Alec Baldwin Goes Undercover on the Internet

Hey, everybody. It's Alec Baldwin here.

I was on the cover of GQ in February of 1990,

and boy, have things changed since then.

I'm here with you now to answer

some questions from the internet.

[peaceful music] [keyboard keys clicking]

Okay, Quora.

[Interviewer] If Donald Trump invited Alec Baldwin

to lunch, would he accept?

You know if it was 20 years ago and I was in my 40s,

I might have, you know, before he was president.

I ran into Trump once because we rented a penthouse.

I shot a film that I produced, my company produced,

a really beautiful film with Ben Kingsley

called The Confession.

Our location department negotiated to shoot

on the top of the Trump building on Columbus Circle.

And apparently, the entire top floor was divided

into two huge units, and one of them was his,

or at least he kept it in his pocket to sell.

It was empty, floor-to-ceiling windows,

and you're looking out at the city, beautiful,

looking east at the park and everything.

And he came by.

We were shooting one night and he showed up.

He's like, Everything good? You good?

Did I take care of you? Did I take care of you?

Everybody's good? Yes?

Okay, okay. And he leaves.

He literally comes in, drive by.

He's in the same clothes. He's in the same long overcoat.

And he said the same line he always says.

He's like, You want me to come in and sit down,

do a quick shot of me, quick cameo?

All the movies that I'm in do great. They all do great.

Home Alone. Every movie that I'm in is a hit.

And we're all like... [chuckles]

No, I would not have lunch with him now.

Oh God, no. Life's too short.

[Interviewer] Does Alec Baldwin get death threats

from Trump supporters for his parody of him?

No, I don't.

But of course, I get a lot of people very vehement

and very, very passionate about, You should be ashamed

at what a disgrace you are, and you have no talent,

and your career is over, and you're so irrelevant.

I always find it funny that when people who have

Twitter followings in the hundreds of people,

they want me to make sure I know how irrelevant I am.

I get a lot of people criticizing me for attacking Trump.

That never really bothers me.

[Interviewer] What role is Alec Baldwin best known for?

Playing Trump on SNL has provided me with an audience.

We did the show the other day, and they had huge numbers.

It was the third highest rated show

since we've done the Trump thing, this show we did last,

the season premiere with Chris Rock.

And I'm gonna say that obviously,

the reason the numbers were so large

was because of Chris Rock.

I mean, it was really a pleasure to get to see him

during this miserable COVID thing.

The Trump thing has been this weird journey.

So I did all the episodes produced season one.

2016-'17, a little bit less season two,

a little bit less season three.

And now, we're back to do a handful of these things

between now and the election.

And hopefully, the election, things will change,

and I'll never have to do this again.

But other than that, I would say Glengarry Glen Ross,

Beetlejuice, Hunt for Red October,

things that were successful projects

not through anything I did essentially,

but I was along for the ride, if you will.

30 Rock is the thing that people

would say the most things to me about.

I would really get a lot of good, good feedback

from people about that.

As I've said countless times,

that was the best job I've ever had

and probably ever will have because of how smart Tina is

and Robert Carlock and all the writers.

I don't think anything can ever compare to the writing

that we had on 30 Rock. [button clicks]

[Interviewer] Twitter.

[peaceful music]

@AlecBaldwin, I'm binging '30 Rock.' It's brilliant.

It was only 10 years ago, but I don't think

you could do that humor today

without the political correct police coming after you.

Do you agree?

I don't know the answer to that question

because I mean, there's so much content out there

that does, just by happenstance,

maybe evade the political police.

There's so much stuff out there that you see and go,

oh, these people here got nailed,

or these people didn't get nailed.

I don't think the political correctness police

can do their whack-a-mole thing fast enough

to catch everybody.

So those that get nailed and those that don't get nailed,

it tends to be rather sporadic.

Do I think that 30 Rock said things that would

be viewed differently now?

Probably.

[bird tweets]

[Interviewer] IMDB.

[peaceful music]

Trade Mark: deep raspy voice,

sometimes plays deeply narcissistic

though inherently moral characters,

deadpan comic delivery, thick, dark hair, dimpled chin.

God, I think that this is all wrong.

I think I have a very sweet, kind of tenor voice.

I sometimes play hypersensitive, very wounded characters,

or very needy characters.

I have no comic delivery whatsoever.

I once had thick, dark fair, fabulous hair.

I had what I considered some of

the best hair in the business.

And now, my hair is a steel gray,

like a kind of a gunmetal gray.

My hair looks like a dirty floor, maybe.

And my dimpled chin.

I think sometimes I do have a dimpled chin,

and then I don't.

In the real world, I guess, once thing that COVID has done

is had me, like six months of just not eating

what I normally eat.

So maybe my dimple's back.

[Interviewer] Reportedly, Baldwin originally

wanted to be a lawyer before he was bit by the acting bug.

Well, I went to school in Washington.

I went to George Washington University for three years.

And I was in what people then used to call

kind of informally, a pre-law program,

where people were taking courses that were geared

toward an understanding of how laws are made,

and about the American presidency and American government

and foreign policy and so forth.

I really, yes, I wanted to be a lawyer,

and there's times I still sit there and say,

Boy, did I make a mistake.

I should have gone to law school.

I feel that way probably once a month.

[Interviewer] Wikipedia.

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In New York City, Baldwin worked as a busboy

at the disco Studio 54.

Well, when I arrived there in the fall of 1979,

I got a job at Studio 54.

I walked in and I got a job as a waiter.

Now, they had busboys who wore the little short shorts,

and they were topless.

They were all really super buffed out guys,

and they were the busboys.

And the waiters were people who went up,

usually up into the balcony to ask people

if they wanted to order a drink from the bar.

And there weren't many of us.

We wore black shirts and black pants,

and we looked like what Schrager and Rubell

would have you wearing, you wear all black.

I had a beard, a very dark beard.

It was nutty part of my life. [laughs]