Episode 1169 - Hari Kondabolu
Marc:all right let's do this how are you what the fuckers what the fuck buddies what the fuck nicks what's happening i'm mark maron this is my podcast wtf thanks for tuning in how's everybody holding up
Marc:I want to say a special hello to my Instagram live crew who hang out with me in the morning.
Marc:I seem to regularly, regularly, it's like all my speech impediments in one thing except for the S's.
Marc:I seem to regularly get on there in the morning and
Marc:meander for nothing for the for for my own sanity for and for that for that uh the sanity of others i uh i do the uh instagram lives usually about an hour when i get on there and just kind of free form it answer questions it's been a lot of uh a lot of good people there seems to be a community forming there uh around the uh the the sort of morning coffee business
Marc:And I'm good.
Marc:Helps me.
Marc:Helps me riff it out like I do here on this mic, but even more free on that mic.
Marc:And I got to be careful.
Marc:No editing on the IG.
Marc:I don't got Brendan keeping things in check.
Marc:So I got to keep my own self in check.
Marc:But it's sort of serving the purpose of...
Marc:you know getting me engaged uh with my brain which is generally how i generate ideas material things and it's helping me because uh you know i'm not doing stand-up so in the morning i get up and do that business and uh you know sparks new stuff i don't understand the farsi arabic russian troll onslaught i don't know what's going on with that but i do know there's a lot of
Marc:And just regular trolls, not too many, but mostly more than anything else, just people looking for a little bit of relief, a little bit of distraction, not unlike you people listening to this.
Marc:A guy I've known for a long time is on the show today, Hari Kondabolu.
Marc:He's never been on for a one-on-one show, despite being on one of the very early live WTFs.
Marc:You may know his stand-up from Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me or from the documentary The Problem with Apu, which he created.
Marc:He's got a new stand-up special on Netflix and his podcast with W. Kamau Bell called Politically Reactive is now back on the air, back in the downloadable zone.
Marc:But he's a smart, funny guy.
Marc:He's an intense guy, and he's a guy that I've known since he was a kid almost.
Marc:I remember when Hari Kondabolu was coming around Comedy Club, sort of intense and seemingly aggravated, maybe a little sweaty, when he was in college, trying to figure out how to do stand-up before he did stand-up.
Marc:And I talked to him about that, which was kind of interesting, because I have very clear memories of this guy.
Marc:And I feel like we were sort of...
Marc:He was sort of a kindred spirit in the sense that he reminded me of me at a different time.
Marc:Just intense, you know, angry, you know, looking for a way not to alienate people, but still kind of wanting to alienate people.
Marc:Smart.
Marc:But he figured it out.
Marc:His new special is actually very good.
Marc:I believe it's called Warn Your Relatives, but it's funny.
Marc:It's smart.
Marc:It's I think it was shot in Seattle, which is one of my favorite places.
Marc:But so I'll talk to Hari in a few minutes.
Marc:And those of you who watch the IG Live know that a lot of people have already bought these things, but we're selling these T-shirts.
Marc:They're the Too Close Marin T-shirts.
Marc:Too Close, which has become sort of a...
Marc:a hook of some kind.
Marc:Whatever the case, people are enjoying the t-shirts, all right?
Marc:I guess people are looking for reasons to get some merch while the days get shorter and our isolation persists.
Marc:So you're in luck.
Marc:We did some sort of a run of t-shirts with some nice
Marc:Art on there of me.
Marc:And you might remember that last year we did a special edition line of posters to celebrate the first decade of WTF.
Marc:So a couple of months ago, we put out a special edition line of merch to celebrate the first 10 years of WTF.
Marc:Artist Johnny Jones did some new designs for us, and we had some T-shirts, pins, and notebooks that are still available at podswag.com slash WTF.
Marc:He also did a limited edition poster design that sold out very quickly.
Marc:So we've got two more of those, two more of the posters, and they're available now, all signed by me.
Marc:There's only 100 each.
Marc:So check them out, folks.
Marc:We'll put some pictures on Twitter and Instagram as well.
Marc:Go get this stuff at PodSwag.com slash WTF or go to WTFPod.com and click on the merch link for the new Too Close shirts and all the other stuff.
Marc:All right.
Marc:So if you know me, you know that I have a sort of love-hate relationship with food and myself.
Marc:That's just my nature.
Marc:I don't know if you can relate to that.
Marc:That's just who I am.
Marc:So I generally take care of myself, but it's a struggle with food because I like to eat things that are very satisfying.
Marc:And if I could, I would eat cake and ice cream all day long every day.
Marc:But I don't.
Marc:And one of the issues with having an addictive personality and the physical nature of the effect of sugar and carbs on the fucking system is that when I put a little in there, it takes me like two or three weeks to pull back.
Marc:Not that I'm going crazy and fucking shoveling pasta into my face.
Marc:But but I got the craving.
Marc:I got the Jones.
Marc:I got the I got the sugar monkey on my back.
Marc:So somewhere after going through a few pints of ice cream that Patton Oswalt had sent to my house, I got a bug in my brain about this goddamn Kentucky butter cake.
Marc:That's the other problem.
Marc:If you follow New York Times cooking on fucking Instagram, you're getting pictures.
Marc:You're getting pictures all day long of fucking food.
Marc:There it was, Kentucky butter cake.
Marc:Some recipe from 1963 won a Pillsbury Award.
Marc:And I'm like, it's in a bunt pan.
Marc:I'm like, I got a bunt pan.
Marc:I'm going to fucking make a Kentucky butter cake.
Marc:No, I'm not.
Marc:I'm alone here.
Marc:I'm dealing with the weight of isolation, of quarantine, of plague, of the possibility of the complete economic and political collapse of the country I live in.
Marc:We're being sort of driven into the ground by a
Marc:narcissistic second tier demon and now i got it on my brain i got to make a perfect kentucky butter cake so i'm gonna do it but i got no one to share it with really i got a couple friends come over my buddy kit maybe she'll have a fucking slice but then what what am i gonna do i drive it over to sharplings am i gonna drive it around what am i gonna do
Marc:So I went and got the supplies.
Marc:I got the buttermilk.
Marc:I got the butter.
Marc:I got the sugar.
Marc:I got the flour.
Marc:I got the vanilla extract.
Marc:And all I want to do is make this thing correctly, make this thing perfect, and then maybe have a slice and then get it out of my fucking house.
Marc:It's really about the process, the meditation process of creating the cake and
Marc:doing it correctly, looking at it, eating it, feeling the high of eating that piece of cake, fighting with the urge to eat the rest of the cake and somehow getting it out of the fucking house, knowing that I succeeded, had the meditational therapy of cooking and the fucking buzz of eating a bunch of sugar and butter and flour and eggs.
Marc:So I did it.
Marc:I set out to do it and I fucked it up and it didn't go the way I wanted.
Marc:The recipe wasn't specific enough about preparation.
Marc:So I made the batter.
Marc:I buttered the pan.
Marc:I poured the batter in the pan.
Marc:Fine.
Marc:No prob.
Marc:Put that in the oven.
Marc:Cooked it the right amount of time.
Marc:Then here's the idea with the Kentucky butter cake.
Marc:It's just basically butter, flour, and sugar sponge in the pan.
Marc:And then you create this butter sugar syrup that you then pour over the cake that you've poked holes in.
Marc:So the cake soaks it up like a sponge and you let it sit for three hours.
Marc:and then you turn it over and get it out of that bundt pan so i pulled the cake out of the oven i poked the holes and i'm making the fucking butter syrup didn't put enough water in they said don't let the sugar dissolve all the way so i i thought it looked a little lumpy and i didn't have a good feeling about it but i thought i had done it right and i poured it over the bundt cake and it wasn't i didn't put enough water in it because i fucked up i put two teaspoons in instead of three tablespoons i don't know why
Marc:So now I know that I fucked the entire thing up in the last goddamn leg of the recipe.
Marc:I fucked it all up.
Marc:So now the sugar is basically just a glaze sitting on what's supposed to be the bottom of the fucking cake.
Marc:And I know it's going to be fine for what it is.
Marc:Like, how is it not going to taste good?
Marc:It's just butter and sugar and flour and eggs and buttermilk and vanilla.
Marc:It's going to be fucking what it is, but it's not going to look like it's supposed to.
Marc:It might not come out of the pan like it's supposed to.
Marc:It might not.
Marc:It just isn't right.
Marc:OK, it's not right.
Marc:So now I'm beating myself up because I fucked it up and I'm looking at this thing.
Marc:It's supposed to sit for three hours.
Marc:I'm looking at the glaze.
Marc:It's supposed to be syrup hardening on the top of what is the bottom of the cake.
Marc:And I'm angry.
Marc:I'm just sitting there going, just throw it out, man.
Marc:Throw the whole thing away.
Marc:Throw it away.
Marc:That's I even said in that accent.
Marc:Throw it away from Queens.
Marc:Throw it away.
Marc:What's the matter with you?
Marc:But I sat in that for about an hour and a half.
Marc:About half the time it's supposed to sit.
Marc:And I went in.
Marc:I tried to shake it out of the fucking mold.
Marc:And I broke a plate trying to shake it out of the mold.
Marc:And I got another plate.
Marc:And I kept shaking.
Marc:It wasn't coming out of the mold.
Marc:So maybe the cake was fucked up too.
Marc:Whatever the case.
Marc:About half of the cake came out of the mold.
Marc:The bottom half.
Marc:It's the top.
Marc:But it's supposed to be the bottom half.
Marc:So now I've got this broken cake.
Marc:With this hardening sugar glaze on it.
Marc:In pieces.
Marc:With the other half stuck in the fucking pan.
Marc:And I'm fucking pissed, man.
Marc:And I just take the pan over the garbage.
Marc:I take out what's left in the pan.
Marc:I throw it in the garbage.
Marc:I throw the pan in the sink.
Marc:Now I'm looking at these fucking jagged, fucked up pieces of cake and glaze on this plate.
