I think the thing with Chevy that got me the most was the 50th SNL bit. To watch that and to see him still be affected. Can't get out of his own way. For people who haven't seen it. Well, I still don't want to. Okay. No, no, you're not going to ruin anything.

29:57I'm checking it out. But if people know that there was a 50th anniversary special on SNL with like everybody that ever pretty much touched it and a lot of the people that were important to the show. By the way, Lauren Michaels is interviewed as well, which I thought was really important. But Chevy talks about not being in the show. Yeah. And even though he was very much part of the origin of the show, I mean, that's not disputed. But also he came back and hosted. It wasn't the best energy for, I think, either party when he came back to host. And sometimes your reputation, you leave a mark that can stick with people.

30:27And who knows what happened? That's the thing. He doesn't know what happened. Lauren kind of is Lauren. So he's sort of, I don't know. We try. But also Martin Short said something really interesting. He was like, Billy Crystal was there as well. He didn't speak either. So what are you going to say? So Martin Short definitely gave some context to the situation. But, you know, what I appreciate is that Chevy Chase said, like, I was hurt by it. He was hurt. He reaped what he sowed. What I respect is vulnerability. Yeah. I respect the honesty. The toughest thing for people to do is just to say, that hurt my feelings.

30:53Yes, literally. Do you know where my compassion came from? Where? It'd be one thing if he was so happy and unaffected by the wreckage he seemed to be incapable of not creating, right? Like if he was sitting there high on his horse, feeling great about it all and enjoying life and feeling good, he is a victim of it all. He's very uncomfortable. He's in such discomfort. It's very obvious. That's true. And so I look at it and I go like, yeah, he was terrible to a lot of people and primarily himself. And I have compassion for that, that kind of self-destructive. I can relate to it. And then also these crazy glimpses of him where he's still a fucking genius, like just him interacting with the dude with the flowers.

31:33And I shared, so I'm lying back from the NBC up front and they put me in a car with him. I've never met him. Oh my God. We're sitting in a car together and then we pull up to the hotel and there's 600 people out in front of the hotel to see stars. And when he gets out, everyone's so excited, right? And he's trying to walk through this crowd and goes, oh yeah, so feeling much better now. Thank you for asking. And keeps moving. And I was like, feeling much better now. Thank you for asking. It's one of the funniest things I've ever heard. And that's also part of him, right? But I think that's sort of a portrait of a person.

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36:39What I love about those documentaries, adding my own to it, you know, with Mary Tyler Moore, is that she's the woman that could turn the world on with her smile. But she also was an alcoholic and dealt with a lot of death in her family and her son as an accidental suicide. And he was in his 20s. And then she also did Ordinary People before that and then experienced it in real life. She went through a ton, but was sort of the Jackie O of television of her time. And so I think ultimately, when you're trying to paint a portrait of someone, there's a lot of colors you have to use and you have to really let people speak to their experiences of them.

37:14And the truth is, everybody's right. Even though there's a moment in the doc where someone talks about how he was treated by them and he was saying, I don't recall that, but this person's truth exists. The documentary allows Chevy's truth to exist as well. Yeah, they're just wreckage. But that's the thing. It's like the Pee Wee Herman doc I thought was really phenomenal because I grew up with that. I loved that doc. That documentary, I watched it multiple times. Yeah, that's a beautiful... So stunning because I didn't realize what I was actually getting when I was watching that show. Me neither.

37:40He was speaking to the crazy, weird kids. Yes. It was all misfits. Yeah. And I didn't even get that, but I felt very connected to him. Yeah. I didn't know I was a misfit until I realized, I'm like, what is it about this language that he's speaking that I understand? Yes. Sometimes you don't know what you're seeing until somebody points it out to you. Yeah. And so, and I think that's the other thing too. You get perspective. You kind of look back on a career and go, oh. And then you see the downfall. You go, I see, oh, this is interesting. That kind of went. They tried to make it like he was a bad dude.

38:06Breaks my heart. That's crazy. He was straight and fucking hookers. Like he could have done anything straight. Nothing would have happened. Oh, yeah. That's the thing. Hello. Anyway, it's the thing about these people's lives and the impact they have on us that we don't even realize. And then you realize that this person that has such an impact on you was a person. Oh, yeah. Everyone. It's weird when you realize your parents are a person. You're like, oh, that's weird. There's only one person I think might not be a person. But this is one. Oh. Steven Seagal. I'm not sure. You could have went anywhere.

38:32Like, I know if I watched the doc and I saw the record, he'd be very comfortable. You're like, I don't know. He's very comfortable. Yes, but going. Yes, but going. Yes, but going. So I read that you wanted to be a TV writer at seven. And this feels impossible to me because when I watched TV at seven, it wouldn't have even occurred to me that it had started with writing. It's just like these people exist on this box. I think that might be real. I think the truth is I knew I liked writing as a kid. I like the assignment of having to summarize the book or tell about what you did the day before. And I remember my teacher really affirming me that young saying, I look forward to reading your papers.

39:06We both know our teacher's name. Who was it? Mrs. Tarbunas. Yeah, Larry LeClaire. Come on. Yeah. When they tell you you're a good writer. You're like, OK. I think what we say is so powerful. The power of the tongue is real. Yeah. And I just need to always, any opportunity, give any little kid that thing. Yeah, because they'll remember it. It stays with them. Both ways. whether you're told you're not good at something or you are good. Like, it just sticks. For sure. So, no, I was really grateful to have that. But also, obviously, love watching television as a young person. I used to watch old TV because I had the grandma in the house.

39:38So we was watching, like, all in the family. Yeah, horror shows. Oh, yeah, we're going to watch what I want. I did that too with my grandma. All in the family. Sanford and Son. Well, we liked the Jeffersons, good times. Obviously, being a family in Chicago, I got to watch that old TV. That had a really big impact on me. A Different World was really important to me, which is the spinoff of The Cosby Show. for the younger audience really sort of speaking to me, even though I was like, didn't even know what college was. I had beef with that show. Okay, what's the beef? I'd say my first number one love of my life was Lisa Bonet.

40:04Of course, you're not alone. I mean, forget it. And then she gave birth to herself. Come on, Zoe Kravitz. I know. I got to dance with her one night for like two hours. What? I just need to tell you. Kristen and I read a thing. Of course. This is how every story starts. And Kristen goes, there's your girl. This is why you're married to the best lady on the planet. She goes, there's your girl and she's dancing and you love to dance. So get over there. Okay. And I fucking danced for two clouds floating on a cloud. Anyways, the spinoff was like, she took us to the spinoff, right? Correct. And then she got in the boot after the first season.

40:39But that's the way it's supposed to go. I lost my lead season three. You know, people knew about that. But there's something that happens when the universe takes someone away like that. Where we're like, we're going to hang the hat on this person. Well, let's remove that person and now see what you do. And what happened was A Different World became the show it was ultimately meant to become, which was supposed to be about Jasmine Guy and Kadeem Hardison and Kreese Sommer and Chanel Brown and Daryl Bell and Sinbad and everyone that came in and touched the show. So that show was like everything.

41:08It was just everything. It's like, even though I talk about it now. Did you just want to live in the world? Did you want to be in that college? Weren't they all in a college? That show is a big reason why a lot of folks went to historically Black colleges. My Black ass, loving a different world the way I did. I ended up going to Columbia College in Chicago, So I studied writing, producing, and television. But I did go visit Fisk, which is an HBCU as well. I wanted to stay in Chicago, and I wanted to go learn how to write television. Is Columbia, Chicago— A part of university? A part of the New York— They're completely different things.

41:33Completely different. I was trying to figure that out. I was researching you today. I was like, I'm reading all about it. My ex went to the university. I went to the college. That tells you, like, you know. Okay. But she was an exec or is an exec, and I'm a writer. So it makes sense. It's like, okay. I feel like all this adds up. You use these different parts of your brain. But I went to Columbia, and it was really the best thing. Can I ask really quick, though, who are you in elementary? Who are you in high school? Who are you in junior high? Oh, who was I? Yeah, in Chicago. And you moved to Evanston, but tell me the first 12.

41:59Oh, my God. Who were you? In elementary school, I was, the conduct grade was always low. Horsing around? Just a busybody. Talking too much. Mama having to come up to the school. You said you're not ADHD, but this is sounding a teeny bit. I was a social butterfly way young. I was there to socialize. The grades were solid, though. The reading and the writing and all that, I was killing it. You know, I was talking too much. And then junior high, I was very much like a tomboy, but I hung out with all the pretty girls and stuff like that. I was in that crew. I loved movies. That was a big part of my personality.

42:36People could ask me about anything. Can I ask how early you were fully aware of being queer? And then when you started sharing that with friends? Oh, man, that's so interesting because I feel like I'm a person that believes it's sort of in you from the beginning. It's about where you recognize it. But I mean, for a minute, you're just not even sexual. True. No. But the thing is, when you're kids, like you laugh, you have crushes. That's true. You like other kids. You like your teachers and shit. There's teachers you like. That was never one of my fantasies, though, because my teachers were like my aunts and moms.

43:11I'm just like, they were like amazing, but they just were giving that. But it was really about, I was looking at these actors and stuff coming up and the Janet Jacksons. I could recognize, I'm like, Janet is beautiful. I was like, okay, what's happening over here? Holly Berry is beautiful. I could recognize Whitney Houston is beautiful, but I also considered my mother to be beautiful. And so there was a level of like, oh, you're beautiful. She's beautiful. Okay. These women that I could recognize, it was a different thing. Did you have a young mom? Are you the older sister or the younger? I'm the youngest.

43:39and my mom was like in her 30s. Like she had a, so it feels like the usual age. You have kids. And my sister's like almost two years older than me. And so it was just the two of us. And I just gravitated toward the female energy. But then I was also a tomboy, like outside with the boys and stuff like that. And so I think for me, high school, I definitely felt very queer. But the thing about tomboys, girls don't really get teased the way boys who are effeminate do. No, right. Because in a patriarchal society, it's not odd to be a girl that wants to be a boy. It's odd to be a boy that wants to be a girl because girls are sort of second-class citizens.

44:15Right. And so that was the thing. I was never teased or made fun of. So I was never eyeballed. And then in college, I was still living with my mom, so I wasn't really out exploring. It wasn't until I moved to L.A. where I was like, okay, where are the gay clubs at? Where are the gay kids? This and that. And then when I would go to those clubs, I would feel very much like an outsider. Like I wouldn't feel welcome. Did you feel inexperienced? Definitely felt inexperienced and also felt like I don't have any gay friends either. And so I've just cultivated this sort of like queer Black women. It's not like a requirement.

