Kate Micucci

I's all that's okay because no one here.

Is Hello everyone, It is once again time for teen Beat with Daniel Fishle and lucky.

For this podcast.

I am Daniel Fishle, and this is a podcast where I sit down with interesting people, hoping to turn the tables, forcing them to share their own awkward teenage stories with me. Because as a child, I performed from millions of people and a weekly salary, trading in my pre pubescence for a national sitcom fame. And so now thirty years later, I look at it like this. I gave you my childhood.

So I can only.

Imagine we're in for an incredible childhood. You've seen this adorable dynamo on TV shows like How I Met Your Mother, Scrubs, Raising Hope, and The Big Bang Theory, where she played Raj's love interest Lucy, and she's a prolific voice actress.

Heard is Velma in the modern Scooby Doo.

Franchise webby Vanderquak on ducktails, and she's even somehow the voice of Clayface in the.

Lego Batman movie. Not sure how that works.

She was one half of the legendary musical comedy duo garfunkeln Oates and released her debut solo album of music for kids called My Hat in twenty twenty three, and now yet another creative endeavor to excel in her first ever children's book, The Monster and Puppet Show, was just released and is available everywhere. What is left for this pocket sized genius The teen Beat podcast, of course. Welcome to the Show actress, artist, author, musician, comedian and friend.

Kate mccouchee.

Hi, Oh my gosh, Danielle.

That was just like the most heartwarming intro and I thank you so much. That was so that was really beautiful. Thank you for saying those kind things.

You're so welcome. They are all true.

You have led such an incredible, wonderful, beautiful life and I can't wait to learn more about where it all started in your childhood.

I'm so excited to dive in. I'm just so thrilled to be here. It's great to see you.

By the way, it's been a minute, so really nice to see you.

Nice to see you. It has been a minute.

I mentioned a few of your most notable voice over roles, but I didn't even touch on dog Man or Angry Birds or Adventure Time. I mean, the list truly feels like it never ends. Were you a cartoon kid?

I was.

I was very much a TV kid, okay, And in fact, every Sunday the TV Guide would come in the newspaper and my mom would hand me the TV Guide and say, here's your.

Bible, and then I would circle my whole week.

And I loved old movies and so, you know, but I also, you know, just everything you know, and so I watched a lot, a lot of TV, and I did watch a lot of cartoons, Scooby Doo being my favorite of all. And so when I got to actually be in Scooby Doo and play Velma, that was, like, you know, truly a dream come true.

Do you remember did you have to audition for it or did they offer it to you? I did.

I had to audition, and it was one of those things that came through. And it was when we were shooting the Garfunkle and Notes TV show, and I was I you know that that time was like an impossible schedule, and I got the call that they wanted me to audition, and I thought, oh my gosh, what a dream I would I would love to have that part. And so I auditioned, and I remember being a my closet, you know, recording it and sending it in, and then they had some notes and so I said, I really want.

To get to these notes.

I honestly don't know if I'll be able to get to them before next weekend. So the next weekend they waited for me, which was so nice, and then I went back into my closet, and then I remember getting the call and I was at a park we were shooting, and I got the call that I got Velma, and I did a dance around a tree.

I was so excited.

I love those moments where that is something you from the time you were a kid. Did it ever occur to you as a kid, like, hey, I could do that, someone is playing these voices and I want to or could do that, Or then when it ended up coming true for you that you get to play Velma from your favorite cartoon, does it just feel like, how is this even my life?

Yes?

I have those moments all the time, I wonder. You know, you've been doing this since you were a kid, so it was so much of your childhood that maybe it maybe doesn't seem as like fantastical or crazy.

I don't know, but I'm sure.

You have those moments everyone does where You're like, how is this happening right now? But there are times with Scooby Doo where we would all be in the studio, Gray and Matt Lillard and Frank Welker, and you know, I'm with these legends and I would just close my eyes and I'd think, oh my gosh, I'm I'm with these voices.

This is so crazy.

And Frank Welker, who plays Scooby and Fred, has been doing it since the very beginning, so we all grew up listening to his voice and Scooby Doo among a thousand to other things, and I would just close my eyes and then I'd be like, oh, it's my line, okay, And it was just the coolest feeling. So yeah, I mean, there's definitely I have those moments a lot.

It's you know, it's a cool thing.

But yeah, I'm sure do you have a good like, do you have a moment whre you're like, I can't believe this. I'm sure with like even Dancing with the Star, many times you're probably like, what is my life right now?

