Once We Were Ten-Year Olds | Episode 18

I know I got a lot from cartoons.

Love them.

You're watching, you're laughing very hard,

you're eating cereal full of sugar,

your brain is trying to grow,

and it warps it in a certain way.

I think it melts it into it.

That's what happened to me.

You think that's the root cause of your?

Yes, I will think of what to be calling your condition.

Hammy.

Hamness.

Haminess.

It's sort of getting hammy.

Once we were spacemen,

thank man.

I tend to play weird people.

Usually aliens and robots and things

that don't have romance.

I once didn't get a job

where they were looking for a Nathan Filion type.

Once we were spacemen,

once we were spacemen.

Alex, do the thing.

Well, we were spacemen.

And we still are floating in space,

lost in the darkness,

like some tossed away space trash,

calling for help, help us.

Tell my life I love her very much,

she knows.

Where's the Alan Tudor to be, the Filion?

Or where's the Alan Tudor to be, the Alan Tudor to be?

Space trash.

Hey, buddy.

Good morning, Alan.

I have a question.

This show's called Space trash.

Yes, go on.

You have a question?

Do you plan these ahead of time?

You said it all?

Thank God no, because if that was planned,

I'm in trouble.

That is a, that is just,

I don't know, electric currents

finding their way through different brain cells

and seeing what comes out.

And please, the results I find intensely satisfying.

Oh, good.

And Christmas mile every time.

Alan, I have a question.

Yes.

Do you sometimes look at your job

and just the life you're leading,

and the things that you're doing,

and you think, what the hell?

And like, what would the 10-year-old version of Alan

think about your life presently right now today?

I think the 10-year-old me would be very happy.

You know, I didn't die by quicksand,

which was a big fear for our generation.

Yeah, that was a huge big deal.

Yeah, quicksand.

That I was doing animation would be a huge thing

because I loved cartoons so much.

I mean, loved cartoons.

I think a lot of young kids like cartoons and animations.

I still do.

Yeah, but we had the Saturday morning cartoon.

Did you have that in Canada?

Yes.

When I grew up, I had very few channels.

We didn't have cable.

We had channel three, five, and 13, and 12 was at French.

But there were some cartoons you could catch.

We also saw a lot of the,

was a Sid and Marty Croft, like, Land of the Lost.

You saw those?

Yeah.

Oh, see.

Karissa's been telling me you guys didn't get those.

She just wasn't hip enough to be lost.

She wasn't old enough.

Right, she's a little younger.

By two years.

By two years.

So Sid and Marty Croft, they made all these little shows.

And they were all, you could tell us,

did Marty Croft show just by the opening.

They always had really good songs.

But far out space nuts was one of my favorites,

Jim Neighbors and Ruth Busy.

And they had a horse dog named Dorsey.

And they came and picked up two kids.

And they were robots.

The seed goes back, that's why I imprinted on robots.

You only want to remember, is Land of the Lost.

The Sleeced House, that's the only one I really remember.

We also had a version of Swiss family Robinson.

That was, it had to be a Canadian production.

Was it racist?

Why would you say that?

I just think I feel like that's something that would lend itself

to kind of like my guy Friday or something.

Wasn't that a, I mean, I might be confusing.

Yeah, Friday was a different,

with an important novel of the old.

Yeah, that's not Swiss family Robinson.

The novel is Robinson Crusoe.

So they, they, they drank Swiss hot cocoa.

It was France and Ernest.

Oh, the two brothers.

It sounded racist from, it's getting even worse.

Yeah.

What did they do?

Yeah, exactly.

What did they do?

I remember them trouncing about a set that was sand and tropical plants, but clearly

they were working with a small area and just crowding a lot of plants in there, like coming

through bushes.

That's your set.

You come through the bushes and you come to this clearing and it's a small clearing.

Compared to Gilligan's Island, Gilligan's Island for me was the epitome of, man, I want

to live someplace tropical like that.

I want to sleep in a hammock every night.

I think that's right.

Cool.

And like for being stranded on an island, those guys had it pretty good.

Those, those huts.

They were so beautiful.

Right.

It's tropical.

I guess that's where the racist idea comes in from, like who's island was it?

I don't know.

Maybe it's just the, just the sign of the times that that's my first question.

It seems like you get a, a group of white people on the island seem to be running it and

I go, hmm, what's your source of money?

Who did you take it from?

Didn't Marty Croft, they had the far out space nuts.

There was very little racism, it was, that was a Gilligan's Island knockoff.

It was about two guys who are putting food on the rocket ship and then instead of their

checking, did you get this?

Yes.

Did you get breakfast?

Yes.

Did we get the lunch?

Lunch?

Copy lunch.

That's right.

Lunch.

No, I said lunch.

Not lunch.

No.

And that's the whole idea of the show.

Breakfast, lunch, lunch and lunch.

They land on a planet every episode and every aliens found it the same.

They would just put their voices through this kind of mix of, of, of, audio distortion.

They're all nuts, bring me aliens to me.

And there was, of course, the one that a lot of people know are, are the bugalus, the

weird Australian.

There were bugs and it was like a record place and they, they were a band.

There was also, Wichipu, was Wichipu one of them?

Yes, Wichipu was in Buggaloo.

She was the, she was bat, or was Wichipu was in, it was called Lidsville originally because

that was, that's what you bought weed in.

But it's pop the magic, no, it was called, there's people out there right now who are listening

who are just jumping at the bit to say, yeah, you are getting this wrong.

