Joe Rogan Experience #2440 - Matt Damon & Ben Affleck

Joe Rogan 0:00 [upbeat music]

Joe Rogan 0:02 Joe Rogan Podcast, check it out!

Speaker 0:04 The Joe Rogan Experience.

Joe Rogan 0:06 Train by day, Joe Rogan Podcast by night, all day. [upbeat music]

0:12 That's wild.

Matt Damon 0:13 And I went in 'cause I came in from Miami, I think I was living at the time. And I went in, and, uh... And, uh, I'm sitting in the waiting room, and it was, like, on a Sunday because it was... I was like: "I'm only in town for a..." And, and Stan was like: "I'll come into the office." I'm like, "Thank you so much." I had to have some, a filling or something, whatever I needed.

Joe Rogan 0:29 [chuckles]

Matt Damon 0:29 It's kind of an emergency. So I'm sitting in the thing, and, uh, [click] and I'm not getting called in, but the, the, the lady's just... Uh, no, no, there's not even a receptionist. And Stan comes out with his mask on. No, the first thing I hear is, "Pig fucker! Fucking piece of cocksucker," [laughing] "fucking pig fucker."

Joe Rogan 0:46 [laughing]

Matt Damon 0:46 And I'm like, "What is happening in there?" It's in the other room. And Stan comes in with his mask on. He goes, "Sorry." He goes: "I'll be with you soon." He goes, "I got Hunter in the chair." [laughing]

Joe Rogan 0:53 [laughing]

Matt Damon 0:54 And he goes back, [whooshes] and I hear... Listen to, to Hunter Thompson swear for, like, 15 minutes. I'm like, "This is amazing." And then Stan goes, "Okay, come on back." And Hunter's kind of getting out, and he goes, "Oh, you're sitting down with this guy? He's a fucking assassin." [laughing]

Joe Rogan 1:09 [laughing]

Matt Damon 1:09 So I... And then he goes, and he's got this jug of clear, uh, of clear fluid, and he's like: "You're gonna need a sip of this." And I'm like, "Oh, my God, this is fucking Hunter S. Thompson's moonshine." [laughing] I'm like, "This is-

Joe Rogan 1:23 [laughing] Fucking ethyl alcohol, like-

Matt Damon 1:23 ... I'm like, "This is fucking amazing!"

Joe Rogan 1:25 2,000 proof.

Matt Damon 1:25 I'm like, I'm, I'm talking to this dude for 30 seconds, and I'm getting a sip.

Joe Rogan 1:28 [laughing]

Matt Damon 1:28 And, like, and it was, like, 10 in the morning on a Sunday.

Joe Rogan 1:31 Was it?

Matt Damon 1:31 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:32 Oh, it's-

Matt Damon 1:32 He was halfway through the jug.

Joe Rogan 1:34 It was just pure, pure-

Matt Damon 1:34 Like, fucking, like-

Joe Rogan 1:35 ... catch fire from it.

Matt Damon 1:35 Yeah, it was-

Joe Rogan 1:36 Where was this?

Matt Damon 1:37 In Beverly Hills.

Joe Rogan 1:38 [laughing]

Matt Damon 1:38 Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, Brentwood. Yeah, Brentwood-

Joe Rogan 1:41 That's wild

Matt Damon 1:41 ... was Stan's office, yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:42 Oh, my God, that's amazing.

Matt Damon 1:43 Yeah, it was, it really was ama- it was, it was... And I... So I had probably a total of seven minutes, you know, with him, and it was like I, I, I, it could, it could not have been a better seven minutes. [chuckles]

Joe Rogan 1:52 That's incredible. I went to the Woody Creek Tavern just to go there 'cause I know he used to go there.

Matt Damon 1:57 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:58 And, like, you could, like, feel him in the building. You know, there's all the pictures on the walls-

Matt Damon 2:02 Yeah, yeah, yeah

Joe Rogan 2:02 ... this cool little place.

Matt Damon 2:03 Yeah.

Speaker 2:03 That, I mean, those books, fucking Hell's Angels and, and, you know, Fear and Loathing, is some of the best writing. I, I just fucking... Like, he really had his own voice. Rum Diary, spectacular, you know. It was, like, really descriptive and punchy and fucking interesting and fucked up, and [chuckles] he also just lived that life. It was like-

Joe Rogan 2:19 Fear and Loathing changed my life. Like, reading that book was like, "What the fuck?"

Speaker 2:24 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 2:24 Like, "What is this guy doing?" [laughing]

Matt Damon 2:26 [laughing]

Joe Rogan 2:26 There's grown men out there-

Matt Damon 2:28 [laughing]

Joe Rogan 2:28 ... balding, grown men with spectacles running around with a-

Speaker 2:31 Yeah, fucking think there's lizards in the fucking lounge. [laughing]

Matt Damon 2:34 [laughing]

Speaker 2:34 Like, the guys are hallucinating and- [laughing]

Joe Rogan 2:36 He's got, he's got a day trip bag filled with acid. Like, what the fuck are you doing, man?

Speaker 2:41 Ah, that was... And it's great shit. It's like you fucking feel like you're on the adventure with him, you know? It's like-

Joe Rogan 2:46 Yeah. No, it's a... It's, it's interesting to watch the, the evolution of his writing, too. You know, like, I, I read Hell's Angels, and it's, like, very different, you know, but it's-

Speaker 2:55 Yeah, it's early. He's kind of restrained-

Joe Rogan 2:57 Mm

Speaker 2:57 ... and he was quite like... For that, I think it was edgy sort of for the time.

Joe Rogan 3:00 Yeah.

Speaker 3:01 You know, like, "Oh, you're gonna get beat and chain-whipped and stomped by the Angels," and that was really edgy. And by the time they got to, what, Fear and Loathing, '72 or something like that, he, you know, he was just-

Matt Damon 3:10 Yes, it was-

Joe Rogan 3:10 Yeah, he was gone

Matt Damon 3:11 ... out there.

Joe Rogan 3:11 And he was-

Matt Damon 3:11 He found his voice.

Speaker 3:12 [chuckles] He did find his voice.

Joe Rogan 3:13 He was supposed to be covering a race for-

Speaker 3:16 Yeah, yeah

Joe Rogan 3:16 ... like, Sports Illustrated. [laughing]

Matt Damon 3:18 [laughing]

Joe Rogan 3:18 That's a Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas-type problem.

Speaker 3:21 I wrote a book about how I fucking lost my mind. [laughing]

Matt Damon 3:24 [laughing]

Joe Rogan 3:24 [laughing]

Speaker 3:24 Great. It's great, Hunter. We'll take it.

Joe Rogan 3:26 Oh, well, hey, it's very nice to meet you guys. I've met you before-

Speaker 3:29 Yeah

Joe Rogan 3:29 ... but very nice to meet you.

Speaker 3:30 Pleasure, man. Thank you very much. Uh-

Joe Rogan 3:32 And I, I love the fucking movie.

Speaker 3:33 Thank you.

Joe Rogan 3:33 The Rip is great.

Matt Damon 3:34 Thank you. Thanks.

Speaker 3:34 Thank you.

Joe Rogan 3:34 It's really good. It's so original, and it's so, it's so different, and it's... You know, it's like I love those kind of movies, but it's not like any one that I've ever seen before. Really solid movie.

Speaker 3:45 Thanks, dude.

Matt Damon 3:46 Thank you.

Joe Rogan 3:46 It was awesome.

Matt Damon 3:47 So much better than you hating it and us having to [laughing] talk about it.

Joe Rogan 3:50 [laughing]

Speaker 3:50 The interviews where they're like, "So I saw the movie. Anyway, how you guys been?"

Matt Damon 3:53 No. We've had, we've had a lot of those, the junk- uh, the press junkets where they come in, and the first thing that you know the movie [chuckles] sucks if, if they don't ask you anything about the movie. They come in, they go, "So how you been?"

Speaker 4:01 Yeah. [chuckles]

Joe Rogan 4:02 Ah.

Matt Damon 4:02 You know, and you're like, "Oh, shit, this is gonna be bad."

Joe Rogan 4:04 Is it weird... Like, the, the transformation of the film industry seems like a lot of it is moving towards these big streaming movies now.

Speaker 4:14 Absolutely. I mean, look, it's because where most people have gone to watch them.

Joe Rogan 4:18 Yeah.

Speaker 4:18 Right? Like, used to be the only place you'd go see movies, in the '40s, like, every American went to the movie every week, basically. But it was 'cause it was that or watch the cows walk by, you know? That was the only... And then TV comes around, and it's little, and you're seeing these little serials. But, you know, what happened was, now this is why it's totally changed the whole thing because you have 300 million people, 330, whatever it is, watching, you know, Netflix, and it's a lot harder to get people to go into the movies. There's also YouTube. There's also TikTok. There's also... My kids, like, it's hard to get them excited about a movie.

Joe Rogan 4:50 Yeah.

Speaker 4:50 Which that's what we had. I mean, anything that came out-

Matt Damon 4:52 Yeah, that was our... So I mean, our teen years were just every weekend, we're at the movies.

Joe Rogan 4:57 Yeah.

Matt Damon 4:57 Um, there's just no question about it. You were gonna go and usually not get into one 'cause there were too many people, and then you just see what else is playing and go to that.

Joe Rogan 5:04 Well, it seems like it was kind of slipping away because so many people were watching streaming already, and then COVID came around, and everyone was locked down, and no one was going to the movie theater.

Speaker 5:12 Yeah, exactly.

Joe Rogan 5:12 And then it just set in.

Speaker 5:14 I had this, like, drama that was coming out, [chuckles] like, right when COVID hit. I really liked the movie, performance movie. It's about an alcoholic guy whose kid, or kid... guy's kid dies and becomes an alcoholic. It's a dark movie, but I, I loved it, and I could tell, like, "We're fucked. No one's gonna go to see it, to theaters to see this movie." And it wasn't even that streaming, streaming really blew up, you know, of course, during COVID. So, you know, look, they rushed it onto streaming. People actually saw it. I was like, "Well, all things being equal, I'd like people to see it," you know? And it's not like-... my dad had an 11-inch black and white TV, and that's what was TV viewing. Now, it's like $200,

Speaker 5:44 you get a fucking 65-inch flat screen, like, and good sound. So of course, people are willing to- And then streamers also started making great shows. You have Adolescence, I don't know if you saw that. I think that's one of the best things ever done.

Matt Damon 5:56 Yeah, it's amazing.

Joe Rogan 5:57 I haven't seen Adolescence.

Matt Damon 5:57 It's unbelievable.

Joe Rogan 5:58 What is it?

Matt Damon 5:59 Oh, my God!

Speaker 6:00 It's a fucking-

Matt Damon 6:00 It's a, it's a, it's... I, I don't wanna spoil too much of it.

Speaker 6:03 Yeah.

Matt Damon 6:03 It's only four episodes. Uh-

Speaker 6:04 They're all one shot.

Matt Damon 6:05 They're all one shot. Each episode is one entire shot.

Speaker 6:08 Whoa!

Matt Damon 6:08 So the cast, they took a, I think, a... I talked to the director about it, the cast took, I think, a, a week to rehearse each one-

Speaker 6:14 Yeah, they did like-

Matt Damon 6:15 ... and then a week to shoot it.

Speaker 6:16 Yeah.

Matt Damon 6:16 And so, so they'd, they'd do it twice a day. It's the full hour, they would choreograph the entire thing.

Speaker 6:22 It's a feat unto itself.

Matt Damon 6:22 Yeah, it's really-

Speaker 6:23 And then the acting is great.

Matt Damon 6:24 But, but that's the, uh... I mean, just dismiss that, even, you could even call it a gimmick. It's not, in this case, but, um, the performances, and the writing, and what it's about, it, it's, it's as good as anything-

Speaker 6:37 Yeah

Matt Damon 6:37 ... you'll see. It's, it's phenomenal.

Speaker 6:38 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 6:39 What is it on?

Matt Damon 6:39 Netflix.

Speaker 6:40 Netflix, yeah.

Joe Rogan 6:41 Oh, okay.

Speaker 6:41 You know, you have like... It's not, this is not even an anomaly. There's Baby Reinders, there's fucking Succession, there's Game of Thrones-

Matt Damon 6:47 Ozark.

Speaker 6:47 Ozark.

Matt Damon 6:47 Yeah.

Speaker 6:48 You know, it's just like, okay, well, they're doing great shit out there. It's not like, the sort of implied thing before was like: "Yeah, well, TV's not as good."

Joe Rogan 6:57 Right.

Speaker 6:57 "Not as interesting. It's a serious kind of..."

Matt Damon 6:58 When we started, it was a, there was a different... I, I mean, like-

Speaker 7:00 There was a thing, yeah

Matt Damon 7:00 ... like George Clooney, for instance, like there was a big thing, you know. He very famously, you know, became this superstar on ER. That show, pe- 40 million people a week were watching that show. It was the biggest thing, right? 'Cause there were only a few channels to tune into, and that show was the biggest one. And, and George never renegotiated his contract. He wanted to work in movies, and it was like, "You can't go from TV to movies." It's very hard.

Speaker 7:22 Now, you're a TV actor, you gotta-

Matt Damon 7:22 Very few people can do it.

Speaker 7:23 Yeah.

Matt Damon 7:24 And he really strategically, and kind of patiently, like... He joked that e- on the last episode he was on, Anthony Edwards, you know, his co-star, was making a million bucks for the episode, and he was making, you know, 20 grand [chuckles] or whatever his deal was. Like, he could have renegotiated, but he would have had to give more years.

Speaker 7:41 The point was, that's how bad he wanted to get off TV-

Matt Damon 7:43 Right

Speaker 7:44 ... and do movies.

Matt Damon 7:44 Yeah. That's how bad he wanted to get off the biggest TV show in the world-

Speaker 7:48 Yeah

Matt Damon 7:48 ... um, because the, there was such a big kind of level change between features and, and TV.

Joe Rogan 7:53 Well, it was a giant difference in quality. It was also this, the breaking it up for commercials.

Matt Damon 7:57 Right.

Joe Rogan 7:58 It was just a different experience.

Speaker 7:58 Yeah, it couldn't be, you know, you, there was all those rules.

Joe Rogan 8:00 Yeah.

Speaker 8:00 So like, you can't say this, you can't do that, you can't swear, not all, uh, you can't have violence and nudity [chuckles] ., all the things people wanna see in movies, you know? And then... And also, it wasn't, it wasn't as interesting, and then, now, that's, like, tethered to these schedules and all this stuff. Whereas you get this shit, uh, like, you don't have a schedule, and, and you can take a bunch of risks. So, and that started happening, and then it was kinda like: Well, this all is just as good, if not better, than what's in the movies, and so the movies went away.

Matt Damon 8:24 Well, then movies started to move towards more IP, and they, and they, and-

Speaker 8:27 Right. Because it was hard to get people to come to the movies, everyone got scared and thought, "Well, you have to, it has to be a sequel or a superhero movie-

Matt Damon 8:32 And, and so, and, and-

Speaker 8:33 ... to justify being in a theater"

Matt Damon 8:33 ... an interesting little movie, kind of in the '90s, when we kind of came onto the scene, you know, there were a lot of really good independent movies that were being made. There was, there was, uh, you know, it was a really great time to be making movie- People were, th- they were making daring movies. And, and, and then everyone just got f- way more conservative because it's huge. Like, the, the business is so different, theatrically and streaming, because to put out a movie theatrically, you have to put so much more money behind it to publicize... Like, you're trying to get everybody-

Speaker 9:03 You're basically spending about what the budget was to make it, to advertise it.

Matt Damon 9:05 To... Because you gotta-

Speaker 9:06 And you get 80% of the theatrical release.

Matt Damon 9:07 Yeah, 'cause you split it with the, the, the movie house, right? Through the exhibitor.

Speaker 9:10 So a $25 million movie, to break even, you gotta make $100 million, and it's phew!

Matt Damon 9:13 And so, and, and you gotta get everybody to not only know about the movie, but to show up, like, that Friday night, like, that specific time, you know, for that specific movie, and so to j- and to cut through all the noise that your people are contending with and, you know, people's-

Speaker 9:26 Well, then it just becomes about risk, and nobody wants to take the risk, so they don't wanna make something new because it's such an investment, and we're gonna lose all our fucking money. And the streamers have stepped into that, and like, now, you know, you don't have to necessarily have a star. You could try something more interesting or didn't have to be a superhero movie, whatever it was. And also, I think it's like, you know, frankly, like, people my age, like, it's... First of all, it's expensive, right? You take your whole family, it's $100. You're on a streaming service, $20 a month, you can watch all you want. So you can't be cavalier about... Like, you're just gonna price it however the fuck you want and expect everyone to, like, be indifferent to that. And then, you know, also, y- you know, the idea of, like, for me, you know, there's a lot of stuff I make that decision. Like, do I wanna see The Odyssey on, on a big screen? Fucking def- I went to a theater to w- just watch the trailer for that movie. And, you know, did I... One Battle After Another, I wanted to go see in the theater. But there's movies with people that I really like and respect, where, yeah, and I got a good system and shit, but I'm like: "Look, I'll watch," and I might get tired, or I'm gonna pause it and take a piss, or the kids, you know, whatever it is.

Matt Damon 10:24 Yeah.

Speaker 10:25 That's conducive to my lifestyle, you know? And so-

Matt Damon 10:27 And most people's lifestyle

Speaker 10:28 ... I even see few.

Matt Damon 10:29 Yeah.

Speaker 10:29 I think most people are, yeah.

Matt Damon 10:30 But there is the experience of seeing it with a bunch of other people.

Speaker 10:33 100%.

Matt Damon 10:33 When you see an awesome movie with a bunch of other people, it's like a shared experience.

Speaker 10:36 100%.

Matt Damon 10:37 It's great.

Speaker 10:37 I, I, I always like an attention-

Matt Damon 10:38 And you have people's attention more

Speaker 10:39 ... way more attent- Like, like, when I went to see One Battle on IMAX, like, you know, that feeling, there's nothing like that feeling. I took, you know, two of my kids, and two of my nephews, and my wife, and we all went, and we, it was just... It was like... And you're in with, y- you know, a bunch of strangers, but people in your community, and you're having this experience together. I always say it's more like going to, going to church. Like, you show up at an appointed time, you v- you know what I mean?

Matt Damon 11:02 Yes.

Speaker 11:02 It doesn't wait for you. It st- you know, and-

Matt Damon 11:05 Yeah

Speaker 11:05 ... versus the, the, the experience of watching at home, I think, you know, you're watching in a room, the lights are on, other shit's going on, the kids are running around, the dogs are running around, whatever it is. You know what I mean?

Matt Damon 11:15 Yeah.

Speaker 11:15 It's just a very different level of attention that you're willing to, or that you're able to give to it, and that has a big effect. And it also ends up having an effect, or is starting to have an effect, on how you make movies. Like, for instance, Netflix, um, you know, standard way to make an action movie that we learned was, you know, you, you usually have, like, three set pieces, one in the first act, one in the second, and one in the third. And, you know, you kind, they kinda ramp up, and the big one with all the explosions, and you spend most [chuckles] of your money on that one in the third act. That's your kind of finale.

Matt Damon 11:46 ... um, and now they're, you know, they're like: "Can we get a big one in the first five minutes to get somebody... You know, we want people to stay-

Speaker 11:53 Yeah

Matt Damon 11:53 ... tuned in, and, and Ken, and, you know, it wouldn't be terrible if you reiterated the plot three or four times in the dialogue because people are on their phones while they're watching. [laughing]

Speaker 12:03 [laughing]

Matt Damon 12:03 You know what I mean?

Speaker 12:04 Oh, no!

Matt Damon 12:04 And so then it's gonna really start to infringe on how-

Joe Rogan 12:08 Creatively.

Matt Damon 12:08 -how we're telling the story.

Speaker 12:09 Yeah, but then you look at Our Lessons, it didn't do any of that shit.

Matt Damon 12:11 It didn't do any of that.

Speaker 12:12 And it was fucking great.

Matt Damon 12:13 Yeah.

Speaker 12:13 You know what I mean?

Matt Damon 12:13 Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 12:13 So I think it's, it's dark, well, two-

Matt Damon 12:16 Yeah

Speaker 12:16 ... it's tragic and intense. It's like a guy who's finds out, this kid's accused of murder, and it's like, you know, uh, and, and there's long shots in the back of their head. They get in the car, nobody says anything. I think there are those... Look, there, the, these ideas-

Matt Damon 12:30 I wish that where this feels more like the exception, though. It's so masterfully made that it feels a little more like the exception. I hope it's not, I mean-

Speaker 12:37 My feeling is just that it demonstrates that you don't need to do any of that shit-

Matt Damon 12:41 Right

Speaker 12:41 ... to get people, you know what I mean?

Matt Damon 12:42 Yeah.

Speaker 12:42 Like, and I think, you know, yes, you know, like, okay, The Town had the action scene [chuckles] in the beginning, the first five minutes, 'cause I-

Matt Damon 12:48 Yeah.

Speaker 12:48 You know what I mean? Like, it's a, it's a common trick that you would go like, [claps] "Let me grab them and get them invested in the..." It's like the movies that start with the hero hanging from the cliff, and-

Matt Damon 12:56 Right

Speaker 12:56 ... now we're gonna flash back to the beginning and tell you how they got there. Um, it's, it... You know, I always feel like, uh, you know, complaining about it makes me feel like one of these guys who's like, "When I was a boy..." [laughing]

Joe Rogan 13:06 [chuckles]

Speaker 13:06 Like, you always wanna freeze the culture at the time when you, I don't know, felt more like, "You know, we didn't used to have these phones."

Joe Rogan 13:12 [chuckles]

Speaker 13:12 "What the fuck are all these phones?" And everybody's looking at their ph- I get it. Yes, it's true. Also, it's like supply and demand. People wanna look at their phone-

Matt Damon 13:19 Yeah

Speaker 13:19 ... they can look at TikTok. They want... You know, they're gonna do that. I think what you can do is make shit the best you can, make it really good, and, you know, people can still go to the movies. It's not like... I think we have this idea that it's like an existential threat. Everything that comes along is gonna destroy everything.

Matt Damon 13:34 Yeah.

Speaker 13:34 Instead of like, what history suggests is that there's, like, marginal encroachments, things shift. Yep, as television came along, there was less theater-going. That's still gonna happen, and people are still gonna go to the movies because of what you said, like, it feels like a cool thing to do. "I'm gonna go see The Odyssey," I guarantee you, in a theater, you know, no matter what. Fewer of them, and you could argue that's because I have more choice or whatever it is. It's hard to fight supply and demand. That's the trick, right? If people wanna watch a bunch of stuff at home, 'cause they invested in TVs and cost us money, they will. So, okay. But the upside of that is, like, I can try to do something, hopefully, that's like, that actually doesn't need to f- you know, have the most urgency to get you to come to the theater with your family, that's a little more experimental or risk-taking or whatever in that way.

Joe Rogan 14:21 Well, you gotta adapt. I mean, there's no way you're gonna change people's viewing habits now.

Speaker 14:24 No.

Joe Rogan 14:25 I mean, h- what percentage of Netflix is actually watched on phones?

Speaker 14:28 Right.

Joe Rogan 14:28 It's gotta be pretty high-

Speaker 14:30 I don't know

Joe Rogan 14:30 ... which is insane.

Speaker 14:31 Yeah. Even watching on a laptop, for me-

Joe Rogan 14:33 Yeah

Speaker 14:33 ... is kinda like, kinda sucks, you know?

Joe Rogan 14:36 Yeah, it sucks. Yeah, I-

Matt Damon 14:36 'Cause it's just a joke that I like to make with every director I work with. Like, when they're really puzzling over a shot or really grinding out something, I go, "You know, it's not gonna look as good on the phone." [laughing]

Joe Rogan 14:46 [laughing]

Speaker 14:46 [laughing]

Matt Damon 14:47 Just, just everyone gets angry when you say that. [clapping]

Speaker 14:49 Takes the wind out of their fucking sails, you know?

Matt Damon 14:51 Yeah. [chuckles]

Speaker 14:51 "No, that's gonna look great this fucking big, but keep fucking around and lighting that." We'll all see, [chuckles] you know.

Joe Rogan 14:56 It is weird, though, the, the concern for the algorithm, like making sure that people watch. Like, "Look, we've got data that shows within the first five minutes, when this happens, they tune out." So let's like... My buddy, Tony Hinchcliffe-

Matt Damon 15:06 Yeah

Joe Rogan 15:06 ... you know, he's got Kill Tony.

Matt Damon 15:07 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 15:07 And now it's on Netflix, and so they're giving him notes now, and they-

Matt Damon 15:10 [chuckles]

Joe Rogan 15:10 ... and they can give him, like-

Matt Damon 15:12 Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Joe Rogan 15:12 But they're not telling him what to do, but they're saying, like: "This is when people are tuning out, and so let's... You know, just so you have that data, now decide how you wanna edit things." It's like, oh.

