Episode 1588 - Mo Mandel

Episode 1588 • Released November 4, 2024 • Speakers detected

00:00:00Marc:All right, let's do this.

00:00:10Marc:How are you?

00:00:11Marc:What the fuckers?

00:00:12Marc:What the fuck buddies?

00:00:13Marc:What the fuck nicks?

00:00:15Marc:What's happening?

00:00:15Marc:I'm Mark Maron.

00:00:16Marc:This is my podcast.

00:00:17Marc:Welcome to it.

00:00:19Marc:How are you feeling?

00:00:21Marc:It's not a great feeling, whatever this feeling is today in relation to tomorrow.

00:00:27Marc:Look, I voted for Kamala in the primaries in 2020.

00:00:30Marc:I've been a big fan for a long time.

00:00:33Marc:And I like her.

00:00:34Marc:I like what she represents.

00:00:36Marc:I like the impact she could have and does have on the culture of this country and the way she represents this country.

00:00:45Marc:So obviously, I'm going to vote for her.

00:00:48Marc:Now, I don't know what your family looks like or what you're doing or who you are, but just go vote.

00:00:58Marc:And don't be swayed or frightened by these pseudo-libertarian, nihilistic chaos junkies or these neo-Nazi fucks or these burn-it-all-down lefties.

00:01:13Marc:Just think about...

00:01:16Marc:The quality of life that you want to have and that you want your family to have.

00:01:22Marc:And I do think I heard someone else talking about it's not a bad time to, you know, today, if there's still people in your world that, you know, have not voted.

00:01:34Marc:I don't know how they could still be on the fence, but I mean, it is a good time to make a case for fucking sanity and for, you know, a future in this country that is tolerant and embracing of others.

00:01:49Marc:It's still possible.

00:01:52Marc:I don't know how anyone justifies or rationalizes.

00:01:56Marc:Putting a criminal, mentally ill person in office who is a complete narcissistic chaos junkie.

00:02:07Marc:I mean, it's just insanity.

00:02:09Marc:It's going to be insane anyways.

00:02:10Marc:I'm sure this thing is not going to be figured out for days, weeks.

00:02:15Marc:Who the fuck knows?

00:02:16Marc:And whatever it's looking like, that's going to cause insanity.

00:02:19Marc:But I can guarantee you.

00:02:22Marc:If Trump gets in office again, the chaos and the damage that is going to happen in weeks is going to be irretractable.

00:02:34Marc:You know, whatever he's planning and his minions and his apparat checks and his stooges and his grifting colleagues, it's just going to wreak havoc on the system.

00:02:43Marc:It's going to bust it.

00:02:44Marc:It's going to make...

00:02:45Marc:Life in this country, insane and unbearable for millions of people.

00:02:51Marc:If he tries to initiate massive deportations in the first week, just the chaos and pain it's going to cause for what?

00:03:01Marc:I mean, do you have people in your family or do you know people that thrive on that?

00:03:06Marc:I mean, I don't know how we've gotten so disconnected from a basic sort of compassion or sympathy that

00:03:13Marc:For people we don't know and people that are struggling, it's mind-blowing.

00:03:19Marc:I think that people have voluntarily disrupted their ability to have a conscience, to have empathy, to see other people as people.

00:03:29Marc:A lot of it has to do with the steady stream of garbage and propaganda they dump into their brains on a daily basis.

00:03:34Marc:Because I would imagine most people, if you're just driving down the street or you're just living your life or you're walking to the store or whatever the fuck you're doing—

00:03:43Marc:If it's quiet and you've got the equipment turned off, what does your life really look like?

00:03:48Marc:What are you reacting to?

00:03:51Marc:Just stuff that's being dumped into your fucking head from your phone.

00:03:55Marc:But look, I'm not talking.

00:03:57Marc:I know that most of my people here, I'm preaching to the choir to a certain degree.

00:04:02Marc:But just know, and if you need to make it more known or take a shot at it, I know a lot of people have written off people in their family already and that they're just, they're lost.

00:04:11Marc:And look, I've seen narcissists unravel before.

00:04:15Marc:And really what's usually at the core of it, when a narcissist is losing his grip on his ability to see himself as all important, when that comes unraveled, what's at the core of a narcissist is something that,

00:04:30Marc:Very young, very damaged, and usually all it can say is, fuck you.

00:04:36Marc:And I just, I cannot understand what kind of damage people come from to sort of justify or rationalize, you know, voting for really a monster.

00:04:49Marc:I mean, the funniest thing that happened at that rally in Madison Square Garden, the funniest thing was not, you know, Tony Hinchcliffe bombing or whatever comedy he was doing.

00:05:03Marc:The funniest thing in that rally, a speaker called Kamala Harris the Antichrist.

00:05:09Marc:Seriously.

00:05:11Marc:Seriously said she's the Antichrist.

00:05:15Marc:That's fucking hilarious.

00:05:18Marc:That's like that's like Trump calling Democrats fascists.

00:05:23Marc:And I've said this before, and I don't believe this shit, but I'm a fan of a good fairy tale or of a good story.

00:05:29Marc:But we have never seen a politician that more closely resembles the Antichrist than this fucking guy.

00:05:41Marc:I know you think he's funny, you think he's kind of a belligerent asshole that just speaks his mind.

00:05:49Marc:But I'm telling you, as a prince of chaos...

00:05:53Marc:This guy is going to wreak so much fucking havoc on this fucking country and people's lives when they're just scrambling to deport hundreds of thousands of people, millions of people.

00:06:04Marc:They're firing all the federal government employees who operate on a nonpartisan level.

00:06:10Marc:They're just going to have to scramble to find enough stooges and fucking acolytes to fill these jobs with no experience of anything.

00:06:19Marc:The cabinet that he's thinking about are just a bunch of fucking...

00:06:23Marc:Whack jobs, grifters.

00:06:26Marc:It's just like, it's a joke.

00:06:30Marc:The joke is on us.

00:06:31Marc:It's a cosmic fucking joke.

00:06:35Marc:The kind of language that these fuckers are using in terms of who the libs are, who the Democrats are, who the woke people are, they're using the language of annihilation.

00:06:49Marc:And I know that there's so much going on to fill your brain with just on a day-to-day basis that it doesn't seem real or that they would never do that.

00:07:03Marc:But I mean, I think it's important to understand that

00:07:07Marc:They have done that in other places, in other periods of history over and over and over again.

00:07:16Marc:Just slaughtered people who didn't agree with them and the ones that saw the slaughter who didn't agree with them learned to shut the fuck up.

00:07:25Marc:And that's really how fascism or authoritarianism works.

00:07:30Marc:You can't kill everybody because you need somebody to run the fucking place.

00:07:34Marc:So you kill a few as an example.

00:07:37Marc:Just the possibilities are fucking horrendous.

00:07:41Marc:And we can no longer say it can't happen here because we're on the precipice of something truly awful.

00:07:49Marc:Or truly relieving and at least with the possibility of maintaining a way of life that is relatively democratic and at least tolerant of all people.

00:08:05Marc:But I do think that you should encourage people to vote for Kamala Harris.

00:08:13Marc:By all means.

00:08:16Marc:And if they're on the fence or they're going to not vote or going to throw away their vote as a protest vote, no one gives a fuck about your protest.

00:08:24Marc:Try to save the fucking country.

00:08:26Marc:Will you?

00:08:29Marc:Today on this show, I'm going to talk to Mo Mandel.

00:08:31Marc:He's a comic.

00:08:32Marc:I've known him for a few years.

00:08:33Marc:I've always thought he was kind of a character.

00:08:36Marc:And I don't know.

00:08:37Marc:It's one of those things where it's like, hey, why don't I talk to that guy?

00:08:40Marc:He was a regular on Chelsea lately and the creator of the show Comedy Knockout on TruTV.

00:08:45Marc:He's got a new special on YouTube called Mo Mandel, Trying to Make It.

00:08:50Marc:So that's going to happen.

00:08:51Marc:I'll be back on tour starting in January.

00:08:53Marc:I don't know what the world will look like or what the nature of that tour will be, depending on, you know, whether it's going to be a terrifying hellscape or something at least, you know, moving in the right direction for sure.

00:09:07Marc:But I'll be in Sacramento, California.

00:09:09Marc:at the Crest Theater on Friday, January 10th.

00:09:11Marc:Napa, California at the Uptown Theater on Saturday, January 11th.

00:09:15Marc:I'm in Fort Collins, Colorado at Lincoln Center Performance Hall on Friday, January 17th.

00:09:20Marc:Boulder, Colorado at the Boulder Theater on Saturday, January 18th.

00:09:25Marc:Santa Barbara, California at the Lobero Theater on Thursday, January 30th.

00:09:29Marc:San Luis Obispo, California at the Fremont Center on Friday, January 31st.

00:09:34Marc:And Monterey, California at the Golden State Theater on Saturday, February 1st.

00:09:39Marc:So you can go to WTF pod dot com slash tour for all of my dates and links for upcoming shows.

00:09:45Marc:I don't know.

00:09:46Marc:I guess I'll talk to you Thursday about whatever the hell fucking happened or what is still happening or what might be happening for the rest of our fucking lives.

00:09:55Marc:OK, look, Mo Mandel.

00:09:57Marc:has got a new comedy special called Mo Mandel, Trying to Make It.

00:10:02Marc:It's available on YouTube.

00:10:04Marc:I like this guy.

00:10:05Marc:We've never had this long a conversation.

00:10:08Marc:I didn't really know him going in, and I'd assumed a lot of things that were not even true.

00:10:13Marc:You know, you think you know a guy, but this turned out to be a fun and interesting conversation.

00:10:18Marc:This is me and Mo Mandel.

00:10:24Mo Mandel

00:10:28Marc:So, all right, Mo, do we have a problem?

00:10:31Marc:We don't have a problem.

00:10:32Guest:Do me and you have a problem?

00:10:33Guest:No problems.

00:10:34Guest:I mean, I'm here, so I guess we don't.

00:10:36Guest:I'm surprised to be here.

00:10:37Guest:I didn't think I would be.

00:10:39Guest:Why?

00:10:40Guest:I don't know.

00:10:40Guest:I just, I talked to you in the hallway of the comedy store, you know, for years, but it never goes anywhere.

00:10:46Guest:It's fast.

00:10:48Guest:You're nice, but you don't, like, you don't ever, like, I don't know.

00:10:52Marc:It was funny.

00:10:53Marc:Here's my impressions of you.

00:10:58Marc:No, no.

00:10:59Marc:I mean, like, I was like, well, he's sort of a burly Jew, that guy.

00:11:03Marc:Right.

00:11:04Marc:You know, he's kind of got the, he's like, I break Jews into, you know, there's the professor, kind of a symphony composer Jew.

00:11:16Marc:And then there are the sort of like the workers.

00:11:19Right.

00:11:19Marc:I'm a worker too.

00:11:22Guest:You're calling me like from the pale.

00:11:25Guest:That's right.

00:11:25Guest:My wife's grandmother's from Austria, she was, and my wife said she would always look down on pale Jews like myself from the Eastern European.

00:11:34Guest:The German Jews were the worst.

00:11:35Guest:Yeah.

00:11:35Guest:Yeah, no, you're like a James Caan Jew.

00:11:38Guest:That's so funny you say that, because I've always heard I look like James Caan from The Godfather.

00:11:41Guest:Yeah.

00:11:42Guest:And then I auditioned to play James Caan in that movie.

00:11:44Guest:I didn't get it, so I was like, well, I guess you still have to be a good actor.

00:11:47Guest:Yeah.

00:11:48Marc:Well, that's the other thing.

00:11:49Marc:I knew you were loud, and I knew that you definitely took hold of the stage.

00:11:54Marc:And I think when I met you, it was one of those things where...

00:11:56Marc:I think you had been cast in that Jay Moore show.

00:11:59Marc:Was that it with Al Magical?

00:12:00Marc:What was the show with Al Magical?

00:12:01Guest:It was Hank Azaria.

00:12:02Guest:Hank Azaria.

00:12:02Guest:I know exactly the moment you're going to reflect.

00:12:04Guest:I'm so glad you brought this up because I've been angry at Al for this moment for a long time.

00:12:08Guest:What moment was that?

00:12:08Marc:Please go on because I know what you're going to say.

00:12:10Marc:No, I've been in this business long enough.

00:12:14Marc:To where I got the sense where, you know, when you got that, there was part of you that's sort of like, I'm in.

00:12:20Marc:I'm doing it.

00:12:21Marc:This is it.

00:12:23Marc:And then I just watched it go away.

00:12:24Marc:And I'm like, well, he's got to do comedy now.

00:12:27Guest:Oh, man.

00:12:27Guest:What was the Al moment?

00:12:29Guest:So one time, well, I got to also tell you, though, the first time I ever heard of you.

00:12:34Guest:Yeah.

00:12:34Guest:But I do remember seeing you at Moshe Kasher's house.

00:12:37Guest:Oh, yeah.

00:12:38Guest:And Al introduced me to you as, here's Mo Mandel.

00:12:43Guest:He's from San Francisco.

00:12:44Guest:He's got a lot of stuff in the industry right away.

00:12:47Guest:And everyone up there is like resentful about it.

00:12:49Guest:And I was like, why would you introduce me like that?

00:12:52Guest:I don't, first of all, that's not how I've seen myself.

00:12:55Guest:I feel like I've done like a million open mics.

00:12:57Guest:I've like been, I was like a bartender, a barista.

00:13:00Marc:Wow, he just took a shot at you right in

00:13:01Guest:front of me yeah right in front of you and i was like thanks al mark will hate me forever now because who likes that guy i mean it was just like that's not but it's also funny how like i didn't start comedy with al so he didn't even he wasn't even around you were a little after him i was yeah after him so it was like it's not like he was like so i don't know when he said that i was like oh that's such a fucking san francisco thing dude yeah because when i got to san francisco in

00:13:25Marc:Fucking 94, 93, 94.

00:13:28Marc:For some reason, me and Patton Oswalt and Blaine Kapatch all showed up within weeks of each other.

00:13:34Marc:And by that time, the scene had been decimated because everyone moved to L.A.

00:13:40Marc:And, you know, there was the people that were left up there were very specific.