Marc:And I just shovel them into my mouth.
Marc:Probably two slices worth quickly.
Marc:And I just, it's so fucking good.
Marc:How could it not be?
Marc:So I'm just chewing that angrily.
Marc:angrily shoving this broken up piece of unsuccessful cake into my face i throw the rest out and the thing is is that not only was i angry at myself for fucking up but you know after i ate it it was so good i had eaten just enough of my fucked up cake to feel shitty about eating it job well done shame intact
Marc:went to bed just sweating butter, worried about diabetes, wondering if my heart was going to clog.
Marc:And whose fault is this?
Marc:You know whose fault it is.
Marc:Fucking Donald Trump's.
Marc:That's a lie.
Marc:I can't hang that on him.
Marc:This is not a political problem.
Marc:I have to say at different points in my life, I've done the exact same thing as I did with that cake.
Marc:But the catch is, is that usually I made the cake correctly, but the exact same steps unfold afterwards.
Marc:All right, so my guest is Hari Kondabolu, a very intense, very smart, very funny man.
Marc:His podcast, Politically Reactive, with Hari and W. Kamau Bell, is back with new episodes every week.
Marc:He also has a stand-up special on Netflix called Warn Your Relatives, very funny, shot in Seattle.
Marc:And his documentary, The Problem with Apu, is now on HBO Max, which was kind of informative for me.
Marc:Maybe you'll enjoy it.
Marc:So this is me.
Marc:talking to Hari Kondabolu, who I had a profound influence on when he was a younger man.
Marc:How are you, buddy?
Marc:I'm all right.
Marc:How are you?
Marc:Don't pretend like you don't know me.
Guest:No, seriously, though.
Marc:How are you?
Marc:I'm all right.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:What, you mean with the thing?
Marc:Of course.
Marc:You know, today was not great, but it's been it's getting easier.
Marc:You know, it's getting easier.
Marc:But it's you know, I don't cry as much in front of strangers or people I haven't seen in a while.
Guest:Right.
Marc:I was surprised you went right back to work.
Guest:Did you take some time off at all?
Marc:I did not.
Marc:I just found it to be fitting for what I do.
Marc:Like, I really had to figure it out whether or not to live that thing publicly.
Marc:Would it be helpful in any way to anybody?
Marc:And you all right with the mic stand?
Marc:What's...
Guest:Yeah, I'm just adjusting it.
Guest:It's funny because it's only been a few months since I've regularly used a mic stand and I feel like I'm out of practice, which is very embarrassing.
Marc:But that does that's a bendy one.
Marc:That's not the straight one, is it?
Guest:No, no, it's a bendy one.
Guest:It's one of those music.
Marc:Yeah, but those are those.
Marc:No matter how good you are at stand up, the one thing you don't want to see when you get on stage is the bendy one.
Guest:It's people don't get it, but it's just awkward.
Guest:Also, it's if you wanted to use the mic stand, you can't anymore because you're fucked up.
Marc:Yeah, it's going to it's going to do it's going to do what it's doing to you right now in the middle of your show.
Guest:I don't really understand.
Guest:Why do they why do musicians need this?
Guest:What is the purpose of this?
Guest:Why do they play the guitar?
Guest:Oh, so it's going to be next to the guitar.
Marc:Is that the idea?
Marc:It's not actually for vocals?
Marc:So they have room.
Marc:No, they have room.
Marc:So if they're standing there with a guitar... Oh, they can... Right.
Marc:All right.
Marc:What was I going on?
Marc:Oh, what was I talking about?
Marc:Oh, yes.
Marc:I started working...
Marc:Immediately, because I just thought that was my relationship with my feelings.
Marc:So I shared them, and I think they were helpful to some people.
Guest:You know how people, when they have tragedy, they say, like, this is what they would have wanted me to have done?
Guest:Especially athletes say that all the time.
Guest:Like, you know, my grandmother would have wanted me to play.
Guest:Did you ever have a thought like that, like Lynn would have expected me to continue to do what I do and not stop?
Yeah.
Guest:I don't know.
Marc:You know, you're in an awful lot of shock.
Marc:So I don't like I just was I knew I was having these feelings that were profound and unlike anything I'd experienced before.
Marc:And I couldn't control them.
Marc:And I think I was surprised at that and the sort of genuine.
Marc:I mean, like anybody would have had it, but like, I don't think I'm one to acknowledge how deep my love is when people are alive or in general.
Marc:Right.
Marc:So I don't know that I thought about what she would have thought, but I tried to to respect her.
Marc:And I felt on some level in retrospect, I think some there's like obviously she has family.
Marc:She has people have known her longer than me and all this other stuff.
Marc:And I didn't want to be disrespectful for them either.
Marc:But this is what I do.
Marc:So I felt if anything, on some level, it might have been a little jarring for the people that have known her all her life to have this new guy who none of them knew that well, you know, crying publicly.
Marc:Oh, so it was a little tricky.
Marc:But speaking about what?
Marc:Go ahead.
Guest:Go ahead.
Guest:Go ahead.
Guest:No.
Guest:You go.
Guest:Yeah, I just want... So you were at that stage where you would have met all her closest people soon.
Guest:Like, it was that... Right, right.
Guest:That stage where this is a real thing.
Guest:Right.
Guest:I'm going to be with this guy.
Guest:Right.
Guest:I want everyone I know to know him and love him.
Guest:Like, it was that stage.
Marc:Right.
Marc:It was before that.
Marc:You know, it was like a little... You know, we'd known each other a long time, but that hadn't really happened yet.
Marc:I'd met...
Marc:her parents in passing before they knew we were a thing.
Marc:Right.
Marc:But no, I had to meet everybody through telling them she was in the hospital.
Marc:It's terrible.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:But speaking about life and death, you look pretty well.
Marc:And I assume it's because you have a baby.
Guest:I feel very tired.
Guest:Thank you for saying I look very well.
Guest:Yeah, I'm incredibly tired.
Guest:I've never been this happy and tired before.
Guest:How old is a baby?
Guest:A month.
Guest:A month old?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:And you have a wife?
Marc:A partner, yeah.
Guest:A partner, not a wife.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:No, we're not married.
Guest:Was the baby a surprise?
Guest:The baby was a surprise.
Guest:We love each other very much.
Guest:We both want to be parents.
Guest:A child is a blessing, especially when you're in your mid to late 30s and you want a child.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:If it wasn't a strong relationship with someone who I imagined I wanted to be with almost from the moment I met her, like...
Guest:you know we this would this conversation wouldn't be happening but like we felt good about that and i think marriage was something that was on the horizon and now all of a sudden it's like what's more important right now you know like to me having a child with someone in theory is actually the bigger bond right because whether or not you're together you always have this child you always have to deal with each other you're always in each other's life and committing to that is so much bigger sure but uh
Marc:But it adds a little extra oomph when it's harder to leave.
Guest:I don't know, man.
Guest:I mean, I know enough people who, like, get... I mean, but you don't have kids, though.
Marc:You've never been in the situation of wanting to... Dude, I have seen... You know, it's like the beautiful thing that you said just then about commitment revolving around this new life...
Marc:that you will always have to be in each other's lives because of the children.
Marc:I've heard that said with such bile in my life.
Guest:Yeah, I guess I'm, yeah.
Guest:I'm certainly not saying it with bile.
Guest:I'm saying it as a beautiful thing.
Marc:I'm talking about guys in the middle of a divorce, buddy.
Marc:it's like i gotta fucking see that bitch all right because we got the kid and i gotta figure out how to get time with the kid now so i gotta say these things i gotta give this money there's a different there's a different tone to exactly what you said right i mean to me it's like well this kid you know is gonna have two loving parents regardless of what happens and that's that's how i'm viewing it and well i think that's probably true with you but you can only hope i'm older than you and i've seen some bad shit but i have faith in
Marc:you well i mean i'm 38 i've seen some bad shit mark it's not yeah but you know you got better friends than i did you know yeah you seem like a little more well adjusted you think you turned out better than me i'm talking to you like you're my brother i i still remember that that night i met you when you were kind of intense and angry and sweaty yeah and panicked that was
Guest:That was years like 14 to 32, I think.
Marc:But I know we've talked about this before.
Marc:I think we talked about it the one time that we talked on the show, so it doesn't matter.
Marc:But I just remember, and I want to sort of clear some stuff up because I feel like for some reason when I see you and I'm watching the stand-up, like I always know we knew each other and I always knew that I was one of the first people you talked to about stand-up before you really started doing it.
Marc:But then I always felt that there was a slight bit of tension between us.
Guest:That's true with everyone you know, isn't it?
Guest:Like you're making it sound like this is unique to me.
Guest:Yes, I'm a person you've met.
Guest:I'm a person that's known you for over a year.
Guest:That's not true.
Guest:It's not true.
Guest:Well, yeah, I think there is.
Guest:I think, well, one, the power dynamic initially as, look, when I first spoke to you, I think I was 19 or 20 years old.
Guest:I was a college student.
Marc:Weren't you a graduate student?
Marc:You're a college student.
Guest:No, no, I was a college.
Guest:I was a junior.
Guest:I went to Bowdoin College, but I spent my study abroad year in Connecticut at Wesleyan University, where I took this pop culture class, and I used that as an excuse to write a paper about stand-up comedy.
Guest:Oh, right.
Guest:That's right.
Guest:You were writing a paper.
Guest:And which is a stupid essay people are still writing today.
Guest:But anyway, so I use that as an excuse to contact comics from their webpages because it was that easy back then in 2003.
Guest:I just emailed you from your web page.
Marc:Now it's even easier.
Marc:You just have to tweet at somebody something offensive and there's an 80% chance they'll respond.
Guest:So I interviewed you and Doug Stanhope and I went to the cellar and interviewed like Greg Giraldo and Hood and Jim Norton and Tom Papa.
Guest:It was a whole Ted Alexandro.
