Hi, I’m Shayne Topp, and this is my last meal. Every person has exactly two things in common. We all gotta eat and we’re all gonna die. Today we’re joined by Smosh cast member, host of the Smosh Mouth podcast, winner of the two thousand and nine LA Film Festival jury prize, and former student class president of Briarwood Prep, the number one high school in Seattle. Shayne Topp, welcome to the show. Wow, you really did your research. I really did. Now, do you still have a relationship with Mrs. Peeloff over at Briarwood? I understand she was a big mentor to you. Yeah. Yeah. I have not watched that episode in like, ten years. So I’m like, what was the one line I had? I know they had a helicopter. They had a helicopter. That’s all I remember. Miranda Cosgrove thought that you may have thought she drooled on herself. That’s right. I had never seen an episode of that show. And I didn’t know a lot about your lore because I didn’t grow up watching a lot of kids TV. That’s also where I learned the phrase, where’s Demi? Man, heard that so much. And then I heard, where’s Anthony for a good solid half a decade. You know what I want to say? That’s my legacy. Where’s Shayne? And Shayne is right here, and that’s all that matters. And everyone at Smosh is wondering, because I didn’t call off of work. We’re basically. We’re still the same company. It’s all the same. Who cares? Who cares? But I really appreciate you coming today, man. I’m super stoked. Have you thought about your last meal before? You know what’s funny is it’s a question my mom would throw at me sometimes. So, my mom’s obsessed with true crime, so she was always watching serial killer stuff when I was a kid. And they’d be like, oh, they’re on death row. And she’d be like, oh, man. I always wonder what I would do for my last meal. I’m like, that’s a crazy thought, but okay, and. So I’ve thought about it a lot, but not as in depth as I thought about it once you guys emailed me. There was a couple things that I put on this list that I am extremely excited for that I never thought I was gonna have again. So I took advantage of this show to get foods that I have been craving for a long time. As well you should, like, Lazarus resurrected from the dead. I am so excited. Speaking of which, you think about death often? I used to think about death. I don’t know if you know this, but when I was eighteen months old, I drowned in my pool. Yeah. Smosh fans know it, because we make fun of it a lot. I drowned, so I was dead for a couple minutes, and then my mom resuscitated me. So growing up, it was just a story that I heard. So it made me think about death a little bit. And then, you know, I feel like I went through that edgy phase as a teenager where I was really into, like, what I thought was philosophy, and it was just thinking of normal things I used to think about a lot. Now at this stage in life, I’m like, whatever. Whatever, man. Whatever happens, happens. And I don’t stress about it too much. I love that, man. Well, let’s see if we can drag up some of those old traumas today. Great. Ready to get to it? I’m ready. Let’s eat. Hey, before we get into the meal, I’m excited to announce that we are releasing a brand new Last Meals hoodie. Remind the people around you the two things that everyone has in common. We all gotta eat, and we’re all gonna die. Available now at mythical.com Shayne, for the first course of your final meal, we got the bottled Mexican Coke, only made with pure cane sugar. And then we got the Arby’s curly fries, best in the game. But here’s a pièce de résistance. These are the Chili’s chicken crispers, pre twenty twenty-two. When they changed the recipe, it used to be a wet batter, making it a very unique tender. Then they switched, like everybody else, to a dry, wet, dry flour dredge. But, Shayne, these are the king right here. Oh, my God. You have no idea how happy I am to see this. When I was crafting my last meal and sending it to you guys, I was sitting there thinking, and this was the one that came to my head, and I was like, oh, my god. My opportunity. Because this was my favorite food for most of my childhood, right? Chili’s was my favorite restaurant. And then I remember I got it a couple years ago. They look different now. And then they tasted like any other chicken tender I’ve ever had. And I was so sad. You should have been. Like, I was actually genuinely devastated. So this was my opportunity, and this was my main request. When I emailed you guys, I was like, I need this. Please dig in, because they’re, you gotta get them while they’re fresh. They’re hot. Oh, god, they’re hot. They’re so crispy. Dude, you can just tell by the look and see as a kid, no sauce. I’d just bite into these. Just raw dogging the chicken. What’s wrong with that? Nothing. No. Delicious. Oh, god. The shell is just. And it’s so, like, thick. Oh, man, it’s crazy. It was such a unique product, because there were so few, like, wet, battered chicken tenders out there, and then they just homogenized it like everybody else. And it’s an absolute shame. You gotta let your freak flag fly Chili’s. People need to. Need to never go to Chili’s again until they change this. We can start the boycott right now. Yeah. My favorite childhood restaurant. Never go there ever again. Tell me about the curly fries. So, I haven’t had Arby’s in a long time. But growing up, Arby’s was a regular staple in my household, and I haven’t had it in a long time, because I feel like people talk shit about Arby’s. Yeah. Arby’s is very misaligned, and I don’t like that. Which is interesting, because I, I’m saying this for the first time here. I really like Arby’s. I like the sandwiches, but most of all, the curly fries. Shayne, that’s very brave of you. I know. Thank you for speaking your truth. Oh, my god. See, I start. And then I just start going. Keep going, man. And then just the perfect combination of just acid sweet. Shayne, you mentioned almost dying as an eighteen month old. You fell into the pool. Mom and dad were having an argument. No one saw you. Your dad runs over, pulls you out. Paramedics eventually come. You were completely gray. Yes. By the time the paramedics got there, you said that you weren’t traumatized by it because you were an eighteen month old, but everybody