Transcript of The Interviews | Matthew Cole, Morgana Robinson, David Byrne, Tracy Letts

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My guest tonight is an investigative journalist. His new book is called "Princes and Thieves: Jared Kushner and Mohammed bin Zayed's Secret Plot to Remake the Middle East." Please welcome to the show Matthew Cole, sir. Thank you for joining us.

Thank you for having me.

Oh my God, did you bring questions for me?

I know, but I do have something out of fairness. Before we begin, I want to read Mr. Kushner's lawyer's denial, part of it, before we start. No, it's serious.

You want to read it before we start?

Yeah.

OK.

Quote.

Is this a bit, or is this real?

It's very real.

OK. This is from his lawyer.

This is from his lawyer.

To you.

To me.

OK. So he has your email.

"Mr. Kushner never accessed foreign accounts and always followed all rules and regulations and only pursued goals that were in the best interest of the United States, as directed by the President of the United States." So I just want to get that out of the way, because it's important no, it's important to note that Kushner unequivocally and emphatically denies everything in this book. I mean, everything.

Well, am I in trouble now? What the what are you doing?

I think you're good.

He's denied did he see the book before it went to print? Well, let's tell people what's in the book first, so that they have a context for what they deny. It is a wild yarn. It is a wild story that is being told here. We're all familiar with Mohammed bin Salman and other Arab leaders put a lot of money into his affinity fund, and he manages that. And it's about $5 billion, $6 billion. I think everybody's aware of that and the conflict of interest that that appears to hold.

Right. It's very distinct from that.

OK, so what is this?

What the book lays out, largely, is how Jared Kushner ran essentially a shadow foreign policy while he was in the White House.

This is the first Trump term, not the second.

This is the first Trump term. This is as a senior advisor to the president, as a White House official. And it's what we see is going back to the very beginning of the Trump Trump's first term in 2017, was he found common cause with MBZ, Mohammed bin Zayed, who's the lawyer.

Now, MBZ.

Yeah.

We all know MBS. We didn't know there was an MBZ. Are there.

Some of us did.

Is there an MBA through Z? Is it do they Mohammed bin Adam, and then they just keep going?

It's it can be difficult, and it's a bit of an alphabet soup. But it's important to understand.

OK.

MBZ is the ruler of the UAE.

UAE, OK.

And I would say, individually, he's worth somewhere it's estimated, but like literally $1 trillion, OK? I mean, $1 trillion. So very hard to sort of put in real terms how much money this man has. And as the ruler of this tiny country, he uses that money more than anything else to buy friends and frenemies, OK?

Why.

And so part of the story is how Kushner gets embraces there's sort of a joint embrace.

He's considered a moderate in the region.

Very moderate.

He's very much against extremism.

He's beloved he's beloved in the West.

Beloved.

And some of that is because his.

That's $1 trillion.

Well, I I will tell you that one of the working titles for this book early on was "No One Can Say No," because that's what it's like when you're reporting on the people who around MBZ from any country. They offer money. No one can say no. I mean, just on a I don't mean illegally. I just mean.

Them in the sound look, Phil Mickelson couldn't say no. None of them.

Right.

They give money to every they buy everything.

Right. And so what you find is is that Kushner and Trump came into office, and they wanted the great peace deal. They wanted to solve the Middle East peace Middle East conflict, which was, you know, Israel versus Palestine, Israel and the Palestinians. And.

Is that still going on? I didn't finish the book.

Well, the issue for them was is that under America's first policy, Trump wasn't going to spend any money. He wanted to pull troops out. And what Kushner found in MBZ and in MBS were two rulers who were willing to pay for it. They were going to bring the financial side to try to get the Palestinians to the table, to accept a deal that was favorable to Israel. And that's sort of the second part of Kushner's, you know, background, which is he was close to Netanyahu. And politically, in terms of Israeli politics and security, he's very to the right, right?

Right.

And it's important to remember that.

And these two a little shading on there is that MBS and MBZ are both upset with the Obama administration.

Very.

Because of the Iran deal that they signed.

That's right.

And also their support of Arab Spring.

Absolutely.

Autocrats there, not big on freedom movement.

That's exactly it. And so you have these two sides coming together.

Yes.

Perfectly aligned, which is the Gulf Arabs were furious about the Iran deal. They wanted it gone. They wanted to not just thwart Iran, but they wanted to hurt Iran. They were hoping to topple Iran, right?

So they all agree with each other, and they all have their policy goals all aligned: MBS, MBZ, Trump, Kushner.

Exactly. And Israel at the time.

And Israel at the time.

And Israel too. And so but what happens is is that Kushner finds himself in a position in the White House with no statutory authority, right? He comes into office.

Right.

Just to remind everyone. He had no experience. He gets the job because he's the son-in-law. He gets.

No.

He gets.

Now you're pushing it.

He's given perhaps the most consequential position in terms of foreign policy in the administration.

Right.

And because he's not been vetted or confirmed by the Senate, he's not a cabinet member, he essentially has no oversight.

And they didn't have security clearance for a while.

Well, for a while, right? And that's in the book too, because that's an important issue. He was essentially working just for the president, right? Now, he will say, in fairness, he had rules and laws and regulations that he followed. And it's true. But there was essentially no oversight. And so you have this someone who is, let's just say, underqualified, who gets into this position and immediately finds himself aligned with two of the wealthiest men in the world.

Right.

Who are seeking US support and top cover for remaking the Middle East in their favor. And when that happens, what we know is is that Kush and Kushner has said this, right? His diplomacy, Trump's diplomacy, is business. It's a real estate negotiation, right? And so diplomacy becomes very transactional. And at that point and we can get into more about sort of what triggers some of this all of a sudden, what appears are some secret financial agreements and arrangements between the three of them, between MBS, MBZ, and Kushner.

Secret financial agreements to.

To reach.

If they all agree, why are there secret if they all agree on what to do, what are the financial agreements about?

Well, that's that's what we're getting into with the with the accounts, right? So what happens is is that there's an original idea. MBZ and MBS float this idea to Kushner early in 2017 that there should be a $10 to $12 billion foreign policy fund, not like overt, essentially an idea that put money together, and we're going to support Donald Trump's foreign policy initiatives, right? And overtly. So for instance, one of the things that I was told was an example of an idea that they had was they were going to fund the wall down in Mexico.

