BONUS Ask Marc Anything #20
Thank you.
Okay, here we go.
Another episode of Ask Me Anything.
All right.
Here are your questions.
Have you ever blanked out during a live set and forgotten how to get back on track?
How do you deal with that?
It happens.
I wouldn't call it blanking out, but sometimes you'll miss a piece of the bit or the story.
That's happened before where an integral piece of
of the story a sentence it just got away from me and then usually what I try to do is back load it and you know so the joke makes sense if I am acting on my feet or in a few instances I've said oh that why didn't that work oh I forgot to tell you this part and I'll do that I'm comfortable enough to
To where I was in a live show where I can do that.
I don't believe it's happened to me on television, but it does happen.
And usually the immediate on your feet thing to do is really just backload it.
See if you can get it in there before you get to the ending.
So you're not missing that piece.
What was the worst stand-up gig you had that you can discuss without having a heartbreaking flashback?
Well, it has to be being sent home from Australia.
And I've told that story many times where I took a gig when I moved away from New York out to San Francisco for the first time.
And a guy had seen me from Australia from a place called The Last Laugh.
And he wanted a headliner for a month.
And I'd never really spent that much time out of the country.
And when I had very early on in my life after high school, I found it very lonely and depressing.
But I took the gig.
And it was supposed to be a week of previews, then a three-week run with the possibility of adding a week.
I did not have...
the full time.
I knew I was working at that point with about 40 minutes, good max.
I needed 50 to an hour, but I took the gig anyways.
And over the course of a week, uh, you might set just my confidence, the previews, my confidence just kept chipping away and chipping away.
And it was incredible.
I was so lonely there, and I knew I didn't have what it took for the job.
I didn't have the confidence, and I just basically had a breakdown.
I just remember that the show was structured with a guy, Greg Fleet, hosting, who I've since reconnected with.
There was a duo, a kind of burlesque act with these, not burlesque, what's the word I want?
almost like a cabaret act, two women in kind of fun makeup with an accordion.
As I remember, they did a bit and then they had a guy who closed with escaping from a unicycle from a straight jacket on a unicycle.
And then they did an intermission and then me.
And by the time that part of the show was done, I had so diminished and destroyed my confidence that the opening night after previews, I went out there and I bombed like you would not believe there was a vacuum to it.
And the guy the next day took me to breakfast and he said, look, I don't think this is working out.
I think you should go home.
And he flew me home and it was such a relief.
But I also relapsed on that flight home.
I might have had about a year and change sober that time.
And I'm like, fuck this.
I got 15 hours or so on this plane to just ruminate about failure and drink vodka.
That was by far the worst set, the worst gig.
When you do a taping for a special, how different is the experience for the audience?
Do they sit through multiple takes of your jokes?
No, you would hope not.
The idea of taping a special, you generally do two shows, you know, for safety.
And I think the only real difference is, yes, everyone knows you're taping because there are cameras around.
They understand everything.
you know, that they are at a taping.
And I think that diminishes some of the freshness of things, both for the performer and the audience, but also it heightens it in another way.
Occasionally you have to redo things and that's okay, but you don't, no, they don't sit through multiple takes.
You do one show and then you do another show and then you take the bulk of the special from the better show.
And if you didn't move around too much or fuck up the continuity and you need a couple of pieces from the other show,
You can kind of use it that way.
But it's a little stilted in terms of what the event is.
It's not exactly like a regular live show.
It's a little heightened.
And usually, I think for me, the liability is I don't want to be so polished that I detach from the material.
That's the real trick.
Okay.
I recently saw you in Louisville, Louisville.
You walked out after the show.
And while I wanted to say, hi, Mark, great show.
I wasn't sure how you felt about having your random audience members coming up and saying, hi, Mark, great show, shaking hands, making awkward eye contact, et cetera.
What are your thoughts on this?
Well, if I'm out there, if I've wandered out, which I will do sometimes, uh,
after the show, but I wait a while.
So usually it's just stragglers and people who are the last to leave.
I'm usually there to say hello to whoever's hung around or is there.
