Episode 105 - Thomas Lennon

Episode 105 • Released September 5, 2010 • Speakers detected

00:00:00Guest:Lock the gates!

00:00:07Guest:Are we doing this?

00:00:08Guest:Really?

00:00:08Guest:Wait for it.

00:00:09Guest:Are we doing this?

00:00:10Guest:Wait for it.

00:00:12Guest:Pow!

00:00:12Guest:What the fuck?

00:00:14Guest:And it's also... Eh, what the fuck?

00:00:16Guest:What's wrong with me?

00:00:17Guest:It's time for WTF!

00:00:19Guest:What the fuck?

00:00:20Guest:With Mark Maron.

00:00:24Marc:Okay, let's do this.

00:00:25Marc:How are you, what the fuckers?

00:00:26Marc:What the fuckineers?

00:00:27Marc:What the fuck buddies?

00:00:28Marc:What the fuck nicks?

00:00:29Marc:What the fuck wads?

00:00:31Marc:Somebody sent me, but I try not to use the negative ones.

00:00:34Marc:I still get, they're coming in still.

00:00:36Marc:Never ends.

00:00:37Marc:Hope you guys are doing well.

00:00:38Marc:Feels like a long time since I've been out here in the garage.

00:00:41Marc:Last week's episode's the Apatow two-parter.

00:00:44Marc:Got a lot of great feedback.

00:00:46Marc:I'm glad you enjoyed that.

00:00:47Marc:And all you people that started, all you people, one person, you one person, you one nasty, horrible person who sent me an email saying that somehow or another I was being bourgeois or middle class or whining about luxury problems when I sent out an email looking for help with my new deck.

00:01:10Marc:This new deck bankrupted me, number one.

00:01:13Marc:I'm flying by the seat of my pants here.

00:01:16Marc:Number two, I couldn't be on the old deck without falling through and perhaps getting tetanus from nails and dirty wood and getting termites under my flesh.

00:01:28Marc:I had to do it.

00:01:29Marc:So fuck you.

00:01:31Marc:And you're, you're, you know, just, I don't need it.

00:01:34Marc:Why do I respond to that shit?

00:01:36Marc:Whatever.

00:01:37Marc:I do want to thank Jeff and Kim for sending me as a gift for the hundredth episode, this amazing habanero hot sauce from Portland, Oregon, of all places.

00:01:47Marc:Aardvark hot sauce.

00:01:48Marc:Thank you.

00:01:49Marc:That was very sweet.

00:01:51Marc:I appreciate it.

00:01:52Marc:Now, let's get to whatever the hell is going on.

00:01:54Marc:By the way, Tom Lennon on the show today.

00:01:56Marc:Tom Lennon, who, of course, another member of the state that went on to tremendous success.

00:02:01Marc:Don't know Tom that well.

00:02:03Marc:Have no history with Tom Lennon.

00:02:05Marc:Someone suggested I try to get him on the show.

00:02:07Marc:I sought him out.

00:02:09Marc:He was more than happy to come on the show.

00:02:12Marc:So we'll talk to him.

00:02:14Marc:Be like one of them first date situations.

00:02:16Marc:I know his work for the most part.

00:02:18Marc:He's made some... I just want to talk to him about...

00:02:21Marc:Does it does how does it feel to make movies that some people think are, you know, sappy family fair, I guess, and also be somewhat of a respected comedic force in the comedic world?

00:02:34Marc:He's always around Reno 911, the movies.

00:02:36Marc:He's, you know, Viva Variety on Comedy Central, the state, of course, many other things.

00:02:43Marc:But yet he writes big blockbuster family movies.

00:02:46Marc:And I wonder if that weighs on him at all.

00:02:48Marc:Perhaps we should talk to him about that.

00:02:51Marc:You know, with all the integrity business that I find is very thin these days.

00:02:55Marc:There doesn't seem to be any such thing as a sellout anymore, as long as you're confident about it.

00:03:02Marc:So I woke up this morning feeling like somebody was literally sitting on my chest all night.

00:03:07Marc:I couldn't breathe.

00:03:08Marc:I've been sort of despondent.

00:03:10Marc:I've been lost in my head.

00:03:11Marc:I'm in this cycle where I know I've got a lot of things to do.

00:03:15Marc:I should be writing.

00:03:16Marc:I should be creating.

00:03:16Marc:But I wake up and I'm not confused, but I'm overwhelmed with anxiety.

00:03:21Marc:And I can't function like I can't make simple decisions.

00:03:24Marc:So what I end up doing is cooking, compulsively cooking, which I think is some manifestation of my male eating disorder.

00:03:30Marc:So I'm in my house.

00:03:31Marc:I'm buying shit at the farmer's market.

00:03:33Marc:I'm getting corn.

00:03:34Marc:I'm getting greens.

00:03:34Marc:I'm getting carrots.

00:03:35Marc:And I'm running a restaurant in my in my house.

00:03:38Marc:And I apparently am the only guy eating at that restaurant.

00:03:41Marc:I will spend all day cooking something that'll take me 10 minutes to eat.

00:03:44Marc:And I'll just waste the whole day doing that.

00:03:47Marc:I mean, it's fine.

00:03:48Marc:I'm not just sitting around smoking weed or watching TV.

00:03:51Marc:I'm cooking.

00:03:52Marc:I'm cutting things.

00:03:53Marc:I'm putting good things in my body.

00:03:54Marc:But still, I should be writing.

00:03:55Marc:Yesterday, I got this shitty chair that's been sitting out in the rain and sun, and it's falling apart.

00:04:02Marc:So instead of writing or working on perhaps my new CD or the set I'm supposed to do on Ferguson today, but yesterday, instead of thinking about things or writing things down or writing a book or thinking about ways to further myself in the world of creativity, I rebuilt a fucking chair, washed the upholstery on it, and came just short of staining the thing.

00:04:25Marc:It's a piece of shit.

00:04:26Marc:It's been out there for years, but I wanted to move it up to the new deck.

00:04:31Marc:So I did that.

00:04:32Marc:And then you know what I did after procrastinating by cooking for most of the morning and then rebuilding a chair in the afternoon, procrastinating and rebuilding a chair that I should have thrown away.

00:04:42Marc:You know what I did after that?

00:04:43Marc:I sat in that chair.

00:04:45Marc:I sat there and I thought about things I should be doing.

00:04:49Marc:I'm going to therapy, you guys.

00:04:52Marc:I'm going to therapy.

00:04:54Marc:I got some health care.

00:04:56Marc:I don't know how I got it.

00:04:57Marc:I have no idea.

00:04:58Marc:I got it through the television union.

00:05:00Marc:What television did I do?

00:05:01Marc:Do you guys know something I don't know?

00:05:02Marc:Do you remember seeing me on television much last year?

00:05:05Marc:I guess that John Oliver thing.

00:05:07Marc:But I'm not going to check them on their information.

00:05:11Marc:I'll take the insurance.

00:05:14Marc:So I'm going to therapy and I get a list of therapists in my area.

00:05:20Marc:And I just picked the first one on the list because, you know, people like say maybe I should get referrals.

00:05:24Marc:You know, I know Dave Anthony's wife's a therapist.

00:05:26Marc:So, you know, she gave me some names and I'm waiting for people to give me names.

00:05:29Marc:Steve Danziger, Dr. Steve.

00:05:31Marc:I can't go see him because he's my friend.

00:05:33Marc:And what the hell does anyone know about references?

00:05:35Marc:Well, might as well just fucking try it.

00:05:37Marc:Yeah, I got a bunch of visits.

00:05:38Marc:I'll go try a few.

00:05:40Marc:So I picked this woman who's right down the street from me, and I call up, and it turns out she works out of an eating disorder clinic.

00:05:47Marc:Just a coincidence.

00:05:48Marc:I call up, and I'm like, I want to make an appointment with this person.

00:05:50Marc:And the woman's like, well, do you have an eating disorder?

00:05:53Marc:I'm like, how'd you know that?

00:05:55Marc:Who are you?

00:05:56Marc:What is this?

00:05:58Marc:Are you fucking with me?

00:06:01Marc:I don't know if I have an eating disorder.

00:06:02Marc:I'm a man.

00:06:03Marc:Do men have eating disorders?

00:06:05Marc:I spent the day cooking just so I could have something to eat.

00:06:09Marc:Is that an eating disorder?

00:06:11Marc:Is that part of it?

00:06:12Marc:I spend a lot of time in supermarkets just looking at things.

00:06:16Marc:Is that part of an eating disorder?

00:06:17Marc:I exercised compulsively for the last week and a half because since I've quit the nicotine, I feel doughy and thick and I feel depressed and I miss my nicotine.

00:06:28Marc:I miss it because it kept my shit together.

00:06:31Marc:Now I'm an anxious ball of despair and anxiety.

00:06:36Marc:I'm sorry, sir.

00:06:37Marc:I'm just a secretary.

00:06:38Marc:It's just this is an eating disorder clinic.

00:06:43Marc:How was I supposed to know that?

00:06:44Marc:Well, maybe I do.

00:06:45Marc:Maybe this is kismet.

00:06:46Marc:Is that what you call it?

00:06:48Marc:Serendipitous.

00:06:49Marc:Synchronicity.

00:06:50Marc:Maybe finally I've stumbled upon something that I might need.

00:06:56Marc:And they sent this huge bit of forms that you have to fill out before you get there.

00:07:05Marc:Checklists.

00:07:07Marc:Describe the main reason for coming to counseling.

00:07:10Marc:Please check all items that apply.

00:07:14Marc:Okay, here we go.

00:07:14Marc:Let's get through this.

00:07:15Marc:Concerns involving behaviors or feelings.

00:07:17Marc:There's a box next to a thing.

00:07:20Marc:It's an alphabetical order.

00:07:21Marc:Accident prone.

00:07:22Marc:No.

00:07:22Marc:Aggression.

00:07:23Marc:Check.

00:07:23Marc:Anger.

00:07:24Marc:Yes.

00:07:25Marc:Anxiety.

00:07:25Marc:Uh-huh.

00:07:26Marc:Right now.

00:07:27Marc:Arguing.

00:07:29Marc:Maybe.

00:07:29Marc:Why?

00:07:30Marc:Assault.

00:07:31Marc:No.

00:07:31Marc:Carjacking.

00:07:32Marc:Not that I know of.

00:07:33Marc:Cheating.

00:07:35Marc:In what way?

00:07:36Marc:I mean, that's broad.

00:07:37Marc:Confusion.

00:07:39Marc:I don't know what that means.

00:07:40Marc:Date rape.

00:07:42Marc:No, not that anyone has alerted me to.

00:07:46Marc:Depression.

00:07:47Marc:Check.

00:07:48Marc:Difficulty concentrating.

00:07:51Marc:You know what?

00:07:51Marc:I didn't check that one, but I think maybe I should.

00:07:53Marc:I mean, I can focus, but now I'm going to check that one.

00:07:58Marc:Difficulty concentrating.

00:08:00Marc:Dishonesty.

00:08:01Marc:Nah, not my problem.

00:08:03Marc:Eating.

00:08:03Marc:I don't know.

00:08:04Marc:Is that a problem?

00:08:05Marc:I mean...

00:08:07Marc:Yeah, I don't know.

00:08:07Marc:Yeah, I'll check it.

00:08:09Marc:I mean, I guess it is.

00:08:10Marc:Emptiness.

00:08:12Marc:Oh, boy.

00:08:13Marc:I didn't even check that one.

00:08:14Marc:I don't know if I feel empty.

00:08:16Marc:Failure.

00:08:16Marc:See, that's broad, too.

00:08:18Marc:What does that mean?

00:08:19Marc:Cheating and failure.

00:08:20Marc:Failure.

00:08:21Marc:What does that mean?

00:08:22Marc:I mean, it depends how you look at it.

00:08:24Marc:Can I put that in parentheses?

00:08:25Marc:I'll put that in parentheses.

00:08:26Marc:Depends how you look at it.

00:08:34Marc:Fatigue.

00:08:35Marc:No.

00:08:35Marc:Fear.

00:08:35Marc:Yes.

00:08:36Marc:Check.

00:08:37Marc:Feelings of isolation.

00:08:39Marc:Uh-huh.

00:08:40Marc:I'm all alone out here in the garage.

00:08:42Marc:Flashbacks.

00:08:43Marc:What's the difference between that and memories?

00:08:45Marc:I guess flashbacks happen spontaneously.

00:08:47Marc:No, I don't have those.

00:08:48Marc:Grief.

00:08:49Marc:Not really.

00:08:49Marc:Guilt.

00:08:51Marc:Eh.

00:08:51Marc:Hostility.

00:08:52Marc:Yes.

00:08:52Marc:Fuck you.

00:08:53Marc:Hyperactivity.

00:08:54Marc:No.

00:08:55Marc:Indecisiveness.

00:08:56Marc:I don't know.

00:08:57Marc:Sometimes.

00:08:58Marc:Yeah.

00:08:58Marc:You know what?

00:08:59Marc:I'm going to put that...

00:09:00Marc:Inferiority feelings, yes, why is everyone doing better than me?

00:09:04Marc:Insecurity, am I okay?

00:09:06Marc:Yes, have that.

00:09:07Marc:Interpersonal conflicts, that is broad.

00:09:11Marc:Yes, I would think that, as you people know, yes, I have those, but given that I have to apologize to everybody that comes on this fucking show.

00:09:18Marc:Irregular sleeping, no.

00:09:19Marc:Irresponsibility, not really.

00:09:21Marc:Irritability, a bit, yes.

00:09:23Marc:Jealousy, uh-huh.

00:09:25Marc:Lack of attention, no.

00:09:26Marc:Lack of self-care, no.

00:09:28Marc:Loneliness.

00:09:32Marc:I don't know.

00:09:34Marc:I guess so.

00:09:38Marc:Loss of control.

00:09:39Marc:Nope.

00:09:40Marc:Except when I drink my... Hold on.

00:09:45Marc:Pow!

00:09:46Marc:I just shit my pants.

00:09:47Marc:Holy Christ.

00:09:48Marc:Yes.

00:09:49Marc:Loss of control when I drink JustCoffee.coopcoffee.

00:09:52Marc:Available at WTFPod.com.

00:09:54Marc:Yeah.

00:09:55Marc:Low energy.

00:09:56Marc:No.

00:09:56Marc:Lying.

