Kim Masters: What Happened to Hollywood?
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to the point where I called Tom's PR person and said, you know, do you want me to tell you what's in the story? And she just said, ah, you've got the sources. Just go ahead. We know you're right about everything. Listen, Tom Cruise says you need a submarine. Guess what? You need a submarine. Hey, everybody. Welcome to Literally. Spending time with me, Rob Lowe. So Kim Masters is my guest today. Kim is probably the best entertainment journalist ever.

around um she's been vanity fair hollywood reporter she currently hosts um on kcrw a show called the business but she is the most insider of the insiders with every source knows where everybody is buried no one i trust more about what's really going on in the entertainment industry and

uh, than, than Kim, truly a legend and still on top of every story that's out there. So I, I mean, look, I'm, I've got three shows on the air, two podcasts, and I'm out there pounding the pavement. So I've, I have a pretty good sense of where the business stands, but I can't wait to get her, uh, position on this because she is in everybody's ear. Let's get going with Kim.

Well, thank you for coming on the show. I'm so excited to have you. I'm happy to be here. A little surprised to find myself here on the other side of the mic this time. I know. Get ready. See, now, you clearly have been interviewed. Yes. Yes. I mean, but how many times have you been interviewed by an actor? You know, I think this is it. This is the first.

When you get a first in journalism at all with Kim Masters, you know it's the real deal. Well, I mean, there's so much to go over with you because I've been in this business for six decades. Wow. And you have been covering this business forever.

For as long as I can remember, at the highest levels. And nobody knows the players better than you. So I, first of all, would like to know your state of the union on the business. Oh, the state of the union is not good, Rob. You know that, right? It's not fun. You know, all the old contacts I've had from my many years covering this business, those who are still among us, they call me and they say,

I'm so glad I finished my career before this happened. And it's a thing that we all knew was coming. The digital revolution was going to get here and cause a lot of disruption. But living through it is awful, I think. And it's not fun to cover. I mean, people say, oh, you must be busy because you've got so many stories. Well, you know...

Yes, but they're not stories where anybody is winning, unless you count Netflix. Netflix would jump out and say, we're winning. And I suppose some others would too. But in terms of legacy studios, nobody is really winning. It's rough out there. So what do you attribute the...

this, the decline from it. It can't just be the fact that we are able to stream. I guess it can be. But isn't there other stuff too? Because look at the movies that are getting made or not made, I should say. And like, I know all of the movies that I grew up that inspired me to be an actor, or even when I already was a successful actor, I like to look at, pick a Friday night

Any Friday night from 1970 to 1992. And there are going to be at least three amazing movies that you still remember. At least three, sometimes more. And I challenge you to find one.

So is that just because it's digital and not film or that people can watch it in their house? There has to be more going on. Has to be. Well, think about all the stuff you could be doing now that you couldn't have done before. You could be gaming. You could be on YouTube. There's so much competition for attention that the movies have suffered. And at the same time, the streamers like Netflix are

they've kind of taken over romantic comedy and genres, you know, that people will not get off their butts to see. They complain, and sometimes they do get off their butts, but it's like that, it's always been Hollywood, you know, you don't quite know, you don't know at all really what's going to work. But more so now, I think, than ever, because people have so many options, and

People, especially like with comedy, let's say, which has really gotten hurt by this, you know, the feeling is, oh, I'll wait. I can wait, you know, a few weeks or a couple of weeks or whatever. I can see it at home in my living room. I don't need to go park and hear all the complaints about the theaters, which are not new. You know, the theaters have been complaining about the theaters as long as I can remember. Incremental change has been made, but...

The theaters, you know, there's the babysitter, there's the

$8 popcorn or whatever it costs now. So there's a lot of, it's a lot, it's become something expensive. It's still, I'm sure the film business would, the MPAA, the Motion Picture Association would say, it's still a best bargain out there for a date night in terms of money, but it's not nothing, you know? And so I think people, if they don't get off their rear ends and go to the theater,

then the movie isn't going to get made, you know, and the next version of it or next in that genre. There are other things, of course, there was COVID, which, you know, is just crushing for movie theaters. And the strikes, which largely, as you know, sprang from concern about new technology. So it's

it all converges. I feel like the phrase a perfect storm is so overused, but I think the movie business has been through something like that. And wow. I mean, the encouraging thing not to be totally up, you know, down is, is we have seen movies start to work again. And that is that Hollywood pretty happy. Yeah. Twister's doing, doing great. My, my, although I will say my, uh,

dearly departed best friend Bill Paxton would be twisting in his grave because he worked his ass off every he'd be killed Rob God I got a new proposal to bring back Twister God I'm meeting with Steven over at Amblin next week and they just were never interested

