Cooper Hoffman (Extended)

Summary

The Late Show Pod Show with Stephen Colbert

Episode: Cooper Hoffman (Extended)
Date: September 13, 2025
Guest: Cooper Hoffman

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Overview

This episode centers on a revealing and playful conversation between Stephen Colbert and actor Cooper Hoffman. The discussion highlights Cooper’s sudden rise to fame following Licorice Pizza, his experiences in the industry, the pressures and perks of notoriety, and deep dives into his latest projects, particularly The Long Walk. The tone is warm, candid, and sprinkled with Stephen’s signature humor, creating a relaxed space for Cooper to reflect and share personal anecdotes.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

Cooper Hoffman’s Meteoric Start

• High Bar for a Debut

  • Cooper recounts the whirlwind of starring in ‘Licorice Pizza’ as his first film role.
  • Quote:

    “A buddy of mine’s dad said you got your driver’s license and then you were handed the keys to a Lamborghini. And that is kind of the truth.” (05:06 – Cooper Hoffman)

• Navigating Sudden Recognition

  • Cooper discusses adjusting to fame, contrasting his background of being around fame to becoming the focus himself.

    “I don't do that well with change… having it to be enacted onto you is a different thing… trying to not to treat it as big as everyone else is treating it, I guess.” (05:49 – Cooper Hoffman)

• How to Handle Compliments & Criticism

  • Cooper describes advice from Paul Thomas Anderson on not being overly attached to praise or criticism.

    “None of it's really that real. It's kind of like air… something that you can read and kind of enjoy. But then you have to move on.” (06:55 – Cooper Hoffman, paraphrasing Anderson)

  • He reflects on the importance of taking compliments, but with perspective.

• Getting Excited About Critical Acclaim

  • Stephen cites a glowing Vulture review:

    “You can’t look away from Cooper Hoffman.” (06:16 – Stephen Colbert)

  • Cooper’s genuine surprise and pleasure at hearing this for the first time highlights his humility.

The Realities and Perks of Fame

• Colbert’s Take on the Best Perk

  • The two joke about the greatest benefit of fame:

    “The best thing about being famous is that sometimes some young guy like you, some 22-year-old… will carry your mulch to your car.” (09:56 – Stephen Colbert)
    “That’s incredible.” (10:10 – Cooper Hoffman)

• Mutual Curiosity

  • Cooper appreciatively flips the script and asks Colbert about his experiences with fame.
  • The dynamic becomes more of a friendly exchange than a typical interview.

• Working with Friends

  • Cooper expresses a desire to create films with friends in LA, emphasizing the value of collaboration and shared passion.

    “Like, buddies of mine in LA that I love dearly and would love to make a movie with them. That's honestly the truth.” (08:35 – Cooper Hoffman)

  • Stephen supports this:

    “Find the people that you love working with and help each other. That’s great.” (08:44 – Stephen Colbert)

The Long Walk: Inside Cooper’s New Film

• Premise and Role

  • Cooper introduces The Long Walk:

    “I play a kid by the name of Ray Garrity. And it's basically set in this dystopian world where you are put upon to this long walk and you have to walk above three miles an hour. And if you don't, you get warnings. If you get more than three warnings, you get killed.” (10:36 – Cooper Hoffman)

  • The story, based on a Stephen King novel written under the alias Richard Bachman, is described as “exhausting” and “really dark.”

• Physical Demands

  • Cooper emphasizes how physically grueling production was:

    “We were walking close to 15 miles a day.” (12:12 – Cooper Hoffman) “It's like for two months you're going home every night and just having a cold shower and trying to sleep.” (12:29 – Cooper Hoffman)

• On-set Bonding: ‘Martini Story Time’

  • Cooper recalls the cast unwinding together:

    “We called it Martini Story Time… we would kind of start the day by going, I have a really good story that I want to tell you… I’m not going to tell you until we get to the end of the day. And that was the thing you would look forward to, which was really nice.” (13:07 – Cooper Hoffman)

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On Adjusting to Fame:

