You are now tuning in to Discover Your Potential. So listen, participate, be inspired, know that you can Discover Your Potential. This is Dan Gilman, your host for Discover Your Potential. We have such an extraordinary guest today. I'm so very excited. Super talented film, TV, stage actor, producer, and director, and show business communities most respected environmentalists. I want to introduce you to Ed Bagley, Jr. Hi Ed, so good for you to be here. I'm honored. Mr. Gilman, what a pleasure to be on with you. Well, it's a pleasure to have you here. So I wanted to, well, first I wanted to speak about your acting career and then segue into something that is very important and dear to me, which is the environment. And I know also you were currently on preferred health magazines cover as well. So I wanted to share that with everyone. But first off, I wanted to chat with you about what was your childhood like? Were you close with your parents? I know your father was also an actor. Yeah, my dad was an actor and he did a lot of Broadway stage when I was young and continued to the rest of his life. And he did TV shows and movies and went to Oscar for Sweet Bird of Youth. He was in wonderful movies like 12 Angry Men. So since my father was an actor, I wanted to do what my father did really. If he had been a plumber, I'd probably be getting piped now. But he was not a plumber. He was an actor and I just wanted to do it. But I didn't really understand how it worked. I secretly, without ever saying it to him, it wouldn't have played very well with my dad, I'm sure. But I secretly presented him for not just getting me a job as an actor. I was a kid, so I didn't have any idea that he had no ability to do that. Number one, that didn't really happen. An actor can just call up and get a job for their son. Those situations happen so rare as to be impossible. And also I had no training. I just thought, well, my dad, what he's doing looks easy. Let me do that. Give me a series. And I went out in a few interviews. Again, I only got those interviews because I was a son of Ed Begley. I didn't get one single job, of course, out of about 10 or 12 interviews I went on over the course of about seven years. Then finally, finally, I wised up and took some classes and started to train. If anyone would, if you're going to be a plumber, you apprentice as a plumber and you watch people do it and you try it yourself. And see if you can make a good joint with copper pipe or steel pipe if you could put the tape on properly and get a good feel on that. And that's what you do. You train. And finally, when I had some training, I started to work at a fairly young age. I was 17 when I got my first job, a show called My Three Sons, very popularly showing the 60s. And I did just one episode of that and I thought, that's it. I'm in Screen Actors Guild. Here we go. I'm going to be a big star. Let's get that phone ringing. I sat by the phone literally expecting to get 20 other jobs offered me. If I had an interview, I suppose I would, you know, grace him with that. I suppose I would do that if they really insisted on the interviewing for yet another part. But I'm inside. Let's get a series going here. And of course, that didn't happen. So I worked as a cameraman for years, a camera assistant. I love that work. But then the acting did pick up. I continued to train and got better. I got pulled back into acting in about 1970, 71. I started to work fairly regularly and I've worked quite regularly ever since I've got into Screen Actors Guild in 1967. That's 54 years I've been working as an actor and very blessed and grateful to be doing it. Wow, that's incredible. And you've been in acting for over 54 years. Is that correct? That's correct. Professionally, I did plays and what have you before that. I've been acting since even younger age, but working as a professional actor for 54 plus years. Wow, that's incredible. And I know one of your mentors was was it William Daniels? Can you tell? Yes, I was a great fan of his. I'd seen him in a movie called Two for the Road and he was also in the parallax view. I'd seen him in a few movies and I knew he was great on stage. I hadn't seen him in any of his wonderful stage work in New York and elsewhere. But I was up for a part on this show called St. Elsewhere in the 80s and I didn't get the part. I was up for a part of a regular character called Peter White. Went up getting killed in the second or third year and I didn't get that. They threw me a bone, gave me a much smaller part. It was in an episode or two. But then as I said, Peter White gets shot and that my character of Aerolik became one of the pitiful characters in the show. So you can't always get what you want and what the universe has in store for you is often better. That is true. I love that. I love that show. It was great. Me too. Thank you. Before before I go on to mentioning other questions or we're asking you, but if you want to speak with Ed Bagley, Jr. I wanted to mention our call in numbers 888-627-6008. That's 888-627-6008. I just wanted to bring that up because I didn't mention that earlier. But so when you first started performing, if I'm not mistaken, were you into comedy? Is that correct? Or is that something you focused on? When I was quite young, they asked me what I wanted to be. I mean, age two or three. I want to be an actor. What do you want to be the next day? I go, I want to be a comedian. And you could, of course, be both things. There's Don Rickles and my father and many other people through. And I had a comedy actor a while. I was part of a duo. I worked with a very talented Michael Richards, played Kramer on Seinfeld, many