On the pod, the guys revisit The D.E.N.N.I.S. System from It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia Season 5, Episode 10 with special guest, Jill Latiano Howerton.
*Charlie plays “I Like Life at Paddy’s Pub” on piano and harmonica*
Charlie Day: Alright, hi Jill.
Glenn Howerton: Jill Latiano Howerton.
Jill Latiano Howerton: Hi! How are you?
Megan Ganz: Do the hugs bit.
Charlie: How are ya?
Jill: I’m good. Hey.
Glenn: Hey, what’s up?
Jill: Hey, what’s up? Saw you like 30 minutes ago.
Meg: Already neglecting her by not even standing up to hug your wife.
Jill: Ohhh!
Charlie: Ohhh!
Jill: The D.E.N.N.I.S. System works, you guys!
Charlie: The D.E.N.N.I.S. System is in action!
Glenn: By the way- By the way, just so you know- Just so you’re aware, this is all part of the show. So the show’s happening right now.
Jill: Yeah, I know.
Glenn: Ok, I don’t know. I don’t know if you know!
Charlie: We’re always rolling. We’re always-
Glenn: Well, you don’t watch the podcast.
Jill: Well, I walked in and everyone’s like *mimes being quiet*, I was like, oh they’re starting.
Glenn: Oh, well no we weren’t. We were talking about schedule and stuff. That’s not going in.
Meg: You never know when I’ll start the podcast. I’ll probably start when Charlie was playing this morning when I walked in.
Glenn: Cool shirt, Jill!
Jill: Thanks Glenn!
Charlie: Pink Floyd. Now between the two of you, the amount of band shirts that you own…
Meg: Oh yeah.
Charlie: Now you guys, do you buy them off people on the side of the highway? Or do you, is it online?
Glenn: It’s not hard to find band shirts, whether it be next to the highway or…
Jill: To be fair, I think this might be my only band shirt, right?
Glenn: No, you’ve got that Bowie shirt.
Jill: Oh, I have that Bowie one. Ok, I have two.
Charlie: Mhm.
Glenn: Yeah.
Meg: Do you have as many opinions on t-shirts as Glenn does? And how the arms, how long the arm length is?
Jill: I don’t have as many opinions as Glenn in general.
Charlie: Yeah, that would be quite a feat.
Jill: Glenn is a very opinionated man.
Charlie: Any household can only have so many opinions and I imagine you [Glenn] gobble up most.
Glenn: I gobble up most of the opinion time.
Charlie: Let’s give our listeners and our creeps a proper introduction of Jill. Um, should we talk about your character first? The fact that you’re married? Where do we begin?
Jill: Where do we start?
Glenn: I think- Well, first of all, I just wanna say, I think it’s like, I mean, ya know, the creeps and the listeners, they’ve seen a lot of Mary Elizabeth and Kaitlin as actors but also they’ve seen them on the podcast. They have some idea of how we interact with Kaitlin and Mary Elizabeth, but I don’t think anybody really has any idea how we interact with Jill Latiano Howerton.
Charlie: It’s true, yes. This is gonna be more of a-
Jill: I’m the secretive one.
Charlie: -Sort of a mystery guest.
Jill: I’m a mystery wife.
Glenn: You are. You are.
Meg: But I will say Glenn has brought you up a lot in the most glowing and loving terms, so-
Charlie: The rest of it we cut out.
Jill: Thank you.
Glenn: We don’t ever edit it into the episode.
Charlie: Glenn, that’s gonna ruin your marriage. We gotta get that out. Um, but we’re also talking about The D.E.N.N.I.S. System.
Meg: Yeah, we’re very happy for you to join us for this episode, The D.E.N.N.I.S. System, which is a fan favorite.
Jill: Yes.
Meg: And you play such a crucial part in it.
Jill: Yeah. It’s funny. We laugh all the time because we cannot post a photo of ourselves without all of the comments, or 99% of the comments, like “oh, the D.E.N.N.I.S. System really works”.
Glenn: The D.E.N.N.I.S. System really works. Oh, you forgot to separate entirely.
Jill: You forgot to separate entirely.
Glenn: It’s like, okay guys, if any of you are the ones making those comments, any creeps and listeners that are listening right now, I get it. We get it. We get it. I understand why you’re doing it. But stop. But not because we’re offended by it or anything like that, just stop because it’s like getting old. It’s like, we get it. You did it. You can’t make the same joke over and over again.
Jill: And do they not see how many other people are making the same joke?
Charlie: I get a lot of that too. A lot of like, “oh I guess The Waitress is lettin’ you hang around this week”, or whatever.
Glenn: Yeah, yeah, yeah, you get that too.
Jill: I don’t know. I guess it’s nostalgic for them.
Charlie: Separate entirely from our characters, please. Let us be real human beings.
Glenn: Yes! We’re real people.
Jill: I mean, it’s been, yeah…
Meg: Just go back to commenting on Glenn’s bleary, red eyes, which he very much appreciates, as well.
Jill: Yeah, how he looks high in every picture.
Glenn: How I look stoned in every picture.
Charlie: Ok, so it was season 5.
Meg: Oh, yes! Ok, so, thanks Charlie-
Glenn: Take us back.
Meg: We have a bit of structure.
Charlie: Let’s give us some structure.
Meg: The D.E.N.N.I.S. System is Season 5, Episode 10. It aired on November 19th, 2009. And I’ve written down here that I believe you two were married on September 8th, 2009, so this was shot before or after you got married, do you remember?
Glenn: It was shot before we got married but aired after. And we got married on September 5th, I don’t know where that date comes from.
Meg: Oh, I’m sorry. The internet.
Jill: It’s Wikipedia and they messed it up.
Glenn: Stupid internet.
Meg: Wikipedia just doesn’t- September 5th.
Jill: September 5th.
Charlie: So you weren’t married yet.
Jill: No, we were engaged.
Glenn: We were engaged.
Charlie: So it could’ve gone wrong. You could’ve been like-
Jill: I still could’ve gotten out.
Charlie: Yeah.
Jill: I had a chance, guys!
Charlie: You had a window there to be like, you know, I worked with you on set and it just, I see now…
Glenn: I see now the man that you really are and I don’t think I like it.
Charlie: Now, we had Marder and Rosell on the podcast and we were talking about The D.E.N.N.I.S. System, which they penned that one.
Meg: They wrote it with David Hornsby.
Charlie: With Hornsby, uh huh.
Meg: And it was directed by Randall Einhorn.
Charlie: Uh huh. Uh huh. Who we’ll have on at some point. Um, now recollections of things-
Glenn: Your specialty.
Charlie: My specialty.
Meg: He can’t remember the words for that.
Charlie: I can’t remember the words for how to remember things. Uh, were you- Do you remember reading the script for the first time? Or did Glenn kinda pitch it to you?
Jill: I feel like Glenn probably pitched it to me. I don’t remember reading it for the first time. I don’t, if I’m being honest.
Glenn: Is Jill close enough to the mic?
Meg: Yeah. I believe so, I’ve been told.
Mara Herron (offscreen): Actually if she can get a little closer…
Meg: Oh.
Jill: Testing, testing, 1 2 3.
Glenn: Rob likes to suck on it and have it fully in his mouth.