Guest:Like there was a ton of people and we spoke initially on the phone and like I was, I just, I still have tapes of our phone call.
Guest:You do?
Yeah.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:In my parents' place.
Guest:It's on old cassette tape.
Guest:You know, I haven't listened to them in years.
Guest:I remember like obviously you and I in very different places back then.
Guest:Like I'm a kid really desperately wanting to do stand up but being too afraid to and using this as an excuse, this academic exercise as an excuse to talk to real comics to understand what this business was.
Guest:Try to get some courage.
Guest:Right, exactly.
Guest:And you were at a stage where you were unhappy with where your career was.
Guest:I remember you getting really upset seemingly out of nowhere.
Guest:And you mentioned Dane Cook.
Guest:And I'm like, I don't know why people like that guy.
Guest:I don't understand that.
Guest:I don't get why I can't fill a room.
Guest:I don't I don't understand.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And I'm like, you know, I'm 19 or 20.
Guest:I'm like, I like you.
Guest:I don't I don't know what to say.
Guest:It was like a terrifying turn of events.
Guest:Can I help this man?
Guest:Yeah, it's like this is a grown man telling me how things didn't work out.
Guest:And I'm trying to convince myself to do stand up.
Guest:And it's like you're warning me.
Guest:And I did not pay attention when I should have.
Guest:You were warning me.
Guest:Don't let this happen to you.
Guest:Did it happen to you?
Guest:It didn't happen to you.
Guest:What?
Guest:You didn't get bitter and mean and awful.
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Guest:I guess you kind of did.
Guest:I don't think I ever got bitter or mean or awful, but I certainly wanted to stop a few times.
Marc:You know what it was?
Marc:I think this is why I think that probably if there was any stressor, but I want to hear about one because I remember sitting down with you at the cellar.
Guest:That was the second time, yeah.
Marc:But you were making me, you almost made me nervous because you were so intense and so filled with this sort of strange,
Guest:what i thought was like defensive angry energy but you were just on you were just uncomfortable with everything about yourself yeah well i was again 1920 21 you know i i loved stand-up so much and it was the only art form i could see myself doing and i'd done it through college and in high school and i just loved it so much
Guest:I was uncomfortable, and I was thinking about, is stand-up a place for me?
Guest:And I also, like, you know, I would go down to the cellar, you know, when I was 18, 19, 20, because back then, the cellar was desperately looking for people to fill the seats during the weekdays, so you could get this coupon online, you'd get two sodas, and that's all you had to pay, and you could watch comedy on a Monday or a Tuesday for free.
Guest:All night.
Guest:Yeah, it was incredible.
Guest:And so I used to go to those shows where people were working stuff out and all that.
Guest:And I would also see, there was a certain, there was like, y'all were a little more hardened than I, you know, you were a club comic, you were working clubs.
Guest:It was like Patrice and Jim Norton and Voss and all these comics and Robert Kelly.
Guest:And I'm seeing like people work in the crowd and it's rough, Nick DiPaolo.
Guest:And I'm thinking, oh, I can't.
Guest:I can't do this.
Guest:I'm not built like that.
Guest:I'm not built like that.
Guest:Those guys.
Guest:And, and to this day, by the way, it's, you know, I still haven't played the cellar still too afraid to do it.
Guest:I feel like I've gotten to do all these incredible things I'm proud of.
Guest:And that's the one thing, the one thing, because it was my God.
Guest:And I know Chris Rock said he would vouch.
Guest:Like, I had different people say they'd vouch, and I'm like, eh, it's all right.
Guest:I've opened for Chris on the road in the U.S.
Guest:and Europe, and the thing I'm afraid of is playing the seller.
Guest:Dude, you know, I don't...
Marc:I'm still afraid of it.
Marc:I play it, but you don't know what's gonna happen.
Marc:There are guys that fucking live there.
Marc:You get to a point, the thing about the cellar is not unlike the Comedy Store original room, is that for some reason, if you show any real fear in those rooms, you will fail.
Marc:And it'll be it'll be hard.
Marc:That's unforgiving.
Marc:You can't you know, you can't be open ended about things.
Marc:You have to have a complete comfort about being on that stage or else it will crush you and you will feel it.
Guest:Well, I think that's also why your stand-up in particular at that time really hit me because I'd watch all these incredible comics, but you were different because you allowed yourself to be vulnerable.
Guest:And I remember just thinking like on this stage in particular, it stood out.
Guest:It was so different.
Guest:It wasn't jokes.
Guest:It wasn't just jokes and stories.
Guest:It was like you were talking about painful things.
Guest:You were making people...
Guest:uncomfortable by being so open and honest and you know some sets were amazing in some sets you know you were clearly working stuff out but like the fact you would like i had never really seen that before i used to make those i used to make my peers leave the room i'd be like attell get out of here i'm
Marc:Let me try to do this, please.
Marc:Can I do it without you sitting there?
Guest:What?
Guest:It's so funny to me because, like, you know, you were playing that and you were playing like Luna Lounge.
Marc:I was at the cusp of what I think ultimately created you.
Marc:You know, like there was this there, you know, there was those places enabled me room to sort of take chances and work out in a way that you couldn't at the comedy store because you had, you know, Manny walking into the room and panicking and looking around and looking at you and seeing if they were laughing.
Marc:And Esty would be like, I don't know.
Marc:And you're like, oh, fuck.
Marc:You know, and then I could just go to Luna Lounge with all that.
Marc:Oh, fuck energy and just blow it out.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:But it was weird because we were all a lot of the people that were over there that started that were were club comics.
Marc:But but then that world became, you know, not this alternative world, but an alternate option.
Guest:Yes.
Guest:Yes.
Guest:I mean, I certainly think that that space was, I think, more conducive to to what I do now.
Guest:But, you know, I started really seriously in Seattle and I was doing the clubs there and I was the underground.
Marc:You were living in Seattle.
Guest:Yeah, I mean, after I graduated from college, I tried to do it in New York, but I was like 21.
Guest:And I'm like, I don't know.
Guest:So I went to Seattle to be an immigrant rights organizer.
Guest:That's actually what I'd planned to be.
Guest:And I worked at an organization where the executive director was Pramila Jayapal, who's a congresswoman now from Seattle.
Guest:And she was my mentor.
Guest:And I did stand up at night at the underground and like the growing alt scene there.
Guest:And it was a hobby.
Guest:And so I just kind of developed it there and it kind of took off.
Guest:But yeah, the Seattle is still the city that like I will go to the most.
Marc:The original underground with all Ron down there.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Did they move?
Guest:Oh, yes.
Guest:The original underground.
Guest:That's right.
Guest:With the little bullpen in the back, basically, where the comics would wait and they go up.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Yeah, the stinky downstairs underneath that other bar.
Guest:Right, where you could see some of the original Pike Place Market before the city had burnt down a century ago.
Guest:Yeah, that's right.
Guest:Yeah, I loved that club.
Guest:That was a great place.
Guest:It's not quite a road room, but a rough late Friday show anywhere is still a rough late Friday show anywhere.
Guest:But it was a great basement, low ceiling.
Guest:Yes, perfect.
Guest:I mean, great.
Guest:I mean, it was a great place to develop, certainly.
Guest:So, like, I think that and the alt scene there and then, you know, I kind of stemmed from there.
Guest:But I still, like, I'll rent a little 50-seat theater in Seattle and work out my material there.
Guest:Like, I'll do an hour of stuff, mostly new, and just, like, do... I'll find a way to work it out.
Guest:Kind of the way the British comics would do with Edinburgh.
Guest:Like, they'd do all these London preview shows before and they'd beat themselves up to get ready.
Marc:Yeah, sure.
Marc:And I got that out of San Francisco when I went out there, too.
Marc:I mean, I developed in a lot of different places, but I don't think I knew about that.
Marc:So you went to college.
Marc:So comedy was not the thing.
Marc:You were focused on immigration rights.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I mean, I'm one of those, I think, young brown people that came of age post 9-11 and was politicized by it.
Guest:And so...
Guest:I think that I was motivated from 18, 19, 20 on by like trying to make the world better, whether that's human rights broadly or specifically in immigrant rights, because post 9-11 with all these hate crimes and detentions and deportations and all.
Guest:I think people like they talk about how bad Trump is.
Guest:I think people forget those years right after 9-11 when everyone was pretending the country was united.
Guest:A lot of people were scared to death constantly.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:It was like being doubly traumatized because you're scared of, are terrorists going to bomb something again?
Guest:Is another plane going to hit?
Guest:And I'm a New Yorker, so that's scary.
Guest:Plus, are my fellow Americans going to beat the shit out of me for no reason?
Guest:So I think that very much drove the kind of work I wanted to do.
Guest:I wanted to support communities of color.
Guest:And I still did stand-up, and I loved stand-up.
Guest:But this was like 2001, 2002.
Guest:There were no brown stand-ups that were making it.
Marc:And how much of your act really like at that time?
Marc:Because like I like how much of your act are you ashamed of now?
Guest:Oh, when I was 18, 19, 20, like almost all of it.
Guest:I was a kid.
Guest:I had no life experiences.
Guest:The only thing I was thinking about is make people laugh.
Guest:They're laughing.
Guest:I did a good job.
Guest:And that's it.
Guest:And I knew that like an Indian accent was funny because the Simpsons proved that to us.
Guest:And I'm like, ah, this makes the people laugh.
Guest:If I do the funny voice, I'll do the funny voice.
Guest:The jokes were well structured, well written, but they were empty.
Guest:Like they didn't really say anything.
Marc:But did you lean on?
Marc:Did you self mock?
Marc:Did you mock your...
Marc:Were you culturally self-mocking?
Guest:Yeah, I think so.
Guest:Not the worst case scenario of that, but certainly I knew that I had that in my back pocket.
Marc:I guess my question is like after watching The Problem with Apu is because it's curious to me how we learn about things and there's always room to learn about things.
