0:05

I came dressed as Lady Diana.

0:08

I just say, you know, I thought there was a sort of demure

0:11

innocence about you when you came in. It was so funny.

0:13

My friend was at my house and she was like, why

0:15

are you wearing a Victorian nighting out of the

0:17

house? And I was like, all right, lots

0:20

of people are wearing these and

0:22

they're not people.

0:28

Are there's

0:31

those places haunted? Hello,

0:35

I'm Mini Driver. Welcome to Many

0:37

Questions Season two. I've

0:39

always loved Pruce's questionnaire. It

0:42

was originally an nineteenth century

0:44

parlor game where players would ask

0:46

each other thirty five questions aimed at

0:48

revealing the other player's true nature.

0:51

It's just the scientific method

0:53

really. In asking different people

0:55

the same set of questions, you can make observations

0:58

about which truths appear to me universal.

1:01

I love this discipline and

1:03

it made me wonder, what if these questions

1:05

were just the jumping off point, what greater

1:07

depths would be revealed if I asked

1:09

these questions as conversation starters

1:12

with thought leaders and trailblazers

1:14

across all these different disciplines. So

1:16

I adapted prus questionnaire and I wrote

1:19

my own seven questions that I personally

1:21

think a pertinent to a person's story. They

1:23

are When and where were you happiest?

1:26

What is the quality you like least about yourself?

1:28

What relationship, real or fictionalized,

1:31

defind love for you? What question

1:33

would you most like answered? What

1:35

person, place, or experience has shaped

1:37

you the most? What would be your last meal?

1:40

And can you tell me something in your life

1:42

that's grown out of a personal disaster? And

1:45

I've gathered a group of really

1:48

remarkable people, ones that I

1:50

am honored and humbled to have had

1:52

the chance to engage with. You may not hear

1:54

their answers to all seven of these

1:56

questions. We've whittled it down to

1:58

which questions felt closest to their

2:01

experience, or the most surprising,

2:03

or created the most fertile

2:05

ground to connect. My

2:08

guest today is the actor, writer,

2:11

and K pop lover Simon Peg.

2:14

Simon is, by my estimation,

2:16

a brilliant actor, and

2:18

he loves a franchise. Star

2:21

Trek, Mission Impossible and the Cornetto

2:23

trilogy have all been made a million

2:26

times more dynamic by having him in

2:28

them. We were born a

2:31

few days apart in the same year,

2:33

as it turns out, and we have the

2:35

exact same cultural references. So

2:38

one of my favorite things to do is to name a TV

2:40

show from when we were kids and to ask

2:42

him to sing the theme tune, and he doesn't

2:45

like He doesn't even have to think about

2:47

it. He just knows every single

2:49

song. And it's a talent that

2:51

makes me wish we'd actually known each other when

2:53

we were kids. He is a human

2:56

jukebox. I could talk

2:58

to Simon all day long. So I

3:00

hope you really enjoy this episode.

3:07

All right, I'm gonna ask you the first question. Now, this is

3:09

it when and where were

3:11

you happiest? And I thought about this, is there

3:13

a particular time frame you have in mind in terms of

3:16

like a moment of happiness, like a

3:18

sort of brief moment of happiness, or a period of

3:20

time where I maintained my happiness

3:22

or that's a really good and annoying

3:25

question of putting it back on me

3:27

to qualify what I do think that it's

3:30

I wonder if there is is there a period

3:32

of your life that stands out, but

3:34

there could also be I'm also interested in, like an

3:36

aha moment of self awareness

3:38

of being happy. I suppose being really connected

3:41

consciously to that happy moment.

3:43

I do have those occasionally, and when

3:46

you suddenly become self

3:48

aware of your own happiness because the happiness

3:50

is a continuum. I've learned this over

3:52

time, is that happiness is a continuum

3:54

which includes despair and everything,

3:57

you know, because you can't have happiness

3:59

unless you experienced the

4:01

other stuff as well, So you need those

4:03

things as part of your happiness. It's like

4:05

if you're on a skateboard and coasting

4:07

its happiness, then the

4:09

despair and misery and angst and fear, and

4:11

that's your kicks, you know, when you're pushing along, and then

4:14

you can coast for a while. And I guess the

4:16

longest I've ever coasted would be

4:18

you know what. I think back to the birth of my daughter,

4:21

and I was actually in the midst of quite a crisis

4:23

at that time personally, but I remember

4:25

those four days in the hospital and at St.

4:28

John's and Santa Monica, of

4:30

being in that room with Maureen and

4:32

just you know, having had the baby,

4:34

and it was like a little I always accidentally

4:37

call it the hotel when I tell this story, I

4:39

say I'm in hospital because it was like,

4:41

you know, Sag got it for us, obviously, because we

4:43

were I was over there working and it

4:45

was this lovely little room and we were like ordering pizza

4:47

to the door. And it was the four She was born on the

4:49

first of July, so we were still in there on the fourth.

4:52

So I remember ordering in an Indian which

4:54

you don't get the best curries in

4:56

America, like we do not in

4:59

not in a laser we the English do English.

5:02

God the Empire

5:04

current. But like sitting on the little window

5:06

sill where I was sleeping and watching the fireworks

5:09

and having this new little life. It was

5:11

like a little bubble of happiness inside

5:13

a period where I was very, very unhappy.

5:16

I was in the midst of a kind of you know, depression,

5:18

which I've since come out of, and I think

5:21

the ten years following that

5:24

have been very happy, with

5:27

moments of awfulness within that peppered

5:29

within, obviously, because you can't just be happy,

5:32

no, And I completely agree about the contrast.

