Episode 446 - Larry King
Guest:Lock the gates!
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:WTF?
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.
WTF?
Marc:All right, let's do this.
Marc:How are you?
Marc:What the fuckers?
Marc:What the fuck buddies?
Marc:What the fuck is?
Marc:What the fuck is Alex?
Marc:What the fucking avians?
Marc:What the fuck?
Marc:What the fuckles?
Marc:What the fuckles?
Marc:I think someone just sent me that one.
Marc:I don't think I've ever said that one.
Marc:What the fuckles?
Marc:All right.
Marc:Well, look, this is Mark Maron.
Marc:This is WTF.
Marc:Thank you for listening.
Marc:I'm happy you're here.
Marc:I'm in my garage.
Marc:It's a nice day in Los Angeles.
Marc:It's been a little cool out and I welcome it.
Marc:I welcome the very difficult winters in LA where it gets as low as maybe 50, 53 degrees.
Marc:Just hard to get up in the morning.
Marc:Got to go out and get the car warmed up.
Marc:But I like it.
Marc:It's just cool enough.
Marc:And I've been through plenty of shitty East Coast winters.
Marc:I paid my dues in the snow walking outside going, fuck, there's no way that car is going anywhere today.
Marc:All right, first of all,
Marc:Larry King is on the show today, and it did not go exactly how I envisioned it.
Marc:Now, that happens a lot, but this was a little difficult getting into it.
Marc:I'll explain that in a minute.
Marc:What do I want to tell you?
Marc:Oh, yeah.
Marc:This Saturday, November 30th, I will be at the Nerd Melt for a Movember show.
Marc:It's a charity show.
Marc:A lot of charity going around this time of year.
Marc:So be nice.
Marc:Be nice.
Marc:We just started shooting on Wednesday.
Marc:I think I've talked to you once since then.
Marc:We've done three days of shooting for the second season of Marin, and it is intense.
Marc:It is insane.
Marc:It is spectacular.
Marc:I'm having a good time.
Marc:I'm actually having a better time this year.
Marc:I'm working with great people.
Marc:I'm not going to tell you any stories.
Marc:I'm not going to give you any idea of what's going to happen in the season.
Marc:But I can say that the amazing and inspired and radically brilliant Rick Shapiro did a character on one of the episodes.
Marc:Me and Rick worked together.
Marc:It was great.
Marc:It's always great to look Rick in the face and react to Rick.
Marc:That should be a movie.
Marc:React to Rick Shapiro.
Marc:Just have Shapiro walking down the street and have people react to him.
Marc:We did a great scene.
Marc:He was amazing.
Marc:He's doing well, if you're concerned.
Marc:Rick is great.
Marc:Also did a scene with Al Brown.
Marc:This is kind of great.
Marc:If you're a Wire fan, Al Brown played Major Valchek, a very frightening, very intense, very angry character.
Marc:But insidious and charming.
Marc:And I did a scene with him.
Marc:He came out.
Marc:It was great.
Marc:And Matt Bronger was on set.
Marc:We did a scene.
Marc:Dave Anthony is a recurring character in the show.
Marc:So Dave and I are working together.
Marc:There's some other guests coming up, but I feel like I'm on the verge of telling you too much.
Marc:All I can say is that it's going to be intense.
Marc:It's going to be a busy few months, but the scripts are good and I'm in good spirits.
Marc:I feel like I'm getting the hang of it a little more.
Marc:So let's get into some other information.
Marc:As I said, Larry King is coming up.
Marc:I wrote this on a napkin.
Marc:Where's that napkin?
Marc:Where is it?
Marc:I'll read it to you.
Marc:I'll read right off the napkin.
Marc:God forbid I wrote it on my phone.
Marc:No, I wrote on a napkin, and it's actually a napkin that's got some food particles on it.
Marc:I wrote down, I don't like the hassle of entry, but once I'm in, I'm good.
Marc:on all levels that's on there the hassle of entry that is the key to my anxiety that is the key that is the portal into the dread is that how much can you talk yourself out of before you even fucking do it how much how much do you want to do but when you sit there and go oh god then we're gonna have to got to drive over there i don't even know if there's parking in that area i would
Marc:What do we got to do?
Marc:Do we need is our name on the list or do we do you just do we have to get online?
Marc:Is it?
Marc:It's probably going to be too late.
Marc:What time do we have to be there?
Marc:Should we get there early?
Marc:Should I get there tomorrow?
Marc:Yesterday?
Marc:Should I get there a day ahead?
Marc:Just the dread.
Marc:of converging on a point.
Marc:It's like travel.
Marc:It's like, oh, I got to fly tomorrow.
Marc:That means I got to get... Everything is like getting on a plane to me.
Marc:It's like I got to drive to the airport.
Marc:I got to park.
Marc:I got to take a cab there.
Marc:I got to get there an hour and a half early.
Marc:Is TSA again?
Marc:I mean, everything is like that.
Marc:Sex is even like that.
Marc:It's like, all right, so we're going to... What are we going to do?
Marc:We're going to do that and then this and then we're going to get that in there and then everything's good.
Marc:Once you get in there...
Marc:Then it's good.
Marc:Once you're in, it's good.
Marc:But that's with everything.
Marc:Getting from point A to point B. I mean, once I'm at point B and I'm in, then, you know, that's a variable.
Marc:That's it.
Marc:Then you've got C and that's going to be what it's going to be.
Marc:Can I repeat that?
Marc:I don't like the hassle of entry, but once I'm in, I'm good on all levels.
Marc:That's a metaphor for my life.
Marc:Once I'm in, it's right.
Marc:All right, I'm good.
Marc:Don't move.
Marc:Just give me a second to get used to it.
Marc:Don't move.
Marc:Just give me a second to get used to it.
Marc:Alright.
Marc:So somebody sent me this.
Marc:I don't know who sent it.
Marc:People were sending me a lot of stuff.
Marc:Thank you for the records.
Marc:Always thank you for the records.
Marc:I've been listening to a lot of records.
Marc:Dude, this fucking kid, Ty Siegel.
Marc:Who the fuck is Ty Siegel?
Marc:I gotta find this guy, Ty Siegel.
Marc:I mean, Jesus Christ, man.
Marc:That Fuzz record?
Marc:Go get Fuzz.
Marc:Alright?
Marc:Just get Fuzz.
Marc:Well, I read this article that someone sent me in reference to my ice cream riff.
Marc:Research has concluded this by a guy named Andrew Howe.
Marc:I don't know where it came from, but I learned that when I did Real News Radio to cite the author.
Marc:The title of the article, Ice Cream as Addictive as Drugs, says new study.
Marc:Everyone knows that a spoonful of ice cream leaves you wanting more, but research indicates that it may be addictive.
Marc:It may truly be addictive as illegal drugs.
Marc:No shit.
Marc:Who didn't know that?
Marc:Okay, you can simplify and say, yeah, sugar's addicting.
Marc:No, man, this is important information.
Marc:The cravings, researchers concluded that the cravings for the dessert were similar to those experienced by drug addicts.
Marc:Being a drug addict, I can honestly say that this is true.
Marc:If it wasn't for my paralyzing fear of fat, I'd be eating ice cream right fucking now, man.
Marc:Overeating high fat or high sugar foods appeared to change how the brain responded and in turn downgraded the mental reward.
Marc:God damn it!
Marc:There's never going to be enough ice cream.
Marc:That's what that means.
Marc:That's what that means.
Marc:Downgraded, downgraded the mental reward.
Marc:See, that's the fucking, that is the rub of being an addict.
Marc:You know, you get it, you eat it, you're like, fuck yeah, this is it.
