Ben Schwartz is busy. That’s not a commentary on who he is, or his life, or anything else. He just is. And that’s perfectly fine. The House of Lies star is constantly pushing forward, trying new things, and working on his next idea.
If J.J. Abrams calls him up to do voice work for a Star Wars robot, he doesn’t bat an eye. If Vulture asks him to interview Paul F. Tompkins, the result is illuminating. And if a hotel brand thinks it’s a good idea for him to write, direct, and star in a series of ads where he interviews athletes, that’s perfectly fine with him, too.
Uproxx caught up with Schwartz recently, and the conversation was equal parts dizzying and hilarious as the man who played Parks and Recreation‘s Jean-Ralphio bounced from subject to subject, often embarking on tangent after tangent before returning back to the start.
You do a lot – between acting, writing, directing, doing podcasts, improv, voice acting, the late-night hosting from a year ago, even the Star Wars stuff. Is that just how you are? Do you need to stay busy?
Ben Schwartz: I think it comes from a place where, at the beginning of my career, I kind of tried to do every single thing that I could because you’re hoping you have a career in that. I’ll write jokes, I’ll try to get on a staff for writing, I’ll do improv, and you’re just hoping that someone grabs you and holds onto you. My parents were workers, too, so the idea of me not working hard all the time is… [Pauses.] This is just instilled in me. If I have a job, why not have five jobs? If I’m working Monday through Friday, I’ll write at night, or do something else. There is a thing, a big drive in me to keep trying to do stuff.
It’s been around a year since that late-night show with Adam Pally. What was that like? I’d forgotten how much anarchy it really was, and you joked at the very end of the show that it was an “absolute nightmare.” But you guys looked like you were having a blast.
We’ve been doing stuff for, like, 12 years together, so it was just Adam and I pretending the cameras weren’t even rolling. Every now and then we’d look at each other, and realize this was going to be on TV, and we’d be like, “What the fuck are we doing? This is going to be on TV.” It blew our minds every now and then. I remember just saying, “I have no idea what that’s going to be like.” We had no idea if people were going to like it or not. We were just messing around. There was no audience, so we’re saying jokes, and two cameramen were laughing. We didn’t even know if it was funny, but we kept doing it because that’s what we do when we’re together.
Could there be a future in that, late-night shows with no audiences that just force you into this surreal environment?
I don’t know. I have no idea. I do not have the answer to that question. [Laughs.] I don’t know if that show would have been better or worse with an audience. It feels like it worked pretty well without it. Especially because we’re both performers on stage, so to not have anybody in front of us, we’re just looking at the other person trying to make each other laugh. And we’re hoping that people would laugh with us. Especially on the Internet. By the way, the Internet really grabbed onto it which was kind of lovely.
You never know what the Internet is going to like, even if you’re an Internet person.
Right.
Out of all the different things you have done, what’s your favorite thing to do? And what haven’t you done that you still want to try?
Ooooooh. Umm, I don’t know if I have a favorite, so I wouldn’t say I have a favorite. I really still like performing improv, so I’ll do improv with Adam and Gil [Ozeri], I’ll do improv with Thomas Middleditch, I’ll do improv at a show called Shitty Jobs in L.A. I really love acting in TV, House of Lies and Parks and Rec. But things I still want to do are, like, I’ve written a bunch of movies for studios, but I’d love to write a move where I’m the lead. It seems like it’ll hopefully someday happen.
But to work with J.J. [Abrams] or an Adam McKay, or do scenes with Tom Hanks. There’s so many people I look up to, and want to learn from, and want to be in the same room with. Those are the kinds of things you look forward to. All these little things that come along, it’d be fun to have my own show, all these things you can dream about and see what’s possible because you end up taking on so much. Something I’ve always loved is collaborating with people I look up to, whether it’s peers or someone I’ve never met before, but the idea that I can connect with that person.
The thing with improv, at least my takeaway from it, is I’m someone who thinks I am a screw-up all the time, and when I make a mistake, I can’t let go of it, but you have to in improv. It has helped me approach life differently. Did you have something like that with improv that basically changed how you viewed life?
