Hey, humans. How's it going? Susan Ruth here. Thanks for listening to another episode of Hey Human podcast. This is episode 423, and my guest is Ed Begley junior. You'd be hard pressed to not have seen a film or television show with Ed featured somewhere in there over the last several decades. His career crosses genre and format, and I just saw a movie this last weekend, and he was in it. And it's called Strange Darling. And if you have not seen this movie,
I highly recommend it. It is phenomenal. It's not a horror movie. It's more psychological thriller, I I think, is the best way to describe it. And don't don't look up anything about this movie. Talk about a movie you have to go in blind or else you'll ruin it for yourself. I give it all my thumbs
and toes up. It's really, really good. So, you know, here's Ed being an actor his whole life and you would think that that success that he's had would be his focus, you know, just doing the acting thing, but he began his passion for environmental activism really early on and never wavered there. He's also a civil and human rights activist and a kind of person who you know that saying, you know, show me, don't tell me? He's a show me
guy. He shows up and he walks the walk and I think that's something to really admire because a lot of us say we're gonna do things and we didn't really get around to it. But he really lives the life. About a decade ago, he was diagnosed with Parkinson's, and he's still going strong, still staying healthy. He's got a good workout
and health and wellness regime. He's so happy and has a beautiful family and just really, I think, as you know, because I'm sure you've seen him, again, I'd be shocked, anyone that doesn't know who Ed Begley Jr. Is, that, he radiates a kind of kindness and but it's it's almost I don't know. It's hard to explain. It's almost ethereal in a way. Almost seems beyond the the normal kind of human kindness because it's it's almost this can sound so weird, but he kind of he kind of glows in a way.
I don't know how to explain it exactly, but I met him at a the first time at a book reading, and some mutual friends introduced us. My friend, Brad, his friend, Brad, introduced us. Brad, by the way, is the one, thank you, Brad, who got Ed to be on the show. And anyway, it was very, very nice. And then, gosh, maybe a year later, I was having lunch at one of my favorite places to eat on a Sunday, and
he was there. And he was sitting and hanging out with his friends, and the cutest dog you ever saw. And I looked over, and I went, oh, that's Ed Begley. So I texted Brad, and I said, hey, your friend, Ed is here. And Brad, of course, being Brad, who's also a delightful human, said, go talk to him. Go talk to him. And I said, nope. I'm not gonna walk up to somebody
during their meal and and disturb them. I think people who are famous very much should be left alone when they're enjoying their family and, you know, just let them be a normal regular person. But, anyway, Brad was pretty insistent, and then I get a text from Brad a few minutes later. He said, I told him you were walking over, so now you have to walk over. And I walked over, and I said hello, pet the dog, and Ed pretended like he remembered me. I'm sure he didn't. I mean, I met him one
time briefly. And as kind as he is, it would be a lot to expect that he would remember me. But he was so gracious and so lovely. And he said, oh, I I understand you have a show, Hey Human. And I said, yes. And he said, well, I'd love to be on it. And there you go. That's how that happened. And he just so happened to have been at Reba's or with Reba. I guess Reba was at his house, Reba McEntire, the night before. And I had done the song for Reba,
so I don't know. The the stars were aligning, and it was really good. And regardless, he could have been weird or or just not interested or but no. He was the absolute opposite, radiating kindness. Literally radiating kindness. So okay. Not literally. Figuratively radiating kindness. I'm excited for you to hear this, interesting life story. I know he's got a long way to go. And he's got a memoir out now, The Temple of Tranquility and Step on It, which I read. And it is a wild ride.
It's it's really a lot of fun and so interesting. And my goodness, he has lived a life so far. Okay. General stuff. Hey, Human Podcast is now on YouTube under official Susan Ruth. Super easy to find. I'm on Patreon at susanruthism. Check that out. We do a monthly sign on to Zoom and Chatter kind of thing, which is really fun. And, yeah, that's a thing. TikTok, susanruthism, trying to do the TikTok thing. Check out heyhumanpodcast.com for links and to learn more about my guests and the show.
Check out susanruth.com to learn more about me and my other artistic endeavors. Follow susanruthism on social media, and find my albums on Spotify, Apple Music, Amazon Music, wherever you get your music. I've got 4 records. Rate, review, and subscribe to Hey Human! Podcast wherever you like and get your podcasts pretty much everywhere. And thank you for listening. Be kind. Be well. Be love. And here we go. Ed Begley junior, welcome to Hey Human. So good to be here. I think I qualify.
I'm fairly human those days. Let's see how I do today. Hey Human accepts all. Shout out to Brad for connecting us. Here. Here. Yeah. So I think a lot of people know your backstory, but just for the sake of setting the ball in motion, tell me a little bit about your childhood. I was born in Hollywood Presbyterian Hospital, and so that's kind of unique among my peers. Most people
came from elsewhere. They came from other states and other parts of California or other parts of the city, but Hollywood is has a certain mystique to it. And I was born in right in Hollywood and I grew up in the valley, an area called the San Fernando Valley you're surely aware of. And I lived there most of my life. A bit of time back east, my dad was doing
some stage plays. So for for a few years there, I was out in a town called Merrick out on Long Island, a very nice, sleepy little town, not a highfalutin place like Hampton. It's pretty, simple community, and so was our home in Van Nuys. Pretty simple, 1700 square foot home, so I never had a lot of grandeur growing up. With a father who was quite famous, did you want to follow in those footsteps right away, or was that just something that shaped you slowly over time?
