D’Arcy Carden
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Oh, poor Darcy Carden. I haven't met her yet, but she's playing this, I guess, a robot in the good place. Welcome to Where Everybody Knows Your Name.

If it's your first time joining us, happy to have you. And if you're a regular, nice to know you're out there listening. Thank you. Today on the show, I have the joy of speaking with an old coworker of mine. And by that mean, yeah, maybe I shouldn't say old coworker, a very young, nimble coworker of mine, the delightful, and maybe I shouldn't say nimble. Anyway, the delightful Darcy Carden.

who you may know as Janet from The Good Place. I remember the second week of shooting with Darcy on The Good Place, who played the universal computer that knows all in the world of The Good Place. And I thought, oh, poor Darcy. What a boring part. She's just going to be playing this computer all the time. Turned out she became the major breakaway hit of the show and is just a remarkable actor. And it was so much fun to catch up with her.

And I'm just delighted to introduce you to Darcy Carton. Hi, friend. Hi, friend. But you walked in and said that you threw the first pitch out. And I say that in every room that I walk into. That's all right. I don't know this story. Will you tell me? Yeah. Two years ago, I was filming A League of Their Own in Pittsburgh. Yes.

And which is a baseball TV show. And I and you know, the the pirates contacted me to throw out the first pitch, which was like a lifelong dream. Really? Yeah. You had that dream. Well, this is a funny thing. I'm going to go like this. Is that scary? OK, I move the microphone. My dad threw out a first pitch in the 80s or 90s. And I remember thinking, like, that's the coolest thing that anybody's dad has ever done.

See, this is why I love doing a podcast. I learn things about you, even though we've hung out and worked together every day for four years and all of that. Wow. I know. We had this cool picture of my dad, like mid-pitch. And I just remember, and he must have been nervous or something because he didn't invite us. He just did it. He like went after work one day. That was his Pirates as well? This was the Oakland A's. I

Oh, Clint Hayes. Oh my God. And why him? I understand you because of the TV show. My dad had a, um, a music magazine, a Bay area music magazine called Bam magazine in like the seventies, eighties and nineties. So he was like, he was like a music industry guy and also a big A's fan. I wonder if that had anything to do with it. Anyway, he would, I mean that it was, um, it was really exciting, but he, I don't know. I mean,

Weird things like that would always happen to my dad. He was like in that world without being like a Hollywood guy, you know? Kind of like Zelig would appear in the most amazing places. Totally. He would, yeah, just sort of, he's like a really...

Likeable, friendly, outgoing guy. People just liked him. And so, and because he was in the music business and like the magazine business. In the seventies. In the seventies and eighties, which was where that was the time. That was it. Yeah. He got to do cool things. Now, let me go to you. Go to me. Back to the pitching part. Yeah.

You as, you know, well, no. Was it overhand? It was over. It was. Okay, let's see. Wait. Historically. Right. In that period, women's baseball. It was overhand for pitch. Yeah, it was all overhand. Yeah. But what did I do? I did overhand. That's amazing. Because I played softball in like, you know, through high school.

And I pitched a little bit and actually it's had, I'm a pretty good pitcher, but there's a point when you're playing softball where you go from being like, like all you need to do to be a good pitcher is be accurate and get it across the plate and hit the, you know, like just be accurate. Yeah. And there's a point I think around like age 13 where all of a sudden girls are like. Whipping it. Whipping it. And I wasn't really a whipping it type of pitcher. So then I was like, I'll be a first base. Yeah.

So I think for the Pittsburgh Pirate pitch, I think it was overhand. And how did you do? Let me tell you. I did fine. But I still have like a little bit of shame because I think I was so afraid of throwing it. First of all, have you ever done this? No. Okay. No. Okay. I mean, thank God. It's like.

I watched a bunch of videos on YouTube of people doing this, and you can see they get either, like, overly confident or nervous. And they throw... I mean, they throw...

to a different continent they throw so far the wrong way and i was thinking like oh don't you know just because i think oh i can do this i know how to do this i was in you know i was shooting league of their own at the time so we were we were i want to say rehearsing yeah playing practicing all the time um so i was really nervous about getting too excited and throwing it like the wrong direction so i i kind of wimped it a little bit it was it was did it go over the plate

Yeah, I guess. It just wasn't that good. It was fine. But, you know, I am so competitive about sports. I really wanted to, like, blow everybody's mind. And then when it just kind of went, I wanted to, like, take the microphone and be like, but I can do better. Hey, everybody. You want to see that again? Like, you just want a second chance right away. But it was really fun. And my whole cast came and watched and...

It was really a cute day. So they came to Pittsburgh? So we were all in Pittsburgh shooting. And so, yeah, it was just like a glorious little Sunday and everybody came and we had like a box and everybody got a little drunk and it was really fun. That was a really good memory. That's sweet. Yeah. Can I go back? Beep, beep, beep, beep. Okay. So let me just get this out of the way. My understanding is...

that you never watched any of the Cheers episodes when they aired live. Am I, is that right? I don't know.

You didn't, did you? Don't be mad at me. I, um, yeah, not really. My, my older sister, Lainey. When were you born? 1980. Okay. Yeah. So I was, so I was. So when I started Cheers, you were two. Yeah. So what was I going to do? Be a little two-year-old toddler watching goddamn. I don't know. You could have found a way. I guess. Probably. Yeah. My grandma, Anita and my older sister, Lainey, they would watch it. And to me, it was like a, it was like a grownup show.

It was, in a way. I guess for a four-year-old. And Lainey was just a couple years older than me, but that was very in line with Lainey. Like, being a little adult and, like, watching TV with Grandma. And I'm like, you don't understand these jokes. And then... And I'm sure...

Everyone you've ever met has told you which family member had the biggest crush on you. But my grandma Anita was really into you. Really into you and George Michael. And let's, can we go back and just say how old your grandmother was when she was watching Cheers? 20? Yeah, I think so more. Maybe 30. Yeah, okay, good. 25. It was so, over the years, it's so funny to watch. Hey, I think you're really good on Cheers. Then, hey, 25.

My older sister thinks, hey, my mom. Yeah. My grandparents just love you. I know. Which is great. I know. Sure. I know. Yeah. No one wants to hear that. No, you love it. Are you a little embarrassed to be sitting here talking with me with headphones on? A little bit. Knowing we're being recorded? A little bit. It's a little weird, isn't it? Just because we... I...

Love nothing more than talking to you like when I think of our four years on the good place We had so many scenes where it was just the two of us and so in what you know Listeners you may or may not know this but there's so much downtime when you're shooting a show That if we had three scenes to shoot that day we were probably sitting in our chairs next to each other for hours and

But also when you're doing that, you are kind of keeping the mood of what you're about to do. So I never, did we, I have trouble having deep, deep conversations knowing that in a second you're going to be pulled up. We're ready for you. Totally. Yeah, that's true. That's true. But we, but I, but I.

Yeah, that's true. But I do love, I just love talking to you a lot. But we've never really done headphones, microphone talks. Here's the best part about doing a podcast. I know I love you. I know a lot of kind of maybe surfacy things about you. But I don't really know your history. Right. Because why would I ever? Why would we ever? Yeah. Yeah.

