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Welcome back, adventurers, to Ale and Well Met, the 20-sided tavern podcast.It's me again, R. Alex Murray, your universal swing and tavern keeper and podcast sounds verbal component guy.We're back again, and hey, this week we are super excited.
We've got Travis McElroy here with us, hanging out, chatting.Thanks for being here, Travis.
Do you prefer R Alex or Rallex?I mean, you hit it in one, man.Rallex is sort of the secret codename.So yeah, Rallex.Rallex, Alex, Guy.I'll respond to pretty much whatever.I'm gonna go with Chef. Chef?I like chef.
Thanks, man.That's what I've been trying to get my kids to call me.Yeah.Because I did this thing for a long time and I'm trying to break this habit of like I would explain a thing to my kids and then I would go, OK, OK.
Because what I wanted was just acknowledge that they heard me.But it was coming across very weird.And so instead I was like, can I get a herd chef?And they'd be like, herd chef.I'm like, OK, cool.
Yeah, there's like gentle authority there as well with a yes chef, right?Yeah, it's very like, also like, I've taught you how to use a knife.I've trained you in the ways of the blade.You will respect me as such.
And it makes my wife laugh, which I think is the most important part.Instead of me saying, okay, and her going, don't, don't do that.Instead, if the kids say, her chef, it's just great.Everybody enjoys that.
Yeah.And you feel like Gordon Ramsay.
Well, and I walk around, I do most of my parenting in a white, like kind of a clean shirt.Freshly pressed.Very tall toque. The whole, the whole thing.
Oh yeah.Oh, so you're a classically trained French parent.Very nice.
Yes, correct.Nice.I went to the Cordon dad, the James Cordon Bleu.No, he's a terrible parent.I wouldn't, I wouldn't trade for him at all.Terrible person.Anyways, not important.We don't need to knock James Cordon, but we will.
Nah, he's not worried about us. So Alex, you're probably wondering why I asked you here today.
Yes.Oh yeah.You know, I've been very curious.Yeah.It seems like, seems like you've played a whole lot of Dungeons and Dragons.You know what you're doing.I don't really know what you need from me.
Well, you've been podcasting for a while without a license.Oh yeah.Oh no.Um, yeah, it's actually, uh, since me and my brothers started podcasts, um, you actually need to run it by us.
I mean, I read the book and it pretty much said everybody could do it.
Oh, okay, cool.Yeah.Then that's fine.If you bought the book, I'm off the hook.Yeah. Okay.Yeah.You're one of like 20 people that bought it.It's like a great coaster over here.Just chill.I love that.It's good for leveling furniture too.
If you ever need it.It's very, uh, it can really withstand a table leg.
Hell yeah.Um, well you're stepping into the 20 sided tavern in what?A couple of weeks here.You're about to go on tour and then come make your off Broadway debut.
Hell yeah.Yeah.You've been playing Dungeons and Dragons for what, how long?
Okay, well consistently for a decade.Okay.Before Adventure Zone started, Griffin and I got interested in it because of Acquisitions Incorporated.Sure.That they did at PAX.
with Penny Arcade, and so we had played some fourth edition, but it was like, you know, like one shot here, one shot there, we never got anything really going.I came to D&D very late in life, but growing up, we played a game called HeroQuest.Word.
Which is like board game D&D.
Yeah, it's the like out-of-the-box dungeon crawler, right?It's with all the minis.
But we have played that a bunch and then like once we went through all of the pre-written like, you know little dungeons in the book We like I know this sounds like a made-up like biography movie thing But then Griffin at like 12 years old would run new ones for us sure that he would like make up and we started using like Figures from other games sure and we had this one where you were trying to oh, what was the name of it?
You were trying to quarantine this virus on a space station.And so we started using the little spacemen that came with that in dungeons as aliens and stuff, too.That's glorious.
I like the idea of Lion-O and Snake Eyes from G.I.Joe trying to make it through a dungeon.Yeah, that's rad.
We were already doing adventures and stupid stuff of like, and what if it was like, I mean, Abnimals is just bringing it all full circle of bringing toys from other games into our game.
It does feel like you're just like looking through your toy chest and going, who gets to be in this week's, yeah. We never grew up.
D&D professionally, it's the best.
But I never really got into it until I was like 23, and even then didn't start doing Adventure Zone until I was like, what, 29, 30?I mean, I'm almost 31 now, so if I've been doing it for a decade, we didn't start doing Adventure Zone until I was 31.
Yeah, crazy.Because for whatever reason, it was like the last, threshold of nerdiness that I was like, I don't know.I don't know if it's for me.I think that like, I talk about this, I guess I'll be 41 by the time I'm on 20 Sided Tavern.
And I can remember a time where you did not talk about playing video games publicly or you'd get made fun of.
Bro, I was shoved into a locker in middle school for reading The Hobbit.
There you go.And I remember distinctly when the Madden football games came to video games, and suddenly everybody was talking about playing video games, and it was very unnerving, very unsettling.Everybody's just... Talking about video games.
Let's just sit like sitting there.Just talking about video games.Just talking just casual There's a girl here.You guys see the girl No one's getting made fun of do you want to see the maps?I've been drawing for the layout of my sims house.
