Loading summary
Transcript489 lines
- [00:00]
Marc Maron
Lock the gate. All right, let's do this. How are you? What the fuckers? What the fuck, buddies? What the fuck? Nicks, what's happening? How's it going? What's going on? Where are we at today? How are you managing? How are you managing? How's your brain? Are you holding it together? It's going to be day to day with this shit. Thanks for coming by. I appreciate you being here. It's interesting because today I talked to Noah Wiley. I think most people know him, certainly people of a certain age, from er. He was on almost all the seasons of er, and he's got this new medical drama that's called the Pit. And I was surprised, you know, I don't know what regular TV exists. And this is on hbo, I believe it's on Max, but it is. It is another kind of emergency trauma show, emergency based. Noah plays a doctor. And I don't remember ever really watching er, but I did watch all the available episodes of this thing, and it kind of did. It struck some nerves with me. I mean, it definitely got me in some sort of zone around mostly mortality, certainly around health care, but more so in that area of when you're in trouble, when people are in trouble, when people need to go to the emergency room. I imagine most of you at some point have found yourself in an emergency room for some reason or another. And it's a harrowing show. Each episode is an hour of the same day in this emergency room, in this trauma ward, where, you know, they have to, you know, make decisions, triage decisions, where they have to sort of manage intake because of issues with the hospital availability of beds, availability of people who work there, these sort of issues of hospital administration and healthcare in general. And it was. It was. I don't. It was heavy, man. I mean, and Noah Wiley is great and the whole cast is great, but it did kind of bring me back to a place. You know, I spent time in hospitals when I was a kid, not because I was sick, but because my dad was a doctor and because he was also kind of a workaholic. You know, spending time with dad sometimes meant, you know, making rounds with him or going to the hospital and dealing with that smell and dealing with, you know, just the. The. The kind of vibration of. Of illness of all kinds on my young brain. And, you know, I remember my dad, when he decided that motorcycles were not a good thing to play on, took me to see a patient of his interaction. You know, I remember, you know, just the. I just have this very kind of early recall of, of being in hospitals. And then as you get older, you realize that healthcare is obviously very important. Having a relationship with a doctor is very important. And what insurance companies and hospital administrators and managing the type of treatment you can get, what it all means to you, getting the proper attention that you need. And then also the realization that, that being a doctor is just a job. Some are better than others, some obviously want to do a good job, but it's a numbers game, man. And sort of seeing this kind of unfold on this show, just the fragility of life and the sort of weight of being a doctor in that situation and having to do your job, but also maintain your own mental and emotional stability and just. It just. The mortality thing was just really kind of heavy to me that, that it's so fragile and that, you know, these doctors have to be, you know, facing that down in the best way they can, that, you know, life comes and goes, and it definitely goes. So I was surprised and, and happy that I connected with the show in order to talk to Noah. And oddly, the guy who I play music with, my drummer Ned Brower, he's a pediatric nurse and I believe an emergency room pediatric nurse. And he has a small part on this show. And just talking to him about, you know, emergency medicine, it's just, you know, it's another one of those things like I talked about with fires, you know, that you gotta just sort of be grateful that there are people that want to do that and want to do it for a life and want to do it because it's their calling. And it becomes very frightening where you have so many people in the medical profession, especially nurses, who just don't want the gig anymore for a number of reasons. Certainly one of the reasons being for how they were treated during COVID and just staffing issues. I mean, these people are on the front lines in life and death situations and we rely on them. And if the system continues to break down or the wrong people are in leadership positions that create guidelines for these systems, it's fucking terrifying. It's a lot to manage just what's going on in general. But when you really think about this life or death situation and the fact that we're all going to come to a point where we're going to need medical attention, we're going to need to stay on top of our health in a way that's different than when we were younger, that it becomes, you know, fucking terrifying. And there's something about the humanity of this show and also the graphic nature of it. Because it's on Max. You do get a lot of very graphic procedural stuff around broken bones, rashes, heart attacks, you know, other, you know, problems that occur from accidents and all that stuff. But there's a really an interesting focus on, you know, each patient and the never ending stream of patients coming in. I imagine that's how ER was. You do get a sort of the hang of the personalities of the doctor. But it's a very empathetic and I think, you know, mostly realistic kind of exploration of the fragility of life, the fragility of the healthcare system and the incredible burden that's on the shoulders of doctors and nurses. It kind of spoke to me, it kind of puts it in your face. And I think people may watch this differently than I did. You may just see it as this exciting kind of well balanced human drama, a medical show. But I don't watch these kind of shows. So for me it was just sort of like, oh my God, you know, do you even know your doctor? I feel like there was a time where you had a doctor. Am I making that up? I mean, I have a doctor, but he's at the place where I go where the doctors are and, you know, and I've had three there. And the older you get, you're like, you know, who's my doctor? And then when you're dealing with the healthcare system, it's like, what doctor can I see? I don't know that guy. And then you realize that the system is at a breaking point and you don't even know what kind of care you're going to get or if you're going to get any at all. And I feel that way about the country right now too. It's at a breaking point and it's a lot. That layer of mental anguish and despair just combined with the basic awareness of mortality is sort of a lot to handle. But it's shows like these and look, I, you know, look, I think Noah Wiley does a great job as this doctor where, you know, you've, you're kind of, you know, you're in the life of a guy that has to balance this with a certain amount of humanity. I don't know, maybe that was kind of a downer of an opening situation. But, you know, I've just been thinking about things. So I have a few new tour dates to announce. I'm coming to Toronto at the Winter garden on Saturday, May 3. The presale is going on today with the password all in a L L L I N. It's in Caps where I'm reading it. So maybe that's it all in one word. General tickets are on sale tomorrow. I'll be in Burlington, Vermont at the Vermont Comedy Club on Monday and Tuesday, May 5th and 6th. Tickets are. Well, that's actually sold out, so I have to make a decision about whether I'm going to add shows there. I'll be in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, at the Music hall on Wednesday, May 7, pre sale today with Password, all in general on sale tomorrow. Tonight I'll be in Santa Barbara, California, at the Wilbero Theater. Then tomorrow, I' in San Luis Obispo, California at the Fremont center, and Saturday, Monterey, California, at the Golden State Theater. Then I'm coming to Iowa, Missouri, North Carolina, Tennessee, Kentucky, Oklahoma, Texas, South Carolina, Illinois, Michigan. Yeah. Go to wtfpod.com tour for all of my dates, including the new ones and links to the tickets. Okay, do that. Oh, my God. I don't mean to be morose or dark. You know, my heart's a little stressed emotionally. My brain's a little taxed emotionally and fearing. But look, you know, I'm going to plug on. I'm going to keep plugging away until I crumble or decide to stop. I had kind of a sobering, humbling couple hours yesterday. This guy, well, he's not a guy. He's a director. Steve Fine Arts. He directed a documentary about Eddie Pepitone years ago called Bitter Buddha. He also directed my last comedy special, From Bleak to Dark. But for the past few years, he's been making a documentary about me. Now, I didn't know what the point of that would be, but he was passionate about it, and he's been kind of, you know, following me around with a camera for years, on and off. I think the original arc of it was to sort of capture, you know, my beginning to do comedy after Covid and Lynn's passing, you know, and that arc would end at my HBO special. But over the years, it's become a much bigger thing, and there's a lot in it and a lot of me. And I guess the reason why it was humbling is that, you know, he's been, you know, following me, or you forget that there's a camera on you sometimes. But I guess the. The point of the whole thing is it's a rare thing that you actually get to see yourself as others see you. Almost nobody really gets that. You're kind of locked in your own vessel here, and you can make assumptions about other people in terms of what they may think, what you think they Think. Sometimes they tell you what they think. But I got a chance to, you know, just watch for an hour and a half or so, just, you know, my behavior in all these situations, you know, in these interviews and these moments in comedy backstage in my house. And it was a little rough, and there's all this footage that. I mean, it's good, I guess, but for me, having not really seen it put together, you know, I. For some reason, I just. I don't see myself quite as a, you know, a kind of sad, cranky guy who's, you know, set in certain ways. And I think that a lot of times when I'm in front of a camera, I act a certain way, but. But it was. It was sobering because I think it's an interesting kind of opportunity to. To really assess myself like that. And it. I think it had an impact at this age I'm at. And also, you know, it's over a lot of different years, but, man, seeing me doing standup in my early 20s, it was cringy for me, you know, seeing me, you know, on video. These videos I did maybe after my first year of college and, you know, on a VHS at home and then some comedy stuff, it was like, you know, because you really think that, you know, when you're younger that you've kind of got a handle on things, but it was all posturing and it was all this sort of fake swagger, and I. I don't know what. What compelled me to. To just enter the life I entered. But. And. And also, you know, I was doing things. I was two years into comedy maybe, when I started working as a comic. And. And, like, I. I don't ever consider that. Like, when I talk to comics, I'm like, oh, you gotta pay your dues. But, you know, what that looked like for me, you know, was really starting to work as a comic in difficult situations when I was two years in, you know, and it was like I was 24 years old or something. And I don't know, man. I guess there. There is a way that I can, you know, have some love for that guy, but. Oh, God, it's really hard. And then just to see who I've become in terms of, you know, how I live my life, what's happened in my life, and me and my cats and I'm like, oh, my God. I'm like, you know, I'm a couple years away from just becoming this eccentric old man that, you know, has this weird place in people's minds and hearts and in my community. And my business of like, oh, yeah, you know, angry old Marin. Yeah, he's out there. He's still out there doing his thing. I think he's still got the cats, but I hope it plays well. I guess it's gotten into south by Southwest and I think Tribeca and they talk to some of my peers and there's a lot of stuff in it about the podcast, about me and Lynn, about when I was younger, and it's a lot. And I guess there's some part of people that, you know, documentaries can be sort of scary, but for me, it was just sort of like, oh, no, you know, that's who I am. Not in a bad way. But, dude, you gotta, you gotta start, you know, trying some, to find some things, even in the climate we're in and even in this sort of period of fear and, and despair and seeming hopelessness to, to kind of open your heart and, and, and let some people in or enjoy some life or something. But it's a very engaging hour and a half. But for, for me to watch it, it was like, wow, I, I gotta, I gotta, like, you know, maybe. Maybe just start, you know, letting go of some stuff and, you know, opening my heart a little more in my day to day life. Yeah, I don't know, I don't know what to tell you, but it was a humbler. It was definitely a humbler, but reasonable. And I'm glad I saw it, and I hope you will too. I'll let you know if it ever gets out there. Tell me if this sounds familiar. You sign up for something, forget about it after the trial period ends and then you're charged month after month after month. The subscriptions are there, but you're not using them. In fact, I just learned that 85% of people have at least one paid subscription going unused each month. That's why I'm glad we have Rocket Money as a sponsor. I can see all my subscriptions in one place and cancel the ones I'm not using anymore. It's an easy way to save money. Rocket Money is a personal finance app that helps you find and cancel your unwanted subscriptions, monitors your spending, and helps lower your bills so you can grow your savings. Rocket Money has over 5 million users and has saved a total of $500 million in canceled subscriptions, saving members up to $740 a year when using all of the app's premium features. Cancel your unwanted subscriptions and reach your financial goals faster with Rocket Money. Go to RocketMoney.com WTF today that's RocketMoney.com WTF RocketMoney.com WTF. Stop wasting cash. All right, so I already talked a bit about this show and its effect on me. And again, like, I'm getting to an age where, you know, everything has kind of an effect on me. But I do believe that there's a lot of humanity in this show and there's, you know, it doesn't pull its punches about the health care system. It's called the Pit. It's now streaming on Max with new episodes every Thursday. Episode five dropped today. And this is me talking to Noah Wiley. Okay, people, all you folks with growing families know this. The bigger the family, the more people there are who want the best seat in the family vehicle. But that's all changed with the 3 row Lexus TX. When the folks at Lexus made a luxury 3 row SUV that's in tune with every passenger, each seat feels like the best seat. The three row Lexus TX is loaded with innovative tech, plenty of legroom and intuitive features that anticipate everyone's needs. They designed the Lexus TX so that every seat lets passengers plug in or just unwind. It's going to be the most comfortable and versatile place you've ever listened to this podcast. And that third row isn't an afterthought. The cabin has been designed to let passengers of all sizes more immediately accessible. The spacious third row. With the spaciousness and luxury of the tx, everybody wins. Which makes it the perfect vehicle for today's modern families. No matter who's in your crew, there's a place for everyone in the tx. The three row Lexus tx. This is more than a three row suv. This is the era of three row luxury. So you have all this stuff. This is something we share. But you tell me you're telling me there's a story behind everything.
