I’m Brie Larson, and this is my last meal. Every person has exactly two things in common, we all got to eat and we’re all gonna die. Today’s guest is an Oscar award-winning actor, a director, a singer, a podcaster, a YouTuber, and she has now added cookbook author to all those titles with her new book “Party People.” She’s one of the top two “Mario Tennis” players at this table, Brie Larson, welcome to the show. Wow, thank you, so happy to be here. Thanks for honoring my tennis championship status. Anytime, anytime. I’ve also devoted a large part of my life to “Mario Tennis.” Wow. And I think we need to make the show down happen at some point. Yeah, instead of last meals, let’s talk about last tennis round. It’s time to go. I got so good at the game that I had to start playing with my feet. And I was- Thank you so much, I’m very impressive. Wow. And I did get to the point where I could beat hard mode on against a computer with my feet. Okay, so now I know not to use your controllers, I’ll bring my own. Please do not. Have you thought about your last meal before? I’ve never really thought about it, and also what’s great about this show is it’s like, you have eight. You know, I feel like most people, it’s like, you just have one thing. How about, like, nine? I agree entirely. How often do you think about death in general? Way more than I’d like to admit. Yeah. More, recently. I think there’s something about being, I’m 35, I’m gonna be 36 this year, that there’s just like, “Oh no, I’m like, an adult.” You’re not kind of like toying with it. You’re not like, “I mean, I’m like early 30s. It’s like it just happened.” I’m like, “Oh, I’m like moving more towards this thing that is like, cannot be stopped.” Yeah. For me, the thing that I’ve noticed is, as I’ve gotten older, it was the sort of potential that kept me going from a young age where I was like, “Everything is so bright and I can reach for it, and that’s what’s keeping me going,” and now I almost feel like I’m at this apex a little bit where everything is motivated by fear of loss as opposed to opportunity and gain, and then I just think about riding that all the way to the end. Yeah, well once you have more experience, then you know what’s possible to lose, right? Yeah. It all is just hard. It’s all hard. It’s all hard. And there’s Taco Bell and there’s pistachio dessert. Yeah. And I think that’s what makes it easier in a way. No, exactly, I mean, and that’s part of the thesis of this book too, is it’s like, find all the ways to celebrate and ritualize your life, to enjoy your life, and to be in connection with people, because that’s what we’ve got. What we’ve got is presence, and like, put the phone away, which is funny to say, ’cause like, you’re probably watching this on your phone, but like, to be with people and to create memories, even if it’s about something silly. Celebrate that you found the best pair of jeans that you’ve ever found. Yeah. Celebrate the fact that you like, broke up with the guy that you should have broke up with two years ago. Celebrate that you just got over gestational diabetes. Like, this is what life is for. Couldn’t agree more, put that phone down right now, stop watching this. Well, actually, no, keep watching it just to get those views, and smash that like and subscribe, and then put the phone down. Veteran YouTuber, what’d I tell you? And then, go on my channel, buy my book, and then definitely don’t be on your phone anymore. You ready to get to eating? Yes, I am. Let’s do it. Brie, for the first course of your final meal on this earth, we have the Mexican pizza from Taco Bell, and we broke out the fine China for the panoply of sauces, and then we have the Auntie Anne’s salted pretzel with nacho cheese dipping sauce. Please, dig in. Do you go sauce or no? Well first I just want it, I want it just the way that it is. I mean, it’s perfect. Are there any discontinued Taco Bell items that really stand out to you? Excuse me. This thing has been- Oh my god, I’m so sorry. Yeah, please don’t talk to me about that. I didn’t mean to minimize your pain. I almost forgot. This has been, this is a hard earned battle, okay? We needed like, the likes of like, pop stars to write songs about it. We needed a lot. Yeah. We mobilized. You really did. But I think it was a really important moment for the community, because we had to like go, “What have we been doing,” You know? Yeah. So, I proudly go to Taco Bell more than I’d like to say, okay? I was gonna give a number to that, but I’m not gonna give you that, because someone’s gonna put that on my Wikipedia, and I’m not interested in that. This is another example of like, I’m always worried that she’s gonna be taken away at any time and that brings us to this sort of like, last meals, stay in the present. Yeah, yeah. Celebrate the good that you’ve got in your life, she’s here. I think similar for Auntie Anne’s, given that malls are sort of going away. I’m gonna cry, okay? Yeah, no. I’m sorry, no, please, eat. No. Eat the pretzel. But, I agree. The only thing that I will say that’s keeping this alive is because obviously these are found at malls, but I will tell you, hockey games are single-handedly upholding soft pretzel culture. They’re keeping them alive and well, and I know, because I wait in the long lines for them. Are you doing that? I’m not, no, you know- Well. So, you’re part- I subsidized my own industries. Of the problem. I was gonna ask, how much do you know about the founding of Auntie Anne’s? Because I didn’t know if this is intentional. I didn’t know anything about it. Is it my grandma? You’re finally like, “Your DNA is like, actually you’re from a long lineage of soft pretzels.” I’m like, “Maybe that’s why I love this so much.” No, but I think it kind of does have some similarity to your activism aside from the Taco Bell. So, Anne Beiler, she lost her child when he was 19 months old in a farming accident. She then goes to her Amish Mennonite pastor to ask for grief counseling, and then he proceeds to abuse her and manipulate her over the course of six years. And then her and her husband decide to set up a free community counseling organization for the Amish Mennonite community, and to fund that free community counseling, she started selling pretzels at the local farmer’s market. You