00:09:57Marc:Now, what is this?

00:09:58Marc:We've got lying, cheating.

00:10:00Marc:I mean, that seems like the same thing.

00:10:02Marc:No, I don't lie, really.

00:10:04Marc:Mixed feelings.

00:10:04Marc:What does that mean?

00:10:05Marc:Mood swings.

00:10:06Marc:Maybe.

00:10:07Marc:Yes, I'm okay.

00:10:08Marc:Nervousness.

00:10:10Marc:Mm-hmm.

00:10:10Marc:Nightmares.

00:10:10Marc:No.

00:10:11Marc:Obsessiveness.

00:10:12Marc:Check.

00:10:12Marc:Outbursts.

00:10:13Marc:Check.

00:10:13Marc:Overwhelmed.

00:10:14Marc:Horrible.

00:10:15Marc:Oh, fuck yeah.

00:10:16Marc:Panic, anxiety, attacks.

00:10:18Marc:Not really.

00:10:19Marc:Just a percolation.

00:10:21Marc:A constant percolation.

00:10:23Marc:Phobias.

00:10:25Marc:Eh, not really.

00:10:25Marc:Procrastination.

00:10:28Marc:I think I'm going to wait on that one.

00:10:30Marc:Ah, see, I made a joke out of it.

00:10:32Marc:I'm going to wait on that one.

00:10:33Marc:Rage.

00:10:34Marc:Yes.

00:10:35Marc:Rape.

00:10:36Marc:No.

00:10:37Marc:Is that really some concerns involving behaviors and feelings?

00:10:40Marc:Rape.

00:10:40Marc:That's on here?

00:10:43Marc:Wow.

00:10:44Marc:Ritualized compulsive behavior.

00:10:47Marc:Wouldn't that be everybody's life and job?

00:10:50Marc:Ritualized compulsive behavior?

00:10:52Marc:Yes.

00:10:52Marc:Robbery?

00:10:53Marc:No.

00:10:53Marc:Sadness?

00:10:54Marc:Yes.

00:10:55Marc:Self-harming?

00:10:55Marc:No.

00:10:56Marc:Sexual harassment?

00:10:57Marc:No.

00:10:57Marc:Shyness?

00:10:58Marc:Eh, not really.

00:10:59Marc:Stealing?

00:11:00Marc:No.

00:11:00Marc:Oh wait, stealing?

00:11:01Marc:Yes.

00:11:02Marc:I have stolen from Whole Foods once and I stole a melon.

00:11:06Marc:Ugh.

00:11:07Marc:Should I put that on there?

00:11:08Marc:Nah, it's only twice.

00:11:10Marc:Stress reactions?

00:11:11Marc:Don't know.

00:11:11Marc:Suspiciousness?

00:11:12Marc:Yes, I'm suspicious of this fucking survey.

00:11:16Marc:Temper tantrums, no.

00:11:18Marc:Tension, no.

00:11:19Marc:Tiredness, no.

00:11:19Marc:Traumatic event, no.

00:11:20Marc:Violence, no.

00:11:21Marc:Withdrawn, no.

00:11:23Marc:Now you should be able to fill something like this out and then punch it into something and they just give you a diagnosis.

00:11:30Marc:Why do I got to talk to some lady now?

00:11:34Marc:Don't we have the technology to where I can fill something like this out and then I just put it into a machine and it makes that noise.

00:11:41Marc:And it comes out, you're fucked up.

00:11:46Marc:This is the medicine you need and you should focus on this.

00:11:51Marc:Don't we have that technology?

00:11:55Marc:Brendan, put that sound in there.

00:11:57Marc:The one we used for the machine, remember?

00:12:04Marc:Or just leave that in.

00:12:06Marc:I don't give a shit.

00:12:08Marc:Fuck, man.

00:12:09Marc:Do I need medicine?

00:12:11Marc:Fuck.

00:12:12Marc:I have fought against medicine.

00:12:13Marc:Do I need Lexapro?

00:12:15Marc:Do I?

00:12:15Marc:Some people have a great amount of success with that.

00:12:18Marc:I'm tired of feeling shitty, man.

00:12:20Marc:But I'm afraid that if I take Lexapro, I took Prozac many years ago.

00:12:26Marc:And as I've said before, it does change your personality, but it doesn't get rid of the old one.

00:12:30Marc:The old one is just locked inside you going, let me out.

00:12:33Marc:Let me out.

00:12:36Marc:I need to ruin things.

00:12:38Marc:You can't keep me prisoner in this ridiculous shell of who you were running around acting happy and okay.

00:12:47Marc:Fuck.

00:12:48Marc:Let's get Tom Lennon in here.

00:12:55Oh,

00:12:56Marc:The only joy you had was smoking cigarettes.

00:12:57Guest:It really was.

00:12:59Guest:That was about it.

00:13:00Guest:I'm going to have a child now and a wife.

00:13:02Marc:That's not joy, though.

00:13:03Guest:Nah, that's weird.

00:13:03Marc:Not like cigarettes.

00:13:04Guest:Not like cigarettes.

00:13:07Guest:Oh, they took everything from it.

00:13:08Guest:I have nothing left now.

00:13:09Guest:How long has it been since you smoked?

00:13:11Marc:I've had a cigarette in about five years, Mark.

00:13:14Marc:You know, to be honest with you, I'm going to have to turn that air conditioner off, but we'll go ahead and talk for... Oh, I don't care.

00:13:19Guest:Let's turn off the air conditioner.

00:13:20Guest:Let's just run down.

00:13:21Guest:We'll run down to the bodega.

00:13:23Marc:Yeah.

00:13:23Guest:And pick up some Marlboro Reds.

00:13:25Marc:Which bodega?

00:13:26Guest:Let's get some.

00:13:28Marc:Calquier Bodega.

00:13:29Marc:Yeah.

00:13:29Marc:Calquier.

00:13:30Marc:We'll get Marlboro Reds.

00:13:32Marc:We'll go up the street and we can get an eight ball smack.

00:13:36Guest:Call it a week.

00:13:37Guest:Let's spend the week.

00:13:38Guest:I think this is 75% a good idea.

00:13:41Guest:At least.

00:13:42Guest:Just leave your number here where you wouldn't get hold of your wife.

00:13:45Guest:Leave an emergency card.

00:13:47Guest:In case something gets fucked up.

00:13:48Guest:It was worth it for the podcast.

00:13:52Marc:So, yeah, so I quit smoking a while back, but then I was- Are we going now?

00:13:56Marc:Sure.

00:13:56Marc:Oh, we're already going.

00:13:57Marc:I love it.

00:13:57Marc:Thomas Lennon, in the garage, at the cat ranch.

00:14:00Marc:Ah.

00:14:01Marc:You're good.

00:14:01Marc:He's drinking like a gerbil.

00:14:04Marc:Oh, my God.

00:14:07Guest:It's hot, man.

00:14:08Guest:Oh, my God.

00:14:09Guest:And it's bad, right?

00:14:10Guest:Oh, my God.

00:14:10Guest:It's so hot here.

00:14:12Guest:Do you want me to turn that back on?

00:14:13Guest:I know what's going on.

00:14:14Guest:I'm just going to take my shirt off.

00:14:15Guest:Get undressed.

00:14:17Guest:I'm going to wiggle out of this shirt.

00:14:18Oh.

00:14:19Marc:I'm going to try to remain comfortable with the half-naked Tom Lennon.

00:14:21Guest:I'm just going to sit here with my shirt off with his hammer here.

00:14:24Guest:We're talking about cigarettes.

00:14:25Marc:That was a realization, though.

00:14:27Guest:We're taking people's calls?

00:14:28Marc:Yeah, unless you can do voices.

00:14:30Marc:You can take a call or if you can make it up.

00:14:32Marc:Okay.

00:14:33Marc:Hello, line one.

00:14:35Guest:Hey, Mark Maron, you're a long-time listener.

00:14:38Marc:How are you?

00:14:39Guest:Who's calling?

00:14:41Guest:Grab a phone.

00:14:42Marc:I take it you're a smoker.

00:14:44Mm-hmm.

00:14:44Guest:No, I'm just... Hang on, I'm going through a tunnel.

00:14:48Guest:All right, line two.

00:14:50Guest:Hello.

00:14:51Guest:Yes, Mark.

00:14:53Guest:First off, a long time listener.

00:14:55Guest:Thank you.

00:14:56Guest:Big time fan.

00:14:57Guest:Thank you.

00:14:57Guest:We have Tom Lennon here.

00:14:58Guest:Do you have any questions for Tom?

00:15:00Guest:Is he one of the kids in the hall?

00:15:04Marc:No.

00:15:04Marc:Hold on, let me ask him.

00:15:05Marc:Tom, are you a Kids in the Hall?

00:15:07Marc:No, I'm a big fan of those guys.

00:15:08Guest:You like that?

00:15:08Guest:Technically not related material.

00:15:12Guest:Separate group of a bunch of pasty white people.

00:15:14Guest:Thanks for your call.

00:15:16Guest:So, did they inspire you?

00:15:18Guest:Kids in the Hall, here's the interesting thing about Kids in the Hall, and I love those guys and think they're wonderful.

00:15:22Guest:I actually never saw the Kids in the Hall until the state had been on the air for several years.

00:15:26Marc:Is that a truism?

00:15:27Marc:Yeah.

00:15:27Marc:Is that a true thing?

00:15:28Guest:No, do you mean a truism meaning the truth or a truism meaning like a universal truth?

00:15:36Marc:Well, either way.

00:15:37Marc:Because it's both.

00:15:37Marc:Okay.

00:15:38Marc:It's both.

00:15:38Marc:It's a universal truth that Tom Lennon had not seen the kids in the hall when he created or helped create the state.

00:15:43Marc:Right.

00:15:43Marc:We had been in the state for a while.

00:15:44Marc:I had heard of them.

00:15:45Marc:Quick quiz.

00:15:46Marc:Can you name everyone in the state?

00:15:47Guest:Everyone in the state?

00:15:48Guest:Yeah.

00:15:49Guest:Mark McKinney.

00:15:50Guest:Yeah.

00:15:51Guest:Scott...

00:15:51Guest:Thompson.

00:15:52Marc:Yeah.

00:15:52Guest:Michael Ian Black.

00:15:53Guest:Yes.

00:15:54Guest:Ken Marino.

00:15:55Guest:Right.

00:15:56Guest:Karen Kennedy.

00:15:58Guest:Right.

00:15:59Guest:David Cross.

00:16:00Guest:David Cross.

00:16:01Marc:Right.

00:16:01Guest:Bob Odenkirk.

00:16:02Guest:Yes.

00:16:02Guest:Janine Garofalo.

00:16:03Guest:Yes.

00:16:04Guest:Paul Rudd.

00:16:05Guest:Ben Stiller.

00:16:05Marc:And the black guy.

00:16:06Guest:Yeah.

00:16:07Marc:Two black guys, I thought.

00:16:08Guest:I get them mixed up because they kind of look the same.

00:16:11Marc:There's one funny black guy.

00:16:12Marc:There's one funny black guy.

00:16:13Marc:Right, and the other guy not so funny.

00:16:14Guest:Right, right, right.

00:16:15Guest:The other guy just does song parodies.

00:16:17Guest:Yeah, yeah.

00:16:17Marc:Oh, good.

00:16:18Marc:He was pretty good.

00:16:18Marc:Because I know it had been a long time.

00:16:19Marc:I wasn't sure I could name all those guys.

00:16:21Guest:Hey, Mark, big red letter day for the state.

00:16:25Guest:The record.

00:16:26Guest:Yeah.

00:16:26Guest:Today?

00:16:27Guest:Coming out.

00:16:28Marc:What was announced today that it's coming out?

00:16:29Marc:Rhino Records is putting out the last state album.

00:16:32Marc:Did you know about it?

00:16:33Marc:Yeah, I'm in it.

00:16:34Marc:Oh, you're in the state.

00:16:35Marc:That's one of the names you forgot to mention.

00:16:37Guest:Oh, me.

00:16:39Guest:And the crushing your head guy.

00:16:41Guest:Right.

00:16:41Marc:The crushing your head guy.

00:16:43Guest:Oh, right.

00:16:45Guest:I think that's Mark McKinney.

00:16:46Guest:That's also Mark McKinney.

00:16:48Guest:Bruce McCullough is the one we forgot.

00:16:49Guest:Right.

00:16:50Guest:Who's often mistaken for Michael Ian Black.

00:16:52Marc:Right.

00:16:53Marc:Now, I've talked to two members of the state.

00:16:54Marc:You realize that, right?

00:16:55Marc:I've had a conversation with Michael and Black on one of the live shows.

00:16:58Marc:David and Wayne.

00:16:59Marc:One of my dear friends and another dear friend of mine.

00:17:01Marc:Who I had in a hotel room.

00:17:02Marc:Both good for the Jews.

00:17:03Marc:Yeah.

00:17:04Marc:You know what I mean?

00:17:04Marc:Yeah.

00:17:05Marc:You know what I mean?

00:17:05Marc:Wayne's good for the Jews.

00:17:06Marc:Right.

00:17:07Marc:Oh, yeah.

00:17:07Marc:And Michael and Black.

00:17:08Marc:I never got that impression, but if you tell me he's good for the Jews, I'll take it.

00:17:11Guest:You got the opposite impression.

00:17:13Marc:I didn't know what he's good.

00:17:14Marc:I've already figured out what he's good for.

00:17:15Marc:He's a very nasty man.

00:17:16Marc:Well, he changed his name to sign more.

00:17:17Guest:Oh, he's a nasty, nasty man.

00:17:19Guest:But he is a Jew?

00:17:20Guest:Well, Mike's real name is Mike Schwartz.

00:17:22Guest:Is that true?

00:17:23Guest:Yeah.

00:17:23Guest:And he's a Jew.

00:17:24Guest:Schwartz is, I believe, the German word for black.

00:17:28Guest:Right, I think that's Schwartz.

00:17:30Guest:Like, hey, careful if you park there, there's a lot of Schwartz around.

00:17:35Marc:Right, right, yeah.

00:17:35Guest:That's a Yiddish expression.

00:17:37Marc:That my grandmother would say, not thinking he was being racist.

00:17:40Guest:Right, right, because it didn't mean it at the time.

00:17:41Marc:It just means black.

00:17:42Marc:Right.

00:17:42Guest:It means black.