00:13:44Marc:You know, like Carlos Alzaraki, Johnny Steele, Proops was still around.

00:13:49Marc:But all the big hitters had gone away.

00:13:52Marc:And it kind of, maybe, I guess it went through a renaissance.

00:13:56Marc:I don't know.

00:13:56Marc:But when I got there, it was always sort of like, that's a comedy city.

00:14:01Marc:I was there when the Holy City Zoo was on its last legs.

00:14:04Guest:That's why I moved there is because I was starting, I was a creative writing major in college.

00:14:08Guest:Where?

00:14:09Guest:UC Santa Barbara, this little teeny college within a college called College of Creative Studies.

00:14:13Guest:Okay.

00:14:13Guest:Is that all you could get into?

00:14:17Guest:I barely got in.

00:14:19Guest:I mean, yes, you're right.

00:14:20Guest:So I was there and I decided I wanted to go into stand-up.

00:14:24Guest:I hit up Arge Barker.

00:14:27Guest:Yeah, Arge, yeah.

00:14:28Guest:Who I had seen doing the marijuana logs in Santa Barbara.

00:14:31Guest:That's the only reason I never heard of him.

00:14:32Guest:Oh, yeah?

00:14:33Marc:Yeah.

00:14:33Marc:Oh, that's right.

00:14:34Marc:They had a thing.

00:14:34Marc:It was him and Tony Kameen.

00:14:36Marc:And Doug Benson.

00:14:37Marc:And Benson.

00:14:38Marc:That was a big deal for a while.

00:14:40Marc:Yeah.

00:14:41Guest:It was hilarious.

00:14:42Guest:Yeah.

00:14:42Guest:It was right when the vagina monologue was like a thing.

00:14:44Guest:Yeah.

00:14:45Guest:So anyway, I asked Al, I mean, Arge, I hit him up.

00:14:48Guest:I was like, where should I move?

00:14:49Guest:I want to go into stand-up.

00:14:49Guest:And he's like, San Francisco, that's the place to start.

00:14:52Guest:Yeah.

00:14:52Guest:And that was it?

00:14:54Guest:Well, I took a detour to England for six months, but yeah.

00:14:56Guest:After college?

00:14:57Guest:Yeah, I had a girlfriend.

00:14:58Guest:This is complicated, but I had a girlfriend from the Bahamas that I met while doing a study abroad in England.

00:15:02Guest:Yeah.

00:15:03Guest:I thought I was going to marry her, so I moved back to England, lived in a dorm room with her illegally while she was finishing school, and started doing open mics in London.

00:15:10Guest:In London?

00:15:10Guest:Yeah.

00:15:11Guest:What was that like?

00:15:12Guest:Well, my first one I did at the Comedy Store in London.

00:15:15Guest:I know that place.

00:15:16Guest:And it was the gong show.

00:15:17Guest:It's hard.

00:15:18Guest:Hard.

00:15:18Guest:Yeah.

00:15:19Guest:So the gong show is like you have to go up and they gong you off if they don't want you on there.

00:15:23Guest:Yeah.

00:15:24Guest:So I go up there.

00:15:24Guest:This is right when America's bringing England to the Iraq War.

00:15:27Guest:Yeah.

00:15:28Guest:And I took the bus up from Brighton or the train.

00:15:30Guest:It took me the whole thing to go up there because I'm like an hour away.

00:15:32Guest:And I go, hey, what's up?

00:15:34Guest:Gong.

00:15:34Guest:They heard my accent.

00:15:35Guest:They just bombed me off.

00:15:36Guest:That was it.

00:15:36Guest:Over.

00:15:36Guest:You sons of bitches.

00:15:37Guest:Yeah.

00:15:38Guest:And I did it to like a Scottish guy.

00:15:39Guest:So I'm like, all right, they're just assholes.

00:15:40Guest:That was it?

00:15:42Guest:And then I did other ones too.

00:15:43Marc:That's a hard audience though.

00:15:45Marc:Oh yeah, it was not easy.

00:15:46Marc:For Americans and just in general, very vocal?

00:15:50Guest:Very vocal.

00:15:51Guest:And I lied about having a career in America to get on stage at a real club before I left.

00:15:56Guest:And it was awesome.

00:15:57Guest:Somehow the chutzpah and just the adrenaline, I got through it.

00:16:00Guest:But it was really cool.

00:16:01Guest:Everybody was smoking cigarettes in the club at that time.

00:16:04Guest:But where did you grow up?

00:16:06Guest:I grew up in the woods in a little place called Boonville, California.

00:16:09Guest:Boonville?

00:16:10Guest:It's in Mendocino County.

00:16:12Guest:Oh, my God.

00:16:12Guest:Like, what is that near?

00:16:14Guest:What's the city?

00:16:15Guest:It's about two and a half hours north of San Francisco.

00:16:17Guest:Holy shit.

00:16:18Guest:No Jews.

00:16:19Guest:Basically no Jews.

00:16:20Guest:No body.

00:16:21Guest:Not a lot of bodies, a lot of pot fields.

00:16:23Marc:It was just like.

00:16:24Marc:It's so pretty up there, man.

00:16:25Marc:When I lived in San Francisco to drive up to Point Reyes and shit.

00:16:29Guest:Oh, yeah.

00:16:29Guest:So I'm not.

00:16:30Guest:Well, yeah, I'm farther than that.

00:16:31Guest:But yeah.

00:16:31Guest:No, no.

00:16:32Guest:I get it.

00:16:32Guest:But like, why up there?

00:16:33Guest:So my parents are both from New York City.

00:16:35Guest:My dad's from the Bronx.

00:16:36Guest:My mom's from Brooklyn.

00:16:38Guest:Both Jews?

00:16:39Guest:Both Jews.

00:16:39Guest:I always heard you on one of your episodes talking about your percentage of Ashkenazi.

00:16:43Guest:Oh, yeah, high.

00:16:43Guest:Mine's real high.

00:16:45Guest:Yeah, mine's like 99.

00:16:46Guest:Yeah, like 97, 98.

00:16:48Marc:I did that show, Finding Your Roots.

00:16:50Marc:Oh, you did?

00:16:50Marc:And they were able to track back my dad's line into Belarus, into Palo Settlement, further back than they'd ever tracked a Jew.

00:16:59Marc:Wow.

00:16:59Marc:Yeah, it tracked it back to like a Jewish tailor with, you know, a Hebrew name.

00:17:03Guest:Okay, so I got to tell you this story with 23 of me and Jewish percentages.

00:17:07Guest:One time we went to this free Yom Kippur service with my wife.

00:17:12Guest:Where is this?

00:17:13Guest:It was at the Laugh Factory.

00:17:14Guest:Okay.

00:17:14Guest:You know how the Laugh Factory would do like free Rosh Hashanah?

00:17:17Guest:I never go in there.

00:17:17Guest:Yeah.

00:17:18Guest:So anyway, this rabbi, this is a long time ago, so I don't know.

00:17:20Guest:Maybe he's gotten there.

00:17:21Guest:You're trying to make connections.

00:17:22Guest:Maybe he's gotten there.

00:17:22Guest:No, just like I didn't want to pay for services.

00:17:24Guest:Like where I grew up, it was like in the woods.

00:17:26Guest:They were just lucky if any Jewish people from any county showed up.

00:17:29Guest:You'd have to pay to go there.

00:17:30Guest:Yeah, yeah.

00:17:30Guest:We didn't even have a synagogue.

00:17:32Guest:Yeah.

00:17:32Guest:So for a while.

00:17:34Guest:Anyway, so we were watching this rabbi.

00:17:35Guest:He was so bad and he was talking about, you know, he was trying to tell a story about how Jewish perseverance.

00:17:42Guest:Yeah.

00:17:42Guest:And he was like, I was talking to a woman and she said, I'm 100% Jewish.

00:17:45Guest:Everyone in my family is married a Jew, you know, through all the generations.

00:17:49Guest:And I asked her, the rabbi says, I asked her, I said, what percentage are you Jewish?

00:17:54Guest:And she said, I looked at my thing, 98%.

00:17:55Guest:And he goes, and I had to explain to this woman that if everyone's married Jews and you're 98% Jewish, someone was raped.

00:18:03Guest:Yeah.

00:18:03Guest:And the crowd just got dead silent.

00:18:05Guest:I'm like, what?

00:18:06Yeah.

00:18:07Guest:And he just like it was like what I don't know what he thought was the response.

00:18:11Guest:It just bombed.

00:18:12Guest:And then he's like, but but Jews persevere.

00:18:15Guest:And that's the point of that.

00:18:17Marc:Well, I mean, I had hoped when I did the 23andMe that there was an outside chance.

00:18:24Marc:That the Vikings had come down into Poland.

00:18:28Marc:Yeah.

00:18:28Marc:And at some point injected a little bit of Viking DNA into me.

00:18:33Marc:But it didn't didn't pan out.

00:18:35Guest:Yeah.

00:18:35Marc:Like, yeah, no, I did the 23andMe and then it was reconfirmed on the on the Finding Your Roots.

00:18:42Marc:It's just all Ashkenaz, which I'm happy about.

00:18:46Guest:I, I, um, yeah, I mean, my wife's half Jewish.

00:18:49Guest:I mean, she is, you know, her dad converted or whatever.

00:18:51Guest:So her mom's Jewish.

00:18:53Guest:Her mom's Jewish.

00:18:53Guest:She's Jewish.

00:18:54Guest:Way too Jewish.

00:18:55Marc:She's Jewish.

00:18:56Marc:I tell a story about like, you know, that, uh, uh, that Orthodox supply store next to canners, like right across from canners on the same side of the street.

00:19:05Marc:It's just all whatever, you know, that stuff, Hasidic supplies.

00:19:09Marc:Yeah.

00:19:09Marc:And I walked in there because there was a lot going on.

00:19:11Marc:It was late at night.

00:19:12Marc:And it was pre, it was before one of the holidays that regular Jews don't know about.

00:19:16Marc:You needed some sort of ritual equipment, but it was just, boom, it was hopping in there.

00:19:21Marc:And I'm like, I want to go in there and see what's going on.

00:19:23Marc:And I walk in, there's a guy like, you know, just right at a fiddler, you know, just like gray pace that had little beardies, shorties hunched over.

00:19:31Marc:And I'm like, what do you got going on in this place?

00:19:33Marc:And he looks at me and goes, he's your wish.

00:19:37Marc:You Jewish?

00:19:38Marc:I'm like, yes, I am.

00:19:39Guest:Okay.

00:19:40Marc:I'm like, wow, full phlegm.

00:19:42Guest:Yeah, if you're like that phlegm, you're at least 99% Ashkenaz.

00:19:46Marc:But, like, you know, you seem to have fared pretty well.

00:19:48Marc:I think we did all right with our looks for 99% Ashkenaz.

00:19:52Guest:Yeah, it's a lot.

00:19:53Guest:I mean, it's funny you say that, though, about, like,

00:19:56Guest:Well, that area in particular of the Cantors, because my cousin is a comedian.

00:20:02Guest:Sue Kalinsky is my cousin.

00:20:03Marc:Oh, fuck.

00:20:03Marc:I know Sue forever.

00:20:05Marc:Yeah.

00:20:05Guest:And she used to have.

00:20:05Marc:She's a cousin.

00:20:07Marc:Yeah.

00:20:07Marc:Second cousin.

00:20:07Marc:I fucking go back to New York with her.

00:20:09Marc:She's my generation.

00:20:10Marc:Yeah.

00:20:11Marc:Yeah.

00:20:11Marc:I mean, like she was.

00:20:12Marc:I just saw her.

00:20:13Marc:I guess I think I probably saw her at Silver Friedman's funeral.

00:20:16Marc:Bud's wife.

00:20:18Marc:Oh, right, right, right.

00:20:18Marc:But I hadn't seen her in years.

00:20:20Marc:Yeah, she was funny.

00:20:21Guest:Oh, yeah.

00:20:21Guest:She used to have this joke about that area.

00:20:23Guest:She's like, it's weird because it's like, you know, it's all Hasidic Jewish places.

00:20:26Guest:And then it's punk rock.

00:20:27Guest:There's like tattoo parlors.

00:20:29Guest:Yeah, yeah.

00:20:29Guest:I wonder if there's ever an intersection where like a guy walks in.

00:20:32Guest:Hey, can you turn this nine into a smile?

00:20:36Marc:An old guy.

00:20:38Marc:It's pretty dark.

00:20:39Guest:I like it.

00:20:40Marc:Very good.

00:20:41Marc:I like it.

00:20:42Marc:So you're up there in the woods.

00:20:43Marc:Yeah.

00:20:43Marc:Wait, so, like, you're going to tell me that Kalinsky's knowing that, like, I know how Jewish families work, where you get to, like, you know, you have a cousin.

00:20:51Guest:Yeah, no, that's how it was.

00:20:53Guest:You know, we would grow up- You had a cousin who was a comedian in New York.

00:20:56Guest:Right.

00:20:56Guest:You had that?

00:20:57Guest:Yeah.

00:20:57Guest:Yeah, we would watch her on, you know, the old- Caroline's Comedy Hour.

00:21:02Guest:Yeah, we didn't have cable or anything.

00:21:03Guest:So we would always like, we have like two channels that we can get in the woods.

00:21:06Guest:And so we would watch like a VHS and like, here's your cousin on the Bob Hope special.

00:21:11Guest:Yeah.

00:21:12Guest:But that must have planted a seed.

00:21:13Guest:Yeah, for sure.

00:21:14Guest:It was really cool.

00:21:14Guest:I mean, I always wanted to be a writer.

00:21:16Guest:I really wanted to be like Raymond Carver or Hemingway.

00:21:20Marc:That's why you did the-

00:21:21Marc:What did you write?

00:21:24Marc:You went to writing school.

00:21:25Guest:Yeah, yeah, yeah.

00:21:26Guest:I wrote a novel.

00:21:27Guest:You wrote a novel?

00:21:28Marc:Yeah.

00:21:28Guest:When did you do that?

00:21:28Guest:I didn't quite finish it, but it was in college.

00:21:30Guest:Still not finished?

00:21:31Guest:No, and I went back and read it, and I was so obsessed with like the beat writers.

00:21:35Guest:Yeah, of course.