44:44But the thing is, like, we had to curate that, cultivate that community. Like, it wasn't just like, oh, where's my other queer Black mask women? It's not turnkey. No, like, you got to really find folks. And we've literally found it. We were hanging out last night and it's private. We don't have our phones. We're just having dinner. We're sharing. It's amazing. But it took a beat for us to, like, figure that out. And so I think that's the interesting thing about community. is that it takes effort. It takes time. It takes energy. Everything worth having. No one ever knocks on your door and gives you something that's worth having.

45:14No. I do think there's this desire of everything you can have delivered to your door and not friends. No, not friends, not partners, not any of that stuff. No, you got to work for it. Not jobs, all the shit that's worth having. You got to fight for it. They don't hand it out. They don't. And then when you get it, that's when the real work begins. Yeah. So you got, I don't want to say lucky because obviously you'd gotten a degree in it, But you land pretty quickly in L.A. after graduation as an assistant to an executive producer of Girlfriend. Yes. Yeah, right? Which I was loving watching. And the greater of that show at the time had been the youngest Black showrunner ever.

45:49Like 30 maybe, right? Because Yvette Lee Bowser, who wrote on A Different World, she was up top. She had created a show called Living Single. So she was outside as well. I want to give her her flowers. And then Mara Brockett Kill was also coming up at that time. Mara. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Anytime M-A-R-A, I'm afraid, is it Mara or Mara? It's Mara. In this case, it's Mara. Mara Brockacue. I have to interject. Go for it. Please, come on. Last week or two weeks ago, I met Mara twice in like one week. She's stunning. And she's incredible. I went to dinner. One of your events? Yeah, one of my events. Monica's right into a lot of events.

46:21I started to go to her events. But she was at two and she's the best. And we exchanged numbers. I told her the story of the show and she was like, I want to listen. What episode? So I was like sending her episodes. So hopefully she'll hear this. Oh, yeah. So big shout out. Mara Buckingham, I'm going to send it to her. I'm going to send it up myself. But that feels like a real blessing to land with that person as a potential mentor. Oh, my God. And she has. She has been. She came to the Queen and Slim premiere. Gina Prince-Bythewitt, I want to shout out as well, who wrote and directed Love and Basketball.

46:48Mara got me a job working for her on Secret Life of Bees once I was done with Mara. And then Gina got me a gig working for Ava DuVernay when she went to go direct her first film. So that's my trifecta of fairy godmothers in the business. And Gina just hit me like today because she got a chance to look at my play that I did in Baltimore. And her and Reggie Bythewood, her husband, who was also a big mentor of mine, they literally sent me a text today saying, hey, we love this play. It was very well done. Really proud of you. And I was like, it's like my parents are telling me they're proud of me right now.

47:14OK, so when you leave that show, is your first staff writing job on Bones or is it on the Nickelodeon show? Nickelodeon was first and then I got Bones. So I did the half hour multicam and then I did the hour long procedural. and culturally going from so different. Yeah. And how did that go? I kind of struggled on the multicam kids show thing because it's just sort of not my vibe. You're not watching a lot of that. Yeah, but like I needed a job and the lead was a black girl. And so they couldn't hire Shout Out to Izzy. I love him. He was like, all right, I must have you two black women split the check because he's otherwise I can only have one.

47:49I know it's sort of how it goes. It's not his fault. I mean, it's just the way it goes. They did like the paper team situation. So me and another black female writer shared an office and we were on a writing team. Then I didn't like work for a bit, but I wrote the pilot of The Chi. I had a table read for it. Did you sell it to Nevins? Yes. I love Nevins. I love him so much. He's the best. I call him my Clive Davis. He was like, come on in. He taught me a lot too. He said to me, whatever you don't get in your first season, you'll get in your second. Whatever you don't get in the second season, you'll get in your third.

48:13It was so great at breakfast. And he just sort of gave me such great advice. He bought the pilot in 15, but you didn't shoot it till 18? We shot two pilots of it. We did one pilot and he said, this could be better. And he was right. and then we did it again. And then that was the one he greenlit. So two things. A, hard to hear that. B, what a champion to say, go get it right. Yeah. Right? Was it hard to hear it or did you know it as well? Or was he wrong? No, he was right, ultimately. I can't have to give him that. I, though, didn't think the director we had for the first one was the right director for it.

48:43I will say that. And they were like, no, this is a big deal, by the way. I don't need to say his name or whatever, but I don't need to disrespect anyone because he is very talented and amazing. I just didn't think he was right for what I was doing. And so then we did that. And in essence, like Nevins was like, yeah, OK, we were both right. And so he said, let's go here. And we got Rick Famuyua, who directed Dope, who directed The Wood. And he directed the pilot of our show, which is a big reason why I think it went. And we had a beautiful cast and Alex Hibbard, who came from Moonlight, right over to our set.

49:09And obviously Jason Mitchell was coming off of Straight Outta Compton and Yolanda Ross and Jacob Lattimore. Just the whole cast was really wonderful. And they sort of brought us into this space of, oh, OK, this is the show. I always wanted to be an ensemble piece, but they were like, no, you need to lead. And then, of course, season three, our lead was taken away due to some events. And then it became the show that I think I always intended it to be. Do you think this description is fair? I've read this many times where people say, like, it's a hopeful version of The Wire. Hmm. I mean, that is maybe the greatest show ever made.

49:37So it never hurts to be in the same sentence. More hopeful. You know, yeah, I definitely get the comparisons for sure. And I think The Wire did something that hadn't been done on television before. And I never feel like weird about comparisons or people mentioning things in the same sentence, because I think that's such an honor. And I think the shy really, for me, was the slice of life ensemble. I didn't want to necessarily go too deep into these different organizations or places or things like that. Because I really wanted to have people in living rooms having conversations while people in living rooms are watching it and maybe be encouraged to have their own conversations.

50:11I'm a writer that I think leans into conversations. Wanting to start conversations. Not even wanting to start them, but want to have them. I love Matthew Lopez, phenomenal playwright recently said to me, which, by the way, which he got from Mike Nichols. But he was saying that every conversation, there's like three categories. It's like it's a negotiation, it's a seduction or it's a competition or something like that. And so I really kind of carried that. And I'm going to be paraphrasing, but I really do love the art of a conversation. Yeah. Conversing for me, it's a very fun game. It's like the best game and you can play it all day long.

50:42Yeah, exactly. I just love games. And I think talking to people is just this super fun game. Sometimes people like to be in combat, in conversation, and I prefer to be in dialogue. Meaning you're saying something, I'm digesting it. I say something, you digest it. And we can kind of accept that. Mine would be opposite of combat. It would be, I say something and it opens the door for you to say something even scarier, which opens the door for me to say something even scarier. That to me is like the ratcheting up of it. Not like a conflict, more just like, I'm going here. Oh, fuck. Okay, I'll meet you there.

51:20And then plus one. That's the fun game of it. I love that. I think because that's really how you get to be close. I'm going to say something scary. And that gives me permission to say something scary, too. So I think Master of None is a very interesting and probably unexpected deviation. Yeah. But ultimately has to be a wonderful thing to integrate into the overall thing. It's going to change my life. I learned the story today. I would have assumed you and Aziz were friends and that the role was written for you. I know. But that is not at all what it was. Yeah, no, not at all. It was written for a white woman that might become his love interest.

51:55Correct. Oh. Yeah. So walk us through how... I don't want to do Aziz. I don't know if it was a white woman. It was just supposed to be a straight woman. He could come on the show and tell us himself. Look, here's the truth. I don't know how likely that is, but get Brad Pitt. Aziz and Sari, I don't know. We'll see what happens. He's hard to get, this guy. He is. Trust me. I know. I know. I love him. I love him. He's my brother. He doesn't like to talk. He doesn't want to talk to people. Like, that's just how he is. He talked to Amy, which was surprising. We've had maybe 15 text exchanges. Come on.

52:21And they're all about watches. I'm like, that's all we're going to do, huh? Yeah, take it. It's more than what I'm looking to get. When we first started the show, there was like a list of like eight people that we wanted. He'd be great, though. And he's on there. Having me here doesn't hurt because now he'll be like, okay, all right, talk to me about it. She lived. Yeah, exactly. I think she lived. Let me call her first and make sure she lived. Talk to me about it. No, the Michael thing's really going to throw him. He's like, I'm never going on there. No, no, no. Oh, Jesus Christ. Again, I got to give a shout out to Alison Jones.

52:50We had her on, by the way. Yes, friend of the pod. That's right. I did. I watched it. We love her. That's also a rare thing because she also doesn't talk to people. I know. That was lucky. She's like, I just discovered people. But you know, not because she doesn't want to, per se. She made it very clear. She said she's not being asked. She was so flattered. And no one ever cares about casting directors. She just didn't think anyone. She kept thinking, why are you interviewing her? So crazy. Which is insane. Yes, it's insane. But it's very endearing. She's phenomenal. She literally saw something I put out online, which I wasn't even in.

53:18It was a pilot presentation for a show I ultimately did called 20s. I put it out there because I wanted somebody to see it and go, okay, we could do this. And so then I got a call that she wanted to meet me. I didn't know who she was, but I went and sat with her and I walked by the poster for Freaks and Geeks and Bridesmaids and Fresh Prince of Bel-Air. And I thought, oh, okay. She's like Lorne Michaels. Got it. Yeah. So I stood across from her and I just talked to her about television. and she has such great taste and everything and I talked about Maud and watching that and watching Golden Girls.

53:44Are you pretty encyclopedic with TV stuff? Yeah. I mean, I worked at Blockbuster for a while. Yeah, yeah. And Best Buy and movie theater. Yes, and the movie theater. You did your homework. I do. I know all my stuff. So we were just like talking about the most randomest like things and she just kind of goes, have you ever considered acting? And I said, I have not. She's like, okay. She's like, can I bring you in for some stuff? Just for like, you know, schist and giggles. And I was like, sure. And she did. She brought me in for Veep

54:08and so I wasn't expecting that. So I just like completely fucking fucking gun slinger to be on feed. That's not a great starter acting job. You're throwing me out here. But then she did bring me in for a tape and I got the comeback which was cool. And then I got a call that said, can you just go meet with Aziz? Wait, really quick. Can I ask? Yeah. At that time, were you like extra money or were you like, I want to act. I have a desire to act. No, I just really trusted her instincts. I didn't think that that was something that was in the cards from me, though. I'm a writer. That's what I do. So because Aziz and her, she was obviously brought on to do the show.