Matt Damon 15:21 Yeah, and which is-

Joe Rogan 15:22 Slippery slope

Matt Damon 15:22 ... it is because, because the... It's like the, the bar for, for walking out of a movie theater is a lot higher than from just changing the channel.

Joe Rogan 15:35 Right.

Matt Damon 15:35 Right? And oftentimes, you know, y- you, directors will wanna make a movie that is challenging and upsetting. And I remember, yeah, Terry Kinney, my, my friend, great actor, and he, he told me about the experience of seeing Taxi Driver in New York for the first time, right, in '76 or whenever it came out, and he said: "What I remember is not only the movie, but I remember standing at the back because I had got up, I got up out of my seat, and I went, but I couldn't bring myself to leave-

Joe Rogan 16:02 Hmm

Matt Damon 16:02 ... 'cause I was so invested, but I was so..." He goes, "I was standing at the back by the door, watching the movie," and he goes, [chuckles] "and there were two other people standing next to me, who were doing the same thing." Like they-

Joe Rogan 16:11 Just 'cause they were disturbed?

Matt Damon 16:12 Because the movie was disturbing them so much.

Joe Rogan 16:14 Wow!

Matt Damon 16:15 Which is not a bad thing, right?

Joe Rogan 16:17 Right.

Matt Damon 16:17 So had that been on N- on Netflix or Amazon, you know, if somebody goes, "Oh, I'm disturbed," and they turn, and they change the channel-

Joe Rogan 16:22 Yeah

Matt Damon 16:23 ... like, that doesn't mean you shouldn't make Taxi Driver.

Joe Rogan 16:25 Right, that's true. Like, the investment of going to a place is much greater.

Speaker 16:30 Yeah, and one of the values of that is that you could, you look at movies from the '70s and '80s, the first act was 25, 30 minutes.

Joe Rogan 16:35 Right.

Speaker 16:35 You know, The Verdict, for instance, a great movie, takes a long time to get it going.

Joe Rogan 16:39 Look at The Deer Hunter.

Speaker 16:40 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 16:40 Oh, yeah.

Matt Damon 16:40 Yeah, I mean, it's...

Speaker 16:41 And, and you're right, like what you're saying, the threshold-

Joe Rogan 16:43 [chuckles]

Speaker 16:43 ... for walkout is real, like, any scene like, "Ah, I wanna watch Naked and Alone," [chuckles] like whatever, you know, you flip the fucking... So you're, you are battling that, and, you know, it's-

Joe Rogan 16:53 I watched Le Mans the other night, Steve McQueen.

Matt Damon 16:55 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 16:55 And it... There's no one talks for, like, five minutes. There's no talking. It's just a bunch of stuff getting done.

Matt Damon 17:00 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 17:01 Just a bunch of people doing things, and it's like, wow, you could make a diff- you could let it air out back then.

Matt Damon 17:06 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 17:06 It was... They had a different respect for what it was, like, you were telling a story, and you're gonna let it air out.

Matt Damon 17:13 Well, they also knew where their audience was.

Joe Rogan 17:15 Yeah.

Matt Damon 17:15 They were in a theater, that they-

Joe Rogan 17:17 Mm-hmm.

Speaker 17:17 Part of it was they wanted to come there. I mean, this great story I like is the first time they, [clears throat] they debuted a movie, guys-

Matt Damon 17:22 Oh, yeah

Speaker 17:23 ... with a, with a projector in a room full of people, it was a, it was a movie of a train pulling into the station. So they put the reel up, and they did the demonstration, and they showed the people, and everybody missed it 'cause they were turned around, staring at the projector. [laughing]

Matt Damon 17:35 [laughing]

Joe Rogan 17:35 [laughing]

Speaker 17:36 They never fucking seen anything like that. You know, it's just like the technology's upstaging. But like, the, the, you come for an event, come for a thing. We're all gonna be here. That's party.

Joe Rogan 17:44 Yeah.

Speaker 17:45 It's, um...... I don't know. There's competing arguments, so you can think, well, what do you get to do? And some people just go ahead and fuck it, like Jim Cameron's Avatar, "I'm gonna make my three-hour movie, and people are gonna come," and great! You know what I mean? And people say, "Oh, well, you can't have a three-hour movie." And he's like, "Well, I'm Jim Cameron, and I've actually got the number one and two and, [chuckles] you know, movies. I, I think I got this."

Joe Rogan 18:04 Yeah.

Speaker 18:04 He goes ahead and does it, you know? There's- history's full of people who got told a bunch of conventional wisdom and were like, "Yeah, but, uh, we're gonna do something different," and, and it... As it turns out, like, that's actually what people want, too, is not for you to just repeat the other shit that's been done before-

Joe Rogan 18:18 Yeah

Speaker 18:18 ... and that worked before.

Joe Rogan 18:19 This episode is brought to you by Visible. Have you heard of Visible? It's the one line wireless with unlimited data and hotspot for $25 a month, taxes and fees included, all on Verizon's 5G network. It's the ultimate wireless hack to save money and still get great coverage and a reliable connection. Got a resolution to save? Kick 2026 off right. Now, for a limited time, new members can get the Visible plan for just $19 a month

Joe Rogan 18:49 for the first 26 months. Ring in the new year with code SWITCH26. Share the savings with a deal that's too good to keep quiet. Switch now at visible.com. Terms apply. Limited time offer, subject to change. See visible.com for plan features and network management details. One of the things I read that I thought was really fucking cool is you guys set it up so that if this film performs well, the entire crew gets bonuses.

Speaker 19:20 Yeah.

Matt Damon 19:20 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 19:20 That's awesome.

Matt Damon 19:22 Yeah, the- w-

Joe Rogan 19:23 I mean-

Matt Damon 19:23 Hopefully, it's successful. [laughing]

Speaker 19:25 It's gotta be successful. [laughing]

Joe Rogan 19:25 I think it's gonna get a shit house if it doesn't- if it doesn't pop-

Matt Damon 19:27 It's a fucking great movie, man. It's a fun movie.

Speaker 19:29 But it's, it's, it's good, but it's not like, you know, fucking we're saints or philanthropists. Like, it's completely self-serving, in my opinion. Because in order to do the job well, everybody who's working on it has to be really invested and give a shit about the result, not their paycheck only. And, and sometimes you work with a crew that just happened to be great anyway, even though they don't really have to care about it, and they do. And what we saw was, like, that makes your movie better, and then there's just the thing of, like, the business is changing. You see these strikes and work stoppages, all these fucking questions. In order for this, I think, to, to survive and to be, you know, a good middle-class fucking ar-artist, you know, artisanal craftsman job, we've got 1,200 people that, you know, need to have reliable jobs, and part of the negotiations is always like, "Yeah, yeah, yeah, but we're all gonna get fucked." Like, we have no participation. Like, you used to working on movies, and it happens to a- actors, too, where you go, "Oh, we all invested. It was really hard, and we fucking put in the extra effort." Somebody else walked away with all the success.

Joe Rogan 20:29 Mm.

Speaker 20:30 And you, uh... You know, my theory is, was with Matt, was we were like, "How about where let's say, okay, it's just fairness, right? If this thing actually blows up and does really well, y- you should benefit from that." People have been, you know, kind of given sort of promises of, of participation back and haven't come true. So this is like the cr- everyone got their rates, everyone got their hourly, no one cut anything. This is just an exercise in actually proving that it's not bullshit, that if there's success, you'll get some extra. A little success, a little extra. A little more, a little more. I like that.

Matt Damon 20:59 But also, like you said, 'cause it's fair, you know?

Speaker 21:01 It's fair.

Matt Damon 21:01 And, and, and in success, the people who made the movie should, you know, should participate in that. And, and also f- with this one, which was important to us, there's a... You know, they, they delineate above the line and below the line, right? Like above the line being, like, us-

Speaker 21:15 Basically, like-

Matt Damon 21:15 ... the director and the cast

Speaker 21:16 - the producers and the...

Joe Rogan 21:17 Mm-hmm.

Matt Damon 21:18 Um, and below the line being kind of the more blue-collar side of our industry, and, and-

Speaker 21:23 Like painters, grips, camera people-

Matt Damon 21:24 Yeah

Speaker 21:25 ... everybody else, the drivers on.

Matt Damon 21:26 And so we just wanted, we w- we... And believed, like, when we started this company, we were like, "Look, you know, we know who makes our movie better," right? It's not, it's, it's, like, they've... This has kind of been mispriced the whole time. Like, the economics [chuckles] have been wrong. Like, when there's a, when there's a big success, everybody who had a hand on it should-

Speaker 21:44 Yeah, because you see a great director that people rely on or an actor that's considered bankable, they're all going, "Okay, I need all my people with me."

Matt Damon 21:49 Yeah, every great-

Speaker 21:50 Because they're... Yeah

Matt Damon 21:50 ... director I've worked with, and I've worked with a lot of them, they have their regular crew members-

Joe Rogan 21:55 Right

Matt Damon 21:55 ... that they, that I'd ride or die with these people.

Joe Rogan 21:57 Right.

Matt Damon 21:57 Because I mean, and you said it to me when we were starting the company, you were like, "You know those department heads, you know, who are each handling like, you know, cinemat- you know, your camera department, you know, your grip department, your electric, like all... " These, this, those people are ultimately the people who make the movie good. Like, they make a demonstrable difference in how good your movie is.

Joe Rogan 22:17 And imagine once you get a good flow with a great crew-

Matt Damon 22:20 Exactly

Joe Rogan 22:20 ... like, you got the band.

Matt Damon 22:21 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 22:22 Like, there's no need to bring in new band members. Let's, let's do this again.

Speaker 22:24 Yeah.

Matt Damon 22:25 Yeah.

Speaker 22:25 And because they, and then, like, you have the situation where they all are c- filmmakers, too. Everybody knows what we're trying to do. So like, then what makes it... You know, you're trying to get something special, something interesting, something fucking magical in some moment. You have to like... If people are tight or if they're out of shape or... You know, it fucks up the environment. People aren't relaxed. Actors can't do their best work, and that does make a difference between something that's good, average, great, whatever. And I think that if you say, like, you know... It, it, it makes cognitive sense to people, but if you look around, like, what's an example? Colin Anderson, camera operator, right?

Matt Damon 22:58 Yeah, unbelievable.

Speaker 22:58 Not the cinematographer, but I would tell you, he's the, I think, he's the greatest camera operator there is in Hollywood. And if you want evidence of that, he shot Marty Supreme. [chuckles] He was the camera operator on One Battle After Another. You know, he's... You look at his resume, and you're like, "Oh, that's interesting. These are all fucking great movies." Now, is he personally responsible for all of it? No, because it's a collaborative medium. There is no... Like, you can be a painter and paint by yourself. You can be a novelist and do that, sing, write music. You can't do this job alone. Like, there are a lot of people that go into it. You know, even when I realize, like, Matt was the lead in the last movie I did, Air, that I directed in. Having somebody so fucking good in your movie, who also shows up, does his job, is friendly, isn't fucking around or playing games or being weird, like, that sets this tone. Everybody else kind of goes, "Okay, what's Damon like?"... oh, I see, this is, we're taking this seriously, but nobody's gonna be a dick. We're all gonna do our job. We're not gonna take ourselves too seriously, but we're gonna take the job really seriously. And [snaps fingers] immediately, everybody kinda snaps into that. That trickle-down effect goes across the whole thing, and the, I think the, the best thing that I know how to do as a director is just create an environment where people feel like they show up, people like me, they're rooting for me. I can fucking embarrass myself [chuckles] and be bad, and it's not gonna be in the movie, and no one's gonna make me feel self-conscious, and-

Matt Damon 24:16 I'm listened to, my ideas are listened to.

Speaker 24:17 Yeah, and if I have something to offer-

Matt Damon 24:19 Yeah, yeah

Speaker 24:19 ... they're gonna go, "Oh, that's a good idea!" You know what I mean? And that, that's kind of the trick to, i-i-in my view, and then you're depending on the gifts of all these people, every single one of them, you know? Guys was, you know, some woman's assistant, uh, prop master is coming up with, like, the stuff that, you know, Phil Knight found, you know, his waffle from the shoe. They found it on eBay. Like, that's an extra mile, you know what I mean?

Matt Damon 24:40 Yeah.

Speaker 24:40 And if you make people feel like it matters, and you give a shit, and that they're contributing, and, "Oh, cool, let's do a close-up of that. That's really fucking cool," they'll die for you. They'll go all the way, and it changes the whole dynamic.

Matt Damon 24:51 And, and if you bonus them [laughs] -

Speaker 24:53 [laughs] Yeah, it doesn't hurt either. Yeah

Matt Damon 24:54 ... you know, it's not just all, you know, it's, it's, it's-

Speaker 24:56 It's not just rah, rah, rah

Matt Damon 24:57 ... there's, there's an actual, like, codified bonus structure to say, like, w-we, uh, yeah-

Speaker 25:03 Just a way of recognizing that shit, right?

Matt Damon 25:04 Yeah.

Speaker 25:04 It's, like, in your paycheck, too. It's not just bullshit.

Matt Damon 25:05 That's very real, yeah.

Joe Rogan 25:06 And you guys developed this? Is this... So is this something that you had... Like, kudos to you guys for addressing this, first of all, and recognizing it, and having that attitude, 'cause it's so important, and it's so easy for big movie stars to just think about themselves and their own career.

Matt Damon 25:19 Well, we're communists, Joe. [laughing]

Speaker 25:20 [laughing]

Joe Rogan 25:20 [laughing]

Matt Damon 25:20 We're from Cambridge. [laughing]

Speaker 25:24 Keep the car running! [laughing]

Matt Damon 25:26 Yeah. No, no, but, uh, but, but each, each deal ha-has had this kind of... Each deal that we've done so far has been different, 'cause we've made deals with, you know, different studios and platforms and stuff like that, and-

Speaker 25:37 And it just involved us basically retroactively going, "Hey, we came in under, we did a great job. There's extra money. Here you go."

Joe Rogan 25:44 Mm-hmm.

Speaker 25:45 This is the first time that we're able to, to actually create, like, a schedule, where it's like... Because, and by the way, we wouldn't have been able to do that without Netflix going, "Okay, cool. You think you can make this work? 'Cause this, we'll, we'll give you a shot." Otherwise, we wouldn't have been able to do it. So we had to say, "Look, we're not asking you to take a cut, but, you know, if y-if we, we can... And we can tell you, if the movie is watched as many hours in the first 90 days as, like, this movie A, that you all know what it is, then that's, you know, 20% of your salary," let's say, right? I mean, you just take a hit. So it's like, yeah, you make more money, your bonus is more. It's all just pegged to where you're at, just because that was the most fair idea we could come up with.

Matt Damon 26:20 So they gave us, like, five different levels, right? Like, the first couple we, hopefully we can hit, and maybe the third, maybe we get... And then it got to, like, the fifth level-

Speaker 26:28 It's kinda like single, double, triple, home run [chuckles]

Matt Damon 26:29 ... home run, fucking grand slam.

Speaker 26:31 Yeah.

Matt Damon 26:31 The fifth one was, was 110% of all Netflix viewers or something like that.

Speaker 26:35 [laughing]

Matt Damon 26:35 So it's everybody who has a Netflix account watches it, and then, like, 10% of them watch it again. [chuckles] And we were like, "We, we-"

Speaker 26:41 No, it's like K-pop Demon. This is the biggest K-pop demon movie.

Matt Damon 26:42 No, but, but that's what happened. We were laughing, and then K-Pop: Demon Hunters came along and actually did that. That's the first movie that's ever-

Speaker 26:48 Jesus!

Matt Damon 26:49 Yeah, it-

Joe Rogan 26:49 Well, I think a lot of autistic kids watched that over, and over, and over, and over and over again. [laughing]

Matt Damon 26:52 I haven't seen... I'm, I haven't seen it, but I, I mean, somebody's watching it over and over and over again.

Joe Rogan 26:56 Oh, yeah. So, dude, people love it.

Speaker 26:59 I mean, it's, you know, it... The, the, the value of it is the- because before this, one of the big things, and everybody's fighting over in the strike, is like, "Well, share your shit." There used to be residuals, right? And residuals, and it was only for SAG and a few other things, but it was like... And you knew if you had a line in the movie, and then there'd be a certain number, like, at the box office, well, you're gonna get another 2,000 bucks, and that was a big deal. [chuckles]

Matt Damon 27:19 Yeah.

Speaker 27:19 You get that check in the mail, and like, "Okay, I can pay the rent for another month, and I can do that shit." But then it, then there was this, like, sort of ill de- what constitutes success? Because streamer doesn't actually sell another ticket if you watch that movie, right?

Matt Damon 27:31 Right.

Speaker 27:31 And it's hard to tell, well, why did you sign up for this service, right? So for a while, everyone was looking at the first thing that you looked at when you subscribed to somebody. Okay, you're gonna go buy Hulu. What did you watch first? The Bear. Well, The Bear must be creating value for us, but it's... You can't assign a, a strict numerical value to it, 'cause it's, um, like a box office, where you can go, "Well, you know-

Matt Damon 27:52 We made this much

Speaker 27:53 ... Oppenheimer is a billion dollars or whatever, and w- you know, that's another billion dollars on our balance sheet." Because streamers are doing a subscription model, you know? It's, you know, whether it's like a gym membership, where in the fucking, you know, first of the year, you're like, "I'm gonna work out again. [chuckles] I'm gonna buy that annual membership," and you go twice, or you go to the gym every single day, you're paying the same amount.

Joe Rogan 28:11 Also, the weird thing is, with streaming, when you're opening up Netflix, it's not like you're going to the movie theater, and there's seven movies playing. You're opening up Netflix, and you have an unlimited option list. It's insane how much content. You could waste the rest of your life-

Matt Damon 28:26 Yeah [chuckles]

Joe Rogan 28:27 ... sitting in front of Netflix and then die and have, you know, millions of hours more to listen to or watch.

Matt Damon 28:33 Yeah.

Speaker 28:33 You're right. Like, when we'd started researching that and built our own data to poll people and examine all this stuff, it's, it's actually all the library stuff that people are watching all the time. If you said, like, the new stuff is theoretically what, what keeps people with the subscription or whatever, but in terms of, like, volume of time, I think, and doesn't come from them, but it looks a lot like, you know, gonna watch, like, Orange Is the New Black, and the episode of Suits, and the old Seinfeld, and Friends, and-

Joe Rogan 29:00 Mm-hmm

Speaker 29:00 ... what, you know, um, Cupcake Wars or whatever. You know, that, that's what's... 'Cause Americans watch six hours of TV a day, right?

Joe Rogan 29:07 That's crazy. [chuckles]

Matt Damon 29:09 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 29:09 And then the other six hours, they're on their phone. [laughing]

Speaker 29:11 Yeah. [laughing]

Joe Rogan 29:11 How does anything get done? How does anything get done? When you started to make this film, like, what, what is the process? Like, how did you guys agree on it? Like, what it... D-d-did you guys have it written first?

Matt Damon 29:22 Was it-

Speaker 29:22 Joe Carnahan wrote it.

Matt Damon 29:23 Yeah, Joe, so-

Joe Rogan 29:24 Before you knew you were going to Netflix with it?

Matt Damon 29:26 Yeah. Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 29:26 Yeah.

Matt Damon 29:27 He came to us with the script, and we've known Joe for a really... He did a movie. His first movie was called Narc. I don't know if you ever saw it.

Speaker 29:32 Yeah.

Matt Damon 29:32 It's terrific.

Speaker 29:33 It's a great movie, yeah.

Matt Damon 29:33 So we met him way back, this, 25 years ago or, uh, something like that, and so we met him, met him back then, and Ben did, you did a movie of his in-

Speaker 29:41 Did Smoke and Ashes

Matt Damon 29:42 ... '04, I think. And so we've known Joe for a really long time and kind of been in touch with him over the years, and, and he just sent this to us and said... And we read it, and we thought it was great and, and, and, and bought it for the company. And then we started talking to Joe about, you know, how he saw it, you know, how he wanted to do it, and, and he suggested that we d- actually do the movie. Um, and we, and we were like, "Yeah, why don't we do it? It seems, um-

Speaker 30:06 Basically, 'cause we liked it, and-

Matt Damon 30:07 We liked it, yeah. [chuckles]

Speaker 30:07 ... part of it's like, we're not trying to just do our movies. We wanna be-... you know, doing movies with all these, the people that we like and respect, and, and, and then, you know, the way we sort of set it up is such that to try to get, like, the— historically, the way it's worked is, like, the, you know, a studio will own a, a, a, an IP or a script or whatever, and then you cut, and they'll say: "Okay, we want you to do it." "Okay, well, how much?" "Well, how much did you get for the last one, right?" And you go, "Well, what's the budget?" And then that's how they assign a value to it, right? But, like, my belief was, well, especially when these streamers were, like, coming into the market and, and chasing stuff, is like, this movie may, may be worth more, it may be worth less, and that, like, w-we're all just subject to that. So we'll try to get the best price for it, and we'll all share it, you know, pro rata. And essentially, that, that was the same process. We've done eight, I guess, movies or so now.

Matt Damon 30:55 Yeah.

Speaker 30:55 And, and, uh, we took it out, and, you know, people wanted it. And then one of the things that was really appealing about Netflix was that they were open to this, this idea that we've been trying to institutionalize. And it was like: Okay, great! That's, that's really meaningful because ideally, it becomes a template that other people go, "Hey, we wanna do that thing," you know? And then we go, "Oh, here's the paperwork."

Matt Damon 31:13 Yeah, that's the thing. Like, a lot of people say that they would wanna do it, but it... Now, now that template exists, so it's like plug and play. So if you're, if you're not full of shit, and you really do mean that, then guess what? Just take this, and go do it, you know.

Speaker 31:26 And it's also gonna let you, you know, I hope, like, m-manage the risk. In other words, the argument you always have is like: Well, shit, we gotta invest all this money in the movie. So you can't have your protagonist be too objectionable. That's too edgy or can't be R-rated 'cause it costs this much. I get it, right? You're gonna put all your money into it. You want-- you don't want money to fucking disappear. You wanna make money, okay. So if, like, when we wrote the first movie that we... Good Will Hunting, it was like, we knew that had to be a cheap movie. People talking in rooms to each other 'cause no one's [chuckles] gonna put a bunch of money into a movie-

Matt Damon 31:55 And do a movie with us. [chuckles]

Speaker 31:56 ... two assholes that no one heard of. So it was like, okay, what can we do that's interesting, that, and try to keep it as inexpensive as possible so that we can make the argument that someone should make the movie? That same logic, like, carries through every time you're asking somebody to invest in something. So what I'd like to have happen is to say, "Okay, now that we know there's a reliable system where we understand that, like, in success, we'll actually benefit, we can lower, you know, the price up front for you so that you can have a low fucking barrier to entry, so that you can take the risk, so that we can do something really interesting, that's, that's an original idea, that's, uh, you know, that's an Anomam or a Sinners or a fucking Marty Supreme or whatever it is. And, and then if it's successful, we're not all sitting here like assholes, where, you know, [chuckles] you guys walk off with all the money, but... And you can have that happen in an ongoing way, so that you can make more interesting stuff."

Joe Rogan 32:46 A lot of the stuff that was going on with the strikes was centered around AI and what AI is gonna do to the business. Like, w-where do you feel is gonna be, like, the biggest problem with AI? Is it gonna be with people's likenesses? 'Cause there's a lot of that, where they want, they wanna use extras and own their digital rights forever, essentially be able to recreate them in any kind of film. But then there's also... You're gonna have films that are written by artificial intelligence. You're gonna have scenes that don't involve people, and it gets weird, right?

Matt Damon 33:19 [lips smack] It gets really weird, but this actually is an area of-

Speaker 33:21 It's tricky, like-

Matt Damon 33:22 ... expertise for him.

