Clearing the A.I.R. – The Making of Am I Racist?

Summary

The Matt Walsh Show – Episode Summary

Episode Title: Clearing the A.I.R. – The Making of Am I Racist?
Release Date: November 8, 2025
Podcast: The Matt Walsh Show (The Daily Wire)
Host: Matt Walsh
Episode Focus: Behind the Scenes of “Am I Racist?” Documentary

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Overview of the Episode

This episode offers a candid, in-depth behind-the-scenes look at the making of the documentary film Am I Racist?, a follow-up to the previous hit What Is a Woman?. The conversation features Matt Walsh, director Justin Folk, and key crew members (Rebecca, Anton, Sean Hampton, Benjamin) as they break down the challenges, comedic strategies, controversial moments, and risks involved in tackling America’s most sensitive topic: race. The tone is unfiltered and often humorous, spotlighting both the anxieties and triumphs of making a provocative political documentary.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. The Stakes of a Sophomore Documentary (02:27)

• After the success of “What Is a Woman?”, the team felt pressure to ‘go bigger,’ not simply coast on past acclaim.
  • Benjamin: “It came out, we were done, we were proud of it. And all of a sudden, I'm just seeing it every single day on every app that I'm on... We have to keep the momentum going.” (02:54)
  • Rebecca (on her initial reaction): “I didn't say it out loud, but was like, hell, no.” (03:12)

2. Why Make a Movie About Race? (03:12–04:36)

• The subject was especially volatile, heightened by the events of summer 2020.
  • The crew reflects on how race was hardly discussed in their youth (80s/90s), compared to its centrality now.
  • Matt Walsh: “Growing up in the 90s, I never thought much about race... it never really seemed to matter that much.” (03:31)
• Taking on the topic felt daunting: “You can't just make a movie. You Just say, well, we're making a documentary about race. What does that mean exactly?” (Matt, 04:23)

3. Risks and Career Consequences (04:49–05:34)

• Working on a conservative-leaning, controversial project risked blacklisting in Hollywood.
  • Benjamin: Admits prior work with progressive outlets and nervousness about career fallout.
  • Anton: “Would I be hired again in Hollywood if my name was associated with this film?” (05:21)

4. Using Comedy to Disarm & Engage (05:45–06:36)

• The team decided the only way to address race was through subversive humor.
  • Justin Folk: “We really felt like humor was the way that we could kind of pick the lock, get our message across and actually have people listen.” (05:45)
  • Benjamin: “Truth is hilarious. And I think that the truth speaks for itself best in comedy of all forms.” (06:18)

5. Trust, Collaboration, and Directing Style (06:26–09:38)

• Praise for director Justin Folk’s collaborative, visionary leadership.
  • Matt Walsh: “One of Justin’s best features as a creative is that he's willing to listen to ideas... That’s pretty rare. There’s a lot of egos in this business.” (06:51)
  • Rebecca: “He can see the edit while he's shooting. Justin understands how to play those moments in the moment...” (09:19)
  • The unique challenge: documentaries require flexibility and rapid adaptation as things constantly change on the fly.

6. Pushing the Boundaries with Undercover Antics (10:01–17:24)

• Matt Walsh’s comfort with cringe and discomfort becomes a major comedic engine.
  • Anton: “Matt's ability to sit in discomfort and just, like, relish it. It's such an amazing skill set.” (10:01)
• The infamous “white grief counseling” and “woke man in a wig” scenes:
  • Walsh describes donning disguises for undercover stunts.
  • Rebecca: “When we were talking about what should Matt's disguise be, he didn't want to shave his beard... My wife's made it very clear that she likes the beard. She doesn't want to see my entire face.” (14:24–14:30)

7. Production Stress and Surreal Situations (12:41–13:45)

• Scenes were high-stress, bordering on chaotic, with the real risk of being exposed or even having cops called.
  • Benjamin: “Afterward, they called the police and the police showed up.” (13:24)
  • Sean Hampton: “Every day of shooting, there was a level of dread and concern that things were about to blow up on our faces.” (13:45)

8. The “Race to Dinner” Setup (17:03–20:47)

• A heavily orchestrated scene where Walsh, disguised as a waiter, disrupts a dinner for white women learning about their “racism.”
  • The crew took bets on how long the ruse would last.
  • Matt Walsh: “You know, after, like, the fifth time I came out and interrupted, the audience is almost like, groaning a little bit... it's almost like they want me to Stop too. Cause it's just too much. It's too uncomfortable.” (20:18)
  • Rebecca: Praises Walsh’s improvisational skill: “Matt Walsh is a very special talent. We can come up with all the scenarios we want, but it’s on Matt to pull it off and he does Uncle Frank.” (20:47)