gotta be gosh darn kidding me. Dead serious, she sold the company in 2005 to exclusively do anti-sexual violence activism work full-time. Stop it, I knew I loved this pretzel. No, I was gonna ask, like it seems like so similar to a lot of the activism you do, and then a lot of the roles you played, in like “Short Term 12,” in “Room,” it sounds like you have this natural urge to want to protect vulnerable people, where does that come from for you? Well, it started as just a fluke. Like, I didn’t have control over being cast in “Short Term 12” really. Yeah. I was just a girly auditioning like everybody else, and I got very lucky. You know, it’s this small independent film that went to South by Southwest, and then we won an award. It like, started to get a little bit of attention, but it was still like a very scrappy film that we had to physically go out and like, promote this movie ourselves. So, we got flown all over the world, but we had this interaction where we realized that it transcend language. Like, when a story is about something that’s really heartfelt and personal and real and true, it gets people on board even if they are not fluent in English in this case, right? So, it changed things for me where I went, “Oh, there’s like a real power in making movies about things that are maybe aspects of life that we didn’t know about that could use a light shined on them.” That’s definitely a huge part of why I love my job. Not the harp back on the Auntie Anne’s, but despite you not actually having that in your grand plan, do you think there was something almost cosmic drawing you to that? Or, there’s obviously something within you that people saw in those auditions that maybe you didn’t get cast for other roles, and you did in these roles that are very- Interesting. Vulnerable and protective, and have to deal with very heavy subject matter? It’s sometimes hard to motivate if you’re like, “Oh, this is just for whatever,” you know? But if you’re like, “If I do this, this might actually help people,” then it means that like, all that time that it takes, and for an independent film, it’s not a huge amount of time, but it’s like really focused, really intense work that now you find meaning in it, and I think that’s what I look for in my life is just meaning of wanting to feel like all the time that I have here adds up to something, that I was not just thinking about myself, and like, my bank account. Do you think any of that search for meaning ends up being a little bit of a burden on you? Because I feel like we’re both millennials about the same age. I feel like that was so much a part of our culture. It was like, “Search for meaning within your work,” and I’ve tried my damnedest to do that, obviously you have too. Mm-hmm. I feel like the generation after us, they’ve almost seen the amount of stress that’s put in our lives, and now we see this huge like kind of anti-intellectualism bent of like, “Hey, it’s not that serious.” I’ve heard it be called the “anti-intellectual bimbo era.” Oh, I didn’t even hear about that. Which, I think is kind of beautiful. No but, I mean, do you ever feel that like, burden of searching for meaning and trying to do intense work? Yeah. Yeah, of course, and I think that’s why there’s moments like this where it’s like, we can talk about heavy things, and also we can like eat a soft pretzel, and like. Yeah Girl, it’s okay, you know? Truly. Everybody, I think, has some sort of extreme in their life, and then you’re just gonna spend the rest of your life trying to find more balance in the middle. And some maybe could use more seriousness, some could use more lightness. I’m on my way to finding that way of both, that like, I don’t have to believe that everything I do is like the end of the world or means everything. And it’s made me really happy actually, ’cause it’s allowed me to go, “Oh, well if I don’t step in on every single thing, it allows somebody else to step in,” and I like the feeling that everybody’s doing their part, and everybody’s my greatest teacher, and we’re just kind of stumbling through this whole- Yeah. This whole thing. God, are we stumbling through it hard? We sure are stumbling through it hard, aren’t we? Yeah, it’s really happening. Yeah, I think sometimes you can also find big feelings within the things that seem very light. Tell me why you’ve occasionally cried during an episode of “Chopped.” Because I get it, I get it. They’ve just, they’re putting everything, it’s half an hour, it’s a high-stakes environment. They’re giving everything to that, okay? And like, I can’t, I get so wrapped up in it, and then you’re like, I’m crying and I’m like, “They did not make that gummy bear roulette in a way that worked. It broke, I don’t know,” you know? It’s like, it’s so intense. The ones that really get me to the point where I can’t even really watch it is like, the “Chopped Junior.” Yeah. I cannot end my day with watching a 12-year-old crying because like her flambe didn’t flambe, or whatever the hell’s going on, you know? It’s like, no, I’m not doing that, I’m sorry. You want to protect their emotions, they’re vulnerable, and they’re on TV, and that’s hard, and they love it. It just hit something for me where, I think ’cause I also auditioned like, thousands and thousands and thousands of times. So, especially for children, it’s like, I really know what it’s like to want something so badly you like, it would give heartburn, you know? It’s like, my body would be like, on fire. I’d be like, “If I don’t get that ‘Beethoven No. 7′ movie, I don’t know what I’m gonna do,” you know? Like, I would literally run away from home because I didn’t get the next Disney Channel movie. I’m still mad that I’m not in “Smart House,” you know? Oh my God, you would’ve killed “Smart House.” Everybody gasped, yeah. I have to live with that, that’s hard, okay? But I’m okay, you know? So, it’s like both things where it’s like, if I could do a new job in the world, I would be the person that’s just there at the end going, “It’s okay.” Yeah. Like, I would like to be like the fairy godmother or the Jiminy Cricket of “Chopped” that’s like, “You’re gonna be okay.” And I think also teach them that like, big feelings are okay to have, and they’re beautiful. And speaking of which, we actually have one more