September 3, 2024 • 37 mins
As a child growing up in Barbados, Minnie Driver developed an affinity for the water—and her love for the beach and its restorative properties has only grown since. For Driver, recharging is necessary: since her breakthrough role in the 1997 classic Good Will Hunting, she’s starred in a slew of feature films (two of which are set to premiere at this year’s Toronto Film Festival) and television shows—the most recent being as Queen Elizabeth I in The Serpent Queen—and she hosts her own podcast, Minnie Questions. On this week’s episode of Table for Two, the actress sits down for lunch with host Bruce Bozzi to discuss why she gravitated towards the performing arts, what she thinks people overlook about Margot Robbie’s talent, and the ideology behind her podcast.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:05):
Hey, everybody, thanks for pulling up a chair today on
Table for two. This is Bruce on a beautiful, hot,
so cool day, and we are not in Hollywood.
Speaker 2 (00:15):
We are by the beach.
Speaker 1 (00:17):
We're having lunch today in Santa Monica at the Shutters Hotel.
Speaker 3 (00:22):
We so have a drink.
Speaker 4 (00:23):
I wasn't getting it, but I've got to struggle all
the way back to Malibron, probably says again under the
full moon.
Speaker 1 (00:28):
Today, we're having lunch with an actress that you all know.
She's not from the United States. She's actually from across
the Atlantic Ocean. You probably know her best from her
role in Goodwill Hunting, which is like quite the cult
classic at this point.
Speaker 5 (00:44):
But she's busy.
Speaker 1 (00:46):
She has two films opening in the Toronto Film Festival.
She's got an incredible podcast, she's written a memoir.
Speaker 3 (00:52):
Oh wait a minute, No, you know what I want you?
I get a share the time.
Speaker 2 (00:56):
That is sweetest drength.
Speaker 1 (00:57):
Anyone's I'm able. We're having lunch today with Mini Driver.
Pull up a chair, enjoy, grab a glass rose on
this hot summer day, and.
Speaker 2 (01:12):
We'll be back with Miss Driver.
Speaker 5 (01:17):
I'm Bruce Bozzi and this is my podcast Table for Two.
Speaker 1 (01:29):
Well, okay, if you've joined us today, if you've pulled
up a chair on Table for two today, we're in
a completely new space. We're at the Shutter's Hotel in
by the Beach, very fitting, as you will all find out.
An incredibly beautiful actress, woman, singer, writer. Your podcast blows
me away. We are having lunch with miss Minnie Driver.
(01:52):
Welcome to Table for two.
Speaker 4 (01:53):
Thank you for having me, brit Oh my god, it's
a pleasure, lovely to be here.
Speaker 2 (01:58):
Thank you. Okay, your surfer, Yeah, every day surfing.
Speaker 3 (02:03):
When I'm here. Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 4 (02:04):
And today we went out early because I was coming
here and my best friends Cameron, Cameron Richardson.
Speaker 3 (02:12):
And Mini Mortimer.
Speaker 4 (02:14):
I know, we never get surfed with each other because
everyone's the minute school goes back, everyone's blown to the winds.
Speaker 3 (02:20):
So we went super early. I was up at six.
Speaker 4 (02:23):
It is the most beautiful day, like those these kind
of dog days of summer.
Speaker 3 (02:29):
The ocean is glassy, the air is like silk.
Speaker 4 (02:33):
It's it's beautiful, pinky blue light that early in the morning,
and it was just us just trading waves.
Speaker 2 (02:40):
And what is surfing? What feelings does it evoke for you?
It draws you to.
Speaker 3 (02:49):
There is something about the confluence of.
Speaker 4 (02:54):
Your body and your soul, the active feeling of the
strength that you need to have when you're surfing, the
wonder of your body as you're.
Speaker 3 (03:05):
Flying down the face of this wave in harmony with
this unbelievably powerful ancient ocean.
Speaker 4 (03:13):
That's as close as I've got to feeling my soul,
I mean, apart from honesty when my.
Speaker 3 (03:18):
Son was born.
Speaker 4 (03:19):
Those are the two great moments where I feel the
presence of something else.
Speaker 2 (03:24):
Yeah, when I'm learning about you, where I've seen in
your eyes.
Speaker 1 (03:27):
Is the importance of connection that you have with people
that you have.
Speaker 2 (03:32):
And I don't surf for some reason. I have a
fear of it. I never learned it. I think, how
did you What was the first time You're like, I
want to do this. So you grew up in Great
Britain unit surfing the.
Speaker 4 (03:43):
Well, the thing is, I actually I grew up a
lot in Barbados in the Caribbean, so I was in
the water, like genuinely before I could walk, I could swim,
and I have never had a fear of the water
and was so comfortable there.
Speaker 3 (03:59):
From a really early age.
Speaker 4 (04:00):
I was a big water skier, when I was a kid,
the surf was on the other side of the island,
so I never surfed. But I when I moved to California,
I began, not right away, but probably five or six
years after I moved here, and I've been surfing a.
Speaker 3 (04:16):
Really long time. I am okay. I'm not even good.
Speaker 4 (04:20):
I'm okay. I can hand on myself. I don't know
a huge amount about the full moon, but it's special.
Speaker 2 (04:26):
I know.
Speaker 1 (04:26):
I was going to do a little research today about
because you know, with your astrological sign, and.
Speaker 3 (04:32):
I'm an aquarian, so it's an aquarius. This is an
aquarium full moon.
Speaker 4 (04:36):
This is why, Yes, that's why I surfed last night
in the full moon and this morning, and why I'm
feeling a little bit like maybe I took mushrooms, like
a little tiny bit high in the most loving, beautiful,
existential way. I can only think that it is the
(04:56):
moon because normally I'm a little more harassed, and you.
Speaker 1 (05:03):
Have no fear of being in the water in the
lat moon is going to make the water so right.
Speaker 4 (05:08):
But we're going to wear glow sticks around our necks,
but it will be so light you sort of look
for the sliver of silver along the top of the wave,
so you can see it lining up when there's a
set coming and.
Speaker 3 (05:20):
There's a huge amount of letting.
Speaker 4 (05:22):
Go and just trusting, which I don't know, but I
think that having the opportunity to do that when it
presents itself, if I can do that, maybe it's like
mitigated risk.
Speaker 3 (05:33):
But now my heart will be beating really fast.
Speaker 1 (05:49):
You know, you've had such an interesting career. Your life
is very it's really interesting, and you've got you've been
through a lot. What was the path that sort of
kept leading you with a light that's sort of bringing
you forward to eventually becoming a successful, very successful actors.
Speaker 4 (06:07):
I went to a school and I grew up in
a place that helped me because I was not an
easy child.
Speaker 3 (06:13):
I think I was hugely emotional and had.
Speaker 4 (06:17):
A tough time focusing, needed to be physical all the time,
and this channel of creativity when I discovered that I
could write, and I had a teacher who supported that
hugely from the very beginning, from like nine ten years
old and acting and being in every play and music
and when I couldn't do math, my math teacher was
(06:38):
so extraordinary and he said, don't sit here, struggling, You're
going to suck all the attention from the rest of
the class. Go to the music school. I play music.
It's the same part of your brain. And then we'll
figure this out later.
Speaker 2 (06:50):
Oh my god, I'm lucky you It helped.
Speaker 4 (06:53):
Yeah, Suddenly there were these avenues that all of the
difficult things could be funneled into. And that's not to
say that they didn't remain difficult. But you can't stop
the hurricane, but you can know how to build a shelter.
So that and I was always aware of what an
unbelievable gift.
Speaker 3 (07:11):
And opportunity it was.
Speaker 4 (07:13):
No one can prepare you, because nobody really knows what
devastation lies ahead as well, and the price that you
will pay, and like what you're willing to sacrifice. And
in those moments of real turmoil and like huge slumps,
like in I suppose what is perceived success, those were
the moments of like incredible growing. And I think because
(07:34):
of the way that I was raised and my school,
even when I was in this agony of unemployment or
a broken heart or whatever, yeah, I knew I could
find my way out. Making things has always been.
Speaker 3 (07:47):
Part of that.
Speaker 4 (07:47):
Like I don't separate out like writing a book, from
like having the most incredible role in a TV show
or a movie, or writing music or performing music, like
it's all from the same crucible. Finding this tiny little
place by the beach in Malibu, my little tiny cottage
(08:09):
and surfing every day became a way of resetting all
of the other stuff that was asked of me as
a person with.
Speaker 3 (08:18):
A profile that has to be maintained in a certain way.
Speaker 2 (08:20):
Yeah, sure, your cottage. When you refer to your cottage,
I found this you're happy place.
Speaker 3 (08:28):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (08:29):
Yeah, And that's where a lot of people never find it.
They keep searching for it. Did you know when you
saw it? Yes.