  “I've always been around fame, but having it to be enacted onto you is a different thing.” (05:56 – Cooper Hoffman)

• Colbert’s Tip on Positive Reviews:

  “Vulture on my next movie could be saying, you know, I want to look away from Cooper Hoffman so badly.” (07:18 – Cooper Hoffman)

• Appreciation for Colbert’s Strike Force 5 Podcast:

  “Strike Force 5, the podcast that you did… was fantastic. Me and my mother loved it.” (09:43 – Cooper Hoffman)

• Filmmaking Aspirations:

  “I would love to make movies that some people don’t want to make. You know, that’s really nice… if I can be the person to bring a script together.” (08:05 – Cooper Hoffman)

• Colbert’s Reflection on Fame:

  “I reached the perfect level of famous… I have a feeling everything north of this is a pain in the ass.” (10:14 – Stephen Colbert)

• On the Challenges Filming ‘The Long Walk’:

  “Their summers are just as bad as their winters… black flies… 101 degree heat… You're walking close to 15 miles a day.” (12:06 – Cooper Hoffman)

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Important Timestamps

• First mention of Licorice Pizza and starting out: 04:50
• Surprise at Vulture review: 06:16
• Discussion of fame and its perks: 07:35 – 10:27
• Detailed description of The Long Walk: 10:36 – 13:35
• Cast’s daily ritual (‘Martini Story Time’): 13:05 – 13:35

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Tone and Style

The exchange is candid, genial, and full of mutual respect. Colbert’s wit and open-ended questions allow Cooper to reveal genuine thoughts about his career, creative process, and personal evolution. Cooper’s responses oscillate between humility, humor, and thoughtful insight, mirroring the youthful frankness that endears him to audiences.

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In Essence:
This episode delivers an intimate peek into Cooper Hoffman’s artistic journey and personality, blending accolades with authenticity. From handling Hollywood buzz to reveling in post-shoot camaraderie, listeners will find a relatable and disarming portrait of a rising star—capped by Colbert’s signature warmth and comedic wisdom.

Transcript

[Stephen Colbert]

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[Doug Liman]

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[Stephen Colbert]

Exactly. I mean, even out of the shell, it's still a nut.

[Doug Liman]

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[Stephen Colbert]

You. I'm not disparaging the nut. I'm describing the nut.

[Doug Liman]

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[Stephen Colbert]

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[Doug Liman]

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[Stephen Colbert]

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[Doug Liman]

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[Stephen Colbert]

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[Doug Liman]

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[Stephen Colbert]

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[Doug Liman]

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[Stephen Colbert]

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[Doug Liman]

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[Stephen Colbert]

I wonder what more there is to learn. We just told them so much. We just told them so much about pistachios. But evidently there's a whole other world. There's an unexplored vista.

[Doug Liman]

They got a bunch of flavors. They got dill pickle, jalapeno lime, as we learned, smoky barbecue. There's a lot of different flavors.

[Stephen Colbert]

Wow. And I would not disparage any of them.

[Doug Liman]

No, no, no.

[Stephen Colbert]

Bring it on.

[Doug Liman]

Nothing bad to say.

[Stephen Colbert]

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[Doug Liman]

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[Stephen Colbert]

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[Cooper Hoffman]

Good.

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[Stephen Colbert]

Ladies and gentlemen. Welcome back to the Late show, folks. My next guest is an actor you know, from Licorice Pizza, Wildcat and Saturday night. Please welcome to the Late Show. Cooper Hoffman. Nice to see you.

[Cooper Hoffman]

Nice to see you too. Yeah.

[Stephen Colbert]

Now, most of the folks out there got to know you for the first time when you were in Paul Thomas Anderson's Licorice Pizza right there. It was a great movie, great performance. Your very first film. Yeah, that's A pretty high bar in your very first film.

[Cooper Hoffman]

Yes. A buddy of mine's dad said you got your driver's license and then you were handed the keys to a Lamborghini. And that is kind of the truth. It's a crazy thing to have on your first one.

[Stephen Colbert]

And you've been working steadily ever since you just had the premiere of the Long Walk, which people are very excited about.

