Marcus Luttrell on Having a Movie Made About His Story

What is it like to have a movie about one of the worst experiences of your life? Yes. Thank you for asking it like that. No one ever has. It's an honor to do that, to be a part of that. And it's funny because people are like, hey, I made a movie and the books and it was great. I was like, man, it's about me getting my ass whipped. As a fighter and a warrior, those are usually the stories you don't want out. Right. So I'm in the loss column. I carry a lot of weight. Nineteen promises. I never forget it. So I walk around, I always remind myself I can run into somebody who knows or loved one of them or one of their family members. So I'll always carry myself a certain way. I have to. That was the deal I made to get me off the mountain. People ask me who my heroes are. Everybody who had to come fetch me out of hell. I was in there pretty deep. And the way that lined out, it's a great story if you want to hear. I mean, the whole process. I would love to hear it. It's funny on the way up here, I was like, man, how's this going to go? And I was watching Joe Dirt last night. I was like, let's do it like that. You want to start from the beginning? Bro, I'll tell you some stuff you can't believe. You said let's start off with whiskey. Yeah. As soon as you said that, I'm like, this is going to go great. It is. Yeah. I only drink whiskey with my friends. And you know, the reason we say that is because the things that come out when you drink whiskey. Yeah. So I've been looking forward to this. We've been friends for a while. I thought we should have a good time with it. A hundred percent. Yeah. You know, I watched the movie again last night. I watched yesterday just to prepare myself and I haven't seen it. I never watched it all the way through. I know the director's cut. You know what I'm talking about? Yeah, no. Yeah. So it was I can imagine it was something to back it up to the book and how that all happened. Are you back it up to the military? Wherever you want to start. We can go all different directions with it. But I was in I was in hospital. So when I got back, I was in the hospital for a while and then they. I went back into the teams and started doing another workup for deployment. And then in between that. I was getting called to the to the boss's house. I've always been watched over on high ground. That was a blessing. Because so many of our guys died and we had a fallen angel. We have a fallen angel. You always hear about it. Like normally if seals die or something, it's on the bottom of the ticker or only the family members here. But we had a fallen angel, which means we have an aircraft going down. And I didn't know about it, actually, when I went when the mission started, because everyone who knew about our operation was on the helicopter. That's why I was out there for so long. And I remember I was in. I just got out of hospital and I was doing physical therapy, the team, and they called me up and they said, hey, we're going to debrief. We're going to declassify part of this operation. And we're going to put it out into a book. And I was like, OK. I didn't know what that meant. Well then they pulled me back up to the to the to the headsheds where we had this big meeting and they brought they assigned to me the I mean, I was privileged enough to have the best lawyers, the best writers. Like I interviewed with everybody until I found a fit. Like I got to travel around like Patrick and I met. He came out to the house. My mother fell in love with him. So that's how we knew he was going to. And I had to live with him. So I would actually wake up on Sunday or Monday morning and go into work, do a workup fix and deploy. And then on Fridays, I'd have to fly to Cape Cod and I would sit with Patrick and tell him the story. And then Sunday night I'd fly back. Patrick is the guy you wrote. Patrick Robinson. He's the guy you wrote. He was young because my name wasn't in the book. It wasn't supposed to be anything like that. I was still operational. And then I deployed back to Iraq in 06 and 07. I ripped Jaco out. I know you met him. Love Jaco. Great guy. And he loves you. He was one of my bosses. He got so excited when he heard you were coming on. He texted me. We went back and forth. Hey, something. I called him. He's just, what you see is what you get. He's never noticed his face. Looks like it could perfectly fit in a Spartan helmet. You want to tell him? Oh yeah. Like he's always, I mean, he's the man. When it comes to leadership. Break glass. That's it. In case of war. We have those guys. Yeah. They're real. I know you've met some of them. Yeah. We need those guys. They exist. They're terrifying. I'm so happy they're real. He's the archetype. Yeah. Yeah. He was, here's the reason why he was over Chris and Michael and Mark. If you notice in the SEAL teams, all of our Medal of Honor guys are named Michael. You ever notice that? No. Hell yeah. Those are called Mark Angels. They always get the Medal of Honor. You get a Mark and a Michael running together in the SEAL team, something bad's going to go down. So you always joke about that. But when the book came out, I was in Iraq. I remember the lawyers and everybody would, they would write me emails and I was like, please don't die. And I was like, well, try not to. Thanks. Jesus Christ. So I got hurt in Iraq again. And when I got back, they positioned me out of the SEAL teams and then they kind of rewrote that part, put my name in it. My job was to go around and tell you about your boys and what they did and how hard they fought and they died. And that was the greatest job. It was the hardest job I ever had to do because I remember when they pulled me offline as an operator and the Admiral was sitting there telling me, he's like, son, you're going to do more for the SEAL teams than you ever did in combat. And that was, I thought that was kind of an insult. I was like, wait, what do you mean? I was like, do I need to work out harder? Do I need to? He's like, no, this is what you need to do. So I did that. I traveled