Joseph Gordon-Levitt | Armchair Expert with Dax Shepard

welcome welcome welcome to armchair expert I'm Dan Rather I'm joined by what's another famous Monica nobody Monica the the the singer Monica no last name I don't even know that that's you're thinking of Madonna no there was a singer named Monica in the '90s I think 2000s and she didn't have a last name she should have maybe got a last name cuz I think I would still remember her maybe she was an R&B if someone says heard Monica's new song I just think someone's talking about their friend well I mean I specifically would think about they were talking about you I like that but even let's say you heard Jenny's new song you immediately go that's someone's friend named Jenny okay but not if someone said have you heard Beyonce's new song you'd know great Point great Counterpoint Point set match listen baber major baber for the podcast today tell me about it Joseph Gordon levit jgl jgl jgl all day all night he's an actor he's a filmmaker and an entrepreneur he has a media company called hit record which is um a very neat platform for people to generate in a communal way art you've seen him in Inception 500 Days of Summer the dark night he directed Don John one of my favorite movies he was in Brick and as a little wee babe he was in Angels in the Outfield of course Third Rock From the Sun don't forget his pop- darts commercial we will learn all about that he has a new podcast called creative processing with Jo Joseph Gordon L it he was a babe on the inside and out really enjoyed him hope you too will enjoy jgl [Music] an now you do drink coffee right now and then oh just now and then well then it works when I need it to right yeah that's the strategy how responsible of you what are you starting your day with I assume like me you're awoken to screaming yeah is that your entry I'm chronically underslept is really it's like in a very lucky comfortable life the final frontier is not being tired and underslept yeah I need to Fig that out I never had the wherewithal to take for granted that you could wake up when you were in the mood and that you would wake up in a quiet environment and now it's always I wake up cuz I have to intercept some fight that's happening in their room yeah they're pretty gentle but they wake up early and the yeah I mean I'm a night owl I like to be up late if left to my own devices I'll pretty much stay up till the sun comes up uhhuh I have a similar I guess Cadian rhythm is that what it is yeah but do you have this mine is I actually have figured out I need a 26-hour day because what happens basically is like let's say I stayed up to midnight on Monday mhm generally I want to stay up till 1: or 2 the next night and then 2 to 4: like I think my body thinks if there's 26 hours I'd be golden yeah but then you would need 28 hours and then a year later you'd need 30 you think so yeah that's how it works well it did occur to me I could move to a planet where the cycle was like 36 hours yeah you could also just build yourself a different watch and give yourself however many hours you want they'd be shorter yeah well I would have to have basically a biodome at that point for the sunlight so I wouldn't want to get seasonal affected mood disorder no but I'm saying you could measure what we call 12 hours of sunlight you could say oh this is 30 blowers oh of time okay but we would still be dealing with the same amount of sunlight true you the numbers would be higher so it would feel different it might it really might wait are we recording yet no we're always AB it always be recording oh I hadn't heard that one okay I like to think we made it up but you made it up I will give you the credit well every from Glen Gary Glenn Ross ABC right always be closed yeah so no matter what anyone says I just will go straight like let's eat yes AB always be eating it's a good thing that mammo wrote the script we're about to perform on your podcast right yes can you imagine I guess what roll am I can I have the Alec Baldwin roll yeah and I'll be I was going to say Pacino but that wouldn't be who's you Alan Alda in uh I don't know but you've been compared to Jack Lemon so it's weird to me you wouldn't just hop right into the Jack Lemon I'll take the lemon roll cool then great and similarly I have never been compared to Kevin spy I guess oh that's yeah wait sorry wait that has context now that sorry sorry sorry but I'm happy to fill in and bring a new context to that okay yeah great yeah I I didn't mean I we're allowed to say their names yeah we're allowed to acknowledge that they existed on planet Earth when I go into thinking about Glen Gary Glenn Ross in my mind goes back in time to when I was just you know fan of him as an actor didn't know anything about you know of course I know and yeah well all right and now so we've had this debate on here numerous times I am someone for better or worse I don't know if this makes me aoral or not but I can click my brain right back into that era like we watched a documentary where the lead was dead what was that the lead was dead or maybe a show where we knew that the actor or the lead was actually dead and you were thinking about it the whole time but I wasn't I was just like oh this guy's alive in this Anthony Bourdain oh yeah I guess we were watching some episodes of of No Reservations no I think the more exciting title he had oh well we were watching some Anthony Bourdain show and I was thinking about that the whole time mostly and then he was like the fact that he was dead just the fact that he is passed okay okay in a sad fashion right yeah so not only aware that he's no longer with us but then also probably contemplating how much joy is he really experiencing in this cuz I know he was depressed now like for her it maybe tore away all the veneer but for me I'm all in I'm like oh he's having a blast the dark days are far from now I can go there I guess I can too and when I listen to music or watch a movie or something I do tend to separate the actual person from the art like for example one of my favorite musicians is Harry Nelson or another one is Nina Simone and both of those musicians actually have documentaries I believe both on Netflix that tell you about the dark personal lives of these human beings and I haven't watched them because when I listen to their songs there's a lot of meaning I have a lot of my own associations with those songs and I don't necessarily want to conflate that very dear precious thing to me with some pain or yeah with whatever was going on with them like I kind of feel like it's none of my business kind of what was going on with Harry Nelson or Nina Simone they might have been in pain or they might I mean and I get the moral question like well what if they were doing bad things and now you being a fan is sort of enabling those bad things and that is really complicated it is complicated but I think it's kind of moot when the person's dead right so I watched the Michael Jackson documentary I loved it I'm open about having been molested I think those dudes bravery and the details they told I can't imagine being that brave I totally believe them when I hear off the- wall it still sounds great to me if I'm in the car I'm [ __ ] still dancing to it there's just a big hard wall for me between those two things that's really interesting but again I'm not putting money in his pocket I'm not helping perpetuate the machine maybe that exists to do all that stuff yeah but to your point I like your example is more innocuous because how far down the road do we go do we go like well I know that person's a junkie and I know they're going to kill themselves if I support them and I give them money so they can do more drugs you know what is the infraction by which we can't I tend to at least in my mind just yeah like I said make a big separation between someone's work and their personal life because if you refuse to enjoy the benefits of the work of anybody who ever did a really bad thing yeah we Stone Age basically there's going to be one song on the radio exactly like Kenny G all the time all of art not just art like probably a lot of Science and advances in any other field a lot of the work that's been done that's allowed us to live comfortable lives or have a civilization or you know speak languages or read books or or appreciate electronic anything there's been really injust tragedies that were you know perpetuated by the people who made huge contributions and so I I just don't know I mean I completely agree that people should be held accountable for their actions of course especially by the law yes even also if they have victims that want to sue them civil bring it on that's the law but I made a similar argument that you're making which is I think what we've really done is just said that we prioritize science over art because if we were to find out Isaac Newton had molested a bunch of people we're not throwing out the laws of gravity we're not going to do that we're going to go no no that guy was a piece of [ __ ] but he gave us something brilliant we're going to take it and use it so by saying we're going to throw art out we're kind of just saying well it's not as important as newon and physics this is something I think about a lot too is just when someone's appreciating a work of art a lot of it has to do with just appreciating that person and when you appreciate a work of art you feel connected to that person and you like that person maybe you identify with that person or you aspire to be like that person whatever it is you feel that human connection whereas when I'm understanding the laws of physics I don't feel a human connection to Isaac Newton or you know right his fingerprint isn't on it as much as art yeah the work itself has value or utility or something inde dependent of that human connection but I feel like different people have different relationships to Art in that way like I know some people who it's really all about that human connection whatever music they happen to be listening to it's because they're feeling a real human connection with the human who's making that music and then I have other friends who and I think I'm probably more in this Camp although I fluctuate but who when they like a piece of music or a movie or whatever it really doesn't have that much to do with right the person it has to do with the song itself or the movie itself yeah yeah my example would be like I think Fleetwood max written some of the most beautiful love songs of all time if you actually evaluate their love life during that time they're all [ __ ] each other the band blows up they all have 26 husbands and wives you shouldn't really be taking any love advice from them but by God they somehow found some truth despite their own failures yeah and it's because art you associate personal memories with and you don't necessarily associate personal memories with science penic like I fell in love to carry while learning about theory of relativity that was in the backdrop at all as we tried to understand this no one has that but with music and stuff it feels very hard to separate and say like well I guess I'll remove that memory CU it's bad now like you can't you can't disassociate those things right yeah you prefer Joe right coose jeppi okay of options youf is another good one I guess that name is in virtually all languages isn't it it's a pretty not the East Asian ones but yeah all the yeah yet we'll get there right on it right but do you recall anytime that we've met cuz I recall the one time we met no it's okay I don't mean to put you on the spot it's more for me to own one of my more embarrassing moments so I I think by your reaction I know you don't remember Kristen and I went to a Kings game a hockey game uhuh and then you and Chan were sitting directly behind us wow and I don't think i' met either of you um but we introduce ourselves to you both had movies coming out in 3 weeks you had Premium Rush and I had hit and run which I had written and directed and I of course was just aware of that because that's all I'm thinking about at that time I like oh my God I have a movie coming out is it going to tank blah blah blah and then here I'm sitting right in front of you my quote competition that weekend so that's really funny I think I just don't know what else to say to you and I kind of go like oh yeah our movies are coming out on the same weekend you're like yeah and then I say and I think about this probably once every four months this will pop into my head it's so embarrassing I go well may the best movie win I don't know why I said that I didn't know what else to say about it I appreciate that as a sense of humor you have to kind of take this [ __ ] lightly you have to and I just always like from that moment on I thought well if he does remember meeting me he certainly is like he said the weirdest thing like let the best movie win yeah I I don't remember that I haven't thought of it no but it's funny what I think about a lot actually what that reminds me of Is How We Do turn what we do into a competition yeah yeah yeah yeah there's going to be a winner and a loser right but should there be no no no but again you and I might not personally care but we are aware of the fact that if it does well we'll get to do more of what we like to do so it's like intrinsically baked in that is the other side of the coin and I think a lot about how it shouldn't matter what box office or Awards or critics or scores or number of likes or followers like rotten tomatoes right like it should be about my creative process and the love of doing it and that's what makes me happy and that is really true and I have found in my life that when I just focus on I actually what I really love is making stuff then that leads me to happiness whereas when I focus on those other kind of external validations it drives me crazy and makes me unhappy but it's 100% true the point you just made and I have to acknowledge that when those metrics when those external validators are positive you do get more professional opportunities right and so those professional opportunities then lead to the opportunity to do that thing that I really like doing so I can't ignore that those things matter I just wish that I could yeah the mental trick I try to play with myself is like I'm in the show up and work business I'm not in the results business I just don't have anything to do with the results as you know you've written and directed a movie the the process of making it is like what you'll think of on your deathbed it's like the most fun fulfilling engaging and then ultimately the whole thing's decided on a Friday not even Friday night you get that c like seven on the west coast and they go so here's the thing this is and you're like well wait can't there be a miracle on the west coast they haven't even started going no there's not going to be a miracle there never has been one this actually is science and then you accidentally start evaluating that 2year process by that [ __ ] phone call on a Friday and this is so unfair to the experience yeah it's true and funny you say that uh