Marty York: The Sandlot

In Episode 3, we sit down with Marty York, known to a generation as Yeah-Yeah from the 1993 classic The Sandlot.

Marty takes us back to how it all started, the audition that changed direction at the last minute, and what it was really like being part of a movie that became a phenomenon long after the cameras stopped rolling. We get into the highs, the harder chapters, the money, the reinvention, and the long road that led him back to telling his own story on his own terms.

It's funny, it's honest, and it's a reminder of why this podcast exists, because the real stories behind the kids you grew up watching are always more interesting than anything that made it on screen.

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Transcript

I showed my wife like a week later, I'm like, wait a second, Marty York in a fight on TMZ and I and I'm like, but I I watched, and it was like a a pretty cool way to be on TMZ that was not negative. I don't know about that. I mean, it was crazy.

You look pretty badass.

Yeah, I mean I would have fucking ran. If you grew up on a baseball diamond, or pretended that you did, you already know today's guest.

He played the loudest, scrappiest, most enthusiastic kid in the stand line. The one and only Yahya.

He helped turn a summer movie about a lost baseball into a generation-defining film.

We're thrilled to have him on the show. Please welcome Marty York. From our childhood to yours, welcome to the Nazo Little Rascals.

Hi, Marty. Hey, thanks for joining us, dude. How are you guys? Stoked. Stoked to have you. We like to start this thing off asking about the call that changed your life. Um I think Sandlot is on the Mount Rushmore of like 90s ensemble movies, you know, that were for kids. It's one of my favorites. Thank you. You know, it's kind of you're kind of you're you're pretty iconic. I'm stoked to have you. So I want to hear about that first call that kind of changed your life.

Thanks, man. Little Rascals was up there too, you know what I'm saying?

Thanks, dude.

Call that changed my life. I mean, I I was from a very small town in Northern California. I was 30 miles north of Sacramento. It was called Grass Valley. And um, you know, I did a lot of theater when I was a kid. And I moved up to LA when I was about 10 years old. My mom and my dad kind of split up and came out here and was put in enrolled in a Catholic school and had some issues at that at that school because I was new to LA. And me, I mean, I came from a town where like when I came here, I was just blown away by the studios and you know, driving past Warner Brothers for the first time and being like, Oh my god, you know, like this is crazy. Yeah, and uh, you know, I just done little theater gigs, and the first thing I did, my my aunt was actually an extras talent agent for for extras and background people. So she she said, Hey, do you guys want to be in a movie with John Candy called Delirious? And my mom was like, Yeah, let's do it. And at that time, John Candy was like the biggest star in the world, yeah. Sure. So we're like, Yeah, so we're on set at the Warner Brothers Backlot, and we were filming, and when they said cut, the actor like forgot his line doing it with John Candy, and I remembered the guy's line. So I did the guy's line to my mom. And John Candy said, Hold on, do that again. And I did it, and he was like, That's pretty good, kid. And to my mom, he's like, Does this kid have an agent? And

 my mom was like, No. And he's like, Well, here you go. And he takes out a piece of toilet paper from his pocket, writes the number to my first agent, John Candy. John Candy. That's that's awesome, which was Media Artist Group. That was my first agent. We set up the appointment. I went in, I auditioned then the very next day, and I got into the agency, and she said we have a Colgay toothpaste commercial. And that was the first day I, you know, I auditioned. Uh, so I went that that was the first thing I ever did, and I had to dance with a little girl, and I was so scared, I hid behind the chair. They coaxed me out. I came out and I danced with this little girl and I got the role. Yeah, after that, they just called me back and said we want him to be in a the same company said we wanted to be in a ragous spaghetti sauce, play this little Italian kid playing bocce ball.

I can see that.

So I did that, and then my mom's like, this is easy. And then, because it's like right out the gate, I did stuff, and then I didn't get anything for like a year. Uh-huh. I was auditioning and auditioning and auditioning. How old were you at the time if you don't mind me asking? I was thinking I was 11. Yeah. Yeah. And then I didn't get anything till probably I was like February of the next year, I auditioned for Sandlock. Yeah. I auditioned for a different character, I auditioned for Bertram, who's the tall kid with the glasses in the movie. Yeah. They were like, okay, we want you to come back for a callback. And in at that time, Bertram had different lines in the treehouse. Squints didn't have the whole monologue, it was like different things. So sure. It was just the lines were talking about the beast and him and the lean to next door. So I auditioned uh for that, got a call back, got the role of Bertram, and my mom was like, Oh my god, you're like in this feature film that Fox is doing, and that's big, you know. Yeah, and at the time it wasn't called The Sandlot, it was actually called Boys of Summer. Okay. That's what the script said.

Sounds like a different film.

It did it did. But there was actually title. Yeah, there was another film called Boys of Summer. Oh so we couldn't use Boys of Summer. Yeah. So um, you know, we all they kind of sent a lot of us to the baseball field to practice, and uh we're all kind of hit, you know, practicing because I had never played baseball in my life. I played soccer for like three years, sure, but I never played baseball. So they were like, they took me to this baseball field and they kind of pulled me forward with my mom. They said, Hey, he doesn't really fit the role. So we're like, Oh, that's it, that's end of this dream, you know. And they said, Well, we have a different character named Yeah that we'd like him to audition for, and Yeah has a ton of energy, so we'd like you to bring a ton of energy to the role. The next day I had to audition, she took me to the local liquor store, didn't buy me liquor, but got me one of those giant Hershey's bars, you know, just full of sugar. Yeah, and she said, Eat that whole thing. Classic. There you go. Yeah, so I ate it and uh went in there and auditioned for Yeah, and the rest is history. Wow. You know, that's so cool.

It's really crazy how similar that is. We both were were auditioning and got, you know, we took the place of a different actor for each of our roles little rascals. And yeah, it seems like that happens a lot as a kid because you know they hire a kid and any second something could change if they find someone's flow more fitting. Yeah. Especially that age.

Yeah, well, I mean, they start doing camera tests and stuff, and and you know, if they just don't vibe, you know, they replace them. And that's kind of what happened to me. Like we were told we didn't get little rascals, and then we got a call saying, Oh, you got it, and we're like, Well, you know, it was insane.

Just didn't you have a very like the froggy-ish voice? I did, and it's like uh it's crazy that they would cast you for something different, like when you had that voice.

Well, for me, and it's like it's what's funny, I wouldn't have gotten it. My coach at the time, and I've said this, it's uh it was uh Blake Lively's parents were Ernanie Lane Lively, like very known acting coaches. They are the ones that knew the movie from the or the classic show, and they were like, just go in and do the voice, put these glasses on. Because I was going back and forth for someone else and I was too short. And the minute I did that, when casting already likes you, you know, it sounds like in your case, they already liked you. They almost just need to see you in a role that fits, and they wanted to give you a part. Yeah, I think for me, they wanted to get me in something that fit because they liked me. And that's I think what happens a lot as a kid, like you can be a fun, cute, charismatic kid, and the casting is rooting for you as as you're a fan.

Yeah, yeah. I mean, I I thought you'd be like froggy from the bat with that voice, man.

I know, I know. That's uh the it was dubbed over by Tommy Pickles, though.

EG Daily, EG Daily. Oh wow, okay.

A lot of people take really offense when they say I was froggy. They're like, You didn't do the voice. And I was like, I was there, yeah, I was standing there, I talked. You did, and the checks were for me.

So they did they tell you to uh watch the old Little Rascals before you did it?

Not, I mean, not really specifically, but like all of our parents knew because like that was the lucky part for us. We walked into a franchise that all of our all the kids' parents knew.

Yeah, like I grew up watching Little Rascals with my dad on the weekends. Oh wow, like on Sundays we watched in black and white. Yeah. So I was very familiar with it. You know, when we got that movie, like, oh shit, like, you know, life's life's about to change. Well, you know, at least my mom thought so.

Well, that's the that's probably the difference. Like it felt like people knew the the rascals would be bigger because it already had some franchise built in. What was it felt like being on the set of Sandlot? Was there any talk of that? Of or just it was another film in the summer that like accidentally became this iconic film.

Yeah, I mean it was like it was like a big summer camp, really. Yeah, um, you know, we were just playing baseball every day, and there was never really any talk about is this movie gonna be big? It was just us having fun. Yeah, a lot of the stuff in Sandlot was improvised. Yeah, and it was funny because like I think 10 days into filming, because we literally I think we filmed Sandlot in about 45 days, and it was always over the summer of 92. Yeah. So I got the role, and then two months later they were like, We're sending you guys to Utah because Utah looks like Salt Lake City did. Well, part of Utah looked like Salt Lake City or Poquoima did, that's where San Lot was supposed to be in the 1960s. And Paquima did not look and the 90s did not look like that in the 1960s. So sure. We went out there, yeah. There was never any talk about is this movie gonna be huge? You know, it was always just it was us having the best summer of our lives. I just remember a lot of the off-camera stuff that we did.

Must have been fun.

Yeah, it's like, you know, just had fun, you know, a bunch of teenage kids, teenage boys. Yeah, you know, we uh we snuck up in into the movie Basic Instinct. Oh, yeah. Yeah, we were like uh Tom's brother, who's like the oldest, you know, he was 18 already. Uh-huh. Uh, you know, we'd all talked about the Sharon Stone scene. Yeah, like, oh, you know, there's a Sharon Stone scene, and Sharon Stone at the time was like the hottest girl.

Yeah, you guys all grew up real quick. Uh-huh.

We did that day. Yeah. Uh so we uh he opened up the back door to the theater and like let us all in. Oh super glad to be. Oh, that's awesome. It's funny, the littlest kid that played repeat, he was like, Oh, I want to go see Ferngully. Not today, but like have fun, have fun, buddy. I don't think today he's still to this day he still hasn't seen Bass Against it.

Oh, he's got we gotta change that. We'll get him in here, I'll still play it for him. Yeah, yeah. So Stanlot was did I I might have missed this, but did you say it was filmed in Utah? Yeah. So the whole movie was filmed in Utah in Salt Lake.

Yeah, the only thing that we didn't film in Utah was that was the interior treehouse scenes, uh-huh, which was incredible because that was the hottest summer like that we'd ever experienced. Sure. And they literally had buckets of what's called sea breeze, it's like an antiseptic that it cools you down and they would mix it with water and put ice in it. And so when they would say cut, when we were done doing scenes, because we're you know, we were on the sandlot field like all day. Yeah, yeah, uh, they would put these sea breeze wraps around our neck and we would go in our trailers where it was air conditioned and cool down, and they say, All right, come back out, you know.

They gotta be careful when you're like when you're kids. Yeah. There's more liability and issues that could come up.

Yeah, totally. Well, in the 90s,

 they they did a lot of shit that you know we couldn't do. Yeah, I wouldn't fly today, you know.

If the parents complain, you get put on a list. Yeah, yeah.

