Episode 362 - Eddie Pepitone and Steven Feinartz
Guest:Lock the gates!
Marc:all right let's do this how are you what the fuckers what the fuck buddies what the fucking ears what the fuck nicks what the fucking ots what the fucking nucks that's that's a good one i am how are you folks sorry i am i am mark maron this is wtf i'm in a hotel room in vancouver uh bc that's uh is that british columbia is that what that is
Marc:I don't understand Canada.
Marc:I don't understand how it's broken down.
Marc:I don't understand the territories, the regions, how the government works, how it's structured, how it's tiered.
Marc:The people are nice here.
Marc:They seem less hung up than we are.
Marc:I know that, so they must be doing something right.
Marc:I'm not being anti-American or anything, but it's just my sensibility.
Marc:It's pleasant people up here in a general sense.
Marc:I guess I could say that people in America are generally pleasant, but I don't know.
Marc:It's arguable.
Marc:I'm drinking coffee, not just coffee, not co-op coffee, so I'm not going to be disingenuous.
Marc:If I was to do a POW in Vancouver, he'd be like, really?
Marc:Did he bring it to Vancouver so he could drink on the show?
Marc:That would seem disingenuous.
Marc:Eddie Pepitone is on the show today with Stephen Fine Arts.
Marc:He's the gentleman that directed the documentary that Eddie is now touring the country with.
Marc:Eddie is touring the country, I believe, with a documentary about Eddie.
Marc:So you can see Eddie and then Eddie will bring on a movie about Eddie.
Marc:I'm in that movie, but I'm not, you know, I'm not going to make that part of it for you.
Marc:Like, I'm selfless enough to be able to say to you honestly that Eddie's got this wonderful documentary in it, out.
Marc:You know, I'm in it, but, you know, it's not all about me.
Marc:But I do want to make it clear.
Marc:I am in the movie.
Marc:I am in it in two ways.
Marc:There's an animated Marc Maron, and there's also just Marc Maron on film.
Marc:So, but this again, not about me.
Marc:It's about Eddie and you'll learn more about it in a minute.
Marc:We'll talk to Eddie and Steven in a minute, but we'll talk to Eddie and Steven will chime in every once in a while and then feel in.
Marc:Then what Steven does is he'll chime in and then he'll sit there for as long as it takes for him to process and accept what he said out loud as something that was okay to say.
Marc:And then he'll chime in again, but I don't want to, I don't want to divulge anything about Steven.
Marc:He's a filmmaker and you know how filmmakers are.
Marc:So let's get back to Canada.
Marc:Last night in Vancouver, we did a live WTF with Matt Bronger, Brendan Walsh, Andy Kindler, Carmen Lynch and Margaret show.
Marc:And Margaret decided to talk about the size of my dick for 20 minutes.
Marc:So I'm not even I'm just going to give you a deep tease on that one.
Marc:I'm not even going to tell you the situation.
Marc:I'm just going to put that out there.
Marc:Uh, and I've cleared it with my girlfriend.
Marc:God damn it.
Marc:That's, you know, that's the hardest thing about being me really.
Marc:That's not even true.
Marc:It's not even that hard, but look, I'm 49 years old.
Marc:Okay.
Marc:I've, I've been around.
Marc:I was not a guy that lived some sort of singular life.
Marc:You know, there was different phases.
Marc:There's different periods.
Marc:My, my, my, my cock has traveled, uh,
Marc:You know, it's been a lot of places.
Marc:It's been dark places.
Marc:It's been in unfriendly places.
Marc:Scary places.
Marc:But it's also been in some nice places.
Marc:But I can't remember all those places, and I don't have a big list of them.
Marc:So when they come up, and now I'm in the monogamy thing...
Marc:And every sexual incident in my life, I treat it like a secret.
Marc:I treat it like I've been found out somehow, and I get defensive and weird.
Marc:And I had to tell Jessica about it, and then she was just sort of like, oh, my God, I wish I was there to see that.
Marc:It was embarrassing to have your penis talked about in a public forum.
Marc:For like 10 minutes by somebody who had seen it, experienced it.
Marc:It was a one-off.
Marc:It was not a celebration of anything.
Marc:It was just something a couple of old friends thought they had to do.
Marc:All right, let's talk to Eddie Pepitone and Stephen Fine Arts, and now I'll be back after that from my hotel room in Vancouver.
Marc:Okay?
Marc:All right, enjoy.
Marc:Enjoy it.
Guest:What the fuck?
Guest:What the fuck?
Guest:What the fuck?
Marc:I think that when people think, you know, which man do we know could fuck his way to the top, I think Eddie Pepitone is... No doubt.
Marc:So I'm here with Eddie Pepitone and Stephen Fine Arts, who's not going to talk until I bring him into the conversation.
Marc:Right, it's good.
Guest:It's nice for me to have a friend.
Marc:Yeah, well, I wanted you to be supported in a way...
Marc:Stephen Fine Arts did the documentary on Eddie Pepitone called The Bitter Buddha.
Marc:And now I guess Conroy claims to have come up with that.
Marc:I feel like I did, but I'm not going to.
Marc:Is that right?
Marc:I mean, that's what I feel like, but I don't know.
Marc:It sounds a little.
Guest:You know, what's funny is that I feel like I came up with it, but Sean absolutely insists that he did it.
Guest:So I just give in to him after a certain point.
Marc:Yeah, I know, but I think it's more like something I would say.
Marc:I feel like it was something... Now, if you had done some real research for your documentary, that would have been a part of it.
Guest:Yeah, well, Sean, he really was persistent about the fact that he had come up with the Bitter Buddha on the long shot on Eddie's podcast.
Marc:Oh, maybe.
Marc:Maybe.
Marc:I want to talk about how I was characterizing the film, because there was a lot of footage.
Marc:What's the matter?
Marc:Go ahead.
Marc:It's about you, but it's about our relationship.
Marc:There was a lot of footage of me, there was some cartoon footage of me, and I came away from it feeling like that Marc Maron character seems like a little bit of a bully.
Guest:Yes.
Guest:Yes.
Guest:Well, there was that scene.
Guest:I don't know how much we want to talk about the movie where you just came in.
Guest:Is there a spoiler?
Guest:Oh, my God.
Guest:But yes, where you come in to tape the long shot.
Guest:And you just go after me.
Guest:And I remember that night.
Guest:And I remember I actually, I had been doing a lot of work in therapy about just feeling what I feel in the moment.
Guest:And I just felt, I felt like you were attacking me.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And I felt attacked.
Guest:And I remember saying, you're not going to get me to cry because I felt close to tears.
Guest:Really?
Guest:That's pretty funny to me now that you were attacking me.
Guest:You were like, hey, Eddie, you're always... It was something like, Eddie, you're always crying or... Oh, right.
Guest:You're always crying.
Guest:No, Eddie, Eddie, Eddie, you're always being someone else.
Guest:No, Eddie, the documentary is not going to see you for who you are.
Guest:You're always being someone else.
Marc:Why don't you be yourself?
Marc:Well, you know, I looked at the movie.
Marc:I want to apologize because I think that what happens is... Because there's no reason for me to bully you, but I think what... Sure is.
Marc:No.
Marc:It's the law of the jungle.
Marc:No, it's not.
Marc:The funny thing about you is that fortunately for you, you're so consumed with your own self-consciousness and sort of like you're all up in your own shit so much that even when somebody takes a shot at you, you seem detached.
Marc:But I don't...
Marc:I don't know if it's real detachment.
Guest:Well, you call it self-consciousness.
Guest:I call it a great awareness.
Guest:Right.
Guest:But it's an awareness of my uncomfortableness in life, for sure.
Marc:But I found the film surprising in that... Yeah, go ahead.
Marc:It was surprising in just how many people you got on there to say nice things about them.
Marc:And it was also surprising...
Marc:No, I'm kidding.
Guest:See, it starts again.
Marc:No, I apologize.
Marc:I'm not going to try not to do it.
Marc:I think we do have to give Stephen some credit for somehow managing to get more footage of Patton and Sarah because they're so rarely used.
Marc:in documentaries or in any sort of show about stand-ups.
Marc:It's like when you think like, who do we need to comment on alternative comedy?
Marc:It's like, well, Sarah and Patton would be great if we could get them.
Marc:And also if we use them a lot, it would bring people to the film.
Marc:But I know that's not what he was thinking.
Marc:I think he was really looking for sources.
Guest:Talk to him about this.
Guest:Yes, I want to hear that one.
Guest:Well, I think we needed to get those people because they work with Eddie though.
Guest:Sure.
Guest:Sarah worked with Eddie on the Sarah Silverman program and Patton's done a lot of pudding and they worked together for a long time.
Guest:So I figured there were people who knew him.
Guest:Okay, okay.
Guest:I understand.
Guest:I understand.
Guest:Now... Yeah, that's true.
Guest:It wasn't really gratuitous, I don't think.
Guest:Zach was gratuitous where he came in and said, Eddie Pepitone is one of my favorite comedians to see but not listen to or something like that.
Guest:Eddie Pepsi won.
Guest:Eddie Pepsi won.
Guest:And then he sauntered off into Galifianakis land.
Marc:Yeah, that seems to be a very lucrative piece of property.
Yeah.
Marc:Yes, it is.
Marc:Galifianakis land is some prime real estate in show business.
Marc:But in all honesty, even watching the documentary, there are certain things that I didn't find out that I think I'd like to find out.
Marc:The one thing I didn't get at, we didn't get in the movie, I thought, was that, look, I lived in New York for years.
Marc:And Staten Island, as a place,
Marc:was only talked about in my circles.
Marc:There's never any reason to go to Staten Island.
Marc:There was like, oh, the dump is there.
Marc:That's where cops and gangsters go to retire.
Guest:It was called, besides being called the Forgotten Borough, it's also called the Borough of White Sox because civil servants work there.