00:21:36Guest:You know, free association.

00:21:39Guest:Not only do I not quite understand the emotion that I had at like 20 years old.

00:21:43Guest:Yeah.

00:21:43Guest:I don't understand what I'm even saying half the time.

00:21:46Guest:It's like these long flowing sentences and passionate things.

00:21:50Guest:It is, you know, it's all this sexuality and just like, just emotions.

00:21:55Guest:I don't even feel it's so weird.

00:21:57Guest:And, and, and I'm just like, God, I kind of missed that guy, but I'm really glad I'm not that guy.

00:22:01Marc:How much of a beat Nick freak were you?

00:22:02Marc:Cause I was pretty dug in, you know, with those guys.

00:22:06Guest:Yeah.

00:22:07Marc:Like I, uh,

00:22:08Marc:I went to Kerouac's grave when I was in college up in Lowell.

00:22:13Marc:You know, left some booze.

00:22:15Marc:But I was like, I really, I was a big kind of like nerd for that shit.

00:22:20Guest:Oh, yeah.

00:22:21Guest:I'm not like that.

00:22:22Guest:I don't ever get into like culture like that.

00:22:24Guest:Like where I like would go visit his grave or whatever.

00:22:26Guest:I don't usually either.

00:22:27Guest:But like I was dug in with those guys.

00:22:29Guest:Oh, I love them.

00:22:30Guest:And I had this teacher in college who said he was coming up.

00:22:32Guest:at a publishing house.

00:22:34Guest:And he remembers Kerouac coming in right towards the end, like drunk with a crate of old manuscripts trying to sell them.

00:22:41Guest:Oh, where?

00:22:41Guest:In Boston?

00:22:42Guest:In like, yeah, New York or Boston.

00:22:43Guest:He was just like, I got this one.

00:22:45Guest:It was just like, just really.

00:22:47Guest:It got very sad.

00:22:48Guest:I mean, he died so young.

00:22:49Guest:It's crazy.

00:22:49Marc:But he drank himself to death.

00:22:51Marc:He turned on his legacy in a way.

00:22:53Marc:He became very closed-minded.

00:22:56Marc:He became very sort of of that town, Lowell, in the bad way.

00:23:01Marc:And his last wife, Stella, I think her name was maybe...

00:23:05Marc:had a brother, George, who ended up with the estate.

00:23:09Marc:And I kind of knew his, it was like a nephew.

00:23:14Marc:I kind of knew the guy who ended up with the estate, young guy, to try to keep getting juice out of it, you know.

00:23:22Marc:But yeah, but like who were, like what were you reading?

00:23:25Marc:Like how did you get turned on to that?

00:23:26Guest:I don't know.

00:23:27Guest:I just, like, well, On the Road, and then I read, like, you know, just, like, you know, all of his books, really.

00:23:33Marc:Were you into all of them?

00:23:34Marc:Berlinghetti, Ginsburg, Burroughs?

00:23:36Guest:Did you go the whole nine yards?

00:23:39Guest:Burroughs, Neil Cassidy, of course.

00:23:40Guest:Me and my friend were just, like, we just thought he was the coolest guy ever.

00:23:43Guest:Yeah.

00:23:44Guest:And then I read a bunch of characters.

00:23:46Guest:They're all nowhere near as good as On the Road.

00:23:48Guest:That's the problem.

00:23:48Guest:Like, there's a big, steep drop-off, I think.

00:23:50Marc:I think some people think that, you know, that straight ahead novel, I think it was called The Town and the Country, was kind of a great novel.

00:24:00Marc:But it was different.

00:24:01Marc:It wasn't as stylized.

00:24:02Marc:I think some people, I don't know, Dharma Bums is pretty good.

00:24:04Marc:Dharma Bums is good.

00:24:05Guest:Yeah.

00:24:06Guest:Yeah, I don't know.

00:24:07Guest:I was just like, I mean, this is a long time ago.

00:24:08Guest:I was obsessed with him.

00:24:09Guest:I read a lot of Japanese fiction, actually.

00:24:12Guest:I got turned on to this Japanese fiction professor in college, and he got me into like all these great writers in Japanese fiction.

00:24:20Guest:I mean, it's so weird because I don't read ever anymore.

00:24:21Marc:But so you're growing up in the woods, but why are your parents in the woods?

00:24:25Guest:So they met in San Francisco.

00:24:27Guest:Well, no, they met at SUNY Buffalo.

00:24:28Guest:My dad was in medical school.

00:24:29Guest:He met my mom there, and they moved out to San Francisco in the summer of love.

00:24:32Guest:Hippy-dippy stuff.

00:24:33Guest:Lived in a dome, a commune dome in the Oakland Hills.

00:24:36Guest:So they met in the late 60s.

00:24:39Guest:Yeah, I guess.

00:24:39Marc:Yeah, or the mid to late 60s, and everything was changing.

00:24:42Marc:Yeah.

00:24:43Marc:And so they got on board.

00:24:45Marc:They got on board big time.

00:24:47Marc:And they moved to the heart of it.

00:24:48Marc:The heart of it.

00:24:49Guest:San Francisco.

00:24:50Guest:They went to Altamont.

00:24:50Guest:I mean, they've been it.

00:24:51Guest:They went to Altamont?

00:24:52Guest:They were at Altamont on acid.

00:24:54Marc:That must have been horrendous.

00:24:56Marc:Horrifying.

00:24:58Marc:I mean, I've read books on it, dude.

00:24:59Marc:Yeah.

00:25:00Marc:Yeah.

00:25:00Marc:I mean, I...

00:25:02Marc:that that movie right so yeah give me shelter yeah so i read um i read joel uh selvin's book on altamont and it's fucking mind-blowing that more horrible things didn't happen it was a shit show it is actually it's a good point only one person died and you

00:25:20Marc:Well, there were some other ones, but it wasn't the guy who got stabbed by the angels.

00:25:23Marc:But there's a couple other like connected deaths from car issues and whatever.

00:25:27Marc:But yeah, there was no bathrooms.

00:25:30Marc:They had not prepared for that many people.

00:25:32Marc:There was no fucking place to park.

00:25:34Marc:It was like the fire festival on steroids.

00:25:36Marc:Totally.

00:25:36Marc:And the stage was like two feet high.

00:25:39Marc:Like it was crazy.

00:25:40Marc:The whole thing, you got to read that fucking book.

00:25:42Marc:What'd your parents say about it?

00:25:44Guest:I mean, I was just like, yeah, it was horrifying.

00:25:45Guest:They took acid and they were there.

00:25:47Guest:Was it the bad acid?

00:25:49Guest:I didn't really get into it too much.

00:25:51Guest:I mean, I don't know.

00:25:52Guest:They just said it was fucking scary.

00:25:54Guest:I highly recommend that Joel Selvin book.

00:25:56Marc:Yeah, I'll have to check that out.

00:25:57Marc:He did his homework, you know, and really kind of built up how it happened.

00:26:01Marc:And a lot of it had to do with Jagger and Bill Graham not getting on board.

00:26:05Marc:The whole thing was fucking nuts.

00:26:08Marc:All right.

00:26:08Guest:So they're out here living in a dome.

00:26:10Guest:Yeah.

00:26:10Guest:They lived in a dome with a bunch of other families.

00:26:12Guest:Like it was called a Siler place.

00:26:15Guest:Was that a cult?

00:26:16Guest:Not a cult.

00:26:17Guest:They were just like commune, commune, real commune.

00:26:19Guest:Yeah.

00:26:19Guest:Okay.

00:26:20Guest:You know, uh, passing babies around to be breastfed by the various moms.

00:26:23Guest:Oh, you know, all that deal.

00:26:25Guest:I missed out on that good stuff.

00:26:26Guest:I wasn't born.

00:26:27Guest:My brother got a little of that.

00:26:28Guest:Oh yeah.

00:26:28Guest:How old's your brother?

00:26:29Guest:He's two years older than me.

00:26:30Guest:Oh, all right.

00:26:31Guest:So he got that good communal.

00:26:32Guest:How old are you?

00:26:33Guest:All right.

00:26:37Guest:Early 40s.

00:26:38Guest:What are you, a lady?

00:26:39Guest:Oh, I am a lady.

00:26:40Guest:I've noticed in my grays already, it's freaking me out.

00:26:42Guest:Really?

00:26:43Guest:Oh, yeah.

00:26:43Guest:Oh, what are you worried about, buddy?

00:26:45Guest:Because my dad's 80, and he has a great big afro.

00:26:47Marc:Well, you're not going to lose hair.

00:26:48Marc:I don't think I'm going to lose hair, thank God, hopefully.

00:26:50Marc:No, you have that hairline, that fucking never-ending hairline.

00:26:54Marc:He didn't go great until he was like 70.

00:26:56Marc:Now you're like, fuck.

00:26:57Marc:You get a few, what are you going to do?

00:26:59Marc:Like, I'm 60, and it's not total.

00:27:01Marc:It's coming, but it's not total.

00:27:02Guest:You know another reason I thought you didn't like me?

00:27:04Guest:Why?

00:27:04Guest:Because one time, because people, I post pictures of my dad, and everyone says, oh, your dad looks like Marc Maron.

00:27:09Guest:Yeah.

00:27:10Guest:And I told you that one time.

00:27:11Guest:I was like, he's probably like, oh, thanks.

00:27:13Guest:Yeah.

00:27:14Marc:Thanks for saying I look like an old Jew, you fuck.

00:27:16Marc:Believe me.

00:27:17Marc:No one's noticing that more than me.

00:27:19Marc:Like I watched some, they're doing a doc.

00:27:21Marc:I mean, I'm watching this footage.

00:27:23Marc:I'm like, I got to do something my hair do.

00:27:24Marc:Cause I just look like a crazy old Jew with that long ass hair with the grazing.

00:27:29Marc:I'm like, what am I doing?

00:27:30Marc:I love it.

00:27:31Marc:I love my hair now.

00:27:32Marc:It took me a long time to love it.

00:27:33Guest:Are you coloring it already?

00:27:34Guest:No, not coloring it, but I just hated the curl and the wildness of it when I was younger.

00:27:38Guest:And now I love it.

00:27:39Guest:The full Jew fro.

00:27:40Guest:Yeah.

00:27:40Guest:All right.

00:27:40Guest:So they're in a commie and your dad's practicing medicine.

00:27:43Marc:Uh, he's a psychiatrist.

00:27:45Marc:Uh,

00:27:45Marc:Oh, Jesus.

00:27:46Marc:All right.

00:27:46Marc:So he's a psychiatrist who's coming up during that era.

00:27:49Marc:Yeah.

00:27:49Guest:He studied real gestalt, R.D.

00:27:52Guest:Lange, all that shit.

00:27:53Guest:He's like, what was the guy he was in?

00:27:55Guest:This guy who built these boxes that you would go into.

00:27:58Guest:Skinner?

00:27:59Guest:Oregon boxes, I think.

00:28:00Guest:Oh, Oregon boxes.

00:28:01Guest:Wilhelm Reich.

00:28:02Guest:That was his guy.

00:28:03Marc:That was his guy.

00:28:03Marc:That was his guy, yeah.

00:28:05Marc:Yeah.

00:28:06Marc:Wilhelm Reich was trying to free the orgasm.

00:28:08Guest:Yeah.

00:28:09Marc:Oh, is that it?

00:28:10Marc:My dad cleaned it up when he explained it to me.

00:28:13Marc:Yeah.

00:28:13Marc:He was the core of the idea that Wilhelm Reich had.

00:28:17Marc:He did write, you know, he became kind of a lunatic.

00:28:21Marc:Like he created the Oregon Box and he discovered Oregon Energy.

00:28:26Marc:But at some point he ended up on the East Coast on, you know, with a compound and a school and this thing called the Cloud Buster.

00:28:33Marc:He was pretty sure he could change the weather with the Oregon thing.

00:28:36Marc:I would say bipolar.

00:28:37Marc:But he was kind of this renegade...

00:28:39Marc:uh, uh, protege of Freud's who his idea was like, well, Freud's right.

00:28:46Marc:And all of neurotic behavior comes from sexual rep repression.

00:28:50Marc:Let's, let's just unleash it.

00:28:52Marc:Just start fucking.

00:28:53Marc:Everybody should be fucking.

00:28:55Marc:And just like, you know, free the fucking Bach, free the dick.

00:28:58Marc:Free the pussy.

00:29:00Marc:Fuck.

00:29:00Marc:And no one will be neurotic anymore.

00:29:03Guest:This is not how my dad explained his thesis to me.

00:29:05Guest:And you're really opening my eyes up to things I've learned about my parents since I've gotten older.

00:29:11Guest:This makes a lot of sense.

00:29:12Guest:My dad was like, it's a box.

00:29:15Marc:Well, the box is different that, you know, Burroughs fucked around with the box and, you know, it's a steel box, you know, that supposedly collects orgone.

00:29:23Marc:But he did write a book that was straight up psychology called The Mass Psychology of Fascism, I think, that still holds it still read in schools and stuff.

00:29:32Marc:But interesting guy.

00:29:33Guest:It sounds more fun to go to therapy when people were thinking of this kind of stuff.

00:29:37Guest:Because I'm so bored of therapy.

00:29:38Guest:I don't go to therapy because I feel like it's so boring now.

00:29:40Guest:It's all cognitive behavioral crap.

00:29:42Guest:But if somebody was going to go into my childhood dreams, that sounds at least interesting, even if it's not true.

00:29:46Marc:Well, I think that style... Well, I think that by and large therapy is kind of a racket, and you kind of...

00:29:52Marc:Oh, I think the guy's name was L.D.

00:29:54Marc:Lang.

00:29:54Marc:I mean, R.D.

00:29:55Marc:Lang is R.D.

00:29:55Marc:Lang.

00:29:56Marc:But anyway.

00:29:57Marc:Also a good psychologist.

00:29:59Marc:Yeah, the best.

00:30:00Marc:But yeah, I think there was a time where they were all trying to work an angle out between Jung and Freud and figure out how to apply this stuff.

00:30:10Marc:And I think a lot of the hippies went with Jung.

00:30:12Guest:My mom loves Jung, and she has a master's in psychology.

00:30:15Guest:So I have these two different...