No No, we do know.Okay, that's not where we're at.We're playing NFL blitz at the bare minimum and Great, great, great, great, great, NBA Jam.Everybody loves NBA Jam, right?And so there was like all of this like kind of ingrained stuff.
Same with like, I recently, recently started getting into Magic the Gathering.And I was like, I've been missing out.I've been missing out on this shit.
I got good news for you, man.There are about 4,000 magic decks backstage at the show.
Oh yeah?I'll bring my dog meat deck.My friend Paul Foxcroft got me the dog meat Fallout Commander deck.Hell yeah.And I've been thoroughly enjoying it.
Hell yeah.That's the big downtime activity.That and Suica, where we try to make watermelons out of smaller fruits. What is this play?I don't know.
It's a it's like a fruit matching game where you just drop fruits onto other fruits and then And that's it for some reason I was picturing this in real life like the weirdest edible arrangement of like how many cherries does it take to make a watermelon?
Yeah, we're gonna find out today backstage Gallagher ing backstage just slam but reverse Gallagher.
Yeah, cuz you're putting together a smaller food with bigger food.
I love that.Yeah.Yes being weird.Well, yeah, I understand they're just like You can't go full nerd, right?At a certain point, you're like, oh, that's all of them.I've collected every nerd gem in your nerd gauntlet.And you're like.
And it's also a thing of like, one of the things like with ADHD, which I have, it would be weird if I started talking about ADHD and I didn't have that.I mean.
Let me tell you about other people that do.You're a white guy with a lot of podcasts, you gotta be careful about just, you know, telling people what they think they need to hear.
Hey, you look like someone who has ADHD.Is that I, interest is such a funny thing because like, Stardew Valley is a great example of like, I bounced off of Stardew Valley like four times.
and then started playing it the fifth time and became obsessed with it and read everything I could about it, learned everything I could about it, devoted myself to, I'm gonna reach perfection, 100% perfection within the first two years of gameplay.
And it's just like, for whatever reason, that fifth time, it hit.And so I think that with D&D and stuff like Magic and all that, it just wasn't the right time for me to get into it or I would have.
Sure.And like, also, if you're like a hyper fixator, you know, one thing at a time, right?So like, yeah, right.Maybe I'll maybe I'll get out of started.No, no, I'm not ready.Not ready to get out of the other thing.
There's nothing else I want to play.I'm in there with Bellator right now where like I had put it down.
When it was on, like, computer and Steam Deck, I put it down, I walked away, I'd finished, then it came out on my phone, and I was like, goodbye, children.I'll see you in a couple weeks.Daddy has to get angry at this game for a while.
Yeah, I'm afraid to touch it because I don't trust myself, frankly.
Yeah, I mean, the last one for me was, I mean, everybody was Baldur's Gate 3.I just disappeared. My wife would be like, oh no, Alex is, he's home, but he's not here.He's in his room with fighting whatever a gith yankee is.I don't know.
The one saving grace is I don't like playing Baller's Gate 3 on my Steam Deck.It's too small.Like it doesn't give the scope.And so at the very least, if I'm not like at my computer, I know like I couldn't be doing it right now.
So it's like, that's that saving grace of like, there's no temptation to be like, ah, I could pretend to be in the room with my children, but actually I'm in Baldur's Gate.
I really know you've got a problem when you're like, oh no, this is a barrier that is totally arbitrary.It doesn't actually exist yet.
But you need the, I need to set those up.Sometimes just leaving something in the other room is enough to be like, I'm not gonna walk in there and get it.
Don't be silly.The big thing with any diet, right, is just telling yourself you're not gonna consume something.No, I'm not doing that.Yeah, for sure.
When did you start playing?I'm curious when you did.
I started playing D&D.So it goes all over the place with the cast, right?There's a whole bunch of people who came late.There's a whole bunch of people who like got into it for the pandemic.
There's a couple of people who like got cast in the show and were like, I guess I should learn how to play Dungeons and Dragons.When I was like eight, a summer camp counselor was like, hey, you wanna play D&D?And like old school, AD&D, first edition.
Get out of town.Or second edition rather, AD&D.Yeah, but I was like nine and eight or nine and wanted to be a dungeon master.And I walked around all summer with, they had like a little like,
It was like a little dossier with all the character sheets and everything in it.And you could just walk around.
I walked around with it, you know, like I'm a real dungeon master and we would make up adventures without dice and like just sort of arbitrarily like using our skills and things and just, you know, just basically telling stories to each other, like sitting underneath trees by a lake in Maine, which,
is as idyllic as it sounds, it was great.And then I got, you know, I couldn't find anybody else to play with.And I got almost the reverse.I got into magic real early because I grew up in Rome, Georgia.There was no gaming store.
There was nowhere to, you couldn't, there, I just couldn't have played Dungeons and Dragons if I'd wanted to.It was, you know, 1994 and there, my parents were scared that it was the devil because church said.
And somehow magic was okay.
And they were right, but I mean, it's fine.Oh, the deals I've made.You think I became a professional D&D player, full-time D&D player by skill and charm?No, sir.
No.The devil.No, you gotta ask for it.And also like, I mean, I get it.You are like, you know, like putting hope into a dice, right?
You are like looking at it and be like, come on, let me decapitate this goblin, you, and putting all your will and passion into it and then throwing it, you know, like runes. And that's freaky.