Not interested. Until they were. For years and years and years, Bill had the, and they were amazing pitches. I'm sure the movie's amazing. But finally, with Bill's luck, he's not around to be a part of it. But I am happy that it's doing well because it's such a part of his legacy. Well, and there was an earlier Twister movie, you know? This is almost like a sequel to that.

Oh, that's right, there was. You're right. To remember the earlier film. And when you look at what's huge right at this moment...

Deadpool sequel. So while people complain and say they want original material, if you hit the sweet spot, and it's not just crank out something that's a sequel, you've got to do it well. But if you do it well, the people flock to it, and that, of course, incentivizes the studios to say, let's do more. That's exactly right. And so the other thing is, obviously, that the days of magazines and

Well, when I would, I know when I would run out to get the new vanity fair and you'd have a, your name on the top of it, interviewing Kim Basinger, somebody. I never interviewed him. I was never on it for an interview. I would just know. And I was on it for like snarky stuff about the business. No, yeah, no. People were like, don't talk, be careful with Kim. Be careful. Bernie Brillstein was always like, be careful with Kim. Uh,

Ironically, because he was never careful with Kim as far as I could tell. No, he just said whatever he wanted to say. Exactly. He was burning real steam. I miss that guy. I know. So...

I'm definitely sounding like a little bit of the old man yelling at the clouds, but I think part of the issue is we don't have people like Bernie Brillstein. A lot of guys come from finance. A lot of guys come from tech and law school and other corporations, and they're not people who just grew up being fans of

I will say one of the things I love about Netflix is that Ted Sarandos is one of those guys. Ted is a movie, movie, movie fan above all else. But there's a big yes, but right? Because Netflix assaulted the industry and did not care. And that's another element with it. That's all this digital stuff. These guys who come from tech, they're not going to care.

they're not like you and me. And they come in and they sort of, I always think Netflix is funny. Ted is probably sick of me thinking that, Ted Sarandos. But, you know, they come in and they say, we're here, we're reinventing the wheel. We're the smart guys from the tech

background and we're going to show you how this is going to be done. And then if you look at Netflix incrementally, inch by inch, they start doing things the old Hollywood way. You know, they start, the one thing they haven't done, the one thing is to really give a movie a decent run in theaters. And that is where they dug in their heels. But yeah,

didn't they promise us there wouldn't be advertising? I seem to remember, you know, that they've broken their own rules and they would say, well, that's part of our philosophy. We're rule breakers. And it's like, yes, you're breaking the rules to do it the way Hollywood was doing it for like a hundred years. Well, now that, you know, the cord cutting has killed Carrier's ability to bundle, which was the golden goose that's that,

There are a lot of people that say that it was the subsidized, they kept channels that never drew flies, as Bernie would say. Right. You'd pay your cable bill and you'd find something on there. You'd be like, what the heck is that? Yeah, you'd be like, MTV2 has been running for 23 years based on what? So those days are over.

And yet I hear a rumor that bundling is – a new iteration of bundling may come back where you can get a little bit of Hulu with a little bit of Peacock with a little bit of Netflix. At this moment, you can get – what is it? Hulu, Disney+, and a third thing that – maybe it's Max. I think that's what it is.

And there's, I mean, this is so confusing right now. Honestly, I can't keep up with it. But I was just reading the offering that they're bringing forward to get these three bundled. And

It's like, do you want it with ads? Do you want it without ads? It's this much, it's that much. And I'm much too bad at math and honestly lazy to try and... I mean, I feel like, oh, I've got HBO and I got Max, I guess. So I'm not even sure what I have. No, and you're not sure what's on what. It's like... Yeah, you have to search. And then the other thing is, my greatest issue is...

And I'm not speaking out of school. You know, my partners at Netflix know this is there is a little bit of like hiding the ball. You're like, how did it really like how many people are actually watching The Bear?

Well, that's Hulu. But it's industry-wide. It's like somebody told me on, what was there? There was some show, Shrinkage? Shrinking? Oh, yes. On Apple. Yeah. So I called Netflix after I saw the 17th billboard for your consideration. Okay.

