Viola Davis

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We have Viola Davis joining us. And man, we talk about so many fun things. We talk about growing up in Rhode Island and Boston and how we get rid of those accents. We talk about our mutual best friend, Meryl Streep. We talk about the time she jumped out of a plane and all the swearing she did on the way down.

And we talk about the new book that she co-wrote with James Patterson called Judge Stone out now. So we're going to get into a lot of great stuff and we're thrilled to have her here. And as we always do, we talk to someone at the beginning of the show that knows our guest or is a fan of our guest and has a question for us. And we talk well behind their back and boy. We've got just a gem of a person.

Julius Tennen, Viola Davis' husband, partner, producing partner, incredible, loving, supportive, wonderful man who makes us all believe in love. He's the only spouse that we've allowed to be on the show so far and the expectation is high. So I cannot wait to talk to Julius. Julius, thank you for joining us. Hi.

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Visit zoomahead.com to learn more. Let up, what do you say? Hello, Julius, can you hear me? I can, hey, are you? Hi, it's a pleasure to meet you.

It's a pleasure to meet you too. And I just want to say quickly that we love you. And you're always amazing and funny as hell and full and all that stuff, so nice to meet you. Julius, thank you so much. So come, you got me blushing already.

Thank you for saying that. I want you to know that we... I mean it. Well, I can tell that about you. I think you say what you mean.

You and Viola. Yes, we do. Thank you for that. So we do this thing at the beginning of whenever we interview someone, we talk to someone that knows them really well and we get a question for them. And we just talk well behind their back.

And I want you to know you are the first spouse that we have spoken to among all of our guests. I feel honored. And I think it's because you two seem to actually really like each other. What can I do? What can I do?

Now, pleasure to meet you, Julius. You're an actor, writer, producer. You're the president of GV Productions, which is a company that you and Viola and others run. And you've got amazing projects that you've done and are getting ready to do. But can I start by just asking you to take us back to the day that you and Viola met on set?

Oh, wow. That was incredible. It was 1999. It was City of Angels. I was planning an anesthesiologist.

She was a nurse, Lynette Pior. And I was passing blood to her. And I was dating a girl at the time that I wasn't so happy with. And then so I said, wow, this lady looks like she could be somebody nice so I could maybe give my card to. So at the end of the day, I gave him my card.

And I had my shirt on. The story is Viola said my shirt had been off. She would have never called me. I had my shirt on. And I gave him my card.

And I said, hey, if you want to hang out, whatever, give me a call. Well, she did. A month later, she called me. I had literally forgot about it. But I hadn't forgot about her.

So when I heard a voice, I went, hey. What ended up she invited me to a casting thing for the main cast because I was recurring on the show. And we went out on a first date almost 27 years ago. And here we are. 23 years married coming up this summer, 27 years it's October.

So it's been beautiful. But that's how it started. Oh, I love that story. And I love that you guys met just your typical way, just passing blood to each other. Yeah, just passing to regular stuff, just passing blood.

And she kind of fit in those things pretty good. And I was like, OK, let me give this to you all my card. I mean, what's so sweet about hearing the two of you talk about each other is you both met each other when you were coming up. Yeah, absolutely. And what it would like to be two young actors working hard to make ends meet and being in love.

Listen, it's tough. Listen, when I met Viola, she was scared to tell me she had bad credit. I said, hey, baby, it's OK. I got good credit. But it's one of those tough things.

But you know what I mean? It's about supporting one another. One, the other one supports the other equally. And that's what we did. We just went about loving on each other and being happy for one another with whatever dropped, whatever happened.

And so just so happened that Viola's career just really started to take off. And it's a beautiful thing. And I'm glad to be a part of it. People are saying, how are you handling it? How are you doing?

Whatever? I said, because I know who I am. So you're a man that starts with you knowing who you are. I don't care how powerful your woman is or what she's she's doing. If your woman knows that you can handle yourself and that you know who you are, then she's going to go, wow, hey, my guy's good.

And so that's the way Viola and I have roles. So it's about me supporting her and vice versa. So it's just been easy for us. Julius, everyone listening right now is just going, ah! Julius, I'm just going to play that on a loop.

Thank you. And it is the truth. But you're right. But you're right. You're right.

You're right. Especially on our business. Because it can be so competitive, even though we're not competing against each other. I'm a man. You're a woman.

But we're not competing against each other. But we're in the same business. Sometimes that intersection, when one is elevating and the other is kind of like not, it can create a lot of different kind of weird kind of energy and things in a relationship. And so listen, this is what we do. It's not who we are.

This is everything. And all this, what we do, it's not who we are. So we figured that out early on. And so it's just been always easy because it's always been in support of one another. Well, that's a beautiful thing because you're reminding me of just the word self in the phrase self-esteem.

It really is your own work to do always. Amy, I can say that I met Viola almost 27 years ago. She's the same woman I met when I met her all those years ago. I hadn't changed a bit. Everything that's happened to her, she's still the same Viola.

And I think that's what makes people so drawn to Viola because she's so real and so authentic. Can we talk about the woman King because congratulations on that? Thank you so much. What a... Yeah.

What was that like making that together? It was a great journey. It was great to be able to do a movie like that because a movie like that hadn't been done in Hollywood ever. And so be able to do a movie like that and have it come out so beautiful, so accepted by the audiences on a global scale. It meant a whole whole lot to Viola and myself.

And so we just went all in despite the challenges, despite not necessarily having enough money to make it, but still saying, you know what? Be down. We're just going to go make it anyway because we know it's going to have a cultural impact and it's going to be long lasting. And as it turned out, if I chose it that year to be one of the great films that was made that year and so we're just so proud to have done that together and battling it out. Just battling it out.

We even know what you want. As hard as it is, Amy, you just have to keep putting one foot in front of the other. If you want something, you have to go for it. And that's what Viola and I continually would our team because I'm a big team. Why was it your football player?

I am an ex-football player. Did you ever coach? I never coached because you have a coach vibe. I was, you know, I was like, I looked at my idols back in the day when I was thinking about acting in playing football. It was Jim Brown, Bernie Casey, Fred Williamson, some of the old school guys from way back in the day when I was saying, yeah, they could do it.

That was kind of a thing. But I always loved the arts. I always loved it. It started with poetry and then obviously. Well, you have a Julius.

You have a real coach vibe and you do something that I absolutely love, which is every other sentence you say my name. And boy, does it work. Every time he's every time I'm a guest. Amy's talking to me. I love it so much.

Okay, I'm sure you've got a sense now of what Viola likes to be asked and what she is asked constantly about and doesn't want to answer anymore. You know, there's always these questions that are like, you know, people think they're asking for the first time or topics that is there anything you would, if you don't mind helping me out to make sure I don't get into an area or a question that she's like, this again? Well, you know, I think it would be fun to ask her some questions about some of the funny moments that we have together. This one is, ask her the origin of Zuni. Okay.

