Danny McBride Returns

Hi, my name is Danny McBride, and I feel thrilling about being Conan O'Brien's friend. Wait, it's thrilling, you feel thrilling, thrilling, not thrilling, just being so cool that you said it has nothing to do with me and you're like plausible than I have really about it. Hey there, welcome to Conan O'Brien's friend. It's not just me. It does this podcast. I am the beneficiary of having very strong, powerful, independent voices joining me. One of those is Sonia Misesia. Hello, Sonia and welcome. And how can I welcome you when you already are welcome and you are an integral part of this whole doing. Matt, Gourley, good to see you as well, and I thank you for your service. No one gets there alone. So here we are together on Conan O'Brien's friend. Who are you? My name is Conan O'Brien and I'm someone who's just filled with gratitude. Glad to be here. Have you been body-snatched? I was body-snatched. I was very tired last night and I fell asleep next to a strange new plant I found. I woke up this morning. There was a decayed BDI carcass next to me and then my body felt refreshed to know I like this, whatever. If you ever got body-snatched, I feel like we'd all know right away. And it would just be you being nice to us. Yeah. Yeah. We're not doing bits, just being normal. That's right. That's how you would know I would just be. Hello, Sonia. How are you? How's your family? And you'd be interested in the answer and you would wait for a response. You know, be funny. The minute I, if there were body-snatchers out there, if I came in and all I would have to do is say, hi, Sonia, how are you? And you would shoot me in the head with a shotgun. Yes. Yes. I would. And you'd be right. Yes. I would. 100%. I would know immediately. I remember there was an episode of the Simpsons back in my time where I think it was one of the Halloween episodes. There's zombies that are taking over Springfield and Homer's shooting zombies left and right. And then Flanders pops up in a window and Homer shoots his head off and someone says, how did you know that he was a zombie and he went, he was a zombie. I just always love that show that he blew Flanders that off. Not even thinking about him being a zombie or not. You sheds zombie Flanders. Flanders is a zombie. Anyway, no, I'm, I just wanted to give credit where credits do and I think this is a village. He's still going. I know. It's really unsettling. What have you done with it? I want to talk about something, which is I always have ink on my hands. I don't know if that comes up on the podcast, but I write a lot with pens and I'm constantly doodling and I always have a pen in my hand and I'm constantly writing notes in a journal or on a scrap of paper. And lately, I've been using this fountain pen that Jeff Ross got me for my birthday, which is really nice. And I use it all the time. And, but it does bleed a little bit of ink and I'm constantly. Does it squirt? What's that? Does it squirt? Like a novelty. No, I'm not, I'm not doing anything. It doesn't, no, no, it's just that when you're working around bottles of ink and stuff like that, and I kind of like it, all my life, I've been an actual fountain pen. Like there's like, it's really nice. And I'm not, this is not an ad. It's, I think it's an Aurora. It's an Aurora. It's really nice. It's a good pen. And he got it from me. And I really like it. And thanks again, Jeff. Let me try that. I use it all the time, but look at my hands. And I noticed when we were in, we were just shooting a travel show, Sonna, and you're with me or in all of my different travels, I'm always about to go on camera. And I see that there's ink over my right hand everywhere. And I just look like a little spike. First of all, feel how warm this is. What have you been doing with this pen? Well, is that why I keep it in a safe place? Why isn't you taking so much? No, no, no, it's not. You guys got this, the Aurora pen. It's just that sometimes, no, no, no, you got to, God, you're not just like see, I'm writing with the pen incorrectly. No, see whatever you do. You're like this. And with a fountain pen, you need to come out with an angle. You were coming at it straight down. And that's just stupid. Oh, I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I was writing. Huh? Yeah. Well, I know. He's, I think he's, I always hold it and I flip it around in my hand. Oh, okay. I always do that with pens. Why are pens like that better than normal pens? I'm not sure. Well, they're beautiful looking. Yeah, they are. And it's just kind of nice. I've always been a little bit, even when I was a kid, I told you I loved pens, paper. I wanted office supplies. Yeah. I mean, what a freaky kid. I wasn't asking for a baseball glove. I wanted a little stamp that said, void. I wanted ledgers. I wanted ledgers. I wanted, did you get them? My parents were very nice to me. They were, they would indulge me. But I remember thinking, all I want to do is be able to sign forms and then stamp them and then put them in a pneumatic tube like in the 19 20s and home depot. Yeah. Exactly. So I just, I was always into that. That's okay. That's your thing. But anyway, I'm just getting a little self-conscious now that, you know, I go to these nice events or events from Swiss Beyond camera. And I sometimes I look at the picture later on and there's just, it looks like I've crawled out of a grave. Oh, yeah. I think you're doing it wrong. What? I think you're just writing incorrectly. You know what you need is like this from the person who, I'm not talking about the, I'm just saying I go with which you attack the page. There's no ink on my finger, but there is. You need some of that powder that like Shakespeare would throw on it after they write, you know, that, that soaks it up. Yeah. Yeah. I think it was just sand back to the day. I don't know. Do you have a quill? I don't have a quill. I've never had a quill. Okay. But, I feel like you're a quill guy. I feel like you're very, you're very quill-ass. You're real quill. I mean, my blotters over the years. I would just fill them with what, little, so many doodles. We kept them all. They were on desk. And then when they would fill up, I would replace them. And then you would just doodle away. There's blank at them. And you could probably tell my mood if you looked at like, oh, here's a, here's a, here's a blotter from 1997. Yeah. You could probably tell what was going on in my life. Well, even right now in your journal, you've written in some kind of hieroglyphics. Yeah. I write, like, I'm trying, no, I just try and create little languages and I like making lines. But anyway, that's what I got is that I'm covered in ink all the time now. And I need to, I need to, I need to clean up my shit a little bit here. Do you need it? Yes. Go ahead. I've completely stopped using pens and paper. I'm, I'm past that. I got a Kindle scribe. Yep. That I've started to, to doodle on, which is great. Yeah. So I don't, trying to get a free one. Why would you bring this up? No, I'm just saying I, if you need a solve, you can move into the digital age