- [19:00]
Noah Wyle
Yeah, pretty much.
- [19:01]
Marc Maron
I have a lot of stuff, but I, I don't know if, if, if there are really stories behind it other than having the thing. And there's so many things I don't even like.
- [19:08]
Noah Wyle
Where's this from?
- [19:09]
Marc Maron
Someone made that for me. That's my old cat.
- [19:11]
Noah Wyle
Well, that's very special. That's your actual cat that offended.
- [19:14]
Marc Maron
It's my actual cat. Like the old house. I took you up to the office there. That used to be what the garage looked like. It was just like my world of stuff. And this is sort of stuff that sort of happened. This is stuff that was in there. I just put it in here. This room doesn't have a tremendous Amount of personality. But these are just bits and pieces.
- [19:34]
Noah Wyle
This is a classic thing that I would keep.
- [19:36]
Marc Maron
I know.
- [19:37]
Noah Wyle
Well, I would keep this even if I found it. I would keep it even if it was not even my grandfather's hammer or had no sentimental value. I'm holding in my hand a broken hammer. The wood is sort of shorn off in half and. But there's a lovely aesthetic to it.
- [19:52]
Marc Maron
Yeah, yeah, well, that's why I kept it. I don't think I have. I don't know what the story behind that was. And like that little thing there, that little orange, you know, mush thing, that's a record before it's pressed.
- [20:04]
Noah Wyle
Oh, come on, that's great.
- [20:09]
Marc Maron
Well, yeah, you and I got the same problem, but I think I'm trying to recover from my problem.
- [20:13]
Noah Wyle
You know, what I want now is I've been seeing these things about. They called them bone vinyl, you know that the Soviets would press onto X rays in the 80s when they couldn't press vinyl, they would actually take plastic X rays from hospitals and they could imprint an album on them. And they were black market Russian albums.
- [20:30]
Marc Maron
Are you a record guy? Eh, you know, but you want one of those?
- [20:33]
Noah Wyle
Yeah, I want one of those. I'm sort of like. I get on a Jag and I do a deep dive and then I need to touch it and have it.
- [20:39]
Marc Maron
Yeah, right. But you're not a vinyl guy. You don't collect?
- [20:42]
Noah Wyle
No, I have every album I've ever owned. I've carried them with me through every apartment, every house and now I have my father in law's albums. He was a huge jazz fanatic, so. Oh really? All of his old, all the old.
- [20:54]
Marc Maron
Blue Nut stuff, everything. And what kind of system are you using?
- [20:57]
Noah Wyle
Well, tubes. Yeah, yeah, basically. Basically have a patroller.
- [21:02]
Marc Maron
Yeah. How old are you?
- [21:06]
Noah Wyle
53.
- [21:06]
Marc Maron
53. So I'm 61 and I. I don't know, like I got in. I've got most of the records I had in high school. Wasn't that many, like 150 or so. But then from there now I've got like 3,000. And that was over the last decade or so.
- [21:22]
Noah Wyle
If you grow up aspirationally wanting things that you can't afford, as soon as you start making money, you go off the deep end. And now you can have all the things you never were able to get. And then the invention of the Internet, suddenly you can get these things shipped to you. And I had to come through that and realize that it's the hunt and the search and the Discovery that really is most meaningful to me if it just comes through the mail. I get no dopamine hit on that at all.
- [21:43]
Marc Maron
Right. Well, I mean, that whole world, that whole process is kind of gone because people who have shit, they know they have shit, so they put it on the Internet and they're like, well, I could really get a lot for this.
- [21:54]
Noah Wyle
And yet there's still the grandmother's attic. There's still a few. They're out there.
- [21:59]
Marc Maron
Like this amp, that thing came. I don't know where the hell that thing came from, but it's like a 1961 Fender Deluxe, big box, and it's mint condition. It showed up in Portland. I didn't get it from the grandma's attic, but I got it from the guy who got it from that. So I paid money for it. But I don't know if that's part of the thrill of finding it for, like, you know, and, you know, kind of conning somebody out of what they have because they don't know what they have. I think those days are kind of gone.
- [22:26]
Noah Wyle
I was never good enough at taking advantage of somebody's. I can't do it, since I would always want to pay something fair for it, even if it was under way, undermarked. And you realize very quickly that value is arbitrary. And really, it's only when someone's willing to pay you on the day you need to sell it, that's what it's worth.
- [22:41]
Marc Maron
And I think you get to a certain point, what you want to do is just sell all of it. Like, how much for this wall of.
- [22:49]
Noah Wyle
Everything in this room?
- [22:50]
Marc Maron
Right.
- [22:50]
Noah Wyle
How much? Put a price tag on it. Yeah. Storage wars. You got 30 seconds to take a peek. And then make me a bed.
- [22:56]
Marc Maron
Exactly. Just have an auction. Right. And have a curtain. Like, what are you going to forgive me for this room, but what are the main things you collect?
- [23:04]
Noah Wyle
Oh, it's so varied. You know, I. You know, one. One point I got into collecting things like old walking canes that doubled as other things, or swords or pipes, flasks, or all that stuff. And then so I got, you know, 30 of those.
- [23:17]
Marc Maron
But you got them. They're just in the doorway.
- [23:19]
Noah Wyle
Yeah. And then I collect everything.
- [23:21]
Marc Maron
Yeah.
- [23:22]
Noah Wyle
Books, albums, pens, watches, old suitcases.
- [23:26]
Marc Maron
You know, what do you think it is? Because that's not a story.
- [23:30]
Noah Wyle
I obviously was a hobo in another life who ate a lot of tinned beans and dreamt of having all the suitcases in the world.
- [23:41]
Marc Maron
You collect suitcases?
- [23:42]
Noah Wyle
Old ones, just. And I. Well, here's how your wife must be going nuts. I collect all these books and I panicked about if my house ever burned down, what would I do? So I have all the suitcases above the bookshelves in case I need to get out the book. Everything goes in the suitcases. And then we go.
- [24:00]
Marc Maron
But, like, I don't see. I guess I'm trying to figure this self out.
- [24:03]
Noah Wyle
She'd rather take the dog.
- [24:05]
Marc Maron
You want four books? I didn't bring anything. I evacuated from one night and I brought like, you know, two pairs of underwear, a fleece, and my cats and some cash. Like as if the entire world had ended. I could just drive into Hollywood and use a fucking bank machine.
- [24:20]
Noah Wyle
That's the truth, though. When push comes to shove, you get paralyzed by what is value, what you would really take. And you end up taking nothing.
- [24:27]
Marc Maron
Nothing I didn't even take. You know, I had to go find my birth certificate, but. But where do you. Did you get affected?
- [24:35]
Noah Wyle
I did not open up in Los Feliz, but, you know.
- [24:37]
Marc Maron
Oh, you're right here.
- [24:38]
Noah Wyle
My mom lives right next to Runyon Canyon. So I had to get her out quickly as their hill behind her house was on fire.
- [24:44]
Marc Maron
I saw that because I had evacuated to Hollywood for the night. And I stayed at the Hampton Inn down on vine in Santa Monica. And I thought, well, I'm safe. And I'm standing there on the fourth floor looking out over the hill. I saw that fire explode, Dude.
- [24:56]
Noah Wyle
We were supposed to have the premiere for our TV show that night. We canceled it in good taste and out of safety. And so I was going to have dinner with my mother, and I drove up her hill and looked up and saw the hill on fire and called her, and she had no idea. I said, mom, you got no time. I'm coming. Get out. Get out now. Get out.
- [25:11]
Marc Maron
Yeah, and then how long she's have to stay out?
- [25:14]
Noah Wyle
Yeah, they went back the next morning. They stayed at our place that night. Then we watched on TV a helicopter do a water drop right on the hill and put it out. Like, miraculous what those guys did that night.