[Cooper Hoffman]

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Stephen Colbert]

Your new movie and another film you're starring in, Poetic License.

[Cooper Hoffman]

Yes.

[Stephen Colbert]

Okay. Just premiered at the Toronto Film Festival.

[Cooper Hoffman]

Yes.

[Stephen Colbert]

So it's a busy time to be Cooper Hoffman.

[Cooper Hoffman]

Yeah.

[Stephen Colbert]

But somebody's gotta be.

[Cooper Hoffman]

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Stephen Colbert]

How are you liking being Cooper Hoffman right now?

[Cooper Hoffman]

Uh, it's.

[Stephen Colbert]

It's, you know, how you handle em. People like going, hey, you're Cooper Hoffman.

[Cooper Hoffman]

It's good. It's nice. I mean, people are liking the movies, which is really great.

[Stephen Colbert]

Yeah.

[Cooper Hoffman]

I don't do that well with change. That's the only thing it's like.

[Stephen Colbert]

Really?

[Cooper Hoffman]

Yeah. And I kind of.

[Stephen Colbert]

What's changing that you're famous?

[Cooper Hoffman]

Well, sure, sure. I've always been around fame, but having it to be enacted onto you is a different thing. And guiding yourself through that and trying to say all the right things, trying to do all the right things, trying to not to treat it as big as everyone else is treating it, I guess.

[Stephen Colbert]

Right. Yeah. Well, I promise not to treat it.

[Cooper Hoffman]

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. If you could tone it down, that would be great. Thank you so much.

[Stephen Colbert]

Exactly. Yeah. Yeah. Well, people damn excited about your performances out there. This is what Vulture had to say about poetical license. You can't look away from Cooper Hoffman.

[Cooper Hoffman]

Yeah.

[Stephen Colbert]

Okay.

[Cooper Hoffman]

That's awesome.

[Stephen Colbert]

Yeah.

[Cooper Hoffman]

It's so exciting.

[Stephen Colbert]

That is so exciting.

[Cooper Hoffman]

I hadn't read that.

[Stephen Colbert]

I hadn't read that. You really had not read this?

[Cooper Hoffman]

I hadn't read that. So that's really. That's very nice.

[Stephen Colbert]

Wow. But when you read something, what's your first reaction? If you, like you hadn't seen that before, first reactions to knowing that people cannot look away from Cooperhoff, will you? Or Vulture. Can't look away.

[Cooper Hoffman]

Yeah, yeah, just Vulture. You have to be excited about it. Right? Like, you have to take that in. You have to take in the good stuff.

[Stephen Colbert]

It's a compliment.

[Cooper Hoffman]

Exactly. You have to take the compliment. And then also, you know, I was. I did Licorice Pizza, which was the first movie I did, and when I was doing the small bits of press that I was doing, Paul said to me along the way that, like, none of it's really that real? It's kind of like air. It's like something that you can't physically grab onto. And it's something that you can read and kind of enjoy. But then you kind of have to move on. Because Vulture on my next movie could be saying, you know, I want to look away from Cooper Hoffman so badly.

[Stephen Colbert]

You know, and that's just right. Exactly.

[Cooper Hoffman]

And then I'm stuck back in the pit.

[Stephen Colbert]

But that's easy for Paul Thomas Anderson to say. Cause he's not an actor.

[Cooper Hoffman]

Yes. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Exactly.

[Stephen Colbert]

Camera's not pointed at. No, it's not.

[Cooper Hoffman]

No, it is not.

[Stephen Colbert]

Yeah, yeah. What's the best thing about fame to you? To you? What's the best thing? I have my own theories about this. I just want to know what your first reaction is. You're like, you know, it's been like three or four years since you've been Cooper Hoffman.

[Cooper Hoffman]

You know, I. Cooper Hoffman. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. God. What's the best thing about fame?

[Stephen Colbert]

I'll lead. You ready? Please. It leads to more work.

[Cooper Hoffman]

That's kind of what I was going to say.

[Stephen Colbert]

It's useful for more work.