Yeah? But you know the I think the closest one I have for that was when I started hosting the Dish for the Style Network. I was such a huge fan of the soup when I was like going back to Greg kinnear, I mean the very beginning of it.

I have always loved the soup.

And so then when I heard, oh, they're going to do a similar show but on the Style Network, and they want it to be hosted by a woman, and they want you to meet for it, it was like, what, I've never wanted a job more. I know this job, I'm familiar with this job, like, I want this.

It feels perfect for me.

And so then when you accomplish the goal and you book, you know, you have the meeting, and you there's always for me, at least, it's always seemed like in every job that I've had that I've loved, there's always a moment where I think I don't have it, you know, or I really don't have it, like in that case hosting the Dish, I did the meeting, they really liked me, but they had already had someone else on contract, and they were basically worried that contract wasn't going to work

Definitely, I so agree. And I like even just as you're telling the story, I could feel your happiness and excitement about like, like me, then you always have that that moment to like just like you know, if you're feeling down and you can remember that moment and be like oh right, yes, Like it's a it's a gift in so many ways, and yeah, I feel like, yeah, those little like happy little dances you know, in our in our closet or whatever, like those, It just those are the magic moments sometimes.

Absolutely picture your dance around the tree, akin to Nicole Kidman dancing after she'd finally divorced Tom Goats.

Those photos are incredible.

Those are the greatest photos.

Just great.

I don't even know that I believe that it's actually right after the doors.

I just know whatever it was, she's so happy. I just love that for.

Her, you know, Yes, yes, I don't think I'm speaking out of turn when I say that you have always had a forever young aura about you.

When you were a teenager, did you look like a baby.

I'm trying to imagine how you could possibly look younger than you do.

I that's thank you.

I it's funny because I just still I mean, I think I hear people in their eighties and nineties talk about this where you still feel like you're in your twenties or something, But I think I do. I was trudging through the snow last night. I'm in New York City. It is just a beautiful snowstorm right now. And last

Fourteen, right.

And then the coolest thing is I you know, the great thing about the cities, you just people are friendly and they talk and I ended up making a ten foot snowman with like ten other people and it was this incredible night. And but yeah, I do think I think, well to that point, I think we're all kids, Like this was a bunch of grown ups making a snowman, and I don't know that. I mean, I think as I get older, I'm more aware that the things that I make really come from that childlike place.

It's you know, it's not intentional, it never really was.

It's just sort of naturally what happens when I make art or music. It just is, you know, I'm if it's coming from that core place and me it's usually childlike in some way.

Recently, some one posted I love this.

I should have like screen grabbed it because now, who the I don't know where it is, but it said that twelve year old is nearly fifty.

That's true.

Yes, wow, no, it is.

It's so it's to me, it's so inspiring because it is very clear that you still have like a direct pipeline to your childlike self, to the child within you, and for so many of us, as we get older, it becomes harder and harder to access that childlike part

Or is it just naturally who you are. I don't know.

I think it probably is who I am in a lot of ways. I also really love trying to bring people in in moments that can be celebrated, even if they're like silly. Like I'm always the first to like like start like cheering or clapping at something that might like I don't know, Like, they had a thing called Mulchfest here in New York where they they take all

And he was like, yeah, mulch Fest. And I didn't know what it was going to be.

And it was for most of the time just me and my son Mikey watching the multure, but then we like started cheering, like as the tree. I was like yeah, and then like we just like started making it a thing, and then more people like started watching and then like we made it a little moment. And then the guys who were doing the mult were like, this is really funny.

Yeah, this is great. By the way, he thinks, it's helping us. It's giving us motivation to keep mulching these trees. Yeah.

So I don't know. I mean, that's just an example of like I just I think too. I just try to appreciate things, and.

But I don't know as far as the kid like stuff, I I I hope I always feel I don't know. So far in my forty five years, I still kind of feel the same, So I guess I hopefully it will continue.

The other day, I was.

Walking down the street and there was this woman and she was she had a cane and she was moving kind of slow, and I said, oh, hi, how you doing, and she goes, I'm great. And then like a couple of minutes, a couple beats later, she turned to me and goes, isn't it funny. I said, I'm great. I've got a cane and I'm moving so slow. I said, well, yeah, look great.

And I thought to myself.

She had this youthful way about her, and I was like, I hope I'm like her.