other roles. And we had a duo and he went off and joined the army. And I was on my own. So I went, well, maybe I'll try to do a single act. And I wrote some more material and I went, I was living in Boulder, Colorado, and there was a talent night or something. And I won whatever the prize was, which was a, I guess it was a job to actually work there for a night or two or a week or something to be able to do comedy there for a very small amount of money. But I went, wow, I'm a professional comedian now. And I always, besides getting dramatic roles as an actor, when I started, I got a lot of comedy roles too. And so I learned to be a comic on stage and on film and in television. And yeah, I've done probably as much if not more comedy than I have drama. That's incredible. And you've played, you've been in so many films and TV roles. I've, I was looking at your credits earlier and what, if there are any, what were a few of your favorites that you performed in? I know that's a, that's a great question. Shane Ellsworth was a great favorite experience in my professional life and in my personal life. The writers were so good on that show. The actors were all so good, the directors. So that was six years of just sheer splendor and fun and joy and, you know, financial rewards of being a series. I mean, not like being part of another successful show during the 80s, Miami Vice, where you're one of two characters, then you got a really big payday, but to be part of an ensemble cast, it was good money, but not, you know, huge star money, of course, because I have a lot of people in the cast. So I worked, I mean, some dough, I learned some more and was part of something very good. Also, I got to work with the incredible Meryl Streep in a movie called C-Double. That was a high point in my career as an actor and my life as a person to work with someone as gifted and wonderful as her. And I worked with Jack Nicholson in a movie called Going South. He's been a friend of mine since 72 and he was kind enough to give me a job in 1977. I had a great time in Mexico working on that. And I worked with Bob Hoskins, Michael Kana, John Lithko on a thing called World War II when Lions roared. We shot in Prague, which is one of the most beautiful cities in the world. So working there with those wonderful actors, you can imagine the kind of stories they all had between shots. Just that was joyous. And to work with Chris Gaston, all his movies to be in spinal tap with all of them, my friend Rob Reiner directing them. Chris did all his many Waiting for Guffman movies. I was not in that movie, but I was in Best in Show and Mighty Wind. And geez, I think every project he's done since and very grateful to know Chris and to work with the likes of him and Arrested Development and now Young Sheldon. I'm on that fairly regularly and I just love that show. It's such a heartwarming show and funny. I just really love the show. Better Call Saul, I was on that for several seasons. I really love just watching that show, let alone the gift of being in it. So I'm a blessed old man. I'm 72 years old now and still working. I don't care if you're in the storm door industry or selling used cars. If you're working 54 years in any business and you still enjoy it, you are one blessed individual and I am not. Absolutely. That's incredible. Yeah, I was actually, my other question I was going to ask you was about working with Meryl Streep in She Devil actually. She's so extraordinary. She's one of my favorite actresses. Yeah. She is a goddess on and off screen. She's been active in some important things environmentally. It was something they used to use on apples for years, something called Allard that was dangerous chemical and it didn't really kill any pester anything. It just made the apples look prettier. So a lot of people, she and I and many others, when you keep the Allard to yourself, you know, and you know, I don't mind if an apple looks a little unusual as long as it tastes good. And so she was active in that years ago and lots of other wonderful things environmentally and otherwise. So she's someone I greatly admired and Ed Asin was the dear friend of mine. He was very active in a lot of important causes to him. So he was a great role model in that way for me. So I'm just lucky to know people like that that care about important things and do something about them. Absolutely. Do they still use that on apples? Just curious. They banned it years ago. Yeah, I don't think you're allowed to use it. And the rumor was that all the apple growers in America were going to go out of business and they did not go out of business. Right. You know, people when I, you know, I don't, I don't need another chemical in my life, right? You know, because it didn't even do anything important like kill a bug and there's ways to keep bugs off apples without using any of those chemicals too. And a lot of people have embraced that organic apples do very well. Organic apple orchards and organic pear orchards and plum orchards do very well. You know, they just advertise the product for what it is and some people are willing to pay that. It's not much more nowadays because pesticides and herbicides and fungicides are very expensive. You know, a lot of people can do even better financially factoring in, you know, you know, whatever costs there are in doing things organically and, you know, with integrated pest management and what have you. To use ladybugs and things like that on crops instead of using hazardous chemicals. Yeah. And do they, they still rub wax though on, I've noticed on apples. I think they do. I think they wax a lot of the fruit. They do not wax and but