Speaker 1: Welcome to Pod Meets World. I am Daniel Fisher, I'm
Speaker 1: will Fredell, and I'm right or Strong and we are
Speaker 1: joined today to talk about episode number one oh four,
Speaker 1: Corey's Alternative Friends, which is the very first episode where
Speaker 1: Tapanga appears. And uh, we are thrilled to have David here.
Speaker 1: Let's jump into my first episode. I've I've now watched
Speaker 1: three episodes, We've done three recap episodes that I haven't
Speaker 1: been in, and so um we get to do one
Speaker 1: with you. Yes, I'm sorry, I've I said this to
Speaker 1: you before, before we even started this. I don't think
Speaker 1: writer would disagree with me. I think if you put
Speaker 1: up a list of the most important Boy meets World episodes,
Speaker 1: this has to be at or near the top of
Speaker 1: every list. They think it's the top. I think it's
Speaker 1: the number one most important episode. What was so funny
Speaker 1: about watching it overall was how um monumental this episode
Speaker 1: is in my mind as an experience, but actually how
Speaker 1: kind of slight it is, like, especially my involvement, Like
Speaker 1: I thought I was a huge part. I was, but
Speaker 1: but what and that that's because of the experience of
Speaker 1: doing it. This was the episode where I became a
Speaker 1: part of the show. And I think this is the
Speaker 1: episode where I learned how to be in a sitcom
Speaker 1: and what you know, how to get laughs and we
Speaker 1: can talk about like I specifically remember the moments we
Speaker 1: can talk about, but also I remember watching the show
Speaker 1: on tape night and seeing the reaction to the Topanga
Speaker 1: Corey relationship and realizing, Oh, this is the show, like
Speaker 1: this is what is going to drive um Boy meets
Speaker 1: World forward for me and and and so yeah, and
Speaker 1: watching it, I was just like, oh, yeah, this it's
Speaker 1: still it's all there that you know, Corey always needed
Speaker 1: a romantic foil right or another character to bounce this
Speaker 1: off of. And it's like, you couldn't you couldn't get
Speaker 1: a better person than Danielle playing to Panga. It's just magic.
Speaker 1: And there was more of the family dynamic and we
Speaker 1: see in the family is in the family House. The
Speaker 1: audience was interactive for the first time ever. I mean this,
Speaker 1: this show, this episode hits so many different notes that
Speaker 1: just I think change the whole ball game for the series.
Speaker 1: I really do. David as the director of this episode,
Speaker 1: do you remember the tape night? No? No, I remember
Speaker 1: I remember tape nights in the early going as raucous. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and raucous for all reasons, like an audience is that
Speaker 1: it's a new cast, yes, so as as cast original
Speaker 1: cast members. You suddenly had the people who haven't hearst
Speaker 1: And and also I remember for Bill Daniels a wonderful
Speaker 1: I mean, yeah, however much we love Bob Young and
Speaker 1: David Kendall. Yes, you guys really special, um he he.
Speaker 1: I think it was very weird to him changes, you know,
Speaker 1: michaelould change things, and it was it was a whole.
Speaker 1: It was like a Hell's It was great. So that's
Speaker 1: what I remember, And I can't imagine that the fourth
Speaker 1: episode was any different. So it was actually even the
Speaker 1: more so, like Will said, this is the first time
Speaker 1: we've heard you know, Erica has that line about getting
Speaker 1: the good hair and the girls win. That's the first
Speaker 1: time that happened. Uh. And then there's a Beavis and
Speaker 1: butt Head reference, which and the audience clapped and screamed
Speaker 1: for Beavis and butt Head. So if anything, it had
Speaker 1: they had just started to get you know, noisy. Yeah.
Speaker 1: I also I wanted to put this up at the
Speaker 1: top of the episode. You know how much of a
Speaker 1: television fan I am especially old sitcom. I love it
Speaker 1: so much. And I went back and I did some
Speaker 1: research about and this again shows how our show is
Speaker 1: constantly overlooked about characters that either started as secondary characters
Speaker 1: or were brought on later in the later in a
Speaker 1: series that changed the entire dynamic. And we're talking Clinger
Speaker 1: from Mash, Fonzie from Happy Days, Merkel from Family Matters,
Speaker 1: Woody on Cheers, Andy in the Office, and not on.
Speaker 1: Not a single list is two Panga mentioned, but it
Speaker 1: was it was episode full Well here's but again, Fonzie
Speaker 1: was on from the pilot, so you know these are
Speaker 1: the Clinger was on from the pilot. They had smaller roles,
Speaker 1: but were then brought on as as regulars on the show.
Speaker 1: That then changed the dynamic of the show. And it's
Speaker 1: one of those things where your husband and I were
Speaker 1: talking about this, Danielle. Everybody when they go back and
Speaker 1: they think of Boy Meets World, I think they remember
Speaker 1: to Panga being on the whole show, right, People are
Speaker 1: shocked from like, oh, I don't think I was in
Speaker 1: that episode. So that's one of the things. It's it's
Speaker 1: you've become so so in grain with the show that
Speaker 1: the idea that you started four episodes you weren't on
Speaker 1: there where any of those names you listed women? Interesting?
Speaker 1: Is there? No? Witten? Apparently the really changed on the show.
Speaker 1: The internet is concerned. And again I went strictly sitcom.
Speaker 1: If you went to UM shows like Lost and things,
Speaker 1: there are a lot of women on okay, right um,
Speaker 1: But I was going strictly old school sitcom. But yes,
Speaker 1: that's they were all men, now that you mentioned it,
Speaker 1: Yes they were alright, And to Pango was not on
Speaker 1: a single list, and I found that to be pretty interesting. Frankly,
Speaker 1: you might have to just doing this. Is Kirstie Elliott Cheers, Yeah,
Speaker 1: there's ae. We're just looking to find a woman, yes,
Speaker 1: And and she wasn't listed on any of this was
Speaker 1: not Woody Harrelson was for the same show on Cheers,
Speaker 1: but Kirstie ally was not very interestingly enough, So there
Speaker 1: you go. David, what was it like directing Bill Daniels,
Speaker 1: because we all remember, you know, first of all his kids,
Speaker 1: he was very intimidating. He was the consummate professional. I
Speaker 1: remember him being nervous that he was going to forget
Speaker 1: his lines and and him just pouring over his script
Speaker 1: and like you said it was probably very confusing to
Speaker 1: him to in the middle of the middle of a
Speaker 1: scene for Michael to come out and take a pencil
Speaker 1: and cross out the entire page and then rewrite new
Speaker 1: lines for everybody. When he was such a pro he
Speaker 1: didn't want to forget any lines. So what was what
Speaker 1: was that relationship like directing Bill Daniels. Well, because I
Speaker 1: came from the theater I had and Built came from
Speaker 1: the theater, there was a sort of distant foundation. Uh.
Speaker 1: You know, the thing that's great about Bill is he's
Speaker 1: in Boy Mets World, he's in the Grant, he's on
Speaker 1: broad he's in He's always the same fine act. He
Speaker 1: doesn't change the way he does what he does for
Speaker 1: the media. He does what he does and the medium
Speaker 1: embraces it, has to accommodate it. He So, so I
Speaker 1: think what Bill was I hope I was trying to
Speaker 1: do with Bill, but I think Bill was monumentally gifted guy.
Speaker 1: I think he was doing for himself was figuring out
Speaker 1: how to be built in in in this on different Uh.
Speaker 1: And obviously he got it very quickly and you can
Speaker 1: see it. And when we watched this episode of In
Speaker 1: the Classroom, scenes were the sort of dry under I mean,
Speaker 1: that's perfect classic Bill, and I don't mean it's like rot.
Speaker 1: I mean he's just being true to how he acts.
Speaker 1: So that's what I think he was doing. And I
Speaker 1: hope I was trying to help that, but I don't know.
Speaker 1: I don't know. Well, you were wonderful at that with
Speaker 1: all of us, all of us, but Bill also made
Speaker 1: all of that. You know, they say that that, you
Speaker 1: know the great sports, you know, having a great player
Speaker 1: on your team makes everybody else better. And that's just
Speaker 1: how it was when you had him as the anchor.
Speaker 1: You just talk about I mean we talked in the
Speaker 1: last episode about kind of in not necessarily a healthy way,
Speaker 1: trying to get Michael's um approval and admiration. It was
Speaker 1: a different feeling with Bill. You wanted that approval and
Speaker 1: admiration because you knew you earned it with him, and
Speaker 1: it was something so special when he would he would
Speaker 1: occasionally throw out a compliment as an actor or something
Speaker 1: like that, So there was that. It was an interesting
Speaker 1: balance between the healthy and the unhealthy ways of of
Speaker 1: I think what Bill is looking to do with you
Speaker 1: and what's these very rewarding for you guys. Good actors
Speaker 1: feed off, reinforced and enhanced each other. They pay good
Speaker 1: actors pay attention. Good actors respond to what is in
Speaker 1: front of them. They're they're looking you in the eye
Speaker 1: and listening to your voice and responding to that. And
Speaker 1: Bill is the highest level actor and so for you guys,
Speaker 1: as as as newcomers to be in that situation, you
Speaker 1: can only get better at there. And when Bill wouldn't
Speaker 1: see that and have that relationship, sure he was as
Speaker 1: gratified as you. Well, let's let's just jump into the
Speaker 1: first scene then, because that that really was a hugely
Speaker 1: forward for me, Um and precisely because of what you're
Speaker 1: talking about. Getting to do this presentation. Beat was the
Speaker 1: first time I remember doing something really kind of funny
Speaker 1: on Boy Meats World, because up until then I was
Speaker 1: always just the sort of one liners, you know, off
Speaker 1: to the side in the cafeteria. And I remember having
Speaker 1: so much fun with this, uh because I you know,
Speaker 1: I I hadn't really done comedy before, but I remember
Speaker 1: what you're what you're saying, like the dynamic with Bill
Speaker 1: just sort of slipping in this dry like Mr Matthews
Speaker 1: was so And then I remember getting permission to be
Speaker 1: stupid getting up there, and like, I remember, I don't
Speaker 1: know who's idea was, but I remember like the pointers,
Speaker 1: and I believe it was you. David said like, no,
Speaker 1: no, no no, no, writer, it doesn't matter where you point.