00:17:43Guest:But black's name is Schwartz.

00:17:45Guest:You're not you.

00:17:46Guest:Me?

00:17:47Guest:Yeah.

00:17:47Guest:i'm an irish citizen really yeah not that that's not that those are what do you mean you move that those are mutually exclusive um they never meet the irish and the jews i feel like we have a lot in common well catholics and jews yeah maybe an irish and the jews oh we love to boil some stuff yeah and reprise you know like yeah uh oppression oppression mommy mother issues sure guilt you are an irish citizen i am an irish what does that mean here is the thing there was a there was a loophole it's like it's a loophole

00:18:17Guest:uh in the 80s if you the uh republic of ireland not the richest country in the world or what are we exporting over there for about 10 minutes they were very rich about a few years ago that's that's they export alcoholism yeah and uh and uh poets poetry and uh a sort of happy sadness and some very attractive women who have the the deep black hair and yeah yeah

00:18:39Marc:Black Irish.

00:18:40Guest:Sometimes big naturals.

00:18:41Marc:Sure, they export the Black Irish beauty.

00:18:44Guest:And copies of Singh's Riders to the Sea.

00:18:48Guest:Sweaters.

00:18:49Marc:How many of those do we sell in a year?

00:18:51Guest:I don't know.

00:18:51Guest:Not a lot.

00:18:52Guest:Okay, so the loophole was?

00:18:54Guest:Here was the loophole.

00:18:55Guest:When Ireland was poor, this is before the European Union, if you could prove that all four of your grandparents were Irish citizens, you could go to an Irish embassy with proof of that, which is kind of hard to prove because you needed paperwork.

00:19:08Guest:And $2,000.

00:19:10Guest:Yep.

00:19:11Guest:And they would make you an Irish citizen.

00:19:12Guest:And that's what you did?

00:19:13Guest:Yep.

00:19:13Guest:Just for the fuck of it?

00:19:14Guest:For the fuck of it.

00:19:15Guest:And I was like, well, who knows?

00:19:18Guest:Now, did you buy property in Ireland?

00:19:20Guest:No.

00:19:20Guest:Are you going to?

00:19:21Guest:No.

00:19:21Guest:Have you been?

00:19:22Guest:No.

00:19:24Guest:Yes.

00:19:24Guest:No, I've been a lot of times, but I don't own... You know, I've often... It's one of those ideas you kick around.

00:19:32Guest:Sure.

00:19:32Guest:Like the way that you have a podcast.

00:19:34Guest:Right, buying property in Ireland.

00:19:35Guest:You kick around the idea of like, you know what we're going to do?

00:19:37Guest:Here's what we're going to do.

00:19:38Guest:We're going to pack up the boy and we buy one of those old rotted down... Your boy.

00:19:42Marc:Yeah.

00:19:42Marc:Not any boy.

00:19:43Guest:Well, either one.

00:19:44Marc:The one you had.

00:19:45Marc:Okay.

00:19:46Marc:Sure.

00:19:47Marc:Just in general.

00:19:48Marc:Pack up a boy.

00:19:49Marc:Take him now.

00:19:50Marc:You know what I'm talking about.

00:19:51Marc:Let him go.

00:19:51Guest:You know what I'm talking about.

00:19:52Guest:Like the old days.

00:19:53Guest:You know, before the FBI would keep tabs on everybody.

00:19:56Marc:You know what I'm talking about.

00:19:56Guest:Back in the day.

00:19:58Guest:The Rat Pack used to do this kind of stuff all the time.

00:19:59Marc:You don't hear about it.

00:20:00Guest:They were packing up boys and taking them all over the place.

00:20:02Guest:But you pack up a boy.

00:20:04Guest:Yeah.

00:20:04Guest:And you move to like an Irish castle.

00:20:07Guest:Right.

00:20:07Guest:All rotted out in the stairs.

00:20:09Guest:And you rebuild it.

00:20:10Guest:And you rebuild it all set to a music montage.

00:20:13Guest:Sure.

00:20:13Guest:Set to like Black 47s.

00:20:15Guest:Right.

00:20:16Marc:And the montage takes like nine minutes.

00:20:19Marc:And that whole beautiful thing is...

00:20:20Guest:And then you turn around, there's window boxes filled with shamrocks.

00:20:23Guest:Right.

00:20:23Guest:And the reality would be 10 years later.

00:20:25Guest:10 years later.

00:20:26Guest:We still haven't fixed anything.

00:20:27Guest:The wife and the child are dead.

00:20:28Guest:They're gone.

00:20:29Guest:Because I didn't build those new stairs to code, everyone's dead.

00:20:33Marc:I now live alone in a castle just with ghosts.

00:20:36Marc:And it's the ballad of Tom Lennon.

00:20:38Marc:The sad ballad of Tom Lennon.

00:20:40Guest:As I was going over the Cork and Carrie mountain, name it.

00:20:44Guest:And I'm just sitting there and I'm whittling my own leg.

00:20:47Guest:And I don't even know.

00:20:48Guest:I'm so fucked up.

00:20:49Guest:But I think people come by and the villagers come by and they say, that's the Yanko Bada house up there.

00:20:54Guest:And I don't know.

00:20:55Marc:Do you hear about his boy?

00:20:56Guest:See, the sea took him.

00:21:00Guest:He threw him in the sea.

00:21:02Guest:The sea didn't take him.

00:21:03Guest:He gave him to the sea.

00:21:05Guest:But I'm sitting there and I'm whittling and I've been whittling so long that I've just started carving into my leg and now my leg bone's like a little nub of Screamshaw.

00:21:13Marc:Yeah.

00:21:13Marc:It's just a dog chewing on it.

00:21:15Marc:Sad story about that Yanko.

00:21:17Marc:Do you know why the cable that the sweaters that you get in Ireland, do you know why they had the- Tells you what town you're from.

00:21:23Marc:I heard it was easy.

00:21:24Marc:It was so you were easy to identify when your body washed up.

00:21:27Guest:It's exactly what it's for.

00:21:29Guest:Every one of those Irish sweaters is like a snowflake.

00:21:32Guest:Meant to help families go.

00:21:34Guest:That's him.

00:21:35Guest:Ah, there he is.

00:21:36Guest:There's Mickey.

00:21:37Guest:There's Mickey.

00:21:39Guest:See, he took him and then spit him back out.

00:21:40Guest:Spit him back out.

00:21:41Guest:Spit him back out right in your face.

00:21:43Guest:See, he wanted him, but just to chew him up for a bit and then spit him back out.

00:21:48Guest:Here's the thing.

00:21:49Guest:Speaking of Irish people and things.

00:21:50Guest:I was just there, by the way.

00:21:52Guest:Jogging the shit.

00:21:53Guest:I was jogging the shit out of today.

00:21:55Marc:Yeah.

00:21:55Guest:Today you jogged the shit out of it?

00:21:57Marc:At the gym, I hope.

00:21:58Marc:No, no.

00:21:58Marc:I was jogging the out of doors.

00:22:00Marc:Really?

00:22:00Marc:Yeah.

00:22:01Marc:Oh, you're fucking nuts.

00:22:02Marc:It's not that hot.

00:22:02Marc:You wore shorts.

00:22:03Marc:You made a declaration coming into my house after I wrote you an email and said it's hot in my garage.

00:22:09Marc:I said, wear shorts is a joke because all I fucking ever see you in is shorts on television.

00:22:13Guest:And you get here and say, what?

00:22:15Guest:I don't ever wear shorts, ever.

00:22:16Guest:Unless, my only other rule about that, is unless I'm doing a sportif activity.

00:22:22Marc:Which today you were doing.

00:22:23Guest:That was sportif.

00:22:23Guest:I'm sweating now.

00:22:24Marc:Yeah.

00:22:25Marc:I sweat a lot.

00:22:27Marc:So here's what I was talking to, but speaking of Irish people.

00:22:28Marc:Jogging the fuck out of the day.

00:22:29Marc:Are you Irish?

00:22:30Marc:No, I'm Jew.

00:22:31Marc:Oh.

00:22:31Marc:If you switch two of my letters, I'll turn Irish.

00:22:33Marc:Like I'm Marin, so if you switch the A. Oh, man.

00:22:35Marc:Oh, man.

00:22:36Marc:Oh, man.

00:22:36Marc:No, you switch the A and the O, it's Moran.

00:22:38Guest:I'm Mark Moran.

00:22:39Marc:Ah, Mark Moran.

00:22:40Marc:Ah, Mark Moran.

00:22:41Guest:See, took him.

00:22:42Guest:Yeah.

00:22:42Guest:See, took him.

00:22:43Guest:Spit him back out of Jew.

00:22:44Guest:Farce.

00:22:45Guest:Shit.

00:22:46Guest:He's Irish going in.

00:22:48Guest:He's Irish going in.

00:22:49Guest:Then a quick little snip.

00:22:51Guest:Spitting back out.

00:22:52Guest:A Jew in a sweater.

00:22:53Guest:A Jew in a sweater.

00:22:55Guest:So you're jogging.

00:22:56Guest:No, here's the thing.

00:22:57Guest:So I was jogging today, and usually I have the iPod on shuffle, but today, sometimes it gets fucked up.

00:23:06Marc:That's too random for me.

00:23:06Marc:Do you do the Nike iPod thing?

00:23:07Guest:You have a Nike iPod thing?

00:23:08Marc:No, I have a regular iPod with thousands of songs.

00:23:11Marc:If I push shuffle, I never know when I'm going to get one of those old Before the Blues albums I have on there.

00:23:17Guest:Oh, fuck it.

00:23:20Guest:I can't jog to that.

00:23:22Guest:Or by accident, that Run DMC Christmas song.

00:23:25Guest:Yeah, I don't have that one.

00:23:26Guest:Well, it's kind of a bummer.

00:23:27Marc:There's a lot of weird stuff on it.

00:23:28Marc:Is there a sad song?

00:23:28Marc:I didn't know it was a sad song.

00:23:29Guest:No, no, it's upbeat, but it just feels weird to be out jogging to, it's Christmas time in Hollis, Queens.

00:23:35Marc:Right, right.

00:23:35Guest:It just feels weird.

00:23:36Guest:Yeah, it's not right.

00:23:36Guest:Yeah.

00:23:37Guest:And then, of course, you know, they have gag songs that you don't want to jog to.

00:23:41Guest:Who the fuck has gag songs on them?

00:23:42Guest:I have gag songs like, you know, Ben and I do a bit.

00:23:45Guest:It's like a Cirque du Soleil bit that's all set to Enya's Orinoco Flow.

00:23:50Guest:Is that the better?

00:24:02Guest:She took her, by the way.

00:24:04Guest:She lives in a castle.

00:24:05Guest:In Ireland?

00:24:07Guest:Man.

00:24:07Guest:Hotter than you think.

00:24:08Guest:Did you hang out lately?

00:24:10Guest:No.

00:24:10Guest:I'm just talking about pictures.

00:24:12Guest:From those covers?

00:24:13Marc:Her hair was kind of crazy, I remember.

00:24:15Guest:What was crazy about her hair?

00:24:16Marc:I don't remember.

00:24:17Marc:How dare you?

00:24:18Marc:You dirty Jew.

00:24:19Guest:How dare you?

00:24:20Guest:You shit on the Irish women of my dreams.

00:24:23Guest:I'm not saying she's the woman of my dreams, but I feel like, unless I'm crazy, is she hotter than we remember?

00:24:28Guest:Maybe.

00:24:28Guest:You want me to Google it?

00:24:32Guest:If you're listening at home,

00:24:33Guest:Yes, in fact, you just a minute ago were bragging about those black-haired Irish beauties.

00:24:39Guest:Is she one of them?

00:24:39Guest:Isn't she?

00:24:40Guest:I can't remember what the fuck she looks like.

00:24:42Marc:I don't think there's any pictures of her.

00:24:44Guest:Throw her up on the thing.

00:24:45Guest:I don't think there's any pictures of her.

00:24:46Guest:Well, if you're playing along at home, throw a picture of Enya up on the screen and see, do you get a boner?

00:24:53Marc:Does she even have a whole name?

00:24:54Marc:Enya.

00:24:56Marc:Enya's the whole name?

00:24:57Marc:Oh, fuck.

00:24:57Marc:What is her whole name?

00:24:59Marc:Wait, hold on.

00:24:59Marc:We're taking calls.

00:25:00Marc:Hold on.

00:25:01Marc:Oh, wait, you're right.

00:25:02Marc:See?

00:25:02Marc:You're right.

00:25:03Marc:Bonertown.

00:25:04Marc:Yeah, hold on.

00:25:05Marc:Oh, you're looking for Bonertown.

00:25:07Marc:Oh, you made two left turns.

00:25:09Marc:There she is.

00:25:09Guest:You made the wrong turn at Bonertown.

00:25:11Guest:You're looking for Enya's castle.

00:25:12Marc:No, I... Put it back in your pants.

00:25:15Guest:Hey, lad.

00:25:17Guest:Not on the street.

00:25:18Guest:Put that back in there.

00:25:20Guest:Yeah, I think she's okay.

00:25:22Guest:Okay.

00:25:22Guest:Oh, my God.

00:25:23Guest:After all that buildup, she's okay.

00:25:24Guest:Well, look, I mean, she's... I can't see her from here.

00:25:26Guest:Can you flip that or no?

00:25:27Guest:Oh, come on.

00:25:28Guest:Okay.

00:25:29Guest:Yeah.

00:25:29Guest:All right.

00:25:29Guest:If you've had a couple of pints.

00:25:32Guest:But that's anybody.

00:25:34Guest:Okay.

00:25:35Guest:That's a pretty good point.

00:25:36Guest:That's a pretty good point.

00:25:37Marc:Why draw the line at end of... She's a cute Irish lass.

00:25:40Guest:She's not Kate Bush.

00:25:41Marc:No.

00:25:42Marc:Okay, so now you're listening to Enya while you're jogging.

00:25:45Guest:No, I'm saying that could come up.

00:25:46Guest:Today I was listening to jogging, and I got super, super pumped because a song came on that I fucking love.

00:25:51Guest:Yeah, which one?

00:25:52Guest:Which is U2's Sunday Bloody Sunday.

00:25:54Guest:This is an Irish-themed show.

00:25:56Marc:Well, it is now.

00:25:57Marc:I know.

00:25:57Marc:It has been the whole time since you walked in here.

