Explicit

Greg Kinnear

Published Aug 7, 2024, 8:00 AM

Paul and Skip welcome the award-winning actor to discuss his remarkable journey that saw him go from the inaugural host of E!'s TV clip round-up Talk Soup to acting alongside Harrison Ford in Sydney Pollack's remake of Sabrina just a few short years later. He also discusses going to Jack Nicholson's house to audition for his iconic role in As Good As It Gets, the trials and tribulations of bringing Little Miss Sunshine to the big screen, and demonstrates his stunning array of flawless impressions.  

Our Way with yours truly Paul Anka and my buddy Skip Bronson, is a production of iHeartRadio. Hi, folks, this is Paul.

Anka and my name is Skip Bronson.

We've been friends for decades and we've decided to let you in on our late night phone calls by starting a new podcast and.

Welcome to Our Way. We'd like you to meet some real good friends of ours.

Your leaders in entertainment and.

Sports, innovators in business and technology, and even a sitting president or two.

Join us as we ask the questions they've not been asked before, tell it like it is, and even sing a song or two.

This is our podcast and we'll be doing it our way.

I guess it's just the study of a person. If you take the time to study someone long enough, you can better understand who they all. You know, that's kind of always what I took away from it, So you know, it's it's worth having a longer conversation than the one you were going to have with somebody, and maybe we could all learn something from that.

Hello, Skippy, what's going on? Believe me? Uh? Just getting over the Olympics. Yeah, really something kind of miss it, Yeah, I really miss it, But I'm excited. Man. You know, my cousin, Mamoris Abraham, was a director on the Greg in Your Show. And you know I'm a huge fan of Greg anyways, great actor and here he's a wonderful guy and anybody you have ever brought in here, they're exceptional. But I'm going to ask him. I want to get a read on my cousin because I never saw him a lot and I didn't know. And hiss flame to fame with me was I'm doing the Greg Kenneer Show. I said, great, Morris, and then I never heard from Morris for about a year. Oh Greg, Greg will love that.

He will love that when you tell him that.

But I know he's a good buddy of yours, and you know, anybody of yours is open toward me. But I'm really looking forward to it because you know, he's just a solid actor and you look at the films that he's done. Everyone he's stepped up to being amazing, and I'm looking forward to getting to know them because you only hear good things about it. He's a guy, you know. I spent a lot of time with him. We play golf together, we hang out, We're good friends. We've traveled together. He's terrific. But he's just the most authentic guy. He's not at all full of himself. It's just totally down to earthing. He lives a life of gratitude and that's the truth. And you know, he's just he's so much fun to be around. Every everybody loves him. There I've never anybody that didn't, you know, think the world of him.

And some of these spells say he's done as good as he gets. I mean, I could watch that film five times. It's just spectacular with Nicholson and Helen Hunt and Greg and then of course you know Little Miss Sunshine which was another, you know, huge hit, and.

His impression Skip. I mean, when I think about it, some of the the impressions that he's done, you know, Carvey and Copple all that they're right on this spot on you know which is And I started doing impressions when I was a kid of singers, but that was easy. But you know, doing the kind of people that he does, who it's fascinating to watch great voice. Well, I asked them to do the podcast and England that obviously you and I were doing it together. He was excited about you know, talking to you. So I'm sure I'll have questions for you, not just you asking him questions. Well, I hope not too many, man, because I don't think it's gonna be fascinating a good thing with with what we're doing, because we're talkers, you and I. You know what we're like. But to sit back and get great guests and just sit back and let them talk and keep our mouths shut as best we can, man, that's a luxury to learn. You know.

I was looking at the list today. It's stunning. I mean, I'll put our guests that we've had on up against any podcast that's out there. Nobody's had the kind of guests that we've had and we've you know what, I think it's when you and I first thought here talking about doing this. You know, we're not trying to get anybody, We're not trying to make news. We're just kind of have a great conversation with great guys. And you know, because like your friends that you've brought on right and just starting with you know, Bill Burn, Michael Boublay and these, you know, they're really close friends of yours, not just people that you've met, and it just makes it so much easier. There isn't one that we've had on that one of us isn't intimately familiar with, and that's made it really special.

Well, I'm looking forward to it. I'm looking forward to it. Which I'll be going to bed tonight.

Tonight is probably gonna be i'd say lights out, no later than ten, that's for sure.

I'll be thinking at you about one in the morning. I'm gonna do some more work on the documentary, and I look forward to Greg kinnear. Yeah, yeah, you're gonna have.

I can't wait for you to talk to him. You're gonna become friends right out of the box. I'm sure. Oh that's always stimulating. All right, Billini, I'll catch up with you later. Okay, So we need a golf to more? You got a golf to No, I'm gonna play golf right now. Actually, I'm running off. The play says we're gone. I'm going to play pickleball at three o'clock. But I love the pickleball. Watch I've watched you. You're good at it too.

We have a lot of fun. So I'm gonna head over there. You go hit your balls and I'll go hit my balls. We'll both have it. We'll both have a ball. I love it.

Let's see you later.

By there, he is, I knew.

Look, we got three girls, three girls. Five Oh my.

Gosh, well, well nine grandchildren, Oh my gosh, five five daughters, Paul, Yeah, five daughters, five daughters, and I got a son who's eighteen. All right, all right.

Between Audrey, Lily and Kate. You thought you had to mark your corner down girls until you just ran into a guy who has five of them.

What are their ages?

You know what?