Ask her to say Viola, what's this whole thing about Zuni? What is that thing? Well, let me just tell you a little bit. It's an animated muppet cartoon that I grew up with. And the show was called Five Ball XL5.

And Zuni was one of the endearing characters and they were going on space exploration. It was about that. And I was a kid. I loved that show. And so that's a pet name I gave Viola.

I call her Zuni. And the reason I do it because I love Zuni so much and I love Viola. So that is so endearing to me. So when I'm calling her Zuni, it's not because of what Zuni looks like, because I love the hell out of Zuni. Okay, but I'm going to have to Google Zuni and see what's going on Google real quick and you'll see Five Ball XL5 and you will Zuni.

But I love Zuni. So ask her about Zuni. Okay. Other thing is ask her about our first theatrical experience, Shadow of a Gunman. Just like, you just want to apply it.

The Shadow of a Gunman thing. What is that? Viola? Let's tell you. It's kind of a funny story.

You know, the regular questions about the business and all that. We can always talk about projects and stuff like that. And she's great to talk about that stuff. But she oftentimes doesn't like to talk about the mundane stuff that you have to answer a thousand times. But it always surprises me.

She's always able to answer this stuff as if it was new. I'm like, how the hell do you do that Viola? You know, yeah, I'm like, how are you doing? Okay. She always wanted people to pull a rabbit out of my ass and I'm going, well, you kind of can.

Well, Julius, I know you guys, you're the best couple in the world and you're, we're not going to be able to interview any other spouse after this because you've set such a high bar. Well, and not like it's a competition, but you've worn a gold medal in relationships. Thank you so much. It's been a pleasure being with you this morning. Same love talking to you.

Thank you so much for your time and such a pleasure. Thanks again. You too. Take care. Bye.

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Orders of $30 or more save up to $25 ends May 31st, 2026. See out for details. Viola Davis is here. I'm so so happy that you're here. I'm happy to be here.

I've been like not working for the longest time. Congrats. I feel like I'm coming out of hibernation and I'm like, holy shit, this is what I do. Well, I got to tell you, we got to start by saying you were the first Egot we've had and probably the last. I mean, that's what scare me all.

I mean, that was not a lot of us. No, there's like 18, 19. I have to tell you that it wasn't until I won the Oscar for Fences and someone said, you'll one step away from an Egot. I never thought of it before. I said it was like the sort of thing for me.

Is that so cool? I mean, it's just it is. And again, not something anyone's like thinking about when they're starting out, but just it's cool. It's cool. It's cool.

It's not going to be on my gravestone, Amy, but it's cool. It is so cool. My on my gravestone is going to be that interview. Do you know where? And also, before we get started, I was going to say the Timmy, Timothy, Timmy, Tama, Tama, Shoutout was so cool.

Oh, and my daughter was that was it for her. Just 15. That was it. Timothy, Shoutout to me. I mean, good company to be in.

And of course we all agreed with him, but you spoke about it. And I love what you said about how you loved his speech. What did you love about? What did you do? The essence of what he was saying in that speech.

Well, because what I loved about the speech is he has a spirit of excellence. You know, some people, I always negotiate, Amy, so if you feel like I take a long pause, I'm just negotiating what I'm about to say. So I don't step on toes and I don't work ever again in the industry. But some people don't have the spirit of excellence. They have this spirit of mistaken their presence with the event for mediocrity, for just beauty.

But it's great that he had this spirit of excellence without putting me in it at all. I'm not saying that. But I love that with young actors. And I also love when people are, I guess, openly ambitious and in real time saying, I really want to try to get the best out of myself and others like when they say it. Absolutely.

And love that. And vision too is different than ego. Yeah, that's right. And I saw the ambition in him and he happens to be incredibly talented. So what is like?

I like young people. Listen, just like I love bad kids. I love a bad kid, like a two year old bad kid. Someone who comes, you know, I had a little bad kid at my wedding, my first wedding. I had three ceremonies, Amy.

But my first wedding, I had a little bad kid who stuck his whole finger in my cake. I thought it was the best thing in the world. I love a bad kid. But I also love young people who have an attitude. I do.

So the world is going to get at you. It's going to kick your ass, just leave you in the dumpster. So it's really great when you go out in the world and you have the hutsbuh. You have that self possession, right? Yeah.

That's what I want with my kid. I was so much of a good girl, you know, but shitty boyfriends who made me feel like shit and I was just still like worshiping at their feet. So yeah, I like, I like attitude. Do you think that's an East Coast? Because we're both East Coast.

I grew up in Boston, New Road Island. You weren't born there, but you spent most of your time in Rhode Island. Okay, Boston. You still say Florida. You know, you're a Patekah on your father and your father and your mother.

Oh my God. I eat grinders and cabinets. Okay, that's different. You're from the bubbler? Yeah, bubbler.

Yes. The first time I said bubbler was at Cal Polycorn. Which is a watermelon anywhere else. And I said, you know where the bubbler is? And the guy literally, he stood there for the longest time.

He was like, what the fuck are you talking about? Totally. And he finally said the water fountain. I was like, water fountain with the statues. Well, did you say pocketbook instead of purse?

Oh, pocketbook all the way. pocketbook and wicked, wicked man. And my parents would go into a bar. They'd be like, can we have a beer? And they'd be like, oh, you're from Boston?

And they'd be like, how do you know? Well, just one word. There's a part of growing up on the East Coast that gives you a directness that I wouldn't want to trade. I like that about people. Yes.

But the other side of that coin can be like a roughness, like a just a toughness and roughness. And you know, Amy, I'm black. So comes with a different set of rules of roughness. Yeah. You know, and so, you know, I came from plain-spoken people.

Yeah. You know, I always say it's like, it's like. I'm negotiating. Oh, my God. I love the sound of your negotiate.

We should put some music over it when you're thinking about what to say. No, yeah. Two pop. You can put two pop music. But I just remember visiting someone's at one point and I took a bus and I got off the bus and I told my friend, well, make sure the person who's coming to pick me up.

They know who I am. Okay. I waited there, Amy. 30 minutes, maybe longer, waiting for the person to pick me up. Finally, I find them.

I go to my friend and I said, why couldn't they find me? And he said, well, I described you. I said, well, how did you describe me? Oh, I just said, you were cute. I said, you had long hair, Amy.

I'm black with long braids. I said, did you tell him I was black? I was the only black girl in the bus. He was like, oh, I didn't feel like I could say that. You know, but the thing with what you're talking about plain spoken thing about black people, they call it as it is.

You know, that black girl who come out and she got the tattoo on her left titty and she got one tooth coming out of her mouth. It's that girl. Yeah. So it's, it's that sort of plain spoken as I grew up with my mom and dad. Yeah.