00:30:17Guest:sides of therapy from parents growing up.

00:30:22Guest:Right, yeah.

00:30:22Guest:My dad, despite all this Oregon box talk, is a pretty by-the-book kind of psychiatrist, you know, and my mom is like, maybe we need to get him a dance therapist.

00:30:30Guest:Oh, yeah.

00:30:31Guest:Maybe he needs to be on some sort of homeopathic clown remedy.

00:30:35Marc:Yeah, well...

00:30:38Marc:Yeah, that stuff, you know, I think even today, because I think about this a lot, you know, philosophy, if it's not, you know, based in numbers and theology and metaphysics and also psychology, it's like, you know, there's all these points of view.

00:30:56Marc:There's all these systems.

00:30:57Marc:And eventually, you know, if you need it, you're going to pick one that works.

00:31:01Marc:But it doesn't mean it's science works.

00:31:03Guest:Yeah.

00:31:04Guest:I've given up on self-improvement.

00:31:05Guest:I don't try to do anything.

00:31:06Guest:I have.

00:31:07Guest:I'm just like, I realize I've peaked.

00:31:09Guest:Maybe I've peaked with stand-up and maybe I've peaked with self-improvement.

00:31:12Guest:But I'm like, you know with stand-up, you're like, I'm just writing the same joke over and over.

00:31:15Guest:I feel like the same with self-improvement.

00:31:17Guest:I'm like, it is what it is.

00:31:19Guest:I've been the same since I was a kid.

00:31:20Guest:I have my same insecurities, which are numerous.

00:31:23Guest:But they're not going away.

00:31:24Guest:What do you parents think of that?

00:31:25Marc:Okay, before we go on, I just wanted to make sure we... The Function of the Orgasm is a Reich book.

00:31:30Marc:Okay.

00:31:31Marc:Uh...

00:31:32Marc:Then there's The Sexual Revolution, also a Reich book.

00:31:37Marc:Sexuality and Anxiety, Reich book.

00:31:39Marc:That should be my—I should have named my special that, Sexuality and Anxiety.

00:31:43Guest:That's the perfect name.

00:31:44Marc:Yeah, and The Function of the Orgasm.

00:31:47Marc:Did I say that already?

00:31:48Marc:I did.

00:31:48Marc:I don't know.

00:31:49Marc:Yeah.

00:31:50Marc:I mean, yeah.

00:31:52Marc:The guy was all about coming.

00:31:55Guest:Well, I found out later in life that my parents had an open marriage for a while when we were kids, so this all adds up.

00:31:59Guest:Oh, really?

00:32:00Guest:Yeah.

00:32:00Guest:One of my dad's friends, they had a falling out.

00:32:03Guest:And for some reason, out of spite, he told my brother that my parents used to be into that stuff.

00:32:08Guest:Swinging?

00:32:09Guest:Swinging.

00:32:10Guest:I don't really know why it would bum me.

00:32:11Guest:I don't know.

00:32:11Guest:Apparently, you know who was really into it?

00:32:13Guest:I shouldn't talk out of school, but she babysat me one time at the old combine.

00:32:17Guest:Winona Ryder babysat me.

00:32:18Marc:Well, her dad was part of it.

00:32:19Marc:And her parents were real into it apparently.

00:32:21Guest:Yeah, yeah, sure.

00:32:22Guest:They were big MDMA swingers.

00:32:23Marc:Oh, yeah.

00:32:23Guest:I've always wanted to meet her so I could be like, hey, babysat me.

00:32:26Marc:Yeah, I don't know how she came up in that.

00:32:28Marc:Yeah, I know her dad was kind of, was he a psychiatrist too or a psychologist?

00:32:32Guest:I don't know.

00:32:32Marc:I think he was a writer.

00:32:33Marc:Horowitz, I think is her real name.

00:32:35Marc:Right, right, right.

00:32:36Marc:No, but so how do you come upon this idea?

00:32:38Marc:All right, so let's track back.

00:32:40Marc:So they're on the commune.

00:32:41Marc:Yeah.

00:32:42Marc:And then they're like, get in the car, honey, bring the one kid.

00:32:45Guest:We're going upstate.

00:32:47Guest:They went to live in a place called Rainbow.

00:32:49Guest:It was a commune up in Mendocino County.

00:32:51Guest:They used to go up there in the summers.

00:32:53Guest:They love this place, Rainbow.

00:32:54Guest:So they were full on smart hippies.

00:32:56Guest:Totally.

00:32:56Guest:Yeah.

00:32:57Guest:A hundred percent.

00:32:58Guest:Which is funny because people always think of me as this kind of like, whatever.

00:33:01Guest:I don't think no one knows that.

00:33:02Guest:I don't show that side of my personality.

00:33:04Guest:I don't know.

00:33:05Guest:It doesn't really translate, but people think I'm like a guy from like, Hey, probably I'm in New Jersey or something like that.

00:33:09Marc:But like, I grew up like, you have a, you know, you have a, a, a momentum to you.

00:33:13Marc:Yeah.

00:33:14Marc:You know, you're kind of a, a loud, straightforward guy.

00:33:17Marc:And, uh, yeah.

00:33:19Marc:you know, somehow or another, whether it was in reaction to that.

00:33:22Marc:I don't know what it was.

00:33:24Marc:In reaction.

00:33:24Marc:Because it's sort of like, it's like children of alcoholics.

00:33:27Marc:Either they're going to grow up drunks or they're going to grow up hating drunks.

00:33:30Marc:Right.

00:33:30Marc:So, you know what I mean?

00:33:33Marc:You might have just pushed back on it.

00:33:35Guest:I guess, but I know it bothers me because, like, when I was at creative writing school, I remember my guidance counselor at the end, she read one of my stories that she really liked.

00:33:43Guest:She goes, yeah, I just never really felt like he belonged here.

00:33:46Guest:Really?

00:33:47Guest:Yeah.

00:33:47Guest:You know, like, yeah, why?

00:33:47Guest:Because I'm not like wearing goth makeup.

00:33:49Guest:Like, I'm sorry.

00:33:50Guest:I'm sorry how I present.

00:33:51Guest:Like, I don't present like a weird artist, but that's how I feel inside.

00:33:54Guest:Yeah, would Hemingway belong here?

00:33:55Guest:Yeah, I know.

00:33:56Guest:And then she's like, but I read your story.

00:33:57Guest:You're really good.

00:33:57Guest:I'm like, thanks for taking four years to do that.

00:34:00Guest:I'm just graduated.

00:34:01Guest:What the fuck are we talking about?

00:34:02Guest:It's unbelievable.

00:34:04Guest:Yeah, people judge people.

00:34:05Marc:But all right, so they moved to Rainbow.

00:34:08Guest:So that's what they wanted to do.

00:34:08Guest:They wanted to move to Rainbow.

00:34:09Guest:Yeah.

00:34:10Guest:It didn't work out.

00:34:10Guest:I don't know if there was no vacancies.

00:34:11Guest:So they bought like 90 acres of just like perpetually shady, unusable property in the mountains.

00:34:19Guest:And they were going to build a commune of their own with their friends.

00:34:21Guest:really yeah yeah that was a thing so and they're in their late 20s uh no they they had me my mom had when she was 35 so so they're grown people grown people starting communes yeah grown communes did never get off the ground yeah we did live in a teepee early cultural appropriation um for a whole summer like a real teepee like with like like like sticks and stuff oh my god it was wild are they doing are they doing drugs uh

00:34:46Guest:Um, I think the plan was to grow a little pot.

00:34:48Guest:I'm sure.

00:34:49Guest:Uh, yeah, they were, I mean, I'm sure they were.

00:34:51Guest:I mean, you know, they, but they, but they were responsible.

00:34:54Guest:Yeah.

00:34:54Guest:They had some friends who were big time pot dealers and they went to jail for a little while.

00:34:57Guest:I've been like, you know, six months here and there.

00:34:59Guest:Yeah.

00:34:59Guest:Well, that's that part of the country.

00:35:00Guest:It was definitely like when I grew up a lot of, uh, that's what you can grow in the shade a little bit.

00:35:03Guest:I think.

00:35:04Guest:Like you can hide it.

00:35:05Guest:Yeah.

00:35:05Guest:They somehow, I guess my dad freaked out about like he'd lose his practice.

00:35:08Guest:So, cause my aunt says she remembers being on one time.

00:35:11Guest:My mom, my dad went down and cut down all the pot plants in our garden.

00:35:14Guest:Yeah.

00:35:15Guest:After like an argument with my mom and she was really pissed that he had cut down the pot plants.

00:35:19Marc:Oh my God.

00:35:20Marc:Are they both alive still?

00:35:21Guest:Yeah.

00:35:22Guest:Yeah.

00:35:22Guest:And they still live in the house that I was physically born in.

00:35:25Guest:Oh, so they did that too?

00:35:26Guest:Home birth, no doctor.

00:35:28Guest:Uh-huh.

00:35:28Marc:Insane.

00:35:29Marc:I cannot imagine that.

00:35:31Marc:Now, but your dad has a practice?

00:35:32Marc:Like, he's worried about losing his practice in Rainbow?

00:35:35Marc:Or wherever the fuck it is?

00:35:36Guest:He practices in a town called Ukiah, which is like- Oh, that's a bigger town, yeah.

00:35:40Marc:30,000 people.

00:35:40Marc:I have a Walmart.

00:35:41Marc:So we're doing good.

00:35:42Marc:But he, so he goes to work every day.

00:35:45Marc:He's got an office in Ukiah.

00:35:46Guest:Yeah.

00:35:46Guest:He's got patients.

00:35:47Guest:Yeah.

00:35:48Guest:There's like three psychiatrists there, maybe three or four.

00:35:51Guest:Is he still doing it?

00:35:52Guest:He still works like minimally.

00:35:54Guest:He does like these like QMEs, which I think is like insurance companies get like sued for like a, you know, he does that kind of stuff.

00:36:00Guest:He still sees a couple of patients, but yeah, that was.

00:36:01Guest:But he's a medical doctor.

00:36:02Guest:Yeah.

00:36:03Guest:Yeah.

00:36:03Marc:So he went the full route.

00:36:06Guest:Yeah.

00:36:06Marc:He's not a psychologist.

00:36:07Guest:No, no, no.

00:36:08Guest:So he can prescribe medicine.

00:36:10Guest:He can prescribe medicine.

00:36:10Guest:And my mom later on in life got a master's degree from a place called the Institute of Imaginal Studies.

00:36:16Guest:Imaginal?

00:36:17Guest:Yeah.

00:36:18Guest:No, I don't think it's any longer.

00:36:20Guest:Yeah.

00:36:20Guest:But one of those kind of places.

00:36:21Guest:Was it ever?

00:36:22Guest:I don't know.

00:36:22Guest:Yeah, I don't know.

00:36:24Guest:I know she left the house every week, so I don't know where she went.

00:36:26Guest:Maybe it was all imagination.

00:36:29Yeah.

00:36:29Guest:That's a very good question.

00:36:31Guest:She'll have to answer that.

00:36:32Guest:I don't know that it's a clear answer to that, though.

00:36:36Marc:So she got that degree, and she's a therapist as well?

00:36:39Guest:She always, for years and years and years, she taught a class, she might still do it, called Authentic Movement, which is like a dance kind of class where you channel your inner emotions through kind of like trance dance.

00:36:51Guest:And she does that in body work.

00:36:52Guest:Yeah.

00:36:53Guest:So very different sides of the spectrum.

00:36:55Guest:In fact, I saw a pilot when I first got here.

00:36:56Guest:It was kind of about this as being like, because I was a really badly tempered kid who had a lot of problems when I was a kid.

00:37:01Guest:And it was like my mom would be like, let's do meditation and let's do this.

00:37:03Guest:And my dad was like, we should put him on Ritalin because they're going to put him in special ed, which they try to do in school.

00:37:08Guest:And I guess ultimately my dad lost out.

00:37:11Guest:So in the pilot, the father is like, fuck this.

00:37:13Guest:My kid needs help.

00:37:14Guest:I'm going to lose patience if this kid... People in the community are going to start judging me.

00:37:18Guest:So he starts slipping Ritalin into his kid's food.

00:37:21Guest:And it works so well that he starts then putting stuff into his wife's food.

00:37:24Guest:Yeah.

00:37:24Guest:Because there was... Yeah, that was the first thing I wrote, really.

00:37:29Marc:You wrote that?

00:37:30Marc:Yeah, I sold that.

00:37:31Marc:That's funny, man.

00:37:32Marc:Because there's...

00:37:35Marc:Did it pan out that the wife thought that it was working, what she was doing, and she didn't know about the Ritalin?

00:37:43Guest:Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

00:37:44Guest:Well, no, but I'm going to say yeah, because that's a good idea.

00:37:48Guest:If FX calls and said, hey, 10 years ago when we passed on that pilot, we want to make season two of like, I got the perfect.

00:37:55Marc:Yeah, I figured it out, man.

00:37:56Marc:It's got to be that she thinks what she's doing is working and only he knows.

00:38:00Marc:I told you the Oregon box was the solution.

00:38:01Marc:Yeah, exactly.

00:38:03Marc:So that was something you wrote about your childhood?

00:38:05Marc:Yeah, it was called Barry Mandelbaum Psychiatrist.

00:38:08Marc:Oh.

00:38:08Marc:Well, yeah, they ended up with a shrink show, you know, or Apple did.

00:38:13Marc:I pitched sort of a social work show to FX that they bought and never made.

00:38:16Marc:But that's the all water under the bridge.

00:38:18Marc:That's showbiz.

00:38:20Marc:But so, okay, so you just have the one older brother?

00:38:22Guest:Yeah.

00:38:23Guest:And you're like, he's very straight and narrow, normal, successful partner in a law firm.

00:38:28Guest:Growing up with somebody like that is wonderful because he's a great brother, but it's unbearable when you're a fucked up younger sibling.

00:38:34Guest:You just cannot live up to this perfect person.

00:38:37Guest:Yeah.

00:38:37Guest:So he somehow managed, huh?

00:38:40Guest:And you were just bouncing off the walls?

00:38:42Guest:Just out of control.

00:38:43Guest:Really?

00:38:43Guest:Yeah.

00:38:44Guest:Like criminal?