Marc:And I learned from watching that documentary some things.
Marc:And there are things that we know as comics and we tolerate as comics that you eventually have to question.
Marc:And that continues to happen.
Marc:But I just wonder, because I think some of the more interesting stuff in that in that in moments of that documentary is how the other incorporates their otherness into accepting the dominant paradigm's view of them.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:So so like when you were younger, it was like you already knew what you wanted to do with your life and what fight you wanted to fight for for people of color.
Marc:Yet you couldn't quite see you get a slight blind side as to how you were stereotyping yourself or you just lived with it.
Marc:Well, I mean.
Guest:And first of all, I was doing stand-up before I ever started thinking about the world.
Guest:Because the first time I did stand-up, I was 17 in high school, on my high school stage.
Guest:And I did it through college.
Guest:And so to me, it's like that came first.
Guest:Right.
Guest:And so this political awakening happens after.
Guest:Right.
Guest:So at that point, the idea of like, oh, you can say something with your stand-up and have meaning and make people uncomfortable and you can still be funny.
Guest:That was a lesson.
Guest:I mean, I probably learned that lesson a little bit from you, from David Cross's double album, Shut Up You Fucking Baby, which is also the reason I started cursing so much.
Guest:And Paul Mooney.
Guest:Sure.
Guest:I saw Paul Mooney do stand-up in Washington, D.C.
Guest:in 2003.
Guest:That's a long show.
Guest:Oh, my God.
Guest:The servers were so angry.
Guest:The waitstaff was furious.
Marc:I middled for him in Sacramento once.
Marc:Oh, my God.
Marc:You middled for Mooney?
Marc:What was that like?
Marc:Well, I learned an important lesson about racism.
Marc:But it's not the one you would think.
Marc:The lesson I learned from Paul about racism, because of the nature of how he keeps antagonizing white people.
Marc:Yeah, he really does.
Marc:Right.
Marc:And in a place like Sacramento, it's mostly a white audience.
Marc:So if you go in there thinking you're not racist, by hour two, he'll find it in you.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I love it, though.
Guest:No, it's genius.
Guest:Obviously, in D.C., it was a mostly black crowd, some people of color, and you have white people walking out.
Guest:To be fair, some white people walked out because it was entering the third hour of a set.
Guest:But for me, it was incredibly cathartic because I didn't know that you could make an audience uncomfortable, and yet I'd never laughed harder before.
Guest:The idea that something could be for me
Guest:Right.
Guest:Was was new like this.
Guest:And I'm an Indian dude.
Guest:I'm not even a black dude.
Guest:Like as an Indian person, this is the closest we got.
Guest:I'm like, oh, this this doesn't need to be for white people because everything else was meant for white people.
Guest:And then you have to interpret their experience and compare it to yours to be able to, you know, because if I'm like, well, I'm not going to watch this white shit.
Guest:What am I growing up watching?
Guest:Do you know what I mean?
Guest:You have everything is made for white people and you translate it so it fits in your life because you're an American.
Guest:You're born here.
Guest:He made something for people of color, black people specifically.
Guest:But it was like, this is fucking great.
Guest:You can say what you want.
Guest:Not everyone's going to like it.
Guest:But who gives a shit?
Guest:It makes it better.
Marc:No, right.
Marc:And I think that the point about some of the more mind blowing things that, you know, I had to reckon with as somebody who claims not to be racist, but accepts a certain amount of white privilege, obviously, because it's where I come from as a Jew white guy.
Marc:But just the lack of representation culturally, I don't think I ever really
Marc:Really thought that through until relatively recently.
Marc:Sure.
Marc:But like, you know, when I was watching the Apu doc, I was like, I never watched The Simpsons.
Marc:I never watched them.
Marc:So I have no point of reference with Apu.
Marc:And I don't really have a point of reference with convenience stores.
Marc:Well, my association with Indian people has always been at restaurants and it's very Indian restaurants.
Marc:And it was always with reverence, you know, like like for years I just I would I taught I said it to Mindy Kalin, who I think I offended just dramatically.
Marc:But I was like, you know, I just want to go to India because they have such great food, you know, like.
Marc:But I don't I don't know anything else about the culture.
Marc:Right.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Right.
Guest:It's not a stereotype.
Guest:I feel like.
Guest:The most important takeaway from that documentary is that, one, people should have the right to represent themselves.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Two, I think more representations are always better because also I think you get better stories.
Guest:That accent and that character is hacky.
Guest:It was hacky back then.
Guest:I think I read a Simpsons interview where they were saying that when that character was created, we already knew that was a stereotype and a cliche, so we didn't want to do it until...
Guest:You know, Hank Azaria did the voice and we started laughing and the Indian voice has been around forever.
Guest:I mean, but the thing is like, you know, the thing about any kind of racism or a lot of these like simple racial jokes is they're like they're hacky, like just creatively.
Guest:They anyone can do them.
Guest:They're not particularly clever.
Guest:And so why didn't you talk to Jerry Bedknoff?
Guest:oh god jerry bedknapp i mean that that's but to be fair jerry bedknapp that's like the proto like he's way back that's like would he have been the first brown south asian comic uh probably right maybe yeah maybe he would have been i can't because then you know i'm thinking after that it would have been like russell peters and aladdin ulla and all these other folks of vijay nathan but like he would have been well before that
Guest:Yeah, he's not like ancient, but he's, you know.
Guest:But that's the first wave.
Guest:70s, maybe 70s.
Guest:Like Pat Morita's stand-up, like if you've seen, Pat Morita was a great stand-up, but like he used to call himself the hip nip.
Guest:I mean, that was his thing, you know.
Guest:This stuff was very stereotypical.
Guest:There's also, I think, a difference between playing to your own and playing to a mass audience, too.
Guest:Russell does lots of accents, Russell Peters, and he's certainly a groundbreaking South Asian comic, and I think a lot of us owe him something for what he's done.
Guest:But people are very critical, like, oh, he does so many accents.
Guest:But if you look at his crowds, like they're mostly South Asian and Asian.
Guest:He's basically open standup markets around the world.
Guest:People have started doing standup because they saw him perform in Dubai or India or wherever.
Marc:Well, I think that what's interesting about him is that he kind of covers the expanse of the non-African-American brown experience somehow.
Guest:That's very interesting.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:That his audiences are diverse within the spectrum of brown, non-African American.
Guest:Yes, I think that's very true.
Guest:And he's global also for that reason.
Guest:I mean, there's lots of comics like that.
Guest:They have really important cultural roles, like Rex Navarrete.
Guest:To a lot of Filipino folks, he's their guy.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:There's a lot of guys.
Marc:I think one of the great punchlines in your last special was the Mango Podcast punchline.
Marc:You don't think anyone would listen to that?
Marc:How about a billion people?
Marc:Then I felt like he's probably right.
Marc:I mean, he's probably right.
Guest:Do you know who doesn't agree is everybody I've pitched that idea to in the podcast world.
Guest:Like they're totally wrong.
Marc:It would be so huge.
Marc:You would just have to you'd have to somehow introduce it into that market.
Marc:And people really underestimate the sort of like loyalty and need to support their own.
Guest:Yes, there's not enough of us at this point to like, I mean, there's enough of us now where we can hate Bobby Jindal and Nikki Haley, right?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:But there's not enough of us where like, you know, I completely hate Hari Kondabolu.
Guest:It's like, he's annoying and he complains too much, but good for him.
Guest:Like there's still like that.
Guest:Interesting.
Marc:How, but you, what is that politically, you know, because how do you, I mean, because politically you are of a certain ilk, you are, uh, uh, progressive and, uh, outspoken leftist even.
Marc:And, you know, when you see someone like Nikki Haley or like Bobby Jindal, do you, do you see that as fundamentally tomming in a way?
Marc:Because that, you know, their approach to the American experience is something it's extreme in the other direction.
Guest:Um,
Guest:That's a good question.
Guest:First of all, regarding my leftism, I think it's taken a hit since I had the baby.
Guest:There's something about a baby that turns you into a capitalist so quickly.
Guest:So let me start there.
Guest:It's okay.
Guest:You can like money.
Guest:And the second thing, to a degree, I think that we all have different ways to deal with being an outsider in a place and what fitting in looks like.
Guest:And, you know, and for some people, it's like, do whatever it takes to succeed, you know, assimilate.
Guest:As opposed to it, like I'm about integration, but I also grew up in New York City.
Guest:So that place is everything all at once constantly.
Guest:It's constantly changing.
Guest:There's always a bunch of different languages.
Guest:There's always a bunch of different cuisines.
Guest:You might not know everything about your friend, but you are familiar enough because you went to school together.
Guest:Like they grew up in South Carolina, North Carolina, like whatever, Louisiana.
Guest:Like I'm assuming their experience was very different.
Guest:But I also think, you know, once they realize, okay, this is also something that, first of all, I've assimilated into this culture.
Guest:These are some of the mainstream beliefs and this is the easier stance to take.
Guest:Or this is the stance I've learned to take from growing up here.
Guest:They've kind of run with it.
Guest:And to me, it's not completely genuine.
Guest:I know Bobby Jindal certainly hit up South Asian, like Hindu temples and other South Asian centers for money when he was running.
Guest:So as much as he can say, like, I don't play race.
Guest:It's not about race.
Guest:It's like, well, when you needed the money, you certainly were into it.
Marc:Well, it's interesting.
Marc:I wonder what they're like, you know, that whole second generation, you know, with a vengeance American kind of thing.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:You know that there's like I would assume there's a desire to pass, but there's also a desire to overcompensate, you know, in terms of like strange jingoism to to command respect from the people that would have usually hated you.
Guest:I think there's some of that, but there's also like, you know, my whole... To me, it kind of comes down, like at a certain point in South Asian American political circles, there's Dinesh D'Souza and there's Vijay Prashad, all right?
Guest:Dinesh D'Souza worked for Reagan.