that's what you'll remember on your deathbed I think about that a lot too that's part of how I often measure or make decisions like do I want to take this job do I want to spend my time doing this I think about when I'm old and I'm like I know I'm going to die pretty soon I'm going to go back and look at a whole bunch of different things that I did throughout my life and I'm going to remember them yeah you're not going to look at a spreadsheet of your box office performance no I'm not no I'm not and I'm not going to go back through my Twitter feed and read my great tweets either those are disposable and so I think about that like what am I going to remember what's going to be meaningful to me and I don't know maybe that's wrong-headed because you're putting too much emphasis on the future and it's important to be present but I do find that compelling like relating to the old man me but that's always the push and pull right is we're part animal mhm and we're moved by those animal urges yeah like to do basic things like well I know that you quit drinking right so like but drinking in Twitter is actually pretty similar they're both addictive you know like Reward Center basically like they figured out how to make software into a drug and that's oh yeah and they've studied their science behind how they build these sort of addictive software products to take advantage of your brain chemistry and I mean there's there's all sorts of science the the one I heard that was most nefarious is it was like one of these guys who defected from Google and went around and did a bunch of interviews know Harris is his name Triston yeah yep yeah and he was saying that on uh Twitter when you reload like you pull down so it'll reload y that the reload is completely arbitrary it could be always loaded but it is determining at that moment do you need to wait 0.5 seconds or 1.2 seconds to keep your interest and I was like well [ __ ] we're all defenseless how on Earth could you outsmart figured out whether I need to wait 30 seconds or one the other thing that Triston says is that that exact technique is taken directly from slot machines yeah right so and gambling is everyone recognizes that gambling is an addiction yes you can go to like Gamblers Anonymous do 12ep programs the only thing I'm not addicted to shockingly it's the one have you given it a real chance I've done I've done quite a bit of I've done quite a bit of gamling I played poker for a couple years seriously yeah or regularly I won't say ser yeah but I do think that probably not too much time there'll be 12-step programs for social media in South Korea they treat kids for video game addiction that's right yeah so I feel like that's got to get it over here eventually right those two sides of being a human there's those things that we have urges to do and I don't think they necessarily have to be unhealthy like I think there is such a thing as Twitter in moderation and there is such a thing as drinking in moderation is different for for everybody and it's like everybody has to kind of know their own threshold for okay this particular thing I can do this much of it before it sucks me in and I know this about myself with social media is like I know that if I start reading mentions on Twitter it'll suck me in and I know I just need to pretty much not do that yeah cuz it never really leads to anything positive positive yeah well that's another thing I quote a lot in here is in Malcolm gladwell's book blink it talks about the power of the chemicals that give either a reward versus you've eaten a poisonous fruit yeah you know those two chemicals one is 10 times as powerful as the other so if you read nine awesome mentions and you read one you're a piece of [ __ ] unfortunately you're powerless over that you're going to get a chemical that's 10 times stronger than the dopamine you got from the complement 100% yeah and we're naturally that way also cuz when our ancestors are out living in the wild if someone comes like running up saying like danger danger danger we're going to pay attention to them yeah whereas if someone comes up and is like let's have a nuanced conversation about you know the way of the world or like how we might solve this problem you're like I'm going to probably not pay attention to you I might might pay attention to you later right right right and that's kind of what happens on social media you get someone like I think Trump wins an election because he's running up saying danger danger danger it gets everyone's yeah and and social media really amplifies that yeah fear is obious a much better motivator generally yeah than mild pleasure now extreme pleasure is a pretty big motivator yeah like if you watch what people will go through to get cracker heroin you're like that's pretty motivating right although is it fear of coming down yeah who knows that's interesting I have always watched you from the outside not knowing you and I've always been very intrigued by you as a person professionally oh thank you truly you fall into one of these categories of people unicorns Again by my estimation and my projection I'm like this guy has a different relationship with this job than I do it what appears to be kind of a healthy way I'm flattered so far yeah also just a very interesting career in that I was aware of you from Third Rock From the Sun and then I was like where's this going to go and it went to the very top of the mountain and then there were different periods where you're like I'm cool I'm going to sit out for a while I don't know where one would get that confidence I'm like holy [ __ ] they let me in this party I'll never [ __ ] leave I don't care what job I have to do to stay at the party by the end but there seems to be some Compass or confidence or something that has kind of guided you and I am very curious as to how that originated and if some of it is that you've kind of always had employment when you wanted it cuz you started so young do you have a relationship with it that it's like there when you want it and it's not going to go away or do you have all the fears I have and other people have I definitely have all those fears it's true I had a really you know fortunate run for a few years there and then I did decide to take a few years off really cuz I just wanted to have kids right and so that's what motivated that yeah it wasn't because I was like oh it'll be fine I was scared and remain scared okay I I just good you're human I just couldn't pass up the experience of like these babies are here I'm I'm not going to go to work yes and and I have the privilege that I could do that like look not everybody has this privilege if I do have the ability like I can afford to take time off of work yes a lot of people can't afford to but I can so I'm G to and how much of that is motivated in the experiential sense right like oh if I can stay home and interact with these kids I choose that I want to do that versus I feel like I ought to yeah like when I'm 70 and I recognize I didn't really have to work am I going to feel like a piece of [ __ ] that I chose that and regret that yeah that's a great question I would say there's probably both for sure going into it was betting that experientially I'm going to get a lot out of this and even just in a present sense there's going to be a lot of rewarding moments if I really take the time and just hang out with this kid yeah and then this second kid yeah and that's true and I don't like to talk too much personally about your children about my kids just because I want them to and I 100% respect anybody who does well I started like you yeah and then now I do it and now I'm more wrestling with like oh what age am I going to shut this off where they might actually mind you they couldn't be least interested in chrisan full body of work yeah this is fascinating tell me so okay this has been my Approach and feeling like the way my imagination goes is cuz yeah obviously right now they wouldn't be aware of it or care but when they're X years old yeah they're going to look back and I don't want them to feel exposed or like people know things about them that they might not want people to know consented to have known about them I want that to be their choice and I agree but again some people do and I respect that too like I have really good friends who I think are wonderful parents who are very open publicly about their family life and I think there's actually something really virtuous about that cuz maybe they're setting good examples or like one thing I feel like I've learned about parenting if there's one thing it's I can't think less of or judge anybody's choices that are different than mine everybody's got their own thing and are approaching it their own way but one thing I'll say is so I have this internal thought which is like same as you they're not public figures their life doesn't need to be out louded right they haven't consented to that right but then I'll just force myself to imagine the opposite argument which in this case I'll sometimes think oh when they're 20 and they might I don't know why they would go back and listen to all this wouldn't it be flattering that I can't go 15 minutes without talking about them they're on my mind all the time I love everything they do I talk about what they do like is there another side of it where they would go like wow you had this whole show you talked for 3,000 hours and you never brought me up once I guess I didn't mean that much to you oh that's really interesting whereas like they can actually hear how much I think about them in real life there is a record of how often when I'm away from them I'm actually thinking about them and talking about them so I I don't know which is better I feel like this medium of podcasting and this platform you've created for yourself with this show which I really admire oh thank you awesome what you've built this I feel like talking about them in this context does feel different because a you have total control over it different than like speaking in an interview or on a talk show or whatever where someone else is going to edit that together and they're going to you know throw whatever context they want to like turn it into whatever they want it to be yeah and they might cheapen it or they might totally twist it or they completely make it sound like you're saying something 100% factually inaccurate yes and so this happens when you're giving interviews Etc whereas if you're talking about your kids here in this context where it's long form I guess someone could theoretically take it out of context if they wanted to like rip the audio and chop it up like that's not it doesn't seem to be how it's working to my to my shock like maybe there's just too many [ __ ] podcasts for them to mind they can't find all the [ __ ] yeah like I think probably the Practical reason is that that wouldn't get clicks right yes if some if you chopped up a thing from a podcast and tried to post it on Facebook or Twitter how many people would take the time to like no one actually listens to the sound like 80% of videos on Twitter and Facebook are watched without sound so this is the thing that's I think so great about podcast I really think that podcasting as a medium is a positive sort of uh coun to the fragmented short attention span frenetic of social media because you can take the time to have a whole conversation and dive in deep and acknowledge the nuances yeah also you're all kind of protected cuz so often what happens is they pull something out of an interview right you go through someone's filter which I can't stand but you're now left to defend in public let's say oh but that whole conversation that he didn't print really I said this this and this and then he only put so the data is here for everyone to examine so if they were to cherry-pick something they know ultimately it wouldn't stand up cuz someone will just check out the whole context and it exists whereas in a a media interview no one's ever turning over their [ __ ] that's right recorder and saying right that stuff's on The Cutting Room floor and not accessible that's a good point yeah and and it's your show show so whatever you're putting out you know you're putting it out so there's nothing to defend it's like yeah this is what I chose to say so there's no gotcha moments like this is just I'm choosing to say that you're right there's no implication that I slipped up right right in other ways it's like oops they slipped right yeah yeah that's kind of the fuel for it the last distinction I'll make too is like when I'm on coar so I did tell a story about my daughter on coar the last time I was on yeah it feels a little stickier to me yeah because couple things one I'm there to sell something clearly I was there in that case to sell a game show and then secondly a whole audience that's not per se My audience is watching no one turned on to see Dak Shepard on coar they just like coar and then I happen to be there so I don't know if they know my intentions or anything about me so and now I'm telling a story about my daughter might seem exploitive I I don't know you know right yeah I mean it all the problems of Us movie stars just hit me no no no no no that's not true social media is a problem for and this picture putting up and kids and all of cuz I follow this one person and who puts a lot of pictures up of her child and then we were at a restaurant and I saw her kid and I didn't see her she wasn't around her kid was clearly with other friends or something I saw her and I was like oh I know that's this person's kid because of social media yikes like I don't think I should know that you know pictures on social media is you're right it's not limited to uh people who are in movies yeah the other thing to consider with pictures of kids on social media and again this isn't to judge anybody who puts pictures of their kids on social media everybody does do it but one thing I think people aren't yet aware of enough is that in the future it's already happening but in the future it's going to get way more advanced algorithms are going to recognize the faces of kids and those algorithms are going to match patterns with data they have on billions of other kids and those algorithms are going to pass down judgments on your kids like whether they should be able to get an insurance policy or whether they should get a certain job or whether they like these kind like every picture of them as a kid was at McDonald's the insurers like I'm passing yeah and it's like it's it's stuff that makes sense like that and then it's mostly though it's stuff that no human could even make sense of there're these blackbox algorithms that just you put billions of peoples of data into them and then the computers find patterns right and humans can't even understand the meaning of those patterns right but then the blackbox sort of spits out okay we can predict with 80% blah blah blah that this person is going to blah blah blah because they match who the [ __ ] knows what match things that don't seem relevant at all but just probabilistically it tends to work out and