Guest:Firemen, postmen, cops, all those guys.
Guest:Back in the day or still?
Guest:I think still.
Guest:But I don't know what's changed.
Guest:But Staten Island, there was no reason.
Guest:Once you discovered Manhattan and Brooklyn now, there's no reason to go to Staten Island.
Marc:Unless it's to help with aid from a hurricane.
Marc:Was there a reason?
Marc:My dad thought it was the country.
Marc:Oh, really?
Guest:No, he did.
Guest:My dad grew up in Brooklyn in Marine Park and his parents- When he was a kid, it probably was the country.
Guest:It was the country.
Guest:He was like, we're moving to Staten Island.
Guest:And I got to tell you, as a kid who grew up in Flatbush until I was nine, I remember the first night I was in Staten Island.
Guest:I remember, I was like, I felt it was the country.
Guest:We were the only house on the block.
Guest:Now it's littered with godforsaken people.
Guest:But we were the only house on the block.
Guest:And I remember looking at the hedges next door.
Guest:I was just an apartment building kid.
Guest:And I was like, I felt like I was the American who went to the English countryside.
Guest:And I was kind of like, excuse me, but I'm here from...
Guest:And I was wondering, what are your ways here in Staten Island?
Guest:And I thought they were the English countryside.
Marc:It's very frightening that you talk like that as a child.
Guest:Pardon me, but I need my diaper changed.
Marc:But that's interesting, because I never knew that.
Marc:Because out of all the people I know who are New Yorkers,
Marc:I mean, you know, I talk to people that grew up in New York and they clearly grew up in New York, the island, Brooklyn or whatever.
Marc:But you strike me as seemingly more authentic a New Yorker because, you know, your father is still alive and there's still, you know, there's a there's going to be 80 soon.
Marc:You don't come from a Jew thing, so there's not that.
Marc:A lot of the people I talk to who are from New York are Jewish.
Marc:There's very few real- Well, my mom is Jewish.
Guest:Okay.
Guest:But I don't come from the Jew thing because my dad put the kibosh on the two families intermingling because he's Sicilian.
Guest:I'm going to just-
Guest:just give you the the upshot of it he's sicilian and sicilians hold hold grudges yeah and uh he was like i don't want to associate with these people well your mother's family yeah but and my mother was bipolar and manic depressive i don't know what in vogue term is now but uh so her relationship to her family was a little weird because she was you know troubled one
Guest:Just not as close as she could be.
Guest:You know what I mean?
Guest:It was a little sad because of her mental illness.
Guest:My mom was really in and out of institutions as soon as we moved to Staten Island, actually.
Guest:Really?
Guest:The country?
Guest:She didn't like the country.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:She liked Brooklyn.
Guest:There's a lot of things going on.
Guest:She used to play Mahjong in Brooklyn.
Marc:Sure.
Marc:You can distract yourself with neighbors and you can sit out on the stoop or go to Edna's house.
Marc:In Brooklyn.
Marc:Or Margaret's house.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Yes.
Marc:Margaret's house probably.
Marc:In Staten Island.
Marc:Was Margaret a person?
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:You know, I don't know where Margaret comes from when I'm always... It's very old school for some reason.
Marc:It is.
Marc:Maybe you should throw Edna in there.
Guest:I've never thought of that.
Marc:Or Harriet.
Guest:How about Harriet?
Marc:Sometimes I do.
Marc:Sometimes just what'll come out of my mouth is Millie.
Marc:Millie.
Marc:There's another good one.
Marc:Millie and Margaret.
Marc:Where are those names again now?
Marc:How come you don't hear those?
Marc:I don't know.
Marc:Now it's Debbie.
Marc:So how old were you when you moved to Brooklyn?
Guest:I was nine.
Guest:You see, we had relatives.
Guest:What was really Italian was, I believe it was Bay Ridge.
Guest:We had relatives in Bay Ridge.
Guest:And then Marine Park, where my dad grew up, was very Italian right there.
Guest:And then we moved to Flatbush.
Marc:And you lived in a tenement?
Yeah.
Guest:Yeah, I was like Cliff Odette's going, God damn it, I want to write about this place.
Guest:It was better than that.
Marc:It's so oppressive.
Marc:Well, you know, a tenement building.
Marc:I don't mean it.
Marc:No.
Marc:Is it floor through?
Marc:No, you know, they were apartment buildings.
Marc:But not the old kind?
Marc:Were it floor through like a brownstone or big apartment buildings?
Guest:Oh, it wasn't a brownstone.
Guest:Oh, okay.
Guest:I didn't get introduced to brownstones until I met... My dad had a close friend, Bob Ellis, who still comes to see my shows, and he lived...
Guest:in park slope and that was a big deal for me to see the brownstones in park slope i was like oh like i immediately knew this was rarefied air yeah yeah i was like awesome this is where they talk about physics physics and he actually bob this is where the books are written and the school books the uh
Marc:School books.
Marc:The connection to physics would be like, this is where the intelligent people live.
Marc:This is where you're having dinner and you're actually explaining to somebody what EMC square means really.
Marc:Like we take it for granted, but if you'd like me to go into it a little bit, the theory relatively, I can do that.
Guest:You know what's funny is that what informs my whole perspective still to this day and my comedy is that
Guest:my dad's side of the family the italian side they were all into like my uncle and i used to work for him in the summer in brooklyn doing what uh construction my my uncle was a contractor and he used to uh my dad used to describe him as a genius with tools my uncle ray was he on the level or was there on the level is a beautiful way to put that because i remember him always getting out the level and things having to be perfect
Guest:perfect yeah and i would be standing on the side going come on it's close enough i mean these guys that bubble would have to be in the middle yeah of that level perfectly and i would be on the side i never took to this to this you never took to building things properly that makes it properly yeah yes and that and that's it that's sort of like that's your core it's like hey we could do this right or we could do it how i want to do it
Marc:And I'm going to defend that.
Marc:Fuck the bubble.
Guest:Fuck the bubble.
Guest:Fuck the bubble.
Guest:So the bubble's a little to the left.
Guest:Yes.
Guest:I was always like that.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:So what if the kid's playing with a ball in the building and it rolls down a slope?
Guest:But why I brought that up was that I never wanted to be around the building, much to my dad's chagrin.
Marc:But was it, were there union guys?
Marc:Was there any mob affiliation?
Marc:No.
Marc:See, that's my own racism.
Marc:Toward the Italians?
Marc:Yeah, I figure Flatbush, you got an uncle who's in contracting.
Guest:I'm sure that stuff was going on, but not with my uncle.
Guest:He was a private contractor, and it was very mundane.
Guest:He would hire these high school kids, i.e.
Guest:me, and kids to help him in the summer, and we'd be distracted and smoking pot.
Guest:you know i used to like to paint walls when i was high with him sure sure he would he would come back he would always split and come back and go you're kidding you're still painting this fucking wall he would be like what the fuck are you doing and i would just be like oh man i'm sorry right i'll pick it up i want to get it right i want to get it right
Guest:So what did your old man do?
Guest:My dad was a teacher.
Guest:My dad was a teacher, and he taught in New York City public schools for, I think it was something like 38 years or 35 years.
Guest:He has a full pension.
Guest:What did he teach?
Guest:History.
Guest:Really?
Guest:Yes.
Guest:Specialty American history.
Guest:Interesting.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And he taught it in John Jay High School in Park Slope.
Guest:And when we moved to Staten Island, he taught in Susan Wagner High School.
Marc:So coming in from Flatbush to teach the Smarties.
Marc:Yes.
Marc:Hmm.
Marc:Yes.
Marc:So my dad- Back when parents actually sent their kids to public schools.
Marc:Exactly.
Marc:Right.
Marc:Exactly.
Guest:So now there's some kind of voucher system, I believe.
Marc:Or just, you know, if you have money, you send them where they, you know, won't have to, you know, kind of commingle with the rabble.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:All right.
Marc:So he's an American history teacher.
Marc:Because that was the other surprising thing about watching Stephen Fine Arts documentary, The Bitter Buddha, about you.
Marc:Was that...
Marc:You characterize your father on stage as this working class terrorist.
Marc:I did?
Marc:Well, just a guy.
Marc:I mean, the entire theme of your emotional engine is that your father was this tyrant and this yelling monster.
Marc:But the thing that was interesting when you actually see you two together is that the natural place to go when you think about a working class angry man
Marc:terrorizing his son is that this guy's a fucking maniac.
Marc:He's like Archie Bunker.
Marc:But then about two-thirds of the way through, you realize that despite whatever faults you see in your father, he was a progressive man, someone who believed in the struggle of the little guy.
Marc:Oh, yeah.
Marc:And politically was very left-leaning.
Marc:My dad, my dad, you know.
Marc:I'm not saying there's no liberal assholes.
Guest:No, my dad turned me on.
Guest:I'll never forget my dad giving me the book, The Rich and the Super Rich, by a guy named Ferdinand Lundberg.
Guest:And my dad was one of Albert Schenker's
Guest:albert shanker the head of the teachers union back in the day yeah albert shanker had a line in woody allen sleeper i don't know if you remember that where uh woody allen as the sleeper character goes it looks like oh no one of the scientists in sleeper said it looks like albert shanker has the nuclear weapon like the uft like it was a funny line if you know that whole milieu but um my dad turned me on to progressive politics like i was a meat i was reading about the one percent
Guest:And when I was like 14 years old, which was 40 years ago.
Guest:So I was reading about the 1% because the rich and the super rich was a book by this guy Ferdinand Lumberg that my dad turned me on to said, Eddie, read this.
Guest:And my dad was really a progressive guy.
Guest:But he was an emotionally very angry guy, too.
Guest:And I think that I took that in.
Guest:And I have realized that my comedy, basically, I've had this epiphany a few times.
Guest:And I've even talked about it with you, where I feel like I'm just channeling my father.
Guest:And I'm just kind of being my dad.
