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[0:23] Grace Aki: Uh, welcome back to another episode of Tell Me on a Sunday. I'm so flattered that you're still listening. What's your end game? I'm just kidding. Uh, I'm very appreciative. I can't, I'm so excited for you to join me today because I have Mr. Ethan Slater, who you remember from Spongebob Squarepants, nailed it. And uh, he's great. Like he is so nice, and I can't wait for you to meet him because when I met him, I was like, this guy, he's really nice and genuine. What's his deal? What's he after? And nothing. He's after nothing. He is just kind and sweet. And I think that you're gonna see that today. He is currently starring in Assassins at Classic Stage Company, and he also just released an EP called Wanderer, and it is good, and you should listen to it and stream it and download it and all those things. But he's a creator, he has a great voice, and I don't mean just like, I mean like truly writing voice, and he's gonna crank out so many great things. Welcome into your ears everybody, Ethan Slater.

[1:56] Ethan Slater: Hey everyone.

[1:59] Grace Aki: So can you, I will tell a short story about you that you don't know. Okay. Um, so I remember when, I don't know if you remember, you did a show called SpongeBob. Uh, oh yeah, yeah. Yeah, it was like way back. It's a while ago. It was a while back, and you had been cast and it was like unannounced, okay? Yeah. And we, because they announced, because it was like a big deal, like who was it gonna be, right? Right. And my husband, Damon, is like top tier, like number two fan of all time besides you of SpongeBob. And he was freaking out about the show. He was so excited, and he like definitely went in for it and then was seen for electric skate. I know, like weird. He's so good. He's also SpongeBob.

Well, well, so he was like so excited, but he was like, you know, like, I don't know. I mean, and then we saw your announcement, and I was like, Damon, that guy, that guy's SpongeBob. And he's like, I respect him, it's gonna be hard for me. Like, even we take everything like in this business so silly personally, and it's like, it's not that, you know what I mean?

[3:00] Ethan Slater: That's so real though.

[3:01] Grace Aki: It is very real. Like, I'm sure it happens to you all the time where you're like, ah, okay. Oh man. Yeah. Oh, it's like a fuck, yeah, he's so, we made this inside joke that you were his arch nemesis. Now, so, so, so, but like it was not real, obviously. You had never come into contact with us, but like I was like, but we do this, we only call people arch nemesis if there's literally no reason for them to be an arch nemesis.

[3:24] Ethan Slater: Sure, because if it's too real, then it becomes, then it's mean.

[3:27] Grace Aki: Yeah, it's actually like, it like hurts you.

[3:29] Ethan Slater: Right, right, right.

[3:30] Grace Aki: Oh, well, they're in the rooms. Um, but I saw you coming out of Ripley Career one time. And I called Dave and I was like, just ran into your arch nemesis. Did not run into you at all, but like literally walked past you. And then Damon was like, oh, well, like, is he working on the project? And I'm like, yeah, he was great. Like, but it became this dumb thing. Cut to like us seeing the show. Because like, I think was it Tom Kitt was working on that? And like he was also doing Rise, like with Damon, so like a bunch of people from the show came. And we were like, I think we were hovering in the rafters. That's how high above. I had my opera glasses. I was like, he's doing great. Can't see. Um, but it was so much fun, and we were freaking out, and then yeah, so we kept enjoying it, and I was like, we gotta let it go.

He's no longer Arch Nemesis. And he's like, no, we should still call him that in our head. So then, cut two, we're at the Cheetah Rivera Awards, and I was like, Damon, you're never gonna believe he's in my room. And he was like, what? And I was like, it's your Arch Nemesis, and he was like, finally. So then I'd known that was the context of our meeting. And then you were so nice. But yeah, we like sat, we hung out all night.

[4:43] Ethan Slater: Yeah, but also like we were the youngest people in the room that we were in.

[4:47] Grace Aki: So true. Who was in that room? George Seawolf, Ben Varin. We were literally sitting there, we're like, we're not supposed to be here. Like it was like the weirdest green room I've been in in a long time. Um, wait, wait, there were some amazing people in that room.

[5:03] Ethan Slater: It was so funny. Well, obviously, Cheetah Rivera was there, and that was outrageous. Um, god, uh see, this is my problem. I actually have like a weirdly unspecific memory.

[5:15] Grace Aki: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[5:16] Ethan Slater: Where you just kind of see it like as a, well, like I remember the feeling of it. I like remember like I remember like Tessa was there. Cheese plate. She was amazing. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Cheese plate. The cheese plate. I remember the bags. They're good swag bags. Yeah, and I and I like wasn't sure whether I, there was none with my name on it. So I was like look, I was like, is it uncouth to like look around and check the names of all of the swag bags? Right. Cause the all the like the very established, like older actors in the back were just like literally chilling, not grabbing the swag bag. Do not care about the swag bags.

[5:43] Ethan Slater: You need this?

[5:45] Grace Aki: Yeah. And I like, I like sidled up to you. I was like, hey, do you have those swag bags? Yeah. And I was like, I will take one when you do it. I do believe that was our first conversation was about swag bags.

[5:53] Ethan Slater: It was.

[5:54] Grace Aki: And that's how friendships are made feeling. Um, my wife still wears the shirt that we got there constantly.

[6:00] Ethan Slater: Oh that's nice.

[6:03] Grace Aki: Constant, constant reminder. Um, yeah, there was like a lot of people in that room and we had a good night and um tried to convince you and your wife to move to Hoboken.

[6:12] Ethan Slater: Yeah.

[6:13] Grace Aki: No, little by little it's working.

[6:15] Ethan Slater: Yeah, I think slowly.

[6:16] Grace Aki: We live in Brooklyn.

[6:17] Ethan Slater: I love Brooklyn.

[6:18] Grace Aki: I know. Um, wait, what part of, well I can't disclose that information. That's weird. I was like, what part of Brooklyn are you? Yeah, we're not, we're not a part that you've heard of. Yeah. No, we're just new, it's a new neighborhood.

[6:27] Ethan Slater: Yeah, built in.

[6:29] Grace Aki: Yeah, exactly. It's in the middle of the river. It's a little um, I really like love it there.

[6:35] Ethan Slater: Mm-hmm.

[6:35] Grace Aki: My like family, a lot of my family immigrated from Europe to Brooklyn from like Poland and Russia, Lower East Side of Brooklyn Jews. Um, yeah, so like my, I mean my grandmother, you know, not super far back. No, but still like that's really cool.

[6:53] Ethan Slater: So I feel a lot of uh roots there in this sort of fun way.

[6:59] Grace Aki: No, no, I mean like I don't have that at all. Like, so I can't imagine being like, yeah, I literally like live in a place where like people wanted to like come over and like be.

[7:08] Ethan Slater: Yeah.

[7:09] Grace Aki: I think it's cool.

[7:10] Ethan Slater: It is cool.

[7:11] Grace Aki: And yeah. And they're still sort of around.

[7:13] Ethan Slater: And they're still, yeah, they're sort of around.

[7:15] Grace Aki: Which is nice. Um, so like you're a performer.

[7:19] Ethan Slater: That's true.

[7:19] Grace Aki: Yeah. And you, when did you, can you tell me a story about like an early memory of you performing where you're like, oh, I really like this?

[7:28] Ethan Slater: Yeah, I, it's interesting. I do feel like I had sort of a slow understanding of wanting to perform and be in theater and a as a life. Yeah. I definitely thought of it as one of my many extracurricular hobbies, you know, things that I really love to do, and I found myself spending the most time focused on it, but I, that didn't really like compute to me as something that was gonna be my career until the end of high school, beginning of college. But I remember like early on, my sister was cast, um, she must have been eleven. She was cast as Dorothy in the Wizard of Oz in our neighborhood community theater. So it's like we all went to this one um family's house, and there were like 50 kids sitting in their living room, and they would then like the older kids between like nine and twelve would like go to the basement and like rehearse the scenes, and then the younger kids would like rehearse the chorus parts up in the living room.

And I, I had been involved in like the chorus section, and then they were looking for a Toto to door to my sister's Dorothy. And they were like, Ethan, why don't you do that? It's a family affair. It's huge. I got to go to the basement.

[8:41] Ethan Slater: That's a wow, which actually sounds, it sounds really creepy out of context.

[8:46] Grace Aki: I was about to say, like, yeah, given any other circumstance, I'd be like, and we're glad that you got out.

[8:50] Ethan Slater: Right.

[8:50] Grace Aki: That is the start of a horror movie.

[8:52] Ethan Slater: It's like musical theater. Why don't you come to the basement?

[8:55] Grace Aki: Yeah, really creepy. But it was uh awesome, yeah. And it was, it was like um, I remember I had very few responsibilities as Toto. Um, but I took them very seriously. And then we were performing at um the children's hospital of Washington, DC. Wow. Yeah. And I like grabbed the curtain to reveal the wizard. Spoiler alert. Oh. So if you haven't actually just skip ahead 15 seconds if you haven't seen The Wizard of Oz. Right, right, right. Um, but I like grabbed the curtain to reveal the wizard, and I, I like went the wrong way, and then I like tripped on my feet, and I just brought the whole thing down on top of the old man who was playing the wizard behind the curtain.

[9:36] Grace Aki: That's funny.

[9:37] Ethan Slater: And it was like my first on stage catastrophe. But like, did everyone laugh and they like it?

[9:43] Grace Aki: Oh, yeah, it was a great moment. I was gonna say, like, you probably in the moment were like, I messed up big time, and then everybody's like, that was brilliant. And you're like, ah, now I know how comedy works, and now I'm addicted.