9. The Robin DiAngelo “Reparations” Scene (26:01–27:24)

• An unexpected, pivotal moment where Walsh tries (successfully) to get the bestselling author to accept cash reparations.
  • Matt Walsh: “This is a real person. This is not a cartoon. There's no way we can get her to actually do this.” (27:03)
  • Sean Hampton: “The moment she got up was a feeling of pretty immense pride in our team and what we pulled off. It was that moment where I think collectively we realized, well, we have a movie now.” (27:15)

10. Audience Reaction & Cultural Impact (28:16–31:10)

• Big relief at the positive, engaged audience reception after months of uncertainty.
  • Justin Folk: “When you finally get to sit down in an actual movie theater with people and hear them laugh… there's something really magical to that.” (28:45)
  • The film became a huge hit, “the most profitable political documentary of the past 20 years.” (Sean Hampton, 29:31)
• Message: courage to question ‘anti-racist’ orthodoxies is key.
  • Justin Folk: “My goal for this film... was courage. I want people to have courage to speak out against bad ideas.” (29:49)

11. Final Reflections on Race and Culture (29:59–32:22)

• Rejecting the view of America as irredeemably racist.
  • Matt Walsh: “If [America] were [racist down to its bones], there wouldn't be anything we could do about it. White people could only wallow in their guilt and black people in their victimhood.” (29:59)
  • Rebecca: “Do I think that most Americans are racist? No, absolutely not. I think most Americans just care about getting through their day. And if you're nice to them, they might be your friend.” (30:59)
• Calls for decency, empathy, and optimism.
  • Anton: “I think for me, the biggest lesson of all is just to love people with your heart and not look at people's skin color.” (31:10)

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• "You can't just make a movie. You Just say, well, we're making a documentary about race. What does that mean exactly?"
  – Matt Walsh (04:23)

• "Truth is hilarious. And I think that the truth speaks for itself best in comedy of all forms."
  – Benjamin (06:18)

• "One of Justin’s best features as a creative is that he’s willing to listen to ideas and be collaborative... there's a lot of egos in this business.”
  – Matt Walsh (06:51)

• “Matt's ability to sit in discomfort and just, like, relish it. It's such an amazing skill set.”
  – Anton (10:01)

• “My wife's made it very clear that she likes the beard. She doesn't want to see my entire face.”
  – Matt Walsh (14:30)

• “You know, after, like, the fifth time I came out and interrupted, the audience is almost like, groaning a little bit... it's too uncomfortable.”
  – Matt Walsh (20:18)

• “This is a real person. This is not a cartoon. There's no way we can get her [Robin DiAngelo] to actually do this.”
  – Matt Walsh (27:03)

• “The most fun thing to shoot was Washington, D.C. grassroots... try to talk to real people and we're just gonna grab them.”
  – Rebecca (23:37)

• “Politics is downstream from culture, and this film does shape and move culture.”
  – Sean Hampton (30:16)

• “I think most Americans just care about getting through their day. And if you're nice to them, they might be your friend.”
  – Rebecca (30:59)

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Key Timestamps for Important Segments

| Timestamp | Segment Description | |------------|------------------------------------------------------| | 02:40 | Comparing fleeting podcast impact to lasting film | | 03:12 | Decision to make a documentary about race | | 05:45 | Embracing comedy as the tool to talk about race | | 06:26 | Praise for director Justin Folk’s collaborative style| | 10:01 | Matt’s flair for handling uncomfortable situations | | 12:41 | Stressful production behind “white grief counseling” | | 14:24 | The making of Matt Walsh’s wig disguise | | 17:03 | “Race to Dinner” scene setup and crew strategy | | 20:18 | Pushing cringe humor to the limit for a point | | 23:37 | Shooting on the Washington, D.C. Mall | | 26:01 | Robin DiAngelo “reparations” exchange | | 28:45 | Theater audience reactions – relief and validation | | 29:49 | Film’s main goal: emboldening courage | | 31:10 | Anton’s lesson: love people, don’t judge by skin |

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Conclusion

Clearing the A.I.R. – The Making of Am I Racist? is an unguarded, revealing glimpse at the creative and ethical tightrope the filmmakers walked to create a comedy-documentary on the most volatile of subjects. Anchored by Matt Walsh’s willingness to be the butt of the joke and director Justin Folk’s collaborative spirit, the team found both cultural resonance and commercial success. The episode closes with reflections on the decency of ordinary Americans, the power of humor, and the necessity of questioning dogma in pursuit of a more united society.

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Transcript

[Matt Walsh]

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[Justin Folk]

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[Matt Walsh]

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[Justin Folk]

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[Matt Walsh]

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[Sean Hampton]

First day of shooting, there was a level of dread and concern that things were about to blow up in our faces.