Speaker 33:22 Yeah, we've been spending time looking at this. Like, my belief is, it's sort of like, what's gonna happen with electricity? Well, a lot of shit's gonna happen with electricity. Some of it's gonna be good, some of it's gonna change stuff, some of it's gonna be like, [chuckles] you know, this is gonna be, you know, shit that kills a bunch of people. Like, it's, it's, it's opening a door that you can't, um, you know, say, well, talk about in a kind of a blanket way. But I think with what I see is, like, for example, if you try to get ChatGPT or Claude or Gemini to write you something, it's really shitty. And it's shitty because by its nature, it goes to the mean, to the average, and it's, and it's not reliable, and it's-- I mean, I, I just can't even stand to see what it writes. Now, it's a useful tool if you're a writer, and you're going, "Ah, what's the thing? I'm trying to set something up," or somebody sends someone a letter, but it's delayed two days and gets... And it can give you some examples of that. [coughs] I actually don't think it's very likely that it can- it's gonna be able to write anything meaningful or, and in particular, that it's gonna be making movies, like, from whole cloth, like Tilly Norville. Like, that's bullshit. I don't think that's gonna happen. I think it's not-- I think it actually turns out the technology is not progressing in exactly the same way they sort of presented it. Um, and really, what it is, it's gonna be a tool, just like sort of visual effects. And yeah, it needs to have language around it. You need to protect your name and likeness. You can do that. You can watermark it. Your-- those laws already exist. You can't-- I can't sell your fucking picture for money. I can't. You can sue me, period. I might have the ability to draw you, to make you in a very realistic way, but that's already against the law, and the unions are gonna... I think the guilds are gonna manage this, where it's like, okay, look, if this is a tool that actually helps us, for example, we don't have to go to the North Pole, right? We can shoot the scene here in our parkas and, you know, whatever it is, and, but then make it appear very realistically as if we're in the North Pole. It'll save us a lot of money, a lot of time. We're gonna focus on the performances and not be freezing our ass off out there and running back inside. That's useful, just like Spencer Tracy and Katharine Hepburn used to be, like, driving their car, and there's-

Joe Rogan 35:23 Yeah

Speaker 35:23 ... a wind blowing a painting behind them, and it looked goofy. [laughing] And, you know, now, you know, in computer-generated-

Joe Rogan 35:28 Yeah

Speaker 35:28 ... people use a lot of computer-generated stuff, and some of it is gonna replace just that. Like, instead of, uh, five hundred guys in Singapore, you know, making two dollars an hour to, to render all the graphics for a superhero movie, they're just gonna be able to do that a lot easier. There's already laws around and guild guidelines around, like, how many union extras you have to use. But also, we've been tiling extras. Like, there weren't a million Orcs in Middle Earth, [chuckles] you know what I mean?

Joe Rogan 35:52 Right.

Speaker 35:53 In Invictus, there weren't all those people in the stadium. Like, that's something we've been doing. It kind of feels to me like the thing we were talking about earlier, where there's a lot more fear because we have the sense, this existential dread. It's gonna wipe everything out.

Joe Rogan 36:05 Right.

Speaker 36:06 But that actually runs counter, in my view, to what history seems to show, which is, A, adoption is slow, it's incremental. Um, I think a lot of that rhetoric comes from people who are trying to justify valuations around companies. [chuckles]

Joe Rogan 36:21 Mm.

Speaker 36:21 Where they go, "We're gonna change everything. In two years, there's gonna be no more work."

Joe Rogan 36:24 Right.

Speaker 36:24 Well, the reason they're saying that is because they need to ascribe a valuation for investment that can warrant the CapEx spend they're gonna make on these data centers, with the argument that, like, "Oh, you know, as soon as we do the next model, it's gonna scale up. It's gonna be three times as good." Except that actually, ChatGPT-5, about twenty-five time-- percent better than ChatGPT-4 and costs about four times as much in the way of electricity and data. So those when they say that it's, like, plateauing-... The early AI, the line went up very steeply, and it's now sort of leveling off. I think it's because, and yes, it'll get better, but it's gonna be really expensive to get better. And a lot of people are like, "Fuck this, we want ChatGPT-4!" Because it turned out, like, the vast majority of people who use AI are using it to, like, as, like, companion bots to chat with at night. And so there's no work, there's no productivity, there's no value to it. I would argue there's also not a lot of social value to getting people to, like, focus on an AI friend who's, you know, [chuckles] telling you that you're great and listening to everything you say, and being sycophantic. But that's sort of a, a side issue. I think for this particular purpose, like, the way I see the technology and what it's good at and what it's not, it's gonna be good at filling in all the places that are expensive and burdensome, and they make it harder to do it. And it's always gonna rely fundamentally on the human artistic aspects of it.

Joe Rogan 37:45 Well, I think the more it becomes ubiquitous, the more people are gonna appreciate real things that are made by real people. You know, like, you're, you, you still appreciate a handmade table. You know?

Speaker 37:56 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 37:56 You're, you're gonna appreciate... Uh, like, did you see, um, [lips smack] uh, The Beast in Me, Claire Danes?

Speaker 38:01 Yeah.

Matt Damon 38:01 No, I didn't. I didn't-

Joe Rogan 38:02 Fucking great.

Matt Damon 38:02 Yeah, I heard it was great.

Joe Rogan 38:03 That lady, woo! [chuckles]

Speaker 38:05 She's terrific.

Joe Rogan 38:06 Woo! When she's in a scene, you're just like, "Jesus Christ!"

Matt Damon 38:09 Great, great actress.

Joe Rogan 38:10 Like, you-- like, her fucking lips are quivering.

Matt Damon 38:12 Yeah. [chuckles]

Joe Rogan 38:12 Like, you believe everything that she's saying.

Speaker 38:14 But you're right, people want that.

Joe Rogan 38:15 You can't, you can't fake that.

Speaker 38:16 Kids want getting fucking cassette tapes-

Joe Rogan 38:17 You can't-

Speaker 38:17 Right

Joe Rogan 38:18 ... records.

Matt Damon 38:18 I would say, like, I, I did this interview [clears throat] with, uh, with Dwayne Johnson, 'cause they, you know, they... When people are in these awards things, they sometimes have other actors interview them, you know. And I, I did this interview with Dwayne, and, and, and I asked him, there's this scene in The Smashing Machine where, where he's overdosed on drugs, and his buddy comes to see him in the hospital.

Speaker 38:37 Yeah.

Matt Damon 38:37 And, and it really walloped me, this scene. I thought it was so great, and, and I asked him, and I was just like: "Can you just tell me about this scene? Like, did Benny, Benny Safdie directed it. Did Benny write this, write that? Did you work on that scene with him? Did you..." He goes, "No, we, we actually worked on it together." And I go, "Well, but how did that scene come to be?" And Dwayne goes, "Well, my father was an alcoholic," and I don't remember if he said substance abuser or alcoholic, but, but I, I didn't know the man. I don't want to impugn him. But, but he had, he had a substance issue, whatever it was. He goes, "And, and when he would talk to me, uh, you know, that's how he would defend himself." It was almost a bargaining thing, 'cause there's this thing when this guy comes to him, he's overdosed, and Dwayne's amazing in this scene. He's, he's going like... He's going like, "Yeah, isn't it crazy? And then I woke up, and so, I mean, I could hear him, but I couldn't really hear him." And you see him, he's kinda tap dancing.

Speaker 39:25 Mm.

Matt Damon 39:25 And his friend finally kinda holds his feet to the fire. And at that moment, Dwayne literally starts to burst into tears and just pulls the hospital sheet up over his head. And it's like, and it's, and it's, i- I mean, it's just... It was- I'm, I'm not doing it justice if you haven't... I mean, I know you've seen it.

Speaker 39:45 I've seen it.

Matt Damon 39:45 I know you've seen it.

Speaker 39:45 It's an amazing scene.

Matt Damon 39:46 Yeah. But, um, he said yes, so he explains that about his father, and then he goes, "And, and, uh, when my mom was diagnosed with stage three lung cancer, I was with her when the oncologist came in, and she was lying in the hospital bed. And when he gave her the news, she pulled the sheet up over her head."

Speaker 40:04 Whew.

Matt Damon 40:04 "And I looked at her, and she just looked like a little, like a little kid, you know?"

Speaker 40:08 Wow.

Matt Damon 40:08 And I was like, "All right." [sniffs] Like, so that, right, is two traumatic events from this guy's life, right? From his life experience. And the actor in him, right, sees this scene, goes into his memory, pulls these two things out, understands that they're appropriate for this scene, and he can marry them together in the scene, and then he goes and performs it that way. And a dude walking in off the road goes to the movies, sees this, understands somehow that it's fucking real.

Speaker 40:46 Right.

Matt Damon 40:46 I, I didn't know why. I-

Speaker 40:47 Right

Matt Damon 40:47 ... That's why I wanted to ask him: How did that scene come to be? I genuinely didn't know. And made me tear up, and, you know... It like-

Speaker 40:57 Yeah

Matt Damon 40:57 ... that is-

Speaker 40:58 And, and there's-

Matt Damon 40:58 There's no fucking AI that can do that

Speaker 41:00 ... technology that can-

Joe Rogan 41:00 No.

Matt Damon 41:00 No.

Speaker 41:01 It's a whole lot more than photorealistic images-

Joe Rogan 41:04 Yeah

Speaker 41:04 ... uh, Dwayne Johnson.

Matt Damon 41:04 Yeah, that, you, you could, you could, you could have an AI understand Dwayne's face and move his face into different, but no fucking thing-

Speaker 41:11 You'd never do that

Matt Damon 41:11 ... could ever do that.

Joe Rogan 41:12 The complications of real-life experiences-

Matt Damon 41:14 Yeah

Joe Rogan 41:14 ... relayed in, in a-

Matt Damon 41:15 That is a completely human-

Joe Rogan 41:16 Yeah.

Speaker 41:16 Yeah.

Matt Damon 41:17 That is an ar- that is an artist. That's a piece of art-

Joe Rogan 41:18 Yes

Matt Damon 41:19 ... right? That comes out of a lived human experience.

Joe Rogan 41:21 That movie gave me so much anxiety. There's moments where Emily Blunt is arguing with him-

Matt Damon 41:25 She's so fucking good in that movie.

Joe Rogan 41:26 She's so good. [chuckles]

Matt Damon 41:27 Oh, I sa- I really said, I, I, I'd like that... I think, I think that's the best she's ever been. I live, you know, we live in the same building in New York. She's, like, a very dear friend of mine, and I, and I, I, I, I was like: "I, I really think that's the best she's ever been." And then I said, and then [chuckles] I blurted that out to Chris Nolan, and, and he kinda stopped and looked at me like... [chuckles] He didn't say it, but he was kinda like, "She's pretty fucking good in my movie, too." [laughing]

Speaker 41:46 [laughing]

Joe Rogan 41:47 Well, she's great, period.

Matt Damon 41:48 She's great, period.

Joe Rogan 41:49 She's great, period.

Matt Damon 41:50 Yeah, yeah.

Joe Rogan 41:50 But there's something about that... Well, I knew Mark. I kn-

Matt Damon 41:53 Yeah

Joe Rogan 41:53 ... I knew Mark from, I met Mark in '97 when he was fighting in the UFC.

Matt Damon 41:57 [coughs]

Joe Rogan 41:57 So I knew the whole journey of him, and I was so happy for Dwayne because it was a film where instead of being this fucking superhero, blockbuster, Hulk of a man, he gets to be that-

Matt Damon 42:10 Yeah

Joe Rogan 42:10 ... but be an, a great actor. And, you know, you can't really get a person to look like that, to express emotions and expe-

Matt Damon 42:22 I know

Joe Rogan 42:22 ... And, and a- and he was Mark Kerr.

Matt Damon 42:24 I know.

Joe Rogan 42:24 If you know Mark, I mean, it was fucking great acting.

Matt Damon 42:27 I, I completely forgot it was him, and somebody who had seen it before told me that was gonna happen. And I was like, "All right, we'll see."... [laughing]

Joe Rogan 42:34 [laughing]

Matt Damon 42:35 And it was, like, from the second it started, I was like, "Yeah."

Joe Rogan 42:37 It didn't get the credit it deserved in terms of, like, the amount of people that went to see it, but I think overall, in time, people will appreciate it.

Speaker 42:42 Yeah, that's-

Matt Damon 42:43 Yeah

Speaker 42:43 ... one of those movies you will go back to-

Joe Rogan 42:44 Yeah

Speaker 42:44 ... and look at and talk about it.

Joe Rogan 42:45 Because it's a movie about MMA, so a lot of people are like, "I don't wanna see a movie about a bunch of fucking meatheads," but it's not.

Matt Damon 42:52 It's not at all, yeah.

Joe Rogan 42:52 It's just a movie that happens to be around MA, but it, uh, MMA, but it's a great movie.

Matt Damon 42:57 Yeah, yeah.

Joe Rogan 42:58 The mo- the, the scenes are fucking fantastic.

Matt Damon 43:01 They're fucking fantastic.

Joe Rogan 43:01 The acting-

Matt Damon 43:02 Yeah, yeah

Joe Rogan 43:02 ... is so good.

Matt Damon 43:03 Absolutely.

Joe Rogan 43:03 And the write... And the, even the s- the fight scenes, they're so realistic, man. It's really... Like, they... I've saw all those fights. They've recreated those fights-

Matt Damon 43:12 Mm

Joe Rogan 43:12 ... about as good as you can get.

Matt Damon 43:14 Yeah, yeah.

Joe Rogan 43:14 And just his crazy struggle, and you know the story be- behind the documentary, The Smashing Machine?

Matt Damon 43:20 No.

Joe Rogan 43:20 So, The Smashing Machine was made when Mark was at the height of his powers in Pride, and he was the most terrifying guy in the world.

Speaker 43:27 Yeah. [chuckles]

Joe Rogan 43:28 He was 265 pounds of solid muscle, just blowing through people, didn't even look like a human being. Everyone was terrified of him. No one knew he was a drug addict.

Matt Damon 43:36 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 43:37 No one knew, and he spiraled out as they were filming, and he let them film him, let them film him shooting up-

Matt Damon 43:44 Mm

Joe Rogan 43:44 ... let them film him, like, bringing this giant bag of pills with him, and all his shit everywhere-

Matt Damon 43:49 Mm

Joe Rogan 43:49 ... and just completely falling apart. While they were supposed to be capturing this hero movie-

Matt Damon 43:55 Right, right

Joe Rogan 43:55 ... of the greatest fighter in the world, he's falling apart, like, live in front of the documentary. It was a fucking amazing documentary.

Matt Damon 44:04 I gotta see it.

Joe Rogan 44:04 It's really good, but the, uh, uh... I was so happy that they put it in a film, and I was so happy that it gave Dwayne a vehicle to show what he's really capable of-

Matt Damon 44:13 Yeah

Joe Rogan 44:13 ... 'cause he's, like, so limited by a lot of just the parameters of the roles that he was in.

Matt Damon 44:18 Yeah, and by, and by, like, galactic success-

Joe Rogan 44:21 Yes

Matt Damon 44:22 ... too, right?

Joe Rogan 44:22 Yes.

Matt Damon 44:22 I mean, it's, it's, it's-

Speaker 44:23 Yeah, that's the other thing, yeah

Matt Damon 44:23 ... he, he has, he had to, and will continue to have to, push for that, right?

Joe Rogan 44:31 Yeah.

Matt Damon 44:31 Because it's what he wants, right?

Joe Rogan 44:33 Yeah.

Matt Damon 44:33 And not because what, because what, what they're gonna continue to want him to do is, you know, the thing that, that, that mints them money. Um-

Joe Rogan 44:41 Yeah

Matt Damon 44:42 ... you know, which-

Speaker 44:42 But I suspect that his experience and feeling about this movie-

Matt Damon 44:45 The, from the conversations-

Speaker 44:47 is different

Matt Damon 44:47 ... that I've had with him, yeah, this, this is, this is... This has changed him, yeah.

Joe Rogan 44:51 Well, I mean, it's, like, this thing that these superhero guys have to do, where it's like something has to change because otherwise you're gonna be boxed.

Matt Damon 45:01 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 45:01 And with a guy that looks like that, it's so easy to-

Matt Damon 45:04 Yeah

Joe Rogan 45:04 ... put him in that box. And so you see him now, he's thinner, he's lost a lot of weight. Like, Dave Bautista went through a very similar thing, too-

Matt Damon 45:10 Right

Joe Rogan 45:10 ... right?

Matt Damon 45:11 Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Joe Rogan 45:11 He wanted to be-

Matt Damon 45:12 Yeah

Joe Rogan 45:12 ... he wanted to have more range, wanted to have, you know, more opportunities to do exciting and different, challenging things.

Matt Damon 45:17 Well, I think also coming from where he came from, right? It's like you talk about going from TV to movies in the old days. Try coming from wrestling [chuckles] to movies-

Joe Rogan 45:25 Right

Matt Damon 45:26 ... to, like, the biggest movie star in the world, right? It's very... It's, like, it's incredible that he did that, and now he's in this place where he's got this leverage as, because he's so beloved and, you know, that, that he can kind of tailor the- tailor what he wants from h- from here on out.

Speaker 45:42 It's hard to bring the audience with you, and go-

Matt Damon 45:44 Right

Speaker 45:44 ... "No, no, I know you like this thing, but let me, let me show you something else," you know? It's sort of like you go to the concert, the band wants to play the new songs. "Play the fucking hits!" [laughing]

Joe Rogan 45:53 [laughing]

Matt Damon 45:54 [laughing]

Speaker 45:54 You know? Because, you know, somebody's a little G- Gilded Cage, "All right, fuck it, Satisfaction."

Joe Rogan 45:58 Yeah. [laughing]

Matt Damon 46:00 [laughing]

Speaker 46:00 "No, I love this song, too, but..."

Matt Damon 46:02 Yeah.

Speaker 46:02 "You know my, my acoustic thing that I did? Boom!" [laughing]

Joe Rogan 46:05 Yeah, I went to see the Stones, and w- when they were here in town, and there was a few songs they played that were, like, new songs.

Matt Damon 46:10 Oh, really?

Joe Rogan 46:11 And you could see the audience was like, "Okay."

Matt Damon 46:12 Yeah, yeah.

Joe Rogan 46:13 "Okay."

Matt Damon 46:13 "I'm gonna go get a beer."

Joe Rogan 46:14 "Okay, get to the other one." [laughing]

Speaker 46:15 [laughing]

Joe Rogan 46:15 Yeah, that's... But, I mean, but, you know, every artist, I guess, has to make that choice, and he's made it, and, and, and it was amazing vehicle, too, 'cause he still kept that superhuman, Hulkish frame-

Matt Damon 46:28 Yeah

Joe Rogan 46:28 ... and then but also showed, like, God, there's, like, amazing depth there.

Matt Damon 46:32 Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Speaker 46:33 And that's the thing that's, I think, especially 'cause it's, A, it's collaborative, it happens with other people, that's what movies do that other shit doesn't do, is just, just create... Like, you feel for people. It's empathy. It's all made up, right? It's, that's not him. It's the, the, all... It's all an illusion. It's all bullshit, but if you do it really well with, like, you know, somebody that seems to really be feeling something, like, all of a sudden, I think what it does, it touches, like, these things in ourselves. Like, you know, it has that same effect that Dwayne went through, of, articulated to you, about, like, these moments that were kind of burned into his memory. Then, really, the best movies are kind of almost blank screens that we project our own fucking, like, "Oh, yeah, I... When my father died," or, "I went through this with my kid," or, "I'm fucking... I feel fucking alone, and, and, and, and miserable," and, and here's this, like, hopeful moment that someone has. You go, "Maybe I can, maybe I can do something." You know, they inspire you, they touch you, they move you, and, like, it's the thing to go for. The other thing is, you know, it's a, i- is to, to tell a lighter story, to go through the more typical sort of tropes of it all, and it's a-

Matt Damon 47:37 Either way, you're in somebody else's perspective for a few hours.

Speaker 47:40 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 47:40 Yeah.

Matt Damon 47:40 And hopefully-

Speaker 47:41 Yeah

Matt Damon 47:41 ... it breeds compassion.

Joe Rogan 47:42 Well, when it's done right, there's a magic to it, where you forget that it's happening, and you're there. When... And the most amazing trick is when it's done by famous people. You know, I was talking to Ethan Hawke about this, is there's a scene with him and Kevin Bacon, when, in, uh, that movie with Julia Roberts about the end of the world. I forget the name of it.

Matt Damon 47:58 Yeah, right, right, right. Yeah.

Speaker 47:59 Yeah, yeah.

Matt Damon 47:59 I forget.

Speaker 48:00 Tomorrow?

Matt Damon 48:00 Yeah.

Speaker 48:01 Yeah, yeah.

Matt Damon 48:01 Tomorrow something.

Speaker 48:02 Yeah.

Matt Damon 48:03 People will find it.

Joe Rogan 48:03 Yeah. [chuckles]

Matt Damon 48:04 But it's a great, great fucking movie. But there's this scene where he's trying to get... He, he's talking to Kevin Bacon, Kevin Bacon's got a gun to him, and it's so fuck... I know that's Kevin Bacon. I know that's Ethan Hawke. It doesn't matter.

Speaker 48:16 [chuckles]

Joe Rogan 48:17 Like, you're fucking locked in. You're locked in. You're like, "Oh, shit!" Like, that's the magic.

Matt Damon 48:22 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 48:23 And, and he was like, "But I'm locked in, too." Like, that's... It's like a hypnosis. It's like everybody is in the scene in a very bizarre way. Like, you, you have the lines, but you're living it.

Matt Damon 48:37 True.

Joe Rogan 48:37 And so, and it, that's either done or it's not done, and when it's not done, you can tell someone's-

Matt Damon 48:42 You feel it

Joe Rogan 48:42 ... kind of just performative.

Matt Damon 48:44 You feel it when you're watching.

Joe Rogan 48:45 Yes.

Matt Damon 48:45 If, if it does that thing, and it pulls you in-

Joe Rogan 48:48 Yeah

Matt Damon 48:48 ... then it's happening.

Joe Rogan 48:49 That's the magic-

Matt Damon 48:49 Yeah, yeah

Joe Rogan 48:49 ... of film.

Speaker 48:50 And sometimes you trick people, I guess, but for the most part-

Matt Damon 48:52 For the most part, you don't.

Joe Rogan 48:53 You trick some people.

Speaker 48:54 I know you're feeling it, and you... It's really happening.

Joe Rogan 48:56 Yeah.

Speaker 48:57 It's much more likely-

Matt Damon 48:58 People, other human beings-

Speaker 48:59 Other people are feeling it, too

Matt Damon 48:59 ... recognize human beings experiencing real shit.

Speaker 49:02 Yes.

Matt Damon 49:02 They, they, they really do.

Speaker 49:03 It's like these mirror neurons.

Joe Rogan 49:04 That's what-

Speaker 49:04 Like, I know what sorrow looks like-

Joe Rogan 49:07 Yeah

Speaker 49:07 ... without having to fucking, "I can't break it down for you," or I even... You know, you, we all know kind of what, like, "Oh, he's a little anxious right now," or, "Did I maybe offend him?" Or, so, you know, all these little things, and when some, like, in the rare moments when these-... big feelings or s- mo- the things happen, you feel it, too, you know? And u- usually, like an example is, is there's an old saying about like, uh, you know, "Actors try to cry, people try not to cry." Like, because when you're really experiencing that shit, you don't want people to see it. You wanna hide it.

Joe Rogan 49:36 Yeah.

Speaker 49:36 You wanna... "No, I'm okay, I'm fine." You know, it's like-

Joe Rogan 49:38 You wanna pull the sheet up over your head. [chuckles]

Speaker 49:39 Yeah.

Matt Damon 49:39 Exactly.

Speaker 49:40 Yeah.

Matt Damon 49:40 Yeah.

Speaker 49:41 Yeah.

Matt Damon 49:41 But the other thing that's really interesting from, from our side of doing it, 'cause he, he and I have talked about this a lot, is... And I've always said publicly, like, great actors are good enough for both of you. Like, when you're in a scene-

Speaker 49:53 Yeah

Matt Damon 49:53 ... with a great actor, that thing that Ethan's talking about, that hypnosis or whatever you wanna call it-

Speaker 49:58 Yeah

Matt Damon 49:58 ... that energy, that, that place where you go, right?

Speaker 50:01 They're bringing you right with it.

Matt Damon 50:02 They-

Speaker 50:02 Yeah, like doing all the work, yeah

Matt Damon 50:02 ... It's like a fucking tractor beam. They will suck you right in with them, and, like, as quickly as you look into their eyes, and you're like, [whooshes] you're, like, just there. And it's like... And it's not like... It's like riding the easiest wave you've ever ridden in your life.

Speaker 50:15 Mm.

Matt Damon 50:16 You know, it can be the hardest thing in the world, and it can be the easiest thing in the world. When you're with a great actor, it, it, it just, it's just... If the scene's a good scene-

Speaker 50:23 Yeah, that's the real paradox is, like, all the stuff that I'm the most proud of, the weird thing about it, it's felt very easy at the time.

Matt Damon 50:29 Yeah.

Speaker 50:30 And the shit where you're banging your head against the wall, trying to get blood from a stone, and killing yourself, and the whole thing, and it just... And it ends up fucking feeling empty. And the thing about the stuff that I'm proud of is I'm, my insecurity is like, "Sh- should be harder than this, right? Are we-"

Matt Damon 50:42 [chuckles]

Speaker 50:42 "... Are, are we, like, we working hard enough? Are we get..." You know?

Matt Damon 50:44 Right. Right, right.

