WIRX “Decoding Carnivale” Call-in with Clancy Brown • 11-10-03

This is the transcript from Clancy’s radio call-in segment on Southwest Michigan’s WIRX/Rock 107.1, with John Jay and Brother Phil.

John: (“Carnivale” theme music starts to play in background.) Coming up, Clancy Brown, from “Carnivale.” It was on last night on HBO, the weirdest show on TV – continues to confound and confuse…

Phil: Absolutely…

John: Only three more episodes remaining.

Phil: Mm-hmm… They’ve got a lot to wrap up in three episodes!

John: Yes, they do!

Phil: I gotta find out if they’ve ordered, ya know, another bank…

John: Yeah, job one will be to see if they’ve ordered more shows. And I would hope the boys would know by now!

Phil: Oh, yeah!

John: So we’ll talk to Clancy Brown in a few uno momentos about “Carnivale.” “Decoding Carnivale” on the way next. Rock 107/WIRX.

(Break for commercials and station identification.)

John: (“Carnivale” theme music starts back up.) Rock 107/WIRX. It’s eight minutes after eight o’clock. News Center 16 says mostly cloudy, high around 50, 45 overnight tonight. It’s only… Get this, Clancy… It’s only 28 here!

Clancy: Very nice…

John: Yeah, oh yeah. It’s great!

Phil: It’s comfy!

Clancy: It’s all-weather.

John: Yeah, what have you got there? Mid-seventies?

Clancy: Actually, it’s warmed up here a little bit. I’d say it’s probably sixty-some here, and it’s five o’clock in the morning.

John: Okay, well… It’ll get better for you, at least! But not much better for us! Clancy Brown from “Carnivale,” welcome to the show. Once again, we’re “Decoding Carnivale.” God knows… Ya know, I really thought that as this show progressed… I almost felt guilty because I thought, we made this deal with Clancy where we’re going to talk to him on Mondays, and I know as the show goes on I’m going to understand more and more. But I’ll be honest with ya…

Phil: Not working out that way?

John: It’s not working out that way.

Clancy: Aww… C’mon! Tonight you got all sorts of… I mean, last night, you got all sorts of stuff!

John: We did…

Clancy: Now you know that Hack Scudder, whoever he is, is Ben’s dad. And that, you know, there’s some kind of thing going on between the blind guy and Samson.

John: Yeah, Lodz and Management is a nice little storyline, where he’s sort of undercutting the power of Samson, there.

Clancy: Yeah! There’s a few payoffs last night.

John: And you were looking real dapper when you left the mental hospital last night.

Clancy: Well, it was a real restful time, ya know…

John & Phil: (laughing)

Clancy: For Brother Justin, going to a loony bin is a little bit like going to a spa.

John: Yeah! Well, here’s the thing, and I started to talk to you about this just a little bit, off the air… You left the mental hospital last night, looking all clean shaven, new suit, and the whole nine yards. And your doctor, the guy that had interviewed you a couple weeks ago, looked like he’d been through a ringer and a half!

Phil: Rough!

John: And he handed you a transcript of like “The Brother Justin Story!”

Clancy: (laughing) That was great, wasn’t it? Well, he was busy writing the story… I didn’t want to give him any time to take care of himself hygienically or anything, you know.

John: Yeah! He just looked really bad when he handed you the little transcript last night.

Clancy: Yeah, well, ya know… He couldn’t get rid of me fast enough! (laughing)

John: (laughing) Yeah… And I did get… I have to thank Beth, Beth Blighton, for giving me a copy of the show from when I was in Mexico…

Phil: The Broken Bones Episode!

John: Yeah, exactly…

Phil: Holy crap!

Clancy: Ah, yes…

John: That was a nice compound fracture on that guy!

Phil: Oh, on the muscle man! BOTH of them!

Clancy: Yeah, a LOT of them! Broken neck, broken arm, broken leg…

John: Yeah, your leg’s kinda… I was reminded of “Misery,” with James Caan, there… (laughing)

Phil: Exactly, I had to turn away.

Clancy: There ya go…

John: (laughing) It was such a nice little scene, where you’re like pleading with the kid to help you. And HBO is like, “Let’s cut to his legs real quick…” Aaaaaarrrrghhhhh!

