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On October 24, 2025, the actor and director Christopher Guest took the stage for a discussion with the New Yorker staff writer Ariel Levy, as part of The New Yorker’s 26th annual Festival.
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00:00Hi. Okay. I'm Arielle Levy. I'm a staff writer at The New Yorker, and it's my pleasure to welcome you.
00:24Oh, okay. We are rocking. I'm very happy to welcome you to the 26th annual New Yorker
00:34Festival. Okay, so Christopher Grass is, of course, a director, actor, and musician. His films include
00:39Waiting for Guffman, Best in Show, For Your Consideration, Mascots, and, of course, this
00:45is Spinal Tap, and now Spinal Tap 2. The end continues, and he has been the recipient of
00:54a Grammy Award and an Emmy Award, and that's just the least of it. What I want to know is,
01:02were you always a shapeshifter? Like, did you do voices and characters as a kid, three blocks
01:08from here? It started tonight, weirdly. It just came over you? No, I think when I was
01:15a kid, when I was a kid, I started to do that on my own. I would see, look out the window. I grew up
01:25on Waverly Place, which is really just there, and I would watch people walking, and then I would
01:32imitate the way they walked, and then if my parents took us to a restaurant, I would imitate the people
01:39that were in the restaurant. And so whatever that's called, I mean, it could be called Let's Put Him
01:46in a Place, a Special Place. But here I am. But that's how that started. It was like hearing music
01:56to, it was the same as music to me, to imitate someone's voice. And then eventually I was doing
02:03some music, and in a specific context, usually. Was there, do you remember like your first
02:10character? Did you have, did you have a first character you did? I don't. I don't, no. But
02:17you did ventriloquism. I did ventriloquism without knowing what I was doing. I was in school, and
02:27I was not interested, apparently, in school. I went to the Little Red Schoolhouse, which is
02:36there, and then I went to PS41, the old PS41, which was built in 1867. And then they tore it down,
02:45and they took our class around to 11th Street, and what was, what's the playground was where the old
02:52building was. And it was a Dickensian building. But I would do what I thought was ventriloquism
03:00in the class, and make sounds that looked like someone else was making them. As any great student
03:08does. So I, uh, why? Why? And the teacher, this is in the third grade, would look around and blame the kid
03:37next to me and say, Anthony, get out in a hole. And his name wasn't even Anthony, which was the worst
03:47part about it. And, I mean, it's sad. Saying this now is, is, um, odd, you know. But it's true. It is
03:57true. So I, I would do that. I would do various other things. And then it turned into me actually
04:03doing some ventriloquism on television, uh, and doing it in a movie. I think it's in Best in Show.
04:10I do a thing. And then finding out, after I had done Best in Show, finding out that a relative
04:17250 years ago was, uh, in England, was a ventriloquist. Oh, wow. And in his diary, it says,
04:24it said, uh, I make sounds for the family. And everything I did as a kid, it was kind of chilling
04:32to think that this is in 1790s. And so that was interesting. I don't know what that means,
04:39but, uh, but thank you for coming. Because what else do you have to know?
04:45Yeah, that's about it. But tell us about, your father was English. Tell us about, you had an
04:50English life too, right? You'd go to London every summer.
04:53Well, we would go, my dad was, uh, English. Uh, he worked at the United Nations and we would go
04:58over there a lot, uh, and do the, do time in England, in London specifically. And so there was
05:05a bit of a, uh, schizo thing. Yeah. Did you feel as at home there as you did here?
05:11Yes. I still, I still do. You still do? Yeah.
05:13And you, and the, the sounds, the accents. Well, my dad had a, it didn't sound the way
05:19I do this in Spinal Tap. I play a character that's, uh, from the East End basically. And
05:25that's a very different, my dad didn't speak that way, but it was appropriate for the film
05:30when we did it. Uh, how does your dad sound? You know. Uh huh. Okay.
05:43Okay. Okay. And this is my last childhood question. Mary of Peter, Paul and Mary was
05:50your babysitter, right? Oh, that was a good reaction. Wow. Meanwhile, I can't see anything.
05:58This is crazy. Um, yes, Mary, Mary Travers was my babysitter. She was about 14. Oh, wow.
06:05And I think I was younger, hopefully, because that would have been really weird job then.
06:13And, uh, long blonde hair, very, uh, beautiful. And, uh, my family knew their family. And yes,
06:21that's true. What kind of, what kind of music were they into? What was the music in your house
06:26like? Oh, well, my family listened to, uh, a lot of different kinds of music, classical music,
06:31uh, Ella Fitzgerald, um, some jazz as well. Uh, a mixture of a lot of different things. Uh huh. And I think that
06:40also laid the groundwork for my interest in different kinds of music, which I still
06:45have. Yeah. Tell us about Ziggy Muldoon.
06:49Yeah. This is his first band, right? The first one. Well, I, I went to a school called the High
06:57School of Music and Art up, up in Harlem, which is now called, uh, the same person. What is,
07:02which is now, I think the LaGuardia School, I think it's called now. And it was a school,
07:10you either were an artist or you took an exam, you, you auditioned to, to be a musician or whatever.
07:16And in, I didn't like that. That was not a good match for me, but there were some really gifted
07:21people. Michael Kamen was an oboist and he said, we should just play other kinds of music. And he,
07:28there was a band called Ziggy Muldoon. This was 1962 or three. And it was a conglomerate of a lot of
07:37different instruments. And we had one gig. The gig was scheduled for, uh, November 22nd, 1963.
07:49Ha. Ha.