[9:53] Ethan Slater: Yeah. Yeah. 100%. I actually um, there's somebody that I take a lot of inspiration from. His name is Buster Keaton. We briefly talked about how we were gonna talk about it later. But um, one of the things that I really love about his story is that like when he was a young kid, when he was like four years old, he was in a vaudeville show with his parents, and he learned early on that there's nothing funnier to an audience than falling and looking like you got hurt, but your facial expression not changing one bit. And so he like wouldn't react to anything, and the audience thought it was hilarious, and that's how he became the great stone face.

[10:33] Grace Aki: I okay, can relate. I am not Buster Keaton, I will tell a short story where I just now realized like that literally worked. So it's in a show, I was in like middle school and we're doing a production of Dearly Departed. You probably don't know this play. I don't know. But it's very silly. There's like a funeral that happens, and like they added my character because I'm like adorable. And so they, I think they called me Precious, not based on the novel Push by Sapphire, but like Precious. Yeah. And so I was always trying to eat. Like I could not get to food. Like people, the joke was always like people would have a tray of food, and then I'd be like, oh, it's my time, and then like they would take it away, and it's like, no. Um, and I'm like, ugh, informed other things.

But um, anyways, so like, and I never had any lines. So there's this one part where there was a couch on stage, and I was crawling across the top of the couch to get a food that was on a lamp thing or whatever, a nightstand, and then I fell off of the back of the couch during a performance onto the ground, and then like one arm just like slowly was like uh uh uh like a little claw coming out of the side, and then I like scooted across like misery style, like to get and I got so many laughs, and the director was like, we're keeping it, and I'm like in sixth grade, and I'm like, oh, that's like that's the funniest bit I could have done. Are we keeping it?

[11:53] Ethan Slater: Yeah, when you do something like just absolutely ridiculous, right? Feels so good.

[12:00] Grace Aki: And I uh did I crack a rib? I don't know.

[12:02] Ethan Slater: I don't know if you've never been able to breathe since now I live with it.

[12:07] Grace Aki: Um no, but yeah, that totally makes sense. So you went to Vassar.

[12:12] Ethan Slater: I was like Googling you famously, and um I was like, oh, you were like a smart boy, and then you went to like a cool college and you did all these things. Did you decide like you when you graduated high school, tell me a story about like that little journey of art?

[12:30] Ethan Slater: Yeah, you know, I um, so I was a junior in high school, and I was in a um a show that I actually talk about it uh too much. I certainly talk about it too much. I was in the producers and I was playing Leo Bloom and one of my dear friends to this day, Noah Robbins was playing Max Bialystock. Um and if you know Noah Robbins, you can Google him, he's um amazing, and uh the two of us as a pair are very funny looking on stage. Um but it was just like this production where we were like, I don't know, we were um too confident, we just thought we were amazing, and I'm still proud of it to this day. But while we were doing that show, we're like in dress rehearsal, and Noah had been going back and forth to New York auditioning for a Broadway show for a Broadway play.

Oh wow. And he's running late for dress rehearsal, and we're like waiting on him, and I get a phone call from Noah, and I was like, where are you? And he was like, I I'm so close. Um, but I have to tell you, man, I just got the call, like I booked it. And he had been cast as Eugene in Brighton Beach Memoirs on Broadway. And so he like he was like, don't tell anyone, like I don't want to, I don't want to tell anyone until after the we're done with the show. I was like, okay. And I hung up and I told everyone, and we like all, I was like just like everyone, like wait outside this room, and then I like went to the front doors of the school and I like greeted and was like, yeah, you did it. And I was like, but I like don't worry about it.

And then he came in and everyone like went nuts. And it was this amazing celebratory moment. It was so cool, and it certainly like made us feel more professional just by being near him. Well, it's when one person from the tribe gets a thing, you're like, we're all in this. And I have to like I just have to say this piece of advice that he gave me that year that he doesn't remember telling me. He's since told me. But he definitely said it. I was like, I was asking him for advice about acting because he's the best actor I've ever met. And he was like, well, you know, so he's like, I feel like the key to acting is making everyone else on stage look better than you.

[14:34] Grace Aki: Oh my gosh. Such good advice.

[14:38] Ethan Slater: We were always throwing each other setups so that the other could hit the punchline, you know, and it was really it was a really great experience.

[14:46] Ethan Slater: So I was doing that, and um his success made me think, well, maybe I could try this in another kind of way.

[14:56] Ethan Slater: I auditioned for like a community theater production for the first time since the neighborhood community theater.

[15:02] Ethan Slater: I was like, I'm gonna try something outside of school.

[15:04] Ethan Slater: I was in a production of Gypsy, which was really fun, and I was like with adults, and it felt really good.

[15:10] Ethan Slater: So my senior year, I was like, you know, full disclosure, my dad was like, don't apply to um musical theater programs.

[15:17] Ethan Slater: He's like, he's like, I don't think you should do that.

[15:20] Ethan Slater: So I ended up not doing it under some pressure from him.

[15:24] Ethan Slater: But um I was also a wrestler in high school.

[15:29] Ethan Slater: Okay.

[15:30] Ethan Slater: I was really conflicted about whether I should go wrestle in college, which was something that I'd wanted to do, or go somewhere where I could pursue theater.

[15:41] Ethan Slater: Um dilemmas.

[15:43] Grace Aki: I know it was it was the traditional dilemma.

[15:46] Grace Aki: Right.

[15:46] Ethan Slater: Um, right.

[15:47] Ethan Slater: So I think because of my experience with the producers and sort of the camaraderie that I found with my theater people, yeah.

[15:56] Ethan Slater: And then, you know, these things sort of lined up so that I decided to go to Vassar where I could study a bunch of different things, but I could do a lot of student theater, and I think that was the big key for me at the time.

[16:09] Ethan Slater: Um, I wasn't gonna have to wait to be in shows like some of the BFA programs, not that I applied to them, but um it was like close enough to New York that I could theoretically jump on the train and audition in New York, which I didn't do until my sophomore year, but then I started working in New York and I was able to go back and forth.

[16:29] Grace Aki: Right.

[16:29] Grace Aki: So it was like it was this confluence of things that I was see.

[16:33] Grace Aki: That's a smart move though, being like, Oh, I could always like theoretically just go.

[16:37] Ethan Slater: Yeah, like I'd literally just whenever I want.

[16:39] Grace Aki: Yeah, that's smart.

[16:41] Ethan Slater: It was it was good, and it was far enough from New York that I wasn't in New York.

[16:45] Ethan Slater: I can't imagine going to school in New York.

[16:47] Ethan Slater: I feel like that's like stress city, yeah.

[16:49] Grace Aki: Like people are like NYU, I'm like, how do you do such things?

[16:54] Ethan Slater: Yeah, I mean, just like having to worry about the things that we worry about now, but like on top of that, an academic schedule, and like Yes, I it's not for me.

[17:03] Ethan Slater: Um, yeah, my parents were like, do not personally I mean they were like, if you want to keep like performing like for fun, like do that, but like don't do it in school, like don't don't do that.

[17:13] Ethan Slater: And I was like, okay, so I went for a marketing degree, and then like sophomore year, I was like, so like I get it now, and I wanna go.

[17:21] Ethan Slater: Like I don't want to waste my parents' money or anything else.

[17:24] Ethan Slater: Um, but ever yeah, everyone has their own like path and all those silly things.

[17:29] Ethan Slater: I mean, I think the like the backup degree thing is I think it comes from a good place.

[17:36] Grace Aki: Mm-hmm.

[17:37] Ethan Slater: Like if you're listening and your parents are trying to tell you to get a backup degree, like it comes from a good place.

[17:43] Ethan Slater: I think sometimes, like depending on who you are, it could be really fulfilling.

[17:47] Ethan Slater: I love studying political science and I loved the, you know, being able to do music and theater as separate entities.

[17:54] Ethan Slater: Like I the liberal arts thing really worked for me.

[17:56] Grace Aki: Yeah.

[17:57] Ethan Slater: But it doesn't for everyone.

[17:59] Ethan Slater: Um so I don't know.

[18:01] Ethan Slater: I don't have any advice, but yeah, I all I say is that it comes from a good place.

[18:04] Grace Aki: Yeah, they're just trying to give you financial stability.

[18:07] Ethan Slater: It literally is nothing besides, hey, we just care about your future.

[18:10] Ethan Slater: Like we've always cared about you.

[18:11] Grace Aki: Totally.

[18:11] Ethan Slater: It's not like, hey, your dreams are kind of shit.

[18:14] Grace Aki: Yeah.

[18:14] Ethan Slater: Like my dad's, you know, supportive, but we did have the conversation where he was like, Oh, you wanna be an actor?

[18:21] Ethan Slater: Okay, pay rent as an actor.

[18:24] Grace Aki: Yeah.

[18:24] Ethan Slater: And I was like, Oh, I will work at a coffee shop.

[18:28] Ethan Slater: And it was fine.

[18:28] Grace Aki: Yeah.

[18:29] Ethan Slater: And it was good.

[18:29] Ethan Slater: You have to get it done.

[18:30] Ethan Slater: Yeah.

[18:31] Ethan Slater: Like Damon in between every gig would be like, okay, I'm on shift gig.

[18:36] Ethan Slater: Like, okay, I'm picking up this thing.

[18:38] Ethan Slater: I'm waiting.

[18:39] Ethan Slater: He used to wait in line for people for Cronuts.

[18:41] Grace Aki: This was amazing.

[18:42] Ethan Slater: Do you know like Dominic Ansel downtown?

[18:45] Ethan Slater: So like he would wait for people, like wealthy wealthy people would pay him money to stand in line and then purchase cronuts, deliver to the hotel, and then literally he would make like a hundred dollars morning.