Speaker 1: That's funny, and that's where we found that joke. I
Speaker 1: remember finding the joke because we were like, we have
Speaker 1: to hit the d He's like, no, no no, no no, don't
Speaker 1: even look, just do it. And I remember we did it,
Speaker 1: and then Bill reaching out and adjusting us and just
Speaker 1: loving it. It was so much and it was like
Speaker 1: the first time coming to live as an actor and
Speaker 1: getting laughs and being like, oh you mean because I
Speaker 1: think in my kid brain, I was like, well, I
Speaker 1: have to bring out the pointer and then I have
Speaker 1: to find where Denver is because that's what my character
Speaker 1: is saying. And I remember you being like no, no, no, no,
Speaker 1: I don't even look at it. Just smack the thing.
Speaker 1: And that just became a whole bit. Well, let me
Speaker 1: let me give the synopsis of the episode and then
Speaker 1: we will go into the first um the first scene.
Speaker 1: So the synopsis is that Sean and Corey gets split
Speaker 1: up from doing a project together, making Sean work with
Speaker 1: Minkus and Corey work with Topanga. Corey overhears girls making
Speaker 1: fun of his hair and he decides to change it. So, uh,
Speaker 1: this is Corey's alternative Friends. It originally aired October fift
Speaker 1: nine three. Uh, and David Trainer, who's joining us, is
Speaker 1: the director of the writers were Michael Jacobs, April Kelly,
Speaker 1: and Patricia Forrester. I don't remember Patricia either. I think
Speaker 1: this may be the only episode she did, but I
Speaker 1: will fact check that myself. So we're in the very
Speaker 1: first scene the cold open, as writer was mentioning, um,
Speaker 1: there are projects going on, and Marla Sokoloff and uh,
Speaker 1: Megan Parlor are the two girls at the front. Yet
Speaker 1: we're gonna we've referred to her as fish girl. Um.
Speaker 1: They get up, they do their presentation, and then we
Speaker 1: see Sean and Corey get up to deliver their presentation,
Speaker 1: and Corey is wearing a hooded vest. They both have hoods,
Speaker 1: but I think I think Sean had sleeves. Sleeves and
Speaker 1: of course the impeccable dinosaur shirt. Yes, with Writer, it
Speaker 1: was big into dinosaur shirts. And this episode is what
Speaker 1: I'd like to start, and we'll get into it as
Speaker 1: we get further, but the the purple phase of Boy
Speaker 1: Meets World, where for some reason all or most of
Speaker 1: us were wearing purple during most of the episode figure,
Speaker 1: So we will get into that as well, the hooded
Speaker 1: hooded sweatshirts. So writer, I remember the pointers as well
Speaker 1: as you do. I remember, you know, because I was
Speaker 1: just sitting in that scene in the front row. I
Speaker 1: remember you guys having so much fun and thinking it
Speaker 1: was so funny to see kids with pointers, and the
Speaker 1: way Bill is adjusting and the way Bill is reacting
Speaker 1: to you, and the fact that prop humor, it was
Speaker 1: just basic prop humor. But I don't think we had
Speaker 1: done that yet on the show, you know, I hadn't,
Speaker 1: you know. And so the ability to just like keep
Speaker 1: finding laughs, and that's mostly what I remember about this episode,
Speaker 1: I think, is when I finally learned what a sitcom was, like,
Speaker 1: you know, while doing it. And we'll talk about later,
Speaker 1: like being able to find multiple laughs in one beat, uh,
Speaker 1: you know, or or or to stretch something into separate
Speaker 1: beats like and I remember, Benn, and I've been so
Speaker 1: happy to be able to do the pointers at the
Speaker 1: same time, like choreography, you know, like that was just
Speaker 1: an educational moment, like, oh, this is what comedy is.
Speaker 1: You get give kids props and let them have fun,
Speaker 1: you know, and then you set them up against somebody
Speaker 1: like Bill Daniels and it's just hysterical. Well. I love
Speaker 1: the proximity of Bill to you guys too, the way
Speaker 1: he's like right in between you. Um, David, do you
Speaker 1: do Do you approach directing kids in comedy differently than
Speaker 1: you approach adults in comedy. I don't think so. I
Speaker 1: mean I would say that there's a kind of schoolyard
Speaker 1: energy that is both valuable and has to be contained channeled.
Speaker 1: But you guys were great. I mean my recollection was
Speaker 1: everybody came to play apply in the finest sense of work,
Speaker 1: you know, came to came to figure out how to
Speaker 1: do this stuff, and and that you know, rehearsal is
Speaker 1: the most fun of all. I might think you have
Speaker 1: to perform it and do it all that stuff because
Speaker 1: you have to put it on paper, film and show
Speaker 1: it to the public. But the real fun, yes, yes, complete,
Speaker 1: everybody relax and do it and do it. There's no
Speaker 1: right or wrong. That's why the whole Michael Jacob stuff
Speaker 1: that we're trying to work for so antithetically to what really?
Speaker 1: Because like much, yeah, do it wrong doing? Standing on
Speaker 1: your head? Do it? Tell me all you think you'd
Speaker 1: be froeing on your head? Try it? What the hell?
Speaker 1: It's nobody cared, and as a result, you end up
Speaker 1: with stuff that's exponentially better than if you So if
Speaker 1: that's what you want. Kids are particularly gifted kids, which
Speaker 1: you will were what fun? It kind of comes naturally
Speaker 1: right because it's very similar to just playing make believe? Yeah?
Speaker 1: Was this writer? Was this one of those times that
Speaker 1: you would often talk about where you were given a
Speaker 1: prop and you and Ben maybe played a little too
Speaker 1: much with the prop, and Bill would after a while
Speaker 1: be like, all right, enough with whatever you're playing with.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, I probably had at this point. But yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean at this point, I think we were still
Speaker 1: you know, we were just discovering what it was we
Speaker 1: were doing. Uh. I would say by second season is
Speaker 1: when we were get in trouble with Bill. The second
Speaker 1: season it went bet and I would be playing with
Speaker 1: something for too long, or just have an inside joke
Speaker 1: that we thought was hysterical that nobody else found funny,
Speaker 1: and we would repeat it at nausea and that was
Speaker 1: that was big with me and ben Um. But now
Speaker 1: I don't think at this point. At this point we
Speaker 1: were just I just remember being so h happy to
Speaker 1: discover comedy, you know, like I I didn't know what
Speaker 1: I hadn't done it, and like this was it. Like
Speaker 1: this was me watching this episode was like and it
Speaker 1: was remembering, Oh, this is where I learned what a
Speaker 1: sitcom is because I didn't watch. One of the things
Speaker 1: you're saying is you didn't go into it thinking it
Speaker 1: was fun. Exactly, went into it as a task to
Speaker 1: Perfore I have to get out of my chair, stand
Speaker 1: up front with and talk. Right, that's good, that's it.
Speaker 1: Oh and then coincidence it's fun. Yeah, So the kind
Speaker 1: it's when you know it's fun, that's when you start
Speaker 1: to do it. Four times it repeated, it starts getting
Speaker 1: stale real quick. That's fun to discovery. And so in
Speaker 1: this scene is to Panga's reveal, and you see my
Speaker 1: hair before you see any other aspect of me, and
Speaker 1: it brought back immediate memories and I called my mother
Speaker 1: because my mother is responsible for that. To Panga hair,
Speaker 1: the crimp, would it be a crimp? It wasn't it was,
Speaker 1: it wasn't branded my I came home on Tuesday night
Speaker 1: eight dinner with my family. So Tuesday, you know, after
Speaker 1: Producer Own Network run through, washed my hair and then
Speaker 1: and then kind of dried it enough that it was
Speaker 1: still damp, and then my mom braided my hair in
Speaker 1: no joke, probably about a hundred braids. I'm talking a
Speaker 1: miniscule amount hair, very tiny braids, rubber bands all at
Speaker 1: the bottom. It would take us until about eleven PM
Speaker 1: and then I would go to sleep and sleep with
Speaker 1: the braids and then wake up that day where the
Speaker 1: braids to work, have them all taken out in the
Speaker 1: hair and makeup room. And we did that for the
Speaker 1: entirety of the first season. That how did you know
Speaker 1: that this? Had you done that to your hair before? Well, yes,
Speaker 1: we we had known just from having long hair that
Speaker 1: if you braid your hair while it's damp, it creates waves.
Speaker 1: And I don't remember the specific conversation of like, oh,
Speaker 1: we want to pay his hair to be crimped, but
Speaker 1: that was a conversation that was that happened with my
Speaker 1: mom present, and my mom said, oh, I could braid it.
Speaker 1: And then eventually at the end of the first season.
Speaker 1: My mom was like, for one thing, Danielle is up
Speaker 1: until eleven o'clock on and we had to do it
Speaker 1: back to back nights Tuesday night for Wednesday pre tape,
Speaker 1: and then Wednesday night we had to redo it because
Speaker 1: by that time then it didn't look as good for Thursday,
Speaker 1: so we had to redo it Wednesday night for Thursday's taping.
Speaker 1: And my mom was like, one, I'm not getting paid
Speaker 1: to Danielle is up until eleven o'clock. We have to
Speaker 1: come up with a different system for hair, and that's
Speaker 1: when we started doing the curlers. But also like what
Speaker 1: it didn't It didn't look like I mean, nobody's hair
Speaker 1: naturally looks like that. Like the only way you get
Speaker 1: hair like that is to spend yeah, six hours. Interesting
Speaker 1: that she's supposed to be this like hippie, earthy, but
Speaker 1: she actually has hair that's been done like basically at
Speaker 1: a salon level for hours. It doesn't make any sense,
Speaker 1: but I guess it was just a unique enough look
Speaker 1: that it made you go like, oh, this person is different. Yeah,
Speaker 1: fit the aesthetic more than it made any logical sense.
Speaker 1: But yeah, so that starts are my hair journey. There
Speaker 1: is Topanga, And I remember this scene in particular, the
Speaker 1: let me see if you're vibrationally acceptable that is being
Speaker 1: one of the lines I had to do a million
Speaker 1: times to say it's slow enough, really just turning slowly,
Speaker 1: let me see if it was so hard. It was
Speaker 1: just so in your head because you've got the lights
Speaker 1: on you, there's a crowd waiting for you. In your head,
Speaker 1: you're probably like, this is taking forever. Oh yeah, talking
Speaker 1: it did it felt like I was speed Like that's
Speaker 1: how it felt to me. I was like, there's no
Speaker 1: way you want me to do it slower. But you
Speaker 1: have to say with your hair, with what you're wearing,
Speaker 1: and with the kind of serene look you have on
Speaker 1: your face, and with Ben just saying Corey just saying
Speaker 1: what to Panga, you kind of get most of the
Speaker 1: character instantly. Yeah, you know right away, you know exactly
Speaker 1: what it's like. You know you're not gonna get the layers,
Speaker 1: but you get what they're going with right away, with
Speaker 1: with like, oh it's a little hippie flower child, like
Speaker 1: you get it right away? Yes, all right? Are we are?