Like, I mean, a lot of us did our own stunts in the film. Like the whole me going over the fence. Yeah, yeah. Uh, I was really about 20 feet in the air hanging on this fiberglass harness by little steel wires. And like the fence below was, you know, it was like this. So, like, one wrong move, I fall and I'm impaled on this fence. But you were having the best time of your life. Oh, yeah. I mean, I was having trust in the you know, the the um the prop guys that they made this right. And of course, yeah, it was I still have the harness, it's like this big now, but it's like that's cool. Yeah, it's very cool.

Who are your closest buddies on it growing up? Like, who do you remember vibing with the best and hanging out with the most? Was it kind of just like a pack? Like you guys were all just yeah.

Really all the guys except Victor Demattia, who played Timmy, yeah, ended up becoming pretty much my best friend. And yeah, we actually hung out again before the whole Sandlot phenomenon started up again. And yeah, it was weird because when we wrapped the film, it wasn't as big as it is today. It was it was so weird because Jurassic Park '93 is like was like a slew of some of the biggest hits in the 90s. Yeah. You had like I think Twister and Jurassic Park, and you know, Sandlot had come around at the same time as like Jurassic Park, and like that movie just like destroyed us. Yeah, Jurassic Park was a big deal. It was like a juggernaut. Then I just I after Sandlot, I just was like doing show after show after show after show, like it wouldn't stop.

That's what happens. You you you do a big movie and you get to do like the guest star circuit.

Yeah, yeah. Yeah, so like moved straight from there to Boy Meets World. Yeah, did the first episode with Danielle, you know, where she became Topango on that episode. She was only supposed to be a day player. No, yeah. And she became, you know, one of the main characters in the show. And I was actually supposed to be a recurring, I was supposed to be their third friend. Yeah. And I originally they had four or five of the guys from Sandlot in that show. I think Chauncey played Squints and Pat, who played Ham, were on the pilot episode. And they didn't really work out with them. And then they brought me in and I did three episodes of Boy Meets World, and I had a recurring role, and then I was in what's called the death chair. So, like everybody that sat in that chair, it's the third chair in the lunchroom. Everybody that sat in that chair that's supposed to be their friend was like gone off the show in like you know, three or two episodes or whatever. Didn't fit. It was like a cursed chair, it was like a cursed chair. Yeah, so when I did that podcast, I talked about that. I'm like, oh yeah, I flubbed that line with uh Mr. Feeney Bill Daniels, and that's why I got canceled. And they're like, No, no, no, no, that's the death chair. That's don't worry. Everybody that sat in that chair got kicked off the show.

So they had their own theory on how that happened. Yeah. Wow.

Were you hired like to be a full season player and then it got reduced? Or was it just you might end up being more, so it didn't feel as bad?

Yeah, it was hired as a recurring role. So I thought that was gonna turn into a series regular and uh it didn't, and then Dan Yoel kind of turned into like his girlfriend on the show. And yeah, yeah.

That's those themes you learn early as a kid. Like we talked about, you learn a rejection, you learn how things could be you know handed to you and taken away, and you learn the business early. And it's just it's it's almost good to learn it early because then nothing can phase you, and you just kind of keep focusing on what's next, what's next, and controlling what you can.

Yeah, you learn its cutthroat from a young age, you know.

Even for kids, yeah. You get forced to grow up a lot quicker than you know you'd like. It's but um it's business, yeah, you know, and it's a it's it's work. Was your mom the one taking you to most of the auditions and stuff as a kid? Yeah, what was that relationship like?

Um, you know, me and my mom had kind of like a rough relationship, yeah. Um, and this is in the documentary I'm doing called Beyond the Lot. Um, that kind of goes through me and my mom's relationship. But you know, my mother was a very good mom. I mean, she was like, what is it? Not Marsha Brady, what's the Brady Bunch mom? Um Mrs. Brady. Mrs. Brady. I don't remember. That sounds right. Yeah, you know, she was like that till I was like 10, and then we her and my dad separated. She kind of came out to LA and became wild, started wearing like short dresses and like teasing her hair up, and like, and it kind of became like a fractured relationship. She left me before I got San Lot. I was staying going to a Catholic school and staying in almost like a boy's home. It was like uh it was like this kid that I went to school with's mom, and she took in a bunch of boys that were like didn't really have families. Was this in LA? Yeah, this was actually in Woodland Hills. What school? It was Our Lady of the Valley.

Our Lady of the Valley. Because you mentioned Catholic school. I went to Alamany. Okay. Another Catholic school.

Another one.

Yeah. Shamanade's in Santa Clarita, doesn't it? No, it's no Shamanade's over here.

Okay, I've heard of Shamanade. Yes, we're all Catholic school boys. Yeah. It was Our Lady of the Valley in Woodland Hills. Yeah. So um, yeah, I mean, I went to that school and it was tough being a kid, you know. I had the mullet, and I know you guys had mullets in the mullet and stuff. Back then the mullet wasn't as cool as it is now. Theo Vaughn made more cool, but uh yeah, yeah, back then it was like not as cool. And so um, you know, I'd get picked on at school. What is that stupid haircut you got? And yeah, it was I was the smallest kid. Yeah, it was it was it was rough in that Catholic school, and the kids did a lot of bad things too. They would like go into the warehouse and steal CDs and we would take off on our bikes, yeah. So it was rough, and my mom at the time was seeing my stepdad, or it never became my stepdad, it was my my mom's boyfriend who was actually one of the lead singers of Sean on A, which is like a huge rock band, you know, they had their own show, and yeah, I remember like I know of the show Shawn on A. Yeah, yeah, because my mom was basically trying to make me a triple threat. So I had singing lessons, yeah, I had dancing lessons, I had acting lessons, a gun a gunmometer, yeah, yeah. So she was I was always, always gone, and like I was never really in school, I was like always doing my singing lessons or my acting lessons or dancing lessons, and I lived in Aqua Dulce, yeah, which is on the way to Palmdale.

So how was like we talk about commuting LA, Santa Monica, like all in the same day is a lot, but at least we get home at night. Uh huh.

So we just Agua Dulce is a different beast.

Yeah, did you ever stay out here when you were auditioning, or do you always went back? So your whole day and evening was just half driving.

Yeah, and you were you were living in sorry, you were living in Agua Dulce while going on with auditions with your mom?

Yeah. Wow, man. Which was like 60 miles one way, yeah. And driving for school, or you're staying there, okay. And going to school. So it was like it became very tiresome. Yeah.

Like me, you spent a lot of time in the backseat of a car. Exactly. Yeah.

But that, but that that quickly helps to make it like when you get old, like tired of acting. The commuting aspect, the audition, like that whole lifestyle, people don't understand. That's what gets you tired. Like the grind of it is very real. And you had a different version of that.

Yeah. Did your mom have the Thomas Guide? Oh, yeah.

Thomas Guide. And then when Map Quest came, that was just the easier relief. But like real maps, like uh, I can't go anywhere without my phone, I feel like now. Even just down the street, I'm like automatically, oh man, I shouldn't need this. Oh yeah.

I'm like, how did we live with this before? Because it's funny because like after I, you know, before we had this GPS stuff, I was like looking at Thomas guides when I was first able to drive and start going on auditions, and like, oh, go to D3 to like F4 and it connects, and you're like, What?

We lost all these skills that we had to have.

Exactly, because it's easy now, you know. Yeah, yeah.

And you had siblings too, right?

Yeah, I had two sisters. Yeah, same.

So, how was how was that with acting and and and and your mom like was how was that dynamic?

You know, it was my sisters. Well, when we first moved out here, it was hard because my mom left my sisters with my grandma to and my grandma was kind of taking uh care of them while she was getting me situated here, and then she met my my not my stepdad, my mom's boyfriend Don, who was in Shawana, who uh once she met him and they decided to stay together, she brought my sisters out, and then we lived in Sun Valley, I think, for a little bit. Yeah, and then we loop moved to uh uh we moved to Aquedulce from there, and we're renting a house. And then when I got sandlot, my mom found a way to take some of the money out for the down payment for the house. I don't know how she did it, but probably tell you. Yeah. I mean, I didn't find out till later on in my life, but she was like, Oh, which house do you like? You know, and like we were like house hunting together, yeah, and there was a house down the street that was beautiful. It had like a courtyard and uh uh you know, tile roof, and it was just it was looked like a castle. And I was like, I like this house.

 And it had a little koi pond and like a the courtyard, it was very cool. Right. At least you got to pick your house, Marty. Yeah, at least I got that, you know. But uh I said, Oh, I want this house, and little did I know my acting money was the down payment for the house.

Yeah. Looking back at that, in retrospect, like I mean, you helped buy your first family home, like that's pretty cool. But also, you know, that money was used without your permission, right? Yeah, I mean, it's sort of a weird thing to think about because I I kind of went through the same exact thing. Like our first family home was purchased with my acting money. Oh wow, and I imagine it was the same way, like parents make themselves manager and then they actually have control over your money once if they make themselves your manager, they have the power to invest it, which is sounds like that's what they did.

Would it just been easier if they just took a salary and just made it like that? I feel like if everyone, if everyone did that, which we could like they could have done, yeah, that'd be easier.

Yeah, yeah. I mean, they had the Coogan account when we're you know, we we were doing this, but there was so many loopholes in it. So many loopholes, yeah. Yeah, I mean you could say hardship or this or that, and the mom could take the parents could take the money off.

Yeah, and they were already entitled to 10% right off the bat because um, you know, taking you to auditions, you know, uh haircuts, uh fittings and all that stuff, like they're they're entitled to 10%. And then if they make yourself make themselves a manager, they're entitled to another 10%. Yeah, but then also have the ability to um invest your money on your behalf. So yeah, yeah, uh, it's an interesting thing. But I don't know, something kind of like being able to provide your family with with a home. I mean, something to be proud of. It is, you know, that is a silver liner. You should be proud. Yeah, we did that. Yeah, it's pretty cool.

Like being proud here and having money here, and you know, you have the best of both worlds.

Yeah, no shit.

So you said you didn't like play baseball at all. Yeah, it's that so you're in the movie that's tied to baseball forever. Yeah. And I saw in some past interviews you talked about being in places where like there's pro athletes in baseball that said like that movie's the reason I wanted to become a professional baseball player. Yeah. Has been in that movie made you enjoy the sport, or did you like go away from it like I'm tied to the sport forever and I don't like it?

I mean, I'll forever be a Dodgers fan. I was a Dodgers fan from being a kid, you know, a little kid. Yeah. Because when they filmed the last scene, you know, when Benny plays for the Dodgers, I don't know why we were at Dodgers Stadium and it was completely empty. And it's kind of funny how we even got to do the last scene at Dodgers Stadium. Our DP was he was a friend with Tommy Lasorda, so he was like, We're like, we have to shoot the last scene at Dodger Stadium. Benny joins the Dodgers and he plays for the Dodgers, and we're like, How are we gonna do this? And fill the stadium with people. And he was like, I'm friends with Tommy LaSorda, and he was like, Get out of here. So they go to Dodger Stadium. Tommy's actually in his office in his underwear because it's such a hot day. And he comes in and he goes, Hey, hey, Tommy, you know, like we're doing this movie, The Sand Lot. I'd love if you know we could shoot here. Tommy goes, Yeah, go ahead. He's like, What day do you want to do it? And Tommy gave us the permission, and that's how we shot at Dodger Stadium.

