Paul Reiser On The Return Of ‘Mad About You’ And Ad-Libbing His ‘Kominsky Method’ Farting Scene

It feels like, after a few years of laying relatively low, Paul Reiser is suddenly all over our television screens. But the “Reiserssance” has been going on for a few years now; it’s just intensified in the past year. He appeared as not-so-nice theater producer Cy Feuer in the miniseries Fosse/Verdon, then resprised his role as Dr. Sam Owens at the very end of Stranger Things’ third season.

About that appearance, Reiser recalled what ST producers The Duffer Brothers told him about when Dr. Owens would show up. “I think somewhere they intimated at the beginning that, ‘You’re going to come in at the end, and it’s going to be cool.’ So that’s all I knew,” he told Decider. “And then it wasn’t until the last episode, the last two minutes, so I assume that there’ll be something to in season four, otherwise why bother me?”

That would be a good year for any veteran actor, but then Chuck Lorre cast him in a guest role in season 2 of The Kominsky Method, opposite Oscar winners Alan Arkin and Michael Douglas. He plays Martin Schneider, the bald, paunchy, sixty-six year old boyfriend of Sandy Kominsky’s 30-something daughter Mindy (Sarah Baker). He’s in most of the eight-episode second season, and even gets put on the spot by Sandy (Douglas) when Martin attends the Kominsky Acting School, unleashing a monologue that’s among some of the best work Reiser has ever done.

But, as they say on infomercials, that’s not all! Reiser has a role in Fatherhood, Kevin Hart’s new movie, which comes out in 2020. And, on November 20, Reiser, Helen Hunt, and most of the cast of Mad About You reunite to do a 12-episode revival of the ’90s series, which will air on Spectrum Originals.

We sat down with Reiser for a wide-ranging interview about this busy period in his career, working with Douglas, Arkin and Hart, how he felt back in the Mad About You fold.

DECIDER: Did Chuck Lorre approach you for the Kominsky role?

PAUL REISER: it’s funny. These two shows [Kominsky and Stranger Things] happened in odd ways, which only underscores my main theory, which is you can plan all you want, and then that ain’t necessarily how it’s going to be. Stranger Things, which is the biggest thing there is, happened just because the [Duffer Brothers] had thought of me, and called me and asked me to do the role, which was absurd. And then Kominsky, I know Chuck from his very, very, very first days in town, 30-something years ago. More. So… yeah, 30 something. So we’ve been keeping in touch, and we always threatened to do something together, and he’s really busy. And when I watched the first season of Kominsky, I was just so blown away, I thought it was so great, and I was so, if I’m allowed to be proud, proud of him. It was so personal and clear, and different from what he is most known for writing.

So I just sent him an email to tell him how great it was, and I half-jokingly said, “Come on, let’s do something like that together.” I said, “Two guys sitting in a car, I could do that all day.” I said, “That’s right in my wheelhouse.” And I was really only half-kidding, and then he called me back, and he said, “Well it’s funny you should say that; let’s have lunch.” So we had lunch and I was pitching him some ideas. “Come on, we could do this, we could write this.” And he went, “You don’t have to say yes, but would you like to come on to season two of this?” And I went, “Yes.” I know I don’t have to, but I did. There you go.

I think he had the role in mind. I don’t think he was… I think he probably would have gone with someone older, but when I called I think he just went, “Huh. That could be fun.” And that was in November. At the end of November, and that’s how fast he writes. January we were shooting. So it was crazy. And it was a dream gig. Have him writing, and he’s writing I think the best stuff he’s written, and it just flows out of him, it’s beautiful. And to go play with Alan Arkin and Michael Douglas is pretty damn fun.

So that’s what I mean. It’s not your average sitcom because you’ve got those two guys doing the leads, so given your experience, how is it different than doing… you’ve done single camera, you’ve done multi-cam, how is it different for you doing a show like this?

Well this is… one of the nice things about this moment in TV, if we can still call it TV, is there’s so many unique flavors, and there are so many different platforms to appear on, and so many different flavors. So we’re not bound into the traditional half hour “sitcom formula,” because this is not a sitcom. It’s a half hour comedy, but it’s a very different flavor. I somehow expected that Chuck, who’s the king of half hours, who just turns them out, I thought this would be… before I watched it, the first season, I assumed erroneously that it’s going to be jokey, and it’s going to be sitcom-y. And it was so not, and it was such a different flavor, and he was writing from such a true place in his heart, that it had its own flavor, and it was beautiful.