Speaker 1: We good to move on to the next scene where
Speaker 1: we're in the cafeteria. So we're in the cafeteria and
Speaker 1: this is where Corey overhears fish Girl and Marla sockle
Speaker 1: Off talking about uh brillow head. They call him brillowhead.
Speaker 1: Corey assumes it is about him, and he then questions
Speaker 1: his hair. Well, he asks writer Sean, what do you
Speaker 1: think about my hair? M I thought, yes, more of
Speaker 1: a nerve head. Props the rider strong for doing something
Speaker 1: that lots of actors do not like to do and
Speaker 1: voraciously eating during the scene. I just wanted to go
Speaker 1: back and tell myself stop eating. Most of us just
Speaker 1: just push the food around with a fork so we
Speaker 1: don't have to eat. Darren Lynes every time you see
Speaker 1: right now you know again another When he was an
Speaker 1: off Broadway actor, he always figured out how to eat
Speaker 1: in a scene in a play. He said, so he
Speaker 1: was sure he would have exactly Yeah. I always figure out. Yeah.
Speaker 1: So that's how every night. That's amazing. Ben at one
Speaker 1: point picks up one piece of ravioli and takes the
Speaker 1: tiniest little bite to the corner. By the time riders
Speaker 1: three quarters the way through his plate, it was sober.
Speaker 1: I was just I was literally pointing it out It's like, look,
Speaker 1: he's still going. You just kept shoveling it and God
Speaker 1: bless your rider. Can I can? I I'm gonna do
Speaker 1: a weird tangent right now because the Marla sockle Off
Speaker 1: was actually present. This is this kind of connects in
Speaker 1: a weird way. So you know, people are asked me
Speaker 1: where my hairstyle came from? Where you know how I
Speaker 1: got this sort of because actually what people don't realize
Speaker 1: I had to straighten my hair. My hair is wavier,
Speaker 1: was wavier, so I would actually be spending hours in
Speaker 1: the chair with them straightening my hair to get it
Speaker 1: to look that, you know, the classics Sean hair. But
Speaker 1: Marla was there the night, so I knew Marla. She
Speaker 1: was a part of a group of kids that lived
Speaker 1: at the oak Woods because we were all kid actors.
Speaker 1: When we come down for pilots season and the pilot
Speaker 1: season that I got Boy Meets World, I went and
Speaker 1: had a gathering where I was the only boy with
Speaker 1: Larissa Atlantic Marla sockle Off, and I can't remember, there
Speaker 1: was like two other girls there and they decided to
Speaker 1: take over my hair and they wet my hair and
Speaker 1: parted it down the middle. And told me that I
Speaker 1: should be wearing it like this because and I think
Speaker 1: it was because it looked like Christian Slater, who was
Speaker 1: like an actor at the time, the older actor that
Speaker 1: we all looked. And so I started wearing my hair
Speaker 1: like that, which is why I was wearing my hair
Speaker 1: that way when I went to the Boy Meets World
Speaker 1: pilot audition. So in a weird way, a full circle,
Speaker 1: Marla sockle Off being in this episode connects to my
Speaker 1: the creation of my character's iconic hair too, and one
Speaker 1: of one of the first episodes, first of many that
Speaker 1: had something to do with hair. Yes, a lot of
Speaker 1: hair here, which is Michael Jacobs has tightly curly hair. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: dance here. So again this is talking about then being
Speaker 1: a voice from a representative. Physically, he's a representative, Michael
Speaker 1: an all that anxiety that the hair here whose name
Speaker 1: is on the script, Yes, that's true. By the way,
Speaker 1: Marla Sokoloff went on, we talked about a lot about
Speaker 1: how we were kind of, you know, against each other
Speaker 1: for the role of Topanga, and that I got it.
Speaker 1: Marla Sokoloff has gone on to have an absolutely incredible career.
Speaker 1: She is so incredibly talented. She's now directing, but she
Speaker 1: was in she was on Full House, she was in
Speaker 1: Fuller House, she was in Whatever It Takes, she was
Speaker 1: on the Practice. She is truly an incredible actress and
Speaker 1: really cool by the way, and a very cool person person. Yes,
Speaker 1: so um just giving her her dues because she is,
Speaker 1: And I think every week we will be doing that.
Speaker 1: We had so many guest stars on our show that
Speaker 1: went off to do unbelievable things, uh, that we didn't
Speaker 1: even realize how blessed we were to be working with
Speaker 1: a lot of these people. Every week. I'm sure we're
Speaker 1: going to be like and remember this person and look
Speaker 1: what they did. And remember this person and look what
Speaker 1: they did. I mean, in you guys in the Cafeteria,
Speaker 1: The Weirdos with Topanga Keyboard, Chris Owen is Chris Chris.
Speaker 1: He says not a single word and plays keyboard the
Speaker 1: entire time, and plays keyboard the entire time. I did
Speaker 1: a movie with Chris. You and I both did different movies. You, well,
Speaker 1: did you remember that he had done this episode when
Speaker 1: you worked with him? No, so we were he said
Speaker 1: to me, like second day shooting, he was like, you know,
Speaker 1: I was on board means for all this like, no,
Speaker 1: you weren't. It's like, dude, I know everybody experience, don't
Speaker 1: know I was. I was. He's like the first Topanga episode.
Speaker 1: I was like, now, I know you're wrong because it's
Speaker 1: that's like the most important episode of the show. There's
Speaker 1: no way, and he's like, no, I just sat there
Speaker 1: playing the keyboard the whole time. I was like, you
Speaker 1: were the keyboard kid, are you kidding? And yeah, So
Speaker 1: Chris went off and had another great I mean, it's
Speaker 1: just we we were one after another of these amazing
Speaker 1: actors all over the place. Yet so and just to
Speaker 1: make sure everyone heard me say it, he was the
Speaker 1: Sherminader in American Pie. He is. He is like just
Speaker 1: an absolutely famous actor. Um. Anyway, so in I didn't
Speaker 1: write it down, which was my fault. Do you see
Speaker 1: the Tapanga and her weirdos in this cafeteria scene or
Speaker 1: is this just okay? I don't think so. I think
Speaker 1: this one is just me offering to straighten his hair.
Speaker 1: And it's where we hear about Stacy for the first time.
Speaker 1: This is and this is this is where the sort
Speaker 1: of my experience of the show was. This was where
Speaker 1: the Death Chair finally came full circle. And because the
Speaker 1: original up until I believe until Tuesday, I think I
Speaker 1: think the pork there was another kid who was playing
Speaker 1: the other best friend, and it was his sister who
Speaker 1: straightened her her hair, and he ended up going with
Speaker 1: Corey to Corey's house and straightened his hair. And I
Speaker 1: was just like every other episode, stuck in the cafeteria
Speaker 1: or in the classroom, you know, with a couple of lines,
Speaker 1: and um, yeah, that kid got fired the same week,
Speaker 1: so this is again a lot of firing that week.
Speaker 1: David explained the death Chair to David. I don't know
Speaker 1: if David knows that we call it the death chair,
Speaker 1: and they were Yeah, I think David helped named it
Speaker 1: the death chair. We we always talked about. But I remember,
Speaker 1: I mean, and I think I've talked about the on
Speaker 1: an earlier episode of the podcast. But David, you might
Speaker 1: not remember. But the morning I showed up, um having
Speaker 1: gotten the script that now Sean had a much bigger
Speaker 1: part and that everything had been cut, you were in
Speaker 1: this cafeteria scene with the cameras there. So yeah, it
Speaker 1: must have been Wednesday morning. It was. It was, it
Speaker 1: was after the Tuesday run through Um and Uh. I
Speaker 1: remember you pulled you pulled me out out of my
Speaker 1: seat and stood me in front of the hall uh
Speaker 1: crew and said, can I just say it is well
Speaker 1: deserved and about time that you had your your your
Speaker 1: your do and you got this kind of part and
Speaker 1: it's going to be great and everybody applauded. And I
Speaker 1: remember just like being so grateful and feeling like, Okay,
Speaker 1: I can do this because I was terrified, you know,
Speaker 1: so nervous, Um, and you just made me feel so
Speaker 1: comfortable and welcome and deserving and it just, you know,
Speaker 1: like I said, it changed my life. This episode was
Speaker 1: the one where I was like, oh, I'm I'm a
Speaker 1: part of a sitcom and this is what I this
Speaker 1: is the job and it's just something too of the
Speaker 1: long life of the show. This is the fourth episode, right.
Speaker 1: The writers can only do so much at once, so
Speaker 1: they start with the core thing, which is Corey and
Speaker 1: and Field Daniel, and then they start to mess around
Speaker 1: with the pieces and figure out what's missing and what
Speaker 1: what how do we amplify this? And you look around
Speaker 1: and find out what resources are right there and write
Speaker 1: are there? You were right just the way Daniel there
Speaker 1: you were in a little bit park and and just
Speaker 1: the way will you said, you know, I came in
Speaker 1: and I realized how to say. It's like actors flower
Speaker 1: in small opportunities and then the opportunities a large and
Speaker 1: next thing. You know, that's the show smart writers are
Speaker 1: paying attention to what's lurking on the edges. Yeah, absolutely, because, yeah,
Speaker 1: it was so funny that they kept trying to find
Speaker 1: this third character. They're like, man, we really can't nail
Speaker 1: this friendship situation. And then they were like, yeah, because
Speaker 1: we don't need the other person. We have of the
Speaker 1: friendship right here. We have writer, we have Sean, and
Speaker 1: let's lean into that. And obviously that's a you know,
Speaker 1: the Sean Corey relationship is absolutely iconic. Wasn't the first
Speaker 1: character that the poor actor who was fired wasn't his
Speaker 1: sister originally named Rochelle, I will consult I will consult
Speaker 1: with Rochelle, right, That was his line, And can I
Speaker 1: tell you the story? But I think we have to
Speaker 1: tell that story. WHI should we wait till the scene?