Yea, when I'm her age. You know, it's so sweet.

I love too that she realized like she probably hadn't thought like how am I or you know, and then you pointed it out and her natural response was I'm great.

And then she thought, I wonder what I looked like.

To that woman who asked, And what I looked like is an older woman walking slowly with a cane.

And yet the truth is I'm great. I love that.

It was really sweet.

But yeah, I don't know, I feel like and I'm sure you know, having kids, I was always very excited to be a mom because I always wondered what I would make with my kid, and I also wondered, like what I would be like with my kid? Yeah, and it does. It is a good way to tap in, you know. But yeah, yeah, Captain Underpants is.

I guess there.

Are well For as young of an aura as you have, you also have very old fashioned taste. You play the ukulele, You had an educational focus on puppetry.

And you are an expert in sand castle building. Yeah I mentioned.

Yeah, I mentioned all of this to ask were you a popular kid?

No?

Shocking, No, I was not, although I was kind of I just kept to myself.

You know, I was very shy.

I I spent every lunch I could in the in the art room, and which is like one of those cliches you hear, but it was very true. And I kind of knew everyone, and I was I think friendly, but I never got like asked for the party or you know, any of that kind of thing. And I didn't want to. I think that was my protective way about being I was like, oh, I don't.

Want that anyway.

So it was a way of protecting myself that I wasn't invited to things because I was like, well, I'm good.

You know, you were rejecting them rather than rejecting you.

Yeah, take that.

Cool kids.

Yet, But where did that like influence come from for you?

Were your parents into those things?

Like most a lot of kids, at least my kids, all their reference for things that they're into come from pop cul things that are cool in pop culture, what their friends are into, or things that Jensen Ry are into. Yeah, so like, where did those interests come from for you?

You know, I think I don't know.

My mom was really great about taking my brother and I to the library, and I think that has a huge influence on me the more I think about it as I get older, because we'd always be getting books and reading a lot. And then my favorite thing about the library was the tapes. And I'd always go to the Broadway section and a big Broadway nerd, just like a up all of the all of the music I could get, and I just remember feeling like I could get lost in those, you know, those soundtracks, and also

I never thought.

I just loved I loved the idea of it, and I loved, you know, I love movies, and I saw everything I could, and I guess I lived very much in a pretend world.

I guess in a way.

But I also was just genuinely happy making things. I was always painting and drawing, and I had a really cool train set, but like to paint a picture my sixteen the summer I was sixteen, the majority of my summer was in that basement making a train set. So that's really that kind of says it all, I guess

I love that.

Yeah, so yeah, I think I wasn't.

I didn't start dating really until I was twenty four, you know, like I was a when they say late bloomer, that's really really late in the scheme of most most people in life. But I've kind of always been a little slow to things, and I think that's okay, you know, yeah.

That is okay.

I also, well, I mean compared to you, when I say I was, I was a little bit of a late bloomer in the sense that I didn't really want to experience. I mean, I had lots of crushes on boys, but I wasn't actually ready to act on any of those feelings until later than most. But I all I wanted to do was focus on boys like I just I wanted to think about them all the time. I wanted to chalk to them all the time. I wanted to write notes to them all the time. But I had,

What you just described. I was like, oh man, I wish I was that brave.

So brave I do want to I mean I buried the lead a little bit here.

Sand castle building, oh right, I'm dying to know where do you even pick this skill up?

You know?

I worked at Shutters in Santa Monica, Okay, the hotel on the beach.

It's a beautiful hotel.

My brother was a doorman there, and so I was about I don't know, right around the time I started dating. I was twenty four and my brother was working there and he said, I have heard they want to start doing sand castle classes. And I told them, you're really good at making things in the sand. And this just came from being at the beach growing up with my brother he just I'd always make things in the sand, and I was like, yeah, I could do that, but you know, I was doing every.

Odd job possible like, so I was like sure, and and then we ended up like it was a weekly class. It ended up being really awesome. It was.

It was just the funny thing about it is usually it was the parents that got excited about making things and the kids really didn't care at all. But so I ended up making sand castles with a lot of parents.

Yeah, you know, it's funny.

I thought my kids would be very I was excited to teach my kids, like.

Here's how you build a sand castle. All they want to do is dig holes. Yeah, they just want it. They want to.

Dig and like watch it fill up with water and then fill it back up. Or they want to be covered with the sand, which is like my nightmare. And I'm the one who wants to build a sand castle. So I'm going to need you to teach me some skills next time.

