Random Roles David Cross 

Eternal Sunshine Of The Spotless Mind (2004)—“Rob”
DC: That was one of those movies—and there are a number of them, I would say about half—that were smaller things where you get a call like, “Hey, we’re doing this thing, Michel Gondry’s doing it and he’s a big fan, and do you want to be a part of it?” It’s a small part, but I didn’t even have to see it. It was a Charlie Kaufman movie that Michel Gondry was directing. It was like I’m Not There, just being able to work with Todd Haynes: You don’t have to tell me what it is, I don’t need to see a script. I’m there. Just tell me when to show up. Absolutely, whatever you want. That was one of them. And that was fun. I’m proud to be a part of it, albeit a tiny part. It’s still something I feel happy about. The only bummer was shooting in Montauk in February. That was a bit rough. But yeah, it was a cool experience.

AVC: Was Gondry a Mr. Show fan?

DC: Hardcore, like quoting stuff I had completely forgotten, or I’m not even sure what they’re talking about. But they’re big time junkies, he and his son.

AVC: So Michel Gondry, Todd Haynes—anyone else on your wish list of directors?

DC: Oh, gosh. Jeez. Yeah, I really like the Coen brothers. Not just because of the stuff they write and the ideas they have, but how the actors work. And Alexander Payne. Any movie where there’s a scene that’s allowed to develop by itself, kind of the opposite of Tony Scott moviemaking, where there’s room to breathe and find stuff while you’re shooting, where it’s not all kind of bombastic. Who else? There must be a million people. I’m just spacing now because I feel like I’m on the spot.

AVC: I’ll offer P.T. Anderson.

DC: Yeah! There you go. Perfect. And Aronofsky. That kind of approach to moviemaking. Yeah. 

I’m Not There (2007)—“Allen Ginsberg”
AVC: Was that another movie where the director, Todd Haynes, was a fan of your work and you just got a call?

DC: I got a call. I think it probably had more to do with the fact that I could potentially resemble Allen Ginsberg. And then when that was brought to his attention he went, “Oh, God, yeah! That’d be great.” A lot of these guys, we kind of have mutual friends. I may not know them personally, but we certainly have a number of mutual friends. And I was a huge Todd Haynes fan, and man, that guy could not be cooler. That guy is awesome. But yeah, so that was another one when I got a call, I don’t even remember when or how or where, but I know it shot in Montreal, and I flew up there and it was really sweet and nice. I worked for two days and that was it. 

AVC: Had it occurred to you before that you might resemble Allen Ginsberg?

DC: Yeah, that’s been pointed out. Plus I live in the East Village, so it’s kind of iconic here.

AVC: I just didn’t know if you would be insulted or pleased getting that call. 

DC: Eh, neither. A Jew’s a Jew. What are ya gonna do?

AVC: Is that what it is? “Get the closest Jew”?

DC: The hairy Jew. 

Tim And Eric Awesome Show, Great Job! (2007)—“Pizza Boy”
AVC: You were in a few Awesome Show episodes, but maybe best as Pizza Boy. You and Bob were early adopters of those guys.

DC: Bob more than I. Bob initially was the guy that was like, “These guys are great!” But we both saw how great and funny and interesting they were. And when we were talking about doing a show, Bob was the one—and it didn’t make sense to me and I had a much different idea of what to do with them—who insisted they do Tom Goes To The Mayor. I was like, “Really? That’s the last thing I would have thought.” I had a completely different idea. And to Bob’s credit, once again, he was right about that. 

AVC: Are you in their movie?

DC: Nope.

AVC: Are you angry about that?

DC: I’m furious.

Year One (2009)—“Cain”
AVC: Here’s an interesting one, a movie that seemed to have a lot of potential. But you ended up being the best part of a movie that fell apart and wasn’t great. In getting a script like that or agreeing to that movie, do you have a sense of how that’s going to turn out, if you’re an actor in someone else’s movie?

DC: Sometimes you do and sometimes you don’t. I think I had pretty high hopes about that, but we shot and it wrapped and everything and I got an email about doing reshoots. And this was a month later, they still had that big huge whatever it is set up—the Biblical city, that Romanesque setup there. That was a good six weeks later, when we were all doing other things, and they were like, “You have to go back to Shreveport for 10 days, for reshoots.” They were reshooting the ending. I really liked the ending that was originally shot, and I felt like the ending that they went to reshoot was more of a feel-good, bullshitty kind of thing. And that was probably the first time when I was like, “Uh-oh, wait a minute.” But it’s a big-budget movie, and they want to get their money back. But that was one of the top three most fun sets I’ve been on. It was a very fun movie to shoot. It was cool to be around Harold Ramis and listen to his stories. He’s really interesting and he’s had an interesting career and life, and he’s an interesting guy to talk to.