07:51It's true. Yeah. And I, very excited, went up to the, the place, the venue, which was the Pierre Hotel,
08:00I believe, thinking, why not? There, this is probably still on. And I show up there and there's,
08:11there's a ballroom and there's nobody there. There's a guy, you know, doing this. Can I help
08:17you? Uh, yeah, I'm here for the thing. Uh, and he just gave me that look, which is, you know,
08:24do you have a television or do you, and I, I, it's a, it's a, it's a strange thing. But anyway,
08:30we, so we never actually played other than out on, in front of music and art.
08:34But at that point, were you already feeling pretty serious about music? Did you feel like,
08:38Well, I was feeling serious about anything except what they were doing at music and art. Yes.
08:43Uh-huh. I was, yeah.
08:44Why? What was so bad? What was the like at music and art?
08:46Well, it was very strict and they were big orchestras that you were placed in and strict old people
08:51that wanted to tell you exactly how to do everything. And, uh, I was actually saying
08:57earlier to a friend that you were in an orchestra and we were playing some piece. I was a clarinet
09:02player and playing, looking around and the old conductor person came over and said,
09:09you're not, you're not reading. I said, well, I know the piece. I've read the piece. I can
09:13read the music, but he said, you have to keep reading it. I said, but I, I know it. And that
09:18was, uh, you know, this is making me look bad because the thing is, I obviously had a problem
09:25with, uh, authority figures or something. I don't know.
09:29Tell us about your, what, what happened in your musical life at Bard.
09:37No reaction. What I'm, I'm, I, this is, now I'm let down. Uh, I went to Bard for one year,
09:44uh, and I was in a bluegrass band there, uh, and we would go to this little venue they had
09:53there, which is where Steely Dan were also playing before they were Steely Dan. They
09:58were four years older than I was. And that was just, didn't know them. I knew, I knew
10:05a person that knew them, but I didn't know them. Yeah. That's that story. I have to write
10:13that down because I want to tell that to other people. So I'll just use my phone as
10:19a, that'll be fun. But didn't you also play music with Arlo Guthrie there? I'm sorry.
10:28I missed that. What? Didn't you also play music with Arlo Guthrie at Bard? No, no. That
10:34was at Stockbridge school in Massachusetts. Oh, okay. So I, I, I wanted to go away. I lived
10:39here, but I wanted to really be in the country. And, uh, I did get to go to a school in Stockbridge,
10:45Massachusetts and Arlo Guthrie was there before he was well known. And I went up to him and
10:52I had listened to his, to Woody Guthrie records for years. And I couldn't believe this was a
10:59connection to, to him. And I said to Arlo, I, hi, I'm coming to the school. He was, he had
11:05already been there. I said, uh, I play the guitar. And he gave me this withering look and
11:10he said, well, I play the guitar, but he said, I'll tell you what. And he went, he disappeared
11:16and he came back and it was a little case and he opened it. And he said, this is Woody's
11:21mandolin. You can play that. I being the scientist that I was thought I was going to catch Huntington's,
11:30uh, disease from playing the mandolin. So I was back in my dorm room thinking, oh, well
11:36now I've done it because I touched the strings of this old Gibson mandolin, but I ended up
11:42playing with Arlo, uh, in, at some, at some gigs. Yeah.
11:46So what pushes you towards comedy? How do you go from music to comedy?
11:52Oh, maybe it was always the same thing. I don't really know.
11:54Yeah. Yeah. I have a friend here, David Nickturn, who I played with in a band called Voltaire's
12:00Nose, which was in 67 or eight. And, um, he would probably know the answer to that better
12:07than I would, because we played, uh, fraternity gigs in these weird places all around the city.
12:15But I don't think I was doing anything goofy then. Was I?
12:18Or maybe I was, I don't know. Oh, yeah. Well, we started playing when we were probably 13
12:28or 14, but I could honestly can't answer that. I don't know. But it eventually became clear
12:34to me when I started working at the Lampoon, the first year the Lampoon started, we were
12:38doing records and I was writing songs with Sean Kelly and that clearly this was something
12:44I was going to do, that I was going to be able to do both of these things together.
12:47And then when you move out to Los Angeles and start working for Lily Tomlin, what do
12:53you learn doing that? What does that do?
12:57I don't know.
12:58Okay.
12:59Let me think about that.
13:00Okay. We'll talk about it later.
13:02No, not actually literally.
13:03Okay. We'll never talk about it again.
13:06No.
13:06Okay.
13:07No, that was a call out of the blue. This was a call saying, would I work with her? And
13:11she was a very big person then, still is. And I went out and worked with her and wrote
13:18some music that was on her show and I was on the show with her. And it was a new thing
13:24for me because I had never done television. So that was a...
13:27And you meet Rob Reiner doing an episode of All in the Family.
13:33Yes. I played in a flashback in All in the Family. I play a double date and me and another
13:40woman were a double date with Rob and Sally...
13:44Struthers.
13:45Yeah. And that's how I met Rob Reiner. That was 77 or 8, maybe. I don't... 77?
13:52I don't know.
13:53No, I'm... I know.
13:54I just met you.
13:55You probably know because you seem to know more than anybody here.
14:01Did you feel immediately from the same comedy...
14:05Well, I think it's the same music. I think if you sit with a musician, you know instantaneously
14:10if there's a shared sensibility and it's happening or it's not happening. And it's the same in
14:16comedy. You get a sense very fast. Is this... Are we on the same wavelength basically? And
14:24we were.
14:25Uh-huh.
14:26Yeah.
14:27And when is... When and how do you come up with the character and the name Nigel Tufnell?
