Shaun Weiss Meets World

H I don't see you guys for a week now, and there's a there's a a Danielle and Ryder's eye hole in my I.

Know right, I've missed you. Howf you goes been? What did you?

Did?

You cry every day without me? Okay? No, no, no, okay? But what have you been up to? H? Sweet? Sweet?

Yeah, I've been podcast walk his dog, my dog.

He's had conversations with his wife where the asked me to do I talk my wife a lot?

No, We're we're currently taking multiple bids for some serious construction at our house, so we're getting ready for craziness.

How'd the closet reno go?

It's awesome?

Yeah.

So it's like, you know, we've got this big, big, huge, walking kind of kind of situation.

You get to go shopping for what?

Oh god, No, it's just the clothes that I do have now aren't in a giant pile on the floor.

It's the same clothes from Boybys World, like something for me. I stick with them.

The I got rid of them when they literally no no longer hold the shape of clothing.

That's when I get rid of them.

All right, that's when it's too much? Yeah, right, or what have you been up to?

Oh my god, I don't know. We went to nineties cons.

It was really good. It was really it was actually like a different crew. There was like the Scream people and some nine o two one oho folks. Uh yeah, I'd never met I mean I'd met Brian Austin Green, but I never really talked to him, and he's like a great guy, and so Leigh Moonfry, who I hadn't seen for years.

It was great.

It was such a good time, Like it was actually not not expected. I was like, oh, we're doing nineties con again, it's gonna at this at the point it's going to be winding down and not a big deal.

And instead the.

Crowd was huge.

It was great.

It's like, wow, people really want time travel.

Yeah, we ave the nineties. It's so weird, Like it was a lot of fun. It was. It was a lot of fun, huge crowds. Like yeah, writer said.

The thing that was weird about this year was we were on the floor so much that I almost didn't see anybody else, Like it was never in the green room.

With everybody where we normally hang out and kind of talk.

So yeah, my dad was there and oh, Okay, first of all because of the podcast, so tons of people coming up talking about the podcast like how much they loved it. And my dad was there and people were going, is that the captain? Can I take a picture with the captain? So my dad was taking pictures with people. But he was so happy sitting there taking pictures and people were calling the captain.

He loved it. So my flight home I was a complete disaster, wasn't.

We got on one plane, had to get off and you know, get on another plane, change whatever, Like I did all the things wrong. Will, like I know you always go like to work flight and that's why you were flying out a box, right, Okay, So I didn't get home till like four in the morning.

It was a nightmare, except it was me and the Lawrence brothers. Yeah, the best time. It was somebody like I haven't.

Talked to Joe like forever, like since we were teenagers basically, and for whatever reason, the three of us just bonded and were laughing and telling stories and I.

Was like, oh, I'm the fourth Lawrence brother I felt.

So it was like, it's okay, it's at an airport where like having a tran and yet every and what the best part is like people would recognize one of us and not the others, so they'd be like they'd come up to me and be like hey, in the hand of the camera to Matt and be like take a picture, or they just recognized Joe and hand camera to me, but like can you take a bit?

And we're like what that was? Like, yeah, so was this in force? It was this in Bradley. Were you at the airport in Hartford? Is this week? Then we got stuck in Dallas, So we were stuck in Dallas for it worth for like you.

Know, three hours or whatever.

But I'm telling you, like, I you know, I've obviously seen Matt a bunch, but I haven't hung out with

Kind to everybody. Yes, it was really fun. It was really good time.

I'm glad you guys had a good time. I'm sad that I missed it. I was directing. I was doing the other thing that I love. I was directing a TV show for Disney Channel called How We Became the Biggest Band. It was so much fun. But I did miss you guys. I had a little bit of fomo.

You guys did a fun panel.

At nineties Cone, right, it was like a ninetyggh was.

That it was good. It was good.

It was one of those things so where it was you know, I prefer personally panels where you just kind of you talk for five minutes and you open it up to questions.

Yeah, and we did the opposite.

We spoke for forty minutes and then we had five minutes left for questions.

We got two questions in and we went. But you know, it's fun.

You're we're on the panel and it's myself and Rider and Solet and Juliel.

Fun.

But it was it was just kind of fun to be with everybody and talk about different experiences, and it was it was a really fun weekend and it's you know, I get to go home that Mike exactly claim in Hartford, So it's a great place.

Nice, Danielle. Did you get to do like, are there musical insequences in the I.

Got to shoot a whole music video?

Yeah?

Cool?

Was it?

It was so much fun. It was truly so incredible.

So the first week I was there, I was a little like gobsmacked by how fast it moves, because it moves real.

Fast, as in so fast.

You only have two hours of rehearsal on the first day, and you do a producer's run through on the first day with two hours as wow, because they for three days, so they shoot Wednesday, Thursday, Friday.

So Monday morning, no audience.

Monday morning you do a production meeting, a table read, then the kids go to school and then you start rehearsal at noon and you do rehearsal until two and then you do a two thirty pm.

Run through and ea, oh my god.

And then on day two you do a network run through and that day you only have three hours of rehearsal. So if the script doesn't change much between Monday and Tuesday, three hours on Tuesday you're like, what are we gonna do with all this time?

Because does it changed?

There's a script kind of lockdown.

Well, my first week it didn't, So I came in like Rare and I saw my first day, I was like everyone had warm me, like the show moves really fast. And then on my first day I was like I was not prepared. So then the next day I came in like Rare in Togo and we ended up feeling like we had so much time because the script didn't change much. But then my second week, the script changed a lot, so much so that we didn't do.