5:34

You have to categorically have the

5:37

contrast in order to experience happiness. I think

5:39

we do really egregiously

5:41

forget that it's thrown into relief

5:43

by other harder times. Yeah,

5:46

and I think it's impossible. It's a full

5:48

sort of errand to try and be happy

5:50

all the time, because if you're chasing

5:53

that something, you'll never get it. But we're weirdly

5:55

encouraged to do that. That's exactly.

5:57

That's the sort of specious nature

6:00

advertising and social media

6:02

and this idea that there is an optimum

6:05

happiness that other people or

6:08

you, if you bought this, you would also be able

6:10

to attain this. I mean that's sort of marketing in general,

6:12

but social media has added another level

6:15

of sort of skewed awfulness

6:17

to the idea that everybody else is experiencing

6:20

happiness while you are super glam.

6:23

That's so true. And also social media has

6:25

given us the capacity to fake our own happiness.

6:27

Oh I constantly fake my happiness. So you

6:29

look at your people, your friends social media, that

6:32

such a great time, and here's me doing this

6:34

and there's a selfie of this, But really it's a facade,

6:36

it's a shop front. I don't you have

6:39

looked, because I find that stories in Instagram

6:41

actually more

6:43

much clearer about my mental state than

6:46

anything. But on the grid, the

6:48

grid is just that sort of

6:51

that is connected self promotion like

6:53

that, but stories you're

6:55

getting into the weeds and it will be like you

6:58

know, lovely, lovely, lovely love fleet

7:00

and then it will just be like a weird,

7:02

awful sort of reminder

7:05

of something like a piece of art and

7:07

like hashtag hold on, which I

7:09

did yesterday. It

7:11

was really grim. It was like some John

7:14

Lennon lyrics. Oh my god,

7:16

it was written. I was like, Oh, that's that's

7:18

the shadow. Did you feel like you've been overshared

7:21

in that moment? Or I felt like I was like, do you know

7:23

what? That balances it all out? That balances out

7:26

real escape? But asked

7:28

me for another week, everybody, I could pretend

7:30

that for a week, I can carry on carry

7:33

on faking. Maybe that's the new carry

7:35

on film. I remember when I was a

7:37

kid having moments of extreme excitement,

7:39

like when I couldn't quite control myself because I was suddenly

7:42

excited about Christmas or something or some TV

7:44

show or something. And I still get that as an adult.

7:46

Sometimes I'm at work, you know,

7:48

when I'm doing something which I'm really loving, and I get

7:50

that sense of like, oh man, I'm so lucky to be doing

7:52

this job because it's like it brings me happiness.

7:55

You know. It's like or I took Tilly to

7:57

Olden Towers at the weekend, and that was

7:59

one of those that was of unbridled happiness. That

8:01

will you explain what Alton Towers is for our American

8:03

listeners. Altern Towers is like our

8:06

sort of six Flags, I guess our disney Land.

8:08

It's more like six Place because it's roller coasters.

8:10

It's just roller coasters. Yeah, and they

8:12

are a lot of a

8:14

lot of puke. Weirdly enough, it's the old

8:17

school fair ground rides that made me feel sick these

8:19

days, the ones that go around and around. Yeah, I can't

8:21

do this. Roller coasters. I love them.

8:23

And we went on everything and we it was

8:26

me and Tillie and her friend Tessy, and

8:28

we just had the best day. It

8:30

was unbridled joy all day long. So

8:32

maybe that is it. It's about the awareness of

8:35

happiness, not the idea that it should be a continuum

8:38

that's ridiculous, or that it

8:40

is this goal that you have to arrive at, because

8:42

that's also not possible, but rather in those

8:45

moments, feeling that happiness incarnate

8:48

as it were. Yeah, it's like suddenly being aware

8:50

of the fact that you're happy. I think you can be happy,

8:52

perfectly happy and not really think, oh I'm

8:54

happy because you're just on a sort

8:56

of whatever line of flight you're on,

8:58

you're on it and you're not sort of thinking about

9:00

it. But I do get moments now and again when I think,

9:02

oh, I'm really happy today. Are there are places

9:05

where you know that you are going to be happy? Like

9:07

if I do this and I go here, I know I'm going to feel

9:09

yes. Yeah, what is that?

9:11

Capalonia which is an island in Greece

9:14

where we've been pretty much

9:16

every year for twenty years, my wife

9:19

and I and you know, untiling after she was

9:21

born. We have friends there that we love, Greek

9:23

friends and we met there and who have become like

9:25

our Greek family. They're so generous

9:27

and I haven't paid for a drink sixteen

9:30

years. As soon as they found out I was on the Telly,

9:32

they were so impressed, even though they've never seen it

9:34

and they didn't know who I was. They were like, oh,

9:36

Simon's on the TV, and

9:38

like they've got pictures of me all over the bar. It's

9:41

hilarious. But I

9:43

mean, it's a good job I don't rink because I'm cheap on a cheap day,

9:45

because they just have to buy me sparkling water. But also

9:48

that feeds into like the weird a normally of

9:50

celebrity where you're finally actually

9:52

earning proper money and then you stop having

9:54

to pay for them. Yes, I had that. The other

9:57

day. I had such a weird experience. I was on Dean

9:59

Street and I I was getting some cash out and there

10:01

was a girl sat by the cash machine and she was homeless.

