0:04
Right now. There we go. Right now. Oh, okay.
Search this video
0:14
Hey, what's going on everybody?
0:14
From First We Feast, I'm Sean Evans and you're watching Hot Ones.
0:17
It's the show with hot questions and even hotter wings.
0:20
And today we're joined by Mark Ruffalo.
0:21
He's one of the most prolific and celebrated actors of our time, from the theater stage to Oscar-winning dramas to iconic rom-coms and historic Hollywood blockbusters.
0:28
His latest project though is Poor Things, the Yorgos Lanthimos-directed dark comedy opening in theaters this December.
0:34
We're very excited for that.
0:35
Mark Ruffalo, welcome to the show. Thanks, Sean. I'm glad to be here.
0:40
What's going through your head as you prepare to take on the gauntlet?
0:41
Are you at all nervous going into this?
0:44
Yeah, I'm I'm a little nervous about the bomb.
0:47
And uh um the uh the goat. The ginger goat.
0:50
Well, those are two things to be wary of.
0:52
Are you ready to get started over here? this, Sean. It's pre-sauced?
1:11
Sorry, I should know that. Mhm.
1:23
I'm still I'm still I feel a little kick there. It's a little creeper.
1:27
It's a creeper hot sauce. Okay.
1:36
So, in Poor Things, you play the role of a dapper lawyer who you've described as a bon vivant, somebody who enjoys the finer things in life and thinks of himself as the world's greatest lover.
1:45
Was there any sort of perverse pleasure or joy in playing a character so self-obsessed?
1:51
Yeah, I mean, I don't get to play many parts like that.
1:53
And um honestly, I was scared of it.
1:56
He's a real Casanova and he's out of control and it's, you know, getting to do it, it was just so free.
2:05
People have all these expectations on you and uh and you start to get stuck in these boxes and at 55 I'm like sick of that.
2:12
And so, it was just a kind of an explosion of um of kind of radical creativity for me.
2:28
All this talking is to avoid moving to the next to the next.
2:33
Listen, I'm well aware of the stall tactics, okay, Mark? I've seen them all.
2:36
They've got their 10,000 hours in. Okay, cool.
2:39
All right, but you can't hide anymore because this next one is the shishito and garlic here in the two spot. All right, here we go. I'm glad I came hungry. That's the way to do it. Mhm.
2:52
There's this often quoted Mark Ruffalo fun fact about this time in your life, a decade plus, where you went on an estimated 800 auditions without landing a single role.
3:02
Is there a moment that you think back on and can pinpoint as being like your acting rock bottom?
3:05
Like what do you think is the closest you ever came to just giving it up forever?
3:10
So, I probably quit like six times during the course of it all.
3:13
Um the closest was I my dad had a was part of a construction painting business and um I went to Wisconsin.
3:25
And I walked on a job site and I saw some guys like sandblasting.
3:31
And these dudes work, I mean, they're covered head to toe and they got you know, all day long and they're sandblasting them and You're like, uh maybe I should give it one more shot.
3:46
Yeah, I was like, my hands are too soft for this.
3:49
But but my mom got wind of this.
3:51
I didn't tell my mom cuz I knew she'd be bummed, right?
3:53
And she got wind of this and she called me and she's like, "What are you doing?"
4:02
She says to me, "If you quit acting, I will never speak to you again.
4:06
I will be so angry and upset with you."
4:11
And I I never heard my mom talk like that.
4:14
And so I was like, "That works." Dad?
4:20
I told him Mom says I should give it another shot.
4:22
I'm going to have to go cuz Mom won't let me. Mom won't let me quit. I got to go call my dad. That's all right.
4:31
OKAY, WE GOT THAT OUT OF THE WAY. SPICY? YEP. And sweet. Not too bad heat-wise. That's good.
4:43
We're in a good spot right now. And my yeah.
4:47
I'm feeling more confident. Right where we want you.
4:48
We got you right where we want you. Spank me. All right.
4:55
What do you think is your personal record for the most takes ever requested by a director while you're shooting a scene?
