Letting Them Talk with Will Harris

This time I’m letting Kevin Dunn talk. Kevin is a gentleman who’s been working in front of the camera since the mid-1980s, but it’s arguable that the role that transformed him from “oh, that guy” to being an “oh, that guy” from a very specific thing was playing White House Chief of Staff Ben Cafferty on VEEP. At the moment, however, he’s doing press for Tyler Kornack’s new film, MERMAID, which premiered at last year’s SXSW Festival, received a brief theatrical run earlier this month, and is on the cusp of receiving a digital release. I made this remark to Kevin during our conversation, but it bears mentioning here as well: MERMAID is a weird fucking movie, but it’s a weirdness that sucked me in and kept me glued to the screen until the very end. SPLASH it is not, nor is it THE SHAPE OF WATER, but all three films share a certain amount of DNA, and… Well, I don’t really want to say much more about it, except that Kevin’s role, while relatively small in the grand scheme of things, is one that provides him with a moment that would be a must-add to any actor’s clip reel. Of course, we talked about other topics as well, although I’ll tell you right now: Kevin’s a guy who has plenty of stories, and given the name of this podcast, it should go without saying that I didn’t get to ask him about everything that you rowdy lot wanted me to ask him about. This, of course, means that a sequel is a must if we can get it scheduled. For now, though, just know that we discussed VEEP, of course, along with MISSISSIPPI BURNING, LUCK, THE PRACTICE, SNAKE EYES, MARKED FOR DEATH, THE BEACH BOYS: AN AMERICAN FAMILY, and HOT SHOTS! And I’m sure a few other things came up as well, but suffice it to say that there’s a lot of great material to be found within those topics. And with that said, I think that’s plenty enough of an intro. It’s time to let Kevin Dunn talk.

This time I’m letting Jay O. Sanders talk. Jay started in the theater, quickly found his way in front of the camera, and has successfully forged an extremely substantial career as a character actor. Before that, though, he made his New York theater debut in a “Shakespeare in the Park” performance of Henry V alongside such fellow cast members as William Hurt, Meryl Streep, Michael Moriarty, and Bruce McGill, which – all things considered – is a pretty amazing way to kick off a career. Thankfully, he didn’t stop there, but since it’s statistically unlikely that most listeners have had the opportunity to catch Jay in his various theater performances, don’t worry, you’ll almost certainly recognize him from any number of TV or film appearances. For me, as I mention in the course of our conversation, he’s instantly Kevin Costner’s right-hand man in JFK. If you’re a fan of Law & Order: Criminal Intent, you might recognize him either from his first appearance, which was as a bad guy working alongside a funeral home owner played by Jim Gaffigan, or you might remember him when he stepped in to keep Goren and Eames in line for the series’ final season. More recently, you might’ve seen him on NBC’s Blindspot, Prime Video’s Sneaky Pete, USA’s The Sinner, or Discovery’s Manhunt: Deadly Games, i.e. the season about the Unabomber. But Jay’s done so much stuff that there’s really no telling where you might’ve seen him. AfterMASH? Crime Story? Roseanne? Eddie Macon’s Run? Okay, that’s kind of an outlier, but if you’re from my generation, they played that thing incessantly on HBO back in the day. He’s also in The Young Riders, Angels in the Outfield, The Big Green, Kiss the Girls and Along Came a Spider, The Day After Tomorrow… He’s definitely an actor where you can comfortably use the phrase, “And the list goes on…” And suffice it to say that he’s got at least as many stories as he’s got roles in his back catalog. That feels like a more than sufficient intro. It’s time to let Jay O. Sanders talk.