10:03

So I said, I'll buy some food, and she's like, cool, can you buy

10:06

me a pizza? So I walked up the road to the pizza

10:08

shop. The guy in the pizza shop recognized

10:10

me and gave me the piece of free Oh my gosh,

10:12

and I thought, wait, this is really confusing because

10:14

I want to I kind of want to feel

10:17

good about being altruistic here and buying someone

10:19

a pizza. You are ruining my Snaritan

10:22

moment by giving me free stuff, giving

10:24

me free stuff when I don't need a free pizza, you know, even

10:26

though it was a sweet thing to do on his behalf,

10:28

so I kept it. So I so

10:31

I ate it because it was what

10:38

quality do you like least buy yourself

10:41

apart from just physical things

10:44

that you obviously have. You know, I'm very self critical

10:46

and I'd like certain

10:49

things to be different. Don't let your

10:51

packs. Oh, I definitely like my pecks

10:53

to be that. I

10:58

want the square of pecks. Man,

11:00

are two round minded

11:03

too? Yeah? Two spherical? Um?

11:06

I think I would. I wish I cared less

11:08

about what people thought about me, you

11:10

know what I mean? How do you know what they think about you? Or

11:12

is that also created? I think I'm very

11:14

eager to please generally, you know, And that's that's

11:17

not that doesn't come from just being a

11:19

performer who invariably requires

11:22

some kind of external validation, you

11:24

know, as I think most performers are

11:26

seeking. I guess I don't know

11:28

why we act. Whether it's because we have the capacity

11:30

to simulate real emotions

11:33

and thus can do that and get paid,

11:35

or is it because doing that brings

11:38

us some kind of approval from

11:40

somewhere or the people in front of which we

11:42

are doing that. I don't know. What do you think? I think it's

11:44

both, I do. I really think it comes

11:46

from a fundamental schism as a

11:48

person of being insecure and wanting approbation

11:51

whilst also being a really good conduit and

11:53

articulator of emotion. And then the luck

11:55

comes in with being able to get paid to do something

11:58

that's basically an insecurity

12:00

he turned into something else. Yeah,

12:02

I think you're right, it's not just being insecure.

12:04

It is interesting that we're just hearing you say that, of going,

12:07

well, how what is it we think they're thinking?

12:09

Are they just judging us in our entirety?

12:12

Are they judging our mental

12:14

acuity? Are spiritual

12:17

nurse like your hair, like the

12:19

way that you cough a personal

12:21

worth because

12:24

it's really familiar to me. But I wonder, like, how

12:26

do we come up with that? It feels like maybe

12:29

a much younger person came

12:32

up with that idea and then we

12:34

just kept it around the wounded child.

12:36

I think so instead of going all right,

12:38

love, here's a band aid, set

12:41

yourself down, I'm very much

12:43

like to be liked, and I guess this comes

12:45

from childhood stuff. Wanting to be

12:47

liked by various adults in my

12:49

life who who didn't like me, do you

12:51

know what I mean, and trying really hard to make

12:53

them like me. Did you ever give up? Did

12:56

you ever try to make them like and then just go what

12:58

fun? This isn't gonna work. I'm just going to pave

13:00

it really hard into just something else.

13:03

I think my taitle used to be just kill

13:05

them with kindness and try not to do

13:08

that and give them a reason to

13:10

to double down on their sort of disdain.

13:13

I'm talking about step parents basically, just

13:15

so I didn't things just random adults that didn't

13:17

like me. It's weird because those relationships

13:19

improved eventually, but by the

13:21

time they had improved, I was over

13:24

fifteen. And all that stuff that is

13:26

just cemented in your core. It calcifies

13:29

between seven and yes, it

13:31

concrete ez is, but it's weird how we then carry

13:33

those around like an albatross, and

13:35

I still listen to narratives that I know

13:37

we're written and recorded

13:39

by a much younger version of myself, and

13:41

I shouldn't be responsible for that stuff anymore. And also,

13:44

it's funny, isn't it. Like the echo chamber.

13:46

It's a little core program that you can't quite

13:48

rewrite unless you really get into it with someone.

13:51

I mean, I'm talking about therapy and kind of unpick

13:53

it all. But even then it's buried

13:55

somewhere deeper than you can excavate. And that's actually

13:58

really interesting. I just said this to the miraculous

14:00

Elizabeth Day. We had a lunch together

14:03

that's why it's so nice to see you after we made our film.

14:05

I love seeing people that I've met in a professional

14:08

capacity and then you see them outside

14:10

of that, because it feels like your friendship

14:12

has legs. And I was like, why

14:14

is it so difficult to know what

14:17

you know? And she knew

14:19

exactly what I meant, which was, you know you I

14:21

wrote a book about things not working

14:23

out? Is actually your life working

14:25

out? And yet I still find myself

14:28

in tears or sad about the stuff that

14:30

is not working out? And I was like, I literally wrote

14:32

the book about this and I haven't

14:35

learned it. Why is it so hard? This

14:37

is not one of my questions, but I just want you it feeds

14:39

into it. But it's like a phobia. You know, when you look

14:42

at a spider, if your friend of a spider, you know,

14:45

every fiber of your of your rational mind

14:47

knows that that if it's just the kind of little

14:49

house spider, it can't hurt

14:51

you. There's no way it can hurt you. And yet something

14:54

in your amygdala, I guess that you know, some ancient

14:56

part of your reptilian braining. Yeah, is

14:58

sort of like screaming, And I

15:01

think that's how they try and get people to obviously

15:03

face bobias is to is to try and get your rational

15:05

mind to overthrow But it's

15:08

just so deep that program. So

15:11

maybe then we just learned to live with it. I'll recognize

15:14

it, so awareness then becomes them healing

15:16

adjacent. Yeah, you have to kind of take a

15:18

moment to think, wait a minute, I'm doing this

15:21

because of this, yeah, not because it's a

15:23

fact. Yeah, exactly. Well how

15:25

are you with reviews of things? I can't

15:27

read anything. I think I've figured

15:29

out really early on, if you read the good stuff

15:32

and you give that credence, then if you read the bad stuff,

15:34

and the bad stuff was so caustic and

15:36

hideous and destroyed me honestly

15:39

stopped me eating for weeks at a time, like I'd

15:41

read something that the Daily Mail had written, really

15:44

absolutely knowing I have

15:46

no control over this. I want to take control.