Isn't that the United States Treasury? I mean, we're not isn't that what we do oversight?

I know.

Isn't that the story of Iraq and Afghanistan, that we have a pool of money, sort of like a slush fund? I mean.

Well, that's all money. This is specifically money from the UAE and Saudi Arabia.

Right.

And so what the first let's just call it the first pool of money.

OK.

And what I in the book call the alpha account looks a lot like Iran contra, OK? This is a pool of.

OK.

This is a pool of money that is meant to remake the Middle East. A lot of the money went to trying to support the war at the time, the conflict in Libya, OK, and overthrowing the government in Libya. And there was a larger view, as you laid out, you know, anti-Iranian, fight back against Iran.

Right.

Undo, but the other part was to really, really undo the last of the Arab Spring. And so for instance, in Libya, where there had been a overthrow and Gaddafi goes down, they want to put in a wannabe dictator, the next dictator in Libya.

Right.

And so the support and the money in some of that account starts to flow into there. Then you get into this is where it gets you know, what I like to say is and I think it's really important for readers to know is that what Jared Kushner found himself into is kind of like a Game of Thrones-like scenario with these three Arab rulers. You have MBS and MBZ, Saudi Arabia and the UAE.

Right.

And then you have Qatar.

Sure.

And so.

And they're at odds with.

And they're at odds.

Yeah.

And so here's how it goes. In June of 2017.

Yeah.

MBS and MBZ team up and announce that they're going to start a blockade against Qatar, OK? They're sick of the ruler of Qatar. They want him they're sick of Al Jazeera. They want him to stop funding the Muslim Brotherhood.

Right, because they feel like that generates unrest amongst the Hopeloy that is threatening their autocracies.

Exactly. In the end, all of this is just about power and self-preservation, right?

Right.

In those countries, the ruling family is the state. And so.

Yes.

Preserving Saudi Arabia really just means preserving MBS and likewise for MBZ. And so they start this blockade. And you know, a lot of it was also that they couldn't control the Qataris. Qataris have a lot of money.

Yes.

And they didn't want to listen to.

And the Qataris are funding Iranian proxies through the region, which is Hamas and Hezbollah and those things.

They're.

And they're hosting.

Some of that is yeah, absolutely. And so there were you know, they had been at loggerheads, right? But they also host a huge American base.

Yes.

10,000 troops. And so they're all allies of the United States.

Sure.

And so well, and that's one of the things I mean, that's a central component of the book is like, you know, do allies, you know, try to use money to buy people to influence the president of the United States, you know, directly?

Apparently.

And so.

I mean, but why all the subterfuge? I mean, they do it out in the open. They give him a $400 million plane.

Well, that's the I mean, actually, what this story is is the origin story. This book is the origin story of how we got there.

OK.

OK? What I've done and I think what the reporting is is it is lifting the veil on 10 years of really deep, dark secrets that have been going on in the Middle East with Kushner as a central component of it, OK?

Now, how do you know that he is a central other than he's part of the diplomacy, and he's trying to do the Abraham Accords, and he gets them done? What is how do you know that he's part of this through subterfuge and this $10 or $12 billion fund?

OK. Well, first of all, let's just point out the $10 or $12 billion fund disappeared, OK? It didn't happen, OK? It didn't materialize. So what does.

Oh, there was no fund.

No, wait. The starts with the idea starts with.

You're killing me, Smalls.

No. We go from 10 to 12, and it doesn't work out, to here's $2 billion, and we're going to split it up into two pots, OK? And that becomes the secret bank accounts, OK? The alpha account and the beta account. And those accounts.

Billion each.

Roughly, OK? One is held in the UAE, and one is held in Israel, OK? And.

You literally held like Abu Dhabi Bank, Bank of Israel.

Yeah, the central Bank of Israel.

Central Bank.

And the first Abu Dhabi Bank.

Sure. You don't want to be in the second.

In the.

Yeah.

In the UAE. And one of those accounts, as I said, it's like Iran contra. That's money that goes to a Libyan dictator, the founder of Blackwater, Eric Prince. It went to a Cuban hitman who worked for both the CIA and the Mossad.

What is their role in this?

Well, they are taking money and moving weapons and trying to arm Haftar in Libya, OK? And so and that's why I'm saying that the what the fund looks like is a foreign policy fund that the UAE is operating and that Jared is just by having access to the account has embraced, right? Because what this is really all about is.

He has access to the account.

Yes. He has access to well, he was a signatory on the account, according to my sources. And so.

He's a signatory.

Let.

Oh, may I?

Yes, you may.

Or you want to.

No, no. Go ahead.

I'm going to assume these guys are sophisticated and understand the laws of cryptocurrency and money laundering and all these other issues. That seems very above board for a way to launder a slush fund through hitmen and strongmen. Like, we do that through the CIA anyway. So why? I don't understand why.

Actually, so you've hit exactly it. The UAE has been obsessed. Mohammed bin Zayed has been obsessed.

Yeah.

Essentially with replicating CIA covert CIA-like covert operations around the Middle East and North Africa. For years, they've been doing it. It's a very murderous regime. And so what they did was they put money into a bank account controlled by a charity, a domestic Emirati charity, that the UAE uses for covert arms shipments, OK?

And his.

That's the wait.

His name is on it, Jared.

No, I didn't say his name was on it. I said he was a signatory, which meant it gave him access to it. And we know that he had access to it because when his phone was hacked in 2017 by the Dutch intelligence service, they saw his access to the account on his screenshots, on his phone.

The Dutch intelligence services.

Yeah. It's a wild story.

Yes.

No question.

Wait, wait, wait.

And just to put it out there, the hacking of his phone is actually in everything that's in here.

The Dutch hacked Jared Kushner's phone. They are NATO allies.

They had an operation. They got themselves into access into a Russian GRU server in 2017. When they get into the server.

The Dutch.

Yes. They find that the Russians have gotten into Jared's phone. And it set off alarm bells.

