Brad Pitt

Summary

Podcast Summary: Armchair Expert with Dax Shepard – Episode Featuring Brad Pitt

Introduction In this highly anticipated episode of Armchair Expert with Dax Shepard, host Dax Shepard is joined by co-host Monica Padman and special guest Brad Pitt. The conversation delves deep into Brad Pitt’s personal and professional life, exploring his journey in the film industry, his passions outside acting, and his experiences with fame and personal growth.

Meeting Brad Pitt The episode begins with Dax expressing his excitement and initial apprehensions about interviewing Brad Pitt. Monica reassures listeners of Brad’s graciousness and kindness, highlighting his willingness to share his time and experiences openly.

Notable Quote:

• Dax Shepard (00:26): "The notion of interviewing this person was absolutely implausible."

Brad Pitt’s Career and Early Struggles Brad Pitt shares insights into his early career struggles, including working as an extra to obtain his SAG card. He recounts a memorable experience where he landed a role as an extra in a restaurant scene, inadvertently inflating his resume, which later became a humorous anecdote.

Notable Quote:

• Brad Pitt (37:20): "I was doing extra work for about a year and a half before I got to do something real. And I was thrilled."

Approach to Fame and Vulnerability The conversation shifts to Brad’s relationship with fame and how he navigates public perception. He discusses the pressure men face today and emphasizes the importance of vulnerability and honesty, drawing parallels to his own journey with sobriety and therapy.

Notable Quote:

• Brad Pitt (46:41): "I need to step back and really disappear. And that's worked well for me."

Passion for Motorsports A significant portion of the episode is dedicated to Brad Pitt’s passion for motorsports, particularly Formula One (F1). He elaborates on his involvement in filming a racing movie, detailing the challenges and exhilarating experiences of driving on prestigious tracks like Silverstone and Spa-Francorchamps.

Notable Quotes:

• Brad Pitt (73:11): "It is so breathtaking. I stood at the base of Eau Rouge. This is a storied track in Belgium."
• Dax Shepard (78:33): "Tell me about. You go out to a track, I think you're at a Porsche training center, and there's a GT3, and you get to go out for a bit and Lewis is there, and then he takes you for a ride."

Collaboration with Lewis Hamilton and Team Dynamics Brad discusses working closely with seven-time world champion Lewis Hamilton and the dynamics of integrating Hollywood talent into the highly technical and competitive world of F1 racing. He shares anecdotes about negotiating with insurance for the movie's scenes and the meticulous attention to authenticity required to satisfy both racing enthusiasts and general audiences.

Notable Quote:

• Brad Pitt (84:28): "They knew how to do that. And we could not have done it without their participation."

Personal Reflections and Growth Brad reflects on his personal growth over the years, acknowledging his insecurities and the evolution of his relationship with fame. He highlights the importance of staying true to his craft and the satisfaction derived from making meaningful, authentic performances.

Notable Quote:

• Brad Pitt (46:41): "The gap's gotten smaller. My relationship with it."

Humorous Anecdotes and Interactions Throughout the episode, Brad shares humorous stories, including his interactions with fellow actors and memorable moments on set. These anecdotes provide a lighter contrast to the deeper discussions, showcasing Brad’s charismatic and down-to-earth personality.

Notable Quote:

• Dax Shepard (55:57): "He is an armchair expert, but he makes mistakes all the time."

Closing Thoughts and Future Projects As the conversation wraps up, Brad Pitt expresses his gratitude for the opportunity to share his story and hints at future projects, both in film and his continued passion for motorsports. The episode concludes on a high note, celebrating Brad’s achievements and his ongoing journey toward personal and professional fulfillment.

Notable Quote:

• Brad Pitt (131:34): "I feel like we lost our way after the first one. Or at least my guy because he was kind of the Duval consigliere guy to George's Danny."

Conclusion This episode of Armchair Expert offers an intimate look into Brad Pitt’s life, blending candid discussions about his career with personal stories that highlight his resilience and passion. Listeners gain a deeper understanding of Brad’s multifaceted personality, his dedication to his craft, and his ability to remain grounded amidst global fame.

Notable Moments:

• Handling Fame: Brad’s strategies for maintaining privacy and mental health while being a global icon.
• Motorsports Insights: Detailed accounts of filming a racing movie and the technical aspects of F1 integration.
• Personal Growth: Brad’s reflections on overcoming insecurities and the importance of authenticity in acting.

Recommended Listening: For those who haven’t listened to the episode, this summary captures the essence of Brad Pitt’s profound insights and engaging storytelling, making it a must-listen for fans and those interested in the complexities of fame and personal development.

Transcript

[Dax Shepard]

Wondry plus subscribers can listen to Armchair Expert early and ad free right now. Join Wondri in the Wondry app or on Apple Podcasts. Or you can listen for free wherever you get your podcasts. Welcome, welcome, welcome to Armchair Expert. I'm Dan shepherd and I'm joined by Mrs. Mouse. Hi there, mightiest of the Meese.

[Monica Padman]

I'm here. I'm mighty. Wow.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. I have to imagine many people have guessed about this episode because we've obviously been so excited for a while now knowing and so excited that I was like, even though he said yes, I just feel like there'll be something will happen.

[Monica Padman]

There's no way I'm still scared.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah, I am too, until it's been out for like even two weeks maybe. But yeah, the number one from when I sat down, the notion of interviewing this person was absolutely implausible.

[Monica Padman]

Hilarious.

[Dax Shepard]

It was a joke. It was a funny joke. But then Moni got Matt Damon and that maybe cracked a little ray of hope.

[Monica Padman]

Oh yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

Dreams do come true.

[Monica Padman]

Dreams come true.

[Dax Shepard]

Without further ado, my dream boyfriend, Brad Pitt. An Academy Award winning actor, a producer, Fight Club 7. I feel embarrassed even listing these. Mr. And Mrs. Smith, once upon a time in Hollywood. Inglourious Basterds and the new most kick ass movie of the summer. I'm gonna declare it as the most kick ass movie of the whole summer and maybe the decade. F1. Hair raising. Fucking a point of view you've never gotten. This is as close as you can get to what it feels like to be in a race car. Oh, it's incredible. And he's fucking perfect.

[Monica Padman]

He's perfect.

[Dax Shepard]

God, we love him.

[Monica Padman]

We really do. And he, I mean, as you'll hear, he's just such a delight. So kind. Gave us so much of his time.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah, charm the fuck out of us, really.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. Well, get your spare.

[Brad Pitt]

Nope.

[Monica Padman]

Don't say it.

[Dax Shepard]

Please enjoy Brad Pitt. We are supported by better help. You know, there's still a bit of surrounding stigma for men's health. I think it can still be challenging for men to admit they're struggling and seek help.

[Monica Padman]

I have a friend who just started therapy, a male friend, and he loves it so much and. But yes, I think it's taken a little extra long because you're right, there is a stigma, but there really shouldn't be.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. Men today face immense pressure to perform, to provide and keep it all together. So it's no wonder that 6 million men in the US suffer from depression every year. And it's often undiagnosed if you're a man and you're feeling the weight of the world, talk to someone. A friend, a loved one, a therapist. I'm a man. I've benefited greatly from therapy and BetterHelp is a great option if you're looking to start therapy. As the largest online therapy provider in the world, BetterHelp can provide access to mental health professionals with a diverse variety of expertise. Talk it out with BetterHelp armchairs get 10% off their first month at betterhelp.com Dax that's BetterHelp. H-E-L-P.com Dax we are supported by Audible from Scott Z. Burns, the writer of Contagion, with special guest appearances from director Steven Soderbergh, Laurence Fishburne and Jennifer L. Don't miss what Could Go Wrong, a deeply thoughtful, occasionally frightening and often hilarious Audible original podcast that delves head and heart first into today's burning question. Can humankind and AI actually work hand in hand? Follow Scott in an ever expanding cast of AI generated partners including Lexter, an extraordinarily gifted sharp tongued AI as they co write and pitch Hollywood execs the Contagion sequel. Listen to what Could Go Wrong. And now on audible, go to audible.com whatcouldgo wrong? He's an object expert. He's an object.

[Monica Padman]

Hey, so nice to meet you.

[Brad Pitt]

Me too. Sorry, I got ice.

[Monica Padman]

No, you're good. What'd you get?

[Brad Pitt]

I tried this new thing here. It's a blueberry latte.

[Dax Shepard]

I'll take a sip. I'll absolutely take a sip.

[Monica Padman]

Thank you for offering.

[Dax Shepard]

Oh yes.

[Monica Padman]

Is it nice?

[Dax Shepard]

Blueberry is my favorite. Fake flavor.

[Brad Pitt]

You want in there?

[Dax Shepard]

Take a little rip?

[Monica Padman]

Not really, but I will.

[Dax Shepard]

I've put two nicotine products next to you in case you are wanting.

[Brad Pitt]

No, I'm done.

[Monica Padman]

For how long?

[Brad Pitt]

Couple years now.

[Dax Shepard]

Zero nicotine?

[Brad Pitt]

None.

[Dax Shepard]

Why?

[Brad Pitt]

I think 30 years of smoking. I've just figured. Had enough? I've had enough.

[Monica Padman]

Good for you.

[Brad Pitt]

I've had enough.

[Dax Shepard]

But nicotine is really good for your brain.

[Brad Pitt]

Is it?

[Monica Padman]

That's what he likes to think.

[Brad Pitt]

Listen, I got in reserves.

[Dax Shepard]

You don't need any. Pick me up now.

[Brad Pitt]

Is there any problem with advertisement?

[Dax Shepard]

No, no.

[Monica Padman]

You can do whatever you want.

[Brad Pitt]

We can advertise.

[Dax Shepard]

Those are just what we thought you might like.

[Monica Padman]

We threw a lot of beverages out.

[Dax Shepard]

But we're going to ask you to hold a filet of fish at one point and say God damn, this is good. You don't have to say McDonald's.

[Brad Pitt]

I have no ide know what this.

[Dax Shepard]

Means, but I'm doing a ad for God. Yeah.

[Brad Pitt]

Supporting.

[Dax Shepard]

Is that.

[Brad Pitt]

Sure.

[Monica Padman]

Wow.

[Dax Shepard]

Is that a waffle? What is that? What do we call that?

[Brad Pitt]

Yes.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. That looks great.

[Monica Padman]

The blue's really nice.

[Dax Shepard]

Okay. Not only is this God's true cashmere, I'm pretty sure this is the one you gifted me. I've got a few now. I was like, I think that's the one he sent.

[Brad Pitt]

You know what I think he's doing? I think he's kind of like pining for another.

[Dax Shepard]

Oh, there's no question.

[Brad Pitt]

I think he's, like, trolling a little bit.

[Monica Padman]

I mean, I'm not going to rule out that I don't want one.

[Dax Shepard]

She has some true.

[Monica Padman]

I do. I have some shorts.

[Brad Pitt]

Shorts are fun.

[Monica Padman]

They're so cute. The green and white.

[Brad Pitt]

Would you do a hoodie?

[Monica Padman]

I would do a hoodie.

[Brad Pitt]

Even with long hair. Cuz sometimes women with long hair up a lot.

[Dax Shepard]

You cut your hair off, right?

[Monica Padman]

For a free hoodie? Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Brad Pitt]

Okay, great, Great.

[Monica Padman]

For God's true or a blanket? You guys do blankets?

[Brad Pitt]

Oh, yeah, we do cushy blankets.

[Monica Padman]

That sounds.

[Dax Shepard]

How did we come up with the name God's true cashmere?

[Brad Pitt]

My dear friend, who is originally a holistic nurse that I met around the time we met.

[Dax Shepard]

In your age of discovery.

[Brad Pitt]

In my age of discovery. And I came in one day and she said, I had a dream about you. You said, I want more green in my life. And I literally said that to someone the day before, just at a whim. I want more green in my life. And so she made me a green shirt, this super soft, super cash. Her name is Sadhedi. It means God's truth.

[Dax Shepard]

Oh.

[Brad Pitt]

And she goes, what do you think of this? We started making them and we really liked them. Then we started making them for our friends and we thought, all right, let's make a little side hustle and have some fun with it. It's been a lot of fun.

[Monica Padman]

So fun.

[Brad Pitt]

But yeah. So she said, what do you think of God's true cashmere? I went, it's bold.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's memorable.

[Brad Pitt]

It sticks out. Can't find a reason not to.

[Dax Shepard]

Might get a certain segment of the country mad. But hey, let's roll with it.

[Brad Pitt]

Well, I mean, everyone's got their own definition, right?

[Dax Shepard]

They sure do.

[Monica Padman]

Everyone thinks it's you, that you're God and it's your true cashmere.

[Dax Shepard]

Very worse.

[Monica Padman]

I think people might think that. I thought it.

[Brad Pitt]

No, in a good way.

[Monica Padman]

In a good.

[Dax Shepard]

Oh, no.

[Monica Padman]

I really stepped in it already. I gotta go.

[Brad Pitt]

Yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

Pit.

[Brad Pitt]

He's known for his ego.

[Monica Padman]

No, you are not.

[Dax Shepard]

Okay, so on that topic, I like.

[Brad Pitt]

That there's no entry to this.

[Monica Padman]

No, we get right in.

[Dax Shepard]

Don't you like that? Because don't you think when you're acting, act action is almost. And there have been famous directors who don't say action.

[Brad Pitt]

I asked on the last one not to.

[Dax Shepard]

Okay. Yeah. Because all of a sudden, it's like, be great now.

[Monica Padman]

Yes, go jarring.

[Dax Shepard]

As opposed to like, we're talking, we're hanging. Given the way you and I met, does it make you nervous?

[Monica Padman]

Of course he wishes.

[Dax Shepard]

That's hopefully where it ends.

[Brad Pitt]

You know, I've never had a gay experience. I kind of missed that window. But if I did.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah.

[Brad Pitt]

It wouldn't be you.

[Dax Shepard]

Oh, man. You had me. I was like, wow. He's gonna say.

[Monica Padman]

I was like, dax is going to die tonight.

[Brad Pitt]

14Th or 15th.

[Dax Shepard]

I don't want to brag, but you're gonna need to build up to me. Oh, boy. I do recommend you start with some starters.

[Brad Pitt]

Okay.

[Dax Shepard]

Okay. Back to the real thing. Given in the context in which we met, which is, like, really heightened honesty and vulnerability, does it make you nervous to have to talk with me in public?

[Brad Pitt]

No, not at all. Quite at ease.

[Dax Shepard]

Oh, okay, great.

[Brad Pitt]

We can say men's group, right?

[Dax Shepard]

I say aa. You're not supposed to, but I say it.

[Brad Pitt]

I said that. I went on some New York Times interview and what an amazing thing this experience was for me. It was a men's group. Was aa. It was. When I first was getting sober, I just thought it was just incredible. Men sharing their experiences, their foibles, their missteps, their wants, their aches, and a lot of humor with it. I thought it was a really special experience coming from the Ozarks, where we're like, everything's great.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah.

[Brad Pitt]

And so I do this interview and I say this, and I got admonished by someone of the higher up. So you did. It's anonymous.

[Monica Padman]

How does that help anyone?

[Dax Shepard]

Not for you.

[Brad Pitt]

That's what I said.

[Dax Shepard]

Here's the truth. There was a period of time where if you were known to be an alcoholic, you would be run out of your neighborhood. You couldn't find employment. There was a great reason for it, but even deeper than that is they didn't want alcoholics just showing up at their doorstep. No one had a fucking solution. And you would be kind of inviting just the town drunks to show up. So. Lot of reasons. My excuse, because I say it openly. And I've gotten some criticism is I've had a couple dozen, maybe more people come up to me in the last seven years and go, like, I'm the best man in my brother's wedding. And my family wouldn't talk to me. And I found out about AA from you, and I'm like, I'll take that, dude. Over 1,000.

[Brad Pitt]

I've had a few of those as well. But you go around in the circle. It's kind of spiral because it's really crowded room. Dax was usually near the end because he's been there a while. He's kind of like elder statesman. Elder statesman. Thank you. And I really respected it was really open, honest. Was a way to take whatever theme seemed to go in the evening and then put it in the funniest package. And it meant a lot to me. Really did.

[Monica Padman]

Good job, Dax.

[Brad Pitt]

Haven't talked to him since.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah, he's so impactful that I have not seen him since.

[Monica Padman]

You use him for what he's worth and then you walk away. That's what we do.

[Dax Shepard]

Send him a couple of the free products every now and then.

[Brad Pitt]

Tell you about our date.

[Monica Padman]

He did, but we keep you on the DL a little bit on this show.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. And this is really kind of this fun theme. And I often tell people this, and I wonder if you can relate to this. Surely you've worked with people where you're holding two things simultaneously about them. Like, if you were to have worked with Paul Newman, I imagine you have Paul Newman, and then you would have a man, you know, I think it's okay to keep both those things alive.

[Brad Pitt]

Yeah, I think that's fair.

[Dax Shepard]

I have a handful of friends. Robert Downey Jr. I saw him as a kid in Weird Science, and him dumping the fucking malt off the top of the mall. He's not even a main player in that movie. But he had a rad cardigan on.

[Brad Pitt]

And like a zoot suit or something.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah, he was wild. And I'm like, that dude's awesome. I love that dude. Followed him throughout the years. Ultimately became friends with him. And it's like, yeah, I have Robert the dude. I know. And then there's the guy I just was in love with from Chaplin. And all these things, they don't intersect, right?

[Brad Pitt]

Yeah. They don't intertwine that way.

[Dax Shepard]

Did you have anyone like that?

[Brad Pitt]

You said it. I remember meeting Newman, working with Redford, working with Hackman. You know, I have that with Sean Penn.

[Dax Shepard]

There you go.

[Brad Pitt]

89. Sean Penn.

[Dax Shepard]

Oh, fuck. Yes.

[Brad Pitt]

He'd be number one.

[Dax Shepard]

Oh, my God. How about Racing with the Moon?

[Brad Pitt]

How about At Close Range?

[Dax Shepard]

Oh, my God. He was.

[Brad Pitt]

You know this one. I haven't seen that Rush Home.

[Monica Padman]

Okay, well, this one on and he's.

[Brad Pitt]

In it with his brother, Christopher Walken.

[Dax Shepard]

Yep.

[Brad Pitt]

Chris.

[Dax Shepard]

And he got huge for it. Remember, as you were young, you're like, oh, Sean Penn's fucking huge.

[Brad Pitt]

Yeah, he's badass.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah, he's a bad motherfucker.

[Brad Pitt]

Super stylized the way it's shot. Jamie Foley directed it, but I think younger actors should study it because so much is said without saying it. It's such a streamlined script and everything is undercurrent.

[Dax Shepard]

The movie's pretty quiet. Okay, we share another one while we're on this road. Mickey Rourke.

[Brad Pitt]

We do. Whoa. Love that. Mickey Rourke.

[Dax Shepard]

Where does it start for you?

[Brad Pitt]

I started really looking at acting. It was late 80s. And so at that point, Mickey Rourke, wow. He had this Bogart roughness to him. Super tough, but also this really vulnerable. He could walk both lines. He was doing something that was so extraordinary. So you watch Angel Heart and Lisa.

[Dax Shepard]

Bonet in Angel Heart.

[Brad Pitt]

That's incredible. Oh, just incredible.

[Monica Padman]

Oh, my God. That's your number one.