I definitely wanted to do what my dad did. If my dad had been a plumber, I'd be fitting pipe now. I'm certain of that. You know, I just I really idolized him, and there's a problem that came with that, though. He was so good at it. He made it look so easy. I thought, you know, I wanna do that. Get me a job on gun smoke. Give me a wagon train. I'm gonna do Perry Mason. Get me a series regular part. Pick up the phone and call for god's sake. Get me a job.
And, of course, he couldn't do that. He didn't have the power to do that nor if he had done it, I wouldn't have appreciated, of course. He said, do you wanna be an actor? Go do the training and what have you. And I went on interviews somehow for a few years, had no training, and I never got a job, of course. So finally, when I started to take some classes, I began to work and I kinda learned on the job, learned by learned while
I was doing it. Do you think you had a sense as you were moving through your acting experience that your self, your sense of self was rather malleable or did you approach it from a really grounded place? Not at all a grounded place. I wasn't very grounded at all. I had a lot of anxiety. Most kids did most of it fairly normal. Some of it kind of unusual and that there was some question about who my mother
was as it turns out. Everybody in the neighborhood knew who my sister and I had for a real mother, who our genetic birth mother was, but we didn't know. And I found out unceremoniously, discovering the day I went to get my driver's license. I suddenly had my hands for the first time on my birth certificate, And so I got a big surprise that
day. But being kind of in a victim mentality for years, I went, oh, poor me, and I decided to use that as an excuse to to numb myself in a number of ways and did that over the years with different substances and really did that from 1965 till 1960 1979, actually. I did it for quite a few years. I read your book Thank you, by the way. The to the level of tranquility and stuff on it. Great title. Thank you.
But I was thinking as I was reading it, here's this kid growing up in, I would consider slightly extraordinary circumstances because of who your dad was and then finding certain things out about yourself. Yes. But all the while as you're growing up there's this humongous event happening in parallel to your upbringing. How much did the Vietnam war and the understanding of it coalesce with your understanding of yourself and place in the world?
It was always there. It was this for voting, ominous kind of thing that was happening to friends of mine, mostly, you know, sons and daughters of the working poor were going to the front lines, and I somehow magically my dad was a conservative and, but we agreed on many things. We did not agree about the Vietnam War, but somehow for his son, he found some way to get me a medical waiver. I was, classified as a partial albino, and I had very poor vision.
Both things, I think, were true. I think there are degrees of albinos, and I certainly have very fair skin, so they reasoned perhaps correctly that I might be easier to spot in the jungle. You know, there's no good sunscreen back then other than the silver thing you put on called Afill, and I'd be like the tin man trying to hide in the in the shrubbery
of Vietnam. But there's no joke about it, really, ultimately, because people came back, friends of mine, you know, in in bags, guys that were friends of mine, they did not come back alive. So I thought I'd, be one of them and somehow got this medical waiver, courtesy of my dad. So god bless him. I didn't ask for it. I didn't even know what was happening at the time. Well, no. I can't serve. Okay. I'm I'm kinda glad, I guess, but, you know, it's out of my hands now. I I liked that there was an
excuse. I I wasn't a draft dodger, but I I got a I got off. Yeah. Was there any kind of survivor's guilt that plagued you, or do you think it was just one of those things? I mean, a lot of people didn't end up getting their number called, obviously. Right. I had some friends who had the number called and some who didn't, and I can't remember what my number was before, but I did feel survivor's guilt and but it was the one big thing that
my dad and I disagreed with. I didn't stand up to him much and didn't I won't call, I won't call it standing up. I kind of slightly elevated in my seat, you know, to let him know I felt a little differently. I didn't quite think the domino theory was viable. Yeah. And then we were hearing things about, you know, the amount of people that are actually lost over there and the winnability of the war, and it turns
out we were right. You know, Robert McNamara was, you know, fudging things a good deal. And my dad was a great guy. He went over there to Vietnam and entertained the troops and brought a lot of joy and solace to their lives. They recognized his friendly face from a lot of TV shows and movies. So he was a great guy, and bless him for going over there and entertaining the troops. Yeah. Absolutely. Well, as I mentioned, I read your book and it is a wild ride.
You are absolutely laid bare in it, and it's funny, and it's scary in places, and and heartwarming and heartbreaking in places, and you're quite daft in moving between those things. I imagine as you're putting it all on paper and honoring those moments in your life, it's gotta have a surreal quality to it. Almost out of body, did you experience that as you're putting it all down? Yes.
