Jason Bateman jokes he had a 'meltdown' recording a podcast with Matthew McConaughey

Not even celebrities like Jason Bateman are safe from the horrors of technical difficulties.

On the latest episode of his SmartLess podcast, the Ozark actor recalled the recording session that made him spiral into madness. The two-year-old incident forced Bateman and his co-hosts Will Arnett and Sean Hayes to scrap an episode entirely — the worst part being that Oscar-winner Matthew McConaughey was listening in the whole time.

"Matthew came on the show a couple of years ago, and he was ready to go," Arnett recalled. "And Jason was having some tech difficulties, shall we say."

The trio recently welcomed McConaughey back for their Monday episode, which couldn't go forward without Arnett recounting Bateman's "full meltdown" from years prior.

Arnett played a recording of Bateman giving up after struggling with computer problems for over half-an-hour. "I don't see it here on the sound thing, so let's cancel," Bateman says in the clip. "Let's just reschedule this thing. I'm in a total f---ing tailspin."

Hearing Bateman's despair prompted McConaughey to burst into laughter. Bateman, who had no idea who the episode's mystery guest would be, did not recognize the laughter and sounded irritated when he responded.

"Great," Bateman said, as McConaughey continued laughing. "Who the f--- is that? Who is that? Great, that's helpful. Is that our guest?"

The Dallas Buyers Club actor then offered a re-enactment of everything he'd heard while witnessing Bateman's tech-inspired meltdown.

"Let me tell you what I've heard here over the last 30 minutes," McConaughey said, before imitating Bateman: "'We've gotta reboot here. His iPad got cloned, and then it got wiped right before the dog peed on it, so I gotta reboot one more time. Wait a minute, it's buffering. Wait, let me reinstall. No, I'm installing. No, it's gonna restart. We got a failure. I need a security check. Oh s---, we got a virus. let me reschedule this whole show. S---, you guys start without me. Fuck that, everyone be patient."

He also tacked on an impression of Bateman saying, "I'm in a tailspin," which got big laughs from Arnett and Hayes.

"That was you," he told the Arrested Development star. "You were going on and on and you went so long, I was like, 'This is getting funnier. And funnier, and funnier.,'" adding that he took notes through the incident.

Bateman called the recording "mortifying" and admitted that he had no idea that McConaughey was on the call until he was filled in later.

"The worst part is me hearing someone laughing and thinking it's Sean or Will and going, 'Who did that? That's not helpful,'" Bateman said, "And then I just slammed my laptop shut. It's not one of my prouder moments."

Thankfully, the technology was in everyone's favor this time around and the SmartLess crew managed to record a new episode with McConaughey as their guest. And all it took was two years.

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