Let's ask the computer what's the name of it.

Wichipu was a character on HR puff and stuff.

Thank you.

Dr. Schringer was a big one.

Sigmund the steam monster.

Sid Martin Rock put out so many, Oh, a, an Electro Man and Dina girl.

Oh, my God.

Oh, that one I remember.

Yes.

Yeah.

What are kids watching now?

What's Saturday morning stuff now?

I mean, SpongeBob Squarepants clearly.

Right.

Is that, is a Saturday morning?

No.

My guess is they're just like playing some video games where they kill and,

are there Saturday morning cartoons anymore?

Is that, is that like an event?

Bugs Bunny.

Yeah.

We watched Bugs Bunny.

That was like the loony tunes.

That was when Daffy Duck and Elmer Fud would shoot people in the face, like dropping

anbles on heads and lots of life.

You don't see on TV anymore.

Yeah.

Bugs Bunny would dress up like a woman.

It was all very, you know, when he wanted to get, he'd get whoever it was, whether it

was Elmer Fud or there was the one where there's the big monster, the big orange monster

with sneakers.

Yes.

The big orange monster was named Gossamer.

Monsters tell the most interesting stories.

This isn't Gary.

Gary the monster.

I said, his name was Gossamer.

And they would use all the stars from Warner Brothers at the time.

The people that they would see at the commissary, you'd see Humphrey Bogart.

You'd see all the people who were in films at that time would be in Lorne McCall.

I remember as a kid being like, you'd see these caricature faces and like,

I guess I understood they were supposed to be people, but I didn't know who they were.

Yeah.

You didn't know the rest of them.

They smoked cigarettes.

Our cartoons did crazy stuff.

You know, Timothy Sam, I love that.

I believe, because back in the day, during that time, the comedy that was happening in

the world was kind of off of Vaudeville and Broadway.

And it had a one, two, three punch, and it had a certain pacing to it and a delivery.

And I wonder if people who came up watching Brennan Stimpy, it seemed like that

influenced a lot of people, a lot of young people, all of the hyper-focus and the extreme

anger and extended moments of, er, er, then it goes farther and then closer and closer

and closer.

Tim Robinson does a lot of that stuff, and I think you should leave in all of his projects

that he's doing.

I feel like that's another pacing to comedy that is, I don't know, may have come from cartoons,

but I know I got a lot from cartoons.

Love them.

Watching, you're laughing very hard, you're eating cereal full of sugar.

Your brain is trying to grow and it warps it in a certain way.

I think it melts it into it.

That's what happened to me.

You think that's the root cause of your?

Yes.

I will think of what it would be called in your condition.

Hammy.

Hamness.

Haminess.

It's sort of getting hammy.

What was your sugar cereal, by the way?

Oh.

You know what I love?

I love a little cinnamon life.

Not a cinnamon life.

Not the most sugary, but you put sugar on it then.

Yeah.

Cinnamon life.

I think we used to add sugar twin, I think that was our, we didn't use sugar, but we

used a sugar very sweet and it's sweet in the milk like crazy, but how do you know

Cheerios was my, any comb and really?

Cheerios.

Any marshmallows here?

Captain Crunch was the one that would like, murder your mouth.

Oh yeah.

Oh.

Would destroy the roof of your mouth.

And there was sort of a bunch of crappy cereals that were basically the same corn mixture.

They were just rough corn sand paper that you ate for breakfast.

Yeah.

Yeah.

It would, it would strip pain off of a warship, I think.

How?

We got a little bit distracted, but because when you were 10 years old, we got to get

cartoons, but 10 year old Alan Tudig is looking at your present day careers.

Oh.

Right.

What would you think of the car you drive?

Well, the car I drive is yours.

Currently, I don't have a car, but the car you own is, it's in Vancouver, right?

Yeah, I do.

We own a car.

So he would, he'd be happy about that car and he'd say, what's a lease?

And he would have a very short attention span because of all the sugar cereal.

He'd be looking at all your dogs and say, what's, what's missing in your life?

Absolutely.

We have three dogs now, three dogs, three dogs.

That is the equivalent of a cat lady, but it's not gender specific and, you know, we got

too many dogs.

Yes.

Three dogs is equal to seven cats.

Yes.

I think that's right.

You know how many people have three dogs in New York, six, six.

Four of them are not liked and the other two people are leery of because you don't, no

one can have that.

I'm going to be walking three dogs down the street and people can say, oh, hey, can

I get your number?

I've been looking for a walking service because no one is walking three dogs that would

possibly be all theirs.

What would tenured Alan think about Alan's house in Los Angeles?

I'd like a lot.

Like a lot.

Because I have a lot of cool stuff around.

It's visually interesting.

I've often said that about like when people bring their children over when they're really

young, it's like a lot of my stuff looks like toys, but don't touch their antiques.

They tend to be like, you know, a sign like a cool, like I got this cool eyeglasses, old

antique eyeglasses sign.

I've been one one for a while.

They're like eyeglasses and they got eyes in them painted.

And so when you hang it on a wall, it's like your wall has eyes.

So it's pretty cool.

Your wall is looking at you.

So that looks like something for a child, I would think at least my ten-year-old self would

be like, oh, let me get my peanut butter fingers on that.

Tell me, do you still have the, your kitchen has like a service bar, like a bar you can

decide to look to?

Is it still there?

The one made of bowling lane?