That plain spoken. Well, you've spoken beautifully about your childhood growing up and the difficulties in it and the way that you've like been processing it in real time as an adult now and but I think and I don't know if this is the same for you as I get older, I start trying to look at my my origin, the place of origin and figure out what gifts it gave me and what pain it gave me at the same time, right? And there is this something about growing up in the East Coast. I don't know that sticks with you. And I know this sounds like the accent that we just did like the accent sticks around.

I always say like when I'm angry or really excited, my accent comes out sometimes. Yeah. Does your accent comes out to even when I'm acting? Yeah. Especially in the emotional scene.

It just surprises me. It'll jump out at me. And you know, of course, I went to a school in New York that kills your accent. Yeah. You get thrown out if you still have an accent at Juilliard by your fourth year.

And by my second year, they warned me and said, you cannot come back to the school until you fix up whatever the hell this is going on. And so I remember like every single day for two hours practicing how to say father instead of father and you know, at Juilliard, when you speak to it, when you're walking around, they put a pencil in your mouth during rehearsal. They put a pencil in your mouth to see what your tongue is when you're articulating your sentences. So I was traumatized into just catapulting that, not realizing that's a beautiful thing. Yeah.

Have you ever got to play anyone with a, you know, with a Rhode Island accent or Boston accent and like let it rip? No, Amy. Nobody's writing a black girl from Rhode Island rolls. Well, maybe we do a road trip. Maybe I need to write it.

Maybe I need to write it. I mean, I mean, you're, you're talking about going to Juilliard and you've talked a lot about it and you're training there and like what you took from it. And before you got there, who told you or when did you have that feeling of I want to be an actor? The reason I asked, I was, I'm the daughter of school teachers. No one I knew was an actor.

I didn't know any actors. I didn't like, of course, I knew famous people in movies and TV, but I didn't know that would be a job of mine. But I was in school plays and people would come up and say, you were good. Yeah, exactly. You're on there.

And it surprises you, right? Yeah. But for me, it's, it's gradual. So it's hard to pinpoint one person in one moment, but I swear to you, the more I think about it, I have to pinpoint the moment that we want to skip contest at James Park when I was eight years old. Amy, that was it.

Yeah. And I was so shy, you know, and brutally shy, like to the point where I couldn't speak in public. And so we did this get, you know, and I played Ooh, we kid from That's My Mama. That's Ted Wang. I don't know if you remember that show.

I don't want to aid you. No, what show? It's called That's My Mama. Okay. And he was an Ooh, we kid.

He was a gossipy guy. Okay. He would come and go, Ooh, we, we, I got it. I got it. I'm in a report it.

So I was an Ooh, we kid. My sister Dolores was, what's his name from? Let's make a deal. Montel. Oh, I'm Monty Hall.

Monty Hall. It was, was Esther, Esther from Sanford. And my sister, Diane was Fred Sanford. Oh my. I think I put, I have it in my book, but we created a, a game show, sort of reality show where we had to come on and tell a story of how you saved the life and whoever had the best story won a million dollars.

What are you in the, in the birth order of the sisters? Next to the youngest. I have one younger sister who was my baby. Mm hmm. Yeah.

So wow. So three, so four girls in the same family rehearsing, like doing skits, doing comedy. I mean, we write. Yeah. We had a little wardrobe budget of $2.50.

We'd go to Salvation Army and, you know, or raid my mom's closet. The whole thing was we did the skit contest because we were like these fucking people in this town. Fuck our fucker. I mean, people who like were bullies, you know, and we were like, we got to stick it to them. We got to win the confidence.

Yeah. Once again, the self possession and just being an everyone in Central Falls was there. People were sitting on rocks. You know, the newspaper was there, Amy. Yeah.

And we won. Damn. That must have been so exciting. Viola, I mean, it's going to be hard for me to not talk about how great you are this whole time. To me, that story feels like when an athlete realizes like, oh, I'm naturally good at hitting a baseball or something, you know, you are so good at what you do.

Well, I appreciate that. And the naturalness of what you do combined with your determination and skill is just so, I mean, I wish I could have a time machine and go back to that day and see you performing because I can only imagine that people pointed at you and said, wow. Well, I don't know if anyone pointed at me and said, wow, but I pointed at myself and I said, wow. How do you go from there to Juilliard? How do you, you know what, we'll never know.

You never know. But what do you audition with to get into Juilliard? I auditioned with Sealy from Color Purple. That was my dramatic. And then I auditioned with a sort of comedy piece from, god dammit, I'm forgetting.

Oh boy. But it was sort of French comedy. Like far, like far, I think. Uh huh. Yeah.

I mean, when you were doing Shakespeare, what do you have a way to memorize Shakespeare or like, how do you like to memorize? It's a process. Yeah. So you have to figure out who you are or what you live for, all that other stuff that nobody ever wants to hear about, by the way. It's so boring.

It really is. It's boring. I know what you mean. But what is cool about it is I think that the skill involves with the, you know, the hard work, which is the theme I would say of looking at your body of work and your life is that you just have never shied away from hard work. You've never run away from it.

And memorizing is really hard. Memorizing is what you know what? Memorizing is the least difficult part of acting. Oh, I think these days, I'm going to be so hard. I'm not late late.

I was just like, you know, when you have another actor looking in your face and they're waiting for the line, now I'm big with this is, and then you know that someone is, I did this with Meryl Streep, you know, in doubt, she had a line, I had a line or whatever. And then nothing. I'm looking in her face, nothing. She's saying nothing. I'm saying nothing.

It's obviously someone dropped the line. Yeah. And then I realized she's a one of God. Oh my God. Thank God.

And so then we did it three more times, three more times that scene. She kept dropping the line. Yeah. Say the fucking line. Of course.

But I can't tell Meryl Streep, you forgot the line. Right. You keep forgetting the line. And finally, we did it. And she was like, why does something feel off?

And I said, because you keep forgetting the line. You forgot the line, Meryl. And she's like, I'm not perfect. And then she said, why did you say something? And you did say something.

But the Shakespeare itself feels just like you really got to, I guess, your point, you got to just keep living in it, living in it. Well, the hits are the same about Shakespeare too. Please. What the hell are you saying? I'm not saying.

I'm not saying that. I'm not saying that's the whole thing. I'm not saying that. I'm not saying that. What the hell are you saying?

What the fuck are you saying? And what are you saying? And also the I am a pentemeter. And also, boy actors are going to kill me. But I went to Juilliard.

And you don't want it to be boring. Listen, they're not going to kill you for that. Here's the thing about Shakespeare. All it is is people acting it and listening to it and going like this. And I'm like, you don't know what you're talking about.

And we don't know what you're saying. Well, here's the thing too. And if you don't know what they're saying, then they're not doing it correctly. But you can't say, you know what, it's boring. I know.