Marc:This is how I want to feel all the time.
Marc:And then you do it again the next day and you're like, oh, I'm still a little itchy.
Marc:I need to shove more of that shit into my face, into my veins, into my mouth, into my eyes.
Marc:I need more, more dopamine.
Marc:Nope.
Marc:See, that is the injustice.
Marc:That is the horrible thing.
Marc:That is why, you know, you got to be comfortable with yourself because you ain't going to get it from a pint.
Marc:God damn it.
Marc:The researchers had already conducted interviews with teenagers, all of whom were healthy weight, about their recent habits and how much they crave certain foods.
Marc:Their brains were then scanned with a functional magnetic resonance imaging machine, an MRI, while being shown a picture of a milkshake before being given a physical shake.
Marc:The study found that all the participants wanted the real shake, but those who ate the most ice cream over the previous few weeks enjoyed it less.
Marc:What a ripoff!
Marc:Got to temper it, man.
Marc:You got to temper it.
Marc:You don't want to get strung out on B and J. You know what I'm saying?
Marc:You don't want to get strung out.
Marc:Quote, you could be continually trying to match the earlier experience.
Marc:Yeah, that is it in a nutshell.
Marc:Chasing that fucking dragon pint after pint.
Marc:Just a sad crying man surrounded by empty ice cream containers.
Marc:Why is there no justice in life?
Marc:why can't every pint be like the first time i put ice cream in my face oh well people you know try to temper it i haven't had any lately i kind of had to pull out because once i start eating ice cream then i'm eating cookies and then i'm eating a lot of cereal with sugar and then i'm eating cake like i have ice cream one night the next day it's like oh fuck
Marc:God, that's one taste, man.
Marc:Just give me a, can I just have a taste?
Marc:Just a little something, a little something, maybe a cookie.
Marc:How about a little sliver of that cake?
Marc:Just give me that back part with the icing on it.
Marc:Yeah, that's all I need.
Marc:That's all I need.
Marc:Yeah, I'll be all right.
Marc:I'll be all right.
Marc:Then I'm out in the middle of the night looking for cookie dealers.
Marc:So Larry King, I get an opportunity to interview Larry King.
Marc:Larry King is Larry King.
Marc:Larry King's like it's like a basic element.
Marc:He's a basic media element.
Marc:It's like he's one of the things that seems to have always existed as he is.
Marc:He's he's pure.
Marc:He's Larry King.
Marc:I got the opportunity.
Marc:I figured, okay, I'll do it.
Marc:Is he coming over?
Marc:No, he's not.
Marc:I got to go to his house.
Marc:Okay, I'll go to his house.
Marc:It didn't really turn out the way I wanted it to for reasons that will become clear.
Marc:I don't think he knew who I was, and that's fine.
Marc:Look, I'm humble.
Marc:I get it.
Marc:A lot of people don't know who I am, but I was going to his house.
Marc:and there was an issue when i got to his house and uh this is what happened uh at the door hello how are you how are you mr king late what do you mean it's supposed to be 10 o'clock i had 10 15. i was gonna do an hour but you don't all right
Marc:Sorry.
Marc:Whatever you want.
Marc:Okay.
Marc:If you're not into it, I don't have to do it.
Guest:Five minutes.
Marc:So that's what I was dealing with.
Marc:That was that was the tone of the situation.
Marc:Yeah, I wasn't late.
Marc:I got the information.
Marc:But like right away, I was like, oh, man, you know, we can do this another time or not at all.
Marc:If that's what you want.
Marc:You know, I just want to have a conversation.
Marc:So that's what I dealt with at the door.
Marc:And now and then I was sitting in his living room.
Marc:I was just sitting there and just waiting for him.
Marc:I set up, took me the few minutes that I told him it would take him, and I'm just sitting there.
Marc:And here was, and some of you know, I'll talk to myself if I'm in the car and I got the mic on or I'm in someone's living room waiting to talk to them.
Marc:So here's me talking to me, apparently, while I was waiting for Larry.
Marc:Fuck.
Marc:So I'm sitting here in Larry King's house.
Marc:He thought I was supposed to be here at 10.
Marc:I came at 10.15 because that's what I had and he was mad.
Marc:So I told him it would take me five minutes to set up.
Marc:That was five minutes ago.
Marc:So I don't know what's going to happen here.
Marc:But I guess we'll see.
Marc:I'm just waiting.
Marc:I told him we didn't have to do it.
Marc:But that's where I'm at right now.
Marc:I don't know if he's making me wait as punishment.
Marc:But I don't know that this is... If this is going to work out.
Marc:Because I'm you know.
Marc:I can get angry too.
Marc:Hello, sir.
Marc:I apologize for the miscommunication.
Guest:It is Mark here sure.
Guest:Okay.
Marc:It's nice to meet you.
Marc:Same here.
Marc:And I apologize for being late.
Marc:It's all right.
Marc:It's all right?
Marc:Uh-huh.
Marc:We're going to be all right?
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:So as a guy who interviews people, I'm a guy who interviews people, and I don't have a particular style, but for you, what is it that you're looking for immediately?
Guest:Information.
Guest:Yeah.
Yeah.
Guest:I think the purpose of an interview is to draw the guest out.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Listen to answers.
Guest:I think listening is as important as the question you ask.
Guest:I think you have to be intensely curious.
Guest:I can't give someone... I couldn't teach interviewing.
Guest:Sure.
Guest:You have to be intensely curious to begin with.
Guest:I'm insatiably curious.
Guest:Been that way all my life.
Guest:When I was a kid, I...
Guest:I'd get on a bus and ask the bus driver why he wanted to drive a bus.
Guest:You don't want to sit next to me on an airplane.
Guest:I'm asking questions all the time.
Guest:So basically, my 56 years in the business, they're paying me for what I would be doing anyway.
Wow.
Marc:So you were the kind of kid that, you know, you walk down the street, you'd see a guy just working or you walk into a diner and you want to know what... Why they do what they do.
Guest:I was a why kind of person, who, what, where, when, why.
Guest:I listened to answers.
Guest:I left my ego at the door.
Guest:I think if my whole career, if I use the word I...
Guest:Five times it would be a lot.
Guest:I never felt I was important except as a transmitter.
Guest:I was a conduit to the audience.
Guest:I try to ask the kind of questions that people I thought would be interested in.
Guest:When did you realize that though?
Guest:When did you understand that about yourself that you were going to let your ego get out of the way?
Guest:I don't know when that happened.
Guest:I thought I'd be a sports announcer.
Guest:I was always an avid sports fan.
Guest:I wanted to be a broadcaster all my life.
Guest:I never wanted anything else.
Marc:When did you first realize that?
Guest:I think when I was six years old.
Guest:I would listen to the radio and imitate radio announcers.
Guest:Who was your favorite radio announcer?
Guest:Oh, I liked Red Barber doing the Dodgers.
Guest:I thought Godfrey was a hero.
Guest:I got to work with both of them later in life.
Guest:And where'd you grow up?
Guest:Brooklyn, New York.
Guest:And I would go around to radio stations.
Guest:I would go on and watch radio shows.
Guest:I used to pretend I was an announcer.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Honestly, I would go into elevators in buildings where there were radio stations, and I would say to the elevator operator, you know, third floor, please.
Guest:I just wanted to be an announcer.
Guest:I had a bunch of odd jobs until about age 22 when a friend recommended I go to Miami.
Guest:I thought it would be a sports announcer.
Guest:I was a disc jockey, newsman, started on a small station.
Guest:And then one day I was hired to do a show at a restaurant, Pumper Lake's Restaurant.
