Pod Meets WorldWhen it comes to quintessential TGIF interviews, this week, we DID do that. We’re jumping across the ABC multiverse to the world of “Family Matters” to hang out with Steve Urkel himself…Jaleel White!
The gang bonds with Jaleel over their experience growing up on a sitcom and find out why he was skeptical of a “Family Matters” reboot!
Urkel started as a guest star and grew to become the face of the network, an unbelievable transition he details in his brand new memoir!
Plus, we hear (what his NDA allows) about his new Star Wars role in Skeleton Crew, on a new, ‘90s fever dream, Pod Meets World!
We spent quite a bit of time together recently and with our well, Susan was not with us, so I was gonna say with our significant others, but Susan was missing. But we learned something about Writer's wife, Alex that came up in conversation, and then the same thing was reiterated the next day also by Writer and Will and I then talked about it on the way.
Home, like, wow, what is it Alex?
Alex said when we so, Alex is a great cook and she loves food, which and it's one of the many things I love about Alex because I also love food. I don't love to cook as much, but I love food, So I can talk about food with Alex for a long time time. And then Alex was talking about how she doesn't like a casual, on the go dinner, like if she has to have a casual kind of on the go dinner that doesn't involve a whole setup and a sit down, she feels like it ruins her day, like that's a bad day if she doesn't have a good dinner.
And then she mentioned she.
Was talking about she was gonna send me some recipe ideas, and I said, oh, you don't do a taco Tuesday, and.
She goes, I hate tacos, and I was like, what's huh hate tacos?
Like, what.
About tacos? Exactly?
It's kind of a bunch of really good stuff in a really good thing.
Yeah, yeah, Like what's really do not like about it? And I thought huh.
And then we talked about what it is and she was like, I just feel like tacos are not a sit down worthy meal.
And I was like, okay.
I started I was asking her about home state tacos. Yeah, She's like, I like him for breakfast, that's fine. And then the next day writer said, I hate tacos.
Tacos really the biggest problem with this is that we live in like Taco Central. We live in East La Highland, the greatest, the greatest tacos, the straightest street tacos ever.
We have a friend for his fiftieth.
We went on a taco crawl with a professional taco guy, taking us to all the different street tacos. We had cheek tongue like all these amazing guacamullys or different salt it was, and I could not care less. We were just like, okay, we'll go along.
Yeah, I just don't.
I'm just tacos.
This is not you know.
I think maybe it's it's an embarrassment of riches. I don't know, like everywhere I wear the Taco shirt.
Okay, you wear the Taco shirts, wear shirt the product.
I mean, it was so funny because we're like we're sitting in the airport yesterday. It's just like, why do they tell you that he hated tacos.
It's it's such a big thing for so many of our friends because like that's what we do, especially with kids. You go to tacos, you make tacos, and you go get tacos down the street, and like everybody in La like they.
Have the best tacos. Uh, And we're always like no, can we can we do something?
Is it just tacos? Do you like Mexican food?
I don't really like Mexican food, though.
I liked California Northern California Mexican burritos and if anybody knows like the Mission District burritos.
I'm blanking on some of the names, but like San Francisco style britos, which you can't find in La.
Explain San Francisco.
It's a gigantic it's it's basically there's nothing. I don't know exactly what's super special about it, except that it's just the flavor profile, like whatever they do in San Francisco and farther north, like what I grew up with the places of assholes called Viva Mexico that I grew up going to. They're just they're just giant burritos with you know, normal like I usually do vegetarian. But then there's also you know this carnitas and chicken, but tons of guacamole, sour cream, cheese.
But there's something.
I think it's the rice and beans, this particular flavoring of the rice and beans that you just don't find in La.
Oh and I still haven't found it in La.
If anybody's listening, please tell me where I can get a San Francisco style burrito in LA. I will, Oh my god, I'm so But other than that, like you know, the La, there's two models of La Mexican restaurants. There's like really traditional Mexican restaurants where they're like those dark caves that you go into, you know, like style, right, And usually I enjoy the.
Food, but I just like my stomach just can't handle it. I have such a black boys stomach. I'm such a I don't like spicy things. And then, yeah, tacos, you know, street tacos. It's like I'd rather go sit down somewhere and haven't meal.
That's right, you were gonna be the first one to tap when we go on hot ones. Finally, Oh my god, I can't know.
I can't do anything spicy because even if I enjoy it while I'm eating it, my stomach will be in so much pain for days.
Yeah, it's not worth it.
What else do you hate?
Writer?
Let's get a few more things out of the way.
What else?
We know a few things will hate. We've already done that. You guys heard me go on about art, so I don't have to share anymore.
What else do you hate?
Writer?
I just feel like I've said I hate a lot. Yeah, jazz?
So then wait, I'm sorry, because Daniel and I on Wednesday are going to Taco Jazz Night? Are you not going to be where?
You're not coming Taco jazz night?
I'll be at this sushi poetry reading a.
More or less honestly, will and I will go to that Insteady, that sounds good too, I.
Won't listen to the poetry, but I'll be all day long. Yeah, I don't care. Yeah what rhymes with with Sabbi my friend? That's all I gotta know.
Welcome to Pond meets World. I'm Danielle Offishal, I'm right or Strong, and I'm Wilfordell.
If nineties tgif Programming was a baseball team, Boy Meets World would have hit in the eight spot. Sure we'll get run opportunities and some highlight worthy sacrifice buns, but.
None of this makes any sense to me, no idea.
I'm with you, I'm with you.
Just go to sleepwriter, But the truth is, don't look for any electric power and four hundred and fifty foot home runs from us. We were the last position player before the terribly hitting pitcher, so we knew our role and were thankful to be in the majors. But this week's guest he was the clean up hitter, the franchise player, the young man behind the world renowned Family Matters character Steve Erkele, a role that was originally cast to be a one and done appearance and then turned into a cultural phenomenon. Over nine seasons, he was the face.
Of Erkele Dolls and Erkle Oh's.
But most importantly, he was the face of a successful and rare black family sitcom on Network TV. In addition to the iconic and lovable Nerd, he'd voice Sonic the Hedgehog and the early animated renditions of the character, and appear on shows like Bones, Castle, and Psych, eventually also appearing on Dancing with the Stars and next up for this.
Busy man, the soon to.