The bowling lane was removed, I replaced it with butcher block because the thing is, turns

out, I bought a bowling alley lane from this place in Florida.

You give them real cheap there.

This guy shipped me one.

And so then I gave it to a builder and I got my buddy Mark Baker who I grew up with down

in Albuquerque if you need a good architect.

He drew me up some plans to make this bowling alley, it was a whole thing anyway.

It started at the floor, it came up, it went across as a counter, it went up the wall,

and then up your ceiling a little bit, and you see the bowling lane marks on the wood

itself.

Like the ones you line up your ball with.

Yeah.

I've never seen a builder so angry at me when I handed him the wood because he's like,

this is a floor.

I'm like, yeah, but we're going to use it as this.

He's like, there's nails all through this.

He's like, he was trying to sand it and broke a couple of sanders and it was mad at

me.

Anyway, it lasted for a long time, but when we redid the kitchen, they had to remove some

of it and then they're like, we're not, let's just use better wood.

And that was what the other guy had been saying, he's like, can't I just put maple in here?

Like no, novelty man, do you know the price of novelty?

You can't put a price on it.

This is a bowling alley, but we're using it as a counter.

You also had a wall of yardsticks.

Yes.

Yes, yes.

I took it down just the other day.

I removed it.

That's a long time.

It's been up.

Yeah.

Well, I moved it.

It was in one place and then, man, yeah, I bought a chandelier and it ruined everything.

Ruined everything.

I bought a chandelier.

I thought in an antique store that was going out of business, I'm not a chandelier antique

guy.

I'm usually not even in those kinds of antique stores.

I'm in the antique stores that go, people go into, they're like, why is it smell so bad

in here?

And this is just eventually junk.

That's where I get excited in those places because I'm finding weird junk and things

that are no longer used in society, like close foot measuring tools, a briadic device.

Anyway, things that have come and gone that are obsolete now, but it was 19th century chandelier,

crystal from Italy and the guy was like, they don't even meek these anymore.

You can't get this if you break one piece of that, it will not be able to replace these.

And you have to get a passport to bring antiques like this over from Italy and they won't

even give you a passport from this beautiful light.

And we walked out of there and I thought about it for a week and a half and then we went

back when it was half off.

And we hung it above my cool wood table right by my cool yardstick wall and the snotty

chandelier said, I will not to be by this ugly table and this ugly wall.

So we got a fancy table and then it made the wall even look worse.

So then we had to tear down which tore down the whole wall and move the yardsticks.

That thing cost me so much money trying to bring my house up to the chandelier.

Yeah.

It demanded more excellence.

Yeah.

It's a snooty Italian piece of crystal and lots of crystal and we still have it.

It's going to end up in New York.

But you know what?

We're moving into a building that was born about the time.

The building was born around the same time that chandelier was born.

So I think it's going to be a good marriage.

So ten-year-old Alan, my ten-year-old, let's say what the hell chandelier is this?

Cares even less about chandeliers.

Yeah.

The house that I always really loved was it's a very small item.

It's a frame with what looks to be like a dissected frog in it.

Oh yeah.

But and it's like pinned open so you can see all the innards but it was crocheted.

It's a little wool model of a dissected frog.

Yes.

And that kind of epitomizes you for me, Alan.

And this is actually something we share.

I like weird little stuff like that.

Of course kind of goes towards the, I don't want to say grotesque, certainly not grotesque.

What grotesque?

Grotesque.

Like I like quirky stuff but macabre, macabre, yes, yes, let's use that word.

Okay.

I do have goofy weird stuff around my house.

Did ten-year-old Alan have a plan?

Like did he have a dream?

When I grow up, I sure hope I blank it blank.

And then something like that has been fulfilled in any way.

I think I've wanted to be an actor.

I always was trying to get into the talent show.

Did you guys have talent shows in like-

We did.

I mean in high school like-

My brother was the performer as I was growing up.

He was musically inclined.

He could play piano and guitar.

You couldn't be his backup singer?

I, you know, I think I didn't have a lot of interest be-

You know when you're the younger brother, you're searching for your own identity.

You want something that sets you apart.

I think that's, I told you, I think that's why I got the unicycle.

Yeah.

Did you possibly win hearts and minds riding that across a stage in elementary school?

No.

Unicycle.

Okay.

Did you perform in any of the talent shows?

In high school.

In high school.

What was your talent?

We did Monty Python sketches.

Really?

Yeah.

We did.

Oh wow.

And we also emceeed a couple of them.

So there was three of us.

Who's this we?

Nathan Mark and Jesse.

This is your poffy.

There's my mind.

Yeah, exactly.

We all shared a similar sense of humor.

We did some, we used to do like student council announcements and stuff like that.

But yeah, it was Monty Python sketches.

Do you remember which ones you did?

Oh yeah.

Which is we did the dead parrot sketch, I want to say?

No, Albatross.

Albatross?

And some of the vendor in the audience was trying to sell an Albatross.

That's pretty cool.

Yeah.

We did the rich men sketch.

The what?

The rich men sketched with the four rich men sitting around talking about how we used

to have it.

We'll judge.

Yeah.

And every story got worse.

Yeah.

We did that sketch.

We did some sirenous live sketches, I think.

Yeah, we just took sketches from stuff that we admired and did those with the accents

unexplicably.

I'm sorry for this interruption.

This is Nathan.

Unexplicably is not a word.

I would like to say, I know it is not a word and I have no idea why I said that.