I just the oldest just crossed out of the teen years. So for the last year and a half, you're looking at a guy who had three teenage daughters. So I crossed that rubicon for about eighteen months when they were all in that zone. Great girls, I'm very very fortunate. But you know, I've said, it's like weather patterns. One minute it's sonny, and then it's very cold, it's misty, and it's snowing, and then it's ceiling and that it keeps changing.

But boy, are they a handful. I tell you I got three now that live in Europe. But raising those five girls, I put them in a convent. I just I got up one day, I said, you're all going to fucking convent with the nuns. I couldn't handle it, so I put them on a convent up in Carmel and I moved to Carmel. They were pissed for the first six but they they all came out well.

And now why are they all that's interesting? Why are they all in Europe?

Well, we traveled all over the world all the time, so they got very used to Europe. Because my wife may she rest she's from Paris. We spent a lot of time and they met, you know, on some of the trips. One met a guy that was Tour de Frost bicyclists, and then they started meeting people as we travel and they they got married over in London, Mante Carlo, ones in Geneva. You know, they moved around, but they met them in their travels. Yeah.

Yeah, Speaking of that, Greg's dad was in the State Department, so he was what they would call a foreign service brat and ounced all around, right like, where did you go? I know you were in Greece for a while, that's true.

We were in well, it was DC and then what hopped not that many places. I was fortunate I'd meet these poor kids that come through, and I'd say, you know, they'd be literally getting off the plane and they'd last six months and be on to their next assignment. But for whatever reason, we had a fairly consistent situation in the sense that we went to Bayward Lebanon. So we were in Beirut for about a year and then got evacuated during the Civil War to Athens, Greece, and he was assigned in Greece then for the next like five and a half year or six years. So it's where I finished high School's where I spent a lot of my life growing up. And I was lucky to not have to bounce aroun around the numerous places, and incredibly lucky to grow up in Greece. I mean, that's winning the lottery. In case anybody a where.

That, Yes, great country bay Root must have been interesting, because I've been there a few times. I put my brother through school in Beroot in that school up in the mountain.

Oh oh right, right, yeah, I was at I was at ACS, which is like kind of an American community school there, and those are throughout Europe. In fact, when I was in Greece, that was at American Community School so there was one in in bea Route, and then of course there was the American University where Steve Kerr's father was, you know, famously the uh tragically killed but he was the president of that university, not at exactly the time we were there. I think he came a little bit later. But uh. But there were two a few different, a few good schools in Beyroute, but I never went to the one up in the mountains.

The French language is used a lot in Beirut. Did you ever pick up any French? Wes?

I'm so bad at language, Paul. How many languages you speak? Because I know, skip skip how many languages you got under the belt?

There one one, one, one one.

That's our golf joke.

What are.

We do that all the time?

Child?

There's so much. I was speaking like Italian and German and French, and uh, those are my best mine.

But you recorded, Paul, recorded songs I can in various languages.

Actually, yeah, vice versho from by Lance vault No. No. I was so patty by the time I finished over there, die they get home? Because I was up every morning at eight with these teachers who are like you've learned now at eight in the.

Morning, and you must put your tongue up here. I said, I put my tongue everywhere else put up here. You already put it up vice Manish was ah, I said, okay, So I did two albums in Germany.

Italy was easier, obviously, right, little Japanese.

But did you did you speak the languages or did they just kind of if you the syntax and you would kind of give the sounds like abba. I was told they famously really didn't speak English, but.

They well they didn't. Yeah, I knew I. That was my partner in Sweden. I knew him, and then he developed the group. And you're correct. But I learned the languages, you know. I took French and school in Canada, and the Italian I could speak, and you know, a little Spanish. I got along pretty well with all of it. The problem is you never get to use it. So ex Geskilde I got to it was my Greek, I.

Think American keep it as there. I can kind of bullshit my way through enough Greek where I look like I know what I'm talking about, and actually it ends up with me being yelled at by a cab driver.

Right right, Look, Greek so you're not going to get very far now. It's hey Greg, Greg, I'll just go through a name atch because I've got to get this off.

Morris Abraham, Oh my gosh, yeah, Morris Abraham one of the greats, one of the greats. He I've known him for a hundred years and I you know, he was one of the first directors who I worked with in in what I was kind of just starting out on some television show fully buried deep below the Earth's surface. Morris Wreck did it, and then I ended up after I was doing talk soup, I ended up going from that to also hosting NBC. Did a show at NBC. I took over for Costas at at one thirty in the morning on Later, which is where you get your smokers and your tokers, as Tom Snyder used to say. And I basically had Morris come over and direct the show. And he was great, and he's a he's a great guy. How how do you know?

Okay, he's my cousin. Oh my god, tell me that he's the only successful family member that ever made it in the whole tree. Me and my cousin Morris somehow showed up and he called me one day and he starts raving about you. I said, you're finally earning more goddamn money than you got a dreamed of Morris. How did you wind up down here? And he went on, but he loved working with you.

Well, it's so funny because he's also been one of the few guys in show business that doesn't actually, you know, mooch Off his his successful family member. He didn't. I never even knew that he was related to you until this zoom right now. I'm this is the first time I'm hearing this.

Well.

I used to send out memos to all my family after my first hit. I said, I'm only signing the back of checks.

Don't call, not the front, not the front the checks.

And then I had a rule. If I don't loan money the family, and if I do, it's not alone.

Take it.

I don't expect it back, but don't ever come back again. You know what you know it is all of us who've achieved. They come out of the woodwork, and it's very tough. Even your kids. You know, you've got to sit there and monetize your actions as to what to give them, how to raise them. It's hard not to spoil them, but family, I just cut it all off. I wouldn't loan money. I give it to them. Take it, You'll never get it back.