That's awesome.

So I don't know why our moms brought us there because we weren't even in that scene. Sure, but we were running around Dodger Stadium when we were like 12 years old, going in and out of like doors. And I remember Chauncey who played squints, got locked in. Doors and he couldn't get out of, and he was like hitting the door. And I walked over, I'm like, Johnson, and he's like, get me out of here. And uh, we were just running around having fun at Dodger Stadium, and yeah, I've been a Dodger fan ever since. The perks. That's rad.

Yeah, I was thinking about that. Like, you've actually had like a baseball adjacent career like that's been longer than most professional baseball players. Yeah, yeah.

Well, I mean, it's crazy because you know, as I said, the movie's bigger now than it ever was. Sure. And it kind of took off in 2018. So, like, my life took a weird trajectory after, like, I did Sandlot, and then I did all these TV guest starring roles on all these TV shows. I was on like Boy Meets World and Sliders and Wings and Say by the Bell and all these other shows. Yeah. When I was 17, I got in a bad car accident going to an audition, actually. Because I told you I was driving from Aqua Dulce to I would wake up, go to school, leave school halfway through the day, drive all the way to Hollywood while I'm like looking down, trying to memorize my lines. Sure. Get there, look for the parking. There's never parking in LA. You guys know this. Yeah. Then you would like park, get a ticket, whatever, go in the audition, you're all flustered, and you know, finally ended up catching up with me. And I was like looking down what they look at on my lines, and I looked up and I was over the double yellow line, and another car just bam. Oh my god. Oh man. And I had a geo metro at the time convertible, which is like a tin can. Yeah. So the engine based the carts already small. It was probably about a little bit bigger than this table. Right. Like width wise.

Just for perspective, like it in cars that you don't want to be in a head-on collision in. That's the number one. That's number one.

Yeah. They don't even make geo metros anymore because of all the deaths. Yeah. So yeah, that happened. And and um, and I actually died. I died on scene, and I remember they resuscitated me, and they were like, he's still awake, he's still awake. We got him awake, we got him awake. And I heard the helicopter blades because the helicopter came down and airlifted me out of this, because I wouldn't have made it if they were just ambulance there, you know, going by ambulance. So um, yeah, I I they took me back and then I was in an induced coma for like I think six days.

Oh wow.

And I woke up and I was having a dream. I remember having a dream that I was being kidnapped and that my leg was they had put metal through my leg and they were holding it, and I was trying to like loosen it, and I couldn't get it free. So I woke up out of the coma after the sixth day and I was screaming, like, ah, help me, you know, like and all these nurses rushed in and I was like, uh, get away from me. I thought they were the kidnappers. Yeah, and where you were, I had no idea where I was. They go, You've been in a very bad car accident, you need to relax, your leg is in traction. It's this piece of metal is holding your leg together. If you keep shaking, the metal that they've placed in your leg will fall apart.

Wow. That's it.

It was like, uh, okay, yeah.

That's a lot to wake up to.

Yeah, yeah. I wasn't aware of everything that happened as I was in this coma that a chaplain had showed up with my parents, my dad had driven down from he lives out near San Luis Obispo, had come down and they prayed basically because the chaplain's like he might not make it through the night. So that was the first night I was in there in in intensive care. And then I made it, you know, woke up, had a lot of bad concussion. They'd shown me pictures of the car like two or three weeks after, and I was just like, Holy shit. Like they're like, dude, this is a miracle. And they brought the car to the junkyard, and the guy said, Who died? Oh, dude.

It was like a box of a car.

It was there was no front end. And the engine had actually come through the front, and that's what broke my legs. Wow.

So what did that accident do to you mentally? And like how did you what happened after that?

I mean, after that, I just basically told my mom, done, I'm not doing this anymore. I was burnt out on the industry, I was burnt out on constantly auditioning, um, burnt out on the rejection. I was at the height too, and she said, Are you sure you want to do this? Because I was auditioning for like free willy, like the lead in that. And I was auditioning for like the good son, and I was like literally right there against Elijah Wood. I could see that. Yeah. So I I was like, because me and him look very similar as kids. So like we were like neck and neck for a lot of stuff, and you know, he was the more famous actor at the time.

Sure.

But yeah, I mean it after that, I just told her, I'm done, I'm not doing this anymore.

So that was kind of you know the the breaking point. But yeah, before that, you had started to feel some burnout, and like I I were you did you feel like it was taken away from your childhood in a sense?

I never felt it was taken away from my childhood, I just felt like the stress of it was too much. I mean, and maybe that was taken away from my childhood. Yeah, I felt it was too much, and it was like I wasn't getting my schoolwork done. I was leaving school every day early, same, you know, doing too much driving.

Probably not hanging out with friends or like living a teenage life.

Yeah, I mean, I would hang out with friends on the weekend, yeah, and every time I would get a role in something, my mom would be like, We're gonna celebrate and do something for you. And she would make little flyers on the computer that said, You booked sliders, so now we're gonna go paintballing or whatever, you know.

So that's kind of cute.

That's cool. Yeah, no, it was cool. It's like I got little gifts for every time I book something, or if I didn't audition, because I got really sick of auditioning for stuff. I was like, I don't want to do this anymore. She's like, just do it, I'll buy you a comic book because I was really into comic books. Yeah, like my first job was in a comic book shop. Oh, that's cool. So I was like, okay, fine. And I had a huge comic book collection. Um, so you know, the little gifts kept me going.

I think we all got gifts, yeah. After ever after after getting auditioned, we get candy or it would go to the sports card store for me.

Yeah, we got little toys and then they got they got our money. Exactly. No shit. That's not a fair trade.

Um, you said you worked at a comic book store. Was that like was that your first job, like civilian job? Yeah, that's cool. Yeah, that's way better than mine.

Yeah, it was in Canoga Park. Oh, really? Where by where that Wells Fargo is in Canoga Park, as you're driving to like Bob's big boy and it's down the street.

Yeah, I could kind of picture. I mean, I know that area. That's funny.

Yeah, there was a comic book shop there, and I always that's where my mom would take me to buy comic books, and just like the smell when you walk in, I was just like, oh very different and opposite than acting too. Yeah. So I uh would get a comic book when I would do good, which is awesome. And then I I got to a point in the you know, where I just was like burnt out and I was just like, I'm done, you know.

Sometimes it takes something that serious though to be able to get away, because like it's either that or a mental break or something. Do you look back at that? Not that the accident was a good thing at all, but it was nice to have something stop you, otherwise,

 maybe it would have been harder to do it yourself.

Yeah, I think so. Because I I I couldn't stop because my mom just kept pumping me up as far as like oh, you were right there for that, or you were right there for this. And you know, they would take you out in the hallway when we were we would go into these auditioning rooms, and you could hear the other person in the room, and then you would my mom would just take me away from that because that would psych me out. Sure. So I would like go in another room and she would give you like again, again, again. Like just like a soldier running lines, like just like again, again, until I had it like down. She's like, do it like this, do it like that, throw this in there.

And so your mom was good, your mom was good at what she did. Oh, yeah. I mean, she she was, I mean, yeah. I was uh I was a I was a well-trained actor by you know, yeah, you were disciplined and like and she took I mean and she kept you, you know, kept you going, she got you everywhere you needed to go. Like I'm sure you you know, remember having to buy new clothes all the time.

It's hard to be coached by your mom though. Like that relationship, it's like even now when you take advice from your your you know husband, wife, girlfriend, friend, like it's always different from a coach. Yeah. I'm sure taking from your mom, you might know she's right, but it's hard to hear from her, probably. Like at the auditions.

Yeah. Did you ever feel like the line got blurred between being your mom and your manager? Like, was that was that also a reason for wanting to step away?

I don't think the line got blurred between her being a mom and a manager. I think it got I think she got to a point where I became I felt like I became just uh a piggy bank, honestly. Because a lot of my money was used. I think that that's where the relationship started severing when I started realizing like everything that I had bought from a kid was my own money. I mean, my Christmas presents were my money. If I wanted a car, she would find a way to get in that Kuban account and get that money out.

Yeah.

I had dirt bikes, I had all this stuff with my own money.

It's different if you know consciously, yeah, like this is how you get things.

Yeah, and I started like thinking in my head, like, I think this is my money that's being used for this stuff, and I'm not gonna have anything when I hit 18. You actually figured that out on your own? Yeah, I started thinking that. Yeah. And sure enough, when I hit 18, I really had nothing left, you know.

Right. Yeah, it was a similar situation for me. Like, because um, I was like 21. I was like, all right, well, let's see it. Uh-huh. Like, wait, wait a second. Yeah, where's my well, you know, there was a big stock market crash, and you know, we tried, you know, that house, and it's like, well, what the fuck, man? Yeah, like this is my shit, you know. Jordan didn't have that problem. His parents handled his money very well. Yeah, you got to fuck it all off and so I got the floating.

That's that's you have to blow it yourself. Fair. Yeah. I mean, technically, I got a lot of it for the cars and the dirt bugs and all that shit, but it's like no, but you would have consciously maybe done differently that age in real life.

If you're older, I don't need everything. I want to, I want to enjoy my 20s.

Yeah, yeah, because you're a kid and you want, you want, you know. Yeah. I saw Terminator 2 and I wanted a dirt bike. I was like, I have to have a dirt bike now.

At what point would the like the sandlot reunion stuff come back into play in terms of like either showing up or just even a reunion with the crew?

Yeah, so we did the 20th anniversary in 2013, and I hadn't seen a lot of the guys, you know, up until then. It was very small. It was like, I think we went back to Utah and to the actual sandlot field where they filmed, and they redid the dugout and they redid the backstop. So cool. And we were signing autographs in the backstop, and I think they they had enough tickets for 2,000 people and like 4,000 people showed up. It wasn't huge, and we didn't get paid a lot for it. And then the 25th anniversary came around, and Fox hit us up, and they're like, Hey, we want to do a tour of all the major league baseball stadiums with you guys. I remember when you guys did this, and we were like, Really? And they were like, Yeah, and they're gonna pay you this amount of money, and we're like, Holy shit, let's go! I'm like, because my money's gone, like that's like but a tour, that's awesome.

That's not a one-time like event.

Yeah, it's like a tour, and I hadn't seen a lot of the guys for 25 years. So the first stop we did was uh the Angels, and that was a very cool experience. Yeah, we went into their press room and they had a pair of PF flyer cleats, and they were like, Can you guys sign this? And like Mike Trout's like, Oh, can you guys sign this? Like Mike Trout, yeah, I know, no big deal. Yeah, like one of the best baseball players, yeah, one of the best baseball players in history. Yeah, and and they literally had a glass box and they put it in the press room, it's still there. Wow sitting in the angels press room.

That's so is that is that like while you're on the tour and you're seeing it from that side after being older, like that's gotta be a different experience. Realizing for these guys that are stars, it meant something to them growing up. And like it's funny when you when someone can meet you, like that's a different feeling of like appreciation of what you did, probably.

