Lock the gate. All right, let's do this, how are you? What the fuck is what the fuck buddies? What the fuck sticks? What the fuck? And this does what's happening? I'm Marc Maron. This is my podcast. Welcome to it. If you're new here, I appreciate you coming by. How's everybody holding up? Yeah, there's still a massive amount of anxiety and panic and isolation going on. And I just wanted to acknowledge that at the outset here.

I know that many of you are home bound and locked in and things are more terrifying. It is here as well. In California. It seems that fucking covid is out of control. And I know there's a vaccine on the horizon, I don't know when I'll be able to get it, but for some reason. I don't know my brain, I guess my brain is just fizzled out on it, I've hit a wall with the fear and I'm in some other zone, I'm in some other zone with it.

I've crossed over. I'm still hyper vigilant.

But, man, I, I've been on set, as you know, many of you.

I've begun work on this movie and it's it's it's been good. I'm fucking happy to be working. But but more than that, it's not even about the work I will talk about in a second.

I do want to tell you that today I talked to Scott Glenn, who I talked to him a few months ago, actually, you know him from the right stuff.

Silence of the Lambs Hunt for Red October Training Day, The leftovers he was in the Marines, one of his first acting jobs was on Apocalypse Now.

He's got a lot of great stories, but we did do it a few months ago is before the election and we held it.

We have to hold on to things sometimes because he's got this movie coming out called Greenland, and it will be released on demand this Friday, December 18th.

But I was a little intimidated. I didn't know how that would go. I didn't know if he was a big talker. But, man, he was fired up, man. Scott Glenn was. And up where I think he's in Idaho, fired up up there in his in his bunker, he's not in a bunker. But I like people who get out of this fucking town, who go out and live a life. I'm thinking about doing that myself.

Would that be all right? I've talked about it before. Can I go live a life somewhere else?

But I love my fucking house anyways.

People, you all right? How's the kid? All right. How's the other one? That one, OK. They're doing all right. Driving you crazy. What's happening? Have you figured out a way to stay away from each other during the day so you can at least pretend like you like each other later? I'm not talking about your kid. I'm talking about, you know, your significant other.

If you guys figured out a way to work it so you can maintain the love and not just be stripped down to the bare essentials and wondering whether or not you'll be able to tolerate each other on the other side of this, I got to assume, folks, and I don't mean to be sad or negative or by anybody out, but, man, if you make it through this.

As a marriage, as a parent, and you come out the other side of this with nothing but deep and more in depth, love in your heart for all involved you have have graduated into decent human hood. I'll tell you that, man, I got to assume that some people were just ripped raw and stripped bare and wondering what the fuck they're doing with everybody involved. Who are you? Why are you here? I never wanted you to see this.

Get away from me. Get away from me. You don't know me. You don't know me.

I do. Now you're the person that yells you don't know me at me. That's right.

That you don't know me. I do now, though.

And I love this part of you. I love the part of you that screaming you don't know me at me. Where are our children? What have you done with our children?

What is happening? Who am I talking about?

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Get help. You know, help me. The other day I actually had to throw away some ice cream.

I know it sounds harsh. It sounds crazy. But had to do it. I had to throw away some ice cream. Shit was getting crazy. Clementine's in St. Louis, sent me all this fucking rich, amazing ice cream, and it turned on me and I couldn't taste the difference between anything anymore and all I could taste was just a spoonful of self-hatred.

Every time I eat it, and I don't think that's a good promo, it's like a warm spoonful of self-hatred with each bite. Isn't that most fucking good food?

Hey, look, whatever I made it through. I'm back on it, I worked out yesterday when on my hike dodging massacres, Armenians both ways.

What did I do on the hike yesterday that you want to listen to?

Honestly, not that they need any promotion, but I'm just saying that if there are any top 10, top 20 rock record with don't include Arrowsmith's first record, then there's something wrong with that list. The fucking guitar sounds on that. What am I just being an Aerosmith fan boy right now? I don't like Aerosmith for the whole arc, but the first four records. Oh, fuck.

Because I say, well, this time it's fucking list time, folks.

The lists are coming and just realized that a lot of times these lists, depending on the outlet, it's just content garbage. But sometimes they're just put together by one dummy, you know, maybe two dummies with an agenda.

I saw like 100 best album lists that had like I think like 40 Radiohead records on it, like Radiohead records that no one could even get Radiohead records that were only available to the members of Radiohead. And Mike, I don't think this list is really objective, not that any of us can be objective. But, you know, Radiohead sessions in the cellar at the place where they were practicing, done by the guy who works there.

No, no, that's not one of the top 100 best rock records. I'm just saying there's a lot of us are incredible. And I guess it's all opinion anyways. I do know that one which I found to be incredibly on point was the Vulture best comedy special for 20/20 list, because that as the number one best comedy special 20/20, they had Marc Maron end times finding.

And I thought to myself, finally, finally someone understood it and it was the comedy nerds of culture. Thank you. Thank you, Vulture. I get no award love. I get no general.

I got you know, I, I just felt I'll be honest with you, I'm not just blowing smoke up my own ass because I don't do yoga, but.

I do I do believe that is my best work and I'm proud of it and I'm happy that it was recognized.

Take care of yourselves.

Right. Use whatever options you have at your disposal to maintain your sanity without hurting yourself or others.

So I'm on set and it's a very safe set, I'm shooting this film, it's called To Leslie, the director is a guy named Michael Morris.

I'm working with Andrea Riseborough and Andre Royo primarily, I did not really know Andrea Rossborough or know what a fucking, you know, inspired acting genius she was.

I know Andre. He's great. And we're hanging out having some laughs in our masks, having laughs in our masks.

So out of a skorton and Weiping on set all the time, they got a whole crew of squirters and wipers.

And this is not too easy a joke.

I'm not going to do that. But it's you know, when you're shooting a small movie, the way the way it works is the only people that ever don't have a mask. It's the actors.

We're getting tested three times a week, which is a beautiful perk because I enjoy testing, as I've established over the time on this show, over the covid times I've established. I do like to be tested.

But, you know, I am not as confident as I would like to be in general or as an actor, but it's funny being alone and not being sort of engaged in some sort of codependent relationship or or even in a day to day relationship of love and intimacy and all that, where there there seems to be almost a a constant need for reassurance.

I think that's part of a healthy relationship, maybe not constant, but the occasional need for reassurance or at least knowing that they love you.

You know, Lynn's been gone a while now and I carry her with me. I carry her sense of who I was with me. I carry her faith in me as an actor, her belief in me as an artist. I carry that with me because she she gave me those gifts of of making me feel like I was good.

And, you know, after 40 years or 30 years, however long I've been doing comedy, how, you know, I know I'm good and I know I've gotten better. I know I'm comfortable. But sometimes it's nice to be showered with love and support.

But now, for the first time in my life. I'm self generating that what an interesting new experience. Hey, hey, Mark, you doing all right? You're doing OK, Mark. Who the fuck are you? I'm you, man. Are you sure that I'm doing all right? Yeah, dude, you're doing OK and you're working hard.

And you should you should feel proud of yourself. Hey, go fuck yourself. I mean, you're bullshitting me, right? No, man, I'm you. Yeah, that's what you say. But are you me? Yeah, I'm you. And I'm proud of you.