There was something otherworldly and kind of, mystical going on while writing it because I didn't intend to write a book at all. I was just taking notes with the help of my daughter and her smartphone. You know, I wanted to get down my whole life in Hollywood. That point, the whole 73 years of it, I think, is when I started when I was 73 a few years ago to get it as much as her data plan and battery would allow, you know, and she started recording it. And we did a full hour
and her arm got tired. I said, well, we'll pick up again tomorrow the next day. In the meantime, I thought, I don't wanna lose that idea. Maybe I'll write a few things down on my computer, some notes to take, you know, to take down some notes to give her to complete the work. And then that's what it happened, Susan. The computer keyboard came became like a Ouija board, but one that actually worked where it took me to all these different places and pulled me this
way and that way. And the stuff I hadn't thought of in 50 years or more was suddenly in great detail before me, and I just kept writing it down. And I did most of it in the fur in the 1st 3 months. Wow. Did you feel your dad with you as you were writing it? Yeah. I did feel influenced by my father's spirit. Ancestors were among us in some ways, so there's some sort of energy left over. I don't think it all ends at the point of death.
I think there's something else that happens, and I can certainly feel his energy still, and my mother's the same, and other people that are dear to me, this woman, Jeanette Pierre, that was like a mother to my sister and I. You know, I I feel guided by them often to do the right thing, and I think that's a very good feeling. I imagine what LA was like in the seventies. And I think, my gosh, I was born too late. I would have ruled that time. But Yeah. Whatever you've heard, double it. Yeah.
Just any anecdotal. I I want people to read the book. So certainly, let's not talk about everything, but pull out one great story from that moment in time for you? Well, it was wonderful, and it was horrible too because, you know, there's a price to be paid for drinking a quart of vodka every day and taking medications at the same time and snorting coke, you know, and operating a vehicle while you're doing that. So it was terrifying.
The fact that I didn't wind up killing anybody, I think, is a bit of good fortune because I was barely conscious many nights I'd be driving home. So and but I quickly discovered that, you know, I got off quickly either because I was either because I was at Begley's son or the way I looked. How far are you from here? Can you just can you drive yourself home? You know, many other people in parts of Los Angeles don't get that same warning
as I would get. You know, they'd allow you to just drive home, and they'd follow you home occasionally. I don't think everybody in the city of LA, you know, was privy to that kind of past, you know, that I got on occasion. So it was terrifying at times and then quite enlightening and quite serene when you get away from that whirlpool of negativity and you get some positive energy in your life and begin to build something from it.
That was wonderful, but we we had some fun back in the in the sixties seventies. I won't lie. It was a lot of fun for a while till till it wasn't. Do you think that it was an escapism that was just for the times, or do you think you were running from some part of yourself? I was definitely running from some part of myself. I originally you know, with pills, it's how I started. I stole some pills from the medicine chest, and I just wanted to numb the pain of finding out that my mother was not
my mother. The woman who died when I was 7 was not my mother. This woman that I was crazy about, my sister and I both love somehow deeply. We barely knew her. We're we're crazy about her. That was indeed our mother, so I didn't wanna go through that pain without any assistance. And, so I started taking pills. And the problem when you do that, when I started taking pills at about age 16, you don't you don't grow any anymore after that because you're numbing yourself. You're not experiencing
good or bad things. Either thing that you're meant to learn a lesson with, you don't you don't feel it. So when I finally got sober in 1979, I was basically, emotionally 17 years old because I hadn't felt the pain or the joy of so many things. So I I was a wreck. I'm one of those people that also think this is heresy to some, but I think
it's true in my case. I think drugs and alcohol saved me before it almost killed me, you know, because I needed some way to numb I I made a dangerous choice by choosing drugs and alcohol. Some people choose therapy or meditation or many other things that are a lot less dangerous, but I needed to do something. And I I had read some Alan Watts early on, but I didn't know how to fully implement
it. And and finally, when I started to learn those lessons and listen to his book called This Is It, my life got to be a lot, lot better. I feel like people like Alan Watts and Ram Dass, and, one of my favorite books of all time is The Alchemist. So I'm gonna throw that in there too. That when you take in that kind of information, even if you may not be ready for it on a grander scale, it's still absorbing into your
DNA. You're still Exactly. Yeah. And that when you are ready for it, you'll have the benefit of that absorption to then implement it. But sometimes it takes time. Yeah. I remember being newly sober, and I was out in the driveway with my wife. We were gonna take a vacation to Monterey. We're packing up the car. It was very, I had a lot of notes about the way she was packing up the car. And so I was like, don't put that in. You put this in first. And I was
getting very upset. I was supposed to take a vacation. I was angry because I wanted to get that vacation. I wanna get up to Monterey. And I was really going kind of crazy. And she and the kids looked at me like they were scared. And I realized, wait a second. The vacation doesn't start in Monterey. It starts right here in the driveway. This is part of the vacation. It's not Monterey that's great. It's the journey to get there.