5:01
You know, I read a quote from your Collateral co-star, Jamie Fox, about how particular Michael Mann can be.
5:07
David Fincher makes Michael Mann look like he's working on a McDonald's hamburger line. I during rush hour.
5:16
I mean, so my first day of work, it was a walk and talk with Jake Gyllenhaal. And we're on take 63.
5:29
Fincher, he came straight towards me and I was like, "Oh no, here he comes."
5:31
And then he walks right by me and he he goes to a background artist behind me. He moves him 2 in.
5:42
He starts walking back to the monitor on the back of me on my back and walks past me.
5:47
And I was like, "Oh, okay.
5:50
I'm just happy to be like 2% of the frame."
5:54
The other crazy thing is he invented the delete button for digital media. Out of necessity.
5:59
He knows he's not going to use it, so he's like, "Why have it?"
6:01
And he literally you'd be in take 50 and he'd be like, "Delete takes 1 through 45."
6:11
And you're like, "Take 30 was the one."
6:21
Do you get sick of spice?
6:24
Not sick enough to think about getting a real job, if that makes sense. Never get a real job. right.
6:30
But I accept it, you know what I mean? it's it's a sacrifice. Yeah.
6:34
You got to suffer for the art.
6:35
Yeah, man, you have to suffer for the art.
6:38
So I read that while preparing for your role as real-life Boston Globe reporter Michael Rezendes in Spotlight, that you asked him, "Can I see you yell at someone?"
6:46
What does that teach you if anything other than like how they yell?
6:52
I had heard that he can be a little hot, a little spicy on some of his calls.
6:58
And so I asked to sort of I wanted to take along with him just to see how he did his business and the cool thing about being an actor is you get invited into these worlds that most people will never be invited into.
7:11
And people want to tell their stories.
7:14
So they're very vulnerable and honest with you in a way.
7:18
And it's just this it's kind of this peak into humanity that's so rare. Mhm.
7:25
And it just makes it fun and it and it makes you have an an appreciation for all different walks of life and different people, you know, and their beliefs and how they came to those beliefs and so on and so forth. It's good.
7:41
Now, what kind of pepper is that one?
7:43
It's got uh You need glasses, man.
7:47
Yeah, I might need Are you Are you at that point yet? Oh, I don't know. I guess we can try. Let's see. It's hard to accept. I actually Now, try.
7:56
These are working kind of better. of hot on you. Do these work? Yeah, man.
8:01
All right, let's see here.
8:02
Can you Can you read that?
8:05
Literally, it's it's like a a flea's writing.
8:08
We've got a serrano peppers in this one. Oh, yum. Serrano peppers.
8:12
And then it says it brings a punch. They're not lying. No, it does. It It's a creeper. Yeah. Yeah. of builds on you.
8:18
Yeah, it's a step up over here. Yeah. up over here. Yeah. Uh Uh How about this? Fact or fiction?
8:25
Is it true that you once accidentally popped Channing Tatum's ear during a particularly physical scene Are you joking me?
8:33
where he told you before the take, "Just slap the out of me and get it over with."
8:38
Oh, there's a lot of that.
8:41
He did ask me to slap the out of him, and it was easy to do because he'd beaten the out of me so many times.
8:50
We had It was like 4 months of wrestling, of learning how to wrestle together.
8:55
And he's like has 30 lb on me.
8:59
Um so, when it came time to smack the out of him, I was like, "Came from Alabama."
9:11
All right, I'll give these back to you cuz I'm worried about how used to them I'm getting. They're good, right? Oh, ghost pepper. Mhm. Gently building. In the back. Yeah. Of the palate.
9:27
Yeah, this is kind of like the one that um makes my throat scratch a little bit.
9:30
Yeah, I'm starting to get a little little um Uh What is it called? Expragation?
9:36
Oh, I I didn't even I did not know that.
9:38
How was that going to help you out at all? Like a little, you know. Yeah. Yeah.
9:42
Which is What is that called? Expergation. Expergation?
