Original subtitles

I like to think of myself as a pretty funny guy.

But today, right here, right now,

we have a comedy superstar on the ground, in Laurel, Mississippi.

He's about to start his comedy tour in Biloxi, Mississippi,

but before he does that, he wants to do a build with me.

Can you believe that?

And he's a huge supporter of animal rescue.

So, when I heard that, I thought, "Let's build something

for the Animal Rescue League, here in Laurel,

let's give something for the dogs there,

but also something that's gonna be a centerpiece that will draw people there."

Something that says, "George Lopez was here."

A legendary stand-up comedian,

star of his own series-s-s-s,

multiple shows,

his own talk show, he's, you know, he's voiced characters in animated movies,

he's been in kids' movies, he's been in dramatic roles,

he'd done it all.

This is gonna be a really good day.

- George Lopez? In my shop? - Yes sir, how've you been man? Good to see you, brother.

- What's up man? - Man, I came...

to do a little work today.

Have you ever built anything?

It's funny you asked. Nothing that I ever...

I wanted to be an architect in high school, as my major.

During this one semester, when you do your schematics and your own...

- Yeah. - ...my doors opened the wrong way,

I took doors in the bathroom, no shower

and everything was misaligned

and I thought, I got a future in comedy, because...

- It was hilarious. - ...architecture wasn't working...[chuckles] Yeah.

You're really committed to this dog rescuing.

Part of what made me a good stand-up comedian or made me a good actor, is that,

you're able to disengage from the nerves...

- kind of, got like a wall up and emotions and stuff. - Yeah.

Rescuing the dogs has made me

appreciate them and then, they made me appreciate me finding

almost like, my heart.

And like, if you treat 'em good, I mean, they love you forever.

How many dogs have you rescued?

You know, I've rescued, maybe 25 and a lot of them are that ones that are either

unwanted or are about to get put down.

Those are the most appreciative.

Do you have any dogs right now?

I do, I have, right now I have some little chihuahuas, like,

one that I've had for about seven years,

another like, a mini-pin that's maybe the size of my hand.

And I have one that got hit by a car and broke its tail,

so it's a dog that doesn't have a tail.

But that little stub moves...

you feel it when he's excited, 'cause it just...

Here in Laurel, we got our animal rescue league.

They rescue all sorts of animals but there are tons of dogs.

I though it'd be good if we built something for them

- to kinda raise awareness for it... - Oh yeah.

What if we built a big centerpiece,

- something beautiful? - Yeah.

- Yeah? - Yeah, that'd be great.

- Okay, I'm gonna show you how we're gonna do it. - Now we're gonna do it.

Oh man! All right.

- So, I was talking about doing something... - Mmm-hmm.

- ...that's a centerpiece. - Right.

So, I was thinking, like, what can we build? Something that

is both beautiful, form and function.

So, let's give them something that they can drink water.

-'Cause if you think about South Mississippi, it's hot. - All right, right.

- They're gonna be out there, they're gonna be playing. - Right.

They need something to drink water from.

You're talking about more of like, a centerpiece, almost like a...

- like a bowl. - A bowl. A big bowl.

- Yeah. - Well done, treated...

- Something they'll come, they'll gather around. - Yeah.

I don't really wanna call it a dog bowl.

What if we called it like, a hydration station.

It's brilliant.

- You like that? - Yeah, hydration station.

All right, so we're gonna use California Redwood

I'm from California, yes sir.

And I want something that's gonna contrast.

- Sure... okay. - Mississippi Cypress.

- Okay, what do you think? - Yeah.

I mean, I've never built anything from scratch.

The way we're gonna build this...

So, we're making a bowl.

We're gonna make three rings and then we're gonna make a base.

We'll cut our pieces, we're taking a simple joint, a butt-joint.

We'll join them on the sander and then we'll glue them together.

When you glue this all up, it creates a circle.

We will take those and we're gonna join them together,

- to make it a rough-shaped bowl. - Yeah.

Then we're gonna mount that on the lathe

and then we're gonna take a knife and we're gonna turn it.

Incredible.

- You're gonna love this. - Are we doing this in a day?

- Yeah. - All right.

- This is gonna be fast. - Wow.

- This if more of that redwood. - Yeah.

See here, redwood is protected okay, so you can't go out and cut it down.