Speaker 4 (08:37):
I has to get up super early, like you know,
four fifteen in the morning to be out first light
surf in the dark of Malibu when there was no
one out, and then maybe get like twenty or thirty
minutes in before the guys came out and I couldn't
get any more waves. And then really early I'd go
into Malibu and there was still overrun by insane stores
(08:57):
and oh yeah, change now.
Speaker 3 (08:59):
But it was there used to be a lot of
mom and power. There was this lovely girl who was
working in this shop.
Speaker 4 (09:04):
It was like a boutique, and I just went in
there in my swimsuit and we were chatting, and I said,
how does someone who doesn't have sixty million dollars that's
how much they cost back there.
Speaker 3 (09:14):
Now they're double that. What do you do? And she went, oh,
you can do it. My parents live up the way
and they live in this place, and you can come up.
My dad's going up with me. I'll show you.
Speaker 4 (09:24):
We went up to this place, and the minute I
got out of the car, I know that there is
a lot of sacred land like in California and Native land,
and I know there's a lot of power in the land.
I can only tell you that it's such a house
that was this place, and I just rented their house.
(09:48):
They wanted to go on a cruise or something, these
friends of this girl who worked in the store, and
I rented their place for a couple months and was
crying when I left, and just said, look, if you
ever want to sell this place, or if you ever
hear of any body that wants to sell their place,
will you just call me and let me know.
Speaker 3 (10:04):
But at that time, everyone who.
Speaker 4 (10:06):
Lived in this little community I live in, like lived
there like thirty forty fifty years.
Speaker 3 (10:10):
You didn't sell them. They weren't. Like when I bought
my place.
Speaker 4 (10:13):
I remember Jay Lenno making fun of me on his
talk shirt because I live in this place, and I
just remember laughing and going, sure, this is going to
keep everybody away. No one's gonna I was like, yeah, sure,
it's it sucks, it's terrible, it's not swanky, and it's
not You're absolutely right, nobody should come and live there.
Speaker 3 (10:32):
And kept them away for a while. And now, oh
my god, studio heads.
Speaker 4 (10:36):
And directors and it's just bananas.
Speaker 2 (10:40):
Now.
Speaker 3 (10:41):
I guess they're the and I'm sure it makes money,
and the first are incredibly high.
Speaker 4 (10:45):
But what we've lost is this community that we used
to have around the actual lumberyard, around the movie theater,
around the ice cream store.
Speaker 3 (10:54):
There was a skate park. It's now a whole foods like.
Speaker 4 (10:57):
It's so it's it's so difficult if you don't defend
the things that actually keep your new together societally.
Speaker 3 (11:06):
And I'm a huge believer in community. I've seen what
it does to people in terms of.
Speaker 4 (11:12):
Rehabilitating individuals and families and keeping us kind of you're
right connected and that.
Speaker 3 (11:18):
The minute you.
Speaker 4 (11:18):
Get rid of that's when you get so much dissolutions
and division, and these schisms are created where you're just
reacting to somebody.
Speaker 3 (11:27):
Because of the amount of money they have, not because of.
Speaker 4 (11:30):
The conversation you had completely, you know, standing outside the coffee.
Speaker 1 (11:33):
Shop, right, completely and inevitably, And what's so horrible about that?
In Malibu and I've seen it, you know, we would
go out. I grew up on the East Coast, but
like in the early seventies, they were all five, five
and dime shops and it was one big movie theater.
Speaker 2 (11:47):
It was like drive ins and all that stuff.
Speaker 1 (11:48):
And over time, of course, that's all gone away, very
very similar. Prices are exorbitant, can't afford it, The people
that grew up there can't live there. But you use
the specialness of that walking across the street going to
the ice cream parlor, knowing the guy that owns it,
the multi generational family that.
Speaker 2 (12:09):
Has has that can and and I.
Speaker 1 (12:12):
Think that's a huge issue here that we're having as
far as community and in America.
Speaker 3 (12:18):
It's a microlo exactly that, right.
Speaker 1 (12:20):
I always keep saying that it has to be a pivot,
There has to be a pivot. So yes, many, I
think keep on wanting to call you a million. You
can so beautiful a million. Dad calls really okay, so
I'm gonna call you a million, so Amelia. So I
think it comes down now to individual choices that you're
(12:42):
going to live a life that you're gonna get as
close to that as you can. It's just you have
your cottage, your relationship with the people in your life,
and you just have to we have to just bring
it into our own lives because it's gone. We can't
get back because that lumber yard is now that or
that thing is now condoms.
Speaker 5 (13:24):
Thanks for joining us on Table for two. Our guest,
Mini Driver, is very busy these days. She has two
movies premiering in September, an amazing podcast called Many Questions,
and is playing Queen Elizabeth on the second season of
The Serpent Queen. I'm curious what true her to playing
a character from history.
Speaker 1 (13:45):
You're very busy, honestly, I know that The Surper Queen
dropped season two, Dar, so you have that, but like
you know, you make reference to wanting to play Queen
Elizabeth and in your family to that the family play role.
Speaker 2 (14:01):
Was there anything that.
Speaker 3 (14:03):
It was interesting my dad. I mean, yeah, they did.
Speaker 4 (14:06):
And my dad used to play polo with King Charles
because my dad had a polo teach, so I knew
him that the polo. I knew this very nice, lovely,
polite gentleman who I knew was somebody important. The royal
family is very present in the UK, like when you're
growing up, and no matter if your dad plays a
(14:28):
rarefied sport with the future King of England, you were
aware of them all the time, And certainly with Queen Elizabeth.
I remember when we learned about her in school when
I was around seven or eight years old. I couldn't
believe that we were talking about a queen who was
so long ago. And I remember my teacher. I was like,
(14:49):
why are we still talking about her? And she was like,
I know, right, because she's that powerful and that cool.
And I became a little bit obsessed with her.
Speaker 2 (15:00):
Right, that's some way to look at it. Why are
we still talking about her? And then you're teaching me
like can you believe?
Speaker 4 (15:06):
By the way, that was essentially what my English teachers
said about Shakespeare when it was always on the curriculum
for all of our exams.
Speaker 3 (15:13):
I was like, why is it always Shakespeare? Why is
it not you.
Speaker 4 (15:16):
Know, Ben Johnson, why are him? And he was like,
because he's so fucking good.
Speaker 3 (15:21):
There's nobody better. That's why.
Speaker 2 (15:25):
What did you love about playing? Like when you got
the opportunity to play.
Speaker 4 (15:27):
Her, I just love the way they said. Justin Hayes
honestly is for me, one of the great writers working today.
He is a genius writer. And his take on Elizabeth,
on this idea of these powerful women. Have to remember
that at that period in history, women couldn't even own
own anything, not just property.
Speaker 2 (15:48):
They couldn't in nineteen seventy five.
Speaker 4 (15:51):
Exactly, it's banana. It's like the because women themselves were chattel.
So first of all, there's like this whole female experience,
and then you suddenly have these queens. You have Captain
de Medici in France and you have Queen Elizabeth in England,
and they were friends over letters, even though apparently they
(16:12):
never met, but we don't know for sure. There was
something about the unicornness of a woman being in that
position and the fact that she had the longest reign
until Elizabeth. Second, how she did that? Like who that
person is? What you have to do, and the idea
that she wasn't a sexual creature, the idea that she
(16:33):
wasn't you know who this woman was. I've started to
become really interested in who the woman is behind the crown,
because we all know the crown is a thing, it's
an entity, it's an emblem, and it's a duty, and
it's a facade. So we became really interested in what
was behind that, and Justin Haige was really interested in
(16:54):
exploring what the public face of her looked like and
then starting to get into what the woman behind that was.
And I wish I could have done it for a
lot longer because I feel like we were just getting
started to really start seeing. She has this great speech
at the end of one of the scenes with Captain
Medicci where she's I'm paraphrasing, but she's like, look, we
(17:19):
are brands, right. I must pose as a virgin and
you as a witch to get what we want.
Speaker 3 (17:25):
This is just fucking business. This is how it is.
Speaker 2 (17:29):
It's amazing awareness of that.
Speaker 4 (17:32):
Then, yeah, of course there was stuff going on behind
the scenes.
Speaker 3 (17:36):
Of course there was.
Speaker 4 (17:38):
It really is, and this idea that it's also persisted,
the idea that you can't have sex unless you're married.
Because she never got married, she must have been a
virgin queen. It's no So I love evolving that idea.
I love the exploration of Elizabeth as a woman, and
I know it can only be.
Speaker 3 (17:57):
Imagined because we don't know.
Speaker 2 (18:07):
Pivoting.
Speaker 1 (18:09):
I want to talk about your podcast because I think
it's such a joy to listen to you if you're
not listening to Mini's podcast. You've picked seven questions that
you've consistently asked your guests on your show.