[Matt Walsh]

Just had to ask who you are because you have to be careful. Never be too careful.

[Sean Hampton]

Every 30 seconds you're like, oh my gosh, are we exposed? Are we done?

[Anton]

Remind me of your name again.

[Matt Walsh]

Steven.

[Sean Hampton]

Steven. Yeah. We had no Right. To pull off what we pulled off.

[Matt Walsh]

Barking.

[Justin Folk]

That was a robust slate right there. This film came together in the aftermath of what Is a Woman. What Is a Woman was a big success and accomplished a great deal. I think we're all very, very proud of that film.

[Matt Walsh]

You put out a podcast and everybody forgets about it by tomorrow, and you got to do it again. What Is a Woman? It was my first time helping to create something that had an impact that lasted for longer than a day. Months later, years later, now, people are still talking about that film.

[Benjamin]

It came out, we were done, we were proud of it. And all of a sudden, I'm just seeing it every single day on every app that I'm on, Instagram reels and all these social media sites. I thought, we gotta do something else. We have to keep the momentum going.

[Justin Folk]

I think we realized that we didn't want to just limp in with a sophomore effort. Like, we had to kind of go bigger.

[Rebecca]

They said they want to do a movie about race. Honest to God. Like, my first gut reaction, I didn't say it out loud, but was like, hell, no.

[Benjamin]

This was, you know, summer of 2020, when whole cities were being burnt down over race, and now we're going to do race. It was just as hot as the subject of transgenderism was when we did.

[Matt Walsh]

What, as a woman, I didn't think it was dangerous. I mean, it is in a way. Obviously, it's provocative, but that's what we're looking for. We're looking for the dangerous topics. Growing up in the 90s, I never thought much about race. Sure, you noticed if somebody was black or white or Mexican or whatever, but it never really seemed to matter that much.

[Rebecca]

Maybe it's because of the time and place. I was raised Louisiana. 80s and 90s. When I was a teenager, I wanted to be Easy E. I mean, I didn't want to die of aids, but I wanted to be Easy E. I.

[Anton]

Was taught and brought up to not see race as an issue. So I didn't really know that it was as big of an issue that people were making it out to be.

[Matt Walsh]

That's how we deal with racism. We just say, oh, it's not happening.

[Sean Hampton]

Yeah, the more you talk about it.

[Justin Folk]

The more you are blatantly acknowledging race.

[Sean Hampton]

And if you want to forget about.

[Matt Walsh]

It, we have to acknowledge you need to shut up. What I guess made it dangerous to me in terms of trying to make a movie about it is that it's so big. So figuring out you can't just make a movie. You Just say, well, we're making a documentary about race. What does that mean exactly?

[Anton]

One of the first meetings I have with Justin, he just talked about painting. His interest in pursuing this kind of DEI stuff that was happening was getting bigger and bigger. Black, Latino and indigenous people are suffering and dying.

[Sean Hampton]

Violent, white supremacist, white, white, entitlement.

[Anton]

We have gotta do the work.

[Benjamin]

I put my name on what is a woman. Prior to that, I'd worked on a lot of things that were, you know, progressive in nature. Cause I'm freelance, so people call me, ask me to do jobs. I filmed Obama in the Oval Office for a media outlet that is very liberal. I'm not going to say it blacklisted me, but it's very likely that they're going to say, oh, Anton's working on that type of project. Well, he's not going to be working on our projects anymore.

[Anton]

I still had one foot in Hollywood and had concerns about my livelihood and would I be hired again in Hollywood if my name was associated with this film. We need to stop being nice about.

[Sean Hampton]

Racism because nothing has been advanced by people. You have to come at it with a lot of humility. These are massive, massive topics we're going after and powerful people we're going after.

[Justin Folk]

The thing that became very apparent to us was we wanted to do a comedy. We knew we were taking on these tough issues. They're hard for people to talk about. So we really felt like humor was the way that we could kind of pick the lock, get our message across and actually have people listen.

[Matt Walsh]

Having petition. We want to rename the George Washington Monument to the George Floyd Monument. We're talking about painting it black. We're gonna raise it. 30% increase in the height.

[Unknown Crew Member]

You're trying to battle in common sense and facts and being serious about something, but it doesn't work.

[Benjamin]

Truth is hilarious. And I think that the truth speaks for itself. Best in comedy of all forms.

[Justin Folk]

Humor is not easy to do. It's actually probably the hardest thing to do. It really does take incredible amount of talent to pull it off. And this is where Matt Walsh just completely shined.