Jill: This one?
Charlie: Uh, all of them. All of them.
Glenn: Yeah, he’s had his mouth on all of them.
Charlie: Yeah, he’s torn through all of the microphones. We have to change them out, though. That’s probably clean.
Meg: Yeah.
Jill: Is that better?
Meg: Yep. All good.
Jill: Uh, where were we? Um, I don’t remember reading the script for the first time. I don’t. I remember, like my general recollection-
Glenn: It’s very unmemorable.
Jill: Well, I just remember thinking that it’s hilarious and insane and that it was gonna be super fun to work together.
Glenn: And we caught Jill at a time where she was still acting. Jill is no longer acting.
Jill: No. Retired.
Glenn: She retired from-
Charlie: Producing quite a bit, though!
Jill: Yes!
Charlie: Producing a lot of great documentaries and films.
Jill: Yes, thank you. The episode, I mean, Glenn and I watched it last night. I was like, oh my god, this is so fucked up.
Meg: Had you not watched it since it aired?
Jill: I don’t think so, no. Maybe I caught it once or twice, I don’t know. But not like fully sat down to watch it. I don’t know, I don’t love watching myself. I don’t know. Some people are like that. It’s kinda weird.
Glenn: I think most people don’t. There’s an uncomfortable factor there.
Jill: Yeah. But when we watched it, I was just like, oh my god.
Glenn: Well, first of all, she was like, we look so young.
Jill: I did. That was the first thing I said, like, look how cute and young we were!
Charlie: I know. It’s hard to go back and watch those.
Meg: Did you also put like a dreamy filter on the sort of flashback? It felt like when you did the moments there was a little bit of a hazy thing on it, maybe.
Glenn: Yeah, a little bit of a thing on it. I’m sure. Yeah.
Meg: You look awful young sitting here in front of me now.
Jill: Thanks Megan. It’s been about 14 years I think.
Glenn: It has been 14 years.
Charlie: Has it been 14 years since we did that episode?
Glenn: Almost exactly 14 years since we shot it.
Jill: Isn’t that crazy?
Charlie: That’s depressing.
Jill: I mean it’s funny but it’s just so crazy. And it made me remember that, at that time, when we were just dating, before we were married, and the show was still young at that point. And they’d say, oh what does your boyfriend do? And I’m like, oh, he’s an actor. Oh is he on anything I would know? I don’t know, do you know the show It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia? Oh yeah! Which one is he? And I’m like, eeeh. He’s like…
Glenn: He’s the, uh….
Jill: Psychopath vain asshole. But I swear he’s not like that in real life. Because does it so well that I felt like I’d have to explain, like, I promise you he’s just a really good actor. That’s not who he is.
Glenn: There have to be people out there that wonder why such a wonderful person as yourself would be married to such a horrible man. Not being able to fully separate themselves from my character or separate out the fact that I could be a different person. Or that I could present in public as a different person than my character but there’s gotta be-
Jill: Deep down…
Glenn: -Deep down, is he the guy? You know what I mean? But we couldn’t have been together if I was anything resembling-
Charlie: Unless the system is so strong that you’re incapable of leaving.
Meg: The mask is so-
Glenn: Imagine the brain power it takes on my part to keep the system going for that long.
Meg: That’s what I’ve always thought about self-help books when it comes to dating is that a lot of them I feel like, especially geared towards women, give you a sort of- Like I remember I once got this one called “Why Men Love Bitches”. I’m hearing some murmurs in the back.
Glenn: Oh that’s fantastic. I heard some cackles in the back.
Jill: Wow.
Meg: But it was all about how you need to treat him badly at the beginning so that he’ll chase you. But my thought is always, ok so let’s say that this system is effective. At what point do you rip off the mask and go, actually it’s me I’m really clingy and dependent?
Jill: I’m really super co-dependent.
Meg: Yeah. When do you do that?
Charlie: The mask just deteriorates. You don’t have to rip it off, it just slowly crumbles away.
Meg: It’s like the stitches you get that dissolve into the skin. Alright, so maybe that was what happened. It dissolved so slowly, imperceptibly, that you didn’t notice.
Glenn: Yeah, and by that time it was too late.
Charlie: I don’t really remember that episode getting pitched. I guess we were talking about those books, those systems for picking up women.
Glenn: Yeah, I have a memory of us writing out the D.E.N.N.I.S. System on the board in the offices where we were writing season 4.
Charlie: Yes, I feel like I can remember the letters on the board and trying to come up with the acronym.
Glenn: I remember being in that space that we were in in season 4, when that acronym, when we first came up with the acronym and what it all meant. But I don’t remember why we weren’t able to complete the episode yet.
Charlie: Well, maybe we just didn’t have a story for it yet. Like, we knew this was a funny concept, sometimes that’s how it goes, we didn’t have the right actress for you, Dennis.
Glenn: Yes! We didn’t know who we were writing to.
Charlie: You guys weren’t even engaged! You were simply dating. We didn’t know if it was gonna last.
Glenn: We were engaged. We were engaged for a year and a half.
Charlie: Wow. What was the hesitation?
Glenn: There was no hesitation!
Jill: There wasn’t. You know what it was? It was Kaitlin and Rob were getting married that year, and like four other friends of ours getting married.
Glenn: We had like so many other friends getting married that year.
Jill: So we’re like, we gotta wait until next year. And then I liked the weather in September.
Glenn: We knew our wedding was gonna be absolutely amazing and we didn’t wanna, ya know…
Charlie: It was a good time. It was a good time.
Glenn: We didn’t wanna step on…
Charlie: It was a good phase. It was a good time for me because I really cut loose at those weddings and just let it rip and I miss that.
Jill: Yeah.
Glenn: Yeah, it was a good one. But yeah, I do remember us coming- And then we finally came up with what the whole story was when we were breaking Season 5, which was at Fox. Because Season 4, we were in Culver City.
Charlie: That’s crazy. Yeah, my whole visual image of the writing of that episode is in the Culver City offices so, interesting. It spilled over.
Glenn: So you do remember it in the Culver City offices.
Charlie: Yes. Yeah.
Glenn: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Charlie: Isn’t it funny how that’s how we remember things by the space we were in.
Glenn: Totally.
Jill: That makes sense.
Glenn: Yeah, it totally makes sense. Yeah.
Charlie: Which is why 5 through like 10 is such a blur because we were in those Fox offices forever.
Glenn: Yeah, yeah. That does become a bit of a blur. 5, less so, because it was our first year there so like this season, in particular, really sticks in my memory because it was the first year we were on the Fox lot. And I remember, and Who Pooped the Bed?, that’s from this season, right?
Charlie: No, that was 4.
Meg: That was last season.
Glenn: That was 4? That’s so weird because my memory of you writing all that stuff out on the board-
Charlie: That’s in the Culver City offices.
Glenn: That was in the Culver City offices?
Charlie: Yeah, mhm. Alright, so uh….
Glenn: Anyway, back to you, Jill.
Charlie: What else?
Jill: What else?
Charlie: So when did you guys meet? How did this happen? I remember you hanging around the Venice house that Rob and Glenn lived at.
Jill: Yes.
Charlie: And every now and then they would have a party and I remember you were in the mix.
