Episode 567 - Jeff Garlin
Marc:all right let's do this how are you what the fuckers what the fuck buddies what the fucking ears what the fucksters i am mark maron this is wtf my show the podcast wtf it's been fun lately been moving along some good interviews some good conversations some good talk
Marc:Last week, Paul Thomas Anderson, Richard Linklater.
Marc:Awesome.
Marc:This Thursday, got Mike Judge, who I don't think talks a lot publicly.
Marc:And we're from the same place, Albuquerque, New Mexico.
Marc:Had a great conversation with Mike.
Marc:Today, I got Jeff Garland on.
Marc:Me and Jeff go way back.
Marc:But I actually got a few words in.
Marc:That doesn't always happen with Jeff.
Marc:And in a minute, we've got sort of a special guest.
Marc:something's been eating at me, eating away at me a bit, is that last week I vaguely addressed my feelings about the Bill Cosby situation by not even mentioning his name.
Marc:And I'm starting to feel a little cowardly about it or something.
Marc:I just don't, it's very strange the feelings you have around realizing or coming to realize that somebody you've looked up to or respected or thought so differently of
Marc:is is such a a sociopathic monster it's a very hard thing to reckon with and you know i have no religion and i can only imagine that on some level it must be the same for catholics wrestling with uh with a local priest who is has been rumored but now is fairly decisive you got to be a moron not to know that the rumors are true how do you deal with that
Marc:And I think a lot of us use due process as a rationalization.
Marc:Absolutely.
Marc:The predominance of the law is phenomenal.
Marc:For the most part, it's supposed to be what makes our legal system so enviable and amazing.
Marc:But, you know, at what point do we start using due process as a rationalization to not...
Marc:engage our common sense or our own logic or to sort of overcome our own fear of speaking what we believe is true.
Marc:I mean, I'm that guy.
Marc:I think we're all that guy.
Marc:Hey, you know, it's like innocent until proven guilty.
Marc:But people in power are rarely proven guilty.
Marc:Certainly the type of power that Cosby has enjoyed his entire life as an entertainer, the money he's made for other people, sort of makes him a bit untouchable.
Marc:And there have been events in the past where he's been able to politically or financially get out of or crush articles or interviews with him.
Marc:but those days are over this is a this is an old man cosby and it's hard as a comic to to realize this stuff and what does what is our responsibility around it for me i know a lot of guys they're like hey man if he did it you know it's horrible well i think he did it and it's horrible but what what do we do now do we just let it go is that it
Marc:You know?
Marc:And I think a lot of people have just refused to want to admit it at all.
Marc:But I mean, how much do you talk about it?
Marc:I've not talked about it at all.
Marc:I'm not saying Bill Cosby is going to come onto this show.
Marc:From what I heard a year or so ago when I really wanted to get him on the show, he wouldn't do it because there was the F word in the title of the show.
Marc:Being a decent guy that he is.
Marc:But
Marc:Something happened on stage last week that kind of, you know, kind of grossed me out.
Marc:Apparently he was on stage in Canada and he made reference to the accusations against him, to the rape accusations by 30 some odd women.
Marc:You know, average it out.
Marc:After a certain point, I mean, you know, he's a bad guy.
Marc:It's true.
Marc:I've decided, and I'm nobody, but it's my personal opinion.
Marc:It's horrible.
Marc:But he was on stage making light of it.
Marc:Said to a woman in the audience who was going out to the bar to get a drink, he said, be careful, don't drink it around me.
Marc:So when he's using the platform of stand-up comedy...
Marc:to obfuscate, make light of, and trivialize what he's playing off as empty accusations is heinous.
Marc:And I knew that Judd Apatow was very public about it, his feelings about it.
Marc:And obviously, he's in a position to where he can be as honest as he wants to be.
Marc:He's not going to be punished.
Marc:There's nothing to be afraid of if you're Judd Apatow in this business.
Marc:And look, I mean, I love Cosby as a comic.
Marc:And I don't know what to do with that.
Marc:You know, it's all very mixed up.
Marc:The emotions are mixed up.
Marc:How do I separate it now?
Marc:Am I going to be able to?
Marc:I might be able to.
Marc:Can I still say, well, he did some great comedy, but he's this horrible rapist monster.
Marc:Can I do that?
Marc:Can I compartmentalize that?
Marc:I don't know.
Marc:I have not done...
Marc:experiments.
Marc:But clearly Judd is able and has been able to completely separate the influence of
Marc:Growing up with Bill Cosby as a comedic hero, respecting Bill Cosby as an entertainer and a cultural activist.
Marc:He's been able to separate all that, to put all that aside to assess this situation.
Marc:But it had been eating me about...
Marc:this is my show my beat is the comedy community that's where this started and that's where most of it remains and i felt you know i felt bad that i was not talking about it because i didn't know how to talk about it and now i'm talking about it and i want to talk to judd about it because he's been very upfront about his feelings and what they mean and what this
Marc:what this cosby situation means to comedy to culture to show business i just wanted to you know a lot of you had seen his tweets and but i wanted to get into it a little bit so i called judd apatow a few days ago and we talked about bill cosby
Guest:Mark, how are you?
Guest:I'm fine, Judd.
Guest:How are you?
Guest:I'm doing well.
Guest:I'm in the final stages of editing the Amy Schumer movie, Trainwreck.
Marc:And what's that coming in under?
Guest:You know, we got it at about...
Guest:I think we're in a solid two hours.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:That might be a new record for me.
Marc:So, all right, well, here's what's going on with me.
Marc:You know, like I have been, you know, I don't know if I'm shying away.
Marc:From addressing the Bill Cosby situation, I have to sort of really kind of question myself as to how do I how do I talk about it?
Marc:What are my feelings about it?
Marc:And I think ultimately what happens, you know, with me is you sort of lean on that, that, well, you know, if it's true.
Marc:then it's horrible.
Marc:And then it gets to a point where we're at now where I realize it is true.
Marc:There's no way that this many incidents can happen with these personal stories.
Marc:And so I know that it's horrible, but what do we do now?
Marc:And you talk about it on Twitter constantly.
Marc:So what do you want to happen?
Guest:One thing that...
Guest:I do know is I'm not comfortable with him running around the country doing stand-up like nothing's happening.
Guest:And I guess on some level I feel like I can't be a part of solving that many problems in the world.
Guest:I do my best to get involved where I can be effective.
Guest:But this is our neighborhood, and I do feel like there's someone running around
Guest:who should be in a different type of building right now.
Guest:There was a comedian named Vince Champ.
Marc:Yeah, I knew him.
Guest:Remember him?
Guest:He was arrested because they looked at his college touring schedule, and in many of the cities that he was in, on those days, people had been raped.
Guest:He's in jail for life right now.
Marc:Right.
Marc:But Bill Cosby, I think one of the other issues is that when somebody has as much power as Bill Cosby and like despite what Patton says or or what you may have known, I mean, I was not really aware of of this, of the reality of this.
Marc:And apparently a lot of people were aware of it years and years ago.
Marc:And until Hannibal said something, I wasn't really on my radar anymore.
Marc:And I think it's pretty unbelievable for a lot of people.
Marc:And there doesn't seem to be any legal recourse.
Marc:So the whole due process argument of kind of like, you know, innocent until proven guilty does not really apply.
Marc:And he's a very powerful guy.
Marc:So you wonder what justice looks like.
Marc:And I understand what you're saying, but it seems like he's definitely been hobbled.
Marc:His legacy has been destroyed and he doesn't seem to be able to work much in this in this country at this point.
Marc:Would you like to see him in jail?
Guest:Oh, I absolutely would like to see him in jail.
Guest:I mean, that's where people who commit sexual assaults go.
Guest:He should be in jail.
Guest:And I think that when celebrities commit heinous crimes, people don't want to let go of their love for their work and their lifelong relationship with them.
Guest:If we admit that Cosby did this, we're not allowed to enjoy everything that made us so happy.
Guest:And I guess in some primal way,
Guest:we don't want to let go of those memories and those feelings and i think ultimately we have to decide that uh... it's way more important
Guest:uh... that he is uh... dealt with in the same manner anyone else is who's commit those types of crimes and uh... he shouldn't be uh... performing hey he got two standing ovations last night and he had three he's booked through the you know through the spring and are people in a book him again that maybe they will if we don't uh... complain about it
Marc:And I guess on the most recent performances, he alluded to it and joked about it, you know, in a room full of people that were obviously adoring fans.
Marc:And he got a standing ovation from what I read, you know, just from or a massive amount of applause just for the joke he made.
Marc:You know, about some woman was getting up to get a drink and he said, where are you going?
Marc:She said, I'm going to get a drink.
Marc:And he said, well, you better you better be careful and not drink that around me.
Marc:And it just got a huge amount of laughter.
Marc:And I think that's what's sort of triggered my mind.
Marc:my, I guess, action or my desire to call you is that, you know, he's now using, you know, our form and his form to sort of trivialize this thing where he has not made a statement about it at all.
Marc:And now he's using jokes to trivialize it.
Guest:Well, he's certainly not saying this.
Guest:On that date, when they said I was at the Playboy Club, I was in Europe shooting a movie.
Guest:Like, he doesn't have a response to,
Guest:that's specific to any of the 33 people.
Guest:And if you didn't do it, you'd probably be pretty pissed off.
Guest:And you know what, the timeline wouldn't match up.
Guest:So it is a Vince Champ situation in that way.
Guest:He doesn't have an alibi for any one of these people.
Guest:And you only need one of these people to be telling the truth for him to deserve to be in prison.
Guest:What I think people have trouble...
Guest:Facing is, what would it feel like to be standing with Bill Cosby?
Guest:You take a drink of something, or you take a pill that he told you was something that it wasn't, and you slowly start passing out, and you're looking at him, and you're thinking, what in God's name is about to happen?
Guest:It is bone-chilling.
Guest:It's a horror movie.
Guest:And I don't think people really want to close their eyes and imagine what it's like
Guest:as you're going unconscious to know that somebody is about to abuse you in that way and that you'll you won't be able to complain because he could say what we were partying what we're like drink and doing pills like it's a setup
Guest:to make the person unable to complain.
Marc:Right, and it's so loaded anyways, and so many of these women were afraid of him, and so many women, generally speaking, who are victims of sexual crime, find themselves ashamed or unable to speak out.
Marc:And certainly with somebody as powerful as Bill Cosby, obviously a lot of these women just couldn't even fathom addressing it publicly.
Guest:Well, I think a lot of people...
Guest:who want to get into acting, and a lot of people he preyed upon were wannabe actresses or actresses.
Guest:Even if he did it, they think complaining about it probably ends my career.
Guest:People will think that, you know, I'm trouble.
Guest:That's why he always went for the same type of person for the vast majority of the time.
Guest:Because you become branded that person.
Guest:Even now, these people in their 60s and their 70s, and most all of them don't want any money.
Guest:They're just trying to be honest.
Guest:They're humiliated.
Guest:There's nothing fun about being 70 years old and having to go on CNN and saying Bill Cosby raped you.
Guest:That's not fun.
Guest:It brands you in a way.
Guest:It takes an enormous amount of courage to stand up and talk about it.
Guest:But I think that people like to think, oh, they're all going to get rich.
Guest:Believe me, most of these people aren't getting rich off of this.
Guest:Might a few people get renumerated in some way?
Guest:Sure.
Guest:Do they deserve it?
Guest:Absolutely.
Guest:That's why people sue people.
Guest:If you do something to someone and it messes with their life and it messes with their psychology and causes them great pain, he should pay those people.
Marc:But when we were engaging over text, you feel that there's no response coming from Hollywood as our community.
Marc:I've talked to people.
Marc:I've said something.
Marc:Most of the people that I've talked to, and I've seen a couple of people address it on stage fairly succinctly.