I've actually watched it. I will know, yes. Oh, yeah. Of course. And two people I love. Jason Segel. Jason Segel. Who I love. So it's nothing against them. And I actually hear it was a great show. But I saw 17,000 billboards as my Netflix comedy, Unstable, was out. We had one. And I called my Netflix people and I said, let me explain something to you. More people have watched...

half of the first episode of your show, then they have subscribers. That's true. And people don't really know that. So you can be all very fancy.

But like, who's actually watching? You know, they keep saying, we're going to give you more transparency. And that was a big issue in the strikes, you know, because these people are used to getting paid in success. And you're one of those people. And grudgingly, and again, this is where my mind, I sort of have half a brain. I have the words part and the intuition part, but numbers, I just cannot. So they'll say, we're giving you this, and this is why it's a better measurement. And I...

I just am like, is it though? I don't know that it's like a regular person can just be, oh yeah, I can see that. They don't want you to know. Yeah, they don't want to hide. But the advertising, if they're going to take it, they're going to have to provide some numbers to the advertisers. That means something. That's right.

Grief isn't talked about much, but that's what my podcast is all about. I had the best possible version of a goodbye with my mother. This is All There Is, Season 3, with my guest, actor Andrew Garfield. In 2019, Andrew's mom, Lynn Garfield, died after a struggle with pancreatic cancer. Without the ending that I had, I'm not sure if I'd be able to eloquently talk about it, to be honest. Listen to All There Is with Anderson Cooper wherever you get your podcasts.

So the strikes, the two strikes, I've lived, I've been around long enough to have lived through a bunch of strikes and what people don't realize is however you feel about the strike, whether you were happy it happened, not happy it happened is irrelevant to what I'm going to say. Every time there's a strike of significance, something that has been in the business forever that we have all loved and or enjoyed goes away forever. Forever.

And there was a strike that brought in reality television. And reality television took over like a virus. So if you were in the industry of making scripted television shows, now you had X amount less slots. So it hurt that business. And then there was the last strike that took away packaging, right? Mm-hmm.

And then there was the strike that took away, you know, all of a sudden studios cleaned house with overall deals, which were great if you had them. They're gone. And with this strike now, there just isn't any production. Yeah, it's got to stop. I mean, this can't go on forever. It's so bad here in Los Angeles. But let me ask you a question. Here's my worry. Here's my worry. Is it one of those things where, you know, you're an average household.

And all of a sudden you can't get, you know, I don't know, detergent. There's a strike. And all of a sudden you go, do I really need, maybe I don't need as much detergent as I, you know, I lived, I didn't die. Yeah, I didn't have my detergent. I like it, but it was always really expensive. And, you know, maybe I just don't need. So my question is, do the studios have time to really look and reassess what they really need? And it turns out what they really need ain't so much detergent.

Well, I don't know how long they can keep that up, honestly. Although, you know, you look at the big thing now is sports, right? Because sports happens in real time and you don't tape it or whatever they call it now, record it in one way or another and watch later. You want to watch it in real time. So now we have this battle going on.

Warner Brothers and NBA or Warner Brothers Discovery, they want their basketball deal back. But the long and short is there's going to be so much basketball on these networks. Just to use one example, it also will crowd out the kind of stuff that you might remember fondly, you know, shows that you thought were great. For sure. It's one less slot for another show. Now, I was just reading the latest because it's been such a soap opera. TNT lost the

the NBA, right? It's over. They didn't get it, right? It's not over if you ask David Zaslav, because he's suing and saying you weren't fair. We matched the Amazon offer and you didn't give it to us. This gets into weeds that I'm not even in. Like, what was the Amazon offer? Especially since it's basketball. I mean, I cover entertainment, but to me, sports is a factor in what goes on as we're talking about, but I'm not like...

you know, who gets March Madness? Whatever. But I know for Zaslav, you know, I think this is, he wants to get basketball back. He's got a huge problem, which is lack of money. I think that's why they've said, where else could we get sports? And they're looking, you know, they would love to make a deal to get CBS because that would bring them football. So everybody's scrambling for sports, not so much scrambling for the scripted content. But you need to have it. I mean, you know, Netflix and

And, you know, I don't work for them. So one of us doesn't, you know, they always, I mean, they're the by far the biggest and the default, you know, the streamer, as people say, they've always got a, they have a knack, they do come up with something, even when you think, you know, I haven't watched anything on Netflix for a while. Do I need Netflix? And for a while, I had a lot of friends who were, who were churning out of Netflix, and I'm not seeing anything. But then some

comes along, it feels like a must-see. And not only does it come along and feel like that for me, but then there's one for my daughter's age, you know, for young women of that age. So there's, they've managed to, they throw a lot of spaghetti at the wall, and they managed to get enough to stick to, I think, and again, I don't know their churn numbers really, they may disclose them, but I don't know them off the top.