- [25:23]
Marc Maron
But when I saw that thing start, it exploded, dude. It wasn't like, oh, it looks like something's burning. It looked like a bomb hit it.
- [25:31]
Noah Wyle
No, that was arson for sure.
- [25:32]
Marc Maron
You think so?
- [25:33]
Noah Wyle
Totally.
- [25:35]
Marc Maron
Well, I don't want to speculate about that stuff, but sometimes it seems pretty crazy.
- [25:39]
Noah Wyle
That one that was up in Griffith park just a couple days ago, that was arson. And they caught the guy.
- [25:43]
Marc Maron
They did. Are they. But do they have. We're not News guys. But do they have an agenda or they just fire freaks?
- [25:50]
Noah Wyle
No idea. Okay.
- [25:52]
Marc Maron
All right, so let's go back to the collecting things. I want to figure this out. So with books, like yesterday, I pull out a book. You know this guy, Wilhelm Reich, you know who that guy is? That kind of renegade Freudian who kind of, you know, kind of decided that orgone and orgasm energy.
- [26:09]
Noah Wyle
He was like, really cool. And then he wasn't cool. Like, he had a lot of great stuff to say and then he went.
- [26:14]
Marc Maron
Well, he just went a little nuts. Like he, you know, he. I think he was one of the sort of intellectual founders of the sexual revolution. But before that he was like a straight up psychologist. And there's this book that I've had for years, and I think it's even still in print, but it's the Mass Psychology of Fascism. Right. So. But I have an old copy of it, but I didn't read that whole book, but I have the book. And like yesterday, because of the situation we're in now, I'm like, oh, I'm just gonna pop into that book, see if I can get a quick answer. But how many of the books? Cause I'm comforted by books. But I don't read them. I don't read them all. Do you?
- [26:46]
Noah Wyle
I would say I aspirationally intend to read them all. I read a little bit of all of them at one point or another, otherwise I wouldn't have them. But there are many that I haven't read. They're ones I just have for comfort. The ones I have for reference. Ones that I intend to get to, but.
- [27:04]
Marc Maron
Right. But the weird thing is we don't need that stuff for reference anymore. Really. There's something comforting about the things I am.
- [27:10]
Noah Wyle
I'm a tactile guy. I just like. I like holding it in my hand. I also, I mean, when it comes to books, I'll buy. If I like it, I'll buy it in triplicate. I'll buy one that I can dog ear and mark up. One that I can loan out because you'll never get it back. And one that I have pristine, that I can keep on the shelf.
- [27:25]
Marc Maron
Really?
- [27:25]
Noah Wyle
Yeah.
- [27:25]
Marc Maron
What was the last book you did that with?
- [27:29]
Noah Wyle
Let's see. Well, the first one that comes to mind was that book, Shantaram. I really liked the book. David Gregory Roberts book.
- [27:34]
Marc Maron
It's a novel.
- [27:35]
Noah Wyle
Yeah, Big thick novel.
- [27:36]
Marc Maron
Good.
- [27:37]
Noah Wyle
Yeah. Great. Autobiographical. Somewhat autobiographical. Great story about three of them. I bought three of them. I bought several for other people, but I bought three for myself, I do that with records.
- [27:46]
Marc Maron
If there's certain records, if I find them, I'll just buy them over and over again. Like Dylan's Planet Waves, which, like, nobody really knows that record, but I know that record. It's a great record.
- [27:54]
Noah Wyle
What's on that?
- [27:55]
Marc Maron
Going, Going, Gone. Well, the, the reason that I buy it is because it's. It's relatively. It's not unknown, but it's not a big Dylan record. But it's the only real record that he did with the band, that and Basement Tape. So it's really a band record and it's a great record, but people just don't know it. So I give it to people all the time.
- [28:18]
Noah Wyle
I'm going to pick it up.
- [28:20]
Marc Maron
I'll show it to you. So what did you. You grew up here, though?
- [28:24]
Noah Wyle
Third generation Angeleno. Is that weird to be a third generation Angeleno?
- [28:28]
Marc Maron
Yes.
- [28:29]
Noah Wyle
We're like unicorns. Yeah.
- [28:30]
Marc Maron
And like your grandparents were here?
- [28:33]
Noah Wyle
My grandmother was born here. My grandmother founded the Crafts and Folk Art museum on Wilshire Boulevard across from the La Brea Tar Pits, which is now the California Contemporary Craft Museum, I think.
- [28:42]
Marc Maron
And what's in that place?
- [28:44]
Noah Wyle
Well, she founded it in 1965, believing that there was something unrecognized about indigenous art, about folk art. And so she became the earliest pioneer to really turn it into a recognized art form.
- [28:59]
Marc Maron
So, like native art and American textiles.
- [29:03]
Noah Wyle
Things that are done with, you know, found objects, you know, she called it the most democratic form of art because it didn't require any actual training and it was coming from the spirit of the artist and, you know.
- [29:14]
Marc Maron
So her house must have been pretty.
- [29:16]
Noah Wyle
It was very eclectic. No, I come by my anthology, honestly.
- [29:21]
Marc Maron
Like, we found the source.
- [29:22]
Noah Wyle
Yeah.
- [29:23]
Marc Maron
Grandma's got cool stuff.
- [29:24]
Noah Wyle
Yeah. And then grandpa collected all the little things, the pocket knives and the keychains and the gadgets.
- [29:30]
Marc Maron
That was her husband?
- [29:31]
Noah Wyle
No. Well, my mother's father.
- [29:32]
Marc Maron
Oh, your mother.
- [29:33]
Noah Wyle
On both sides, really.
- [29:34]
Marc Maron
Just going as a kid, going to houses and be like, cool stuff and.
- [29:38]
Noah Wyle
Going to swap meets and going to garage sales with your grandfather. With my mother. With my. That was our family outing. We'd go hit the garage sales.
- [29:45]
Marc Maron
Oh, well, now it's all explained.
- [29:46]
Noah Wyle
Yes.
- [29:46]
Marc Maron
You have to accumulate stuff.
- [29:48]
Noah Wyle
Yes. The money stuff. Other people's stuff. Yes.
- [29:50]
Marc Maron
Well, swap meets or flea markets. I think there you can still find some cool shit.
- [29:54]
Noah Wyle
Definitely.
- [29:54]
Marc Maron
Yeah. There's still stuff around where I grew up in Albuquerque now, like all the retail, old retail, big businesses are kind of gone. And some of those big store Spaces are now flea market spaces where you get like 50 or 40 or 50 people that rent space and they just bring their stuff there. It's like all around the clock flea market.
- [30:14]
Noah Wyle
That's how young people. You talked about barter earlier. I feel like this younger generation has sort of rediscovered that and they're all borrowing, trading stuff with each other.
- [30:22]
Marc Maron
Yeah.
- [30:22]
Noah Wyle
It's funny, I used to go to, you know, thrift stores to get clothing and I used to love.
- [30:26]
Marc Maron
Yeah.
- [30:27]
Noah Wyle
Now I go in those stores and I can't stand the smell. I've gotten old enough that it just.
- [30:31]
Marc Maron
Smells like it's a little dirty.
- [30:32]
Noah Wyle
Dirty. But now my, my kids are totally into thrifting, so.
- [30:35]
Marc Maron
They do.
- [30:35]
Noah Wyle
Yeah, it's. That's, that's the next generation.
- [30:37]
Marc Maron
I just brought a bunch of like, clothes that, like, you know, shirts, you know, western shirts and stuff that I just don't wear anymore. But it was a lot that I was keeping around because they made me feel like I don't know the same shit. And I didn't know what to do with them. And, you know, I thought, like, why? Probably someone want these. If I get someone to sell them on ebay, some of them are collectors. But I'm like, you know what, go put it into the ecosystem of the thrift so somebody will find it and be excited about it. Yeah, let it go. Free the fish.
- [31:05]
Noah Wyle
I'm not there yet. I. You know, hoarding has an emotional component to it that I think comes from this feeling of lack or scarcity. It's really hard for me to let go of stuff unless I'm giving it to somebody who I think is gonna appreciate it. It's really hard for me to let go.
- [31:20]
Marc Maron
But did you come from scarcity?
- [31:22]
Noah Wyle
No.
- [31:23]
Marc Maron
So it's probably more just like it feels. It's comforting to have the stuff.
- [31:27]
Noah Wyle
I think it's trauma based. I think it's just. Yeah, I think I've always liked nesting environments. Bookstores, junk shops, places that to me, the ideal environment was Fred Sanford's house on Sanford and Son. I used to watch that show, not so much for the comedy, but for the decor.
- [31:45]
Marc Maron
Oh, my God. Yeah, I remember that seemed like a great. I feel the same way, but I think it's comforting. But it's also like, you feel a sense of history and different people and intelligence and wisdom. Like, it seemed to me that all the people that had those kind of places were wizards of some kind.
- [32:02]
Noah Wyle
Agreed. And you know, sometimes you can believe that an object holds a little bit of energy from the people that have touched it. So historical artifacts, things that were at that place when that happened, I. I actually feel that they have some kind.
- [32:15]
Marc Maron
Of little mystical juice. So three generations of Angelenos. So this like in terms of living here your whole life? Because we're talking about this with other people, about the sort of inevitability of fire that's been around your whole childhood, I imagine. Wasn't that part of your psyche the whole time?
- [32:38]
Noah Wyle
Yeah, I grew up in the Hollywood Hills, up in those canyons. It was always part of our reality. Well, fires then mudslides and earthquake, you know, it's all.
- [32:46]
Marc Maron
And what is it with people? You know, I mean, I. I love la, but I mean, there is. We always put that risk at the back of our head. Like you just. You kind of rolling the dice, you.
- [32:56]
Noah Wyle
Know, Living in Hollywood, I used to always look at the people that lived in Malibu and think, you're crazy. You're crazy. There's one road in, one road out. It's either on fire or getting mud slid out. Like, why would you ever lived there? Yeah, and then I lived there and. And I loved it. I loved it. I love the isolation, I love the beauty. I love the community.
- [33:13]
Marc Maron
You're not there anymore though.