And Juilliard, I would fall asleep a lot. Oh my God, I have a friend who it would piss her off. As soon as I was in a class, we'd have the greatest actors, greatest Shakespearean actors in the world come to the school. Within five minutes, I would be dead asleep. I would be knocked out with my lip in my lap.

I mean, I would be knocked out. And to this day, she was like, I can't even believe you would do that. I can't believe you would do that. And I said, did it ever occur to you that it just didn't excite me? Mm-hmm.

But that's the thing with Shakespeare. You just don't want it to be boring because I want it to be boring. Here's the thing. It's just about people. It can be kings and kings.

I mean, it's a soap opera. Most of the time, those plays. But thank you for saying that because the thing about art in general is if you don't figure out how to find a way in, sometimes you feel really strange when everybody else is in there and you're like, how come I can't connect? Yeah, but Amy, let me tell you something. You're going down the road, talking about acting like it's real deep.

People don't see it. I see it as deep. You see it as deep. Most people do not see it as deep because once again, it's about mis-mistaking your presence for the event. Yeah, that's right.

I mean, my big thing, I love scenes. I can't stand, love scenes. I can't stand watching them. I can't stand doing them. I finally said how to get away with murder.

I'm not doing any more love scenes anymore. I mean, you write a love scene. I'm not doing it unless you give me a boyfriend who has a stomach. Wait, say more. A big good.

Yeah. And you know why? Why? Because you'll actually write the scene. It won't be about taking off the shirt and the six-pack abs.

That's right. I mean, I'm watching. I did a scene with Billy Brown, who I love. Billy Brown loved everyone. And it's TV.

Yeah. So, Annalise Keating is in bed. Annalise Keating is sort of sleeps with a lot of people, men, women, which. It cannot be any opposite for me. I mean, I'm like, oh my God.

So, and I'm in the bed. I'm laying down and everything. And then he gets up with his underwear. And they literally just take his underwear down, put his makeup on. And he's got his abs.

And then they want him to walk into the bathroom and come out with, you know, one of those scrub brushes and slap it on his hand as if he's slapping my ass. So he's like, slap, slap, slap. As we're saying, the dialogue. I'm in the scene, Amy. I'm like, you've got to cut.

You've got to cut. Please cut. That's my nightmare. It's a friggin nightmare. That's a nightmare.

So I said, if you write someone with a gut, maybe we won't be in bed. Maybe it'll be about everything else. Yeah. And then we finally kiss. It's like something that's organically happening.

But right now, for me, a lot of love scenes, it's like, that's the time to go to the bathroom. You want to pick up going to the bathroom? You come back. You haven't missed anything. Oh, my God.

I feel you. I feel you. I feel you. I've not done many, but the couple of times it's been on the call sheet, I'm like, oh, no, this is the worst day. And by the way, anybody that's like, ooh, I got a love scene today, red flag.

I had to do a love scene with Tom Verica, who cannot be more lovely. How to get away with murder. First love scene. Well, actually my first love scene was with Billy Brown and the, and it got cut. And I'm so happy it got cut because we were having sex on my car in Philadelphia.

It was 12 degrees. I was terrified. First love scene in my life. But the second love scene, Tom Verica, who plays my husband, Hottick, so we get prepared for the love scene in the trailer and the makeup artists are saying, so do you want anything to cover? I mean, I have stretch marks.

I got stretch marks everywhere. I can stretch marks on my hands. I can stretch marks on my arms. I can stretch marks everywhere. I'm just going to say it.

And so I'm like, yeah, I want makeup on my arms. Yeah, I want makeup on my ass. And it's like, I got makeup on my ankles. Okay. He's getting makeup on.

I mean, we're just basically spraying ourselves with makeup. Both of us terrified. Okay. And then finally, I had the big aha moment. I said, Tom, this is what we're going to do.

We're going to hold it up for the regular people. Yes. Hold it up for the people out there who, you know, may have a little bit of something sticking out there or whatever. There was makeup all over the sheet, makeup all over the bed, you know, you know, thank God my wig didn't come off, you know, and that was. There's nothing sexy about it.

When you do a love scene, in my opinion, there's nothing sexy about it. It's just, it's hard. Your search for the realness and things like the way you're looking for the truth and things in your own life and in your work, it, it dovetails so beautifully with August Wilson. Can you talk about your, how you felt about doing his work and like, well, how important he is to you as a writer? He's important because he writes about black people.

It's arcadences. It's my mom, my dad, my father. That's how we talked, you know, I listened to them, how I talked, you know, and that's the beauty of it because, you know, otherwise, listen, I went to Juilliard. We were doing George Bernard Shaw, St.

And I was like, oh, I can't do this. I mean, I shouldn't say I can't do it. I can do it. I can transform. I could do all of that.

But then, you know, people in the audience, I've got it, you know, let me ignore the fact that this is a deep voice black woman who is self-possessed and very grounded and is not, but with August Wilson. I don't have to do any of that. I still have to do the work, but I could do a work in a way that invites me in, you know, and that's the beauty of August Wilson. And you're nominated for Tony three years after you got out of school? For that, I mean, do you remember when you found out you were nominated?

That must have been an incredible feeling. I found out I was nominated, you know, back in the day, back in the day when you had those answering machines and you had to call. You had to call the answering machine. I would call every single day to see if I had an audition. So I called and my agent at the time said, oh, well, you got a Tony nomination.

Oh, my God. I ran to my parents' house. They don't know what a Tony Award is. And my little niece is an F. They don't know what the hell a Tony Award is.

I ran into the house. I said, you guys, my little nieces and nephews, they were in their diapers running around acting bad. I ran in the house and I said, you guys, I got a Tony nomination. And they started throwing themselves on the floor. They didn't know what the hell a Tony nomination was.

But we all just jumped in. I mean, come on. Yeah, amazing. Come on. This episode is brought to you by Apple Watch.

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So go on, make yourself at home. cozy.ca that's C O Z E Y dot C A and transform your living space today. Cozy, the home of possibilities made easy. You were a very accomplished working actor on a lot of shows before a kind of America at large new year name. You had a really substantial body of work.

Do you feel like that allowed you, you know, it's just like that 10,000 hours idea that you worked really hard and often and kind of figured out that you worked in TV, worked in film, you worked on stage, you like got to like feel confident in your skill. Yes, but once again, that's the task. Yeah, but it's not always everyone's. No, I understand. Yeah.

And I understand that and therein lies the problem with the business that anyone feels like they can do it, you know, but there was never a time and I was at the Guthrie theater working in Newton, Massachusetts. I worked in New Massachusetts. Um, every I'd worked everywhere. I'd worked with everyone hunting, theater, ACT, Mark Taperform, Goodman theater. I thought I'd already made it.