Next next time I'm there, we can do it.

Let's do okay, great, next time you visit La, we'll meet at the beach, so you could teach me how to build a sand castle. I'm super down you would assume that that might be the strangest thing you had ever done to make ends meet.

But then I.

Stumble on watering banana and pineapple plants in Hawaii.

That was Yeah, that was more of a family gig.

I guess you could say my aunt and uncle lived in Hawaii and Big I still do. They're on the Big Island.

And I grew up in the small town, like I had mentioned, never had been to Hawaii, and I had gone.

To a two year art school. My plan was to be a toy designer.

And I love the movie Big and I think there was a part of me that was like, I want Aloft with a trampoline and a buck bed. That's the dream. And I thought, well, then I'll be a toy designer. But also I loved toys, so it kind of made sense for me. And so I went to a two year art school that had a great It was like a good gateway too. Then going to school to be a toy designer, yeah, here in New York.

And then I just wasn't ready for.

The big city of New York City. I was like a little scared by it. I think my dad said, why don't you take some time off because you know, school was expensive and trying to figure out the right school.

I didn't want to make the wrong decision.

Yeah, so my uncle, my aunt, uncle and aunt in Hawaii and Audrey and uncle Eddie, theyre the best.

They said stay with us. So I slept.

They had this like covered porch and I slept in this giant chair. That was my bid and as my way of repaying them for letting me stay there.

For it was only three months, but it's a good chunk of time.

I did all of their They had huge farm of like banana plants and pineapple plants, and I did all the watering.

So it was great.

That is so cool.

I love when family, both for your parents and your aunt and uncle for them to be so supportive to say one, I mean a lot of parents here that their kids just spent a bunch of money on school, or that they spent a bunch of money on school, and then I still don't know what I want to do and youth, and the the response is not maybe you need to take time off, it's well and what have you been? You know, there's like a different energy around it.

But your parents.

Really nurtured the idea that you needed to take your time and that you needed to really feel good about whatever.

Was the next step for you.

So they encouraged you to take that time off and then for you to have an aunt and uncle to say, hey, come be with us for three months and figure it out and think about it.

That's so cool.

Yeah, it was.

You know. I think there's so much pressure put on kids to just you know, they're expected to know what they.

Want to be.

And yeah, and these days, I think everything's changing so quickly that who knows, like what jobs are going to look like, Like it's so hard to know what you want to be.

And I still every day I'm like, what am I today?

Like, you know, I'm very fortunate that I get to jump around and try a lot of things, and I know that's a really lucky thing. But I feel like, you know, it's always great to just be open kind of And I think that was the idea in Hawaii too, where I was just like I ri at universe, like send me some signs, and it really I got some signs while I was one, being that my grandpa, who was also there at the time, bought me a ukulele and that's when I started playing ukulele.

So and you know, almost cliche that.

I started playing the ukulele in Hawaii, but it led to a lot of things.

Yeah, exactly that led to so many things. For you is that when I first realized you were a musician.

No, I grew up playing classical piano.

So I think maybe the classical piano part of my life also feeds into my being just sort of a solitary person.

But I grew up competing.

My brother and I both competed with piano, and you know, was practicing. My mom really was very strict about it, and so we had to practice at least an hour a day. And yeah, by the time I was a senior in high school, I was probably practicing close to three hours a day and I and then I just stopped for a while. I started taking it again in college. But I am just so grateful that I have that training, because I think my classical training, I don't have it.

In a way I wish I.

Could get my children to focus on anything for even close to an hour. Yeah, I apparently am not being strict enough, because who that would be an absolute fight. We try to just do homework or you know, practice reading and writing for thirty minutes a day, and boy, you'd think I was holding their hands to a fire.

I feel you we are in the same boat, you and I. Yeah, my son does not want to do I mean the reading homework. If we get through it, and like as soon as we're done, it's like it's over. But yes, but I think I wonder, like, you know, by the time I started playing piano at four and Mikey is six, and I don't know, like I don't know when. I really really hope that he'll have.

An instrument he focuses on.

But I still it's a big question mark as to how I'm going to try to have him do that.

I don't know.

My husband's a musician, so he's all around music, you know, hmm, But I don't know.

I feel the same way. I want him to have a focus.

Maybe it's not music, maybe it's something else, but right right, right now, it's just flipping off the couch.

