Gaten Matarazzo Had an Unsettling Encounter with Vecna on the Stranger Things Set Transcript

Jimmy Fallon: (00:00)
The charades champion.

Gaten Matarazzo: (00:02)
Right?

Yes.

I can’t believe we did it.

We are the champs.

Not deserved.

No, not at all.

At all.

No, not at all. But by the way, we kept saying, “Hey, we’re going to come back. We’re going to come back.” And what did we do?

Exactly.

We came back. Yeah. I want to talk about this. Dear Evan Hansen.

Yeah.

You’re coming back to Broadway.

I am. Thank you very much.

Is it like riding a bike? Do you go, “Oh, I know how to do this. Broadway.”?

A little bit. So if that’s riding a bike, this is like getting on a motorcycle.

Oh, it is?

Yeah. A little bit.

Yeah.

Just because I haven’t run on a show long term consistently since I was 12. And that was before my voice changed. I was only doing four shows a week then now I’m doing eight.

I could just imagine it’s just so straining on your voice to do…

Especially. Yeah. This show is not kind to most of the performers in it and I’m playing Jared. I’m very, very excited and his track is really great.

When does it begin?

I open July 19th.

Wow.

Yeah.

That’s soon.

It is soon.

That whole cast of Stranger Things can all sing.

A good portion. Yes.

That’s a talented cast.

Some of them much better than I can.

I think season one, do you remember that you were doing this thing that all the rest of the cast were getting annoyed by? You kept singing Oh my God. Do you remember this? We had it-

Oh my God. Yeah.

Yeah, yeah. You kept saying, oh my God.

Yeah that one.

And everyone’s like, “Will you stopped saying that?”

Everyone’s like, “Gaten”.

But that was your catch phrase at the time.

At the time. Yeah. I wanted-

Oh my God.

I wanted something that they’d hear just in the distance and they’d be like, “Oh, there he is.”

Can you do it one more time?

Oh my God. I was better at it when I was like 14. I was better at it.

No, it’s so good. Someone should sample that and put it in a song.

Well, it’s better when the roots can accompany you with it.

Can you give a little bit of the…

Yeah. Oh my God. Yeah. Yeah, of course. It’s perfect.

Oh my God.

That’s all we need.

In the show, I guess I got to see A Never Ending Story, of course.

Yeah.

We got to that, Running Up That Hill, by the way. How about that?

Right.

That’s taken a life of its own.

I know. It’s great for me.

Yeah.

Because it’s replaced A Never Ending Story.

Oh, yeah.

It’s awesome.

That was your… Oh, because that was your thing.

Oh yeah.

Oh yeah.

That was-

We’ve done stuff with you on the show.

I haven’t-

Do you mind doing that? But now, no. Now it’s on Sadie.

It’s now it sucks for Sadie, yeah. But, I’m in the clear for a bit. It’s awesome.

Did you like hearing it when you were doing it on the show, when you were filming?

I loved doing it on the show.

Yeah.

Gabby who plays Susie is just awesome and incredible. She’s a Broadway kid as well.

Really?

Yeah. She’s been Fun Home for like… I just saw her. Three or four years she ran in that show, which is a really long time, especially for a kid actor. Yeah, but she’s great. When she came on set, we heard it like 10 minutes before we shot. Then we got a harmony track set up and all that jazz. Yeah.

It was the greatest.

It was fun.

When Sadie was on the show I was talking about Vecna.

Yeah.

Who’s a new character.

Yeah.

Who’s kind of taken off a little bit.

Yeah.

That show Stranger Things. Yeah. Here’s Vecna and she said she had a very-

There he is.

I go, “Was he frightening on the set?” And she goes, “Actually, no, because my first time I met Vecna, he was eating a sandwich.” Kind of takes all the frightening… I was eating a hoagie, chomping on a hoagie.

I saw him once during filming of volume one. I saw him one time.

Oh.

I was in costume and we were doing 3D scans. You have to go into a room and they take a bunch of pictures all around, because there’s a lot of animation in the show, especially this year.

Oh yeah. It’s great.

And it’s like a little line of the cast in costume whenever they had free time during filming and I saw-

Vecna?

Yeah. I saw Vecna sitting there and I looked at him and was like, “Hi, it’s great to see you.” I hadn’t seen him since the table read. And he was just like, “Yeah, how are you? It’s good to see you.” Just like in like a lawn chair, feet up and whole half done up in Vecna gear. It is unsettling and just-

Yeah from the waist-

Bonkers.

From the waist down wearing like sweat pants?

Yeah, pretty much I think. I think, if I remember correctly, I was drawn towards his messed up face. But yeah, I think I remember he was-

And then he’s just talking to you like he’s not Vecna?

Yeah. It was like, “How are you?” He was like, “It’s good to see you.” He looked exhausted.

Everyone said… We did a bit. The roots and I did a Macy’s Thanksgiving Day parade and we’re on the float. We’re on a bus. They put all the people that are going to be on the floats on a bus-

Yeah.

Before you go on the float. It was me and The Roots and Ronald McDonald. It’s just crazy. The guy was so nice, but he-

That’s awesome.

He is dressed like Ronald McDonald.

But he’s Ronald McDonald.

Yeah. And he’s having a normal conversation.

That’s perfect.

Drinking a coffee.

That’s perfect.

He’s like, “Yeah. The subway was crazy.” And I go, “I can’t have this. You’re Ronald McDonald.”

Did you laugh?