gift from the kitchen for you. I know you once got a plate of enchiladas from Baja Fresh. Brie, that all you wanted was a big old gob of melted cheese, and they didn’t have the gob of melted cheese and it was lettuce, and who puts lettuce on enchiladas? So, we have made you a tray. Did you talk to my mom? Uh-huh, we called her up. I can’t believe this. Watch out, it’s hot. Thank you so much. Can I serve you some cheesy enchiladas, can I put it on your Auntie Anne’s? I am actually gonna cry. This is like, this is food therapy. That should be the name of the show, and you deserve just a cheesy mess. Food therapy. That’s all I want. This is all I want. Same, girl, same. Every single thing I’ve had here is everything I want, thank you. No, thank you, for the work that you do. Wow. See, and this is what life is all about. Agreed. Mm-hmm. Can we cheers enchiladas, does that work? Cheers. Cheers. Oh, no. It’s so hot. It’s so hot, it is so good. Food really is for the soul. Anyone out there who’s like, “Why is Brie making a cookbook? Is she like, is she mentally okay?” I have a reason, okay? And it’s like, I have hosted my whole life, my mom’s an event planner. She gave the most elaborate birthday parties all the time, and there’s a reason why there’s certain foods we always wanna return to. It’s like, it can immediately bring us back. Or like, this, that’s so caring. Like that is, it’s not a plate of enchiladas, you’re trying to heal a past memory. Correct, yeah. The food is never actually about the food, you know? The Latin word companion literally means the person you break bread with, and that’s, you know, the person that you walk through life with, it’s one in the same. Or break the enchilada with, you know? Break the enchilada with. Sometimes you gotta break that enchilada with your fellow party people, so. Hey, do you have skeletons in your pocket? Well, I do, and that’s because I have the brand new “Last Meals” apron. This bad boy is our best apron yet. It’s got adjustable neck and waist straps when you really gotta lock in tight, and some big ass pockets for all your kitchen bullshit, and that’s not all we got. Well, function meets form with this beautiful new “Last Meals” pin. Who said you couldn’t have swag in the kitchen? Tell ’em they’re wrong, just like your stepdad, you are gonna become something, Jo- I mean, audience. Get these before you die, live now at mythical.com. Brie, for course number two of your final meal on this earth, we have the official “Party People” punch, we have the twice-baked potatoes, a little bit of butter, Colby Jack cheese in there, chives on top, and then Skip’s peach chicken, and this is whole-baked chicken with peaches and cloves, and almost nothing else. Yeah. I’ve never seen anything like this. I know, I grew up with this, and it was like- I’m so excited. I’ve loved it, and was like, “Oh, I gotta put this in the cookbook.” I’m like, “Mom, what’s the recipe?” She’s like, “A can of peaches, and like, just put more cloves than you think it needs,” and you’re like, “That’s it?” And, boy oh boy. We debated the amount of clove. We’re like, “Guys, that’s a lot of cloves.” No, I know. Trust me, I know. That’s not a typo, that’s real. I love that, can I pour you up some punch? Please. Talk to me about the merits of a large format punch bowl, ’cause this is inspiring to me. Well, all of this is about making it easy so that you’re not the one sitting there like, batching out each drink. We don’t need to do that, okay? If you have a group of people coming over, what is better than a big punch bowl? It’s heaven. So, this is also based off of the fact that I just, I’m crazy about fruit punch, and like, specifically Minute Maid fruit punch is so perfect. Thank you so much. Nice. Mazel tov, thank you for joining me. So, that’s what this is. I mean, I think we keep talking about the same sort of thing, which is like, if food and drink is the gateway to the soul, let’s be nostalgic about it, you know? Agreed. Like, all of my things when I think about when I’ve gone to fancy restaurants, it’s like, when I get down to it I’m like, “Oh, that’s because that tasted like Fruity Pebbles.” Like- Yeah. Yeah, yeah. It’s a fancy version of whatever, and so, having things like this, it’s fun, it’s beautiful, it allows people to pour it themselves. Mm-hmm. But, it’s also just easier. You can be the host, and you don’t have to worry so much about figuring out making, I don’t know, shaking cocktails for everybody. No, truly, truly. Well, cheers. Cheers. Mm. You really taste the Minute Maid essence of it, because it was both- Or is it just Minute Maid? Because it was both inspired by Minute Maid, and has Minute Maid in it. Yeah. That’s incredible. Well, here’s the thing in the book is we’re like, “You can squeeze a bunch of oranges and limes, you can do the whole thing, that’s great, but also, you just wanna throw the Minute Maid fruit punch in there, I’m all about it.” Love it, we also have one more dish. I know you normally eat the Skip’s peach chicken with the cornbread stuffing, so we made cornbread stuffing for the chicken, can I dish you up some? Yes, please. I love big communal food, this is how I want to eat. Yeah, me too. Are you kind of like anti-germophobe also, where you just want to like dig in in a communal dish? If I could eat out of a giant bowl with everybody, that’s sort of what I wanna do. Oh, do I wanna eat out of a giant bowl with everybody? No, but will I? Sorry, I thought we were having the same thing here. I’m sorry. I thought we were bonding over something. I’m sorry, I’m sorry. You noticed we did not eat the same Mexican pizza at the same time, okay? I’m not like, afraid of germs. Yeah. You kind of can’t be at a certain point. Like, if you wanna really get into all the nooks and crannies of this life, you gotta just take some risks, shake some hands, you know? The chicken is delicious. When was the first time you had this? I’ve had this like my entire life. Like, since I was a child, my mom has been making peach chicken. It’s one of those things that you think is completely normal until you realize that it is not a normal thing that anybody makes, and now this has kind of become what we have for Thanksgiving. Like, we just do this. Really? Yeah, it’s so cozy, it’s so much easier. Because