The Joe Rogan ExperienceJoe Rogan Experience #2406 - Russell Crowe
EVERY SPOKEN WORD
150 min read · 30,021 words- 0:00 – 2:00
Nuremberg film impact: unseen Holocaust footage and courtroom storytelling
- RCRussell Crowe
(drumbeats) Joe Rogan podcast. Check it out.
- NANarrator
The Joe Rogan Experience. (drums)
- JRJoe Rogan
Train by day, Joe Rogan podcast by night. All day. (rock music plays) Joe, ladies and gentlemen. How are you, sir? Good to see you.
- RCRussell Crowe
Joe Rogan.
- JRJoe Rogan
Yeah, good to see you.
- RCRussell Crowe
Nice to see you, man.
- JRJoe Rogan
Your movie's great. (smacks lips)
- RCRussell Crowe
Thank you very much.
- JRJoe Rogan
When does it come out?
- RCRussell Crowe
Uh, in the United States, it comes out November 7th.
- JRJoe Rogan
Okay, so it's-
- RCRussell Crowe
And then, uh, various dates over the next month and a half or so around the rest of the world.
- JRJoe Rogan
It's a fucking heavy movie, man.
- RCRussell Crowe
Yeah.
- JRJoe Rogan
It's a heavy movie.
- RCRussell Crowe
Yeah.
- JRJoe Rogan
The, um, the trial, that footage, was that all real footage, the Holocaust footage?
- RCRussell Crowe
Yeah.
- JRJoe Rogan
Real footage of the-
- RCRussell Crowe
Yeah.
- JRJoe Rogan
... the plows and-
- RCRussell Crowe
I was one of the, one of the reasons that, that inspired Jamie to go ahead, that he was given access to that footage, some of which has never been seen since-
- JRJoe Rogan
Oh.
- RCRussell Crowe
... 1946.
- JRJoe Rogan
Oh.
- RCRussell Crowe
Yeah, uh, it's a very interesting way that he makes the subject matter accessible, because it's such a dry topic from the outside, right? "Here's a court case."
- JRJoe Rogan
Right.
- RCRussell Crowe
You know, "Here's yet another courtroom drama-"
- JRJoe Rogan
Right.
- RCRussell Crowe
"... procedural or whatever." So I can imagine that people would see that and go, "Well this, uh, you know, might not be an exciting watch or something." (laughs) But he sort of puts the audience in this position where he allows them to start to be amused by some of the things that are going on and the interpersonal relationships, and, you know, when the commandant of the, um, prison has to call up his two, um, top mental health experts and dress them down for getting into a fistfight. (laughs) You know, things like that. Kind of, it's, there's a charm to it, and then he gets you into the courtroom, and he locks the door.
- 2:00 – 4:25
The scary thesis: ordinary people can commit atrocities (and how it happens incrementally)
- JRJoe Rogan
Yeah, it's, uh, it's also a fascinating psychological tape from the, uh, psychiatrist, from Kelly's perspective, you know, because the way he's describing all human beings-
- RCRussell Crowe
Yeah.
- JRJoe Rogan
... that all human beings are capable of these horrific acts.
- RCRussell Crowe
Yeah, and that's the thing that was a very unpopular take at the time, actually led to his removal from the process, because he wasn't fulfilling what the War Department wanted him to say.
- JRJoe Rogan
Yeah.
- RCRussell Crowe
Which is, you know, all Nazis are crazy, you know, ruled by a madman, and, uh, this is a unique experience. But that's not what he found, and sitting down, talking to the 22, um, major Nazi sort of names that, that he was assigned to post-war, he realized that every single one of these people was, you know, as normal... Well, there was a couple (laughs) that were pretty out there. But, you know, for the most part, he was dealing with rational men.
- JRJoe Rogan
Yeah, that's what's scary.
- RCRussell Crowe
And how the hell did they end up making this series of decisions if they're rational men?
- JRJoe Rogan
Well, it just seems like things just get pushed slowly but surely into this unbelievably horrific place.
- RCRussell Crowe
Right.
- JRJoe Rogan
Like, it starts off, there's just, it's just a war. It starts off, Hitler's in power, and then slowly but surely, things get pushed-
- RCRussell Crowe
Incrementally.
- JRJoe Rogan
Yes.
- RCRussell Crowe
And that's the thing that's, you know, (inhales sharply) difficult, because gigantic jumps, we can all read.
- JRJoe Rogan
Right.
- RCRussell Crowe
But little incremental changes-
- JRJoe Rogan
Right, the boiling of the frog.
- RCRussell Crowe
... just how, you know, you take-
- JRJoe Rogan
Yeah.
- RCRussell Crowe
... away this person's rights, that person's personal power, you know, and slowly-
- JRJoe Rogan
Right.
- RCRussell Crowe
... you know, you get to a point where the average person then turns around and goes, "How did we get to here?"
- JRJoe Rogan
Right.
- RCRussell Crowe
You know, "I thought it was, I thought it was about something else." You know, "There's a smoke screen going up, and I thought we were doing that," and, uh, as it turns out, it's very different.