But you have this amazing music background. I know. I mean, your daddy was in that world. Yeah. I know. It was really... It was just... What a cool way to grow up. I mean, it was... I mean, I almost can't think of a cooler way to grow up unless, like, your dad was Walt Disney or something. Mine, no. No? No. A Walt Disney character. Yeah. But that would be cool, too. It was just such a fun... I mean, getting to be a kid and going to concerts all the time and being in...

But kind of being hidden. It wasn't like my dad was a rock star. My dad wasn't, I don't know, who am I even thinking of? Tom Petty or whatever. So we could kind of just be backstage or be in the background and observe everything. It just was cool. And as an adult...

I mean, I appreciated it when I was a kid, but really as an adult looking back, the fact that my parents really included my four siblings, my three siblings, the four of us, was really cool. I love that your first concert was Huey Lewis and the News when you were four. Uh-huh.

You at four, you were so much more hip than I am. I know. And I'm sure that was like, again, my older sister who's two years older. So she would have been six. I'm sure that was them thinking she was old enough for a concert and me just being like, I gotta come to mom. I know all the songs. And tell me, tell me, I'm sorry. I just found out about you. There's a, there's a weird, a weird little, uh, Huey Lewis story that, that with, we, and we saw him in concert a bunch. He was,

That was like a really good Bay Area band and they were really friendly with my parents and I think my parents had sort of come up with them at the same time. So they have a lot of great Huey Lewis and the news stories. But at this one, so this was my first concert and again, I'm like four, so don't quote me on it as far as I don't fully remember this, but everybody around me did. That apparently Huey was not pleased with his performance and was kind of displeased

bummed backstage. So after the show, there's a green room and everybody's hanging out, but everybody's like, where's Huey? Where's Huey? And everyone's like, oh, he's kind of taking a moment because he didn't love that show. And a few minutes later, he comes out. He comes down the hallway and I'm holding his hand and he basically was like,

Like, I cheered him up. Little four-year-old Darcy had, like, gone in to wherever the hell he was. Just coincidentally? Or had you heard he was bummed and you thought... I couldn't have known that, right? I couldn't have. I mean, that's what it seems like in my mind. That little, like, superhero kid was like, I'll cheer him up with the good ship lollipop song or something like that. But I think I really just probably had no, you know... What a great story. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. And he was always really great to my family. Like, it was...

It was such a fun thing to sort of check in with getting to see somebody on stage, you know,

I mean, what a cool thing. I'm still addicted to seeing concerts. I can't resist. Even though parking sucks and tickets are expensive and there's a work day the next day, I have something inside of me where I feel like I can't miss it. So I go to everything. And I think that has a lot to do with the way I grew up. It was almost like church or something. It just was...

I don't know. I don't know what that was. But I still definitely have that. That's so wonderful. I had the opposite. I grew up listening to classical music that my mother would put on the record player or South Pacific. Yes. Oklahoma. Yeah. And that was it. I had no pop culture. Right. I was the guy who was... I went to Stanford and I was halfway to Monterey for this...

I don't know, concert somebody told me about. Halfway there, I went, oh, you know, this is a long drive and I'm tired. I'm turning around. Oh, no. And I totally missed the Monterey Pop Festival. The only person. I'm tired of this. It's not that long. Two hours, maybe. Yeah, two hours. I also was at a freshman dorm party and

Janice Joplin, who I didn't know, and probably not that many people did at that time because it was a freshman dorm party. And I guess, you know, she came and sang and I was this close as I am to you right now. And my reaction was, wow, she's going to fuck up her voice. She's screaming. The sixties went right over my head. It was wasted on me. Yeah, that's good. That's probably good. And that's why you're here today. Yeah.

You don't want to compromise on your vacation. In fact, you deserve more on vacation. Experience more with Norwegian Cruise Line. Find more amazing places to explore, more unique and longer itineraries, more time in port, and more entertainment and restaurant options on board NCL ships.

Enjoy perks like unlimited open bars, specialty dining, free airfare for second guests, and excursion credits too. There's more to a vacation with Norwegian. More to see, more to do, more to enjoy. Visit ncl.com, call your travel advisor, or 1-888-NCL-CRUISE. Restrictions apply.

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Stanford for basketball. Yeah. But sort of. Kind of. Yeah. Stepped out on the court, looked around and went, oh, shoot. Uh-oh. Turned around. Yeah. Walked out. Yeah. Very sad. Yeah. Well, again...

Look where you are now. It was my gauge, though, on what was worthwhile in life. Oh, yeah. Because of team, sport. I think I grew up in the acting world loving ensemble. Me, too. I really love ensemble. Yeah. I mean, there are many reasons why I'm not Tom Cruise. Not just my love of ensemble, but...

But I do truly love my lot in life. I love it. I'm exactly the same. And I credit a lot of that to sports, too, of just loving being on a team. Yeah. We're cool. We're so cool. But we're tall, which is why we're so cool. Exactly. I mean, not to get ahead of myself, but I really... Okay. I'm basically talking to the listener, not to you, because I can't look at you when I say stuff like this. But getting... Okay, listener. Imagine...

Getting cast in a show like The Good Place. I had never met Ted before. I loved him forever. And then not only is he incredibly nice and incredibly cool,

But he like, this is a weird thing that I couldn't have even expected. You love, he, guys, he, he loves acting. You love acting. There's something that like, I honestly could cry right now and I don't want to because sometimes you make me cry without even meaning to it. Wow. But it's like, it's not, it's such a gift to remember why we do this because it's, it's not, if you're going to spend your life

acting, there's so much bad about it. There's so many ups and downs. There's so much no. Yeah. Yeah. And to remember the sort of like childhood love of acting when you're on a big Hollywood set like The Good Place is is such a gift. It's hard to even put into words. It's it was such a gift. And it really I feel like you you shaped you like reshaped me.

Now look at me and keep going. I want to see if you cry. Nah, you're not crying. You know, same back to you, by the way. You know what I love, and you are full of it? Enthusiasm. You know, enthusiasm for life, enthusiasm for acting, and the willingness to say yes, you know, are some of my favorite qualities in people, and you're chock full of that. You're the same. Really, like, I mean, just the...

I cannot tell you how lucky I feel that we got to work together. Me too. Really. I mean, yeah, you changed my life. Although I was a little thinking, ooh, poor Darcy Carden. I haven't met her yet, but she's playing this, I guess, a robot in The Good Place. I think she's going to get bored very quickly. Yeah, very one note. And it turns out to be one of the most iconic parts on television. Yeah.

I love that. I love that so much. Just so you know, I was dead set against Shelley Long playing Diane Chambers, too, when I first met her. I thought, oh, no. This is not right. No, right. And she was like through the roof. Oh, yeah. Wait, let's go back a little bit. So I... Hey, I'm running this. Okay, sure. Let's go back a little. Okay, great. Go ahead. You first. So you asked about Cheers. And while I didn't watch it...

As a kid. As a two-year-old. Yeah, as a two-year-old. Jason, my lovely husband, who you know and love. I do. We watched it during the pandemic. You even took a photo and sent it to me of you guys sitting on your counter. Yeah, it was great. Eating dinner, watching church. You know, you like need it. If you go back to, you know, 2020, March, whatever. Like, you just needed something to get through the day. You needed something to look forward to. So, yeah.