I always loved, my parents, when I was a kid, I grew up Southern Baptist, and my mom was a church secretary.We went Wednesdays and Sundays, but it was never indoctrinated in that way.It was always like, my parents were very social.
They liked going and doing all the stuff and doing all the things.But then it would be like, I remember Captain Planet, for some reason, where they're like, there's a lot of stuff about Gaia.
and stuff i don't are they okay for it is this it the kid do they need to not watch the fifth power is love and there was like so many things like that like i remember like the simpsons was one where they were like
I don't know, are we, can you guys watch this?I wasn't allowed.I guess it's fine.Like there was just a lot of that where it's just like, I think, just don't tell people at church you watch The Simpsons like that.
Like that was always their like go-to thing.Of like, my parents very much wanted to be, and they were very good like moral, you know, in that way.But anything where it's like, I feel like I'm supposed to tell you not to do that thing, but.
Right think it's fine.There was a lot of that.
Well, we also grew up we were we would have been we're about the same age and We were right there when the Simpsons was all about Bart being a little prick, too Yeah, so when you're like 10 and my mom watched this show where Bart's being a little stinker and telling people to eat his shorts And they were like, no, no, no, no, no worst thing.
We don't eat shorts in this not here, sir You will be having a trout cow
in this house.Like a fine Christian family.We eat trousers?Yes.And maybe, maybe culottes if times get tough.
That's it.In a few years, you might be able to eat some cargo shorts because they're coming down the pike, but.Yeah, JNCO jeans is too much.
You'll fill up before dinner.I was definitely, there was to be no JNCO jeans in my house.My mother would have, nothing in the 90s hot topic was allowed, but.
Well, that was the thing is like the dichotomy of me growing up was like going to church every Wednesday night and Sunday morning and also on every other day doing theater, right?
And so it's like, my parents were like, yeah, man, what are we gonna tell you not to hang out with kids wearing JNCO jeans?That would cut out 90% of your friend base.
Man, I had a kid wearing JNCO jeans who was playing Smog the Dragon who got me into the Grateful Dead because you know, he was,
Because tropes exist in real life.
Yeah, absolutely.Yeah, and what are you gonna do?So, okay, that's a good place to go.You were a theater kid growing up, yeah?Correct.Awesome.Went to school, got my degree in it.Hey, me too.Look at us now, off-Broadway, getting it done.
I don't think that what I do now, my theater professors then would have called getting it done.Yeah, but it didn't exist. It took a long time.
You know, a lot of people talk about like making their parents proud or like explaining what they do to their in-laws or whatever.But for me, it was would I get published in the alumni, the theater program alumni newsletter.
And it took many, many years before I was in there.
My theater department just had a big 25th anniversary of the theater and they invited a bunch of distinguished alumni there.You will notice that I am here and not there right now.
Yes, I haven't been asked to speak Um, one time I did get interviewed.That's not true.I did do a class with, uh, uh, like online during, you know, lockdown when I did like a zoom thing with some of the kids at the theater school now.
And it's very lovely.Nice.Very nice.
That's cool.Well, there's more and more people that want to get into this space too.I've done sort of a thing and they're like, how do I get into voice acting?And I'm like, I, I don't know. I don't know, man.I don't know what to tell you.
Start a podcast.Have a weird voice.Yeah.Start a podcast.Have a weird voice and hope people like it, is my answer.Yeah, that's great.Have very talented brothers and just hang on tight.Don't let them shake you off your coattails.
But like the thing is, I mean, the theater thing is so interesting to me because what I get to do now, and this is like, so I also worked at the Cincinnati Shakespeare Company for many, many years, for five years as their technical director, and I performed in a bunch of stuff, and I set design, did all kinds of things, wore many hats, as they say.
And I never really loved it because I didn't like performing a character that wasn't me saying someone else's words, following someone else's direction, all that stuff.Sure, acting.Okay, but I'm just doing other people's stuff.
And I often think about what would have been different for me.Because I remember when I left college, my senior year, I was getting my degree.And I was thinking, I don't know what I'm going to do with this.I don't want to audition for things.
I don't want to.And there was no one who was like, have you thought about stand-up comedy?Have you thought about sketch comedy?Have you thought about improv?There was none of that.It was just like, you're getting your theater degree.
You're either going to act in film or act in shows. And so it took, we didn't start doing the podcast until I was 25, and I don't think I considered it a full-time job until I was like 28.And it was like, oh, I get to be myself.
Play me, it's different every time I get up and do it.And the like character I'm bringing to it is like myself performing, right?And that's what I really want to do.I don't want to act, I want to perform.
And that was like the realization that I made that kind of unlocked. my own brain.
Yeah, I can just I could just be me like real hard at people for sure.Yeah, well, it's weird.Like I did stand up for a while improv clearly still doing and like those aren't things that people encourage people to do.
Nobody's ever looked at somebody, no parent has ever been like, you know what I think you ought to do, son?Stand-up comedy.Stand-up comedians don't want their kids to be stand-up comedians.It's not a thing you get encouraged to do.
Which is so wild because it's like, yeah, maybe the pathway to a career or whatever is more obscured.You can't see it as well as you auditioned 100 times for a movie and now you're Robert Downey Jr.or whatever.People understand that.
where I think about how many more jobs there are behind the scenes for somebody who writes really well, somebody who can tell a good joke and can tell a good story.