Guest:And I think the big conflict that was in my dad and now in me...
Guest:is the conflict between being an enlightened person but also in an emotionally uh troubled person like i like and that's kind of my nickname genesis the bitter buddha where you know the buddha meaning enlightenment the bitter meaning i'm so angry at life but it seems that well i get that and my dad was my dad was like that like
Marc:Yeah, but I mean, he doesn't seem to be on any journey to any kind of enlightenment.
Marc:He seems to be.
Marc:Not anymore.
Marc:No, but I don't know that that character or the reality of him ever is.
Marc:I mean, your father's, you know, play this weird role as sort of like, you know, I am what I am.
Marc:What am I going to do?
Marc:And usually, you know, they get older and, you know, they mellow out.
Marc:And then it's sort of on you to sort of acknowledge it.
Marc:Like, oh, how can I maintain the level of anger at this guy?
Guest:Toward your dad?
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:when he doesn't get out of the chair.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:He's sitting there, you know, and he's fragile.
Marc:You're right.
Guest:Right.
Marc:No, I hear you.
Marc:But it's very hard because, you know, my father, you know, can still, like, you know, if he puts his mind to it, really sort of churn out some real asshole fucking stuff.
Guest:Me too.
Marc:My dad too.
Marc:But then, you know, and it hits all those triggers and you're like, ah, fuck him.
Marc:And then you get on the phone with him.
Marc:He's like, what's the matter?
Marc:And I'm like, oh, God.
Guest:I know.
Marc:You're going to play the old guy card?
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Yes.
Guest:You're going to play the you're living in this reality card?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Is that what you're going to do now?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Like this is my reality that I'm 80?
Guest:My dad's going to turn 80.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:So, but your struggle, like I don't see him as on any sort of path to enlightenment.
Marc:He seems mellow because he's older.
Marc:And, and, but, you know, you, and, but, you know, they, they're, they're odd.
Marc:They're selfish is, is what the problem is that like, I could completely identify with this sort of like, you know, he doesn't know if he's going to make it in for the show because he doesn't want it.
Guest:Now that was a typical thing.
Marc:That's a typical thing for my dad, but that's completely narcissistic.
Marc:It's just like, uh, that's what got gets me.
Marc:Yeah, like, my father has not listened to my podcast, because he doesn't, he doesn't, he claims.
Guest:You're the number one, like, I don't think you could get him then, because you're basically.
Marc:He just, he still claims, like, I don't know, like, you know.
Marc:And he's on the internet all the time, but he's like, how do you- He's on the internet.
Guest:I know my dad too.
Marc:Have you sent him the audio of the show at all or anything like that?
Marc:He knows how to get it, but he sends me links to strange- He's sending you links to various websites you've never heard of.
Marc:He subscribed me to some doctor's website, some fucking huckster of alternative medicine.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:But he can't figure out, and that's that same thing.
Guest:Well, maybe your dad has what my dad, I think what's going on with my dad, maybe your dad has it too, is he doesn't want to know.
Guest:He doesn't want to know what you're saying.
Guest:And my dad, I think, doesn't want to know what I'm talking about too, because I think they're afraid to hear what we're saying.
Guest:I wish that that was true.
Marc:I think.
Marc:Oh, I thought I had a great theory.
Marc:No, it's a good theory, but I think they just see us as some extension of them.
Marc:So, you know, when you're there with your own life, then all of a sudden it's like they have to acknowledge that, you know, you're not part of them.
Marc:Oh, I see.
Marc:And, you know, you have all these things going on, and, you know, that would mean that's going to take time away from them thinking about themselves.
Marc:You know what I mean?
Marc:Ha ha ha!
Marc:So, you know, they got to package it up somehow.
Marc:It's like, yeah, you're doing the thing.
Marc:Okay.
Marc:I think my dad is happy that I'm doing better.
Marc:Yeah, my father is too.
Guest:You know, like he doesn't have to worry about me as much.
Guest:And, you know, my dad took care of me for so long.
Guest:Until a couple of years ago?
Guest:Until about a couple of years ago.
Yeah.
Guest:Brody's got that great line where, you know, Brody's, I don't know, bro 40, but Brody Stevens would go.
Guest:It's so great to be able to go out to lunch with my mother and pay half.
Marc:But it seems like your struggle, the conflict, the triangle of Pepitone problems is that, you know, you have this anger.
Marc:And then you have this other part of you, which I think is the authentic part of you, which is hypersensitive and completely self-conscious and struggling just to be liked and accepted and funny.
Marc:And then you have this other part of you that's just sort of like, you know, fuck that guy.
Marc:That guy's a fucking weak piece of shit.
Marc:Wow.
Marc:You know, I'm going to yell and scream, and that's the other guy.
Marc:And then you have this other thing, which is like, you know, I need to be socially relevant.
Marc:And in the middle of that, you just want to be a television actor.
Marc:In the middle of that, I just want comfort.
Marc:Yeah, comfort and just some security and to act.
Guest:Well, you know what's happened, you know...
Guest:What's happened pretty recently is... I don't know how to put it, because I always get confused about politics, but the Occupy movement and the burgeoning Occupy movement and the fact that the economy has gotten really bad and there's so many disenfranchised people is that I feel like I should be, and I've had this talk with you, is I feel that I should be, as an artist...
Guest:talking about that stuff and not a silly-ass jester, quote-unquote, or, you know, asshole who goes to yuck-yucks in fuck-fuck land, wherever, goes to yuck-yucks in the middle of the country or whatever and talks about my dick and their latest reality TV.
Marc:I feel like... Yeah, but where does that exist other than in your head?
Marc:You know, those sort of... What do you mean, where does that exist?
Marc:Well, the whole idea that you're going to go to a comedy club and feel pressure to talk about your dick and reality shows is really some sort of.
Marc:Is that in my head?
Marc:Well, it's a fading myth of the comedy club in a way.
Marc:Yeah, there are road hacks and there's hacky comedy.
Marc:But in the age we live in now, I mean, you can sort of build your own crew.
Marc:You know, you can build your own audience.
Marc:And that's what I'm doing with the help of Stephen Fine Arts.
Marc:Right.
Marc:But sometimes they'll come to the show and sometimes they wouldn't.
Guest:But there's plenty of... Oh, you don't find that most of the comics today are still talking about, I don't know, basically irrelevant stuff.
Marc:Well, I don't know what relevant means in a way.
Marc:Is that to be culturally relevant doesn't mean you have to be a labor leader.
Marc:And, you know, quite honestly...
Marc:you know i i think that i don't know not many people strike me as being um relevant i don't know if that's true i mean you know we we we're entertainers so you know there's there's such a thing as as personal relevance as you know identification through personal struggle
Marc:You know, political relevance is its own thing and it's a smaller market, unfortunately.
Marc:But but no, I think to be righteous politically is is important.
Marc:But I mean, you know, then I think the issue you're talking about is that you have to be it because of America in general, not because of comedy club audiences.
Marc:But if you're going to talk about that stuff, you have to be an educator.
Marc:That instead of, you know, getting on stage and saying, you're all stupid.
Marc:How do we live in this world?
Marc:You know, that there's a way to present the material to make people go, whoa, never.
Guest:Yeah, I finally have hit on one way to do that.
Guest:I have a bit which is called, how do you get these?
Guest:It's called, I'm calling it now, where I say, you know, I used to audition for commercials.
Guest:And I would never book them because I'd be so angry.
Marc:Oh, yeah, that's funny.
Marc:I saw that.
Guest:It's in the show.
Guest:How do you get your shirt so fresh?
Guest:And within that bit, I'm able to talk about a lot of relevant things.
Guest:Right.
Guest:To me.
Marc:But I think what's appealing more about you than anything else is that...
Marc:You know, not unlike, you know, some of the great cranky people or sort of, you know, the sort of the anger, the angry working class guy.
Marc:You know, like, I've had enough of this with these guys with the money, you know.
Marc:Jerking us around.
Marc:But I mean, I think what's engaging about you is your own personal struggle.
Guest:Yeah, and I realize that's where the comedy is.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:So that's an interesting thing is that I want to talk about
Marc:things politically but then I realize well no no no I can't do it unless it it it's about me personally yeah I feel the same way yeah unless you have and so that narrative is sort of like yeah I went on this audition it was very important I had coffee it took me 20 minutes to get there people are starving you know like that and
Guest:Like I rail against the networks for having a lot of stupid programming on, but recently I've started saying on stage, which has made me feel very comfortable because it's so true.
Guest:I say, but how come I'm so nervous in front of these people?
Guest:Like I'm going to read for some horrible show, but then I get in front of them and I'm like, hi, Mrs. Network and Mr. Network.
Marc:I hope I- Well, you just hope they're going to be a nicer father than your real one.
Marc:Can you please-
Marc:Little Eddie is here.
Marc:Would there be any actors if they had a lot of self-esteem?
Marc:I don't know.
Marc:I think some people are more practical about it.
Marc:I mean, there's some actors that are fundamentally not that interesting people, and they just sort of got into it because they looked right or they had a knack.
Marc:for sort of occupying other people, and they were able to wrap their mind around some sort of crap.
Marc:I mean, I think there are a lot of, from the guys I've talked to, I mean, they look at it as a job.
Marc:They've got their angle on it, and some of them are effective and some of them aren't.
Marc:I mean, there's so much about that business, not like our business, not like comedy, which has to do with how you look and how effective you are at playing this game up there.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:What I've learned from acting, because I studied it a lot in New York, is that the key is not doing anything.
Guest:And it's antithetical to what I guess everybody was.
Guest:As soon as I get on stage, I want to do so much stuff or in front of a camera.
Guest:And I'm constantly, constantly, I've always been told, Eddie, just throw that line away.
Guest:And then I'm like, well, why don't I not say it?
Guest:If you want me to throw it away.
Marc:It's a mixture of letting go of being self-conscious and also engaging.