Be released Star Wars Skeleton Crew on Disney Plus. He also just released a memoir, Growing Up Arkle, finally telling his story and detailing the peaks, valleys, and plateaus of fame and fortune.
So this week on Pod Meets.
World, we are thrilled to welcome a Hall of Fame nineties kid actor and a well adjusted grown up in twenty twenty four, It's jilliel White.
Yeah hear me?
Yeah? Do you hear us?
I can hear you?
Just fine?
Okay, good welcome.
We are so excited to have you here with us. Even though Boy Meets World aired after you, I still feel like you are just are very very strong lead.
In and you are now you still are. Did you even know Boy Meets World existed?
Oh? Very much. So you can really you guys, and you ever brought into replaces, you guys right in replaces now that I understand it the way I understand it now, yeah, I get it, but I would.
Love to hear that. Please explain that to us.
No.
So, so, all the shows on TGIF were originally all the shows on TGIF were originally owned by one of brothers. And this is the part of the business, guys, that you know, we were never privy to as young performance. And when it became legal for Disney to begin making their own content for their own network, that was illegal before nineteen ninety six, you could not do that network add to order their their properties from other studios.
That that's what creates a fair market in capital.
So once they were allowed, the big crunch happened, and then Universal merged with NBC, and Disney bought up ABC and they all start the all started hustling to own their for verticality.
They wanted to get rid of us.
So the first show that they did that was in house cooked was was was Bringing a Teenage Witch And Melissa is a genius. Her mom is a gangster. Yes, her mom is a complete gangster. And uh, they got the rights to uh Sabrina and they did a movie of the week.
For proof of for proof of.
Concept, Yeah, yep.
For Paula bought it for a dollar. She walked in and she bought it for a dollar for.
Proof of concept, and then she marched herself in there and she sold that concept to to ABC Disney Touchstone at the time, and they're like, great, you're you're going to replace Family Matters and step by step because we own you guys.
So that's so.
I think a lot of times sometimes people don't understand the business something and how that affected us. So if I had been owned by let's say, Disney, then I probably would have ended up working with you guys or doing co promotion. If I had gotten off of Warner Brothers books and said, hey, I've had a big little tantrum holdout or something and said I'm not working anymore unless my contract is with Disney for future future endeavors.
But you know, I.
Didn't have none of us people kids, none of us had representation that would ever stick their neck out.
For a kid and to piss off business affairs. No kidding Me's not happened.
Yes, I mean that is leading into my My next question was, I would love to imagine between Will's genius brain and your genius brain. Could we imagine an Eric and Erkle crossover moment?
Please? What would that crossover have been.
If?
I'll tell you if, if, if somehow my contract had changed immediately after after Disney brought ABC and I became more of a Disney employee, Yeah, I promise you that would have happened.
Yea, yeah, yeah, I think it would have too.
Immediately. Yeah, And we never did a crossover with you.
We didn't do a crossover because you were owned by two different studios.
Wow, shees.
Meanwhile, I did a crossover with everybody.
They put me on step by step, they put me on full, they put because those are all Wanner Brothers shows. So that's why it's like sometimes it's tough and you just gotta got to take it on the chin with fans and people, well why didn't you and why didn't you? Like guys, it was all different back then. It was about ownership. It was about you know, companies growing and gaining control and.
All this other stuff.
And it's like, you know, at the end of the day, we were kids having fun exactly.
I wouldn't have.
I wouldn't have known the first thing about that me neither. No, you and I both have something other than just being on a T G I F show in common. Both Urkle and Topanga were originally intended to be one time guest stars on.
The case.
That we also found that out. Recently we had Danica McKellar on and she playing Winnie Cooper. It was the same thing for her. She was also supposed to be a one off episode.
Yeah, do you imagine that show without Winnie exactly?
So?
Do you remember your audition for Steve Rkle.
I remember it very very well, I really do. Nobody wanted the job.
Everybody wanted the job of the Q kid that was supposed to, you know, the good looking kid, and Laura had the big crush on because they thought that would be a recurring like it's some type of boyfriend care right, and.
You know that.
It just it just went the way it went. It was. I remember the first time I went, nobody dressed up as a nerd.
I did.
I talked about that in my book, and nobody dressed up. And then in the second audition, all of a sudden, I had two or three guys dressed up as me.
I'm like, oh man, it's messed up.
I dressed up last time for the first one, and and and now I got copycats. So what I did to try to give myself steal a leg up was I walked into the room and I introduced myself to the producers aste vertical in character.
I never I never let them meet delete break it.
Yeah, so great.
I just walked right in and just and just start playing a character.
And how old were you at this point?
I was twelve?
Wow? What year was this? What year did step did? Did family?
Where you were?
Some of you were not even born, you were your fathers some of you No, it was eighty nine.
I remember this because you'll never I'm sure never remember this because it was just a day in your life, but it was an hour of your life. But to me, it was magical. So I was on a Nickelodeon show at the time in New York, and once a year they would fly us out to interview the big stars of the television shows that we all grew up watching. And I went to the set of Family Matters. Oh, and I interviewed you and a number of the other actors and It was the first time I was ever on a sitcom set, and it was sitting watching one of your run throughs that made made me go, this is what I need. I have to do this, I have to be here.
I don't know why, but I do slightly remember that.
Yeah, you, but we would have people sometimes.
As a guest watch out run through. Obviously that ever happened.
We were just as excited to perform for you as you may have been to watch us. So I'm sure I greeted you and was like, so so I did.
Oh no, you were very you were very all. Everybody was very very sweet. We interviewed you, Reginald vel Johnson, we've introyed some of your cast members, and it was just a magical day in my life and career. You were very, very nice to me, but it was what I was.
One of the biggest compliments I got was just recently.
Actually, I ran into Ashton and Mela at a at the opening of Into Its Dome here in La and Mila was like, I have to pay you a big compliment, and I'm like, oh, Mila, Kuna said a big compliment.
Information.
I met you at the l Capitan Theater and I just recognized you and I said hi. And I had not even done like one major job yet, I was still trying to break into the business. And you just said the most encouraging things to me. When my agent, I guess her agent was with her at this at this screening, and you just talked to me like I was already in the business.
I just I thought that was It was such a huge compliment to.