54:44It didn't even have a title. It took forever for us to get the title of the damn show. It was Untitled Aziz and Sorry Project, because y 'all know how that goes. But obviously, I was a fan of Parks and Rec and knew his comedy. But I got a call that was from her office that says, why don't you go meet with Aziz? And I was like, why is it casting people calling me? What's about the staffing? Yeah. I don't know, but go meet with Aziz and Alan Yang. And obviously, I knew Alan Yang's name as well. And so I thought, But, okay, all right, I'll go sit with them. But it's from Allison's office. So this is strange.

55:08And they were like, I know, just go to his house and sit and talk to him. And so I later found out that Aziz told her that he didn't want just people to come in and read with him. He wanted to meet people first and see if they were interesting and then read. So he just said to her, send me interesting people. And by the grace of God, she and I just met. She said, oh, Lena Waithe is interesting. You should meet her. And he was like, okay, I don't know who that is. We're sending you the house. And so I went to his house and sat with him and Alan, not unlike this, literally kind of almost similar.

55:33the furniture and everything. And I just sort of talked to them like I would if it was a staff writing meeting, but I clearly wasn't. And I just was like myself. I had recently fallen in love. I was just being myself and comfortable with my own skin. And then I got the call. Okay, he wants you to read with him. And I was like, oh, okay. So he thought I was interesting. So I came in, sat down, read with him, and it was just instant. Then I came in to test for it. The casting couch, it was a very straight white woman sitting next to me. And she's like, are you going in for Denise? And I was like, yeah.

56:00Are you going in for Denise? She was like, yeah. She's like, it's funny. with each other all the time. And I was like, right, yeah, that's weird. By the way, it's so much better. Oh, yeah. It's way better. In other words, when you sit down, it's like, yeah, I'm kind of the same, but way less good looking than this guy. You're like different variations of each other. And so to me, what I looked at, it was Alan and Michael Schur, too, who was our parent on that. It was basically them saying, this is the NBC 1994 version of this show. This one we're bringing in. Of course, when I come in, it's like, this is where shit is going.

56:27Like, this is what it is. And so I totally get what they were doing. too. And when I went in, I was like, oh, I told Michael Stroud, this is my flu game. I'm going to talk right around this, man. Because I was like, let's go. Because I could just feel something was interesting. And of course, after I read and tested, Aziz was like, come on, come to New York. And were you encouraged to be loose in improv in that audition? A little bit. Because again, if I'm going from, okay, we had this one archetype. Right. But we're trying this other thing out. Let's see all the flavors. Like, I would want to know.

56:54They knew I was a writer. They were like, you know, but I also didn't come in there. I didn't want to blend the two. So the season one, I didn't write anything. Oh Me and Z's would have conversations Where he would take little things From there and put it in there But then season two In success He was like Okay I want to do A Denise centered episode And I was in season two A lot less Because I had gotten Ready player one And that was a very Interesting tricky thing Because it was like classic Like we got a season two And now you say You want to go do This Spielberg movie And only be in there For a couple episodes And I was like Yeah I was like But this is an opportunity I'll give you a great episode Just talking shit Yeah I'll give you a great episode It'll be fine man Don't worry about it Like I gotta go do this movie And he's all like Oh god classic And so sure enough, he came to London where I was filming so he and I could write the episode.

57:33Because I actually told him, I said, I can't write that episode with you. I said, because I got to focus on this movie, man. I'm like, how many of you get to be in a fucking Steven Spielberg movie? I got to show up. He was like, if you don't write it with me, it's not happening. Good for him. And so I was like, fine. And it won an Emmy. Yes, it did. You won an Emmy for that. Yeah, we became the first black woman to win for Outstanding Writing in the Comedy Series. Yeah. So great. And did you love acting? It took some getting used to because he did want me to be myself. And you were in New York City?

58:01I was in New York City, baby. Going to restaurants with him. Yeah. I mean, he's like showing me. He's like, he's the reason I know how to eat oysters and caviar, this kind of stuff. Because he's such an old school gentleman type guy. He knows every restaurant. And I'm like, okay, this is all fascinating. Yes. What a tour guide to New York he must have been. Oh, my God. I mean, even in London, too. I watch the show. I'm like, I want to spend a week with him and fucking meet him at corners. and eat shit. I know. Shopping, eating. Yeah, look at girls and eat shit. Let's go. No, it was fantastic. I remember we used to go see Moonlight together and Barry Jenkins was doing a Q &A after and it was just like crazy.

58:36And then we were, because we knew we had Thanksgiving coming up and so we were like, oh, this is crazy. He's someone that is a big part of not just my career, but I think just my evolution as an artist and as a person in the world. And I'm really grateful for his existence because my career wouldn't look the way it does if it weren't for him. and Allison Jones and Alan Yang and Michael Schur and Netflix, those guys over there. It's just such a big part of my career. Now, what did you have to learn to run The Chi? I'd never run it. I'm not a showrunner. Oh, you've never run it. I did the showrunner training program with the WGA, and I realized, yeah, someone said, get in your own TV show is like being beaten to death with your own dream.

59:16And nothing is truer than that. I always say the hardest core motherfuckers in all the show business are showrunners. You have to give it to them. That's why I don't do it. Because they're doing budgets. They're dealing with actors. They're dealing with execs. They're the edit. They do every single piece of it. The way I get to sit here, you know, shout out to Jewel and Justin, who co-show run it together. I do think it's a two-person job. I get to be the creator. You know what I'm saying? And I get to, like, give notes and things like that. You were in the writer's room, I imagine. I was in the writer's room for season one and season two.

59:43And those were rocky times because I was a young buck. Like, I was 30, 31. That's young to be a show creator. They have showrunners they put you with who are older and wiser. But at the same time, I'm doing something new and you're holding on to something old. That's the inherent tension in all these situations. Always. Is I'm trying to do something new, but you know how to do it. You're right. Both of you are right. Yes, correct. But we're fighting. But you can't get the green light until they're like, well, we approve this guy to come oversee. If they spend$100 million on something, they want someone that has done it many times successfully.

1:00:13I lightly call Michael Scharr our parent on, you know, Master of None, because you need that person that's going to kind of watch over. Okay, all right. What are y 'all doing? Okay, what's happening? Okay, you want to do what? That's the nature of the beast. And I think people that watch television don't always think about all those things. Or sometimes you have a whole episode and this actor got sick or this actor got a movie. Okay, you go here. We got to rewrite this. And that changes that storyline. But we'll figure it out. These two actors, we wanted to be a couple, don't really have great chemistry.

1:00:34Okay, so we'll go over here. It's like all these different things. It's logistics. Yes, it's logistics. It's like, it's also a workplace. It's like everybody don't always get along. Yeah, you're doing a lot of... Therapy for people in HR. Exactly. Okay, HR. Dealt with that. So it's just like, okay, it's eight seasons. I was like, yo, I'm going May 8th. We're going to be in Chicago. Last day of filming. We're going to do the whole thing and go promote it in New York. Now explain this to me. So seasons one through five, 10 episodes. Season six, 16 episodes. They did that. They asked us for more.

1:01:05Yeah. Season seven. 12. 12. And eight, I asked us to go back to 10. Okay. So for our last season. It's going to be 10, baby. Okay. Yeah. By the way, Parenthood, which I was on for six years, we never did a season of the same numbers. Same thing. I was like, we did 13. We did 21. We did 18. We did 14. Was that because of the streamer or the network? It was the network. It was like they would never kind of commit to us. We were always on the bubble all six years. And it was like, this year was like, good news, 16. We're like, what fucking, what number is that? You're either doing 13 or you're doing 22 at that time.

1:01:35We're going to do 16. And then one year we're going to do it. They tell us midway through. I don't know. It was very confusing. When they told us they wanted 16 episodes, we had already had our 10 episode pitch. So we had to go to them and say, well, you got to give us a few more weeks to figure out what that is. And they were like, okay, but it's good news. They want more episodes. and it's like I had a new guy come over and he wanted more episodes because it was doing well. But we had never told a story that way before. Yeah. People don't realize, you're being told. You're like, okay, so we're going to do 16.

1:02:00Got it. And then seven, oh, you're doing 12. Okay. And that's why they said, yo, eight, I got to, this will be 10. Okay, cool. Yeah. Do you have the pride of having a show that went eight seasons? This is like, you're in the thinnest of air. I know. There's a lot of gratitude. But also knowing that when we came on at that time, it was a different world. Eight years ago? I know. Things were very different. Very different. Even more, slightly more than eight, because we did the first pilot. Then we did the second one. So we had a mini room and then this and that. You mean you sold the pitch in 2015?

1:02:30Correct. So you've been doing this for 11 years. Exactly. You've only seen eight seasons. But as a pilot, you'll never see the light of day. There's things that I've lived through that have really made me the artist I am now and made me someone that can really see things from a lot of different angles. In 2018, you became the voice of AT &T. And I'm wondering what your tagline is. Can you say it? I want to hear it. Oh, my God. I made Billy Crudup do the Visa commercial, Priceless. MasterCard. I made him do it to Monica. Hold on. This is how you know. I wrote one to fuck with Monica that he had to write.

1:03:00MasterCard was fantastic. Oh, my God. He did a cold read. It was perfect. What was my main? Because it was like, what was my main timeline? I'm forgetting it. I haven't done it in a while. Just OK is not OK? Just OK is not OK. Is that it? Does that feel familiar? It was that, but it was something else, too. It was something else. How many years did you do that? I did that for a few years, like maybe like three. That's the best job in Hollywood. It was the best. And I could do it at the crib too. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, exactly. And the pay is nice. It is lovely. It's like nice payday. Yes, it is.

1:03:33Yeah, for minimal work. Like another VO situation. If you looked at your career and you charted your hourly rate, there would just be this huge spike and it'd be your AT &T. It's right there. It's right there. And people would recognize me from my voice. Speaking of the voice thing. Well, Delta, yeah. They knew. They're like, hmm, your voice sounds familiar. Oh, maybe Delta's like going to have a huge campaign. No, she will. She will. She will. I'm jealous already. She's the kid who, you know, I'm certain to be wrong. What I love is she loves writing more than anything. She writes compulsively.