Guest:He's saying stuff about like...
Guest:indian cultural superiority and talking about black inferiority and how it's cultural and all that and he's just just playing into this whole model minority thing and you have like vijay prashad who is a marxist who's like who wrote the book the karma of brown folk playing off of w.e.b du bois is the souls of black folk right who is saying that while du bois asked like you know why are black people posed as the problem of america you know you know it
Guest:Prashad saying Asians and South Asians are seen as the solution to the black problem.
Guest:Like the ultimate sin of slavery, all of a sudden you push that aside and say, well, it's black people's fault because we have these other dark skinned people, these other people who aren't white who are succeeding.
Guest:So so there's something wrong with you.
Guest:And there's you know, he's America's been able to use that racial triangulation to consistently keep us as non black minorities, as outsiders, while keeping black people as inferior, but still American.
Guest:And so, God, God, that while I'm saying that, I'm like, God.
Guest:Damn, I'm in the wrong profession.
Guest:That is a waste of an education.
Marc:No, but also that triangle lets white people off the hook somehow.
Marc:But but yeah, but no.
Marc:But I mean, to segue from that idea that, you know, that your education or what interests you or what causes motivates you, you know, you know what you do and what I've struggled with at times more so at different times.
Marc:But in my last two specials, a little more than the one before that.
Marc:is integrating these ideas into comedy that people can understand.
Marc:I mean, your Tracy Morgan joke on the last special about him telling you, you know, you're too smart and, you know, what would be hilarious is if a guy that looked like you and sounded like you said, you know, I was licking my girlfriend's asshole or whatever.
Marc:Which he's right, by the way.
Guest:Objectively, that that would be effective.
Marc:No, but we do it.
Marc:You do it.
Marc:I mean, it's like, you know, you're the smart guy, but, you know, you also, your appreciation for the comics that you appreciate enable you, you know, to be filthy, you know, in a moment and in a selective way that doesn't, you're not a filthy comic, but you know how to use the device confidently, even though you call yourself out on it, which bothered me.
Marc:But, like, you know, you can...
Guest:why did it bother you it's a little bit of a wuss move i thought you know just jerk off you're okay you can just jerk off just jerk off are you kidding me i to me that wasn't a wuss move that's me like because you know i'm a huge the biggest comedic influence in my life outside of margaret cho that made me want to do stand-up when i was 15 and paul mooney who told me that like who showed me that you can make people uncomfortable is stewart lee
Guest:Right.
Guest:Fuck.
Guest:I'm obsessed with Stuart Lee.
Guest:That's right.
Guest:I remember that.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I remember you.
Guest:Remember, I'm the one who kept telling you, you should interview Stuart Lee.
Guest:And I gave you all to him.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And I got you.
Guest:I remember you emailed me and I gave you all this like info on him.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Clips to listen to.
Guest:I'm such a huge fan of him and his ethos.
Guest:And like, I mean, he's one of those guys who's like, oh, there are no rules.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Like whenever comics, like when people were going after Hannah Gadsby and saying, it's not stand-up, it doesn't count as stand-up.
Guest:And it's like, where does this purest nature of stand-up come from when it's like, it's the lowest production values.
Guest:It's a person, a microphone.
Guest:It can be anything you want it to be.
Guest:I know, I've known comics who've performed on pool tables and without mics.
Guest:There's no rules.
Marc:No, but I think that came with...
Marc:You know, that that ultimately what happened with alt comedy and the sort of, I think, the produced show movement and then with TED Talks is that comics felt like they were losing turf, that, you know, we paid our dues in this particular context and now there are these infiltrators.
Marc:So I think it comes the purest mode comes from the old idea of dues paying and club work.
Marc:And then they sort of judge on those lines.
Guest:I think it's that simple.
Guest:That doesn't work anymore.
Guest:Of course.
Guest:Especially, you know, people are complaining that.
Guest:That said, though, I did pay my dues.
Guest:You did pay your dues, yes.
Guest:I have audio evidence of you talking about paying your dues, actually.
Guest:And I was only halfway through the dues.
Marc:I hadn't even hit the hard part of the dues when you talked to me.
Marc:But what I'm saying is that.
Marc:You do honor your education by doing the kind of shit that you do.
Marc:And at what point did you realize you could do that?
Marc:What joke was the turning point for you where you realize, like, this is a political joke.
Marc:It's effective.
Marc:It makes people look at what what they take for granted differently.
Marc:And it opened a window because usually, you know.
Marc:Which moment?
Guest:There's two bits.
Guest:One of them was this joke about the Kohenor diamond, which is the diamond that the British stole from India in the, probably the 1700s maybe.
Guest:Right.
Guest:And how it's on, it's like one of the British crown jewels and it's on, you know, it's on one of their crowns.
Guest:And it was a bit about like reading, I haven't done it in forever, but like a museum exhibit that says that it was
Guest:found in India in the 1700s.
Guest:Like, yeah, it was found there.
Guest:It wasn't taken from India.
Guest:It was found because we were just eating them.
Guest:We didn't know what they were.
Guest:We were making diamond biryani until the British showed up.
Guest:And they taught us how to use our opposable thumbs.
Guest:And I took those diamonds away.
Guest:So there was a bit I did about that that was like, okay, this is about colonialism.
Guest:It has a bit of anger, which I think I had to learn gradually that anger was the place that
Guest:I guess my comedy comes from the most.
Marc:I think that's why you and I might have had tension in what I saw in you that I related to and resented.
Guest:The thing we had in common.
Guest:I think you and Louis Black, especially Louis Black, because Louis Black screams.
Marc:But he's cartoon-like.
Marc:He's figured out how to do it.
Guest:Right, right, right.
Guest:But I definitely think that release of anger and frustration as funny, I think you definitely were...
Guest:you know influenced me particularly that first record which i listened to obsessively like i love was uh not sold out right oh the 9-11 record yeah yeah yeah uh where you i remember you opened by talking about how you had a cold sore yes that's right yeah that's not sold out and that has the bit about thinking that the fbi is watching me that i want to see my file yeah yeah
Guest:That's my favorite joke on it.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Nope.
Guest:Napping.
Marc:Masturbating again.
Marc:Now he's sleeping.
Guest:Crying now.
Guest:Crying for no reason.
Guest:There's a few bits.
Guest:I think the bit on there that...
Guest:I think for me had the most impact and for a lot of awful reasons, but was the one where you talk about suicide and where you say, have you ever gotten so depressed how you think about suicide?
Guest:Not because you actually want to do it.
Guest:It makes me.
Marc:Oh, yeah.
Marc:Makes you feel better.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:I mean, I like I still kind of talk about that joke.
Marc:Like, I don't want to do it, but it just it just makes me feel better knowing I can if I have to.
Guest:yeah oh that that thing stayed in my psyche probably way too long uh because i think it's still in mine i mean there is a part of me i will say before before the kid that saw the end of the world in the same way right like like a nuclear annihilation or this thing oh thank god this whole thing's over like there's that relief in the same way as it's gonna be quick for everybody
Marc:oh thank god we're finally in like we're all in it together for the first time yeah done uh which all of a sudden feels different having a kid it's like well i want him to at least experience something i want him to at least experience a horrible authoritarian racist culture that he's going to be growing up and ice cream yeah um so okay so the first kind of aware bits were about colonialism which oddly to me
Guest:Yes.
Marc:Was something I didn't even take.
Marc:I only recently took into consideration because of a trip to London where I realized that the people of color experience in Europe is completely different than America.
Marc:But I was not educated that way.
Marc:But I went to an art exhibit at the gallery.
Marc:I can't remember which.
Marc:The Hayward.
Marc:And it was all a reflection on colonialism.
Marc:And all of a sudden, my mind just blew about that.
Marc:I'm a 57-year-old man who's relatively progressive and fairly open-minded, but I never really kind of absorbed the idea and result of colonialism properly because I didn't grow up in it and I didn't study it.
Guest:I mean, my parents speak English.
Guest:Do you know what I mean?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:there's like English is still one of the official languages of India.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Like it's, it's, it's also the administrative language in addition to Hindi.
Guest:So, you know, yeah.
Guest:I mean like it's certainly, it's very strange being in a colonized country coming from like whose family came from a place that was colonized.
Guest:There's something weird about like we got them to leave and now we're going to another place they went and they took over.
Guest:Right.
Guest:I mean, we're all contributing.
Guest:Like, look, I'm benefiting from it, too, by being here and living off this land.
Guest:I'm also like the, you know, I have caste privileges, you know, like a lot of the Indian people that are in this country, you know, they came from upper classes, especially that first wave with visas.
Guest:I mean, you know, they were brought to this country, you know, with educations to get more educations to support the U.S.
Guest:economy.
Guest:And they come from upper caste backgrounds.
Guest:How's your parents?
Guest:come my dad my dad's sister my aunt came I think she's a nurse so her and her husband who's a doctor came moved to Kansas then brought my uncle and my dad and sponsored them and then my dad eventually moves to New York from Kansas from Kansas he spent his first year in Independence Kansas which is a very small town where he was once asked if he was Chinese because nobody knew what to make of him
Guest:But then he moves to New York, lives with some friends there.
Guest:And then eventually my mom and him got married, an arranged marriage in 81.
Guest:And then my mom comes over.
Guest:So it was arranged back home.
Guest:Back home.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:It was interesting because my mom, I mean, I think it speaks a lot to my mom's really unique experience is that she was a doctor as a South Indian, which is very conservative, South Indian woman in her late 20s with her own practice.
Guest:like my she never learned to cook she never had to do any of the domestic things that a lot of young indian women especially of that time are taught to do and how marriage is ultimately the goal my mom had her own thing man you know what i mean like she she's oh she's told me like i love you and your brother but if i never gotten married i'd be fine being a spinster reading books for the rest of my life like that would have been fine too so
Guest:I think she actually took the biggest hit.
Guest:To me, both my parents' stories are really interesting, but I think my mom sacrificed to me.
