Deep Dive
Shownotes Transcript
The Jan Arden Podcast is brought to you by Senecote, the number one most trusted laxative by Canadian shoppers. Well, this is a very, very, very huge day here at the Jan Arden Podcast. I'm here with Caitlin Green, Adam Karsh. Whee!
We have a sponsor. We have a sponsor today. It's our hundred and... We're well into the hundredth. Listen, we really are excited. We do have a sponsor today. And it's something that I have used many times in my life. Not embarrassed to say it. I'm just going to come out right now and tell you guys, Santa Cod. Raise your hand if you've had, you know, if you've had a few, you know, moments in your life where you've had a sponsor.
When you haven't been able to do your daily constitutional. That's what my grandmother used to say. You know, the daily constitutional. My English friend, Nigel, says I'm going to go post the mail. And that always makes me laugh. You can't see us all raising our hands, but we are. We're all raising our hands. When he stays with me just outside of Calgary here, you know, he gets up, has his coffee. We'll be right back.
in the middle of a conversation. Oh, got to go post the mail. Like, I'm like, were we not just talking? He goes, no, I can't miss the window of opportunity. It is so small. I have to go now. So I am beyond happy and beyond thrilled because you know, me at the show, me and Adam and Caitlin, we like to talk about things that you want to hear about.
So I'm happy to have you join me today. Join us today. Hey, stop looking at me that way, Adam. You're in on this too. Okay. Join me today as we break the poo taboo. You heard it, folks. The poo taboo. And there is a poo taboo. And share the scoop on poop around occasional constipation. Okay? So get ready because we're going to tell you how you can help yourself. I'm helping myself right now.
Anyway, Senacot is, it really is an amazing product. And we, and it is for the occasional, you know, times when you can't go to the bathroom. And it's an overnight product. So you take it, you sleep on it. You don't even have to think about it. You go to bed, you have a cup of tea, you have a glass of water, whatever. You do your nightly routine and you wake up. Trumpets play. Yeah.
But, yeah, and it's something you can feel good about doing. And I know I've told you guys this story before, and it is funny, but on a tour bus, so I'll just, I'm going to go right out and tell you, for those of you that weren't there to hear it the first time, you cannot poo on a tour bus. Because it's just, it's etiquette. Well, it's etiquette, and the drivers don't want to go and empty a bus because
It's always hard to find way stations. Is that what they're called? Probably kind of, yeah. You're on these routes. You got to drive the route. You got to get to where you're going. These, the drives are already so long in Canada and you got 12 people, you got 12 bunks. Usually there's 12 people on the bus and you know, you, everyone goes to the bathroom at a different time. Everyone's got a different routine. So what happens is people hold it.
They, they're like, oh, I'll just wait till I get to the gas station. And what I was saying about my friend Nigel of like, got to go post the mail. If you do miss that little window of opportunity, and I'm like that too, then it's gone. It secretly goes back into a distant far off place somewhere in your abdomen.
abdominal cavity. And it's very hard to find again. Sometimes it takes days. So, you know, and a lot of times as years rolled on and I got a bit braver and I wasn't so embarrassed because sometimes you do, I would get out of my bunk if it was one o'clock in the morning or if it was five o'clock in the morning, I would tell the driver, you need to stop. You need to pull over now because I got to go. I got to go poo. And everybody knew when,
He pulled over. He says, you know, we need like another 11 minutes to the next. I said, I don't care where it is. I don't care if it's a deep ditch. I don't care if it's a cluster of trees. I don't care if it's a large telephone pole. You need to pull this thing over because I've got to go to the bathroom. Turn this bus around. Yeah. It's also just one of those things where it's, I don't know. I think as you get older, you tend to be more comfortable talking about all this stuff. Yes. So it's,
When I was younger, it was more embarrassing. And then you get older and one person talks about it at a party. And then you realize that, oh yeah, definitely over half of people are going to deal with an occasional round of constipation. I don't know anyone. I don't know anybody. Honestly, yeah.
I know the stats and I think it's actually higher because I don't think people are necessarily telling a panel of experts what their real truth is about bathroom visits. But yeah, I mean... Huge part of your health. And on the road, and I will say, and ask any band, Caitlin, any band out there, I don't care if it's Barbra Streisand's band, I don't care if it's Metallica, I don't care if it's Kiss, you know, elderly rockers.
One of the worst problems people face on the road is being constipated. Okay, and travel in general, right? And traveling in general, yep. I mean, there were always the jokes that people would have about when your schedule is thrown off and you're traveling or it's just a period where you're under a lot of stress.
and you just, I don't know, something's off, right? Then you're like, oh no, this also can't be thrown off right now. I can't have it. I'm away on vacation. I am dealing with a ton of things at work and at home and I cannot deal with this on top of everything else. So like, yeah, if you're on the tour bus, that's like everything at once. It's stressful because you're on tour and you're traveling. Those are like two of the biggest red flags for this department.
I don't know why. I have no idea why it's embarrassing because now the floodgates are open. You know, 10 years later, there's every conversation we have is around going to the bathroom. And then, you know, in the morning, everyone gets up on the bus. Everyone's got bus hair. You know, everyone takes their turn going into the bathroom to pee and, you know, brush their teeth with the water bottle because it's non-potable water. You can't drink it. You can't wash your face with it.
everything. You just can't. That's not what these buses are. It's not like an RV. And the first thing that comes out, did you go? Did you go yesterday? I haven't gone for two days. That is the conversation that I'm having. Grown ass men and women that have children that are, you know, just talking about it. But it, it, it is really frustrating. I have a friend that won't go to the bathroom of any form in public. So she won't go to,
And I have a few friends like this. She won't go in the gas station has to be the perfect environment. It has to be clean. Like you can't, you don't want to get the key that's hanging off of a hubcap. Like that's not going to happen for her.
