Danica McKellar

you can only imagine all the nerves, anticipation. You know, you're about to have your first kiss, You've got a crush on the guy, you know, and then it finally happens. It's the most amazing moment ever, and it's like, wait, that wasn't a private That wasn't real, Okay, right. Hi. My name is Danika McKellar. I act in Christmas movies and I write math books for kids. Hello, my favorite listener and also my not so favorite listeners. Welcome to

another episode of Off the Beat. I'm your host, as always, Brian Baumgartner. Now, as you just heard, my guest today is Danica mckeller, who, well you might know from her time playing Winnie Cooper on The Wonder Years. Everyone who I have told that I have talked to Danica has

been so excited. Apparently there are a lot of Wonder Years fans out there, or maybe you know her from the many rom coms that she started the Winter Palace Christmas at Dollywood with of course Dolly Pardon, but there's also a subset of you who might know her for a totally different reason. That's right, Danika is gonna out math even me today. Yes, she does do the numbers. She literally has a mathematical theorem named after her. I mean,

is that normal? It is certainly not normal on this podcast. And to think her big splash in the world of academics happened after she'd already kicked off her acting career. Danica has truly led an exceptional life, which has included things like writing an advice column for Teenbeat magazine and appearing in one of Avril Levine's music videos. I'm so excited for her to tell you all about it, and so much more so. Let's bring her on my new

best friend, Danica McKellar. Everyone, Bubble and Squeak. I love it, Bubble and Squeak, Bubble and Squeaker cooking at every month left over from the nut before. What's up to Entica? Hey, Hey, Brian, I'm good. How are you good? Where are you? I am at home, but I just got back from Canada. I just shot a Christmas movie. I was so much fun.

It actually comes out in November. Nice. Yeah, I got me like Christmas stuff in the Christmas The movie is called Christmas at the Drive In, by the Way, and it will be on Great American Family is a new channel very similar to Homemark. I know all about it. We're going to talk about that and your your history with Christmas. Uh, movies of of varying types. I want to I want to start back with you though you were You were born in Lahoya? Is that right? Very

close to where I live now? Yeah? I mean what was it like being born in Paradise? Oh? I know you just you just take it for granted and don't realize. Wait, Laoia is this incredible vacation spot. And to grow up there and my dad still lives there. I go there all the time. In fact, my family built the Laoia beis and Tennis Club a couple of generations ago. No, well, I grew up at the beach club. I mean I have a lifetime membership just because I'm family. I'm actually

a part owner um technically speaking. So yeah, that's buying my roots. I need a discount. I need a friends and family discount. I love that place. For those of you who don't know, this is a it is. It's private on the beach. It's one of like two in California. It is absolutely And you think, what difference does that make? What? What the difference it makes is? You can do anything you want. That's basically it. If you want to make a bonfire, you can have a bonfire. If you want

to put a grill out, you can do that. It's an in doable place. I don't live quite close enough that it makes sense for me, but it is a club. By the way, if you if you there's it's a hotel as well, so you can stay at the hotel. You can stay there, that's right, you can stay there all the same benefits as a member. That is what I have done. Yes, so that is very cool. I'd always tell people it's only bad if you don't like perfect. Yes, but you fairly early on age eight, you moved up

to Los Angeles. Why did you leave Paradise? So my my parents divorced and my mom was producing music videos of all things. She was a answer before and work brought her to l A. And then my sister and I decided we kind of wanted to try acting, and she put us in acting classes at LEA Strassburg like that same year, I think, and so very quickly it like we started working, and then I started doing commercials

and things. We both did, me and my sister. About a year and a half later, I booked The Wondering Years, and then I was working as well. Okay, so the Lee Strasburg Institute, for those of you who don't know, there's like three who are considered to be the greatest theater teachers Udahgen Lee Strasburg. I mean, this is this is serious business. And so like at age eight and nine, you're already taking classes there. Yeah, your classes kids, you

know well, of course, but we loved it. We loved it so but my mom had she said my my mom's rule was this, She said no projects would take us away from home and no series. So I wasn't allowed to audition for any series. The part of Winnie Cooper was only supposed to be a guest role on the pilot episode only, so that's the only reason I was even allowed to audition for it. And when I got the job and we were midway through shooting, the producers saying, hey, toll my mom, we really think that