Guest:That's the real story.
Guest:If she wanted to be a doctor here, she would have had to go to medical school again.
Guest:She had to take an exam, and it didn't automatically transfer over.
Guest:I don't know what the rules are now.
Guest:And between raising two kids and my dad, so technically three kids, it was difficult.
Marc:Yeah, your dad gets sort of – he takes a couple hits in the special too, and my parents always take hits.
Marc:But having seen –
Marc:Like the idea of an arranged marriage, I think, to me and to a lot of people is sort of like, well, that sounds horrendous.
Marc:And how do you remain committed to that when they didn't have to do that in this country?
Guest:Right.
Guest:I mean, one, I think that it's not always terrible.
Guest:You know, there's enough stories of arranged marriages.
Guest:that work out and it's a lifetime of I learned to love someone and this is an incredible partnership I've shared with some person.
Guest:There's also, this is a terrible marriage and thank God I got out.
Guest:And then there's the, I'm in it because of the social and societal pressure to stay.
Guest:And at a certain point, you have to accept that
Guest:They were figuring things out too.
Guest:And I think my dad certainly was falling in line with what he expected a wife to be.
Guest:And my mom was falling in line with what she was told that she had to be.
Guest:But secretly she knew otherwise.
Guest:My mom's a brilliant woman.
Guest:She, again, had her own practice in a small town in Andhra Pradesh, southern India.
Guest:Her life was so different than the life she's lived in 40 plus years since.
Guest:In 40 years since.
Guest:So I think that there's lots of stories.
Guest:And I think a lot of women have these stories.
Guest:It's not just South Asian women.
Guest:It's not just Indian women.
Guest:There's a lot of women that have stories of like expectations ruining or affecting the course they were on and changing, you know, what they expected.
Guest:There's a lot of tragic stories like that.
Marc:You know, there's a ton of women like that.
Guest:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:So we certainly have our share.
Guest:And, you know, I think my mom certainly is an incredibly forward thinking and thoughtful, brilliant woman and is beloved by people who meet her.
Guest:And at the same time, I think this idea of duty and what is your duty as a woman, that stuff's ingrained, man.
Guest:That doesn't go away.
Guest:Wired in.
Guest:Again, I just want to reinforce, that's not just various Indian cultures.
Guest:I mean, that's everywhere, and that's just how it looks in our scenario and in our context.
Guest:So is your brother still in the band?
No.
Guest:No, that band broke up eight years ago.
Guest:What's he doing?
Guest:A lot of things.
Guest:I think he sold something to Spotify.
Guest:The band was Das Racist?
Guest:Das Racist, yeah.
Guest:He was the hype man, Dapwell.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:But he's still in the music racket?
Guest:Nah, not really.
Guest:I mean, he DJs a show called Chillin' Island and he does his own thing, but it's not.
Guest:Nah, he doesn't play music.
Guest:He never played music.
Guest:Right.
Guest:But it sounds like he's still in the area.
Guest:Yeah, we're developing our own things together and we're pitching things together.
Guest:Are you?
Guest:Yeah, which is always like a dream thing.
Guest:I've always wanted to work with my brother.
Guest:He's my best friend and he's definitely the smartest and most creative person I know.
Guest:So that's nice.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:No, I think we as a team have always been kind of, yeah.
Marc:I think the other thing I'm trying, I keep trying to figure out like what it is about, you know, our dynamic, me and you.
Marc:It's also the thing of, of having to accept.
Marc:And I think, you know, we both, I think maybe Stuart Lee made it easier for us to,
Marc:In the sense that, you know, he he told me, you know, when I talked to him, but we had to accept that we're not for everybody.
Marc:And that's a benefit and that there's nothing we can do to be for anybody.
Marc:Not that we want to, but it's not even available to us as an option.
Marc:Yes, because secretly, you know, when you think about other people's success or the size of other people's success or why can't what I say be as entertaining and as far reaching as that other motherfucker?
Marc:It's it's there is part of your brain that does that.
Marc:But then you realize, like, it's never going to be.
Guest:Oh, I had to put that away a long time ago.
Guest:We've all gone through that, right?
Guest:Where you start comparing yourself to your peers or how come I don't have that?
Marc:Well, yeah, I still get that sometimes, but I'm talking specifically about- You still get that?
Marc:Sure.
Marc:Really?
Marc:A little bit.
Marc:Well, sometimes because I see myself a certain way, right?
Marc:Like if I look at my last special, I'm like, I'm not going to get better than that.
Marc:I'm not going to get better than End Times Fun or the one before it.
Marc:I'm just not.
Marc:Everything I ever worked towards is in there.
Marc:Everything I've ever done to make me me is in there.
Marc:All right.
Marc:And they did fine.
Marc:They did well.
Marc:The timing of the last one was prescient and fucking weird, you know, because there was a prophetic element to it.
Marc:But it didn't blow up.
Marc:You know, didn't, you know, didn't get me an Emmy nomination.
Marc:But it's really the best I can do.
Marc:So there's part of me that thinks like, what is it?
Marc:I mean, I couldn't have been more accessible.
Marc:Okay, fine.
Marc:Mike Pence blows Jesus at the end.
Marc:I still couldn't have been more accessible.
Marc:so there's there's like that's that's the thing it's like how how is this not for everybody why aren't there more kids at my shows you know what i'm saying but so i still oh my god this is the conversation we had 17 years ago
Guest:Why are there not more people at my shows?
Guest:How come how come I don't have an Emmy?
Guest:I don't know.
Guest:I don't know.
Guest:What what is Dane Cook doing?
Guest:I don't know why people like that guy.
Marc:Yeah, I don't know why people like that guy.
Marc:OK, OK.
Marc:All right.
Marc:But the truth is, is I know I have a tremendous, beautiful fan base.
Marc:I know I can.
Marc:I sell out the places I go to.
Marc:And I know all that.
Guest:You're a top 100 American comic all time without question.
Marc:Good.
Marc:Yeah, no, I agree.
Marc:I agree.
Marc:So like in the sense that I get it sometimes, it's not real.
Marc:You don't want to know where you rank in the top 100?
Marc:I'd rather not.
Marc:Okay.
Marc:All right.
Marc:But... Because I don't know.
Marc:Who makes those lists?
Marc:Some kid in an office at Rolling Stone?
Marc:No, I was talking about an imaginary one in my head, but all right.
Marc:All right.
Marc:I'm glad I made the cut.
Marc:So it could have been top 20 would have been nice.
Marc:100, sure.
Marc:Okay, well, thanks.
Marc:Humility.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:But...
Marc:But but but what I'm saying is that there's about about self-ownership and about knowing that, like, it's OK.
Marc:You know, once you find your your place and you find your people and you find your voice, you know, it's a very comforting thing.
Marc:And then to accept that, like it isn't for everybody and that's OK.
Marc:And to sort of make fun of that, which I do as well, is is is great.
Marc:And to sort of have the power to sort of make people look at things differently, which is really why I got into comedy, which is what comics did for me, which is they would frame things in a way that I would understand and also to make me think about things differently.
Marc:And we can do all that.
Marc:And the fact that you were able to figure out how to do it.
Marc:you know, around politics without seeming too strident, which I think you had to work through, or to anger that you had to work through and balance it with mango jokes.
Marc:You know, it takes time to do that.
Marc:Well, to be fair, that mango joke's also about colonialism.
Guest:No, I know.
Guest:I mean, I think a lot... I mean, I'll say that I'm...
Guest:All those things are... And I appreciate that.
Guest:Thank you.
Guest:But I feel like my goal is still... I still think about you on a Tuesday night at the Comedy Cellar dying and talking about things like... I remember to me, like, oh, this is what Pryor did.
Guest:This is what you're supposed to do.
Guest:I've never completely gotten there.
Guest:I've never shared the stuff that hurts the most.
Guest:I've never...
Marc:When you think about that in particular, when you say that, you seem to know what that is.
Marc:What is the area of that in you?
Guest:Depression, anxiety.
Guest:Oh.
Guest:Like, man, fuck, I didn't expect to be alive five years ago.
Guest:Like, I want it to be done.
Guest:Like, this is not, you know, that's why I like the idea of, like, I'm happy.
Guest:I'm happy and tired because I have a kid and I'm still around.
Guest:But, like...
Guest:For me, it's funny because I'm saying like, at one hand, I'm saying like, I would love to talk about this stuff on stage and I'm saying it to you.
Guest:So I guess it's already kind of happening right now.
Guest:But like, you know, to be able to share that, like what it feels like to not want to be alive, to be depressed, to be anxious, to have panic attack after panic attack after panic attack in a hotel room in Australia at the Melbourne Comedy Festival.
Guest:I had that.
Guest:You went to the Melbourne Comedy Festival?
Marc:No, I got sent home from Australia.
Marc:Australia was your Australia too?
Marc:But it was way before the Melbourne Comedy Festival.
Marc:It was just like I bombed so badly on a five-week run that they sent me home after the first week.
Marc:You got to listen to me tell that story at some point.
Marc:But okay, so what was your panic attack about in Australia?
Guest:It was...
Guest:I don't know, man.
Guest:It was everything.
Guest:Everything was terrible.
Guest:Certainly, it's a mix of what am I doing with my life and I'm sick.
Guest:Why am I on the road constantly and I'm alone and I'm depressed and this sucks.
Guest:What the fuck am I doing with my life?
Guest:And I'm in this room.
Guest:They put you in the same room.
Guest:You're there for two weeks.
Marc:Were you doing a one-person show?
Guest:I was doing that headliners thing.
Guest:And it was with Wyatt Cenac, Mike Kaplan, and Cristela Alonso.
Guest:So like two depressed guys, a math guy, and the other guy.
Guest:Well, the thing is, I had to go on.
Guest:I'm pretending.
Guest:I wasn't feeling well.
Guest:I was sick, generally speaking, in addition to being depressed out of my mind.