I'm going to take the fifth on this, your honor.

It's like my line on the weekends. I used to say to my kids, the Royal Bank of Dad is closed on the weekend.

Es Well, trust me when they're teenagers and the Royal Bank is wide open on the weekend.

Yeah, Cat exactly. Hey Greg, my son in law Bateman, Jason Bateman. Yeah, his sister. She played a big role in your career, didn't. Can you talk a little about that. I'm very curious.

Yeah, absolutely, it's amazing. Actually, when I was starting, I asked it was basically answering phones at this kind of low budget film company over in Hollywood and just trying to get through the day, not really sure what the future held. I just I liked LA very much, and I was glad to be here, and I was grateful to have any kind of gig, and I thought, you know, maybe I'd get into marketing movies or something like that. I wasn't sure where the road was going to lead. But I was on this desk, and while I was there, my buddy of mine who I knew through another friend was Bobby Anderson, an old friend of mine. Sound great sound mixer. He's worked on a number of shows I've done over the years. He was dating Justine Bateman and so they were. She was doing Family Ties and she got offered to go to do MTV and Daytoto Beach back in the day, and they came back and they were like, hey, we got an idea. You should call this guy Jodavola at MTV A auditioned to be a host, and I was like, what, I'm the guy who answers phones. So I have to give her credit because she was like, no, no, I think you'd be good at this. And Justine had this, you know, she kind of her and Bobby were like, yeah, you'd be good at this and kind of encourage me. And so I put together some bad tape. In fact, I went to Justine's house and interviewed her and I got this tape out of it, and I ended up going and submitting it to MTV, which was very hot back in the day. You sat on the steps and you talked about music videos and there was JJ Johnson and Martha Quinn and all these people there at the time, and I didn't get the job, but I got a very cool looking tape out of it that said MTV Audition. So when there was a channel starting up which was kind of the precursor to EAT, it was called Movie Time, I had an audition to that said MTV audition, and they were like, holy shit, this guy must be for real. I wasn't, but it looked like I was, and through Justine's good natured helping hand, I suddenly had something to hand over to this channel, which ended up putting me on the air. It was the first kind of broadcasting job that I ever got. And I wasn't a guy driving around town with like, will you know born to act? Bumper sticker on my car. I wasn't. I didn't have an agent, I didn't have really anything sort of triangulating towards the business.

You know.

I'd had some interest as a kid, I'd done a radio show and on some acting, but I just didn't think that was I didn't know anybody out here for the most part, so I never thought that was a real possibility. So just through the happenstance of meeting her, for them going to the thing, for going to MTV and not getting the job. I ended up with my first broadcasting job, which you know ultimately led to some other stuff and ultimately movies after that.

So so Talk Soup that was nineteen ninety one.

Came after all of this.

Oh got it.

Yeah, So this came after. I mean, I'm talking, I'm taking you back to the eighties, ladies and gentlemen, and I am it's like late eighties, and I have tried out unsuccessfully for MTV, and I have suddenly got a you know, I got an opportunity with a twenty four hour entertainment channel which was kind of like it was E before it was E. They basically ran trailers and interviews, they ran anything they could get for free. And I did that for three years and made, you know, not a lot of money, but it was great experience and kind of got me on television. And then ultimately, you know, a year or two later, Movie Tom turned into E and E had various shows on it and one of them ended up becoming Talk Soup, which was, you know, the first thing that really broke out that I ever had a hand.

Will Leo fan of Talk Soup.

I started it, so I it was basically, they they had a few clips of daytime talk shows and I saw it, and they I got a call from Age saying that they have this idea to turn this into a show where you would look at, you know, look at a few clips of daytime talk shows, which didn't really seem like the greatest idea I'd ever heard, and they wondered like more of a was supposed to be like a serious, serious look at you know, HAROLDO and Richard Bay and all these crazy shows. And so I went in there, and I think I did keep a straight face for about forty eight hours, maybe the first two episodes, But then it became very clear that you know, we we we were just doing a you know, this show was just wacky and kind of caught a moment in time where people were weird. Daytime talk shows were happening, but they weren't getting their fill of them until they got home, and so it just kind of hit in a lot of different areas, mostly college students who would go home and smoke his belief and watch him talk to.

Is that how you got to Sydney Pullock, Well, Sydney, Yes, was he a fan of this show?

Yeah? It actually is. I just got a text from John McEnroe. By the way, just breaking news, ladies and gentlemen, Now you are talking. Okay, there you go. That's what I just got from John. I don't know if that's from referring to us doing this. Didn't John come on your Guys show?

Yeah? Yeah he did, Yeah he did.

Yeah, there you go. Maybe he knows that.

I've loved the shows that we've done. Paul's very friendly with Harvey Levin from TMZ, So we did TMZ. We actually went to the studio where they do it in Marina del Rey. They have they have like two hundred people working there. I mean, that is an unbelievable business. And he's got so many you know, anything that pops up it then turns into a documentary that he does. I mean, it's just talk about a phenomenon. Look at TMZ. That's crazy, totally true.