around you was. Do you think any amount of that trauma sort of leaked into eighteen month old Shayne’s little subconscious baby brain? And, I mean, I say they were traumatized. I don’t know how much. Like, I’ve said this before. My nickname that my dad and my brother had for me growing up was Shayne Bobber, and I didn’t understand. It didn’t click for me until I was a teenager, when I was like, oh, I was bobbing up and down in the pool. That’s why you’re calling me that? That’s crazy. So maybe they weren’t traumatized. I don’t know, man. I think you know your family better than me. But I think a lot of people sort of counter that trauma with humor. I would have simply called you the boy who lived. But. This was nineteen ninety-two, man. If only it happened nine years ago. They say it, and then suddenly it’s a phrase. They’re like, wait, hold on. My mom says, like, oh, I claimed to have. When they were looking through photo books and stuff, I claimed to have known or seen my great grandfather who had passed away before I was born, so, and I take that all with a grain of salt. I’m like, you know, I was a little kid. I probably was just saying whatever. When you were a kid and heard that, though, did you take that as truth? Because often when you’re a kid and, like, a trusted adult, especially a parent says something, you just assume it to be true. Did you believe when you were a kid that you had the gift of sight? I mean, I guess I sort of believed that I must have gone somewhere and come back. I don’t know now. I don’t have any memory of it. You know? I haven’t, I guess I could try to go to a hypnotherapist and try to see if I can rummage through something, but no, I have no recollection. I don’t really have memories until I’m, like, four or five, which I think is normal. Right? Do people have memories from earlier than that? I’m getting some nods. Yeah, big time. Like two, three. I have nothing from two. Okay. Maybe. What do you remember from three? I think maybe. Maybe I have a faint little memory of, like, Halloween when I was three, but I don’t have much of anything. There was another factor, though, that came out of you being a little Shayne bobber. The fact that your parents didn’t know if you would or wouldn’t have brain damage until you were six years old, which, that’s like a long waiting period from eighteen months to kindergarten age. Right. Surely that must have affected the way that they treated you growing up. I wonder. I mean, once again, they didn’t tell me that until I was older, of just, yeah, we didn’t know. And so I’m, like, looking back on my memories, and my joke is often that I would draw something and be like, hey, guys, look what I made. And my parents would be like. Like, oh, definitely something’s missing up there. But I don’t know. I don’t know. And you know what? I think the jury’s still out. Yeah. I think we’re still, still yet to be seen. I think most Smosh fans could probably tell you that, yes, something did get damaged, but in a good way. You know, kind of like when you hit a jukebox, maybe. I don’t know. Something like that. You talk about being dubious about your mom’s potential clairvoyance, but there was one instance with your mom that she claims. That seems pretty prescient. She was with an ex at the time who was a pilot. Yeah. And she said, you can’t go to work today. There’s something wrong with the rings. He goes to work, nothing happens. But that was the day the Challenger exploded. And the reason the Challenger exploded is because the primary and secondary O rings on the right rocket booster failed. Can you explain that one away? Yeah. My mom has told this story a lot, and I do. I do believe her, because my mom isn’t, like some person who’s claiming stuff all the time. She woke up from this dream and so adamantly, like, believed that this was gonna happen, that she was begging him not to go to work, and then he went to work, and then. Yeah, the Challenger crash happened that day. I believe her. I simply believe her. And I am a very skeptical person. Yeah. But, I have no reason to believe my mom is just telling this massive lie about this one instance in her life. It’s crazy. Do you think you’re somebody who likes living in the unexplainable, because certain things like death, that you say you’ve kind of made a little bit of peace with? You don’t exactly know what happens, but who cares? We’re here. And you don’t know exactly what your parents thoughts were when you were in that period between eighteen months and kindergarten age. Do you think you find comfort in that unknown? When I was a teenager, I was so obsessed with figuring out what happens after you die. I think it did come from a bit of a feeling of depression, of worrying that my life was gonna be insignificant. And I think a lot of that was. I was getting into the acting industry, which is such a, like, you make it or you don’t. Yeah. And so I’m like, oh, my god, I’m placing my, all my chips on making it in the acting industry, and if that doesn’t happen, I’m just a failure, and my life is nothing and insignificant. Now, as you get older, you realize, like, significance and insignificance is so nuanced. Like, your life has meaning on so many different ways. When you say, as you get older, you realize that’s not the case for all yous out there. I guess that’s true. I guess that’s true. What do you think brought you there? I think failure. I think failures, different kinds of failures. I think my life not turning out how I thought it would, and also my life, like, succeeding in things and realizing, oh, it’s not what I thought it was. You know, when I started in the acting industry, I had this idea, and then, honestly, you get onto a set, and you’re like, oh, it’s a job. It’s just a job. It shatters the illusion. And also just, the world has changed so much in the past fifteen years when I started that I’m like, you’re never gonna know what your journey is. And you kind of have to accept that, that it’s gonna be so unique. I don’t know. I think all of that plays a part on a deeper philosophical level at this point of just going, this is all so insane, my brain is incapable of comprehending it. But whatever’s happening is happening. Like, this is happening, and I have no choice but to keep