Here's The Thing with Alec Baldwin

This week Alec sits down with comedian Jerry Seinfeld who debuted on HBO in 1981, the same year he first appeared on Johnny Carson. Jerry Seinfeld was 27 years old.

Seinfeld's material stood out.It wasn't about his upbringing or personal relationships.It was about our universal experience of small things.Eight years after his HBO debut, he and Larry David created a weekly series that changed both their lives.After Seinfeld ran for nine seasons, Seinfeld went back to stand-up, and to his audience.As he explains to Alec, Seinfeld feels uniquely connected to his fans:“You have this relationship with the audience that is private between you and them.Critics want to write, people want to talk.We have our own thing that nobody can break… once you build that it can't be broken by outside forces.”

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James Toback and Alec joined forces to make the documentarySeduced and Abandoned, which began as a story about raising money for a film. However, it soon became a study of the tension between art and commerce and how difficult it has become to secure financing for independent films.

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Chris Columbus has brought to the screen some of the biggest American family films in the last 20 years:Adventures in Babysitting, Home Alone,andMrs. Doubtfire. He also produced and directed the first twoHarry Potterfilms and produced the third as well.Despite this success, Columbus admits that he “always, to this day, [feels] like [he’s] gonna walk on a movie and get fired.” He reveals to Alec what it was like working with brilliant improvisers like John Candy and Robin Williams—and casting Macaulay Culkin inHome Alone.

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Danny Bennett has spent the pastthirty years managing the career of his dad, Tony Bennett and has produced a film following his father's life entitledThe Zen of Bennett.It was Danny who helped bring his dad’s music to a younger generation, through appearances onSNL, The Simpsons,andLate Night with Conan O’Brian—and the series ofDuetsalbums, which feature Tony Bennett singing with the likes of Lady Gaga, Billy Joel, Barbara Streisand and Amy Winehouse.Duets IIdebuted at #1 on theBillboard 200chart, makingTony Bennett—at 85 years old—the oldest living artist to do so. As Danny says, “I don’t just handle a career, I manage a legacy.”Last year Danny produced a film calledThe Zen of Bennett, which followed his dad throughout the recording of theDuets IIalbum.

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Dan Mathews is in favor of going naked instead of wearing fur. That makes sense considering he is Senior Vice President of People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals. He sits down with Alec to discuss his battles (and victories) with the fashion industry and he explains why PETA actually owns stock in Kentucky Fried Chicken.

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Eric Fischl became known in the 1980s art scene for work that explores issues of sexuality and power and what it means to become a man. Alec talks to Fischlabout hismemoir,Bad Boy: My Life On and Off the Canvas,where the painter writescandidly about his youth, the art world, his own struggles with depression and substance abuse, and his thoughts about the creative process. Fischl started as an abstract painter, but as he explains to Alec, once he began to work with figures, he realized he was“doing the work that [he] was supposed to do, that [he] was built for.”

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Former MLB pitcher Dwight Gooden earned the Rookie of the Year Award in 1984. He was 19 years old with a blistering fastball and a notoriously deceptive curve ball. His outstanding first three years in Major League Baseball were soon replaced by very public battles with alcohol and cocaine which continued for much of his professional career. At 40, Gooden served ten months in a state prison for drug-related charges. That was a decade ago. More recently he published a book,Doc: A Memoir. Gooden watches football now and hasn't touched a baseball or a drink in years.

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Josh Fox didn't set out to be a documentary filmmaker. And in 2008, when Fox was canvasing for Barack Obama, hydraulic fracturing meant nothing to him. Things changed when Fox’s parents were offered nearly $100,000 to lease their Pennsylvania land for drilling rights. After seeing people light their contaminated well water on fire, Fox made a film calledGasland,which explores the impact of hydraulic fracturing on everyday Americans. It showcased at Sundance in 2010.

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This week, Alec sits down with Rosie O’Donnell who says she “never wanted to be a talk show host …I wanted to be on Broadway…I wanted to be a Bette Midler backup singer, one of the Harlettes.”

And for over three decades, Rosie has done a lot of things – she’s been a standup comic, aStar Searchcontestant, an actress, a talk show host, a philanthropist, an activist, a magazine editor, a blogger, a Broadway and television producer, and above all, a mom to five. The latest child, Rosie tells Alec, "rebirthed" her.

On changes in the acceptance of gay actors during the arc of her long career now, she says, "To think that in my lifetime, in my career, that you can be an out performer/actor playing against type – Neil Patrick Harris playing a womanizer on that show, being out and married with twin boys – and it doesn't hurt your career. It doesn't do anything. So in a way it's the most beautifully astounding, inspirational thing that I can think about in my 51 years of living."

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David Simon cut his teeth as a crime reporter forThe Baltimore Sun. When the newspaper industry began to collapse, Simon started writing for television.The Wirewas born, and Simon hasn't gone back. Simon has a much larger platform now for sharing his strong opinions on the U.S. war on drugs, but he admits he still misses reporting.

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