Yeah, I did. Yeah. You know, making your 650 a week and then you did your 10 weeks and then you qualified for unemployment. So you got your unemployment and true, you call it unemployment every Sunday, get that 350. I think it went up to $390 a week.

I thought I'd already made it because I could say that I'm an actor, but you do have to put in those hours in order to have some level of a process because here's what I think, whenever I do a job, this is my thing with actors. It's a little bit of my pet peeve. A little bit is this. If you have a criticism for a writer, you never have it for another actor. You don't criticize them.

That's like a no, no. Okay. I don't care if it's a day player. That's the director's job. Oh, I love this.

But if you have a criticism of the work, if you say, you know, this scene is not working, you have to tell them why and you have to know how to fix it. I will say, once again, I'm a negotiating, I would say 98% of the time people don't know how to fix it. Yeah. That's such a great point because I've often said that actors should spend a day being a writer, getting notes from actors because the way that people give writers feedback is often appalling. It's like, this isn't, and not just actors, anybody, but like the way writers receive feedback is like dismissive, it's insulting.

They don't have a fix like your, to your point, something they've worked really, really hard on, they hand it over and people just kind of like open it up and barely pay attention to it. They barely read it. They don't know the words. They don't, they don't, they're like challenging stuff before it's even tried out. And then conversely, I always say to writers, now put on someone else's clothes.

Go over there and scramble an egg while you remember two pages of dialogue while everyone you know is on the other side of the room drinking coffee, looking at you. And then we're even. Yeah. Absolutely. And sometimes it's really not that deep to fix something.

It could be a simple choice. But what happens is the filter that goes through is, okay, is it going to get more viewers? People are going to want to see, is going to turn on the 18 to 34 year old boys who come see the movie. That's a big one Amy. Oh yeah.

I mean, the boys. The boys. And also, we'll, yeah, we'll man care. We'll man care about this project is like, I don't know. Yeah, that was the one.

Oh yeah. I bet there was a lot of discussion about like, we want to make sure our men show up and it's like, do we? Do we want to make sure men show up? Like these days, me too. I mean, like maybe they don't come to this one.

Exactly. And I think one for us does one. I'm playing a Goji Warrior. I just chopped off five men's heads in the first two minutes. And maybe it's just not for them.

I mean, it's like a lot of the notes were, you know, less dirt and more lipstick. Are you freaking kidding me? Wild. Are you kidding me? Wild.

I'm playing an Goji Warrior. I'm thinking about lipstick. And eyelash extensions. That film, you are so badass in that film. That film is so beautiful.

I love it. You and your husband produced it together, you generated it, made it for yourself such an example of like taking the currency that you had and using it and making that project. And the thing I wanted to ask you about the woman king is, and for people who don't know, it's based on a real story for people that don't know about a could you explain what it was based on the Goji tribe, a Warriors in the home in Benin West Africa in like 1854. And they were all female army unit that would go out and fight neighboring tribes and, you know, Europe, but tribes. Now, you know, the controversy is there was a lot of controversy involved with the Goji Warriors because it would have slaves.

OK, I think ultimately that is what maybe people had problems with. And the other problem is, you know, it was an all black cast, mostly female cast, mostly without getting into it because there will never be enough time in the world, dark skin females who have muscles and who are taking men down. I mean, I'm trained for five hours a day and I was the oldest mother of freak in warrior in the movie. So we trained five hours a day for months, hand to hand combat. I have to tell you though, without getting too much into it because there's a lot about that movie.

Yeah. Very important to me. I didn't think it was a big deal for women to be Warriors. Right. I didn't think that it was a big deal to have a title like the woman king because first of all, there's a lot of kings who are women in Africa.

They actually called kings. I didn't know that that was going to be a controversy until we did it. I thought this is badass. I mean, I would take my toy machete home to practice with my husband. I mean, not around my husband because he would say, Oh, this is a lot.

But, but I just didn't know it was a big deal until we started shooting it. And there was, you know, can you make your curls looser and we're pretty? Mm hmm. Could we do eyelash extensions? Maybe a different title.

You know, this whole sort of watering down. Yeah. This idea of like, just don't forget to stay soft. Yeah. Like while you're the hardest warrior ever, don't forget to be a little bit cute and soft because God forbid you just step into your full power.

Absolutely. And God forbid that you don't turn me on. That's right. That you don't look sexy. That's right.

And, you know, it sort of leads into the whole thing of the value of beauty. You know, that's right. I mean, I'm definitely like at 60 years old, I feel fabulous because I am one of those women. I got that done and over with very, very early in life. You know, I feel for the beautiful women who were younger and now they're older and they walk in the room and no one's looking at them.

Yeah. That's tough when beauty is your another one currency because it goes away fast. Exactly. It's really fickle. Yeah.

And but I will say, and you spoke about this when you were doing the woman king, like the way in which you created this new relationship to your body in your fifties, I think a lot of women, I know a lot of women, I know I speak for myself, you start to really take, you really kind of looking to say, Okay, this is my one body. I really, you know, the the ways in which I got to kind of put it in the on the back burner in my twenties and thirties, I really have to pay attention to it now. And I've joked on here, like, we got to eat 85 grams of protein and we have to lift weights. But you did that. You what?

What did you learn about yourself when you were training five hours a day? And you know what, Amy, it was the first time I could walk into a room with that. It was a leather sort of shirt I had on armor that I had on. And so my stomach was exposed. It was the first time I can walk on the field and in the room and totally be in my body.

You know, there is something about the female body, what you're sort of conditioned to believe about it, that it's got to be beautiful, right? Yeah. So it's got to be thin and beautiful. And the why and the how it has to be beautiful is always tied to male desirability. That's right.

It's never tied to being capable. It's tied to a shrinking. Yeah, exactly. Shrinking and not being capable, not being strong, not being, you know, it's never ours. Yeah.

And so even in the practicing, I was going to lie a little bit. I was going to lie a little bit. I hope it was a little tiring. I hope it never days already. No, no, no, no, this is what the lie was.

Okay. This is what the lie was, Amy, because I do. Okay. Music for negotiating. You know, hit them up like Tupac.

I was going to say, you know, if you know, just in the practicing because we would do an hour of weightlifting, 30 minutes of running on the treadmill at 10 point. Oh, no, I've done 10.0. That is a disaster. It's 30 minutes straight of 10 point. Oh, like was it sprints?

Oh, God damn it. And then three and a half hours. I mean, by the end, I mean, and so all these young girls, they have a little sweat on their bodies. I would sweat out three for sure today. So I would go to choreo for three and a half hours and you're taking down eight, seven dudes at the same time.

Okay. Eight, seven dudes. What I was going to say is, you know, it was, it was so great because then I could really tap into part of me, could I never tap into before? That's bullshit. I was always that girl that wanted to kick someone's ass and probably did a couple of times, but it gave me permission to do it.