going as best I can. You’re floating on a river, and anytime you fight the direction, it just doesn’t matter. You’re going where the river is. Exactly. It’s that old, like, Alan Watts thing of, yeah, you just have. All there is is acceptance. That’s all you can do. You can’t fight it. The truth is the truth, whatever it may be. I hope to someday figure it out, but it probably won’t be in life. And maybe when I go, there isn’t something. But, I guess my philosophical thing that I’ve always dealt with is, I’m like, well, whatever happened before this experience, right now. If this something came from nothing, and then I go back to nothing, maybe infinity from now, I’ll become something again. But I have those thoughts on occasion. And then I’m like. Whether I land on if it’s the truth or not, it doesn’t matter. So, I’m gonna keep eating my chicken crispers. Shayne, when you go to that big chili’s in the sky, they’re gonna have pre twenty twenty-two crispers, and everything is going to be light, and nothing will hurt. You ready to go to course number two? Yeah. Shayne, for course number two, in the natural progression from chili crispers and curly fries, we have dolmade, some lovely stuffed grape leaves, a little bit of ground lamb and rice in there, finished in lemon and olive oil. Then we have a nice plate of roasted green veggies. We have broccolini, we have Brussels sprouts, a little bit of baby asparagus in there, and then spiny lobster tails with drawn butter and lemon. And then we have the Kaigan Japanese sakura cask expression whiskey. Now, this is aged in white oak for three years, and then it’s actually aged for six months in a cherry blossom cask, giving it some more chocolatey and cherry notes. Okay. Cheers, man. Cheers. Thanks for stopping by this rules. Thanks for doing this for me. Yeah. That’s good. That’s really good. I love Japanese whiskey. It’s just so smooth. It is. And they, like, take a lot of care and crafting, especially with really cool expressions like this aged in cherry blossom cast. Like, where the hell are you gonna get that? Do you ever make cocktails at home? Are you a big social drinker? During lockdown, I bought a couple cocktail cookbooks from Death and Co. Yeah. And I was obsessed with going through them and making these really weird cocktails. I was buying ingredients that I could only use for one thing. I’m like, oh, I have aloe liqueur. What else am I gonna use that for? You have Chareau aloe liqueur? I had it. Oh, okay. And I made this cocktail called a lily pad, which was a aloe liqueur. Was it Chartreuse? And gin, and a bunch of other things, but I got really into cocktails, and. But my favorite cocktails are, at this point, just the classics. Love martinis. I love Manhattans. Old fashions. Because I love the feeling of getting punched in the face. Yeah. I don’t like sweet stuff. That’s how we’re actually gonna end this video is just you and I, rock them, sock them at each other until one of us actually dies. Okay, good. Did you read their guide on how to shake with ice? Bro. And I’m just like, come on, man. I can’t do this. It’s gotta be circular so the ice doesn’t break with the vertical motion. Yeah. I was like, all right, I’m not doing this, but I respect it. Tell me about the spiny lobster specifically. So spiny lobster. This is a nostalgic pick for me. I know that most lobster you get is not spiny lobster, right? Yeah. A lot of is like, main lobster is different. The big crusher claws, they call them. Yes. So growing up, my family would go to Key West every summer, and my dad is obsessed with catching lobsters there in Key West, and it’s spiny lobster. So as a young kid, I would go along with him. Now I’m just snorkeling around. I’m not catching the lobster, but my dad would be diving around, going under coral heads, grabbing them, using the tickle stick to. You what now? Use a tickle stick and a net. Okay. And you find the lobsters, and you basically smack them on the face and they swim backwards into your net. That’s how you catch spiny lobsters. Or if you can reach and just grab them, they, you know, don’t have claws, so my dad would just be grabbing them, but we’d get a bunch or whatever, the amount that you could get with a license, and then we’d cook them up, and it was always solid. So it’s a very nostalgic childhood thing for me. That’s a very dad thing to do. You didn’t have the traditional American high school experience. You were working kid actor. You said you put a lot of pressure on yourself. Do you think a lot of that pressure was self imposed, or do you think a lot of that was coming from the fact that your entire social circle were people trying to book roles over each other? Or at that point, do kids even have any sort of responsibility in that as far as the pressure put on them? Yeah. There’s an interesting thing with child actors that I observed, which is when we were young, when we were teenagers and stuff, everyone’s very mature because they all know how to present themselves. They all know how to act like an adult. But then, so, yes, there was extreme pressure we’re all putting on ourselves because you’re fifteen and you’re thinking about your career, which is something I look back on. I’m like, you shouldn’t be thinking about that. I taught kids dodgeball at a science camp. Not a lot of pressure there. That sounds awesome. Yeah. I think the adults in my life all meant really well, and it was all very positive. But, you know, you are inevitably putting a ton of pressure on people when you’re going, oh, man, you have this incredible talent. Oh, my gosh, you could be in movies. You could do. You could do this. You have the ability to do this. So then you’re going, oh, if I don’t, it means I messed up. It wasn’t just luck. It wasn’t just whatever it was. I screwed up. Turning thirty kind of helped me take the pressure off because I think I was battling this idea of what I would be when I’m thirty. And as far as my acting career, it was very different than what I expected by the time I was thirty. So it kind of was this, like, all right, well, that’s it. And so it’s almost like a finish line in my head in a very messed up way of like, well, it’s over. You’ve given yourself multiple lives. Like, how that guy gives himself