around and I told you guys, and then the movie Hollywood came calling. So I got stationed to live there. They actually sat me down and introduced me to all the directors and we had to find the fit and then once Pete and I linked up for the first time, rest is kind of me and Peter Berg. Yeah. Peter Berg. God damn. He nailed it. Man. I know you haven't seen it because you've seen the directors cut. Yeah. Yeah. But he he fucking nailed it. That guy is a hell of a director. He, you know, it just there was no bullshit in that movie. You know, there's a certain amount of bullshit and I don't know if there's any bullshit in terms of like the reality of the experience versus the film version of it, but there was no, no gloss to that film. The way we, I'll talk about what I meant, Pete, for the first time. I got pulled up to LA to interview all of them. I was traveling around just getting to meet all of everybody. Oliver Stone. I sat down in front of him. I mean, they went through me through the guy had lunch. Wow. Yeah. It was pretty cool. He was a veteran, right? Yeah. And I love that guy. The lawyer that I got assigned to, he was great. Alan Schwartz is his name. And for those, have you ever seen Spaceballs? Yes. Okay. The Schwartz in Spaceballs? Yeah. It's named after him. So he's Mel Brooks' attorney. This is real. That's crazy. This is crazy. That was one of the coolest things I got to meet him. And I was like, wait a minute, you're the Schwartz? He's like, yeah. So I got assigned to him. And then my literary agent was this guy named Ed Victory since past. But he was great because he was a British guy, tall, skinny, and he would wear the sweaters with tight around his neck and the white and black wingtips. Dressed to the nines, had that awesome accent. And he would tell me, he's like, Marcus, darling, I'm the seal in this world, just in this environment. Just let me take care of this. What are you saying to me? How dare he? And I just kind of like, Roger that. Because if you're the resident expert, something I'll always drop in right beside you. So I was traveling around. And I'd been in LA for a couple of days. And I was supposed to get back to the base. And they were like, wait, there's one more guy who wants to meet you. His name is Peter Berg. And I didn't register in my head. I couldn't put the name to that. He's been around forever. He's like, he's down on the set, filming a movie called Hancock of Will Smith. And I was supposed to get on my plane, but we went late and missed my flight. He's like, just go down there and see him. And I was like, all right. So we dropped down there. And he's sitting in his chair. And then there's a train scene. So there was this huge train and Will standing. I got to meet him. It was pretty cool. And Pete walks up, Peter Berg. He's like, hey, let's take a walk. I go, all right. And we sat down on this park bench overlooking the water. He's like, this is what I think of this. This is what I want to do. And he kind of shot me straight. He's like, before I say anything else, I want to show you a movie that I just filmed. And I want you to watch it so that I got to go to the theater and watch this movie. And then the next day, it was his attention to detail. He like focused on the stuff that you would normally miss, which makes it kind of realistic. I was like, OK, cheers. I was like, no, this, if you screw this up, if you do anything to dishonor any of my friends, I'll kill you. And he didn't know what to do about that. And I mean, look on his face because I shook his hand and I had his hand and I was like, OK, here's the deal. It's yours if you want it. But you screw it up, I'll have to know. No, no, no. Nothing personal. For real. And right when that happened, I mean, he took it. We made him go to all of our trees. The door was open for him because it was an assignment. Most everything else, the books and the movies and everything, they were shut down. Except for this one. So when the Navy's got your back and the SEAL teams, man, that's how that works. So we sent him overseas. He had to go live with. I mean, that guy went through some stuff. He came back early and didn't tell me about it because some of the stuff he saw and I was like, hey, it's real, right? It's real. And he's like, that's all I needed to see to change how I feel. I was like, OK, well, let's do this, man. And then it started. Oh, so he went overseas and experienced what did he experience? They they embedded him with the SEAL platoon. Oh, Jesus. He got to see them guys and how they. It's a really cool story. I'll let him tell it because of what he got to see and what he got to do. And some of the guys called me from the deployment. They were like, hey, we put Pete through the wringer. I was like, good, because of what he was stepping into. And I mean, to this day, we're still best buddies. I talked to his son yesterday. He kind of comes over and we do. I can teach my kids some things and I teach his kids some things. And it's just everywhere I go, I was always taught to make a friend over money. Right. Because those are the that's the best cash you can have as a friend. And getting to live with him and experience that Hollywood lifestyle was amazing. I remember showing up at his house the first day. I was like, man, why does this place look so familiar? He's like, OJ's house is right. He lives in Brentwood. He's like, OJ's house is right there. I was like, oh, yeah. OK. And then it just got crazy from there. First time he took me out. I mean, those are great stories. Catch new episodes of The Joe Rogan Experience for free only on Spotify. Watch back catalog JRE videos on Spotify, including clips, easily, seamlessly switch between video and audio experience on Spotify. You can listen to the JRE in the background while using other apps and can download episodes to save on data cost all for free. Spotify is absolutely free. You don't have to have a premium account to watch new JRE episodes. You just need to search for the JRE on your Spotify app. Go to Spotify now to get this full episode of The Joe Rogan Experience.