"Taika Waititi"

26:23I thought I'd get such a hard-hitting question. It's so late, too, to be so articulate. I have another one. Oh, I didn't even answer that. To watch you suck Marvel's dick for so long was a real treat. I took it all. Did you see me take it all? You did take it all. Yeah, right down to the pubes. Let's get the answer now. Okay. Right down to the pubes. Oh, my God. Jason watches gay porn in his free time. Fuck it. What happened to me? You know what? I had no interest in doing one of those films. It wasn't on my whole plan of my career as an auteur. But I was poor and I just had a second child. and I thought, you know what?

27:08This would be a great opportunity to feed these children. Or do what my dad did. Go ahead, continue. I'm still doing my answer. Sorry. No, no. Yeah, yeah. Quiet, John. Hang on. Hang on. Okay, so then they called and they said, do you want to do this? And Thor was probably, let's face it, it was probably the least popular franchise. I had never read Thor comics when I was a kid. That was the comic I picked up and was like, oh, it was never open. And then I just research on it, and I read one. A full one. Four comic. Yeah. All 18 pages along there. Sure. I was still baffled by this character. And I thought, well, if there's anything I can bring to this.

27:53Let's be honest. When it comes to comics, I mean, red is a stretch. Okay, go ahead. Sorry. Looked at. Looked at. I flicked through. that went, yeah, that's enough. And then pitched myself. I thought the only thing that I could bring was his character. It's like just looking at Thor as a character. He's like a billionaire, lives in space. And, you know, he's just, he looks ridiculous. And that was sort of the end. I was like, well, let's just highlight that. He's like a rich kid. And I pitched that he's a bit like you and me, Jason, that he hates germs. Right. And, you know. That didn't scare the shit out of them?

28:33I think there was no place left to go with that thing. Everyone had passed. Right, right, right. I was like, it felt like, I thought, wow, they called me and this was really the bottom of the barrel. This happened to me, the barrel. But Feige has taken nice swings on it. He has taken great swings. Right, I mean, starting with Favreau, right? And then, I mean, like, and Kenneth Branagh and Chloe Zhao. Yeah, the Russos. The Russo's, like, I guess it has been directors that have been outside of the box, but... But they know what they're good at, right? They're good at keeping everyone in their lane and making sure they don't veer off into, you know, something else that doesn't feel Marvel.

29:13So they bring people in who are good at story and making great characters and, like, you know, bring something unique, and then they'll keep it within the Marvel. Right. And you obviously had a great experience because you went back for one. Yeah. Yeah, but it is true. Like I remember we have friends of ours who were doing another one of these. I won't name it. It's a series of movies that takes place in space. And they went off a little bit, I think veered a little bit off the plan and ended up not working out because they had too many ideas that were outside. That wasn't Marvel though. No, no, no.

29:48I didn't say it was Marvel. I said it's a different thing. But it was outside of the playbook a little bit, right? And so it made them nervous because they got a lot at stake. Again, it's their property and they got a lot at stake. So when they hired you, though, Taika, I mean, again, knowing you. The fans hated it, by the way. They hated that I was doing this. They hated Thor? No, the fact that I was, when I signed off for that first one, and they're like, who's this guy? He's going to be doing this. No, but they fucking end up loving it. My kids who are big Marvel fans, like my son Abel still to this day, when I told him that you were on the show tonight, he was like, wait, he's on the show tonight?

30:21Because he loves fucking Thor so much. He's an idiot, though. He's not an idiot. He's a funny fucking kid. He's not a dullard like you. Wait, Tyka. You get a compliment out of Archie, you got to. When you hear this, this is the seven o 'clock vision. Yeah, we're getting crouching. Bateman's 45 minutes past gummy hour, and he is not. Starting to shake. He's got the fight. It is not pleasant. Amanda won't let him in. Amanda's going to text him and say, you take that gummy and 15 minutes later you can come in the house. She leaves it on the front step. Out on top of the mailbox. With the key, next to the key.

31:04Taika, when you... Just paces outside, waiting for it to kick in and then it's just a scratch at the door. I'm coming on, honey. Not a bang at the door. She's like... And she's looking at her watch. She's like 29, 28, 27. Taika, when you hear that, that fans, like you said, It made me happy. Okay, next question.