Marc:If I'm just talking to you, I've never taken that much acting, but I recently did a bunch of shows.
Marc:But if I just treat this as a real interaction and I'm present, if you're present, you can do it.
Marc:But then there's that whole other world of acting, which requires movement, Alexander technique, fencing classes, dialogue coaches.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:Shakespeare.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I was just going to say maybe that's the industry justifying their existences.
Guest:All these teachers.
Guest:Alexander Technique.
Guest:No, no.
Guest:Definitely it's a racket.
Marc:Because you're going to make it whatever it is your own.
Marc:And all you're going to do is learn a few tricks.
Marc:But some people are good at the sitcom acting.
Marc:It's a very specific thing, that thing.
Marc:You're just sitting there.
Marc:It's a vaudeville.
Marc:You're sitting there delivering jokes to one another, and that's what it is.
Marc:No one watches the Big Bang Theory and says, this doesn't seem real.
Marc:That's not the comment.
Marc:You know what I mean?
Marc:That guy would never do that.
Marc:No one's thinking like that when you watch a fucking situation comedy.
Marc:How come there's only one door to this?
Marc:I do that.
Guest:I'm like, Jesus Christ.
Guest:These people are so not...
Marc:tethered to any reality that i'm not interested but all it is a joke machine yeah if it's a if the rhythm of the jokes works with that's right with the characters that's right if the characters are well defined enough to where you're not like it really is it really is like i i
Guest:I'm trying to think if I'm into any sitcom.
Guest:I'm kind of into Modern Family.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Into Modern Family because I feel like that's one of the better written shows.
Guest:But if I'm watching that joke machine, it's like such a... You turn your mind off so... That's obviously the function of those shows.
Guest:Oh, Big Bang Theory.
Guest:Let's just completely...
Marc:turn on mine people love it it's huge because the characters are defined and they deliver jokes appropriate to their characters and and they all seem like you know whatever it is you know it's it's just uh do you like that show she watches it i don't i don't really i it's effective i mean i can sit and watch you know uh king of queens anytime it's on yeah
Marc:Is that right?
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:Kevin James is a funny guy.
Marc:He's fucking hilarious.
Marc:Like, naturally, you know, he can't help himself.
Marc:And it's a rare quality in a clown or a comedian where, like, you know, any moment...
Marc:If he's not saying it, he just can't help himself.
Marc:He's a funny guy, yeah.
Marc:But in his blood.
Marc:There's very few people that are just sitting in a chair, and there's funny coming off of them.
Marc:I mean, how the fuck does that even happen?
Guest:He can't not be... I would hate to... I agree with that, because I was on a couple episodes, and I used to love to watch him just work.
Guest:How we would turn it on and off when you're on a set.
Guest:And then when the cameras aren't going, just he looked...
Marc:yeah oh really here we go yeah yeah he was able to just sort of like you know lock in and yeah and it was so funny oh yeah wow you've done a lot of episodic yeah here and there yeah like what else ah god well this year whatever what were some of your good experiences with that because i think people like i think that i had some similar problems that you i did house this year oh that's great or the last season of house yeah
Guest:It was a small character, but I'm always fascinated by the process.
Guest:In House, it was a carnival.
Guest:And on, I forget what, Lotto Foxlot, I think, they recreate Little Italy.
Guest:And it's just wild to me, all the extras and the carnival.
Guest:And also the precision.
Guest:It goes back to my uncle with the bubble that I hated.
Guest:And I still hate it as an actor.
Guest:You got to stand here.
Guest:And the camera's going to be panning.
Guest:And Eddie, when you deliver that line, don't go 240.
Guest:I hate all that stuff.
Guest:I do.
Marc:But don't you have appreciation of the fact that what you're doing is you're making something that's being shot on a camera?
Guest:Yeah, I know.
Guest:It's true.
Guest:I mean, obviously, you know.
Guest:I do.
Guest:But you know what it is?
Guest:It's like, in my head, art shouldn't have to be so precise.
Guest:You know what I mean?
Guest:Well, it's not.
Guest:But television is.
Guest:But television is.
Guest:Yeah, maybe that's my problem is I think television is art.
Marc:So you're sitting there...
Guest:Some of it, I guess.
Guest:But I really realized from doing television work.
Guest:What do you want to do?
Marc:Can I deliver my line from the part of the set that's not built over here?
Marc:I know you've built Little Italy, but wouldn't it be interesting if I did my lines from the parking lot?
Marc:I don't want to break the reality, but I think if you juxtapose the Little Italy set with the parking lot, it's a statement about television.
Guest:Also, what's even funnier is me having two lines on house coming on like I'm a great artist.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Like I'm in my trailer going, don't disturb me.
Guest:I am trying to get into this part, which I don't because all the episodic stuff I've done...
Guest:It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia.
Guest:I did an episode and that was really exciting to me because it was with Danny DeVito.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:You know, and I was like, oh, Danny DeVito.
Guest:And it was so good.
Guest:But I realized all television stuff is about just deliver your lines.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Nail it.
Guest:Just nail it.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And that's really a big part.
Guest:I remember in New York, I did a couple law and orders.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And I remember, yeah, I just remember being under pressure because I fucked up a line.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And everybody's waiting for you.
Guest:Yeah, I know.
Guest:The whole fucking crew.
Guest:You know, that's what television becomes about.
Guest:It's not like whether or not you're feeling anything.
Guest:We move on to the next shot.
Guest:Let's go, Eddie.
Guest:Eddie, you're really fucking... The director, you're really fucking this up.
Guest:Like, that's how he talked about it.
Guest:Eddie, you're really fucking this up.
Guest:You have to deliver it here and don't stumble on it.
Guest:You're killing me.
Guest:We've got time.
Guest:We got to go.
Guest:We got to go.
Guest:Lunch, lunch.
Guest:You know.
Marc:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:Well, no, but see, that's the reality.
Marc:But see, you have that part of you that's like, I want to shatter everything that's commercialized and false.
Marc:You know, I'm an authentic person and they are taking that away from me with this format.
Marc:Where do I stand again?
Marc:You know, that in your mind.
Marc:In your mind, you're fighting against this thing that's just a... Granted, a lot of it's shitty, but it's just a job on another level.
Guest:I did two broke girls twice, and the second time, I did it this year,
Guest:And the first time I did, I was a hoarder.
Guest:And this is the greatest role I had because I was behind books and newspapers.
Guest:And you only saw the top of my head and I could read the script from behind the books.
Guest:And I just had to do a voice like, come on, because I get hired for that.
Guest:I get hired for my cranky voice and my ethnic voice.
Guest:But then...
Guest:In the second episode, I played a clothing store owner in a subway stop.
Guest:And you know those sleazy clothing stores in subways that just sell the pimps and preachers?
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:And then I had to do a scene with Cedric.
Marc:Yeah, Cedric, funny guy.
Guest:And the two broke girls.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And, you know, I was starting to feel, like, cocky.
Guest:Like, they cut the scene.
Guest:They cut some of my lines.
Guest:I was like, hey, what's up with them?
Guest:And I thought those were going pretty good.
Guest:They're like, yeah, I know, but we gotta... Had nothing to do with you.
Guest:Nothing to do with me.
Guest:And it didn't.
Marc:No, it's like a story problem.
Marc:Or a time problem.
Marc:I mean, if they didn't like what you were doing, they would have cut all of it.
Guest:Or they would have fired you.
Guest:I replaced the guy who got fired.
Guest:I couldn't handle being fired from a sitcom because that would...
Guest:that would take me to another level of give you a new hour or some great tweets yeah yeah like i would be like how can i rail against the whole system when i can't even get do a sitcom part well but you know what i mean that's that like the specific goes against you know this big thing i have in my head about changing the world
Guest:or being the spokesperson for all these people.
Marc:You can't compartmentalize.
Marc:When you're talking about the injustice of sitcom acting, you're not speaking for all these people.
Guest:No, no, no, no, no.
Guest:That would be a funny character, actually.
Guest:Because I'm more or less a bit character actor on these episodes.
Guest:A bit character actor union leader.
Guest:Now, I've got to tell you, these Honeywell trailers that they put us in,
Guest:They're only 35 by 25.
Guest:I say, how about 38 by 26?
Marc:People say that all the time.
Marc:Why don't you get involved with the union?
Marc:Why don't you go?
Guest:You know, I actually thought of that.
Guest:And I realize, you know, and this is the problem with me caring about the whole world is that I do want to be so comfortable, ultimately.
Guest:You know what I mean?
Guest:You know, I'm getting older.
Guest:And I want comfort.
Guest:It scares me, too.
Marc:It scares me.
Marc:And what the hell am I going to...
Guest:I just went through a two-day flu.
Marc:I don't want to die broke.
Guest:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:I just went through a two-day flu, and whenever I get the flu, I'm always like, this is what it's going to be like on my deathbed, just surrounded by... Cats?
Guest:No, when I feel physically ill, it always bleeds big time into the mental, and I'm just sort of like, oh, God, life is just such a mess.
Guest:Like, I always try to get a hold on life, and I can't.
Guest:You can't get a hold on life.
Guest:You can't.
Guest:There is no security.
Guest:You know what I mean?
Guest:There's very little security, really.
Marc:Yeah, something could fall out of space onto this garage right now.
Guest:Well, also living in Los Angeles?
Yeah.
Guest:I don't know about you, but I feel like this is such an insane place to live.
Guest:Every time I get in my car, I feel like there's some kind of incident on the road.
Marc:I have a paralyzing fear of being broadsided.
Marc:Like of a car hitting me from the... T-boning you or whatever.
Marc:Horrible.
Marc:But...
Marc:But yeah, you just got to look at the numbers.
Marc:You know, if you're not going to look at God, look at the statistics.
Marc:You know what I mean?
Marc:Before you do anything like, you know, one out of how many people, you know, gets hit by a rock and then sort of go like, no, probably not going to get hit by a rock today.