yeah, you can see a lot of fruit out there is wax and you can pretty easy to tell the difference sitting in the bin there, the stuff that looks like a gleaming floor and other stuff has more of a matte finish. I always go for those kinds of apples. Yeah, I prefer that as well. Not to go because I know we want to go into the environment. I know you're that's that's a big component of what you do. But I know I wanted to ask you you in a few interviews that I've seen actually you've mentioned working with acting teacher Roy London and I was really interested. You mentioned he mentioned I know this kind of out of context but how a character deals with pain and either comedy or drama. I'd love to hear more about that that I just found that so intriguing when you mentioned that. I only work with them briefly. He passed away sadly. I'm sorry about my daughter's dog. They should make a little noise which will stop. But I work with Roy London and the show was doing called Winnetta Road that came and went but I wanted a little extra help and someone knowledgeable when he was out he had worked with a lot of my friends as an acting coach. After we did some work one day said you know what I think is the most interesting thing to watch Ed. So what's that Roy says how a character deals with pain. I sat there and I nodded and I thought I thought this guy was good. What a stupid how a character. Oh pain I'm in pain. Look at me I'm suffering. I'm in Garcia Lorca's blood wedding and my character's in pain and like been painful. Jesus Christ what did I waste my money on this guy. So thanks a lot Roy. Oh Jesus I got to run. I got to get home and I'm driving home ago. Wait a minute wait a minute. He didn't say a character I didn't. It's the most interesting thing to watch as a character in pain or suffering from pain how our character deals with pain how you keep that lid on the pot or try to Sophie's Sophie and Sophie's choice Meryl Streep's character how she's trying to live her life years down the road from what happened to her and then we discover what Sophie's choice was and how she's trying to deal with her pain low those many years. Pick any movie that Joaquin Phoenix does pick any movie that Daniel Day Lewis does or any movie that Meryl does as a French Lieutenant woman or out of Africa how she deals with pain of what her character Isaac Denison is going through and either one of those she's done and it's universal. It's comedy or drama. Laurel and Hardy are carrying a piano a big heavy piano down a flight of stairs and they fall carrying a piano and then as they fall they fall in piece of piano this heavy piano fall on them and you're laughing the way it's staged you can't help but laugh if you want to find that clip and watch it it's very funny but it's people carrying a piano and it's how their characters deal with pain. It's true comedy or drama Roy was very smart I didn't listen to what he said of course how does a character deal with pain and what's the most interesting to watch as I said is trying to keep the lid on that pot to keep it from boiling over and it's starting to boil again and you're trying to watch this character what it's seeing between the reads and what they're trying to hide from you with all the different behaviors and that's very compelling to watch. This episode is sponsored by Liquid IV. Hey DIY P-Fans I don't know where you are in the world but here in the desert it feels like summer is already arrived which means it's going to be triple digits soon so it's a really good time to talk about the importance of staying hydrated in the hottest time of the year. It always sneaks up on people in the desert you know like last week I volunteered to take my friends dogs to the dog park and just a couple extra hours of exercise a day felt good to be outside. 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I think it's important not just in the summer months but it reminds me that you need to take a little extra care I wouldn't mind drinking two of these they just taste so delicious and the cool thing is that it's got three times the electrolytes of the leading sports drink plus there's like eight essential vitamins and nutrients it's all clinically tested it turns ordinary water into extraordinary hydration so I think it's important to own your ritual break the mold own your ritual just take one stick in 16 ounces of water and it hydrates so much better than water alone you maximize your hydration with liquid IV you can get 20% off your first order when you go to liquid IV dot com and use code DYP at checkout that's 20% off your first order with code DYP at liquid IV dot com Roy was right our character deals with pain and it can be physical pain it can be emotional pain can be cosmic dread it can be whatever it is but that's that's what's very interesting watch and you look at take another great comic performance from my money get on YouTube or anything and watch a clip of Sherry O Terry from Saturday Night Live going to a pharmacist counter to get medication of Sherry O Terry pharmacist just type it in and watch once you something funny and the character very much in pain and it's hysterical as everything she does so it's out there it's a universally true rule in my opinion and I stand by it Roy London who's a dear man and a very smart one at that yeah absolutely and if you don't mind I would love to talk to you about your dear friend and mentor Norman Lloyd actually oh I love Norman Lloyd he was a man that I worked with before saying elsewhere he was a director and a producer he worked with Alfred Hitchcock he worked with you know he was in the mercury players of course and work with Orson