again, a lot of my extended family, we see them once or twice a year, and I’m like, “Do we wanna spend all day trying to make this Turkey taste good, or do we just want to have the thing that we actually wanna have, and like, enjoy our time together?” And we play Cards Against Humanity, and I just feel like, why does your birthday have to be on your birthday? Why does Halloween have to be on Halloween? I’m just more of like, if you’re out of town for your birthday and you’re not back for a couple months, I mean, I’m saying this to somebody who has to travel all the time, I’m like, “Then my birthday is in January,” you know? Yeah, yeah. It’s just, like, you don’t have to miss out on the opportunity for any of these things. Like, we’re not bound by… that, you know, Thanksgiving, you have to have a turkey. Why? Why? I don’t understand. I like to take those conventions and kind of play with it. Like, this book was genuinely very inspirational to me, because we were gonna do monthly dinner parties, me and my wife, and we were like, “Okay, mid-January, we start it.” It’s on. We haven’t throw one this year, at all. Oh, you haven’t? No, and I don’t know if it’s a perfectionism thing or what, but for Thanksgiving every year, I divide the turkey in half, I break down the entire thing, and then I pick one country to do half the turkey and half the side dishes, and then one for the other one. So, I love like flipping those kind of conventions on their heads, then there’s so much work and I’ve set myself up. Exactly. That’s the thing though, is I was just saying to Courtney today, I was like, “One of my party hacks is that there’s a reason why Thanksgiving is not a monthly event,” but other things where it’s just like, bringing people together, figuring out what those barriers to entry are and then just eliminating them. Like, there’s all these great compostable plates, glasses, cutlery. Like, you don’t have to feel like you’re destroying the planet because you don’t wanna wash like, 10 plates at the end of a night. Or like, some friends, when they get drunk enough, they wanna clean. Let them clean. Let your friend get drunk and do your dishes for you. How wonderful is that? I have so many that offer. And always invite them over, always, you know? It’s just, you figure out what it is. We have so many ADHD friends who love doing repetitive tasks with their hands. The dishes aren’t even a burden to them, they love it. Here we go, exactly. It’s the circle of life. It’s a circle of the party. Truly. You know? But, whatever it takes to get you to bring people together and not make everything the Thanksgiving where you have to make a turkey from four different countries, which like, bless you for that, and it seems like something I would do as well, but like, that’s not every month. I expected the delicious food, I expected the great recipes in there, what I didn’t expect was all the references to like, Gertrude Stein and Alice B. Toklas’ Parisian salons, and then like, a very serious treatise on collectivism versus individualism. And then like, statistics about the worldwide loneliness epidemic. Yes. That actually was really awesome, because I, I’ve always been the asshole in my friend group who’s like, “Everything is so much deeper than we think it is,” including eating and death, right? Yes. They’re so connected, but how much of that thought like went into this book of like, “No, this is sort of a dire thing. We need parties right now.” It was like, I’m not kidding, It’s like I had like, a vision. I’m serious, I mean, Courtney and I were already working on it, so it was- Yeah. It was in my mind, but then once we started talking about it more, I started to really climb up on that soapbox, and I was like, “This is much bigger.” Like, one aspect is like people who are like, “It’s my birthday, but like, don’t sing happy birthday.” I’m like, “This is a much bigger deal than your birthday. This is like, you’re not comfortable with being praised or attention,” or like, I’m like, “Why aren’t you wanting to acknowledge your existence that’s happening right now, right now, right now?” It’s also this place where spilling a drink at a party or saying the wrong thing at a party that like, makes you blush, like, these are all opportunities for us to like, learn and grow and play and be silly, and like, be free. Sometimes it’s just the place to be free. Life can be really difficult. Work is can be so intense, and to have a place where you’re like, “I can just take my shoes off, and like, eat a pizza, and we can like, do karaoke,” or like, we have a party in the book that was inspired by my friends. We have been doing this for, we do it quarterly. It’s a brag and complain party where the only thing that you do is brag or complain, and you can have a little paddle, one that says brag, on that says complain, or you just raise your hand and you go, “I have a complaint.” And there’s no small talk, I don’t wanna hear about any sort of like, mid situation in your life. Yep. It’s like, you’re pissed about your parking ticket, and you’re really happy that you made that deadline or whatever. And it’s like, you start off, and everybody’s like… And I’m like, “I got a bag, I gotta complain.” And then suddenly everyone’s like, “Oh, I have one too.” And then you feel so good afterwards, because you allowed yourself to admit that your life is happening right now. Why are the parking meters in Beverly Hills only coin operated? They don’t take card? It’s an obvious racket, just until it’s like- See, I’m inviting you next time, you know? It costs $60 to park there because you’re just building in the parking tickets. What am I gonna do, be an hour late? Exactly. God. See, and then you can brag about the fact that you know how to complain, that’s a really big deal. Thank you so much. It’s a big deal. I appreciate it, it is a lost art. Yeah. When you’re on your deathbed, do you have one specific party memory that you’re gonna look back on, go like, “That, that was the apotheosis of party hood?” Gosh, you know, one of the best parties ever was one that my mom threw for me when I was eight years old. It was a two-day “Indiana Jones” scavenger hunt. You had to decode hieroglyphics to find out where the party was going to be, and then you had a fake passport. And