Episode 375 - Jason Stuart
Guest:Are we doing this?
Guest:Really?
Guest:Wait for it.
Guest:Are we doing this?
Guest:Wait for it.
Guest:Pow!
Guest:What the fuck?
Guest:And it's also, eh, what the fuck?
Guest:What's wrong with me?
Guest:It's time for WTF?
Guest:What the fuck?
Guest:With Mark Maron.
Marc:Alright, let's do this.
Marc:How are you, what the fuckers?
Marc:What the fuck buddies?
Marc:What the fucking ears?
Marc:What the fuck nicks?
Marc:What the fuckstables?
Marc:Alright, that's it.
Marc:I am Marc Maron.
Marc:This is WTF.
Marc:Thank you for tuning in.
Marc:Thank you for listening to me.
Marc:I'm very excited about things.
Marc:Things are very exciting.
Marc:I'm trying to keep that frame of mind.
Marc:Exciting.
Marc:Things are good.
Marc:Things are happening.
Marc:Things are going to happen.
Marc:It's not a bad thing.
Marc:Nervousness is fine.
Marc:Do not derail yourself over anxious nervousness.
Marc:just channel that energy into yeah finally this is gonna happen not oh god what's gonna happen here that's velcro I don't even know what these things are oh these are those things that you can wrap wires okay got it got it not your problem
Marc:Let's do some business before I get into this.
Marc:I'm going to explain to you my side of the James Franco situation.
Marc:I will have my guest Jason Stewart on here in moments.
Marc:Interesting guy, out gay man who's been doing comedy for a very long time.
Marc:I've seen his pictures at the comedy store for years.
Marc:He reached out to me, said, what's up?
Marc:I said, who are you from those pictures?
Marc:I know your face from all these things.
Marc:Why don't we talk?
Marc:You've been around a long time, buddy.
Marc:Tell me about the struggle.
Marc:Tell me about the process.
Marc:So Jason Stewart is here.
Marc:Lovely man at Crackers in Indianapolis in the Broad Ripple Club tonight.
Marc:That's April 4th.
Marc:Tomorrow, Friday the 5th and Saturday the 6th doing five shows.
Marc:Come out.
Marc:I know a lot of you have seen me up in that region.
Marc:But come on out.
Marc:I'm trying to crunch the special.
Marc:I'm doing the hour plus thing with the new stuff.
Marc:Come on, man.
Marc:Ryan Singer's going to be with me.
Marc:That's always fun.
Marc:I'll be in San Francisco at the Palace of Fine Arts April 13th.
Marc:That's Saturday, 7 o'clock.
Marc:Few tickets left.
Marc:That's exciting.
Marc:That's a big old place.
Marc:I've been getting some emails.
Marc:I've been seeing some comments about the James Franco episode.
Marc:Look, this is what happened.
Marc:You know, you can hear whatever you want to hear on that episode.
Marc:And I think people made a little bit more of it than it really was.
Marc:I was heading into South by Southwest.
Marc:Harmony and James were a sort of last minute booking.
Marc:I was thrilled that they were there.
Marc:There was even talk that we would do an hour with them.
Marc:But in hindsight, that might not have been the best choice.
Marc:So I think I made the right choice.
Marc:But sadly, I didn't get to see Spring Breakers till after the interview.
Marc:And I enjoyed Spring Breakers.
Marc:I think Harmony's film was great in a lot of ways.
Marc:There were some things in that movie that you'll never see anywhere else or ever again.
Marc:And James Franco, I think, gave one of the best performances of his career, no doubt.
Marc:And I recommend seeing that film.
Marc:And it's funny.
Marc:I think you should look at it as a dark comedy because that's what it is.
Marc:I don't think it should be misunderstood.
Marc:That's how I saw it.
Marc:That's what I'm telling you.
Marc:All right, so I'm doing the live WTF.
Marc:I got Peter Sagal out there.
Marc:I got Bargetzi out there, Nate Bargetzi.
Marc:And and I see Harmony and James are there.
Marc:And before the show, I don't think they knew what they were getting into.
Marc:I don't think they knew the tone of the show.
Marc:I got a sense that they were expecting something a little more straight up, not necessarily a comedy show with a big old audience.
Marc:But that might be just me projecting.
Marc:So I had a nice chat with Harmony before we got on stage.
Marc:And then he came out on stage and immediately stopped talking.
Marc:And it was tricky.
Marc:So right out of the gate, I wanted to talk about his films.
Marc:I wanted to talk about where he was coming from.
Marc:And his public persona is sort of like, what?
Marc:I can't.
Marc:What?
Marc:Which is fine.
Marc:You can present yourself however you want.
Marc:But I have respect for the guy.
Marc:And I think we got a little bit out of him.
Marc:And then Eddie interrupted me.
Marc:And that was fine for a few minutes.
Marc:And that jarred Harmony.
Marc:I think it might have jarred James a bit.
Marc:But when James came out, I just want you to know that, look, I am a fan of performance art.
Marc:I'm an open-minded guy, an open-hearted guy.
Marc:And I encourage any sort of expression.
Marc:But in my mind, there was a question, you know, as to whether or not, you know, where's James Franco coming from?
Marc:You know, is he a prankster?
Marc:Is it all a performance art piece to him?
Marc:What are some of the things that drives him around this stuff?
Marc:These were the questions I wanted to talk to him about.
Marc:I wanted him to be candid with me.
Marc:You listen to this show a lot.
Marc:You know that, you know, if at baseline, you know, ground zero of what I do here is that I want to connect with somebody as a person.
Marc:And that's what I tried to do.
Marc:So James came out and immediately sat with his back towards me on stage in front of people.
Marc:He sat and turned away from me.
Marc:This was the first.
Marc:Here's James Franco.
Marc:Boom.
Marc:Comes out, sits, turns away from me.
Marc:So three quarters of his back is to me.
Marc:And I say, what's up?
Marc:He goes, well, you're a little close.
Marc:Okay.
Marc:This is how I remembered it.
Marc:I moved away.
Marc:He turned around and I began to talk to him.
Marc:Now I'm doing a live show.
Marc:I'm doing a show that, you know, should be a little lighthearted and funny, but yet I'm capable of, you know, getting into serious stuff.
Marc:And right out of the gate, he was, you know, standoffish.
Marc:He was difficult.
Marc:He was judging the situation.
Marc:I could feel it.
Marc:And it just right from the gate between turning his back on me and then being difficult and cagey.
Marc:And it just got off to a bad start.
Marc:So whatever you people are reading as condescension was really just me trying to lighten up the situation and get him to relax into just having a conversation.
Marc:You know, me making light of things is just me being a comedian and me asking him questions about performance art and about other things.
Marc:It was not condescending.
Marc:You do not realize that sitting there with that guy and acting like I was about to sandbag him somehow or I was about to, you know, belittle him, which I was not trying to do.
Marc:I was really just trying to connect.
Marc:I know the guy's a funny guy and I just wanted him to open up a little bit, but it just didn't go that way.
Marc:It did not go that way.
Marc:I thought it was good about the stuff about the Oscars and the stuff about Marina Abramovich.
Marc:My asking him how he didn't laugh was a reasonable question given the situation if you watch that show.
Marc:I'm not defending anything.
Marc:I just think the reason why it got awkward is I tried my best with both of those guys just to lighten things up and get them to sort of...
Marc:Be loose.
Marc:But I think the fact that it was a comedy situation, and maybe I didn't have as pointed a question as I might have needed to get through, we did okay.
Marc:But at the end, when he said that he used to take himself seriously, and I turned to the audience and said, used to, or whatever I did, and made a face like, really?
Marc:That was a reasonable joke to make for anybody who...
Marc:You can take a joke was not offensive.
Marc:It was not particularly cutting.
Marc:It was really pretty lighthearted.
Marc:And he recoiled and almost turned his back on me again in that moment.
Marc:I just I'd had enough.
Marc:So I stopped it.
Marc:That's what happened.
Marc:You can think whatever you want, but I know in my heart, all I was trying to do was connect with him to see what he was up to, what he was about, what was a joke, what wasn't a joke to him, where he was coming from around art, and how he felt about what he does.
Marc:That's all I was trying to do, but he made it very difficult.
Marc:And, you know, the reason it ended awkwardly was I didn't want to get back into it.
Marc:You know, you know, I just gotten him out of his shell a little bit and he made a couple of jokes and I made one joke and he just went back into this sort of like weird posture of defensiveness and and aloofness.
Marc:And I was like, fuck it.
Marc:I'm done.
Marc:And I was shaken.
Marc:I was jarred to the point where I couldn't even remember Peter Sagal's name.
Marc:And then after the show, we were backstage and there was still weirdness.
Marc:And eventually, you know, he relaxed and it didn't seem weird.
Marc:He came out and took some pictures and it was OK.
Marc:But, you know, with somebody who plays a role in culture as an actor and then as somebody who desires to have relevance.
Marc:you know, in the higher arts, but also is, you know, kind of doing his own performance art piece and letting that reputation, you know, be what defines him outside of his roles in mainstream movies is that, you know, I don't know.
Marc:Was I just part of his performance piece?
Marc:Did I just get fucked with?
Marc:So you're entering a situation where it's like, who's fucking with who?
Marc:And, you know, can we just get to some, you know, engagement here that is earnest?
Marc:And I think there were a couple of moments of that.
Marc:So despite whatever you think was my disposition, that was what was going on.
Marc:So think what you will, but that was the situation.
Marc:Dig?
Marc:All right.
Marc:Jason Stewart.
Marc:I believe we've met maybe a few times.
Marc:The improv, just in passing.
Marc:No actual chatting.
Marc:No chatting.
Marc:But I mean, I've known you and your photograph on the wall at the comedy store forever.
Marc:And I realized, yeah, it's still up there with hair and hope.
Guest:Hair and hope.
Guest:It's the picture.
Guest:Are we on?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:It's the picture that you have when you put your hands on your face.
Guest:You go, oh my God, I'm a comedian.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:It's your first comedy picture.
Guest:I'm wearing a leopard jacket and I have my hands on my face and my hands tilted to the side and my hair is standing up.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Because the joke was I would wear leopard pants and a zebra jacket and spike up my hair and dance in a circle because I didn't want anybody to know I was gay.
Marc:That was the joke?
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:But I mean, the point is, you sort of sought me out to do this.
Marc:Yeah, definitely.
Marc:And was there- Honestly, I'll tell you the real truth.
Guest:Because as a gay guy who's a comic, how long have you been doing it?
Guest:I'm going into my 30th year.
Marc:I'm getting close to that.
Guest:So we're around the same- I'm 49.
Guest:Okay.
Guest:I'm in that area.
Guest:And gay guys don't tell our age.
Guest:Sure.