this is is how Facebook makes their money this is how Cambridge analytica worked but it's not just Cambridge analytica this is how Facebook is so effective at serving ads to people is doing this kind of pattern matching and so that is one thing that I think is worth sort of spreading that like you're feeding this machine that's going to get smarter and smarter than us yes so that of course is like the glass half empty version of it and I'm with you that's where my mind goes to but there is some other imagine this the computer notices that kids that wear Nik shoes and eat at Sizzler and get this grade in School blah blah blah 85% of them OD at 26 yeah I want that data like oh wow thanks for figuring out my kids in some pattern I would have never seen yeah uh or they are they're 89% likely to commit suicide wow thanks for the heads up I'll get on this I totally agree with you so and I I uh I'm so glad you said that cuz it's I don't want to come off as if I'm demonizing this technology the question is what's the that going to be used for yes and how is what's the business model stay tuned for more armchair expert if you dare we're in the era where I happen to read the Cornelius Vanderbilt biography which is phenomenal and before anything was regulated these Steamboat captains they all wanted a monopoly on the routes right so they would race each other and numerous times they collided and killed like 130 people because there's no no one's watching over them and it's just that's the market completely at its own yeah and so that's kind of where we're at right now it's like people are smashing big paddle boats into each otherly right it's exactly right we're we're in that kind of age where this is revolutionary technology and we're just at the beginning of it and it's not well understood or regulated yet yeah and it moves so fast and legislation moves so slow it's like you can't keep up with it at all right well it wasn't until what the 19 whatever it was that we go like hey our envir men look the air and the water they've been running you know steam engines and stuff since the 18 whatever it is yeah my history is not accurate enough 1840s been 100 or so years or something that we've been really damaging the environment with this technology and it took us that long to say like oh wait a minute we didn't even think of this yeah you know I thought so so this show is generally apolitical CU I want everyone to be able to listen I yeah that's great but one issue I did think I thought of an analogy doing things for the sake of improving them I don't think should be a left or right issue so my the example I thought of the other day is 5G is coming right 5G is coming it's going to be trillions of dollars of business for many companies imagine if there was a wing of the government that was trying to protect 4G yeah no we must protect 4G we don't want 5G that I mean that in essence is like the notion that we're going to get like that we're subsidizing coal and yeah it's like there there's a there's a better cooler cleaner faster everything about it will be better why aren't we like look at it like 5G the government should be looking out for all these people who've worked in the coal industry for all this time the government should be looking out for those people but the best way to look out for it would seem to me and I say this coming from a play I don't know that much detail about how the coal industry by the way none of us do it's such it's a political talking point that no one but it's a technology that's older there there are better Technologies that's what the the government ought to be doing rather than saying let's make sure that we can keep going with this old technology is let's make sure that all the people that have earned their livings for Generations working with this technology have a good path towards working with something new and we've lived through this cycle now 30 times that we didn't try to protect Wagon Wheel makers jobs we just embraced the automobile and that created way more jobs than the Wagon Wheel companies were creating so it's just an inevitable okay back to you um you're one of the few people I think you're a minority of actors that work that grew up in Los Angeles right a lot of actors are not La natives it's true yeah and you're actually kind of third generation right your grandfather was a director that's right so he wasn't born here that's my mom's dad Michael Gordon yeah he was a filmmaker he directed where was he born in Baltimore oh okay okay and then his parents all of my great-grandparents are born in Eastern Europe and that was a generation that they were all like Slavic Eastern Europe Russian polish Lithuanian Jews they all moved to the states so all four of my during World War II or they were the lucky ones that left in time uhhuh yes and the extended families of my grandparents you know weren't so lucky right so all four of my grandparents were born here meaning the United States and then two of my grandparents actually grew up here in LA on my dad's side they grew up in Bole Heights oh yeah and in uh South Central LA which at the time were Jewish ghettos at that time actually there was a sort of like red lining but for Jews could only what's R red lining red lining is it's about ownership of housing red lining was the rules about only white people were allowed to own houses outside of these red lines and so people of color were only allowed to own houses within these red lines right and Jews were included in that few Generations ago depending on where you look in La there were certain places where Jews could have houses and oil Heights in South Central LA were a couple of them so that's where my dad's parents grew up so yeah in a way I do feel like a third generation Angelina my grandpa grew up you know taking the red line yeah when there was public transportation I mean there is some now but like it was a more common thing back when Western was actually the Western Edge W Los Angeles now Western is a street here in La that's actually quite far to the east what we now consider LA and then you know he remembers when the Dodgers arrived uhhuh and he was a big director right he directed Siro Siro de bak and pillow talk is maybe pillow talk yeah I was actually just talking about my dad's dad my mom's dad is who you're talking about Michael Gordon as opposed to Milton levit and he was a a successful director and then he was blacklisted actually yes I read that that's fascinating yeah so he was a Pinko commi scum exactly Je yeah three stripes really he he had been to some meetings right right anybody in the film industry who would been to some meetings about you know like hey what can we do about poverty what you know yeah yeah how dare they was uh put on this list that the government enforced that you weren't allowed to work and it's a dark moment in American history one of the really subtle weirdnesses of that whole McCarthy thing is these folks generally that were blacklisted I they are [ __ ] capitalist they are benefiting big time from capitalism and so this notion that they wanted to live on a commune maybe just a little bit extreme it might have been an extreme uh painting of their position yeah I mean so my Grandpa died when I was 10 so I never really got to have a conversation with him about this I would have loved to I'd be curious to see what exactly he was a proponent of I don't think he would have been in favor of USSR style communism right it's the debate that we're still he probably had some socialist viewpoints that got that got framed as communism that the government could be doing more to help the less fortunate perhaps right there's there's a valid debate on both sides like is the government the one that will be effective at doing that I understand like I I grew up a lefty and I consider myself pretty strongly left leaning but I do think it's worth having those discussions oh yeah left and right and I do think there's valid points on both sides and I'm not talking about the sort of culture wars or Charlottesville good people on both sides whatever I don't think either side has a monopoly on all good ideas yeah and especially when what you're talking about is how are we actually implementing policy for the government so much of the red tribe and the blue tribe nowadays doesn't really have anything to do with policy doesn't have doesn't really have to do with Socialism or capitalism do like do I like you or do I not like you so and I don't know how much of it back then when my grandpa was blacklisted how much of it was identity [ __ ] versus how much of it was you know the specific policies is probably was some of both I guess I don't know yeah so did Mom grow up with means or did he become broke as a result of that blacklisting yeah they had to move out of la oh really uh they went back East to where uh my grandpa's brother was working and he worked with my great uncle Budgy yeah they didn't have that much money back then what a shift yeah oh my goodness having gotten to do the thing that you love more than anything and also you and I both knowing what a special job that is yeah to then return to you know something you're not passionate about it's just a big sh the government said you're not allowed anymore because you went to some meeting ironically yeah what I would assume about you is just the fact that you have a hyphenated name on your birth certificate mom's a baller right mom is a tough 70s Progressive a bad [ __ ] yeah yeah I think that's fair to say Gordon you were born in ' 81 yeah that not a very common thing for people to hyphenate a child's last name in ' 81 in 1981 may I guess that's true and she ran for congress at one point in the 70s she did yeah in she learned no lesson from her dad right cuz was she with like the freedom the peace and freed and Freedom Party being very she was like bring it back onu I'm going back at it yeah no it's true yeah my my mom and dad met as political activists they actually were both working at kpfk which is a radio station that still exists here in La it's like public radio and your dad was a news director yeah yeah she was in charge of the newsletter at kpfk which at that time the newsletter of a radio station was a bigger thing than it's become you know nowadays yeah yeah so she ran the newsletter for kpfk and he was the news director at kpfk and that's where they met and fell in love yeah and then they had two boys yeah and now here's where again there'll be a lot of projecting cuz I have a brother who's 5 years older than me yeah my brother's six and a half years old right and so did you grow up with the mild chip on your shoulder of I'm not a baby oh interesting I feel like the chip on my shoulder was I'm not a loser actually cuz my brother would beat me at everything so maybe that's similar to I'm not a baby now did you guys have the kind of relationship where sometimes you were his best friend and other times you were just way too young yeah yeah 100% there was still a rivalry until then he moved out right I was like 12 and he was 18 mhm and from that point on I was just always so happy to see him right and I think he was pretty happy to see me too we were close throughout living together when we were growing up too but definitely once he moved out he was just and then that was also right as I was entering puberty I was 12 he was 18 he had a girlfriend oh my God like you have a girlfriend what's that going to be like to have a girlfriend you know these kinds of that when I started to have that relationship with him and he he embraced and enjoyed the role of being a mentor to you yeah I think so like I remember him showing me how to shave and whatever like kind of thing he was the one who like did that who of mom and dad was the more artsy mom mom was yeah for sure yeah dad like if I had to be reductionist about it and it is reductionist I would say I owe whatever taste I have probably to my mom and what ever like work ethic I have to my dad right right yeah that makes sense you and your brother the most eerily similar looking Brothers I've ever seen separated by six years like to the point where you're like could they have done IVF back then and the Egg split and you guys are identical to you know saved it for a few years yeah cuz when I saw a picture of him yesterday I was like I literally thought oh you had a phase where you had dreadlocks which I had in high school I was like this is a rare thing yeah it's really funny we didn't look so much alike When We Were Young that's the funny thing oh really yeah and it wasn't until we got older that I think we started really looking alike and I remember actually the moment when people started asking me who was older which was such a trip such a fundamental part of my understanding of who my brother was is that he was older than me quite a bit old six and a half years older that's the first thing you think of probably brother my big brother right and when people started saying like so wait who's the older one i' be like what you can't tell he's my big brother right really funny and um you grew up in the valley right MH were there any sports you were into cuz you have kind of a sweet physique if if you don't mind me complimenting yeah yeah yeah yeah it's real nice it's very gymnastic in I did a lot of gymnastics you did you learned that I didn't learn that I didn't you just said it's very gymnastic without yes really yes I didn't know I didn't know believe you you've proven your I will I will tell I know I can tell you're you're very fourth coming yeah no I did do gymnastics and and quite a few team sports you know the baseball and flag football didn't play tackle football well good it's probably now in retro yeah I I wanted to and my parents wouldn't let me they were so ahead of their time hyphenating and they knew somehow about CTE before anyone did are they [ __ ] warlocks are they Clairvoyant you started in musical theater at like four years old you joined a little club right and you were in The Wizard of Oz yeah so obviously you probably don't have any memories where you weren't acting and stuff right and then the retelling of Wizard of O led to you starting to do commercials right that's right boy did you end up with some of the the brands of the 80s like when I read the list oh he had a peanut butter campaign kind of a no-name peanut what was the peanut butter Sunny Jim yeah I never heard of Sunny J some like local brand of peanut butter Coco Cocoa Puffs oh that's a good poptarts poptarts oh wow yeah Kenny Kenny shoes I don't know Kenny Sho that was a very thing yeah so a couple things I immediately sizler don't forget Sizzler very I [ __ ] love Sizzler no doubt I will eat more chicken wings from that Buffet than you than any one human should the the shrimp though the fried shrimp good for you you're getting into the seafood I won't [ __ ] with the seafood I think the reason that I eventually grew to be able to eat seafood was because of Sizzler fried shm sure sure oh fried yes I was picturing you eating like raw shrimp with [ __ ] yes from Sizzler and I got scared wait how old