Speaker 2 (18:22):
So one is how do you pick a guest?
Speaker 1 (18:25):
And then has there been a consistent sort of human
behavior that you've seen that we share even though we're
all different.
Speaker 4 (18:35):
Yeah, well, essentially that what you said, because what I
like is the.
Speaker 3 (18:42):
The idea if you create.
Speaker 4 (18:46):
A sort of constricted environment, which the same seven questions
is a particular discipline. So what that does is it
it makes people feel safe, and then it also makes
them feel like they're in control. I've noticed is the
thing amount of people is. That's a really good place
to begin from. But those questions, I realized they're just
(19:09):
tinder to ignite that the way someone thinks about the world,
And so there's so much that's revealed. But it's a
great place to begin because people feel I think it's
very manageable, which is why they they've had had some.
Speaker 3 (19:24):
Really truly, because it doesn't.
Speaker 4 (19:25):
Matter how much somebody prepares your selfdom seeps out. So
someone will answer their question and then I'll ask a
follow up and then suddenly.
Speaker 3 (19:36):
All is revealed.
Speaker 4 (19:37):
Or some people don't like to see the questions beforehand,
and I'll ask a question and out will bubble. This
amazing response has been triggered by something that happened that
very day.
Speaker 3 (19:49):
But the essential idea of.
Speaker 4 (19:51):
The show I think makes people feel it's completely manageable.
I don't have to sit there and they're not going
to ask me about my love life. They're not going
to ask me about this there or the other.
Speaker 3 (20:00):
I don't know.
Speaker 4 (20:00):
I guess I always felt Q and as I loved
doing those kind of interviews, I was like, send me
a set of questions that I can sit and think back.
Speaker 2 (20:08):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (20:09):
The reason that I why I launched a lunch that's
we're in person.
Speaker 2 (20:14):
It's because I feel like because it's basically the same thing.
Speaker 1 (20:17):
There's a romance in a meal, there's a intimacy with
eye contact, and inevitably I might definitely know, like, oh
I want to hear about your films coming out in Toronto.
Speaker 2 (20:29):
I'm gonna throw out the Serpent Queens, you know, season two.
You know you have put the professional pieces of you.
Speaker 1 (20:35):
But inevitably we are talking about other things because we
have taken the time to connect is to humans for
this moment, and I think that's things are revealed that
are beautiful or kind or emotional, and that's really that's
(20:56):
all we got.
Speaker 3 (20:58):
It really is.
Speaker 1 (21:07):
You've had such a career and if you're looking at
Famelia now looking back, how have you navigated this decade
of our life? I happened things are very important and
an incredible decade.
Speaker 4 (21:22):
It is like the big And I always used to
think whenever I would hear people talking about their fifties,
I always felt like, oh, yeah, you're just trying to
spin being.
Speaker 3 (21:34):
A yeah yeah, yeah yeah, or your wisdom.
Speaker 4 (21:37):
Sure.
Speaker 3 (21:39):
And I really did think that in my thirties and
actually maybe even my forties. And the reality is.
Speaker 4 (21:47):
I felt like it is the most extraordinarily clarifying moment.
All of the wisdom, all the threads that I could
never quite weave together. I feel like I actually am.
I'm braiding myself, I am weaving them. I was constantly
grabbing for different bits and modalities and this thing and
(22:07):
is it this thing, and mastering some of it and
not mastering other bits. And suddenly now it's like I
could see it all so much clearer. Stuff that just
doesn't matter, which is really what we're talking about completely.
It's the stuff that you chased and kept chasing because
(22:27):
you either were told it was important, or that other
people were telling you it was important, or you were
watching other people do that, and so you went along
with it. And now I don't know if it's just
a function of just being tired and my energy is
for the things I really wanted because.
Speaker 3 (22:42):
I don't have as much as I use.
Speaker 2 (22:43):
I think that's true.
Speaker 1 (22:44):
I think there is the sort of laser focus and
this is what I want to do.
Speaker 2 (22:49):
I know what I want to do. And we've gone.
Speaker 1 (22:51):
Through the twenties and thirties and forties, and each one
is you can see say.
Speaker 3 (22:55):
They're all beautiful, and they all have.
Speaker 1 (22:57):
That completely and necessarily to get to messiness or the
loves of the twenties and the youth and all that
to lead you to your thirties to begin your We
both had children in our forties.
Speaker 2 (23:09):
I believe.
Speaker 1 (23:12):
The podcast is amazing because when you listen to you
answer and you share, which is also very beautiful, which
I love, because you make it's a conversation. It's not
like I'm going to ask you questions and you're just
gonna I really did love the Debbie Harry one. She's
something else and there was something about her too when
she answered the questions. I was almost like a little
(23:32):
intimidated by actually, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2 (23:35):
You asked me. Okay, I guess that's all answer.
Speaker 3 (23:38):
By the way, I've really learned that.
Speaker 4 (23:43):
Sometimes someone's no is it's revealing about them as a person,
and they they should be allowed to have that.
Speaker 3 (23:49):
So when someone just goes yeah.
Speaker 4 (23:53):
Or no to a question that I've asked, instead of
getting flustered, I now start to chuckle, going.
Speaker 3 (23:59):
Oh wow, all right, that's okay. I wonder what it
is around that.
Speaker 4 (24:04):
And sometimes I'll even ask and go, that was really definitive,
that no, or that yeah was really definitive.
Speaker 3 (24:09):
And it's often about.
Speaker 4 (24:11):
Quick thinking and going is that speaking to a larger
issue around whatever it is that they've said no or
yes to you don't judge someone on their reactions, which
is very difficult to do on a podcast.
Speaker 3 (24:23):
I can do it. I'm just gonna I'm gonna listen if.
Speaker 1 (24:25):
It's over, if it's in it's completion, which is another
thing when you like, have you found that in life?
We have all these ideas that things are going to
be forever and then they end, whether it's whether it's
that was it's forever.
Speaker 2 (24:41):
I did think everything was forever. I gotta tell you
you do. I did if it was like if you
fell in.
Speaker 3 (24:45):
Love, it was going to be you were going to
be with them forever?
Speaker 1 (24:48):
And then did you When I was in my twenties,
ually like year one was great, Year two.
Speaker 2 (24:54):
Was like how do I get out of this?
Speaker 4 (24:55):
And then terrible?
Speaker 2 (24:56):
How did you say you have the same sort of rhythm?
Speaker 4 (24:59):
I list, Yeah, Honestly, this is the longest relationship I've
ever been in and we're like in year six. So
he's the greatest, And I'm so funny because that's the
other thing that I think I realized or again using
that word clarified in my book, which was all of
those relationships that in quotes didn't work out, they were
(25:21):
a version of life working out. It's just not the
bells and whistles version of romance and love that I
had been sold as a kid, which is that you're
with someone, they love you, then you're going to get married,
you and have kids.
Speaker 3 (25:31):
It's going to all work out, for sure.
Speaker 4 (25:34):
It took a long time for me to let go
of that expectation that this person had to be the one.
Speaker 2 (25:41):
Well, I also think each one of those brings you
to him.
Speaker 1 (25:44):
Yeah, definitely, because without any of all of that, without
any of all the years that we've lived. Like someone
once said, I'm fifty eight years old, but still there's
a seventeen year old is still in me.
Speaker 2 (25:55):
That piece of you doesn't go all the way.
Speaker 3 (25:56):
No, exactly.
Speaker 5 (26:18):
Welcome back to Table for two. A couple of years ago,
Many released her memoir Managing Expectations. The essays in the
book are both funny and honest, and I'm curious how
she went about the writing process.
Speaker 1 (26:33):
And just so you know, Minnie's book is called Managing Expectations,
a memoir and essays, and it's beautiful.
Speaker 2 (26:41):
What was that process? And that's not easy, that's a
very emotional thing to do.
Speaker 4 (26:46):
Yeah, yeah, definitely, it was a function. The actually getting
it done was a function of COVID, you know, on
like day three, so like March fifteenth or sixteenth, man Jason,
who is a very old friend of mine in addition
to being my manager, he called me.
Speaker 3 (27:05):
And he was like this, you got all this time.
What are you going to do?
Speaker 4 (27:08):
I started the podcast and he said, if you were
going to write a book, what would it look like?
Speaker 3 (27:13):
So I wrote as if he were a.
Speaker 4 (27:15):
Teacher at my school giving me an assignment. We talked
about it at dinner my son, Addison, my boyfriend, and
me that night and I was like, okay, so I
want to write a book, and my son went, well,
it would be your stories. Because he's now lived long
enough to see that there is very little I love
more than telling stories. And my favorite thing is telling
(27:39):
stories that I know people have heard before, but telling
them again in a different way and getting a new
laugh out of them.