- [33:14]
Noah Wyle
No. No. Well, it was too isolated. You have a meeting at 10 and one at three and you'd be just the whole day driving around in circles. Yeah, but I understand why people want to live out there.
- [33:25]
Marc Maron
Yeah.
- [33:26]
Noah Wyle
Even with the. The risks.
- [33:27]
Marc Maron
Yeah.
- [33:28]
Noah Wyle
You choose. You choose your. Where you're happiest, I guess.
- [33:32]
Marc Maron
What'd your folks do?
- [33:34]
Noah Wyle
My mom worked at a hospital in Hollywood called Kaiser for years. Orthopedic nurse. My dad was orthopedic or nurse as well. My dad has done a million different things, a lot of different businesses. Computer business, biomed, science, all sorts of things.
- [33:51]
Marc Maron
They around?
- [33:51]
Noah Wyle
Yes, all four. Stepfather's in our movie business. He's produced movies and worked in studios. And my stepmom is an educator, teacher.
- [33:59]
Marc Maron
So they both. Both. You're divorced and they both have divorced.
- [34:03]
Noah Wyle
Remarried. I had breakfast with my father and stepmother and I'm gonna have dinner with my mother. And today, yeah, I'm knocking them all out today.
- [34:10]
Marc Maron
So you did have one person in the movie business. How old were you when they split up?
- [34:14]
Noah Wyle
Young. Second grade.
- [34:15]
Marc Maron
Oh, really?
- [34:16]
Noah Wyle
Yeah.
- [34:17]
Marc Maron
But everyone's cool.
- [34:19]
Noah Wyle
Super cool now, you know. Are we also adults and grown up now?
- [34:26]
Marc Maron
Well, things start to fade, I think a little.
- [34:29]
Noah Wyle
You would hope I, you know, you go back and I would change nothing. I would change nothing. And I'M an advocate of two happy houses are better than one unhappy house.
- [34:38]
Marc Maron
Yeah.
- [34:39]
Noah Wyle
I have been greatly influenced by my step parents.
- [34:42]
Marc Maron
Yeah.
- [34:43]
Noah Wyle
And the more the merrier.
- [34:45]
Marc Maron
You have kids?
- [34:46]
Noah Wyle
I have three.
- [34:47]
Marc Maron
Three? How old are they?
- [34:48]
Noah Wyle
22 year old son, 19 year old daughter, 9 year old daughter.
- [34:52]
Marc Maron
Wow. Whole second time around, huh?
- [34:54]
Noah Wyle
Second act with a little wisdom and maturity. This one's gonna work. Yeah, no, they're all wonderful. I love them all. And my son is a huge admirer of yours and really psyched them on your show.
- [35:05]
Marc Maron
Oh, really? Is he in show business?
- [35:07]
Noah Wyle
He's in college. He's at Boston University.
- [35:09]
Marc Maron
That's where I went.
- [35:10]
Noah Wyle
Oh, yeah?
- [35:10]
Marc Maron
Yeah.
- [35:13]
Noah Wyle
Well, on his way.
- [35:14]
Marc Maron
What's he studying? What's he want to do?
- [35:16]
Noah Wyle
He's in the communication school. He's, you know, gonna end up doing something under our umbrella. I'm sure.
- [35:21]
Marc Maron
You think so?
- [35:22]
Noah Wyle
I tell him all the time, it's a big umbrella. We got truck drivers and lawyers.
- [35:25]
Marc Maron
Sure. You do anything? Yeah. Wow. Bu. Yeah. I did liberal arts. I had friends in communications, but I did liberal arts because I wanted to have the books. I wanted to know about the books. I want to know about films. I wanted to do that stuff. Well, that's good. You got good kids and it's all.
- [35:43]
Noah Wyle
Working out, you know, you're only as happy as your least happy kid. And today I'm feeling pretty good.
- [35:50]
Marc Maron
Well, you're. You're a stronger man than me. I don't, I don't have any. And I don't know where that leaves me. It's a very weird thing to be childless at 61 because you're sort of like, what am I gonna do with all this? Who's gonna come get me?
- [36:01]
Noah Wyle
I think you have many, many children out there.
- [36:05]
Marc Maron
Not real ones, I hope.
- [36:06]
Noah Wyle
You are daddy to a lot of people.
- [36:08]
Marc Maron
I know, but most of them are almost my age. So when does this like. So with the stepdad in show business, were you in into show business?
- [36:19]
Noah Wyle
Totally. You know, you don't grow up in Hollywood and not be aware of it. I went to Gardner street elementary, which is on Sunset Boulevard and used to walk Hollywood Boulevard. And I used to put my foot over Noah Beery Jr. S name over the Beery part and fantasize. I always was enamored by this business.
- [36:35]
Marc Maron
It was kind of cool back, I mean, when you were kids, I mean, it wasn't as dirty and broken down.
- [36:40]
Noah Wyle
In the late 70s, early 80s, it was worse. It was way worse. Hollywood was, you know, just rampant with runaways and prostitutes and it Was a pretty scuzzy time. It was really the 1984 Olympics that kind of cleaned up the city.
- [36:54]
Marc Maron
Yeah.
- [36:54]
Noah Wyle
Pri prior to that, it was more like Times Square in New York and on Hollywood Boulevard.
- [36:59]
Marc Maron
And then they did what they did at Times Square.
- [37:00]
Noah Wyle
They put.
- [37:01]
Marc Maron
Brought in all these big hotels and cleaned everything up. It's still kind of intense, though.
- [37:06]
Noah Wyle
It's still pretty intense down there.
- [37:08]
Marc Maron
But you wanted to be an actor always?
- [37:12]
Noah Wyle
I think I did. My stepdad worked at Universal when I was a kid.
- [37:16]
Marc Maron
So you went to the lot and stuff?
- [37:17]
Noah Wyle
Went to the lot, got to go to screenings and got to be around people that were working in it. And it was that when you get to go to the circus, you enjoy it, or you can get to peek backstage and see how the guys that are in the circus are hanging out. I loved watching the guys hang out backstage. Oh, man.
- [37:33]
Marc Maron
Yeah. Behind the scenes, that's always the best part of show business, is before you go on.
- [37:37]
Noah Wyle
Yep.
- [37:37]
Marc Maron
Yeah. It's kind of wild when you do, like, a talk show and stuff, and you just.
- [37:40]
Noah Wyle
To be in on the joke and to be, you know, on the backside of the Hollywood sign.
- [37:43]
Marc Maron
Yeah. I remember I was doing. I don't know, maybe it was Conan O'Brien or something, but they had a large animal walking through the halls, and I'm like, yeah, this is show business. It's back here. This is where this is happening.
- [37:53]
Noah Wyle
I'm working in Warner Brothers again after all these years, and it's still my favorite thing in the world to drive onto that lot and go past all those sound stages, talk about history within those space. Those big warehouses.
- [38:03]
Marc Maron
How about those prop warehouses?
- [38:05]
Noah Wyle
Phenomenal. Every once in a while, they'll have a sale, and I go crazy.
- [38:11]
Marc Maron
Did you go to the last big one? Didn't. Didn't Sony Universal have a big sale?
- [38:14]
Noah Wyle
When I tell you about the things I've missed out on, really. Oh, the gun that Rod Steiger pull that pulls on Marlon Brando in the back of the car. On the Waterfront that came out for auction once, and they wanted nothing for it. And I just missed the auction by a day. I think about that all the time.
- [38:29]
Marc Maron
Like, how much?
- [38:30]
Noah Wyle
They wanted, like, $300 for it. Come on. Yeah. And the stories behind that particular gun, how they had agreed that it wasn't gonna be part of the scene. So when Steiger pulls it, the look of disappointment on Brando's face is him going, come on. I thought we cut that shit.
- [38:42]
Marc Maron
Yeah.
- [38:42]
Noah Wyle
And, you know, the fact that Steiger had to do his close up to the script supervisor because Brando left early. Like, I know all about that scene. I wanted that gun so fucking bad.
- [38:50]
Marc Maron
Who got it?
- [38:51]
Noah Wyle
I have no idea. If you've got it, I'll pay you handsomely for it.
- [38:54]
Marc Maron
I don't do. I don't go to those auctions and stuff. I get overwhelmed too easily exhausted. You know, it's exciting when I get there and then I'm like, oh, my God, so much here.
- [39:02]
Noah Wyle
It's too much stuff.
- [39:02]
Marc Maron
Have you bought anything? Any artifacts from. From movie history?
- [39:06]
Noah Wyle
Oh, God, I've got so much. That's why. I mean, I've got stuff I really shouldn't have because it should go to a museum or a library somewhere where they'll take care of it.
- [39:13]
Marc Maron
Like what?
- [39:14]
Noah Wyle
Oh, I once bought a series of letters back and forth between Tennessee Williams and Marlon Brando. Oh, my God, Brando. Tennessee writes to Brando, asking him to star in In Rose Tattoo with Anna Manyani. And Brando writes back about why he won't. And then Tennessee writes him back about why he's a coward. They're just wonderful. Oh, the language is unbelievable.
- [39:35]
Marc Maron
And you have those?
- [39:36]
Noah Wyle
I do, yeah.
- [39:37]
Marc Maron
And what else?
- [39:39]
Noah Wyle
You name it, I've got it. I've got so much stuff. When er ended, I was like, I'll take that door. And cut up those floors for me, please. And I'll take that CPR dummy and I'll take the exit sign. I took everything. It's all in my house.
- [39:54]
Marc Maron
You don't even have a special storage space for it. It's just out.
- [39:58]
Noah Wyle
It's just out. It's the door to the library. Is the door really? Yeah.
- [40:04]
Marc Maron
You're gonna need to get like. I remember the first time I went to Graceland to see the Elvis's house. He has a whole separate structure just for awards. You have to build your own museum.
- [40:16]
Noah Wyle
I don't see that in my future. But maybe for some more canes.
- [40:21]
Marc Maron
Maybe let your son know he's got a task ahead of him.
- [40:25]
Noah Wyle
Build the annex.
- [40:27]
Marc Maron
So when did you start doing the acting?
- [40:31]
Noah Wyle
I. I credit. Sophomore year of high school, I auditioned for a play, kind of on a lark with a guy and got the part, you know, by default. And it was just the first time I'd ever tried anything like that and felt kind of good at anything other than, you know, hanging out or. Hanging out. Yeah.