14:32That was at the Lampoon in the 70s. Yeah, I did a record. One of the records we did and
14:37I... I was that. And then in 79, I did a tour with Lenny and the Squigtones and that was
14:43my character's name.
14:45Uh-huh.
14:46Yeah. Yeah.
14:48Michael McKean from playing...
14:50Right.
14:51...Lenny on Laverne and Shirley.
14:53Correct. Yes, it all starts to merge into a thing. Yeah. Yeah.
14:57And how do you guys get going with Spinal Tap, your first movie? How does that come to be?
15:05We did a television show and in the television show, a little segment of it was a band that
15:12we had created to be on a parody of the Midnight Special, which was a rock and roll show in
15:18the 70s, I guess. And we called ourselves Spinal Tap and we did a song and that was the beginning.
15:27And then we thought this might be good to do again in some fashion. And so several years
15:32later, we did the film. Were there other names you considered for the band?
15:37Yes. I have them written down at home. Seriously, I wrote from one of the writing sessions and
15:44I wrote them all these names and on it is Spinal Tap, but there were other names, but I can't
15:51remember what they are right now. But they weren't that good, I don't think.
15:54So it's just as well that you can't remember. Well, I don't know. It's all, it could have
15:59been good or not because it was what it was. So I don't know. Yeah.
16:03All right. Well, let's watch a clip from Spinal Tap and then we'll talk more about it. I hope.
16:09Your first drummer was John Stumpy Peeps. Great, great, tall, blonde geek with glasses.
16:20Good drummer. Great look. Good drummer. Yeah.
16:22Good, good drummer. What happened to him?
16:25He died. He died in a bizarre gardening accident some years back.
16:30It's really one of those things. It was, you know, the authorities said, you know, best leave
16:35it. It's not unsolved, really. And he was replaced by, uh, Stumpy Joe. Eric Stumpy Joe Childs.
16:43And what happened to Stumpy Joe? Well, uh, it's not a very pleasant story, but, uh, he died,
16:50uh, he choked on, uh, the act, the official explanation was he choked on vomit. He passed away.
16:59It was actually someone else's vomit. It's not, you know, there's no real, uh,
17:05Well, I can't prove whose vomit it was. They never, they don't have facilities in Scotland
17:09Yards to print spectrum photographing. You can't really dust for vomit.
17:21I've heard you say that you found his wig in a box of wigs on the street.
17:26Yes. Well, it wasn't just a random box on the street. I went looking with a hair person. I don't
17:39mean that like an alien hair person. I mean, a person who does hair for films. And we went looking
17:46and there was this box and I think there were a few dollars and this one, and she picked it out.
17:52It was fake. It wasn't real hair. Uh, and then she cut it on my head to be that. That's what that was.
17:58I see. So it's not like you picked it out of a pile of rubbish. It was a, it was a, you were looking for wigs when you found the wig.
18:08Thanks for the backup. You know, that was, wow. It was a sad ass box of wigs on the street. Uh, it wasn't garbage. No, I don't know how else.
18:23I'll let it go. Okay. Good. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. We'll move on. Okay. How does, how does it go? Tell me about the experience of making this movie and it picking up speed to the point where you were going to get the
18:38you're, it's no longer a joke. You're out touring and going to Blastonbury and the Royal and Albert Hall and there's fans shaking your limo and like girls with flashing the boobs.
18:48Like what? Right. Am I art? Didn't that happen?
18:53Yes. Uh, well, we had been, we're, we're musicians and so, and then we're doing this thing. And so we went out, we actually did some gigs before the movie came out, uh, at clubs.
19:04And we thought, I wonder how the, if they're going to be able to tell that this is not, and nobody could tell anything because we were just doing what we did, but you know, so it was just us now going on the road and doing a lot of touring and playing these Carnegie Hall, all these venues all over the world and, uh, Wembley. And, and, uh, that was what that turned into.
19:24And then it was became its own thing. And there would be people backstage waiting for us in various states of undress, shall we say, which was puzzling because we knew who we were.
19:38We were those people. It was a schizophrenic sort of thing. We just done a concert, people having yelling or whatever. And then we'd go backstage and we were looking forward to going out to dinner, just doing that and going out to dinner.
19:52And there were half naked people there. And we, over the years would think, what are they thinking? What did they not know? Or did they think? And it really was a question we would ask seriously, because we never really did know what that was, except if they thought they were now in the movie, but it never was a successful, uh, thing. I don't know. It was just, anyway.
20:19And you get to the point where you're playing gigs where you're with people who are so big that they're playing along to tracks, right? And so it's like the joke band is the only one who's serious, who's playing.
20:31Well, the, the, the crazy thing was that we did a gig once where it was a charity thing. And the other two people groups were, the opener was Chaka Khan. The second was us. And then it was Michael Bolton. And this is true. This is a real event.
20:49So I went over to watch Chaka Khan. And in the, in the middle of a song, all the sound cuts out, the band cuts out because she's playing to a track.
21:00So she has musicians on stage that are miming to the record. She is furious and it keeps cutting out. It goes in and out and out. No one in the audience is even bothered by this. Nothing.
21:14Nothing. I kept thinking, well, this is, no one's booing and saying, why don't we play or whatever. And then we're playing, but we're really playing in half an hour from then. We're doing actually playing.
21:26And the irony of that obviously was strange. This is off subject. Do they have popcorn here or do they only have soft drink kind of things?
21:39Are you hungry? No, no. I've just, it's what I'm looking at. I'm looking at the, the snack bar. So it's, now what?