Guest:i did a morning i did my own disc jockey show and then i'd go to the restaurant do an hour show from the restaurant and one day bobby darren walked in and mac the knife was the number one song in america i had no idea he would be coming yeah and uh so i couldn't plan for him and i got to like that i liked the impromptiveness of it i liked uh
Guest:Off the top of the head.
Guest:I like being to start the cold.
Guest:I would like to do interviews where someone walked into the room.
Guest:I didn't know who they were.
Guest:And then famous people started to come in.
Guest:Jimmy Hoffa.
Guest:Jimmy Hoffa.
Guest:Ed Sullivan.
Guest:Oh, Danny Thomas.
Guest:A slew of famous people.
Guest:And then the Miami Herald started to write about it.
Guest:So I fell into interviewing.
Guest:I never really thought about my style much.
Guest:I never said to myself, I'm going to leave my ego at the door.
Guest:I just felt that I was so curious about what the guest was that the guest counted to me
Guest:I wasn't irrelevant, but I'd be there tomorrow.
Guest:Sure.
Guest:My name was on the show.
Guest:So the guests counted.
Guest:Did you ever get intimidated or frightened at times during interviews where you didn't know if it was going your way or where you felt like you were?
Guest:The only time I was ever intimidated was the first time I did Frank Sinatra because I'd been such a fan of his and Jackie Gleason arranged for the interview and I was nervous.
Guest:But I got over that in a minute.
Guest:In a minute.
Guest:First time in the White House.
Guest:A little kind of in awe of the White House.
Guest:But that goes away because I learned a long time.
Guest:In fact, I learned my first day on the air that the person whose show it is is in control.
Guest:So whether I'm at the White House, whether it's the president or the mayor.
Guest:Or the carpenter.
Guest:Sure.
Guest:Or Frank Sinatra.
Guest:I'm in control.
Guest:You're in control of this interview, not me.
Guest:Right.
Guest:So once you know that, once you know you're in control, there's nothing to be nervous about.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Right?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Okay, because you're in control.
Marc:And also, don't you find that when you talk to people that they become people very quickly, despite what you may think of them or their public personality?
Guest:Oh, sure.
Guest:The mic disappears.
Guest:The camera disappears.
Guest:I never thought about how am I doing.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I never thought about yesterday's show or tomorrow's show.
Guest:Today, I was always in the moment.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I felt right in the moment, the moment I was doing it.
Guest:The first day I was on the air, I was very nervous.
Guest:And nothing was coming out of my mouth.
Guest:And I can remember it to this day.
Guest:It was May of 1957.
Guest:Really?
Guest:And I couldn't think of anything to say.
Guest:And I thought my whole career was over.
Guest:And the general manager kicked open the door and he said, this is a communications business.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:You better communicate.
Guest:And what I did was, I swear to God, I turned on the microphone.
Guest:Right.
Guest:And said, this is my first day on the air.
Guest:I've wanted this all my life.
Guest:I've been sitting here for three, four minutes scared to death.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:So I just want to let you know that I'm nervous.
Guest:So what I did then, this is in retrospect.
Guest:Right.
Guest:I brought the audience into my dilemma.
Guest:Sure.
Guest:Okay.
Guest:Then nothing could go wrong after that because if I miscued a record, goofed up a commercial.
Guest:Right.
Guest:It's my first day.
Guest:Right.
Guest:And they knew it.
Guest:So once they know that, what am I going to be nervous about?
Guest:Right.
Guest:Because I've taken them into my situation.
Guest:Right.
Guest:And that was like the last time you used I. That was it.
Guest:Yeah, that was one of the last.
Guest:And also, I've never, after that, I got to say I was never nervous again.
Guest:My first day on television, I wasn't nervous.
Guest:I do a lot of speaking.
Guest:I do comedy tours.
Guest:Right.
Guest:i saw some comedy yeah i tell funny stories i i like all of it and i've never gone on a stage frightened because i know from that first day it ain't brain surgery yeah if the story's funny they're gonna laugh right they're not gonna laugh it ain't the end of the world
Guest:that's a hard one to learn no no i mean i don't know that you learned it i just i i just you were able to frame it that way i don't have the confidence in life that i have in broadcasting or on a stage because i think it's a control issue i have two young boys here 14 and 13 one just started high school one's still in junior high school yeah i had to get up this morning and take one to work and one didn't want to have breakfast and i had to drop them off
Guest:And now I don't know what my wife's going to say today.
Guest:And then I got a lunch to go to.
Guest:But I can't control that.
Guest:However, if I were broadcasting today, I can control that.
Guest:So the best part of my day is when I'm working.
Guest:The easiest part of my day is by far when I'm working.
Guest:Because I can't control life, but I can control the situations of radio, television, speaking.
Guest:I'm in control.
Marc:Sure.
Marc:How is it for you now bringing up young kids?
Guest:Well, I have three grown.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I have a stepson.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And then I have two children.
Guest:I'm the age of a grandfather.
Guest:Right.
Guest:But I'm a father.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:So I go to go to baseball games.
Guest:I got to take kids to school.
Guest:Grandfathers don't do that.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Someone said the best part about being a grandfather is you get to go home.
Guest:You don't get it.
Guest:I don't get to go home.
Guest:Is this the most hands-on you've ever been with all your kids?
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Guest:Absolutely.
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Guest:Because I have more time with them.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Is it rewarding?
Guest:I'm not running around making it.
Mm-hmm.
Guest:Well, there's a good and bad to it.
Guest:The great part is to watch them grow and to see they're both very athletes and both kind of bright, very different night and day, except for being good athletes.
Guest:There's not one thing they have in common.
Guest:Definitely.
Guest:Not one.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And then you think of your age, you know, and we go to all the Dodger games and sitting the other night with my son and I had a vision that he'd be playing with the Dodgers and he's 14.
Guest:And then I was thinking to myself, oh, wait a second.
Guest:Logically, if he went in after high school and he played a couple of years in the minors, maybe he'd come up to the majors when he's 24.
Guest:yeah i would be then going to be 90 so my fear was would i be around right and so you had the problem of aging is you want to be around to see him grow up yeah i hope you're going to be around yeah was it was your choice to to have kids at this age i didn't think i'd have i just married a younger woman and uh she's much younger than i and children develop you know children came but it's a gift
Guest:It is a gift, and I watched both born.
Guest:I didn't watch my other children born.
Guest:They didn't allow you in.
Guest:Didn't you have a son that you didn't really meet for a long time?
Guest:Oh, that was a great story.
Guest:Yeah?
Guest:What happened?
Guest:Well, I was married to this woman for a short period of time, and we broke up.
Guest:She said she was pregnant.
Guest:I didn't know if it was mine.
Guest:And then years later, I learned I had a child, and he was in his early 30s.
Guest:And we got to meet, and he's as if I raised him all my life.
Guest:Really?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:So there was no contention initially?
Guest:No, it was amazing.
Guest:And he met his brother and sister.
Guest:And he grew up with my name, Larry King Jr.
Guest:He grew up in Miami.
Guest:He watched me broadcast Dolphin Games.
Guest:Before he knew you were his father?
Guest:Oh, he knew he was my father, but he had a stepfather.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Why did he wait so long to meet you, do you think?
Guest:I don't know.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:It just happened.
Guest:Then his mother was dying, and she called and said, you know, you have a son.
Guest:You ought to meet him, and he's about to get married.
Guest:And I went down to Florida.
Guest:I then was living in Washington.
Guest:I sent a lawyer down first.
Guest:And he called me up and he said, you can take a DNA, but you're going to be throwing away money because this is your kid.