Guest:But I'm in the vicinity.
Guest:And you're a New York guy.
Guest:I'm an LA guy.
Guest:So we sort of, our paths have crossed.
Guest:I bet we worked all the, and we worked a lot of the same clubs during the day.
Guest:Sure.
Guest:And you being a more political comedian and me being a gay guy, we probably dealt with a lot of same crap, you know?
Marc:Right.
Marc:Well, also I started to think like, well, he's probably mad at me because I have not, I don't know that I've interviewed anybody who's out.
Guest:You did, well, when I started to pursue you and I thought it was because Todd had been on.
Guest:Yeah, he came out.
Guest:Right.
Guest:So I thought to myself, God.
Guest:He was only a gay comic for half of that.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Exactly.
Guest:You know, it's so funny.
Guest:I never knew that Todd was gay.
Guest:I never thought about it.
Guest:You guys are supposed to know.
Guest:No, because those guys stay away from me.
Guest:Seriously, he gives me like two seconds and he walks away.
Guest:Why do you think that is?
Guest:Because I guess they feel like I can tell through osmosis and I would out him or something.
Guest:Anybody who's in the closet doesn't want to have anything to do with me because I'm totally out.
Guest:I mean, I totally myself.
Marc:Well, and I also, when you reached out to me, I realized that I have not, because I don't know that many out gay comics because it's almost- Because we don't mix.
Guest:And I'm sort of- That's true.
Guest:I'm sort of a guy that's been sort of known for- A long time.
Guest:Yeah, for being a comic and then also known for being an out and I'm a character actor.
Guest:And if anybody wants to get me, go to jasonstuart.com, S-T-U-A-R-T.
Guest:And I sort of, you know, when you're gay and you're a guy and you're in the- This is a boys club.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I mean, three years ago, I did Bob and Tom with Louis C.K.
Guest:Right before he exploded.
Guest:And I'm sitting there, and Louis knew who I was, but I got to tell you, for a second, I didn't know who he was.
Guest:Because it's not in my world.
Guest:I'm not in that world of you guys.
Marc:Well, what is your world?
Marc:Who are your world?
Marc:I mean, I know Scott Capuro.
Marc:I used to know when I lived in San Francisco.
Guest:He was like the biggest when I first started, when I came out.
Guest:He was one of the first people I did a gig with.
Guest:So you were not out initially as a stand-up?
Guest:No, 10 years, closeted, scared half to death.
Guest:Really?
Guest:You know, fired.
Guest:I also got fired a year ago too for being gay.
Marc:But wait, so where did you start?
Marc:I mean, where'd you grow up?
Guest:I started, born in Los Angeles.
Guest:I mean, born in New York, New Bronx.
Guest:Moved there when I was a year old.
Marc:Moved here when you were a year old with your family.
Guest:My parents moved.
Guest:My father was in the Holocaust or not the camps, but the- He's on the other side?
Guest:He's like the pianist.
Guest:Really?
Guest:He's like that guy and then the pianist.
Guest:He was like in all the ghettos and everything.
Marc:Are you Jewish?
Guest:Yeah, definitely.
Guest:100% Russian, Polish, Jew.
Marc:So he sort of avoided the camps but lived that horrible life of just trying to survive.
Guest:Yeah, like in the movie The Pianist.
Marc:And was that a heavy upbringing too?
Guest:Oh God, it's awful.
Guest:It doesn't matter what you're feeling, it doesn't matter.
Marc:Why?
Marc:Because it's always like, you don't know what I've been through.
Guest:Exactly.
Guest:Your life is great.
Guest:And you should stop crying and stop complaining and stuff.
Guest:And I'm eight.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:You know, I don't know what he's talking about.
Guest:I just want to know why I can't play with dolls.
Marc:What is it?
Marc:Did you have more than one reason why you couldn't?
Guest:Oh, never.
Guest:Your life is great.
Guest:Shut up.
Guest:Stop feeling things.
Guest:Well, you were...
Guest:I was always too much.
Guest:Why do you have to have so many feelings?
Guest:Was he a religious man or no?
Guest:No, no.
Guest:My sister became a born-again Orthodox Jew around 20 years ago.
Guest:And I said, Dad, how do you feel about this?
Guest:And he said, well, it's good that someone's doing this.
Guest:I said, why?
Guest:He said, because I don't want to do it.
Guest:So we have someone in the family who does it for us.
Guest:And when we all die, then there'll be somebody who represents us.
Guest:So she's doing it for us.
Guest:She's like an orthodox.
Guest:She's got the hair and the wig, and she looks like she walked off the set of Yentl.
Guest:Does she have nine kids?
Guest:Oh, four.
Guest:It's like the road company of Fiddler on the Roof.
Guest:She can't get out.
Guest:They keep having to do the show.
Guest:It's really crazy.
Marc:She doesn't speak to me barely at all.
Marc:What did your old man do, though, when he moved out here?
Marc:What was the business?
Marc:He was the vice president of a necktime manufacturing company.
Marc:A necktie necktie.
Marc:That's old school Jewish schmata business.
Guest:He is the American dream.
Guest:He came to this country in 1949, not being able to speak English, started working as a cleanup guy, basically in a tie factory, learned to cut ties.
Guest:Became the manager.
Guest:He learned a way to cut ties, do the pattern so that it would be faster.
Guest:He became very well known in New York and they offered him a job in LA.
Guest:He moved to LA and then the whole family followed and everything just went crazy.
Guest:In a good way?
Guest:Oh, no, no, no.
Guest:My mother, of course, married him when she was 17.
Guest:She was pregnant.
Marc:In wherever, Poland or wherever?
Guest:No, she's a Brooklyn-born Jewish woman, you know, poor Brooklyn trash.
Guest:And the old man's from what, Poland?
Guest:Poland, Stanislaus, a hometown called Stanislaus.
Guest:And my mom was poor Brooklyn trash with parents that were completely insane.
Guest:But Jewish.
Guest:Yeah, looks sort of like Barbara Streisand meets Marilyn Monroe and had an affair with her second husband, the butcher.
Guest:for probably the 15 years out of the 22 marriage.
Marc:So she was fucking the butcher.
Guest:Oh, yeah, but we can say that.
Guest:I forgot.
Guest:And, of course, we had a freezer in the garage, so my father never said anything because we got all free meat all the time.
Marc:But he knew?
Guest:Oh, I think he knew, yeah.
Guest:And it was worth it for the meat.
Guest:I don't know.
Guest:He got caught.
Guest:They all lived in their own fantasy world.
Guest:And how did it blow up?
Guest:How old were you?
Guest:I think I was 17 when it all happened.
Guest:I really didn't know what was going on exactly, but I knew that both of my parents had affairs because my mother had an affair with Marty Cove, who used to be on Cagney and Lacey, because my friend Joey Santos, who I grew up, his father was Joe Santos, who was on Rockwood Files and used to hang out at their house.
Guest:So I actually introduced through me one of my mother's affairs.
Guest:My mother had a lot of affairs.
Guest:She was really hot.
Guest:And when she walked down the block when I was a kid, people would say things like, oh, my God, here comes your mother.
Guest:Here comes Gloria.
Guest:You know, hold on to your husband.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Oh, really?
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Guest:I got a hot mom, too.
Guest:It's hard.
Guest:Oh, no.
Guest:It never bothered me at all.
Guest:It's my whole act.
Guest:Oh, really?
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Are you kidding?
Marc:If it wasn't for her, I wouldn't be funny.
Marc:Well, I mean, it's just like as a kid and knowing that you have this sort of overly sexualized mother, like your friends would come over and they want to fuck her.
Marc:It was a...
Guest:gotta tell you you know for me the thing is my parents my father taught me how to take care of myself my mother taught me how to be sex sexy and and to be funny yeah i got the best from all of them even though they were completely insane so you've got no ill will no i have a lot of forgiveness that's the way i live with my family how long did that take uh forever okay yeah my dad just passed away recently too he passed away in uh february february 25th now when did you come out to them
Marc:I was in my 20s, my early 20s.
Marc:And they didn't know.
Guest:My mother somehow we set up the question.
Guest:I was having lunch with her in Beverly Hills and I set up the question with her and she asked me, she says, well, have you ever had sex with a guy?
Guest:I said, what do you mean?
Guest:She goes, well, what do you mean?
Guest:What do I mean?
Guest:And that's what happened.
Guest:And it's like now she calls me.
Guest:I said, ma, I met this really great guy.
Guest:And she goes, is he gay?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Of course he's gay.
Guest:That's the most important part.
Guest:Why are you yelling at me?
Guest:Why are you yelling at me?
Guest:I didn't know.
Guest:I said, Mom, I came out to you 25 years ago.
Guest:She says, I forgot.
Guest:So it no longer matters.
Guest:Most things stop mattering over time.
Guest:My mom actually stopped dating somebody because he didn't like gay people.
Marc:But when you started doing comedy, I think that the family story is very interesting because there's a dynamic in Jewish families where you just have this loud, crazy bullshit going on all the time.
Guest:Oh, 24-7.
Marc:And it takes you years to sort of like decode what was really going on.
Marc:I mean, when you were growing up, did you find that your parents, was your mother sort of so selfish that you felt neglected?
Guest:Selfish.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:Selfish.
Guest:I don't think I existed.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I was there to watch her put on her hair and makeup.
Guest:I mean, literally.
Guest:Do I look fat?
Guest:I don't think my mother even cared.
Guest:I think my mother would spend around literally 30 minutes at least just to put the hair on and the that girl eyelash or the thing.
Guest:That?
Marc:It was a lot more work back then.
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Guest:And we had this bathroom in our house in the center of the house that had a big makeup table in it.
Guest:And I would sit on the toilet, you know, on the little furry toilet thing and just sort of wait there.
Guest:Mom, come on already.
Guest:You know, come on, clip that on.
Guest:You know, I knew exactly how to do her hair.
Guest:I could do it faster than she could because I'd watch her so many times.
Guest:We couldn't leave the house until she was completely dressed for her work as a prostitute somewhere.
Guest:That's what it was like.
Guest:It was like I was getting ready to, she's like working.
Guest:I mean, all the guys would tease me all the time about her.
Guest:Which guys?
Guest:Oh, all my friends, you know.
Guest:When did you know you were gay?
Guest:I never knew I was gay.
Guest:Why don't you ask me when I knew I was straight?
Guest:When did you know you were straight?
Guest:I knew that I wasn't straight.
Guest:In 1971, coming home on the bus from West Side's Jewish gender camp, Michael Jackson's song ABC was playing on my transistor radio, and I saw the kids coupling up, and I said, oh, man, this is not going to be me.
Guest:I got to find a wife because I'm going to be in trouble.
Guest:I knew that it was bad.