00:38:45Guest:Not criminal.

00:38:46Guest:Like young problems.

00:38:48Guest:Yeah.

00:38:48Guest:Like young kid.

00:38:49Guest:Like, I remember reading this essay by David Sedaris.

00:38:53Guest:Yeah.

00:38:53Guest:When he had OCD as a kid.

00:38:54Guest:I'm like, wow, that is me.

00:38:57Guest:Oh, really?

00:38:57Guest:I had this criminal.

00:38:58Guest:crazy 55 point process I would have to do to go to bed.

00:39:02Guest:Really?

00:39:02Guest:It was insane.

00:39:03Guest:55.

00:39:04Guest:I mean, I don't know if it was actually, I don't know if it was actually, I mean, it was probably less than that.

00:39:08Guest:Yeah, yeah, yeah.

00:39:09Guest:I mean, it was more than that.

00:39:09Guest:Yeah.

00:39:10Guest:So I would have to go up to my parents' balcony.

00:39:11Guest:I would have to like ring the, I'm just probably like,

00:39:14Guest:nine or yeah ring their their wind chime kiss a little knot on the wood yeah and kiss another knot kiss another knot kiss another look out do something look in the mirror look in this mirror then i had like a i lived in a loft when i was a little kid so i guess i was young i was probably eight was that an a-frame uh my parents originally bought an old loggers kitchen yeah and then they remodeled it when i was like second second grade

00:39:36Guest:And they still live there.

00:39:36Guest:Still live there.

00:39:37Guest:Yeah.

00:39:37Guest:Okay.

00:39:38Guest:So you, okay.

00:39:38Guest:So I run to the loft and I would have to wind my body through the slats of the ladder to get up into my bed.

00:39:45Guest:Yeah.

00:39:45Guest:I mean, this is all this like, I mean, like just, you had to do it.

00:39:48Guest:Oh, it was powerful.

00:39:49Guest:And I had to do this stuff till college.

00:39:51Guest:Yeah.

00:39:51Guest:And still a little bit now with the OCD stuff.

00:39:53Guest:Yeah.

00:39:53Guest:It's, it's, since I've become a father, it's really flared back up.

00:39:56Guest:I'm drumming.

00:39:56Guest:My wife fucking can.

00:39:57Marc:Are you on medicine?

00:39:59Guest:Yeah.

00:39:59Guest:A little bit.

00:40:00Marc:And, and so it doesn't help.

00:40:01Marc:Well, what, what, how does it manifest with the kid?

00:40:04Guest:I just like, okay, she bumps.

00:40:07Guest:My wife's a doctor too.

00:40:08Guest:So that is actually kind of bad because I expect her to be able to weigh in on every bump, everything that happens to the kid.

00:40:14Marc:So you're nuts.

00:40:15Marc:You're worrying.

00:40:16Guest:Thank you.

00:40:16Guest:That's the right way to put it.

00:40:19Guest:You should have been a psychiatrist.

00:40:21Guest:You're good.

00:40:22Marc:You really summed that up well.

00:40:24Marc:So you're panicking about everything.

00:40:27Marc:My dad was a doctor and he panicked about everything.

00:40:29Marc:So you're lucky she doesn't panic.

00:40:31Marc:I was taken to the hospital more times by my doctor dad than should have been reasonable.

00:40:36Marc:Because with him, it was always like, yeah, it's leukemia.

00:40:40Marc:Like I had my appendix out by what turns out to be not a guy who should be doing that operation because we just moved somewhere.

00:40:46Marc:It was like old timey Groupon.

00:40:48Marc:Almost.

00:40:48Marc:It was like, you know, we just moved to New Mexico and he had met one doctor who, you know, the incision was incorrect.

00:40:56Marc:They took my appendix out and I think it was just gas.

00:40:58Marc:I don't even think I had appendicitis.

00:41:00Guest:But my dad panicked and there I was in the hospital.

00:41:02Guest:That's the complete opposite of my dad.

00:41:03Guest:In fact, we have like a bit where like my dad's solution for everything is like, you want to try to ice it?

00:41:08Guest:Like, no matter what it is, like ice might be the answer here.

00:41:12Guest:You just like, what kind of fucking doctor are you?

00:41:16Guest:But was there chaos?

00:41:18Guest:No, my parents have a wonderful marriage.

00:41:20Guest:They're wonderful, wonderful people.

00:41:23Guest:That's the thing.

00:41:24Guest:Sometimes I think, what would my life have been like if I didn't have good parents?

00:41:27Guest:Because I needed a lot of help growing up.

00:41:30Guest:I had a lot of psychological problems, and I have great parents.

00:41:33Guest:Outside of the OCD?

00:41:36Guest:Yeah, just like real terrible phobias, like scared about a lot of stuff.

00:41:42Guest:Yeah, yeah, yeah.

00:41:42Guest:Hyperactivity.

00:41:43Guest:Yeah.

00:41:44Guest:Just, you know, I don't know.

00:41:47Guest:How did it settle down?

00:41:48Guest:Or has it?

00:41:49Guest:I mean, it certainly has.

00:41:50Guest:It's been a process for sure.

00:41:52Guest:Yeah.

00:41:53Guest:Through therapy?

00:41:54Guest:I don't even think I would give, I don't know, a little bit.

00:41:57Guest:Just getting old.

00:41:58Guest:Just getting old and sort of slowly adapting.

00:42:00Guest:All right, so how do you freak out with the kid?

00:42:04Guest:Like, okay, this is embarrassing, but this is, like, real, like, and I do this, like, today.

00:42:08Guest:Yeah.

00:42:09Guest:Like, I'll be like to my wife, like, hey, do you think, like, do you think when I slammed on the brakes in the car, like, did she hit the car seat or whatever?

00:42:17Guest:Yeah.

00:42:17Guest:And she'd be like, no.

00:42:18Guest:And I'm like, so you don't think she did?

00:42:20Guest:She'd be like, no.

00:42:20Guest:I'm like, okay, so you don't think she hit the car seat?

00:42:22Guest:And she's like...

00:42:23Guest:No.

00:42:24Guest:In my mind, I'm like, you got to ask a fourth time.

00:42:27Guest:You got to get that fourth one in there.

00:42:28Guest:You got to get that fourth one in there.

00:42:32Guest:So then she's fine.

00:42:33Guest:I'm not doing this.

00:42:35Guest:Yeah.

00:42:36Guest:Okay.

00:42:37Guest:Yeah.

00:42:37Guest:But we're good on the cars.

00:42:39Guest:I mean, it's fucking brutal, dude.

00:42:40Guest:It's bad.

00:42:41Marc:You can't stop.

00:42:42Marc:Oh, God.

00:42:42Marc:Because in your mind, she hit her head, and then she's got a problem now, and it's your fault, and you go all the way?

00:42:47Marc:Oh, I go all the way.

00:42:48Guest:Oh, my God.

00:42:49Marc:Well, I don't know what all the way is, but I go all the way to, like, she's mentally challenged.

00:42:52Guest:It's just like, fuck, anything I could do, I'd just fuck myself up.

00:42:56Guest:And it was in control.

00:42:57Guest:I was in control.

00:42:58Guest:And since I became a dad, it's really gotten bad again.

00:43:00Guest:because now like all the stuff that you had when you were a kid it's just triggered because now you're thinking for her like can I just tell you we're in a live live example of how my brain works what you just said there all the way mentally challenged I'm like do I need to get him to take that back or did I curse did I curse my daughter thank you just four times if you don't mind I take it back I take it back I take it back there you go there's that fourth and I'm like not even kidding like it makes me feel better that you did it

00:43:29Guest:It truly does.

00:43:30Guest:Like, it makes me feel a little calm.

00:43:33Marc:Oh, why did someone tell us how to use God?

00:43:36Marc:Is this God's fault?

00:43:39Marc:No, I just mean, like, my brain's the same way, dude.

00:43:41Marc:And, like, I, you know, yesterday, you know, my girlfriend just refuses to wash her car, so...

00:43:50Marc:You know, I took it.

00:43:51Marc:We went to the hand car wash and I brought a sponge to, you know, kind of, you know, scour off any bird shit.

00:43:57Marc:And I got to a brace of a sponge and I and I just put micro scratches all over her car.

00:44:02Marc:And she doesn't give a fuck.

00:44:03Marc:She doesn't wash it anyways.

00:44:04Marc:And it's cleaner.

00:44:05Marc:But like I woke up at three thirty this morning, like I get that buffed.

00:44:08Marc:I fucked it up.

00:44:09Marc:I fucked it up.

00:44:11Marc:And there are bigger things I've fucked up in my life.

00:44:13Marc:But if I can find one thing, like just to be my spirituality, like to ground me, the way I ground myself is always, you know, through sort of panic.

00:44:22Marc:Like if I can get to a place where I'm full of dread and anxiety, I'm like, all right, this is where I live.

00:44:28Guest:Yeah.

00:44:28Guest:And for you, not to make you feel worse, but the worst part is you tried to improve the situation and made it worse.

00:44:34Guest:That's right.

00:44:34Guest:That's the big thing.

00:44:36Guest:That is the thing.

00:44:36Guest:That hurts.

00:44:37Marc:Yeah.

00:44:37Marc:So it's like, why did you even get out of bed that day?

00:44:40Marc:I didn't have to get the sponge.

00:44:41Marc:And now all I'm thinking about is I think they can buff it out, so I got to get it buffed.

00:44:45Marc:And this car is a piece of shit.

00:44:47Marc:It's a piece of shit.

00:44:48Yeah.

00:44:49Marc:But I got to get it to a buffer like soon.

00:44:52Marc:And I got bigger things going on, dude.

00:44:53Marc:I got to do a movie.

00:44:54Marc:I should be working on that.

00:44:55Marc:But I'm waking up thinking about the movie and thinking how, like, you know, I'm going to suck.

00:44:59Marc:I don't know the guy I'm playing and I'm the lead.

00:45:01Marc:And then, you know, and then I just rose.

00:45:04Marc:I made I made the buffing a priority to ease the pressure from the other thing.

00:45:09Guest:OK, well, so you're a guy who clearly has put a lot of thought into self-improvement and therapy and stuff.

00:45:13Guest:Why are you still so fucked up then?

00:45:15Guest:Well, I... I don't mean that offensively.

00:45:17Guest:I just mean, like, maybe does any of this stuff work?

00:45:19Guest:And that's why I've given up.

00:45:20Guest:Because, like, case in point.

00:45:21Marc:But I don't think you really did give up.

00:45:22Marc:Because the thing is, is that...

00:45:26Marc:Ultimately, what happens?

00:45:27Marc:Because I can break it down like I just did.

00:45:29Marc:Like, OK, I wasted a little time, but I knew it was ridiculous.

00:45:33Marc:And because of sobriety and because of knowing that that my imagination left to its own devices is not going to do creative things that will help anybody.

00:45:43Marc:It's usually just reflexively does worst case scenarios and obsesses about bullshit.

00:45:50Marc:So I know those things.

00:45:52Marc:So that means that I have to disassemble it when it's happening.

00:45:56Marc:So in that way, it's helped.

00:45:57Marc:Like you said, I don't know that we can fully change our wiring.

00:46:01Marc:I think that with some, if you have trauma or whatever, you can process that and maybe integrate that.

00:46:05Marc:And I think that's possible.

00:46:07Marc:But I think with those kind of things, you just have to have that other side of yourself that's like, you know what you're doing, right?

00:46:12Marc:Yeah, but I'm doing it.

00:46:13Marc:Yeah, but if you want to waste your time.

00:46:15Marc:So I think that that dialogue, which is cognitive, I think cognitive therapy is helpful because if you can start making different decisions, whether you can carve new neural pathways, I don't know, but you can at least fight the good fight and not let it destroy you and your relationships.

00:46:34Guest:Yeah.

00:46:34Guest:So you're saying the best case scenario or really what you can hope for, which it sounds like you've maybe achieved in a certain sense, is you have a little bit more perspective.

00:46:42Guest:You can step back and witness your own.

00:46:44Marc:Well, yeah, you just know that, like, all right, this is a thing that I do that's not, you know, it's not serving anything.

00:46:50Marc:Right.

00:46:50Marc:Like my buddy Jerry in recovery, like, you know, if I'd be spinning out, he'd say, like, what are you getting out of that?

00:46:56Marc:Because somebody had said that to him.

00:46:57Marc:And then that's a really interesting question.

00:47:00Marc:You know, what are you getting out of what you're doing right now?

00:47:03Marc:And if you usually break that down, it's just like, oh, I'm just enabling myself to beat the shit out of myself and, you know, live in this fiction that is driving everyone around me crazy.

00:47:13Guest:Are you in a good place personally?

00:47:14Guest:No.

00:47:15Guest:Oh, I feel like I remember used to see you at Tiger Belly and you seem like like you're more like.

00:47:20Guest:Well, Jesus, I was going through divorces.

00:47:22Marc:That's what it was.

00:47:23Marc:I was always in relationships that made me crazy.

00:47:25Marc:Yeah, I'm in a better place.

00:47:27Guest:I always think of you as a guy.

00:47:28Guest:I'm like, he's someone who really like clearly has a mind that's not dissimilar to mine and sort of ways that I've tried to work on.

00:47:34Guest:But he seems like he's sort of.

00:47:35Guest:Maybe when I hit my mid-50s.

00:47:38Marc:Yeah, no, mid-40s.

00:47:40Guest:You'll have enough of it.

00:47:41Marc:You'll exhaust something.

00:47:42Marc:You'll get someone so fed up or a number of people so fed up that you'll have to be like, well, maybe it is me.

00:47:50Guest:That's why I got sober.

00:47:50Guest:It was purely that.

00:47:51Guest:It was just witnessing how much people fucking hated being around me.

00:47:54Guest:Really?

00:47:55Guest:How long have you been sober?

00:47:56Guest:Ten years almost.

00:47:57Guest:Really?

00:47:57Guest:Did you do it like the old school way?

00:47:59Guest:I did it the classic way, midway through seasons of a bar show on TruTV.

00:48:04Guest:Yeah.

00:48:05Guest:I got sober.

00:48:07Guest:And so then I had to host a whole season of a bar show sober, secretly.

00:48:12Guest:But did you go to meetings and stuff?