31:25I almost did a legitimate spin. And then I have to ask about Mandalorian because I'm a massive, massive, massive, massive fan of that series. And so Scotty, my husband, and how did you get Mandalorian? And how, by the way, and you voiced the droid, right? Yeah. The IG-11? I do it all. So Jon, so Fabro. What did he voice, Sean? The droid. The droid G11. Sorry, what's the serial number on the droid? Yeah, it's IG11. IG11. Make sure to have that on the top of your head. Fucking. This is how you landed Scotty. I always wonder. Hey, you went to IG11? They're going to put, your headstone when you die, your gravestone is just going to be blank.

32:08It's just going to be nothing. Not even a date. No, it'll say sorry. It'll say I apologize. He had fucking nothing.

32:17So John said. Anyway, see, IG-11. People walk by. Oh, that's Sean. Well, yeah, IG-11, who Sean will know is based on IG-88. That's correct. Wow. Which is something I found out when I did The Mandalorian. Did that floor you as much as it's flooring me?

32:37Wait, you were about to say Favreau picked you up and said. He picked me up. He picked me up. I was standing on call and he picked me up and said, come, hey, kid, come and do an episode of Mandalorian. And I went down, this was the first time I'd used that volume thing with the TV screens all in a big circle. We shot most of the show on that. And he said, come and do this thing. And it was great because I didn't have to write it. And if you do anything, just turn up and direct. And it was awesome. And he was there to help. And the first day, I was directing 75 Stormtroopers. Wow. Standing in a big, giant Stormtrooper battle.

33:09That's so cool. Just fucking incredible. It is cool. By the way, it's good that you had a guy like Favreau. He's a friend of the show and we like him a lot. I love that John Favreau. Yeah, same here. And I'm sure he was fucking helpful as shit because he's a cool dude. Taika, so why did you just fly into L.A.? And where were you? I went to Scotland. Because? And I was hanging out in Scotland. Just hanging out? Airbnb had these special little pop-up places you can stay. And I don't know if you've heard about this, but they made Shrek's Swamp with Shrek's house, a full replica of Shrek's tree and the house inside it.

33:44And everything is exactly like the movie, the bed, the table. Wow. And Rita is... Your wife, Rita. My wife. Yeah, amazing. My ex-girlfriend. So she... Ex-girlfriend. She booked us in, and we went and stayed at Shrek. Hold on. And then we drove around Scotland and stuff, and we dressed up. She bought costumes. Oh, wow. Kinky, right? We dressed up as Shrek and Princess Fiona. Okay. And she did some photos and a video. Well, there goes the what-do-you-do-in-your-free-time question. Wait a second. Jason, the disgust on Jason's face. I just... Can I have 20 minutes of the interview real quick? Yes, go ahead.

34:29So, all right, so you are married to... You were dating her. Rita Ora. And now... Incredible singer-songwriter. Now we're married. And now you're married. Yeah. Did you know that she was such a fan of Shrek before you put a ring on her finger? No. No, I did not know that. So she's a big Shrek fan such that you went ahead and bought yourself a couple of first-class tickets all the way over to Scotland, and you stayed in a little grass hut or something? Yeah. That was just part of the trip. That was just one fun thing we got to do. That's fun, I guess. And then we drove around Scotland. That's so nice.

35:05That's pretty cool. I guess that's pretty cool. Now, Sean, don't lie. If they had a place like this Airbnb that was Star Wars themed, Would you take Scotty for his birthday surprise? Yeah, without a doubt. Yeah. Would you fly all the way to Scotland for it? Do you love him that much? Probably not. Would you go to space for it? Absolutely. If it existed in space, you wouldn't. Well, space is faster than it's out. Would you like to go to space, Sean? Absolutely. Don't you? Would you? No, honestly, no. Now, I played golf today with Michael Strahan, who told me that he went up into that Jeff Bezos rocket thing.