Marc:If these numbers are true, a rock's not going to hit me in the head.
Marc:You know, if I stay away from these areas.
Marc:But yeah, but so, okay.
Marc:So let's go back to Staten Island where the trouble began.
Marc:You were a fun kid.
Marc:You moved from Brooklyn.
Marc:You're nervous.
Marc:You get there.
Marc:You're in the country.
Marc:Your father liked it.
Marc:He didn't like it.
Guest:He loved it.
Marc:Now, your mother, in and out of institutions, what does that mean?
Marc:From what age?
Marc:Do you have a sister?
Guest:Yes, I do.
Guest:I do have a sister.
Guest:One sister.
Guest:One sister, yeah.
Guest:She's a lawyer.
Guest:She all right?
Guest:Susan.
Guest:Yeah, she's fine.
Marc:She does all right for herself?
Marc:She does great.
Marc:Thank God someone does.
Marc:Exactly.
Guest:i'm looked down upon you know by what like well the guy who does what the fuck he wants and doesn't wanna you know and it led to uh some problems with me and my sister for sure like oh eddie's doing what the fuck he wants you know because i was always performing you know and i couldn't make certain family functions i gotta perform and blah blah blah um
Marc:But coming from that family, coming from a specifically working class background, there's that sort of like- I was ostracized by my dad.
Guest:When I told my dad, by the way, I went to Fordham.
Guest:I don't know if I'm jumping ahead, but yeah, Jesuit.
Guest:My dad, besides being a history teacher, was a dean for a while.
Guest:He was really into me becoming like a doctor.
Guest:I even tried to please him.
Guest:I so wanted to please my dad-
Guest:up until a couple years ago uh you know i was like yeah dad i'm studying to be a dentist i actually told him that yeah just just because i wanted him to believe that i was doing what he wanted i went to fordham and i basically i don't think we covered this in the movie but had a nervous breakdown
Guest:where I would look in a mirror, and this is the shape the nervous breakdown took, and this is for real.
Guest:I would look in a mirror.
Guest:This was on the Fordham University campus in Rose Hill, Bronx, and not know who I was looking at.
Guest:I would freak out.
Guest:I didn't recognize the face, my own face, and I completely didn't know who I was, and my analysis of it was through doing a lot of work in therapy was that I was trying to please my dad so much
Guest:my whole life that I didn't know who I was.
Guest:I didn't know what I wanted.
Guest:I didn't know who I was.
Guest:And it literally manifested as me not being able to look in a mirror.
Guest:For six months.
Marc:Six months you couldn't look in a mirror?
Guest:I couldn't look in a mirror for six months.
Guest:Wow.
Marc:Well, I mean, I think that's true in that when you have narcissists- Now I wish- What?
Guest:There were mirrors all around me.
Guest:I mean, I know, you know, but only on my face.
Guest:My eyes are gorgeous.
Guest:I don't want to, you know, the full body mirror I don't want right these days.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Well, maybe do you have one in your house?
Marc:No.
Marc:Okay.
Marc:So you just kind of wing it?
Marc:Like, you know, you just- What do you mean?
Marc:Wing what?
Marc:Your point of view of you is just looking down at yourself.
Marc:Yes.
Marc:And occasionally you catch a glimpse of you walking by a window.
Marc:i hate looking at that yeah no but like i i understand that when you have uh narcissistic parents with high expectations uh their their expectations their needs obliterate your sense of self there's no way for you to to define yourself because if you don't want to do what they want you to do
Guest:That's what happened to me big time.
Guest:And when I told my dad, this is what I wanted to get to you, is I remember walking into his inner sanctum, his bedroom.
Guest:Right.
Guest:And going, Dad, I'm dropping out of Fordham and I'm going to study acting.
Guest:College.
Guest:I'm dropping out of college and I'm going to study acting.
Guest:And he wouldn't talk to me for a while.
Right.
Marc:Now, where's your mother in all this?
Guest:Well, she was kind of checked out.
Guest:This is sad.
Guest:So I don't talk about it a lot.
Guest:And I don't think we dealt with it a lot in the movie because it's so freaking sad.
Guest:But she just got really clinically depressed.
Guest:How old were you?
Guest:This informs my anger, I think.
Guest:My volatile anger is the combination of my dad being a volatile person.
Guest:And then my mom...
Guest:completely not being available for me like she just would not get up out of bed uh then she started going into psychiatric institutions how old were you uh that started to happen when we moved to staten island when i was nine like nine or ten nine you're nine your mother just became on just
Guest:She started going in.
Guest:I remember she would go to this place called the South Beach Psychiatric Center.
Guest:And I remember going there to visit her and being really scared of the people who she was in with.
Guest:And at the same time, really, really sad.
Guest:And I still, to this day, when I think about it, get extremely upset.
Yeah.
Guest:The sadness is great inside me, and I think that's why I rage so much, because of that injustice.
Guest:I think, you know, first, the injustice that she wasn't there for me, and then secondly, why is she so sad for me?
Marc:And at that age, you can't understand necessarily what mental illness means.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:It's just that she's acting.
Marc:She's not sick physically, but she just has to go to this place.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And then the effect it had on our family.
Guest:You can imagine when my mom started checking out, my dad was very unhappy.
Yeah.
Guest:You know what I mean?
Marc:There's nothing you can do about it.
Marc:There's nothing you can do.
Marc:And back then, the treatment was speculative.
Marc:It still is to some degree.
Guest:My mom, I think, was at the forefront of all those new drugs.
Guest:Now they're not new at all.
Guest:But she was on lithium.
Guest:I forget some of the others.
Guest:There's some heavy-duty stuff.
Guest:Electroshock.
Guest:My mom freaking had electroshock done at her.
Marc:But before that, when you were in Brooklyn, I mean, was she present?
Guest:She was obviously, not obviously because you were there, but she was showing signs of depression for sure.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:something about the move to staten island really it became a full-blown thing and it might have actually you know you were kind of kidding about that like oh there's things to do with edna and this and the move kind of uprooted her from her friends isolated yeah yeah and i think that was enough to you know push it so from age nine or ten she was in and out of hospitals for the rest of her life and
Marc:Yes.
Marc:For extended stays.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:It's awful.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:And that was a struggle going on.
Guest:And I would visit her.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And I would visit her in these places.
Guest:And then the places that she stayed at kind of got worse and worse.
Guest:Like it wasn't South Beach Psychiatrics.
Guest:It was some other place at the end.
Guest:I feel like this is getting so sad.
Guest:Like it's a William Kennedy novel.
Guest:Then at the end, we all went into a room and three of us only left.
Guest:Two people blew their brains out.
Guest:But at the end, she was in a very weird, surreal place.
Guest:on the ocean yeah in coney island seriously it's cinematic out in brooklyn yes which is on the ocean coney island which is awful awful desolate and weird you know it right yeah like yeah and that's like probably before the russians took over so it was just sort of fucking a ruin yeah
Marc:Oh.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And these are the images.
Guest:But how close to the amusement park?
Guest:It was really nice as far as the amusement park.
Guest:That horrible fucking roller coaster.
Guest:I never liked that.
Guest:The cyclone.
Guest:That's awful.
Marc:I've never been.
Guest:And I've always had friends that I would go to that place.
Guest:It would be, come on, come on, come on.
Guest:You've got to go on the cyclone.
Guest:Get on the cyclone.
Guest:And I still, to this day, can't get on a roller coaster.
Marc:It's not even that big a roller coaster.
Marc:It's terrifying.
Marc:It's the only roller coaster I know.
Marc:It's wooden.
Marc:One of the only wooden ones left.
Marc:But two days later, your neck hurts.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:oh you've done it yeah yeah it's like you're sore from that fucking roller coaster because it jerks you around it's like this rickety fucking thing all right so she's out there in coney island on the water at the end and i would visit her but who like when you walk into these places i mean so scary because there isn't a lot of supervision yeah you know it was like i don't there isn't a lot of supervision but there are people wandering around in robes and
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And people outside and guys who just wanted cigarettes and big like I would get on an elevator and just some big Hulk of a man who was broken.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Just some big, broken man would be on the elevator with me, you know, and I would just be like this.
Guest:In my head, I'd be like, boy, I hope this elevator goes quickly up to three.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:He's like this medicated lummox.
Guest:Exactly.
Guest:You know, a medicated lummox.
Guest:See how I added nothing to that?
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:And then in two weeks, you say you thought of it.
Yeah.
Guest:My new one-man show, Medicated Lummox, and I'm like, yeah, well, I thought of that.
Guest:I remember it was a sunny day in Marin's garage.
Marc:And how old were you when she passed away?
Guest:That was, I'm 54 now.
Guest:She passed away about seven years ago.
Marc:Oh, my God.
Marc:So this went on and on and on.
Marc:She never went back home again?
Guest:No.
Guest:No, because, well, I skipped that they divorced.
Guest:And then my dad divorced her.
Guest:And then once my dad divorced her, she then kind of had to fend for herself in all these kind of weird places.
Marc:How old were you when they got divorced?
Guest:You know, I'm sketchy about all this stuff, and I wonder if it's because I don't want to know, but it was something like when I was about, I think I was around 30.
Marc:Oh, really?
Guest:Something like that, 28, 30, something like that.
Marc:So on some level, whatever the hell you did to protect yourself emotionally, you had to separate yourself from this horrendous reality that it was just hopeless.
Guest:It was really bad.
Marc:At some point, you realize she's not going to get better.
Guest:You know what I did, which is unfortunate, is I became a big pothead.
Guest:And I say it's unfortunate because looking back at it now, because basically I've been...
