(Jan. 2006) David Faustino was kind enough to spend a few minutes with Pop Culture Madness to talk about his current release, National Lampoon's Pucked (also starring Jon Bon Jovi), his rap career, his upcoming projects and his life as one of America's favorite underwhelming kids, Bud Bundy. Once we fix a technical glitch, we'll have the audio portion in its entirety.

David Faustino: Joe?

Joe: (shuffling papers, obviously unprepared for the call) Hi David! Thanks you very much for taking the time to call!

(a few formalities take place and...)

** originally planned as an audio/text interview, a technical snafu has made the audio unavailable as of now (sorry about that) **

J: We did some research, and we found a picture of you when you were about 12 in a leather jacket.

DF: That's on the website?

J: No, we would not do that to you!

DF; Oh, hahahah. Yes I do remember that picture.

J: When they make young actors do things...

DF: Yeah, isn't that funny?

J: Your first gig was when you were three months old, with Lily Tomlin?

DF: Yea, basically that was the first role I did. I came from a show business family. My father was a wardrobe man for years and years, and worked with everybody, you name it, and some point my older brother was on set with him, and they wanted to use him in a commercial and next thing you know, all the kids started doing commercials and getting into acting. So I just fell into it and at three months old they had the Lily Tomlin audition and I went in, and the part was actually for her daughter, and she held me and I was one of the only babies that didn't cry, so she said "This is the one." Basically, my first role, I played a girl. Big stretch.

J: You've had over 60 roles. You're a busy guy!

DF: I've been really, really, really lucky and blessed in my career. I've been doing it a long time and its been really good to me. I enjoy what I do and I love working in this business.

J: I see that you have a highly collectable and out-of-print CD.

DF: The highly collectable and what, out of print CD? The Balystix album? Yes, that was an album that we cut back in, I'm guessing '93, but we ran a Hip-Hop club out here in L.A. It was the first Hip Hop club on the Sunset Strip, back when it was like, you know, noone even knew about it. It very like on the east side of town. We discovered some bands and some talent there. Actually, that's where the Black Eyed Peas met. They all basically met there and joined forces. We just tried to put some of the talent that we saw there together on a compilation album and of course I had to put myself on it. It was a pretty good E.P., with I guess, 4-6 songs on there.

J: What do you think of rap today versus back then? It's a different animal.

DF: Yes it is. I'm not one of those guys who's gonna say, oh my God back ion the day it was so much better, but it kind of was. But there still great things today, but I find them to be few and far between. It's like I turn on the radio and I'll hear some really great stuff, but then I have to weed through so much, in my opinion, garbage that it's hard for me to listen.

J: They say that out of everything, it doesn't matter what the subject is, 95% of it is crap, and 5% is excellent.

DF: Yeah! I guess that's the case, eh? I really think, how do these guys work, I mean somebody's buying this stuff. I'm just a fan of the east coast nice regular rhymes, I'm not really a big I don't know, booty shaker! hahaha

J: Actually, I like Eminem. Probably, in my opinion, the most talented guy in the field.

DF: I love Eminem. He is absolutely without a doubt a talented rapper. There's no question about that. I'm a huge fan of his. Matter of fact I just set my Tivo for his concert coming on MTV2. Live from Madison Square Garden, I got that Tivoed so I can bang, play that really loud.

J: As a side note, my partner in this Pop Culture venture is Anna, and she moved here from Russia and the first show that helped her family learn English was Married With Children.

DF: Oh that's cool.

J: We wanted you to know that.

DF: That's very cool, I've actually heard that from an amazing amount of people who've actually stopped me in the street and told me that. That they learned English from watching the show.

J: Funny, the critics hated the show, as you know, and they hated Gilligan's Island. These are two shows that, everybody and their mom, watched, and watch the reruns.

DF: Well I tend to think the critics were right about Gilligan's Island. hahaha. Sorta. You know, they did attack us at first, and I think that was the thing that bothered the creators the most. The show was never really respected by its peers. The fans loved it, people watched it. I go out in the street and... I was in Vegas yesterday. Everybody, from all walks, rich, poor, it doesn't matter. Most people really liked the show, except for the people within the Hollywood community. Those were the only people who just didn't get it, didn't respect it and didn't really watch it.

J: I remember the first time my dad watched the show. He sat down, said "I hate shows like this" and Ed O'Neil (father Al Bundy) was carrying a big box from the basement, it was way too heavy for him and he said "I'm alright... I don't need any help", while you kids sat watching Tv or something, and my dad just broke out laughing. It was real to him. My dad had four sons and he really did do all the hard word.

DF: hahaha! Right! Because people can relate, you know?