Clancy: Yeah, that was the scene where they just beat me up. And from the original script, it was really… The original script was more like a Roadrunner/Coyote script. They just terrorized me. Now she just hits me over the head with a rock and whacks me with a stick. Before, I was falling off cliffs…

John: There’s a little bit of violence happening in the show right now, which I really enjoy. And I had missed – you guys were talking about it last week…. You guys were talking about the little violence between Lodz and his girlfriend. What’s her name? Is it Lilly?

Phil: Lila…

Clancy: Loving violence…

John: Yeah, he gives her the shot across the legs with the cane… (laughing)

Phil: Yeah! And I’m going, “What the hell’s THAT for?!?”

John: I know! And she was being so nice! (Lila voice) “He’s back…” and (sound of cane landing, then screams!)

Phil: (Lila voice) “Gabriel’s arms all healed up…” And he gets up, (Lodz voice) “Oh, okay. Well, great!” Then WHAM! What the hell was that for?!?

Clancy: (chuckling in background)

John: I think that’s what the green devil does to ya, the absinthe… I think you just lash out with your cane once in a while.

Clancy: Yeah, he was frustrated there…

John: Lodz is turning out to be a nice little character.

Clancy: Yeah, he’s great! He’s terrific, Patrick…

John: He’s playing a much more involved role in the evolution of Ben, and Ben’s past history. And that’s what this show does! It keeps bringing different characters into the mix. And we still don’t really know how it’s all gonna play out!

Phil: And there’s three episodes left?

Clancy: Yeah. Well, my favorite line last night was, “You’d better hurry up and get born, boy!” Samson says that to Ben.

John: Yeah!

Clancy: (laughing) And that’s what’s going to happen in the next few episodes, is he’s gonna “get born.” He’s gonna start catching up with Brother Justin a little bit.

John: Yeah, how soon, if you can reveal to us… You and Ben have only been together in dream sequences on the show… where you guys physically actually come into contact with each other?

Clancy: Ohhh, I would say… episode… I would say Season Three, maybe! (laughing hard)

John & Phil: (laughing)

Phil: I was gonna say, there’s a lot to work out in the next three episodes!

John: Yeah.

Clancy: Yeah… Well, we’re not gonna physically meet. But you know, guys like us, we don’t have to physically meet!

John: No!

Clancy: We know each other already…

John: Well, Phil’s been dogging me to ask you this question…

Phil: Yeah!

John: Have they…? What’s the future for “Carnivale?” There’s only three episodes left. Are we gonna see Season Two?

Clancy: I dunno! I mean, officially, we don’t know. Everybody’s feeling is that we will, but… But we’ll just have to see. People will have to keep tuning in!

Phil: The guys from HBO just have to physically meet you!

Clancy: Yeah, exactly…

Phil: You guys have to physically meet, get this thing wrapped up, and get another season in the can!

Clancy: They have to pull the trigger. But, you know, they’re never in any hurry. The executives are never in any hurry to make my life any easier…

John: All you have to do is put on those black contact lenses and go show up at the HBO offices.

Clancy: Hey, hey! I hadn’t thought of that! I should just go and get into their heads!

John: That’s right!

Phil: There ya go… Maybe pull a few props outta the “Highlander” movie!

Clancy: (laughing)

Phil: That ought to scare the hell out of them!

John: Yeah! Well, last night… I really enjoyed the show last night from the standpoint that there was a lot of time spent with Ben and his inability to sleep, and sort of getting a little more into his involvement with Lodz and that sort of stuff.

Clancy: Yeah, we were… It was a tremendously unsubtle show last night. Unless you’re still moved by the snake metaphors…

John: Yeah…

Clancy: I mean, c’mon… Ya know, you got Ruthie there in the “Xena, Warrior Princess” costume, doing the nasty with a snake. Intercutting between Jonesy and Mama Cooch, and… (laughing) and it’s like, c’mon, you guys! I think we know what’s going on here!

John: (laughing) The scene with Jonesy and Rita Sue… They’re like, “No… We can’t do it again.” (a pause, then the sound of mad dogs slobbering.)

