Episode 795 - Paul Rust / Dax Shepard
Marc:all right let's do this how are you what the fuckers what the fuck buddies what the fucking ears what the fuckadelics what the fuck nicks what's happening i'm mark maron this is my podcast wtf
Marc:How's everybody holding up?
Marc:How you doing?
Marc:I'm all right.
Marc:You know, there was a big death week that hit me kind of, I don't know if it's hard, but certainly it definitely shook some stuff loose or made me reflect.
Marc:Chuck Berry died at 90, the true king of rock and roll and somebody whose music changed the entire trajectory of my life and brain.
Marc:And Derek Walcott, the Poet Laureate, Nobel Prize winner, died as well at 87.
Marc:That's somebody I studied briefly with, poet and playwright when I was at Boston University.
Marc:I don't know that I fully appreciated Derek at the time.
Marc:But looking back and now looking at his poems and having the memories I had, the few memories I had of him were are kind of nostalgic and interesting points in my life.
Marc:But Chuck Berry and I'd like to just talk a second about the two of them.
Marc:It's oh, by the way, we have Paul Rust on the show today.
Marc:And Dax Shepard stopped by to talk a little bit about his life and his new movie.
Marc:Sometimes I do these short interviews with dudes that have been on the show before.
Marc:And he came by.
Marc:It was nice to see Dax.
Marc:I like Dax.
Marc:But Chuck Berry, despite the fact that he's not known to be the most moral guy...
Marc:Some funky video going around of old Chuck years ago that involved farting and pee and sex and badness.
Marc:I guess just some dirty shit.
Marc:And he was also, I believe, busted for installing cameras in one of his restaurants or something in the ladies' room.
Marc:So, you know, not...
Marc:You know, dirty guy.
Marc:He's a dirty guy.
Marc:But he is Chuck Berry.
Marc:And the music from years ago, obviously I'm too young to have been there at the beginning of it, but I think I picked up in around probably 19...
Marc:In 72, in my room, in the basement, I had the Beatles' second album, and they do a cover on there of Chuck Berry's Roll Over Beethoven, and it just, I could not, it changed everything.
Marc:That beginning, that Chuck Berry, you know, I mean...
Marc:For some reason, that just drilled itself into the channels in my brain.
Marc:I don't know where those passages, those channels in my brain came from, but they just locked everything together.
Marc:I was obsessed with that song initially, Roll Over Beethoven.
Marc:And I sought out every version of it possible.
Marc:I found Leslie West and Mountain's version.
Marc:And eventually, I got to Chuck Berry's version.
Marc:Through the Beatles and Mountain, I arrived at Chuck Berry.
Marc:I think my folks had the Live in London sessions, which had his one hit, my ding-a-ling, his one number one hit, which was a travesty, really.
Marc:But I didn't really figure it out.
Marc:I'd played a little guitar.
Marc:I'd done very basic versions of Johnny B. Goode, just three-chord, open-chord versions when I was 11, 12 years old.
Marc:But it took till high school, when I was a failing bassist in a stage band who couldn't read music, that...
Marc:Uh, some dude with a comb in his back pocket and a perfectly feathered hair named Adolf, uh, Latino guy.
Marc:He, uh, he was the guitar player in the stage band and he showed me that opening Chuck Berry riff.
Marc:And I was like, Oh my God, I've got the keys to the world now.
Marc:Cause I already knew how to play honky tonk.
Marc:I knew the three core, but I knew that, but that was the, the, the riff at the beginning of the Chuck Berry songs was the missing piece.
Marc:And I felt enlightened and it stayed with me.
Marc:So, Chuck Berry, rest in peace.
Marc:I'll tell you, lately when these older guys that have had full lives die, I feel happy for them.
Marc:I'm like, you got out.
Marc:You got out and you got a lot in.
Marc:Rest in peace, Chuck Berry.
Marc:So, Derek Walcott.
Marc:Derek Walcott.
Marc:was a great poet.
Marc:And I didn't know a lot of his poems, and I've been going over some of them over the last day or two because I wanted to re-engage.
Marc:But how I knew Derek was he was a professor at Boston University where I went to school, and he had established the Playwrights Theater, which was a small black box theater up on... It was up on Com Ave, right near...
Marc:the old paradise.
Marc:There were some art studios in there.
Marc:And then there was the playwrights theater and it was a nice little space, but it was where he taught playwriting.
Marc:And my writing partner and good friend, Steve Brill was in the playwriting workshop with Derek.
Marc:And we had, we had written a thing together, this very broad comedy thing about a, an alien who comes to earth and, and he's a, he's basically Jesus.
Marc:And,
Marc:And it was a bunch of scenes that had a bit of an arc, but I just remember Derek was this very robust Caribbean presence who seemed to just, you know, had a tremendous appetite for life.
Marc:And I remember when we were performing this thing, he would tell us, you know, to keep pushing it, keep pushing the comedy and keep taking chances, you know, comedically as actors and in the writing.
Marc:And he was just a very impressive man.
Marc:Yeah, big presence.
Yeah.
Marc:And the funny moment that I had with Derek was I had gotten it in my mind, even though there was no indication of it really, that I could get into Yale drama school just by the virtue of my charm and my cockiness that I could go up there.
Marc:So I set up an audition to go up there and I've told the story about that before, but I don't think I've told this piece of it.
Marc:I needed a letter of recommendation.
Marc:And who the fuck was going to recommend me as an actor when I'd done some stage troupe stuff and I took one acting class years before.
Marc:But Derek had seen me.
Marc:He had seen me and I knew like he lived around the corner in a brownstone.
Marc:And I believe in my memory, it was the morning that I went to drive to Yale.
Marc:And I just, you know, I went up to Yale and embarrassed myself.
Marc:But the only non-embarrassing thing that I think I delivered that day was that I had gone over to Derek's house in the morning before I left.
Marc:It must have been like eight in the morning.
Marc:I pounded on his door and he came to the door in a bathrobe.
Marc:This, you know, this large man, I must have woken him up.
Marc:I believe he was lighting a cigarette.
Marc:I said, I need a recommendation letter for Yale for acting.
Marc:He's like, all right, come in.
Marc:So I walk in and he had like one of those old, what are they, Underwood typewriters?
Marc:In my memory, it was this antique looking typewriter and it was sitting on the top of, I believe, a file cabinet.
Marc:And he rolled a blank piece of paper into this old thing.
Marc:And he stood there in front of this file cabinet standing and smoking a cigarette and typed, typed me this one or two paragraph recommendation letter on this old typewriter.
Marc:And he pulled it out and he said, good luck.
Marc:I can't talk like him.
Marc:And I was like, very appreciative.
Marc:And I thought that was my ticket into Yale.
Marc:And it was not.
Marc:But it was an interesting moment, I'm sure, for both me and Derek.
Marc:And I respect him indulging me.
Marc:He must have known that I was terrible.
Marc:So RIP, rest in peace, Derek Walcott.
Marc:And I will read a poem by Derek Walcott and also what I think we can call a poem by Chuck Berry.
Marc:So I'm going to read a piece by Derek Walcott called The Glory Trumpeter.
Marc:I found this the other day and I like the language of it and it wasn't too long.
Marc:And I like reading poetry out loud.
Marc:The Glory Trumpeter.
Marc:Old Eddie's face wrinkled with river lights looked like a Mississippi man's.
Marc:The eyes derisive and avuncular at once.
Marc:Swiveling fixed me.
Marc:They'd seen too many wakes, too many cat house nights.
Marc:The bony idle fingers on the valves of his knee cradled horn could tear through Georgia on my mind or Jesus saves with the same fury of indifference if what propelled such frenzy was despair.
Marc:Now, as the eyes sealed in the ashen flesh and Eddie, like a deacon at his prayer, rose, tilting the bright horn, I saw a flash of gulls and pigeons from the dunes of coal near my grandmother's barracks near the wharves.
Marc:I saw the sallow faces of those men who sighed as if they spoke into their graves about the Negro in America.
Marc:That was when the Sunday comics, sprawled out on her floor, sent from the States, had a particular odor, a smell of money mingled with man's sweat.
Marc:And yet, if Eddie's features held our fate secure in childhood, I did not know then a Jesus ragtime or gut-bucket blues to the bowed heads of the lean, compliant men back from the States in their funeral surge, black, rusty Homburgs and limp waiters' ties with honey accents and lard-colored eyes, whose Joshua's ram's horn wailing for the Jews of patient bitterness or patient siege.
Marc:Now it was that as Eddie turned his back on our young crowd, out fading, swilling liquor and blue, eyes closed, one foot up, out to sea, his horn aimed at those cities of the Gulf, Mobile and Galveston, and sweetly meted the horn of plenty through a bitter cup in lonely exaltation, blaming me for all whom race and exile have defeated, for my own uncle in America, that living there I could never look up.
Marc:That's a Derek Walcott poem.
Marc:I don't know when it was written, but man, the language.
Marc:And now this.
Marc:Roll over Beethoven.
Marc:This is by Chuck Berry.
Marc:I'm gonna write a little letter, gonna mail it to my local DJ.
Marc:It's a rockin' rhythm record.
Marc:I want my jockey to play.
Marc:Roll over Beethoven, gotta hear it again today.
Marc:You know my temperature's risin' and the jukebox blows a fuse.
Marc:My heart's beatin' rhythm and my soul keeps on singin' the blues.
Marc:Roll over Beethoven and tell Tchaikovsky the news.
Marc:I got the rockin' pneumonia.
Marc:I need a shot of rhythm and blues.
Marc:I think I'm rollin' arthritis, sittin' down by the rhythm review.
Marc:Roll over, Beethoven, rockin' in two by two.
Marc:Well, if you feel you like it, go get your lover, then reel and rock it.
Marc:Roll it over and move on up just a trifle further and reel and rock it.
Marc:Roll it over.
Marc:Roll over, Beethoven, rockin' in two by two.
Marc:Well, early in the morning, I'm giving you a warning.
Marc:Don't you step on my blue suede shoes.
Marc:Hey, diddle diddle, I am playing my fiddle.
Marc:Ain't got nothing to lose.
Marc:Roll over, Beethoven, and tell Tchaikovsky the news.
Marc:You know, she wiggles like a glowworm, dance like a spinning top.
Marc:She got a crazy partner, ought to see him reel and rock.
Marc:Long as she got a dime, the music will never stop.
Marc:Roll over Beethoven, roll over Beethoven, roll over Beethoven, roll over Beethoven, roll over Beethoven, and dig these rhythm and blues.