Whatever it is, the journey to getting on a show like St. Elsewhere, the journey to working with Meryl Streep, the journey to working with Jack Nicholson, the journey to own my own home one day, the journey to have the grandkids one day, all that is the experience of the process of that is what's truly, truly joyful. And if you don't wake up to that at some point, as the Alan Watts book suggests, this is it. This moment right now with you, Susan,
is really all there is. We can certainly remember the past, so we don't make the same mistakes and we can plan for the future. So I make sure I eat dinner tonight. You can make some plans for the future and remember the past a bit, but you don't wanna dwell there. You wanna stay in this moment here comes again right now, this one where I have every single thing that I need. And if I let it be, it's perfectly blissful being here with you, and it really is when you just let it be. And and
I've gotten very good at that. And that book, I can't say it enough. Alan Watts book, this is it. If you're just in an enlightened mood walking past the window where the book is sitting there for sale, think about it. This is it. It's not happening later. This is not a dress rehearsal. Not gonna happen when you get to Monterey. It's happening right now in the driveway before you ever leave from Monterey. Wake up to it.
It takes a lot of the pressure off because we never ever can get to the future, and we've left the past. Well, there's no way to get that either. Even 10 minutes ago, it's gone. It's a it's in the ether. Yes. And I think we do we're told by a lot of outside voices, what are you gonna do next? What are you gonna do next? But that's just a recipe for absolute anxiousness.
It's not that you can't think, you know, someday, like you said, I wanna have a house or I wanna have kids, but there also needs to be room to grow into those experiences because we don't know which door is going to open. It might be 12 doors, and then you have to pick and walk through. And then maybe that door didn't work, so you walk back out and you go through another door, and you keep trying. And if it didn't work, if there were not tangible results,
people wouldn't be doing it. You know? People would have stopped it long ago. There would be no Ram Dass, no Alan Watts, no Sai Baba. Those people would not have devotees or know who they be who we know them to be because people go, well, I didn't really feel I did that thing of being in the moment, and I didn't get anything out of it. If it didn't actually work, it wouldn't be, you know, still surviving for
1000 of years. It's been, you know, going in many parts of the world in India and different parts of Europe and all over. People have tried it, and it's worked, And that's why we continue to do it to this day. So give it a try. I did it also in my acting career. I was always trying to get an interview for a job, get the interview, get the job, get the paycheck, learn the lines, do the job, get another
job. I wasn't experiencing any joy in the actual moment of doing it, the learning of the lines and the performing of the lines and all the money investigating the character. All that can become joyful if you let it be. But if you're just always trying to get onto the next thing, you never had any joy enjoyment and indeed bliss in right now. Yeah. If you keep moving the goalposts, how do you ever win? You don't. I sure wasn't winning in those
years. You said something in the book that really struck me, and you said, I'm in no hurry. And I'm curious. That's the words of a younger man who thinks they have their life ahead of them. Right? And rightfully so. Now that you have a few more years on you, are you in a hurry now at all? I, many years, started to get good about that. When I got sober is when it really started to make a a difference. And I got better at it. 1980 was better than 1979, and 81 was better
than 80. And I get continue to get better, but there's really no backsliding. It's the point now. I almost never I can't tell the last time I was stressed or yelled at another driver, anything like that. The solution is very good nuts and bolts solution to all that stuff. If you're stressed in traffic, two words, leave earlier. You know, just I go to Santa Monica for an appointment. Of course, there's gonna be traffic on the
4:0:5. So just leave earlier, do the crossword when you get there or whatever you wanna do. We just sit there and meditate, but there's tools to do this. And when I get to four way intersection, I always let everybody go before me because I'm in no hurry. Maybe they are in a hurry. Maybe they have a medical emergency. Who knows what people have? Maybe they're about to get fired because they're gonna be late. Let the others go. I have no rush about anything anymore.
What a great way to live. It's it's so much, much, much better. Sounds like a person who knows how to live in grace, especially if you see other people as also being important, which is what that is, letting them go first. And gratitude is a perfect lubricant for all of that. It gets all that stuff really working and running smoothly to really be in gratitude, to to figure out fairly early in my life, wait a minute. It's not a bad thing that Ed Begley is my father. I used to think,
don't compare me to him. I'm different. I'm my own man, and I don't wanna be compared to him. It was a big plus having him for a father. People remembered my name. People were inclined to hire me for jobs because they thought I might be good because I'm his son. Nothing but a plus, but I I viewed it as a minus and began to accept how lucky I I was to be born at Begley's son. I won the lottery. I didn't even buy a ticket.
Then have all the other breaks that I got over the years in and out of my career from different police officers and people who let me slide. Now some would argue that with some substance behind it, maybe people who let me off the hook for things like that, they're enabling me in my alcoholism, and that's probably true too. You know, I didn't have the kind of, the kind of challenges that some people had with that kind of bad behavior. I could
have I could have really hurt somebody. That's what I just keep thinking of every day. So that's another reason to never try that behavior again. What what you could have done to an innocent person or persons is, is terrifying. Did your dad ever step in and say, what are you doing, or was he doing his own life? He was sober for about 18 years when he passed away. I was 20. So the 1st 2 years of my life, he was drinking a bit.