21:46Okay. Now what? Okay. Now. Yeah. How about see if this, yeah. Okay. That the form that I'm not going to say mockumentary, cause I know you don't like that term, but it's doing satires of documentaries.
22:01Obviously you've become a master of this form. What is it? Well, what do you mean?
22:06I mean, just what I did. I did this. That means this.
22:12All right. You don't think your movies are pretty funny?
22:18I do. I decided that I liked working in the form that we did spinal tap in. And so I did a series of films after that, A Mighty Wind and Best in Show and other movies that were done in the same form.
22:29Yeah. Which is hard to explain, but that's its own thing. So.
22:34But can we talk about what you like about the form?
22:37Yes. Awesome.
22:42When? No. Ah, you see, my thought before I came on here and talking with Ariel was that we should flip this and I should interview her.
22:54And seriously, because she's a wonderful writer and how that would be very interesting to hear about what she does.
23:01I've talked about what I do to over the years, but she didn't like that idea.
23:07I don't think people would be.
23:09And if anyone did, it wouldn't be me anyway.
23:10Who would it be?
23:11Well, that's, we talked about that.
23:13Right. Well, I didn't. Yeah.
23:14Okay. But I, and I wasn't being facetious. I think that would interest me.
23:18More than this experience.
23:19Well, no, no, this is what it is. Yeah.
23:21So I think, I've explained this before or tried to talk about this.
23:26This is very much like music to me. Improvisation in comedy is music because you're playing with a band, you're playing and listening to the other people and you're not all soloing at the same time.
23:36You can sense when someone is going to do that and you're laying out for as long as you have to lay out or not.
23:43And that was very musical to me.
23:45And it seems that a lot of these people who do this are musicians as well, which is interesting.
23:51It's a separate thing, but, but Michael McKean and Harry and Jane Lynch and John Michael Higgins, and I can name a lot of people are very, and Eugene Levy are very musical people.
24:03And so this, there was sort of an overlap, I think.
24:07Well, and also with, didn't you have like part of what you love about improv is that remembering the lyrics was actually, didn't work for you to have to look up lyrics and write them on your hand and stuff?
24:20Well, I can't remember lines. I did theater here in New York for a while and it was really difficult for me to remember lines even when I was a young person.
24:29And up until this last, we just did a concert in London about a month ago and it became a running joke.
24:37But there was one song we sang, a song I wrote, which I couldn't remember the words to.
24:42And it was, it was now a thing. It was a bit of a thing.
24:46So my guitar tech would write down on a piece of white paper, the first line of the song.
24:52And then once I saw that, then I could remember the song.
24:56And it's a different thing than improvising, memorizing something very different.
25:03Yeah.
25:04Do you not like the mockumentary term just because it sounds stupid or you don't think you're mocking anyone?
25:09Both.
25:10Uh-huh.
25:11Yeah, no, seriously, both. I think, yeah, both. Yeah.
25:16Can we see the clip from Waiting for Guffman, please?
25:19Oh.
25:20From the parlor to the pool room, everyone knows our name.
25:30Oh, sorry.
25:31No, too.
25:32You will...
25:33Oh, I couldn't believe.
25:34I've never stopped.
25:35Never breathing, working.
25:41I don't want to interfere.
25:43But I think it would be...
25:49I think we have to work on...
25:50I can't hear you.
25:51I think we have to work on the music a little bit more.
25:54Fine.
25:55But I don't want to make trouble.
25:57So I don't really want to do this in front of them.
26:01But I think...
26:02Where do you want to do it?
26:04Well, I think we have to sit down and make a schedule that includes some, some music time.
26:11Because I think Gene and I have to work...
26:15Why are you whispering?
26:16I'm right here.
26:17You know?
26:18I don't know just...
26:19Oh, I'm sorry.
26:20Do you want me to talk louder?
26:23Because I, I think that it would be...
26:26Well, now it's too loud.
26:27You know, just talk like a normal person, okay?
26:30All right.
26:31I think what they were doing was good.
26:33Well...
26:34To me, you rehearse, you rehearse.
26:35You rehearse.
26:36You get it perfect.
26:37You know exactly what you're doing.
26:38And then what?
26:39And then you forget about it.
26:40Let me pinpoint you.
26:41You said they learn it, they forget it, and that's okay.
26:44That's great.
26:45Well, they've forgotten it.
26:46But they never learned it.
26:47So when did they learn it?
26:49I'm just saying, when do we have a tire?
26:50But what I'm saying is if they're going to forget it anyway, then what difference does
26:53it make?
26:54I mean, you see what I mean?
26:55It's just like, it's like one of those, it's like a, it's like a, it's a zen thing.
26:59It's like, you know, you know, how many babies, you know, fit in the tire thing.
27:06That whole, the old joke, you know?
27:08Mm-hmm.
27:09Mm-hmm.
27:10No, you have a point.
27:11It's an interesting point.
27:14Do you think anger is the funniest feeling?
27:21Indignation?
27:22Yes, I think it's the main thing.
27:27I think, now, I forgot, yes.
27:31It's the main thing.
27:32Anger.
27:33It's part of it.
27:34It's part of it.
27:35But there are a lot of, it's like anything, it's a lot of different things, you know?
27:39That scene, which I haven't seen this movie since I made this movie.
27:43I haven't seen it again.
27:45I know I made it because it's there, but I see it.
27:49But that scene was always one of my favorite scenes because Balaban is unbelievable actor
27:55and great, great improviser.
27:58And the sort of battle between those two types was so fraught with just, this is not going
28:06to work.
28:07It just was, you know, you could do that forever, basically.
28:10How much of that scene was improvised?
28:13All of it.
28:14Every word.