[Dax Shepard]

When I was a kid, I'm like, I'm naming my daughter if I have one. Epiphany.

[Brad Pitt]

Lisa Bonet. Oh, Epiphany.

[Monica Padman]

Yes.

[Dax Shepard]

Lisa Bonet for surfer's name is Lisa Bonet.

[Brad Pitt]

He's got great vulnerability. That's the deal. To be able to walk with that kind of strength and toughness.

[Dax Shepard]

And he was sexy. Which dudes weren't really sexy.

[Brad Pitt]

Back Village. Oh, what a stated movie. So 80s. He still is timeless. He is so badass in it. I'm the Pope.

[Monica Padman]

Oh, wow.

[Brad Pitt]

Remember, this is my fingers.

[Dax Shepard]

Johnny.

[Brad Pitt]

You took my fucking thumb. Charlie Chalutes.

[Dax Shepard]

Okay, go back to that situation, which meeting you in that context you're at this meeting, we're going to get into the fact that a bazillion famous people have come to this meeting and everyone's used to it. And then you came in. It was pretty overwhelming. And I got a real sense of what your experience is in this way that I couldn't really fathom. But you have the power of when you are in a place, everyone can't stop thinking about you. And I was like, God, he has to be aware of that. What does that feel like? That's a lot to deal with. How is he ever going to open up and be honest in this space? And then it dissipates a bit. People get A little more comfortable. And then you were. You were so fucking honest. And I was like, he must have a stubbornness like I have, which is like, y' all, this is going on, but I refuse to let it not let me be a person.

[Brad Pitt]

Oh, it's interesting. Never thought about it that way. You know, I was pretty much on my knees, and I was really open. I was trying anything and everyone. Anything anyone threw at me. It was a difficult time. I need rebooting. I needed to wake the fuck up in some areas, and it just meant a lot to me. So, yeah, the first is, oh, my God, it's coming around. You know, it's coming around, it's getting closer. It's going to be yours. But everyone was so open. It gives you permission in a way to go, okay, I'm going to step out on this edge and see what happens. And then I really grew to love.

[Dax Shepard]

It when another dude shares so honestly about his struggles and his defects, and it gets to you. You feel like you owe him that honesty in return.

[Brad Pitt]

Anything could go. Because some guys would be like, you know what? Didn't have such a bad week and talk about their wins, little failures and little successes. And you know what? I woke up and I'm going to do it again tomorrow. So that too. What do you think is. There's about 30 guys, roughly.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. On a big different guy. Especially when you fucking showed up.

[Brad Pitt]

There's always one guy, though, just loves to hear himself talking and just go, yeah, that's tough. And wait till you get through the next one. It's actually not tough. It's pretty funny.

[Monica Padman]

Well, Dax got in a fight with someone over it once, didn't he?

[Dax Shepard]

I did get in a fight in that room.

[Brad Pitt]

Oh, really? I missed that week.

[Dax Shepard]

We told the story on the podcast, so I don't mind saying it out loud again, but the actor Eric Dane, who I now fucking love, I have such a sweetness for him.

[Brad Pitt]

Yeah, we all had a mini group over there.

[Dax Shepard]

Right, right, right. He was hosting, but when we first were around each other was not good. And then he threatened a dude in the meeting, and I said, let's go, motherfuckers. In the middle of the meeting, he goes, if you hit that timer gun, I'm gonna fucking throw you in that candle.

[Brad Pitt]

I was right in time.

[Dax Shepard]

And I go, that's it, motherfucker. Let's go. Stand up. Let's go outside. He stands, go outside, and I'm gonna beat the fuck out of him. In Tom's driveway at an AA meeting. At an AA meeting where we're coming for healing and understanding. But what's great is we're friends now. We told that story on the podcast, and it's quite a hilarious beginning for us because now I love him. But anyways, I set all that up just to say I felt very compassionate to what you go through, and I never sweated you. I wasn't, like, coming up to you. Hey, man. Dax. Nice to meet you. So I didn't really interact a ton with you.

[Brad Pitt]

We had met before that.

[Dax Shepard]

We'll save that to the end, I think. Okay.

[Brad Pitt]

It didn't leave a mark, but I'm pretty sure we did.

[Monica Padman]

Okay, listen, I think it would have.

[Dax Shepard]

Left him, so I didn't sweat you much. I do want everyone in the world to know you're insanely gracious. You learned everyone's name. You engage with people. I thought you were particularly good at assessing who was kind of low status. And you seem to really be kind to those people.

[Brad Pitt]

It was really moving. Some of these men were so moving.

[Dax Shepard]

And then you come up to me at the end and you go, hey, are you going to this track day next week? And I go, yeah, I am. And then I go, oh, right. We both know Duffy. This must be how you know I'm going to that track day.

[Brad Pitt]

Track day. Motos vehicles, motorcycles on the track, two wheels.

[Dax Shepard]

She's been on some vehicles.

[Monica Padman]

I've been on a couple.

[Dax Shepard]

And you go, hey, you want to ride up on a helicopter with me? And I go, absolutely.

[Monica Padman]

Who's going to say no to that?

[Dax Shepard]

Of course I will. What should I wear?

[Monica Padman]

Bachelor style date?

[Dax Shepard]

Do you have a favorite color you.

[Monica Padman]

Want me to dress in?

[Dax Shepard]

So you invited me, and I was like, oh, this is incredible. I wasn't even sure if he knew I was in this room. And then we went on this glorious helicopter ride. For me, it was very romantic. Chatting the whole way.

[Monica Padman]

And were you, like, giving a tour?

[Brad Pitt]

Just slowly.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah, slowly. Get that hand around.

[Brad Pitt]

Three hour drive up there. Something like that isn't too much to beat down. Yeah. So to get up early and more time on the trip, it was just one of those rock and roll things you get to do every now and then.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

You said you want to go on as like. Yeah. I'm not sure how I'm gonna get my bike there. I'm saying, yes. Someone else's.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah.

[Brad Pitt]

Let it be known Dax is rapid. He's fast.

[Monica Padman]

You brought him here to give you so many.

[Dax Shepard]

The record also reflects Brad's very fast, too.

[Monica Padman]

Okay.

[Brad Pitt]

No, not that much. On two wheels, I wasn't as quick as these guys are. Channing, well, he's been doing it.

[Dax Shepard]

Channing was annoyingly good.

[Brad Pitt]

Really quick, really good.

[Dax Shepard]

And I'm like, yeah, he's one of these athletes that can kind of do every single. Like Lewis. We had Toto on and Toto's like, you know, Lewis is one of these guys that drives you crazy. He can do everything. Just he tries it and he's immediately fast.

[Brad Pitt]

You just kind of got to do like a subdued Schwarzenegger.

[Monica Padman]

It is, it's almost the same and it's bang on.

[Dax Shepard]

If Schwarzenegger went to a four year.

[Monica Padman]

College, you know, I have a quick question about the meeting before we leave the meeting go. When you first get there, when it's going around, are you thinking, are people going to talk about me specifically? Is there any nerves going into a meeting when you do have to be very vulnerable and, you know, people there might have an extra interest in my story.

[Brad Pitt]

So I've heard of stories where like Philip Seymour Hoffman went to one and someone videoed it and put it out.

[Monica Padman]

See, that's scary.

[Brad Pitt]

But I'd been assured by another friend this was a safe place. Two, I am a stubborn fuck, but also, when I've stepped in shit, I'm pretty good at taking responsibility for it and owning up to it. And now it's a quest to, you know, what do I do with this? How can I write this and make sure it doesn't happen again?

[Monica Padman]

Or just be better.

[Brad Pitt]

Yeah, be better. Step up. So I was really open to that and I was really open to see what these guys were doing who had their thing and been there for a while. Sure, I was a bit shy. I can generally be a bit shy in any kind of situation first. But I just remember getting my arms around it pretty quickly and it became a thing for me. It was really something I'd look forward to.

[Dax Shepard]

Me too. I was very kind of special.

[Brad Pitt]

Yeah.

[Monica Padman]

But it's hard. Even me in therapy, who no one cares. But I'm like.

[Dax Shepard]

And particularly the therapist could care less.

[Monica Padman]

But I'm like, should I tell her everything? What if she tells somebody something?

[Brad Pitt]

No. When I jumped into therapy, then I was just blah, blah, blah, and I did this and I did that and da, da, da, da, and I did that.

[Monica Padman]

Good for you. That's trusting or stupid.

[Brad Pitt]

Desperate.

[Monica Padman]

Well, desperate's a good reason.

[Brad Pitt]

Yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. You don't come into AA because everything's working out fantastic.

[Brad Pitt]

No, that's usually not the entry point.

[Dax Shepard]

Not the winner's Your hair's gotta be on fire before you go, like, yeah, I'll go hang with a bunch of dudes and talk about emotions.

[Monica Padman]

My feelings.

[Dax Shepard]

My feelings. It's not the most appealing offering. I want to know about Missouri.

[Brad Pitt]

Yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

I think we've bonded over this before. And you saying I want more green in my life is something that I constantly think of as, like, lakes is in my DNA.

[Brad Pitt]

You and me both.

[Dax Shepard]

Shocking. I hadn't read Huckleberry Finn or Tom Sawyer, any of that until maybe two months ago. I read both.

[Brad Pitt]

Amazing.

[Dax Shepard]

And now I'm reading the Chernow biography on Mark.

[Brad Pitt]

I just got it good.

[Monica Padman]

It's a great.

[Dax Shepard]

It's awesome. How close were you to where he grew up?

[Brad Pitt]

It would have been the same. It's the Ozarks. I mean, it's a beautiful country, but it's also the Mason Dixon Line. North and south fought there. It's birthplace of televangelism.

[Monica Padman]

Oh, wow.

[Brad Pitt]

A lot of meth labs. There is this dichotomy that's always at play. And because it's this confluence of Midwestern and Southern, it all kind of flattens out there in a way. You know, our accents are kind of more like this. We just kind of, like, talk like this and we just keep on going.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. Yeah. And your dad owned a trucking company.

[Brad Pitt]

At the tail end? He did. He ran a trucking company.

[Dax Shepard]

Was he himself a truck driver?

[Brad Pitt]

No, I worked there on the docks, loading. No, they didn't let me load.

[Dax Shepard]

They didn't let you load. They didn't let you near the forklift. And mom was a counselor.

[Brad Pitt]

She was a teacher and then raised us and then got more into counseling after we left.

[Dax Shepard]

So you have a very confusing. When I go through my stereotypes of where I grew up in Michigan, people didn't play tennis. They weren't swimmers. Like your sports. I can't really put you in a box. You were an athlete, but you're golfing and swimming.

[Brad Pitt]

No, I rebelled against golfing because everyone was golfing. Well, it was. Rebelling against. It felt like the sport of the religious right a little bit to me. My dad, he did all right. We were middle class. He gave us certainly much better than what he had. He was outhouse poor Oklahoma, and gave us much better opportunities. But I don't know. I had a bug at my ass about that one. And yet I've watched all the Masters. I love them. I find them so relaxing.

[Dax Shepard]

They're great to take a nap, too. Right?

[Brad Pitt]

They're good to doze and come back In.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah, not much is happening.

[Brad Pitt]

Come in and see whole 16, 17, 18.

[Monica Padman]

That's not really a good selling point. Like, it's good to nap, too.

[Brad Pitt]

Yeah, you like nap. But it is incredible what these guys do. It's amazing.

[Dax Shepard]

I had no interest in it and then I got sucked into Full Swing, which is the same fucking company that did Drive To Survive.

[Brad Pitt]

Love that one.

[Dax Shepard]

Everything they make, I watch. Do you watch the jockey one? No. The race for the Triple Crown?

[Brad Pitt]

No, but we just did one with him. Isle of man tt.

[Dax Shepard]

Oh, my God.

[Brad Pitt]

Wait, so it's with Channing's company?

[Dax Shepard]

No.

[Brad Pitt]

And then Channing's going to do a film.

[Dax Shepard]

Oh, baby. You've been then?

[Brad Pitt]

I've never been.

[Dax Shepard]

Okay, that's what we'll do to you then. No.

[Brad Pitt]

This is the most insane race.

[Monica Padman]

And you want to race in it?

[Dax Shepard]

No, no, no.

[Brad Pitt]

Oh, my God. These guys are another breed.

[Dax Shepard]

I told you about this race. A couple people die every single.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah, that sounds horrible.

[Brad Pitt]

Last year. Last year, they got through.

[Dax Shepard]

Was that the one you were filming at? Because that would be good.

[Brad Pitt]

Yeah, yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

You got.

[Monica Padman]

Like.

[Brad Pitt]

Even the MotoGP guys go, those guys are fucking nuts.

[Dax Shepard]

Okay, great. We're right here. What it enrages in me is you're a coward. I'm so afraid to do that. And now, weirdly, I have got to do that because I'm a coward if I don't do this. That's what drove me to it.

[Monica Padman]

He has so much shame.

[Dax Shepard]

What drove you to it?

[Brad Pitt]

There is that white trash side of the Ozarks. Growing up, getting on a mini bike and being at the lake and in bass boats and my dad would give it to us at 12 and we'd take the boat out ourselves. And then driving too early and driving on dirt roads, driving in the rain, driving in the ice.

[Dax Shepard]

Did it snow there?

[Brad Pitt]

Oh, yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

Driving in the snow is the funnest thing a young man can do.

[Brad Pitt]

Except you hit the black ice and.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah, it'll surprise you. Yeah, the motorcycle thing, just. You started watching it?

[Brad Pitt]

No, I had one when I was a kid and then kind of lost it in the 90s and then got back on it. I'd kind of watched a little bit in the McDohan period when he was winning MotoGP. That's a crazy story because he had a horrible accident in the early 90s. They were going to take his leg. He said, don't, please don't, don't. They revolutionized this thing that's. Now it's common practice where they fused his Two legs together to get blood supply.

[Monica Padman]

Whoa.

[Brad Pitt]

And worked, got up, won five championships. What? Yeah. And now his son is Jack Doan, who was driving for Alpine.

[Dax Shepard]

Oh, my. That's his son. He's a rookie this year.

[Brad Pitt]

Yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

Oh, wow. I had no idea.

[Brad Pitt]

I just had a flashback. Did you ever go to demolition derby?

[Dax Shepard]

Oh, God, yeah.

[Brad Pitt]

Okay, so demolition derby is a bunch of guys get in a car, any kind of car, usually station wagons, one, because it would go in reverse, and they just bang the shit out of each other. And the last man standing wins. Sometimes There's a figure 8, but I went to those a lot. And then I had a crazy uncle who's a preacher, had this kind of Elvis hairdo, and he raced stock cars.

[Monica Padman]

You just grew up around it?

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. How much were you in search of masculinity? I was. Deeply. My story is my dad wasn't around, so I was like, whatever the dude said to do. Ride a wheelie, jump your bike, whatever. The thing was fight. I was racing towards it. I had to get some kind of masculine validation. Were you in search of that?

[Brad Pitt]

I never put that much thought into it. My dad was a pretty cool customer, and I think I absorbed. You know, I see it in my roles. I'm either doing him or I'm rebelling against him in some way.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

Is he with us still?

[Brad Pitt]

Yes. He's 83. Going to see him next week. Oh, he's pretty cool. But, you know, going to the drive in theaters, they didn't have a lot of money, so we would pop popcorn. By the time we got there, it was wet. They'd make Kool Aid, and we'd go sit on the front of the big Buick and watch movies. In our neighborhood, we had a drive in theater.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah.

[Brad Pitt]

But also these ideas of masculinity because we would see a lot of Clint Eastwood. We would see Butch and Sundance.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah.

[Monica Padman]

Do you have brothers and sisters?

[Brad Pitt]

I got a younger brother. Younger sister.

[Monica Padman]

Okay. So your first. Firstborn. Yeah. That wouldn't have been my guess.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. You don't read as firstborn.

[Brad Pitt]

Why?

[Dax Shepard]

You're kind of too nice. Hey, what was your thing?

[Monica Padman]

Because I'm firstborn. We are bossy. I suppose I associate that type of adventure with a middle or youngest.

[Brad Pitt]

Ah, okay.

[Dax Shepard]

That's the other thing. I had an older brother five years older than me, so whatever he was doing, I was trying to do. So he was in a bmx and then I was in a bmx.

[Monica Padman]

You're always trying to raise the stakes when you're a younger improve Yourself.

[Brad Pitt]

That'd be my brother, certainly. Always getting in trouble.

[Dax Shepard]

Is he wild?

[Brad Pitt]

He was wild then, and now he's uber successful and whatever he takes on, he masters it. But that was the thing, I think, when you talk about masculinity, maybe I put in terms of capability, because that was a big thing with my dad. You get up and you do it. And he had us mowing the lawn at 8. You know, like, he shouldn't be around these blades and things, dumping them. But all my life I had a job, okay?

[Dax Shepard]

So maybe that's another thing I chase and maybe do is competence. Competence is so hot.

[Brad Pitt]

I'm going to agree with you. You've talked about all those sports. I was okay at all of them. Didn't stick with any of them long enough to be great at him. Not that I even could. Yeah, but to be competent in all of them. Yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

Did you ever have to beat anyone up to save your brother?

[Brad Pitt]

No. In fact, I remember he got in fights before I did. Oh, yeah. I remember getting a fight and I grabbed the guy in the balls, like.

[Dax Shepard]

Oh, wow, it works.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah.

[Brad Pitt]

Desperation. Desperation again.

[Monica Padman]

It works.

[Dax Shepard]

I wonder why it worked, though. It was it because it hurts so bad because everyone's such a homophobic. He's getting away. Run away.

[Monica Padman]

Was that happening then? Was there, like, a lot of calling?

[Brad Pitt]

Yes, don't cry. Yeah, don't be gay.

[Monica Padman]

Fake.

[Brad Pitt]

That kind of stuff. A lot of that. That was that error. Error. That era. But error.

[Monica Padman]

It's still happening, though. We thought it was gone. And then we were talking to Dax's kid the other day. She was like, this kid in my class is racist. And she was like, telling. I'm like, he is racist.

[Dax Shepard]

Oh, yeah. Like crazy racist in LA.

[Monica Padman]

School's like, oh, 10. And I thought it was done. And maybe it's just human nature to be cruel.

[Brad Pitt]

It is, I think.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah.

[Brad Pitt]

Nice.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah.

[Brad Pitt]

No, benevolent is the word I was looking for.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. Okay. So you go to University of Missouri?

[Brad Pitt]

Yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

You must have pretty good grades.

[Brad Pitt]

I was all right. Yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. Just all right?

[Brad Pitt]

Good enough. Yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

Good, Capable. And you wanted to do journalism?

[Brad Pitt]

I wanted to do architecture, but there wasn't an architectural path at Mizzou. But they had the best journalism school. And then I thought, I don't really want to interview people, but I'll design magazines or movie posters. It was going kind of the design angle.

[Dax Shepard]

Had you read Fountainhead already?

[Brad Pitt]

I had not read Fountainhead.

[Dax Shepard]

Okay, let's talk about Fountainhead for one second.

[Brad Pitt]

Okay. I'm not a big fan by the.

[Dax Shepard]

Way, I, 20 years ago, read some interview with you, I swore it said you liked Fountainhead.

[Brad Pitt]

I think I did then, yeah.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

This is what I wanna talk about. Because I was like, I'm gonna check that book out. This is his favorite book. I read it and I was like, oh, yeah, Howard Rourke. I want to be Howard no matter what happens. It's just proven I'm right.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

That's a very appealing archetype when you're young.

