Jason Bateman asked Will Arnett a rather awkward question about the latter’s past marriage to Amy Poehler live on their podcast, SmartLess.
Arnett and Poehler started dating in 2000, married in 2003, separated in 2012, and amicably divorced in 2016. They share two sons: Archie, 17, and Abel, 15.
Bateman’s question came up during their humorous banter, leading to a discussion of each other’s bathroom habits.
Highlights
- Will Arnett retorted to co-host Jason Bateman over a question about intimate details of his marriage to fellow comedian Amy Poehler.
- Arnett refused to answer and said his ex-wife would be “outraged” to hear the conversation.
- Arnett and Poehler split in 2012 after more than a decade together and two children, but remain close friends.
Arnett snapped back at his Arrested Development co-star with a lighthearted rebuttal.
Will Arnett refused to answer Jason Bateman’s question about Amy Poehler
Image credits: Dia Dipasupil/Getty Images
The latest SmartLess episode, released June 22, saw co-hosts Jason Bateman, Will Arnett, and Sean Hayes trade playful jabs and personal anecdotes, as is typical of the show, as they discussed each other's lives.
It started with Bateman accusing Arnett and Hayes of not being “real deep on manners,” to which Arnett responded that he preferred not to talk about “potty stuff” or pick his teeth in public.
“You don’t fart either,” Bateman responded. “I don’t think you’ve ever farted in front of me.”
Image credits: Gilbert Carrasquillo/FilmMagic
After a brief exchange with Hayes, Bateman turned the conversation back to Arnett, asking him, “So then, Will, did you ever poo in front of Amy?”
“Are you looking for clicks?” Arnett replied, laughing. “Are you trying to get something that we can click around?”
“I always forget people are listening,” Bateman joked. “But hang on. You were married to her and had two kids. You guys never went to the bathroom in front of each other?”
“I'm sorry. The question is, did I poo in front of Amy? And you're saying that I don't have manners. What are you talking about?” Arnett fired back. “It's not a good question. I refuse to answer it.”
“[Poehler] is going to be outraged by this, by the way,” the BoJack Horseman star added.
Hayes jumped in at this point and asked Bateman if he uses the bathroom in front of his wife, Amanda Anka.
Image credits: RumourJuice
“We don’t use the same potty,” Bateman said. “But if she needed to come in and ask me something, she could, she would.”
“I don’t know if I would do that to her. Although she doesn’t poo, never has. It’s amazing!” he joked.
According to both Arnett and Poehler, they have remained “very, very good friends” and are on great terms.
Will Arnett previously opened up about his current relationship with Amy Poehler
Image credits: amypoehler
Fans got to see how amicable Arnett and Poehler still were when the latter appeared as Sean Hayes’ surprise guest on the 250th episode of the SmartLess podcast in April 2025.
During the episode, Arnett gushed about their relationship post-divorce.
“I’m really, really lucky to have her as a partner in this way. There aren’t many people I speak to more than I speak to her, which is weird — you know what I mean? But it’s great,” Arnett said. “She is somebody that I still run a lot of stuff by.”
Image credits: smartless
“She’s the person I go to, like, ‘Hey, I’m thinking about doing this.’ Whether it’s life or work, I really seek her counsel because it’s important to me — because I trust her. She’s awesome.”
Later that year, in a Rolling Stone interview, Arnett revisited the episode and commented on how the media often gets his personal life wrong.
“That was a great one,” he said about the episode.
Image credits: smartless
“Amy texted Sean and me this morning saying, ‘We all got nominated for Golden Globes, let’s party.’ And then she said, ‘I don’t have Bateman’s number, that’s probably for the best.” That was the text.”
Both SmartLess and Poehler’s podcast, Good Hang with Amy Poehler, were nominated for the inaugural Best Podcast award at the 2026 Golden Globe Awards. Poehler took the trophy home.
“One of the more alarming parts about her coming on our podcast was that my sons lied to me. That’s the part that unnerved me,” Arnett added.
Image credits: smartless
“People think that they know,” he said when asked about the public opinion about his personal life.
“Over the years, I’ve read so many opinions people have. It’s f***ing hilarious to me how much s**t is just made up, and they have zero idea. It’s like, ‘Oh, you think you know what my life is?’”
Amy Poehler feels “grateful” for Will Arnett despite their divorce being “too sad” to talk about
When the couple was still married, Amy Poehler often spoke about how Will Arnett found ways to make her laugh.
In a 2025 interview with People magazine, she admitted they enjoyed “looking like idiots to each other or other people,” and that he made her feel “very safe.”
“You can have a lot of adventures if you have someone by your side,” she said.
Image credits: smartless
However, she has refused to delve too deeply into her divorce over the last decade, because it was “too sad” and “too personal” to her, she said in her 2014 memoir, Yes Please.
“Imagine spreading everything you care about on a blanket and then tossing the whole thing up in the air,” Poehler wrote. “The process of divorce is about loading that blanket, throwing it up, watching it all spin, and worrying what stuff will break when it lands.”
“When you are a person going through a divorce, you feel incredibly alone, yet you are constantly reminded by society of how frequently divorce happens and how common it has become.”
She added that she was “proud” of how she and her ex-husband were co-parenting their kids.
“I am beyond grateful he is their father, and I don't think a 10-year marriage constitutes failure,” she said about Arnett.
Poehler is currently dating podcaster and former New York Times editor Joel Lovell. Will Arnett was dating supermodel Carolyn Murphy, but the couple reportedly split in April 2026.
"They are not normal." Social media users reacted to Jason Bateman's "crazy" question about Will Arnett and Amy Poehler