J: In the weeks after Married With Children you went into a mall with a MWC T-Shirt on, you went into the mall and nobody recognized you?

DF: Yeah, I did. I was really excited because when they first aired the show they did the back to back Sunday night. It was Fox's creative way of blasting off the new network. They did Tracy Ullmann, Married With Children and another show (Duet) and they played them three times on Sundays, by which they tried to force-feed people. So they did that for 2-3 weeks in a row, so I thought "OK, I've got my little Married With Children shirt, I'm going to the mall, I'm gonna wear this thing and someone is gonna recognize me, for the first time", and IT DIDN'T HAPPEN! hahaha!

J: Now, I guess its just the opposite...

DF: It's pretty crazy now. It's crazy how many people still watch it and recognize me. But I have ways where I don't. You can call attention to yourself or not call attention, depending on what mood you're in. Then again, you can try to hide and someone will spot you.

J: Well, Michael Jackson can't.

DF: Yes, this is true. Yes, I'm very grateful that I don't have his problem.

J; Or any of them.

DF: yeah, ANY of them. Absolutely.

J: May I ask you a couple of "acting type" questions?

DF: Sure.

J: When you are preparing for a role, how do you approach it?

DF: First of all I just read and see if I can do it, if it's something I vibe with. I've learned the lesson that if you read something and you try and try, and you feel like you're forcing yourself to go into an audition, I find I don't necessarily get those jobs, so first I just try to see if I can even vibe with it, and if I do, then I just do the work. I get into it. I get out my notepad, and write down all the givens, everything I can, and I do the lessons that I basically learned from acting class. What does the director need? What does he want? And I just go about it. It's not hard work, if it's a great character that you like and you can relate to, it shouldn't really be hard, it should be fun work.

J: While you are on a set, can you just flick out back of character or are you stuck in character for a while?

DF: I don't do the stay in character thing, but obviously if it's a heavy duty scene you're not gonna sit there and joke around, talk to people, although I do respect people like Renée Zellweger for instance, who had the guts to keep her English accent during the whole time she shot Briget Jones' Diary. She had the guts to literally, the entire time she shot that, speak in the accent, when she went out, on set, everywhere. That takes guts, and she said that she had to work through some issues, because she was embarrassed and stuff, but her coach said to her, that at the end of the day, that don't you think it's easier just to stay in that, instead of hopping in and hopping out the whole time? So if I had an accent, I would absolutely try that. But as far as "character" character, I'm on when they say action.

J: Do you have a routine or any kind of superstition, if you are going to get a role or hoping to get a role.

DF: No I don't, I don't believe in superstition. Not at all.

J: What was your greatest fame moment?

DF: Man, I've had some good ones. No one's ever asked me my greatest fame moment but it probably really boils down to the people that I got to meet, people that I've been a fan of. I remember when Eminem, when I was the source awards a few years back, when he had just dropped the Marshall Mathers LP, it was huge and and he was going down, on his way to accept his award and I happened to be sitting in the aisle row and I reached out to shake his hand, and he looked at me and he's like "Woah! Man! <Heck!> I grew up with you, man!" And this was on his way to get an award, so that was kind of cool. But, I've had a lot of moments like that with people that I didn't know knew I existed, and you're in these people's consciousness, and they are aware of you, so it's interesting. And not only that, the places I've been able to travel, the perks that come along are just amazing.

J: You sound very down to Earth.

DF: Thank you. Well, I try.

J: Are there any roles that you've turned down that you later regretted?

DF: Yeah, not many but there is one actually that I wish I had done and I don't know why I turned it down. Aerosmith did a video a number of years back where there was a guy who was basically calling a phone sex line and in his fantasy, she was this beautiful woman, and at the end of the phone call, the lady hangs up and the reality was that it was this fat woman ironing, and it was a famous video, they played it all the time (Sweet Emotion). They requested me to do the video, they wanted me to play the guy in the video, in the fantasy. It was great little role, and for some reason I turned it down. When I saw the video I thought it was so cool and I wish I had done it. I never got the chance, but if I could, I'd like to tell them at some point that I wish I had done the video.

J: Your birthday is in a few weeks. Hoping for anything special?

DF: No, it's one of those ones, I'm turning 32... no, I just want to have a decent, fun evening, just have a good time and nothing to spectacular. I just want to be mellow.

J: You've been married two years, any kids or plans for kids?

DF: We both want them, we're sort of career oriented right now. We have a lot going on. We like to have a good time and enjoy our freedom, so we're putting that off for a little while, but we both want them.

J: Let's talk a little bit about your movie, Pucked. It looks like it was fun to make.

DF: Yeah, we did. We had a good time, we were down in Greensboro, North Carolina, a lot of down home folks were very nice and very accommodating. We met some good people.