[18:55] Grace Aki: That's incredible.

[18:56] Ethan Slater: But it's so funny because it's like people will pay for anything.

[18:59] Ethan Slater: And it's just like okay.

[19:00] Ethan Slater: But then he was able to make rent, go to Idrisons.

[19:03] Ethan Slater: It's like whatever you have to do.

[19:04] Grace Aki: Yeah.

[19:05] Ethan Slater: I don't think there's any shame in it.

[19:06] Ethan Slater: I'm glad that there was that like story report on the guy from like the Cosby show that was at Trader Joe's, because I was like, okay, you we all needed you to see behind this curtain.

[19:16] Grace Aki: Yeah.

[19:17] Ethan Slater: The dodo curtain that fell on this man.

[19:19] Ethan Slater: Poor man in Brooklyn.

[19:21] Grace Aki: Poor man, but he survived and everyone left.

[19:22] Ethan Slater: You know what I mean?

[19:23] Ethan Slater: And then also he booked work after that.

[19:24] Grace Aki: Did you see that?

[19:25] Ethan Slater: Yeah, that was incredible.

[19:27] Ethan Slater: I was like, okay, good for you.

[19:28] Ethan Slater: Like, what do I have to do?

[19:29] Ethan Slater: Um, I yeah, I think like the we we actually just live in a world where people have multiple jobs, you know, like not to get into the the political element of it all, but there is like there's a difference between employment rate and how many jobs and the quality of those jobs, and the fact is that we have this misconception that um a career for most people means that you get to do one thing constantly.

[19:55] Ethan Slater: Um, you have to have multiple jobs.

[19:59] Ethan Slater: You gotta do what you gotta do.

[20:00] Ethan Slater: Some, you know, and sometimes that sometimes, like for me, I feel really happy and lucky when that other job is like teaching theater.

[20:09] Ethan Slater: Um that's a really incredibly fulfilling thing.

[20:13] Ethan Slater: It's tangentially related to doing it, but it's a different thing too, you know.

[20:17] Ethan Slater: But it's still in your wheelhouse of like what gifts can I give another person, just like you were telling about your friend.

[20:22] Grace Aki: Yeah.

[20:23] Ethan Slater: How can I make this person that I'm teaching look better?

[20:25] Grace Aki: Yeah, yeah.

[20:26] Ethan Slater: You're always giving gifts, see?

[20:28] Ethan Slater: That's your love language, boom, boom, boom.

[20:30] Ethan Slater: Um we were talking about the five love languages.

[20:33] Grace Aki: Shout out to Mark Tallman of the First Wives Club.

[20:36] Ethan Slater: Check it out, it's on season two.

[20:37] Ethan Slater: Um, they just got renewed, but he gave us this book when we got engaged, and it's like lovely by Gary Chapman.

[20:44] Ethan Slater: We are not sponsored by Gary, but we might be soon.

[20:47] Grace Aki: Um so tell me, okay, I'm sure you have these because I also stocked your like tag photos of you and like celebs backstage.

[20:57] Ethan Slater: Which by the way, sometimes celebrities for us don't mean celebrity other people.

[21:02] Ethan Slater: Like, I met, I saw Judy Kune one time in a space, and I went, I just I and and I was absolutely tongue-tied like a ridiculous, silly little girl, and I was like, hold on, I have met like a million people, and it was like Judy Coon was in my space, and I was like, okay, well, what you did.

[21:20] Ethan Slater: She's like, um, can I get this t-shirt in a size small?

[21:24] Ethan Slater: And I was like, yeah, but like first.

[21:27] Ethan Slater: I was an absolute like wreck.

[21:29] Grace Aki: Was this like pre or post- it was custom?

[21:32] Ethan Slater: Yeah, he's easy.

[21:35] Ethan Slater: She's so good in that.

[21:36] Ethan Slater: She, but she's also like the I feel like she's such an icon.

[21:39] Ethan Slater: Um because of for so many different communities, like because of her animated voiceover work.

[21:46] Ethan Slater: Honest.

[21:47] Ethan Slater: Or lame is.

[21:48] Ethan Slater: Like, she just like Yeah.

[21:50] Ethan Slater: She is.

[21:51] Ethan Slater: Um also I found out that um she went to my high school.

[21:55] Grace Aki: Really?

[21:56] Ethan Slater: Wait, you grew up in DC proper?

[21:58] Grace Aki: Mm-hmm.

[21:58] Ethan Slater: Oh, okay.

[21:59] Ethan Slater: You're a cool person.

[22:01] Ethan Slater: Uh yeah.

[22:01] Ethan Slater: I mean, when we were 13, on my 13th birthday, actually, we moved from Silver Spring, Maryland.

[22:06] Grace Aki: That's where my best friend lives.

[22:07] Grace Aki: She's literally, yes, she literally just moved there.

[22:10] Ethan Slater: So Georgia Avenue.

[22:11] Ethan Slater: So I'm literally gonna do my show at the Silver Spring Black Black Box.

[22:15] Grace Aki: And you are you should come.

[22:16] Ethan Slater: Yeah.

[22:16] Ethan Slater: That's amazing.

[22:17] Ethan Slater: Yeah, I love that place.

[22:18] Ethan Slater: That's so weird.

[22:19] Grace Aki: That's I've met Silver.

[22:21] Grace Aki: What are you doing with people?

[22:22] Ethan Slater: When am I doing?

[22:22] Ethan Slater: I'm like lining up the calendar for 2020, which we are already in.

[22:26] Ethan Slater: It's 2020.

[22:27] Ethan Slater: We're fully in 2020.

[22:29] Ethan Slater: I already need a break.

[22:31] Ethan Slater: Um I gotta take a second and tell y'all about my personal training coaches, Steve and Rachel Payne at House of Pain.

[22:39] Ethan Slater: I've been doing their workout programs, let's say three years, and they shape bodies.

[22:43] Ethan Slater: And yes, they prepare people to compete in bodybuilding shows, which some of it's your jam, it's not my jam.

[22:49] Ethan Slater: What I love about them is that they understand the look that I want.

[22:52] Ethan Slater: Tone, fit, something that's sustainable for my lifestyle.

[22:56] Ethan Slater: They create a custom individual plan that includes my workouts, my cardio, and my nutrition.

[23:01] Ethan Slater: I do their online program, but when I'm in Atlanta, I do one-on-one training with them at their facility, and it kicks my ass.

[23:08] Ethan Slater: They FaceTime me whenever I have questions, alter my plan when needed, and no matter what stage you want to step on, competition, career, lifestyle, a red carpet, wedding, whatever it is, House of Pain personal training is the most personal training you can get.

[23:23] Ethan Slater: Visit their website, train with pain, T-R-A-I-N with P-A-Y-N-E.com for more details.

[23:31] Ethan Slater: So we were talking about Judy Coon, I guess, and but this is all this to say.

[23:35] Grace Aki: Can you tell me stories or a story about anyone that you remember meeting in all of your press, all the things where you go, oh my god, I can't believe I'm meeting this person.

[23:47] Ethan Slater: You had a lot of that.

[23:48] Ethan Slater: There are a lot of those, but the the I think the niche ones, like the ones where it's a personal moment, have the most impact.

[23:59] Ethan Slater: But the one that I that I feel like um is for me the most full circle is I so I was backstage after the show, getting my wig off, and um, like I it was just like this great ritual where I would sit and um Kevin, maybe who is um worked on wigs for SpongeBob and does like every Broadway show, he's brilliant, would take off my hair and we would talk and we would like debrief, and if I had any cuts, he would like, you know.

[24:29] Ethan Slater: It was he's the best.

[24:30] Ethan Slater: He's just the best person.

[24:31] Ethan Slater: Um, but we were like sitting in the chair and talking, and there was an announcement made um, like Ethan, your cousins at the stage door.

[24:42] Grace Aki: Yeah.

[24:43] Ethan Slater: And this was like six months into the run, so my reaction should have been like, Oh, how nice.

[24:48] Ethan Slater: But at that point, it was like You're probably pissed.

[24:50] Ethan Slater: I was like, my cousin came and didn't tell me, like, I want to go home.

[24:55] Ethan Slater: I'm so tired.

[24:56] Ethan Slater: Like, there's so much to do.

[24:57] Ethan Slater: I wish I'd known.

[24:58] Ethan Slater: I would have planned differently.

[24:59] Ethan Slater: Like, that was my reaction, which was not the correct reaction.

[25:03] Ethan Slater: Um, but this gave me an opportunity to check myself because I was like, I guess, like okay.

[25:09] Ethan Slater: And someone really kindly, um, you know, one of the dressers, his name is Chris, who's amazing.

[25:16] Ethan Slater: He was very, very sweetly was like, dude, I'm gonna go check which cousin it is while you get your wig off.

[25:20] Ethan Slater: And I was like, that would be great, thank you.

[25:22] Ethan Slater: Check which cousin.

[25:23] Ethan Slater: And he like goes, and I go back to my dressing room, and I'm like getting undressed, and um he pokes his head and he goes, Um, it's Christian Slater.

[25:33] Grace Aki: Is he your cousin?

[25:35] Ethan Slater: And I was like, No.

[25:37] Ethan Slater: There is no that's amazing.

[25:39] Ethan Slater: Like, what?

[25:40] Ethan Slater: And he was like, Do you want me to bring him back?

[25:41] Ethan Slater: I was like, Yeah, bring him back.

[25:43] Ethan Slater: So he like he comes back and he opens the door, he goes, he's like, um, well, I don't know if we're officially cousins, but probably right.

[25:50] Ethan Slater: First of all, that voice.