Guest:But I'm pretending that everything's okay.
Guest:Hey, what'd you do today?
Guest:Oh, I just went around and saw stuff.
Guest:And I'm like, no, I was in bed having panic attacks and being tired and passing out and then waking up.
Guest:And I'm like, oh, where did I leave off?
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Guest:And then another panic attack.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:that that's what i that was what australia was to me and then probably drinking too much good coffee which doesn't help the anxiety so no i mean at a certain point i ended up like canceling six months of shows telling my reps that i just wasn't feeling great yeah i was just i just feel kind of sick you know but meanwhile i'm like i don't know if i want to do this anymore
Marc:What do you what do you think it was?
Marc:Was it was it fear?
Marc:I mean, was it like, do you think it's clinical depression?
Marc:Because was it just like an anxiety?
Guest:I had been depressed for years and, you know, definitely refusing to to medicate in any way because fuck that.
Guest:Plus, you know, I think a lot of South Asian cultures, the idea of, you know, sharing your personal life with someone else is very taboo.
Guest:Do you know what I mean?
Guest:Like, that's not something.
Guest:I get it.
Guest:I get it.
Marc:You got to keep a, you got to keep it to yourself because we're trying to make it here.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Exactly.
Guest:This is, this is for, this is us.
Guest:And so that's, you know, you don't, and plus you don't let outsiders know your shit.
Guest:Right.
Guest:And to break through that, to accept therapy to begin with, then medication just felt like a weakness.
Guest:Right.
Guest:And, and, you know, I,
Guest:I'm a homebody that chose a really weird job for a homebody.
Guest:Like I'm a well-traveled homebody.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And I'm... So that's anxiety.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:It's anxiety.
Guest:It's being alone.
Guest:It's like, what value am I adding to the world?
Guest:It's, you know, stuff at home that I don't want to get into, but it's like a lot of that that's building and...
Guest:It was not good.
Guest:It's funny.
Guest:I was talking to Kamau Bell the other day.
Guest:W. Kamau Bell is one of my best friends.
Guest:He's a mentor.
Guest:He's a brother.
Guest:I owe him so much as a friend.
Guest:But I was talking to him about this the other day, and he had no idea any of this happened five years ago.
Guest:And I just assumed I had told him.
Guest:But like it was one of those things where like, you know, I think about my life in terms of five years ago.
Guest:Everything is really five years ago.
Guest:Like when people talk about this documentary, about this Apu documentary, to me, it's like it was a pop documentary that for me was like a side project I thought was interesting that turned into this whole global thing where people in Brazil are sending me death threats in Portuguese.
Guest:Like, you know, when was that?
Guest:When did you make that?
Guest:uh the thing came out i think in 2018 the apu duck and like to me the apu duck the thing that i'm proud of is the fact that that was one of the first things i wrote a pitch for after i came out of where i was like it was one of the first things that you know that i actually decided to make like i'm like i kept going you know like that and that and my second record i'm like this came out of a bad period but
Guest:To me, everything from this point on is fucking gravy.
Marc:So you made it through.
Marc:So when I asked you originally what got us here is that you feel like you need to, that you don't address that on stage.
Marc:Well, maybe you don't need to.
Guest:I feel like being able to address, both as a human being but also as a performer, being able to address the most difficult things and turn that into art, that's what the great performers do.
Guest:And I feel like people who like my standup, they know who I am through what I am saying and through what I believe.
Guest:But they have no sense of any of that.
Guest:They have no sense of the context that creates those feelings.
Marc:Right.
Marc:Well, my suggestion is I would definitely punch it up a little bit.
Guest:You don't think the suicide would have been the bigger punchline, right?
Guest:If I had done it, that would have been the bigger.
Guest:No, no, no.
Guest:I'm just saying that.
Marc:The intensity with which you were explaining it.
Guest:This feels like when I first talked to you.
Guest:That was the energy that you had when I first talked to you at the cellar.
Guest:It's so funny.
Guest:I'm sorry you went through that.
Guest:What's the name of that clown that everyone talks about, the one?
Guest:Pagliacci?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Sad clown?
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:Yeah, that's who we are.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:That's funny, though, because I can't see it in you anymore, so maybe I don't see it.
Marc:Like, you know, the anxiety, the depression, not anxiety is anxiety.
Guest:I feel like I'm in a, I feel like I'm in a very different place than I was.
Guest:I think I put a lot of work in and I don't think I understood the work I put in.
Guest:I also don't, I don't think I understood the impact I was having on other people that, you know, I don't think I was, I understood and I'm still working on like the selfish choices I made and things, you know, when you're depressed, when you're miserable, you
Guest:you know, you're dragging everybody when you're drowning, you're dragging everyone down with you to keep yourself up.
Guest:And I was doing that.
Guest:Like, I, I feel terrible about it.
Guest:I know that the version of me that did it isn't the me that's talking to you now, but like, you know, to me, like, you know, it's funny, like hearing people talk about, that's the guy that wants to kill the cartoon character.
Guest:And I'm like, I don't give a fuck about that.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:But what, but like, I, I, I didn't really know about all this.
Marc:So, so in after the, this is after you got through the depression,
Marc:You made the Apu doc, which is basically an argument, you know, founded in the stereotype that sort of because South Asians were so not represented culturally in America, that Apu became this sort of this identifier for almost...
Guest:all white americans it's a few things one it's that it's the idea of this is how a stereotype carries how this particular stereotype was grandfathered in because the simpsons is this show that's lasted long that anyone could have expected the impact the stereotype has also it's a singular example which is useful to look at minstrelsy in general how it's worked historically you know we got whoopi goldberg to talk about the history of black minstrelsy and kind of kind of the the legacy of that uh the impact that has
Marc:But ultimately, the journey was to for somebody to take fucking responsibility for Apu and what it put you and your Indian compatriots through as a stereotype.
Guest:I think that's I think that was the way to sell the documentary.
Guest:I mean, I think the documentary I wanted to make had no voiceover and was just edits between interviews.
Guest:But I was doing it for true TV and we had to account for commercial breaks.
Marc:But I thought it was very effective and provocative.
Marc:And you talk to a lot of the right people.
Marc:And I thought that the lessons about, you know, non people not being represented culturally is a big it's everything.
Guest:It's a very good one on one.
Guest:And I think what's hard is that if you're somebody who knows this stuff, like for brown people, for people who it's like, this is old, man, this is like shit.
Guest:So for me, it was like, I know the only thing that was really interesting in it was to be able to talk to other brown people.
Guest:You know, and also be able to talk about, like, Suchajit Ray and the history of the Apu Trilogy.
Guest:I know.
Guest:I wanted to go see those movies again.
Guest:I only saw the first one.
Guest:But, I mean, that to me is, like...
Guest:The film like I made a short film in 2006 called Manoj that covered the stuff that's in that documentary in 12 minutes.
Guest:And to me, the documentary is saying more than showing.
Marc:And I guess what I didn't understand or what I didn't know about was the.
Marc:The backlash, you know, that I thought like I'm such a fucking dumb, idealist, progressive person or open minded enough to think like, well, well, Hank, you know, he's not going to do the voice anymore.
Marc:They might not have the character anymore.
Marc:You know, victory.
Marc:You know, we move on.
Marc:But I didn't realize that there was a global movement against you for for ruining The Simpsons.
Guest:And for people who didn't even see the documentary, because the documentary was only available in the US for more than a year.
Guest:So people are reading what they think it's about from different articles.
Guest:You know, it's still not available in South America.
Guest:I don't know why all these death threats in Spanish showed up, but that's the way.
Guest:Because at a certain point, it's a template, right?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:It's not actually about what the argument is.
Guest:It's the idea of anybody questioning something becoming this politically correct, you know, crusade to destroy everything we love versus, no, I'm a Simpsons fan.
Guest:I'm talking about the complications of art and how art and culture interact.
Guest:That's what this thing's about.
Guest:It's not about hating a thing or not.
Guest:And what I wanted, you know, I was hoping for a nuanced argument about representation, and instead I got, like, nonsense.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:The idea of making a movie about a cartoon and then having extra security at shows is fucking absurd.
Guest:Right.
Guest:And then having to tell the security guards, why did they hire me?
Guest:It's like, because I made a cartoon movie and people like the cartoon.
Guest:It sounds fucking ridiculous.
Marc:You had to do that?
Guest:You had to hire extra security?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:It's like you want that if you're saying Lenny Bruce type shit.
Guest:You don't want that when you're talking about the cartoon bothers me.
Guest:Who wants that?
Guest:It's stupid.
Guest:There was credible death threats, you think, against you?
Guest:I don't know what credible means.
Guest:I know that it was enough where people are sending things to schools or venues, so you have to get security.
Guest:Oh, my God.
Guest:So you had to deal with that?
Guest:And it's stupid.
Guest:Again, something that was a nice side project that I thought would be fun to do on TruTV.
Guest:You've just gotten through your depression and now this.
Guest:Yeah, which, honestly, there was a part of me, like, you're trying to kill me.
Guest:You're like, I just, two years ago, this would have been perfect.
Guest:There's your joke.
Guest:There's the punchline you were looking for, yeah.
Guest:We got it.
Guest:Where were you two years ago?
Guest:I just wanted to start living two years ago.
Guest:Not now.
Guest:I just had my epiphany.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:But all in all, Hank Azaria never talked to you?
Guest:no but you know i've heard that he's done a lot of his own work on race and he's like read a lot and he studied a lot and he's done his own and to me that's kind of what i was hoping other people would do i just wanted this to be a spark point i thought for having this conversation and it looks like the only person that had it was hank which is like a fucking bummer well if the movie is honest it seemed like that's what you were gunning for
Guest:I was trying to get a larger fucking conversation.
Guest:I appreciate that guy for actually... I mean, I get why he didn't speak at the time, and I was annoyed at the time, but the fact this dude did the work, that's what you hope people with any sort of privilege do.
