Judy Greer Pranked Johnny Knoxville On The 'Reboot' Set & Lived In Fear He'd Get Her Back
“Don’t tell Johnny Knoxville that I’m afraid of spiders!”
Johnny Knoxville in "Reboot." Right: Judy Greer and Keegan-Michael Key in "Reboot."
When Judy Greer, Keegan-Michael Key and the rest of the Reboot cast first showed up on set, they were all on the lookout for one person: Johnny Knoxville.
Knoxville, Greer and Key play three washed-up sitcom actors who come back to reboot their old show in the new comedy series on Disney+ and Hulu, which was created by the guy behind Modern Family.
But behind the scenes, the actors were all waiting for Knoxville to drop a Jackass-style prank on them out of the blue.
"We were like on Day 1, 'Is Johnny Knoxville going to be pranking us all the time?'" Greer recently told Narcity. However, she also admitted that she was the first one to prank him on the set.
"She parked next to me, but one day I came in and she had parked sideways on her spot," said Knoxville. "That's just to hurt my feelings!"
We chatted with both of them together ahead of the series premiere, and it was a wild ride to say the least.
Knoxville joked that working with Greer was either a dream or a "nightmare," although he insists he was "totally a gentleman to her and didn't say mean things."
Greer says she lived in fear that Knoxville would get back at her, especially after she admitted to someone on set that she's afraid of spiders.
"You told me that you sent a box of spiders to somebody," she said to Knoxville in the interview. "So like, the biggest fear in my life is that Johnny Knoxville is going to send me a box of spiders."
Knoxville later admitted to Greer that he has a rule against pranking people on set, although he clearly has no issue with teasing her in interviews.
"It's a great cast and outside of Judy and I, we all get along," Knoxville joked. "Everyone else is a pleasure!'
\u201cThe new #Reboot show on Hulu/Disney Plus is a lot of fun.\nYou know what else is fun?\nWatching Johnny Knoxville and Judy Greer chirp each other throughout our interview about the show \ud83d\ude02\n#RebootOnHulu\u201d— Josh K. Elliott (@Josh K. Elliott) 1663698281
Although Knoxville is best-known for taking a beating in his Jackass stunt series, he's also racked up a solid list of comedies over the years, including Bad Grandpa and The Ringer.
At 51 years old, the stunt man is more than happy to give up the punishing physical stuff and focus on the acting with Reboot, which happens to be his first leading TV role.
"I don't have to worry about not being able to walk when I go home at the end of the day on this," he said. "I'm safe and sound."
Greer has appeared in everything from 13 Going On 30 to Ant-Man to Archer over the years, but she says Reboot was special because she got to build a "family" with the rest of the cast.
"I'm an only child," she said. "I think I've always been looking for a family, and I always look for them in my TV casts."
Reboot is an irreverent, meta, occasionally NSFW comedy that also stars Rachel Bloom, Callum Worthy and Paul Reiser.
The first three episodes of Reboot are available now on Disney+ in Canada and Hulu in the U.S., with new episodes dropping each Tuesday for the next five weeks.