Me because to a certain degree, I know I'm a performer, but I kind of feel just like destined to be in this business. My parents never tried to put me in this business for any other reason. They're making money to go to college. We had no like sneaky ulterior motives about anything. So I've always been able to just see other talent, no matter where they were in their growth, you know, Like you know, there's so many people I became friends with before they even blew up. Lamar and Morris, who just won an Emmy. I met that dude at a friends giving. I just thought he was the funniest guy at the friends giving before he'd ever done a single commercial, And before I know what, I look up in two years and he's got ten national commercials on the air and he's going on a new girl. So I really take pride in having met people who have gone on to become something in this business because it reminds me it's still a spiritual journey, this thing of being able to communicate with people.
Well, you met me, so.
You mentioned that, just kind of intuition almost, of knowing to walk into the room and to address to introduce yourself as Steve Rkle.
Where do you think that came from.
By the time Family Matters came around and you were twelve, you had already had quite a bit of experience right in the in the industry.
Yeah.
I auditioned plenty. I'd done about fifty national commercials. Wow, I had full of television guest spots. Shows you guys that wanted to remember the Jeffersons, Mister Belvidere or stuff. Yes, and but really, honestly, I was just a kid that was desperate to get a freaking Saga Genesis, and I was really pissed off those guys dress like me.
It wasn't deep. I'm a competitive dude, you know. I got to grab some more rebounds to win the game. That's just who I am as a person, and you.
Know, people were just like, that's such genius method acting whatever. It was like, Nah, these guys copy my steeves. So I just I had to do something.
At the next level.
Yeah.
I mean what you didn't know at the time is that you probably already had the part. Just knowing that they have actually informed those other guys to dress like you means that you had already defined the character.
You know, like you had that part the second you want to.
By the way, I tell her, never do that again. She's just literally probably the most delicious plate of food while.
You're podcasting the middle of a podcasts, go ahead.
Eat your waffle.
No one will mind to say, I'm advocating now for we all get waffles podcast new thing.
Everyone loves to hear people too.
That an apple slice?
Did she peel the apple for you? Is that is?
Oh my god?
Nice?
Nice?
Or do you you.
Know?
But we did well?
Is amazing? This is phenomenal.
O my god, apples, peeled apples and waffles every morning.
Listen, you are living the life.
So we have talked a lot on this podcast about never really feeling like our jobs were very safe as child actors for at least the first couple of years of the show, we were always thinking, yeah.
We're lucky to be here. They oh my gosh, this is such a blessing.
We are just an and every week of not being fired feeling a little bit.
Of like a who okay, not this week. When did you have that feeling?
And if so, when did you start to realize, oh, Rkle is here to stay.
Dah, you're gonna laugh at this, but we got play.
It was all by design to always make all of us feel yeah.
Yeah, And you know it was smart to some degree because it kept egos in check. But I believe there was a point, probably after even the second season or somewhere around there, where we had multiple year pickups that were understood between the studio and the network.
And we're just not told I'll never.
Forget, I'll never forget doing a a another series on UPN.
And one of our coworkers after probably about I don't know about the fourth or fifth episode, he bought a new car. Remember those land cruisers were a big deal. Oh yeah, he bought a land Cruiser.
Right.
He came pulling up and I remember one of the producers tapping me on the elbow and was like you see, you see he just bought a new Land Cruiser.
I guess we got him for a steal next year.
It's a diabolical business that way, and it's really unfortunate that that discourse and that conversation is not more average.
Yeah, sometimes when I have these kinds of.
Conversations with people like I actually probably wouldn't, but I know you guys are savvy bets and bets and you've been through the you know, the ring or two.
So it's fun for me to.
Kind of exchange and be like, Okay, well what do you know? Here's what I but you know that feeling. I talk about it in my book Growing Up, Check it out.
We have lots of work, so I'm just proud of that.
Not everybody does the audio, but I did my own audio.
But there's this whole section I talk about that because I had lunch with Leslie Moon best I was. I was really lucky at a young age with some of the head honchos that I would regularly have a brunch with or a lunch. And I remember when Friends was going through their negotiation, and I talk about that negotiation in my book because he was just sharing me, sharing with me details that if they knew, maybe they would have behaved differently. So everything is just a is a pyramid of information, and Daniel, they made a point to make you feel that way at the bottom of the pyramid, even though you mattered so much to the show.
Yeah.
Absolutely, And we have also talked a lot on the podcast now about how much we have realized.
People in power.
Had to gain by knowing we did not feel comfortable talking to each other about things.
Oh yeah, divided conquer, total divided conquer.
And I remember there was a to answer your question more directly though. I remember there was a banner placed above our audience and it said congratulations on your first.
One hundred episodes. And I'm like sixteen years old at this point, so.
I'm like our first right, And I knew it.
Wasn't a TYPEO. So that really was my indicator that wait a minute, what's going on here when you say congratulations on your first one hundred episodes?
But every season, around the eighteenth or nineteen episode, they you know, they said, well we heard from the network today.
Yeah we're bash right right right, yeah, or we're on the bubble and everyone's going to need to not everyone's going to need to take a pay cut. Everyone's going to not you know, we're notagotiate next year now exactly.
So all of that was by coordinated design to keep people in their places. You know, you should talk to Miam b Alex sometimes. Man, her Blossom stories are the most gangster stuff I've ever heard. Sometimes it's not even a white, black, or gender issue. It's just you know, youth being taken advantage of for what they didn't know. You know, she didn't make very much money off of Blossom, but she's such a you know, a destined person that she made up for it on Big Bang No Bit.
Yeah.
Now, Family Matters ended up doing two hundred and fifteen episodes amazing, So that banner was absolutely true. That wasn't even just wishful thinking. You guys did multiples of one hundred episodes.
That's incredible, No, and we knew that by the time we came in, So we were we Our first season was ninety three. Yep, you guys were the rock off. You were the reason that TGIF was allowed to have new shows like ours come in and so like, you know, if we had ever talked, if anybody had ever asked us we'd have been like, well, family matters is set for forever, like that's not going anywhere. It's yeah, I mean to get rid of us, and you're no, they were relying on you. They were you know, the whole night was basically, you know, an experiment that Disney was playing because they could rely on your show.
That's crazy.
And then it became you.
Yeah, yeah, well then Sabrina.
Really, I mean, like so we we we always had our audience like sort of eking out.