- [40:49]
Marc Maron
What sport?
- [40:50]
Noah Wyle
Basketball.
- [40:51]
Marc Maron
Yeah. And what did you go to school with any Hollywood kids?
- [40:55]
Noah Wyle
I went to. One of My best friends in elementary school was Henry Winkler's stepson. So I knew Henry really well when I was a kid. I watched Happy Days at the Fonz's house a few times. Amazing guy. So great. He wrote my college recommendation letter.
- [41:10]
Marc Maron
He did?
- [41:11]
Noah Wyle
Yeah. I didn't get in, but he wrote it.
- [41:13]
Marc Maron
He's a sweet guy, man.
- [41:15]
Noah Wyle
Yeah.
- [41:15]
Marc Maron
Do you remember when he was Fonzie for years and then he did that war movie that the Heroes.
- [41:20]
Noah Wyle
Yeah.
- [41:20]
Marc Maron
And it was like this big departure and everybody was like, is the Fonz going to be able to pull this off?
- [41:25]
Noah Wyle
Harrison Ford, Sally Field.
- [41:26]
Marc Maron
Big movie. Right. And so in high school that was where you. You got the bug.
- [41:32]
Noah Wyle
I got bit by the bug. I had the crush on the girl and I wanted to be good at something and you know, it was fun.
- [41:37]
Marc Maron
What play was it?
- [41:38]
Noah Wyle
The first one was Odd High School Fair. It was Joe Orton's lute kind of.
- [41:43]
Marc Maron
Wow.
- [41:43]
Noah Wyle
Rybald piece for high school.
- [41:45]
Marc Maron
Kind of hip. Hip piece. Yeah.
- [41:47]
Noah Wyle
Piece.
- [41:47]
Marc Maron
Yeah. And that was. And you nailed it.
- [41:49]
Noah Wyle
You felt like I played, you know, 65 year old British man with a pillow in my shirt and a bad Peter O2 impressions, you know, and loved it.
- [41:59]
Marc Maron
And then when did you start to take it seriously?
- [42:03]
Noah Wyle
I did a summer program that Northwestern University sponsors for high school juniors. Yeah, they call it the Cherub program.
- [42:09]
Marc Maron
Yeah.
- [42:10]
Noah Wyle
That was sort of like kids from all over the country that were theater kids. And being inspired by those kids and holding my own with those kids really kind of solidified my decision to pursue it. And then, you know, I didn't go to college. I started right out of high school.
- [42:27]
Marc Maron
But did you train?
- [42:28]
Noah Wyle
Yeah, I was fortunate enough to start with a teacher named Larry Moss who came.
- [42:32]
Marc Maron
I heard of that guy.
- [42:33]
Noah Wyle
Yeah, Larry's famous now. He was basically Stella Adler's prize student and took over her class in New York. And then when he came out to la, he had a very small class in Santa Monica. They were about eight women and me and I was 18. It was amazing. I studied with Larry for five years.
- [42:51]
Marc Maron
So was Meisner. That was the angle?
- [42:53]
Noah Wyle
No, it was more like there was a little Meisner to it. But his Adler was script analysis. Know how to break down your script into transitions and beats and understand arcs for your character.
- [43:03]
Marc Maron
Yeah.
- [43:03]
Noah Wyle
And then a lot of emotional accessibility work to make sure that you could, you know, hit anything you needed to. But not so much methody, not using your own life. More building your imagination to get you from the script. From the script. Using the circumstances from the script to get you to a place of emotionality.
- [43:21]
Marc Maron
And that works for you.
- [43:23]
Noah Wyle
I am Now a hodgepodge. I've got a technique that, you know, after 35 years, I'm proud to say I can literally put it in a backpack, take it anywhere in the world, do it in the middle of the night, middle of the rain.
- [43:33]
Marc Maron
But it is a series of steps in your mind.
- [43:35]
Noah Wyle
Yeah, yeah. I get, you know, sometimes music or sometimes. It's a lot of breath work. Yeah, Breathing is the quickest way to get there for me.
- [43:43]
Marc Maron
Really? How exactly?
- [43:47]
Noah Wyle
Well, I got fixated on relaxation being the sort of key to being able to build everything up, as opposed. When you first get on set and they call rolling, everything tenses in you, and you immediately stop breathing. And then you start acting. And so the idea that there isn't any differentiation between who you are before they call rolling in. After that, you're at a place of relaxation. But the relaxation matches the character's relaxation, breath matches the character's breath, the heart rate, so forth. So if I can get there, then the emotionality and everything else comes effortlessly. Wow. And it's just a. It's sort of, you know, doesn't take me long now.
- [44:27]
Marc Maron
That's great.
- [44:28]
Noah Wyle
This thing I'm doing now is. So it all takes place in real time. Every hour of the show is one hour.
- [44:35]
Marc Maron
I know. I watched it. I watched all the ones available. I didn't get all of them, but I've watched the four like everybody else.
- [44:42]
Noah Wyle
Every hour I'm adding a little bit more tension, a little bit more fatigue, a little bit more anxiety, a little bit more, you know, less of a. Of a filter. So I have a sort of checklist I go through to not only do what I've already done, but to get. To add to it so that it will progress over the course of the show.
- [44:59]
Marc Maron
That seems to be the hardest part for me, to know where you came from and, you know, what you did before. And, you know, if you're shooting at a sequence. Where were we? That becomes tricky.
- [45:07]
Noah Wyle
Some people don't care. You know, David Mamet says there's no such thing as a moment before.
- [45:10]
Marc Maron
He thinks, yeah, but don't listen to that guy.
- [45:14]
Noah Wyle
I think moment before is a very important. No, but I mean, carry where you were into where you are and you. Half of where you are is thinking about where you're going.
- [45:23]
Marc Maron
No, no, but that's what I mean. That's challenging. Like, I have to be like, I can't. If I have a good director and obviously I don't have the experience, the best director for me is someone who goes all Right. This is what happened. You know, we're out of sequence here. So just to remind you, you know, so you can at least lock into something. Right. I didn't know you were saying, like Mamet, like, seemed to think for me and I like David Mamet, he's a character. But like his approach seemed to be that anybody can do this. It's on the page.
- [45:51]
Noah Wyle
I disagree.
- [45:52]
Marc Maron
That's right. I disagree too.
- [45:56]
Noah Wyle
Well, Stella Adler had a great expression. It's not the lines, it's the life. And I'm a firm believer in that, that we often don't say what we mean. In fact, we often say just the opposite of what we mean. But you could convey what you're thinking underneath what you're saying and communicate on two levels or more. And that's.
- [46:12]
Marc Maron
What do you think about that? Scene for scene?
- [46:15]
Noah Wyle
I try to think about whether my character's in this particular show. This character has a secret. Yeah, the pit. My character's going through a nervous breakdown that's getting triggered every hour by hour until eventually he hits rock bottom. So it's a day that he knows is probably coming, but he doesn't want it to be today. And it's the day you could no longer compartmentalize.
- [46:35]
Marc Maron
Right. And he had been off work for a while.
- [46:37]
Noah Wyle
Been off work. But this is the anniversary of the passing of his mentor who during the height of COVID he took off life support to give a better chance of survival to another patient. And then everybody died. And he's not dealt with that grief or that guilt. He's just sort of marshaled on. And today it just gets triggered all day long.
- [46:55]
Marc Maron
Well, I thought like having not really been, I didn't watch ER. I don't remember what year it came out. 94. I was probably more self involved than television at that point. But it was a huge show.
- [47:10]
Noah Wyle
Huge.
- [47:11]
Marc Maron
And you were there from the beginning till the end?
- [47:14]
Noah Wyle
I took a little time off when my son was born, but I did the first 11 seasons, a little bit of 12th and came back and did 15th.
- [47:21]
Marc Maron
But before that had you done roles?
- [47:23]
Noah Wyle
Big roles, Little roles in movies?
- [47:26]
Marc Maron
Yeah, you know, and when you like then this is when you're what, 20?
- [47:30]
Noah Wyle
I was 22 when we shot the pilot.
- [47:33]
Marc Maron
So you're just running around la, auditioning like everybody else?
- [47:36]
Noah Wyle
Yes, sir.
- [47:36]
Marc Maron
Out of acting class you got an.
- [47:38]
Noah Wyle
Agent And I got the agent before the acting class. My agent actually got me into the acting class and she paid for my first two months. That's how great of an agent she was.
- [47:47]
Marc Maron
Are you still with her?
- [47:48]
Noah Wyle
Of course not. Of course not. I rewarded that loyalty with betrayal.
- [47:55]
Marc Maron
Is she still around?
- [47:56]
Noah Wyle
And I've made amends. Yes, she's around. And I called her actually last year and said, hey, I think I owe you a long overdue apology and a big thank you.
- [48:04]
Marc Maron
Oh, really? And how'd she receive it?
- [48:07]
Noah Wyle
To her credit, she beat me up a little bit before she forgave me and let me know that it did sting. And I respected her for that.
- [48:15]
Marc Maron
Well, that's touching, but with the experience with er, because it's interesting, you know, you do ER and everyone knows you from er and then you do some other series, some kind of. There was one that I told my girlfriend about. What was the librarian was sort of a fantasy trip.
- [48:30]
Noah Wyle
Yep.
- [48:30]
Marc Maron
Yeah. But ER was the big thing. And then, you know, here you come full circle and you end up in another medical show. But this one, like, from my experience, because I don't watch anything with that much regularity that often. But when I, you know, I wanted to talk to you and know what I was doing because my buddy, the guy plays drums with me, Ned, you know, he was, you know, he kind of was like, you know, no one wants to do it. So I watched his show and he's a nurse, like, he's a real guy. But what I found interesting about this show, and again, I don't know exactly how ER worked and I don't know where this show is going ultimately, if there's a second season, is that, you know, this isn't, you know, this isn't about the kind of, you know, lives of the practitioners. It seems to be, you know, very focused on the immediacy of the work and their relationships in the workspace. But also it just seems to be, after watching it and the choice to let HBO do it in the graphic way that they did it, it's really kind of a, kind of like a menacing examination of mortality. Right. And also, like, you know, in my life, there was a point where I realized that being a doctor is a job. And at a certain level, if you're the type of doctor that deals with life threatening things all the time, that your connection to it, you know, has to be a little detached in order just to do the job. And that, like, you know, you want to believe when you see a doctor, like, they care about you, but they care about you to the extent that the job enables them to without sacrificing their own mental well being, if it's possible.