1:04:04We just had the conversation last night. You would love this. I imagine if you could imagine having a kid, this would be the ultimate conversation you could ever have, right? She wants to win. there's like a writing competition at school to write basically the closing statement of elementary. And so all the kids are writing something. She really wants to get picked and to be able to read it on stage. She wrote it and then she read it to Kristen and Kristen said, it's really good, but I think, and you're better off speaking to your dad about this, but I'm not sure that it's you. And so she came upstairs and she's like, mom said this, I'm going to read it to me.

1:04:38And I got to have this conversation with her. And I said, the challenge as a writer is to never write for anybody but you. And it's so hard. That's true. I said, so you could choose to write this to try to win a contest, or you could choose to write the story that you would tell your best friend Inka about your experience at CWC. What would you say about your experience to Inka, your best friend? And she was like, I get that. Okay, I get that. And I was like, this is like the dream of all dreams. I have a conversation like that with my daughter about what it means to find your voice as an artist.

1:05:11Oh, that's good. I was just floating on a cloud this whole conversation. It was so fun. You know, it's interesting because I am childless by choice. And it's when we talked about this a little bit. Like if you remember that, I'm still in that camp. It's so fascinating because there's so many things that I think about in terms of like why I don't want to be a parent. A lot of it is because you have to have a sort of mental capacity for that at the end of a day. What's interesting is you have the capacity to sit and like hear it, give the note. You're going to hear the rewrite. You're going to maybe be there if she wins.

1:05:46You know, it's going to be a lot. If she doesn't get it, then there's also that, you know, emotional showing up that you'll do. The most likely thing is if she succeeds at writing the thing she'd really tell her friend Inka, it's not going to get picked. Oh, well, who knows? We don't know that. We don't know. But at this age, in that context, it probably won't be rewarded originality in true voice. But that's also a little lesson you got to give. Well, I told her. I said, look, hon. Okay. You set her up just in case. Well, luckily, I got my own storyteller. It's like, I've always written what I wanted.

1:06:17And it didn't work. It didn't always work. I wanted a car chase movie that was a love story. Nobody wants that. I wanted that. And it didn't work. But I kept doing it. And one day, the podcast happened. It took so many years. of me being truthful to that. Sometimes it takes a while, but you will have the pride of having always told the story you wanted to tell. And that is invaluable and worth more than any amount of money you could have made. Absolutely. Where I do that, because I have this mentorship program where there's writers, there's actors, there's people who want to be execs. And I get on Zooms with them once a month and they can ask me whatever they want.

1:06:50We have these lovely private conversations. And I think that's where I realized, oh, that's where I can show up and like be real. Because also it's that element too of being supportive and encouraging, but also being grounded and being realistic. And I think that is the path you're walking with your kid. Maybe for me as a mentor, which I've become and I try to do that, it's still a responsibility. But I think you're doing, I always say parents are doing God's work because it's a different kind of responsibility that you have. This is a person that is a reflection of you, but also you want to make sure that they're on a carbon copy of you.

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1:09:28The thing you fight the most as a parent constantly is they are their own thing. It's all you're doing. Like you're trying your hardest. But think about how many parents don't do that. There's so many parents whose children are really doing the thing that parents want them to do. It's very natural and gratifying to see yourself in other things. We search for that. And that's how we bond. And it's great. Invariably, you do that. You see all these things that are similar to yourself in it. And it's very gratifying. But then you have to go like, and that's 10 % of them. I might miss the other 90%.

1:10:01It's not like me at all. Because I'm not looking for it. Right. You got to remind yourself to constantly look for it. Back to the baby thing. So what happened to me was, A, I've always wanted kids. So that's standard. But also I had a friend who had a daughter who I just fell in love with. I'd take her trick or treat and she'd ride on my shoulders. And I just constantly was like, if I don't get a Madeline before I die, I'm going to. Oh my gosh, you're built for it. Yeah, I'm built for it. But Delta, fuck you up a little bit? Oh yeah, no, that's not the problem. No, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

1:10:31Because then I'll meet kids and I'm like, oh, can my kid be cool and chill? Yeah, of course they will. But then the jerky part is though, they going to have moments of not being chill, not being cool. like upset. It's just a lot going on. There is a lot. You know, I'm just like, how much do I have? Like, I got responsibility for myself, my community, my work. And you feel fulfilled. I do. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You're like, I'm whole. Yes. And I do think it can be very societal. I think sometimes people say, oh, why'd you want to have kids? Oh, you know, I'm at that age. I couldn't finally afford it.

1:11:03Or it's that time. And although now there's so many, every other week, there's an article in New York Times about people can't afford to have the children now. So they're deciding not to for certain reasons or people don't like the world they may bring them into. But for me, it's more of an internal thing about what do I actually have the mental capacity for? What I also think about is at the end of a long day, what do I want to do with myself? And I think the first thing is to not take care of someone else. Yeah, yeah, that's fair. Because it's a different kind of thing that you're doing. Because also anything could happen with kids.

1:11:31Like they fall, break something. That's so scary. They sick. Can I hit you with something? Go ahead. No, I'm trying to convince you to. No, no, no, no, no, go for it. But I'm just, I just want to point out a lot of these counterintuitive things. Yeah. You might be shocked to learn or find out or experience that taking care of them is taking care of yourself in a way that was unimaginable. Oh, that's interesting. The amount of healing and perspective that's happening in those moments and the right sizing of all of your concerns and all these existential things you have in the racket in your head and the things that are important.

1:12:02Like somehow it can alleviate all of those things. It's like you think you're going to be overwhelmed, but weirdly it prioritizes things in this way. oh, this is weirdly nurturing to me and has, yeah, just prioritized things in a very clean and lovely. Like, here's what I miss about being an addict. The beauty of being an addict is you have a single goal. Yes, it's true. I'm telling you, it's a liberating fucking thing. It's like, I have one mission today. Do not fall off of this high. That's so peaceful. Is it difficult for you to watch stuff like Euphoria or like any of those things? No, I love it.

1:12:38So you can watch. Oh, I love it. Yeah, yeah. Because I know it's not like I just see it. I'm like, oh, I've been in that room. I know this thing. Yeah, I love it. Got you. Some addicts can't watch. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. No. Yeah. But I hear you because I love Jada Pinkett calls her children, her teachers. She says they teach me things about herself, life, all that kind of stuff. And I thought that was a really interesting way of looking at parenthood because obviously you're thinking this the other way around. But I think for me, I am taught something by human beings every single day.

1:13:08And that's why I feel like I don't need to produce one or have somebody produce one because it really is a writer's job to be a witness, to really look at human behavior and try to understand it and accept things about it that don't make sense to us sometimes. Because when I look at society, it's easy to get frustrated, but rather I say, why are we behaving this way? Because it's not out of sheer desire for destruction. Right. It's out of the sheer desire to be seen, to be loved, to be a part of something. And so I think, yeah, I may not be a parent and I don't have a desire to be, but I think what I do have a desire to do is to understand humanity and have empathy for us and be able to reflect us back to ourselves so that way we could better understand ourselves.

1:13:53I mean, Chelsea Handler says this so perfectly all the time. She's like, I don't have kids, so I have the capacity to give to all these other kids. Oh, yeah. A lot of my friends have kids. Yeah. And just like she gives all these charities. She's just like, I have space. If I had a kid, I could not feasibly do all of that. Yeah. And I will say my friend, Melina Matsoukas, who has a little one who's like her son who has not yet one. And he is in that space of when I come over there, I can just like hold him. And I was over there holding him. And she's like, you come over here to get your baby fixed.

1:14:27And I was like, what? No, no. because when I hand him back, when I'm sitting there, also low-key getting tired. He's getting heavy as hell. Yeah. He's heavy. She knows this. I'm like, girl, this is not normal, girl. What is happening? What's in the breast milk? She's like, I know, child. But as I give him back because I'm like, yo, I'm exhausted before I leave. And she's just like, let's give him back over here. I was like, yeah, I want to give him back. I want to give Brock him back. We had a terrifying moment when Kristen was probably like six months pregnant. We went out to eat with our friends, the Hansons, and they already had two little kids.

1:14:58And we were at Bob's Big Boys Impossible. It was not possible to have dinner with these kids there. And so you guys were like, look what we're about to do. Oh, Lord. We can't go to Bob's Big Boys anymore. Like, that's a wrap on going out to fucking eat a hamburger? Y 'all don't want to leave the house, though. Let's keep it out. Let's be honest. You don't want to leave the house. Yeah, now we have an excuse. So you got that built-in excuse. That's nice. That's the other thing. Parents, don't be going nowhere. Anytime I don't want to go somewhere, there's a play that night. Oh, look, see? Look, I'm here.

1:15:27I go out. I go out a little bit. I'm outside a little bit. Just a little bit. You're social. You've been since elementary. Problem. I've been social. Yeah. I know. It's your life. It's your life force. I can't help it. You're social too. I am. You're social too. Drives my wife crazy. Like, how many people do you need to talk to? I'm like, everyone, hopefully. I think there's like 7 billion left I have to talk to. It's like, it's your job. It's your job. She always says the greatest gift about this show is that, like, I do get to talk myself out enough. So that way we can go home. I'm tolerable at night.

1:16:00Yeah. Yeah. The load's not all on her shoulders. I love you guys. I love you guys together. I'm not team share. What happened? I'm not. I'm not. I'm like, guys, no. I said, internet, what are you doing? Can I tell you my conclusion? Did you see all that stuff? Oh, God, yeah. That's all we got asked about when we got nominated this year. But I think my final conclusion on it is the best way for me to digest that is nobody's good enough for her. Oh, my God. And I love that. And that's true. But I'm the next best thing. That's right, brother. Yeah. Yeah, you're killing it. You're killing it. That's the message.

1:16:32The message isn't against me. No. It's nobody's good enough for her. And I love that. I'm glad that's how she feels about her. And I'm glad that's how America feels about her. This is real. This is real. I can live with that. But to me, I just love what you two represent, which is... 1950s.

1:16:54Old school. No, but I think sometimes people have an idea of who they're supposed to be with. that idea is never as good as who they're actually supposed to be with. She said I was supposed to marry like head of UNICEF. You're supposed to marry Mike Sher. Oh, wow. You know, a good boy. Mike's pretty successful. And he's just a good human being. Oh my God. He wakes up thinking how he can help other people. I don't. I wake up thinking about speedboats. I'm like, should I order a Donzie or buy a used one? No, but you also type of person that said, I got to get a Madeline before I die. Yeah, that's true.