Marc:Chuck Berry, Derek Walcott, rest in peace.
Marc:I don't think you two, if you can hear me, ever knew you'd be honored in the same space for your poetry, but
Marc:There you go.
Marc:Life is funny.
Marc:As is death, I guess.
Marc:Dax Shepard, he wrote and directed and stars in the movie Chips, which opens this Friday.
Marc:He was also a guest on WTF back on episode 533.
Marc:You can hear that with a subscription to Hal Premium.
Marc:Go to hal.fm and use the code WTF.
Marc:This is me and Dax hanging out for a few minutes.
Ah!
Marc:I've done promo for shows or radio stuff for when I'm in town, but you're actually traveling with the movie?
Marc:Yes.
Marc:Because usually you get put in a booth and it's a radio junket.
Guest:Yeah, zoo, like morning zoo somewhere.
Marc:You're there for two hours with someone in your ear going like, okay, it's Jack and the Fatty.
Guest:Yeah, and all they're doing is asking you really provocative questions about your wife and you're trying to remember that you won't come across well if you don't.
Marc:handle it the way you want to my girlfriend i don't know what she was doing i told her i was talking to you and uh she goes yeah i just read a thing that uh that he and his wife are have a uh a good relationship oh good that was the final stamp at the end of the article it just said we stamped this good
Guest:Yeah, I think because we've been, you know, what's crazy is we live in a time where we have a Twitter account, right?
Guest:And we have Instagram.
Marc:I am almost off Twitter entirely.
Guest:I am because of the election.
Guest:It was ruining my life.
Guest:We were getting in real life.
Guest:I would be recounting an argument I was on on Twitter to my wife.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And then she would vaguely take their position.
Guest:And then we were in a real life argument over some stranger that I don't know.
Guest:And I don't care about their opinion.
Guest:With no name.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And I was like, I got to get off this.
Guest:But the upside of all of it is it used to be you were really beholden to doing an interview with...
Guest:You know, L.A.
Guest:Times.
Guest:Right.
Guest:And it went through that interviewers filter.
Guest:And then, you know, you might have they might have seen you be a dick parking.
Guest:And then that's part of it.
Guest:You know, we're all subjective.
Guest:So what is cool is that actors or musicians, they have a direct line to everybody.
Guest:So the message you want to send out isn't really being manipulated.
Guest:And you can reach more people than these outlets can, you know.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Currently doing the movie, I've been pitched a few things that I go look up their thing.
Guest:It's like, well, yeah, I could go spend four hours doing that thing and it's going to reach 85,000 people.
Guest:Or I could just spend the time to tweet or Instagram and then send the exact message I want to send.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:You wonder, though, I always wonder how much of it gets into people's feeds.
Marc:I mean, I don't know what the percentages are.
Guest:Right.
Guest:If you have a million followers, how many people really actually...
Marc:Yeah, and how many people are they following?
Marc:What scrolls by?
Marc:But sometimes doing press is fun if it's a good radio show or a fun TV show.
Guest:Oh, 100%.
Guest:There's a ton of it I love.
Guest:Actually, I'm not opposed to it at all.
Guest:I enjoy, especially in a situation like this where I wrote it and directed it, it's not like I'm out there trying to put a good spin on an experience I didn't like.
Guest:Yeah, right.
Guest:Like, oh, this director, who was me, was kind of difficult to work with.
Guest:Yeah, he was horrible.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Well, a lot of times what you want to say is like, I don't know, guys, script was awesome.
Guest:I don't know what the fuck happened, but we tried really hard and it's a hard job.
Guest:And, you know, but so it's fun.
Guest:It's more fun to go out and talk about something you've been working on for two and a half years.
Marc:It's a long time.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:It really is.
Guest:So when you go out, like you say you're going to seven cities, what do you do?
Guest:I wish we had my itinerary in front of us because it's amusing.
Guest:I will land in a city.
Guest:I will go to a hockey game.
Guest:I will go out on ice and shoot a puck at something.
Guest:Really?
Guest:Yeah, literally.
Guest:Some kind of sport stunt thing, right?
Guest:And then I'll go to a basketball game and I'll shoot a half-court shot.
Guest:And then I'll throw out the first pitch at a baseball.
Guest:I realize it hasn't started yet, but normally I go throw out a first pitch.
Guest:And then I'll do a bunch of local press, local TV, local radio.
Marc:But when you do this stuff, it's like coming out onto the court now, Dax Shepard, his new movie.
Guest:From Jacksonville.
Guest:Yeah, exactly.
Guest:Really?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And you're right.
Guest:There's 70,000 people in the stand and like 200 really connected the dots that you're there about a movie.
Guest:But how why the sporting angle?
Guest:I just think because it's televised and interesting.
Guest:I've never heard that.
Marc:But you're not known to be like a sports prankster or whatever.
Marc:That's Dax Shepard doing funny things with balls.
Guest:No, no, no, no.
Guest:I have no athletic background.
Guest:I am known for automotive stuff.
Guest:Right.
Guest:That's right.
Guest:We talked about that.
Guest:Yeah, I'll go to motocross races.
Guest:And there they'll actually know why I'm there.
Guest:Oh, yeah, yeah.
Guest:So that happens.
Guest:And then in the evening in each city, there'll be a screening.
Guest:And then I'll do a Q&A afterwards, which is my favorite part of the whole experience.
Guest:Get to riff a little.
Guest:Oh, my God.
Guest:It's so fun.
Guest:It's like getting to do stand up for a thousand people.
Guest:Right.
Guest:With no pressure.
Guest:And how's the movie going over?
Guest:Wonderful.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Truly.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:You know, obviously, when you do a studio movie, you test a ton and we tested really, really high.
Guest:And it's been a really crazy, blessed thing.
Marc:Getting out the big, getting the big laughs.
Guest:Uh-huh, yeah.
Marc:I think I asked you to do my TV show and you were working on this.
Guest:I was, that's right.
Guest:I've had to turn down a lot of really neat stuff, unfortunately, to do this, but I'm happy.
Marc:All right, well, let's talk about this.
Marc:When I talk to people who make movies, I don't have the follow-through.
Marc:I'm sort of like, I have a two- or three-day window to stay focused with my own ideas and projects.
Marc:If I'm doing someone else's and there's a schedule and I have to be somewhere, I can handle that.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:But when I talk to people who do movies, the amount of time it takes to attach somebody, to get the money, and then to get made, and then some people are in these things for six years, and then maybe it'll do well, maybe it won't.
Guest:Yeah, odds are it won't.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:It sounds very unsatisfying to me, but you wrote and directed Chips.
Marc:So why Chips?
Guest:Well, quite simply, I like cars and motorcycles.
Guest:So I'm always trying to figure out a way to direct a comedy that has car chases or motorcycle chases.
Guest:And this property lends itself perfectly to motorcycle chases.
Guest:This property, right.
Guest:Well, it is.
Guest:It's a property.
Marc:Oh, right, because it was a TV show that we grew up with, Eric Estrada.
Guest:77 to 82.
Marc:Eric Estrada and the other guy.
Marc:That's right.
Guest:Exactly.
Guest:That other gentleman.
Guest:The white, tall, goofy gentleman.
Guest:That poor guy.
Guest:But look, I'm a realist, so if I had walked into Warner Brothers and said, hey, I want to direct a two-handed comedy with me and Michael Peña, and it's called Bonkers, they would have said, no fucking way.
Guest:You're not a star.
Guest:He's not a star.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Original comedies are hard to open.
Guest:Right.
Guest:I just would have never made a movie at a studio.
Guest:So I have to be realistic about what they would make.
Guest:So in their mind, the brand's the star, right?
Guest:So Chips is a worldwide property.
Guest:It's still on in some places.
Guest:It's still on here.
Guest:It's still on in Germany.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:In the Latin world, Eric Estrada was the first huge Latino star.
Guest:So it's a beloved property there.
Guest:So that kind of safety nets them and allows someone like me who isn't a big movie star or a really known director to do something like that.
Guest:So I would have done Starsky and Hutch.
Guest:I would have done The Fall Guy.
Guest:I would have done anything with a car that had a car star, I would have tried to do.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:What about, did they ever do a movie?
Marc:Yeah, sure they must have.
Marc:I can't remember.
Marc:What was the one that was down south?
Guest:Starsky and Hutch.
Guest:Oh, Dukes of Hazzard.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Yeah, in fact, I desperately want to remake it yet again.
Guest:Really?
Guest:Yeah, because they did.
Guest:They remade it about 10 years ago.
Guest:And I feel like I want to do a different version.
Marc:And Stiller was in Starsky and Hutch.
Marc:I grew up watching those when I was a kid.
Marc:I'm 53.
Marc:I remember watching Starsky and Hutch.
Marc:I wasn't a Chips guy, really.
Marc:But...
Marc:What studio did you do it at Warner Brothers?
Marc:Was it their property?
Guest:Yes.
Guest:And they had had many different versions of this movie throughout the last 20 years.
Guest:They've been trying to do it?
Guest:They've had an interest in making it, yeah, into a movie.
Guest:I think like 10 years ago, Wilmer Valderrama was going to be Paunch, and it was more Starsky and Hutch version, like a satire or a spoof.
Marc:But you're incorporating the great sort of like high-tech furious pace of the cinematic ability to do amazing chases and jumps.
Guest:Motorcycles, yeah.
Marc:Flying through the air.
Guest:That's right.
Guest:Because there's a lot of car chase movies.
Guest:There's very, very few motorcycle chase movies.
Guest:Up until recently, the kind of technology to film them didn't exist.
Guest:And so it wasn't really easy to capture that experience because they're so...
Guest:narrow and nimble you can't be following it in a in a pickup truck you know did you have to devise a way yes we devised i almost said devose devised many ways one is like we had drones right so you can now fly behind a guy on a motorcycle cheaply drones are like you know before it was sort of well yes in theory when i when i saw what the bid was for that stuff it's only it's about 70 as expensive as renting a helicopter for the day
Marc:We did a shot on my TV show with one of those weird little kind of Best Buy drones.
Guest:Yes.
Guest:And it was great.
Guest:Yes.
Guest:And unfortunately, the studios have all adopted this policy where they'll only use three different drone companies that have been FAA approved.
Guest:Right, right.
Guest:Because on your show, you probably had a GoPro on it or something small, but we put a huge red on it.
Guest:Oh, wow.
Marc:So you're talking about 55 pounds falling out of the sky around crew.
Marc:About what, $100,000?