Speaker 1: We wait till we get to this. Now, this is
Speaker 1: so the Originally he offered to talk to his sister
Speaker 1: to figure out how to straighten her hair or how
Speaker 1: she straightens her hair, and Corey says to him, well,
Speaker 1: will you ask her? Can you can? You? Can you
Speaker 1: find out? And the kid was supposed to sit back
Speaker 1: and be really cool like he was maybe going to
Speaker 1: help Corey, and he just in the line was I
Speaker 1: will consult with Rochelle. And before the run through, what
Speaker 1: was a big laugh the first time. Remember right before
Speaker 1: the through, Ben told the guy that is so funny
Speaker 1: when you take like the longest beat ever before you
Speaker 1: say that line, it's so funny. You should just wait forever.
Speaker 1: And the kid listened to Ben and sure enough leaned
Speaker 1: back in his chair, took a deep breath and just
Speaker 1: nobody laughed. Just he took. He took like thirty seconds
Speaker 1: and then said I will consult with Rochelle and not
Speaker 1: a single laugh. And when he was next and you,
Speaker 1: Ben and the whole rest of the week, Red and
Speaker 1: I were like, oh my god, we got that guy
Speaker 1: fired because it was two of us being like, that's
Speaker 1: so funny, let's see. But yeah, Ben, I remember Ben
Speaker 1: always being like, what do they do? I told him
Speaker 1: to take a huge beat. Oh my gosh, if you
Speaker 1: think it's funny, oh my gosh. Okay, so we were
Speaker 1: out of the cafeteria. We're back at home. Lily has
Speaker 1: her classic doll throwing moment. Her Dolly is cold, she
Speaker 1: puts it in the toaster oven. Great joke, by the way,
Speaker 1: great jokes that you I mean that that would be
Speaker 1: a mistake, and then tapping her dead Mommy, that was
Speaker 1: a funny joke. This is now the dance. There were
Speaker 1: so many iconic moments in this episode, I mean, one
Speaker 1: after another of stuff that people talk about when they
Speaker 1: think of Boy Meats World. They were like four of
Speaker 1: them just in this episode. Yeah, there's a couple of
Speaker 1: them just in the scene. Use a mirror babe, a
Speaker 1: mirror babe. The dance. Yeah, and I remember the dance.
Speaker 1: I hadn't remembered it until I was watching again, but
Speaker 1: I remember that when when it came time for Topanga
Speaker 1: to do the interpretive dance, I remember saying to David, so,
Speaker 1: what do you want me to do? And he said,
Speaker 1: come up with it. What feels what what feels good
Speaker 1: to you? What do you want to do and being
Speaker 1: like huh, okay again. That was one of the things
Speaker 1: that David did so beautifully is put things in our hands.
Speaker 1: This is your character. What would she do? Think about it?
Speaker 1: Put it together. I'm here. I'm here to help you
Speaker 1: if you need help. And I was one of those
Speaker 1: things that then Jennifer the unsung hero of Topanga Lawrence, Uh,
Speaker 1: My mom and I choreographed that dance. I remember my mom.
Speaker 1: I remember saying, like, you know the humpback whale part,
Speaker 1: being like, okay, well, now what am I going to do?
Speaker 1: And she said, what if you you know, what if
Speaker 1: you do this and it's like a humpback whale and
Speaker 1: then immediately that moment and then when you know, so pale,
Speaker 1: oh you know, look to the sun like I remember
Speaker 1: doing that with my mom and coming up with what
Speaker 1: we came up with and presenting it to David and
Speaker 1: David being like, yeah, yeah, that's great, it's great. I
Speaker 1: love it. That's what is you O Yes exactly. And
Speaker 1: that's so one of the things is that that moment
Speaker 1: holds because it's coming out of you. It's not imposted.
Speaker 1: Yeah right if if if you and it's a wonderful moment.
Speaker 1: But yeah, and I felt comfortable doing it because my
Speaker 1: mom and I created it. Yeah, I felt I felt
Speaker 1: comfortable doing it. I knew what I needed to do.
Speaker 1: The only thing that, of course, is hard. I was
Speaker 1: holding the lipstick in my hand, and I was supposed
Speaker 1: to be making a round donut, and so I'm holding
Speaker 1: the liquid in my thumb, and so the circle isn't
Speaker 1: a complete circle. Um. And then I have to take
Speaker 1: the lid off, and I'm now I'm holding a lid
Speaker 1: in one hand and the lipstick in the other. And
Speaker 1: I think I was supposed to draw a peace sign
Speaker 1: on my face. It was, which makes sense, but I
Speaker 1: think it ended up being a plus sign. It was
Speaker 1: a circle with a plus sign in on my face. Um.
Speaker 1: And I don't think we had to do it a
Speaker 1: bunch of times. I think we pretty much. I mean,
Speaker 1: I know we did it more than once, but I
Speaker 1: don't remember having to, Like I remember because I remember
Speaker 1: this was my first moment discovering that there would be
Speaker 1: two laughs for the price of one, because I would
Speaker 1: walk in and get a laugh on the look, and
Speaker 1: then get a laugh on use a mirror, babe. And
Speaker 1: I remember discovering that on tape and being like, oh, oh,
Speaker 1: they're laughing at just the way I stop and look
Speaker 1: that that's a whole separate beat, you know, just learning
Speaker 1: how to act that you were listening to that unrehearsed
Speaker 1: cast exactly. That's the key to doing this. That's where
Speaker 1: it was back to the theater because yeah, you gotta
Speaker 1: both do it and be ready to jump and also
Speaker 1: listen and be ready away. Yes, it's I mean they were.
Speaker 1: That was the first time we we had an interactive
Speaker 1: audience too. I mean we had They were really engaged
Speaker 1: that night and giving us instantaneous feedback, and that was
Speaker 1: the first time we'd ever really experienced that. It was
Speaker 1: was that because the show was already airing or what?
Speaker 1: What made you think it was out yet? I just
Speaker 1: got lucky. We just had the best two people we
Speaker 1: could have pought some. Yeah, I remember, I'm One of
Speaker 1: the things I remember about that is, you know, we
Speaker 1: always would do intros, and our intros are always a
Speaker 1: ton of fun for us. We would do what we've
Speaker 1: talked about this, we do our our yell and then
Speaker 1: we'd run out. And that was the first time that
Speaker 1: it was mostly girls. And I remember that you and
Speaker 1: I ride both got like the woos for the first
Speaker 1: time ever, and it was like, oh, what's going on?
Speaker 1: Something that was just totally different. Yeah, it was a
Speaker 1: totally so it's very strange. There's an element too of
Speaker 1: four episodes and your kind of got your feet down
Speaker 1: were more relaxed. Yeah, definitely. If you were nervous, even
Speaker 1: hidden nervous, the audience can feel if you're sort of cool, yeah,
Speaker 1: can relax and respond naturally, and then it gets much more.
Speaker 1: It was I remember, actually I remember so Mitchell Bank
Speaker 1: was our warm up guy, and um, the girls were wooing.
Speaker 1: So Mitchell brought me out in front of the audience
Speaker 1: and had me like run back and forth in front
Speaker 1: of them as they were wooing, and he came, Yeah,
Speaker 1: exactly exactly, so he came and apologize. That's what I
Speaker 1: remember is he came and apologize where he was like
Speaker 1: the next week he was like, you know, I shouldn't
Speaker 1: have done that. And it was Michael who told me.
Speaker 1: He's like, no, I told Mitchell that don't ever do
Speaker 1: that to you again. And it was again, I'm ignorant
Speaker 1: to all this stuff. I was like, oh, important person
Speaker 1: tells me to run in front of audience, that's what
Speaker 1: I do. Yeah, he to us though they were adults.
Speaker 1: You know, everybody was an adult. Everyone was an adult,
Speaker 1: So it was. But he came an apologized, sorry, I
Speaker 1: shouldn't have done that, and and Michaels like, You're never
Speaker 1: doing that again. I was like, So then he did
Speaker 1: it to Bill Daniels the following week, right, probably, yes, exactly.
Speaker 1: Well Bill was always the hard throb of the show, really,
Speaker 1: but it was it was it was that strange moment
Speaker 1: of realizing where it's like, oh, maybe I shouldn't just
Speaker 1: do what the adults automatically tell me to do all
Speaker 1: the time. You know, you have those moments where it's
Speaker 1: like that's you know, you gotta you gotta stand on
Speaker 1: your own a little bit at some point, and you
Speaker 1: get those little moments of that was one of those moments.
Speaker 1: I probably shouldn't have done that. So it was weird. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's very strange. So then we're up in the bedroom
Speaker 1: Corey and Eric's bedroom and uh, we see the hair
Speaker 1: straightening of disaster disaster on his hair. His head is burning. Uh,
Speaker 1: and writer, you call Stacy like you do all your sister,
Speaker 1: like Sean always did for seven years oh eight. This
Speaker 1: was the only time that ever. Yeah, I was also
Speaker 1: bummed at, like how quickly Sean just as like they
Speaker 1: clearly hadn't developed We hadn't. I had no relationship with
Speaker 1: the parents yet, had no relationship with you yet, and
Speaker 1: that really didn't happen to the end of this season,
Speaker 1: probably to the Fugitive episode. I feel like when I
Speaker 1: blew up a mailbox is when Sean as sort of
Speaker 1: troublemaker was really solidified. But this is the beginning of that, right,
Speaker 1: Like Sean gets Corey into the situation. Um, so it's funny,
Speaker 1: but but I don't have any any real character, Beautis.
Speaker 1: But they also haven't developed you at all yet because
Speaker 1: it was not was it this episode or last episode
Speaker 1: where you say like touch football my house after and
Speaker 1: it's like, okay, well Sean didn't have a house and
Speaker 1: there was no backyard, so it's like you could tell
Speaker 1: they didn't you know, they just weren't there yet. It
Speaker 1: was like, let's put this, let's put this in all right,
Speaker 1: your your friends, that's the way it's gonna be. All Right,
Speaker 1: You're gonna play touch foot by your house. It's like, well,
Speaker 1: we haven't developed that John doesn't have ows or a sister. Yeah.
Speaker 1: I was bummed at you bailed, especially because you I
Speaker 1: really feel like for both Will and Writer. I felt
Speaker 1: like this is the episode where I feel like you
Speaker 1: guys did really have your characters. Like Writer was very
Speaker 1: you were very funny in as You're always right to
Speaker 1: me the star of like you are so freaking good
Speaker 1: every week I'm always like, damn, he was good, way
Speaker 1: better actor than most of us. But you know what
Speaker 1: I'm doing. But you were not in control of my
Speaker 1: body or my voice. I'm just like all over the place.