35:39Yeah, that's what I would do. You would do that? Absolutely. Now, I just... Tyke, would you go to space? Yeah, I'd go to space. For how long? Oh, great question. Just a couple minutes. I mean, what we... That's just a couple minutes. That Bezos thing's a couple minutes. I just don't want to do anything that when I land, the euphoria is relief because I got away with something. I feel like, you know, I just... I shouldn't be doing things that I get away with anymore. Well, that's how we feel about our careers. Yeah, that's true. Jason's like one of those dogs, you know, they have those collars and they set up the perimeter and the perimeter is the golf club at his house.

36:16Okay. And if he goes any further, it fucking shocks him and it keeps him, you know. Keep it safe. But Jay, it's a once in a lifetime thing that you could just experience the view of space and the weightlessness and like you can't ever. Oh, he loved the weightlessness, Jay. Come on. That's true. No, but you know what? You know what? You actually, you end up getting very bloated up there. Do you think so? Yeah, I know. I know so. You've seen those shots of the astronauts. Your takeaway from the astronauts from talking to people in space is they look bloated, man? A little too bloated, a little too bloated, and the hair all stands up.

36:51I'm kidding. You know I lean into all this stuff. I don't care about the germs. Scotland sounds great with the Shrek thing, and let's just get a parachute on me and get a plane going. Yeah, okay. This is all for bits. I would have loved, it would be great. I was just now thinking about Scotland. I was thinking about JB in like medieval times. When like people were like ripping, ripping, you know, ripping legs off of chickens and stuff at the meal and just, you know, biting into it. You're not going to wash those hands? Damp castle where nobody's had invented socks really yet. Or plumbing. No plumbing, no bath.

37:31Toilet paper. We'll be right back. all right back to the show i want to know speaking of all these little things taika what's it like like you seem i don't we don't know each other that well we met once and it was like a uh such a highlight of you know my life meeting i'm such a huge fan i've seen all your movies i love jojo rabbit i've seen it like three times and um taika has no recollection no of course not uh uh i remember i almost put your jacket on do you remember that i remember that it was a great That was a highlight for me as well. Okay, so the little bit I know of you, you seem completely relaxed, low-key, chill, like normal down to earth.

38:17What do you do? He just mentioned he's married, by the way, so just fucking cool it. What do you do when you meet a personality that's totally opposite of yours, that you have to work with? You're like, oh, my God, this guy or this girl is way too much for me. They're not on my level. How do you deal with that? I just, I'd say I just bitch about them later. You send all your notes in through the first AD. Yeah, and then I go home and, this son of a bitch, who believes this guy? That's why we all do that. Yeah. I mean, actors in particular, just fucking hard work. We're all nuts. They're just fucking pain in the ass.

38:56So true. And then each actor's got a different way of working that you've got to find out because they won't tell you and you've got to figure it out by watching them and you're like, oh, you're one of them. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Oh, you're one of them. And then there's always the other ones that are like, oh, let's do an improv taking. Oh, God. Not them. Wait, Taika, one for me now, right? One for me? Yeah, yeah. And those guys who are like, I was talking about this a lot. The crew loves that. They go, let's do an improv taking. I'm like, fuck, all right. Like, are you at the point, though, in your career where you're just like, you know, I'm going to handpick the people I want, the actors, the producers, all those people?

39:29Yeah, and usually it's, you know, it's just people you trust and your friends. But what were you going to say, Douglas? Oh, about improvising. You know, you fucking roll the camera and then they, you know, and a lot of actors' idea of improvising or ad-libbing is just say the first thing that comes into your head. It doesn't have to help the scene at all or anything. They go, action, they go, cool, wall. Yeah. And then you're like, fantastic, well done. Right. That was the one for you, let's move on. Right. Or it's just a list of jokes that 100 % wrote the night before. Right. Ian Morris texted me out of the blue today, just so I can get a mention on Ian, who co-wrote Next Goal Wins, is our mutual friend.

40:12And he texted me. Sorry, so it's about soccer, yeah? Mm-hmm. And Willie, what do you play in the film? Nothing. Taika asked me last minute to come in and just do a couple days to help out. It's a small little role. Yeah. But it makes a huge difference. The film is about the words, it's a true story. about the worst soccer team in the world, which was the American Samoan soccer team. And in the history of the country, they'd never won a game or scored a goal. Wow. And I think like in 2001 or something, they suffered the biggest international loss, which is still the record today, which was against Australia, and they lost 31-0.