This time, I’m letting Corbin Bernsen talk. As one of the leads of NBC’s long-running legal drama L.A. LAW, Corbin was one of the biggest TV stars of the ‘80s, and he’s managed to maintain a significant career ever since, not only as an actor but as a director as well. On paper, he seems to be someone who was always destined to work in Hollywood, given that his mother, Jeanne Cooper, was a soap opera star on THE YOUNG AND THE RESTLESS, and his father, Harry Bernsen, Jr., was a producer. But as you’ll hear, Corbin really wasn’t all that enthused about the idea of becoming an actor. Obviously, he changed his mind, but it took a little while for him to come around. Currently, Bernsen is busy talking up his latest film, THE YETI, a horror movie that centers around – you guessed it – a yeti, but it’s a period piece, and even with all of the horror movies emerging nowadays, it stands out both in its look and its substance. But don’t worry, there’s plenty of blood, too. Our conversation starts with the new movie, of course, and from there we delve into various other highlights from his career, including as many listener requests as we had time to tackle. I also reached out to a couple of his former co-stars – including two of his PSYCH castmates – who I’ve interviewed over the years and got some questions from them. One of them is so well-considered and absolutely unlike the relationship he has with that actor that it completely blew his mind, but his response proved to be so philosophical that it blew my mind. Anyway, yes, we talked about MAJOR LEAGUE, and, yes, I asked him about guest-starring on STAR TREK: THE NEXT GENERATION…and he teased that he has something else STAR TREK-oriented coming up. We also talked about his appearance on SEINFELD, some of his other horror films, most notably THE DENTIST and TALES FROM THE HOOD, briefly popping up in the blaxploitation classic THREE THE HARD WAY, how his version of faith-centered films doesn’t necessarily mesh with the general definition of that genre, and why he thinks the never-aired attempt at an L.A. LAW revival didn’t work. No, we didn’t hit everything that I would’ve liked to have hit, but that just means there’s plenty of material left for a sequel. That’s probably enough of an intro. It’s time to let Corbin Bernsen talk.

This time I’m letting two – count ‘em – two people talk: DeAnn Heline and Eileen Heisler. They’re the pair behind Blackie and Blondie Productions, which should ring a bell if you’re a diehard TV fan, but in case you’re still drawing a blank, DeAnn and Eileen are the duo responsible for creating The Middle. Yes, you may recall that we’ve had another duo on this show in the past, and they, too, were part of the Middle family: Eden Sher and Brock Ciarlelli, a.k.a. Sue and Brad, not to mention the host of the Middling podcast. When I interviewed them for the show, I made a comment about how I was planning to interview DeAnn and Eileen, and I said that my plan was to focus on their career before they created The Middle, thereby giving me an opportunity to discuss an era that I didn’t know that much about while also leaving the Middle stories to Eden and Brock. As it happens, Brock instantly said, “No, but you have to ask them about The Middle!” Almost as instantly as DeAnn said, “Uh, we created it, we can talk about it if we want!” So there you go: we talked about The Middle. But we also talked about Blackie and Blondie: The Early Years. In addition to the inevitable secret origin of their long-running friendship and creative work together, we also discussed the various stages of their career, including their work on Roseanne, Murphy Brown, Ellen, Lipstick Jungle, and a few other short-lived series in their back catalog. They offered up stories about working with Norm MacDonald, Garry Marshall, Tom Poston, and another past guest, Peter Tolan, plus many others over the years. And, yes, there was a decent amount of conversation about my personal connection to The Middle, how my family helped inspire a storyline in one of the episodes, and more. Okay, that’s probably enough of an intro. It’s time to let DeAnn and Eileen talk.