were you when you got like Pop-Tarts and stuff when I did a Pop-Tarts commercial I was probably like 10 or 11 or something like that it's perfect age to do Pop-Tart commercial Pop-Tarts was a miserable experience it was tell me why well so I never liked acting in commercials you didn't no I I from a young age maybe this is some of what you're getting at with like how I relate to the job or something I want to get back to that I'm curious to hear from your perspective what that's like but from a young age I was pretty precious about acting and like really believed in it and was kind of serious about it even at age nine what did you want to be in like ET or something like did you have some be in Rainman you wanted to be in Rainman okay okay you wanted them to add a child role in yeah Dustin huffin was he has an autistic kid yeah yeah yeah bring him out so I didn't like acting in commercials because in commercials it's not what I would have called real acting with quotes around it like very heightened yeah heightened is now I've come to understand that there are a wide variety of different kinds of acting and in fact if you look at Lawrence Olivier for example he's not being realistic either but when I was younger to me realism was real acting and then if you were acting in a way that wasn't like real people behave then that was kind of phony and felt bad to me and commercials was all about like oh hey you got time for Kellogg's poptarts and you have to have a big fake smile on your face and I didn't like it did mom or dad did they have a a love for film or acting mom did yeah okay so do you think maybe in some way you're like you wanted to make Mom happy or I don't know if it was I I wouldn't think of it as I wanted to make Mom happy I mean I'm sure there is some of that but I think she illuminated for me the pleasures of being I guess you could say an artist right expressing some some kind of true emotion and conve also an a really important person that I would probably think of first when it comes to my early views of what acting is that I still have and his name is Kevin McDermot he was an acting teacher I never studied acting other than I did several years of classes with Kevin McDermot I don't think he's teaching any more but he was a brilliant brilliant guy and he taught kids but he didn't treat us like kids right he didn't use words like the stanislowski method or thing he didn't say that so like when I speak to educated actors I I never went to any kind of training MFA program yeah I didn't do any of that but when I speak to educated actors they'll say things and I'll be like I don't know that term and then they'll explain what it is and like oh yeah Kevin taught us that right like sends memory or something and you go oh yeah I guess yeah I do know that I just don't know the title of it ex yeah but so Kevin was so good at like teaching us about having a character that's different than yourself and what it means to imagine what if you felt differently than you feel what if you're not just your name is something different but what if you know this thing that you really like what if you didn't like it yeah or you know that's such a great plasticity to to put into a kid's head period just uh forcing yourself to uh yeah imagine a different set of emotions and all that that's a road to empathy basically exactly well and that's what acting really kind of comes down to is being able to put yourself in someone else's shoes being able to take your perspective and twist it into a different perspective yeah yeah or just hit pause on it for a second yeah so Monica put your seat belt on I'm excited do you know that one of Joe's first movies was A River Runs Through It really he played young Norman yeah not Pit's character unfortunately the kid who wasn't Brad P this is where I discover Brad Pit and I see this [ __ ] angel and I go he's obsessed oh wow that now I know exactly who I want to be couple questions about that did you have a sense of who Robert Redford was at 10 years old like did you understand who you were working with did it have any kind of weight I mean my mom told me I mean I didn't grow up with those movies I think I watched the natural oh sure sure and in fact it was a funny thing cuz that was his rap gift to me and to the kid who played young Brad Pit because I played young Craig Sheffer and uh this kid named Van van gravage who was just he hadn't acted before he was a local kid from Montana and he was hired to play young Brad Pit and Mr Redford gave us these two bats that were the bats for lightning that was like his rap gift to us I was going to say have you have you managed to hang on to that I'm bad to hang on to things I'm sure I have it somewhere I actually just found a whole bunch of old stuff that I hadn't seen in like 20 years I have a very pack radish habit nature yeah I have a lot of trouble like to collect things sentimental things like things that aren't even collectible like this receipt will remind me that I had this sandwich when I was I have trouble throwing it away oh I just have to have one question I forgot to ask about the commercials I already know you hate them but I just imagine myself being like seven and like you were in a Pop-Tarts commercial that's great we everyone loves Pop-Tarts but like Kenny shoes that was kind of like a more of a like at the mall it wasn't Foot Locker so I just wondered what within the commercial World me like I want a [ __ ] Legos commercial I don't want like was there a hierarchy of commercials at that age just because of the products you thought were cool that's really funny I no cuz I was just going on tons and tons of auditions and it was a thrill to get aart all a blur and also the the other thing if we're going to talk about commercials again the other story to tell is that the reason that I did that Pop-Tarts commercial and that Cocoa Puffs commercial those two in particular was because at that time in my life like I said I hated doing commercials but you could make a lot of money especially back then yeah ex like your popt commercial probably ran for 2 three years probably yeah something like that it could be a lot of money and while you know my dad made a good living and we were like you know a comfortable middle class life making that kind of money was still like a really impactful thing like hey you could pay for your whole College if you do a couple of these commercials I'm so glad to hear you say this cuz I've interviewed several people now that were Child Actors and I'm always like were you aware of the fact that you're making you know like a 100 2,000 $200,000 a year as a child so I feel like I would have been so aware of that and like stoked feeling safe because of it well a lot of kids end up having to you know support their family and I think that's really hard and I wouldn't say it's wrong because that's the right thing for certain families but I'm grateful that that wasn't the position that I was in right it that's a big burden yeah it was never put to me as like hey you're helping support this family it was always if you like doing this then we'll support you doing it and Joey your father needs a colonoscopy and we just can't afford it he might have and die if you don't book this Coca-Cola spot exactly so it wasn't that but at the same time they were like yeah but it's worth appreciating the value of this money and so we understand that you don't want to do these but you could like pay for your college if you do them so if you do two national commercials you can buy anything you want they like break out a percentage of which you were allowed that be in charge of yeah well I I did get like a very small amount of money into like my own personal bank account uhhuh it was like basically instead of an allowance where was like other kids get an allowance I didn't get an allowance but I got your own money actually was it was something like no it was something really small though it was something like $5 a day something like that for every day that I worked right just so that like got a sense of like you do this work you make some money and then you can buy a Genesis game with you know you go to the bank and you can draw out your $60 that you made oh it's so fun isn't it yeah so for the case of these two commercials they were like you can buy anything you want uhhuh and what did you buy I bought Street Fighter 2 ah the arcade not oh wow okay not not the oh good I'm glad you went big on that yeah anything you want I literally was on the verge of going oh that's so funny cuz my first job to tasseling Corn I bought some Nintendo game and and I was in my mind I was like oh where this and then I was like oh the [ __ ] arcade version well was a little bit before cuz yeah and I remember being all pissed when it came out on Super Nintendo and really snobby about it too I was like it's not the same as when you're playing with the joystick it's just not as responsive which is just me being bitter that like I would lose to people when I was playing them on Super Nintendo was there a line of kids out your front door trying to play this standup video game I feel like that would have made you the most popular guy in town I was pretty I was sort of secretive about it I do remember one like play date with a kid that I probably wouldn't have normally had a play date with like a kid scho who was like let's hang out and I was like you want to come over to my house okay and then we played Street Fighter the whole time I was like wait a minute oh I was just admitting to this the other day that I had this is Shameless but whatever I was seven and eight years old I hung out with so many different kids because they had like a four-wheeler or any kind of off-road vehicle cuz I didn't have any of them I'd [ __ ] put up with anybody to be around some snowmobiles or some [ __ ] an odyssey oh okay okay you get Angels in the Outfield I can't help but be obsessed with what is it like to be in grade school in some of the kids have seen your Pop-Tart commercial or certainly now when we get into angels and Outfield there's going to be a ton of your classmates that see that yeah I can see it going either way a like we all want approval and attention and that could be great and then also we're very self-conscious at that age and to be stared at might be really uncomfortable so I don't know which way and probably for different people it went different ways but for you to have gotten that movie what was that like I mean I Lov doing the movie as far as how the other kids or other people in general would relate to me it actually gave me a lot of anxiety for people to think of me as special in that way or oh you're famous you're a star you're and I totally understand how it's counterintuitive to hear what I'm saying like why wouldn't you want people to say hey you're famous hey you're a star wouldn't that be great yeah I don't know that I could break down exactly why it gave me anxiety but it really did weirdly I totally desired the Adoration of strangers I wanted to walk into places and people be excited I'm there I very much desired that what I had underestimated is I am also a control freak and it inherently takes away a lot of my control you couldn't choose to glide through the hallway and get into your home at class in a manner in which that you could have control over now there's this other variable that is much too big to control and for me it's it was just kind of that loss of control which I desire so deeply yeah that's interesting I think that probably does have to do with it and I also have a desire for that kind of control about my life and about what people think of me probably sure and maybe it is when when you meet someone and their perception of you is sort of predefined now I don't get to really Define myself for myself you're going to assume things about me because you've seen me in a movie and again some of those assumptions might be flattering I don't know it's it would give me a lot of discomfort and I I would go so far as to like just fully lie about it when people would say hey you're the blah blah blah I wouldn't even say no I'm not I would be much more convincing a liar about it i' like play dumb be like wait what what are you talking about oh no no no it's not like like I would really go way out of my way to try to not be that person I imagine I can explain some of your moves then going forward as your desire to reclaim your identity or or for you to Define your identity and not anyone else right right I just have to imagine going to college at that point maybe ultimately is in the recipe 100% yeah and then and I quit acting right because I was on Third Rock From the Sun they let me out a year early I was already a year older than most First Years okay um cuz I was 19 so you actually quit that show to go mhm they did their sixth season while I did my first year of college oh my goodness okay so really quick let's speed through catching up to there so you do angels in thefield that's a big movie clearly now you're dealing with a whole new thing and then now you get on a show that's in everyone's house in your you what 15 to 21 you're on that show uh 13 to 19 yeah 13 to 19 now was it like no one's ever going to take me serious if I don't go get this actual Accolade or if I don't accomplish this thing no one will ever take me serious is that part of the motivation or just pure desire to be normal quote normal I think more that yeah just be a normal dude that would be going to college at this point doing what all my peers were doing at that time and doing a thing that I'd been looking forward to for as long as I could remember going to college yeah moving out of the house and going to college I mean I that was just such a glorified thing I really wanted to experience that yeah that age of your life you're like really trying on your your identity as an adult yeah all these and I'm just thinking what is that lay like of you arrive and you're already self-conscious as we all are at 19 and then certainly some significant percentage of that campus knows who you are right how did that play out was it an asset was it a liability or was it both people were pretty good about not pegging me to that I got to say they probably knew that I didn't want that yeah and just I guess politely respecting it I I got to hand it to the kids in my class and I also just was not going to let myself be defined that way right I wasn't going to give up the experience of like here I am I'm in New York because I went to Columbia I moved to New York City which is I'd always wanted to live in New York City ever since the first time I ever visited that town when I was 12 and I'm here in New York I'm going to do my thing I'm going to you know dress loud and be blah and I had a blast I loved going to and I love I honestly I loved living in New York stay tuned for more armchair expert if you [Music] dare okay so you you do four years there roughly no I dropped out well I know you dropped out but I thought you were still there for quite a while I kind of thought you maybe dropped out at the Finish Line I