Clancy: (laughing hard) Been there, done that?

John: They’re voracious! I wonder if she gave him another knee-job?

Clancy: Well… you know! I think they cut right to the chase on that one.

Phil: The well-fed Rita Sue…

John: Yeah, the Rita Sue who it’s a mystery how she can be so zaftig in the Depression era, when she is only eating a couple slices of bread a day.

Clancy: (chuckling)

Phil: Hey, there were a lot of potatoes back then.

Clancy: That’s right.

John: I’ll tell ya this, Clancy, I am VERY impressed with Adrienne Barbeau…

Phil: Yeah, I was just gonna say…

Clancy: Didn’t you just wanna SMACK that boy?!?

John: Yeah! Dude… What are ya doin’?!?

Clancy: It’s like, this is Adrienne Barbeau coming onto you, man! That’s like if Liz Taylor came onto my dad! What’s the matter with you?!?

Phil: Yeah, exactly!

John: She was like one of the seventies women du jour…

Clancy: Oh, my God!

John: And here she is going after this kid… And I gotta tell ya, she still looks pretty good!

Clancy: And she still… She looks really great! She looks much better than Liz Taylor ever did at that age, I tell ya what!

John: Oh, boy!

Phil: Mm-hmm.

Clancy: Yeah, I’m… I’m just gonna go and shake that young man! WHAT are you THINKING?!?

John: I was pretty happy that I taped that snake dance last night…

Clancy: Yeah, she had some fun with that, didn’t she?

Phil: You didn’t tape that, Beth did!

John: Huh? No… I taped last night’s show.

Phil: Oh, okay… I apologize.

John: And by the way, Beth… I know you’re listening…

Clancy: (chuckling)

John: Please… Turn your VCR to the SP setting… I gotta have quality!

Clancy: Ohhhh-ho-ho-ho…. Oh, listen to you!

Phil: Oh, boy! (laughing)

Clancy: “I’m too lazy to do it myself! But…”

Phil: Exactly! He’s gonna start ragging on somebody who dropped off a tape! Boy…

John: Once again, John Jay should have Tivo!

Clancy: Yeah… Just buy the DVD set when it comes out.

John: Oh, is it gonna come out? Have they talked to you about that? HBO does that a lot, so I would imagine they’re gonna do the DVD.

Clancy: Yeah. Of course they are… They’re gonna squeeze every dollar out of it that they can.

Phil: Put a little more money in your pocket? Are you gonna get a little taste of that DVD sale, are ya?

Clancy: Oh, I doubt it…

Phil: “Oh, I doubt it…” Like you don’t know?

Clancy: They won’t even tell me whether we’re gonna go again, so…ya know.

Phil: That’s true.

John: Now ya got me feelin’ bad, cuz I… Beth, I love you. Thank you so much for the tape.

Clancy: (evil laugh) There ya go!

John: Yeah, it was great being able to see it because that had some really cool key parts in it.

Phil: Oh, man!

John: Now, last night’s show, just to recap a couple things before we get your tips to watch out for next week… We saw a bag full of severed feet, we got heads on pikes, we got what appear to be medieval warriors with swords now, we’ve added that to the mix of the World War I guys, the bear in the foxhole, a Tattooed Man raping the catatonic psycho woman…

Clancy: (laughing)

John: We’ve got Lodz, we’ve got Ben laying under a bus, he can’t sleep, with three limbs torn from his body… Am I missing anything? We’ve got Brother Justin with a Mystery Manuscript, written by his psychologist!

Phil: (laughing)

John: I’m tellin’ ya! I’m TRYING to keep track of all this stuff!

Phil: I think you’ve covered about half…

John: Yeah, I think I’ve got about half of it….

Clancy: You’ve got about half of it! Yeah, well… The other half’s coming up!

John: Oh, and the Radio Guy hitting on Iris!

Phil: Yeah!

Clancy: THAT was great, wasn’t it?

John: That was so cool!

Clancy: What’s going on, man? EVERYBODY in this show is getting’ some, EXCEPT Brother Justin!

John: (laughing)

Clancy: My SISTER, for cryin’ out loud!