00:25:59Marc:Was that the agenda?

00:26:00Marc:I get it.

00:26:00Marc:I'm a Jew.

00:26:01Marc:I have no agenda.

00:26:02Marc:You have something to prove.

00:26:03Marc:You're success in show business.

00:26:04Marc:I dated a lot of Jews.

00:26:04Marc:And I'm Irish.

00:26:05Marc:I dated a lot of Jews.

00:26:05Marc:I'm Irish and I'm winning.

00:26:06Marc:Is that what the theme of this fucking show?

00:26:08Guest:Were the Irish ever winning?

00:26:10Guest:I love that we're in Hollywood and somehow the Irish are winning.

00:26:15Guest:I'm looking at your IMDb page.

00:26:17Guest:This Irish, this Mick is ahead of the game.

00:26:19Guest:Well, watch out because there's the other...

00:26:23Guest:No, but I was feeling bad because I got so excited jogging to Sunday, Bloody Sunday, and I was like, this song is kind of about a tragedy, right?

00:26:29Guest:Isn't it about a bunch of innocent people getting mowed down?

00:26:33Guest:Horrible murder.

00:26:34Marc:Yeah.

00:26:35Guest:But man, it's so good to jog in that shit.

00:26:37Marc:I have been on a treadmill and playing air guitar to Sympathy for the Devil.

00:26:42Marc:Is that how that was intended?

00:26:43Marc:What's Sympathy for the Devil about?

00:26:44Marc:Who the hell knows?

00:26:45Marc:Does anyone really know?

00:26:47Marc:Please allow me to introduce myself.

00:26:48Marc:I'm a man of welcome.

00:26:49Guest:Isn't Brown Sugar about slave trading or what is that?

00:26:52Marc:It's about black women, I think.

00:26:53Marc:And Sympathy for the Devil was about, hey, I'm the devil.

00:26:56Marc:You know you like me.

00:26:58Marc:And then I've actually been on the treadmill jamming to Highway to Hell.

00:27:02Marc:Highway to Hell.

00:27:03Marc:Which I think is about the closest I've been on the Highway to Hell.

00:27:05Guest:Whose mama was a tent show queen?

00:27:07Guest:Had all the boys since Sweet 16.

00:27:09Guest:I bet your mama was a tent show queen.

00:27:11Marc:What is a tent show?

00:27:13Marc:Mark?

00:27:14Marc:A tent show queen?

00:27:14Marc:Yeah.

00:27:15Marc:A tent show is, I would say, maybe a side show.

00:27:18Marc:Perhaps maybe his mom, I bet your mom was a bearded lady, perhaps.

00:27:22Guest:She was a freak.

00:27:24Marc:I bet your mama was a monstrous freak.

00:27:26Marc:Exactly.

00:27:27Marc:Had a beard and weighed 800 pounds.

00:27:31Marc:Tent show.

00:27:32Marc:Tent show.

00:27:33Marc:Tent show.

00:27:33Marc:Definition.

00:27:34Marc:Circus.

00:27:35Marc:Given in a tent.

00:27:36Marc:Hey.

00:27:36Marc:Tent show.

00:27:37Marc:Could be anything, I think.

00:27:38Guest:Put away that tent show in your pants.

00:27:39Guest:Yeah.

00:27:40Guest:Are you looking for Enya's castle?

00:27:41Guest:Yeah.

00:27:43Guest:I could tell by your tent show that you're looking for...

00:27:46Guest:For Castledania.

00:27:49Guest:Liar she is on the trapeze.

00:27:51Guest:You're right.

00:27:51Guest:She's really not that amazing.

00:27:52Guest:She's all right.

00:27:53Marc:All right, so now- She's got a lot of money, though, probably, right?

00:27:55Marc:I don't know.

00:27:56Marc:From that one song?

00:27:57Marc:You don't think she just rolls around in money?

00:27:59Marc:She probably does.

00:28:00Marc:Her house?

00:28:01Marc:To that song.

00:28:02Marc:Or the other one.

00:28:03Marc:Is there another one?

00:28:04Marc:What's the other one?

00:28:05Marc:There's Orinoco Flow.

00:28:06Guest:Wasn't that on a commercial as well?

00:28:08Guest:The other one is, who can say where the road goes, where my heart goes.

00:28:14Guest:I don't know that one.

00:28:15Guest:Only time.

00:28:17Guest:That one's only time.

00:28:18Guest:And then she sings in Irish.

00:28:20Guest:She sings in Gaelic?

00:28:21Guest:Gaelic.

00:28:22Guest:No.

00:28:23Guest:In the Lord of the Rings film.

00:28:24Guest:She does?

00:28:25Guest:Yeah.

00:28:25Guest:She probably made a few bucks on that.

00:28:26Guest:Bo-cha-ching.

00:28:28Guest:Yeah.

00:28:28Marc:Fucking sweet hobbit money.

00:28:30Marc:Speaking of sweet hobbit money, look, man, let's talk about your fucking gilded career.

00:28:36Marc:What am I doing?

00:28:37Marc:I'm talking to you in a garage.

00:28:38Marc:I haven't seen you in a while.

00:28:39Marc:I'm getting...

00:28:40Marc:how long have we known each other would you estimate i think the last time i saw you i was brooding at luna maybe smoking cigarettes yeah and i walked by you and you walked by me and i think you had that look sort of like i don't think it's gonna turn out well with that guy

00:28:55Guest:You know what I was thinking at the time?

00:28:57Guest:I don't think that guy's going to turn out okay.

00:28:59Guest:Mark's too mad.

00:29:01Guest:Mark is so mad.

00:29:02Guest:And then one night we were at Caroline's together, and I remember, I feel like we were at a Comedy Central event, and I feel like you laid into the entire administration of Comedy Central in a great...

00:29:14Guest:none that was it it was like a star yeah that's where it was it was trouble it was like a roast that of like but what do you call a roast comedy central party a roast combined with remember that scene where michael kills the corrupt police officer and the godfather there's like a gun strapped in oh yeah yeah yeah and sterling hayden yeah yeah yeah and he goes yeah yeah

00:29:34Guest:He holds a trunk.

00:29:35Guest:It was a combination between a roast and that scene from The Godfather where they don't know.

00:29:41Guest:Oh my God, Marc Maron's gone into the bathroom.

00:29:43Guest:There's a gun in the tank and he's coming in and we're fucking done.

00:29:47Guest:Yeah.

00:29:48Marc:They didn't know.

00:29:48Marc:I got in trouble for that.

00:29:50Marc:Did you really?

00:29:50Marc:A little bit.

00:29:51Marc:By whom?

00:29:51Marc:What do they say?

00:29:52Marc:By the new brass.

00:29:53Marc:By the new brass.

00:29:54Marc:I had to go apologize for that comment.

00:29:56Marc:For what?

00:29:57Marc:All you did was say that everybody is a bunch of fucking idiots.

00:30:00Marc:Basically.

00:30:01Marc:But somehow when I say things, when I throw a punch like that, it lands and it sticks.

00:30:08Marc:They can't pull the fist out of their face.

00:30:10Marc:So then I got to go there and I got to go, let me help you pull the fist out of your face.

00:30:14Marc:And then I got to stick it in my face.

00:30:16Marc:We used to have to apologize to everybody.

00:30:17Marc:Did you really?

00:30:18Guest:Well, the state used to always say the dumbest.

00:30:19Guest:Here's the problem with the state.

00:30:21Guest:We would endlessly have to fucking apologize for some shit.

00:30:24Guest:Like what?

00:30:24Guest:Because there were 11 of us.

00:30:26Guest:Yeah.

00:30:27Guest:And we used to, other than smoking a million cigarettes, which was basically- In the offices.

00:30:32Guest:Yes.

00:30:32Guest:Yeah.

00:30:33Guest:Oh, we had to apologize for that.

00:30:34Marc:Yeah, of course.

00:30:34Marc:Sorry, we should burn the thing down.

00:30:35Marc:People would fucking catch us smoking on MTV all the time.

00:30:37Guest:Yeah.

00:30:37Guest:Somebody saw, we had an office, if you've ever seen the show, what used to be Total Request Live, TRL, that window looking into Times Square was the state's office.

00:30:46Guest:Right.

00:30:47Guest:Well, you guys built MTV, kind of.

00:30:48Guest:Yeah.

00:30:49Guest:Didn't you?

00:30:50Guest:And unbuilt it, I guess, yeah.

00:30:51Marc:Well, I mean, that girl that's sitting in my living room, who I'm dating, it was significantly younger than me.

00:30:56Marc:I'm not bragging.

00:30:57Marc:I was kind of thinking, way to go, when I first, I'm walking.

00:30:59Guest:Here's my next question.

00:31:00Guest:And then I thought, like, does he have a daughter?

00:31:01Guest:Didn't know...

00:31:02Guest:Way to go.

00:31:03Guest:Wait a minute.

00:31:04Guest:A million questions ran through my head when I stepped in that room.

00:31:07Guest:I was like, girlfriend?

00:31:08Guest:Triple question mark.

00:31:10Guest:Yeah.

00:31:10Guest:And then I was like, Maren's girlfriend?

00:31:11Guest:Yeah.

00:31:11Guest:Question mark, question mark.

00:31:13Guest:And then I was like, Maren's girlfriend?

00:31:15Guest:Exclamation point.

00:31:16Guest:Way to go.

00:31:16Guest:Yeah, thank you.

00:31:17Guest:No, that's a beautiful girl.

00:31:18Marc:Yeah.

00:31:20Marc:I should just be sitting here wearing a clown.

00:31:21Marc:I can't remember what her name is, though.

00:31:23Marc:For the life of me.

00:31:24Marc:Jessica, though, she grew up on your shit.

00:31:26Guest:You know, like, cause I, you know, I have to think the kids.

00:31:28Guest:Yeah.

00:31:28Guest:The kids love us now.

00:31:30Marc:I've had this conversation with Wayne too, like that.

00:31:33Marc:You guys grabbed hold of this crew when they were like 10.

00:31:36Marc:I mean, she must've been 10.

00:31:37Guest:Yeah.

00:31:38Guest:Now they're in charge of everything.

00:31:39Marc:They're in charge of everything, but they still come see your shows.

00:31:41Guest:They do.

00:31:42Marc:They do.

00:31:42Guest:They love us.

00:31:43Guest:And it's all the kids, you know, it's kids who, uh, it was like the first real generation whose parents were not raising them at all.

00:31:48Guest:Right.

00:31:49Guest:State some things we had to apologize for.

00:31:51Guest:Like what?

00:31:52Guest:once there was some trouble about we had maybe some some members of the group had smoked some marijuana in the mtv offices holy shit marijuana you fucking guys and no that wasn't the marijuana it was that the people who were high were singing at the top of their lungs in the office why can't we be ferns why can't we be ferns why can't like that and it was cracking everybody up and everybody was kind of high and then our producer jim sharp is a great guy works i remember jim sharp and it was like

00:32:21Guest:like you mother I'm responsible for you fucking guys man you can't be smoking merit doob in the office do trouble for that yeah I can do Joe Latruglio we had a permanent in our sort of like office which overflowed into the Beavis and Butthead offices Beavis and Butthead had not been on the air yet

00:32:41Guest:it was a cartoon that they were working what it was just Mike in an office knows it was a bunch of animators like people like hanging out working and we were like now they're working on some cartoon we didn't know what it was we didn't know that would literally change the entire world yeah like yeah in a couple months and obscure your success yeah oh we were a fucking footnote tiny tiny footnote to those guys but so so we were playing foursquare one day which we did we have permanent taped off foursquare court um

00:33:07Guest:Me and Kerry Kenney played Strip Fork Tour one day in that same office.

00:33:10Guest:It was awesome.

00:33:12Guest:Who won?

00:33:13Guest:Everybody won because Kerry Kenney was completely nude in our office.

00:33:16Guest:It was a good time.

00:33:17Marc:Did you guys spend a lot of time nude?

00:33:18Guest:The state people?

00:33:20Guest:Were you just all sitting around nude?

00:33:22Guest:I guess.

00:33:22Guest:yeah yeah alright oh wait what was my point oh so fucking like our four square ball goes bouncing down the hall and like knocks over some fucking really important animation stuff where they're animating Beavis and Butthead oh shit and Mike Judge gets really mad Mike who's a friend of mine now and I really like him as a guy but he got really really mad and came over and was like fuck what the fuck is wrong with you guys you're playing fucking four square and we're doing really fucking complicated stuff over here for a fucking good show and fuck you guys and Joe LaTriglio flipped him off

00:33:52Guest:yeah and then it went that went up to the very top of MTV really and we got a call like did you flip off my judge holy shit very nice hard-working creator of Beavis and Butthead whose offices right next year's Joe had to apologize and he bought him like a framed piece and then even in our state's apologies we were dicks he bought him like a piece of street art like a framed piece of art and gave him a check for like three dollars

00:34:17Guest:Really?

00:34:17Guest:Just to be.

00:34:18Guest:And then it was like we're a fucking dick.

00:34:19Guest:Then we had to apologize to the 21 Club and the William Morris Agency.

00:34:24Guest:For that?

00:34:25Guest:No.

00:34:25Guest:Totally new incident.

00:34:27Guest:Oh.

00:34:27Guest:We could do a whole show about shit.

00:34:29Marc:The state had to apologize for?

00:34:30Guest:The state had to apologize for stuff that we said about Nottingham Cats in the New York Times in the first ever interview about the state.

00:34:37Marc:That's why I had to apologize.

00:34:37Guest:We said they kept trying to dumb us down.

00:34:40Guest:We said, you know, we said, you know, the network, if they left their own devices, they would just dumb us down and have us do a bunch of pop culture shit and make fun of Dan Cortese and MTV sports and a bunch of, you know.

00:34:51Guest:Right.

00:34:51Guest:You know, but we said we've been fighting their terrible notes and bad ideas.

00:34:55Marc:Herzog and Katz.

00:34:56Guest:Yeah.

00:34:57Guest:And Doug, by the way, brilliant guy.

00:34:58Guest:I've been a friend of mine.

00:34:59Guest:Put me kept has kept me on TV.

00:35:00Guest:Mine literally my entire life.

00:35:02Guest:Yeah, and it's a really good guy.

