Episode 640 - Nick DiPaolo / Brian Regan & Joe Bolster
Marc:all right let's do this how are you what the fuckers what the fuck tuckians what the fuck buddies what the fucksters what the fuckabillies what the fuckaholics what's going on it's mark maron this is my show wtf how's everybody doing thank you for joining me
Marc:Here in your head, I appreciate being here.
Marc:I like taking up space here for a little while.
Marc:I hear a lot from you people.
Marc:I hear a lot that sometimes my voice is so invasive that some other things in your lives get narrated by my voice.
Marc:I'm honored.
Marc:I appreciate that.
Marc:I will not seek any compensation for being an inner narrator, even when I'm not being piped into your head because I'm a big hearted guy.
Marc:And I appreciate living in your head, whether I'm talking into it or just there, occupying space.
Marc:As long as it's not obsessive and weird and you're not coming to kill me.
Marc:That got dark awfully quick.
Marc:Welcome to the show.
Marc:Today on the show, Nick DiPaolo, who I have known since 1988.
Marc:Nick DiPaolo, stand-up comic.
Marc:Some of you know him from Tough Crowd.
Marc:Some of you know him from stand-up.
Marc:Some of you know him from his show with Artie Lang a while ago.
Marc:Some of you know him from things he said that upset you.
Marc:But Nick and I have been friends for coming up on 30 years.
Marc:And I did one of my first gigs opening for Nick DiPaolo.
Marc:I've known him a long time and I talked to him on a trip to New York.
Marc:And, you know, Nick is Nick.
Marc:So brace yourselves if you're if you're the type of person that requires bracing of oneself.
Marc:Also, in a minute, Brian Regan stopped by.
Marc:He's got a pretty exciting bit of business happening.
Marc:Brian Regan, this Saturday, September 26th, he will be performing the first ever live stand-up special in the history of Comedy Central.
Marc:Brian Regan live from Radio City Music Hall is this Saturday night.
Marc:Watch it live as it happens at 9 p.m., 8 central.
Marc:So Brian came by to talk about doing that live special, and he brought Joe Bolster with him.
Marc:Now, Joe Bolster, myself, and Brian all hosted a show called Short Attention Span Theater on Comedy Central back in the day.
Marc:It was my first gig on television.
Marc:I was not happy about it, surprise, but I did it because I was broke, and I learned some things doing it.
Marc:But it was interesting that Joe came.
Marc:Joe opens for Brian sometimes.
Marc:I had not seen Joe in years, so I put him on the mic, and it was like this weird reunion of,
Marc:of past hosts of Short Attention Span Theater, and we had fun.
Marc:We had more fun than I anticipated.
Marc:I always knew Brian would be fun, but then Joe was here, and I was like, wow, we just upped the fun ante.
Marc:Right?
Marc:I appreciate all the kudos and excitement over the Keith Richards interview.
Marc:A few...
Marc:Bleeding deacon types of sober people got a little concerned with the cigarette.
Marc:Some insinuations were made.
Marc:What if he'd offer you heroin?
Marc:What if he'd offer you a line of Coke?
Marc:What if he offered you a cocktail?
Marc:I wouldn't have done those.
Marc:There's that answer.
Marc:Well, why'd you smoke?
Marc:Now you're going to start smoking again.
Marc:One guy who was, I think, fairly sensitive to the situation and the possibilities of the situation said, oh, great.
Marc:Now we're going to have to listen to Marc Maron trying to quit cigarettes for six months in the monologues.
Marc:I'm here to report that because I'm completely saturated with nicotine again on a daily basis through nicotine lozenges, I have not had another cigarette since I smoked that cigarette with Keith Richards.
Marc:I have no plan to smoke another cigarette.
Marc:I know that a lot of people say that, but I don't think I'm in the woods.
Marc:I think I'm out of the woods.
Marc:I knew I was out of the woods when I smoked it.
Marc:It was risky just to smoke it because I'd already sucked a bunch of lozenges.
Marc:But I wanted to share a smoke with Keith Richards, and I think a lot of you understand that.
Marc:Who wouldn't do that?
Marc:Amazing day in my life.
Marc:And I'm glad I was glad I got to share it with you.
Marc:And for those of you people, let me let me let me say another thing while I'm here, because I'm sensitive and I get aggravated and angry sometimes over over little things.
Marc:But here's the deal.
Marc:If I don't ask the questions that you think I should ask, you should seek to do an interview with the person I'm talking to.
Marc:That's how that works.
Marc:If the interview falls short of what you think you would have asked, you should make contact with that person and get those questions answered.
Marc:Because I do what I do.
Marc:And for those of you who listen and are still hung up on answers and not hung up on feeling, I think you're missing the point of what happens here on a good day.
Marc:That said, those of you who'd like to see me in Australia, here's your chance to take a trip to Australia.
Marc:If you live there, it's going to be easier.
Marc:But if some of you are like, when should we plan to go to Australia?
Marc:Well, October 15th would be a nice day to go to Sydney because I'll be at the state theater that night.
Marc:Or if you're thinking Melbourne would be fun, October 16th would be the day to see that city.
Marc:I'll be at the Palais Theater.
Marc:And if Brisbane is on your mind, you should make that trip on October 17th because I'll be at the Brisbane City Hall.
Marc:So if you live in Australia, those dates are for you as well.
Marc:But I was just trying to encourage a tourist activity in your country for those of you who live in Australia, for you Aussies.
Marc:Also, I'll be at the New Yorker Festival on October 3rd.
Marc:That's all I know about that one.
Marc:I imagine you can look it up.
Marc:New Yorker Festival on October, the evening of October 3rd.
Marc:I'll be somewhere in New York doing a thing, a talk.
Marc:God knows I need to talk more.
Marc:What else?
Marc:I got some interesting news that I'd like to share.
Marc:I think it's pretty exciting news that somewhere in the last month, somewhere this month,
Marc:we crossed a pretty big mark.
Marc:It's a big number.
Marc:But this show, WTF, this happened this month.
Marc:I don't know the day.
Marc:I could find out, but it doesn't matter.
Marc:We crossed the threshold of 200 million downloads since the day of this show's inception.
Marc:And the weird thing about that is,
Marc:It was less than two years ago that we crossed the 100 million mark.
Marc:So things are picked up.
Marc:But that's a big number.
Marc:And man, if I had a dollar or a quarter or a dime, even a penny for every one of those downloads, wouldn't that be something?
Marc:Let me do this now.
Marc:Let's go to my conversation.
Marc:This is Brian Regan and Joe Bolster and myself, all three of us, previous hosts of Comedy Central's Short Attention Span Theater.
Marc:And again, Brian's special is this Saturday, September 26th.
Marc:It's the first ever live stand-up special in the history of Comedy Central.
Marc:Brian Regan, live from Radio City Music Hall, is on this Saturday night.
Marc:You can watch it live as it happens at 9 p.m., 8 central.
Marc:So here's me, Brian, and Joe.
Music.
Guest:Is it historical?
Guest:It's historical.
Guest:Yeah, I guess in a way.
Guest:Come on, don't be, what do you call it?
Guest:Modest?
Guest:Historic by, Comedy Central's never done one of these.
Marc:Yes.
Marc:It's going to be happening while you're doing it.
Marc:That is correct.
Guest:With no delay.
Guest:well there'll be a little delay a little delay a six second delay i have to have a little delay yeah did was that a negotiating point were you a stickler and it's not like what you're ready did you say i want no delay well i think that's uh you know i even saturday night live anything has a six second delay yeah because you never reason right because you never know when some idiot's gonna lose his fucking mind see right there i hope we're on delay mark
Guest:I hope that gets bleeped out.
Guest:I apologize to Mark's listeners for that.
Marc:So your tape's on the 26th, and is this an hour you've been doing for, what, the last six months, year?
Guest:Well, I mean, I've been, like, zeroing in on this particular hour because, you know, you need to... It's that weird tightrope.
Guest:You want it in your bones, but not so much in your bones that you suck all the funny out of it.
Guest:Sure.
Guest:You know what I mean?
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:You want to at least feel like you're engaged with it and not walking through it.
Marc:Yeah, yeah.
Marc:Have that weird moment where you're like, look at that guy doing my jokes.
Guest:Oh, fuck, that's me.
Guest:Right, the out-of-body thing.
Guest:There's me saying some memorized stuff.
Marc:Have you had that before?
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:I've had it.
Guest:I mean, as soon as I feel like that, then I will automatically not say it the way I'm supposed to say it just to get back into real mode.
Guest:Sure, sure.
Guest:I'd rather clunk through a joke and have it be real than say it perfectly and have it not feel funny.
Marc:Right, right.
Marc:And does it bother you if you don't feel like it's funny and you just sort of walk through it and you were thinking about something else and they're all laughing and rocking in their chairs and there's a party that's like, look at them, fooled them again.
Marc:I'm not even present.
Guest:no I don't like that feel it's horrible yeah because it's like it's that feeling of mailing it in is a horrible feeling we have I always want to feel like I'm there in the moment right why would you what yeah we could have done another job yeah we were gonna mail shit in exactly
Marc:Could have been some type of mailing person.
Marc:Sure, a mailing person or just a guy that just does this and goes, yeah, I'll get to it and just sit there, whatever that is.
Marc:So you got the honor of doing one of Letterman's last bit of shows.
Guest:Yeah, man.
Guest:I had done what I thought was my last one in October of last year.
Guest:I usually do one about every nine months, so I thought, all right, that was probably my last one.
Guest:And then my manager, Rory, called to tell me they wanted me to do one more.
Guest:And it was great.
Guest:Rory Rosegarten?
Guest:Rory Rosegarten.
Guest:No kidding.
Marc:Did I know you were with Rory Rosegarten?
Marc:Rory Rosegarten.
Marc:What's his brother's name?
Marc:Peter Rosegarten.
Marc:Rory and Peter Rosegarten.
Marc:Yes, with a T. Famous for handling the Romano and the Robert Klein is what I know.
Marc:yes yes and joe bolster and joe bolster who's in the house who's in the room he's in the garage we're gonna get him on mic in a second because we all share a weird common history bolster uh i remember at one time sported a mustache but we'll talk about that there was am i am i wrong about that no you are correct
Marc:this is gonna be boy that's a big tease and we'll be back we'll get into that we'll get into that right right around in a few minutes right after these words from our spine remember joe bolster's mustache coming back at you so uh all right so what was it like with the letterman did he talk to you
Marc:Did you have a relationship with my I've done the show like four times and he was always one time he I sat down on the chair and he actually said you can get that stuff to work at clubs.
Guest:That's great.
Guest:You know, I never, you know, well, I saw him backstage once or twice, you know, before a show, but we never hung out.
Guest:You know, everybody knows he's not right.
Guest:He's not a social person in that regard.
Guest:And I've, like, jokingly in interviews, you know, people say, what's Dave Letterman like?
Guest:And I would say, you know, just to be ridiculous, I say, well, I was flying a couple days early, and he and I go out to Central Park because he likes to fly kites, and we'll fly kites together.
Guest:You know, thinking you're so over-the-top absurd.
Guest:That they wouldn't.
Guest:And then an interviewer will go, really?
Guest:I didn't know that he was into kites.
Guest:And you go, oh, jeez.
Guest:Now I've got to bring this back.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Does he like the complicated kite or a classic?
Guest:Is he classic?
Guest:Single piece kite.
Guest:Some of those kites, they got fish, many parts.
Guest:And then I got to start Googling kites while I'm on the air with a guy going, no, no, we're going down this rabbit hole.
Marc:Didn't know this bit was going to keep going.
Marc:I was not prepared for the improvisation.
Marc:Now I'm talking like Brian Regan.
Marc:See how quick it happens?
Marc:How quick it happens.
Marc:But you did that show like a lot.
Guest:Yeah, I think it was 28, and I was honored to do every one of them.
Guest:The last one I was on, Ray Romano was also on.
Guest:He was the first guest, and he had a very nice moment where he told Dave that his life changed on that spot, the stand-up comedy spot.
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Guest:He said, I went out there, and I had a set, and your people called me a couple days later.
Guest:That's right.
Guest:And you changed my life and Ray Romano got emotional on the show.
Guest:And Dave said, why don't you go out there and stand on that spot again?
Guest:Oh, man, I'm going to cry.
Guest:And I'm backstage going, I got to go stand on that spot.
Guest:For real.
Yeah.
Guest:I got to follow a guy crying standing on a spot, and I got to go out there and make people laugh on that spot.
Guest:I'm here to do the job that that spot requires.
Guest:This is not a nostalgia journey for me.
Guest:I don't have to work on that spot.
Guest:Get the tears off that spot.
Guest:That spot's not for crying.
Guest:But it was a really nice moment for Ray.
Guest:He said that he had never been able to thank Dave Letterman publicly like that, so it was a good thing for him.
Marc:He's a sweet guy that way.
Marc:Absolutely.
Marc:And somewhere backstage, Rory Rosegarden was going, I got two guys on tonight.
Guest:two of my guys on but uh but so you really just passing conversation with him generally just like good job and he shakes your hand and you stand there yeah just the moment where he comes you know you finish your set and then he walks up from behind and you have to pretend like you don't know he's walking up right right just stand you don't want to turn around right right because what if he isn't coming right
Marc:There is that weird few seconds where you're just standing there.