Yes. And I mean, I was one guy, the huge six, four, two, sixty. I mean, come on. That's exciting. And I felt like I could do it.

Yeah. Yeah. Now, whether I could do it or not in real life, who knows, but the feeling like I could. You have stood toe to toe with such amazing actors, Denzel talked about Merrill. You worked with Chadwick when you're in that zone with people that good and you're like, what is it?

I guess I guess I'm like, I'm asking you, like, what's it like to be in the World Series? Yeah, exactly. And not pissing your pants. Um, well, what, Merrill, that was it. Yeah, I mean, she's the man.

She's so great. She's funny and cool and cool. It's like, it's like you could be that great and that cool. Well, you're like that. You guys are so good because you're, you're so good that you don't have to be assholes because you know how good you know those assholes.

Yes, because they're not that good. You know, or I should say they're not being led by insecurity. So you're, you and Merrill meet, of course, you guys are friends and like respect each other because you both. I followed her everywhere. On set?

On set. I mean, to the point where it was like, you know, when you say to yourself, okay, tomorrow I'm not going to do that because I don't think it made her, it didn't make her feel comfortable. Because at one point, she would never admit this. She probably doesn't remember it, but she was going to set and I was trying to keep her from going to set because I was too excited. So I was like, so how's it going?

She was like, oh, good. So I'll see you later. She was going up the stairs and then I was like, so I was going good, right? So so the day was really good and you could, you know, when someone's trying to do something and you're stopping them from doing it and they don't feel like they don't want to be rude to you by going shut the fuck up. I got to get to set.

So she was being really nice and I said, okay, so I'll see you later. Right. So I worked next week. So I worked next week. You know, she was like, yeah, yeah.

So that was the first day. And then I was like, I'm not going to do that tomorrow. So I'm not going to do that tomorrow. I went back to my mom. Oh, yeah.

I was sitting there and then I'm staring at her and I'm really shy. She's not that shy. She's sort of shy, but not that shy. So then I don't because I'm not good at small talk and I go so long as pause. And then I said, can I get you some tea?

And she said, she said, no, baby, no, you don't have to get me any tea. And I was like, okay. So I couldn't think of anything else. I kept staring, staring and you could tell. You don't want your step.

You could tell she was really trying to be gracious. And the only thing I could come up with is like, you got beautiful skin. I actually said that to Meryl Strean. I love you. And then finally my husband, who was like, V, did you tell that woman that you love her work?

You tell that woman you love her work? I said, well, Julius, I just, you, she said, when I get to that day, I'm said, I'm going to tell her that I love her work. And I'm going to tell her that she is your favorite actress. I said, don't say that. And Julius finally came to the set and he said, I love you so much.

And you are so beautiful, Meryl. You are such a wonderful actress. She blushed. She was like, oh, well, I have met Julius and Julius is something else. I mean, I know I find that sometimes in my life, people want me to be funny and they're a little disappointed when I'm not quite bringing it.

Do you feel conversely that sometimes people assume that you're going to like exchange in something very deep and serious with them and you just want to laugh all the time? Me. Because I feel like what I'm learning about you is that you love, you love to joke around and laugh. Oh, but I mean, I can't really been joke around like I want because I'm dirty with it. Fantastic.

Oh, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, you don't want to go down like that, Amy. No, you don't want to go down. I'm dirty with it. Who did you love, bro? Who were your?

Oh, the first one. Who do you love? Mom's Mabel. Oh, yeah. And she was dirty dirty.

So dirty. I would play that album over and over again. Flip Wilson. Yes. Red Fox.

Red Fox. So dirty. Or the better. Yeah. We can't go there.

Yeah. So funny. Yeah. So you would play those records when you were. I would.

Yeah. And then the funniest is Richard Pryor. Yeah. Whenever I feel down, I play that live in concert over and over and over again. Oh my God.

That's just the best. And he talks about his kids. One part, but he talks about his kids and how he doesn't know how to swim. And every time he gets into the pool, he's drowning. He's basically drowning.

And his kids are like, ah, daddy, he's so funny. And he's like, you motherfucker. I'm drowning. It's like, I love that. Yeah.

Okay. Now I want to get to your book before we finish because you know, your relationship to writing is an interesting one to me. I mean, I'm sure you have, you know, we talked about it earlier this idea of like when you're acting and you're writing and you're working with writers and what that kind of writing looks like. And then there's a different kind of version of writing when you're writing a book when you're writing fiction. And when you're writing a memoir, which your memoir was a huge hit.

You won the Grammy that was your, you got was your, when you did the recording of it, when you read your book on tape. And that book came out a while ago and I'm curious, you know, when we write about our stories and then they go out into the world and everybody gets to kind of read them and process them. Have you ever heard from anyone from your past after that book came out? I hear from various ones all the time. My fourth grade teacher in fourth grade, I had the story in my book that was and I actually went back to my fourth grade class to the actual classroom, but my fourth grade, that was almost the height of my dysfunction, my dysfunctional life.

But in the book, it still has a lot of shame for me. I would go to school. I would smell so bad. I mean, there were no words for it. Okay.

And this teacher that I had that I loved, I loved her Mrs. Cody. She sent pictures to my sister who was a school teacher in Central Falls. She sent all these pictures that she had saved of me. Wow.

I have no pictures of my childhood. She saved these pictures and she saved some of my writing. And in one of the pictures, I was at a museum looking at this sculpture and all the kids were behind me who were in my class. But I was looking at the sculpture and my mouth was gapped open in awe. And I thought to myself, you captured something in me that I didn't know I had in me.

It was already that when something was beautiful, when something was created ahead, that I would have no connection to. Otherwise, I saw it. That was in one of the pictures. And she told my sister that she never forgot me as a student. And she was the one who actually told me that I needed to go to the nurse one day because I smelled so bad that my mom had to get some soap and hot water and you need to wash yourself because the odor is too much.

She was a teacher who told me that. And I loved her. That's why it hurts so bad. Yeah. So you're once again, the paradox, right?

Yeah. She's looking out for you. I mean, she's the one who I felt shame me. She didn't really shame me. Do you know what I'm saying?

But that was a big one. I mean, it feels like writing has been something that's been a big thing that you've wanted to do for a long time. And then you write, you're now co-written a book with James Patterson. It's on my shelf. It's right here.

Judge Stone. Judge Stone. The book is out. What is it about? It is about a 13 year old girl named Nova who has an abortion, who gets raped and has an abortion.

And Union Springs, Alabama, Alabama has the strictest abortion laws. And the doctor who performs the abortion is now on trial for murder. So it is definitely to kill a mockingbird. It is just, it's pulsating. It's all of those things.