[Monica Padman]

Read it. What is he like?

[Dax Shepard]

Howard Roark is basically Frank Lloyd Wright. Right. That's the kind of model the idea is.

[Brad Pitt]

Model on? Yeah. Ayn Rand modeled it off. Frank Lloyd Wright.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. So he would design things for people, but he wasn't really interested in what they wanted. He was a genius and he would come in and he would build something for you.

[Brad Pitt]

Let me show you what you want.

[Monica Padman]

Yes. Yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

It's his vision. Certainly people would be against it, but when it was all over, he would be right. And I think when you're 20, you're like, yeah, man, validation.

[Brad Pitt]

I was right.

[Dax Shepard]

That's all you want. I'm a genius.

[Brad Pitt]

And there was also this idealism of. She came from socialism, and this idea of an individual voice and supporting the individual voice, I think meant a lot to her, and I think is the basis behind this. And so as a young person, you read the idealism because spoiler alert, he'll burn it all down if you take his thing and corrupt it. There was no group sport in it. So in this day and age, blowing a building is not really.

[Monica Padman]

It's not cool.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah.

[Brad Pitt]

Not cool. It's not the course you want to take.

[Dax Shepard]

There's other ways to handle it, probably.

[Brad Pitt]

Yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

Okay, so you already had. Loved architecture, so. Yeah. If you already loved architecture and you're in your 20s and you read that book, it's like this thing was written for me.

[Brad Pitt]

Yeah. Then. Did you read Alice Rugg?

[Dax Shepard]

Yes. James. What is it called?

[Brad Pitt]

Galt. Yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah, yeah.

[Brad Pitt]

I read it and then I went.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. It fell apart for me reading that.

[Brad Pitt]

I know so many people love this book, but for me it was like, we're special and we're going to keep our specialness.

[Dax Shepard]

To us, it was all about individualism.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah.

[Brad Pitt]

But it was also this entitlement to our opinion is right and we're best, and we're going to keep it to ourselves because you don't deserve us.

[Dax Shepard]

Compromise would be a very ugly word for her or any of those books right now. Is this true that you left college a week before Graduation?

[Brad Pitt]

No, I actually went through graduation. I just didn't finish my last week of classes and actually graduate. But my parents were already coming.

[Monica Padman]

Oh, you went to the ceremony but you didn't graduate?

[Brad Pitt]

Walk the line, hat and all.

[Dax Shepard]

Cap, you wanted to be to throw your hat.

[Monica Padman]

Well, sure. It's very good.

[Dax Shepard]

I'm not going to miss that. That's a crazy decision.

[Brad Pitt]

No, because I decided come to la.

[Monica Padman]

We only have one week left.

[Brad Pitt]

I had one week left. But what's the Spike Jones movie adaptation? Remember when Chris Cooper talks about he's into orchids? Yeah, yeah, he talked about his former. Jones was about some kind of fish breeding. I think it was Merill. Ask him what happens and he says done with fish?

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Brad Pitt]

It felt like that for me. Just done. I was kind of lamented that movies weren't an option. I'd always loved movies. I met this friend whose dad had a condo in Burbank and said I could stay there for one month. Oh, and I went green light, I'm going to it. And he moved to Beverly. What car did you drive out for that Datsun 206.

[Dax Shepard]

Oh, wow.

[Brad Pitt]

With the bumper hanging off.

[Dax Shepard]

Okay. Wasn't in great shape.

[Monica Padman]

You still have it?

[Dax Shepard]

No.

[Monica Padman]

Oh, sometimes it's fun to have those old original.

[Dax Shepard]

Do you fantasize about getting any of the stupid cars you have? Because I had a 91 Honda Civic DX for a decade here and I want to get one and make it fucking fast.

[Brad Pitt]

I was just looking at. My dad had a 74 Monte Carlo.

[Dax Shepard]

You got to get it just looking it up.

[Monica Padman]

You got to get it just for fun.

[Brad Pitt]

Just a little tribute.

[Monica Padman]

How often are you scrolling those cars? Be honest.

[Brad Pitt]

Almost as often as I'm scrolling Zillow.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah, I know Zillow will really.

[Brad Pitt]

I love house porn. House porn, car porn, bike porn.

[Dax Shepard]

Well, you've been in this situation for a long time. But for so long it was just I dreamt about it and then I could do it and then I did it. I bought too much stuff.

[Brad Pitt]

I saw the toys out.

[Dax Shepard]

It looks fun. This is me now, constrained. So I have these rules I have to have in place. Like I have to look at the car like 10 times so you make.

[Brad Pitt]

Sure that you put the time in to make it worth its while.

[Dax Shepard]

That's right. Because I'm dangerous. I get on, bring a trailer and I'm like, oh my fucking God, I need that thing so bad.

[Brad Pitt]

Stay tuned for more Armchair Expert if you dare.

[Dax Shepard]

We are supported by quints. You know when you look back at photos of yourself in your all black punk stage in high school or wearing head to toe 90s neon and you wonder, what was I thinking? Sometimes trends just don't stand the test of time. If you want an outfit that you're going to feel great about both now and later, check out the wardrobe staples from Quince. They're classic and elevated, so you're gonna love the way you look now and years from now. And they're made with high quality materials, so they'll hold up for years to come too. I love quints. I love their cashmere so much.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah. If you want to revamp your wardrobe, which I suggest per season.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah.

[Monica Padman]

Add some pieces in that are fun, kind of just for the season. There's some really good summer pieces, some great button downs that you can also wear by the pool.

[Dax Shepard]

They have European linen beach shorts, you know, organic silk polos. Stick to staples that last with elevated essentials from Quince. Go to quince.comstacks for free shipping on your order and 365 day returns. That's Q-U-I-N-C-E.comstacks to get free shipping and 365 day returns. Quince.comDax we are supported by Kachava. My brother is visiting and boy, these days just unraveled quickly for us. I'm very blown away with his stamina.

[Monica Padman]

Oh, wow. Good for him.

[Dax Shepard]

Five years older than me, I got him to take a hike and then to my surprise, he pushed for the seven mile hike. Ooh. Then the second we got home, Lincoln was like, it's time to play volleyball. You guys promised you'd play volleyball. Second, that was over. You promised to play pickleball. Play pickleball. Then when that was over, Delta, you promised a motorcycle ride. So we found ourselves wall to wall. Six hours and I'm telling you, I needed a quick hit of nutrition. I didn't have time to sit down. And wherever the day takes you, you need nutrition that fuels your daily adventure. Like Cachava's whole shake will keep your body and mind nourished all day long. Because Kachava has 25 grams of 100% plant based protein and comes in five indulgent flavors including chocolate vanilla chai matcha and coconut acai.

[Monica Padman]

I'm a chocolate gal.

[Dax Shepard]

The chocolate salad in the vanilla is also really good. I'm a sucker for vanilla.

[Monica Padman]

And then if you add, you can add like frozen fruit and a little peanut butter.

[Dax Shepard]

Oh, then you got a full deal.

[Monica Padman]

You can mix it with your iced coffee. Lots of options.

[Dax Shepard]

Every two scoops of Cachava has 85 superfoods, nutrients and plant based ingredients. And there are no artificial flavors, colors or sweeteners. No gluten, no soy, no preservatives. You can feel good about adding it to your diet. And it's so easy. So when you have a chaotic, busy day, whether that's managing work, family or an unexpected adventure, and you realize you need fuel fast cachava makes it easy to get something delicious in your belly. And unlike fast food, cachava gives you the sustainable energy you need to power through the day. Fuel your daily adventures with Kachava. Go to kachava.com and use code DAX for 15% off your subscription for a limited time. That's Kachava K-A C-H-A-V A.com code DAX for 15% off.

[Monica Padman]

People love dogs on account of how nice, soft and fluffy they are. But did you know there's a credit card called CareCredit and it's like a dog in every single way. Okay, it's nothing like a dog, but.

[Brad Pitt]

You can use it to pay for.

[Monica Padman]

Things like vet care for your dog or dental and vision care for yourself. At over 270,000 locations nationwide, CareCredit offers flexible financing for health and wellness for pets and people. Which actually makes it better than a dog because dogs don't even have flexible financing. Take that dog's eye.

[Brad Pitt]

Visit carecredit.com to apply and find a location near you.

[Dax Shepard]

Subject to credit approval. This is Nick and this is Jack. We're best friends, ex finance guys and resident 90s experts. And every week on our podcast, the Best Idea yet, we're bringing you the untold stories behind your favorite product. For instance, can you guess which billion dollar fashion company went viral thanks to a rhinestone covered tracksuit? Or which cartoon turned four turtles into a global toy empire by accident? It started as a joke. Last one. Which cold beverage was so hated by Starbucks they actually ended up acquiring it? Spoiler. The Frappuccino. Howard Schultz apparently thought cold coffee was super lame and then he bought it. From Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles to Juicy Couture to the orange mocha Frappuccino. Join us every week to learn how your favorite things got made. Follow the best idea yet on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts. And you can listen early and ad free right now by joining Wondering Plus. And if this podcast lasts longer than 45 minutes, call your doctor. Okay, so you drove out in a Datsun. I did hear a Funny story about you wanting to get your SAG card.

[Brad Pitt]

And interjecting all that shut down so hard. I was doing extra work for about a year and a half before I got to do something real. And I was thrilled. I loved it. I couldn't believe I could be on set. When I landed in Burbank, I got the paper. I went to McDonald's. I had $275 left in my name. There were three extra agencies. You could pay me 25 bucks. And you were in. I found it in the paper, and I got in. I'm doing an industrial video by the end of the week. And I get this. I get this gig I'm about.

[Dax Shepard]

You're already inflating. What happened?

[Brad Pitt]

I'm an extra in this movie.

[Dax Shepard]

I land this role.

[Brad Pitt]

I land this job as extra.

[Dax Shepard]

He's a waiter.

[Brad Pitt]

When I started, I put them on your resume like they were real. And it still haunts me.

[Dax Shepard]

That's great.

[Brad Pitt]

It's a restaurant scene. The main characters, Charlie Sheen and D.B. sweeney and a bunch of other actors that I wasn't necessarily aware of. And I am the waiter. I was supposed to bring up champagne and pour champagne. They show me how to do it. You gotta pour. You spin, you wipe the thing. I said, great.

[Monica Padman]

Than an extra.

[Brad Pitt]

Well, it was a chosen extra.

[Monica Padman]

Oh, wow.

[Brad Pitt]

Put forward.

[Monica Padman]

Oh, my God.

[Brad Pitt]

And the whole game was, how do you get your SAG card? Because you can't get a job. You don't have your SAG card, but you can't get your SAG card unless you've had a job. So it was just catch 22.

[Dax Shepard]

Specifically, you need to speak.

[Brad Pitt]

Yeah. That was the barrier to entry. Yes. And like a jackass, they're doing the scene. I get to the last actor, and she seemed lower on the totem pole, like I thought, maybe. And literally, the scene is going on. I pour her champagne and I go, would you like anything else?

[Dax Shepard]

I want the dailies from that.

[Brad Pitt]

Listen to this.

[Monica Padman]

Oh, my God.

[Brad Pitt]

First AD Runs over you do that again, you're out of here.

[Monica Padman]

Oh, my God.

[Brad Pitt]

It was just shame for the rest of the night. Took a shot.

[Monica Padman]

Look, it was.

[Dax Shepard]

These are the best stories. Favreau has one. Favreau is an extra. I think it's a Hoffman Hoffa or something. Something's shooting in Chicago when he lives there. He's an extra. And he's in a van and he's driving through the background of a scene. It occurs to him, they're not gonna be able to see me. There's not enough Light in here?

[Brad Pitt]

No.

[Dax Shepard]

So he decides, no, I'm gonna turn on the interior lights and I'm gonna drop the visor and turn that light on. Take three. Someone finally notice, like, what's going on.

[Brad Pitt]

With the fucking extra.

[Dax Shepard]

Why is the extra lit in the. God, you can't light yourself.

[Monica Padman]

Oh, my God.

[Brad Pitt]

Industrious, though.

[Monica Padman]

Oh, my God.

[Brad Pitt]

Yeah. We're desperate at that time. Yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

So endearing.

[Monica Padman]

It' it is sweet.

[Dax Shepard]

How long before you were. I guess when Thelma and Louise. How long before we get that?

[Brad Pitt]

They always say, what, five years? If you're not working in five years, go home. I got that. At year four.

[Dax Shepard]

We just need to honorably mention Monica and I shared favorite movie is Seven.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah. It's actually hard for me to. With you sitting there. Think it's you. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

That's that thing.

[Monica Padman]

It's that thing. You've watched it so many times. It holds up.

[Brad Pitt]

It does hold.

[Dax Shepard]

Oh, it's bulletproof.

[Brad Pitt]

That's David Fincher, that's Andy, Kevin Walker.

[Monica Padman]

But the two of you also.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. What about working with Morgan? I interviewed Morgan this year with the Gun Down.

[Brad Pitt]

David?

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah.

[Brad Pitt]

Oh, my God. No, he's the voice of God. I had hit a point. 94. Such a bugged out year. That's Cobain. That's OJ. The whole summer I had had not such great experiences. Coming off a couple of jobs and I just wasn't sure what I was doing. I had the weirdest summer. I had this girlfriend who was into reptiles. We bought 40 chameleons. I was living in Errol Flynn's old bachelor pad. Glass windows, and they were filled. Our house was like a terrarium.

[Monica Padman]

Girlfriend who was into reptiles and 40.

[Dax Shepard]

Specific, not five or 10.

[Brad Pitt]

I know, I know.

[Dax Shepard]

Were you showing off like, we'll take them all.

[Brad Pitt]

It was the most unhealthy time. I just needed to check out. I would wake up, I would get a bongload. I would have four Coca Colas on ice. No food this particular summer. And I've watched the OJ trial and trying to figure out, what do I do next? What do I do next? And then I read this script. My dear friend and manager and basically my sister, now Cynthia, sends us over. She says, you gotta read this. I read the first seven pages. I call her up, I go, are you kidding me? The cliche. The old cop wants out. The young cop comes in, he's looking at his trophies, his high school football trophies. She goes, just finish it.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Brad Pitt]

And then I go meet Finch. And he was just talking about films. Like, I'd never heard anyone speak about film. Yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

What had he made already?

[Brad Pitt]

Just Alien 3. And he had had a crap experience on that. Got fired off it three times.

[Dax Shepard]

Oh, wow. Wow.

[Brad Pitt]

And I just got the Jones back. And finding that, it just reinvigorated what I wanted out of this thing. What's possible.

[Dax Shepard]

Can I argue there's a humility to that performance that I'm wondering, was that new because you're coming off of California? Like, I watched California, and that's kind of the dream role I would want to play growing up. Hey, Dale, put your titty in your shirt.

[Brad Pitt]

Hey, Dale, put your titty back up.

[Dax Shepard]

Back up. Yeah, that's who I want to be. I want to drink the beer and be a badass and all that stuff. And so to go play, you're kind of a putz in seven.

[Brad Pitt]

Yeah. It's that naivete or even the hubris that you think you know the world. And that's what I liked about the Mills character. You grow up in this vacuum. You see the world as your own backyard. And you do not appreciate that there are people who think differently than you, have ulterior motives, other beauties, different beliefs. And that was always kind of a theme for me, this idea of your own hubris. Anytime I've ever gotten knocked down, it's been because of hubris. It's been because I think I know what's going on.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah.

[Brad Pitt]

Yeah. I think I know the score.

[Dax Shepard]

But you gotta go in there and say lines like, no, he's fucking dancing around his grandma's underpants or whatever the hell that was. Like, there's no vanity in that.

[Brad Pitt]

Yeah. No, he thinks he understands there's good and there's bad. There's black and there's white, and that's the world. Bad guys gotta go. It's that kind of stupidity.

[Dax Shepard]

Was it already the situation where it's like a bazillion takes? I entered this with a lot of insecurity. Like, I'm not sure I belong here. That would have triggered for me, like, I suck.

[Brad Pitt]

I don't think it's completely fair for my friend David Fincher, because I think he's brilliant and he knows what he wants. The only time I ever did that was on Fight Club, and it was a big Steadicam shot outside in the parking lot, coming into the bar, going down, starting the Fight Club. That was like, 40 takes. But they're so technical. And so usually there's a technical aspect of it or if he needs to beat the acting out of the actor, which is the Kubrick way. And that's the only time I've ever seen it flare up in that way.

[Dax Shepard]

It never triggered your insecurities.

[Brad Pitt]

He is not shy to do it. No. In fact, I was more insecure the first three takes. Four takes, I'm trying to find my way at that time. I'd feel safer now. Like, two takes, please.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah, I gotta get a take and.

[Dax Shepard]

A half stitch together.

[Brad Pitt]

Yeah. Take the time and clean that and you can edit.

[Monica Padman]

I guess it's true. If you're doing that many, you feel safe. That one has worked.

[Brad Pitt]

I did, but it was so important to me.

[Dax Shepard]

How much insecurity were you working with at that period?

[Brad Pitt]

First half of the career was a lot of insecurities. No, he's doubting. You know, you get in there, you get in the ring and you have this amount of time, and that's compromised. That goes into cement and that's it.

[Dax Shepard]

Also, it's not like you necessarily had some long period where you're working with okay actors. You're pretty immediately working with, I don't know. Legends of the Fall. You're with Anthony Hopkins right out of the gate.

[Brad Pitt]

Yeah, it was cool. I feel like my learning has really been on film also. It came from just a love of movies and love of performance and wanting to make sure I got it right. Like, there's this idea. Right, right. And what you learn to understand is it's just being truthful. And if it's truthful, it's gonna play.

[Monica Padman]

What's the first time you felt that?

[Dax Shepard]

Oh, that's a good question, Monty.

[Brad Pitt]

It is a good question. Oh, man. I just know the best moments I started figuring out in the 90s were things I hadn't planned for. They were being in the moment. And then it flows.

[Dax Shepard]

I'm not sure when I'm good and not. There's times I thought I was great and I'm just okay. And there's times I think I suck and I'm kind of good.

[Brad Pitt]

That's the early stuff.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah.

[Brad Pitt]

Fucking rock that. You look at it, I go, I do have some moments. One of the first one was in this teen horror film. One of my very first jobs. For some reason, I was thinking I was Sean Penn. I run into high school. I see a dead teacher and I go, no, I don't even know this guy.

[Dax Shepard]

You wish you had a wall on against and fly down.

[Monica Padman]

Was it your streetcar moment?

[Brad Pitt]

Exactly.

[Dax Shepard]

I'm afraid to ask you this one, but Here go we. We go. Have you ever heard this Cary Grant quote? Everyone wants to be Cary Grant. Even I want to be Cary Grant.

[Brad Pitt]

Yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

You relate to that at all?

[Brad Pitt]

Maybe the earlier years. I don't know. I don't even think much about perception anymore. But yeah, certainly people look at you this way and I don't feel that good. Other people look at me like I'm an asshole and I go, I feel a little better than that though. Right, right. You run into that. But I don't think about perception much anymore. I believe in what I'm doing. I understand my craft. I feel like I elevate the jobs I'm in and I make sure I do and put the work in. I work hard.

[Monica Padman]

When were you able to drop that?