Guest:What do you mean it wasn't you?
Guest:I looked up in the World Book Encyclopedia.
Guest:Do you remember those?
Guest:You saw a bunch of kids making out.
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Guest:And you were like, this is not happening for me.
Guest:With anybody?
Guest:I just knew that.
Guest:You have to realize that in those days, for those listening, we didn't know what gay meant.
Guest:I looked up at the World Book Encyclopedia of Homosexual.
Guest:It said mentally ill.
Marc:So you're not going to tell me you're a little older than me.
Guest:No, I'm not.
Marc:All right.
Marc:Not much.
Marc:I'm in the same age group.
Marc:Okay, fine.
Marc:The same age group, Jason.
Guest:This is so hard.
Guest:It's not hard.
Guest:You look great.
Guest:You look great.
Guest:It's so hard to get old.
Guest:I fucking hate it.
Guest:I fucking hate it.
Guest:I hate you for saying it.
Guest:I wish that it could have stopped at 39 because that's what I'm comfortable with.
Guest:Okay, but we're talking probably, okay, the late 60s.
Guest:I would say this all happened in the 70s.
Guest:Okay.
Marc:So you're having feelings that are unusual or ill-defined.
Guest:They weren't unusual to me.
Guest:I knew who I was.
Guest:I just didn't have a name for it.
Guest:Right.
Guest:I always knew who I was.
Guest:I was in love with Alan Taffelman who lived across the street.
Guest:I remember I wear my watch on my right hand because the coach, Dwight, who was the Noon Aid, I had a crush on, and he was the only one that would ever talk to me.
Guest:Where was this?
Guest:This was in Hancock Park Elementary School.
Uh-huh.
Guest:I just knew that I like guys and I didn't really think about it until someone told me it was bad.
Guest:And you got the message from all your people.
Guest:So when you looked it up and it said... Somehow I heard the word homosexual on PM Magazine.
Guest:I heard there was a transsexual one named Carrie or Carney who was a singer.
Guest:And she was talking about her feelings and that she thought she was homosexual.
Guest:And I thought, oh man, that's me.
Guest:And I remember looking up the World Book Encyclopedia, the Britannica, is that what it's called?
Guest:Yeah, sure.
Guest:And we had that.
Guest:Everybody had one when we were kids, because that was what the internet was.
Marc:No one looked at it.
Marc:Yeah, it was just on the shelves, all the brown volumes.
Guest:But I opened it up, and I looked up Lucille Ball, and then I also looked up homosexual.
Marc:Did it say homosexuals love Lucille Ball?
Guest:Yeah, and Barbra Streisand.
Guest:Those are the three things I looked up.
Guest:There was nothing on Barbra Streisand at that time, but there was a thing on Lucille Ball from the 40s when she married Desirenais, and it said homosexual, and it said mentally ill.
Yeah.
Guest:slap that book shut never opened it again right because i thought that's it who wants to be mentally ill right you know i was already picked on so much as a kid and beat up and fought but when did you find uh what you were beat up for for what for being gay yeah right from the but they knew that already or they just or was it just they knew it before i knew it they knew it before i knew it
Marc:So they were calling you again.
Guest:Oh, yeah, yeah.
Guest:I didn't know what it was.
Guest:I didn't know what it was.
Marc:And when did you find any sort of comfort in the lifestyle?
Marc:I mean, how did that evolve?
Guest:At 21, I went to Suicide Prevention Center.
Guest:And for years, I used to talk about it as I went there because I didn't have any money because I was just an actor at the time.
Guest:To work?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I didn't have any money to go to therapy because I wouldn't take money from my family and I was living on my own.
Guest:And I called the Suicide Prevention Center.
Guest:I think I called twice before I actually went there.
Guest:And I think that I was, and I didn't... You called because you were suicidal?
Guest:Yeah, but at the time, I didn't... It's funny, it took me a long time to admit that.
Guest:But this was a place you could go.
Guest:It's just a phone number now, I thought.
Guest:Because when I was 18, I remember I'd said, I'm not going to have sex with men, because I'd had sex with men from the time I was 16.
Guest:That was the first time you had sex with a dude?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And I remember I say, when I moved out on my own, I remember thinking to myself, okay, I'm starting fresh.
Guest:I'm 18.
Guest:I'm starting my acting career.
Guest:No more men.
Guest:No more.
Guest:I'm going to be straight.
Guest:And I had my girlfriend, Lisa, who I'd been with from the time I was 16 until I was 21.
Guest:Lisa Beeney, if she's listening, I doubt it.
Guest:She was your girlfriend.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:And you would have sex with her too?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And you were able to do that?
Guest:yeah he she was the only one yeah because she'd always say no right and for some reason that was it yeah so i knew that i didn't really have and it was sort of crazy it's all crazy what explain that to me i think that um god i haven't talked about this in so long um
Guest:You had this girlfriend.
Guest:I've had sex with five or six girls in my time.
Guest:But you knew she was... Every other girl I had a problem getting it up with.
Guest:Right.
Guest:But with her, I did not.
Guest:And I think it's because she didn't want me to, because she, I think, this is so personal to talk about, but I doubt she's going to listen.
Guest:God bless you, Lisa, if you're there.
Guest:I think she had had something terrible happen to her.
Guest:I won't say what, because it's not my place to say it.
Guest:But I think, you know, so long ago, I think something terrible had happened to her.
Guest:Uh-huh.
Guest:And I think I felt that I was this guy.
Guest:It's sort of who I've become now.
Guest:It's sort of this masculine daddy kind of figure to her.
Guest:And that's something that I'm really comfortable with.
Guest:So if there's any boys out there, you know.
Guest:Sure.
Marc:Now you're apologizing to her and you're reaching out to... Yeah, for those 20, 30-something guys.
Marc:To the misguided youth who are... No, no, I'm kidding.
Guest:I'm kidding.
Marc:No, it's all right.
Marc:I'm a bit of a daddy.
Marc:It doesn't matter about me.
Marc:I get that too.
Marc:I mean, look, I'm dating a woman who's 29 and I feel I have that.
Marc:I don't know if I'm a good father.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:But she does say, Daddy.
Marc:So you were able to have sex with her and she was your girlfriend, but did you know in your mind that you were just sort of, it was a charade or no?
Guest:Oh, I knew that I, you know, it's not clear because I was so messed up then.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:I don't have a clear, I thought that I- Were you on the drugs?
Guest:No.
Guest:No, I had to do it.
Guest:I had to do it.
Guest:It was like you were trying to train yourself.
Guest:Being a heterosexual, I wrote a piece recently about it that I did in Don't Tell My Mother, which is so funny that we're talking about this.
Guest:It was called The Dating Game, and it was about how I went on The Dating Game with Lisa.
Guest:You did?
Guest:Oh, yeah, because the girl on The Dating Game wouldn't go out with me because I was so crazy.
Marc:You were a bachelor on The Dating Game, and I won.
Marc:Because you're funny.
Marc:People don't realize that that was a big showcase for comics at that time.
Guest:Oh, it was nuts.
Marc:Like a lot of comics did it.
Marc:Am I right?
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:Oh God, everybody.
Marc:Was it still with the original host?
Marc:Who was that host?
Marc:Jim Lang.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:So it was early on.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Because I know they sort of redid it later.
Marc:That's the one I was on.
Marc:I was on the redo.
Marc:But it was still with him.
Marc:I remember that kooky girl that booked that because I seem to... I remember... You were on it too?
Marc:No, I went out for it.
Marc:I didn't get on.
Guest:I could see you because you're so cool.
Guest:I always think of you and Louis C.K.
Guest:You guys are all so cool.
Guest:You're in this world.
Guest:Oh, come on.
Guest:You're in this world with Dave Rath and Dave Becky and all these guys that just think you guys are like, you know, Jesus, you know, and I'm some gay guy off to the side.
Guest:They go, what the fuck is that?
Guest:I don't get it.
Guest:You know, I don't get what he's doing.
Guest:I don't even get what I'm doing.
Guest:I'm so uncool.
Marc:Well, I don't know that we're cool.
Marc:It was just sort of at that time.
Guest:Well, you speak to them.
Guest:You speak to them.
Marc:I mean, they're just comedy managers, really.
Guest:Yeah, but you speak to them, and that's what that's about.
Guest:That's why you didn't call me to be on your show, honestly, because you guys are all in this group of people that speak to each other through your comedy.
Guest:For me, I speak to the disenfranchised people.
Guest:That's my audience.
Marc:I definitely speak to the disenfranchised.
Marc:Mine are the other ones.
Marc:Yours are the cool ones.
Guest:To me, your disenfranchised are cool people.
Guest:You're all smoking cigarettes.
Guest:You got this cool house.
Guest:You're all drinking and you did LSD for a couple of years and you came back.
Marc:But on some level, your world is very cool as well.
Guest:It doesn't feel it.
Guest:My guys all love Margaret Cho and Kathy Griffin, and I'll do a show.
Guest:Why is that?
Guest:I'll do a show, and some guy will go, ooh, and I go, look, if I were Margaret Cho or Kathy Griffin, you'd be masturbating in a circle, so shut the fuck up.
Marc:Nice.
Marc:What is it with the diva camp thing?
Guest:I am done with it.
Guest:I am done.
Guest:I don't want to stand behind Lady Gaga and let her talk for me.
Guest:I'm probably not as, you know, I probably have pissed off some people, but I don't want women speaking for me.
Guest:I love Kathy and I love Margaret and they're great, but I don't want someone speaking for me.
Guest:I want to speak for myself.
Guest:I mean, this is what this is about.
Guest:This year is about for me in a very, very big way.
Guest:This year is about, this is my 20th year in...
Guest:2013 will be 20 years since I came out on the Geraldo show.
Guest:They did a big thing with Paul Mooney and me, unconventional convenience.
Marc:He didn't come out.
Guest:No, no.
Guest:He came out as an angry black man 20 years ago.
Guest:I didn't say anything.
Guest:I don't know anything.
Guest:I don't even know who I am right now.
Guest:Okay.
Guest:The show's way too popular to make a mistake about anything.
Guest:I know nothing about Paul.
Guest:Nothing.
Guest:Kathy Buckley was on, who's hearing impaired, and Sandy Church was a little person, and Sheila Kay, who'd lost a lot of weight, and was a woman, and Paul Mooney came out as being, where it was okay to be angry and black.
Marc:But did that upset you?
Marc:Because that's pathologizing homosexuality as well.
Marc:I mean, these people were dealing with, like, you know, a hearing impairment, an anger problem.
Guest:No, I was so thrilled.
Guest:to be able to be on a TV show and someone to give a shit that I lived or died I was a nervous wreck I thought my whole career would be over but I was so depressed I was so depressed on not being able to move on in my career you know when I started they didn't want me around everybody didn't want me around
Guest:They just said, you know, I remember Freddie Asparagus.