9:45
Yeah, that's like a law in New York City.
9:47
You're not allowed to expergate. Oh, okay. Well, I'm expergating. Yeah.
9:50
Something fierce right now.
9:51
Are you you feeling that? Yeah, I'm expergating. Mhm.
9:57
What makes Kenneth Lonergan's This Is Our Youth such a sought-after playground for young actors?
10:01
It's kind of crazy the number of people I've interviewed who have that as part of their origin story.
10:06
Yeah, it's like it's like our generation's Hamlet.
10:07
Um It's just such great writing. It's so well designed.
10:13
It's sort of that character becomes a man and an equal to his friend.
10:18
And those people who are who are the dominant ones in high school, unless they change, it doesn't work out for them, you know, going forward.
10:27
And it's the geeks or the the nerds or the more thoughtful people that actually kind of do well later in their lives.
10:38
It like pierces the heart of the theater kid. Totally. It smashes it. The ginger goat. We're going big. Yeah. It's an explosion. I'm with you. Yeah. Oh, yeah. Same wavelength. Yeah.
11:00
Same page, Mark, right now. Oh, yeah. I'm down with that. Yeah.
11:04
Have you ever had Woody Harrelson on the show? No, but I'm dying to.
11:07
Can you put in a word for me? He has.
11:10
He has this pepper that he grows in Hawaii.
11:15
He gives it out in a little vial, like that, with a cork.
11:18
Uh, I've met some of those guys before.
11:20
It's literally a matchstick amount of that in a freaking giant pot of chili. And that's enough? And it's just bam! It is so intense.
11:34
I mean, he carries one with him everywhere he goes.
11:36
Yeah, I know guys like that, too.
11:38
He might be crossbreeding that stuff himself out there. he is, man.
11:40
If anyone knows how to crossbreed, it's him.
11:48
Can you give us one pro and one con of having Joaquin Phoenix as a roommate when the two of you shared a house while shooting Reservation Road? He's a great cook.
11:58
And he turned me on to um vegan cuisine.
12:02
And so, he would cook all the time.
12:05
And he was a great roommate.
12:05
You know, he was a roommate who'd be out and he he'd get you'd get a text, "Need anything?"
12:10
You know, "Want Need me to pick up anything?" The place is clean.
12:13
All the dishes were washed.
12:15
He's got a great sense of humor. He was super thoughtful.
12:18
And he offered for me to stay there.
12:21
I was supposed to stay somewhere else.
12:22
He he's like, "Hey, man, why don't you stay here?
12:23
I have like three bedrooms."
12:25
And you're like, "All right, I'll renew the lease." Yeah.
12:28
Put me on the Put me on the lease.
12:32
This is not my jam, this next one. Okay.
12:33
That looks It looks serious.
12:33
It has a little It has a little nuclear fallout uh Yeah. Yeah.
12:40
And there's a reason for that. They're not lying.
12:42
The label being a warning is appropriate in this case. It is beyond insanity.
12:49
So, this is like the turbo or what is it?
12:51
The insane button on the Tesla? Yeah. That's what we're doing. We're lighting it up. All right, here we go. It looks really red. Yeah.
12:58
I'm going to take this whole thing. You are? Let's do it.
13:02
All right, I'll go where you go. Cheers. Cheers. I'm stupid. This thing keeps going.
13:22
I know, and it doesn't stop. It doesn't stop.
13:24
And this has got a nice long hair which sometimes makes it doesn't it?
13:29
of always makes it worse but if we didn't have it on the table people would ask for it.
13:33
You know what I'm saying? Just two more. We're so close. We're so close.
13:37
But before we get there Yeah.
13:40
You know, you've been an established actor here now for over three decades.
13:44
How has it been that long?
13:45
Yeah, it's been a long time. It's been It's true. It's true.
13:47
Dozens and dozens of titles.
13:50
Some of them huge massive Hollywood blockbusters.
13:52
Others maybe don't even remember making them.