Speaker 50:44 And learn to kinda just trust that and go, "Ah, it feels good. Let's just keep going," you know?

Joe Rogan 50:48 Well, there's some scenes in this movie, without giving too much away, where there's conflict between you two guys that seems so real, and that's even harder to recreate 'cause you guys are good friends. And you're making the movie together, and you've got this scene where you're acting in this, and it- with the conflict with the two of you guys in the movie, but it's very fucking real.

Matt Damon 51:06 The reason that it was real is... That, I like that scene. The reason it's, it, it, it works, I think, is because he's coming at me, and he's, he really needs to know something, and I'm completely blanking him. Like, I'm just... He's going, "You gotta tell me what's going on, man!" [chuckles]

Speaker 51:23 Yeah.

Matt Damon 51:23 He's like, "It's awesome. Like, what, what is going- what is the thing?" And I, and I'm just, like, literally kind of blanking him in this bizarre way, which, which, like, was really frustrating him in real life [chuckles] because he, he was-

Speaker 51:37 That's also the most-

Matt Damon 51:37 ... 'Cause that feeling of like, " Dude, it's fucking tell me, dude. It's you," and be like-

Speaker 51:41 Right.

Matt Damon 51:41 When he finally goes, uh, he screams out, "I don't trust you right now," [chuckles] that's a fucking problem, right? Which is, like, what you would say to an old friend, like, "What are you doing, man? Like, what, what, what are you do..." Like, are you-

Speaker 51:53 Like, the betrayal is like, yeah.

Matt Damon 51:53 Tell, tell me the fucking... The betrayal is that-

Speaker 51:55 Lie to me or tell me the truth.

Matt Damon 51:56 Lie, lie to me or tell me the truth.

Speaker 51:57 But don't fuck me and, like, step outside our whole relationship, and all of a sudden-

Matt Damon 52:01 Just-

Speaker 52:01 ... act like, you know-

Matt Damon 52:02 Give me this weird look of just like, "I don't know." You know, like [laughing] ...

Speaker 52:06 [laughing]

Matt Damon 52:07 And so we're doing the scene, it was really fucking pissing him off. I could see him, like, getting like-

Speaker 52:13 There's the one line that wasn't written that I saw, that I didn't remember doing, was, "I would've never fucked you like this."

Matt Damon 52:16 I ne- "I would've never fucked you like this," yeah.

Speaker 52:19 Which I didn't even remember saying. And George, "I like that line. Keep that thing, 'I wouldn't have fucked you.'" And I was, I thought, I was like, "What is he... I thought, what did I say?" You know, I, and I so watched the playback. It was one of those rare moments, again, it was like where he, it was that thing of you doing all the work by, by not doing anything, which I didn't expect, uh, that to be the choice-

Matt Damon 52:36 [chuckles]

Speaker 52:36 ... that you made, and it just was confusing, and it felt like just, you know, leaving you out in the fucking cold. And the only thing I could rely on is like, "I, you know, I w- I would, I wouldn't do this to you," [chuckles] you know?

Joe Rogan 52:47 So do you have, in those moments where you're, you're ad-libbing a line, where a line come... Is it just, just that feels like that's what you say?

Speaker 52:55 Yeah.

Matt Damon 52:55 It's just kinda like he couldn't stop from saying it.

Joe Rogan 52:57 Right.

Matt Damon 52:58 You know?

Speaker 52:58 But you have to be working with somebody that makes that okay. You know what I mean? 'Cause the part of your brain that will, like, govern you or tell you something's not okay, whatever, will, will step in if it's sorta like, "You know, listen, I expect you to fucking do this in this box." And there's, there's, uh, directors and writers who, who really do really care about every word precisely, and that, you know, and that's, that's how they do it, and that's fine. That can be great, too. For me, like, it, it... I find it's, it becomes more interesting and sometimes better stuff happens if you actually feel like you don't have to say any of the lines. I don't have to say any of the lines in this scene, then I'll tend to say the ones [chuckles] that feel right. But it-

Matt Damon 53:35 Right

Speaker 53:35 ... but, like, that, it's that fake thing that never happens in life, which is I'm never sitting here talking to you and think, "What's my next line?"

Joe Rogan 53:42 Right.

Speaker 53:42 "What am I supposed to say, and how should I say that?"

Matt Damon 53:44 And it's not about the lines ever. It's not about the words. It's about what's hap- what's the scene about? What's happening in the scene?

Joe Rogan 53:49 It's one of the reasons why Curb Your, Curb Your Enthusiasm is so great.

Matt Damon 53:52 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 53:52 'Cause Larry David just gives you a place to get to.

Matt Damon 53:55 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 53:56 Like, you gotta-

Matt Damon 53:56 He gives them a j-

Joe Rogan 53:57 Yeah

Matt Damon 53:57 ... kind of a loose agenda of-

Joe Rogan 53:58 Yeah

Matt Damon 53:58 ... what's gonna happen.

Joe Rogan 53:59 And then films a bunch of stuff-

Matt Damon 54:00 Yeah

Joe Rogan 54:01 ... and everybody figures it out.

Matt Damon 54:02 Yeah.

Speaker 54:03 And a lot of times, that show's about the awkward shit in between, when people are missing each other or not-

Joe Rogan 54:07 Yeah [chuckles]

Speaker 54:08 ... not sure of themselves-

Joe Rogan 54:09 Always, yeah

Speaker 54:09 ... and a little embarrassed and maybe- [chuckles]

Joe Rogan 54:10 Fucking genius show.

Matt Damon 54:11 It really is, yeah.

Joe Rogan 54:12 Well, and, and, and people talk like we're talking. Like, you occasionally talk over each other.

Matt Damon 54:17 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 54:17 There's a stumble. There's no one know- like, "What? What, what the fuck are you talk..." There's weirdness to-

Matt Damon 54:22 Well, what's, because what's also happening is that forces you to really listen, right? And that is, that is the hardest thing to kind of learn for young actors, I think, is, is it's really all about listening. And like I did m- a bunch of movies with Paul Greengrass, and that's how he works, where he, where you just know the agenda going in. You know some basic things that you... You know what your guy needs going in. Like, I was playing a chief warrant officer, and I had to go through a door, and there was a guy, and I needed to interrogate him, and I... This is what I needed to know from him. I needed to secure the house with my guys, and I needed to get to this guy. We needed to make sure everybody here was secure. So, and it just, and the, and he put me with a bunch of real combat veterans, and we fucking went in and, you know, they're the experts.

Speaker 55:07 Which is another thing that does your job for you, by the way.

Matt Damon 55:09 It's just having around the real people.

Speaker 55:11 Joe putting the, the cops from Miami, you know, on these parts, and it, it just, like by osmosis, you feel more legitimate. The thing feels more authentic to the audience. You don't know why, because you don't know what the, how, what the fucking culture is of the narc- tactical narcotics team in Miami. But when you see the real guys, you kinda, oh, you're like, "Yeah, that seems right." [chuckles]

Joe Rogan 55:30 And Miami is the perfect place to have it, too.

Matt Damon 55:32 Yeah.

Speaker 55:32 Miami is such a fucking nutty place.

Matt Damon 55:33 Well, it's also specific to this, 'cause it's based on this real tactical narcotics team in, in, in Miami, and-... and, uh, and the guy who ran that, this guy Chris Casiano, is Joe's friend, and he's the guy that my character's based on. Um, so Chris was- Chris, we went... You know, we rode along with Chris down there. We went with that team and watched them operate, and then hung out with them, and then they came up, and they were, you know, all in the movie, and Chris was around as a technical advisor the whole time. So any question, like little details, "All right, how do I go through this door? What do I do? What do you do here? What's the, what's the protocol here? What..." You know, all of that stuff was kind of overseen by him so that it, so that it was how they really do it.

Joe Rogan 56:13 That whole fucking town is so- did you ever see Cocaine Cowboys?

Speaker 56:16 Yeah.

Matt Damon 56:16 Yes. [laughs]

Joe Rogan 56:17 Ooh!

Speaker 56:18 Shit.

Matt Damon 56:18 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 56:19 The entire fucking graduating class of the police academy one year either wound up murdered or in jail. [laughing]

Speaker 56:26 Yeah. But that's what happens-

Matt Damon 56:27 Yeah

Speaker 56:27 ... when all of a sudden you push so much fucking money into something, right?

Joe Rogan 56:31 Oh, yeah.

Speaker 56:31 And it's like, and before they even kind of figured out, like, you know, and it was, there wasn't even a lot of stigma. It was like, "Ah, cocaine, whatever. It's kind of rich guys' fun drug." But, you know, there's some statistic about, like, you know, the amount of money in the banks in Miami-

Joe Rogan 56:46 Oh, yeah

Speaker 56:46 ... was, like, the same as the rest of the country. [chuckles]

Joe Rogan 56:48 More banks-

Speaker 56:49 Where do you think that's coming from?

Joe Rogan 56:49 ... per capita in Miami than anywhere else in the country.

Matt Damon 56:52 Right. Right.

Joe Rogan 56:53 Because they were just laundering money.

Matt Damon 56:54 Right.

Joe Rogan 56:55 And they got away with it.

Matt Damon 56:56 Have you ever-

Joe Rogan 56:56 They literally got away with it, too. [chuckles]

Matt Damon 56:57 Have you ever flown over Bimini? You know, the island right off-

Joe Rogan 57:00 No.

Matt Damon 57:00 So, so if you fly over, ever fly over Bimini, there are all these, like, Cessnas underwater, all these planes-

Joe Rogan 57:08 [chuckles]

Matt Damon 57:08 ... like, around the island. 'Cause what they used to do, Bimini's, like, the closest... It's 50 miles off the coast of Florida. Um, they would, they would come in with a plane full of drugs and just crash the plane into the water. They would land it-

Speaker 57:20 Yeah, on purpose?

Matt Damon 57:21 On purpose. Because there's no runway on Bimini.

Speaker 57:23 [chuckles]

Matt Damon 57:23 There's no... It's like-

Speaker 57:25 It's like, "Fuck it, we're gonna dump the plane in the water and pick it out?"

Matt Damon 57:26 They would have 10 cigarette boats, like a flotilla of boats waiting. They would crash the plane. They'd offload the drugs as the plane was sinking, right?

Speaker 57:35 [chuckles] Just-

Matt Damon 57:36 And, and then they'd put it, they'd put it, they'd put it-

Speaker 57:38 The plane's the loss leader. [chuckles]

Matt Damon 57:39 ... The Coast Guard, like, figures it... They're always coming for them. That's why they have 10 boats. They throw the drugs into one of the boats, and they got a one out of 10 chance of making it.

Joe Rogan 57:48 Wow!

Matt Damon 57:48 They just scatter.

Speaker 57:50 And that, and the cost of the plane. [chuckles]

Matt Damon 57:50 And the Coast Guard goes after o- one of them and hopes they get the right one, and not...

Joe Rogan 57:54 Wow!

Matt Damon 57:54 It's just like, "No, it's just taking a cruise tonight. What, what's the problem, officer?" [chuckles]

Joe Rogan 57:58 Wow. Wow.

Matt Damon 57:58 But the planes are still all submerged. Like, you could... The water's so clear, you can see them.

Joe Rogan 58:03 How many fucking pl- Oh, wow!

Speaker 58:04 Oh, there you go.

Joe Rogan 58:06 That's crazy.

Matt Damon 58:07 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 58:07 How many fucking planes are out there?

Matt Damon 58:09 I flew over it probably 20 years ago, but, I mean, there's... Yeah.

Speaker 58:15 That was an ap- That is wild.

Matt Damon 58:16 I don't know how long they... I mean, but if you think of probably the cost of one of those little Cessnas, probably wasn't... I mean, with the amount of drugs they were moving on, on them.

Speaker 58:22 Yeah, it was-

Matt Damon 58:23 Yeah, there you go.

Joe Rogan 58:24 Fucking wild.

Speaker 58:26 [chuckles] That's great, they're kind of landing where it's sort of shallow, you know? [laughing]

Matt Damon 58:29 Yeah, they land, and it's like-

Speaker 58:29 "Fuck it, we can swim!"

Matt Damon 58:30 ... five to 10 feet of water, and they're... What do they... They land at, whatever, 55 knots, so you just try to-

Speaker 58:35 Water looks nice, too. Like, "Yeah, sure, you're about..." Wow.

Matt Damon 58:38 I mean, it won't be comfortable, but, I mean, Sully landed a 737-

Speaker 58:42 Yeah, right

Matt Damon 58:42 ... wherever it was, in the, in the water.

Joe Rogan 58:43 Right. Yeah. Fucking wild. What a crazy part of our culture that that happened.

Matt Damon 58:50 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 58:51 That the, the, the whole cocaine run during the '80s in particular-

Matt Damon 58:54 Yeah

Joe Rogan 58:54 ... like Miami Vice, all that shit.

Matt Damon 58:56 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 58:56 Like, it's like, it shaped the entire country.

Matt Damon 58:59 For sure.

Speaker 58:59 Oh, yeah.

Matt Damon 59:01 I just remember that one guy in that documentary who was, like, I think he was from Boston, and he was, like, the pilot, and he had figured out the route, and he was like, "Man, like, we could've gotten away with this forever." [laughing]

Joe Rogan 59:11 [laughing]

Speaker 59:11 [laughing]

Matt Damon 59:11 He was like... Because somebody talked, and he knew, "That's the only way we would've been caught."

Speaker 59:14 By the way, you know-

Matt Damon 59:15 He was like, "I, I had it all." He was clearly really smart, and like-

Speaker 59:17 A ton of guys did, too.

Matt Damon 59:19 Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Speaker 59:19 You know what I mean? There's a whole lot of people out there that were like, "Yeah, we had a nice run back in the '80s." [chuckles]

Matt Damon 59:23 Yeah. [chuckles]

Speaker 59:24 "It's why I got eight houses." You know, it's like... [chuckles]

Joe Rogan 59:26 Oh, yeah. That's one of the real crimes that people got away with, was bringing cocaine into this country. There's a lot of people that got very wealthy-

Speaker 59:33 Yeah

Joe Rogan 59:33 ... including banks, which is just really crazy.

Speaker 59:36 Yeah. You got banks or the jewelry companies-

Joe Rogan 59:38 Oh, yeah

Speaker 59:38 ... fucking Jag- There was, like, more Jaguar dealerships in Miami than everywhere else in the country. And it was like, "Doesn't pay to ask questions, so, yep, I guess a lot of people like our cars here."

Matt Damon 59:47 You don't say, all cash. Sure. [laughing]

Speaker 59:49 [laughing] Yeah, we can make you a deal, sure.

Joe Rogan 59:51 But how many backyards in Miami still to this day have bags just buried somewhere that nobody knows about?

Speaker 59:56 It's probably worth just checking, you know? [chuckles]

Matt Damon 59:58 Yeah. When you buy a house in Miami, just dig the yard up.

Joe Rogan 1:00:01 Well, at least find out who owned it before you. Oh, he's a pilot.

Matt Damon 1:00:04 [chuckles] Yeah.

Speaker 1:00:04 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:00:04 Get a truck. [laughing]

Matt Damon 1:00:06 Yeah. [chuckles]

Joe Rogan 1:00:06 Get a tractor. [laughing] It's time to dig up the backyard. I mean, one of those guys in the films had millions of dollars just buried in his backyard. They had nowhere to put it.

Matt Damon 1:00:14 Right.

Joe Rogan 1:00:14 They were making so much money, they just had to bury it places.

Matt Damon 1:00:17 That's fucking crazy.

Joe Rogan 1:00:18 Well, it's why it's a perfect backdrop for the film, you know, because, you know, that... The situation that the cops... Without giving away too much of the plot, but the situation that the cops are dealing with is a very real situation. I mean, so many DEA agents turned dirty, so many cops turned dirty. It's 'cause they just could get confronted.

Speaker 1:00:35 So much temptation.

Joe Rogan 1:00:36 Yes!

Speaker 1:00:36 It's like you take these, these people, you know, you got, like, six, seven people, they fucking work for a living. They got the same bullshit they have to deal with, and there's $20 million, you know? And it, I mean, it makes for great, like, drama, too, even, like, the, you know, in the performances. 'Cause all of a sudden, somebody's thinking, like: "Okay, how are they gonna react?" [chuckles] You know?

Joe Rogan 1:00:55 Yeah.

Speaker 1:00:55 "Who, who will be the first person to say, 'You know, I'm gonna have to turn this all in?'" You know, and, and, like, getting to play that shit... And for me, also, I like, you know, without being, you know, sanctimonious or preachy, 'cause I really think movies, we're talking about, like, what they do well. What they do very poorly is deliver messages or a lecture. As soon as you get into that thing-

Joe Rogan 1:01:13 Yeah

Speaker 1:01:14 ... it, it, it, the audience is like, "I, you know, I'm gonna go to church for that or fucking school for... I don't need that shit here." Um, but I like that what was underneath it is like, this is a fucking hard job, and, and that there's a lot [chuckles] ... Like, there's a lot of value. Like, the- these characters, the ones that are trying to do their job, are trying to get through the day, and just at the end of the day, have done their job like they said they were gonna do, you know, adhere to the fucking ethics that they're supposed to, and at the end of the day, be able to sleep at night and believe there's some value in not fucking stealing the money or flipping somebody over. You know what I mean? And doing all that shit.

Joe Rogan 1:01:48 Yeah.

Speaker 1:01:48 And that's the win. The win doesn't have to be get away with the bag of money or fucking, you know, saves the world from, uh, you know, the evil scientist laser beam or whatever. It's like-... at the end of the day, if you can fucking live with yourself and say, "Look, you know, I acquitted myself according to what the fucking expectations were, and what am I, true to my word." And I, I think there's so, like, that's a... I don't know, that, that affected me. I, I found that kind of moving, and, and you can't do it if you create, like, if, i- it's to credit to Joe's script, like, just two-dimensional characters. "Oh, I'm the hero, I'm the villain," or, "This person would never do that." They all have to be real people-

Joe Rogan 1:02:20 Yeah

Speaker 1:02:20 ... like we would be, subject to, like, temptation. And money just represents whatever that thing is you think you want or that's gonna make your life better, your... You know, it's something different to everybody. But, you know, i- i- and especially when you're, like, you're facing, like, real, you know, the custody thing or the, you know, the sick relative or, or whatever it is, that's- it's a real thing. Nobody's immune to, to, to that kind of temptation, you know? Sometimes I think it's cavalier to be like, "Oh, well, you're dirty or you're not." Like, putting people in a very tough situation a lot of times, particularly if they're feeling, like, undervalued, like, like the woman, the scene where Catalina's like: "I get fucking pissed, I get yelled at, I get shit on," you know what I mean? Like-

Joe Rogan 1:02:58 Yeah

Speaker 1:02:58 ... "I'm out here grinding every fucking day." You know, it's, uh, it's a lot to, it's a lot to ask, and I think it's, it's worth kind of making that, you know, heroic, i- i- without sort of indicating too much.

Joe Rogan 1:03:11 No, it's really well-written because there's no suspension of disbelief moments. It's a, it's a... And that's hard to do in a big blockbuster action movie. There's always one movie-

Speaker 1:03:20 Yeah

Joe Rogan 1:03:21 ... moment in a movie where you're like, "What?"

Speaker 1:03:22 Come on. [chuckles]

Joe Rogan 1:03:23 "How did he do that?"

Speaker 1:03:23 Yeah, well, that's convenient. [chuckles]

Joe Rogan 1:03:24 You guys don't have any of those. There's none of that, and I loved it. I loved it. I loved that, that aspect of it, too, where it, it felt like all of it was like I believed it. I believed it.

Speaker 1:03:34 Great. And that, that's really a credit to Joe and his, like-

Matt Damon 1:03:36 Yeah

Speaker 1:03:37 ... taste, and that's why we really felt like this guy knew how to make narc. He kind of obviously-

Joe Rogan 1:03:41 Yes

Speaker 1:03:41 ... understood this world, just p- and understood that it has to, above all, it has to feel real. And that's why he was open to, like, "Okay, whatever happens, you throw in a line, maybe it's good." You can't get your feeling hurt if it's not, you know? But, like, you gotta be able to take that shot, and we're all down, you know, trying to spend time with people. I mean, I kind of feel for these cops, a bunch of actors descend on you, and they're like, "What, uh, what kind of sweatshirt is that?" [laughing] You know?

Matt Damon 1:04:04 It was like that Michael J. Fox, James Woods movie. Remember that movie where, when he-

Speaker 1:04:07 Oh, God, no.

Matt Damon 1:04:08 I forget what it was called, but he's... Michael J. Fox is an actor-

Speaker 1:04:11 He's the actor

Matt Damon 1:04:11 ... falling around James Woods.

Speaker 1:04:12 Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Matt Damon 1:04:13 He's, he's studying him for a character, and James Woods is a real, like, detective, [chuckles] and he's just like-

Speaker 1:04:17 Yeah

Matt Damon 1:04:17 ... "Get this guy away from me."

Speaker 1:04:18 Yeah.

Matt Damon 1:04:18 I kept thinking of that when we-

Speaker 1:04:19 What kind of hair gel you use? [laughing]

Matt Damon 1:04:20 Yeah, well, yeah, exactly. Like, all these questions, you know. But they were very tolerant of us, which was, which was nice and, and, uh, and, uh, and really, really helpful, you know? Re- 'cause it's all, it's always details. It's always details. It's like, how fastidiously do you, do you kind of mine for those details? 'Cause I've, I've always been convinced that, like, an audience... It's like you were saying, they don't analyse why they don't believe something. They feel it. They just don't believe it.

Speaker 1:04:48 Yeah.

Matt Damon 1:04:48 And it's usually because those details are... You, you don't get those.

Speaker 1:04:52 And that's the only thing, like, I'm not great at imagining something. "Let's invent this."

Matt Damon 1:04:57 Right.

Speaker 1:04:57 I was saying everything that I've done, like, that I, that I like has been a result of something I found in research.

Matt Damon 1:05:02 Yeah.

Speaker 1:05:02 Like for The Town-

Matt Damon 1:05:03 Oh, the-

Speaker 1:05:03 ... I went down and just went through the, you know, all the prisons, you know, out there, Massachusetts federal prisons, state prisons, and, and sat down and talked to guys who robbed trucks and banks. And, you know, kind of sometimes, you know, you wanna know... And then sat down with the FBI guys and was like, "What are they like?" And the great shit, you know, for me is that, you know, and I'm in, like, uh, I'm in, like, uh, Walpole, or I'm in the prison at Dedham or whatever, and I'm to some guy, I said, like, after talking to him for two hours, you know, I was like: "Has anything just fucking weird ever happened or fucked up? Anything you remember?" The guy was like, "Yeah, one time, uh, you know, we were coming out of this thing. We robbed this truck, and, you know, we, we had the masks, we got the switch car, and we drove around the corner and whatever. We pull up, and we get out with fucking guns, the masks, the whole thing, and we look over, and there's this [chuckles] cop sitting there doing construction duty." And I was like, right then, he was telling me the story, I was like, "Oh, shit!" I, I was like, "What happened?" He goes, "You know, he looked at us, we looked at him, he looked the other way."

Matt Damon 1:06:02 Whoa!

Speaker 1:06:03 And I was like: "Really?" He goes, "Yeah. He didn't wanna end up on the wall at the VFW."

Matt Damon 1:06:06 Phew!

Speaker 1:06:07 It was like-

Matt Damon 1:06:07 These guys with full automatic weapons, masks on, switching cars.

Speaker 1:06:12 I was like, "I'm putting that in the movie." [chuckles]

Matt Damon 1:06:13 And it's in, it's in the... It's a great sh- moment in the town, like, in the movie, 'cause, you know, Renar, they all jump out of the things, and they-

Joe Rogan 1:06:20 Yeah, I remember that scene.

Matt Damon 1:06:20 And then, and he... Oh, yeah, here it is.

Speaker 1:06:21 Yeah. [chuckles] Yeah, exactly. It was like, you know, powerful-

Matt Damon 1:06:24 It's great, and it's this awkward [chuckles] They just stop.

Speaker 1:06:27 The guy's just doing construction. [chuckles]

Matt Damon 1:06:29 And this dude, he sees them, they see him.

Speaker 1:06:33 He's like, "Uh, fuck, we have to kill this guy."

Matt Damon 1:06:38 Nope, he turns away.

Speaker 1:06:40 Okay. Wow! [chuckles]

Joe Rogan 1:06:43 [chuckles]

Speaker 1:06:43 Well, this is- [chuckles]

Matt Damon 1:06:44 It's such a great... But that's straight from research, which I always loved that story. Um, and then he, and then the line is here, that he put it here.

Speaker 1:06:52 "He didn't want to end up on the wall at the VFW." Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:06:54 Wow!