Jill: That’s where we met.
Glenn: Wait, was Charlie at that party? I think he was. I think he might have been.
Jill: Well, I don’t know because I didn’t know you yet. That’s why. It’s not that you’re not memorable.
Charlie: Ehh. Ehh.
Jill: Or maybe you’re not.
Meg: You remember someone else from that evening.
Jill: Well, there was a lot of people there.
Charlie: Well, the gravity of Glenn was so strong that you only had eyes for him.
Jill: Mhm.
Charlie: Plus I was taken so I wasn’t giving off that vibe.
Jill: So we had a mutual friend, we have a mutual friend, Yara Martinez, who Glenn went to college with and who I became quick friends with when I moved to LA. And she brought me to their house party. I don’t know if you wanna say the beginnings of that. Glenn kinda asked- You wanna tell your part?
Glenn: Well, yeah. I’d been single at that point for maybe two and a half, three years or something like that and Yara and I were good friends and I was like, “hey you got any cute friends you wanna invite over? Anyone you think I would like?” Ya know? Because we knew each other pretty well, and she knew, I guess, maybe what I was into as far as what I was looking for. And she was like, “ya know, it’s funny you bring that up. There is this one person.” And then she described to me the person and I was like, “tell me, what’s her name?”
Jill: I did not sound good on paper.
Glenn: Her name is Jill. Well, in some ways you sounded amazing on paper.
Jill: Yeah.
Glenn: But then in other ways I was like, ehh.
Jill: Ehh.
Meg: Really?
Jill: You’ll get it when he says it.
Glenn: She was like, “her name’s Jill”.
Charlie: Strike one.
Jill: Strike one. Who has the name Jill?
Charlie: I hate “J” sounds.
Glenn: Well, my name’s Glenn. And Jill, she needs to have a cooler name to-
Meg: To carry the weight.
Glenn: To balance the Glenn of it all. But no. She was like, “she just moved here from New York. She’s a model. She’s a dancer and now she’s acting, as well”.
Jill: You know what I mean?
Glenn: And I was like-
Meg: That’s three things!
Jill: Triple threat!
Glenn: And I was like, “ok, so she’s probably physically attractive, but is she gonna be-”
Jill: Vapid.
Charlie: Does she DJ too?
Glenn: She did, actually. She did DJ! She did!
Jill: That was a small stint, ok?
Glenn: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Jill: But like, on paper I get how kinda like douchey I could’ve sounded…
Glenn: I was just like, ehh-
Jill: Or there’s preconceived notions of girls-
Meg: Yeah.
Jill: -that are in those businesses sometimes.
Glenn: But I knew because you were friends with Yara and how much I liked Yara and trusted Yara’s taste in human beings, I was like, ok well she must be pretty decent.
Jill: Worth a shot.
Meg: Now wait, sorry, did you get Glenn’s breakdown? Were you also aware that this setup was happening? And how was he pitched to you?
Jill: He was pitched to me-
Glenn: Pitched.
Jill: He was pitched to me. You know what happened was, I think we were in the car with another friend and they were talking about the show and it was only Season 2 so I hadn’t heard of the show yet.
Charlie: Ok.
Glenn: Oh yeah. There had only been two seasons.
Jill: I don’t even know if Season 2 had aired, maybe it had.
Glenn: It had. It had.
Jill: Ok, but still very early. And they’re talking about the show and talking about the guys on the show and then they were talking about Glenn like, “oh, he’s cute and this and that” and I was like “oh, what is this show? Who is this person?” And I, had just got out of like a five year relationship, so I was kinda like, ready to have fun and not looking for something super serious but also I was single, I had just moved to LA. So she told me about him, I probably looked him up, ya know, I’m like ok. Alright, let’s meet this guy.
Glenn: Right, so on paper, I might’ve not looked that good either then, right?
Jill: No, you looked good. You looked like a successful actor.
Glenn: Right.
Jill: And a handsome guy.
Charlie: He was renting a pretty big house. It was a three-story house in Venice.
Glenn: No, no, no. You’re misremembering.
Charlie: Two stories?
Glenn: No, no, no.
Charlie: One story but you had a big room.
Jill: It was a big room.
Glenn: It was an apartment, but it was a big apartment and it was on the top floor of like a two-story building or whatever.
Charlie: So you and Rob had the top floor apartment. And jacuzzi on the roof.
Glenn: With a jacuzzi on the roof.
Jill: It was pretty bachelor pad-y.
Glenn: It was very bachelor pad-y.
Meg: You got taken back to that apartment with a jacuzzi on the roof and you were like, well you were, I guess you were in the place where you were like, “this isn’t gonna be a long term thing”.
Jill: Yeah. This is fun.
Charlie: At that age, a jacuzzi on the roof is not a red flag. At that age, a jacuzzi on the roof is like, “you can afford a jacuzzi”? You know? Like, “wow how did you pay for the water”?
Meg: “How’d you get it on the roof?”
Jill: “How’d you get it on the roof?”
Glenn: “How’d you get it on the roof?” By the way-
Jill: They craned it onto the roof.
Glenn: We craned it onto the roof if anyone’s interested. We literally had to get a crane.
Charlie: You were like Mac and Dennis craning a hot tub onto a roof.
Glenn: First of all, picture Rob and I hot tub shopping. Which we did.
Charlie: Ah, that is amazing.
Glenn: Which was the first step. The first step was going to the hot tub place on Sepulveda and looking at various models and-
Jill: Discussing the pros and cons of the different shapes and colors.
Glenn: Yes, exactly!
Jill: Who’s gonna sit where and…
Charlie: Glenn, let’s form a pact right now. If we have a quick midlife crisis, let’s get an apartment and put a jacuzzi on the roof. It’d be a lot sadder now. It’d be a lot sadder.
Meg: The three of you guys in an apartment with a jacuzzi on the roof.
Charlie: We’d be going in to soak the things that hurt.
Jill: It’d be like an Epsom hot tub. Therapeutic.
Charlie: A whole different motivation for being on that roof. Just like, everything hurts.
Glenn: Everything hurts.
Charlie: Wanna get up in the tub, bro? Rob’s in an ice bath.
Jill: Totally.
Glenn: You’d have to have an ice bath and a hot tub.
Charlie: We’ll fill the jacuzzi with ice. Ok, so-
Jill: Ok, so we met at the house party.
Glenn: Yeah.
Charlie: You met at the house party and you got past the whole jacuzzi on the roof thing.
Jill: And got past that, we talked about lots of interesting things.
Glenn: Yeah, we had some interesting conversations.
Jill: Well, we bonded over the fact that Glenn had two cats. I don’t know if everyone knows this. When we met, he had two cats. I grew up with cats. I liked cats.
Meg: And you had zero cats at the time when you met?
Jill: I had zero cats as a single woman in my mid twenties.
Meg: Good for you.
Jill: But I think what we first started talking about was I heard that one of the cat’s names was Bean. And my nickname, my friends called me Bean, like Jilly Bean, and Bean for short. So he’s like, “Bean! Bean!” And I’m like, “what”? But then I see he’s talking to the cat and I think I said like, “I thought you were talking to me because my friends call me Jilly Bean or Bean.” And then we started talking and he was like I have another cat in the other room. He showed me his other cat.