Speaker 1: It was great, and you definitely every week you've been
Speaker 1: giving yourself crap, saying like, oh, I'm not good whatever.
Speaker 1: This moment when Will comes in does the balls a ball? Yeah,
Speaker 1: it was great, dude. I was getting I was slowly
Speaker 1: getting more comfortable, but it was still I still get
Speaker 1: moments in my head as an actor where I'm looking
Speaker 1: at it going like, oh, and I'm sitting on the
Speaker 1: desk because David said, now go sit on desk. You know,
Speaker 1: like it was one of those things where I just
Speaker 1: was very I wasn't doing anything naturally and I was
Speaker 1: very robotic. Yes, yeah, you're very presentational, but I feel
Speaker 1: like they felt like like you were owning the presentation.
Speaker 1: I was getting there a little more, but it was
Speaker 1: I mean, I wasn't looking down to find my mark,
Speaker 1: but it was pretty damn close still. So it was
Speaker 1: I just wasn't comfortable in my own skin as an
Speaker 1: actor at all. So it was And I'd love to
Speaker 1: blame the writing, be like, well they hadn't found me
Speaker 1: as a character, you know, I just wasn't comfortable. I
Speaker 1: was how could we be? But see, that's the thing,
Speaker 1: that's what Daniel was talking about. You came off as
Speaker 1: very comfortable. You came off really like you had the
Speaker 1: character even though you didn't know what the character was yet.
Speaker 1: You were very natural at doing what you were doing,
Speaker 1: young actor. But it was in theater. I had never
Speaker 1: watched television, so I didn't know what we were doing.
Speaker 1: So I was probably more present in some ways, like
Speaker 1: I was more of a less self conscious in a
Speaker 1: good way, you know. But it's not like I knew
Speaker 1: what I was doing. And you know, I was super
Speaker 1: relaxed because I was. I was just there. I was
Speaker 1: just in the sort of ever present state. Uh So, yeah,
Speaker 1: but I I all I see is like a mess.
Speaker 1: When I look at me, I'm like, oh god, David,
Speaker 1: do you have any thoughts feelings looking back at like
Speaker 1: your old directing work. When you watch this episode. Now,
Speaker 1: I look at you guys, and I love what you do,
Speaker 1: and then I admire and grateful to be part of it.
Speaker 1: And I know that sounds a little like what Way,
Speaker 1: but it's about the actors, about the actors in the words.
Speaker 1: So when you guys are good and funny, I think, yeah,
Speaker 1: they're good, and I take great pleasure in that. Like
Speaker 1: an audience, I really did. Like, I know we're only
Speaker 1: part partial way through it, but I really did love
Speaker 1: this episode. I did. I did too. It was really
Speaker 1: it's so I don't know, it's so, it's so cute.
Speaker 1: It's also very well built, and again to credit where
Speaker 1: it's dudent, even a twenty two minute story has to
Speaker 1: have a structure, and every one of the scenes at
Speaker 1: dances this. And I want to go back to Lily
Speaker 1: or if that's your name, a little, the child that
Speaker 1: has no part of the story. It doesn't have any
Speaker 1: connection to anything else. Everything else built. Where there's a project,
Speaker 1: there's hair. The hair leads to I did notice. I
Speaker 1: did notice. She says, I don't care what my doll
Speaker 1: looks like. I still maybe, I still love I was like, oh,
Speaker 1: maybe that's a thematic link exactly, but it's a very
Speaker 1: built little store. Yeah. That's something right or mentioned early
Speaker 1: on too, is that every moment so far in the
Speaker 1: scripts were like, yeah, that comes back later. Yeah, that
Speaker 1: builds on it, everything builds Yeah, all right. Can we
Speaker 1: talk about the end of the scene. Yes, this is
Speaker 1: one of those classic moments that I think this might
Speaker 1: have been the origin of us saying optical flip. This
Speaker 1: is what bed is. Like. They're one thing, I'm not
Speaker 1: going to school tomorrow, school Corey. No, And then in
Speaker 1: the script it would say optical flip and then you
Speaker 1: turn the page. And what that meant is that they
Speaker 1: would in the editing flip the screen. It's such like
Speaker 1: a nineties eighties like editing technique to flip the screen
Speaker 1: to then reveal, of course Corey's sitting in school. But
Speaker 1: then we this became our in joke, is that we
Speaker 1: knew we were like our service for the end of
Speaker 1: the scene was to tee up the optical flip and
Speaker 1: that's all we do. So then it just became our
Speaker 1: running joke for seven years. We'd say something to one
Speaker 1: another and we'd be like, optical flip. But there's no
Speaker 1: way I'm going to that party, opal flip. It's true. Yeah,
Speaker 1: the second I saw that, that memory just came right
Speaker 1: back into my brain. But yeah, we'd say it about
Speaker 1: everything and personalized, not just when we heard. One of
Speaker 1: us will be telling the story and we'd just be like,
Speaker 1: optical flip. Yeah, I remember it so well. The only
Speaker 1: thing so there we go to the classroom after that
Speaker 1: optical flip. Yet that struck me as odd is that
Speaker 1: he's wearing the hat and we're acting as though the
Speaker 1: hat is completely covering the fact that his hair is
Speaker 1: all the way down. I was watching it last night
Speaker 1: with my wife and she said that she's like, does
Speaker 1: nobody notice that the rest of his hair doesn't look
Speaker 1: It's like, has nobody nobody picked up on that? Like,
Speaker 1: I guess not, baby, Well, I guess the two the
Speaker 1: two moments, like, um, the scream that happens in that
Speaker 1: episode where you know, we pull out to reveal Corey
Speaker 1: screaming in the room and then we see the outside
Speaker 1: of the house and then we reveal you know, that's
Speaker 1: like the first real moment of the show that's like
Speaker 1: clearly not taking place in reality. It's like the first
Speaker 1: time yeah, out of nowhere. That's kind of the first time.
Speaker 1: And then you know in the next scene with him
Speaker 1: with the with the wig and wig was the wig
Speaker 1: is actually pretty funny? It is the wig with the
Speaker 1: duck bill on the front, about the taking off the
Speaker 1: hat and whether or not the hair would drop to
Speaker 1: create the duck bill. I remember the stress of like
Speaker 1: that needing to go right and not really ever fully
Speaker 1: fully falling the way we needed it to bend. To
Speaker 1: his credit, you can tell is doing his best to
Speaker 1: play it towards the lens, like where he's like trying
Speaker 1: to turn his head, trying to turn show the angle
Speaker 1: so you can see that there's a big duck bill
Speaker 1: in the front. So even he was more aware as
Speaker 1: an actor at that point of Okay, well if I
Speaker 1: turn this way, then at least I can show what
Speaker 1: the whole joke is supposed to be. Um I hadn't
Speaker 1: found that yet, but he clearly had. Which is at
Speaker 1: twelve again carrying the show. And let's point out again
Speaker 1: we've said this in every episode now so far, but
Speaker 1: he's been in every single scene essentially for four episodes.
Speaker 1: This kid who's twelve has been carrying four straight episodes
Speaker 1: it's amazing. But one of the things I remember, because
Speaker 1: you know, my workstation would be a podium right where
Speaker 1: I had a script and that stuff on the podium
Speaker 1: office in the script open and I remember Ben would
Speaker 1: come over. You can barely see up to where the
Speaker 1: script is before a scene. Look at it got right.
Speaker 1: He's like his brain remembered every particle went into amazing. Yeah,
Speaker 1: the skill level of I mean, obviously he's studied his
Speaker 1: lines before, but he would just like look and do it.
Speaker 1: Also skill set. Yeah, I remember him being off book,
Speaker 1: which is what you call it. You know, you you
Speaker 1: hold your script for the first couple of days because
Speaker 1: you don't know the lines yet. Uh. He was always
Speaker 1: off book. Uh faster than the rest of us was.
Speaker 1: The rest of us were excuse me english, um, but
Speaker 1: he he was, he would he would we all. It's
Speaker 1: memorizing lines, especially when you have the regularity of a sitcom,
Speaker 1: is muscle memory, and you really can you you lose
Speaker 1: it after a while if you if you're not memorizing
Speaker 1: lines every day, you go back fifteen years later and
Speaker 1: it's tough to memorize your lines again. Um. So it
Speaker 1: is a muscle memory you use, but He just had
Speaker 1: it very quickly. I mean to the point where, just
Speaker 1: like David was saying, he would because Michael would run
Speaker 1: in in the middle of scenes, in the middle of
Speaker 1: when we talk about changing the like oh, Bill has
Speaker 1: to deal with the changes, or we had to deal
Speaker 1: with the changes. These would happen instantaneously on the set
Speaker 1: in front of the audience, sometimes an entire page, like
Speaker 1: the full page. Cross it out. Now this person is
Speaker 1: going to say this, this person is going to say this,
Speaker 1: and everything is different. And now I'm really I'm learning
Speaker 1: que lines differently. I'm figuring out what I'm gonna say.
Speaker 1: I have to figure out how I want to say it,
Speaker 1: and the audience is sitting there waiting for you to
Speaker 1: do it. And Ben would just instantly pick it up
Speaker 1: like all right, let's go, and we're like, okay, I
Speaker 1: guess we're doing this. So yeah, he had that, right,
Speaker 1: there's that energy of we don't even know it, you know,
Speaker 1: it's so fresh at that point. But yeah, Ben was.
Speaker 1: Then we keep talking about how good Ben was, but
Speaker 1: he was he was good. Yeah, I mean into David's
Speaker 1: point too, that's, uh, you don't know if anything's funny yet.
Speaker 1: So it's great because you'll get a real natural reaction
Speaker 1: based on you know, we we don't have any feedback.
Speaker 1: Nobody's had a chance to tell us, oh my god,
Speaker 1: that's so funny. And then we find a way to
Speaker 1: play it up. And it's fresh for the audience too.
Speaker 1: They might have seen it three times already, so now
Speaker 1: they've got a new scene automatically. They don't expect it either,
Speaker 1: and it's a whole new energy coming from there. We
Speaker 1: add something into this because as you talk, how completely untemperamental.