Guest:You're just looking forward, going, I think he's walking up.
Marc:Oh, here he is.
Marc:Oh, hey!
Marc:I didn't know you were coming up from behind me.
Marc:It's so wild to be out there and know he's sitting there.
Marc:It's so trippy, man.
Marc:I'm going to miss him.
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Guest:I think comedians, most comedians love Dave Letterman and his comedy and his style.
Guest:He's the best.
Guest:He introduced a...
Guest:a style that had not been prominent before he was on the scene.
Guest:And I think that's why comedians really, you know, love what he did.
Guest:The endearing crank.
Guest:Yes.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Well, when Dave Letterman had the daytime talk show, you know, before they realized, well, no, it's not for, you know, that, that audience, but, um,
Guest:When he was going to be replaced, his final episode, he did a tribute to the show that was going to replace his show, which was going to be Card Sharks or Card Sharps.
Guest:And he had like 52 people dressed like playing cards coming out and walking around.
Guest:And it was so subversive and funny that he was making fun of the show that was going to replace him.
Marc:Oh, yeah.
Marc:He had just enough fuck you.
Marc:You know what I mean?
Marc:More of it when he was younger, and then it kind of smoothed out.
Marc:A nice palatable fuck you at the core of it.
Marc:You know, that's important.
Marc:You don't see that enough on TV.
Marc:Now, is Joe going to open for you?
Marc:Joe, it's time to get on the mic, Joe.
Marc:Joe Bolster, ladies and gentlemen.
Marc:The Joe Bolster.
Marc:Joe Bolster.
Marc:I have felt like Teller for the last 20 minutes.
Marc:Now, Joe, I should tell my audience, Joe Bolster is a comedian, but he also...
Marc:And I didn't remember you doing this.
Marc:I hosted Short Attention Span Theater, which was a show originally hosted by Jon Stewart and Patty Rossboro.
Marc:Yes.
Marc:Which then I think became just Patty Rossboro.
Guest:Correct.
Guest:And then to Brian.
Marc:And then Brian Regan hosted it.
Guest:And then Brian and I co-hosted.
Marc:Oh, you two co-hosted it.
Guest:For a brief period.
Marc:Get on that mic, Joe.
Guest:You know how to do it.
Guest:We were reminiscing today.
Guest:If you'd like to ever see us, you can go down to the Museum of Radio and Television where we've been archived.
Guest:Yes.
Guest:Then Brian left.
Guest:He did not like train wrecks.
Guest:It was just you?
Guest:Mustached?
Guest:No, this was post-moustache.
Guest:We'll get the mustache in a moment, Mark.
Guest:Okay, I'm sorry.
Guest:I'm burying the lead.
Guest:Burying the lead, yeah.
Guest:And what happened when I took over is they then auditioned my replacement with me on camera.
Guest:Which one was that?
Guest:They brought Randy Kagan and Reshumba, who was a model at the time.
Guest:Reshumba?
Guest:No, I don't remember at all.
Guest:She was illiterate.
Guest:She couldn't read the prompter.
Guest:So you're auditioning.
Guest:You put through the humiliation.
Guest:Yes.
Guest:Yes.
Guest:Of, you know, finding my replacement.
Guest:And then they wound up this guy, Marcus Allen, who was a DJ.
Guest:A radio personality from Sacramento.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:Is it San Diego?
Marc:Sacramento, I think.
Guest:He's somewhere out here.
Guest:And the thought was he's young and looks good, but he had no comedy chops.
Marc:He looked plastic.
Guest:Yes.
Guest:He had the Ken doll kind of.
Marc:And I think I came in after him.
Marc:You did.
Marc:And then Robert Small, known for the Unplugged series.
Marc:That was his big claim to fame.
Marc:You know, just put a curtain up.
Marc:And he said, we're going to revamp it.
Marc:So they just trashed the whole premise of the show.
Marc:And what did it become?
Marc:Oh, you didn't watch it at all?
Guest:Thanks, Joe.
Guest:I had to sit through your fucking shot.
Guest:I've got them all on tape, Joe.
Guest:Thank you, Brian.
Guest:I was watching some last night, Mark Maron in front of the curtain.
Marc:No, it wasn't.
Marc:No, no.
Marc:That was what he was known for.
Guest:Oh, I'm sorry.
Guest:I'm trying to lie my way through this.
Marc:You remember the vault.
Marc:It was the concept was we were in the comedy vault in the basement of Comedy Central when there was an elevator that I'd come out of.
Marc:And there were several elevator operators.
Marc:Frank Santorelli was my elevator operator briefly.
Marc:And you'd have chat with him on the
Marc:way down yeah we'll chat and then i come out and then what they do is they just bundle together a theme for the day based on free promotional clips so if we were doing a carson theme show it was because they just released the best of carson and we'd be like you remember this gem like and i had to uh i had to like when i first got there i had a fight for them to get a writer in there that would write me jokes they had me doing these weird throws to clips all i remember i
Marc:is saying this before i lost my mind i said next up a pithy python pair oh man and that's when the we went to clip and i go i need what the i'm a comedian you know i'm a little literate that was the turning point that was it the pithy python pair and then john groff came in and that was his first writing job who he later went on to be a head writer at conan
Guest:You know what was very hard about that show when we were doing it?
Guest:They would put themes together.
Guest:They would have three or four comedians talking about tennis shoes.
Guest:Oh, right.
Guest:And then they were doing it.
Guest:It wasn't going out live, but they were trying to do it live to tape.
Guest:While they were doing that, while showing those clips, they would come up to me and say, we're 45 seconds short.
Guest:Wing something about tennis shoes.
Yeah.
Guest:So I'm like, they got to come back.
Guest:I got to follow three of the best comedians in the world doing their tightest tennis shoe stuff.
Guest:And I got to wing something off the top of my head about tennis shoes, which of course can't even come close to what everyone had just seen.
Guest:Right.
Guest:And just let everybody just kind of land with the thud at home going, ha ha ha.
Guest:He needs a co-host.
Guest:He needs a co-host.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:Bring in Joe Bolster.
Marc:We need a laugher.
Marc:Get a laugher up there.
Marc:So you ended the show.
Marc:I buried it.
Marc:Yeah, I buried that thing.
Marc:It wasn't bad, I guess.
Marc:You know, it's weird that... Because you've had opportunities in television that you've just... You know how it goes.
Marc:It's limiting somehow.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Well, we have complete autonomy as comedians.
Guest:Exactly.
Guest:And then to get into a world where you don't is challenging.
Marc:Yeah, it's like having a job.
Marc:Yes.
Marc:Yes.
Marc:Well, that's exciting, man, and I'm happy for you.
Marc:What else do you want to add?
Marc:Well, I think we should get to my mustache.
Marc:See, look at that.
Marc:That's how lazy I've gotten as a broadcaster.
Guest:That's the big thing we were working towards.
Marc:Okay, there was a decision.
Guest:Well, back in the day, in the early 80s, Maxwell House decided to do a campaign featuring comedians, Maxwell House Coffee.
Marc:Oh, my God, there's a real story here.
Guest:Yeah, and they had you come in, and you had to write the copy.
Guest:You had to prepare your own material that was coffee-related.
Guest:And so I was one of the guys they brought in, and I came in, and they said, we don't like you with a mustache.
Guest:So I said, well, I'll shave it and come back tomorrow.
Guest:So I shaved it and came back the next day, and they said, we still don't like you.
LAUGHTER
Guest:and were you like, fuck.
Guest:It took me time.
Guest:This was my hook.
Guest:Can you bring back just the mustache?
Guest:Use that on the can.
Marc:Could you voice the can with your mustache?
Marc:Well, you look well, man.
Marc:It's good to see you.
Marc:Thank you.
Marc:It was a nice surprise.
Marc:And good luck with this thing.
Marc:It sounds like it's going to be hilarious.
Marc:Well, I appreciate it, man.
Marc:Thank you very much.
Marc:Yeah, now I'm going to plug the date like a professional.
Marc:September 26th at 9 o'clock p.m.
Marc:Is there some part of your brain that's sort of like, I'm going to do something I've never done before.
Guest:I hope they got that pixelating machine ready.
Marc:I'm growing a mustache.
Marc:You better get on it.
Marc:I'm working on it.
Marc:Thanks, guys.
Marc:That was fun.
Marc:It was good seeing those guys.
Marc:I don't know if you know this.
Marc:I like hanging out with comedians because I'm a comedian.
Marc:I like hanging out with guys that do the thing that I do as well.
Marc:Huh?
Marc:How do you like that?
Marc:Anyway, got Nick DiPaolo in a second.
Marc:And it's very interesting how far back I go with that guy.
Marc:I bring it up to him.
Marc:I talk to him about it.
Marc:So now, enjoy.
Marc:And as I said, those of you who might be sensitive to particular tones...
Marc:I'm not even going to... Whatever.
Marc:Nick is Nick.
Marc:And Nick and I have known each other a long time.
Marc:And Nick is my friend.
Marc:And he's got some stuff going on.
Marc:If you want to see Nick, I believe you can go to Governor's on Long Island this weekend.
Marc:I remember that being a good room.
Marc:I remember having a great sound system.
Marc:But the last time I played Governor's, you could still smoke there.
Marc:But if you're on the Long Island, go to Governor's to see Nick DiPaolo.
Marc:He's at the Gramercy Theater in New York City on October 17th.
Marc:And you can get his special, Another Senseless Killing, at NickDiPaolo.com.
Marc:Please, please join me as I talk to Nick DiPaolo.
Nick DiPaolo.
Guest:Come on, you had fucking Obama on.
Marc:I know.
Marc:It was funny because when we were setting this up, I went out of town.
Marc:When you were supposed to come out, you're like, I don't know if I'm going to.
Marc:You had the president on.
Marc:What am I going to do?
Guest:I was honest.
Guest:Even now, I'm walking across the street.
Guest:I'm going, Jesus Christ.
Guest:He must be going.
Guest:What the fuck?
Guest:What am I doing?
Marc:I don't feel that way at all.
Marc:Because with me, that whole thing, it was an amazing honor.
Marc:As an American, the president says he wants to talk to you.
Marc:Dude.
Guest:Dude, well, you know what I call you now?
Guest:You're like Dick Cavett.
Marc:Oh, yeah.
Marc:That's how I look at you.
Guest:One of the Smothers Brothers, kind of a hip talk guy.
Guest:That's a fucking great thing to be.
Guest:Yeah, but you were impressed.
Guest:Dude, I was blown away.
Guest:I was fucking blown.
Guest:I woke up excited for you when I read that.
Marc:Seriously.
Marc:It was the only time you were excited about Obama.
Guest:That's exactly right.
Guest:Trust me.
Guest:He belongs in a garage.
Guest:Listen, I was so excited for you.
Guest:And I actually said this.
Guest:I said to my wife, Maren, who's a friend of mine, I got a friend of mine interviewing the first black president, and they're talking about my old roommate, Louis C.K.
Guest:It's not the greatest country on the face of the earth.
Guest:Are you shitting me?
Marc:That's so funny.
Marc:And the fact is that we go... I want to talk about your house, though, but maybe we'll work up to there.
Guest:All right.
Guest:So you just got a good deal on something.
Guest:It's so funny.
Guest:We were living in Tarrytown, me and my wife.
Guest:We moved up to Tarrytown and went to Tough Crow.
Guest:That's 15 miles south of where my present house is.
Guest:Right.
Guest:But my wife's such a financial genius.
Guest:We lived in this condo right near the opening of the Tappan Zee Bridge.
Guest:You've probably been by it a million times.
Guest:It's a complex.
Guest:And we were there for a couple years.
Guest:Tough crowd was on.
Guest:I had saved a lot of money even before then.
Marc:So you were not only a regular, but you were writing on the show?
Guest:I don't think I got a writer's credit.
Marc:You were there every day.
Guest:You're going to laugh at this one.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Well, I was supposed to be on.
Guest:They had contract for us, and I was scheduled to be on twice a week.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And after the second or third episode, I get called in by Comedy Central and Colin.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:He has a serious look on his face, and everybody's talking like he's cryptic.
Guest:I'm like, what the fuck?
Guest:Well, you've been making a lot of Jew jokes, and you don't do it with a smile on your face.
Yeah.
Guest:This is an actual meeting.
Guest:I go, what are you talking about?
Guest:And they go, I said everybody was making Jewish jokes on an episode.
Guest:Yeah, but you weren't really.
Guest:I go, I want to see the fucking tape.
Guest:Give me the tapes.
Guest:Did they show you the tape?
Guest:Yeah, I brought them home.
Guest:People were laughing their ass off.
Guest:But I was saying some over the top shit.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:But so it was a big content.
Guest:Colin and Colin said to me he had to keep me from getting kicked off the show completely.
Marc:Uh-huh.
Marc:So now you know who really runs show business.
Marc:That one turned out to be true, I guess.
Guest:Yeah, at least in Comedy Central.
Guest:It was so weird.
Guest:I remember he goes, I don't want you to be that guy.
Guest:And I'm like, there are all these cryptic.
Guest:I didn't know what they were talking about.
Guest:What did I do?
Guest:What does that mean?