Guest:Do you remember him?
Guest:Sure.
Guest:Passed away.
Guest:God bless him.
Guest:He used to grab my ass all the time.
Guest:I don't know how many guys that you guys treated me like I was a sex object almost, except I didn't get to have sex with anybody.
Guest:All the grabbing and the pushing and the teasing.
Guest:It was like going to public school all over again.
Marc:Yeah, but it wasn't malicious.
Guest:It didn't matter.
Guest:It felt that way.
Guest:Because you also didn't call me to work with you.
Guest:Right.
Guest:You know, I had to call you.
Marc:You have to stop speaking to me directly.
Guest:I was not one of them.
Guest:No.
No.
Guest:But I mean, I wasn't a part of that school.
Guest:I had to do everything myself.
Guest:You know who really helped me?
Guest:Who?
Guest:Was Vince Champ, the guy who raped all those girls on the college campuses.
Guest:I remember Vince.
Guest:And went to prison.
Guest:That's the guy that helped me.
Guest:That's the guy who helped me get jobs first on the road.
Guest:And I was completely taken aback when I heard how terrible...
Marc:I did one of my first middle weeks with Vince.
Marc:You know who he is.
Marc:For my listeners, he was a comic.
Guest:He's known like the game show comedian.
Guest:That's what they call him.
Marc:He was a black comic that was very white-ish.
Guest:In those days.
Guest:Now you see comics, there's no line for that as much.
Marc:No, but I mean, he was definitely not doing what you would call like a deck jam.
Guest:Right.
Marc:But he was very mainstream and almost hacky.
Marc:I mean, he did.
Marc:Very hacky.
Marc:Yeah, he did some props.
Marc:But it turns out that, you know, he would tour colleges and there were a string of rapes that were very brutal and horrible.
Guest:And it was shocking.
Guest:And the comedy community was the nicest guy.
Marc:Right.
Marc:And the way they caught him was bizarre because it was on a radio show, right?
Marc:Someone heard him, a victim, heard a radio show that he was promoting a college gig on or something.
Guest:And I had heard from Elliot Threat, who was his best friend, that he had done this and he had his book and he actually was on a cruise and came back.
Guest:To do this, to do a college gig, it's almost like he wanted to get caught.
Marc:I would think psychologically that was probably true, but it was a string of brutalized.
Marc:I think he's still in prison.
Guest:Oh, yeah, he is.
Guest:Elliot calls me once in a while.
Guest:I talked to him recently.
Guest:But he helped you out.
Guest:So much.
Guest:It was really weird.
Guest:I'm teasing it to you guys at home.
Guest:I'm teasing about you guys, and I say it to be funny.
Guest:No, it's okay.
Guest:I say it as a joke, but I sort of felt that way at the time.
Guest:I don't feel that way now.
Marc:I'll take the hit and I'll try to speak, you know, from my own point of view in terms of like when I lived in San Francisco at the comedy store.
Marc:I don't remember there being I was only a doorman for like a year.
Marc:So I didn't spend a lot of time there and you weren't there when I was there.
Guest:I was there during the 80s a lot.
Marc:I was there in 87.
Marc:I passed probably Crossroads.
Marc:I was living up in Crest Hill.
Guest:I remember hanging out with you once at the Improv.
Guest:In the 90s, I was at the Improv a lot.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:And then I aged out.
Yeah.
Marc:but i was like sort of fascinated and excited by you know when i was in san francisco and sabrina matthews was starting she was great scott capuro uh mark uh what was that guy's name mark davis mark davis um and then scott got really well known in england um because he pushes it man he did he yeah he he was really way past a lot of comfort zones for people yeah sabrina now
Marc:And who was that guy that got MS that was like, you know, Bob Smith.
Marc:Bob Smith was like the well-known, like the first sort of accessible gay comic.
Guest:You know what's so funny is all these guys, yeah, somebody wrote to me the other day, some fans, and they said, Is he still around?
Guest:Yeah, he is in New York.
Guest:Is he all right?
Guest:He's doing okay, is what I hear.
Guest:You know, none of these guys, I'm like great friends.
Guest:Sabrina and I were quite friendly.
Guest:for what happened to her she moved to the west coast i think she made a girl and moved to the east coast east coast i'm sorry east coast she's still doing it because she's still doing funny she's still doing indication she you know i think a lot i think it's what's really interesting about being openly gay is that there's been a ceiling for us oh absolutely you know and and and i feel like you know because how do you transition out without being stereotypical or doing yourself a disservice how do you become more mainstream
Guest:It's so funny.
Guest:I've never felt not mainstream because I started in the mainstream clubs.
Marc:So tell me about the closeted period.
Guest:I started for 10 years.
Guest:I worked clubs.
Guest:I was a middle act.
Marc:What the hell were you talking about?
Guest:I talked about being Jewish.
Guest:I talked about my family.
Guest:I talked about pop culture.
Guest:I talk about the same things now, except I didn't talk about dating or my sex life or how I felt about it.
Guest:Out of fear?
Guest:Oh, my God.
Guest:Not fear.
Guest:I didn't know I could.
Guest:What do you mean you didn't know you couldn't?
Guest:I remember seeing Leah Delaria's picture in the paper in San Francisco.
Guest:I remember her.
Guest:She had this picture of her.
Guest:It said, bull in a china, dyke in a china shop.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And I remember seeing it, and it was 1991 or 92, and I was middling at Cobbs for Stephanie Hodge.
Guest:Margaret Cho was the opening act.
Marc:Stephanie Hodge.
Marc:And who was that big lesbian act who was very- That's Leah Delaria.
Guest:No, there was another one that almost- Oh, Kate Clinton?
Marc:Kate Clinton, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Guest:But she was also, she was in the lesbian world.
Guest:Right.
Guest:She was not even connected to mainstream.
Guest:Right.
Guest:I've always been in the mainstream.
Guest:I've always pursued my acting career at the same time.
Marc:I saw that movie you were in that was, you had a very big part in the date movie.
Marc:You watched 10 Attitudes?
Marc:no no it was like uh so was it called a guy date or first date or it was a weren't you in a film where it was i can't remember yeah it's called 10 attitudes and i produced the film it was it's 12 years old about how difficult it was for a 30 something guy to fall in love i did it totally improvised pre larry uh yeah yeah i saw it i saw it i think i saw it at a festival and and it was really you're really good in that well thanks it was sort of uncomfortable and heartbreaking right
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Guest:It's partly my story, pieces.
Guest:Everything has a little bit of my story.
Guest:That's so neat.
Guest:I can't believe you saw it.
Guest:I did.
Guest:Wow.
Marc:I'm trying to remember where I saw it.
Guest:It must have been at a film festival, because we did a lot of them.
Guest:We won quite a bit of them.
Guest:We won the Barcelona Best Comedy or something, and then we won Philadelphia.
Guest:We got the Critic Prize.
Guest:It was filmed so badly, and the sound was so bad, because we did it in the early 2000s before anybody...
Guest:had the cameras they have down.
Guest:And we did it as an experiment.
Guest:It was supposed to be called Dating.
Guest:And the director, he was smarter than me, this guy named Michael Gallant, and he made this a full-length movie.
Guest:Judy Tenuta was in it.
Guest:Alexander Paul from Baywatch and Jim J. Bullock and David Faustino and a lot of people.
Guest:It's so funny.
Guest:And why would you go to see it?
Guest:You're so cool.
Guest:I'm digging you.
Marc:So now I'm cool in a different way.
Marc:See, now I'm not the alienating cool.
Marc:I'm afraid of you guys, but I want to be on your team.
Marc:Here I am.
Marc:You guys again.
Marc:I'm you guys again.
Marc:Listen, I've had a rough time.
Marc:Have you?
Marc:Sure I have.
Guest:I mean, I ended up- Now, let me just say, because you're so cool at this.
Guest:You're so good at this.
Guest:I'm already like, I'm so excited.
Guest:Okay.
Guest:What?
Guest:I've not had the hardest time.
Guest:I'm really sort of lucky in a way.
Guest:I mean, I'm a gay guy.
Guest:I'm way, way over 40.
Guest:I've done a lot of film and television.
Guest:I mean, on IMDB, I'm like close to 100 as an actor.
Guest:So I've done a lot.
Guest:I'm really lucky.
Guest:I'm not complaining.
Marc:Yeah, you've worked a lot.
Marc:I looked at your thing.
Guest:Yeah, I have.
Guest:And I've gotten to play straight guys in the last couple of years.
Guest:Because I'm too old to play gay.
Guest:I'm aged out.
Guest:There are no gay people over 40.
Marc:All right, well, let me get back to a couple questions I need answers to personally.
Marc:Okay.
Marc:What determines, and just speak for yourself, I'm not asking you to speak for the gay community, but what determines the popularity of these female performers like Kathy and like Margaret?
Guest:You know what it is?
Guest:I can tell you what it is, because my first comedy album was called Gay Comedy Without a Dress.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And I did it in Provincetown because all the drag queens and all the girls like Margaret Cho and Kathy Griffin were so popular.
Guest:And they would come to my show.
Guest:You have to work so hard to get them.
Guest:And they'd love you.
Guest:But to get them there was so hard.
Guest:They were more interested in naked boys singing or something with a girl wearing a dress, whether it be a straight woman or a drag queen.
Guest:Right.
Guest:And I thought to myself, what is it?
Guest:And I finally figured out what it is.
Guest:I think it's the idea that if a guy is funny, he's no longer sexy.
Guest:Because for us, sex is really serious.
Guest:We don't fuck around.
Marc:For gay guys.
Guest:Oh, my God, yeah.
Guest:Sex is serious.
Guest:We don't laugh and fuck around during sex.
Guest:We get in there.
Guest:It's just, come on, shut your mouth, do what you're told, kind of thing.
Guest:There's no laughing?
Guest:Oh, no, not at all.
Guest:Daddy's here.
Guest:I've got candy.
Guest:The whole thing.
Guest:Come on, come on, come on.
Guest:You know, we are really, you know, like I always say in my act, I'm not one of those little fruity gay guys that run around and that you guys think that you see on TV.
Guest:I'm the guy that just sort of gets you and you're begging for more, you know.
Guest:So, yeah.
Guest:Does it say top on your business card?
Guest:It should say it, but, you know, because we've gotten a little specific there, haven't we?
Guest:Sure.
Guest:You know all the terms.
Guest:I know a couple.
Guest:Yeah, you know, not that I haven't on occasion.
Guest:Here we go.
Guest:Now we can talk about it.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Now maybe I'll get a little more PR than Todd.