They're such a slow-growth tree, that once you cut them,

you know, it'll be generations before there're more of them around.

That's why the redwood that we use is actually salvaged.

What's great about them is it's good for outdoor furniture...

- Mmm-hmm. - ...because, it's resistant to rot and bugs...

- Amazing. - ...that sort of thing.

This is a piece of a cypress, just to kinda show you...

Oh, wow yeah.

...what that's like together.

Both these trees produce a lumber that is good for outdoor materials.

So, then we start off with a good base to build from.

Right there where this apron is hanging,

- you can actually put that apron on. - Oh.

- That one's for you. - Okay, you know, I always hate to put things on,

because I say, "Is it gonna fit over my head?" Let's see.

Oh, thank God.

When I was in little league, my head was so big,

I had to wear a hat that coaches would wear.

My brother, he, in seventh grade,

- he had a varsity football helmet. - Yeah.

So, you played sports growing up.

I played a little baseball, yeah.

- Really? - I got a letter from the Reds

when I was in tenth grade.

And then I had a falling out with my coach in twelfth grade

and he tore the letter from the Reds up in half, in front of me.

- Dang. - So, we got into it

and then he started to get into my character and he says, "You know,

I'd like to see where you are in ten-20 years, because,

you're a quitter. I'll see how far a quitter can get in life."

He gave me the spark of truth that I needed to build...

- my life on. - That's fascinating.

That baseball field that I played in High School,

I started to donate back to the school,

and they named the field after me.

- Oh wow! - They won two championships and I bought those kids

championship rings...

- That's cool. - ...twice.

All right, so, this is our cypress.

We're starting from a big slab. Right now what we're doing

is giving ourselves more manageable pieces

- that we can make the segments from. - Okay.

So that we can start cutting the pieces for the rings,

we'll rip it down, we'll get it to the thickness

and width that we want.

So, I'm gonna let you cut that.

Beautiful.

- You sure you haven't done this before? - I haven't done it before.

- I'm going early with the push-stick. - Do it.

What was it like growing up

being George Lopez?

- You never knew your dad... - Yeah.

Uh, you didn't know much of your mom.

You know my grandparents raised me, they were older, they worked, I was home a lot.

Well, my grandmother was pretty hard on me, man.

And you know, we didn't have a lot, you know.

- Absolutely. - I wouldn't have had a show if I couldn't talk about

my grandmother, who became the mother character and those

stories of this childhood, as tough as they were,

were real and I didn't know that

in those tough summers and in those tough holidays and then the...

all the stuff of being alone, that I was really, kinda building

- what would become my future. - Yeah.

I gravitated towards comedy.

Instead of being hurt, you look at it and you laugh.

But, I mean like, your friends and your school, raised you also.

Yeah, I was kinda, taken in by my friends

and I'm still friends with those guys.

When I was 15-14, we would go to Hollywood every morning.

When I would go to the Walk of Fame, I would see George Burns' star

and I would imagine my name there.

At the end of March, on the 100th episode of my show,

I got a star on the Walk of Fame and then when I, uh...

looked... man...

to my right,

- I saw the guys that used to take me... - Sha...

the guys you'd go with...

they were all there.

Amen. There's sawdust in my eyes.

- It is... - But, I mean, to look over and see...

- ...us as men... - Mmm-hmm.

...and know that as kids, it was a dream of mine,

to do this was... I mean...

and I know how hard it is to get to a place where you've achieved something that

is almost impossible.

- Yeah. Well, that's gonna make this thing... - Come on, man.

- like nothing at all. Let's cut some wood. - This is easy. This is easy.

Take the cypress,

I'll take the redwood. We're gonna go over to the miter saw, now.

Now, we're gonna cut the 18 pieces that'll make up our three rings on the miter saw.

Miter saw... we're gonna set our angle.

- It's 15 degrees. - Okay.

That slight angle, taking that 15 degree angle,

applying it to the perfect length of board,

when you glue this all up, it creates a circle.

- You see that mark? - Oh, yeah, yeah.

- So that's seven inches. I'm gonna cut it a hair bigger - Okay.

Man, when we gotta cut this one, I'm gonna flip this board over.

'Cause now, that angle's ready. So, we need three rings

- and for each ring, we need six redwood and... - Okay...

- ...and six cypress. - ...and six cypress, right.

- So, we're gonna need 18 pieces of these. - Okay.