And there's so much, most of the people, because I lived in LA for a couple of years and I did UCB,
And like most of the people I met either doing UCB or like that were teachers, they are doing things is like they went on to be writers on things and like that kind of stuff.And there's so much more, I think job security.
I mean, not, I mean, don't get me wrong.Writers get boned all the time, but I mean like when you are good at it, there's a smaller pool, right?But more anyway, I think that like being an actor,
there's a lot more dime a dozen kind of feeling sometimes.
I think that actor is a way easier thing for people to go, you hear this all the time, I think I'll be an actor.People move to New York all the time and you run into them and they're like, this happens at the show.
People will look at me and be like, I'm an actor.How do I get to be in this?And I'm like, you want my job?The one that I have that I'm doing right now? Well, you know, there's a process.But yeah, it seems more accessible, right?
You look at people do it, and you're like, I can pretend, no sweat.But writing, nobody's ever sat down and written an episode of television.
Yeah, right?Yeah.Well, and it's the thing, man.
I remember I grew up doing a lot of Children's Theater, and then I went back for a while when I was living back in Huntington, and I was playing the dad and stuff with a bunch of kids, and I directed some Children's Theater and stuff.
And I remember talking to kids and being like, hey, you're a really good, like, I remember I had this one kid who was a stage manager for me when I directed a thing.And I was like, you're very good at this.You should be a stage manager.
And she was like, well, I wanna be an actor.And I was like, okay, listen, I understand that.But do you understand how- You'll work forever.If you are good at this already and you're 14 and you're a great stage manager, if you focused on this,
You will work forever.You're too organized to be an actor.There are so few people.You can't do it.So few people dedicating themselves to being a great stage manager or like a good props designer.A deck carpenter.
Do that, man.Do that.Yeah, I mean, also you get into the business and you start making friends with the Iazi people and the stage hands and they are super chill.They're in the entertainment industry.They love it.They're building stuff.
They're putting stuff together.They get to be part of construction and also,
union job security the pool's way smaller yeah no one ever talks about like what's their beauty routine if they put on a couple pounds oh i didn't like it i don't know they're just working consistently and aging and it's fine it's all good and they're the most mellow people ever it's like oh what have you done for the last 30 years i've run sound at this theater in orlando yeah man leave me alone
Do you want to know about the ghosts in this theater?Yeah, I do.I do.Tell me about these ghosts.
I worked at a rainforest cafe for three weeks in Nashville, Tennessee.And there are two guys at the rainforest cafe that are Ayahtzee.One of them's an Ayahtzee union set guy.He's a guy who takes care of all the animals and the lights.
And then the other dude, takes care of all the animals, right?There's one guy who's like, he's got a zoology degree and he's in charge of two tanks in a rainforest cafe in Tennessee.These dudes didn't give a fuck.They were high all the time.
They were like, you know, I thought they were crazy old at the time, probably 45.And like, yeah, man, they didn't care.They just had a good thing going, chilling, watching like, you know, 22 year olds try to sell microwaved hamburgers.Hilarious.
I also, I want to say Maddie is here, but Maddie lost her voice.And so she's just been very supportive and listening this whole time.
But man, I've really been thinking about the fact that Maddie is here just having to listen to the two of us being like, and let me tell you more about me.Now you tell me about you.Hi Maddie.I like your nails.
You just get Maddie's miming at us.I promise Maddie's here.We're definitely not making it up.No, no.There's definitely a coworker in a closet showing us their very good nails.
And their clothes and their dresses with pockets.
OK, well, Maddie was going to be here to, like, give us some like trickster 101 advice.
So, you know, luckily, Maddie is already I was kind enough to, like, speak with me before now because I reached out and I was like, hey, I know you're doing the trickster right now.Give me some advice.And she said, who is this?
How did you get this number?She yelled at me a lot.And then she lost her voice because she yelled at me so much.Yeah.Yeah.She was very hostile. But in a very much like, I felt respected, right?Because she respected me enough to be hostile to me.
And so I look forward to, on her advice, first rehearsal, finding the biggest person there and just beating the crap out of them.That's you and me.Establish dominance.I assume it's you, Alex, so I'll probably have to beat up.
Just two 40 year old theater majors just wailing on each other.Yeah, ineffectively.
Should be a long fight.We're going to be pulling all of our punches and doing naps instead.It's like fake punch, but pulling everything.
You come into quadrant one, two or three, buddy.Come on.What are we doing?Yeah.
Okay.I'm going to be coming from here and I want you to turn this way.Yeah.
We do.Oh man.I'm excited.I don't know how we'll do.We do.We warm up with Latvian slap circles.So we do start rehearsals by pretending to slap each other in the face.Very hard.It's very fun.Oh, perfect.Yeah.
We also play a game that I think you will like called Portmanteau. where it is essentially work of fart, but like blown wide open.You can do it just to any things.Yeah, yeah, yeah.
And we'll just, people will run into a room and just yell like, oh, okay. Yeah, I should have had one queued up.
Yeah, you didn't get it like I like.
OK, let's see a a flashing light circle plays the biggest RPG video game of 2024. Eldon Ringlight.That's pretty good.I was thinking Disco Baldur's Gate, but Eldon Ringlight.Oh, that's too good.Yep, see?But Eldon Ringlight will get it there.