1:17:27That's real. I do want to ask one thing and you can say no. Okay. But you were with someone for a couple of years. Uh-huh. And then you got married and it only lasted a couple of months. Uh-huh. And I'm dying to know if something about the title fucked everyone up or you up personally. It wasn't the title. No. Okay. It was me also feeling like even though I'm not as happy as I should be, I think this is what I'm supposed to be doing. And I just didn't have the language or understanding of that. My happiness didn't feel like it was important. I think what was most important was that I honor this relationship.

1:18:09Keep this thing going, whether you're enjoying it or not. Because of how much it's changed my life and how grateful I am for it and how amazing this human is. And I don't want to say happiness. I want to be frivolous about that. Like, I think we wanted different things. One of the things is like, I actually realized I didn't want to have children. And that's a pretty big life change. And so, but I, at that time, I just thought, I just kept putting it off. And so that wasn't me lying. It was me still trying to understand what I wanted and who I wanted to be. And I think that's why for me, it's really important having this perspective, stepping back.

1:18:40It's like, we have to really ask ourselves whose life we want to, because a marriage and a relationship is the blending of two lives, truly. And so you have to really ask yourself, what life do I actually want? And I don't think I was very clear about that. All I knew was I want to be with this person. I want to have this house. I want to have this dog. I want to have this mural. But then I didn't ask myself, but like, where do you want to be in five years? Like, really? And in its best version, it's like, I wanted this life. This person wanted this life. And then magically, when we get together, the two of us get a life that neither of us even thought of.

1:19:11Right, right. And that's like maybe the greatest thing that can happen. Yeah, I mean, or you can say, yo, we have impacted each other's lives in such a significant way. And now this might be where we give each other room to go and have lives that make sense for both of us. Yeah, that's brave. That's hard to do. Yeah, but I didn't do it in a way that was noble, that was honest, that was kind. It was done in a way that felt like a car crash. And that's because I just sort of like was driving the car too fast, not knowing the gear and just sort of going. And that doesn't remove accountability for my behavior.

1:19:47It's hard to exit these things elegantly. Very few people. I wish I could have, you know, landed the plane better. You know what I mean? But I think ultimately, and again, it's about giving yourself grace and kind of looking back at it. I go, oh, you could have handled that much better. You could have dealt with that in a different way. But what I do also understand and accept is that I'm where I'm supposed to be. I know she's where she's supposed to be. And I don't have any ill will toward anyone. If any of the will is toward myself. I think for me, the greatest feeling is I was with a woman for nine years.

1:20:16I still love her to death. We're friends. And her life turned out so fucking good. And I'm like, oh, yes. Oh, yeah. This person's life is like 10 times better without bias in it. That's where it could kill you. If you crash the car and the person's fucked up, that's hard to live with. But if like you can look back and like, oh, good, she's so happy. She has the perfect husband and the perfect kids and fucking mwah. So happy. And that to me is how you know you really love somebody is that when you want them to be happy and happier without you. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Because I don't know if that happiness would have ensued if I would have stayed there.

1:20:51to me removing myself, I think was actually the right thing to do because I wouldn't have been able to deliver the life that I think she would have wanted. Yeah. What are you most excited to do? You've done so many things. You have created many, many shows. You have them on Amazon. Obviously, we have... The Chi. The Chi. Yeah, wrapping up. May 22nd, Paramount+. Coming out May 22nd, Paramount+. Last season, The Chi says goodbye. Okay, Chi says goodbye. Eight seasons. What are you dying to do? You're also a producer in Cats, which just got nominated. Angelical Ball, myself, Cynthia Erivo, Jeremy Pope, La Roche, John Legend.

1:21:26Dominated today for nine nominations. Nine nominations. One of the ones, thank you so much, one of the ones I'm in there is for best revival of a musical. Uh-huh. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Now, let me ask you, were you a fan of Cats? No. Yeah, the whole time I'm like, what's going on? And then I went to go see this version where it's told through queer black ball culture. Okay. Which really makes so much sense. It lends itself to this world so well. It's almost like it was meant for this world. Couldn't agree more. It's phenomenal. It was perfect. That world would have made sense in the ball world and almost nowhere else.

1:21:57Exactly. Paris is Burning. I highly recommend everybody check out also, you know, the Cartier and Collection. Jenny Livingston, phenomenal documentary. Changed my life as well. What's that about? That's about the ball culture. She made a documentary about it when she was coming out of NYU. And it just is a movie that has been such an archival of our queer Black ancestors and what they were doing at the time and the things that they were saying. but also speaks to reality of the time, what was going on. So I obviously love that. And then I went to go see this show at PAC, which is where it started, and I was blown away by it.

1:22:27And then I wanted to be a part of it. And they were kind enough to let me join the team and came over to Broadway. And here we are. Really special. So do you want to do another show next or do you want to do a movie or do you want to do more AT &T commercials? I'm doing a movie. Writing a movie now was an adaptation of a short story called Grand Rising, which is something that you guys, if I say that, you kind of go like, huh, I don't know what it is. It's a different way that sometimes Black folks in certain groups say good morning. Instead of good morning, they say grand rising. Grand rising is something that sometimes I feel like a little more enlightened.

1:22:58You sort of say that. So this woman wrote this amazing short story. I read it, loved it. I raised my hand to see if I could possibly come on and adapt it. They were kind enough to trust me with that. Fox Searchlight is doing it. We're not telling much about what the movie is because I think that's the new thing now. Be a little bit mysterious about the storyline. Let folks come experience it for themselves and see what it is. But I'm working on that right now. A couple of TV show ideas. maybe want to play with like what it is to be in your 40s. So stay tuned. And then yeah, theater, theater, theater.

1:23:21That's what I care so much about just because I think with everything happening with the streamers and people not really want to go see the movies, live entertainment is something that we can't deny. And it's like Station 11. It's like they're going around town performing Shakespeare for the people, for entertainment. Because when all of this stuff shuts down, what do you have is people that can interpret words on a page and inspire you and move you. I think it's why Hamnet hit us all. Shakespeare sort of wrote about the most difficult thing he ever had to experience. And we just know it to be one of his great works.

1:23:55But to see that movie and to see how that story was happening in real time, obviously the way they were showing it, just reminds me that this is how we actually like to be communicated with. I'm ashamed to say I haven't seen it yet. It's okay. Don't worry about it. I have kids, isn't there? That's another kid shit. That's another kid. That's okay. She didn't see F1 when Brad came. She was like, I don't. I have no fucking way. You know why I was editing this show? I couldn't make it. Like, Brad, I haven't seen a movie. Continue. I hear it's fine. I hear it's fine. I heard you're fine. I heard you look fine.

1:24:30I can see that you are fine. I hear you look good in it. Nah, yeah, yeah, yeah. So theater's my shit. Lena, I just, I adore you. I really, really, really like you. That feeling is mutual. I'm really, really like you. I'm so glad I got to spend a couple hours with you that day. And my heart swells when I think of you. and I'm really glad you came. And I want everyone to watch the final season of The Chi, May 22nd on Paramount Plus. Go see Cats. Yes, please. Watch them. I was a part of season one of Them Covenant. Season two, I wasn't, but I think both seasons are really strong. Okay. Also, Tonys.

1:25:00We're putting out good vibes. Come on. Win all the Tonys. Come on, Tonys. The Anthonys, as I call them. Get you a couple Anthonys. Anthonys. Let's get that EGOT going. Come on, let's go. I know. We're going to see what happens. All right. Be well. Thanks for coming. Thank you so much. Stay tuned for the fact check so you can hear all the facts that were wrong.

1:25:26What's up? What it is. What is up? How are you? I'm good. You're good? Yeah. Yep, yep, yep. Okay. Well, we both went to Delta's play. Oh, my heavens. That was a big event. It was a huge event. Big event. And events that happen within the event. Yeah. Tell. Do tell. Yeah. Okay. Mary Poppins. Yes. And I think some backstory is necessary. And you can help me be objective here. But Delta's like, she's never been super into acting or musical theater or singing. Yeah. Like just a mild interest. I think she's done a few little plays. I think she did last year's school play but she just seems she seems to be in it for the social aspect of it which is great so we all went you, Anna me, Kristen, who else was in that one o 'clock show?

1:26:30Kristen's mom and dad oh yeah, Kristen's mom and stepdad and for the first two thirds of the play no Delta she was not in it Yeah. And we, you were directly behind us with Anna. And we were having some fun up until then, right? Yeah. Because there's a lot of goof. It was the first run through of it. Yeah. There's lots of mic errors. There's, you know, there's the expected stuff. Yeah. We've discussed the plays before. Yeah. It's the whole, it's the whole school. So there's second graders out there, you know. Yeah. And everyone did a great job. Everyone did a great job. And it was also very fun.

1:27:11You know, you can hear the mics in the back, you know, the same, same, same old stuff. Yeah, yeah. All the standard fare. And I think even Anna said, is Delta in this, you know, at some point? Yeah. Then she came out. She was Mrs. Anderson. And for people who don't remember, and I'm not super well-versed in Mary Poppins. Yeah. Meredith Poppins. Yeah. She splits at one point and they bring in Mrs. Anders. And she's an old-fashioned old - Is it Anders or Anderson? Anders or Anderson. Oh, we don't know. Okay. Tomato or tomato. Okay. She comes out and she's a bitch. She's mean to the girls and she's shoving people around.

1:27:48Yeah. And right when she came out, full commitment, full energy. Yeah, she came out with a real presence. A real presence, a real intention. Yeah. Immediately, her dictation was off the charts. Oh, yeah, they have to do accents, which I just wish they would take that off these kids' plates. I think, you know, all in all, they did pretty darn good. Yeah. I think if you got, like, adults to do it, the accents would have been much worse. Like, just a random sampling of adults doing British accents. Yeah, that's probably true. I was like, it's not—I was expecting to hear some real— It could be worse.

1:28:22It could be worse. Some real snafus. Yeah, I just feel like they should have taken that. What was going on? Like, they needed just to— They had enough on their plate. Yeah. Yeah. But anyway, she did a great accent. She did a great accent and you could understand everything she said. And she was projecting. She was loud. She was. And then she has a solo song. All right. Maybe you take over now because I might sound too subjective as a father. Well, I'm subjective too. I don't know that I can be very objective. Yeah. But no, she just did so. She just like had so much confidence. She sang it so well.

1:29:00She wasn't like, you know, you're kind of scared when these kids are singing. Yes. Obviously, anyone singing, if any play, it's like, oh, God, like, what if they mess up or what if they? It's stressful. It's very stressful. And she just knocked it out of the park and was so confident and like loud. Like she belted with her diaphragm. Like she did it all right. And it was, oh, it was so wonderful. Yeah, two mega belts. It was the last one with her on top of a staircase. And she looked possessed. Yeah. She like the level of commitment and she was screaming to the rooftops and it was holding. Yeah.