Guest:pretty sober since uh 41 so the last 13 years i'm not a pothead anymore right but i was a big pothead and i look back on it i started smoking pot when i was 14 yeah and i look back and i go i was obviously trying to fucking escape this when i look back on it
Guest:numb it out i was numbing out yeah i would smoke so much like i wouldn't just take it yeah we were smoking i'll never forget that we were smoking out of gas mess like surgical mess we would put on surgical attach it to a bong yeah and smoke out of surgical mess yeah you know because it was a medical necessity
Guest:We were doing prescription before this prescription.
Marc:Yeah, that's everyone's argument.
Marc:That's always what I used it for.
Guest:Medicinal?
Marc:Yeah, it's medicine.
Guest:So I smoked a lot of pot, and that I think stunted my progress as a comedian.
Guest:I mean, as a successful comedian.
Marc:What are you so hard on yourself for?
Marc:I don't know, because I feel like I'm old.
Marc:Yeah, we're old.
Marc:You know, I'm 50.
Marc:What are you going to do?
Marc:Rodney was like 60.
Guest:Rodney, I love that.
Marc:I always think of Rodney.
Marc:He's the last one, though.
Marc:I know.
Marc:No one above that.
Marc:You know, once you hit 60 in the United States.
Guest:Well, you watch all very young people just get a lot of stuff, and it's like, oh.
Marc:Well, what do you think?
Marc:Well, fuck that.
Guest:No, I know.
Marc:But I mean, but what do you think your obstacle is?
Marc:What do you think now?
Marc:Now?
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:Now I don't think, well, now I just think that maybe my age is an obstacle.
Guest:But comedy is ageless.
Guest:Right, but like television maybe.
Guest:What do you want to do?
Guest:Well, I would like to have my own show on television, like a good network, you know?
Guest:But I'd like to just be a household name.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:i just hear myself say you know i'd like to really become very big you know what i mean maybe that won't happen what do you think you keep doing that is stopping that no i actually think that i haven't been doing the sabotaging thing you know yeah i don't know if you agree but i but i are you asking me yes i'm asking you because you seem to be you seem to be saying to me what are
Guest:What are you doing now?
Marc:What I wanted to bring up earlier was that it's a very odd thing when you have as defined a personality as you have, or you have an element of it that's very defined.
Marc:And I did it another time.
Marc:And then people see you as something
Marc:That's specific, but to you would be limited.
Marc:You're very clear that you get hired for your yelling and your tone.
Marc:And then there's part of you that's sort of like, this is not who I am.
Guest:I would like to do a little more than that.
Guest:But that is kind of up to me, I think, to show that in my stand-up.
Marc:But it's frustrating.
Marc:Yeah, right.
Marc:Exactly.
Marc:So you say like, I accept that.
Marc:They see me as this ranting, angry, working guy.
Guest:Yeah, like I'll go on a set and I'll just be yelling for the whole day because they've given me a part where I'm the yelling guy.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And I'm making money and it's a TV thing.
Guest:And so I'm like partly happy.
Guest:But then halfway through the day, sometimes I'll be like, Jesus, I wish I had something where I wasn't screaming all the time.
Guest:well isn't that funny because that's a real you is that you know this quiet uh sort of guy that in but you can turn on the rage because you know that's so accessible yeah yeah yeah you know what i get rageful at these days little things like my bathrobe um belt falling yeah today yeah like i i wanted my bathrobe where was my bathrobe belt
Guest:It's on the fucking floor.
Guest:It's supposed to be in the loops.
Guest:And I was so pissed at that.
Guest:Little things really enraged me.
Guest:But you do that out loud?
Guest:I curse out loud.
Marc:In front of your... And my wife, Karen, is always like, come on, what are you getting so upset for over this thing?
Marc:And I'm like... You know what I learned about myself?
Marc:With that kind of stuff.
Guest:What?
Marc:But you got married.
Marc:I did.
Marc:When was that?
Guest:November 30th.
Guest:Just a month ago.
Guest:Not even a month ago.
Marc:So was it a quiet ceremony?
Marc:Mm-hmm.
Marc:Just the two of yous?
Guest:Yeah, basically, we drove to Vegas.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:And now we're going to celebrate in a reception now.
Marc:Was it impulsive?
Guest:Well, we knew we were going to get married.
Guest:We were engaged.
Guest:But the day was impulsive.
Guest:I woke up, and we were going to go to Beverly Hills just to get a license.
Guest:It's a two-part thing when you do it locally.
Guest:First, you have to get a license, then make an appointment for the ceremony if you're going to, quote, unquote, elope.
Guest:But I was like, on the way to license, I was like, hey, why don't we just go to Vegas, baby?
Guest:And you did.
Guest:And we did.
Guest:And it was great.
Guest:Yeah, fuck this.
Guest:Vegas is surreal, man.
Guest:It was surreal.
Guest:Have you never been there?
Guest:It was raining, which someone told me recently is good luck.
Guest:You've never been to Vegas?
Guest:I've been to Vegas.
Guest:I don't like Vegas.
Guest:No, it's nothing I like.
Guest:But so many guys are like, oh, Vegas.
Guest:No, I don't like Vegas.
Guest:Let's go to Vegas.
Guest:And I'm always like...
Marc:I don't like to lose money.
Marc:I don't drink.
Marc:Yeah, I don't drink.
Marc:And I don't like cheesy-ass bullshit.
Marc:Yeah, exactly.
Guest:I never even worked.
Marc:You can get a good meal there, I think.
Marc:There's a couple of restaurants.
Marc:Yeah, yeah.
Marc:It's a big ordeal.
Guest:But when we got married- Congratulations.
Guest:Thank you.
Guest:But when we got married, we stepped outside of the little chapel, one of those chapels that we found online to get married to.
Guest:And the sun was setting, and the sun was hitting one of those golden casino buildings.
Guest:And it was just beautiful.
Guest:It was that gaudy beauty that I kind of ... I was like, oh, Vegas can be really ... I would never live there.
Guest:And you drove back to LA that night, right?
Guest:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:I was going to take Karen to ...
Guest:It was a Cirque du Soleil thing.
Guest:It was way too ambitious.
Guest:Really?
Guest:And this is me already.
Guest:You mean you had to get tickets?
Guest:Yeah, already I'm like, but honey, we got to go to the Bellagio.
Guest:Who knows what that's going to be like?
Marc:The weirdest thing about Vegas, out of anywhere in the world, like here I could see you get aggravated when you got to park and everything, but Vegas is built to accommodate everybody.
Marc:All you need is some fucking cash.
Marc:You pull your car up, the guy comes out, bing, bing, bing, that's it.
Marc:That's true.
Marc:You walk in, you just need money?
Marc:Okay, I get money.
Marc:Do anything you want there.
Guest:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:I got defeated in my head, and this happens to me a lot about traffic.
Guest:I was like, maybe we're going to pull into the goddamn Bellagio.
Guest:I do that too.
Guest:It's going to be fucking crowded.
Marc:So you found this woman that you love.
Marc:You've been with her a long time.
Marc:She's lovely, Karen, and she puts up with your bathrobe problems.
Guest:Now, do you ever think... She puts up with that insane muttering from nowhere.
Marc:like like you know what i mean like like the bursts of anger from nowhere yeah but don't you think that given your you know what you come from and you know i can relate to it a bit it's just that you just want somebody to make it okay your mother was in the hospital your father was running around yelling and screaming no one was there to say it's gonna be okay eddie yeah and that's all i want people to say now is uh and for for my whole for my whole uh like
Guest:for my whole fucking growing up which is i i would say from 20 i started growing up i don't know 30 maybe me a couple years ago yeah well yeah i always i had one of my closest friends jim cohen i would always call him up yeah he was my go-to guy yeah i'd always call him up and i go am i gonna be
Guest:And we started laughing about it recently because he goes, you know, pretty soon you're not going to be all right because I'm getting older.
Guest:And I would always say to him, am I going to die?
Guest:That would be my big thing.
Guest:I'd always say to Jim, am I going to die?
Guest:And he would go, not tonight.
Marc:Maybe.
Marc:Well, it's good that he's honest, but I just feel like.
Guest:I need it to be comforted is what I'm saying constantly.
Marc:When you grow up in chaos or emotional detachment, the one thing parents are supposed to do is at least make you feel like it's going to be okay.
Marc:You know what I mean?
Marc:Is there a monster under my bed?
Marc:No, there's not a monster under my bed.
Guest:Yeah, and that's another thing in the movie.
Marc:There's a monster in the living room.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:That's another thing in a movie, too, is that I recently have never really been a road guy.
Guest:I used to do the road with an improv group that was kind of lame, but I was never a big road guy.
Guest:And I look back at that and I go, why didn't I ever do the road a lot?
Guest:And I think I was scared to just do the road because I think to be a road comic, you really do have to have balls.
Guest:I mean, and now I finally feel like I've got enough stability in my psyche and
Guest:where I can fucking leave home and actually go to strange places and enjoy it and also have the courage to face other audiences.
Guest:I was staying to the comfort of just my audience.
Guest:Yeah, free shows.
Guest:Whatever they were.
Guest:Down the street.
Marc:yeah yeah i know but but yeah but i think a lot of that had to do with the fact you didn't think you had an audience out there you thought you were going to walk into a hostel or totally or detached environment uh and you're all alone out there i mean you know something changed for me on the road recently is that like i enjoy it it's like you can stay in a hotel yeah i love that it's gonna be clean they're gonna be maybe they have nice soap you know i love hotels yeah i'm like i always whenever i open up in a hotel when you know the nice hotel thing i'm like oh god
Guest:God, this is great.
Guest:Look at this window.
Guest:Because I went to Dublin, man.
Guest:I went to Dublin.
Guest:How did it go over there?
Guest:It went really well.
Guest:I couldn't believe how well it went because I almost gave myself a nervous breakdown going, are they going to get me?
Guest:how are they going to get me?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I can't even do Nebraska.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Like in my head, I can't do, you know, Kansas.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And now I'm in Dublin?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:They're not going to get me over here.
Guest:And someone pointed out to me they're English speaking.
Guest:Yeah.