I'm not going to go in there. Like I'll go first. What was the bathroom like? It was really clean. You stall number three. I've done recon. You're okay. The paper, you know, I'm, that's a true friend. It is a true friend. I remember the first friend who ever broke the, the kind of, you know, the poo taboo. She would talk about the like first one of the day as an FP and,
being that it was the first one of the day and that it was just very like, this was like, great. Now I can start my day first thing in the morning feeling good. I don't have to worry about being caught if I'm like out somewhere. Cause I think people are a little public toilet phobic. I'm sure the pandemic has not helped. Adam is raising his hand gleefully. I can say this with all honesty and I don't think that this is amnesia. I really don't think that I went to the bathroom like that at all.
throughout all of my high school years. I think my schedule just set in stone that this was not the time and the place and I didn't like it. But it's crazy how much brain space this takes up for a very regular activity. No, it can be really tough and people can feel very sick. You know,
You know, another thing about being on the road is I'm always watching late night television. So presumably like from midnight till four in the morning, there's all kinds of weird programming. But I remember seeing this ad once and it really struck home for me. And it was about going number, it was going to the bathroom. It was having a bowel movement. And this guy was going on about some people that don't have bowel movements for a week.
And I know you're driving along in your car right now, and I know some of you can relate to this. But especially if you have kids. My friend's son in particular, and it's a friend that we know. It's a friend of CTV and a friend of the social who happens to have a child that is playing on games, like doing gaming in a really good spot in the game. And he will not go to the bathroom.
So then you get into problems. So kids override that. Every adult I know now pretty much doesn't do that if they have the opportunity to go to the washroom. They'll go. And I have no problem. I grew up in the country. I can perch on the side of a log. I can just squat down. And I learned that from my mom. I remember being on camping trips, but a lot of people aren't exposed to that kind of
You know, hike your pants down. I think you guys know my tube sock story with my friend Jamie. I don't know what we'd done or what we'd eaten. I don't know if I do. I feel like after 3,000 episodes, we've talked about this, but...
We both had to go to the bathroom. It was like long road trip. We got out, we had no toilet paper. I had tube socks on that. I loved like they were the high sports socks, white with like red stripes. They were like Farrah Fawcett ones that she had. Anyway, I gave her a tube sock. I took the tube sock. Why do I feel like the tube socks didn't make it? Yeah, there we go. They didn't make it. They will be found by an anthropologist. They will be found by an anthropologist or someone doing archeology.
And it'll just be, we believe that the people of that time would do anything they could do to relieve themselves. So, you know, we both like, we both sort of appeared out of the trees and got back in the car. And she's like, thanks for your sock. And I was probably, I don't know, 17 or 18 years old. I remember I hadn't been driving for very long.
But I just, I love this podcast so much today. I just, I love everything about it. I think I feel like a burden lifted off of me being able to talk about something. How's everybody doing?
Well, I think the tour bus thing is actually kind of interesting because it's like, would you have brought, you know, something with you if you were on tour or if you were like traveling? Because now I'm like, I think this probably is kind of a good idea. Maybe for as we return to live music. Yes. Yes. People are on tour more. Oh, no. The buses are going out. Yeah. Yeah.
Maybe this is something that they should start stocking. Should they start stocking buses with, you know, Santa Cot? Or maybe they should have them, you know, like in first class airplanes. We're going to have Santa Cot on the bus. I think there is absolutely a shelf that we should just have, you know, a dozen boxes and then everyone can just take a box back to the room. I think it's really important and it's not something, you know, it's not something that you want to,
Like anything in life, folks, you don't want to do it every day. Listen, we're going to be right back. You're listening to The Jan Arden Show. Caitlin and Adam and I will be right back. And we're not done talking about the number two. Welcome back to The Jan Arden Show. We are so proudly brought to you today by Senacot. Senacot is something that you should be using because...
It is a laxative that provides gentle overnight relief from occasional constipation. Who doesn't need that? How long have we been waiting for a sponsor, you guys? And this is so perfect.
When this came across my desk, I was like, there is a Lord in heaven in the sky. Because this could not be more perfect for our show. We've been waiting two years, over two years, I think. Yeah, we've been just... Every day I say things, I'm like, well, we do still need a sponsor. So, Senecaught, thank you. You're going to go down. You're in the history books now, folks. Senecaught is in the history books. And I have used Senecaught. I have...
probably two boxes of Seneca in my home as we speak right now. And God strike me dead on my mother's life. My mother had Seneca. Once again, just getting back to my friend who has the, and you guys out there with kids that are gaming and that circumvent that whole idea of going to the bathroom. And I was one of those kids. My mom said, you, I'd have you sitting on the toilet.
for an hour in there. And I'd say, well, Jan, you need to go and you need to push it out. And if you don't, you're not going out to play. It's as simple as that. But I have this vivid memory of, and we had a pink fricking toilet in this little house. It was a pink porcelain, pink sink. There was pink tiles, kind of a soft pink toilet.
I don't know, but it's a very visceral memory of my mom, hands on hips, peeking through that doorway. Why don't you run the water for a little while? Like she...
So true stories, similar but very extreme. I, as a child, nearly gave both of my parents a heart attack and once held it for two weeks. Two weeks? Oh, Caitlin. And had to go to the hospital. No.
Yeah, it was two weeks. Like this was a medical condition at this point. Whoa. Because I came downstairs one day and I marched downstairs and I don't remember any of this. I was like three or four years old. And I told my parents, I've decided I'm never doing that again. Like I just was done with it. And I was so stubborn that I was like, there has to be a better way. Do you remember how it started? Like, do you remember how that...
that whole thing unfolded. Obviously, you're circumventing the feeling of going. Yes. You're waiting and then it subsides and then whoops, now it's a medical condition. And so...
