Picking up girls with Jeremy Piven and Common

By: The Dude

Smokin' Aces is the hippest, most fast-paced DVD going around, so it seemed only right that we would send our hippest, most fast-paced employee to interview the cast. The Dude hangs with Jeremy Piven and Common, and among other things discusses fashion, perks, boxing and picking up the perfect woman.

Jeremy Piven: Do you mind if I stand up for a little bit? I’ve been sitting down for three days.
 The Dude: Is that a fashion statement (he wears jeans, a white wrinkled T-shirt and a black jacket with a green John Deere cap, and he looks very tired), the ‘I don’t give a give stuff' look? Or did you spend a lot of time perfecting it?
Jeremy Piven: Well, he put that together earlier than me.
Common: (He is wearing a blue, sharp suit, a mustard yellow shirt with a greenish tie, diamond earrings and he has a short beard) This is my first press junket, so I’m excited (laughs). He’s a veteran doing these, so he could come like that.
Jeremy Piven: I also knew that we weren’t going to be on camera until after lunch so I was really lazy, I rolled out of bed and threw my gear on and came to this. So there you have it.
 
The Dude: What designer brand of jeans do you have?
Jeremy Piven: I don’t know.

The Dude: Oh, come on…?
Jeremy Piven: (tried to look at the label) What does it say?

The Dude: You have Jason Bateman look!
Jeremy Piven: I look like Jason Bateman? How dare you (laughs).
 
The Dude: Do you have a stylist for all your top red-carpet events?
Jeremy Piven: It’s funny you say that because I saw Common in this Vanity Fair piece and he had these colors on that are almost impossible to get to work together: purple and orange and green. I was like, “How did he do that?”. So I did my research and there’s this stylist called Dawn he works with so I work with her sometimes. It’s always good to have female energy. Men would do so well just to ask women how they look. It would solve a lot of problems.
 
The Dude: Have you ever said, “Does my bum look big in this?”
Jeremy Piven: No. Because people don’t realise, especially women, that if your butt looks big that’s a plus. That’s fantastic.
 
The Dude: Doesn’t it depend on what country or culture you are from?
Common: It’s universal. In our culture it is (laughs).

The Dude: You look quite dapper yourself sometimes. You had that cravat look?
Jeremy Piven: (laughs) I actually worked with Dawn on that. I just wanted to be different. I like the way they used to dress back in the day. There was a real sense of style and it was ok to do that.  In the 20s, 30s, 40s, whatever. I wanted to go for an ascot just to mix it up a little bit. I got a lot of grief for it (laughs).
Common: No matter what style you have, you got to have a certain eye too. Jeremy has that. When I use stylists, that person goes to put some things together, “How do you like these together?”, and it’s up to you to make that decision and how you wear it too. 
Jeremy Piven: I would always say the same thing: Run it by a woman.

The Dude: So who do you run it by then?
Jeremy Piven: Well, I’m single so it’s not like…it depends.
 
The Dude: On who’s there in the morning?
Jeremy Piven: But that’s a great thing. It doesn’t matter even what the generation is just as long as it’s female energy.
 
The Dude: You’re so big on that female energy!
Jeremy Piven: Yeah, it’s great.
Common: It’s necessary for life, it’s good.

The Dude: So why are you single then?
Jeremy Piven: This is not an excuse but I put so much time and energy into my work. It’s all consuming. And you can just say that’s an excuse but maybe it is but now for the first time in my life I feel like I’ve earned my break so I can take a bit of a break. But I’ve worked without stopping since I’ve been an adult, really. That’s why I can’t sit down right now because my back hurts.
 
The Dude: So what’s your idea of the perfect woman?
Jeremy Piven: Wow. That’s maybe part of the problem. I have this idea. I don’t know. I think someone who’s self-empowered and articulate and funny and able to get the joke and not self-consumed and incredibly beautiful (laughs).
Common: Yeah, that’s right.  

The Dude: Isn’t it difficult to meet a good woman now you’re so famous?
Jeremy Piven: I don’t really know that I’m really famous to be honest with you.
 
The Dude: How satisfying is it to have this success because you’ve been working for so long?
Jeremy Piven: It’s kind of beyond surreal. It’s almost like what I do hasn’t changed. I’ve been doing it for a while. People who saw me on stage in Chicago see me in stuff in front of the camera and go, “Yeah, but I saw you in Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, I saw you in Methuselah.” It’s just interesting that my on-camera work is now finally starting to catch up to the contributions I made on stage. I almost feel like I’ve been doing my thing but I’ve been invisible and suddenly they can see you. But at the same time I don’t feel any different so it’s just that the people around you or the strangers have changed if that makes any sense.
 