Speaker 3 (27:45):
I find that incredibly satisfying.
Speaker 4 (27:48):
The next day, I went, okay, I'm just going to
start with the stories that I maybe three stories that
I know I've told that are so hardwired into my life.
Speaker 3 (27:59):
And I began there. I wrote this proposal of what
these stories might look like. And we then went out
and sold.
Speaker 4 (28:06):
I already said, look at this is not going to
be a tell or it was never going to be
a celebrity memoir. So then I started with these stories.
And when we sold the book and I then had
to write them, what you realize is that in telling
the stories, you're actually going back and not just telling them,
(28:26):
but you're healing the bits that were really hard because
I didn't realize how tragic bits of my stories were,
like being put on an aeroplane when I was eleven
years old because I had a fight with my dad.
When I was writing it, I was like, Jesus Christ,
this is actually awful and painful.
Speaker 3 (28:46):
But there was so much humor in it as well.
Speaker 1 (28:49):
Telling and we have a story like that, we're at
eleven years old, you're traveling alone, and you can look
at it and you can see the humor in it,
but you can also see, well, like, this is insane.
Speaker 3 (29:01):
Yeah it was insane. It was and devastating, but it was.
Speaker 4 (29:07):
You then start going that created a level of independence
and the fact that everything was fine and I was fine,
and I did go on this bizarre adventure that was
part of the infrastructure of how I think I moved
to Hollywood when I was twenty five years twenty four
years old. I could move seven thousand miles away from home,
(29:30):
still loving my family and not wanting to and have
the best time, knowing no one.
Speaker 2 (29:36):
Right. Well, I think that all that.
Speaker 1 (29:40):
Develops the strength of character that brings you into the room,
because you also chose a very tough profession and you
you know, you mentioned you know, goodwill hunting and what
that did, and.
Speaker 2 (29:50):
That was that's become.
Speaker 1 (29:51):
This was not only an incredible movie where it came out,
but it's still amazing.
Speaker 2 (29:55):
It's a cult classic. It's an amazing film that you did.
Speaker 1 (30:00):
Some movies just they age out, you're like, oh my god,
I love that.
Speaker 2 (30:04):
Movie when I saw but it's just not other, but
definitely that movie no matter what age you are.
Speaker 3 (30:11):
Now, we made a classic. And it's very rare to
make those kinds of films. It's very difficult to keep
making good films.
Speaker 4 (30:18):
So much has to come into alignment for movies to
be good on all the levels. Received well, I have
a timeless quality, great performances, wonderful time on set.
Speaker 3 (30:30):
It was the happiest experience shooting that movie.
Speaker 4 (30:33):
The movie has touched people for now twenty five years
or whatever it's been like there was. That's very special,
and it's the very beginning of these two extraordinary careers
of Matt and Ben. This beautiful performance of an icon
in Robin Williams.
Speaker 3 (30:49):
Everyone who is in it, everyone, but it was very lowcly.
Speaker 4 (30:52):
I mean turn.
Speaker 2 (31:03):
So speaking of movies, so you have two films that
are going to be in the film.
Speaker 3 (31:07):
Yeah, very different films.
Speaker 2 (31:09):
Yeah, it's kind of wild.
Speaker 3 (31:12):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (31:12):
One is this extraordinary film that stars Alusia Vikander and
Elizabeth Olsen and Himesh Patel.
Speaker 3 (31:20):
It's a kind of dystopian future where if you want.
Speaker 4 (31:24):
To have a child, you have to be assessed by
an assessor. It's called the Assessment, and Elusivikanda plays the
assessor and it is this extraordinary journey into I think,
what it means to be a parent or what it
means to want to have a child, but set against
(31:44):
in a very Alex Garland way in a way, this
dystopian idea of the future. We all take this drug
to remain looking young called synoxin, and I think I'm
one hundred and eighty three years old in it, but
like I look like I do. And it's pretty stark
and it's it's just so brilliant. This amazing French female
director is her first film she's called Flur fourteen amazing.
(32:08):
And then the other movie same brilliant writers, brilliant acting.
But it's a Edward Burns movie. I mean, Eddie's been
making movies for thirty years now. I think it's almost
the Brothers mcmullon, I think is thirty years in January.
Speaker 1 (32:21):
Wow, I forgot about that sum Yeah.
Speaker 4 (32:26):
And so that is this movie that we made, which
is an ensemble piece with Patrick Wilson, Julianna Marguley's.
Speaker 3 (32:32):
Benjamin Bratt, Rishian Mare, Campbell, Scott Eddie.
Speaker 4 (32:37):
Amazing, amazing and a very sort of adult grown up
movie about relationships.
Speaker 2 (32:43):
What do you love about me?
Speaker 3 (32:45):
Oh my god?
Speaker 4 (32:47):
Honestly, from like the cables snaking across the floor to
the kind of harod ads with their ear pieces in.
Speaker 3 (32:55):
The quiet on set, I don't know what it is,
but it feels like home. It's this idea of like.
Speaker 4 (33:04):
You're playing you're literally playing make believe and everyone's taking
it really seriously and you know that it's going to
be metabolized in a way that makes people feel a
whole other thing, Like, it's such a beautiful con for
people to be to enjoy themselves watching you play that.
Speaker 3 (33:22):
They're called movies not because it's a moving image, but
because they move people, They move you.
Speaker 4 (33:27):
And you get to be like a conduit for all
the things that people they don't want to feel, those
big emotions in their life, they want to.
Speaker 3 (33:35):
Watch you do that.
Speaker 4 (33:36):
And particularly if you don't find that difficult to do.
I mean, perhaps it's difficult to do well.
Speaker 2 (33:43):
No, I think it is. I think you have to
be talented like yourself. Not everyone can do it, and
a lot of things have to come together.
Speaker 3 (33:49):
But yeah, it's funny. I don't know what is that.
Speaker 4 (33:55):
I know certain things that make a great actor in
my opinion, but there is this kind of special there
is this special something that is really unquantifiable that certain
actors have.
Speaker 3 (34:10):
I've been actually looking recently.
Speaker 4 (34:11):
I've been watching movies and thinking about that, and watching
movies with people that.
Speaker 2 (34:15):
I just I was about to ask, who are the
people that.
Speaker 4 (34:19):
So Isabel Lupere is my I can watch Emma Stone
all day long, Michael Fassbender, Alicia the Canada, Sean Penn
and Dan day lewis probably being the I think he
was the king.
Speaker 3 (34:36):
Of all of them. I love watching them. I actually love.
Speaker 4 (34:41):
Watching Margot Robbie work because it's also she's such a
fine actress, and it's like, in a way, it's like,
don't be taken in by her.
Speaker 3 (34:49):
Beautiful she is.
Speaker 4 (34:50):
She is so finely tuned to emotion, and she holds
her space so brilliantly and doesn't incroach on other people's
There's something incredibly delicate and very powerful about that.
Speaker 2 (35:06):
I agree she has a very special quality.
Speaker 3 (35:09):
I think she's magical.
Speaker 2 (35:10):
Yeah, she really is.
Speaker 1 (35:11):
I've had such a great time having much of you,
and there's so many things.
Speaker 2 (35:16):
If you've pulled up a chair with.
Speaker 1 (35:18):
Missing me driver, I'm just staring at you because you're
you're mesmerizing, just so you know, you're mesmerizing you and
you're a doer and you and I can feel it.
You've inspired me today, which is I think right is
all about thank you for taking the time wow today.
Speaker 3 (35:36):
Thank you so much for having me.
Speaker 4 (35:37):
It was really delicious and it was really lovely talking
to you.
Speaker 2 (35:41):
Good.
Speaker 1 (35:41):
Thank you, Thank you everyone, Thank you for falling up
at chair and have a great dead.
Speaker 2 (35:52):
Thank you for pulling up a chair.
Speaker 6 (35:54):
I love our lunches and never forget the romance of
a meal. If you enjoy the show, please tell a
friend and rate and review us on Apple podcast. Table
for two with Bruce Bozzi is produced by iHeartRadio seven
three seven Park and Airmail. Our executive producers are Bruce
Bosi and Nathan King. Our supervising producer Dylan Fagan. Our
(36:17):
editors are Vincent to Johnny and Cas b Bias. Table
for two is researched and written by Jack Sullivan. Our
sound engineers are Meel B. Klein, Jess Krainich, Evan Taylor.
Speaker 2 (36:30):
And Jesse Funk. Our music supervisor is Randall Poster. Our
talent booking is done by Jane Sarkin.
Speaker 5 (36:36):
Table for Two's social media manager is Gracie Wiener. Special
thanks to Amy Sugarman, Uni Scherer, Kevin Yvane, Bobby Bauer,
Alison Kanter, Graber, Barbara Jen, Jeff Klein, and the staff.