I mean, I mean he really took something there that was I mean just so easily dismissed and kind of found the right way to you know, make it pop and to monetize found a place. And I think, you know, some of that has to do with you know, good timing. I certainly you know was the beneficiary of that with with Talk Soup, But yeah, there's a lot of work too, and I, you know, while I was doing it, I did it for three years, and I had decided, I'm only going to do this for three years. I don't know what the hell because I didn't have like a backup plan. But I was coming to the end of three years and they came to me and offered me a big deal, like more money than anybody, you know, a really very impressive offer, and I was grateful for it. But at the same time, I had met with Sydney who had called me up and asked me to come in and talk about Sabrina and audition with with you know, the casting people at Paramount, and I knew I was in the mix for this thing, but I didn't know if I had it. And it kind of came to a point at the end of the three years I had done Talk Soup where it was like I got to make a decision. Either I'm gonna say yes and take this Talk Soup out for another year, or I'm going to let go and hope for the best with the movie. That's what I ended up doing, and I just didn't I felt like it had run its course, and even though you know it hadn't. It went on for many years, but I kind of checked out. And about two weeks after I did, after I left it, I got the call from Sydney saying, you want to come and do a movie, And that.

Sounded like that's a shocking leap, isn't it? From television? And then Sid Nepaul one of the greats obviously, and you worked with the you know when I started as a kid starting out as you did. You know, he was in au of Sinatra. When I was around him and Sammy Davis and I'm the kid. You know, these guys are twice my is. It was just mind bobbling. What was it like for you when you first encountered Jack Nicholson? How good was that? What was that like when you were of auditioning? Did you go to his house?

I did?

I went, I went up to Mulholland.

Yeah, the first I think the first time I met him, I went to I went to meet him at his house up on Mahawk. It was first introduction to Jack, which was like the most stomach turning, refining just you know, I mean, it had helped It wasn't like this was my first gig. I had done a little work by this point, and I had done Sabrina. But Jack, come on.

Did you do your Jack impersonation for him?

Are you out of your mind? No? Because it's so good issue they didn't say it work.

I want to a couple before we're done. Couple. I want you ah.

Oh, the taed cop. Nobody even knows Ted Copple anymore. A bunch of impersonations of people that no one knows anymore. I give you the whole list. It's like a Who's.

Who, Who's Johnny Gusson?

Ny? I gotta listen, we gotta turn the tables. You gotta tell me. I mean, I can't think if I think about the history of television, of modern television, and I think about music. I mean, most iconic song like ever recorded, unequivocally has to be The Tonight Show thee It is thirty years worth.

Well, you know he worked, he worked with me, Greg when he was starting out. I was doing this TV special in England and I said, nobody wants to hear me for two hours with these cockamamie teenage songs. I said, I need some comedy so they sent me a bunch of kinescopes over to London, and I saw this guy, Johnny Carson, who did a bit where he was, you know, an alcoholic till four in the morning. Then he had to get up and run a kiddie program with kids at night, so of course you can imagine it was. It was an amazing bit. I said, that's the guy. He flies over, he works with me, you know, not an easy guy to get to know, never was, but brilliant at what he did. And I go back to New York and I run into him and like, you who were going to You're going to do the show for three years? He said, I'm doing this new show for a couple of years, and you know, the Tonight Show and blah blah blah, and I'm changing this and this. He said, I think I might need a theme song. Well, you know, I'm the wrong guy to ask, right because I mean it'll come out of me like this. I said, you got it. So I went to the studio and I recorded for Bok two hundred and fifty bucks Dad, and I send him over the demo and he called me back and he said, I love it. He said, but we can't use it because the guy that's been here for years, Skitch Henderson, you know, he was twice h Yeah, he said he doesn't want some kid getting involved in the show. He's going to do it. So and I've been rejected all my life up until then, right, So I said, oh okay. So then I thought about it, and I called Johnny back. I said, look, I'll give you half the soul. I'll give you half the publishing. I'll put you down as the writer. You'll get fifty percent of everything that discerns over the next two or three years. So he called me back a couple hours later, said, you got it. So when you look at the music, it's got Johnny Carson, Johnny Gard's right. Well, Skitch was pissed. It goes on not for two years, but for what thirty nine whatever the bucket was and it was the largest earning theme song ever on television. And I call it they called my college song. Put all the kids through college with it. And that's how it was there. You know, it was just the fifteen seconds of simplicity, that's all it was.

It all came down to I I am going to make a fuck load of money off of this.

Thank you.

You gotta rub the eye. Remember you had all the shtick you'd rubbed the eye. Those were all sickmas the nose, Yeah yeah yeah.

But pivoting back the Nicholson, I have to say, as good as it gets, it's not just one of my favorite moves. It seems it's like one of everybody's favorite movies. It was just so so special, and that was in ninety seven. But the movie Little Miss Sunshine, it holds a special place in my heart because of an experience you and I had Greg at a golf club. Paul. You don't know this, but at the at the private country clubs when they had each one has a major event. I know that, okay, they have like a three name, three name ever a guest tournament, and while if you're not playing in the tournament, we had reciprocity with other clubs where our members could go over to their club, you know, because our course was tied up with this tournament. So Greg and I wind up at another country club in the LA area with two other friends of ours, and we play golf. It's a very chilly, daddy. We're got our jackets, sweaters, hats, the whole thing. The end of the round. We said, well it was great, let's get something to eat. And two of the guys said, now we have to be somewhere. So Greg and I went into the grill room. And as we walk in, the grill room is packed and there's a woman, a little old woman, sitting by the front and she spots Greg and she says, oh, I loved you and little miss sunshine. And Greg said, oh that's that's thank you so much. And we sit down order I order a diet code. Greg says, alb and Arnold Palmer. We're sitting for like ten minutes and they haven't brought our drinks and that's sort of And we look over and there's a gentleman in a sport jacket and tie and he's on the phone at the desk and he walks over to us and he said, oh, good afternoon, good afternoon. Are you members? Yes? Oh oh, what's your member number? So I give him my member number. It's three digits. He said, well, our member numbers have four numbers. I said, well, no, that's the number at our club that we belong to. We have reciprocity here, so we just want to order a couple sandwiches. Well, you don't have reciprocity for the grill room. That's only for the golf course. I'm afraid you're gonna have to leave. So Greg looks at me. We've got our stuff piled up on the chair, right, the hat, sweaters, jackets, hats. Greg looks, Greg looks at me, He goes, grab your shit. We got to do the walk of shame, and we had everyone in the grill room was like watching what was going. They didn't know. They knew something was up there, they didn't know quite what. So everybody there's maybe one hundred and eighty people in grill room and we have to walk out carrying our hats and jackets, and we get to the door to leave and a little old lady Looksie Greek and says, I still loved you in that movie, just not enough to eat us.

