Pushkin.

The whole idea of being able to be in this business is to try to find freedom, you know.

I still am seeking it with every circumstance and I think as I've gotten older

sometimes the freedom has been more apparent to me that I have more freedom than I think I've had

you know and I probably could have felt very free in bad dialogue and a little bit of

charm if I had just given myself permission.

That was Bill Pullman. I'm Sam Fregoso and this is Talk Easy.

Welcome to the show. Oh, Bill Pullman was born in O'Nell, New York to James and Joanna.

His father was a physician, his mother a nurse.

Together they set the stage for Bill to do whatever he wanted to do.

Instead of leaning into the field of medicine, he chose acting.

First, at a couple of colleges in New York and then eventually receiving a master's degree

from the University of Massachusetts Amherst.

But then the idea of actually acting started the dim, and instead the idea of teaching acting took hold.

I'm providing this context because we start this conversation with Bill at a very important moment in his life. He's a teacher

in Montana and has a very stable, safe, comfortable job. He lives in an idyllic town with a partner that he loves. Things are going

incredibly well, almost too well. And the kicker, he's only 28.

And so what you're about to hear is an abridged version of his life from 28 to right now. For those who need a brief refresher, you have seen Bill in such films as Space Balls,

while you were sleeping, sleepless in Seattle, Independence Day, Lost Highway, Lake Placid,

and most recently in the show The Sinner, currently streaming on Netflix.

He's also great in a film called The Ballad of Lefty Brown, which came out a couple years ago. In it he plays the title character.

If you have followed Bill's career, you've seen him oscillate back and forth between a leading

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