This time, I’m letting Jane Alexander talk. Jane is a four-time Academy Award nominee, a seven-time Tony nominee, and a two-time Emmy winner (with six additional nominations to her credit), so…there’s really no good reason why she should be talking to me for this podcast. The only explanation I can offer: she and I got along swimmingly when I did a piece for Smithsonian about the play and film versions of The Great White Hope and chatted with both Jane and her co-star, the late, great James Earl Jones. Since then, we’ve stayed in touch, and when I found out that one of the films that scored her one of those aforementioned Oscar nods – Testament – was being added to the Criterion Collection, I pitched her on the idea of this conversation, and she was kind enough to agree. I also took advantage of the opportunity to do something I’ve never done before during an interview: spring a special guest on someone. As you may or may not know, I did all of the interviews for the book Surely You Can’t Be Serious: The True Story of Airplane!, and one of those interviews was with Ross Harris, who – in addition to being the boy who visits Peter Graves in the cockpit – also played Jane’s son in Testament. This is another one of those moments that plays particularly well if you’re a paid subscriber and have access to the video, but even without it, you can hear the unbridled joy in Jane’s voice when Ross joins us for a portion of the conversation. Of course, Testament isn’t the only thing we talk about during the episode. Jane has plenty of stories about other projects, including meeting Muhammad Ali while doing The Great White Hope, acting alongside Johnny Cash and being invited to introduce him at one of his concerts, working with Burt Reynolds and Clint Eastwood in City Heat, and – more recently – being part of the runaway Apple TV+ hit Severance. Well, that’s probably enough of an introduction. It’s time to let Jane Alexander talk.

Today, I’m letting C. Thomas Howell talk. I’ve been watching this man’s work since I was 11 years old and went to see “E.T.” with my family. A line like that might make some actors feel old, but given that Tommy – and I’m not being overly familiar here, this is actually how he’s listed on his official Facebook page – was only 12 years old himself when he was hired for that particular film, I think he’ll probably be cool with it. I first interviewed this gentleman when he was in the midst of his run on the cop drama Southland, and we did a lengthy Random Roles that, if I’m being honest, included a discussion of decidedly more projects that we managed to hit in this particular conversation. By which I mean to say that if you’re looking for tidbits about Kindred: The Embraced or Soul Man, you’ll want to head over to the A.V. Club and read that piece after you’ve listened to this episode. And, yes, there were a couple of encore stories that I knew from that interview that I pointedly asked him to tell in this interview because I knew listeners would enjoy actually hearing them straight from the horse’s mouth, as it were. But what we had was, for the most part, an extremely organic conversation where I was able to easily jump from one topic to the next…and that’s on the occasions when he didn’t do that himself. He’s done more than a few interviews at this point in his career, and given that the name of this podcast is “Letting Them Talk,” well, you know exactly what I opted to let him do. We started our chat by talking about his latest project, “One Mile,” which is available for your digital purchasing pleasure as of this recording, and since it’s a villainous role, that led into talking about “The Hitcher” and “Criminal Minds.” A question about how he’d considered following in his father’s footsteps and becoming a stuntman led into talking about “E.T.,” which in turn led to talking about “The Outsiders.” But talking about his dad also led to some great stories about how he got to visit some of the film sets that he worked on, including one of the “Planet of the Apes” films. Oh, sure, we talked about other stuff, too. But that’s probably enough to keep you listening for the long haul. It’s time to let C. Thomas Howell talk.

This time I’m letting Raymond Ian Burns talk…although you’d know him better by his nom de punk: Captain Sensible. As a founding member of the Damned, he’s a proper punk rock legend and a member of the band who famously released the first punk single in the UK and was the first UK punk band to play in the US. Mind you, he hasn’t been a consistent member of the band throughout the entirety of their existence, but it’s because of that absence from their roster that he was able to forge a solo career, one that provided him with some huge hits in the UK, including “Wot” and the still startlingly-successful cover of the Rodgers and Hammerstein song “Happy Talk,” from the musical “South Pacific.” No, for real, it was a #1 hit. Go figure. These days, however, the good Captain is indeed back with his bandmates in The Damned, and they’ve just released a new album of covers called Not Like Everybody Else, with the songs selected as a tribute to their fallen Damned comrade Brian James, who died in March of last year. It’s a fun album, featuring songs by everyone from the Lovin’ Spoonful to Syd Barrett-era Pink Floyd…and, indeed, the cover of “See Emily Play” provided the perfect opportunity to for me to ask the Captain about how the Damned once tried to get Syd Barrett to produce an album for them. During the course of our conversation, we obviously talked a great deal about the Damned’s career as well as the Captain’s solo work, including his songwriting collaborations with Robyn Hitchcock. As someone who’s been a fan of the Damned since purchasing and absorbing every bit of the band’s two-disc best-of collection, The Light at the End of the Tunnel, this was a bucket-list interview for me, and I enjoyed every minute of it. I hope you do the same. And with that, it’s time to let Captain Sensible talk.