I remember him being drunk one night. Pretty certain he was drunk by the way he was behaving. It's a very, very young, very, you know, traumatic memory, but I remember that. And, fortunately, you know, he he got sober and stayed sober, and he knew I was having a problem at some point because the pills were missing from his medicine chest, and he reasonably figured out it was me that was doing
it. Then when I got arrested on on acid in 1969, he took me to Synanon to see if maybe they could help me. They were more about getting off heroin than LSD. They didn't know that much about that in 1969. So I just went there for a day and lied to everybody. So, no, I wasn't on LSD. I was hypnotized. Somebody hypnotized me. That was my excuse. Back in 1969, I'm not an asset. I'm hypnotized. That's a good one. How they kept a straight face at that, I'm not sure. I did a
lot of acid in high school. It was it was hypnotizing for sure. Yep. For sure. You, of course, are very well known for your activism and environmentalism, And I think there is an idea that all hope is lost, and so why bother at this point? I I would love for you to speak to that because I think in general, you're an optimism guy. Let's talk about that a bit. There's 2 big lies about the environment. There's many little ones, but the 2 big ones are.
And there's certain news outlets that promote this a lot. There's no problem at all. Back to your house, there's nothing to see. It's just people trying to be the nanny state and tell you what to do, and people trying to make things cost more. There's no problem with climate change and no problem with anything. Don't bother doing any of this stuff because it's not needed. That's one lie. The other lie that's every bit as dangerous as it's so far gone. There's nothing that we can do.
And there certainly are huge challenges with climate change and many other things, but think about what we have done, what's quantifiable, what we've done already. That's huge. We have 4 times the cards in LA for 1970, millions more people, yet we have a fraction of the smog. If we had just the same amount of smog from 1970, it was bad. I lived here. We'd go, wow. Four times the cars, millions more people, and it didn't get worse. We're fantastic.
That's not what happened at all. It got to be much, much less because everything that we hoped would work did work. You know, cleaner vehicles, cleaner power plants, all the stuff we did worked because we really got tough. We did it with something called the Clean Air Act, which was signed by Richard Nixon of all people. So it takes a bipartisan
effort to do some things. We had that in LA, thank God, and the air got much, much now we still have people near the ports of Long Beach and Los Angeles. There are shipping centers, fulfillment centers, there are freeway interchanges that are breathing dirty air. We've gotta clean that up for them, but we've proven that we can do it. Ozone depletion, we had a problem. I'm sure you've heard of years ago with the CFCs that were damaging the ozone. That's a global problem like
climate change. We said no more CFCs. We're not gonna ever use CFCs again. We're gonna ban them. People said the naysayers once again jumped in and said, it'll be so expensive. You won't be able to buy a refrigerator. Nobody could ever buy an air conditioning unit again if you banned CFCs. I'm told that they still sell both those products. Have you heard? I think they're still selling refrigerators and air
conditioning units. Yeah. They just banned CFCs, and they found another way to to keep them cool, you know, with another substance that isn't nearly as damaging to the ozone. And look what we did. We made a problem on a global way in that way, so we can do with climate change. Now having said that, I'm not living in a dream world. There's much much to be done and much that's gonna be damaged. Whatever we do, there's so much in the pipeline now. The oceans are so warm. There's so much
plastic in the oceans. There's so many things like the damage of the coral reefs, the bleaching of the coral reefs, and so many things, loss of species. I mean, how many rivets can you lose from an airplane before it ceases to fly? And we're losing these rivets from the airplane, which keeps us all aloft, though, and that's the web of life that keeps us going. And if you lose too many of those rivets, those being the many plant and animal species that we need,
it's gonna be the end of us. So we have to do it for our own survival. It's not just save the whales or save the earth. It's saving ourselves, and we can do it. We've proven that we can in big, big ways. Is your activism toward these things I mean, I think if you're paying any attention as a human being, you see the things around you. But did you grow up in a family that was aware of this stuff, or were you the pied piper trying to lead everyone? My dad was the influence in this way
too. And I'm telling you, he never really used the word environmentalist, but he was one because he was a son of Irish immigrants. He lived through the great depression, simply turned off the lights, turned off the water, saved string, saved tinfoil. You know, he was a conservative that liked to conserve. So when he died within a few days of the first Earth Day, I did everything that I could to honor his legacy. And I started, you know, composting. I became a vegetarian. I started
riding my bike even more. I took public transportation, even more non toxic soaps and cleaners, all that stuff. And I found very quickly that it was not only good for the environment. It was good for my pocketbook. I was saving money. I did it starting in 1970 and pretty soon I had enough money to buy a little solar oven. Pretty soon I had saved enough money to buy a rain barrel to collect rainwater. And after 15 years of doing it, I finally had solar solar hot water in my house in Ojai.
Then 20 years after the 1st birthday, I could have finally afford solar electric, and I've had solar electric ever since 1990, and it works great. So start slow. You know, I'm kind of a fiscal conservative myself. I don't wanna buy something I can't afford. I didn't try to buy solar panels in 1970 as a broken struggling actor, and his father
wasn't around to bail him out. I just did what I could with bike riding and public transportation, things that I could afford and save money and did things as I as I could do them. I think that's the key that people get overwhelmed with the idea of they have to start in in a giant way, and, tiny steps are still steps. Yeah. All or nothing is that people get hung up on that. They make a long list of or a short one or a list at any rate of these things that
they can't do. I'm not interested in that list. That's the list. Put it aside. What is the list what's the list of things that you can do? Much more interesting list. Can you ride a bike if weather and fitness permit? Can you take publish public transportation if it's available near you? Can you, you know, buy an energy efficient light bulb? Can you buy an energy saving thermostat?