Guest:You don't mean the guy who gets fired.
Guest:I guess so.
Guest:Yes.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And they were jokes.
Guest:They were just that.
Guest:It's the same shit we were doing at the Comedy Cellar table.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And that's the whole idea.
Marc:That was why people love that show and why it was probably a threat to everybody is that it was jokes.
Marc:Absolutely.
Marc:But it's still got a little hairy.
Guest:And you know what?
Guest:I do.
Guest:I know when I'm on stage, people have told, you know, sometimes I don't say it with a smile on my face.
Guest:You know me.
Guest:I'm way too intense in my own good sometimes.
Guest:Well, it's weird.
Guest:But you know when you cross the line.
Guest:Oh, fuck yeah.
Guest:But it's fun.
Guest:It's fun.
Guest:And sometimes I don't think there is a line.
Guest:Your line might be here.
Guest:Mine's 500 feet down the road.
Marc:But you know when it's not funny anymore.
Guest:I have trouble.
Guest:I really have trouble going.
Guest:Was that just mean or was that funny?
Guest:As I get older, I'm worse.
Guest:Do you notice you get jaded?
Guest:Well, I don't know what happened to you.
Marc:I don't know when the anger became first and foremost.
Marc:You know what I mean?
Marc:Because I started with you.
Marc:I know.
Marc:But you were angry, too.
Marc:No, no, no.
Marc:I was.
Marc:And I think arguably not that funny sometimes.
Yeah.
Marc:But you were always on the right side of the joke.
Marc:I don't know if I was.
Marc:When I look back at it, there were definitely jokes I did at a different time where it was meant just to see if I could get away with it, to push the buttons.
Marc:But if I really think about them, there's a couple of jokes I did where I'm surprised people didn't come up to me and go, yeah, I don't know if that's wrong-minded.
Guest:But my stuff sort of goes against, you know, the showbiz.
Marc:Right.
Guest:You know, I lean a little to the right, and that's not always very popular.
Guest:Well, that's right.
Marc:That's true.
Guest:And showbiz, and the showbiz world we live in.
Guest:Right.
Guest:You're always aggravated.
Guest:Yes.
Guest:No, I know.
Guest:A little of this, you know.
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Guest:Yeah, before the show.
Guest:You get bored after being at the cellar for 12 years.
Guest:A couple cocktails.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:That brown liquor makes me fucking angry.
Guest:It took me two cancellations to realize that.
Marc:That it was the booze?
Marc:Still, I have to watch myself.
Marc:Oh, really?
Marc:Because your brain changes.
Guest:Without me, nobody would point it out to me.
Guest:Everybody's afraid of me.
Marc:Yeah, right, right.
Marc:Nobody would point out.
Marc:You get a little intense.
Marc:Remember, I think we talked about this once before, but probably a long time ago on the show.
Marc:I did, I think, my first paid gig in Boston opening for you.
Marc:In Maine, yes.
Guest:Captain Nix.
Guest:You had just come off rehab.
Guest:You'd taken a few years off.
Marc:Well, no, I was in L.A., and I came back to Boston where I went to school to start comedy over again.
Marc:And then I think it must have been...
Marc:I wonder if it's even before I came in second in that riot.
Marc:And like it might have been right before me.
Marc:Barry Katzman's throw me some bones.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:And that's when I met you.
Marc:And you were up.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Walk into that.
Marc:Fuck.
Marc:I drove up to a gun quit.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:Captain Nick's.
Guest:I still I went by there a few years ago.
Guest:I think it's still the sign was still there.
Marc:Really?
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:It's still open.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:And it was like in the bar area.
Marc:I kind of remember it.
Marc:You walk in and the bars on the left and the stage is right there.
Marc:Yes.
Guest:Walk in on the left.
Guest:That's exactly how I remember.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And you were all nervous because you had to do like, look, what's funny?
Guest:How about you open for you?
Guest:Now you're interviewing Obama.
Guest:I know.
Guest:That's wild, right?
Guest:I got Joe Matarice on the show.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:But see, I still like the funny thing is the week after I did Obama, I did Rich Voss.
Marc:I made sure that.
Marc:What the fuck am I worried about?
Marc:Nothing.
Marc:You don't need to be worried about anything.
Marc:He provided a nice buffer with boss.
Marc:It was funny because what am I going to do?
Marc:I love boss.
Marc:Yeah, me too.
Marc:I interview Obama.
Marc:So what?
Marc:Has everything changed?
Marc:How many things?
Guest:I don't know about you.
Guest:I thought you might be.
Guest:You've really changed.
Guest:We're talking about my personality.
Guest:You've gone the other way.
Guest:There was a time when you and I had such negative energies, both of us.
Guest:You'd walk into the comedy cellar and literally a rain cloud would form over that table and stop pouring on other people.
Guest:And you and I would just laugh.
Marc:I know.
Marc:It was true.
Marc:They were going different directions, but I don't think they were essentially the different directions.
Marc:I think that both of us are angry anyways.
Marc:Yes.
Marc:And the idea of having politics to sort of run it through is nice.
Guest:That's like throwing gas on it.
Marc:Right, exactly.
Marc:Yeah, I just think that we've got that attitude.
Marc:Yeah, and we can't hide it.
Guest:Yeah, that's what I like.
Guest:And you and I, even though probably opposite ends of the spectrum politically, but we never really had a beef.
Guest:Never.
Guest:It's terrifying.
Marc:The idea of really having your anger pointed at me.
Marc:I was going to...
Guest:i was like you know it's great he can point it wherever he wants just not at me i'm not gonna do it i don't know i'm mellowing out you know age gets you man age gets you you can't you know i mean horrendous even now coming down to the fdr i was like bumper to bumper i just fucking i actually have a john denver fucking best of john denver i put on now in my car i swear to god i download it on my phone so when i get in traffic calm you
Guest:I swear to God.
Guest:I put on like, you know, Colorado Rocky Mountain High.
Guest:Sunshine on my shoulder.
Guest:Sunshine on my shoulder.
Guest:I swear to God.
Guest:It's the funniest fucking thing.
Guest:Well, yeah, I'll be singing along with it.
Guest:Colorado Rocky Mountain High.
Guest:Then I'm like, get the fuck over.
Guest:You're in the left lane.
Marc:Get over.
Marc:As well as it helps.
Marc:But so, okay, so let's go back because, like, I remember when I came back from LA, yeah, I was a little fucked up.
Marc:I was trying to stay sober, and then I go there because I remember you were sort of like, yeah, you did a pretty good job.
Marc:You were supportive.
Marc:You were nice.
Marc:I think you had a chick with you.
Marc:I don't remember who the hell that was.
Marc:But, you know, you were doing your thing, but it was all about, you know, tuna sandwich, you know, and –
Guest:Holy shit, you're right.
Marc:Why don't you put some more sawdust in it or whatever?
Guest:Yeah, broken glass and dust.
Guest:How did you remember that?
Marc:I remember jokes, dude.
Marc:But there was a story about you that it's an inspiration to me.
Marc:Because I don't know if it really happened.
Marc:It was one of those.
Marc:It's one of these road myths that that you made a bridal party cry.
Guest:I've made a couple bridal cry.
Marc:That's what parties cry.
Guest:I've got banned from the from the comedy works in Denver.
Guest:Right.
Guest:That's where it happened to me.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Don't sit the bachelorette party up front.
Guest:I get banned from there because I guess the woman runs it.
Guest:Wendy, yeah.
Guest:Yeah, and I called the table.
Guest:I gave him a chance.
Guest:I always give the bachelorette.
Guest:You know, you got to give him a little rope.
Guest:Yeah, right.
Guest:Get drunk.
Guest:Right.
Guest:And then they just kept yelling shit out.
Guest:And so I snapped on them.
Guest:Bad.
Guest:Whatever.
Guest:Call them a bunch of drunken cunts.
Guest:And next thing you know.
Guest:They're crying?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Some chick gets upset and she's bawling.
Guest:She's bawling with a fake tiara on her head.
Guest:Get out of here.
Guest:And even worse, Mark, at the Punchline Sacramento.
Guest:That's the one I heard.
Guest:That's the one.
Guest:what happened that one got really through it well i was in no mood even for me i'm like i shouldn't be out tonight i don't know why i was like just totally not in a good mood you had to work and was there a full house like because that's a pretty full house oh yeah for two shows friday night big room big room yeah and there's a bachelorette party once again up front but you know what like you're sitting off stage and you see them and you see the middle and you see the bachelorette party you know before you even go on like oh
Marc:Fuck.
Guest:They were ruining the Middles act.
Guest:Right.
Guest:I was getting so pissed that nobody was doing anything about it.
Guest:And they were ruining his act.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:So on my way up, on my way up to the stage, the chick's like, take off your shirt.
Guest:And I'm not even to the microphone yet.
Guest:And they're yelling shit at me.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And there's no doorman doing anything.
Guest:i get up there i go look shut your mouths you ruined the last guy you're not going to ruin my act back and forth back and forth haven't even told the joke yet yeah and and and uh some girl goes you're a dick this is before i haven't even i haven't even get to the microphone yeah so then i snap on her and another girl throws a beer at me yeah like a half a cup of beer yeah like right on my shirt oh my god so i would go nuts yeah even for me i go crazy
Guest:Like you're frothing, you're bent over.
Marc:Bent over right over.
Guest:My face is an inch from the table.
Guest:Just calling the filthiest things, wishing cancer on them.
Guest:Anything I could think of.
Guest:And all of a sudden, other tables, some guys stand.
Guest:A table of guys gets mad at me.
Guest:You can't call girls that.
Guest:I go, you're defending these fucking whores?
Guest:And they start screaming at me.
Guest:Now half the room...
Guest:This is how bad I was.
Guest:It's chaos.
Guest:And I'm taking blame for this.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Even though they should have been thrown out before I got on stage.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Now it's chaos.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I have tables yelling at me.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Because you didn't get them on your side at all.
Guest:Not at all.
Guest:Not at all.
Guest:Which I've learned since.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:So literally, they're screaming at me.
Guest:I'm screaming at them.
Guest:Other people screaming at me.
Guest:Right in the middle of it, here's the manager's idea for resolution.
Guest:He runs up and hands me a shot to calm me down like a rumplement.
Guest:And I do it.
Guest:And it gets even worse.
Guest:Now people are leaving.
Guest:Now people are trying to leave the club.
Guest:There was 220 people, I think.
Guest:It was a packed house.
Guest:Comedy was booming, like you said.
Guest:And when all the mayhem died down, there was 45 people.
Guest:Oh, my God.
Guest:Mass exodus.
Marc:Mass exodus.
Marc:You stayed in the saddle.
Guest:I stayed in the saddle, did my set.
Guest:They were loving it.
Guest:Here's the funny part.
Guest:So the second show between... I'm hanging in the back of the room and people are being seated for the second show.
Guest:And I hear people...
Guest:I hear people, the waiter would come over, you know, the show hasn't started yet, and I'm standing in the back, and then I'm hiding behind the corner, and I hear people going to the waiter, hey, we heard the headline.
Guest:It went nuts on the last show.
Guest:Is he like a real fucking crazy guy?
Guest:because all the people piling out see him waiting on line in the hallway yes there was a line to try to get their money back they saw people coming out of there screaming and and what was scary was even after the second show was over the guy comes out and he goes we have to have security walk you back to your hotel because those guys that first table of guys that was yelling they're in a pickup truck this is a couple hours later you know waiting for me to come out and that place is in a mall it's upstairs across from a fucking mattress store that
Marc:Exactly.
Marc:Exactly.
Marc:And then you got to walk downstairs to the parking lot.
Guest:I had to go to the mattresses.
Marc:Strip mall.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:No, you're exact.
Guest:It was, they had the security guy to bring me back to the hotel.
Guest:We had to walk across the street.
Guest:Like you said, you mellow out with age.
Guest:And I've had 20 bachelor parties since probably.
Guest:And I say to him, even,
Guest:And they've been pretty good.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I think even clubs are evolving that way.
Guest:Right.
Guest:But again, they still sit them up front.
Guest:But I say to the girls now, I go, you know, I'm flattered you came to see me.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Even though you probably didn't know who the headline was.
Guest:Right.
Guest:But I always say, why aren't you at, you know, Chip and Dale's eating whipped cream out of a guy's ass?
Guest:Yeah, that one.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Thunder Down Under, whoever the latest gay guys are dancing.
Guest:So I go, but I'm flattered you came to see me.
Guest:I don't know why.
Guest:Why would you come?
Guest:Your best friend's getting married, which means you're not going to see much of her for the next 50 years.
Guest:So this might be the last night you're out with her, and you're going to come to a place where you can't talk.
Guest:I don't really know where the tradition was established.
Guest:I don't know why they keep doing it.
Guest:I think it was Barry Katz management thing.
Marc:established that's how he gets the beginning of your career yes no but i i i get that i think what they're really looking for is like yeah they'll make fun of her so they they expect us to do what we're gonna do but they don't realize that we we fucking hate them right and it's not gonna be that fun for us i mean some guys may handle it better but i'm like oh this is gonna be a problem
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And I am flattered they came out.
Marc:Right.
Marc:But I think that you and I, what you realize as you get older is it gets sort of exhausting.