Marc:I saw Sherrod Carmichael address it with a very pointed joke.
Marc:I saw Rob Schneider talk about it a bit in a more personal way, less pointed.
Marc:I know that Chris Rock has said if he did it, it's horrible.
Marc:There's still a qualifier there.
Marc:I mean, what would you like Hollywood to say?
Marc:And what do you think is disproportionate in terms of how Hollywood's responding?
Guest:Well, I think it's the path of least resistance.
Guest:Nobody wants to stand up for anything that can't help them in some way.
Guest:So...
Guest:what are the chances that bill cosby pulled out a date book and shows that he was not in those locations for all thirty three of those women it's it zero so even in a situation where bill cosby clearly did it nobody wanted risk the idea for the one in a billion chances uh... that uh... they're wrong
Guest:that they get in trouble.
Guest:But the truth is, if I was raped, I don't expect courts to need 33 witnesses to convict my rapists.
Guest:A lot of people are in jail because one person spoke up and said this happened.
Guest:So we're so far past the normal bar for proof.
Guest:And so everybody in Hollywood, for the most part, there's a few people that are standing up, like Rosie O'Donnell.
Guest:There's some comedians that are standing up.
Guest:But there are very important figures in our business who say, you know what?
Guest:This isn't a racial issue.
Guest:We don't want people like this in our community.
Guest:This is wrong.
Guest:People who commit these acts should be in prison.
Guest:And I believe these women.
Guest:There's 33 women.
Guest:Go on the computer, and there's videos of every one of these women in great detail explaining what's happening.
Guest:It is bone-chilling.
Guest:The amount of detail that they remember.
Guest:We're way beyond the point of, like, did this happen or did this not happen?
Guest:It's just certain statutes of limitations are allowing him...
Guest:to avoid dealing with this.
Marc:Now, what do you think about when somebody like the showrunner from Blackish Kenya Barris comes at you and says, you know, let it go?
Guest:I spoke to him afterwards about that.
Guest:You know, I can understand why someone would say, why does Judd care about this?
Guest:I don't know.
Guest:I have two daughters.
Guest:I'm a comedian.
Guest:I see him a little bit as our comedy dad.
Guest:It's like finding out your comedy dad is a really evil guy.
Guest:And you want to say, hey, does everybody care about this?
Guest:But he's doing that.
Guest:And when the community is pretty silent, then I feel like, well, if no one's going to talk, I'm going to talk.
Guest:If everybody was talking about it, I probably wouldn't have that much to say about it.
Guest:But I don't want it to suddenly disappear.
Guest:And then he just kind of goes back out on the road.
Guest:And just does his thing and has his hundreds of millions of dollars.
Guest:And all of those women are shamed for coming out.
Guest:They're all ignored, which is just re-injuring all of those people.
Marc:Yeah, I think that's right.
Marc:And I certainly appreciate what you're saying and what you're doing.
Marc:I just...
Marc:There is a hopelessness to to it in that he is still very powerful.
Marc:He is not going to be taken to task.
Marc:And I guess the only way to make him responsible, which he won't be, or at least answer to to the reality of the situation is is.
Marc:diminish his ability to work.
Guest:Well, you just don't want him having a blast.
Guest:That's how I look at it.
Guest:I don't want him running around getting standing ovations.
Guest:At the very least, go in your mansion and disappear for the rest of your life.
Guest:He shouldn't be rewarded and applauded
Guest:for raping that many women.
Guest:And that's a huge commitment to rape, by the way.
Guest:We were talking about this starting in the mid-60s.
Guest:That's a full commitment for four decades.
Marc:Well, yeah, obviously somehow in his mind,
Marc:You know, he had this was the way he was going to go about it.
Marc:He was going to be this guy that drugged women and then, you know, then raped him.
Marc:And somehow in his sick mind, you know, he had made that OK.
Marc:That's you know, that's what serial sociopaths do.
Guest:Did you see the video of him on the Larry King show in the 90s?
Guest:And he's talking about Spanish flies.
Guest:He is absolutely giddy, laughing about the concept of
Guest:of doing that to women.
Guest:People need to look it up.
Guest:It's really horrifying.
Guest:He thinks it's hysterical.
Guest:He can't even hide it.
Guest:And that's, you know, look at everything I've ever done in my career.
Guest:I never brought up Spanish flies.
Guest:That's not something anyone brings up, drugging women so they'll have sex with you.
Marc:Yeah, it's really a sick situation.
Guest:I think it's the saddest, most bizarre thing
Guest:in a way, Shakespearean episode that's ever happened in show business.
Guest:I mean, right now, when he's sitting home with his wife, Camille, what are they talking about?
Guest:What's happening in that house?
Guest:What does his butler think?
Guest:What does all his news?
Guest:What does his assistant think?
Guest:Are they all in some cult of Cosby where it's cool, or are they terrified?
Guest:Well, I think I think that's an old man.
Guest:And so everyone thinks, oh, that was a long time ago.
Guest:But there's people just hanging out with him right now.
Marc:I know.
Marc:I think that.
Marc:Well, I think that does happen.
Marc:I mean, there is a certain sort of Stockholm syndrome type of cultish psychology that happens around the powerful, you know, the people that surround the powerful.
Marc:There certainly is plenty of people that still are willing not to believe any of these accusations.
Marc:What do you make of that?
Guest:Well, the people who don't want to believe it, it's the same reason why people don't want to believe that Michael Jackson ever did anything with kids.
Guest:They just love thriller, and they don't want to give it up.
Marc:Maybe that's how his butler and his wife are able to sit there and have dinner.
Guest:I'm sure.
Guest:Back in history, when I first heard about these accusations, it probably took me way too long for it to think in that this happened.
Guest:uh... but it's but it's uh... it's very troublesome mainly due to the silence because people should say this is wrong.
Guest:It's not the hardest thing of the world to say.
Guest:Oh, by the way, there's 33 women saying this, I believe them, and this is wrong.
Guest:And people don't say it.
Guest:And look what happened when Mel Gibson got in trouble.
Guest:Mel Gibson for just making comments was tossed from the business for years.
Guest:They burnt that guy a mistake for comments.
Guest:And this, you know, this is actual, you know, violent acts.
Marc:It was a very sort of lukewarm reaction.
Marc:I think that you're right, though.
Marc:I think that it's that if you don't keep it.
Marc:the public sphere I understand your argument is that you know those people that refuse to want to believe it or or see their their lovable hero in that way will just you know eventually evolve into giving them a pass and even people that if nothing is done about it eventually it'll just fade from public memory well it also makes women who are assaulted not speak up so the reason to say
Guest:Bill Cosby is a terrible man, and I believe these women are so that women aren't hiding in their homes in shame when people commit violent crimes against them.
Guest:I mean, that's why everybody has to say, I just want to go on record, I believe these women.
Guest:But you're not seeing important people say that.
Guest:It is dead silent out there, and I find it very, very...
Guest:troubling.
Guest:It reminds me of the North Korea issue with the interview.
Guest:Our whole town was ready to just shut down on the freedom of speech issue.
Guest:Nobody spoke up and said, we have freedom of speech regardless of the content.
Guest:You're not allowed to tell us that we can't have freedom of speech anymore.
Guest:You know, it's much different overseas, you know, the incredible passion to fight for that freedom.
Guest:But here, everyone back down.
Marc:Yeah, it just seems that people within the business world, their default is to protect business or to try to keep business in the status quo without really fighting the good fight.
Marc:They'd rather just take the hit financially and not cause trouble and then move on.
Guest:For the most part, that's the case.
Guest:And I think that money wins the day.
Guest:for the most part you at the bill cosby show everybody knows that this guy is up to no good they may not know he's raping people but he's certainly doing terrible things with women and casting couches and cheating on his wife everyone at that show knows what's happening it is not a secret i've worked on television shows if i had sex with one of the actions of girls
Guest:You would know about it three hours later.
Marc:Well, you probably, yeah, that's true, Jed.
Guest:It's not that anyone in this industry was unaware that he was a wretch.
Guest:Well, that's what I'm saying.
Guest:Everybody knew that he was a terrible guy for decades and decades.
Guest:It was not a secret.
Guest:in our industry.
Guest:But when it goes into this kind of criminal activity and all those people remain silent or say, that's not the Bill Cosby I knew.
Guest:Well, I'm sure the Bill Cosby you knew was also awful in a different way.
Guest:He wasn't a great guy.
Guest:Everybody knows.
Guest:I have a relative who was working on a TV show and Bill Cosby was the guest star.
Guest:And before he arrived, everyone was like, she needs to stay away from Cosby, make sure he doesn't see her.
Guest:Really?
Guest:His reputation preceded him for decades and decades.
Guest:But people aren't even coming out talking about just those types of stories of just a guy on the hunt for a very long time.
Guest:And I think part of it is the racial aspect of it.
Guest:Because, yes, he did things that were very important in the civil rights struggle.
Guest:And he did great things.
Guest:But he also did some things that were as evil as you can do on Earth.
Guest:And there's a lot of great people who fight for civil rights, and we don't need him.
Guest:We don't need his legacy.
Guest:There are a lot of other people who we could look up to and we could say, you know what, he did great things and he also did evil things.
Guest:But the fact that he did great things doesn't mean you ignore this type of violence.
Guest:Right.
Guest:And I don't look at it like this is about a black person or a white person.
Guest:To me, Bill Cosby is a comedian.
Guest:Right.
Guest:And I just look at it as someone in my family did something terrible about
Guest:And I think we all should be clear and say, this is awful.
Guest:We don't accept this in our comedy community.
Marc:Agreed.
Marc:And I appreciate you talking to me, man.
Guest:You know, I love this subject because when I talk about it, I completely lose my sense of humor.
Guest:And I remember during the Iraq war, the run-up to the Iraq war, Janine Garofalo would be on TV all the time.
Guest:And I thought, oh, I wish she could do this with a sense of humor because she was right about everything.
Guest:And she predicted everything bad that would happen in the Middle East, but she didn't find a way to make it funny.
Guest:And so people resisted her thoughts.
Guest:And I know I'm doing the exact same thing.
Guest:And I completely relate because when something is that awful, that painful, it's very hard to hold on to your sense of humor.
Guest:So on this day, I commend Jon Stewart as the greatest genius of all time, even though he doesn't like you for some reason.
Marc:There's a reason.
Marc:But thanks for talking to me, man.
Marc:I'm glad you're doing well.
Guest:All right.
Guest:Thanks, Mark.
Marc:It's Jeff Garland's turn.
Marc:Jeff Garland and I go back years and years.
Marc:We didn't come up together, but I've known him.
Marc:He's been on my periphery for a while.
Marc:I think I first met him in San Francisco.
Marc:We'll talk about that.
Marc:But he's also appeared.
Marc:He was in the first season of Marin on IFC.
Marc:I have done his show.
Marc:He has done a live version of this show.
Marc:But I was happy he was able to sit down and talk because my concern with Jeff is always, am I going to talk?
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Is there going to be talking available?
Marc:Is there going to be talking time available for me, Mark Maron and my own show?
Marc:And Jeff and I share some things, uh, different styles of it.
Marc:He's got food issues.
Marc:I got food issues.
Marc:He's got them.
Marc:He wrote about them, but, uh,
Marc:But I think we got down to something here.
Marc:You know, it's not easy to get Jeff to just sort of engage and listen.
Marc:And we did it.
Marc:We did it.
Marc:Before we go to Jeff, I do want to say that we have some new music here between segments this week and over the next few episodes.
Marc:It was made by Dean Copley, a big fan of the show from Kalamazoo.
Marc:You can check him out.
Marc:He's DJ Copley on Facebook and WebPuppy45 on Twitter.
Marc:So let's go now to my conversation with Jeff Garland.