00:48:13Guest:No.

00:48:13Guest:I went to one addiction class, and I just hate groups.

00:48:17Guest:I'm such a loner.

00:48:18Guest:I should go to meetings.

00:48:19Marc:But you don't do anything?

00:48:20Guest:No.

00:48:21Marc:Oh, good.

00:48:21Guest:Yeah.

00:48:22Guest:So you're just vigilant.

00:48:23Guest:Yeah.

00:48:24Guest:I would binge drink, and I would just kind of drink too much.

00:48:27Guest:And it was this perfect thing where I got out of a long relationship and then was on the road for two months straight hosting this bar show for True TV called Bar McGinn.

00:48:35Guest:Yeah.

00:48:35Guest:So single for the first time in five years.

00:48:38Guest:in a bar every day with reality TV crews who are like pirates.

00:48:42Guest:They just live like road comics.

00:48:44Guest:And you could just go behind the bar and drink whatever you want.

00:48:46Guest:It was amazing.

00:48:47Guest:It was so much fun.

00:48:48Guest:It was like, I could have sex.

00:48:50Guest:Hooking up with chicks.

00:48:51Guest:Online dating, that was easy.

00:48:53Guest:It was great.

00:48:54Guest:And then all of a sudden it was like, holy shit, I cannot handle this.

00:48:58Guest:Wow.

00:48:59Guest:Why did that happen?

00:49:01Guest:What tipped it?

00:49:01Guest:Just a lot of just...

00:49:04Guest:You know, the producers being like, whoa, dude.

00:49:07Guest:Blackouts?

00:49:08Guest:Just all kinds of—it just wasn't good.

00:49:10Guest:It just wasn't good.

00:49:11Guest:And the producers being like, you know, you're slurring.

00:49:13Guest:Like, you're not supposed to be slurring while you're talking.

00:49:15Guest:You're, like, hitting on this woman that you're talking to.

00:49:18Guest:Like, what are you doing?

00:49:19Guest:She owns the bar, so I'm trying to hook up with her.

00:49:21Guest:I'm like, what?

00:49:22Nah!

00:49:22Guest:This is the show, man.

00:49:24Guest:So then I was like, but I was like, I don't want them to fire me.

00:49:26Guest:And I was like, if I tell them I'm sober between, because they were just like, you know, they were like, dude, you're just like, you're not listening to us.

00:49:31Guest:And then I was like, I don't want them to fire me.

00:49:33Guest:If I tell them I'm sober, they'd be like, all right, we should replace this guy.

00:49:35Guest:So I just showed up.

00:49:36Guest:And then I was like, oh, yeah, but I don't drink anymore.

00:49:38Guest:Like, what?

00:49:39Guest:Yeah.

00:49:39Guest:A huge part of the show is you trying the cocktails.

00:49:41Guest:Yeah.

00:49:41Guest:What do you do?

00:49:42Guest:I was like, yeah, we'll just have to fake that.

00:49:43Guest:They're like, well, fuck, we're already on the road.

00:49:45Guest:I guess we're stuck with this asshole.

00:49:46Marc:And you faked it?

00:49:47Marc:Oh, I faked it, yeah.

00:49:47Marc:And it was an awkward second half of the season there?

00:49:50Guest:It wasn't as fun.

00:49:52Guest:It certainly was not as funny.

00:49:53Marc:And that was 10 years ago?

00:49:55Marc:2015 or something.

00:49:58Marc:So what made you think you weren't going to be a writer?

00:50:00Marc:Well, no, I mean.

00:50:04Marc:Did you get into comedy thinking you were going to be a writer?

00:50:06Guest:I wanted to be like a novel writer.

00:50:08Guest:That's what I really wanted to be in.

00:50:09Guest:Yeah.

00:50:09Guest:You know, and then I got into comedy.

00:50:11Guest:The same reason I heard somebody else on this podcast talking about it where they're like, yeah, I just got sick of nobody like reading my shit.

00:50:15Guest:Yeah.

00:50:15Guest:Like I can write something and say it.

00:50:17Guest:So yeah, I got into comedy really wanting to be right.

00:50:19Guest:And I've done some writing and that's what I want to do.

00:50:21Guest:We sold the show and stuff.

00:50:22Guest:Yeah.

00:50:22Guest:It's just like, it's hard to get into those writers rooms, dude.

00:50:25Guest:They don't exist anymore.

00:50:26Guest:They don't exist anymore.

00:50:27Guest:And there's like, I feel like every white guy who's a writer is kind of the same guy.

00:50:30Guest:Yeah.

00:50:31Guest:No, for sure.

00:50:32Guest:And they don't... They're not me.

00:50:33Guest:Yeah.

00:50:33Guest:And I somehow put them off, I think.

00:50:35Marc:Well, they're getting pushed out, too.

00:50:39Marc:Good.

00:50:39Guest:Yeah.

00:50:40Guest:Not good.

00:50:41Marc:But where do you start doing comedy outside of England?

00:50:43Guest:You come back from England.

00:50:45Guest:Yeah.

00:50:45Guest:So I moved to San Francisco and, you know, got into that scene at a time when it was like, you know, the big guys were like, Louis Katz, you know, Jacob Searoff, Alicia Kasher.

00:50:56Guest:Ally came a couple years later.

00:50:57Guest:It's kind of weird, you know...

00:50:59Guest:comedy is such an impossible thing to get into.

00:51:01Guest:So you saw me at the punchline?

00:51:03Guest:I never did.

00:51:04Guest:The first time I ever heard of your name, I think I texted you about this, but Shang Wang said to me one time, he goes, hey, you know, you're kind of stealing a Mark Merritt joke.

00:51:12Guest:I'm like, oh, I don't know who that is, so I don't think I am stealing it.

00:51:15Guest:No, yeah.

00:51:16Guest:It was a joke where you- We're on the angry Ashkenaz spectrum.

00:51:18Guest:Yeah, the joke was like, you ever just wake up and you're just like, fuck, and people are like, what's wrong?

00:51:22Guest:They're like, I don't know yet.

00:51:23Guest:They just got up.

00:51:24Guest:And I was like, well, I don't think one guy is allowed to have depressive mornings.

00:51:27Marc:Well, I used to do a whole joke about, I think, I did that joke, a version of it.

00:51:33Marc:I used to have a joke where I got this new self-help book.

00:51:35Marc:It's really working for me.

00:51:36Marc:It's a very simple system.

00:51:39Marc:You know, you get a gun, and right when you wake up, you put one bullet in the chamber, spin it, and

00:51:46Marc:Click.

00:51:47Marc:And I'm like, yeah, carpe diem.

00:51:49Marc:But I did do a joke where the first words out of my mouth are fucked, but who cares?

00:51:54Marc:Yeah.

00:51:55Marc:So that's how you knew me.

00:51:56Marc:Because I was up there.

00:51:57Marc:I'd go up there.

00:51:58Marc:Moshe Kasher featured for me back in his kind of white hip hop phase.

00:52:03Marc:Oh, yeah.

00:52:03Marc:Yeah.

00:52:03Marc:And I found him very disconcerting.

00:52:07Marc:He had an energy that was, like, pretty intense.

00:52:09Marc:He was real yelly, too.

00:52:11Marc:Yelly and just, like, you know, untethered and a little, you know.

00:52:14Marc:Yeah.

00:52:16Marc:Okay, so, yeah, and Ali featured for me once.

00:52:18Guest:I mean, so many great people came out of there.

00:52:20Guest:It's weird to think that Hasan Minhaj, Ali Wong, W. Kamau Bell.

00:52:23Marc:And they were later, yeah, W. Kamau Bell.

00:52:24Guest:We were all, like, doing open mics together.

00:52:25Marc:And before that, it was, like, you know, Dana Gould.

00:52:28Marc:Yeah.

00:52:28Marc:He had moved out there.

00:52:29Marc:DeGeneres, I think.

00:52:31Marc:You know, the punchline was a mecca.

00:52:34Marc:There were other people, Robin, you know, Steve Kravitz.

00:52:39Guest:I had an amazing Robin Williams moment.

00:52:41Guest:I was opening for Chappelle.

00:52:42Guest:You know, when he first came back, he would always go to the punchline and do these, like, nine-hour shows.

00:52:46Guest:Yeah.

00:52:46Guest:Did you stay for him?

00:52:47Guest:I would stay for him.

00:52:48Guest:One time I did.

00:52:49Guest:Then after that, I was like, I can't take it.

00:52:52Guest:I'm too tired.

00:52:53Guest:I don't know how you're still open.

00:52:54Guest:So one night, I opened for Chappelle.

00:52:57Guest:And midway to the show, he goes, there's a young comic here who I think is really good.

00:53:01Guest:Yeah.

00:53:01Guest:Robin Williams.

00:53:02Guest:Robin Williams came out of the crowd.

00:53:03Guest:Yeah.

00:53:04Guest:He went on stage.

00:53:04Guest:Yeah.

00:53:06Guest:And then at a certain point, Mos Def showed up.

00:53:09Guest:And I'm sitting at the back bar with Robin Williams.

00:53:11Guest:And Mos Def is like real hip hopped out.

00:53:13Guest:He's got a backpack.

00:53:13Guest:And I go to Robin.

00:53:14Guest:I'm like, what is he like on his way to school or something?

00:53:17Guest:And then before I know it, Robin's on stage.

00:53:19Guest:Hello, son.

00:53:19Guest:Welcome to school.

00:53:20Guest:Can I take your backpack, please?

00:53:21Guest:He's doing the whole thing.

00:53:22Guest:And then he starts beatboxing while Mos Def and Chappelle battle rap.

00:53:26Marc:And you were the colonel.

00:53:29Marc:You saw exactly how it happened.

00:53:31Marc:What everybody has been talking about.

00:53:33Marc:Yeah, so it became his thought very quickly.

00:53:36Marc:Right.

00:53:36Marc:But you were flattered, right?

00:53:37Marc:Did you call him?

00:53:39Marc:I was going to use that bit.

00:53:40Marc:That was one of my best bits.

00:53:41Marc:Was that one of the nights that Tom Waits was hanging around?

00:53:44Guest:No, but it was an interesting night because Robin kind of bombed.

00:53:46Guest:Yeah.

00:53:47Guest:Because he tried to do what Chappelle does, that casual thing.

00:53:51Marc:Yeah, yeah, yeah.

00:53:51Guest:And then I heard Robin talking to Molly or someone in the hallway.

00:53:54Guest:He's like, yeah, he's so conversational.

00:53:57Guest:I tried to do it, but it's just not me.

00:53:58Guest:I'm like, it's so weird to think that you could be Robin Williams.

00:54:01Marc:Yeah, and still be that insecure.

00:54:02Guest:And still forget what makes you funny.

00:54:05Yeah.

00:54:05Marc:Well, you know, he had some, you know, trying times.

00:54:08Guest:For sure.

00:54:08Marc:It wasn't easy for Robin after a certain point, you know, certainly stand up.

00:54:12Marc:So when you're starting out, is the competition still happening?

00:54:15Marc:Yeah.

00:54:16Marc:Did you do that?

00:54:16Guest:Yeah, yeah, I got third.

00:54:18Guest:Oh, you did?

00:54:19Guest:Yeah.

00:54:19Guest:It was pretty awesome.

00:54:20Guest:What year?

00:54:20Guest:2008.

00:54:21Marc:Oh, yeah.

00:54:22Guest:Or 2006.

00:54:23Marc:I think I was second in 94.

00:54:25Yeah.

00:54:25Marc:Oh, you did?

00:54:26Marc:That's pretty good.

00:54:27Guest:I actually just went up there and hosted one of the semifinals.

00:54:30Marc:Is John Fox still running?

00:54:31Marc:Still doing it, dude.

00:54:32Marc:Did you do those Fox gigs?

00:54:33Marc:Yeah.

00:54:34Marc:Oh, my God.

00:54:35Marc:I still do them.

00:54:35Guest:I still do them.

00:54:36Marc:You still do them?

00:54:37Guest:You got to make a living.

00:54:37Marc:What's he got left?

00:54:38Marc:The Underground?

00:54:39Guest:He doesn't have that.

00:54:40Guest:He does, like, little theater shows every now and then.

00:54:41Guest:Yeah.

00:54:42Guest:So that's cool.

00:54:43Guest:You get to do a theater.

00:54:43Guest:I don't get to do a lot of theaters.

00:54:44Guest:So it's like, if you can do, like, you know, 700 people, like, oh, this is awesome.

00:54:48Guest:Yeah, I'll do it.

00:54:48Guest:So when you started coming up, how long have you been doing standup?

00:54:51Guest:20 years.

00:54:52Guest:I got third in that competition within three years, which is crazy.

00:54:55Guest:I didn't even realize it.

00:54:57Guest:Yeah.

00:54:57Guest:So somehow I just like.

00:54:58Guest:It's not what it used to be.

00:54:59Guest:Well, thank you.

00:55:02Guest:Well, you're really good at this therapy stuff.

00:55:06Guest:You really have a knack for it.

00:55:09Marc:I don't want you to get too big headed.

00:55:13Guest:I just told you I still do John Fox theater gigs.

00:55:16Marc:And I'm still busting your balls.

00:55:17Guest:And I'm still getting the same price.

00:55:19Guest:I just tried to get $100 more out of him.

00:55:21Guest:Are you lucky you get paid?

00:55:22Guest:He's never not paid me, but literally I'm like, John, this is what you'd give me in like 2011.

00:55:26Guest:He's like, take or leave it.

00:55:28Guest:I'm like, fuck, I'll take it.

00:55:30Guest:So you still go up there and do them.

00:55:31Guest:Every now and then.

00:55:32Guest:Every now and then.

00:55:32Guest:Yeah.

00:55:33Guest:But 20 years, dude.

00:55:34Guest:Dude, get this.

00:55:34Guest:So in the semifinals when I was in it, the Smothers Brothers were going to be the celebrity judge.

00:55:40Guest:Yeah.

00:55:40Guest:And this is in 2006.

00:55:41Guest:And they canceled.

00:55:43Guest:And they go, well, we got this food guy.

00:55:45Guest:Guy Fieri's going to be the guest judge.

00:55:49Guest:And no one had ever heard of him.