- JRJoe Rogan
Yeah, that's the, one of the scariest aspects of human beings is our ability to dehumanize others, to turn others into something less than us.
- RCRussell Crowe
Right.
- JRJoe Rogan
Non-human, an other.
- RCRussell Crowe
Right.
- JRJoe Rogan
Humans with families, with mothers and-
- RCRussell Crowe
It's-
- 4:25 – 5:32
Modern tribal politics: red vs. blue thinking and collapsing nuance
- RCRussell Crowe
It's one of the most dangerous things, as- and I see it going on everywhere at the moment, that we're trying to say that you're either, you know, and for want of a better team name, that you're either red or that you're blue.
- JRJoe Rogan
Right.
- RCRussell Crowe
And humans are far more nuanced than that. They're not, we're not that extreme, you know? And that the idea that you can split all of us into two camps is kind of nuts.
- JRJoe Rogan
It's nuts.
- RCRussell Crowe
You know?
- JRJoe Rogan
Yeah, it's nuts.
- RCRussell Crowe
And it takes out all the room for subtlety in a discussion, and therefore, it makes communicating with each other less and less, um, available.
- JRJoe Rogan
Well, it's just, in this country, in particular, I don't know about Australian politics, but we only have two parties, and they're both essentially financed by enormous corporations. So it's a, it's a ruse. The whole thing's a ruse.
- RCRussell Crowe
Yeah.
- JRJoe Rogan
And you have different social issues on each side that come up, and, and then it becomes this, you're with us or against us, right versus left. But it's, there's-
- RCRussell Crowe
It's going nowhere good.
- JRJoe Rogan
Nowhere good.
- RCRussell Crowe
Yeah.
- JRJoe Rogan
Yeah.
- 5:32 – 7:37
Australia/New Zealand vs. America: outward-looking culture, sports, and identity
- RCRussell Crowe
I mean, we have the same sort of, you know, two principal party system in Australia as well. Um, but we have a slight advantage in that we're kind of on the edge of the world in a lot of ways, you know? So what I've always said is when you're growing up in Australia or New Zealand, you're growing, you grow up looking out. Yes, you understand your own culture and all that, but you grow up looking at what else is happening in the rest of the world.
- JRJoe Rogan
Mm.
- RCRussell Crowe
What, what's happening in Europe, what's happening in America, you know? But by and large, Americans grow up looking in.
- JRJoe Rogan
Right.
- RCRussell Crowe
... the principal sports who are only played by American teams. Uh, American football, uh-
- JRJoe Rogan
Baseball.
- RCRussell Crowe
... in, in some instances, baseball, but they're not the types of sports that we play where the pinnacle of that sport is international competition.
- JRJoe Rogan
Right.
- RCRussell Crowe
Rugby union.
- JRJoe Rogan
Right.
- RCRussell Crowe
Rugby league, cricket.
- JRJoe Rogan
Right.
- RCRussell Crowe
Football, soccer, you know? Um, so we, w- w- w- we grow up at, with that as being the pinnacle of any particular sport if you get to represent your country, and that's only really relevant in an American sense if, uh, in an Olympic period, you know?
- JRJoe Rogan
Right. That's, uh, yeah. We never think about other sports. We mock them. We think about, you know, like, "What are you doing playing cricket?" (laughs) You know? (laughs)
- RCRussell Crowe
(laughs) And it's a fascinating game.
- JRJoe Rogan
It is.
- RCRussell Crowe
And any- anybody who loves baseball, uh, generally I've found baseball lovers are all about the minutiae. They're all about the stats and what those stats mean. You know, there might be a certain score on the board, but, you know, they're... and their team might be getting beaten, but they see in the stats that there's, you know, a certain dominance in an area and so they, you know, they still have a hope that the outcome of the game is- is- may come their way. And cricket fans, uh, are the same a- as that. So the o- the fact that the two never seem to meet is odd to me.
- JRJoe Rogan
It is odd.
- RCRussell Crowe
Because it's the same type of game.
- JRJoe Rogan
There's, is, cricket is larger worldwide, right?
- RCRussell Crowe
Mm-hmm.
- JRJoe Rogan
Much larger.
- RCRussell Crowe
Yeah, well you have the-
- JRJoe Rogan
India.
- RCRussell Crowe
... India and Pakistan-
- JRJoe Rogan
Yeah.
- RCRussell Crowe
... and, uh, Sri Lanka, and, you know, countries like that with huge populations playing the game.
- 7:37 – 12:15
Cricket explained: ‘a six,’ formats from T20 to five-day Test matches, and family ties
- JRJoe Rogan
Did you, do you guys have home runs in cricket? Like, where someone really cracks the ball and smashes it out of the park?
- RCRussell Crowe
It's called a six. It's called a six. If you hit the ball over the fence without it bouncing, you get six runs.
- JRJoe Rogan
Oh, okay.
- RCRussell Crowe
And that's, that's the, um, version of a home run.
- JRJoe Rogan
Does that happen often?