For me, improv has done so much. It helps you move quick and live in the moment. Or to say yes to the ideas and stuff. Something I did at the beginning was saturate myself in comedy. Everything was comedy. I was a page at Letterman, then I took a class at UCB, then I’d intern at UCB, then I’d do a show at midnight. And I wound up living that in everything in my life. My improv got repetitive, and my teacher told me, “Look at your day. All you’re doing is comedy. Go out and enjoy life and have experiences.”
You’re so right that you have these goals and these wants that are so big, and you forget that you fucking need time to relax and live your life so you can write more or improvise more or learn how to play moments better, stuff like that.
I’ve noticed you do a lot of interviewing, too, and that’s something that I feel like has come from improv. You’re constantly giving gifts to your subjects, even if they’re people who aren’t necessarily “funny” people, but anyone can be funny if you make it relatable to them.
When I have to do interviews and stuff like that, it’s just like an improv scene. I love playing with people. I love going back and forth. It’s cool if the other person is funny. A lot of improv isn’t about making yourself funny, it’s about making the team hilarious. So, in interviews or podcasts, I’ll be the straight person, and they’ll give it back to me, or they’ll be the straight man and I’ll get to play. That’s great. I love that shit.
That interview with Paul F. Tompkins was exactly that. You two were just talking, and it felt so natural. It was like I was reading the transcript of a podcast episode.
It was so unique. We just talked. They edited a lot, but they transcribed most of it. You don’t sit down and talk, real, often. That wasn’t business talk. In a sense that’s comedy, and what it really means, and we’ve never really done that. I love Paul, but we’d never done that. You find there’s stuff you’re both interested in, but you don’t get the chance to talk about it and bring it up. We were having these tiny thought processes with each other, and it was really interesting.
The whole idea was that we can make people laugh, but let’s talk about real shit and figure it out. It was very interesting. How many times does a comedian interview you and the whole point isn’t to make joke, joke, joke, joke, like every now and then we’re asking each other real questions and trying to figure our way out of it.
And then you get to talk yourselves into circles. It seemed like he’s asking you questions back. It’s not an interview, it’s just a conversation. It felt natural the whole time.
It was very cool. I think Paul’s a genius. I think he’s so, so smart.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2sCWT8ScN2s
You were running around with Rex Ryan and Kirk Cousins out in San Francisco during Super Bowl week in those “Courtyard Camera” videos. How much fun was that?
That stuff is always super fun. To talk to people who are some of the best at what they do. There’s pressure on it because those I direct, and write, and act in them, too, so you have to look at the monitors, and check the edits, and help out there. But it’s so fun, and when the product comes out really good, those two that came out, I’m really proud of them.
We usually do them all indoors, and this time, it was like, “Let’s go everywhere.” Then you find that Kirk Cousins has great timing, or Rex Ryan is really funny. You get to be fucking hilarious. And you get to see these people you look up to, but you don’t always get to see that side. When I talk to them, in interviews, I get to do a comedic interview, and all their interviews normally aren’t like that. This is more of a sketch. We’ve been really lucky. All of the NFL talent has been fucking awesome.
Is there a trick to making them comfortable, bringing out the best in them, and making them seem human? So often coaches and athletes, the wall is up with them all the time. They don’t want to get put on blast.
That’s so interesting. I’ve never thought about that. I treat them like, I don’t know, we talk beforehand and we get in a cool space and become friendly with each other. That helps them deal with it. I tell them I’m going to act a little exaggerated, and silly, and stupid, and if there’s something you don’t like, we won’t use it. I would never put out something they said that was rude or weird. That’s not the point of it. Why in a million years would I make them look bad? It’s about getting the funniest content out there and then we figure it out.
Who got to keep the caricature?
A woman who works for Courtyard, Callette, has it. I think she’s going to make copies for everyone. She wanted it, and she’s great. She’s someone who has shepherded this project through and is awesome. I’m also thinking about giving a game ball to the other people who really crushed it. We were scrambling, and we work so hard. Those smaller shoots are tough when there’s three cameras and you’re running around. But if I get people who are down to have fun, to have great dialogue, it’s easier. And our crew is awesome. They take risks, which is why we end up with this cool thing.
These ended up reminding me of those ESPN videos you used to do.
Yeah, man! You remember those?