40:52Jesus. Let's figure that out. What is that, a goal every three minutes? Yeah. Was anybody in the goal? Was there a goaltender? There was a guy on the goal. Oh, bless him. I think he was quite traumatized by that. And they lost to the Socceroos, who is not the best soccer team in the world. And then they got this coach in, Thomas Rongan. I think he might have been the only person who responded to the request. He came into the island and got them into shape, and then they ended up, spoiler, they scored a goal. Yeah, yeah. And it was a big... And that person, the guy playing that part is Michael Fassbender, who is a fantastic dude.

41:37That man is gifted. Brilliant actor. And it was funny because he's done so many serious, really heavy, he's got a new serious movie coming out next to you soon as well. He's someone you can improvise. He's very good. He's a smart dude. He's so good in The Killer too, the Fincher film. It was fantastic. I want to see that. I want to see that too. But anyway, but he's, and so you have Fassbender in there in a very sort of like comedic role. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Right? And I didn't think it would be that his role would become his comedic. I thought that, you know, everyone else around him would provide the comedy.

42:13But he was just, he kept delivering and just gave him more things to do. Yeah. Was it twisting arms to get him in that film? because, you know, he's much more interested in racing cars right now. He's a race car driver. Yeah. Yeah, he was doing that when I called him up. He was... You had to fit it in in between races? Yeah. He said, well, I'm thinking about taking the year off and just racing. He's legit. He's legit. And I said, well, it's in Hawaii. And he said, I'll be there. He's got this love. He's got the... Fassbender's got one of those... Like, the more you ask him about what's going on in his life, the cooler it is.

42:52And he's like, yeah, yeah, man, wow. I'm racing this type of BMW, and then I race this kind of thing, and then where's that? Well, we drove, we're in Portugal, and then we drove up to fucking Belgium to do that thing, and you're like, what kind of life is this? This is a fucking life I want. This is a real Steve McQueen life. Yeah, it's a real Steve McQueen life. Like, cool. He just channeled that whole life. He's stolen that whole life. He raced Le Mans last year. Yeah, yeah. Fucking A. Taika, how much time do you spend in New Zealand versus the States?

43:24depending on what tax department is after, it changes. It changes, of course. I've got a certain number of days I can stay in each place. Right, right, right. And you do the right one for each one of those, for sure. Yeah, yeah. I have about 14 days left this year in the States. Are you being serious? Wow. Come on, really? I'm serious. Well, but you've timed it out. I've got to get out of here. Yeah, yeah. But no, I try and spend a lot of time in New Zealand because my kids are there, and I'm trying to come here because I want to see Will. Are they going to love this movie? Are they soccer fans?

43:58No, they don't care about soccer. New Zealand is not a soccer country, really. No, it's rugby, right? It's rugby. It's all rugby. Are you a rugby fan? I'm a massive rugby fan. Really? We just went to the World Cup games. I just saw that. We just lost the World Cup. I watched that. I'll tell you guys. How did they do? We got to the final and then we lost. Barely lost. To South Africa. To South Africa. You guys are the two powerhouses, right? Yeah. Well, hang on. The Springboks, South Africa, barely beat England, let's be honest. They were kind of charmed this tournament. Yeah. And New Zealand had a really good chance.

44:34We had a good chance. It's always close between those teams. Did you ever play rugby as a kid? I played rugby up until my sort of late 20s. I mean, it really hurts, doesn't it? There's no padding. It hurts still. I get up in the morning and sometimes an ankle won't work. where a knee won't work. Well, there's little injuries you get in your 20s and you bounce back really fast, and now it's your body, then your body just punishes you later. Some people say that it's safer to tackle in that sport because there's no helmets, you know? So you're actually a little bit more careful. Well, you don't tackle with your head.