- RCRussell Crowe
In... So there's different forms of the game. You have, uh, um, T20, then you have one day, so this is gonna be, this is gonna be difficult. (laughs)
- JRJoe Rogan
(laughs)
- RCRussell Crowe
T20 means that each team gets to bowl 20 overs. An over is six balls. So you have 26 ball overs that you're bowling to the batting team, and they've gotta get, try and get as many runs as they can.
- JRJoe Rogan
Okay.
- RCRussell Crowe
And then you will have a go at batting, right? So you have that version of the game, which is very short. It can be, it can happen in an evening. Then you have a one day game, which maybe, you know, starts in the afternoon, finishes by 8:00 or 9:00 at night. But then you have the test match, and this is what I grew up with. It, it's sort of been dialed down a little bit now 'cause they've brought in shorter forms of the game, but the test match is between two countries, and it's played over five days. And the idea is that both teams have to bat and bowl twice, and the result will be whatever it is at the end of five days.
- JRJoe Rogan
Five days?
- RCRussell Crowe
Five days, man. Five full days.
- JRJoe Rogan
Jesus.
- RCRussell Crowe
And they start, and then they have morning tea, and then they have another break, they have lunch, (laughs) and then they have-
- JRJoe Rogan
(laughs)
- RCRussell Crowe
... afternoon tea. And if it's really hot every now and then, somebody will walk out and give them drinks, you know? It's very civilized. You, my, my, my cousin Martin was a great cricket player. He was the captain of New Zealand. My other cousin Jeffrey was also a captain of New Zealand, so I kinda grew up in a cricketing family, and it was one of the pathways for me that was, you know, potentially play cricket, you know? But when you've got two of your cousins who are as good as they were, it's a very crowded room.
- JRJoe Rogan
(laughs)
- RCRussell Crowe
You know? It's like, well, how am I gonna make any kind of statement here when one of them, Martin, uh, at his peak, he was called by Sports Illustrated, I believe, the Michael Jordan of world cricket.
- JRJoe Rogan
Wow.
- RCRussell Crowe
He was a very dominant player in his day. And, um, he used to call, we used to discuss test matches as the gentleman's war, 'cause you have a defined space. You have X amount of players and you've gotta stop that little ball in this gigantic 180 meter by 120 meter oval, you gotta stop that little red ball from going between the players and therefore, you know, preventing the batsman from scoring runs. But that five day game, the way that it ebbs and flows, once you're into it, it's the only way you wanna watch cricket, 'cause it's like, you know, at one moment your team can be just so far ahead, you're like, "Ugh, just," you know, and then it'll turn on a dime. And day two, things get really dark for your team, (laughs) you know? Day three, you got an edge back again. Day four, it's fantastic, man. And as a kid, I used to go and attend every day of a five day game.
- JRJoe Rogan
Wow.
- RCRussell Crowe
Yeah. Yeah, it was crazy.
- JRJoe Rogan
Yeah, there's nothing like that here.
- RCRussell Crowe
No. No. I, I mean, it really requires, um... I mean, just like, look, look at the... You know, five, (laughs) five day game is like five news cycles, right?
- JRJoe Rogan
Yeah.
- RCRussell Crowe
(laughs) We're not really set up for that sort of patience and-
- JRJoe Rogan
How is it broadcast?
- RCRussell Crowe
... persistence.
- JRJoe Rogan
Is it streamed?
- RCRussell Crowe
Television.
- 12:15 – 16:21
Rugby league, owning the Rabbitohs, and why refereeing controversies fuel corruption fears
- JRJoe Rogan
Yeah, that makes sense. The, it's, uh, always been fascinating to me that rugby never took off in America.
- RCRussell Crowe
Yeah.
- JRJoe Rogan
'Cause it seems like kind of a more savage version of football.
- RCRussell Crowe
Yeah. Well, the w- the way I think it sort of plays out is you've got rugby union, right? Which is, um, 15 men a side.... every time a player is tackled, you re-compete for the ball. You have rucks, mauls, you have line-outs. Uh, it's a very different game. But there's another version of rugby called Rugby League, which was played in the north of England, and that has a defined period of offense and defense, and I think that's where American football comes from.
- JRJoe Rogan
Oh.
- RCRussell Crowe
I actually own a team in Australia, in, uh, the NRL, the National Rugby League, the South Sydney Rabbitohs, the oldest team in the game. In 1908, we were formed. I bought the team in 2006, uh, and it's very easy to explain to Americans. I have American friends come down, I spend maybe 20 minutes talking to them, and they get the game, and they st- start to dig it. My girlfriend at the moment, actually, uh, Brittany, uh, was one of the reasons why I really (laughs) started being attracted to her, because she understood- stood the game straight away, you know. Then I find out, uh, that when she was younger, she was a- a cheerleader for the, uh, New Orleans Saints-
- JRJoe Rogan
Oh, wow.
- RCRussell Crowe
... while she was studying electrical engineering. (laughs)
- JRJoe Rogan
(laughs)
- RCRussell Crowe
So it- yeah, it's- it's a-
- JRJoe Rogan
Very similar.