[25:51] Ethan Slater: Yeah, that that's like that's how I experience it.

[25:53] Ethan Slater: I don't know if it's right, but it's how it's how I experience him.

[25:55] Ethan Slater: And he came in, and I was like, uh no, we're definitely not cousins.

[25:58] Ethan Slater: Um I'm like, I'm super super Jewish.

[26:00] Ethan Slater: Our name was Slutznick.

[26:01] Ethan Slater: It was changed um because we couldn't get work.

[26:04] Ethan Slater: You do a 23andman it's like Christian Slater, and you were like, like we're happy.

[26:08] Ethan Slater: Yeah, we're like the first cousins.

[26:09] Ethan Slater: Um but he like comes in, we like had the most lovely interaction, and my entire life, people have been asking me if I was related to Christian Slater.

[26:16] Ethan Slater: Every time I meet somebody, it's either Christian Slater or Kelly Slater or AC Slater, the fictional character from Stand by the Bell.

[26:22] Ethan Slater: So uh now at least one of the three is aware of my existence, and that's huge.

[26:29] Grace Aki: That is, and also like, I'm sorry, but like you gotta be really reaching to be like, are you related to Christian Slater?

[26:35] Ethan Slater: Because you two do not look alike at all.

[26:37] Grace Aki: Not at all.

[26:38] Ethan Slater: No.

[26:38] Ethan Slater: Um my favorite thing about it though is that he told them he was my cousin.

[26:43] Grace Aki: Yeah.

[26:44] Ethan Slater: That's such that's so funny.

[26:46] Ethan Slater: Yeah.

[26:48] Ethan Slater: It's pretty bold to just for for straight up Christian Slater to walk down and be like, Yeah, I'm uh I'm Ethan's cousin.

[26:55] Grace Aki: So we are related for sure.

[26:57] Ethan Slater: It's so good.

[26:58] Ethan Slater: Uh but yeah, so that made me feel really good.

[27:00] Grace Aki: Oh, that's sweet.

[27:01] Ethan Slater: Yeah, it was that was a good moment.

[27:03] Ethan Slater: You you got to work with so many people on that show, like literally so many, because there's so many songwriters.

[27:09] Ethan Slater: And I don't know if you got to meet everybody because I know that's not really how it works.

[27:12] Ethan Slater: Yeah, but it's still bizarre because the creative team technically for that show is cuckoo bananas.

[27:19] Grace Aki: So many people.

[27:20] Ethan Slater: So many people.

[27:20] Ethan Slater: Yeah.

[27:21] Ethan Slater: Um, who uh I'm now I'm like forgetting his name, which is silly of me.

[27:25] Ethan Slater: But like Sweet Man, Cookie Glasses, wrote a lot of your show.

[27:31] Grace Aki: Jonathan Colton?

[27:32] Ethan Slater: No, kooky glasses.

[27:34] Ethan Slater: To me, his photos are always like big glasses.

[27:37] Ethan Slater: Oh and his wife is Lauren Warsham.

[27:39] Grace Aki: Oh, oh, Kyle, Kyle Gerrow.

[27:41] Ethan Slater: Book writer.

[27:41] Ethan Slater: Yeah.

[27:41] Ethan Slater: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[27:42] Ethan Slater: Oh, Cause the Vest.

[27:43] Grace Aki: Yeah.

[27:43] Ethan Slater: Sorry, I was thinking I was in the songwriter world.

[27:45] Ethan Slater: That's why sorry.

[27:46] Ethan Slater: I'm like, You're so right.

[27:47] Ethan Slater: Glasses is such a huge part of his head shot.

[27:50] Ethan Slater: Yeah, but I've never met him.

[27:52] Ethan Slater: I watched the to uh weird.

[27:55] Ethan Slater: I one of my dearest friends, Michaela, is like Lauren's like friend, also, like we she would house watch for her when she was like first having her baby.

[28:06] Ethan Slater: And I was remember watching like one of the Tony Awards that Funhome was on wow, this through line.

[28:12] Ethan Slater: Um we were watching, and we were like, all these like lesbians in the room were like, we feel it, we see it, we hear it, and we're sitting there watching it, and um there was like photos and like stuff out about him working on SpongeBob, and they were like, Oh, he is working on the show, and I was just like, Oh, for real, like they're making that for real.

[28:30] Ethan Slater: And then she was like, Yes, for sure.

[28:32] Ethan Slater: But like Lauren and Kyle, I have never met in person.

[28:34] Ethan Slater: I've been in their house a couple times, like house watching with them.

[28:37] Grace Aki: But really, right, right, right.

[28:40] Ethan Slater: And it's like, oh my gosh, it's so cool.

[28:42] Ethan Slater: I love to see like the little bits of like before and then as it's happening, and like watching a journey and watching you do it and then watching you do it again on TV just recently.

[28:53] Ethan Slater: Yeah, that was really cool.

[28:55] Ethan Slater: I had like the best seat in the house.

[28:56] Ethan Slater: I was like watching from my couch and I was like, wow, this was like a house seat that I didn't pay for.

[29:01] Ethan Slater: And like I think I I just feel like Tina and Glenn Tina Landa who directed it and Glenn Weiss, who um co like co-directed the TV version.

[29:09] Ethan Slater: They just I feel like they did a really good job of of making it feel really live but also dynamic.

[29:14] Ethan Slater: It was really fun. Like it's probably one of the best ones because I was like, you know, I get mad that we don't um not bootleg. I get mad that we don't bootleg. We gotta start doing bootlegs. We gotta do more YouTube bootlegs. Yeah, we need uh we need really bad quality. We need the zoom in, zoom out. And then and then the dropping of the phone really fast. Right, and he likes start away. Flashlight. PS we do not condone those no, but I will say, you know, uh Alex Brightman on Twitter is right. Um it is s yeah, super intense. Um I feel like the accessibility question is a really important one. Um, like it I want theater to be more accessible. I that's why I think these like film TV versions are a really great thing. And that's why I was like, I hope this opens a window for like everyone else because it was so good. And I just I want kids to have that all the time.

[30:09] Grace Aki: Yeah.

[30:09] Ethan Slater: For sure. But sitting in the audience with an iPad. I you heard me, iPad. Wait, this happened to you?

[30:15] Grace Aki: People do the cream. Tell me a story about the...

[30:16] Ethan Slater: Well, this is this one is like this is an audience experience. I was sitting um in the Nederlander theater watching Amazing Grace. And Josh Young's Amazing Grace. Josh Young's Amazing Grace. The very uh Chuck Cooper and I was gonna say. Um and I'm sitting we're sitting in like maybe the back row of the orchestra section. So if you've been in the Nederlander theater, there's an overhang. You're like anyway, we're like sitting in the back row, and the people in front of us are holding an iPad, like a full-on professional size iPad over their heads filming it. And I say there because it was it was two people. I only saw the back of their heads. Um, but they kept on passing it back and forth when like if somebody would walk by, they would like pass it to the other person that's like to hide it, and they would like hide it a little bit off to the side. They got asked to put it away four times. Every time the usher left, immediately the iPad went back up. So we basically watched Amazing Grace bootleg in the theater.

[31:17] Grace Aki: Ah.

[31:18] Ethan Slater: We did it was a nice size screen though, I will say. But you eventually got confiscated.

[31:22] Grace Aki: Yeah, okay, good.

[31:23] Ethan Slater: But also like it because of that, you literally missed some of the show because you're so invested, like you're invested in like what's gonna happen with these people. Truly, we probably missed 30 minutes of the first act.

[31:35] Grace Aki: Yeah.

[31:35] Ethan Slater: Like no, no less, possibly more. It was really outrageous. And we also, I was there with Danny Skinner, and we were um Oh, how do you know him?

[31:44] Grace Aki: Uh we uh, you know, we did it, we did SpongeBob together.

[31:47] Ethan Slater: He's nice.

[31:47] Grace Aki: Yeah, he's a nice guy. Y'all are best friends.

[31:51] Ethan Slater: It's funny. It's funny that we know each other through SpongeBob because we didn't meet seven years ago, eight years ago because we're now in 2020. Um at our at the first workshop, but our friendship has become so much more like most people actually in that show. Um but we were we were also a little bit mad about it. We were like, I can't believe they're doing this. So also there's some there are some really incredible front row stories while we were doing SpongeBob. We see you. Like if if you're on if you're on stage and you can see the audience, um, and you can especially see the audience when they're holding a phone or something filming. Like we can clock you. We know that you're there, we know that you're doing it. We've we'll look straight down the barrel of the camera, so look for those because that no that means you got got. Um it's so much no, but I do think I do hope that this is like part of the wave of accessible theater.

[32:49] Grace Aki: Yeah, and I don't think that my hope is that it doesn't replace theater going. I think it is a different experience to see it live.

[32:57] Ethan Slater: Um well, I this is how I know that it it won't. Because I remember looking at I like I will say, like years ago, I was constantly like, oh my gosh, like somebody put up a video of Jeremy Jordan doing Newsies. I have to watch. And then I watched it and I was like, I have to see that show live.

[33:13] Grace Aki: Yes.

[33:13] Ethan Slater: So honestly, it's a commercial. Yeah. It's so I don't think that doing like doing a professional like license from the company is bad. I think it would encourage people to go because they people like they wanna they like it. Yeah, I went to see um I went to see Bridges in Madison County in its closing weekend.

[33:34] Grace Aki: Oh because I had seen videos and I was like I sort of want to see it live.