45:07Over here, they just sort of, just dive through the air with their head first. Yeah. Trying to stab people with their bodies. Well, when the CTE stories were all about in the last, five, ten years or something like that. There was a thought that maybe NFL would think about removing the helmets. Really? Yes, so that people would stop using their head as part of the tackle. All the other pads would still be on. You just have to learn how to just tackle differently like the folks who play rugby. Yeah, you just tackle and move your head out of the way. Are they really less in rugby, those CTE injuries?

45:43Well, it seems like they have less concussions. Wow, that's Because you don't have that false sense of safety. Yeah, you protect yourself. You don't make sure your head doesn't bang into anything. That's interesting. All right. So, Taika, hi. What about like when you're directing something? I hope each time you talk to me, say hi. Hi. Because this might be usable for the first part of the interview. Sure, forget it. We're not even going to do this. We might cut it. We haven't even started yet. Everything before this. Yeah, we haven't started yet. So, Taika, hi. Today's guest is Taika Waititi. Taika, welcome.

46:17Hey, Taika. I have a question about your process. When you are directing something, is there an itch to be in it always? Are you like, oh, God, I'm so glad I'm not in this? No, I really love being in it. I love acting. I think it's fun, but only if it's something that I find fun and I've got control over that. Do you like the process of directing yourself? The fact that you don't have to? I like it because it's easier for me to direct people in the scene as well. I can just talk straight to them while I'm doing the lines. Do that again. Doing the lines. What if you have an actor that's not very pliable with all of that?

46:54Like they get upset that you're talking to them in the middle of the scene, that they want you to wait until after cut. You ever had one of those? I'm pretty lucky I haven't worked with people like that. Maybe one or two, but I just sort of tend to... Ignore it. I tend to kind of cut them out of the cool group and then just ignore them and then they go left out and then they either quit or... Just alienate and bully them on set until they quit. I mean, film sets are like high school. Yeah. Do you have siblings that have cool names like you too? Yeah, most people have got cool names. My kids have got really cool names.

47:30My first daughter, her first name is Te Kainga Ote Henekahu, which means house or home of the she-hawk. Wow. Yeah, and my second daughter, Matewa, the literal translation is Time of the Dead. Wow. That's awesome. Be careful what you name your kids. Do you know that Sean means I like macaroni. Yeah. Not a lot of people know that. Not a lot of people know that. I like macaroni. Only if you spell it S-E-A-N. You spell it S-H-A-W-N and we'll tell them what that means. That's Jason's improv. I like setups. I don't like punchlines. And you say the other part. You say the other part. And pro take and action.

48:19You've got a poem you wrote. About this situation. About this wall. Exactly. Tell them. Tell them what you wrote. You've got a poem you wrote. And then point at the person. We did this fucking stupid bit for a long time. Tyke and I were doing it on texting each other. And we were doing Flag Means Death, and there was this scene where Reese has to walk away, and I said something to his character, and then the kid comes up behind me and goes, don't, man, let him go, man, or something like this. But he said it in this, like, we were laughing because he was doing it on purpose to sound like it was in an after-school special, and he grabbed my arm and I'm like, just let him go, man.

49:04And so... Just let him go, Johnny. We'll get him next year. And we started laughing so fucking hard. And everybody's like, what are you guys laughing about? And he kept going, don't worry about it, Johnny. They were never like us. We were always outsiders, Johnny. The fucking director was like, you guys got to fucking cool it, man. And then we would text each other these stupid things. It's fun stuff, you know what I mean? Yeah, yeah, it sounds like a good time. It does sound like a good time. It's not funny anymore, Johnny. People got hurt.

49:39we killed a kid Johnny

49:45it's not a game anymore people are getting hurt fuck me that gets me every time Saika listen this has been a pleasure it's after 8 o 'clock after 8 o 'clock everyone's pissed off you just got off a fucking plane no one wanted to do this at this hour oh are you kidding me this is so weird once I saw you it was all on Sean's like, you're like, it's 30 minutes past the ice cream sundae, right? How far are we past? You're joking, but that's exactly what I'm going to do right now. I'll take a photo for you. What are you going to have? What's on your sundae? I just put vanilla ice cream chocolate syrup and whipped cream, and I do a whole thing of Haagen-Dazs.