Oh, gross. Gross. What does that even mean? It means I'm proud of us. Oh, now we're together.

Yeah. Finally. Oh really. You think so. Yeah, OK. OK, I'll hang out with you. We are doing a good job, so. But I got on set, you know, and I was nervous, but here's here's the beautiful thing about being present and being in scenes is that when you're doing these movies, these smaller movies and even, you know, TV shows without big budgets, there's no readthrough.

I mean, you've got to show up, ready for work, ready with your choices, ready to engage. And you usually kind of rehearse on set, you know, in the first couple takes. But we're shooting on film and it's intense.

And that's why I'm calling her by her character's name.

Andrea has to really put a lot of things together before each take. You know, she's a professional and she's got to get in something deep.

But there's not a lot of time for us to engage as as each other or we're on set as the as the characters there are.

Sometimes when I'm in a moment and we're having I need to be received emotionally when I'm acting. And I think that's part of it. And she's such a good actress that, like, I don't know if she's pretending to receive me or she actually is. But either way, it's fine because I'm feeling it in my heart and like sometimes like on set when I'm watching her work or her, she's going through emotional things. I get choked up, but I realize, like, the characters shouldn't be choked up.

Mark So you're going to have to shove that shit down. So I don't know if that reads like, you know, I look at this poor man who's struggling with his heart because that guy, the guy I'm playing, definitely does that. And maybe that's exactly what I need to do. But I do know I shouldn't be scared now.

Tears. So hold that back. And I guess that's just part of being in it in the scene.

You know, shit, we had to do a scene that was very engaged. And, you know, you've got to get your lines together and you've got to get ready, you know, and it's a quick day. It's a quick shoot. And there's not a lot of takes which are shooting on film. So you got to be you know, you got to be in it.

And, you know, we had not really ever you know, this is like Friday and we'd been working together five days and we'd not really rehearse together. And she was just sort of like, can we just do this? And I'm like, yes, please.

Anything you need, you are the star. However, I can help us do this. Let's do it.

And we just kind of hold up and rehearse for the first time, like going through the lines and going through the scenes and getting it right and kind of connecting as people. And it was very moving to me. She's an amazing actress. And and I and I didn't feel like I got to know her at all until Friday when she's like, can we run this?

And I'm like, let's run it all day, Andrea. Let's I'll run it all day long with you.

I don't know and I have a hard time admitting this, but, you know, I think I am doing pretty good work, but I'm more than that. Like, I'm excited that I know how to do it, to be on a set to that I've achieved some sort of experience with working as an actor.

And, you know, I'm kind of proud of myself and I hate saying that I hate it.

But but I'm proud of myself. And I hope I don't die of covid or get it first, OK, but I'll tell you one thing. The last few days I felt very at peace with a lot of things, and I don't really know why. I don't know what to attribute it to. But I I've been very at peace with a lot of things. And I have very little control over almost anything, and it's OK. So Scott Glenn is a great actor and intimidating if until you meet him and then he's just a little less intimidating and very engaging.

His new natural disaster movie, Greenland, will be available on demand this Friday, December 18th. And we recorded this this talk before the election. But, man, did I did I like talking to him. This is me talking to Scott Glenn and.

I'm still new to doing this shit, so, hey, how many of you done you just started?

I didn't think for what was it for GQ it was called.

Oh yeah. Iconic parts of the actors who played them.

Oh, nice. And which which role was that for? It was for a whole bunch of them starting where I think that they began with urban cowboy rides throughout October of Silence of the Lambs, Silverado, blah, blah, blah.

I think that one of my I think a childhood memory I came upon this morning was that you playing with that worm in your mouth in Urban Cowboy? Yeah, that was an accident, was it?

Yeah, we were. We finished shooting for the night and it was Mesko consuegra salad with your worm. And I said to Jim Bridges, the director, you know, I know how to get the worm out of the out of this bottle. Why don't we shoot it and gross everybody out? And. And he said, great, we'll put a macro lens. How do you do it? And it's a game I played in another part of my life down south Texas where everybody puts a hundred bucks in the table, right?

Yeah. Pass the ball around.

The first person gets the worm, gets all the cash and what typically people gringo's people are unused to doing that kind of shit as they try to get the worm and they passed out from drinking too fucking much nasco. Right. And what you do is you stick your tongue in the neck of a bottle, hold it up, wait for the so you can feel the worm, hit your tongue, then take in as big a gulp as possible.

And what I did was I held the worm against the roof of my mouth, swallowed the Mesko and used my tongue to shove the worm back out and then chewed it back into my mouth to really be totally fucking disgusting.

But the but the plan was just to fuck with people in the editing room, not to publish it every hour, hour dailies that they used to do this with, movies all the time, everybody involved. And now if you were a caterer, driver cast, everybody came to dailies. And so it was just it was just it was just a joke for four dailies. And Jim saw and he said that's going to be one of the most memorable memorable scenes in this movie.

Stuck in it. You know, a movie is on your side when a lot of the best stuff are accidents.

Yeah. I mean, it's it seemed to have scarred me, so it's stuck. I'm no good.

Where are you from? I grew up in Albuquerque, New Mexico. Families from Jersey, but I grew up in Albuquerque. How about you?

Pittsburgh, really? How long did you live in Pittsburgh? I lived in Pittsburgh until I until I joined the service as a as a six month reservist. And since it was in the sixties, I was briefly activated a couple of times and got my discharge. November twenty seventh. Nineteen sixty fucking seven.

So you just missed it huh. Kind of. I don't talk a whole lot about that. Oh really. But nevertheless I was and it will be past the grave. A United States Marine.

So there is a big life changer I guess. I mean I don't know. What was your dad doing in Pittsburgh. What was the family business snap on tools.

Oh, really? Yeah. And he was a salesman and then worked his way up through the history of the company. And for me, Parris Island was probably the best three months of education I ever had in my life because I was really a. Pretty much an arrogant cocksucker, and, I mean, I needed the discipline of those three months and then what came afterwards was some it was great and some not so great.

And so were you in those cases where like if you didn't go into the service, you might have ended up in jail? I mean, what was the childhood like?

Yeah, I could have.

I know that that future was always a looming possibility, but and also the part of Pittsburgh that I came from, nobody was drafted.

So if you were smart, you could either join the Coast Guard or become a pilot, either in the Air Force or or the Army or the Marine Corps. And if you weren't smart, your options were first a second airborne United States Marine Corps. And I'm just going to go with the first till someone told me that I could join the Marines and also be airborne. So I thought, oh, that's cool. And I'll do that. I did not avoid the draft five times from fucking bone spurs in a foot, which saw me say, oh, I can't remember which foot I had my fucking bone spurs in.

That was no.

Yeah, yeah. No, it does not seem like it. And yeah, these fucking these cowardly rich kids. Right.

Well you know, I mean, no I'm not to be too serious or okay if I am. Sir John McCain was a huge was and is a huge hero of mine. When I heard where the douchebag calling and said I don't like people who are caught with multiple I think it was 20, I don't want over combat runs over Hanoi, shot out of the sky, beaten up, busted over 30 bones in your body. And then when you're incredibly influential, Dad, when the when the NBA found out that he was admiral of the Pacific and you were offered a ride home to say no, you know, in the next day, they hung him up by his buddies, by his by his wrists and, you know.