Speaker 1 (36:49):
At the Tower Bar in the world famous Sunset Tower Hotel.
Speaker 5 (36:53):
For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcast,
or we'rever you listen to your favorite shows
Hey, everybody, thanks for pulling up a chair today on
Table for two. This is Bruce on a beautiful, hot,
so cool day, and we are not in Hollywood.
Speaker 2 (00:15):
We are by the beach.
Speaker 1 (00:17):
We're having lunch today in Santa Monica at the Shutters Hotel.
Speaker 3 (00:22):
We so have a drink.
Speaker 4 (00:23):
I wasn't getting it, but I've got to struggle all
the way back to Malibron, probably says again under the
full moon.
Speaker 1 (00:28):
Today, we're having lunch with an actress that you all know.
She's not from the United States. She's actually from across
the Atlantic Ocean. You probably know her best from her
role in Goodwill Hunting, which is like quite the cult
classic at this point.
Speaker 5 (00:44):
But she's busy.
Speaker 1 (00:46):
She has two films opening in the Toronto Film Festival.
She's got an incredible podcast, she's written a memoir.
Speaker 3 (00:52):
Oh wait a minute, No, you know what I want you?
I get a share the time.
Speaker 2 (00:56):
That is sweetest drength.
Speaker 1 (00:57):
Anyone's I'm able. We're having lunch today with Mini Driver.
Pull up a chair, enjoy, grab a glass rose on
this hot summer day, and.
Speaker 2 (01:12):
We'll be back with Miss Driver.
Speaker 5 (01:17):
I'm Bruce Bozzi and this is my podcast Table for Two.
Speaker 1 (01:29):
Well, okay, if you've joined us today, if you've pulled
up a chair on Table for two today, we're in
a completely new space. We're at the Shutter's Hotel in
by the Beach, very fitting, as you will all find out.
An incredibly beautiful actress, woman, singer, writer. Your podcast blows
me away. We are having lunch with miss Minnie Driver.
(01:52):
Welcome to Table for two.
Speaker 4 (01:53):
Thank you for having me, brit Oh my god, it's
a pleasure, lovely to be here.
Speaker 2 (01:58):
Thank you. Okay, your surfer, Yeah, every day surfing.
Speaker 3 (02:03):
When I'm here. Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 4 (02:04):
And today we went out early because I was coming
here and my best friends Cameron, Cameron Richardson.
Speaker 3 (02:12):
And Mini Mortimer.
Speaker 4 (02:14):
I know, we never get surfed with each other because
everyone's the minute school goes back, everyone's blown to the winds.
Speaker 3 (02:20):
So we went super early. I was up at six.
Speaker 4 (02:23):
It is the most beautiful day, like those these kind
of dog days of summer.
Speaker 3 (02:29):
The ocean is glassy, the air is like silk.
Speaker 4 (02:33):
It's it's beautiful, pinky blue light that early in the morning,
and it was just us just trading waves.
Speaker 2 (02:40):
And what is surfing? What feelings does it evoke for you?
It draws you to.
Speaker 3 (02:49):
There is something about the confluence of.
Speaker 4 (02:54):
Your body and your soul, the active feeling of the
strength that you need to have when you're surfing, the
wonder of your body as you're.
Speaker 3 (03:05):
Flying down the face of this wave in harmony with
this unbelievably powerful ancient ocean.
Speaker 4 (03:13):
That's as close as I've got to feeling my soul,
I mean, apart from honesty when my.
Speaker 3 (03:18):
Son was born.
Speaker 4 (03:19):
Those are the two great moments where I feel the
presence of something else.
Speaker 2 (03:24):
Yeah, when I'm learning about you, where I've seen in
your eyes.
Speaker 1 (03:27):
Is the importance of connection that you have with people
that you have.
Speaker 2 (03:32):
And I don't surf for some reason. I have a
fear of it. I never learned it. I think, how
did you What was the first time You're like, I
want to do this. So you grew up in Great
Britain unit surfing the.
Speaker 4 (03:43):
Well, the thing is, I actually I grew up a
lot in Barbados in the Caribbean, so I was in
the water, like genuinely before I could walk, I could swim,
and I have never had a fear of the water
and was so comfortable there.
Speaker 3 (03:59):
From a really early age.
Speaker 4 (04:00):
I was a big water skier, when I was a kid,
the surf was on the other side of the island,
so I never surfed. But I when I moved to California,
I began, not right away, but probably five or six
years after I moved here, and I've been surfing a.
Speaker 3 (04:16):
Really long time. I am okay. I'm not even good.
Speaker 4 (04:20):
I'm okay. I can hand on myself. I don't know
a huge amount about the full moon, but it's special.
Speaker 2 (04:26):
I know.
Speaker 1 (04:26):
I was going to do a little research today about
because you know, with your astrological sign, and.
Speaker 3 (04:32):
I'm an aquarian, so it's an aquarius. This is an
aquarium full moon.
Speaker 4 (04:36):
This is why, Yes, that's why I surfed last night
in the full moon and this morning, and why I'm
feeling a little bit like maybe I took mushrooms, like
a little tiny bit high in the most loving, beautiful,
existential way. I can only think that it is the
(04:56):
moon because normally I'm a little more harassed, and you.
Speaker 1 (05:03):
Have no fear of being in the water in the
lat moon is going to make the water so right.
Speaker 4 (05:08):
But we're going to wear glow sticks around our necks,
but it will be so light you sort of look
for the sliver of silver along the top of the wave,
so you can see it lining up when there's a
set coming and.
Speaker 3 (05:20):
There's a huge amount of letting.
Speaker 4 (05:22):
Go and just trusting, which I don't know, but I
think that having the opportunity to do that when it
presents itself, if I can do that, maybe it's like
mitigated risk.
Speaker 3 (05:33):
But now my heart will be beating really fast.
Speaker 1 (05:49):
You know, you've had such an interesting career. Your life
is very it's really interesting, and you've got you've been
through a lot. What was the path that sort of
kept leading you with a light that's sort of bringing
you forward to eventually becoming a successful, very successful actors.
Speaker 4 (06:07):
I went to a school and I grew up in
a place that helped me because I was not an
easy child.
Speaker 3 (06:13):
I think I was hugely emotional and had.
Speaker 4 (06:17):
A tough time focusing, needed to be physical all the time,
and this channel of creativity when I discovered that I
could write, and I had a teacher who supported that
hugely from the very beginning, from like nine ten years
old and acting and being in every play and music
and when I couldn't do math, my math teacher was
(06:38):
so extraordinary and he said, don't sit here, struggling, You're
going to suck all the attention from the rest of
the class. Go to the music school. I play music.
It's the same part of your brain. And then we'll
figure this out later.
Speaker 2 (06:50):
Oh my god, I'm lucky you It helped.
Speaker 4 (06:53):
Yeah, Suddenly there were these avenues that all of the
difficult things could be funneled into. And that's not to
say that they didn't remain difficult. But you can't stop
the hurricane, but you can know how to build a shelter.
So that and I was always aware of what an
unbelievable gift.
Speaker 3 (07:11):
And opportunity it was.
Speaker 4 (07:13):
No one can prepare you, because nobody really knows what
devastation lies ahead as well, and the price that you
will pay, and like what you're willing to sacrifice. And
in those moments of real turmoil and like huge slumps,
like in I suppose what is perceived success, those were
the moments of like incredible growing. And I think because
(07:34):
of the way that I was raised and my school,
even when I was in this agony of unemployment or
a broken heart or whatever, yeah, I knew I could
find my way out. Making things has always been.
Speaker 3 (07:47):
Part of that.
Speaker 4 (07:47):
Like I don't separate out like writing a book, from
like having the most incredible role in a TV show
or a movie, or writing music or performing music, like
it's all from the same crucible. Finding this tiny little
place by the beach in Malibu, my little tiny cottage
(08:09):
and surfing every day became a way of resetting all
of the other stuff that was asked of me as
a person with.
Speaker 3 (08:18):
A profile that has to be maintained in a certain way.
Speaker 2 (08:20):
Yeah, sure, your cottage. When you refer to your cottage,
I found this you're happy place.
Speaker 3 (08:28):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (08:29):
Yeah, And that's where a lot of people never find it.
They keep searching for it. Did you know when you
saw it? Yes.
Speaker 4 (08:37):
I has to get up super early, like you know,
four fifteen in the morning to be out first light
surf in the dark of Malibu when there was no
one out, and then maybe get like twenty or thirty
minutes in before the guys came out and I couldn't
get any more waves. And then really early I'd go
into Malibu and there was still overrun by insane stores
(08:57):
and oh yeah, change now.
Speaker 3 (08:59):
But it was there used to be a lot of
mom and power. There was this lovely girl who was
working in this shop.