But we were Touchstone. But we weren't. You know, Disney. ABC didn't own Disney until ninety six.
I'm saying that's the greatest thing that ever happened to you guys, can remember we do remember you guys being on behind us. Once Disney bought ABC, it was like you were.
Made and everyone else was Yeah jeez.
Acquisition alone extended you guys existence probably by about four to five seasons.
Yeah, probably, yeah, probably, except when we were three seasons in so as somebody who you you came on as a guest star quickly essentially took over as the lead of the show. What now I know, but you did. You were you were the face of the show, your face of tgif was there any resentment from any of the actors you were working with that you know, it kind of became your show.
I mean, you know, that's that's a.
Question that I've fielded thousands of times, and so as a courtesy to my my, my, my former co stars, you know, I it was clearly bumpy in the beginning, but we really did become a family, you know, and I think any animosity that I felt from the kids was more because of chatter that they were hearing from adults.
Totally.
I've long forgiven Kelly and Darius.
You know, we are like brothers and sisters, Kelly, Darius, and Laura and Eddie in particular, you know, because I see our adolescents our childhood as.
One quite frank, and it's so much better. I'm just in a space to tell so much more fun stories about the stuff that we did as teenagers growing up side by side. You know, I couldn't drive. I remember I met a girl at an award show and I was sixteen, and I was just taken by her. And in the moment that I got her number on a napkin, the original tender, right, I realized I was like, oh, I can't drive, and I'm like, I've been on this show and just doing you know, schoolwork and whatever. In I here, I am sixteen and I can't drive, and the idea of my mother taking us anywhere was out of.
The question, not happening.
I went to work the next day and I asked Darius, Darius, by the way, it's only six months different in age from me, and most people don't know.
So you know, Eddie.
Winslow and Steve were only six months apart in age in real life, and Garius like and thirty pounds driving his mom to work in a fresh BMW at fourteen years old out a licenress.
Oh my god.
Darius was a character on our set that I think translates better as a character on screen, quite frankly. And I was like, yo, man, like can you drive me on my date? And He's like, looks at me like I'm not a chauffeur, Like she got a friend. And that's that's where the story begins in my book.
Oh man, I love it so much.
So where did the cadence for did I do that? Come from?
Will also had a catchphrase on Boy Me World. He didn't know it at the time. That it was a catchphraise, but over the years it has become one. But in the script it would just be Feenie. And he took that word Phoeni and turned it into what we now know as the Phoenie call. And it just came from the deep recesses of Will's comedic mind.
Where did did I do that come from? For you?
You're so smart? Deep recesses. You should have been a late night journalist, baby, you should be a lawyer. Gave it up in this damn sitcom.
No, you know what.
They tried a million darn catchphrases, and the first one that they ever tried really was Steve would just bump into inanimate objects, uh at end table or a lamp knocking over and be like and say excuse me.
That was excuse me.
Then they tried to borrow one that was already in existence.
I fall in and I can't get up. We did that one for a while. We did about three of them, and just did I do that?
Just stuck And it's just it's one of those things you you lob them out to the audience and.
You know it's you.
It's back. Then was completely about the immediate audience.
Reaction.
Yeah, has had live studio audience to tell you in real time what was working. There was no social media, there was no you didn't.
Hear from I think that's the thing I miss most about our era though, of televisions.
We didn't have to hear from haters.
Rights board, people who hated us or disliked us, or thought our show was terrible.
It's like, you thought our show was terrible, you didn't watch, or maybe you were a TV critic and you bashed us. And we were kids anyway, so I'm sure they told you the same crap they told us.
All those critics don't know what they're talking about. Look at our ratings. And then that was That was the end of it.
And now you're an adult and you're like, no, no, no, you got some of these critics. Got to like your stuff if you want to ever get to the gold and globes, you know.
So we weren't really taught.
That way at all.
But catch rises had just sent me a love out to the audience, and they latch onto it, and they latch onto it, and for us, by the third or fourth tribe, they caught on to Did I do that?
Oh my god, man, you're absolutely right.
I remember when we came back and did Girl Meets World and the hardest, you know, I went into it thinking, oh, I'm so excited to be an adult to help guide these kids through this journey. And sure they're social media now, but you know, I didn't really know how that was going to play into it. And then I remember doing our first live studio audience taping and the kids walking off stage after doing their curtain call and picking up their phones and already seeing the people who had been in the audience reading the things they had been posting about, things they liked, things they didn't like, tensions they thought they were picking up on between the kids.
And here we had just finished a show.
They should be on such a high of what they had just accomplished and how much fun they had and the whole journey of the week, and all of them and their faces dropping.
Oh they said that this wasn't funny. It's like, oh no.
Even worse to me is that the writing staff is also checking all of that. So it's like the.
Creativity of the show itself is now being made, and this is across the board is now being made in response to the audience's reaction in real time.
But again our audi but are our writer? Are all of those you know, are all of those immediate responses authentic?
Exactly?
Some of those people are just epping with you and play a game of choose your own adventure with somebody they don't even particularly even care about totally and affecting it because it's like they.
Want to be heard.
Like have you ever responded to somebody who left a negative post on lack on your babe? Like you just couldn't resist and you're like, I'm going back at this pool right and the person's.
Like, oh my god, like you really hit me back.
You're a human being exactly you are feeling.
It's like you just said the most biting, hurtful.
Rest on a come if you don't know me at all, and really you only did it as big to get me to actually see you.
Oh man.
That's that's a sad psychological existence, and it's around us hugely.
We were on set, guys, we were present.
You know, I'm dripping while.
We're cracking jokes on each other, you know, you know we're trying.
When we got cars, Oh man, I used to love to go to city walk that was our thing. Yes, And it was like we didn't even have time to eat.
We just wanted to get there, park our car and just walk around, and then.
We had to rush back to the set, like you know, you're not getting a city walk for Warner Brothers in an hour having a real time.
We would literally go there just to order something and feel fancy and be like, can we take it to go?
Those are the days we'd go see a movie. We'd walk around. Now we'd go see movies at the end of our work days, not in the middle of the day.
Well, okay, I'm asking to admit something that most people wouldn't. But back back in the day, we would sometimes go to the mall to be recognized.
At the mall all the time.
I was just there anyway. Also, I was at the Topanga mall, so.
It was, oh my gosh, you could not have ever step foot in the Topanga mall.
