Get Your Weekly Digest

Receive the best podcast summaries and insights delivered to your inbox every week.

We respect your privacy. Unsubscribe anytime.

SmartLess

"RE-RELEASE: Jenny Slate"

with Jenny Slate

Published November 13, 2025
View Show Notes

About This Episode

The hosts talk with Jenny Slate about her life split between Los Angeles and a small coastal town in Massachusetts, where her husband owns a general store and she records voice work from various closets due to poor internet. She discusses her need for tidiness rooted in a messy childhood, stories of extreme mess-related consequences, quitting weed after an accidental massive THC overdose, and adjusting to motherhood while navigating performance anxiety in stand-up comedy. The conversation also covers the long creative process behind Marcel the Shell with Shoes On, from its improvised origins to the seven-year production of the stop-motion feature film.

Topics Covered

Stand-up comedy Parenting and child development Relationships Art and creativity Improvisation Anxiety Filmmaking Personal narrative Marijuana use Small-town life

Disclaimer: We provide independent summaries of podcasts and are not affiliated with or endorsed in any way by any podcast or creator. All podcast names and content are the property of their respective owners. The views and opinions expressed within the podcasts belong solely to the original hosts and guests and do not reflect the views or positions of Summapod.

Quick Takeaways

  • Jenny Slate currently lives most of the year in a small Massachusetts coastal town on a peninsula, where her husband and his brother own the local general store, and she literally joined the podcast from its supply closet.
  • Her need for tidiness grew out of a chaotic, messy childhood contrasted with very clean grandmothers' homes, so clutter now makes her feel mentally unsettled and disrespected.
  • A severe experience with a THC tincture, in which she accidentally took many times the intended dose and felt she nearly died, led her to quit weed entirely after years of heavy use.
  • Becoming a mother has made stand-up logistically and emotionally harder, but she still feels compelled to perform and is developing material for a new special while balancing bedtime and family life.
  • Marcel the Shell with Shoes On began as an improvised voice Jenny did in a cramped hotel room, evolved into shorts, and eventually into a stop-motion feature that took about seven years to make using an improv-based writing process.

Podcast Notes

Host introduction and pre-guest banter

Will's fake workout bit and opening tone

Will jokes about having just done a massive workout and feeling so pumped he barely recognizes himself in the mirror[1:56]
He immediately undercuts the bit by admitting he never works out[2:12]

Welcome to SmartLess and light science banter

The show is identified as SmartLess as Will welcomes listeners[2:12]
Will brings up a half-formed news item about the Voyager spacecraft being 15 billion miles away and sending strange data[2:39]
• Jason and Sean tease him for not having enough details to make the story interesting

Haircut, color, and candy-at-the-salon story

Sean jokes about having MRI results as a more interesting topic but pivots to a story about his haircut[3:14]
He describes getting his hair cut very short and colored, mentioning his stylist Scavo[3:23]
Jason and Will riff on hair color names and profile handles like "chestnut forever" and a crude punny username[3:43]
Sean tells a story about asking celebrity hairstylist Chris McMillan for candy while in the salon[4:18]
• Chris initially offers to make him a peanut butter sandwich, which Sean declines
• Ten minutes later, Chris sends someone out and brings Sean a bag of chocolates, which Sean finds incredibly sweet and above-and-beyond service
Will and Jason lightly scold Sean for demanding snacks without saying please and behaving like a tyrant in the salon[4:55]

Introducing guest Jenny Slate

Sean's detailed intro and Jenny's credits

Sean describes Jenny as sweet, kind, funny, and "cute as pie" and recalls recording Q-Force with her[5:55]
• He notes she made him laugh hard in the Q-Force recording sessions
He calls her a workaholic who graduated valedictorian from Milton Academy and then studied literature at Columbia[6:13]
He lists film and TV credits including Obvious Child, Gifted, Parks and Recreation, Girls, and the Amazon rom-com I Want You Back with Charlie Day[6:16]
Sean highlights that she is the star of Marcel the Shell with Shoes On, calling it his favorite animated character of all time[6:28]
They officially welcome "the wonderfully talented and hysterical" Jenny Slate[6:31]