instead of going back. No, no, no, no, no, no. I don't move forward. You can email yourself. No, it's, it's great. I, um, I know what the actual, no offense, but I like the tactile nature. This is tactile. Listen, I'm very suspicious, Blay, and for good reason, that you mentioned, it's a Kindle scribe because you can take that out of it. No, no, no, no, no, We're gonna leave it in because based on your past behavior, I think you're gonna try and write that off now. I think you are. No, no, no, no, no. I was gone for that and play. We got a talk now. No, no, no, no. You know what, if we brought that up again, I need to, I need to apologize. You're guilty of the same thing as your mom. We're gonna continue this in the segment after the interview. It will be actually part four of Blaze Tax Saga. Tax of Asian scandal. And by the way, Blaze is guilty of the same thing that put Capone in prison. Okay, take us to the intro. Okay, podcast today as a hilarious writer, producer, and actor behind such shows as Eastbound and Down, Vice Principles and the Righteous Gemstones. He knew us a new book titled "Thrilling Tales of Modern Man." Very excited. He's back on the podcast. Danny McBride, welcome. Danny, as you know, I'm a massive fan of yours. Have been since day one. Well, the feeling is mutual. And I'm just thrilled that you're here and we have a lot of stuff to talk about and we'll talk more in depth about it in a little bit. But you wrote a book of short stories called "Thrilling Tales of Modern Man." And you write so well and the stories are great. And I'm very proud of you and also jealous because I like to write. I haven't gotten my shit together to do something like this. And this is fantastic. And then the thing I must jealous of is the first quote, you know, you get known people to write a nice quote on the back. Yours is from Sturgial Simpson. And I love Sturgial Simpson. And so much so that I have a band on the side and I play Sturgial Simpson. And I've said to people I'd like to get to know Sturgial Simpson and people said he was on your show. And I'm like, I know but it's not the same. Like I wish Sturgial Simpson was my friend. He's such a good writer, such a good singer. Well, I can make that happen. I could negotiate that meeting. I'm really sure. I could. It's going to end up with me a suitcase of cash in a parking lot late at night where the deal goes down. We'll meet you around the world somewhere, one of your destinations for your show. I would love to hang with both of you. of you at the same time, but this book, we will talk about it, but I want to start on some other stuff first, which is, who the fuck do you think you are? Let me tell you something. I don't like you, and I don't like your comedy. I don't like your Southern ways. I'm from Boston, C. You know, I was thinking about you, reading up about you, and one of the things that we really have in common was how important Saturday morning cartoons were to us, and sort of our comedic outlook. First of all, you took it really seriously. I remembered my brothers and I did too. We would study the Saturday morning lineup, because it would refresh. It was a big thing back in the day. Now, I think new shows come and go all the time. But if you're like me, I'm older than you, but I remembered in the summer, you'd start reading about the shows that we're going to come out in the fall, what the schedule and the lineup was going to be. You'd circle the ones that were interesting to you and the TV guide. You'd talk about it, and then we were there Saturday morning. I would get up and have coffee. That was fine. I have coffee in a couple of cigarettes. I got to make it to Smurf's. Yeah. And then I would watch these shows with real interest. So you were watching, probably the thing that influenced me the most was not a new show. It was Warner Brothers cartoons, the loony tunes characters. They influenced my comedy timing, everything. And you were into Daffy Duck. I was into Donald Duck. Donald Duck. Yeah. I like. I don't respect that. I like how I like how angry he was. He was always so pissed off. And it was just such a funny, so funny against someone like Mickey who just literally never loses his temper. Okay. And then he's just buddies with the angriest guy. All right. Well, I got that one. So now we're talking about Disney. It's very cool. I love. I love Donald Duck because I mean Daffy Duck because he's he really is disturbingly insane. Yeah. He is. He can pull his beak off and put it around the back of his head. But I mean, just just he needs to be medicated. He needs to go to McLean Hospital in Massachusetts. And we're all laughing. But it's like, no, no, he's we know what this is now. He was on TV now. He would get the care that he needs. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. But so you like Donald Duck. Donald Duck is so pissed. Oh, so pissed. Yeah. And everything the whole universe is always shitting on him all the time. Yeah. It's like absolutely. He just has this little blue shirt on just walking around pissed off. That awful blue shirt. And no pants. And no pants. No pants. Maybe I think that's why he's pissed. Yeah, it probably is. Walk around with no pants for a while and you'll just be an angry guy. Busy, hot, not that hot. It is when you have no pants. So you watch that and you watch my line up was the Dungeon Dragon's Cartoon show. That was awesome. Yeah. I mean, I'm trying to think of what else came in the the littles. Do you? I don't know if you're I was born in 76. 73. So yeah, the little snores. You were a little too old to be watching the littles. I was almost aging. I was a late builder. And what I believed in too was disturbing. I just have to admit, I was watching Saved by the Bell when I was 45 years old. Those kids were all girls are pretty. Dude, you're 45. You're hearing a you're hearing an electronic store watching Saved by the Bell on nine televisions. You've been here every morning. Yeah. The littles were awesome though. What are the littles? I don't even know what that is. Their their theme song was literally, we are the littles. They just said their name and yeah, they were just tiny people that lived in someone else's house. Normal people. Normal people. But they would like make their beds and stuff out of like match boxes and they would like design things like that. You know, we're full size, but they would use it to their advantage. Cute sea animated. They kind of all look like Elvis almost. Yeah, somebody should somebody should remake that. And then you mentioned shirt tails. I remember that. That was such a strange concept for a show, which was just animals who their shirts said stuff. Right. That was. Wait. What? That was an animal that we're clothing. There were shirts. There were shirts. And their shirts say things. Yeah. They think they'd change depending on their emotions and stuff. Right. I believe so. So the shirts are like a mood ring, but they have words on them. And they might not have warm pants. They might have it. Yeah. Oh, there we go. And see again, the trend of no pants. Yeah. Just