Marc:Mm-hmm.
Guest:Yeah, so they really vet these vendors that do that.
Guest:So it's expensive.
Guest:But we're mounting on motorcycles.
Guest:We also invented this.
Guest:I didn't invent it, but my camera guy invented this thing that self-stabilized.
Guest:So it would be mounted on the front of the motorcycle looking back at me.
Guest:And as I'm leaning, it's keeping the horizon.
Guest:It's on this huge... A gyroscope thing?
Guest:Yeah, ring gear.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:It just rotates.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Which, that didn't exist, you know.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:sure months before i made the movie so yeah there's a lot of cool technology now that how does it like walk me through the process of like you know you know i mean studios don't part with this type of money easily no and you know so you you you decide you want to do chips so what happens your agent gets you a meeting and you walk in there and you're like not even my agent my friend who's a producer who i've done almost everything with
Guest:who had a relationship with the then president of Warner Brothers, I said, hey, I've got like this take on chips.
Guest:He goes, great, let's go sit down with them.
Guest:And as luck would have it, and I tell you, this is as much why I'm sitting here as anything else.
Guest:The day I pitched them, the Academy Award nominations had come out.
Guest:So that president had just heard like 14 of their movies were nominated.
Guest:He couldn't have been in a better mood.
Guest:And so we sit down and all I really have is...
Guest:hey, I think there's like a lethal weapon version of Chips, like a cool version, not a spoofy version.
Guest:And he goes, ooh, I love that.
Guest:He goes, and I'm only there for a writing job, by the way.
Guest:And then I'm going to beg them to let me direct it.
Guest:And I said, yeah, I'll write it, and then I'd love to throw my hat in the ring to direct it.
Guest:And he goes, yeah, and then you'll play John, right?
Guest:And I go, well, no, I assume you'll want to get Channing Tatum or a movie star to play John.
Guest:No.
Guest:No.
Guest:You're John.
Guest:This is great.
Guest:And I went there for a writing job and I left with acting and directing.
Guest:That's a good day.
Guest:But again, it's only because of that nomination.
Guest:Timing.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:If I had come the weekend after one of their movies failed, he'd be like, you're fucking crazy.
Guest:I've never directed a super movie.
Guest:You're not a movie star.
Guest:You're not funny.
Guest:You're not even funny.
Guest:I don't even like you.
Guest:So I went in there and I pitched that version and then I wrote a draft that took three months and then I wrote another draft because initially he said, okay, how much do you want to make this for?
Guest:And at that time it was going to be PG-13 and I said, well, kind of to deliver in that world of PG-13 action, I would need probably $45 million.
Guest:He said, great.
Guest:Then as we got closer and farther away from those nominations, he's like, we can't give you 45 million.
Guest:So then I had to change the script again to make the stunts smaller, then again and then again.
Guest:And then at a certain point, I said, you know, they told me then finally you can have 25 million.
Guest:And I said, well, then I got to go R because I need stuff.
Guest:I need blood.
Guest:I need stuff that you can't have in PG-13.
Guest:They said, great.
Guest:But anyways, that was a negotiation.
Marc:If I can't have more fun stunts, we're going to need violence and blood.
Guest:Well, and adult content.
Guest:For 25 million, you can still have an amazing time in a movie if it's got provocative, risky new shit.
Marc:So the basic pitch, though, that made it different than a lot of sequels is that it seems like it's devoid of camp, right?
Guest:Yeah, there's zero camp.
Guest:You updated it.
Guest:For better or worse, we take it very seriously.
Guest:Right.
Guest:I wanted Michael Peña, who's an amazing actor.
Guest:I love that guy, yeah.
Guest:He's a comedian.
Guest:He's a really solid actor.
Guest:He was a comedian?
Guest:No, he's not.
Guest:That's what I'm saying.
Guest:But he's funny, though.
Guest:He can be funny.
Guest:He's really, really funny.
Guest:He's got good timing.
Guest:Yep.
Guest:And my whole thing was the 80s show, by today's standards, is very cheesy.
Guest:So I need everything I can do to move the needle away from cheese.
Guest:So Michael Peña was a conscious decision to do that.
Guest:And it takes place now, correct?
Guest:Yeah, it's present day.
Guest:Oh, thank God.
Guest:That would have cost you another 15 million to date it.
Guest:Not to mention all you're focused on when you're shooting those things is like, well, how does Prius get in the shot?
Guest:Whose Prius is that?
Guest:When you do a period of time?
Guest:Yeah, 77.
Guest:But then I also hired Vincent D'Onofrio, which obviously takes you, the bad guy.
Guest:Oh, he's the bad guy?
Guest:Yeah, and he's a fucking beast.
Guest:Oh, he's such a beast.
Guest:But when you do stunts with like, those bikes are huge.
Yeah.
Guest:Yeah, well, they start the movie on the big cop bikes, the BMWs, and those things weigh like 800 pounds.
Marc:Yeah, you can't fly too easily with those, huh?
Guest:You cannot fly.
Guest:So they switch bikes mid-movie because the bad guys have far superior bikes.
Guest:Oh, really?
Marc:So there's a choice made?
Guest:You're going to laugh at this because you're not a gearhead, but the entire movie, I started working backwards from the fact that I wanted a certain motorcycle in the movie.
Guest:I wanted this Ducati Hypermotard, right, that can jump and go 140 and do everything.
Guest:I have one, yeah.
Guest:and so i was like well how on earth are chp gonna drive ducatis they just never would yeah and then i was like well if one of the cops was a fbi agent undercover well the fucking fbi can get anything they want so then i mean honestly my the entire story was just backstopping from the fact i wanted ducatis in the movie right yeah yeah it created the whole world yeah was ducati happy about that
Guest:Thrilled, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Guest:They're a tiny company.
Guest:It's Italian?
Guest:It's Italian, yeah.
Guest:I went to the factory in Bologna, and I was expecting, because they're a very legendary brand, I was expecting to walk into Hughes Aircraft, and it's slightly bigger than this garage we're in right now.
Guest:I was like, Jesus Christ, you make all the Ducatis in here?
Guest:Yes, just barely.
Guest:One bike at a time.
Guest:Yeah, it's a pretty small operation.
Guest:It's really cool.
Marc:So who's the straight guy and who's the goofball?
Guest:It flips a little bit, but I'm mostly the goofball.
Guest:Basically, my character is kind of an emotional genius.
Guest:He's clearly someone like you and I. He thinks way too much about why he does the things he does.
Guest:And then Punch, who's an FBI agent undercover, he's a logical genius.
Guest:So these two fight nonstop, but they're both making really valid points.
Guest:It's kind of like watching a husband and wife argue.
Marc:Now, did you know he was an FBI guy at the beginning?
Guest:Does my character?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:No.
Marc:Okay.
Guest:No.
Guest:I'm a rookie.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:So I was an X Games dude.
Guest:I've had 50 surgeries.
Guest:Right.
Guest:I'm an opiate addict.
Guest:Really?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Active?
Guest:Active, yeah.
Guest:Oh, wow.
Guest:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Marc:You're kind of a rough character.
Marc:Uh-huh.
Marc:Uh-huh.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And so I lose all my sponsors.
Guest:I don't know what the hell to do.
Guest:And the only thing I know how to do is ride a motorcycle.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:So I'm like, fuck, I could be one of those CHP guys.
Guest:They ride motorcycles.
Guest:I can do that.
Marc:And you get into that backstory at the beginning?
Guest:Yep.
Guest:Uh-huh.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I'm an opiate addict, and Panch is a... You know, on the show, Panch was like a ladies' man.
Guest:Right.
Guest:But we both know that's bullshit.
Guest:So in this, Panch is a hardcore sex addict.
Guest:He has a real problem.
Guest:Oh, really?
Marc:Porn and everything?
Guest:Yes.
Guest:Yeah, he's on his phone nonstop texting with girls, sending pictures, hopping in the bathroom to jerk off.
Guest:Really?
Guest:Oh, he has a legit issue.
Marc:Are you telling me this is the truth?
Marc:This is the truth.
Marc:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Marc:Flawed guys, dark characters.
Marc:Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Well, that's exciting.
Guest:But again, you know me and I know you.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:These are the only things that interest me are like people who are fucking paddling something.
Guest:Sure.
Guest:Yeah, they might have a real job, but 16 hours a day they're fucking wrestling whatever this ism is.
Marc:No, just saying no to something your brain's doing.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:He only likes being an FBI agent because it's probably the only two hours a day he's not thinking about getting some ass or the shame of having gotten some ass.
Marc:It sounds good, man.
Marc:And I'm excited for you and congratulations.
Marc:Thank you.
Marc:And I'm glad we talked.
Marc:Now I want to watch the movie because these are broken, flawed guys.
Guest:No, you're going to like it.
Marc:Running around on motorcycles.
Marc:Yeah, truly.
Marc:So now you sold me on it.
Guest:Okay, good.
Guest:I say together they make one decent person.
Guest:With a lot of flaws.
Guest:Yeah, Pena has the best tagline he came up with last week where he said, he's tall, I'm dark, together we're handsome.
Marc:Oh, you can put that on the poster.
Guest:Yeah, it was too late.
Guest:They already made him.
Guest:God damn it.
Guest:It was a little late in the game.
Guest:All right.
Guest:It's a pretty good tagline though.
Marc:Yeah, it is good.
Marc:What's the tagline on the poster?
Guest:Chip happens.
Guest:It's fine.
Guest:Yeah, it's fine.
Guest:Exactly.
Guest:That's what you're shooting for, to be honest.
Guest:Because 90% of the shit's embarrassing, you know?
Marc:Yeah, I mean, yeah.
Marc:Well, so it opens March 23rd.
Marc:4th.
Marc:4th.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:All across the country.
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Guest:And across the world.
Guest:Wow, is that how it works now?
Guest:It is, yeah.
Guest:Boom.
Guest:Yeah, it's nuts.
Guest:But what's great about that is there are a lot of movies now that tank here in the U.S.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:They crush overseas and they get sequels out of them.
Guest:right but so you like in the way the market works i guess now is that you'll pretty much you know if everything goes well you make your money back over a weekend yes yes yeah because we had a very modest budget well good you can imagine what kind of head games yeah that go on for me because i will know march 25th what the next 10 years of my life looks like which is a very precarious situation what does that mean though so like like the hope is you get to direct more
Guest:right well let's say this let's say chips opens uh huge to 30 million dollars right i know that i'll be directing two more of those and those are each going to take two years and then i'll they'll probably let me do another one so it's like i kind of know what'll happen right but you know i'm not in the results business i'm in the show up and work business so sure it's a very tricky yeah and if it doesn't make the money back and i'm like i'm not where's the audition yeah yeah yeah
Guest:No.