And you come in and you’re working on this episode this week, but it’s really just a little brick in the wall of the whole season. And you don’t have an audience. We’re doing the Mad About Yous now, and it also has an arc, and they do run into each other, but it’s much more traditional in that each episode has an ending. They have to link together, and they do build on each other, but you still look at them as wrapping up. And I think one of the things with The Kominsky Method is, they don’t need to. And they can just put the scissors anywhere, and you’ll say, “Great, I’ll come back and watch the next piece now.”

Yeah, especially in season two, one flowed into the other very well.

Chuck said something about that that he really learned from this first season, he learned how to better write for this medium. And that he knew how to write in that way, that it also… that the episodes don’t have to end as much, but also that a lot of things can be done cinematically without dialogue, when you have actors like Michael and Alan. You don’t have to write a joke, you just push them on Alan’s face and you’re getting a laugh.

Alan Arkin’s the king of just acting via pained expressions.

I tell you, Alan was one of those guys that I adored and idolized growing up, and I didn’t love a lot of actors. I didn’t care about acting as a kid. But Peter Falk and Alan Arkin just were the two guys that I zeroed in on really young. And I didn’t know what they were doing, but I went, “That’s good. Whatever it is they’re doing, I’m enjoying that.” And as I got older, I watched Alan… The In-Laws is one of my favorite movies of all time, it has both of my heroes in there.

And you get to see what he’s doing, and it’s just so sly and deliberate. It’s not accidental. He’s very meticulous about his craft, but he’s just so funny and so much of that is somewhat him. He’s a bit curmudgeonly and fatalistic, but he’s also very Zen Buddha. Philosophical. It is close to him. So that was a thrill. And I only had that really one episode where I got to work with him, which was a shame, because I was hoping to have more with him. It was just so fun. I mean he’s just… we would make each other laugh. To get a laugh out of Alan Arkin is a nice feeling.

But the education for me was watching Michael. He’s been such a big star for so long that you take it for granted, and he’s not flashy. You think of De Niro a certain way, or Pacino, sort of explosive guys. And Michael can certainly do that and he has, but he’s just movie star. And so I never really thought one way or another about him as an actor. But getting to work with him, I would just get a sense of what he does. And we would do a scene, and I would go, “I don’t think he’s doing anything. It looked so… it was so natural it almost felt like nothing. And then I’d watch it, and I’d go, “Oh, geez. He’s good. He’s really good.” And it ain’t an accident and it’s not nothing. He’s just very… he’s very subtle and funny.

As Sandy he comes off as very casual and laid back and funny, even though he’s going through this crisis of his health scare.

Yeah, and I think Chuck writes to that. Michael is a big star, who’s, anyway you slice it is in the latter part of his life. When you’re in your 70s, you’re not 20. So that informs it. Part of that dynamic that was written was also off-camera. We’d be sitting there exchanging doctor’s numbers, and we’re like, “Here’s they guy I see for my knee,” and “Here’s a urologist.” All right, this shit’s not… this is real, we’re not making this stuff up.

But he’s really funny, and Chuck wrote funny characters. So when Sandy Kominsky is funny, he’s making a joke. And he can make a joke as people do. It’s not a sitcom where the character’s making just a free-form funny holding for a laugh. If he’s getting a laugh, he’s making a joke, which you’re allowed to laugh at, or you’re laughing at his pain. His discomfort is funny.

And then there’s that scene where he’s doing the scene from Doubt with the student that saw him getting treatment. That is the scene where the Michael Douglas from Wall Street comes out.

I’m telling you, it was like going to acting school for me. I mean, I was just watching, and that class, I’ve been in enough classes. It’s been a while, but you remember those classes, and it feels so real. And it’s a set, it’s fake, but it feels real. And sitting in that room, and somebody going up, and the excitement of nervousness of somebody doing a scene, and wanting the teacher’s approval. And that’s all palpable. And Michael is the veteran, and so when he’s talking to those kids, it’s sounds like if Michael was talking to those kids.

And [there’s] one scene, and Chuck wrote a beautiful piece, where he for fun makes me come up there. Or for vengeance makes me go up there. And pushed me to open up. [Michael’s] off camera. We do his shot and then we’re shooting me. And some actors might say, “Hey man, good luck, I’m going home early.” And we don’t need him there. But not only was he there, as an acting partner and as a producer, but he wasn’t just sitting there. But in his silence, I felt it, I could just see… and you see it in those takes, in those cutaways to him. He’s giving you something. He’s working, and he’s like a therapist or an acting coach. His silence was punching me, the character, to go deeper, but it also was making me feel that. It was like, “Oh, man. I didn’t really want to be up here.”

