Paul Rudd Plays “Quantum Chess” With Stephen Hawking In This Spectacularly Dorky Clip For Caltech

You know that thing where your science-minded friend — the kind who studies physics or mathematics and wouldn’t be completely out of place in a turtleneck — cracks a joke that no one understands? You might have caught a weird emphasis on the word “matter”. They’re raising their eyebrows as though a punchline just hit. The silence is suffocating. Finally, someone politely laughs.

This is the large-scale, incredibly prolonged equivalent of that featuring one of the world’s most renowned and respected theoretical physicists and Paul “I’ll fart my way into that snatch” Rudd. I understand exactly none of it (I don’t even know how to play chess), but it’s somehow incredibly endearing all the same.

The only limited context I can give you for all this is that the clip was made for a conference on quantum science at Caltech earlier this week and it was directed by Alex Winter. Yep. That’s the guy behind Bill And Ted’s Excellent Adventure.

SCIENCE!