The correct word is inexplicably, please don't use unexplicably because of me.

I now return you to your podcast.

I auditioned every year to be in the talent show.

We only had it in K through five and then that was over.

And six, seven, eight, great.

There were actual plays being put on that were not great plays, but that's I got into

plays then.

What was your talent that you wanted to, like you said, I tried to get into it.

Sounds like they said, no, Alan, no.

They said no, Alan, every time.

What was your, like, but I want to do this, well, obviously lip syncing to Greece songs

as an old woman and then kind of stripping off all my old woman garb and throwing my

cane down when I really got into the song.

The kids, whatever I would do, the kids that I did it in front of would howl and the

teacher go, there's no way we're putting them on stage.

And I also, I was big into lip syncing and fake guitar playing this dumb diddy from K

Tell Records.

It was called, I'm a nut, the song, I'm a nut, you remember I'm a nut, it was that guy.

He did also it's a cookie songs, I'm a nut, I'm a nut.

So that's sadly I would get in front of my fellow students and go, look at me, I'm a

nut, I'm a nut.

And they would go, that's really no talent at all.

And I'd sit down.

Was this a solo performance, you would, these, these, that was a solo performance.

The Greece one was done with Tony Sikowski, he and I were a team into seventh grade.

We teamed up.

Where's Tony now?

He's still in Texas, he's still in Texas.

Did he pursue the, no, Tony was, we had a great time.

But I feel like I forced him into things.

We're doing young Frankenstein.

You are I Gore, I am young Frankenstein, I did that with him.

But we did, there were speech tournaments in sixth, seventh and eighth grade.

That's where Tony and I really want a lot of trophies.

And we, there was like, there was a contest, you would have loved this, TV commercial.

That was something you competed in, you made up a product and you would put on a TV commercial

that would have to be three minutes long.

So we had macho hair, which was like hair that was, that you, like, that you would get

it Michaels or whatever, these crafty craft hair.

And you ripped it off, you could grow immediate hair and the women loved you.

And you could rip it off and hand it to them and it would grow right back.

One year it was the Swiss army cow chip.

I looked out there at my fields and I ain't got nothing, all I got is cow chips.

And then it came to me.

So I won't, when I'm looking at cow chips, it makes me hungry.

So I need a spoon and a fork and a, and anyway, I made cow fake cow chips with insulation,

you know, that squirt insulation that expands, almost like whipped cream on a paper plate.

You just do a little cow pie, paint it brown.

And then on the back there were fork knife, this, that it was a weapon.

It was all this stuff.

And then you'd write a jingle and you'd sing the jingle and we'd win trophies.

And then you could do improv and you would do group improv and improv is what they called

it was just the one person thing.

You have one minute with a subject and I would always choose a character to do it in and

just make a story from a character's point of view and I'd won a lot of trophies.

And that's how I got into acting because I liked, I could never win a trophy through athletic

prowess.

I know you're surprised by that.

I am quite, you're quite fit.

Yeah, yeah.

But evidently sport requires coordination.

Yeah.

Mm-hmm.

The ability to throw different shaped balls, that's not, I don't do that.

Hit balls with sticks, but that's not, I don't do that.

Never really practiced that.

No, kick it, kick it to a specific place.

Is there any part of your life that 10 year old Alan would look at and go, yeah, this

is all great, but I'm going to pass on that part.

You work a lot, like you do actual, like there's the fun part of our job and then there's

like the, oh, this is a bit of a grind part, you do that a lot, the grind part.

Yeah, I'm a character actor, Nathan, as character actors, it's a hustle.

There's a bit of a slog to it.

Although I'm now, I'm really enjoying auditioning, like I like auditioning, maybe I think a 10

year old wouldn't want to do that part.

It's boring, but I think the more time, I think I want to take more time with auditions

and yeah, I really enjoy them.

I really enjoy the process of it.

I got used to doing the same show every year, you can probably relate to this.

When you go on set it, rookie, you step right into your character.

You know this character.

You don't have to, there's not a lot of, let me get into a special place.

You could get somebody, they can throw something at you and you'll be able to pick it up

real fast.

Yeah, yeah.

10, 8 years building a foundation, you don't have to create anything from the ground

up, but in audition, you're ground up every time.

Yeah, it's a whole world.

It's a whole new end when it's a character there.

Like, unless I'll get some offers, they tend to be offers for roles that I've played

before.

Oh, we know he can be a robot because we've seen him robot.

There, there, there, we'll probably be able to do a robot, but when it's anything else,

they need to see it.

But 10 year old me, all 10 year old me want to do is go outside.

What's with my 10 year old would like about my house here is that I have a piece of

canyon attached to my house and I would be down in the canyon getting ticks and loving

it and trying to have adventures.

That's what my 10 year old, well, no, I'll tell you, am I 14 year old me would be surprised

I lived in LA because I went to Los Angeles when I was 14 with my older brother and we

were visiting a friend of my brothers and I had a terrible time.

I had just cut all my hair off, I had a little buzz cut and I was too young and we went to

sea world and my brother, we met three girls.

My brother starts holding hands with one, Quentin is holding hands with the other girl and

the third girl looked at me and said, I'm going to go find my mom.

So I did not like it here.

This place was a place that didn't get me.

You were running around Los Angeles unsupervised as a 14 year old?

Well, Quentin was there, he was 16.

Where were you like in a neighborhood in that?