- RCRussell Crowe
Rugby- rugby league is a very easy game for Americans to follow. Now, how it's refereed becomes frustrating (laughs) for an American audience because it's- there's so much room for interpretation, referee to referee, game to game, situation to situation. So, it can get frustrating. I think one of the greatest things about American football from the outside or from an objective point of view, it seems that every single thing that th- the NFL try to do is based on an across the board fairness for everyone.
- JRJoe Rogan
Mm.
- RCRussell Crowe
You know? So those- you know, the conversations were between, um, the referees and what have you, seem to be everybody's on the same page. And sometimes when you're watching Rugby League, something that you saw somebody else get sent from the field for the week before, and now nothing happens this week, but it's the same kind of hit or whatever-
- JRJoe Rogan
Mm.
- RCRussell Crowe
... and it's like, "What?" You know? So I- I've had a few Americans get very frustrated.
- JRJoe Rogan
Is that corruption?
- RCRussell Crowe
No, I think that (laughs) yeah, I think it- the game moves very fast.
- JRJoe Rogan
Right.
- RCRussell Crowe
And, uh, y- you know, referees don't have eyes on all sides of their head, you know.
- JRJoe Rogan
But do you have referee corruption over there? Because you have gambling.
- RCRussell Crowe
We definitely have gambling.
- JRJoe Rogan
Yeah, I know you have gambling-
- RCRussell Crowe
Uh-
- JRJoe Rogan
... 'cause I read ads for them. (laughs)
- RCRussell Crowe
(laughs) Yeah, it's-
- JRJoe Rogan
Ladbrokes?
- RCRussell Crowe
... uh, absolutely crazy the way gambling has become such a significant player. I also read the other day that, uh, it now turns out that 50% of ownership of all the major gambling things are, uh, in the hands of sports teams.
- JRJoe Rogan
Oh, boy.
- RCRussell Crowe
So, what's going on? (laughs)
- 16:21 – 19:27
Sports betting scandals and the poker-ring ecosystem (NBA-style prop bets and cheating tech)
- JRJoe Rogan
Um, what was that scandal in America, Jamie, the most recent one, the basketball one? It- it had to do-
- JVJamie Vernon
It's still ongoing.
- JRJoe Rogan
It's still ongoing?
- JVJamie Vernon
Yeah.
- JRJoe Rogan
Yeah. Um, what did- what are they accusing these guys of, though?
- JVJamie Vernon
Uh-
- JRJoe Rogan
I know there's- they rig poker games, but there's also-
- JVJamie Vernon
Yeah, that was separate.
- JRJoe Rogan
... accusations about the basketball games itself.
- JVJamie Vernon
Yeah. Uh, most of it would've been, like, based off of player props. So like, uh-
- JRJoe Rogan
Oh.
- JVJamie Vernon
... they're n- they know that they're not gonna take themself outta the game, so they just take the under on "I'm not gonna score 20 points, I'm only gonna be there for 10 minutes."
- JRJoe Rogan
Mm.
- JVJamie Vernon
Wink, wink. Or like, you know, "These players aren't gonna play in this game that- against us." That sort of what that is.
- RCRussell Crowe
This is players gambling, is it?
- JVJamie Vernon
One of the coaches was doing it too, or like-
- RCRussell Crowe
Right.
- JVJamie Vernon
... uh, giving information. I mean, he was... The thing is, is they were- they were- they were tied to the poker game too.
- JRJoe Rogan
Oh.
- JVJamie Vernon
And-
- JRJoe Rogan
So it was just a full on criminal enterprise.
- JVJamie Vernon
Yeah, one of them- I just saw in the news today that the one player who's been tossed around, uh, he had a big, uh, IRS debt, and all of this sort of started around the same time too.
- JRJoe Rogan
Oh, he was trying to pay off his debt, so he got corrupt.
- JVJamie Vernon
Who knows?
- JRJoe Rogan
Who knows?
- JVJamie Vernon
Really.
- JRJoe Rogan
But they- weren't they ripping off their friends in the poker games?
- JVJamie Vernon
That I don't know 'cause I've seen clips-
- JRJoe Rogan
Allegedly.
- JVJamie Vernon
Yeah, I've seen clips of this. People knew about this a year or two ago on Instagram, they're like, "I was at a fucking rigged game, and I know the people involved and know that I should not have- like, I'm not going there and losing my money."
- 19:27 – 22:22
Crowe’s Reno lesson: losing it all, ‘vibrating’ afterward, and a family gambling history
- RCRussell Crowe
Now, I- I-
- NANarrator
Buy-in, thank you.
- RCRussell Crowe
... I stay away from it. I know how you feel about it, but...
- JRJoe Rogan
About gambling?