Speaker 1:06:54 Which is a great line, you know-

Matt Damon 1:06:55 It's a great line

Speaker 1:06:56 ... It was such a simple explanation for what, what do you think he, what do you think he did, you know, and why, like... And that's exactly what it would've been. Like, that guy, the next day, his picture would've been up on the wall at the VFW.

Joe Rogan 1:07:07 Yeah.

Speaker 1:07:07 You know?

Joe Rogan 1:07:08 Yeah.

Speaker 1:07:08 And he knew it, and everybody knew it. He said he didn't want to [chuckles] do it like that. You know, that was... And that kind, that kind of stuff is, uh, I don't know, it's very human, human calculations and interact, and it's in a very extreme version of it. But it also doesn't have... Sometimes it's not dramatic at all. You know, it's like, "Yeah, that was an easy decision." And then the guy never says anything. "No, I didn't see anything," you know, and kind of can't really blame him, you know? It's, uh-

Joe Rogan 1:07:32 Yeah. The Town was a great fucking movie, too, man.

Speaker 1:07:34 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:07:34 And I, I knew a lot of people like that, you know, from boxing gyms and stuff.

Speaker 1:07:38 Mm.

Matt Damon 1:07:38 Oh, yeah, yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:07:39 I, I knew a guy who was a hitman for Whitey Bulger.

Speaker 1:07:42 Really?

Joe Rogan 1:07:42 Uh, I knew a guy who was a, a friend of a brother of mine who went to jail for that, for murder, for killing people. Yeah.

Speaker 1:07:49 What town did you grow up in?

Joe Rogan 1:07:50 I lived in Newton.

Speaker 1:07:51 You did?

Joe Rogan 1:07:51 Uh, I g- uh, yeah, I grew up in... I lived in Jamaica Plain for a little while, and I lived in Newton, but I, I spent a lot of time in Boston 'cause I was fighting.

Speaker 1:07:59 Right.

Joe Rogan 1:07:59 I was mostly-

Speaker 1:07:59 Right

Joe Rogan 1:07:59 ... training, and so I was around a lot of these, like, very shady characters who were in the fighting world.

Speaker 1:08:05 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:08:05 And a lot of them had backgrounds in crime.... one of the guys that I went to, that I trained with, he went to jail for a little while, and then he got, uh, arrested because a guy got killed, and they broke every bone in his body with a hammer and kept injecting him with cocaine to keep him al- keep him awake-

Speaker 1:08:24 Mm.

Joe Rogan 1:08:24 -while they were doing it, and then they cut his hands off and cut his head off.

Speaker 1:08:27 Jesus Christ!

Joe Rogan 1:08:28 And this guy that I used to train with got arrested for that.

Speaker 1:08:31 Jesus.

Matt Damon 1:08:31 Wow!

Joe Rogan 1:08:31 Yeah. He didn't wind up going to jail for that. He's dead now, but he was, somehow or another, at least peripherally involved.

Matt Damon 1:08:40 Yeah.

Speaker 1:08:40 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:08:40 Yeah.

Speaker 1:08:40 Well, I didn't do any fighting, but I, I went around and found a lot of things. One of the things about being, you know, being an actor is just people will talk to you, you know?

Joe Rogan 1:08:48 Oh, yeah.

Speaker 1:08:48 Which is a fucking amazing gift. Even if somebody's like, "Oh, yeah, I killed guys," you know, they'll just c- come out and, like-

Joe Rogan 1:08:54 Yeah

Speaker 1:08:54 ... it's kind of the rules all of a sudden don't apply. Like, these guys in the prison, what the fuck are they gonna talk... You know what I mean?

Joe Rogan 1:08:59 Yeah.

Speaker 1:08:59 But they're, like, interested in it for whatever and, you know, so, so you avail yourself of that. And, and then I had, like, you know, we had people around that movie who everybody knew, "Yeah, he did that job. He, he never got arrested." And so, like, yeah, people, you know, meet pe- you know, and, and, uh, and talk to him. And it's interesting because the- such a good lesson for, for doing this job, which is that they're never how you think they're supposed to be, like the murderer person-

Joe Rogan 1:09:25 Right

Speaker 1:09:25 ... Right. You know, there's always something a little... I remember one guy was supposed to be, like, this really violent, kind of loose cannon fucking guy who was supposedly had done all this shit, like, stabbed and killed two people, Faneuil Hall, and shot these guys in a, in a robbery, and he, like, shows up with his polo shirt kind of tucked in. You know, he's, "Hi, how's it going?" [laughing]

Joe Rogan 1:09:43 [laughing]

Speaker 1:09:43 You know, just like, I never would have fucking put this guy on-

Matt Damon 1:09:46 [laughing]

Speaker 1:09:46 ... fucking killing four people. You know what I mean? "Hey, yeah, have a good time." We, so I love that one movie, and you're just thinking, "Fuck, man, like, this is why..." It, and, and it's a really good lesson for, like, you know, we tend to r- read a script and, "Okay, this guy's the tough guy, and he's gonna be the..." It's like you work with this, like, I had the fucking, like, the opportunity to train with these Delta guys. Like, you know, it's the most elite special forces combat fucking, uh, operators in the world. I mean, I suppose the SEALs will take exception to that, but what- just numerically, right? I think there's been less than 900 guys ever in the history of Delta. You meet them, and it's... They're not the biggest guys. They're not the toughest guys. They're not trying to fucking be hard, and, you know, they're the most relaxed, at ease, and it... You know, I found myself just being, like, finally, I was, "What? Can I just ask you, what do you think makes somebody, like, qualify for the, the Delta Force? Like, what's a good Delta operator?" He's like, "Uh, you know, problem-solving." [chuckles] "Problem-solving?" The guy was, "Yeah, it's probably like your job." I was like, "No, let me tell you something [laughing] It's, it's really not like my job. I appreciate it."

Matt Damon 1:10:48 [laughing]

Speaker 1:10:48 "There's a very big fucking difference." He's like, "Yeah, you solve problems." "Yeah, nobody's trying to kill me." [laughing]

Joe Rogan 1:10:52 [laughing]

Speaker 1:10:52 See, that's the thing. But that, that was the closest insight I got to it, which was... I've always kind of thought this about, like, a guys like, like Brady or something, that there's guys that just don't get tight, and that they are, they are kind of able to problem solve when the problem is, like, "Well, that helicopter's crashed-

Joe Rogan 1:11:10 Right

Speaker 1:11:10 ... "and we're 200 miles inside Afghanistan, and we're outnumbered fucking six to one. How do you think we should get home?" Like, just having your wits about you to make that calculation while, by the way, you're in a fucking gunfight and things, you know, I'm sure that does make... 'Cause those are the people whereas I'd be in a fucking panic, and not, have no idea what to do, and you get, like, attracted to the person who, who's, like, seems to have a, like, "Hey, I'm... It's good. We're gonna be okay. Everybody get your shit. We're going over here." You'll just follow that guy. You know what I mean?

Joe Rogan 1:11:39 Yeah. Yeah.

Speaker 1:11:39 And, uh... But it's a good le- it's not always the most... Maybe it's just 'cause they're so confident. They're not like, "I don't, like, I don't need to prove that I can kick anybody's ass. I don't even get in fights. Like, I have a weapon," you know what I mean? [laughing]

Matt Damon 1:11:51 [laughing]

Speaker 1:11:51 So, like, it's, it's just a, a... It always, it surprises me what it, how those kinds of, like, extraordinary experiences and people or extraordinary people don't always manifest themselves in how they show up.

Joe Rogan 1:12:04 Right, we have caricatures-

Speaker 1:12:05 Yeah, yeah

Joe Rogan 1:12:05 ... in our head of what, like, these tough people-

Speaker 1:12:08 Yeah

Joe Rogan 1:12:08 ... are like. Well, you, you see that about MMA fighters.

Speaker 1:12:10 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:12:10 Like, there's a lot of MMA fighters-

Speaker 1:12:12 Yeah

Joe Rogan 1:12:12 ... you meet them, they're like the sweetest, nicest, friendliest people [chuckles] in the world.

Speaker 1:12:15 It's like-

Matt Damon 1:12:15 I remember going to one of the events at, in LA, I think it was at, at Staples, and, and I was backstage and, and was talking to, uh, one of, like, the lawyers for the UFC about... Uh, we were talking about Conor McGregor, and he was telling me a great story about him. And this guy walks up, and he's in a, like, chinos, like, khaki pants and, like, a blue button-up, like, you know, kind of business shirt with spectacles, and he's very small, and I kind of don't really regard him, and I'm still hearing this story. And then Patrick goes, "Matt, do you know Henry?" And I turn, and it's Henry Cejudo, and I'm like, [chuckles] "This fucking guy could wreck me right now." [laughing]

Speaker 1:12:57 [laughing]

Matt Damon 1:12:57 "Absolutely fucking destroy me," and he, and he is the guy that some dummy would try to pick on.

Speaker 1:13:04 Yeah, right.

Matt Damon 1:13:04 You know what I mean?

Speaker 1:13:05 Exactly who you're talking about.

Matt Damon 1:13:05 Like, he's just not, he's not carrying himself.

Speaker 1:13:07 Right.

Matt Damon 1:13:07 Like, he's, he just is the thing, you know? And, and-

Speaker 1:13:11 You find out a little bit too late. [chuckles]

Matt Damon 1:13:13 Yeah, don't find that one out late.

Speaker 1:13:14 Yeah, yeah.

Matt Damon 1:13:15 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:13:16 A lot of guys do, unfortunately. Yeah, that's, uh, it's, uh... Well, they don't have to prove themselves, right?

Matt Damon 1:13:21 Right.

Joe Rogan 1:13:21 They do it all the time. The same with Delta Force guys. Like, this idea that this, like, outwardly brash, tough guy-

Matt Damon 1:13:28 Right

Joe Rogan 1:13:28 ... usually, that kind of machismo and... That's bullshit.

Matt Damon 1:13:32 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:13:32 That's, you're, you're using that 'cause you're insecure.

Matt Damon 1:13:34 Yeah.

Speaker 1:13:34 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 1:13:34 The secure people are very calm-

Speaker 1:13:36 Mm

Joe Rogan 1:13:36 ... and genuinely very friendly.

Matt Damon 1:13:38 Really nice.

Joe Rogan 1:13:39 Yeah.

Matt Damon 1:13:39 Yeah, that's been my experience, like-

Joe Rogan 1:13:40 Yeah, it's crazy, right?

Matt Damon 1:13:41 Yeah.

Speaker 1:13:41 It's kind of beautiful, too.

Joe Rogan 1:13:43 Yeah.

Speaker 1:13:43 You know, I've kind of like, "What a great guy!" And you feel like, "That's nice of you to be so s- so sweet to me, 'cause you obviously you don't have to be." [chuckles]

Joe Rogan 1:13:49 Right, right, right.

Matt Damon 1:13:50 Right.

Speaker 1:13:50 I'll just give you my watch if you want that. [laughing]

Matt Damon 1:13:53 [laughing] Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:13:54 Yeah. No, it's-

Matt Damon 1:13:55 [clears throat]

Joe Rogan 1:13:55 ... it is a fascinating thing. It's like we have these ideas in our head, these caricatures, you know, of what, what a, a tough man is, what a good woman is-

Matt Damon 1:14:03 Mm

Joe Rogan 1:14:03 ... what this is-

Matt Damon 1:14:03 Right

Joe Rogan 1:14:03 ... what that is.

Matt Damon 1:14:04 Mm.

Joe Rogan 1:14:05 And as I think one of the beautiful things ab- about film, when a, a film is really good, is you see these complex characters, and it sort of, like, reformulates in your mind, like, what a person actually is.

Matt Damon 1:14:15 Mm. Yeah, it's seeing all kinds of different people.

Joe Rogan 1:14:17 Yeah.

Matt Damon 1:14:17 You know? And, and yeah, yeah, I completely agree.

Speaker 1:14:20 I mean, look, the fundamental, like, challenge, I think, in life and, is like, in m- is like, to find some-... humility, which means actually thinking you might be wrong about the shit that you're pretty sure about. And it means that, like, you kinda have to assume somebody else might have a point. You know, it's not like just writing everybody else off who disagrees with you because, "Oh, fuck him, he's, dude, he's an asshole, he's a..." You know, like, those are things that actually take work to get to. Because the, the first instinct, 'cause you just defend your idea or whatever, it's easier-

Matt Damon 1:14:52 Right

Speaker 1:14:52 ... is to just-

Matt Damon 1:14:52 That it's a zero-sum game somehow.

Speaker 1:14:53 Yeah, exactly.

Matt Damon 1:14:54 Yeah, that, that two competing ideas can't exist, right?

Speaker 1:14:57 Well, that somebody can't be a good person and, and disagree-

Matt Damon 1:14:59 Like, and believe... Right. Right.

Speaker 1:15:00 That's the p- Like, if you're gonna decide, it's, "Oh, you can disagree, we don't believe so, or I don't know, what about this or what about that?" But once you find yourself relying on, like, "Well, I need to, like, zero out this person's humanity-

Matt Damon 1:15:10 Right

Speaker 1:15:11 ... in order to defend my idea," I think that's a pretty good indicator that, like, there's something wrong with the way you're thinking. Like, because it can't be that you're right about [chuckles] everything-

Matt Damon 1:15:19 Right

Speaker 1:15:19 ... and everyone else is bad who disagrees with you.

Joe Rogan 1:15:21 And I think that was one of the most interesting things about The Sopranos, is that the main character, the guy that you loved, was a fucking murderer.

Matt Damon 1:15:30 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:15:30 He was like, uh... Who would murder his friends, and he was a, a-

Matt Damon 1:15:34 Yeah

Joe Rogan 1:15:34 ... a complete mobster and a thug, but you really loved him.

Matt Damon 1:15:38 You yeah, loved the shit out of that guy.

Speaker 1:15:39 Yeah, you cared about him.

Joe Rogan 1:15:39 It was so complicated-

Matt Damon 1:15:41 I'm re-watching it with my daughter right now [chuckles]

Speaker 1:15:43 ... and James Gandolfini was so good at doing the part-

Matt Damon 1:15:44 He's, he's-

Speaker 1:15:44 ... that you found yourself being like, "I don't know, I think, uh, you, he probably has to kill him now."

Joe Rogan 1:15:48 Yeah.

Speaker 1:15:48 "Probably gonna kill him."

Matt Damon 1:15:48 But that's, that's also, that's also great, a great actor. Like, there's a very famous story about Marlon Brando when he did Streetcar Named Desire, and Tennessee Williams, who wrote it, like, freaked out because he was making Stanley Kowalski... He was making people empathize with Stanley Kowalski.

Speaker 1:16:07 Oh.

Matt Damon 1:16:07 And Tennessee Williams was like, "But I wrote him as a brute. He's this, he was like a two-dimensional brute who just came and beat up his wife," and b- you know, and, and was just, and was supposed to be this kind of dark, looming force over the play. But Brando was like, "No, he's a human being, and I'm gonna play him like a fucking human being." And, and it changed the, the play. But, but Williams, in much of his writings-

Speaker 1:16:28 Well, ultimately, that so much more reflects life and the real world.

Joe Rogan 1:16:29 Yeah.

Matt Damon 1:16:30 Yeah, exactly.

Speaker 1:16:30 So everybody's the hero of their story. Everyone has their reasons for why they're doing... And people don't set out to be like, "I'm just gonna go hurt someone or dominate the world." Like-

Joe Rogan 1:16:38 Yeah

Speaker 1:16:38 ... you think, "Well, I gotta protect what I have." It's like even the, you know, not to bring it back to this movie, but it's like, what I liked about Rip was it was kind of the slippery slope. You know, at first time, you take a little money, and then, "Well, you know, I gotta cover that. I don't wanna go to jail. I think I have my reason why I did that, but now I've told a lie. Now I gotta cover that thing." And now you have guys who both live by this code that's very, "Hey, you protect the people who are with you, and you gotta have this fucking..." And so now, it's two people are very similar, like, by that kind of slippery slope, ultimately find themselves, you know, willing to kill one another. Uh, because... And it's really not-- I don't, I don't believe in that one choice turn. It's like more, how do you find yourself, you dig yourself in a fucking hole? 'Cause you're just covering up the la- trying to fix the last problem that's arisen, you know? And everybody thinks, a ba- is, is of course, the roots for themself. It's like [chuckles] empathize with themself, is that's what we have to be concerned with, ourselves, our needs, our families, our basic shit. It's so hard to expect people to go like, "All right, and, and, and what about, you know, like, what they think?" And I a- and I think that's... I think it's a, it's a much more honest evaluation of people, and it allows for, like, complexity and forgiveness and fucking all the shit that's sort of beautiful about people. Like, uh, rather than this notion of like, "Well, we're gonna be binary, good or bad, perfect or not, whatever," and any infraction, then it's like t- permanently stains you.

Joe Rogan 1:17:58 Right.

Speaker 1:17:59 It's just a-

Joe Rogan 1:18:00 Right, that was like what we were talking about earlier about people that have been canceled. You know, that, that this idea that one thing you said or one thing you did, and now we're gonna exaggerate that to the fullest extent and cast you out of civilization for life.

Matt Damon 1:18:13 In perpetuity, yeah. Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:18:14 It's fucking crazy, and it's-

Matt Damon 1:18:16 Yeah, I was... Because, because I bet some of those people would have preferred to go to jail for 18 months or whatever, to, and, and, and then come out and say, "No, but I... That, the- we can't-- I'd, I paid my debt. Like, we're done." [chuckles]

Speaker 1:18:30 Yeah.

Matt Damon 1:18:30 "Like, can we be done?"

Speaker 1:18:31 Mm.

Matt Damon 1:18:31 Like, the, the, the thing about, about that, you know, getting kind of excoriated publicly like that, it's just, just never ends. And it's, and it's the first thing that, you know, it, it's just, it just will follow you to the grave, I think.

Joe Rogan 1:18:46 Well, it's also this problem that people have with people that are in the public eye, and they have this, like, desire to chop them down always. You know, and anybody that stumbles in the public eye, they wanna destroy their life, and they wanna just pile on. And you're not there with them, you don't feel the empathy, you're not talking to... They're not a human being.

Matt Damon 1:19:03 Right.

Joe Rogan 1:19:03 It's just text on a screen.

Matt Damon 1:19:05 Right.

Speaker 1:19:05 Yeah, it's just, like, kind of, like I was saying, like that kinda sixth-grade instinct to be like-

Joe Rogan 1:19:09 Yeah

Speaker 1:19:09 ... "Oh, he's in trouble!" You know, there's this, we, you know, human, like, we have dark, fucked up instincts [chuckles] too sometimes-

Joe Rogan 1:19:16 Yeah

Speaker 1:19:16 ... to, like, isolate people or get joy out of someone else, that they're in trouble. 'Cause maybe because part of it's saying, "Hey, it's not me," you know?

Joe Rogan 1:19:23 Yes.

Speaker 1:19:23 So if you can point the finger, everyone's looking over there, we feel safer, you know?

Joe Rogan 1:19:27 Right.

Speaker 1:19:28 But it's, it's like, yeah, and, and to, to, to take any forgiveness out of it, you know, is a really fucked up thing. Because then it makes it impossible, A, to actually go, "All right, yeah, I did that. Fuck, shit, I- that was wrong, I get it," you know? Because it doesn't matter. Once you've said you've done it, you're, you become, like, an outcast, and I don't think anybody wants to think, you know, like, you're, the sum total of who you are is your worst moment.

Joe Rogan 1:19:51 Right.

Speaker 1:19:51 You know, it's sort of like, the qu- you know, or, you know, I think you wanna be judged just as, well, are you capable of doing something good or something beautiful? It's not to say to forget, you know, there's people that just over and over and over again are doing horrible shit, don't care.

Joe Rogan 1:20:02 Right.

Speaker 1:20:02 I get it. No one's trying to, like, absolve that, but you remove the ability to sort of forgive people or look at them in a complicated way, or else it's kind of one, become one of those things that's like a, "Let's get one of ours or one of them," the instinct to get, like, a team, tribal-oriented, and it just becomes a sport, you know?

Joe Rogan 1:20:19 Yeah.... Yeah. It's also like, who wants to live in a world with no forgiveness and redemption?

Matt Damon 1:20:24 Right.

Speaker 1:20:24 Ugh.

Joe Rogan 1:20:24 That's crazy.

Speaker 1:20:25 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:20:25 Like, that's just denying the very nature of human beings.

Speaker 1:20:29 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:20:29 And that people do things that they regret, and they do- and then they become better people because of it, and to, to-

Matt Damon 1:20:35 Yeah, that's the-

Speaker 1:20:35 Some of the people I would rely on the most, like, trust my kids with the most, have done shit that they, that they really regret, and, you know, was, yeah, objectively wrong. And other people have been like, "Ah, shit, I did that. I fuck it," whether it's, like, addiction, "I got myself down this fucking road. I did this, I did this." They're able to go, "I did it. I'm sorry. It's real. I shouldn't have done it. It was wrong." They're-- actually, that, those people can become someone that's very trustworthy.

Joe Rogan 1:20:59 Yeah.

Speaker 1:20:59 'Cause you're like, "This motherfucker will say if they've done something..." They'll actually look at their own behavior, they'll acknowledge it, and then you, you feel, you feel good, and you feel much... Versus someone who tells you, like, "I'm, I'm, I... No, I got all, I, I always get it right. Everything's pre-"

Matt Damon 1:21:12 Well, yeah, it's like, it's all, it's about evolution, right? And, and, and, and, and in our own personal evolution, and we're all in our, on our own path towards that. Like, the, the, the idea of attacking someone, it's like, "Oh, so you, you aced the test? Like, put your pencil down?"

Speaker 1:21:27 Right. [laughing]

Joe Rogan 1:21:27 [laughing]

Matt Damon 1:21:27 Like, you nailed being human.

Speaker 1:21:29 Yeah, exactly.

Matt Damon 1:21:29 [chuckles] You're done. Like, congratulations.

Joe Rogan 1:21:32 Well, yeah, if you didn't nail being human, that's not possible because you forgot about the part about forgiveness-

Matt Damon 1:21:37 Right.

Speaker 1:21:37 Yeah

Joe Rogan 1:21:37 ... which is a giant part of it.

Matt Damon 1:21:38 Right.

Speaker 1:21:38 You haven't nailed it by definition-

Matt Damon 1:21:39 Right

Speaker 1:21:39 ... if you're out there throwing stones.

Joe Rogan 1:21:41 It's most of the people that I find, especially when there's someone that's publicly in trouble for something, most of the people that I know that have attacked people have a lot of questionable shit in their past, and it's almost like they're trying to hide that by going on the attack.

Speaker 1:21:53 Yeah, that's the thing, like, if I can point my finger, it's like-

Joe Rogan 1:21:55 Uh-huh

Speaker 1:21:55 ... no one's gonna be-

Joe Rogan 1:21:56 Yeah. "Oh, he's a good guy."

Speaker 1:21:57 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:21:57 "Ben's a good guy."

Speaker 1:21:58 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:21:58 "He's calling them out."

Speaker 1:21:59 Yeah, exactly.

Joe Rogan 1:22:00 Yeah, well, meanwhile-

Matt Damon 1:22:01 Right

Joe Rogan 1:22:01 ... you know.

Speaker 1:22:01 Mm-hmm. And if you, like, like... Yeah, I think it's like you, you were telling me to see, uh, Wake Up Dead Man, the Knives Out, the third Knives Out movie.

Matt Damon 1:22:08 Oh, yeah. Oh, it's great.

Speaker 1:22:09 And I watched it.

Joe Rogan 1:22:09 Yeah, it's great.

Speaker 1:22:09 I really liked it, and I thought it was a really interesting, like... You know, I'm not a religious guy. I don't, like, that's, you know, and, and, yeah, I'm aware of all the, like, okay, you know, there's the religion, then there's people who's supposed to be rational. I thought it was a really beautiful movie about, like, what's the role of grace in life?

Matt Damon 1:22:26 Right.

Joe Rogan 1:22:26 Yeah.

Speaker 1:22:26 You know?

Matt Damon 1:22:27 Yeah.

Speaker 1:22:27 And, and a really honest examination of that, like, sitting side by side with, yeah, okay, you don't believe in... But like, you, you, and, and, you know, so and it's not about, like, whether or not you're gonna argue over fucking evolution. It's about, like, w- how graceful are you in your life?

Joe Rogan 1:22:43 Yeah.

Speaker 1:22:43 You know, how much fucking dignity can you afford other people? And are you willing to recognize and see that there's maybe something bigger than yourself, and that there's a reason to, to, like, uh, to try to sort of be-- to find that grace, to get better, you know?

Joe Rogan 1:22:55 Yeah.

Matt Damon 1:22:55 Yeah.