[Brad Pitt]

I made a big switch. I remember going in the 90s, going, you could plug any one of us into this role, this kind of movie, this leading man kind of thing. It's all going to be the same. So that's boring. And it's really about chasing an image. And then I made a switch in the early aughts where I said, I know the movies I've enjoyed this far and why I'm not taking anything because someone tells me it should or it's good or someone else is going to get if I don't. I did a couple of those and always didn't work. And I just made the switch. And really I enjoy what I do now.

[Dax Shepard]

And I'm going to admit that this is really Malcolm Gladwell's question because I admire him so much and we're pals. And I called him. I was like, I'm interviewing Pitt and I'm nervous and I want it to be great. And I'm wondering if we have the same curiosity, what is your great curiosity about him? And he said, I guess I'm most curious. The gap between the public Brad Pitt and the real Brad Pitt. If that gap has shrank or gotten broader.

[Brad Pitt]

Wow.

[Dax Shepard]

And I thought, that's a cool question. And I guess I'm curious.

[Brad Pitt]

I don't break a lot of this down. That's a hard. I don't know if I put it in either way because I go in and I go in hard, I work hard, and then I always need to disappear and step out. I just need to refill. I'm not that guy that's really can be out and about in the public and people. And I've always enjoyed my solitude. Not my loneliness, not those periods, but the solitude that can even be with loved ones and Friends or family, and I really need it. I'm getting ready to start now. This big press gauntlet juggernaut for this film that deserves to go worldwide, and I got to go do that. I'll get up for it as I need to do. I don't feel like I'm very good at it. I've always been a little embarrassed this side of it, and I still have that feeling each time. I got to get myself up for it, and it takes a lot out of me. So then I need to step back and really disappear. And that's worked well for me. So has it gotten bigger or smaller? I think it's gotten smaller. My relationship with it. The gap's gotten smaller.

[Dax Shepard]

Is the embarrassment. Because it feels like there's some kind of lack of humility in that part of the job.

[Brad Pitt]

Yeah. You know, where we grew up and especially that era, You're a braggart. If you talk about yourself, you're conceited. And I got accused of that a lot as a kid. Even just being quiet. I'd get accused of being conceited or something. And I didn't understand that.

[Dax Shepard]

That.

[Brad Pitt]

And then there's just the fear I'll always have Just putting my foot in my mouth or stepping in a pile of.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah, live with it.

[Brad Pitt]

I've never considered this my specialty. I'd rather make things, whether that's a chair or a shirt or a movie, and let it speak for itself and move on and get to the next. But this is a group sport, and we got to support it.

[Dax Shepard]

My arc. I'm embarrassed to even try to compare it to yours, but my arc was. I wanted it so bad. It happened. It was so fun for a minute. Then I was down in Austin. I was making idiocracy, and I was in fuddruckers, and I was like, oh, that table of people staring at me. Oh, that table's also staring at me. And I remember leaving the restaurant, calling my girlfriend, almost in tears, going, like, I have no control over my environment anymore. And it felt very claustrophobic. Then I hated it, and then I came to accept it. And then even more profound, in therapy a few years back, the dude really figured out or helped me figure it out. Out. I feel very fraudulent receiving that attention. I don't feel worthy of that.

[Brad Pitt]

Yeah, that's fair enough. But when you say worthy because the importance isn't there. It's looked at from afar like it's important in some way. And I have a similar version of that. I mean, the way I was able to get my arms around. It was. I just remember when I saw my first celebrity, I moved here and in a week I saw John Cusack at a Fishbone concert. I embarrassed the person with my. Because I was like. And they're like, shut.

[Monica Padman]

You're in la.

[Brad Pitt]

She turned her back on me.

[Dax Shepard]

It's not cool here. Yeah.

[Brad Pitt]

That's not cool. But I just remember what it meant to me. I met the Harlem Globetrotters when I was a kid. I got pulled out on the court.

[Dax Shepard]

No.

[Brad Pitt]

Yeah. First Taste Metal Arc and all of that. Remember?

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Deep, Deep. Dee Dee. Dee Dee Dee.

[Brad Pitt]

And Curly. And the Original Squad. The Original Squad and what it meant to me. And so when you look at it that way, that you can brighten someone's day, that could be, like, a highlight in some way. Like those days were for me. That's how I found my way around it, at least.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. I was reading an interview with Owen Wilson years ago, and I thought he summed it up the best. He goes, you know what's kind of cool? If you think about. About the fact that you can just make someone's day. I was like, well, that is a cool power. Yeah.

[Brad Pitt]

It's a lovely thing.

[Dax Shepard]

You need to, like, accept it. It's easy to get caught in fighting it.

[Brad Pitt]

Yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

And you can ruin your life, I.

[Brad Pitt]

Think, because no guidebook tells you that part of it. I just love movies. I didn't really understand fame.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. That part of it.

[Brad Pitt]

What you lose, what the trade off is. But we got to talk about punk, because punk was pretty revolutionary. Jackass. And then into punk. Punk'd. We're coming off this time where we gotta be tough guys. We don't show weakness to this punk rock kind of approach. Like. No, no, no. Not only that. We're gonna embarrass ourselves the most we can. And there was a real freedom in that switch that happened.

[Dax Shepard]

I don't think I can appreciate that.

[Brad Pitt]

I rank punked up there as something kind of revolutionary. Really? No, I mean this. I mean this.

[Dax Shepard]

Thank you.

[Brad Pitt]

Yeah. Jackass as well.

[Dax Shepard]

Okay, great. So that's one of my questions.

[Brad Pitt]

Okay, great, great.

[Monica Padman]

Thank you for the comment.

[Dax Shepard]

I want nothing but approval. And then when I get it, I'm like, oh, I don't want it.

[Brad Pitt]

I don't trust it. I don't want approval.

[Dax Shepard]

All I want is. Yet I can't stand it when I.

[Monica Padman]

Think of someone who needs approval at all.

[Dax Shepard]

Do you? I think you do.

[Brad Pitt]

I wouldn't put it that way either. I know if I like the Work I'm putting out there. If I like the stories, it's not going to speak to everyone, but I know it's going to speak to someone else too. And I have a comfort in that. So it's different than approval. When I think of what movies meant to me as a kid living in a Christian vacuum, you saw different ways to handle things and you saw different cultures and things around the world. And you saw. Saw John Travolta swearing at his dad for messing up his hair. I record on my hair, that kind of shit. And I was just enraptured with it. And movies, for me, was that kind of other.

[Monica Padman]

Teaching you as Brad, do you need a. Like Dax and I need. We're bottomless pits, approval from, let's be really honest, people who we think are high status. As the gross way of saying it.

[Dax Shepard]

As my grossest quality.

[Brad Pitt]

People I admire.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah, exactly.

[Brad Pitt]

So that's fair. Yes. And by the way, way, I still feel like that kid in Oklahoma, Missouri, Ozarks, who's still like, groping his way through this whole thing.

[Dax Shepard]

Still kind of can't believe you're here.

[Brad Pitt]

No, I take total responsibility for being here, but to me, it's just another craft, like anyone who works hard at what they do and has confidence in what they do.

[Dax Shepard]

Now, Jackass. The person I admire the most is Will Ferrell.

[Brad Pitt]

I will not miss a Will Ferrell movie more.

[Dax Shepard]

What I love is his art installations as a human. So I'm at a Lakers game one time, I'm with Chris and I. I go, the security guard looks like Will Frell. You know, at the Lakers, the guys with the red jackets.

[Brad Pitt]

Yeah, my God.

[Dax Shepard]

Really looks like Will Ferrell. And I'm like, that's Will Fell sitting there as a security guard next to the other security guard.

[Brad Pitt]

Oh, my God.

[Dax Shepard]

I interviewed him. Like, what was. I saw you at the lake. And he goes, oh, I have this bit with Adam where on our birthdays we give each other outfits and then you have to go use the outfit wherever. So Adam gave him the full security and he smuggled it into the Staples center. And he went into the bathroom, he put the outfit on. And I'm like, I just admire it so much. I'm almost mad at myself. I haven't thought of that.

[Brad Pitt]

But I love the Sabotage. The underground fun you gotta have with this thing. We'll do that with interviews, going down press lines on Ocean's. Like, Matt, you have to use God willing in every single interview or give him some word or something.

[Dax Shepard]

But what I really like about you is I'm watching Jackass one time, which I love, loved. And all of a sudden, you're on the show and they kidnap you.

[Brad Pitt]

Celebrity kidnapping. Yes. It was great.

[Monica Padman]

What?

[Dax Shepard]

And I'm like, he likes Jackass. Did you reach out to them?

[Brad Pitt]

I'm not sure how it happened. I knew Spike through Fincher. They were shooting Bing John Malkovich right next to us while we were shooting. We'd visit the 17th and a half floor, whatever it was, you know, duck like this. I love Jackass. I loved what they were doing again. I thought it was revolutionary. Maybe with Spike. I said, you ever need a. I'm in. And then Knoxville called up.

[Dax Shepard]

How'd you end up on Dave? There's another thing. I'm watching Dave, you're on, and I go, oh, my God. And then I reverse engineer. I go like, brad loves Dave. How rad.

[Brad Pitt]

I love Dave. My favorite humor is the most irreverent humor. Maybe because I'm so worried. Stepping shit. People who say the wrong thing. I will at times say things that are so wrong, and it just makes me laugh. And so maybe he got word that I really like to show, and he wrote me, said, hey, you want to do something? And I just said, I'm trying, but I can't find a reason not to. So I guess I have to.

[Monica Padman]

Oh, that's great answer.

[Dax Shepard]

It's good karma to go participate in the things you love.

[Brad Pitt]

Come on. Genius show. Yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

He's incredible.

[Brad Pitt]

And I so admire that wit because I don't feel like I necessarily have that really quick wit.

[Dax Shepard]

Isn't it funny who people, like, admire? Like, I was watching the. You and. And Adam Sandler. You did the actor on actor thing.

[Brad Pitt]

Oh, right.

[Dax Shepard]

And I was like, drama dudes love comedians. Comedians love drama dudes.

[Brad Pitt]

I love comedians.

[Dax Shepard]

I love musicians.

[Brad Pitt]

Love comedians, love musicians.

[Monica Padman]

We all just wanna be the thing we're not. It's wild.

[Dax Shepard]

How could you not? Okay, so I saw Once Upon a Time. When it came out, I liked it a lot. Then five years went by, and I'm on a plane a year and a half ago, and it's there. So I start watching it, and then I'm like, this movie's way better than I remember. And then we get off the plane, and now I gotta finish it. So now I'm in a hotel room watching it on my iPad, and then I'm like, I gotta watch it in my theater. I come home, I watch it in the theater. Then I'm like, I gotta watch it with my friend Nate. In the theater. He's gotta rewatch it again.

[Brad Pitt]

Again.

[Dax Shepard]

And I've watched it now, sincerely, probably eight times in the last 18 months. I'm so obsessed with that movie. I think it's second best to only Pulp Fiction. It's so good. And I started thinking, the one bummer about being in a Tarantino movie is do you rob yourself of the experience of getting to watch the Tarantino movie?

[Brad Pitt]

There's no bummer about being in a Tarantino thing. That dialogue.

[Dax Shepard]

I encourage you to watch it eight times in the next 18 months.

[Brad Pitt]

That will never happen if you need.

[Dax Shepard]

To watch it with me in my.

[Brad Pitt]

Theater watching your own shit.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah, exactly.

[Dax Shepard]

That's what I'm saying. That would rob you of the experience. Can we talk about Leonardo in it for one second?

[Brad Pitt]

Come on.

[Dax Shepard]

He's great in my obsession with this movie. And the more and more I watch it, the more and more I'm blown away with his performance.

[Brad Pitt]

Me too. I haven't watched it eight times, but.

[Dax Shepard]

He'S playing like six layers. He's an actor. He's not as good as Leonardo DiCaprio as an actor actor, but he's got to have the scene of his life. But it can't be as good as a Leonardo DiCaprio scene.

[Brad Pitt]

Yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

I don't think people understand the math of what he's doing.

[Brad Pitt]

That's the thing that's least understood as the degree of difficulty. And even we'll get credit for a great director or great writing.

[Dax Shepard]

Perfect song choice.

[Brad Pitt]

Yes, absolutely. Great editing. We need all these accoutrements to help us out. But no, he was doing multiple layers in there. And that star tantrum cracks me up, buddy.

[Dax Shepard]

I'm a. Has been. He's crying as he leaves the place. I'm not going to ask you to rank your co stars, but just where does he fall now? Do you love acting with him?

[Brad Pitt]

Yeah. He works hard, too. I watch someone like him or Margo works so hard, I can go through phases where I'm approaching it a little easy. I'm wondering if maybe I don't have the fire anymore. Maybe not offering. Then I find something else. Or I see performances like that and then I go, ooh, gotta up my game. I wanna be like that. Yeah. Look at all the cast in that. These were all up and comers, new kids. You got Austin Butler, Margaret Qualley, Sydney Sweeney, Mikey Matson, Ethan Hawke's daughter. Pretty incredible. Now they're all doing their own things.

[Dax Shepard]

That was part of my joy of going back and watching it over and over again. I was like, oh, I know all these people now.

[Brad Pitt]

Yeah, that's really fun to see.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah, that's part of his genius is being able to scout talent and then help them blow up your resume is annoying because we're not gonna get to talk about any of this. We gotta go into one of my favorites of all time. I came into this show, talked about Moneyball for like three months straight.

[Dax Shepard]

We just had Michael Lewis on.

[Brad Pitt]

Oh, really?

[Dax Shepard]

What a fucking dude.

[Brad Pitt]

What a brain, huh?

[Dax Shepard]

Oh, my God, he's so charismatic and charming and eloquent. Genius, but chill.

[Brad Pitt]

I would want him to like me.

[Monica Padman]

Approval.

[Dax Shepard]

I wanted him desperately. Okay, the only thing I want to ask about Once Upon a Time, and then we'll move on, is I was getting Duffy vibes. Is he at all in the mix? We owe Duffy an explanation of who he is. Funny, I thought I was watching Duffy.

[Brad Pitt]

I see my dad. But I understand Duffy's got some of my dad in him. That's not a bad call.

[Dax Shepard]

Our mutual friend Duffy was a Navy seal. He's the toughest human being on planet Earth.

[Brad Pitt]

Yep, rock solid.

[Dax Shepard]

He's gorgeous. Okay, if you can't see that, you need fucking glasses.

[Brad Pitt]

Okay?

[Dax Shepard]

He's the only 60 year old man. I see like 30 year olds buying him drinks and shit. There's one scene I always love to point out.

[Brad Pitt]

GI Jane, he's a trainer.

[Monica Padman]

Thank you. He's a trainer.

[Dax Shepard]

How long has he been trained?

[Brad Pitt]

I met him on Troy.

[Dax Shepard]

Okay?

[Brad Pitt]

So I trained him on Troy in a few of them, probably the next decade.

[Dax Shepard]

In G.I. jane, they needed real Navy SEALs in the movie. And he's in the movie.

[Brad Pitt]

Is that right?

[Dax Shepard]

Watch it. Because there's one moment where they need someone to do the ultimate Navy SEAL thing, which is they're in a Zodiac boat and they're flying. Someone's got to hang out of the side of the Zodiac with a fucking inner tube. And the guy in the water grabs it. And then Duffy rips the human being out of the water. The lats are like. Like that wide.

[Brad Pitt]

Yeah, yeah, that's him.

[Dax Shepard]

And you're like, how'd that dude just rip a guy out of the water on a Zodiac going 25 miles an hour?

[Brad Pitt]

Those guys, Navy SEALs, Rangers, Delta Fort, I mean, their baseline is discomfort. Where we would tap out. That's where they begin.

[Monica Padman]

So if that character's your dad, you said they're either your dad or you're rebelling against your dad.

[Brad Pitt]

Yeah.

[Monica Padman]

What are the characters that you are actively rebelling against?

[Dax Shepard]

Really?

[Brad Pitt]

My upbringing, when I say my dad, probably my upbringing like Fight Club and things that are more irreverent.

[Dax Shepard]

Maybe even being flashy in Oceans.

[Brad Pitt]

Was I FL. Flashy?

[Monica Padman]

Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

You're embracing the flash.

[Brad Pitt]

I feel like we lost our way after the first one. Or at least my guy because he was kind of the Duval consigliere guy to George's Danny. I'd like that much more. And then you know when you watch CSI or something and they're trying to give a speech but they got to give each actor one line.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah, yeah.

[Brad Pitt]

They just pick up in each line and just equal distribution.

[Dax Shepard]

Everyone needs a moment.

[Brad Pitt]

Yes, it kind of went that way.

[Dax Shepard]

One last question that you've worked in four different decades now. 90s, 2000s, 2000s, tens. We're now in your fourth decade. Do you have a favorite of those decades of working?

[Brad Pitt]

No.

[Dax Shepard]

Then I don't have a follow up question. Oh, okay. Is there a sweet spot you get nostalgic about?

[Brad Pitt]

It's more like period. So certainly seven. And then losing my way a bit with Choices and then landing back with Fight Club and Snatch.

[Dax Shepard]

Snatch.

[Brad Pitt]

This area felt good. Good.

[Dax Shepard]

How did you learn that accent? Get a kid. Can you still talk like.

[Brad Pitt]

I don't know. She's terribly partial to the periwinkle blue boy. Bice, something like that. Perwinkle blue bice.

[Monica Padman]

Oh my God.

[Brad Pitt]

I don't know. Scarly par something. I don't know. Take a bit.

[Dax Shepard]

So scared to take that role.

[Brad Pitt]

I was too.

[Dax Shepard]

I'm sure scared. Okay, so motorsports. We talked about why you're into motorsports.

[Brad Pitt]

Oh, wait. Before we started, I brought you a gift.

[Dax Shepard]

Oh, you did?

[Brad Pitt]

I brought you a. A Apex GP souvenir.

[Dax Shepard]

I cannot wait.

[Brad Pitt]

I didn't bring you one.

[Monica Padman]

That's okay.

[Brad Pitt]

You're going to understand why.

[Monica Padman]

I don't even know. What time did you give her like.

[Dax Shepard]

100 bucks or something?

[Monica Padman]

Oh my gosh. This is exciting. And unboxing.

[Dax Shepard]

I wasn't anticipating it.

[Brad Pitt]

Yeah, it looks bag and all.

[Dax Shepard]

Oh, I'm on.

[Brad Pitt]

Okay, look at the front.

[Dax Shepard]

First of all, you don't know this about me. Black and gold's my scheme.

[Brad Pitt]

Maybe I did know.

[Monica Padman]

Or did I?

[Brad Pitt]

This is day one. This is the pit crew shit. And we have real crew, proper car guys and they bring the shirts out all for the guys. It's day one. We're in Silverstone, we're shooting. The crowd's there. It's race weekend and they start getting shit from the other teams because look what's on the back. The action Factory, but they put it on tramp stamp.

[Monica Padman]

Oh.

[Brad Pitt]

And we started getting so much shit from the other crews. We were between Mercedes and Ferrari and they were laughing their ass off at our team.

[Monica Padman]

That is fantastic.

[Brad Pitt]

So they switch out all the. The shirts, change them. But I saved one.

[Dax Shepard]

Someone went, can you get Glenn from wardrobe?

[Monica Padman]

Oh, my God, Dex, that's so special. You got a tramp stamp.