Guest:I want to.
Guest:Do you want to wear them?
Guest:Yeah, I'm going to wear mine.
Guest:Yeah, I'll wear mine too.
Marc:That way you can modulate your loud voice.
Marc:Yes, I can modulate my loud voice.
Marc:Look, Jeff, you want to play comfortable?
Marc:You're going to be comfortable?
Guest:What?
Marc:What the fuck are you talking about?
Marc:Let's just start with the elephant in the room.
Marc:Which is what?
Guest:Why were you feeling slighted?
Guest:All right.
Guest:Let's take a few steps back.
Guest:All right?
Guest:Let's take a few steps back.
Guest:Not to the beginning of our friendship.
Guest:Not to the beginning of our careers.
Guest:None of that.
Guest:All right.
Guest:You want to get this out, right?
Guest:No, I don't give a shit.
Guest:I don't like your tone.
Guest:I know you don't.
Ha, ha, ha!
Guest:I so confuse you because I call you on your shit, yet I love you.
Guest:Do you know what I'm saying?
Guest:I have nothing but positivity and love for you.
Guest:And that fucks you up.
Guest:That confuses you.
Guest:But what's happening right now?
Guest:Right now, I am calling you on your shit.
Guest:Listen, let me finish.
Guest:All right.
Guest:So, okay.
Guest:so the basic premise is that you know i wanted to do your show i i i was the greasy or the the squeaky wheel i was for a change i was the one complaining about shit right that's not like me it threw me i bet you it did yeah but i'm here i know well because i i i yeah it worked it worked yeah
Marc:It did.
Marc:Well, let me just explain something to you.
Marc:In my mind, we had done the live one.
Marc:I had done yours.
Marc:And I just really had forgotten.
Guest:First off, the live one was fun.
Guest:And I had fun with it.
Guest:I don't know how much fun you had with me having fun.
Guest:But the point being is this is totally different than the live one.
Marc:I know, but I would have gotten to you.
Marc:That was my point.
Guest:You would have gotten to me?
Guest:What does that mean?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I've forgotten to... By the way, just so the listeners know, all I did was ask you a few times why I'm not on the show.
Marc:Well, it was a little more loaded than that.
Guest:Well, however you want to phrase it, but the point being is, it's not like we weren't speaking.
Marc:No, no, we were fine, and then at one in the morning, I get an email that says, I get it, you don't want me on the show.
Guest:Well, yes, I know.
Guest:And by the way, that was... That was...
Marc:I understood.
Marc:No problem.
Marc:And then he continued to have that conversation even after I chimed in.
Marc:No, no, no.
Marc:I understand.
Marc:You don't want me on your show.
Marc:Yeah, it was clear to me.
Guest:It was so clear to me.
Marc:That I had decided.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:No.
Guest:And you would have eventually gotten to me.
Guest:What does that even mean?
Marc:The show's not going anywhere.
Marc:You reminded me.
Marc:And I'm like, it could have just been like, hey, am I going to do the show soon?
Marc:But no, it was like laced with guilt.
Guest:No, no, no, no, no.
Guest:First it wasn't.
Guest:Then it became not guilt.
Guest:I don't work with guilt.
Guest:And by the way, me saying I get it was me saying I get it.
Marc:You were wrong, I think.
Guest:I was wrong.
Guest:By the way, are you curious about me?
Guest:Do you have things you want to ask me?
Guest:Is that why I'm not on the show?
Guest:No, no, no, no.
Guest:I knew that there would never be a problem.
Guest:Because I'm going to give you every honest answer in the world.
Marc:Okay, I didn't know you'd expect nothing else, but no like I what the weird thing is I can't even remember the first time we met Can you I think it was in San Francisco?
Marc:You were doing some version of someone I want to eat something with or or the was that one at the improv when I was doing right there, right?
Marc:I feel like that's where you're playing hobs or something or no, I lived in San Francisco They lived in San Francisco.
Guest:What year was that like 92 91?
Guest:It was mid... I don't even remember.
Guest:93?
Guest:Yeah, 90s.
Guest:Right?
Guest:Early 90s, yeah.
Marc:And I feel like that was the first time I met you, and I really had no idea who you were until that time.
Guest:Wait a minute, wait a minute, wait a minute.
Guest:No, no, no.
Guest:Let's take a step back.
Guest:We met in New York before that.
Guest:You think?
Guest:In the 80s, yes.
Guest:I was living there when you were doing...
Guest:The Comedy Channel.
Guest:Was it The Comedy Channel?
Guest:Short Attention Span Theater?
Guest:Short Attention Span Theater.
Guest:Right.
Guest:I was living there.
Guest:Okay, so that goes way back.
Guest:So it would be Caroline's, The Comic Strip, The Cellar.
Guest:But you weren't there that long though, were you?
Guest:Yeah, I was there for a while.
Guest:Because I used to do Boston and stuff.
Guest:I don't remember.
Guest:The Boston Comedy Club.
Guest:I used to play Boston Comedy Club all the time.
Guest:But I remember you playing Boston Comedy Club.
Guest:We just didn't really talk that much.
Guest:I think we weren't even acquaintances.
Guest:We were like, hey, how you doing?
Guest:I don't think we were anything more than that.
Guest:And then, I think you're right, San Francisco.
Guest:And then over the years, we just became closer through sheer being around.
Guest:And also...
Guest:you know it's not like a lot of guys our age and i don't want to say like we're baron von old right but the point being is let's say the comedy store where you and i work out yeah okay and that's really and that really is now yes yeah but that really is like our gym that's like going to lift weights sure that's exactly what it is yeah not a lot of guys our age a lot but people are a lot younger than us there
Marc:Yeah, no, that's true.
Guest:That's true.
Marc:Except for Argus.
Guest:That's a whole other thing.
Guest:But it's like we're, you know, in this, you know, even who there even works out in their 40s, Bill Burr on occasion, Sarah, you know what I mean?
Guest:It's like, I'm talking about in like the last decade.
Marc:Yeah, we want to stay fresh.
Marc:Keep that going.
Guest:We do it, but there's not a lot of our peers that do that.
Marc:Yeah, I know a lot of them are working on the road more, I think.
Marc:A lot of them are working on the road or quit.
Marc:Then it was interesting that... It didn't stick in my craw, but I knew that you were being... I knew that you were hired by Jon Stewart...
Marc:maybe i'm wrong to to help him put together his special yes that's completely true you were a dramaturge in a way you were you were helping you know like you like in my mind at some point did you do it with leary as well i did it with dennis leary first i developed their specials with them i went on the road with them i'd go up first i come off i take notes and so
Guest:I directed their specials, but I didn't direct the cameras.
Marc:Right.
Marc:You were like a dramaturg.
Guest:I was a stage director for their shows.
Marc:And I also edited with the writing.
Marc:Yeah, right.
Marc:But you became that guy that did that.
Marc:Was that a service you provided?
Marc:Or was it just those two guys?
Guest:It could have been a direction that I would just go down, but it was those two guys.
Guest:I mean, yes, people have asked me and I've given notes before, but they were the only two guys that I actually did.
Guest:did that with and then my question and i got credit like like in other words right right right you know yeah right so so that but that's an interesting place like because you're a guy that comes from a bit of a theater background at least an improv background right and you know sometimes it's good to have a second you know second set of eyes without like if i was working on a set i would love it to have like you in the audience telling me here's what you thought of the set here's what i might want to think about not think about you want somebody you can trust do you do that
Guest:that i mean you don't seem to you don't like i would do i've i've done it for at this point in my life yeah you would have to say to me can you come watch me right and tell me right and i would gladly do that i remember i gave you advice once before you did and yeah uh when i i think i told you to you know to open with the banana again or something
Guest:I'm sorry for screwing up your sound.
Guest:Yeah, it's all right.
Guest:But you know where that came from?
Guest:That came from... But it was like terrible.
Guest:Well, it was... It worked once.
Guest:Well, here's the premise of it.
Guest:The premise of it was I was at breakfast with some friends and there was a banana on the table and I just picked it up and said, hello.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:What do you mean the president's dead?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:You know, something stupid.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And then I said, I'm going to do this on stage.
Guest:I'm going to bring a banana up and I'm going to take the most simple.
Guest:And the truth was, it actually worked for a while until I got bored with it.
Guest:You saw it when I was bored with it.
Guest:And you said, yeah, open with that.
Guest:Be sure and do that, which killed me.
Guest:And I dropped it.
Guest:But it was to me, it was like so stupid.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:During my set to answer a banana.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Well, you have a pretty absurd streak in an improvisational nature.
Marc:But let me ask you this before.
Marc:Like, I'm going to set up a few things and we'll go back.
Marc:But like the relationship with Larry on Curb, like, is it my misconception that what was it?
Marc:Did it start as a similar relationship as you and John and you and Dennis?
Guest:Very, very much.
Marc:Like, you know, Jeff's very good at helping with the putting together of the special.
Guest:Well, actually, HBO had approached Larry and said, we want to do something with you.
Guest:A special kind of thing.
Guest:No, no, no.
Guest:They wanted to do a series with him.
Guest:Okay.
Guest:And they said, let's start by doing some sort of special or something.
Guest:Right, right.
Guest:But no, no.
Guest:Actually, I take that back.
Guest:They never said special to him.
Guest:They said, we want to do a series with you.
Guest:Chris Albrecht made it known to Larry.
Guest:Boom.
Guest:Okay.
Okay.
Guest:Larry and I, I was writing with Alan Zweibel this show that, ironically, it was a companion piece for Everybody Loves Raymond.
Guest:Instead of choosing mine, they chose King of Queens.
Guest:Really?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Huh.
Guest:I never even got to, it was just, which is good because it led to Curb.
Marc:That was sort of bouncing around for a while, because Johnny Red Wilson did one, too, that had a man cave, Jackie Gleason-y kind of feel.
Marc:Oh, he did?
Marc:It didn't go either.
Guest:Mine was different.
Guest:It was not like King of Queens.
Guest:They just wanted a companion show, and it was the same year that they were developing King of Queens.
Guest:So Larry's office is right next to Alan's White Bells.
Guest:When I say office, it's like a little suite of offices with Billy Crystal.
Guest:Where's this?
Guest:At Castle Rock.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And I would go into Larry's office every day and talk to him.
Guest:I knew him from being a comic, you know.
Guest:And...
Guest:One day we went to lunch, and I said, if you ever want to do a comedy special, I have the perfect idea.
Guest:It would be the behind the scenes of the making of a comedy special, and you'd never have to shoot the special.
Guest:You could back out, and then that would be the special.
Guest:And it came from my experiences with Jon Stewart and Dennis Leary doing their thing.
Guest:And he said, I love it.
Guest:And then we went to Chris Albrecht and told him the idea, and he said...
Guest:His exact words were, how can I not do this?
Guest:How often do you ever hear those?
Guest:And so we went and did that.
Guest:And he said to me, the first day of filming, wouldn't this be great as a series?
Guest:And in my head, I thought, yeah, right.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Of course it would be great as a series.
Guest:Because it was as if Larry and I had worked together for 40 years.
Guest:It was just natural.
Guest:Well, it was natural from the audition process when we were auditioning people.
Guest:We felt like, wow, this is really weird that we have this connection.
Guest:And then he said that to me and then
Guest:We did it, and lo and behold, HBO said we'd like to do this as a series.
Marc:And that's how it started.
Guest:That's how it started.
Guest:It's interesting, so I wasn't so off.
Guest:No, you weren't off.
Guest:Because I was thinking when you said to me, was there anybody else besides Dennis Leary and John Stewart, I'm thinking there was somebody else.
Guest:And the somebody else was Larry.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Yeah, that's who the other person was.
Marc:So now, here's why...
Marc:I think we didn't know each other when we were younger, really, was that I didn't see you as a comic in my little world.