And so I think that, you know, I wound up having to go into the hospital and the first doctor who kind of came near me and I was not like this as a child. I was incredibly eager to please. I wanted adults to like me. I was very well behaved. But this doctor came near me and I didn't know what they were doing. And I just knew that my tummy hurt and I didn't want to be there. And I bit the doctor. Oh, really? Yeah.
I was like, I'd become like a wild animal. I was like, I've been holding it for two weeks. I'm going to bite this doctor now. Get away from me. Anyways, they probably gave me Seneca out of the hospital and things resolved themselves from there. But yeah, that was two full weeks for my poor parents. I can't imagine what that was like. I mean, I think there's a lot of reluctance sometimes,
I don't know. Just kids are so funny. And then we get into adulthood and then we deal with a whole other set of issues. Like I was talking about my friend not wanting to go on the plane or in public or, um, I just, my, my friend's 19 year old son, um,
going to university. That's so bizarre to be talking about a very similar story to you, Caitlin. And I certainly don't want to like go, Oh, you think that's bad. God, I sound like one of those people, but 19. And this was just, just before Christmas. And I got a phone call from my, the mom, my friend. And she's like, Oh, I'm just, there's an ambulance going to pick up, um,
You know, my son and I don't want to say his name because it is embarrassing when you're 19. And, you know, we call an ambulance, pretty sure it's appendicitis. And, you know, he was at the university just in school. The pain is unbelievable. It's all down the whatever side it is. I don't know what side it is.
and I've never seen him in so much pain. So they get him there. They get him to the hospital. They're doing everything they're supposed to be doing, and the doctor there, the emergency room guy, is asking him a bunch of questions, and one of the first things that came out of his mouth was, you know, when did you have your last bowel movement? You know, we're going to – don't – stay calm. We're going to get these tests back. We're going to find out what's going on with you, and he's like –
You know, like four or five days. And he says, well, that, you know, we need to address that because that could be exactly what this is. And my friend's son is like, there's no way, there's no way this, the pain is unbelievable. It can't be that. And sure enough, he,
They kept him there. They did something medical as far as getting his body going. I get what you're saying. But that's what it was. And so his level of embarrassment, I think he was hoping to come back to the kids at the university and go, got my appendix out. Yeah, I'm here. But to go back, my friend is just like, Jan, I have never seen him so embarrassed.
like just disappointed that he didn't get his appendix out and didn't major abdominal surgery. Don't let it get to this point. People get it up with,
Hit it up when it's occasional before you get into the hospital like myself and your anonymous friend's son. But can you imagine, you know, just studying and being in the middle of whatever and putting it off? I learned that lesson. I don't care if it's 3 o'clock in the morning, 5 o'clock in the morning, 11 o'clock in the morning. If I have any indication that it's even a possibility, I go. When there's a knock on the door, you answer it. This is ultimately what you need to know in life. Yeah.
There's a knock on the door. Santa Cod, are you looking for a new slogan? Oh my gosh, as a three's company. Come and knock on our door. Listen, you can...
Send your letters to Caitlin Green. 55555555. 123 Fake Street. Please don't contact me. There's just so many stories. I can't tell you the amounts of hours, hundreds of hours spent on the bus talking about bodily functions. Everybody always wants to know the bus, the bus, what goes on on the bus. You guys party on the bus and this is what goes on on the bus. And it's so much to do with
How everyone's feeling, what they ate, what was happening at catering, what made them feel crappy in catering. Oh, I hope you didn't eat the brownie and who had the chicken. And I mean, it just never, and eventually it doesn't matter if you're talking about baton twirling, fireworks, some random, but somebody getting a new bicycle within 10 minutes,
It slowly starts creeping around. You know where it's going. You know where it's going to the bathroom. I remember our drummer, this is years and years ago. He's in the little door. It's the smallest bathroom in the world. Welcome to the Jan Arden Show, everybody. I'm so glad you joined us today. It's just getting better from here. So Grant is in the bathroom. I'm not going to say his last name. It's 1996. Let's go with that.
you guys, you guys, I need a bag. No. Yeah. What are you doing? Well, he just, he just was having trouble. We were rolling along and I just think it got to the point. So I don't know. Somebody hustled. They dumped out. They'd been to the grocery store. They had like a flimsy grocery bag and they,
that was handed into Grant and, and he's, oh, this is coming back to me like it's yesterday. He's like, put some music on or something. And the bus is already noisy, right? It's already noisy. Am I, am I adding to the glamour of musician life? Or am I taking away? You're dispelling myths. So,
I don't need to tell you what happened with the bag. No, I get it. Because the driver had put the fear of God into Grant that you cannot do that in these bathrooms. That's wild. I never knew about this rule. It's a lot to clean it out. I got nowhere to take the waste. And I guess the number one part is easy to deal with. I don't know. I have to ask that question. I've been on buses for 40 years. I have to ask the driver...
Where do you go to get rid of the number one? Never ask that. It's amazing what we don't want to know. I'm guessing it's not somewhere very official if it's done with ease.
Well, this reminds me of, you guys know the story, the Dave Matthews Band tour bus incident in Chicago. Just tell us quickly. We've got 30 seconds. On August 8th, 2004, over the Kinsey Street Bridge in Chicago, Illinois, a tour bus belonging to the Dave Matthews Band dumped an estimated 800 pounds of human waste from the bus's septic tank onto a passenger sightseeing boat on the Chicago River below. Whoa. I think I knew that, but I forgot. Oh, my God.