28:15Oh, yeah.
28:16So what do your screenplays look like?
28:18Hey, you're mad now.
28:19No, I'm not.
28:20Fuck.
28:21Whoa.
28:27See how funny anger is?
28:31When you do it, yes.
28:34Hey, wait a minute.
28:35Yep.
28:36This isn't the last time we're going to be doing this.
28:39No?
28:40Nope.
28:41We're going to be going on the road with this little...
28:43I can't wait.
28:45Yes.
28:46The process of this is that in the case of this, Eugene Levy and I spent six months writing
28:52the story out.
28:55Each scene is delineated.
28:57Each character, their whole background, where they went to school, everything about the person.
29:02The music was obviously written before.
29:04I wrote the music with Michael McKean and Harry Shearer for Waiting for Guthman.
29:08And then when you're on the set, you do it.
29:12There's no rehearsal.
29:13So that is just, now we're doing this.
29:16Do you know why you choose the worlds you choose to satirize or investigate?
29:23Well, in this case, yes, I do.
29:25Yes.
29:26In this case, I had gone to see a friend of mine's daughter in a play.
29:31She was in junior high school and they were doing Oklahoma.
29:35Which shouldn't be happening.
29:38Arguably, it shouldn't be happening for anyone.
29:44But these were 13, 14 year old people doing this.
29:49A kind of cut down version of this musical.
29:52And it was, there was something charming and they brought out the director who was sobbing.
30:01They came out with roses and he was, the impression was this was the biggest thing that had ever happened in the theatre.
30:10In the history of the theatre.
30:12And I was taken by that and the idea of putting in a small town people who take themselves very seriously.
30:19And it's, this is the biggest thing for them.
30:22And the head of the, that Corky St. Clair, whose vision this is apparently, also thinks this is his big break.
30:30They're going to go to Broadway.
30:31And I was, I found that very compelling in this case, you know.
30:35And in the dog world, I was walking my dog.
30:38It was a rescue dog.
30:41And a woman had a fancy dog in this dog park.
30:44And she looked at me with this real chilling disdain.
30:49And she said, what's that?
30:53I said, that's Henry.
30:56That's Henry the dog.
30:58I mean, what is it?
31:00I said, well, it's a, he's a rescue dog.
31:03It's a mix of, and she looked and the look was, I'm so sorry for you.
31:08Because you don't have a purebred dog.
31:13And I thought on the walk home from that park, I thought, this is deep.
31:17Because this felt really big in a, even though it seemed like it was just a dog thing.
31:23It felt much bigger than that.
31:25And so the world of this thing where people have these dog shows.
31:29We, I thought that was a thing and I called up Eugene and I said, this is my next idea.
31:37And he said, no, it's not.
31:38I'm not doing that.
31:39What are you talking about?
31:40And it took him a while to kind of come to the thing.
31:43But then we had fun doing that eventually.
31:45How are you in the scene and directing it at the same time?
31:49Like, how do you do that?
31:50Yeah.
31:51Well, in the Guffman film, there was one camera.
31:56It was Super 16, which they don't use much anymore.
32:00And I was trying to explain, I was in a scene with Eugene.
32:05I was trying to explain to the cameraman.
32:07I said, we're going to be just, there are no lines, but we're going to be talking.
32:11And he didn't know what to do.
32:14And I said, here's what we're going to do.
32:16I'm going to put my foot on your foot.
32:19And when I tap the foot, that means you go to the other person.
32:26Very much like Star Wars or Mission Impossible situation where similar technique going on.
32:37And I actually did that.
32:39So it's a scene where he wears his glasses and I say, you shouldn't wear your glasses.
32:43And I'm now tapping, which means, because I know if I'm directing this, where, how that's going to work.
32:50Uh-huh.
32:51Yeah.
32:52So, but then it got, then it got more sophisticated after that, you know.
32:57No, it didn't.
32:58It didn't.
32:59It didn't.
33:00Okay.
33:01One thing I was really struck by in the new movie, in the sequel, and the end continues, is that Nigel turns into this kind, gentle, poignant person.
33:17Can you talk for a minute about, well, he's become such a wife guy and he, or maybe it's his girlfriend, but he's crazy about his partner.
33:24Right.
33:25He's crazy about his cheese.
33:26Right.
33:27How did you decide to make him go gentle like that?
33:31Well, I don't know if, you'll get to see this.
33:34It was, it'll be on a streamer thing soon, I guess.
33:38The second movie, if you haven't seen it.
33:40But it's, I thought he'd had enough of London and he moves to the north of England, right on the border of Scotland.
33:47He's met this woman who he falls in love with and they have a little cottage and they have a cheese shop.
33:52And they also, he also sells guitars and cheese.
33:55And.
33:56We actually have a clip of the cheese and guitar shop.
33:59Oh, okay.
34:00Well, I didn't.
34:01Anyway, I thought this is who he is now.
34:03He's, he's, he's, he plays music at home.
34:06He plays in a pub.
34:07He does what he does, but he's, he's a, just a gentle guy.
34:11He's not a, you know, that's who the person is really.
34:14Please show us the cheese shop, the Spinal Tap 2 clip.
34:18How do you make your life after rock and roll cheese?
34:24That, that's odd because you normally wouldn't think the rock and roll, now cheese.
34:31Yeah.
34:32You wouldn't think those.
34:33Maybe not, but for me it was.
34:34And then I see over there you have a number of guitars.
34:38Yeah.
34:39And you sell both?
34:40Yes and no.
34:41Sometimes people come in with a guitar.
34:43Yeah.
34:44And they trade for cheese.