[Matt Walsh]

I told him, find anybody but Justin folk. And they came back and said, he's the only guy willing to work with you. So I said, shit, no. Of course. There's no. There's no question at all. Is he sitting around here? It was awkward. If I'm complimenting him. If he's.

[Rebecca]

Can you leave?

[Matt Walsh]

Justin, get out of here. Oh, you are there. You can't. I don't. I don't compliment people normally, so it's always awkward for me. One of Justin's best features as a creative is that he' willing to listen to ideas and be collaborative. It's actually a very rare trait. Now he's got a real great creative vision himself. So it's not like he's going into this and he has no idea what to do. But if you step in and say, well, what about this? Or what if we think about it this way, he's willing to listen to that and we can have a conversation about it. And like I said, that's pretty rare. There's a lot of egos in this business.

[Anton]

One of the things that makes documentary filmmaking difficult is it's constantly evolving.

[Rebecca]

You have to roll with the punches. You can't get a take two with.

[Benjamin]

What is a woman. Our very first day, Justin told me, hey, by the way, they might cut this interview off immediately.

[Matt Walsh]

You know what? I think this interview is over. Yeah, I think this interview is over. I just had one last question. Well, the interview's over. You wanted to know what is a woman?

[Benjamin]

I was like, wait, what?

[Anton]

You get the interview that you didn't think you were going to get, and then you have to pivot. You don't get the interview that you were hoping to get, or you don't get the location that you were going to get. There are decisions that have to be made along the way, and not only is it your livelihood that you're entrusting in your director, you're entrusting in your reputation. Ultimately, the decision is his, and we all, as a team, are very confident in him as a director. He's very much a leader that we all trust.

[Rebecca]

If you don't have confidence in your director, you have nothing. Okay. Like, you might as well direct it yourself.

[Sean Hampton]

Sean Hampton has a great quote about directors. It's that directors are the only people who have seen the movie while we're making it. He's the only person that actually knows what we're doing. Everyone else is just kind of showing up and trying to support and help him.

[Matt Walsh]

Daily Wire.

[Justin Folk]

Oh, that's good.

[Sean Hampton]

That's good.

[Justin Folk]

Okay, now let me grab your hat, Steve, Right there.

[Matt Walsh]

Don't move.

[Unknown Crew Member]

Justin, compared to most of the directors that I've worked with, is way more planned and organized and strategic and outlined. And there's purpose for everything. It's not like a director just filming a whole bunch of stuff and saying, here you go, editor. Make something cool.

[Justin Folk]

Matt, can you slide just a little bit to your right just a hair Just. Just a. Just a fraction.

[Sean Hampton]

A little bit more.

[Justin Folk]

A little bit more. There it is. There it is.

[Matt Walsh]

Okay, ready?

[Rebecca]

He can see the edit while he's shooting. Justin understands how to play those moments in the moment while Anton's shooting, while Matt's in the zone.

[Matt Walsh]

Okay, good. Back down. Back down to one.

[Rebecca]

When I saw his nuanced directing like that, obviously I'd seen what, as a woman, no safe spaces. Justin created a genre that didn't exist. And that's, to me, really exciting because we can push boundaries at that point.

[Matt Walsh]

Yeah, I mean, it's a great team. I really like three of them. It's pretty good batting average.

[Anton]

Matt's ability to sit in discomfort and just, like, relish it. It's such an amazing skill set. So I think, like, Matt's ability to do that coupled with Justin's storytelling is one of the things that sets it apart. I would like you to close your eyes. What does that loss feel like in your body?

[Matt Walsh]

Feels like a thousand knives plunging into my soul in a sack. Being hit by bats and bricks, and the whole sack is thrown into the ocean.

[Sean Hampton]

Thank you.

[Matt Walsh]

That's what it feels like.

[Rebecca]

Matt goes to the white grief counseling. That shoot made me the most nervous. We went into that needing something specific for the story, but there was no guarantee we're gonna get it.

[Anton]

We're moving to her now.

[Matt Walsh]

Why? I hadn't finished. Please finish with the sack's thrown into the ocean and then the sack's taken out and it's set on fire.

[Anton]

Thank you.

[Matt Walsh]

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[Anton]

Can you please leave?

[Matt Walsh]

I Would like it if you left. I'm trying to learn. I'm on this journey.

[Rebecca]

Come with me.

[Anton]

Well, thank you.

[Matt Walsh]

I didn't consent to be touched. Maybe there's somebody in the group who's not exactly reacting how you want. But then you got all these other people and there's just a lot you can sort of play with there.

[Rebecca]

And then in a moment.

[Matt Walsh]

Are you saying I needed a better disguise? Is that what you. I don't know. Maybe.

[Anton]

But you can figure that out as you walk out the door.