We decided we didn't want to binge it. We wanted to watch one episode a night, which is not long. That's like 25 minutes. But we would make dinner and we would sit down and watch one episode. And we really...

It was one of my favorite things that we would do. We would walk our dog and we would watch Cheers. Those were like the two things I would look forward to all day. What a time. What a time. And it was great. And I would have to resist texting you every day like, holy shit, Ted, you're good. Like, you're real good. You know what I did when I saw the pilot? What? I pulled Jimmy Burrows aside.

And started crying because I thought I was so bad. Oh, my God. And he looked at me for about two seconds, then started laughing and walked away in the opposite direction. Never addressed me. Just started laughing and walked away. And what a thing. I mean, we could talk about Cheers for hours. I know, I know, I know. But what a thing to be a part of.

Yeah. Holy crap. It dawned on me years after the fact went, holy moly, I got to play Sam Malone. Yeah. And basically, you know, you did a play. It was like a play. I mean, it's one room, sometimes two, sometimes three, but you were, I mean, that's the other thing Jason and I would watch and marvel at like,

It was like you guys were doing a 30-minute play. We felt like that, too. I'm so jealous. That's incredible. In the beginning, the first three or four years, no one messed up a line. It was just we were doing a play. Don't mess up the line. Yeah. That changed. Yeah, I bet. Yeah, that's going to change. Yeah, but we just were in love with each character and your chemistry with Shelly. I mean, it was just...

I also got like a weird like 80s crush on you and I was like, well, that can't happen. She's looking at me and crying again. Yeah.

By the way, this is the right time to say my wife, Mary Steenburgen, loves you so much. I love her so much. And said to say hi. I love her so much. Actually, for the rest of the podcast, let's just get our calendars out and figure out when we're going to have dinner. We are. Yeah. So how did the little girl that pulled Huey Lewis out of his funk and also went backstage at Annie at age six –

And gave the lead actress a pat on the fanny, like good job or something? Maybe a slap. It was a slap? Yeah, I think I really spanked her. Did you do that to me? Did you? I really, I saw Annie and it was one of the first big plays I had ever seen, big musicals. And I tend to still to this day get really like lost in whatever I'm watching. Like I really go to a different planet. And so when we were backstage meeting the cast, the wonderful, the

amazing actress who was playing Miss Hannigan was sort of like bent over talking to a little kid. And I walked up behind her and I smacked her hard on the butt kind of to be like, I'm an orphan too. Like kind of like I'm in this world with you. That poor woman. I'm sure she was like, get this kid the hell away from me. But she played along. Or maybe it's her favorite story. Yeah. And then how did you go? All right. So get us to when you first start. Oh, I'm getting paid.

To act or, oh, I want to go off and be funny. I mean, I read that you were into musical comedy and you explored that. But what happened when you went, oh, this is what I want to do and I want to make people laugh and I want to be that? The laughing thing, it's funny because I went, you know, I started acting young. Like I was doing community theater and plays, like anywhere I could get my hands on it. That's not how that happened.

You know what I'm saying? Yeah. But it wasn't... I guess looking back, I was often getting cast in funny roles, but I wasn't really thinking...

That I was the funny actor. Right. And went to school for like Shakespeare and. Where'd you do that? Southern Oregon University in Ashland, Oregon. Ashland. Where they had the Shakespeare Festival. And it was really a heavily Shakespeare-y education. Yes. And then right after college moved to New York with the intentions of doing theater.

And yeah, and I had done a lot of musical theater and was loving it and had a bunch of friends that lived in New York that were doing musical theater and that were on Broadway. And that really felt like that was what was going to be my path or my goal, at least. And, you know, it's like it's hard, as you know, and as every actor knows and as everybody knows, like it's just a hard career. And really the first year of living in New York,

All the audition. Nothing was going right. I was having like a great time, but nothing was happening for me at all. Like some creepy student film somewhere and like, you know, some weird... It just... Nothing was happening for me. God, I wonder where the footage of that is. Or how famous that creepy kid is now. I don't think he was very... I don't know. I just went somewhere. And then...

A friend took me to see a show at the Upright Citizens Brigade in New York and truly, like, in a life-changing way, watched their show, their, like, flagship show, ASCAT, and signed up for class the next day. And describe UCB. Yeah, it's like, it's an improv and it's a comedy theater and school founded by...

Amy Poehler and three dudes that you also know. How cool is that, though? I know, I know. Ian Roberts, Matt Besser, and Matt Walsh. And yeah, it was just... It was like, what a scene. It was so... I mean, every...

I would say like every third actor that you love, maybe every fifth actor that you love in a comedy on TV came from UCB. It's just, it was like this amazing wealth of talent. And, but, but when I started there, it wasn't like that. It wasn't a sure path to TV at all. It was, it was just like a really cool comedy theater that I was, that I was hyper fixated on and wanted to kind of get to the top of. That was, it was almost like my, my, my, um, my career goals shifted to just,

this theater. And how did you serve, how'd you feed yourself? I, cause that, that doesn't pay in the beginning at least. Yeah. It didn't pay at all. And, and,

I was a really good nanny. I was a waitress and I was a temp and I was a lot of things. But then I when I started nannying, I was like, oh, but I love this. I love nannying. So I'm going to just quit all those other jobs. And instead of oh, God, I remember temping at all these offices and I had this like this this little black suit on.

And all these little button up shirts. And I would get a temp job at some hideous office. And I would have to put on my suit. And it was like putting on, I don't know, like putting on my death. Your funeral outfit. Yes, exactly. I just was like, it felt like a costume. It didn't look good. I just hated it. It wasn't me. And I would walk into these offices and do my little job. It just was like soul sucking completely. So when I was nannying, I was like really happy.

So that's how I... And how long did you do that? I did that for like 10 years. While you were going in the evenings? Exactly. So I would nanny during the day and then I would do shows and rehearsals at night. And UCB was so all-consuming that we would like

I was a part of one sketch team that would start our tech rehearsal. So this would be once a month. We would start our technical rehearsal at midnight. We would start it at midnight after all the shows were done. That was the only time the theater was free or something. Although thinking back, I'm like, well, it was free during the day. Everybody's just asleep, I guess. Yeah, yeah. And then I would wait. When I think of my tech. Whose we would do your tech rehearsals? What do you mean? Like my sketch group that I was in. Yeah.

Um, some of which, let me just think real quick. Brandon Scott Jones, who was on our, our show, the good place. Um, wonderful, wonderful. One of my best friends, a bunch of, um, uh, Chris Kelly, a writer who created the show, the other two, like a lot of, a lot of really cool talent came from, from that theater. Um, and, uh, yeah, so we would, and I would be doing shows there every night. It was when I think of my 10 or 11 years in New York, I think of,

And this is why you live in New York in your 20s, I think. I just never slept. I would sleep for like five hours. I'd come home. We lived in Brooklyn, so it was a far, you know, I would travel far to go nanny. I just never slept. And I would pack a gigantic backpack full of like nanny stuff into like rehearsal stuff into what I was going to wear for the show that night into a different pair of shoes and maybe an umbrella. And I just jump on the subway. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Wow. I know. It was fun, though. It was really fun. Next? What happened next? Then I... Then, you know, New York was great.