sure. You know what? I walked through them all wearing a shirt that said hug me with no pants. Not one person hugged me. Yeah. I guess the security guard. It's kind of a hug when they pull you to the ground. Yeah. That's what they were doing. So you're growing up. That's important to you. You're a raised Baptist. Yeah. Yep. And your mom used to perform at the church. She would write out like skits and do the scripts and make puppets. And she would do a little show. Yeah. That must have influenced you. It definitely did. Yeah. I mean, but I remember I was like surprised when she even took it on. Like, you know, we just went to church. Then suddenly my mom is stepping up into this position where she's going to do puppet shows in front of the whole church. I was like, how are you going to do this, mom? You do know about puppets? Do you know how to do puppet stuff? She does. But yeah, they would she would kind of like drum up these like two to three page little scripts. And then she would it was her. It was my dad sometimes. And then it would be other people from the church playing some of the other characters. And it was just like the children's sermon before the big sermon. They would, you know, so it'd be something, you know, thou shalt not steal or whatever. And it's just a little skit about a kid who steals my lunch money at school and why you shouldn't do it. Right. But it was, you know, I think what was cool about it was the idea of being able to see something create it. And then like a few days later, performed in front of people. And then, you know, my from my point of view, I'm not doing the puppet. So I'm not, I don't have anything, I don't have anything to do with it. I'm just sitting there watching the process. Like I'm seeing her in our kitchen, writing these scripts and like, you know, running the lines. And then a few days later, I'm at church, like looking around, watching people watch it and respond to it. And, you know, I just thought it was cool. I think that was like the beginning of me sort of like even understanding, like, oh, this is like something you could do. You can, you can write things in your kitchen. And people might respond to it. Yeah. That's so cool. You, were you quite religious then when you were a kid when you were a Baptist? I wouldn't say I was religious. I think I spent most of my time, like, you know, doodling on the minister's face and the program or just imagining what I went to the seat. I think whatever religion you are, I'm not religion. Yeah. But it's funny because now that, you know, we, I stopped going probably in middle school, but we went all the time. But then you looked back and I was actually kind of awesome. That for like an hour, you had to just be forced to sit there and be quiet. Yeah. While, you know, I think my imagination would run wild during that time. I was Catholic. So I went to Catholic Mass, but you guys had to stand up and sit down a lot more than that. Stand up and sit down. We could just be crazy. We could just sit there every now and then clap along doing so long. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. We had to stand up and sit down a lot, but there's still a lot of time to look around. I would just look around Saint Lawrence's church and like, I would look up and just imagine all kinds of insane things because you're not a let you weren't on a tablet. They didn't have tablets then. And you just, you had to, you were trapped with your mind. Yeah. And I wasn't thinking about the stuff I was supposed to be thinking about. You said that you're, you have said that your parents got divorced and that also probably had an effect on whatever you questioning the Baptist thing. Yeah. I just saw it as, you know, I don't think it's, it was exclusive to like the Baptist church, but it was at that time in the 80s. It was sort of like, you know, people weren't getting divorced as much. And especially at the church, I think. So it was just, we, after it kind of happened, I felt like my mom didn't really feel like welcome there as much. And so then she would drop me my sister off. And we're like, well, we're only going because you were going, we ain't trying to go this far. You walk in, you peek the cars left. And then you guys go out the back. Yeah. And you know, the cool thing about that church I went to is called Salem Baptist Church. It was in Spots of India, Virginia, but it was actually a church that was around during the Civil War. So it was just kind of wild to go to some little church that was like, oh, this was like standing. Was it the same Spots of India? Yeah. Is the battle? Yeah. Yep. Same one. Yeah. A lot of, a lot of Civil War action in my hometown. Yeah. Lots. Those are, those are, those are nasty battles too. That one, that, that area too, had some of the nastiest battles. Like, I think it is, it's known as the bloodiest ground in all of North America because of how many battles were there. But the gnarliest one, I think, is that battle of wilderness that was there. And that's like this insane battle that happened over the course of a few days in the forest. The forest was on fire. And guys were literally like hatching each other. It was awful. It was awful. It was insane. And yeah, it's, uh, killer. I used to go there all the time and just enjoy myself. Watch, think about that, that brutality. Yeah. Good times. So great. That's a good, that's a good first date. I've talked about this on the podcast, but I'm a, you know, history buff and a Civil War guy. And I remembered what, my wife and I, it's, people think it was our honeymoon, it was not. It was after we got married. But just, shortly after, like a couple of months later, I had a week off from the late night show. - That's a honeymoon, isn't that? - No, we had our honeymoon, and then we came back from it, but then maybe two months later, I had a week off, and she said, "Let's take a trip," and I said, "Yeah, let's drive down through Georgia "and visit the different towns in Georgia." And she liked it, and then the next thing you know, I'm saying, she said, "Where are we going to now?" And I said, "Andersonville." And she said, "What's that?" And I said, "That's the giant prisoner of war camp "where the Confederates kept all the Union troops, "didn't feed them, and they all died of diarrhea." And she said, "We're going to Atlanta "to the fourth season's hotel to die of diarrhea." - We're gonna drink half a teeny's and get our diarrhea there. So we did that instead, but-- - I think you had a great idea. - I think that would have been a great idea. - Think about looking at a field. - Think about the diarrhea. (laughing) (upbeat music) - I do think one of the things that made the righteous gemstones just so great was, you knew your subject, you understood these people. And also, I always sense there's a faction there too. Like, I don't think it works to make a comedy about people if you just think they're stupid and loathe some totally. - And that's not what you did. You had a real understanding and affection for these people and found them ridiculous, but also understood them