A producer run through on Monday.

So we did a combo producer network run through on Tuesday with a brand new script with only three hours of rehearse.

God, you're shooting the next day, no.

Closers run through because the table read, they were like, we're just going to be working on We're just.

Going to be working all day and there's no point in putting something on its feet that that we know is probably going to change. So we had you know so so and then you're shooting the next day. It's like, okay, you're shooting.

I'm getting adjutve you just explaining what's happening, like I'm imagining the change, so I get oh geez.

And so there are they new songs, like they have original songs.

All the originals, and.

They've recorded them ahead of the week, and then.

You like, shoot yes, And they also have to learn choreography, like that's how much time I have for rehearsal and they're learning choreography in that time.

Like, can we give the girls twenty minutes to go learn for full dance? Numbord's like yes, I think we can do that. We have no we have no other choice.

These kids are working so hardly.

They are working their butts off.

But let me tell you the only reason that schedule is at all able to work is because they are so gosh darn talented and they are on their lines and they are taking risks and having fun and it's just beautiful. Like on my third week, because then you know, my third week, I'm like, I'm in it. I know exactly what we're doing. Everybody's in a nice groove. And one of the girls put on a performance for us.

And just nailed it, nailed everything.

It's a big set, lots of crazy blocking where she's really vamping it up as this totally out of the box character.

And I literally cried. I literally I cried. I cried watching it.

I was like, I'm so proud of them. I'm so proud of them, Like what they are doing is amazing, and it was just incredible.

Weeks is the show about like a girl group? Are they?

Is it one of those things where it's almost like The Monkeys, where it's like they do it's a show, but then they also are a band that's together.

Is that thing?

It's a show called How We Became the Biggest Band, and it takes place in two time settings, a current day which is the future, where they're already the biggest band and they're eighteen years old and they're telling you how we got here. Most of the show then takes place in flashbacks showing you how they met correct, okay, how I met your mother?

With a with a with a band?

All the same cast or are there an adult version and a younger.

The same cast, which is one of the reasons why it moves so fast.

There is no B storyline. The B storyline is them in.

The future show.

Yeah, yeah, there's no as of right now, there's no adults on the show. It's just four core cast members that are all miners, and so you're dealing with school schedules, and you know, all of the they also are playing instruments and like, you know, one of them is like learning guitar, so she's in music class. Diane or In is writing like half the songs. The music is incredible. It gets stuck in your head. We had to listen to it dozens of times. I wasn't sick of any

It was really hardly it.

Works because Disney does not is not really known for their musicals, especially if that take place in high school.

Yeah, it's usually they don't do well.

The old flops with Disney and musical those never work.

I mean, come on, Welcome to Pond Meets World. I'm Daniel Fishal, I'm righter strong.

Ah oh if it, I'm sorry, audition, We're officially done.

Damn it.

It's been quite some time since the days of the Death Chair, the rotating season one child guest star who changed week to week but mostly pulled from the movie The Sandlot, and though we became used to seeing a familiar young face thrown into the mix, whether it's Marty Yorke as a best friend, Arianna Richards in a very special episode, or Andrew Keegan in Orlando, the show has since left the young stunt casting behind.

To focus on us, the core cast of the show.

So when we did have a new guest star firmly set in our age bracket, especially one from a ton of hit movies and TV shows, it was a big deal, and this week's guest is a prime example. He rose to fame as the comedic goalie in The Mighty Ducks, Greg Goldberg, an iconic role he'd revisit for an entire franchise, but it was another Disney movie he'd star in, Heavyweights.

That many of us hold nearest and.

Dearest to our hearts. A bit of a child prodigy when it came to making people laugh, he began his career in one of the coolest places ever, Pee Wee's Playhouse, and he went on to appear on shows like Sabrina, Freaks and Geeks, The King of Queen's and Yes, Boy Meets World, where he played Louis a new college friend that appeared in two season six episodes, and beyond the hilarious work he's done on screen, he has also become an inspiration for those dealing with addiction, honest and open

Look at your beautiful background.

Wow?

Is that gonna be okay? For the thing?

Yeah?

You look great? Where are you?

Thank you? I'm in Georgia. I got to Georgia like two months ago. I moved here. Wow.

Yeah, there are trees in Georgia.

Breathing fresh air is like I didn't even know.

I wasn't right I'm doing it.

Started, Yeah, it's you know, I was.

I was really kind of emotional, somebody.

I was kind of emotional leaving la you know.

I just always pictured myself living there, and from the moment I got there, I was in love with that place.

So it was a little hard to go. But I love it here. I's I like that.

Good for you. Thank you so much for doing this.

It's so good to see you. Thank you so much for doing this. We want to start with where it all began for you. I know that you were an East Coast kid. You were out of New Jersey. So how did you convince your parents to start driving you to the city for auditions.

Well, honestly, it was my it was my mom's idea, Okay, but it wasn't like my mom got me into it and forced me to do it.

She got me into it, and then once I started, I mean I.

Was hooked with the whole process of going on auditions and I got to skip school and stuff. Yeah, I was a very precocious kid, and I had older step brothers and stepsisters. They were in like years older, and they would get me to do crazy things like walk up to adults and give them the middle finger, you know, ask adults how their sex life is. When I was yeah, I was walking around saying these things that adults had

Wow, and I remember that.

I just remember that circuit because we were on the same circuit back in the day. He was always seeing each other at auditions and you're just you're always with the same twenty five kids everywhere you go.

Yeah, you were one of the guys I used to see all the time. And then we did that show together.