Guest:What show?
Guest:Wait, Culver City.
Guest:I thought this said I'm in Toluca Lake right now.
Guest:Why can't you just go to Burbank?
Guest:Yeah, the stakes couldn't be higher.
Guest:I mean, but not really because my fallback plan is I go back to TV, which I love.
Marc:Yeah, so you're in a good position.
Guest:I don't want to whine.
Guest:I don't want to whine.
Guest:No whining.
Guest:It's exciting.
Guest:Life's fantastic.
Guest:rolling the dice but you know when you for folks like us when you have a date looming like that where you you at least think it's going to decide the next 10 years of your life oh yeah it's just dread yeah and dread and sort of like i need to feel better yeah yeah but i've been i've been taking action to actually break my my go-to is pessimism yeah and and and i i i think i do that to avoid ever being embarrassed
Guest:Like, I'll be the first to tell you, Marc Maron, yeah, that movie's going to tank.
Guest:That way, when it tanks and you see me, you won't feel bad for me.
Guest:Right, right.
Guest:Because I already said it.
Guest:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Guest:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Guest:And I think I do a lot of stuff just to avoid ever feeling embarrassed at some point.
Guest:But I'm stopping that this time.
Guest:I'm here to tell you it's going to be a fucking mega hit.
Guest:And if you see me, I'll be embarrassed.
Guest:Big deal.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:I gotta stop going through life.
Marc:Then you just shifted to like, wasn't my fault, man.
Marc:You know, like a lot of whatever.
Guest:Yeah, yeah.
Marc:Because like I was strapped.
Guest:It was the writer.
Guest:It was, no.
Guest:Shit, that's me.
Guest:No, blame the studio.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:No, they're kind of crushing.
Guest:Oh, good.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I won't be able to blame them.
Marc:No, so it's all on you, buddy.
Marc:It really is.
Marc:The lovely Dax Shepard.
Marc:I like that guy.
Marc:Now, Paul Rust, I'll be honest, which is I didn't know anything about him.
Marc:I knew, you know, what he looked like and stuff.
Marc:And then, you know, I got the opportunity to talk to him.
Marc:And I'm wondering, like, well, how's that going to go?
Marc:And I watched like four episodes from the first season of Love.
Marc:You know, and I liked it and I liked him.
Marc:And I thought, OK, let's give it a shot.
Marc:And we had great conversation.
Marc:Midwestern guy, Iowa.
Marc:He's one of those guys where he had the goods and he found himself in the right situations and shit worked out.
Marc:That's not a bad story.
Marc:The new season of his show Love is now streaming on Netflix.
Marc:All episodes from season one are there as well.
Marc:This is me and Paul Rust.
Marc:You seem too young, look at me already condescending, to be referencing Mad Magazine.
Marc:I mean, come on.
Marc:I'm almost too young, but I mean, it meant something to me.
Guest:Yeah, I think it's like if you have an exposure to it when you're like nine or ten, it's always going to...
Guest:It's weird.
Guest:I don't know.
Guest:Did you have the experience that you were aware that maybe it was past the wave that was great when you were reading it?
Marc:I remember reading Mad when my family lived in Alaska.
Marc:So 1971, 70.
Marc:So my first exposures of it, I was like six or seven, which was too young.
Marc:And that was the late...
Marc:60s, 1970s, 71, so it was pretty... Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Marc:It had some bite to it, but I remember there was a back cover of... I don't remember if it was the fold-out, you know, the fold-in?
Marc:Sure, yeah.
Marc:Or not.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:I think it was the fold-in, but it was like a hippie crucified on a hypodermic needle.
Marc:Wow.
Marc:stuck into a pile of pills.
Marc:But I remember that, and I remember there were some things, I used to love Al Jaffe, all his stuff.
Marc:When was your exposure to it?
Marc:Now I'm dying to Google that fold out.
Marc:Like if I'm hallucinating it, or is it real?
Guest:Well, the thing that I remember with Mad Magazine was the stuff you saw was sort of like could blow your mind or maybe be a little dirty.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And being afraid if I read a word that I didn't understand going and asking my parents what it meant because I could have been revealed that I had been.
Guest:That's how I found out what a diaphragm was.
Yeah.
Guest:There was a diaphragm joke in Mad Magazine, and I asked what that meant, and then I got the real story.
Guest:You did?
Guest:You learned?
Guest:It provoked the conversation?
Marc:A semi one, sort of guarded and repressed.
Marc:Yeah, I mean, I learned a lot about sex from underground comics.
Marc:My parents were not very filtering, so I'd get hold of them.
Marc:Our crumb things, this or that, the bookstore.
Marc:But I think it's a lot of where I saw actual sex.
Marc:was in comic books.
Guest:Just illustrations of it, yeah.
Marc:Or if your parents were progressive or filthy people like my parents, there was a joy of sex in the house, which you'd go find and you'd be like, oh man, this is crazy.
Marc:Open the door there.
Marc:Well, it showed you how it works.
Guest:Well, I remember seeing my first Playboy magazine.
Guest:I was actually thinking this on the drive over here about what a repressed little boy I was.
Guest:That when I saw my first Playboy, I ran home and confessed to my mother that I had just looked at it.
Marc:Really?
Guest:The guilt was so strong.
Guest:Really?
Guest:In my heart and in my mind.
Guest:Really?
Guest:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:How old were you?
Guest:I was 16.
Guest:No, I was probably like seven, eight.
Marc:And you thought you had done something horrible.
Guest:Yeah, like I had witnessed something that I shouldn't and I had to make like a confession, basically.
Marc:Right, a full body experience.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Body and mind, spirit.
Marc:Connected.
Marc:Just polluted.
Marc:Yeah, then going to the source.
Marc:But why was that?
Marc:Did you have a religious upbringing?
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:I was raised Catholic, so I think there was some sort of... That was planted in there?
Marc:Don't look at the dirty pictures.
Guest:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:And it's grown up too.
Guest:Don't even look at your own body.
Marc:Right, yeah.
Marc:That shameful vessel.
Marc:What a horrible, flawed...
Marc:craft it is nothing but trouble yeah inside and out yeah well yeah and then there was hair then so you know you saw grown-up boobs and vagina oh right yeah right yeah but it's it's like the uh when were you born 1981 well things were definitely different than when i was a kid you know yeah i mean 81 it was already pretty uh airbrushed and glossy and tempered
Marc:You know what I mean?
Guest:Both pornography and the culture at large.
Marc:Sure, everything.
Marc:When I was like six, it was still dirty hippie time.
Guest:A lot of hair and sweat and bad grooming.
Guest:I envy it.
Guest:I think about how it would have been great to live in a more permissive decade.
Guest:You know, like, well, I mean, I was 10 when Magic Johnson was HIV positive, and that's sort of where I logged on.
Marc:I see, you grew up with the fear, the weight, the cloud of AIDS hanging over your little heterosexual brain.
Marc:As a horrendous extension of the guilt that was already in place.
Guest:Yeah, I remember like the Clarence Thomas hearings were happening at the time.
Marc:Pubicare on the soda.
Guest:Yes, and hearing about sexual harassment and in fourth grade going like, wait a minute, have I sexually harassed somebody?
Guest:Am I not going to get to be president at some point?
Marc:It won't stop anyone now.
Marc:That's right.
Marc:That's not an obstacle to becoming president at all.
Marc:Oh, yeah.
Marc:Quite the opposite.
Marc:Yeah, yeah.
Marc:It's actually an endorsement.
Marc:Exactly.
Marc:It's a positive point.
Guest:So where'd you grow up?
Guest:I grew up in Iowa, northwest Iowa, this town called Lamar's.
Guest:Really?
Guest:Yeah, yeah.
Marc:I'm not saying that because I didn't think anyone grew up there, but I've talked to a few people from Iowa.
Marc:I think- Higgins boys and-
Marc:I've never interviewed any Higgins boys or Grubers.
Marc:Toby Huss, though.
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Marc:He was part of that crew.
Guest:I love Toby Huss.
Marc:Yeah, I think he's Iowan.
Guest:Yes, I went to the University of Iowa, and he did as well.
Guest:And going into college, Toby Huss was the name that was...
Guest:Bandied about?
Guest:Echoing through the halls, because I knew him through Pete and Pete, watching him as the strongest man in the world.
Guest:And then I've gotten to bump into him now, and it's nice to see a Hawkeye.
Marc:Sure.
Guest:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Guest:He's a real man's man, that guy.
Guest:He makes more sense coming from Iowa than I do.
Guest:I think if you met Toby Huss, you'd be like, oh, salt of the earth guy.
Marc:Well, he definitely wears it.
Marc:You think he's a guy that belongs in a truck.
Marc:You know what I mean?
Guest:I mean, it's always like a thing you have to be careful about is how hard you play the working class Iowa card.
Guest:I'm very tempted always to be like, I did grow up with pickup trucks and dogs and shotguns.
Guest:And my wife, Leslie Arfin, she's always teasing me.
Guest:She's like, when I meet somebody within the first minute and a half, I'm mentioning that I'm from Iowa.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Guest:I had restraint here, though, Mark.
Guest:Don't you think?
Guest:I had some restraint here.
Guest:You asked me.
Marc:I didn't sit down.
Marc:Well, I like that's a way how you sort of qualify yourself.
Marc:If you're being judged as too much of a dork, you're going to be like, whoa, whoa, whoa.
Marc:I got farms in my past.
Marc:I've been in trucks.
Marc:I've touched animals.
Guest:That's the trap that I'm always in, Mark Barrett, is my outside doesn't really match my inside.
Guest:People will reference Dungeons and Dragons to me, and I never played it.
Guest:Really?
Guest:So I've lost, or comic books, I didn't grow up, I read Mad.
Marc:Well, I mean, are you, but, I mean, isn't there another way that you've tried to- You're looking me up and down like, are you sure?
Marc:Another way you could maybe, I mean, how many different manifestations of self-presentation did you go through to land on these glasses?
Marc:That's true.
Marc:Like, I have to assume there may have been maybe a little more gothy period or something.
Guest:Grungy, grungy.
Marc:Oh, okay.
Marc:So you did that.
Marc:A little bit of flannel, maybe no glasses.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Well, it's great, though, because in Iowa, the I think grunge was probably hitting nationally.