Phil: No offense against Amy Madigan, but uh… I think the Radio Guy could do a little better. They’ve got her dressed down, man! I’m tellin’ ya…

Clancy: YO… Yo, Phil… (with the “watch it” chuckle)

John: That’s brutal.

Phil: Your sister’s kinda rough looking…

John: Well, she’s in the Depression era and the whole…

Phil: I know, the Depression era just does not do anything for me!

Clancy: (chuckling)

John: It was tough to find a foxy woman in 1932…

Clancy: Yeah, it wasn’t the height of fashion. That wasn’t the most important thing…

John: But you don’t push Adrienne Barbeau away!

Phil: Hell no!

Clancy: You don’t push Adrienne Barbeau away…

John: Especially when she’s got a snake! All right… So what are we looking for next week? What are the key things that Sunday night is going to bring us… that will sort of tie us together with bags full of severed feet and snake dances?

Clancy: Well, you’ll start getting the idea of what those severed feet are all about, and that this story goes back many generations. So that’s sort of what that’s all about. And that there are other people who are hip to what’s going on – other mortals who are hip to what’s going on, and have been hip for a long time. You saw, I think, in the previews, the end of my sermon. I come back to my congregation and tell them that, ya know, it’s a brand new me!

John: Yeah…

Clancy: And get ready to rock!

John: (laughing)

Clancy: And then, let’s see… The snake… I don’t think the snake comes into it just yet. But there is more snake stuff going on.

John: Oh, good!

Clancy: Yeah. And, oh yeah, the Samson/Lodz subplot is developing.

John: That’s very nice.

Clancy: And ya know, we actually heard… Well, I guess we heard Management before, but…

John: Yeah!

Clancy: But now we get the idea that maybe Management doesn’t know everything, since they had that little whatever it was, the watch fob, with the In Hoc Signo Vinces… And Lodz came in and showed it to Management, somehow, and they finally came to some understanding. I’m not sure WHAT they knew, but the important thing was that perhaps Management DIDN’T know something.

John: And finally, we’ve got Clancy Brown admitting he doesn’t know what the hell is going on! (laughing)

Clancy: Hey, I’ve been saying it from the beginning! (chuckling) I’ve been saying it from the beginning!

John: I did like the line… I think my favorite line in last night’s show was when Lodz handed that little fob back to Samson, wrapped in the napkin, and says, “Nicely played, Little man…”

Phil and Clancy: (laughing)

John: That was great!

Clancy: Yes… (Patrick Bauchau voice) “Nicely played, Little Man…”

John: That was great! Clancy Brown, I really appreciate you spending time with us, once again.

Clancy: There’s only three more of these, man… What are we gonna do?

John: I know!

Phil: I know! We’ve got a lot to wrap up, a lot to explain in three episodes.

Clancy: (laughing)

Phil: It’s scaring me!

Clancy: Well, it’s not ALL gonna be explained.

Phil: I know… That’s why we need more, MORE!

Clancy: Some of it’s gonna be done with metaphor – like Snake Dances during love scenes…

John: That was a real subtle metaphor, wasn’t it?

Clancy: Yeah, we oughtta be able to get that! Ya know, maybe in the fifties they wouldn’t have quite gotten that yet…

John: To quote Ricky Riccardo, (in bad Ricky accent) “Clancy… You got some ‘splainin’ to do…!”

Clancy: (laughing) Got some ‘splainin’ to do….

John: (laughing) Hey, thanks again, man… And we’ll talk to you again next Monday, after I’m sure what will be a watershed moment in “Carnivale.”

Phil: That was bad, by the way…

John: I know…

Phil: Don’t ever try to do Ricky again.

John: Sorry… That’s my bad. That’s my bad.

Clancy: Yeah… (laughing) All right!

John: Clancy Brown from “Carnivale” – Thanks, man!

Clancy: Talk to you later!

Phil: Thank you very much!

John: Have yourself a wonderful day and all that kinda stuff… I love talking to that guy. I just get more confused each week. And I’m waiting for that one moment of clarity on the show, when everything just sort of meshes and comes together, and makes me go, “YES!”

Phil: I don’t think that’s gonna happen.

John: I don’t think so either… But that’s what I love so much about it!


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