Charlie: Ok, so he demonstrated his value with his cats and his rooftop jacuzzi.
Jill: Yes.
Glenn: Showed her that I was in touch with my feminine side by having cats.
Jill: Yes. I think he rented those cats and then he was stuck into keeping them because it worked.
Glenn: Right. Right. You know, the funny thing is, like, on the surface very, like maybe to be considered not that cool to be a single dude with two cats, you know what I mean? But to my mind, and by the way, I wasn’t single when I got the cats. I got the cats with an ex-girlfriend and then we broke up and I kept the cats and she left. But so I ended up a single guy with two cats. But I decided at a certain point was I’m gonna own this. I’m gonna fully own this and embrace the fact that I’m a single dude with two cats, you know what I mean?
Charlie: You’re demonstrating your value. You’re demonstrating your feminine side with your masculine side. It’s a good move. So, ok, what’s the next step. E - Engage Physically.
Jill: That didn’t happen for a while.
Charlie: That didn’t happen right away? That didn’t happen that night?
Jill: No. He did not, let’s be clear, he did not D.E.N.N.I.S. System me. Ok, everybody? That was not real.
Charlie: He may… He may have. So let’s try to break this down.
Jill: Are we gonna discover this and then I’m gonna…
Glenn: Let’s see. Let’s find out. So I did demonstrate my value that night with my hot tub and my three bedroom apartment.
Meg: But in the episode, Dennis doesn’t even take Caylee on a date, so you dated, at least. You had some dates.
Jill: We did. We went on a first date. We got sushi.
Charlie: The D may stand for “date”. So you dated.
Glenn: Something very shady happened on our first date.
Jill: Oh, the money thing?
Glenn: We were talking on the phone-
Charlie: I have no money. I’m in a lot of jacuzzi debt. And I need you to pay for this sushi.
Jill: No I think what happened is, when we met and you asked me out and I said, “oh I’m going to Vegas the next weekend for a friend’s bachelorette party, so let’s hang out when I get back.”
Charlie: Red flag.
Jill: And he says-
Glenn: I said, “alright, I’ll tell you what, when you get to Vegas, first thing you’re gonna do is walk in the casino and put $100 on black. Right? And if it pays, I’ll take $100 and you take $100. But if you lose, I’ll pay you back the $100.”
Jill: I was like, “that’s cute and flirty”.
Glenn: So you’re at no risk here. And she lost. And so, on our first date, the first thing I did-
Jill: So I walk up to the sushi restaurant, he’s at the booth, and he hands me $100. Looks real good.
Meg: Better than at the end of the night!
Jill: Straight up. I was like, “I’m not sitting down until you pay me”.
Glenn: Yeah, exactly.
Charlie: Thanks for the night, babe. Here’s the $100.
Jill: I was like, “that looks real bad”.
[AD BREAK]
Charlie: When do you bring Glenn Howerton to San Diego to meet your parents? Or your parents come up and meet him?
Jill: No, it was my sister’s birthday I think, wasn’t it?
Glenn: Yeah, it was Jamie’s birthday.
Jill: Yeah, my sister was living in Orange County at the time and she had a big birthday, it might have been our, I don’t know, how old are we? Maybe it was her 30th. And I brought him to that.
Charlie: And what did they think? Had they seen the show? Were they like-
Jill: No. I don’t think they’d seen the show.
Glenn: Her dad, ok. Her sense of humor comes from her dad.
Charlie: Yeah. Bob Latiano, rest in peace.
Jill: Yeah.
Glenn: So I go to this thing, this party, which is basically just a family party with me there.
Jill: Like a handful of my sister’s friends and family.
Glenn: Yeah, that was it. But I got along with all of them instantly. Especially her dad, who, he and I are just like, we have the same sense of humor, we just got along super super well. And we were at the bar, we were gonna get like a beer or something like that, and I was like, “hey, you wanna do a tequila shot?”
Meg: To her dad?
Glenn: Yeah, and he was like, “yeah, let’s do it.” So we did a tequila shot.
Meg: Ballsy.
Glenn: And then like maybe fifteen minutes after that, he busted out the karaoke machine and was like, “we’re gonna do karaoke”. And I was like, “oh shit, ok”.
Jill: This family gets crazy.
Glenn: This family gets crazy! Ok, so a couple people got up, did some karaoke. I’m sitting next to her dad on the couch. This is a true story. I’m sitting next to her dad on the couch and his song came up, his turn came up. The song started and he turns to me and he’s like, “oh, it’s my turn, I’m gonna go” and I’m like “yeah, go, go”. And he literally gets up and as he’s getting up, he farts on me. Audibly, like super loud. And totally on purpose. It didn’t squeak out.
Meg: Like swings his butt over?
Jill: No just as he’s lifting.
Glenn: He was like *fart noise*. Like that, just like fully farts on me.
Charlie: Wow.
Jill: Oh my god, you guys.
Glenn: And I was like, “that is the funniest fucking thing”. Like, I just met this guy.
Charlie: Wow.
Meg: It’s territorial in a way.
Jill: This is the father I was raised by.
Glenn: Yeah, this is the man who raised her. And he would do things like that.
Charlie: Well, he was a car salesman, right? And he was like the life of the party. He was a great athlete, an awesome golfer. We would often talk golf.
Glenn: He was amazing.
Charlie: And you got the sense that had his life taken a different direction, he would’ve loved to be a performer.
Jill: Totally. Yeah, super charismatic, like walked in a room and just like radiated.
Glenn: Yeah, the kinda guy everybody loved.
Charlie: Like a big kinda Sean Connery type of energy, ya know?
Jill: But yeah that was his sense of humor.
Charlie: But like interesting, to get farted on intentionally…
Glenn: I couldn’t believe it.
Charlie: I don’t know, like, is it a power move?
Meg: Yeah, it seems like a power move.
Charlie: Is he negging you? Like, remember you’re beneath me.
Jill: Don’t forget. I might be having fun with you and doing shots, but don’t forget your place.
Glenn: Yeah. I’m the farter and you’re the fartee.
Jill: He was just like, a frat boy trapped in an adult man’s body. That was his sense of humor. He did that to me in high school. I told our son Miles this story recently. One time the phone rang, I was telling Miles that like back in the day when you called someone’s house, you had to like talk to their parents and be like, “hi, can I talk to so and so” and he’s like, “that’s awkward”. And I was like, “wanna hear awkward?” One time he answered the phone and my friend was like, “is Jill there?” and he’s like, “yeah, hold on a second” and put the phone to his ass and farted on it. And it was my boyfriend!
Charlie: Wow.
Jill: It was my high school boyfriend! So this was like a move he did. I guess he thought it was hilarious.
Charlie: If I fart on these guys and they stick around, he’s a good man!
Jill: Yes! If they think this is funny, then they’re a keeper. I don’t know.
Charlie: If they’re offended by my casual flatulence, they’re not gonna make it in this family.
Glenn: Not gonna make it in this family, yeah.
Charlie: If I can blast ass all over this guy, he’s cool.