Week, week and a half later, disrespect to Gold Star family, I guess because Muslims don't give a shit if you're a three headed fucking marshal, you lose a son or daughter fighting for this country. You're all owed all the respect, I think, the rest of your fucking life. And then stick a dagger in the heart of the Kurds, who, while we are fighting ISIS for brave special forces operators, died at eleven thousand Kurds and.

How did we get on this subject? It's like he's a fucking monster, dude. I was thinking about it today, you know, about the new movie, like about about Greenland. And it's like I'm watching this movie and like all these movies are being made, you know, like a couple of years ago with apocalyptic themes and they're being released. And I'm like, I can just look outside, dude, my fucking states on fire, you know?

Oh, man. Are you in L.A. now? Yeah. Yeah. Holy shit.

I said, yeah, I saw pictures of it today.

What's going on up there? You're in Idaho. Yeah, there is, Carol. What's there like today, which sucks, right? Yeah, it sucks up here. It's not as bad as you have it, but the numbers, I think we're 70, so not good.

So the Marines that like, I can feel the impact, like even when you were just talking about service, I got kind of choked up. And I think that yeah, I guess that's where you kind of developed the depth of your character as a person.

I you know, I guess so. I it's it's really a good experience, I think even briefly, to be in a spot where you take orders and go for something bigger than yourself. And it wouldn't you know, I have one of my best friends also no longer alive, was didn't believe in in the military on any level.

So he joined the Peace Corps Center. Right. Just had the experience of thinking about for half a second about somebody else and trying to take care of him for a while, that's all. Yeah.

Yeah. I think I think that's what that's what's supposed to make humans different than other animals in a way. Yeah.

I mean, when you're talking about the apocalyptic I mean in California, holy shit. You've got you've got coronavirus and climate change both smacking you in the face at the same time.

Yeah. Now I've got to wear masks just to breathe. It's not just the body.

I went on I went on a hike today because I can't not get physical or I'd go crazy. I put it in ninety five mask on. I did.

I kept it on the whole fucking way just because you would you you keep him fucking solid shape what you did. What did you eat for breakfast there Scott. Oh God.

I had I shit. I had a protein drink. Yeah. A couple of pieces of toast and about a half a gallon of coffee.

Nice. Yeah I do a half a gallon of coffee too. I mean we're in it.

We're in it. Carol and I, my wife and I are kind of still in quarantine. She's a potter. Yeah. Brilliant potter. So she's her work hasn't stopped at all. She's in the studio throwing pots and fire and glazy. I'm a pottery fan.

I want to know tell me how can I look at her stuff? I like buying pottery. You know what she sent you? I worked it out with the producers. I'll send you a link for you can check out her stuff. And she has a book. She's brilliant. She's easily the best artist in this family. What's her name? Carole.

Carole Glenn. Oh, that's great. I'm I was Carole Schwartz. But now, OK, I'm a huge I don't know why I've taken that.

I love pottery. I buy a lot of pottery. I was just up and talked about some pots.

I'm a big fan of it. Yeah, me too. Yeah, I guess you would be. How long has she been throwing pots.

She's been throwing pots for fifty years. Fifty years. Yeah. We've been married.

This will be our fifth, the second wedding anniversary. Holy shit. Wow. Yeah. So she's been since just right around the time we hooked up she started throwing and firing and still is doing it.

It's interesting to me because it seems like there's you know, I don't know you obviously, but but to come out of the Marines and then, you know, choose a life of of the arts, I mean, that seems it seems it's not counterintuitive, but it's unique.

And also to have this to have a wife who's an artist. I mean, how did how did that happen? How did you know?

My life is a terrible lesson for other people because I wouldn't I tried not to even give it to my two daughters, but for me. The best thing I can do is walk outside. See how high can jump up in the air and find out which way the wind blows me, because every really good thing that's ever happened to me has been an accident. And that's just the truth. From meeting her to I never planned to be an actor. I took acting classes in New York.

I wanted to be a writer and poetry and short stories and shit like that. And I was talking to a friend of mine and she said, and I had gone to job. On a sports desk of a newspaper in the Virgin Islands, it was silence. Yeah. And I thought, you know, go to the Virgin Islands, hang out with a lot of opportunities and live a good life and write poetry and the great American novel. And she said.

Why don't you go to New York and take an acting class, and I went, for what reason? And she said, I'll be honest with you, Scott, your description of your places and action and ideas is not that OK, but your dialogue essentially sucks. And it's it's it's stiff. It's not real. The minute you put words in anyone's mouth, whether it's a poem or short story or whatever, you lose it. She said you're not doing anything for six months.

If you get up in front of people and say words, it'll kick you in your ass to listen to the way people really speak. And if you're dealing with theater, you'll be dealing with arguably the best dialogue ever written.

So after I got over maybe 30 seconds of being hurt and angry, somebody telling me the truth, I thought, you know, she's right.

Yeah, I drove to New York and I got a couple of jobs. One as a bricklayer are turning a burlesque house into a rock theater, the Fillmore East. And you were laying bricks for the Fillmore down on the Lower East Side.

Yeah, yeah. And then and then drop briefly as it sounds like bullshit when they called it a bouncer. When I got really good because I'm a skinny guy and but I got really good at buying people drinks and stopping fights. And so I got a couple of jobs and.

The first day I looked up acting as the Village Voice, nothing under a Underberg off, I didn't know I Berghof Studios, I got a hold of this guy. I don't know if you know Bill Hickey.

His name was Heikki. He was. Yeah, yeah. That that famous. You almost had his voice. Forsett Yeah. Yeah. Bailly He was nominated for an Academy Award.

Prizzi's Honor. Exactly right. Yeah. And I got him on the phone and he said he gave me a monologue to work on. He should come by Wednesday. So like eleven o'clock in the morning Wednesday in the basement at Bank Street, I walked out in front of probably seven or eight people. Yeah. And literally this is true literally before I open my mouth for the first and only time, my life was like a light bulb went off between my eyes and I thought, holy shit, I'm an actor like that fast.

And it was like and it wasn't, oh, I love this. I want to express myself or anything like that. I was like. My life made sense to me for the first time ever, really, I like instantly thought, you know, I daydream all the time. I live in these fantasy. So this is this is what I'm meant to do. And I and Bill saw it and he looked at me. He started to laugh and he said, that's right, you're one of us.

And then he turned to the seven people who were trying to still wake up, probably. And you said Scott's not going to finish this scene. He's got a walk. He's got to go outside, walk around the block a couple of times and think about things.

And he was right. I went to I got a phone call. My mom, dad, dad, I'm not go to the Virgin Islands. And they thought maybe I was going to go back into the States. I'm not going to go back into the Marine Corps. I'm going to be active.

And my dad. Said the smartest thing any father could say about something like that and and very few ever would, he said, I don't know anything about what you're telling me, son. The only advice I can give you is don't give yourself any deadlines. Don't say if I haven't made it in four years, he said. That's like starting a race with a lead weight hanging around the neck in for a penny, in for a pound. You love it.

Make it your life. Holy shit. And I did.