So we're talking one and two. Yeah, the whole King Caboodle on sightseers. So this is why there's the rule on the bus probably. You're listening to The Jan Arden Show. This is the greatest show of all time. We'll be right back. Welcome back to The Jan Arden Show. Brought to you, yay, by Senacot. Senacot laxatives provide gentle overnight relief from occasional constipation.
Ladies and gentlemen, not only has this been a record day for Wendy, Wendy McLennan Covey is here. Okay. She's, she's, she's here now. And, uh, but Wendy, you're joining us on a day where we've had our first sponsor after 129,000 episodes. We, we have a sponsor for this show. This is so advantageous that I'm here today. Thank you. Seneca for sponsoring such a stellar podcast that speaks to me and my needs.
Wendy, I've been so freaked out since you said that you would do this. I do want to go into like your unbelievable career. Wendy McLennan Covey is known for many, many things. The Goldbergs playing Beverly, who is one of the most iconic, crazy MFers on television ever. And the fact that she's based on an actual person is even more outlandish. Yeah.
Reno 911, which is so hilariously redonkulous, Clementine. There's a million movies. You're a writer. You are a cat lover. Bridesmaids. I would be remiss if I didn't. Absolutely. And I know you're inundated with that. And when is there going to be a number two, three, four, five, six? I know there's never going to be one, right? Right, right.
Yeah. Sorry. But no, no, don't be sorry. Well, to everyone that keeps asking, I wish I had different news for you, but that's, that's how it is. And you're also married. You're you live in Los Angeles. You are an extremely successful actor and,
And you've been married for a long time to a really wonderful guy. And I'm always like blown away by your stories about him, how you speak about him, your holidays with, with your partner. Tell me about how you guys met and how is this possible? Well, for one thing, I think it's possible because we don't actually, we live in LA County, but we actually live like, like 30 miles outside of Los Angeles. That's the trick. Yeah. I think that's a big part of it.
So when I come home, I'm home. And not everybody is talking about, you know, the business, which is exhausting. So I live actually maybe five miles from the house I grew up in. My parents don't live there. Yeah. Yeah. So I think that's a big part of it. And we met in community college.
Okay. So like loser school, loser college. It's not loser college. No, it isn't. But we were, we were, you know, a little too old to be there, but you know, we were, well, I shouldn't say that because you know, you're never too old to do anything, but I know what you mean. Yeah. You know, it was just like, all right, time to get our lives started. And I had just come off a breakup and
that I had made into such a big deal. Although there was really nowhere for this relationship to go. But still, it stinks. Yeah. I had managed to really make it a big thing. And at the end of that, I met Greg. Is it just when you least expect it? Yeah, when you're not looking. When you're absolutely not looking. So then we got engaged secretly, like three months after we met.
Three months, 12 weeks, 90 days. But then we didn't get married for like another two and a half years because we didn't have any money. I was living with my parents. He was living with his parents. We had no money. And so, you know, that's how that happened. And 25 years later, here we are. But we see the story over and over again.
You meet young, and then all of a sudden you have this career that explodes. You are pulled in 100 billion different directions. You meet all these great-looking people that are in this industry, and you're away on shoots for weeks, maybe sometimes months at a time. And then the seams start coming undone. But you guys look so goddamn solid. You don't do a lot of him on Instagram, but when you do, it makes my heart squish. He is...
The greatest guy. Okay. In existence. Okay. And everything he does is perfect. So that's it. That's it. No, I, he is literally, he's not in the industry. Not at all. Not at all. He is literally the only person that ever encouraged me to go and follow my dreams.
And when I was in the Groundlings, which is for people who don't know, it's an improv comedy theater in Los Angeles. Very, very tough. One of the best guys, one of the Groundlings is the people look it up. Yeah. Look it up. The people that have come out of the Groundlings are exactly like Wendy. They're just stellar, unbelievably successful people. Okay, go. Oh, that's okay. But he worked two jobs together.
to pay for all that stuff. I was working part-time. He did it all without complaint while I was buying costumes, buying wigs, doing all these things. He would help me rehearse my lines. He would go to my shows. You don't get that kind of support. And I will never hurt that man. Yeah. Never, ever, ever. There, there is no one else that is better. So like,
If I'm away on a shoot, I get how people stray. Yeah. I'm never going to because there's no one ever, ever that can give me what he gives me. That's it. Full stop. I don't understand why people don't get that. When you meet a solid person, when you've had someone with you your whole life and you see these stories again. Anyway, it's very inspiring. Your husband's inspiring. Yeah.
The cats. You have one of my very favorite Instagram pages. And I just want to tell folks, like when you follow me on Instagram, I phoned everyone that I knew that would accept my call still. And I just said, Wendy McLennan Covey is following me on Instagram. Like I just was thrilled and it is, but you have my favorite Instagram. I look at you. That's one of the last feeds that I look at before I go to bed because you have hilarious heartwarming posts.
pet stuff. And I'm inundating people with like, stop eating effing meat. You guys are cruel bastards. My feed's just like, I had to stop following you, Jan, because your animal activism is horrifying me. But you're like, but no, but you're like this wonderful small things in boxes, like cuddling up with bananas and
Chimp. I don't even know how you find this stuff. Yeah. My stories, I used to get real militant in my stories about politics and blah, blah, blah. And sometimes I still do, but I figure, you know what? If a baby cow with a frog on its back is giving me joy, it's going to give somebody else joy. So I try to just
Only put like cute animals or, you know, uplifting things in my stories. They're great. I'm trying to chase the blues away always. And I figure someone else, you know, would probably rather see that. No, it's a great way to go. And I do. I love it. It's you're very I like how you curate your page. It's amazing what we choose to show each other.
And you, you're not like your, your whole page is just filled with your life. And I'm always surprised at your vulnerability. Like you see little glimpses of your house. The cats are hilarious. How many cats do you have, Wendy? Seven. Seven cats. And we sure did not start out. No, it never does. But they keep showing up and I can't turn. No, I can't turn a baby away. You know?