Um, but this is pre Jason during Jason. So you met Jason at UCB. I met him when I was doing UCB. I met him when I was doing UCB. Did he know what he wanted to do? Was he doing it? We, we actually met doing a play. So he was an actor and I was an actor. We did a play in the Bay area, just a random play while he was living in LA and I was living in New York. And then I guess the fast forward version of that is when we started dating and moved to New York.

And his day job was working in like a production house. So he was doing producer-y things. And that's what he was falling in love with. And when he... He was a great actor. I loved acting with him. I miss acting with him. But he... I have this memory of him producing like a little web series that we were in. And...

On the days that he had to do the acting, he was miserable. He loved producing. And then he'd be like, oh, shit. Okay, what are my lines? And then he kind of realized, oh, maybe I really like producing. And that's what he's been doing now for so long. But we were struggling and figuring it out together. And it's fun working.

We, how do I say this? Like there have been some wonderful, crazy, exciting, extravagant moments in our life in the last, you know, five, six, seven years. And it's, it's very fun to look at him and be like, remember when we lived and the walk up of a top, you know, top, the top floor of some shitty little apartment.

you know, we had a bed that touched like all four walls, the tiniest little bed. It's nice to be able to look at it. It is. It is. And if you have the, if you came into it, I think for the right reasons, which is,

and I've got to, and whatever this process is, whatever this tribe is I want to join, is everything. Yeah. Because that doesn't go away. I mean, don't you still feel that way about going to work? Yes, totally. Yes, completely. Yeah. Especially when you're surrounded by people that feel that way too. Yeah. Which you tend to do, I think. That's what you attract. Yeah. You know, at a certain point you attract that, if that's what you love. I think so. And I mean, I almost...

I, not to say I don't have time for it because I love to act and, you know, money's great. It's fun when they pay you. But I would rather not do it. I would rather not do it if it wasn't with people that feel that way. It's so, it's such a heartbreak. It is. It is a heartbreak. Trying to think if I'm really that pure. I know. No, I think you are.

Okay. Okay. You are. You surround yourself with, yeah. I know you think about that because we've talked about it. I know you think about that when picking things and saying yes to things. I have been, I think God knows I'm not great with choice, the acting God. Yeah. Because I usually do what is next offered to me.

And by and large, I've been blessed by amazing writing, which attracts really good directors, which attracts great casts. And I've led a kind of magical life that way. I don't have a stack of scripts going, hmm, I'll do this one. I kind of don't believe that, but I know you're telling the truth. No, no, it's true. I'm sure stuff gets weaved out by my agent or my manager or whatever. But by and large, I...

I'm blessed that way. I really am. You don't have to say that any project, but do you, when you look back, are you, do you have a movie or a show where that was offered to you that you didn't say yes to that year? No. Yeah. I mean, they didn't, that you're like, damn it. No, I have no, I have no regrets. I mean, yes, I'm a joy junkie. So I, you know, I trained myself to be drunk.

Even if I have to fake it to make it, but I always do about whatever it is I'm working on. I'll tell you one of the hard, this, this is a terrible,

This is going to sound like I'm making a comparison. I'm not. But one of the hardest jobs I ever did was CSI. Yeah, I bet. It's just really, really, really hard because you didn't have room to be funny. Right. Because if you're funny at the end of the scene, which is where you sometimes can improvise some funny stuff at the end of scenes. Yeah.

the audience forgets about the perforated gallbladder that the guy died of. So they went, no jokes. No, please.

yeah and the things you're memorizing are not it's almost like if i had to say vaginal tear or blood splatter you know it's like really and they were really good at making uh prosthetic uh charred people oh wow you know yeah to stare at while you're talking how many years did you do that i did it four and i the people were wonderful the cast is great the writers were sweet and kind the

you know, the world watched it. Yeah. But it was hard. I bet. Yeah. I need to be silly. I know. You're really good at being silly. Give me silly, please. I know. I know. You're really, really good at being silly. All right. Let's jump just around. Okay. Let's talk about The Good Place. Okay. I love it. I mean, to me, it's one of my favorite things I've ever been blessed to do. And that's also so exciting to hear because it was my first thing, really. Yeah. And I was like,

holy shit this is amazing i love like at my first meeting with mike i was like i think this guy is incredible oh what no do that do how you got there oh yeah how i got there okay i'll do that really quick i you know i would i had moved to la and

I'd been here for a few years and was auditioning here and there, but nothing, just your regular shit. I wasn't getting anything. I wasn't getting anything. I had a teeny little part on a show called Broad City. I really wasn't, like, TV was not happening for me. And I did an audition. Oh, yeah, I got the audition, and I was excited that I knew you were attached. I knew Kristen was attached, and I knew it was Mike Schur, and I knew some of the writers from Parks and Rec.

And I remember thinking like this would be the dream. And of course I won't get it. Like I don't get everything. Like I don't get anything. But I would like to do a really good job in this audition and maybe make Mike Schur cast me in some little bit part in a different season or whatever. So I really worked on it so hard.

That's the other thing I have. I mean, this is a side note, but I have one of my worst qualities is not committing fully to auditions because it's so sad when you don't get them. That it was like this weird little self-fulfilling, like not fully committing audition.

so then my heart doesn't hurt when I don't get it. I could have gotten it, but I just didn't prepare. Yeah. And the good place, getting the good place after working so hard was like a really good lesson. I was like, Oh, so it works when you, when you put in there. Okay, cool. Um,

Yeah. So did you prepare for the role of Janet? Is that where you came in? I did. But if you remember, you know, the scripts weren't out and it was you and Kristen were basically the only people that knew anything about where the show was going. So the scripts were like dummy. They weren't real. It had it was some fake scene. I was like an operator at like a

Was it a fast talking scene so they could test whether you could do Janet? Yes. Like looking back on it, it was perfect. It was like I worked at a hotline for broken dolls and I needed to give the person advice on how to fix the doll and different, you know, different options and never getting flustered and never, never. It was, it was a great scene. It would be fun to like, you know, to put it out there somehow. Um, but, but every audition I had, maybe three or four of them just went so well that I was sort of stunned afterwards. Like, wow.

like, how could that have gone better? I'm not going to get this role, but like, what could I have done that really worked? They laughed. I felt good. Like it just was so good and easy. And then, yeah, getting that, getting that call. How long did you have to wait? Oh, this is great. Well, very long, maybe five years is what it felt like. I'm sure it was like a week, you know, but it was just staring at my phone. I had some, I'm

I'm going to say it shitty little writing job at some weird little, some pop culture show that I refuse to even watch. I hated it so much, you know, just some, I was really not, you know, my career was not happening and I, and I would just stare at my phone waiting for something for a call to let them know that for them to let me know that I didn't get it. So you were, you went negative. You went dark. Yeah, totally. Yes, completely, completely. I bet. I'm like, what was the percentage of light? I,

I bet there was like a sliver. Yes. A sliver of maybe, maybe, or even just a good compliment. It's not going to be you, but they actually loved you. And he knows your name now. It's some, something to get me by. Um, but okay. So, you know, a week or two of, of waiting and, and when we would be at home, um,

I was trying to distract myself. So Jason said, why don't we watch this season of Fargo? Let's just watch TV. Let's just watch TV, watch TV, watch TV. So we started watching Fargo. And who comes on the damn screen with this handsome man in front of me, Ted Danson, playing a character that I'd never seen you play. She's crying again. Tears are just streaming. You were so good and so charming and so heartbreaking. And...