[Cooper Hoffman]

Yeah, yeah. That's so good. I wish I just said what that. But I.

[Stephen Colbert]

Do you want to just say it and then we'll edit out bit. We'll end it up. Me saying it. You go like, well, Steve, I always.

[Cooper Hoffman]

Thought, yeah, yeah, yeah. If we could be. This could be an hour long. And I just say all my best things. But I was going to say that. Yeah, it really does. Like, I would love to make movies that some people don't want to make. You know, that's really nice. If I can be the person to bring a script together or whatever it is. That would be really lovely.

[Stephen Colbert]

Yeah, lovely. That is nice. Is there a movie you want to make right now?

[Cooper Hoffman]

You know what? Like, this is kind of crazy, but I do have, like, buddies of mine in LA that I like, love dearly and would love to make a movie with them. That's honestly the truth. Yeah. That's honestly the truth.

[Stephen Colbert]

Yeah. Definitely find the people that you love working with and help each other. That's great.

[Cooper Hoffman]

That's all I can ask.

[Stephen Colbert]

Yeah. You share the same values. That's important. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I still work with people that I started working with when I was 24.

[Cooper Hoffman]

Really?

[Stephen Colbert]

Yeah, yeah. They work here on this show. Yeah, yeah.

[Cooper Hoffman]

What's the best thing for fame for you? Can I ask you questions?

[Stephen Colbert]

Best thing.

[Cooper Hoffman]

Okay. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Stephen Colbert]

Oh, yeah, absolutely.

[Cooper Hoffman]

No, no.

[Stephen Colbert]

I really do no, 100%. This is your first time on a late night show?

[Cooper Hoffman]

Yeah. I don't know.

[Stephen Colbert]

Like on most of them, you can't do that.

[Cooper Hoffman]

Well, I just saw Jenna. That's. Yeah, I assume so.

[Stephen Colbert]

But on this one, totally a percent. Because I'm out of here.

[Cooper Hoffman]

Yes.

[Stephen Colbert]

So do you want to switch? You want to ask me a question?

[Cooper Hoffman]

Yeah.

[Stephen Colbert]

So good. So what's your question?

[Cooper Hoffman]

No, my question is genuinely, like, what has. Like, you're also just. This brings a certain different kind of fame in the sense of like, it's you. This is you every night.

[Stephen Colbert]

Right?

[Cooper Hoffman]

Yeah.

[Stephen Colbert]

So interesting. Yeah, sure, sure. It's like me.

[Cooper Hoffman]

It's like you. Yes.

[Stephen Colbert]

It's one and a half times me. I'm not this energetic in person, by the way.

[Cooper Hoffman]

Can I say one thing?

[Stephen Colbert]

Yes, Sir.

[Cooper Hoffman]

Strike Force 5, the podcast that you did, boom, was fantastic.

[Stephen Colbert]

Oh, thank you.

[Cooper Hoffman]

Me and my mother loved it.

[Stephen Colbert]

Terrible reason, but a wonderful experience.

[Cooper Hoffman]

Of course. But what you guys were doing was so lovely, it almost made you forget how horrible everything was.

[Stephen Colbert]

Very nice. The best thing, and you'll realize this when you're older, the best thing about being famous is that sometimes some young guy like you, some 22 year old who's working at the local plant store because he likes your show, to talk to you more, will carry your mulch to your car.

[Cooper Hoffman]

Yes. Yes, exactly. That's incredible.

[Stephen Colbert]

That's it.

[Cooper Hoffman]

Yes, that's exactly right.

[Stephen Colbert]

I remember when that first time that happened, I was still working on the Daily show and I got home, said to my wife, Evie, I said, I reached the perfect level of famous. Yeah, yeah. And I told her what happened, and I said, I have a feeling everything north of this is a pain in the ass.

[Cooper Hoffman]

He's gonna be. Aw. That's really the truth.

[Stephen Colbert]

Yeah, that's really the truth. Well, people are really excited about the long walk. Can you tell the people what it is and who you play in it?