Guest:What would you say, Mark?
Guest:Ninety two, ninety three.
Guest:That sounds maybe right.
Guest:But if you check our like high school yearbooks.
Marc:Ninety nine.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:Yeah, exactly.
Guest:That's like when it finally touched.
Marc:It reached.
Marc:Takes a while to get up there.
Marc:You know, but that's not that's not unusual.
Marc:Like sort of like pre massive Internet speed.
Marc:Sure.
Marc:That, you know.
Marc:punk rock and a lot of things they didn't get to places unless i've talked to a lot of dudes who are like we had to wait for some guy to bring the records right you know someone had a mail show yeah yeah yeah uh and and maybe there's a cool record store within a hundred miles of your town right that's right the one place that's got the goods
Guest:That was Omaha, I guess, where I grew up.
Guest:Omaha.
Marc:Omaha.
Marc:Now, I've been to Omaha.
Marc:I know I have friends in Omaha.
Marc:So how far was that from where you grew up?
Marc:Still two hours.
Marc:Two hours away.
Marc:Two hours to a record store?
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Well, what the hell were your family doing out where you were?
Marc:Were they doing what?
Guest:Farm stuff?
Guest:No, no.
Marc:I almost asked that, but I didn't want to be judgmental and stereotyping.
Guest:I mean, I definitely, I didn't grow up on a farm, but I had friends did, and it was the age that cable didn't even reach their homes.
Guest:You would go out to their house, and you'd be like, oh, we can't watch MTV because Ryan lives on a farm.
Guest:But no, my mom, it was a teacher, and my dad owned a small business called Russ Western Shed, and it was like sold cowboy boots and Western material.
Marc:It was right there.
Marc:Yeah, yeah.
Marc:It was right there for you to engage with and become.
Yeah.
Marc:And you ran the other way, Paul.
Guest:It was this tantalizing object that I could have.
Marc:Then you had Tony Llamas.
Marc:You had a full range of.
Marc:That's right.
Marc:Some Justins.
Marc:Justins.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:You had the pearly buttons.
Marc:Right there.
Marc:Right, the snaps.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And you turned your back.
Guest:Well, and especially, you know, my dad, his father owned a Western apparel store.
Guest:Like, they're also shoe repairmen.
Guest:So it was like shoe repair and then also selling boots.
Marc:Your dad fixed boots?
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:He could do that?
Guest:Yeah, and he always was like, come down to the store sometime, and I know you might not want to do it as a career, but just so you learn the trade.
Guest:I have such respect for shoe repairmen.
Guest:Now, you what?
Guest:You were like, no?
Guest:I said no, and I'm sure my father is still alive, but I'm sure this will haunt me for the rest of my life that my dad offered.
Guest:Hey, come down for a few days, and I'll teach you the thing that I've done my whole life.
Marc:You're just lucky it worked out for you.
Marc:yes uh so to speak yeah i mean you know look at your the career trajectory you chose is working out because he would have been like i told you oh yeah i still got the tools let's get come here there's some souls here yeah give me those that pliers we're gonna rip the soul off of this thing but you said you were saying uh you have respect for i love shoe repair places i talked about on the show not long ago
Marc:So you turned your back on cowboy boots and shoe repair.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:You have brothers and sisters?
Guest:I have two older sisters.
Marc:So no one took up the shoe repair?
Guest:No.
Guest:And then, well, he had two other brothers who also owned other West Western sheds across Iowa.
Guest:They each owned one in different towns.
Guest:And no, there was no other generation.
Marc:So were you some freakish thing that your parents were like, where did it come from?
Guest:I mean, I don't think it was a usual thing to want to move out to Hollywood.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:But, you know, my dad was like a funny goofball.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And my mom has a dry wit.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:So certainly like it wasn't like the idea of comedy wasn't like completely alien.
Marc:Are you the youngest?
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:Uh-huh.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I was going to ask you before, before I told you what siblings I had, I was going to like, just take a guess, because I feel like you're a good read on people.
Guest:I'm not good at that.
Guest:After hundreds of these interviews, I think you could just like sit back and go, like, oh, it's like being able to guess somebody's weight.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:You're like, oh, yes, two older sisters, the youngest.
Marc:I'm not good at that.
Marc:You were infantilized.
Marc:Yeah, you were infantilized by all of them.
Marc:So you're blaming your sisters.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:You're blaming your sisters now for your lack of boots and trucks.
Guest:That's right.
Guest:That's right.
Guest:It all leads back to that.
Guest:No, I definitely like my experience was a lot of times being like in a living room with my two sisters and them going like, go up and get us a Coke.
Guest:And I'm like, okay.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I like that.
Guest:You're that guy.
Marc:I like that structure.
Marc:Sure.
Marc:Get the girls a Coke.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Why aren't you getting the girls a Coke?
Yeah.
Guest:But I actually love my sisters, and I've thought before, oh, having older sisters is a nice setup.
Marc:It's sort of a gift if you take it the right way.
Marc:I think you do learn about women.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Before I lost my virginity, I went and asked my sister, not for tips or whatever, but I was just like, hey, I'm going through this emotionally.
Guest:I don't know if I should or shouldn't.
Guest:Can you help me out with this?
Guest:And then she talked.
Guest:And what did she say, the Catholic sisters?
Guest:She was cool.
Guest:I mean, she got me into Nirvana and stuff.
Marc:Oh, good, right.
Marc:So she was trouble.
Marc:She was a rebel.
Marc:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:They were both rebels.
Marc:Oh, good.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Good, good.
Guest:So she said, do it, dude.
Marc:So when was this?
Marc:Like, just when you shot the show last year?
Yeah.
Guest:It was a love scene.
Guest:Give me some tips.
Guest:I remember she was very thoughtful and she was like, as long as you think you could do it and the next day you wouldn't feel bad or regretful, you should go ahead and do it and be safe.
Guest:One of those things.
Guest:Right.
Guest:And how'd it go?
Guest:Oh boy, Mark.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Well, you know.
Guest:Quick?
Guest:Yes.
Guest:I thought you meant, you want the story to be quick.
Guest:No.
Guest:You're like, quick?
Guest:No, I was just about to say it was the opposite quick, but not in a stud way.
Guest:Right.
Guest:In a, I'm on the medication that the Columbine killers were on.
Marc:Did you open with that line?
Guest:Did you say that?
No.
Marc:Was that what you said right before you... Sit back, relax.
Marc:I'm on Luvox.
Guest:You were on medicine?
Guest:In high school, I was on... That was a weird way of saying it, but I remember I was on this medication that when they did the autopsies on the two Columbine boys, they were like, oh, these kids must have been on something.
Guest:They must have been hopped up on PCP.
Guest:What was Luvox?
Guest:It was like an anti-OCD sort of medication.
Guest:Yeah, and it just made me super sleepy.
Guest:The whole time, I was just zonked out through high school.
Marc:Oh, you were desensitized.
Guest:Yeah, I mean, I think it was anti-anxiety, some kind of thing.
Guest:So it just turned off the switch that would make you whatever.
Marc:Do you have OCD for reals?
Guest:You know, when I got on that, it sort of did what I guess it was supposed to do, which is kind of cleared the space in my mind to be, say, hey, I don't have to do this.
Guest:Oh, really?
Guest:I don't give a shit.
Guest:So that when I eventually got off it.
Guest:It had done what, it had worked.
Marc:Yeah, it actually worked.
Marc:It had given you, I like when that happens.
Marc:Prozac does that too, turns the noise down a bit.
Guest:Yeah, so you can actually.
Marc:So you can make decisions.
Guest:I saw it, I remember thinking of it as like, oh, it's like a spring day.
Guest:Right.
Guest:When you can open the door and take stuff out of your house and put it on the yard.
Guest:It's not snowy out.
Marc:Right.
Guest:So you can like sort of just.
Marc:Right.
Marc:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Marc:Well, how did your OCD manifest itself?
Guest:Lists, sort of like making lists, but then going so deep into it that I would have to use a ruler to make a perfect box next to the list of things that I'm gonna check off, and then using a ruler to check off the box perfectly.
Marc:And this was like every day?
Guest:Yeah, up until high school when I was finally like, oh, this sucks.
Guest:This is awful.
Marc:I'm a slave to these boxes.
Guest:Well, it's like anything.
Guest:When you first do it, it's so pleasurable.
Guest:Like there's something there.
Guest:It's scratching some itch and you're into it.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And then it turns into a prison of some kind.
Guest:Like you'd wake up and be like, oh, fuck.
Guest:Yeah, you're like, oh, I have to.
Guest:Well, and it was also like, I mean, this is where it tidily dovetails into the Catholic thing.
Guest:I'm like the 5,000th person on the show who made this acknowledgement.
Guest:But like the same wire that sort of crossed upstairs with OCD is...
Guest:the ritual of Catholicism is actually really tantalizing because it's the same sort of thing.
Guest:You're like, oh, I go in, I'm going to do this and this and this.
Guest:Before I could fall asleep, I would have to sort of like perfectly do the sign of the cross.
Guest:Oh, really?
Guest:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:Had to be right.
Guest:It's very clear the parallels between these two things.
Marc:A need for order.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:But was self-flagellation part of it as well?
Marc:I mean, was it the guilt of not doing it or not doing it right?
Marc:I mean, I guess it's hard to peg that to religion, but you think it was strictly a chemical thing in your brain, or was there chaos in the home?
Guest:I think it was more chemical because the fact that when I got on meds, but certainly, I don't know, I think there's...
Guest:I wouldn't, like, yeah, do the broad stroke of it being religion, because I'm actually, like, if it works for somebody, I'm all for it.
Guest:I have no, like, there's certainly the lapsed Catholic.
Marc:No, I think that OCD, and I've said it before in my act even, that there is a ritualized element to it.
Marc:There is a way of having a order in your life.
Guest:Well, and when I was most OCD'd out in like high school, when it was really reaching its peak, I loved going to church.
Guest:It was like, so it was, it made me, it brought peace.
Marc:Well, that's what it's supposed to do.
Marc:The world is chaotic.
Marc:You don't know what's going to happen.
Marc:A minute to minute, you could die any second or something shitty can happen.
Marc:Right, right.
Marc:Not here.
Marc:No.
Marc:Not these boxes.
Yeah.
Guest:These windows are so beautiful.
Guest:What wind would blow these in?
Marc:Look at that.
Guest:They understand.
Guest:But I went to 13 years of Catholic school, and my mom was my teacher for four of those years in high school.