Danna Kinfred had this really cool chemistry. So I would like to extended cotton in. The network agrees we want to if I never had to go to network for that show. Uh, they like to to make for a series regular. My mom was really torn about him. No, please, please, please you because I loved working and I was I loved the group, and because the other moms Joanne Savage, James Saviano, Marsha Hervey, they were very much about their

kids and protecting their kids. They weren't that typical stage mom do you think of like mom's shoving their kids in front of the camera and you know, kissing after the producers. These moms were all like, you know, our

kids or kids first. And because of that, my mom said, you know, this might be an okay environment, but I'm getting a really expensive lawyer, and if there's any issue of bread, have a loophole and you tell me, you just say the word and you can just leave the show at anytime, Like okay, I'm not going to do that. But your sister, Crystal you mentioned, is active with you as well, and presumably you both enjoyed it. Now I read that both you and your sister were up for

the role of Wenny Cooper. Now was this? Did this cause issues when you got cast with the family at home and it was just a one time role. It wasn't like a big deal role that I got, you know, it was a one off. But they loved her so much they said they were going to write a role for her, and they did. She played Becky Slater. She did I think nine or ten episodes. That's awesome. So because you weren't auditioning for serious roles, this ends up becoming a really big deal for you. Do you remember

anything about the audition? Yes, I remember. I remember we auditioned on a Thursday callback for that Friday, and I remember there's like a group of girls all reading for the part of Winning Cooper, including me and my sister, and the room got small and small, and I kept having us come in and read again, and I said, we're taking a dinner break. You come back and you're gonna read with Fred Savage, the boy who's playing the lead.

After dinner, I was like okay. So we all went to dinner and there's a restaurant down belows the studio city, and H remember seeing Fred and wondering if that was the kid, and I was like, oh, he's cute. I wonder if she's the guy who I'll be reading with, and it was. I'm not sure I ever said in this in an interview, but it came down to the three of us, Me and my sister and this actress. I don't know her name, but she ended up with

like a couple of lines in the pilot episode. She's the girl for people who are super fans of the Wonder Years. Kevin is talking about love, you know, Junior High, and there's this couple who's holding hands across his desk saying I love you, I love you too, And she was one of she was one of the three of us who were the final contenders or Winnny Cooper. So of the three of us who were sitting there reading with Fred after dinner, we all ended up with Roles

on the show. With Roles on the show, that's awesome that I love That's a BTS everybody. That's a behind the scenes nugget. Um. I did talk for a while to to Daniel Fishel about what I understand is the same with you that you're your first kiss was on camera with Fred in the pilot. How did that bring some extra nerves? Oh for you, especially because at the time I had a huge crush on him and I was just so excited and so nervous. And I start remember after the first take when they said cut the

whole Who started a plotting? And I don't know who started that, but it was mortifying. I mean, you can only imagine all the nerves, anticipation. You know, you're about to have your first kiss, You've got a crush on the guy, you know, and then it finally happens. It's the most amazing moment ever. And it's like, wait, that wasn't a private that wasn't real, Okay, right? Did you did you think for the rest of your life every time you kissed someone that would it would break out

an applause all around you. I remember when I had my first real kiss at least two years, no year and a half later, with Jeremy Miller, by the way, who was the little boy on Growing Pains. That was my first kiss. He was my first little boyfriend. I was fourteen and he was thirteen, and and uh, it was actually at my dad's house in Lahoya, were they were down there for some reason, and so we all hung out and then we're my dad's house and we had a moment alone and and I remember thinking, wait,

is this gonna be my first kiss? And it was like, oh, this is so different because I don't know, oh you know, but not scripted, it may or may not happen. Yes, So no, I didn't think You're gonna be cameras. But I was like stunned at how addit felt to not actually know how I was going to go now how it was going to go down. Yes, um, you are on the Wonder Years, basically your entire teenage years, right twelve to eighteen. What was it like for you growing up?

And this is a huge show at the time, and everybody is talking about it, and everybody is talking about you and and about Fred at the time. What was it like for you growing up in the spotlight with all of that attention during what for most is awkward teenage years. I was not in touch with it. And that's the truth. I was not in touch with it

at all. At some point some point. I think I was probably sixteen, and someone on set referred to me as America's sweetheart, and I was like, what we're talking like, I just I was very busy with school and work and family life and my mom on both my parents always emphasize the importance of basically everything over show biz. So health, family, school, and then sure showbiz. But that's that was the prioriest game. In fact, when The Wonder Years got nominated for the first time for an Emmy,

in fact, we won that year. I wasn't there because there was a river trip like a river rafting trip scheduled with my dad and my sister that and he had a really busy work schedule and we couldn't move it, and so we went on the trip, I mean, and it was kind of like, well, we have this invitation we could go to the Emmy's where we could go in this river rafting trip, And my parents decided together, know, the trip is more important. And I remember being in

this tiny, little more Tell room in Oregon. We're gonna get in the Rogue River the next day, and it was like a TV from the nineteen seventies. I don't know where. It was, tiny, little screen and we watched The Wonder Years win the enmy we jumped up and down the bed and like the we won, and we went to sleep, got up at like five in the morning and hit the river and had the trip of

our lives. I mean, I remember click picking black berries on the side of the river with my dad and my sister, and it's some of the most precious memories. So that kind of thing, you know, that's that was my life. My life was all the all the regular stuff. And then I went to work and I loved it, but it wasn't the focus. I didn't go to Hollywood parties. I mean there would be like ABC affiliate parties here and there that would go to with my mom, you

know what I mean. But I was never I was never in that scene where I would have been offered drugs or gotten going wrong group, but just that just wasn't my reality. I was going to a challenging school and it took up a lot of time and that was my that's my focus. Were you doing set school as well? Yes, So any day that I missed, I actually I just take the homework and do it on set. And we had a fantastic teacher David Combs. He was great, and he was great at everything except for math. Like