[33:38] Ethan Slater: I have never been moved by a single musical note a single sung note in the way that I was when what is it Steven Pasquale sang that A flat and all fades away. It all fades away. Yeah. The oh my and like I'm sitting in the back and he just hits he hits the note and you think he can't he can't grow it any bigger and it just like pierces you. I was like that's that was an experience that you could only have in the theater. I immediately was like he's gross. He's so good. It's outrageous.

[34:06] Grace Aki: Yeah like I saw the Robert Bridegroom like four or five times.

[34:11] Ethan Slater: Yeah.

[34:11] Grace Aki: Just because of him.

[34:13] Ethan Slater: Yeah. You were right too.

[34:15] Grace Aki: Yeah and then well that's when I fell in love with Leslie Kritzer.

[34:18] Ethan Slater: She's amazing. I can't I can't bring myself to even talk about because we don't have the time. Um but yeah she is an icon and she deserves your money.

[34:26] Grace Aki: Yeah.

[34:26] Ethan Slater: So anyways let's okay. When the night that I met you you brought up Buster Keaton.

[34:32] Grace Aki: Yeah.

[34:32] Ethan Slater: And I was like oh this all tracks. Yeah like you you like liking him investigate like his story and I was like oh can you tell me a story about Buster Keaton and like how you fell in love with him and his story.

[34:45] Ethan Slater: Yeah that it's a good question. I mean like I I have always liked Buster Keaton. I think when I was working on SpongeBob I went to Buster Keaton as research. I went to all sort of the silent comedians Laurel and Hardy in particular because of SpongeBob and Patrick, they're like their comedy is really based on it. But in turn but in terms of just like figuring out how to um have physical comedy not take away from the story and and not take away from the character but be sort of a big part of it. I I personally like Buster Keaton the most. SpongeBob has a lot of Charlie Chaplin's uh tramp in it, but like Buster Keaton is is sort of my guy. So I was doing a lot of research, and then once the show started, and um, you know, we were a few months in.

[35:31] Grace Aki: Yeah.

[35:32] Ethan Slater: Actually, you know, we were actually like eight months in, nine months in, and I was looking for ways to get reinvigorated. Um, and you know, I was I actually never felt um bored of the show or anything like that. There are things in a long-running show where it can be really hard to get yourself to do the best work that you can do. I never felt like it was a challenge because of the show, but I I did feel like I wanted new ways in. And one of those was to sort of revisit Buster Keaton and uh Laurel and Hardy and those things. So I started reading his autobiography.

[36:03] Grace Aki: Okay.

[36:04] Ethan Slater: And um I was reading this chapter about his time in vaudeville, and he was um performing, he was about 21 years old. He was performing at the Palace Theater in New York City on stage, and his father, a man named Joe Keaton, who is like this drunk, sort of angry man, um is getting heckled from the wings. There's a there's like uh the theater owner, but the guy who owns the Palace Theater, it's like standing in the wings, and he's like yelling, like, make me laugh, Joe. And and Joe uh chases him out of the theater, like all the way down 47th Street, all the way down Sixth Avenue.

[36:49] Grace Aki: Oh my crap.

[36:50] Ethan Slater: Um, and uh Buster is left alone on stage at the Palace Theater, and he and there's like 1600 people waiting for him to do something. He's 21 years old. Um, and he does a little dance and a little song, and the audience goes wild, and there's like this little review written about him. And I was reading this as I'm walking through Times Square, and I'm like trying to finish the chapter before I get to work, you know. I'm like trying to finish the chapter. So I'm standing outside the stage door of the Palace Theater. It's like still pretty cold, and I'm like reading it, and uh it ends with that was the last vaudeville performance that my family ever did. I was like, whoa, Buster Keaton's final vaudeville performance was on the stage of the Palace Theater.

And then I went in, we did the show, and I'm gonna say that night for the sake of the story, but it was actually like two weeks later. The producers call a meeting um for after the show. We all gather together and they tell us that the show is closing because they are tearing down the Palace Theater.

[37:57] Grace Aki: And it was like a really emotional thing.

[37:59] Ethan Slater: You know, they're renovating it, quote unquote. Right, right. It was like this really, really emotional moment. Wow. Um, but it like kicked clicked for me in this weird cosmic thing that Buster Keaton's final show was on the stage of the Palace Theater, and we would be the final theater to final show to play the Palace Theater the way it was played when Buster was there.

[38:20] Grace Aki: Jeez.

[38:20] Ethan Slater: Um and so I feel incredibly connected to him for that reason. I also um one of the most amazing people who worked at the palace, this guy named Bobby, who's just a true gem, and yeah, and he uh gave me a little piece of the palace to take home.

[38:38] Grace Aki: Oh my gosh.

[38:39] Ethan Slater: So I have it on my mantle. Um so that was that's only sort of a story about Buster Keaton and more a story about being Buster. It all has to, but it all has to like make sense for you. Like it, you know, you and also PS, like we forget how like the theater is literally a second home for a lot of people.

[39:00] Grace Aki: Yeah.

[39:00] Ethan Slater: And so like when you invest time and like you perform you're giving so much on the stage, like, yeah, it means a lot to you to take a piece of it home because it's like, yeah, I that was like a second childhood home for me.

[39:11] Grace Aki: Yeah, I I mean I slept there, I like napped there. I would like you know, I can I'd be I some of the biggest milestones in my life happened there within a single year. But it it's it was a really important place. It's really sad walking by it right now.

[39:25] Ethan Slater: It's so you know depressed city, yeah.

[39:31] Grace Aki: Well, then don't go to the other side of that avenue.

[39:34] Ethan Slater: That's true. But I I like keep on I keep on trying to get a I was actually with Tina and we were walking down Broadway together, and we saw that like the construction door was open, and so we could like see into the totally gutted theater. It looked it was really really sad.

[39:50] Grace Aki: What street is it on?

[39:51] Ethan Slater: It's on it's really on 7th, where Broadway and 7th come together on 47th Street.

[39:55] Grace Aki: I literally saw it open.

[39:57] Ethan Slater: Yeah, I saw people like walking in and out with like planks and stuff, and I took a photo because I was like, this is bizarre.

[40:03] Grace Aki: Oh that I you got a photo.

[40:04] Ethan Slater: Okay, so Tina was like, Ethan, go stand there, go stand there and get a picture of you. And I was like, I was like, I don't think I can do it. She was like, do it, do it, do it. So like I like walk in, and then security comes out and is like and like forcibly pushes me out of the out of the space, and then it like waves his hand at Tina's cameras, like, no pictures, no pictures. So we got um, we got nice and scolded for trespassing.

[40:25] Grace Aki: Okay.

[40:25] Ethan Slater: Um, but it was so funny. Uh bizarre.

[40:29] Grace Aki: Yeah.

[40:29] Ethan Slater: Also, like she can do whatever she wants.

[40:32] Grace Aki: She can do whatever she wants.

[40:33] Ethan Slater: She can and she should and she will. Um God bless uh female directors.

[40:38] Grace Aki: Anyways, I want you if you can tell me a story about your wife.

[40:44] Ethan Slater: If like, yes, because you two are so cute. And you guys got married like right after us, I think. When's your wedding date?

[40:52] Ethan Slater: November 11th.

[40:53] Grace Aki: Yes, because we were October 20th.

[40:55] Ethan Slater: Yeah. And we're also like the exact same age, just about like you're a month older than me.

[40:59] Grace Aki: Yeah.

[40:59] Ethan Slater: And I was just like, wow, it's so weird, like, you know, everyone says, like, this is when you're supposed to do things in life, and then we've noticed that a lot of people like it all lines up, but sometimes it's not when you think it was gonna be, and all that good stuff. I say all this to say I love hearing about you and your wife, so please tell me a story about you guys.

[41:18] Ethan Slater: I like I haven't thought of a story, so I'm gonna ramble for a second. But I think like what you're saying is so is really true. Like we um people are often sort of surprised that we're young and married, which is funny.

[41:30] Grace Aki: Yeah.

[41:30] Ethan Slater: Um because we don't feel young.

[41:32] Grace Aki: Yeah.

[41:33] Ethan Slater: I don't know. We don't really feel super young either. I mean, we feel young in some ways, but like, you know, we've been together now eight years.

[41:41] Grace Aki: Yeah.

[41:41] Ethan Slater: And um, I don't know, it the the marriage thing is like this extension of a partnership, and I feel like we're really we really are uh teammates in a really a really awesome way that I'm that I'm very grateful for.

[41:56] Grace Aki: Yeah.

[41:57] Ethan Slater: We met. So we've only been together for about eight years. Um, but we did meet when we were 13.

[42:05] Grace Aki: I was I went to summer camp with her brothers.

[42:09] Ethan Slater: So she's so she's has uh she has uh trip with brothers, so I was in my the same age group as her two brothers at summer camp. One of them for many years. Her older brother was my counselor, my CIT. So I like knew her family well before I met her. But when I was 13, she like came to visit camp, visit her brother as a sleepaway camp, a Jewish sleepaway camp. And um, you know, all of the kids in our bunk went to play basketball, leaving her and her father alone.

[42:48] Ethan Slater: And I, to everyone's great surprise, I'm sure, am not good at basketball.

[42:53] Grace Aki: Okay.

[42:54] Ethan Slater: Nor do uh nor do I really play it. So I gave them a tour of the camp. I didn't know her at all. I didn't know him at all, but I was just like, yeah, I'll I'll show you around.

[43:05] Grace Aki: Also, you're a 13-year-old showman.

[43:07] Ethan Slater: Yeah, like you this is always ingrained in you. You're like, well, I can do this. I can I can help you by singing about the bunks.

[43:13] Grace Aki: Yeah, you know, I took them around the whole camp. We ended up like that. We ended by sitting and watching the basketball game that was happening on a bench, and that was the first time I met my future wife.