Marc:Exactly.
Marc:To fucking, to do this defensive fucking, you know.
Marc:Yes.
Marc:And it actually feels better just to do a nice show for people that want to laugh.
Marc:Yes.
Marc:But like, I think you and I, but I didn't feel this about you when you first started.
Marc:I went into it defensively.
Marc:You know, like when I, when I started doing comedy.
Marc:Insecurities.
Marc:Of course.
Marc:But I was sort of like, it was always a fight to me.
Marc:Before it even started.
Marc:Before I even got up there, I'm like, oh, I'm done.
Marc:For no reason.
Marc:So it was always a fight.
Marc:Yeah, you can talk yourself out of a good show.
Marc:Yeah, and I don't think I knew how to have a good show.
Marc:The fact that I was doing regional gigs in the Boston area was crazy.
Marc:Me?
Marc:Like, you know, I watch you.
Marc:You're speaking their language.
Marc:You have the right accent?
Marc:And I'm like...
Marc:Revere Beach Jones.
Marc:Yeah, but when you started, though, like I don't remember you from Sam's, like played against Sam's and shit.
Guest:I hung out there.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:Well, Nick's was my home club.
Guest:Right.
Guest:But when did you start, though?
Guest:Like 87?
Guest:Yeah, 87.
Guest:Like the spring of 87.
Guest:Right.
Guest:So we were working year in.
Guest:That's the weirdest thing about those gigs.
Guest:Well, that's how much stage time there was.
Guest:Yeah, because they had all those gigs everywhere.
Guest:Every restaurant and pub.
Guest:I'll show you my book from my first year, Over 300 Nights.
Guest:Like B.B.
Guest:King for Christ's sake.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Every restaurant and pub.
Guest:On a Monday night, I'd be at a Mexican restaurant in Franklin, Mass.
Guest:Franklin.
Guest:Franks and Franklin.
Guest:Franks and Franklin.
Guest:With Drunk Frank.
Guest:Thank you.
Guest:Next night, I'd be the holiday in Nashua, New Hampshire.
Guest:I remember that one.
Guest:On Tuesday.
Guest:Wednesday, I might be back at Stitches.
Guest:Thursday, I'm in Providence, Rhode Island at an Italian restaurant.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Friday, I might be back at Nick's.
Guest:Saturday, University of Massachusetts.
Guest:It was every pub and restaurant in New England.
Guest:Ski Lodge in Vermont.
Marc:Remember all these gigs?
Guest:Three of them.
Guest:Mother Shapiro's.
Guest:Mother Shapiro's.
Guest:B.K.
Guest:Denny's.
Marc:BK, how do you remember?
Marc:I don't fucking know.
Marc:You're like Louie.
Marc:You're like Louie.
Marc:We remember certain things.
Marc:Somehow you convince yourself it'll be nice.
Marc:It'd be nice up there in the winter.
Marc:We'll go up.
Marc:We'll hang out at the nice house.
Marc:It's a nightmare.
Marc:Mother Shapiro is a fucking nightmare.
Guest:Mother Shapiro.
Marc:With that weird Jewish dude that ran the place.
Marc:And there was that weird mixture of skiers and fucked up locals.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:I was there once and some guy, like, basically, there was a group of fucking creepy ass dudes.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Hitting on my fucking, you know, what became my wife, Kim.
Marc:And I'm like, you know, I'm no fucking fighter.
Marc:I'm sort of like, let's just go.
Marc:You get out of here.
Marc:We were mostly working for Barry Katz's Boston Comedy Company.
Marc:That's right.
Marc:I didn't work for The Connection much.
Marc:I worked for Mike Clark.
Marc:I worked for Barry.
Marc:You and me both.
Marc:I didn't work for The Connection either.
Marc:I still remember Mike Clark's phone number.
Marc:It's so fucked up.
Marc:Oh my God.
Marc:I still remember his phone.
Marc:It was, you remember, it was, he had the answering machine.
Marc:But so we'd go and you never knew what you were driving into.
Marc:Remember Lemonster?
Marc:What was that?
Marc:Poncho Villas and Lemonster?
Guest:Poncho Villas.
Guest:I did it two nights in a row for some reason.
Guest:A guy was yelling, second night he was yelling my punchlines.
Guest:A guy came back to see me.
Guest:He's yelling my punchlines out from the balcony.
Guest:I went up in a balcony with a microphone.
Guest:You did?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:It was one of the first places that had no wire on the thing.
Guest:I went up there and I'm like, who's yelling my shit out?
Guest:And the guy raises his hand.
Guest:So I'm interviewing him in the balcony.
Guest:Oh, my God.
Guest:Imagine yelling my punch.
Guest:And I'm upset at a club like that.
Marc:Remember Banditos?
Marc:There was Banditos in Fall River.
Marc:Your memory is killing me, dude.
Marc:I thought you smoked a lot of weed.
Marc:No, I haven't done anything in a long time.
Marc:I have selective memory.
Marc:I can't remember some people's names that I've known for 20 years.
Marc:You can remember banditos.
Marc:Yeah, but you know why?
Marc:And I realized this later because I had it with the comedy store.
Marc:It's like where we were abused.
Marc:It's like traumatic experience.
Guest:That's what I was going to say earlier.
Guest:I know.
Marc:It's like a childhood rape.
Guest:You're not going to forget that face.
Guest:Kind of, right?
Guest:Mike Clark's phone number is...
Marc:I didn't know.
Marc:I knew that I had to do the job, but it's sort of fascinating to me, given my temperament and my mind, that that's where I learned how to do comedy, was going into regional New England and doing it.
Marc:And those are not easy audiences.
Marc:No, they weren't.
Marc:And I was a freak.
Yeah.
Marc:we didn't know how good it was for us you know i mean to work that much that early in your career that's how we learned we we didn't know though but we were able to skip over the fucking host spot it was a gift that's right that's you know you're gonna be gonna be a local opener that can't get that can't get bumped up to middle and then never get worked as a headliner right that's what happens to those guys right
Marc:A lot of them do fine, but we literally had to do the job.
Marc:You got these guys coming in from out of town or the colleges.
Marc:The weird thing about the fucking colleges is that when we were doing colleges for Barry, he was giving Anthony Clark and Eddie Regine the big money on the ticket, and we didn't know better.
Marc:That's exactly right.
Marc:It's like you go out and do the 20 in a fucking lunchroom.
Marc:You know, for $100 and fucking Anthony's walking with five grand.
Marc:Yes.
Marc:We didn't fucking know.
Marc:No, we didn't.
Marc:We're just like, let's have the gig.
Marc:That's Barry, man.
Marc:Right.
Marc:Always with the... He had me on his podcast and he literally let me shit on him for an hour and a half.
Marc:He loved it.
Marc:That's the weird thing about Barry.
Marc:Well, no, no, no.
Marc:I guess that's true.
Marc:Do we have it on film?
Marc:Yeah, yeah.
Marc:No, but he likes you when you bust his balls because he knows he deserves it in his heart.
Marc:So he gets a bigger kick out of being, you know, busted on than anybody I've ever met in my life.
Guest:He's always loved me, right?
Guest:Right.
Guest:Because he was my first manager.
Marc:I remember the time that happened.
Marc:It was like a mafia thing.
Marc:Like one day you get this call and everyone's brought into the basement and he slides the papers in front of you.
Guest:Oh, this is how it went down with me.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:This is my favorite Barry Katz story because it sums up his management style.
Guest:Right.
Guest:And how he.
Guest:I was at Knicks.
Guest:I went on in front of Dana Gould.
Guest:Again, I'm only doing it a year.
Guest:Dana Gould's like 17.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And brilliant.
Guest:Amazing.
Guest:And I'm up there doing raw stuff because I'm new.
Guest:I'm probably being dirtier than I should be or whatever.
Guest:And destroying.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Probably for all the wrong reasons.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Right.
Guest:I come off.
Guest:Dana Gould goes on and starts bad-mouthing me on stage.
Guest:Now, I've only been in the business about a year and a half.
Guest:I'm in a suit jacket.
Guest:I still have my college football muscles.
Guest:People hate me just for that because this is a nerd business.
Guest:Not then it wasn't.
Marc:Not at Knicks.
Guest:Not at Knicks.
Guest:But I'm wearing a suit jacket.
Guest:It fits me like a T-shirt.
Guest:And I'm waiting for Dana Gould because he's bad-mouthing.
Guest:As new as I was, that's one thing you don't do.
Guest:You don't bad-mouth the comic.
Marc:The cack before you.
Guest:So he comes off, and he's coming down the stairs.
Guest:I'm waiting for him.
Guest:So he's walking out of the building.
Guest:I grab him, push him against the wall in the hallway.
Guest:And I go, what are you doing?
Guest:He's like, what are you talking about?
Guest:I go, you fucking, you know, saying I was hacking and just shitting all over me.
Guest:I went, no, don't start fucking trying to.
Guest:I watched the whole thing.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Right.
Guest:So then, you know, I scared the fucking daylight up.
Guest:I go over to play it against Sam's later that night.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I'm sitting there with Kevin Flynn.
Guest:Barry Katz comes up.
Guest:Now, Barry has signed Kevin Flynn already, Jackie, everybody with me.
Guest:Oh, really?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:He had already signed a few of my friends.
Guest:Right.
Guest:He comes up to me.
Guest:He goes, hey, DiPaolo.
Guest:And I hadn't even met Barry.
Guest:I heard what you pulled.
Guest:I heard the shit you pulled, like, with my client, Dana Gould.
Guest:Dana was with him?
Guest:Yeah, at that point.
Guest:So I go, Barry, do you want to hear my side of the story?
Guest:He goes, sure, I do.
Guest:Call me on Monday and hands me his business card.
Guest:So I call him on Monday.
Guest:He ends up signing me.
Guest:Is that not?
Guest:That's crazy.
Guest:Is that not?
Guest:That's like something you'd see in a movie.
Marc:Right.
Marc:Like a sleazy agent.
Marc:Yeah, yeah.
Marc:I didn't sign with him.
Marc:He did it all at the same time.
Marc:He made this weird jump.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:And he brought me into one of the rooms in the basement there where he was running in his apartment.
Yeah.
Marc:Right?
Marc:In Austin.
Marc:He gave me the pitch.
Marc:He had the paper right there.
Marc:I said, look, I don't know what it means or what you would do for me, but I can't do it.
Marc:I don't know what it means.
Marc:What do you want me to sign?
Marc:I think in that run, he signed Al Ducharme, Marcy Rose, Ed Regine, Louis C.K.
Marc:He signed that whole first crew.
Marc:Anthony Carr.
Marc:I think Chip was like, Anthony's my guy.
Marc:He had everybody.
Marc:And it took all of you a little while to get rid of him.
Guest:Did it ever.
Guest:Did it ever.
Guest:I moved down to New York with Louis C.K.
Guest:He was my roommate.
Guest:Barry got us an apartment on the up west side.
Marc:Because Barry opened the club here, the Boston Comedy Club, and the idea was he's going to run you guys, his guys, through there.
Marc:And then he had that magical apartment.
Guest:That's right.
Marc:Bunk beds.
Marc:Yeah, bunk beds.
Marc:You and Louie.
Marc:But everyone came in, right?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:There's definitely some stories in that apartment.
Guest:And then me and Louie had it after people started coming.
Guest:It was me and Louie.
Guest:Oh, was that fun?
Guest:Was it?
Guest:Looking back on it.
Guest:Oh, I mean, those were the good times.
Guest:We wandered around New York City, me and Louie.
Guest:Louie had no concept how to use money.
Guest:And we went out.
Guest:We did the punchline in San Francisco.
Guest:I mean, Louie, for a week.
Guest:I've told the steer on many.
Guest:He goes, I'm going out.
Guest:And we had a net worth of probably $1,200 between us at that point, right?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:He goes, I'm going out to get a VCR.
Guest:This is how long ago.
Guest:I'm going to get a VCR so we can watch movies all week at the hotel.
Guest:He's gone for like four hours, comes back with an $800 trumpet.
Guest:A trumpet?
Guest:That's the trumpet?
Guest:Yes.
Marc:Because I remember him buying a trumpet.
Marc:Right, yeah.
Marc:Yeah, there's a couple of trumpet stories.
Guest:We weren't even making $100 that week between us, I don't think.
Marc:He bought a car out there, too, to drive.
Marc:Like, he would buy cars at places and then leave them on the side of the road.
Guest:Right.
Guest:That's why I love him.
Guest:He's the real deal.
Guest:He was screwy Louie, man.
Yeah.
Guest:and we and we laid in bed and we used to play this game i took a i took a shit so big and then you do an analogy uh-huh right right i took a shit so big it was worth 20 electoral votes uh it took a shit so big it sprang i sprained an ankle and we we would lay there till five in the morning laughing just belly like it was like a good comedy exercise you know i mean that's a funny bit it's a funny because that doesn't exist anymore bunk you're doing bunk beds like kids yes doing jokes yes that's hilarious
Guest:No, we... And he had his motorcycles.
Marc:Those are my fond memories.
Marc:And he had a motorcycle that he almost got killed on.
Marc:And then he had cars here that he would wreck and park.
Marc:And then eventually they'd just be taken away.