Freak Show (2006)—various characters
AVC: At the time Freak Show was debuting, you said you felt really great about it, and then it ended up just going one season. What do you think misfired? 

DC: I’ve thought about this. I think there were three big mistakes made—all three rectifiable, but they weren’t. One is, I think Jon [Benjamin] and I were lazy in writing it, in the sense that, when I look back… Let me preface this by saying that I think it’s funny and I like it and it makes me laugh. I enjoy the performances in it and the writing. I don’t think it’s the smartest thing I’ve ever done, but it’s funny and goofy. Whatever. But I think Jon and I were ultimately lazy in writing it, because when I watch it, I see room for one and a half times as many jokes. There should have been way more jokes, and visual jokes, and playing with the idea of animation. There were just all kinds of opportunities: signage jokes, and quick little dumb asides, stuff like that, that just aren’t in there. We missed a lot of opportunities to do that. 

I think the other mistake was that the animation was really poor. The animators missed opportunities for jokes, too. It’s not a very appealing animated style, I guess. And then it was marketed completely the opposite way it should have been marketed. They marketed it as a superhero spoof, which it isn’t. That was always—and we pitched it this way—just a context to frame all this other goofy comedy within it. And it really concentrated on this idea that it was a superhero spoof, which is really going to turn off my fans and Jon Benjamin’s fans, who think we’re doing a comedy but we’re just doing a superhero thing. I think people would be like, “I’m not interested in that at all.” And then people who don’t really know us, or who are interested in comic books and superhero stuff, would tune in and go, “Well this isn’t a fucking good spoof at all. I don’t even get it.” And it was just a bad idea. But everyone has a little piece of the blame to take in that, and certainly Jon and I, as I said, we could have put in way more jokes. But I still think it’s funny. I think the ideas in it are funny. I don’t think it’s the greatest thing ever, but you know. It’s the first six episodes. Barely anything resembles what it looked like in the first six episodes.

Oliver Beene (2003-2004)—“Narrator”
DC: I remember it was early voiceover work for me, and I like doing voiceover work. But I remember that there seemed to be an elephant in the room that nobody would talk about, even when I would bring it up as a joke or a little aside—that it was a complete rip-off of The Wonder Years. And The Wonder Years was a rip-off on Jean Shepherd movies. The Wonder Years at least expanded on that thing that Jean Shepherd did, but Oliver Beene came to be a direct lifting, the style, everything about it. I can’t say that I thought it was funny or clever, but as far as a job went where you go into a recording studio and record it, it was fun. It’s innocuous and forgotten, I suppose. Not very offensive. It just sort of came and went, and it filled the niche for a couple years. And there you go.

AVC: Was that a weird time for you? It seems like you weren’t involved in anything that was particularly your thing in the 2000s. But you popped up in other people’s movies doing small stuff.

DC: The Oliver Beene time? What year was that?

AVC: That was 2003. I guess I’m thinking about Men In Black, if you want to talk about that.

Men In Black (1997)—“Newton”
DC: Oh, that was way earlier. Men In Black was like the first or second year of Mr. Show. And, as you know, Mr. Show didn’t really catch on until after the third season, so outside of some hardcore comedy fans in L.A., nobody really knew about it until the third season had aired. And at that point, you’re still running around auditioning for stuff, because nobody knows what Mr. Show is. There were a number of periods in my career where, if you don’t work for a while, six months goes by and you take what you’re given and you work. You don’t have the luxury of going, “No, I’m not going to do that.” Not that I have anything negative to say about Men In Black, or the experience. It was fine. It was great. But it was one of those things where if you get the role, you take it. Doesn’t matter what it is, you need to work. After two years of Mr. Show and then shooting the third season, nobody knew if anything was going to happen with it. There’s no guarantee that you’ll ever work again, you know?

Scary Movie 2 (2001)—“Dwight”

AVC: I only want to bring up Scary Movie 2 because I found an interview with you on YouTube that you did for some Spanish-language entertainment show, and you seem to be trying really, really hard to be polite about it. 

DC: Uh-huh.

AVC: And you say something like, “I would never ascribe the word ‘acting’ to what I’m doing in this movie,” but that’s kind of the most negative thing you say about it. You just kind of say, “Oh, yeah, we’re having fun.”