This time, I'm letting Kyle Vincent talk. Kyle is someone whose music I’ve been enjoying since the release of his self-titled 1997 album. Appropriately, it’s that very album that brings us into conversation today, since it’s finally made its way to streaming services for the first time. Kyle has a deep history in music, but things really got rolling for him when he was fronting the band Candy, who you may remember for their single “Whatever Happened to Fun?” It’s arguably one of the catchiest power pop singles of the ‘80s, which makes it all the more cruel that the band never really made the commercial impact that they deserved. From there, Kyle went solo, and although it took awhile for him to find his footing on his own, it helped significantly that he found himself serving as opening act for none other than Barry Manilow. That aforementioned self-titled album spawned a hit single, “Wake Me Up When the World’s Worth Waking Up For,” and if you didn’t hear it on the radio when it was originally released, you might’ve heard it in some TV series or film, because it’s popped up repeatedly. Kyle’s continued to release solo albums on a regular basis – the most recent, “Sunshine Soul,” came out in 2024 – but he’s also kept busy in other ways, including fronting a latter-day incarnation of the Bay City Rollers. Kyle’s got stories about all of these aspects of his career and more. And with all of that said, I’d say it’s time to let Kyle Vincent talk.

This time, I'm letting Angelo Moore talk. Angelo is a force of nature, one of the most gregarious individuals I’ve ever had the good fortune to interview, and – it must be said – one of the greatest self-promoters you’re likely to ever come across. And I mean that as a compliment. I need to take notes from this man. In addition to having been the frontman of Fishbone since the band’s inception, Angelo also works under the guise of Dr. Madd Vibe. I interviewed him years ago, way back in 2001, and it was a decidedly freewheeling conversation, but it was also one that led to him signing my copy of Fishbone’s The Reality of My Surroundings with the words, “Thanks for the accurate article.” Accuracy should be pretty easy when all you’re doing is literally transcribing what someone said, but you’d be surprised how many people are grateful for you simply for typing out their actual words. During the course of this freewheeling conversation – and truth be told, I’m pretty confident that freewheeling is the only sort of conversation that Angelo is capable of having, but I’m 100% good with that – we talked about as much of Fishbone’s career as possible, including John Cusack’s support of the band, the time Fishbone opened for the Beastie Boys, Angelo’s appearance in Breakin’ 2: Electric Boogaloo, and much more. I should probably mention a few things up front, however. First of all, this is inarguably the most visual episode of the podcast that’s happened to date, so if you’ve ever thought about joining the ranks of the paid Substack subscribers or the Patreon supporters, this is the one. Angelo spends the early part of the conversation taking me and his camera on a tour around the entirety of his new apartment, and then he later takes me on a visual tour of some of his more recent releases, which are pretty amazing. Given that he’s talking the entire time, it feels wrong to trim it from the audio version, but just know that you’re definitely not getting the full experience without seeing the video. He also gets a few calls during the course of the interview, but I kept those in as well, since he proceeds to introduce the people who are calling, even holding the phone up to the camera. How could I cut those out? That’s gold, Jerry! GOLD! The other thing is that when I asked Angelo one of my stock questions – the one about the first person who ever made him have to fight to keep from going full fanboy – he thought I was asking about Fishbone fans who went full fanboy on him. Given the title of this podcast, I didn’t interrupt him, I just let him answer it the way he thought was accurate, and the end result was still a really great story, so…no complaints whatsoever. Okay, that’s enough of an intro. Now brace yourself accordingly, because I’m going to let Angelo Moore talk.