Oh, yeah, yeah. I mean, it's it was crazy. Like, and you know, then we went to Dodgers and it was game three against the Giants, and uh they we came out of the Dodgers dugout before the game started, and we took our positions on the Dodger field that we played on the sand lot. So I'm shortstop, yeah. Timmy took first, you know, Pat was catcher, and Denuez took pitcher, and uh, we got a standing ovation from 60,000 people. The whole the whole plank thing was so and it was like the first time I was really like, holy shit. And I looked at the guys like, is this really happening?

Yeah, that that was probably a moment where you you I mean, you've probably always known this, but that was probably a moment where it really hit home. You're like, this is a cultural phenomenon, this movie. Like, this movie means a lot. 25 times touched so many people's lives. Like, you know, you talk about Jurassic Park coming out the same year. Like, I've seen Jurassic Park a few times. Like, I could watch Sandlot 25 times throughout, like, so many times throughout my whole life. That movie doesn't get old to me. Like, it's a timeless, perfect story.

Yeah, the cool thing about Sandlot, and you guys would probably think it's about Rascals, is that like uh, you know, they made each of the kids have their own special scene. Yeah, and that's that was the cool thing about David Mickey Evans is he's like, I want all these kids to be stars, yeah. So like every one of the kids in that film had their own little scene that they didn't, which is hard, yeah, yeah. And and we really made the film, yeah. You know, our character the way we played our characters, that's why he it took so long getting these kids because we we would go to the sportsman's lodge when we auditioned for this. You guys remember the sportsman's lodge? Yeah, totally, and we would go to sportsman's lodge and there would be like thousands of kids, and I would see a bunch of kids auditioning for Yeah Yeah, and they all look like me and shit. And I was like, oh my god, you know, yeah. To narrow that down to actually be chosen was like very special.

Totally. Oh, so so what the casting process for Sandlot sounds like it was similar to Little Rascals. Like, was it kind of like a cattle call? I mean, were there just tons of kids and like yeah?

I mean, the first when when I first got cast as Bertram, yeah, it was like that. Yeah, um, and then it they kind of narrowed it down to the kids that they wanted. I think they got a look in their head about what they the way they wanted these kids. Sure. Because they wanted like the fat kid and the black kid. Yeah, how they fit together, yeah. And they wanted kind of like these these little rascal kind of like you know, kids that would when they all were together, they were forced to be reckoned with. Sure. So that that's kind of like you know how Sandlaw was. That's right.

School too, is like the if you compare it to Jurassic Park, Jurassic Park has leveraged making a bunch of sequels, and that's why it's still popular, but no one, no one rewatches the first. There's no like culture icon for that specific one. Yeah, and even if there's been other sandlots and like they try to do another like rascals, yeah, the ones that were in are still the endless reference, and like that won't be replaced. Yeah, and that's what's really different than any other film that's still popular. They try to squeeze sequels and prequels out of it. Yeah, there's very few movies where the that feature stayed the same, and and it's almost left alone.

And it's not dated, like you you watch Jurassic Park and you're like, oh, like you know, the effects are different, you know, you complain about this.

You're like, what happened? What happened?

You know, I feel like that happens with a lot of movies now, but you know, uh like practical movies like The Sand Lod, which are an original, original screenplay, you know, um, just fully rely on the ensemble cast, you know, rather than effects or anything like that.

Um but even the effects that back then they had animatronics, which were way better than yeah, these visual effects that they have now.

Yeah, totally. I believe it more.

Yeah, you watch the first Jurassic Park, you're like, holy shit, that's like a real dinosaur. Yeah, and then you watch it now, you're like, okay, that's CG.

Yeah, it's clearly not a real dinosaur. Yeah. How did you handle as a kid like getting recognized and like pressure? And I mean, I know that for me, I was always kind of I had a little bit of I was a little embarrassed, you say, like when people would ask me about the little rascals or recognize me or want to take pictures or autographs and stuff, like you know, it always kind of weirded me out. Like, how did you handle that? Like, was that something you were you know open

 to? And like, did you ever feel uncomfortable or uncomfortable? It was weird.

I mean, I grew up in a really small town, yeah. But you know, Aqua Dulce is still a very small town that I lived in. My mom had a ranch, so we had horses. The school that I went to was very small, and I was the only kid that was like this big actor in the school. And then San Lot come out, Sanlot came out as I was transitioning from fifth grade into sixth grade. Yeah, I I was very small as a kid and very skinny. So I like would go to school and the jocks would like all the all the cheerleaders are like, oh my god, it's yeah, yeah. Like, and they would be on my shit, and the jocks would be like, Fuck you, you know, like little bitch. Yeah, they they wouldn't like because there's there, you know, there's jocks at every school, there's not actors at every school. No, there's not. Yeah. So working ones. Yeah, working ones. Yeah, yeah. There's a kid that was in a fucking you know, cocoa commercial or something, but yeah, you know. So it was hard. It was hard living that life, you know. I mean, I didn't spend too much time in school because I was always on set.

Did you ever do homeschool or you just I did do homeschool. Okay.

I mean, I did homeschool after I got in a car accident. That happened when I was 17. So I actually got my GED from like a I wasn't like a going to school in a rehab center.

Just try to get it done.

Yeah, it was like a rehab center, and like I was like, they had a school there. Yeah. For like homeschool, and it was like this satellite location, so you didn't have to go all the way to the high school to do the homeschool. Sure. So I I went there and got my GED from there, and you know, I never went to a prom, I never did any of that stuff.

Yeah.

So I didn't really have that kind of you know experience. As I was doing the rehab, I started learning how to work out, you know. That became something I was really intrigued in. Yeah. Because I always had comic books, I was collecting them. I always wanted to look like Wolverine or like one of these superheroes, one of these superheroes. So I started like working out and really like lifting weights and learning how to eat right, and you know, that became something that just stuck with me.

You seem a little bigger now, then yeah, yeah.

You kind of fucking jacked up. I mean, that's the number one thing I get is like it's like, are you sure you're that you're the right guy? Like, I'm like, yeah, I'm that's me. I ate the beast after the film. Yeah, but it just became something that you know it relieved stress because of my home life. Sure. Um, I felt better when I left, and it changed like my dating life, and you know, you notice you get you gain a confidence from it that you don't for that to you don't have before.

So it's like and you and it it's that natural like feeling good. Like I said, you leave feeling confident and good. It's not always about how you look at the end, but you feel different. Exactly. Especially if you were smaller, like I was always small growing up. Uh-huh. I'm still not big, but like that sticks with you as a kid because you don't know the bullying is because they're jealous. You think it's because the other thing is because that's what they use.

Yeah, yeah.

It takes years to figure that out.

They'll go after you because you're small. Yeah. So, like, and I was skinny as you know, I was like 110 pounds soaking wet.

So I was like, And the mullet doesn't help.

I had that the mullet, yeah. Nowadays that's in, you know. I I know like I wish you'd be able to.

Now if you're skinny Wick, our producer, he he's got a little mullet action going.

That's not necessarily a mullet.

I don't like full head of hair, I would say.

I know.

We both are very jealous. I people always like, why don't you bring back the mullet? I'm like, You think if I could, I would? Yeah, I would love to bring it back.

Please. Yeah, I would love that. Um, but the mullet's in, man.

It's like you rock a mullet now, you're you're cool. Did you ever feel pressure to keep performing even off camera?

No, I didn't. No, no. I mean, I I felt pressured to go back into the business because like after I did Sandlot, I was like, what am I? I mean, I'm not saying after I did all these things I did, I just was like, What do I what do I do with my life? You know, I didn't know what to do. So I was looking to see what the guys from Sandlot were doing. And this is like when AOL was around and it said like Mike was like a firefighter. So I was like, maybe I should just do that. So I went to school for the fire science. This is actually my legs were like completely effed up at this time. Yeah, from the accident. So that's tough. So I mean, I went, I got my associates in fire science at the College of the Canyons.

Dude, I gotta stop you for a second because I I went to COC and I took fire science classes. I wanted to be a firefighter.

I wonder if we were in the same class.

That's crazy. Probably 2004.

I feel like the other students would have blown up if they knew.

Yeah, that's crazy. That I mean, that's just a wild thing to have in common. Was your teacher? My dream was to be a firefighter. I don't remember who my teacher was. It was a long time ago. I've done a lot of drugs since then. Um but uh yeah, that that that's wild that we had like that same exact my dream was to be a firefighter.

Yeah. And then uh I kind of stuck. Mine was too, and then I did the whole EMT thing and I was like, eh, I don't think so.

Oh, you act did you actually start EMT? I did. Oh yeah, you see some gnarly shit.

Oh yeah. I mean, I there was a time when we were in the we were in the ambulance and a girl had drank too much alcohol, she had alcohol poisoning, and we had to give her like activated charcoal.

Yeah.

And so they a what activated charcoal. It's like literally charcoal in a syringe, and they put it in your mouth and it induces vomiting.

Wow.

So she was just like vomiting everywhere, and they had like a some like clamp to hold her mouth open because she was like, you know. And I was like, Yeah, I'm not doing this.

I had that, yeah, but at the hospital. Yeah, I had to take a ride.

I mean, I I give them props, like the people that do that because like yeah, they see you see horrific shit. You see horrific shit, and it desensitizes you to a lot of stuff.

Your your drive to want to help has to be stronger than not being able to see the things along the way.

Yeah, but I mean, it's a little different from what turned me off to it was uh I was doing the firefighter explorer program a lot too, and there's a lot of politics in it, and like there's I mean, there's a lot of politics in acting as well, like especially when we were kids, you know. Like um, but I I would notice that the kids who had dads or uncles who were firefighters, they always got a chance to ride out before me, you know, and like actually participate in calls and stuff. Um, and I I mean I was pretty good at it, like you know, I was in great shape and I worked my ass off, but still always got passed up over some kid whose you know uncle might have been a firefighter down across town.

You told me your little rascals that might have helped more than your dad being in a firefighter.

Yeah, but you remember at the time, like that was like that was the peak time where I was trying to hide little rascals. Like I would actually tell people, like, no, like that wasn't me. Yeah, you know, like it's only been a few years since I really started embracing it, but it wasn't something that I just didn't like that attention, you know. No, really, it just wasn't something.

Did you do the whole CPAT test and all that? The oh for for the like the whole physical test?

No, I never got that far.

Okay, no, yeah, I did the I did the CPAT, but my legs were in such bad shape, and like this is I hadn't started working out yet, so like the amount of physical. Endurance that you need to like do that stuff. Yeah, it's like drag a hundred-pound dummy up a bunch of flights of stairs and move them around in circles and like take a hammer and hit a thing and like go up and you have to do it within nine minutes. And like I took that thing three times and I failed it every time. And I just said, I'm just I'm not gonna do this till you know I'm I'm I've trained, yeah, and uh I'm ready, you know.

Yeah, at that point you're only trained to cry on cue, you know?