So I don't mind it.
I generally never really mind it.
I'm careful not to make it a clusterfuck and do a meet and greet because that gets a little exhausting, but I don't mind it.
I saw you live recently, and the MAGA babysitter was a pretty wild and demented nutcase.
Any chance that you will develop that character?
You know, it is something.
I don't know where that character came from, and I don't want to spoil anything for anybody.
But...
But yeah, yeah, I mean, it's worth exploring.
I don't know what I'll do with it, but yes, I'm aware that it is a wild and demented creation that I've got there.
A quarterly episode with Bill Burr.
How about it?
The conversations you guys have are incredible and you could show all the other comedian podcast duos how it's done.
I don't mind talking to Bill.
I think that quarterly would be fine if he's up to it.
I'm definitely open to that.
How do you go about getting guests to come on the pod?
Does it usually line up with press tours for movies, books or releases?
I've always been curious about this.
Well, we do and have for years now worked with a booker and we are given a list of people who are out doing promotions for any of those things.
And they usually know what my show is.
And then I kind of decide on the list, you know, who I'm interested in or who I could be interested in based on the list and what they have coming out.
And that's how we make our decisions.
But they do know what they're getting into.
I know Shane Gillis is ostensibly part of the Rogan crew, but would you consider having him on?
Do you like his material?
From what I've seen, I've watched one special and I watched his entire series or that season of tires.
I don't mind him.
I do truly think that...
The bit about George Washington that he did on the last special was brilliant.
And I can recognize that.
I'm not really adverse to having him on.
Are you still friends with Matt B. Davis?
Do you have any reflections on that episode a year and a half later?
Yeah.
I don't know if we're friends anymore.
I've heard from him a couple of times.
I'm sure that episode didn't make either of our lives easier because people fall on both sides of whatever happened there.
But I don't really know if we're friends.
Do I have any reflections on that episode?
I don't know.
It was a volatile episode, and I made a choice about...
talking to him about stuff that was personal.
And we, I used to do that more early on, but that was a heavy one.
And, and then, you know, afterwards, you know, he felt like he didn't, he wasn't represented properly and we did a second part.
So I, I felt like it was pretty full, you know, was it necessary?
I don't know.
Uh, but I, I think it was something that people related to.
And it was interesting that some people kind of took his side, some people took my side.
So I thought it was compelling, but, um,
I don't know if our relationship will be the same.
I tend to doubt it, and I don't know that it was necessarily worth that, but I don't regret it.
Did you offer Sir Ben Kingsley a coffee mug after the interview?
Separately, is the mug always taken by guests?
If I have mugs, they're taken, and people love them.
They become everyone's favorite mug, and if I had a mug, I'm sure I gave it to Sir Ben.
Which of your advertisers comped you the best swag?
Were there any in the past that you regret endorsing?
I don't know.
I don't really remember any that I regret.
I don't know.
The best swag that I use all the time is still our very first sponsor, JustCoffee.coop.
They've been supplying me coffee for many years, probably since 2007 or 2008.
And, uh, and I drink that coffee and I have a lot of it and sometimes I give it away.
Sometimes, uh, I, I, it just, uh, in terms of usage that, that is what I really get the most use out of.
Um, what else?
Yeah, I don't know that I regret.
I got an electric bike that was sent to me, and that's a pretty good piece of swag there.
And I got some record separators, you know, labels.
you know, wooden ones.
And they weren't even an advertiser, but I got that through.
They sent me some because I talked about them on Instagram, I think.
But the electric bike is there and it's demanding that I ride it.
And I have ridden it a few times and I like having, it's literally in my house because I want to get outdoors more with that thing.
It's not really exercise.
It's more like a Vespa, but it's kind of fun.
That's a pretty good bit of swag there.
yeah it comes you know people send me stuff and sometimes it's pretty it's pretty good but in terms of actual advertisers it's still just coffee is the one that that gets the most is most integrated into my life what are your top three favorite record stores in the u.s well now i'm gonna forget where that fucking record store is i feel like there's that one in st louis that's fucking awesome um what is that place hold on
Euclid.