But that's what an amazing thing for that guy to say. Yeah. You guys, you were tight.

Yeah, I you know, I mean, I grew up in disgustingly functional family. My mom and dad loved each other to the very end. Long marriage. Got along with them, Gray was all good and, well, they feel that that's some testament, that would be why you are also you are still married and grounded, right?

Yeah. Yeah. I'm lucky to be with. I'm lucky to be with a woman who's not only amazingly beautiful and talented, but, you know, has on her mom's side of the family, she's. How many generations, Carol, 20 to. Around twenty two unbroken generations of Orthodox rabbis. So there's a rich there's a rich background that this woman comes from. Wow.

I just come from Jewish tailors in Russia.

But that's cool. Where where do the Orthodox rabbis go? What what part of Eastern Europe is she from? Hungary. Oh, yeah.

We my family goes back into into the pale of settlement in Russia. So you're you're Jewish now, is that true? Yeah.

I converted a good friend of mine, the amazing guy. I went to see him. As it turns out, he was a rabbi with a shoe in the Upper East Side. But he had been just a very amazing, interesting kind of activist guy and I said. Made me a Jew, I want to be a Jew, and he said, Schmock, I'll live for you and I'll tell her parents I didn't do it and you don't want to do that.

And I went, I really did.

And and and I don't want to do it for her parents. I just make me and make me a Jew.

And he said, you know, he said, I'm a conservative rabbi and I don't really hang with conversions that much, but I know other rabbis don't do it. So I'll get a hold of one of them. But I just as soon not I went OK, and I started walking. I was sure, he said with an asshole turned around and I did. And he said, stop her parents. It's not. He said, what do you know about the Talmud?

And I said, if a man teaches his son no trade, it is as if it taught him highway robbery. And he said, You've read the Talmud. And I see a lot of it. I have. He said, Do you accept it is the word of God? And I said, no. I said a lot of wisdom. But if you ask me what resonates with me more than any other of those kind of works, it's probably Lautz is the way of life.

And he said, then why do you want to be a Jew? And I said, honestly, if there was no such thing as anti-Semitism, we wouldn't be sitting here talking. But I love this woman and I don't know how long it's going to last year, what's going to go on. But we both like to travel. And I just simply don't want to be anywhere in the world or somebody is going to be pointing a gun at her, not me, for the same reason.

And he said he looked at me. So I sat down and he said after me all that. I said, what were you what are you doing? He said, I'm converting everything. Why? And he said, I've never had that answer to that question. And he said, You want to take a target and put it on your back. I am obligated to convert you. So he did. There you go.

And now you're just too happy targets. Too happy target. Yeah. Yeah.

Well, welcome to the club. So so now.

So you studied with Hicky and you went back to the class, I assume. And that was the that was the beginning of the.

Yeah, that was the beginning. And it was a. In a lot of ways, the late 60s, early 70s, I think was a much easier time for actors to learn their trade in New York than, say, right now, because there was so much off off Broadway happening, if you wanted back then, if you wanted to work at the Lamamra, if you were willing to run props and paid Flach, you had a part in the play now.

Yeah.

And I imagine the third thing on that list would be to be naked and paint yourself red as well.

Well, there's that too. Yeah. And and you know. Yeah, that didn't happen to me till later on when I did Kilojoule. I didn't have to paint myself red, but I did have to walk around therapy.

What's killer killer Joe?

Joe was originally and in its best form, not a movie, but it was a play by Tracy. Let's examine him. Right.

And Friedkin made it a digital movie guy, and I never was one of those deals. Some some pieces are really meant to be what they were originally, nothing else. And Killer Joe, we did it in a theater that held a little less than two hundred people with very low ceilings. So it was fucking claustrophobic. And the people that came to see that play, it was like they were all jammed into a trailer on the outskirts of Dallas where the thing took place.

And there's just no way we had a fight scene at the end of the play. It was not choreographed. It was improv every single night and so on. Amanda Plummer through her neck out three times. I think she broke her wrist. I had a cracked collarbone. It was it was a crazy, crazy experience that there is no way you could duplicate any of that stuff on screen.

You originated that play with Tracy. You know, it was originated in Chicago. There is Tracy comes from Steppenwolf. And they were doing was either I can't I can't remember whether it was Steppenwolf proper or one of those experimental offshoots, but he brought the play from Chicago to to New York with Michael Shannon, with a couple of the original people from Chicago, and then the add ons where we're we're we're Daudi that were were two different actors should play that part.

Right. And Amanda Plummer and myself. And wow, it was a it was a it was a great experience because you have to it was comedy, which is fantastic because it ain't working. If they're not laughing at circus skills, you be able to do pratfalls and all that kind of stuff. Right. And be willing to be naked, both emotionally and physically in front of people. And so I I remember when we started doing the thing I said to Amanda.

This is great training, but this you know, this play could potentially kill us and she said, you know, it's such an extreme play, we'll probably split the critics down the middle.

And you have to worry about we'll be here for we'll do our long are endless previews. In our case, it was, I think, a couple of months of previews.

We'll open and we'll close in a week or two. What happened was we got great reviews and we're essentially adopted by the New York Times magazine section. And remember, right after it came out, I was walking to the theater and three blocks away from the fucking theater, the limos were lined up.

Yeah, I walked in and Amanda was there and she said, woops, we're going to be doing this for a while. And that was six months. We did it. And then I went to New Zealand to make a movie.

So you're saying in the mid 60s that or the late 60s it was a good time for actors if they were willing to sort of, you know, do everything?

Yeah, there was a ton of work. There is improv. I mean, I remember we did one play. We started on the streets. We started at Battery Park and worked our way up to the George Washington Bridge.

And that was the actual play.

Neither there is these were were theater games, improvs, just picking up on things and trying to either make something happen. No, what you go too quickly is humor. Right.

And if you had the chops and you thought you could pull it off, you could also take improv, can go in other directions, as John Cassavetes has put it. But doing improv when you're doing it for. Things other than laughs is tricky business. What did you you worked with Altman a couple of times. I mean, what was it like on Nashville? I mean, that character was that improvised.

Nashville was not improvised. Tewkesbury wrote that script. She called it a patchwork quilt. But the way that you did things, I have had a tiny part in Nashville. And I remember that it was a scene in a hospital. And I went over to Bob and I said, how do you want me to do this? I mean, I could I think I could actually be funny and or I could hopefully have some pathos, maybe break your heart.

Maybe we said, where do you want me to go with this? And he said, You're the fucking actor, not me.

I have no idea. He said, You don't. Scott, you're doing the only job in this movie that I can't do. I can write better than the lighting guy. I can cook better than I can. I don't I don't know. You do it. And I said. What do you want? And he said, this is what I want. I want to see your performance in dailies and say, yes, that's real. That happened.

I said, that's it. Yeah, but you chose like that part.

Even though it may not have been big, the choices you made were kind of, you know, powerful because it's a memorable little part because you were so the obsession or whatever you felt for that singer was it seemed it seemed to kind of reveal itself as something genuine, like like love. And it was sort of a moving thing.

Well, thank you. It was. And that was kind of what I was going for. I mean, I was I was telling you, my good luck is really the name of my life and yeah, good accident. My Masters, when I moved to Hollywood, both of whom were thought of at the time as outlaws, were Bob Altman and Francis Coppola. Right. And you know, with Francis, I played really a tiny part. But in the most amazing movie, American movie, I think of Apocalypse Now.