00:55:50Guest:Right.

00:55:50Guest:And he showed up.

00:55:51Guest:He's like, blonde hair, leather jacket.

00:55:53Guest:I'm like, who?

00:55:53Guest:who the fuck is this guy?

00:55:55Guest:And then like six months later, you're like, oh, he's doing pretty well.

00:55:59Marc:Well, yeah, because the competition was so huge.

00:56:02Marc:Like I was in San Francisco 93, 94, I guess it sounds about right.

00:56:07Marc:And, you know, it was still kind of like it started with like, what, 40 guys, 40 comics.

00:56:13Marc:Yeah.

00:56:13Marc:And they still had the shows at the winery, at the Masonic, you know, the finals were at the Masonic.

00:56:19Marc:But I know it's kind of the venues have changed and it's kind of become less impactful.

00:56:24Guest:Most of them are not in San Francisco anymore.

00:56:26Guest:They're all over the place, but not really, not a lot of big venues in San Francisco.

00:56:30Marc:And it was weird because I ran into a casting agent just the other night who was a big casting agent back in the day.

00:56:36Marc:And she had seen me at the finals because there was no internet.

00:56:39Marc:So they would come up and watch the semis and the finals to see new talent.

00:56:45Marc:And it didn't have that kind of juice.

00:56:47Marc:It kind of went downhill.

00:56:48Marc:Did they still have the winery show?

00:56:50Marc:I think they had a winery show.

00:56:51Guest:Either way, I made four grand, which was a huge deal.

00:56:53Guest:For third?

00:56:54Guest:Yeah.

00:56:54Guest:Yeah, it's good.

00:56:55Guest:For me at that point, what I'm working at, I mean, at one point I was working at Pete's Coffee, a taqueria, and a bar all in the same block.

00:57:02Guest:I was like Bugs Bunny.

00:57:03Marc:So I watched the part of the special that you sent me.

00:57:06Marc:And what's interesting about it is I've never heard somebody aggressively and proudly, you know, own the cuck disposition.

00:57:15Marc:The cock disposition.

00:57:16Marc:Is that what I was doing?

00:57:17Marc:No, I'm kidding.

00:57:19Marc:I just about being a kept man in a way.

00:57:22Marc:Oh, yeah.

00:57:23Marc:Yeah.

00:57:23Marc:Like, because I think that, you know, you you can't help.

00:57:26Marc:And I'm the same way you can talk about your brain and you're going to talk about your life.

00:57:31Marc:But to sort of talk about like, yeah, my wife makes all the money.

00:57:34Marc:It's fucking perfect.

00:57:35Marc:What are you kidding me?

00:57:36Guest:I don't think I've ever really seen that before.

00:57:38Guest:Yeah.

00:57:39Guest:I mean, I, I don't know how I ended up married to a surgeon.

00:57:44Guest:It's weird.

00:57:44Guest:How did you end up married?

00:57:45Guest:So I was doing a, I was doing a Harvey's in Portland.

00:57:48Guest:Yeah.

00:57:48Guest:Which was like the B club.

00:57:49Guest:Sure.

00:57:49Guest:I know.

00:57:50Guest:It's gone out of business now.

00:57:51Guest:So I'm on stage, you know, I'm like newly sober.

00:57:55Guest:I just got vocal cord surgery.

00:57:57Guest:Like 10 years ago.

00:57:58Guest:Yeah.

00:57:58Guest:I had to be silent for a month.

00:57:59Guest:Why?

00:58:00Guest:Cause you yelled your vocal cords out?

00:58:01Guest:Basically.

00:58:02Guest:Yeah.

00:58:02Guest:I yelled my vocal cords out.

00:58:03Guest:I had to get, like, what singers have to get.

00:58:05Guest:Yeah.

00:58:05Guest:So they had to, like— Did you learn how to use your voice properly?

00:58:08Guest:I did, yeah.

00:58:08Guest:Okay.

00:58:08Guest:I did, yeah, a little bit.

00:58:09Guest:In fact, I did my vocal exercise on the way down here.

00:58:12Guest:Anyway— You really fucked up.

00:58:13Guest:It's just from yelling.

00:58:14Guest:You're a yelly guy.

00:58:15Guest:Yeah.

00:58:15Guest:I mean, I'm a little— That's why you notice how conversational I am now on stage.

00:58:18Guest:I'm sure you've noticed it.

00:58:20Guest:No.

00:58:21Guest:But I was louder, you know?

00:58:22Guest:No, you were always loud, and I liked it.

00:58:24Marc:I was like, wow, this guy's like, you know, he's fucking— He's like, Mo's gonna go up and yell.

00:58:29Marc:Yeah.

00:58:30Yeah.

00:58:30Good.

00:58:31Guest:I'm good.

00:58:32Guest:I'm glad that's what people would say in the Comedy Store Hallway.

00:58:34Guest:You guys want to go watch Mo?

00:58:36Guest:He's going to yell?

00:58:37Guest:I'm good.

00:58:37Guest:I'll stay out here.

00:58:38Guest:I'll hear him.

00:58:38Guest:I'll hear him here and I'll walk outside so I don't hear him.

00:58:40Guest:I don't know if people were saying that.

00:58:42Guest:It's just what I was thinking.

00:58:43Guest:No, I've definitely, yeah, no, for sure.

00:58:45Guest:But even as a kid, I would have like a raspy, I would tighten my throat, you know.

00:58:49Guest:So this is my first gig on the road.

00:58:50Guest:I'm doing a show in Portland.

00:58:53Guest:Yeah.

00:58:54Guest:The B Club.

00:58:55Guest:Yeah.

00:58:55Guest:You know, which I think is always funny with life because like if I'd gotten what I wanted to do, Helium, maybe I would have never met my wife.

00:59:00Guest:Right.

00:59:01Guest:Right.

00:59:01Guest:Yeah.

00:59:02Guest:Luckily, my career was where it was at.

00:59:03Guest:Yeah.

00:59:04Guest:We got true love.

00:59:05Marc:Believe me, when I started the podcast and I was looking down the barrel at a life of B rooms, I was like, I'm going to either die or figure something else out.

00:59:12Marc:Someone's got to give.

00:59:13Marc:I either got to die or I got to marry a urologist.

00:59:16Guest:Those are my.

00:59:17Guest:Oh, yeah.

00:59:18Guest:OK, so you're at Harvey's.

00:59:19Guest:So I'm at Harvey's.

00:59:20Guest:I see her in the crowd because her this woman she's with is like taking photos with like a telescopic lens.

00:59:26Guest:I'm just like, what the fuck are you doing?

00:59:27Guest:Like it's like basically in the front row.

00:59:29Guest:I'm like, all right, stop doing that.

00:59:30Guest:And then I start talking to this woman, my wife, Ashley.

00:59:33Guest:And I'm selling my merch, and she kind of just like leers around.

00:59:37Guest:Like if she was a guy and I was a woman, this would be like very creepy behavior, just kind of like loiters around me.

00:59:42Guest:I'm selling my T-shirts.

00:59:43Guest:Meet her.

00:59:44Guest:We go out for drinks.

00:59:45Guest:This woman is a lesbian who had just befriended my wife.

00:59:49Guest:The camera.

00:59:50Guest:Yeah.

00:59:50Guest:aggressive lesbian.

00:59:51Guest:Yeah.

00:59:52Guest:Where she's like, we're all at drinks and she's showing like photos of women she's hooked up with.

00:59:56Guest:Yeah.

00:59:56Guest:Like she's got like frat guy vibes.

00:59:58Guest:Yeah.

00:59:58Guest:And my wife had just moved to Portland so they have like very new friends.

01:00:01Guest:Yeah.

01:00:01Guest:And I said to my wife like, you know, who became like, you know, this woman's trying to hook up with you, right?

01:00:05Guest:Right.

01:00:05Guest:You do realize that's what's going on.

01:00:07Guest:She's like, no, no, no, no.

01:00:09Guest:Yeah.

01:00:09Guest:And she's like, yeah, I hooked up with this chick, hooked up with this chick.

01:00:11Guest:I was like, what is going on?

01:00:13Guest:Like it was so...

01:00:14Guest:Bro-y, lesbian.

01:00:15Guest:I never experienced it.

01:00:17Guest:Anyway, so I asked my wife to come back and be the Red Lion.

01:00:19Guest:She said, I'm not a floozy.

01:00:21Guest:Which is funny, because I've since found out she's had a ton of one-night stands.

01:00:24Guest:But that night, she threw the door down.

01:00:27Guest:Because she liked you.

01:00:28Guest:I guess so.

01:00:29Guest:And then, of course, yes, we met there.

01:00:31Guest:And as soon as I left, that woman goes, he seems like a bad guy.

01:00:35Guest:I get a real bad vibe.

01:00:36Guest:And she kind of...

01:00:37Guest:Yeah.

01:00:38Guest:They never hung out again.

01:00:39Guest:Cock blocker.

01:00:40Guest:Cock blocker.

01:00:40Guest:Yeah.

01:00:41Guest:So I, I just feel like, I was like, when you know, you know, you know, and I'd been, I'd been single for about four years, like, you know, dating, but no one, I didn't want to fall into a relationship.

01:00:51Guest:Cause I, cause I could do that.

01:00:52Guest:So when I met her, I was like, let's just do this.

01:00:55Guest:I'm going to fly up here every other weekend.

01:00:56Guest:You're going to fly down to LA.

01:00:58Guest:Like, let's not go more than two weeks before we see each other.

01:01:00Guest:Yeah.

01:01:01Guest:Did long distance.

01:01:03Guest:She's a dick doctor.

01:01:03Guest:She's a surgeon.

01:01:04Guest:She's working at Kaiser up there.

01:01:06Guest:Um,

01:01:07Guest:And, yeah, and then we got engaged, and then COVID happened.

01:01:10Guest:I kind of ended up in Portland for basically two years, and then we moved back here, and, you know, we've got a kid.

01:01:15Guest:We've got another one on the way, and she just opened a dick doctor practice.

01:01:18Guest:Wow, so the COVID sealed the deal.

01:01:21Guest:Well, we were already, I was nervous.

01:01:23Guest:You know, we're talking about neurosis.

01:01:24Guest:We had already been engaged, but we never lived together.

01:01:26Guest:So I'm like, fuck, maybe this is one of those things, like,

01:01:28Guest:but I never lived with her.

01:01:30Guest:And then I didn't know she did this, but you got engaged before you lived together.

01:01:33Guest:Yeah.

01:01:33Guest:And then COVID happened.

01:01:34Guest:So I ended up living with her for six months before we got married.

01:01:35Guest:So it's like, all right, I know I can handle it.

01:01:38Guest:Yeah.

01:01:38Guest:I know she can handle it.

01:01:39Marc:It was perfect.

01:01:41Marc:It's like, no, she, she passed a test.

01:01:43Marc:Yeah.

01:01:44Marc:The test, the mo test.

01:01:45Guest:I mean, I could, I could easily see her being like, fuck this guy.

01:01:48Guest:This guy is too much.

01:01:49Guest:You know what I mean?

01:01:50Guest:But was that what happened in the other relationships?

01:01:52Guest:Um, I don't even know.

01:01:54Guest:It's like a mixture of booze and yelling.

01:01:57Guest:I don't think being sober.

01:01:58Guest:I don't think being drinking helped.

01:02:00Guest:Yeah.

01:02:00Guest:Were you yelling?

01:02:01Guest:No, no, I don't yell.

01:02:02Guest:I don't have a bad temper with like that.

01:02:04Guest:I didn't grow up in a place where my father would ever yell at my mother.

01:02:07Guest:Yeah, yeah.

01:02:08Guest:Mostly the opposite.

01:02:09Guest:Yeah.

01:02:09Guest:So I don't have that instinct.

01:02:10Guest:Oh, that's good.

01:02:11Guest:Yeah, I think that's good.

01:02:12Marc:So that was a funny joke, but what's that joke in this, in this special where, uh, uh, what's the high five joke?

01:02:19Guest:Oh, it's saying like, you know, it is cause it is concerning when like my wife looks at dicks all day, you know, and they don't have to show her mind.

01:02:25Guest:She's like, Oh, better than my three o'clock, you know?

01:02:27Guest:But, but it's not like, but then I have to remind myself, no one goes to the dick, no one goes to the doctor for a high five and no one's like got a perfect dick.

01:02:33Guest:Like, Hey, what do you think of this?

01:02:34Guest:I'm pretty good.

01:02:35Yeah.

01:02:35Guest:Why are you here?

01:02:36Guest:What do you think of this?

01:02:37Guest:High five?

01:02:38Guest:What are you here for?

01:02:38Guest:A high five?

01:02:39Guest:Yeah.

01:02:40Guest:And so, but it is weird.

01:02:42Guest:I mean, it's like during COVID, this is true.

01:02:43Guest:And I talk about the special, but like, you know, she was working at Kaiser up there.

01:02:46Guest:So I would, and they shut down the Kaisers for a while.

01:02:49Guest:So I would hear her in her room on Zoom with people.

01:02:52Guest:Are they showing her dick on Zoom?

01:02:54Guest:Is that what's going on?

01:02:56Guest:Like, we just got married.

01:02:57Guest:What the fuck's going on?

01:02:58Marc:It's an interesting thing where the dick pic takes a different agenda.

01:03:07Marc:Right.

01:03:07Marc:Yeah, yeah.

01:03:08Marc:She was looking at dicks in there, right?

01:03:10Marc:I'm sure she was.

01:03:11Guest:Live streaming dicks.

01:03:12Guest:Live streaming dicks.

01:03:13Guest:Sick dicks.

01:03:14Guest:Yeah, she could have just combined it with an OnlyFans.

01:03:16Guest:We could have a better house.

01:03:17Guest:Yeah.

01:03:18Guest:The fetish of sick dicks.

01:03:20Guest:Yeah.

01:03:20Guest:So now she just opened this sexual medicine practice in Pasadena.

01:03:23Guest:And she's also.

01:03:24Guest:What does that mean?

01:03:25Guest:She's just like just sexual dysfunction and sexual medicine.

01:03:28Guest:Oh, so the angle.

01:03:29Guest:Yeah.

01:03:29Guest:The angle.

01:03:30Guest:Yeah.