Guest:Somebody stole his Honda.
Guest:Remember he had a Honda Prelude when we first started?
Guest:Uh-huh.
Guest:And somebody stole it and like...
Guest:Left it like two blocks from where he was living in New York.
Guest:And he does a joke about somebody stole his, oh, somebody stole his watch out of the car.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And he saw the guy wearing his watch in the neighborhood.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And he goes up to the guy, he goes up to the guy and he goes, can you tell me what time it is?
Guest:And the guy likes it and Louie goes, you got to push the button.
Ha ha ha.
Marc:that's one of his early bits so we all did the like we like at that time because Barry was sort of like he Barry always helped me but like that was when you guys were in New York and they they were shooting Caroline's comedy hour here yes so we got to do that we got to do the MTV weird 10-minute things but there was a lot of basic cable
Marc:shit we all did yeah what when and why did you decide to go to LA what how old were you then because I remember there's this weird memory I have I was visiting in LA because I didn't really move there until 2002 so I don't remember when you were there but I was driving somewhere and I saw you walking across the street from a coffee shop or you know something in a mall somewhere and I said hey how's it going and you were just sort of like without even provocation you're like I got fucked I know that Tony Danza was involved I don't remember what
Guest:oh yeah i had a deal with tom but i didn't get fucked there i actually got made some money uh must have been before like you were just sort of like just like alone walking that is perfect and you were like just you know just like without you like how you doing it ah fuck this plate you know like right out of the gate i was like holy shit i get really bad memory i went out there twice i went out on my own like a 93 for like a year so the first wave so you're like i'm gonna i'm gonna do it yeah and you leave new york yeah 93 or 94 and i gotta with no deal just to go
Guest:No deal, but Rich Super would just sign me with Irving Arthur.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Which is a good agency, and he was my agent.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:So, yeah, I went out there, and like an idiot, I find the place on Venice Beach, a basement apartment.
Guest:I leave my girl from behind, Nancy, from National Hampshire.
Guest:Arsenio Hall had me on a show like three times in six months.
Guest:Had I moved at that point?
Guest:I'm so bad with dates.
Guest:The first, he had booked me.
Guest:I knew I was going to be on his show.
Guest:Right.
Guest:And my manager said, yeah, you got to move out there.
Guest:Not Barry, though.
Guest:It wasn't Barry.
Guest:I forget who talked me into it, but I left my girlfriend behind.
Guest:I was going to be a star, like an idiot.
Guest:Right.
Guest:I get out there.
Guest:I don't know anybody.
Guest:Rich Super's not around.
Guest:And you moved to Venice?
Guest:Venice.
Guest:Because Rich was out there in Santa Monica.
Marc:So for Nick DiPaolo from, where are you from?
Marc:Brockton?
Marc:No, Danvers.
Marc:Danvers?
Marc:North Shore.
Marc:North Shore.
Marc:There you are.
Marc:The entire world of minorities and freaks is at your doorstep.
Marc:That never bothered me.
Guest:I don't think it does really bother you.
Guest:you know people i got there again from tough crowd i said a lot of shit to patrice who was my friend yeah i got pigeonholed they're quick in this business if you say they're quick in this culture to let's throw that on you yeah but uh you're right i get out there was a culture shock but i'm living in a basement apartment i want my girlfriend back nancy i miss her yeah i literally call home i kept calling the house the father's answering at like three in the morning i'm like where's nancy
Guest:She's done with you.
Guest:I cheated on her before we left New York.
Marc:Oh, you did.
Marc:Right.
Guest:So she's like, no.
Marc:You're calling jealous or sad?
Marc:Both.
Marc:Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Guest:I'm like, he goes, no, she's out with a guy, Brian, down the Cape.
Guest:And he goes, Nick, you're not a bad guy because he was, he apparently, he was, you know.
Guest:A wild man when he was younger.
Guest:Doesn't make you a bad guy.
Guest:But I'm crushed.
Guest:I'm sitting in Venice Beach.
Guest:Mark, I went 14 days without taking a shower.
Guest:Fucking sitting against the wall.
Guest:I got my wife beat her on.
Guest:I'm eating pizza by myself.
Guest:Evan Grant.
Guest:Do you remember Evan Grant?
Guest:He worked in like Brian Steinberg's office.
Guest:Kind of a good looking kid.
Guest:Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Guest:I do remember him.
Guest:Luckily, he was out there.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And a real player with the chicks.
Marc:Right.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:He saved my life.
Guest:It was like that movie with Vince Vaughn.
Guest:What is it?
Marc:Swingers?
Marc:Yeah, Swingers.
Guest:It was just like that.
Guest:Remember they kept dragging... The Favreau character?
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:I was that guy.
Marc:Oh, really?
Guest:I lost like 20 pounds.
Guest:I was running every morning on that... On the boardwalk?
Guest:That boardwalk over Venice Beach, like six miles.
Guest:I fucking was ripped.
Guest:But I wasn't eating.
Guest:I was depressed.
Guest:You look good, though.
Guest:I look like John McCain when they pulled him out of the Vietnamese prison.
Guest:Had him shaven.
Guest:I weighed like 11 pounds.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I would just totally fuck my... I'd go home.
Guest:I'd fly home and try to get her back.
Guest:I'd drive up to her house.
Guest:Oh, that guy.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:With flowers or something?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I remember even my mother going... They'd pick me up at the airport.
Guest:My parents, my mother goes, I wish you'd act like a man.
Guest:Act like a fucking man.
Guest:I go, that's how I get into this problem in the first place.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:my father's laughing my mother's almost crying oh my god so i had a horrible and then i then i moved back to new york and then went out there went out to but so that was it so when you were out there in venice it just didn't nothing happened you did arsenio a couple times a few times and uh yeah and uh evan grant thank god he was in my complex and he used to fucking save my life and one sunday i'm walking just what you just said i'm walking down the sidewalk with a miserable look on my face
Guest:Evan Grant's coming the other way.
Guest:I step in dog shit.
Guest:It's like 108 degrees.
Guest:The beach is closed because of gang activity.
Guest:And I go, I'm out of here by Wednesday.
Guest:Fucking watch me.
Guest:He starts laughing.
Guest:Sure enough, I packed all my shit.
Marc:That was it.
Marc:Dog shit and gang activity.
Guest:That was it, man.
Guest:Nothing was happening.
Guest:So you flew back and you tried to get the girl back.
Guest:You didn't get her back.
Guest:couldn't get her back and and and uh yeah so i come back to new york and um what the hell did what were your parents thinking like how how many brothers and sisters you got i got uh three sisters and a brother i'm in the middle all italian all the way through no no no i'm half italian that's the other thing and and and french canadian and english on my mother's oh your dad's italian yeah and what you so you guys what you were a football player
Guest:Yeah, I played, you know, I played, I was a captain at high school.
Guest:Me and my two buddies were tri-captains.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And I went up to Maine, and I tore up my shoulders in high school.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Busted up my shoulders.
Guest:I had surgery after.
Guest:Walked on at Maine.
Guest:I was supposed to get a scholarship.
Guest:That's another heartbreaking story.
Guest:To the University of New Hampshire.
Guest:That didn't turn out.
Guest:So I walked on at the University of Maine and earned a, you know, partial scholarship.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And played up there for a couple years.
Guest:Did you finish college up there?
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Best time of my life.
Guest:Was it?
Guest:It was there or BU.
Guest:I couldn't decide where to go.
Guest:I was at BU.
Guest:Oh, you did go to BU.
Guest:I went to BU, yeah.
Guest:I didn't go because I... Want to get out of town?
Guest:Yes.
Guest:The distract.
Guest:I go... It was a good move because up at Maine... I've been up there.
Marc:What part of Maine?
Guest:I couldn't even focus up there on books, though.
Guest:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Guest:I can imagine if I went to BU.
Guest:No way.
Guest:What part of Maine?
Guest:It's called Orono, but it's a little north of Bangor.
Guest:Yeah, far.
Guest:240 miles from where I grew up.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Fucking best time of my life.
Guest:It blew high school away.
Guest:I would do it again in a second.
Guest:Fondest memories of my life, University of Maine.
Marc:Sure.
Marc:You got all the freedom in the world to do whatever the fuck you want.
Marc:And I guess you were playing on the team.
Guest:Not until I went out this spring of my sophomore year for spring football.
Guest:Like I said, I walked on there.
Guest:I didn't know who I was, and I sort of opened some eyes.
Guest:Jack McNeil recruited me, a guy that coached Doug Flutie at BC.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I walk in there after having shoulder surgery, right?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I had atrophy to about 170 pounds.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I get the balls finally to walk into his office and go, you recruited me.
Guest:And I said, I want to be part of the program.
Guest:He literally goes, well, you can carry water and shit.
Guest:He knew that would blow me out of the office.
Guest:Fucking what an asshole.
Guest:Literally, he goes, you could carry water buckets.
Guest:I'm like, this mother.
Guest:I go, I fucking excused myself politely and walked out of there.
Guest:But he was right.
Guest:I had a sweatsuit on.
Guest:I weighed about 11 pounds.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:You know, it's still Maine football, but the guys are fucking big.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And doing steroids and shit.
Guest:And so, you know, I was in no shape to play football.
Guest:Took a couple years.
Guest:I went home, got strong over the summer.
Guest:And then a new coach came in and I walked on.
Guest:And, you know, it was fun.
Marc:It's weird when you think back of the fun times.
Marc:But then it's not like you had a good time living with Louie and shit.
Marc:Oh, my God.
Marc:But when did you decide to do comedy?
Marc:Why?
Guest:It's the same reason I think a lot of us.
Guest:Well, I was always attracted to it.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And I've heard other famous people tell the same story, but it was true.
Guest:My parents would go, you got to go to bed downstairs watching TV downstairs.
Guest:I'd go up and leave the door open a crack to watch Johnny Carson's monologue.
Guest:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:I was attracted to it.
Guest:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:And my buddies were funny as hell.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:You know Boston kids.
Guest:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:My buddy Bob Murphy was David Letterman before Letterman was Letterman.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Brilliant.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:Went to work at a think tank this kid.
Guest:Graduated first in our class.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Funniest motherfucker I ever met in my life.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Another guy, Greg.
Guest:You still talk to him?
Guest:On occasion.
Guest:On occasion.
Guest:That's the other sad thing.
Guest:We go our separate ways.
Guest:It is really weird.
Guest:It bums me out.
Guest:But that's what, you know, so I was always attracted to the stand up to the stand up thing.
Guest:And I'd see Jay Leno on the Merv Griffin show and go, that guy sounds like me.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:And it turns out he's from Andover, which is, you know, 10 minutes from where I grew up.
Guest:right yeah i go wait a minute i think i could do this and then bob murphy my very funny buddy dragged me into stitches one night like in the mid-80s to watch paradise to watch steve sweeney it's stitches interesting wasn't really his club but yeah yeah sweeney mean you yeah oh right the sweeney and meanie show that's right and it means like wednesdays or something we were blown away sweeney actually like picked on me look at this good-looking giddy yeah told me a new asshole and i was fascinated
Guest:This is why I think I believe in God sometimes.
Guest:I was a barback at Stitches before I was a comedian for like six months.
Guest:I was in awe of Steve Sweeney.
Guest:I was afraid of him.
Guest:I was so in awe.
Guest:It was like Ted Williams to me.
Guest:I just moved to an apartment in Boston with my other buddy Tony.
Guest:I get drunk on St.
Guest:Patrick's Day by myself.
Guest:My buddy was working at Faneuil Hall.
Guest:He gives me like 11 beers.
Guest:I wander out of there.
Guest:It's not even one in the afternoon.
Guest:I get on the fucking tea and I get lost.
Guest:I'm over by Huntington, by Northeastern.
Guest:I'm literally stagging down the sidewalk, and I'm thinking about comedy and Steve Sweeney and Lenny Clark.
Guest:As I'm thinking that, who comes stumbling out of a bar?
Guest:Steve Sweeney.
Marc:So I guess he was drinking at that point.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:And he goes, yeah, the fucking Guinea bar.
Guest:He goes, come on, let's go for a drink.
Guest:Dude, it was like Elvis.
Guest:It would be you being a kid in love with Elvis and Elvis comes out of a bar.
Guest:Right.
Guest:I still tell, I told my parents, I go, I never really, I don't know about God if he exists or not.
Guest:Right.
Guest:That day.
Guest:That day.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:We go and he get, you know, drink two Guinness and whatever the fuck.
Guest:I drank with him all afternoon.
Guest:Now he goes, I want to go to Avenue B. It's getting dark.
Guest:He drags.
Guest:We get in the cab.
Guest:We go to South Boston.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:He wants to score some coke.
Guest:Yeah, right.
Guest:I'm in the back of the cab with Steve Sweeney, my idol.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Dude, I fucking, I was hard as a rock.
Guest:I couldn't believe what was going on.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:We're in the cab.
Guest:He goes, we pull into some neighborhood.
Guest:It's getting dark.
Guest:This is on St.
Guest:Patrick's Day night.
Guest:They beat up Irish people on St.
Guest:Patrick's Day night.
Guest:Never mind.
Guest:I wouldn't get out of the cab.
Guest:Steve goes, here, hold my watch.
Guest:I go, why am I going to hold his watch?