Guest:And I went down.
Guest:Obviously, he was my kid.
Guest:And now he's like nothing.
Guest:I feel like I raised him.
Guest:So it's a great story.
Guest:And it's one of them.
Guest:I don't know if I'm proud of it that I, you know, that I shirk responsibility.
Guest:I wasn't sure I even had a kid.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:But she said she had.
Guest:But you didn't know.
Guest:I know the new, not new.
Guest:Right, right, right.
Guest:And does he have kids now?
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Guest:I have three grandchildren.
Guest:He has twins.
Guest:That's a good one.
Guest:And then my son has, my daughter's not married.
Guest:How did you grow up?
Guest:my father died when i was nine and a half i grew up with a bunch of friends three of whom are still my best friends um i grew up in brooklyn went to dodger games jewish neighborhood at the time yeah jewish and italian yeah we didn't know what a protestant was yeah um were you religious the family i was bar mitzvahed my mother kept a kosher home oh yeah but i lost that a long time ago i uh
Guest:My father's death changed my life.
Guest:I was very close to him, and then I lost interest in school.
Guest:I never went to college.
Guest:My younger brother went through law school.
Guest:Is he still around?
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Guest:He's 76.
Guest:Guy's got good genes.
Guest:Surprisingly, because my father died at 46 of a sudden heart attack, and my mother lived to 76.
Guest:I always thought that I would die at 46, because he died at 46.
Guest:He smoked.
Guest:I smoked.
Guest:Isn't that interesting?
Guest:I had a lucky heart attack.
Guest:I was 53.
Guest:I was smoking three packs a day.
Guest:You miss them?
Guest:The cigarettes?
Guest:No.
Guest:No.
Guest:But if I had an hour to live, I'd smoke, because it was a great habit.
Guest:However...
Guest:I got scared to death and never smoked again.
Guest:I had a heart attack in February of 1987.
Guest:And through this driving home, my daughter drove me home from the hospital.
Guest:And the cigarettes that I'd gone to the hospital with that were in my pocket, I threw into the Potomac River and never smoked again and never reached for a cigarette nor wanted one.
Guest:Now, a psychiatrist friend of mine told me that what happened to me, fortunately,
Guest:was i got scared to death so much so that if i had i never you know chewed gum or held toothpicks and that if i had a desire yeah the fright in me was so great yeah it went away so i i didn't reach for cigarettes in my pocket that's spectacular i i was unbelievable i was i don't even take credit for it i was it was my osmosis
Guest:The heart attack.
Guest:I mean, you had the bypass and everything else?
Guest:Five months.
Guest:I had the heart attack in February and the bypass in December.
Guest:Like, what was the feeling after you get a bypass?
Guest:It seems like, I don't know anyone that's had one, but there's a vulnerability that you feel, a fragility.
Guest:Well, you feel...
Guest:First, the amazing thing is you have the weeps because a stranger moved your heart.
Guest:That's a real thing.
Guest:Yeah, they move your heart because they put you on a heart-lung machine.
Guest:The whole process of it, now a lot of it's much simpler.
Guest:This was 1987.
Guest:But I'm still close with my surgeon.
Guest:I started the Larry King Cardiac Foundation.
Guest:We help people who can't afford to get heart help.
Guest:And he's the same surgeon.
Guest:He did Letterman, Cronkite.
Guest:He did Regis.
Guest:But you get choked up about things?
Guest:No, what happened is, after a couple weeks, I went down to Florida.
Guest:And this was funny.
Guest:I was on the plane with Alexander Haig.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:and uh we're in the first class and he had had heart surgery and i started to cry i didn't know i was crying and the stewardess came over and he just said don't pay any attention it's the weeps and it it must be the vulnerability uh-huh what happened was and then i got real healthy i i lost weight i most people when they start stop smoking gain weight i lost weight i took care of myself i watched what i ate
Guest:Still?
Guest:Yeah, I don't exercise as much as I used to, but I walk a lot.
Guest:And the chance I get to walk, I walk.
Guest:And the food, you're careful with food?
Guest:I'm not super careful, but I'm 5'11", I weigh 160.
Guest:That's good.
Guest:I was 190.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:That's the most that I weighed was 190.
Guest:I think when I had the heart attack, I weighed 190.
Guest:Did you stop going to the deli?
Guest:We have our own bagel store now.
Guest:It's called Brooklyn Water Bagel.
Guest:Oh, that's you?
Guest:It's a franchise.
Guest:Well, I got the Beverly Hills franchise.
Guest:I'm their spokesperson.
Guest:So in return, I got the Beverly Hills franchise.
Guest:So you don't need to go to Nate and Al's anymore?
Guest:No, I go there once a month for some matzo rye because matzo rye was one of my favorite foods.
Guest:Did your mother make it?
Guest:Sure.
Guest:Yeah, my mother made it.
Guest:It was nothing like Jewish cooking.
Guest:In fact, a chef was here the other day.
Guest:We did a TV show for my internet show.
Guest:Which chef?
Guest:Stone.
Guest:Chris Stone.
Guest:And he was here and he was going over all the delicacies that he cooks and everything.
Guest:And I said to him...
Guest:Are you going to cook a meat?
Guest:I said, I like it.
Guest:Well done.
Guest:And he goes, I can't cook that.
Guest:I said, well, just keep cooking it.
Guest:I can't.
Guest:I will not cook that.
Guest:I said, why won't you cook that?
Guest:Because he said, that's not food.
Guest:That's like...
Guest:A container, you're eating a... I said, no, it's my food.
Guest:I like, I hate red meat.
Guest:I was raised, I just raised, I can't stand to see meat that's red.
Guest:So I'm kosher cooking.
Guest:I like...
Guest:I have no religion at all.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:My wife's a devout Mormon.
Guest:Devout?
Guest:Devout.
Guest:She goes to church every Sunday.
Guest:And the children, we had an agreement when we got married since I have no religion that she could raise the children.
Guest:I think it's good ethics.
Guest:Is she raising them Mormon?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:My boy goes to Catholic school, Notre Dame High School.
Guest:And I'm glad to get grounded in a good faith.
Guest:I have no, I lost my faith in God a long time ago.
Guest:Why?
Why?
Guest:The more I interviewed religious people.
Guest:Yeah, but was there a moment?
Guest:I never got answers.
Guest:No.
Guest:They couldn't tell you for sure?
Guest:I'm a person.
Guest:I have to know no.
Guest:And if you're a messenger of God, I would ask them, all right, the old story, God gave man free will so he couldn't stop Hitler.
Guest:Okay, all right, I'll buy that.
Guest:He couldn't stop Hitler.
Guest:How about Katrina?
Guest:Uh-huh.
Guest:That wasn't man's wish.
Guest:Man didn't start Cortina.
Guest:And they don't answer it.
Guest:So they always say the same.
Guest:We question not the ways of the Lord.
Guest:Come on.
Guest:I question the ways of the Lord.
Guest:Then I remember when I was a kid,
Guest:While I'm a social Jew, I like being Jewish.
Guest:I like Jewish food, Jewish humor.
Guest:I gravitate toward Jewish people.
Guest:I like Israel.
Guest:But the God of the Old Testament, I didn't like him.
Guest:Slay my enemies.
Guest:Come on.
Guest:I thought he was barbaric.
Guest:And I didn't like him.
Guest:And he wanted me to fear him.
Guest:And you're teaching me love and fear at the same time.
Guest:And the Christian faith, I could never bar.
Guest:But what about faith without God?
Guest:Is it possible?
Guest:Faith in what?
Guest:In just a human's goodness.
