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The Adam Friedland Show

JOHN C. REILLY Talks Step Brothers, Empathy, New Album

09 Jan 2026

Transcription

Chapter 1: What is the main topic discussed in this episode?

0.031 - 17.257 Adam Friedland

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17.277 - 41.229 Adam Friedland

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41.549 - 43.932 Adam Friedland

Warning, this product contains nicotine.

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43.972 - 70.588 Unknown

Nicotine is an addictive chemical, guys! That's the first ad I've ever read straight through.

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71.935 - 75.77 Adam Friedland

You're 6'11". 6'2". 6'2"? That's nice, dude.

76.895 - 83.697 Unknown

For Hollywood, that's a Hollywood 6'8". Well, people over six feet don't actually care about how tall they are.

83.717 - 97.957 John C. Reilly

Oh, they don't care. It's the shorter people that are like, I'm 5'8 and a half. 5'8 and a half is, I would, I'm a, thank God I'm 5'10. Every inch is so like. I used to put 5'10 on my resume because I didn't. That is so annoying.

97.977 - 98.718 Unknown

I hate that.

98.778 - 110.865 John C. Reilly

You wanted to be below six feet so you didn't seem too tall. My culture is not a costume, sir. You can't. Well, I imagine like actors... You're a real culture warrior. I didn't know that.

Chapter 2: How does John C. Reilly reflect on his career and roles?

657.766 - 664.673 Unknown

Amateurs. Yeah, and they thought she was like... They almost treated her like one of the adults or something. She got bullied.

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664.653 - 666.396 John C. Reilly

It sounds like she got a little bit, yeah.

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666.537 - 667.378 Unknown

A little bit, it sounds like.

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667.398 - 692.122 Adam Friedland

Yeah, it's interesting, because actually when I had a partner, Nick, who worked on the show with me, and he's now doing other stuff, but we directed kids. Nick wrote this short that we made, and it was amazing, because the kids, communicating intention to a child actor, And a kid understanding emotion and intention is really difficult, because you have to be really emotionally intelligent, right?

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692.402 - 711.046 Adam Friedland

And the kids we had on it got it, and it was really incredible to see it. And also to see Nick communicating it over to them. And when you watch Disney Channel, they're like, Today I went to the store. You know, they can remember the words, but it's difficult.

711.066 - 719.234 Unknown

They're like little robots. Yeah, yeah. And they've been practicing with their parents all day. Yeah. I've directed a lot of children's theater, actually. I wanted to go there.

719.334 - 733.287 Unknown

I've worked with kids from all ages in theater, and it's an amazing experience to watch someone, like the therapeutic qualities of theater and acting, like with little kids that are not necessarily, like I did this at a Waldorf school once,

733.267 - 760.81 Unknown

and it was part of the curriculum it wasn't like these kids wanted to be actors like maybe maybe one of them had some interest or something but all the other kids it was just what they had to do for class so i watched how acting can like bring someone out of themselves and and we used to cast the plays in that way too like like you know we did like uh we do like norse myths or like greek stories or whatever and one of them was thor betrayed and all the kids were like oh

760.79 - 778.34 Unknown

Oh, no, so-and-so. Adam should be Thor. Adam should be Thor. No, certainly not. I don't have it. But we wouldn't pick that kid. We would pick the kid who needed to be Thor. Yeah, yeah. because there was something about him that needed to grow and so we let him be Thor and suddenly, you know, anyway, it was really beautiful.

Chapter 3: What insights does John C. Reilly share about empathy and creativity?

1036.978 - 1038.42 Adam Friedland

The fact that we were all together,

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1038.518 - 1054.376 Unknown

I think Paul asked his dad shortly before we made that movie, so it was definitely coming from a personal place with him. Yeah. The question people always ask me about that movie is like, what's up with the frogs? Why the frogs? Why the frogs? Well, the first thing is that it's real. Frogs do fall out of the sky.

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1054.717 - 1068.753 Unknown

Philip Baker Hall, who was in that movie, experienced a rain of frogs in the 50s in Germany where he was working for the government. Anyway. He was a spy? Yeah, he worked for like the precursor to the CIA. What was it called?

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1068.773 - 1071.74 Adam Friedland

The Naval Intelligence.

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1071.78 - 1095.992 Unknown

Yeah, they had another name for it before. In post-war Germany, he would drive around and do the government's bidding. Those guys had amazing lives. But the point is that Frogs falling out of the sky makes about as much sense to a person as getting hit by lightning or your father or mother getting cancer. It doesn't make any sense. It's chaos. It's this thing that happens to us.

1096.573 - 1117.546 Unknown

And I think Paul's never explained to me what he felt the metaphor was. To me, that's what it is. Like, your father dying of cancer, like, well, my father died of cancer. And, you know, I asked the doctor, like, so what is it? And they were like, well, it's a tumor, blah, blah, blah. And I was like, so what is that? Why did it happen?

1117.566 - 1121.573 Unknown

He's like, you know, I realized, like, you don't know anything.

1121.733 - 1122.174 Adam Friedland

They're idiots.

1122.194 - 1125.259 Unknown

This is very primitive where we are with this.

Chapter 4: What are the themes of John C. Reilly's new music project?

4214.02 - 4227.525 Unknown

We're both the same age. I don't know. I had a lot of respect for Phil. We did a show on Broadway, True West, together. I know. I was going to ask about it. They have to go. No, they have to go. They have to go to the airport. There's just no negotiating with airplanes.

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4227.505 - 4257.343 Adam Friedland

please yeah I appreciate your time and it's weird to throw the Phil Hoffman thing at the end but I hope you've enjoyed it yeah it's funny that you mention it because I was just I was doing some earlier interviews and other people mentioned him too but yeah you know one of the all time greats I associate you with like an ensemble I think because of all the PTA movies yeah we were part of that ensemble together definitely it was kind of like a crew that was like oh these are the best but yeah if you say so thank you Adam

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