[43:24] Grace Aki: Oh my gosh, that's really cute.

[43:26] Ethan Slater: It was I was wearing uh a mesh Orioles jersey and jean shorts, if I remember correctly. I'm almost 90% sure that's what I wore because I wore that a lot that year. Who is like jean cargo shorts, really horrible look?

[43:50] Ethan Slater: I was working in the shop and he came in and I was like, I know that guy from somewhere, but I don't know. Because he has the bluest eyes I've ever seen. Yeah, he has the most piercing blue eyes in the world. And Iron Man. Yeah. And so he's like sitting on this couch and he's massive. He is the biggest man I've probably ever seen in person, besides like Zachary Levi. And so, which he shocked me with his height, and I did not speak to him. He's so tall. He jarring. And he's Cal Ripkin Jr. sitting on this couch. He's so nice. He has this giant golden doodle who is a baby, and he's like, he's getting bigger. And I'm like, okay, Cal. But I don't know him. And he hears my accent. He goes, Where are you from?

And I was like, oh, like North Georgia, near Chattanooga, Tennessee. And he goes, Oh, like the lookouts. And I was like, Yeah, how do you know the lookouts? It's a minor league team. Yeah. Literally, they're like the most minor. They're cool, but it's a minor league team. Yeah. And he was like, Yeah, I scout there all the time. And I was like, cool. And then I went, Oh my god, it's Cal Ripkin Jr. Like in my head, because he, you know, famously, like people that are in a field don't normally talk about the field they're in because they don't like to give away the thing. Yeah. And so then he just started talking to me about baseball, and then he came in like a million more times, was so nice, he's like, hey, lookouts are doing good this year.

And I was just like, Oh my gosh, he's so nice. That's so nice, but like he's a really really lovely man. So if you ever meet him, you can be like, I can approach this man because he's nice. That's sing that's such good news. He was such a childhood hero. He and he I think he knows that and he absolutely like pays it forward. That's awesome. So sweet. So that's how I know about the Orioles, and I did a Christian mission trip to Baltimore once. I know. In Inner city. I gave, I remember like being on a hill, and this is when I was like, mmm, this is shifty. But we were in some like a park scenario, and we were handing out ice creams with like Bible verses on them. Whoa. Yeah, and I handed one to a gentleman on a bench, and he goes, Hold on, lady, and he slapped his arm, tied it up, and started shooting heroin, and I went, This is not for me.

And I ran away. Whoa. And I was like, I don't think I can be um a Bible person. Like, I don't think that I can be a missionary like I thought. And then people were like, that's not normal, and I was like, Yeah, but I don't want it to happen again. And so I yeah, I did not was that your last one? That was my last yes. Wow, have you seen Watchmen? No. Well, I love the book. I'm a graphic novel person. Really? Yeah. It's on HBO, right? It's on HBO. I suggest watching it. Okay. Don't know if any of that is going to make it in. But okay, so that's a beautiful story about you and your wife. Yeah, it's just I know. That's amazing. Thanks, Cal Ripkin, for reminding me of that heroin story. Um yeah. Um, I was gonna ask you to tell me a story about um like the people, like, you know, stage door fans, all these things, because you went from I don't know if you're familiar, like you went from cool dude, actor, blah blah blah, to instantly like internet, famous, and when you're doing a show that is predominantly targeted at children, I'm not saying that's who went all the time.

It you're an adult man, adults went. I like it, but like a lot of children know Spongebob, like they associate you with it. Like, did that can you tell me a story about how that changed your life when you were like, Oh, I couldn't prepare for this in school? Oh, yeah. Um, I feel like a big thing about it, and this is so this feels really dumb, but like my Twitter had to change. Because um sort of weird irony Twitter. Uh-huh. It doesn't really connect. And like I'm not, I wasn't like super into weird irony Twitter. Like, I mean, I like following it, but I can't like retweet everything I see. You know, like there's there's certain like there's certain things where I just have to be sort of aware of um, you know, my quote unquote audience, which until then was limited to my immediate family, you know?

Um, which although it's a big immediate family, it's still uh I think that that was something there definitely is this really awesome responsibility of being people's first introduction to Broadway. Um and Spongebob had a lot of first-time Broadway audience members. A lot of people, this was their first Broadway show. Um, and that wasn't like a really beautiful thing. It was really amazing. Uh and it felt like a pretty big responsibility in a w in not nothing that we couldn't handle as a cast, but definitely was something that we were sort of aware of that this was bringing people in, and and it I think was a positive experience. Um I will say though, like it's still sort of a niche thing. Like Spongebob on Broadway is like still relatively niche.

Like I'm not I'm not getting like stopped all the time. I do like, you know, which is good. Like I do get, you know, like one, like once a day. You know, there's casual once a day. Casual hello, a night in the in the city. Yeah, yeah. It does not happen in uh specifically Europe you know it never happens in Europe PS where did you guys honeymoon did you honeymoon we did we went to Iceland that's yes and we went to Ireland oh yeah what okay so like was her thing Iceland and your thing Ireland or was it like reversed? No that's totally what we wanted to do. Like I was like I've always wanted to go to Ireland I'm not Irish but people for my whole life have asked me if I was Irish um a la Christian Slater um my wife is half Irish um but nobody thinks she is so the entire time people were like asking so like where's your family from I was like uh Russia they're like no really you know you just lie yeah like the Blarney stone we are the first we are from the Blarney stone um yeah no that's that was that was it was really amazing that's cool Iceland was incredible did you yeah we we tore that place off for three days like it's so cool is that where that's is that where you get honeymoon or no no we went to Greece and like no offense Greece but like you suck it was brutal I just didn't like it it was just like do you like to the islands we yeah I mean it was very luxurious if I was like oh Kim Kardashian like I just want to take pictures on top of buildings with the wind blowing which I did do once but I digress like it just was kind of boring and it felt very like oh this is what people that vacation do but I like to experience culture and food and like cities and theater and all these things.

So but Iceland to me was really interesting and like I felt I don't know. How did you guys do Iceland? Like, what did you do? We we flew in and we did like an Airbnb, and then we um we did the blue hole. Did you guys do the blue hole? Yeah, was it the blue hole? No, the blue lagoon. Blue hole. That's a poison Tennessee. So much funnier as a name. I think it's the blue hole now. Yeah, it's gonna be called that. But yeah, oh yeah, yeah. We should we should write to Iceland. We should we should low lomo. Um I'll call Bjork. We're friends. It's I didn't want to, you know, drop it, but we are friends. Um I went to her cat cafe and she wasn't there and I got really mad. God, she's like, I don't know that she has a cat cafe.

She had a cat cafe in Iceland. In Reykjavik. Oh my god. You guys had your honeymoon win last year. We just went this summer, actually. Oh yeah, you guys were. We ended up traveling a lot this year because we fit we filmed SpongeBob in in England. So after we filmed that. Yeah, really random. Really random. Why? Really super good question. Incredible question. Well, they had to rebuild everything, and so they built it there. That's cool. It was really fun. Yeah. And then we uh took like a second vacation in three months and went to Berlin and to London, and it was awesome. Wow. That's really cool though. You guys got to have a little trip together. It was great. It's a really nice thing to be able to like cap off some work with some strictly play.

Yeah, I can't imagine. That's and then you also you had just when I met you, you had just been seen on Fossi Burden, which I was wanting way more screen time. Man of yours. You know what? I feel very grateful for the screen time that I got. Yeah. It was super fun. Good. I would love to play Joel Gray in a bigger capacity at some point in life, though. I'm sure you could. Like you're such a sweet guy can. I absolutely freak out when it comes to singing harmonies. I hear someone sing a different note than me, and I assume I'm wrong. I've always looked for a better way to train my ear and give myself more confidence in my harmony singing ability. Now I get to tell you about my new go-to app, Harmony Helper.

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Take the rehearsal room into your own hands with Harmony Helper. Download it in the Apple App Store or Google Play Store. Yeah, you've obviously you've met him. Yeah. Yeah, he's the nicest. He seems like a sweet little man. He's the best. I do see he you see him just like walking around New York sometimes. He's my favorite sighting. But now I have the perfect excuse to go up to him. I met him, um, he came to see SpongeBob and he came backstage. This is probably one of my most star-struck moments. Now I've met him a number of times, but the first time I met Joel Gray, I was warned he was coming to the show. And um he came backstage afterwards and he walks into my dressing room and he like looks around, and the first thing he says is he goes, um, what year is it?

I was like, uh, it's 2018. April 2018. Fifty years ago today, we opened George M in this dressing room. I was like, that was such a good payoff. Right. It's incredible. Which is, I think Bernardette Peter's first show, also, George M. Oh wow. George M. Coam. And that was like that was like my first I had him sign his memoir. Yeah. It was like an amazing experience. That's really cool though. For those who couldn't see me because I was doing a physical impression. He was looking around the room, like at the moulding. As though he was gonna like see his initials somewhere. Right, like if you knock three times on this brick. Yeah. That's really cool though. That's so cool. He um I saw him in the cherry orchard.

And like at the end, he like dies, and I got really upset. Because I was like, I'm gonna picture this when he passes away. And I need to erase his memory. And then I I guess I did, I don't know. But um, yeah, it was it was very jarring, and I was like, oh, I I wish I had not seen that. Oh man, I would I would where did you see that? I want to see him in the Cherry Orchard. It was on it was at roundabout. It was um Willie Coop's dad. Chuck. Yeah, yeah. Whoa. Which I was excited to see him in it because he had just done West Side Story with Damon. Damon was uh they did at the knockdown center for Carnegie Hall. Oh, cool. It was cool. They had like this whole warehouse space, and then they like they made it look like a New York City street.