[Brad Pitt]

You got the tramp stamp one.

[Dax Shepard]

Maybe by the end of knowing you, I'll have a full wardrobe of clothes you've given me. I've got two items.

[Brad Pitt]

I'm going to work on the waist down now.

[Dax Shepard]

Okay. So I had it wrong and I've wrongly taken a little bit of credit for this. Again, I'm an approval junkie, but my telling of it is I text you at one point and I said, are you watching Drive to Survive? If I. If not, text me when you've finished it. I bet It'll be in 18 hours. Something along those lines.

[Brad Pitt]

Yes, yes, I remember this.

[Dax Shepard]

You did. You text me like 18 hours later. You're like, oh, fuck, I watched them.

[Brad Pitt]

Yeah. Probably nine.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. So you fell in love with it like I did from that. Right?

[Brad Pitt]

Well, I'd been watching a little. Because MotoGP races, there's just not enough of them.

[Dax Shepard]

There's not.

[Brad Pitt]

So then you start dipping into F1 a little bit. Now there's not enough F1 races, so I started dipping into indie. You watching indie?

[Dax Shepard]

No. You're in.

[Brad Pitt]

Oh, I love it.

[Dax Shepard]

I've.

[Brad Pitt]

Even as a tourist, I've stepped into NASCAR a little bit.

[Monica Padman]

Oh, ok.

[Dax Shepard]

Okay, okay, okay. I've done a little dabbling in NASCAR too. I really recommend the night race at Bristol. That's a vibe.

[Brad Pitt]

Wow.

[Dax Shepard]

That's like old fashioned. You feel like. Yeah, there's bootleggers out here.

[Brad Pitt]

Yeah, yeah, Good.

[Dax Shepard]

Just real quick, Valentino Rossi.

[Brad Pitt]

Ah, come on. Still miss him. Don't we miss him, number one. God, don't you.

[Monica Padman]

I don't even want to talk about it. I miss him so much.

[Dax Shepard]

If I had to say the number one God on planet Earth, I think it's Valentino Rossi.

[Brad Pitt]

Yeah, it's Valentino Ross.

[Dax Shepard]

He's so charming. Have you ever seen that thing with Lewis and Valentino? No, I've been told.

[Brad Pitt]

I keep meaning to go look it up. So Lewis gets on his bike and Valley gets in his car.

[Dax Shepard]

That's right. And they go on the track and they've both put down times. And Valley's fast.

[Brad Pitt]

I'm sure he is.

[Dax Shepard]

And Lewis is great. On the bike.

[Brad Pitt]

Yeah, he's gonna be.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah.

[Brad Pitt]

See, there's some video he's put out where he went to a gun range.

[Dax Shepard]

No.

[Brad Pitt]

Oh, my God. He's just like.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah, I guess he's a great surfer. He can do everything and well. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So you fall extra in love with it though, through drive to survive. I'm imagining.

[Brad Pitt]

Yeah. I've been dipping, I guess a little in the arts, you know, in the Schumacher period. I wasn't in like the religion that it is now.

[Monica Padman]

I think the show really, I think.

[Brad Pitt]

It did a lot, especially for America, bringing in new fans. But people have their driver and it's like the success or the struggle of this driver is emblematic of their life.

[Dax Shepard]

The emotional roller coaster we've been on by being really good friends with Ricardo is almost too much for us.

[Monica Padman]

It is too much.

[Brad Pitt]

It's heartbreaking.

[Monica Padman]

I know we love him so much.

[Brad Pitt]

I know there's a second generation of where he's going to go in the sport doing something absolutely, you know, like the gods are with you. Everyone has their own path in the.

[Dax Shepard]

Confidence and how tenuous your grasp on the confidence is.

[Brad Pitt]

Yeah. Even Lewis talks about that. Oh, we know that there's win last year in Silverstone in an inferior car. He was having doubts. And we're talking about fractions of a second.

[Monica Padman]

Such a mind fraction, sometimes one or.

[Dax Shepard]

Two hundredths of a second for pole.

[Brad Pitt]

The idea, idea that 20 guys can go around four mile track, three and a half mile track and be within a second of each other.

[Monica Padman]

That's crazy.

[Brad Pitt]

And the guys on the back end are considered slow.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

Yes. So you don't initiate this. You get approached.

[Brad Pitt]

I get a call from Joe.

[Dax Shepard]

Okay.

[Brad Pitt]

The director, Joe Kaczynski. This mapping technology that he discovered on Top Gun, Maverick mapping in the planes, he has this idea, he can do this with the cars on the track, Formula One cars. So very wisely he said, we're outsiders. I gotta have the tap on the shoulder from someone on the inside. And he goes to seven time world champion Lewis Hamilton.

[Dax Shepard]

Let's go to the greatest driver. Yeah.

[Brad Pitt]

And you gotta understand, I've been trying to get a racing movie made for 20 years in cars, in different classes, in bikes, Isle of Man even. And for whatever reason, it just never came to fruition.

[Dax Shepard]

They're kind of high risk. They're hard to do really well.

[Brad Pitt]

They are hard to do really well. In fact, when we talk about this one, the most difficult thing of it was threading this needle between a faction of fans again. That revered this sport as the greatest thing on this earth and people who don't understand how the sport works but are just going to enjoy the movie. So this thing that we were constantly trying to negotiate like Moneyball, the analytics of it all, we only used the surface analytics of the easy things that we could understand of don't steal, go for walks. And the analytics that they were doing were so much deeper, so much more complex. So to how to tell the story. Story. It's not going to piss off the fans and you're not dumbing down for the fans, but it's not going to be over the head.

[Dax Shepard]

It's a tiny needle to thread.

[Brad Pitt]

Took us two years, really. 3. Developing the script from nothing.

[Dax Shepard]

And I think Lewis was an incredibly smart move because here's the unbelievable triumph of the movie is I think its closest comp. And I say this in the best way because I fucking love the movie is Days of Thunder.

[Brad Pitt]

First of all, I write him. What'd you think? And he goes, it's titties.

[Dax Shepard]

Oh. I said, fucking titties.

[Brad Pitt]

So titties. I guess we all like titties. It might be good.

[Dax Shepard]

The best.

[Brad Pitt]

But then he said it wasn't a but. But Kristen loved it.

[Dax Shepard]

I said more importantly.

[Brad Pitt]

Oh, more importantly. Okay. It's like, you know, after a screen you couldn't quite get it and you go, man, the music was awesome.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. You gotta say something. You know when you're in one of those screens and you're literally going like, I gotta pick something I can say believably.

[Brad Pitt]

Oh, no.

[Dax Shepard]

Boy, that shot with the crane was.

[Brad Pitt]

Was incredible. That must have been really hard.

[Dax Shepard]

How many feet Was that crane? 100.

[Brad Pitt]

Diversion, diversion.

[Dax Shepard]

No fucking titties is my ultimate compliment.

[Brad Pitt]

All right, great.

[Dax Shepard]

Because titties are the best thing in the world.

[Brad Pitt]

They kind of.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. Not been. They kind of been around for 300,000 years.

[Brad Pitt]

Men and women would agree.

[Monica Padman]

I agree.

[Brad Pitt]

Yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

But the genius of having Lewis is it's really hard to make a movie about F1 that could exist actually within the world of F1. I think that's a really tall order.

[Brad Pitt]

Dude. This is unprecedented.

[Dax Shepard]

Yes. The fact that they're involved is crazy. That's a coup.

[Brad Pitt]

We're infused into the racing season. I don't know what other sport you could really do that with. Stay tuned for more Armchair Expert if you dare.

[Dax Shepard]

Today is the worst day of Abby's life.

[Monica Padman]

The 17 year old cradles her newborn.

[Dax Shepard]

Son in her arms. They all saw how much I loved him. They didn't have to take him from me.

[Monica Padman]

Between 1945 and the early 1970s, families.

[Dax Shepard]

Shipped their pregnant teenager daughters to maternity.

[Monica Padman]

Homes and forced them to secretly place their babies for adoption in hidden corners across America.

[Dax Shepard]

It's still happening.

[Monica Padman]

My parents had me locked up in the godparent home against my will. They worked with them to manipulate me and to steal my son away from me.

[Dax Shepard]

The godparent home is the brainchild of.

[Monica Padman]

Controversial preacher Jerry Falwell, the father of.

[Dax Shepard]

The modern evangelical evangelical right and the.

[Monica Padman]

Founder of Liberty University, where powerful men, emboldened by their faith, determine who gets.

[Dax Shepard]

To be a parent and who must.

[Monica Padman]

Give their child away. Follow Liberty Lost on the wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts.

[Dax Shepard]

I think having Lewis there is all of the. The mechanisms and devices that were driving the plot could really happen. And they're so intricate and they are true to formula one. We all know the reality of it. As you say, it's by a tenth of a second. If you're not on the right team, that's that there's so many things that are antithetical to a great movie. You can't have a magic device in this. It has to all be real. There's so many clever things your character does that are totally believable, that are so fun, and they're very.

[Brad Pitt]

Days of Thundery, we're last place team. So the idea of you got to play with what you got.

[Dax Shepard]

So how do you win with what.

[Brad Pitt]

You got, which is a money ball. There's good teams, there's bad teams, and there's 50ft of crap. Then there's us.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. Well, the gap in real life is you have Mercedes and red bull spending $500 million a year, and then you have name the team Haas doing it on 100 million. That's really significant.

[Brad Pitt]

Yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

So how on earth are we going to build any stakes where anything can really happen in reality? And it all really works. When I'm saying Days of Thunder, the reason that I think that's a common compliment is that took something that not everyone was into and it made it so widely available.

[Brad Pitt]

Okay, fair enough.

[Dax Shepard]

Everyone loved Days of Thunder. You did not have to be into cars. Kristen came with me because she had to. I'm like, come on, we're gonna go see this movie. And it ended. And she's like, that's one of the best action movies I've ever seen. That's incredible.

[Brad Pitt]

I think it's fun. As.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah.

[Monica Padman]

Did I wasn't able to go because I were.

[Dax Shepard]

But you did get an invite she got an invite.

[Monica Padman]

Dig in there.

[Brad Pitt]

He didn't cut you out?

[Monica Padman]

No, no, no. I get myself in places.

[Dax Shepard]

It almost made me question who Monica was to ride with us. And she goes, I'm not coming. And I was like, what has happened?

[Monica Padman]

Look, I have an operation to run here and I had to do it.

[Dax Shepard]

You had to edit.

[Monica Padman]

And Dax made a good point. Sometimes it's good for me not to have seen the movie in case things get very esoteric. I also edit the show. So if I'm like, no one's going to understand any of this.

[Brad Pitt]

I wonder if this was going to be an hour and a half just talking about wheels.

[Monica Padman]

No, no, no, no.

[Brad Pitt]

It was the danger of us sitting down here.

[Monica Padman]

I know. That's why I'm there.

[Brad Pitt]

You did really well to hold it off, by the way.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. Thank you. Thank you. I have a lot of practice. Anytime someone arrives in a cool car, she's like, like, we're fucked.

[Monica Padman]

He can read my face where I'm like, ready, Ready to move on from this part.

[Dax Shepard]

Really specific look that says, you're in the weeds on this and no one gives a fuck but you and the guest. But the driving is a huge part of this. I can't imagine you want to do this movie unless you're going to drive.

[Brad Pitt]

I'm so grateful the others didn't work out. They put us in the fucking cars during the race. During the race weekends.

[Monica Padman]

Okay.

[Brad Pitt]

That was my first shot though, was the race weekend. I mean, it was the whole cruise. First shot.

[Monica Padman]

So it's race weekend. You're driving, it's race weekend.

[Brad Pitt]

And the first thing we're going to do is put us out on it was quality day. It is such a military, precision designed machine. That whole day to this second, we're going to get 15 minutes to go out in front of the crowd of how many hundred thousand people are at Silverstone.

[Dax Shepard]

Silverstone's Wimbledon to put it in perspective. Yeah, it's a cathedral.

[Brad Pitt]

This is the UK track.

[Dax Shepard]

F1's British. That's their track.

[Brad Pitt]

Yeah. It's the beginning of the official F1 in the 50s. Started on this track. It's hallowed.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah.

[Brad Pitt]

And they strapped me in the car a half hour early. I'm sweating my balls off. It's really hot. And they screw in the horse collar.

[Dax Shepard]

You have a HANS on and everything.

[Brad Pitt]

Hans helmet. It's really sensory deprivation at that point because you have earphones and you got the fire retardant gear underneath. Then you got your suit and you got the helmet and you're sitting like you would in a bathtub. It's too short to stretch out. And they screw in the horse collar.

[Dax Shepard]

And you can only turn your head about this far with the on.

[Brad Pitt]

And they put us in a half hour early because we couldn't miss our window. We had to prove ourselves. Ourselves. Like if this weekend went bad, if it went tits up, this movie isn't happening.

[Monica Padman]

See how come Tits up that sits used in a B?

[Brad Pitt]

You end up on your back. On your back. Okay, let's say. Let's say if we it up.

[Monica Padman]

I like that.

[Brad Pitt]

Okay. If it goes pear shaped.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah.

[Brad Pitt]

As they would say over there. So we go out now. I had practice. It's a whole nother thing to have all these fans there. I'm not going to be hitting the speeds that those guys are hitting. You see them go around. Cops. Flat out, dude. It is so breathtaking. I stood at the base of Eau Rouge. This is a storied track in Belgium.

[Monica Padman]

Okay.

[Brad Pitt]

Spa for me, it was the greatest track. We got to drive. But I stood at the base with my back at the bottom. And they go up this blind ass up. Lewis talks about the GS. At first it compacts your spine into the ground. Then you get up to the top. It's blind. You lift up. He said it's the only track where you have down upward GS. Anyway. It's amazing. But you stand right next to the wall like this. The cars are right. Here they go. They're flat out. It takes the air out of your lungs. It is so staggering.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah, it is. It warps space and time.

[Brad Pitt]

Yeah. If we could Chris Nolan that moment.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah.

[Brad Pitt]

So it's race weekend. I had practice in my mind driving the track.

[Dax Shepard]

This is stressful.

[Monica Padman]

I know.

[Brad Pitt]

I don't want to spin out because if we spin out, we go off the track. And I'd taken a few misadventures, so I don't want to lose the car. And it's the fan. So I'd practice in my mind. People in the stand and just hitting my breaking points. Practice, practice, practice, practice. And so when we got there, I just told myself the last minute, just have fun. And it was such a joy.

[Dax Shepard]

Was it?

[Brad Pitt]

Yeah. But I'm gonna break 10 yards earlier just to make sure. I'm not gonna get on it hard coming out because again, this is our first attempt. And then the next day, we're shooting on the grid. National anthem. We're off to the side.

[Dax Shepard]

Oh, wow.

[Brad Pitt]

The main feed cuts us out. You just see the drop drivers, but it's me, Damson, Max and cho and then LeClaire. And I'm almost embarrassed because I have such reverence for these guys, the sport. And here's this jackass actor standing at the end, like he knows what he's doing.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah.

[Brad Pitt]

So I just had to swallow that. I'm like, we got to do it. And there's this real energy because we have 10 minutes to get back to our cars and then have a little scene there with Javier Bardem and Tobias. And then we got to get it. So we do that two takes. We get off the grid and they're lining up for the start of the race for the warmup lap. And then our car is. One's going to go. It's already choreographed, where he's going to peel off. And we had two great drivers with us. We couldn't have done it without him. Luciano Bachetta, he was F2 champion. And then Craig Dolby. They're in the cars. We're not doing this part. And one of our cars does not start, the one that's supposed to take off. But they had already had plans for that. If it didn't, guys came running out, push it off the track. And everything went, oh, wow. So then we were in and running, but then we went on strike the next day.

[Dax Shepard]

I was going to say, you have this triumphant, fuck, this movie's going to work.

[Brad Pitt]

We got it. We're in. And then we went on strike on a Monday. It was such a let down. I was just bumping into walls was such a high.

[Dax Shepard]

And you had to do a unique thing on this, which is the movie has to be insured. If something goes wrong, there's so much money on the line that someone's got to ensure that. And they've never insured a movie and let the actors drive 180 miles. Miles an hour.

[Brad Pitt]

No, this was Steve McQueen's problem filming Lamont the last week. He was supposed to drive in the race and insurance stepped in at the last. Said, we lose you, there's no movie, Right?

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah.

[Brad Pitt]

Our movie was predicated on us being on the track and driving.

[Dax Shepard]

Did you personally have to explain to them, like, look, these cars don't work till 180.

[Brad Pitt]

This is a really good point. This happened because we're hitting speeds. We're running with 100kg of extra weight because we got camera gear. We got a block camera here. I got a camera here where I can't see break points, turning points on my phone boards on here, one over here. Sometimes they'd be a big camera up here, which would diffuse all your downforce on the back, the rear, so you'd be sliding out. And we don't have power steering because we're on an F2 that's been chopped and stretched and arrowed. We're in Abu Dhabi and we've been getting away with a lot. And insurance got hip to it, and they came in, they said, speed limit 140. And it actually, in these cars, it becomes more dangerous. You don't have heat in the tires, you don't have heat in the brakes. And they actually become undrivable, unstoppable.

[Dax Shepard]

You're not creating the downforce, so you can't go through the turns.

[Brad Pitt]

This thing would go off and I would just ignore it. And we would go. And the guys, especially Luch and Craig, put together a case for the insurance to show them this is actually more dangerous. It is actually safer to go at 180 and brakes and get the heat in as we need than keep us down at 140. So it took three or four weeks of negotiations and we got there.

[Dax Shepard]

I watch F1 and I am deeply humbled by. I know that you have to believe this car is creating so much downforce that, yes, you can turn right at Silverstone in seventh gear going 190 miles an hour. And that's a leap of faith.

[Brad Pitt]

It's shocking.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. So what was your curve the first.

[Brad Pitt]

Time I got in? I just could not believe you could take corners at these speeds and the car would stick. Every impulse is to get off the gas, but you do that, you destabilize, you'll go wide, then you'll go off the track. So you actually need to stay on it. They say if you're not on the gas or you're not on the brake, you're not driving the car and you're upset in the car. I just kept saying, trust the car, trust the car. I had this mantra going in my head. This is week one. And then the braking capabilities are shocking.

[Dax Shepard]

Now what they do kind of defies physics.

[Brad Pitt]

Yeah. They call it an upside down airplane, don't they?

[Dax Shepard]

Oh, yeah, yeah.

[Monica Padman]

When you're driving it, you can't be in character. Right. Because you have to be so focused on.

[Brad Pitt]

We do the scenes, but we're also in a helmet like this. So if you fuck up the lines.

[Monica Padman]

Yes. How are you doing that?

[Brad Pitt]

And we're getting to drive and we can actually use our side view mirrors. So that leads to the authenticity of it all. But you asked about downforce.

[Dax Shepard]

Yes.

[Brad Pitt]

I don't know how to explain it. It's the greatest feeling. You want to go roller coaster, but no, that's not it. Because you feel the fulcrum under you and a roller coaster on corners. I was in an aerobatic plane once and guy took me for a ride. That'd be the closest thing. I think it is a high. I just can't wait to do it again.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. What's so great is these cameras are fucking mounted on the car in such a way and Joe can control them. And we're seeing you and you're almost blueprinted to think, oh, yeah, he's on a green screen and we're watching him. And then it's just a fluid pan and, oh, no, we're going 180. And there's the other cars. It's so intense and novel. It's really a technological kind of accomplishment.