Speaker 4 (09:04):
It was like a boutique, and I just went in
there in my swimsuit and we were chatting, and I said,
how does someone who doesn't have sixty million dollars that's
how much they cost back there.
Speaker 3 (09:14):
Now they're double that. What do you do? And she went, oh,
you can do it. My parents live up the way
and they live in this place, and you can come up.
My dad's going up with me. I'll show you.
Speaker 4 (09:24):
We went up to this place, and the minute I
got out of the car, I know that there is
a lot of sacred land like in California and Native land,
and I know there's a lot of power in the land.
I can only tell you that it's such a house
that was this place, and I just rented their house.
(09:48):
They wanted to go on a cruise or something, these
friends of this girl who worked in the store, and
I rented their place for a couple months and was
crying when I left, and just said, look, if you
ever want to sell this place, or if you ever
hear of any body that wants to sell their place,
will you just call me and let me know.
Speaker 3 (10:04):
But at that time, everyone who.
Speaker 4 (10:06):
Lived in this little community I live in, like lived
there like thirty forty fifty years.
Speaker 3 (10:10):
You didn't sell them. They weren't. Like when I bought
my place.
Speaker 4 (10:13):
I remember Jay Lenno making fun of me on his
talk shirt because I live in this place, and I
just remember laughing and going, sure, this is going to
keep everybody away. No one's gonna I was like, yeah, sure,
it's it sucks, it's terrible, it's not swanky, and it's
not You're absolutely right, nobody should come and live there.
Speaker 3 (10:32):
And kept them away for a while. And now, oh
my god, studio heads.
Speaker 4 (10:36):
And directors and it's just bananas.
Speaker 2 (10:40):
Now.
Speaker 3 (10:41):
I guess they're the and I'm sure it makes money,
and the first are incredibly high.
Speaker 4 (10:45):
But what we've lost is this community that we used
to have around the actual lumberyard, around the movie theater,
around the ice cream store.
Speaker 3 (10:54):
There was a skate park. It's now a whole foods like.
Speaker 4 (10:57):
It's so it's it's so difficult if you don't defend
the things that actually keep your new together societally.
Speaker 3 (11:06):
And I'm a huge believer in community. I've seen what
it does to people in terms of.
Speaker 4 (11:12):
Rehabilitating individuals and families and keeping us kind of you're
right connected and that.
Speaker 3 (11:18):
The minute you.
Speaker 4 (11:18):
Get rid of that's when you get so much dissolutions
and division, and these schisms are created where you're just
reacting to somebody.
Speaker 3 (11:27):
Because of the amount of money they have, not because of.
Speaker 4 (11:30):
The conversation you had completely, you know, standing outside the coffee.
Speaker 1 (11:33):
Shop, right, completely and inevitably, And what's so horrible about that?
In Malibu and I've seen it, you know, we would
go out. I grew up on the East Coast, but
like in the early seventies, they were all five, five
and dime shops and it was one big movie theater.
Speaker 2 (11:47):
It was like drive ins and all that stuff.
Speaker 1 (11:48):
And over time, of course, that's all gone away, very
very similar. Prices are exorbitant, can't afford it, The people
that grew up there can't live there. But you use
the specialness of that walking across the street going to
the ice cream parlor, knowing the guy that owns it,
the multi generational family that.
Speaker 2 (12:09):
Has has that can and and I.
Speaker 1 (12:12):
Think that's a huge issue here that we're having as
far as community and in America.
Speaker 3 (12:18):
It's a microlo exactly that, right.
Speaker 1 (12:20):
I always keep saying that it has to be a pivot,
There has to be a pivot. So yes, many, I
think keep on wanting to call you a million. You
can so beautiful a million. Dad calls really okay, so
I'm gonna call you a million, so Amelia. So I
think it comes down now to individual choices that you're
(12:42):
going to live a life that you're gonna get as
close to that as you can. It's just you have
your cottage, your relationship with the people in your life,
and you just have to we have to just bring
it into our own lives because it's gone. We can't
get back because that lumber yard is now that or
that thing is now condoms.
Speaker 5 (13:24):
Thanks for joining us on Table for two. Our guest,
Mini Driver, is very busy these days. She has two
movies premiering in September, an amazing podcast called Many Questions,
and is playing Queen Elizabeth on the second season of
The Serpent Queen. I'm curious what true her to playing
a character from history.
Speaker 1 (13:45):
You're very busy, honestly, I know that The Surper Queen
dropped season two, Dar, so you have that, but like
you know, you make reference to wanting to play Queen
Elizabeth and in your family to that the family play role.
Speaker 2 (14:01):
Was there anything that.
Speaker 3 (14:03):
It was interesting my dad. I mean, yeah, they did.
Speaker 4 (14:06):
And my dad used to play polo with King Charles
because my dad had a polo teach, so I knew
him that the polo. I knew this very nice, lovely,
polite gentleman who I knew was somebody important. The royal
family is very present in the UK, like when you're
growing up, and no matter if your dad plays a
(14:28):
rarefied sport with the future King of England, you were
aware of them all the time, And certainly with Queen Elizabeth.
I remember when we learned about her in school when
I was around seven or eight years old. I couldn't
believe that we were talking about a queen who was
so long ago. And I remember my teacher. I was like,
(14:49):
why are we still talking about her? And she was like,
I know, right, because she's that powerful and that cool.
And I became a little bit obsessed with her.
Speaker 2 (15:00):
Right, that's some way to look at it. Why are
we still talking about her? And then you're teaching me
like can you believe?
Speaker 4 (15:06):
By the way, that was essentially what my English teachers
said about Shakespeare when it was always on the curriculum
for all of our exams.
Speaker 3 (15:13):
I was like, why is it always Shakespeare? Why is
it not you.
Speaker 4 (15:16):
Know, Ben Johnson, why are him? And he was like,
because he's so fucking good.
Speaker 3 (15:21):
There's nobody better. That's why.
Speaker 2 (15:25):
What did you love about playing? Like when you got
the opportunity to play.
Speaker 4 (15:27):
Her, I just love the way they said. Justin Hayes
honestly is for me, one of the great writers working today.
He is a genius writer. And his take on Elizabeth,
on this idea of these powerful women. Have to remember
that at that period in history, women couldn't even own
own anything, not just property.
Speaker 2 (15:48):
They couldn't in nineteen seventy five.
Speaker 4 (15:51):
Exactly, it's banana. It's like the because women themselves were chattel.
So first of all, there's like this whole female experience,
and then you suddenly have these queens. You have Captain
de Medici in France and you have Queen Elizabeth in England,
and they were friends over letters, even though apparently they
(16:12):
never met, but we don't know for sure. There was
something about the unicornness of a woman being in that
position and the fact that she had the longest reign
until Elizabeth. Second, how she did that? Like who that
person is? What you have to do, and the idea
that she wasn't a sexual creature, the idea that she
(16:33):
wasn't you know who this woman was. I've started to
become really interested in who the woman is behind the crown,
because we all know the crown is a thing, it's
an entity, it's an emblem, and it's a duty, and
it's a facade. So we became really interested in what
was behind that, and Justin Haige was really interested in
(16:54):
exploring what the public face of her looked like and
then starting to get into what the woman behind that was.
And I wish I could have done it for a
lot longer because I feel like we were just getting
started to really start seeing. She has this great speech
at the end of one of the scenes with Captain
Medicci where she's I'm paraphrasing, but she's like, look, we
(17:19):
are brands, right. I must pose as a virgin and
you as a witch to get what we want.
Speaker 3 (17:25):
This is just fucking business. This is how it is.
Speaker 2 (17:29):
It's amazing awareness of that.
Speaker 4 (17:32):
Then, yeah, of course there was stuff going on behind
the scenes.
Speaker 3 (17:36):
Of course there was.
Speaker 4 (17:38):
It really is, and this idea that it's also persisted,
the idea that you can't have sex unless you're married.
Because she never got married, she must have been a
virgin queen. It's no So I love evolving that idea.
I love the exploration of Elizabeth as a woman, and
I know it can only be.
Speaker 3 (17:57):
Imagined because we don't know.
Speaker 2 (18:07):
Pivoting.
Speaker 1 (18:09):
I want to talk about your podcast because I think
it's such a joy to listen to you if you're
not listening to Mini's podcast. You've picked seven questions that
you've consistently asked your guests on your show.
Speaker 2 (18:22):
So one is how do you pick a guest?
Speaker 1 (18:25):
And then has there been a consistent sort of human
behavior that you've seen that we share even though we're
all different.
Speaker 4 (18:35):
Yeah, well, essentially that what you said, because what I
like is the.
Speaker 3 (18:42):
The idea if you create.