13:55
And to put that to the test I want to play a game where I hit you with a Mark Ruffalo movie tagline and you try to connect the tagline to the movie.
14:06
All right, does that sound good? Sounds okay.
14:09
When the girl next door when the girl next door moves across the hall Apartment 13. Wow, there you go. One for one.
14:16
That was like my first movie. There you go.
14:18
You remember the tagline.
14:19
And I remember the girl across the you know, across the hallway.
14:22
The girl next door moves across the hallway. I know. I know. I'll tell you something.
14:26
It was so low budget that I flubbed a take and the director came up to me and said, "That was 500 bucks just so you know." Okay, let's go ahead. I kind of like that.
14:36
Keep the actors accountable, you know.
14:40
How am I supposed to practice my craft when you're putting a number over my head, man?
14:48
It's that kind of pressure.
14:48
That's what's going to form a diamond. And it did.
14:50
I was Whatever happened that director?
14:51
He go on to become Scorsese, right? Basically. How about this one?
14:56
Forbidden desires are unleashed and unspeakable evil is watching. That's Mirror Mirror. There you go. Good job.
15:07
That might have been my first movie.
15:10
There was Mirror Mirror and then Mirror Mirror 2 Raven Dance. Yeah, yeah.
15:14
Which had a penthouse porn star in the female lead and Billy Drago in the male lead. And I'm Oh my god.
15:26
I was the I was like the serious actor's sidekick.
15:31
And my first It was like a softcore horror film.
15:33
Like that's where I got my start. Yeah, yeah.
15:35
That was like your crime procedural.
15:37
I Yes, that's where I got my That was my brand.
15:40
It's like, "Oh, get get the kid. Get that Ruffalo kid." How about this one?
15:49
It's a wonderful afterlife. Aw.
15:56
I only know one afterlife, just like heaven. That's it. That's it. That's it.
16:01
Hold on, I need to wipe down.
16:03
Oh, no, my makeup came off. How are you feeling?
16:07
doing a cutaway to a commercial now?
16:10
You look like you're Yeah. That's what we do. After the bomb.
16:15
All right, and we'll be right back with more Mark Ruffalo here on Hot Ones. It's really well done.
16:25
Are you going tongue down?
16:26
I'm going wherever you take it. Tongue down. All right, tongue down.
16:30
So the hot part on the tongue. All right. Full? Living dangerous. Yeah. Right there. There we go. Right there. All right.
16:47
Got tongue down, spice on tongue. Full on. Direct skin contact. Direct tongue action. Yeah. No prophylactic. Mhm.
16:55
Do you have a favorite living sculptor? twice. I know. I know.
16:58
It does There's always a second act to this show.
17:03
Do you have a favorite living sculptor?
17:04
I know that that's become like a profound kind of escape for you, like an outlet for you. Okay.
17:10
All right, I don't want to blow it up.
17:12
I don't want to blow it up. Blow it up.
17:13
Just Can you Can we take that one back?
17:16
I I I hear you're taking uh like classes or I'll be autographing Funko's all day long.
17:27
There'll be like 10 new people in the class that just happen to have Funko's on them, right?
17:34
I don't want it to turn into the you know like the baggage claim at the airport or anything. Yeah.
17:41
Yeah, you heard about that? Oh my god.
17:43
Funko to believe it or not. I'll sign your Funko. Take out that Funko.
17:48
Can somebody grab my toy?
17:51
I'm taking them up on that.
17:51
I'll totally sign your Funko.
17:53
I'll sign anyone's Funko here. All right.
17:58
My teacher's name Arslan.
17:58
He's a he's a he's a Russian sculptor. He's so great.
18:05
And I he's he's my favorite living sculptor right now.
18:07
And he's not super well known, but he's known and he is just an amazing sculptor.
18:11
And if you want to go online and look up Arslan, he's on there and all his works on there and he's just fantastic. I knew it.
18:22
I knew you were going to do that. What I'm shaking it. You got to shake it.
18:28
Like daddy needs a new pair of shoes.