Guest:But I think that what happens is that gay guys feel that their comedy, which comes out feminine, is a more feminine thing at times because you're sort of flippant and stuff comes out.
Guest:So you have to do it through the auspices of being a woman to be accepted.
Marc:So you're saying that most gay comedy has been the Femi version?
Guest:I think so.
Guest:When you see that seems to be the joke to straight people.
Guest:Whereas I have in the last five years have sort of embraced the masculine side of myself, embraced the bare world, embraced the leather world, and embraced the masculinity within myself since I turned 40.
Guest:Late 30s, 40s.
Marc:With your material as well?
Guest:And just as a person.
Guest:I almost felt forced into femininity as a kid because if you're in love with Barbra Streisand, who are you left to be but Robert Redford?
Guest:You don't have an identity.
Guest:You don't know who you are.
Guest:You know what I mean?
Guest:You just know you're in love with Barbra Streisand.
Guest:Right.
Marc:Build a personality around that.
Guest:Exactly.
Guest:But if you're in love with Robert Redford and you're not in love with her and you don't want to have sex with her, who are you left but to be her?
Guest:You're left to be her, so you wind up being a woman because you don't exist.
Guest:So that's also a part of it, too, is if I am attracted to you, Mark, and I think you're sort of hot and sexy, who am I in the world?
Guest:If there's no...
Marc:You're smart and clearly right.
Guest:Yeah, but if there's no reality anywhere of me seeing a woman, you know, seeing a man and a man fall in love together, if you don't see that growing up, I think it's changing.
Guest:I mean, I've been allowed to work and I've been allowed to have a career for, you know, it'll be 30 years as a comedian in June of 2013.
Guest:I'm sorry, May of 2013.
Guest:In June of 2013, it will be 20 years as an openly gay artist.
Marc:To address the sort of ridiculous straight guy question that I ask is that gay men are entertained by these over-the-top female personalities.
Guest:I think it's not just gay men.
Guest:I think it's everyone is.
Guest:Well, no, I mean.
Guest:I think everyone is.
Marc:There are certain performers, female performers, that really are part of the gay community.
Marc:And it's because they are over-the-top and take femininity to beyond anything that is mainstream.
Guest:Lady Gaga.
Guest:Certainly a drag queen status.
Marc:Right.
Guest:But I think that there are so few of those.
Guest:No, no, but they're icons.
Guest:Other than Lady Gaga, who has become that in the last, maybe I guess Beyonce, but she's also crosses over.
Guest:I think it's no longer just for us.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Kind of a thing anymore.
Guest:I think straight people.
Marc:But I think that also that speaks to what you're saying is that it's become more comfortable.
Marc:to be out and to be gay and to be public.
Marc:That you don't need these secret societies that revolve around drag queens.
Guest:They did a thing on CNN recently on the Situation with Wolf Blitzer show where I did, last week I did a bit where I came in to talk because I'm the chairman of the Screen Actors Guild after LGBT committee.
Guest:And I started that seven years to support openly gay actors so we would have a place to talk about our problems and to move to the next level.
Marc:Does it function?
Marc:I mean, is it a group?
Guest:Yeah, I'm the chairman.
Guest:But how many members?
Guest:Well, there's people that are on the list.
Guest:There's probably a thousand of actors who are a part of it.
Guest:It doesn't work like we're...
Guest:There's the chair committee, and then there's the committee committee.
Guest:It's the way the whole thing works at SAG-AFTRA.
Guest:And we do all these stuff.
Guest:At first, there was no... We didn't exist in the SAG-AFTRA contracts.
Guest:We didn't exist where all the minorities do.
Guest:Black, older people...
Guest:People with disabilities, we weren't even there, which I didn't know.
Guest:So first I had to get us to exist, and I had to redo the medical insurance to make sure that we're covered in the same way that we're covered in the country, which a lot of people say, well, they don't treat you the same at SAG.
Guest:It's not SAG, it's the country.
Guest:We don't get the same insurance.
Guest:And then the idea... In terms of couples?
Guest:Medical coverage.
Guest:Couples.
Guest:It's mostly couples and the couple's children.
Guest:Right.
Guest:As single people, it doesn't matter because single is single.
Guest:Right.
Guest:And then we started doing... To me, I started doing it selfishly, honestly, because I'm an actor.
Guest:I'm an artist.
Guest:I don't see myself as just a gay person.
Guest:I see myself as an actor who plays parts.
Guest:So I started pursuing a career in trying to get different kinds of work, but also being realistic.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And what I can play.
Guest:And if I can't play that, I have to work on it and do that and change my voice or change the way I move.
Marc:But it took you a while to evolve out of self-typecasting and also industry-typecasting.
Guest:Get the confidence because you know how it is.
Guest:People are ready to tell you no, that's their job.
Guest:Sure.
Guest:You go into an office, it's like they're looking, show me.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Show me why I shouldn't hire you.
Marc:Well, I just saw that documentary on the guy who wrote The Celluloid Closet.
Marc:What's his name?
Guest:Vito Russo.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:Unbelievable.
Marc:I mean, what a genius that guy was.
Guest:It's funny because I got to rush when you say that guy's name.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Because he's an icon for us.
Marc:I had no idea who he was.
Marc:I'm talking three weeks ago.
Marc:I saw this documentary.
Marc:I'm like, this guy changed everything.
Guest:Yeah, it's him, Harvey Milk, people like Robin Tyler, who was the first- Kramer, is he in there?
Guest:Larry Kramer, definitely, to the point of being hated by people.
Marc:Well, the celluloid closet and for him to make that case of homophobia and typecasting by going so meticulously and obsessively going through every movie ever-
Guest:Well, you know what it was?
Guest:It's like when I was a kid, I wanted to be an actor.
Guest:That's passion, total.
Guest:And then when I was told that I couldn't because of who I was in so many different ways, it became...
Guest:like like like a mission to be able to do this for me to do what I want to do so when I started this committee I thought to myself you know I can do this for myself but I can also do this for other people so other people don't have to go through what I went through and then I thought to myself somebody said somebody asked me this question last year when I was this year rather I forget it's not next year yet when I was working at the Laugh Factory in Chicago I was doing an interview with a paper and he said when someone gets to break the ground like you did do you get to walk on it
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And I said, well, sometimes, no, I don't.
Guest:And then I started to think about that.
Guest:This was in August and now it's December.
Guest:And I was thinking about this and I said, I want to change that.
Guest:I want to be a guy that gets to walk on the ground.
Guest:I don't want to fall to the side and let everybody else who's younger than me, you know, just do it and not me.
Guest:I want other people to do it.
Guest:I want to make everybody's lives easier.
Guest:That's service is a big part of what I do in my life as a person.
Guest:But I also want to be able to be a part of it.
Guest:I don't want to be left out.
Guest:It's some old guy that all of a sudden, oh, did you hear Jason Stewart was the one and then now he's dead.
Marc:Well, let's talk about the generational difference in relationship to when you decided and why you decided to come out.
Marc:I mean, because it seems to me that on the timeline, if you spent 10 years closeted and talking about your mother and pop culture, how did...
Guest:uh your decision to come out because it seems like it's right around the time that kramer and russo and act up and and and that it was it was you know what it was i was in san francisco your town where you were living and i heard bill clinton on tv you're getting me really emotional man i was watching bill clinton on tv and i remember um i remember him saying we need everybody's help
Guest:And I never heard anybody talk like that ever on television who was running for president.
Guest:He said, gay people, Jewish people, everybody.
Guest:And I just went, wow, I've got to do this.
Guest:And I was working at the Cobbs.
Guest:It was my first time there, not the second time.
Guest:The one down in the cannery?
Guest:With that guy, Tom Sawyer.
Guest:Sure.
Guest:Who would tell you what was wrong with Iraq right to your face.
Marc:I tagged your bits while you were up there.
Guest:And he was like, the guy was like on you.
Marc:He drove me completely crazy.
Marc:He's mellowed.
Marc:So was it the one down in the cannery?
Guest:Yeah, it was when it was there.
Guest:And then I went back there again.
Guest:And I thought, why won't he let me headline?
Guest:Because I was starting to headline.
Guest:And he wouldn't let me headline.
Guest:And starting headline was in the early 90s.
Guest:And I said, this is San Francisco.
Guest:I'm going to come out and do it.
Guest:He says, well, gay people don't come to this area.
Guest:And then I started to say, man, I got to find a way to be more powerful.
Guest:But you were out already or you weren't?
Guest:No, I was thinking about it.
Guest:You know, I was testing the waters.
Guest:It was frightening at that time.
Guest:You know, there was no Ellen.
Guest:There was no Neil.
Guest:There was no Rosie.
Guest:The only person was out with the funny gay guys, you know.
Guest:Sure.
Guest:I remember those guys.
Guest:Bob Smith and his group.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And Mark.
Guest:I didn't even know Mark Davis.
Guest:I didn't even know.
Guest:Is he still around?
Guest:I think he's dropped out of what I've heard.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:I don't know for sure, but I haven't seen him around in years.
Marc:I used to like him.
Marc:He's a little kooky, but he wasn't quite sure what he was doing up there, but he always dressed well.
Guest:He was really brilliantly, I think, interesting reference comedian details.
Guest:He was really funny.
Guest:I mean, there were so many good people.
Marc:Now, was your fear that you would be sort of like then just... My fear was I never got to act again because there were no gay roles at that time.
Guest:And even now, most of the gay couples on TV... Unless it was about a gay problem.
Guest:And then that was with a big star who was straight.
Guest:That was that Oscar turn.
Marc:Right, right, right.
Guest:You know...
Marc:But as a comic, I mean, were you afraid that like, well, if I start doing this on stage, then I will be owned by- You've gotten me so emotional.
Marc:That's good, isn't it?
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:I used to expect that.
Marc:Were you afraid that you would be sort of owned by the gay community then?
Guest:No, there was no gay community to be owned.
Guest:People used to ask me, did you do all the gay clubs?
Guest:There were no gay clubs.
Marc:But there was a gay community.
Guest:Yeah, but this didn't exist.
Marc:We're not talking about 1960.
Guest:20 years ago, there was no gay anything.
Guest:in terms of it was san francisco yeah but there was no gay jobs for an actor a comedian there was no place for us right there was nobody hiring us there was maybe some gay prides but they would hire the and they still do it they hire the disco girl singers straight girl singers they get paid all the money and it's very hard for what i call middle class actors and comedians to get paid to work you know like it didn't happen and then through the 90s as i came out i started to do all that kind of stuff when did you come out what was 93 and do you remember the show
Marc:Yeah, Geraldo.
Marc:Right, but I mean, on stage is a comic.
Guest:Oh, okay, I can tell you that.
Guest:The first time I tried it out was on the RSVP Cruises.
Guest:The RSVP Cruises?