Yeah, that was an indie film, right right, it was.

It was an indie By the way, Skip forgot to tell you that when he's able to carry all his sweaters and hats out and he was still able to flip off everybody and drive room. Yeah, no, it was humiliating and uh, but but they did send us a bottle of wine. Uh that I skip went and found the price on it. I think it was not eight dollars two buck chuck or something. They set of it because they felt bad for what had happened, which made the story even funnier by.

The way, of course.

So uh yeah, Little Sedghine was a was an independent movie, and it was a very very good script by Michael Aren't And and the truth is it really wasn't going to be made. There's a producer named Mark turtle Toob who just literally went out of his pocket and there wasn't any time left because you know, John Jonathan Dayton, Valerie Ferris who I saw recently, you know, were the directors on this, and they had stuck with it through and through for like you hear these stories about how long it takes to get movies made. This was kind of one of them. And our little Olive, of course, continues to get older, and they kind of got to the point where Olive was going to age out of the role, and obviously we were all set on her playing the girls. So so Mark just wrote a check for I don't remember what the number was, like seven million bucks or something like that, and we all found ourselves in the course of five or six weeks making the movie, and yeah, it's a great, nice little film. Turned out really well. We actually rehearsed, which movies don't do very often, and it premiered at sun Dance, I think, and just kind of took Do.

You think you could make a movie like that today?

I think you have more chance of making like a Little the Sunshine than you do. As good as it gets, I mean, you know, as good as it gets, a big studio, you know, forty to fifty million dollar movie that is really just about some very great issue, you know things. It certainly deals with love, and it deals with but it deals with this misogynous racist guy at the forefront of it. And it's a it's an odd ball script. I mean, it was kicked around for a lot of years Forrest Gump. There's so many movies that aren't those kind of unusual stories that can only be realized if they're ultimately somebody takes the chance and puts them together and gets them out to a mass audience, and they can get turned into something that that audiences ultimately appreciate. But I think the risk factor on that now is so high that those kinds of films seem to have kind of gone to gone to the wayside. You know, if you're spending five ten million dollars to make something that's small, that that has a contained story and you know, finds as humor and joy, I guess it's still possible. I like to think it's still possible. You know, I'm an optimist. But definitely an unusual time right now, I think for.

The entertainment business, yeah, I think it's I don't think it's a business anymore. It's so changed. The movie business, it's not like it used to be years ago when I grew up around it. It's just very strange business today. Like the music business, it's also changed.

Yeah, And I guess at the end of the day, you know, you wonder what was the key what's the key factor that has changed it?

Is it?

Is it us or is it that I often think it's this These things have changed it, you know, whether it's through music or whether it's through the you know, watching a movie on your iPhone. It is it is the ability to have all of this information in your pocket all the time. That kind of cut into both the music and entertainment business. But I still you know, I went to the screening of of something recently and I, you know, you've felt the whole crowd in on the experience, and I was like, Oh, this still happens. This still can be a fun group experience to see a film. So I haven't counted it out yet.

Well, AI looms. You know, Artificial intelligence is the other dynamic that we haven't really experienced, knowing it's a threat. It is in the music business and I think the film business ultimately in some way.

Yeah, So can AI write write a song? It probably can't.

You know. I don't want to drop names, but I got a call about a year and a half ago from Warren Buffett, who's a buddy, and he was with Bill Gates. He said, Polly, you won't believe it. The Gates just showed me I got this computer thing. Here was that geez thing that the one that we're experiencing. Because I'm not into that stuff, he said. I asked the machine to give me four different versions of my way, and in one minute, it spit out four different versions of my way in one minute. So the answer is yes, they can duplicate visual voice right, whatever you want. It's doing it, so we have to look at it differently in terms of licensing, you know, what we're going to do in the future, like I think across the board are culturally and for everyone, We're gonna have to look at it all differently because it's it's going to take over without doubt.

It is. It is. It is when you talk about doing things differently. So you guys are both unicorns. I mean, you know, how many people can sing, but then how many people turn in to be, you know, a superstar singer. How many people can act, but how many people get to be in the kind of you know, extraordinary films that you've been in. So if you hadn't become an actor, if what was your fallback or what would you what do you think you would have pursued if you weren't going to be an actor?