[Rebecca]

It all came together, together. And it's all thanks to Matt. There's nobody I know that's quicker on his feet than Matt.

[Matt Walsh]

It was my favorite to film. It's also my favorite scene in the movie to watch the very last scene we filmed, even though it's early in the film, obviously there's a lot of like, awkward cringe humor in the film, quite intentionally, of course, but that scene has the most of it and it's a. In a very concentrated form.

[Sean Hampton]

I am here to dig a little bit.

[Matt Walsh]

I'm sorry, kids. I forgot one other thing I wanted to promise the black community.

[Anton]

It's really important that we don't interrupt each other.

[Benjamin]

That one was hard for so many reasons. I'm a cinematographer, so I'm thinking about lighting and that sort of thing. If you notice, there's windows 360 degrees in that room with sunlight coming in. If you were to film that with no lighting, everybody would look like a silhouette. So we actually had a light called the aputure infinibar mounted to the ceiling. It took us a day beforehand to pre rig all that. So a ton of equipment that we have to put break down. Afterwards, they called the police and the police showed up.

[Matt Walsh]

Now, of course, I fled because the cops were called. As a leader, I left my team behind to deal with the cops. I was gone.

[Benjamin]

So I don't know, like, am I going to have to, you know, give a statement to the police? And also we're going to be here for hours afterwards breaking all this equipment down. So as far as, like, the stress of production, that day specifically was very, very stressful.

[Sean Hampton]

Every day of shooting, there was a level of dread and concern that things were about to blow up on our faces. And there was a divine providence in the works of creating this film that it didn't. There wasn't one specific moment. There was every 30 seconds while cameras are rolling that you're like, oh my gosh, are we exposed? Are we done? And that just kept on not happening. Right up until the workshop scene in New York.

[Matt Walsh]

If they know that I'm Matt Walsh, I'll always be an outsider. I need to go deeper undercover.

[Sean Hampton]

And that gave rise to. To this amazing character that Matt got to dive into. This woke man in a wig.

[Rebecca]

When we were talking about what should Matt's disguise be, he didn't want to shave his beard, to be honest, because.

[Matt Walsh]

I have to go home to my family at the end. I mean, I have to walk in the door to my wife and kids, and I cannot walk in bare faced. It would legitimately be traumatizing. My wife's made it very clear that she likes the beard. She doesn't want to see my entire face. And when it comes to my face, I guess, like, from here up is just. It's a better experience than from here down. What was the question?

[Rebecca]

The idea of putting him in Professor Grzonka's costume A, is hilarious. B, I will give all credit to Sean Hampton, who came up with that. I wish it was my idea.

[Justin Folk]

The first time I saw the disguise, I laughed because it was the perfect bad disguise. You know, I mean, we. Instead of giving him a full transformation, it was like, okay, we want Matt Walsh, but just slightly different and slightly more woke.

[Anton]

I honestly still can't believe that he didn't get recognized. Like, there were moments where as a team, we were like, oh, my gosh. Like, we did it. Like, he's actually not getting recognized.

[Rebecca]

This is how clueless they are. That was all it took. I mean, honestly, I'm still frickin shocked.

[Sean Hampton]

People can have their opinions. People keep on crafting on the wig. It's a fantastic wig. I know that because no one called him on it.

[Justin Folk]

As soon as that man bun came on, he was a different guy. It was incredible to watch. It was like Clark Kent going into the phone booth, coming out woke. And that was Matt Walsh.

[Sean Hampton]

When we're traveling with the Walsh costume and we have the entire wardrobe in a suitcase that we call the football, and that's a reference to the briefcase that the president carries around for the launch codes and doing nuclear attacks. And that's exactly how important this thing was to the film. I thought to myself, well, like, if I choose between sacrificing myself for the wig, I'm gonna have to take that bullet.

[Matt Walsh]

It's easy to come up with, theoretically ideas for disguises, but they have to be things that we can do on the fly. So if we get an opportunity, you know, we hear from Robin Diangelo, she says, I can talk to you tomorrow, then we have to be able to just show up there. And if it's something that require seven half hours in the makeup chair doing prosthetics and all this stuff, it's just not gonna work. Felt very weird putting it on the first time. I didn't like it. The wig was made of human hair. I was very aware of that, that I'm wearing someone else's hair. I asked for information on the person. Did we take it with their consent or without? I don't know. So that felt weird at first. By the end of it, though, it became part of me. I started to like it. It's changed me as a person. I'm revealing something I've never revealed before. You're telling me I'm full of shit.

[Benjamin]

You liked wearing the costume?

[Matt Walsh]

Yes.