00:35:03Guest:Yeah, and it was so unnecessary for the one of us who did like kind of rag on the network really bad This is like this is what the state would do you would give us and something but you guys we would shit in your hand Then go tell everybody what a dick you were about the fact that we just took a shit in your hand Wow, um guess you can't take a little bit of shit in their hand and

00:35:25Guest:I didn't know you were going to be so fancy and high and mighty that it would bother you when we literally shit in your hand and then told everybody how you weren't cool about it.

00:35:34Guest:We were fucking such dicks.

00:35:36Guest:I can't believe it.

00:35:37Marc:How old were you, though?

00:35:37Marc:You were like 19, right?

00:35:38Guest:20?

00:35:39Guest:When the state formed, we were freshmen in college.

00:35:43Guest:We were all 18 or 19.

00:35:44Guest:When the TV show was on, we were all around 22, 23, 24.

00:35:48Guest:The show was over...

00:35:51Guest:The show was long over.

00:35:53Guest:We were working on the CBS show when I was 25, I remember.

00:35:57Guest:Because I was so hungover the morning after my 25th birthday that I curled up into a fetal position under my desk at CBS, at our CBS offices, and just tried to hold myself in a little pod and not shake or shit my pants or whatever was going to happen.

00:36:15Guest:But it was a really bad scene.

00:36:17Guest:So, yeah, by 25, the state was fully about to be over.

00:36:21Guest:Now, I didn't remember that.

00:36:22Guest:You had a CBS pilot or you were on CBS for briefly?

00:36:25Guest:How could you forget that we were on CBS for 42 minutes?

00:36:28Guest:One episode.

00:36:29Guest:One episode.

00:36:30Guest:The idea was we had a deal for, I believe, two or three episodes.

00:36:33Guest:Right.

00:36:34Guest:And then those were going to be a test.

00:36:38Guest:See how the kids do with this.

00:36:40Guest:And then, of course, we'll give you your own CBS series.

00:36:41Guest:Because they were chumming for a younger demographic.

00:36:44Guest:They wanted the hip kind of kids.

00:36:45Guest:They're like, we'll grab this cool thing off MTV.

00:36:48Guest:MTV never canceled us, ever.

00:36:50Guest:And I must say, to the credit of Eileen Katz, who gave us some of the best notes we ever had, and Doug Herzog, who's one of the smartest, funniest guys I've ever worked for and always worked for.

00:36:59Guest:He's at MT.

00:37:00Marc:He's now back at... Where is he?

00:37:02Marc:Comedy Central and Spike.

00:37:03Guest:He runs them both.

00:37:05Guest:They...

00:37:06Marc:tried to pick up the state for 65 more episodes you'd still be doing it today still be doing yeah it would be right now it would be it would be terrible yeah let's face it well yeah i imagine i'd like to see how you would have all it ran hot and cold at the time yeah i don't i don't remember much of it why would you well no because it was very important it was a cultural uh like the this jessica just told me like you know when she was like basically like you know when you talk about all those old guys yeah like the state were our people they were our guys

00:37:32Marc:were the were the uncle milty right of that generation like even before mr show really by a couple years right and i remember all you guys and for some reason i never had a problem with you i mean i like it is weird that we because because you're so confrontational no but you never did stand up i think it's primarily not really no a lot of us have gotten into it later but that's what bothered me right

00:37:51Guest:I do stand-up now.

00:37:53Guest:Do you?

00:37:53Guest:And that bothers you?

00:37:54Guest:Yeah.

00:37:55Guest:No, you don't.

00:37:55Guest:I do tons of stand-ups.

00:37:56Marc:Goddamn you.

00:37:57Marc:I just don't tour.

00:37:57Marc:Fuck you, Lennon.

00:37:58Marc:Why did I bring it up?

00:37:59Marc:You did not do a stand-up tour.

00:38:01Guest:No, no, no.

00:38:02Guest:I don't tour or anything.

00:38:02Guest:I just do... I've done... I did improv this year and things like that.

00:38:05Marc:Just to fuck around?

00:38:06Guest:Yeah.

00:38:07Guest:Just to play?

00:38:08Guest:No, to get my head together.

00:38:09Guest:Keep my head... To keep sharp?

00:38:11Guest:Yeah.

00:38:11Guest:To keep your comedy chops in place?

00:38:13Guest:To keep my brain intact.

00:38:14Marc:Dude, you...

00:38:14Marc:You're fucking on everything.

00:38:15Marc:You're like, you know, if someone was to do like a six degree of whatever that game is with comedy, you've done it pretty much.

00:38:24Marc:God, I feel old these days.

00:38:25Marc:It seems like you've written everything that's been on comedy television since the last 10 years, right?

00:38:33Marc:Some of it was good.

00:38:34Guest:No, Viva Variety, I remember that was funny.

00:38:37Guest:Hey, you know, here's an interesting thing about Viva Variety.

00:38:39Guest:Have they released in Variety?

00:38:40Guest:No, never.

00:38:40Guest:I don't know why.

00:38:41Guest:But I heard- That was kind of a funny show.

00:38:44Guest:Yeah, I liked it.

00:38:44Guest:I thought you just said kind of a funny show.

00:38:47Guest:I'm fucking sitting in your fucking hot garage.

00:38:49Guest:I'm sorry.

00:38:50Guest:We did three seasons of that fucking thing.

00:38:52Guest:It was nominated for a Cable Ace Award for Best Comedy Series.

00:38:55Guest:Fuck you.

00:38:55Guest:It was kind of a funny show.

00:38:57Guest:I had to fucking wear that fucking, I had a fucking mustache and prancing around all the time.

00:39:01Marc:But you did the accent.

00:39:01Marc:What was it, like a Brazilian accent on?

00:39:03Guest:It was like, well, here's the thing.

00:39:05Guest:We are doing, I know this is official because I said yes to it.

00:39:08Guest:Me, Michael Ian Black, Carrie Kenney, Robert Ben Garant, probably some other people involved in the show.

00:39:13Guest:We are doing a Viva Variety reunion at Sketch Fest this coming January in San Francisco.

00:39:19Marc:In San Francisco?

00:39:20Guest:That's awesome.

00:39:20Guest:And I think it will be, it's not like one of those sit and do a panel and chat about it things.

00:39:24Guest:You're going to do bits?

00:39:25Guest:I think we're doing a live episode of Viva Variety at Sketch Fest.

00:39:29Marc:Why not?

00:39:29Guest:Why not?

00:39:29Guest:Why the fuck not?

00:39:30Guest:It'll be a blast.

00:39:31Guest:It was pretty good when it was on the air, as even Marc Maron will attest.

00:39:34Guest:Kind of funny.

00:39:35Guest:How bad does it say?

00:39:36Guest:I said kind of funny, not pretty good.

00:39:39Guest:It's a huge difference.

00:39:39Guest:State was pretty good.

00:39:41Guest:State was pretty good.

00:39:43Guest:Viva was kind of funny.

00:39:44Guest:And Reno was very funny.

00:39:45Guest:Tolerable.

00:39:46Guest:No, Reno's funny.

00:39:47Guest:Thanks, man.

00:39:47Marc:You moved up.

00:39:48Marc:It's a natural evolution.

00:39:49Marc:Oh, good, good.

00:39:50Marc:From pretty good to kind of funny to very funny.

00:39:52Guest:We're doing a show for FX now.

00:39:53Marc:Really?

00:39:54Marc:Well, because network TV keeps just slapping us with their dick.

00:39:57Marc:Well, everyone's doing FX now.

00:39:58Marc:I mean, I think maybe Louie and It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia opened a portal.

00:40:02Marc:They did.

00:40:03Marc:What are you doing on FX now?

00:40:04Guest:We're doing a show.

00:40:05Guest:It's Reno 911 on a spaceship.

00:40:08Marc:Right, the spaceship show.

00:40:09Guest:Yeah, it's called Alabama.

00:40:10Marc:Now you've got an episodic commitment?

00:40:13Marc:No, we're doing a pilot.

00:40:14Marc:Oh.

00:40:14Marc:Yeah.

00:40:14Marc:Well, that's great, man.

00:40:16Marc:You keep working and you're going to go have fun.

00:40:18Marc:And that's just the fact that you're over here.

00:40:19Marc:It seems like you should be busy writing Another Night at the Museum movie.

00:40:23Guest:I am.

00:40:24Guest:You're writing Another Night at the Museum movie?

00:40:25Guest:I just feel like we've known each other so long that this is important stuff.

00:40:27Guest:Seriously.

00:40:28Guest:Are you writing Another Night at the Museum?

00:40:29Guest:We actually already have written it.

00:40:31Guest:The third one?

00:40:31Guest:Is it the third one?

00:40:32Guest:It is three.

00:40:33Guest:It's amazing.

00:40:34Guest:We have written it, but I don't know if it's getting made or not.

00:40:36Guest:Why wouldn't it get made?

00:40:37Guest:I don't know.

00:40:38Guest:They're weird about this stuff.

00:40:39Marc:Are they really?

00:40:40Guest:Well, you know what?

00:40:40Guest:I don't know if they're weird about it.

00:40:42Guest:Often the writer is the last person to know.

00:40:44Guest:But you do a lot of acting, so let's just go over it quickly.

00:40:46Marc:I do a lot of both.

00:40:47Marc:Let's quickly go over the things that you were either part of the creation of or created.

00:40:50Marc:So that's the State?

00:40:51Marc:State.

00:40:52Marc:The Viva Variety?

00:40:53Marc:Yes.

00:40:53Marc:Reno 911?

00:40:54Marc:All three.

00:40:54Marc:Okay, those are the TV projects.

00:40:56Guest:And then there's a lot of failed stuff in between there, too.

00:40:58Marc:Yeah, which failed thing did you wish made it the most?

00:41:02Guest:We did a show that I really loved called Hey Neighbor.

00:41:05Guest:And who was involved with that?

00:41:06Guest:Me, Carrie Kenney, Silver, Michael Ian Black, Ben Garant, Jack Plotnick, some hot chick whose name I forgot.

00:41:16Guest:That was a sitcom sketch show hybrid.

00:41:20Guest:It was a sitcom where an entire town was played by six actors.

00:41:26Guest:so it's kind of like a weird like a BBC show you know yeah high school high or whatever it is summers summers right summer high high it's a little weird high summer high this weird show yeah it had a little bit of Little Britain yeah it was like a sitcom in a suburb everybody's played by six people mm-hmm that was a really cool show we did that for FX and I mean for Fox and eventually that sort of fell apart blah blah blah blah eventually turned into Reno not normal now what happened why the shorts wait what the hell you don't wear shorts where'd that come from here's the thing I just feel like shorts are really really really and no offense because you're wearing them but it's hot in the garage

00:41:56Guest:Shorts are just, they look silly on an adult man.

00:41:59Guest:Yeah.

00:41:59Guest:You know?

00:42:00Guest:But you went really over the top.

00:42:01Guest:I went really over the top with my balls almost out and became a kind of sort of gay icon in the process.

00:42:06Guest:Did you really?

00:42:06Guest:Yeah, it's a very popular Halloween costume now.

00:42:08Guest:With the gays.

00:42:08Guest:Yeah.

00:42:09Guest:And the straights.

00:42:10Marc:Yeah.

00:42:11Marc:Both.

00:42:11Marc:Really?

00:42:12Guest:Do they sell it as a costume?

00:42:14Guest:Oh, yeah, yeah.

00:42:15Guest:What's the character's name?

00:42:16Guest:Dangle?

00:42:16Guest:Dangle.

00:42:16Guest:I love that you don't know the name of my character that I've done for the last six seasons.

00:42:21Marc:I'm learning a lot about you.

00:42:22Marc:No, I know.

00:42:22Guest:You have credibility.

00:42:23Marc:I don't have any credibility.

00:42:24Marc:You do with me.

00:42:25Marc:I'm having a conversation.

00:42:25Guest:You do with me.

00:42:26Marc:I'm having a conversation with a respected member of the show business community.

00:42:30Marc:And a very funny man.

00:42:31Marc:Oh, you know why it's a good Halloween costume?

00:42:33Guest:Because it's kind of fun to almost have your dick out.

00:42:36Guest:Sure.

00:42:36Marc:You know, you get to go to a Halloween party.

00:42:37Marc:You can't see it.

00:42:38Guest:My dick's out now.

00:42:39Guest:It's that hot in the garage.

00:42:40Guest:Yeah.

00:42:41Guest:But it's like, you know, it's a really good excuse to be like, plus, here's the thing.

00:42:47Guest:When I find, and here's my pitch for wearing the dang left foot as a Halloween costume.

00:42:52Guest:When you are in it, people want to touch you.

00:42:56Guest:A lot.

00:42:57Guest:So, especially if you're going to, like, a Halloween party where there's, like, hey, people might be rolling on ecstasy or something like that, show up in the dangle outfit.

00:43:03Guest:In fairness, some of the people that like to touch me, older, older ladies.

00:43:07Guest:Yeah, really?

00:43:08Guest:Like, really older ladies.

00:43:08Guest:Like, where do they touch you?

00:43:09Guest:I don't think, like, upper thigh.

00:43:10Guest:They don't come just cup your package.

00:43:12Guest:Gingerly near, very close.

00:43:13Guest:One of Joan Rivers' handlers did do that.

00:43:16Guest:Cup your package.

00:43:17Guest:Pretty much, yes.

00:43:17Guest:We were down in New Orleans.

00:43:18Guest:Right.

00:43:19Guest:For some reason...

00:43:20Guest:Here's the thing that sometimes.

00:43:21Marc:For some reason you were in New Orleans.

00:43:22Marc:No, we went down.

00:43:23Guest:Yeah, I know why.

00:43:24Guest:Because we were in the Orpheus crew Mardi Gras parade.

00:43:28Guest:Uh-huh, yeah.

00:43:29Guest:Which is like Harry, everybody, you know, how much do you know about Mardi Gras parades?

00:43:32Marc:I know there's beads involved.

00:43:33Marc:Beads.

00:43:34Marc:And there's music.

00:43:35Marc:Good times.

00:43:36Marc:And teats.

00:43:36Marc:Yeah, a lot of boobs being flashed.

00:43:38Marc:Teat flashing.

00:43:39Marc:Good times.

00:43:39Marc:Pirates, I think.

00:43:40Guest:Do you know that there are, there are,

00:43:42Guest:Pirate, they have a different day called Pirate Days down there at Lake... And also there's the tribes, right?

00:43:47Guest:The chiefs.