Yeah, True Blue.

Well True Blue. I had to explain it to my fiance. I was like, it was kind of like a er but there was.

A truck invall.

Yes, let's talk about that because we'll mentioned that you guys worked together. He actually said you were like his very first actor friend.

My onset buddy, my first onset buddy.

Yeah, yeah, well you were. I think that was one of my first like TV jobs me too.

It was my first ever TV show.

Dude. You were so nice. And here was the thing we were.

We shot this thing out on top of a cliff, yep, and it was very dangerous, right and not freezing.

It was cold. Yeah, it was ice cold.

You couldn't feel your toes and if we moved in the wrong direction, it was like.

Exactly, hey, kids, you're fine, just walk up to the edge of this cliff and it don't But we're going to pay you to do it.

So I remember that day.

Oddly enough, I remember that day better than I do stuff that happened two weeks ago. But I remember you were like very protective of me and very like really helping me not fall off that cliff, and so I got I found out kind of the guy you were very early, and meeting up with you years later, you really never changed and I appreciated that well.

I you were my first onset friend. We had a blast.

I remember it being freezing cold, and then one scene we have to cross a river and I hear splash and I look behind me and you had fallen into the river like all like up to your neck, and they pulled pulled you out, and we're like trying. Everyone's warming you up, and the putting in front of heaters, and then after that like all right, great, get on the edge of the cliff, and it was just it

I was just I would be blowing my nose for weeks with just all this black coming out like it was bad.

This is New York in the eighties where they were like, just do it, kid, just doing fine. They handed me at one point, with no prep whatsoever, they handed me a fully loaded AK forty seven.

Who were you guys playing?

Were you criminals this story? Did you remember?

Yeah?

It was like the drug dealer that was after us because we found his stash and stash so we found was like an AK forty seven.

Oh so that's the thing is we find that.

We leave our school field trip at the Cloisters and we go down. Robert Mitcham's son Chris Mitcham plays the bad guy, and we find this cave and I find an AK forty seven and I go hey, and I spray the cave and there's a.

Huge cave in which blocks him off.

Oh my god.

I then get beaten up and thrown off the cliff by the drug dealer and still no, I'm like, I fall like thirty feet down.

They put makeup on me.

My head's broken open all stuff, and so truck one, which is what the show used to be called, shows up, and it's all these really good looking actors. It's like Grant Show from Melrose Place before he's on Melrose Place and Ali Walker and all these people like repelling down to get me and then they've got to go bury dig him out of the cave.

It was like it was intense, man.

It was.

Listen no stunt doubles anywhere for the first time seeing a squid go off right next to my head and be like, I probably shouldn't get too close to that thing.

Both of you were both such talented young comedians. So despite whatever crazy circumstances, I bet this movie is incredible.

Want to watch it now?

Yeah, it's on It's on YouTube. It's an episode called Caves True Blue.

Hell yeah, my evening entertainment.

To write that down, it would be difficult to beat you for best first job. You were a recurring character on Pee Wee's Playhouse, So I mean you shared the screen with the legendary Paul Rubins. You probably sat on cherry right.

Yeah, I get to do that.

Oh my god.

So what I mean it must have been like a dream like experience. What are some of the most unreal stories from set?

It was. I mean, they really did a good job to create like a very fun, uh kid like atmosphere for us when we were on set, and I remember talking to, uh, the genie Phil Hartman.

Oh my god, wasn't that Phil?

Oh my god? Was that Phil Hartman?

That was Phil Hartman?

Was the original genie on on Pee's Playhouse.

I'm almost I don't know if that was the guy.

I mean, I have to check down now, I have to check because that was Phil Hartman. Then I've got some crazy Phil Hartman memories. But what I mean, I remember just seeing the movie Pee's Big Adventure.

Movie at that age, I'm not.

Who was it, John Peck.

John Paragot came so Phil did it like first, and then that guy came in.

And did like.

But anyway, I saw Peey's Big Adventure and found out I had an audition for this show. And I'm not sure that I really understood the difference between like real.

Life and movies.

So going on to.

Pee Wee's, going on to the set there, it was really mind blowing. But what I do remember is I fell in love with like the trick of movie making. When I found out there was a guy sitting inside Cherry, I was like.

Oh, this is so cool, and I really I really.

Got enamored with that whole thing of like you know, making a camera tricks, you know what I mean, definitely one of the aspects that also you know, made me fall in love with the whole movie making things.

So that was that was a crazy experience.

One another memory that stands out one hundred percent is uh Laurence fishburn Lawrence Fishburne.

Used to show us his tongue.

And he had some kind of crazy thing where his tongue it looks like a lizard of what It's a big triangle with like wedges, and we were.

Thinking of that.

He'd be like, check this out, and he'd go and the thing would come out to hear and wave around.

Oh my god.

Definitely something never party trick was not on my card today.

Okay, okay, stuck out for sure. If I ever meet him, you see him and I haven't seen him since, but if I ever see him again.

He'd be like, I have a memory. I'm going to need to make sure correct.

That I didn't just dream this.

That's the thing too, what of my mind's just playing tricks.

On me and has a totally normal tongue.

I have a question was was there did did Paul Rubens break character.

On the set or was he always Peek. He was always pee Wee, right, he was.

Always Peee, but a very quick story to kind of give you an idea of the kind of guy he was.

So I got the audition and it's it's.

Tomorrow, and I stayed up all night memorizing my five lines, and I'm gonna do a scene with pee.

Wee the next day.