like stopped for a water 10 ft from the Finish Line that's funny and they got distracted see I I went in the fall of 000 and I dropped out in like 2002 I think that was there for like two and a half years and is that because you were like okay I got the experience I I got the thing I wanted yeah it was that and in particular I got my first copy of Final Cut Pro oh sure video editing software oh I remember my my girlfriend got it for me for Christmas obnoxiously expensive yeah it was my 21st birthday present to myself uhhuh and I got my first Mac I had never had an Apple computer before yeah but I got it because it had Final Cut Pro and I I had been making little videos with the family video camera and stuff forever I'd always love doing that with my friends yeah but you couldn't edit and that was the huge huge impediment to making a video with your friends if you're 10 years old and trying to like make a chase scene yeah you can't edit you're like doing your best to hit the record button at just the right time you're editing in in process camera in camera there was a whole art to it I mean there was something actually fun about it when I looked back on it but I just it's a fun creative box to be stuck in kind of that's exactly right yeah but I so desired to be able to edit what we shot and so finally it became sort of available to on a more consumer level yeah and I got myself that copy of Final Cup Pro and that was kind of the end of college for me because I didn't want to take any classes in it I just learned it I just stayed up all night cutting things and just shooting things and cutting things and making things I I went through the same thing you did which is I was at the Groundlings at that time in 2000 and we were doing sketches and then this [ __ ] software came out to me and movies in general were such a mystery until I got that editing software I was like oh that's what makes a movies is this this [ __ ] that you can put it together and so I started making shorts long before YouTube or anything to play on the screen inside the Groundlings for interstitials yeah and I just found immediately like oh that's what I'm really passionate about I love how much you can [ __ ] with it all after the fact that's exactly it yeah it's the ultimate puzzle yeah oh so fun that that it is it's where you make the movie and and especially because I've been not only making these you know videos with the family video camera I've been acting in stuff and when you're acting in stuff you put all of yourself into this performance and then you totally relinquish control of it and hand it over to someone else to assemble and the editor really has just about as much to do with the performance the audience sees as the actor does yo totally and so to finally have all of that power all of that control like I can make the thing that I want to make yes I kind of knew like all right I this is what I want to do because I had gone to college thinking like maybe I don't want to be an actor or be a filmmaker be in Show Business maybe I want to be something totally else and I want to give myself that opportunity to discover that actually I'm going to be something else cuz I don't want the decision I made when I was 6 years old to be an actor to necessarily be the defining point of my entire life now that I'm 19 let's like let's reexamine this let's see that was the other reason I wanted to go to college but once I got that Final Cut Pro I was like nope this is it I know this is what I want to do and I'm just going to get back into it right now I say this as someone that's the exact same so there is zero judgment in this but I was was at first I wasn't going to college I was going to live in a kowak book that's it I was going to be kowak and so that's what I was going to be and then all of a sudden I was going to be a writer and I [ __ ] submitted [ __ ] blah blah when I hear you say that I think to myself who am I talking to yeah you know what I'm saying like who am I showing that I'm living in a car question and I try to put my finger on like who was I trying to impressed I feel like it'd be helpful if I knew like oh it's my brother I'm trying to show my brother this or my mom or my dad but I don't think it's those three maybe it's just a generalized like I don't know it's just interesting for me it's all of those people but it's all those people adding up back to me yeah it's who do I want to be who do I want to think of when I think of myself like yeah yeah I get that wait real quick just cuz I'm curious what was your major I dropped out right before having to declare a major oh got it I would have been French by that time I was studying all in French yeah he's a Francophile and you speak French right a little bit yeah have you had the pleasure of like going to Paris and just like talking to people in French yeah and often times they'll speak back to you in English in Paris especially you got got to go to like Geneva or to you know the south of France or like if people are less impatient and and also easier to understand parisians speak really quick yeah this is very name droppery but I just got to say it is it's the closest I've ever seen to a friend take flight which is I one time was with Bradley Cooper in Paris and he's like hey I got to do this talk show tonight you want to come I'm like yeah I'll go and by God it was a [ __ ] comedy talk show yeah and he's he's like people are laughing and he's laughing on and I'm like he is a superpower like it's one thing to just go be on Charlie Rose and speak another language and just say but he's cracking jokes and he knows the cadences and everything and I was like this is mind-blowing this may be the most impressive thing I've seen him do [ __ ] that guy [ __ ] piece of [ __ ] gorgeous piece of [ __ ] all right this isn't a conversation just I think it's really funny in 2007 you were in a movie called the lookout and your character's name was Chris Pratt yeah that is pretty funny which is really funny now because that would now be like be playing Harrison Ford your character's name is Harrison Ford it just couldn't happen crazy true so that's just a fun fact another fun fact along your ride I had and I make no claims that I was offered this or that they wanted me I don't even remember the details I just remember at one point I was given the script for 500 Days of Summer and personally just didn't understand it I was like I don't think I understand that yeah and then I got drugged to it with a by a girlfriend and I was like my god did I miss the boat on this um it's just really fun sometimes when you see like the power of Direction the power of writing sometimes it's the power of writing carries through and no one can direct it poorly other time like that thing was in that person's head and it was executed in a way that I was like oh wow I didn't see that yeah the two writers who wrote that were great and writing from an a somewhat autobiographical place so that it has that sincerity but yeah Mark Webb the director of that movie is a fantastic director and he really as they say directed the [ __ ] out of that movie yes and now this will be one of the two times where I was poised to not like you it's just oh I don't know if it's going to turn out good and then I watched you be great in it and you actually make me fall in love with this thing I didn't like oh thanks yeah so it's just kind of an extra compliment to you because you had something to overcome for me and my own ego can I ask you've said a few times very you've been very flattering towards me and my work and I'm so appreciate it but there's also you said oh this guy has a different relationship to this job than I do I want to just understand that better cuz it's a funny thing amongst actors uh very much in my experience know that the less I think of things competitively and the more I think of things collaboratively the happier I am 100% it's hard not to be competitive with other actors I was bad at it I'm now I I like I like to think of myself as quite good at it now now I generally am rooting for everyone to win I realize that that's not it doesn't make me lose CU everyone's winning yeah and in fact I subscrib to the idea that a rising tide lifts All Ships so I'm there now but I was not there a I was 10 years in La auditioning never made one dollar yeah then I got my foot in the door and then I did things right so I'm inherently jealous at that time of someone who was on a sitcom in their teens sure right right and I am like flx that that person would go to college not that I even knew that then right I didn't know that to be totally honest but even thinking about it I would have been like what do this guy's going to go to college now like I I would give anything to be so there is that that like yeah that's there somewhere that's so interesting yeah that I hadn't quite thought of it that way that makes plenty of sense but by the way just like that's healthy what is his point of view the way he's going through the world and oh incredibly yeah yours is on the more unhealthy side of the spectrum couldn't agree more so I just want to make that clear case it seems like I agree it's different and you've made your way towards that 100% I am just now at 44 got to where Joe was at 19a this this is what I'm talking about true cuz I feel like you're positioning me as some kind of like uh I I don't I don't see myself in that kind of oh I'm doing it right way and but I get the feeling sometimes that maybe I give that off uhhuh well there is what appears to be utter confidence in your compass I see you can see where someone would think that right you like you could have done Third Rock for another year or however many years and then you could have gone directly into another sitcom you like you certainly could have done all those things yeah and so that just is a very confident decision to make it's interesting the last thing I want to do is give off the impression like oh I know what's right more than other people like I cuz I actually sincerely don't think that's true I believe you yeah and this is all my literally sitting on the sidelines I don't think you're alone in this though like that's maybe why I'm asking I feel like this like sort of uh feeling that you're articulating is something I've sensed other people let's also State another obvious thing in the early 2000s people didn't leave sitcoms and then become movie stars that really wasn't a trajectory that was known to most people it had happened a couple of times Jennifer Aniston did it you know whatever there's been a few so right there you're going like oh wow this guy did something that's almost impossible to do so then you fill in the blanks how could that happen what good for him he believed that that was possible he had to have beli that was possible cuz he went and pursued it so like there's just some kind of implicit like oh he must have been confident or believed in himself and I could be totally wrong I definitely had plenty of moments where I was like [ __ ] I so badly want this thing and I'm never going to get it right well especially if what the thing you wanted was Dustin Hoffman that's almost impossible for anyone to get yeah if that's like the high water mark well it's impossible and no one no one will ever be and that's the thing no one will ever be anybody else if you compare yourself to other people you're just going to get there I think the thing that you're touching on is that you feel that people assume that there was some calculated moves or something and you're like I didn't make any calculated moves like a master it just all ended up this way that's true and it seems to people that I planned and I took a year off here and I did this and it was all like for reason and really you were just following what was in front of you yeah that's very true but so you look at it as like I'm looking you did this and you did this and he's like well I don't understand cuz I'm just living my life and I'm looking at yeah and I'm looking at it from a vantage point of a 25-year career that now seems to have a pattern emerg like your algorithm uhh there probably wasn't a pattern while it was happening but now over time I can point to these Cycles yeah that's interesting I I I actually have thought of that right now because I when I I took a couple years off to have kids mhm and you know when I decided to take that time off you could say I guess like the amount of jobs I was being offered were different than they are now having taken a few years off right which is nerve-wracking to say the least to be like if we're being forthcoming and I admire how forthcoming you are about your own things so I I've thought of that in the past I was like well it worked once like I quit you know I was on a sitcom and being offered other sitcoms and I quit and decided to do other [ __ ] and for a while there it seemed like I wasn't wasn't going to get to do the [ __ ] that I really wanted to do but then it did work out yeah and so now I feel like I've definitely sometimes felt like okay I'm in that place again I'm going to hold tight and like it's going to happen again right and now when you're at your lowest moment in your evaluating your prospects do you take it personal or are you able to see that the entire industry changed in the last six years like do you recognize they don't make as many movies the only movies that work aren't maybe the ones you would even want like the whole thing is dramatically shifted towards television ultimately yeah very true I think both in more practical moments I'm able to zoom out and be like okay what does this mean what should I do what are the like you said how's the landscape shifted yeah in less practical moments I just think like [ __ ] I blew it I got off the train I can see it disappear have like I got I got I was cocky I shouldn't have done that like why like the kids would have been fine if yeah okay so after 500 Days of Summer you do go on this incredible ride from 2009 to 2013 where you do gii Joe you do Inception 50/50 Premium Rush a Lincoln The Dark Knight Rises this is Bonkers in that time the one thing I want to say where I actually became a fan of you as an actor was brick just that's where I was like I know who this guy is but now I've seen him in something that I love and I just think you're terrific in that you're awesome in Looper and obviously you and Ryan Johnson have some kind of awesome is it not the most flattering thing to have a talented director want to use you as his point guard it really like if you're talking about just that kind of arguably unhealthy pleasure yeah a validation yeah validation that's a good way to put it yeah that's a strong one yeah okay now so 2013 I go see Don joh I go in I could not have loved your movie more I [ __ ] loved it from the [ __ ] title card to the end of the movie the music was awesome it was so stylized I love the casting of putting Tony Dan's in there I thought you were incredible the script was great I [ __ ] loved it it was the other time other than 500 Days somewhere I walked out and was like God damn it he did