Speaker 1: There was never any ride or you went you know,
Speaker 1: and that's the remarkable thing of a company of actors
Speaker 1: who who Because I've been in other situations where lines
Speaker 1: change things or where things are and I just pushed back. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I can see you put on it and I will
Speaker 1: push back or be just naturally have a temper battle
Speaker 1: response to things. That's not always the easiest thing to do.
Speaker 1: And I get it right. It's not like I'm going
Speaker 1: to let the heck is going on. You guys will soon,
Speaker 1: so take it well with figure out how to be
Speaker 1: along to do it. Nearly remarkable and because a show
Speaker 1: with young people like you has time. Yeah, yeah, we
Speaker 1: don't if you say I can't do this or I
Speaker 1: gotta go to my dressing already, we never get done right.
Speaker 1: So among all the other things you deserve credit for
Speaker 1: is having your feel we have so I mean, I
Speaker 1: like right or remember those moments and thinking it was
Speaker 1: just fun and just being what what new lines? Okay,
Speaker 1: what are they? What are what are we doing? That's
Speaker 1: the way you got to do it. And Daniels had
Speaker 1: to learn it. I think he's a smart guy and
Speaker 1: learned fast, but she in the beginning exactly exactly and
Speaker 1: then and then I think he got I don't think
Speaker 1: they walked on to him seventeen seventy six halfway through
Speaker 1: and said we're going to change the John Adams. So
Speaker 1: at the end of the scene in this classroom, Corey
Speaker 1: takes off his hat. Everybody sees the hair. Everybody laughs
Speaker 1: at him, and he looks at the panga and he says,
Speaker 1: you know, go ahead and laugh, and she says, you
Speaker 1: know your hair looks different. Why would I laugh at you?
Speaker 1: And he gives her that look for the first time,
Speaker 1: like why are you? Why are you like this? And
Speaker 1: he wants to know a little bit more, I think,
Speaker 1: which is odd. Because later in the series we find
Speaker 1: out you've actually been in love since you were fine
Speaker 1: exactly another and then you were in Yeah, it gets
Speaker 1: mentioned that we mentioned exactly. It's of course mentioned that
Speaker 1: Corey and Topanga been together since they were three, which
Speaker 1: we you know, we've seen the origin. You know that
Speaker 1: isn't true. Um. But so then we go into the
Speaker 1: cafeteria and this is now where I basically stopped writing
Speaker 1: notes at this point because I was now just like
Speaker 1: sucked in. And I loved this cafeteria scene where we
Speaker 1: see the cast of characters that Tapanga hangs out with.
Speaker 1: One of my favorite lines in the series is what cape?
Speaker 1: When he says so funny, laugh out loud, funny line
Speaker 1: that I was not expecting it, and I thought it
Speaker 1: was amazing. It was great. Yeah, have a question for you.
Speaker 1: You've you know, you've worn this cape since you were little.
Speaker 1: And he just stands up, he says, what cape? It's
Speaker 1: so funny to me. Uh, And Marty York is the
Speaker 1: friend in this so he's the third friend. He's not
Speaker 1: sitting in the death chair, but he's he is the
Speaker 1: death chair. That week is so mean. There was a
Speaker 1: lot of people that I mean if you look back
Speaker 1: at that, there were times where and I get why
Speaker 1: it had to be very direct, but there's times where
Speaker 1: Corey came off as me. I mean, there's there's there
Speaker 1: are a couple of characters where it's like, but that's
Speaker 1: there's something very real about that. I mean, that's kind
Speaker 1: of how kids are. And if I don't think it
Speaker 1: works the same way in today's world, no, I don't think.
Speaker 1: I think that there's a there there's an overall insider
Speaker 1: outsider what is normal, what is not? Uh atmosphere that
Speaker 1: this episode sure surely encourages, if not exploits, And obviously
Speaker 1: you know, it makes a bridge between Corey and to
Speaker 1: Pango via that. But there's a mean spiritedness there, you know,
Speaker 1: in general, to like what is normal and what is
Speaker 1: average or what what most boys do? And you know,
Speaker 1: I it's funny because I feel like that is incredibly
Speaker 1: dated and it doesn't think it's like of course, yeah, no,
Speaker 1: definitely fact that Corey, as the representative of the spirit
Speaker 1: of the show, comes to see that he was wrong, Yeah, definitely,
Speaker 1: So that's it. There's one line where it's not in
Speaker 1: the scene to be able to say, well, get there,
Speaker 1: but there's only one line where I go, and that
Speaker 1: is you're gonna be one of those girls just doesn't
Speaker 1: shave the let's right. Yeah, that's why when you think,
Speaker 1: now you just take that. Yeah, that scene we yeah,
Speaker 1: that's the scene where I do the dance. That's another one.
Speaker 1: That's right, that's us a mirror babe scene. And you're
Speaker 1: going to be one of those girls who doesn't shave.
Speaker 1: And I loved the reaction, and I actually loved my reading, haven't.
Speaker 1: I haven't decided yet. It's a little offended, but hey,
Speaker 1: I and I'll figure that out when I figured nothing
Speaker 1: to do with you. Yeah, exactly in your response. Save
Speaker 1: your response makes it okay, passable? Exactly. Um. So yeah,
Speaker 1: this is where we see Chris Owen playing the keyboard,
Speaker 1: never speaks, never speaks, first stops playing the keyboard. Not one.
Speaker 1: I know every every actor there, Lee Norris, Um. I
Speaker 1: don't know the actress's name, and she I think went
Speaker 1: on to do other stuff too. Recognized her and I couldn't. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I couldn't remember what her name was either on but
Speaker 1: everybody is so great at that table, and so Sean
Speaker 1: is laughing at Corey. Corey gets up and he goes
Speaker 1: to join them and realizes he's one of them now,
Speaker 1: and the petition again to save to save the Librarian
Speaker 1: comes up, and he then, you know, says why they're
Speaker 1: not going to have any success? Um, I mean that's
Speaker 1: anybody else want to talk about anything else? And that
Speaker 1: I mean again we we hit out the jarred by
Speaker 1: the Beavis and butthead reference that doesn't want but head.
Speaker 1: But it's a good one because even though it's dated
Speaker 1: and obviously it's just the name is funny, you know,
Speaker 1: like they don't want that, they want Beavis and they
Speaker 1: watch Bevis and buttheads and then but then our audience cheered,
Speaker 1: I doubt we expect it. Actually, yes, when he said,
Speaker 1: like anything without Angela Lansberg, that's fun it's so funny somehow, still, yes,
Speaker 1: it is, and it's also it's it's one of those
Speaker 1: things where the writers would often put in jokes that
Speaker 1: meant one thing to kids and something else to adults.
Speaker 1: I mean, how often you have eleven or twelve year
Speaker 1: old kids throwing out an Angela Lansbury reference? And it
Speaker 1: works and it still works to David's point about twenty
Speaker 1: nine years later, it's so really funny, funny to hear
Speaker 1: see Lee talking about Angela Lansbury. It's yeah, every character
Speaker 1: in that little group is phenomenal and literally wrote down
Speaker 1: what it was. It's just so funny. And and even
Speaker 1: Chris Owen without having a line playing the keyboard, like
Speaker 1: it's all those characters were well defined and you you
Speaker 1: loved them, and you you know, doesn't keyboard. Man, he does.
Speaker 1: He does so great. It's so great. Oh man, so great.
Speaker 1: I love it. So we go back to the else.
Speaker 1: We're in Corey's bedroom. Cory is now curling his hair,
Speaker 1: trying to get it back to its original glory, and
Speaker 1: Eric walks in, yes, this is uh so I'm actually
Speaker 1: gonna show Daniel something here on my phone I found
Speaker 1: when I was home. All the original polaroids are you work?
Speaker 1: He has the polaroids that he took me. M the
Speaker 1: polaroids Oh my gosh, that I took of him in
Speaker 1: the actual scene, in the actual scene. So I have polaroids,
Speaker 1: and then polaroids of them doing, and then polaroids of
Speaker 1: the original kid that was with you writer. No way,
Speaker 1: I will consult with roche I will consult with Rochelle.
Speaker 1: So I have all I literally the polaroids and I
Speaker 1: must have I must have fifteen of them from all
Speaker 1: the different takes we did. It's just walking in, taking
Speaker 1: a taking a polaroid, and walking out with the whole scene.
Speaker 1: And I was cleaning out my my childhood bedroom and
Speaker 1: I came upon all the polaroids, so I still have.
Speaker 1: It's so strange, amazing. Yeah, I thought that was kind
Speaker 1: of cool. And then we are back at the school
Speaker 1: by the lockers and Corey shows up. His hair is
Speaker 1: now huge and frizzy, and you know, even the weirdos
Speaker 1: all to Panga and her weirdos, we all even you know,
Speaker 1: laugh at him there, and he laughs at that himself.
Speaker 1: He laughs at himself, you know, Yeah, he lightens up,
Speaker 1: he can laugh at himself a little bit. And then
Speaker 1: we have created a human barrier. We handcuff ourselves to
Speaker 1: the lockers. We are going to get everyone to sign
Speaker 1: the petition for Mrs rosemead. Um. There's a Don King
Speaker 1: reference here. So can we talk about how obviously a
Speaker 1: bunch of kids have access to fifteen pairs of handcuffs,
Speaker 1: which is which is totally horrible, are absolutely lock and
Speaker 1: easily easily unlocked. Exactly police stained handcuffs. They just automatically
Speaker 1: have that. Yeah, it's so funny because like I don't care,
Speaker 1: Like it's such a good like I was so on
Speaker 1: board with this scene and I was so glad also
Speaker 1: that Corey gets you know, gets a moment as a leader,
Speaker 1: as you know, he it's not just that they're going
Speaker 1: to handcuff themselves, is that he convinces them, you know,
Speaker 1: he argues with them, he does he supports the cause. Um. Now,
Speaker 1: though that was great, you know, one of the things
Speaker 1: I found interesting that I found a little bit jarring
Speaker 1: was this is the only time, maybe the only time,
Speaker 1: because it starts to grow from there that Sean and
Speaker 1: Corey are literally and figuratively on different sides. I mean
Speaker 1: any on the scene, am I even in this I
Speaker 1: don't think so, But that's what I'm said. But it's
Speaker 1: like you're not part of like you were part of
Speaker 1: the more Marty York kind of friendships kids, the cool kids,
Speaker 1: and they're never in the future they you would have
Speaker 1: been handcuffed with with with Corey right next to it,
Speaker 1: and so there was something interesting about that. They still
Speaker 1: hadn't quite found that yet. But it is also interesting
Speaker 1: that Sean isn't in that scene because Marty York is there.