at the same time. Does that make sense? - It does make sense. And I think we were, that is what we were trying to do. And I think we extended to a lot of the stuff from even, you know, Eastbound device principles. It's sort of, you know, we know that we're not dealing with like the best examples of mankind. And but I think that it's fun to treat them still with, with a little bit of empathy and even giving them enough depth. So, you know, there's layers there. I think when comedy is written where there is such a disdain for what you're joking about, it could kind of become boring. I think it becomes more unexpected if you're confused as the audience of where you even kind of sit with this person. - Yeah, I think, I mean, I talk about this now. I do think it's very tricky. You always have to have a blend in comedy. And if you're just thinking about the comedy and obviously we're very divided right now in this country and people are yelling at each other a lot and it's very vitriol like, and I think sometimes that, I don't know, it just makes comedy. If you wanna talk about it or portray it in any way, the only way to do it is to show some nuance and empathy for a different point of view, but that's not what a lot of people are interested in. - Yeah. - Does that make sense? - It totally makes sense. And then the thing is when everyone is kind of like, on both sides are angry about the same exact stuff, it also just makes any comment you're making sort of feel redundant like people have. It's like well traveled paths, you know? So I do think when you can find that nuance, you probably have a better shot of actually like, making people think if it's not something that they've been shouted out about over and over again. - The, what's interesting, I don't think it's interesting to me is that you came to be known through comedy and hugely successful in comedy, but you've also carved out time to do these other things. You were a huge force behind the Halloween franchise, the reboots, and it's so fascinating to me because I've always thought there's a weird like a, sometimes people say or I've said, many people said it, there's a symbiosis between comedy and music, like a lot of comedians also love music and there's some kind of weird parallel. I also think there's something going on between comedy and horror. There's some, they're very different, but also there are things about them that aren't that different 'cause it's all about surprise. - Exactly, I think you're with both of them, you're structuring an experience, you know? You're with a joke, you know, you obviously want to paste things out so that the punchline gets the biggest laugh and I think it's the same way with those scares. You think about how, you know, we'll make them a little scared here and then we'll let them off the hook here and then, oh, we'll hit them here. So I think there is a little bit of that is similar as the architecture of trying to make sure you get the result that you're going for. - Also, I mean, if you look at Jordan Peele, his work, if you look at obsession, if you look at weapons, a lot of these people got their chops in comedy. And then, you know, when I was watching weapons last year and one of the reasons that I really wanted to do something with it on the Oscars was that character of Aunt Gladys is, to me, a comedy character. And there's so much of the movie that's kind of funny at the same time and it's that razor thin line between, this is hilarious and this is horrifying. - Yeah, and many times when I've been trying to be funny in my career, I've been horrifying. (laughing) And if I tried to, you know, frighten any guy, I think they would just start laughing. So, but there's something going on there and so it must have been a great trade of outlet for you. Clearly it was. - It was a lot of fun. You know, that was Jason Blum had come to David Greene about adapting that. And, you know, David Greene and I have gone to college. We went to college together. We've known each other for a really, really long time and, you know, he came to me and was like, I think I might do this. Would you wanna help me? I'm like, no way. You shouldn't relaunch all the way. That's a terrible idea. I love all the way. Don't do that. - Yeah. - But then as we were thinking about it, I was like, well, I mean, if someone's going to, why don't we give it a shot and let's see if we could. And, yeah, it was, honestly, it was like unreal. It was so funny to be sitting there like riding on that script and you're just riding, you know, the shape walks into the room. - You know, you're gonna. - I was formed in that movie. My babysitter made me watch it when I was five with the lights out. And so to like, do away with all those sequels that in their own way I love, but to come back the way you guys did. - So much fun. - With the 2018 one. It was like closure for me. - Thank you. - The whole experience was awesome. Not only getting to do that, but even, you know, we had to go through steps to approval to do it. Like, David and I had to go to John Carpenter's house and pitch him what we wanted to do. And it was sort of like, I've never really been nervous about pitching an idea ever. I was just like, I don't know if they don't like it. They don't like it. But suddenly as we're like knocking on his door, it's like, oh God, I think I'll be crushed. If you guys like this idea is, listen. - Insane. And so we, you know, I'm meeting him and pitching him this idea of like, we have an idea of what we want to do with something you've made. Here's all of a sudden like, what are the balls of us? What are we thinking we should never have? - That's great. - It was awesome. And then, you know, once we got his approval, we sent it to Jamie Lee Curtis to, because obviously it wouldn't work with her in it. And yeah, when she called back and was like, yeah, I want to do this. I mean, Creen and I are just looking at each other like, what is going on? I mean, it was insane. And when it premiered at TIFF, I think it might have been the most proud I've ever been of anything that we've done. I mean, I was so nervous of what that reception was going to be for that one, because I'm there with them. I'm a fan of this. It's a lot. And I just really wanted it to work for the other fans. And I remember watching that and just my stomach wasn't nuts. I wasn't like eating like two days, leading up to it. And we're sitting there and when it got to the last half, where they're like in the house with them. And everybody in the theater's like cheering and applauding. I was like, oh, God. Yes. (laughing) Well, I'm gonna leave. (laughing) It was awesome. It was so much fun. Yeah. - I also think writing how someone gets killed would be kind of fascinating, because there is a real art to it. You know, just if a character just gets killed, well, that's, you know, gets gets shot. It's boring. It's trying to think of these inventive ways that are sometimes 50% comedy. - Yeah. - The way someone, you know, in view of what she's movie says, they're competing with each other to do it in a more interesting