- RCRussell Crowe
Yeah. I- I had an experience when I was a young fellow. Uh, it was the first time I was in America, actually, and I'd had all these intense meetings and what have you, and it was... I- I had a decision to make. I had 10 different people wanting to be my agent. So, I rented a car, and I went for a drive, and I went up to, uh, San Francisco along the coast, and then I turned inland thinking, "You know, we'll... I've heard of Reno, so I'll go there," right? (laughs) So, so I went to Reno, Nevada, and, uh, I had X amount of money, right? I was a very, um... I wasn't... You know, I was doing well in my career, but I didn't have a lot of cash, so I had a couple $100 in my pocket, that's all, you know. So, I- I went and had a- a beer, and I started playing blackjack on a$ 5 table, and it was a single deck. This is how long ago this was, uh, '92 or something, right? So, I'm playing, and I did pretty well. I, you know, uh, amassed a few hundred dollars, feeling very cocky and confident about myself, and I'd probably just then had one beer too many. And I went for a walk down the street, and I saw a roulette table, and I think, "That'll be me," right? (laughs) Sucker. And so everything I won, I lost. And by the time I sort of got my shit back together, I had $25 in my pocket. I'm in Reno, I've got a quarter of a tank of gas, and I gotta get back to LA. I don't have a credit card.
- JRJoe Rogan
Oh, boy.
- RCRussell Crowe
So, as it was, I'd paid for my hotel in advance, so that, that's all cool. But I was like, "Okay, I gotta sober up, yeah." So, I go back to the place I started, back to that same $5 table, and I just very carefully... Uh, when I got to, like, $190, which I knew was gonna be enough to get me back with petrol and food and all that stuff, I stopped. I go out into the car park of this hotel. It's, like, 11:00 midnight, something like that, and I just started vibrating, man. My whole body was, like, shaking, like I was having some kind of fit, you know? And it was just really weird. I- I got back to the hotel room, and I called my mum collect in New Zealand, and I just... See, I just did this, I went through this, she goes, "Oh, no, darling. Um, something I've never told you." (laughs) "But your great-grandfather was a professional gambler. And at one point in time, he gambled his house away."
- NANarrator
(exhales)
- RCRussell Crowe
"He had to go and get his daughters, wake 'em up, get his wife-"
- JRJoe Rogan
Oh.
- RCRussell Crowe
"... and tell them this is where they no longer live. And that one act kept that family in, you know, uh, relative terms, poor for another two generations."
- JRJoe Rogan
Wow.
- RCRussell Crowe
"That one impulsive act to gamble his house."
- JRJoe Rogan
(exhales)
- RCRussell Crowe
Yeah. So, I know it's in me, so I don't go anywhere near it.
- JRJoe Rogan
That's fascinating.
- RCRussell Crowe
Once a year-
- 22:22 – 30:31
Is addiction genetic? Discipline, ‘team blackjack’ with Tom Cruise, and avoiding ego-risk
- JRJoe Rogan
So, you think it's genetic?
- RCRussell Crowe
... there, there's a, uh, a horse race in Australia called the Melbourne Cup, and I will focus on that. And if I happen to be at home, and, and I have, uh, the day off kind of thing, I'll, uh, put a bit of money on that. But that's it, you know. Uh, everything else (laughs) that I do in my life is gambling. Becoming an actor, massive gamble. What are you talking about? It's ridiculous, you know. Buying the football team, it's, it's all a version of gambling. But the idea that you're just giving money away to a system that ha- that (laughs) , where it's not fair, it's not gonna benefit you, and at the end of the day, in the longer term, you're simply not gonna win. It sort of... That drives me a little crazy. I don't wanna get involved in that.
- JRJoe Rogan
Y- the vibration thing, do you think, do you think gambling's genetic? Like, there's a thought that a lot of le- there's- there's certain behaviors that are in people that are passed down from their parents.
- RCRussell Crowe
Mm-hmm.
- JRJoe Rogan
There's certain thought processes, there's certain inclinations.
- RCRussell Crowe
Right.
- JRJoe Rogan
That it's some genetic proponent that we haven't clearly identified yet, that it's... You know, they used to think that people are a blank slate.
- RCRussell Crowe
Right.
- JRJoe Rogan
You're born, you're a blank slate, you learn everything from your environment.
- RCRussell Crowe
But we know that's not real.
- JRJoe Rogan
It's not real. No.
- RCRussell Crowe
No.
- JRJoe Rogan
There's a shit ton that you get from your genes.
- RCRussell Crowe
Yeah.
- JRJoe Rogan
It's very weird.
- RCRussell Crowe
Yeah.
- JRJoe Rogan
And I wonder if you got that from your grandfather.
- RCRussell Crowe
It- it- it really feels like it's in me, and I have to work against it.
- JRJoe Rogan
Well, s- thank God you have discipline, that you could go back to the table-
- RCRussell Crowe
In one area. (laughs)
- JRJoe Rogan
... and win one... (laughs) Well, that's a good area to have it is, though.
- RCRussell Crowe
But that, but that's how desperate, uh, uh, the situation was.
- JRJoe Rogan
Yes. Right.
- RCRussell Crowe
It's like, I'm standing there in Reno realizing I can't even get back to LA.
- JRJoe Rogan
Right. Geez.