That gives us, you know, enough pieces

that we can create a pattern

So, what was your grandmother like?

What was she like... let's see, um...

she was just kinda, little bit mean... she could be mean fast.

And I don't know why. I mean, I wasn't a bad kid. She wasn't really into...

compliments or asking how you were,

or how was school, because she was always working.

So, I lived kind of, in solitude, you know.

Solitary confinement.

I mean, all of that was kind of like, the fabric

- for what I built my career on. - Yeah.

She didn't prepare me for life being good,

she prepared me for life being bad.

So, nothing bothered me.

And then when things got good, I could handle it,

but when things got bad, I was better at it.

- Dang! - Crazy

That's how he became who he is.

And he uses that in his comedy and he uses it in his routine.

I think he's come to peace with that.

It's fascinating to me.

- Power of the saw, it's impressive. - Yeah.

- Does it make you nervous? - A little bit.

So, we need to cut each segment a little bit bigger

just a hair bigger than seven inches

and then we'll take it to our sander, so, once we sand it down to seven inches,

we'll have a perfect glue surface, so, a perfect joint.

We're also going to cut out

triangles for our base. The bottom of the bowl

is going to be a series of triangles coming together at the center.

This is gonna be a 30 inch bowl for the best dogs in Laurel.,

All right, so we got all our pieces...

All sanded down. Beautiful.

- ...sanded, ready to glue. - Yep.

- Is that our bottom right there? - This will be the bottom.

- Beautiful. - This will be what the bottom of the...

bowl looks like.

And it all lines up.

- Almost like we planned it. - Finally.

That's the really cool thing about this is,

that we're taking a simple joint, a butt joint,

but by applying a different angle to it, we can make something new.

It creates a circle.

This is sleight of hand,

...magic.

Comedy started early for you.

I'm 18, I just graduated... I'm still in high school

and just got out.

- I go to the Comedy Store, uh, June... - When did you start?

June 4th of 1979. It was a Monday

I didn't do very good. But, I went up. It's almost like, you know...

- You did it. - I did it.

Like, you gotta get up there. So, I did it.

- Did you get any laughs? - Not the first two times.

The third time, so it's packed in the middle of the summer.

It's almost July, '79. So, I go up there and I start...

and they're laughing and they're laughing more...

and then, they're laughing more and I'm kinda like,

"Wow, what the hell is going on?" and they're laughing some more.

It's all like, adrenaline, smiles and happiness

like I'd never had in my life up until that point, so...

it was kind of like, an infusion of

acceptance and laughter and like,

love that was new to me.

I was just out of my mind.

I don't know what made me continue to go back.

It wasn't like I was a natural, like, "Oh, this guy is a savant."

It was... every time was tough.

But, it must've been better than where I was

or what I thought my future would be

if I didn't do it.

Was this the first thing you did and didn't quit?

I just decided I was gonna work harder than everybody else.

I was gonna work when people were sleeping.

Still, you know, scared to death of every time was gonna perform.

In five years I met Arsenio I did his show 15 times

and in seven years I did The Tonight Show

and in 2000, I met Sandra Bullock

and she came to see me

and she said, "I'm interested in your show,

I like what you gonna do. Come and-- let's meet."

- She like... one of the biggest movie stars ever... - Bigger movie star.

- So... - ...at that point.

...she'd become disillusioned with Hollywood.

- And... - Wanted to do something different.

And just wanting to step back.

So, when she saw me,

I was unique enough and...

funny enough in the material to...

pique her interest. She became, like, my biggest advocate.

And the first day I went to her...

office and we had lunch, and she was taking notes and

she's walking me down to my car and I turned back and I said,

"What you're gonna try to do has never been done successfully before

"in the history of television.

"And I just wanna say, whatever happens and if I never see you again or...

you know, whatever happens in this whole thing, I could just thank you."

- Yeah. - And she goes,

"Why don't you worry about being funny

and why don't you let me worry about that?"

- Dang. - And man... and that was it.

- The rest is history. - I wanted... the president at Warner Brothers saw me,

the president of ABC saw me,

I said to myself,

"I think I just might've gotten myself a television show."

That's cool.

- So, once you to get these all glued up... - Yeah.

I'll throw a strap around them.

You know, I wouldn't have expected that we would

put a band around it to...

hold it secure while it glue-dried.