Make that list up of the things that you can do, then go down the line, and you will save money, I guarantee it, to do other things so you can afford them. It's pretty straightforward. I wanna pivot and talk about love and sex. You famously had some relationships going. You talk about in the book. You were a ladies' man, I think, is what the term would be as you were growing up and have been married and have beautiful children and are married now. What is your how has your
thoughts on love changed through your life? I'm not sure I was ever a ladies' man, but I was with some amazing women. I had some amazing women in my life. My first wife was extraordinary in every way. My current wife is, of course, and I I did date a bit in the seventies and the eighties, so I won't lie about that. But I I just lucky to have met these great, powerful, smart, wonderful women, and I just feel blessed. I don't know what they saw on me.
I'm still trying to figure that out. Apparently, I'm amusing. But, other than that, I'm not sure what they see in me. And all the all the people that I've gone with over the years, all the wonderful women I've known over the years, I'm still friendly with them. I can't think of one that I'm not happy to see. So there's a plus to that. I I must have done something right. Well, you must know that you're a lovely man, that you have a good heart, and you try your best.
I mean, that was pretty clear as I was reading the book that you were always striving even, I think, even in your addiction. And maybe that's the older person writing about the younger person, but there seemed to be a sense that you did care deeply. I did. That's true. Yeah. Yeah. That people respond to that. And that is the basis of what love is, is a a deep caring. And whether or not you at the time are able to commit to what the vulnerability around that means and
all that. But I that's why I'm wondering, looking back as an older person, how love has shaped your life and and shaped you. I mean, I think it's deeper than just like, oh, shucks. You know, I'm just a regular guy. No. You're right. It it has shaped me, and I've been guided by these powerful women. Some of with whom I've had a relationship, I've been very much guided by them and felt and experienced a great deal of love from, you know, my some of my long term relationships.
All of my relationships, really, I've felt a great deal of love from the women that I've known over the years. Has it taught you now to love and and see yourself as worthy and deserving? Yes. I'm much better at that now. I've really opened my heart in many ways since the late seventies, since I finally got sober. Unfortunately, I had the addiction of drugs and alcohol, then there's a few other addictions that remained for about another decade, and that was
gambling and then philandering. I hadn't entirely gotten well in every area of my life, but I've gotten better at it. This is my second marriage much, much better. I've decided to remain true to all of the vows, not just the ones I found, you know, easy to tick off. Yeah. Sure. So, you know, I'm doing much better in this marriage than I did in my first. My first wife was wonderful beyond measure, but I wasn't grown enough to appreciate it and
to value it. So I decided to try it again and and do better, and I've been quite successful this time around. And it's by ex exactly what you suggest by opening my heart and being vulnerable and jumping off the high dive and and hoping that there's water in the tank by the time you get down to the bottom. And doing it anyway even if there's not. Exactly. That's the hardest part about love is to to do it no matter what the outcome will be. That's again staying in the present.
I choose to love in this moment, and whatever happens, happens. I found that to be true very much so. I'm excited because on Saturday, I get to see your new movie, strange darling. Yes. I just saw it the other night. It's really it's it's a chiller. It's kind of graphic, so be prepared for that. But it's very, very good. It's a very smart movie. It's, really, it's got some huge surprises. It's gotten
unanimously good reviews. Every review I've seen at New York Times, Detroit Free Press, Arizona Republic, all the reviews I've seen have been very, very good. Rotten Tomatoes gave it a 100%. I saw that. Very exciting. Doing very well. We'll see how the box office is. That starts tomorrow. That's the ultimate, you know, benchmark is how well it does with actual box office numbers. Sure. Of course. Well, I have a strict rule. I don't look at trailers. I don't read up about a movie. I just go
to the movie. I love going to the movies, so I'm super excited. That's the way to do it. Let's talk a minute about your diagnosis. You were diagnosed with Parkinson's. How has that been for you? How was that in that moment, and and where is that taking you in life? It was a tough diagnosis to receive,
but I knew something was up. Back in 2004, I lost about half my sense of taste and smell and was having trouble with my balance, but I thought I just getting older, I had some reaction to something. I got some virus or something. Nobody knew quite what it was. And a full 12 years later, I went to a speech therapist. I was starting to have trouble with my addiction. I wasn't being as clear as I used to be as an actor, as a person
talking to another human being. And so I went to a speech therapist after the first session. She inquired with the rest of my medical team, said, Why is it not in Ed Begley's chart that he has Parkinson's? And nobody had figured out that I had Parkinson's because nothing was really presenting in a noticeable way. The things that I was doing, I somehow never did them at the doctor's office. I'd have a little bit of what they call pilling like this on
manufacturing. Now, like you're trying to hold a pill between your thumb and forefinger, and it kind of wiggles a bit. I never did that once in any of the different tests I had. They thought I had a brain lesion. They tested for that. I didn't have it, but I never exhibited those things because I was in very good health. Every day, I'd ride my bike up to Mull and drive then around Franklin Canyon Lake, around that reservoir. And I just kind of every day just kept riding, even though it
got harder and harder. And just kept riding, even though it's got harder and harder. And there's nothing better to keep Parkinson's at bay than rigorous out outdoor or indoor exercise. So I did that every day, and I used to do the whole upper body circuit at the gym, and still I do that to this day. So it took me 12 years, even though I had it. It's been 8 years since I got diagnosed.