four days in one day? Yeah. First day starts at nine and then at. Yeah. You did that with. That grind, that grindset guy. You’re on the grindset. Yeah. Eat, eat, eat. I’ll shut the hell up and let you eat. You wrote a journal entry in two thousand and seven, Shayne, called The Meaning to Life. In it you say, if there is a meaning of life, it is for happiness, for love and friendship, and for learning. We can choose to kill and wage war or to give and help others while we live in this world we know so little about. What are your current emotions here and then? Man. I forgot I put that out there. You’ve really done your detective work. Do you regret it? No. That’s the epitome of I’m fourteen and this is deep. Yeah. Because it’s just like, yeah. Everyone would be like, yeah, man, that’s for sure. I don’t know. It’s one of those things where I’m like, okay, yes, there’s truth to it. You’re not wrong. I’m not wrong. It’s just the most basic understanding of things. I do have a lot of thoughts. Because I was very religious when I was, like, in my early teens. And then, honestly, by getting so into it, I fell out of it, because I was really reading it and, like, looking up a bunch of stuff. I wanted answers. I was diving deep into the Bible, I think, at this stage, my view. And, you know, there’s that philosopher, Alan Watts, who said this of, like, oh, to sin is. It’s been misinterpreted. It means to miss the mark. And so it’s like, oh, it’s just you’re striving for some sort of happiness in the wrong way. And I do look at people that way. And so I was thinking that at the time. So I still agree. I just. I’m not writing journal entries about it anymore. I’m writing journal entries about, I don’t know, other bullshit. Yeah. What is it? We cringe, but we are free. You know? Like, anybody can look back at any of their thoughts when they were fifteen. I was the opposite. Where I was, like, the virulent atheist because I grew up in such a christian neighborhood right next to a megachurch, and I was like, kind of the token Jew. And so I’d be like, do you believe in the flying spaghetti monster? And, like, I hurt so many people that were close to me by just being a huge asshole. Right? And I look back at that and I cringe. But I also give myself so much, like, grace and empathy. Because I’m like, I know exactly where that was coming from. Do you have that same thing with your younger self. Also. Can I dish you up some grape leaves? Yes. Oh, man. These are homemade, bubbale. We’ve never done it before, but we’re very proud of them. You know, when I read back on things, I do cringe so hard. I cringe, though, largely… because I could tell that even though it was in a private journal that I had no intention of showing to anyone, I was kind of performing. I’m reading this, I’m like, I’m trying to sound smart. I’m trying to sound philosophical, and I get so frustrated that I wasn’t just letting my genuine feelings and thoughts out. Do you think you have those genuine? Eat, eat. I’m gonna shut up and just sit here for a sec. I’m gonna watch you eat grape leaves. So good, man. Why grape leaves? Just a fan? When I first had this, I was with my friend Damien, who’s also on Smosh, and he took me to, I believe it was a Lebanese place, and I got some grape leaves, and I was just like, what is this? I’ve never had anything like this before. I’d say every month, at least I’m ordering this from somewhere. And I’m very lucky that in LA, there’s plenty of places that make it, and it’s just so delicious. Enjoy. What’s the deal with the veggies? I love vegetables. I love green vegetables so much. This one’s kind of more. I needed to pay homage to what I do eat a lot every day. You know? This is something I do cook. It’s my last meal. I kind of wanted to pick things from, like, all over. So I’m like, things from my childhood, things from, things I’ll never get again. Chicken crispers. But then I’m like, also things that just bring me back to just every day. You’re paying homage to current you. I knew you guys would make it better than I do, so I was like. We’ll come over to your house, and we’ll make it for you. Only on your deathbed, though. And we gotta record it because everything is content. It was super evident that you are a very self serious kid. If you have ever watched an interview with you from before you were eighteen, the Dear Lemon Lima press tour. You’re doing an interview. You’re already shaking your head in shame. It’s actually an incredible, like, look into who you were and who you are, which I’m sure is more fascinating to me than you who lived it. But you are there with your co-star Vanessa Marano on Clevvertv, and Vanessa is talking about, we would go get ice cream as a cast, and we’re all friends, and it was so fun. We shot in Seattle, and it’s beautiful. And then they turn the camera to you, and you go, my character, Philip Georgey, was incredibly arrogant. He feels that he’s smarter than everybody else. So I would walk around set with that same air of arrogance, and I really tried to play it like Jason Schwartzman from Rushmore. Yeah. Because he’s not a jerk, as in, like, the regular jerk. Like, oh, what’s up? I’m a jerk. It was more of an arrogance of I’m smarter than everybody around me. It was an impersonation of Jason Schwartzman. And it’s very obvious that you have this entirely different tone than all of your co-stars. Did you feel sort of like, apart from them in that way? On set, I think that’s more of an indication of how my nerves would affect me there in those interviews and how I wanted to be perceived. But on set, I had such a great time there. I mean, I’m still friends with Vanessa to this day. I made so many friends on that set, and it really was such a blast. I think it does show how, especially when I was younger, my insecurity made me, like, hide who I am, and who I am is such a silly person. And I don’t think. I don’t think people at large got to see that until I was on Smosh for, like, a while. Yeah. And then I just kind of became comfortable with it. And I was on camera so much. You can tell, like, oh, I want to be a dramatic, serious actor. I want to be seen as cool. I want to be taken seriously. My name is Daniel Shayne Lewis. Yeah, exactly. No, Daniel Day-Lewis was, like, my