-My first guest is a talented actor,
who you can see in the new movie "Freaky,"
which is in theaters this Friday.
Here he is, Vince Vaughn. Vince, oh --
-Good to see you, man. -I'm so happy.
Thank you so much for doing this.
I really appreciate it. -Always great to see you, dude.
-Yeah, great. Last time you helped me out,
it was six months ago.
We were on Zoom, and we're like, "What's going on?"
We're trying to help each other out with our kids and stuff.
Here we are, we're still on Zoom.
-I know. We're still in the middle of it.
-Yeah. -But you're back in the studio,
which is exciting. -Yeah. This is exciting.
It's good. It's baby steps.
It's very safe here at NBC. [ Ringtone plays ]
-Are you liking that? -Wait. That's me calling you.
-Hello, Jimmy? I got you.
You're right here on Zoom. Thank you so much.
-Okay, I'll talk to you later.
-Are you liking being back in the studio?
-Yeah, I am. I do like it here.
It's -- I miss the audience, and I miss
having all the writers around.
And, you know, everyone's so spaced out.
They're in different little things.
Not all the writers can come back.
So it's a little tough that way.
But besides that, I like --
The sound is much better. My kids aren't running.
-I thought you did a great job from home, and your wife, too.
You guys did a great job from home.
-Thank you. I feel like my wife --
-It's probably nice to get some space,
for her to get a little space from you.
-[ Laughs ] -You can go crank up the funnies
downtown now, am I right? -[ Laughs ]
I was gonna say, she's very cool.
She's like, "No, it was great.
It was just a perfect amount of time."
I want to say two weeks ago, I go, "Honey, I think I can
probably come home a little early, you know, if you want."
She goes, "Take your time. Take the night."
And then I go, "Okay."
-A nice way of saying, it's like,
"Don't do it for us. We're okay."
[ Both laugh ] -Exactly.
Is remote learning going okay with you and your kids?
-Yeah. It's been good.
We do pods. We have four in a class.
-Yep. -It's not like I'm
in the middle of it, like, rolling up my sleeves.
I hired a teacher, which is a benefit for everyone,
including the children. -Yeah.
My wife did that, too, yeah. -And they're loving it.
And I like it 'cause at least they get to socialize, like,
"Hey, that was my pencil," or, you know,
they're at least learning how to behave.
How about you? You're doing the same thing?
-Same exact thing. Yeah.
Me and my wife set up this whole thing,
and it's -- You know, we just didn't know
where it was gonna go and what to do,
but the kids are having a great time.
They're learning. It's like we have
all sorts of different teachers,
music teachers, Spanish teachers.
It's like -- I had nothing like that going to my school.
-No. You're, like, raising X-Men.
That's exciting. You have, like, music and Spanish?
-[ Laughing ] -Like raising
future Secret Service. -You know, my kids love is --
Winnie loves Reading Eggs, you told me about.
It's an app. -Yes.
My kids have enjoyed that. -She does that.
-Do you make them earn games by doing that?
-Yep. Exactly right.
She's actually, like, going like, "I've got to read more,
because I've got to get the game."
But I don't know -- the logo freaks me out a little bit.
-A little bit? A lot, yeah, a lot.
-You see that thing? -Yeah, it's not a --
-Is it a human? -It's a nice app, to be clear,
but the logo design, I don't know what happened.
-It's like a kid inside of an egg.
-Bursting out of their egg.
-That's true. Bursting out.
It's much too large. Already wearing shoes.
And then, like, throwing a plane --
I don't know. I think I would go back...
-I'd like to see it with you and myself bursting out of the egg.
That could be an exciting logo. -Yeah.
We don't have an investment in this company,
but why not us coming out, like, holding --
Or even holding books or something.
Why a plane? -Yeah, right.
Why not engage in reading?
-Have you watched movies with the kids?
-I do. I watch a lot of movies,
and my son has a real appetite for dangerous stuff.
And he's 7 years old.
I watched the original "Dirty Harry" with him.
I don't know how this plays out, but I did it.
-Wow! -I know. It's scary.
It's freaky. You remember that guy
that's a real psycho in that movie?
-Yeah, he's like -- It's, like, awful.
-Remember, he's, like, shooting people from a rooftop
to open up the film?
-And he's, like, laughing really --
[ Laughter ]
Oh, that's scary to me.
My little one likes the scary ones.
She likes those -- like, we watched "Coraline"
and thought she was going to freak out, and she loved it.
-"Coraline's" a scary one. -She's like,
"Why does everyone have button eyes?"
-When the eyes go away. -Yeah, she goes,
"Do you and Mommy have button eyes?"
And I go, "Okay, all right."
Let's go back to watching cartoons.
-Sometimes it goes over their head, thankfully.
-What were you watching when you were their age?
-I had two older sisters, so they weren't knocking to go see,
you know, "Jaws" or "Saturday Night Fever"
just 'cause I was like 6.
So I would go -- I was like --
They'd just, like, "Bring him along."
But I kind of liked -- I didn't like scary.
Scary really bothered me at night. You?
-Yeah, no, I was not a scary --
I don't think I was even allowed to.
We didn't have HBO. We had nothing.
So, I mean, if I did see a horror movie, it was like --
Oh, gosh, maybe some edited version of "Halloween"
or something on TV.
-Inappropriate language and that kind of stuff --
the comedy stuff I was fine with.
-We were -- -Possession stuff bothered me.
The puppets talking and stuff
would really give me a hard evening.
-Yeah, I agree. The "Twilight Zone"
with the puppet, where he talks back,
and the guy becomes the puppet.
-Wasn't it "Twilight Zone" with Burgess Meredith,
the gentleman who dazzled in "Rocky,"
when he lost his glasses?
-He's -- The man loves books.
-Yes, that's it. -He loves to read,
and it's the end of the world, and he's the only --
And he survives, and he goes over to the library
and just rubble and thousands of books,
and he's like... [ Laughing ]
Like, crazy laughing, he's so happy.
And he walks, and he trips, and his glasses fall off,
and he breaks his glasses. -Yeah.
They did a nice job with that show, didn't they?
-Oh, they were so good. I remember the first movie
I think my parents took me to, I was probably 5 or 6,
I saw "The Champ," with Ricky Schroeder.
-Did the tears fall? -Dude, I cried my eyes out.
Everyone was crying. It's unbelievable.
You don't take a kid to go see "The Champ," do you?
-That was a remake. I didn't realize that,
but there was an original "Champ."
Was the same actor from "Treasure Island."
Did you always watch movies? Were you always into movies?
-Yeah, my parents loved -- -Yeah, me, too.
-Yeah, loved it. We were Irish Catholic,
so every James Cagney movie -- We were watching
gangster movies, didn't know what they were.
-Would your dad go around the house saying, "You dirty rat"?
-Yeah, that was my first impression.
I swear I'll get it next time you're on.
I'm gonna play it for you. I was probably 2 years old.
I said, "You dirty rat." -It's so good.
Would you go to school and say that to people,
and they were like, "Where is this guy coming from?"
-I was doing, like, Don Ho impressions like, no one --
-You were singing "Tiny Bubbles"?
-I said aloha. That was my jam.
No, that wasn't the opener, nor was it a closer.
But it was somewhere in the act. -Yeah.