Marc:I was hanging around with Attell and Louie and Jeff Ross, Todd Berry, but you weren't.
Guest:When you were doing that,
Guest:I was hanging out with Jon Stewart, Dennis Leary, like a different group.
Guest:A little older, a little more established.
Guest:Yeah, a little more older, a little more established.
Guest:The only person of your group that I was actually friends with was Louie.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I've been friends with Louie forever.
Guest:Right.
Guest:And as a matter of fact, Louie and I just talked about you the other day.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:How smart you are.
Guest:Oh.
Guest:Bill Grunfest, I'll say his name.
Guest:I don't give a shit.
Guest:Doesn't matter.
Guest:He was scared to put me up.
Marc:He wouldn't put me up either.
Marc:What was his reasoning?
Marc:At the Comedy Sour, Bill Grunfest was the original booker.
Marc:And the host.
Guest:His reason was, just like the same reason for you, taking risks.
Guest:doing things differently.
Guest:But you know what he did, which was strange?
Guest:He gave me Thursday nights to MC.
Guest:So I would MC Thursday nights and a towel would come in.
Guest:People would come in late at night and I'd put them on when they weren't normally getting spots down there.
Guest:Right.
Guest:So, but when did you, you started in, where'd you grow up?
Guest:I grew up in Chicago and South Florida.
Guest:What's that?
Guest:It was Chicago.
Guest:What part of Chicago?
Guest:Jewish part?
Guest:There were Jews amongst me at all.
Guest:But not Highland Park.
Guest:Not Highland Park.
Guest:No.
Guest:I grew up in a suburb that had a significant amount of Jewish people in it though, called Morton Grove.
Guest:But what was your thing?
Guest:Like when you were a kid, were you a jock?
Guest:No, I was... Well, I was one of these weird sort of... I played every sport and I was the class clown.
Guest:But you were on the teams.
Guest:I was on the teams and I was actually...
Guest:Because you're a big boy.
Guest:Yeah, no, I was a good athlete.
Marc:Yeah, I could feel that.
Guest:Yeah, I played football, I played baseball, I played everything.
Marc:You played football in high school?
Marc:Yes.
Marc:What position?
Guest:I was a guard and a tackle and a defensive tackle.
Guest:Big guy.
Guest:Big guy.
Guest:I was about the same size I am now.
Guest:I was like 6'1", 230 or so.
Guest:Baseball?
Guest:Baseball.
Guest:You played baseball?
Guest:Power hitting first baseman.
Guest:First baseman?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Got to be quick.
Guest:Yeah, I was actually quick.
Guest:Better fielder than I was a hitter.
Marc:Yeah?
Guest:Yeah, but I was a good hitter.
Marc:No track.
Guest:What do you mean no track?
Marc:You didn't run track.
Guest:I did shot put in discus.
Marc:That makes sense.
Guest:See, I did all of it.
Guest:And by the way, I was the fastest lineman.
Guest:Like I ran faster than some of our running backs.
Guest:But here's the problem.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:The problem was I had a heart ailment.
Guest:No, it was correct.
Guest:It was called Wolf-Parkinson-White syndrome.
Guest:It's a thing where you get like an extra pathway in your heart.
Guest:You get like tachycardia.
Guest:So I had to quit playing all sports.
Guest:How'd they fix it?
Guest:I was the 72nd person ever to have this done.
Guest:Now millions have had it done.
Guest:Since then, Michael Cera had the same thing.
Guest:Oh, really?
Guest:He had it fixed.
Guest:And before me, I was number 72.
Guest:Number like 14 was Mitch Hurwitz, who created Arrested Development.
Marc:I never knew that there were actual credits for a medical facility.
Guest:I was so early when they fixed me, it said on the machine, not for human use.
Marc:Oh, really?
Guest:It was like a dog thing.
Guest:I'd like to say for you a cat thing.
Marc:The names of the people previous?
Guest:Yeah, they were all etched in.
Guest:Mitch Hurwitz is here.
Guest:That's something.
Guest:But what they do is they burn the extra pathway with high frequency waves that stops the tachycardia.
Guest:So anyone who has any sort of tachycardia, this is how they fix it now.
Guest:Like when I was having my procedure done, which I had to go to Oklahoma City to have it done.
Marc:That's where they do all the big heart stuff.
Guest:Well, they did then, the inventor and all that, Oklahoma City.
Marc:Of this particular.
Guest:Of this thing.
Guest:And Oklahoma State University.
Guest:One of the Oklahoma universities.
Marc:Did you enjoy Oklahoma?
No.
Guest:oklahoma's fine i wish the thought oklahoma's okay yeah it's okay yeah you know um so i had it fixed and but what it does is at a young age you have a vulnerability that your peers don't have yeah like i thought i was gonna die a million times just because like your heart would
Guest:race out of nowhere race out of nowhere and then ultimately i didn't get it fixed until i was in my late 20s i was in second city and i had tachycardia on stage thought i was gonna die told them the cover for me went in the back stairwell i thought i was dead and then i went and uh had it fixed
Marc:It surprised me you didn't use it.
Marc:Use it up there.
Marc:Stay on stage.
Marc:Stay on stage.
Guest:By the way, I have stayed on stage with tachycardia.
Guest:I remember doing stand-up early on.
Guest:Originally, before they knew what it was, I had Inderol, which is like a slows your heart down.
Guest:You know, because of the anxiety of when I went on stage, I had great anxiety when I first started.
Guest:Now it's, you know.
Guest:Now it's the opposite, it seems.
Guest:It seems.
Guest:By the way, I would go on record as saying that I might be the most relaxed comedian on stage in the business.
Guest:To a fault, I might add.
Guest:To a fault.
Guest:I will not argue with you.
Guest:To a fault.
Guest:I could nap on stage if I had to.
Guest:I'm surprised you haven't tried that yet.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Because people who don't know me who are still listening, I improvise a lot on stage.
Guest:I sometimes have material, but I improvise a lot on stage, and it should make me a little more tense and excited before I go up.
Guest:Instead, it's very relaxing.
Guest:I imagine, and I'm just thinking this now, looking you right in the eye, that I would be maybe tense if I had a set set from point A to point E. Yeah.
Marc:You know, I think I've sort of gently nudged you towards perhaps writing a joke.
Marc:You have.
Guest:No, no.
Guest:In all sincerity, you've been supportive over, you know, maybe you want to try this.
Marc:Maybe you get off stage and I'm like, hey, maybe write something.
Guest:More than that.
Guest:But, you know, yes, you're right.
Marc:Yes, you have.
Marc:Okay, so you're jock, but you're a funny jock.
Marc:You're in high school.
Marc:You're a big guy.
Marc:I was friends with the nerds and the- Yeah, I did that.
Marc:You go both places because you're smart enough to do that.
Marc:You weren't a bully.
Marc:No, God, no.
Marc:You're a little loud, but not a bully.
Marc:A little loud, but not a bully.
Marc:There you go.
Guest:That can be misunderstood sometimes.
Guest:You know, I'm a big bowl of gregarious.
Marc:Yeah, that's right.
Marc:Just a charismatic, large machine of Jew.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:That's right.
Marc:That's right.
Marc:Big bowl of Jew loud.
Marc:Jew loud, yeah.
Marc:But what kind of... Do you have siblings?
Marc:I have a younger brother.
Marc:What's he up to?
Guest:Did he ever get to talk?
Guest:He has his share of resentment.
Guest:I'm not kidding.
Guest:Towards you.
Guest:Towards you.
Guest:Towards me, most definitely.
Guest:We love each other.
Guest:We're close.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:But he has his share of resentment of being in my shadow.
Guest:What does he do?
Guest:He is the director of a temple.
Guest:Really?
Guest:Yes.
Guest:Outside of Chicago in Northbrook, I believe it is.
Marc:My God.
Marc:So he has resentment and he's a spiritual man, I'm assuming.
Guest:He was trying to get me to go to Israel and all sorts of stuff like that.
Guest:That's not going to happen.
Marc:What's his resentment based in?
Guest:It's based in growing up in my shadow.
Guest:His name when he was little was Little Garland.
Guest:I mean, that alone can shove you down a path.
Marc:And you can't process that?
Marc:It's still there?
Guest:Well, no, there's other things, you know what I mean?
Guest:By the way, where he goes, people hear his voice and they go, you sound just like that guy.
Guest:People are familiar.
Guest:It's close enough.
Guest:And not only that, but running in the Jewish community.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:The Goldbergs and Curb Your Enthusiasm are two very big Jewish shows.
Marc:So now he's got to deal with that.
Marc:You're a bonafide Jew star.
Guest:Yeah, but the irony is I'm proud to be Jewish and all that, but I'm not very religious.
Guest:I don't like organized religion.
Marc:No, I understand.
Guest:And he works in organized religion.
Guest:Right, but it's Jews.
Guest:Yes, it's Jews, but to me, it's all organized religion.
Marc:Yeah, okay.
Marc:No, of course it is.
Marc:I understand that.
Guest:It is.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:Yeah, but like... And I do my transcendental meditation twice a day.
Guest:I'm a person who thinks that there is a God, probably.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:But I mean, to me... By the way, you don't believe in God, right?
Guest:Or you do?
Guest:I just stay out of it.
Guest:By the way, big bowl of agree with you.
Guest:Just stay out of it.
Guest:If there is a he or a she or whatever God being it is, hi, how are you?
Marc:I hope I'm doing the right thing.
Marc:You know what I mean?
Marc:I try to behave as best I can.
Marc:I don't need a God to judge me.
Marc:I'm on top of that.
Marc:I am so with you.
Marc:I got that covered.
Guest:We're almost two sides of the same coin.
Marc:Yeah, you would be the louder side.
Guest:All right, enough with the loud, okay?
Guest:Enough with the loud.
Guest:Your laugh is pretty, you know.
Guest:No, because I have my share of self-loathing.
Guest:You do?
Guest:Most definitely.
Guest:And codependency and all sorts of crap.
Guest:Really?
Guest:But the thing is, I don't take others down.
Marc:I've taken a few down.
Guest:Yes, you have.
Guest:What are you talking about like that?
Guest:Oh, shut up.
Guest:I will wrestle you.
Guest:Who do you got?
Guest:You have let it be known.
Guest:Here's the thing.
Marc:Okay.
Guest:If I'm insecure about a situation or I'm just not comfortable with something, if you don't know me intimately, I'm sorry, you won't know about it.
Marc:If you don't know me intimately, that's who will know about it.
Guest:That's who will know about it.
Guest:And also, when I'm on stage, I'm more than happy to be vulnerable and expose myself.
Guest:But when I'm off stage, you don't, you know, unless you're close to me, you don't have a chance in hell of knowing me.
Marc:Well, yeah, I could feel that.
Marc:Like, I don't feel like I know you completely well.
Guest:But you could.
Guest:Right.
Guest:You're in my, I mean, I don't want to make like I've got the circle, but you are in my circle of intimates and friends, and I'd feel very comfortable talking to you about anything.
Marc:Well, how do I get to know you?
Marc:I just call up and- Oh, stop it now.
Guest:Don't make me wrestle you.
Guest:What are you doing?
Guest:How do I get to know you?
Marc:No, no.
Marc:I'm serious.
Marc:Because I'm not clear.
Marc:I know a lot of people, but I don't have that many friends.
Marc:I don't hang out with many people.
Guest:Well, just call me and say, do you want to have coffee?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Why not?
Guest:Okay.
Guest:All right.
Guest:But here's the thing.
Guest:As much as you're saying, oh, yeah, okay.
Guest:Do you know how many times you've said that to me before?
Guest:No.
Guest:I'll go at least twice.
Guest:You've said to me on the flip side, hey, why don't we ever have coffee?