00:43:48Guest:Yes, the crews.

00:43:49Guest:Yes.

00:43:49Guest:Now the crews.

00:43:50Guest:Yeah.

00:43:50Guest:And we were with one of the crews.

00:43:52Marc:I watched the first three episodes of Treme.

00:43:53Marc:I'm on board, yeah.

00:43:55Guest:Do you have cable TV?

00:43:56Guest:I do.

00:43:56Guest:I don't.

00:43:57Guest:No, come on.

00:43:58Guest:I don't.

00:43:58Guest:I don't have cable.

00:43:59Guest:On purpose?

00:44:00Marc:On purpose.

00:44:00Marc:Why, so you pay attention to your children?

00:44:02Marc:And your wife?

00:44:03Marc:Exactly, for the boy.

00:44:04Marc:Yeah.

00:44:04Guest:Well, my children and the boy.

00:44:06Guest:The boy and the boy.

00:44:08Yeah.

00:44:08Guest:Did you bring the boy in the car?

00:44:10Guest:He's waiting in the car.

00:44:11Guest:I cracked the window, though.

00:44:12Guest:He's fine.

00:44:12Guest:Yeah, they're fine.

00:44:13Guest:They can take a lot more than people think.

00:44:17Guest:Oh, so we're in the Orpheus crew parade as Reno 911, and we're on one of the floats.

00:44:24Guest:First off, there's like 12 parades.

00:44:26Guest:There's two or three parades every day leading up to Mardi Gras, to Tuesday.

00:44:31Guest:Right.

00:44:32Guest:And then there's a bunch of parades, and then Wednesday it's over, everybody goes to jail.

00:44:34Guest:Yeah.

00:44:36Guest:But the parades are like six hours long.

00:44:38Guest:Yeah.

00:44:38Guest:I thought there was one thing that's like the Mardi Gras parade.

00:44:40Guest:No, fuck that.

00:44:41Guest:There's days and days of parades.

00:44:42Guest:They go everywhere.

00:44:43Guest:They take forever.

00:44:44Guest:You drink on the float.

00:44:46Guest:It's a real good time.

00:44:47Guest:My wife was actually pregnant on our float.

00:44:49Marc:That's nice of you to take her down to that horrendous, humid... Yeah, she was like six months pregnant.

00:44:55Guest:Oh, boy.

00:44:56Guest:But one of the other floats nearby us was Joan Rivers.

00:44:59Guest:She was a float?

00:45:00Guest:She was...

00:45:02Guest:She was the whole thing.

00:45:04Guest:They tethered her to balloons.

00:45:07Guest:She like floated a bit down the street.

00:45:09Guest:They dragged her, you know, like underdog.

00:45:10Guest:Oh, good.

00:45:10Guest:You know, she just went down the street.

00:45:12Guest:The actual Joan Rivers.

00:45:13Guest:So much work done on her face.

00:45:14Guest:She's just floating above everybody, just fucking screaming at people.

00:45:18Guest:You know another thing about you.

00:45:19Guest:Yeah, but she rolled in with these handlers.

00:45:22Guest:They're all wearing like floor-length mink coats, and they're all the most high-maintenance people you've ever seen in your entire life.

00:45:30Guest:If you think John Rivers are high-maintenance.

00:45:31Guest:The handlers are also a pain in the ass.

00:45:33Guest:They had handlers.

00:45:34Guest:If you feel like John Rivers is a pain in the ass,

00:45:36Guest:You should see the two.

00:45:37Guest:Remember those little, like, eels that swim around?

00:45:39Guest:In The Little Mermaid, there's that witch who lives under the water who sings, poor unfortunate souls.

00:45:44Guest:And she's got those two eels that slither around her.

00:45:47Guest:Joan Rivers has those.

00:45:48Guest:The two eels.

00:45:50Guest:That just slither around her.

00:45:51Guest:Just like, no, Joan needs the bathroom.

00:45:56Guest:No, stop.

00:45:57Guest:So one of them just legitimately like walked right up to me in one of the Mardi Gras bars and just like basically cupped my balls a woman Yeah, but she was basically like so what's this all about?

00:46:12Guest:Really like wow that was really aggressive anyway It's a fun outfit to wear if you wear it people will play with your dick and balls in general Some of it will be great

00:46:21Guest:Some of it will be scary and feel a little wrong.

00:46:24Guest:I think you'll learn a little bit from both versions.

00:46:27Marc:Now, so did you really become a gay icon to some degree?

00:46:30Marc:A little bit.

00:46:30Marc:I mean, I've been in Out Magazine a bunch of times.

00:46:32Guest:Yeah.

00:46:33Guest:And what is the angle?

00:46:36Guest:The angle of the... Why isn't Tom Lennon gay?

00:46:39Guest:Well, it's a big question.

00:46:39Guest:If you run my name through Google, like the fourth most popular search about me is Tom Lennon, Thomas Lennon gay, question mark?

00:46:47Guest:But I believe Michael Ian Black has the same problem.

00:46:49Guest:He's also a married man with children.

00:46:51Guest:I'm not feeling that you're gay.

00:46:52Guest:Right.

00:46:52Marc:I don't feel that he's gay.

00:46:53Marc:Right.

00:46:54Marc:Show, Walter, we got to worry.

00:46:55Marc:Okay.

00:47:01Guest:But I hear you just got to get... Sorry.

00:47:04Guest:That was so unfair because actual snot came out of my nose.

00:47:07Guest:Oh, you got me in a weird moment there.

00:47:10Guest:Sorry.

00:47:11Guest:I wonder if I have a Kleenex.

00:47:13Guest:Also, I think I might have somehow sucked in a fart...

00:47:16Guest:That created a minor heart attack.

00:47:20Guest:Oh, that was really weird.

00:47:22Guest:I'm sorry.

00:47:23Guest:That's okay.

00:47:23Guest:It's okay.

00:47:24Guest:But I basically, I inhaled.

00:47:26Guest:You just got engaged, though, so I guess.

00:47:28Guest:Yes, you did.

00:47:28Guest:I have a save the date reminder that I got.

00:47:32Marc:So you guys are all still friends?

00:47:35Mm-hmm.

00:47:36Marc:yeah we're quite close he's gonna be on the show he's gonna do a live one in new york in a couple weeks oh that'll be fun in front of a live audience yeah so now you did you wrote now okay so those are the tv shows now the movies balls of fury balls of fury and the night of the museums yeah we're gonna start going through my career i'm not concerned have you ever been on that website rotten tomatoes yeah yeah i kind of i don't do a lot i don't watch a lot of things and i don't go to a lot of websites no good

00:48:02Marc:Yeah, I just don't.

00:48:03Marc:I don't know where people have the time.

00:48:04Guest:What's your number one website if we were to just go to, like, if we were to, you have a Macintosh computer, I see, which is top of the line.

00:48:12Guest:Yeah.

00:48:12Guest:But if you know how, like, if we went to your browser window up above and we just typed the word, like, what's your number one most visited website?

00:48:18Marc:Oh, can you do that?

00:48:19Marc:Can you find that out?

00:48:20Marc:Just go to history.

00:48:22Marc:I'm looking at my history.

00:48:24Marc:Give me a couple.

00:48:25Marc:Twitter, Facebook, Google.

00:48:27Marc:Classics.

00:48:28Marc:WTF of Marc Maron, Facebook, YouPorn, GoDaddy.

00:48:35Marc:What's YouPorn?

00:48:36Marc:Nothing.

00:48:38Guest:Oh, it's a YouTube of porno.

00:48:40Guest:Basically.

00:48:41Guest:Right.

00:48:41Guest:People submit their own, like, hey, I made a porno.

00:48:44Guest:Check it out.

00:48:44Marc:Well, that's what, yeah, supposedly.

00:48:45Marc:Here's me jacking off on a skateboard.

00:48:47Marc:Well, no, it's not.

00:48:48Marc:It's just a lot of porn for free.

00:48:49Marc:Here's me fucking all the holes in a mini golf place.

00:48:52Guest:Woo.

00:48:52Marc:Yeah, that one.

00:48:53Guest:These are my first two ideas, by the way.

00:48:56Fuck it all.

00:48:56Marc:at a mini golf i think that's pretty good yeah that's gonna be the first one i put up i'm at the windmill i'll go to new york times i'll go to daily beast for news and like sometimes i'll go to um uh yeah i don't uh lately i've been doing much anything right that's good yeah it's not good so rotten tomatoes no rotten tomatoes no they you know they they score everything you've ever done in your life you can look through at all your

00:49:21Guest:Your life.

00:49:22Guest:It's like IMDb, but right next to it, it says sucks.

00:49:25Guest:Yeah, right.

00:49:25Marc:Next to everything you've ever done.

00:49:26Guest:I'm familiar with the site, yeah.

00:49:28Guest:Yeah.

00:49:28Guest:And so what are you saying about that?

00:49:31Guest:My highest rated thing, the two highest rated things on Rotten Tomatoes of my entire career are...

00:49:38Guest:The three sentences I say in the film, memento.

00:49:41Guest:Now, my, if you look through all the things that Roger Mato hates about me, we wrote the American version of Taxi.

00:49:48Guest:Oh, you wrote with Jimmy Fallon.

00:49:50Guest:I read for that.

00:49:51Marc:Yeah.

00:49:51Marc:I read for which role.

00:49:52Marc:It was one that comics go out for where you just say something like, hey, get away from that.

00:49:57Guest:Yeah.

00:49:57Guest:Hey, why don't you frisk me next?

00:49:59Guest:By the way, that is the one really good scene in Taxi that we wrote and I'm really proud of.

00:50:04Guest:There's a scene where Giselle Bunchkin, am I saying her name right?

00:50:08Guest:I'm sure.

00:50:09Guest:How do you say her name?

00:50:10Guest:I'll go with that.

00:50:11Guest:And Jennifer Esposito, where Giselle Bunchkin frisks Jennifer Esposito.

00:50:15Guest:Yeah.

00:50:16Guest:And she really takes her time doing it.

00:50:17Guest:Uh-huh.

00:50:18Guest:And it's a great scene.

00:50:18Guest:Look it up on YouTube or Google it.

00:50:20Guest:Called Jennifer Esposito frisking.

00:50:23Guest:And that's good.

00:50:23Guest:Or Giselle Punchkin frisking.

00:50:25Guest:It's really good.

00:50:26Guest:Well, let's talk about this idea.

00:50:27Guest:I forgot the point of that thing is, oh, people hated the movies that we write.

00:50:31Guest:That was the point of it.

00:50:31Marc:Okay, so you're a funny guy.

00:50:33Marc:You did entertaining stuff.

00:50:34Marc:All the stuff you've done is entertaining and creative and interesting.

00:50:37Marc:Now I'm sure what you're saying is you're basically getting accused for writing sort of middle-of-the-road, hacky comedies.

00:50:43Guest:I'm not going to argue that we write kind of big family studio comedies.

00:50:49Guest:That's what we do.

00:50:49Guest:Family studio comedies.

00:50:51Guest:You know, that's a tricky racket to be in.

00:50:53Guest:I didn't phrase it like that.

00:50:55Guest:If you can get into it, I highly recommend it.

00:50:57Guest:It's a terrific job, but there's a certain style of movie that you have to write.

00:51:02Marc:But you're very aware of what you're doing.

00:51:04Guest:Also, we... Oh, yeah, absolutely.

00:51:06Marc:But Balls of Fury was the other way.

00:51:07Guest:Oh, by the way, we have a... My writing partner and I have a book coming out.

00:51:10Guest:Ben.

00:51:11Guest:Yeah, Robert Ben-Gurant.

00:51:12Guest:We have a book coming out with Simon & Schuster called Writing Movies for Fun and Profit.

00:51:17Guest:But on the title page of the book, the words fun and the word and are crossed out.

00:51:23Guest:So the actual title of the book is Writing Movies for Profit.

00:51:28Guest:Do you really have a book coming out?

00:51:29Guest:We do.

00:51:29Guest:I'm not kidding.

00:51:29Guest:Simon & Schuster, sometime next year.

00:51:31Marc:Okay, so the big blockbusters, the big family movies that you wrote, the remake of The Love Bug, the taxi movie, which didn't do that well.

00:51:38Marc:Neither did The Love Bug.

00:51:39Marc:No.

00:51:40Marc:It did well enough.

00:51:41Marc:There is a scene in the original Love Bug that Buddy Hackett does, a philosophical scene.

00:51:45Guest:Holy smokes, Dan.

00:51:47Guest:That Volkswagen's looking at me.

00:51:50Marc:Yeah.

00:51:50Marc:That was great.

00:51:51Marc:I love Buddy Hackett.

00:51:53Marc:Oh, he's the best.

00:51:53Marc:Did you study that movie?

00:51:55Marc:I watched it a lot of times, yeah.

00:51:56Marc:You did?

00:51:57Marc:Yeah.

00:51:57Marc:And then, okay, so the Night at the Museum movies.

00:51:59Marc:So you know what you're doing.

00:52:00Marc:You're writing these movies for money, big family entertainment, and people like them.

00:52:03Marc:But those two didn't do well.

00:52:05Marc:But the Night at the Museum movies did what?

00:52:06Guest:Night at the Museum did very, very well.

00:52:09Guest:Right.

00:52:10Yeah.

00:52:10Guest:And the second one did pretty well.

00:52:11Guest:So you have no shame about it?

00:52:13Guest:Oh, no, no.

00:52:13Guest:No, I have no shame about it.

00:52:14Guest:I mean, we get tons of flack about it.

00:52:16Guest:But from who?

00:52:18Guest:Everyone on the internet.

00:52:19Guest:It's weird because we have a sort of a double life, which is we do very sort of culty TV shows, as you can tell from all the culty TV shows we've done.

00:52:27Guest:And then we do big family studio movies because, you know, for a lot of reasons.

00:52:33Guest:For a lot of money.

00:52:35Guest:And it's a comfortable way to be.

00:52:38Marc:Yeah, no, I know money's good.

00:52:40Marc:But I mean, but how do you answer?

00:52:42Marc:Do you just say, I guess the real thing is, is that does it bother you?

00:52:47Guest:You know, I mean, here's the thing that bothers me, which is, you know, we always try to make, even if we're writing a big family comedy for a studio, we try to always make it our sense of humor.

00:52:56Guest:It does bother us.

00:52:57Guest:Our stuff gets rewritten a lot, certainly.