[Cooper Hoffman]

Yeah, I play a kid by the name of Ray Garrity. And it's basically set in this dystopian world where you are put upon to this long walk and you have to walk above three miles an hour. And if you don't, you get warnings. If you get more than three warnings, you get killed.

[Stephen Colbert]

And you know, this is Stephen King.

[Cooper Hoffman]

This is Stephen King. It was something that he wrote when he was 16 and under the alias of Richard Brockman. And it was one of those things where, like, you know, I watched it last night at the premiere. It's exhausting. It's an exhausting Watch. And I love for my movie, you're.

[Stephen Colbert]

Walking the whole time.

[Cooper Hoffman]

Yes. You're walking the entire time under this threat. Yes. And it's under this extreme anxiety that like, you know David Johnson, who's my co star in it, who's fantastic if you don't know who he is, but he has this line in it that says, you know, I just thought that when they would shoot the gun, a little white piece of paper would come out and it would just say bang. And he'd say, this is a whole big joke. And you would all get to go home. And it is that kind of thing of like, you're watching these kids slowly realize what death is and slowly realizing that it's gonna come to them at some point. It's really dark. I really hope you guys all enjoy it if you go see it. But it is really dark.

[Stephen Colbert]

It's getting great notices. Yeah. Ye. But you walk for the whole thing.

[Cooper Hoffman]

Yes.

[Stephen Colbert]

And really had to walk. This isn't green screen. You're not on a treadmill. No. And so where did you walk?

[Cooper Hoffman]

Winnipeg, Canada.

[Stephen Colbert]

Winnipeg. Winnipeg, Canada. In the winter?

[Cooper Hoffman]

In the heat.

[Stephen Colbert]

In the heat. Okay.

[Cooper Hoffman]

Which by the way, their summers are just as bad as their winters.

[Stephen Colbert]

Yeah.

[Cooper Hoffman]

Black flies. The flies. It was awful. And then it was also just like 101 degree heat. And you're on concrete, there's no shade. You're sitting ducks for. You're walking. We were walking close to 15 miles a day.

[Stephen Colbert]

Were your hamstrings just like a zither?

[Cooper Hoffman]

Awful. Awful. It's like for two months you're going home every night and just having a cold shower and trying to sleep.

[Stephen Colbert]

And how do you let it go? How do you let it go at the end of the day?

[Cooper Hoffman]

Well, me and my buddies on that movie would go, have we called it Martini Story time?

[Stephen Colbert]

And were there stories about martinis?

[Cooper Hoffman]

No. We would be enjoying martinis to kind of, I think, loosen us all up to tell. Really embarrassing.

[Stephen Colbert]

That's a plot.

[Cooper Hoffman]

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. It's a two at the most because we had to shoot the next day. And it wasn't every day that makes it sound darker than it was. It was really nice, actually.

[Stephen Colbert]

And then. So you would just. Whatever story came to you.

[Cooper Hoffman]

Yeah, it was. Well, no. Kind of. So this is also the really nice thing is that there's a really nice bit in the movie where Peter McVree's David Johnson again says, you know, we're just gonna wait for our moments. We're gonna keep having moments that we.

[Stephen Colbert]

Try to get to.

[Cooper Hoffman]

And I think our version of this was our stories. We would kind of start the day by going, I have a really good story that I want to tell you. And we're like, what is it? I'm not going to tell you until we get to the end of the day. And that was the thing you would look forward to, which was really nice. Yeah.

[Stephen Colbert]

Well, Cooper, lovely to meet you.

[Cooper Hoffman]

Lovely to meet you. Thank you.

[Stephen Colbert]

The Long Walk is in theaters this Friday. Cooper Hoffman, everybody. Thank you for listening to the late show pod show with Stephen Colbert. Just one more thing. If you want to see more of me, come to The Late Show YouTube channel for more clips and exclusives. And Doug Limu and I always tell you to customize your car insurance and save hundreds with Liberty Mutual. But now we want you to feel it. Cue the emu music. Limu.

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[Cooper Hoffman]

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[Cooper Hoffman]

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[Stephen Colbert]

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[Stephen Colbert]

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