Yeah. Yeah. You were you were there on the on the on the shore, right. As the boat pulled up, I was the guy that went up the river ahead of Merce Colby. Yeah, exactly right.

You know, it's weird, dude. I was just in New Mexico. I spent a couple of weeks in Taos and I visited Dennis's grave.

Oh, did you know? I didn't know him at all, but I had heard he was buried up there and this little weird kind of like Mexican cemetery that wasn't even attached to a church because he loved it up there. And it was such a moving thing. I went twice and just spent time over there because, you know, with those kind of rough kind of Mexican cemeteries where, you know, it seems like people keep contributing to the grave that you could there was sort of a celebration to it.

It wasn't morose. Yeah. And and just being there, I felt I thought I was really connected to him as an actor. I didn't know him. He was.

He was God, I don't know. I loved him, he was crazy, really crazy. I mean, I had that I had a chance, Francis, because of a bunch of events that happened, that Francis thought I'd saved his life, which I hadn't really. And but anyway, he he he said, you know, you've got a decent I was going to play a part of the Dulong Bridge, Guy Raz and seventy nine grenade launcher. It's in a movie.

It's a bigger part than what I wound up playing. Anyway, he said I'm a great writer because I think you maybe saved my life and helped out. We were hit with a typhoon in the Philippines and screwed us up a lot. And I helped out son. So he said, just tell me apart.

You won't you want me to write and I'll write you a phenomenal part in this movie. I said, I want to be in the end of the movie. And he said, that's the only part I can I can't do that. But it's completely cast. It's Dennis Hopper. It's Marlon Brando. It's the people. He said, I mean, if you want to play Kobe, the guy that went up the river ahead of them. You can do that, but I don't even have any lines right now, maybe I can give you a line, but essentially you'd be just a glorified extra.

But if you want to do it, OK, it's not going to start. We won't even get to that part of the movie for sure. At least four or five months. And I'll have to figure something else for you to do here in the Philippines. In the meantime, do you really want that? And I said, yeah, I really, truly want it because I realize the acting is like serving an apprenticeship. And yet you don't work out of a book or you're an actor and a comic.

Do you learn is there any is there any school other than stand up that can teach you what stand up can teach you?

No, definitely not. Well, I was going to get to work with Marlon fucking Brando and Dennis Hopper at the end of this movie in the middle of all of this insanity. And I realized I had to and I was the smartest thing I ever did a three or four months ago. Francis may have been five or six. I'm so screwed up with time now.

He has been endowment, but he released the final cut of apocalypse.

Another one. I went and saw it and I told him, I said, you know, I've never said this before, but I really hope you gave me the greatest gift that anybody can give. Certainly a performing artist, if not any artist. And he so I and I said the gift of self-confidence. Before I gone to the Philippines, I go to like Universal and and I audition for some TV show and, you know, and they would say, you know, you squint too much and you don't you don't do this enough and you don't do that enough and you're not going to get the part.

But you and I would get kind of angry. But I walk out thinking, shit, maybe I should go back to New York and maybe I'm just can't do this in front of a camera, you know, and and then after apocalypse, I'd have the same exact experience. But at the end of it, when they would tell me about what a shitty job I'd done, I'd say, who the fuck are you?

I just finished working with Marlon Brando and Dennis Hopper and Victoria fucking Storaro and Francis Coppola. And by the way, you can't direct traffic. How's that? And they said you're not coming back to Universal. And of course, a month or so later, I was back in Universal, even made more money. It's right.

It's a gift to not give a fuck. It's a gift to be able to say fuck you. And it's a gift to realize that these people are talented at almost nothing.

Very true. Yeah.

I asked Bobtown, I said also I noticed. I said, why? These people wouldn't let me get in the front door to their office. Now I live in Idaho and they're all offering me, you know, big parts and big films. And he and Bob said, that's because you come into an office now, you bring the Sawtooth Mountains in with you and they are all fucking jealous. They all went. That's why.

Do you talk to him still? Is he still around? I you know, I'm going to have to call him up in the next day or two because I don't know if you've had this experience or not, but it's like when you're making a movie or working on a TV show. Yeah, I guess so tight with the people. It's kind of like your best friend in fourth grade was going to be your best friend forever. Right. And then three years later, you can barely remember their name.

It's a weird thing. It's a weird secret little it's almost like you have this life that you you spend the life with them from birth until like almost like death and in a six month period. And then you walk away from it and you don't miss him really. And it feels like a complete thing. But it's another universe or something.

It's a very weird you're on to the next one and you're like yourself best investing that whatever that part of your personality, you want to turn the volume up on and however you work.

So were you there on the set of apocalypse when K-Tel came and went? Yes. Oh, man. That must have been an entire lesson in show business of all on all levels. Yeah, it was.

Yes, it was. I know Harvey, Harvey, Harvey and I are brother Marines will be for our whole life. Right. And really a good guy. And I like him a lot with apocalypse. God, I'd better not say, OK, what was how did Francis think he saved his life when I got to begin with the way I got a part in Apocalypse.

It was. They cast all of the all of the major parts, everybody in the boat and all of that, and they were casting all of the know 30, 40, 50 smaller parts that were going to run throughout the film. Yeah, and what they did was they had a bunch of maybe I think was probably around 50 actors come over a long weekend to a soundstage in Hollywood. And there were folding tables all around in the center of the room and then folding chairs around the side.

And everybody would sit there and wait to be called. And Francis Wood with the ads would run improvs. And the first two days, nobody called me. So it was the final day was Sunday. I went in and I sat up against the wall again, and Frances came over and put up a card table right opposite where I was, but did not pick me that four guys. And he said, OK, this is what you're doing. You're floating down the Mekong River in a boat.

The engines are off. And you've got Playboy's Playboy magazines and you're having an argument, the four of you, over who should be playing Man of the Year. So go. So these guys start doing improvs on, you know, I'm a I'm an ass guy. No, I like this woman tonight. And they and they're and they're and they're doing great work. But I guess what I did was. Rolled my eyes to the sky and Francis stopped the work right away, he walked over to me, excuse me, I know I haven't called on you.

I don't even really know who you are, but don't make comments on people's work like that. These these guys are doing good work there. Really. And I said, no, no, I'm not commenting on their work. That's not why he said why you're your eyes. I said, you're floating on the Mekong River engines off and you're shouting like that, you're going to have a mortar in your fucking lap in five seconds, OK? You're dead.

You're going to have that fight like this. And he looked at me, he turned to the aid and he pointed me. He said, I want him in my movie. So I got to. So I get to the Philippines and they're all in a place called the Sand Valley. And I was called on. It was a it was a Japanese bunker that turned into some kind of a motel. And everybody in it in the film was staying there.

But it was the weekend. So they were all going back to Manila. Most of them went back to Manila. I think Marty stayed there with his kids. He lived away from the hotel. At any rate, they went back to Manila in the morning, late that afternoon, the worst typhoon to hit the Philippines since nineteen thirty two can roll in directly where we were. We were on an isthmus that was turned into an island. They thought we were dead for the first wow three days because we had no communication.