We went to sea world, he was from the OC and we went to sea world, we went to Universal

Studios.

Like, so we did all that kind of crap.

We went to a DePesh mode concert with Book of Love opening up.

That was fun.

Yeah, that was good.

But this is take your parents go here, we'll drop you off at the gate and see you guys

later.

We'll pick you up in six hours.

My parents dropped us off at DFW Airport in Dallas and we flew to go visit, they were

the Downies, they were our neighbors.

They lived next to Orders and then they moved away to California.

And so my brother was friends with Quentin because they were older, my brother's older

and they had to bring me along.

That's a hell of an adventure for a 14 year old kid.

I enjoyed Universal Studios.

There was a place where you could make your own video and I did, I sang because this is

before you had video cameras everywhere.

So they had it all set up, you could put on a wig, you could do this and that and I sang

the duet to all the girls I've loved before ironically since I was shunned at SeaWorld.

Go play with the sea, you smell like fish.

So I did both Willie Nelson and Julio Glacias parts of to all the girls I've loved before

and they videotaped it and I came home with a pretty good souvenir.

I in my later teen years, I must say, I might have been 17 or 18 maybe 18.

I was the 97th caller to K97 for some contest and I had one tickets to an MC Hammer concert

in Vancouver.

Whoa, whoa.

For young Nathan Phillian, it was Hammer time.

It was, but you can't touch this.

So I, thank you.

So I told my brother I said, hey, for your Christmas gift this year, this is what I'm

giving you.

Because I, you know, I'm unless 18, I wasn't making a lot of money or anything like that.

I was, I was hand them out.

Pick it.

So he and I, well, that was our trip, but he and I went together to Vancouver.

We flew to Vancouver and the radio station affiliate in Vancouver picked us up in a

limousine with a bunch of other concert winners and we went to the MC Hammer concert on Vogue

opened and afterwards we're going to go backstage and meet MC Hammer and they line us all

up and MC Hammer and his entourage walked past him and, hey, nice to see you and kept

walking.

And then they put us back in the limousine or us back to the hotel, which was, I remember

being a very nice hotel.

They kind of leaned over and said to my brother and I said, you guys just, just sit down

over there.

Just sit down right there and said, okay, good night, everybody.

Good night.

Thanks very much for coming.

Just wait over here.

Just wait.

Good night, everybody.

And then kind of shoot everybody off and said, okay, guys, come on, jump back and we've

jumped back in the limousine and they took us to a battle of the bands down, not on

Grandville Island, but with a little Olympic village, isn't it?

And it's kind of a portal.

Yeah, it was kind of a fun, there were some battle of the bands in there and they had

a bunch of Canadian rock and roll artists were there as judges, but they also performed

all together.

It was an incredible.

And we were upstairs in a VIP lounge with free shrimp cocktails and beer and oh my

god, we're a fun night food adventure we had.

No doubt, man.

Yeah.

Well, that was my first kind of experience in Vancouver being like on my own and doing

something.

I think I visited another kid, but I think you're right.

You cannot touch that.

You cannot touch that.

Wow.

Yeah, but MC Hammer will always have that special place in my heart.

To all the girls I've left before, I've traveled in and out my door, I'm glad they came

along.

Who do you glasses?

I celebrate this song.

To all the girls I've left before.

I saw Willie Nelson in concert once, too.

Oh god, really?

It was an accident.

It was the house of blues.

How do you like it?

He was incredible and he put a little twist on everything he sang so that nobody could

sing along.

We were just interesting because he was doing like a little different, saying everything

a little different.

So no one could sing along.

So it was just him singing.

It was great.

I was up on a balcony up on like stage right and kind of great view.

Somebody at the back took their hat off and just did a fling just flew it flew at an

angle curved around right in front of Willie Nelson.

He's playing guitar.

He sees it, goes, whack, catches it, puts it on his head, keeps playing.

And the crowd went crazy.

She would, then he took it off, he threw it back out, threw it, and he, you know, Willie

Nelson always wears the bandana.

He would take off his bandana after every song and throw it out there, grab another bandana,

tighten a loop around the neck of his guitar, take that, put it on his head and then keep

playing.

And then at the end of that song, throw that out there.

He just kept playing, putting on new bandanas and throwing them out to the crowd.

But what a great, he took a little, what I was told was a smoke break to go out to his,

in the middle of the thing to go out to his bus and smoke a little weed and chill out

a little bit.

And Cheryl Crowe came out and performed a couple songs and then they formed a couple

songs together.

And I was, besides myself, I feel like the concert itself is a smoke break.

He's taking a break from smoking.

And that's the only time he stops.

That's the smoke's a lot of weed.

A lot.

That's what I was told.

That's what I was told.

Really strong weed.

I've been told many times where people who have been with him in the van or in his bus.

And 10-year-old Nathan would say, who's Willie Nelson?

No.

But kind of coming back to the 10-year-old version of me, 10-year-old versions of both

of us.

I have an, in my head, I think it took me a little while.

I think I was around 10 or 11 when I said, I'm pretty shy, kid.

I'm pretty much a wallflower.

And it doesn't serve me at all.

Yeah.

I was shy.

Super shy, kid.

Wow.

Fifth grade.

I went to a new school.

There was a class clown, Cameron.

Son of a bitch.

He and I were buddies.

Oh, I mean, great guy.

And then he got sick.

Yeah, he was when I said, I liked him.

He got sick.

You poisoned him.

Yes, move on.