Marc:I think it did do that.
Marc:I think a lot of things are happening, even in the shadow of this dismantling of our government that may or may not take, is that there have been a lot of proactive...
Marc:uh, events and movements going on that, that clearly are having an impact.
Marc:I think to, to, to, to deny that that thing was provocative.
Marc:I mean, I watched it and it was, I was provocative to me and, you know, and I'm, and I'm a fairly, you know, like I I'm old and I'm, but I obviously it would resonate with me, but it, it definitely got in there and I learned a few new things.
Marc:And so I, I don't think you should discredit in any way, just because a bunch of fucking monsters, you know, came at you, but yeah,
Guest:Yeah, but also keep in mind, as a stand-up, what do you want people to see?
Guest:You want them to see your stand-up.
Marc:Yeah, I know, but dude, what made me famous was a goddamn podcast.
Marc:So I was going to shows, and I had my 2,000 listeners saying to each other on comment boards, we should go support Mark.
Marc:I'm like, what do you mean support?
Marc:I've been doing stand-up 25 years.
Marc:I need an audience.
Marc:I don't need fucking a support group.
Marc:And then when...
Marc:Then people would be like, I really like your stuff.
Marc:And I'd be like, well, what do you like?
Marc:Like people would come up to me after the show.
Guest:Don't fucking tell me about what you want to be known for.
Guest:I really like your stuff.
Marc:I'm doing this over two decades.
Marc:I didn't know why they knew me.
Marc:Why did you know me?
Marc:It took me years to integrate the two to where they became one thing and it didn't matter.
Yeah.
Marc:Like there are still people that see me on glow and they don't know that I do anything else.
Guest:It's crazy, dude.
Guest:But they're going to come to your stand-up.
Guest:If we ever have stand-up again, they're going to come to the gigs, obviously.
Marc:No, that's fine.
Marc:I get it.
Marc:But they're all surprised.
Marc:Like, I just know you from glow.
Marc:I never knew you did this.
Marc:I'm like, how could you not know?
Marc:I've been pounding my head against the wall for 30 fucking years.
Marc:I've done 50 Conan O'Briens.
Guest:I've been performing in nondescript basements for 30 years.
Guest:How are you not...
Guest:Why isn't everybody in the loop?
Guest:I'm on Twitter.
Guest:You have Twitter.
Marc:But the way to look at that, Hari, from a guy who's put it into perspective is see yourself as always discoverable.
Marc:Yeah, that's true.
Marc:I am Googleable.
Marc:No, but I mean, literally, people can find your shit and be like, who's this guy?
Marc:Let's go check him out.
Marc:Right.
Marc:But you're okay now?
Marc:What'd you do?
Marc:Did you take medicine or you didn't?
Marc:I'm great.
Guest:No, I mean, yeah, I've been good.
Guest:I think the last five years, you know, it's always up and down, but it's not living in the down.
Guest:And it's the idea that, you know how when you're really depressed, it's the same day for years.
Guest:It's just the same day.
Guest:Like being able to wake up in the next day, being the next day is remarkable.
Guest:Oh, because your perception is fucked.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:Yeah, I, in retrospect, don't believe I ever had actual depression.
Marc:I think I suffer from paralyzing anxiety, future thinking, and I get to a point of dread that causes a type of paralysis that feels like depression, but it's actually at its core anxiety.
Marc:So if I treat it as such and I can get back into the present and sort of reconfigure how I'm approaching the day, I have some success at that.
Marc:Whereas I think depression is paralyzing no matter what you do.
Marc:Hmm that the level of dread I can experience and also the level of a lot of times it has to do with me Not necessarily doing what I need to do to feel better or like, you know this there's this I think there's a thing of like if I could like I think I don't think it's a South Asian thing But I think it's I think you and I are very hard on ourselves and that the expectations we have on ourselves are sort of hard to meet If not impossible, so when you said that right
Marc:When you set that up for yourself, you're only in the state of self-punishment.
Marc:And eventually that's going to become exhausting and you're going to disappoint yourself and fall into a hole somehow.
Guest:I think that's true.
Guest:I think there's a great deal of self-flagellation and that just is exhausting after all.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:And eventually, you know, you just it has to do with, you know, you know, faulty self-parenting, you know, expectations that were unmet or whatever you're projecting.
Marc:It's a it's a it's a deep wiring thing.
Marc:But I think what I'm saying now is that I think your success and maybe the baby, but also that, you know, your your comedy coming like a lot of these things that that that we didn't have self-esteem before.
Marc:But you do stuff where you kind of can't deny it after a certain point.
Marc:Where you're like, I feel better.
Marc:Why do I feel better about myself?
Marc:Because you've done some amazing shit.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:You can't even take it?
Guest:You can't even take that?
Guest:I think part of it, in this...
Guest:Right now, as you say this, I am 20 again.
Guest:And I'm just kind of taking it in like, Mark thinks I've done some good stuff.
Guest:That's nice.
Marc:Can't Hari think he did some good stuff?
Marc:Can't we get Hari to think?
Guest:Did you like the special?
Guest:The special is funny, right?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Yeah, it was good.
Guest:It was good.
Guest:It was good, right?
Marc:Yeah, it was tight.
Marc:It was good.
Marc:It was funny.
Marc:Everything landed.
Marc:I could see you put the work in.
Marc:You wrote the good jokes.
Marc:You ran that shit for at least a year, some of it.
Guest:That's correct.
Guest:That's absolute.
Guest:You did good, man.
Marc:Thanks.
Marc:So what's this podcast?
Guest:So W. Kamau Bell and I have a podcast called Politically Reactive that we did before the last election and continued a year into the Trump presidency.
Guest:And then we stopped doing it and we just kept getting...
Guest:emails and tweets and people after shows coming up and saying, hey, when are you bringing the podcast back?
Guest:And it's like, it's been three years.
Guest:I don't think we're bringing it back.
Guest:And we decided between COVID and the demand for it that it was time to bring it back.
Guest:It's definitely... It's a political podcast, but more than that, it's an activist podcast.
Guest:I mean, we certainly...
Guest:You know, we don't have politicians on as much as we have people that are working on the ground who are organizers, academics.
Guest:You know, what's cool about it is that we can talk about something like gerrymandering, which we did in one of the first seasons.
Guest:And that can be used in like college classes and high school classes, which wasn't the intention.
Guest:Or we could just be like, you know, goofing around like, you know, we did with like Hasan Minhaj or...
Guest:You know, Asif Manvi.
Guest:We're having Alana Glazer on soon.
Guest:Like, you know, the cool thing about the podcast is that we're able to be light, be ourselves.
Guest:I mean, we're great friends.
Guest:So that definitely lubricates the thing.
Guest:And still be able to talk about stuff that maybe would have been seen as wonky otherwise.
Guest:And it's forward moving like it's not really this isn't a what are the Republicans think address both sides.
Guest:No, it's a podcast with a very clear agenda to it.
Marc:And also at this point, you know, people need to, you know, people are isolated and they feel alone.
Marc:They feel crazy.
Marc:And, you know, those, you know, your voices and.
Marc:Your ability to see things, the 2 a.m., be light, be heavy, kind of run the gamut of emotions, be funny.
Marc:It's very helpful to people who are not able to get out much anymore.
Guest:Also, I mean, I think it's a very good friendship, and I think that's really what drives it, too.
Guest:It's like these two friends who care about the same things.
Guest:who are both comedians who have this incredible dynamic and who are very inquisitive and very thoughtful.
Guest:I mean, I think that's part of what drives it.
Guest:And also, I mean, Kamau and I used to be on the phone and we'd have these amazing calls.
Guest:I'm like, this should be a podcast.
Guest:And that's kind of what we want this thing to be.
Guest:We want that except with a bunch of brilliant people also teaching us stuff.
Marc:Great.
Marc:Well, I'm excited that you got it back up.
Marc:And I look forward to the new hour about depression and anxiety.
Marc:Thanks.
Guest:I'm glad that we did some workshopping today.
Guest:I haven't been on stage in a long time.
Guest:So that was good.
Guest:That was good.
Guest:You tagged it, man.
Guest:Real good tag out of that.
Guest:Thanks.
Guest:Thanks, Mark.
Guest:One quick thing.
Guest:I just want to say that I love my father very much.
Guest:And the man worked very hard.
Guest:And in case he's listening to this, and he will be, Dad, I love you.
Guest:You're a good dad.
Guest:You're going to be a great grandfather.
Guest:And I just want you to know that.
Guest:Nice.
Guest:That's all.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:You might want to maybe call him, too, give him a heads up.
Guest:mom i don't mom you're a very strong person i don't want to make it sound like you were purely a victim of fate that didn't have your own autonomy uh you absolutely do have your own autonomy uh but i do think the weepy immigrant story sells better mom and you know that good so i'm glad you got me maybe i'll do that uh with my parents if i can figure out some nice things to say
Marc:Do you like the cop-out deconstruction at the end of this interview?
Marc:No, I think it's a great closer.
Marc:And I think that's how you're going to close your anxiety depression show.
Guest:Do you think Stuart Lee will like it?
Marc:Because ultimately that's what this is about.
Marc:I think he'll like it if you're going to have to pace it a little slower and more deliberately.
Marc:Okay.
Marc:Take care, buddy.
Guest:Thank you, Mark.
Marc:Yeah, it's great to see you.
Marc:Take care, man.
Marc:All right, that was Hari.
Marc:Again, the podcast, Politically Reactive, with Hari and W. Kamau Bell.
Marc:You can get that.
Marc:It's back.
Marc:You can get that where you get podcasts.
Marc:It's special on Netflix.
Marc:Warn Your Relatives is up, and his documentary, The Problem with Apu, is now on HBO Max.
Marc:Now enjoy the failed butter cake blues.
The Problem with Apu
guitar solo
guitar solo
Marc:Boomer Monkey La Fonda.
Marc:Live.