Welles and you know he was a saboteur and Hitchcock saboteur and he just was such a knowledgeable guy he knew so much about old Hollywood I was the son of Ed Begley so now I knew a little bit about old Hollywood it was kind of starting to fade away some of these things I met one of the Keystone cops as I was a man that's silent film days but I met one of the people who was one of the Keystone cops and those old comedies so I I got to see a bit of that Norman lived it and he was wonderful in this show saying elsewhere and helped me a great deal and gave me something to aspire to to still be working at his age back then I think he was maybe 70 maybe late 60s I thought wow he is so old and here I am a little older than that what he was at the beginning of saying elsewhere I'm 72 now so maybe I'll get to be someone else's Norman Lloyd and pass it on as he did to me that legacy of what came before you know anybody doesn't know about the actor Norman Lloyd look that up and see about the fine work he did amazing actor amazing director and producer too who would you consider your role models just curious about that do you do you have I know Lloyd is probably one of him Daniels potentially do you have other role models in the industry that you feel is is one of your role models before I mean now you're meant you're probably a role model so many I mentioned it I mentioned his name before and I'll say it again I don't ever expect to do the work anything remotely like Joaquin Phoenix but I can watch what he does and try to do my humble version of that kind of immersion immersion in a character and that kind of commitment and that kind of talk about how our character deals with pain him and the Joker him and the master you know the you know gladiator everything that he does is so remarkable he's someone I aspire to is an actor Daniel Day Lewis I've had the pleasure of meeting and kind of work that he does is just incredible I made a meal one day for Joaquin Phoenix Alan Ark and my old friend from the in laws was there Tommy Lee Jones I can't remember who else was there but wonderful wonderful actors I was in a motion picture Academy lunch and you know I just had a great great time cooking for them and so I got to I've gotten to know some of the those people that are that talented another role model is of course the great Meryl Streep you know try to do the kind of work that she does again I haven't a fraction of the skills I could never do anything approaching that but I try to have that level of commitment and that kind of level of preparation you know when I have the time given my schedule you know I don't have like months to prepare as one often does with a major motion picture I have a few days to prepare for a television show often but I do the best I can and try to emulate those kind of talented people then environmentally I have my own models you know Cesar Chavez was a friend of mine and he not only did so much for the farm workers you know with you know wages and working conditions but part of the working additions you know work that he did for the farm workers with people that are getting hit with pesticides and how you know that's an environmental issue and I I knew Cesar Chavez and I work with him on those matters and continued to work with his partner in the union the great Dolores Huerta Dolores is a friend of mine and I've gotten to work with her and I know Jane Goodall and work with her on the Roots and Shoot program so I'm just blessed to know these people and they are my environmental role models David Drower yeah you know from friends of the earth and you know he just was he passed away years ago but he was an incredible man and a great role model environmentally Sylvia Earl who knows so much about the oceans I'm blessed to know these people and I get to continue to work with some of them well that's incredible Jane Goodall is incredible didn't she she is amazing she's of course the nature yeah I remember down in Boston I actually got to meet her once she was doing a conference down here and she's just extraordinary sorry just jump off topic yeah there's no one like her she's amazing yeah she is she is well I'd love to continue to talk about your acting career but I know you know our timing I would love to go into the environment but there's one thing I do want to ask you because there might be some young people who aspire you know inspire and are inspired by you and I'd love for them to hear from maybe from your side of what you feel what kind of tip or suggestion or help or support that you could give young potential actors who want to really go into acting or performance or if there's something that you can give them today and then I'd love to like move on to the environment if you are a pianist or a violin player if you're a musician and guitarist you're gonna want to practice every day you're going you need to play if you want to be very good at something even certainly great at something you have to practice every day in a very disciplined manner if you're an actor you need to act you need to do it as much as you can and not just wait to get a TV show or a movie and start acting then because you somehow got a role you know God knows how you would get it without training but you need to be part of the theater group you need to do you know small films independent films you know this is after having some training before you even rise to the level to that you know student films short subjects actors act so the best way to get cracking is to whatever city you're in if they if it's a large enough city like you know LA San Francisco Chicago New York Boston cities like that there's always