I just watched these again for the first time in forever. Those have got to be like five or six years old.
Those are fucking real old. Those are from, like, the ESPYs years ago. I interviewed Nastia Liukin, and Jordan Farmar, Matt Kemp, Tony Gonzalez.
You asked the one dude if he was a robot.
Travis Pastrana. I told all those guys, I’m going to look like a big idiot, so just play around and act like it’s a real interview. They were all game. You could see it. Think about how many interviews they have to do. They have to do press almost every day of the week. So, when they finally have a thing where they can just let loose and be funny… I didn’t want any real information from them. I was just playing around.
Can you pick out a favorite character you’ve played? A lot of them all seem like they have threads of yourself in there.
I kind of like all of them. They let me do different things. With House of Lies, I get to be dramatic a lot, which is really fun. There’s monologues, and I love to be able to stretch my muscles that way. But other things like Parks and Rec feel like playtime. When I do web shorts, like the Jake and Amir thing, it’s friends hanging out. I don’t have one favorite one, but I have all these things that I love. It’s fun to keep playing. When I act in a bunch of stuff, there’s always going to be an exaggeration of yourself in there. It’s never really who you are, but it’s the jumping off point.
Do you miss the Jean-Ralphio hair at all? Was there ever a thought to see how big it could get?
A couple of times, I really went for it. It would become so big that the hair product I’d use, any hair product, you can’t keep it up. It just looks terrible. My hair, I kind of look like a beetle when I come out of the shower, and I put that hair product in and it gets so, so big. When I’m not filming, I won’t cut my hair for a few weeks, and it’ll get real big, and I’ll be like, “What am I doing?” It happens every single time. I’m on stage at UCB, and I see myself and I say, “I look so stupid right now.” Then I go to this wonderful woman named Abby who cuts my hair out here, and oftentimes we’ll take a picture of how much hair is on the ground afterward, and it looks like a dog is just sleeping. Then, I’ll look at the haircut, think it looks good, then I’ll be like, “Yeah, I can grow my hair out.” And the whole process starts again.
We do these rankings posts all the time, but if you had to rank the Parks and Rec characters, could you do it?
I would never do that. Are you crazy? They’re so good. All of them. I’d put them all in one box. They’re just the best. They’re so funny. And so wonderful. And so well acted.
It’s like you have a little toy chest, and you take one out and play with it, take another one out, line them all up on the table, and once in a while, you’ll play with one for a little bit longer, but you love them all equally.
Yesssss. Yes, yes, yes. They’re all your toys and you love playing with them. I love playing with those guys. Everybody is so funny. You just want to talk and do scenes. Every time I did a scene with anybody, it was never like, “Oh no.” I was always like, “I get to do a scene with this person now!”
What was the best question that you got during your AMA last week?
[Makes BB-8 whistles and beeps for a few seconds.] My best question I got was, I think someone asked me, “What would you rather fight, a duck the size of a horse, or 100 horses the size of ducks?” Stupid questions like that I like a lot.
Did you go with the 100 ducks?
I literally went 15, 20 minutes with that answer of like, “Let me ask you a bunch of questions.” It was super fun.
What’s something about Don Cheadle that we don’t know, that we should know?
He is incredibly funny. He’s done my improv show a bunch of times. He’ll jump in, and any bit, one time we’ll joke around on set, off camera, any silly thing, he’s just amazing. The whole idea with any TV show is that if the lead actor, the number one person on the call sheet, is cool, has a good heart, and loves their work, whether it’s Amy Poehler or it’s Don, it just trickles down. I’ve been so lucky. You look at him, and that’s what I want to do. That’s how I want to act. How I want to treat the crew. How I want to respect everybody. I want to come so prepared, and down to have fun and laugh and explore and improvise. Being around Don is wonderful. But he is so fucking fun, and any joke you do, he can keep up.
Know when to be a pro, and know when to ease up a little bit. That’s gotta take practice and patience.
He is always prepared, but you can find things with him. It’s such a gift that he gives everybody else. You just learn, you look at his process, and you try to take things and add them into process. He’s a perfect role model, and he helped the environment and has these huge causes. He helps people. He’s a very smart, and great role model to have.