So it was Butters the latest? Butters followed me home on July 30th and has never left.
Followed you from where home? I was on a late night hike because where we live right now, there's like a lot of hiking trails. And I was off, you know, on a dark night of the soul, just looking for signs from the universe for something. And I this big friendly kitty showed up and followed me home and he's never left. Now, we looked for an owner and we looked for a chip. He was not fixed and he was old enough to be fixed. I don't know what the problem was.
So I don't know where he came from, but he's my little angel boy. And we got him fixed, got him all his shots. He lives here now. Now we're moving. Now we're moving to a different place. And I think cats will stop showing up. There's something about this house. Before we go to break, I'm just going to say you are going to have cats that are knocking on your door. I think you're my father because Butters did have his balls.
And that's how it works now. They can look up. We're with Wendy McClendon-Covey and it's an exciting day because Santa Cot is also sponsoring the show.
We'll be right back. You're listening to the Jan Arden Podcast. We are so excited to welcome another new sponsor, our friends at Cove Soda. Have I pestered Cove enough to come and join us here at the Jan Arden Podcast? I love them so much. They are Canadian, first of all. They are a natural, certified organic, zero-sugar soda, which includes, get this, one big
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while putting a gut-friendly, guilt-free drink in your body. Cove Soda is available in 12 delicious flavors all over North America. So for our American friends, you can find it. They've got this fruity lineup that's fantastic. I drink those all the time. They've got the classic lineup if you like...
A cola or a cream soda, root beer, yes indeedy. And they've got their limited edition summer flavor, which will take you right back to the second grade. You got to try the ice pop one. Head to janardenpod.com to find out where the closest place to you is where you can go and buy Cove. Go right now. Welcome back to the Jan Arden Show.
The Jan Arden Show today is brought to you by Senacot. Senacot laxatives provide gentle overnight relief from occasional constipation. And I should know because I've used it and I do use it. Adam, am I allowed to say what you have? Yeah, you go ahead, please.
Adam has COVID. I know. Can you hear it in my voice? His kids, but he's okay. Your kids are fine. Your wife is quite, she doesn't feel great. No, she's a little better now, but it took her down pretty hard. But I'm okay. It's basically for me, it's like a head cold and I feel kind of yucky, but I'm okay. And we're also here with Caitlin Green, as always. Caitlin is also sick. Yeah.
But Caitlin, but you don't go ahead. I'm told it's not COVID. I did go for a PCR. I went for the King Daddy topper of COVID tests and they said it's fine. So we'll see. But yeah, it is a nice reminder that there are still regular gross viruses out there, which seems rude considering we've been dealing with COVID, but they're out there. And now that we're kind of getting back to some regular life, you might get one. Like a cold. Yeah. One of those colds.
Wendy McClendon Covey is here. She does not have anything. She joins us from approximately 30 miles outside of Los Angeles. We are trying to Google map her house to see if we can see movement. Now, that would be so creepy, wouldn't it?
Yeah. And it's creepy that that is actually an option. Sure is. If they have your address, they can punch it into Google Maps and they can see cars sitting in the driveway. I remember my friend looking, she looked me up my house up once and she said, it must be like a really old Google Map thing because your parents' house wasn't there. And I'm like, no, that's new because I picked my parents' house up and moved it.
Oh, that's right. But they did. They got a picture of my yard. I'm so amazed that I wasn't like out there brawless. And you didn't have a bra on. We could see it in the Google. Wendy, how do you learn lines? Like you are probably one of the busiest actors around. It's great to have a show that's in syndication. And on season nine, hello, the Goldbergs. But also you're in a whole other franchise. Yes.
Like, is that that's really unusual. Yeah, that is unusual. It's unusual because, you know, I stopped that show at season five. Yes. Like back in 2000, 2009 or something like that. And then it resumed again in 2020. So that's that's very unusual.
um that whole show is improvised so there are no scripts so that's you know that's great I kind of knew that but I wanted to know to what extent it was improvised and how do you not just crack up all day long I'm the worst at breaking I am the worst me and Carlos Al is rocky
are the worst at breaking. During our morning meeting scenes, we shoot them all at once and we shoot them like for exhausting lengths of time. And there's footage of us just losing art. I can't swear, but just losing it and having to hide under the table and pretend we're getting something so we don't ruin the take. As far as the Goldbergs goes, that's tough. That's tough because... The shooting schedule...
Yeah, the shooting schedule is a lot, but as far as learning lines, there was a time when we would be getting handed rewrites mid-scene while we were filming. So it's like, okay, then there's no reason to memorize anything until the last minute because you guys are going to just change it. So it's a lot and it's a skill thing.
that I haven't totally mastered. I'm okay at it, but believe me, there are times when I have to have our script supervisor save me. So, yeah, because everyone I talk to, it's always a different thing just because I'm so new to having to learn lines. I know on the music side of things, for me, Wendy, I've worked with a teleprompter for 15 years. So even though I wrote the effing songs,
And I've sung them, I don't know how many hundreds of times. Oh my God, if I don't have the prompter there, I go into a panic mode. Don't you find that when you've sang something or done something millions of times, then it starts to not even feel like words coming out of your mouth. It just feels like mouth sounds. And so then you maybe substitute a word that has the same syllable count just because it feels right. Yeah. Yeah.