theater groups get part of a theater group a regional theater group a community theater group and start doing plays of the young person as a middle-aged person there's an older person wants to start acting or return to it actors act violinist play the violin the guitar players play the guitar and they do it regularly so you have to keep that muscle working and you have to act so and the best way to do that to get ready and to be able to get admitted into a theater group you have to train and take some classes from somebody reputable and and that's very very important you have to train yeah yeah and that's that's interesting so I did want to talk about I know you live by example you're an environmentalist when did you start living an and you know eco-friendly life or what what was the thing that made you do it what what really got you to push through where so many others just don't it was it was living in LA at that point I was 20 years old I lived two decades in Los Angeles in the San Fernando Valley and LA at that time for my whole young life then 1949 when I was born till this year you know that I started 1970 I lived in a horrible choking smog it hurt your lungs nearly every day of the year only these few days when it would rain you know the winds blow would you be able to catch your breath but now you just you took short breaths because it hurt to breathe they would not allow the kids outdoors to play or even indoors because if you'd open the door and the smog would come in of course open a window whatever wouldn't like there was no smog inside it was just worse outside and you you were told by the authorities not to play in those days and not to move around much it was just crazy so that was the bad influence that got me involved you know the other bad thing was this river called the Cuyahoga River outside Cleveland caught fire and I thought this is a bad sign when rivers are so polluted they're catching fire that's bad you know the Santa Barbara oil spill happened in 1969 that was very bad but the good thing also motivated me the good thing was I was in Boy Scouts and I saw nature up close and personal and liked it I knew it had value and my dad was a conservative who liked to conserve you know we turned off the lights and turned off the water and save string and say 10 foil he was a son of Irish immigrants he lived through the Great Depression so all that stuff there was good and bad influences led me to get started in 1970 and I said well what I'm gonna do this is a nice day what about the other 364 days of the year what do we do he said well we're gonna clean up there and clean up the water I went sign me up but I couldn't afford things like solar panels or a fancy electric car I could afford to take the bus or you know take other forms of public transportation I could afford to ride my bicycle I became a vegetarian I used all sorts of non-toxic baking soda and vinegar and water to clean things now I did everything that I could afford and there was a lot I could do and each one of those things also helped me save money so I stayed with it and I bought a $950 electric car in 1970 it was basically a golf cart with a windshield wiper and a horn but it had a California license plate mostly driven by old people in retirement communities but I could drive it you know staying to the right of the road you know and so you didn't get run into I drove it around LA for a while and and all that stuff was not only good for the environment it was good my pocketbook so I stayed with it yeah that's that's great I know Buck Binster Fuller also created something at one point in time or tried to yes he was a very good influence on people to take action environmentally as geosciences were you know a wonderful way to build simple structures that were structurally sound and you know they were you know low-cost materials he did a lot of you know very noteworthy things for years I was a fan of his as well yeah so everything we buy as you know everything we own has some sort of carbon footprint more than just the purchase price or you know the cost of the environment but even even the web even the web actually causes carbon footprint unfortunately a lot of people don't realize that but with that said what are your thoughts on alternative technology that can help our environment like battery technology or you know I know that they're coming up with things where they were for a while at MIT they were doing living batteries I don't know if they're ever going to be put that into production but I've heard you know organisms that actually save energy that would be great I hope they keep pursuing that because that's another viable option but there's plenty of ways you could do something today that will help reduce your carbon footprint and save you money if you do it in the right order and that's what I heard people to do to pick the low-hanging fruit first and do what they can then you afford to buy some light bulbs energy saving light bulbs energy saving thermostat you know weather stripping home garden home composting if you have a bit of a back-to-front yard you can grow things public transportation if it's available near you bike riding a weather fitness permit do those things and they'll save money and maybe get yourself a home energy audit gets home well insulated very efficient and then and only then after you've done all that maybe look into solar panels if you can afford to buy them or nowadays you can you don't have to buy them with no money down most places in America you can lease a solar system and put that up on your roof if your roof is a good candidate and nowadays they use Google Maps they don't even send