Ken Marino loves living in Los Angeles
Living here has certainly been good for his acting career. Although he broke into the business as a member of the New York-turned-MTV sketch comedy group The State in 1994, he moved to Los Angeles in the fall of 1997 when he landed a role on the second season of “Men Behaving Badly,” an NBC comedy. Marino filmed only 13 episodes before the show was cancelled. Still, she remained in Los Angeles and landed roles on beloved shows like “Veronica Mars,” “Party Down,” “The Residence” and “Running Point.” She's also co-written a few things, including “Role Models” and “Gail Daughtry and the Celebrity Sex Pass,” which is out July 10 and was filmed in and around Los Angeles.
In Sunday Funday, the people of Los Angeles tell us step by step their ideal Sunday in the city. Find ideas and inspiration on where to go, what to eat and how to enjoy life on the weekends.
“Working in Los Angeles and looking for work is what allowed me to understand Los Angeles,” Marino says. “It's a very comfortable city to live in. I think it's fun to be able to move around and do whatever you want.”
This is how Marino would spend his perfect, carefree Sunday in Los Angeles.
This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
6 am: Dog walk, coffee and flowers.
We have two dogs. They need to go out in the morning and eat, and they express this very clearly. For a while, every morning at 5:58 my only dog, Dot, would start fussing and moving until I would say “yeah, okay, let's feed you.”
In our family, I am the one who feeds the dogs and takes them for walks, because I am a morning person. I enjoy when there is not much light, maybe making a coffee or taking a walk to this place called Bloom Café Project. It's a little mom and pop place and they have great coffee and breakfast sandwiches. They are also florists. Sometimes they even use this cool clipboard with a handle where, on one side you put the coffee and then on the other side you put your beautiful flower display. Then you can walk home with your coffee and your flowers together and it's something I've never seen anywhere else.
7:30 am: Online Chess
After I get my coffee and walk the dogs, I'll still be the only person awake, so I get on my computer and play a couple of games of chess. Play with people from all over the world online at Chess.comand I usually get frustrated or feel like I'm the best chess player in the world. Anyway, I'm raising my rating on the app and I'm really excited about it. I dove down the rabbit hole of chess tutorials on TikTok and YouTube teaching me how to play better.
9 am: More coffee and “911”
If I go to Project Bloom, I'll bring my wife a coffee and some flowers, but if not, we have a small espresso and cappuccino machine, so I'll use it to make her a cappuccino, which I'll bring to her in bed. She is always very happy about it and then I will try to wake up my [16-year-old] I wake my daughter up, which usually takes me two or three tries until I grab her phone, set the timer for five minutes, and then put it on the other side of her room so she has to get out of bed to turn it off when it rings.
She and I have been watching “911” religiously recently. We started with season 1 and now we're about six or seven seasons in, so I'll make her breakfast (maybe a Nutella crepe with some cherry tomatoes on the side, which is weird but she likes it, or maybe some oatmeal) and then we'll watch “911” and talk about our favorite characters, like Buck, Chimney, and Bobby.
Noon: Lunch on the west side
We have a little apartment in Marina Del Rey that's right next to the beach, so sometimes I go out with the dogs, just to sit for a while and enjoy. I usually walk between Venice Pier and Washington Street, but sometimes I go further north and walk along Venice Beach if I want to hang out with some weird deakies.
When I'm on that side of town, there are a couple of places I could go to eat, like this Italian restaurant called Ospi That's in Venice. They are incredible. They make their own homemade pasta and it is delicious. There is also this chain called stewsAnd I love their tacos, so sometimes I make them too. Venice Ramen It's also good and they make these things called jumbo gyoza that are absolutely delicious. They are about 2.5 times bigger than a normal gyoza, about the size of your palm, and I really like them.
2pm: Play practice and a pint.
My daughter is in two plays right now at this place called Morgan Wixson Theater in Santa Monica, so it's my responsibility to get her there and drop her off to practice. When I do that, if it's Sunday, I might want to have a Guinness somewhere and watch basketball. There is a bar called tired livers At the end of the street there are a lot of board games and you feel like you're in someone's basement, which is nice. It's also right next door brixton, Which is another nice bar I'll go to from time to time if I'm waiting for my daughter to finish her essay because otherwise it's a long drive.
4 p.m.: Garage band practice
Normally on Sunday we will also have a rehearsal for the middle-aged Dad Jam band. [Editor’s note: Marino co-founded the group with David Wain, whom he’s known since “The State” and who co-wrote “Wet Hot American Summer.”) We’ll play for a couple of hours in David’s garage, trying out new songs and working out what we’re going to do at our next live show.
6 p.m.: Guerilla promotion
Right now, David [Wain] and I'm trying to think of different promotional things we can do for our movie, “Gail Daughtry and the Celebrity Sex Pass.”,“So maybe we would do more of that. It's a really fun movie and we sold it at Sundance.
Anyway, two Sundays ago we walked with our friend. Francisco Barrierwho is also one of the camera operators for “Gail Daughtry.” We went to Hollywood Walk of Fame and we filmed promos for the movie where we talked to different people and pretended that the Gail Daughtry cinematic universe is vast and has been around for decades, like we were asking people what their favorite Gail Daughtry movie is. This confused a lot of them, but every once in a while someone would say something, so we used them for promotional ads.
I also spent some time running up and down the street, very excited and yelling “Gail Daughtry's new movie is coming out!” and then we filmed people's reactions, which were typically “confusion” and “disinterest.” Like, “Stop yelling at me, you weirdo.”
7:30 p.m.: Thai takeout
On the weekends, my wife and I like to order from a specific Thai place that has won many awards. is called Luv 2 eats a Thai bistro and it's absolutely fantastic. The curried crab is delicious and they make these street food sausages that we crave. They come with ginger, peanuts and garlic, plus a big hunk of raw cabbage and some hot peppers, and we'll eat them like popcorn, shoving them into our mouths while we catch up on “Survivor.” The flavor is crazy and we think about how good they are all the time.
9:30 p.m.: Checkmate
After watching “Survivor,” usually what happens next is we end up saying, “Should we watch a movie?” Then we'll watch a movie for a while and then my daughter will say, “Hey, Mom! Come here and watch this YouTube show with me,” so they'll pull my wife away and I'll immediately grab my computer and start playing chess again. I like to end the day with a quiet game of chess in the morning and another quiet game in the evening. It's a good way to relax.
I usually play a minimum of three games before my eyes start to close because they're trying to fall asleep. That's when I'll quit because I'll make stupid moves and that affects my grade, like “Oh, I just lost that game because I fell asleep while my computer was on,” that's how I know when I'm done.