34:46Really?
34:47Yeah.
34:48And sometimes it's the opposite.
34:49Sometimes people come in with cheese.
34:52Yeah.
34:53It goes both ways.
34:54What I do is I go like this because I trust my hands more than a scale.
34:59I go like this.
35:01Yeah.
35:02Then I go like this, let's say.
35:03Yeah.
35:06Close.
35:07Yeah.
35:08Very close.
35:09So a half a wheel of that cheese would buy you that base.
35:11Trade it.
35:12Trade it.
35:13Everyone's happy.
35:18The thing about cheese is actually a real thing.
35:22I do love.
35:23You love cheese.
35:24I do love cheese.
35:25Good cheese.
35:26And my wife and I were living in London period and I was walking through London and I came
35:33upon a very famous cheese shop and they had a sign in the window.
35:39It's called Neil's Yard.
35:40It's a very famous cheese shop.
35:42It said, help wanted.
35:44And I walked in and the cheese monger said, oh, you've got to try this.
35:50It's unbelievable.
35:51This is unbelievable.
35:52It just came in yesterday.
35:54And this as well.
35:56And he's cutting off these little slices.
35:58And this moment, real moment of maybe I should take that sign down and do this.
36:07And I thought, oh, I thought about it.
36:10I didn't.
36:11But it was a real thought of this would make me very happy working in this little shop.
36:16And then it shows up in this movie, you know.
36:21It occurred.
36:22The premise of the movie is that they get called.
36:24They get sort of lured back into playing.
36:27Well, they're not lured.
36:28It's a contractual thing.
36:29They're owed a concert in the film.
36:31The band is owed a concert to that.
36:34And their manager died.
36:35And now the daughter, the manager's daughter is doing this.
36:38So we have to do this show against our will.
36:42And so we hadn't seen each other in 15 years.
36:45That's the basis for the new film.
36:47Yeah.
36:48Well, and as I was watching, I was thinking, you have described yourself as being sort of
36:52semi-retired.
36:53Tell us about, and you were kind of lured back into making a movie with this.
36:58Yeah.
36:59Tell us about your life as like an outdoorsman, which is what it sounds like your retirements,
37:04about music.
37:05Well, I've been doing that my whole life.
37:06I've been spending a lot of time in the outdoors.
37:09And I still do.
37:10And that's just a few weeks ago.
37:13I was in the wilderness in Wyoming.
37:16And I do these trips with a friend.
37:19And that's always been a draw for me ever since I was a kid.
37:23But this one, we spent years debating whether we had a story that we all thought was enough
37:29of a story worthwhile to do, because it takes a lot of time.
37:34And we thought this, we did, I guess, because we did it.
37:37But it was not a quick decision.
37:40Yeah.
37:41And in the movie, you play music with Paul McCartney, you play music with Elton John.
37:46Yep.
37:47So what's it like as a musician playing, like looking up and being like, oh, I'm playing
37:52with a Beatle.
37:53Yeah.
37:54Sorry, I don't mean to sound so angry.
37:55It's not an insignificant thing for some of my generation especially, I guess.
38:00It doesn't compute really, you know, to have, to be sitting there and playing and you're
38:07in a movie and you're playing with Paul McCartney or with Elton John.
38:11In the case of Elton John, it was a big stadium and it was filled with people and we're doing
38:16a concert.
38:17And it's surreal, completely surreal.
38:20And, but it's happening, I guess.
38:23So it was, you know, yeah.
38:24Can you tell, like, with just playing that little bit with Paul McCartney, can you experience
38:29the virtuosity, like that, can you tell you're playing with someone who's extra good?
38:36Like, is there something that separates?
38:39Well, there's something, obviously with those two people who are iconic people in music for
38:42the last 50 years or more, it's a huge thing.
38:47It's, it's, it transcends music, it transcends everything.
38:51It's, it's bigger than that.
38:56It's much bigger than that, you know.
38:58And it's not as if they're, oh wow, that guy can play fast or something.
39:03It's, this is a person who's been, who's made 50 records and just every song you ever heard
39:08as a kid.
39:09You know, it's that, it's that thing.
39:10So it's, it's a very different thing, you know.
39:13Is it intimidating?
39:15It isn't.
39:17No, because we've, we've written the music and it's, it's in the context of what we do
39:21and they're playing with us, you know.
39:24And so it, it works in that, in that way, I guess you'd say, you know.
39:29And you still, people still will say to you, oh, you really play, right?
39:33Yes.
39:34All the time.
39:35All the time.
39:36Yeah, we did a, we've done huge shows, two hour shows, and it's happened quite a few
39:43times where someone will come back and say, were you playing?
39:49Yeah.
39:50Yeah.
39:51How would that have worked?
39:53But in all fairness, a lot of bands and big shows go out and huge number of tracks are
40:00being played from the album because they do these shows where they dance around and sing.
40:06And a lot of it is not live.
40:09And when you see the Super Bowl, it's all, it's a thing.
40:12But we've always played live.
40:14We've never done the other thing.
40:16But it happens all the time, you know.
40:18Yeah.
40:19Okay, you ready?
40:20I'm gonna...
40:21What's happening now?
40:22I'm gonna open the, I'm gonna try to open the idea.
40:23Oh yeah, open it up.
40:24How do you approach casting your movies?
40:27Oh, you don't even say the person's name.
40:30It used to be...
40:31I can't, I don't have it.
40:32Oh no, no, I, because maybe there's some legal thing or something.
40:35How do I approach casting in movies?
40:39Oh, I sit and talk to, people come in and I just talk to them for about half an hour.