Speaker 4 (18:46):
A sort of constricted environment, which the same seven questions
is a particular discipline. So what that does is it
it makes people feel safe, and then it also makes
them feel like they're in control. I've noticed is the
thing amount of people is. That's a really good place
to begin from. But those questions, I realized they're just
(19:09):
tinder to ignite that the way someone thinks about the world,
And so there's so much that's revealed. But it's a
great place to begin because people feel I think it's
very manageable, which is why they they've had had some.
Speaker 3 (19:24):
Really truly, because it doesn't.
Speaker 4 (19:25):
Matter how much somebody prepares your selfdom seeps out. So
someone will answer their question and then I'll ask a
follow up and then suddenly.
Speaker 3 (19:36):
All is revealed.
Speaker 4 (19:37):
Or some people don't like to see the questions beforehand,
and I'll ask a question and out will bubble. This
amazing response has been triggered by something that happened that
very day.
Speaker 3 (19:49):
But the essential idea of.
Speaker 4 (19:51):
The show I think makes people feel it's completely manageable.
I don't have to sit there and they're not going
to ask me about my love life. They're not going
to ask me about this there or the other.
Speaker 3 (20:00):
I don't know.
Speaker 4 (20:00):
I guess I always felt Q and as I loved
doing those kind of interviews, I was like, send me
a set of questions that I can sit and think back.
Speaker 2 (20:08):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (20:09):
The reason that I why I launched a lunch that's
we're in person.
Speaker 2 (20:14):
It's because I feel like because it's basically the same thing.
Speaker 1 (20:17):
There's a romance in a meal, there's a intimacy with
eye contact, and inevitably I might definitely know, like, oh
I want to hear about your films coming out in Toronto.
Speaker 2 (20:29):
I'm gonna throw out the Serpent Queens, you know, season two.
You know you have put the professional pieces of you.
Speaker 1 (20:35):
But inevitably we are talking about other things because we
have taken the time to connect is to humans for
this moment, and I think that's things are revealed that
are beautiful or kind or emotional, and that's really that's
(20:56):
all we got.
Speaker 3 (20:58):
It really is.
Speaker 1 (21:07):
You've had such a career and if you're looking at
Famelia now looking back, how have you navigated this decade
of our life? I happened things are very important and
an incredible decade.
Speaker 4 (21:22):
It is like the big And I always used to
think whenever I would hear people talking about their fifties,
I always felt like, oh, yeah, you're just trying to
spin being.
Speaker 3 (21:34):
A yeah yeah, yeah yeah, or your wisdom.
Speaker 4 (21:37):
Sure.
Speaker 3 (21:39):
And I really did think that in my thirties and
actually maybe even my forties. And the reality is.
Speaker 4 (21:47):
I felt like it is the most extraordinarily clarifying moment.
All of the wisdom, all the threads that I could
never quite weave together. I feel like I actually am.
I'm braiding myself, I am weaving them. I was constantly
grabbing for different bits and modalities and this thing and
(22:07):
is it this thing, and mastering some of it and
not mastering other bits. And suddenly now it's like I
could see it all so much clearer. Stuff that just
doesn't matter, which is really what we're talking about completely.
It's the stuff that you chased and kept chasing because
(22:27):
you either were told it was important, or that other
people were telling you it was important, or you were
watching other people do that, and so you went along
with it. And now I don't know if it's just
a function of just being tired and my energy is
for the things I really wanted because.
Speaker 3 (22:42):
I don't have as much as I use.
Speaker 2 (22:43):
I think that's true.
Speaker 1 (22:44):
I think there is the sort of laser focus and
this is what I want to do.
Speaker 2 (22:49):
I know what I want to do. And we've gone.
Speaker 1 (22:51):
Through the twenties and thirties and forties, and each one
is you can see say.
Speaker 3 (22:55):
They're all beautiful, and they all have.
Speaker 1 (22:57):
That completely and necessarily to get to messiness or the
loves of the twenties and the youth and all that
to lead you to your thirties to begin your We
both had children in our forties.
Speaker 2 (23:09):
I believe.
Speaker 1 (23:12):
The podcast is amazing because when you listen to you
answer and you share, which is also very beautiful, which
I love, because you make it's a conversation. It's not
like I'm going to ask you questions and you're just
gonna I really did love the Debbie Harry one. She's
something else and there was something about her too when
she answered the questions. I was almost like a little
(23:32):
intimidated by actually, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2 (23:35):
You asked me. Okay, I guess that's all answer.
Speaker 3 (23:38):
By the way, I've really learned that.
Speaker 4 (23:43):
Sometimes someone's no is it's revealing about them as a person,
and they they should be allowed to have that.
Speaker 3 (23:49):
So when someone just goes yeah.
Speaker 4 (23:53):
Or no to a question that I've asked, instead of
getting flustered, I now start to chuckle, going.
Speaker 3 (23:59):
Oh wow, all right, that's okay. I wonder what it
is around that.
Speaker 4 (24:04):
And sometimes I'll even ask and go, that was really definitive,
that no, or that yeah was really definitive.
Speaker 3 (24:09):
And it's often about.
Speaker 4 (24:11):
Quick thinking and going is that speaking to a larger
issue around whatever it is that they've said no or
yes to you don't judge someone on their reactions, which
is very difficult to do on a podcast.
Speaker 3 (24:23):
I can do it. I'm just gonna I'm gonna listen if.
Speaker 1 (24:25):
It's over, if it's in it's completion, which is another
thing when you like, have you found that in life?
We have all these ideas that things are going to
be forever and then they end, whether it's whether it's
that was it's forever.
Speaker 2 (24:41):
I did think everything was forever. I gotta tell you
you do. I did if it was like if you
fell in.
Speaker 3 (24:45):
Love, it was going to be you were going to
be with them forever?
Speaker 1 (24:48):
And then did you When I was in my twenties,
ually like year one was great, Year two.
Speaker 2 (24:54):
Was like how do I get out of this?
Speaker 4 (24:55):
And then terrible?
Speaker 2 (24:56):
How did you say you have the same sort of rhythm?
Speaker 4 (24:59):
I list, Yeah, Honestly, this is the longest relationship I've
ever been in and we're like in year six. So
he's the greatest, And I'm so funny because that's the
other thing that I think I realized or again using
that word clarified in my book, which was all of
those relationships that in quotes didn't work out, they were
(25:21):
a version of life working out. It's just not the
bells and whistles version of romance and love that I
had been sold as a kid, which is that you're
with someone, they love you, then you're going to get married,
you and have kids.
Speaker 3 (25:31):
It's going to all work out, for sure.
Speaker 4 (25:34):
It took a long time for me to let go
of that expectation that this person had to be the one.
Speaker 2 (25:41):
Well, I also think each one of those brings you
to him.
Speaker 1 (25:44):
Yeah, definitely, because without any of all of that, without
any of all the years that we've lived. Like someone
once said, I'm fifty eight years old, but still there's
a seventeen year old is still in me.
Speaker 2 (25:55):
That piece of you doesn't go all the way.
Speaker 3 (25:56):
No, exactly.
Speaker 5 (26:18):
Welcome back to Table for two. A couple of years ago,
Many released her memoir Managing Expectations. The essays in the
book are both funny and honest, and I'm curious how
she went about the writing process.
Speaker 1 (26:33):
And just so you know, Minnie's book is called Managing Expectations,
a memoir and essays, and it's beautiful.
Speaker 2 (26:41):
What was that process? And that's not easy, that's a
very emotional thing to do.
Speaker 4 (26:46):
Yeah, yeah, definitely, it was a function. The actually getting
it done was a function of COVID, you know, on
like day three, so like March fifteenth or sixteenth, man Jason,
who is a very old friend of mine in addition
to being my manager, he called me.
Speaker 3 (27:05):
And he was like this, you got all this time.
What are you going to do?
Speaker 4 (27:08):
I started the podcast and he said, if you were
going to write a book, what would it look like?
Speaker 3 (27:13):
So I wrote as if he were a.
Speaker 4 (27:15):
Teacher at my school giving me an assignment. We talked
about it at dinner my son, Addison, my boyfriend, and
me that night and I was like, okay, so I
want to write a book, and my son went, well,
it would be your stories. Because he's now lived long
enough to see that there is very little I love
more than telling stories. And my favorite thing is telling
(27:39):
stories that I know people have heard before, but telling
them again in a different way and getting a new
laugh out of them.
Speaker 3 (27:45):
I find that incredibly satisfying.
Speaker 4 (27:48):
The next day, I went, okay, I'm just going to
start with the stories that I maybe three stories that
I know I've told that are so hardwired into my life.
Speaker 3 (27:59):
And I began there. I wrote this proposal of what
these stories might look like. And we then went out
and sold.
Speaker 4 (28:06):
I already said, look at this is not going to
be a tell or it was never going to be
a celebrity memoir. So then I started with these stories.