[Brad Pitt]

Yeah, I think so, too. It's really visceral.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah, it's interesting to hear that. It was tech first, almost. That was what the whole thing.

[Dax Shepard]

Tell me about. You go out to a track, I think you're at a Porsche training center, and there's a GT3, and you get to go out for a bit and Lewis is there, and then he takes you for a ride.

[Brad Pitt]

This is after the controversial 21 finish.

[Dax Shepard]

This is the only time I felt some stress between you and I. Yeah.

[Brad Pitt]

Because I love Max, who's undeniably so damn good, especially this year in a car. Oh, my God, he's incredible. But, yeah, I've been in a few arguments over that one.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah.

[Brad Pitt]

So this is the first time he's been on a track since that controversial end where he loses the title. I just feel like an idiot. He's getting in the car with me, so I'm not going to even try to push. I know lines from being on the bike and on the track and understand trail braking and when to get back on the fuel, the throttle and all that. And that felt good, but I was just.

[Dax Shepard]

Oh, I was feeling such an idiot. Yeah.

[Brad Pitt]

But then I got in with him and it's this bit on the track where it's just a straight way and then it's got this. What do they call it, the carousel. And it's just one of these banked things and it's walled and the guy says, take it easy going out, giving Lewis instructions. There's a bump. It can really unsettle you.

[Monica Padman]

Oh, God.

[Brad Pitt]

He just takes off. We hit the bump. We're here. We're going, going. We hit this course corkscrew. He comes sliding up around in the back end, kicks out. Now we're in the gravel and inches from a wall, and he comes out and he's just laughing his ass off.

[Dax Shepard]

He loves it.

[Brad Pitt]

These guys have such control of this car.

[Dax Shepard]

They're at the very max and they have control.

[Brad Pitt]

You know, he came in. We're getting close to the final cut, and he is so detailed. He would come in and go, no, no, no, that's the wrong gear. You're turned 11. You need to be in fifth by sound.

[Dax Shepard]

Yes. Wow.

[Brad Pitt]

Because we're in an F2 car, so we got to redo the sound for it to sound like an F1 car. He would go down the straight. There's this reverb that comes off the left. You need to add that in. What knowledge.

[Dax Shepard]

Have you ever seen these videos where they just put headphones on the drivers and they play the audio from the car and these guys, within about 30 seconds will go spa. Have you seen them do that?

[Brad Pitt]

No.

[Dax Shepard]

There's many videos of them doing this. They can tell just from the audio. Oh, it was third gear, then fourth, then third. Real quick. They'll name the track.

[Monica Padman]

Wow. Did you get to do all the tracks?

[Brad Pitt]

No. We drove Spa. We drove Dakota. We drove Vegas. That was weird and sketchy and way cold and.

[Dax Shepard]

Tell me about that.

[Brad Pitt]

Just sketchy. And we got no rehearsal on it, and we just had to go out and we had our 115 minute window. 10, I think. Even sketchy.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. Slippery, right?

[Brad Pitt]

And not only that, there are points in it where you're breaking on a curb. It's just odd, technical.

[Dax Shepard]

I went, wait, wait, wait.

[Brad Pitt]

I want to brag some more.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah, please, please.

[Dax Shepard]

Oh, yes. Because this is where the GQ guy was at Silver. What about Abu Dhabi? Because it's night.

[Brad Pitt]

Amazing. Goes from day, dusk, night.

[Dax Shepard]

Oh, I'm so fucking jealous. The fact that for your job you had to go drive all these tracks.

[Brad Pitt]

You should be.

[Dax Shepard]

You should hate me.

[Brad Pitt]

No, this one I will rub in.

[Monica Padman]

I can see how lit up you are about this. This is so fun, both of you.

[Dax Shepard]

I'm hard as a rock for the listener.

[Brad Pitt]

Yeah, yeah. Slight chub over here.

[Monica Padman]

We have so many actors in here, and they're artsy for the most part. That's why they got into it. Do you sometimes feel like an outsider amongst all these artsy actors because you're their peers, but you're also this guy?

[Brad Pitt]

Am I not artsy?

[Monica Padman]

You are artsy.

[Brad Pitt]

Right after I went Right into a man and a dog survival story out in the wilderness of New Zealand. So I'm trying to mix it up.

[Monica Padman]

I'm doing both. But this part of the conversation is the happiest you've been in the whole conversation. Let's be real about that.

[Brad Pitt]

No doubt. No doubt. And we could go on for another few hours. You know, we'll wrap this thing up and we'll still be at it.

[Monica Padman]

You will.

[Dax Shepard]

I want to add some. There's so many rad things about the movie. The fact that all the real teams.

[Brad Pitt]

Are there is that insane.

[Dax Shepard]

You're in shots with Charles LeClaire.

[Brad Pitt]

We could not do it without them. And we had to go into the driver's meeting and make our case. And of course they're going to be suspect of us. What are we going to do? How Hollywood is it going to be? Who are you going to make the bad guys, Ferrari or Red Bull? Like, because you have Lewis, are you going to make us? You know, didn't know what this thing was going to be. And little by little, we made our pitch. I think they understood our respect and told him, we're going to be here in the race weekends. Wherever you're away, tell us to fuck off. No problem. Fucking off. We know how to do that.

[Dax Shepard]

I'm quite good at fucking off.

[Brad Pitt]

That first certainly weekend, I felt like a tourist who had no right to be there. By the end of it, we'd been so integrated into the old ecosystem of it all just having laughs with the guys. And we could not have done it without their participation, without the teams. Toto's in it. Fred's in it.

[Dax Shepard]

Yes.

[Brad Pitt]

All the team bosses are in it. I mean, this production value. There were $30 million cars and their entire teams for the whole pit lane. And they gave us an hour. They pulled out their cars, they all came in, worked on it. I mean, it was unbelievable, the whole F1. Stephano and his team. I think once we proved ourselves, they were super accommodating.

[Dax Shepard]

I talked to some of these dudes, they're pumped, they like it and they're all in it. There's only a single completely unbelievable part of the whole movie.

[Brad Pitt]

Go.

[Dax Shepard]

And it's when Toto offers the kid a ride on Mercedes and he says, no, thanks. I'm like, bullshit. Everyone wants to drive for Mercedes.

[Brad Pitt]

Had to get Toto in.

[Monica Padman]

We love Toto.

[Dax Shepard]

We had so much fun. I've never encouraged you to watch anything that I've done, but I text you, like, you gotta watch Toto on the Body so play.

[Monica Padman]

So playful.

[Brad Pitt]

Yeah, he's really charming. I didn't watch it, by the way.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah, I know, I know.

[Brad Pitt]

I'll get there.

[Dax Shepard]

You're smart. You know, I'm an approval junkie, so you withhold enough to keep me on the hook.

[Monica Padman]

He has to get through eight viewings of Once Upon a Time in Hollywood.

[Dax Shepard]

First, the only thing we've done a bad job at is the premise of the movie, which is fantastic. We meet you, and you are driving in an endurance race. You're one of the drivers 24 hours, a Daytona in a Porsche GT3. And you come out, you've gotten the lead before. Then the other drivers lose the lead. You come up, you get them back in the lead. You get out of the car and you're like, don't fucking lose this lead. This guy's like a fucking. Has been. But he's a genius. He's still incredible.

[Monica Padman]

He's very good while hunting.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. So you're obviously an insanely good driver, but you're kind of a renegade and a vagabond. And then you get approached by Javier Bartolo.

[Brad Pitt]

Yeah. The great Javier Bardem. Oh, my God, can that man wear a suit? Dear Lord, he'll be my number two.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

Okay.

[Monica Padman]

That's a good pick.

[Brad Pitt]

Yeah. He's so good and such a beautiful guy. He, Penelope, his whole family, they're just beautiful people. When you watch a movie, one scene makes the cut, or some kind of amalgamation of one scene makes the cut. But this guy, take after take, just doing different things. In any one of them, you could throw up there. And it was so fun to watch. That's the other side of being behind the making.

[Dax Shepard]

These Spaniards, too, they had have like an art of living. Were you attracted to his whole thing?

[Brad Pitt]

Europeans certainly more than Americans. They carve out more time for enjoyment of life than we do.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah, they know how to get in the fucking J. Yeah. Okay. So he approaches you. He is the owner of this terrible team in F1. And he's in the situation where he has to win a single race or he's going to lose control of the team. And he's got this incredible rookie driver, Damson. Idris is a rookie.

[Brad Pitt]

Young phenom buddies got to get reeled in a bit.

[Dax Shepard]

This is great. This is Bull Durham.

[Brad Pitt]

Bull Durham is probably the closest connection where two guys have to work together who are at odds through the whole movie. And that's the fun we have.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah, it's a great, great relationship.

[Brad Pitt]

He's a gem, man.

[Dax Shepard]

Snowfall. That's where he's from. Yeah, he's cocky.

[Brad Pitt]

Yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah, I like cocky.

[Brad Pitt]

Yeah. Not only that, he enjoys this whole parade in a way. I never knew how I admire that about him. But on the court, he's in on the joke. He doesn't mind being the brunt or he'll give it back. He's really well rounded.

[Dax Shepard]

Well, it's spectacular. You guys did it. You made the most realistic racing movie that's ever been made. You're radical. Okay, I'm going to end on this. You said no. I met you before the meeting and you did. And I'm going to tell you when you wouldn't remember. But I don't think you know the punchline to the story and I think you'll get a kick out of it. So we're at the Academy Awards, Kristen and I, I've never been. And I go to take Squirt and she knows you're my number one. You're like three rows ahead of us. We're coming back to the seat and as I'm getting close to her, she's mouthing something to me and I'm like, what? And I hear he's talking to you. And I go, what? Brad Pitt's talking to you?

[Brad Pitt]

I'm like, what?

[Dax Shepard]

Brad Pitt's talking to me. And I fucking turn around and you're standing up and you go, we loved your movie, right? And you're talking about hit and run, but I lose my shit. I don't really remember that I've directed a movie at that point. I'm just like, oh, thank you. And you're like, yeah, we loved it. It was so nice.

[Brad Pitt]

You know, you see people up on screen, you still recognize your people.

[Dax Shepard]

And I'm doing 100% of the driving in that movie. And you know, as someone who does these things, like I'm in shots you can't be in unless you're sideways.

[Brad Pitt]

Just a down home, more country vibe that you just recognize your people in Ireland, New Zealand, the screen.

[Dax Shepard]

So you're standing up at the Academy Awards shouting to me, we loved your movie. So then I sit down and this is the punchline you don't know about the second after you said that, the very next thing that happened was they started the immemorium portion of the Academy Awards. And I'm sitting down and I'm like this. I'm so happy that Kristen goes, honey, stop fucking smiling. This is the imoram part. And I couldn't not talk about things. I always also want the outtakes. Up. If there's any camera on me during that immemorial.

[Monica Padman]

You almost got him cancelled.

[Dax Shepard]

Escorted out of the business. I've never been happier watching this group of dead people be celebrated. So that was the punchline that you missed from that.

[Brad Pitt]

I love that. I love big fails.

[Dax Shepard]

I'm so grateful that you did this. Thank you, man. I really appreciate it.

[Brad Pitt]

I so appreciate what you guys do do. And this is the one I got to. I didn't have a choice, did I?

[Monica Padman]

You did not.

[Brad Pitt]

No. I mean, we've been talking about Wheels. I mean, I think it enters every conversation we ever had.

[Monica Padman]

That's awesome.

[Brad Pitt]

Something about wheels.

[Dax Shepard]

It's inexhaustible. F1 is out June 27th. Don't listen to me because I wouldn't. Trust me. I love everything with engines that you put gas in. But listen to Kristen. Kristen loved it.

[Brad Pitt]

And it's titties.

[Dax Shepard]

It's fucking titties. Put it on the poster. You can quote me. It can be on the poster. It's fucking titties. Dax Shepard. All right, brother. See you soon.

[Brad Pitt]

All right. Thank you both. Love you.

[Dax Shepard]

He is an armchair expert, but he makes mistakes all the time. Thank God Monica's here. She's gotta let him have the facts. We had a fun run in this weekend.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah, we did.

[Dax Shepard]

Delta and Aaron and I went over to Mustard Seed Cafe.

[Monica Padman]

That's a cafe nearby, which I've recently.

[Dax Shepard]

Become all renewed obsessed with.

[Monica Padman]

Yep.

[Dax Shepard]

Because they got a dish for me in there that is. It couldn't be more perfect. Describe broccoli egg whites. I add capers. Oh, so broccoli egg whites with capers scramble. Yeah.

[Monica Padman]

Okay.

[Dax Shepard]

Turkey patty on the side. This is all one dish, you know, one plate.

[Monica Padman]

Right. But is the egg on top of the patty?

[Dax Shepard]

Separate everything separated on one plate. And I get this remoulade sauce, which. I don't know if I'm saying that correctly, but I have a whole history with this, which is. I thought they made just a special sauce at that place that was their signature proprietary sauce. And I was obsess. And then I was there recently and she said, oh, we just ran the. Like, somehow she said, like, the bottle just ran out. And I was like, oh, they're buying it. So then I went home and I searched. That's a popular Cajun sauce. Do you know about remoulade?

[Monica Padman]

Remoulade? Yeah, they have one at Houston's.

[Dax Shepard]

Oh, it's got horseradish in it. Some kind of stuff that I think is fishy, but I don't focus on that.

[Monica Padman]

Sure. Probably anchovy.

[Dax Shepard]

Tartar sauce. Tar. Yeah. There's just maybe some cocktail type sauce vibes. Does cocktail sauce have fish in it or just you combine it with fish so often that I've associated it with fish. You combine it.

[Monica Padman]

But it does have horseradish often, but.

[Dax Shepard]

No fish in it.

[Monica Padman]

It might have anchovy. A lot of things that are tasty have anchovy. You wouldn't know it, though.

[Dax Shepard]

Earmark that. Ewan McGregor on his motorcycle show. He eats so much fish paste, and I just like. He's so much. He's so much more manly than me. I can't eat fish paste.

[Monica Padman]

I want you to try it.

[Dax Shepard]

Nothing sounds worse to me than fish. I already don't like fish.

[Monica Padman]

It's original. That's what you think. Remember we talked about this on a previous episode where you've been to a restaurant and you were like, I don't like any of these things. And then you like it.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah, yeah. French Laundry. If. If the French Laundry had a fish paste, I would try it. But they're getting it at a gas station in a tube and they're gobbling it up. Anyways, Ramalade sauce ordered. It was great. I'm there getting that wonderful breakfast. I think it's called the lean plat. And I see you and your tall gentleman friend Jess stroll by. You pass through frame. I'm facing the window.

[Monica Padman]

Okay. You were inside.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. Eating. And I said, Delta Monte. Just walked by. And so she ran out, flagged you down.

[Monica Padman]

It was such a fun pop out. By then, I was past. I was at Maru.

[Dax Shepard]

I was tempted to also run out, but then I had this thing where it's like. It was. We had already eaten. I really felt like it was gonna look like we were running out on the check.

[Monica Padman]

Dine and dash.

[Dax Shepard]

Dine and dash. There's another couple good terms for it. But of course, they wouldn't have thought that because I'm a regular customer there and they know I'm a nice person. But anyways, that. That stopped me. But then you guys were en route to the protests.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah, we went to the rally in Los Feliz on Saturday.

[Dax Shepard]

No Kings rally, no Kings, but definitely short Kings. We'll get to that.

[Monica Padman]

No, not if they're trying to be monarchs.

[Dax Shepard]

No, just. I like all the boys that have been getting short King love. So you guys are still good?

[Monica Padman]

Not Napoleon. See?

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah, he took it too far.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. He wasn't just getting some dates. He wanted to take over the world. So Then I said, where did they say they were at? Let's go look. And then en route to there. We saw you guys, guys. We shouted at you. You were probably already on edge because you were going to a protest and you thought the cops were there. Yeah, we had a very fun run in and you guys looked so excited and.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah, we were excited. It all happened very fast.

[Dax Shepard]

Okay, tell me.

[Monica Padman]

I told. I think also on the last fact check maybe, or a couple fact checks ago, I was saying that I've been pretty overwhelmed by social media.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah.

[Monica Padman]

So I was. I kind of wasn't paying much attention to it and so I didn't know. I didn't know there was like a day where the country was protesting Trump's birthday.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. You would only find out on social media, right?

[Monica Padman]

I would. I mean, I don't. I also didn't.

[Dax Shepard]

You don't watch the news.

[Monica Padman]

Exactly. Yeah. So Jess texted me in the morning, or he texted me and he said, there's a no Kings rally happening in Los Feliz right now. And I was like, we should go.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah.

[Monica Padman]

And I was already on my walk.

[Dax Shepard]

Oh, okay, great.

[Monica Padman]

So it worked out. And he was like, okay, let me just, just like finish a couple things. And then next thing he knew, two minutes later, I was at his door, knock, knock, knock. And he said, oh, wow, okay. Yeah, I guess where we are going.

[Dax Shepard]

Yes.

[Monica Padman]

And so he put on his sunscreen and his tall socks.

[Dax Shepard]

Uh huh. Yeah.

[Monica Padman]

And off we went and we walked there and we ran into you and it was a lovely run in. And it was so. It was so, so fun to me.

[Dax Shepard]

Can you pause for a moment, one second?

[Monica Padman]

Yeah. So it's almost as if I planned that.

[Dax Shepard]

Planned the whole rally.

[Monica Padman]

No, just now. You had to step out because there was a dog barking.

[Dax Shepard]

Yes.

[Monica Padman]

It is almost as if I planned that because I. I have a. I want to talk about something about dogs.

[Dax Shepard]

Oh, okay. Okay.

[Monica Padman]

But first let's finish up the rally.

[Dax Shepard]

Okay. So that maybe like farted while I was gone or something? No, it feels like a great place to meet a lover.

[Monica Padman]

I mean, sure like minded people. I. I could see that. But that really wasn't on our.

[Dax Shepard]

And it had a good party. Like I drove through it.

[Monica Padman]

It was.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. It felt very much like a parade kind of a vibe.

[Monica Padman]

It did. And that was one thing about it that I will comment on. It was very heartwarming.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. Yeah. That's what it felt like as we were driving through. There's also so much to look at. There's so many signs everyone's gotta put a spin on those.

[Monica Padman]

I know there's some fun ones.

[Dax Shepard]

There was really fun ones. There was really. There was some we disagreed with.

[Monica Padman]

Okay, what did you disagree with?

[Dax Shepard]

Well, one of them, this man had done a very. A beautiful oil painting of Trump. And it said, this man has never had a friend. And I said, well, he's assuming quite a bit. He seems to know a lot about that. And then we were making up signs, the three of us, of stuff like you couldn't really know. Like, he stubbed his toe in second grade on the way to the pool. Well, that was your claim that you knew.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

And then there was really clever.

[Monica Padman]

There was. So there were really, really funny ones. A lot of plays on the word ice, which I found very, very fun.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah.

[Monica Padman]

I did really like the one that was. That said you were worried about the cost of eggs, but what about the cost of ice?

[Dax Shepard]

Ooh.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah, there were some great ones. A lot of dictator, but D, I, C, K. Okay.

[Dax Shepard]

Oh, sure.

[Monica Padman]

That's a fun one.