I would say that Euclid Records in St.
Louis is a really good one.
Obviously, my favorite record store is Gimme Gimme Records, where my friend Dan is the proprietor and curator.
He's had the, I would say, the most impact on my musical tastes of almost pretty much anyone because he kind of turns me on to stuff.
So I would say Euclid Records is second.
Gimme Gimme Records is first here in L.A.,
Euclid in St.
Louis.
And I'm a big fan of the old Amoeba.
There's that other place that I used to like, Red and Black, outside of Denver.
I think it's about 20, 30 miles from Denver.
I had a good time there.
Permanent Records over in Glassall in L.A.
is good.
Did I say the original Amoeba?
It's good.
I went to Amoeba recently.
It's still pretty good, but I used to like the one, the original Amoeba down by the Synodome in LA and also the original Amoeba in San Francisco.
So that's how, how does that go?
So it goes Gimme Gimme, Euclid, Red and Black.
Is that what it's called?
I want to, I think it's called that.
It's Books and Records, but they have a lot of old shit there.
Permanent and Amoeba.
What is your dream guitar?
Well, I think I probably have one.
My dream guitar really turned out to be that 73 Telecaster.
I believe it's a Telecaster custom 73 with the humbucker.
I love that thing.
I love my Les Paul Jr.
with the single P90.
I think that my dream guitar would be like an actual late 50s gold top.
And I have not got one of those because I can't... I can't...
I can't really entertain spending that kind of money on an old guitar when I'm not really a professional musician, but I do like the old ones I have.
Would you say your favorite pickup is the P90, and is that what you use on most of the outro jams?
Sometimes.
I do love the P90 because you can get a full range of sound, and it breaks up really nicely.
It gets pretty grungy, but it can also get pretty clean.
You've got a lot of range with that thing, but I love that dirty sound.
When you pick up a guitar, what is the first thing you always play to test it out?
Is there a go-to chord or riff?
There is.
Just some pentatonic riffs, generally pretty simple blues riffs that I always seem to go to that are in the either major or minor pentatonic.
No song in particular, but just some old guy blues riffs.
Will you consider watching Brady Corbet's first film, Childhood of a Leader?
When you do, let us know your thoughts.
I did watch it, and I think I talked about it, but I did watch it, and I believe it's probably his best movie, better than The Brutalist even.
It's a stunning movie.
Really kind of another big film with a lot of space to think about how it's working on you, what it implies.
It's a sparse script in a lot of ways, given what it's really talking about.
And the last beat of the film is brilliant.
As you prepare to direct your film, what personal challenges do you anticipate facing?
How do you plan to tackle them?
Anxiety and impatience.
I think the biggest challenge is going to be to afford myself the confidence and space to know when a take is done, to know when a set is set up, to know what I'm looking for, and not to be freaked out all the time.
Just to realize that I put a good team together, and hopefully I will, to afford me the space necessary to just focus on directing the film.
As a moviegoer, what are your preferences in terms of where to sit, when to arrive, and what to eat and drink?
Well, if I've got no choice because it's a fuller movie, I will take an aisle.
If I go to one of the nicer movie theaters, I'll generally take, if I can, one of those handicapped
companion seats.
Obviously, if somebody shows up in a wheelchair and they're needed, I will let them go.
But in some of the theaters I go to, the handicapped companion ones in the center, you've got two and then there's an aisle in front of you.
So there's no one sitting in front of you.
And, uh, there's a space on either side of you for wheelchairs.
And obviously you, you, I buy those seats and I know that of course I would give them up if someone showed up who needed them, but that's where those are the best seats for me.
Um,
Regarding crimes and misdemeanors, do you think, considering one of the major themes of the movie is wealth and status shielding people from consequences of their actions, that Woody Allen was grappling with his demons when writing the final scene between him and Martin Landau?
Granted, this was a few years before the Dylan Farrell allegations, but it's interesting to watch the movie knowing what we know now.
Yes, I don't know.