So the whole show, like their audience was on both sides, and then you would literally watch the choreography take place on the street. Oh, I love that. I heard I feel like I heard about that. Yeah, it was cool. It was like for one weekend, they had a children's chorus singing There's a Place for Us, and you would like peer little pants weeping. I'm excited to see this new West Side story, both of them. Both of them, yes, both of them. Which P.S. I'm gonna go on record right now. I called that Ansel Elbart was going to be in this West Side story years ago, because his dad came into one of my businesses that I worked in retail, and um he was so nice, and I was like, I didn't know who he was, and I was like, Yeah, let me help you with this jackie.

He was like, Well, I take photos, so I need to be able to zhuge my sleeves, he's an older man, and I was like, Okay, like I was like, Okay, this man's on vacation, like he likes to take pictures, that's so cute for his family. Like, he's a fashion photographer, like he's a famous, like fine art photographer. Yes, I didn't know that. Oh, his work is beautiful, and like, yeah, and that's why like his children have incredible photographs because his dad and like his mom is a model, I digress. So he was like talking to me, and he was like, Oh, like you do acting, and I'm like, Yes, also my boyfriend, and um, he was like, Oh, my son, he he loves acting too, and I'm like, good for him. And he was like, Yeah, he goes Will Guardian.

Okay, all right. Okay, okay, okay. And um, he was like, Yeah, he he's done some movies, but you know, I really want him to sing because he has a beautiful voice. I said, Oh, like tell him to audition, like not knowing like this man has done like all these movies, like he's famous. Um, and I said, Well, you should tell him to audition and follow his dreams, and he was like, I will. His dream role is West Side Story, and I said, That's weird. My boyfriend's doing West Side story right now. He goes, Is it the Carnegie Hall? And I said, Yes. He goes, My son was supposed to do that, but he yes, and it's Skylar Skylar Aston was Tony when they did it. But he said, Yeah, he really wanted to do it, but he ended up filming something, and I was like, and then I started to catch on.

I was like, Oh, your son, like no doing things. And then of course he hands me his Amex, then last name is El Gort, and I went, motherfucking. And I'm like in my head, I was like, nah. Um, and then I said, Oh, is your son named Ansel? And he goes, Yes, do you like his films? I said, I do, for sure. And he goes, Well, one day, if you see him in West Side Story, yeah. And he literally said these things, and I like, of course, told all my roommates, I was like, you guys heard it here first. If they ever do a West Side Story movie, that boy, Ansel Elgort's gonna be in it. And the news broke, and I was like, Yeah, I I do. And Ansel was like, Dad, yeah. Stop telling people.

[58:27] Ethan Slater: I know, I now I stop them. Um, I thought she was gonna be Maria because she is like yeah, she's like a beautiful girl dancer, blah blah blah. But I hope she's somewhat featured in the movie. I don't think she's even in it. Whatever. Anyways, none of this really matters. That's nothing to do with you. I just wanted to tell you all these things. That's a good story. I had I have like sort of a sim I mean sort of a similar um moment. I was talking with somebody, um, not gonna name names because this is a story about name dropping. Yeah, yeah. And uh I was telling my the story of my run-in with Meryl Streep. Jeez. In which I so I have this like the um this story that is like like clearly sort of based in a lie.

Um, but the story is that uh when I was a freshman at Vassar, I uh took part in a show called Vassar Voices, where it was like the show about Vassar that toured the country, and there were a couple of students alumni. But the original four people who did it were famous Vassar alum, Lisa Coudreau, Meryl Streep, I think it was like Franny Sternhagen, and um uh Lorenzo Pistoni, I think, were the four people. I'm not 100% sure. And it was it was like this awesome things at Lincoln Center, and then the track that I did was like similar to the track that Meryl Streep did, so I like like to tell people that I like replaced her in it, you know, like I replaced Meryl Streep.

[59:48] Grace Aki: You were the first replacement.

[59:49] Ethan Slater: Yeah, I was the first replacement. And and that's like it's like clearly not true, but like it's true to me. So who's to say? Um, and then she was on campus for some event while we were rehearsing, and I like, you know, I got to meet her and I got to shake her hand. I think that was the context. Doesn't matter. The point is, I tell this whole story, I tell the 25-minute version of it. Sure. Um, and the story ends, and this guy says so kindly, like, wow, amazing. You know, when I lived with Meryl, she was like, You lived with Meryl Streep, and you let me tell that whole embarrassing story. I just name dropped so hard based on literally nothing about your dear friend. Just so horrifying. Ugh, but he was so kind about it.

[1:00:40] Grace Aki: That's nice though.

[1:00:41] Ethan Slater: That he didn't like, oh, yeah, so you're a fool. Right. Yeah, so I feel like we probably all do that a lot. Like, I literally just did it now. Like, it's just part of it, and then one day we're gonna be friends with the people that we were kind of telling those weird little stories about.

[1:00:56] Grace Aki: Yeah.

[1:00:57] Ethan Slater: Like, you're the arch nemesis.

[1:00:59] Grace Aki: Uh, I love it so much though. I I do think that at some point, just like we will our our network will get big enough that it becomes small again. I feel like we'll also be just more forgiving about it. Like, I think he was setting a good example of you know what? I know that my friend is famous. Like, I can deal with the fact that you have thoughts about somebody that I know personally because of you know her prowess as you know the actor of a generation or a couple of generations. Um I think like that that's like sort of a good example in like I don't know, is it like patience or like humility?

[1:01:37] Ethan Slater: Humility, maybe?

[1:01:38] Grace Aki: Yeah, there is like some humility to it, like not taking too much ownership over your connection.

[1:01:43] Ethan Slater: Yeah, because it's like you don't own that person. It's not like you're talking about my cat.

[1:01:47] Grace Aki: Right.

[1:01:48] Ethan Slater: Like they are their own person. Everyone has relationships to those people.

[1:01:53] Grace Aki: Yeah.

[1:01:54] Ethan Slater: It's just they're different.

[1:01:55] Grace Aki: Oh, that's sweet.

[1:01:57] Ethan Slater: There's something nice in it.

[1:01:58] Grace Aki: Maybe.

[1:01:58] Ethan Slater: There's something there. Hard to tell. It's who's to say. So this is the part of the show where we play short story.

[1:02:06] Grace Aki: And you did not prepare for this.

[1:02:08] Ethan Slater: I did not prepare for this. Basically, what happens is it's like an improv game. Where um I will say a word to you and you will have two minutes to tell me a story that comes from that word. Like it just can remind you of something.

[1:02:21] Grace Aki: Yeah.

[1:02:21] Ethan Slater: It doesn't have to include the word.

[1:02:22] Grace Aki: Okay.

[1:02:23] Ethan Slater: Got it? So or and then also you give me a word and then I will tell a two-minute story.

[1:02:28] Grace Aki: Okay, wonderful.

[1:02:29] Ethan Slater: Yeah? Do you want to go first in storytelling?

[1:02:32] Grace Aki: Mm-hmm.

[1:02:32] Ethan Slater: Okay. Let me think of your word.

[1:02:37] Grace Aki: Um.

[1:02:40] Ethan Slater: Oh, okay, sure. Um, your word is yellow.

[1:02:44] Grace Aki: Yellow starts now.

[1:02:46] Ethan Slater: Mm-hmm. Oh, see, this feels really misleading because um, you know, yellow is like the color of SpongeBob.

[1:02:53] Grace Aki: Sure.

[1:02:53] Ethan Slater: But I'm gonna connect yellow to um the mug that I'm drinking out of, which is Fun Home. Um, I I remember seeing Fun Home and like just being absolutely moved to tears by it. This isn't really a story, but I think Fun Home was part of a series of shows that for me was like, oh, musical theater can be impactful in a multitude of ways. And that there's like such a beauty in the intimate story and storytelling. I think every like element of it taught me something. Um and it just made me want to be a creative in that way. And I think I like, you know, wow, this is this is just free association. But when I was in college, I wrote a musical as my thesis.

[1:03:40] Ethan Slater: And it was like sort of this sprawling story of like um people who had never met in real life but come together in the virtual world to like solve a mystery. It was like this really big concept that like had too many parts. And that was the kind of stuff I was writing at the time. I had written a few things, but I had just written that. And um I remember feeling like really bogged down and not quite sure why I wasn't able to like talk about or write about or express myself the way I wanted to. And then I saw Fun Home and a couple of other shows in that time, and I was like, oh, there can there's a space for those big sprawling shows, but there's also a a real space for sort of intimate storytelling that can jump out into different locations in these things, but it's really self-contained.

Um and so it was really I think the story itself of like knowing who you are and knowing who your family is and uncovering secrets like really connects on sort of the emotional philosophical level, but on a structural level, it also like taught me a lot about self-expression.

[1:04:45] Grace Aki: And that is literally two minutes.

[1:04:47] Ethan Slater: That is the most deep short story we've That was too deep.

[1:04:52] Grace Aki: That was beautiful.

[1:04:53] Ethan Slater: Like I that was yeah.

[1:04:55] Grace Aki: Well thanks for letting me talk. Can I can I also like ruin your day a little bit?

[1:05:01] Ethan Slater: Yeah.

[1:05:01] Grace Aki: Fun Home came out literally two weeks after my dad Bruce died.

[1:05:07] Ethan Slater: And I went to see that show like a goon by myself, and I was like the whole time I was like, I can't do it.

[1:05:16] Grace Aki: And I literally wrote Alison Bechdel because I was like, and then I immediately like bought her graphic novels, like blah blah blah. And I was like, you don't know what you did for me.