Correct all the time, all the time. The minute he comes home, my son throws his back back down, rips off his shirt, and goes immediately to like jumping off the couch, throwing them at throwing the cushions on the floor, practicing wrestling. I'm like, Okay, this is so much boy energy.

We need to get the kids together next time. The yes sounds like they'll really get along.

I think they will.

And then we have my other son, Keaton, four and a half, and he's right there with them, so I.

Think I think the three of them will have a blast together. You mentioned being from a small town.

What was high school like for young Kate mccoochee in small town Pennsylvania.

You know, again, I was pretty pretty shy, but I have good memories of high school. I think middle school was really rough for me. I think that was a bad time, and looking back, I was, you know, I just think even just like you know, it's that hormone shift and everything else. I was just kind of lost

You know.

And yeah, I think that I really loved my teachers. My senior year, they found mold in the high school, like throughout the high school and then so I only had school for two hours a day and that was a whole crazy thing. So my brother and I were ski instructors. So during the winter we'd go to school for two hours then go skiing. Like there's like good memories there.

Yes, by the way, ski instructor for high school sounds awesome.

Yeah, you know we thought.

I remember my parents saying like we thought, like, you know, gets you in like the cool kid mixed somehow.

It really my brother and I were like.

Really the nerdy ski instructors, but you know it was, you know, we were teaching little kids like I'm very good at skiing backwards slowly.

Okay, great, so that's the skill you took on from Yes, okay, that's great.

So a lot of like memories of like snot and cold gummy bears as rewards.

Yes, yes, and saying pizza French fries, Pizza French fries as often as possible. When did your last name become funny to kids?

Oh?

You know, it's it's interesting.

That's such a good question, because I don't. I think it snuck up on me. I think that first of all, I didn't know that there was like, uh, you know, a dirty connotation for my last name until I was reading the play The Vagina Monologues, when I was like, I don't know twenty five and that word was in a long list of words, and I was like, oh my god, that is what that is why, that is why they were this moment, this moment, this moment was

How did I miss that? But I missed sheltered sheltered kid.

But I I kids love to say my last name, and kids love to say my full name, So among I really kind of realized it when I was babysitting a lot, like after college, I was babysitting to like pay my bills, and kids always said Kate Macouchi, Kate mcuchie and to this day. It's just a funny. It's a fun funny thing. I don't know, but I love that people. I love that kids know my whole name. It's very cute.

It is very cute.

I mean, uh, Jensen had a best friend growing up whose name was BJ Service. Wow and wow, and none of them thought it was funny or knew it was funny until college. And I don't know how that's possible.

I just don't know how that's possible.

That is so amazing and and and did he He must have had a moment BJ where he realized what it was.

I'm sure for.

Him what that was like was I know, yeah, he had my my moment with the vagina monologues, there was something Yeah, sure, he goes.

That's why they've been saying my name like that.

Yeah, when you think about I know, we just talked about junior high and also junior high was not my favorite time in life. I think it's just rough for everyone, no matter who you are. But would you have would you say you were a confident kid?

No, Well, it's funny.

I think I was both things because I was I really in social settings. I was not whatsoever that middle school feeling. I still talk about that middle school. There's a lot of times in life today where I'm like, oh, I feel like I'm in middle school right now, Like there's this oh, it's so yeah. I don't think that I.

Walk out of the room and I thought that's weird.

And I was like, oh, he must be laughing like like that he had to probably leave to laugh. But I in those moments, I was so excited and so confident because I was sharing what I had made.

And I think that's still to this day.

What is like my favorite thing is like I love making things, but I equally love sharing them. And you know, I'd write a song in college and then I'd run across the dorm and knock on a dorm that you want to hear the song I wrote, Like I was always just wanting to share this thing immediately and and so I think I had confidence to, you know, be an animatronic uncle Sam.

And I also knew that the kids were loving it.

And I remember being done with my presentation and then a kids said if I put another quarter in, will you do that again? And I thought, oh, I did it. Like so I think those moments, I definitely had confidence. But when it came to like anything social, forget it.

Yeah. I didn't even like to ride the bus. I was really scared.

I didn't there were big kids on the bus like it was scary to me, and my dad would drive me in his electric van. He has an electric company, bush Kill Electric, So we'd drive in his van and we'd listen to Howard Stern and I thought that was so cool and that was making me cool. But then there were many times where we had to turn it off.