then during lunch, when everybody arrived and went through passport control, as you do, you know, my first time at passport control, you get a nice sit-down lunch afterwards. Sure. So, it’s really interesting that we don’t do that anymore, but then it was like interrupted by this mystery, and it was done on my grandparents’ horse ranch. So, it was all this space. And my grandparents papier-mached this giant boulder that was as tall as us that rolled down and chased us. There was like a blacklight tomb. We slept outside in a tent. The next day, I, who knows, there was all this decoding and stuff we had to do, but it ended in the dead of night, and my mom had built a cemetery, and we had to dig up, I am not kidding, we digged up a fake grave that had a treasure chest in it filled with gems, like fake plastic princess jewelry. It’s never been better than that. How could it be? Yeah, I’m like, premieres, what are you doing? Like, let’s- Yeah. Where’s the scavenger hunt? Like, where’s the escape room? Party aside, that’s such an incredible act of love, right? Especially somebody who shows it through service like that, and the fact that it stuck with you for so long. I mean, it obviously paid off, and that’s really beautiful. That was the way, you know, my mom sees the world, and it’s no wonder I have just like, a brain that builds and has so much magical thinking, and a desire to bring people into my world, because that’s what my mom did and still does. And now we get to do it together, which is really fun. Yeah. Brie, for course number three of your final meal, from Night Market, we have the gaeng panang neua with roti, then we have the Lo Scoglio-style nerano pasta with the courgettes on it, and then, of course, the punchbowl. This has to stay, yeah. The punchbowl stays. The punchbowl stays, yeah. Brie, can I dish you some curry? Please. When was the first time you had this dish? Okay, so, Night Market used to be a popup. It’s the most profound experience of overeating. Yeah. I’ve had in my life was here, where in the car ride back I had to sit really straight, and then by the time, when I got home, I just fell asleep. I was so full. Have you been there before? I have, I actually remember the popup days. I remember being there at a popup with Danny Bowen and Jess Koslow from Sqirl. Danny Bowien- What a flex. I know, right? What a freaking flex, wow. Thank you, I’m very important. No, no, no, but Danny Bowien wheeled out a drum set and just started drumming, and Chris was playing guitar and doing just like a punk rock riff as we’re eating Sichuan pepper chicken wings, and Danny Bowien punched a hole in the wall that’s still there and then tagged it. Wow. But like, that to me was such a golden era of restaurants that I don’t think we can get back in a way, so. The pop-up culture is gone, isn’t it? I think we’ve lost something that I used to consider kind of like sacred with restaurants, which was a bit of a party culture, you know what I mean? I’m sure it’s still kind of out there, but, I don’t know, this could just be the false nostalgia of me getting older and feeling like I can’t recreate, you know, these positive memories. Yeah, I’m wondering is it that that’s not happening at restaurants, or that we’re getting earlier dinner reservations? Is that it? You know, like I don’t know if the drum circles happens at the 6:00 PM reservation. But if I eat too close to bed, I get sweaty at night, and then I don’t sleep, Brie. Exactly, no, I know. Tell me about the spaghetti right here with the courgettes in it. I feel like Stanley Tucci loves this pasta, right? So I feel like it’s become the Stanley Tucci pasta, but it’s the Lo Scoglio pasta. So, this restaurant, Lo Scoglio, it’s like, Italian coast. Mm-hmm. Exactly the type of romance you expect when you’re like imagining, “What if I went to a restaurant on the Amalfi coast?” You could like, pull up in your little boat, or your big boat. I don’t know what kind of boat you have in your fantasy. It’s a big old boat, okay? Mine’s a small, intimate boat. Oh, okay. So, you have a small intimate boat. Mine’s like a jungle cruise, kind of like, boat. And so like, you pull up and you walk up these steps, it’s basically, it’s like a big deck outside. The beach right there. Children looking for shells, and you get poured a nice crisp glass of white wine, and then they start bringing you all these vegetables that are like, perfectly prepared that are from their garden. Once you’re full on fiber, they bring this out, and this is absolutely perfect. This is like, “Oh, wait, it’s just like, a lot of butter.” Hey. And zucchini, the humble zucchini, which I sort of forget about except for like when I go to this restaurant, and then I’m like, “Wait, zucchini is everything? Zucchini was the key?” I didn’t realize. I’m so excited. Also, the picture that you painted is building this entire image in my mind and building up the expectations. It’s part of it, ’cause otherwise you’re like, “Okay, Brie, so you have like, butter pasta with zucchini, relax.” Zucchini just kind of, oh my god, it melts, but then it gives us like, beautiful vegetal sweetness that kind of almost just acts as like an absolution from the butter. ‘Cause otherwise, this would just be butter and cheese. It’s actually, yeah, and maybe that’s the other thing, back to the nostalgia. It’s like, we all at some point in our life were the child that just wanted butter noodle. Truly. So, this is maybe like, the much more elevated version of it. Yeah. I’m shocked that you forget about zucchinis often, because I think one of your biggest accomplishments is this photo right here. Can you explain… What the hell happened? Okay, so really what happened is, is I started playing “Animal Crossing” again during the pandemic, and I was so into it with my garden, and then I was like, “Hold on, maybe I should have a real garden instead of a digital one.” I’m here, I can’t leave my house. So, I started growing vegetables. And one of them was zucchini, and I learned that like, if you don’t cut your zucchini, they never stop growing. And I’m just one girly at home with a lot of zucchini, and so, it was really hard to get through it all. But I did, you know? And when they’re bigger like that, they don’t taste as good. I was gonna ask, ’cause I