I poisoned him and I stepped into his shoes.

I said, well, we're going to need a class clown.

And I really enjoyed it.

There was like a level of adrenaline with that kind of performing thing.

And you know, you're certain bird in the boundaries.

Like, how do I walk this line of between being entertaining and annoying?

Like, at what point did the teacher go, that's enough.

That's, that's enough.

That's the test.

That's the trick.

That's just like, gosh, I remember I was talking to Adam Baldwin's youngest son,

definitely.

He's the youngest boy.

He's the youngest kid.

He was very little at the time.

This is back in Firefly.

And I said, hey, buddy, how's school going?

And he goes, well, we have a substitute teacher.

And Nathan, subs can be tricky.

He was, he was that kid who had, you know, there was a funny line.

He would say it.

He's not opening.

He'd go for it.

And if you didn't get him, his sense of humor, I could see how, you know, and you

were like, subs are tricky.

He wasn't wrong.

He wasn't wrong.

I remember being a young man and thinking, you know, like, where's the line?

And trying to just get right up to it, but never, never trying to go over it.

You were an over the line guy a lot.

You're very conscientious as a class crown.

That's very good.

I was way past the line, man.

I was bad.

I heard a lot as a kid.

You don't know when to stop.

I heard that a lot.

I heard that again and again, year after year after year after year, sometimes more

strident than other times I heard that.

You don't know when to stop.

Because I had been in situations so many times where I knew I was going past the point

of that I should stop and it worked out.

So I was always trying to find that sweet, sweet spot.

You know what I remember getting admonished for?

I was a good kid.

I was a very good kid.

But I was always accused of being a daydreamer, which clearly was a thing.

Sounds like a good thing.

Also wasting my time practicing my autograph.

And who's laughing now?

What?

No, no, no.

What?

And accepting awards in the mirror with a hairbrush.

What?

That has yet to pay off.

Didn't you?

No.

I mean, maybe there's just that point where you learn, oh, I'm going to have a signature

like mom and dad.

Let me try to figure out what my signature is going to be.

But it was more like-

And you start learning cursive and start-

Yeah.

And loopy letters and stuff.

Yeah.

Yeah.

And I think, yeah, I'm pretty proud of it these days.

But you were practicing for the day that you're going to need to be like, who do I make

this out to?

I think so.

Yeah.

Wow.

Yeah.

Wow.

Nice.

So you knew early on.

Well, I had a dream.

I don't know if I knew, but I certainly had a daydream about it.

I was on Johnny Carson in my mirror, you know, and then Johnny's gone.

It's like, oh, Jay Leno, now I'll be on-

And now I'm going to do it with Letterman.

That went-

Mine was Letterman.

But you, but you were on Letterman.

You fulfilled that dream.

I really, I did.

I really did.

I lived in New York.

Uh-huh.

And I would pass by the Ed Sullivan Theatre and look up at that big old Letterman sign

and say, one day, I'm going to be on that show and I'll know that I've made it.

Not only did I get to go on that, it's a very proud moment for me.

I'm something I really hold dear and he was very kind to me.

I was told like, oh, you never know what he's going to do, but he was extremely kind to

me.

The last time I guessed it on that show, Mr. Letterman said, how many times have we had

you here on the show?

And I just, I smiled to myself because it was unreal to me.

I said four times.

Wow.

Yeah.

That is.

I don't know.

I mean, it's weird to talk about because how many people can relate.

But David Letterman's a big deal to me.

So watching with my dad all the time and my dad liked him and would tell me, oh, my God,

see what he did.

He didn't like that guy.

He doesn't like him very much.

You could tell because he's like, I really enjoyed how individual he was and how fearless

he was, except for a vanimals.

He didn't like animals too much.

But except dogs, I've gotten close to him, but there's a restraining order now because

he lives upstate and I'm not allowed in the grounds.

And like, what is, what are the grounds?

How do you define that?

Evidently, his property line.

But so anyway, that's a better story than mine.

You got to meet him.

And he likes your hair.

I remember you, I've seen, I remember seeing you on Letterman doing the hair bit, which

is very funny.

I do a hair bit because I like, I have what my family calls a floating scalp where you

can kind of grab the hair and kind of wiggle it back and forth and it looks like you're

wearing a hair piece.

Yeah.

And then I can control my scalp forward and backwards so I can pull it forward and it

will stay and then I can pull it backwards and it will stay because I can, I know the

bit.

It's very good.

And he found that very entertaining.

He would have me do it every time I came on the show.

If you haven't seen it, please check it out.

YouTube, the Indian Villain Hair, David Letterman, it's out there.

Check it out.

We used it too.

Comic effect.

Again, I keep talking about Comic because we just need to make more things together because

that's the only thing we have that we've made.

But I used that bit that your character was actually bald and it just took it one step further

so in common.

I was very in common.

Yes.

You took the, and you would, in season two, you were pulling the hair off of your head

and putting it on and you just had the side walls in the back, which you don't see these

days.

That was something that was more than 80s look, which is so bad.

Please don't come back.

I don't want that look to come back because I wanted to live in the fun.

It's just so funny.

I don't want it to be cool again.

Was it ever cool?

It was just what you had.

But you were very funny in that going that far.

You told me later you were worried that I wouldn't want to do it.

Absolutely.

I was worried because it is just so.

It's so unbecoming.

It's so unbecoming is not an attractive look.