Yes exactly.

He was like, okay, turn it off.

I think I might have caught something I wasn't supposed to hear.

What was the most amount of trouble you ever got into as a kid?

H You know, I just I didn't. I was too scared.

I was so fearful, and I was such a like a people pleaser. I wanted to please my parents.

I didn't.

I mean, maybe the worst thing would be like not practicing the piano long enough or something, But that really how alame is that I never did.

I was not a rebel, not a rebel whatsoever.

I love that.

It's not even like I skipped practicing. You were like not practicing the piano.

For the full hour. You did it for forty two.

Minutes and then yeah, and you were like, Nope, that's the most amount of trouble I ever got into.

Okay, I like I sometimes do this thing where I go back and I'm like, if I could go back in time, like and do high school again or do middle school again, Like what would I do?

And I'm like, I just wish I had.

I wish I had socialized more like and like, I think that would have been like, you know, hanging out in a parking lot at the Walmart.

You know, but I wish I had done that.

I didn't get that experience, but again, you know that's okay, But yeah, I just wish I had had a little bit more outgoingness toward other people, because I do now.

I love it hanging out well.

And even to hear you talk about how you'd make a song and then run down the hall and knock on the door, it's like when you felt inspired to connect with people, you.

Would reach out and then it would always go well.

So it's kind of surprising that that amount of feedback of like when I do go out of my comfort zone, it's always a positive that that feedback didn't make you inspired to do it. In other scenarios, you just yeah, you just were very choosy about when you did it.

Yeah, probably maybe a bit of fear of fear of failing socially or something. Yeah, but I have a question for you because you know you were in La as it like what was the where did kids go?

Like where did teenagers go?

What was like the hot spot in la the mall which which mall?

The Topanga Mall?

Oh, how fitting it was perfect.

I was at the Tapanga Mall every single weekend getting my vanilla bean ice blended from coffee bean, going to Victoria's Secret.

I you know, was not had no.

Reason for lingerie, but we would look at the Bras, try on Bras, me and my best friend Jamie, and then we'd wander around the food court get food, you know, check in at the Charlotte Rous.

See what there was Charlotte Ruth.

Yeah, it was the mall. The mall was pretty cool. And then like in the Hollywood scene Edd Bevicks.

Oh, yes, that was on Los Sienaga, right correct. Yeah, I first moved to la that was.

Still there, but I think maybe for like just a year and then it went away. But that was that was a cool.

That was a cool hangout. We loved we loved that.

But yeah, them all and it makes me very happy now because like a lot of things, you know, now we're moving into the nostalgia of the early aughts. But we have just been really inside a big nineties nostalgia craze. And as a part of that, I'm also noticing there are lots of young cools at the mall. I'm still at the mall every weekend. Yeah, because it's it's what I knows. And so I bring my kids to the Tapanga Mall, same mall, very very sheltered.

Bring my kids to the Tapanga Mall.

We play at the arcade we you know, right on the little train that's there. We wander, we see movies, We go to the Tapanga Social which is now like the elevated version of the food court, and we just hang out there. And I'm pleasantly surprised by how many young people are at the mall.

That is so fascinating. I mean that mall is gorgeous.

If you can call them all gorgeous, that's probably one of the most gorgeous malls. Like I feel like, uh, I yeah, that makes sense, and it's still like a comfort for you, and then.

You get to share that with your kids is pretty cool. I think.

Yeah, I always wonder I daydream about like probably in the time that I was like daydreaming about Hollywood in the nineties, I think, what was what was it?

What was it for someone like you.

A kid in the nineties, and you know you know, And also I should I should mention I also lived vicariously through my so called life. Oh that show was like I like, I like dreamt of having, you know, a cool boyfriend like Jared Leto.

Yes, so did I Yeah, I was not that cool.

Yeah I know, I know that that was. You know, I joke a lot that my mom is not even a joke. My mom would not let me watch nine

So, yeah, I understand that I didn't watch nine O two and O or and like any of what I would consider like yeah, like cool kid shows cool kid shows.

Yeah, yeah, So.

I want to talk to you now about the Monster and the Puppet Show. I'm so excited your first kid's book. As you know, we are huge fans of your art. In our house, I am the proud owner of a Kate mccoochee original, and now I get to introduce your work to my boys. So tell me where where did the idea for this story come from?

Well, thank you for saying that.