But, you know, when we

bought mattresses and we're driving home with them,

nobody put a strap. You just had people

- reaching out. - ...hold them.

- Yeah. - So, this is essentially just a butt joint.

- Okay. - Okay.

So, as far as woodworking joinery goes,

this is not a complicated joint.

What makes it complicated is the fact that once we put all these pieces together,

- it's a circle. - Right.

Once that glue dries,

it is actually a stronger joint than

where the woods comes together in mother nature. Like,

it is stronger than where the wood fibers joined to each other.

Unless you didn't glue it right and then it's weaker.

All right. We got all our pieces glued up, ready.

This is my sander. It's a wide-build sander.

It's got this big belt.

- Inside of there it's sandpaper. - Okay.

- So, then we'll run these through. - Okay.

So, then we're gonna take our three rings

and our base

and we're gonna run them through the wide-build sander on both sides,

because, in the same way that we needed the segments to be

perfectly glued together,

we need each of these four pieces

to glue together perfectly.

How long was it from...

the lunch with Sandra, ABC get involved

and Warner Brothers to

making the first episode?

In literally, a summer, less than a year,

I'm on TV.

- This is crazy. - And they were, you know,

they were almost recreations of my real life,

which, I think, you know, one of the things that has made it survive since

2002, is that, it had heart and it had

a reality and it had...

my... kind of my struggle.

So, the show was trying to prove to my mother I wasn't a boy

and trying to prove to my wife, I'm a man.

So, to mime my life,

almost verbatim was...

was easy and cathartic for me. So, now when it airs...

- And you're airing it out... - And the mom is...

like, a mean mom.

That's really my grandmother. When my grandmother sees it,

she says, "You've made me nice,"

- She said... she said you made me nice. - Oh my God!

So, the next step, now that we've got everything sanded perfectly, we will glue

all four pieces together.

And we're essentially stacking it like a layer cake.

But then, we're going to shift it a little bit a...

half-a-segment turn

on each one, so that our lines

don't line up. This is where the beauty comes into it.

- So, you like the pattern? - I love the pattern.

I realize that our pattern just kinda looks haphazard right now.

But, once we turn and slick it down,

- it's gonna be beautiful. - Okay, so, you're a craftsman,

you did it intentionally, I would have done it...

I was like, "Oh man, I thought everything lined up."

- So, that's the difference between, I mean... talent. - We did it on purpose.

We did it on purpose.

This is also our moment of truth, because is we didn't...

glue these very well...

- Okay. - We're gonna find out here in just a minute.

Okay. Let me go outside and come back in when it's over.

I'm honestly a little bit intimidated.

I've never tuned something this big, so...

mounting this on the lathe and turning it

is... it's intimidating for me.

It's gonna be sacring George pretty good.

And then we're gonna turn this bad boy on.

We got a 30 inch,

you know, pointed piece of wood that we're mounting to an electric motor.

We're gonna turn it on at, you know, 700 rpms and

stick a knife into it.

I don't know who thought this was a good idea. I'm gonna blame this on George

Heaven forbid that it's not perfect,

what can we expect to have happened?

If it's not perfect, then it's gonna come apart.

What's perfect in this case?

Perfect does not mean that it is...

perfectly aligned or anything,

- it mean these seams aren't perfect. - Okay.

The stakes are actually high here, because,

this bowl could blow up.

And when I say blow up, I literally mean, "Blow up."

Like, looks like a bomb goes off.

You could stop now and take this home

or you could continue and possibly risk it all

for dogs to drink out of it.

You have ten seconds.

- It does feel like a game show doesn't it. - Yeah.

- All right. - This is like, a day-of-firsts for me.

I don't think I've seen a lathe machine work.

I always... when it gets down to the part that's like where,

you know, where the real nut-cutting happens...

- Yes... hits the road. - When the rubber hits the road,

then I start getting nervous.

Are our joints good enough? Yes, they are simple joints.

Did we do them perfectly?

My first car had that same slight wobble.

- Are you nervous? - I'm a little bit nervous.

I wasn't really watching George when he was gluing some of his.

But I hope he used enough glue.

Okay, first thing I'm gonna do is I'm gonna try and

- even it up. Take that wobble out. - Level it up... okay.

The fact that it's segmented for one, is...

you're gonna have those joint, those elbows, where the pieces come together

and so, as they're coming around and hitting the knife.