Guest:Which is the gay cruises.
Guest:Okay.
Guest:And it was in the middle of the ocean, and I didn't have an act for gay people.
Guest:You just took the job.
Guest:Yeah, because they said, I thought, I'm going to try this.
Guest:And I thought, it didn't occur to me, this is how completely stupid I was, that I'd have to talk about being gay to be gay.
Guest:Okay.
Guest:I didn't have an idea.
Guest:I just thought I had to be funny.
Guest:So then Bud Freeman, God bless him, called me to headline an AIDS benefit in Chicago at the Improv.
Guest:And Scott Caporo was the middle actor.
Guest:He was pissed at me because he had been out way before me.
Guest:But I was more famous in the comedy world and I had been headlining.
Guest:And Scott had not been known in this world.
Guest:He was just a San Francisco comic and was gay.
Guest:And we headlined this benefit and I started to talk about being gay.
Guest:I riffed and improv'd.
Guest:my whole life changed that day i thought oh my god what i get to talk about what's going on with me uh-huh oh wow yeah i didn't understand that yeah i also come from being an actor that's my roots so i also thought of my stand-up as a character like judy tenuto or peewee herman or that kind of thing when i started i had all sorts of crazy outfits and i would had this sort of weird voice that i would talk in and i didn't really understand you know we remember the 80s were quite different
Marc:Your intention was never to be a comic.
Marc:Never.
Guest:Really?
Guest:Jerry Seinfeld would probably take a gun out and shoot me right now.
Marc:Well, you were one of those guys that's sort of like, this is a way to get seen.
Guest:I thought that that's what would happen and that someone would find me because God, this is because I believe that God.
Guest:And then you got stuck as a comic.
Guest:And then I went on the road for 20 years and got real, well, I could make money.
Marc:That bitch in the ass, didn't it?
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Guest:I didn't know I could make money though as a comic and I couldn't get arrested as an actor.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:How old did you when you started doing comedy?
Guest:I started acting when I was eight.
Guest:I started pursuing my career when I was 16.
Guest:I got my first job when I was 19 on TV.
Guest:Doing what?
Guest:On a show called Life and Times of Eddie Roberts with Rennie Templeton and Billy Barty.
Guest:I played a pot smoking ping pong player and it was a guest star.
Guest:And I dropped out of college, community college.
Guest:because I thought I was it.
Guest:That's it.
Guest:Oh, they're going to, I can do this.
Marc:Everyone feels that way when they work with Billy Barty.
Guest:That's it.
Marc:This is it.
Marc:I'm taking off.
Guest:You were 16 working with the king of the little people.
Guest:19.
Guest:Well, yeah.
Guest:Well, those were my people.
Guest:Anybody that was disenfranchised, he loved me.
Guest:He was so nice to me.
Guest:And really, I don't know, you ever see him in W.C.
Guest:Fields and Me?
Guest:He's a brilliant actor.
Guest:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:No, he's great.
Guest:And he was like, he, to me, wow.
Guest:You know what this guy must have had to put up with to be who he is.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:So there's a lesson there.
Guest:Oh, definitely.
Guest:That really stuck in my mind over the years.
Marc:So when did you first start doing the comedy?
Marc:How'd that go?
Guest:Was that at the comedy store?
Guest:I started at the comedy store.
Guest:What year?
Guest:It was 83.
Guest:And I remember I went on stage.
Guest:I wore a bathroom scale around my neck and I talked about being a fat kid.
Guest:And I was so nervous and so quick.
Guest:You wore a scale around your neck.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And Mitzi said what?
Guest:Well, you're funny in a crazy way.
Guest:You need to wear a hat.
Guest:You need a funny hat.
Guest:That's what she said to me.
Guest:And did you go out and get that hat?
Guest:Oh, definitely.
Marc:She told me I needed to wear a scarf.
Guest:Are you serious?
Guest:got together, we could be Truman Capote.
Guest:We should have done an act together, a hat and scarf.
Guest:She would have fucking loved that.
Guest:Oh, she would have, yeah.
Guest:I never was one of her favorites.
Marc:Well, I mean, but she let you work.
Guest:Yeah, she let me work and I started following people like Sam Kennison and Carl LeBeau and Karen Haber.
Marc:Yeah, I remember all of them.
Marc:I was a doorman in 87.
Guest:I think we know each other and just forgot.
Marc:Maybe.
Marc:I mean, I was a door guy for about a year in 87.
Marc:I was living in Crest Hill and I was caught up with Sam and doing a lot of blow.
Guest:I wasn't a drug person.
Guest:I was eating too much chocolate cake and I was scared shit.
Guest:I was scared of all of you.
Guest:It was like being in high school again.
Guest:I didn't really know what I was getting into.
Guest:I would go and do my set and leave.
Guest:There's no girl factor for me.
Guest:So to hang around and meet girls afterwards.
Marc:I didn't even really think about that either.
Marc:I just wanted to hang around with like-minded people.
Marc:I just liked hanging around with comics.
Guest:I was scared shit all the time.
Guest:And finally, it really, you know, around 10 years after, it just sort of got to me.
Guest:You know, I've been fired a couple times too for being gay.
Guest:I remember I was- What does that mean?
Guest:Amarillo, Texas.
Guest:I was at the, I think it was called- Before you were out?
Guest:Yeah, before.
Guest:Really?
Guest:I remember doing my show and the guy said, and I even talked about being gay.
Guest:And the guy said, I did two shows and I did okay.
Guest:I remember I didn't kill, but I got laughs and I was able to get through.
Guest:It was only the opening act.
Guest:And he said, we're going to have to let you go.
Guest:We're going to pay you.
Guest:It was like $300 plus the air.
Guest:We're going to pay you and change your airfare.
Guest:But you need to get out of here because there are people here that just want to kill you.
Guest:Really?
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Guest:And this is what year?
Guest:85?
Guest:This was 85.
Guest:And then I also got, I remember Mark Johnson.
Guest:I think he's passed away.
Guest:I was a headliner.
Guest:And this was when I was gay.
Guest:This was around late 90s.
Guest:I was headlining the Funny Bone in Des Moines, Iowa.
Guest:And I was selling out.
Guest:There was a time that I had three separate times that I was selling out every club everywhere.
Marc:Why?
Guest:Because of the Geraldo or because of-
Guest:I'd be on the cover of the Gay Magazine.
Guest:I'd be in the Pick of the Week in their LA Weekly, and I'd do their Los Angeles Times.
Guest:And I got on there.
Guest:I did every single thing I could do.
Guest:I get there on Wednesday.
Guest:I do the show.
Guest:I get there Thursday morning.
Guest:I did the interviews.
Guest:I do the show, get up in the morning, do more interviews.
Guest:I said, you want me?
Guest:I'm there.
Guest:And I learned to do it because when I was the middle act, I would go with the headliner, and I'd be on the radio.
Guest:Sure.
Guest:Because those at home who listen to your podcast probably don't know, you better have been good on radio, or else they didn't fucking ask you back.
Guest:No.
Guest:That's right.
Guest:And I know they'd say, oh, Maren came in last week and he wouldn't talk.
Marc:I hear that all the time when I do radio.
Marc:It's like some radio stations are like, we're not doing comics anymore because they get up and they come in and they don't do anything.
Guest:And they'd say, what do you want to talk about?
Guest:I said, here, give me the newspaper.
Guest:Whatever, let's go.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Improv is my gift.
Guest:I'm not Shakespeare.
Guest:I'm not this, but I can improv about anything.
Guest:And I do those shows and I sold out everywhere.
Guest:I mean, I remember the Funny Bones in St.
Guest:Louis.
Guest:They used to have a line.
Guest:I used to do eight days of shows with Al Canal producing my show there.
Guest:Oh, I got to call him again.
Guest:He's doing the improv now in Colorado.
Guest:He's a great guy.
Guest:Just a great guy.
Guest:And when I did Des Moines, I remember I was selling out.
Guest:I remember somehow I got on some Christian radio show and I pissed somebody off.
Guest:And Mark Johnson would not pick me up until like 15 minutes before I would go on.
Guest:10 minutes, five minutes.
Guest:The condo was like five minutes.
Guest:And I'm sitting there in the condo like a nut, waiting to be picked up, and they wouldn't pick me up.
Guest:And I called, I said, what's the deal?
Guest:He said, don't ever call, and we'll pick you up when we're goddamn ready.
Guest:And he hung up me on the phone.
Guest:Now, I'm having a little self-esteem at this moment, getting to the club.
Guest:I said, don't ever talk to me like that again.
Guest:He said, get out of this bar.
Guest:And he said, I don't want to see your face.
Guest:I did my two shows.
Guest:I sold out, killed.
Guest:And the next day I came in from the Sunday show.
Guest:This is on Saturday night.
Guest:He had fired me, gave me my check, prorated, grabbed my arm and pulled me out of the club.
Marc:That sounds personal.
Guest:Oh, definitely.
Marc:what do you think it was he thought he did not like me at all but it wasn't necessarily a gay yeah it was you threatened because he told me he told me yeah he said he had said it to me several you made him uncomfortable yeah yeah yeah and i didn't know really what it was until years later yeah yeah well you work like i'm looking right now i mean you know you've been on a lot of fucking shows man
Guest:You mean acting-wise?
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:The big show that changed everything acting-wise probably a couple years ago was guest starring on The Closer.
Guest:That a guy named Adam Belanoff, who's a friend of mine, straight guy, who I'd known for a long time.
Guest:I met him through a neighbor, Luke Yankee, whose mom was Eileen Hackard from Butterflies Are Free, won the Oscar.
Guest:I would go up to his apartment just to touch the Oscar.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:He actually had the Oscar in a glass thing.
Guest:And him and his boyfriend would have these parties all the time.
Guest:So I went up there and I met Adam Belenoff.
Guest:And he was just the nicest guy.
Guest:We'd have coffee and became really friendly.
Guest:And he was on the closer and I called him.
Guest:That's how I got most of my jobs.
Guest:Most of the time people don't call you back.
Guest:But 10% of the time they do.
Guest:And they call you back and you go in and you read.
Guest:And they see, oh God, he can do something different.
Guest:And I played a guy talk like this.
Guest:It was sort of a Jewish kind of annoying.
Guest:And I became the annoying Jewish guy.
Yeah.
Guest:And then I got this job, and then all of a sudden I got all these other jobs being an annoying Jew.
Guest:You've evolved.
Guest:You're going back to your roots.
Guest:Yeah, well, I think what happens is that you start to feel so comfortable in your own skin that you're not afraid anymore.
Marc:You got range.
Marc:You're not pigeonholed and you're not operating in that level of fear.
Marc:Do you think that, you do think that the business is changing?
Marc:You do feel that things are changing?