And when we sold the book and I then had
to write them, what you realize is that in telling
the stories, you're actually going back and not just telling them,
(28:26):
but you're healing the bits that were really hard because
I didn't realize how tragic bits of my stories were,
like being put on an aeroplane when I was eleven
years old because I had a fight with my dad.
When I was writing it, I was like, Jesus Christ,
this is actually awful and painful.
Speaker 3 (28:46):
But there was so much humor in it as well.
Speaker 1 (28:49):
Telling and we have a story like that, we're at
eleven years old, you're traveling alone, and you can look
at it and you can see the humor in it,
but you can also see, well, like, this is insane.
Speaker 3 (29:01):
Yeah it was insane. It was and devastating, but it was.
Speaker 4 (29:07):
You then start going that created a level of independence
and the fact that everything was fine and I was fine,
and I did go on this bizarre adventure that was
part of the infrastructure of how I think I moved
to Hollywood when I was twenty five years twenty four
years old. I could move seven thousand miles away from home,
(29:30):
still loving my family and not wanting to and have
the best time, knowing no one.
Speaker 2 (29:36):
Right. Well, I think that all that.
Speaker 1 (29:40):
Develops the strength of character that brings you into the room,
because you also chose a very tough profession and you
you know, you mentioned you know, goodwill hunting and what
that did, and.
Speaker 2 (29:50):
That was that's become.
Speaker 1 (29:51):
This was not only an incredible movie where it came out,
but it's still amazing.
Speaker 2 (29:55):
It's a cult classic. It's an amazing film that you did.
Speaker 1 (30:00):
Some movies just they age out, you're like, oh my god,
I love that.
Speaker 2 (30:04):
Movie when I saw but it's just not other, but
definitely that movie no matter what age you are.
Speaker 3 (30:11):
Now, we made a classic. And it's very rare to
make those kinds of films. It's very difficult to keep
making good films.
Speaker 4 (30:18):
So much has to come into alignment for movies to
be good on all the levels. Received well, I have
a timeless quality, great performances, wonderful time on set.
Speaker 3 (30:30):
It was the happiest experience shooting that movie.
Speaker 4 (30:33):
The movie has touched people for now twenty five years
or whatever it's been like there was. That's very special,
and it's the very beginning of these two extraordinary careers
of Matt and Ben. This beautiful performance of an icon
in Robin Williams.
Speaker 3 (30:49):
Everyone who is in it, everyone, but it was very lowcly.
Speaker 4 (30:52):
I mean turn.
Speaker 2 (31:03):
So speaking of movies, so you have two films that
are going to be in the film.
Speaker 3 (31:07):
Yeah, very different films.
Speaker 2 (31:09):
Yeah, it's kind of wild.
Speaker 3 (31:12):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (31:12):
One is this extraordinary film that stars Alusia Vikander and
Elizabeth Olsen and Himesh Patel.
Speaker 3 (31:20):
It's a kind of dystopian future where if you want.
Speaker 4 (31:24):
To have a child, you have to be assessed by
an assessor. It's called the Assessment, and Elusivikanda plays the
assessor and it is this extraordinary journey into I think,
what it means to be a parent or what it
means to want to have a child, but set against
(31:44):
in a very Alex Garland way in a way, this
dystopian idea of the future. We all take this drug
to remain looking young called synoxin, and I think I'm
one hundred and eighty three years old in it, but
like I look like I do. And it's pretty stark
and it's it's just so brilliant. This amazing French female
director is her first film she's called Flur fourteen amazing.
(32:08):
And then the other movie same brilliant writers, brilliant acting.
But it's a Edward Burns movie. I mean, Eddie's been
making movies for thirty years now. I think it's almost
the Brothers mcmullon, I think is thirty years in January.
Speaker 1 (32:21):
Wow, I forgot about that sum Yeah.
Speaker 4 (32:26):
And so that is this movie that we made, which
is an ensemble piece with Patrick Wilson, Julianna Marguley's.
Speaker 3 (32:32):
Benjamin Bratt, Rishian Mare, Campbell, Scott Eddie.
Speaker 4 (32:37):
Amazing, amazing and a very sort of adult grown up
movie about relationships.
Speaker 2 (32:43):
What do you love about me?
Speaker 3 (32:45):
Oh my god?
Speaker 4 (32:47):
Honestly, from like the cables snaking across the floor to
the kind of harod ads with their ear pieces in.
Speaker 3 (32:55):
The quiet on set, I don't know what it is,
but it feels like home. It's this idea of like.
Speaker 4 (33:04):
You're playing you're literally playing make believe and everyone's taking
it really seriously and you know that it's going to
be metabolized in a way that makes people feel a
whole other thing, Like, it's such a beautiful con for
people to be to enjoy themselves watching you play that.
Speaker 3 (33:22):
They're called movies not because it's a moving image, but
because they move people, They move you.
Speaker 4 (33:27):
And you get to be like a conduit for all
the things that people they don't want to feel, those
big emotions in their life, they want to.
Speaker 3 (33:35):
Watch you do that.
Speaker 4 (33:36):
And particularly if you don't find that difficult to do.
I mean, perhaps it's difficult to do well.
Speaker 2 (33:43):
No, I think it is. I think you have to
be talented like yourself. Not everyone can do it, and
a lot of things have to come together.
Speaker 3 (33:49):
But yeah, it's funny. I don't know what is that.
Speaker 4 (33:55):
I know certain things that make a great actor in
my opinion, but there is this kind of special there
is this special something that is really unquantifiable that certain
actors have.
Speaker 3 (34:10):
I've been actually looking recently.
Speaker 4 (34:11):
I've been watching movies and thinking about that, and watching
movies with people that.
Speaker 2 (34:15):
I just I was about to ask, who are the
people that.
Speaker 4 (34:19):
So Isabel Lupere is my I can watch Emma Stone
all day long, Michael Fassbender, Alicia the Canada, Sean Penn
and Dan day lewis probably being the I think he
was the king.
Speaker 3 (34:36):
Of all of them. I love watching them. I actually love.
Speaker 4 (34:41):
Watching Margot Robbie work because it's also she's such a
fine actress, and it's like, in a way, it's like,
don't be taken in by her.
Speaker 3 (34:49):
Beautiful she is.
Speaker 4 (34:50):
She is so finely tuned to emotion, and she holds
her space so brilliantly and doesn't incroach on other people's
There's something incredibly delicate and very powerful about that.
Speaker 2 (35:06):
I agree she has a very special quality.
Speaker 3 (35:09):
I think she's magical.
Speaker 2 (35:10):
Yeah, she really is.
Speaker 1 (35:11):
I've had such a great time having much of you,
and there's so many things.
Speaker 2 (35:16):
If you've pulled up a chair with.
Speaker 1 (35:18):
Missing me driver, I'm just staring at you because you're
you're mesmerizing, just so you know, you're mesmerizing you and
you're a doer and you and I can feel it.
You've inspired me today, which is I think right is
all about thank you for taking the time wow today.
Speaker 3 (35:36):
Thank you so much for having me.
Speaker 4 (35:37):
It was really delicious and it was really lovely talking
to you.
Speaker 2 (35:41):
Good.
Speaker 1 (35:41):
Thank you, Thank you everyone, Thank you for falling up
at chair and have a great dead.
Speaker 2 (35:52):
Thank you for pulling up a chair.
Speaker 6 (35:54):
I love our lunches and never forget the romance of
a meal. If you enjoy the show, please tell a
friend and rate and review us on Apple podcast. Table
for two with Bruce Bozzi is produced by iHeartRadio seven
three seven Park and Airmail. Our executive producers are Bruce
Bosi and Nathan King. Our supervising producer Dylan Fagan. Our
(36:17):
editors are Vincent to Johnny and Cas b Bias. Table
for two is researched and written by Jack Sullivan. Our
sound engineers are Meel B. Klein, Jess Krainich, Evan Taylor.
Speaker 2 (36:30):
And Jesse Funk. Our music supervisor is Randall Poster. Our
talent booking is done by Jane Sarkin.
Speaker 5 (36:36):
Table for Two's social media manager is Gracie Wiener. Special
thanks to Amy Sugarman, Uni Scherer, Kevin Yvane, Bobby Bauer,
Alison Kanter, Graber, Barbara Jen, Jeff Klein, and the staff.
Speaker 1 (36:49):
At the Tower Bar in the world famous Sunset Tower Hotel.
Speaker 5 (36:53):
For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcast,
or we'rever you listen to your favorite shows
Host
Bruce Bozzi
Popular Podcasts
40s and Free Agents: NFL Draft Season
Daniel Jeremiah of Move the Sticks and Gregg Rosenthal of NFL Daily join forces to break down every team's needs this offseason.
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com
The Bobby Bones Show
Listen to 'The Bobby Bones Show' by downloading the daily full replay.