The Russians hacked Jared's phone.

Yes. What the hell is going on here?

Thank you.

OK. They follow that up by deciding that they also want to get into Jared's phone. And when they get into Jared's phone.

I'm sure it's just dick pics. What was I don't even understand. Like, what? So the you OK.

So just let me follow me here.

OK.

So after the Dutch access the phone, what they start to see are they see an access to an account in Abu Dhabi, at the first Abu Dhabi Bank, OK? And on Jared's phone. Now, they can't control his phone. They can only see the phone when he's using it, OK? So it's like screenshots. And.

And he's literally like Venmoing a guy in Libya.

No. What they see is an account, a bank account. And that bank account starts to show money flows in from a bank from Azerbaijan, OK? And they have in from Azerbaijan into the UAE. And the Dutch are looking at it going, what is this? And then the money starts to pool there and starts to go out. And the first, for instance, the first transfer out from that account went to Eric Prince, the founder of Blackwater. The second one went to Khalifa Haftar in Libya.

You've seen the statements.

What?

You've seen bank statements.

I'm not going to get into my sourcing. As a reminder just as a reminder, now this is serious.

Yeah.

Last year, I wrote a story with a colleague for The New York Times about a secret SEAL Team 6 commando raid in North Korea.

North Korea.

That failed. My reward for that is to receive a subpoena.

Yes.

To testify before a grand jury.

And your phone's been hacked by UAE as well.

And my phone has been hacked by the UAE. So protecting my sources is critical.

Understood. Can you, without giving up sources, just say you have witnessed this, and it's not just verbal hearsay? Like, I know a guy in the Dutch intelligence that I trust.

I can't say anything. I can't say anything beyond what as I have it in the book, which is.

But when they're going to like, they're going to sue you, you're going to have to say something, no?

Well, I mean, I think the issue is I can't speak to whether they're going to sue me or not. I listened to their denials. I took them in. I went back to some of my sources. And I'm very confident that I have the story right. And so if that comes, I'll deal with it when it comes.

Right.

This is a story that the public needs to understand and see and hear to figure out how we went from 2017, when Donald Trump went into office, to how we ended up in a war in Iran. Because it is the same arc. And it starts there in 2016.

Right.

When Jared Kushner meets privately and secretly at the time in Manhattan's in the Four Seasons in Manhattan with MBZ.

Right.

Because they start a bromance. And that bromance is about.

That's so like everything is so spivey, spy, and then you end with bromance? Come on.

Look, this is really serious stuff.

It is.

But the reality is is right.

Let me just push back for a moment.

Yeah.

So your theory of the case makes total sense to me. But it makes total sense to me in the world of things we already know. MBZ and MBS, they don't like Iran. Netanyahu doesn't like Iran. They're working together across purposes. They don't really seem to care about the Palestinians. Everyone seems very willing to sell them out. They have people in the Trump administration who are fellow travelers in that larger project, protecting Israel, weakening Iran, and strengthening the autocracies that are in the Middle East.

Here's a better question. Why would the Dutch tell the Americans that they hacked the president's son-in-law's phone? If they made that.

Allies.

Yeah, but at the time, they were terrified, as were most of NATO's allies, most people in NATO, most countries in NATO, that Trump was a Russian spy, right? That he was a setup. And so when they see money flowing from Azerbaijan.

OK.

They have this question.

Why didn't they talk to the Biden administration in 2020?

I mean, intelligence agencies spy on countries all that's literally what they do.

OK.

OK?

But.

And they don't talk about it.

But this is a big MGILA. And you're asking us to go with you on a big MGILA, not for a story that seems implausible in the sense that money laundering is rife, but like, it does beggar belief when you think like, why wouldn't they do this through crypto or shit that you can't trace? Like, signatories through the first bank of Abu Dhabi.

Well, actually.

And the central bank of Israel seem crazy.

I think first of all, you've read the book, right?

I have.

OK. Did you enjoy it? I mean.

I did.

Would you recommend would you recommend it to others?

I don't think most people are readers.

OK. That's not much of a.

I think most people are waiting for the book.

OK.

No, it is it was a frustrating read, if I'm being honest.

OK.

It's a story that I believe on theory, but I felt like oh, this is going to sound crazy. It felt a little like religion. I get the general, like, there might be something in the sky that's bigger than all of us. But once you get down to like, and he's a carpenter, then I'm like, OK. And I think that, for me, was part of the problem is when you get into some of the specifics, they raise so many questions that I began to question the entire narrative.

OK. And that's fair. And that's what I want are is people to read it and come up with their own decision or their own sense of what they think. I am very confident that what is in there I'm sitting here very confident that what is in there is true. And I fully behind it. And the real issue is, I think, is that, one, all of this stuff is complicated, OK?

Yes.

You have I mean, I didn't even get into the breakup between MBZ and MBS, right? Because they were they had a bromance, and then they broke up. And right now, they're very broken up, right? And so.

I was really rooting for them.

And so then they each individually are trying to wrap their arm around Kushner and take him away from the other. I mean, there's a whole element of that, right? And so it's not easy stuff. It's you know, it's journalism. And not journalism isn't always you know, investigative journalism in particular doesn't always have the perfect ending. It has you know, what's frustrating, I think, partly, is that when you're talking about foreign policy and all of these powerful people who are interested in preserving their own ends, right?

Yes.

And achieving their own ends, is they break apart. They come together. You know, it's not dissimilar. It's like watching Trump and Netanyahu, right? When they need each other, they're together. When they when then they hate each other, and they're apart, right? So that is the collection here. But there was a central element to it, which were these secret financial transactions and deals between MBZ, MBS, and Kushner.

Right. But ultimately, for the veracity of it, people are going to need more than like, take my word for it. I believe it. That's my only point. And that within that, that's going to it's going to ultimately end up being a tough sell if you, for reasons that may seem very reasonable to protect your sources and you've been burned in this area before, it would make sense. I'm just concerned that, like, this book's a big swing.

Sure.

Like, no question.

I'm I would say two things. Number one.

Yeah.

I think we are in a place right now in this country where most people can see there's something wrong, OK?

Yes.