00:52:59Guest:And that's something on the studio.

00:53:00Guest:You will get fired when you write for the movie studios.

00:53:02Guest:You will get fired off of your own movie two, three, four times.

00:53:05Guest:Happens all the time.

00:53:06Marc:You've been fired off your own movie?

00:53:07Guest:All the time.

00:53:09Marc:What are you talking about?

00:53:09Guest:There is no studio movie that you write.

00:53:11Marc:And then they rehire you?

00:53:11Marc:That is yours.

00:53:12Guest:Of course.

00:53:13Guest:No, if you're not a dick, they rehire you.

00:53:15Guest:How does that work, Thomas?

00:53:16Guest:You get a call on the phone that, look, hate to be the person breaking this to you.

00:53:24Guest:This is your baby and we all love you for it, but we just feel like it's time for fresh eyes.

00:53:30Guest:And that's what they say, fresh eyes.

00:53:31Marc:Fresh eyes means it's not your script anymore.

00:53:33Guest:No, fuck you.

00:53:33Guest:You're a fucking asshole.

00:53:34Guest:We all hate, not only that, we hate you right now.

00:53:37Guest:Just because we feel like, and here's the thing, it's just something that they have to do because like, it's part of the studio process is just constantly rewriting movies that they're making.

00:53:45Guest:Because they're out of fear.

00:53:46Guest:Of course.

00:53:47Guest:You know, I mean, to keep your job at a movie studio is very hard.

00:53:50Guest:So it's like one of the things that you can do is keep fiddling with scripts to make sure that you're addressing your boss's notes or whoever's in charge of everything.

00:53:58Guest:Right, and to make sure that you fiddle it to the point to where you can blame someone else.

00:54:02Guest:Of course.

00:54:03Guest:I mean, when you look at title pages of movies that have been made, it's insane.

00:54:09Guest:Because they always list in order of work all the writers that worked on it.

00:54:12Guest:Sometimes you will get a title page followed by another title page for an arbitration of here are the...

00:54:19Guest:28 writers who worked on this film at some point.

00:54:22Guest:But when it's your film, you create it and you get fired off it?

00:54:25Guest:Yeah.

00:54:25Guest:You create a night at the museum.

00:54:27Guest:It's based on a children's book.

00:54:29Guest:Okay.

00:54:29Guest:But yeah, we created it.

00:54:31Marc:We created it based off that book.

00:54:32Marc:So no matter what happens, you will get final credit or no?

00:54:37Guest:No.

00:54:37Guest:I mean, no matter what happens after the first movie...

00:54:39Guest:Yes.

00:54:41Guest:No matter what happens, you know, but in that case, in the first case, no.

00:54:44Guest:How movie credits work, there's a chapter about it in our book.

00:54:47Guest:It's nuts.

00:54:48Guest:When's that book coming out?

00:54:49Marc:I believe sometime next year.

00:54:50Guest:And it's basically how to write?

00:54:53Guest:How to write for the studios.

00:54:55Guest:It's not how to write art house films.

00:54:57Guest:It's not how to crack your story.

00:54:59Guest:It's not, you know, the Robert McKee storybook.

00:55:03Guest:This is like, do you want to make money as a studio writer in Hollywood?

00:55:07Guest:Here's how you do it.

00:55:08Marc:Exactly.

00:55:09Guest:And those studios still exist.

00:55:10Guest:All of these studios as of right now, as of this podcast.

00:55:13Marc:But the process is a common one throughout every studio.

00:55:16Guest:Oh, yeah.

00:55:17Marc:And if we could be quick about it, what happens?

00:55:19Marc:Here you go.

00:55:20Marc:I'm Mark Maron.

00:55:21Marc:Here's my script I wrote.

00:55:22Marc:This is a script about an ice cream cone that flies and saves Candyland.

00:55:28Guest:That's great.

00:55:29Guest:Yeah.

00:55:29Guest:Do you know that they're making Candyland the movie, no joke, for real, and this was just pitched to us about one month ago, and we didn't get the job because we were too hard on the script.

00:55:38Guest:Oh, shit.

00:55:39Guest:Yeah, but they are making Candyland.

00:55:40Guest:Hold on, we think it's something else.

00:55:41Guest:No joke, they're totally making Candyland the movie.

00:55:43Guest:It's coming out.

00:55:44Marc:Okay.

00:55:45Marc:But by the way, it's a good idea.

00:55:47Marc:Should I do a board game, another board game?

00:55:49Guest:Okay.

00:55:49Guest:I had heard, who was it?

00:55:51Guest:It was Zach Penn.

00:55:53Guest:Yeah.

00:55:53Guest:Told us one time he got called by somebody and had a one-word movie pitch for them, and here's what it was.

00:55:58Guest:What?

00:55:59Guest:sorry to which his response is what the fuck are you talking about are you talking about make a movie out of the board game sorry where the little like the yellow guy the green guy the black guy and the red guy move up the thing yeah and then you get bounced back to the other thing and then you roll the dice and go the thing he's like yeah it's a world of your imagination like fuck you it's a world of your imagination oh my god you want me to imagine a whole movie based on sorry there's nothing there um oh but here's how it works let's try again i'll do another i'll do another pitch

00:56:25Marc:Look at all my books.

00:56:26Marc:Oh, no, they're coming to life.

00:56:28Marc:Great.

00:56:28Marc:All my books come to life.

00:56:29Marc:Books come to life.

00:56:30Marc:Great.

00:56:30Marc:And they all have different personalities, and some of them are intellectual, and some of them aren't.

00:56:34Marc:Great.

00:56:34Marc:And then we get lost in one book, and that sets the tone in the story for the whole movie.

00:56:38Guest:Great.

00:56:38Guest:I'm going to call it Night at the Library.

00:56:40Marc:Yeah, Night at the Library.

00:56:41Marc:Exactly.

00:56:41Marc:It's a great idea.

00:56:42Marc:Yeah.

00:56:42Marc:Thank you.

00:56:42Marc:It's a good idea.

00:56:44Guest:Here's how it works.

00:56:45Guest:You just sold it.

00:56:46Guest:Okay.

00:56:46Guest:Oh, my God.

00:56:47Guest:Mark.

00:56:48Guest:It's amazing.

00:56:48Guest:Thank you.

00:56:48Guest:Night at the Library.

00:56:49Guest:It's a huge idea.

00:56:50Guest:It's got nothing to do with Night at the Museum.

00:56:52Guest:Of course, those movies are trash.

00:56:54Guest:Yeah, they got higher brow.

00:56:55Guest:This is total.

00:56:55Guest:Yeah, yeah, yeah.

00:56:56Guest:Smarter.

00:56:56Guest:Well, wait a second, Mark.

00:56:57Guest:Now you're making me nervous.

00:56:58Guest:What?

00:56:59Guest:These are smarter than those?

00:57:00Guest:No, no, no, no.

00:57:01Guest:They're not smart.

00:57:01Guest:Let's go back a beat.

00:57:02Guest:No, no.

00:57:02Guest:I mean, they're not smart.

00:57:03Guest:It's just I thought books, but no.

00:57:05Guest:Right, right, right.

00:57:05Marc:No, but we're going to have books.

00:57:06Guest:Okay, because is this a four-quadrant movie, Mark, or who is this movie for?

00:57:09Guest:It's for everybody.

00:57:10Guest:By the way, and this is an important thing, when you're making movies in Hollywood, you should be absolutely as concerned what the studio people who are going to read your script think, but even more so because they will be involved from early on.

00:57:23Guest:What does the marketing department of the studio think about your film?

00:57:25Marc:Okay, this movie's for everybody because everybody has books, and some people read them, but especially kids.

00:57:32Guest:I would argue everybody doesn't have books, Mark.

00:57:33Guest:You're living in a fool's paradise.

00:57:36Guest:What do you kids like to have read to them?

00:57:37Guest:Mark, you know what?

00:57:38Guest:I think it's time for fresh eyes.

00:57:39Guest:And you're fired.

00:57:41Guest:Oh, my God.

00:57:42Guest:You made it 90 seconds in the studio system.

00:57:45Guest:And you had a pretty good idea.

00:57:46Guest:Let's start take two.

00:57:47Guest:Okay, great.

00:57:48Guest:Hey, Mark, welcome back.

00:57:50Guest:We're so sorry that Lennon and Garant came in and messed up your version of Night at the Library.

00:57:57Guest:Which, by the way, we're all huge fans of.

00:57:58Guest:And we just wanted the original writer back in here.

00:58:01Guest:Thank you.

00:58:01Guest:We wanted to get a crack.

00:58:02Guest:Here's what they did.

00:58:03Guest:Okay, let me have a look.

00:58:05Guest:Take a look here.

00:58:06Guest:You can see they added the kid.

00:58:08Guest:Oh, and you don't like that?

00:58:09Marc:No.

00:58:09Marc:Me neither.

00:58:10Guest:And a funny billy goat who walks around with him who tries to eat the books.

00:58:13Guest:Well, that's ridiculous.

00:58:13Guest:These guys are jerks, right?

00:58:14Guest:Yeah, right.

00:58:15Guest:So what would you do now?

00:58:17Guest:Well, wait.

00:58:17Guest:Hang on a second.

00:58:18Guest:We want to keep the billy goat that they added just because we think it's funny.

00:58:21Marc:Sure.

00:58:21Marc:No, no, I can see that.

00:58:22Marc:So you're cool with that.

00:58:22Marc:So you're cool with the billy goat.

00:58:23Guest:Could I just work with the goat a little bit?

00:58:25Guest:We love the Billy Goat the way it is, Mark.

00:58:27Guest:Why don't we just, you know, don't mess with the Billy Goat.

00:58:29Marc:No, no, no, no, no.

00:58:30Guest:Because the Billy Goat is the one thing those assholes really got right on this new draft.

00:58:33Guest:I like those guys.

00:58:34Guest:Yeah.

00:58:34Guest:Good, good, good, good.

00:58:35Guest:Yeah, they are good guys.

00:58:36Guest:They're movies.

00:58:37Guest:Okay, go ahead.

00:58:37Guest:Yeah.

00:58:37Guest:Here's the thing.

00:58:38Guest:Yeah.

00:58:39Guest:We just felt like we needed fresh eyes.

00:58:40Marc:Yeah.

00:58:41Guest:When we said fresh eyes, what we meant was the original fresh eyes.

00:58:43Marc:Well, I think that with the Goat, it changes a little bit of the vision, but I think that if I just take a look at what was there from the first draft.

00:58:51Marc:No, no, no.

00:58:51Guest:We don't want to go back to the first draft.

00:58:53Guest:Everyone hates the first draft.

00:58:54Guest:Oh.

00:58:54Guest:That's why we got fresh eyes.

00:58:56Guest:You know what, Mark?

00:58:56Guest:I don't feel like this is working out.

00:58:58Guest:You know what?

00:58:59Guest:I think it's time we go for some fresh eyes.

00:59:02Guest:Elsewhere.

00:59:04Guest:You know what?

00:59:04Guest:In fact, can you just leave that copy of the script that we sent to your house?

00:59:06Guest:Just set it down right there.

00:59:08Guest:Here's a little trick.

00:59:10Guest:When you're writing for the movie studios, always send in, when you turn in your scripts, they'll say, hey, just email the script in.

00:59:18Guest:Always send in a PDF.

00:59:21Guest:A locked PDF document.

00:59:23Marc:Oh, so they can't get in there.

00:59:25Guest:Well, no, because you know what will happen, which is at some point down the road when you get the phone call, which is, hey, we just want to let you know that we love how far you've gotten us.

00:59:33Guest:Yeah.

00:59:33Guest:We think that you're great.

00:59:35Guest:The Billy Goat stuff is amazing.

00:59:37Guest:Oh, that wasn't you?

00:59:38Guest:No, that was Tom.

00:59:39Guest:Oh.

00:59:39Guest:but we love the i mean the whole you are you're the you're the creator of night at the library it's wonderful stuff and between that and the billy goat yeah it's great yeah but um could we get a final draft copy of the script because we need to give it to the new writer i swear to god you will get that call you'll get the call where the assistant will be like hey um since we're about to fire you like tomorrow off of this movie that you wrote yeah can we get a final draft copy uh just so we can

01:00:05Guest:fiddle with it.

01:00:06Marc:Okay, now how about I do this?

01:00:07Marc:Yeah.

01:00:07Marc:I've got a whole new final draft copy I'd like the studio to read.

01:00:11Marc:Oh, great.

01:00:11Marc:What's in it?

01:00:13Marc:You did a free pass.

01:00:14Guest:Yeah.

01:00:14Guest:By the way, you always have to do free passes.

01:00:15Marc:So great.

01:00:16Marc:Yeah.

01:00:16Marc:Great.

01:00:17Marc:It's got the Billy Goat.

01:00:18Marc:Billy Goat's still in.

01:00:18Marc:It's got the books.

01:00:19Marc:Great.

01:00:20Marc:Yeah, yeah.

01:00:20Marc:And it's got a lot of stuff for the kids.

01:00:23Marc:What's at stake for the kids?

01:00:24Guest:Huh?

01:00:24Guest:What's at stake for them?

01:00:26Guest:Well, the Billy Goat has magic powers.

01:00:28Guest:It's ultimately sort of about bringing a broken family back together.

01:00:30Guest:Of course.

01:00:31Guest:Oh my God, Mark, you're back in.

01:00:32Guest:Those guys are such assholes.

01:00:33Guest:I can't believe we were going to hire them.

01:00:35Ha ha.

01:00:35Guest:Welcome to... Now you're on the Mobius.

01:00:38Guest:It's an insanity Mobius of studio writing.

01:00:41Guest:By the way, these are all very mild examples I'm giving.

01:00:44Guest:There's a million times crazier things.

01:00:45Guest:It's all in the book, but... That sounds like a great book for people who want to write.

01:00:49Guest:There is... Well, it's for people... If you want to write studio movies.

01:00:52Guest:I have tons of respect for, you know, Adam Eglian films, and they're great.

01:00:59Marc:They're difficult.

01:00:59Marc:That's an interesting one that you pick, Adam and Gorian.

01:01:02Marc:All of them, you're going to pick Adam and Gorian, which, like, you know, two or three of his movies are very difficult.

01:01:06Marc:Oh, I'd say.

01:01:07Marc:Jeez.