Speaker 1: He's the kid, He's the kid who calls Ben, Yeah,
Speaker 1: I sign it signing, and so it is. I wonder
Speaker 1: if that was like a deliberate choice that we weren't
Speaker 1: going to put Sean. Maybe I'll tell you why you
Speaker 1: can't have Sean in the scene, because Sean would have
Speaker 1: stayed and you have to be able to get one right.
Speaker 1: There's a kind of it's easy for the gang, the
Speaker 1: group to walk off if you have an established character,
Speaker 1: which is the same reason why Sean's character has to
Speaker 1: leave in the bedroom when you haven't established a relationship
Speaker 1: with the parents, Because then you're gonna say, now, do
Speaker 1: these parents no Sean already? Or is this the first
Speaker 1: time they're meeting him? Are they angry with him? Do
Speaker 1: they like you have to blame Sean. It becomes a
Speaker 1: whole It becomes a whole different thing that they don't
Speaker 1: have time for Sean. In their first scene, when when
Speaker 1: Phoeney says stinks and stinks, do you think exactly pertly
Speaker 1: happy to blame exactly? He's happy to pass the buck there.
Speaker 1: It is also one of the most if you go
Speaker 1: back and watch. One of the most unnatural exits ever
Speaker 1: is the four of them still handcuffed together backing out
Speaker 1: of the scene. They are literally backing up the stairs.
Speaker 1: You could tell it was just like get out of
Speaker 1: the scene. So they're just the four of them handcuffed
Speaker 1: trying to back out of the scene. So funny it is.
Speaker 1: It was really funny. I noticed the same thing, very funny.
Speaker 1: And then I was shocked while watching this that you
Speaker 1: cannot physically see me shaking. I was so nervous. Well,
Speaker 1: wait before we get to your nervous thing, because I
Speaker 1: think that's going to be very important and that has
Speaker 1: to be its own thing. Can we talk about Ben
Speaker 1: mouthing along with Marty York's lines, Oh, man, is not
Speaker 1: even it is not even subtle. I mean he we
Speaker 1: are just on Corey's face as he is just full
Speaker 1: mouthing along with all of memorized the whole scene well,
Speaker 1: and I think it also speaks to his nervousness this
Speaker 1: scene for us. I think Ben would probably tell you
Speaker 1: I was not his first kiss. I don't know. Ben
Speaker 1: was also twelve. I think Ben has said, no, it
Speaker 1: wasn't my first kiss. It was most certainly my first kiss.
Speaker 1: I had never kissed anybody. Um, we had not rehearsed
Speaker 1: the kiss. Throughout the week. We had rehearsed what was
Speaker 1: going to happen, you know, the pushing up against the lockers,
Speaker 1: but we didn't actually ever kiss. And it was being
Speaker 1: taped and we were filming it in front of the
Speaker 1: live studio audience, so we had never rehearsed the actual kiss.
Speaker 1: And I was the most nervous of any I have had.
Speaker 1: You have the most confidence and poise, like, and it's
Speaker 1: so interesting, like when you just have that beat where
Speaker 1: you're like, okay, sure whatever you say, and you sort
Speaker 1: of look off to the side. It's just like such
Speaker 1: I was. I was. I was. I remember being there
Speaker 1: looking at the monitor on tape night and just being
Speaker 1: so thrilled with that scene and like, and I felt
Speaker 1: it again watching it now years later, I was like,
Speaker 1: oh my god, I remember this beat. It's so good.
Speaker 1: I was shocked. You couldn't see me shaking because I
Speaker 1: remember my inside being just a jumbled mess. And also
Speaker 1: I remember, you know, my grandparents were there, and so
Speaker 1: not only am I doing this, it's tape night in
Speaker 1: front of this live studio audience, I've had this tumultuous
Speaker 1: week of getting the job, getting almost fired from the job,
Speaker 1: keeping the job, you know, succeeding at the job. This
Speaker 1: is the last scene of the night, and my grandparents
Speaker 1: are about to watch me kiss a boy and I've
Speaker 1: never done it before, and all these people, not just
Speaker 1: my grandparents, but like two hundred people are gonna watch.
Speaker 1: And I knew how important it was to the show,
Speaker 1: and I was worried I was gonna like do it wrong,
Speaker 1: or that I was going to let somebody down. And
Speaker 1: I knew that Ben was also very nervous, and I
Speaker 1: just remember thinking, like, oh my gosh, I'm never going
Speaker 1: to get through this. And when I watched it, I
Speaker 1: was so kudos to me, so I was. I was
Speaker 1: so cool, and the way I put my hand on
Speaker 1: my hip and like looks away, I look so self assured.
Speaker 1: Well you just something you just said. It resonates in
Speaker 1: such a way that it hadn't hit me until right now.
Speaker 1: From the note session to where you were crying to
Speaker 1: that kiss was three and a half days later. Not
Speaker 1: even a note session was Monday after exactly three days,
Speaker 1: three days later. This entire journey for you was three days.
Speaker 1: That's nuts to, which for a three year old is
Speaker 1: like a year and a half. But you know, like
Speaker 1: as far as your brain changing rapidly, like and you
Speaker 1: did you you you've rose to this challenge and you
Speaker 1: became this confident you know because depended on that moment
Speaker 1: is acting like a twenty five year old woman. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and you believe it. You completely believe it. It's wonderful.
Speaker 1: And then of course ben expression is just like one
Speaker 1: of the most iconic things. He pencil and he has
Speaker 1: his lips sucked in because he didn't really want me
Speaker 1: to kiss him. So he's not he's like, lips sucked in.
Speaker 1: I'm not really good. He's our lips didn't really ever
Speaker 1: touch Uh, Yeah he was. He was really nervous about
Speaker 1: kissing you for a number of reasons. Yeah, he was
Speaker 1: very nervous to kiss me. I remember that distinctly. So
Speaker 1: was I. So was I. Man, David, do you remember
Speaker 1: any of that, like kid nervousness about a kiss? Was
Speaker 1: this the first time you had ever directed? Before you
Speaker 1: you didn't do it until you shot because he didn't
Speaker 1: want to give up the units have photograph. But the
Speaker 1: other thing I was thinking is you guys were talking
Speaker 1: about this, any problem, A good actor understands that any
Speaker 1: problem is not the actor's problem, it's the character. And
Speaker 1: so the nervous is the panas and the control of
Speaker 1: the nurses is depar and saying with them exactly, and
Speaker 1: actors were not in it. Whatever it is. He gets
Speaker 1: the frock. I don't understand. It's not the characters, the
Speaker 1: candles not being with it's not the actor. Yeah, so
Speaker 1: this kiss is really is you being a real actor,
Speaker 1: you and Ben being real because whenever you felt like that,
Speaker 1: actors made the cap. Yeah. Yeah, I can get emotional
Speaker 1: thinking about it. I just it was such a it
Speaker 1: was such a big moment and we and we really did.
Speaker 1: When I watch it, I think those look like two
Speaker 1: kids that are really sure of what they're supposed to
Speaker 1: be doing. And I didn't feel that way. But we
Speaker 1: pulled it off. We we look like we know what
Speaker 1: we are doing. Um, And I love I didn't remember
Speaker 1: that her reasoning for doing it. For all these years,
Speaker 1: I never really remembered why she what she why she
Speaker 1: did it? Like I knew that we kissed in that scene,
Speaker 1: but I didn't really get it. And I love the
Speaker 1: idea and the line because wouldn't it be interesting if
Speaker 1: you had, if you're you always remembered for the rest
Speaker 1: of your life that your first kissed happened when you
Speaker 1: thought you looked your worst. Um, it's very cool, it's
Speaker 1: very cool. Yeah, I just yeah, I love it. It
Speaker 1: makes it gives me a different feeling on the scene
Speaker 1: because I hadn't remembered that there was like that really
Speaker 1: deep meaning behind it. Well, we haven't really in any way,
Speaker 1: shape or form, and I know we're at the end
Speaker 1: now discussed the meaning of the show. But the actual
Speaker 1: theme of the show of let's not care so much
Speaker 1: what other people think about you and just be comfortable
Speaker 1: in your own skin is hugely important. And that's the
Speaker 1: thing that still resonates with a lot of people about
Speaker 1: Boy Meant World is you would get those messages without necessarily,
Speaker 1: you know, having to do a very special episode, you know.
Speaker 1: So that was that's I mean that resonates through the
Speaker 1: generations that there comes that you can't care what other
Speaker 1: people think about you, and and doing that through the
Speaker 1: Tapanga character, I thought was a great way of doing
Speaker 1: somebody who was so confident at such a young age
Speaker 1: and showing that kind of like I don't care what
Speaker 1: people think about me. I'm I'm not the best version
Speaker 1: of me that I am. I thought it was really cool.
Speaker 1: So yeah, that that that was one thing our show
Speaker 1: did very well without having to kind of spoon feed
Speaker 1: it to you. It's Michael. Michael's inherently moralist, and I
Speaker 1: do mean I have a bad one, but I mean
Speaker 1: he he used television as a way to deliver message. Yes,
Speaker 1: so there are other shows that are wonderful in their
Speaker 1: own way that they don't don't deliver a message. They
Speaker 1: may have one coincidentally there, but Michael's very much this
Speaker 1: is the point the deliver of me. Yeah, and and
Speaker 1: this episode seems very well into whatever the meaning of
Speaker 1: my I thought so too. Yeah, it's a great message
Speaker 1: still and I love Then we're the next scene, the
Speaker 1: final scene of the show. We're back in the cafeteria,
Speaker 1: and you know, Corey's hair is back to normal, which
Speaker 1: means Corey's life kind of goes back to normal. And
Speaker 1: he's going to sit with his friends. But there's this
Speaker 1: really nice understanding that for one thing, they offer him
Speaker 1: a seat the to Panga and her weirdos offer him
Speaker 1: a seat at their table, and he isn't rude about it.
Speaker 1: He's it's a He just says, you know, I'm going
Speaker 1: to sit with them, and we all understand. But we
Speaker 1: also let him know if you ever need to return,
Speaker 1: there's always a seat for you here. And uh, you know,
Speaker 1: then Corey goes and sits back with his friends, and um,
Speaker 1: I remember the red hat moment, uh, and and the
Speaker 1: way we looked at each other. And I feel like
Speaker 1: I don't know if that was always in the script
Speaker 1: throughout the entire week, because, like David said, in the
Speaker 1: last episode, we talked about how it's like there's always
Speaker 1: the possibility that a character is going to return. There's
Speaker 1: no way you watch that red hat moment and not.