All I was thinking was like, I want to work with this guy. This is not doing what it should be doing, which is distracting me. I'm watching this

No, that was positive though. That, that was opening the crack of positive open a little more. I guess so. I guess you're right. Yeah. Yeah. And then, you know, truly watched an episode of Fargo, closed the computer, got settled into bed and then got a call at like 11 PM from. Really? Yes. 11. Yeah. I think it was, it was from an agent and I don't think they were like supposed to tell me yet. I think it was supposed to be a morning call. Yeah. You know, but they were like, they were, they were giving me sort of, um, uh,

It wasn't like a, you know, it wasn't like this is 100%, but they were like, be ready tomorrow. And I'm like, what does this mean? And we had champagne and we screamed. Oh, how wonderful. It was great. Two of our best friends lived upstairs, Paul and Lucia, who created the show Hacks. But they also were same as us, just kind of like struggling. Right. Yeah.

And we knocked on their door at like 11 p.m. and they popped champagne and we... Oh, how sweet. It was great. We were all in our pajamas and screaming and it was really good. Yeah. You have generous friends because sometimes it's... Yes, totally. Oh, you got that? Oh, good. Good for you. Wow. Hmm. Surprise, but good for you. Yeah. Yeah. Well, they did fine. Yeah. And then it was quick. I was the last person to be cast. So then...

I probably met you and the rest of the cast the next, I don't know, two, three days later. And did a table read and we were off. I was terrified. Were you? Yeah, I had no idea. I mean, Kristen Bell somehow adopted me in her brain and was so sweet and supportive. And I had met with Mike.

Who was, you know, very complimentary and very sweet and very real. And then I listened to him pitch the idea to me for an hour. And he's one of the brightest people. And he has a lot of people are bright, but his brain is also encyclopedic. It's just. Yeah, he's extra. Yeah. Yeah. So when he pitches a story, it's not there's no sort of or kind of. Yes. You could be flipping the page. Totally true. Wow. Yeah. He doesn't miss any details. Every second of something. Yeah.

And I just listened quietly for about an hour. And then my manager and I were listening. And we both kind of looked at each other. It was like, all right, I have no idea what this is, but I want in. Let me in, please. I want in. Yeah. I didn't understand how to be, how Michael, my character, the architect, could be funny. Mm-hmm.

When you didn't know his secret. Right. Because usually audiences, it's, there's a triangle, right? You, I'm talking to you, Darcy, but the audience knows yada, yada. And they laugh because I'm misleading you or I'm this or I'm that. But there was no triangle. Right.

Including my own cast. Not my cast. I hate that. Yuck, yuck. Cut that. No, don't cut it. They're cutting it as we speak. There's the truth. All right, I'm going to talk about myself in third. Ted made a mistake. Ted made a mistake. And Ted is sorry. He's really upset. No, that was the other thing. For people that don't know, the four other cast members, other than Kristen and Ted, Manny, Will, Jamila, and I, did not know...

what the season looks like after about episode three. And I almost don't want to... I'm sure people know. Whatever. It's been years. Whatever. We didn't know the big twist. Yeah. So...

So, yeah, so not only, right, not only did the audience not know and not only did our characters not know, but we, your fellow actors, didn't know. What a fucking insane thing that was. Or directors who would come and direct. And give you advice. And you'd feel so rude because they'd come and say, I think you should play this. Right. And I'd slowly. Look at one of the writers. Surreptitiously look at one of the writers and go, how do we deal with this? Who's going to tell them? Yeah, totally. Yeah.

That was the most amazing. I mean, God, what an amazing thing to be a part of something that, a twist that really worked, that really twisted. The twist worked. I think people went online and talked about it. And then at the same time, Netflix started airing the first season. It was this convergence of luck. It was. That kind of blasted us out there. It really blasted us. What a thing. It felt like there was, I remember there was like, it must have been, I think it was like

Again, in my mind, it was like the next day after Netflix released it, but of course it wasn't. Let's say the next week where I was like, oh, I think everyone in the world watched it. I just was, I went from, yeah, I just, I feel like every person I would run into on the street would say I watched the show. What was that like for you? Because you went from people not knowing you very much, right? To getting blasted with people. Yeah.

loving it, knowing you, and really appreciating you. What was that like? Because it's not always easy. Yeah. It may have been the easiest version of it because it was so pleasant. Yeah. I think the Janet character is such a pleasant, sort of lovable person.

Yeah.

were like nice and smart you know what i mean it was like a nice smart group of people that would watch it so they always seem to be pretty nice although i have i have a lot of people show up who i wouldn't have pegged as necessarily smart who you know uh with a bow tie and a sweater you know but hard hats and this and that people who love it yeah and then kids kids

That was something that I could have never guessed or expected is just the amount of kids. Before The Good Place, I had to spend 20 minutes describing to people what Cheers was. Was it show in the latter half? Different century. Yeah, 20th century. Yeah.

And then kids loved it. And because Michael had the bow tie and Janet had the little purple suit, we were almost like, I always think of... We were Halloween characters. Exactly. We were. Yeah, we were. Yeah. Yeah, there was almost like a Mickey Mouse quality. Like little kids just sort of... Yeah, it was... Hey, let me just say, you're spectacular in The Good Place. You are. You really, truly are. And I remember the day that they... You were...

So popular and so good. And the writers, or at least that's how they describe it, say we have to give her something spectacular to do. And they did the episode where you were playing all the different characters. We all, to hide from the bad place folks, went into your, what do you call it? Void. Void. Yeah.

You have to watch it, folks. You've got to watch it. Because it sounds a little weird. I know. Impossible to explain. But you had to end up, Darcy had to play all the different characters, all of us, Kristen, Ted, you know, all of us. And you were alone in a room that was pure white walls, white ceiling. It was like, it was hard to even stand in the room. Without getting dizzy. I remember turning to you once the first time.

beginning of you shooting that whole week by yourself going, this is fucked up. Exactly. Ted, it's so funny that you have that memory. Wait, were you about to say something else? Yeah. I can't even remember my name when I step into that soundstage. You know what's cool? That conversation got me through the entire episode because that was day one.

And Ted is basically in the first minute or two of this episode and then I'm in this white room by myself for the rest of the time. So getting to do a scene with you first and then feeling crazy and...

Then hearing you, not just my friend and fellow actor, but Ted Danson, who's done a million things and who I love and respect as an actor, saying, hey, this is fucked. This is going to be hard. And you said you're going to forget basically your objective. You're going to forget what you have to remember what you're doing now.