I think some of that stuff was ad-libbed, I can’t remember now. But I was just so struck by how powerful he was not saying anything.

Do you feel that, considering that you’ve been doing this for almost 40 years now, that it’s refreshing that you can still learn from folks like Michael and Alan?

Oh, yeah. I would never assume, I wouldn’t. Hopefully we’re always learning. I hope I’m learning til the end. I don’t think we ever get to a point where we go, “Got it.” I’ve never heard of that.

When you’re going in to those acting school scenes, do you feel like the student, a little bit?

No, the character, it was funny because he was so out of place. I can’t remember why I was even… oh yeah, because [Sarah Baker’s character] pushed me. She said, “You got to get out of the house, you’ve been moping since your heart attack. Come on, sit in the class.” So I didn’t feel like I was me, Paul, I felt like I was that character.

And to me that was… [the monologue] was towards the end of the eight, and I don’t know where Chuck is going, if he’s going at all, but I assume that’s part of my character’s arc, that he had to open up. And in the beginning, when you meet my guy, he’s really… I mean the joke is wow, his young daughter is dating an old guy, and that’s the fun, and that’s the fun of being, I’m a thorn in his side. But the character is very upbeat. Yeah, he’s old, but he’s happy. He’s with a young woman, he writes books, he drinks wine, he makes pottery. He’s a happy guy.

And over the course of the season, that façade comes down. Like, “Oh man, you know what? I don’t know what I’ve done. I was teaching for 30 years and I didn’t like that, and I’m not sure what the hell I’ve done.” And so whatever façade, or whatever real comfort I had at the beginning starts to get chipped away, and that makes me excited for whatever it is he’s going to write this time.

By the way, did he tell you from the beginning you’ll be bald with a ponytail and a paunch?

Yeah, he did. I said yes, and then he said, “Well come in, we want to talk to you.” And he said, “We’re going to age you up.” And I said, “Sure, whatever you want. Call me 68, 70, whatever you want.” He said, “No, no, we’re not just going to say it. We’re going to do it.” He said, “We’re going to make you bald, and give you a gut.” And I said, “I’ve already got a gut.” I said, “I can save you money, right there.” I said, “And the bald, it’s coming. Just hang out a few years, and we can do it.” And then he says, “And before you go, also we’re giving you a ponytail.”

And so at first you go, “Oh, that’s going to be stupid.” But it really was a genius stroke, because it just really defines the character. Absent the ponytail, I looked in the mirror after ever two hours, three hours of makeup, and I’d go, “Oh my God, I’m my father.” Then I’d see the ponytail, and I’d go, “No, I’m not my father.” He didn’t have that. But it does a lot of the acting for you.

So, when you’re playing this kind of character, a character who’s got some dignity in life, but he can be talkative when he gets high, or when he had his heart attack he crapped his pants. Things like that. A little bit awkward, a little bit out of place, a little bit embarrassing. Where do you reach for that in your experience, to play someone who feels not quite comfortable, not as comfortable as Alan and Michael’s characters do?

Well, we all, every person, every human, actor or not, everybody’s had experiences, if not daily, of feeling out of place or feeling insecure or feeling less than. I mean, so it’s not hard to summon up. But it was written so well. Chuck said when he wrote the shitting his pants scene, he said, “We got something funny in store for you.” I said, “Tell me.” He goes, “You’ll see.” And it just really made me laugh. I mean, come on. A guy crapping his pants is fantastically horrible and funny. But also sadly pathetic, and “Oh God, this guy.”

And the fun part of that was improvising with Alan. And that was actually the hard part to get through because we just kept laughing. Because I think I added a beat, I said, “Alan, tell me to lean over.” I said, “I’m going to lean the wrong way.” And you go, “No, no, not that way.” And every time I got up there, I think I would crack up first, and then he would crack up, because it’s so small. It’s such a tiny little thing of, you’re picturing a guy just leaning one inch to the left and then Al’ll go, “God no.” It just really made me laugh, and there wasn’t a moment that I wasn’t aware, I’m with Alan Arkin. Life is good. I’m doing a scene with Michael Douglas and Alan Arkin. Pretty darn fun.

And there’s no sympathy for you while you’re in the middle of a heart attack. He’s like, “Pull your butt the other way.”