did see you make a crunch wrap supreme using that zucchini on the internet, and I was like, “This is too large of a zucchini to possibly taste like anything.” It doesn’t taste that good. No, but the fact that you were playing “Animal Crossing” and then just said, “I should grow a six-pound zucchini,” like, but it sounds like you throw yourself into really intense situations a lot. It sounds like you follow everything- I do. With a certain amount of passion. Yeah. And even like in filming “Room,” ever heard of it? Sorry. But, no, you talked about how much prep you had to do for that, and how dark of an emotional place you went to, did any of that over preparation, was that out of like love for the craft, or was that out of fear of failure? It was a bunch of factors. It was like, I had been trying to be an actor for so long, and this felt like this next potential big step, but it still was an independent film. You never know what’s gonna happen with it, where it’s gonna go, but I also, the subject matter was very serious and deserved like, a lot of attention and a lot of care, and there was a lot of personal sacrifices I had to make. Like, not going in the sun and being on this like crazy diet and all that stuff. But even that was like, that’s kind of like a privilege and like a small percentage of what is actually happening if you were actually in the situation, so it felt like fear of failure of letting people down for depicting this incorrectly or inappropriately, fear of failure that like, the movie wasn’t gonna work, and then I’m like, back to the what feels like the beginning again. It was really stressful, but I think it became really good fuel. Like, I had a lot of drive and focus at that time, even though it was like mixed with like, you know, the cold sweats at night being like. And even after the movie was done it was like, took me a long time to really be like, “I think it’s gonna be okay.” It’s interesting that you said “Back to the beginning,” ’cause by saying back to the beginning, it almost implies that there is an end point, right? To a creative career, and I totally understand where you’re coming from back to not making any money and, you know, I know you like weren’t really paying your bills, you were taking craft services home, you know, and eating it for dinner, which I think, you know, we’ve all been there in some way. I’m gonna do it again today. As you should, as you should. You’re gonna have to arm wrestle me for it, but that’s totally fine. What is that end point that you imagined for you, or do you think you’ve reached it? When you’re an artist, it’s like, there’s so much- Yeah. To be inspired by and enjoy all the time, and I think that the things that are accomplishments to me, it’s all kind of in the same timeline as everything else, but they’re so different. It’s like, part of what was amazing about the trajectory of “Room” was that like, it forced me to come out of my shell and do interviews and do all these things that used to make me break out into hives. I was so scared of being myself, and I realized, it wasn’t until the pandemic and I did my like, silly YouTube channel that I realized that that was an exercise for me of like, getting over the fact, like, I would’ve been too scared to do something even like this a couple years ago. Yeah. I was like, “I’m just my characters,” because you can dislike an interpretation of a character, that’s fine, but to dislike my character is way harder to grapple with, and I’ve become quite good at like, learning that you can’t be for everybody. Yeah. And if you try to, it’s like, oh my gosh, then you’re for nobody, really. I just remember I was like, I called Glennon Doyle for advice like a couple years ago, or something regarding all of this, and she was like, “Oh, honey, you have to let down as many people as possible every day so that you don’t let down yourself,” and that is like everything to me now. Can’t say I get through this life without having moments where I’m like, “Am I a loser?” But also, that’s part of it too. Yeah. One of my favorite books is “Down and Out in Paris and London” by George Orwell. Orwell writes, “People are so afraid of their rock bottom, not realizing that if they hit it, they’re still alive.” The thing that I feel really lucky about in my life is that somehow very early on in my life, but it can come to you whenever it comes to you, that I just knew what I wanted to do. Like, I just knew what drives me, and I’m just willing to risk whatever it takes for that. I also have great parents, so like, my parents will let me sleep on their couch if this all doesn’t work out at any point, so like, I have that, which is a massive privilege. I can’t even explain what happened other than every time I hit my rock bottom when I was like, “Why am I doing this? This is so painful and so hard,” I use that as an opportunity to really figure out why I was willing to sustain this amount of rejection and pain. And for me, it became this thing that’s larger than me, that there’s stories that I want to tell that are more important than the minor pains and dramas of my life, and that’s what I’m wanna do with my life. And, it helps you rise. Brie, for the final course of your final meal on earth, we have your grandma’s pistachio dessert, and then we have the fried figs from Lo Scoglio. This is my favorite dessert ever. No notes. That green, the way that that green matters to me is shocking. I’ve tried to get this green into basically every element of this cookbook. I’m like, “And what about my pistachio dessert as a color in this cookbook?” Cars were that color of green. Grandma’s couches were that color of green. What happened to this color of green? There’s time to bring it back. Did you always have fascination, one, with his era of food, but two, food in general before you started playing Elizabeth Zott on “Lessons in Chemistry?” I did. Yeah. I’ve loved cooking my whole life. I cooked a little bit when I was still living at home, because I did the thing that you have to do when you become 15 years old, which is become a vegetarian, and make sure everybody knows that that’s what’s going on, you know? And then you proceed to only eat grilled cheese? That was me. That’s what I did. And then I was like, “Wait a minute, I need to actually feed myself. I can’t survive off of grilled cheese.” Mm-hmm. But, the thing about then moving out and being a vegetarian, it like opened my whole world of needing to figure out how to cook all of these wonderful things that exist in the world. And then I went really far with it where I made a challenge for a year that I couldn’t order anything at a restaurant that I hadn’t cooked myself before, so like, you can’t order a lasagna at a restaurant unless you’ve made a lasagna. That became… Too hard. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I was like, “Too much to take on,” but it forced me to learn a lot. And, from there, I became the person that was always hosting, having people over, you know, it was a lovely thing to do, especially at a time when a lot of my friends were auditioning struggling actors as well, and you’d make like a big kitchen sink salad and have people over and drink the two-buck Chuck, and. Yep. That was a wonderful evening. Please, tell me about the fried figs from the Amalfi coast. Yeah, so imagine you’ve just had that zucchini pasta, and you’re like, “I’m so full, I couldn’t possibly,” and then they bring this thing out, and you go… “Well, gosh darn it, that looks like a beignet, does it not? That’s a beignet.” And then… Wait a minute, there’s a freaking fig in there. No, there’s a figging freak in there. There’s a freaking fig in there. A freaking freak. And you’re like, on your knees now begging them for mercy. You’re like, “How could you do this to me?” Like, this is so heavenly. The children on the beach collecting shells have sharpened them into weapons, and they’re now charging the beach. Yeah, they’re trying to take the figs and I’m like, “Please, no, not these, anything but that.” I love you kind of just like, throwing out these random challenges to yourself. Like, not ordering anything on the menu that you haven’t cooked yourself, it sounds like you- Yeah, I’m a freaky figgy. You really are a freaky figgy, like I was gonna say, it’s a little bit of like a sicko mindset. Yeah. And I mean that in a beautiful way, in the way that so many people we lionize as artists or athletes or chefs often are. How are you with relaxing? Not great, it’s just hard. Like, I just care an embarrassing amount about, like, everything. Yeah. Like I’m just super excited about like, being here. I’m just like always like, “Wow, like, name a better planet.” Like, it’s just spectacular. So, I’m very interested in like, making it work here, you know? It’s like, I think why I’m passionate about like, from composting and having a garden to like, caring about human rights. I’m like, “Think of, look at all this awesome stuff we have here, like, let’s make it work.” But, it’s a full-time job, caring. Yeah. So, I think the closest I’ve found is like, sauna and ice is like the best way I know how to like ground myself because it literally stops you, and I play a lot of video games, that’s relaxing for me, depending on the game. Like, I’m playing “Stardew Valley” again, which is like, another sort of just kind of like an “Animal Crossing,” simple, digital garden, build the chicken coop kind of thing. Yeah. So, I do my best. I’m not great at it, for sure. I think the hardest part about, one, being excited about anything, or two, caring, is that it’s really vulnerable. Mm-hmm. In a lot of ways, and I think when you care so deeply, often that can be misconstrued as criticizing somebody else. Saying, “I like pancakes,” and they go, “Well, does that mean you hate that I love waffles? Why are you doing this to me?” Do you ever feel like your intentions are misunderstood? Of course, I’m a human. Is that still really painful for you, or do you think you’ve gotten over that hump where you’re like, DGAF? It depends. I wish that there was more that I could talk about. Like, I hate that I have to think through like, “Oh, well if I talk about that, then that part could get pulled out, and then it basically starts a wildfire that is going further away from my point.” I think people were more able to freely speak about things in previous areas, or am I just romanticizing something that never quite existed? I don’t think we’ve ever had this much connectivity. Yeah. So, I think that’s the big difference is where were we speaking about all of these things in like this very public platform that doesn’t necessarily- “May I introduce you to parties.” Yeah, exactly. Yeah, that was the original social network. But even that, but even that, being misunderstood at a party is so not the same thing as being misunderstood on the internet. It is part of the thing with this book where I’m like, “If you can actually get in like a face-to-face dialogue, you could get some things done.” It’s really hard when you’re trying to like, get something across to like, I don’t even know, who’s on, like billions of people, and then like bots? One thing that keeps me kind of going and hopeful is just believing in the general resiliency of the human spirit to overcome things. Yes. Looking at all this division on social media, but generally believing that humans are very, very adaptable and more resilient than we think. Is there anything that kind of keeps you hopeful in that way? I try my best to, when you see all of these things that are not working, to seek out the ways that they are, and to find the goodwill, just so that we don’t continue to fall into a pit of despair, because the pit of despair doesn’t mobilize us in any way. Yeah. And the other part too is like, if I’m like doing a bunch of calls and Zoom calls and activism and all these things for like all these worthy causes, but then I’m frazzled and angry, and then I snap at someone in the line at the grocery store, I’m like, “I need to find better balance,” because we’re holding two really big things at once. Like, we’re holding our immediate community and the larger world as a whole, and we’ve never been prepared for that. It’s just a big thing to hold, and there’s a lot of people doing really important work. And so, if you start to find yourself feeling frustrated and angry, you don’t necessarily have to reinvent the wheel, you can just connect with the people that have already made certain positive pathways and join them. There’s soup kitchens all around. There’s all kinds of places. There’s