I don't know if he was or not.
I can't speculate about that.
But certainly that that moment at the end of that movie is something that has been dealt with in literature.
It's been dealt with in the Russian writers.
It's been dealt with.
And I'm not letting him off the hook.
I'm sure he was grappling with his demons.
if he acknowledges that there are demons.
This is the guy that did make the movie Manhattan fairly shamelessly.
I would say completely shamelessly.
So I don't really know what goes on in Woody Allen's head, but the theme of wealth and status shielding people from consequences is sort of an ongoing theme and it's quite an ending.
It's really pretty stunning.
If you could remake any movie either as director or as actor, what movie would that be?
I don't know that's a pretty difficult question you know that there are there movies that I think could be better if they were directed differently sure I don't it's fuck I can't think of this kind of question I just don't know you know what movies I watch and I think like holy fuck why did they do that
No, I don't know.
But I will say this.
I do.
I in the same kind of light, I am kind of against things being recut as directors cuts long after they did the movie, because I think that part of the beauty, same with bootleg, not bootleg, but outtakes of music.
It's like whatever restrictions or constrictions were on the artists at the time that forced them to make the movie they did.
If it's a great movie, that version is the one I'll take.
Like, I can't watch Apocalypse Now Redux, and I don't care what anyone says.
The French plantation scene was good to not be in the movie.
So I don't know.
I would really have to think longer and harder than I am doing right now to figure out which ones I would redo.
Why did you move from Highland Park to Glendale?
Well, that old house in Highland Park was where a lot of things started and a lot of things ended.
And it got to a point where I realized it was a very small house.
It was less than a thousand square feet.
And at some point I realized, like, you know, I'm...
making some money i'm saving my money i don't have a family why do i need to die in this house and it was as haunted as it was special so i just was ready to to move into a different environment with a little more space
Has fame changed you?
I don't know.
I wish it has changed me more in terms of the way I see myself or my confidence or, you know, who I think I am in the world.
It's changed me in the way that, you know, I do not have to worry as much about money and I can kind of eat where I want.
And I'm not sort of constantly panicking about that.
And that's a great thing.
And that I don't think has anything to do with fame as much as it does with just, you know, making a good living doing what I'm doing.
Not a question, but I use a Nutribullet blender and my hummus is the smoothest ever.
Yeah, I believe that.
I mean, that's the way to go.
Like I have...
I have a Vitamix and I think it goes pretty good in there.
But I do have a sort of, I'm going to get a Nutribullet.
Because a lot of people were sending me this idea, which I've done before, where you remove the skins of all the chickpeas before you make the hummus.
And I think that screws with the texture.
It may make it smoother, but it also makes it too soft.
I think there's something about the cellulose or whatever it is that covers the chickpea that gives it a density.
But I'll take that advice on the Nutribullet or whatever it is.
Is that what it's called?
Where did that go?
Nutribullet.
Yeah, I'm going to get one.
What was filming Los Enchiladas like?
Oh, that was great.
That was a great time.
I mean, Mitch flew everybody out, Mitch Hedberg, and he put us up in a little hotel.
And there were so many of my friends there.
And it was just like, it kind of felt, it was kind of loose and wild and kind of, we didn't even know what it was going to be or if it was going to come out.
And it was fun, but it didn't feel like any movie set I've been on since.
You know, it was just kind of like a guy, you know, putting his own money into making something happen.
And it didn't have any of the affectation of a, you know, like a well-funded movie or even a well-funded indie.
It was just kind of a bunch of guys and women who knew each other as friends, both behind the camera, in front of the camera, trying to make this thing.
I had no idea how it would come out, but it was a fun experience.
What is the best thing to keep in the house for a vegan or vegetarian diet?
Oh, for me, it's brown rice, oatmeal, chickpeas, any kinds of beans.
I generally always have a slab of uncooked tempeh around and pickled things, sauerkraut.
I have some vegan chocolate around.
You know, just whatever the range of snacks you enjoy that are plant-based if they're not too garbagey.
When you smoked Stogies, what were your favorites?