I you know, it's it really came from from, you know, well basically Mo Williams, who I'm a huge, huge fan of, and I mean he truly is. He's as wonderful a person as his books are so funny and so cool, and he is that.

You know.

And and when he was helping me figure out this book along with his editor Tracy, who's become a great friend, he was saying, you know, you really need to have a story that matters and like, you know, something that's true to you. And this book is a lot about protecting your energy and your creativity and like just really kind of being true to yourself in a way.

And I think that is what I'm really proud of.

Is I feel like even grown ups, if they just need a reminder of that. Even though this is a kid's book, it really does have that message. And yeah, so it really it started with it started this book morphed a million times before we got to where we are now. But that process alone was very fascinating and very very fun. And I knew I wanted, you know, this like creature to be creating.

It was like a monster creating. I wasn't sure.

And then it became a puppet, which is perfect because I am just a big puppet person. Yes, like I said, super cool, So I it just kind of made sense. And my I have this puppet, Camille that I've had for twenty five years now, and so she was really an inspiration for this idea of you know, this, this creature finding a puppet and then you know what comes out of that. But uh and then I also am

I love that.

But uh, yeah, and Mo, I will say Mo was just to work with him was truly a dream.

And I've always wanted to publish a book.

I have so many books I've written and illustrated and I've never done anything with them.

Som hmm.

This is a dream come true. That is happening, you know, at forty five now, so I'm really really excited again, late Bloomer, I guess yeah.

We are also a big mo Willems house.

We were gifted the Piggy and Gerald Elephant and Piggy series by Paul Sheer when we first had Adler. That was their congratulations on your baby gift, and it was perfect. I have read every single one of them at least

I I'll try to get to the bottom of that for you, because I don't know which ones, but yeah, I'll find out for you.

I'm invited to a party does not have a pigeon appearance at the kay and so do I. Uh, and I'm trying to think of what I'll figure out what the other one is.

Yeah, let me know, I will because I.

Have always wondered, like, how did the pigeon not make an appearance in these? And if I pull one out, Keaton will go is that check the back? Is that one that doesn't have pigeon? And I'm like, no pigeons in this ways Like, yeah, so it's I was very excited to see the pigeon made appearance in yours.

It is it's a it's an honor to have the pigeon. Uh.

Yeah, it's it's just an honor to be uh, you know, associated with this world and that it's an elephant and piggy like reading book is like, I don't know, the whole.

Thing has been so cool. It's very exciting.

I love that you're creating boundaries and setting boundaries for kids, and I love that you specifically said it's even a good reminder for adults, because I truly do not think I ever really mastered the concept of boundaries until I was in my thirties. Yeah, I in my thirties. All of a sudden, I started looking around, going, why do I have all of these situations that pop up where eventually something makes me very uncomfortable?

And I just realized, like, wow, I don't think. I don't think.

I was very specifically taught that I can and should create my own boundaries around things that I'm comfortable with. I think you mentioned being a people pleaser. Being a child actor, it's almost impossible that you don't become a people pleaser and that you don't always look to others for what you should be.

Doing to make them happy.

Yes, and so you're very rarely in touch with what you want or need or what makes you comfortable, but you can pretty much immediately tell what other people need and want for you to do. And so it was really the first time in my life I was like, oh, I can set boundaries. So I agree with you that although this is a book for kids, parents and children will have something to gain from this wonderful book. So I'm really excited for the world to be able to get their hands on it.

Oh, thank you.

Yeah, I feel like I similar to you. I'm kind of new to being aware of it. I think I think having a kid really helps, for at least help me to go, like, Okay, this is time with my son as he's small, and it really makes you go, Okay, what do I say yes to?

What do how?

You know, because you know, it's great to be able to spend so much time and be there for him, and yeah, I think but also just in life, you know, regardless of like a kid's schedule or whatever else, Like, it's really good to know what you need as a person.

Yeah, and it's a yeah, it's a hard thing to do.

Yeah it is.

Yeah, it takes practice. I guess I'm not quite there yet to be honest.

Yeah, it still takes practice.

And yeah, I agree, I'm but but at least to have the recognition that we need them and we can do it, it is good. It's like it's in the forefront of our minds. Now since becoming a mother, you have released a kid's book and a kid's album. Did you expect to find so much inspiration in motherhood?

You know, I hoped I would.

I like, you know, I dreamt of having like a room of Legos, like I like, like I just want to like play Legos.

And then it was like a reason to play. I mean, I still played legos.