- [50:15]
Noah Wyle
Perfectly put.
- [50:17]
Marc Maron
And I think that what you don't see generally in these kind of medical shows, you know, and in that. And I think probably in ER to a degree, although I'm speaking out of my ass, because I don't know, it is. This really focuses on the trauma of all kinds.
- [50:33]
Noah Wyle
ER was a very patient centric show. You know, the cases came in, we treated the patients, and then we got a little bit into the personal lives of the doctors. But it was not to the degree that this is a practitioner centric show. This is really about looking at the people that are first responders, and you're embedded with them for a shift the way you'd be embedded with an army unit in war or doing a cop ride along.
- [50:56]
Marc Maron
Right. And because of the focus on getting the graphic nature of physical trauma, the impact is different because there's obviously a lot of attention paid to the injuries to the disease, to what is really happening in the moment of emergency. And there's no way not to watch that and think like, oh, this could end at any second for any of us.
- [51:23]
Noah Wyle
Yes, Yes. A little character secret. My character's got two tattoos that you probably will never see. One of them is Memento Mori, and the other one is Amor Fati. Remember that you're gonna die and love your fate.
- [51:37]
Marc Maron
Yeah. Well, I mean, I think you do a great job with that guy.
- [51:40]
Noah Wyle
Thank you.
- [51:41]
Marc Maron
Now, what was the process of getting the show off the ground? How'd that come together?
- [51:46]
Noah Wyle
Well, it sort of started in 2020 during the pandemic.
- [51:51]
Marc Maron
Were you part of the creative process?
- [51:53]
Noah Wyle
Yeah, I was on the writing staff. I wrote two of the scripts.
- [51:56]
Marc Maron
Yeah.
- [51:57]
Noah Wyle
I was getting all this mail from first responders saying thank you for inspiring me to go into a career in emergency medicine, or thanking me for continually keeping them inspired from ER from er. But it was also. They were very confessional. They were really letting me know how hard it was and how.
- [52:16]
Marc Maron
Why were you in touch with them?
- [52:18]
Noah Wyle
They just wanted to reach out because of what Dr. Carter had meant to them, either in their medical training or in their early careers. I was a touchstone character, and they wanted to let me know what was going on out there.
- [52:31]
Marc Maron
Yeah.
- [52:32]
Noah Wyle
And it was really heavy to get all that mail, so I kind of pivoted the compliments to John Wells, our executive producer, and said, I know you don't want to redo the show. I don't want to redo the show, but there's a show to be talked about here about what's happening in healthcare and if you ever want to do it again or some version of it, I would sign up. And that's where it all began.
- [52:55]
Marc Maron
So that's the fundamental difference in the two shows, is that there is a social conscience to this around the community.
- [53:05]
Noah Wyle
My intentionality came from wanting to put a spotlight back on this community, that. But for the first time since ER came on the air, they weren't matching all the candidates at all the places that they needed them. So we have a nursing shortage, and we have a great, great need for these people to be in their jobs, especially if we, God forbid, have another pandemic.
- [53:24]
Marc Maron
Right.
- [53:24]
Noah Wyle
So ER was great at inspiring a generation of people to go into this discipline. And then the pandemic kind of made that discipline seem really unappealing for a lot of reasons. For a lot of legitimate reasons.
- [53:36]
Marc Maron
Yeah. And for political reasons, that if you don't have the support.
- [53:40]
Noah Wyle
Those people have been in those jobs now for five years without a break. And it's taken a toll. It's taken a toll on their morale. It's taken a toll on our system. And the ripple effect is, you know, you get to spend less time with your patients. You have to spend more time on their chart. You have to spend more time making sure you don't get sued. And patients are waiting longer, they're getting angrier. And, you know, the system is really fragile.
- [54:03]
Marc Maron
If fragile, why Pittsburgh?
- [54:08]
Noah Wyle
Because it's not New York. It's not San Francisco.
- [54:10]
Marc Maron
I love Pittsburgh.
- [54:11]
Noah Wyle
I do, too. But I love it. It's not an overshot city. I wanted to sort of show a part of America that hadn't really been seen, although a lot of stuff is shooting there now.
- [54:20]
Marc Maron
In Pittsburgh?
- [54:21]
Noah Wyle
Yeah. Believe it or not.
- [54:22]
Marc Maron
Really?
- [54:22]
Noah Wyle
Yeah.
- [54:23]
Marc Maron
Are there tax incentives in Pennsylvania?
- [54:25]
Noah Wyle
Yeah, they're not bad. It's a major metropolitan city. It's got a good cross section of ethnicity. Beautiful, big, you know, socioeconomic swing. And it's surrounded by ag land. So you get a cross section of urban and rural cases.
- [54:40]
Marc Maron
Yeah.
- [54:41]
Noah Wyle
And it's remade itself over into a kind of a medical center in the last 10, 15 years.
- [54:45]
Marc Maron
Really? Because, like, I've gone to work there a few times, and every time I'm there, I'm like, this place is great.
- [54:49]
Noah Wyle
It's great.
- [54:50]
Marc Maron
It's beautiful.
- [54:51]
Noah Wyle
Yeah.
- [54:51]
Marc Maron
And, like, I love that there's a history to it, several eras of history. Some of it goes way back, I mean, to, like, 1700 stuff.
- [55:02]
Noah Wyle
Oh, yeah. And medically, you know, that's where Dr. Safer, who invented CPR, trained. And that's, you know, we get into it later in the season, but the Freedom House Ambulance Service is an amazing story that somebody should tell. It's the very first ambulance service and they were all young black drivers who were basically trained by hospital staff and life saving techniques so that they could go into the underserved neighborhoods and pick up people that the cops wouldn't pick up. Because that's in the old days. If you had to go to the hospital, you called the police.
- [55:31]
Marc Maron
Yeah.
- [55:32]
Noah Wyle
So the very first ambulance service was these. All these young guys and they changed the face of the. Of ambulatory care. And it's a great and tragic story.
- [55:41]
Marc Maron
It's like the Tuskegee Airmen of ambulances.
- [55:44]
Noah Wyle
Totally. Yeah.
- [55:44]
Marc Maron
Oh, that's an interesting thing. And also like the whole, you know, dead steel business, like, I'm obsessed with that. That. What's the big steel company? There's a. Is it American steel? Like, there's a building there, U.S. steel, the U.S. steel tower. That's not the U.S. steel tower anymore in Pittsburgh. It's just made out of raw girders and now it's all kind of rusted. Like, I thought it was genius to do this modernist building out of raw steel because it would eventually turn brown. And I'm just. I'm obsessed with that building.
- [56:18]
Noah Wyle
It's a great art scene. That's where Warhol's museum is there and.
- [56:21]
Marc Maron
The mattress factory museums, those are really cool. But your character, I think that to speak to just the cultural PTSD of everyone because of the pandemic, and also all these different levels of what you're talking about, the healthcare system, I mean, it feels kind of vital, the entire feeling of the show. Like, you know, everybody's kind of, you know, different points, chipper, but, you know, you can't. There's no sense of panic in the show, you know, and the dialogue is good because it's character driven, but the menace of the never ending parade of people injured, hurt, freaking out, whatever, it's just like, it's overwhelming. But when I watch it, all I think about is how fragile we all are and how fragile everything is and that life. There's a scene where you're like trying to talk. And also the device of making it a teaching hospital is kind of great. Right? Cause then you got all these kids that are. But just the idea that one of them makes a mistake and it could have cost a guy his life, but you kind of go like, hey, welcome to the crew kind of thing. It's. It's a little disturbing.
- [57:45]
Noah Wyle
Yes, it is disturbing. And yet I look at those people and think they're rock stars. These are high performance athletes. These are people who are Michael Jordan, Kobe Bryant, fourth quarter, you're down by several. They want the ball. They live for these high pressure moments and they get adrenalized by things that would terrify the rest of us. So I'm just incredibly in awe of their skills and I'm grateful for them being there. And I'm shocked that we've called into question their expertise as much as we have these last couple of years.
- [58:19]
Marc Maron
Yeah. What do you think that's driven by? Politics?
- [58:24]
Noah Wyle
Politics, Greed. Yeah, all of it. All of it.
- [58:27]
Marc Maron
Like, why trust anybody? Why not sue? That kind of thing.
- [58:31]
Noah Wyle
All of those relationships that used to be sort of sacred, either that between you and your doctor, that between you and your priest, that between you and. And they've all been called into question these last few years. So that it's a general seeding of distrust. That's very worrisome.
- [58:46]
Marc Maron
But also like what you said about the ability for a doctor to do his job thoroughly, being limited by insurance requirements or hospital requirements is a fundamental problem that even my father, towards the end of his practice was up against, is that, you know, if you're working in a system, no matter how good a doctor you are, if they limit the type of care that you can give, then what are you.
- [59:15]
Noah Wyle
You don't want to live in a society where when somebody's on the ground having chest pains, you're afraid to jump in and help them because of the litigious aspect of what if you did, you know? And right now I think we're very close to being a culture where people don't want to get involved. Like, it's almost not worth their. The risk. I've heard doctors talk about that.
- [59:33]
Marc Maron
Doctors and probably just regular people.
- [59:36]
Noah Wyle
Sure.
- [59:36]
Marc Maron
Well, that's. And I think the show kind of deals with that because right at the beginning, in the first episode, you're dealing with the hospital administrator. And it's about numbers and it's about employment. I mean, I've been talking about this with firefighters where you think to yourself, thank God there are people that want to do that. That's what they want to do. It's not one of these jobs where you're kind of like, I'm thinking about being a firefighter. You either want it. And that's. If you ask those guys, well, is there any other job you want? No, this is it. Yeah. If that starts to diminish. And I think that's what you're talking about in relation to the health care for whatever reason, then what do you have? It's a very unsafe situation.