1:29:44I couldn't believe it. I couldn't believe it. I mean, from last year's play to this year's play. Major jump. Oh, my goodness. Major jump. Like we have four performers in the family. Sure. And she just threw down a performance that I think might top, you know, both Kristen and I's professional work. Well, okay. I don't want to. Now I guess we are getting subjective because that's not true. But it was like, I think last year at this time we had this conversation here that was a little touchy, but I was like, she's not committed. No, well, she was more her mission on that previous one, as we talked about, was to make sure everyone else was doing.

1:30:30She was being very bossy, like vocally, like up on stage, like telling people what to do. Get over here. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. And I was like, oh, no. Like, I wish she would just commit. Yeah, no. And then, boy, did she take the note. I mean, I didn't give it. Right, right. She learned on her own. And she really just. She brought the fucking house down. It was so good. It was so exciting. I said we cheered like it was a Super Bowl. Yes. I said, wow. OK, so that's what the experience is for these people who have kids that are great athletes and like score a touchdown. I've never really had that experience yet.

1:31:08Yeah. No touchdowns in the family. No goals scored. And this was I get how the parents get addicted to it. Oh, yeah. It was so exciting. I know. Yeah. We were rowdy screaming for her. It did remind me, I told you this, but there's a picture of the state championship second year, I think. Maybe first year, I don't remember. But there's a picture of the parents. And, you know, everyone is just like freaking out. There's this picture. And my dad is wearing a hat. He's like wearing a boa. Oh, a boa? Yeah. They like hand these out. In my head, he has a boa. Maybe he didn't. And he's like, yeah, up out of his seat, screaming.

1:31:55And it does. It takes over. It takes over when your kid is like. Crushing. Yeah. It's so exciting. And then the moment that was tied for that moment where she was on the steps at the ends, yelling from the bottom of her soul as loud as she could. And Lincoln was there all day volunteering to help all the girls backstage get in their outfits. As an alumni. Yes, yes. And I had this, you know, 30 % anxiety over, okay, well, one child has already declared this is her path. The younger sibling now has just come out and fucking crushed. Oh, wow. Okay. What will this reaction be? You know, what will seeing her get so much attention and praise from us?

1:32:50do. I had some anxiety about that. Yeah. And I think you were standing there when Lincoln ran out and they met each other in the seat. She ran out and gave a huge hug. And she picked her up off the ground and squeezed her. And she was genuinely so pumped for her. She was so proud of her. It was so sweet. It was so sweet. My heart was just destroyed at that moment. I'm like, Oh, yeah. Siblings, man. Yeah. It's more important than anything else. Yeah. Well, no. You know. I don't know. You don't know about that statement. Yeah. So it was. Did you ever see Neil crush at anything? And did you give him the full.

1:33:32No. No. Only now. Now he's crushing at fatherhood. He's about to crush. Early fatherhood. Yeah. No. No, I was really hard on him. Yeah. Yeah, he needed it. Yeah, he needed it. He's, look at him now. He's doing great. Yeah, it all paid off. Because of my mothering. But yeah, no, it was really, really sweet. And I loved it. And then there was a five o 'clock, which I didn't go to, but there was a big incident. Yes. So we're at the five o 'clock. The curtains down were - Intermission, right? It wasn't intermission. It was just between some scenes where there was a little downtime. Oh. And so the curtain was down.

1:34:16And then all of a sudden you hear from the audience this horrendous crashing sound. Yeah. And it's like, it's substantial, right? The kind of ground shook. Yeah. And my only thought was like, oh, did one of the sets, because they have pretty big sets on stage. Yeah. Like two-story sets. Did one fall forward? Yeah. And oh my God, where are the kids? Yeah. And so I'm thinking this and then Kristen jumps up and goes backstage because she's like, you know, clearly something's happened. You can hear kids back there like they weren't screaming, but there were noises. OK. So she goes back there, scopes out, comes back and she's like, you are not going to believe the size of this tree that just fell into the school.

1:35:00And so after the plant, I went and looked back. And there's this like, you know, like cement balcony with like a really huge steel railing, maybe a loading dockish thing off the back of the gym. And this enormous tree, like the width of our oak tree in the front yard, like the trunk had to be like 36 inches in diameter, maybe more. It just exploded and it fell in all these directions. It bent like the big fence post size railing. Yeah. It was just crumpled like a taco. Huge branches on there. A table that they were all sitting on. So scary. 10 minutes before. Ugh. Was flattened. Ugh. Ugh. It's crazy.

1:35:46And I was like. Oh, my God. I just was like, yeah, my first thought was, oh, this is why it's completely pointless to worry about your children because you're not even going to think to worry about. I hope a random tree doesn't fall on them on the fucking playground of the school. Some people do think like that, though, but it's a lot. It's too much. It's not generally. People are worried about kidnapping and all these other things. Right, that's true, yeah. And it's like, okay, so thus far, the closest call we've ever had was just a tree exploded in the backyard of the school. Yeah, I mean, freak accidents do happen.

1:36:21Yeah, it's very scary. You just don't even know what to worry about. That was my thing. Yeah, that's a good takeaway. Like, yeah, that's crazy. That was almost a fucking newsworthy disaster. Oh, my God. That would have been so... It was crazy. Everyone will have a different takeaway. Someone will be like, I knew God was real. You know, someone will say Sam, me, probably. Yeah, there's a lot of takeaways. You just choose. Yeah, you get to pick. Yeah, I mean, I don't think there's much meaning behind it for me other than just, oh, it's a good reminder that like life's that way. And it's really pointless to even worry about anything.

1:37:08Yeah. That's a great example of confirmation bias, right? It's like whatever your overarching theory on life is, everything, every bit of proof will file in and support that. So it's like for you, that proves the world scarier. Well, I didn't say that. Or, I'm sorry, didn't mean to give you that. Yeah. Label. Yeah. And then for me, it immediately confirms like, yeah, what a waste of time to worry. I don't think I thought like the world's scarier. I just feel like, yeah, things go wrong all the time. Yeah, yeah. But also I think like, wow, so lucky. Just like so lucky. And we're just missing things all the time.

1:37:46Oh, yeah, yeah. Just like constantly avoiding catastrophe all the time. Yeah. But yeah, like yesterday I was walking down the street and there were so many cop cars, but they weren't regular cop cars. They were all like just like black cars. Unmarked cop cars. Unmarked. But then one was like on, like headlights or whatever in the back. But there were so many in a row. Where was this at? On Western. And I was just walking by noticing all these cars. And I was like, oh, well, something is going on. Something's probably bad. Yeah. Yeah. And I thought, oh, do I, should I go home? Like, this is right where I'm about to be.

1:38:32Okay. And. Were you in the car? Yeah, I was walking to Cara. And so it was next to Cara. By the Baskin Robbins or that weird apartment building. In between. Yeah. That sketchy apartment building. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And I was like, I mean, there could be a bomb in there. Should I go home? But then I was like, I mean, they'll probably get it. Tell us to leave. Like, I guess I trust that someone in charge would tell us to leave. And there was a cop on the street and he just said, hi, when I walked by. So I was like, I can't be that bad. Right. He didn't say, ma 'am, go on the other side of the street.

1:39:09Yeah, exactly. Or you shouldn't be here, ma 'am. Ma 'am, you shouldn't be here. You didn't ask him what was cracking? I wanted to. I should have. And then, because when we left, it's still there. And someone was yelling at them because cars were blocked in and he was yelling and I didn't want to bother them. They're probably executing a search warrant. He said, I heard one of the cops say something like, we're almost finished with the investigation. Okay. So. So someone went missing. I was like, maybe it's a bomb or maybe it's a jumper or maybe it's a big drug, like probably a big drug situation or hijack.

1:39:52Sex work. It could be a sex situation. A negotiation. A standoff? Hostage negotiation. I mean, there could have been so many things. Uh-huh. Yeah. Yeah. And I wish he would have asked. Because he would have told you. You're a cute young girl. He would have wanted to tell you. I thought about it. He would have made it a little more dangerous than it was. Yeah, we just, you know, he probably like, you know, fluffed it up a little bit. Officer, should I go home? Or should I stay here? Am I safe to go home or should I stay next to you? Will you protect me? I feel safer next to you. Um, yeah. He's like, I'm just coming out.

1:40:29I was first one in. So they're telling me, go ahead and have a 10 minute break, which is why I'm out here. But I was first one in there. I was first one in there. Once I saw it was not dangerous, then I was like. Oh, it's not dangerous? Well, it could be. Could always get dangerous. Probably want me to stay close. Oh, okay. Yeah. What are you doing for dinner? I'm hanging out with my friend Jess. You'd love him. Oh. You can go. All right, have fun. I think we're all wrapped up here. Okay, this is interesting. Okay, dates. Mm-hmm. So we have a friend who just went on a first date. Oh, we do? Mm-hmm.

1:41:10And this person brought me up a few times because I'm in stories. Sure. Right? Yeah. And then at some point, the girl, it was a girl on the date. It's a lesbian on a date with a girl. Okay. Okay? Yeah. And she brought me up. Yeah. And then at some point, the girl on the date said, should I know who that is? Oh, OK. And then my friend said, oh, she's my friend, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And then she was telling me this and I was like, yeah, this is tricky. It can get tricky if you're bringing up your friends a lot on a date, but they don't really know the backstory. They don't know like the level of friendship or whether either party are less compatibly.

1:42:06Exactly. Sexually attracted to one another. Yeah. If you're bringing up Jess all the time, they don't know he's gay. You got to go my gay friend, Jess. You go my gay friend, Jess. And then she shows up my straight friend, Monica. I know. But that seems like a weird thing to say. Like, oh, I mean, he comes up like he he's he comes up. Right. And so, yeah, I guess I have to say like, oh, my my friend. I think I'll just say my friend Jess and maybe it'll be obvious he's gay.

1:42:37I mean, I don't know. I don't know. To me, it's obvious he's gay, but I know. You know it. I know. Yeah, yeah, yeah. He at least has a name that could pass as a female. Oh, right. That is true. But if you're talking about beefy burger or anything penis related, he'll. Don't think I'm probably going to bring up beefy burger yet. Yet. It will come up. It will come up. But anyway, yeah, it's like a weird thing about how much you talk about the other people in your life. On a date. On a date. I think it's only. Two of the opposite sex if you're straight and same sex if you're gay. I think it's only a thing if you're talking about your ex a lot, which is also fine.