Guest:I was so naive.
Guest:I go, why am I holding his watch?
Guest:Turns out it was like one of the – he gets out of the cab.
Guest:He's not out of the cab 10 seconds.
Guest:Three kids come around the corner, three guys with leather jackets.
Guest:You couldn't have made a more stereotypical – two of them had red hair, and they start chasing Sweeney up the street.
Guest:They want to beat the fuck up.
Guest:I go to the cab.
Guest:Cab driver takes off.
Guest:I go, what are you doing?
Guest:You can't fucking leave.
Guest:He said, fuck that.
Guest:I'm not going to get killed in this.
Guest:And then Sweeney, I didn't hear from him the rest of the night or day.
Guest:I call Stitches.
Guest:They didn't know where the fucking.
Guest:I come in on Monday night.
Guest:I'm working.
Guest:He comes in.
Guest:He punches me in the chest.
Guest:Physically punches me in the chest.
Guest:He thought I told the cab driver to take off.
Marc:Oh, my God.
Guest:I was almost going to get a fight with my idol.
Marc:I was ready to fucking get in.
Marc:I'm glad he lived.
Marc:What the hell happened to you?
Guest:The last I saw of him, I looked out the window of the cab.
Guest:He's sprinting.
Guest:And he had shoes on, not sneakers.
Guest:He's got shoes on and three guys are chasing him.
Marc:It must have been an old deal.
Marc:Exactly.
Marc:There was some history there.
Marc:Yeah, right.
Marc:There was some history there.
Marc:There's that motherfucker.
Guest:Right away, they came after him.
Guest:And he's the godfather of South Boston for Christ.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:How's that for a story, though?
Guest:It's great.
Guest:He comes out of a bar.
Guest:I'm lost in Boston.
Guest:I'm over by Northeastern.
Guest:What the fuck's he doing over there?
Marc:Did that make you decide to do comedy?
Marc:It sure in hell didn't hurt.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:And I used to try to be funny around him.
Marc:All right.
Marc:So then you start out and you start doing what?
Marc:The open mics there?
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Stitches and shit.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:George.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:George McDonald.
Guest:George McDonald's.
Marc:Comedy hell.
Marc:Comedy hell.
Guest:I pulled up.
Guest:I was drunk at my parents' house.
Guest:My name was in the hat, I think, and they told me I was on.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I almost got in a fight with this kid, my roommate.
Guest:I was living with an Alston, Anthony Seymour.
Guest:He's an eye doctor now.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I met him up at University of Maine.
Guest:He's from Augusta.
Guest:Now he has a practice, like, in my hometown.
Guest:Oh, really?
Guest:In a house in Topsfield.
Guest:What's the name of the town again?
Guest:Danvers.
Guest:Yeah, Danvers.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:So...
Guest:Yeah, so he confronted me one day.
Guest:He thought I was the funniest guy alive.
Guest:And all these open mics, comedy was booming.
Guest:He goes, you're a pussy.
Guest:We almost got into blows about it.
Guest:He's questioning my manhood.
Guest:He goes, you could be making a living fucking, you know, literally fucking almost got physical.
Guest:So sure enough, I put my name in the head of Stitches and they're like, yeah, you're on Sunday night.
Guest:And I'm like, oh, no.
Marc:That feeling is the worst.
Marc:We got three days or whatever.
Marc:Exactly.
Marc:And you're like, oh, God.
Marc:It was horrible.
Marc:And when you did Sam's and stuff, you'd get booked like six weeks out.
Marc:That's right.
Marc:You're doing five minutes in six weeks.
Marc:And then like for six weeks, you're like, oh, God.
Guest:It was fucking insane.
Guest:I went on at Stitches.
Guest:My first line ever was an ad lib.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Off the cuff.
Guest:That's when George goes, that's when I knew you were going to be funny.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I was in a sweatshirt and jeans.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And I go up and I followed a guy in a tuxedo.
Yeah.
Guest:Who was it?
Guest:I don't know.
Guest:So I went on after him, and I go, you know, I was trying to figure, I didn't know what to wear all afternoon.
Guest:I was like, what do I wear on my first con?
Guest:I go, I don't know.
Guest:I didn't know I was going to follow Mr. fucking Saunders.
Guest:That was a tuxedo local.
Guest:And it got like a nice laugh.
Guest:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:And you're like, I'm in.
Guest:I'm in.
Guest:Then my next bit was about shaving my sister's back or something.
Guest:That went in the toilet.
Guest:And then I did Archie Bunker being blown by a great white shark.
Marc:What?
What?
Marc:Well, that's pretty creative.
Marc:How horrible.
Guest:That was the seed, the seed of the Nick disposition.
Guest:But George said that.
Guest:George goes, when you did that ad lib and it got a laugh, it was the first thing out of your mouth.
Guest:He goes, you know, I saw something.
Guest:And then George would be on the back mic.
Marc:Remember, just making fun of other open micers.
Guest:That's right.
Guest:How about Bob Nickman?
Marc:Nickman I still see with the hat.
Guest:Funny.
Marc:He was so funny.
Marc:He wrote and did a lot of TV work.
Marc:He's a sober guy and he runs the Yuckaholics every year.
Marc:Him and Scheidner created this show that every year happens.
Marc:Huge show to benefit Halfway House and stuff.
Guest:my favorite bob nickman joke and he's the first guy i saw call a table of women cunts on stage but my favorite it's a big moment for nick i'll never forget that day i was like if that's okay i'm in i'm in how do i how do i get good at this how do i get good at this he but one of my favorite jokes he goes i i he goes uh i'd suck a dick not if it's like attached to a guy but if it was like hanging off a wall
Guest:Kenny, remember he used to take the hat off at the end and have pigtails?
Guest:He was a bald guy with pigtails.
Guest:Right, right, right.
Guest:Yeah, that was the big physical clothes.
Guest:But he was brilliantly funny.
Guest:They would kick me out of the green room at Knicks because I was the only one not doing blow.
Guest:Gavin, Lenny would show up, Kenny, and they'd go, hey, rookie, get the fuck out of there.
Marc:We don't want you to see this.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Marc:I remember.
Marc:I used to do it.
Marc:Remember, like, there was the green room, but then they'd close the place down, and then you'd sit there in the main room at a table with everybody.
Marc:In the main room.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:It's all dark.
Guest:John Panette, I did coke once before I went on stage.
Guest:John Panette, the late great John Panette, gave me a line of coke.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And that was the only time you did it?
Guest:Before I went on stage.
Guest:Oh, I'd do it.
Guest:I was at the Palace nightclub trying to pick up whores from Rivera.
Guest:You had to do it.
Guest:Only in that situation.
Guest:Trying to pick up a hairdresser from Somerville.
Guest:You had to fucking give her a couple bumps.
Guest:But, God, I got chlamydia 19 times out of the Palace.
Guest:But yeah, I only did it once before I went on stage.
Guest:Panette gave it to me.
Guest:This is a true story.
Guest:I'm up on stage.
Guest:I'm not even up there five minutes.
Guest:My upper lip keeps getting stuck to my teeth.
Guest:I'm tripping on my punchlines.
Guest:And I had my hand in my right pocket.
Guest:And all of a sudden, some guy in the third row goes, hey, relax up there.
Guest:I looked down.
Guest:I was jiggling my car keys in my pocket like 100 miles an hour.
Marc:Hey, relax up there.
Marc:That's the best heckle I've ever heard in my life.
Marc:Hey, relax up there.
Guest:He's just like, dude, slow down.
Guest:We want to see the show.
Guest:I hadn't done much coke at that point in my life.
Guest:To do it, to go on stage.
Marc:And I'm there as a comic.
Guest:It threw off my timing.
Marc:It's a bad drug for that, unless you're one of those guys.
Marc:Unless it works like Ritalin.
Marc:I was also like that.
Marc:If I did coke, my eyes would bug out, and I'd talk too fast.
Marc:I'd see footage of me.
Marc:I'm like, oh, my God.
Marc:And you're thinking, like, I'm nailing this.
Marc:It's like a fucking disaster.
Guest:Now I take Advil PM.
Marc:There you go.
Marc:Slow me down.
Marc:Yeah, but, like, that's so funny.
Marc:Hey, relax up there.
Guest:Guy yells, hey, relax up there.
Guest:He's being supportive.
Guest:It wasn't mean.
Guest:And I look down, and I hear my right hand doing this.
Guest:I think that's the best crowd heckle I've ever heard in my life.
Guest:Nick's was a rough Rome at times.
Marc:Oh, my God, dude.
Marc:The one time I get, I don't know how the hell I managed to get in with them, but I did.
Marc:They worked me.
Guest:Because you're a good comic.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:But, like, the one time, the first time I went up there for the guest spot, you know, it was a really big lesson for me.
Marc:Like, I was waiting to go on.
Marc:You're just nervous.
Marc:Because, like, the thing about me is, like, I couldn't be more different in my mind than that audience.
Marc:A very specific audience.
Marc:They were very, yeah.
Marc:White, sweaty, Irish, you know, tough guys.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:You know, like from all over, you know, they would come in from Revere, from Saugus, wherever.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:And, you know, it was like it was already I was already at odds, you know, and Leary's on just like he was one of those guys where you know whether he was killing or not.
Marc:But, you know, there's a lot of energy going on.
Marc:Like, so Leary's just like nobody more committed.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:That's what I learned from watching him.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:He could be dying.
Marc:You think he was killed.
Marc:Exactly.
Marc:But but so whatever happened up there, it was Leary for 20 minutes, 15 minutes.
Marc:And then they bring me on for my seven.
Marc:And I'm thinking, like, I'm just going to jump into his energy.
Marc:So I start out like that.
Marc:Like, I do, like, the first 40 seconds at this pace.
Marc:And I stop, and they're just like, what is happening?
Marc:And I just tanked.
Marc:It was horrible.
Marc:It's like seven, eight minutes of, like, the never-ending pain.
Marc:And I get off, and Dominic's like, hey, how you doing?
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:He couldn't even hide it.
Marc:Do you remember when it blew up?
Marc:Like somehow, like Knicks had the main room and then the dance club, they made a second show.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:And you could do like nine shows in one night at Knicks.
Marc:Yes.
Marc:You run downstairs.
Marc:Yes.
Marc:It was crazy.
Guest:Yeah, you do one up, go downstairs, go back up, go downstairs, never leave the building and make a nice chunk.
Marc:Yeah, big chunk.
Guest:What a money-making machine that was.
Marc:And then they opened up all those other rooms.
Marc:Satellite rooms.
Marc:You know, the one in Saugus is still there.
Marc:That was actually a good room in Kowloon.
Marc:Yes.
Marc:Like, it could really be good.
Marc:It was like playing a theater.
Marc:That was the first time I used the word cunt on stage, and it did not.
Marc:It was bad.
Marc:I used it right out of the gate, and it was a long half hour, that half hour.
Guest:I had a guy open his coat and show me a gun.
Guest:I was making fun of his wife.
Marc:Oh, really?
Guest:Big Italian guy.
Guest:I don't know what I was fucking thinking.
Guest:Did you stop?
Guest:Big sweaty Italian.
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Guest:He was sitting right in front.
Guest:He goes like this.
Guest:He goes like this real quick.
Guest:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:Saw the butt of the gun.
Marc:Hey, no problem.
Marc:Love her.
Marc:Love her.
Marc:Good for you.
Marc:How long have you been married?
Marc:Congratulations.
Guest:Congratulations.
Guest:I didn't mean that about your dress looking like.
Guest:Like a circus tent.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Exactly.
Marc:Nice leopard print.
Marc:All right.
Marc:So, okay.
Marc:So you come back to New York and you get strong again.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:And then when do you go back that way?
Marc:95.
Marc:Because that's when it really got bad, it seems.
Marc:Right?
Marc:No.
Marc:No.
Guest:I went out.
Guest:I went out.
Guest:David and Christine Martin were handling me.
Guest:Brett Butler just landed her big thing.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And I was being handled by.
Guest:Right.
Guest:By the same management.
Guest:And they were like, you know, come out.
Guest:audition for Brett show.
Guest:Louie was with them too, too, right?
Marc:Yes, he was.
Marc:Briefly.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:For a few months or whatever.
Guest:I remember Christy Martin going, Louie's such a liar.
Guest:He lies a lot.
Guest:I go, what are you talking about?
Guest:I don't, you know.
Guest:Louie would be the first to say that he did.
Guest:Yeah, exactly.
Guest:So, yeah, so I went out and, no, it was pretty good.
Guest:You know,
Guest:We all thought we wanted to be in sitcom world.
Marc:That was what we were trained to do.
Marc:You become a headliner, you get a voice, and then you get your show.
Guest:Yeah, what better way to get that voice out there than be a sidekick on Brett Butler's show?
Guest:Is that what you did?
Guest:Yeah, I played like a worker at her place.
Guest:I did like a half a season.
Guest:I was there when the whole thing blew up.
Guest:I watched it.
Guest:You watched it unfold?
Guest:Oh, my God.
Guest:It was the funniest thing you've ever seen.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I still love Brett to this day.
Guest:Brett Butler.
Marc:Borderline genius insanity.
Guest:One of those people.
Guest:I actually took the picture on the back of her book, her autobiography.