Not that you're, not that you're a vain person, but it's just totally embracing because

you take it off and you're brushing it and counting the brushes and you're like a

little headstand, it's like it's, it's, you're trying different hats on it.

It became quite a little bit.

We just kept using it.

Very funny.

Also, check that out if you want to.

We don't maybe need to do this right now, but I do have something about you that I don't

know that everybody knows.

This should be something.

Helen's Hollywood secrets only about Nathan Phileum.

Hollywood secrets.

It was after Firefly in the time period, so in the 2005, 2006, 2007 era, that those era,

that's those three years constituted an era in my brain.

It was before Castle and you had more time on your hands.

These were the really good Halo Plan days.

We were doing a lot of Halo Plan and you learned to sew and you sewed slankets for your friends.

That's true.

I learned to sew in junior high school and also my mom was real good at it.

My grandmother taught me a couple of hand stitches.

My mom was good at it too.

I don't know how to do it.

You learned sewing from your mom because you were frozen in a glacier and that was all

there was to do.

It was in 7th and 9th grade, your options were home economics or industrial arts and

in home economics and making cookies with the girls cooking things and it's all the

girls since so I remember Tom Petruck and I said, tech with this, we're taking home economics.

And I learned how to sew and Alan, it's something I used to this day.

Well we all benefited from it when you showed up and like we got these sort of fleeced

slankets which if you don't know what a slank it is, it is a blanket with sleeves.

It kind of was a hit.

It was right around the time that people were getting shamwows.

I feel like it was sort of in that same era or that jerk off thing.

What was that thing called?

That weight shake weight.

The shake weight.

That's what it's called.

The same time as the as shamwows and shake weights, there was the slanket and it was so

that we could play video games because cold, it was definitely cold in Venice.

Yeah.

The winter time gets a little chilly.

Just a little chilly in Venice, a little that little log cabin, he looked in house that

I was, it was pretty breezy and did I ever tell you it was built by Tony Dow who played

Wally?

Anyway, odd little factoid.

Tony Dow who played Wally in Liebitt to Beaver built that little log house that I lived

in in Venice right by the beach.

I think that quote by this is a Hollywood secret.

Yes.

Hollywood secrets.

And we would all reward the slankets that Nathan made us so that we can have free arms

to play Halo while we stayed warm.

That's a pretty great thing as a friend like here's your slanket.

I got to choose a camouflage, I got camouflage fleeced slanket.

I think I don't know anybody out there who's got a buddy who's making them slankets.

It's just it's a pretty cool, pretty great thing about Nathan.

So there, that's that secret.

I still have a sewing machine if I have something that can be repaired because I like it and

I don't want to get rid of it.

I will repair it.

I will do it.

I just got a set of new hand sewing needles I'm really excited about.

What?

Really?

Yeah.

Really?

Yeah.

Wow.

That's a good craft.

That's a good thing, man.

Yeah, exactly.

When this little shit show comes crashing down, you know, the world, you're going to survive

everybody.

You've got flashlights, you've got sewing.

I can weld.

You've got a bug out bag.

You can do a little welding.

I've seen you're with the arc welding, there's the, but yeah, you can weld.

You can weld.

I got a proper welder now like the wire fed and yeah, it's not amazing.

It's not beautiful.

It'll suffice.

It's enough to put together like an A team vehicle, like the final boss vehicle that A team

would always put together at the end of the day.

Yeah, there was always like a van with, they have so much sheet metal in the 80s, just

hanging around for them to put together these homemade war vehicles.

Loaded sliding racks and yeah, it was like a team, a guiber point of the show.

Yeah.

I was Murdoch.

That would be my character.

Totally Murdoch.

You're so Murdoch.

You would have been face or Hannibal.

I accept.

Alan, let's get to know you better.

All right.

I know you and you know me.

Let's get to know you better.

Alan, what's up?

I know about you.

You don't know that your BMW, you let me?

Oh, I'm sorry.

I'm sorry.

I'm sorry.

I'm sorry.

It's God, it's going to need a little bodywork.

Oh, no.

I didn't know if you were doing a bit because we've done this exact bit.

Yes, we have.

And now it's come to life.

We've manifested it.

Well, okay.

Look.

First of all, Alan.

Look.

Are you okay?

I feel like there's a little delay.

But yes.

Yes, I'm okay.

I'm okay.

Is everyone okay?

Is everyone okay?

I think everybody's okay.

Okay.

I, in a sense, I wrecked it because I parked it on the street.

See, there's a little qualification here.

I am having some work done and I left my driveway open for the workers to you.

Who's there's a staging area for the work?

And these Yahoo's, when they showed up at the end of the day in the big truck to pick up

all the guys that were there, this construction team, like, drops a couple of experts off and

then they take off and go do other jobs and they come back and pick them up.

They're like indent, and they're like, they're, they can't escape.

They have to be here.

It feels very indentured, servitude.

It feels dicey, but they backed right into, to the BMW.

And knocked on the door.

When you said I wrecked it, I mean, yeah, that conjures images of you behind the wheel.

Alan, I think you can hardly blame yourself for someone.

Thank you for seeing it that way.

You lent me your car.

It's now wrecked.

So in a sense, I wrecked a car.

I feel like I have your car and it is now, it needs bodywork, but they are going to

pay for it.

Again, wrecked.

Listen, that's wonderful.

That's wonderful.

First of all, that's wonderful.

I'm glad it's not going to cost you anything.