way. There's the scene at the rest stop when Michael Myers comes in and just drops a teeth on the ground from, it's heroin. - Well, I was, I think that idea about the teeth dropping, it might have even, I might be remembering it wrong, but I feel like it was our location, our buddy who works in locations, who had that idea. And so that's the other thing is you're working on, you know, if you're on a comedy sometimes, you'll get jokes from people saying, oh, you should say this, like, oh, it's not bad. When people suggest things like he should drop the teeth, you're like, great idea, but also keep it on, let's do that. (laughing) That is fucked up. (laughing) - Yeah. (laughing) - Would you come up with that idea? (laughing) - So in time, no, I don't wanna talk about it. I mean, I wanna take the credit. (laughing) - That's fantastic. (laughing) - Yeah, I, I, it just occurred to me that it will be, I don't know, it'll be really funny to shoot a short thing where it's you going to John Carpenter's house to pitch him. And he doesn't really like the idea, but you hang around. And then you use all the tropes from horror movies, like he goes into the kitchen at night and opens the refrigerator door, and then when he shuts it, you're right there. (laughing) And you're like, I just really think, I told you what I wanna do! (laughing) - The pitch. - Yeah, it's just a pitch, it's called the pitch. - Yeah, season of the pitch. And you just keep, I don't let it go. - Yeah, you know, I become his dog. - And it's all, yeah, it's all the, exactly. It's all the stuff that has been used a million times. - I'm always amazed now when people use some of those tropes that have been used way too many times and they don't put a spin on it. - Yeah. - Really? - That's where we're talking about Widow's Bay. There's a slasher episode and a moment with a shotgun that you wish you'd seen in slasher movies for decades and you finally see it and it's wonderful. - Widow's Bay is, they're, I mean. - I can't wait to see it. Everyone I know loves it. - Well, here's what I did on my list. - Here's what I, they're doing something new on that show which is it's not a comedy, it's horror and there's comedy, but they've got this ratio. It's like they invented this cocktail. It's kind of perfect and I don't think anyone's done quite that yet. - That's great. - And they, they do, I think one of the real brilliant things about the show is they'll get the tension up to this highest pitch and then they'll always deflate it in this kind of humiliating way but then get the pitch right back again and without giving anything away but there's just one point where there's a, there's like a demon and the main character Matthew Reese has gone in to talk to the demon and. - This other woman says you gotta go in there and talk to the demon so he goes in and he's starting to talk to the demon and it's like Knife's Edge tense and then the door just opens and she goes, I forgot my purse and the demon and Matthew Reese wait a second while she gets her purse and she backs out and you're like, who the fuck does that? Who does that? - It's great. - Anyway, I don't know why we're plugging this show that neither one of us is involved in. But Widow's Bay, you're a genius. - It's a killer. - I just have to give a shout out. Katie Dippel is the mine behind Widow's Bay. - I think she's brilliant and she's a former intern on our show and she's brilliant. She's done a ton of other work but I think Widow's Bay is her masterpiece. - And also while we're talking about other people's work. I think Hyundai makes an incredible audience. - Oh boy. - They've come a long way. - Oh boy. - Let's talk about this book because thrilling tales of modern men, I know that this is a theme you've worked on for a while in your work over the years, which is men kind of trying to confront maybe a world that's passed them by or men who feel, well, you're going to describe it better than I am. - No, no, you keep going. I want to hear how you start. (laughing) - No, you're totally right. - Men like me who are masculine and never lose. (laughing) - I'm going to do. Oh, actually, I can read from a New York Times review. - Okay. - This is shit, it says. - No, it's an elementary. (laughing) - It's a very interesting review. - Oh, I haven't read that one yet. - Oh no, this is the New York Times. What a piece of shit. Shitty, shitty, shitty shit. What the hell? - My mom wrote that. (laughing) - I thought this was in my toilet, but it was, no, it's a book. No, New York Times review. Some of the stories fit neatly into the canon of wounded protagonists who lash out. Others tip toward a quieter emotional depth. I'll be laced with obscenity and the occasional violent outburst. They're all undeniably the work of a storyteller interested in entertaining while also poking at what makes men tick and then go boom. Which is, yeah, I'd buy that book. (laughing) You'd write that book. - I don't have to, 'cause I don't have to, 'cause you gave me one for free. (laughing) Not for free. (laughing) I need the Ben Moe. - No, it's coming, it's coming. 'Cause I'm real good with tech. (laughing) But this comes out like, you're very, you're so good and I'm going back to even if, you know, your first work, foot fist weigh and through everything you've done at, and also, you know, Donald Duck. Like, people who are, you know, assertive male characters that are also pissed off and frustrated because things aren't working out. And that seems to be this area that you love exploring. And now you've got this really terrific book of short stories that tackles that. Yeah, it's just, you know, it's an extension, I feel like, like what you were saying about the work I've done in TV, like, this kind of came to me 'cause I really just wanted to see, could I do that and deliver that same experience, that same vibe, the same level of story time, could I do it in a totally different format? And that was kind of why I entered this. And, you know, even the way the stories are sort of structured, like, they start, in essence, with like a cold open and the title of the story, like, comes up later in the story. Yeah. And so it was kind of a way of me sort of trying to translate what I, I mean, I've written at this point like over 80 episodes of TV. Yeah. And so it trains your brain to work in a certain way when it comes to storytelling. And I was just trying to use some of the stuff I learned doing that to just put it into a totally new endeavor. Also, it feels to like, if you're writing episodic television as you have, you know, brilliantly over the years, you've got these characters, you wanna get multiple seasons and you set up your own rules and you set up who your, you know, protagonist are and your side characters. And then that's what you've got to work with over and over and over and over again. And with a project like this, you can have an idea explore it in a short story. Totally. And then pivot, say, okay, I'm done with that. Now it's gonna be about a robot. Now it's gonna be about a magician who's suspended in a box in a mall and gets