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I've done it. That's interesting. But I, I just, every actor is so different. Some people use these apps where you plug in the lines and you time it out so that your fricking phone reads it back to you. And then you're, I don't know, I can't even work the apps. I've tried a couple of those. I don't even know how to do that. So I actually now have a guy that follows me around Tom Carey. I don't know what I would do without him.
you know, and someone's paying for him. I hope you're getting a million dollars, Tom, wherever you are. And we just go over it and over it. And we drive people insane because the real professionals are quietly sitting with their scripts going, she's a complete idiot. They're so not. I don't want to slow everyone down. So yeah, I'm glad to hear that someone like you who's been doing it forever, uh,
still is like not sure if I know what this word is going to come out of my mouth. Like I've seen you do monologues. Like I've seen you do things in films where you got a chunk of stuff to say. Yeah.
You were so good in blush. I just want to tell you that. And you're a scene stealer. When you walk onto screen, Caitlin, she's, Caitlin is nodding. Well, you're one of those people that you are, you steal scenes in the very best way. You just elevate it and you, everyone waits for you to come back onto screen. And I've long before I even was following you anywhere, like just seeing you,
And I'll go back, of course, to Bridesmaids, of course, but I just thought you were the funniest part of that movie. I will never forget the stiff blanket and the scenes on the plane and the lines you were given and the way that you delivered them, like how you decided to create that woman.
um, your care, it, it just, it just really is masterful. How much does, um, the improv stuff play into how you work certainly on Reno, Reno 911, but just in general. My God, it, I gotta say, Jan, the, the training, the improv training I got at the Groundlings, I probably used it more than anything I use. I learned in college, you know, um,
it one thing that we really concentrated on at the groundlings was character creation so that is everything whether or not any of this stuff ever comes out i've always got a backstory and you know and reasons for why this character does what she does whatever it is um because then it helps you feel more like oh now these lines make a little more sense to me um
And that's another thing too about memorization. If you don't know why your character is saying something, then you cannot remember it. Yeah. You know? So yeah, that improv training is everything. And it also hopefully helps you figure out when to back off and let someone else have their moment because it's not about you always trying to get the funny line in. It's about the story as a whole and the scene as a whole.
But now it'll make you funnier in the end too, though, to share that moment. Yeah. I wish we had like 99 more minutes. This is our radio portion. So I want to tell everyone right now, we're going to keep Wendy in a perpetual state of podcasting. We're just going to keep her for like an extra five minutes. So once this show wraps up here, please come and join us over on the podcast side, because I want to ask Wendy a couple of questions about food.
about junior high school and about her parents.
Tell me about your parents a little bit and also your sister who I also follow. She's another artist in your family and she's extremely, she's another kind silver haired beauty of a fierce woman. And she's, we we've chatted a little teeny bit on Instagram. Oh, wow. And she just said, I'm Wendy's sister. And, and I just wanted to say hi. And, and anyway, yeah.
Oh, my sister, Shelly, I love her so much. She, you know, it's funny because we were raised differently, same house, but different. So I was the first baby. I was the experiment. So my parents were always very like reactionary. Everything that happened to me was like, oh no, we got to go to the doctor. Then when it was time for Shelly, it was like, oh, she's fine. She's fine. She's not bleeding. Everything's fine. So she's very independent.
And I'm the one that never left home. So that's how that works. And when you're five miles away, I'm five miles away. Are they still there? They're still there. And we just, we just bought a different house and we're slowly moving in. But with
you know, the idea in mind that if they ever need to come and live now there's room for them. Yeah. And also with my mother-in-law, if she ever wants to, you know, and they may, they may never want to. Okay. But it's there if they, if they want it. Um,
And my sister was like, see ya. And she lives in the Pacific Northwest. She lives up in near Portland, Oregon. She's almost Canadian. She is almost Canadian. That's a great part of the world. But creators, were your parents creative people? My mom was. Okay. Like acting or what? What does she do? She's a singer.
She plays piano. She sings, you know, she writes little sketches and stuff. And the thing was, is that no one ever told her she could be anything other than a housewife. So all this stuff had to have an outlet. And so that was church for my mom, but she sang at church. She was in every singing group.
For the holidays, my mom was busy every night performing for like the entire month of December. So you grew up watching that? I grew up watching that. And yet when it was, you know, and my sister and I, we grew really tall, really fast. So we had no control over our limbs. We were just big, clumsy girls.
So she put us in dance. Of course she did. And then that took off. Like we loved it and we did it for a long time. And, you know, when it was time to declare a major in college or whatever, I told my mom what I wanted to do. And she and my dad were like, that is stupid. You will never make any money doing that. That is embarrassing. No. How are you going to have a family and do all that? Quite embarrassing.
you know, devastating. Well, no kidding. So I would have to sneak off to auditions. You know, you're never going to get anywhere if you're like sneaking around trying to, you know, get your life started. Long story short, you know, I never got anywhere till I grew up, got married and moved out of the house. Then it was like, oh, I can do whatever I want. I don't have to explain anything. Love is so weird how it comes out.
because it wasn't, I mean, they seemed defiant to me, but it was out of love for you. They did not want to see you be disappointed, get hurt by people, not making an audition. And you and I both know that failure is such a huge part of success. Yeah. And if you think of it as failure, then you're really doing yourself a disservice. But their whole thing was
That they, they didn't know anybody doing that. They had no point of reference. So they couldn't envision it. And they, their whole thing was the rejection, the rejection. If you're going to think of it as rejection, then yeah, you, you,
you're just setting yourself up to be miserable for the rest of your life. If you get into a business where, where you're really thinking about going out and getting rejected all the time, then aren't you crazy for doing it? Yep. So I had to reframe that. It's not rejection. It's that just wasn't supposed to happen. That's not yours. Get to know so you can get to yes. Exactly.