Did I give you advice? You gave me... No, but you give really good advice. You give advice that I... Because you don't give advice. Not only are you not crying right now, it's just not true. No, no, no, no. I talk about it all the time. No, it's not true. No, you do. People take my advice and do the opposite. It's good that way. It works. Sir, I listen to your advice and I take it because you're not like, come sit down, let me tell you everything I know. You're just talking to me like my friend. You really... Because...

being in that white room by myself, my instinct would have been to like get through the lines and, you know, it's so technical. It's almost like it's not even acting. It's more technical than emotional. But the scenes were emotional. And so you just said, remember what these scenes are about and remember who you're talking to. And I swear to God, that got me through the whole week. You gave me other advice on other things that I took and... Didn't work out as well. It did work out. Oh, good, good. After when we were sort of

Um, winding down, you and I were like having coffee at crafty and crafty is where we have snacks. And, um, and you were sort of like, Hey, after that, whatever we do, whatever you do next, make it be as far away from Janet as possible, which is,

Was such good advice because I think the- Are you sure you don't just think of these things and then put my- No, I don't. I also don't have a very good memory. You've really made an impact, sir. Good, good. I'm glad. Because a lot of the things that were coming my way around the time of Good Place being done were Janity type characters. Peppy and perky and happy and-

I think it would have been literally like robotic. I mean, people don't have much of an imagination. You know what I mean? She does robot really well. Yeah, you got to cast her. And she prefers acting by herself in white rooms. Let's do it. It's really easy. You don't have to pay her more either. And yeah, anyway, so the next role I took was League of Their Own. And she was very, very, very, Greta Gill was as different from Janet as I could get. And I really credit you so much with helping me figure that out.

Thanks. You're welcome.

Thank you to our friends at Samsung. They sent over this new OLED TV for the studio here. We actually watched some cheers on it. I don't know how that happened, but I got to tell you, the details, the colors, and the contrast. I was noticing things that made me feel like I was actually back on the set. Brass railings, Tiffany lamps. You had an amazing tan that really comes through. You had great skin. I have. I have great skin. Oh, that's what I said. That's right. That's what I said.

Thanks, Nick. I've got this from here on if you want to leave the room. With Samsung OLED's glare-free technology, the light distraction is limited on your screen so you can watch everything you love with nearly no glare. Experience TV as it's meant to be seen.

with Samsung OLED. Visit samsung.com slash OLED to learn more.

Thank you.

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They even just launched a feature that helps you write job descriptions, making the process even easier and quicker. Post your job for free at linkedin.com slash tedandwoody. That's linkedin.com slash tedandwoody to post your job for free. Terms and conditions apply. The good place. Yeah.

The Good Place, which is truly, truly about ethics and what it means to lead a purposeful life. Would you add anything to the headline of the show? That's one of the things I took away and looked at myself, which is leading a purposeful life. Is this me being purposeful in my living? Let me ask you this.

How's your purposeful life going? For real. Yeah. And purposeful doesn't mean you go to the UN and save the world. Right. It means, are you doing something that, what? You describe it. Well, I feel like purposeful is, there's always like more to do. So like when you say, how's your purposeful life? My first instinct is small, which is maybe okay.

But there's so much good to do. And sometimes I feel like I'm doing good in a very small way or with a very small group. My good could be so much bigger. And maybe that's everything. Even if I was going to the UN and all that, maybe I could still be doing more and bigger. But I think that's an area that...

I'd like to be bigger. I'd like for my purposeful small life to grow. Yeah, I hear you. And when I want to beat up on myself, that's kind of how I think. You know, I'm not doing enough and da-da-da-da-da. But I do also believe that, which is what we talked about in The Good Place too, I mean, it's not like The Good Place invented this. This is probably Ethics 101 or something. Right.

you don't know the ripple effects. You don't know the ripple effects of you just walking in the room today or down the street or whatever. You have no idea whether you looked and smiled at somebody, whether or not that changes the ripples. And so I think it's about

Just being conscious to try to do a little bit better. Yeah, I like that. I like that. And I totally believe in that. And I do think that is one of the things that this show made me sort of kind of put into words and into my brain, which is just like when faced with the option of doing good or doing bad, doing good. And when you can do a little bit better, do a little bit better. Here's what I have trouble with.

There are a lot of things where it's easy to be a little bit better. Yeah. Yeah. You know? Yeah. Yeah. But that includes caring for, liking, and listening to people who are stupid as batshit, as far as I'm concerned. Yeah. Which right away knocks me out of the conversation of a purposeful life. Right. I have, you know, you're forced to discover how judgmental you are. I know. You know? And this ties into The Good Place, I think. Because...

If you're going to be ethical, if you're going to be purposeful, that includes everything in the world. You have to try to step up to the plate. One of my favorite things of failure when it comes to the good place in ethics was the celebrity tip.

You're in a cafe and they're making you a coffee and there's a tip jar. Do I quietly put my celebrity tip, which is large, while their back is to me making the coffee? No. I wait. I wait until they see me drop the 10, 20, whatever in there. This one is really... That's tough. I don't even... I mean, I guess... Okay, because I've actually...

I've really thought about this one. And especially when we were on The Good Place, we kind of played so many games like this where we would come up with these real-world scenarios and what would you do and what is the right thing to do. But the thing is, okay, so yes, I'm the same way where I'm like, I want them to see me put the tip in because that makes me feel good. But then you go, okay, so the right thing to do is actually...

you know, put the 10 in the 20, the whatever, the hundred, I don't know. I don't know what kind of money you have, uh, the 50 cents and, and when their back is turned so that it's, it's, you know, it's, it's really for the good of, of giving them the thing without, without any credit. But then here's where I'll go a step further. Maybe. Okay. Wait, let me just think how, how can I put this into words? If they see you do it,

Maybe there's like a moment between the two. No, no, no, no, no. I think any any way that I could explain this is just to help.

The celebrity tipper. Yeah. Yeah. No, there's no way around it. It's a karmic wash. You gave somebody money they probably need or certainly deserve. What about if they go, what about if they say, hey, later they're telling their spouse at dinner, well, guess who came into the coffee shop today? Ted Danson. Remember him from your favorite show, The Good Place? Yeah.

And guess what? He gave me a huge tip. Doesn't that make you feel good about someone like him would actually care enough to put in my, like they're, they're, it's bringing good into the world in a bigger way. Like they're, uh, no, no. As I'm saying, the person's husband is probably going to asshole. I never liked that guy. Yeah.

No, I know. I know. Okay. I'm bouncing now. Here we go. All right. So you, I saw you last cause we had lunch in New York and you had to then run off and go do your Broadway play. Yeah. That evening. How was that? It was really cool. Oh my God. Wait, this is okay. I'm going to, I'm going to, this is another little ethics thing that I, okay. I'm just going to tell the story. Feel free to cut it. I, I was, um,

doing this Broadway play, and it was just a short little run. Called? The Thanksgiving play. Yep. It was like a 10-week run, and I got this sweet...

little video from ted on this app called marco polo that we love where you make little videos and send them and he was in a broadway house he was about to see a play and he turned the camera on himself with a big smile and he showed the playbill where there was an article about me and a picture of me and he was like look it's you i'm so proud of you okay i thought it was so sweet and then two hours later after he's done with the play i get another one from him that was like i'm such a piece of shit

I just sent you a video showing you that I'm in New York seeing a Broadway play and not seeing yours.