18:34
Man, you really slathered that thing, didn't you? On accident.
18:37
Try not to do what I did.
18:39
No, I'm doing what you did. Here we go. Here we go. Sean, I'm with you.
18:43
Is that look about right?
18:43
Yeah, that looks that looks perfect. Okay. I won't stop you. Are we doing fullsies?
18:55
Yeah, we're doing fullsies.
18:55
Well, I'm going wherever you go, but You wouldn't ask if you weren't going fullsies. Five.
19:04
See you on the other side.
19:11
Become a non-verbal show here at the end. Yeah. Okay, I got you. I got you. Yeah, yeah, yeah. All right. So, Mark Ruffalo.
19:25
To close things out, you know, it's been such an amazing spice journey with you.
19:29
The highs, the lows, the dark days of serial auditions and serving up margaritas to keep the lights on. know everything.
19:39
What would be your advice to other young aspiring actors?
19:41
Like if you were to come across somebody who likewise had 800 auditions without booking one, would your advice be closer to never give up or call it quits?
19:55
You're the only one who can stop you.
19:59
You know, as any kind of artist, you are the one who says it's enough.
20:05
Cuz sometimes you feel like, "Oh, this world is not is against me doing this."
20:09
I had a lot of time like that. Next, stay out of debt.
20:16
Do not take on huge debt because you need time.
20:20
And you can't spend all your time servicing that debt.
20:23
You got to be doing your work.
20:26
And number three is develop yourself.
20:29
Right now, everyone's on social media and and everyone's in some way trying to trying to be the same, you know? Yeah, yeah, yeah.
20:36
And it's like stay off of that and and develop yourself so you have your own voice.
20:41
It's you who they're looking for, not the next X.
20:47
You know, develop develop a style, develop a way of working.
20:51
Wise words from Mark Ruffalo.
20:51
And look at you, taking on the Wings of Death, living to tell the tale. Wings of Death.
20:57
And now there's nothing left to do but roll out the red carpet for you, Mark Ruffalo. Thanks, guys.
21:03
This camera, this camera, this camera.
21:04
Let the people know what you have going on in your Um, I have four things coming out.
21:06
I have um, which is an amazing movie and so much fun.
21:13
What other There's another camera? That one? Mhm. I got lots of them.
21:18
Mark Ruffalo and uh, this is Hot Ones. Thanks for joining.
21:23
Um, I have uh, All the Light We Cannot See on Netflix out right now.
21:27
And I just shot a television show.
21:32
And that's Hal and Harper directed by the amazing Cooper Raiff um, with Lili Reinhart and um, Betty Gilpin. Thank you. YOU DID IT. YOU DID IT. THAT'S THE HOTTEST ONE. THAT COME HERE. Come here.
21:49
We we we survived Sauce brothers until the end, brother. Thank you, man. Thank you. That was great. I had a great time. I was scared. Thank you.
22:02
really nice to meet you, man. That was great.
22:04
You're a great interviewer, man.
22:05
That was that was really in-depth.
22:08
Well, we got to meet you halfway, you know? old cuts, man. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Some deep cuts.
22:13
It's fun to dive into the material, you know?
22:14
Like that's the part that I I like about it, you know?
22:17
You're really good at it. Thank you, Mark. I appreciate that.
22:19
Yeah, bless you guys, everybody. Nice to meet you. Nice meeting you. Where's your Funko? Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. Somebody got my toy?
22:30
Hey, what's going on, Hot Ones fans?
22:32
This is Sean Evans with an announcement.
22:33
Truth or Dab The Game now has a brand new refresh edition. That's right.
22:36
If you already had the original Truth or Dab game, you can now get even more hotter questions with the refresh edition. The game is simple.
22:46
Answer deeply personal and potentially awkward questions or face the wrath of The Last Dab. That's right.
22:52
Both editions of the game feature a mini bottle of The Last Dab hot sauce.
22:56
Check out the description below to see where you can pick up Hot Ones Truth or Dab the Game or visit wildertoys. com.