Glenn: But the thing is, you know how there’s some people who can get away with certain jokes and some people who can’t. If you don’t know Bob Latiano, you don’t know if he’s the kinda person who could get away with something like that. Coming from another person, it would just be disgusting, disrespectful, strange and awkward. But coming from him, I mean, I felt like I knew him almost instantly. He just had that personality. And he was the type of person who could get away with something like that and it was genuinely funny.
Charlie: I think there’s a thing too with men who’ve raised two daughters, right? Who suddenly there’s this man in the life to be like, enjoying the guy energy of it. I have this a little bit with Mary Elizabeth’s father, where I think they like, they didn’t have a son, but they like-
Jill: And he didn’t have a brother. He was an only child, ya know?
Charlie: Right.
Jill: He’s like a sports guy.
Charlie: He was very sporty and jocular.
Jill: Yes, exactly. And I think he just enjoyed that sense of humor and he was silly.
Glenn: When things like that happen you suddenly have permission to just be fully yourself. In a weird way. You’re just like, “oh, ok you can let it all hang out with these people”. Like, that’s a good feeling to feel like you can be your authentic self and that you’re not gonna be misunderstood. You can let your full sense of humor, you can let your freak flag fly.
Charlie: You can find your inner Mantis Toboggan.
Glenn: You can find your inner Toboggan and just kinda go for it.
Charlie: Let’s talk about that a little bit. Let’s talk about Dr. Mantis Toboggan, which is such a big part of why that episode is so funny.
Glenn: That was without a doubt a Marder and Rosell name.
Charlie: There’s something about the name Mantis that I remember Rosell had latched onto that as a word.
Meg: So did you think of the full name, Mantis Toboggan, and then you went back and inserted it into the dialogue? Because Mac says, “you should see him feast. He’s like a mantis”.
Jill: Right. And then he’s like, “mantis, I like that”.
Meg: And then he likes that and so then he takes that as the name. So I wondered if that was done organically in the script writing or if it was thought of at the end, like we want him to be this guy, Mantis Toboggan.
Charlie: Oh man.
Meg: You can’t remember.
Charlie: I wish I could remember that.
Glenn: I think it was, I think the name came first, honestly. And then I think it was a way for him to organically realize the name. Although, it occurred to me, like he’s been signing scripts just as Dr. Toboggan, and he hadn’t created a first name for his doctor character yet. Until that moment. And in that moment, he realized, like “that’s the name I’ve been searching for”.
Meg: Yes. Yeah.
Glenn: You know what I mean? Because he had been signing scripts already.
Charlie: There’s a different episode where he does the video.
Meg: Yes. The viral video.
Charlie: Because I remember pitching to him, “hey Danny, will you say Dr. Toboggan and then remember your first name’s Mantis?”
Glenn: Mantis.
Charlie: Yeah, and he did it in such a funny way.
Frank: Take it from me. I am a doctor. Dr. Toboggan. Mantis Toboggan.
Meg: But that Mantis conversation is very close to my favorite line, which is, “I got my magnum condoms, I got my wad of hundreds, I’m ready to plow.”
Jill: Ready to plow.
Charlie: I’m not realizing until this moment, right now, that I forgot to watch the episode.
Glenn: Oh, you did?
Charlie: I forgot.
Glenn: You forgot to watch it?
Charlie: It skipped my mind but I’m excited because now I get to go back and watch it.
Glenn: I completely forgot about your story line.
Charlie: What is my story line?
Glenn: You’re trying to D.E.N.N.I.S. The Waitress.
Charlie: Oh and I go over and I mess her plumbing up?
Jill: Yes, you’ve got like a bag of hair.
Glenn: That bag of hair. A ziplock bag of hair.
Jill: And then you show up at her job at the carnival or the fair at the end.
Charlie: Yeah.
Jill: You know? And you want to get the carny to stab her.
Charlie: To do the speed pitch.
Meg: Yeah, and then you pay a carny to stab her but he stabs Dee instead.
Charlie: Yeah, that guy was great. The guy who played the carny. We had him on a pilot that we made for Bill Burr.
Meg: Brad Carter.
Glenn: Brad Carter, yeah. Also an amazing musician.
Charlie: He’s a really good actor.
Glenn: There’s a really crazy video of him getting very serious brain surgery while he’s playing the guitar.
Jill: What?!
Glenn: Yes.
*Video of Brad Carter playing guitar during surgery*
Meg: They do that to make sure they’re not going near…
Glenn: That’s right. That’s exactly right.
Meg: Yeah, they’ll have people playing the violin.
Charlie: They’re tinkering around to see if they can trigger any new skills.
Jill: Yeah, right? That’d be cool.
Glenn: They start handing him new instruments.
Charlie: Like, if this guy starts speaking in Portuguese, you know, write this down.
Meg: I love this episode because you think it’s going to be a very Dennis-centric episode, and it kind of is, but what I like about it is like, your major want for the episode is that you want to be understood by the gang that your system works. You don’t even, his want, his character’s want isn’t even to get the girl.
Glenn: No.
Meg: He doesn’t care about that at all.
Jill: No, it’s to prove-
Charlie: It’s to prove that the system works.
Glenn: That the system works, yeah.
Meg: To the rest of you. And then it just has a great Sunny structure where that’s sending you all off to these little storylines which are really fun to watch, like Frank and his Mantis Toboggan, and Mac trying to move in-
Charlie: Move in after completion.
Jill: And Kaitlin getting all paranoid that her boyfriend is D.E.N.N.I.S.-ing her.
Meg: Yes, is D.E.N.N.I.S.-ing her.
Glenn: And Ben the Soldier.
Charlie: The “I like turtles” bit.
Glenn: We convince her that Ben the Soldier is D.E.N.N.I.S.-ing her
Meg: And he’s sitting in that hot car.
Jill: Yes! Which is so sweet.
Mac: You’re probably getting D.E.N.N.I.S.’d right now by that new boyfriend of yours and you don’t even know it!
Frank: What boyfriend? She don’t have a boyfriend!
Dee: Yes I do! Ben, ya know? The online soldier that I met. We’re back together now.
Charlie Kelly: What! That dude wouldn’t date you after what you put him through! Maybe he’d D.E.N.N.I.S. you but he wouldn’t date you!
Dee: He’s not D.E.N.N.I.S.-ing me! He’s in the car right now. I told him to wait for me.
Dennis: Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. So wait, your guy has been waiting out here for you all day in the hot sun?
Dee: Yeah I just told him to wait for me and he kinda just does whatever I say. It’s pretty great.
Dennis: Well, why’d you tell him to do it with the windows up?
Charlie: The engine’s not even on.
Dennis: That’s just cruel.
Dee: I didn’t. I just didn’t tell him to do it with the windows down. He’s not, ya know, the smartest but-
Charlie: It’s like a hundred degrees outside.
Dennis: Alright, now I’m assuming that he has engaged you physically?
Dee: Well, of course we’ve engaged physically, I mean, look at that body, it is stupid. Of course we’ve engaged over and over physically, but that doesn’t mean that he’s pulling some sort of a system.
Ben the Soldier: Hey guys! Hey Dee! I didn’t see you there. Are you almost done?
Dee: Yeah! Yeah, I just got caught up in a story but I’ll be done pretty soon.
Ben the Soldier: Oh okay! Do you want me to come in?
Dee: No! No I don’t. You just stay where you are and I’ll text you when I’m wrapping up and then you can crank the AC, cool the car off for me.