[Justin Folk]

There were a number of scenes that I did not know if it was gonna work or not up until the very moment that we were in. Those scenes raced to dinner. We have these ladies who are doing this charming dinner for these white women and telling them that they're all racist. And there's a lot of moving parts there. There's the food, there's the filming of it. There's Matt coming in and out of that scene. There's just so many things that are taking place.

[Anton]

Matt's security team had vets on. How long is this actually gonna last? One guy was like five minutes. One guy was like, I think I'll go 23 minutes. And so everyone's placing these bets.

[Sean Hampton]

All you do is talk shit about each other. Talk shit about yourself.

[Anton]

Oh, my God, I'm so bad.

[Matt Walsh]

That's all they do, I'm telling you. These white women.

[Sean Hampton]

The Indian woman came off camera a few times and was just wondering, hey, what's up with this waiter?

[Matt Walsh]

That's all. We may have to add Gene to our team. Oh, I would love to take a seat and join me. No, you're not allowed to. Definitely not allowed. Okay. I do have my. I have my DEI certification that I got.

[Sean Hampton]

So he's kind of throwing off the flow. Seems, you know, seems odd. And of course we were like, you know, waiter. I don't know about that.

[Anton]

So many people on our team had to wear so many hats because we had to be so careful about confidentiality and not wanting to get found out. So I did set decorating and hired the florist and. And then raised to dinner. One of their requirements was that we hired a black owned catering company. So we hired a catering company and they brought it in. But then we didn't want extra people on set. We have to have sign an NDA or whatever. So I actually cooked the food plated. It was handing the plates to Matt. Matt dropped the plates. This country is a piece of shit.

[Matt Walsh]

Oh, my goodness. Oh, sorry.

[Anton]

We'd have to, like, scrambled to find a band aid because he got his hand. Or we have to hurry up and get the plates all sat and back out.

[Matt Walsh]

Sorry. It is a really uncomfortable situation to be out there, and I'm making a total ass of myself. And then you go into the kitchen and it's like, I don't really want to have to keep going back. I want this just to be over. So I got to, like, psych myself up each time to go back out there and keep antagonizing them.

[Anton]

He was kind of like, what else can I be doing to kind of, like, troll this dinner? And I was like, just take this butter and, like, really thwap it on the plates. And even if someone's like, no, I'm good, I'm good. Just, you know, keep. Are you sure? And that was really fun.

[Justin Folk]

All that preparation time, all that work to get to that point paid off, because now you're in that moment and you're watching it unfold. And I wouldn't say my job is done at that point, but it is nice to kind of step back and be like, okay, I'm just gonna watch Matt Walsh do his thing. I'm gonna watch the scene. And frankly, it's pretty. It's pretty enjoyable to watch.

[Unknown Crew Member]

If you sit for an hour watching this whole scene play out, I'm like, what do you cut these women in this scene is so crazy. Like, you could put that out as its own feature length doc. As we kept whittling down to try to get this from an hour and a half to 60 to 30 to 20 to seven or eight minutes now, Justin had to kind of like, hey, man. Like, it's not about these women. It's about Matt inserting himself so many times over and over just to make the audience just so uncomfortable with all these different moments that Matt is having.

[Sean Hampton]

Are you an actor?

[Rebecca]

Oh, no.

[Anton]

Can you let us. We're trying to listen and trying to have this conversation.

[Matt Walsh]

Okay. You know, we're all acting all the time in our lives, and I think that that's part of the problem. You know, after, like, the fifth time I came out and interrupted, the audience is almost like, groaning a little bit. Like they think it's funny, but it's almost like they want me to Stop too. Cause it's just too much. It's too uncomfortable. And I very much felt that as well. Can I just say one last thing? Can I just propose a toast? Raise a glass if you're racist.

[Benjamin]

Cheers.

[Matt Walsh]

Oh, I'm not racist.

[Rebecca]

Let me just.

[Matt Walsh]

Racist. Well, all the rest of it. Too racist.

[Rebecca]

Matt Walsh is a very special talent. We can come up with all the scenarios we want, but it's on Matt to pull it off and he does Uncle Frank.

[Matt Walsh]

It is not funny to mock marginalized people. It's not a joke. It's not funny.

[Justin Folk]

So to become this character, he had to understand what this character believes. This character was a creature of this anti racist movement and he actually understood that movement probably even better than some of the people that are in the movement themselves.

[Matt Walsh]

Ultimately, should we be colorblind? Society is what Martin Luther King said, not to judge people by the color of their skin.

[Justin Folk]

So Martin Luther King said a lot of stuff. Really amazing to watch. And as a director, it made my job a lot easier.

