Jason Lee: 20Q

The skateboarder turned actor ponders karma, rates celebrity mustaches and confesses his weird fascination with Burt Reynolds 

Q1

PLAYBOY: On NBC's My Name Is Earl you play a former criminal who discovers karma. He makes a list of 200 or so people he has wronged in his life and vows to make amends. Who's on your list?
LEE: Wow. Where do I begin? I'm a 36-year-old human being, so I'm sure I've made some big mistakes along the way. It's not in the 200 range, I'll tell you that much. If I had to point to one thing, it would be my family. I'm very conscious of correcting any laziness or carelessness from my past that might affect my son.

Q2

PLAYBOY: Earl's funky mustache has become his most recognized feature. Do you regret growing it?
LEE: Not really. I think it gives Earl some flavor. I originally tried to grow a Fu Manchu, but I looked a little too scary. NBC said absolutely no to the Fu Manchu, so I shaved it. A mustache can be a burden sometimes, especially if I haven't trimmed it in a while and I start to get bits of food in there. But I can live with it. It's a sacrifice for my art.

Q3

PLAYBOY: When you hosted Saturday Night Live, you claimed to have one of the greatest mustaches ever. That's a pretty bold statement. Which celebrity mustache would rank a close second?
LEE: Burt Reynolds's, obviously, and Tom Selleck's is definitely on the list. I also have a lot of respect for Bill Suplee's stache. He plays Willie the one-eyed postman on Earl, and he has the most insane handlebar mustache I've ever seen. It curls in ways that can't be described.

Q4

PLAYBOY: Speaking of Reynolds, he has been a fixation in your work. You've referred to him in nearly every film you've done with director Kevin Smith, and you even devoted an episode of Earl to Smokey and the Bandit. Is this some sort of man crush?
LEE: Smokey and the Bandit was a huge part of my youth. It was my fantasy to be the manly man with the hot rod and the cowboy hat, which is kind of funny because I turned out to be the exact opposite of the tough guy. Doing the Earl episode about Smokey and the Bandit was a big thrill for me. When I drove the Bandit car, I remember thinking, Man, I need to get a cowboy hat and a Trans Am and some cowboy boots, and I'm just going to drive cross-country. There's something kind of appealing about that. I want to be on the run from the law, with stolen beer in my trunk.

Q5

PLAYBOY: Do you think audiences actually sympathize with Earl, or do they just enjoy mocking a white-trash loser?
LEE: They definitely sympathize with him. We're not making fun of Earl, and I don't think people would like the show as much if we did. If Earl were just some redneck asshole, it wouldn't be as funny. It's rare today for a comedy to try to move you on an emotional level as much as make you laugh. There's an ironic, cynical gloss to a lot of films and TV shows. But we care about Earl. We're rooting for him to succeed, and I think that's why it works.

Q6

PLAYBOY: Before accepting the role on My Name Is Earl, you sat down and wrote a pros-and-cons list. What were some of the cons?
LEE: I was apprehensive about doing TV, because I didn't want to be known for a certain character. When I did Kissing a Fool with David Schwimmer, I realized how trapped he was by his role on Friends. Everywhere we'd go, people would shout out to him, "Ross! Hey, Ross!" It's difficult to get away from the shadow of a TV character. I hope I've done enough movies that I won't be pigeonholed as Earl for the rest of my life.

Q7

PLAYBOY: Your stink-palm routine from Mallrats, in which you shake a person's hand after wiping your ass, has lived on among your fans. Do you care that you may never escape the scatological humor of your past?
LEE: No, I dig it. That's an admirable legacy. When Mallrats first came out, I couldn't walk down the street without somebody yelling, "Hey, wanna shake my hand?" It died out after a while, but it comes back every few years. Recently I've been approached by a lot of 15-year-old kids, and they'll quote lines to me: "You want a chocolate-covered pretzel?" At first I didn't think anything of it, but then it hit me: When the movie came out, these kids were six years old. That's so bizarre to me. They've grown up with Mallrats and made it their own.

Q8

PLAYBOY: There's an action figure based on Brodie, your character in Mallrats. Do you own the toy version of yourself? And if so, do you ever take it out and, uh, play with yourself?
LEE: [Laughs] I've never really played with myself in that way. The chances are good that I've masturbated at some point, of course. It's a pretty cool action figure. Actually, I think it's technically called an inaction figure. My son has one in his room. We call it Brodie Daddy.

Q9

PLAYBOY: You were one of the first professional skateboarders, before the X Games brought skating into the mainstream. Do you regret retiring before you had a chance to rake in some fat endorsement cash?
LEE: No, I was never interested in that. When I decided to retire, I thought I was getting a little too old to be skating for a living. There was a lot of pressure to be at the top of my game all the time, and my heart just wasn't in it anymore. But I haven't given up skating completely. I still cruise around now and then just for fun. I'm way past my prime, so nobody expects much from me anymore.

Q10

PLAYBOY: Unlike many other athletes, you were able to make the transition from sports to acting. What's your secret?
LEE: It might be that skateboarders aren't considered real athletes. Skateboarding was never as popular as something like basketball. But I think the real reason it worked was I went into acting with no expectations. I was just curious about it, in much the same way you might be curious about how cars are made or how to get to the moon. It was naivete. My girlfriend's mother was a talent manager, and when I told her I wanted to do movies, she said, "Okay, let's give it a shot." So many people would have said, "Oh, I don't know. Let's get you into some acting classes first and see how it goes." That would have been a bit deflating, and I think I would've lost interest.