My mom schleps me into New York, like a three hour trip, and there's all the waiting, and you know, it's five hours before I'm in a room with the guy, and mind Joe only sticks. So I get into the room and uh, Paul there, but he's not in character.

He's just Paul Rubens and he's got a beard and.

He has glasses, and I just I didn't believe it was him. And so they kept telling me that's Paul, and I'm like, listen, I know him only six right, I.

Know pee Wee. When I see pee Wee, that ain't pee Wee.

And so I gave them such a hard time because I was this kind of kid, you know. And so Paul left the room for about half hour however.

Long, and transformed himself into Pewee.

Everything costume and came back into the room as Peeley so that I could the audition, and I told him, I said, Peeley, I just got to let you know before you got here, there was some guy and he's telling everybody that he was you.

And Paul said, yeah, that was Paul. He does that to everybody.

Oh my god, Yeah he says that to people.

Wow.

That's oh God, make me feel comfortable.

I love that story.

He's a real sweetheart.

You just, Daniel, You didn't even realize what you just did.

What you just did the peewee tagline.

I love that story.

I love that's just straight upline.

Yeah, I love that. Yeah, that's great.

So then John, were you coming out out to l A for pilot season? And then if you did come out to l A, were you staying at the oak Woods?

I did do an oak Wood.

Yeah, of course he was.

That was all in New York.

Okay.

A couple of years later I came out and did the full l A pilot season at the oak Woods.

Yeah.

I think I might have come out maybe three maybe three different times, three different occasions, all oak Woods.

Maybe. Were you got oak Woods kids too?

Of course?

Where?

Yeah?

Yeah, yes, of course you're just from California day.

Yeah, we were from here, so we we had we lived here. I've lived here my whole life.

I got so Will and Ryder.

Oh yeah, nineteen ninety one, nineteen ninety two, and nineteen ninety three because it was the first season A Boy. I was still at the Oapens living there for the first season The Boy's World.

Yeah, ninety three, ninety four, So.

You got boy out of while you were living in yep, while I was rollerblading around the oak Woods.

Man, I was in the Z building my first year than the M building. Yeah, it's so quick.

I don't think it's the oak Woods anymore.

It's not. And there's no pilot season, so I went, now, it's just DIVORCEMN. So yeah, it's strained.

I knew. I knew the tennis coach at the oak Woods. You know people that don't know. It's like a little city within a city, right, Yeah, And I knew the tennis coach and his main hustle was he would give free tennis lessons and he was friends with all of the hot child actors. When oak Wood ride up, I'm sure his you know, personal life did too.

Funny.

So after Pee Wee's Playhouse.

You go into an arc on Webster, which is another slightly hallucinatory show. You played Herbert. What was your character.

I think that was just you know, Webster had like a group of friends, and I was one of them and the other one was Miambiolic.

Oh wow, Yeah, it.

Was me and Mim and all of the episodes that we were on, We're on a handful, we were kind of recurring and it was always me and her going on together.

Wow.

Similarly to p Emmanuel Lewis as Webster is like a real larger than life character to young jen xers.

What was it like to work with him?

I was like obsessed with the manual because I was a Michael Jackson fan and he used to go around with Michael all the time. Michael he would either bring an Emmanuel of the monkey bubbles.

Bubbles.

I don't know how he would pick.

But it was a little odd because he was like an adult. So when we got on the show, like he wasn't the age he was playing. I guess he was playing eleven, but he was probably eighteen or nineteen right older.

So he was very cool, but he didn't We didn't really spend a lot of time together because of.

That, because he was an adult.

But he was very nice and we still keep in touch.

On that's great.

Thanks God for Instagram. You know you can just drop anyone, Aline. I know it's it's a little annoying.

As like from the celebrity standpoint, because you know, used to be had to write somebody a fan mail and you could ignore them.

You can't do that anymore. You got to answer.

Just before what would end up being your big break, you did an episode of The Cosby Show, completing a very surreal trilogy of first gigs. It is the biggest sitcom in the universe at the time.

That job couldn't have been easy. What was that like?

It was like, you want to talk about an energy pulsating that's tangible going on that set.

It was like being in a part of something that.

Was like alive and taking and such a beautiful energy there in New York. And the first day I went for my audition, I ran into Adam Sandler because he was on the show too, and I guess he was at the production office for some but I had a whole chat with Adam and got to be friends with him and didn't even know it was Adam Sandler. Yeah, so we Adam and I go back to you know whatever year that was, was that like nineteen eighty seven?

Yes, what crazy?

Okay, So let's get into Mighty Ducks. So then Mighty Ducks comes along and you would play the iconic Goldberg. What was that audition like, did you have any hockey experience?

I had no hockey experience, but the character when I got the part, wasn't for a character named Goldberg, who was originally written to be a kid named a Tuk.

And you only had one line in the whole movie. I'm the Tuk, the goalie.

So when we got to training camp, I think the producers and you know they the writers, they got to know us a little better, and I suppose they figured with my big mouth, I'd be better suited, you know, making more remarks.

Yeah, with that dialogue.

Yeah, yeah, exactly.

When I get the part, it was just the one line, and it took us over six months of auditioning, and I must have been back five or six times.

And you guys know how it is.

You go in the room and they weren't giving me, giving me any notes or anything. So I was just going in the room and doing that, I took the goalie every time.

Oh my gosh, wait, they brought you back that many times for just that one line.

That one line.

They were probably doing like tons of mix and match sessions and they were like, which which group of kids looks the best on camera?

Yeah, when I think back, that had had to do what it was.