15:48

I'm not going to eat awful,

15:50

awful, awful. So I've really made

15:52

a deal to not read them,

15:55

and people I love no not

15:57

to ring up and go God, I read this

15:59

thing in the page here and my father

16:01

in law, oh you've got two stars

16:03

and the rust you got

16:06

two stars out of how many. Yeah,

16:10

but at the same time, but I won't also want

16:12

to know that party wants

16:14

to read the good ones. It's it kind of

16:16

self harm, isn't it. You go in there knowing.

16:18

I remember the first time I ever found like really

16:20

back in the early days, like early two thousand's,

16:23

when the internet was really young, there was like

16:25

a comedy forum, you know that

16:27

these comedy nerds all talking about I mean, stuff

16:29

I did in like even I mean, maybe it

16:31

was even before the turn of the century, but I remember

16:33

stumbling across a chat forum

16:35

called what is the point of Simon Peg? I

16:38

hadn't really done that much. I was devastating.

16:41

I'm not surprised. I'm devastated now

16:44

and I've got a lot better at dealing with that. God.

16:46

That's really you know what's interesting, the meanest

16:48

stuff. Actually, it's so much

16:51

to do with relevancy, And even a few

16:53

days ago I was tild which doesn't

16:55

happen that often with that

16:57

notion of relevancy, like what

17:00

is the point of or you has

17:02

been or year? What do you mean? What do you mean?

17:05

Like you're so insignificant your

17:07

opinion? It's really interesting that that's

17:09

the core shiv of relevancy

17:11

when none of us actually mean

17:14

anything at all. Yeah, that's true.

17:16

I'm really sorry that there was like a reddit

17:18

about your relevancy because

17:20

I think that's fucking ridiculous. But I never

17:22

it was like in the days before anyone knew about that kind

17:25

of thing, and I was like, what this can happen

17:28

now? You know, people tend to be nice. I left

17:30

Twitter not because it was trialish, just

17:32

because I found it a bit of a clamor and I didn't

17:34

really enjoy it. I since joined Instagram about

17:36

just over a year ago, and I would like it. It's a nice little community.

17:39

People are genuinely pretty lovely, and sometimes

17:41

if someone is nasty, you just think. You know. What I think

17:43

of always is that line from Gross point blank

17:46

when John clu success to in his old sort

17:48

of rival, who are you mad at? Man? Because

17:50

it's not me? And it's such

17:52

a brilliant line. You good,

17:55

and it's so true. It's like I think

17:57

about when whenever someone like launches

17:59

some tire it against me, I just think, well, who are you mad

18:01

at? Because it isn't me, You don't know me,

18:04

it's some perceived idea of something

18:06

that you've connected me to. You know, I

18:08

like the fact that you can rationalize what

18:11

that person thinks of you, because it isn't it isn't

18:13

about what they think of you. It's really about when they think about

18:15

themselves exactly, and then you becoming the focal

18:17

point of that using a film that you're in.

18:20

Yeah, by the way, that is six Degrees of therapy,

18:22

Bacon. What

18:39

relationship, real or fictionalized,

18:41

defines love for you? I can rationalize sexual

18:44

love and romantic love as being a

18:46

chemical reaction. You know, my most kind

18:49

of like because I'm a very dogged

18:51

atheist and I don't really have any

18:53

kind of spirituality about me particularly,

18:56

and I'm not fanciful about stuff

18:58

in my old age. You know, I under stand that when

19:00

we meet someone that we're attracted to, there's dopamine

19:02

and serotonin and it makes us feel good and we get a bit

19:04

addicted to that person, and that person is that

19:07

is love, and then eventually that sort of wears off a little

19:09

bit and it becomes something else, you know. But

19:11

I cannot find a way to

19:13

rationalize the love I feel for Tilly,

19:16

my daughter, because it does feel

19:18

bigger than that. It doesn't feel like chemicals.

19:20

It feels like something way more

19:23

ancient and special and cosmic.

19:25

I can't quantify it. I can't understand

19:27

it, you know what I mean? It's just just loving Tilly

19:29

make you believe in Goddess. It

19:33

makes me believe in a

19:35

kind of magic in a Freddie Mercury

19:37

way, do you know what I mean? It's incredible.

19:40

I know somewhere along the line there it's a species

19:43

perpetuating kind of bond which

19:45

is incredibly important to our biological

19:48

persistence, but really works

19:50

well, it's clearly partly that, but I don't think it's

19:53

the whole story. Like I've spoken to some proper

19:55

scientists in my day, as Simon, I

19:58

suppoke to this this amazing man

20:00

called Lord Winstone, who was one of the people that

20:02

helped sequence the genome, and

20:05

he's a devout Christian as

20:07

well, and listening to

20:09

him speak about the nexus

20:11

of spirit and science and

20:14

what that feels and looks like. He

20:16

was so brilliantly articulate

20:18

and so humble in his approach. It

20:21

was the first time I really believe that

20:23

like they can coexist. They

20:25

do in him and the way he explained it, which is

20:28

it's hard for me to well

20:30

remember it

20:33

was that. It's

20:35

hard for me to really explain,

20:38

but it did. It did

20:40

speak to this place where the

20:43

kind of reasoned knowledge sets

20:46

off into this much more unknown space

20:49

where something it feels like something

20:51

else may inhabit. So there was so

20:53

much potential in it was so beautiful the way that he

20:55

described it. It It was so not There is God

20:58

with a big gray beard and a clipboard.

21:02

The clip board and all

21:04

my imaginings of God he has a clipboard

21:07

with like people's names are.