- RCRussell Crowe
I've gotta rent a rental car. So, I had to... And I just took it really, really slowly. And I do this thing w- w- if I'm playing in a situation like that, because occasionally I will go and play blackjack at a casino if I'm in a group of people. Uh, because if you're all disciplined, and if you hold every seat on a table, you can turn the tide against the house very easily.
- JRJoe Rogan
Mm.
- RCRussell Crowe
They hate you doing it (laughs) , and they try to break it up and put somebody in the middle of you or whatever. But if you... Uh, and actually, funnily enough, it was Tom Cruise who taught me this. Um, if you have it so the first chair and the last chair make the calls and the decisions, and everybody else just sits on 12 and above.And you watch the mathematics come your way.
- JRJoe Rogan
Ah.
- RCRussell Crowe
Now way, way back in the day, right, it would've been, hmm, (smacks lips) '95, '96, '97, something like that, right? Tom calls me. He's married to Nicole Kidman at the time. Calls me and he goes, you know, "Hey, bud. We got this thing set up. Steve Wynn has put on a jet. He's gonna fly us to Vegas," right? We were allowed to play at Shadow Creek, we were allowed to play golf at Shadow Creek. So, I'm not really a golfer, but sounded good to me. Jumped on the plane, went there, we're playing Shadow Creek, lightning storm comes up. Tom's (laughs) like in the middle of the fairway, still trying to play and we're going, "Dude." (laughs)
- 30:31 – 43:23
Gambling vs alcohol: normalization, kids on betting apps, and the ‘addiction stack’ of phones
- RCRussell Crowe
I- I really dislike the way, in Australia, we have normalized it. You know, they're doing a sports report on the news, the national news, and they'll tell you-
- JRJoe Rogan
The odds.
- RCRussell Crowe
... the odds.
- JRJoe Rogan
Well, we do that with the UFC. The UFC will give the odds. They, they even, I don't know if they announce, uh, round by round odds, but the, I think they do, but the, I don't, I try not to pay attention to it 'cause I don't vote, uh, uh, excuse me, I don't, um, gamble on the UFC, but I used to.So, I used to gamble in the UFC when I first started working for them, and then I was like-
- RCRussell Crowe
Mm-hmm.
- JRJoe Rogan
... "I don't think I should do this anymore."
- RCRussell Crowe
Probably not. (laughs)
- JRJoe Rogan
This is a long time ago, though. So, what I started doing is giving my friend, Aubrey, uh, who's my business partner at Onnit, I started giving him tips.
- RCRussell Crowe
Mm-hmm.
- JRJoe Rogan
And he was like 84%.
- RCRussell Crowe
Right.
- JRJoe Rogan
'Cause I know the sport, and a lot of these guys would be coming from Japan or coming from Russia, and I'd be like, "Oh, this guy, um, from Brazil, Anderson Silva, bet the fucking house."
- RCRussell Crowe
Right. (laughs)
- JRJoe Rogan
I go, "Bet the fucking house," 'cause people do-
- RCRussell Crowe
Not my house, though. Your house.
- JRJoe Rogan
Not my house. (laughs)
- RCRussell Crowe
(laughs)
- JRJoe Rogan
But there's people that were coming across from other organizations that I was a giant fan of, and the bookmakers were woefully uneducated about especially-
- RCRussell Crowe
Right.
- JRJoe Rogan
... foreign fighters.
- RCRussell Crowe
Right.
- JRJoe Rogan
And there's a thing, like if you are gambling on MMA and you don't know how to fight, you're just guessing. You don't really... We're all just guessing when we... two guys get into the cage together, but you're really guessing. Like you really don't... You can't recognize, like, how fast a person is. You can't recognize how good they are at countering. You just know stats-
- RCRussell Crowe
Right.
- JRJoe Rogan
... and you know... But you don't know how to do it, and if you don't know how to do it, you can't really see it. You don't really know. So, at a certain point in time, I stopped, um, just on my own, gambling, 'cause I would, like... I don't... 'Cause I was... People were accusing me of being biased one way or the other anyway-
- RCRussell Crowe
Right.
- JRJoe Rogan
... which maybe I was. You know, I got better at that. But I wanted to make sure that no one thought that, so I was like, "I'm only gambling, um, a couple hundred bucks or something like that." I wasn't doing anything crazy.
- RCRussell Crowe
Right.
- JRJoe Rogan
But the, the fucking people that... I have friends, like good friends, that are just hooked and when they start talking about, like, fights that they're gambling on or they put so much money on this and money on that, I'm like, "Oh my God." G- I know g- I know guys that put millions of dollars on a fight. I'm like, "Oh my God."
- RCRussell Crowe
Yeah.
- JRJoe Rogan
You're freaking me out. (laughs)
- 43:23 – 56:22
Burnout and the work avalanche: five films in months, Highlander, and why schedules collide
- RCRussell Crowe
I'll be in the bush in a minute. This has been such a crazy year, man, you know? So, you know, we finished Nuremberg last year, and then I went on that big tour, which is when I was here, um, when I came to see you the first time. But this year, since... Between December and August, I made five movies.
- BSBrian Simpson
Wow.