in over his head. Now it's gonna be about a sitcom actor who takes revenge on the coyote that killed his pet. Like you, you, you're working in a shorter form, but you can go nuts, which is great. You can go nuts. And, you know, gemstones, I was writing on that for, you know, seven years basically. And it was so much fun and it was fun writing for all those characters in that world that we established was a ton of fun. And it's weird, you know, like when you, when you've worked that long on something once it's over, it is like almost like a breakup. It's like getting over a relationship or something that I wanted to write more, but I felt like I ain't trying to get into anything too serious. I just need, I need to get in and out. I just need some short stories, you know? I felt like I couldn't like commit myself to telling a story that was gonna take that much time, you know? And so the idea was like, I think there's just a lot of stories I wanna tell. And this allowed that to happen where you didn't have to think of the story of like, well, will this have legs for four years? Will this, you know, when you tell this one episode, it has to connect to six other episodes that tell a story. It's like you could enter it, start it, and take it to completion and one sitting. And yeah, it was, it was a lot of fun. And I think after writing so much TV, it was, yeah, it was sort of a cleanse that I needed. - Well, now is this, what is your process? I know it sounds like a boring question, but to me, it's fascinating. Do you write these stories here and there to just sit down to write a collection of short stories? - You know, I started the, I think there's only like, maybe one or two of them that are from this, but how I even began even writing in this format was when we were writing Vice Principles, it was, we wrote both of those seasons in one year. So it was one solid year of just working on that morning, noon and night, and it was the, I was about, I think about five months in, I was feeling that thing, I'm like, oh, I love these guys, but fuck, yeah, you have to do more with these guys. - You're locked in a room, mentally, with these few characters, and you're just trying, and it becomes a puzzle figuring it all out. And I was just sort of like, the idea of anything else felt appealing. So I just, I start this thing, we're in the morning, before I'd go into the writer's room, I would just freehand write like anything I wanted, and I would just get to about three or four pages, and I would stop it. And I had no ambitions for what any of it would be. It didn't have to be anything, I didn't have to continue the same story, just whatever idea I wanted to, I would just let myself write that. And I did that for the rest of that year, I ended up filling up like four books full of just all this stuff, and I put it away, and didn't go back to any of it, and it really did kind of help my brain, as I was writing it by Sprintz, to help me exercise different ideas, and get things out, and kind of stay excited when I would go into the writer's room. And then anyway, I guess it was around 2020, I just pulled those books out and looked at them for the first time. Was there anything in here that was worth anything, and most of it sucked, but there were a few things that just kind of got my imagination going, or I was like, oh, it'd kind of been interesting if this thing continued, or if I wrote more on this, I would do this with it. And so that was kind of the beginning of it. I pulled out of those books probably about, maybe eight to 10 of the little snippets of stories, and then started focusing on expanding those things. And then as I did that, I ended up getting rid of most of them. I kept one or two, and then I just kind of was like, I want to do this, I want to try to create a book that I put this sort of level of thought into. And then that just became, I was kind of teaching myself how to do it. I thought the big difference between doing this, and then writing a script is with the script, there's always someone else really talented is going to come in to make it better. Whether it's an actor is going to come in, or the DP is going to make it look cool, and it was kind of interesting to have it where you're like, oh, I'm just writing this, and then I really need to go, I need to do all that stuff myself. I need to make sure that this is translated to people the way I'm imagining it. - Ernest Hemingway didn't say, oh, that's what I got, punch it up. - Yeah, give it a little to you. - The thought will be really nice. - Yeah, yeah. Let's focus on this one story, Institute of Men. It's because it's a fascinating idea. Do you want to talk about it a little bit? It's a story about a guy who is getting self-conscious about his hairline as we're seeing. He's losing his hair. And he's worried a coworker of his thinks that he has gollum-esque features in that if he loses his hair, it really could be bad for him. You know, so he starts to, he's like looking for a solution. And he kind of sees this ad for this place called the Institute of Men and he decides to sign up. And then he goes to this place and it's a little unorthodox there. There's some strange questions. They ask him and it's a very odd procedure that he has to kind of sign a way to. And then it's one of those monkey-paw situations. He gets hair, but there's a price. That's what there's little things in it that remind me of some of the sort of comedy slash horror things we've been talking about where, you know, he has to fill out, you know, when you're going to get a medical procedure, you have to fill out a questionnaire. And the questions are just really, yeah. They're, they're not things that you would normally see on a medical questionnaire. It should have been the first red flag, yeah, they're, they're asking him things like how many friends he has and the last time he cried. It was the last time he cried. Yeah, when it would have you been in a fight. It's so funny because I've had ideas over the years for a little strange things that it's like, it's not a comedy sketch, it's just a concept. It's kind of freaky, but I'd like to expand on it more and write it out. But, you know, I've never, I don't know, never, I've never done it. It's, it's why I mean, I've been a massive fan of yours. And then when you did this, I was like, no, this man, this man, this man did the thing. See, I have never been able to do it. If an idiot like me could do it, Tony. That's, that is not how I, that is not how, that's not how I think about it. But it's, it's really exceptional. And, and also it has to just feel, to have a book on the shelf. I mean, there, there are a lot of celebrity, famous people toss off books. And it's, that's not what this is. Do you know what I mean? Yeah, no, I, I worked, it's hard on this as I would on any of this, any of the shows I've worked on. I mean, I was like living and breathing it for the last year. And, you know, the craziest part about it is like you, you finish it and then you turn it in. And then it's like the rewriting it where it's like, you know, you