Oh, so you're thrown into a hockey team, albeit it's a fictional one, but you're filming in Minnesota together.

Did you guys have bonding.

Exercises and all start to have that like real team connection?

And I would say our bonding exercise was training camp because before the movie.

They had to teach us liars who told them we knew how to play, And we did a camp, a training camp that was legit right.

It was you know, eight in the morning till three every day and I think it was three months.

So where did you Where were you staying?

They put us off at like the fattest condominium situation you could ask for.

It was nice working.

It was my first like film, and it was awesome to do it for a big company like Disney.

I thought that now they would all.

Be yeah, yeah exactly, so yeah, we definitely so Not only did we have training camp, but we also did recreational stuff together.

They would put us all in the duck bus and like take us to a movie or land. So we definitely I don't know about I can't speak for the other guys, but I definitely felt like I was really part of a team, and I think that really showed in.

The in the film.

I think that's what, you know, people can relate to that. That feeling kind of probably comes off screen.

Do you love seeing people in Goldberg jerseys now so many years later?

It never gets old? Danielle ye Old, Yeah, no, it's awesome.

Did Emilio Estevez feel like your coach.

Milo, That's a really good question.

I don't know if he felt like a coach To me, he always just felt like a movie star, Okay, yeah, yeah, because Amelio was a movie star at that time, and you know, he didn't he wasn't. It wasn't you know, his personality wasn't affected in that way. But he definitely had movie star energy.

Yeah, he had that presence.

So when he was around, you know, I was always just kind of starstruck. I'll be honest with you, But he could not have been like any cooler or any you know, more down to earth and just an awesome guy to work with. He would do a couple of times he would rent out a movie theater and just.

Have us all go to watch some movie together.

He had a one come out called Judgment Night, and he took us to see that one.

I like that as a team.

That's really cool. That's very cool.

So after Mighty Ducks comes out, you become very recognizable. How does life change for you after that movie comes out?

I guess when you mentioned I guess it did change a little bit. I mean it was kind of.

A gradual thing because I was doing TV and I was getting recognized for stuff. But definitely getting recognized in public.

Was something to get used to. I enjoyed it.

I always it never bothered me in the way I see you know. I guess there are certain times where you know you're having dinner or something and it's.

A little weird. Yeah, but I always enjoyed.

Just I felt like it was a complement of the work. And I never really took personal credit for how successful The Mighty Ducks was, and I just figured that I was a part of something that was really successful, and I was very proud of it.

I guess you'd say, yeah, so great, so healthy.

A shoot was that I didn't get I didn't start the problem with me didn't start till later.

It was fantastic.

How long a shoot was Mighty Ducks? Uh?

Well so two months of camp and then maybe ninety days of a shoot.

Okay, so like full five months and then you shown for D two?

How long how long after the first one came out did you guys go back for D two?

I want to say less than a year?

Oh wow?

Okay.

So he likes to pump them out if they if they know they have a hit, it's like, let's do the next one.

Yep.

I think they got the I did have the hockey team and they were like, all right, let's let's do well.

Yeah, because it's I mean, is this the first time Ryder?

You're good with all this this Hollywood stuff, but I mean, is this the first time a fictional sporting team literally then became a professional sporting team.

I think so.

I remember the Mighty Ducks stadium and the tea and it was just like, this is crazy that Disney's going this big and making this a thing.

Like yeah, it was also it's illegal.

I started buying up the world.

But I remember that because I went to a Mighty Ducks game and I wore my Whaler's jersey, and literally the next day in my dressing room there was a Mighty Ducks jersey with a note from somebody at Disney was like, saw you at the game last night.

If you go again, please wear this. I remember, And it was like.

I was like, Okay, I guess sorry for Disney.

Did that happen after the show is on the air that Disney and ab she became Buddy.

Yeah, it was like ninety six ninety seven, so it was in the middle of our run answering. Yeah, yeah, So I want to talk Heavyweights. It's one of the darker Disney comedies ever made, written by jud Appatoo, follows a group of kids sent to a weight loss camp run by maybe one of the funniest and most psychotic performances.

Ever heard with Ben Stiller.

Stiller is Tony Purkis. How do you not break in every scene with him?

Dude? That is a great question.

It's the only time I've ever had an issue with that in my entire career, which was not a thing for me. Right but have a straight face. When Ben was doing that thing like this close to you was difficult, was difficult, and I can be honest, like Ben wasn't trying to be funny, right, he was very intense and very like scary. It was definitely a little scary. I think he wanted to have that effect on us, and I'm pretty sure it worked on everywhere.

I mean definitely how much of it was improv versus actually scripted.

I want to say almost everything he said was his own off the cuff stuff.

I mean they might have like.

Arranged it a little before the tape, you know, but so much it was all, you know, And I think that was it was like that for all of us and where we had the freedom if we wanted to go.

Off the books, and that was just amazing, you know, to have that setup.

And I think that's kind of where Judd began to develop that style of his you know, let's comedians sort of writ So yeah, definitely we were allowed.

To do that.

And it was weird because on The Mighty Ducks the directors we had were also very encouraging when it came to improvise, not improvising at living because we had a lot of scenes where it was like, you know, the ducks make their way to the limo, or the ducks make their way to the bench. You know, there's shots of a lot of us moving somewhere, and always they were always open to us picturing the lines.

Yeah, so I love that.

Yeah, And I thought that's how it would be all the time, and you know, not so much. You know, I started working on sitcoms and stuff, and you can't show up on Boy World and be like, I'd like to say this right now, can we try it?

My way?