Guest:I think there are people that know you differently.
Guest:Like there are people that know you just as the radio guy and they probably don't know your standup.
Guest:And now you're going to do this show on, what is it?
Guest:IFC.
Guest:IFC, which is going to be really, really, it's going to change your whole life.
Guest:I hope so.
Guest:Because the independent film world will start to see you.
Guest:Yeah, different person.
Guest:That's a whole different group of people right that don't go to stand-up comedy shows They watch girls and they like all the mumblecore movies and I do a lot of those movies Yeah, I'm in like that word and they barely know my stand-up, right?
Marc:I do feel that I mean after doing stand-up for 25 years and then you know the biggest thing I ever did was this show in my garage which I'm very proud of but I
Marc:Nuts.
Marc:Well, it is, but I had let everything go.
Marc:I'd really gotten humbled by life, and then I did this out of just a desire to keep doing things.
Marc:I didn't have a real agenda to it.
Marc:And it is kind of weird when people go, I love your podcast.
Marc:I'm like, yeah, but what about my stand-up?
Marc:You're like, I'll actually go out and do standup and do well.
Marc:And I got a lot of fans that come and they're like, you know, as they're leaving and I'm selling t-shirts or whatever, they're like, I really love your podcast.
Guest:And what all you hear is you don't like my standup.
Guest:Exactly.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Yeah, I do hear that.
Guest:So are you bitter?
Guest:No, honestly not.
Guest:Seriously, I'm not at all.
Guest:I really feel lucky.
Guest:I feel really, really lucky.
Guest:So what's the frustration right now?
Guest:I think the thing is, is I'm at this point where I'm a certain age and I want to work with really great people.
Guest:I've always been an admirer of yours as a comic and also as somebody who there's a certain intelligence to everything that you do.
Guest:And that to me is something that I wanted to be a part of.
Guest:And I felt really excited about being on the show.
Guest:Is it going well for you?
Guest:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:Good.
Guest:I was a little nervous because this is going through my fears of being in the big boys club with you guys.
Guest:With you guys.
Guest:Oh, boy.
Guest:I see it that way.
Marc:Well, I got to be honest with you.
Marc:I have always felt at different times in my life ostracized by those guys too.
Marc:Believe me.
Guest:I'm sure you have.
Guest:I'm doing a show at the Laugh Factory a couple months ago.
Guest:Paul Rodriguez, who I've known since I was a kid, I've known him forever, comes over to me and says, God, man, you are so funny.
Guest:I said, well, thank you.
Guest:He said, why haven't you ever made it?
Guest:I said, what do you mean?
Guest:He said, well, I didn't mean it like that.
Guest:I mean, you never got a series.
Guest:I said, well, don't recurring roles count?
Marc:I think you could have turned that question on him with some success.
Guest:But he's really, I mean, he's had like 10 series.
Guest:He's done movies with Clint Eastwood.
Guest:I mean, I'm sure he feels, we all feel like we want to be in the next guy's shoes sometimes.
Marc:And that's a very annoying thing about show business and about us as people.
Guest:It's a guy thing, too.
Guest:Is it?
Guest:I don't know.
Guest:Girls are pretty vicious, man.
Guest:Not in the same way.
Marc:No, that's probably true.
Guest:They'll go off and move to another country and be with a guy.
Guest:Now, you follow me, baby.
Guest:You follow me.
Guest:Two guys together?
Guest:Dear God.
Guest:I got to get a little Latin boy who wants daddy to make it.
Guest:That's the one I'm dating now.
Guest:Are you?
Guest:Yeah, I'm dating this Latin guy named Caesar.
Marc:Uh-huh.
Marc:And is it working out?
Marc:Uh-huh.
Guest:It sounds like you're doing all right.
Guest:I'm doing okay.
Guest:I want, you know, you want to be, I mean, when I, it's so funny because I would watch Louie and I didn't know him really well because he's a New York guy.
Guest:And you know, for those.
Marc:He's a pretty private guy too.
Guest:But also it's New York, LA.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:We don't really, you know, and also the straight, I stopped watching comedy a long time ago.
Guest:And then I started watching it again recently because I just, I had to pull back.
Guest:It was, I didn't want to hear other people's material, number one.
Guest:I didn't want that in my head.
Guest:And in the last three years, I've been doing this sort of improv, freestyle kind of changing my comedy so it's more who I really am, which I really never did completely because I didn't want people to know who I was.
Guest:I was so private.
Guest:So it's a heightened version of who I am, and it feels better than it's ever felt.
Marc:Is it interesting, though, because your performance, it sounds like early on, was always very exaggerated and very defined, but you didn't see that as you being you.
Guest:No, I felt like I had to do joke, set up joke, joke, joke.
Guest:And I had to be funnier than everybody because if I wasn't, they'd get rid of me.
Guest:And then there was this whole thing in the last 10 years that's come through that you can be gay but don't talk about being gay so much.
Guest:Don't use it as a crutch.
Guest:I would love someone to call Paul Reiser on the phone and say, you know, it's enough with the family and the kids.
Guest:Talk about something else.
Guest:We don't really give a shit.
Guest:You know, it's enough already.
Guest:Jay London, I don't care that you look like a homeless person.
Guest:Stop talking about it.
Marc:Well, you know, but there were some great guys who were clearly gay and that were not that out for a long time.
Marc:And I imagine... I don't know.
Guest:It's like Mario Cantone.
Guest:I've never met him.
Guest:We've talked on Facebook.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:We know each other's work, but we never really talk.
Guest:So funny.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:You know, Kay Clinton... He's out though, isn't he?
Guest:Oh, definitely.
Guest:Okay.
Guest:But he officially came out.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Mario did.
Guest:Yeah, at one time.
Guest:People just didn't do it.
Guest:People were frightened.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Uh-huh.
Guest:Jim David is also brilliant.
Guest:I remember I was in Montreal.
Guest:He's very funny.
Guest:We were doing the Montreal Comedy Festival together, and he had done his first Comedy Central half hour.
Guest:And I think there was a segment on where he talked about his boyfriend.
Guest:And he actually said, should I do this?
Guest:We had this whole conversation.
Guest:He was really scared.
Guest:And I think, and I don't know, there are times that he'll go back and forth depending where he is.
Guest:I don't have this fear.
Guest:I am who I am.
Guest:That's it.
Guest:As an actor, I can play straight.
Guest:I can play gay.
Guest:I can play old.
Guest:I can play Jewish.
Marc:Jim schooled me once.
Marc:He got mad at me.
Marc:Did he?
Marc:Yeah, because I don't remember what the situation was, but we were talking.
Marc:I remember vaguely we were online to see a show, and I had suggested that.
Marc:I don't remember what the setup was, and I said, well, why don't you, in order to get something, I'm saying, why don't you just gay it up?
Marc:And I didn't mean it in any horrible way because I assumed that he was comfortable with it.
Marc:But he said, basically, it's like, would you say that to Chris Rock?
Marc:Would you tell him to black it up?
Guest:That's so funny.
Guest:But it's like, I won't say who this booker is.
Guest:And that's horrible.
Guest:Because I'm probably going to go back to him.
Guest:But I remember there was a booker of one of the big talk shows.
Guest:I mean, one of the top ones.
Guest:And he had gotten the job as the booker.
Guest:And I said, hey, I'd love to do the show.
Guest:Can I come and audition?
Guest:He says, can you do it without being gay?
Guest:And I said, well, what do you mean?
Guest:He said, just don't talk about it.
Guest:And I thought, why?
Guest:I said, that's who I am.
Guest:He said, you don't have to not be who you are.
Guest:And I thought, man.
Guest:And this guy I'd known forever.
Guest:And it completely stopped me in my tracks.
Guest:And I actually stopped pursuing the talk shows.
Guest:Because I thought, I can't take this.
Guest:I cannot take this.
Guest:It's way too much.
Guest:And this is the year that I'm probably going to go back and see if I can do that in some form.
Marc:What do you think generationally speaking, because you talk about breaking the ground, what do you see as the big differences between younger gay guys and your generation of gay guys in terms of how they move through the world?
Guest:There's a couple of them that don't have the same fear.
Guest:None of them seem to be able to get past a certain point, though.
Guest:you know, they're not able to get past a certain point.
Guest:Which point is what?
Guest:There's nobody that's gotten to be a major headliner in the clubs.
Marc:But I mean, just culturally in life, I mean, like I once saw this amazing sketch, and I think I've brought it up once or twice before, at the Aspen Comedy Festival.
Marc:It was John Rigi had written it with somebody.
Guest:He was a major headliner, wasn't he?
Guest:And he left before he came out.
Marc:But he's, yeah, I don't know what his personal life is like, but he's a big writer and he's a very funny guy.
Marc:But there was a sketch that I never forgot.
Guest:I never heard that he was straight from anybody.
Guest:So I don't know him.
Marc:I never met him.
Marc:Well, the sketch was basically he played, him and another guy played these sort of like, probably a little older than us, that generation of gay guys whose entire being was based on sort of this over the top, you know, leather, you know, and kind of like, you know, like completely sort of like in your face gay, you know, because that's how they had to be in order to define the community at that time.
Marc:And they were having a younger gay couple over who were just basically almost like Republicans.
Marc:And it was just this sort of clash
Guest:It is now in a sense, but not in the comedy world, but it is now in life.
Guest:It is.
Guest:I think it's not a big deal to them.
Guest:Right.
Guest:And that's progress.
Guest:Is that progress?
Guest:Yeah, I mentor kids.
Guest:There's one kid I mentor.
Guest:It's not an issue to him.
Guest:And his issue is being fat.
Guest:But he doesn't have an issue.
Marc:But that's an amazing step forward.
Guest:It has changed.
Guest:It has changed.
Guest:But I do think there's still a little fear.
Guest:I don't know if you know this, but I do a show every year for the LifeWorks mentoring program, which is mentors kids between the ages of 12 and 24 for gay kids.
Guest:Who need to have someone show them the way.
Guest:A lot of them don't know the history.
Guest:They don't know what's going on.
Guest:But I still think that they I still think we're still second class citizens.
Guest:What does it say to a kid when he sees that he can't get married or he can't get the same health insurance or he can't get the same rights or he can get fired from his job from where he lives or his parents can come out of his house or no one wants to talk to you.
Marc:I think that's going to change, don't you?
Guest:I think it is changing.
Guest:And that's what the CNN piece was about.
Guest:It's about all these celebrities, everybody from Lady Gaga to Brad Pitt to Barack Obama.
Guest:I mean, man, when he said that, I was like, you're my best friend now forever.
Guest:Though I do love this president, I got to say.
Guest:I think that he's done tremendous things for this country in so many different ways that people don't really seem to want to understand.