Honestly, I don't, I don't, I don't know. I don't have a great answer for that. I I think I was young enough and stupid enough to feel like you now, I'll figure this out. I definitely didn't have a you know, full blue pret you know when I remember talking to Costas about later and he showed me that Mickey Male baseball card that he kept in his wallet since he was five because he was interested in being a broadcaster, and I was like, that, ain't me. I definitely did not know what they wanted to be when I came out here, and I certainly am grateful in a way to have kind of kept a loose hand on the wheel. I do think it's you know, I you know, not that it wasn't a you know, very difficult time even back then to kind of find your way through all of this. But now I just worry about, you know, anybody trying to come out to Los Angeles and make a crack at it, because I feel like there are you know, less opportunities, less jobs, and maybe the AI think Paul's talking about that's bringing the room down, quite frankly, is true. I mean it's true. I mean, like, if you think about it, it is pretty uh, you know a lot of stuff that we experience and entertainment is going to become more automated. That's just unavoidable.

But did your parents at that point were your parents thinking, wait, you don't want to be a doctor or a lawyer? I mean, were they supportive of the idea of your being an actor?

I don't think there was ever a moment skip where Ed and Susie Knier were thinking I was going to be a doctor or a lawyer. I think the goal was to keep little Greg out of prison. I think that was the highway that they were. They reached the that bar early on. So I don't know, I mean, I don't really think there was a you know, and I don't like I said, I mean, I was I was grateful, I guess, to get out here and get fine kind of a job doing anything in the entertainment business. And I have so many friends who were on desks of people and working and you know, whether it was an agency or a management place. You know, I was at this you know, it was called Empire Pictures. Charlie Bann was making these kind of movies like Reanimator and uh just crazy Experience. They had this three floor building over in Hollywood. And I don't know, I mean, I don't know where that might have led in terms of the entertainment business if I hadn't have been become a actor. But I thought maybe i'd find my I'd find some step into it or some step into maybe the business side of it.

How about this, So Paul saying you are my destiny, and so you this was your destiny, right, this was your You just assumed that this was going to be it. You didn't have a backup plan, That's what I'm saying.

Yeah, I think that's I think that's true. You're giving me anxiety. But the fact that you're saying I didn't have a backup plan is making a little late, little.

Late Like if Audrey Lilly or did they have they given any sort of indication that they'd like to be actors or zero I I I have.

None of them have express that. I certainly would be supportive of whatever my kids wanted to do, but none of them have shown really a lot of interest in that. Maybe even if there was anyone, maybe my youngest, but but I not a lot and I don't encourage it or discourage it. In fact, I find of the more I stay out of it, the batter. So hands off at this point, but not seeing a lot of interest.

Oh your upcoming projects, Like, I know you've just spent a lot of time in Vancouver. What what film was that for?

So that's a that is a Apple TV show? So I did a show a couple of years ago Dennis Lahane was a wonderful novelist and showrunner as well. Did this show Blackbird with Paul Walter Hawser Taron Edgerton. That was a great experience and and we did I think six episodes of that for Apple TV. So I'm back with a lot of that same gang again. This is another true time series, nine episodes about a true crime that based loosely on a true crime that took place here in Los Angeles that involves Arson and Taron Edgerton's in it, and John Leguzamo and myself and a lot of great actors and Journey Spilette. It was amazing at it. So we just just completed that this week. So we completed so recently. I haven't had a chance to shave my mustache off yet, which I'm getting a lot.

Fresh around the house to do.

So it's amazing. Paul. You know, we played golf. One of the other guys in our regular golf game is Luke Wilson and Greg and Luke. They're always working.

By the way, I did a movie with I did a movie with Luke. I was thinking we should have had we should have done it with We should have had Luke on here as well. It has been a lot of fun to actually talk about it. We did a little movie about a true story about a baseball team out of Dallas that ended up weren't very good. They ended up making it to the World Series, and we play these two fathers who were kind of dual coaches on the team, one of us, one of the one of the guys dads we played, got ill and ultimately very sick, and it's kind of a story about how the team persevered. And the movie, it's called You Gotta Believe, comes out at the comes out at the end of August. But it was very weird to work with Luke Skipp because you're right, we're old friends, and like you're sitting on set, you know, suddenly face to face with somebody actually working a dialogue. Somebody who usually just used to talking shit with is suddenly now you're reliant on to actually perform a scene with. So I have to say that we had a blast, and.

Luke's really great in the movie. So you were also in the highlight. I'd have to say, you were in the finale of Curb Your Enthusiasm.

It felt like the the whole twelve seasons of Larry's show was was leading up to the Courtroom featuring me. I'm not I'm not taking anything away from the other you know, twelve the other eleven seasons and epping shows before they got to me, because I'm sure those were good. But uh man, did we stick the landing at the end. It was actually really fun. Obviously known Larry for uh, you know, for for the through many years, and I had talked to him over the years about doing doing it and just for whatever reason, this worked out and and it was great fun to do. And he is unequivocally the Michael Jordan of comedy. I mean, he just was so fun to watch. Uh it was like having a front row seat to the to the big show, you know, I mean, here they are. You had Jerry, everybody in the show. So it was great fun to go want to do that.

You know, Greg, you've done such great works over the years. You're truly a good actor, a great actor. And you've placed so many historical figures over the years, you know, from Crane to Hope and JFK. Is it difficult harder doing that other than just regular fictional characters.