Second, it's like a utility vehicle that I use for guests or for friends when they like

a case of point when you need a vehicle and wrecked.

It sounds like the thing was destroyed.

It's a little bit of bodywork.

It's still working.

It's still good.

You can still drive around.

It does still drive.

It drives.

They crinkled up the front.

It's going to show up on their insurance and they, they're ready to, those are plastic

bits.

Alan, that can be fixed.

No problem.

I am so glad Alan that you were safe.

Okay.

Good.

Okay.

That's the thing you didn't know about me.

I love that you saved it for the podcast.

They're like, can we get in touch?

Do we need to get in touch with them?

Like, don't get in touch with them.

No, no, no, no.

I got it.

Let me do it and I'll be the one handling it.

So I know exactly, exactly when to do it.

Yes.

Nathan, what's something I don't know about you?

Alan, if you really want to get under my skin, the one thing you can do is wreck my car.

No, is.

I was going to say, Alan, this is something I realize that I have done for my entire life.

I'm not a superstitious person.

I'm a limousetitious.

I was in a car with my brother and we crossed over some train tracks and we both lifted up

our feet as we went over the train tracks.

It's something we have done since we were children and it was for a good luck.

I was like, you have to lift your feet, train tracks, get a little treat.

First it was like, you've got to do it and then it was for a good luck and then here

I am, I'm turning 55 next month, Alan.

I still do it.

I think now I'm more so for tradition or anything, but I lifted my feet and I looked over

my brother was lifting his feet and he looked over with his head a little bit as well

and each other like we still do it.

Well, okay.

What is that?

It's a superstition.

Yeah.

So if you're driving, you're taking your feet off of the pedals.

No, because because now I drive an electric car and when you lift your foot off the accelerator,

it slows down a little bit.

So I will lift my heel off the floorboard, but I'll keep my foot off my toe on the accelerator.

Like I'm going to tell, I'm not going to, at the cost of driving, I'm not going to,

you know, safe.

I'm the safe superstition.

Right.

You know where the line is between nostalgia and I will sometimes, even for kicks, see if

I can hold my breath through a tunnel or over a bridge, which is something else we did

as kids.

Oh, really?

In a tunnel.

Yeah, that could be dangerous.

Over a bridge.

Yeah.

Which in Vancouver doesn't work because that lines gave bridge.

That's a long bridge, you're going to pass out.

You really just want to hold your breath over the north side of it because for some reason

it stinks.

That's right over the ocean, there's a, isn't there a port there or some kind of?

I think it's, there's a lot of, there's a lot of pulp, there's a lot of industrial stuff

on that side.

And there's always those two giant piles of yellow sulfur, isn't that sulfur that

those two piles?

Yeah.

Yeah.

Maybe it's the sulfur we're smelling.

I say too, there might be more, but I can see, you can see it as you fly into Vancouver,

those mountains of sulfur.

It's weird.

That's always there.

They've always got some sulfur on hand.

You think they'd need to put a cover on it?

Nope.

It's rained on.

It's like a guy taking a break, smoking a cigarette over there.

Steve, get away from the sulfur.

Yeah.

Wow.

So you pick up your feet, you're superstitious, a little stitious, nostalgic.

I'll say, let's go with nostalgic because it was something I did as a kid that I still

do to this day, but you didn't know that about me.

I didn't know that about you, Nathan.

I did not know that.

Here's my question.

Yes.

What are we going to do about you getting into a car?

How do we get you into a car?

Like you, you need a car.

Well, they're going to have to give me a rental or something.

Well, it's fixed.

Oh, okay.

They'll take care of that.

Someone, it's pretty wild that I don't have a car in Los Angeles, but it's a place

where you need a car.

I do have my motorcycle and I am riding it and I love it very much because I'm going to

get rid of it going to New York.

No need for a motorcycle in New York.

Boy do I have fun on that thing.

It's so much fun.

Yeah.

Good God.

I got you that horn, by the way.

Oh, right.

I got it for you.

Oh, you have it there?

I have a package here waiting for you.

Yeah.

Oh, so it's a big horn that makes loud sounds.

I'm not going to use it.

I don't think I should use it.

What I meant to say was thank you, Nathan.

I'll come pick it up soon.

God bless.

Alan, thank you very much for this lovely, wonderful chat.

I think if I learned anything, I think I got to know the 10-year-old, Alan, a lot better

today.

Yeah.

And your harrowing brush was desks in that auto accident.

It makes me just to appreciate our friendship all that much more.

Yeah.

It was touching go there for a minute, but I'm glad to still be on this side of the

border between life and death.

Yeah.

Let me know if you need any counseling to overcome that trauma.

Thank you, man.

Oh, my God.

Thank you for listening.

You just bless your heart.

You know what?

If you haven't yet, why don't you head on over to our Patreon.

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And if you love the show, please leave us a review and tell your friends.

Once we were spaced, man, it's a collision 33 production.

The hell that is.

The shows produced by Michelle Chapman, Siobhan Homan.

Oh, yeah.

And Josh Levy.

I wear them jeans.

He is of collision 33.

It's all starting to make sense.

It's edited and mixed and produced by resident records, special thanks to Courtney Blomquist.

And Adam Tilesel.

Our theme music is done by Carlos Sosa.

The groove line of horns, guy.

Yeah.

And Josh, who a more artwork is done by Lewis Jensen.

Until next time, I swear to God, I'll love you.

I will not be by this ugly table and this ugly wall.