01:01:08Guest:Wouldn't you but this is not a guide for how to write those kind of movies Yeah, you can write those movies.

01:01:13Guest:You don't need a guidebook to write those movies You just need to be an artist right?

01:01:17Guest:Yeah movies that are art you don't need anyone's help on but just like theory was something you did for fun was a theory was something we did for fun

01:01:24Marc:That's more of a comedy nerd movie.

01:01:26Marc:Yeah.

01:01:26Marc:Did that get received like you wanted it to?

01:01:28Marc:No.

01:01:28Marc:Widely hated.

01:01:29Marc:Really?

01:01:30Marc:Hated?

01:01:30Guest:Yeah.

01:01:30Guest:Go look at Rotten Tomatoes.

01:01:31Guest:It's a very, very low.

01:01:33Guest:I don't look at Rotten Tomatoes.

01:01:34Guest:Very low rating for that movie on the tomato meter.

01:01:37Guest:I don't know.

01:01:37Guest:I thought that movie was funny.

01:01:38Guest:Yeah, I thought it was funny, too.

01:01:39Guest:Well, thanks, buddy.

01:01:40Guest:And I thought you were funny.

01:01:41Guest:It's one of those.

01:01:41Guest:You know what?

01:01:41Guest:It's perfect.

01:01:42Guest:Here's what my entire career is.

01:01:44Guest:Yeah.

01:01:45Guest:A perfectly okay thing to watch on like a rainy day when you've got the flu.

01:01:49Marc:Yeah.

01:01:50Marc:That's the timeline.

01:01:50Marc:That's what my life's work.

01:01:52Marc:The box set of your life.

01:01:53Guest:My life's work should come with Kleenex and Dayquil.

01:01:56Marc:Do you think, I guess my question is that you're writing this book and you seem to think that it's a viable career choice.

01:02:04Marc:Absolutely it is.

01:02:05Marc:Why?

01:02:05Guest:Writing studio movies?

01:02:06Guest:Yeah.

01:02:07Guest:Oh my God.

01:02:07Marc:If you have the stomach for it and are capable of it.

01:02:10Marc:Do you think that there is a big enough market that people, they're always looking for stuff?

01:02:13Marc:Do you think that is true?

01:02:14Marc:Yes.

01:02:14Marc:We're always looking for writers.

01:02:16Marc:Right, but not anybody can do that.

01:02:19Marc:How do you get into that system?

01:02:21Marc:Okay, you have to write something.

01:02:22Guest:Fuck, I knew I was missing something.

01:02:25Guest:You do have to have one script.

01:02:26Guest:Like a whole script?

01:02:28Guest:You ready for the weird way that Ben and I got started?

01:02:33Guest:We wrote a script that was considered unproducible.

01:02:36Guest:But was widely loved in town.

01:02:39Guest:And it was called You Are Going to Prison.

01:02:41Guest:Based on a book by this dude who'd been to prison like fucking 20 times.

01:02:46Guest:Yeah.

01:02:46Guest:Who's basically like a real criminal.

01:02:48Guest:Right.

01:02:49Guest:And he wrote a book about how to survive in jail.

01:02:51Guest:Yeah.

01:02:51Guest:And how to make wine.

01:02:52Guest:And who to align yourself with.

01:02:55Guest:And you just need any kind of fruit.

01:02:57Guest:Yeah.

01:02:58Guest:Literally any kind of fruit you can basically make wine in the toilet with an activator or yeast or something.

01:03:03Guest:But if you think you're going to get shivved, how to make a little Kevlar out of old newspapers and stuff under your shirt.

01:03:09Guest:He has all the tricks for... And this became a movie, though, right?

01:03:12Guest:It became a widely disappointing film that everyone hated called Let's Go to Prison, which was never the title.

01:03:20Guest:The title of the book was You Are Going to Prison.

01:03:21Guest:We always kind of liked that.

01:03:22Marc:Okay, so you had this script.

01:03:23Guest:I actually liked that movie right up until kind of the very end.

01:03:26Guest:But I thought Bob did a really nice job with that movie.

01:03:28Guest:I thought everybody's funny in it.

01:03:30Marc:He's not thrilled with it.

01:03:31Marc:I had him in here.

01:03:32Guest:It was a major flop.

01:03:33Guest:Yeah.

01:03:34Guest:The script became sort of famous around town.

01:03:37Guest:The people read it and were like, what the?

01:03:38Guest:This is fucking crazy.

01:03:40Guest:Because there's like a romance with the guy who kind of punks out Will Arnett's character.

01:03:46Guest:And it's literally treated exactly like a romance novel between them and stuff.

01:03:51Guest:There was just really...

01:03:53Guest:crazy shit in it and that was honestly all it took was that script going around town people saying we could never make this but it's really fucking funny and neat what else you guys got what else you got that's by the way 99% of the time what happens in Hollywood is you have a script right that is either funny or touching or great or people love it you give it to people they're like oh great fuck you I'm not gonna make this of course not when I've got fucking nine floundering projects over here that I need fucking fixed like right away

01:04:21Guest:Like, fucking Night at the Library needs someone to come in and fucking fix it right now.

01:04:25Guest:I liked your... Prison script.

01:04:29Marc:Yeah.

01:04:29Marc:So why don't you take a look at this?

01:04:30Guest:Come in, pitch me like five great ideas for Night at the Library and your heart.

01:04:34Guest:Right.

01:04:35Guest:Yeah.

01:04:35Guest:And you won't get paid that much the first time.

01:04:36Marc:But this is Marc Maron's script.

01:04:37Guest:Yeah.

01:04:38Marc:Not anymore, it's not.

01:04:39Guest:Now we got fresh eyes.

01:04:41Guest:No, by the way, you will get hired to rewrite your friends too in Hollywood.

01:04:45Guest:We've been rewritten by John Hamburg and vice versa.

01:04:47Guest:Oh, absolutely.

01:04:48Guest:And he's like one of my closest friends.

01:04:50Marc:And do you call each other during that process?

01:04:52Marc:No.

01:04:53Guest:I mean, usually you- It's just the way it is.

01:04:55Guest:It's the way it is.

01:04:55Marc:So you're saying that- It's just the way it is.

01:04:57Guest:But ultimately when you look at this- It's like you're all, you know, it's like those tie hooker bars.

01:05:00Guest:Yeah.

01:05:01Guest:You're all tie hookers with a number on you.

01:05:03Guest:But you have to accept that.

01:05:04Marc:Yes.

01:05:05Marc:You can't get beaten by the first turn of the screw.

01:05:08Guest:If you take it, if it hurts your feelings, get out.

01:05:13Guest:It won't go well.

01:05:14Guest:You can't, I mean, you need a very, very thick skin because it will, if you take it personally, you're ruined.

01:05:21Marc:But were you emotionally, so the movie that became Bob Odenkirk's movie, that had nothing to do with your script?

01:05:27Guest:No, it's 99% our script.

01:05:30Guest:Except for the last three or four minutes of the vineyard where they all go to a mind tasting room.

01:05:35Guest:So no one rewrote that?

01:05:37Guest:No, Bob wrote that part.

01:05:38Marc:Oh, yeah.

01:05:39Marc:So that's the only part that was rewritten?

01:05:41Marc:Yeah, everything else is almost exactly the script that we wrote.

01:05:43Marc:Oh, my God.

01:05:44Marc:So what are you working on now?

01:05:45Marc:So you're chomping at the bit for a big, like you want a little more respect.

01:05:50Guest:Me?

01:05:50Guest:Yeah.

01:05:50Marc:Not at all.

01:05:51Marc:Okay.

01:05:52Guest:I have tons of respect, just not on the internet or not from anyone who likes movies or comedy.

01:05:57Guest:That's what I meant, from those people.

01:06:00Guest:No, I've done, I mean, I've, yeah.

01:06:03Guest:No, I'm very happy with my life.

01:06:05Guest:You seem happy.

01:06:06Guest:Well, I do two, I mean, we do two very different kinds of things.

01:06:09Guest:Our movie thing is big studio stuff, and our TV thing is us, you know, is our sense of humor.

01:06:16Guest:And what do we got?

01:06:16Guest:I mean, we do some abstract stuff.

01:06:18Guest:Reno, there were some very abstract things on Reno.

01:06:20Marc:Definitely.

01:06:21Guest:I mean, it's inspired shit.

01:06:22Guest:I mean, you're comedically.

01:06:24Guest:You saw Who Pooped.

01:06:24Guest:Did you ever see the skit we did called Who Pooped in the Book Donation Box?

01:06:27No.

01:06:27Guest:That's like maybe my proudest achievement.

01:06:29Guest:I'm going to have to watch it.

01:06:30Guest:Here's the idea.

01:06:31Guest:There's a book donation box outside of the sheriff's department for people to come and put books in.

01:06:36Guest:And because there was sort of a circular hole cut in the top to drop books in, it looked the slightest bit inviting.

01:06:42Guest:And some insane person came by and took enormous shit in there.

01:06:47Guest:And then it's basically us removing the wonderful books...

01:06:51Marc:you know and going sort of down a memory lane of like oh look here's the wind in the willows and this is a wonderful one of my favorite books yeah and then you know wiping shit off of them that that's the kind of work we like to be doing you know yeah but it's it's amazing that like because even when you're coming over here i'm thinking about it i'm looking at all this stuff because you know night at the museum was on tv like when she turned the tv on it was on right so you can make a few bucks just from that from cable showing

01:07:15Marc:Right.

01:07:16Marc:I'm sure.

01:07:17Marc:Yeah.

01:07:18Marc:And it's just when I talk to people that have figured out how to make a living in this business and also do what they want.

01:07:24Marc:It's just impressive.

01:07:25Marc:It's a balancing act.

01:07:26Marc:I mean, keep in mind, it's a balancing act.

01:07:28Marc:Right.

01:07:28Marc:But you can it seems like right now, I guess everything could go away.

01:07:32Guest:But you always really showbiz careers are like football careers.

01:07:38Guest:Yeah.

01:07:38Guest:You know.

01:07:39Guest:Are they really?

01:07:39Guest:Unless you're Tom Hanks.

01:07:40Guest:Yeah.

01:07:41Guest:Boom.

01:07:41Guest:You know those football guys who are done at like 30.

01:07:44Guest:Yeah.

01:07:44Guest:You know?

01:07:45Guest:Right.

01:07:45Guest:Yeah.

01:07:46Guest:And then they go to the openings of mattress stores for the rest of their lives.

01:07:49Guest:See you live with that fear?

01:07:50Guest:And they're like, remember me?

01:07:51Guest:Yeah.

01:07:53Guest:Well, yeah.

01:07:54Guest:I mean, we like to keep busy while people will have us.

01:07:58Guest:Our policy is to stay as busy as you can while they will have us.

01:08:02Guest:If you try to make it as an actor, if you try to make it in comedy, if you try to make it as a screenwriter, the odds against you succeeding in any one of those careers are tremendous.

01:08:12Guest:Yeah, I know.

01:08:13Guest:The odds are against you.

01:08:15Guest:So fuck it.

01:08:15Guest:If people will fucking hire you, fucking shut up.

01:08:18Guest:Shut the fuck up and just shut up.

01:08:21Guest:Don't ask anybody.

01:08:22Guest:Don't question anything.

01:08:23Guest:Just keep your fucking head down.

01:08:25Guest:Fucking do it.

01:08:26Guest:And dance, clown.

01:08:26Guest:Shut up and dance, fucking clown.

01:08:29Guest:Put the fucking G-string on for fuck's sake.

01:08:32Guest:Tom, thank you.

01:08:35Guest:Good to see you, Mark.

01:08:35Marc:It's a good way to end, don't you think?

01:08:36Marc:Yeah, I think so, too.

01:08:37Marc:Do you want to sing some Indian before we go?

01:08:38Guest:Who can say where the road goes, where the heart goes.

01:08:45Guest:I see you've got a tent show going.

01:08:47Guest:A little bit of a tent show.

01:08:49Guest:Your tent's shown.

01:08:50Guest:You've got to go take care of the boy in the car.

01:08:53Guest:Oh, God damn it.

01:08:53Guest:I forgot.

01:08:54Guest:Oh, my God.

01:08:54Guest:I forgot he's in there.

01:08:57Guest:Guillermo!

01:09:02Marc:Well, that was a fucking great time with that Tom Lennon fella.

01:09:06Marc:Sweating it out here in the garage.

01:09:08Marc:I do want to tell you this.

01:09:09Marc:Live WTF at Comics in New York City, September 15th.

01:09:12Marc:Two shows, 7.30 and 9.30.

01:09:16Marc:Big shows.

01:09:17Marc:First show, nerdier.

01:09:18Marc:That's how I'm that's how I'm billing it.

01:09:20Marc:The first show, Jesse Klein, Maeve Higgins, who you heard on my Ireland episode is going to be in the States.

01:09:25Marc:Glenn Wool, who you also heard here in the garage.

01:09:29Marc:Michael Showalter, one of the few remaining members of the state.

01:09:32Marc:I haven't had on yet.

01:09:33Marc:There's been several that I haven't had.

01:09:35Marc:I think I'm going to have I'm going to have Kevin Allison on.

01:09:37Marc:But Showalter, that's the 730 show, the 930 show.

01:09:41Marc:Kurt Metzger, Joe LaRosa, Pete Correale, Bob Kelly, and Dave Attell.

01:09:46Marc:That's the 930 show.

01:09:47Marc:September 15th.

01:09:48Marc:That's a Wednesday at Comics.

01:09:50Marc:I will have the new t-shirts and posters available.

01:09:52Marc:And new stickers, I'm hoping.

01:09:54Marc:I hope all this stuff.

01:09:55Marc:You know what?

01:09:56Marc:Go to punchlinemagazine.com.

01:09:58Marc:Check that out.

01:09:59Marc:Go to standuprecords.com.

01:10:00Marc:Check that out.

01:10:01Marc:Of course, justcoffee.coop.

01:10:02Marc:You know what I'm saying.

01:10:03Marc:Please go to wtfpod.com.

01:10:05Marc:Get on the mailing list.

01:10:06Marc:We're doing that every week.

01:10:08Marc:Send me some money.

01:10:08Marc:This is my job.

01:10:10Marc:And despite what any of you said, the deck bankrupted me.

01:10:13Marc:But now I won't hurt myself.

01:10:15Marc:All right, I got to get out of here.

01:10:16Marc:I'm Gabby today.