a person out to your house they look on Google Maps see what kind of shading you have from trees or other build buildings that go no you're not a good candidate for solar we're not going to waste your time or we'll come by Tuesday and you know have a guy give you some information about what it would cost on your roof so there's a lot that we can do today the technology is getting better I have a lead platinum home what that is is leadership in energy and environmental design leed and it's like the rating the miles per gallon if you will of a home how fuel efficient it is how energy efficient in every way how much electricity how much natural gas how much water and they even look at as they should look at how much energy used while you were building it how much trash you created on site at the job site the construction site when you're building it how far did that stone material for your countertop arm they come from is it marble from Italy you know you get dinged for that and you should you know because it used a lot of carbon a lot of CO2 to get it to Southern California so you avoid those kinds of materials and if you do everything right and we did we hit not lead silver not lead gold but platinum status which is up high and we did a very good job with that but I got to tell you as quickly as I say that it's been a few years since we finished the house and when Greta came on the scene Greta Toonbury she you know she really moved me I went I got to do more and I didn't fly much at all back then but I just stopped flying I really don't fly ever now I take my electric car which has pretty good range and I drive cross country and I just don't fly anywhere and I also I thought what else can I do at my house I've got to leave platinum home and I realized I had from years ago we had a natural gas dryer I got rid of that put in an electric dryer we had a natural gas boost your water heater because our solar hot water system gives us our hot water most of the time but if it's cloudy for a few days the water is going to be cold and you can't take a hot shower what have you the ladies aren't gonna put up with that I can maybe brave that they ain't gonna do that right so we got rid of that electric that I'm sorry that natural gas and booster water here to boost the solar hot water and replace that with electric that's actually being put in soon we've ordered it already and A. O. Smith is gonna do that job soon so it's great there's always something you can do yeah so is your home run solar basically solar energy powered or mostly run on solar would be if it was just me here living alone or she all and I is a couple living here alone and living a modest retired life we can live off the the solar panels and the the you know the hot water that we get we have very low natural gas bill if we still got out very low electric bill but we have three and a half people charging cars here but that I mean I drive a pure electric my wife drives a pure electric and so does she drives a Chevy Volt but she never drives it on gasoline it's always on electric that trips that she's taken so charging three cars you can't be all right you know just charging them on what rooftop solar you have you have to have a nearby field or roof as big as that at Walmart to charge three and a half cars because I say a half because my grown daughter lives in an apartment so she comes to charge at my house a lot of the time and also we have a pool which I bought my wife on and I lost the battle I didn't want to have a pool because I knew that pool filter would be running a lot of time that's like running a blow dryer you might know pool filters you know and we have a very efficient pump but still without efficient pump it's still like running a blow dryer eight hours a day and then we also have an ozone treatment system rather than use chlorine in the pool we treat it with ozone that's like having half a blow dryer then we also have because it wasn't warm enough for my wife to feel comfortable pool so we put some black tubing solar black tubing on the back of the photovoltaic and pump that water from the back of the of the solar electric panels which is quite hot on the back down to the pools and that pump is running 10 hours a day maybe 12 hours a day so all that together really I buy some nighttime power is what I what I'm getting at and all of that is power every bit is green as the sorry my battery was low every bit is green as the power I make my roof DWP has a green power program and if you sign up for it they put new green kilowatts into the grid not buying carbon offsets with the forest somewhere you're putting new green electrons in the grid for every kilowatt hour that you use they buy that amount of wind solar geothermal so I only buy power at night when I need it which is rarely and I only buy 100% green power as green as the nine kilowatts and solar my roof long winded answer but you don't want to misrepresent things with a good question like that yeah and it's interesting because I actually worked on a project for the Museum of Science called it was all on solar energy not to bring this up but Daniel Sierra came up with this he's from MIT came up with a way to take energy from the sun and convert it to hydrogen that's supposed to power your home in your cars but I guess that didn't come to fruition but the the kiosk that I worked on that I designed is still sitting in the Museum of Science but I'm just curious as to I'm wondering if that's something that could be an option today yeah if you have a good rooftop as I actually do you have the space for something like nine kilowatts you can run a house quite easily with two or perhaps