Guest:Oh yeah.
Guest:Oh my God.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:And you had to pretend?
Marc:What, like you were just a kid in the class?
Guest:Well, I was a real goofball, Mark, in school and stuff.
Guest:I love cracking jokes.
Marc:Sure.
Guest:So what's fun about that, as you know, is like... You're not doing it with your mother.
Guest:Well, if you make a teacher laugh, you're kind of like, hey, I got away with it.
Guest:Like they laugh, they can't get mad.
Marc:I've usurped the power and they like it.
Guest:And they like it.
Guest:And so now I can't get in trouble.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Now imagine having that authority layered on with the authority of your mom.
Guest:It was...
Guest:I loved it.
Guest:It was great.
Marc:So you got reprimanded in class, then you got more at home.
Guest:Yeah, but to make her laugh in front of the class was actually really awesome.
Marc:Yeah, and you knew how.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Because you grew up with it.
Marc:You had her number.
Guest:Yeah, she had seven buttons installed in me.
Guest:Sure.
Guest:I had found some.
Marc:And the class all knew this, I'm sure.
Marc:Yeah, yeah.
Marc:I picture there was nine people in the class, and it was a single farmhouse.
Marc:Is that wrong?
Guest:With a wood-burning stove in the center.
Marc:And everyone's wearing your dad's boots.
Guest:We all had our own chalk slates.
Guest:Yeah, no, not the way it was?
Guest:No, it was a class size of like 40 people, so it was very small.
Marc:You grew up knowing the whole town, really?
Yeah.
Guest:Yeah, with my mom being a teacher and my dad owning the shoe repair shop down the street, they came in contact basically with any of the 8,000 people who lived in our town.
Marc:Well, I was in Iowa City.
Marc:I did a show there.
Marc:That college has that very famous internationally known writer's program.
Guest:Yeah, I went to that college, and so you- Oh, you weren't on the football team?
Marc:They have the writer's program and the football team.
Guest:My parents came to visit me once, and I, because I was donating plasma, and the sore grew on my arm.
Guest:You know when a pizza gets that little air bubble pocket that's sort of happening in my arm?
Guest:So my parents just happened to be visiting me that weekend and they were like, oh, we should take you to the emergency room.
Guest:So they took me to the campus emergency room and we drove by the football stadium.
Guest:And I was like a junior, senior.
Guest:And I'm like, oh, that's where that is.
Guest:And it broke my dad's heart.
Guest:He's like, you're finding out about college football as we drive your fucking dork ass.
Really?
Guest:poor dad two girls and you i know i thought that well that was always the you know the mythos of me it was like we were gonna stop at two kids yeah but your father wanted a son uh-huh so we tried one more time and we had you who's not good at baseball
Marc:and doesn't want to learn boot repair.
Guest:Yeah, I mean, my parents now are, you know, they're... They're okay?
Guest:Yeah, they've always been remarkably supportive.
Guest:Like, for having zero...
Guest:the world of entertainment would be an unknown wild world for them.
Guest:So the fact that they've always been nothing but supportive and have never once even breathed the sort of like, are you sure you want to be doing it?
Guest:They never said that?
Guest:No, it's weird.
Guest:Maybe they were secretly impressed.
Marc:I mean, that's a nice way of thinking it, yeah.
Marc:That always is heartwarming to me.
Marc:I find that more people that I talk to in our business that come from seemingly resistant backgrounds, we're always encouraged.
Marc:Almost 90%.
Marc:There's very few that I know that I've talked to whose parents were like, who seemed that they would be adverse to it, were like, don't you ever fucking do that.
Marc:I think most of the time that parents are concerned more than anything else.
Marc:It's not...
Marc:I've met very few people that were forbidden, but there is always a sort of like, is that a good idea?
Marc:Maybe you should get a degree first in something.
Guest:But you got a degree.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:In what?
Guest:Communications.
Guest:Theater and film.
Marc:The broad communications umbrella.
Guest:Yeah, and it was one of those things that halfway into college I go, oh, I wish I had actually done whatever.
Guest:English?
Guest:Cultural, some sort of sociocultural bent.
Marc:Oh, really?
Marc:Because you knew you were gonna get out and you wanted to know how other people talked?
Guest:I think it was also like, I was spending so much time watching movies and reading about movies that it's like, I should have used college as a way to like open my mind up to other things.
Guest:I mean, I liked it.
Guest:And the thing that I really enjoyed was like being able to, there was like a Friday night, Toby Huss, this is where he came from, No Shame Theater.
Guest:And on Friday nights at 11 o'clock, if you were a theater dork and you were going out to the bars and you wanted to hang out with other guys,
Guest:theater kids yeah yeah wrote pieces you wrote scenes and bits and so and then you would go up on Friday nights and perform them and Toby Huss was that first he was part of the first group that put it together oh yeah and it continues to this day and it's great and it's how I met my buddies who I live out here and who live out here so that's where it started yeah in Iowa City and
Marc:And you were doing, writing the sketches and doing the things.
Guest:Yeah, and oh, the reason I was bringing it up was just because you could read something in a class on a Tuesday that was like a just somebody's little theory, you know?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And then on Friday, you could kind of like write a sketch that somehow, believe me, it wasn't like I'm doing a witty take on, it was more just like, oh, that gave me an idea, and then you wrote it, so.
Marc:But you were engaging and performing.
Guest:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:Is that where that started?
Guest:No, I mean, I was growing up an attention-starved person who wanted to be, did theater.
Marc:I know you busted your mom's chops in class, but did you do high school theater?
Marc:Yeah, I did that, like speech.
Marc:It's time to get it out, Paul.
Marc:This is the time.
Marc:To come out.
Marc:You did speech.
Marc:You did musicals.
Guest:I did musicals, yeah.
Guest:But the year I was cast in the Music Man was the year that there was like this big beer bust, beer party bust.
Guest:And if you got caught drinking beer, you couldn't be in the play.
Guest:And so we lost our cast because our school was so small.
Guest:So Music Man got canceled.
Guest:Because of beer?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:In Iowa?
Guest:Yeah, which is weird.
Guest:I'm now realizing the connection of like, oh, that's what the Music Man is about.
Guest:It's sort of like our kids are going to play pool.
Guest:We got to keep them in line.
Guest:Ironic.
Marc:Yes.
Marc:Would that be ironic?
Guest:I believe that would be ironic.
Marc:So that was the only musical you were going to be in?
Guest:No, I did like Jesus Christ Superstar.
Guest:You were that guy.
Guest:You did all of it.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Theater nerd.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:But, you know, it's why people like it.
Guest:You get to meet like the 10 other people in your town who are like this and share that interest.
Guest:Yeah, no, thank God.
Guest:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:Oh, boy.
Marc:It's a lifesaver.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I mean, so Friday nights at 11, you know, I didn't drink in college.
Guest:I was so straight and just wanted to be a good boy, like, to go on Friday nights and put up... But then that was... What's weird about it is sort of a tension there, which is, like, the stuff that I would do on Friday nights, the sketches were so wild and outlandish and doing crazy things that, like...
Guest:Now that I think about it, in retrospect, I go like, oh, that was me burning off the energy that people would do, maybe go into a kegger or something.
Marc:Well, right, you had an inner life that couldn't find a way out.
Marc:It was probably a better way than just blabbering on in a bar or acting like an idiot or throwing up on yourself.
Marc:I mean, it's not like you didn't miss a lot.
Guest:People say that, but I actually look back out of regret sometimes.
Guest:I'm like, I wish I would have partied in college and stuff.
Guest:That would have been fun.
Marc:Yeah, but you don't know how you're built.
Marc:That could have derailed you entirely.
Guest:Yeah, right, right, right.
Marc:I mean, there's always that gamble, you know what I mean?
Marc:Because sometimes you go back to where you grew up, and it's like, that guy's still partying.
Guest:Well, yeah, and I'll get that insight when I talk to people who are sober, and I'll share that.
Guest:I'll be like, man, in college, I actually wish I had gone crazy.
Guest:And they go, that's the complete opposite of my experience.
Guest:I wish I had been going crazy in college, because then I could have enjoyed or appreciated this whatever, you know.
Marc:But maybe you're not cut out to go crazy, Paul.
Marc:I saw, you know, Love, I saw the party scene where you had a few cocktails.
Marc:Right, yes.
Marc:That's probably what that looks like.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Is that the guy you wanted to be in high school?
Guest:That wouldn't have played out.
Guest:No, that would have, yeah.
Guest:I mean, but in college, like on Friday nights, I did that, I did a bit once a monologue where as I'm doing a monologue, I like start peeing my pants.
Guest:like on stage and like so like as people are watching it like this trickle forms in my crotch and then like goes across my thigh.
Guest:How'd you do that?
Guest:I just drank a lot of water.
Guest:So you actually peed?
Guest:I actually peed my pants like on stage as I was like delivering a monologue where the person's like brain started like falling apart.
Guest:He started speaking gibberish and as he spoke like gibberish I started like peeing my pants.
Guest:And then I had laid down newspaper because I thought that would be like a dog.
Guest:And it like dripped out of my pants and it went across the newspaper.
Guest:But because I had over drank water out of fear that I might not be able to deliver, it was way too much.
Guest:And then so people, after the monologue was done, they were trying to help me out, like giving old scripts that they had already read to try to soak it up.
Guest:But it would just like kind of glide across the puddle of urine.
Marc:I think the impressive part about that story is that you really peed.
Marc:That, like, you know, usually you figure out a device.
Guest:Maybe a smart person.
Marc:Well, no, but that was my first idea was, like, what kind of squirt bottle do you use?
Marc:How'd you rig that up?
Marc:You're like, no, I peed.
Marc:I mean, it's like the character work is not...
Marc:Half is interesting.
Guest:It's a cheap trick, I think, is what it actually is.
Marc:It's not a trick.
Marc:I guarantee you, you ask dozens of people who did pee-pee jokes, if they really peed, they'd be like, no, no, we had to rig up it.
Marc:No, you peed.
Guest:And afterwards, people came up to me, and they were like, I saw how you tugged on your belt right before it happened.
Guest:Like, they thought there was a trick.
Guest:Of course they did.
Guest:Yeah, yeah.
Marc:So you're worried about, you know, that you didn't drink and do crazy shit, yet the way you did a guy peeing himself on stage during a monologue was to pee?
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:You did fine.
Marc:Well.
Marc:You didn't need alcohol.
Marc:That's commitment.
Marc:And you probably didn't even think of that.