[Anton]

More and more as the film went on, everyone felt he's just part of the team. And I felt like Matt feels like he's one of the team. And I think from a talent perspective, that's exceptional. I don't know that I saw a need to be like reverent to him as talent. I think he just really wanted to make a really solid film that would change the culture.

[Sean Hampton]

If you ever bump into Matt Wolfe on the street, please run up to him, say hi, give him a hug. He's a really big hugger. That's just kind of the tender hearted soul he is.

[Matt Walsh]

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[Rebecca]

For me, the most fun thing to shoot was Washington, D.C. grassroots. Like, we're just going to come out here with a camera and matt in his wig and we're gonna try to talk to real people and we're just gonna grab them.

[Matt Walsh]

We have a petition for the to redress historical inequities. Would you mind signing it?

[Rebecca]

You will.

[Matt Walsh]

We want to rename the George Washington Monument to the George Floyd Monument.

[Rebecca]

There's something really special about being there. When you're on the mall in Washington and you're at the monuments, you feel it like, you're like, America's not perfect, but pretty cool.

[Matt Walsh]

So are you going to erase all of them? Yes. No. Well, can you sign it anyway? Nope.

[Anton]

We have to get permits to be there. So that was part of my job, is pulling permits to make sure that we are okay to be filming on the street and getting people to agree to be on cameras. Kind of being in the moment and running down the street to find somebody, you know, being out in the middle of traffic, those things are always fun.

[Rebecca]

We were flying by the seat of our pants. Even Benjamin out there, he was freezing. He gave his coat to Kelly, the hair and makeup person. She was cold. So Benjamin's such a gentleman. He gave her his coat. When you're watching the movie, he's frickin cold. But he did it anyway. And he did that so many times. The truth is, this movie isn't this movie without Benjam. All of us played a part. All of us are integral to making this thing.

[Justin Folk]

Film is such a collaborative medium. You really do rely on everybody to do their job. You have to trust people. You have to allow them to do what they're going to do. And ultimately you're putting these people in these roles for a Reason, because they're smart people and they're good at what they do.

[Anton]

This is probably the first project that I've worked on, whether it's Hollywood or in the conservative space where I completely trusted everybody. I never had to make sure that Anton had done his thing or make sure that Rebecca had sent that email. That was something that was really powerful. So for me, having our team be who they are was the most important thing to me.

[Justin Folk]

And so my job as a director is to just harness that and let those people run and do that and keep just sort of reminding all of us about what the vision is of this film. I think the entire film was difficult to make. Essentially, we're creating these scenarios for Matt to be in. The way I describe it is we created a sandbox for him to play in. At any moment, it could all take a turn and go completely in the wrong direction.

[Sean Hampton]

The Robin d' Angelo scene, which was the first time I went on camera, we didn't quite know what is the craziest thing to do in this scenario? Well, why don't we try to get her to pay someone reparations?

[Matt Walsh]

I want to pay you reparations right now. Will you accept?

[Sean Hampton]

I won't turn it down.

[Matt Walsh]

Okay. I don't know. There's 20. Well, this is all I have. I don't remember where that idea came from. I want to say it was my idea because I want to say that all the good ideas are mine. We went into that interview with a rough kind of outline of what we wanted to get out of it. But it is very rough because, again, you don't know what's going to happen. You don't know what someone's going to. Can't script it. And I've found through two movies now, as long as I know where this is all supposed to go, what is my end point supposed to be, then I feel pretty confident that we can sort of construct a plan and then revise it on the fly to get to that end point. Did you want to pay any?

[Sean Hampton]

That was really weird.

[Matt Walsh]

Why was it weird? That just seemed really weird to me. Of all the things that we did and all the kind of little stunts we wanted to pull, that was the tallest task. This is a real person. This is not a cartoon. There's no way we can get her to actually do this.

[Sean Hampton]

The moment she got up was a feeling of pretty immense pride in our team and what we pulled off. It was that moment where I think collectively we realized, well, we have a movie now.

[Unknown Crew Member]

When Justin sent the Hard drive for d'. Angelo. I'm like, dude, you guys got this already.

[Matt Walsh]

This is gold.

[Unknown Crew Member]

This is like the end of our film. Everything else that came after that was just cherry on the top. And then you get like, race to dinner. I'm like, you guys got this. How do you guys pull this off?

[Sean Hampton]

There's a lot of power that Matt has when it comes to him being very, very comfortable with silence. A lot of people can't handle that. Robin can't handle that when Matt asked her the question and just let it hang in the air, because I think.

[Matt Walsh]

Reparations is like, a systemic. This is something that I can do right now. Why wouldn't I do it?

[Sean Hampton]

You'll actually see Robin start looking around the room for anyone, anyone to give her an excuse to not go down the road of her own ideology. In that moment, I kind of had a new hope about conservative and conservative media actually being able to take on Hollywood.

