Ethan Hawke talks new season of 'The Lowdown' and acting with Tommy Lee Jones

All right, we'll cancel your plans tonight. A can't-miss fan favorite returns to FX tonight. The Lowdown, starring iconic actor Ethan Hawke, earned a near-perfect score from Rotten Tomatoes. Season 2 could do it all over again. What are you doing here? I read about you in the paper. Something about a ward or something. Said you own a bookshop. I used to own a bookshop. It was a pawn shop. I mean, they had books. Big Beaver's Bend was my favorite, I read that twice, I was seven. So the series star and executive producer Ethan Hawke joining us live now with a sneak peek. Oh my goodness, the Ethan Hawke it is so nice to meet you, Ethan. Thank you for joining us. Nice to meet you, thanks for having me on your show and saying all those nice things of course, yeah, there's a lot of excited people around the studio today after we saw that we were speaking with you. First of all, congratulations on season two. Season one was a hit and I think this is the crime comedy drama that so many people needed. Uh, let's talk about one of the new additions though, as we just saw in that brief clip, Tommy Lee Jones is now joining the series as your estranged father. Uh, talk about the dynamics of that relationship that we're going to see on camera, you know, sometimes my job is so much fun you know i i grew up watching Tommy Lee Jones you know whether it's Coal Miner's Daughter Lonesome Dove, or The Fugitive, or Men in Black, or blah, blah, blah, you know, No Country for Old Men. So I kind of feel like I've known him my whole life, and to have him playing my father is so wonderful. And you see him walk on set, and you realize, oh, there's a reason why this guy is internationally famous. He is really, really good at this job. And playing these scenes with him was so much fun and i think it it pushed us all into not taking season two for granted of really trying to use this opportunity to make something worth your time yeah yeah i mean we're excited to see this a father and son relationship play out on screen uh let's talk about your character Lee Raybon a rare bookstore owner who moonlights as a citizen journalist digging into all the corruption and and finds himself getting into some trouble uh when it comes to your character this season what can we expect from him well you know this is a person involved in journalism you know it's tough out there uh especially when you're doing uh local journalism how important it is to celebrate the righteous and the good and to also make sure to hold accountable uh the the malevolent forces in the world and the trouble is if you tell truth to power right you're going to get punched in the face and um lee has to take a lot of hits to keep singing his song yeah we we've seen that i want to go back to just the script season one when this all started if i'm not mistaken there was just one full script for one episode what was it about this this show this project that made you believe in it just that much two things two things first and foremost i had seen Reservation Dogs and i loved it so much uh it was such a beautiful show full so much wit and humor and heart and soul and all the good stuff about life and so i love the guy who made it immediately Sterling Harjo and second of all he gave me this script it was just about and i felt like i've been waiting my whole life to play this character i love this guy i know this guy i um sadly aspire to be like this guy because he's a hot mess but i love him oh man i'm sure so many uh just parallels to real life ethan i wish we had more time congratulations again we look forward to seeing this latest project and also congrats on walking your daughter maya down the aisle earlier this year it's so sweet yeah yeah you know life keeps being interesting doesn't it keeps providing new windows of experience hey thank you appreciate you so welcome all right take care ethan steve Thank you.