I was like,
Guest:That's a good point.
Marc:But you're a broad character in the sense that everyone gets... That's what people were telling me.
Marc:Everyone gets anger.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:And everybody gets... But you know, I was on stage in Dublin and I said to... Excuse me.
Guest:I said to the audience, how many of you folks are in therapy?
Guest:And that's a no-no.
Guest:I found out.
Guest:They don't talk about it.
Guest:So the cultural differences... Steve just whispered, shame.
Guest:Shame.
Marc:It's shame.
Marc:But they understand it.
Marc:I mean, you know, they... They do.
Guest:And I talked to another Irish comic about it.
Guest:He said...
Guest:He goes, they're all in it.
Guest:They just don't want to talk about it.
Guest:That's my Irish.
Marc:That's pretty good.
Marc:I know I have the same fears about doing international.
Marc:But how was Edinburgh for you for the month?
Guest:Oh, my God.
Guest:Well, Edinburgh was great in the sense that, wow, did it make me into a comic book.
Guest:As far as a headliner.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:You know, hour long shows.
Guest:And I did 20.
Guest:I did 23 shows in 24 nights headlining.
Guest:However, because I yell and because I was giving myself a nervous breakdown, there were reviewers constantly.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:There was constantly someone from a newspaper or someone from the committee looking to see how good you were.
Guest:So every show for me was a big deal.
Guest:And by the end of it, I had a shredded voice and I was physically exhausted.
Guest:And it took me about four weeks to just lay down in L.A.
Guest:before I was going to – I was really worried about my voice.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I went to two throat guys.
Guest:Dana Gould finally turned me on to a Mr. Beverly Hill throat guy who sees guys from Coldplay.
Guest:His name is Schnittman.
Guest:He's the big throat guy in L.A.
Guest:And he calmed me down.
Guest:He was like, you're okay.
Marc:But you got audiences and people liked you?
Guest:Yeah, it built for me.
Guest:It built for me in Annenborough.
Guest:Good, good.
Marc:Now, let's switch gears here, because I got Stephen Fine Arts, the dude who made the documentary on you here.
Marc:And the reason I brought you in, Stephen, is that Eddie is a very specific character.
Marc:I've been doing comedy a long time.
Marc:And there are guys that are very specific, which means that there's nobody like them.
Marc:And usually, they're sort of rare birds.
Marc:Mm-hmm.
Marc:And they kind of, you know, go to the beat of their own drummer for better or for worse.
Marc:And there's usually a guy, a young guy around that decides to just lock on to the fucking, the momentum of the weird guy.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:And you're one of those guys.
Marc:Is that a good thing?
Marc:What made you gravitate towards...
Guest:Honestly, I'm a comedy junkie.
Guest:So I just love it.
Guest:And I was listening to the WTF from the beginning.
Guest:WTF?
Guest:This show.
Guest:Oh, this show.
Guest:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Guest:I was listening to Maren.
Guest:I was listening to you basically from the beginning.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And Eddie was... You called him, I believe.
Guest:You called him.
Guest:He was making kale one time.
Guest:And I listened to Eddie just...
Guest:It was a telephone call?
Guest:It was a telephone call, like the fifth or sixth episode.
Guest:I listened to like every... I'm ridiculous.
Guest:But Eddie was one of those guys.
Guest:I was like, who is this fucking guy?
Guest:And I just wanted more.
Guest:I wanted more of it.
Guest:And when he got to... When I finally got to see him at UCB, I just wanted more and more and more.
Guest:And every time I could see him, I was just like...
Guest:You know, this is brilliant.
Guest:And it was always new.
Guest:It was every time it was something different.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And I never experienced that before.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I wanted more.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And what compelled you to make a movie about him?
Guest:I know, that's a big jump.
Guest:I just finished a job producing for reality TV.
Guest:Oh, don't tell me it was just a practical decision.
Marc:No, I took like, but you know, no, no, no.
Guest:I'm kidding.
Marc:You know the whole story.
Marc:I'm kidding.
Marc:But you come from craziness.
Marc:So like, you know, this, right?
Marc:I mean, you got to come from some craziness because, you know, this guy's not for everybody, but he spoke to you.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:To the, to the point where, to the point where you're like, yeah, I got to make my, I'm going to build my life around this guy for a couple of years.
Marc:My mom's an alcoholic.
Guest:Let's see.
Marc:That's a, that's a thing.
Marc:I met her.
Marc:She's very lovely.
Marc:She's very nice.
Marc:She's what you call a pip in the business.
Marc:Your mom's a real pip, that one.
Guest:Literally, she's like, you know, he made this movie.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Oh, God.
Guest:How's she doing with this?
Guest:She's good.
Guest:Like five years, I think.
Guest:Oh, good, good, good.
Guest:But yeah, it was a difficult childhood.
Guest:You know, it was always, you didn't know what you were going to get with mom.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:So there was a lot of that.
Guest:The surprise.
Guest:Yeah, the surprise at the party, the family function.
Guest:Mom's dancing and there's no music playing.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:You always knew what you were getting with my mom.
Guest:Right, but not with your dad.
Marc:Nothing.
Marc:But I think what made me attractive to him was that, you know, it was chaotic and spontaneous, but it had a context.
Marc:Yeah, absolutely.
Marc:You know, like, you know, Eddie's on stage.
Marc:Who knows what's going to happen, but he's not going to embarrass me.
Marc:Yeah, exactly.
Marc:Yeah, it's true.
Marc:So this guy seems to have a handle on one of my biggest fears, which is, what's the grown-up going to do?
Mm-hmm.
Guest:yeah and he was and when I got a chance to meet him too it was just like that the sweetest guy I didn't know what to expect and I was really nervous when I first met him and yeah he really couldn't have been nicer to me so yeah for and I'm like someone wants to meet me yeah really I'm like really this well you've got that fellow who wants to meet me you've got the crazy yelling Eddie and then you've got the needy yeah the needy insecure overly sensitive Eddie hi
Marc:Well, that was the thing about the last time we talked for an hour at the very beginning.
Marc:I found myself just performing for you and just making you laugh.
Guest:I love to laugh.
Guest:What's wrong with that?
Marc:I'm not saying there's anything wrong with it, but the whole conversation was me saying things and you going, yeah, you're right.
Guest:Well, yeah.
Guest:How long ago was that?
Guest:I don't fucking know.
Guest:Because I've grown along.
Guest:Well, it was the beginning of when you started this.
Marc:Have you grown or are you just becoming a little more successful and happy?
Guest:That's what I mean by grown.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:No, I think you've grown in a lot of ways.
Guest:Has he grown since you've known him?
Guest:He's a lot less fear.
Guest:I think we already mentioned going on the road and just all that.
Marc:It's amazing when people start to know who you are and like you that you finally sort of like, I mean, that's really where self-esteem comes from, sadly, is that what you've committed for better or for worse or whether you were able to make decisions around that or not, you are who you are.
Marc:And when you're that guy, when you can't change to accommodate whatever this audience is.
Marc:You assume that people don't like what you do because they're too stupid.
Guest:Yeah, exactly.
Marc:But it never comes into your head.
Marc:It's like, well, maybe I change what I do to accommodate them.
Marc:Because it's not even a question.
Marc:It's not an integrity issue.
Marc:You can barely be you.
Guest:I never looked at it that way.
Guest:Yeah, that's true.
Guest:I get it.
Guest:How am I going to tweak anything?
Marc:So, you know, after you're that guy, it's like, I'm just struggling to be me.
Marc:And then finally people are enjoying you.
Marc:You're like, oh, good.
Marc:Okay.
Marc:So I guess it was okay.
Guest:It's okay.
Guest:You know what's great about what Steven did?
Guest:Steven did a lot for me because the fact that Steven believed in me and wanted to make a film about me,
Guest:I think had a lot to do with me accepting to go to Edinburgh and just like this forward, you know, because when I have time to think about things and go, should I go to Edinburgh?
Guest:You scare yourself.
Guest:That doesn't seem like a good thing to do.
Guest:They're not going to get, you know.
Guest:I was scared for you.
Marc:I had a bad experience there.
Marc:I was scared for you.
Guest:I remember that.
Guest:Yeah, you were like, I forget what you said.
Guest:We were outside the Ice House when I first broached it to you in Pasadena.
Guest:And you were like, it's one fucking reviewer you're waiting on.
Guest:That's a fucking nightmare.
Guest:And that's all you said about it.
Guest:Thank you, Mark.
Guest:And you walked into the Ice House.
Marc:You and Kirk Fox had a show out there.
Marc:Is that right?
Marc:Yeah, yeah.
Marc:It was a double billing.
Marc:It was produced.
Marc:I didn't self-produce.
Marc:I think the shows weren't bad.
Marc:There was just no audience.
Guest:That's depressing.
Marc:Yeah, it gets a little hard after a long time, after a month of it.
Marc:Three days.
Marc:Yeah, yeah.
Marc:And I wasn't in a good place.
Guest:The one thing about that festival is that I would come on in the fourth week.
Guest:I was like, folks, this is no longer a festival.
Guest:It's a hostage crisis.
Guest:Because after three weeks, to me, that's plenty of a festival.
Guest:Week four, I thought, was hilariously.
Guest:It was like, come on.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:four weeks of this?
Marc:Well, yeah, people ask me, going back, I'm like, why?
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:I mean, like, if you're not gonna try to... It's nice, though, for me.
Guest:It's opened up.
Guest:I'm going to Norway.
Guest:Guys saw me in Norway.
Guest:I'm going to Norway in a couple of weeks.
Marc:You're going back to London.
Guest:I'm going to London for three weeks.
Guest:Ireland, you know.
Marc:Well, that's it, you know, if you want to break that international market.
Guest:I like that.
Guest:I like that.
Guest:Now, I gotta say, I just want to...
Guest:What I really loved was being exposed to some Irish and UK comedians who blew me away.