Jenny's reaction to being introduced

Jenny says it's intense waiting in the wings on mute while the hosts riff, worrying briefly she might be a "bad surprise"[6:39]
She admits she didn't fully trust the mute button because she was laughing so hard at their bits[7:00]
Jason and Jenny clarify that although they both worked on The Lego Batman Movie, they didn't actually record together and have never had a real conversation before this[7:23]
They joke about missing each other at craft services and Sean explains craft services as essentially a snack table for cast and crew[7:41]

Jenny's current location and small-town Massachusetts life

Recording from the general store supply closet

Jenny confirms she is not at home but in what looks like a supply closet, with a dress hanging behind her and even a toilet underneath her[8:00]
• She jokes she only feels safe and like herself if there is a toilet fully plumbed into whatever space she is in
She explains she lives most of the year in a small town in Massachusetts by the ocean, on a little peninsula[8:41]
Her home internet was installed by her mother-in-law in the late 1990s and has never really been upgraded, so rain alone makes it unreliable[8:48]
Her husband owns the local general store, so she brought her laptop and power cord there and is using the manager's office to get a stable connection[9:06]

Where in Massachusetts and local roots

Jenny says from her house she can see Martha's Vineyard but clarifies she is not in Woods Hole[10:09]
She identifies the area as "South Coast" Massachusetts, which she didn't even know existed despite growing up in the state[10:22]
Jenny shares she is from Milton, Massachusetts, and Will jokingly riffs in a Boston accent about knowing people from Milton and nearby towns like Peabody[10:30]

How Jenny met her husband and their backstory

Meeting in Arctic Norway

Contrary to a romantic small-town general store meet-cute, Jenny says she actually met her husband in Arctic Norway[11:17]
She was there making a movie written by her friend; that friend's now-husband is best friends with Jenny's now-husband[11:40]
Her husband was invited to come hang out with them in Norway, and that's how they met[11:47]
He was living in Amsterdam at the time, so the trip was not as extreme as if he had flown from Massachusetts[12:25]
Jenny clarifies he is originally from Massachusetts and that they now live in his childhood home[11:58]

Cleanliness, "OCD" jokes, and messy childhood

Being in the closet and segue to cleanliness

They joke about Jenny literally being "in the closet" in the supply room, setting up a vaudeville-style bit which Sean leans into[13:43]
Jason brings up having read that Jenny is a massive OCD clean freak and asks about it[14:21]

Jenny's relationship to mess and tidy spaces

Jenny says she did have a messy childhood home but very clean grandmothers, whose tidy houses felt much less stressful to her[15:01]
She connects untidiness to feeling like her mind is unsettled and "crazy"[15:10]
She is baffled by people leaving things open-cabinets, dishwashers, jars-and says she finds that behavior crazy[16:01]
She does not frame her issues as classic germ phobia, but more about order and mental state, noting she is at a baseline "COVID level" of germ concern[15:24]

Hosts' reactions to cleanliness talk

Jason has been casually calling his own tendencies OCD, and Will interjects that the term is overused and not accurate for most people[16:13]
• Will notes people similarly overuse other diagnostic labels casually, and he pushes back on that habit
They joke about what people might be "leaving open" in their life if they leave cupboards slightly ajar[16:04]

Stories about dishes, mess, and consequences

Annoyance about dishes left by the sink

Will describes frustration with a friend in Atlanta who would leave multiple glasses and cups stacked by the sink instead of in it[16:57]
• He argues it is literally easier to lower your hand into the sink than stop at the counter, especially if you just run a bit of water into the glass
His friend ultimately shrugs and admits he has no good reason for not doing it[17:25]
Sean mentions that his partner Scotty cannot tolerate pieces of food in the sink and always rinses dishes immediately[17:33]
Sean says he himself ensures no food is left in the sink but doesn't always load the dishwasher, which Scotty likes to do[17:33]