Yes, I’ve ruined their lunch.

This is the third time I’ve talked to you; the first time was before The Paul Reiser Show, and you’ve just gotten busier since then, including producing There’s… Johnny! What are you attributing this new busy phase of your career to?

It’s mostly coincidence. Realistically. As I said before, you can make plans and it doesn’t always work. The Paul Reiser Show, which as I said to you, I hate that title, because it wasn’t the title. That was something that I was reluctant to do, and got excited about when I was given free rein, and I wrote the show, and I rewrote it, and I was like, “Oh, this is really fun.” And I got excited, and then they just dropped the ball. The network changed is what happened. They guy who bought it was gone. And so that fell through the cracks. And you go, “Oh man, there is a reality of show business that is just unpleasant.” I was like, “Oh, we worked really hard,” and it just died. It didn’t even get fully seen. Only two of the seven were seen.

On Mad About You again, we swore that we weren’t going to ever do this, and for various reasons, and I can track it, but we ended up rolling the dice and we go, “Yeah, come on, let’s do it.” And I don’t know what’s going to happen with it. And going in, the given was, we’re only going to do this once. We’re not signing on for anything. If it’s a hit and people like it and we want to do it, great. But this is a one-time thing.

I couldn’t tell you right now what’s going to happen. I have no idea. My guess is it’ll be fine. It’ll be received by the people who want to watch it and ignored by the people who don’t, and then we’ll all go about our life. But it’s fun, it’s great.

Well let me talk to you about that for a second.

Sorry, yeah. I didn’t mean to jump your curriculum.

We had been hearing about this. I think I may have even asked you when I talked to you a couple of years ago about it.

It’s been almost three years since we [started] talking about this. It was with Sony, because Sony owns the show. And then they were taking it around, and we ended up going with Spectrum. It’s weird, because they’re brand new. We’re their second show and their first comedy. So on one hand it’s great, because it’s nice to be able… we went with them, they were really the most eager and excited, and it’s nice to go where you’re wanted. And it’s also nice to be able to help define a network. And so it’s like, “Oh, we’re going to be their first comedy. They’re forming right now, and we can help form that.

On the other hand, at this moment, it’s not the same size platform as Netflix. There are huge pockets of the country that don’t have Spectrum, and I don’t have an answer for them yet. “How can we watch it?” The only answer if have now is, “You got to come to my house, because I’m going to retire someday. The plan is shortly we’re going to close a deal with somebody else, like a Netflix, or Amazon or somebody. Or Apple, to put it out more widely.

So it’s a little bit… in a way it appeals to my tastes. I think I’ve said this to you before, I like small. I never aim for big. So the fact that this is a little bit of boutique platform and it’s not under the radar, but it’s not jumping out at the world. It’s going to be there, and if you want it, here it is. And if you don’t, nobody’s offended.

But it’s a property that’s had big fan base, had huge rating on NBC, part of their vaunted comedy lineup. And people must be curious just like they have been with all the other reboots that have come out over the last two or three years.

Yeah, we approached it differently. We never wanted to do it, and I was very clear. Every once in a while over 20 years, “Would you be interested in doing it?” Somebody wanted to develop it as a musical, somebody wanted to do it as a play, I went, “Leave it alone.” I said, “Not everything has to be developed.” You see a mountain, you don’t have to go, “Maybe that’s a book.” I’m like, “No, it’s a mountain. Just look and enjoy the mountain. You don’t have to develop it into maybe two smaller mountains.” And I felt like the show, we were so proud of what we did, and we landed the plane, and it was over, and everything we wanted to do, we did. And even in the finale we showed the future just to show you what happened so we would not be even tempted to come back.

And when people started talking about it, Helen and I would get together for lunch pretty regularly anyway. When this was all in the air, we said, “Well wouldn’t that be silly.” Because we kept… people asking us, “Would you want to? Would you want to?” And we both said no, and then we go, “Well, it would be fun to play together again.” That was the appeal, but we thought, “Why?” I don’t want to mess it up. I’m not really a big fan of that kind of nostalgia.

So we didn’t view it as a reunion, or a rebooting. We’re not trying to do another seven years. But rather just checking in. It’s a continuation. Let’s see where these people are now. And the one thing that we thought really palpably when the show was on, is that those who were watching it really related to it. And they felt like, “Oh, I’m so happy to see another couple.” Most of it was either fantasy fulfillment or company. It’s like, “Okay, they’re having the same kind of crazy fights that we had. They’re going through the same hardships that we are, and they’re laughing at it.” It was the companion to those people.