This time, I'm letting Jerry Ordway talk. Jerry is one of my favorite comic book artists and writers, going back to the early ‘80s. If you listened to my interview with Mike Carlin a few episodes back, then you already know that I’m a certifiable comic book nerd, but I will admit that I got even nerdier while talking with Mr. Ordway. If you came of age with DC Comics anywhere within the ‘60s through the ‘80s, then you’re aware of the existence of Earth-2, a parallel version of Earth where superheroes started to emerge in the late 1930s, i.e. when DC Comics first started publishing their adventures. If you have no idea what I’m talking about, then…you probably never even started listening to this episode in the first place, so let’s just keep moving. Suffice it to say that my formative years of comic book reading involved falling head over heels with the characters of Earth-2 thanks to an ongoing series of crossovers with the Justice League of America and the Justice Society of America, so when DC decided to launch a book about the World War II era adventures of Earth-2 called “All-Star Squadron,” I was all-in. And a few years later, when they decided to spotlight the children of some of these heroes in a series set in the present day called “Infinity, Inc.,” I was even more all-in. This is how I became a fan of Jerry Ordway, and it’s why I’ve remained a fan of his for lo these many years. In addition to being a great writer and artist, he’s also one of the best inkers in the comic book business. You’ve seen his work in comics for both DC and Marvel, including inside and on the covers of titles like The Adventures of Superman, The Power of Shazam, Crisis on Infinite Earths, Fantastic Four, the Avengers, Maximum Security, and more. Jerry is a talker, and given that the name of this podcast is “Letting Them Talk,” I was happy to fulfill his destiny throughout this episode by allowing him to do just that. If you’re a comics nerd like I am, you’ll love his stories. If you’re not a comics nerd… Well, like I said before, you’re probably not even listening at this point anyway. As such, I’m going to go ahead and let Jerry talk…

This time I’m letting two people talk. Better yet, it’s two people who starred in one of my favorite sitcoms in recent memory, and now they’re the hosts of one of my must-listen podcasts. If you’ve ever watched The Middle, then you already know Eden Sher, a.k.a. Sue Sue Heck, and if you watched The Middle on a semi-regular basis, then you also know Brock Ciarlelli, who played Sue’s bestie, Brad. I think just about everyone who listens to this podcast already knows this, but I reviewed The Middle for the AV Club from season three through season seven – plus the series finale – and during the course of that time, I was able to interview Eden a few times and Brock once, but the last time I interviewed either of them was during season seven for Brad’s coming-out episode, and that episode celebrated its 10th anniversary back in October, so...it’s been awhile. As you might reasonably expect, I end up talking about my connection to The Middle a decent amount during the course of this episode, but in my defense, I was interviewed two podcast hosts, and Brock did not hesitate to turn the tables on me to satisfy his own curiosity, and I have no complaints. We talk about how both of them got onto The Middle in the first place, we talk about the Middle spinoff, Sue Sue in the City, that never made it to series, and, of course, there’s a whole lot of Middling…albeit in a general, non-episode-specific way that in no way steps on the toes of what they’re doing on their wonderful podcast. I’ll also give you fair warning that there’s a point in this episode where Eden’s dog makes a cameo appearance, and at the time it was happening, I was considering editing it out, but after the fact, two things occurred to me: 1) it’s actually going to be pretty funny for the people who are watching the video version, and 2) it felt more than a little bit like a sitcom moment, so given the episode, why would I edit it out? So if you’re feeling lost as you listen to that portion of the proceedings, just remember: If you sign up for either a paid subscription to my Substack newsletter – http://willharris.substack.com – or for my Patreon campaign – just go to Patreon and search for "Letting Them Talk" – then you’ll get access to the video version. Okay, that’s enough of an intro. Let’s get to…letting Eden and Brock talk.