50:25No cherry. Because you start doing two scoops, and you're like, well, there's only two scoops left. I might as well just finish. You do the whole pint. Every single time. And let's see the proof of that. Go ahead, stand up. Shake the cookie pouch. here it comes there it is yeah good for you hey you know what I'd say you're enjoying life yeah that's exactly right we all have five minutes uh Tyka you're a fucking superstar dude yeah love you dude I love you guys thank you so much man thanks for having me on this thank you thank you thank you thank you for yeah exactly thanks for doing it right off the plane you asked me if I'd do this about three years ago I know I'm really happy I know you did listen for the record thanks for doing it I would have recorded this with you at 9pm huh yeah 10 10 10 I could have another go at it.

51:06I can do better. Well, thank you for eventually doing it. I appreciate it. And I'll see you next week. Thank you, Taika. See you next week. Thanks, guys. Bye, Taika. Thanks, pal. See you, guys. Well, you pulled it out of your hat there, Willie. I know. Yeah, I know. That was fantastic. So, wait, now, hang on a second. That was our first official yawn I think we've ever had in over 100 years. No, you had one during the show that was quiet. It was quiet, yeah, but I hide it behind the microphone so the guest doesn't see it. or my co-host don't see it, but we heard that one, and so that's an evening record right there with the yawn.

51:43Well, put it this way. And there's a belch. Good, thank you, Sean. It's 11 minutes after 8, and I'll be asleep by 9.15. Yeah, I know. Yeah, I'll be asleep by 9.15. What are you going to do right now until you go to bed? Right now, I'm going to go up. I've got the little kids, make sure that they're down, going to sleep. Okay. I'm going to go in there and see what's going on on MSNBC. Wonderful. See if Sean, you're going to have a Sunday. I'm going to make a Sunday and sit on the couch and get fat. So listen, Taika. Are you going to watch This Old House? No, that's Sundays. I watch that Sundays a lot.

52:17Yeah, that's Sundays with Sundays. You don't have a. Do you, do you. Oh, that's so good. I know. Sundays and Sundays. Just fucking write it down. Scotty. Hey. Wait, Taika. What will you watch tonight? Before we get. Well, sorry. Yes, let's get into Taika. how great is Tuck? How funny and cool and rad is he? He seems very hip and cool and like, you know. He was hard to get on because he kept like, it was changing and then he was like, like two years ago, I was like, hey, will you do, like right when he came to the podcast. He was on my list too, yeah. And I go, come do the podcast. He's like, yeah.

52:51I was like, great. And then like trying in the schedule and then he's always in like England and New Zealand and shooting stuff and whatever. He also just doesn't care in the best way. No, he doesn't. That sexy indifference, right? Right, right. It's just like, well, if it happens, it happens. If it doesn't, it doesn't. I was in Atlanta a few months ago, earlier this year, and I get a text and I said, listen, you or your doppelganger, or either you or your doppelganger just walked into a restaurant in Atlanta and went upstairs. And then I walked downstairs and there he was on the ground floor with Rita.

53:27Where? In Atlanta? In Atlanta. Just recently? Yeah. Well, no, no, no, a few months ago. He's just such a fucking cool... And that's when you close the deal for the... Yeah, but that was one of the other times that he was like, yeah, I can't wait to do it. He's one of those people, too, that kind of created his own style of comedy-ish. Oh, my God. Yeah. Yeah, he doesn't have to... Jay, you said he doesn't ask for it. He's created his own lane. Yeah, he's created his own lane. and he doesn't, you get this, it is true, you get the sense he doesn't really, it's not that he doesn't care about what other people are doing, it's just that he's into what he's doing in a way and he's confident about it.

54:12He's super smart and, you know, and super funny and self-deprecating and all of those kind of great things. But it seems like he's more concerned in the best way about making himself proud and making himself laugh than other people. And other people's opinions or their ability to get what he's doing doesn't really guide what he's doing. No, he's genuine. He literally just sent me a text talking. Like, he's a sweet, thoughtful person. Yeah, he seems like it. And you know what? These days, those kind of people, they're hard to come. Bye! Wonderful. Bye.

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