inspiration. I really wanted to be taken seriously for so long in my life. And honestly, it just kind of, that, I regret more than anything. I wish I could go back and just be like, man, it’s okay to be silly. It’s okay to not be seen as a certain thing. Like, just be. Just be yourself. And what’s funny is, as soon as I was on Smosh and just letting it loose and just being an idiot was when I probably suddenly had the most fame, you know, when I suddenly got recognition, when people actually started paying attention to me in any sort of way. So I just wasn’t embracing who I was. And those interviews really show it. It’s really funny to watch them. Well, you can even see in your body language, like, you don’t even seem comfortable the way that you do now, which is also reasonable because you’re a kid and dealing with so much. And I’m also wearing, like, I’m literally. I mean, I’m the epitome of two thousand nine in some of those interviews, like, black hair, everything’s black. I would swear back then that I didn’t, like, I hated Twilight and Edward Cullen, but I’m trying my best to dress like Edward Cullen in that interview. It’s so funny. I wore a lot of beyond the knee Michael Jordan basketball shorts, and so I wouldn’t want to go see myself back then either. That’s sick, dude. That’s freaking rad, man. Ready to get to round number three? Let’s do it. Shayne, for course number three, you said you really love garlic naan with just, like, all the sauces, and so we made you a giant tower of garlic naan with saag paneer with chicken tikka masala, with raita, with cilantro chutney, and tamarind chutney. Please, just go tear it the beast. Enjoy to your heart’s contentment. Oh, my God. This is how you guys are gonna kill me after, too. I’ve never seen anything like this. Laughs are cheap. We want gasps. Oh, my god. Okay. Yeah. I knew I needed a bread in this, and I decided on garlic naan, because every time I’ve had it, it’s, just the best. Homemade too. We had to invent a new contraption. This is great naan too. Oh, this is so good. Oh, yeah. You have, like, a lot of simpler foods on this, curly fries, chicken crisp. But, like, you also seem like somebody who does really, like, kind of chase flavor and chase new experiences. Absolutely. I don’t talk about it a lot, but I love food. I’m a super foodie. The first time I had garlic naan. it was actually in lockdown. It wasn’t that long ago. And I. I had the saag paneer. I had the chicken tikka masala, you know, like, the, like, easy, the basic order. But having the garlic naan and just dipping it in anything was the best part. I was obsessed with it. I haven’t had a ton of Indian food, and I need to go in person more, so that I can really, like, mix it around and try different things. I’ll take you to my favorite all you can eat buffet on Sunday, and they do a good job. They don’t water down the tikka. They don’t water down the chutneys like the other places. Let’s do it. Shayne, we both exist in the same very strange economy where you’re performing a sort of exaggerated and more entertaining version of yourself. And you’ve always said that it’s important for you to differentiate between your on screen persona and your off screen person. What’s the biggest difference between Shayne the persona and Shayne the person? I would say a big one is that in life, I’m not as, like, funny. I don’t think. I think. You’re not. I’m very chill. I’m also not. Real downer. Bummer to be around. I’m really depressing. Nobody likes you. No, but I’m very, like, downplayed, I think a lot of times I’m very shy. I have a lot of social anxiety. So when I meet new people, I’m very quiet, I think. And I’m just. I try to just be very polite. Whereas on camera. I think I say things more rudely a lot, because I’m just going for the laugh. I’m like, however I need to get it. That means roasting my friends or whatever, but in life, I’m not really roasting people that much. Yeah, it was interesting earlier when you said, like, I was acting so serious, but I am a silly person. There’s no, like, but, right? I was acting really serious and I’m a silly person. Right. But I’m also not serious in that way either. I think you were deliberately edgy in the way that a lot of teens were. But I think you are, like, an incredibly thoughtful person who’s, like, very deliberate with their words in a way that I really have always appreciated. Yes, I’m a very careful person. That’s probably the biggest difference. In life, I’m very careful with how I speak and what I say, and then on camera, you just don’t think. You just start talking. You just start going, I’m doing that a little bit right now. But on Smosh, especially, anything comedy, I just go, and you almost don’t think. And it’s almost a blur from action to cut, and then it ends and you’re like, I hope that was good. And then you watch it later, and so often, it’s so trippy. I will watch our videos and be like, I just don’t remember this at all. Yeah. I have no memory. No recollection. You got a psychology degree from ASU online. Go online, sun devils. I never watched a game. No applause. Do you ever feel like that? Like you are a completely different person on camera and then off. And where do those things meet? I don’t think I feel like a different person. I think it just, at this stage is so routine. Like, improv is so routine in a way that it’s like a muscle memory more so. It’s kind of the same. I mean, you can relate to this, of when you go to the gym a lot and you have your workout routine, almost, when you stick to the same routine for too long, you can kind of just be zoned out because you’ve done it so much. I think it’s more akin to that than, like, I’m a different person now. It’s just like, all right, I’m doing the thing I do every day. Yeah. Yeah. You also said that privacy is really important to you. Shayne, I don’t know if you know this. You got wife. I know. A wife named Courtney Miller. Equally talented performer and actor. What was the decision, like, to finally go public with that? Like, when did the burden of keeping things private sort of, like, outweigh this fear of an invasion of privacy? Because that’s something that we all deal with. How much do we give outwardly? Right. Yeah. And I think the big thing for me, for