Speaker 1:22:55 I thought it was really beautiful-

Matt Damon 1:22:56 Yeah

Speaker 1:22:56 ... and kind of rare and, uh, really surprised. It was very-

Matt Damon 1:22:59 I was really surprised, too. I, I kind of put it on and not, you know, not, not thinking I would like it-

Speaker 1:23:04 I still was thinking murder mystery.

Matt Damon 1:23:05 Yeah, I, I, I loved it. Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:23:07 Yeah, I loved it, too. I think it's one of the best of the three. It's, uh, my favorite, too.

Matt Damon 1:23:11 Yeah, my... It was my favorite of the three.

Joe Rogan 1:23:12 Those are great. Uh, Daniel Craig is great in that role.

Matt Damon 1:23:15 He's fantastic.

Speaker 1:23:16 Yeah.

Matt Damon 1:23:16 Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:23:16 The guy goes from James Bond to that.

Speaker 1:23:18 Right.

Matt Damon 1:23:18 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:23:18 And so many other things as well.

Speaker 1:23:19 So Josh-

Joe Rogan 1:23:21 Josh O'Connor

Speaker 1:23:21 ... Josh O'Connor, the, that, who played the priest-

Joe Rogan 1:23:23 Mm-hmm

Speaker 1:23:23 ... I, 'cause I first saw him on, uh, on, uh, The Crown.

Joe Rogan 1:23:26 The Crown, yeah.

Speaker 1:23:26 He played-

Joe Rogan 1:23:27 I liked him a lot in this thing, yeah

Speaker 1:23:28 ... Prince Charles. Fucking, man, what an actor he is. Really, really good.

Joe Rogan 1:23:31 How much film do you guys consume? Do you, do you spend a lot of time watching films? I mean, do you-

Matt Damon 1:23:36 Well, with the company, like-

Joe Rogan 1:23:37 Do you consider it-

Speaker 1:23:37 It depends.

Matt Damon 1:23:38 There's a lot, like, if we're working, we're watching cuts after cuts and going to the editing room. Like, there's a lot of kind of work around a- all the stuff that we have going that, that, that eats into a lot of time, um-

Speaker 1:23:48 And mostly it's trying to keep up with w- what people are doing. Uh, my, my issue is really that, like, we've kind of developed this pattern where all these sort of movies that come out are more interesting and very... Like, they're all jammed out at the last fucking month of the year, and so all of a sudden, you're trying to race-

Matt Damon 1:24:03 You got homework

Speaker 1:24:03 ... through all these movies. [chuckles]

Matt Damon 1:24:03 Yeah, right.

Joe Rogan 1:24:04 Right.

Speaker 1:24:04 I got really lucky, like, uh, recently, my son, you know, who's 13, decided he wants to, like, watch movies, you know? And I, like, give him shit. I'm like: "What are you fucking... You're always looking at TikTok and shit. Like, we- why don't-- let's watch a movie." And, you know, he's kind of blowing me off and rolling his eyes, and like, you know. I mean, if you're a dad, you're kind of an asshole fundamentally. Like, "Come on, Dad."

Joe Rogan 1:24:23 Right.

Speaker 1:24:23 "You don't know what's going on." You know what I mean? Like, he told me one time, he, he was like, "Dad..." I said, "Look, look, let's watch this movie," and I played him the trailer. It was, it, and it was... I can't remember what the movie was. It was a good movie, and the trailer was good. He just looks at it and goes, "You know what you guys ought to do? You guys ought to work with some of the TikTok editors." [laughing]

Joe Rogan 1:24:41 [laughing]

Matt Damon 1:24:41 [laughing]

Speaker 1:24:41 It's just like- [laughing]

Matt Damon 1:24:42 Wow!

Joe Rogan 1:24:44 Oh, no.

Speaker 1:24:44 I went and told the editors. I told Billy and Chris that. I was like: "Guys, I got news for you."

Matt Damon 1:24:48 [chuckles]

Speaker 1:24:48 "You guys..." But, but now he's like, "All right, let's watch, like, what are some movies I should watch?" You got Letterboxd, he got into that thing, you know, it's like... So I said, so I said, "Okay, what are the great movies? I'll give you a list." I start giving him a list. They started watching them, and so... I mean, this is like heaven for me. So I said, "Okay, what are you watching?" "The King of Comedy." Like, last week, he watched Taxi Driver, King of... all these Scorsese movies.

Joe Rogan 1:25:09 Mm.

Speaker 1:25:09 And it really was like, "Oh, man, I, I..." 'Cause in my mind, I'm like, "Sure, I've seen that movie. I know it." I watched them again, it was, I like, seeing it all, I realized how much better they were than I even could appreciate when I watched it when I was younger.

Joe Rogan 1:25:21 Yeah.

Speaker 1:25:21 And it really... And it was just the most beautiful fucking experience for me to watch my son, like, taking an interest in it. 'Cause the, you know, the older two have always been a little bit like, "Yeah, Dad, no, great." But, "Hey, you guys wanna come to the premiere?" "No, not really." [laughing]

Joe Rogan 1:25:34 [laughing]

Matt Damon 1:25:34 [laughing]

Speaker 1:25:34 "You guys wanna come to the set?" "No, I'm good." You know? [chuckles] And, and that's-

Matt Damon 1:25:37 Well, it's just too much familiarity, you know?

Speaker 1:25:40 Yeah.

Matt Damon 1:25:40 You grow up with a dad as a movie star, you're just like, "Eh."

Speaker 1:25:42 The kid's gotta...

Joe Rogan 1:25:43 Yeah.

Speaker 1:25:43 And I get it.

Matt Damon 1:25:43 Yeah.

Speaker 1:25:43 You gotta be your own person, do your thing-

Matt Damon 1:25:45 Sure

Speaker 1:25:45 ... They have all their own shit, and I get... You know, I, I never even, so I never expected it from my son, and I don't know that he's gonna... You know, and I wouldn't wanna lean on him, like, "Hey, get into the family business." Um, most of the time, it's just like, you know, we go to, like, basketball games, baseball, all that type of stuff, and, um, but it, but this was a really, it was like, oh, fuck, it was, like, so joyful. You know what I mean? To sit there and watch some movies with my, my kid. I was like, I was like, "This doesn't get better. This is the happiest I may ever be in my whole life. You know, right here, watch this movie." And he's like, "Wow, we..." He's telling me what he thinks, you know? I'm just like, like, "Honestly, the rest of it, you can fucking keep it," you know?

Joe Rogan 1:26:23 That's awesome.

Speaker 1:26:24 ... That's the best.

Joe Rogan 1:26:25 Well, it's great that you guys still love film, you know? That it's a- it hasn't become just a job. It hasn't become a thing that you do, that you, you really enjoy it and love it.

Matt Damon 1:26:35 Yeah, it was never a job. I mean, it really, like, we was, it was like the, an absolute dream from the time we were kids. I mean, we, we did fucking high school theater together, you know? Like [chuckles] -

Joe Rogan 1:26:44 That's crazy!

Matt Damon 1:26:45 Yeah, um-

Speaker 1:26:46 It was like we're lucky to get it, and lucky to-

Matt Damon 1:26:49 Yeah

Speaker 1:26:49 ... The whole idea that you could even... The goal was, like, to make a living, to not have to be like, "Well, I'm an actor, you know, slash a waiter, contractor, dentist," [chuckles] or whatever the fuck it is-

Matt Damon 1:26:57 Yeah

Speaker 1:26:57 ... You know? Like, actually, I can earn money. I can... And we always figured, like, I don't need that much, especially if we didn't have kids.

Matt Damon 1:27:03 Yeah.

Speaker 1:27:04 You know, okay, we can make a living, or it's, you know, maybe it's fucking gonna be dinner theater, or maybe it's gonna be writing.

Matt Damon 1:27:08 Yeah.

Speaker 1:27:09 Maybe it's gonna be, you know-

Matt Damon 1:27:09 There'll be a job somewhere that we can find where we can do this and keep doing it, yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:27:13 Well, there's something that I, I, I mean, I love when people love things. I, I, I spend time on YouTube watching people, like, uh, fix watches. You know, like, I, I don't know why, but I, I love when people make furniture.

Matt Damon 1:27:26 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:27:26 I love, I love watching people do things that they really love, that they're invested in. I think we all have that thing in us, where we see someone who's got a passion for something, someone who really loves it, and that's what everybody really wants in life-

Speaker 1:27:38 Yeah

Joe Rogan 1:27:38 ... to be l-

Speaker 1:27:39 Your purpose

Joe Rogan 1:27:39 ... lost in the thing you love-

Matt Damon 1:27:40 Yeah

Joe Rogan 1:27:40 ... to have a purpose.

Matt Damon 1:27:41 Yeah.

Speaker 1:27:42 And it's beautiful.

Matt Damon 1:27:42 Yeah, and even-

Speaker 1:27:43 I agree

Matt Damon 1:27:43 ... watching someone else with true purpose is-

Joe Rogan 1:27:45 Yeah

Matt Damon 1:27:46 ... yeah, inspiring.

Joe Rogan 1:27:46 Very, it's hypnotic.

Speaker 1:27:47 It reminds me of Joe Versus the Volcano, where he goes in to buy luggage.

Matt Damon 1:27:50 Oh, God, oh, that's one of my favorite scenes.

Speaker 1:27:50 "Do you like luggage, sir?" He's like, "Uh..." He goes, "Luggage is the central preoccupation of my life."

Matt Damon 1:27:56 "Is the central preoccupation of my life." [chuckles] Yeah, it's-

Speaker 1:27:57 The guy's a luggage salesman, and he fucking loves bags. [laughs]

Matt Damon 1:27:58 He loves nothing more than luggage.

Speaker 1:28:00 And by the way, I was like, "Okay, that's the guy I'm going to." [laughs]

Matt Damon 1:28:01 And, like, and it's the greatest scene. I asked Tom Hanks about that when I did Saving Private Ryan. I was like: Can you tell me about that scene? 'Cause we love this scene so much. And he go- and he named the actor, he's a Broadway actor, I guess, the guy. He came in, he, he worked for, like, one day in this scene, and he's so good in that movie. And then, at the very end, he's showing him all the luggage, and Tom Hanks has unlimited money to spend. He thinks he's dying, and so he basically goes like, "Well, what's the best luggage?" And he goes, "Well, if I..." You know, and he opens the-

Speaker 1:28:26 If I had the means, sir [chuckles]

Matt Damon 1:28:27 ... If I had the means, sir. And he opens up this thing, and there's this trunk-

Speaker 1:28:29 Oh!

Matt Damon 1:28:29 ... and it's like this music plays, and he opens it, and Tom Hanks is like, "I'll take two of them." [laughs]

Speaker 1:28:34 [laughs]

Matt Damon 1:28:34 And he goes, "May you live to be 1,000 years old!" [laughing] It is the greatest day of his life.

Speaker 1:28:42 One of the best things. Oh, God!

Joe Rogan 1:28:43 That's amazing. You guys have been in some fucking bangers, man. Saving Private Ryan, that opening film, the storming of the beach-

Matt Damon 1:28:51 Unbelievable

Joe Rogan 1:28:52 ... That might be the, the most realistic depiction of war that's ever been made.

Matt Damon 1:28:56 So I remember reading the script, and there was all this dialogue, all this stuff that was written. And I came late, 'cause I'm only in the... And he shot it chronologically, and I'm only in the last, you know, the last act of the movie, basically. And, and, uh, and he told me on set, I was saying, "How..." I go, "How did it go at the beginning?" I go, "You know, there's that, all that dialogue with them on the boat coming in," and, and Steven goes... He just goes, "I cut, I cut all of that out." He goes, he goes, "No talking for the first 27 minutes of this movie."

Joe Rogan 1:29:26 Whoa!

Matt Damon 1:29:27 And that was when I was like, "Oh, my God, this movie's gonna be fucking unbelievable."

Speaker 1:29:31 Yeah, that's just-

Matt Damon 1:29:31 I think Tom says, like, "I'll see you on the beach" or something. He's scream- you know, guys are puking-

Speaker 1:29:35 Look at the man next to you-

Matt Damon 1:29:36 Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, remember the-

Speaker 1:29:37 ... He's not gonna live through it.

Matt Damon 1:29:38 That that was the script, right?

Speaker 1:29:39 Right.

Matt Damon 1:29:39 Remember that?

Speaker 1:29:40 Yeah, yeah.

Matt Damon 1:29:40 It was, it was, it was, "Look at the man next to you. He won't live..." You know-

Speaker 1:29:43 He's gonna die, yeah.

Matt Damon 1:29:43 He's like, "Two out of three of you are gonna die, so look at, to your left, look to your right, and feel bad for those two sons of bitches, 'cause they're not gonna make it." You know, it was stuff like that, and Steven was just like, "Nope, no."

Joe Rogan 1:29:54 Wow.

Matt Damon 1:29:55 "No." These guys are puking. They're ve- It's like the thing's up, you can just hear tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, you know? And it's just like... And then just boom, and you're into it, and-

Joe Rogan 1:30:04 [exhales]

Matt Damon 1:30:04 ... Also, they did this incredible, like, like-

Speaker 1:30:06 Little guy changing

Matt Damon 1:30:06 ... cinema changing-

Speaker 1:30:08 Yeah, open the shutter

Matt Damon 1:30:09 ... Open the shutter all the way.

Speaker 1:30:10 Took away all the motion blur.

Matt Damon 1:30:11 Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 1:30:11 They skipped the b- the bleach process in developing the film.

Matt Damon 1:30:14 I don't, I, I-

Speaker 1:30:15 Created that look

Matt Damon 1:30:15 ... And, and I don't know if they're going to 22 or 23 frames anywhere in there, maybe, but I, I, I just remember-

Speaker 1:30:20 My-

Matt Damon 1:30:21 ... Maybe it's just the open shutters, just pa, pa, pa, pa, pa.

Speaker 1:30:22 But when you open the shutter-

Matt Damon 1:30:23 Remember, yeah.

Speaker 1:30:24 Yeah, but it just means-

Matt Damon 1:30:24 Yeah

Speaker 1:30:24 ... that instead of, like, the motion blur is what makes something that, like, moves across the frame quickly. If you look at each frame, it's like a blurred thing, and when you roll those at 24 frames, it gives you this, the illusion that it moves across fluidly. And if you basically open the shutter up so you get much more light, each frame takes a super sharp picture, and when you run those together, like, the piece of dust goes tick, tick, tick, tick. You know, that's what-

Matt Damon 1:30:45 And so the mortar explosions are going like ta, ta, ta, ta, and it... And you get that feeling that you're adrenalized, and you're see... You know what I mean?

Speaker 1:30:51 Ah, yeah, yeah.

Matt Damon 1:30:51 And it's just... And nobody had ever done it, and-

Speaker 1:30:54 He's just a master of the thing.

Matt Damon 1:30:55 Yeah, he-

Speaker 1:30:56 He understood how to use the tools, and combined with a great idea, and it's, that's just masterful.

Matt Damon 1:31:00 Yeah.

Speaker 1:31:00 Like, that's just how you do it. There's nobody who directs movies who doesn't go, "Ah, it's Spielberg," you know? [chuckles]

Matt Damon 1:31:05 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:31:05 Yeah.

Speaker 1:31:06 That's, that's how you do it.

Matt Damon 1:31:07 That's, uh-

Speaker 1:31:08 This is, like you say, one of those things, a guy that's passionate and also, you know, y- y- caring about something, you know, it's con- that, that, with that much passion, is kind of connected to greatness.

Joe Rogan 1:31:19 Yeah.

Speaker 1:31:19 And it's, I think, why we love to see that, whether, you know, sports, fucking, you know, fighting, or whatever it is, there's something that makes you kind of love being alive and [chuckles] also love that-

Joe Rogan 1:31:31 Yeah

Speaker 1:31:31 ... that person, where you go, "Fuck," like, when you see Michael Jordan. Like, that was that whole movie that we did, Air, is really all about. Like, what does it mean to be great? And how does it, like, touch everybody, and change everybody, and make people wanna fucking improve their own lives because somebody's just better at, at that thing than anybody else in the world?

Joe Rogan 1:31:50 Yeah.

Speaker 1:31:51 It's, it's transfixing, you know? I mean, I find that really fascinating.

Joe Rogan 1:31:56 Yeah.

Speaker 1:31:56 Like, I... You know, people who are great at something, and the mystery of, like, well, what is that like, and what does that do to your life, and how did you get that way, and what does it take, you know?

Joe Rogan 1:32:04 And what's the cost?

Speaker 1:32:06 What's the cost?

Joe Rogan 1:32:06 'Cause to truly be great at something, you have to kind of almost abandon everything.

Speaker 1:32:11 I, I've seen that in various ways. Like, in, in that kind of just empirical personal study-... I haven't seen anybody who I think, like, qualifies for that, who, who didn't also seem to be really suffering.

Joe Rogan 1:32:23 100%.

Speaker 1:32:23 You know, and you're like, "Damn, sh- you should be so happy. You're the greatest!"

Joe Rogan 1:32:26 Oh.

Speaker 1:32:26 You've been... And the, you know, interviewer's always, "How do you feel right now?" And there's that sense that, like, ew, it's never finished-

Joe Rogan 1:32:31 Right

Speaker 1:32:31 ... or it's never enough-

Joe Rogan 1:32:32 Mm. Right

Speaker 1:32:32 ... or they can't enjoy it, or they're carried... It's that line we, we put in Air where it's like, "And you have to be that thing."

Matt Damon 1:32:37 You have to be that thing, yeah.

Speaker 1:32:38 You know? Like, it's a kind of a burden-

Matt Damon 1:32:40 It's a, yeah

Speaker 1:32:40 ... too, in a way.

Joe Rogan 1:32:41 100%.

Speaker 1:32:42 And I, I just see that, and that's why we, we want these heroes and people who are great to, I don't know, you know, flourish, have their life, and have it all in hand. Like, there's all this tragedy and all this stuff that happens, too, and I, I, I- it's... Yeah, just like you said, there, there seems to be a real cost.

Joe Rogan 1:32:58 Well, there's always a massive cost in personal relationships, because there's no way you have the time for other things. And the obsession that you have to be the best at something, you have to abandon almost all your concern for everything else. You have to have this single-minded focus, and that comes with a cost for the rest of your life, because you damage relationships-

Speaker 1:33:18 Yeah.

Matt Damon 1:33:18 Mm-hmm

Joe Rogan 1:33:18 ... you feel like a piece of shit, you-

Speaker 1:33:19 And you see that up close, and like, that's not admirable.

Joe Rogan 1:33:21 Right. Right.

Speaker 1:33:22 Yeah, you don't give a fuck about anybody else?

Joe Rogan 1:33:24 Right, right.

Speaker 1:33:24 "No, I do! I just care about this more."

Joe Rogan 1:33:26 Right. Yeah.

Speaker 1:33:26 You know? It's like, so imagine that. You're making the sacrifices, and it's causing injury to people, and you know it.

Joe Rogan 1:33:32 Yeah.

Speaker 1:33:32 And you don't wanna hurt them, but you can't help it, and you're getting rewarded for it. You know, it's, it's complicated. Yeah, it's, it's-

Joe Rogan 1:33:38 It's crazy because you inspire all these people that don't know you, and you ruin all your relationships [laughing] with the people-

Matt Damon 1:33:43 Right, right, right, right. [laughing] That's right.

Speaker 1:33:44 Maybe that's why they say, "Don't meet your heroes."

Matt Damon 1:33:46 Yeah, exactly. [laughing]

Joe Rogan 1:33:47 Yeah, exactly. [laughing] There's something to it-

Matt Damon 1:33:48 Yeah

Joe Rogan 1:33:48 ... man, there really is. But it's just, uh, we all grow from it. There's a fuel to watching greatness.

Speaker 1:33:55 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 1:33:55 There's a thing that-

Matt Damon 1:33:56 Yeah

Joe Rogan 1:33:56 ... that hits you and lights you up-

Matt Damon 1:33:59 Yeah.

Speaker 1:33:59 Mm-hmm

Joe Rogan 1:33:59 ... where you wanna do more, you wanna be better.

Speaker 1:34:01 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 1:34:01 You wanna... Whatever it is that you can do, whatever it is you do do, you become more, w- whether it's a great game, a winning touchdown, whether it's a great film-

Matt Damon 1:34:09 Yeah, it inspires you

Joe Rogan 1:34:10 ... a great song.

Matt Damon 1:34:10 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:34:11 Yeah, it, it lights you up, and it, it's the fuel that we all live off of, that consumes, that like, we consume to make our culture move forward.

Speaker 1:34:19 Yeah.

Matt Damon 1:34:20 Yeah.

Speaker 1:34:20 You know, there's like a sacrificial element to it, the people that do it, and we all feed off of it-

Joe Rogan 1:34:24 Uh-huh

Speaker 1:34:24 ... you know? And it feels like, well, that's the person that [chuckles] doesn't get enough out of it, you know?

Joe Rogan 1:34:28 Right. Right. But i- i- in great film... I mean, how many lives have been changed by decisions made after great films? Like, when I was a kid, I, I think I was, like, seven or eight or something when Rocky came out.

Matt Damon 1:34:39 Mm.

Joe Rogan 1:34:39 And I, I saw it and immediately ran around the block.

Matt Damon 1:34:43 [laughing]

Joe Rogan 1:34:43 I've never run in my life. [laughing] I was like... I was eating raw eggs.

Matt Damon 1:34:46 Right. [laughing]

Speaker 1:34:46 Yeah. [laughing]

Joe Rogan 1:34:46 I was like, "I'm like, this is gonna change my life."

Matt Damon 1:34:49 [laughing]

Joe Rogan 1:34:49 Like, it, it, there's things that happen when you see something truly great, that it makes you wanna be better as a human being. It makes you wanna-

Speaker 1:34:56 I remember where I was when I saw Denzel Washington play Malcolm X.

Joe Rogan 1:35:00 Mm.

Speaker 1:35:00 Went to the movies and watched that movie, and I remember leaving, I mean, I was 19 or so, thinking, "I wanna be a better man."

Joe Rogan 1:35:06 Yeah.

Speaker 1:35:07 I thought that in my mind-

Joe Rogan 1:35:08 Yeah

Speaker 1:35:08 ... you know, because of what I had seen this actor do and this perfo- and the way... You know, that was the only real conscious thought I had, but I remember having it, and, and kind of being surprised by it, you know?

Joe Rogan 1:35:19 Yeah.

Matt Damon 1:35:20 Mm.

Speaker 1:35:20 And it does, it, it, that shit can, you know, it's really touched me, you know, a lot of fucking people's work. And, and that's why you get that, like... You know, you, you, you see the people, and you wanna let them know, you know what I mean?

Joe Rogan 1:35:32 Yeah.

Speaker 1:35:32 And tell them, and, um, I k- I always think people come to you, "Oh, hey, I love that movie." I always feel like, "Ah, you don't have to say that." You know what I mean?

Joe Rogan 1:35:38 Right, right, right.

Speaker 1:35:39 Uh, it makes me kind of u- un- uncomfortable, and I, I don't ever, like, l- put myself in with those figures who I think are like, "Oh, but there's these, these towering giants who have done this," you know? I don't know, it's, uh, it's the, it's, it's, it's... I finally kind of ca- arrived to a place where it was like, it was uncomfortable. "People say, "Oh, I saw The Good One Thing. It made me wanna go out to Hollywood and write a script." And I think, "Oh, shit, I wanna hop back home." [laughing]

Joe Rogan 1:36:03 [laughing]

Matt Damon 1:36:03 [laughing]

Speaker 1:36:03 You know what I mean? Like, all right.

Joe Rogan 1:36:04 Sorry, man. [laughing]

Matt Damon 1:36:07 [laughing]

Speaker 1:36:07 Like, [laughing] at a certain point, I figured, "Okay, you know what? Whatever it is, like, great."

Joe Rogan 1:36:11 Well, it's-

Speaker 1:36:11 That's the thing that-

Joe Rogan 1:36:11 ... the cost of your fame, you know, that you have to... There's gonna be a bunch of people that are gonna come up to you and then wanna say those things to you. And, like, the wanting them to say those things to you is t- the opposite of the mindset that you need to make those things. [laughing]

Speaker 1:36:26 Right, exactly. Exactly.

Matt Damon 1:36:27 [laughing] Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:36:27 Which is, it's so counterintuitive.

Speaker 1:36:29 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:36:29 You think, like, once you become really successful, and you make a bunch of great things, it's gonna be awesome having all these people come up to you. Like, no, no, no, I'm doing something else right now.

Speaker 1:36:36 Yeah.

Matt Damon 1:36:36 Right, right.

Joe Rogan 1:36:36 And I can't be all wrapped up in the fact that I'm changing your fucking life. [laughing]

Matt Damon 1:36:40 Right. [laughing]

Speaker 1:36:40 And also, I can't be satisfied-

Joe Rogan 1:36:42 It's like-

Speaker 1:36:42 ... or take any fucking joy in that-

Joe Rogan 1:36:43 Ever

Speaker 1:36:43 ... 'cause I, I don't think-

Joe Rogan 1:36:44 Right

Speaker 1:36:44 ... I'm good enough yet.