Guest:I mean, if you just go to look and see what he's done, but that's a nice subject.
Guest:I agree with you.
Guest:I really do.
Guest:But I think that he, by saying that is such a big deal.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:You know, things change when somebody of power says something, words mean something, living your life a certain way means something, you know, walking the walk, you know, taking the hits.
Guest:When I came out 20 years ago, I didn't know what was going to happen and I had to be willing to give it all up.
Guest:And I remember, you know, God bless him.
Guest:Jan Smith from, from Igby's who now is the book at the ice house who just hired me to headline that room and,
Guest:where I got to sell out and have fun, he said to me, I don't think you should come out.
Guest:I'm not sure.
Guest:No one's doing this.
Guest:I think you might really lose a lot of work.
Guest:And he's an older guy.
Guest:Jan's probably around 65, 70.
Guest:Now, but I mean, at the time, it was 20 years ago, and he was in his 50s probably.
Guest:And he was doing it because he cared about me.
Guest:And I was working at his club all the time.
Guest:And it was scary.
Guest:We didn't know what was going to happen.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And we still don't.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I mean, do I get to walk the walk?
Guest:I want to, you know, I want to be able to go to the next level.
Guest:I want to be able to play someone's best friend on a show and not having being gay the whole issue of it.
Marc:Right.
Guest:You know, when are they going to let gay people play gay people on TV?
Guest:Right.
Guest:Every gay couple on television is a gay and a straight guy.
Guest:What does that say to everybody that says, oh God, it's not really safe yet for us.
Guest:We'll have too many opinions.
Guest:Could you imagine two gay guys on a set and then you telling them when they're both actors don't touch each other?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And you have a gay guy and a straight guy.
Guest:There's all these issues.
Guest:If we were playing lovers in a show, you know, the issue would be, is Jason comfortable with me touching him?
Guest:Does he think I'm coming onto him in real life?
Guest:And I could say, if I'm touching you, do you think there's all these issues?
Guest:But if we're two gay guys, we just do it.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Most actors, you know, you're on a show.
Marc:You've had that experience where you're working with a straight man who is playing?
Guest:I don't play a lot of lovers and sexual objects.
Marc:Because my limited experience with acting in my own show is that, you know, people are just sort of like, ready?
Marc:We're going to do it.
Marc:And then you do it.
Guest:Yeah, but there is these inhibitions that you have.
Guest:And you'll see when you act more when things... Did you have girlfriends on the show?
Guest:Did you have to kiss anybody?
Guest:And did you talk to them about it before?
Guest:A little bit.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:See?
Guest:Because you want to make sure she was comfortable.
Guest:Well, yeah, because you got to... How am I going to kiss you?
Guest:How are you going to kiss me back?
Guest:Right, exactly.
Guest:That kind of thing.
Guest:Well, you would do the same thing with a guy.
Guest:It wouldn't be how.
Guest:It would be, are we going to?
Guest:Right.
Guest:It's like if you play my boyfriend and I would come home, I wouldn't kiss you on the cheek.
Guest:I'd kiss you on the lips.
Yeah.
Guest:You know, I mean, even Mike and Carol on the Brady Bunch, you know, kissed each other.
Marc:Right.
Marc:But I mean, if you're taking that role, you have to be willing to do that.
Marc:No, you don't.
Guest:They don't do it.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:I mean, Modern Family, perfect example.
Guest:There was an actual Facebook page on when are these two guys going to kiss, you know, and this is 2011, 2012.
Guest:They had to wait for years because it's a gay guy and a straight guy and a straight guy doesn't want to do it.
Guest:Why would he?
Guest:You don't think that was a network decision?
Guest:I think it was probably a lot of people's decision.
Guest:I thought it was a pretty big deal still.
Guest:Whereas you saw the- It took them three years to kiss.
Guest:It did it?
Guest:No, I don't know.
Guest:It took a couple years.
Guest:I don't know how many exactly.
Guest:But you saw the Brothers and Sisters show where the show was run by gay guys and they were kissing right off.
Guest:So-
Guest:I don't know.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:You know, I think it's also people's comfort level.
Marc:Watching or doing both.
Guest:Yeah, I think it's, and they say, well, there's people going to be offended.
Guest:Well, there's people that are going to tune in to watch it too.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:So why are we so concerned with the people that are going to be offended always?
Marc:Because it's a numbers game.
Marc:It's a bottom line thing.
Guest:Yeah, but I think more people were going to watch it.
Marc:Well, yeah, someone's got to do it to get people used to shit.
Marc:You know what I mean?
Marc:How many years are we going to practice?
Marc:I know, I know.
Marc:I mean, change is hard.
Guest:I'd rather just play straight guys and kiss girls.
Guest:It's easy.
Guest:I'd love to kiss girls on TV.
Marc:So what?
Marc:So is marriage in your future, buddy?
Guest:I would love to.
Guest:Are you kidding?
Guest:Walk down the aisle.
Guest:Come on, straight people.
Guest:It's 2012.
Guest:If you let us marry each other, we'll stop marrying you.
Guest:That's my joke, baby.
Marc:All right, man.
Marc:So where can people see what you're doing?
Guest:JasonStewart.com, S-T-U-A-R-T.
Guest:All the social media is on the page.
Guest:And what's this?
Guest:You do a podcast as well?
Guest:I do a podcast Tuesdays at noon on Radio Titans, which is also on the website.
Guest:It just says Radio Show, which I'd love you to come guest if you want to.
Guest:Okay.
Guest:It's an hour show.
Guest:Where do you do it?
Guest:We do it in Hollywood.
Guest:Okay.
Guest:I can make that trip.
Guest:Yeah, it's very close.
Guest:It's only 20 minutes from here with that.
Guest:And it's all about, mine's called Name Dropping with Jason Stewart.
Guest:Uh-huh.
Guest:And it's all about famous people that you've worked with and stories about them.
Guest:Uh-huh.
Guest:You know, things that I want to know about that, you know, what was that like?
Guest:What was it?
Guest:You know, I want to know what that whole thing with you and Louis C.K.
Guest:I love that episode.
Guest:Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Guest:Loved it because the same exact thing has happened to me.
Guest:Uh-huh.
Guest:Hey man, you apologized to me five years ago, don't you remember?
Guest:And then you never called me to hang out or do anything.
Marc:Is that really true between the two of you?
Marc:No, I had him on the show and we were very good friends and we became sort of distant for different reasons.
Marc:I was the one apologizing though.
Guest:Oh, you were.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Such a funny episode.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I think that show is so brilliant.
Guest:And there's something about it that transcends his comedy.
Guest:But I'm an actor guy.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I love acting more than anything.
Guest:Comedy is... I know I love comedy, but I think comedy is limited in some forms.
Guest:Sure.
Guest:it's you know because going for the laugh exactly and if they don't laugh then you're you don't get asked back but acting you can do stuff it doesn't have to be perfect and that show i mean the whole the whole um thing with uh um oh what's the girl you know the parker posey
Guest:You knew what I'm talking about.
Guest:That whole relationship, was that just fucking brilliant?
Guest:Yeah, it was crazy.
Guest:I wrote a letter to Dave Becky and I said, please send this because I've sent some stuff to Louis.
Guest:I don't know if he answers his email, the one he used to have.
Marc:It's hard to get him to answer his phone.
Guest:Oh, is that it?
Guest:So he probably gets it and reads it.
Guest:But I was like blown away that it was so cutting edge and so interesting and different and gutsy.
Guest:And someone who claimed that he didn't want to act.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:He definitely got the hang of it.
Guest:Well, he's also just exploring that side of him.
Guest:And I think that he's going to, I think he's falling in love.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:That's what I see from his work.
Guest:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Guest:And he just did Woody Allen's movie.
Guest:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:With Andrew Dice Clay.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Which sounds fucking crazy.
Marc:That's going to be good.
Guest:I mean, I was like, man, did he tell you about that?
Marc:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Guest:Well, we'll talk about that on my show.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:But I want to hear all that.
Marc:And Dice told me, like, I had Dice in here.
Guest:I did Dice.
Guest:I did Entourage with him.
Marc:Yeah, he's great.
Guest:He's a character.
Guest:I've known him 25, 30 years.
Guest:He forgets who I am every time I see him.
Marc:Well, as a gay guy, how did you react to his early work?
Guest:um you know he's a comic yeah I don't have a thing about that yeah that's his responsibility he has to live with that shit out there yeah he has to live with that yeah you know what you say to people I have a responsibility as a human being I know his was a character it wasn't real yeah
Guest:I don't know who he is in real life because I don't think he knows who he is.
Guest:I don't think he really knows who he was.
Guest:I think he just wanted to be a success and he did whatever he did and he just sort of fell into this and it happened and he went for it.
Marc:I think that's true.
Marc:I think he wanted to be an actor.
Guest:Did you ever see him in Casual Sex when his career started and the couple things that he did?
Guest:He was just great.
Guest:And all of a sudden, this one part of his show became this thing and it was so exciting.
Guest:And people don't understand out there
Guest:That doesn't happen to everybody.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:That was like a phenomenon.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And they say, where is he now?
Guest:What happened?
Guest:Well, he's still doing Vegas.
Guest:He's still making a living.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And not everybody, you know, even Madonna and Streisand and the biggest stars are competing with themselves.
Marc:Well, it's a horrible reality of people is that they just, they love when people fail eventually.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:They just, there's something about this idea that like, eh, so what's he doing?
Marc:I mean, what is anyone doing?
Guest:You get an opportunity, you ride it out, and then hopefully you've- You try not to make mistakes, and you try to, when you're doing it, is you try to, you bring it to the next level.
Marc:Right, and also you get to a sort of, if you hit a plateau, you just hope to God that you stashed enough to make it okay for the rest of the run, you know?
Marc:I think so.
Marc:Well, it was good talking to you, Jason.
Marc:Oh, really nice talking to you.
Marc:That's our show.
Marc:Thank you for listening.
Marc:Thank you very much.
Marc:Thank you, Jason.
Marc:Lovely conversation.
Marc:You can go to Crackers tonight, tomorrow, or Saturday in Indianapolis, the Broad Ripple area.
Marc:San Francisco, Palace of Fine Arts, April 13th.
Marc:More dates coming up.
Marc:Go to WTFPod.com.
Marc:Check that calendar.
Marc:Check that episode guide.
Marc:Kick in a few shekels.
Marc:Buy some merch.
Marc:Got some new posters going up.
Marc:JustCoffee.coop, always available.
Marc:Get the WTF blend.
Marc:I get a little bit on the back end.
Marc:I'm very excited about things.
Marc:I'm very excited, very nervous.
Marc:I, uh... All right.
Marc:I gotta get... All right.
Marc:Okay.
Guest:Boomer lives!
you