- [60:22]
Noah Wyle
I think that people will stay in those jobs with a little bit of acknowledgment and a little bit of validation with that. What they do is difficult. A little bit of compassion.
- [60:31]
Marc Maron
Yeah.
- [60:32]
Noah Wyle
Goes a long way, you know.
- [60:33]
Marc Maron
How much time did you spend, like, in DO studying this stuff? I mean, did you go to trauma units and.
- [60:39]
Noah Wyle
Yeah, we spent a lot of time down at. We were. We have a lot of relationships in the community, obviously, and they access here at county, down at SC especially, which is, you know, treats a population that nobody else will treat. It's right on the edge of skid row. People that are down there working, you know, are doing heroic duty day in, day out. We spent a lot of time with medical personnel. We had them come into our writing room. We spent a lot of time going to them to get things right, basically to say we want to do it right. And more than that, what isn't being told on TV from your perspective that should be, what is it that you're up against that you really want people?
- [61:18]
Marc Maron
And what were some of those answers?
- [61:19]
Noah Wyle
Oh, it varied depending on who we were talking to. If we were taught there was a woman doctor in Pittsburgh, Black woman doctor, wonderful woman. Who just talked about the experience of being a black woman doctor in Pittsburgh. Because there aren't a lot of black women doctors in Pittsburgh. In fact, for all of Pittsburgh's pluses, statistically, it's like the worst place to grow up if you're a black girl, you know, and it's for lots and lots of reasons. And she clued us in to what those reasons were and then informed the way we wrote certain characters and certain situations.
- [61:53]
Marc Maron
One of the main characters is a black woman doctor.
- [61:56]
Noah Wyle
Yes, indeed.
- [61:57]
Marc Maron
And I don't know what's going on with YouTube.
- [61:58]
Noah Wyle
I guess we find out we have some history.
- [62:01]
Marc Maron
Yeah. I mean, I'm only on the fourth episode.
- [62:03]
Noah Wyle
Oh, good. That's the one I wrote.
- [62:05]
Marc Maron
It is. It was good. And in terms of performing this thing, I mean, it's like, because. Because of the minimal amount of acting I've done, the. The foundation of your character, wrestling with his own ptsd, that's driving him to kind of break down limited acting.
- [62:23]
Noah Wyle
But I'll give you. You're always so grounded in your work. I love your work. I watched every episode of Glow. I've watched everything you've done. I can't wait to see In Memorial. Yeah, I read the script.
- [62:34]
Marc Maron
You did?
- [62:34]
Noah Wyle
Yeah.
- [62:35]
Marc Maron
How'd you get that there.
- [62:36]
Noah Wyle
My daughter audition for it.
- [62:37]
Marc Maron
Oh, really?
- [62:37]
Noah Wyle
Yeah.
- [62:38]
Marc Maron
Funny, right?
- [62:38]
Noah Wyle
It's great. It's great. It's great. You talk about Meisner technique. That scene, it's all in there. It killed me, man. Can't wait.
- [62:46]
Marc Maron
Well, that was one of the interesting things about what you're saying. And if you've listened to the show, I talked about that scene I did with Sharon Stone and sort of accessing the emotions that would enable me to cry, which I had no confidence or experience, and really. And how I got there with her. But then in other scenes, doing the Meisner, which I've never done, you know, I knew about it, but there's elements of that movie. This character is a student of Meisner's, but that if the script is good, the emotions will come if you're open, right?
- [63:24]
Noah Wyle
Yeah.
- [63:24]
Marc Maron
I mean, that's the whole trip. And that was kind of an amazing revelation to me that it really comes down to the honesty of the writing.
- [63:32]
Noah Wyle
And the cleansing of your own ego in the service of accomplishing that. There's a great quotation. Supposedly Michelangelo, before he began any work of art, would turn his eyes to the heavens and say, lord, rid me of myself so that I may please thee. And I use that little incantation before takes where right before they say, rolling, I say, lord, rid me of myself so that I may please thee. Just get me out of my own fucking head and let me just play this moment and I just roll from that point forward. You go into your little fugue state and whatever comes up comes up.
- [64:03]
Marc Maron
Yeah, but the character you're playing, it's like every five minutes, it's a life and death situation. So you had to put some sort of foundation into yourself that could accommodate the constant tragedy with enough empathy to service the moment.
- [64:19]
Noah Wyle
Imagine a character where when he's able to concentrate on somebody else's problem, he's at his happiest. And when he doesn't have somebody else's problem to concentrate on, all he's left is with his own. So that's the most uncomfortable, is when he's not busy and not in service of distraction.
- [64:39]
Marc Maron
So.
- [64:40]
Noah Wyle
Well, that's.
- [64:40]
Marc Maron
Well, that's another interesting thing about doctors is that it's not so much a lot of them. It's just about the work and being. You know. I mean, I grew up with that. You know that my dad did his residency at, like, Metropolitan. Metropolitan in New York in that, you know, in probably the 60s. And that was crazy. I remember when we saw the movie Hospital, and he was like, you know, he was like, yeah, that. That was where I did it. I'm like, oh, my God. But, but. But he's a guy who needs to be engaged all the time or else it's just going to be sadness.
- [65:14]
Noah Wyle
It's a tough thing to attend everybody's worst day all day long. Right. The worst moment in your life when you go to the emergency room, you're at your worst or you're most scared. And you extrapolate that times four, an hour, all day long for these people.
- [65:29]
Marc Maron
So this guy is having a breakdown.
- [65:32]
Noah Wyle
It's being triggered as the day goes on. Yeah. One thing after another is sort of. It's a. The whole show is a pressure cooker that keeps adding ingredients and temperature until eventually it hits a boiling point, which will come.
- [65:44]
Marc Maron
It will come. And. But it is really pandemic specific.
- [65:51]
Noah Wyle
It colors everything.
- [65:52]
Marc Maron
Yeah.
- [65:52]
Noah Wyle
It's what. The way that it color. You know, and the pit is sort of a proverbial metaphor for what we've all been in for the last several years, trying to figure out how to climb our way out.
- [66:02]
Marc Maron
Yeah.
- [66:03]
Noah Wyle
And Dr. Robbie is, you know, and every man who's going down to the bottom of his and gonna have to find his way out.
- [66:09]
Marc Maron
Wow. And who came up with the. I thought that the Mr. Rogers B story was kind of good.
- [66:17]
Noah Wyle
Pittsburgh, you're looking for things that are intrinsically Pittsburgh and some fucking good acting.
- [66:23]
Marc Maron
On that show, dude.
- [66:24]
Noah Wyle
Oh, man. Rebecca, who played the daughter. Oh, my God, she just killed it.
- [66:29]
Marc Maron
What is like, I'm getting choked up thinking about now. That was crazy where she went with that thing. And the guy I just worked with in the Apple Show.
- [66:38]
Noah Wyle
MacKenzie. Yeah, yeah. He's terrific, too.
- [66:41]
Marc Maron
What a range. Because he plays a dick in the show that I was in.
- [66:44]
Noah Wyle
You remember him on Facts of Life. He's been doing this since he was five. He's Sean Astin's little brother.
- [66:48]
Marc Maron
Oh, really?
- [66:49]
Noah Wyle
Yeah. Patty Duke and John Astin's son. He's Hollywood royalty.
- [66:53]
Marc Maron
Yeah. It was good to see him because I worked with him on the golf show that I did with Owen Wilson, and he plays a real dick. And in this one, he's really soft and he's like, you know, he was great. It's amazing that I think a show like this also gives opportunity to all these actors that are around. I mean, it's like constant casting.
- [67:15]
Noah Wyle
Oh, well, first and foremost, it's an LA job. There are no LA jobs right now. It's the first time I've worked in Los Angeles in 15 years. Really sleeping in my own bed and having dinner with my family. First time in 15 years since the year ended. I've worked in Louisiana and Atlanta for.
- [67:31]
Marc Maron
Years at a time.
- [67:32]
Noah Wyle
Yeah, five years in Vancouver, five years in. In Oregon, Portland.
- [67:38]
Marc Maron
What'd you do? Which one did you do in Vancouver?
- [67:40]
Noah Wyle
Falling skies. Killed aliens for five years up there.
- [67:46]
Marc Maron
Was five years enough of that.
- [67:47]
Noah Wyle
Yeah, that was funny. That was ample.
- [67:51]
Marc Maron
But how do you, how do you live your. Because this is one of the issues I have with acting in general. How do you live your life? Like when you're up in Vancouver for what, three months, four months at a time?
- [67:59]
Noah Wyle
Yeah, yeah.
- [68:00]
Marc Maron
And how did you handle that? The family came up.
- [68:02]
Noah Wyle
I bring my kids to me when I could and always have accommodations that would allow them to come and arrange it with their teachers to get schoolwork and tutors if I needed it. My wife, who I've been with now for 14 years, she's great about setting up home in a hotel room. So when kids are small, they're pretty portable. Yeah, we homeschooled our youngest for a while, which made that easy. But it's, it's, you know, it's life.
- [68:29]
Marc Maron
On the road and that's just part of the gig. I get anxious.
- [68:33]
Noah Wyle
So coming back, this is an LA job, you know, 250 crew members, lots of background, hundreds of actors. This is a big economic boon to the city to be able to employ this many people in this city after a 192 day labor strike and after a pandemic and now after these fires, this city's hurting and could use the work here. So there's actually a petition going around now that a lot of people are signing to try and, and put a little pressure on the governor, a little pressure on studio heads to make more of a commitment to bring work back here.
- [69:01]
Marc Maron
Well, I think then they shift the incentives a little bit.
- [69:04]
Noah Wyle
They doubled the incentive from last year, but it's still paltry and it's kind of a lottery based system to apply for it.
- [69:10]
Marc Maron
I made them do that little movie here because I had just gotten back from Vancouver and I didn't want to go out.
- [69:14]
Noah Wyle
If you do it under a certain level, you can still do it, but it's not as easy and as accessible as it used to be.
- [69:21]
Marc Maron
But I was just, I'm just so happy to see that there are so many actors ready to go. They're so hungry and it's like so many of them are just like they're. You can tell they're just putting everything into it.
- [69:30]
Noah Wyle
I sent out a little letter to our. With our. To our casting agent, Kathy Sandridge, that went out with all the breakdowns. That was basically kind of a mission statement about what we're trying to do.