both of us, was we just didn’t wanna make. There’s certain things that I’m like, this is not content. Yeah. I don’t make money off of this, because that was, for me, a decision for my own brain. We also simultaneously were like, okay, at some point, it’s gonna be easier on our lives if we’re just upfront about this huge thing. And I think we knew for a long time, especially once we were engaged, that, okay, once we get married, we’ll announce that. That’s where we’re gonna do it. And so we knew that for a long time, and then was like, okay, we’re getting married at the end of March. Should we just announce it on April Fools? And it was Courtney who pitched it. And I was like, that’s funny. And then every person we told. I love that you’re not, you’re talking about keeping things separate from content. And you’re like, yeah, so my wife pitched me. Yeah, it was like, okay, here. But I was like, that’s funny. That’s really funny. And that is us. Everyone we told were like, was just like, that’s so funny. Like, all right, we’ll do this. And it also, I think, was a way of, like, announcing this thing, but also being like, let’s not take this too seriously. Like, this is. It’s not a big deal. It was fun. I don’t regret it at all. But when a few days passed and people were still, like, I don’t know if it’s real, and then you’re like, okay, settle down. But, you know, a lot of it also, that we, the reason we announced it was because fans were speculating so much about our relationship. And through speculation, they were trying to dig to a almost cyber stalking level of trying to, like, figure out what, where I was, where she was, and trying to find our locations to prove that we’re at the same place at the same time. So it was also hoping that it would kind of kill that and that it’s like, all right, you guys know we’re together, so stop. Stop caring. And honestly, to a degree, it has worked. That aspect of it has died down. Now that they just know. If you continue to, like, extrapolate your career on YouTube, I mean, like you said, who knows where this goes? Does that, like, increased level of invasiveness ever really worry you? Yeah, I mean, there’s so many ways where I’m really grateful that I’m not, like, famous. Right? At the same time, with a lot of big celebrities, they kind of have more of a general audience… I think people with Youtubers think they have more of a connection. Yeah. So I actually think there’s probably a lot of Youtubers out there with five thousand subscribers who are dealing with extreme levels of, like, stalking and cyber stalking because this parasocial stuff can really get out of hand. I have met Youtubers who I watch religiously, and it is a weird feeling. Because you’re like, oh, I’ve heard you talk so much and you’ve never seen or heard me in your entire life, and it’s a trippy feeling. I think I’m very lucky, though, in that Smosh where we’re at now in our fan base, they seem mostly obsessed with, you know, our content and what we’re creating. And I’ve always said, like, for fans, what the people you’re a fan of really appreciate is when you let them know that you’re a fan of what they’re making, like, that is what you’re a fan of. And even if you think, like, oh, well, I love this personality content creator and I love them, it’s like you love the personality content they’re making. That’s what you’re a fan of, and that’s great. And a parasocial relationship between a fan and a Youtuber is a real relationship in its own way, but it’s not, like, it’s not the same as what you have with your friends or your family. And I think it’s important to make that distinction and to cherish both. I feel sometimes this sense of. It’s almost strange, like a paternalistic connection. I’ve had real connections with fans where they tell me a personal story. But you are a very different version of yourself. And I like what you said about them being a fan of what you make, right? Not of you, because the real you is never, even this, shooting Last Meals. I’ve said stuff on this show that, like, you know, was very, very personal to me, but it’s still not the real me necessarily. How important is it for you to, like, only keep that real you for people? It’s pretty important to me. I really do keep that distinction. And I think people know by this point that anything I do online, for the most part, especially on my own social media, I’m trying to be silly. I’m trying to entertain you. I view it as entertainment, and to a degree where I’m almost sad that I don’t get to use social media in the genuine way it was designed, which was to connect with your friends and, you know, your social circles. When I’m posting, I am thinking about my followers, and I’m just like, this is for you. Yep. It’s all for them, so. It’s always been for you. It’s all for you! Ready to get in the final round? Let’s do it. Shayne, for the final course of your final meal, we got the apple cobbler with the ice cream, and then we got a stack of buttermilk pancakes with plenty of butter and real Vermont maple syrup over here. Awesome. I will let you know. When my mom would ask me about what my last meal would be as a kid, I would say pancakes. I would definitely be like, there’s definitely gonna be pancakes in there. Just beccause it’s classic. Can I syrup you up, or do you wanna syrup you up? Syrup me up, dude. I’m a heavy syrupper. Are you? Oh, same, same. Yeah, absolutely. Solid. I wanna be able to soak each bite in the syrup. Oh, yeah. And then it becomes really alarming how much syrup you’ve consumed over the course of pancakes. I mean, hey. Oh, god. We’re not leaving this booth until all these pancakes are eaten today. I’m rolling out of this booth, man. Do we still have the wheelbarrow? Bring it in. I don’t want to talk about anything more. I just want to eat pancakes. It’s ASMR for the next thirty minutes. Yeah, chew close to the mic. Yes. We’re gonna eat this pancake here. This is not a sexual thing by nature. I know some of you are using it for that, and that’s okay. That’s okay. You’re safe here. Do whatever you want. Just make sure your mom doesn’t walk into the room. Shayne, you once said in an interview when you were seventeen, I love. I’m obsessed with seventeen year old Shayne. No, honestly, I’ll tell