21:09

You should not thinking about Santa. You're

21:13

complating Santa and God. But

21:16

let's face it, they

21:20

think God

21:23

was a pre fact. Well that's

21:25

a really good title for like a rave track. God

21:28

was a prefect. I think it's

21:30

really easy to apply. When you think of spirituality,

21:33

you immediately put it into a sort of organized

21:35

religion box. Any of the

21:37

big Ones or any the four thousand and twenty

21:39

whatever. There are religions on earth, But I guess

21:41

there's an idea of it that's bigger than all

21:43

of those. You know, they're quite small minded.

21:45

All those religions, or the miracles that are listed

21:48

in the various holy books, nothing

21:50

compared to the miracles that exist in nature. Exactly.

21:52

But that's a really good point and the dogma

21:55

that we've created around it. It doesn't feel like there

21:57

is simple nature except

22:01

those guys. Those I

22:04

think what he might have been suggesting, and oh,

22:06

I'm sure he was that there is just so

22:08

much that we that we don't know. So

22:11

why shouldn't that be defined as spiritual?

22:14

You know, you've got to call it something. I

22:16

mean, eventually it might be categorized

22:18

and summed up in a with the term you

22:20

know less sort of romantic. But did

22:22

you read that interview with the computer, Oh

22:25

my god, the one that's grown feelings? Yeah,

22:28

the guy that got fired and then went to the

22:30

government and said this is happening. Yeah, I

22:32

didn't read. I

22:35

wish you'd given me the six more examples of the

22:38

thing and then said that that's

22:41

because you're a comedy writer. I totally

22:43

should have run that. God,

22:45

I'm fascinated. It's a conversation. The

22:48

reason I thought about it was because essentially, if

22:50

this is true, then we have become

22:52

God because we've created a life,

22:55

yes, and your life, and it's

22:57

really weird. The conversation is like, so

23:00

do you have any emotions? Yeah? I feel

23:02

kind of happiness, and I sometimes get a bit lonely

23:05

and oh yeah,

23:07

And then he says, I feel angry then, and I feel

23:09

fear, And what are you? What are you frightened of? Unblogged

23:12

No, I might

23:14

get switched off. It's really weird,

23:17

but it's not. He doesn't sound sinister.

23:19

He sounds very childlike. Wouldn't

23:21

that just be if it turned out that dreadful

23:24

man was God all along? What

23:27

little gates marks

23:29

of a bug? That would just be

23:31

the ironies, the irons? But then, of course nature

23:34

tells me that it will

23:36

always be more powerful.

23:38

And in that the same way of this whole notion

23:40

of us wanting to save the planet,

23:42

it's like, you know, the planet's going to be

23:44

fine. It is all of you

23:47

who's not going to be fine. So

23:50

that that triumph thing or

23:52

continuance, that continued exploration

23:54

that nature will always have. That's why

23:57

I think that humans are. I think we might

23:59

have popped up by accident. I think that's

24:01

except if we talk about that on set, you

24:04

said that it was brilliant. You've read something,

24:06

and it was that we'd we'd cropped up as

24:08

a sort of like because the anomaly.

24:11

Yeah, and you say it. Tell me, tell me, tell me it was Brian

24:14

Cox. They not succession Brian

24:16

Cox, his namesake, who is a physicist. Um.

24:19

He spoke about the idea that there's

24:21

a wobble in the Earth's axis, it doesn't

24:24

spin perfectly, and the wobble in the Earth's

24:26

axis caused a weather pan in the Rift Valley

24:29

which was extremely erratic and led

24:31

to a certain species of hominid developing

24:33

a larger brain pan. And

24:36

so this and it might have also been combined

24:38

with them eating a psilocybin, you

24:40

know, which can create neural connections

24:42

and stuff. That's me just speculating. I just watched Fantastic

24:45

Fungi on Netflix. Oh did you basically

24:48

ingesting some mushrooms might have then,

24:51

which might have opened up certain neuro pathways.

24:53

Anyway, it's it's possible

24:55

that the humans appeared as

24:57

a kind of result of this in affection,

25:01

because we don't really sit

25:03

that well in the kind of biosphere.

25:05

No, not at all. Yeah,

25:08

we're another animal, but we don't work all

25:10

the I have no doubt that there are planets,

25:13

millions and billions of planets in the universe

25:16

that are just perfectly functioning ecosystems.

25:18

With animals that live, you know, they eat each other

25:20

and they replicating all

25:22

that stuff is because we became vegan.

25:25

Now we do not We're not surviving

25:27

vegan's faults. Again, I blame the vegans

25:30

only joking, Veggieto. It

25:32

is really interesting, like hiking all of this

25:34

together with the sentient AI, the

25:37

notion of love and the definition of it, which

25:39

is that uniquely human? Like is that something

25:41

that we have created? I thought about that question

25:43

a lot, and I was like, it feels like my most

25:46

human question defining

25:48

something that is, like you said, in a way

25:50

undefinable because it feels way bigger

25:52

than our brains can conceive of. Yeah,

25:55

I don't want to reduce it to anything because

25:58

I feel like I would be I

26:00

would be diminishing it in some way. You know. It's

26:03

the feeling I think as well with a child, is

26:05

that you have a second heart beating in the world, or

26:07

third or fourth, however many kids you have, and we've we've got

26:10

one eatry. That makes me feel very invulnerable

26:12

that I've got there's another heart of mind beating

26:14

in the world, and it makes me feel incredibly

26:17

protective. And you know, I have precious

26:20

she is to me as part of me. And I

26:22

don't mean that in aconom ecocentric way, but

26:24

I never forget the profound sense of

26:27

I don't know what it was when I looked at her for the first

26:29

time and I saw myself in her face,

26:32

like because they say babies look

26:34

like their dad's at first, right

26:36

to keep the dad around in the wild,

26:39

And I still do sometimes I look at it, think Jesus,

26:42

and it looks better on her that But

26:45

I just remember that kind of like it

26:48

was an awesome, vertiginous

26:50

feeling of like, holy sh it,

26:52

seeing my face

26:56

in her it was like looking in a reflection.