How do you, I mean, just navigating the industry, whether you're in Hollywood, New York, wherever the hell you are, Toronto, Vancouver, in the arts in general, especially when you are either in music or in performing arts, there's always that part of it where your self-esteem takes such a kicking in the ass, you know, with how you look, your weight, you know, all of that stuff. How has that been for you? Because you strike me as someone who's
really confident, cautiously, but that you just damn the torpedoes. This is how I am. And if you want to hire me, great. And if you don't, that's great too. You know, that's something that just kind of came with getting older. And I'm telling you, Jan, the minute, the minute I made my peace with certain things, that's when I started booking jobs. For instance, I'm not
I'm not an ingenue. Even when I was an ingenue, I wasn't an ingenue. You know what I mean? I want to be the funny girl. I want to play the characters. I'm a character actress. Don't even send me out for those other roles. But I can kill a funny line. I don't have to be number one on the call sheet. Just give me something funny to do. You don't like the way I look? I probably don't like the way you look. It doesn't matter. But I can be funny. Call me ugly. Call me whatever you want. I don't.
I don't fucking care. Like, and if you're the one saying that and you're that unprofessional, you're probably not a decision maker anyway. So I don't have to listen to you. Yeah. You know, like you just have to think in any other area of my life, would I put up with this kind of behavior? No. No.
You wouldn't do it in the grocery store, for God's sakes. Exactly. You wouldn't do it in a lineup at a movie to have someone speak to you that way. And yet young women, especially going into the industry,
Man, sometimes it's hard to watch young people in music and young people. And I'm going to be 60 this weekend. And I know I'm so grateful. It's exactly what you said, Wendy, was you get to an age where it's not like I don't care anymore. I do care, but it doesn't hurt me anymore. I actually had someone many, many years ago, 45 years ago. I was 15 or 16 years old. And he said to me, you're too fat and ugly to ever make it in the music business.
I remember his name very clearly. I would never say it, but I ran into him at an industry thing years later. He was so afraid to come anywhere near me because he remembered. I wasn't anybody then when he said it to me, but I carried that around for years. Then I thought, I'm the person carrying this around. I need to take it out of my pocket, set it on this table with the cigarette butts and this piece of shit glass of cold water.
whatever, pizza, and move. Leave it. No, it's true. And again, luckily times are changing and that kind of behavior is really not tolerated as much. But for anybody out there that thinks you have to be so reverential towards these people, that is a two-way street.
I don't care what industry you're in. Nobody gets to talk to you that way. But what if they're afraid of booking jobs? Like if I don't do this, you don't want to book that job. You do not want to book that job. Anybody that, that talks to you like that, you want to be on set with that. Forget it. You don't want it just like that's, that's almost like saying, well, if I put up with it, will I ever get a husband? If I don't put up with it, will I ever get a husband?
Fuck that. But they're afraid. They're afraid they're never going to book anything again, Wendy. If I don't take this and this is my one chance. And it's not about one chance, is it? No. It's about many, many, many chances. A lot of people think of, oh, I got to get my big break. But guess what? It's a series of breaks. Amen. Yes. It's a series of breaks. And my God, yes.
Seriously, if you think that's how the industry is, why do you want to be in it? If you're constantly trying to make yourself smaller and not be yourself in any way just to please some...
rude person that has a very limited idea of what success looks like. Do you really want to do that? No. That's a terrible life. That's going to make you hate your art. Yeah. You know, it's going to make you resent it. Your mom, she makes me laugh, like just little things I've read about her. But the fact that you were smoking a reefer on Reno 911 and she was
Had a hard time separating out like the real world from the acting world. And she wanted you to quit the show. She just was. Yes, she did. She wrote me a nasty letter. Again, my mother who lives down the street. For real? Felt that she needed to put pen to paper and write me a little nasty gram shaming me for my behavior. Yeah.
I think because she thought that other people in her prayer circle or whatever would think that that's really me. You know, I think most, and yet, you know, at the time I thought, come on, everybody knows this is a TV show. They're watching it on TV. I'm not a cop. But I am surprised at the amount of people who do think that's a real thing.
Well, I think it looks like a reality show. The way that it's shot. And I'm telling you, there are people out there, as you know, Wendy, that are like, no, no, that's totally real. It's part of, like Reno, that's what it's like there. And they're actually following those people around. Yeah. The fact that it was on Comedy Central for so many years, which is all scripted,
I don't know. I am surprised that that many people don't get the joke. But anyway, she was very upset with me and we didn't talk for a while. And does Shelly get away with more than you? Oh, yes. Okay. Oh my God. And Shelly, my lovely sister. We love you, Shelly. I love her so much. I admire her so much.
But when I was first coming up, my sister said, Wendy, I got to tell you, I just don't think this is going to happen for you. I just don't think it's going to happen. Then when it started happening, she's like, not going to be out done. So she started in.
And my sister, I don't know if you knew this. She is a family therapist. I didn't know that. Yeah. She's got a thriving, very busy family therapy practice. But also theater. And owns a theater. Yeah. Comedy theater. What the hell? Yeah. Yeah. She's a busy one. And I got to say, I'm so proud of her. She's in a sketch comedy duo program.
called the aces. And I'm a bad sister. I, I don't go out there that much because it's, you know, Jan, it's not exactly 45 minutes away. It's getting on a plane or it's you and your husband driving for 14 hours. So yeah, it's not easy. It's not easy. And especially like when you are an artist, like when the jobs come, you gotta, you gotta go to the job. Like the minute you make plane reservations to do something fun is when a job comes in.
So, but the last time I went to see her and her sketch show, I was laughing so hard. I was, I was not even making human sounds. She is so damn funny. I'm very proud of her. Humor is so magical. It's been such a gateway to so many things. And, and you're the perfect example of you can monetize being yourself. Yeah.
You don't have to aspire or try and bend your body and your personality and the way you dress around an idea of what you should be doing. Be yourself. You embody that. I could keep you here forever, but I do want to ask you about junior high school. Were you a popular person? Were you in the middle of the pack? Were you at the back of the room? Who were you?