Will's boarding school punishment for messiness

Will recalls being messy at an all-boys boarding school when he was 12 and being repeatedly told to clean his room by the housemaster[20:45]
One day he returned to find all his belongings gone; the housemaster had put everything in garbage bags, loaded them in his car, and driven Will six miles away[21:09]
• The housemaster made Will unload the four big bags on the roadside and drove off, saying this would teach him to clean his room
Will struggled to move the huge bags, shuttling them in short stages and realizing it was unsustainable[21:21]
He solved it by opening the bags, putting on as many clothes as possible like the Michelin Man, and then carrying a smaller remaining bag[21:31]
• When he appeared back across the first soccer field, the housemaster clearly saw him much sooner than expected, and Will felt triumphant for outsmarting him
Will admits the experience ultimately worked, and from then on he was much better about keeping things clean[22:18]

Jason's father's extreme dish protest

Jason recounts his father, who often came home very drunk, once getting furious because the dishes weren't done[22:30]
His father put a dirty dish on every linoleum tile on the kitchen floor, making it impossible to walk without stepping on dishes[22:41]
Jason labels this behavior as "psycho," and the others agree it was extreme[22:51]

Life at the general store and working from closets

What Ben's general store is like

Phone calls and background voices from the store interrupt occasionally, and the hosts riff as if someone is yelling at Jenny to get off the Hollywood podcast and back to work[23:33]
Jenny explains her husband Ben and his brother bought the store during the pandemic; his great-grandmother used to shop there and his family has long roots in the town[24:45]
They renovated it, adding a bar and a bookstore, and hired a manager named Marianne, whose office Jenny is using[25:08]
Ben owns the store and comes by daily to do various tasks, but a staff handles day-to-day operations, including the lunchtime rush happening during the recording[24:39]

Recording voiceover in closets and family details

Due to poor internet at home, Jenny often records voiceover work in a linen closet between her bedroom and her daughter's bedroom[25:21]
She mentions she has a 17-month-old daughter[25:21]
Sean jokingly suggests "Closets" or "My Life in Closets" as the title of her future autobiography, referencing her recording spots[25:38]

Balancing marriage, baby, and living between LA and Massachusetts

Adjusting from single life to partner and baby

Jason asks whether it was harder for Jenny to adjust her tidy habits to living with Ben or to the baby[25:52]
Jenny says the baby was a harder adjustment in terms of neatness, because Ben can understand when she explains what she doesn't like, whereas the baby can't yet understand threats or negotiations[26:19]
Jason notes a big early-parenting lesson for him was realizing you can't negotiate with someone who doesn't speak your language or care about consequences yet[26:25]

Keeping an LA base and describing her Silver Lake house

Jenny confirms they still own her house in Los Angeles on the East Side in Silver Lake[27:30]
She bought the house when she was single and a heavy stoner; it's a small, old house where the refrigerator is not even in the kitchen but in a tiny room off of it[28:08]
• At the time, she romanticized it as an Under the Tuscan Sun scenario: living alone in an old house with her blouses, not caring, and finding it all very romantic
When Ben moved in, she realized how messy and cramped it became with two people, and it now feels too small with a baby and a large border collie mix they adopted during the pandemic[29:12]
The loud stairs and limited space make the LA house difficult with a toddler and dog, even though she still loves it[29:19]

Decision to raise their daughter in Massachusetts

Jenny confirms they have decided to raise their daughter, whose name is Ida, in Massachusetts rather than in Los Angeles[29:25]
The hosts lightly affirm this as a good choice, and Sean makes a brief pun on Ida's name[29:59]