Maddie says 16th president meets big underwater passageway in New York.Okay, hold on.Abraham Lincoln Tunnel?Yep, there it is.Yeah, there we go.This is it.I don't know if you've ever, I love Port Rantos very much.I am aware of this.
I have a tier ranking system for them.Okay.Because like, okay. S-tier.S-tier portmanteau is that it shares letters when you put it together and is clear what the two words were.
So like a great example, celebrity couple named Bennifer is a perfect S-tier portmanteau combining Ben and Jen, right?And you can clearly see that the root names were Ben and Jennifer.With the internal rhyme. I love it.Now, a D tier, brunch.
Brunch, there's no connecting tissue between breakfast and lunch in there.And if you heard it for the first time, you would not immediately think, oh, that's a combination of breakfast and lunch.You'd be like, what is that?
That doesn't make any sense.
You want me to go to brunch?What are you gonna do?
You gonna hit me with that?Yeah, it sounds violent. Brunch sounds violent.
It is not a good portmanteau.
Maddie says, Maddie's in the chat now, says it's the smash burger of portmanteaus.Correct.
That kind of thing bothered me.It's like, well, you just put, you just put some of the letters from one thing on another one.It's not, that's not a portmanteau.There was no overlap.It's just one of those pet peeves that I have.
If we can do it now, surely you have thought about this before, is there a better something than brunch?Is there a better portmanteau for we're having breakfast at lunchtime than brunch?And we have weeks till maybe this, till your debrief.
Okay, Malice has privilege, which is pretty good.Yeah, I agree there, that's fine. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.That works.Privilege.
We're going out for privilege today.Oh, cool.$13 for avocado toast.Enjoy.
This is the other thing too.I was about to start talking about brunch and how I can't drink during the day anymore because I'm super old.That's not what we're here to discuss.
I mean, we're here to discuss anything, man.This is just so our listeners can get to know you.For those of them who have not been listening to The Adventure Zone or my brother and my brother- Oh, there's plenty of those.
Or Shmanners or whatever for years and years. Yeah, it's for you to say hi and tell them to come hang out.Hi, come hang out.Done, good, nailed it.Okay, bye, logging off.Yeah, the rest of it is just us talking about brunch and privilege.
Well, you know what, I think we have two questions that we ask the characters before we go into the adventure proper on stage.The first is, anything you're particularly excited about?
Yeah, honestly, Honestly, the characters, I said this to Michael and David and Sam in my first meeting with them, going over the characters, I'm gonna be doing Barry and Wondro and Tamburlaine.Hell yeah.
And all of them are great, but Wondro especially, I had said like, I'm angry in a jealous way that I've never thought of this before.
Because it is very similar to, I had an idea for a D&D character that I hope I get to play someday, where it's like a Houdini monk, where it's like a stage magician monk escape artist who's like trained his body to be like a perfect thing, that every time somebody thinks he's doing real magic, gets mad and explains to them like, no, magic is easy, that's a spell they cast.
I have trained for years and years to be able to do this.
The opposite of a wizard.
Yeah.Yeah.Very much so.Because I'm a big fan of Houdini and that was Houdini's whole deal of like, don't call it magic.Don't say that I'm like a wizard.I worked very hard to learn how to do this.
And so having the reverse of that with Wondro is so good to me.It makes me so happy. Same with Barry of getting to play a quote-unquote evil character who's basically good and effective.
Because I love characters, oh my God, this makes me sound like such a dork, but like Gru in Minions and Megamind and even like the Grinch, right?Where it's just like, they're not bad.They want to seem bad for all these reasons, but they're not bad.
I mean, that's Barry.And then Tamerlane, do you guys want to hear my idea for him?
I'm gonna play him like a lounge lizard, like Dean Martin.More like Jerry Lewis doing his impression of Dean Martin in The Nutty Professor.But that to me is... That's gonna be great.
I want him... I'm focusing very much on the charming aspect versus seduction, because I want it to be... I could talk them into anything, and seduction might come out of that, but charm being a more powerful way of... I'll do anything this guy says.
I trust him.I'd buy some swampland in Florida from this guy.
Yeah, for sure.I mean, they're all gonna be very fun to watch.It's great.Man, people just keep having different takes on them all.
It's glorious.That's the thing that I think is wonderful about this.If I might wax poetic about the 20-sided tavern, one,
The way that you guys have figured out how to do this show night after night makes me so jealous, because this is a thing that we've talked about at Adventure Zone for years, of every time we do a live show, we have to come up with what the story's gonna be.
And so my brother and me, when we do live shows, we have the structure, we get the questions, generating the segments sometimes where it's like, yeah, I'll work this up and I'll figure this out, right?But what the show is is what it is every time.
every time we do it, having to come up with like, okay, we've got like a two-act structure, it's gonna be a complete story in this time and everything has always been like, hopefully someone has an idea for it when it comes time to do it.
And to have it built out where not only do you guys have a repeatable way of doing it, a structure that it is like, and if this happens, this happens.So it's like,
even as it gets more and more chaotic, there's enough structure to it to have it be a show that you guys understand what is happening.