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Guest:I took the picture.
Guest:Oh, yeah?
Guest:I went to Alabama with her to research her book.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:She calls me up.
Guest:This is when I was still living in New York, and she had just become big.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Or I had an apartment.
Guest:I was staying at somebody.
Guest:I can't even remember.
Guest:No, I was living on the Upper East Side.
Guest:She calls me around in the afternoon.
Guest:I'm laying there watching a football game.
Guest:How do you like to open me in the Westbury music tonight?
Guest:I'm like, yeah.
Guest:And...
Guest:Who was the guy?
Guest:Do you remember the Italian guy?
Guest:He had a heroin problem.
Guest:He was very funny.
Guest:Did a stint on SNL real quick.
Guest:Oh, Vitale.
Guest:Vitale.
Guest:I interviewed him.
Guest:Did you really?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Loved Vitale.
Guest:He had a drug problem.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And he couldn't make it that night.
Guest:So I opened for Brett Butler.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:And then flew out to L.A.
Marc:Well, Danny was probably trying to be clean.
Marc:He probably just couldn't make it because he was too nervous.
Marc:Like, I got it.
Marc:No, you're right.
Guest:That was exactly the story.
Guest:The pressure sort of broke.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:But I ended up becoming friends with Brett on her show.
Guest:And she flew me.
Guest:She calls me when I was living in L.A.
Guest:She goes, I got Tom Cruise's Learjet.
Guest:I'm flying to New York.
Guest:She was doing something in New Jersey.
Guest:Next thing, I'm on Tom Cruise's Learjet with Brett Butler flying back to the East Coast to open for her somewhere.
Guest:Wow, that's great.
Guest:Isn't that fucking crazy?
Guest:So you did a lot of dates with her?
Guest:I got a little taste of showbiz.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:You know what I mean?
Guest:Just enough to tease me to keep me in the stupid business.
Guest:I know.
Marc:Sometimes you feel that way, don't you?
Guest:Oh, you shouldn't.
Marc:I shouldn't.
Marc:No, but I didn't even have that much success.
Marc:I never got into that rotation at all.
Marc:This only happened out of desperation.
Guest:Oh, dude.
Guest:Let me tell you something.
Guest:And I love doing this.
Guest:Radio's still my favorite thing.
Guest:I like it as much as stand-up.
Marc:Oh, no, definitely.
Marc:Because you have the freedom.
Marc:Nobody heckling you.
Marc:You can be funny conversationally.
Marc:So you're an inspiration.
Marc:Oh, thanks, buddy.
Marc:So you're working with Brett.
Marc:So you saw that whole sort of like the... Oh, that's so sad.
Marc:she used to write for the fucking dolly parton show i mean like her like that's right i mean like it's way it's really interesting like because a lot of people don't know about people who are you know what their life is like i remember i was gonna tell you i just interviewed remember john ridley the black dude yes he did comedy for like six or seven years in new york when we started yeah and then he just won the academy award for 12 years of slaves yes but he used to be a comic he never talks about every time i see that name yeah how stupid i am i go is that the
Marc:comic john ridley right it is right so i finally interviewed him just the other day and i'm like you know i remember you i remember his jokes he had smart jokes great jokes and and he just like he just shut that part out of his you know the resume out of his brain you know yeah childhood trauma really chalk it up to that right yeah but he's doing okay i guess the hell he won an academy award it did right yeah so all right so so you do the brett thing you're out in la what was the tony danza thing
Guest:how did that even come about i don't know it seemed to make sense to me it was katie face production is the name of his company yeah and uh before i that i got a deal bill do you remember a guy named bill gross that worked for the william morris agency i do remember him he was over qualified to be like a showbiz agent right because he was like a financial whiz or something right right right but i'm with him for five minutes he gets me a deal for 75 grand
Guest:i don't remember with who newcastle or yeah yeah whatever the fuck it didn't turn into anything yeah steve pamer david i love that guy yeah yeah well steve pamer his brother wrote a great script yeah for me yeah it was it was gonna be like a giuliani mayor and i i'm a childhood friend who runs his fleet of limos and shit and
Guest:That's great.
Guest:It was a great store.
Guest:Anyways, it goes nowhere.
Guest:Right.
Guest:But I got a check out of that.
Guest:And then I don't even remember how the Katie Face production thing, they might have saw me up at Montreal.
Guest:Right.
Guest:But I ended up going to Tony Dan's house and sitting on the couch drinking Heineken's.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And he's telling me how much he made on Who's the Boss and how much he made the network.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And he's in his softball uniform.
Guest:He just came back from the bat.
Guest:And I loved it.
Guest:He was so personal.
Guest:He couldn't have been nicer.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And and then I had an audition that went nowhere.
Guest:And about a year later, I had an audition for another show he was making.
Guest:And I had to read with him.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And I guess I was like nervous because halfway through the read, he goes like this and wipes my face.
Guest:And somebody said, that's what they do to make you comfortable.
Guest:He goes, oh, you got something on your face.
Guest:He goes like this.
Guest:He licked his thumb and wiped your face?
Guest:Licked his thumb and wiped my cheek like I had something.
Guest:And somebody told me, yeah, he... That's his trick?
Guest:Yeah, to put you at ease.
Guest:That's interesting.
Guest:And I was like, wrong guy.
Marc:Put me at ease.
Marc:Wrong guy to put his face.
Guest:What the fuck's this guy doing?
Guest:I want out of this.
Guest:Yeah, Tony.
Guest:So I was at his house and this beautiful house drinking Heineken's with Tony.
Guest:This is the shit that's cool.
Guest:I mean, you sort of take it for granted.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:I put that in the rear view mirror two seconds after half.
Guest:What's next?
Guest:Right.
Guest:Now I look back on it.
Guest:I go, dude, come on.
Guest:That's kind of cool.
Marc:Right, right.
Guest:My wife has been in love with Tony Dan since she was 10.
Guest:Right.
Guest:To this day.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I had to go take her to see his one man show a couple of years ago.
Guest:Oh, here?
Guest:The cabaret show?
Marc:Yes.
Marc:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:Yeah, it cost me like $550.
Guest:After that show, I go, it was good, Tony, but Jesus Christ, it cost me half a nickel.
Guest:He's laughing.
Guest:My wife gets a picture with him.
Guest:She still loves Tony to this day.
Guest:It's the funniest thing.
Guest:And, yeah, so in 95, I just met my now wife.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:We're just dating.
Guest:And I go, I'm moving back to L.A.
Guest:Christine, Dave, and my auntie told me to go out there.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And she follows me out.
Guest:I go, you can come out.
Guest:I'm not promising.
Guest:We just met.
Guest:She fucking comes up.
Guest:God damn.
Guest:Thank God she came out because, again, I didn't know anybody out there.
Guest:Right.
Guest:I had her over all the, you know, next thing you know, she's decorating my apartment.
Guest:And my wife just I never had a chance.
Guest:Looking back.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Never had a fucking chance.
Marc:That was the one she decided.
Guest:She saw me on HBO, a comedian special, said to her, her sisters, I'm marrying that guy.
Guest:Wow.
Guest:And then she saw me on Jon Stewart's talk show, and I was plugging a date at Caroline.
Guest:She came into Caroline's.
Guest:Which young comedian special were you on?
Guest:The one shot in black and white in the 1850s.
Guest:The one Dana Carvey hosted.
Guest:Janine was on it.
Guest:Listen to this line-up, Mark.
Guest:Spade, Janine, Kindler.
Guest:Not Spade.
Guest:Kindler.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:Kendler, me, Janine, Judd Apatow, Ray Romano, Bill Bellamy.
Guest:Bill Bellamy.
Guest:Right.
Guest:And Dan and Carvey was the host.
Guest:Wow.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:That's amazing.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Me and Kendler are fighting it out for the last play.
Guest:I think he pulled ahead of me with all his Letterman spots.
Yeah.
Marc:i don't know where's bill bellamy bill bellamy he had a stretch of movies you know yeah yeah it's it's weird how it all happens but you know the the the difference though is when we're sitting here talking is that we've clearly mentioned a couple of guys were like they disappeared and the the weird thing is is that the real dudes the ones that can't help themselves they find a way yes you know you find a way yes you do and and you know you hopefully it's not too embarrassing
Marc:You know, it's a good point.
Marc:You know what I mean?
Marc:Hopefully you can live with it or you're delusional enough to think that everything's okay.
Marc:Right.
Marc:You know?
Marc:Right.
Marc:It's fucking crazy.
Marc:It's been good to me.
Marc:No, I definitely.
Marc:This business has been good to me.
Marc:And it still is.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:And people, you know, respect you and like you and Louie.
Marc:Like, I love when, you know, like Louie uses you in the show all the time.
Guest:And he doesn't have to do that.
Marc:No, but it's a friendship.
Guest:And you don't have to interview me.
Marc:Yeah, it's a friendship.
Marc:No, we go way back.
Marc:I mean, way back, dude.
Marc:Wait 25 years already.
Guest:This business has a lot of generous people in it.
Marc:When you come up with people and you have relationships with people, I don't know any better people.
Marc:And the thing about it is it's not like normal life.
Marc:It's almost like we were all in the same war together.
Marc:And when we see each other, they're like, holy shit.
Guest:I remember when you lost that arm.
Marc:Yeah, that's right.
Marc:That was a bad night.
Marc:Bad night.
Marc:You doing all right?
Marc:Grew back.
Marc:Look at that.
Marc:You got your arm back.
Marc:That's right.
Guest:You were holding the mic with the other hand for like four years.
Marc:Yeah, it was your hook.
Guest:It's almost sad it grew back.
Guest:No, it's been very good.
Guest:Look, two weekends ago, three weekends ago, I was at the Ridgefield Playhouse.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:In Connecticut.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:It's a beautiful venue.
Guest:350 people pay 30-something bucks to see me.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Good show.
Guest:It's my favorite show.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And I told him next time I shoot something, I don't care if it's an expensive place.
Guest:I'm shooting at that theater.
Guest:It was fucking beautiful.
Guest:People in the balcony.
Guest:It was full down the bar.
Guest:Coming to see you.
Guest:Coming to see me.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:They paid and, you know, and they listen.
Guest:No waitresses.
Guest:No, you know, the theater is how nice it is.
Guest:Right.
Guest:They're hanging on every punch.
Guest:Shit, I mumble under my breath.
Guest:A tagline.
Guest:They catch that.
Guest:It's the best.
Guest:It was so, and I was home by quarter of 11.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And I get paid for what I'd get paid to do a club for a week.
Guest:Right.
Guest:It's the best.
Guest:What is, I mean, I can't complain.
Guest:Would you have that moment?
Marc:And I do anyways.
Marc:Like now that I'm doing like bigger venues, I'm still nervous about it.
Marc:But like when you start doing door deals at comedy clubs and you realize this is what these fuckers were making when I was starting out.
Like,
Marc:you know like you know i remember when i got when i was headlining comedy clubs in you know and no one knew me and i was making 1500 bucks for wednesday through sunday i'm like i did it i made it yeah and then you do a door deal like wait a minute yeah you mean 20 years ago were these fuckers doing that i know and then you wonder like why you know like that guy's still on the road yeah because he's doing door deals he's making a fortune yeah i wish i was that's all i want mark that's all i want at this point
Guest:I want, stand-up is still, I hate the flying and all that shit.
Guest:But being on stage, it's as fun now, if not more, than it was, I don't know how many jobs you can say about that, than it was when I first started.
Guest:Oh, me too, yeah.
Guest:But I just want to put asses in the seats at this point.
Guest:That's what it really comes down to.
Marc:That's all I want to do.
Guest:And like I said, that Ridgefield thing just reinforces that, that experience I had.
Guest:My second, I was there a year before.
Marc:Well, it's beautiful now because you got the podcast.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:And you got visibility.
Marc:And Howard loved you.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:And the thing is, you do have people that like you.
Marc:And they come.
Marc:It's just getting them there and getting the gig.
Marc:Right.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Right.
Marc:And I think what's interesting about you is a lot of people don't know this.
Marc:And we know it.
Marc:Because your public personality, once you decided to be completely opinionated.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:might alienate people, but you have your people, and I know you like to alienate people, but I still know you, and Louis still knows you, you're a sweet guy, you're a good-hearted guy, and you wrote for Chris Rock.
Marc:I mean, I don't think people realize that the difference between an act and the difference, what you're doing and how aware you are of it.
Guest:Well, I'm not even, yeah, and I...
Guest:Look, sometimes you have to do shit to get noticed.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I had to be.
Guest:I noticed.
Guest:Everybody thinks one way politically in this business.
Guest:Right.
Guest:I'm going to swim upstream.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Sometimes bad publicity is good publicity.
Guest:And the tough crowd experience was good and bad for me.
Marc:Right.
Guest:It got me noticed.
Guest:Right.
Guest:And there's a lot of people who think like me, and they still do.
Guest:Right.
Guest:But yeah.
Guest:But like I said, we live in a time where to be an opinionated white male.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Shut your mouth and swim with us.
Marc:A little bit, though.
Marc:But, you know, I understand that point of view.
Marc:But I think that when it comes down to doing comedy, that on your best night, you know, you're talking to a crowd that likes you and you're having a good time.