But, you know, they managed to hold on to that big lead. Now, at a certain point, I wonder, because, you know, they sort of saturated the United States with Netflix subscribers. And then they're like, oh, but we're going global. So we're going to grow. We're going global. I feel like, you know, the United States is finite and global is also at some point finite. And the...

what they call ARPU, the average revenue per consumer, for somebody who subscribes in India, it's not paying the same as someone who subscribes in Pittsburgh. So they're not getting the same kind of money from those markets. So I'm not sure it's... Even though Netflix has been declared the winner by many people, it doesn't...

I don't know that there was a game over. I mean, the game goes on and on, right? Of trying to dominate and exist now. I mean, in entertainment, that's why we see Paramount, question mark, Warner Brothers, question mark. And you know, as a Hollywood veteran, Warner Brothers was it. It was, you know? Oh, I remember. You'll love it. I remember a day on the West Wing and they...

The West Wing had won, at that time, the most Emmys that any show had ever won, and certainly the most shows a new show in its first year had ever won. And we had to stop shooting because the brass, Warner Brothers and AOL.

We're going to come down and give us a big... And this is a time when there was so much money in the business that actors on hit shows were getting cars. Yeah, I remember when Steven Spielberg gave Miatas to everybody on some movie that I can't even remember the name of. And I was just thinking as you said that. Oh, Will and Grace got...

Porsche's, um, Molina Canacarides on Providence got a Range Rover. So I'm thinking we're the West Wing. What, what, the sky's the limit. And we sat there in the Roosevelt room and in came Peter Roth, who was running the studio at the time. And I think,

I don't know if Dick Parsons was there or not, but it was the new AOL family. And Jerry Levin, probably. Rest in peace. And they were like, I'll never forget as long as I live. They said, we just as an indication of what we're doing with our corporate synergy and what you're doing at the West Wing, we would like to present you with this gift. And I noticed it was gift, not plural. And then he turned and wheeled in what looked like a room service cart.

And I remember the late, great John Spencer turned to me and said, kid, I don't think we're getting cars. And with a flourish, I think he might have literally said, voila. He pulled the sheet away and they were presenting us with a single serving espresso maker.

Oh, wow. A little disappointing. That is an absolutely true story. Better than anything I've gotten in journalism in all these years, but still, not the Hollywood. And to be clear, it wasn't a single espresso maker for each cast member or crew member. It was one single espresso maker for the company.

Well, that's how you could tell there were new owners, I guess, because in the Steve Ross era of owners, they had the jets and the house in Acapulco and all the goodies. What do you make of David Ellison's Skydance Paramount? This is a complicated question. So David Ellison, son of Larry Ellison, billionaire. If you want to be mean, you say Nepo baby, but David has worked hard. We'll say that too.

They made this play for Paramount. Paramount has been in trouble. They make the play. The deal collapses, I don't know, three times, I think, up to the last minute.

down again. And this is Sherry Redstone, the daughter of Sumner Redstone, who created this entertainment empire of CBS and Paramount and, you know, just this gigantic media empire. And then, you know, her father, to give her, in fairness to her, kind of screwed things up by becoming old and demented and having all sorts of sordid activities with women and, you

just, you know, he turned basic management over, at least on the Paramount Pictures side, to people who couldn't care less and were looting the company and weren't even ashamed to be looting the company. It was so egregious. So she had to get

control back and she had her work cut out for her and just as she's trying to do that the whole digital thing happens and they jump up they make a lot of terrible decisions I mean we're going to start a streamer and we're going to spend a damn fortune and we're going to lose so much money they made a lot of bad decisions but they end up in all of this trouble and then there's David Ellison with money I mean he shows up in Hollywood literally with billions that always gets people's attention and

And he would love, you know, he would love to be, I am in charge of a legacy studio. So they stay in the battle. The other buyers drop out as they had reckoned they would, at least as far as we know. They make a deal. And then, you know, we're in a moment where it's a sticky wicket. There's a story out there about the conduct of Jeff Schell, who was supposed to be president of the company working for David Ellison when they acquire Paramount.