he was fine. But when I got into pre calculus and stuff, they brought in somebody else, so I had my own personal calculus tutor. I mean, in some ways you could say that being on the Wonder Years helped me in my math education. And ultimately, yeah, I became a I don't want to jump ahead, but but like I became a math major e c l A. They love math so much, and I had all that wonderful private tutor in for caculus um. I love that you

went river rafting instead of going to the Emmy's. I love that that your parents were trying to keep that normalcy and put their importance on on family and those and those experiences. I do want to ask you, though, what are some of your favorite memories from your teenage years that that either were outside of the show or or happened because of the show. Oh my gosh, it's a huge question. I mean I went to prom you know,

and uh, I would go to the Homecoming games. The producers of the Wonderings were really really good about like if we had some event coming up, they would try to work around it. They weren't always able to, but they always tried, so that was really special. Kent to fulsky Um and Bob Brush. They were just wonderful and really really cared about us being kids, So that made a huge, huge difference, and I remember being really grateful to them on several occasions, so that that's a happy memory.

It seems to be, though, as big as the show God, as much as your parents wanted to shelter you and give you, as you say, a normal life, the experience at what became Harvard Westlake, you must have been getting some attention. There was that positive or was that a negative? You know, it's in l A. I mean, it's not that big a deal. Tori Spelling was a couple of years ahead of me. It's not a big deal. Okay. In l A. It was every now and then somebody would have a problem with me, but it was really

not a big deal. And the guys definitely stayed away. I don't know it's just intimidating or what. But I have a boyfriend eventually, but not from school. So yeah, I felt pretty normal, okay. And I'll say because we were not one of those shows that taped in front of life, suit of your audience. There, I only worked on the days that I was in scenes. And if you really watched the show, Winnie Cooper wasn't in that many episodes until the very ill season. The sixth season,

I was in almost every one. But I would like have a couple of weeks where I was just in school, and then I have a week where I was only worked two or three days. I would say I was in my regular school at least half the time. Now, it was an interesting skill set to go back and forth and back and forth. It's an interesting It would have been a little easier if I just known kind

of what the deal was. But I'd be in school and they say, Okay, we've got a history test next Friday, and I wouldn't know if I was going to be there for it or not. And I remember when I got to U c l A, how much of a relief it was, like, Oh, wait, I can like set mind the schedule. I can be dependable. I know what

next week looks like. Right when you start hearing things on set about being America's sweetheart or whatever, when you started to realize how important that relationship was too people outside of it, do you think that that increased the pressure of you portraying it or how did that affect specifically your performance do you think I don't think I was aware enough of it to have affect my performance, but I did affect the way I related to the world,

especially when the show was done. I mean, even through today, having a certain sense of responsibility to people because of the character that I play. I mean, I'm very similar to any Cooper, to be quite honest. But it also just so I did have a sense of responsibility the whole time. We just didn't affect play the role, but affected me in the world. Remember where I was probably fortunate or fifteen, and I was offered a contract to represent some sort of granola bark and it was a

lot of mine. And I looked at the ingredients. I'm like, with a sugar in hand, I don't like, you don't need sugar. And my mom was like really proud, and I said, no, I can't. I can't tell people to eat this because they might listen to me and this isn't what I would eat, so that's not healthy. So we said no, and I remember my mom was like so proud because of just no understanding that I had a responsibility to the public and I wanted to be a good leader and take this gift of being the

block I and do something positive with it. I mean, I look and I've certainly continued that I love mathematics. But what I do with that now is I don't go in a corner and do mathematics by myself. I have all these books to help kids. You know, I know that that the parents normally from the Wonder Years. Some of the kids normal me from my Christmas movies, but the parents definitely know me from the Wonder Years.

And so to be able to take my position as this public figure and people somebody who people look up to, a character that people look up to you and say, oh, well I can do something positive with that and help these parents with you know, their kids math issues and help do something to that. Well, you've transitioned beautifully. I have not spoken, for sure in all of my guests

to a math genius until today. Um, you go to U c l A. Well, first off, did you make a conscious decision that you were going to take a hiatus from acting like you were going to go to school and focus on school? So I first went to U c l A with the idea of being a film major and learning the other side. And then for the first year I still did jobs. I did a movie with the Week for NBC, and I did like an episode Bad one five, and I was doing things

here and there. But it's funny because I realized, wait a minute, because it was it's so stressful going back and forth, not again, not knowing if you're gonna be there for something, leaving town, coming back, trying to make up assignments, find out what the work was, get ahead of the curb. All that stuff really really tough. And I was like, wait, so the wonder years and in high school, like the law told you you have to

go to high school. Well now I'm an adult. I don't even have to be school if I don't want to be. And I don't have to take any of these jobs because they're all one off jobs, and that it's less serious, Like what am I doing to myself? So about a year into it, and I kept getting incomplete. The professions, weren't letting me make up the exams. I'm like, what,

why would you just let me take it again? And I'm like, well, if we just don't do that, like, Okay, different fault, this is a different this is a different landscape here. So I decided to take a break at that point and just focus on school work. And at that point, by that point, I had taken a math class. It was multi variable calculus, and it was as tough class I was. I was so nervous about because I hadn't taken math since high school. Its's been almost a

year since I've taken any math. Well, I still had all my high school math notes, because that's just the kind of first I am. And I studied them, learned all the trigonometric identities for calculus, for doing integrals and all that stuff, and so I get to multiple calculists and I was like really prepared, and I had no idea that I was so like overly prepared for this class. It was a class of like a hundred and sixty three people. And I remember the first mid term exam.