Jenny's experience with weed and why she quit

From heavy stoner to quitting after an overdose-like episode

Asked about her former heavy marijuana use, Jenny explains that she essentially stopped after a frightening experience with THC[30:05]
She had a back issue and took a CBD gummy recommended by a friend, who said it needed a THC tincture to "activate" it[31:09]
Because she smoked a lot of weed, the friend told her the label's "one to three drops" should be interpreted as three "droppers" rather than three drops[31:23]
Jenny took three full droppers and soon had what she describes as possibly the worst experience of her life[31:36]
• She tried to watch the film Amelie and couldn't recognize what language it was in or why it seemed so scary to her
• She vomited outside her bathroom because she couldn't figure out how to get over the threshold, then went to bed fully clothed, including her zip-up boots
• She kept thinking she needed to call for help but then convinced herself it was too late, before realizing it was only 6:45 p.m.
The next day her friend Jane Levy called, apologizing after seeing Jenny's intense texts about patriarchy from the night before[32:38]
Jane clarified that the dosage was meant to be one to three drops, not droppers, meaning Jenny had taken about 120 times the intended amount[33:05]
Months later Jenny tried a small hit of weed and immediately felt transported back to that horrific experience, which convinced her to quit weed permanently[33:17]

Stage Fright, performance anxiety, and stand-up

Jenny's feelings about performing live

Sean brings up Jenny's Netflix special Stage Fright and asks her to talk about the love-hate relationship she has with live performance and fear[36:05]
Jenny likens stand-up to what adrenaline junkies might feel, saying she loves it but also finds it really scary[36:35]
Her core fear is that the audience won't like her, and that they'll see her choke and flounder on stage, exposed and out of control[37:05]
She notes that if it goes well, the same situation transforms into being seen as powerful and masterful, but that possibility exists on the other side of the same risk[37:14]

Jason's framing of audience dynamics and Jenny's response

Jason imagines stand-up requiring a balance between an adversarial stance toward the audience (to feel strong) and being teammates with them (to find connection)[38:03]
Jenny says she thinks of it more like a date, where the other person could either like or reject you[38:11]
She says she "has to" keep doing stand-up despite the fear, implying it's essential to her identity and creative process[38:24]

Post-baby stand-up routine and wanting Ben to see her perform

In Los Angeles she typically performs at Largo and had been trying to go up about twice a week while there because she wants to make a new special[40:21]
She says it's harder to perform now that she wants to be home to put the baby to bed[40:25]
She likes when Ben comes to see her sets, especially after the baby, so he can remember that others see her as popular and funny, not just as someone who complains at home[40:27]
She avoids making Ben the butt of her jokes in stand-up, unlike Jason's past habit of using his wife in talk-show stories before she objected[41:08]

Marcel the Shell with Shoes On: origins and film production

Sean's fandom and basic premise of Marcel

Sean professes long-time fandom of Marcel the Shell with Shoes On and says the whole concept is captured in the title: he is literally a shell named Marcel who wears shoes[42:03]
He asks how she came up with the voice, whether she is sick of it, and whether there will be more Marcel[42:09]
They delight in details like Marcel using men's toenail clippings as skis and sleeping in a bedroom made of bread[42:30]

Creation of Marcel's voice and first short

Jenny says she still loves doing Marcel's voice; it feels soothing and she does it by herself a lot[43:02]
The voice emerged one weekend when she was sharing a cramped hotel room with about five friends, all men, and every sleeping surface was taken[43:11]
Feeling tiny and overwhelmed by the cramped and messy room, she started talking in the small Marcel voice to rib people[43:29]
Her partner at the time, Dean Fleischer-Kemp, had promised to make a video for a little Williamsburg show and asked if he could interview the voice as a character[43:41]
Dean interviewed her in the voice, then built Marcel's physical body, and together they made the first Marcel video[43:53]

Dean, Nick Paley, and writing process for the feature film

Jenny confirms Dean is still involved; he directed the film and co-wrote it with her and their friend Nick Paley[44:07]
She states the feature film Marcel the Shell with Shoes On is being released through A24 on June 24[44:35]
She says the film took seven years to make[44:38]
The movie was financed by an entity she calls Cinerich rather than a studio, which she likens to receiving arts grants and says gave them complete creative freedom[44:56]
They started with a long treatment, then recorded improvised audio sessions based on it[45:06]
• Dean and Nick would go back, comb through the audio, and shape a script from the improvisations, then write additional lines and prompt new improv sessions