Joe Rogan 1:36:45 Right.

Speaker 1:36:45 I need to fucking... You know what I mean?

Joe Rogan 1:36:47 Right, never satisfy.

Matt Damon 1:36:48 Right.

Speaker 1:36:48 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:36:48 Yeah. You can't, and that's the, the darkness of trying to do something great. You'll never be satisfied.

Speaker 1:36:53 You see it in a lot of the fighters, the same kind of thing, the great-

Joe Rogan 1:36:56 Oh, yeah

Speaker 1:36:56 ... great fighters.

Joe Rogan 1:36:57 Well, also, fighters have a very small window of greatness. There's, uh, there's only, like, a certain amount of years we can burn the RPMs-

Matt Damon 1:37:04 Mm

Joe Rogan 1:37:04 ... at, at the red line, and then eventually the knees go, the back goes. You, you start to-

Matt Damon 1:37:08 Is it earlier than other sports? It must be, yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:37:10 Yes, I think so. Because, like, Tom Brady is still elite. I bet he could probably play football right now. I bet he... You know, what- how old is Tom now? 40?

Matt Damon 1:37:17 He's probably 47 or 8 now, probably.

Speaker 1:37:20 Like that, yeah.

Matt Damon 1:37:20 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:37:20 I bet he could still play, you know?

Matt Damon 1:37:22 Yeah, I mean, but that's a... Yeah, I mean, that's a very specific skill position-

Joe Rogan 1:37:25 Yes

Matt Damon 1:37:25 ... and the way he played it, he, you know, he, yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:37:27 Right, but running back, no.

Matt Damon 1:37:28 Right.

Speaker 1:37:29 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:37:29 Right.

Matt Damon 1:37:29 Right, right.

Joe Rogan 1:37:29 But at-

Matt Damon 1:37:30 Cornerback, you know.

Joe Rogan 1:37:31 The elite levels of MMA, especially with USADA testing and, you know, and now, uh, drug-free sport testing, when they are making sure that people aren't on testosterone and growth hormone, all these different things, like, you have nine years.

Matt Damon 1:37:45 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:37:45 You have nine years at peak performance.

Matt Damon 1:37:47 Right.

Joe Rogan 1:37:47 That's legitimate. Like-

Matt Damon 1:37:49 How long has Jon Jones been going?

Speaker 1:37:50 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:37:50 Jon Jones is a freak of all freaks.

Matt Damon 1:37:52 [chuckles]

Joe Rogan 1:37:52 'Cause Jon Jones beat Daniel Cormier when he was on coke. That was one of the funny things he said in the, uh, in the press conference for the rematch.

Matt Damon 1:37:59 [chuckles]

Joe Rogan 1:37:59 Daniel was talking shit. He goes, "I beat you when I was on coke." [laughing]

Matt Damon 1:38:03 [laughing] That's...

Joe Rogan 1:38:07 [laughing] I mean, he was getting arrested, he was partying.

Matt Damon 1:38:11 Right.

Joe Rogan 1:38:11 He- for when he fought, uh, Gustafsson, he beat Gustafsson, and he didn't train at all.

Matt Damon 1:38:17 Mm.

Joe Rogan 1:38:17 I talked to his trainer. He's like, "He didn't even show up at the gym. He was fucking never there. He was never training. He could just show up and beat everybody's ass."

Matt Damon 1:38:24 I saw a thing, uh, on my Instagram feed of a fighter, and I, I don't know who it was, but he was a heavyweight. And he-... he goes, "I had the chance to spar with Jon Jones, to, to work with Jon Jones." And he goes, "I, you know, I, I knew about it months ahead of time." He goes, "I got every- my nutrition, everything was absolutely flawless. I got all, you know, my sleep, everything was on." He goes, "I show up at the gym that morning," he goes, "It's me and five other guys." He goes, "He comes in, I think he went to sleep at 4:00 in the morning or something-

Joe Rogan 1:38:53 Yeah

Matt Damon 1:38:53 ... He was out all night," and he goes, "He ran through all six of us."

Joe Rogan 1:38:56 That's my buddy, Brendan Schaub.

Matt Damon 1:38:57 Is that who it was?

Joe Rogan 1:38:58 Yeah. [laughing]

Speaker 1:38:58 [laughing]

Matt Damon 1:38:58 Okay, yeah. It was the funniest story. I was just like... And he goes, "And then I just knew," you know, like-

Joe Rogan 1:39:02 Yeah. There's levels.

Matt Damon 1:39:03 Well, that's, that's a level, like-

Joe Rogan 1:39:05 Yeah, [chuckles] that's a level.

Speaker 1:39:05 Yeah.

Matt Damon 1:39:05 But imagine being that elite-

Joe Rogan 1:39:07 Mm-hmm

Matt Damon 1:39:08 ... and, and realizing there's another level.

Joe Rogan 1:39:10 Yeah.

Matt Damon 1:39:10 You know?

Joe Rogan 1:39:10 Oh, yeah, Brendan was a top 10 heavyweight, and Jon-

Matt Damon 1:39:13 Yeah

Joe Rogan 1:39:13 ... wasn't even a heavyweight. Jon was a light heavyweight. It was a-

Matt Damon 1:39:16 Wow

Joe Rogan 1:39:16 ... lower weight class, and he just beat everybody's ass, and he said this was his warm-up. [laughing]

Matt Damon 1:39:22 [laughing] He just get in there-

Speaker 1:39:24 Let's go fuck everybody up.

Joe Rogan 1:39:26 And just fuck everybody up. I mean, he has a unique aptitude for MMA, but also he had two brothers that were super athletes.

Matt Damon 1:39:31 Чанning Jones.

Joe Rogan 1:39:32 Yes.

Matt Damon 1:39:32 Yeah, played for the Patriots.

Joe Rogan 1:39:33 And Arthur.

Matt Damon 1:39:33 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:39:34 And so these guys are super athletes, and so they're beating the shit out of each other all the time.

Matt Damon 1:39:38 Right, yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:39:38 So they're, like, constantly in competition with elite athletes from the time he was a child.

Matt Damon 1:39:43 From the time they were tiny, yeah, yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:39:44 So he was just so tuned into competition, and he, he was so intelligent. Like, his fight IQ was above and beyond everyone's, and he would study tape meticulously.

Matt Damon 1:39:54 Well, that, that, that spinning kick that he did-

Joe Rogan 1:39:58 Mm-hmm

Matt Damon 1:39:58 ... to that-

Speaker 1:39:58 Stipe Miocic

Matt Damon 1:39:59 ... Stipe-

Speaker 1:39:59 Yeah

Matt Damon 1:39:59 ... where he, where he said he... And I think he thanked his taekwondo coach.

Joe Rogan 1:40:03 Uh-huh.

Matt Damon 1:40:04 And he said he had been working on this one specific kick from both sides-

Joe Rogan 1:40:08 Yeah

Matt Damon 1:40:08 ... because of something he saw on the tape. And he, and he got it off and hit this guy so hard.

Speaker 1:40:16 Nice.

Matt Damon 1:40:16 Not even on, not even on his liver side. He hit him on the other side, and you see it shudder through his entire, like, organ structure.

Joe Rogan 1:40:22 Yeah, he, his heel-

Matt Damon 1:40:23 He-

Joe Rogan 1:40:23 ... was deep into his body cavity-

Matt Damon 1:40:26 It was so-

Joe Rogan 1:40:26 ... like, all the way up to his fucking spine

Matt Damon 1:40:28 ... it was so gnarly.

Joe Rogan 1:40:28 Yeah.

Matt Damon 1:40:29 Like, and but he had s- but he, he, he just practiced this one specific... And he was like, "It's-"

Speaker 1:40:35 That's what-

Matt Damon 1:40:35 ... And he even said, "It is a devastating shot." Like-

Joe Rogan 1:40:38 Yeah

Matt Damon 1:40:38 ... "I- there's not a human being who could take that."

Joe Rogan 1:40:40 No, it's like getting hit by a car.

Matt Damon 1:40:42 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:40:42 Because when you, when you do it-

Matt Damon 1:40:43 But getting hit by a car in one spot [chuckles] -

Joe Rogan 1:40:45 Right, right, right

Matt Damon 1:40:46 ... You know what I mean?

Joe Rogan 1:40:46 The size of a foot.

Matt Damon 1:40:47 Yeah.

Speaker 1:40:47 Yeah, yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:40:47 The size of a 13 foot.

Matt Damon 1:40:48 Oh, yeah, here it is.

Joe Rogan 1:40:49 Right here.

Matt Damon 1:40:49 Watch this.

Joe Rogan 1:40:50 He sets him up. Boom!

Matt Damon 1:40:52 Boom. It's just, and-

Speaker 1:40:53 Wow.

Matt Damon 1:40:53 It's like-

Joe Rogan 1:40:54 Oh

Matt Damon 1:40:54 ... yeah, no, it's over, it's over, it's over.

Joe Rogan 1:40:55 And this is Jon moving up to heavyweight because light heavyweight wasn't a challenge anymore. He decided to become a two-division champion. I mean, Jon was a freak.

Speaker 1:41:04 Oh, you see it rumbling through.

Matt Damon 1:41:05 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:41:05 And by the way, that was almost a little bit glancing, 'cause he caught him with a bent leg.

Matt Damon 1:41:10 Right, right.

Joe Rogan 1:41:10 Like, he wasn't even-

Matt Damon 1:41:11 It wasn't a full extension

Joe Rogan 1:41:11 ... fully extended-

Matt Damon 1:41:12 Yeah

Joe Rogan 1:41:12 ... which, you know, was even more devastating.

Matt Damon 1:41:14 Geez, yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:41:14 But Jon realized that as a heavyweight, he didn't have the power that he had at light heavyweight, and so he said, "The most powerful kick is a spinning back kick, so I'm just gonna work on that kick over and over again, 'cause that's the one tool that I have that can knock a heavyweight out with one shot."

Matt Damon 1:41:28 Wow, okay. That's just intelligence.

Speaker 1:41:30 So it's not just the physical stuff, he's also, like, a genius.

Matt Damon 1:41:32 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:41:32 Oh, yeah, he's a genius.

Speaker 1:41:32 [chuckles]

Joe Rogan 1:41:33 Like, well, he's also, like... He's the most meticulous when it comes to game planning and study. He will not take a short-notice fight. Even a guy that he could fucking beat any day of the week, you could wake him up at 3:00 o'clock in the morning, he could fuck that guy up, he will not take that fight-

Matt Damon 1:41:47 Right

Joe Rogan 1:41:47 ... unless he gets a full training camp to prepare for that fight. Well, it's just, you know, greatness. But Jon's troubled, you know? Jon's been arrested a bunch of times, and DUIs, and all kinds of crazy shit, and he's, you know, he's a wild fella. And, you know, and that pursuit of greatness, I'm sure, has cost him a lot of shit in his personal life.

Matt Damon 1:42:06 Mm, yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:42:08 But, you know, when he knocks Stipe out and then did the Trump dance in front of the whole world-

Matt Damon 1:42:12 I know, I know.

Speaker 1:42:12 Yeah

Joe Rogan 1:42:12 ... [chuckles] like, for that moment, he's on top of the world.

Speaker 1:42:15 [chuckles]

Joe Rogan 1:42:16 You know? But then, again, it's, like, the same thing. You, you're- as soon as you get back, like, what's next? You know.

Matt Damon 1:42:22 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:42:22 There's, there's another challenge.

Matt Damon 1:42:24 Right.

Joe Rogan 1:42:24 There doesn't matter how many b- how many people love you now, like, it's not good enough. There's someone else looming. You gotta beat this guy.

Speaker 1:42:30 That seems like a kind of an agonizing thing, to both have the, like, complete compulsion to have to get to the next level, and the next level keeps fucking-

Joe Rogan 1:42:39 Yeah

Speaker 1:42:39 ... moving the goalpost, you know?

Joe Rogan 1:42:40 I'll never forget, um, I interviewed Matt Hughes after he lost to BJ Penn. He lost the welterweight title to BJ Penn, and I'm interviewing him inside the octagon. He said, "I'm gonna be honest with you, it was actually a relief."

Matt Damon 1:42:52 Oh, wow.

Joe Rogan 1:42:52 And he goes-

Speaker 1:42:53 Mm

Joe Rogan 1:42:53 ... "The pressure of being the champion and having someone p- chasing at you for so- ever- in the whole world chasing you," he goes, "I'm gonna be hon..." And I thought it was a, an incredibly brave moment for a guy to say that, who is-

Matt Damon 1:43:06 Mm

Joe Rogan 1:43:06 ... you know, just this-

Matt Damon 1:43:06 Yeah

Joe Rogan 1:43:06 ... fucking amazing human being, this warrior, to say, "I just gotta be honest, it's a relief. Losing my title feels like a relief." And I was like, "Wow!"

Matt Damon 1:43:16 Yeah, that's amazing.

Joe Rogan 1:43:16 Like, that, that is, uh, so, so brave to be that honest in front of the... 'Cause everybody's like, "You just got your ass kicked."

Matt Damon 1:43:23 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:43:23 He's like, "I'm... This is a relief. I, you know, it took a burden off my back. I'll be back. I'm gonna regroup, but I n- I needed that. I needed to just-

Matt Damon 1:43:31 Right

Joe Rogan 1:43:31 ... s- to step off the fucking top of the hill for a little while."

Matt Damon 1:43:33 Get a breath.

Joe Rogan 1:43:34 Jesus Christ!

Matt Damon 1:43:34 Yeah.

Speaker 1:43:34 You gotta be, like, a great... Actually relief to be able to say something like that.

Joe Rogan 1:43:38 Yeah.

Speaker 1:43:38 It's kind of a gift, instead of feeling like you gotta hide or pretend it, and go, "Yeah, I'm-"

Joe Rogan 1:43:42 Yeah

Speaker 1:43:43 ... "I'm relieved. Fuck, it was a lot to carry, and now I..." You know?

Joe Rogan 1:43:45 Well, the thing about fighting is, everything you try to hide gets exposed. You're exposed completely during camp, because they're doing these, these round... W- Well, they take, like-

Speaker 1:43:54 Sorry if I, uh, I was here.

Joe Rogan 1:43:55 Yeah, yeah, yeah. Spoke up. They'll, they'll, they're taking, like, you know, five guys, and they're r- rotating them in with you. So you're doing five rounds with fresh guys.

Speaker 1:44:06 Jesus.

Joe Rogan 1:44:06 So you got one guy who is fucking warmed up, getting, you know, getting ready for you, and then you're fucking out of breath. They'll give you a 30-second break instead of a minute, and then they're throwing in these monsters, and, you know, you're exposed. You're, you're getting beat in training, you're getting smothered in training, you're t- you're exhausted. You know, you're always reaching your limits, 'cause the only way to surpass those limits is to hit them.

Speaker 1:44:27 Right, to push through them.

Joe Rogan 1:44:28 You gotta hit them-

Speaker 1:44:29 Yeah, yeah

Joe Rogan 1:44:29 ... and then they gotta figure out where that limit is, and, "Okay, next week, we're gonna do one extra round. We're gonna do this, we're gonna do that. We're gonna do more strength and conditioning. We're gonna push you past wherever your capacity is right now." So you're always breaking.... you're always, you're always at the point where you can do no more, 'cause it's the only way to g- And you can only maintain that, like, the condition that they get in when they step into the octagon, it's not possible to maintain that.

Matt Damon 1:44:51 No, right, right, right.

Joe Rogan 1:44:52 You can only get to it-

Matt Damon 1:44:53 You have to aim at that one moment-

Joe Rogan 1:44:54 Yes.

Speaker 1:44:54 And the peak.

Matt Damon 1:44:55 Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:44:55 Yeah, you have to peak, and then if you fuck up and overtrain, which a lot of those guys do, just 'cause they're such savages-

Matt Damon 1:45:01 Yeah

Joe Rogan 1:45:01 ... they never wanna leave the gym, then they don't peak right, and then they come in, and they're exhausted, and they didn't recover properly. And then in between rounds, they're too tired, and they can't go out for the next round.

Matt Damon 1:45:10 Right.

Joe Rogan 1:45:10 They're too beat up. That happens, too.

Matt Damon 1:45:13 I imagine that level of exhaustion has to be just insane when you overtrain-

Joe Rogan 1:45:17 Oh, God

Matt Damon 1:45:18 ... in a, in an actual championship fight.

Joe Rogan 1:45:19 And you've realized you're, you- there's no... You can't bounce back-

Matt Damon 1:45:23 Right

Joe Rogan 1:45:23 ... and this guy is fucking blasting your legs with kicks and-

Speaker 1:45:26 [laughs]

Joe Rogan 1:45:26 ... hitting you with punches, and you can't get out of the way anymore.

Matt Damon 1:45:29 Do you think d- who, who was it? Was it Khabib who said that they, they, they should just do 25-minute just straight?

Joe Rogan 1:45:35 Oh, a lot of people said that. That, I mean, that's a, a, a f- What? [laughs] Is it a song I was playing? What's going on?

Speaker 1:45:42 A little theme song going there. [laughs]

Joe Rogan 1:45:43 Just hit my fucking technology.

Matt Damon 1:45:44 Oh, the T- the Teskey Brothers playing in my pocket.

Joe Rogan 1:45:46 That's hilarious.

Matt Damon 1:45:47 Um, sorry about that. Uh-

Joe Rogan 1:45:48 Well, Royce Gracie always said that. Like, that was how he fought in the early days.

Matt Damon 1:45:53 They just straight-

Joe Rogan 1:45:53 Yeah

Matt Damon 1:45:53 ... 25 minutes? [chuckles]

Joe Rogan 1:45:54 Because he was like, "Look," he goes, uh, "If we're on the ground," he goes, "I don't want them to stand back up again-

Matt Damon 1:45:59 Oh, yeah

Joe Rogan 1:45:59 ... and go in between rounds." And he goes, "I need time to cook them." That's what he would say.

Matt Damon 1:46:03 Cook. [laughs]

Joe Rogan 1:46:03 Yeah.

Matt Damon 1:46:04 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:46:04 Yeah, it was... I mean, that's what jujitsu's all about. Jujitsu's all about staying one step ahead of you until you become exhausted, and the, you know, and then they eventually finish you.

Matt Damon 1:46:14 Like a, like a-

Speaker 1:46:15 You're just fucking-

Matt Damon 1:46:15 ... boa constrictor.

Joe Rogan 1:46:16 Yeah.

Speaker 1:46:17 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:46:17 Yeah. I mean, it's... The real- That's... But, you know, there's this balance of, like, making it interesting for the s- for people to watch. I, I've been a proponent of no stand-ups. Don't ever stand anybody up. When a guy takes you down, like, you get an advantage at the beginning of the round anyway, because a striker gets to s- be standing up-

Matt Damon 1:46:35 It's the start

Joe Rogan 1:46:35 ... when he didn't earn it.

Matt Damon 1:46:36 Yeah, yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:46:36 So you should never get stood up in a fight.

Matt Damon 1:46:38 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 1:46:38 I don't care if the guy's doing nothing. If he's holding you down, and you can't get up, that's how it should be. So it's more realistic, but it's the balance of it being a sport and-

Matt Damon 1:46:46 But people wanna watch.

Joe Rogan 1:46:46 Yeah-

Matt Damon 1:46:47 Yeah

Joe Rogan 1:46:47 ... making it... 'Cause people get... When people grab someone and take them to the ground, nothing hap- people go, "Boo!"

Matt Damon 1:46:51 Yeah, right.

Joe Rogan 1:46:51 You hear it in the audience, and then the referee gets a little motivated, and he stands people up, and I'm always like, "Ah, don't stand them up." It's-

Matt Damon 1:46:58 I never thought of it that way, that the beginning of the round starts it to the advantage of the, the striker.

Joe Rogan 1:47:03 Always.

Speaker 1:47:03 The champion.

Joe Rogan 1:47:03 Always, always. You're, you're in a position you didn't earn.

Matt Damon 1:47:06 Right.

Joe Rogan 1:47:06 You never got back up. You know, I think they should put them right back to where they were at the end of the round. Because it's one fight, it's not five fights.

Speaker 1:47:12 [chuckles] Right.

Joe Rogan 1:47:12 So if you start it standing up at the beginning of each round, that's a new fight.

Matt Damon 1:47:16 Yeah, right.

Joe Rogan 1:47:17 In a way, it's at least a new aspect.

Matt Damon 1:47:18 Though you're, well, you're pitching, like, uh, how quickly would the UFC go out of business if-

Joe Rogan 1:47:22 Real quick. [laughs]

Speaker 1:47:22 [laughs]

Matt Damon 1:47:23 30, 30 seconds, they're on the ground, and then it's 24 and a half minutes. [laughs]

Joe Rogan 1:47:27 [laughs] Dude, I'm a terrible businessman.

Matt Damon 1:47:28 [laughs]

Speaker 1:47:29 [laughs]

Joe Rogan 1:47:29 I, I... I would give the fighters more money. They would, like, do it, do it... I would fuck up the whole business model.

Matt Damon 1:47:34 [laughs]

Joe Rogan 1:47:34 I would, uh, I would get rid of the cage. I would have them all fight in a basketball court and just put mats on the ground in the basketball court. I don't think you should have a cage. I, I think the cage gets in the way. It becomes, uh, a way to get back up. Because you press your back up against the cage-

Matt Damon 1:47:47 You press your back. Ah, I see

Joe Rogan 1:47:48 ... you use it-

Matt Damon 1:47:48 Yeah, yeah, yeah

Joe Rogan 1:47:48 ... to stand back up again. When you're in the middle of the center of a mat, it's very difficult to get back up, and that's realistic.

Matt Damon 1:47:55 Right.

Joe Rogan 1:47:55 You know, you're using a foreign object to help you perform.

Matt Damon 1:47:58 To help you, yeah, right.

Joe Rogan 1:47:58 Yeah.

Matt Damon 1:47:59 Right.

Joe Rogan 1:47:59 But, you know, there's the whole macho thing about people fighting in a cage, and it's like, "They lock you in there, and fight!"

Speaker 1:48:05 Huge match.

Matt Damon 1:48:06 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:48:06 Yeah. It's just, uh... But, I mean, in terms of, like, inspirational performances and things that you, when you see, like, the human spirit elevated to the, the, the highest possible place, when two s- very skilled men or women are fighting in a cage where they prepared for this for three fucking months, and then, you know, the referee's like: "Are you ready? Are you ready? [claps] Let's go." And it's like that moment-

Matt Damon 1:48:32 Mm

Joe Rogan 1:48:32 ... like, is, it's cr- not, not like anything else in all of sports.

Speaker 1:48:36 I think that's the moment that, like, people show up for.

Joe Rogan 1:48:38 Yeah.

Speaker 1:48:39 'Cause they build the intense... It's the same with, like, the old Tyson fights or whatever.

Joe Rogan 1:48:42 Oh, yeah.

Speaker 1:48:42 Like, now it's gonna happen.

Joe Rogan 1:48:44 Yeah.

Speaker 1:48:44 And there, there... You can't help-

Joe Rogan 1:48:46 Yeah

Speaker 1:48:46 ... but have that feeling once it, you know... And yeah, some fights end up being disappointing, whatever, but they're, that moment is always there.

Joe Rogan 1:48:53 Well, Tyson was a crazy example of what we were talking about with greatness. Because, like, you could dedicate your whole life, you could fucking get up in the morning at the right time, you could eat all the right foods, you could do all the right training-

Matt Damon 1:49:04 Wasn't gonna help you. [laughs]

Joe Rogan 1:49:04 ... but then you see that fucking guy, and you're like, "Oh, no!" [laughs]

Matt Damon 1:49:06 He was gonna smoke you in 13 seconds. [laughs]

Joe Rogan 1:49:08 There's nothing I can do! I have no chance.

Matt Damon 1:49:11 There's no, no chance, zero.

Speaker 1:49:11 You knew by the look in his... He had the-

Joe Rogan 1:49:13 Yeah

Speaker 1:49:13 ... just the look in his eye, and you... He was one of the only fighters where you would just see the other guy was scared.

Joe Rogan 1:49:17 Yeah.

Speaker 1:49:17 Usually, they get... At least hold themselves together, where they come off like, "Oh, I don't know. This guy looks pretty tough." Guys would fight Tyson and just... It would start, and they'd feel that moment, too.

Joe Rogan 1:49:26 Yeah.

Speaker 1:49:26 "Oh, shit-

Matt Damon 1:49:26 Just feel it, right

Speaker 1:49:27 ... they're letting this tiger out, and here he comes." And it was like-

Matt Damon 1:49:30 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:49:30 Well, we're old enough to remember when he was in his prime, and those fights were like executions.