And what I found in the last few years doing stand-up is that the audiences coming, they’re all ages, and there’s a lot of Stranger Things youth now, but the core of the audience is grownups, and they are laughing at the stuff I’m saying now, which is not what I was talking about 20 years ago, but it’s the continuation. Here’s what it’s like having older kids, here’s what it’s like having nobody in the house now. Here’s what it’s like when this part of your body fails, and they’re laughing, and it’s the same continuation. It’s like, “Oh, yeah. Okay man. Thank God we’re not the only ones going through this.” And that’s what I anticipate and what I hope the audience is now. “We loved that couple, let’s see how they’re doing, because they’re probably going through the same thing we are.”

And when Helen and I talked about it, beyond just the fun of working together, we thought, “But why? Where would we pick it up and what story would we tell?” And then, I’m sure I’ve said this to you before, I always say I’m not smart enough to make anything up, I can only mine what happened to me. I have two boys, my younger son is leaving for college. And I had heard about the words “empty nest,” but I didn’t get it. And then when he left, it’s like, “Oh, it’s not just about missing the kid, it’s like what does it do to the dynamic in your home?” I thought, well that’s a really interesting, rich point to write from.

Because at end, it really mirrored, paralleled the original pilot, which was all the hoopla of marriage and weddings and so on. The newlyweds and honeymoon. As soon as that dies down, the doors are closed, and it’s the two of you. And that was always our DNA of the show, the two of you. And so when the kid leaves the nest, there you are again, but you ain’t the same people. You’re not going back to who you were, because you’re older, more tired. Your dreams are different, your reality is different. Your bodies are different. Write from there, and you’ll see that’s a good show.

What do you think of this era of reboots?

I don’t know, I know in interviews we’re supposed to have a reason and explain things. I have no idea. I’m just like, why are the Eagles still on tour? People still like the Eagles. But not all the Eagles are in the Eagles. “Yeah, but we still like the Eagles. We enjoyed it then, we enjoy it now.” Steely Dan is half as many people in it, but we’ll still go. So I think people always like what they like. And people are comforted by things that are familiar.

When it was announced that we were coming back, there were lots and lots of voices on social media going, “Oh my gosh, we’re so happy. We love that show, we can’t wait to have this back.” But there were also other voices who go, “We love that show, please don’t come back. Don’t mess it up. We don’t want you to spoil our memory of it.” And then there were other people going, “Hey, what are doing that show?” Just haters going, “Don’t bring it back, we want new shows.” Which is silly. Just don’t watch it if you’re not interested. We’re not going to make you watch it.

We were both very happy not doing it, and very proud of it being in a part of our legacy and behind us. And actually, somebody, as I was hedging my bets going, “I don’t know if I want to… I don’t want to damage the franchise. People have an image of it.” And a friend of mine said, “Well, let’s say it sucks. They can still watch the old ones.” I went, “Yeah sure. You don’t like it, don’t watch it.” But having said that, I am wildly pleasantly surprised at how… not surprised, pleased at how good they are. I mean, editing them I’m going, “These are funny. These are wall to wall funny.”

Everybody is just that much more comfortable in their skin, in their character. And the characters are older, and they’ve changed, and have different life stories now. We have to, by smoke and mirrors, tell you what happened in the last 18 years. We raised a whole kid off camera. I didn’t even think of this til now.

Actually, I wrote this in my book, Families. The preface of the book was, I remembered this thing with my parents when I was, I don’t know. I guess a teenager. And I was the last of four. And I remember my parents suddenly had these friends that I don’t remember seeing. And they were apparently my parents’ best friends, but they lost touch while they were all raising their families. And then 20 years later, they just picked it up. And I went, “You can do that? You can just step away for 20 years?” Because that’s how involved raising your kids can be. You lose certain rituals and certain friendships. They had seen each other, but they weren’t frequent friends.

And it just hit me that that’s what we just did with this show. We’re going to go away, because we got to raise a kid. And now the kid’s leaving, we’re available to go out again. There’s really something very organic about that.

Joel Keller (@joelkeller) writes about food, entertainment, parenting and tech, but he doesn’t kid himself: he’s a TV junkie. His writing has appeared in the New York Times, Slate, Salon, VanityFair.com, Playboy.com, FastCompany.com, RollingStone.com, Billboard and elsewhere.

Stream The Kominsky Method On Netflix