And it's like different every single time because of the decision tree and the characters and the inclusion of the audience and just like the improv nature of the actors.
He's like, oh my God, this is such a brilliant evolution on what we've been doing in a way that like, It makes me proud and jealous and excited to be a part of it.Hell yeah.
Well, I mean, thank you.I'm excited that you understand the time crunch thing because I have heard you guys in the middle of like a live show go like, oh God, uh, throw these two pages out.This has to go.
We've got to get out of the theater in two hours, which is a thing that we have to contend with every night because the improvisational nature of the show, you do get lost in it.
You just get lost in a scene and then all of a sudden you like look down at the clock and you're like, oh God, we,
Is there a clock on stage?
Oh yeah, the DM is just looking at a clock.
We have that too and man it's so funny because Griffin and I have two very different ways of like running live shows where Griffin will have like 10 pages of notes and I will have I'm looking around to see if I have a notebook handy but see if I have any of my notes but it will be like
they'll meet these people and then this thing will happen and then this guy will show up and then like act two will just say they fight a big guy yeah and that's like all I've got and so Griffin looks at the clock with this nervousness of like how much I'm gonna have to cut I'm gonna have to edit on the fly and for the first 30 minutes of every live show I've ever done I think what if I don't have enough
What if we're just done now?
You sure you don't want to talk to this guy anymore?He's probably pretty interesting.
You can hang out with him.
That's a weird tree, huh?Let's talk about this tree that I just made up.That's a weird tree.You see that tree over there?Let's go take a nap under it.
The big trap with us that you'll find is the combat tutorial, because it's so fun and so stupid and there aren't any stakes yet.And it's the first time everybody starts starting to get to do stunts and crap. we will hang out there forever.
And then all of a sudden be like, Oh Jesus Christ, we got it.Like we haven't even, there hasn't even been a call to, nobody knows what we're doing yet.We got to get to the wizard South so people know what's up.
The smartest thing you guys have done is the beginning of the show has the most structure because that is the time for us where we'll sit down and just shoot in the shit and like poking fun at each other and intro and characters.
And suddenly like it's been 30 minutes of our two hour show. And what would be the first two lines of notes?We've spent 30 minutes just making jokes and now we have to cut like four or five.
Yeah, all of it.Oh no.I mean, we get bad too.I mean, the thing about doing the same thing with the same people over and over again too every night is that like we start trying to make each other laugh, right?
You can get lost in that sauce of like, especially Maddie who can't talk right now, which is too bad.That has a bit where they do a natural one on chugging a beer or a seltzer.
And it went from a sort of like tee-hee, I open it and it's to this like wrestling match with Maddie and a beer and a seltzer can and there's just beer going everywhere and we're all screaming.
And like, I don't know if the audience thinks it's as funny as we do, but we're having a blast.
This is one of my favorite things that used to happen because it was so consistent.
Well, you're going to get to do that too.
Yeah, when we worked, when I worked at the Shakespeare Company and we were doing like comedies is there would come a moment and it was usually during like final dress or something where you see a bit that had just over the weeks kept getting bigger and bigger and bigger because he kept laughing at it in you know in the career it's sitting there yeah and then you get to like final dress just before you have an audience the next day and you're like
Is that just funny to us?Cause we know the evolution of it when this opens and then like you have your first preview and like this moment happens that has grown to this like minute long bit and the audience doesn't react at all.
And you're like, okay. Mm, you know what?Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.I think, mm-hmm, maybe we scale it back to where it was the first time we laughed at it.And we just keep it there.Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Yeah, I mean, it happens.And you know what?That's what we've got Michael for.We absolutely get those notes of like, okay, new choice, guys.That thing is done.
That horse is dead and beaten and leave it alone. Well, it's one of the things that I'm excited because it does remind me so much of the Adventure Zone.
And it's one of the reasons we stopped doing Balance for live shows is that, one, I mean, the main reason is because Balance is really the only one we've done where the story was done, right?We got to the end of it.
It's my favorite thing in any of those where Justin specifically would be like, I know I'm not gonna die.I know how it works.
Yeah, well that was the thing it always felt really shoehorned in and really like I don't know this could have happened And but it also was like we were just recycling like things that had made us laugh or that had Resonated with the audience and it felt like a band that hadn't put out new music in 20 years Just like playing the same.
It's like yeah, I've heard these 10 songs a dozen times.Oh shit guys.Are we Weezer?Damn it
we're just yeah let's do my name is jonas again yeah let's do it three times in one night yeah and um and so like doing uh different you know different one shots and different things for the live shows you find new things that are like crack you up and do it um another reason i love the structure you guys have of like
you have, everybody has three characters in the audience picks which one.Yeah.
Like where it's like, yeah, listen, the actors can have bits, but you're not going to be able to like count on recreating character interactions and character dynamics and everything over and over again, because one, it'll be different depending on what the characters are, what the group makeup is and what actors are playing them.
Well, and night to night, you can be, I mean, you'll find, I mean, like Felicia played legs,
Three times and every single time was wildly different because she was like, well, let me take another swing Let me take another swing and you've also got like you'll end up doing the show with probably all of us So you'll have at least three different DMS.
You'll have Like different people on the bench with you like people swing.I'm only doing seven shows.What are you talking about?
I mean, this is this is how we do it You'll probably do like one or two with me one or two with Cass, but I have to do all of them.