Ben the Soldier: Sure thing!
Dee: Ok.
Ben the Soldier: See ya, fellas.
Dennis: Ok. Ok man. Dee, you’re gettin’ played.
Charlie: You’re getting played big time.
Dee: He’s not-
Charlie: Big time.
Dee: -doing anything he just, I told him to…
Meg: And then, it does have such a great Sunny structure, and then it just sort of ends. It kind of gets up to a point and then it just sort of, well, you’ll see.
Charlie: No, I recall. I think there might’ve been a couple lines past it that we just cut. We leave it on Gladys who’s like “am I gonna get a ride home?” So sometimes we have those endings that feel wooden or just sorta script-y so it’s just better to find a-
Glenn: It’s so funny ending on Gladys. It’s so dark, so sad.
Meg: Mae Laborde, a hundred years old when she shot this episode.
Jill: Oh, she’s so sweet.
Charlie: Wow, she was a hundred?
Meg: A hundred when she shot this.
Glenn: Wait, what was her name? I’m forgetting.
Meg: Mae Laborde.
Jill: Mae.
Charlie: I think the best version of finding an ending that wasn’t in the script was, seasons later, but it’s a waterpark episode where it ends with-
Meg: Mac sitting on that vent.
Charlie: Mac putting his butt on the thing. We had a whole thing of us going back to the car and recapping what went wrong.
Glenn: Oh yes! A whole conversation about it.
Charlie: And it just felt clunky when we got into the editing room and then just ending it on Rob, he even kinda like looks into camera a little bit.
Glenn: Yeah he basically looks right into the camera.
Charlie: Yeah. Perfect, there’s our ending.
Meg: Actually, one of my favorite moments is this, it’s the first time we see Dennis’ sort of flashback. The first time we see Dennis describing his system, and the first time we see you, and you get this sort of like, flashback feeling to it, where they’re mouthing the words that they’re saying but you’re narrating it. And then you just look straight into the lens, which is really funny and just kinda sets the tone for how creepy this is what he’s doing.
Dennis (V.O.): I demonstrated my value to her by filling a prescription. I told her, it’s for my grandmother, she’s quite ill. Thus demonstrating my value as a loving grandson and an all-around great guy.
Meg: I don’t know about what the time frame was around when you started dating but do you, we were talking about the other day, The Game, the thing this episode is based on, do you remember ever feeling like the victim of The Game being done on you? Like the negging or any of that-
Glenn: Peacocking.
Meg: Do you remember that? Were you dating then?
Jill: No.
Meg: You said you were in a five-year relationship before you met Glenn, so I guess, yeah.
Jill: Yeah.
Glenn: Yeah, she might’ve missed The Game window.
Meg: Oh man. It was weird.
Jill: Yeah I don’t even know what-
Glenn: So you were saying you experienced someone trying to The Game you?
Meg: Oh yeah. I experienced the peacocking, I started seeing that. Because that was like in, the book came out in 2005. And 2006 to 2009, I was in New York just like dating and in my early ‘20s.
Glenn: Just gettin’ Game’d left and right.
Meg: Yeah.
Charlie: What was the peacocking?
Meg: Just wearing weird things. Like they, Marder and Rosell, talked about their buddy wearing the tie around his head. Wearing strange things, like coming in with like a bird on the shoulder, or something like that. But also just coming up and having pick-up lines that are really random, like, “how often do you wash your bath towel?” Just these weird things.
Glenn: It’s all about throwing people off balance, right?
Meg: Exactly.
Glenn: Like becoming a person of interest by peacocking, and then having interactions with people where you throw them off balance. And they don’t have time to recalibrate before you’ve-
Meg: Like you tell a woman, “oh, I really love those shoes you’re wearing. I think I saw another woman wearing them.” And so you’re kind of complimenting her but also being like, “you’re basic” at the same time.
Jill: You’re also a basic bitch, so…
Charlie: Did you see, um. You guys saw Licorice Pizza, right? The character Bradley Cooper is playing is a famous guy who was like a hairdresser turned movie producer, he dated Barbra Streisand. Anyway, he had a pick-up line that, Paul Thomas Anderson had written the script and asked him, like, “hey can I represent you in the script? Is this ok?” and he was like, “oh I wouldn’t be yelling at the girl from Haim, I would be trying to sleep with her.” And PTA was like, “oh, that’s much better.” And he was like, “hey, can you get my pick-up line in the movie?” He’s like, “what’s your pick-up line?” And he’s like, “I would just ask girls if they like peanut butter sandwiches.” And they would think that was a random question and they would laugh at it and then it would kick off a conversation.
Jill: It’s more like an icebreaker, I feel like.
Glenn: It’s pretty good! I like that.
Charlie: Hey, you like peanut butter sandwiches?
Glenn: Yeah, it’s not-
Charlie: It’s tame, it’s got nothing to do with like, hooking up with them.
Glenn: Yeah it’s not gross. Like, “how often do you wash your towels?” is creepy.
Meg: Yeah. Asking about my hygiene routine, which is a little too personal.
Jill: Right.
Meg: But that’s a much better one.
Glenn: “Do you like peanut butter sandwiches?” is just a perfectly normal thing to ask someone.
Meg: Did you guys ever have pick-up lines? The two of you, did you ever have pick-up lines?
Charlie: What do you think?
Glenn: Definitely not.
Charlie: Definitely not, no.
Meg: Charlie was just waiting and waiting and waiting for her to make it very clear that she wanted him to start a conversation.
Charlie: Yeah. I don’t know. I mean, I definitely would just use my sense of humor, right? Like if I meet someone, we’re hanging out, start joking around the way I’m always joking around, and if they didn’t like my jokes or understand what I was talking about, adios!
Meg: That’s pretty good.
Charlie: It’s a pretty clear indication this ain’t gonna work.
[AD BREAK]
Meg: I love in this episode Mac swimming in your wake and then Frank swimming in his wake and one of the things Frank says he wants to do is move up a rank, so he wants seconds now.
Charlie: Oh yeah, he’s trying to rise in the ranks.
Meg: He’s trying to rise to get seconds and go in front of Mac, who’s doing the bookworm routine with the reading glasses outdoors at the fair, which I thought was a really funny choice to be like, “oh smart people wear these” but then not recognize that they’re for reading.
Charlie: Him flipping the magnum and monster at the end where he says, “I dropped my…”
Glenn: I dropped my monster condom for my magnum dong.
Charlie: Which wasn’t an accident. I think we scripted it like that.
Glenn: I can’t remember, I think he screwed it up in the rehearsal or something. I think it was one of those Danny accidents where we were like, “yes, that.”
Charlie: Yes, that one. Do that one.
Glenn: In the same way that the guy in Hundred Dollar Baby said, “don’t get your panties in an uproar”. It was a mistake, and we were like, “that is so much funnier than don’t get your panties in a wad”.
Jill: Amazing. Yeah.
Meg: Also in this episode, Charlie tries to D.E.N.N.I.S. The Waitress and there’s a great Charlie line that I love, “I’m a plumber. You’re a fair worker. We go well together.”
Jill: We go well together.
Glenn: Those go well together.
Meg: Those go well together.