She choose to go mall.
It's my closest mall, and they should do their advertise the mall with your face.
You go to the Topago mall.
She chooses that that's my favorite spot.
I love it much better celebrity than me and Will and will to be not.
A low self esteem day. You can take a scroll around the Topega mall.
That's exactly right.
If I'm ever feeling bad about myself, I just take a walk around the bathing, bathing in the warm glow of the of the fame. Okay, I want to talk to you about Rock and Jock basketball. None of us ever played in those games, but you have some amazing photos online of like taking Reggie Miller to the whole and warming up with Mark Wahlberg and Will Smith.
What do you remember from those games?
Rock and Jock was awesome. MTV never really liked me, to be quite honest. It was just a testament to the success of the show that I even ended up in the game, and also to the infancy of Rocking Job. The first the first celebrity basketball players they got to participate in Rocking Job, where Dan Marley, Reggie Miller, spud Web Wow, yes right, And it was like there might have been like two of the Vloody d boch Yes Floody.
It was so new and it didn't pay.
So the top guys, you know, your Jordan's and your Magic's and your Barclays, were.
Like, I don't even know what that is.
And the idea of also playing which celebrities was brand new. Nobody had done that before. So I hooped and I the ball.
They were I think.
I think I ended up there because MTV never really saw me as their brand. So even after that first year, I never got invited back. Nobody really noticed that because the first year is your proof of concept and now you get to get some cooler people.
And but the cool thing about my year was this was the year that Mark Wahlberg was still Marky Mark of the Funky Bunch. And so I remember at halftime, this guy I had never heard of.
Him, Well you know, Marky Mark was going to perform at halftime, And so I'm sitting there at halftime and I wait for him to do his thing. And he jumps out there with a couple of brothers and it's a real urban set, like I almost expect a black guy to be rapping like this. He takes his shirt off. Girls start going crazy because he's real bumpy, all right. So the girls started going crazy and I'm watching this deck to Spun Web and Blade de Bag was like, oh man, this got pretty good, and all of a.
Sudden, he drops his freaking drawers. He just literally just drops his pants all the way down to the ankles and it's hopping around in his calvins, rapping, and I'm like, back then, I'm like, oh, he's gonna get in trouble.
Yeah, like, this can't be.
I'm already thinking, like a little little seasoned, little producer or whatever. I'm like, this broadcast standard and practices tell you something that is the greatest defiance television protocol, perhaps in the history of Hollywood. Still, I remember that dude was on Calvin kleinb billboards.
All around town so fast after that.
Any notion that I had that he was gonna get in trouble, let's just say he was not treated like Jane and Jackson was. She did like this.
Exactly. Yeah, not the same treatment.
She didn't get it. She didn't get a Victoria Secret deal out of that. You got a calvic line.
Yeah.
Yeah, my god.
So that's about a big memory from from Rock and Jock. And they barely wanted me, but I had.
A fantastic time. And yeah, because I couldn't find my limousine at the end of it. I remember that was when I learned that they only care about the limousine.
Picking you up. They don't get you can never find your car. At the end of those awards.
Shows, it was like you had to call Darius again, like Darius.
Up.
There is also an infamous clip online that I would love to hear about where you teach the Erkle dance to be Arthur at the American Comedy Awards and you are such a.
Pro in it. What do you remember about doing that?
You know, it's funny.
That's one of those kind of things where I look back at and I kind of have mixed feelings. I do because be author was Comedic Royalty, and she was such a nice lady.
She was so nice to me that and all of Comedic Royalty was in that room.
However, that's one of those moments where people are actually laughing at you and not with you. Because our brand of comedy that I was doing at the time, that family comedy, it was.
More seen as.
It was more seen as what a farce, how funny it is to have be dance with this little phenomenon kid in this way, So her participation was taken to be funny by the elite, whereas my participation was looked at to be the gimmick portion.
And I've always said that where I'm like, you know, I understand.
Comedy on such a level that I'm blessed to not that I'm a genius, Like I just get it, like I get tone and intonation and things like that, and I love.
That's why I love certain stand ups to this day.
I just want to see my boy Dave Chappelle in New York this weekend and I watched him. I watched him do Boston and Austin watch him do New York back to back nights. Having that ability to watch the difference in the crowds and how he has to change his sets based on the region. That's the kind of stuff I study, really when it comes to comedy. And in that moment, it was like, you know, I really wish that.
That I had been able to perform with more people who have been considered comedic elite.
Because then it would have been oh, he has the chops to when you're seen on screen with them, it's different and my man, Yes, So there were there were too many moments like that where we were just good, participate, fitting people.
And we had fun. And when I look back on and it's like, oh, I'm the.
Joke in that dance right right, whereas b is the the irreverent comedic artist that's doing this with.
The kid right.
Yeah.
Wow, that's really insightful.
So during your book tour, you have talked about how you passed on the Family Matters reboot, which you know, maybe we should have talked to you and gotten some advice. But what is the craziest project you have said no to? When they asked you to be Arkle as an adult?
Diane Sawyer, you missed your call and I'm putting it out there.
While this woman up, I no wanted to chick but retire, and they charge you money anyway.
You can get me for a steal.
Don't say that, don't You don't need to know how much you're walking around.
Me and to pay them all.
Congratulations on your first hundred episodes, Danielle.
Okay, so first of all, I have I'm continuing to set the record straight and every platform I possibly can't. I was never offered a reboot really, okay, there was no script, there was no producer attached. They made Fuller House, and you know, our top executive producer, you know, really was kind of showing me a different side of himself unfortunately than I was really sad to see because I'm really brought up just admiring this guy and putting him on a pedestal my entire life. And he just came to me with a blind studio contract and said, you will get paid half the amount of money you got paid for your you know, your on your last day on the show, and you know we're gonna make thirteen episodes if we sell the show, and going to create the show.
And I'm like, so, I don't get to see a script, I don't have a hand in who are going to be the showrunners.
Nothing.
You just think in your silly mind that my life might be so bad right now that I'll just take half of what I made and you get to come back to me in a holding deal within six months and tell me when I have to report to work.
Right So, when I fraged like.