Yeah, having a kid, but I think I yeah, I The kid's album came about in kind of a like I had really really bad postpartum depression and I had Mikey in twenty twenty and in January twenty twenty, and then I knew something was deeply wrong because I'm I always just operating at a level that I wasn't ever accustomed to.

It was really hard and bad.

So I went to a doctor and who had been recommended to me for postpartum, and I said, I think I might need, you know, some medication or something to get me out of this fog and and and the woman was like, no, you're fine, you just have the

Things like I can do this.

And and then also it was it was at a point in the pandemic where we were able to have friends to come in and play different instruments and everything just started feeling a little better. So my Kids album kind of came out of that, and so in almost a different way of you know, having a kid.

Yeah, different type of inspiration, yes, exactly.

But I'm really like making that album was just so much fun. And we were all in a like we did it live to tape, so we were all in the same room and I'm singing, and our friend Brendan was on drums, and my husband's on bass, and my friend Sean's and guitar were just like in a circle playing and recording, and it felt so alive and like just really fresh and fun. And I think I'm very

So that was a whole thing.

But then that brings a whole other you know, appreciation for life. And I know you went through your version of that and how lucky are we? And you know, yeah, I know it gives a whole new perspective on things.

You know, absolutely, how are you doing now? What was your treatment and how's everything looking for you?

I'm doing really great.

I'm gonna knock on my head because you know, it's like there's always that little fear in the back. But I did just have my six month scan last week, so I leave feeling like, okay, I'm okay right now. But I was diagnosed with lung cancer. I've thought that's insane because I've never smoked a cigarette in my life. That couldn't be And you know, to this point, I've talked about this a little on like my Instagram and stuff.

That was all I had to do.

I mean, I say, yeah, oh, the recovery was.

I kept being like, I'm fine, I'm totally fine.

But I i'd say it took a good six months to feel like I was kind of put together again. So I was very tired. But that is a very lucky, lucky scenario that it was found. Really it was able to just you know, be taken out and I didn't need to do anything else.

So yeah, I've been cancer.

Free basically since I had the surgery, and it's been two years now, so I feel very lucky.

How how are you and how is your health similar?

Similar?

I only had to have two lumpectomies in twenty days of radiation.

So oh that's one.

Yeah, I didn't need chemo, and I have had multiple mammograms since my surgeries and no evidence of disease.

So yes, pleased to say. Also, same boat.

There's always that tiny little bit of fear in between, you know, they think they call it scanxiety. You know, around the time of getting another scan, you're always like, eh, because, like you, I had zero thought in my mind that there could be anything wrong. I had just had a mammogram the year before and it was clear, like and I was you know, I was like, I'm in my early forties. As far as I was aware, breast cancer

So yes, I'm so happy. I'm happy.

So yeah, talking about it is always a reminder, you know, we're we're so fortunate and and I think you know, for me, I like, I'm sure you probably felt the same way, where it's like, Okay, I still get to do this, I get to do this. Is I I remember someone asking if I was really upset, and I was like, no, I feel like I won the lottery or something like, like how lucky that this was almost

I'm so glad you're doing well. And likewise, yeah, and for anyone listening who's putting off any doctors, just go go check it out, you know, do the blood work, do the things.

That's exactly right, schedule the appointment, may make the time, prioritize yourself.

It is.

I would always rather know than not know. And there's so many things now, with so many different types of cancers that the earlier, you know, the amount of treatments out there compared to even just ten years ago.

Yeah, it's night and day.

So yeah, and I always say to friends like, just get like you said, get the information, just like, get all the information and then you have it and you know, and then you can and hopefully everything's fine.

And if you have a little weird thing, then you'll go down that path and figure it out.

Yep.

Yeah, I just try to, Yeah, to stay on top of it is a good thing.

Absolutely.

There was no way I was going to hang out with Kate and only do one episode. So this Friday she's back for a bonus episode as we look to you, our listeners for an embarrassing childhood story sent via email.

So make sure you have.

Subscribed to the dedicated team beat feed on whatever streaming service you use for podcasts. Way, whenever a new episode drops, it's in your library, no questions asked, And I'd love to hear your childhood cringe. So send a somewhat concise voice memo to Teenbeatpod at gmail dot com and next thing you know, we could be playing it on a future episode. Plus, Kate mccuchi's first children's book, The Monster and Puppet Show is available now go pick it up.