Charlie: That’s funny.
Glenn: Yeah, yeah, yeah. I feel like that was probably an improvised line. That feels like one of those things where you were just playing on the day.
Charlie: I remember we had a real speed pitch thing. And I remember like, trying to throw, seeing how fast I could throw and hurting my shoulder, already, back then. And also being bummed out at just how slow it was. Like aw, I have no, I never had a strong arm, but like maxing out at mid-fifties. It was terrible.
Meg: I really like that sequence too because Charlie is just like, “what is this?” and she just has to read off the big board with the very big letters that just say “Speed Pitch”. She says it so slow to you.
Charlie: I think that was her improv.
Meg: That was very funny.
Glenn: Speed. Pitch.
Meg: Was it in the script or improvised? Another moment I love is Dennis coming up with how he’s gonna fix the plan with that classical music playing.
Dennis: Ok, clearly none of you have any idea how to run my system! God damn- alright I’m gonna get everybody what they want, including myself, let me just think for a second. Let me just work something out here. *Mimes conducting an orchestra*
Dee: What’s he doing?
Mac: Just shut up and let him work.
Dennis: *Stops miming abruptly* We’re going to the fair.
Charlie: That was not in the script, that was an editing room discovery.
Glenn: I think that was an on-the-day thing. I think I thought like wouldn’t it be funny to have some kind of orchestra playing in my head where I’m literally orchestrating a plan as an orchestra is playing.
Meg: But then you go through all of that and then you just say, “we’re going to the fair”. Which has already been put forward as the plan.
Charlie: Did we play it dry or did we do music and cut it out.
Jill: There’s music.
Glenn: No, we put music in.
Charlie: Yeah. Ok.
Meg: Yeah. It’s great.
Jill: Did you have that in your mind when you were doing it?
Glenn: That I don’t remember.
Jill: Because it matches pretty well, like what you were doing to that song. So I don’t know if they had to find a song to match or…
Glenn: Yeah, I don’t think I did. I think it just worked out somehow. Which is weird.
Charlie: You’d be surprised how often things fit. Like sometimes, you just put it in and it fits so good you’re like, “oh, perfect”.
Glenn: But it does end perfectly on that “dun dun dun DUN” and I go like that. It’s crazy. Yeah, I don’t know maybe we just timed it out.
Charlie: Messed with the timing.
Meg: How was it to act with one another? Had you done that before or have you done it since? In all those scenes you had together.
Glenn: Uh, I don’t think we had done it before or since. I mean, we used to work on auditions with each other. But that’s different.
Jill: Yeah, but no projects that we’ve worked on together.
Glenn: No.
Charlie: You’ve produced things that Glenn’s been a part of.
Jill: Yeah. Recently.
Glenn: Yeah.
Meg: That’s correct. The Thief Collector, which is a great documentary that she produced.
Jill: Thank you.
Meg: And Glenn is in some of the reenactments.
Jill: Yeah, he stars in our reenactments.
Meg: With a very fantastic mustache.
Jill: Yes, they’re very kind of quirky, stylized reenactments. That was just released last Friday! You can see it anywhere you rent or buy DVDs.
Meg: You can see it on Amazon and various places.
Jill: Yeah. Amazon, iTunes, Google Play.
Glenn: Can we talk a little bit about the transition you made from being an actor to being a producer?
Jill: Yeah!
Glenn: Like, how that happened and what kinda stuff you’re working on right now?
Jill: Yeah, of course. It’s interesting, I was always kind of performing. I grew up dancing since I was three years old, and that transitioned into my early ‘20s when I moved to New York. I was a Knicks City Dancer for a short time. And then I got into modeling from that. And then I did that for a while. And then I started doing commercials. And I thought acting is fun, so I transitioned into acting.
Meg: And we talked about a commercial you did with Tom Brady?
Jill: I did do a commercial with Tom Brady.
Meg: I think we talked about it on the podcast. I’m not sure if it ever made it in but you can find that on YouTube, I think. It’s out there.
Jill: Yeah. It was a Visa commercial with Tom Brady.
Charlie: Really?
Meg: We’ll put it right here.
Charlie: Watch right here.
[VISA COMMERCIAL WITH TOM BRADY AND JILL LATIANO HOWERTON]
Jill: Yeah so you know, I was evolving and always trying to find the thing that was my thing. And I enjoyed every piece of that journey, but even as an actor, and I enjoyed it when I was doing it, but anyone that acts knows that it can be a very difficult journey. It’s a lot of waiting. I felt like I was waiting for something because it’s like, you work and then the job’s over. And then you’re auditioning and auditioning and auditioning. It’s between you and one other girl. Oh, you didn’t get it. It’s like this rollercoaster.
Glenn: You have no control over your fate you’re just waiting for someone.
Jill: I remember you [Charlie] talking about this so many times, like you tested before Sunny. I tested, I remember, seven times in one year for the leads in pilots and didn’t get any of them. And it was just like so rough, ya know? And although I enjoyed it, I just felt like I had more to give and I’m just sitting here, like I need to put this energy into something. So Glenn and I enjoy documentaries and we had reached out to a director of a doc that we saw that we really liked. And I said, I just started putting it out there, like, “look if you need help with anything, this is an issue I really care about. Let me know.” And I started doing work with non-profit groups and environmental groups and that director who we reached out to, she was doing this celebrity PSAs for Prop 37, which was to get GMOs labeled. This was back in 2012. And she calls me out of the blue and she goes, “hey, I’m doing these PSAs and I know you haven’t produced before but I was wondering if you wanted to produce them for me.” And I think at the time she was asking because I have a lot of connections with actors. That it would be easy to cast and get people in, and I was like, “oh, ok I haven’t done this before, but sure!” And through that process, I was like, “oh! This is my thing!” I just enjoyed it so much. Like, my natural skillset is that of a producer, so it doesn’t feel like work to me, and then couple it with an issue that I care about, and I was like, “this is amazing”. And so my now producing partner, Josh, he was also producing those PSAs with me, he had started another project, called GMO OMG, which was a full feature doc about GMOs, and he’s like, “look, it’s just me and my best friend, who was the director, and we’ve shot it but we haven’t edited it, we need some new blood. I know you’re new but I can tell you’re great at this. Would you want to come on and help finish this movie?” And I was like, “yes!” And so it just kinda took off from there. And then Josh and I had such a good experience on that movie that we decided to start our company, Roots Productions, and it’s just been growing from there.
Charlie: It’s amazing when you have that moment when you’re like, “oh, this fits! This is right!” Like you don’t feel like you’re pushing a boulder up a hill.
Jill: Yeah!
Glenn: I saw it happen too. Like, I could see that she was searching for something. She would say, “I feel like I have so much more to give”, right? So much more to offer the world. And just couldn’t quite figure out what that was. And it wasn’t until she got involved in GMO OMG that I really saw, like, I saw you light up.
Jill: Yeah.
Glenn: And I could see like, oh ok, this is it.
Jill: Yeah. And I think because I had always been in the performing arts, I’d never considered it really but then once I got into that role I was like, “oh, no, this is it.” And all of the experience I have as a performer helps me so much because I’ve been on sets, like I feel very comfortable in that setting, I’ve seen how producers work, how they interact with talent. So, it was amazing how it just was like, “oh my gosh, this is it. This is what I’m supposed to do.”