That with people, it's like, guys, that total ain't that's not a reboot, and b that's not a fair offer, and and and I don't want people think. Oh and the worst part about it was he he then said, well, you know, Herod and carl And and Aunt Rachel, they'll stop by from time to time, so it's hurtful to me when I have to hear the adults sometimes talk about how difficult I was, and it's there and I'm like, guys.
The show that they he even pitched me didn't include you, right looking, So you.
Think I've cut you out of some you know, opportunity to do a reboot and they have no plans to include you, you know, right, That's what I tell you, Danny, I said, it's about that information and how it goes down, and if you don't know what you don't know, you end up looking a little silly. So the worst job that I actually turned down, though, was celebrity rehab. Yeah, these efforts called.
Me and we're like, you know, you know, Juliana doesn't have any substance abuse problems.
And I went right around that, you know, we you know, we like, it's the demographic for our show.
And they offered me more money.
They basically were like, we'll.
Pay you more to just save.
Just just take these drugs for a week and then you're perfect, right.
They don't the average person doesn't get it. And now we get to do this on a zoom from allations.
Oh my god, we get offers every day to ruin our lives.
Yes, yes, yes, yes, and they come in email form exactly.
Yeah, And you're so right that the most that the the the feeling really is have you been irrelevant long enough that now.
You'll take us up on this?
Yep?
Yep?
Right?
Are you feeling bad enough yet that I can that I can drop this in your email box and have you go, well, I guess I really should make some money.
Yeah, it's or you just want to stay in the industry because you know, we all to be freaking still lucky to be here.
Yeah, have to be relevant and yeah.
To play on that insecure, do whatever is asked of you just to be on camera, and that's just not the case for most of us. Like now we're I'm not going to do that. I can't believe they wanted you to fake a substance abuse problem to come on Celebrity Rehab. That's insane to me. Oh wow wow.
It is also something we've talked about on this on this podcast.
That another thing people don't really know is that we have careers outside of on camera work. If they think if they don't see us on their TV screen, we must be out of work as opposed to not working on camera anymore, which maybe we're out of on camera work. Maybe that's my choice, maybe that's because we haven't booked anything, who knows. But they also just assume you must be doing absolutely nothing, even though most of us have found ways of having fulfilling careers and jobs way outside of being on camera.
It's funny of the I'm gonna use an actual space metaphor given my background, but by the time you see a star based on how much time it takes the light to travel, the.
Star is dead.
Yeah.
Yeah, So when you see a person on a talk show or whatever project that's come out, that project is long dead. Yeah, We've already done the work. So when you see me, actually, that's evidence of the work that I've long.
Been doing exactly.
Yeah, And people don't necessarily compute that.
I think one of the toughest questions that I've never had good emotional responses to is when you're promoting something, and right on the heels of promoting something, people say, well.
What else do you have coming up next?
And I'm like, yeah, it took us two or three years just to get.
This out just enough. Are you not entertained?
Exactly have you worked with as an adult? Now have you worked with kid actors?
And how do you think your experience having been a child actor has now shaped the type of actor you are as an adult.
So it's funny.
So I have two different experiences that are standout. I have several, actually, but I did a show called Me, Myself and I on CBS and it's started Jack Jack Blazer, Jack Dylan Gras and.
He was one of the kids from it. Yes, So when it came out, I remember when we started the show. We started the show.
It was basically a Wonder Years, but he was the center of it, except it was telling the story of one man's life at three different portions of his life, so at age twelve, at age thirty, and at age sixty. I think they made their mistake by doing the age sixty because Bobby Moonahan wasn't allowed to play himself at age sixty, and they hired John lear Ket to play Bobby Wanahan. And at Presto Or people were like, Bobby, why is the person playing you in their sixties eight inches taller than you. That's where that's where executives make the dumbest decision in the world. We have to sit on a stage and answer.
For it exactly.
Well, it's because that everyone knows in your mid fifties is when you have that eight inch s Grotzburg.
Yeah, that's.
Come on, I can't wait.
That deserves an apple.
So the thing I noticed about Jack was when we started, he had like, you know, a couple hundred thousand followers when we did the pilot.
By the time we.
Got canceled after it came out, he had two million freaking followers.
And guess what time our show was programmed on CBS. Wow, these freaking geniuses.
Have the hottest, cutest little boy with perfect, freaking brown locks that.
Little girls are loving everywhere.
Their response to that is, let's.
Put him on after their kids go to bed when they won't be able to watch him.
Amazing.
Yeah, I got an other one kids I worked with.
I worked on a show called The Big Show Show. I started The Big Show on Netflix, and I really enjoyed this show.
I really did.
I was the best friend again, but I actually kind of came up with a character and I had a different way of speaking and everything, and I was really enjoying it.
And I was happy that it was the Big show show like Paul was such.
A good guy, and it was interesting watching the kids get better week after week, and it was the business model was though that WWE was going to take some of their retired wrestlers and start making sitcoms around them.
But Netflix and.
WWE, I found out on an adult level, really were on the same page of.
Who was going to pay for the lion's share of the show.
I think WWE made a huge mistake, and this is where people get cheap and create problems for themselves. People were enjoying the show, but I could tell by the end of the show that this dynamic that was going on between the network and our showrunners, our two showrunners, one of them didn't even show up on the for the last taping, and that's always a telltale signed I'm like, sod the show when you're not even here.
To watch us perform. At the last us outkay so at.
Table reading not to say sorry a curtain call for the last episode. I just remember the kids crying because they were just tears were running down their faces in anticipation of like will we get picked up and will we ever see each other again? And that sucks because I'm like I know they are standing there.
I was like, we're not coming back.
Yeah.
I just my professional brain is kicking in.
I was like, that other producer is not here tonight, and I know that it's been going on.
In the background and we're not coming back.
Yeah, And so that was It's tough when I'm watching kids enjoy them to that degree where it's like the last day of school for them and they're crying and it's like signed my yearbook kind of vibes right, and I'm like, damn, but I know you're not coming back. The last one that I'm actually I have good vibes for is I actually I'm in Disney Skeleton Crew. Yeah, I shouldn't say Disney Star Wars, Star Wars Universe Skeleton Crew. I don't talk too much about it because I really do like the focus to stay on the kids. Robbie and Ryan and Christia. They're just they're They're terrific kids.
But when I tell you, the production value behind them is like, this ain't no sitcom. They see.
This was one of the biggest sets I've ever been on in my career. And you know, I get to do my pul QW because I'm a pirate, you know. But it's just like for me, it's it's so enjoyable for me.