Guest:And you've said that to me too, and sometimes it just doesn't happen.
Guest:I mean, it's not personal.
Guest:No, no, hold on a second.
Guest:Yes, it's not personal.
Guest:But I'm saying I would have coffee with you anytime.
Guest:All right, okay.
Guest:Can we keep this tone when we're having it?
Guest:By the way, the odds are likely because we have sort of a realistic Jack Benny, Fred Allen type relationship.
Guest:You know what I mean?
Guest:And they were close friends, you know?
Guest:We want to do this.
Guest:on stage yeah but you know what we have done it on stage when you did my show yeah it was very apparent yeah here's the thing here's my tagline in our comedy team reel it in jeff reel it in but the fact is we do have a very honest relationship i think we do and i'm very comfortable with you at all times i don't want to say what it is unless you want it but recently i told you that something was beneath you that you shouldn't do that
Marc:yeah you know and so right right yeah yeah so I'm saying uh and I felt comfortable saying that to you and I wasn't I feel comfortable saying what it is that like I don't need to throw people under the bus out of my own petty resentment yes exactly publicly yes because it doesn't make me look good it does not like I should not say Jerry Seinfeld doesn't know who I am right and and be bitchy about it yes exactly you shouldn't it's way beneath you he doesn't I don't think he has any
Guest:All right, stop it.
Guest:I'm sure he does, but he's not actively thinking that Marc Maron... Not going to have to.
Guest:He's never... No, it's passive, if brought up.
Guest:No, but the thing is, you do bring it up.
Guest:Only a few people.
Guest:Yeah, a few people.
Guest:Was it Rolling Stone, The New Yorker?
Guest:Where did I read it?
Marc:Oh, right.
Marc:That's my point.
Guest:No, don't do that.
Guest:Don't do it.
Guest:It's beneath you.
Guest:Okay.
Guest:Because you're, to me, I was about to say a man of letters, but you're an acerbic, brilliant guy.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Why be petty?
Guest:Why be petty?
Guest:And also, I watch you.
Guest:I so enjoy your comedy.
Guest:Yeah, you do.
Guest:I enjoy that.
Guest:You make me laugh.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And laugh hard, really hard, you know?
Guest:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:So it's beneath you, man.
Guest:And by the way, would I want to do your podcast if it wasn't something that was excellent and a good... I don't like wasting my time.
Guest:And this is not a waste of my time.
Guest:I dig this.
Guest:This is awesome.
Marc:So your brother's the Jewish director of a temple.
Guest:Yes.
Marc:You guys hang out sometimes.
Guest:Yes, yes.
Guest:Your parents still alive?
Guest:My dad.
Guest:Remember, I said on your show, I improvised it, but it was true because he had just died.
Guest:We were talking about something with- Oh, yeah, that's right.
Guest:He's dead.
Guest:And I said, my dad's dead, which you used in the show.
Guest:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Guest:And he had just died.
Guest:And my mom is still alive, but has brain cancer.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:She's had it.
Guest:But by the way, she was only supposed to, generally a year for this type of brain cancer, this terminal thing.
Guest:She's been going three years.
Guest:She's still cooking.
Guest:She's still driving.
Guest:She's going.
Marc:And she's like all there?
Marc:All there.
Marc:That's amazing.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:So when you grew up, what was your father's task?
Marc:What was his work?
Guest:Oh, my dad, first he used to work in the plumbing supply business.
Guest:My family owned a plumbing supply business in Chicago.
Marc:Your grandfather?
Guest:My grandfather did.
Guest:Did you know him?
Guest:Yes.
Guest:I knew both my grandfathers, but it was my dad's father who had the plumbing supply, and I was very close with him.
Guest:He died at 99.
Marc:It's like a hardware store-ish.
Guest:No, no, no.
Guest:Plumbing supply is an actual, like, the parts.
Guest:It was like a factory.
Guest:They made them.
Guest:Oh, really?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Was your grandfather like a character?
Guest:Yeah, he was a character.
Guest:My grandfather was eternally positive.
Guest:Like, he ignored anything that was negative.
Marc:You're kind of like that.
Guest:No, I'm not.
Guest:You try to be.
Guest:By the way, externally, very positive, very supportive.
Guest:No, I would...
Guest:I'm weird as a comic because comics that I like, boy, I cheer on and I root for it.
Guest:No, he was just like, if it's negative, it's no good.
Guest:And to me, negative things can affect me and make me down and depress me, but I won't take others down with me.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:You won't take the lifeguard down with you.
Guest:No, I will not.
Guest:I'll go on my own and he'll swim back and go, I tried to get the fat fella.
Marc:I tried, but he seemed insistent.
Guest:He seemed insistent on drowning.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Yeah, so he and my grandmother, on the other hand, who I was also very close with, was eternally negative.
Guest:His wife.
Guest:Yeah, she hated everybody and everything.
Guest:And one of the only things in the world she loved was me.
Guest:And hopefully her husband.
It was true.
Guest:yeah she did yes she did but nonetheless she was i i can't tell you how negative yeah i mean unbelievable where'd it come like what like where'd it come from oh i don't know where it came from it just was it just i don't like her she'd be at functions with other relatives yeah standing in the corner talking about the relatives that were 10 feet away and they could all hear her and your mother's she was the least popular of everyone in the family i can't understand why yeah but i loved her she was great
Marc:You had personality, had a point of view.
Guest:And my mother's parents were very nice.
Guest:My grandfather was funny, and my grandmother was a very sweet, sweet lady.
Guest:You know, they were just- And you grew up in like- Suburban Chicago.
Guest:suburban chicago jews yeah suburban chicago jews so you had you know the food the cookies all the stuff and stuff the the familiar to me it's all it's all from yes it was it was unequivocally classic we'll go to south florida for vacation so this tv show the goldbergs is no stretch not by any stretch no there's no stretch there whatsoever
Guest:It's like, oh, I've lived here.
Guest:And by the way, on the show, I take off my pants.
Guest:They say, are you going to have a problem with that?
Guest:I go, that's what I do when I go home now.
Guest:My dad did it, too.
Guest:The difference is my dad wore tighty-whities.
Marc:I wear boxer briefs.
Marc:And now I hope on the show and tighty-whities under the boxer briefs.
Guest:No.
Guest:But by the way, they're really uncomfortable, the tighty-whities that I have to wear.
Guest:Because it's like two layers.
Guest:They can't see any movement on the show.
Marc:Right.
Marc:That's what I mean.
Marc:So you wear them under the boxers.
Guest:No, no, no.
Guest:I just wear the tighty-whities, but they're layered.
Marc:Oh.
Guest:But I don't wear them under the pants.
Guest:I only wear them in the scene.
Guest:I don't wear them every day when I come in.
Marc:No, when you're doing no-pants scenes.
Guest:When I do no-pants scenes, I wear these special things.
Guest:It's like a foam padding.
Guest:Sure.
Guest:It's like a whole rigmarole so I don't... Jiggle.
Guest:So I don't jiggle, so there's no wiener action for the young people.
Marc:Yeah, they don't see any movement.
Marc:None.
Marc:Whatever's in there is stationary.
Guest:Docile.
Guest:There's an older woman who comes in to check and she'll say sometimes, I see shadows.
Guest:Now, the only way you could see a shadow is if someone put a flashlight behind my balls and I was wearing something sheer.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:It's in her imagination.
Guest:She's seeing my shadows.
Marc:It's trauma-induced probably.
Guest:I don't know what her story is.
Marc:Ask her about her grandparents.
Marc:Ask her about where the shadows started.
Marc:Where the shadows started.
Marc:Where did it start?
Marc:Where were the shadows first seen?
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:All right, so what compels you towards comedy?
Marc:When did that happen?
Guest:Always the funniest.
Guest:From nursery school on, no exaggeration, I was the class clown.
Guest:Do you need a lot of attention?
Guest:You do, right?
Guest:did did um i feel so much more secure when i than when i did when i was younger when i younger how recent like in the last decade yeah very much so because because things start work out yeah we're just getting i i strive to be spiritual i strive to be uh calm but yeah but don't you tm has helped me with that but don't you think there's just finding a like real success like and all of a sudden you know having
Guest:No, no, no, no, no, because real success to me makes you, you can go one of two ways.
Guest:You can go down the path of finding some enlightenment and growing as a person, or you could become more of the bad side.
Guest:Ego can ruin and rule your work.
Marc:No, I get that, but what I'm saying is that, like, for years, look, I mean, we'll get back to the history in a minute.
Marc:For years, you were sort of pounding your head against the wall.
Marc:You weren't a straight stand-up in the way that you didn't want to do sets.
Guest:Right.
Marc:You sort of avoided something, whether it was by design or by insecurity, I don't know.
Marc:I don't know either.
Marc:So you saw a lot of us who are your contemporaries doing specials, doing this, doing that.
Guest:Right, yes.
Marc:And then your first real success comes from helping another comic create something.
Marc:And I'd seen some of the one person.
Marc:I saw the one one-person show, 93 or whatever, that I think became the first movie.
Guest:Right, I Want Someone to Eat Cheese With.
Marc:Right, which made no sense to me, the title.
Guest:It was based on Susanna Melvoin.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Anyhow, she and I were having lunch in New York and she said to me, we were talking about what we wanted in a relationship.
Guest:She said, I want someone to eat cheese with.
Guest:And I said, that's what I want.
Guest:That's so simple.
Guest:And so I just hung on to the title for a one man show.
Guest:Right.
Guest:And then when I did the movie.
Marc:Yeah, I don't like, I don't love cheese.
Guest:I don't either.
Guest:I don't even like, I talk in the movie about not liking, you'd think I'd be a guy who likes fudge because I ask the next question I ask, I don't like fudge either.
Marc:But fudge doesn't really happen in the real world.
Marc:It's something you go to a place, a tourist place.
Guest:Oh, there's fudge places all over the Midwest where I'm from.
Guest:Lots of fudge.
Marc:Yeah?
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:It was a thing?
Guest:People had fudge in the house?
Guest:Right down three, a few doors down from Zaney's, a half a block from Second City, the fudge popped.
Guest:But my point is, is that like- Where my picture hangs.
Guest:One of the few places on earth where my picture hangs.
Guest:It's me at like 26.
Marc:Signed to the fudge place.
Guest:Signed to the fudge pot.
Guest:Yeah, that's it.
Marc:But you don't love fudge.
Guest:I love the idea that the only... Actually, to be honest, the only place my picture hangs is the fudge pot.
Guest:Okay.
Guest:Since then, any dry cleaner or whatever that's asked me, no.
Guest:No, just the fudge pot.
Marc:One picture of the fudge pot.
Marc:Yep.
Marc:But I guess my point is that it seems to me that you may not have been sure how you were going to make your break.
Marc:Right.
Marc:But traditional stand-up was not really your bag.
Guest:Well, it was my bag and my passion.
Guest:I just wasn't a traditional stand-up.
Guest:Right.
Guest:That's a better way to say it because I never stopped working, never stopped doing sets, but they were sets by my definition.
Marc:But when you were offered an opportunity to do a structured set, did you say, no, I can't.
Guest:No, I did Letterman.
Guest:I did an HBO half hour.
Guest:Right.
Guest:So I did.
Guest:Right.
Guest:But you didn't feel that it really showcased you?
Guest:No, it did.
Guest:And the Letterman thing, I could not have had a better set on Letterman.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I really destroyed.
Guest:My half hour, pretty good.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:But the point being is I was much better, as a guy who improvised, really focusing on six minutes.
Right.
Guest:than I was in a half hour longer.
Marc:It also turns out you're better at being in the present with somebody else.
Marc:Always.
Marc:Yeah, and that really became what catapulted you.
Marc:Right.
Marc:Both as a person who works behind the scenes and as a person on camera.