Well, you know, I think there's a it's kind there's kind of a two sides to it. I mean, on the one side, if you play somebody that people are familiar with, it does come with a certain amount of baggage. People are watching closely, they have a preconceived idea of who that is, and so I do I think you feel inherently more pressure doing that. But you also have just a you know, treasure of facts about them. A lot of times you have you know, footage and speeches or whatever you got in order to kind of, you know, really represent that character in a way that hopefully feels authentic to the audience. So when you create a you know, when you're just doing a character that you you know, nobody knows or his uh fictional character, you it's it's great, it's yours or as did call it. But with that comes I always feel like a certain you know, it's it's also kind of think that takes a lot of you know, it takes some thought because you're trying to create something that feels organic to the story you're telling and the person doesn't really exist, so you're it's kind of whatever you say it is at the end of the day, it's all, you know, it's all the script. If the script's good, you can get held of some.

Of these, Like people obsessed, including my assistant Aaron, with Blackbird, just obsessed with it. People. I mean, you know there are people you watch a film, right, you watch one of the films and you know that's about it. But people became obsessed with Blackbird. Just unbelievable.

Yeah, it's it's a really nice it is it's a it's an incredible, incredibly powerful story. It's it's really well told. I think Dennis is writing is there's just no better in the business right now. His dialogue, his sense of pace, and I do think you're talking to a guy who's you know, I mean he's done something like, you know, twelve fifteen novels. I think maybe more that skill, you know, that muscle is just so developed for him that it's it's a pleasure to kind of get to work with him.

You know, Greg, I don't like listening to a lot of the music I've recorded through all the years, maybe because there's too much of it. But how often do you watch your movies? Well, what do you take away from it?

Yeah, it's it's I find I don't watch as much as stuff that I but today that I used to kind of like, you know, watch rough cuts and things of stuff I've done. But I find now it's like a lot of stuff will come out and then maybe you know, a month or two, I'll catch it or see it at something, maybe even later than that. I don't find the urgency to see it as much anymore. I hope, you know, anything I do, you hope for the best. You hope the movie works and that it finds an audience. But I think with time you start to realize. It's probably similar in music. You know, you realize how much of that is really out of your control. And at the end of the day, if you feel like you've you know, you've you've played the right note, that's all you can hope to do. And so the you know, all of the what comes out of that later is not worth really tracking and even watching it. I mean, doing it is great fun and great, very satisfying, but you know, going and watching it afterwards is always fraught with why.

I do it that way? Yeah? Why do that?

With all the historical figures that you've you know, you've played, is there one that you would have liked to have played or still would like to have played a person from history that would be meaningful to you to play.

Yeah, there there's something that I'm tracking. I'd always say what it is because there's there's some complicated issues tied to it. But there's there's a there's a guy that I'm I'm very interested, but I I don't know. I mean, like I know, the answer is I have occasionally somebody that I think, oh, well, that would be ripe to do. But for the most part, it's not like I have a book full of characters that in playing, because at the end of the day, you can fixate on somebody you think, oh my gosh, why don't they tell this story? I mean, like I never read a million years. I've certainly watched you know, Hogan's Heroes as a kid, but you know, until I read the script, you know, Paul Schrader's version with Michael Jibosi of Auto Focus, Who the hell would think to do that movie? No, nobody wants to see Bob Crane, But you know it's the script, dynamic script in this great movie.

Great you know, So.

At the end of the day, if the script's good, Hellalujah, would you do Carson? Yeah, I for sure.

I think somebody should do a Johnny Carson film. That's a great story, a great story.

I agree. I'm afraid that it hasn't been done done. I'm surprised it hasn't been done.

I know that that backstory is amazing with Johnny. You know, it was just, but somebody should do Carson.

When you say he was hard to know, like what what do you?

Well, look, I love Johnny Carson. We all agree. You know, he holds that mantle. Nobody quite did it the way that he did. But it was just, you know, I really am very hesitant about talking about it because I know, but it was just a backstory to it that was not what you would think. And it was not a happy life. It was just, you know, with what comes with some lowners. Even some can deal with the space. But you know, he liked to drink, and that's a whole other story. And you know, my introduction was early in the sixties, and you know, knowing that he liked Frank Sinatra, for instance, and Frank really didn't care. He didn't want to meet anybody. And Johnny was a drummer, as you know, and he loved drumming, and he'd go into Jilly's. Jilly was Sinatra's guy, and they had this hanging place called Jittlies in New York, and you know, Johnny in and played the drums some nights, and you know, one night he came in him and head and they like to drink and they were blasted by the time they got in there, and Johnny started like messing around with these girls at the bar, you know, pinching them and flirting with them. Well, back then, you know the Mafia guys. On Friday nights, they had what's called side dishes, which were the girls the mistresses. On Saturday night they bring the wives. So the distinction between the mistresses and the wives on Saturday was very distinct. So he started messing with one of the side dishes and the guys happened to see him, and they took him and they threw them down a flight of stairs, but six stairs down of the bathroom, and all you heard was this ruckus and somebody yelling they're beating up Tonny cars. So Jillie had to go down and rip them off Johnny. And it was but a lot of stuff like that, just different things, but it's a great backstone. Or if somebody did their homework, you'd find that it had a lot of depth to it. And he's there's no figures we know in our business, like Johnny Carson.

Well, it's and that loaner thing I did. I do remember like seeing video or some stories about him after he retired, you know those three or four years where gues he'd go and watch little tennis and stuff. But it did seem painfully reclusive. And I had a famously. I had Gary Shandling was a good friend of mine. And Gary was friends with Johnny a little bit. And I was going somewhere. He was like, literally a kid, my kid's birthday party. But I couldn't miss it. I had. I was taking her her birthday party, but it was a way I had to take her. There was no getting around this. And I think Helen was away and so I'm like, honey, I'm the guy. And then I get a call from Gary saying, hey, do you want to Jerry and Jerry and I are going to have dinner with Johnny Carson. Can you make it? And I was like, no, I can't, and it he tortures me that I.