Guest:Yeah, like who?
Guest:I was like, who are these freaking guys?
Guest:Tommy Tiernan?
Guest:Yeah, yeah, he's good.
Guest:And David McSavage in Ireland?
Guest:I don't know McSavage.
Guest:I was like, oh my God, who the hell are these guys?
Guest:And then in the UK, just seeing other guys, Stuart Lee.
Guest:Stuart Lee's great, yeah.
Guest:Who the fuck?
Marc:Why don't I know these fucking guys?
Marc:Because they don't cross over.
Guest:But I was like, these are better.
Guest:They're great comics.
Guest:When I saw Tiernan in Dublin, I was like, this guy may be the best comedian I've ever seen in my life.
Guest:At least that's what it felt.
Guest:You know how when you're at a show and it's like magical.
Guest:And I was like, this is unreal.
Guest:This guy should be the king of the world.
Guest:Never mind just the Pope of Ireland.
Marc:Yeah, yeah.
Marc:Yeah, no, it's amazing.
Marc:I had Dylan Morin in here.
Guest:I liked him a lot because he mentioned me.
Marc:Yeah, yeah.
Marc:And I've seen Tiernan.
Marc:I'd like to talk to him.
Marc:But like Stuart Lee I had on the show when I was in London.
Marc:He's amazing to watch.
Marc:Completely unique voice.
Guest:So smart.
Guest:Well, that's good.
Marc:So you're locking in because I'm still a little nervous about international shows.
Marc:I don't blame you.
Marc:But so, Stephen, so you feel good about what you did here with Eddie?
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:Yeah, I'm actually really happy with it.
Guest:It took a little while to get used to audiences watching the film.
Guest:You're very nervous.
Guest:I am nervous.
Guest:You kept yelling at me.
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Guest:In Montreal, are you talking about?
Guest:What are you talking about?
Guest:You're in it.
Guest:Why don't you watch it?
Guest:That is a frustrating thing when you give someone a link and you're like, hey, watch this.
Guest:No, they ask you for it.
Marc:I got a, what, you talking about me?
Guest:No, not you.
Guest:Well, you left.
Guest:You left.
Guest:You left in Montreal.
Guest:You introduced it, which was so nice of you.
Guest:And then you left.
Guest:I had to be somewhere.
Guest:You did?
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Why would I just leave?
Marc:I had a show to do.
Marc:You were like, could you please come?
Marc:Eddie's not going to be here.
Guest:I didn't know that.
Guest:That would have been funny if you didn't have a show to do.
Guest:I swear I didn't know that.
Guest:I swear I didn't know that.
Marc:All this time you didn't know that?
Guest:All this time.
Guest:Like, I would just say, like, I can only be for 10.
Guest:What kind of fucking idiot am I?
Guest:I don't know if you're going to dinner.
Guest:or something like that.
Guest:I didn't know.
Marc:Why would I do that for dinner?
Marc:I had to be in a fucking show.
Guest:I've been holding onto this grudge for like four months now.
Guest:That is ridiculous.
Guest:I wasn't in Montreal, so I'm out of this one.
Marc:No, the kid, he's like, you know, will you please that he's not here because you introduced it?
Marc:You're a big part of it.
Marc:But I'm like, yeah, of course, but I got to go.
Marc:Because I had to do a show.
Marc:Yeah, I had to be at my show in an hour.
Marc:You know, and now he's sitting here going, what kind of fucking asshole?
Yeah.
Marc:like why would I do that oh my god it is a real personal thing now you know your film your film I know I talked to his mother for five minutes that was nice you calmed her down that was good but they liked it did they ever ask you like why you like this guy so much
Guest:My dad loves him.
Guest:My dad loves him.
Guest:Yeah, me and Steve's dad have really hit it off.
Guest:Yeah?
Guest:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:Absolutely.
Guest:So he doesn't feel like... We speak the language of the proletariat together.
Guest:You watching the Bear game?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Boy, the Giants suck.
Guest:Oh, really?
Guest:Ah, the Bears, ah, they're up and down.
Guest:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Guest:The way the working man talks to each other.
Guest:You're a football guy?
Guest:Drew sports.
Guest:You're a football guy?
Marc:yeah i'm a big sports fan yeah i can't reconcile that with my you know because when you're a big sports fan you're also kind of like uh just a corporate junkie it's all corporate now it's all corporate would you stop it what what do you why do you got to go there for you should i don't know because a proud sports fan yeah but no it's in my blood though yeah i know but why is that in the show right but but your choice is like oh these guys are just paid monkeys
Marc:Just self-loading.
Guest:It's just manipulation of everybody, this sports crap, I think.
Guest:When I stand back from it, it's just such big business.
Guest:Why do I care about these games so much?
Guest:No, I really feel like you're not a sports fan.
Guest:I know you.
Guest:It's like such an investment of time that I think can be better spent.
Marc:But when the boots are on the ground, on the field.
Guest:It's pretty intense for me.
Guest:It's what it is, right?
Guest:Yeah, I like it.
Marc:You separate all that from the other shit.
Guest:That's true.
Guest:You know what it is?
Guest:And I analyze my love for sports is that I love the competition.
Guest:And I think that's sick too.
Guest:Like, win.
Guest:Like, it's all about for me.
Guest:I have to win.
Guest:Like, I identify with the team.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And it's like,
Guest:win we gotta win we gotta beat these guys and what i talk about in my act is that like for instance the giants my new york giants won the super bowl last year and wait and it's not the giants but your giants the new york your giants well there's san francisco giants whatever but you said my new york giants did i say that yeah so the new york giants won the super bowl and i always talk about how it seems like about a half hour after they win it it's like okay now what they won and
Marc:It's okay to believe in something, Eddie.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:Sure.
Marc:Sports is relatively harmless if you're not painting your face and hitting people.
Guest:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:I'm not painting my face.
Guest:I will wear the jerseys and shit, though.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:There's nothing wrong with that.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Yeah, I wish I had that in me.
Marc:You do?
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:It looks fun.
Marc:People seem to really have a good time.
Marc:They have a lot invested in it.
Marc:I don't judge it.
Guest:What's that line you have?
Guest:I don't judge you for the myths you believe in.
Guest:I don't want to mock the myths that define you.
Marc:I love that line.
Marc:Well, I'm happy, Stephen, that you believed in Eddie, and I'm glad, Eddie, that you still love sports.
Marc:I think you should talk about it more on stage.
Marc:Why don't you talk about that?
Marc:I should.
Marc:Why do you go right to corporate?
Marc:Why not say, like, oh, I love the Giants.
Marc:I love them.
Marc:I should.
Marc:I should.
Marc:I think that's... It's a big part of your life.
Guest:You know what pressure I'm feeling now is I have to go to London with a brand new hour.
Guest:And I'm nervous about that.
Guest:Because I always go, okay, what's funny?
Guest:That's like I go, okay, like trying to write.
Guest:Okay, what's funny?
Guest:What's funny?
Guest:What's funny?
Guest:Instead of it all comes from I really love the Giants.
Guest:It all comes from just talking about your reality.
Marc:Start with, you know, I got married finally after all these years.
Marc:Yeah, I got married.
Marc:What the hell does that mean?
Marc:Right, yeah.
Guest:That's a good move for me, though.
Marc:What, marriage?
Guest:I think, for me.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Yeah, if I get into a couple of, you know, exercise programs.
Guest:Boy, just coming up the hill here, by the way, I was like, maybe because I've had the flu the last couple of days.
Marc:That must be it.
Guest:I could barely walk from my car, which I parked just down, like, you know.
Guest:I was like, whew.
Marc:Well, you know, you gotta just...
Marc:I think it's important for you to always have something you're not doing that you can beat the shit out of yourself with.
Marc:So you don't want to stop that.
Marc:Now you're married, so all that's left is the big struggle with the belly.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Boy, that's a big one.
Guest:The belly and the struggle.
Marc:Yeah, the belly and the struggle.
Marc:There you go.
Marc:We just named your new hour.
Guest:Well, I thought the new hour should be I can barely be me.
Guest:Okay.
Guest:Okay.
Guest:I like that.
Marc:Well, I'm glad to help out.
Marc:So just remember, you thought of it.
Marc:I still like medicated lummox.
Marc:Medicated lummox.
Marc:Well, we've had a good session, fellas.
Marc:Are we okay?
Marc:Everybody good?
Marc:I feel very good.
Marc:Can we stop this now?
Marc:Yes.
Marc:All right, that's our show.
Marc:That's it.
Marc:I just wanted to say that it was lovely finally talking to Eddie for that long of a time, and Stephen was lovely, and the movie is fun.
Marc:Eddie is one of the great underappreciated comic personalities of our time.
Marc:And Stephen is a nascent but hungry filmmaker who will lock in.
Marc:He'll find some other disturbed and broken personalities to latch onto and document.
Marc:I am.
Marc:I'm going to say goodbye.
Marc:I'm in Vancouver.
Marc:I'm probably going to go get some Asian food of some kind.
Marc:It seems to be what you do here.
Marc:There seems to be a lot of that.
Marc:Go to WTF pod dot com for all your WTF pod needs.
Marc:You know, get some merch kicking a few shekels.
Marc:There's new posters there.
Marc:The box brown posters from the Philly show are there.
Marc:The hand screened ones.
Marc:You can also pick up the Mark and Tom show there.
Marc:You can get that on iTunes.
Marc:You do a search for Mark and Tom or Mark Maron, Tom Sharpling.
Marc:There's all that.
Marc:What else can you do?
Marc:You know the story.
Marc:Leave some comments.
Marc:Check the episode guide.
Marc:Who's been on?
Marc:What's going on?
Marc:Got some good shows coming up.
Marc:We got E from the Eels coming up.
Marc:We got John Darneal from the Mountain Goats coming up.
Marc:We got some good stuff coming up, and thanks for hanging in.
Marc:And Boomer Lives!