I studied so hard for that. I memorized everything, I knew everything, and yet the test was ridiculously difficult. I got like a forty four or something out of a hundred and um. As it turns out, it was a weader test. The professor raft the scores on the chalkboard. Forty four was by itself, and there were a couple of fifteens, and then it was like nine below and this is the class of a hundred and six to

three people. I'm looking at my test. I'm looking up and like, that's that's met working get the number wrong. But it was it was like it was all by itself and everything was blow. It might have been twenty. It was twenty two out of forties. Twenty two out of forty. So I'm getting mixed up anyway. Point is I'm a numbers person because matters and don't getting the numbers right. So I was like, I was like, oh my gosh, this is amazing. And the professor pulled me

aside afterwards and said, like, you've got a gift. I mean you you're really good at math, and like, I don't. I studied really hard. I don't know, but as it turns out, that's part of it, studying really hard and wanting to study hard and wanting to become a master. It's something that's part of It's not like you're just a math genius and so it's just easy. That's not what makes you good masking. Yeah, but hold on it. Since I stopped talking about the Wonder years and started

talking about math, your energy has changed. So there is something inside you that you love. It's of her from being a genius. I love it. I want to learn it. I want to study. It's a puzzle. It's it's beautiful if these proofs are beautiful. And he was just reading a book she's talking about. She's trying to like bridge mathematics and literature, and she says, if you happen to be a mathematician, then you already have poetry in your soul.

And I was like, yes, she gets it, she gets it, because math is beautiful when you are doing this proofs and you understand, it's like crystallized beauty. I don't even know how to but you don't get to that until you've gotten through calculus and gone through all that stuff. So that's all fun and good, and I would hope that some people might get that who may not have having been exposed to me talking about it. Yes, no,

I'm with you, but just hold on first. She's a three time New York Times bestseller, by the way, so she knows what she's talking about. But four time, four times our research was wrong. I'm gonna yell at somebody later. You have a mathematical theorem with your name on it. The chase is that right, Chase McKellar in theorem? She has a theorem? All right, you gotta talk slower, and you've got to explain elevator talk. What what is that?

What is the theorem relate to? It relates to a two dimensional mathematical model of magnetic material that has to do with temperature, and based on a temperature, whether or not the magnetic material will hold its magnetic charge as you pull the magnets farther and farther away. That's kind of based on temperatures in temperature. So the colder it is, it's mathematical physics. Really, the colder it is, the longer

they'll stay magnetized. The low stone. But it's a two dimensional model of it, and it's kind of amazing and an only con point in four directions the electroc theat the polls, which is not anything like the real world. But what's really cool about math is that it's the language of the science is right, and it's amazing. Even with a two dimensional model of the magnetic material, you can still get a lot from it. But if you look at the paper, it's not like a bunch of

pictures of magnets. It's all this crazy looking math, Like, what is all this? I did that during college. It's a long time ago. And I look at the paper now and I'm like, kind of sort of, yeah, I was there. Did I listen? I here's the crazy thing. I kind of understood what you said. Yes, I kind of. I kind of understood. What you say. Is way easier than mass. If you can look at in the real world,

there's something you can grab onto tangible. But if you if you don't, if you want to be kind of not feeling is on top of this um, we'll just say the title that's percolation. It gives its multiplicity for fair magnetic Ashman teller models and two dimensions. It's fara magnets, not regular magnets. Anyway, all right, what you lost me? But I can tell you why to be lost. I think you were happy when you were lost. No, you're exactly right. Here's a fun fact for everybody here. Now,

many people haven't an Urdos number. Burtis Iritish. It's actually pronounced British Kurdish. Okay, so Danica has an Urdish number. Okay, do you know who Paul Urtish is. Uh, He's an Huggarian mathematician. Of course, he's a very prolific mathematician, much like. Okay, so let's think we should start with the Kevin Bacon number, because Kevin Bacon number, that's what people know about, right, Urgish number. Yeah, people have Kevin Bacon number. That's that's

how many degrees away from Kevin Bacon. You are, right with Kevin Bacon. So I've got to baking a number of two. Yeah, yes, and my Iurgish number. He wrote many many mathematical papers. My my Iritish numbers four. So together my Bacon Iurgish number, and there are only a few people who have the can work with Kevin Bacon at some point, which I really must do, then I can bring it down to five. I think I'm tried with Natali Aportman right now. I'm not totally sure she