Speaker 1:49:34 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:49:34 You didn't wanna pay-

Matt Damon 1:49:35 I, I remember when he fought-

Joe Rogan 1:49:35 ... for the pay-per-view 'cause they were so fast. [laughs]

Matt Damon 1:49:37 ... Alex Stewart. I, I'm, I swear, I mean, I mean, Jamie might be able to prove me wrong, but I'm pretty sure that they cut to Alex Stewart, and then they cut to his wife, and she was crying. [laughs]

Speaker 1:49:46 [laughs]

Joe Rogan 1:49:46 [laughs]

Matt Damon 1:49:47 And this is when they're coming to the center of the ring-

Speaker 1:49:49 Oh, my God!

Matt Damon 1:49:49 ... and she goes, "But by the way, for good reason, like-

Joe Rogan 1:49:51 Yeah

Matt Damon 1:49:52 ... this man might kill my husband."

Joe Rogan 1:49:53 Right.

Matt Damon 1:49:54 You know what I mean? Like, like-

Joe Rogan 1:49:54 Well, he's certainly gonna beat the fuck out of him, and she knows it-

Matt Damon 1:49:57 Yeah, yeah

Joe Rogan 1:49:57 ... and the world knows it.

Matt Damon 1:49:58 And her husband knows it.

Speaker 1:49:58 And the guys were ready to quit. Remember that dude, Hurricane, or whatever?

Matt Damon 1:50:01 Oh.

Speaker 1:50:01 White kid who fought him?

Matt Damon 1:50:02 Oh, Pete McNeely when he came in-

Speaker 1:50:04 Yeah, his guy couldn't wait to throw the towel in.

Matt Damon 1:50:05 Yeah. [chuckles]

Speaker 1:50:05 He had it ready, like, he, you know, he was ready to go, "All right, that's it. Let's go." [laughs]

Matt Damon 1:50:08 The bell rings, he picks up the towel. [laughs]

Speaker 1:50:10 Yeah, "You got one job, save your guy's life."

Joe Rogan 1:50:12 [laughs]

Speaker 1:50:12 You know what I mean?

Matt Damon 1:50:13 [laughs]

Joe Rogan 1:50:13 McNeely's fucked up now, too. When you hear him talk, it's rough.

Matt Damon 1:50:16 Right.

Joe Rogan 1:50:16 It's rough to hear.

Matt Damon 1:50:17 Oh, really?

Joe Rogan 1:50:17 Yeah, I saw him get interviewed recently. That's the dark side of the sport, of, of MMA and of fighting. You know, you, you talk-

Matt Damon 1:50:23 You get CTE.

Joe Rogan 1:50:23 Like, I had Johnny Knoxville on here yesterday, and Johnny Knoxville was knocked unconscious 16 times.

Matt Damon 1:50:29 Jesus Christ.

Joe Rogan 1:50:29 Yeah, like, that's what I said, and I'm like, "Holy shit, man!" And he seems normal, like, he doesn't seem like he's got brain damage.

Matt Damon 1:50:36 Mm.

Joe Rogan 1:50:36 Now, when you're talking to guys, and you know they have brain damage, they're slurring their words-

Matt Damon 1:50:41 Right

Joe Rogan 1:50:41 ... and they're still fighting.

Matt Damon 1:50:42 Right.

Joe Rogan 1:50:43 And their, their words all mumbled together. Like, you have no idea how much they're struggling.

Matt Damon 1:50:47 Yeah, yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:50:48 Like, and they'll... They're gonna be struggling in a downhill slope for the rest of their life. It's not gonna get better.

Matt Damon 1:50:53 No, no.

Joe Rogan 1:50:53 It's gonna get way worse. 'Cause the real brain damage occurs, like, 10 years after the, the injuries.

Matt Damon 1:50:58 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:50:58 That's when it really sets in.

Speaker 1:50:59 Really? It starts, like, just keeps atrophy away?

Joe Rogan 1:51:01 Just keeps getting worse. I mean, there's some therapies that they can do now. There's, uh... Like, they, they do, uh, well, and Knoxville did some of it, like, this magnetic therapy that they do that re-stimulates neuron growth and, and o- oddly enough, mushrooms, like, psilocybin has been shown to regenerate-

Speaker 1:51:18 Damn, mushrooms all of a sudden cure a whole bunch of shit. [chuckles]

Joe Rogan 1:51:20 I know.

Speaker 1:51:20 It's like-

Joe Rogan 1:51:20 Well, probably always has.

Matt Damon 1:51:22 Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Speaker 1:51:22 Yeah, right.

Joe Rogan 1:51:22 You know?

Matt Damon 1:51:23 For sure.

Speaker 1:51:23 It's- All of a sudden, they're m- m- acknowledging it, yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:51:25 Well, one of the things that's opening the doors for them to acknowledge it is soldiers.

Matt Damon 1:51:29 Right.

Joe Rogan 1:51:29 Because it's always been kind of like a left-wind-wing thing to be into psychedelics, but all these soldiers are coming back with PTSD-

Matt Damon 1:51:37 Yeah

Joe Rogan 1:51:37 ... and drug addiction, and a lot of CTE from, you know, b- bombs blowing up-

Matt Damon 1:51:42 Concussions

Joe Rogan 1:51:42 ... and IEDs-

Matt Damon 1:51:42 Yeah

Joe Rogan 1:51:43 ... and concussions, and the only thing that's helping them is psychedelics. So it's kind... Like, in Texas, uh, former Governor Rick Perry has started the ibogaine initiative. So they're using ibogaine to help all these different soldiers, which is ironically the drug that Hunter S. Thompson claimed Ed Muskie was on when he was running for president.

Matt Damon 1:52:01 Oh, really? [laughs]

Speaker 1:52:01 Really? [laughs]

Joe Rogan 1:52:01 Yeah, remember when he sank Ed Muskie? [laughs]

Matt Damon 1:52:03 Yeah. [laughs]

Joe Rogan 1:52:03 It's, if, if-

Speaker 1:52:04 What is ibogaine? I never-

Joe Rogan 1:52:05 It's from the iboga tree, and it is a psychedelic that is in no way recreational.... It is a very difficult experience. It's not fun for anybody. It's like a 24-hour trip.

Guest 1:52:15 Oof, hmm.

Joe Rogan 1:52:16 I haven't done it, but my friends that have done it say that it's basically like you see your entire life play out before you. You see where all your problems come from, you see where all of your emotional hitches are-

Guest 1:52:28 Jesus!

Joe Rogan 1:52:28 Where all... Yeah, and with addictions, it has an 80%, 80- I think it's 84% with one treatment, they quit whatever they're hooked on.

Guest 1:52:37 What?

Joe Rogan 1:52:37 Not only that, it rewires the brain, so the physical pathways to addiction, like someone-

Guest 1:52:43 Yeah

Joe Rogan 1:52:43 ... who's addicted to opiates, gone. Completely severed. So you literally don't have a physical addiction to opiates anymore. So with one treatment, 80-plus percent of people-

Guest 1:52:52 That's incredible.

Joe Rogan 1:52:53 With two treatments, it's in the 90s.

Guest 1:52:56 That's amazing.

Joe Rogan 1:52:56 It's amazing.

Guest 1:52:57 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:52:57 And it's been illegal, you know, since like 1970 in this country, the sweet psychedelic stuff.

1:53:02 Did you say Rick Perry has, like, a clinic or whatever that's-

1:53:03 Well, Rick Perry, um, because he's worked with soldiers and because he's worked with a lot of veterans, that... You know, and he's a very compassionate and intelligent man. He realized, like, "Okay, maybe I'm wrong about all this psychedelic stuff." And so-

Guest 1:53:16 Good for him

Joe Rogan 1:53:16 ... he started getting behind this ibogaine initiative. They passed it in Texas, and now they're doing it with soldiers, and they're gonna do it with police officers and... I mean, police officers experience more PTSD. Like, I, I have a good friend who was a cop in Austin, and he said... And he was also in the military, and he said, "What I saw in the military was nothing-

Guest 1:53:33 Hmm

Joe Rogan 1:53:33 ... compared to what I saw as a police officer."

1:53:35 Really?

1:53:35 He goes, "I was seeing death and violence on, on a daily basis."

1:53:39 Yeah.

1:53:39 He goes, "When you're deployed," he goes, "Yeah, you're g- you're gonna see some horrible shit, but you're gonna see some horrible shit mixed in, you know, over a course of time, where, you know, you go out and, and things go live." He goes, like, "Every day-"

Guest 1:53:52 Every day you're going directly to-

Joe Rogan 1:53:53 Every day

Guest 1:53:53 ... somebody who's having the worst moment of their life.

Joe Rogan 1:53:55 And every day you're pulling someone over, and they might shoot you.

Guest 1:53:57 Right.

Joe Rogan 1:53:57 Yeah.

1:53:57 Like, you have no idea. You're, you're pulling up to, uh, tinted windows. You don't know what the fuck is going on. You're running the plate. The, the license is expired. You have no idea who's, who's in the car. You don't, you don't know anything.

Guest 1:54:10 Hmm.

Joe Rogan 1:54:10 And you've seen all the videos. We've all seen videos of cops getting shot down, like when they're pulling over a car. We've all seen it.

Guest 1:54:16 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:54:16 And so these guys are living with this fucking PTSD all the time, and then they have to live in real life. They, they're supposed to go home, and they're supposed to just be a normal dad and a, a normal neighbor, and their fucking head is just a hurricane of chaos.

Guest 1:54:29 Yeah. Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:54:30 And ibogaine has been very beneficial for those people to just r- just sort of come down, and, and try to find the root of all this stuff and, and get them off pills and, and get them on the straight.

Guest 1:54:42 That's great.

Joe Rogan 1:54:42 Wow.

1:54:43 Uh, it's amazing. I don't know why we got on the mushrooms. Well, uh-

1:54:46 [chuckles]

1:54:46 ... ibogaine, because, uh, d- during the tr- [chuckles] during the presidential elections, he, he started spreading these rumors, and it's in the, the documentary. Uh, I ca- what is that, that documentary? Is it Fear and Loathing? Gonzo. Gonzo.

1:55:01 Yeah.

Guest 1:55:01 Okay.

Joe Rogan 1:55:01 Gonzo, that's right. In that documentary, Gonzo, he talks about it. So he's getting interviewed by Dick Cavett-

Guest 1:55:05 [laughing]

Joe Rogan 1:55:05 ... and he goes, uh, he goes, "Yeah." He goes, "There was a ru- a rumor running around [chuckles] that, uh, Ed Muskie was on ibogaine, and I, I knew about it because, uh, I started that rumor." [laughing]

Guest 1:55:17 [laughing]

Joe Rogan 1:55:17 [laughing]

1:55:17 But he made the guy-

Guest 1:55:17 That dude is so good

Joe Rogan 1:55:18 ... I sold it to him.

Guest 1:55:19 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:55:19 So the guy completely cracked.

1:55:21 Yeah.

1:55:21 So, like, this guy was, like, a frontrunner for the president, and he fucking completely f- cracked-

Guest 1:55:26 That's crazy

Joe Rogan 1:55:26 ... because everybody thought that he was on drugs. 'Cause Hunter S. Thompson was just running around, like saying there's these-

1:55:31 "Tell the truth"

1:55:31 ... Brazilian witch doctors are coming in-

Guest 1:55:33 [laughing]

Joe Rogan 1:55:33 ... to treat this guy. It's crazy shit.

1:55:35 That's great.

1:55:36 [laughing]

1:55:37 [laughing] They were like, "And Hunter would know." [laughing]

Guest 1:55:39 [laughing] Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:55:40 Yeah, yeah. But it's crazy that he chose ibogaine, too, because ibogaine is like... It, it's not a recreational drug, and it's not a drug of addiction. It's a, literally a drug that stops addiction.

1:55:48 No, but that, the... He was the guy that would have the full ca- the whole book's full of these fucking-

1:55:53 Yeah

1:55:53 ... esoteric drugs you never heard of.

1:55:55 Yes.

1:55:55 That he mentions in a really casual way.

1:55:56 Yeah, but-

1:55:56 Like, "Of course, Gloria stopped to get ibogaine at the one gas station that sold it-"

1:56:00 [laughing]

Guest 1:56:00 [laughing]

Joe Rogan 1:56:00 ... "between needles and nothing." Yeah, sure. No, of course he did.

1:56:03 Yeah. But it, it does help people that have, uh, brain damage as well. It's, it's supposed to, like, cause some sort of neuro regeneration.

Guest 1:56:11 Neurostimulation.

Joe Rogan 1:56:11 Yeah.

Guest 1:56:12 Yeah, yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:56:12 I mean, there's just stuff out there that can help people, but, uh, a, a, the large percentage of these fighters are silently suffering-

Guest 1:56:19 Hmm

Joe Rogan 1:56:19 ... and we don't ever hear about it.

1:56:21 Don't they say, like, it's supposed to be that it's... That, like, the argument is, is because it's, you know, they're not using a glove, like that football's supposed to be worse. I mean, wasn't that the sort of rationale that, like, you were gonna have less impact in boxing because the, the boxing gloves were-

Guest 1:56:34 No, but it's really, it's all, it's like the subconcussive blows.

Joe Rogan 1:56:37 Right.

1:56:37 Mm-hmm.

Guest 1:56:37 It's like, the, it's not necessarily the, the, the one shot knocking you out-

Joe Rogan 1:56:41 Hmm

Guest 1:56:41 ... as much as the repeated kind of, like, small, like, little bit of brain damage.

Joe Rogan 1:56:46 Look, I'm sure that's like, they're all bad for you.

Guest 1:56:48 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:56:48 You know what I mean? Then, like, a version of getting your head-

Guest 1:56:50 Knocks to the head are not a good thing

Joe Rogan 1:56:51 ... cracked in over and over.

1:56:52 Yeah.

Guest 1:56:52 They should be, be avoided.

Joe Rogan 1:56:53 Yeah.

Guest 1:56:54 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:56:54 Well, it's also what you take in training, too. We're only considering what happens during a fight. If a guy has 40, 50 MMA fights, that's 40-

Guest 1:57:01 How many rounds does he have-

Joe Rogan 1:57:02 Right

Guest 1:57:02 ... right in the gym?

Joe Rogan 1:57:03 In training.

1:57:03 Oh, training camp is fucking brutal, and depending upon how intelligent your camp is. Like, some people are really smart, and they'll spar where they're not hitting each other hard, and then maybe one day of the week they go live, but you do it with trusted... You know, they're, they're very close to you. These are people that you care about and love, so they're not gonna try to hurt you on purpose.

Guest 1:57:22 Right.

Joe Rogan 1:57:22 But sometimes not. Like, sometimes you're in a, a hostile gym, and, you know, you've got to spar with people you don't even know. They're from other countries. You have a big name. They're trying to take you out.

Guest 1:57:31 Hmm. Oof.

Joe Rogan 1:57:31 You know, it's, um... But the, the amount of damage these guys take, I mean, I don't know if football's better or worse. They're all... Like, the, but the thing about football is, the big impacts are way worse. Because when you've got a 300-pound super athlete-

Guest 1:57:46 Hmm. Yeah

Joe Rogan 1:57:47 ... that's fucking full tilt-

1:57:49 All the way from across the field, yeah

1:57:51 ... Boom!

Guest 1:57:52 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 1:57:52 I mean, it's like-

Guest 1:57:52 Yeah, with a running start.

Joe Rogan 1:57:53 Yeah.

Guest 1:57:53 Yeah, yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:57:53 You're getting hit by a truck. And that, but that doesn't... It's, it's not targeted necessarily at your head.

Guest 1:58:01 Hmm.

Joe Rogan 1:58:01 So it's like, what, what is better and what is worse, you know? Boxing's bad. You know, it's like, you have less options. MMA is slightly better, because if, especially if you're a grappler, you can take guys down, and you can beat them up on the ground. But it's-... ultimately, you're paying a price.

Speaker 1:58:18 Hell of a tough way to make a fucking living-

Joe Rogan 1:58:19 Yeah

Speaker 1:58:19 ... I'm sure.

Joe Rogan 1:58:20 But for that glory, for that one moment when they win, and the fucking 16,000 people are on their feet screaming, there's probably no drug like that, that could ever reproduce it, and those guys chase that high-

Matt Damon 1:58:30 Yeah

Joe Rogan 1:58:31 ... for their entire life. And then after it's over, they, y- you know, they feel oddly detached.

Matt Damon 1:58:36 Right.

Speaker 1:58:36 And nothing ever rises to that level again.

Joe Rogan 1:58:38 Right. You can make films until you're 100 years old. You know, you can make great films forever. You can do the thing that you love forever. They have a little window, a little window of greatness.

Matt Damon 1:58:47 That's the, that's the really tough thing about being an athlete. Like, I, I-

Speaker 1:58:50 We were talking to Pete Sampras that time we met Sampras years ago.

Matt Damon 1:58:53 Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:58:53 Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 1:58:53 And he was like... We were probably, I don't know, we were 30, he was 32-

Matt Damon 1:58:57 Yeah, we were... Yeah

Speaker 1:58:57 ... something like that. And he was kind of... We were like, "Oh, my God!" You know, he had all these fucking, you know, wins and Grand Slams, and he, he had a kind of vaguely like, "Yeah," he was like, "Yeah, you guys, look, I, I'm about to retire. It's... I'm finished." And we're, you know, young guys who were, you know-

Matt Damon 1:59:11 Just getting started, you know what I mean? Like, we're... And also, the thing is, you get better at your job the more you do it.

Speaker 1:59:17 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:59:18 Yeah.

Matt Damon 1:59:18 You know?

Speaker 1:59:18 Yeah.

Matt Damon 1:59:18 And so it's that thing with the athlete. Yeah, I was having this conversation the other day. It's like, you have all the physical skills at the beginning, but you become a better, you know, w- uh, better at your sport-

Joe Rogan 1:59:28 Yeah

Matt Damon 1:59:28 ... you know, as your skills are declining, and-

Joe Rogan 1:59:31 The body just doesn't wanna do it anymore.

Matt Damon 1:59:33 Yeah.

Speaker 1:59:33 And you've gotta just com- just, like, become Greg Maddux, you know, and compensate with all the tricks and location and... But, like, and that's why that drama of, like, the aging athlete is so-

Joe Rogan 1:59:44 Mm-hmm

Speaker 1:59:44 ... powerful. You still have... It's like, "Oh, do we still have it in me? Can I still do it?"

Joe Rogan 1:59:49 Right.

Speaker 1:59:49 "How long..." You know, "And is, is what I've learned enough to compensate for what I've lost?" You know?

Joe Rogan 1:59:55 Well, there's an interesting story about Vitor Belfort. So Vitor Belfort was... He won the UFC Heavyweight Tournament when he was 19 years old. That was, like, the first event I ever worked at in 1997. I mean, he was, like, o- one of the all-time greats, for sure. But as he was getting into his 30s, he was starting to decline. Then the UFC allowed fighters to use testosterone replacement therapy, and boy, did he fucking use it! [laughing]

Matt Damon 2:00:20 [laughing]

Speaker 2:00:20 [laughing]

Joe Rogan 2:00:20 Okay, 'cause I don't know what his levels were, but they were, like, superhuman levels. And there was a moment in time for a few years, where they allowed him to use testosterone therapy, and people refer to it as the TRT Vitor years, because he was fucking terrifying. Because he has the mind of a veteran-

Matt Damon 2:00:37 Mm. Right, right

Joe Rogan 2:00:38 ... an incredible amount of experience-

Matt Damon 2:00:39 Mm-hmm

Joe Rogan 2:00:39 ... but now his body is moving like a 25-year-old, and so he was just annihilating people, just lighting people on fire.

Matt Damon 2:00:48 So they're not allowed to use testosterone or, or-

Joe Rogan 2:00:50 No, they can't use anything.

Matt Damon 2:00:51 Um-

Joe Rogan 2:00:51 No.

Matt Damon 2:00:52 No dro... How about peptides? Can they use peptides?

Joe Rogan 2:00:54 Nope, nope, not even peptides.

Matt Damon 2:00:55 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 2:00:55 They're trying to take that and, and reform that, but there, there's a lot of ignorance about peptides, what they actually do. I mean, all it's allowing you to do is soft tissue injuries, heal quicker, and optimize your body's ability to produce hormones.

Matt Damon 2:01:08 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 2:01:08 So instead of adding exogenous hormones-

Matt Damon 2:01:10 Yeah

Joe Rogan 2:01:10 ... you're allowing your body to produce them more naturally, and it'll... it just makes you more healthy. For a very unhealthy job, and where you're, you know-

Matt Damon 2:01:19 Yeah

Joe Rogan 2:01:19 ... you're getting hurt all the time-

Matt Damon 2:01:21 Yeah

Joe Rogan 2:01:21 ... it's, it's gonna be better for the sport, better for the athletes to allow them to all use it. And it's also, there's no long-term damage that's it's gonna do, like steroids, where it shuts down your endocrine system.

Matt Damon 2:01:31 Right.

Joe Rogan 2:01:31 So I hope they reform it. But the idea was that there's so many fucking loopholes and so many people cheat. Big camps used to hire scientists, so they had a scientist on staff that was not only pu-

Speaker 2:01:44 What did he, what did he do? [laughing]

Joe Rogan 2:01:45 Yeah, exactly. Not only procuring stuff that, that would slip by the test, 'cause there's, like, you know, the BALCO stuff-

Speaker 2:01:52 Yeah, yeah, yeah

Joe Rogan 2:01:52 ... with Marion Jones and the Clear.

Speaker 2:01:53 The Clear, yeah.

Joe Rogan 2:01:54 There, there's, there's stuff probably right now that people are using that's slipping through, and there's a lot of experts that have... Like, one of the things is animal-derived testosterone. So testosterone, one of the, the, they do- they use a carbon isotope test, I think, I believe that's what they use, to figure out where the testosterone came from. So if your testosterone-

Matt Damon 2:02:14 Mm

Joe Rogan 2:02:14 ... is, like, at a very high level, they test all your other ratios. They go, "Well, no, it all seems l- likely."

Speaker 2:02:19 Consistent, yeah.

Joe Rogan 2:02:19 "He's just... He's an outlier. He just has naturally high testosterone." But testosterone that you get from, like, synthetic testosterone, is derived from a wild yam, believe it or not.

Matt Damon 2:02:31 Really?

Joe Rogan 2:02:31 Yes.

Matt Damon 2:02:31 Really?

Joe Rogan 2:02:31 Yeah, it's not, it's not animal-derived testosterone, so the composite of it varies when they run the tests on it, and they can determine-

Matt Damon 2:02:38 They can determine that-

Joe Rogan 2:02:39 Yes

Matt Damon 2:02:39 ... it's a yam-based testosterone.

Joe Rogan 2:02:40 It's exogenous, not endogenous.

Speaker 2:02:41 It's the yam in there fighting-

Joe Rogan 2:02:42 Right [laughing]

Speaker 2:02:42 ... it's not him. [laughing]

Joe Rogan 2:02:43 But if they could figure out a way to ex- and there's a lot of proof of concept to this, can they figure out a way to extract testosterone from animal sources?

Matt Damon 2:02:50 Just bull testosterone?

Joe Rogan 2:02:51 Something like that.

Speaker 2:02:52 Well, the taurine-

Joe Rogan 2:02:53 There's like a horse one

Speaker 2:02:53 ... that's what they used to inject-

Matt Damon 2:02:54 Yeah, yeah, yeah

Speaker 2:02:54 ... Hitler with taurine. You know, Hitler was like a fucking guinea pig for-

Joe Rogan 2:02:58 Yeah

Speaker 2:02:58 ... this one doctor who tried a bunch of shit on him, and one of the things they did was, like, inject him with bull testicles and stuff to try to keep him virile.

Joe Rogan 2:03:06 Yeah, but, but there probably are athletes right now that are using some shit that they haven't figured out yet. So to give them any loopholes at all, they're like, "No, no, no, fucking no loopholes. No IVs, no nothing."

Matt Damon 2:03:19 No IVs-

Joe Rogan 2:03:19 No IVs

Matt Damon 2:03:20 ... like vitamins and-

Joe Rogan 2:03:21 Right, but the problem with IVs is you can mask testosterone and, and, and mask steroids by over flooding the body with liquids. So if you overflow-

Matt Damon 2:03:30 Oh, oh, I see.

Joe Rogan 2:03:31 Yeah.

Matt Damon 2:03:31 Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Joe Rogan 2:03:31 So then when you piss, you piss-

Speaker 2:03:32 So the ratio's hi- high-

Matt Damon 2:03:33 Yeah, yeah

Speaker 2:03:33 ... 'cause like you add more water, it's lower.

Matt Damon 2:03:35 Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Joe Rogan 2:03:35 Yes. You would just fill them up with saline, and