Marc:You're like, this is the only way to do this character.
Marc:This is a very funny idea.
Guest:I'm not good at science, so I can't devise some sort of rig.
Marc:But did you have that thought?
Marc:Or was it just like no question you were going to pee yourself?
Guest:I thought the fun of it would be if people realized I had actually done it, that it would be like.
Guest:But, you know, people got upset and it was like.
Marc:So the idea that you would be celebrated for really peeing backfired.
Guest:Imagine them hoisting them up on their shoulders.
Marc:The guy who peed.
Marc:No, they were like, what the fuck is wrong with you?
Guest:Well, yeah, and I wasn't a theater major, and the people who were really theater people who didn't even go to that thing on Friday nights, when they'd see me in the hallway, I remember I'd get dismissive looks, and people would come up to me and be like, you know, a lot of the theater majors don't like you because
Guest:Because that's not acting.
Marc:Yeah, exactly.
Marc:They were right.
Marc:No, they were mad at your commitment.
Marc:Is that like they're spending all the hours trying to get open and vulnerable on stage, but none of them would think of actually peeing.
Marc:Only the fucking nerd who doesn't drink.
Marc:So it just worked against you.
Marc:It's like, what kind of fucking dork?
Marc:would really piss himself for a sketch.
Marc:So fortunately, you only have one sketch to do that night.
Guest:Well, that's what they're like, for a sketch?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:For a sketch.
Guest:Yeah, maybe for Shakespeare.
Guest:I could get it for antiquity.
Guest:Yeah, right.
Guest:Yeah, yeah.
Marc:That's great.
Marc:I'm proud of you.
Marc:Oh, thanks, Mark.
Marc:So you do this thing in college, and then after college, you're like, I'm gonna go to L.A.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And what's cool about the University of Iowa actually is like, it's all people who are like, fuck Hollywood.
Guest:Everyone's fuck Hollywood in college.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Even the professors.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:The ones who failed in Hollywood.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Well, I'd go and I'd be like, talk to like somebody.
Guest:I'd be like, I'm thinking about making a short about this.
Guest:And they never wanted narrative stuff because that was Hollywood.
Guest:but art movies yes experimental yeah some stand brackage yeah sure colors yes colors and lights yeah yeah and uh or documentaries that those were the things they were always pushing right and uh i look you know at the time it was whatever but i look back on it now i'm like oh i that's way preferable to something else i would if if it was like
Guest:We're going to put you on this track to get you to Hollywood.
Marc:Right, right.
Marc:Well, that made you iconoclastic that you saw what you wanted to do and you had resistance from guys who insisted that you do things that may or may not get you anywhere.
Guest:Right.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:But were nonetheless felt that they were champions of the human spirit in their aesthetic sense.
Guest:Well, my sister's a film professor now, like a theory, not production.
Guest:And so she like... Your sister's a film professor?
Guest:Yeah, my oldest sister, Amy.
Guest:Where?
Guest:In Florida.
Guest:And my other sister's a nurse.
Guest:But just felt like I had to be fair and mention both of them.
Guest:But my sister... At least one of them's doing something important.
Guest:Out of the three of you.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:No, there's definitely times where I'm like, okay, my one sister is educating people.
Guest:The other one is healing people.
Guest:And I'm just- We're all healers.
Guest:Giving sugar cubes, man, to the masses.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:No, you're healing.
Marc:I mean, you know, there's a certain slice of the culture that needs to kind of move through your heartbreak and frustration.
Marc:I mean, we got to think that telling those stories are important in making people feel less alone.
Guest:Yeah, well, let me just say, I mean, like, I was going to say this before we even started recording, but I didn't get the opportunity, Mark.
Guest:I had a lot of technical difficulties.
Guest:Yeah, well, no, but your podcast here has meant so much to me over the years.
Guest:Oh, good.
Guest:And I think the thing you just said I feel like could be said a hundredfold to you, which is that I can't imagine how good it must feel to know that people listen to your show.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And they get to hear people talk about feelings that they also have.
Guest:And like it's mind blowing how rare that actually is.
Guest:And I know there was a stretch in 2010, 2011 where I'd listen to your podcast.
Guest:I go out walking for like a mile as the sun went down and it was just the way to get into the night when I was like in a really bad place.
Guest:And it continues to like be very therapeutic, but you're doing the Lord's work, somebody's work.
Marc:Thank you.
Marc:I'm happy to hear that.
Marc:It's really beautiful.
Marc:Well, that's very nice of you, because I do wonder about that.
Marc:You know, as times get more difficult and things get darker, I'm wondering, like, should I really be talking about this guy peeing himself?
Marc:Is this the important stuff that needs to happen?
Guest:Well, I love that I just said, like, it's feelings that you also share.
Guest:And I'm like, does anybody have the feeling of like, oh, I pissed my pants in front of an audience to get three laughs?
Marc:I think that makes you a hero.
Marc:I appreciate the commitment.
Marc:I've known guys that have done some pretty risque stuff up on stage in a sketch way.
Marc:But outside of maybe exposing genitals, I don't know that I've seen actual peeing.
Guest:Good for you.
Guest:Thank you.
Marc:That's some radical shit.
Guest:It's not the same work that I just extolled for you.
Guest:I was like, you've changed lives.
Guest:You help people drive to work and not kill themselves.
Guest:Right.
Marc:Well, I think that changed a life or two.
Marc:Changed yours.
Marc:It certainly must have given, you must have at that moment realized, like, I've got some balls.
Guest:I got some things to, yeah.
Guest:And urine's coming from them.
Marc:Yeah, yeah.
Marc:I did it.
Guest:I did it.
Guest:Yeah, well, it's interesting.
Guest:And, like, you know, not to just go devolve into pee-pee and poo-poo talk, but at the UCB.
Guest:You're not getting told me a story where you shit yourself.
Guest:Well, the UCB wants me.
Guest:Neil Campbell, my comedy partner.
Guest:Yeah, I didn't know that guy.
Guest:Yeah, Neil's.
Guest:best, funniest dude in the world, and comedy's greatest weapon.
Guest:But we did a Dirtiest Sketch show once at UCB where I took a dump on stage, Mark, and the next day, Matt Besser came up to me and shook my hand with so much pride in his eyes.
Guest:Wait, you took a real dump?
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:Now there's something wrong with it.
Guest:Yeah, I know.
Guest:Now there's some pathology.
Marc:We've just crossed over from taking chances to, what the fuck is, really?
Guest:And I think I've heard the loss of 100 general meetings right now, Mark.
Guest:They're like, is he going to come in and take a dump on my coffee table?
Marc:These mothers driving to work.
Marc:So wait, how many people were at the show?
Guest:It was like a sold out crowd.
Guest:Can you shit on stage?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Gigi Allen style, man.
Guest:Okay.
Guest:All right.
Guest:So what did the audience do?
Guest:Oh, Mark, it was the best night of my life.
Guest:It was great.
Guest:I just, I remember Neil and I did a sketch and, you know, we're-
Guest:we're naked and like that gets its own laugh i don't do this anymore this is in my past yes i haven't done anything like this since the pre-obama yeah uh this was the bush years by the way just because i know this is a good to be continued spot yeah neil and i uh our first work we ever did together was on your radio show
Guest:What?
Guest:Yeah, I think your show must have reached out to UCB and just, is there any people who wanna do guest bits?
Guest:And we were so... Yeah, I used to use Wyatt, Sinek, and Seth Morris.
Guest:yes yeah what did we do was i the guy yeah and i remember we were at the ucb because we had a show at 11. yeah and uh or no midnight and i don't know what time your show was on but we had to do it from backstage at the ucb and i remember getting the number with the code to call you in and i was really nervous so like my hands were like shaking in the dark yeah like the backstage of ucb and uh we had the radio on in the background so we could sort of hear it
Guest:But it definitely was like the largest audience I had ever had at that point.
Guest:I don't know.
Guest:I've tried to remember.
Guest:It was both of you?
Guest:Uh-huh.
Guest:Yeah, we came up with the bit and then we called in.
Marc:And I was a straight man?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And I remember, you know, whatever.
Guest:I could have been fluffing myself up.
Guest:But I remember, you know, when you can tell like somebody's smiling.
Marc:No, I love talking.
Marc:I love doing improvised phone bits.
Guest:Yeah, but when you could hear somebody smiling as they do it, I felt like I could hear you smile.
Marc:Oh, I'm sure I was.
Guest:Yeah, I was like, oh, that went well.
Guest:Neil and I were like really, yeah.
Marc:I wonder what show that was.
Marc:It was at night, and it was live.
Marc:On Friday night.
Marc:All right, so you're doing a lot of UCB.
Marc:That's where it starts?
Marc:That's where you came out here?
Marc:How'd you leave Iowa?
Marc:Did you make the funny film, or what?
Guest:when I was in college during the summer, I wouldn't stay in my, in Iowa city, I'd go back home.
Guest:And, uh, the way I occupied my time was like, yeah, by making little movies or whatever.
Guest:So I had done that the two summers and they're all, if you watch them, it's all about being very lonely and melancholy in Iowa.
Guest:Like this, this is the experience, but, uh,
Guest:But then when I moved out to LA, that was like 04.
Guest:And then the UCB went from New York to LA or started a new one in like 05.
Guest:And I remember the comedy... I had been doing open mics and...
Guest:As a solo stand-up?
Guest:Doing, minus the peeing, my pants part, I would just take the bits that I wrote that were solo things that were more theater-y.
Guest:Oh, and do them as monologues?
Marc:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:And Neil and I, Neil would do his stuff, too, and we'd go out to open mics together and do it.
Guest:And we also had a sketch group, us two, with Mike Cassidy and this guy Chris Stangle, and they were super funny dudes.
Guest:But we were doing M-Bar.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And...
Guest:Scott Aukerman's old show, the early Death Ray show.
Guest:Yeah, the early Death Ray show, which Neil and I got asked to host Comedy Death Ray one night.
Guest:This would have been like, oh, five.
Marc:I remember, I was doing it then.
Guest:I remember, yeah, it was great.
Guest:I love that show, oh my gosh.
Guest:At Embar.
Guest:Yes, holy shit.
Guest:It was wild.
Guest:Well, it was like the first month.
Guest:I knew about it before coming to LA.
Guest:When I was in Iowa, I'd read online, like, oh, there's this.
Marc:Oh, on a special thing?
Guest:Yeah, yeah, a special thing, yeah.
Guest:And being like, oh my God, there's a comedy show where you can go and see Dino Stanatopoulos do standup?