has an Earnish number. Yeah, oh yeah, Natalie Portman's your number. What's what's her number? There's also six, but but I'm not sure. I haven't looked in years. It was years ago that I saw that. I was like, hmmm, because she has written she she went to Harvard and she did something really smart. It wasn't math, it was something else, but it was something in the sciences. So this math person did something with this science, and that science person

did something over there. And so it's still linked your back to Paula Artisi. So you can crush her in math. I mean maybe, but I he's super smart. She might do on the side for all I know. It's all about a competition for me. Um. So yes, you have begun, not just begun. You've been doing it for for quite a while now, writing children's books related to math. Four time New York Time best selling author. Why what was

missing in this category? Well, so in the year two thousand, I was I was invited to speak in front of Congress about the importance of women in mathematics. I just graduated from college and it was known that oh, Winnie the math whiz okay and to auch a kind of funny story. So this commission wanted to get more money for scholarships for women in college to entice more women to study the STEM careers. So they invited me to testify basically about the importance of When my mathematics so

they could get more money for this thing. But I wasn't really thinking of it in that way. I was like, yeah, I'm gonna help solve this problem in this country. So I read the hundred page report, okay, hundred pages, and it was detailed. And in this document and this hundred page document, it was clear that middle school was the time when girls started to shy away from Matt. That's when their confidence really started dropping, and then their grades

would drop after that. And I was like, wow, this is really, this is this is crazy, this is kids need support in middle school. Like it's too late by college. So I get up there and in my four minutes I was given to give a speech, I say all this and I say, look, it's too late by college. So unwittingly, like like ruining their their whole plan for it, invited me out there, um and uh. And they didn't get the money, by the way, my fault. So I said, look,

it's too late by then. Middle schools the time. And here's the other thing my dad loves to tell people because he was there. He came with me in the executive summary, which is what the Congress people usually read, because how they're not gonna read a hundred page report on every single issue they're looking at. Right, it wasn't in there. The thing about middle school was not in

the executive summary. So this commission had paid for all this research and put this paper together, but then they put the argument that they wanted to try to get their money because that's what I'm sure that's how politics works. Fine, whatever, So I tell them, I say, I said, you know what, the information that I had to tell you, the most important stuff, wasn't in the executive summary. And my dad says that the congressman put glasses dentists will why don't

you enlighten us, young lady? I said. I was like, no problem. So I'm like, go on and time. I said, like, look, middle school as the time the grade started to job in this country is fourth grade. When you start to see if it really by eighth grade. This is the middle problem. I said, math. I said, if you have your money to help a math education, give it to middle school teachers. We need better middle school teachers. A

lot of them are underpaid. You know, they're like gym teachers who then are pulled in because they're they're low on math teachers. We need to attract more math teachers to middle school. This is when we really need that support. Also, mathews better pr and I said, and I will be

working on that. I pledged to you that I will do everything that I can to improve the image that people have of math in this country because when you started growing up, and I even talked about like on the Wonder Years, it's that time and life when you're worried about who you are and trying to figure out who you are. Well, if you're like, I don't know who I am, but you're seeing all these stereotypes about mathematicians. But but I'm not. I'm not that, I'm not a

math nerd. So I'm gonna just not look at that plus be here that math it's too hard, it's too boring, it's just for boys. It's whatever. It's it's other, it doesn't apply to our lives, it's not relevant. I'm like, this is all untrue. But let me, you know, let me like work on that. So I told him I will pledge to do what I can. So at that point I was like, Okay, I'm not sure I'm gonna do.

But I started a website and then it was in July of two thousand five when I did a lingerie spread for Stuff magazine because I was thirty and I was like, hey, I'm gonna show that you can still look hot at thirty, which is so funny now in my forties. Um. So it was a class every tasteful. But that same month, in July two thousand and five, the New York Times decided to do a story about my math paper that I had written years before. So

it was this great article that came out. And so those two things came out the same month, and it just kind of showed this duality, you know, like breaking stereotypes about who's good at math. So I had a couple of different literary agents reach out to me until my manager saying, hey, we would we think that Dannicus should write a book of some story. And at that point, I've been doing so much studying about middle schools, like I know exactly the book. I want it right, And

it was this one math doesn't Suck? I think, how does provive middle school math without losing your mind or breaking a nail? So this is the book that came out in two thousand and seven, and uh runaway bestseller like crazy, like couldn't keep it off. Shelf kept having to reprint it because this book it teaches fractions and decimals and percents and you know, proportions, solving for X, all that stuff, but it does it like a girlfriend

talking to my girlfriend. And it was it's friendly, it's successful. I have real world examples. Every single chapter shows you how you might use that in real life. So I had to, you know, tackle k It doesn't have to just be wos. You can be a glamorous girl if you want and still be good at math. Picture. Math is the thing that's making your brain sharp and preparing you to be in charge of your finances, preferring your brain to be good at problem solving, and then you

can tackle anything any goal you have. But aspire if you want to be glamorous, aspired to be the woman in for in shields, holding your briefcase, walking down you know, Wall Street, and go into a super important job like make that the type of glamorous that you aspire to.