dog rescues, there’s like so many ways to exercise this and to do good in our communities, and I think at a local level, it’s such a wonderful thing, ’cause it’s nice to see the direct correspondence of like, the ways that we can positively impact our communities. You’ve accomplished so much in your career, but when it’s all said and done, you have a lot of life left to live, a lot of things left to accomplish. What, at the end of the day, do you want your legacy to be? What’s the headline on the tombstone? “Damn, she cared a lot.” I love that. What do you think happens when you die? You know, I think nothing. Yeah. I really do think nothing. As hopeful as you are for life on earth, maybe you are as hopeful as you are because. Yeah, I think that’s it. It’s like, anything else would be a bonus. I’m like, not trying to say anything shitty, just in case there is that guy that’s like- Sure. “Wait a minute,” but because I deep down think that there’s nothing after, it makes me go, “Oh, is this the heaven the whole time?” Have you learned the harp yet? Have you really gone into that as a hobby? Yes, of course, because you have to have a fallback. That’s my hobby in case this whole God thing works out and I ascend to those pearly ass gates. One final audition. I got a drag- One final audition to nail, Brie! That’s what it is, that’s my fear is that you get to heaven and God’s like, “We’ll start with the first scene.” “You have your sheet music.” Yeah. I think that’s actually your hell, it’s that every single day. Yeah, that would be my hell. This has been incredible. You ready to get to the lightning round? Yeah. I lost it. Oh, great. Well, we’ll do the thunder round? We found it. Who’s the one person dead or alive you’d want to share your actual last meal with? Buster Keaton? Hell yeah. What song do you wanna be played at your funeral? Probably like a disco song. Like, “You Make Me Feel .” Oh, hell yeah. You know? Dancing on the grave? Yeah. You’re a former DJ, what’s one obscure artist or genre you want to introduce people to? I’ve had too much “Party People” punch. Her name, Courtney, I’ve talked to you about her before and I misspelled it in there. Does someone have their phone? Yes. S-A-Y-A-G-R-E-Y. Saya Gray does exist. Saya Gray. Who’s your dream eulogizer at your funeral? Mr. Peanut. Oh, shit. That’s right, the original, didn’t they kill him? The Duolingo owl is dead. The Duolingo owl is dead, and Mr. Peanut killed him? No, no. No? No. This is an interesting murder mystery party though, everybody comes as a different, someone’s like Wendy. I like this. No, two different things. Mr. Peanut’s not dead, is he? I think they killed Mr. Peanut and turned him into a baby. They turned him into a baby. He was reborn. He was reborn. Mr. Peanut was reborn? You believe in nothing, and Mr. Peanut believes in reincarnation. In reincarnation? Wow. Well, if Mr. Peanut was reincarnated, I gotta rethink a lot of things, because I believe in him. Do you think the song “Black Sheep” from “Scott Pilgrim vs. the World” was snubbed for best original song at the Oscars in 2010? What are you guys talking about? The internet, come on. That was me, that was the first one from me. Oh, that just you? I was like, what? I think that song rips so hard. Oh, yeah. I don’t think- Listen to it all the time. Yeah, we never had a shot. What’s your biggest fear? Catfish. They are disgusting. The actual fish, okay. Yes. Not being catfished. Okay. I don’t talk to people online like that. Yeah, catfish and frogs. But, yeah, pond creatures are a no. I just sometimes think about if I was God, I’d be like, I’d just have like a line of animals coming in, being like, the frogs would come in, I’d be like, “Nope.” Except for the one tree frog that was on everyone’s binders in like 1992, that one can stay. Sure. But the other ones have to go, they just have to. What a sexy frog that was. They have to go. Chipmunks can stay. Yeah. My state flowers can stay, but other mice have to go. Other, mice that refuse to eat flowers have to go? Mm-hmm. Okay. Only mice that pick flowers in little baskets. Yeah, that makes sense. They can stay. My next question is frog-related. Oh, no. The the WB dancing frog with the top hat, can he stay? Yeah. He can stay, ’cause he’s a cartoon. We don’t live in the same dimension, as far as I’m aware. But if that changes, we’re gonna have to have a conversation. Okay, fair point. In so far as he becomes actualized, all right. What’s your greatest regret in life? It’s a hard one for me, because I don’t know if that is like a concept that I fully know how to jump into. I mean, there’s a lot of people that I’m like, “I regret dating some of my boyfriends,” but even then I’m like, I don’t really. Yeah. I don’t, I don’t really. So, with all of the delicious food and the good company, it’s like hard to regret anything right now. Yeah, we’ll get you in like a real bad dark mood to answer that question next time. Like, show up hungry, we’ll just like- I think I need to feel less love and comfort in the studio. I’m gonna need like, the chokie in like 10 minutes. She’s method, folks, she does it again, Finally, are you happy? Mm-hmm. You seem very happy. Also, you just talking about the love and comfort in the studio, that made me so happy, ’cause, you know, we do try really hard, and we do care a lot. Not nearly as much as you, it’s on your tombstone, I don’t know if you’ve heard, but that really did mean a lot, and I’ve had the best time today, and one- Most wonderful time with you, and thank you to all of you. You’re gonna look into that camera right there and deliver your last words. Let’s go, I don’t know if this reincarnation thing is real, but Mr. Peanut got it, let’s go. Mr. Peanut got it, let’s go. Let’s go. This is truly awesome. Everyone, check out “Party People” the cookbook. You got any favorite pages in here? Flip one open, and that’ll be my favorite. Bubbly drinks! Bubbly. That’s my favorite. No, there’s so much thought put into this, every single thing in there is my favorite. These are all, like, friends and people who worked on the book, and my dog. Awe. Yeah. Is that a young Elvis Costello? My dog? Yep. We all gotta eat, and we know you’re dying to get your hands on a “Last Meals” apron and pin. Get yours now at mythical.com.