[laughs]

It's your friend, Timothy Olyphant.

Listen, your mom wants to wish you a happy birthday, and say that while you two still disagree on whether your actions January 6th constituted an insurrection, she was glad to hear of your recent pardoning, and you are still invited to Thanksgiving.

Oh, yeah.

Last night you said to me very kindly when I first, when you first walked in, and you said, "Hey, tell me about this, uh, show." And I just said, uh, you liked the show or whatever, and I said, "Thank you," but what I wanted to say is, "Which one?"

Mm-hmm.

Um, it's such a ball to play these kind of roles, you know? It's such a...

You know, because he's a guy who wakes up every morning and he doesn't see himself as a villain.

He's genuinely loves his daughter.

He's trying to do the best.

He's-

He's-... helping her try to navigate this world.

Aw.

Right.

Um, and, uh, so almost every day on that set was these kind of stories.

But we had a, was it the second season? There was a, we had a, a storyline where, um, I, I'm married to my, which it wasn't what really happened in real life, which, uh, in, in, my character was a real guy, Seth Bullock.

But anyway, he was married to his brother's widow and, uh, was raising his brother's child as his own kind of thing.

Mm-hmm.

Anyway, so we had this whole This kid and, and like a lot, I think, uh, the, there was rumblings on the set one day that there was some issue with the, with the kid, his, either his reps or his mother, but David was really upset about something.

And, and I was, I was, he, I was like, I, I don't, I'm not gonna pay attention.

I'm just doing my thing.

Yeah.

I think he just had a clear grasp.

Well, first of all, he went in and pitched a show to HBO about the Roman Empire or something.

And they were like, we already have a show.

And so they were like, could you do a Western? He's like, sure.

A Western of the Rome story.

He wanted to do a show about how man governs himself without law.

When you were under fire, did you imagine that that would help or hurt your Emmy chances? I thought I

Yes.

Um, but it, it was a fun role, you know? It's always great when you get to play a role that's complicated.

What do you think audiences will take away from Lucky?

Well, piggybacking on that, I, it's a, it's such a cool, slick show.

It's thrilling.

It's filled with action.

It, it just looks like, you know what, every episode feels like a film.

It's really elevated in that capacity.

Mm-hmm.

And it was just so kind of, uh...

I don't know.

It- it was just, he was doing something and it was, uh, his mannerisms, his physicality was so amazing and captivating.

And I just thought, "Well, I wonder if I could just kind of have a conversation between these, you know, let's say these two had a baby, and, um, play in that kind of place." So, I really on- (laughs) was, uh...

I shouldn't admit this.

I really thought at times, I'm like, "Well, I'm just gonna sprinkle a little bit of this with a little bit of that, and find some kind of, uh, thing and try to make that my own." Um, but I really felt take to take, moment to moment, I could go from one end to the other and see if it would still hold.

Or with your- with your agent? Like, how did that go? Did you say like, "I'm just gonna go gray, and that's it"?

When you got there, you were hoping to maybe do architecture or something?

I walked (laughs) into the architecture school on my recruit trip.

I had this instilled early on.

My grandfather on my mother's side was very much like, "There's only four or five professions." It was like architect, lawyer, government, or doctor, and everyone else is just hanging on.

I drew a lot as a kid and I loved to do creative stuff, so I was like, "I guess I'll be an architect," 'cause that's the only one on the list that seems to (laughs) be connected.

So, I went to the architecture school.

They just, right off the bat, the dean told me I couldn't be on the swim team and still be in the architecture school.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Hm.

And, uh, every now and then he gets a hankering for just something very American.

So, we went into a, uh, Subway.

He's like, "I'm gonna get a meatball sandwich." And he orders the footlong meatball sandwich (laughs).

And this, God bless him, what a sweet young Thai kid on the other side of the counter, he gets out the bread and then he gets the little scooper they use, and it's one meatball, two meatball (laughs) three, and they're going up.

(laughing)

By taking another movie and turning it to TV, it's, uh, in good hands.

It is in good...

So she was in the class?

She was in the class.

She'd, yeah, she used to come in late, one of the last people to come in, so I'd always see her coming in.

And, um, to your point, I began referring to her as my girlfriend.

We'd never met, and, um, but I was like, "That's my girlfriend.

I need to save her a spot because, [laughs] because she comes in late, and she'll, she'll have to come up, sit next to me." Um, so, uh, yeah, that's...

We had met, uh, taking oceanography class.

Mm-hmm.