Marc:You're not up there just spewing anger.
Marc:Right.
Marc:You know what I mean?
Marc:I went through that phase.
Marc:It was a scary phrase.
Marc:Frankly, there was a period there probably.
Marc:I think it happened to a lot of guys, you know, right after 9-11.
Marc:Right.
Marc:You know, like everything sort of snapped into place.
Marc:That's a good point.
Marc:And the anger, you know, had a depth to it.
Marc:And, you know, it kind of unleashed a thing.
Marc:But you were kind of scary for a couple of years.
Guest:Maybe.
Guest:Nobody will tell you, though.
Marc:Oh, really?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Well, that's because we're comics.
Guest:Quinn will.
Guest:Colin Quinn's my best friend in this business.
Guest:And when he would hint, it's like having like your family member finally sit you down or whatever.
Guest:You know what I mean?
Marc:He's like a father figure.
Marc:Yeah, yeah.
Marc:That's when I started going, shit.
Guest:What did he say?
Guest:Well, just I'm afraid he goes some of the, you know, I'd have meltdowns at the Comedy Cellar.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:A lot.
Guest:Right.
Guest:And he goes, you know, I'm just afraid that'll come back to bite you in the ass.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Eventually or whatever.
Guest:And I sort of knew that myself.
Guest:Right.
Guest:But it's fun to be, it's fun to walk that, see how far I can go.
Guest:Right, right.
Guest:Part of the, you know what I mean?
Marc:But you said the booze will make it worse.
Guest:Yes.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:And I'm not like I didn't drink like David held it in his prime or whatever.
Marc:I already like you just want those like when I drink, you know, you get, you know, something else turns on like they say.
Guest:And you probably know this from rehab.
Guest:It's not how much it's what it does to you.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:It changes you.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And I'm not blaming it on that because I'm not a fall down drunk.
Guest:But I actually.
Guest:Noam, the guy who runs a comedy salon now, about a year and a half, two years ago, he goes, look, you know how me and my father love how you stick your thumb in the eye of political correctness?
Guest:But he goes, you're even making it hard on us now.
Guest:And you know what?
Guest:I didn't argue one point of his...
Guest:I said, you're right.
Guest:Some nights I leave here feeling bad, how I turn the room into a, you know.
Guest:I feel bad about driving home, what I did or whatever.
Guest:That's how I know it's not right.
Guest:I have since sort of like kept distance from that room just to give them a break.
Guest:He wasn't going to suspend me, but, you know, he's got a lot of angry emails.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Isn't that weird, though, that whole, because I do that, like there's a couple reasons that happens where you actually feel bad.
Marc:You knew that, you know, that you did something.
Marc:Oh, yeah.
Marc:Fucked up.
Marc:And it's a real feeling.
Marc:And, like, I get it now.
Marc:Sometimes I get it where, like, you know when you're doing a room and you hear where the laugh is and you know you're not going to get higher than that.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Like, it's just the audience.
Marc:It's not even anything you said.
Marc:But there's part of you that's sort of like, well, I'm going to have to push harder.
Marc:You want the reaction one way or the other.
Marc:That's right.
Marc:You want to connect.
Marc:You want to wake them the fuck up or do something.
Marc:Like, sometimes when I'm bombing...
Marc:or not bombing, but not doing as well as I want, I won't get off stage.
Marc:I'll stay up there for two fucking hours because the one thing I don't want them to leave sane is like – He's a quitter.
Marc:Yeah, yeah, exactly.
Marc:It's like, all right, so this is where you're going to be?
Marc:Then I'm just going to stay up here and at least get your money's worth of something.
Marc:But there is that feeling where you know you crossed a line.
Marc:You're like, oh, fuck.
Marc:And then you sort of – there's something about that weird –
Guest:guilt or self-hating thing that like it's it happens a lot it's kind of compelling i'm not sure what it is maybe it's the way we we feel better about ourselves i don't fucking know what the fuck it is i knew something was wrong when i i i got an apartment on the upper east side right before i moved to la and uh here in new york yeah nick's diner was right across the street yeah corner yes to eat breakfast my first week in the apartment i go over there to have breakfast yes waitressy
Guest:She goes, are you a comedian?
Guest:And I go, yeah.
Guest:I go, how did you know that?
Guest:She goes, you call me a cunt at the Comedy Cellar like a couple months ago.
Guest:I go, don't spit in my eggs.
Guest:Please don't spit in my eggs.
Guest:Did you apologize?
Guest:She laughed about it.
Guest:Yeah, I go, look.
Guest:I go, you know, there's no way to apologize.
Guest:I go, but yeah, that's happened more than you realize.
Guest:It's more common.
Guest:Don't spit in my eggs.
Guest:Don't spit in my eggs, please.
Guest:But...
Guest:Yeah, but now, like my last hour I put out, I was never- Another sense was killing.
Guest:Yeah, another sense was killing.
Guest:Go to nickdip.com.
Guest:It's selling well, man.
Guest:Good.
Guest:Thanks to, I went out to LA, did Corolla Rogan and Fitzy, but it's selling well.
Guest:Good.
Guest:And yeah, on that, I was never a political comic.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:But like Colin Quinn, and I've said this on every podcast I've been interviewed on, Quinn said it best.
Guest:He goes, no, you're not a political comic.
Guest:He goes, but Nick, you could be telling a joke, a McDonald's joke, and people know how you voted.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Exactly.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:So, you know, I am not a political comic.
Guest:Are your parents still around?
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:How do they feel about everything?
Guest:Well, it's kind of sad.
Guest:My dad was just, like, diagnosed with Alzheimer's, like, last December.
Guest:He'll be 80 in October.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:No, but he tells me now how proud he is.
Marc:He never did.
Marc:You know what I mean?
Marc:Isn't that interesting?
Marc:They get softer and they get, you know.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:So the Alzheimer's, he says it and then he claims not to remember.
Marc:Exactly.
Guest:I go, can you recite one of my jokes, Dan?
Guest:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Guest:And my dad was the funny guy.
Guest:I mean, that's the other thing.
Guest:People ask my influence.
Guest:I used to watch him riffing at a cookout with my parents' friends.
Guest:My parents' friends would be double over.
Guest:Oh, yeah?
Guest:What did he do?
Guest:He would just like.
Marc:No, like what was his job?
Guest:Oh, he was a business controller.
Guest:My uncle owns a very successful machine shop, Tool and Dye.
Guest:My father's the bookkeeper.
Guest:Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Guest:So, you know.
Guest:He was a funny guy.
Guest:He was the funny guy.
Guest:And I used to see him riffing and making these people double over.
Guest:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Guest:He always had funny cracks watching TV, but he always laughed at shit that was inappropriate.
Guest:Right.
Guest:He always found the dark.
Guest:I tell a story about it on my, on Another Sense is Killing.
Guest:We're at McDonald's, you know, we're kids.
Guest:I'm probably eight years old in the back of a station wagon.
Guest:The whole family's packed in there.
Guest:Like an old lady came out with a tray and she slept on some ice.
Guest:Like fell and my father's laughing his balls.
Guest:He went out and helped her up.
Guest:That's my dad.
Guest:He was belly laughing before he got out of the car and helped her.
Guest:She was all right.
Guest:And we're all pointing and laughing, just following his lead.
Marc:Well, it's funny when it's fake.
Marc:I guess why wouldn't it be funny if it happens in reality?
Guest:No, exactly.
Guest:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:So, yeah, he was my dad.
Guest:Yeah, so he'll be 80.
Guest:My mother's like 78.
Marc:They're proud, though.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:You did all right.
Marc:They're happy when you make a living.
Marc:I think most of the time they're worried.
Guest:And I'm living in a nice house in Westchester.
Guest:I mean, it could have been worse.
Marc:Oh, dude.
Marc:Right?
Marc:Yeah, I've seen it.
Marc:I've seen it.
Marc:It's like it can get really heartbreaking and sad.
Marc:And you and I have both been through that.
Marc:There's not many people who don't pay their dues that get really big and hold it.
Marc:We've all had hardships.
Marc:But the rejection and heartbreak of having those moments where you really don't know if it's going to work out.
Marc:Yes.
Marc:At our age, because I had that when I started the podcast where you're like, what am I going to do?
Marc:What am I going to do?
Marc:Are we going to enter the job market at 45, 46?
Marc:There's nothing.
Guest:I still have this conversation.
Marc:You do?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I mean, I'm 53.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:You know, it's like, like I said, thank God for gigs like Ridgefield.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:That energy back into me.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And the podcast, my podcast is going, I've only been doing it two years and it's always in the top.
Guest:It's great.
Guest:On iTunes.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And I still, you know, I still love radio and I, and I got people working on it.
Guest:I really think that's where I'm going to end up.
Marc:Well, you don't have to go to radio and just keep elevating the podcast.
Marc:Well, yeah.
Guest:Maybe what you do is... You're the only one that's figured out how to monetize.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:Well, you can monetize.
Guest:It's just about numbers.
Guest:But you... Everybody... I always say this because, you know, my people, my web guy would be pointing to Joe Rogan and Adam Carolla.
Guest:I go, they were famous before they had their podcast.
Marc:Right.
Marc:You understand?
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:I go, Marin is the best example of... Yeah.
Marc:Didn't know.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:No one knew me.
Guest:You'll teach me how to monetize it.
Marc:No, I can't tell you that.
Marc:But what I was thinking, though, is that maybe you get to a point where you can have some sort of situation in the city where you drive down to interview people.
Marc:But you think the key is having... No, no, no, no, no.
Marc:No, I don't think so.
Marc:The key is really just figuring out who the hell knows how of getting people to the goddamn thing.
Marc:That's right.
Marc:There's still a lot of people who don't even know how to do... It's like some big fucking question.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:podcast how the hell do you what do you mean turn your computer on you have a computer you fucking idiot i know it's getting easier every year to find it ultimately will become easier but yeah we can talk about that but i'm glad you're doing all right and thanks for talking to me are you kidding me uh it's just like i said man uh i'm really impressed that you did it with the podcast
Guest:Yeah, I know.
Marc:One time in my life I had good timing, career-wise.
Marc:You don't know how the hell that's... It's the one thing no one can manufacture.
Marc:You see a lot of talented guys, you're like, why the fuck didn't that happen?
Marc:It's like, because the shit didn't line up.
Marc:The thing that we don't have any control over...
Marc:You know, is sometimes the thing that's going to turn.
Marc:Right.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:I just happened to get in.
Marc:You know, I had a certain capacity for radio and it was just at the beginning of this thing.
Marc:And, you know, I grew my show grew with the medium.
Marc:Like, you know, no one was a few guys doing it.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:But it wasn't like the thing.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:And it just turned around.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Well, I mean, a zillion people are doing it, so you got something.
Marc:That's right.
Guest:Seriously.
Guest:I keep feeling like career-wise, I feel like I'm on the old Let's Make a Deal show.
Guest:I keep picking the wrong curtain.
Guest:Yeah, I know.
Guest:I know.
Guest:Oh, the cow.
Guest:Wah, wah, wah.
Guest:4,000 cans of dog food.
Marc:Wah, wah, wah.
Marc:But you seem better personally, which is good.
Guest:Yeah, I am.
Marc:You got a little peace of mind.
Guest:I got a wife that sort of smooths me out and keeps my anger in check and
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:She goes, don't call him back and leave that message.
Guest:You're going to cost yourself 20 gigs.
Guest:20 gigs.
Guest:I don't want you sitting around the house.
Guest:I have tweets, Mark.
Guest:I've had tweets where my finger's an inch from the button.
Guest:I could commit showbiz suicide if I hit this tweet.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:And she goes, oh, what are you doing?
Guest:I'm like a suicidal guy with a gun through his head.
Marc:Go ahead.
Guest:I'll pull this fucking... Say one more word.
Guest:You'll be living back in that one bedroom in Queens.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:She has like parental controls on your computer.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:No, exactly.
Guest:That's...
Marc:I'm like a child who wants to see porn.
Marc:It was great seeing you, man.
Marc:Thanks, Mark.
Guest:Appreciate it, brother.
Marc:That's it.
Marc:That's me and Nick.
Marc:That's Nick DiPaolo.
Marc:Kind of a one-of-a-kind, that guy.
Marc:It was good talking to him, good seeing him.
Marc:Go to WTFPod.com for all your WTFPod needs.
Marc:Go to get a little justcoffee.coop over there.
Marc:If you get the WTF blend, get a little on the back end of that one.
Marc:You can get on the mailing list.
Marc:You can check the calendar.
Marc:And also, if you're new to the show, go to WTFPod.com slash guide.
Marc:to see everyone who's been on this show.
Marc:You can also get hooked up with Hal at WTFPod.com and I've just added a new poster.
Marc:I dug up an old poster that I love that you can get on the site now.
Marc:I'll sign it if you buy it.
Marc:It was a riff on the Black Cat's packaging.
Marc:The Black Cat Firecracker packaging for a live WTF and CD release party we did years ago.
Marc:It was always one of my favorite posters and I dug it up and now it's available again.
Marc:Whoa, here come the planes.
Marc:So now I'm going to play guitar.
Marc:So those of you who are trying to sweep, maybe you should turn it off.
Marc:Boomer Lives!