it I'm so glad he's good at this and I liked it so much that I remember like wishing I knew how to reach out to you cuz I I was so passionate about how much I liked it and I was just so impressed by everything you did in it man thanks why didn't you roll right into another one yeah I've been one wanting to direct another thing since and I took a couple of really big swings on very ambitious projects that uh fell apart for different reasons very hard to Beyond My Control mhm I'm actually currently working on that yeah not ready to talk about thing you're directing a Marvel movie Monica he's directing a Marvel movie greats I'll call the TR and at the same time though the the other place where I get that satisfaction where I have that outlet of making stuff is with my company hit record which is really different than directing a uh traditional feature of film yes so hit record is this online collaborative artists workspace right where people can start stories other people can contribute they can start songs people can contribute so I went on the website and I was looking at it I'm pretty uh prehistoric in my understanding of a lot of the embarrassingly so yeah where are the finished products of all this it's a it's a really good question and that's not you being prehistoric like so hit record was always ever since 2010 what we've called ourselves a production company uhhuh and it was about me and the people in my office sort of starting projects and leading them and then letting anybody who wants to come contribute to them yeah and the finished things wouldn't really exist on our site like we would publish a book or we would put out a record or we made a TV show or we would make a branded campaign and the website was like the kitchen dining room wasn't there okay okay lately though we realized hey you know this actually a really wonderful thing that's going on with this community because it unlocks creativity for people when they do it together with other people MH in the ways that I think is different than a lot of the kind of creativity or the kind of creative culture you find Elsewhere on the Internet it's wonderful that YouTube exists and any anybody can make a video and put it out on YouTube and share it with the world but if you don't have the wherewithal to make the video all by yourself mhm or with your friends cuz you've managed to move to LA and you have your friends at the ground Lings and you can like all make a video together right or if you're just like I know I want to make something but I don't I don't even know what uhhuh having a community of people that are like in the middle of doing stuff is really encouraging for people yeah and then I would imagine people can be utility players within that like I'm a great editor but I don't really want to tell exactly yeah or like I feel like drawing today I don't know what to draw what does someone need drawn uhhuh and that can like provide that inspiration and we saw that working at a certain scale within the production company context yeah but we realize that there's a limit to how many people can really be included when we're always the ones leading the project we meaning me and the folks in my the creative Direction team yeah so we said what if we take what we've been doing as a production company and build sort of a larger ecosystem around that so so that we're not always the ones leading the projects let's build the tools to take what we've learned leading these projects and let other people lead the projects and then when people finish projects have a place where those finished projects go so to your question where are the finished project yeah because I got super intrigued and I'm like now I want to hear some of these collaborations or see some of them or it's so cool you ask cuz it's it's funny like I it's as if I asked you to ask that question because that's that's exactly what we're building right now oh cool so like just last year we went up to like Silicon Valley and said like here's our idea here's what we've been doing as a production company for all these years we've been successful at it our show won an Emmy blah blah blah yeah but we think a lot more people could do this and get a lot out of it and so we raised money and now we were able to we never put any emphasis on technology before so now we're able to like hire a proper engineering team and a product design team we're like building our website and our our app was like heroically worked on by a very small number of people to make it like good enough to allow us to make the things we wanted to make yeah now we're making a proper user experience that's serving more than just us that so that anybody can come and get involved right awes and I also think it would lead to growth because if you could see the product and you might go like oh wow I could have added that thing that's exactly it yeah that's what ultimately I would love to have a media ecosystem if you will where when you watch something you're not just then taking down a rabbit hole of addictive watching the next thing and the next thing and the next thing but rather if you watch something and it's inspiring to you you're served up hey here's something you could get involved in if you liked that maybe you want to we're making the next episode right now or here's another thing that's sort of similar that you might want not just watch but that you might want to contribute something to I would love to see the immed media platform that works that way and that's what we're trying to build that's really cool now you have a new podcast that's right that's right now let's talk about that what's the name of the podcast it's called creative processing creative processing yeah and so it's it's funny cuz your podcast came up when I was starting to think about doing a podcast really yeah when I would like start floating that idea way more than anybody else people were like oh well Dax Shepard has a really good podcast you should listen to his very flattering and I listen to yours and just even the very concept of armchair expert I was like this is such a smart way to frame these conversations and to frame like the position of you both in speaking about a variety of things is it's so telling for like what our time is we're all kind of turned into armch we're all Geniuses now we all have these platforms to be like here's what I think and like you're so good at in the the podcast that I'm doing is pretty different I think actually I would give you credit like because I'm like I'm not going to do that he's killing it like well I would never try to direct a porn porn addicted guy yeah don't yeah yeah it's already been UNP stay off my territory no so the the idea of creative processing is to actually narrow the focus and really just talk about creative process yeah which is something that probably the only thing I feel like I have some amount of expertise at sure speaking of armchair expert yeah are there favorite blueprints of being creative that you adhere to one of my favorite books which is called letters to a young poet uh it's written like a hundred years ago it's by the the author's named real K who was a poet and he had this correspondence with a fan really this kid started writing him letters r felt a personal resonance with the kid and the book is just a series of I don't know 10 letters that real wrote to this kid and the kid is like you know in the middle of military School wants to be a poet and is writing letters to his favorite poet saying like what should I do and will you read my poetry and what's life about and like is am I going down the right path basically and and this [ __ ] Raina Maria real takes it upon himself to write these beautiful long indepth very forthcoming and honest and and not necessarily like um sugarcoated some of it's kind of brutally honest sure letters to a stranger to this young kid who he happens to for whatever reason take a liking to or be like you know what I'm GNA Mentor he must have spent hours I mean many many hours writing letters to this kid that he didn't know yeah about his poetry and about writing in general and about life and about getting older and about just how to find meaning in being a creative person he talks a lot about just not caring what other people think having to go deep within your yourself and find your own voice and maybe that's part of what you were kind of alluding to that I've always like struggled with I don't think I'm perfect at all at it because I do care a lot what people think but I strive to live in that place where I where you're intrinsically motivated as opposed to exactly I learned that those terms intrinsic motivation and extrinsic motivation when Tasha and I were learning about parenting oh right and I was like oh this applies so much to being an artist yeah and the I think the simplest explanation is is you play guitar because you enjoy playing guitar versus you're playing guitar to get good to play for someone else yeah because they'll they'll validate you yes yeah yeah I strive for intrinsic motivation as well in my experience that's where I find Joy yeah is when I'm like say playing guitar like I do play guitar actually I like playing music I've never really done anything with it very professionally but still do it all the time just cuz I really really love it now do I also struggle with like maybe I should have put out an album or like maybe like the world would tell me I was great if I would just in the end I'm I still think I still like stand by being happy just like doing it in my room yeah cuz the unfortunate thing is is as we get other people's approvals which definitely feels nice in the moment it just doesn't have any stain power it's only really your own approval that can can have any kind of longevity it's a very good way to put it yeah when you get that external validation and it's actually it's addictive it's the slot machine yeah it is that slot machine you it's a high for a moment and then it goes away and then you want more and you don't even want an even amount of it you want more and then more and more and then more more and more and it's never enough and this the the amount of validation you were getting previously is no longer enough to give you that same feeling that you got and so you need more yes I I know from experience now that just I've seen it time and time again when I'm able to get my head out of that space and just focus on how it feels yeah for myself to be doing it it's that's when I get really happy so say the name of it again one more time the podcast or the podcast it's called creative processing creative processing and are you on a network or something how how do we find your show Cadence 13 is the company they're known for pod save America and most other things but I don't know you find podcasts on podcasts are on Spotify and etc etc and when does it W August 20th is the first episode it's with Ryan Johnson who you met oh great I would love to listen to that he was really fun we talked about originality each episode starts with a question okay and then the conversation goes from there and it goes here and there but we kind of get back to the question of whatever that question is for that episode and we take questions just from the internet and then I try to find like oh this would be a good question to ask Ryan right and the the question we asked Ryan was about being original cuz Ryan is such a mixture of a totally original voice but also someone who draws heavily from his influences like you mentioned brick brick is like basically a dashel hamut novel dashel hamut is like B you know kind of the film Noir detective Humphrey Bogart thing yeah g but he put this weird Twist on it setting it in high school and so he's always playing with how to build originality out of pre-existing Parts yeah he had so many great thoughts about what it means to have an original voice creatively so we talked about that for an hour okay well listen I like you you're talented you're nice uh I can't wait to listen your podcast and Monica you as well you like Joe right oh love oh good Joe good we all Found Love well I like you both too all right let's go do the neighbors let's hang out yeah yeah and now my favorite part of the show The fact check with my soulmate Monica padman Joe Joseph Gordon Levy oh Joey Gordy Levy yeah Joey Gordy [Music] Levy liked him I liked him a lot too yeah he's one of these guys that I had an opinion of yeah you told him I told him as much and then he's just much more um approachable is that the right word you know what it was is he just triggered my insecurities where I just thought oh this person's a a better actor than me or a more ACC claimed actor than me and they think I'm low rent yeah and from the wrong side of the tracks it was my insecurity you think that about a lot of people you think so oh yeah you say it to a lot of people who come in here that I think they're like higher status than me you say to a lot of people like I could see that you think I'm this this this you say that too I would say oh oh there isn't going to be a number I'm going to like go ahead hit me 70% of the people oh my goodness no I don't think it's that hot yeah it is and and listen I know you believe that I know that is real to you sure sure that you feel that way about them but nobody thus far well there's a few things happening first of all nobody thinks that okay at all secondly no one goes like o gross here comes to a no one's doing that and secondly I mean know just not to crush you but they're not thinking about you oh that is totally true so they're not like even evaluating whether you're whatever that you're afraid that they think of you yes so they're not thinking about you but then they have to pretend kind of in these moments oh they do well not pretend but I think they they feel like they have to be like they have to entertain the hypothesis well no no no no okay I just just imagine somebody said that to you right obviously are going to say no right well I I've had this with friends of mine in the program who are actors right who will express some kind of embarrassment about how their career is going to me right okay and I regularly say never once and this is true never once has their job been a part of how I'm evaluating my opinion about them never when they're on a hot streak does I don't think anything about them like the the thing they're doing for money is the thing I'm least interested in about them I can clearly see it in others you know what I'm saying I can see and I try to tell them like I don't I've never considered your job or whether you're working a lot or none yeah um and and obviously it would go without saying no one's doing that towards me either yeah but I can relate to feeling that way like oh boy I'm a oh I these people think I'm a failure yeah I get that and and also though it's a little different with those people cuz you know those people mhm they're in your life so even extra like of course you don't care about their job you care about them as a person but with strangers it's easier to do it because you're like