And with the you know, there was a woman, thank God she did, but she was dead and she was pregnant with twins. And as anybody here delivered a baby, I had to raise my hand because I did my second child I had in our bedroom in Topanga Canyon. So I'm upstairs, huh?

On purpose. Yeah. OK, hippy dippy.

Yeah. Yeah, on purpose. So.

So I set up an operating room for, you know, had the generator, we had no fuel. I said, can we run this on Long Island, which is coconut moonshine. I said yeah but you burn the generator up after two hours. I said fine, it's all I need is two hours but we'll do that. And we just sort of myself and a guy who had also a former Marine, I kind of got the place together. Two and a half days later, they flew back from Manila and Francis came in with the insurance adjuster because of the force majeure.

You can't just say, look, this is the worst typhoon to hit the Philippines. It started to give us our money. All of our assets are destroyed. We're going to have to close down for a while and start again. That's not the way it works. The way it works is an adjuster has to see you try to continue to shoot and in fact, see that it's impossible.

So they went down to what was a shot that was going to be at a very shallow, gently meandering stream that because of the typhoon, it turned into white water. Right. So Francis got in the boat with the insurance adjuster, Enrico Mitali, who is a camera operator. I'm sure I can borrow, like, four guys in the boat. Yeah. And they tied a rope to the back of the boat to let it out into this white water.

So they started to get in way. They could pull it back. And I'm a baby twenty five yards away and I'm seeing this whole thing happen. I'm thinking this is a disaster, because what's going to happen is the tide is going to take that boat straight down straight. The rope is going to go to pull down the back of the boat and it's going to sink. So the minute they let, they let it go. Being a Marine, I always had a knife on me.

I pulled out a knife, ran and cut the rope and the boat sort of went downstream a bit.

And they eventually got in and Francis said, who cut the rope? And they said he described it. So he thought potentially all I did was run and cut the rope. And then the next day, the helicopter pilot was ready to leave to go back to Manila and it was still raining sideways. And he said, we can't we can't go back because to fill this chopper up with jet fuel, if we get any water and we'll go down on our way back to Manila.

And I said, no problem, you fill the million of these things up. So I ran out and all you do is you shield that where you're putting the gas in with your back, your shield. You feel yourself being a block from the rain and you shoot into the. Into the opening where the fuel goes and some of it bounces back on. And I didn't have a shirt on, so I fill it up and top it off and I go back and I say, OK, you're good to go, there's no water in the fuel.

I guarantee you're not going to crash. But meanwhile, the front of my chest looked like I had a case of measles because of all the fucking jet fuel that was on at that point. Francis said, I'm a good writer. What do you want? And at that point, I said, I want to be in the end of the movie.

That's what I'm a. And he couldn't deliver it. He couldn't deliver it.

Well, I mean, it sounds like that thing, not unlike the Marines just being on that set with a life changing, you know. Yea.

I mean it was. Yeah, it was. And it kind of gave you all this confidence. It planted you in the business. You've got to spend time with these guys who you respected. I mean, Jesus, that's a great experience.

So Francis wanted he essentially wanted everything, each one of us to dive as deeply into our own personal lunacy as we possibly could. So for that for me, that meant living with there are probably a couple of hundred thousand of them altogether. We had about five hundred people from a tribe in northern New Zealand called the IFFCO, and I live with them house for four months that I learned a language. They took me into the tribe, gave me an African name, Kimaiyo.

And so for me that was the slide adventure of that was wonderful. But it also was a lesson on. Really immersing yourself in part and and and finding the not necessarily the lunacy, but the place and in whatever character you're playing with, the volume is really turned up.

The truth of the character. Yeah, interesting. Yeah. So like, when you do something like, you know, how do you carry that when you do the right stuff with the right stuff. One of my favorite movies, because you know, when you realize it's kind of a comedy, it becomes an it's like it elevates it somehow that there's definitely the tone of that movie outside of being sort of heroic and amazing about the astronauts. But there's so much humor in it and it's so cleverly done.

Yeah, but you were great in that. So when you trying like in the quest for truth of Alan Shepard, did you were you able to spend time with him?

No, I did.

I was I was given the option and I turned it down and I got it.

It's my observation that we you're going to place somebody. And there they know their image is going to be exploded onto a screen the size of a four story building. They will maybe without even intending it, edit themselves. I didn't do this. I didn't do I just didn't want. So I wanted every bit of footage on Alan Shepard that I could possibly get, including home movies, anything. And I wanted to talk to everyone who knew him. I didn't want to talk to him myself, partly because I didn't want to be edited and partly because I wanted whatever that inside to be mine.

It was Phil.. Phil sent me the script and he said, Here, pick your part. And he thought I was going to say, Chuck, he if I was going to say yes. And I said, I want to do Alan Shepard. He said that's really a comedic part. And I'm like, yeah, I know. And he said, can you do that? And I'm like, yeah.

And he said, OK, well, I promised you he's I'm good to my word. You want to. So so a lot of the exterior was actually Admiral Shepherd. Probably the hardest thing. And then the humor, a lot of the. You're quite right. Came from the script. It was just implied in the script.

And then the vibe on the set was somehow I mean, how can you miss when when you're seeing involves not being able to keep from being in your in your space? I mean, how can you miss and and and with the joke.

I mean. Yeah, yeah.

And and the thing that you realize also about these guys, they're all lunatics. Yeah. They were so squeaky clean and shorthair and but the odds are were then they were going to die. That's what happened with Motus. Most of those rocketships they went up and they exploded. So what kind of a person really wants to do that? A crazy person. Right. My my favorite review I ever got in my life, I got actually from then Admiral Shepard, he saw the movie and he wrote a letter to feel comfortable.

And he said, Tell Scott Glenn when you see it from me. Congratulations. He did a phenomenal job. He got me almost perfect. There's just one thing he missed, and that is he isn't anywhere near as good looking or desire, which I love.

He didn't disappoint.

Oh, that's. Well, that's right. Yeah. That is the best review that you could get when you're depicting somebody else.

So that crew of guys, when you were coming up in New York in acting, you studied with Hicky. Were you also did you also study anywhere else?

Yeah, I got a friend of mine called me up and he was doing his final audition for the Actors Studio. Yeah, you're seeing Partner Gunship, and it was a scene from Long Day's Journey into Night. And he was playing Jamie, who has a huge monologue. And my character was just essentially listening to him talk, knowing I was going to go into a hospital for consumption the next day. So I'm just sitting there and he said, ask me if I do it.

You see, you don't really have to do anything. It's my audition. I said, sure.

So three days before that, I was in a traffic accident in the back of a car with a bunch of dogs, station wagon that got everybody that was hurt except for me.

And I had to get people to hospitals and stuff like that. And I got a bad cold. So I was coughing and wheezing. And then right before the audition, a friend of mine called me up and he said, my girlfriend got sick and I've got one ticket light heavyweight championship of the world, Madison Square Garden. You want to come with me? And I said I yeah, I'm sure I'll make it because the audition is early. And of course, it wasn't early.

And by the time we did it, all I was thinking was, I want to fucking out of here. I want to go to Madison Square Garden to see this fight. And meanwhile, I'm coughing and wheezing. I was the carrot.