OK. This book, for me, started five years ago. I pulled a thread. I followed that thread for five years.

But are you worried that this is the steel dossier? That this is Christopher Steele.

No, no, no.

Selling a P-tape? And you go on shows and go, there's a P-tape.

No.

And that puts you in a position you don't worry about.

No, no, I think no, no. I think that, you know, look, journalism is imperfect, right? It's, you know, often described as the first draft of history.

Yes.

And just because I don't have you know, the book doesn't have every answer to every question or it prompts more questions, to me, that's the point.

OK.

That's the purpose, right? We have to understand.

This is an invitation.

What the hell happened? And let's figure out what I'm bringing is the tip of the iceberg in terms of Trump's corruption, OK? The Trump administration's corruption that started in the first administration, OK?

Mm-hmm.

And I don't know how big it is beneath the surface. But I know it's a lot bigger than the tip. And so I'm pushing it there.

The book is called "It's a Lot Bigger Than the Tip." It's it's it's it is a great invitation. And I do urge people to read it. It is a fascinating story. It certainly corroborates a worldview that I think most people believe is the underbelly of international intrigue. And we certainly know stories of America feeding cash to warlords and manipulating governments.

This was just done in reverse.

In reverse.

Right.

But obviously, too, I'm certainly not the only one. Like, I'm on Team U. And so for me to go like, hmm, is the only thing I'm saying.

OK.

And I hope that, obviously, there is.

I respect that.

Oh.

And I appreciate you having me.

You know what? Wait. Hold on. Are we having a bromance? The book is printed, indeed. Matthew Cole.

My guest tonight is a BAFTA-winning comedian and actor who stars alongside Sacha Baron Cohn in the new film "Ally G: Who Is I?" Please welcome Morgana Robinson. Morgana!

Thank you very much.

You're in the brand-new "Ally G" movie.

I am.

You're Julie, or Me Julie.

Yeah.

As it's officially or.

Our Julie.

Our Julie. Welcome, Julie. What for people who aren't up to date on the "Ally G" universe, what is going on in the new "Ally G" movie?

OK, so it's sort of Ally G, blah, blah, blah, mayhem, chaos, offend everyone, and the end.

And that's it?

Yeah.

It's sort of all wrapped up right there.

Yeah, that's it. That's it in a nutshell.

I mean, it's remarkable. Watching that clip right there.

Oh, yeah.

You are an actress, comedian.

I'm an.

Yeah, impresario, I might say.

I feel like I'm dressed as a Dallas Extra.

Oh, a very no, yes.

Or a sort of a flight attendant or something.

Did you feel the need to dress like an American star coming on over here to perform? Is that the.

No, I'm just I just like a bit of drama.

Yes.

And she says wearing the beige-est top she could.

A beige with a dramatic bow. That's really the move to make.

It's confusing. Who is she? Yeah.

Well, in that clip, you are there's two of you who know what's going on.

Yes.

And you're basically, that scene is you and Ally G are trying to communicate through a real estate.

I don't know what's going on.

You don't know what's happening in that scene.

No, I'm just I'm just holding on for dear life.

You really are. Well.

Honestly.

You're basically sending a person back and forth between you and Sacha Baron Cohn.

Yeah.

And he doesn't know he's in on the joke.

It's like a really terrible game of tennis. I don't know what where it's going to land. I'm like, you know, no ball boys.

No ball boys whatsoever.

Yeah.

Although there is a lot of genitalia in this movie.

There are a lot of balls. And yeah, not enough kebabs. Oh, actually, I lie.

There's plenty of kebabs.

No more spoilers.

No spoilers. Well, break us down. For people who don't know this type of world, you're asked to do a lot in a movie like this.

Yeah.

Because you're essentially playing a character, a comedic character, out in the world with a bunch of people who don't know they're part of a movie, who don't know what is going to happen or what's going on. And so you have to improvise with people for hours and hours at a time, correct? Like, I'm curious what the audition process for getting a role like this is.

Oh, my goodness. OK, so there were sort of waves of auditions. The first one was like with Sacha, like a one-on-one. Can you be funny? Can you improvise? Can you, you know, essentially go toe to toe with him?

Yeah.

And the next one is they literally just throw you into a real-life scenario, like an interview, and see if you can be real. Because I guess it's the combination of, like, being funny but also being able to be real. Otherwise, you don't have a film.

Otherwise, there's nothing in there.

Yeah.

So they're basically like, we're going to throw you into something. And the other person doesn't know they're into it. But we're going to watch you sort of exist with these other people for a while.

Yeah.

Yeah. Is that exciting? Is that nerve-wracking?

Terrifying. But also, like, you're full of adrenaline.

Yeah.

So it's a bit of both. You've never felt so alive. Plus, actually, there was a weird sort of I was actually quite relaxed.

Really?

Because there were no lines, no lines to learn.

Yeah.

And for, like, a you know, for a bit of a dumb blonde, like, I just I can't remember them. So I'm like, I'll make them up as I go along. This is easy.

You can't up at that point.

Yeah, that's what I thought.

Well, you come from also a sketch background.

Oh, yeah.

Did you up? Is that what you realized?

Lots of times.

Lots of times?

Yeah.

What does that look like in this universe?

Well, thank God my character's a bit, you know.

Yeah.

You can there's she's you can sort of it could be there's a few times I corpsed, for example.

Mm-hmm.

Sorry, does that that sounds really awful? I didn't die.

Yeah.

That's what they call it in on the thing when you laugh when you're not supposed to.

Yes, yes. So yeah, you're fully alive right now.

That is so nice.

So there was no death.

Never felt so alive.

Yes.

What jet lag? Yeah.

Is it do you get in trouble when corpse scene happens? Or do you have to make that part of your character?

Yeah, we get you put me in a small box and not feed me for a few days.

Yes. How long is the process of filming a movie like this?

I mean, I think this is year three.

Yeah.

Yeah. I mean, he'd like to change his mind.

Yeah.

And the script is like a sort of, like, constant moving thing. It was there's this script. And then you're about to go on and shoot. And then two minutes before, there's a totally, totally different thing. We're doing what? He's no, what? No, come on. They never and also, you're like, they're never going to believe this. There's no way we can pull this off. This is impossible. And then it's sort of it's like a magic trick.