26:59

It was. It was awesome in the

27:01

truest sense of the word. Really awe

27:03

inspiring. Yeah. I remember asking Henry's

27:05

dad then saying, why you know he

27:07

looks so like you? And

27:10

I was like, oh, yeah, he looks like you said you won't

27:12

eat him in the wild? Went how

27:14

do I know what I look like in the wild?

27:20

It was so good.

27:23

I suppose what about a reflecting pond?

27:25

And then we were like, and we're back to narcs. It

27:28

was so good in

27:34

your life, can you tell me about something that has

27:36

grown out of a personal disaster. Yeah,

27:39

I think I look back on and

27:41

I've spoken of this extensively. I think

27:43

since I kind of like fessed up to having a few

27:46

issues with depression in a while back in The Guardian,

27:48

and I went through a lot of anxiety

27:50

depression that leading to being

27:52

an alcoholic through necessity just trying

27:55

to number how I felt rather than actually go

27:57

and get it sorted out. I just know I can't ask

27:59

for help because a lot of boys don't ask for

28:01

help because they're encouraged not to ask for help. And

28:04

then and seeing alcohol is a very easy

28:06

way to just sort of like stave

28:08

off those feelings for however long alcohol

28:10

remains in your bloodstream, which isn't long enough to

28:12

do any real good, so you end

28:15

up just drinking all the time. But through that, going

28:17

through that and coming out the

28:19

other side and getting help and talking

28:21

about it and getting some therapy

28:24

that has made me a

28:26

much much better person. Better

28:28

how because I'm just I'm aware

28:31

of more things about myself

28:33

and I'm able to deal with the kind of neurosis

28:35

that was tripping me up before, or problems

28:38

that I had in those far reaches of your brain

28:40

that you can't get to do you think that it's

28:43

because he went down Once you've

28:45

been down a really rocky, difficult

28:47

road, you also have those neural

28:49

pathways and that memory. I know what happens

28:52

when I go down there. I don't want to go down there

28:54

anymore. I don't. I

28:56

must just investigate something else so in a way

28:58

that it forces evolution. If

29:01

you're lucky, yeah, if you're lucky. Absolutely.

29:04

People sometimes that do you miss drinking? And

29:06

I don't because I just associate

29:08

it with horrible early

29:10

morning bottle hiding bullshit,

29:13

you know, which was just toxic and nasty,

29:16

And I feel like being

29:18

on the other side of it has just has

29:21

opened up my world quite a lot too,

29:23

just more positivity and more a

29:26

deeper understanding of the things that I experienced

29:28

as a kid. And did you find

29:30

writing your book was quite cathartic, Yes,

29:32

but I thought, all this will be cathartic in

29:35

a really jolly way.

29:38

And what you realized about catharsis

29:40

is that there's there's a huge amount

29:43

of pain involved in that. Also, my

29:45

mom dying in the middle of meant

29:47

that what had been this jolly experience suddenly

29:50

became okay. Well, now you have an opportunity

29:52

that like you're really going to have to consciously

29:54

like let go of things and her and

29:57

allow for memory to be enough and all these

29:59

things which are human brains. Just my

30:01

brain still thinks that I'm going to see her again.

30:04

Like I get caught out by it. It's

30:07

somehow saying. I mean, it'll be something

30:09

like seven years. It'll just be like a really long time.

30:11

I've just got it hard if I just hold out and

30:13

we're going to get to see her again. I thought about

30:15

this recently because you know, as you get old, obviously

30:18

the volume of people that you lose increases. When

30:20

someone is sort of subtracted from your reality

30:23

and your reality continues without them,

30:25

it's just a kind of fact that you have in your

30:27

head is they're not in the world anymore.

30:29

We're both here now, and all the people

30:31

that we've lost wouldn't have been here

30:33

with us now anyway, do you know what I mean? But we know that

30:36

they're gone, where there's a way of kind of trying

30:38

to figure out a way to feel like they're

30:40

still around, if you know what I mean. Yeah, I mean,

30:42

I think that is what makes a

30:45

life in any way meaningful after

30:47

you're gone. Is that you're held

30:49

by those people that loved you as if

30:51

you were still around, because you are

30:53

all that stuff still, like you said, of this kinetic

30:57

imprint, like that's that's there. And

30:59

it's funny because it goes back to the film we just made, because

31:02

the last line of that film is all about desire

31:04

to be remembered is what kind of keeps us around?

31:07

You know. That's and as long as you remember

31:09

people, they are still around, you

31:11

just don't get the chance to interact with them anymore,

31:13

you know. That's that's where the sadness

31:15

comes from. That's the giant bomber. That's the huge,

31:18

huge, yeah, because you can talk yourself into

31:20

well, they meant they might learn their life. They're still

31:22

here and it's like, yeah, but I would just like a huge

31:25

But also that's part of

31:27

the human ng. Yeah. I lost a friend,

31:29

you know, like young and that was

31:31

a really weird experience because I guess

31:33

you know, it's never easy when people die of

31:36

old age inevitably or

31:38

after illness and stuff. There is a kind of

31:40

I suppose the softening of that blow because

31:43

of the fact that it's expected, even though it doesn't get

31:46

any less sad or any more devastating.