Marc:Right, yes.
Marc:So I guess my point is that I have to imagine that once you found your groove as a performer and found some place to really have fun and work and do what you're great at, you must have felt better about yourself.
Marc:One had nothing to do with the other.
Marc:Come on.
Guest:No, one had nothing to do with the other.
Guest:I felt that to me... None of your self-esteem hinged on... None.
Guest:I mean, actually... So what the fuck... Yeah, hold on, hold on, hold on.
Guest:Yes.
Guest:When I was younger, what propelled me into stand-up was being liked and meeting girls.
Guest:The fact that my tool was being funny, that's what I was really great at.
Guest:That's what I used to meet girls and to be accepted.
Guest:But at a certain point, what is that?
Guest:I can't be defined by... So the point is, that's how I became so fearless.
Guest:I go on stage, doesn't matter what happens, my personal self-worth in no way hinges on...
Guest:I mean, I could do Letterman tonight.
Guest:I'd feel bad if I did Letterman and ate it.
Guest:But the point being is, I really, they're two separate things.
Marc:Well, that's interesting because I find that's what's baffling is sometimes, and this is not a dig, but sometimes when you get off stage, and I know when you do well and I know when you don't do well.
Guest:Right, right, right.
Marc:But you don't act differently either way.
Guest:I don't.
Marc:I don't at all.
Marc:And I'll come up to you and I'll start poking around like, what's going on?
Marc:And you don't register any feeling of like, oh, God, that was fucking terrible.
Marc:It's like it didn't even happen.
Marc:And then I'm like, there's something wrong with that guy.
Marc:Maybe.
Guest:But I drive home.
Guest:You drive home and cry?
Guest:No.
Guest:But I would drive home and think about maybe my conversation.
Guest:Here's the odds.
Guest:The odds are I'm going to drive home and think about what we talked about and have already forgotten my set.
Marc:I've gotten better at that.
Marc:But sometimes, though, when I can't get over on them or when there's some sort of fundamental resistance, and I know some of it has to do with me.
Marc:Oh, that's something.
Marc:I mean, you've seen me do that.
Marc:Yes, I have.
Marc:You brought it to my attention.
Marc:I think you were a little overly angry at that situation.
Marc:But then I feel bad.
Guest:Well, I but I'm saying that's that's what I'm saying.
Guest:We're two sides of a very of a similar coin.
Guest:Well, then if this is the case, my side of the coin, it's all personal stuff.
Guest:And your side of the coin is it.
Marc:Well, it's all personal, but I take it out.
Guest:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Marc:Because I make my personal public.
Marc:There's no boundaries there.
Marc:But then then what was the fundamental issue you were having?
Marc:That, you know, that all of a sudden you feel better because you're meditating and everything else.
Marc:What was brewing inside of you?
Marc:What was, why were you, what, what was it that was happening that made you go like, I got to fix this?
Guest:Well, I got to tell you, it didn't really get fixed.
Guest:Really, really get fixed until a year ago.
Guest:Well, what is it?
Guest:I got arrested.
Guest:Was that the road rage thing?
Yeah.
Guest:Yes, that was the, quote, road rage thing.
Guest:It wasn't really road rage.
Guest:I don't know what it was.
Guest:Well, what it was was, without going into immense detail.
Guest:Why not?
Guest:Well, because- Legal reasons?
Guest:No, I don't want to bore people.
Guest:You're not going to bore people.
Guest:You got arrested.
Guest:I've done it in my stand-up since then.
Guest:No, here's the thing.
Guest:I was on this path, this path of striving for enlightenment, striving to be the best person.
Marc:When did that start, though?
Hmm.
Guest:Maybe sometime in my early 40s.
Marc:By the way, it's still happening.
Marc:I know, but what I'm saying is you did the movie in your early 40s, so you're already working.
Marc:And I had a stroke at that point.
Guest:What?
Guest:I had a stroke at 37.
Guest:Really?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Yeah, I had a stroke of 37.
Guest:What happened?
Guest:I woke up one morning.
Guest:The room was spinning.
Guest:And I had had back surgery the month before.
Guest:I was on a cocktail of a bunch of drugs.
Guest:Where were you living?
Guest:Here in West Hollywood on Sweetser.
Guest:Married and everything?
Guest:Married and everything.
Guest:Married, pregnant.
Guest:My wife was pregnant with our second child.
Guest:Are you working?
Guest:I'm working.
Guest:As a matter of fact, I'd already shot the hour Larry David special.
Marc:OK.
Guest:If anyone wants to go back and watch the first season of Curb Your Enthusiasm, especially the very first episode, you will notice that I'm strokey on strokey.
Guest:I can barely talk.
Guest:I got better because I had to perform the first season.
Marc:Was this before or after you?
Marc:Oh, this is before.
Marc:You and I pitched that ridiculous show to NBC before you started Curb.
Guest:Yeah, but that was before I had a stroke and everything.
Guest:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Marc:We should talk about that later.
Marc:So you wake up, the room's spinning.
Guest:The room is the room spinning.
Guest:My wife had told me that after the surgery, my eye was kind of droopy.
Guest:I'm on all sorts of meds.
Guest:I didn't know it, but I had developed type 2 diabetes.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:So you have that.
Guest:I do have that, yeah, but I try controlling it with diet and exercise, which I've been pretty good.
Guest:I've kept the weight off.
Marc:Is that genetic?
Marc:Type 2?
Marc:Yeah, I don't know.
Guest:I guess it's genetic if you're – I mean, I have diabetes in my family.
Guest:How do you get diabetes?
Guest:Type 1 is the other people.
Guest:Well, I don't know how you get type 1.
Guest:Type 2 comes when you have metabolic syndrome, when you have a lot of weight, you have a high cholesterol.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:How's your cholesterol now?
Guest:Good.
Guest:It's been great.
Guest:Are you on the... I'm not on anything.
Marc:So you have the stroke.
Marc:Room spinning.
Guest:Room spinning.
Guest:I go to the hospital to tell me I have a stroke.
Guest:I'm slurring my words.
Guest:I'm thinking I'm never going to be a comedian again.
Marc:Can you remember shit or what?
Marc:I remember everything 100%.
Marc:So you're just slowing your words.
Guest:I'm having trouble walking.
Guest:Really?
Guest:I have to have help walking.
Guest:And during the course of... I never thought I'd work again.
Marc:But no, but what'd you do?
Marc:You went to the hospital?
Guest:Yeah, I went to the emergency room and they said you had a stroke and they put me on blood thinners, Coumadin.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And I was in the hospital for a couple weeks, I believe.
Guest:Really?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And I really was sitting in the hospital going...
Guest:What do I do now?
Guest:What do I do now?
Guest:And I'm about to have another kid.
Guest:Oh, my God.
Guest:No, it was.
Guest:But the thing is, through my life, I had the hard problem.
Guest:I've had these vulnerable things.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:So that's why I look at life maybe a little bit different and a little more positive, you know.
Marc:Yeah, but also it's interesting because you are such a sort of bombastic sort of momentum guy.
Marc:Right.
Marc:That sort of like everything's happening and boom, out of nowhere, this thing they have no control over.
Guest:But that's what I got from my mom.
Guest:My mom has always been a...
Guest:When I was a kid, she would say to me, she'd go return something.
Guest:It was always so embarrassing.
Guest:She'd say, a clerk is a jerk.
Guest:And I never understood.
Guest:It's like, why is that person a jerk?
Guest:They're helping you.
Guest:But the point she was making is get the manager, get what you need done.
Guest:Very much like the woman who plays my wife on the Goldbergs.
Marc:Who plays your wife on the Goldbergs?
Guest:Wendy McClendon Covey.
Guest:I call her Wendy McClendon Willie McCovey.
Marc:So you have this thing and you go to the emergency room.
Marc:You had a stroke and you're in the hospital for two weeks.
Marc:You're fearing for the future of your life and career.
Guest:But just like I didn't let anything stop me.
Guest:I wouldn't walk with a cane.
Guest:I walk with a golf club.
Guest:How long did it take?
Guest:It took about six months to fully rehab.
Guest:to fully rehab i went through regular rehab i went through with my you know talking rehab i had to start filming curb your enthusiasm a month later i you know i got to give credit or credit to jamie masada man that guy gave me tons of spots and i had trouble because i had had a stroke but it just kept on giving me the spots did that make you feel weird when he got off stage
Guest:Were you feeling like... Well, no, it was frustrating because when you can't... All right.
Guest:There's no... I think there's no worse feeling when an audience is primed to see you and happy to see you and you suck.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Now, I can deal with I'm on fire, I'm feeling good, and they're not grooving to it.
Guest:That's fine.
Guest:That's their problem.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Okay?
Guest:But if I know they're great and they're ready and I blow.
Guest:So it was night after night of this is a good crowd and I can't.
Guest:But I'm trying.
Guest:I'm doing the best I can.
Guest:I'm doing the best I can.
Guest:And I didn't get too down on myself, but it was depressing.
Guest:But I kept on fighting and fighting and fighting.
Guest:So when you have that attitude, what can stop me?
Marc:Right.
Marc:But you say that was the beginning of a more spiritual search.
Guest:Yes, it is.
Marc:And you're talking about just will and sort of an attitude.
Guest:Spiritual search, but jumping now to the... So I thought that I was on that path until I got arrested.
Guest:That's when being arrested was... At 40.
Guest:At 50.
Guest:Just turned 52.
Guest:It was like a week after my 52nd birthday.
Marc:This was less than a year ago.
Marc:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:So after the stroke, you rebuilt... Was it last summer or was it my 51st birthday?
Guest:No, it was my 51st birthday.
Marc:All right, so you rebuilt and you realized that you're fragile and that you're pushing through.
Marc:But that's not necessarily spiritual, just saying, like, I'm going to get... It helps.
Guest:But I'm saying it helps and you think differently.
Guest:And also, I'm a father.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:You know, there's there's you think outside of yourself.
Guest:Right.
Marc:OK, so you're saying that, like, you know, I had this like I had this scare.
Marc:I fought through it.
Marc:I recovered.
Marc:I'm grateful.
Marc:I have my family.
Guest:Exactly.
Marc:My wife, you know, like I should be grateful every day.
Guest:Right.
Guest:And would you not spending time with me and see me think that I'm a grateful guy?
Guest:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:You wouldn't think I'm an arrogant like jerk, like self-involved jerk.
Guest:No.
Guest:That's my point.
Guest:No.
Guest:That's my point.
Guest:And for comics, that's a different way of going.
Marc:Well, I think that like I always found you to be a confident guy.
Marc:Very confident.
Marc:I don't know if I necessarily... There's no reason you shouldn't be grateful.
Marc:I mean, people look at your career.
Marc:Right, right, right.
Marc:If anything, a bitter comic's going to go like, that lucky son of a bitch.
Guest:Yeah, that's possible.
Guest:I'm sure it's likely.
Guest:It's possible.
Guest:But I don't think that way.
Guest:Of course not.
Guest:There's comics, even now, that I don't particularly get.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:But I'm happy for them, and I understand that...
Guest:It's rare that a comic comes along and it becomes successful where I'm thoroughly confused.
Marc:But not confused, but I know also you have a respect for dues paid and things that are earned versus things.
Guest:But I don't hold that against the ones that don't pay their dues, whatever.
Guest:It's only going to hurt them because they won't have the...
Guest:They won't have anything to fall back on.
Marc:But you know, I know for a fact, and I know for myself, that if you grow up a unique type of comic, then you're always up against the comics that have success because they're not unique necessarily.
Marc:And you've got to live with that.
Guest:Well, I'm a guy who loves Charlie Parker and John Coltrane and all that sort of stuff.
Guest:So that's what they went through.
Guest:Right.