Was Ben able to turn it off between the scenes, like was he laughing joking with you guys, or was he pretty much in character?

Ben was sitting character.

He really did, and I think you know, the way he did that was by separation, and he was he wasn't lax about it.

It was like cut, I'll be over here.

And he was very deliberate in not establishing friendly relationships with us.

Right friend on this movie.

I don't know if if that, you know, worked for him because he didn't like kids or fat kids or what.

But he definitely made.

A choice to do that and I think it worked. But on the last day of production, Uh, you know, we were out there three months and I walked up to him and I said, Ben, like I went to shake his hand. I said, this has been just the magical experience learning from you and observing for you, and I just want to thank you for an incredible shoot. And he shook my hand and said, you're welcome, and what's your name again?

Oh my gosh, was he even serious?

I don't know. Wow.

Movie is like a cult classic because it didn't really hit at the time. But I remember, like ten years later, like I guess in the early aughts, having a friend be like, you haven't seen Heavyweights.

You have to watch this movie.

It is so good and so dark and interesting ways And I remember watching it and just I want to see it again now that we're talking about it. But I remember being like, oh, yeah, this is kind of a missed masterpiece.

It's it's like really funny and interesting.

And Ben Stiller, he has this tradition of films that are very like dark and edgy, and you know, like the same with Cable Guy.

And there are movies that they didn't reach.

Like a popular audience, but we look back on them now and we're like, they were really kind of ahead of their time in terms of their comedy and what they were saying really interesting.

Guys and Geeks team was also involved in it, and you ended up being on Freaks and Geeks quite a bit. Sean, Yeah, okay, it works.

Loved you.

I loved that show and I wanted to be on and they just didn't like I really wasn't a freak and I really wasn't a geek. So really, what happened, I don't know how much into the weeds you want to get into, but what happened was at the time and I was sort of doing a day player part on there, and my manager advised me to quit the show.

What do you think the where do you think that advice came from? What do you think your manager was trying to do?

Well?

I mean I know where it came from because I was making a lot of money doing like series regular and I had just come off a series regular thing, and then I was doing a day player part and I remember him saying, how do you expect to ask people to pay you blank amount if you're going to show.

Up for nothing enough? Yeah?

And so.

I took his advice.

And you know, that's probably if I had any regrets career wise, that was probably not a good decision because I wanted to be on the show and I liked those guys right.

And it meant something.

You know, I've made smaller projects myself, and you know, when people who are with you and want to work with you, it means a lot. And when they say I don't want to be part of this, you remember that, you know, yeah exactly. So I think it it might have, you know, just affected my personal relationships with those guys.

So what are you going to do.

As a kid?

You had such an old soul aura about you and the characters that you played, very old school wise beyond your years, comedy chops.

Where do you think that came from?

I don't know.

I mean, as I mentioned before, I had older brothers and sisters, so I think I would, you know, mimic them a lot. But also people used to tell me that I reminded them of Jackie Gleason, I could see that he happened to be one of the guys that I started watching from a very young age.

So I think most of my.

Comedy, like the way in which it ended up manifesting, was influenced mostly by watching I Love Lucy and by watching Honeymooners. Yeah, so that stuff sort of has is you know, has an older time games.

It's like old timey comedy.

Exactly those rhythms, you know that that that cadence and even some of the body movements. So maybe that's that's where that came from me trying to emulate my heroes basically, but I can see that.

And then you on Boy Meets World, with your first episode being season six, You're married, You're dead, And I know you had done one episode of Charles in Charge with Michael back in nineteen eighty eight, But did you have to audition for this Boy Meets World role or was I just offered to you?

I don't think I did.

I think what happened was I was looking for jobs here and there, and somebody had had remembered that I was friends with Michael somehow, and I think my manager pitched me to him. Hey, do you have anything for him on the show? And I think he was nice enough to give me, you know that part. I mean, I'm sure I had to come in and do something and it's just handed to me, But I don't.

Remember it being like a typical audition.

Yeah, I mean, I probably just had to come in and read for them, you know that that sort of thing.

Had you ever seen Boy Meets World before?

Are you kidding?

Listen?

And this is what's crazy, because I rewatched the episode just yesterday and there's a lot of there's It's really the theme in the show that my characters talking about was really a very true to life thing for me, because well, I just got to say, you guys, you know, back then, it was like cool was the thing.

It was all about being cool, right, and you guys as.

A group were the coolest kids on the face.

Of the earth. It looked like it looked like.

And also I remember I remember being having that feeling too. When I got there. I was like, wait a second, these kids aren't trying to be cool. They're being funny, like you guys are working hard on comedy. And I remember thinking about that too, him like, well, Will is that cool? He's not trying to he's trying to be

I mean, you want to talk about getting in with the cool kids, I made it.

We did not feel cool at it all ever, so strange.

No god, no, wait a second.

You mean to tell me you're on the cover of Team Beat and that doesn't help feel make it feel cool.

No, it was the opposite for me. It made me feel like so insecure. Like you talk about getting recognized and feeling proud and like happy that you I would run away head down, like just trying. I was so insecure and freaked out.

Used to feel like a real actor. Sitcom acting wasn't the real work he wanted to be doing.

Yeah, I was.

I felt trapped on a show that didn't makes sense and it just didn't feel like me. I mean, in retrospect, we were having fun, like we loved each other and we were having fun on the set, But as far as the work itself, like I was just like, this is not my jam because I just never watched TV. I didn't know what was going on, and it just didn't feel like me. So I was incredibly insecure.