even three thrifty people in it you know charging a certain amount of electric car charging yeah but yeah if you use all LED lighting and energy efficient stuff like that and neutron dimmers you can do it hmm I also wanted to talk about I know this is an interesting subject but about bees and what and I know bees are actually a big component of the environment right because we're still having issues and people are still unfortunately because of the environments destroying bees and those are critical for our earth our planet I'd love to talk to you about that and what can people do to save our bees pollinators are very very important and I think 65% of the produce you see at your market comes from pollinators avocados and you know like all the citrus and what have you you need those pollinators so you get to have a lot of the food we need so I had a had my own line of cleaning products called Beggie's Best and when I started in 2004 I thought well I'm gonna be retired any day now things are starting to slow down a bit as an act in 2004 so I can devote myself this line of cleaning products and I had some time for a while but then things really picked up in a very amazing way as an actor by schedule you know got very challenging so I had to abandon that company and and you know focus on the acting work but then my friend Mark Cunningham came to me and said he had a line of cleaning products that he wanted me to consider you know partnering with with him on and I did their wonderful formulas certified by the EPA designed for the environment program really really good products and everybody's things as the ones I had originally and more importantly a wider variety of different SKUs different products and so just go to Amazon and type in Beggie cleaning and you'll find it or just go to Google and type in Beggie cleaning products and you'll find it and they're they're very good products I'm glad they're non-toxic I wouldn't have it any other way but most importantly besides that clean clean formula they're they work very well they're very effective you know there's good as any formula 409 or Windex or anything like that and certainly with things like the floor cleaner the pet stand and odor remover you've got pets or kids that are crawling around on the floor all the time putting their fingers that are paws in their mouth you don't want them to be getting that stuff that toxic stuff in their mouth in their system so you got to be careful with that stuff everybody's out there and I'm there with them with sign processing the hazardous waste site near their homes but the worst hazardous waste site is not just near their home it's in their home it's under the sink you know with all those cleaning products that we seem to want to buy stop buying those buy other good products seven generation makes good ones to you cover you know there's other people I'm not going to be just self-serving here say buy my products I hope you do I think mine are among the best but other people make them and get them and try them they're they're very very good they That's wonderful yeah and I'll I'll share the links we actually have a caller on line one Hello hi is this Melissa hi how are you good how are you thank you for calling in thank you so much thank you for having Mr. Begley on he's so amazing his acting and his environmental work so I wanted to just say Mr. Begley your products are amazing I actually spilled red wine on one of my white couches that I just got and I used the dog product the pet product it came off it disappeared fantastic Alyssa that's so great thank you for trying it I'm so glad it worked it certainly worked in every stain that I've had so I'm glad it worked on that difficult stain of a blind that's great to hear thank you so much no thank you so much because I literally just bought this couch and I sprayed the pet your pet product on there and it came right off it disappeared right in front of my eyes so I actually put a review on Amazon so I just wanted to say thank you so much for your products for your life's work and thank you sir thank you for the review on Amazon wow how great bless your list that's so lovely thank you thank you Dan so much have a great day thank you you too thank you for calling in there's been a lot of negative press out there that if we don't do something now which is true we don't do something now to protect our earth then it's you know there's obviously gonna be we're already seeing the effects of global warming so and I'm not sure how we can reverse it but what can people do to to really help with the environment what can people start with what can what kind of messages do they need to hear because our earth is our home that's all we have well I urge people to do it just the way I did it when I started in 1970 they said earlier I was a broken struggling actor I wanted solar panels I wanted a fancy electric car I couldn't afford either of course I didn't have anything like the funds for that but I could afford to ride my bike I could afford to take public transportation I could afford to do some home composting I could afford to buy you know make vinegar water spray to clean things and then baking soda to clean things now I turn the lights down when I didn't need them turn the thermostat you know down in the winter and up in the summer everything that I did on a real budget back in 1970 it always good for the environment also good for my bottom line and I found I had extra money you know after a while and I could then move up the ladder a bit after picking the low hanging fruit I could buy a solar oven after a while I could buy a rain or collect some rain water pretty soon