Yeah, yeah, yeah. At that point, you're just like, you know, I'm not sure what I'm doing here. And yeah, so yeah, I left that and then I uh decided I was didn't know what to do, and then my buddy was doing mortgages and he was like, Oh, come do mortgages. He's like, I'm making, you know, 30,000, 40,000 a month. And I'm like, what? And I'm like, you know, this was before the crash in 2007, yeah. So I started doing mortgages, and like kids were coming in BMWs and Ferraris, and like I was like, That was a wild time. Yeah, how do I do this? Yeah, yeah, and like, you know, I was making a ton of money doing that, and then that crashed in 2007. And uh company I was working for got rated by the FBI. Oh no shit.

Yeah, another Lincoln Common, another Lincoln Common.

Yeah, this is crazy. Yeah, I was a ticket. I I got into after high school, I got into I became a ticket scalper. Oh wow, okay. It's like it actually the company I worked I worked with, we became like one of the biggest ticket companies in the world, and we were shut down by the FBI in like 2009, rated 30 FBI agents. Like, holy shit, it was insane. Like, another little yeah, it's so weird.

Yeah, it was funny because like we had a we had like a 20,000 square foot building, probably about 150 people working in there, yeah. And by the time the FBI came in, there was six people, and I was one of the six people left. They took the six people that had the highest highest uh sales, yeah, and they kept us there for a month. So we would just go like make forts and like do all this crazy shit. And at the end of that month, we closed everything out, and they were just like, You guys are gone too.

So wow, okay, so then what?

Man, then I did timeshare. Oh, right on. Yeah, I did timeshare. That sucked because it's not like a necessity, it's not like people need these vacation packages, and they're just sitting there trying to get out the room, yeah. And they put me as the guy doing the exit program. Yeah, so it was like they you would meet with the main salesperson that they were the one that would make the high-end commission if they sold it. Sure. And then I would sell them an exit package, so they would like say no to that because they just want the free gift, yeah. Yeah, right. They get like a free cruise or something, which was all BS anyway, because there were so many blackout dates you couldn't use it. Yeah, so that you'd have like three days in the year, and then it was impossible. They would come to me and I'd be like, Oh, well, I'll sell you this one year program. You guys can try it out, see if you like it. If you like it, you can buy it at the resort and all this. I sold a decent amount of those, enough to survive. Yeah, but I just I couldn't, I got I got tired of doing it.

So timeshare is a rough way to make a living. Yeah, yeah, yeah. The accident happens. You recover from the accident, yeah, you decide you're gonna step away. At any point, do you miss the do you miss performing? Do you miss it? Like, do you miss the business?

Yeah, well, I mean, like 2013 when we did the 20th anniversary, I the bug kind of bit me again because that was the first time I had signed autographs since I was like, you know, 14, 15 years old. And seeing all the people that liked Sandlot, because I just thought Sandlot was some of my past. I was like, yeah, moved on with my life, you know. That kind of was like an awakening, like, oh, this movie still has has legs. And I was like, well, maybe I'll try this again, you know. I put sent out headshots and resumes. An agent hit me up and said, Hey, we'd like to cut come in. We're huge fans of the Sandlot. So I go in and uh she she hires me. And that year I shot three national commercials all right on. Yeah.

That's all man, that's

 that's a great way to start. Yeah, yeah. I'm honestly like I'm I'm really curious though, because yeah, a lot of a lot of former actors don't go back like auditioning again and like starting from scratch. What is the what is it like starting it from scratch, but like having that having the resume as a kid? Is that is that help? Does the agent use that? Like I I I I have no idea.

I mean, there was there was times like I would go in for a part, they'd be like, Oh man, we love San lot, but you're not good for this role. So you get that that's weird, you know. Um, but I was like, this was when the Jersey Shore was huge, and it was like I would go audition for like these Guido roles, like I think the biggest one I did an old spice commercial, I had to play a total Guido, like muscle head guy, and I was like in this room with all these other like buff guys, and I'm like, this is so different than when I was a kid where I'm competing against kids, now I'm competing against these bodybuilder guys, had an idea of what I was gonna do in my head, it was gonna I use some props and stuff, and uh I got the role for that, and I made a lot of money off that one. Old Spice actually did a a uh uh a website with my face on it. Oh, that's awesome. Yeah, called the uh spray tan guy. That's awesome, yeah. So I made good money because they had to renew it every single year, so like that was a good one. Then I did like a Takate beer commercial, and then I did a um seven up commercial with Chelsea Handler, all right on where I'm currently waiting.

That's the best, huh? Commercials like are a great way for a living, yeah. Just like just to do that while you still can pursue anything else, too.

Yeah, yeah. So it was it was nice to like get my feet back in there and start doing stuff again. And the auditioning process was exactly the same. It was like you can't find parking, you go in there, you're in a room, you know, they're doing that, you can hear the person through the door, and I was just like, okay, and I I remember this.

What was it like auditioning with like as an adult, you know, with all these other people who were trying to make it, you know, and you already had this like pretty impressive body work, yeah. You know, like you've been doing this most of your life already.

Yeah, the funny thing about Hollywood is like, what have you done for me lately? Yeah, no shit. Nobody cared about my body work. Yeah, that that was the craziest thing. Is like in Star War most famous baseball movies ever made, no one gave a shit. Yeah, it's like, what can you do now? Yeah, okay, I want to show you, you know. Had to reinvent myself, went back to acting classes, yeah, found my old acting coach from when I was a kid, started going back to him. That's cool. Yeah, he's actually in my documentary, which I give him so many props because when I got in that car accident, his wife actually I lost so much blood, I had to have four different people donate blood. Wow. With my blood type, and his wife was one of them.

So like well, so you had a pretty tight relationship with this person.

Yeah. What was his name? Uh John Homa. He ran a he ran a um acting class called The Shop. The shop. But his acting class as a kid had all the biggest stars. Yeah. Like Kirsten Dunce was in my class, and the kids from home improvement were my class. Yeah. Andrew Keegan. I mean, so many acting, big acting stars were my class. So I know all these guys.

He does adults too. Yeah, there are different classes.

Yeah. And a lot of these guys were in my classes as adults, you know. When I went back, I was like, oh my God, what's up, man? How are you?

It is kind of like that's the humbling experience. You have to really learn acting when you're an adult, and and it just it's different. And then as a kid, you you can get a little more freedom. Uh-huh. But is it are you able to approach it more relaxed now because you have that history? Versus like it's not may not help you in the room, but it makes you more relaxed because you've been on set, you've been in shows, you've been in in in stressful moments. Yeah. Other people in the auditioning haven't been.

Yeah, I mean, it's different now after COVID because you're not in a room anymore. You're self-tape. It's self-tape. It's like everything's self-tape. Yeah.

So do you do you find that that seems like it's better because you can get you can get the tape you want, uh-huh. But I feel like you lose out what making a fan in the room, which is why a lot of us would get parts, because the person was rooting for you.

I mean, at the beginning it was it was cool because I was like, I don't have to drive, I can just film this and do it as many takes as I want. And and I wasn't getting as many roles when I was self-taping because you're not in the you're not meeting the casting director, you're not getting in there. And on with self-tape, they're getting thousands of thumbnails because now anybody can do it. You don't have to live in LA, you don't have to live in New York. Anybody can do this. So I was I was a little deterred because I was like, okay, there's a lot more people doing this now, and they're just looking through thumbnails. You're not in a room meeting the casting director, yeah, you know, developing that relationship.

I think that's the like in the last acting class I did in college, it was Leslie Conn's in Hollywood, and like a lot of the week we spent was an audition week, and you literally got feedback from the other people in the classmates. Like you came in with way too much energy, or you came in really calm and confident, and that helped us feel good with you starting the audition. And that was like a part of the training. I feel like losing that it's just come it brings it more back to the look that you get away from when you're in the room.

Yeah, the acting classes you could still go to, but it's the the auditioning process is like so much different. It's just like, you know, setting it up and making sure the lighting's good. And like, I'm like, I'm an actor, I'm not creating content now. It's creating content more. Yeah, and I'm like looking at some of these other actors' self-tapes, I'm like, Jesus, that looks fucking great. And I'm like, I need to get a better camera, or like I need to have a better backdrop and get to become a filmmaker for another. Right.

Now you need an edge, you got to set yourself apart in a different way. Yeah, you rather than a personal connection with a casting director.

Yeah, you know, you're a director, you're an actor, and you're hoping you get in with these, you know, these casting directors that are looking at your tape. Yeah, yeah, and the only real link that you have because you're not meeting them is who you were as a kid. Sure. So they're looking at that going, oh, this guy from the sand line, let's see what he's got, you know. Yeah. So I I mean, I did get in a couple doors that probably other people couldn't get in, but at the same time, it's much harder business. Yeah. And especially with social media. I mean, it's you know, these vertical shorts everybody's doing now. I'm auditioning for those. There's no money in them.

Because they're non-union, right?

They're non-union. And I'm FICOR, so I'm like, you know, if you don't make enough money in SAG in a year, you can do FICOR to where you can do non-union and union.

Oh, okay.

Yeah. So it's like I'm auditioning for those, and it's like, we'll pay you $300 for the whole shoot. And I'm like, what? Like, that's crazy.

And you're not getting a trailer, you're not getting craft service. Oh, you're not getting in the residuals, nothing.

SQ days, they move on to the next one. The crazy thing is, I'm not booking a lot of this. I'm act I've actually done a couple big like I did Abbott Elementary in October.

Oh, no, no, they shoot on the same lot as my show, All American. Yeah. The Warner Brothers.

Yeah. Are you are you on the show? All American?

I was the I was a camera assistant on it for like seven years.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah. So yeah, going back to the back lot of Warner Brothers, I remember I literally when I was the first day I was on the lot, I went to the area where me and my mom did delirious. Uh and it just like I shed a tear because I was just like that's cool. It was just like full circle, and like I can get into like what happened with my mom and everything, but it was like seeing that area just literally made me fucking ball. That's your childhood. Yeah, it was my childhood. That's what started everything for me.

We didn't grow up on the playgrounds in the same way.

Yeah, that yeah. Yeah, like if John Candy never gave me that number, who knows, you know?

So that's a crazy origin story though. Like that it's very organic that he you happen to just say a line that you weren't trying, and he saw like that's a cool way to get into it.

I mean, back then it was just like that, you know. It was like peep if people saw talent, they'd give you a shot. It's not like that anymore now, it's not, it's a lot more corporate and like there's just so many bullshit politics and and people are looking at what's the new popular thing. Yeah, and there's no you know, there's no heart or anything in it, anything anymore. It's just it's a cold business now. Yeah, especially people talking about putting AI actors and stuff. Yeah, yeah.

I saw I think Telly Norwell was just shut down. I saw a post. But like I think that's what's nice for me. Like, it's nice seeing you and and seeing others from San Lon and other movies like really embracing it and just enjoying life older and seeing like fans love it and these Comic Con presents. I think that's what's really nice about it. You can you can have that and still audition and want to be an actor now, yeah, but you don't have to sacrifice one or the other or shy away from it. Yeah. Because it's like we should be proud of what we did and not let jealous people get in the way and feel like, well, are you still holding on to it? Be like, are you still holding on to your pictures from a kid? Like it's our it's our childhood, it's not just the same.