Speaker 1: Of course Tango's coming back. Of course she has to
Speaker 1: come back. Um. And so I remember specifically shooting Matt
Speaker 1: and wrapping that up and then being like, I think
Speaker 1: I'm going to have a job. I've mom was getting
Speaker 1: paid eleven o'clock at night in every episode subsequent. No,
Speaker 1: she wouldn't become a regular to like season three, Yeah,
Speaker 1: that was crazy. You were you were You weren't even
Speaker 1: guaranteed recurring for a while. I think after this episode,
Speaker 1: I got guaranteed thirteen for the rest of that for
Speaker 1: the rest of the season, but I didn't I got
Speaker 1: paid for I wasn't in actually thirteen. I think I
Speaker 1: got paid for thirteen, but I only ended up being
Speaker 1: in eleven. And then I think the following season, I
Speaker 1: was also guaranteed thirteen, but maybe did more that season.
Speaker 1: And then season three was when I was a full
Speaker 1: blown regular. Um, how is it? You look back and
Speaker 1: then it's like, really, Tapango wasn't a regular show season three.
Speaker 1: That's crazy, that's you know it was. There was also
Speaker 1: just a network. They only allowed so many regular and
Speaker 1: we had a big cast and wed and it was growing. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and I think before Site Unseen when the season started,
Speaker 1: Michael had added Minkas to the cast because he had
Speaker 1: already worked with Lee and he knew Lee was a
Speaker 1: known entity. Um, you know. And that's again, you know,
Speaker 1: Lee wasn't around for the second season, so it's like
Speaker 1: you had to shuffle. There were only so many characters
Speaker 1: the budget of the and then Tony Quinn came on
Speaker 1: second season, didn't he second season? Yeah said that, so
Speaker 1: it's like we added another regular right there. Yeah, Tony Quinn,
Speaker 1: who played Mr. Turner came on, um, and so yeah
Speaker 1: that we were just kind of adding characters and dropping characters,
Speaker 1: and other characters are coming on as guest stars. It
Speaker 1: was there's still very much finding themselves. UM. But I
Speaker 1: look back at this episode, there were so many iconic
Speaker 1: moments of this episode. There just the legendary. This is
Speaker 1: the most important episode in the history of Boy's World.
Speaker 1: I'm convinced. And David, we have you to thank for
Speaker 1: so much of it. And uh, you know, as I
Speaker 1: started the last episode, you just you've been so impactful
Speaker 1: in all of our lives, um, and we are so
Speaker 1: so grateful that you came here and broke this episode down.
Speaker 1: And it's I mean, you've you you taught me things,
Speaker 1: a million things. But even now I'm learning about how
Speaker 1: this whole process came to be. And I'm just so
Speaker 1: glad that you came and shared all your email. Yeah
Speaker 1: that sounds first of all, to see you guys, it
Speaker 1: is a great pleasure, and I thought, yeah, I'm going
Speaker 1: go back twenty year. Um, this is a really good
Speaker 1: way to do it. So thank you for asking well,
Speaker 1: thank you for for being here and walking through it
Speaker 1: with us. I'm again, I feel very safe. Yes, I
Speaker 1: always did. Yeah, you are an amazing conduit into the
Speaker 1: world of acting. That's for that's for sure. So thank you.
Speaker 1: Now we'll see each other again, I hope, so I
Speaker 1: absolutely hope. So thank you, Thank you for asking. Really
Speaker 1: great to see you all. Please come back again doing this? Yes,
Speaker 1: well you how many have you in season two? So
Speaker 1: you don't have to come back soon? I mean, thanks,
Speaker 1: really nice to see it. That was so wonderful to
Speaker 1: have him here and to break down that episode with
Speaker 1: us and to um Man pick his brain and hear
Speaker 1: his experiences. Yeah, you know, it's always like I mean,
Speaker 1: I think it's it'll be interesting to hear from our
Speaker 1: our listeners. Um. You know, we sort of take it
Speaker 1: for granted, like how important a director is. But it's
Speaker 1: one of those positions, like I think for a lot
Speaker 1: of people, the separation of a producer and a director
Speaker 1: and a writer, it's all kind of jumbled together and
Speaker 1: it's hard to understand. Um. But really, um, the director
Speaker 1: is the person who works the closest with the actors
Speaker 1: um and and and he spends all week rehearsing with them.
Speaker 1: So Michael Jacobs has so much of the creative um
Speaker 1: writing uh control Uh, David was really the person in
Speaker 1: the trenches with us every day. And you know, and
Speaker 1: whoever the director was that and so so nice that
Speaker 1: he came back, that he has all these positive memories
Speaker 1: of us, and and because I have such positive memories
Speaker 1: of him, so I looked to him as a huge
Speaker 1: mentor in my life. But I never I've talked to
Speaker 1: him since, you know, since this whenever he came back.
Speaker 1: I think in the sixth season he directed an episode two,
Speaker 1: but you know, we never really talked, and and we
Speaker 1: also just never you know, I never understood that when
Speaker 1: he left the show. You know, he obviously went on
Speaker 1: to other things, but um, you know I didn't. I
Speaker 1: was really nice to hear his thoughts on Michael and
Speaker 1: and and I'm the dynamic of our show because you know,
Speaker 1: when you're a kid, you just think that's why all
Speaker 1: shows are. Yeah. Well, I also think one of the
Speaker 1: things we tend not to do when our guest is
Speaker 1: actually on the air with us is is gush over them.
Speaker 1: And he's television royalty, I mean, from Designing Women, Boy
Speaker 1: Meets World, that seventies show that I mean, this guy
Speaker 1: has has to to sit there and speak with him.
Speaker 1: The way that we just did kind of as adults
Speaker 1: is so strange. But that's the thing I'm start wrapping
Speaker 1: my head around with a lot of these conversations, is
Speaker 1: having a conversation with these people that were so important
Speaker 1: when I was a kid, to then sit down and
Speaker 1: talk to him again as an adult is so interesting
Speaker 1: to me. It's just a whole new dynamic. Yeah, so
Speaker 1: uh yeah, thank you so much for coming on, David,
Speaker 1: and please come back. Yeah, I hope he does. Mayeah.
Speaker 1: So anyway, absolutely love that guy. Writer. I agree with you.
Speaker 1: He's like a mentor in my life. And yet it's
Speaker 1: funny because, like you said, I've never seen him since
Speaker 1: and he doesn't know that. So it's crazy to think
Speaker 1: that like you can have like he had such an
Speaker 1: impact in our life. And I guarantee you he's never
Speaker 1: once thought, you know, I bet, I bet Danielle and
Speaker 1: Rider and Will I bet those guys think of me
Speaker 1: as a mentor. But yet you could have had that
Speaker 1: much of an impact in somebody's life and you have
Speaker 1: no idea. Well more so for the two of you,
Speaker 1: because this is what you do. Became directors and four
Speaker 1: camera director, I mean, you direct other things. But that's
Speaker 1: the kind of the bread and butters at the four
Speaker 1: camera sitcom and this is the this is the man
Speaker 1: you looked up to to do it. So it's in
Speaker 1: an approach to acting, I mean like listening to him
Speaker 1: talk about what he how he you know, in the process,
Speaker 1: like he understands it so well, and he gives actors
Speaker 1: so much permission and support. And I remember, you know
Speaker 1: you feel that as a kid especially, it was palpable
Speaker 1: that this person respected us, respected our input, wanted us
Speaker 1: to come up with our own stuff like that dance Daniel.
Speaker 1: Like the fact that he turned that back on you
Speaker 1: like any I've worked with so many directors, especially directors
Speaker 1: who direct kids, who are just like give him a
Speaker 1: cookie and make him say the line, you know, just
Speaker 1: do the thing, like come on, do it like this,
Speaker 1: let me give you a line reading. He never did that,
Speaker 1: and that it was like the greatest gift for us
Speaker 1: as actors, um that we wouldn't have had. Otherwise we
Speaker 1: would not have had that, and we had it immediately
Speaker 1: following David Trainer with Jeff McCracken for season three and four.
Speaker 1: So are the first four years the most formidable years
Speaker 1: of our you know, TV careers, were with two of
Speaker 1: the most incredible, like minded directors, two generating. Absolutely, and
Speaker 1: it's also it's it's one of those things where you
Speaker 1: imagine how different the show would have been had it
Speaker 1: not started with David Tran exactly. It would have just
Speaker 1: all of us would have been different actors who wouldn't
Speaker 1: do different people if that was not the kind of
Speaker 1: anchor we had on the set every day for two seasons.
Speaker 1: So yeah, thank thank thank thank god he was there. Absolutely,
Speaker 1: be sure to follow us on Pod Meets World Show
Speaker 1: on Instagram or email us your thoughts and opinions at
Speaker 1: Pod meets World Show at gmail dot com. And we
Speaker 1: have very exciting news that our first ever podcast merch
Speaker 1: is now available coming out. We have Pod Meets World Show,
Speaker 1: which rolls right off the tongue for me, as you know.
Speaker 1: Pod Meets World Show dot com is our website, and
Speaker 1: you can purchase our very first pod shirt Merch odd shirt,
Speaker 1: Pod Mech shirt one, our pod Merchrch, purchase the pod Merch.
Speaker 1: I'm still going to come up with a song. Guys
Speaker 1: were professional actors. We are pod merch po merch. That's easier.
Speaker 1: Just the pod merchant pod Meets World Show dot com
Speaker 1: right off the tongue, We Love You All pod dismissed
Speaker 1: Pod Meets World as an I heart podcast, produced and
Speaker 1: hosted by Daniel Fisher, Wilfredel and Writer Strong. Executive producers
Speaker 1: Jensen Carpin, Amy Sugarman Executive in charge of production, Danielle Romo,
Speaker 1: producer and editor, Tara sud Bash producer, Loraine Verruez, engineer
Speaker 1: and Boy Meets World super fan Easton Allen. Our theme
Speaker 1: song is by Kyle Morton of Typhoon. Follow us on
Speaker 1: Instagram at Pod meets World Show or email us at
Speaker 1: pod Meets World Show at gmail dot com