And so that whole message was it just hit a nerve, It just struck a chord, and everyone seemed to get on board, and I was like person of the week on ABC World News and like this crazy time, and I thought that was just gonna be the one book that I would write. Well, eleven books later, here we are writing book number twelve right now. And um so next one was kiss My Math, showing creology with his boss. And then I have hot X the Algebra book, and

I've got girls Get Curves. John Ashul takes shape. So it goes all the way up through high school geometry. And then I had so many people saying, please write little kid books. We want maths support even younger. And it's like, you know, it's true, even though you might middle school at the time when you really see it falling apart, the problem starts sooner and you can't. There's no time. It's too soon to start showing kids that math is part of your life, part of your life.

It's friendly. So this book Ten Magic Butterflies, it teaches different ways of making ten from two numbers. It's a story of these ten flowers who, one by one they ask a fairy if they can become a butterfly, and they do and then but in the meantime, it's teaching you how to make ten from two numbers one and nine, two, and eight, three and seven. It takes you through the whole thing. So and then very good Kevin. This is the book that I can't believe it just called you, Kevin.

Do you have people to call me Winnie? Like they call me Winnie and I'm like, I can't, but I forgive them. You must be in the same space. It's just did that to you, and oh stop. The crazy thing is this just happened to me today, right? You know, you go into a Starbucks and they make you and especially if they're playing it very cool. You know, I'm not thinking about it, and I give my name, which is I know I don't And then I'm standing there and you hear names start to be called up Kevin.

I don't turn around because I'm like, oh no, I mean clearly. And then I turned around and they're looking at me, and it's like, all right, it's written on the car exactly. Wanted to call you, Kevin. Exactly. They just love your character and that's why people love the character so much. Anyway, what I'm saying was, this is the most recent like teaching book. It's the Times Machine, and it might be the one that I'm maybe the most proud of it came out in which is just

in time, so many kids were falling behind. Already teaches multiplication and division for third and fourth graders to help memorize multiplication facts. And so I have this whole section where I do like a story and a poem and things for all the difficult ones, for example, six times seven? Do you know that one? I know them all. I'm actually not bad for two. Go ahead, go ahead, quiz man. Now here's the story of Mr Masse. Mr mass loves

cheese because what mouse doesn't love cheese? Well, magine Mr Mouse eats a six sided block of cheese every day three weeks at seven right, six times seven. Well, by the end of the week, Mr Mouse is pretty full and farty too. I got what you did. I see what you did there. Kids will then seven is forty two. This is what this book does. The Times Machine, well, I gotta tell you something with all sincerity and all

joking aside. I have a second grader and she is in love with math and is already at the start of second grade, is already doing third grade math. The Times Machine sounds like for her, I'm going to get her the Times Machine. We'll do it together. She was just doing her eights with me the other day. We do math together. She teaches me daily. So I want to say to you, one, I appreciate what you're doing. And I appreciate this, particularly as a father of girls,

that you are doing this for the girls. And I hope she sticks with it, and you know what, if she doesn't and she finds something else, that's amazing too. But I want you to know I appreciate that. And uh, yeah, the Times Machine and by the way, I'm sure the Little Kid books all the way up through the Times Machine, those are very co it's really starting with math doesn't stuck. By the way, all the books can be found at McKellar math dot com math dot com. You still have

a math going on, but a career, a math author career. Yeah, but anytime you have a theorem, you're an act of math mathy. What brought you back to your acting career? I mean, you have so many credits I can't even begin to name them. You've been doing this for so long, but also a voiceover career as well, doing things like Young Justice, DC, Superhero Girls, Generation rex Um Acting on camera or voiceover? What do you on camera? I love I love them both, but on camera, I just there's

so much more you can do. There's so much more innuendo, and there's a lot of subtlety. But look, voice, that was super fun and you're done right away. It's fast, and you could could fully be a character that maybe

you wouldn't normally get to play otherwise. And Young Justice my character and Miss Marshall has gone so many places, dark places, places that you know that I haven't gotten to do on camera because I don't come off that way like I'm, you know, wholesome girl, light story and I always happen and I was over and it was and I love it. I'm I'm very grateful. But you asked me what brought me back? Um, it was missing connecting with people. Matt is so much fun, but you're

why yourself most of the time. And I missed Sharon. I would even just try to have lunch with my mom and talk to her about what I was doing, and I would have to keep defining all the words I was using, and it just by the time we finished lunch, I had just finally finished all the definitions. It couldn't even really by that point, she'd forgotten the first one, because it's just not it's a totally different language when you get up into the high crazy you know,

specific math stuff. So writing the books also turned out to an amazing way of connecting with people got math. But long before that, I had already gone back to acting, and um, I've done a few independent films. And then The West Wing came up and I got to read for Aaron Sorkin and some of that audition and he goes, I am crazy about you, and I was like, I'm crazy about you. Amazing moment. I did like nine episodes