I like a Bolivar.
I like a Cuban Bolivar.
Strong.
I like big, you know, punchy in the head cigars.
Those were really, once I kind of leveled off on something, those were special.
The Cuban Bolivars.
Do you think that living in LA made your disordered eating worse?
No, no, I can have that anywhere.
It certainly didn't make it worse.
It actually, living in LA is helpful in some ways if you are doing a vegan thing or a specific diet.
But no, I'm not vain in that way.
I just have a serious eating disorder from a lifetime of it.
I've been reading The Fantasy Bond thanks to your recommendation.
Not an easy read, but quite thought-provoking.
Can you summarize your understanding of it briefly?
Well, the mind-blowing thing for me from The Fantasy Bond, Dr. Robert Firestone's book, was that if your parents were emotionally negligent or abusive—
that when you're young and that's happening, you don't ever think to blame your parents because they're your parents or like your gods.
So what you do is you blame yourself.
And in that blame of discomfort from your parents' negligence or abuse, you put in place in your mind a very sort of specific self-parenting mode that is usually self-destructive one way or the other or self-judgmental or constantly,
You know, a voice in your head that you replace your parents with because you blame yourself for how you are when it's really because of the abuse or negligence.
And and that stays with you.
And it's really sort of trying to figure out and negotiate and fix that.
that voice, that inner parent, and the bond itself of constantly looking to replace your parents or find good parents in light of the voice in your head and in light of what you went through will sort of always end in defeat or roughly with the same emotional dynamic that you grew up with.
But it's that quest, you know, for this good parent that you never quite, you know, it's a...
You never find them.
You got to find it in yourself.
You got to sort of kind of train that voice in your head and realize the liabilities of your emotional wiring from what you grew up with and try to choose differently and live with that.
And that is of itself challenging.
I'm early in my recovery process, but I want to first thank you for all the times that you talk about it.
It has been extremely helpful to me.
I also was wondering if you got a lot of pushback from people in AA about you being public about it because of the tradition in AA of maintaining anonymity at the press, television, and film level.
Look, you know, with the AA thing, it's something I have sort of dealt with for years, and I understand that tradition.
The anonymity in press, radio, and film.
And I still understand it.
And I did get pushback at one time, but I'm pretty careful to qualify the fact.
I mean, the concern around that tradition in a general way, not in a bleeding deacon or AA position.
Zealot way was that you didn't want people out there who were talking about AA to be seen as representatives of AA in the way that what if their life comes unglued again or they relapse or they turn out to be...
fucked up they didn't want that sort of uh being you know indicting aa and i understand that but i'm very careful usually when i talk directly about it that i'm not a spokesperson for aa i'm clear on that that the fact that aa certainly worked for me and it doesn't work for everybody and there are other ways to get sober but in my experience with the show and being candid about being part of aa i i know and i and and
More than any other reaction from the show that I get publicly or through emails or people coming up to me is that you made me feel and believe that being sober was okay.
You helped me get sober.
You saved my life, whether they do it with AA or not.
So despite whatever pushback I got, which is really none now, the service that I feel is
is provided just by me being frank about it or candid about it.
My experience with it has, has, has truly been of service to, to people trying to get sober.
And, and that's why I continue to talk about it.
I turned 61 last year.
Like you, I'm starting to feel my mortality a lot more.
Are you?
Yes.
Yes, I am.
It's like I just wrote in my notebook.
I said, you know, life.
What did I write?
Hold on.
I'll tell you.
I don't think life goes by fast, but I do think all of a sudden you're old.
Yeah.
Yeah, man.
You got to think about like, well, am I doing everything that I want to do?
And am I feeling the way I want to feel?
Am I honoring my true self at this juncture in my life?
Because I don't have that much time to do those things.
And if I haven't been doing them my whole life, or if there are things that I've been struggling with my whole life...
It's time to accept or step up and deal with them if that's going to be something completing for me.
And I know that time is pressing now.
So yes, yes, I do feel my mortality.
Thanks for your questions.
I appreciate it.