J: In message boards and chatrooms I've seen, where people talking about the movie, everyone had nothing but nice things to say about everybody from the cast.

DF: Oh, that's cool. Even Jon, huh?

J: Even Jon.

DF & J:- laughing

J: Which leads to another question. What are five things, given that most of Pop Culture Madness is music oriented, tell me five things about Jon Bon Jovi that his fans might not know.

DF: Well, he loves white wine, not to a fault, but loves his white wine. What else? As rich as you think he is, he's richer. He smokes lots of cigarettes, but his fans probably know that already.

J: I didn't know that.

DF: He's very direct with people. If he likes you, he lets you know right away and if he doesn't, he lets you know also. He doesn't put up any fronts whatsoever. He doesn't try to be nice, and I respect that. That's the way he is. And fifth? Hehehe.

J: Uh oh a laugh, will that have to be edited?

DF: No no, I'm trying to think... The fifth is, that, if you give him enough white wine at a bar, he'll get up and rock one of his hits

J: So Jon can be bribed to sing, for a few drinks.

DF: Yes. Exactly.

J: When I watched Pucked, it looked like the girls kind of knew what they were doing on the ice. They didn't just get a couple of girls who skated around. They didn't have live action shots like the olympics would have, did they have girls who actually knew how to skate a bit?

DF: Yeah, they had like half real hockey players from the area we were shooting in. There was a real women's federation or league there locally. Those girls did the real action stuff, and there were actresses and some extras peppered throughout.

J: They didn't do a lot of hype for this movie.

DF: No, because it's opening in very select (locations) It's only in 6-7 cities. Those cities are the "guinea pigs", and if it does well then hopefully it will go wider. It's a smaller movie, and I think they just want to test out the waters.

J: I had mixed feelings about it. I had no problems with anybody's performance in the movie, but I didn't love it. It seemed to be aimed halfway between older kids and halfway an afternoon special.

DF: Yeah, it sort of doesn't know what it wants to be in ways.. I mean Arthur Hiller directed...

J: He's been around, he knows his stuff.

DF: Yeah, he's been around, he's a classic director and I'm a huge fan of his, however, it is a National Lampoon movie, it is supposed to be edgy. It is supposed to be hip. It is supposed to be fresh. I think that there were some crossed visions here and there.

J: I agree with you. It could have been really good on any of several levels if they had stuck with it.

DF: Exactly.

J: The target market just didn't seem consistant.

DF: I agree and I think that may be an issue for them when it comes to an audience. That's why, in this case, unless I'm producing on something, I just show up and I do the best job that I possibly can. I do the job I do. You can pray and hope for the best...

J: It looked like you and Curtis Armstrong had the right kind of chemistry between the two of you. I liked the scenes, the talks between the two of you, with everything going on around you.

DF: Curtis is a great guy. It's funny, we had just worked for the first time together, two weeks before that on a guest spot on UPN, and then all of a sudden we got this together which is kind of funny. Yeah he's a cool guy and I think he's a good actor.

J: He started with the Revenge of the Nerds movies...

DF:- Exactly, and what a great role he had in Ray.

J: I didn't see Ray yet...

DF: Oh man, you gotta see it. He's got a great role, in the first half of the movie, he's in a lot of it and he plays a great character.

J: It makes me want to see it even more. It's on my "to see" list, but I just haven't gotten to. He had the role in Moonlighting too, he seems like a guy who's consistently getting work, and that's a good thing.

DF: Exactly, he's one of those guys like me, he's very blessed in that he always works and he may not be at the top at some points, but he's always around.

J: Upcoming, you're doing a movie with Jason Mewes, I guess it's finished filming by now?

DF: We shot that, it's called Nice Guys, with Corin Nemic, who's a great actor who played Parker of Parker Lewis Can't Lose (1990, Fox).

J: Another under-rated show.

DF: And Corin Nemic is an under rated actor. He's a good friend of mine and we're actually in production now, we have a team together now where we're creating projects, finding projects and putting them together. We're actually in talks with Lampoon on some other stuff right now. We have exciting stuff happening.

J: And you're part owner of a restaurant...

DF: I'm not any more.

J: No more washing dishes?

DF: I got out of that business, and I don't know that I'll return to the restaurant business any time soon. Not my cup of tea.

J: I remember, where I got married, a place called The Eagle's Nest, a place owned by retired Eagle's quarterback Ron Jawarski, it stuck me, while we were making final arrangements that he was actually busing tables. Not at the wedding, obviously, but he there a few days before. I'm not sure it was part of his job description, but he was there, carrying dirty dishes.