1:43:24On a first date, I don't think you should. Yeah, and there are versions of it that are totally fine. Right. If you still have complicated feelings about your ex, it's not the place to discuss that, nor is it this new person, their duty to comfort you through that. Right. There are all these rules. But if you've been with someone for a decade and you're talking about your life. Yeah. And then you're going to ignore the last 10 years of your life. Yeah. You know, like, of course, if you were with someone. They're going to come up. Yeah. I don't think that's a big deal. I don't think it is a big deal either for me.

1:43:59But I think a lot of people would say that's wrong. Like, everyone has these rules. I think those people are really insecure and that's their issue. Yeah. I don't think it would bother me. The thought of someone having had an ex is too disturbing for you. Right. You have some insecurities. Yeah. That's not, it's not that other person's. I know. I think I'm kind of like, I want to know. Sure. All the details. Yeah, I do. But I don't want them to ask me. So I think I'm just leaving that off. I think it's like, it's just like, hey, let's never talk. What kind of questions would you want to ask? Let's not talk about any of our past.

1:44:33Okay. But we're now on a date. We're on a date. Okay. Hi. Well. I like your hair. Further along. We're dropping into like. Mid. I want to know exactly like what kind of info you're interested in about the ex. Yeah, because I think. So, well, you have to bring her up, I guess. Well, we had to, we were sharing our dog and then it just got kind of ridiculous. And finally, I was like, just you can have Snickers. That was probably hard. I have a friend who is going through that, too. It's really. A boyfriend? No, no. A girlfriend. A girlfriend. A girlfriend of mine. Yeah, but it's tough. She's gay.

1:45:18No, she was straight. She was my girlfriend. No, my friend is gay. Oh, okay. So don't worry. I was hoping you would, I would figure out what you want to know about the ex. I know, but I... Well, what do you want to know about an ex? I don't know. We have to practice and see. I think you want to know what they look like physically, don't you? No, I actually don't. I don't. Are you sure? Well, sure. You don't want to find out if they were Indian? Oh, fuck. No. Because I know you got a whole thing about that. I don't want if. OK, do it again. You might need to. Yeah. OK. Yeah. So anyways, we had booked this trip and like we talked about going on it together.

1:45:51But I was like, I don't want to be in Bombay with my ex. So I was like, you can just take someone else. Oh, yeah. And I transferred my ticket. OK. Oh, my God. First of all, that would not to me. I'm not like, oh, so she was Indian just because you were going there. I'm just trying to tempt you in that direction. Okay, so, oh, have you, I don't even, I wouldn't even ask. You got to write this out on a date. I would say, I would say, have you been to India before? How long were you guys together? You don't think you can go, have you been to India before? I mean, no. You don't care. You just want to know about the girl now.

1:46:31Yeah, yeah. Well, I almost was about to say, oh my gosh, I went to India. last year on this kind of random crazy trip. And it was so cool because I've only been one time before when I was little and it was really cool. Oh, are you Indian? I am. Yeah. Oh, I thought you were Lebanese. Oh, no. No, no, I'm not. Well, I mean, I was born in Georgia and raised there, but my parents are Indian. Oh, cool. How long were you with your ex? How long were you with her? Five years. Wow. Wow. Yeah, from 46 to 51. What happened? Do you mind me asking? Sorry if that's too private. God, I mean, what happened? Like a million things happened.

1:47:19Really? Yeah, as happens in a relationship. Yeah, it's hard. Like I could list things and it'd probably just be me blaming her, but I'm sure I'm half the reason. That's very evolved. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's evolved of you. Yeah. What are you going to order? But she's, oh, you're off of it. The old? She young? Is she Indian? I'm not asking that. I never asked. Okay, I was on a date once where it came up, but I didn't ask. He brought it up. What did he say? He said, like, she was Indian and her family and something about an Indian princess. And I was like, I hate this. I absolutely hate this Oh wow If anyone says Indian princess to me You're not for me What is the stereotype of me?

1:48:09I don't know I know of the Jewish American princess That's a stereotype That has a name Jap, it offends both people Two groups of people at once It's a twofer Even if someone said Jap to me I'd be like, I wish you didn't say that Yeah, sure You know, actually someone I love said it recently. And I was like, when they're referring to a Jewish American princess or a Japanese person. Oh, you didn't even get that part. Oh, yeah, I forgot. Oh, gosh. OK, Jewish. I thought you were saying it offends princesses and. Oh, no. I don't care about offending princesses. They're a tiny group. Your wife is a princess.

1:48:48Not a real one. She is the closest we got. She played a princess. There's actual princesses. Oh, yeah. I forgot. Yeah. Okay, well, I don't want to offend them either, but Jewish. I can live with that. Me too, me too. Like, picking the group, talk about punching up or down. Royalty, yeah. Yeah, punching up or royalty, I'm okay with. It's more the Jewish part I didn't love when they said it. Yeah. Well, I'm from a very Jewish area of Michigan. I know. So that term was used a lot. Right. And quite often by Jewish people. Right. Well, they're allowed. Mm-hmm. But this person wasn't Jewish. Anyway, okay, if you said it to me on a date, say it somehow.

1:49:25Jap. Oh, are you Jewish? Yeah. Oh, cool. Hard to be Jewish right now. Oh, my gosh. I know. I feel like the world is nuts. By the way, if the first date has somehow strayed into Palestine, Israel, it's a bad day. I'm going to the bathroom. Yeah. Oh, my God. I'm going to go shit. Have you heard of tonking? I'm going to go tonka all over the floor in the bathroom. I want to go to my car. Because I prefer doing that than having this conversation. Well, yeah. No, I know. I know. But, you know, I do get deep and I do worry sometimes that, like, I get us to a place we're not supposed to go to soon. Oh, well, that can be fun.

1:50:09I know. But then it's, like, not fun because then, yeah, we're talking about. I don't think what I know so far, which, oh, I guess I should tell people I'm going on a date. That should be clear. Oh, okay. From what I know so far, I just don't. I think he's very chill. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And I don't think we're going to talk about global news. Global politics. Yeah. That's good. Stay tuned for more Armchair Expert, if you dare.

1:50:47What if he's super into crypto and he wants to tell you about crypto the whole time? That's a hard one. Even if everything else was like a thumbs up. Yeah. I think I would say. What would you say? I'd say. I'd go, have you heard of Belizium? Oh, it's a one-to-one currency. It's so strong and promising. Oh, I haven't heard of it. I bought for$13 a coin and it's already up to$13.90. That's cool. Do you know Ben McKenzie? Have you ever heard of Ben McKenzie? He was from the OC, but he's also. Oh, I never saw the OC, but I heard it was really great. Yeah, I actually also didn't watch it. Oh, okay.

1:51:30But he was a big actor on that show. And he's also an expert in crypto. And he was just on my podcast. What's his holdings? Which ones is he into? Well, he's actually pretty critical of it. Oh, he's a hater? Well. He's just mad he didn't get in when Bitcoin was. Maybe. Yeah, he's just jealous. Yeah, maybe. but I do have a podcast I do I do yeah are you are you Lebanese oh no I'm not I'm not yeah do you think only Lebanese people have podcasts that's it that's an interesting leaf hey I gotta go Tonka oh that's what you parked in a lot called Tonka or something? That's when you poop in your car.

1:52:20Oh! Oh, you're going outside to poop in your car. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Fuck yeah, can I come? Oh, you're interested. Well, that could salvage the hole. That could! Yeah, fuck. That sounds rad. I just got perked up. Yeah, that's rad. Can I come? It would probably be a crypto guy that was into it. Yeah. So it all makes sense, you know. Trade-offs. Yeah. Everyone, no one's perfect. You're not gonna get it all. No one's perfect. You gotta get the right things. Anywho, I mean, full honesty. Oh, Rob, he might be here. Lucas or the breast milk guy? Breast milk. Breast milk guy. Colossal, man. Rob is going to pick up another drink for us using his ID.

1:53:04That's not alcohol. Full honesty. Yeah. I'm on a date. Yeah. And the girl goes, if you excuse me, I have got to go shit in my car. Dude, I would be so into that. No. I would. I would be like, wow. who's this person you would not yes I would you would be like who is this person yeah I'm intrigued you'd be intrigued but you would not you would be like she's crazy well no I would have some follow up questions okay so tell me oh my god I'll be right back okay do you mind waiting I have to god I have to go tonka what's what's tonka it's when you poop in your car okay and i have to go right now oh my god you have to poop in your car right now i do i do okay do you mind waiting well i don't mind waiting but can i just ask you a quick question i can see it's pressure yeah yeah it's kind of time why go in your car and not the bathroom here oh i'm just like so uncomfortable i i'm really uncomfortable pooping in front of other people oh sure that's yeah i just have like a privacy thing and i know i'm not gonna make it home how often do you do this every time you got to go to a normal bathroom?

1:54:16It's only happened once. It almost happened again and I can tell it's going to happen right now. Okay, how about I come out and I'll just hang by the camera and make sure no one bothers you? No, because... Because you don't want anyone knocking on your window or if I see a dude peeping, I'll be like, bro, give her some privacy. Okay, that's really, really nice, but the whole... And I can hold your bag too. Oh, you don't have a... There's no bag. You just like poop on the seat. But that bag next to your feet, do you want me to hold that while you're... That's really kind. Yeah. The whole... Let me be a lookout for you.

1:54:46This will be fun. No. Okay. The whole issue is privacy. Okay. I'm going to look the other way, though. Okay. You're being a little pushy. Oh, you think I'm a weirdo now? I got to tell you something. You're about to go shit in your car. So why don't you fucking back off the judgments, tootsie? No, let's go. Grab your bag.

1:55:06Oh, my God. This is a great date, dude. It's so memorable. And he would be, like, cut to the three years later, I can see him with a microphone in his hand and his tuxedo on. And I'll go, I knew there was something special about Monica when on our first date, she looked at me and said, if you'll excuse me, I have to Tonka. And for those of you who don't know, Grandma Jane, Grandpa Bill, Tonka is when a woman uses her car to defecate it. As a toilet. And I thought I should get out of here and run. No, I'm going to provide lookout services. And I'm so glad I did. Oh, isn't this great? They would also throw up.