Guest:Oh, I guess I wouldn't call it faith.
Guest:I think it probably came from the Bible.
Guest:The do unto others is the only law you need.
Guest:yeah right right if you in fact you don't need any law in the books but do unto others do unto others covers cheating income tax red light murder yeah yeah yeah yeah that's a good one everything is don't lie i think is what do unto others as you would have them do unto you don't pass the red light yeah right don't cheat on your income tax yeah don't screw around with people i think carlin did a big bit on that yeah yeah yeah george was a friend of mine and uh we went over that a lot about
Guest:Well, you know, there's that great joke about the rabbi, you know, in terms, because I was brought up Jewish as well.
Guest:And I don't really believe in God.
Guest:But, you know, the joke about the rabbi walking down the street and it starts raining.
Guest:And then the water is raising up about two feet.
Guest:And some guys come by and, you know, in a car.
Guest:And I get in the car.
Guest:We'll take you to safety.
Guest:The rabbi is like, no, no, God will save me.
Guest:Then the water is up to his neck and he's treading water a little bit.
Guest:And some guys come by in a boat and say, rabbi, get in the boat.
Guest:You know, he goes, don't worry.
Guest:God will save me.
Guest:And then now he can't tread water anymore.
Guest:It's so high.
Guest:The buildings are covered with water.
Guest:Helicopter comes down.
Guest:They tore a ladder.
Guest:I said, Rabbi, get on the ladder.
Guest:And the rabbi goes, no, God will save me.
Guest:And he drowns.
Guest:And he gets to heaven.
Guest:He says to God, why didn't you save me?
Guest:And God says, I sent a car.
Marc:I sent a boat.
Marc:It's a tricky thing how you interpret that stuff.
Guest:I know, but I say when your time is up, your time is up.
Guest:Well, if you're on an airplane, what if the pilot's time is up?
Guest:You know, I didn't have anything to do with that.
Guest:Jesus Christ.
Guest:You can't say Jesus Christ.
Guest:Which, by the way, you know how he got his name.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:It was in the manger.
Guest:And they were trying to figure out a name.
Guest:And Joseph stood up and hit his head on the top.
Guest:And he said, Jesus Christ.
Guest:That stuck.
Guest:I like that.
Guest:Got a rhythm.
Guest:Yeah, it does.
Guest:Got a little catch to it.
Guest:Five letters in the first word, six in the second.
Guest:So the bagel joint, was this a reaction to the lack of ability to find a good bagel?
Guest:They came to me and they had this idea.
Guest:They started in Florida, a very good company.
Guest:They're franchising all over the country.
Guest:And they said, we make the water.
Guest:New York City is the best water in America.
Guest:And they make the water in a lab.
Guest:You see it in the restaurant.
Guest:They show you the machines.
Guest:Oh, really?
Marc:To match the New York water?
Guest:To match the New York water.
Guest:So they can boil the bagel in there.
Guest:Which is the equivalent.
Guest:And water is the difference.
Guest:That's right.
Guest:The theme is the difference is in the water.
Guest:So the bagel, everyone who comes in says they're back in Brooklyn.
Guest:Really?
Guest:Yeah, it's great bagels.
Guest:Great bagels.
Guest:It's nice to know that.
Guest:Do you think, and now this is the question, do you think that because your father passed away at such a young age that part of your interest and need to connect with people and know about them was some sort of search for that?
Guest:That might be true.
Guest:I never questioned that psychologically.
Guest:I know I lost something in not having a father because all my friends had fathers.
Guest:And I was like the boy without a father.
Guest:So maybe that led to the need for, I don't know where it came from.
Guest:The love to broadcast it, not because I wanted to be a broadcaster before he died.
Guest:And your first job was just on a radio.
Guest:Was it a music show?
Guest:I was a disc jockey.
Guest:It was a kind of station, small station.
Guest:We had news, sports.
Guest:I did everything.
Guest:But I did a disc jockey show in the morning and then I did in the afternoon I did sports and I did news.
Guest:You know, you learn the business from the ground up.
Guest:And then I got this interview show at a restaurant about two years later and that's when I started.
Guest:Were you one of those guys that had to go all over the country at times to chase the work?
Guest:No, no, no.
Guest:It was all in Miami.
Guest:My whole career was 20 years in Miami.
Guest:Then I got the national radio show.
Guest:We were the first network talk show.
Guest:And then I always did local television.
Guest:I did television as much as I did radio.
Guest:Probably two years of radio and then television started.
Guest:And I always did both.
Guest:And then Ted Turner came along and I interviewed him a few times.
Guest:And he liked my work.
Guest:And he had CNN when they were five years old.
Guest:I started on their fifth anniversary.
Guest:And he liked me and hired me, and I didn't know what CNN was.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I didn't have it in my home, but it sure took off.
Guest:And that was it?
Guest:That was the game changer, huh, for you?
Guest:Oh, sure.
Guest:Well, the radio was a kickoff because I got a lot of good write-ups and a lot of stories about that radio show.
Guest:Why did you get so much attention?
Guest:Because it was the first national network talk show, and I was the beginning of talk radio.
Guest:Mm-hmm.
Guest:I get a lot of credit.
Guest:That's the beginning of talk radio in America.
Guest:You like what it evolved into?
Guest:No.
Guest:Because it became a soapbox, screaming, yelling idiots.
Guest:And a lot of what I hear is pop nonsense.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Political crazies.
Guest:Yeah, no real discussion.
Guest:Political crazies.
Guest:You know, NPR is good radio.
Guest:But, you know, the Limbaugh's and these guys are just playing with a loose deck.
Guest:And a lot of it's an act.
Guest:Oh, I know, yeah.
Guest:They're hot stars.
Guest:I came to respect Howard Stern.
Guest:Yeah, sure.
Guest:I used to, when I was earlier on, I didn't buy a lot of that act, but now I understand his maturity, and he's matured.
Guest:Yeah, I think so.
Guest:I think that's true.
Guest:He's a very good broadcaster.
Guest:But I was raised by the Godfrey's, and whenever someone curses on the radio, it still drives me nuts.
Guest:Does it?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:It just doesn't fit right, right?
Guest:It's like a violation.
Yeah.
Guest:Can we pause a second if I had to go to the men's room?
Guest:Go ahead.
Guest:Okay.
Guest:When you're older.
Marc:I'm looking forward to it.
Marc:No, don't.
Guest:Okay, good.
Marc:I think what I want to talk about a little bit is your relationship with Jackie Gleason.
Marc:How did you change your life?
Guest:When Jackie moved down to Miami to broadcast, I went up to New York and came down on the train with him and did interviews with him on a train.
Guest:And then we had a big welcome Jackie to Miami dinner, and I MC'd it.
Guest:So I sat up on the dais with him, and we got to be friendly, and he'd call into my radio show, and then he came on my television show.
Guest:And he didn't mentor me, but he liked me.
Guest:And I made a big switch.
Guest:I went from Channel 10 to Channel 4.
Guest:Went from the ABC affiliate to the CBS affiliate, and he did all my promos.
Guest:i mean he was just terrific to me he got sinatra for me yeah sinatra owed him a favor and that was the return of the favor uh he was a pretty great like a huge personality he was larger than life yeah everybody was pal yeah hey pal i'm down
Guest:He was at his house and he was gregarious.
Guest:He called himself a roaming Catholic.
Guest:He thought a lot about death.
Guest:The night before he died, I got a call from his PR guy.
Guest:And he made a list of people to call and say goodbye.
Guest:This is very touching.
Guest:He had... Jackie understood...