But even like to kill a mockingbird, which the courtroom was stating, Tom Robinson, a yellow UO, it was just heart stopping, right? But the character is within it. But just as memorable as the trial. That's what I feel about Judge Stone and James Patterson is like, well, you can do anything and... No, I can't.

Tell us what we can't do. No, I can't bake. Okay. You know. You could probably learn.

I have a 15 year old at home. It's like, it's just me. You're probably out of the teen years. No, I'm right in the middle of it. I got a 15 and a 17 year old.

I'll have a 15 year old. Yeah. There's no easier way to feel uncool than when your kid, your teen kid looks at you like, what? I'm not cool. No, I bet you're not supposed to be cool to your kid.

If you're cool to your kid, that's weird. I know. I think so. It is. Nobody wants to be the parent that like hangs up at their kids and like, their kids are like, wow, your mom is so cool.

I don't want to go to an escape room. You don't have to. You don't have to. I try to. That's why I jumped out of a plane.

I tell people I jumped out of a plane. What? Oahu, Hawaii. I jumped out of a plane to be cool for my daughter. I did it, Amy.

What year was this just recently? I was 57, 56, 56, 57. So I'm 60 now. Yeah. What did you, what was it like?

Did you, was it awful? It seems awful. It seems, it truly seems like awful. Have you ever jumped? So obviously, I'm not jumping out of a plane.

I jumped out of a plane because we had the most awesome nanny. When I say awesome, it's like, everyone else is great nanny and ours was like, God, okay? She jumped out of a plane. You know, you're jumping in tandem with someone who's talking like. I was going to say you're jumping in tandem with someone you met yesterday and he was like, so bio, you know, you're a great actress.

So what do you like better? The theater of film and I want to say, shut the fuck up. Like, focus, Zach. My favorite movie is The Parishu Working. And look at that's Yummy Mommy Volcano right there and that erupted in my fucking life.

And then they roll the curtain up and they say, okay, so let's go. That's cool. I mean, Viola, that's a bad ass. They did that. I will never do it again.

Although it was a terrific experience. I told my daughter as I was falling down because she said, mama, if you die, can I do weeks in your money? So I'm falling down. So I'm falling down. I'm falling down.

I told her, don't listen to mama. Don't listen to me. I think every cuss word that I could possibly imagine. I mean, it was coming out of my mouth. You have no idea.

But I did it because of Molly. You did it because of Molly. And you and Julius, we talked about your husband a little bit. You guys have like when you do stuff together and you talk publicly together, you laugh a lot. You laugh a lot and you laugh.

You have fun. I mean, look, your relationship is very aspirational and I don't want to project upon it because I know everyone's relationship is their own private. You know, a relationship is like a country with its own set of rules and you don't really know it unless you live there. But what it seems like is you have the best relationship ever and you have a wonderful marriage and beautiful love being a partner. It's fantastic.

You guys be crazy. I drive him crazy. I want to hit him, but then I love my life. Yeah. You know, he's just the love of my life.

I mean, when I say laugh, no, Amy, I mean, just he is a character and every time he comes up and, you know, in public, you know, he puts, you know, the brave, the mask and everything on. But the guy is absolutely hysterical. I mean, and does the oddest things that for me is a little bit of me that says, is he crazy? He could be crazy. I mean, he lost his soul.

He couldn't find his saltine crackers one day. Salting them crackers. Yeah. And he was convinced that someone broke into a house was living in our attic and has stolen his saltine crackers. And so I was like, why are you walking around the house with a baseball bat?

I can't find my saltine crackers. I said, well, did you look in the cabinet behind the tuna fish? And there was four packages. Now there's only three packages left. V dis on in the attic.

And here's for me what for me is about love. I was like, oh my God. He's crazy. There's someone living in me. And what did I do?

I grabbed my baseball bat too. And we looked for the person together in the attic. And did I finally found the saltine crackers near the tuna fish? And it's just like, I love it. I do.

I do. I mean, your love is very, very special. And you know, and then talking about his mom and just the stories, he's another one that could tell the stories. Well, we talked to him before your interview. And I want you to know, he's the only spouse we've talked to.

And we do a thing where we kind of talk well behind some. He's back before they come in and I get a question to ask our guests. And Julius was the only spouse we wanted to talk to because we were like, first of all, they seemed like they really like each other. But he spoke so beautifully, of course, about you, Viola. But he also speaks to a bigger idea of what women, a lot of women, yearn for and hope for, which is that somebody really sees them, like somebody sees them in real time and celebrates their wins.

Oh, yeah. He does. He does. And you seem like you do that for each other. Oh, yeah, totally.

And again, a simple thing to say, but sometimes hard to find like that. Do you think that is the secret to why you have been together so long? Is the way you do that for each other? You know, by the time I met Julius, I absolutely understood what love is. You know, first of all, I thought he was cute.

You know, I thought he had a tight ass. I'm not gonna lie to you, Amy. Yeah, don't. He had a tight ass. He was a football player.

You guys are actors on the set. You know, you love, you were a hot nurse's outfit. Yeah. And I was like, he's really cute. And I was really lonely.

And so that was it. Of course. I mean, I just with him, it was. And I prayed for a football player type dude, you know, and it was him. And but you know what got me with him is he told me his story because he's a talker, but he told me his whole story from the giddy up.

Cool. Everything. Straight note chaser. You know, he raised his kids on his own. He married, you know, all of those things.

It just, and for me, it opened me up. He's just a dude. He's been wired right. He has. Well, he has three really weird questions for me to ask you.

I know he's great in every way, but I don't understand these questions. Julius. Julius, one of them is tell, ask her about Zuni. Who is Zuni? And can I Google it?

Because Julius was talking about a TV show that he grew up with. I've never heard of power XL5. What? Oh no, Amy. Zuni.

Amy. It's a cartoon with puppets that he watched when he was a kid. Wow. Do you see Zuni? ZU and I.

Okay. You see Zuni now? With the giant head? Yeah. You see that?

Let's see. Let's see. You pressed in the images of it. Let's see. Yeah.

See you were Zuni. Okay. Zuni. Zuni. Oh, and I.

That's why I'm a classic spelling something wrong. For your listeners, Zuni looks like... Who's Zuni? No, I'm going to tell you who Zuni looked like. We were laying in bed and Julius said, V. You know who you look like?

What's it? So did I make you? I was like, she make me feel all warm and fuzzy inside. She might be a somebody I know. And then I thought about it.

You look like Zuni. That's who you are, V. Zuni. And this is a show that you would watch every Saturday. He was the only one in his family who wanted to watch it.

I can't believe the show. It looks like it's dolls and puppets. Dolls and puppets. And he was the only one who wanted to watch it. None of his brothers and sisters wanted to watch it.

They say, ah, Julius, he wanted to watch Zuni and his mom would say, let that damn boy watch Zuni. That's all you talk about, really Zuni Zuni, damn Zuni. Watch that damn Zuni. Get your ass out of the house after you watch that Zuni. So Zuni.