Wait.

It just happens.

It's.

And we pull it off. And I'm like, ah.

I mean, it's there's stuff that happens in this movie. I don't want to give anything away. But like, there's you're pregnant in this film.

Oh. That's the only thing I let me sleeve.

There's.

Yeah, I'm up the duff.

Yeah.

I'm up the duff.

Up the duff?

I've got a bun in the oven.

You've got a bun in that one, I know.

Up the duff.

You're up the duff?

Up the duff.

What is the duff? Is that a river? Like, the Duffy?

Yeah, go on then.

Yeah? Are people pregnant in Ireland? Is that what's happening?

Yeah.

Yeah?

Shitcreek Without a Paddle is another one. Do you have that one?

Yeah, we do have that one, yes.

I think that might be more Australian.

The Shitcreek or the Duff?

I've Shitcreek Without a Paddle.

That sounds the way you say it, that definitely sounds that way.

Yeah.

So you're pregnant in this movie.

Very much so.

You give birth in this movie.

Oh, for God's sake.

Is that am I giving it away?

No, I also get my minge out. All the spoilers are done.

All the spoilers.

That's it now.

Here's the good news. I think. The good news is I bet only 20% of our audience knows what a minge is. That is that's deep cut British slang right there.

It is, yeah. Oh, yeah. We've got lots of different words for vagina.

Yes, yeah.

I wonder what if you give me American ones that I don't know.

Oh, don't make me say that on TV. That makes me feel so.

I'll start. I'll start. I'll start.

OK.

OK, snatch.

OK, pussy.

That is universal.

That's the word that you think, uh.

Growler.

Growler?

Yeah.

Pie.

Oh, nice.

Mm-hmm.

Twat.

Oh, you said snatch. There's another one that starts with C that I think your culture is more comfortable saying than ours.

Yeah, we own that word. We own that word.

You do. It's so casual.

Americans can't say it.

Oh, no, we can't say it.

But we can't really say asshole. Well, we can, but it just sounds so posh. Asshole.

That is true, yeah.

You own asshole.

Oh, we love asshole.

Yeah.

Asshole, yeah. Oh, yeah, yeah. That's asshole. That's my asshole, asshole, asshole. That's easy and it's fine.

Yeah.

Yes. But the C the C word is that's too much for us.

I've actually got it tattooed on my right there.

Right there?

Yeah.

That's the wrong placement for it, I got to tell you. I would not put it there.

I like to confuse people, keep them on their toes.

You had the premiere for this. And you had to go to the premiere in character. Is that a bummer? You can't go as yourself?

No, God, I loved it.

Really?

Yeah, because it was sort of like it was like a very you know when you've got a really good, solid bra?

Yes.

I felt protected. I felt supported.

Mm-hmm.

You know, it was the best thing ever. Because I can hide behind my characters.

You could be in that.

I'm actually really shy. I am.

You're really shy?

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

No, I don't buy that.

You know, you're true story.

Really?

Yeah, yeah. I was, well, like, five minutes ago, well, knock your knees. Yeah, I'm a bowl of jelly.

You got to slow this British down for me, OK? Knock your knees, bowl of jelly back there?

Yeah, knock your knees, yeah.

You're knocking you're nervous, but yes.

Yeah.

But you've had to like, some of the things you had to do for this film, you're like, you're doing this these are, like, eight-hour performances.

Yes.

You're in it to win it.

Oh, my God. This was weird. So to sort of he sort of trained me, like, rocky.

Uh-huh.

So we would we were I got to the lot. And he I've done the scene in for, like, six months, you know, since the audition. I was like, hi, do you remember me? He was like, in character! I was like, what? He's like, no, you're in character all the time. So he insisted that I was Me Julie on set, on the lot.

Yeah.

Practicing to stay in character all this time. It was like a sort of Daniel Day-Lewis jail.

Yeah.

Day sentence.

Yeah, if Daniel Day-Lewis had the guts to be a pregnant woman from stains, right?

Yeah, it takes a special kind of person. Yeah.

I mean, there's a lot of gullible people in this movie.

Yeah.

People who go along with some pretty wild premises or what have you. Did you find like, how does the US mindset compare to the folks back in the UK? Did you are they different? Could this have been pulled off back there?

I mean, with yes, because it has, hasn't it?

Yeah, I mean, originally, I guess "Ally G" originated over there.

Yeah, that's where it all started.

Do you think it would still work over there?

I don't know. I mean, it's hard to tell.

Yeah.

I mean, never say never.

Yeah.

We always think, oh, this is the last one. And then it's not. So who knows?

Yeah. Who would you what would you want to play next time if you had to live for another three years as a character?

Oh, it would be nice just not to be pregnant, not to be having sex with someone or someone's mother.

The dream role for so many young actors out there. "Ally G, Who Is I?" is coming to Prime Video October 28. Morgana Robinson is here.

My guest tonight is a legendary musician, artist, and author whose new book is called "Sleeping Beauties: Why Good Ideas Go Dormant and How They Wake Up." Please welcome David Byrne.

Very nice. Very nice welcome.

David, they seem to really enjoy you and your work.

I haven't done anything.

You haven't done anything?

Yeah.

You deserve that. I should send you your own Wikipedia page. I think you have. This book is remarkable.

Thank you.

But you are a rock star. And this book dives into yes. This book dives into culture, art, Kafka, Melville. It dives into Lykens, deep scientific research. Why?

I'm not really an expert on any of these things, but I'm interested.

Yeah.

So I can go down the rabbit hole and dig in enough to figure out, OK, why did that happen? What happened there? Why did this thing get forgotten? And who rediscovered it? How'd that happen? It's a great story. The book is a story of all these stories of how things disappeared, got forgotten. And then years, decades, centuries later, somebody goes, that's what we've been looking for.