Animation process and Isabella Rossellini's role

Jenny explains that they first locked the audio play for Marcel and his grandmother Connie, the only characters with full voice tracks, aside from Dean's occasional on-screen presence[45:35]
They then shot all the live-action plates of the real house environment and Dean's movements, and finally animated Marcel in stop motion over that footage[46:17]
Isabella Rossellini voices Marcel's grandmother; Jenny calls her incredible and says she has a beautiful voice[45:39]
Rossellini invited them to her farm in New York to improvise scenes, and Jenny jokes about it as a sort of actor's farm focused on improvisers[45:57]

Closing moments with Jenny and host reflections

Personal tidbits and goodbyes

Sean notes the film's release date, June 24, is his twin sisters' birthday and shares their names, Tannis and Shanley, plus his brother Chuck[46:47]
The hosts thank Jenny warmly, call her hilarious and a delight, and invite her to visit their imagined SmartLess Studios in Silver Lake[47:05]
Jenny signs off playfully, asking if she should just go now and saying she will say hi to Ben and Ida for them[47:04]

Hosts debrief about Jenny after she leaves

They repeat a rhyming "Jenny Slate is great" bit and call her a killer performer[48:00]
Jason mentions having done a small movie with her called The Longest Week and praises how fun she was on set and how good she is on camera, not just as a voice performer[48:23]
They reiterate that she is cute, funny, adorable, super talented, and has great energy and vibe[48:34]

Will's depleted energy and lunch plans

Will admits his energy has plummeted following his earlier workout and he is very hungry[49:16]
He says he needs to eat before a lunch meeting with Jason, and Jason teases him about what he'll eat and whether it will undo his workout[48:58]
They close with a silly "bite" riff and move toward the show's credits[49:37]

Lessons Learned

Actionable insights and wisdom you can apply to your business, career, and personal life.

1

Creating external order can be a powerful way to calm an unsettled mind, especially if you grew up in chaotic environments where mess equaled stress.

Reflection Questions:

  • • What specific types of clutter or disorganization most reliably make you feel anxious or unfocused?
  • • How could you redesign one room or workspace this week so that it feels more like a tidy, stress-reducing "grandmother's house" to you?
  • • When you notice yourself feeling mentally scattered, where in your physical environment could you apply a small act of order (like closing cabinets or clearing a surface) to reset your mindset?
2

Knowing your limits with substances and respecting dosage instructions is a critical form of self-protection, even if you think you have a high tolerance.

Reflection Questions:

  • • Where in your life are you currently assuming that "more is better" without really understanding the dosage or impact?
  • • How might you build in a simple double-check process (with labels, professionals, or friends) before you change a health, supplement, or substance routine?
  • • What is one boundary you could set for yourself around substances or self-medication that would make you feel safer and more in control?
3

Fear and stage fright often live right next to growth and power; the same situations that can expose you can also become the arenas where you build mastery.

Reflection Questions:

  • • What current or upcoming situation in your life feels like an exposed "on stage" moment where you might choke or shine?
  • • How could you reframe that situation more like a "date" or collaborative interaction with the other side rather than a one-sided judgment?
  • • What small, repeatable practice (like Jenny returning to the stage at Largo) could you adopt to make yourself more comfortable operating in high-exposure scenarios over time?
4

Designing your life deliberately-where you live, how you work, and who you live with-can align your day-to-day reality with your real values rather than default habits.

Reflection Questions:

  • • If you look at where you live and work today, which parts were chosen intentionally and which just drifted into place?
  • • How might your priorities change if you evaluated your environment through the lens of your family's needs, not just your career opportunities?
  • • What is one concrete change you could make in the next year (location, schedule, living setup) that would move your daily life closer to what truly feels "ideal" to you?
5

Playful improvisation and low-stakes experimentation can unexpectedly lead to your most meaningful creative work when you stay open to developing those sparks.

Reflection Questions:

  • • When was the last time you treated a small, silly idea as something worth capturing instead of dismissing it as throwaway?
  • • How could you build more space into your work or hobbies for improvisation, where you let things be messy and unplanned at first like the early Marcel recordings?
  • • What casual bit, joke, or side project in your life might be worth deliberately developing into something larger over the next few months?

Episode Summary - Notes by Kai

"RE-RELEASE: Jenny Slate"
0:00 0:00