Guest:human behavior he liked my curiosity and he he he was a compelling person to be around because he understood poor he understood being down understood being broke and he lived life larger than life and he uh
Guest:I loved the moment.
Guest:I loved being live in the moment.
Guest:And he appreciated that.
Guest:He worked live most of his life in television.
Guest:I worked live most of my life in broadcast.
Guest:Anyway, they were doing a Honeymooners once, a live musical for an hour at the Miami Beach Convention Center.
Guest:And it was Saturday night, and I was in the wings watching this show.
Guest:And he comes off stage for a minute, and he says to me, call Raimondo's and tell him I want the spaghetti, but I want the La Dolce spaghetti.
Guest:And the guy yells, 10 seconds.
Guest:He says, I want that wine.
Guest:five seconds jackie and they were doing this and then suddenly he goes what norton he went from me knew right where his line was right into the scene yeah and i went wow yeah he was just so he never rehearsed he had this big fat guy that was a friend of his that did all the scenes in rehearsals and he'd watch that and so he knew all the movements
Guest:So he had a guy stand in for him.
Guest:Correct.
Guest:And so when you appeared with him, the first time you saw him, like Bing Crosby said, where is he?
Guest:And he'd do a skit, and then suddenly the night it's live, Jackie would appear.
Marc:And do you think he did that to keep it fresh for everybody?
Guest:Yeah, to keep it fresh, but he knew where to lay out.
Guest:Couldn't speak, couldn't understand a note of music, yet conducted orchestras through those Capitol albums.
Guest:Had an instinct.
Guest:And he understood the broadcast instinct.
Yeah.
Guest:He sort of was a pioneer in television, I think, right?
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Guest:The Honeymooners and those early shows that Jackie did, the characters he did, the various ones, Reggie Van Gleeson, the bartender, and the poor soul, and
Guest:And he just he just was a tremendous guy to be around.
Guest:And it was very sad when we lost him.
Guest:And the problem with this as youth goes on, my kids don't know.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:You know, and you mentioned these names to people and anybody under 30, they don't know Jackie Gleason.
Guest:Isn't that sad and amazing?
Guest:I knew people that was before my time.
Guest:I knew the greats.
Guest:Yeah, like who are you thinking?
Guest:I knew Lowell Thomas, H.V.
Guest:Caltenborough, and Edward R. Murrow.
Guest:But these kids today, they don't know Vietnam.
Guest:They don't know what I'm talking about.
Guest:There's no real historical context anymore for things.
Guest:No, because of 24-hour news.
Guest:Eat it up, spit it out.
Guest:And also the Internet.
Guest:Nothing has any context.
Guest:I mean, it's just pictures.
Guest:It's just bits and pieces.
Guest:It's in and out.
Guest:Everybody's a journalist.
Guest:Everybody blogs.
Guest:The Twitter.
Guest:Now, there's a plus to that.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Twitter could start a revolution.
Guest:Sure.
Guest:There's no privacy.
Guest:That's terrible.
Guest:However, the plus in that is they would have never caught the guys who started those blowups in Boston.
Guest:If it hadn't been for cameras everywhere.
Guest:Invading privacy.
Guest:Uh-huh.
Guest:Yeah, but it's a weird, slippery slope, right?
Guest:Yeah, and that's what Obama faces in that where do you draw the line between when can I know what you're doing if I... It's a different world, right?
Guest:We know that somebody's going to come up with a nuclear weapon that's in your one hand and you can bring it into the country.
Guest:So what do you do about that fear while you want to uphold the Constitution?
Guest:And I'm a constitutionalist, so...
Guest:I don't want you invading my privacy.
Guest:But on the other hand, see, there's always on the other hand.
Guest:However, Hitler made a famous speech in 1937 in which he said Germany was doing away with warrants.
Guest:When we come to your home, if the police come to your home, if you have nothing to hide,
Guest:What do you worry about?
Guest:But we're in great danger from enemy within in this country.
Guest:And so why not let us look in your home if you have not?
Guest:And the German people bought that.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I would bet that if you made that same speech in America today.
Guest:30% might say, yeah, I got none to hide.
Guest:Right.
Guest:I bet you're right.
Guest:You're not me.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:You're not coming into my house without a hide.
Guest:Well, the one thing the Constitution protects is that no matter who's in charge, you have those rights.
Guest:See, that becomes the tricky thing.
Guest:It's like right now you've got a good guy in charge, but when they come looking for Jews again... When do you give up your rights?
Guest:Right.
Guest:That famous guy who said...
Guest:First, Hitler said it was only the communists.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Then he said it was only the Jews.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And then he said it was only the Catholics.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And then he said it was me.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Yep.
Guest:But the weird thing is, is I went to Google the directions for here.
Guest:And because you sold the house, you bought the house, it's on record as your house.
Guest:And you have that same problem.
Guest:It's weird.
Guest:Tour bus goes every five minutes.
Guest:Right there.
Guest:Tour bus goes by.
Guest:Nothing you can do about it.
Guest:Nothing.
Guest:People take pictures.
Guest:does it piss you off ellen degeneres lives two blocks up yeah she had no idea about the tour bus yeah she used to live way up on top of the hill they never got up that high now she lives on the street sort of near the flats yeah and she's going nuts is she she's furious yeah she's mad but you could do it it's a public street right and they go by and they take pictures and i go i wave to them i'm nice they're nice but what am i gonna do be mad at people what are you gonna do
Guest:One night, my little boy, when he was 10, went out front and said, yeah, he's in the bathroom.
Guest:You want to wait a minute?
Guest:Did they?
Guest:They waited?
Guest:They waited.
Guest:Oh, they sometimes see my car come back and they make U-turns.
Guest:It's funny to watch this, but that's...
Guest:You know, Truman said, if you can't stand the heat, get out of the kitchen.
Guest:So I chose a business in which if you do well, you get well known and you pay a price.
Guest:So I think you owe something back to that price.
Guest:In other words, the ball player.
Guest:owes the kid the autograph yeah there's no law that says he has to give it to him but he was a kid and you were a ball player because somebody gave you that talent whether it was God or whatever you had this talent
Guest:i was given this gift of this voice or this curiosity who gave me i had this great indian swami tell me once yeah who gave you this gift yeah right yeah so it's a good way to live it's impossible to live this way but he said you don't have to believe in god or anything when you open your eyes in the morning did you earn that
Guest:It's a gift, right?
Guest:Give thanks to whatever.
Guest:Whether you believe it is.
Guest:You have the right to open your eyes in the morning.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:So give thanks for that.
Guest:And then give thanks for everything that happens to you during the day.
Guest:So if it's raining, so what?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:You woke up.
Guest:Life's a gift.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Gratis.
Guest:So if I can have the skill to hit a baseball.
Right.
Guest:And someone's paying me $5 million to hit a baseball.
Guest:And a nine-year-old wants me to sign an autograph.
Guest:I'm too busy for that?
Guest:Are you crazy?
Guest:So I'm not going to smile for a tour bus when I'm living in this freaking house that if my mother and father saw this house, they would faint?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:You've never forgotten.
Guest:That's what I liked about Jackie.
Guest:Gleason told me a great story once.
Guest:The first appearance Elvis Presley ever made was on the Jackie Gleason summer rerun show hosted by Tommy Dorsey.
Guest:And in order for an act to appear on the show, Gleason wanted to see them.
Guest:So Presley came in, like audition, and he called him over and he said, listen, kid, you're going to be famous.
Guest:You're going to be real big.
Guest:I want to give you a bit of advice.
Guest:Go out.
Guest:Don't stay in.
Go out.
Guest:Talk to people.
Guest:Because if you stay in, you're going to be the loneliest guy in the world.