I remember just being in between takes and just you know, have conversations with them and this or that and you know who's a better rapper and get there. There's still such kids, you know, and I'd see like boxes of empty crumble outside of their classroom and be out as hell in the classroom, and I'm like, well, I know what, it's loud in the classroom, look at all the crumbled in consum.
Gets so nostalgic to look at them work. I cheer for them.
It's like I'm working alongside them, but I'm like, I hope you get a chance to do it big enough that the business doesn't play, you know, you get a chance to put away enough money, you get a chance to do enough episodes that it it wasn't a swing and a miss or a bunt.
But you know, it's like the guys from Stranger.
Things, they're set, you know, like right right, like they did it where it's like okay, yeah, they got to work like everybody else to move on to their next project, but they're set.
You know.
It landed in such a way that they're all icons, and I'm hoping that for these kids too, because they deserve it.
Well, it looks great. I mean, I'm the resident nerd here and looking at all the you know, Star Wars shows. We were just talking this weekend actually about how it's like they've kind of lost the Star Wars vibe. And then I saw the trailer for Skeleton Crew and I was like, Yeah, that's the vibe. That's what I'm looking for right there. That's the Star Wars we're looking for. So I think this could be, you know, I don't know, but I'm hoping it is the success that Star Wars needs right now because it looks like a whole It was like, it's like that vibe of Gooni's but in space, you know. So that's something that I think is lacking in the Star Wars world. So I think it's going to be. I mean, if you haven't seen the trailer rider, it looks.
John Watson, John Wats is a badass creator.
You know, they're just I don't know, Like I said, I told you guys at the beginning, I kind of have an eye for people who just have the thing and just being on set with him and the two Chris is the executive producers. They know what they want, and I don't think people understand. For as much as we get criticized or what we may or may not have done in our careers, we're only as good as the people we get to work for.
Do you know how many people I've worked for who had no idea what they.
Wanted or even how to achieve it? And you know it early on set well, like oh this do it on the right.
This was the complete opposite, Like you know, Lee Isaac Chung was one of our directors, the director Twister. This dude, just his handling of a set of this size and magnitude, it's just you're just you're all watching him, like I love it when the stars of our project are not the people on the screen.
It's the cinematographer, it's the.
Director, it's this guy doing the sound in the doing the musical score. When that happens, my job is easy, I.
Say, my mind.
And like you said, as we've was, we've all talked about one of the hardest parts about being an adult actor. You don't think about it when you're a kid, but once you are an adult and you realize man every It takes all of these people to make a project, and not all of these people are necessarily.
Doing a great job. But I'm the face of it. I'm the one who has to go out and speak for it. I'm the one who gets asked the questions.
And now all of this is on my shoulders, and people think I'm somehow responsible for all of it, and and that becomes a really like, oh, I don't I don't.
Want to take that on.
So when you, like you said, when you look around and you go look at these superstars, it make you feel a lot more comfortable being the face of something.
I think it makes me. I'm super comfortable.
And the best part is I'm not the fast Listen, I'm a supporting pirate, right But I don't think you know, I always want people to understand that everything I've ever done in my.
Career has been about the audience experience.
You know.
It's it's we get joy when we know you enjoyed what we've done. Yeah, and it didn't croach on our dignity anyway. You know, reality TV.
Ushered in a different era that says, hey, how can we humiliate you and call it good TV?
I'm like I don't want to be a part of car wreck entertainment.
Like that's not socially responsible, it's not even good for my own mental health.
I got asked to be in some I won't say the name of the show. I mean, you're pretty much guessed.
But it was one of those kind of like you know, boot camp type shows where they wanted us.
To live, you know, in you know, Belgium or whatever, in some place where with only rocks that look like an area that should be in Game of Thrones, and we're submerged in water and tortured with Chinese you know, Chinese torture or whatnot.
And it's like, okay, how much And it was like, okay, I didn't even say how much. I said, let me see the original show from Europe. That no, I said, I don't even want to know how much you're offering. Let me see the original show from Europe. I saw the way they would torture any dudes, and I'm like, so you expect me to leave my daughter, move to Belgium or wherever and be tortured for six weeks. And by the way, they don't give you all the money unless you lax. If you have like, you know some issues, you.
Need to get off the show early in two weeks. You're not getting the you know, the dangle two hundred thousand whatever.
So I turned it down and came back with five.
Hundred thousand, six hundred thousand.
I was like, this is crazy.
You will pay me more to see me be abused on screen and just do what I love at the clip that I know it should be done.
Yeah, well, if that, it'll just be a bunch of child actors doing hunger games. Yes, I mean that's where that's where hap is. Just let's see what's that you guys are going down?
Yes, he's lasting til the end.
Yes.
Oh man.
Well, now you have written Growing Up Arkle, a memoir, and I want to.
Know before I want to know about the book and all of that, but I want to know what was the process like for you? What was your writing process? Did you how did you plan out your chapters? I want to know, like the nitty gritty details about you as an author, What was your process?
Like, I've been writing since I was seventeen, So I made the mistake and I'll own it of not getting into books earlier.
But you know, you can want to be in an industry.
But if you don't have a champion in that industry, yeah, you're probably going to start in that industry well below where you should. So you know, people say why now, and I'm like, well, because this, certainly, this opportunity beats anything that would have happened to me if self published.
Right, you know, you you can't fight the machine.
And I was very fortunate that between the two publishing houses, I started writing down basically just answers to questions people.
Have answered asked me all the years.
By the time I just answered those in literary form, I had enough for a book proposal.
And then there was a process where the.
Different publishing houses, three in particular, came forward, but one just stood out, Simon and.
Schuster above all. It was like, we really liked the proposal, and you know, we just you know, we want to make you a very special project. A lot of late nights writing.
I'm a game show host now with the flip side, so you know, sometimes I'd have to do deal with edits after six episodes in a day, so that part wasn't necessarily so fun. You know, once somebody pays you to do something, now you're on their deliverable time schedule. Yes, you know, that's that's where it becomes a job again. My first draft I hated, I absolutely hated.
Like.
It was probably about a solid week of what the hell have I done? So I'm just I'm honest. I'm like you.
You know, if you.
If you turn in any if you try to bring some of your past papers you turned into school, tell me if you'll like them.