after 20 years doing it not 15 years of doing it 1985 I could afford solar hot water I could afford to I was working on St. Elsewhere then I invested in a wind farm I bought half of a wind turbine in the California desert that made wind power and so the electricity to Southern California Edison so I did everything that I could you know without going broke or going into debt doing it and that urge that's exactly what I'm asking people to do it's an interesting list that people have the things they can't do I always want to hear that that's good to know but the more interesting list is the things that you can do do those things today you don't run up to the top of Mount Everest you get the base camping to get acclimated after a few days and you climb some more and not everybody's gonna make it to the peak not everybody gets in summit not everybody's gonna afford a Tesla and nine kilowatts a solar or a lead platinum home but can you buy a thermostat can you buy some weather stripping can you buy an energy efficient light bulb can you ride a bike of weather and fitness commitment to take public transportation if it's available near you home gardening home composting if you got a front or back yard I don't have a backyard I don't have a friend yard I'm in an apartment can you get part of a community garden they don't have a community garden start one you know there's always a yes after you've said all your nose and find what that yes is and do it we have to do it for the for Greta you know and all the other young people that now see where we're headed and it's not pretty the world that's going to be looked to them and they're understandably upset with us start small and build do what you can today yeah that's great and also I see a lot of plastics still being used there's still a lot of plastics being manufactured and just even with waters and how is that affecting the environment as well a lot of the petroleum that we're you know we're drilling for oil and we're fracking for natural gas it's not being used to make fuel a lot of it a lot of being used to make plastics single use plastics you know you can make a case for making eyeglasses out of plastics that gonna last you 10 years sometimes or more a good pair of glasses you can make a case for making medical equipment out of plastic or other things like that different parts components that can't be metal some plastic in something durable like a computer I get that but single use plastic you know get one of these reusable bottles get I have some down in my back here these you know I'll pull it out so people can see you know some utensils rather than use those plastic utensils they give you your takeaway food or what have you always say no I don't want any plastic spoon to what have you who's little case you can clip it to your belt if you want like this that's great it's got top sticks a knife or fork spoon all made out of bamboo very sustainable materials what have you and you know canvas bags for your groceries you know there's so many things you can use instead of the the plastic throwaway and fortunately we just passed a few bills here in California you can no longer continue this fantasy of all these different little numbers 3 4 5 6 little circles with a like you know the recycling arrows not really recyclable even in LA number 3 number 4 number 5 number 6 plastics so they're not going to be able to do that in California anymore they can't put that sign on it number 1 and number 2 they can you know if they continue to have a place where you can take them but there's no place to take number 3 number 4 number 5 number 6 those different resins you can't take so they're you know they're trying to make some of these things have some accountability with the companies that are making and promoting products in these single-use plastic you know materials and so we're doing well in California with that and I hope we continue to right yeah and I know a lot of the plastics unfortunately end up in our oceans too which is yeah unfortunate only 10% of it really gets recycled everybody talks about recycling and some people like me and others do it but sometimes even put it in the bin oh good it landed I saw it going the way recycling bin a wind comes up and blows it out of the bin and blows it into a stream and out to the ocean you know a lot of times they've run out of a place they don't take our plastic materials anymore in Asia so they recycle a lot of these resins even number one and number two sometimes and they have no place to put them they put them in a landfill yeah and the wind comes and blows them out of the landfill into a stream or down a storm raining out to the ocean again so it's a big problem you know we're paying a price for this convenience but I'm old enough to remember when I would buy a pack of gum or a greeting card and they didn't put it in a little plastic bag you know my life was fine without that and it can be fine again without getting all these just remembering to bring a canvas bag with you when you go to buy groceries or anything and life will go on without most single use plastics and and it'll be fine life I promise you it was such an honor and a privilege and a blessing to have you on the show and I wanted to thank you so much for being with us today and again thank you buddy thank you thank you very much this is Dan Gilman with Discover Your Potential and we look forward to next time and as my mother used to say do something nice for yourself and do something nice for others this is Cindy Gilman and you're listening to Discover Your Potential so until next time do something nice for yourself but do something nice for someone else