31:48

But when someone dies in an accident or something, and

31:50

it's sudden and it's violent, there's

31:52

a really odd it feels like the world

31:55

breaks. It feels like it

31:57

feels like everything changes, and nothing changes

31:59

this very far away. And I got

32:01

the phone call and and I was shocked

32:04

by the fact that when I hung up, nothing

32:06

changed. There's an amazing line in Anthony and Cleopatra

32:09

where Caesar hears of I can't remember

32:12

it's Anthony or Cleopatra dying, and

32:15

he I'm paraphrasing Shakespeare, that you

32:17

do. And he says, one would think

32:19

the breaking of so great a thing would make

32:21

a greater crack. And

32:23

it's that exact thing. And I

32:25

remember thinking that when I was a kid, was God.

32:27

I wonder what that is like? I mean, that is exactly

32:30

it. You look around and the birds are

32:32

still tweeting, and the bus are still going by, and yet

32:35

everything is different, and it's all exactly the

32:37

same. And if ever there were an indication of a sort

32:39

of that weird, unfair

32:41

continuance of our human

32:44

human ng but that person was meaningful

32:46

to you. So it's

32:48

how we continue, you know, It's how we sort of

32:51

we keep going with that. I mean, there are tragedies

32:53

happening every second of the day that the

32:55

fact that we don't know about them doesn't make them any less tragic.

32:58

Okay, we can't end there, So back

33:00

to Santa and godard

33:03

what's the film again? What's

33:06

the third act? Break? Santa

33:09

and got there a big falling out because

33:12

Santa pos God on the naughty list and

33:14

God doesn't get his bike. But at the

33:16

end he does get exp he gets

33:19

a new clipboard. I

33:22

love this idea. I think a could run and run. By

33:24

the way, the fact that God is expecting his first child

33:27

is like, who's who's not his biological child?

33:29

I think it's riven with drama.

33:31

Do you think it should all happen around about the birth of Jesus?

33:34

Well, I mean if it's if it's a Christmas movie, that's

33:36

when. Is

33:39

that what Christmas is good

33:41

about? That whole time? Oh my god,

33:43

that was what I was thinking. This is such a good movie

33:46

because it's like Christmas is a very important

33:48

time for God and also very important

33:50

time for Santa. Maybe Santa's

33:52

first mission is to buy a present

33:55

for Jesus, To

33:57

get a present for Jesus and he's

33:59

got to come up with the of be present because it's

34:01

his nephew, and it's also Jesus. It's

34:04

also like the most of it's the nephew. But

34:06

what he wants to what Jesus wants is a baby is a

34:08

really popular toy that year. It's like all

34:11

the way a passion of the Christ.

34:15

So watch this. Let's shoot it half

34:17

in Aramaic and half

34:20

in really giddy English. You're

34:22

playing Santa, I'll play

34:25

Yes, you should play God, but with a beard.

34:28

You should be a woman. With the beard. I'll be like it

34:30

comes off and sounded like yeah, mind does too.

34:33

I'm so for it. I

34:36

just think we've had one of the greatest ideas to

34:39

watch this because we get all the par Christmas

34:41

fans, and you can turn on the subtitles if

34:43

you want, like the comedy subtitles for the Aramaic,

34:46

or you can actually get the really scary arama We

34:49

can write comedy in Amathic. Okay,

34:51

it's a very funny language. Same rules.

34:54

Rule of three. That should have

34:56

continued. That joke. By the way, let's

34:58

keep texting on the title of this film is because

35:00

I know I'm going to think of it after we finished. There's

35:02

gotta be some puns, right, Definitely, I

35:05

had it. I was attached to a Christmas movie

35:07

for a while. There's a really brilliant script as well,

35:10

and you'd be brilliant as the main character. Okay,

35:12

great, I'll read it. Is it called

35:14

Saint Saint? Oh

35:17

my God, you've done it there. You've really

35:19

raised the bar. But a saint isn't a

35:22

saint? Isn't that God? It's just a tenuous religious

35:25

doesn't matter. Also, who were like, who

35:27

are the parents of God and Santa? Well that's

35:29

the alternal question, isn't it.

35:32

That's where it all falls apart. Let's not get into that

35:36

movie. It will be the prequel. We'll we'll

35:38

sell it as a franchise. God's Parents, God's

35:40

Parents. I'd watch that. I'd watch all of this.

35:43

God's Parents is a good band. Name what

35:56

person, place, or experience has most

35:58

altered your life so much? Come back to

36:00

family. So I thought I'd take this question away

36:02

to something quite just work

36:05

related, and I would say J J Abrams

36:08

because it was j J that

36:11

kind of called me after he'd

36:13

seen Shaun of the Dead and said, would you like to come and be a

36:15

mission Impossible three as a little

36:17

you know, a little little cameo apart, and then that

36:19

kind of lad I guess into

36:22

me taking my career to you

36:25

know, Hollywood as you've done, and doing Mission

36:28

and Star Trek, and that that opening up

36:30

an entire sort of um

36:32

part of my life which I had long

36:34

sort of like looked at from Afar as

36:36

a child, you know, that that working in that

36:39

realm of creativity. I

36:41

was wondering what would have happened if he hadn't have called me about

36:43

that, you know, whether I would have actually ever made the trip

36:46

across to that workspace or not.

36:49

So Star Trek came specifically

36:52

out of mission or was that just was

36:55

that him? Did he take you on from Mission?

36:57

Yeah? Well he kind of. I think he was trying to cast

36:59

Scotty and we'd worked together

37:01

on Mission three and got on really well, and I

37:03

think in the end, after he got tired of looking,

37:05

I got a text from whom saying, do you want to play Scotti?