DF: That's hilarious, it just wasn't for me. There was a lot to know, and a lot to watch. I'm busy doing other things, and it's an eyes-on business, and a difficult one.

J: There's cash involved...

DF: And you have to trust, and out here, and in any big city, there's a lot of uh, interesting folks, you know what I mean? I wanted to get out without getting hurt.

J: I guess you're sticking mainly in the entertainment business, looking at producing and acting...

DF: Yeah, we're looking at a slate of reality shows with a company that we've teamed up with and taking them out to networks. One is a scripted reality that Corin and I would actually be in together, basically a ruse on ourselves. Other ones we've created would not for us to be in at all, but actual shows that we just came up with that we thought people would actually want to see, reality based. Mostly all in entertainment though.

J: A few questions left. Anna suggested that we should go for a Barbara Walters moment and try to make you cry.

DF: hahaha! Good Luck!

J: Did you ever have a pet that disappeared?

DF: No, but my mom did run over my dog. The thing was, in my mom's defense, my mom claims it was an act of God because the dog was dying of cancer, which is of course miserable, and she got behind the car and my mom didn't see her, and she ran over it, which was a tragedy, but again, it was dying so... It was kind of sad, but you're not gonna get any tears out of me from that.

J: Here's a two part question. You're stuck on a desert island. Who do you want to be with, Mary Ann or Ginger?

DF: It's funny, pathetically enough, I was never a fan of the show, I don't know which one's which!

J: Mary Ann is the farm girl, Ginger's the actress.

DF: Farmgirl. I'm tired of actresses.

J: Part 2, Mary Ann or Jeannie, from I Dream of Jeannie?

DF: (without hesitation) Jeannie!

J: Everybody chooses her.

DF: There's magical things that can happen there!

J: Top 50, you made VH1's list of greatest kid stars. You were # 48. Almost all of them were arrested for something. Assuming the statute of limitations has passed, what have you gotten away with?

DF: Oh, I've gotten away with an amazing amount. The fact that I was never arrested is an amazing fact. I've really gotten by the skin of my nose in this town. But then again, I've been smart with myself. I know how to have a good time, but I also know how to reel it in. That's the difference. If you know when its time to play and when its time to be real... There's a lot of people who get carried away with the partying aspect of it. I always know when its time to work and that's what kept me safe.

On that whole VH1 note, it's funny because being number 48, they asked me to do the show, and I just didn't feel like doing the interview, so they promised me I'd be in the top 20 if I did the interview, and because I refused they made me number 48! I Thought that was interesting.

J: I look at lists like that, and a few years ago, Blender Magazine came out with a "Worst Song List", everybody disagreed with it. We have a worst song list on Pop Culture Madness and hundreds of radio stations referred to our list as the correct one. We weren't just a couple of editors looking for something to do. Our list started out with ten songs, years ago, we had people adding and suggesting, the list always changed.

DF: You didn't have corporate reasons...

J: Exactly. There's a good side and bad side to that. The bad side is, we don't have the limos...

DF: Or the jets!

J: (sigh)

DF: I just flew on a G-2 yesterday. Came back from Vegas, came back from the premiere of Hairspray at the Luxor. I got to fly back with Alan Thicke and his lady, it was cool. It was very exciting my wife had never been on one before.

J: You've always been an L.A. kind of guy?

DF: I am, born and raised. Burbank, California.

J: Anna just slid me two more questions... What do you do in your free time? Any hobbies?

DF: One of my things on my intention list year is to start a new hobby. Hobbies are good, I think in that we do a lot of things. We love to work-out, take walks, we like to go out, we enjoy the city, go to museums, we do all things we can to enjoy life as much as we can.

J: Quality time with a loved one, the best hobby of all!

DF: Yes it is. We enjoy spending time together.

J: Do you go online very often?

DF: Not really. Yeah, I go to sites, but I'm mostly a check the news kind of guy. Check the news, do my e-mail. I find I get sucked in too quickly.

J: Do you read many books?

DF: I do, but I haven't lately because I've busy. I have a stack of things I want to get to.

J: Grandmaster B. Explain? Anna wants to know what made you want to try this rap thing?

DF: I was always a fan of the music, from day one. We did that whole hip hop club thing, and that's where we decided to do the album from. Grandmaster B was basically the (MWC) writers attempt to just poking fun at me really. They were good at poking fun at all of us. Everything on the show was traits of our own personalities that they ended up writing into it.

DF: What else? Are we a..

J: I think we're kind of done. You might be free to go have breakfast or did you just roll out of bed?

DF: No, I've been up for a little while, but I'm definitely ready for some food.

J: Thank you very much for taking time out of your day to talk to us.

DF: Thank you.