Guest:Jackie went out.
Guest:Always socializing.
Guest:Hello, how are you?
Guest:Presley hid in the house.
Guest:And look what happened.
Guest:Died on the toilet.
Guest:Alone.
Guest:Alone.
Guest:Sad.
Guest:Jackie went out.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:He had a good time, Jackie.
Guest:Jackie lived, Jackie had a good time.
Guest:Jackie, he knew how to drink.
Guest:And he knew how to, he wasn't a carouser like with women and stuff like that.
Guest:He was, but he was.
Guest:You like to stay up and party.
Guest:He was genuine.
Guest:He was afraid to fly.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:But he flew to work with Laurence Olivier in London.
Guest:Uh-huh.
Guest:They did a two-character show for HBO.
Guest:I wonder why HBO doesn't show it more often.
Guest:Great story.
Guest:I'm trying.
Guest:Gleason loved the script.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Olivier played an Englishman whose wife had just died.
Guest:Right, right.
Guest:I kind of remember this.
Guest:And the American, Gleason, went over for the funeral.
Guest:And Gleason had had a 25-year affair.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:with that man's wife and they're in a bar yeah and the whole hour is just the two of them was it great no it was great and that's why he flew oh yeah to work with olivier yeah out of all the people that you've known in your life and talked to who outside of gleason who do you who do you find yourself thinking about and missing the most
Guest:Oh, I'm not missing.
Guest:I've interviewed so many, seven presidents, and Sinatra was a lot of, was interesting to be around because he was so complicated.
Guest:Oh, yeah?
Guest:Oh, Frank was.
Guest:Did he not have a good time?
Guest:Frank was unhappy.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Why, because there was never enough?
Guest:Nothing satisfied him.
Guest:When he was in a sad moment, like he said to me once, he said, you know, all my friends are dead.
Guest:All my friends are dead.
Guest:It was so sad.
Guest:Oh, God.
Guest:But he was never totally happy, except when he was on stage.
Guest:Yeah, you don't think about it.
Guest:Yeah, you don't think about it.
Guest:And his understanding, his phrasing.
Guest:If he liked you, you could do no wrong.
Guest:If he didn't like you, you could do no right.
Guest:There was no grays.
Guest:Life was black or white.
Mm-hmm.
Guest:And I was looking up that he liked me.
Guest:That's what Rickles would say.
Guest:I said to Don, what if he didn't like you?
Guest:And Don would go, you have relatives in New Jersey?
Guest:He's great.
Guest:How's he doing?
Guest:Are you personal friends?
Guest:Rickles is all right.
Guest:Yeah, I talk to him every once in a while.
Guest:I'll see him every six months or so.
Guest:We run into each other.
Guest:He's an old dear friend.
Guest:He's still working.
Guest:He's 86 years old.
Guest:His son died.
Guest:I was sad.
Guest:Yeah, I heard about that.
Guest:Larry.
Guest:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:But Don...
Guest:Don and Mel Brooks and all of them.
Guest:I interviewed Mel.
Guest:That was great.
Guest:It was at Cesar's house a couple weeks ago.
Guest:Mel was there.
Guest:Cesar's not talking.
Guest:So you're one of the guys that goes up there to Cesar's house?
Guest:Mel goes.
Guest:I don't go.
Guest:No?
Guest:Mel and Carl Reiner have breakfast every day at the same restaurant in Westwood.
Guest:And they're still a riot together.
Guest:Oh, that's great.
Guest:2,000-year-old man is still the funniest.
Guest:Still happens.
Guest:Funniest album.
Guest:They're living it now.
Guest:Yeah, they are.
Guest:They're...
Guest:Mel is the funniest person I've ever known.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Because he's the classic.
Guest:Woody Allen is in that, but not as broad.
Guest:Mel is the classic Jewish humorist.
Guest:Oh, absolutely.
Guest:A 2,000-year-old man, if you listened to it carefully, was genius.
Guest:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Guest:I played it with him once.
Guest:Right.
Guest:I went up to the New York World's Fair in 1964.
Guest:The World's Fair was in New York.
Guest:In Flushing, right?
Guest:In Flushing, in Brooklyn, Queens.
Guest:And I interviewed Mel there.
Guest:That's where I met him.
Guest:And we played the 2,000-year-old man.
Guest:And he'd go into it like that.
Guest:I said, do you want to play 2,000-year-old man?
Guest:You just improvised it?
Guest:Oh, I just said it.
Guest:We're here at the World's Fair.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:What do you think?
Guest:You're 2,000 years old.
Guest:He goes, fair.
Guest:I go, fair?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Look at all you see.
Guest:Oh, it's fair.
Guest:Then he said to me, were you with the first fair?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:No, the first fair, 183 people came, the whole world.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And we held it in a ravine, in a ravine, at the bottom of a ravine, and people rolled into the fair, which was one of the exhibits.
Guest:And I said, well, what could have been, look, we have a monorail.
Guest:You got a monorail?
Guest:We had the burning bush.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:We thought it was a ride, but his best line of all was, what was the, I asked him, what was the big hit of the fair in 003?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:The big hit was Moses.
Guest:Moses parted the Red Sea.
Guest:He did it two times Friday, three times on Saturday, four times every Sunday, six drachmas.
Yeah.
Guest:And he had a press agent who told him, you keep doing this, Moses.
Guest:I'll get you 10, 11 pages in the old pestilence.
Guest:And that mind that can go that quick.
Guest:Yeah, so quick.
Guest:And you not know where he's going to go.
Guest:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Guest:And so I'd watch his mind.
Guest:And he still has that.
Guest:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Guest:He still has that.
Marc:Oh, yeah.
Marc:He's very quick still.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:I love being around him.
Marc:So I guess before we wrap up, again, I apologize for the time miscommunication, but marriage, you believe in it?
Guest:Well, obviously, I've been in enough six, seven marriages.
Guest:I can't even get lost count.
Guest:Eight, I think, one twice, right?
Guest:Seven, one twice.
Guest:Okay.
Guest:But...
Guest:i never lived with a woman i never liked spending a night with a woman i like to go home and if i was in love i got married because that's where i was raised and i always felt when i meet people who are married like 60 years yeah all the compromises they had to make yeah all i didn't want to do that yeah so what i loved at 20 is not what i loved at 30 and what i loved at 30 is not what i loved at 40
Guest:sometimes i think back to people that i loved what was i thinking but i was crazy for them then and in that time when i grew up you got married now this marriage has lasted 16 years maybe it's maturity maybe the difference in ages the fact that she was in show business
Guest:What'd she do?
Guest:She was a singer and actress.
Guest:She appeared in a lot.
Guest:She opened for Rickles.
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Guest:Very good singer.
Guest:So she understood that if I had to go somewhere to do an extra interview, you know, she had her own show on USA Network.
Guest:So she knew the business.
Guest:Yeah, knew the business.
Guest:It was helped.
Guest:She was a backup singer for the Osmonds.
Guest:Uh-huh.
Guest:her father ran capital records so even though like they're devout mormons they're also very show bits uh-huh yeah they understand sure the business which helps yeah helps makes life a lot and then having kids of course look at it i look up at that picture that's adorable yeah that's when they were three and two i guess uh-huh
Marc:So you got no regrets?
Guest:No, we go to Dodger Stadium and they know that stadium.
Guest:They've been going there since babies.
Guest:They know it like the back of the hand.
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Guest:And then they run around.
Guest:That's great.
Guest:They go to different seats.
Guest:Sure.
Guest:They sit behind the dugout of the visiting team and they yell at the other players.
Guest:It's great.