- [69:40]
Marc Maron
Yeah.
- [69:40]
Noah Wyle
And I made it analogous to an Altman movie. Said this is more like Nashville or mash, where it's a tapestry. There's things happening in the deep background, the foreground and the other background. And sometimes the camera's gonna be on, sometimes it's not, but you're gonna be alive in your storyline all the time. So we're looking for dynamic performers, people that got theater background, but mostly we're looking for people that want to buy into kind of an immersive type of working that is not like your normal TV show. It's more like camp or rap. And so bring your creativity and your enthusiasm and leave your ego and.
- [70:14]
Marc Maron
Right. Well, yeah, because you might just be the guy on the chair in the.
- [70:17]
Noah Wyle
Room if you go back and rewatch, which you don't have to, but if you do, you'll see that the patient we treat in episode four is in the waiting room in episode one and two and three. And they're just background actors until they get called back, but they're there like they would be in a real emergency room. And so we've got people that are on the show that stay in that waiting room for eight hours before they get treated.
- [70:40]
Marc Maron
And. Well, you. You mentioned Altman. I mean, how is there. Is there any improvisation?
- [70:46]
Noah Wyle
None.
- [70:47]
Marc Maron
Yeah, none.
- [70:49]
Noah Wyle
Nothing. These scripts have got to be so tight in order to. I mean, there's moment shot moments could be improvised, you know, little bits of dialogue here and there, but there's not. It. This thing is. Is so airtight out of necessity that there's not a lot of room for.
- [71:01]
Marc Maron
It, because every shot is loaded, loaded.
- [71:04]
Noah Wyle
It has to take you. It's a link in a chain, you know?
- [71:06]
Marc Maron
Yeah.
- [71:07]
Noah Wyle
And if you deviate, then there's course correction that has to be done later downfield. So you got to keep it pretty straight.
- [71:12]
Marc Maron
Have. Did you direct any?
- [71:13]
Noah Wyle
Not this season. I'd like to next year.
- [71:15]
Marc Maron
Yeah. Would that be a challenge?
- [71:18]
Noah Wyle
No. I've directed shows that I've done before, and I've done. I've directed myself before. This particular show, I think, lends itself to being like a Bill Russell player coach. You know, you're on the floor making play calls, and you're also, you know, strategizing before, because the show doesn't leave this environment. You know, the prep work. There's no location scouting. It's all there.
- [71:39]
Marc Maron
So it's just on the lot. You're in a studio.
- [71:41]
Noah Wyle
Stage 22.
- [71:42]
Marc Maron
Isn't that nice? Where you don't have to worry about lighting or planes.
- [71:45]
Noah Wyle
Oh, my God, I love it. And lighting. There's, you know, there's no dollies, there's no dolly track, there's no C stands, there's no flags. All the lighting is in the ceiling. So we come in, we rehearse, we shoot, we rehearse, we shoot, we rehearse, we shoot.
- [71:56]
Marc Maron
A lot of guys running around with Steadicams.
- [71:58]
Noah Wyle
Just two operators. One woman does everything handheld and a guy who's got kind of a Steadicam rig called the ZG rig. That's same like a steady cam, a little bit more maneuverable.
- [72:07]
Marc Maron
Just two cameras.
- [72:08]
Noah Wyle
That's it. We carried the three cameras for two episodes for some stuff that happens later in the season, but it's mostly just two.
- [72:15]
Marc Maron
And what about these? You're involved with the local theater for years.
- [72:19]
Noah Wyle
I ran a company here in LA called the Blank Theater Company.
- [72:22]
Marc Maron
Yeah. And what is that? What. What do you make of the.
- [72:25]
Noah Wyle
You don't make any money, I can tell you that.
- [72:27]
Marc Maron
No, but what is the theater scene here and how does it feed the bigger business in your mind?
- [72:34]
Noah Wyle
It's a fragmented theater scene. You know, L.A. is so sprawling that it doesn't really have a theater district. It doesn't have an East End, it doesn't have a Broadway, it doesn't have a loop. But there are more theaters in Los Angeles than in most other cities. You just have to kind of see.
- [72:52]
Marc Maron
But there's all those ones on Santa Monica.
- [72:54]
Noah Wyle
That's where my space was, across from the Hudson. We had the nicest little shit box on that street.
- [72:58]
Marc Maron
Yeah. And what was your intent?
- [73:01]
Noah Wyle
Our mission statement was either west coast premieres or original works. And we were the Blank because we didn't want to have a fixed company or a fixed space. We wanted to kind of reinvent ourselves wherever we wanted to be. That changed when we got the lease on the second stage on Santa Monica Boulevard. But predominantly we were known for two programs. We did a Monday night reading series of new works that was a stage reading series. And then we did an a playwrights festival for young playwrights 18 years old or younger. Yeah, and we did that for 20 some odd years and produced several hundred plays by teenage writers, one of whom went on to be a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize and won the Tony for best play.
- [73:40]
Marc Maron
Who's that?
- [73:41]
Noah Wyle
Steven Caram. He won for I Know that guy?
- [73:43]
Marc Maron
Yeah, I saw the humans. I interviewed that guy.
- [73:46]
Noah Wyle
He was. He wrote a play called Sons of the Prophet that was nominated for the Pulitzer and he won Tony for the humans.
- [73:53]
Marc Maron
Yeah, I saw the humans and I interviewed him. I had no idea that. I wonder if we talked about you.
- [73:57]
Noah Wyle
He was a three time winner. He won when he was like 12, 14 and 16.
- [74:00]
Marc Maron
12 years old?
- [74:01]
Noah Wyle
Yeah. Oh, we had winners that were like nine. It was really cool. It was. We'd fly the kids out if they were from out of state. We'd cast the plays professionally and put them up at the Stella Adler Theater up on Hollywood Boulevard. And these kids would get to see their words performed by professionals. And it was life changing for them. Whether they went on to a career in the arts or not. It was a seminal experience in all of their lives.
- [74:22]
Marc Maron
What do you think ultimately? Because I think about this often, that especially in the political climate we're in and how culture is changing, I try not to despair around thinking about the futility of art in some ways. And, you know, what ultimately is, is impact. But when you talk like you're talking now that you know, whether or not anyone knows anything's happening, the type of change you can facilitate in an individual and their approach to life and their creativity is really the goal.
- [74:59]
Noah Wyle
I think it's going to have greater impact and need going forward. I think the more that AI gets invested in and technology and movies become sort of more technologically based, the more there's going to be a need for a temporal human live experience.
- [75:18]
Marc Maron
You would hope that there's something in the human spirit that craves that and it doesn't get diminished.
- [75:22]
Noah Wyle
I think there's something in the human spirit that craves expression and the need to work. In contrast to the technological advances that we're seeing, I think are going to, on a parallel track, make theater, grassroots theater, small theater, propaganda theater, political theater, more important again, you think? Yeah.
- [75:43]
Marc Maron
And are you still involved with this stuff or. No, no, it's done.
- [75:47]
Noah Wyle
No, I, you know, it was a long, long, long chapter in my life. And I, you know, think about getting back into it, but it'll take a minute. We ended up being just a lot of fundraising, which is not a lot of fun, you know. Yeah.
- [75:58]
Marc Maron
And do you, do you yourself crave stage acting?
- [76:01]
Noah Wyle
Only in the way that I think about going to the gym where I feel like I need it. I don't really want it, but I need it because it's, you know, it is where you kick off the rust and sort of get back to it.
- [76:12]
Marc Maron
Yeah. But I imagine, like, doing this show.
- [76:15]
Noah Wyle
It'S almost like doing theater. It's really strong. I mean, there's similarities.
- [76:19]
Marc Maron
Yeah.
- [76:19]
Noah Wyle
And it's so physical. Yeah. I love it. I think this. I mean, I'd be very happy to do this for a couple more years.
- [76:25]
Marc Maron
Well, it was good talking to you, man.
- [76:27]
Noah Wyle
This was my pleasure. Thank you.
- [76:29]
Marc Maron
Yeah, thanks for doing it.
- [76:30]
Noah Wyle
Truly.
- [76:36]
Marc Maron
There you go. Nice guy. Good actor. The Pit is streaming on Max. Check it out. Hang out for a minute, folks. With Robinhood Gold, you can now enjoy the VIP treatment. Receiving a 3% IRA match on retirement contributions. The privileges of the very privileged are no longer exclusive. With Robinhood gold, your annual IRA contributions are boosted by 3% plus. You also get 4% APY on your cash in non retirement accounts. That's over eight times the national savings average. The perks of the high net worth are now available for any net worth. The new gold standard is here with Robinhood Gold. To receive your 3% boost on annual IRA contributions, sign up@robinhood.com Gold investing involves risk rates subject to change. 3% match requires Robinhood Gold at $5 per month for one year from first match. Must keep funds in IRA for five years. Go to Robinhood.com Boost over eight times the national average. Savings account interest rate claim is based on data from the FDIC as of November 18, 2024. Robinhood Financial LLC Member SIPC Gold membership is offered by Robinhood Gold LLC. So, you guys, I did a bonus episode this week just to give full Marin listeners an update on what's going on out here in LA and in my head with seemingly everything on fire these days in both the literal and figurative sense. And it was right after Don Johnson was here, so I talked about that too. You know, he's like a Buddhist guy, not a Nam Yahoo guy, but like, you know, long time sober and, you know, kind of, you know, really is into the teachings of Buddha. So he's kind of moving through that and it was sort of a life lessony kind of thing. You know, it didn't get too dark. You know, he's got everything pretty, pretty well kind of processed and, you know, but it wasn't without depth and, you know, yeah, there was definitely some life stuff in it and a little of this and that. But it turned out to be a pretty, you know, spiritual or, you know, self aware conversation. He's fucking Don Johnson. You can listen to that episode and other bonus episodes twice a week on the full Marin. To subscribe, go to the link in the episode description or go to wtfpod.com and click on WTF Plus. And a reminder before we go this podcast is hosted by acast. Here's some guitar. I didn't spend a lot of time with it, but it's here. Sa Sa Boomer lives Monkey and LaFonda cat angels everywhere.