Guest:You know, lots of artists go through that, you know.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And I always jumped on the jazz thing because it was easy to grab hold, you know.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Yeah, so... So you get arrested.
Guest:Oh, get arrested.
Guest:So here's in a nutshell what happened.
Guest:Crowded parking lot Saturday afternoon.
Guest:Where?
Guest:A corner of the CVS parking lot, the corner of Ventura and Laurel Canyon.
Guest:And it's very narrow, and it's one way, like each lane.
Guest:And suddenly, a big Mercedes S500 starts going the wrong way.
Guest:Right in front of me.
Guest:And I'm like, what?
Guest:I say out loud, what are you doing?
Guest:My windows are closed.
Guest:She can't hear.
Guest:It's a hot day.
Guest:The air conditioning going, you know, and there's lines of people behind me.
Guest:She points.
Guest:She wants the space that I'm waiting for.
Guest:Now, I have a natural and the spaces are on an angle.
Guest:So the only way that she could get in the space would be Rebecca, not me.
Guest:20 of us to back up, and it would take her, without exaggeration, about five minutes to do the three-point turn.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Okay?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And I like to joke and say a half hour, but really five minutes, which is a long time.
Guest:In parking time.
Guest:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:So when I said, it's not going to work, you know, I'm mouthing this to her.
Guest:So when the space opens up, the person cannot back out and go because of her.
Guest:So it pulls forward.
Guest:There's, you know, it can pull forward.
Guest:So I pull in right before I pull in, she starts blowing up her cheeks with her hands around like, like, like in other words, making fun of me for being fat, go park fatty.
Guest:Really?
Guest:Oh, most definitely.
Guest:It was completely clear.
Guest:Now,
Guest:Obviously, that triggered something deep inside of me, you know, being made fun of for being fat.
Guest:I mean, I'm like, who are you?
Guest:We're adults.
Guest:Why would you do that, you know?
Guest:And I kept on thinking, why would you do that?
Guest:That's crazy.
Guest:I mean, over and over.
Guest:Total righteous indignation, okay?
Marc:Like, not only was she in the wrong way, but now she was making fun of you in a personal way.
Guest:Yes.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:So when I got out of my car, she's still there.
Guest:All the cars are parking at her.
Guest:I go up to her window and punch with the side of my arm.
Guest:And I'm glad I told the stroke thing ahead of time.
Guest:I lost a lot of strength in my right arm.
Guest:I still lift weights and stuff.
Guest:But when I had my stroke, my right arm is what suffered.
Guest:So I hit her window to say, at the same time, going, why would...
Guest:What's wrong with you?
Guest:Her window cracked.
Guest:Okay.
Guest:Well, I stepped back because I couldn't.
Guest:It was a slow crack, too.
Guest:And I stepped back, and she gets out of the car, and I say, I'm so sorry.
Guest:I did not intend for that to happen.
Marc:You must have hit it pretty hard.
Guest:Oh, I'm sure I did.
Guest:Harder than I thought.
Guest:Righteous indignation.
Guest:Harder than I even knew.
Marc:Rage.
Guest:Yes, I would say rage, but not because I wanted to do that.
Marc:Break her window right.
Guest:I wanted to use to an implement yeah or something, you know I never would want to do that I could by I didn't know I had the strength to do that now, you know now I guess I do and So she got out and I said I'm so sorry, but I did like a Larry David thing I said to her but why would you make fun of me for being fat yeah, and she says because you are fat and you have a small penis and she begins to do a dance puffing up her cheeks and
Guest:Did she do a small dick dance, too?
Guest:She did a small dick dance, too.
Guest:Now, I backed up even more.
Guest:I was freaked out.
Guest:To control yourself.
Guest:No.
Guest:I was completely calm.
Guest:I was scared.
Guest:Because she was acting nutty.
Guest:She was acting nutty.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And there's a lot of pieces to this and whatever.
Guest:Nothing more of what I did.
Guest:Because at this point, I'm done doing what I've done.
Marc:Got a broken window.
Marc:Did it shatter?
Guest:It just cracked right down the middle.
Guest:So I'm staying away from her.
Guest:I am being calm.
Guest:I'm giving my information to her friend, saying I'll pay for it.
Guest:All she's doing is call the police.
Guest:And I say to her calmly, I am not coming after you.
Guest:I've given my driver's license.
Guest:Her friend took a picture of my driver's license with her phone.
Guest:You know, we're at that stage.
Yeah.
Guest:Well, the cops come and I'm very calm.
Guest:I tell them what happened.
Guest:They tell me they have to arrest me because it's a Mercedes S 500 and it's felony vandalism.
Guest:If it was a Toyota Corolla, they wouldn't have to arrest me because they have to arrest me because of the value, not because of the action.
Guest:Not because of the action.
Guest:It's felony vandalism.
Guest:Vandalism, you don't have to do anything violent to vandalize something.
Guest:There was nothing like attempted anything.
Guest:Vandalism.
Guest:I go to jail.
Guest:In jail, none of the cops know who I am.
Guest:Every prisoner does.
Guest:And they're all excited and freaked out that I'm...
Guest:What are you doing here, man?
Guest:And they're in there for some serious shit.
Marc:This is just the L.A.
Marc:County, right?
Guest:This is the one in Van Nuys.
Guest:Oh, all right.
Guest:Okay.
Guest:So I get out.
Guest:I was in there for like 12 hours.
Guest:And I get out.
Guest:Did you have sex with anybody inside?
Guest:Two or three young people.
Guest:Okay.
Guest:Not too young, of age.
Guest:Right.
Guest:I checked.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:Okay.
Marc:Because I know you kind of have to do that.
Guest:Why did I say that flippant?
Guest:It wasn't even funny.
Guest:It's all right.
Guest:It wasn't.
Guest:Okay.
Guest:I didn't have sex with anybody.
Guest:You're improvising.
Guest:Yeah, but that was just.
Guest:It happens.
Guest:I'm going to blame the premise.
Guest:I'm going to blame the premise.
Guest:It was a bad premise.
Guest:Hacky.
Guest:Hacky.
Guest:It was prison sex.
Guest:All right.
Guest:So they sneak me out the back when I leave because TMZ is there.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I go home.
Guest:They drop the charges, all that sort of stuff.
Guest:But the city wants to meet with me to make sure.
Guest:This is the key part.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:The city wants to meet with me to make sure that I'm not like some crazed knucklehead.
Guest:Right.
Guest:That this is going to be a repeated thing.
Guest:Right.
Guest:But the charges have been dropped.
Guest:My lawyer says, you need to go to anger management.
Guest:I'm like, why?
Guest:He goes, because if we say you've gone five times to anger management to the city, that'll really show that.
Guest:So I went to anger management and I learned at anger management, I don't have an anger problem.
Guest:I have an ego problem.
Guest:Huh?
Guest:And then all I did what wanted to do was stop my ego.
Guest:And that's all I focused on for like, how'd you learn that?
Guest:What do you mean?
Guest:Well, that was a fallacy too, because there is no stopping.
Guest:I learned you can't stop you.
Marc:No, but I mean, but like, had you had anger issues before?
Guest:No.
Guest:No, I'm not real.
Guest:I mean, like, I've gotten angry as people get angry, but I never had an anger problem.
Marc:But so how do you differentiate?
Marc:You're sitting there in anger management and you realize this thing.
Marc:How'd you realize that?
Guest:Because if you have an anger problem, your impulse in any situation is to go to anger.
Guest:Mm-hmm.
Guest:Me...
Guest:I'll feel a feeling or eat a sandwich instead of feeling a feeling.
Guest:No, for me, it was about my ego, my ego of being called fat.
Guest:That's what it affected.
Guest:My righteous indignation was all about, why would she call me fat?
Guest:She doesn't know that I've worked so hard not to be that fat and all that, but it was ego.
Guest:And then I thought, as I studied this, I thought nothing good comes... Confidence, supremely good things happen.
Guest:Being kind and humble, even though you're confident, is fantastic.
Guest:But ego screws up everything.
Guest:Orders of shows.
Guest:There's nothing good that comes from ego.
Guest:So I set about...
Guest:Eliminating ego.
Guest:And this happened to me at 51, not 52, so it was a year and a half ago.
Guest:So I said about eliminating ego, but then I learned, because you examined everything, there is no eliminating ego.
Guest:What you have to do is recognize it and say, enough with that.
Guest:That's not going to do anybody any good.
Marc:Well, the spiritual path is to get egoless to some degree.
Guest:Well, yes, but I've learned so far in my journey that you can't eliminate the ego.
Guest:You can only recognize it and see it for the bullshit that it is, and then it goes away.
Guest:Try to act differently.
Guest:Try to be real.
Guest:It's not trying to be differently.
Guest:You accept it, you see it, and then you make the choices that you make.
Marc:Right, but sometimes you're too late, and you have to say, like, oh, that was a bad choice.
Right.
Guest:Yes, you have to be forgiving of yourself, but it's almost like when people say, how do you go up on stage?
Guest:Aren't you scared?
Guest:Well, I went through, when I got sick with my heart, I went through a period of stage fright, which I also worked through.
Guest:That's the only way you can do it, is work through it.
Guest:But I also learned about that is, if you've got stage fright or anxiety, you have to go,
Guest:Hi, stage fright.
Guest:Hi, anxiety.
Guest:I see you're here.
Guest:And you can't say, don't feel this way.
Guest:Don't feel this way.
Guest:You have to see them, accept it, and make your choices.
Guest:And it works for me.
Marc:So in Chicago, before you started doing stand-up, you did Second City?
Marc:No, I was doing Second City at stand-up at the same time.
Guest:You started both at the same time?
Guest:No, I'd been doing stand-up before I started Second City.
Guest:Now, how long were you at Second City?
Hmm.
Guest:Over the late 80s.
Guest:But you were in the troupe?
Guest:I was in every troupe.
Guest:And I was fired from every troupe.
Guest:And I quit every troupe.
Guest:Why?
Guest:Why did you get fired?
Guest:For the same reason that you and I would have trouble getting a spot at the Comedy Cellar.
Guest:When you're... You know what it was?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Audiences love me in improv, but my peers didn't respect me.
Guest:And then in stand-up, my peers respected me, but audiences were confused by me.
Guest:Why didn't your peers respect you in improv?
Guest:Now I look back and I think a lot of it had to do with jealousy.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Because I've seen it with other people.
Guest:Yes.
Guest:I would say that one was more jealousy.
Guest:And I wouldn't say the audiences in stand-up who didn't like me were jealous.
Guest:I just didn't figure it out.
Guest:I hadn't figured it out.
Guest:But I knew from my time at Second City when I went out that I had an inherent likability in the group setting that you could point to me and go, there's the funny one.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:You know, the other six people on stage with me or five people, maybe one other might be funny and one might be pretty funny.
Guest:And then the other one's three or four, not funny at all.
Guest:Right.
Guest:That's normal.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Okay.
Guest:And so I would walk out in that situation and the audience immediately would go, we like him.
Guest:He's funny.
Guest:No matter what my skill was.
Guest:It's almost like in standup, a hack who's really comfortable and a funny person.
Guest:And big guys too.
Guest:What's that?
Guest:Big guys.
Guest:The audiences tend to like big guys.
Guest:Yeah.
Yeah.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:So when you were in Chicago, when did you live with Conan?
Guest:I lived with Conan sometime in the late 80s.
Guest:Bob Odenkirk said to me, you know, there's a writer's strike and a friend of mine's moving here to Chicago from L.A.
Guest:or something.
Guest:But anyhow, he goes, his name's Conan, which I laughed at.
Guest:And then he moved in and we...
Guest:He was one of the two or three funniest people I'd ever spent time around.
Guest:I would wake him up at four in the morning to have him do funny things.
Guest:When he'd come home?