Glenn: So after GMO OMG, you guys produced The Devil We Know.
Jill: Yeah. We went on to do The Devil We Know and then The Thief Collector was next. The Thief Collector was the first doc we did that was not issue-based. It’s just a fun, quirky art heist film.
Meg: Also about like a very interesting couple so it’s fascinating.
Jill: Yeah. Well, it became about that. It started out as this, basically a de Kooning painting was cut out of the frame in 1985 at this tiny museum in Arizona and they had no security cameras or anything so it kinda disappeared into the desert. And then cut to 32 years later, this 85 year old woman passes away, her husband had died a few years earlier, a small town in New Mexico, like 300 people, and then they find this painting, now worth $160 million, hanging behind their bedroom door.
Charlie: Crazy.
Meg: Just to do something like that and then to never tell anyone about it.
Glenn: Well they were school teachers. And that’s what the whole documentary is about, like, “did they do it? Did they know what it was?”
Jill: Because they’re deceased like there isn’t full proof, did they do it? Did they not do it? Did they purchase it? Ya know, all these things. There’s a lot of evidence in the film, as you’ll see, that points to them actually doing it themselves but that’s why it’s so fascinating.
Glenn: But then the mystery becomes like, “how did two school teachers become art thieves?” How does that happen?
Charlie: And why? Because they don’t sell it, they don’t profit off it, so it’s purely the rush of doing it? Or knowing? Or maybe having some sense of power in a powerless life? Yeah, it’s really interesting.
Glenn: And all of the people in their lives would have never guessed in a million years that they would be capable of something like this. It’s a fascinating, fascinating doc.
Meg: Couples that commit crimes together are just interesting. It’s so hard to meet somebody that just jives with you on so many different things but like imagine if you found somebody that was like, “no I also want to kill people!”
Glenn: And what are you working on now? Are there projects that you’re working on that you can talk about?
Jill: Yeah. There’s a handful I can’t talk about yet, but I guess the one we’re working on now, two things we’re in production on, one is four-part docuseries for MGM+ about the serial killer, Ed Gein.
Meg: Oh, interesting! He used people’s skins to make lampshades and stuff like that.
Jill: That’s why it’s a little ironic that the wife of Dennis would be producing a doc about a guy who makes skin suits.
Glenn: I’ve made so many jokes that were all based on my knowledge of Ed Gein, only because I remember seeing a movie…
Charlie: And by the way, kind of fucked up to call him just a serial killer. Like, serial killer slash designer, yes?
Meg: Slash DJ, probably.
Glenn: I had seen a movie about Ed Gein years ago and I was just like, “this is the most fucked up shit I’ve ever…” and the thing that really stuck with me is that he would take people’s skin and like turn it into lampshades, and so that became a source of comedy for me for my character somehow.
Meg: Like you saying, “do you think of somebody made a mask of my face, that you would wear it?”
Glenn: Totally! All that stuff, all those jokes. And then in the podcast thing that we did where I talk about turning someone into a lampshade. And the episode where I’m talking to Dee about like turning her skin into-
Meg: Oh yeah, like “put you in a box”.
Charlie: A glass box.
Glenn: A luggage collection.
Jill: Yeah, so it’s very ironic. The subject matter is not in our wheelhouse. We’ve never done true crime or anything, but there’s a really unique aspect to the show that hasn’t been announced and I’m not allowed to talk about, but stay tuned.
Charlie: These are organic lampshades, no GMOs.
Jill: There’s something that’s gonna make it different than any other show or movie you’ve seen about Ed Gein.
Glenn: Well, first of all, most people don’t even know that much about Ed Gein. There have been so many things about other serial killers, but he was like…
Jill: The psychology behind what he did was really interesting. He’s not a charismatic Ted Bundy type, he was like a very simple farmer but he had a complicated relationship with his mother and so the skin stuff, they think maybe he was trying to recreate his mother, like it’s very dark.
Glenn: For those of you who don’t know a lot about Ed Gein: Leatherface is based on Ed Gein. That character in Psycho is based on Ed Gein.
Jill: Silence of the Lambs.
Glenn: Yeah, Hannibal Lector is based on Ed Gein.
Meg: Put the lotion in the basket.
Glenn: Like so many of those horrible characters are based on Ed Gein. And yet people don’t know much about Ed Gein. And this doc, like she said, has like an element to it…
Jill: It’s gonna be surprising. I’m not allowed to say yet, but it’s new discoveries. New discoveries.
Meg: Ooh, I’m looking forward to that.
Charlie: You’ll be haunted for days.
Jill: Yeah, so that one will be out in September, I believe. We were thinking Halloween but I’m thinking it’s gonna come out after Labor Day so we’ll see. And then we’re in production on another feature doc about domestic workers and their fight for protections under federal labor laws and dignity. We like to say, I shouldn’t say we, I should say Ai-jen Poo from the Domestic Workers Alliance coined this phrase, which is so true, which is that “domestic workers make all other work possible”. Women, like me, would not be able to be in the workforce if it weren’t for domestic workers. Our nannies and our home healthcare aid that take care of our elderly and our disabled. So it’s about that group of mostly women, not all women, mostly women of color, immigrants. So that’s a really important story that I’m excited to be working on. And then we have a handful of other things in development. We’ve kind of organically gotten into scripted, because as I’m looking for stories for docs and reading things, I’m like, “this would be an amazing movie” so Glenn and I are actually, speaking of working together, we’re producing a scripted movie together.
Charlie: Great.
Meg: And this is how those things seem to find their way around. Like, you say you’ve retired from acting but I wouldn’t be surprised if it found its way all the way around until you find a scripted movie where you’re like, “you know what? I want to be in this”. And then you’re acting again.
Jill: You never know! You never know.
Glenn: I don’t, I mean maybe. It came up when we were working on The Thief Collector of like, “should we be in this together? Like, do you want to play husband and wife in this?”
Jill: Right. We were casting the woman and I was trying to get different actresses and I did say, “if we can’t get who we want I will do this” and everyone was like, “just do it” and I was like “I will” but I didn’t really want to.
Glenn: Yeah. That was the thing that was interesting to me.
Jill: I’m kind of done with it. If someone had something that was just right, or it was a funny cameo, or they asked me for Kaylee to come back for an episode, yes I would do that.
Glenn: Which I would like to do actually…
Meg: Oh, that’s interesting, Kaylee coming back.
Jill: But I’m not looking for that.
Meg: You have separated entirely from that.
Jill: I have separated entirely. I really have.
Meg: It just makes it want you so much more. That’s been proven.
Charlie: And your marriage, it’s gonna last? Or where are we with that?
Glenn: Well, there’s no telling.
Charlie: The kids are driving you nuts and there’s no telling. There’s no telling.
Glenn: There’s no telling. I mean, there’s all kinds of things that can ruin a marriage.
Charlie: But for now, you’re bonding over the skin lamps. Ok! So I think we did it!
Meg: Yeah, we did do it! Jill, that was all that it was. What’d you think of being on the podcast? Did you enjoy it?
Jill: I loved it. I did enjoy it.
Charlie: Alright, time to separate entirely.
[End Credits]