Denis Leary shares the story about meeting R.E.M.‘s Michael Stipe: “I hate ‘Shiny Happy People’ too”

67-year-old comic Dennis Leary was a recent guest on the Rich Eisen Show to promote his latest Fox ‘Going Dutch’ sitcom.

During the interview, the Irish-American stand-up comedian and actor offered insights on being offered to star in Martin Scorsese’s ‘The Departed,’ getting acting tips for ‘Draft Day’ from Bill Belichick, and how he and Sean Penn settled a beef with R.E.M. lead singer Michael Stipe.

Eisen asked Leary if he was originally asked to star in the video for the single ‘Shiny Happy People’.

Leary replied: “No, but I’ll tell you what is true is I did a rant about, I did an MTV spot about shiny happy people, okay, and some other stuff I hated, the sketch went....I want everybody off the bus. I want the shiny people over here and the happy people over here. Okay, I represent angry gun toting, meat eating people. Pal, I got two words from Michael Stipe....Steve Tyler, okay".

He continues: “and then I was in a restaurant in Los Angeles with Sean Penn and it was kind of empty. We were having an early dinner, so we’re just sitting there smoking, and my back was to the door, and Penn goes, hey, hey, Michael Stipe is on his way over. So, he walked up, and he hands me a little match book, and then walks away. It doesn’t say anything. And I opened the match book cover, you know, the old matches, yeah, of course, and, and it says, I hate shiny happy people, too.

"So, Sean and I go, and we went over and we sat with him and he was the greatest guy, great sense of humor about himself".

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