Right, yeah. You see, like, the progress of ideas, both on a scientific level and on, like, a cultural level. I think one thing that stood out to me, I was curious, like, you followed some of these artists, like I mentioned, Kafka, Melville, who weren't renowned in their time. And then they find themselves, like Moby Dick finds it's after 50 years after Melville dies, suddenly becomes this modern American masterpiece. Like, how important is it when you go through something like this for some of these great ideas to have a PR team in the afterlife to make these things make these things real?

Uh, Melville, the Moby Dick author, was really successful before that.

Mm-hmm.

He wrote these South Sea adventures based on his experiences going to sea. One involved, like, cannibals and escaping and all kinds of stuff. And they were so crazy as adventures that one of the publishers says, no, no, no, we can't that didn't happen.

Yeah.

So then he decides, I've got to do something different. And he writes "Moby Dick," very different kind of book, not just a straight adventure.

Right.

In a tank. And.

There's a lot of tangents in "Moby Dick." It's very whaling-focused at times as well.

Yeah.

Yeah.

But it deals with all these other subjects.

Mm-hmm.

I mean, it deals with racism and sex and colonialism and all these other things tangentially.

Yeah.

So he was so forgotten that at one point, some English reporter or what was saying, oh, is Melville around? I'd like to do an interview with him. And because I think he's dead.

He wasn't even dead. He was still alive at the time.

He was still alive.

Yeah.

So in his case, it as it was with some other things, it was a catastrophe, World War I, that it seems to have changed the public's thinking, that this horrible thing happened, this horrible war happened, atrocities and horrible things happened. And people wondered, how could we do this? How could as human beings, what are we made of that we did this?

It finds a I'm curious for you who has struck a nerve all throughout the last many, many years. Like, how much of this Melville, I'm sure, in some ways wasn't reflective of the culture at the time, at least when "Moby Dick" came out, perhaps earlier in his career he was, and then create something that is more reflective of a culture of a different time that he wasn't connected to. You've had to create work that does reflect something that resonates with the culture of the moment. Like, as an artist yourself, do you reckon with that?

Well, where's my white whale? Yeah. I've been doing this long enough, not being on shows, but like yours, but making music, things like that. And I've seen my career go up and down, all that kind of thing. So I have a little perspective. And I feel like, OK, I know that you can have some success. And then it can go away again. And then you can kind of people go, oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, we actually like some of what you do.

Right.

And.

Yeah.

And everybody goes, yeah, he's our guy. But yeah. So there's yeah, I thought, yeah, that's what happened with a lot of these people.

Do you think like, there's an element with, like, with Melville, with Kafka, with the artists in here. You also talked about, like, Caravaggio, many of the other painters. It seems like to make work that becomes timeless or resonate outside of your time, they have to leave a very specific space that perhaps is not articulated in their own time, that can be filled in or articulated in a time somewhere in the future. In some ways, don't wrap everything up. Like, when you're creating your own art, are you considering those things as well, like a clarity that are you withholding any clarity in the work that you create so that it becomes it becomes more open and resonant later?

I'm writing or making songs for people in the year 3000.

I knew it. I always knew it.

So am I.

He's burning down a house. Whose house is this? I don't understand.

Uh-huh.

Do you think about future generations with that? Or is that a fool's error?

No, no, no.

Yeah.

No, no. I'm just thinking my reference has to be.

Yeah.

What makes me work works for me. What yeah. And of course, when I'm performing, I see, oh, people like that.

Right.

That maybe not so much.

What I love, there's an element in here too. You talk about how we have such a you talk about, like, the ego of modernity, how we basically think all the dead people that didn't have it figured out, the people who are alive do. And you have such great examples of ideas from the past in the world of science, in the world of concrete, that in and of themselves perhaps have outpaced the ideas that we have right now. What do you have against the past? Or what do you have against the present?

Nothing against the past. But yes, about the present, I think we all do it. We all do it. We all think we know more than our parents or our grandparents or whatever or in general, people who came before us. We think, well, we've learned more. There's more science and knowledge. And the internet has everything. And you think, oh, we're smarter. Whatever we're doing has to be the best because here we are.

Mm-hmm.

And then, I mean, the evidence in the book kind of piles up. And you realize, ooh, no, not always.

Right.

Sometimes something that was done in the past, excuse me, is actually better than what we're doing now. And we could learn from it, be humble for a minute, and go, you know, they were actually doing it better.

Yeah, do you feel like humbleness is in and of itself a secret weapon in terms of creativity and breaking new ideas?

Yeah, I mean, you have to be willing to think that maybe somebody else knows something better than you do.

You have to do that? But have you met somebody else? They're full of so many shit ideas.

No, I know it all.

I love you also talk about how important it is to work between disciplines. And at the end of the book, you discuss also moments and ways that you've tried to cultivate serendipity for people in creative fields, like how to step out of them and learn from fields like from science or other creative spaces that you don't traffic in. Like, how much is that a part of your own creative process?

I try. But it's really hard. I mean, in quite a few of the stories, it's somebody who gains an insight from another discipline.

Mm-hmm.

And it could be something way outside of what they're doing. And they go, oh, that gives me the idea that is going to solve the problem I'm trying to work on. And so we know of all these things like the open office plans where people are supposed to mingle and talk about things and get ideas from one another. And it's a good idea. But it's really hard to get it to work. I tried it in a little office that I had where I had people in all different disciplines in kind of we all shared an eating area and a kitchen and all that kind of stuff.

No.

I mean, I find that yes, you have to be you want your doctor to know their specialty.

Mm-hmm.

I mean, if they're treating you. But you also want them to kind of be aware of what other developments are happening.

Right.

In the world of health.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Are you I'm curious, in that in studying for this book, researching for this book, like, are you actively searching out these stories? Or I'm curious what, like, the next to David Byrne's bed, is there just a pile of books in random fields that you are pulling off and saying, like, oh, this is for the next book. I'm going to dive into this. I'm going to make an album out of this. This might become a painting. Like, what's on your nightstand?

Quite a number of the things here were found by accident.

Yeah.

I'd be reading, say, a thing about a painter like Caravaggio or something like that. And then they'd mention, oh, he was really successful. And then for 200 years, nobody was interested in him. And then they'd go on and talk about his these paintings and how great they were. And I go, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, that sentence that he was forgotten for 200 years, what happened?

Mm-hmm.