OK, next morning I got a call from Lisker Mar, who is the Lee Strasberg secretary, and she said, I don't think this has ever happened before, Scott, but congratulations. You're a member of the Actor's Studio, and I knew so little about it.

I said, you know, that's really great, but I don't have that much money now. And I, you know, joining and paid by the month, she started to laugh and she said, wait a minute. The next voice came on, was Lee Hill in that place? He said, I was there last night. He said, so listen, Mark, he said this is for free for life. I saw you last night and you really have something.

So we're going to see come on by. Let us be rude to you. And I worked on a show, I worked on a scene two giant long, the two longest monologues I could find of Yorgos from Othello. I put them together with costumes and props and everything and brought that into the Actor's Studio. And I did the scene and we talking in the royal way. He said, we don't know what to say to you, said bring in something simple, something that.

Like tying a necktie or this is too much, Scott and I got criticized by a bunch of the people in the in the audience and I thought, fuck this. I you know, I feel bad. And everybody everybody and I waited till everybody left because I didn't want to walk out door with everybody. You just see me, you know, essentially screw up. And when I walked out, Lee was standing on the sidewalk by himself and he said, What do you drink, coffee or tea?

I said, coffee. He said for me to come on a bicycle. And we sat down and he said, You really have something, Scott. But I work on smaller things on it. He said, I'll give you suggestions and I'll work with you myself. He said, But we go back in that building. Don't expect me to be polite or let you down easy or anything to change. So for a period of time, again, just an accident.

Good luck. I had Lee Strasberg is like a private coach.

And did it change the way you saw acting? What he told me from the. Yeah, I did. But what he told me about all studied acting, especially if you work from the inside out and begin with what started at the Moscow arts theater shooting. Is and he said himself, it wasn't this was my idea. He said basically what you're learning from me and from Bill and George Morrison and theater games and all this stuff is how to get yourself out of trouble when you've got a really shitty director or when you've got a part that's really not working.

Yeah, he said if you're in the throes of inspiration, if it's playing, you just leave it alone. That's not what this is about. This is about getting yourself out of trouble and making something work anyway.

And did you have to use that quite a bit more than I'd like to? Yeah.

Yeah, I've only had that.

I've only done just parts of my life that actually played me where I would wake up in the morning and say, Scott, your only job today is just stay the fuck out of the way. Don't get in the way. Just leave it alone, which I'm now. That was Killer Joe on stage. Urban Cowboy. Yeah. And then much later on TV show that I did with all credit to the brilliant writer Damon Lindelof on The Leftovers. Yeah.

Where I just said, you know, Damon has given me an amazing gift. And my only job essentially is not to fuck it up.

That's great.

The reason I asked you about the Actors Studio is like, does it seem like the right stuff that all those guys in one place seemed almost like a generation of actors, Quaid and and Harris and Gran and Fred Ward and Sam Shepard?

Sure. I remember when we were doing the right stuff, we had a somebody came up for variety and they they asked us about the competition. All you guys are starting. Your careers are all beginning. You must be like trying to steal scenes from each other and to what what kind of friction is happening on the set. And they got really pissed off at me and the anyone else who was asked that question because the answer was. We all love each other and we're all getting along really well.

I remember I told the the the reporter from Variety, I said today I did the scene where I was going to. I was in a rocket ship and I was going to have to pee in my spacesuit. Yeah. Dennis and Fred Ward and Ed all showed up on the set to help me out. They were working out that it was their fucking day off. So it was just like the movie.

It was just like the movie. Yeah. Yeah, it's great.

I just watched Silverado recently again to to sort of check it out, you know, I feel like that. I feel like there's like four Westerns in one Western in that movie.

It's Larry Kasdan and his brother tried to include their favorite scenes from every Western they've ever seen. And the only part that had to be cut out because of budget were the Indians. There was a giant. Thing with the Indian, save that wagon train from the area. We had to have that part was written for me.

So again, that was a gift then the fact that I can't ride at all and walk away the horse that I wound up with fell in love with me. Yeah, we do pretty much anything with him that I wanted to be.

You were great in it and it must have been fun doing that. Yeah, I was New Mexico. Where where'd you shoot it? Santa Fe and outside. We would leave while we were shooting in New Mexico in the winter, which meant we had maximum four and a half to five hours of decent light a day to work with. The good news was it was all.

Magic hour all five hours, the light was low in the sky and it's just the most beautiful place in the world, but we would leave having had breakfast leave for work every day between three thirty four in the morning.

It's so there's something so magical about northern New Mexico, man. It's so fucking pretty. Yeah. Is it pretty in Idaho. Gorgeous.

Yeah. How long you've been up there. Forever. Yeah.

We Carol and I've been here for thirty seven years.

When you went was one of the things where you were getting out of Hollywood. Yeah, it was.

Nothing was going right. And I just thought, you know, we had come up here to Idaho for the summer. Carol was at the time, which was it was by invitation only, the kind of the most prestigious ceramic workshop in the world at the time with all of America's greatest potters.

And so she was coming up here with our two daughters who were little babies and. I went while she was throwing pots, I went up north with a group of people for a little over two weeks of controversy on snow and ice and then climbing. When I came back, the whole family, like, had kind of fallen in love with each other again. We moved back to L.A. and we all get the blues again. And I'm sitting in our living room in Topanga Canyon watching myself on television on a on on a Baretta that I've done.

You kind of locked into the into the living room. She said, what's wrong? I said, What do you mean? She said, You're crying. And I'm pointing at the screen, I said, you're supposed to get better or you do no worse, that's the worst piece of shit acting I've ever seen. Are this way better on the streets of New York? What's going on here? And I realize that living in L.A. for me was I had stopped thinking about what makes this person tick and how do I make this person understandable and and to what party can I go to the made who watch my building and I turn into a showbusiness politician.

And I wasn't any good at that at all. And I thought, you know, my dreams of acting are right on the edge of dying. And I can't go back to New York because my schedule I can't subject gun to the life of a New York street actor. And so we moved up here and I just didn't really know what I was going to do. I thought, you know, I can do Shakespeare in the park in Boise and I'll get a job up here doing something to somehow make it work.

But I still have this love when the kids are older. I'll move back to New York. So we've been up here just a few weeks and I got a small part of the film called Catalani. And Little Richard's the only because Rupert Hitzig, the producer I was a friend of mine from the Marine Corps, got the part, came back up here and they wanted me. I remember Jeff Bridges. We drop by on our way up from Mexico to see him.

And he said, you're perfect for this part of the movie. I'm doing a weight around town for three days. Meet the producers. The star is cast approval and I can make this happen. It's a great villain. And I said, fuck that, I don't do that. I want I walk into people's office like basically I live in Idaho. I just made four thousand dollars on flesh.

And I just want to tell you I love you and say goodbye. Goodbye. We came back up here two weeks later. The phone's ringing, as Jimmy said. Now I'm in Houston. Paramount doesn't want you to do this film, but I do. If you come down and do this thing, you'll never have to audition again as long as you live. It's going to be the making of you, I promise. I'm sending you a plane ticket.