I Alex, here's the thing.No one can swing in for me, Alex.What about Travis?Why doesn't anyone think about Travis?
I don't know, man.I'm sorry.It's rough being a middle brother sometimes, dude.
I forgive you.Hey, tonight I'm thinking Wondero's a real sleepy guy who naps on the bench the whole time.Huh?What do you guys think?
Wondero needs a break and a fucking cookie, man.Wondero's invisible and silent. Honest, I swear to God, I would love to watch that show.That would be really wonderful.
If you were just like, if you just, if like two people came on and were like, hey, okay, what do we do?He is in a snit.And then there you go.And that's it.We start from like Wondro being grumpy and yeah, needing more attention or a break.It'll work.
And like that, we do that all the time.It's like, we talk about back foot and forward foot playing too.And sometimes you're just tired and you're like, hey, hey, can Chester be like, kind of chill tonight.
Yeah, I need a there was the first time we ever did live shows in New York.We did them at this place called people's improv theater as a 99 seat venue.
And it was which one then the loft like the original little one or the
All I know is it was like amphitheater or stadium seating.Yeah, the big one.And even at the time, right, this was early days for live shows.It was too small for us to do in New York.Right.
Which I don't know if you guys know this has a lot of people in it.And the first we put the tickets on sale.They were supposed to go on sale at noon.And for some reason, the venue put them on sale like a half hour early.
So they sold out in like 10 because there's only 99 seats and sold out in like a minute. long before the time when we told people they'd be on sale.So people were very upset.And we said, okay, we'll do a second show.
We'll do like a seven o'clock and a 9.30 or whatever it's nine o'clock.And then like those went on sale like 10 minutes before they were supposed to.And we were getting so mad.And then people were mad again.And we're like, we will do a third show.
We'll do like a 1 p.m., a seven o'clock and a 10 o'clock.It's a long day, man.
And by the 10 o'clock, there was a moment where I was sitting there, and I'm just like watching my brothers talk, and I'm like looking back and forth, because I sit in the middle, and suddenly my brain went, I don't think I've said anything in like 10 minutes.
I think I'm just looking at my brothers.I should say something.It's part of my job to talk.I need to say, and a feeling I've never had in my life of it's been too long.I haven't said anything in 10 minutes.I need to say something.
And afterwards I was talking with my wife and I was like, yeah, it was so weird.And she was like, I thought it was the best show you've ever done.Which I think says a lot.Thanks.Thanks, honey.Thanks, honey.
But I think it's one of the things that
when people say like, I could be an actor, I could do that, to jump back to that, it is one of the things that I think that people don't, they see you get up and you memorize lines, you say the lines, but the thing is like, the number of trains of thought you have to have going at any one time, where it's just like, there's blocking I have to hit, but I also have to like be in character and do the character,
And to add on to that, like, and also I need to think about game mechanics and the timing of this.And like, there's no, you have to like autopilot is the character and then the actor brain is everything else. Right?
Like being on set, I always talk about like one of the things that always stressed me out about being an actor is like when you're on stage and you're trying to do a scene, but also part of your brain is thinking, oh, I was supposed to move that glass.
And in a second, he's going to come down and slam this thing down on the table.But the glass is sitting there.If I don't move that glass, that glass is going to get shattered.
And so I need to find an excuse while delivering this important monologue to this guy to walk over there and pick up this glass and just gently move it six inches to the right, but not in a weird way.Oh, no.
And it's like all of that has to be going on in the background. background.
Yeah.Are you aware of Marlon Brando and the glove in on the waterfront?This is my acting teacher.Like there's a scene in on the waterfront where Marlon Brando is playing with a glove that like people like all the prop work.And it's literally like.
his scene partner just dropped it, and he just picked it up, and he just found it in his hands, and he was trying to remember his lines while he was trying to figure out what to do with the glove, and it just came off as like, oh, he's brilliant.
No, he was flailing.One time I was in this, we were doing Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are dead.Nice.That's an easy one.Not a whole lot of thinking or memorizing to go on there.
I was one of the players in that one, so I didn't have to do much because we were doing it in rep with Hamlet, and I was Laertes in Hamlet.
And so I had to be dead at the end, so I was one of the players throughout, and I played the strong man and everything.And it was great because I didn't have to do a lot of lines, and I just basically threw people around.
But every time there would be a freeze or a big monologue, this other dude that I did it with named Matt was like, hey, how come you're always sitting down?How come you're always leaning?I was like, Matt, I'm gonna give you a big acting secret.
Human beings love sitting down.They love it.It's like your character always wants to be sitting down.Sometimes the only motivation you need for blocking is, I haven't sat down in a while.
I'm going to stand up, I'm going to get a drink, and then you know what I want to do?I want to sit back down.And so anytime you're on set, you walk into a room,
Your character, even if they don't sit down right away, he's planning where they're gonna sit down.He's thinking about sitting down.And if you can't sit down, lean against something.
Because human beings want to be standing or leaning if they have a choice.And like years later, he messaged me on something.He was like, hey man, I want you to know I was in the show.Fucking right. I just sit down all the time.It feels so natural.
It feels so right.Every time I walk into the thing, the first thing I do is lean a chair as if to say, this chair's mine.I'm going to sit here in a second.And then I sit down there.And if someone takes what was my chair, my character gets so mad.