- RCRussell Crowe
And I was on the set of the sixth, and so weary and I had no juice. I, I still feel it a little bit actually, man. I, I... You know, I've had a little bit of time off, but I've still had so many responsibilities. I kind of feel like I broke my brain or something in August.
- BSBrian Simpson
Hmm.
- RCRussell Crowe
And I'm still trying to recover, and I won't really recover till I get home the next time I... As I was saying to you before, is when I land at home now, I won't know when I'm flying out again. And that is such a relief, because when you do know when you're flying out again, every day is just counting down, counting down to... You might have three weeks, but it doesn't feel like three weeks.
- BSBrian Simpson
Hmm.
- RCRussell Crowe
Because you 100% know when you're leaving again. But this time I'll get home, and I'll have three months, and I'll be in the bush, and I'll be waking up with the birds and, you know, uh, hopefully (laughs) all of those things that I emptied out through the, the earlier part of the year will, will fill up again. 'Cause I was on that set, and that was the, um, the set for the remake of Highlander with Henry Cavill. So I'm playing Ramirez, which was the Sean Connery character.
- BSBrian Simpson
Oh, wow.
- RCRussell Crowe
So I'm excited by it. I'm really looking forward to it. But there I was turning up to the gym to do my katana sword and, you know, going to these meetings and everything, but I was empty. I was absolutely empty, and it was just to the point where I'd... You know, I'd texted my agent and I'd said, "You know what? I maybe need to talk to these guys 'cause I'm not sure if I..." I've... I don't have any juice here. Uh, I don't know what I'm gonna be bringing, you know? And I'm sitting in these meetings and everybody's talking, but it's all just bouncing off my face, you know? I'm not really taking anything in. And that same night, I get a phone call around 10:30. And it's so unusual 'cause m- I have everything turned off on my phone, it never rings. But for whatever reason, it did ring and it was the director saying, "Look, I'm so sorry to tell you that Henry's, uh, injured himself. He's, he's, uh, ruptured his Achilles, so we're gonna have to push the film." Now, I love Henry. I've known him for a long time. I've known him since he was a schoolboy.
- BSBrian Simpson
Oh, wow.
- RCRussell Crowe
And, uh, um, uh, like, I met him at a place called Stowe School in England. I was doing a scene in a movie called Proof of Life, talking to my son in the movie, and in the background a, a rugby game's going on. And, you know, we're doing the scene and everything, but I've got my eye on the field and this one guy on the field who is just displaying he's got a great brain for the game. And as it happens, we finish the scene and they break up the, the, the... What's going on behind us, and that one kid is walking towards me, and he's the kid that I've been watching, and he wants to have a, a chat. He introduces himself and, you know, uh, he just asks me, "How do you get into acting?" And so we had this very, very brief conversation, then we got swamped by these other kids. Couple of days later, I was doing a present for the kid from that school who'd played my son. It was a boy called, uh, Merlin Hanbury-Tenison, his name was. And so I was doing a thing for him, and then I had some other things left over and I was like, "Oh, what was, what was that other kid's name? Oh, Henry." So I wrote on a photo of Gladiator, of Maximus, which was a movie that had not actually been released yet, "To Henry, the journey of 1000 miles begins with a single step. Russell."
- BSBrian Simpson
Wow.
- RCRussell Crowe
He kept that photograph with him for wherever he lived or place to place, and he kept his dream alive and burning. The next time I see Henry Cavill is in a gym in Illinois, the outskirts of Chicago, and I'm working one side of the gym, he's working on the other, and I'm thinking to myself, "Well, I'm Superman's dad. I reckon that must be Superman over there." (laughs)
- BSBrian Simpson
(laughs) .
- RCRussell Crowe
Kinda looks like it, you know? So we worked in the gym a week or s- more together before we talk, you know? And finally one day he comes over, puts his hand out, and we start talking, and I just... At one point I went, "Do I know you?" And he goes, "Yes, sir. You do." And he remind... And I went, "Henry? That Henry? Is this Henry?" It was crazy. So...
- BSBrian Simpson
That's wild (laughs) .
- RCRussell Crowe
Absolutely wild, right? And so now we have this-
- BSBrian Simpson
That's so crazy.
- RCRussell Crowe
... other situation where, you know, he's kind of in the position of, of being the Highlander and they asked him who he wanted to be Ramirez and he said, "I've only got one option and you gotta get him." And so, uh, you know, that's fantastic. It'll be a lot of fun when we do eventually get around to making it.
- BSBrian Simpson
How cool must that be for him to have been a kid and met you and got you to sign that and then working with you when he's Superman?
- RCRussell Crowe
Superman.
- BSBrian Simpson
(laughs) .
- RCRussell Crowe
(laughs) . Yeah, it was, uh-
- BSBrian Simpson
Oh my God, that's amazing.
- RCRussell Crowe
Yeah.
- BSBrian Simpson
What a great story.