oh they just know this about me and this about me and they probably have this opinion yeah but really they don't and they're not thinking about it and then when you bring it up they have to be like no I love you oh so I'm forcing them to and I think they're they do of course they do but maybe not maybe just to like get out of the whole coners is what you're saying no they do but there's like they're never going to say to you yeah I actually I did kind of think that yeah I was like I saw employee the month and I was like why what what's wrong with you yeah I'm just saying to you that you know this conversation comes up a lot and it goes the exact same way every time and also because there's no way it could go any other way yeah you're right when you're right you're right you don't have to stop no I'm going to going to aim to stop I'm not telling you why wouldn't I why wouldn't I try to get better at something that's well it's not something you're better Above All Things a waste of time CU to your point what else are they going to say like no man of course I don't think that about you yeah they and they don't and nobody does no about anybody but yeah all of our opinions are so mired in our own fears it's ridiculous yeah yeah well no not just fears experience mhm on Earth that too yeah jgl jgl Jake gyllenhal [Music] LaVine so he's was talking about Harry neelson and Nina Simone to musicians he loves and that he kind of stays away from hearing about their story so that he can just mhm and he said that he thinks they both had documentaries on netx about them the Harry Nelson one is called who is Harry Nelson it's not on Netflix okay but it is a documentary the other one is what happened to Miss Simone and it is on Netflix oh we should watch that we should I I would love to watch it yeah or if you want to take his path and remove yourself you can't I did something last night that's going to anger both you and Kristen which is I watch that documentary with Gaga what well I wanted to share something with Gaga what documentary the one that was suggested by Josh oh jeez yeah I I I I okay let me just run by what happened yesterday okay so the listeners know why we can all be upset okay so I said it was a double crossing for sure yeah geez Louise so I am in the car with you and you said what are you doing tonight I said nothing and then you said oh well there's some documentaries like this one that was recommended To Us by Josh and I said oh okay well Chris is not going to be home tonight so we shouldn't watch that you want to watch something else and you said no I'm going to go to bed early that's right and then I watched it with Gaga I watched it with Lori she wanted to watch something and I um I didn't know what to suggest so I in a panic I just I went ahead and watched it okay and um it was really good good I'm sorry to say the whole thing wrapped up around 9:30 at night anyways I apologize that I did that I got um yeah I don't know I got scared one part you left out though uhhuh which is totally fine it's just I did then said to you an hour after I said I'm going to go to bed early I said you know what I've changed my mind I kind of want to watch a movie yeah if you want to and then you said oh well now I've made plans with Jess and I said totally understand yeah it did um yeah yeah so there was I did I did it wasn't a total uh it wasn't great it wasn't great but but I didn't invite you after I said I didn't want to yeah you did you're right yeah you did all things are true do you feel good about yourself I'm just kidding but do you do you really I do have that question like this is so silly which is why we can talk about it because if we're talking about watching shows and stuff which is so so many people deal with this benign but everyone is dealing with this right now where it feels like a real betrayal uhhuh yeah when like we were watching a show uh loudest voice loudest voice and I left you you did without telling me you finished well because part of me was thinking I would just watch it and then rewatch it with you and pretend I didn't see it okay but then I do that all the time do you you do you guys are so [ __ ] impatient well hold on though here's can I just run you through the thought analysis in my head yeah so last night I think oh I could put that thing on and I'm like no I'm supposed to watch that with Monica and Kristen but then I think we have so much stuff to watch sure like we're we're behind on on handmaids we got to catch up on that um pey is coming in two seconds we now have succession which we're supposed to be watching and we now have righteous gemstones so I think are we going to watch this documentary before any of those three things and I go no so now I'm choosing to not watch this thing right now so that I can watch it in 3 months and then it starts getting a little more like [ __ ] it everyone will forget or we'll have watched other things in it's not really at the top of the burner yeah and then I prioritize gaga gaga Michigan Lori Kristen's mom is I want to make her happy and I think of the many different options that's the one she'd like the most cuz it's a kind of a horrific tale and she likes the maab I get that so you know those all the things that go through my head but I I definitely go like oh I I'm supposed to watch this with them but I don't think that'll happen for months yeah I get it but what was the documentary I wish I could remember the name it's about the um deep diver who his umbilical cord got severed working on a uh what's called a manifold where the oil comes out of the surface of the the ocean floor in the North Sea their GPS system on the boat that keeps it in one position it's it failed so the boat started drifting off in a storm and it was on the umbilical cards and then he got snagged on this thing underwater it's it's crazy it's it's not that sounds breath what is it last bre yeah last Last Breath it's phenomenal and it's so identical to something that would happen in space you know like those two environments are virtually the same yes yikes it's crazy it's incredible documentary but something I knew Lori would glad glad you liked it so much yeah now I'm in at an ethical Crossroads of I should downplay it so it doesn't feel like you got left out of something great and an obligation to the filmmakers who did a great job it's okay but with the Roger als's one that's different there's no Gaga involved with that you can't pin it on somebody else's happiness no but that again how that happened I'm wrong is I'm back to work I know I'm working three weeks in a row then one week off and so we're just not watching TV at night really CU I have to wake up at 6:00 every morning and so I'm like I would not expect her to not watch this show for three and a half weeks so I'm going to tell her just go on without me and then knowing I'm going to do that then I just start watching it and you tell me to go on I did no yes I that's how it happened I I said to you I I I text you to say do you know how much his assistant made no no no no no no you watched and then me and you were having a talk talk okay and I'll be forthcoming about this we were coming out of a fight and we were talking to remedy that and you said you should finish the yeah loudest voice and I was like oh did you I really remember that reaction right there yeah yeah that's fair right I knew I was in and then you said yeah so no no no you watched the show but I said you should you should finish it that was my way of saying that was my way of bringing up that you should peel off and finish it after you had finished it yeah uhhuh because I knew I was going to say that sure and I wasn't going to wait till I told you that and we were in a fight we weren't talking a bunch it was all complicated yeah and we were in a fight when I did it we exactly that hurt a lot more it did yeah cuz it just felt like okay so we're in a fight and then he's just decided to move on with his life I can see where it felt that way but I was I was being much more practical about it which is okay we're in a fight so we're probably not watching TV together this week I'm also at work every single day for 12 hours and I know we need to talk before we're ever going to be watching TV again so I know what best case scenario we're going to have this talk on Saturday or something yeah it's all so far away and I'm bored at lunch what do I do yeah yeah not an excuse it was an act of betrayal this is what people are dealing with in 2019 I know all things said like I hope that's the Apex of my betrayal of you is that I watched a show at work I hope so too yeah we can overcome TVD TVD okay so you said that Fleetwood Mac makes great love songs but if you evaluate their actual romantic lives they're a mess they all have 26 husbands and wives mhm was I low okay I don't really understand what you meant by that I just meant they've all been married and divorced a bunch of times yeah they have well do you want to hear a little synopsis of them hit me with Stevie Nicks the duo um who's Mick Mick uh Mick Fleetwood okay you don't hear much about Mick Mick's the drummer so Mick Fleetwood is the Fleetwood and Fleetwood Mac I want to say the guitar player or something was the the Mac part and they were a band with Al V or Al and then they brought in Stevie Nicks okay their original Fleetwood Max stuff is almost punk rock there's some really cool Fleetwood Mac albums that are it's way less without Stevie Nicks yes oh interesting and then I think many of the members fell in love with each other at different times yeah okay so this is what I have here but there's probably way more the duo who joined the group in 1974 uh began dating in the late 1960s their tumultuous off andon relationship officially ended during the making of rumors in 1976 the vocalist and the drummer began an affair in 1977 when Mick was still married to first wife Jenny boydd oops the pair mutually agreed to end it soon after but the damage to mixed marriage had already been done Fleetwood Max co-founder married the model the model I'm sorry I don't know who that is in 1970 and the pair had two daughters in 1973 Mick discovered his wife was having an affair with his good friend and fellow band member Bob Weston oh wow Mick forced Bob out of the group and ended up divorcing Jenny in 1975 the two remarried only to divorce again in 1977 after mix affair with Stevie oh I was right this is a mess I love it soon after Mick began dating Stevie's best friend Sarah this is awesome fellow co-founder John married Christine in 1968 and she officially joined the group in 1970 and her name's Christine MCV or something maybe I don't have a last name during the making of rumors the pair was having marital problems and Christine engaged in a with the band's lighting director oh perfect the duo ended up divorcing in 1976 but Christine remained in the band until 1998 I mean what a reality show that would have made oh my God every just bed swapping I bet every time they got to a [ __ ] a city on their tour the hotel room doors were open and closed and people were crisscrossing in the hallway that's right what a party I know and I love too whatever whoever the lighting director he must have been watching from the outside for a couple years going like how do I get myself into this circus I want to be bed hopping at the hotel yeah he had to like go to the hotel early and be like where what floor are they on yes and can I please get on that floor I bet he just used to stare out his people at the hotel see who is crisscrossing in what direction and was so jealous of all the activity oh man good for him he got in there he did yeah big leagues so um you said in South Korea that they treat kids for video game addiction mhm okay so roughly 1 in 10 South Korean children between the ages of 10 and 19 are addicted to the internet according to the most recent government data in a new report Vice estimates that number could be as high as 50% addicted Gamers suffer sleep deprivation mood swings and seizures as a result of their dedication and make for Less engaged citizens in 2011 the government passed the Cinderella act Comm known as the shutdown law which prevents children under the age of 16 from accessing gaming websites between midnight and 6:00 a.m. wow that's the only parameter yeah isn't that crazy under the system anyone in South Korea wishing to log into those sites must enter the age encoded national ID but I guess people like got around hardly uh Dr Lee J Juan a neuros psychiatrist at a hospital in Soul told Shay that online gaming accounts for roughly 90% of addiction cases in South Korea of course the overnight gaming band has its flaws some kids will use their parents IDs to hop online a pretty amateur hack when the system fails to save kids from themselves some parents employ an alternate defensive mechanism internet rehab one quarter of teens diagnosed with internet addiction will be hospitalized in a government sponsored Center like Dr Lee's practice sheay visited this hospital and tried out some of the unusual Therapies so is one jerking off no not that I know cuz you got to introduce them to the pleasure of jerking off oh instead oh that's not a horrible idea the first stage of treatment is a brain scan to test addiction sheay watched gameplay while electrodes were strapped to his head next he received some sort of neuro feedback or biof feedback therapy the applications of which were unclear he sat in a chair as Dr Lee delivered a single electric shock via a brain pulse instrument in the seconds after the zap his whole body shuddered involuntarily oh boy so electroshock therapy yes in the final stage of therapy Shay sat in a chair and watched footage of violent video games doctors measured how long he could observe without feeling a dire need to pick up a controller for internet addiction treatment it's not about avoiding using the internet as a whole it's more about a patient being able to control their use of the internet like a normal person I have um pessimistic views of if once you're you've proven addicted to things the the road deoder ation to me seems a lot harder than road to abstinence yeah but in some cases you can't like food right you got to eat and internet really sex addiction you got to [ __ ] sex addiction you could do abstinence for some time no you're going to end up in a relationship and your partner's going to expect sex yeah but by then you may have figured out some tools but like when you're in the midst of it you could stop having sex yes yes yep I mean I'm you're probably going to to do things I'm arguing the opposite now uh oh you flipped you waffled um but anyway I'm not loving the sound of this electroshock therapy okay you got kind of a kneejerk yeah yeah who knows I don't really know anything about electroshock therapy I think it's better I do I do though I'm leaning more and more and more I just brought this up I I I don't think I want any screens in our house ever yeah [ __ ] it we can't smarter than us if I can't compete with my phone if my phone is smarter than me and has me addicted to it and