DC: Scary Movie is clearly not for me. People love it. I still, almost on a daily basis, in part because I live in the East Village, get recognized for Scary Movie. Yesterday, a cop on Sixth Avenue was like, “Hey!” and did that thing where he was pointing, trying to figure out who I was. I walked another 10 feet and he yelled out, “Do another Scary Movie!” And that is that audience. And it’s not for me, and it’s not for you, but for better or for worse, roughly 75 million Americans fuckin’ love it. Love it! The height of comedy! And that was another thing where I was offered some good money and an opportunity to get my face out there. And then I was confronted with additional pages in my trailer, and they’re like, “Oh, in this scene you’re gonna try to suck your own dick.”

AVC: That scene wasn’t what attracted you to the role?

DC: That script was rewritten like every hour. It wasn’t even finished when they started shooting, because the first one made so much money. It was pretty crazy to see how much money they sunk into that thing. But again, I’ve had better experiences, I’ve had worse. It is what it is, and I’m glad I get to leave that as part of my legacy and hopefully my children’s children will grow up to respect their old grandpa when they pop that in the ol’ DVD player.

AVC: Well, maybe you’ll get out of a parking ticket or a speeding ticket at some point.

DC: Yeah, true. There’s plenty of Puerto Rican and Dominican cops. 

Waiting For Guffman (1996)—“UFO Expert”
AVC: On the opposite end of the comedy spectrum, you have one scene in Waiting For Guffman. You always hear about the improvisational nature of Christopher Guest movies, and how there are, like, six-hour cuts out there. Did you do a lot more, do you remember? 

DC: I didn’t do additional scenes, but I guess on the day, we probably shot, I’m guessing, six takes, maybe? And he took what he wanted to take. I would do stuff, and they were very far away because it was in the middle of this crop circle thing. I would ramble and do stuff, and then he would yell “Cut!” and then it would take him almost a minute to get to where I was in the middle of the crop circle, and then he would just very politely go, “Uh, don’t say all this stuff you said. Don’t say this, don’t say that, do say this, do say that, say more of this, say less of that, mention this.” And then he would walk back to the chair and he’d yell “Action” again and it would just sorta go. It was strange in the sense that there was no feedback; I couldn’t even see where anybody was. But it was a thrill to be able to work with him and get a ride home from the set back to Austin with him. One of the highlights of my life. 

A Bucket Of Blood (1995)—“Charlie”
DC: That was Mike McDonald, who went off to be a longtime cast member of MADtv. Showtime was doing this very low-budget, purposefully low-budget thing where they were trying to replicate a sort of Roger Corman-esque factory in a sense. So they redid all these old films, and Michael, who I knew from the Groundlings, who I would hop on and do shows with them occasionally, just asked me to do this thing and I shot for like, two days. It was me and Will Ferrell, and I think we had some kind of a weird exchange under a stairwell. I don’t remember much of that. But yeah, that was another kind of L.A. crowd all working with each other. I imagine there were other people that I know there.

AVC: Do you remember if it was any good?

DC: I never saw it.

Celebrity Poker Showdown (2004)—himself
DC: Oh, that was a blast, man! I really had fun doing that. There was a weird moment when I found out, like, 40 minutes before we were shooting that Scott Stapp was replacing someone. But yeah, I really enjoyed that. That was fun to do. 

AVC: You still play?

DC: I wouldn’t say regularly, but I still pop in on games if there are games to be played. My girlfriend [Amber Tamblyn] plays a lot, and she was on that show as well. And I was able to raise $50,000 for a veterans’ charity, which was good. 

AVC: You have some Scott Stapp story about that, right?

DC: I think that’s on the first CD. In fact, I know it is. Was it the first CD? Maybe the second. No, it was the first one. I don’t know if I told this on the CD, but I went down to the suite they had in the casino for hair and makeup, and I went and grabbed some coffee, waited in a chair. And they were talking about somebody who had just been in there, saying, “What a prick, what an asshole! Who does he think he is?” And that’s how I found out that it was Scott Stapp. When I went down there, I was like, “Oh, jeez, I’m gonna have to get this out of the way. We’re about to sit and stare at each other for an hour.” And I had no idea if he knew about some of the shit I’d said about him. I had no idea if that had ever made it to his ears. So we all kinda meet and they’re going over the rules, and he’s across the table from me. Small poker table. And I lean my hand in when I went to shake his hand and I said, “Hey, Scott. David Cross,” and he shook my hand and he pulled me into him and half-whispered, “Thanks for the words,” and I went, “Well, you know.” That answered my question— he clearly knew who I was. Or at least what I’d said. “Thanks for the words.” 

AVC: But then it wasn’t an uncomfortable game? And you won, right?

DC: I think I knocked him out, too. And I almost said, “This is for every artist on Matador.” I was gonna say that when I put my hand down. But then I was like, “What if I can’t beat him? That would be awkward.” But now in hindsight I regret not saying that.