- RCRussell Crowe
And so now we've got... You know, we've got the, the third stage of our, uh, our connection and, um, w- when we get to do it, it's, it's gonna be great. But, and I know this sounds really weird because I love Henry and I... The last thing I want is for him to be in a... Under any pressure or injured or whatever, but it was an... A prayer answered (laughs) .
- BSBrian Simpson
(laughs) .
- RCRussell Crowe
And I'm talking to the director expressing that I'm so... That it's terrible, but I'm also shaking my girlfriend going, "We get to go home." (laughs) .
- BSBrian Simpson
(laughs) .
- 56:22 – 2:11:11
The restorative ‘panacea’: Crowe’s bush property, identity relief, and rebuilding nature
- RCRussell Crowe
And I need to go home, and I need to be in that rhythm, because, you know, I call the place I have in the bush, w- you know, it's, it's not its official name, but I call it the panacea. It will fix all ills, but you have to give over to its rhythm. You have to wake before the birds. You have to sort of put yourself in a situation where you're going deep into the bush, so you're getting that kind of oxygen. You know, you just have to really give yourself over to it, you know, and, and spend your days just, you know, checking if the cows are okay, having a look, you know, if the new, uh, trough system is working or what. Just getting your sort of hands a little bit dirty and forgetting all the other stuff.
- JRJoe Rogan
Yeah.
- RCRussell Crowe
You know? And, um, you know, I, I... But will hopefully see me come charging back out next year.
- JRJoe Rogan
You'll be charging, but that sounds like a perfect balance to offset the charging, you know?
- RCRussell Crowe
Yeah, well that's, that's-
- JRJoe Rogan
The recharge.
- RCRussell Crowe
I al- I always, like, I look back at my 30-year-old self who made the decision to take the little bit of money that I'd earned at that point, 31, 32 I was, and buy 100 acres in the bush, because somehow I knew I would need that place. So it's like, you know, I could've bought a, you know, an apartment in, in the city. I, you know, but I didn't. I bought 100 acres of basically blank bush. No fences, no... And it, the, the fact that it's been in my life s- listen. January 20th, 1996, I paid for that first 100 acres.
- JRJoe Rogan
Wow.
- RCRussell Crowe
So that's, that's before LA Confidential. It was before I even shoot LA Confidential.
- JRJoe Rogan
Wow.
- RCRussell Crowe
So it was... I don't, I don't know where it came from, but I look at that 32-year-old and go, "Mate, well done."
- JRJoe Rogan
(laughs)
- RCRussell Crowe
(laughs)
- JRJoe Rogan
You gave yourself a battery. You gave yourself a place to recharge.
- RCRussell Crowe
No, I gave, I, I gave myself an island.
- JRJoe Rogan
Yeah.
- RCRussell Crowe
You know, I go through that gate, and because you know what it's like. People don't just call you Joe. They call you Joe Rogan. They call me Russell Crowe, Russell Crowe, Russell Crowe, you know? So this, this brand name, this sort of stamp, and that's all you hear, you know? Russell Crowe, Russell Crowe. And then I go beyond that gate, and I'm no longer that. I'm a son, I'm a brother, I'm an uncle, I'm a dad, you know, a- all of those things, you know? I'm, I'm, I'm the boss of the operation and the farms and stuff and, and all that as well. But all of those things come into play, and the whole brand thing drops away, and you gotta prove yourself on a way different level (laughs) when you're at home.
- JRJoe Rogan
You gotta exist in a natural world-
- RCRussell Crowe
Yeah.
- JRJoe Rogan
... as opposed to in a world where you're the center of attention constantly, people are at your beck and call, people are, "Mr. Crowe, Mr. Crowe." Yeah, that's not good for you. But it's also the amount of attention that you, uh, time you have to spend when you're on that many sets in a row, five movies in a row. Like, I thought a lot of people were probably like, "Oh, boo-hoo. You had to be in five movies."
- RCRussell Crowe
(laughs)
- JRJoe Rogan
"Boo-hoo." (laughs)
- RCRussell Crowe
Yeah, but that's, and that's the brilliant thing. That, that, the, the-
- JRJoe Rogan
"Poor, famous Russell Crowe." (laughs)
- RCRussell Crowe
The big gap between people who are not in the business' understanding of what it really takes-
- JRJoe Rogan
Right.
- RCRussell Crowe
... and, you know, the realities that, that you deal with. And look, you know, I'm the last person... I'm not whinging about the job at all, but I am just pointing out that I went a little bit too hard, and I've burnt my brain (laughs) and I need a bit of a break, you know?
- JRJoe Rogan
Well, if Nuremberg is an indication or if it's an example of what you did, the, the, if it's on par with the rest of them, it's gonna be an awesome run because Nuremberg is great. It really is. It's, it's very disturbing, and it's a, it's a... Just to see the, that footage, the, the footage in the trial was just... People should see that, you know?
- RCRussell Crowe
Yeah.
- JRJoe Rogan
And the fact that it's never been released before, you know? That, just to cement into our heads. You know, that's the thing. It's like, that war was one of the first wars where we got regular footage.
Episode duration: 2:58:15
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Transcript of episode P4G2KGEkSyI