All right, But after about two weeks of really dealing with my editor, now.
Oh okay, put this here, we were this here, put this.
With their okay, now, I started to see the magic of this thing for me.
It really started to become a book about going from the journey of being humble to being aware. And I think those two things don't have to be mutually exclusive. You can be a kind person and you can still be very aware of people.
Around you who do not have good intentions for you. And as child actors, I think you guys know exactly what I mean.
Where we are, we are taught to be such troopers, to tough it out to deliver when we haven't even been given the goods to deliver.
That is like and I'm like writer, I can see you perking up at this right, and I'm like, we've been We've.
Been conditioned that way to not feel like we even have the option to say no.
That doesn't work for me. I've never even had a.
Moment on a set, no matter how bad it got or how bad I knew the project would end up being where I said, excused myself from production, where I said, I'm sorry, I know this is gonna suck, so I'm gonna bow out, take your money back, I'm gone.
The child after brain.
To me is like you ruin.
We could get there, we can do it, we can say this yes.
And that's part of the therapy that I'm even.
Just avoiding conflict, yeah, just aborting contest. Feel like I couldn't make waves, Yeah, of course not.
Yeah, yeah, No, It's like you're you're you're as a child actor, you're the best thing you do is to like go along, to get along, to deliver your and And I remember just watching like older actors and being like, wow, they're they're making so many much conflict. In retrospect, they were standing up for themselves in really proper ways most of the time. But I was like, you know, I wasn't until I was an adult, I was like, I don't have the tools to stand up for myself. I'm so scared of conflict on set, which is conflict is part of the process, Like you should have different opinions and different you know, it's a collaborative art form.
But no, I always had in my mind like, yeah, I gotta be a trooper.
The trooper is the number one compliment as a kid that you want to hear. Oh, so easy to work with. Such a trooper takes direction. Well, yeah, we have all through. Certainly this podcast has been incredibly therapeutic for us of being able to look back and it.
Could have gone one of it could have gone the other way.
Instead of it feeling cathartic and healing, it could have been absolutely traumatizing. And I think because of the closeness of the three of us and the bonds that we have and our ability to look back and say, yes, that is that was the reality of the situation, or no, you're remembering it wrong and here's what's been going on, it's been really good for us. So I hope that the book has felt like that for you and that there was so much healing.
It certainly has.
Okay, good.
Well, I can't wait to get a copy of it next time I see you. I'd like for you to sign it for me.
Would you do that for me?
Absolutely? You should have my information anyway. I'll make sure you get it all right.
Thank you?
Well, should mean I've run to him a million times?
Yeah, I think I do. I'll check, but I'm pretty sure.
Are you kidding me?
Absolutely? That's that's easy. I'm not going to make you jump through agents and manage.
It for that well, even I might have to, it's worth it. I would love that.
I really hope that we get a chance to see you in person. There is something, as I mentioned, with us doing the podcast and it feeling cathartic.
There is such a.
Just a connectedness we all feel when we talk to people like yourself, when we talk to Candice Cameron, when we talk to Danica mckeller, people who have been doing it since they were kids, all of the child actors we've had on the show, and there is there's a shared history and a shared it's like a fraternity, it's a and it is there's just a knowing and it's a nice feeling to have that shared history with people and to be able to have these kinds of conversations, and I think we're making the industry a better place for the kids who are coming up underneath us because we're able to talk about the fact that divide and conquer is a thing, and you know that you need to be on top of your agents because they may not even be looking out for your best interest. It's just I really, I really think it's a it's a service that we can that we can share. And it has been so wonderful to talk to you. We really thank you for spending your time with us this morning. Look for Skeleton Crew on Disney Plus and his memoir Growing Up Arkle.
We're so honored to have you here today, Julia. It was great to see you. Hope to see you again soon. Enjoy that waffle you earned it.
Thank you man. You guys are awesome. Seriously, we'll make sure they have my number.
Yeah yeah, all right, yes, well, thank you in touch, Thank you bye day.
It never ceases to amaze me how how much how little we all knew, yeah back then, about the way it worked.
You're also told constantly and you're just lucky to be here, like not only it's like, hey, don't make ways don't do anything. We can't there's no more money, there's anything. You should just be proud to be here and be doing this, and so all of us there is that kind of combination. I mean, we hear that all the time. You know, there's no more money, there's no more this, or it's yeah.
It was so interesting to hear like that sort of basic institutional division that I didn't think about, right, because it's like, oh, we're all on tjif it was like, but right, but which ones did we do crossovers with?
They were other Disney shows.
There's like yeah, right, right.
We had a question before about like why wouldn't we have ever done anything with Sister Sister? Oh because there wasn't enough money to be made for one company, right, So none of the whole thing.
And I love how you hear how he speaks about it now, where he's kind of it seems like he's had an awakening and is like, no, I'm an adult in this business and I'm I now know what to do. And there's times where he's being labeled difficult, right because he's actually asking questions and taking control of his career. And now that well, you know, the child actor doesn't want to do a reboot. It's like, wait, you want me to sign a blind contract without a script, and I'm just supposed to sit on my hands for half the money. But now I'm somehow difficult to work with because I won't just sign your contract. I mean, things like that just drive me crazy. It's insane. Yeah.
Yeah.
It also is such a good lesson in at the things you say no to actually do more for your career than the things you say yes to.
You know, the power of a well placed no.
Huge.
Yeah.
They don't watch you until they can't have you. Yeah, all of a sudden they want you. Yep, that's just the way it is. So yeah, man, what a business.
Well, thank you all for listening to this episode of Pod Meets World. As always, you can follow us on Instagram pod meets World Show. You can send us your emails pod meets World Show at gmail dot com and we have merch Did I merch that pod meets World show dot com?
Uh?
Writer? Send us out.
We love you all, pod dismissed.
Pod Meets World is an iHeart podcast producer and hosted by Danielle Fischel, Wilfordell and Ryder Strong Executive producers Jensen Karp and Amy Sugarman, Executive in charge of production, Danielle Romo, producer and editor, TaRaSu Bosch producer, Maddie Moore engineer and boy Meets the World Supervan Easton Allen. Our theme song is by Kyle Morton of Typhoon. Follow us on Instagram at Podmets World Show, or email us at Podmeets worldshowat gmail dot com