[Justin Folk]

When you make a film, it takes a considerable amount of time, and you go into essentially a dark room with a computer, and you just pour over things for weeks and months at a time. And ultimately, you don't know if what you're making is good or not.

[Matt Walsh]

I was pretty well terrified before it came out, especially once we decided to release in theaters. I believed in the film. We all believed in the film. But there are a lot of films that are good, and the people who made them believed in them, and they didn't work.

[Justin Folk]

When you finally get to sit down in an actual movie theater with people and hear them laugh and hear them gasp and hear them groan at some of the uncomfortable points in the film where they're just crawling out of their skin, there's something really magical to that.

[Matt Walsh]

I think about 10 minutes into that experience is when I finally like, okay, we're good. And I wasn't worried anymore. And hearing how much they really, legitimately loved it, like, thinking that all the things that we thought were hilarious were hilarious, like, that's. It just. It just clicked with the audience. It brought in huge crowds this opening weekend.

[Justin Folk]

Your movie is really funny.

[Matt Walsh]

It's really funny. It's one of the best comedies I've seen in a long time. He's had enormous success in exposing just.

[Justin Folk]

How extreme and dangerous this movement has become.

[Rebecca]

The impact of that this film has had is huge.

[Sean Hampton]

This film was wildly successful. The most profitable political documentary of the past 20 years.

[Rebecca]

We are showing people that we can create culture and not just fight. Fighting it is important, but creating the reality that we want to live in.

[Justin Folk]

Is everything my goal for this film, which is actually similar to what is a woman? It's the same goal. It's courage. I want people to have courage to speak out against bad ideas.

[Matt Walsh]

This experience has really taught me something. The anti racist industry says that America is racist down to its bones. And if that were true, there wouldn't be anything we could do about it. White people could only wallow in their guilt and black people in their victimhood.

[Sean Hampton]

This movie gives people permission to question things that were not allowed to be questioned two years ago. That's the Andrew Breitbart line. Politics is downstream from culture, and this film does shape and move culture.

[Unknown Crew Member]

I would get texts and phone calls from people that I haven't talked to in years or old college buddies or whatever, saying, like, dude, you worked on Walsh's doc, this is badass. Like, over and over again, people saying, like, this stuff is crazy and all stuff like that.

[Matt Walsh]

They don't say that I'm racist and you're a victim, because that's what they think we are. They tell us that because that's what they want us to be. Well, it's time for us to say no.

[Rebecca]

Do I think that most Americans are racist? No, absolutely not. I think most Americans just care about getting through their day. And if you're nice to them, they might be your friend.

[Anton]

I grew up in a community that is predominantly a black community and never ever looked at anybody any different. They were just my friends. I think for me, the biggest lesson of all is just to love people with your heart and not look at people's skin color.

[Matt Walsh]

That's it.

[Sean Hampton]

A lot of these bad ideas that are dominating this cultural battle of ours is being ran by and organized by a powerful vocal, a well funded, but a very, very small minority of people. Once you get out of that bubble, once you talk to the average person, you realize it has a lot less power than you think it is.

[Matt Walsh]

I've kind of been working on decentering my whiteness. Oh, your whiteness. I know, baby. I'll bleed the same thing. Dude, if I caught you right now.

[Rebecca]

You will bleed just like me.

[Anton]

I think just what Milton said. I almost could start crying. Like, we just kind of love each other, you know? And I think the divisiveness that's happening in our country is heartbreaking. And when you see someone like Milton, you know, hit Matt's arm and be like, we all bleed the same. Like, we just gotta love each other.

[Rebecca]

Great.

[Matt Walsh]

Final note to end on. And that's a cut.

[Sean Hampton]

Perfect.

[Rebecca]

Is that good? Is that it?

[Unknown Crew Member]

Yeah.

[Justin Folk]

Is that it?

[Matt Walsh]

They gonna say I'm racist But they call everybody racist I guess that mean nobody is racist now it doesn't mean much when you say it when you say it they gonna say you racist but they call everybody racist I guess that mean nobody is racist now it doesn't mean much when you say it when you say it no say they gonna say I'm racist But they call everybody racist I guess that mean nobody is racist now it doesn't mean much when you say it when you say it they gonna say you racist but they call everybody racist I guess that mean nobody is racist now it doesn't mean much when you say it when you say it when you say it Are you ready to get spicy?

[Sean Hampton]

These Doritos Golden Sriracha aren't that spicy.

[Matt Walsh]

Maybe it's time to turn up the heat or turn it down it's time.

[Sean Hampton]

For something that's not too spicy Try Doritos Golden Sriracha Spicy but not too spicy.