rewrite an episode of TV, it's 30 pages like, I can get through this in a day or two. You get the notes and you look at it like, this is like a 400 page talk to me. I got to rewrite this. Where the hell do I even start? I don't even know if I can read this fucking thing in a month. You know, but then you, you do, you get down into it where you do just start, it just happens. I just, I went away and just left my computer on and just sort of like would just paste back and forth. Like just, just approaching it, sentence at a time, Danny, like don't get intimidated by the, by the weight of it. Then it does start to strip away. You do start to just like, you're like Neo in the matrix. Like get rid of that, put that in, change that. You could just start doing it. Yeah. I've never had that. I'll show you. I've never been Neo in that. I'm Kiano and point right. That's who I am. So what is, okay, this, what are you working on now? Because this, this project is done. And I hate to say, okay, what else you got? You know, what have you done for me lately? I've been working on something I'm pretty excited about. You know, I approached Paramount last year about trying to relaunch GI Joe for them as a feature. Yeah. Talk about cartoons, dog. And so, yeah, the guys are right. Jim Sons with Jeff Raleigh and John Couture. We jammed, we jammed out this script that Paramount's excited about. And we're going to try to, that's what we're trying to make next year. Wow, you can't say anything, huh? Yeah, I can't say, you know what? It's not a comedy. It's like a grounded action movie. Oh my God. You know, in the comics, there's this town Springfield that is like secretly co-er lives there. I have that original comic. Yeah, I loved it. And so our story takes place there. And I mean, Matt's going to follow you home. Yeah, you got to. Make sure you watch the gate close behind you when you get home, but don't just assume that no one's walking in after you. But don't worry, I'll be dressed like Duke from GI Joe. You're going to go to shut the refrigerator in a night. That's where he's there. That was like the Halloween thing of like feeling like insane writing the shape. This was like, I, when I'm like right in the climax of it and we're sitting here and I'm putting things like Cobra Commander in snake ice fighting. I just had a like stop and like, go downstairs with my wife. And I'm like, this is nuts. I used to do this when I was a kid every day. Oh, and make these guys fight each other. Now I'm writing that shit. You're living my life. I'm so excited. Wow, tears of blood from that girl. Yeah, I do think that and I chuck it up to pure luck, but there are so many times now where I'm doing something and I realize this is how I goofed around as a kid. And now I'm doing it and people are saying, and cut, nicely done. I'm not getting yelled at. Yeah, they're not telling you to clean up your toys. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's all fine. Let's get back to Geo Joe. Walton Goggins, I have to ask you about Walton Goggins because you know, I know him a bit and he's been here. He's just a fascinating creature. He really is. I mean, and I mean, you must have the second you saw him do anything thought like, oh, I got to know that guy. 100%. Because he's such a, he's like a Walton Goggins is a character you would create. I mean, the person who got the universe pushed us together. Yeah, I love him so much. He's one of my best friends. And yeah, I mean, since the very first time we worked together in vice principals, him and I have just had such a fast friendship. And you know, we went to, we took our families to grease together last year and just hilarious. Yeah, he's just so funny and so good. He was here to do the podcast. I don't know if you remember this, but he got here a little bit early. And then his one of his people said, Walton's very tired. He's going to take a power nap for five minutes. And he went into that little office where you were sitting, that little green room with the couches and the sliding door that goes outside. And I walked by and he's asleep on the couch. But he looked like Dracula sleeping in his casket. He was like, like this and his eyes were closed. And he slept really hard for exactly five minutes. And then came in here. And he gave us a full blast to the Goggins. I love it. He gave us full Goggins, full metal Goggins. Full metal Goggins. Yeah. When we went to grease last year, it's like, you know, I mean, he's a force and it was awesome walking around grease. Everyone recognized him. He had such a stellar year with white lotus. And everyone was coming up and Walton was dressed for it. I mean, what we would go out and Walton is like in full white linens. And then, you know, I'm there with my kids. They're wearing like crocs, you know, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. We'll take this photo. We'll take the photo for you. We go to these beach clubs and it's like everyone in his family are just like, finally dressed. It just looked like they're off the magazine. I just got my little redneck kids in New York. Sitting here with bad sun tans. So he's like Aristotle, O'Nassus, and Jackie O'Nassus walking around grease off the yacht. And then you guys-- And I'm like, you know, Randy Quaid and, you know, vacation. It's like, wait for me. You're like, I'm going to get them Duke boys. Wow. I wish I could have-- again, I would just want to shoot that. I just want to see the b-roll of you guys walking around having a killer time. Unbelievable. Well, this has been a huge shot in the arm. I didn't even need a shot in the arm today. But I was-- I do this sometimes. I'll be driving in. And I think, hey, I get to see Danny McBride today. And I love his book, and so happy for him, and just-- I just love talking to you and getting any time to hang with you. And I will take you up on your promise to just the three of us, you me, Sturgel Simpson. I'll coordinate it. I'll pay for the meal. You guys pick the Outback Steakhouse. I'd love that. And we'll go there. And if Goggin wants to drop by at some point-- We'll bring him to him. He might-- we might have to change what we're wearing, if he comes. We're not going to have to go out there again. Well, Danny, thank you for dropping in, and congrats on the book. I love it, "Thrilling Tales of Modern Men." Awesome. Thank you. This won't air. Great. That's fine. [MUSIC PLAYING] Here we are. We're talking about Blaze Tax Saga. This is part four, and maybe an ongoing series, and hopefully it ends well. Blaze, along with his mother, are part of a criminal gang, where Blaze was able to write off his various nerd collections of swords, lightsabers, Darth Vader helmets, whatever else he can think of. He was writing them off because he was bringing them up on the podcast. And if the internal revenue service is listening, and I think they should be, I think he should be investigated. And now you were a stranger to all of this math. I added-- Because you were out in, I think, a nine-month fraternity leave. Which is fine. You will. We began with conception