And as you know, I think, Jeff Schell had been fired at his previous job at heading NBCUniversal for improper conduct with a woman. And as we believed at the time, but could only get so far in knowing, multiple women. So this is...

They fired him for this at NBCUniversal. He went out into the woods and reconciled with his wife. But it's coming up again. It's coming up again. There's a big story just as we are speaking that just came out.

about how many, how much harassment did he do at NBC Universal and to what degree was it covered up or not dealt with properly? And this is a guy who hired John Lasseter, who was the animation legend who had to leave Disney because of harassment.

And so, as one of the old school moguls said, it's really the most ridiculous sale of a public company that anyone can remember, not just in Hollywood. This thing is on, off, off, on. The hope is that David Ellison, who obviously, you know, he has that Hollywood, that love of Hollywood,

Can he run it and make it into a thing? What does he do with it? And it's going to be a year. Let's say it doesn't blow apart because of all these things that have been talked about, like how can we start to dig out? Can David Ellison dig out of this crisis?

I have no idea. This is where we're dealing with someone, you know, he could make, they could say we're losing money on Paramount Plus. So we're going to partner up. We're going to partner up with, with Matt. So we're going to partner up with Peacock, which is also not doing so well for, for Comcast and NBC Universal. The combinations, you just feel like everything gets thrown up in the air. We can wake up any day and hear anybody's team is teamed up with anybody.

It feels like that up to a point, and then you've got to get past the feds. And if we have, or we continue to have a Democrat in the White House, it's not an easy walk necessarily. You know, we saw the merger that created Warner Brothers Discovery,

bogged down because Trump at the time was mad at CNN. So yes, anything could happen. It feels that way. I mean, Disney probably has the number one advantage among the legacy studios. Disney has so much, so many assets, but they've had to be caught up in the layoffs and

And investor, you know, dissident investor fights that are expensive and time consuming because Disney was having its own problems. It's a very, you know, going back to the beginning, it's just such a difficult time. And what I keep saying to people when I talk to my contacts in the industry, it's like,

nobody is winning. And that's what, it feels like nobody is winning and it's just not fun. You know, it was fun when people were winning and some people were losing. There was a lot of bad behavior and whatnot. I'm sure there's still plenty of bad behavior. But,

You know, it was still, it was just more like, you know, a wild and untamed business in some ways. Yeah, it was, it's definitely the notion that it was always show business, but now it's kind of just, it's just business with very little show. And the show that's left is not anywhere near as fun. ♪

Grief isn't talked about much, but that's what my podcast is all about. I had the best possible version of a goodbye with my mother. This is All There Is, Season 3, with my guest, actor Andrew Garfield. In 2019, Andrew's mom, Lynn Garfield, died after a struggle with pancreatic cancer. Without the ending that I had, I'm not sure if I'd be able to eloquently talk about it, to be honest. Listen to All There Is with Anderson Cooper wherever you get your podcasts.

Let me ask you this. I heard that the new Mission Impossible will be the most expensive movie ever made. Have you heard that? I certainly believe it's possible, yeah. I mean, I wrote a piece about...

which is supposed to be part one of two, and you'll notice they're not calling it part two anymore because the seventh didn't do as well. I mean, credit to Tom Cruise, right? He dragged that movie through the pandemic, through multiple shutdowns and outbreaks. So, you know, he is the ultimate movie star and he takes that role seriously and he truly believes, possibly with some justification, that he saved the movies. Yeah.

with Top Gun. Top Gun, yeah. Yeah, but...