And every time I see my neurologist, which I just saw him, just a few weeks ago, he said, If I was grading on the bell curve, you'd be the head of the class. Keep doing whatever you're doing. So I'm doing what he says in the way of medication. There's something called Ryteri, which is carbidopalevodopa. I do that, but then I also do hyperbaric chamber, something called NAD.
I do something called glutathione, and, I do lots of things and exercise every day that really help you in other ways besides the normal medication. And it turns out to be a big plus for me. May not work for everybody, but it certainly made my life, my Parkinson's, easier to adapt to. And so I'm still working as an actor a good deal. And on several different shows, I said, I wanna thank you so much. I'm glad that we had such a good time in the show, and I'm sorry it's over, but thank you
for being so understanding about my Parkinson's. They said, you're what? My Parkinson's. You guys remember you've The day you'd love me to do this and that. They said, No, we just know you're a man in your 70s. We had no We didn't know you had Parkinson's, so I've been getting away with it for a while. Then I decided to talk about it in the book, perhaps help others, and I'm glad I did because a lot of people have called me for advice on it, and I've told them what's worked for me.
Again, there's no guarantee it's gonna work for them, but try it. But if these things help you, you know, as it does, I I firmly believe in the AMA solution too, which is medications can help out a good deal. The ones that I've taken have helped me, but also try these other things that may help you a good deal because medications, the more you take them, the less they work. So you have to keep upping the dosage, so that's something to be aware of
and, you know, to adapt to. Well, certainly, going into it, the fact that you are so healthy, I mean, I you are truly the only person I know that could ride a bike up Mulholland. So I know. I don't think I could do that anymore, but I did it till just a few years ago. That's a feat for sure. Yeah. The things that life throws at us. I mean, obviously, that's that's a big deal. Parkinson's is a
big deal. And that you are, again, staying in the moment with it and being like, well, I'm doing what I can do. And I think back again as reading your book and all these different scenarios you were in cheating death, certainly. I mean Definitely. Partying with Charles Manson, that one rang a few bells. Yeah. I know. The situations I put myself in through drugs and alcohol, I mean, it's just crazy. We just went to this house of a a friend of his, and we smoked to join with a bunch of hippies
there. And I later see the LA Times under the picture of those same people, and that they turned out to be the Manson Gang. Me and my friend, James, went and just smoked to join with a friend. And when I get out of it, meeting with people that were extremely dangerous, I'm I'm just grateful that nothing ever happened as a result of my very brief encounter with them. Yeah. Lucky. Lucky. The you talk a lot about the lineage of actors in this town in in LA.
And, certainly, that has been a big topic of conversation. That is not to say that the people who are descendants of actors who have already been successful that I mean, they still have to do the work. They still have to be good at their job. But for people that are looking to get into the business, let's say, who are don't have the benefit of being born into one of the royalty of Hollywood. Do you have any advice? Any advantage that
you can use? Any any device that's, ethical, legal that you can use to try to get work? I think it's fair game. I I mentioned earlier that I I didn't wanna trade in my father's name, and I was even gonna register with Screen Actors Guild as James Begley, so I wasn't Ed Begley junior and let people guess if I was related, and I didn't do that. I'm glad I listed myself as Ed Begley junior because it's a very positive thing. Number 1, they're gonna remember my name. That's good at any job
interview. You're trying to excel at, you know, law, medicine, sports, show business, whatever. They remember your name. That's number 1. And number 2, if they know your parents or some relative close to you, they're gonna be inclined to be rooting for you. They have something to talk about in the job interview. I work with your dad in a Philco Playhouse. He was fantastic. We did a show on Broadway too called, odds against tomorrow, and so I I just wanna say good luck, Eddie. Top of page
8. Good luck. We're all pulling for you, pal. So that's the kind of thing that happened. I got, you know, a lot of help from people who like my dad, and how can that be a bad thing? It was a very big plus. Take anything that you can use to your advantage and and use it, and and I did. And you gotta deliver. I mean, it's not Rob Reiner is not just the son of Carl Reiner. He's a brilliant director, brilliant actor. He's great. Liza Minnelli
is not just Judy Garland's daughter. She's much, much more. These talented people sometimes, they get lucky through through birth, and then they do something incredible with it, and and many people have. I'd like to think I have, to a certain extent, improved on what my dad handed me. Be bold. I know people have come up to me and said, you know, can you keep me in mind for this show with that? And sometimes when I can't help, I do.