and then ended with delivery and ended with her starting at a very good college in the Northeast. But now you so you have a fresh approach to all this we haven't heard your opinions. So you speak you listen to what Blay was up to and what do you think? Well, God, you know, I love you, Blay. And this only comes out of concern. Oh, boy. You know, it's not going to be good when you hear that. I'm just concerned that you're doing things backwards that you know what I mean? That you're coming on and saying that I should after you've purchased these like, oh, I'm going to mention them now as opposed to having an actual solid reason for bringing them on the show, which I think would justify a write off. Uh huh. Yeah. Well, how can I bring them up if I don't already own them? Well, I think they have to be organically. This is organic. He talked about the pins. No one needed to mention the brand. You need to mention the brand. Why'd you say this is called what's it called again? No, it's called it. It's called the it's called the Kindle scribe. Yeah. By Amazon. Okay. Oh boy. I find it suspicious that you give lots of labels. You give a lot of. This is how what this is what it's called. This is where it's available. I think it's a really reasonable price. Get yours now. You click to proceed to cart. You said what kind of pen you had. You said it's an Aurora pen. It's really nice that you didn't you say the kind of pen. I did say that. Okay. I was writing it off. I don't know. I was a gift. It's a gift. It's a gift. No, I'm not writing it off. But I think the difference is if I was to say like, oh, I was taking out the trash last night, hefty trash bags. They are a good trash bag. Okay. You know the difference. You know the difference, which is I just said, this is a nice pen. It's an Aurora. I'm not expecting anything from Aurora. Were they to give me something which would be very nice if I got a free pen from Aurora? I would accept it, but I would never mention it on air. No, I know. Although I might I probably would Aurora. But anyway, that's not what I would very good pens. It's just a pen that I use. And it's a pen that I have right now on camera. You know that you can't write with it normally. Well, you have to write on an angle. No, a fan's Aurora, but what the fuck? I'll show you. You're right. You're right. How that thing into a hefty trash bag. When I watched how you tried to write with this, I was a bald. Because listen, you just came right down straight. It was a 90 degree angle. It was completely perpendicular. And I felt I was like, Oh, my goodness. And 11-year-old me was a bald. Oh, no. That is that how I want to hold a pen and pen. The one with the one who wants the stamp, that 11-year-old version of you. How I want to, how I want to was a void stamp. I really wish I could, you know, impress that 11-year-old version of you. When you go out with me stamp. Yeah. Hey, you like stamps? A rubber stamp. It's really fun. And you get to like with real authority safe. Oh, no. Remit. I wanted to remit stamp. So now. What? What me? No. Blay. Remember? I get it. I get it. Oh, yeah. Rooers are great. I want you. Yeah. I want to do a quick shut up. And then onward to play. Wait, I just don't want to see anything happen to you. That's all I can. Thank you. I appreciate it. I do want to see something. I would be delighted if you and your mother who does your taxes for reasons that still escape me. Even though she's not a tax person. She gets you on the phone. And then she calls. What is it? She's got a turbo tax. She calls turbo tax. And you know, calls turbo tax. You know, I'm doing your part for you. Calls turbo tax. Who calls turbo tax? I did that for you as a gift to you. I was just showing you that I can do your role in this podcast too. If you know, I want that argument with my hub. You're writing a grugglies. By Amazon readily available. I think it's a good price. I know what you're up to. I see what you're doing. And you leaned in and you also still do the thing we've talked to you about, which is you put your mouth over the mic. Okay. Yeah. Like you're eating a giant killbasa. And you shout into it. He's grabbing it too. He grabbed it. What is the grabbing about? What do you grab? Because Eduardo and I share no one likes you. We share a mic. No, I was just saying we share a mic. So I need to grab the mic to pull it over to me. Why are you yelling? I don't know. I'm trying to take. Can I just in defense? The reason why I say what it is is not to write things off. I'm not going to write this off. It's in case people are like, oh, that's pretty cool. Where can I get that? That's pretty. I like that product. I would like to buy it also. Uh-oh. So that's where your role here is on the on the podcast is to direct people towards items that are in your life that they have. There's no affiliate link where you get a percentage. Yeah. We could have an affiliate link from the podcast maker. I like paper. Yes. And I like the idea that and I'm never going to be someone that wants to doodle and then press a button and it goes into the cloud. Okay. Because guess what? You think you're saving paper. But now server farms have to handle my doodles and we're burning valuable energy. We're burning fossil fuels. Yeah. So that somewhere a server farm can hang onto my little guy that's going bimbo, bimbo, bimbo. But you can you can lose your doodles. And this is my notes are being saved forever. That's important. And you know what? It's important that your thoughts are saved. Blay for all of time. Well, I've never said anything. It's more ridiculous. We're going to end there. But Blay, I've got my eye on you. I think you're up to no good. And if the IRS is listening, his name is Aaron Blair. I think that's the thing that was the IRS has been gutted. So you're probably saying, oh, we can all just do it. And you know what? The worst criminals like Blay are going to get away with murder. It's like tax fury road right now. Just go for it. Go for it. Go for it. Well, if that's the message of our podcast today, it's if you're thinking of cheating on your taxes, just go for it. Let's do it. Conan O'Brien needs a friend with Conan O'Brien, Sonom of Session and Mac Gourley. Produced by me, Mac Gourley. Executive produced by Adam Sachs, Jeff Ross, and Nick Leo. Themesong by the White Stripes. Incidental music by Jimmy Vivino. Take it away, Jimmy. Our supervising producer is Aaron Blair and our associate talent producer is Jennifer Samples. Engineering and mixing by Eduardo Perez and Brendan Burns. Additional production support by Mars Melnick. Talent booking by Paula Davis, Gina Batista, and BritCon. You can rate and review this show on Apple Podcasts and you might find your review read on a future episode. Got a question for Conan? Call the Team Coco Hotline at 669-587-2847 and leave a message. It too could be featured on a future episode. You can also get three free months of Sirius XM when you sign up at SiriusXM.com/Colon. And if you haven't already, please subscribe to Conan O'Brien Needs A Friend wherever fine podcasts are down the road.