Yes, that, I mean, you cannot control Tom Cruise. I laugh. I mean, I'm not the only one who laughs. People who are producers of Tom Cruise movies laugh. You know, there was a big push when Paramount was flailing and trying to launch the streamer. They're like, you know, let's put Top Gun on the streamer. And I mean, are you nuts? Tom Cruise has been dealing with Paramount through so many executives and so many people

He just sits there and does what he wants, you know? Good luck controlling it. I thought about that. I would have loved to have been a fly on the wall for that conversation with Tom. Oh, I mean, poor Jim Gianopoulos. They then fired, which was like so unfair because he gave them so many number one movies and dug them out of a hole, but they fired him. And he had to go to London and sort of say,

I mean, he knew, he knew it was never going to happen. And St. Tom, you know, they kind of, and they announced it, actually. They were so desperate and needy that they announced that, you know, they were going to put, I'm trying to remember whether it was Top Gun or the second, one of them on at least, you know, in a fairly, without the usual theatrical run that you get when you're Tom Cruise. Yeah.

And, you know, ha-ha to all of that. You can tell yourself you're managing Tom Cruise, but you're not. Yeah, and apparently he calls up the studio and says, hey, I want to do a biplane sort of crazy dogfight against the Table Mountain of South Africa. And they spend all the money and they shoot it. Four weeks, comes back and goes, okay, now I know what we want.

We need to have, and it's another 30, 40 million, and it just never ends. I wrote this whole piece in The Hollywood Reporter about the making of Mission Impossible 7 and the harrowing. I mean, they get COVID, and Chris McCrory ends up in the hospital, which they kept quiet. All of these things that happen, and then he's kind of like, you know what? We need a submarine. Yes, the famous submarine. Yeah.

I mean, I have to say that was a fun story to report because everybody was just willing to talk to the point where I called Tom's PR person and said, you know, do you want me to tell you what's in the story? And she just said, yeah.

You've got the sources. Just go ahead. We know you're right about everything. Listen, he's the best, man. I love it. If I'd write a check for Tom, if he says, if Tom Cruise says you need a submarine, guess what? You need a submarine. By the way, yes, you don't get to decide. That's not a request. Yes. That's an order. Yeah, for sure. This has been great. Thank you so much. I'm trying to think of, because I do feel like I have one of the few people right here

who I trust implicitly. Oh, that's a compliment. Well, you know, listen, you know exactly where the bodies are buried and you've seen so much of it. I have seen a lot. I do. I have crazy stories. Yeah. Here's the one thing I, as I've gotten older, my friend group has expanded into people in what I call straight business, real business. And

I routinely tell them stuff that I don't even think is odd about daily life and show business, and they are a gog. Their jaws are on the floor. And listen, there are inefficiencies in the business. There always have been. There always will be.

A lot of people who could have and would have taken care of it were happy to be on the gravy train until it ran out. And let's shout out Donna Langley at Universal because she is running...

the closest thing and she's winning to a certain largely winning she has amazing stuff but she will you know she has the minions and and Twister but she'll roll the dice on straight out of Compton or whatever you know she goes high she goes low she is almost the last I mean there's others like Mike DeLuca at Warner's but she really is running that place and running it incredibly well so I feel like

As we look around at all the problems, you know, she is truly like last of the old school and doing it right. And, you know, the other thing is whenever it's chaos, there's an opportunity none of us will ever see coming. Right. It will come and it will create a whole new ecosystem. But, I mean, it's like I'm glad that I'm able to survive this moment when the meteor is hit and there's lots of extinction events happening.

Yeah, you and I are both like, how are we here? I know, right? I know. I'm walking around with my fingers crossed. I'm like, keeping my head down. Oh, never mind me. I'm just doing my thing. Never mind me. Don't look over here. Well, thank you, Kim. I know I will be talking to you again at some point on your amazing podcast. Well, thank you. KCRW, The Business.

Yeah, we've been getting some great guests and enjoying ourselves. Yeah, well, I'll come see you on my next round. I have to give you a little static, though, because the one time, the time you did my show, and you were mad at, maybe it was Fox, I can't remember, for something. And you said, I am never, never doing a network show, a broadcast network show again. And like literally three days after that ran. No, Kim, the quote was...

I won't do a network comedy. Oh, okay. Okay. And I haven't. I'm going to go look that one up. No, because it really was because it was The Grinder, which it's funny. As we're talking, there's some talk about reviving The Grinder because it was so beloved.