Do that.

Yeah, he he's socially, you know, even a lot of the dinners at events he'd go to here in town, he'd go off to himself in the corner, you know, was not very social.

He's like, he's a lot like Skip in that way, a lot.

Yes, Yes, we were trying to We're trying to draw it out. We're trying a few of us are making it a mission to bring it out and Skip. But it's tough.

It's tough possible, Skip plays Johnny Carson. I mean, I'm just thinking I'm spitballing here, so I don't know.

Yeah, the last couple of years, Yes.

I played the part where he gets thrown down the flight of stairs. It's perfect. I like you.

That really the earlier in his career.

But Greg, before we run out of time, I want to I want to ask you a sort of a serious question. All Right, there's a great line in the movie as Good as the Cats, That's just great. And the line was, if you look at a person long enough, you can see their humanity. And I'm just wondering, I've always loved that line and wondering what that what that means to you? There was quite a powerful, a powerful thought.

Yeah, I mean, well, Jim Brooks is the master of powerful thoughts. I mean, if you think, like every one of his movies, you know, broadcast news terms, I mean all just you know, even the ones that aren't haven't been you know, box office you know successfully as much box office wise, are still filled with three thoughts and ideas. And I don't know, I mean, I guess it's just the study of a person, if you believe, you know, if you if you take the time to study someone long enough, you can better understand who they are always what I took away from it, So you know, it's worth having a longer conversation than the one you were going to have with somebody, and maybe we could all learn something from that. How about that?

You know, you know, Greg, the are thousands of listeners don't have the benefit of the visual that I'm looking at and I'm looking at you, you know, away from all the films and everything. You're in great shape. You look great and I'm a health nut. Well, what's your routine? I'd like to know, what do you eat? What's your focus on your body? How do you take care of yourself? Because we get a lot of people, you know, in life that we've grown up with with the time they hit fifty or sixty. It's tragic. What do you do for yourself? Do you have some kind of a set routine?

Allright, Well, first of all, can I call you every day? Paul?

Yes you can.

Yeah, I want to call you every day the rest of my life. And you just get me this run down you just gave me.

Yeah, I'm a Carls Junior from one to two of it, McDonald's from four to six, a bit pizza hunt from seven to nine. But you can get me on myself. No, but seriously, look, you look as I I don't.

I don't know. I mean, like I'm I think I am. I think I had pretty good jeans. My my father passed away a couple of years ago, but he was he was pretty good, pretty good shape. He was a tennis player. And I don't have like a regular cardio game, which I you know, I think there's no better game than tennis. And my dad just told me that golf good but not really. No, no, no, So this morning I was down at the gym, you know, working out, you know, but I'm not. I'm pretty moderate. I mean, I either I take a hiker, you know, try to get some cardio every day. And it waits in a couple of times a week and stay off the French fries.

And uh so you eat carefully, you do eat carefully.

I guess I'm a little careful. I don't I yeah, I definitely am careful, carefuler than I would otherwise be. My dad, before he got involved in the State Department, actually had a you know, big vending business, vending machine business back in Indiana with his father. And I think Ausman was like, you know, if things had gone slightly differently, I'd weigh about four hundred and fifty pounds and be selling like everything people take out of a vending machine these days. So it's in the back of my mind enough so that so that I get after it. It's some capacity every day, but I'm not nuts about it.

Those three girls will keep you business.

They certainly will.

Yeah, look out.

Man, you're a prince to do this. But leeve in or not, I have your spot in the golf game this afternoon.

Oh you do.

Got Doc Rivers and Peter they're waiting on the tee.

So I played with him yesterday, by the way, and I know I don't want to say who who won, but you know, you can you're asking yourself. I don't really care, but I know there was a winner. I just can't remember.

Yeah, I think I'm looking at.

Him maybe with this, Guys, that's that's me. My wife just reminded me. Gave me this the other day because I got it from my mom. That's me. Wow, records in Athens, Greece.

Oh, that's wild.

And I don't know and Paul, I don't know. I probably probably spun something connected to Paul ank in no doubt. So there you go.

Well there's enough music out there. Hey, I gotta tell you, I've really enjoyed this.

Greg.

I'm very Uh, I'm very impressed with humanity. Uh. You're a great guy to talk with and I get a real good vibe from you, and I'm very happy for your success. And I thank you for all the great work that you've done. You know, I know it's not an easy business. We all are confronted with the challenges, but you're an impressive human and I like that.

Well, thank you, and thanks Skip and the show guys. Pleasure to come on and hang out for a little bets, So thanks for having.

Me, Thanks for doing it, and keep spinning my records, will you please, I could use all the help. We all do all the help. Yah yah, yes, cool messy bo cool don shu donka shunet.

Do you want to jump in on.

This great Buck Kennere everybody, He's the man.

He is the man. Thanks, Greg, love you a lot.

Thanks, Thanks for being a friend.

All Right. Cheers, guys, Cheers.

Sea Our Away with Paul Anka and Skip Bronson is a production of iHeartRadio.

The show's executive producer is Jordan Runtogg, with supervising producer and editor Marcy Depina.

It was engineered by Todd Carlin and Graham Gibson, mixed and mastered by the wonderful Marry Do.

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Our Way with Paul Anka and Skip Bronson

Music icon Paul Anka and business visionary Skip Bronson are dear friends, and together they boast t 
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