40:43There's no lines, there are no lines to read.
40:45So I just talk to them and I can tell, probably in five minutes, if they can do that.
40:51Which is an odd thing, because how would I know, but...
40:54What's the word you use for improv-ing with people?
40:57Oh, I don't really...
40:59You don't wanna say?
41:00I don't remember.
41:01Okay.
41:02Yeah.
41:03Can I say?
41:04No.
41:05Okay.
41:06It's fast...
41:07This is interesting.
41:09It's fascinating that you are a baron.
41:12Have you ever considered writing a mockumentary?
41:15Didn't you hear?
41:16He doesn't like it.
41:17About hereditary peers in the UK.
41:21I don't know who this was.
41:22I'm gonna ask every single person who that was.
41:31No.
41:32No, no.
41:34Because to be in that situation is not really the cartoon of what you would think it is.
41:42Huh.
41:43That you would see.
41:44It was much more nuanced than that and more interesting than that.
41:48I've heard you say that you have a really interesting family history on your father's side.
41:53Would you tell us anything about that?
41:56So that's a no.
41:58No.
41:59No, it's not a no.
42:00I'm getting angry, so that's funny.
42:03Well, yeah, it's an interesting family because they, my father's family were, my grandmother
42:13was a playwright and he was a doctor and they had this salon situation in London where HG Wells
42:20and Bernard Shaw and people would come over and hang out and do whatever those people would do.
42:25And that idea that you don't think about people doing that much anymore.
42:30I guess people do that, but it was a thing then in Paris and in London where people would
42:36have these groups come over and they would talk and have food, I guess, or I don't know
42:42what they were doing.
42:43But my dad would tell me about this except that these were these kind of high level interesting
42:48people that were from the arts, from politics, from science, whatever.
42:53But then did your parents carry that on?
42:55Yeah, they did.
42:56They had interesting people.
42:57They had, my dad was at the UN and he had, there were musicians and they were actually
43:02cartoonists from the New Yorker came over to our house and actors and people from other
43:08countries.
43:09And I guess I just took that for granted, but I think it was interesting and something
43:14now that would be considered somewhat unusual, but that's what it was.
43:18Yeah.
43:19But so the world of really talented artists wasn't so far away.
43:24It wasn't so high up to you if you grew up around.
43:27No, it's true.
43:28Some people would come over and they were just the people that came over.
43:31They weren't, it wasn't an abstract thing.
43:34Yeah.
43:35So did you, when you started your work, your career, did what did it, did it feel like,
43:41oh, of course I can, that's my, those are my people.
43:44That's my world.
43:45Or was it?
43:46No.
43:47No.
43:48Okay.
43:49No, I thought I had to do something in this realm, but I didn't know what that was.
43:52I guess I thought in some ways that there were, what else was I going to do?
43:56I guess.
43:57I don't know what else I could have done.
43:59You know, couldn't have done mathematics.
44:02Cheese.
44:03Cheese.
44:04I could have done cheese maybe, yeah.
44:07Okay.
44:08Yeah.
44:09This is a question for Corky.
44:13Where did life take you after Red, White and Blaine?
44:16I actually know the answer to that.
44:18Where, where does what take me?
44:20Where did life take you?
44:22Oh, I think it's in the epilogue of the movie.
44:24The Corky character is auditioning for a Broadway show.
44:28He's auditioning, I think, for My Fair Lady.
44:31He thinks he's going to play the main part in My Fair Lady.
44:36That's how deluded he is.
44:38And he's practicing his English accent.
44:40As I remember, that's where that ends up.
44:44No, there's more.
44:45You put him in mascots.
44:47He's back in mascots, right?
44:49Oh, yeah.
44:51Of the films you made, what was the most enjoyable to film?
44:56I think Equalizer 2.
44:58Ha!
44:59Because there's something about revenge where you can sit in a bar.
45:08Because a lot of people think that way, but they don't want to admit it.
45:11That when you see the bad guy, it goes back to him, it goes back to them, and you know he's going to kick ass.
45:18Or, I've actually forgotten the question.
45:22Which one was the most pleasurable to make?
45:25Oh, all of them were, there was not one that was not a joy to do, truthfully.
45:30And because of the way they're done, it was great.
45:35It was fantastic.
45:36Yeah, it's not, if you're doing someone else's movie and you're a hired hand, many times it can be challenging.
45:41But this was not the case.
45:43There was a period in your 20s where you were doing theater, isn't there?
45:47Why are you so shocked that I'm asking you a question?
45:49Actually...
45:51I've been doing it for an hour.
45:53I was saying to someone today, I was saying to someone today, that this is probably another problem,
46:03besides doing ventriloquism noises and why would you be doing that?
46:07But, someone would tap me and I'd say, whoa.
46:11And they'd say, I'm sorry to scare you.
46:13And I'd say, you didn't scare me, I was just pretending to be scared.
46:16And they'd look at me.
46:18Why would you do that?
46:21And that's the same thing just now.
46:23Yeah.
46:24Yeah.
46:25It's like how I always see my rate.
46:29You're very good at this.
46:33I'm serious.
46:35Oh, thanks.
46:36No, I've done this a few times, and Ms. Levy is great.
46:40You're not having a bad time?
46:41No.
46:42All right, good.
46:43Ooh, this is a great question.
46:44Oh.
46:45What are...
46:46So, just brace yourself.
46:48I'm going to ask you.
46:49Yes.
46:50Okay.
46:51What are some of your favorite documentary films?
46:52How have they influenced your work?
46:54That's a good question.
46:55That's a good question.