No.

Did you-

No. I just had to tell him that you got to stop, because you’re-

I couldn’t.

Dressed like Ronald McDonald.

I wouldn’t have been able to breath.

I had a full on hour and a half conversation with Ronald McDonald and we were all freaking out. We were like, “Oh my gosh.” And then James-

Of course, you have like the… You’re doing the parade. That’s pretty nerveracking. Right?

Yeah. We were nervous about that, but then we were all just freaking out that Ronald McDonald was on the thing. We’re like, and James was about to come on the bus and we’re like, “Oh, James is going to freak out that we’re talking to Ronald McDonald.” And James came on the bus. Do you remember what he said, Quest?

Speaker 3: (05:38)
Yeah. He was like, “What’s up Ron?”

He said, “What’s up Ron?” Like he’s one of our friends.

Yeah.

We’re sitting talking to Ronald McDonald. “What’s up, Jay? How you doing?” He goes, “What’s up Ron?” Like him and Ronald McDonald hang out or something.

What are the daily issues of Ronald McDonald? What are like the-

Putting curlers in the wig. Yeah.

Yeah.

He’s got a curled hairstyle.

Yeah.

He’s got big shoes.

Beautifully quiff.

He’s got a quiff, Ronald McDonald.

Right.

He’s got the yellow jumpers.

It’s a lot. The shoes are a bit big.

Shoes are giantly big. He’s dressed like a clown.

Sure.

He’s a pretty famous clown.

Yeah. One of them. One of the famous clowns.

He has to take a car to wherever he is going. Can’t take public transportation.

No, I guess not. Yeah.

You can’t see Ronald McDonald.

I’ve never thought about the struggles of being Ronald McDonald, though I got to say.

There’s got to be a documentary there somewhere. What goes on? It’s like Vecna.

Yeah. That’s right.

The poor guy can’t even eat a sandwich.

He can’t go anywhere. He can’t eat a sandwich.

He can’t be on his cell phone, checking his voicemail.

He can’t have Starbucks. No.

He can’t go to Starbucks. He’s like, “Oh. I’m Vecna.”

Yeah. I got other beep to do.

Yeah. You got big things to do. Yeah. Season four, volume two comes out this Friday.

Yeah.

I know. You’ve done a great job not giving any spoilers away and I’m not going to get you in trouble.

Well, thank you.

I just wanted… This is your wardrobe.

That’s great. That’s fun.

Yeah. Okay, so I’m assuming that there’s a big finale.

Yeah, as you can see.

Yes. There’s also, here’s you.

There’s a picture.

Screaming.

I look so cute in that picture, don’t I?

You look so cute here. Yeah. Oh my God. This should be the poster board, but-

That’s the new Instagram bio picture there.

When you’re doing this, you go, “Okay. Oh my gosh.” They go, “Oh, there’s two new episodes coming out.” And you go, “Yeah.”

Yeah.

I go, “Oh, two? That’s it?” And you go, “No, no, no.”

No, no, no, no.

The first episode’s like two hours?

First episode’s, so eight episodes, I think probably an hour and a half. But episode nine, it’s getting close to two and a half hours. It’s a movie.

That is a movie right there.

It’s a movie. Yeah.

Coming out.

I know.

You did a movie.

It’s great. Yeah.

They’re all beautifully done.

They’re basically just… It’s nine movies, practically.

Yeah.

All of them are close to an hour and a half. All of them over an hour.

They’re so good. It’s all starting to pay off and everything works and it’s really cool.

Yeah. You learn a lot.

You learn a lot. Yeah.

Yeah.

And it’s scary and it’s good.

Yeah.

Yeah. I want to show everyone a clip. Here’s Gaten Matarazzo in season four of Stranger Things. Take a look at this.

Hey Steve.

Speaker 4: (08:11)
Did you guys see this?

How many phones do you have?

Speaker 4: (08:13)
Someone was murdered.

How many phones do you have?

Speaker 4: (08:16)
Two. Why?

Speaker 5: (08:17)
Technically three, if you count case in the back.

Speaker 6: (08:19)
Yeah, three works.

Speaker 4: (08:21)
What are you doing? You- whoa. What are you… No, no, no. Not on my tapes. Dude. What are you doing, man?

Setting up base of operations here.

Speaker 5: (08:29)
Base of operations?

Speaker 4: (08:31)
Stop. Get off of that.

No, I need it.

Speaker 4: (08:32)
Need it for what?

Looking up Eddie’s friend’s phone numbers.

Speaker 4: (08:35)
Oh, Eddie. Your new best friend Eddie you think is cooler than me because he plays your nerdy game?

Yes. I never said that.

Speaker 5: (08:39)
Seriously guys. Maybe on a Monday you can play around in here like toddlers, but it’s Saturday. It’s our busiest day.

All right. Look, Robin. I totally empathize, but this cannot wait until Monday.

Speaker 5: (08:48)
What, because calling all of Eddie’s friends is an emergency?

Correct.

Speaker 4: (08:51)
Do you want me to strangle them or do you want to do that?

Speaker 5: (08:53)
We can take turns.

Yeah. It’s fun. Gaten Matarazzo, everybody. Season four, volume two of Stranger Things is on Netflix this Friday. And you can see Gaten in Dear Evan Hansen on Broadway starting July 19th.

Speaker 7: (09:05)
(Singing).

Gaten Matarazzo Had an Unsettling Encounter with Vecna on the Stranger Things Set Transcript

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