Oh, your has been. Well, your never was been. I know, that's why in college. Yeah, what have you done?

Right. Okay. Marty, do you have kids? No, no, not um, not yet. I have a I have like a hypothetical. Now that you've got some distance and and you know you're older and you know how to navigate the business and you've lived this life, would you put your kids in acting and like it and how would you handle that? Like, what would you think? If you really wanted to do it, yeah, probably, but I think it's a different ball game now.

Yeah, it's not the same as it was when we did it, you know. It's not it's it's much harder. And I think what's makes money now are these YouTube videos and this TikTok stuff, and like it's a machine versus the city. It's a machine, it's not like it's not, it's not there's no kids. I see a lot of this stuff and I'm like, these people don't have talent. There's no talent here. Yeah, you know, we did everything in our era to gain the talent to do what we do, you know.

They're manufacturing more fake lives. Like I have a I have a four-year-old girl, and uh she'll watch these YouTube videos when it's like a family.

Uh-huh.

And I still wonder, I'm like, you're watching them eat breakfast and have their day. Like, is that what you do on Mondays? And then Tuesday through Friday, you're a normal family. Or is breakfast table like, okay, enjoy your breakfast, but now we're turning on the camera and pretend like it's not there. Like it's yeah, that to me, the instant feedback of likes and comments. Yeah. I'm really happy I didn't like we didn't grow up with that.

Did you see the documentary that was on Netflix about that family that the influencers seemed like the first the perfect family? Oh and then they the woman and the guy that were the the parents, like everything was perfect in their life, and they lived in a nice two-story home. And like then the woman and the guy they couldn't deal with each other more, they got divorced. So the woman moved in with this other influencer woman that's like, I'm gonna make you bigger, and they were abusing the children and keeping them in the closet, and like I've seen that it was crazy. I was like, What? I haven't seen that. What's that called?

They made these weird YouTube channels doing content together. Yeah, it's like uh the but it was I think it was in Utah. The yeah, the the the influencer agent is like this famous influencer that had a whole like like network of kids, yeah. But they were like, Okay, now make suggestive content like you're kissing, and they're like 13 because they saw their audience is there.

So gross, yeah.

But that's the machine of it. Like that's how that's what it is now.

That's not acting, it's just it's getting clicks.

But the crazy thing is those people are making more money than we ever did because there's no middleman, all the money goes directly into them, sure. And YouTube takes her little cut and then gives them the the money, and but it's it, but like you said, it's there's no enjoyment.

I think that is way more traumatizing for a kid because your mom can get mad at you if you did if you like my mom would get mad if I spoke too fast. But she wouldn't, she wasn't in the room, uh so she could just assume if I didn't get the callback. Yeah, but like your mom can go, you didn't get a thousand likes for this video, we have to do it again. Like I can imagine dealing with

 that every night.

Yeah, like yeah, because you're crazy. Yeah, you're you know, you're basing your worth on if people are liking your stuff, and you can check it every second. It's crazy because like instant feedback. I don't know if this sounds cocky by saying this, but like I don't hold these people in the same regards as people in my industry, like actual actors, yeah. And like I got into it with like I don't know if you saw the documentary on the dance crew that's like a cult. No, okay. So there's these this these influencers and they dance, right, on the street and stuff like that. Uh-huh. So like I was in Vegas, I know I know all the I used to go to Vegas all the time. So I know I used to go to nightclubs all the time. Yeah. And there's a funny TMZ thing about sandlot actor, near death hangover in Vegas on St. Patrick's. I have the weirdest TMZ posts, but like Oh, we're frame that.

That's a good one. Yeah, that's pretty good.

Yeah, it was like on St. Patrick's Day, and I had gotten wasted, and I went back to my timeshare and I had drank too much, and the maid came in and felt my pulse, thought I was dead. So I wake up and there's like firefighters and paramedics and hotel staff and police officers. I'm like, what the hell are you guys doing in my room? Like, get out of here, you know? And they're just like looked at each other like, he's alive, let's go. He's fine. So it's so weird. But yeah, these dance influencers were at this club and they were like, um, this is our table, so like you need to get out of here. And I'm like, Your table, who the fuck are you? Yeah, oh, we're the dance crew on TikTok. And I'm like, bitch, get that. I'm in the fucking sand lock, get the fuck out of here. Like, and then and then my my dude ran the club. He's like, Hey, get out of here to the whole dance crew. Get the hell out of here. You don't talk to him like that. So, like, I don't know. It's like I just don't hold these people in the same regard because they're not coming back 30 years later, like we are.

No, you know, there's cut like content creators, there's also some that are different levels, some that just like fly by night, make a few videos, you get views, you're gone. There's some that use that and like you can see them leveling up to now they're working with like Mr. Beast, or they're or they're making films and they're now doing short films. Like those that create a media strategy, yeah, I think that have a vision, yeah, that's taking advantage of treating it like a business.

Uh-huh.

Those that are just getting clicks on YouTube, like every channel is not an actor.

Yeah, it's just the flavor of the week thing.

Well, like I I would get upset. I'm sure you you had all the time growing up.

Yeah.

You say you're an actor, and you don't really say you're in a sound line, you just say I'm an actor. Yeah. And then no one's like, Oh, I'm an actor too. And then you're like, Well, wait a second. I was like, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, restaurant you work at. Yeah, I don't want to say this, but I'm in like people just say it. Like, if you move here to to become an actor, uh-huh. If you don't have an agent and you're not auditioning, you can't just say you're an actor. You can, I'm trying to be something.

Uh-huh. But in seconds, I was six years old. But again, you don't want to say, hey, I'm an actor, I was in the sand lot, which I've done time or two, and yeah, it sounds stupid, but it's like uh No, stand by it.

But like when people try to make it.

If you want to get in the front of a line somewhere, you've seen the little rascals. Yeah.

Yeah.

You know, I've tossed that line out a few times. Yeah.

Marty, I like to ask this question, but did you ever use uh the sand lot to get laid? Yeah. Yeah.

That's all we just kidding.

Um sometimes it comes to you know a little bit of an advantage. Yeah. You know? Yeah.

I mean, most of the time they're like, what?

Yeah, now it's like, what's that movie?

Yeah, yeah, it's another tool in the belt. Yeah.

Is that is that a playground movie, The Sand?

Yes. Right. Yeah, what is that?

You mentioned TMZ earlier. I'll just say it's funny because after we we talked online, you're gonna be a guest. And like literally, no, well, the next week the next week, I showed my wife like a week later, I'm like, wait a second. I'm scrolling my phone, I'm like, Marty York in a fight on TMZ. And I and I'm like, wait a second, like this is who I was just talking to. But I I watched, and it was like a a pretty cool way to be on TMZ that was not negative. I don't know about that.

I mean, it was framed, you looked pretty badass at least.

Yeah, I mean I would have fucking ran. Jordan probably would have tried because easy to mean it was we I was in a weird zone because I I will admit I had a couple and I was coming out, and I think sometimes like I don't know if you've experienced this, but people will try to fuck with you. Yeah. To like, I don't know if you've had experiences with a paparazzi or anything like that.

Well, not paparazzi, but definitely people try to fuck with you, you know.

Yeah, I mean I've had I've had paparazzi or people that ran um ran like YouTube channels that have been waiting outside the club if like there's actors in there or whatever, and coming out and like talking shit or whatever. And like I've responded stupidly and at certain times and said shit I might not have should have said. The guy was outside, um, I think it was somebody else running their mouth, and then he started talking shit to me. And I was at a pre-Oscars party. Yeah, and so I started walking. You know, Lauren was like, just keep walking, just keep walking. He said something, and then I turned around and I was like, What motherfucker? And then that's when the fucking I was like, All right, you want to do this? And I I had an expensive shirt on. I'm like, I'm not gonna get blood on this. Fucking took it off. I didn't realize because I was a little hammered, the guy was a hundred pounds heavier than me and like a foot taller than me. Then I when I as soon as I scored up with him and like uh the alcohol died down a little bit, I was like, this guy's fucking huge. Yeah, so I'm like, well, as long as I don't back down and act like I, you know, know to fight, which I do, but not I'm not a professional fighter. Sure. And at the same time, I was also thinking in my head, these people are trying to get a paycheck. Yeah, so I didn't want, and I could tell the guy was sloshed, yeah. So I didn't want to engage with this guy, hit him in the face, he falls, cracks his head on the cement because we're fighting over cement, and then he sues me. Yeah, yeah.

I said the video looked like you showed a lot, a lot of restraint. I did Julie.

He kept coming at me, but he was beating his own ass, honestly. He was like throwing punches, then he fell and hit his head on the on a parked car. So I moved around him.

And it was caught on camera, which is good. Like I like it clearly shows him just like just tanking down.

Yeah, and I, you know, I was kind of like wobbly a little bit too, but like the guy was like, and he he clocked me with one or two good punches, but uh I moved around him, and then I it was funny because I I just did a thing with like some of the Sandlaw guys, and they're like, Why didn't you smash him when he was down? I'm like, It's not good, yeah. It's not good, it's not good. Then the media's gonna be like, Oh, you hit a guy when he's down, yeah.

Because there's 10 cell phones filming you, yeah, yeah.

And you don't I didn't even see any of that till like TMZ came out and they called me on Monday and said, Hey, by the way, there's a bunch of people that filmed you getting into a fight on the weekend, which I knew I got into, but I was like, hopefully this just doesn't hit TMZ. So I'm like, look, can you not air that please? They're like, Unfortunately, we have to, because another company will air it if we don't. Yeah. So I said, All right, well, uh, and they're like, Do you have a statement? And I go, the guy came at me and attacked me, and that's what happened. And I defended myself, but I didn't really have to because the guy beat his own ass. Yeah, he looked pretty much. I mean, I have my hands up, but I'm like, I'm I'm like, hands are all the way up here, which you don't fight like that. But I wasn't planning on keeping them here to throw, I was planning on keeping them here in case like you were avoiding him to avoid being in a public fight too.

Yeah, like this morning.

Yeah, I was trying to do that. Yeah. Because you know, you get on then you're on camera hitting a dude and him falling.

Yeah, that's a whole nother set of issues.

Yeah, there's not many good ways like that's a different headline, exactly. The guy the guy that played recharge has gotten to one too, and like it's it turned out good for him when he saw both.

Well, the funny thing about this is I'm freaking out because I'm filming this documentary, so I call the producer the next day and I'm like, hey TMZ, just call. They want to air this shit. He's like, fuck. Freaking out, like, oh my God, I hope this is gonna be bad press. And like, oh my god, what are we gonna do? And uh I said, well, let's just see what the video looks like because I didn't know what it looked like. And he goes, Oh, that's not that bad. He's like, You just look like you're avoiding the dude. Yeah, and it looked like he he fell, so you don't look like you're a bitch. Yeah, I don't see a problem with it. Yeah, it's my work out in our favor. I mean, I got a lot of friend requests and people following me from it, and I'm dude okay. No presses by the present people were like that was yoked or whatever. I don't know. Yeah, I mean well that I mean that was with the I'm like, Jesus, Marty's fucking chat. I mean, there's always trolls that are gonna be like, you know, hiding behind private accounts with no profile picture. They're gonna be like, yeah, oh, you can't find it, fuck you, this and that. I'm like, you don't even have a profile picture and you're hiding behind a private account. Yeah, not only are you hiding behind your computer, you're hiding behind a private account. Yeah, Jordan loves calling those out. It's pretty funny.