Oh, it's so funny that you picked junior high because I remember junior high. I remember like, like it just happened for some reason when I, when I was in junior high school, again, it was within walking distance of my house, but I had just come from private school, a private Christian school in elementary school. So when I got there, it was like, Oh my God,
Why is everybody so mean and aggressive? Like it really did a number on me. But I loved it. And was I popular? No. Were you funny? I was funny. That took a while to come out. But, and I was taller than everybody. I was a giant dangly girl. But, you know, I, in my junior high, there were,
there were a lot of kids that got bussed in. So like a lot of Latino kids and black kids and Cambodian kids. There's a lot of, you know, there's a big Cambodian diaspora here in Long Beach. And then the white kids were like the preppies, the rockers, or the new wavers.
And I was none of those. I was like wearing a teddy bear sweatshirt. My mom always dressed me like a doofus. But anyway, I had such anxiety in junior high school that I used to, this is maybe TMI, but I'm telling you anyway. No, do it. I feel so close to you. This is a bonus round here. This is all things. But I used to throw up in my sleep.
Oh, because I was so anxious. I had to go into therapy, all these things. Were you afraid of the, some of the kids at school or just being in a, in a, just being a social, just being in the social environment. Some of the kids were like really rough and I did not know how to navigate that. Isn't the brain, your brain was working overtime. It was trying to
sort things out in the middle of the night. I mean, I would liken that to somebody who, you know, what's the bad. I had so many, so many friends that were for, you know, that had similar stuff like anxious. And I was in a school with 42 kids. Whoa. And when you talk to kids now, all these years later, they're like, I was so freaked out to go to school. I hated it. I hated how small it was. I hated that you couldn't move or think or breathe without somebody knowing what you're up to or,
Thinking that you could only be that one thing. It was so hard to break out of that. That's a lot of pressure too. Yeah. I went to a school that probably had a thousand kids. Oh, God. But 42, that sounds like, oh, my God, I'm living under a microscope. What's worse? They're both equally...
They have their own issues, their own problems. Yeah, but did you... I mean, obviously, what is junior high down there? Up to ninth grade, ninth grade? Yeah, it was then. Now it goes from sixth to eighth, and then you go to high school. But, oh, my God. Thank God I didn't go to high school in the ninth grade. I was...
I was such a wreck, but you know, I had choir and I had my performing arts classes and my drama classes. And that's what kept me engaged and creativity doing creative stuff. You've, you found your people. Yeah. Yeah. You got to find your tribe. It's so important, but I felt like, okay, you know what? You guys can pick on me. You can call me whatever you want, but when I'm on stage, I,
You've got to watch me. I know. Mic drop. Yeah. That kind of empowerment is infectious. And you realize that when you first start performing, you do your first little part or sing your first song or do your first dance. There's something that feels so natural in your body. It's all those endorphins firing off and you feel good. You feel like this is something I want to pursue. A, it makes me feel physically good.
Why wouldn't you chase that? Why wouldn't you want to have like an orgasm all day long doing your job? Hello. And there's something very powerful about,
especially for kids of that age to be standing on stage and getting applause. Everyone deserves that feeling. I am going to wrap this up. I swear to God, but I know people are loving this. What was your school lunches? In junior high, did you have to eat at the school or did you go home to your mom and dad's place?
My mom always packed our lunches. Oh, God. I want to know everything. My mom packed really good lunches. I got to say props to my mother, who was a working mom. And they're still with us. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. And she should have said, listen, sister, you're old enough to pack your own damn lunch. Do it. But, you know, like a turkey and cheese sandwich on a little roll and, you know, a juice box and a Twinkie and an apple sandwich.
Oh, very, very upscale lunch. What is, what, what would be your favorite meal? You and your husband are going out. This is, this is my final question. This is you guys. Cause I know you just celebrated a big anniversary too, or wasn't it your husband's birthday? My husband's birthday was on St. Patrick's day. Yeah. So dinner, what, what would be a dinner for you guys? We're not real fancy. Yeah.
I love it. I love Mexican food so much. And my best friend is Mexican and she cooks like a dream. Go to her house. I know she's down the street. So whatever she I'm waiting because I think she left town, but I'm waiting for her to call me up and say, hey, come on over for dinner. And whatever she makes me is going to be amazing. But I love Arabic food. Arabic. What is Arabic food?
Is it Middle Eastern tabbouleh type flatbread dips? Yes, yes, yes. Okay.
Love that. A lot of interesting rice dishes, lentils and stuff. Yeah. Wendy, thank you so much. Thank you, Jan. I just love you. Well, it's so mutual and you have been, like I said, just so unbelievably supportive, kind, generous when you meet someone that you've admired for such a long time. And especially when you do from afar as a fan, and you know this because you admire so many people's work and then you do get a chance to meet them at a function and
Sometimes it can be really great. And sometimes it can be like, oh, for Jesus sakes, really? When they're, when they just, they just like, they're not what you thought because you have an idea when you watch someone's work of who they are, but you are that person. You are the person, your humor is, is really such a generous gift to us all. Fuck, I've laughed watching you over the years.
It really is. It doesn't matter if you're in a, in something for five minutes, Barb and Star go to, um, God, Jesus, you know, you weren't in that for very long, but Christ almighty, when you came down that street there in your outfit, I was like, yay. Yeah.
There she is. Anyway, keep doing what you're doing and just enjoy yourself and much happiness to you and Butters and the other six cats. And I know next time that we speak, you're going to have nine cats and I can't wait to hear why. Please don't say that. Please, Jen. You're a good person. You are. Thank you for having me. It was great. Totally did. Thank you.
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