[Dax Shepard]

That's fun. Yeah. Anyway, everyone got playful.

[Monica Padman]

Everyone got really playful. And it was a. It was a happy environment. Yeah, there. It was. It was a. It was kind of emotional. Like, there were some people. You know, there was this, like, young boy with this, like, Mexican flag, and it was really sweet. It was very. It's like, yeah, that's what we're doing this for. And anyway, it was heartwarming, and I'm really, really glad that we went.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah.

[Monica Padman]

And what I also like about it is it's not. It's not for the purpose. Like, it's to show up and say, we don't like what's going on. It's not active in that. Like, it's not a vote. You know, that's what really is gonna make a difference. But it's solidarity. And it's like, look, you're not alone.

[Dax Shepard]

Own. Yep.

[Monica Padman]

People are here to support you. Whatever. So, anyway, it was lovely. We did that, and then we went to the Beverly Hills Hotel and had a martini.

[Dax Shepard]

Oh, wonderful. Yeah. Very classy of you, huh?

[Monica Padman]

Okay, now pivoting.

[Dax Shepard]

Yes. Dogs.

[Monica Padman]

You know, I've taken a break from speaking ill of dogs.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. Yes. Yeah.

[Monica Padman]

Because people don't like it.

[Dax Shepard]

No, they hate it.

[Monica Padman]

And I know. I get it. Like, I get that you love your dogs, but I have a. I had a. I had a resurgence of annoyance for them this weekend, and it was a one, two punch. Okay. So I'm so sorry.

[Dax Shepard]

I just thought of a very funny analogy.

[Monica Padman]

Oh, man.

[Dax Shepard]

He was Like Chappelle just couldn't stay away from trans.

[Monica Padman]

Trans.

[Dax Shepard]

Kept just pulling even when he was saying, I know it's not going to be about trans. And then it is.

[Monica Padman]

And he knows, like, this isn't going to go well.

[Dax Shepard]

Yes. And he. He can't resist.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah. That's how I feel. So I almost texted you Saturday night because I need you to pass along a really important message for me.

[Dax Shepard]

Okay.

[Monica Padman]

To Amy Poehler.

[Dax Shepard]

Okay.

[Monica Padman]

Okay. Babers.

[Dax Shepard]

Babers, AKA Babers, AKA Babers.

[Monica Padman]

Amy has an awesome podcast, new podcast, newish, called Good Hang. And she had Dakota Johnson on her podcast.

[Dax Shepard]

Who you're obsessed with. People should know.

[Monica Padman]

I am currently a bit obsessed with Dakota Johnson. I've been going down real rabbit holes. It started because obviously I do watch a lot of. Not obviously, but I watch a lot of Vogue videos.

[Dax Shepard]

You know, obviously was the right word.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah. I watch a lot of Vogue videos and there's a lot of, like, get ready for this red carpet or get ready for this. Whatever.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah.

[Monica Padman]

So I'm served a lot of that content. So I was served. Dakota Johnson, getting Ready for Kids Can.

[Dax Shepard]

Okay.

[Monica Padman]

And I love her. The dress she wore, it's a Gucci dress, pink fringe, sequined silk. Gorgeous. Okay. So I was obsessed with the dress. So I was like watching that. And then once that happened, it's all.

[Dax Shepard]

I'm getting auto load.

[Monica Padman]

Yes. And then I saw a Vanity Fair.

[Dax Shepard]

You see Melanie Griffiths.

[Monica Padman]

Yes.

[Dax Shepard]

And Don Johnson's daughter.

[Brad Pitt]

Yes.

[Monica Padman]

And she. She notoriously is. Has kind of wild press. Oh, tours.

[Dax Shepard]

Oh, I didn't know this.

[Monica Padman]

Yes. She. She has some controversial press tours.

[Dax Shepard]

Political opinions or. No.

[Monica Padman]

Like. Okay, so she was in Madame Web and it was like a whole thing. Because she was pretty much shitting on it the whole time.

[Dax Shepard]

What's Madame Web?

[Monica Padman]

It was. Was some movie.

[Dax Shepard]

It was a movie. Superhero.

[Monica Padman]

Superhero.

[Dax Shepard]

Okay. And she did a bad job.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

Speaking favorably about the product.

[Monica Padman]

Correct.

[Dax Shepard]

Okay.

[Monica Padman]

And it was a whole thing.

[Dax Shepard]

Okay. And I. I was a liability. Unoppress.

[Monica Padman]

I will be honest, during the Madame Web thing, I was like, I just think if you're in a movie, it's part of your job. You got paid to be in that movie. You gotta.

[Brad Pitt]

It's too late.

[Monica Padman]

It's too late.

[Dax Shepard]

Sometimes they turn out good, sometimes they turn out bad.

[Monica Padman]

You kind of gotta stand by it. Unless you were like abused or something.

[Dax Shepard]

Sure. You gotta go down with the ship.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah. So anyway, so I had this idea about her based on Madame Web and Callie loves Dakota Johnson.

[Dax Shepard]

Okay, great.

[Monica Padman]

And Dakota is her kind of Girl crush. And I was always like, I don't really get it. And now I get it. Now I totally get it. And I have been wanting to get her on this show because of my new obsession with her. Also because I saw a Vanity Fair lie detector test she did, and. And she doesn't know a lot like, that I found interesting. Like, she didn't. They slid a picture of Alix Earle and also Alex Cooper. Ding, ding, ding, dingles. Alex Cooper's episode came out today. Great episode, Great conversation. Anyway, she didn't know who they were, but she was like, oh, for Alex Earle. She was like, oh, is it call her daddy?

[Dax Shepard]

Okay.

[Monica Padman]

And they were like, no. And then they showed that picture and she was like, this is a different person. Like, she didn't. She doesn't know a lot about pop culture.

[Dax Shepard]

Okay, great.

[Monica Padman]

I find all this kind of interesting.

[Dax Shepard]

Yes. And it feels authentic to you.

[Monica Padman]

It does feel authentic to me. And anywho. So I've been sort of obsessed with her and I've been. I've been trying to get her on. It can't happen. And all of a sudden I see her pop up on Good hang.

[Dax Shepard]

Oh, okay.

[Monica Padman]

So I have mixed feelings about this. Right?

[Brad Pitt]

Yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. Yes.

[Monica Padman]

I'll be honest. I was like, fuck, yeah, sure. I wanted to her.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah.

[Monica Padman]

But I love Amy, so of course, Next best thing.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah.

[Monica Padman]

And I. I turn it on and Dakota has her dog with her. Tokyo. Very, very cute dog.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah.

[Monica Padman]

But this interview is happening. Oh. And I will say she. Dakota said she has never done a podcast before. That was her first podcast ever.

[Dax Shepard]

Okay.

[Monica Padman]

She doesn't. She's kind of.

[Dax Shepard]

She's never heard of a podcast until that moment.

[Monica Padman]

Afraid of them. And she felt she'd be safe with favors.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah.

[Monica Padman]

Anyway, the dog was really taking up a lot of the conversation for the first chunk.

[Dax Shepard]

And I could feel talking about the dog or the dog was being rambunctious and they were having to corral he.

[Monica Padman]

Or she mainly talking about the dog. Talking about the dog, but the dog was like drinking water out of the cup. And then they had to address that the dog was drinking water out of the cup. You know, it was just very dog centered.

[Dax Shepard]

Yes. Yes.

[Monica Padman]

And Amy said, you know, she has a no dogs at work policy.

[Dax Shepard]

Oh, she does. That must be very controversial.

[Monica Padman]

And I have. I mean, I didn't think I could love her more, but my God, did I feel so seen and loved. I felt loved.

[Dax Shepard]

Wow. Okay, great.

[Monica Padman]

And I want you to tell her that.

[Dax Shepard]

I'll tell her that.

[Monica Padman]

Please pass along the message that I felt stressed on her behalf, that the dog was. And it wasn't anyone's fault. Especially not the dog's fault.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. He's not supposed to be at a podcast. He's supposed to be in the woods.

[Brad Pitt]

Correct.

[Monica Padman]

He was really cute, actually. He won't be over whatever it. Tokyo was commandeering the conversation. And I could feel like if that was us, I would be a little.

[Dax Shepard]

Like you'd lose it.

[Monica Padman]

We need this dog to get out of here.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. Cuz you get there's, there's Tokyo. Wonderful, wonderful. Tokyo looks like a puppy. Like if she also, she brought a puppy, I think.

[Monica Padman]

And actually to be fair, Tokyo was very well behaved. Tokyo just fell asleep in her lap pretty quickly after that sipping of the water.

[Dax Shepard]

Wow.

[Monica Padman]

Anywho. So I, I just really respect Amy's policy.

[Dax Shepard]

Oh.

[Monica Padman]

And. And then. God, I'm gonna get in trouble for this.

[Dax Shepard]

That's okay.

[Monica Padman]

From my friend. So I feel bad, but I have to say it morally.

[Dax Shepard]

You feel obligated.

[Monica Padman]

I do. I'm watching this on Sunday. I feel like Amy's a hero for handling Tokyo so well, but also stating her boundary, but not sticking by her boundary. It's mixed.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah.

[Monica Padman]

And she gets a C on that part. I go to Anna's house and Ana has a dog who we love. Mona. Mona. We love Mona.

[Dax Shepard]

Just saying this morning, I wish Mona was my dog.

[Monica Padman]

Mona is a great dog. And Jess and I went over there to see. She got a new apartment. We were gonna see her new apartment and we were gonna go on a walk. And as we were getting ready to go, I was like, is Mona coming? Because I could sense that Mona was gonna come with us. Okay. And, and last time we went out, she also came.

[Brad Pitt]

Uhhuh.

[Monica Padman]

And I, I, I'm very hyper aware when we're out at a restaurant and we have Mona. Also Mona's huge.

[Dax Shepard]

Mona's ganic. Yeah.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah. She's a, she's in people's biz.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah, she's like a puppy.

[Monica Padman]

She thinks she's a puppy.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. But she's a big girl. Like a horse.

[Monica Padman]

Look, we are in la. A lot of people are like totally fine. Stan Standard. Yeah, people are fine with it. But I'm like, Mona is in that person's lap and they're trying to eat and they're strangers. So I already had this last week. And then here we are again with the dark.

[Dax Shepard]

Well, I think it is Mona, by the way. I think the same offender.

[Monica Padman]

It is.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. That was barking.

[Monica Padman]

It is, yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

Because Anna Brings Mona to work.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah, I know. So. So then we're.

[Dax Shepard]

But I love Mona. I love.

[Monica Padman]

I do too.

[Dax Shepard]

Because Anno is right. Really nervous that to bring Mona to work cause of me. And it took me telling her like a thousand times like, I love Mona. I don't mind.

[Monica Padman]

I know. You've been very kind. I keep thinking like, what if someone has an allergy? And then at one point Mona got on the seat. Even if you're not allergic, you might not want to step over a dog. You might not want to sit on dog hair. And she did get up on the furniture. And then someone did come over and say like, we can't have her on the furniture. And I, you know, as someone who is a rule follower in general and I think maybe that's.

[Dax Shepard]

You don't want attention.

[Monica Padman]

I don't want attention.

[Dax Shepard]

That's really what it all is.

[Monica Padman]

And I don't.

[Dax Shepard]

It's all about attention.

[Monica Padman]

I don't want attention for something that I fundamentally feel like we're getting in. We are in people's way.

[Dax Shepard]

We're inconveniencing people. Yeah.

[Monica Padman]

I really don't like inconveniencing people. Yeah, it feels selfish.

[Dax Shepard]

Well, it's very tricky for the dog dog owner because a huge percentage of the city loves it. They genuinely love it. Kristen's happier when she runs into a dog at a restaurant. If she's got to step over one, like it improves her day.

[Monica Padman]

But she doesn't bring her dogs out.

[Dax Shepard]

No, ours are though. They would bite people. But we used to bring Lola around. Lola was cool to take to a restaurant and stuff. If we were going to sit outside it, like, ding, ding, ding, mustard seed should. She ate there a lot. For the dog owner, they're running into tons of people that are so excited to meet their dog. And then the people who are don't enjoy it are not saying anything, nor should they.

[Brad Pitt]

Why?

[Monica Padman]

See, this is what's unfair.

[Dax Shepard]

Well, I'll tell you why. Because it's small. You have the choice and overall you should go. Things giving this group of people a lot of joy. I don't like it. I. I can live with it. I think it's definitely the aspirational version is to just let it be without it bothering you. I think Buddhism, I can't get you. But maybe Buddhism, it feels unfair to me. So I recognize they might not be fully aware of how much people. But I would urge the people you have to acknowledge you're bringing an animal somewhere. Like the. The restaurants and our transportation. They were Designed for humans. You throw up. There's not, like, parking for dogs at restaurants. Under the table.

[Monica Padman]

Exactly.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah.

[Monica Padman]

Or on podcasts and stuff. Or at work, if you're Amy.

[Dax Shepard]

Although we got to be honest, we loved having Nico.

[Monica Padman]

I know, but Nico, that's a different thing. Nico.

[Dax Shepard]

Service dog.

[Monica Padman]

No, Rob.

[Dax Shepard]

No.

[Monica Padman]

This is also. It's like everyone's just calling them service service dogs. That's crazy. You know what my service need is? No barking.

[Dax Shepard]

No dogs and barking and fighting. Listen. Yes. At the aforementioned thing. These two. So one person with a fricking boxer, another with a pit bull, and they're. They're both insisting the dogs are nice. They're not nice. They get no fighting the dog.

[Monica Padman]

They're all barking and causing a scene and making people sort of trip. And, like, I don't. I don't. I'm fine with it, I guess. I mean, I'm not, but I am. I have to be in this world. But I want some. Instead of me being the enemy, I'd love some acknowledgement that, like, people who don't like dogs are constantly just dealing with dogs.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Monica Padman]

All the time in la. And they don't get to say anything or they're bad.

[Dax Shepard]

I don't know. When it's like other places, I feel like LA would. Would trend towards the liberal.

[Monica Padman]

Definitely.

[Dax Shepard]

Maybe crazy. Be like Portland, like, where you can. I imagine.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah. They're, like, up on the counter.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah, yeah. Like, they. They get seated, and everyone's got their.

[Monica Padman]

Well, you said that you went to a pet storant.

[Dax Shepard]

Oh, yeah.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

I picked up food and delivered to a dog ref recently.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

For my other job.

[Monica Padman]

Oh, this is outrageous.

[Dax Shepard]

You want to hear about Father's Day?

[Monica Padman]

Yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

You know, the tradition at this house is on Mother's Day, moms get to have a spa day, and the dads take the kids away. So you're pretty much in our house, I think, in our pod. If it's your Father's Day or your Mother's Day, you get an indulgent day.

[Monica Padman]

Yes.

[Dax Shepard]

Right.

[Monica Padman]

Yep.

[Dax Shepard]

So mine was. We had just had a guest guest on. Is one of my funniest, favorite moments we've had back to me loving being embarrassed. It's a male guest and myself. We come upon the topic of the Godfather, and then we start the male guest and I start talking about Godfather. And now we're starting to explain to you some things about Godfather. And it hit me all at once. I was like, oh, my God, we're kids. Ken from Barbie.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

Oh, My God, was that funny? It was. So we already have been made fun of about it.

[Monica Padman]

I know.

[Dax Shepard]

And we still did it.

[Monica Padman]

You couldn't stop yourself.

[Dax Shepard]

Oh, my God. I think that's so funny and embarrassing.

[Monica Padman]

Very funny.

[Dax Shepard]

So then I decided, oh, I am in the mood to watch Godfather. I haven't in 15 or 20 years.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah. We made a group plan to watch it with this guest who doesn't live in this city. So it's going to take some real planning.

[Dax Shepard]

Yes.

[Monica Padman]

And. But you couldn't wait, so you had to watch it on Father's Day.

[Dax Shepard]

Well, and I would watch it again next week for sure, if everyone wants to get together. But, yes, I had two other fathers over and I ordered a ton of Italian food.

[Monica Padman]

Oh, nice.

[Dax Shepard]

Really good Italian food. And watched Godfather, and it was a blast.

[Monica Padman]

Both.

[Dax Shepard]

No, no, that was the goal. Can't be done. It's like three hours long. And we were pausing to go make plates, and we were making a lot of jokes. It was very fun.

[Monica Padman]

Good.

[Dax Shepard]

But then it was kind of early on the early side. It's five. I still have a bunch of leverage. They're basically like, what do you want to do, dad? And I said, well, if. If everyone's up for it, I would want everyone to be up for it. I would love to watch a movie together as a family. Let's grab something from the kids list. I keep a list in my phone. Kids movies. Romancing the Stone. These movies that I know they'll like.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

Oh, Pirates of the Caribbean. That was recently. And so I said to the family, so, yeah, something off the kids list. So I was thinking either Rocky or Smokey and the Bandit. And Crispin goes, when did Rocky get on the kids movie list? And I was like, oh, I added it because we were watching Friday Night Lights. And I was like, oh, yeah, these sports stories are really simple. You know what the goal is and you know the stakes. Yeah. And Rocky was either one. Best Picture. It was certainly nominated for best picture. It's like an incredible movie. We all watch Rocky. It is a great movie. It holds up. Yeah.

[Monica Padman]

Great.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. There's so much cool stuff about it. The fact that he, you know, the whole story behind Rocky.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah, he paid for the movie.

[Dax Shepard]

No, he had been. He was completely penniless. He wanted to play Rocky, and he turned down a million dollars in 1974 for a screenplay.

[Monica Padman]

And do you know why? I know that boy. Goodwill hunting.

[Dax Shepard]

Oh, they reference that. Oh, they do. So you're watching this guy that really.

[Monica Padman]

Gambled it all, and it Worked out.

[Dax Shepard]

And it worked out like as big as could work out. He was the biggest star for 15 or 20 years. But anyways, I felt like I Really, I was FaceTiming with my father in law and when I told him what the day was, Godfather and now we're watching Rocky, he just started laughing so hard. And I said, my powers are so strong today, aren't they? I've convinced everyone to watch Rocky.

[Monica Padman]

Good. Father's Day.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Monica Padman]

Did the kids like it?

[Dax Shepard]

They. They did. They loved it. Yeah, they really, really loved it. There's weird stuff. There's really compelling stuff you have to talk about as a family, which I loved because. Have you ever seen it?

[Monica Padman]

I don't think so.

[Dax Shepard]

He's not. This is one of the things I like about it. Like he wrote himself this role and it's so not vain. Like, Rocky is a simple guy. He has to carry his combination to his locker that he's had for six years in his hat, written on a piece of paper. Like, he's very simple.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

And Adrian works at a pet shop and she's like morbidly shy. And Rocky knows her brother and he keeps trying to date her. He keeps going to the pet store and she's just too shy to, to deal with it. And he eventually goes on a date with her and then they, they have this date and then he's. They're at his house and he's like, come inside. And she's like, no, I don't want to come inside. Rocking. He's like, come on, come inside. Come and come inside. You're gonna like it. And it, she says no like six times, right?

[Monica Padman]

Oh, boy. Okay. Yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

So you're watching this with your kids and you're like, wow, well, this wouldn't be a scene today. Let's start there. And so she says no. She says no. She says, she says no, then she says yes. Then she comes in and then she wants to leave and he doesn't want her to leave. And at this point, we are now paused to talk about this. And I said, so number one, a woman should never go into a place she doesn't want to go into. She should not have to. Number two, any guy who would not listen to a woman say no three times and keep pushing her to come in is off the table. Is a no. No.