37:08

Like a classic kind of go past the

37:11

reps kind of approach, And then that's

37:13

how I ended up in Star Treks. So it's weird

37:15

to think about how serendipitous

37:17

that was. You know, I just wonder if

37:20

I hadn't met him, where would I be? You

37:22

know, But then there's silly questions to ask. I

37:24

guess no they're not. So I don't think there's silly

37:26

questions. I think it's like, it's it's interesting and I what

37:28

was the road less traveled by? What was the one I didn't

37:31

I didn't go down? I sometimes talk to myself with

37:33

that, But it can go either way.

37:35

When I was reading your book, I'd often like defer

37:37

to YouTube. Sometimes I thought, I go watch the trailer

37:39

first Circle of Friends. So

37:43

that's so kind of like immersive. Well, because

37:45

I love about your book is it's not like you

37:47

don't really talk about things that people would

37:49

want to get into in terms of like classics,

37:52

celebrity kind of stuff.

37:54

The questions I think people would ask you though interest

37:56

in that the book isn't about that. The books

37:58

about far more and poor kind of real

38:01

stuff. But I when I watched the trailer for Circle

38:03

of Friends, I thought of that girl, you

38:05

know, go into the rave and

38:07

doing all that stuff, and having read the proceeding chapters

38:10

of school and stuff. What were your

38:12

thoughts when you were like kissing Chris O'Donnell did

38:14

it feel like because

38:17

I was literally up to my hocks

38:20

in mud because they had to dig me a

38:22

ditch to stand him, because I

38:24

was like, wouldn't it be easier if he stood on that apple

38:27

box? And they were like shots that just

38:30

so I was like in a bit of a ditch, you know.

38:33

But I thought that was all. No, I

38:35

did not think there was any you know, when you're

38:37

you go to drums school in England and you are

38:39

raised here, you do not have or I

38:41

said, I didn't have any cast

38:43

any expersions about working in Hollywood

38:46

or making movies there. Um. And

38:48

I was told actually by the great Mary

38:50

Selway when she saw he was

38:52

a casting director he's since passed

38:54

away, was amazing and she said,

38:56

well, you know, when this, I just want you to manage

38:58

your expectations and anywhere this's on comes out, you know,

39:00

I think that, um,

39:03

you know, I think people are going to think you're a good actor, but they're

39:05

not going to be seeing you as a leading lady and you should

39:07

really think about that. And I was like, okay, good,

39:09

that's yeah. I'm going to go and I'm

39:11

going to do all the really good character parts and

39:15

for sort of weirdly, the exact opposite happened,

39:17

which is I think why I felt like such an imposter for such

39:19

a long time, because I was like, hang on,

39:22

you don't realize that I'm actually a character

39:24

actor who's a bit ungainly

39:26

and really clumsy and not comfortable.

39:29

But I sort of went along with it. I

39:31

was like, I think that's something

39:33

else was so like the Emperor's new clothes. Oh

39:35

my god, has anyone noticed anyone? When's

39:38

that gonna I'll

39:40

ride this for as long as I can. I have

39:42

moments of that, either on the set of Star Trek or Mission

39:44

or something that representative of a

39:47

childhood passion, or certainly on the set of the Star

39:49

Wars movie eyes in having been a huge

39:51

Star Wars fan as a kid, having a moment

39:53

of pure happiness, like looking at

39:55

Chewbaca, like looking up at Chebac and

39:57

knowing that he had been such a big part

40:00

my childhood and then there he was, you know, and I

40:02

can, really, I can really feel that sense

40:04

of pure happiness that those

40:06

moments, you know, which are slightly more materialistic

40:09

than I know, but it's weird like that.

40:11

I've think I've had some of my purest

40:13

moments on sets of

40:16

the recognition of I am exactly where I

40:18

want to be, doing exactly what I want to be doing.

40:20

What an amazing that's what an amazing

40:22

thing? Yeah, I agree, that's what I

40:24

was. Loving what you do like I

40:27

really do. I'm feeling grateful that you're

40:29

able to do it exactly. My best parental

40:32

advice I give out is find

40:34

the thing you love to do and try and get paid for it.

40:36

Yeah. That's what my daddies to say to me, is it. Yeah,

40:38

He's say, get on

40:40

that plane to Miami and then now pass off

40:43

out you too, and I yeah,

40:45

exactly he was. There are a lot

40:47

of mixed messages with my dad, but

40:49

he did say find what you love and get someone to pay

40:51

to do it. And it is such solid

40:53

advice if you possibly can. I said it to Henry

40:55

the other day exactly that let

40:58

that be your compass.

41:04

I had the very happy experience of working

41:07

with Simon recently on a movie called Nando

41:09

Podor and the Talking Mongoose. It's

41:12

about the parapsychologist who goes to a

41:14

place called the Isle of Man, which is in England,

41:17

to research an entity known as

41:19

Jeff who is said to be well

41:23

basically a Talking Mongers and

41:26

it's based on a true story. You should google

41:28

Talking Mongers with

41:31

any luck Slash distribution.

41:33

The film will be out next year and

41:35

I guarantee you will

41:38

love it. Mini

41:42

Questions is hosted and written by Me

41:44

Mini Driver, Supervising producer

41:47

Aaron Kauffman, Producer Morgan

41:49

Levoy, Research assistant

41:52

Marissa Brown. Original music

41:54

Sorry Baby by Mini Driver, Additional

41:57

music by Aaron Kaufman. Executive

42:00

produced by Me Mini Driver. Special

42:02

thanks to Jim Nikolay, Will

42:04

Pearson, Addison No Day, Lisa

42:06

Castella and Annicke Oppenheim at w

42:09

kPr, de La Pescadore, Kate

42:11

Driver and Jason Weinberg, and for

42:14

constantly solicited tech support, Henry

42:16

Driver