And he justifies now every part of blocking and acting with sitting down, waiting to sit down, being mad that he can't sit down.And he's like, it makes so much sense.
That's so good.And I can't, now I can't unsee like Brahma's Hamlet where all he's doing is sitting and leaning and moping and like just perching.Yeah.That's, I'm going to direct Hamlet one day.I'm going to be like, listen, come here, buddy.
Hamlet's tired.Because if you ever see a person in real life and you're like, that person seems really awkward or nervous or uncomfortable.Just need a seat.It's because they're like standing, right?
And it's just like, they walked into a room and they don't know what to do.What do I do with my ass?When you walk in, someone's just sitting down. You're never like, that person's awkward, right?
Well, they're in charge, right?The guy in the seat is in charge of the room, right?The mob boss always invites you to sit down at his plush leather banquette.
This is what I'm saying.I think that sitting is acting. There, I said it.
Well, we have a very comfortable pew all set up for you, and I can't wait to see how Tamburlaine Wondro and Barry lounge upon it.It's interesting that the second question that we asked the second character is, is there anything you're nervous about?
And I mean, I think we kind of covered it.
Well, I hurt my calves walking the other day, so I think I'm a little bit nervous about that.
We broke a Bria.That was the first thing I messaged a Bria.I was like, hey, what advice do you have?And she was like, start building up your knee strength now.
And so that's definitely something I'm aware of and something I've been building up my aerobics, my endurance, and I'm doing my best.But I can also just power through it.
Just power through, or just say, hey man, find a seat, have a seat, take a load off, you'll be fine.
People love sitting down, Alex.I don't know if you know this, human beings love sitting.
They can't get enough of it, man.Can you imagine going to a concert and standing up the whole time?Ugh, it's terrible.
No, thank you.General admission.Who are you trying to impress?The band.Standing person.
Look at me, Mick Jagger, I'm standing the whole time.I love you so much.
No one loves them.No one loves them.If I look out on a crowd at a My Brother, My Brother Me show and someone's standing, I'll kick them out. I don't care what, even if they're going to the bathroom, what are you doing?
Just the one guy who just won't sit down, just holding up a big Munch Squad sign.Get out of here.Oh man.We don't need that energy here.No, we're chilling, we're hanging out, we're doing advice.
Well, Travis, thank you for coming on, for chatting with us, for saying hi to the listeners and our audience. Can't wait.
There's an audience.There's going to be people there, man.
They're going to be alive.I got to tell you, they do stand up.I hope they'll be alive, Alex.They will be alive for the most part and they will stand up and they will yell things and it will be fine.Nice things. Most of the time.
Sometimes rowdy things.I mean, you guys, we have secret codes for like, hey, look out for that dude.Yeah.And I'm sure you do as well.I, I. I've been at a My Brother, My Brother and Me live show where someone needed to get off of the mic before.Yeah.
That will happen.It does.But everybody's lovely and wonderful and I'm so thankful for my audience, Alex.For sure.I have nothing bad to say about them.
Well, if you'd like to say, you want to take a minute to plug yourself for what you got going on in the next couple of weeks before we wrap this up?
In general, I would say just check out, we started a new run on Adventure Zone called Abnimals, which is my word for, you know, all those cartoons back in the 90s that were like Biker Mice from Mars, and Samurai Pizza Cats, and Street Sharks, and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, and it's animals with abs.
You know, anthropomorphic animal superheroes.And I'm running it, and Dad is playing a cow secret agent called Roger Moore.
Justin is playing an extreme firefighter axolotl named Axolotl, and Griffin is playing a SEAL who has never served in the armed forces named Navy SEAL.And it is off the rails, and I love it very, very much.I'm having a blast with it.
And coming up on Macroy Family Clubhouse, which we do every Tuesday at noon Eastern time, I think, Yeah, this'll be up later.
We're doing, we've started, this is our first year doing Clubhouse, so we've decided to end the year with a bracket-style competition called Master Jeff, in which we're gonna figure out who wins Master Jeff of 2024.
So we've broken down, we've picked a bunch of Jeffs and superlatives by which to judge them, and then we'll just be putting them in a bracket system to narrow it down.There's actually been, no joke, a lot of logistical effort.
power rankings up for how we're gonna do it.
Goldblum's gotta be top seed.Goldblum's in there.I have a strong place in my heart for Jeff Corwin, who was an animal show host when I was a kid and still does a lot of conservation stuff and animal stuff.But that's Tuesday.
You can also just go to the McRoy family YouTube and find it all there. All right, well, thanks.And come see the show.
Yeah, come see the show.Come see the show.We're gonna have fun.Travis is gonna be being weird.He probably is gonna be sitting down a lot, so come stand up, drive him nuts.
It's important that you know that for context, because then when you see me stand up, you're like, some bitch is gonna come out.Oh, here it goes.
It's about to pop off.He wouldn't stand up for nothing.No, Tamburlaine has a glass he needs to move before it gets shattered.He's about to blow us away.Yeah.
Or he needs to go to the bathroom, and he's making an excuse for it.
You can follow the show at 20 Sided Tavern.I'm at ralexmurray all over the internet.And yeah, until next time, ale.And well met.
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