I'm 44 what [ __ ] shot does a 12-year-old have with a underdeveloped frontal lobe I know it's powerless you might mean might as well give them [ __ ] lines of cocaine no you can teach them how to handle it responsibly I mean it really hard I get it but you I don't think removing you can't they're going to go to their friend's house there's going to be yeah so great so they they do it there but uh I just I don't know I I don't think the way to get kid I just I don't know I don't think I think they have their whole life to be addicted to the stupid phone in their hand why not give them 18 years of not addicted to it okay first it's not going to happen that they go 18 years without a phone is this like I'm I'm basically an abstinent sex person you are you're being a little bit unreal cuz sex is a connection and it's a positive thing well than stebie Downer you're right that is the truth in the case of what like it gets abused all the time not even in molesting in between two people who even want to be there that's not it's not always about connection some oh no no but but minimally it's about you know pleasure it should be pleasurable whatever yeah it should yes I think one thing is good and one thing is not good yeah I think sex is good and I think staring into your hand is not good right that's your opinion yes it is and because a lot of people think sex is not good for young people most people are ignoring 150,000 years of History okay yeah and I do think when you talk about frontal loes and emotional kids are do not have emotional stability so sex cannot be good for them in that way where they can get taken advantage of they can use sex to get they don't want yeah sex where you're doing it to get approval of that's terrible sex before you're ready to have sex terrible if your kid is uh horny and wants to engage in sex and is in some kind of respectful uh Union with somebody yeah I I think it's positive I do too teenagers have been [ __ ] since we've been uhhuh Homo Sapien that's why you start your period at 13 and not 19 yeah so I don't know they also lived much shorter lives so they kind of had to start earlier also I'm totally Pro also except I do think kids G probably have a hard I don't even know if it's a harder time it's hard for adults to manage emotions and sex right but anyway true phones I don't see any upside to the phone though like I can't even paint a scenario where my life's been made better by a phone well for work it has podcast oh [ __ ] Rob you're right yeah entertainment you're right access me checking my text though every 10 minutes is deplorable I know but I also like it yeah me too I like I I mean again if if that's your only level of connection you're getting in life like if you're only on your phone that's a problem but if it's an additive connection right or to maintain Real Life Connections that's what I mean yeah it's it's another way to connect with people you already love and and for people who are far away that you don't get to see I think it's lovely I'd rather write you a letter on Monday and mail it to you that says hey would you like to watch TV on Wednesday and then you mail me a response and it gets there on Friday yeah all right yeah I just think I'm making I'm making it binary and I hate binary I'm trying to say it's good or bad yeah which is stupid there are good things and really bad things I still just think though that the world is so big around you and to focus your attention to your hand is intrinsically bad I mean yeah I agree maybe there are rules that could be put in place like what tall Ben Shahar said which is like the rule is your phone stays in the kitchen at night M so you can't pick it up first thing in the more like try to like minimize some of that cuz you you really just need to get used to as like um oh I really want that thing oh I can't have it oh and life went on like the more times you can experience that yeah the the less fearful you'll be about losing the thing yeah so as many times as you could practice that like oh yeah I'm agitated for 15 minutes and then life went on and I was fine yeah I think it's a good yeah yeah okay so 80% of videos on Facebook or Twitter are watched without sound yes 85 is the number I found not crazy mhm it's a lot that's what they type that type out everything now like whenever you see a video they they've added uh close captioning to it basically yeah oh okay so he did this Pop-Tart commercial uhuh and I want to play oh good love when you play these commercials me too we're out of here hold on Mr rushing out the door you haven't had your breakfast yet no I know tick tick tick look you got time for Kellogg's poptarts That's my boy now you're cooking look strawberry your favorite now doesn't that hit the spot kiddo M Kellogg's Pop-Tarts real good real F was he speaking to his father yeah it was like don't forget your homework oh he's holding a briefcase up when he says don't forget your homework it was a roll reversal yeah fantasy fulfillment where you're in charge of your dad that's right yeah no wonder it was successful doesn't it feel crazy when you go to watch an old ad on YouTube and then but you have to watch an ad first yeah to see the old ad no no no I'm already watching an ad that's right or like the worst is when um they they monetize a trailer it's like you go on to see a trailer and then you got to [ __ ] watch a commercial before a trailer the trailer is a commercial oo speaking of that there's a new really interesting teaser for the movie bombshell that no did you see it Rob oh God you both have to watch it I so I'm a little hazy the teaser is three women Charlie's the Ron Nicole Kidman and Nikki Kitty Nikki Kitty okay and Margo Robbie Margie Robby Mari Margie wab and they are in an elevator okay throughout this whole teaser and they're kind it like looks really anxious it's in building anticipation anticipation anticipation and then the doors open and one of the ladies walks out and it's Fox News they're at Fox News and so some of these characters I think are real but I think maybe one is like fictional so I'm curious how this is all going to happen it looks so interesting and good but this was an interesting thought experiment because cie works at Netflix my friend cie MH she sent me the teaser and then oh was a Netflix movie No it's it's not she just like yeah um and then she goes it's introduced a really interesting conversation at my office because most of the men feel like it's anticlimactic or like it's not that interesting it needs more it needs like we need plot we need stuff and the women feel like it's so emotionally powerful it's so there which I fully agree with so I'm curious what you guys yeah that makes sense though yeah isn't that funny like it is boys are so visual uhhuh I mean I know not to do gender things but well also are there some kind of like um there's some kind of mirror neuron experience that many women have had in that elevator waiting to go into the lion's den that guys just haven't had but we don't know what it's going to open up to that's right so it's not really like but don't you think in general just being very general aren't women more afraid of elevators than men just in general well because it was it was it was wisely pointed out in that Sam Harris interview it's like imagine getting into an elevator you I'm saying this to men now yeah imagine getting into an elevator with with a Silverback Gorilla cuz you're out weighed by twice generally if you're a woman and you get in an elevator you're getting into a steel box with another animal that's twice your size yeah that's just inherently a little dicey I I think you're probably right I'm sure there's a the fear level is a little bit heightened for women and elevators than men like when I think of an elevator my anxiety Peaks just because I'm gonna have to have an awkward exchange with a stranger that's my anxiety not that I'm going to get attacked and raped in there also also not an I mean not to just diminish your fear but you don't need to have a fear of that cuz you could just be quiet and not talk I can't I can't I feel like everyone feels so uncomfortable and I have to break the ice and put everyone at ease I'm super codependent in an elevator it'll be some guy with like a headset on even like he's fine I'll think and then you think that's codependency but really then you're putting that person in the position to then have to engage with you it's total projection yeah I talked about this this with um with Ricky glasman on his podcast he's like you're just projecting that those people feel as awkward as you do and I'm like you're dead right I'm just assuming that they feel as awkward as I do because you're standing like a foot from a stranger sometimes you're touching a stranger you're all looking forward there's this protocol that you don't turn and look at one another the whole thing is very awkward I think it's my most awkward experiences in life is being an elevator everyone's being dead quiet oh it's so awkward I you don't feel that I don't oh wow don't I I know what you mean but I do not feel the need to communicate with the other people unless something like funny happens like you can't press the button quick and then everyone has to kind of laugh not a fart would never comment on a fart um what if I had told myself I always fart to break the tension to relieve everybody's yeah so I I never feel that and saying the word codependent is so interesting here because I feel like I don't want that person to feel uncomfortable that's codependency right the same thing and and I think oh your average person doesn't have the skill set to break this situation with a fun joke so it's like falling onto my shoulders so I I I have to be the one to relieve everyone's suffering cuz I should be able to do that right and you I'm outgoing sure you are outgoing and you're great at making jokes but can can you can you see the selfin that's a little bit of the self- involved perspective that like I'm the only one who could possibly Rel this tension that's not there that I've made up uhhuh and well the attention is there I think no it's not people don't care they're wait they're thinking about their thing where they're going what they're about to do and then someone's like cracking some jokes next to you you're right some guy could just be like the he can't get to floor eight fast enough cuz he is on the verge of [ __ ] yeah he's probably not even thinking of me he's like singularly focused on how quickly he can get from the elevator to the the employee bathroom yeah so that's an option and then you're making him talk and he doesn't want to little com yeah yeah yeah you can you can just be Let It Go yeah very hard yeah you can do it I believe in you that is all that's all yeah oh do you want me to play my voice message oh sure yeah that could be fun we have one minute voice memo first I'll say this I played a voice memo the other day of Houston SDS and then you had said that you I had a fun voice memo yeah and here it is yeah and it was cuz um uh the DP on blus mess speaks Japanese and he was explaining how they put vows after all the consonants and I said oh like maanadu MacDonald's in Japan is maanadu and he said yeah yeah how do you know that and I said oh Max girlfriend spoke a bit of Japanese and then I said oh in fact she could Sing Rudolph the Red-nose Reindeer in Japanese and it's the cutest song in Japanese yeah and then so that caused me to text her and ask her if she still knew how to sing it she said yes she did I said would you please record it for me and then she has and I want to share because it's it's a real uplifting song Let's see the best part [Music] oh my phone stop yeah isn't that great I like the middle part the most I love that I love that and also at at one point I feel like I heard her say to herself why what am I doing 100% now only to find out I played it for a million people which I'm sure oh how fun I wish I had something like that I know well it's kind of like you know what it is it's just like Jess's Pippy long strump in in Swedish yeah yeah there's something so tickly about hearing a familiar song in a different language so yeah that was probably maybe the number one party trick I would beg her to do in public did did she spend time in Japan no she took it in high school oh well she's from Washington and there is a large Japanese population they taught Japanese in school they didn't teach Japanese in my school that wasn't offered to me either yeah and I also think um around uh so I'm one year older than her or two years old two years older when I was like 18 you had the Michael kryon was it book The Rising Sun and then they made the the Wesley Snipes movie about it we had all this huge Japan phobia that they basically they were the China of today where Japan was going to be the number one economy in the world and so at the same time were like we got to learn Japanese cuz they're going to be the number one economy in the world so I think there was this push for everyone to learn Japanese so that we could do business with them ah yeah but then now that the fear is transferred to China and the examples like it's funny to be old enough to have lived through these cycles of fearing different people because I remember uh during the Chinese Olympics which you and I loved that opening ceremony was so spectacular the Beijing Olympics but on the cover of some magazines I was seeing like Chinese coaches push athletes to perform through injuries like they were uniquely Savage in this right and I was like we do the exact same thing we have all these [ __ ] documentaries we're so excited people did the backflips on broken you know yeah feet yes yeah what is different about this we're just like now we're in this phase of China phobia so so what they're doing is unique yeah and then not to make excuses for the Russians but then when it was in Sochi there's all these articles that they rounded up dogs and killed them which sounds horrific right yeah it is horrific yeah but we killed several million dogs in this country we also round up dogs we put them in you know the kennel and then if they don't get adopted we kill them so it it's just a little pop call the kettle black yeah you're right yeah and it's all just perpetuating like oh now we got to be afraid of them oh now they got be nationalism like we don't do that they do that or you know uh I think a lot of countries uh stance right now on gay ISS is deplorable it's absolutely deplorable and at the same time I don't think we get to stand on a [ __ ] you know on a Ivory Tower or moral High Ground judging those people because just five years ago it was illegal to get married so those are the only things I Tri up we can also push for Progress yes we can push for progress without a position of superiority and arrogance is really what I'm striving Fort I agree yeah thanks for letting me preach you're welcome you're the cult leader so you get no armchair is not a cult please buy one of the sweatshirts that states that plainly um I love you love you and happy birthday thanks [Music]