The Dude: Celebrities always say it’s the people around them who change, not themselves.
Jeremy Piven: Yeah, I know I’m a cliché. (laughs)
 

The Dude: What are the best perks of being Jeremy Piven right now?
Jeremy Piven: I got to buy my mom a hybrid, a Prius, which was kind of amazing. Just the idea that you can take care of the people that you love. That kind of stuff is really great. And if you can get an appointment with a doctor faster, that’s kind of cool, I have to say.
Common: That’s really good or to get in a restaurant.

 
The Dude: So you call and say, “It’s Jeremy Piven. I do need the next appointment and I’m not waiting till next week?”. Or do you have five assistants who do that for you?
Jeremy Piven: I don’t have five assistants. You put it out into the universe and if they get it, they get it. But you never really push it. I think the one thing you never want to say in your lifetime is: “Do you have any idea who this is?” (laughs)
 
The Dude: So you’ve never had to use that line?
Jeremy Piven: No, because I think if you have to use it it’s not going to work anyway. And it’s embarrassing.
 
The Dude: You do go out a lot though, right?
Jeremy Piven: Well here’s the funny thing. I have a place in Malibu so let’s say I venture in to Hollywood one night and it’s documented, it makes it seem like it sure is a lot. So it’s not as much as you think. I stayed in last night. I love to stay in and watch basketball. I really do. There are certain things you have to do when you go to a premiere or you go to the premiere of a friend. I’m having my pretty girl moment so I have some attention. So it makes it look like I go out more than I do.
 
The Dude: You mean you’re the pretty girl or you have a pretty girl?
Jeremy Piven: I mean I’m the pretty girl for the moment. I understand women now more than ever. Especially in L.A. women will not look up if they feel male energy in a room. They won’t give you their eyes. And once you’ve been approached a lot you do get a little leery of strangers. So I kind of know a little bit what it’s like to be a woman. I used to think “Why would they do that?”, and now I understand why they are a little skittish about that stuff when you get a lot of attention all the time.
 
The Dude: So how are you going to meet the right girl then?
Jeremy Piven: Just try to be as authentic as possible and true to myself. Show them who you are and then maybe you’ll attract someone you have synchronicity with.
 
The Dude: Common, what advice would you give to somebody, like Jeremy, who wants to start out in the music business?

Common: Jeremy is a drummer too, so he is already a musician. You approach it the same way as you approach acting as far as with integrity and being creative. I know that he would do that, I wouldn’t even have to give him that advice because he would want to be good and have fun with it.

The Dude: Jeremy, what advice would you give someone who’s up and coming like Common?
Jeremy Piven: I would say, “Keep doing what you’re doing”, because he gets that joke that if you surround yourself with people who have integrity and work on a high level, you are going to be in good hands. And you don’t want to have the most expensive house on the block. That’s a strange metaphor but you want to be sure that everyone who is in it with you respects what you’re doing and really wants to work hard. And to get out of your own way, and just do your thing and love it. Don’t give up your integrity.
 
The Dude: What’s something you’re good at that people would be surprised about to know?
Jeremy Piven: I’ve been drumming my whole life.
 
The Dude: Are you a good cook?
Jeremy Piven: I wish I was a good cook. There was a moment where if I’d been six inches taller and 80 pounds heavier I could have been a vicious linebacker but I was too small. I had good lateral movement and I could hit really hard and I could always tackle and I had a good sense of the field. That was always my biggest disappointment.
 
The Dude: That you weren’t six inches taller?
Jeremy Piven: Well yeah, (laughs) had I been I’d probably be a really bent-up, beat-up ex-football player right now. I really wanted to continue on, and I could have been in a division three school, but it’s a lot of abuse. But now I get to live the dream and hang out with guys like Brian Urlacher who played middle linebacker for the Chicago Bears and I don’t get to get hurt. They know what I do and I know what they do. That’s the best way to meet your heroes. For you to really be effusive and love what they do and then for them to have a reference for what you do is kind of miraculous. I wish it upon everyone.
 
The Dude: Maybe you should have been a boxer? Height doesn’t matter.
Jeremy Piven: You’re right about that. I could have been a middleweight. I could have been a contender.