you what. Because I recognize so much of my seventeen year old edgelord self in there, and I think you and I have both let go of that in different ways as we’ve gotten older. Absolutely. Especially having gone through, like, all the weird rigors of the constant pressure of YouTube and then finally getting yourself to release from it and reaching clarity found in a stack of pancakes. But you did say, if you love doing something, you just gotta do it. Maybe it’ll be hard. Maybe you won’t make enough money for a while, but you’re gonna be happy with your life. Did that prophecy come true? Are you doing what you love and has it led to happiness? You know what? Yeah, it did work out. And it worked out in ways that I didn’t expect. I don’t think I fully realized at seventeen what I loved. Because I was still, at that time, trying to be a dramatic actor. Once I got on Smosh and I was doing it for a while, I think it took me a minute to really accept. Like, this is. I couldn’t have found a better place to be and a better job for what I want to do. And so, in so many ways, even though I’m not doing what seventeen year old me pictured I’d be doing. I am actually doing what makes me happiest and what I think I’m actually best at. I just wasn’t willing to accept it back then. Like, it found me more than I found it. So, in a way, the prophecy came true. You’ve already broken your life up into two parts. Let’s say there’s a third part. Okay. What do you think’s happening in that third act for Shayne? And also, do you think that you would look back at thirty year old you and cringe just as hard as you looking back on fifteen year old you? No. I mean, it’s a good thing to look back on yourself and cringe or regret or something, because I think that means you’ve grown, right? Or I imagine I will look back on this, and I do hope to be like, oh, god, like, this guy. But, I also think at this stage, I hope to look back and be proud. I look back on a lot of stuff over the past ten to fifteen years, and I’m like, all right, cringey, silly, but cool. Like, I respect it. It’s important to actually still give yourself those props, and also, I still hope that you do end up doing some dramatic roles. I saw one dramatic role that you did. It was in a So Random sketch. I think Martin Scorsese actually took some inspo from The Irishman. Damien was actually the teacher, and the joke was that he pronounced the word forty. Oh, yeah. He was our Irish teacher. So he. He would say two forty would be two farty. Two farty. And so all the students are just making him say two forty as much as they can. But you. There was empathy behind your eyes. Shayne, I thought you really channeled Daniel Day-Lewis in that moment. No, you know, Damien and I met up in the trailer beforehand, and we talked through the nuance of that scene, and, you know, we wanted to really go back through the history of Ireland and all the struggles, and. And we wanted to bring that out and show that in this, you know, like, this sketch, I’m like, they think this is about a guy who can’t say two forty correctly. This is about the troubles. Yeah, absolutely. It’s about the crown. No, no, I saw that it was about the crown. It’s season four of The Crown. That’s what we’re watching. You said you would have been a therapist if you weren’t acting. You also said that you got some imposter syndrome. Can you do a little, like, self therapizing here? And this isn’t totally for me at all. At all, Shayne, but if some people had imposter syndrome, how would you actually help them through that? Really, the best you can do is ask questions. Now, I’m not. I have a bachelor’s in psychology, which means I have a general education with. But I took a lot of psychology classes. Yeah. Way more than I’ve done, man. I’m in no way a therapist. It would take so many thousands of hours to become a therapist. But, I think if I had, with friends who have imposter syndrome, the best you can do is to ask questions and to lead them to realizing the absurdity of it and also just. There’s no point in it, right? You know, you’re here. You’re doing the thing. You’re so obsessed with the failure of it that you’re not even gonna get to enjoy the doing of it. It was actually something I learned in an acting class, which my coach, he pointed out to me. He’s like, you’re only thinking about messing up this scene, and so you’re gonna mess up the scene, because that’s all you’re thinking about. That becomes your goal. He’s like, focus on what you want. What I do a lot, because I still have imposter syndrome is I find myself in my head thinking that I can think my way out of it, and you just can’t. You’re never gonna think your way out of anxiety. You’re never gonna. That spiral never goes up. It only goes down. And to accept, like, I’m not going to think my way out of this, there’s no thought that’s going to fix this. There’s no realization that’s going to make this go away. I have to accept that this is happening. I have imposter syndrome. It’s there. Cool. What do you want? What makes you happy? Think about that. And if you can’t think about that, that’s okay. Acknowledge that that’s going to still be there and go on despite it. In a similar way, with how nervous I used to get in auditions was something I had to accept of. I’m nervous. Yeah. I’m nervous, and I have to go do this. Okay. I have no choice. Yeah. Over time, the nerves just went away because I just failed enough, and that. The failures end up being a gift because you do it enough where your body starts to go, all right, well, I’m not going to supply you with this anymore because it’s not making a difference. Yeah. If you keep holding on to those failures, biologically, your body’s just gonna shut down. So it just learns to not hold onto it. And, you know, at this stage in my life, and I think this is where I hope to be in twenty to thirty years, is, like, the outcome not being the reason I’m doing stuff. Right? Especially now, where we’re doing so much of what we set out to do, like, we’re doing the thing. Where would I rather be right now? Yeah. So we’re doing the thing that we wanted to do, so it’s more trying to get into that flow state. Like, what I’m jealous of now is when I see people who are just locked in and enjoying the thing. That’s