[1:05:24] Ethan Slater: And I saw it like a million more times. It was therapy.

[1:05:26] Grace Aki: Yeah. But it yes, it inspired, and I hope it inspired a lot of other people as well. In storytelling and also like just we could really have a whole episode about that show. It's just like really beautiful.

[1:05:38] Ethan Slater: And a friend of a friend of a friend just did it at Yale.

[1:05:44] Grace Aki: And did you hear about this?

[1:05:45] Ethan Slater: I did hear about it.

[1:05:46] Grace Aki: They did puppet work as the children, um, because it's like at a college.

[1:05:52] Ethan Slater: Yeah.

[1:05:52] Grace Aki: So like the come to the phone home, like, or like little puppets coming out, and it like draws this connection of like, even though we can't see the children, they're hearing it, and it's just like oh, it's so pretty.

[1:06:03] Ethan Slater: So that's so amazing. I this really I think maybe another thing that I connect to about it, but maybe not. Maybe this is but I I think that there's this interesting community of people who are um like traumatized by the death of a parent.

[1:06:17] Grace Aki: Yes.

[1:06:17] Ethan Slater: And my my mother died when I was when I was seven, and I have a number of friends who have lost a parent either in that time or later in life, and it's a really different experience losing a parent as a young child than use losing a parent as a young adult.

[1:06:30] Grace Aki: Yes.

[1:06:31] Ethan Slater: It's like uh it they're sort of incomparable.

[1:06:34] Grace Aki: Yeah.

[1:06:34] Ethan Slater: Um I think in a lot of ways that there's no reason to like qualify or quantify pain or whatever. Yeah, but in a lot of ways it can be harder when you know the parent a little better, you know, in these things.

[1:06:46] Grace Aki: Sure, sure.

[1:06:46] Ethan Slater: Um, but there was something about seeing it that was like one of those stories being told that I thought was really important. And I've had this, I've had similar conversations with friends a lot about not always about Fun Home, but it's it's made its way in about like what that does to your sense of self and like growing up, and it's a really interesting thing.

[1:07:07] Grace Aki: It's uh yeah, it's a it's a doozy.

[1:07:11] Ethan Slater: It's a dizzy, but yeah, it's yeah, it mm-hmm.

[1:07:11] Grace Aki: Mm-hmm.

[1:07:15] Ethan Slater: That's all. I can't even like that's it. It occupies a lot of brain space for me. It ends up being a lot of the things that I write about.

[1:07:21] Grace Aki: It informs a big part of like your expression.

[1:07:24] Ethan Slater: Yeah, I had this interesting coup my sister's the only person in my family who like reads a lot of the things that I write.

[1:07:31] Grace Aki: Um not because the others won't.

[1:07:34] Ethan Slater: I was like, we would all like to read your things.

[1:07:35] Grace Aki: No, no, it's nice.

[1:07:36] Ethan Slater: It's like I mean, I'm like, you know, before she she just reads them before they're ever like on their feet or anything.

[1:07:40] Grace Aki: In the world.

[1:07:41] Ethan Slater: Um, and at one point she said to me, like, really sweetly, she was like, It's interesting how you always write about the same thing.

[1:07:48] Grace Aki: And I was like, what?

[1:07:49] Ethan Slater: She was like, I don't know, they're all like really different stories, but they're just like all versions of you're like trying to deal with this thing that happened, and it's really interesting to see that.

[1:07:56] Grace Aki: Oh wow, and it made me sort of recontextualize the things that I've been writing, and um and act and there's a real validity to it.

[1:08:03] Ethan Slater: Like I didn't feel undercut by it. It wasn't like I wasn't finding new, they were all different stories, but he's like different ways in. And I think Fun Home like is that for other like a lot of other people.

[1:08:15] Grace Aki: This it brings you into the story.

[1:08:17] Ethan Slater: I'm glad to hear that it was therapeutic for you.

[1:08:21] Grace Aki: Yeah, well, I think that everyone's gonna go the other way.

[1:08:24] Ethan Slater: Yeah, no, no, no, it was great, but it it also inspired me to like, oh, I can tell my story and it's not the end of the world, and it might help somebody.

[1:08:31] Grace Aki: That's what it taught me.

[1:08:32] Ethan Slater: It taught me that because I was always so scared to write my own stories because I thought they were very self-indulgent. And then I learned literally by sitting there, I was like, Oh, it literally helped me. So, like when I do my play, it might help somebody, and that's how I can do this.

[1:08:49] Grace Aki: It's helping me, and it can also be like, hey, you know what? You're heard.

[1:08:51] Ethan Slater: Yeah, I'm like, we all have dealt with alcoholism, I'm sure of it. So, you know, it's just it's a lot, but um, yeah, what is it speaking of Judy K in that song Days and Days and Days just and days and days and days?

[1:09:06] Grace Aki: I don't even want to do a short story myself because I want to end on that note where people are having to Spotify Fun Home right now.

[1:09:12] Ethan Slater: No, but you have to do one because I did one.

[1:09:14] Grace Aki: Okay, fine. Um, but mine are usually like so cuckoo.

[1:09:18] Ethan Slater: That's the way to end it, is on an uh like something that isn't too dark, isn't it?

[1:09:25] Grace Aki: So introspective.

[1:09:26] Ethan Slater: Yes, I do have a club of people called Dead Dad Club, but you're always welcome to join, even though you don't have a dead dad.

[1:09:31] Grace Aki: That's so sweet.

[1:09:32] Ethan Slater: Yeah, anytime it's a lot of people have to be.

[1:09:34] Grace Aki: Um that's why I honestly Beetlejuice, so into it.

[1:09:38] Ethan Slater: Yeah, like that song Dead Mom.

[1:09:40] Grace Aki: Uh my wife hates how much I sing it around the house.

[1:09:43] Ethan Slater: But well, it's I it's gotten better, but like there was just I to me it's just like the perfect song, it's a perfect song.

[1:09:48] Grace Aki: It like really encapsulates like that feeling of being a young person, be like, Dead mom.

[1:09:57] Ethan Slater: Yeah.

[1:09:57] Grace Aki: Oh my god.

[1:09:59] Ethan Slater: I just love it.

[1:10:00] Grace Aki: Even just that line.

[1:10:01] Ethan Slater: Oh, it's so good.

[1:10:02] Grace Aki: Yeah, I'm gonna tell you a story.

[1:10:05] Ethan Slater: Um, not on those when we're done recording, just remind me um about that.

[1:10:09] Grace Aki: So, Damon cut all of that. Okay, so you're gonna give me a word.

[1:10:12] Ethan Slater: Is gonna be snowball.

[1:10:16] Grace Aki: Snowball, okay.

[1:10:17] Ethan Slater: So that reminds me of my mom because one time we were at the um we were at Eckerd. Do you remember Eckerd drugstores? It was before Walgreens.

[1:10:24] Grace Aki: I know, I think this might be a southern thing.

[1:10:26] Ethan Slater: But there was an Eckerd that my stepbrother also happened to be a manager of, but anyways, they had those little snowball like uh candies, like it was like the little coconut thing with all the cream and then the coconut and then like the chocolate in the middle. And they obviously like always look like boobs, but I would always look at them and be like, ew, like who eats those? And one day my mom was like, I remember saving up so I could buy snowballs, and I thought that is so sweet. And every anytime my mom would be like, Oh, this was like a special treat. I would love to buy them and be like, let's share them. And even if I thought they tasted like crap, it was like, oh, I'm sharing this thing that my mom liked.

Do you know what I mean? Like when she was my age, and so we started doing that with like fudge or like divinity. Do you know what divinity is? It's like a sugary, um, the texture's kind of like toffee, but it's not as like chewy, and it's like kind of it's very dense, and like you have to home you have to make it from home.

[1:11:23] Ethan Slater: Yeah, you don't really like sell it. It's like a homemade rice crispy treat where you can't get the same thing out of a box. Yeah, and it has like all these little pecans in it, and um, yeah. So anytime I think about like those snowball treat things, I think about like buying them and like sharing them, and even if I thought they tasted badly, I was like, but this is like our thing.

[1:11:41] Grace Aki: That's so sweet.

[1:11:42] Ethan Slater: Sorry, we were just telling these like I don't know, but like parent stories, and that's what that's where I'll say that.

[1:11:47] Grace Aki: That's so lovely, yeah.

[1:11:49] Ethan Slater: Uh, so eat your sugar. That's what we're trying to say. Into the new year. Um, do you have anything that you want to put out into the world that you're like about to because you just did like a 54 Below show of some of your like original songs.

[1:12:03] Grace Aki: Yeah.

[1:12:03] Ethan Slater: Like you have an album.

[1:12:05] Grace Aki: I have an EP that's on Spotify. We're recording um another short EP.

[1:12:11] Ethan Slater: Yeah I guess that's redundant.

[1:12:13] Grace Aki: We're recording another EP that we're hopefully gonna release soon. Um and yeah there are a lot there are a lot of things coming in 2020 that I still can't talk about but it's well then just everyone's going to be following you.

[1:12:26] Ethan Slater: Yeah.

[1:12:26] Grace Aki: So just like constantly be updated by your stuff.

[1:12:29] Ethan Slater: Yeah just um I don't know keep a lookout I put songs on YouTube.

[1:12:34] Grace Aki: Yeah and they're good so you can live they're at least there they're they're in the world yeah and people like it.

[1:12:40] Ethan Slater: So there you go thank you so much for coming thanks for having for sharing these stories and then also talking about JD Coon.

[1:12:45] Grace Aki: Yeah goodbye and one time there's more to the story the kind of story we need right now is for you.