But but we were always having fun on the show.

So interesting, right, I gotta tell you, it's just the way you might have been insecure, but it just came off as I'm a movie star and I'm shy. That is so interesting to hear you say that, and what a trip. You know, things are so complicated right, totally. And one of the things that, uh, that was noteworthy for me last night was that, you know, were you watching the episode like you and Ben were a comedy team, but it seemed like Ben like he wanted you to be the straight guy.

Am I right about that?

Definitely? Definitely?

Yeah, he is the star of the show, so he was right.

Well, no, it's you know, we've been watching the show because like for me, when we're doing this rewatch podcast, is me watching the show for the first time because I never watched it and so going back, yeah, it's it's it's interesting like in the first couple of seasons that dynamic, like when when they found that that Ben and I could play off of each other. It really changed the show and it became sort of its own thing.

I think the show worked better when we were more.

Of a duo.

Do you think that was something that he like, you know, talked to the writers about.

I was just interested.

I was like, I wonder if Ben said to them, like, I want to be more you know, know.

He could just brought it. He was just such a funny guy in real life, and I think that he had such a sense of humor that they that he just kept ratcheting up this like sort of bizarre character, this different version of Corey, and then they ran with it because it really is funny, and you know, it makes for it becomes the engine of the later seasons, is like that he is this neurotic mess and that he isn't getting along in the world like that, as

Go around me going yeah yeah.

People.

People forget that how funny Ben is to the point where when I look back, I go, oh, that's right.

He's literally one of the funniest people I've ever worked with in my life. I mean, that's Ben is hysterically funny on a camera.

It got a little muddled in the middle seasons there because I think they were trying to find what Corey was going to be. But now that they've you know, for lack of a better word, unleashed him in the later seasons, he's just hysterically funny.

Oh well.

Also, there's a lot of mouths to feed on that cast.

You will you were like, bro, you were such a good actor and so funny, like the work you did in the in this episode where you're doing the whole uh you know, the Truman Show character, like.

That's the one you watched? Okay, because we were wondering which one you watch, because we we did.

The first one we did was your first episode You're Married Poker.

And I didn't see that. I didn't see that.

It's probably better that you didn't. It's not our favorite episode. You were great with what they gave you. You were great and the you know, the nothing wrong with the acting. The story was muddled and weird. But the Truman Show one. These guys don't remember that at all, and I fully remember that. I fully remember that episode, so I remember how involved I was. But when I told them we brought it up a couple episodes ago, I was like, oh, yeah, the Truman Show episode.

And they're like, what are you doing?

Remember that season is it's later this season?

Right? Yeah, it's later later six, season six.

They just really did an excellent job. And I remember watching.

You work on that, and you know there's there's a scene where there's like maybe fifty extras, right, And I remember watching you work on the scene that week, just you know, finding the comedy beats and really you know, working with the writers to get it down and then on the tape day, like fifty.

Dudes show up.

Yeah, and we have to act like they've been it all the long time.

Right, of this a strange, a strange flip.

To have happen. Man, that's hysterical.

So you didn't watch the first episode that you did, which is You're Marriage, You're Dead, and you play Louis the Lackey to Gambling Dan, an actor who appeared to be about twenty years older than you late fifties. What do you remember about your first week on the show?

What are what were your experiences?

Like, I gotta be honest, and I remembered the feeling as soon as the episode came on. I was really, I don't know how to say, hormonal, hormonal, and the chicks on that set, Danielle, I mean I was.

I wouldn't you know.

I was just when you came into the room.

My chemistry would change. I know, I how to control myself, Danielle.

And then the other girl, the redhead, I would just look so basically the whole time anybody was around, I was just like trying to keep it together and try to keep it together, and I was losing.

My mind by all like the hot.

And then in the in that episode, were there I want to say, there's somebody doing a lap dance kind of.

And the girls are sitting on us, yes, ordering stuff.

Yeah.

Yeah, So basically I'm just bursting at the seams, Danielle. The whole time, being like, I gotta go to my trailer for a minute.

Oh god, yeah, it was Pubert.

I remember that show reminded me of puberty.

Watching it, I was just like, holy man, it was like madness, madness. But I do remember you guys being very gracious and welcoming. It's kind of weird because you guys have like your little family there, and then you know, strangers come in and a lot of times, you know, I've been a regular on shows and strangers come in and they kind of act like they own the place, and it's just like there's like weird dynamics that are involved.

Well, I also remember that was the first time I'd seen you in ten years, because I remember walking onto the set and of course they don't tell us who's coming on, and I saw you and I was like, oh my god, you and I ran over gave each other a big hogs like because.

I hadn't seen you since that set in New York, right, So.

Yeah, that was you know, here you are out here, you are out in Los Angeles, you're famous on a TV show and you do.

You were you were the Mighty Ducks. Everything. It was like we made it.

The clim Yeah, well it's because we saved all that drug dealer's money and flew out here.

It worked like a charm.

Yeah, it really felt very special, like.

Really it was, you know, looking back on it, it was really a magical experience.

I hate to put it like that, but very nice.

And so now on the other side of sobriety for you, which we are all so proud of you for. By the way, how much did the allure of Hollywood and the situations we were all put in as kid actors dealing with fame play into your ability to find that scene?

Well, I mean really, when I look back on it, my my my issues really sunk in when all of that stuff went away. So I never really got into like drugs or anything while I was working, and it was when it was when I stopped working and I basically walked away from.

Things thinking that I could just you know, roll back in whenever.