what I want. I just want that. I don’t care if people think it’s good. I don’t care if it’s successful. I care about doing something and really being in the moment with it and having a blast. That rules, man. Eat your cobbler. The ice cream’s getting warm. The cobbler’s getting cold. Yeah, but that’s good. I like when it’s a little bit melted. I like the soup. I’m here for the soup. Yeah. So good. I don’t know that there’s a better taste in the world. That’s what I’ve always said. This is my favorite dessert. What could it be? Is this a proper cobbler to you? Because there’s a lot of. There’s a lot of drama, at least in my world. I’ll be honest. I have no idea. I think when I sent you guys this list, I said, apple cobbler pie. Doesn’t matter. It just needs to be, like, hot cinnamon apple with vanilla ice cream. And this nails it. First time I had this, I was a kid, and I was at my uncle’s house, and my uncle was a chef, and he. I didn’t know that. He was in the kitchen. He was cooking up just, like, a storm. But it was the first time I ever saw a chef, like, a professional chef in action, where they’re cooking, but they’re also cleaning at the same time. Yeah, yeah. And I was amazed that by the time he was done making steak and mashed potatoes and, like, green beans for everyone, the kitchen was just perfectly clean. I couldn’t believe it. And then he just quickly whipped up some apple cobbler and ice cream, and I was like, this is the best. This is the best thing I’ve ever had in my entire life. And I. Every time I have the option to get it, I get it from then on. Shayne, what happens when you die? Where do we go? Here’s what I want. Here’s what I’ve thought. Here’s what I want. I think. I guess it’s kind of, like, a more eastern philosophy of. I don’t know if there’s an individual. I’ve often described it as, like, you hold up a piece of paper to a light, and you poke holes, and you go, the holes are us, but the light is, like, life and experience and stuff. So we’re that, all of us, but we’re experiencing a bunch of different individual things. And so I don’t know. I think it goes on forever. I think, it goes on forever. And I think the idea is to experience everything that can possibly exist, which is everything. So it’s just never ending, infinite, whatever. I know that. I think that whatever it is is so unbelievably far beyond my comprehension, that’s, I do firmly believe that. Yeah. That’s where I kind of end it. It’s just gonna keep going until a monkey fully types out the words of Shakespeare on a typewriter, and then they’re gonna go and scene, and then it’s black.. And then we get a reboot, and then we get a sequel. It’s all IP. But it’s worse. It’s worse. Life number two. And you’re like, this sucks. This seems redundant. And Robert Downey Junior plays it, and you’re like, okay. You’re like, you’re playing what? Shayne you ready for the lightning round? Yeah, let’s do the lightning round. Who’s the one person dead or alive, you’d want to share your actual last meal with? Someone from far in the future, ten thousand years in the future. Someone from there. That would be cool. Robert Downey Junior, Junior, Junior? Yes. There we go. What song do you want to be played at your funeral? Just some nice, like, instrumental. Just classic instrumental, saxophone. Just a royalty free saxophone. Don’t blow the budget, guys. Who would win in a fight, The Chosen or Courtney freaking Miller? With prep time. The Chosen. I’ll give it five days prep. Five days prep? Courtney freaking Miller. Yeah. What’s your biggest fear? My biggest fear is hurting. Hurting others, hurting someone. Who is your favorite pizza place? My favorite pizza place. My actual favorite pizza place is a place in Arizona called Barro’s Pizza. Is there a silent S before it? No, it’s Barro’s. It’s not Sbarro. It’s Barro’s. It’s B-A-R-R-O, Barro’s, which is hilarious. I’m like. Authentic Arizona pizza. Yeah. What’s the hardest goodbye you’ve ever had to say? Oh, my god. Probably every time I say goodbye to my grandpa. Because he cries, and I’m just like, okay, man. Like, you know? And he’s like, a retired colonel, like, in the Air Force, so he’s like, this very, like, serious guy. But then when you see, like, he, you’ll just say goodbye, and then you’ll see him with a tear in his eye, and you’re like, oh, my god, dude. Sounds like a Folgers commercial. Yeah, but every goodbye is hard. Yeah. Smash, marry, kill. Indiana Jones and the Raiders of the Lost Ark, The Before trilogy, and Spirited Away. Okay. I will, I will marry Indiana Jones, or, no, I will, unfortunately, have to kill Spirited Away. But that’s okay. There’s a lot of spirits in that. They’re all good. Most of them are already dead. Fine. I will love or. What was the? What was the? We said smash. Smash. But that’s too, that’s very, like, two thousand eleven. Smash the Before trilogy. I mean, come on, they’re so sexy. And then marry Indiana Jones Raiders of the Lost Ark. He’s rugged. He’s handsome. He’s the best, dude, come on. I’ve never seen it. What’s your greatest regret in life? My greatest regret in life is all the time I’ve spent, like, not doing stuff. You know, it’s the classic answer, but I wished I’d have failed more by this point. Are you happy? Yeah, I am happy. You look happy. Thanks. It’s the mustache. It really helps. I know. Yeah. Shayne, if you want to look into that camera right there and deliver your final words. See ya. Wouldn’t wanna be you, Shayne, truly man. Thank you so much for stopping by. I had a rad conversation, and honestly, I love diving into the psyche of teenage you and thirty year old you. Thank you so much. This has been incredible. Shayne, tell the people where they can find you. You can find me at Smosh, Smosh Pit, Smosh Games, Smosh, and Smosh Cast, where I host the Smosh Mouth podcast with my friend Amanda. And then I’m on Instagram, I’m on TikTok. I’m all over the place doing stupid stuff. But you probably know that. If you want to find him, you can find him. Yeah. And thank you so much for stopping by Mythical Kitchen. We got new episodes out all the time. Drop a comment on who else you want to see on Last Meals, or don’t. Face the reality of mortality head on with our new Last Meals Hoodie, available now at mythical.com