for The West Wing and it was fantastic. And then and then I got really into the math book writing for a while. And then I had a baby, and then I year now after that, I got divorced and kind of restarted my life and moved with my mom. And then um, yeah, I think I started doing I started doing Hallmark movies in and I did like seventeen movies there in the space of like six years or something, and started your love of the Christmas movies. Absolutely, Christmas

at Dollywood with Dolly. Did you film at Dollywood for a few days of it? Yeah, we shot mostly in Vancouver and then a few days at Dollywood, which and it was during Christmas to so they don't turn on the Christmas Lives until the beginning of November, and these movies come out like that movie came out the beginning of December, so we shot the entire movie before and then had like a couple of days at Dollywood. They had to just cut stick in the movie to be

able to have that air on time. Instaying, I was like, how is this going to happen? What was it like working with Dolly? She is such a professional, she's so she's just she's larger than life in the best way. She walked into the room, this big theater which is where we shot the first stuff with her, and she was like Mary, Christmas everybody and you just everyone was happy. I mean everyone was like waiting. It's like she's getting here, so okay, well yeah to Dallas, come and say okay.

It's all this is anticipation. She walked in put everyone at ease. And she also knows how to make things sound good no matter what she's saying, so even if it's like threatening, this is one moment where so it was it was on my clothes up and she was walking past the camera to be to be over her shoulder onto me, and there was a chord where she had to walk and the DP said, um, I don't want you to trip on that. She goes no, you know, and honey, right right, so good. So she's so good

and anyway, so she I I absolutely adore her. That was twenty nine and then it was last year that I made the move from Hallmark Channel to Great American Family and the Bill Abbott so he he left Hallmark and went to Great American Family and he kind of just starting another Basically, it's another Hallmark. I mean, he's creating what he created before. He revived the whole Christmas movie genre, and then he really gave me this whole

section of my career that I love so much. And it's been so much fun and playing these roles in these movies where everything is going to work out. It's wonderful. I just I love giving people happiness and giving them It's nut's not just an escape to people talk about this as being an escape, but it's more than that. It's a reminder of the good side of human nature.

And the Christmas movie is, in particular one of the things that Bill Abbott is always really specific about is you always want to talk about traditions within the Christmas movie. And it's a reminder of people to, oh, you know what, it's good to have little Christmas traditions, however small they might be, especially for kids, because it tells them what season they're in, it tells it's a grounding effect, and it connects people. It connects the family together to have traditions,

whatever they are. So these movies give ideas for traditions as well. And just kind of hearing that word makes you go, oh, right, it's Christmas time. We should do a tradition. I love that. November. Uh, your latest Christmas movie, Christmas at the drive In? By the way, how many of your viewers do you think have been to a drive in? I don't know, you know what, honestly that I mean, I have not been doing well. Okay I have because of the movie, but I'm not sure if

that counts. And and to be honest, they've built the drive in. It was a working it's a working drive in, like they built it projector and they built the whole big screen in the whole thing. I don't know, I don't know, but they it should be because they well, they built it on the on the back lot up in Canada that they have So I don't know, but I think I've been to a drive in once, like with my dad a long time ago. Yeah, I think so,

when I was a kid. Yeah, but this is the nineteen fifties style drive in the decor and the story is that was built in the nineteen fifties. So my co star, played by Neil Blasto, his father owned the drive in, and his father passed away last year and now it's his, but he doesn't live there anymore. Hasn't been profitable for years, so he's gonna just sell it, and he's selling it to a place it's gonna knock

it down and building distribution center. And you know, my character like loves the drive in and wants to save it. I'm a lawyer of property lawyer, so I get into the weeds. And the thing is he and I used to be high school sweethearts, so we have to um find it out. And then and then the Historic Commission they say, look, we'll give you three weeks to prove the drive in is more important to the town than

the distribution center. And they say to Holden when I coast if she has to prove that it that it's more important than you have proved isn't, and then we'll judge it from there. So that's that's the setup for the movie. And it's really fun and sweet. And this film, of well, starts of just nostalgia because breaks nineteen fifties style drive in and also because there's all this memory of the relationship they had as high school sweethearts and

how things have changed. And it's great. And I know my fans, the fans of the Wonder Years are definitely fans of nostalgia. So great American Family Channel November the Friday, the day after Thanksgiving, there you go, and I will be live tweeting with that broadcast. Well you know, it is the most wonderful time of the year. Yes, I prefer it starting on exactly the day that this movie is coming out, So that's what I prefer. We're a little early right now, but by the time we get there,