46:56It is, because I love documentaries.
46:58I've watched more documentaries than I do other forms of films.
47:03And I...
47:06Someone asked me to do a real documentary.
47:08A real documentary.
47:09And I said, I can't.
47:10Because if I do that, even though I'm interested in the subject, people will assume that it's
47:15funny or there's some, you know, thing going on here.
47:20Which there wouldn't be, but...
47:22So, I wasn't able to do that.
47:24But I've watched a lot of documentaries and still do.
47:28I don't even know where I'd begin with seeing ones.
47:31There was one called Salesman that was a movie done in the late 60s that the Maisel Brothers
47:40did.
47:42And that was one of the first that completely messed me up.
47:48I thought, this is incredible.
47:50I got to work with Al in 1970 on a project.
47:53He was the cameraman and his brother did the sound.
47:56And...
47:57But there have been many.
47:58I don't know if I can come up with other names right now.
48:02I know what I was going to ask you before.
48:04There was a period in your 20s when you were doing theatre.
48:08Where you were doing serious acting, right?
48:10You said that before, right?
48:11Did I?
48:12Yeah.
48:13Did I really?
48:14Oh, yeah.
48:15Oh, my God.
48:16I just didn't answer you.
48:17And I didn't do it intentionally.
48:18I did theatre for about five or six years in New York.
48:21I did Off-Broadway and Broadway.
48:23And loved it.
48:25Loved doing that.
48:26Yeah.
48:27It was great.
48:28I did a show for the Lampoon that we did called Lemmings, where I co-wrote the music.
48:32And we did that down in the village here for a year.
48:35You were there at the same time as Chevy Chase and John Belushi.
48:39Is that right?
48:40Yes.
48:41I got them in the gig, as they say.
48:44Yeah.
48:45Yeah.
48:46Tony Hendra and I, I was a young person at the time.
48:51I was 23, I think.
48:53And we put this show together with about three or four other people.
48:57And we would go to these clubs.
48:59And I had met Chevy before, and that's how they were in Lemmings, yeah.
49:05Did you feel like you were on this same page comedically?
49:09I mean, I guess, of course, or you wouldn't have hired them.
49:12I guess.
49:13Yeah.
49:14I guess they worked out, yeah.
49:16Well, I don't know if you're going to go for this.
49:21What makes you laugh?
49:23That's a great question.
49:25Oh, great.
49:26I was drawn to Laurel and Hardy very early on.
49:29My dad took me to see some of those movies.
49:32And Peter Sellers was a huge, huge influence.
49:36And the biggest influence was a show called Beyond the Fringe with Peter Cook, Dudley
49:41Moore, Jonathan Miller, and Alan Bennett.
49:43And that was the turning point.
49:45That was the Rosetta Stone for me of everything, I think.
49:49Didn't you go up to Peter Sellers once and do your Peter Sellers impression?
49:55I don't know what that would be.
49:56What would that be?
49:58No, I was, when I was 13, he had a heart attack.
50:03I think it was 13 or 14.
50:04He had several heart attacks.
50:06He had a heart attack and it was on the news.
50:08And I was in my room here, nearby there, and I knelt at my bed.
50:19And I'd seen this in a film.
50:21People prayed, apparently.
50:23I had never prayed.
50:25No one I knew had ever prayed.
50:27And I prayed that he wouldn't die.
50:30And this is a 13-year-old kid.
50:33I was crying.
50:34I thought, don't do this.
50:36Don't, you know.
50:37That's a true thing.
50:38But, yeah, so I'd say Beyond the Fringe thing was the moment where I thought this is, and
50:44it still is to this day, the four smartest, funniest people, period.
50:49I mean, that was it.
50:50Not even close.
50:51Not even, nobody could touch that, you know.
50:55And it wasn't as well known here, although they did it on Broadway here.
51:00Playing the same character 40 years later, you made, you know, the first one, you're basically
51:06an older kid, right?
51:08Like your late 20s.
51:09Yeah.
51:10Yeah.
51:11Except when we decided to do this, this, well, it's not even there, this, the second film,
51:16we're old people.
51:17We're the people, when you look at, you know, old rockers, if you look at the stones or the
51:22people who are still alive, and you look at pictures of them, you think, wow, that's
51:27an old, that person is so old.
51:30I wonder what, whoa, that's me, hold it a minute, wait a minute.
51:33And you look at the movie and you think, this is, this is scary.
51:37This is really scary to see yourself as a young person and then see yourself as an old
51:44person, because internally I don't feel that way.
51:47You know, I still run around and do what I do.
51:51If you who made the first one could see your life and your career now, what would be surprising?
51:59What would surprise me about the way things are for you now?
52:02I don't know.
52:03Okay.
52:04It's a good question, but I really, I don't know.
52:07I didn't think I would be doing any of this.
52:10I really didn't.
52:11I didn't know if someone had said, what do you want to do?
52:14And there are many people who have a dream, they have a goal, they say, I want to be able
52:19to do this.
52:20I never had that.
52:21Things just sort of weirdly fell into some place where I got to do some great things that
52:28that were fun.
52:29There were some really fun things and work with some great people.
52:33So that, but it wasn't, I hope one day I'm a make movies or something.
52:37It wasn't that.
52:38It's just the way the cookie crumbled.
52:41Yes.
52:42Yeah.
52:43Yeah.
52:44You guys, we did it.
52:46We're zero words.
52:47It's all zeros.
52:48It's all zeros.
52:49Thank you so much for doing this.
52:52It was a real pleasure.
52:53Thank you, sir.
52:54You're great at this.
52:55Thank you all for coming.
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