01:03:30Guest:STDs and boner drugs.

01:03:31Guest:I don't think STDs.

01:03:33Guest:I think that more just like vaginal estrogen, all this kind of stuff.

01:03:37Guest:I hear pieces of on the phone while she does these meetings and I don't really.

01:03:40Guest:How to make your sex life better.

01:03:41Guest:How to make it better, less painful.

01:03:43Guest:Right.

01:03:44Guest:This is actually funny because our house has all these like dick books.

01:03:47Guest:Yeah.

01:03:47Guest:And on the shelves, like, you know, what to do when sex hurts, you know, male impotency, all these kind of things.

01:03:52Guest:And we were moving.

01:03:53Guest:I noticed one of the movers was like big burly guy holding the couch.

01:03:56Guest:He looks over and he's like, what to do when your penis doesn't work?

01:04:00Guest:I'm looking at him like...

01:04:01Guest:These are my books.

01:04:04Guest:These are my wife's books.

01:04:07Guest:She doesn't have a penis either, by the way.

01:04:09Guest:And he was like, okay, dude, whatever.

01:04:12Marc:I'll just move your couch for you.

01:04:13Marc:That's funny.

01:04:15Marc:It's like that Bargatze joke about, you know, when they come to fix the water cooler.

01:04:20Marc:or the water heater, and the guy showed up at the door, and he's like, I don't know where it is.

01:04:26Marc:I think it's here.

01:04:27Marc:I don't know.

01:04:27Guest:Oh, that's so real.

01:04:29Marc:And they were trying to be progressive, and they go, well, is your husband home?

01:04:37Marc:And he's like, yeah, she's out in the shed, I think.

01:04:41Marc:Because his wife does all that stuff at the house.

01:04:43Guest:Oh, that's so fucking good.

01:04:44Marc:That's so good.

01:04:46Marc:But do you find that, so are you, do you get to spend more time with the kid?

01:04:50Marc:And is that the way it works?

01:04:52Guest:Yeah.

01:04:52Guest:I mean, she, like I said, she started this practice now.

01:04:54Guest:So she's like, she's not like doing these crazy Kaiser gone all day shifts.

01:04:58Guest:Oh, yeah.

01:04:58Guest:And I've stopped going on the road for a while because like, it's just, you know, it's just, it's too unbearable to be away from your kid.

01:05:03Guest:Yeah.

01:05:03Guest:Like, you know.

01:05:04Guest:Well, that's good.

01:05:05Guest:Yeah.

01:05:05Guest:You feel that could be the other way.

01:05:07Guest:It could be the other way.

01:05:07Guest:Yeah.

01:05:07Guest:Maybe when she gets older, it will be the other way.

01:05:09Guest:We'll see.

01:05:09Marc:I don't know.

01:05:10Marc:How far along is she?

01:05:11Marc:I take it back.

01:05:12Marc:I take it back.

01:05:13Marc:I take it back.

01:05:13Marc:He takes it back.

01:05:14Marc:He takes it back.

01:05:15Marc:He takes it back.

01:05:15Guest:She's almost two, and then we got a son on the way.

01:05:18Guest:Wow.

01:05:18Guest:How pregnant is she?

01:05:19Guest:She's two in January.

01:05:20Guest:Wow.

01:05:21Guest:Yeah.

01:05:22Guest:You're doing the whole thing.

01:05:23Guest:Doing the whole thing, dude.

01:05:24Guest:Yeah, but it's weird, though, because I love stand-up, but then I'm like, what if I had a great career?

01:05:30Guest:Yeah.

01:05:31Guest:Well, what would that mean?

01:05:32Guest:Must not.

01:05:33Guest:I'd just be FaceTiming my kid all the time?

01:05:34Guest:Well, you're fortunate it's not happening.

01:05:37Yeah.

01:05:39Guest:People are listening like, don't worry about it.

01:05:42Guest:You'll be fine.

01:05:48Guest:Yeah, so guys, don't stream the special.

01:05:50Guest:God forbid I have to go on the road.

01:05:52Guest:Do not make Mo more successful.

01:05:54Guest:Where is the special?

01:05:55Guest:It's on 800 Pound Gorilla's YouTube channel.

01:05:57Guest:Okay.

01:05:57Guest:Trying to make it, yeah.

01:05:58Guest:It's all about, you know, because it took us like two years of fertility issues.

01:06:03Guest:Oh, really?

01:06:03Guest:With the urologist?

01:06:04Guest:Yeah.

01:06:05Guest:And she was hip to that stuff.

01:06:06Guest:She couldn't dissolve it magically enough, yeah.

01:06:08Guest:Huh.

01:06:08Guest:So actually...

01:06:09Guest:Sometimes in life, problems equal good solutions.

01:06:15Guest:And the WGA had just put fertility coverage into their benefits.

01:06:20Guest:And I was about to lose my WGA insurance because you have to make a certain amount of money every year.

01:06:24Guest:Where'd you have it from?

01:06:25Guest:I sold a screenplay in 2020, like an action movie.

01:06:29Guest:So you're writing.

01:06:30Guest:That's what I want to do.

01:06:30Guest:Yeah.

01:06:31Guest:I just really want to be like, I wish I, every day if I could just wake up, drink coffee and be creative all day and sit in front of you, that would be my happy place.

01:06:38Guest:Yeah.

01:06:38Guest:And play with my kid at night, hang out with my wife.

01:06:41Guest:That sounds like what you're doing now.

01:06:42Guest:Yeah.

01:06:42Guest:Yeah, and then get the next kid here, you know, play with him.

01:06:45Guest:That's what I want to do, but I need to, like, I don't know.

01:06:48Guest:I just need to get more.

01:06:49Guest:I don't know.

01:06:49Guest:It's good, but I need more of that.

01:06:51Guest:So you had a few months on that insurance?

01:06:53Guest:Yeah, so I had a few months on that insurance, and they were like, oh, we can do IVF, you know, because we had had a miscarriage that was just, like...

01:06:59Guest:brutal yeah i actually made a video of this that oddly enough where i'm doing stand-up about the miscarriage to just my wife in a comedy club in helium yeah it's like this weird dark short film of a stand-up set and i was really worried to post it and actually had a lot of like really good like people had miscarriages like oh it helped people yeah but for us it was like helpful like do something yeah so anyway so we have like two months left and i'm like we gotta do this ivf shit

01:07:22Guest:So we get going and they just took so long, the place in Portland, like they were like to schedule the appointments to do this.

01:07:28Guest:It was so much just like inept, you know, for whatever reason.

01:07:32Guest:And then by the time they finally got around to giving us the thing before, right before she got pregnant.

01:07:37Guest:And then I lost the insurance.

01:07:39Guest:Wow.

01:07:39Guest:Yeah.

01:07:40Marc:Worked out.

01:07:41Marc:Yeah.

01:07:41Marc:I mean, that happens, man.

01:07:43Marc:You know what I mean?

01:07:44Marc:There were no drugs.

01:07:45Marc:It was just one of your sperm finally found a way through it.

01:07:48Guest:Those little fucks finally figured out.

01:07:50Guest:It is a very weird thing, the trying to have kids thing, because it's like you spend your whole life terrified you're going to have kids.

01:07:57Guest:Yeah.

01:07:59Guest:And then you hit your 40s or whatever, and you're like, I should probably think about doing that.

01:08:04Guest:If you want to do it, yeah.

01:08:04Guest:I never did it.

01:08:06Marc:You never thought about it?

01:08:07Marc:For reasons that you seem to have overcome and you don't give yourself enough credit, I just knew that because of the way I am emotionally and mentally, because of the way I was brought up, that the fact that I didn't think about it much, and when I did think about it, I really questioned my ability because of my brain and my emotional structure.

01:08:31Marc:It was never a priority to me, so why do it?

01:08:37Marc:You know, that must be telling.

01:08:38Marc:I wasn't just sort of like, I don't want kids.

01:08:40Marc:I'm like, you know, I just don't think about it, so I'm not going to do it.

01:08:45Marc:I don't think about it either way.

01:08:46Marc:I knew I didn't want them, but it was mostly out of my own fear of my mental disposition.

01:08:52Marc:So, you know, I'm okay.

01:08:53Marc:You mean out of a fear of the kind of father you would be?

01:08:56Marc:I think I'd be okay, but I think it would be fleeting.

01:08:59Marc:Yeah.

01:08:59Marc:Like, I don't think I'd be a bad father, but I'm just so anxious and so prone to panic that I didn't want to, you know, really put myself through that or put a kid through that.

01:09:10Marc:Yeah.

01:09:11Marc:My brother ended up with three adopted kids.

01:09:14Marc:And, you know, he did all right.

01:09:17Marc:But it's just I was just afraid.

01:09:19Marc:And I don't and again, I don't have any regrets about it.

01:09:22Marc:So I'm not fucked up about it.

01:09:23Guest:Yeah.

01:09:24Guest:Yeah.

01:09:24Guest:I think unless you really, yeah, it's hard.

01:09:27Guest:It's hard.

01:09:27Guest:Like, unless you really want to do it, there's no reason to do it.

01:09:29Guest:But I'm on this thing now where I don't really know because, like, I love doing stand-up.

01:09:33Guest:I'm actually one of those guys who loves being on the road.

01:09:35Guest:Yeah.

01:09:35Guest:Before I have family.

01:09:36Guest:I like it too, yeah.

01:09:37Guest:I enjoy it.

01:09:38Guest:I feel like I live healthier.

01:09:39Guest:I go to the gym all the time.

01:09:40Guest:Yeah, you learn how to do it.

01:09:42Guest:Yeah, I write a lot.

01:09:42Marc:And it's nice and quiet.

01:09:44Guest:You don't have to take your car in.

01:09:45Guest:You can't deal with buffering your girlfriend's car.

01:09:48Guest:Yeah.

01:09:48Guest:Nothing you could do.

01:09:49Guest:Yeah.

01:09:49Guest:And, but so now I'm just like, what do I do?

01:09:52Guest:Because I love going on the road and doing standup, but I don't know how to, so what I, I guess my hope is that I'll keep doing standup around LA all the time, going on the road every now and then, get a huge career by the time my kids will go to college and then I'll just like be on the road when I'm 60, I guess.

01:10:05Marc:Yeah, but it sounds like you're chipping away at the writing.

01:10:07Marc:And, you know, despite whatever anyone thinks about AI, I mean, writing and doing original stuff is still, you know, still happens.

01:10:17Guest:By the way, I had a Marin AI experience two days ago.

01:10:20Guest:So you had texted me to come to the podcast, which I was stoked about.

01:10:23Guest:And then I looked at my junk email and I had a thing like, hey, come to Marc Marin's podcast.

01:10:28Guest:Yeah, what is that?

01:10:29Marc:Everyone's getting them.

01:10:30Guest:Yeah, and a bunch of podcasts are like, some of them are like, come to Bobby Altos' podcast, we'll pay you $4,000.

01:10:35Guest:I got that one.

01:10:36Guest:Yeah.

01:10:37Guest:I don't think it's real.

01:10:37Guest:No, it's not.

01:10:38Guest:Anyway, yours is hilarious because it's so clearly written by AI.

01:10:41Guest:Yeah.

01:10:41Guest:So I should have written it down.

01:10:42Guest:But this is how it describes your podcast.

01:10:44Guest:Come on Mark Brown's podcast to discuss life, some of the sadder parts of life, comedy, entertainment, and politics, including socialism.

01:10:54Guest:Oh, my God.

01:10:54Guest:Yeah.

01:10:55Guest:So that's what AI has deduced your podcast about.

01:10:58Guest:Is that what's generating those things?

01:10:59Guest:It's got to be.

01:11:00Guest:The way this is written, it literally says politics, period, including socialism, period.

01:11:05Guest:They're after me.

01:11:06Guest:And I almost fell for it.

01:11:07Guest:I was like, oh shit, do I got to?

01:11:08Guest:How do you feel about socialism?

01:11:10Guest:I'm a big fan.

01:11:11Guest:Good talking to you, buddy.

01:11:12Guest:Yeah.

01:11:12Guest:Thank you for having me on.

01:11:13Guest:This has been great.

01:11:19Marc:There you go.

01:11:20Marc:That was Mo.

01:11:21Marc:You can watch Mo's special trying to make it on YouTube.

01:11:24Marc:Hang out for a minute.

01:11:27Marc:Folks, if you're looking for something to distract you over the next few days, we have thousands of hours of WTF episodes that you can listen to ad-free with a WTF Plus subscription.

01:11:38Marc:Go all the way back to the beginning and start with episode one.

01:11:41Marc:It's exactly what I said.

01:11:42Marc:It's like listening to the history of Jewish show business.

01:11:45Marc:There's just a cadence that you can follow back right from him all the way back to probably Myron Cohen or whoever it was who performed for the pharaohs in Egypt to keep from being killed.

01:11:57Marc:I think we should leave this part on the podcast.

01:12:03Marc:Whatever just happened.

01:12:05Marc:The abrupt stop because I didn't know what was supposed to happen, although I did on some level know it was supposed to happen.

01:12:11Marc:And then the seamless segue into my next WTF story, which happens to revolve around Ralph Lauren.

01:12:21Marc:I don't shop at Ralph.

01:12:23Marc:Oh, now I can't do the R and the L at the same time.

01:12:26Marc:I have a speech impediment.

01:12:28Marc:I have rolling L's and I say them like ours because I don't put my tongue at the top of my mouth.

01:12:36Marc:I'd say L's like ours, like la, la.

01:12:39Marc:That's the right way.

01:12:40Marc:But I go la, la.

01:12:41Marc:So it's over my throat.

01:12:44Marc:Doesn't matter.

01:12:45Marc:And then keep listening for as long as you want.

01:12:47Marc:Depending on how things go this week, maybe you just keep listening forever.

01:12:50Marc:To sign up for WTF+, go to the link in the episode description or go to WTFPod.com and click on WTF+.

01:12:58Marc:And a reminder before we go, this podcast is hosted by Acast.

01:13:03Marc:I'm not getting the hang of this looper, but I'm going to keep doing it.

01:13:11Guest:guitar solo

01:13:41guitar solo

01:14:09Marc:Boomer Lives, Monkey and LaFonda, Cat Angels, everything.