And it's a good thing I did because you was thinking it. I do believe. No, no, no, no, no. Yes, yes, yes. No, no, no, no, no. She's not crying. No, I'm not crying. The truth is. And then you said, let's go to breakfast tomorrow. So we got to spend good time. And that's actually what I said. I said, I don't care if you see my play. I just want to sit and hang out with you. So what was it like, the play? Yeah. It was scary. Yeah.

I hadn't been, I hadn't done a play in like over a decade. A lot of lines? So many lines, four actors split, you know, quarter, I don't know, down the, down the middle, two, four ways. Um, a month of rehearsal. Okay. Was that enough? Did you? I think so. Yeah. Yeah. Um, this is something that like really messed with me that I bet would have messed with you too. In rehearsals,

Okay, so we were doing a comedy. It was a really funny show. If we would say, if I said something in a rehearsal that got a laugh from the producers and the director, it immediately sent me into a panic because I knew I would have a hundred more of the, I'd have to do this a hundred more times just in rehearsal alone.

And because we do comedy, the whole thing about comedy is like keeping it fresh and keep changing it up and surprising. Right. And you do that with, you know, when it's for the camera, you can do five, six, seven takes and they can be a little bit different each time. And maybe you'll get the, you know, camera guy to sort of chuckle behind the camera. But the idea that like I...

It worked in this moment and that means I'm going to have to do it exactly like that. Yeah. It really. Yeah. It was it was it was I panicked. I really like had a really hard time with it. I had to talk to the cast and the director and I said like is it cool with you guys if I if something works can I just not do it again until we open. Yeah.

To which they were like, no, you have to do it. That's not how this works. We need to all know the rhythm. And, you know, so I got that was something that was like a very big challenge for me that that ended up being a blessing and really fun and a cool way to sort of flex another comedy muscle of like,

you know, timing and details. Right. I have no right to talk about plays. It's been so long that I've been on stage, but there's such a different rhythm. You, when you're in front of a camera,

You can go for it and discover and, no, that didn't work. Again, I keep doing it. But the rhythm kind of of a play is finally, oh, you got it. You understand it. Then there's a hill down where everything sucks. And then hopefully it comes up in opening night. Bam! And through the roof, great. But it's a different rhythm.

You have to go through what you just described of, oh, this is deadening. Yes. And when you're in that downslope, it feels like there's nothing you can do. And that's for the entire sort of rehearsal and play process. But just on a nightly basis, once the show was up and running, I noticed, especially because this was a comedy comedy, a lot of jokes, a lot of laughing, if someone in the audience sneezed on the end of a funny line,

I knew it wouldn't get like you, you know, you get that into it where it's like, okay, someone coughed right before he said the funny part. So they're not going to hear that. So that means the next thing. Yeah. Yeah. But which was kind of fun. Because then you're engaged because when you're rehearsing, you don't have an audience except those few people are desperately hoping that their words are funny and all of that stuff. But the audience is just guiding you and yanking you around and doing new things. So that,

does make it a little bit more spontaneous for you. For sure. And it was, that was the way to keep it fresh. And, and, and I had a great time and my biggest takeaway from it was just like, I can't wait to do it again. So, you know, I want to, I definitely, yeah, I liked it. I really liked it. I loved it. It's, it just took me back to, you know, real childhood, like doing plays with friends when you're a kid is the most fun thing I could possibly imagine. And that wasn't so different from this.

Yeah. I think I told you my story, which I won't bother, but I got so scared. No, all right. I was at the Atlantic Theater. It's a good one. Atlantic Theater, which is this amazing theater in New York that feeds a lot of things into Broadway. Everything they do kind of ends up there. And they're friends of ours, Neil Pepe and Mary McCann, and they're just great people. And so they asked...

all the company members but also me i'm not a company member to do this uh celebration uh three or four or five weeks of all the playwrights it was the 25th anniversary so they got 25 playwrights that they had been working with and said write anything 20 minutes long doesn't matter you can write an opera you can write a monologue you can write a scene it doesn't matter

and then all these actors would come in and they would do five of these a night for a week and then they'd switch out to a new group of playwrights and do five of them every night. And you got about one day of rehearsal with Neil Pepe, the artistic director, and then off you went. And I saw somebody the week before me. When I flew into New York, I went to see that week's plays. And I saw somebody go up on a line and I thought,

Oh, well, somebody will whisper the line very surreptitiously from the wings. No, it came from the lighting booth over a microphone. You know, the line you just missed. And so I thought, oh, I better think of something clever to say if I go up. And I had a monologue. It was a 20-minute monologue.

And I so psyched myself. It was a wonderful monologue about the man who is talking to the audience and tries to remember what horrible thing he's trying to remember and he can't. And he goes through his day in front of the audience and then realizes that when he gets home, his wife says, can you take this down to the basement? And as he goes down to the basement, he realizes that

A literal hell with stalactites and stalagmites and hell is in his basement. The real hell. And then he horrified and he goes back out to walk the dog. And by the time he comes back in, he's forgotten. So every day is his cycle. Right. So...

20 seconds in to my little opening night. I'm going to throw up. Yeah. I went totally blank and it was like sticking my finger 20 seconds in. Sticking my finger into a light socket and my whole body went, you know, and my heart raced my

In that split second, it's like, fuck, I can't believe that happened. Oh, my God. My daughter's in the audience. Do I cry? No, don't cry. I could get up and leave. Oh, shit. I can't believe this. And then I remember to ask Darcy for the line. So I say, Darcy. Really? The person says, Darcy.

Darcy, what happens next? Great. That's so charming. Like I'm in charge. Yeah. Well, Darcy, the stage manager, has just sat down behind the desk with her cup of coffee and 20 seconds in, the clown splits my line. I don't know yet. Spills her coffee, thumbs through to find out. And she gives me the line that I had just said before I forgot it. Got that one, hon. Yeah. I said, actually, it's the next line, Darcy. I mean, I would be so charmed. Woo!

So, okay. So then she gives you the line. She gives me the line and I'm off and running. Okay. And I have so much adrenaline, so much anger, so much just craziness in my body that it probably was a brilliant performance because this guy discovers he has hell in his basement. So he has a right to be upset. My poor daughter had to walk me around the block.

With like two liters of water. To just calm your body down. Yeah, totally. That's not natural. I was just vibrant. Yeah. The next day, Neil Pepe, the director said, hey, why don't you come in half hour early and we'll just go over the lines. Let's just go over it. I don't know. I mean, the thing is,

Hearing the way you handled it, it is the perfect way that puts the audience at ease. Sure. Because I've been on the stage screwing up a line and I've been in the audience screwing up a line. And that is as much stress for the audience as it is for the person on stage, right? When it's just, you can tell. Car wreck, car wreck. Yeah. And when you, you know, hey Darcy, what's the line? That's so charming. But, yeah.

It was Darcy, by the way. That's so weird. I know. So when you met me, were you like, I have a bad connotation? No, I just made that up. It was Marcy. It was Marcy. Okay, similar. You can understand my confusion. This is why I'll never do theater again. I had a moment on stage for this play where there was like, it was like a really clippy comedy, right? We were just like, the rhythm was there and-

And, you know, we weren't screwing up lines a lot. But on this one night, there was like a pretty big dead pause. And my brain went, ooh, who screwed up? And I looked around. I was like trying to, what did we just say? What's coming up next? And my thought was, how can I help this person get out of this situation? And then I see all three sets of eyes staring at me. I realized it was my line. It was my line.