This time, I'm letting Pepe Serna talk. Pepe is a character actor who’s been appearing onscreen since the start of the ‘70s, bouncing between film, stage, and television, and although he’s still acting whenever the opportunity presents itself, he spends a good chunk of his time these days as an artist and an acting teacher. Pepe’s first film was a Roger Corman cult classic called The Student Nurses, and having gotten his foot in the door, he never looked back, quickly finding himself working for Dalton Trumbo in Johnny Got His Gun, sharing the screen with Gregory Peck in Shoot Out, and guest-starring ono a plethora of classic ‘70s series, including Mannix, Kung Fu, Adam-12, The Rookies, Cannon, Medical Center, and The Rockford Files. But it was film where he really got the chance to shine, including roles in Car Wash, The Jerk, Scarface – spoiler alert: he’s the one who meets his demise at the end of a chainsaw – and The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension. He also forged a longstanding friendship with Edward James Olmos that found the two actors sharing the screen in a number of projects, including Miami Vice, American Me, and The Ballad of Gregorio Cortez. Pepe has lived a fascinating life that’s still going strong, but you can learn more about him by watching the very interesting documentary that’s been made about his life: “Pepe Serna: Life is Art.” Not coincidentally, he also has a book by the same name, with the subtitle “A Chicano’s Groundbreaking Life in Film.” Both of these are accessible via his website, PepeSerna.net. We had a great chat, but I’ll warn you that as you listen, you’ll get the impression that he’s doing some physical bits to go along with some of the acting information he’s imparting during the conversation, and you’re right. If you haven’t already upgraded to either a paid subscription to my Substack newsletter or contributed to my Patreon campaign for the podcast, then this is a good excuse, because that way you’ll be able to check out the video footage of the interview as well. And with that plug having been delivered, it’s time to let Pepe talk.

This time, I'm letting Billy Campbell talk. Billy is someone whose career arc has taken him from Dynasty to Dracula to Star Trek: The Next Generation, if not necessarily in that order. He’s starred in a plethora of period pieces that have found him in the midst of the Civil War, Los Angeles in the late 1930s, and Chicago in the early 1960s. But, of course, it’s important to keep in mind that Billy basically hasn’t stopped working since kicking off his acting career in the ‘80s, and when you’re working more or less constantly, it puts you in a position where you find yourself working in all sorts of projects and with all sorts of people. For instance, once again, we have another guest who once worked with former podcast guest Paget Brewster, who referred to Billy as “dreamy,” to which he replied, “She’s pretty dreamy herself." Of course, we talk about that project - a TV movie called Max Q - during the course of our conversation, and we hit on a pretty huge collection of other works from his back catalog, including the aforementioned projects, plus the ones I casually referenced by their location and era, like Crime Story, The Rocketeer, and the one-two punch of Gettysburg and Gods and Generals. Probably my favorite story is his remembrances of working on the various Tales of the City miniseries, although when I later asked him to tell me his definitive “Hollywood” story, he told me one that went in a direction that was different from the way most people answer the question, and that’s even knowing the reputation of the actor who features in the story. Suffice it to say that the reputation in question is definitively cemented by story's end. Even though he’s originally from Virginia, he now lives in Norway, although he maintains a residence in Canada as well, thanks to working there on such projects as The Killing and Cardinal. But, of course, he still works in the US pretty regularly, including on an upcoming film called A Better Place, which he filmed in Las Cruces, New Mexico, and he’ll be back in Gettysburg next year for a special event that will provide him with the opportunity that’ll give him the chance to do another performance as - you guessed it - Abraham Lincoln. Oh, and did I mention that I made him cry? I just wanted to talk about how awesome Alan Arkin is, I swear! Anyway, that’s probably enough to secure your listenership for the remainder of the proceedings. It's time to let Billy Campbell talk.