- It's a little smoother. - I like it.

I don't know if George is gonna wanna actually do any turning.

- All right, you ready? - I think that thing would end up back there. No, no, no.

You got the wobble out of it,

I'm gonna take credit for it anyways, I think we're good.

- All right, we got the outside even. - Okay.

Now, I'm gonna work on smoothing the inside

and then we can do the finer details.

- I just wanna get all the rough... - Out of it?

So, now looking back on The George Lopez Show,

what do you feel like you accomplished?

It appeals to all people. Not necessarily Latino people, but...

everybody loves it.

In 19 years, it's never been off the air

and that people feel like

"That's my family. Oh, that's my family", not necessarily a Latino family.

Now you're this successful Hollywood actor,

you're able to give back to the community.

I was doing a show in Venice

and as I'm getting in my car, this girl comes over

and she says, "You know, I'm from New York, I came out here with my brother.

"I wanna tell my story about coming out as a teenager

"in senior high school and I wrote this part

and I had you in mind to play it."

I gave her my number and I said, "When you get it done, I'll do it."

And last year, she uh,

got it done and I did it.

You got to be...

- I got to be the Sandra Bullock. - ...the Sandra Bullock.

I know that that girl would've never had a chance to tell her story

had I not decided to play her father

and brought her attention that she needed to get it sold and...

- and she got it sold. - That is pretty cool

Now that the bowl is shaped,

George can actually sand it down without worrying about it blowing up.

The last step is actually taking it off the lathe, so we've got it turned and we

layer a sheet of fiber glass on the outside

and on the inside and then we do a two-part epoxy.

So, we're gonna spread our fiber glass

over it...

and then we're gonna mix our two part epoxy,

pour it on and spread it out.

The fiber glass will kind of, disappear.

It's, your know, it absorbs the epoxy and once it all cures,

then it is a water and weather-proof barrier.

This thing will be sealed.

There's another thing haven't seen in my life.

- You've never done a fiber glass? - Never... no.

Once this all cures, we've got a little brass plate

that says built by George Lopez

and Ben Napier.

Man, I'm happy that I came out here to see it. Man, this is amazing.

This is beautiful. All right.

- The only one of its kind. - The only one, maybe ever.

Let's go. Let's go deliver it.

The Animal Rescue League of Laurel has been around forever.

Erin grew up getting her pets from there.

We pull up at ARL,

we carry the bowl, we've got it, you know, hidden under the tarp.

See this is the yard where they come and play.

- How are you? Nice to see you? - Hey. How are you?

- Nice to see you. - Your place is great.

These dogs are, they're like, well adapted.

I mean, they see a bunch of strangers and they're...

- They're very calm, very calm. - They've been quite. Yeah.

Alicia runs the rescue league

and she is extremely passionate about

helping these animals.

How many dogs y'all have here, right now?

Close to 25.

So, tell us a little about who we got out here.

I mean, here on the right is Ms. Paisley.

She's been here since about 2017.

Mmm-hmm.

Regina came in, in 2019.

Big boy here, this is Kane.

He's about five years old,

- he has a torn ACL in his back-rear left leg. - Oh.

So, he's gonna be a special needs case.

- How did he end up here? - He was a surrender.

I don't like it. I'm almost crying, 'cause you know...

Rescuing dogs is what saved me. It saved my life.

That's great. Yeah, that's awesome.

George is extremely passionate about helping these animals.

That it's a way for him to give back,

it's a way for him to help something else of someone else

who's fallen on hard times.

- We're very excited for you to see this. - Yeah.

- We're excited to see what y'all have created. - The only one...

- in existence. - We're proud of our work.

- Come on, guys. - And she calls out all of the people that

volunteered there, all the people who worked there.

And they're all excited to see it.

One, two, three.

- It is a... station. - Hydration station.

Love it!

It's California Redwood is what the darker wood is

and then the lighter wood is Mississippi Cypress.

- Love it. Love it. - You like it?

I'm fighting back the tears.

- Let's fill it up. - Let's fill it up!

I hope that it's a bright spot in these dog's days.

George will forever be remembered for the time that

he built the huge hydration station

for the Animal Rescue League and he'll be remembered for

giving this incredible gift to our town.

- Oh what the hell. - Yeah, let's get down here.