And, but it just didn't rate. And, and I was like, if this show, which is, it's so hard to get a great, great show. If this can't work on a network, I'm never going to find a comedy as good. So I'm not going to do an ever do another comedy on a network. I haven't, I'm, but by the way,

In advance, I'm going to go against my quote because I'm ready to do one if someone comes up. But at the time, I meant it. I meant it so much. Okay. Well, we have Abbott Elementary as proof that it can work if you do it really well. Ghosts is fun, too. I mean, there's a few. Yeah. There's ways to do it. What I like about it is the larger orders because it takes, like my show, Unstable, we're in two seasons, a grand total of 16. Well,

When you look at all of the great comedies, they got 22 in the first year, and it takes that long to find your footing. It's a character comedy. You can't laugh at the characters until you know them. Exactly, yeah. It's interesting, though. We've had a number of guests come on and say –

that the shorter limited series is a lot easier on your life, you know? So some of them, they don't want to go back to broadcast. Well, I will tell you this, is that there is a thought out there that there have not been any real comedies. There have been a lot of amazing dramas launched on streamers, like that will stand the test of time. But when it comes to comedies, there haven't been. And I just keep telling Ted, it's the short orders. You cannot expect comedy anywhere.

to perform on eight episodes. You can't do it. I mean, we all know Seinfeld would have died if it was living in today's world. Cheers. Another one. Come out of the gate strong, you know? You got to give people time to love and learn those characters and then they can truly laugh and appreciate. You don't need to do that with, you know, dramas. Right. Thank you. You were great. My pleasure. Be well. Thank you, Kim. Thanks.

Well, thank you, everybody. I had a very, that was very, very interesting. Very, very, and she really knows her stuff. I hope you enjoyed it. All right, just one more thing before we end today's episode. Let's check the lowdown line. Hello, you've reached literally in our lowdown line where you can get the lowdown on all things about me, Rob Lowe. 323-570-4551.

So have at it. Here's the beep. Hi, Rob Lowe. This is Tanya Grant from Medina, Ohio. I am a literally podcast listener and a long time fan. Long time. I'm also a fellow Daytonian and I fell in love with the theater watching the Kenwood players as you did.

I very much enjoyed reading both your books and we met at Playhouse Square here in Cleveland when you were here with your stories, I Only Tell My Friends Tour. So one of your podcasts you said, "You're never too old to get started." And I'm a nurse and my second career is a professional voice actor and background film actor. Love film, love movies, love TV and have enjoyed watching you progress through your career.

So you're a curious person. I'd just like to know if your curiosity has ever gotten you in trouble. Tell us more about that. And also, please keep the educational podcast coming. Mark Hyman was once with the Cleveland Clinic as I was, and that was a great episode. So thanks for all you do, and I'll be listening. Bye. Oh, thank you so much. You saw the Kenley players.

Amazing. I want to do a documentary about the Kenley players. My brother, Chad Lowe, had John Kenley ready to be interviewed before he passed away. And at the last minute, it didn't happen. But I feel very lucky that you and I both got to share that and that that was an inspiration for both of us to. And I love, by the way, your second career. You go get them. We need actors of every age, shape, size. You know, there's no good or bad time to be an actor.

I am really curious and I have to work on saying no to things because so many things sound interesting to me and I end up getting overscheduled and grumpy and tired sometimes. And the real place where my curiosity gets me, and I think curiosity and enthusiasm are kind of similar places.

is I'll, maybe I'll get a script in my imagination and my enthusiasm. I see it one way of what it can be. Meanwhile, it actually is what it is. And, and, and, uh, my, my good friend, Mike Myers used to call that and a, he used to call it a wish sandwich. And he'd say, don't eat a wish sandwich, make sure it's an actual sandwich. So, um, I, I try to be a little more practical and things that I'm doing. Um,

Because if I let it to my own device, I'd be, yeah, that sounds great. Like a puppy. Yeah, that sounds great. And your call, by the way. Sounded great. Thanks for calling. And next week, I will be back here on Literally. And I know you will be. You better be or I'm going to come get you. So I'll see you next time. It's me signing off. Rob Lowe on Literally.

You've been listening to Literally with Rob Lowe, produced by me, Sean Doherty, with help from associate producer Sarah Begar and research by Alyssa Grau. Engineering and mixing by Joanna Samuel. Our executive producers are Rob Lowe for Low Profile, Nick Liao, Adam Sachs, and Jeff Ross for Team Coco, and Colin Anderson for Stitcher. Booking by Deirdre Dodd. Music by Devin Bryant. Sports and culture by Devin Bryant.

Special thanks to Hidden City Studios. Thanks for listening. We'll see you next time on Literally.