I said screw that. They're not going to have their hooks into me for a plane ticket. I'll get my truck and drive down to Houston. So. Well, he was right. I didn't have to audition. And and after Urban Cowboy, I when I came up here, Carol, Sam will show you some room through the bedroom. And there are two scripts lying on the bed, four offers for Legian movies for more money than I'd ever dreamed about making.

And I thought, you know. At the time, I thought all I have to do is not do a repeating part and in TV, I can live anywhere I want if I'm willing to get behind the wheel of my truck or hop on a plane. I can live here and have a life. And here I am at Beautiful.

I'm starting to think that, too. I don't know what the fuck I'm doing here. I can't even breathe outside, you know.

But I like I like that, you know, that, you know, you you claim to have had all this luck, but you fought some of it, which was, I think, a pretty interesting that, you know, like this guy was telling you, he's going to change your life and you're like, you know, fuck that studio.

I mean, arrogance has got its plus and minus side.

But the weird thing is, though, it's like it's arrogance to a certain degree, but it becomes impossible. I think I think what you saw in that moment was, you know, you were going to lose your ability to have self-respect if he stayed there.

You're right. Right. And and, you know, nothing's worth that. Really. No. Yeah.

I want to ask you a quick about the like like I've seen a lot of your movies, obviously, and a lot of them are great.

But like, there's something I've talked to you.

I talked to Ethan Hawke about training day, right? Yeah. And and Ethan told me this weird thing about how he prepared for that.

He said because he knew the nature of Denzel that he watched he watched all of Denzil's old movies like they were football training films.

Like he said, if I'm not going to get if I'm not going to get eaten alive by this guy, I better be in good shape. I got to know how to work this thing. Yeah.

And those scenes, that scene where, you know, with you and Denzel were, you know, you know, you're kind of going to die and you know, and he knows you're going to like I find him to be a very I think there are guys that can just fill themselves up with something that you can't quite explain.

Hackman does it, too. Like what do you do when that scene, what you two is fucking amazing. Now, when you work with an actor that, you know, you guys are equal caliber and you're going to go you're going to do this thing, do you like it?

Is it is that what makes it worth doing? It must have been a great scene to do now am I?

It was a phenomenal scene to do. And I you know, I worked with with Danny once before.

And on that right.

Small part, I played a reporter, you know. Yeah. Talk there. And so we knew each other and got along right away.

Yeah. I had done God I that I, I got offered that film. I worked straight for two years and I won some time off. I go on from from from Georgia to vertical and the Buffalo soldier on my way back from Germany stopped in New York, have lunch with Losa Halstrom. That turned into a whole day. And he said, I want you to do this part in shipping news. Will you do it? And I said, yeah, I want to start.

He said, three weeks. OK, I've got three weeks.

Yeah. And I got home and I get this offer to do training day and I and I and I turned it down. I said, you know, I got to have some time off. I can't I can't do this. And so Denzel got a hold of me and he said, this is the way it works. God, I need somebody, a white guy to play my best friend who I'm going to kill in the end of this movie.

And the whole audience, including the entire black audience, has to be pissed off at me for doing this. You said you're it. I don't know. I don't have this relationship with you. You're the one you're. So he said the way it's going to work. And at the time, Hollywood was under the threat of a writer's strike. So everybody was trying to get in the door before the strike happened. Yeah. Which allowed themselves to make my deal.

And he said the way it's going to work is going to say, Denzel Washington, Ethan Hawke in Training Day, starring Scott Glenn, Dr. Dre, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Right. And for this month and and this and you're going to be paid this much money and you're going to work for maximum five days. And I said, OK, and and just went and did it and realized then how amazing that part was and how deep.

And I got just between the two of us to cover so much of each other's unspoken history. Yeah.

To get some real acting. And so it was just it was a pure joy. My, my my grandkids are my older my oldest daughter lives now. She's a teacher now. Yeah.

And her two kids, my my grandson and granddaughter were visiting the set when when when I was doing that. And my nickname on the set was was where they heard everybody was calling me Dog. What happened was one of drays. One various body guards were said something about a pistol that was across the set wire prop table, and he said that Glock over there is just not a Glock. So he said, go over, see where it is. Here's another shot box to say later on this submachine gun that he had his fooling around with with snap caps fake and it got jammed and they couldn't fix it.

And I said, give it to me, not feel stripped clean and handed it back to you. The dog is anything about guns you don't know? I don't know much.

And then Denzel said, yeah, there are sheep, there are wolves and there are sheepdog. She said, you're a sheepdog. So to this day and for the rest of my life with with Eliza and Chloe, I'm Grandpa Dog and it's stuck.

Yeah. So when when you went up to Idaho, you you you were rock climbing. You've been doing that kind of that kind of stuff for your whole life.

Yeah. I like I like those kind of challenges. And, you know, I like things that demand my attention. And if you don't give it your attention, you die.

Things will turn out well. And it's very physical.

And I was a kid. I had scarlet fever. I wasn't supposed to live from it. I stood in front of my eyes wide about my hearing to get into the Marine Corps. So, you know, I've always, you know, challenged yourself.

Everything everything felt like kind of a gift since then. So, yeah, I like ice climbing and I did, but I don't, you know, for a while I was addicted, free diver, open water, spear fishing. And I don't do that anymore because although I am not afraid and I was at the time, I'm not afraid of being in the water. A lot of sharks are indeed, but I am deathly afraid of skin cancer, so I'm not doing that sport anymore.

Yeah, I mean, I understand that sort of the nature of like the type of focus it takes when you engage in that stuff. It's sort of like you're so you're so in it and you're so alive that sometimes, you know, you don't realize it until after you're out of it.

Also, it's a very it's amazing in some odd way it's addressed. Right, because even though you've been on this in this high adrenaline space, it's forcing you to live in the present for that period of time. There's no past that screaming at you.

All right. I wish I'd done that. Why? There's no future. I've got to pay those bills or. Yeah, none of that. It's like free time away from all that stuff. Right. That I think that stuff, the past and the future are more exhausting and debilitating than anything. Oh, yeah.

Yeah. Because they're just draining you and it's all you when you're looking back at the past, if you're if you are of of strong spirit, you don't have any regrets, but the future you can't know about. So that's impossible to project without a certain amount of dread.

So yeah, the present, the future doesn't end well for anybody.

So nobody gets out of here alive, that's for fucking sure. Well, I mean, it is great talking.

Yeah. And and I hope the new movie, you know, does well. And, you know, your career has been a real gift. And I've always enjoyed watching you and I have a tremendous amount of respect for you. And now even more. It was great talking to this guy.

It was great talking to you, too. Let's do it again. OK, buddy. Take care, man. Thank you.

Wow, fucking live wire, man, intense. What a great guy Scott Glenn is in the new disaster movie. It's a natural disaster movie, Greenland. It's available on demand this Friday, December 18th. And don't forget, if you're feeling depressed, overwhelmed or anxious, better help offers licensed online counselors who are trained to listen and help talk with a counselor in a private online environment at your convenience, just fill out a questionnaire to assess your specific needs, then get matched with a counselor in under 48 hours.

Better help is an affordable option. And for WTF listeners, you get 10 percent off your first month with the discount code. WTF get started today at better dotcom wtf. Talk to a therapist online and get help. OK, and now get this guitar in your head. Boomer lives. Monkey and the fanda. Cat angels everywhere.