Bryan cranston encouraged to try magic mushrooms by Seth Rogen
Bryan Cranston has detailed trying magic mushrooms for the first time while seeing Dead + Company with Seth Rogen and their co-stars in The Studio.
Bryan Cranston was encouraged to try magic mushrooms by Seth Rogen.
The Breaking Bad actor plays Continental Studio CEO Griffin Mill in The Studio and after turning to the show's creator and co-star Ike Barinholtz for advice on how to behave in a scene where his character ingested a large dose ofthe hallucinogenic, the "huge druggies" advised him to give them a go himself.
Appearing on Jimmy Kimmel Live!, Bryan said: “I’m playing this character who is wiped out and I had never had any experience in that.
"Not that many drugs at all, as a matter of fact, and so I didn’t know really how to behave.
"So I was asking Seth Rogen and Ike Barinholtz, ‘You guys are huge druggies! What can you tell me?’”
The pair advised Bryan, 69, to start out by microdosing.
He continued: “I said, ‘I don’t even know what that is. What is that?’ Well, it’s a microdose, you know?
"And I said, ‘Well, what would the effects be?’ And he said, ‘Well, try some!’ And I go, ‘Whoa, whoa, whoa, hang on.’ "
But an unexpected opportunity came Bryan's way when The Studio cast decided to see Dead + Company, the supergroup featuring former members of the Grateful Dead.
He said: “We were in Las Vegas shooting this crazy show with Seth Rogen and we all decided to go to the Sphere to see the Grateful Dead. If God wasn’t telling me to do microdosing, what was he telling me?!”
Bryan still had reservations and he and co-star Catherine O'Hara were "clutching each other" and wavering as to whether or not they'd try mushrooms.
He added: "We were nervous. And Ike Barinholtz was our drug dealer. Can I say that? I think I can.
"And he said, ‘I’ll take care of you.’ And I said, ‘I’ve heard that before!'"
Ike promised the pair that the experience wasn't "gonna be anything" they couldn't handle - and Bryan was unimpressed to feel "nothing" at all.
He said: "So he gave us these little thin square chocolates — you know what it is. Some people know. And this little square chocolate, I go, ‘It’s a piece of chocolate? It’s like a wafer!’
"And so I broke it in half, I took it… nothing. I didn’t feel anything.
"[I had the rest] and it felt like maybe I took three sips of wine. It was nothing! Nothing!”
Asked if it eventually kicked in later, Bryan said: “No! Now I’m angry.”
Jimmy was impressed by his guest's admission.
He said: “So you really are a great actor, it turns out, because that [performance on The Studio] was all acting.”
Bryan said: “It was acting. I didn’t know what I was doing.”