Somehow, you know, somehow I had just gotten off. And then I said it and then it was fine and we were off and moving. But it is such a weird... And also, oh, yeah, yeah. There was also...

So a little bit after that, there's a moment where I'm staring at the back of the stage at the, you know, upstage. And the only thing running through my mind was you are on Broadway. You just made that mistake. This isn't a community. Like, this is not some little nothing that you are on Broadway and you fool. You just made that mistake, but it was okay. And then I never did it again. Do you really want to know? Yeah. Great. Fantastic. Yeah.

Give me a quote. You know, actually, now that you say that, like I didn't really, my, my, you know, just your people, your, your, your reps do this where you get like an email that kind of have pull quotes about you. Do you get that? If there's a review and it's like, this is, this was positive. They said, blah, blah, blah. So now that I think about, here's something that I do. This is weird. And I'm sure this is my ADHD brain in full effect. And I did this for the good place too. When we would get reviews,

I would open them. Okay, so imagine my little laptop. I'd open them, but I wouldn't read them, but they'd be a tab. So they would be like one. I would have the review on my laptop ready to read, but I wouldn't read it for months. I wouldn't read it for months. Smart, smart. I don't even know why. I think I can handle it, but I just couldn't do it.

And so I remember having like reviews of that Janet's episode up for like a year before I got to them. Yeah. So anyway, they were, they were, you know, it was, it was really, I felt very embraced and like welcomed. Wonderful. Yeah, it was, it was, I felt really good. It was really, really nice. It was nice. I kind of couldn't quite believe it. Can I tell you some of my reviews? Yeah. It was after Cheers. Okay. It was Becker. And Becker.

To some degree, I think it's a truism that after something massively successful, there are some folks out there, especially if the press loved you and the, you know, cheers, that were kind of laying in wait. I'd like to think that that's the case. But Mary and I, it was premiere night, but Mary and I were in New York because I had just done all the press, you know, all these shows for two days.

And then we were in a car being driven to the airport to fly back to L.A. for opening night party and watch the show. And I watch Mary. I'm happy. I'm content. I've done my job. And why is Mary slowly moving this stack of newspapers onto the floor? You know, I went, oh.

Okay. Yeah. Let me read them. You know, she stutters for a minute and then hands them to me. Here was my favorite headline.

Too tepid Ted. And then the sentence went on. But too tepid Ted stuck in my memory. The other one was, Mr. Thinks he's so wonderful, Danson. Yeah. These people didn't like me as much as you do. Oh, no. It was just, it's hammered in my brain. I will never forget too tepid Ted. No, the other one is worse for me. Thinks he's wonderful. My mom basically said that to me one time.

About me? No, not about you. She thinks you're great. Something similar. Like, okay, wait, what was the line again? It was thinks he's so wonderful. Yeah, thinks he's so wonderful dancer. Yeah. I just remember, I don't even remember what it was having to do with, but it was, you know, your mom can say whatever. She can call you a brat. She can, moms can get you. But there was something about you're not as cute as you think you are. That really stuck with me.

of the meanest things she's ever said to me, but also good, good to, good to, you know, remember. Yeah. I've said this on the show before, but my mother, when asked how she felt about my, uh, my success on Cheers in the early days, she said, well, I'm happy for him. Uh, of course. Um, but it's a little foreign to me because I come from a long line of people who believe in the quiet, no, no, the nobility of quiet failure.

Wow. Wow. Wow. That'll stick with you. Yeah. Yeah. Oh, that's really good. That's a great quote. Yeah. That's the best. All right. Let me ask you another question and then we're about at the hour mark. But first off, I adore you. The feeling is so mutual. And I really, we have you on camera, by the way. So when you were professing your love with tears in your eyes. You might see. We do have that. You might see. I do think I got a little tear in my right eye. Yeah.

On the corner. The downstage audience. The camera's there, right? No, I really... But I want to ask you one more. I want to know about... My cosmic heart? Yeah, yeah. I mean, in general, you know, here's... I feel very lucky, okay? And...

And I think that's when I think about my heart, I think I like I can be a little boo hooey. But then if I zoom out, it's it's very easy for me to see that I am so unbelievably lucky and grateful. And I get to it's like as simple as like live my dreams. I got, you know.

Think of that, me telling you that I got to watch you on Fargo and all I could think of was I want to work with that guy. I just want to work with him. He's so good. I just want to be on a set with him and get to work with him. And I've gotten to have that experience with not just you, but I got to tell you, Ted, and I've said this before and other people have said this too, you're the best actor I've ever worked with.

In scenes together, you and me one-on-one. No, don't look at the paper. Your resume is very short. No, I have, I've worked with really good people. That's true though. But no, I, um, you are the best scene partner. No, don't even, don't go towards the microphone. You are the most, um, connected and committed and, uh, uh,

most surprising and inspiring actor I have ever worked with. And when I got to be in scenes with you one-on-one, I'm not kidding. When I got to be in scenes with you one-on-one, you made me a better actor in real time. For real. You, you alone. This is tough. Just so you know, I have complete editorials.

But at least I know you heard it. So I'm keeping this in. I am definitely keeping this in. You really are. You're so special. You're deflecting. But okay. Thank you. Thank you so much. I really, and I adore you too. Here's something about you that wherever I go, especially in our world of actors and writers and directors and stuff,

People, I'm not looking at you either, but I'm not crying, but it's hard to look at people directly. I know it is hard. Sorry. But the ripple effect you have of what you put out in the world, people love you. People are ferociously care about their relationship with you and with Jason. You mean a lot to a lot of people that are out there working in our world. Oh, that's so nice. And that's something that...

Hey, I didn't interrupt you. That's something that is a ripple effect that is a purposeful part of your life. You care about people. You care about your friends. You're fiercely loyal. And that does have a ripple effect. Cool.

I love that. Thank you so much. I'll take that. Really, really enjoy sitting here talking to you. I love you. Yeah. Marcy or Darcy? Well, I'm Darcy. Darcy. There are Marcies out there for sure. And that one. This is Two-Tap-It Ted signing off. Two-Tap-It Ted. I love you so much. I just couldn't love you more. I fucking love you. Darcy Carden, everyone. What did I tell you? The best, right? She has a podcast too called WikiHole.

It's a wild ride into the internet's most interesting and interconnected Wikipedia entries. Actually, I'm holding something back. I was on her podcast and had the best time with her. So it really is fun. That's it for this week's show. A special thanks to our friends at Team Coco. If you enjoyed this episode, send it to a friend.

Subscribe, rate, and review. And you can always watch full episodes of this podcast on Team Coco's YouTube channel, if that is your thing. And I recommend doing that, actually. I'll be right back here next week where everybody knows who you are. See you soon.

Research by Alyssa Groff.

talent booking by Paula Davis and Gina Batista. Our theme music is by Woody Harrelson, Anthony Gann, Mary Steenburgen, and John Osborne. Special thanks to Willie Navarro. We'll have more for you next time, where everybody knows your name. ♪

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