Guest:Like I'd come home and he'd be sleeping and I'd go, do that George Takei in this scenario thing.
Guest:And then we did a fake talk show in the living room where he was actually the host, and I was his guest.
Guest:I either played Adam West or myself, and he was generally George Takei.
Guest:It was during that period where Fox was looking, before Arsenio, after Joan Rivers, and they were looking for someone.
Guest:So we did our fake one in the living room where I was always the guest.
Guest:He was always the host.
Guest:He was frustrated by me as the guest.
Guest:Little did we know, little did we know that he would go on to be a talk show host.
Guest:right and how how long did you live with him we lived together less than a year yeah yeah he was over there was he only in chicago for that amount of time yeah yeah when he left it wasn't like i have to get out of here and then how'd you get to florida well i was my family moved to florida south florida when i was in chicago when i was a kid i was 12 and then i started comedy in south florida at 20 moved back to chicago at 22 to do second where'd you start in south florida
Guest:The comic strip.
Guest:The same one from New York.
Guest:Yeah, I remember.
Guest:And I started there with Brian Regan.
Guest:That was my other contemporary I started with.
Guest:And Dennis?
Guest:Dennis didn't start down there.
Guest:Oh.
Guest:No, he started in New York after that.
Guest:So you were seeing all the New York guys coming through there?
Guest:Meeting all of them.
Guest:Seinfeld.
Guest:I mean, everybody.
Guest:Dom Herrera was one of the headliners.
Guest:They had three headliners getting $600 a piece, each doing 40 minutes.
Guest:He was one of the headliners my very first night going on stage, which was June 12, 1982, or June 14, 1982, I believe.
Marc:Really?
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Wow.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:So now let's talk about our pitch.
Marc:You want to go pitch?
Ha ha ha!
Guest:I'm sorry.
Marc:By the way, I look on that fondly.
Marc:No, I do too.
Marc:I'm trying to remember exactly how we came together.
Marc:Because I know I was not in a good place and I was needed to pitch something.
Guest:Was it an outside person who asked us?
Guest:Did you approach me?
Guest:I don't remember.
Guest:I don't remember what it was.
Guest:I think I might have thought of you, but you had that office and that...
Guest:in the asahi bureau building which is now the samsung building i'm no longer there but i i had my office there through a lot of really i must have been looking to pair up with a writer yeah i don't think i mean i remember that was also the time where like larry and jerry had done it you know there was like a history of that that i don't think i had a deal
Guest:no you didn't have a deal yeah i didn't have a deal either um and then we got together we come up with this uh what was it a cop show it was everything i ever think of is generally except for curb is pretty much a cop show in some way you were actually i was a cop you were an investigative journalist right and it was you and i figuring out crimes right i mean that's really what it was and then the
Guest:I know what you're going to bring up.
Guest:We always bring it up.
Guest:We had a, yes, we do.
Guest:And it's a word I still use.
Guest:I say it all the time.
Guest:I think it's a funny word.
Guest:And that was grandma was our safe.
Guest:Our deep throat guy.
Guest:No, no.
Guest:It was our safety word.
Guest:And then when we were writing, I said, why not make your actual grandma our informant?
Marc:Right.
Marc:That's how it started.
Marc:For the informant.
Marc:And you're like, why not have it be your actual grandma?
Marc:Why not be your actual grandma?
Guest:Because I'm like, it makes no sense.
Guest:And you're like, no, it's great.
Guest:It's great.
Guest:I still, by the way, I stand behind it.
Guest:And by the way, I stand behind that show.
Guest:We pitched it.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:To deaf ears.
Guest:Yes, we pitched it a couple times, if I'm not mistaken.
Guest:Yes, nobody was interested.
Guest:I'm not kidding you.
Guest:i thought it was a great show when it was over i wasn't like oh that's i thought that would have been a funny show yeah it would have been a funny show yeah i'm sure i mean yeah no very much so and it was before pre-curb yeah for sure so now what what's the big plan you made another movie you made uh someone you cheesed with then you made another movie yeah dealing with idiots that didn't do as well it was an improvised movie i shot it in 12 days yeah who was in that
Guest:Nia Vardalos, Jamie Gertz, Richard Kine, Fred Willard.
Guest:People can see that?
Guest:Yeah, it's on Netflix and iTunes and all that.
Guest:Who else?
Guest:What's his name?
Guest:He stars in Justified.
Guest:Timothy Olyphant is in it.
Guest:He plays my father.
Guest:I know that sounds weird, but they're flashbacks.
Guest:Not flashbacks.
Guest:They're dreams I have.
Guest:Are you working on another movie?
Guest:I'm doing two things right now.
Guest:Next summer...
Guest:I'll either be doing... I don't want to talk about it, but I'll be doing a stand-up special.
Guest:Do you need help with that?
Guest:Because I can... Well, maybe my sets, but I'm doing something...
Guest:That's never been done before.
Guest:And when I say that, it's not even close to anything that's ever been done before.
Guest:Because specials have become anything but.
Marc:So you're going to do your special on a plane or something?
Guest:Nope.
Guest:It's not where I'm doing it, and it's not how I'm doing the stand-up.
Guest:I'm not reinventing that.
Guest:I'm reinventing the presentation.
Guest:And it'll be done in a way that's never been done.
Guest:Are you going to do it live, like door to door?
Guest:No.
Guest:By the way, what if I told you?
Guest:There's even nothing clever about it.
Guest:Cleverness you're done with in two minutes.
Guest:Oh, that's clever.
Guest:Done.
Guest:This is going to stick.
Guest:Yes.
Guest:It's going to be something that people are going to say, why didn't I think of that?
Guest:And I hope it works.
Guest:I hope you don't wait too long.
Guest:well no it doesn't it's not by the way it's truly no one's it's not simple it's right under our noses it is but it uses my particular talents and all right so that's happening that and then a movie i'm making a movie and another improvised movie yeah and one of them will be this summer because i'm after this month i'm stopping stand-up until i'm done with the goldbergs i can't do both i don't like being mediocre are you going there are you going to stand up tonight
Guest:Tonight I have my book club at BookSoup.
Guest:We've read Lolita.
Marc:Oh yeah, you finished it.
Guest:By Nabokov.
Marc:And you just do a book club for fun?
Guest:Actually, to be honest with you, I've been doing it to help BookSoup from the standpoint of I don't care if no one shows up for my book club, like the actual book club, as long as they sell like 50 books, which they seem to do.
Marc:Got to support the independent book club.
Guest:So I'm supporting BookSoup by doing this.
Guest:you know like 15 people show up and we discuss the book there's probably two or three that are there to ask me questions about curb your enthusiasm how did your book do my book book yeah what was it called again uh my footprint and then uh uh curbing it it's the paperbacks they they insisted when they put out the paperback that they want to curb in the title so i thought of the least offensive which was curbing it
Guest:And it was about your weight?
Guest:It was two things.
Guest:Part of it is really good and part of it is boring.
Guest:It's about me trying to lose weight and go green while I made the Seinfeld season of Curb Your Enthusiasm.
Guest:And the stuff about Curb Your Enthusiasm and me trying to lose weight is really good.
Guest:The stuff going green, which is a smaller part of the book,
Guest:At least for me personally, I regret it.
Guest:Some of it's good, but I just regret it.
Guest:Do you struggle with the food thing every day?
Guest:Every day.
Guest:I'm an addict, man.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:That's how I approach it.
Guest:I'm an addict.
Guest:And I even go to AA meetings sometimes.
Guest:Not OA.
Guest:See, here's the problem with OA.
Guest:OA is, a lot of people at OA are very casual.
Guest:They haven't hit bottom, man.
Guest:Whereas you go to an AA meeting, these are ones that I know people in them will go to them.
Guest:Nobody there is not taking it seriously.
Guest:So what was your worst night eating?
Guest:Oh, eating until I couldn't stop throwing up.
Guest:Really?
Guest:Yeah, not making myself throw up.
Marc:No, because literally you can't.
Guest:You know, eating, I mean, eating a box of Little Debbie cakes and the same night having a half gallon of ice cream and maybe a bowl of Captain Crunch and three or four Pop-Tarts.
Guest:Just at home.
Guest:At home, I used to always, I put this in I Want Someone to Eat Cheese With, I used to go to the 7-Eleven by Wrigley Field, buy a bunch of crap and sit on the hood of my car by the left field wall and just down it.
Guest:And then I go off to- No joy.
Guest:No joy.
Guest:And the feelings they were stuffing down, they were stuffed down temporarily.
Guest:And then, of course, you feel worse.
Guest:What was most of the feelings?
Guest:but see this is the thing okay so i made this movie i want someone to eat cheese with and people who saw it early on when it was still rough cut i would show good things happening to me and then eating and they couldn't associate with that i wish i kept it in because it's any feeling man it's not it's not bad to keep it going or make it go away it's just it's just it's any feeling right
Guest:anything you feel you want to shove down and then discovering later on codependency and all that stuff man i'm an addict and you don't come from addicts not not to my knowledge so the codependency thing how does that reveal itself it's sort of weird because that's what you do professionally i know it is i know but but you know you're an enabler i help i look to help people
Guest:I'm always wanting to help you.
Guest:You help me all the time.
Guest:I know.
Guest:As a friend and stuff, but I think that also that's part of my codependency.
Guest:It makes me feel better.
Guest:Not that when you help other people you shouldn't feel better, but... But to do it for that reason as opposed to do it for real, genuine... Well, it's like when you wait to be defined by what somebody texts you back.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:I've always said I'm too sensitive to text.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I'm getting better at it now because I'm learning through my codependency.
Marc:It's hard because it can be kind of ambiguous.
Guest:that's true too right what does that mean what does that mean of course yeah or silence when i texted fuck you it meant i was being nice if you text me fuck you i would laugh even if it came out of nowhere i would just laugh well i i love you buddy i know you do and i love you too i love you i love you you're the greatest so we're um we're good oh we're great this was but see i had a ball doing this yeah this is by the way this was everything i dreamed it would be
Guest:It is.
Guest:It was.
Guest:We did all right.
Guest:We did great.
Guest:This was fantastic.
Guest:And this is what, by the way, which is the name of my show, the reason people love this show, outside of you, outside of the thing,
Guest:As human beings in this world that we live in now, we get so little in the world of entertainment, in the world of things that are electronically and digitally brought to you that are really human and to the point and real.
Guest:And this show is completely grounded and real and human.
Guest:It's people being human beings.
Guest:And what's more joyful than that?
Guest:No matter how dark you get, it is completely and utterly joyful.
Guest:And I'm going to tell you this, too.
Guest:The number of people who tell me that they love your show.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:My gosh.
Guest:Good.
Guest:So many.
Guest:People love your show.
Guest:Nobody has ever said, that show is okay.
Guest:Right.
Guest:To a man, to a woman, everyone that talks about it loves it.
Guest:So there you go.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Thank you.
Guest:Sure.
Guest:And look at you saying thank you.
Guest:I love that.
Guest:That is great.
Guest:Just saying thank you, not throwing some other bullshit in.
Marc:I'm not going to throw any bullshit in.
Guest:I love that.
Marc:I'm not going to throw any other bullshit in.
Guest:I appreciate that, man.
Guest:I love that.
Guest:Thanks, buddy.
Guest:Sure.
Guest:Thank you.
Guest:Bye.
Marc:All right, that was a nice conversation with Jeff.
Marc:I enjoyed his company.
Marc:Go to WTFPod.com for all your WTFPod needs.
Marc:Get some JustCoffee.coop over there.
Marc:They're still churning out the WTF blend.
Marc:Get the app.
Marc:Upgrade to premium.
Marc:Get them all.
Marc:Mike Judge.
Marc:Mike Judge this Thursday.
Marc:Long chat with the judge.
Guest:Thank you.
Marc:Boomer lives!