Yeah, you did the smart thing in this day and age, which is like you defended yourself, yeah, and you got to look like you're waiting for him to hit you, and then you could do something if you need to, and otherwise you're not gonna attack.

Yeah, that's what that's what you gotta do. I mean, technically it would have been self-defense, but it's like California. So it's like if this happened in Tennessee where you know Reacher beat the hell out of that guy, it's a different state. So it's like they can stand your ground in that state. Here they're everybody goes to jail. Yeah, and if you're the victim, they don't care. Like the victims are the ones that are screwed in this.

And and really, there's also the the new age criminal court of social media. So you can be totally in the right, but if the video says something otherwise or the comments say otherwise, now your representation or the documentary or whatever it is goes on the back burner just because of what the news slant says. So, like, yeah, that's the biggest part we all like everyone has to avoid

 is yeah, what social media becomes.

Exactly. Yeah, you don't you you don't know what people filmed. So at the same time, I was kind of self-aware that people were filming me, but not really, honestly. I mean, I hurt people all around me, but I was I had a couple drinks, so I wasn't like thinking, okay, there's then I saw the video, I'm like, holy shit, there's like 15 people filming it.

Well, not only that, but like you also have the adrenaline of like, you know, like getting in a fight, and like your your whole world kind of narrows exactly.

You're looking directly at the person you're gonna do.

Yeah, like none of the other shit matters, and that's kind of I think that's how people make massive mistakes, you know.

Yeah, you're seeming like you're avoiding punches, so you're waiting for the guy to throw a punch to avoid it, and you're not paying attention to anybody else. Yeah, totally.

And you mentioned you're working on uh on a documentary, yeah.

So I'm I'm doing a doc called Beyond the Lot. It was originally titled The Sandlot Legend, but there's trademark problems with that. Which Beyond the Lot I like better because it kind of goes beyond the lot into my life, and I have a lot of child actor friends in it. I have the cast of boy meets world, I have all the sandlot guys, a lot of actors, you know, like um the bad guy from Dumb and Dumber that eats the peppers. And I got I got I got like tons of actors in this thing because the producers know a lot of people as well, they put in it. Yeah. Um, but it goes into my life, the business in general. Because you know, I I mentioned to you guys I got in the car accident after the car accident, you know, I was doing these random jobs, and then in '97 or no, 2017, my sister died of a drug overdose. I'm sorry to go back. Yeah. So that kind of set forth a whole pattern in my life. Uh it really screwed me up. Because at that point, Sandlot was really still something in my past. And the next year we did the 25th anniversary and it just blew up and it was like crazy. And um, it kind of helped me to cope with the death of my sister because the guys were there to help me through it because I was I was a mess, you know. After that, my mom, who was in her 60s, decided who who's a crazy person because she everything she's ever said she was gonna do, she's done. So she was an animal wrangler for films when we first came to LA, and she got hired to be in Army of Darkness as the lead wrangler. So that's like never heard of. It was directed by Sam Raimi, who directed Spider-Man, Toby. Team Surge didn't like that. My mom had no experience and she just came in here and Sam gave her the job as the lead wrangler. Sure. Because it's a union position, yeah. Right. So they tried to do a lot of shit. They tried to make the horses fall on top of themselves and all that, to like like you know, kicking the horse in the side to where like and pulling it over, you know. They did a lot of shit to my mom, and she was able to like power through things, you know. And then after that, she uh she did a bunch of films as an animal wrangler from like dogs to like horses to cockroaches to like everything, you know. So we lived on this ranch, there was always animal, weird animals in my house, and then uh she wanted to be a producer. So then she started getting into that. Then when my sister passed, she wanted to be a sheriff in her 60s. So I said, Mom, you're you're old. My mom's like this big and like 105 pounds, you know? Yeah, little red haired woman, like crazy. Yeah. Uh she was like, I was like, Mom, it's not a good idea. Like, you're gonna get hurt. This is this is being a cop, you know? You gotta be out there. She's like, No, I can do it. I can do it. I need to get drugs off the street after what happened to Nadia, my sister. So she did it and she took all the tests, ran them the same amount as the 30 and 20 year olds, got sprayed with mace, learned how to shoot a gun, learned how to fight, and she got in. I six resilient, Jesus. 63, no, 64 years old. She got in. Oh, she's pretty bad at it. But people are retiring, she got in. Yeah. I talked to her, but we kind of parted ways after I went to the police academy um graduation. I hadn't heard from her in a while, and I didn't know she had a relationship with this guy that she was dating. So I was in Vegas October 2023. I was in my hotel room and I get a call from the police uh station. They said, Your mom has passed away. And I said, What are you talking about? Like in the line of duty, and they go, No, she, her significant other took her life. So my mom was murdered by someone she was seeing. And I didn't know that my mom was seeing this other guy. I the guy that I knew that my mom was seeing was this old man, and I'm like, there's no way this guy could, my mom would kick his ass. But she was seeing this other guy I never heard of. They sent me his mug shot. They're like, he ran as soon as uh as soon as, you know, he found out, you know, as soon as he committed the crime, he ran. My mom lived on the Oregon border, so this guy basically ran across the Oregon border to a homeless encampment and was staying there. And he wouldn't have been found if not the media didn't get involved. So once the media picked this story up, it was on every single channel. Chauncey plays Squince was in Italy at the time, called me, he's like, bro, you're on TV here in Italy. Like, what is happening? Like, you said shit about your mom. And I said, I didn't believe it. I go, yeah, dude, it's real. And uh it was very heartbreaking. And uh because of this media coverage of what happened to my mom, they put nationwide manhunt going on for this guy, but they ended up finding him the next day at this homeless encampment because some guy looked on his phone and saw Star of the Sandlot's mom murdered, and he was like, I just gave that guy a ride across the border to this homeless encampment. Wow. Yeah. So he reported it to the police, and the guy got arrested. So my documentary kind of goes into like that happening too, you know. Um because I would it's not something you're ever prepared for. It's not something you ever you you think you see it on TV, you don't think it could happen to you. Right. So I had to go through that and uh you know it was it was very difficult period in my life. Um and then I I'd been approached by people to do a documentary on my life because of the car accident of my sister, of my mom, my acting career. So I did a mini 12-minute documentary for NBC Peacock, and people were hitting them up being like, I want to see more. It's like, is this is this a is there more to this? And they were like, no, you know, it's just a little 12-minute short story. Yeah, and people were really into it. And I was in um the frolic room in Hollywood one day, and I was having some drinks. You've been in the frolic room? Of course. Yeah, like a little dive full bar. Yeah, and I was sitting next to this guy that looked like a Marlon Brando, and I he was having some shots, and I was like, hey, give me some shots. You know, we started talking to each other. I go, You look like Marlon Brando's. Oh, thanks, man. I'm a producer, and I go, Oh, yeah, what do you what do you produce? He's like, I do documentaries. We just came from the documentary from Michael Matson. Uh you know Michael Matson. Yeah, so they did his documentary, American Badass. So I started telling him my life story. I'm drunk, you know. Start telling my life story. He goes, Marty, this story is crazy. We have to do your documentary.

Yeah, I'm drunk.

I go, Yeah, sure. Hollywood talk.

 I don't believe you. Wake up the next morning, there's like all these text messages. Where are you? Why aren't you on the zoom call? I'm like, hung over. I'm like, the fuck? The zoom call? This was real. Yes. I get on the document, I get on the uh phone with him, I go, dude, we got like 10 people on here right now. I go, what? Get on the zoom call. They're like, Marty, you arrived. I we start talking about it, and I've been filming now for like two years, this documentary about my life and um beyond the sandlot. And all my acting friends have joined and they've gotten involved in it, and they've you know, talked about me on Boy Meets World and what the experience was like working with me and just my story, you know. Yeah, it's just like you know, being in the industry we we've been in and overcoming the things we've had to overcome. And I think it's a story of resilience. Absolutely.

And you're the one making it, which is cool. Yeah, which is not always the case.

Yeah, I mean, I have a say in everything, um, the music and how I want things to go. And I'm I'm actually per part producer on it as well. It's awesome. So I'm learning how to do it, but documentaries are so much different than filming, you know, uh what we've done, movies and TV, because you know, you do that, there's a set schedule. We're gonna film this day and this day. With that, you got to do it as you can. So it's like went back and filmed my childhood home, went back and filmed my childhood school, have a studio rented out to film Danielle this day and writer this day, and you know, getting all the people in and all the sandlock guys in and doing it different locations to make it look, you know, nice. Right.

So that's that's really cool. It gives you but it's also like a way you can tell the story, and like unlike some of the documentaries that are on TV now related to child acting, they're always like we talked about a negative aspect for clicks. Yeah, you might have some aspects that aren't all positive, but it's it's it's it's life, it's not to show one or the other, that's just to show what you've done and you come out of it and you're still still acting, still trying to do things and still.

Yeah, it shows a pretty great story of resilience on your part. I mean, you've been through some emotional atom bombs, yeah, you know, it's wild.

Yeah, and it's it's been you know difficult to keep going after something like that. Yeah, but it's like you know, one thing my mom always told me was uh, you know, never give up. Yeah. And I've taken that with me to every aspect of my life. And also the gym's helped a lot too. It's like it's a way to release things without doing drugs or drinking or any of that stuff. Yeah, yeah.

It's also I feel like that's a really nice way to get connected with people in the in the way that you want to.

Yeah.

Like they can see the Team Z story and think one thing, they can see Sandlot and think one thing, but like to actually understand you and your life growing up, like that's that's really important.

There's not a lot of us that it humanizes you a lot more than just you know being yeah, yeah in the sandlot, you know.

Yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But like, but but like you said, you you you've been a magician, you've been like you worked for time stretch, you've done always regular things on the colour. Kind of like Forrest Gump's life. But like you've but like you tried every different thing in different ways, but you kept like I'm gonna try to be a firefighter. Yeah, but that took a lot of work to even be able to see it wasn't for you. Yeah, there's no shortcut. So, like that's the life a lot of people live, and you have background, and it's nice you can have it culminate in in something that that you care about and get to put together.

Yeah, you know, as long as we keep going and you know, a lot of child actors go the wrong way and we gotta stick together, yeah.

You mentioned earlier about uh a support group, yeah, child actor support group.

