Gary Sinise wanted to go on a USO tour. Getting someone to call him back turned out to be the hard part. On Joe Rogan Experience #2579, he tells the story of the messages he left in 2003 and the one line that finally got a response.
Clip: Viral Podcast Shorts YouTube Short from the full source linked below.
It is a short story, told in his own words, with laughter in the room as he tells it. It also shows how a famous role can be recognized faster than the name of the actor who played it.
Wanting to go
Sinise says he had wanted to go to Afghanistan, but he was caught up doing a lot of movie work. When the U.S. went into Iraq, he says, he really wanted to go and support the troops.
So he called the USO. He left a message on their machine: it's Gary Sinise, he wants to go on a tour, he wants to support the troops, please call him back.
He did not hear anything.
The second message
He tried again. As he recalls it, he left another message saying it was Gary Sinise again, that he would really love to go if they were taking a tour over to Iraq, and asking them to call him.
Again, he says, "I didn't hear anything."
Both messages, as he tells it, led with his name and his wish to support the troops. Neither one mentioned his films or the parts he had played. That detail matters for what came next.
"I'm the guy who played Lieutenant Dan"
Then Sinise started thinking. He decided to call back right away and leave one more message, this time with a different introduction.
"Hi, this is Gary Sinise. I'm the guy who played Lieutenant Dan in Forrest Gump. I'd like to do a tour."
"And then they called me back," he says, to laughter.
Why the name did not ring a bell
Sinise's explanation for the silence is simple. "So they didn't know who Gary Sinise was," he says. "I hadn't done that many movies, I guess."
Rogan offers another explanation: it was probably very young people working there, too.
Sinise puts it in context. This was 2003. He had done Ransom and Apollo 13, he says, but he was still "kind of a character actor," the supporting guy. "But everybody knew who Lieutenant Dan was."
So he figured it out, he says. They were not sure who Gary Sinise was, but they knew the character, and that was enough to get the callback.
The first big tour to Iraq
The callback led somewhere. Sinise says he ended up on the next tour, which he describes as "the first big tour to Iraq" that the USO sent over. He does not describe the tour itself in this clip, and no details about it are added here.
Rogan's reaction closes the clip: "Well, good for you for being persistent."
What the story shows
The anecdote lands because it is so relatable. Plenty of people have left a voicemail that went nowhere. Sinise's fix was not to give up or go through someone else. It was to describe himself in terms the person on the other end would recognize right away. The request itself did not change from one message to the next. Only the introduction did.
It also shows how a single role can follow an actor. In his telling, the people taking his calls might not have placed his name, but they knew Lieutenant Dan from Forrest Gump, and that recognition opened the door.
The clip covers only that first step: the unanswered messages, the third call and the tour that followed. Sinise talks about more in the full episode, but this article stays with the segment used in the Short.
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FAQ
Why didn't the USO call Gary Sinise back at first?
On JRE #2579, Sinise says he left two messages and heard nothing. He says they did not know who Gary Sinise was.
What did he say in the message that worked?
"Hi, this is Gary Sinise. I'm the guy who played Lieutenant Dan in Forrest Gump. I'd like to do a tour."
When did this happen?
Sinise says it was in 2003, after the U.S. went into Iraq.
Where did the callback lead?
He says he ended up on the next USO tour, which he calls the first big tour to Iraq.