I remind him of Zuni. And he's big lips and big eyes. It's like almost like a little ferret meets sloth meets a. No, Zuni. It's cute though.

Zuni is messed up. No, Zuni is messed up. I call him Ferdinand because he looks exactly like Ferdinand. Ferdinand is a ball. Yeah, we name people.

You look just like Ferdinand. Okay, the other question he wanted me to ask you is ask her about Shadow of a Gunman. He said he's setting you up for some stories. Oh, he set me up. It was one of our first dates.

He said V. You want to come, if you know him, you would know that this is a great imitation of Julius. V. One of my friends is doing Shadow of a Gunman. You know that play.

You know that Irish play Sean O'KC Shadow of the Gunman. He's going to see Shadow of a Gunman in some small theater off Abbot Kinney Boulevard in Santa Monica. So we go to see Shadow of a Gunman. And I'm walking and going, oh, we're going to see some theater. And so we go to this theater.

We walk in and I'm like, okay, let's sit in the front. Ninety-nine seats, no one's at the theater. Let's sit in the front. He was like, oh, we ain't sitting in the front. Let's sit all the way in the back.

Let's sit up there in the back. I was like, but Julius. We're all the way in the back. He said V, let's sit up in the back. He's sitting up in the back.

He's got the chair near the wall. As soon as the curtains go up, he's dead asleep. The only thing that's why he wants to sit in the wall is to take a nap all throughout the plane. The only time he woke up is when he thought some sex scene was going to happen. He woke up for two seconds.

He woke up for two seconds thinking he was going to see some good, good-emuses, we call it. And nothing happened. It was the worst production in the world. Oh my God. And then afterwards, he went up to his friend and he said, I love that performance.

You were fan. And you don't want to do that thing? That thing you did. I was like, Julius, you slept through that whole day in performance. Are you guys watching, listening?

What's making you laugh these days? Where do you get your comedy? In bed. With each other. With each other.

It sounds like. Oh my God. With his imitations. I mean, no, Amy. Like, I mean, just absolutely hysterical.

It's so funny to hear how you guys like to play. Oh, yeah. It's like, it really feels like there's like young versions of you. Like, healed young versions of you together. I mean, this morning we were just talking when I first, when we first got together and they want me to do the play that I won my first Tony award for King Hedley.

But I remember when I was offered the role. And I said, I don't know if that role was good enough for me. Julius, first of all, can I just tell you I never talk like this? So the fact that I remember talking like this shows you that I'm full of shit. So I said, Julius, that role is not good enough for me.

And he's sitting in the living room. He's just listening to me. He just got out of the shower. I said, this role is not good enough for me. And, you know, they think I'm going to go to New York and they think I'm going to do A, B and C.

And they think I'm going to do that role. I need the lead role. I need to get the lead role. And blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, but he's listening, listening, listening, listening, listening. And then there's a pause.

And I said, so what do you think, Julius? He said, this is what I think. You need to take your ass to New York and you need to do that damn play because here's the thing. You ain't got your damn job. And we're not bringing any damn money.

So you need to go on and take your ass to New York and do that play. And we talk about that whole time. You know, those moments, you know, of when I told him for the first time that I thought most horrific credit. And I was about to cry. I said, my credit score was 500.

And I kept that as a secret because he was so organized and together and responsible. You know, and I said, Julius, I have to tell you something. He said, okay, go ahead. Tell me. I said, Julius, I have bad credit.

And he said, I knew your black ass had bad credit from the moment I met you. I could tell by the way you dressed and everything you all over the day in place. That's okay. I know you started to cry. Come on, we use my credit.

Don't worry about it. I knew your black ass had bad credit. And that was it. Like moments like that. Yes.

Yes. Yes. Levity of safety, safety of connection. Yes. You know, the freedom that I had to tell him I had bad credit.

But also how he helped me build from there. Yeah. That's the thing. Yeah. That was my big thing.

I finally found it. Someone who makes your life better. That's love. I think so. Yeah.

That's what a healthy relationship looks like. I guess. To end our condo today, what's the best thing about being in your 60s? It's the next decade up for me. And I mean, I've been loving my 50s more than my 40s and more and more and more.

What do you loving about your 60s? In your 60s, your life is yours. That's the best part of it. It's yours. You realize that, you know, it's a quote that it's been running through my mind is, I know, it's sort of morbid.

But on your last day on Earth, the definition of hell is your last day on Earth, who you became meets the person you could have become. I feel that that's 60s, man. The 60s is I'm going to become that woman because all that bullshit that I was told in the past that, you know, I had to make a certain amount of money, I had to be smart enough or pretty enough or thin enough or whatever. None of that shit means shit. My life right now is about who I love, who loves me and what I leave behind.

That's it. It is clean and it's given me a certain level of bravery too. Now, if I could put some hormones in there, that would be good. That's amazing. It makes me really look forward to what's ahead.

Yeah, well, yeah, it's the other stuff too. We don't talk about that one. We'll deal with that when it comes. Yeah. My only Davis, I mean, so much that you did this.

Thank you for being here today and for talking to me and for doing the show. I just absolutely adore you and your work. Well, I love you too. And I'd love to move in with you and your husband. It won't be weird.

I'll just be a roommate. But you'll go into the attic and don't be consulting crackers. I'm sorry, I'm assuming the baseball bat on your head. I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm still your husband. But I get hungry up there, but I want to listen to two of you.

Thank you so much for coming. It really means a lot. Thank you. Thank you so much, Viola. You're incredible and so good at what you do.

And it was so wonderful to talk to you. Thank you for stopping by for this polar plunge. One person, we didn't get a chance to talk to Viola about that. What he did with her is he was a fantastic father. And it was the last time that he was born in the country.

I would like to talk to Viola about a part that Hela lost, who I was born the current master, who she was born. So I was born a transfer family, and I was born in a country's church. I have had a lot of times that she was born by a country's church. I can tell that she was born in a country. She was born in the country's church.

And I was born in the country. And if I ever lived here I was born in the country. has been an incredible wide variety of television and movies and is a really terrific actress and was one of our Hollywood legends. So check her stuff out, I guess, plunge into Sisley Tyson and her work. And by all the Davis, we love you.

We can't wait to see what you're doing next. So thanks so much for joining us and see you soon. Bye. You've been listening to Good Hang, the executive producers for the show are Bill Simmons, Jenna Weisperman and me, Amy Poehler. The show is produced by the Ringer and Paper Kite for the Ringer, production by Jack Wilson, Kat Spillane, Kaya McMullen, and Elia Zanieras.

For Paper Kite, production by Sam Green, Joel Lovell, and Jenna Weisperman, original music by Amy Miles. Ah!