1:55:48Not the people at your wedding. Fuck. I hope this all goes down, man. This sounds like a great. Can you please knock on wood? You better not hope that on my date I have to Tonka. That is literally worst case scenario. Unless he loves it. And then you guys have fast forwarded to like such a level of intimacy and trust and connection. I mean, if he has to Tonka. Yeah. Interesting. Not me. I don't want. Okay. I don't want to be the girl that poops in her car all the time. Okay. It happens one time. Not all the time. No one wants to be that all the time. I know, but you're the one. You're kind of manifesting it for me.

1:56:25You wanted me to put a bag in my car. Trash bag. Why not? You just act like that's where you put your trash. No, that's manifesting. That's manifest destiny. Do you know if you're driving together, you're meeting there? Okay. That's supposed to be the safe thing to do? I don't know if it's safe or not, but one time I was on a date where the man picked me up. The mail. And at first I was like, oh, I like that. Yeah. And as soon as he picked me up, I hated it. Oh. I was like, I really don't like being trapped in the car. Uh-huh. I don't, now I'm aware of how he's driving me. Okay. Precious cargo.

1:57:02Yeah. And at one point he was just staring at you. And I didn't, then I was like, you need to look at the road. I didn't like any of it. Oh, man. So we're just gonna meet there. Okay. Right. What though? How do we handle a nighttime? He's not or not do it. Hold on. You guys can kiss. He drives you home. Then he's got to get out and like open your door and clean out the Tonka from your backseat. Put it in your trash can. And then he might want to give you a kiss. Good night before you go inside. If he wants to kiss me after I've Tonka'd. Yeah. What a stud. Well, a stud and kinky. He's kinky. That's pretty cool.

1:57:42Yeah. Yeah. Yes, we like them. We like them. It's pretty cool. Okay. All right. Anyway, some facts. Let's do some facts. Okay. Okay. She talks about Half Man, the show, and you've since watched it. I'm glad you're bringing this up. Yeah. She was dead right. She loved it, and you loved it. I love it. And now I even see what she was saying. Because at the time, remember, I think I said, like, yeah, you and I watch things differently. Like, you're recognizing when someone's being represented. Right. That's important to you and you'll always notice it. But anyone would notice it. Yeah. Like the show is that type of show.

1:58:19Yeah. Where it is, it's exploring some weird shit that goes down in most boyhoods that I'm aware of. Yeah. Just weird. Boys are so fucked. I don't. Yeah. I don't think girls know how weird boys are. Little boys. There's like a whole window where they're so bizarre. Mm-hmm. I cannot tell you how many of these boys were constantly trying to show me their penises and they wanted to sword fight and stuff. And like they just don't, they have these penises and they don't know what they're doing. They don't know what to do. They want to get them out. Yeah. Smack them around. I was just like, I'm not into all this sword fighting.

1:58:58You weren't? No. Oh. Because you were already molested. I think because I had already been molested maybe. It was like I didn't like the whole thing. Yeah. Yeah. But when we were in like hunting and gathering and we were naked all the time. Yeah, yeah. I bet they weren't playing with them. It was like, it was just normal. This is one, I read this really interesting article, and it was about. How cultural everything is to the degree of molesting. Yeah. Here it means one thing. It's always inappropriate and it's always some kind of like deviant sexual behavior. Whereas they were paralleling it with this group, this hunting and gathering group that like when they see little kids, they juggle their balls.

1:59:41Right. As a greeting. Oh, wow. The dudes aren't perverts. There's nothing sexual going on. Yeah. They do the same activity that here we would, it would be trauma. Yeah. And it's just so interesting how the power of. I know. And it's all about, does it induce shame or not? And in that culture, it doesn't because everyone was getting greeted by getting their balls fondled. I know, but that is weird, though, because innately, though, it is sexual because that is also a way to get aroused. But again, because the culture is so strong and the context is so strong, it's not. They don't get aroused. It's not a sexual activity.

2:00:18I didn't grow up there, so I have my thing. Right. Anyways, I'm off on a long trajectory here. Oh, that makes sense. I can't remember what we left base. Half-man is so good. Yeah. With similar tones being explored as DTF St. Louis. Like that relationship between Bateman and Harborough was so intimate. Yeah, it was. Male friendship. They're constantly hugging and stretching each other and breathing on each other. It's just like this level of intimacy. That certainly I didn't see on TV growing up. Right. And by the time I did see it on TV growing up, it was explicitly sexual between two homosexuals.

2:00:55Right, exactly. This is this weird zone. I know. Of this, yeah. Even though it wasn't represented for you, you still did it with Aaron. Yeah, so like Aaron and I had a very, very intimate, very physically touchy friendship. Yeah. But no penis business. Right. There were no penises coming out. But you like snuggled. Yeah, but there was no weird sexual component. I'm talking about the behavior that had all. Oh, I see. It was like this weird sexual component. Well, Bateman and David Harbour didn't have any sexual component. They didn't, but it was confusing. And there were times where it seemed they were both confused by the intimacy.

2:01:28Sure, sure, sure. And then he's even going to hook up with a dude or he's like, he's open to, if he can give a guy an erection, he'll like that. Right. Just because he'll be desired. Right. So just getting into all this fun gray area. Yeah. So Nate and I loved that show, of course, as did you. I loved it, yeah. But we were talking about it at lunch and he goes, dude, the other show that's even more extreme than that, that I've been watching, I want you to catch up so we can start watching together, is Half Man. So I did. And then the last Friday when we had the day off, Nate and I went to lunch and then we came and got in the theater room and watched two episodes back to back.

2:02:01And it was so fun. It reminded me of like being in my 20s or something. We were just watching TV. I love that. That's really fun. Okay, quickly. Is Adam the one, Adam Osseri, the one on Instagram with glasses who sends updates? I mean, I think so. Oh, yeah. Okay. He has glasses. That's definitely what she's talking about. He makes tons of posts directly to camera, letting users know of new features. Yeah. Rightly posts direct updates about that platform. He's so fun. He's so cute. He said we were his favorite food. He's so smart, too. He is. Who is the model with the gap tooth named Lauren? Lauren Hutton.

2:02:38Ah. Iconic model. So something came up and you said everything worth having, like everything worth having. It's hard. Yeah, basically. And it reminded me that in high school, Callie's mom got her this little compass necklace. It was from Kohl's. And on the back, it said, there are no shortcuts to anywhere worth going. Yeah. Okay, guys. And I loved that. And then they bought me the necklace because I loved it so much. Oh, that's nice. And I love that saying. There's a dude in AA who has a similar saying that he says all the time. Almost every share he says it, and I love it every single time, which is I found out that the shortcut is the quickest way to the back of the line.

2:03:22I like that. Similar. Yeah. Shortcuts, the quickest way at the back of the line. Although it'd be quicker to just go to the back of the line before you do the shortcut. So it doesn't hold up. Yeah, because like if you're cutting the line, which is the shortcut, you're not at the back. Well, the point is the shortcuts never work and you always have to go back and start the way you're supposed to. I understand the point. Okay. Yeah. We'll stick with yours. I like mine. What was yours? There are no shortcuts to anywhere worth going. Oh, okay. I love it. Cole's cash. Cole's cash, man. Oh, uh, Callie also got a tattoo of a compass.

2:04:00That was her first tattoo. She got a compass on her ankle. It was in college. She has since gotten it removed. Oh, she has. She didn't like the way it looked in pictures when she was like in heels and stuff. Okay. Okay. Um. Compass is a very popular tattoo. Is it? Yeah. I don't know anyone else with one. I mean, I don't know a lot of people with tattoos other than you. Not your scene. Uh-uh. Um, and her. Um, and Anna. Okay. Okay, I know a lot of people with tattoos. Rob. Natalie. Natalie. Everyone has tattoos, actually. Erica. Wow. Yeah, Charlie. Okay. Matt. Whoa. At least half. Mike Nichols. Yeah, at least half my friends.

2:04:40That's probably right. Mike Nichols says about conversation, a conversation falls into three categories, a negotiation, a seduction, or a fight. A negotiation, a seduction, or a fight. This isn't theatrical realm, right? This isn't. Every scene or conversation. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay, yeah. It says or conversation. It has to be one of those three things. A fight of seduction. But life doesn't have to. A lot of conversations. It doesn't have to, but I think he's kind of saying like it is. Like he's representing life and like that is what happens in life. Life as we know it. On Lifetime Network.

2:05:19Yeah. Okay, the catchphrase from our AT &T commercial. Rob said it in the interview. just okay is not okay. She thinks there's another. That's what I'm seeing too. I think I found another one too after. Let me see. Your way right away? More for your thing spots, I think was her. Oh, get more for your things. Let me see. That's not a good phrase. That's abstract. That's not a good phrase. If AT &T wants to hire me, I will say the shortcut line. Okay, only that line. Yeah. Oh, wow. I'll say anything you want AT &T. Actually, I will too. Not to outcompete you, but. Yeah. Oh, God. God. You could hire Monica.

2:06:02You should know she's only going to say one sentence. They should hire me because a long time ago, I think, have I done an AT &T commercial? I'm sure you have. I maybe have. But I do know one of the commercials I lost was an AT &T commercial. and it was down to me and this, my nemesis. And she was my nemesis. I lost, I lost a couple roles to this girl. Okay. She wasn't Indian or Lebanese. Did you end up knowing her? Um, I like. Did you ever chat with her at auditions? Um. Hey, you beat me out. I bet you beat her out a few times too. Maybe. I forget her name. She was like up in, she was like becoming a thing.

2:06:46Uh-huh. Um, and I forget her name. But she beat me out for this AT &T, I think, like campaign. Okay. So many spots. And I was upset. And I knew the directors well. I had worked with them a couple times, really loved them. Uh-huh. And so that was upsetting. Yeah. That was a hard one. Yeah, he lost a couple hundred grand probably. Fuck. Anyway, so they should make up for that. Oh, AT &T shit. And hire me now. As a voiceover artist. I'm like, now you're getting bigger bang for your buck. I only say one thing, but you're getting a bigger bang for your buck. That's right. Yeah, trade-offs. I have a voice for radio and AT &T commercials.

2:07:28That's what they say. That's what they say. Yeah. You have a face for AT &T commercials. Oh, yeah, I have a face for radio.

2:07:36Okay, I have a face for radio and a voice for AT &T commercials. That's what they say. That's what they always say. Yeah. All right. Well, that is all. Those were the facts. That is all. Well, I love Lena. Me too. Great app. I love her. Great app. Love her. She's so lovable. She is. She's very smart and wise. Yeah. And interesting. And accomplished. And accomplished. Accomplished is cool. And just a good chatter. Yeah. She's a good chatter. All right. Love you. I love you.

2:08:16What's wrong back to you? Thank you.