Yeah, I think I I the guy's last name was Peterson. I do remember that. He was on My Three Sons or one of those old shows. Uh-huh. But he did hit me up and he was like, Come to the this child actor support group, and I was like, I'm good, man. Like, I I'll I'll find my way through this, you know. Yeah. Um, because he was seeing TMZ stories about like I've been through a lot of shit in my life, and he was, you know, wanting me to join and talk about it. And I'm like, I'm at that at that time I was like in my late 20s. Yeah, and I was like, I think I'm good. Yeah, I can see that.

I was at the same at that age.

Yeah. I just kind of wanted to like move away from that and and do my own thing and not commit to going to a child act or rehab center or something.

Yeah, this is my rehab.

That's good.

Yeah, that's good. Earlier you had mentioned John Candy, but I wanted I wanted to ask you, like, were there any other actors or you know, celebrities throughout your career that had like a major impact on your life who like you still think about that meeting or that interaction, and it changed you.

It was weird, is like I became friends with Dustin Diamond, who's Screech on Say. Oh yeah, oh yeah. Because I was on Say About the Bell the College years when I was 14, I think. I also became friends with Jonathan Brandis, and he was also on the same episode I was on, it was a Thanksgiving episode. Okay. So they had all these stars. Brian Austin Green was on it, and you know, they had all these at that time some of the biggest actors in the business. A couple of covers of Teen Beat Magazine. Yeah, all the like it was like a Teen Beat Magazine, like literally all these. I'm like, oh my god, Jonathan Brandis, and there's Zach Morris, and you know, and uh I had watched that show every day when I came home from school, and the person I became friends with was Dustin Diamond Screech. Yeah, and it was funny because like you I saw how they treated him on the set, and it it was it was fucked up, you know. That there was a Thanksgiving episode, and they were they had a turkey on a table, and I remember the turkey fell, and he was making a joke, like he was picked the turkey and was giving it CPR, but it pissed them off because he fucked the scene up or whatever. They're like, Yeah, fuck the scene up, and like they were getting mad at him or whatever. And I became friends with him and I was talking to him, and afterwards he was like, You want to go roller skating? He's like, I like roller skating. So we went to a roller skating rink. I had my backpack with me because I was on set school. Yeah I remember like I left my backpack with him, and I had my mom come pick it up, and I saw him in 2020. I did one Comic-Con because it was during COVID. It was in Tennessee because they didn't wear masks or anything, they didn't care. Yeah, he was there and I go, Hey Dustin, you remember me? And he goes, Yeah, he's like, Marty, you left that red and black Jamsport backpack with me. I go, You remember that? He's like, Yeah, man. We went roller skating, your mom picked it up. I'm like, Oh, that's cool, bro. Like, yeah, that's awesome. And uh I noticed he had a large growth on his neck, yeah. And I was like, I was like, Are you okay, man? What is that? Like, he's like, Oh, it's nothing, man. I just got a sore throat, and I go, No, that looks that's something bad, dude. Like, and all he did was eat sugar. Like, I was like, bro, you're eating ice cream. He had a six pack, he drank two six packs of soda, like coke. And I'm like, bro, you can't do that. It's so bad for you. It catches up to you, yeah. So I mean, you do you live like that and you eat like that, you're gonna something bad's gonna happen. Yeah, so we hung out. There's a whole other story to this. I don't want to go into because it might make him look bad.

Yeah. Um, no, I'd like you know, I'd like to remember him in the best way possible. Yeah, I want to remember.

Yeah, so uh, 

yeah, it was it was it was pretty funny. An incident happened. Like we I was in he was in a room with Felissa Rose, who was in uh sleepaway camp. She was the girl and that, and then me and the guy that played Doofy and Scary Movie, and my buddy Vic, who was Timmy and Sandlot, all she calls, she's like, Dustin, we'll get out of my room, and we all came to the room, and like me and Dustin were kind of fucked up when I took pictures with him. But then um February came around and he passed away, and I saw it, and I was like, Oh man, that's of throat cancer, you know. Yeah, and I was like, fuck. Oh, that's a big thing. But he left a big impact, you know, because it was like someone that I watched in my childhood that made a big difference in my childhood, and they took me under their wing and remembered me, and yeah, that was that was cool.

So now that you're not so little and you have all this experience and perspective at this age, if you could walk back into you know the industry, what would you do if you could do anything?

If I could come back as an actor at an adult age?

Actor, director, producer, anything.

Grip. I mean, I would love to be a in a comic book movie since I left comic books as a kid. Yeah, yeah. I think be I love the boys. That's I love the boys. I freaking love that show, man.

That's something you and I would comment also. I'm a big comic book guy, and I remember reading The Boys for years, and it was one of my favorite books. And yeah, the the show actually that's one of the rare instances where the show actually did the book justice.

I thought I thought it was like Tony Starr is brilliant killer. I mean, that's one of the best TV villains I've ever seen in my life.

Yeah, incredible, like menacing.

You literally feel scared for the people about what's gonna happen. I mean, because you imagine, like, if you had all the powers of Superman, but you were evil, yeah. And it's like you could fuck shit up.

Yeah, well, it's it's also it became such a great show as the political climate kind of started happening, and it was almost like it was an accident that worked in the favor because I looked up who he was before another work. I'm like, he's so different. Yeah, his past work, like he did such a good job.

Banshee, he was great in Banshee. Banshee's great show.

Yeah, the the oddity of the show and the climate of things, you're like, this feels very purposeful, but it couldn't have been. Yeah, but it's uh yeah, that show's great. But that's a typical way of like I like that's cool to do it not because it's popular, but because you grew up just being a fan.

Yeah, I would just love to do something fan-wise, like love Wolverine. Oh man, would love another shot if I mean love a shot if Hugh ever die with the clause. Yeah, to be that character just would be awesome, man. But I I mean I would just like to play maybe like a new character that they haven't introduced yet, and yeah, I think that'd be cool. Well, it's not too late. You're still going after it, dude. Yeah, yeah.

I could definitely see that.

I'm just you know, I'm hoping the documentary also opens doors too. Yeah, I'm sure people really, you know, that's the nice thing about it is I want to show people a side of me that they haven't seen, and I want people to laugh, I want them to cry. Yeah, I mean, I do skits with um uh I do skits with um uh rookie of the year.

Uh oh, yeah, another class. I mean, I love that movie too. Yeah, he's uh what's his name?

I I do uh Thomas. What is it? Thomasyan Nicholas. Okay, I'm I'm friends with him. He's in the dock, and we do a funny skit in it. And um yeah, it's just a fun little thing. It's with child actors as well as showing who I am.

I think that will help you because I feel it's not it's not it sounds like it's not trying to do something, yeah. But once like in the in the way culture is now with entertainment, if people like you, that's the best next step to getting into something.

It's documentaries are so popular, like they're just I was just watching the one on the Mar One last night. Yeah, yeah, I was watching the one too on the cyclist girl that uh Mariah or whatever, yeah. Yeah, and uh yeah, I mean they're just you look every time a documentary, especially like a murder mystery documentary comes out, it's always like number one. So this is a lot about our culture. This takes that times 10. Yeah, because it goes into so many other things, you know.

But you have the hook for for people to care versus just this is the headline of a cyclist who had you know was murdered, and this happened, this happened, as like the headline. Yeah, but you you're in a beloved movie and people are rooting for you to do well, and that's what absolutely shows now. Like that's what's cool.

Exactly. I like to ask this question because it um when you look back at your career and the body of work and all the things that you've been through,

 you know, specifically like the sandlot and like are you proud? Like can you look back on it? Like, do you feel proud of your career and like Yeah?

I mean, I'm proud of everything Sandlot stands for. I mean it stands for inclusion, um, it stands for friendship. I think more than baseball, the Sandlot's a movie about friendship.

Yeah, do I agree?

You know, you know, to include a bunch of kids that wouldn't normally hang out but are brought together by an all-American sport, I think that's really the the draw of Sandlot that you don't have to be the most popular dude, but you have your crew, right? And when your crew gets together, you guys can mess stuff up, you know, you guys can be the best.

And life can be easier.

Yeah, life can be easier because you have your your your crew. It's like, you know, it's funny, Brandon Adams, who played De Nunes, you know, he's on also on the Mighty Ducks, and he he said this to me, he's like, you know, the Mighty Ducks are like a team. You guys are like a we're like a gang. Yeah. Like the Sandlots are the other tough kids, you know? Yeah. That live in a tough neighborhood, and but you know, we don't put up with shit. We hold our own and we could play ball.

Yeah, but are also vulnerable and like, you know, give give you know the underdog a chance. Yeah, yeah. You know, and that's like one of my favorite things about that movie is you know, um they open they opened their lives to um what was the character's name? Smalls. Smalls, you know? Yeah, and you know, feeling alone and scared in a new town and you don't have anybody to accept you, and like this movie is about acceptance, exactly, you know, and brotherhood, and you know, it's an important movie. Like to me, like like I said, it's on my Mount Rushmore. I love it. And like um, and I was actually thinking about, you know, one of the coolest pieces of memorabilia I could possibly get is uh would be a baseball signed by you know the guys from the sandlot. So since you're our first guests from the sandlot, who'd be I'd be honored if you would be the first to sign the ball. And look at that, you have a ball ready, right?

Whoa, out of nowhere.

One thing though, you're gonna have to open. I can never oh, you have it open. Those things are the hardest uh cases to open. We're gonna add this.

Marty, let me just tell you, it took me about 15 minutes to get it opened.

Just to note after I bought it. Just to note, when you sign baseballs, there's like a film over them. Yeah, sometimes sharpies are the worst thing. Sometimes pens are the best thing, like a ballpoint pen.

Okay, hold on a second.

We're gonna pause for one second. I know where some pens are. Because this this will smear a ballpoint pen.

No, this this idea is really fun, though. It's it'll be cool to collect these.

Trust me, I've signed a couple of these.

Honestly, how many do how many do you think you've you've honestly signed?

Oh my god, dude. Probably 50,000, probably. It's insane. I mean, when we do signings, um Do they make sandlot branded like baseballs? Yeah, they do.

Well, like to bring for those?

They make sandlot branded baseballs, they make sandlock shirts, they make hats, they make shotgun.

Are you allowed to make things with sandlot without getting someone own that name in general? Because like I don't think we're gonna get control for running rascals.

The crazy thing is, is like hold on. On on Amazon they sell if I take a photo of Marty?

Are you signing it?

Yeah, sure.

We hold it up, yeah. Thanks, dude.

 Awesome. That's awesome. Thanks, Marty. It means a lot, man.

Thank you.

You guys gotta sign some kind of little rascal pair from Alien or something. What do you guys do? What do you guys look doing there?

Yeah, we're not cool enough to have like a be attached to a sport.

Like that's you guys have a dog in your movie too.

Yeah, I know. Yours is a little bigger, yeah. Cool, dude. Well, I can't tell you how much we appreciate you doing this with us. Yeah, man.

Thanks for having me. Thanks for being on. Yeah, man. We felt like we've been connected without meeting each other for decades.

Yeah, totally. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Means a lot, Marty.

If we do a uh podcast, we'll have you guys on.

Yeah, I would love that. That'd be awesome. Yeah, cool, dude. Thanks, Marty.

Yeah, thanks, man.

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