Guest:Great life.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Any regrets?
Guest:Regrets.
Guest:If I had one day back in my life, the day I started smoking.
Guest:Really?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I'm sorry I smoked.
Guest:That's not too horrible.
Guest:And out of all the powerful people you met?
Guest:Couldn't name one.
Guest:But I mean, were you ever surprised?
Guest:Let's talk presidents real quick and then we'll finish up.
Guest:Who surprised you the most as a person, both for better or worse, out of the seven or six?
Guest:I'll run them down.
Guest:Nixon, so bright.
Guest:And yet...
Guest:Hung up.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Little things.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Bug him.
Guest:George Bush, the first.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Best guy in the world.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Nicest, sweetest, care about you.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Concerned guy.
Guest:George Bush, too.
Guest:Great baseball guy.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:He invited me to the White House once.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Off the record.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:No interviews, no nothing.
Guest:We sat down for two hours to talk baseball.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Let's talk baseball.
Guest:That was it.
Guest:I had just gotten to Washington.
Guest:So he says, hey, I got to go to California.
Guest:You want a lift?
Guest:I said, no, I just got here.
Guest:He said, oh, geez, we could have talked baseball.
Guest:You love talking baseball, that guy.
Guest:Reagan for his humor.
Guest:Uh-huh.
Guest:And the best of all, from an interview standpoint, was Clinton, a steel trap mind.
Guest:I liked Jimmy Carter for how much he cared about little things and detail.
Guest:Gerald Ford was a great guy.
Guest:just a good guy there's something to like about everyone yeah obama for his mind like obama's mind and his he's so well within himself by that i mean he he's very entered in himself he's not gonna wrap his arms around you clinton's gonna hug you yeah
Guest:So I liked them all for different reasons.
Guest:The most incredible person probably was Mandela because he was such a single, solitary, incredible figure and still around.
Guest:One of the great days of my life was...
Guest:I went to his house.
Guest:I was in South Africa speaking to her.
Guest:And I went to his house for lunch.
Guest:And I had dinner with the clerk, the man who freed him.
Guest:So here's little Larry.
Guest:Little Jewish kid from Brooklyn.
Guest:I'm with Mandela and the clerk on the same day.
Guest:But I was at Jackie Robinson's first game.
Guest:And I interviewed him.
Guest:And so I've lived through history.
Guest:And...
Guest:And I've been on this journey.
Guest:I wrote a book called My Remarkable Journey.
Guest:And I pinch myself every day.
Guest:I was on relief as a kid.
Guest:My father died in New York City, bought my first pair of glasses.
Guest:So I sit around and look at me.
Guest:And yet I'll complain if the plane is late.
Guest:What am I doing?
Guest:I got to run.
Guest:All right.
Guest:Thanks, Mr. King.
Guest:Anytime.
Marc:Yep.
Marc:So that was my conversation with Larry King, and I don't know if I made it clear on the tape there, but he left me.
Marc:He left me in his living room.
Marc:He left me in his living room.
Marc:He took off, and that was that, and no one showed me out.
Marc:No one said thank you.
Marc:He just went away.
Marc:He walked into his house, and I packed up, and I should have taken something.
Marc:A memento of some kind, an ashtray or something just because I felt like, well, if you're going to leave me here.
Marc:Well, I mean, maybe it was trust on his part, but but it was bizarre.
Marc:You know, I mean, generally, if someone comes over to my house, I'll walk them out.
Marc:I'll walk out on the porch with them.
Marc:I'll say goodbye.
Marc:Thank you.
Marc:And then I don't know if you know this, but I did Larry King show.
Marc:online uh i'm not sure what the uh how you get that but you know just uh i'm sure you can just google larry king and and i reminded him about this experience and i still don't think he really put it together i i really don't think he had uh and again i'm humble i don't need everyone to know who i am but uh maybe a little research you know like uh he had no idea we got along good on his show you know better than we got along in his uh in his house
Marc:So that's it for today.
Marc:Thank you for listening.
Marc:Again, I appreciate you being there.
Marc:And go easy on the ice cream.
Marc:Be good to yourself.
Marc:Is this me saying this?
Marc:Am I becoming that guy?
Marc:Moon Zappa seems to think I should write a self-help book.
Marc:Would that be helpful?
Marc:Would that be helpful?
Marc:I guess anybody can sort of throw their hat into that ring.
Marc:Just make up something.
Marc:Just put down on the page what you think works for you or what you think would work for other people even though it doesn't work for you.
Marc:Go to WTFPod.com.
Marc:Mugs are on the way.
Marc:The Christmas stuff.
Marc:We are restocking.
Marc:We're restocking.
Marc:We're restocking the cap bowls, the t-shirts.
Marc:I just got an email from Brian Jones, the genius potter up in Portland.
Marc:He's got about 80 or so mugs on the way.
Marc:We're going to do that.
Marc:Everything should be up in the next week or so for WTF Pod Christmas shopping.
Marc:You can always go there and do what you need to do at WTFPod.com.
Marc:Get some JustCoffee.coop.
Marc:Get some, you know, check in.
Marc:Get the app.
Marc:Some of you are newcomers, okay?
Marc:Only the most recent 50 episodes are available at any given point in time.
Marc:All episodes are free for six months, and then you need to get the app for free, upgrade for a few bucks to the premium app.
Marc:You can stream all 400 and some odd episodes.
Marc:You can also get the DVD of the first 100 at wtfpod.com if you'd like to get that for a Christmas gift or something.
Marc:What else can you do?
Marc:Do all that stuff, okay?
Marc:Have a good Thanksgiving.
Marc:I got to stay here.
Marc:I usually go to my mother's, but I can't.
Marc:We're shooting on Wednesday late, and then I don't know where I'm going to go.
Marc:I don't know what I'm going to do.
Marc:I've been enjoying staying by myself.
Marc:I've been enjoying being alone, but I don't think that you should do that on holidays.
Marc:It's almost like if you don't hang out with other people on a holiday, you enjoy that.
Marc:you enjoy the sad self-pity uh celebration it's like oh everyone else but actually it's it's sort of amazing you know sometimes when when it's a holiday and everything is shut down everything's quiet and nobody is out and you just know that everybody's sort of you know doing their best to deal with family things and you know getting dinners ready and moving towards that moving towards that the the hassle moving through the hassle of entry the hassle of entry and
Marc:And then eating and then dealing with all that.
Marc:That'd be nice.
Marc:Coop invited me over.
Marc:I think I might go over there.
Marc:I get a little panicky, though.
Marc:I mean, I know Coop.
Marc:I love Coop.
Marc:But I don't know.
Marc:I'm always concerned that there's going to be nudity involved.
Marc:And I don't know if I'm ready for that on Thanksgiving.
Marc:Maybe I am.
Marc:Maybe.
Marc:Maybe I'll go.
Marc:I was invited by Moon to go to her place.
Marc:Maybe I'll go over there.
Marc:That would be interesting.
Marc:I don't know who's involved in that.
Marc:The Zappa clan.
Marc:But that's it.
Marc:Those are the two invites that I'm waiting.
Marc:I feel like I might have committed already.
Marc:I just have to decide and negotiate what I'm going to do.
Marc:Right now I'm going to go boil my brains out with some Ty Siegel band Slaughterhouse.
Marc:I don't even know this guy.
Marc:I'm not paid to plug this guy.
Marc:But I'm enjoying the music right now.
Marc:I need a lot of music.
Marc:I need some sound all the time.
Marc:I need some things kind of humming when I'm around.
Marc:Maybe NPR in the background.
Marc:Some music.
Marc:Boomer lives!
you