[Monica Padman]

Great.

[Dax Shepard]

Three, she is morbidly shy. She's not going to get to this point ever if some super assertive man doesn't come in and invite her to cross her fear and in her total life. That's also maybe what she needed for her life isn't that complex. What do we do with that? That reality?

[Monica Padman]

It's complex, but it is. It's an invisible line, but it. There is a line, and I think you gutturally know it.

[Dax Shepard]

It's just interesting because I said, you know, the analogy I gave them is like, Jackie did not. Jackie was in love with our dog Glenn. We needed to get rid of Glenn. She was in love with him and would not take him because she had such commitment and anxiety. And I literally at one point had to shove him in her hands. And I shut the door and locked it and said, you're taking him home for the night.

[Monica Padman]

This story complicated, actually.

[Dax Shepard]

And it's the love of her life. She's thanked me a bunch of times for forcing her to take it. And I knew what would happen the second she got the dog home.

[Monica Padman]

That's the part. It's the part I knew.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah.

[Monica Padman]

That is complicated.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. You hope you're a good judge.

[Monica Padman]

No, you know what I mean. You were in that case. Right. But there is no knowing about what a person will or won't steal.

[Brad Pitt]

Right.

[Dax Shepard]

So do you risk never helping the nine people that are. That you're right about to prevent the one person you're wrong about?

[Monica Padman]

I actually think. Yeah. Personally, I think if Jackie's gonna let the commitment issue derail. Derail her life, it's not really on you to change it.

[Dax Shepard]

It's not. But we're attracted innately to people that we think can get us someplace that can benefit us.

[Monica Padman]

Sure.

[Dax Shepard]

Like, you know, like a lot of betas are. They're super attracted to Alphanus because they desire someone who doesn't have decision anxiety.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah. And that's different from forcing you to make a decision. You might. You can be attracted to someone's self assuredness and confidence in their ability to make decisions. And that is attractive. If you aren't good at that, I don't think. I think. But then it crossing over onto you is where that is different to me, because I think if you're attracted to that, what ends up happening is you sort of take some of it on by osmosis. Like, you like it. You're seeing it modeled, and it looks cool, it looks good. You start, you know, you start trying those pieces on. Yeah, but the forcing is where things get muddy for me.

[Dax Shepard]

Right. And then you're talking about the, like the nuance between forcing and pushing.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

There's like there. There's a difference in my Mind between forcing and pushing, like people do. Some people want to be pushed.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

They want to be helped and pushed in a direction. Do they want to be forced? They don't have a decision. No, I don't think so. But I do think people seek out people they know will push them. Some people love coaches. Like, I'm not this type of person.

[Monica Padman]

Right.

[Dax Shepard]

But there are people that love being coached, love being pushed and yelled at and the whole nine. That's not me.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah. I think it. God, though, it's so dependent on the person.

[Dax Shepard]

It's dependent on the outcome. Because, like, for Adrian, she undoubtedly would. If you asked her, she would go, thank God he made me come inside. And thank God he didn't let me.

[Monica Padman]

Leave because it worked out.

[Dax Shepard]

Because, yeah, she would have never, ever come out of her shell unless someone drug her out. And then she was so happy and loved Rocky so much. That's wonderfully complicated.

[Monica Padman]

Very complicated.

[Dax Shepard]

Yes. I love it. Like, what a fun thing to hear their opinions of. About.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. So it delivered in a lot of ways.

[Monica Padman]

Great.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah.

[Monica Padman]

That's fun.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah.

[Monica Padman]

Well, I'm glad you had a good Father's Day.

[Dax Shepard]

Oh, thank you. Me too.

[Monica Padman]

Fathers are fun.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. They can be.

[Monica Padman]

Talked to my dad on Father's Day. He's doing good.

[Dax Shepard]

Was he spoiling himself?

[Monica Padman]

No, he. He had exercised when I called him. He exercises every day.

[Dax Shepard]

Oh, good.

[Monica Padman]

He's very disciplined.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah.

[Monica Padman]

Extremely disciplined.

[Dax Shepard]

What's his job and exercise?

[Monica Padman]

What do you think?

[Dax Shepard]

Naps?

[Monica Padman]

He doesn't nap. I've never seen him nap in my entire life.

[Dax Shepard]

What do I think?

[Monica Padman]

Knowing me, Jogging, walking.

[Dax Shepard]

Walking.

[Monica Padman]

He goes on long walks.

[Dax Shepard]

Plotter. Plotter.

[Monica Padman]

Outside and on the treadmill. Well, I like dads.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah, me too. You want to do some facts? Sure, let's do it.

[Brad Pitt]

Stay tuned for more armchair experts. Her, if you dare.

[Monica Padman]

Wow.

[Dax Shepard]

Wow.

[Monica Padman]

Brad Pitt. Facts. Who would have thunk that sentence could possibly come out of my mouth?

[Dax Shepard]

I'm a little scared for us.

[Monica Padman]

Like, we'll die.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. Just like it's too good. Yeah.

[Monica Padman]

Life's too good.

[Dax Shepard]

This is suspiciously good.

[Monica Padman]

There's some real suspicious stuff because that day, the day we were recorded. Brad, we also recorded an episode super suspicious that it happened to be on that day. The subject matter, and I'm not going to say what it is yet, but when that episode comes out, I would.

[Dax Shepard]

Argue you're going to protect.

[Monica Padman]

Okay, fine. It's on the simulation.

[Dax Shepard]

It's on the sim. Guys, what are the odds of the day that we have the sim? Then BP walks In your dad's getting playful.

[Monica Padman]

I don't know if he's getting playful or if we are going to die. And he's like, let's give him a lot of good stuff before they die.

[Dax Shepard]

Go out big. Let's throw pit their way. Let's throw a sim.

[Monica Padman]

I'm getting scared talking about it. What a dream. What a dream.

[Dax Shepard]

I said it to you. I've said it a couple times. I want to say it in public. I appreciated you so much in that interview. You did the perfect job. I was just really, really grateful for the way you just handled the whole two hours. Bacnalia.

[Monica Padman]

Thank you.

[Dax Shepard]

There were moments where you could feel that I probably value being on his good side enough that maybe there's like a next emotional question I would normally follow up with that I was incapable of at times. And right as I was thinking, like, oh, I should ask that. I can't. I'm afraid to ask that. Then you would come. It was. It was. Every time I ever thought that you immediately kind of were there to do that.

[Monica Padman]

Oh, that's nice.

[Dax Shepard]

And that was awesome. You also were like. You knew it was a big day for me. I could see the generosity in your spirit. And then also you would click out of it and go like, no time to make the donuts. And you'd make the donuts and you'd hang back. And then beyond, actually, all that stuff, that was for me, selfishly. I was filled with such joy, sincerely, that the little girl that was afraid to talk in front of my mike sure was sitting across from Brad pit and letting it rip.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

I just felt so proud of you and happy for you.

[Monica Padman]

Thanks.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah. We've come a really long way. We really have.

[Dax Shepard]

You were so confident. I just was really happy for how confident you were.

[Monica Padman]

Well, bts, you had yourself three or four times. Yeah, I had already unloaded. No, I had a whole morning.

[Dax Shepard]

Morning.

[Monica Padman]

You know, where I had to talk to myself.

[Dax Shepard]

You know, steady yourself.

[Monica Padman]

Yes. About expectations and knowing it was him and knowing that there was a chance that I really wasn't gonna. It's hard to. That I. I might not be able to say much. I could feel. Feel myself when I would think about that. Getting upset.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah.

[Monica Padman]

Like, I should be able to say stuff. And I am gonna.

[Dax Shepard]

I'm big enough.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah. And I'm gonna do it. But also, I'm not like, he. I doubt there's gonna be space and how will I. How. You know, and it was starting to happen. And then I had to really, like, Take a second and. And. And say, like, this is a big. This is such a big deal for us. Not just you. For us as a show. And it's kind of like the thing. It's kind of like before Matt Damon, when me and you were in a fight and you said, don't let this.

[Dax Shepard]

Fight fuck up your big day.

[Monica Padman]

Get in the way of this moment.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah, yeah.

[Monica Padman]

And you need to be present for this moment. And I sort of circled back, back to that. Like, this is just a big day for us, and it is a big marker of the show, and it's something to be proud of, regardless of what I singularly do. So just enjoy it and be excited. And. And also because I guess, you know, making not having space was highly possible because this is your job. Dream guest. This is what you've sort of been looking forward to for seven and a half years.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah, yeah.

[Monica Padman]

And you guys also have a shorthand. You know each other.

[Dax Shepard]

Kind of.

[Monica Padman]

It would have made kind of.

[Dax Shepard]

Kind of.

[Monica Padman]

So anyway, I was then very, very grateful that it did not feel like that at all. It felt like there was plenty of space for me. It did not feel like you were like. If I spoke, you were like, tensing.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah, we're off story. I have a whole arc plan. Yeah, Well, I was having my own ruminations in the morning, as one would have, and I. Yeah, my thing was, like, you gotta prioritize the audience and not you. Because recently I did prioritize me hanging with a guest, and we left, and I was like, I could have. I could have gotten a lot more out of that person. That would have been more rewarding for the audience. But I was definitely, definitely. I have prioritized my own experience. I was like, so we can't do that today. Dax.

[Monica Padman]

Dax Shepard.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. I had a whole laundry list. I had at that point. I'd watched enough interviews with him. I saw him and Adam Sandler talking for an hour and a half, and when I saw. Immediately, he's like, he is so allergic to you saying he's good and stuff. Like, he just doesn't like it.

[Monica Padman]

Yep.

[Dax Shepard]

So I'm like, oh, I gotta get through two hours with this guy and not fawn over him. Yeah, that's a deal. Because I had a lot of deal breakers going in.

[Monica Padman]

Sure.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. Well, it went great, but. And I'll just. I'll credit and thank him. He showed up like so Cash, feeling good, relaxed. He put us at ease nicely.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah, he really did. He's such a nice guy.

[Dax Shepard]

He is.

[Monica Padman]

And it was Great. And we all had fun.

[Dax Shepard]

We had a ton of fun.

[Monica Padman]

That's all we can ask.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. I wanted him to stay forever, but he had to carry on and promote.

[Monica Padman]

Kept him way past the amount of time we were supposed to.

[Dax Shepard]

And, yeah, that was another thing I was. I was like. I was juggling in my head. I'm like, 90 minutes. I don't know. I'm gonna have to read him and see if he's cool. Going over.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

We blow by that 90. We didn't look back.

[Monica Padman]

We kept on going. Okay. The one thing that I. So before he came, we were getting kind of worked up into a lather.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Monica Padman]

Like, really feeling.

[Dax Shepard]

And, well, this will remain a mystery. So I text him, like, 14 minutes before he was to arrive. Hey, this is the gate code if you want to just pull right in.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

And then he wrote, like, bueno.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

And then he wrote, oh, is that today? And I wrote, hahahahaha. But then I'm like, I don't know if that's.

[Monica Padman]

Haha. I know. We don't know.

[Dax Shepard]

We don't know.

[Monica Padman]

Yep.

[Dax Shepard]

But suffice to say, we did have 10 minutes while we were waiting for him to get here, where we were just sitting.

[Brad Pitt]

Yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

Waiting to do the thing we've been thinking about all day long. And for me, three weeks, maybe.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah. Our whole lives.

[Dax Shepard]

Yes, yes.

[Monica Padman]

But so then when he walked in, you went out and you got him, and then you guys walked in, and I, you know, I get up to go introduce myself, and. This part's embarrassing. I was gonna cut it, but I left it so people can see it if they want to. I, like, stuck my hand out to shake his hand. Hand. And he. His hands were, like, full.

[Dax Shepard]

I missed that part.

[Monica Padman]

So he, like, had to, like, kind of put down his coffee, and he had. And he was like, oh, my hands are wet. And so I. But I just had my hand out straight.

[Dax Shepard]

And you weren't moving it for the.

[Monica Padman]

Whole time all this was happening. And I thought, put your hand. But then you'll have to put it back up, so just leave it.

[Brad Pitt]

Yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

This is the stress. And then I yelled at you for not hugging him.

[Monica Padman]

You did?

[Dax Shepard]

I think that's in there.

[Monica Padman]

I didn't even hear that.

[Dax Shepard]

No, that was with another.

[Monica Padman]

That was another heart throb.

[Dax Shepard]

And then you hugged him at the end.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

But then you hugged Brad at the end too. Yeah, yeah.

[Monica Padman]

Anyway, so that was bad. That was the worst part. The handout.

[Dax Shepard]

Rough start.

[Monica Padman]

Yep. But then it Then was fine.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah.

[Monica Padman]

Then he was just a regular old boy.

[Dax Shepard]

What did you say, though? You said something. Then you go, oh, this is off the wrong. On the wrong foot. Yeah. You came hot. You came hot. What was it?

[Monica Padman]

No, I said. I said I stepped in it already.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. Do you remember what it was about?

[Monica Padman]

Yes, I do. And actually it leads into my first fact.

[Dax Shepard]

Okay.

[Monica Padman]

So the first fact is you asked if he was wearing a waffle.

[Dax Shepard]

Oh, waffle shirt.

[Monica Padman]

He's wearing his brand, God's true cashmere, which you're also wearing. And I actively did not wear. I have the shorts. They're so cute. And I actively did not wear that. But that's like when I was with Gwyneth and like, I didn't wear goop on purpose. Yeah, it's that move.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. Your famous move.

[Monica Padman]

It's like one of my moves.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah.

[Monica Padman]

So he's wearing. I'm pretty sure. So I'm on the site right now and I think he's wearing the cerulean melange cashmere shirt. Is not a ruffle. A ruffle. It's not a waffle.

[Dax Shepard]

Okay.

[Monica Padman]

I think that's the one. It's either that one or the A azure cashmere shirt. Now no one's going to like this. Both of those are sold out.

[Dax Shepard]

Ah, yeah.

[Monica Padman]

Anyway, if you want to look like me, my shorts are the.

[Dax Shepard]

I love the origin story of God's.

[Monica Padman]

True cashmere emerald do cashmere surf short is what I. I have. And it is so cute. What happened is he was telling the explanation of God's true cashmere. And I said, oh. I thought, like, I think the assumption is it's you, that you're the God. He was like, what? He did not like that.

[Dax Shepard]

No. I was like, well, I know he hates compliments if he gets told he's God, but it was.

[Monica Padman]

But it was. I thought it was sweet because his shock and horror that he would do something that anyone would think that was actually very intense, endearing.

[Dax Shepard]

I agree.

[Monica Padman]

So it was worth it. And I did think that. And I just had to be honest.

[Dax Shepard]

I appreciate your honesty. I did not think that.

[Monica Padman]

Well, for whatever reason, you were right for once.

[Dax Shepard]

You.

[Monica Padman]

He mentioned that Maybe Robert Downey Jr. Was wearing a zoot suit and because it said weird science.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah.

[Monica Padman]

But actually the term zoot suit is primarily associated with. With Robert Downey Senior's film Greaser's palace.

[Dax Shepard]

About zoot suit guys, I guess. Do you know about zoot suits?

[Monica Padman]

It says he didn't wear a zoot suit in Weird Science.

[Dax Shepard]

Do you know what a zoot suit is?

[Monica Padman]

Yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

Okay. Right. And like LA gangsters wore zoot suits.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah. We learned about them, I don't know why in college. The suits were first associated with African Americans and communities such as Harlem, Chicago and Detroit in the 30s, but were made popular nationwide by jazz and jump blues musicians in. In the 40s. Okay. In the movie adaptation, the Ghost Orchid.

[Dax Shepard]

The ghost orchid is the flower.

[Monica Padman]

It says the film uses the idea of finding your flower, your soulmate or passion as a metaphor for life's journey.

[Dax Shepard]

That's an incredible movie. I don't know when the last time you watched that is.

[Monica Padman]

I don't know if I've ever seen it.

[Dax Shepard]

It's exceptional. But what's so great is in the same way I love Fall Guy, it's like acknowledging the meta reality that they're in a movie, making a movie, trying to figure out the story of the movie. It's just so satisfying.

[Monica Padman]

Yes.

[Dax Shepard]

And he is reading this very famous writing book, how to called story the most famous screenwriting book there is. It's like the Bible.

[Monica Padman]

Oh, is it like Save the cat?

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah.

[Monica Padman]

Okay.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. So he is struggling to write a script script about this orchid hunter. And the movie is about him trying to figure out how to write this script. And he has a twin brother who's like a hack, and he goes to a story book convention and he's like, oh, it's so easy to write. And he's like getting stuff sold.

[Monica Padman]

Oh.

[Dax Shepard]

And it's like it's talking about all the rules in story as it's breaking the rules and story, which is really fun.

[Monica Padman]

That is great.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. It's very, very meta in the most satisfying way.

[Monica Padman]

Oh, I love that.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah.

[Monica Padman]

Okay. The Harlem Globetrotters. The original Harlem globetrotters founded in 1926.

[Dax Shepard]

Oh, I guess he didn't meet the original.

[Monica Padman]

Exactly. That's what I'm unfortunately, he needs. He needs to know, although he mentioned Curly, and Curly's in this mix and he's from 1942. Born in 1942.

[Dax Shepard]

I think I mentioned Curly and I think the kids characters recycled. I think new basketball players came in. But these roles that the Harlem Globetrotters had, I think they might have recycled.

[Monica Padman]

What? No, his name is Curly Neal.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. And when I was a kid, there was a Curly as well that was in the Harlem Globetrotters.

[Monica Padman]

I'm pretty sure it said the first lineup included players like Walter Toots Wright, Byron Fat Long, Willis Kidd Oliver, Andy Washington, and. And Al Runt Pullins.

[Dax Shepard]

There's nothing in there about the character Curly Neil. Yeah, I don't think there was only one. Okay. It's weird. I knew that one played for 22 seasons.

[Monica Padman]

Sweet Lou Dunbar.

[Dax Shepard]

Well, I think I know Sweet Lou.

[Monica Padman]

I think he maybe mentioned Sweet Lou. Mainly Curly and Sweet Lou and a bunch of others.

[Dax Shepard]

They were kind of gone by the time you were on the scene.

[Monica Padman]

I've heard of them.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. There would be ads all over when they came to your city. Be a big deal.

[Monica Padman]

They did like tricks and stuff. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

And they always played the same team. And it's like big time wrestling, but with basketball.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah, that's fun. That's it.

[Dax Shepard]

That's everything.

[Monica Padman]

So Brad Pitt done? No. Wiley not done yet.

[Dax Shepard]

Not done yet. But hopefully Nick Cage still out there.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah, we have. There's still. We still got some. We still got good old Tay. Yeah, she's always going to be on the hook.

[Dax Shepard]

Jay Z.

[Monica Padman]

That's right.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. Okay. Thanks to all those people.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah. Thanks for keeping us going. All right, love you.

[Dax Shepard]

Love you. Follow Armchair Expert on the Wondry app, Amazon Music or wherever you get your podcasts. You can listen to every episode of Armchair Expert early and ad free right now by joining Wondry plus in the Wondry app or on Apple Podcasts. Before you go, tell us about yourself by completing a short [e-mail] survey.