I'm ready. I'm all in. All right, I gotta ask you about one more thing. Is this math or is this entertainment or is this both? I understand you are a judge on My Good Buddy Show. Eric stone Street Domino Masters. How did that come about? What did you learn that was so much fun? Yeah? So I heard they wanted to have a meeting with me and they sent me a video. So, first of all, Domino Stors For those who don't know, it's a show that was on Fox this past summer, still on Hulu if people

want to check it out. It's a competition reality show kind of like Lego Masters, but instead of Legos, it's Dominoes. And the thing that Domino's you build these huge structures with dominoes that also chain reaction machines, so it'll be you know, a ball rolling down inclined plane and nots in new domino and then the domino things swirls around and they hit something else when the baseball back comes around and falls down or whatever. It's it's a lot

of physics, a lot of math and physics. Well you don't you don't have to use numbers so much, but it's it's physics to well. Yeah, and that was actually my challenge when they when they when I had my like audition, they sent me a video of a domino structure and chain reaction machine knocking down and they wanted me to like you know, judge it and a headshine, thinking like what kind of Mathew things can I say? Like the mathemetition. I appreciate that they were what do

you thousand dominos used? Because they didn't tell me how many dominoes they were became a joke with me and my son. He was like, yes, well, as a mathemetician, so we was aren't every sentence with asthmam petition? I think this book weighs a certain amount of palms. Yeah, whatever. So but I did talk about the physics of it a bit, but well, I'm not really a physics expert. I'm no math more than physics. But I studied about the angle of the dominance hid and how much faster

it goes and it closer together. I read, watched all those videos and and become a camera expert, and I did. I actually even talked about math and some like how you can prove with physics of the calculus that the physics of a catapult fourty five degrees is the is the best angle for the maximum distance. So I put all that stuff in. But as you may know, in reality shows, they use like a fifth or like a tenth of what you actually say so some of made

in a lot of it didn't. But yes, there was a lot of a lot of be figuring out what's the physics angle, what's the Mathew angle on this? But I also made my audition about this. I said, this was a great knockdown. You know what it was missing? It's a story. I want a beginning, in middle and the end. Just like good choreography and a dance. You want to have a sense of where the stories have a climax and then have a resolution, as opposed to just a lot of really cool things being knocked down.

And that became part of the show. One of the criteria was okay, what's the story, So that became I became sort of the dual like physics slash storyteller expert, and like Vernon Davis, he was all about the art and just the aesthetic of it. That was his main focus. Then Steve Price, the other judge, of course, was he knows a lot of a dominant because he is a dominant artist. Not well, this is this is you, this

is an artist, this is a mathematician. It's fascinating because I don't know someone created your left and right brains to be of equal strength, which is very strong. So thank you so much for coming to talk to me. I don't know that I fully grasped the math, but I think I pretty much did. I think we're pretty you got you got you know, six times seven equal party too that you were facts and I got, I got all that. I got all that when incid if

you're a daughter, it sounds awesome. And I want to say about your darter, you said something I didn'te a chance to address, and that is you said, even if she finds something else that she likes instead, that's fine too. And yes, here's the thing about math. It trains your brain to be a problem solving brain, and it helps you to distinguish between what do I know and what do I think? What am I assuming? It is the most, to me, the most useful skill for a kid to learn.

It has nothing to do with whether or not they're gonna use math in their career, because they will use math and their finances they will not. Kids who are afraid of numbers tend to be adults who avoid numbers. And you know who doesn't avoid numbers? Credit card companies, whoever is on the other end of the contract that you're about to sign all that all these details. The devil's in the details. So be good at math, feel

confident about it. And then if you use it, if you love it, great, you know, because you're gonna use it, love it or don't love it, but know that you can do it though. And that's what I want for kids from you know what, I can do this and to get used to doing challenging things because when you're when you practice doing challenging things, then when another challenge comes, whatever it is, whatever category of life is in you'll

learn to save yourself. Well, it's the good thing. I got me in my side because this looks tough, it's a good thing. I'm here. And that's all through on my books, these math books. Math doesn't s kiss my math. It's all sorts of this positive reinforcement and teaching kids that when things when you're struggling, that's good because that's like going to the gym for your brain and when you lift a heavy, heavyweight ear like that's when you're

getting stronger. To sort of celebrate all that to tell your daughter, because I wanted her to embrace the idea of doing challenging things as a good thing on its face, like that's just by itself, just for the fact that's challenging. That is the benefit. That is one of the great things about math, makes it stronger. Awesome, Dannica, thank you so much. I so appreciate you taking the time to come on. And good luck with Christmas at the drive end.

Thank you so much, Anica. That was incredible. Happy Holidays to you. Good luck on the movie. I know so many we'll be watching. Thank you for coming on the podcast today. I can't wait to see what you come up with next. And to you listeners, even my not

still favorite ones, thank you for stopping by. If you haven't already, give us a follow on Instagram at at Off the Beat, review us on Apple podcast, tell a couple of friends about it and uh and if you do that, well, then I'll be back next Tuesday with another great guest. And probably I'll be back whether you do it or not, We'll see you next week. Off the Beat is hosted an executive produced by me Brian Baumgartner, alongside our executive producer Langley. Our senior producer is Diego Tapia.

Our producers are Liz Hayes, Hannah Harris, and Emily Carr. Our talent producer is Ryan Papa Zachary and our intern is Sammy Cats. Our theme song Bubble and Squeak, performed by the one and only Creed Breton,