And I look to see make sure that they know what they're doing and go see them in a play or something or look at a clip that they have, look at their reel, make sure they're qualified to do the work. If I'm gonna recommend them to a casting agent, I have to know something about the work. I can't just recommend somebody.
Yeah. But, I urge people to be bold and do whatever it takes to really, you know, without being a stalker or something with a casting office, you know, to just do what's ethical and proper and and just go out there and do the footwork and just keep trying because you'll hear no a lot. Then one day, you'll hear maybe. Then one day, finally, you'll hear yes. And which is true of even your life. I mean, it sounds like as as I'm reading, it it sounded like you you didn't
get everything. You too had to work hard to get indoors and be heard and seen. I did. After 15 years of it, I was ready to move to Atlanta. I was gonna sell the house. My first wife Ingrid and I had bought because just after 15 years, I said to her, you know, I don't care if it's law, medicine, show business. You know, if you're not really getting to where you want to get in some way, after a decade and a half, it's time to mix it up.
I'll go to we'll go to Atlanta. I'll try to get a job as a local weatherman or something and try to one day get a talk show in Atlanta. He is big fish in a small town. You know, all I know is show business, so I wanna still work in show business, but it's not working here in LA. The ring, the phone rang. What do you mean? What? Wait a minute. Slow down. What's the saying elsewhere? I don't know what that even means. And it was just hospital show in the eighties, and I
had an interview for that. And I went and read for a part and didn't get it. I got another part that had, like, 2 lines, a small part. The part I wanted wound up being shot in the 2nd season. So my plans for my life and my career have never been good near as good as what the universe has thrown me, so I'm blessed. And if you want that kind of blessing, you gotta do the footwork first. Do you think about, the what happens at the end of the of this corpus and what comes
on the other side? Is that something you think about? I try not to dwell on it too much, but again, as I mentioned earlier, I just can't imagine that's it. The, you know, the heart stops pumping and the cells eventually die, and it all just stops. I suppose that's possible, but that's the most farfetched of all the possible scenarios.
More likely is if there's something after and there was something before, and it's perhaps like the Hindu the Hindu religion believes that there's, you know, like a big bang and a big crunch. There's a infin infinitesimally small one thing, then there's many things. The universe goes on. I think it's something like that. I think the big bang is where it all comes from, and I think perhaps there's even a big crunch one day out. Hope it doesn't hurt when it happens.
Well, you know, if by the time the big crunch happens, hopefully, it will be millions millions of years in the future and will have lived a 1000000 different lifetimes by then. Wouldn't that be nice? Yeah. It would be. And, you know, it'd be time for a nap by then. I think so too. I'm ready for a nap. Alright. So the book is To the Temple of Tranquility and Step on It. Well, how did that that you said in the book that that was something that someone had said to you.
It's such a great juxtaposition of how humans live their life. I I just love it. The great actor Dick Stahl is the one who said it. I'm told he didn't just say it on stage as he did many times as an improv actor or in a movie or a TV show, which he was also brilliant. Dick Stall was his name, and he, like me, was very smitten with the Maharishi when the Beatles went
to him back in the sixties. And so we all thought that was fantastic, and he wanted to get somebody who is that practice those kinds of, spiritual ways. And so he had planned a very, like I would, a very type a personality kinda trip. He was gonna go from LAX to Hawaii, and from there, get a plane to the Philippines. And from there, he got a berth on a merchant marine vessel to get to this island, then to another
place on a smaller boat. Everything was planned out perfectly with nothing could go wrong, but that first plane was late leaving LAX. And so it just barely missed a flight to the Philippines. And from there, he had to wait a week because it was monsoon season to get another shift to get to the smaller island. Finally, when he ran up the dock and hopped in a little little, like, a rickshaw to get to the place, he said to the driver, he said, the temple of tranquility and step on it.
So the driver started to laugh and so did he. He thought it was absurd, and I did too. So when it came when it came time to write a book, I thought that was a perfect title. It's such a perfect description of what it's like to be a human being. I just love it so much. Ed, tell people how they might find you, learn more about what you do, and and the things going on in your life, and and the book, and everything. Go to edbegley.com.
That's where you can find out more information about what's going on. I'm on, Twitter. Well, I'm not on Twitter. I'm still on x. I haven't figured out how to exit yet. And I'm on Instagram, and it's ed_begley_jrfordjunioron Instagram. That's where to find me. And, you can buy the book at your local bookstore, or you could certainly buy it at Barnes and Noble. Those kind of stores, you can buy it, at Amazon and elsewhere. Just search Ed Begley book. It'll come
right up. And I'll put links on heyhumanpodcast.com with all of your stuff so that it's easy for people to find it. Thank you so much, Susan. I really appreciate it. It's been lovely speaking with you. This has been great. Thank you. You too. You're great to talk to. Thank you. Thank you, Susan. Thank you, and thank you for listening, everybody. Bye. Lots of love. Great. Review and subscribe to Hey Human podcast on iTunes or wherever you get your podcast. Thank you,