And I go, OK, now I got to go get a book or do some research and find out why that happened.

Mm-hmm.

And how did he come back?

Yeah.

Yeah.

So it's basically, you're reading shitty books first that don't give you the whole story.

Yes.

And then you go find better books about that.

Yes.

Yes.

But.

That makes a lot of sense. You recently created a song for the new Elon Musk documentary that came out using different phrases and words from Elon Musk. That's been out a few weeks. I'm curious if you've if you had heard back from any of the anybody in the Musk camp as he challenged you to a cage match? Or how did that come about?

The director reached out to me. We'd met. And I'm a fan of his other documentaries. And reached out to me and said, will you work with the guy who's doing the score?

Mm-hmm.

Who's really good. So I said, I'm in the middle of a tour. But yeah, I think I can do it. And I had an idea to kind of be inspired by things that Musk had said. And he gives good quotes.

Oh, he really does.

He gives really good quotes.

Yeah, yeah.

And they're really, like his tweets I'm.

Ways I've been less into, but the quotes, yes.

Yeah. And so I thought, OK, maybe not all exactly his, but very close. And I can organize them so they rhyme, put a bunch of them together. And I thought, OK, that way, at least in the song, you kind of hear his point of view rather than me editorializing and saying, oh, this guy, this guy, he did this. It's let's hear from him.

Yeah, getting inside his head.

Yes.

Do you have any sense as to whether or not he's going to destroy humanity?

I think he believes he's going to save it, save humanity.

Mm-hmm.

There may be a little collateral damage along the way.

Yes. Perhaps the arts in and of themselves are the thing that will come in and save the day.

Maybe.

Right?

Maybe.

Tell me this with this book. This book really does highlight ways in which ideas can be resuscitated, but also how ideas can change and evolve based on culture. Do you see this as an optimistic book in these times that we're in?

Yes. It's optimistic because it shows that we can change. We can discover things. We're not so close-minded that we go, oh, no, that's old news. That happened in the past. We know better. People do sometimes realize, oh, this thing that we've stumbled on is pretty good.

Well, this thing that I stumbled on was pretty great. Congratulations.

Thank you. Thank you so much.

"Sleepy Beauty" is available now. David Byrne.

My guest tonight is a Tony and Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright and actor who stars in the upcoming film "I Play Rocky." Please welcome Tracy Letts. I Play Rocky, it's great.

Thanks.

To be clear, you do not play Rocky.

I don't. Nor do you.

None of us play Rocky.

Right.

And is that at all confusing when people ask you, what film are you? And you say, I Play Rocky?

No, I kept calling it "I Hate Rocky," which is not the title. It's called "I Play Rocky."

Yes, your character hates Rocky for up to a point.

That's true.

Yes, for people who don't know, this is not a Rocky movie. But it's a movie about making Rocky.

Yeah.

Yeah, yeah. OK, yeah, well, there you go. Well, thanks. That was Tracy Letts, everybody. What was your relationship with Rocky?

I saw it in the movie theater in 1976 when I was 11 years old. Had a great time.

Yeah.

Loved it. At one point, we became aware on the set that Peter Farrelly, the director, and JB, his first aidee, and me, we were the only three people who had seen the movie in movie theater. Everybody else was too young to have seen it in the movie theater.

Really?

Yeah.

Did the people who were still working on it, did they have a relationship with the film? Like, even though they weren't there for it, was it still iconic to them?

You know, it turns out it's important to people for different reasons. Their dad showed it to them when they were a kid. You know, you got to sit down. This was an important movie for me. And not to mention all the sequels and.

Yeah.

All the lore and everything else. I'll tell you, one day we were going out to shoot in a location where they shot the original film.

Yeah.

We repeat some of the same locations. And it was a rough neighborhood in Philadelphia. And we heard a couple of neighbors who were next door to where we were shooting saying, what, does this bring back memories? It's like they've lived on that block for 50 years.

Even when it was happening.

Yeah.

Right?

Yeah.

Have you ever run the stairs?

I did run the stairs.

You did?

Yeah.

Yeah?

Yeah, slowly. But I ran them.

I was in Philadelphia recently. And I showed my six-year-old clips from that movie because we were going to the art museum. And it was raining so bad. We entered through the back. And I had to lie to my child that those were the stairs that we ran.

Oh, right.

So now that I put it on television, this will be used against me in a court of law later in my life.

At the art museum, they hate this movie.

There's a dynamic about this movie, right?

Yeah.

Because there's a statue there.

Yeah.

That was put outside of the movie.

Yeah.

That was brought into the art museum. Whether this is kitsch or art is an ongoing question.

Right. And meanwhile, they're like, we're trying to run a museum in here, people.

Stop running it up and down. People want to see art. It's curious because you are an acclaimed playwright. You have a Pulitzer Prize. You're a writer as well as an actor who has.

Thank you. Thank you. Thank you for acknowledging my awards.

But you are careful with your words. You take your time mulling over projects. And then you go into a movie where Sylvester Stallone, this actor, writes Rocky in three days.

You believe that. I don't believe that.

You don't buy it?

I don't buy it.

No.

I mean, we say that in the movie because, you know, it's a good story. I don't buy it.

You're telling me movies are lying to me is what you're telling me?

I'm telling you, there's no way he wrote it in three days.

What do you think? What do you think happened with Sylvester Stallone?

I think he wrote something in three days.

Do you think it was enough to call it a movie or like.

Maybe not.

Yeah.

Probably they had to flesh it out a little bit.

Uh-huh.

I'm sure he wrote a great movie in a short period of time.

Yeah.

I just don't think he did it in three days.

Yeah, what do you imagine? Like, when you sit down to write a movie, how long does it take to write a decent movie like that?

I've never written anything as good as Rocky. I won't even make that claim.

No, you don't think so?

Yeah.

Office of State's County is a banger of a play.

It's no Rocky. Come on.

You're right. You're right. Do you think if you were a tougher person, you would be able to write Rocky? No shade. I thought the audience would laugh with me as I said that, as a way of like, we're all in on this. We're having fun. And I realized that came across as mean. Nobody's as tough as Sylvester Stallone.