And so when the life of being in movies and television, when that disappeared, I think boredom really became something that was very hard for me to deal with. You know, when there's a kid actor and you're working on stuff, there's always something. There's a press tour or a screening or something, and just the excitement of.

Showing up to work on a sitcom it's very exciting.

Right when that stuff went away, it definitely created an enormous void that I had difficulty filling. That's definitely affected me and definitely.

Was a big deal.

But maybe not in like the traditional way that people might assume exactly.

Yeah, it's actually it's not like Hollywood itself didn't lead you.

There was the absence of that in your life.

Because when I was getting into things like it was becoming hip to sort of like the clean lifestyle was taking over, like the cocaine party nights. So when I came to Hollywood, everyone was doing their best to try to be as healthy as possible.

That's true, nobody really. I never really had adults really give me anything, you know.

So I know a lot of your struggles were documented on the internet, including your mugshot and aspects of life many people face, just not in public. Did it make that entire situation harder for you to overcome? Knowing that everything was being documented, even if you didn't want it to be, Like, how did that play into your recovery?

Honestly, I think in some ways it made it a little easier, Daniel, because first of all, it made me have to surrender earlier than I might have. Because when you have, you know, stories about you on the news and the narrative really isn'tcorrect, There's nothing I could do about it from a jail cell. So I had to decide to surrender early on, which ended up being a

Sense, it's amazing.

Well, it's it's so strange because it's it, but it makes perfect sense because as somebody who was born and grown to be an entertainer, you naturally look for an audience.

And so that's just that's a very natural thing.

Because as somebody who who is a natural entertainer like you are, you want to please the audience watching you, and in this case, you're doing it to make yourself healthy. It's such an interesting dynamic of how that works as an entertainer.

It's so so strange.

Yeah, that's really brilliant, Will, because I've never nobody's ever put it to me like that, and but that's just dead on.

Maybe I thought that's amazing because that's how I feel too.

I Mean, you always want to please that audience, and using that as your key to getting healthy is just such an interesting way to.

Go at it. It's a great way to really take advantage of that's really amazing. I'm so proud of you.

It worked, you know, so it just worked luckily, you know, thankfully.

Well, we know you have been doing some stand up, you're jumping back into some projects. Does it feel good to be able to return to the thing you grew up doing?

So good? So good? I mean, Will just said it like that thing you know that you have inside to want to be an entertainer.

It never diesn't me at any rate. So being able to go do my stand up and at the same time deliver.

A message, it is just it's the best. And you know, thankfully, I'm having the time my life.

Even though forty five and things have happened, I'm in the best place that I've been, So, you.

Know, that's amazing.

Well, unfortunately, you then, right when all this is happening, you picked up and you moved to Georgia where nothing's being shot.

Hollywood.

Hollywood, get more work out there, for sure, oh man, but it's not close out here.

There's a lot of production.

I have a couple things that I have that i'd like to get off the route. One of them I'm going to give you the elevator pitch. One of them is about these signings that we do. These autograph conventions. Yeah, I have an idea where the Mighty Ducks guys and the Sandlot guys get, shall we say, by one of these promoters and decide that they're going to go get the one hundred thousand dollars cash that he has.

In this safe in his hotel room.

So with the sports team. Yes, it's a great idea.

It's a web pitch, Sean.

Where can people find you? I know, are you're on cameo?

Right?

You cameos love? My cameo is directly tied to my door dash, so.

Cameo. I love doing cameos.

And just my Instagram is just my name at Instagram, and I'm always you know, posting notices about my shows or whatever I have going on.

So that's the best way to keep in touch with.

Me Instagram at s h A U n W E I S S.

Sean.

Thank you so much for being here with us, sharing your memories and your energy and your optimism, and you're you are an inspirational man and we are lucky that you graced us with your time, So thank you.

So I can't tell you what a pleasure it's been getting up with you three and you guys all.

Look amazing or as beautiful as ever here.

I'm here too, Sean, We'll see you soon.

B bye.

Man, what a guy, what a story.

It's so strange to think about the journey, just just all of life.

I mean, the first time, literally, the first time I.

Stepped on a set that other than that one commercial I did was with Sean and it was the two of us.

Leading the leaning commercial.

Yeah my lean acting, my lackting, but just to see just the journey we've taken.

And he's forty five. I'm almost fifty. We were he were.

I mean I think I was twelve, so he was nine when we did that thing.

And it's just incredible comedic energy and he's still has it and he's just such an open uh god, he just he just shined.

He was a born entertainer. He's a born entertainer.

He was born to do this and he just he found it and they found him, and it's just it's one of those things where you look at somebody you.

Go, oh, yeah, that's why you're here. You're supposed to be entertaining.

Yeah No, there's no surprise that you You've always had it, you still have it, yep.

Yeah.

So great, well, thank you all for joining us for this episode of Pod Meets World. As always, you can follow us on Instagram pod meets World Show. You can send us your emails pod Meets World Show at gmail dot com. And we've got merch.

It is freezing in this river. Merch.

That's for you, Shanie, pod Meets Worldshow dot com.

We love you all, pod dismissed.

Pod Meets World is an iHeart podcast produced and hosted by Danielle fischl Wilfridell and writer Strong Executive producers Jensen Karp and Amy Sugarman. Executive in charge of production, Danielle Romo, producer and editor, Tara Suebachsch producer, Maddy Moore, engineer and Boy Meets World superfan Easton Allen.

Our theme song is by Kyle Morton Typhoon.

Follow us on Instagram at Podmets Worldshow, or email us at Podmetsworldshow at gmail dot com