Is that right?

I guess I should amend this comment. I feel like Sylvester Stallone well, and that becomes part of what is funny about this film as well is that, like, he is a tough guy who seems as if he was a boxer. But everybody in there who is an actor is pretending to be qualified at the thing they do but are just artists who are creating something out of nothing.

It's always the case, isn't it?

Yeah.

You watch some old western. You don't think about John Wayne taking off his toupee and going over and, you know, drinking tea in between. Shots.

Yeah.

It's not the way we think about it.

Is toupee a real detail of John Wayne?

It really is.

Is that right?

Yeah.

He has a toupee?

Yeah.

Son of a bitch. That's why there's hats all the time, huh? The character you play in this is so fun, though. You get to play like an asshole movie executive. Is that a dream job where you had a mission to take somebody down when you were portraying this guy?

No, not really. I mean, I have the luxury in this movie that the character I portray is fictional.

Mm-hmm.

Right? So they don't get sued by the real asshole executive.

Always a smart move.

So they took several asshole executives and combined them into one character and gave me a fictional name and then let me do whatever the hell I want.

That's true freedom, right?

It really is. And at some point, I asked for this ridiculous wig I'm wearing in the movie. I had a long speech that I gave to Peter Farrelly about why I should have this wig. I don't remember the speech at all. And so now I watch the movie. I'm like, why are you wearing that wig? Why did you he's a fictional character. I'm not trying to look like anybody.

Is that a thing you do? You have, like, opinions about wigs? I just watched "East of Eden," which you're in and great. You have a you got a great head of hair in that as well.

That's a wig.

That's a wig.

Well, they just they gave me that wig. That was their idea.

That was Steinbeck's idea.

Yeah, there you go.

OK.

But the wig I wear in "I Play Rocky" was my idea. I just don't remember why I felt it was important that that guy had a wig.

Yeah?

It kind of works. I don't know. After my long explanation, Peter Farrelly said to me, yeah, OK, whatever.

Yeah.

It's like, yeah, have whatever you want.

Yeah, do you think you're a difficult actor to work with?

I'm really not.

No, you're not.

Not really.

You're lovely, right? A fact I heard about you is that you are a collector of DVDs and Blu-rays.

It's true.

Is it like 11,000?

It's about 12,400.

12,400 DVDs and Blu-rays?

And 4Ks? Yeah, sure.

4Ks? That's a separate do you have Blu-rays, those big old things?

No, no, laser disks.

Laser disks?

I don't have laser disks.

You don't have laser disks?

Yeah.

Over 12,000.

Yeah. We all heard it. We all heard it. Everybody heard it. No, I do not have laser disks.

But could you imagine, Tracy? Could you imagine if you had laser disks? See, that's the kind of experience that you could write about if you had laser disks. You could create this great character with beautiful hair and a wig that you request, who fights everybody with laser disks. People would go to the theaters to see that movie, Tracy.

There you go.

I'm just saying. Pulitzer number two is there for the taking.

Yes. Laser disks coming to a theater near you.

I'm with 12,000 laser disks at home. I'm curious, how do you index something like that? Is it like, does it go onto a computer to have that much?

I do. And it is indexed. I mean, look, if you've got the collector gene, if that's a hobby of yours, I collected baseball cards and comic books as a kid.

Yeah.

Part of the fun is, you know, making the list and.

Checking it twice.

Checking it twice. Alphabetizing.

That's part of that. Who doesn't have fun putting things in alphabetical order, right? Why don't they do a decimal over here, right? For somebody who wants to get into collecting actual, like, tangible media, what is, like, a baseline?

Don't do it. Don't. The baseline is don't do it.

No.

No. It's definitely a sickness. And I don't recommend it for anybody.

Well, as a lover of film, is there, like, are there films that you're like, you must have this to be considered a legitimate collector? Do you have a?

No, I don't suppose so. I mean, Criterion just came out with a big Stanley Kubrick box set of all of his work on 4K.

Yeah.

I would imagine that's a great thing for a collector to own.

Uh-huh.

I certainly own it.

I imagine. I imagine. You did perhaps duplicates as well?

Well, sometimes what happens is you upgrade. You have the movie.

Yeah.

But then they come out with a better format. And so you wind up purchasing the movie again. I owned seven copies of "Kind Hearts and Coronets." There's no reason anybody should have seven copies of "Kind Hearts and Coronets." But I do.

Another lovely thing you do, the first time I saw you perform was in Chicago. You were improvising in the great improv show "TJ and Dave," which is.

Uh-huh.

Two legendary Chicago performers there. Also performed with Michael Shannon. I brought this up with him when he was on the show as well. It's such a different mindset to get on stage and make something up out of nothing. How do you approach that with somebody who doesn't shy away from sitting down and working through an idea to actually just be loose and on stage like that? How does your mind approach something like improvisation?

I first did that show about 25 years ago. And those guys are such gifted improvisers. I can only screw up their show so bad. What I've learned over the course of doing that show over many years is not to have anything in mind, not to go out with any kind of preconceived idea. Just you're doomed if you do. Oh, I'm going to try and do this tonight. You're doomed if you try to do that. You just go out and try to make yourself as blank as possible and just receive whatever is there.

Yeah.

Coming your way.

And that works for you?

So far, yeah, sure.

Come with nothing and see if they bring something else.

Yeah. And those guys like I say, those guys are so good. You know, I've rehearsed with those guys. And they do it in a fascinating rehearsal because there's no text to rehearse.

Right.

But they will just one of them will call lights up. And then you stand there in silence for a minute or so. And then one of them says, all right, where are we? And you see if you are the three of you are in agreement about where you are.

Yeah.

There's a kind of weird alchemy that takes place that conjures this location for you.

Yeah.

It's very it's a little mystical. And it's one of the things I love about doing the gig. It scares the hell out of me. But I love it.

Yeah, it's a magical thing to see it happen. Are you thinking what I'm thinking right now?

Yeah, absolutely.

Laser disks, right?

Yeah.

We're going to do it. Laser disks. "I Play Rocky." It'll be in Celeste City November 6. And theater's everywhere November 20. Tracy Letts.