Guest:That's amazing.
Guest:And so I knew Scott and I knew BJ before even moving to LA, so like- From the website.
Guest:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:And Mr. Show, just loving Mr. Show.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And Neil and I and Cassidy just being huge comedy dorks.
Guest:I mean, we're like at the M bar, like in a corner being like, that's Scott Walkerman.
Guest:Oh, wow.
Guest:And Scott was the, him and his wife Kulop, they were dating at the time, but the two of them were like the surrogate parents.
Guest:I mean, they were like the people who like looked out for all of us and took care of us.
Guest:I remember maybe after the second or third time Scott saw Neil and I perform, I was talking to Scott afterwards.
Guest:And this maybe is an obnoxious thing to say.
Guest:Scott was like, hey, I want to help make you famous.
Guest:And when it's your first year in LA, that is your hope is that a person would say that to you.
Guest:It's like the thing like you.
Marc:Yeah, he never said that to me.
Guest:You were already, you were doing fine.
Marc:I was something.
Marc:I don't ever remember having stellar shows at M-Bar.
Marc:I was always so cranky and mad at the audience for being too cool.
Guest:Yeah, well, but it's not cool.
Guest:It's like a bunch of special thing dorks.
Marc:I know, yeah, but I always felt like I was from the outside.
Marc:Yeah, that's my problem.
Guest:Well, the first time I met you, officially met you, I think Judd introduced us at the comedy store.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And you killed man.
Guest:That was very funny.
Guest:I remember the bit about the billboard of the, that's in LA for Vegas performers.
Guest:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Guest:Who are they?
Guest:Yeah, who are these people?
Marc:They have one name?
Marc:Are they just-
Guest:Inventing them.
Guest:A lot of times there's an exclamation point.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:But you were in the green room at UCB and I came backstage and there was a group of people and I and my like,
Guest:I want to be liked by everybody way.
Guest:I came in with a big explosion.
Guest:I'm like, hey, everybody, how's it going?
Guest:And everybody's like, hi, hello, hello.
Guest:And you did say hi.
Guest:And I went back into the back dressing room.
Guest:And I was like, this is Marc Maron.
Guest:I go in there and I say hi to everybody who doesn't say hi to me.
Guest:What's his problem?
Guest:And it was actually Harris Whittles was there.
Guest:And he went, I don't know, man.
Guest:Maybe people just have a bad day.
Guest:And if they can't be on in that moment, that's OK.
Guest:And from then on, not just with you, but with anybody.
Guest:That peaceful, zen-like, fish head, Harris Whittles philosophy.
Marc:Stuck with you?
Guest:Totally.
Marc:It maybe has nothing to do with you.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And clearly, that would push my buttons as a person who's like, I'm going to control this situation with my niceness.
Marc:No, yeah, I mean, we all do it.
Marc:I specialize in making assumptions about what other people are thinking about me.
Marc:It's never great.
Marc:Like, I don't know, I just had that horrible exchange with Mike Birbiglia.
Marc:Why'd I do that?
Marc:I'm a grown-ass man.
Marc:I'm 53 years old.
Marc:I've known him for decades.
Marc:Sure, he annoys me, but like, why can't I let that go for a second?
Marc:There are people that trigger me.
Marc:What are you gonna do?
Marc:You're not one of them.
Marc:I'm sure I was completely immersed in my own garbage.
Guest:oh no i mean yeah and i mean that's always the case right were you tight with harris oh yeah he's my brother i mean he's the closest thing to a brother yeah i mean especially i think when you grow up with out brothers and he had an older sister as well yeah i think guys who didn't grow up with brothers are always on some level searching for a brother and yeah i definitely found that in in harris what a sad story what a terrible loss
Guest:A huge loss to comedy, but also the universe.
Guest:I'm still raw about it, so anything I would say is still something that I don't know my full feelings on.
Guest:Sure.
Guest:Brief is hard.
Guest:Yeah, I just know that I miss him every day and think about him every day.
Guest:Did you guys work together?
Guest:Yeah, we were in a band together, the unfortunately named Don't Stop or We'll Die.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:But he was a drummer and he was an awesome drummer.
Guest:He was the best drummer I've ever played with because he, this is gonna sound so behind the music key, like prepare to roll your eyes, anybody listening to this.
Guest:But he was a drummer who played with emotion.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Like we would play stuff and he would be able to somehow like create a feeling with what he was playing, which is very, I don't know, like it's very rare in drummers.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:A lot of times.
Guest:What do you play?
Guest:I play bass, which is like the idiots.
Marc:But you need the drummer.
Marc:Yeah, exactly.
Marc:You're going to understand the drummer better than anybody.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And there was a part, there was one song, you know, there was always one part where I remember we loved playing that part together.
Guest:And so when we were on stage, we always glanced over at each other during that part, just being like, this is just you and me, man.
Marc:This is awesome.
Marc:Sorry.
Marc:I'm sorry for your loss, man.
Guest:I'm sorry for, there's other people who've lost him who it's far more painful.
Guest:I mean, the thing I think about all the time was that he was such a, he's like on the very short list of people who had such a high standard for what was hack and what was original and what was actually good comedy.
Guest:that what breaks my heart is like, oh, in 10 years, he would have been, just as a comedy fan, he would have done something that would have been totally changed.
Guest:He already was, but like changed comedy because he had- Humblebrag was a big contribution to the culture.
Guest:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:I mean, I was in the rest of development writer's room when Humblebrag was really kicking off and-
Guest:you could tell just like the delight all of hollywood just had about somebody finally has the balls to do this but also have a word for it yeah yeah yeah it's quite a thing yeah and you wrote on that uh i wrote on arrested the fourth season the one that was on netflix what other one things did you write for
Guest:I wrote on that, and I wrote on Comedy Bang Bang for a bunch of seasons, and that was awesome.
Guest:I mean, that was like... For IFC?
Guest:Mm-hmm.
Guest:Uh-huh.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Companions.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:And, you know, what else?
Guest:Did you work with Dino?
Yeah.
Guest:Yeah, my first writing job was on Moral Oral.
Guest:He asked Scott Aukerman to write a script.
Guest:And Scott, again, I have 10 of the examples of this.
Guest:Scott asked Neil and I if we'd want to write the script with him.
Marc:Well, I would think Dino would have a tremendous amount of respect for the guy that shit on stage and pisses me off.
Guest:Well, it's funny because Dino, I loved, I mean, I first saw him that first season of Conan and I was just like, this guy is so funny.
Guest:Like he blew, whatever.
Guest:The thing you see in sixth grade, I feel like.
Marc:He's very, yeah, he's raw and ballsy.
Guest:Yeah, he did the kiss-ass turkey.
Guest:I remember it was like the funniest thing.
Guest:The guy in the audience, the turkey in the audience who would over laugh at Cody's jokes so he didn't eat them for Thanksgiving.
Guest:But Dino was my first experience with this where I had so much admiration for him that I would keep my distance if I saw him in public because I would be like, he doesn't want to talk to me.
Guest:He's on the Mount Rushmore of comedy or whatever.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And then I was talking to Scott and I was like, oh, I saw Dino out, but I didn't say anything.
Guest:And he said, yeah, he told me he saw you.
Guest:He said he was really upset that he wouldn't say hi.
Guest:And it was the first time I was like, oh, right.
Guest:There's also the sensitivity of being like, somebody wants to be talked to.
Marc:But once you're in the club, you're expected to act like a person.
Guest:That's true.
Guest:But I didn't think I was.
Guest:Do you now?
Guest:No, I still have the philosophy of you don't ask to go to the party.
Guest:You don't cross the room to meet somebody.
Guest:But that could also be its own narcissism of being like, no, that person walks across the room to me.
Marc:I'm a little like that.
Marc:I don't feel like I'm part of it, but I am.
Marc:And I do like if I see somebody that I really want to talk to, I'll go.
Guest:like do it like a fan boy though but I don't I don't ever assume that but I think you have a history and a or a world around you no but also of being like a somebody who's smart about comedy so if you came up and introduced yourself to say I don't know who you're referencing but like a Steve Martin right it goes a little further than a special thing
Marc:But yeah, no, but sometimes they don't know me.
Marc:And then I'll tell them who I am and they're like, nope.
Marc:Of course.
Guest:What do you think this is?
Marc:I'm not Kanye.
Marc:Guy does a podcast in his garage, a very specific bunch of people.
Guest:Kanye's probably recorded music at his home.
Marc:No, I know that, but everybody knows Kanye.
Guest:Yes, yeah.
Marc:Some people know me.
Marc:So how does this, I mean, so you spent, you were here like a decade before love started to happen, really.
Guest:Yeah, you know, I... A lot of writing jobs and... Which, you know, I did this movie.
Guest:This was like probably like I'd lived here in like NLA for about four or five years and booked a part in this Chris Columbus movie called I Love You, Beth Cooper, which was this like 20th Century Fox big release.
Guest:I was the lead with this really great actress, Hayden Panettiere.
Guest:And it has its fans, but it just tanked at the box office.
Guest:So it was this like weird thing of, even when I was experiencing it, I remember thinking like, well, this isn't necessarily what I...
Guest:had imagined, but because it feels like a big thing, then I guess it is.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And when it didn't do well, I wouldn't necessarily say I was atoning or anything, but I think the idea of like, I would rather be in a writer's room writing on a show that I love and respect, like Arrested Development or Comedy Bang Bang, rather than chasing another...
Marc:Right, someone else's work.
Marc:Yeah, yeah.
Marc:Well, you were going out, though.
Marc:You made yourself available.
Marc:You're of that generation, I think, that is proficient in working with other people and doing all these different things.
Marc:I mean, you knew how to be on stage.
Marc:You knew how to shit on stage.
Marc:You knew how to write.
Marc:You knew how to act to a degree.
Marc:You knew how to be in the world of doing a lot of different things.
Guest:But it was weird because when that movie was coming out, it was the same time that I had tested for SNL.
Guest:I'd gone out and tested and it was like a, that was what I was really wanting to be a part of and working for.
Guest:How'd that go?
Guest:It was good.
Guest:Did you meet with Lauren?
Marc:Mm-hmm.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Yeah, it was good.
Guest:Like, it was out here in L.A., so it wasn't the... Full treatment?
Guest:It wasn't the experience that I think would probably be grander, which is like, oh, you go to 30 Rock and you go up in an elevator.
Marc:Yeah, more grander, more terrifying, you mean?
Guest:Where'd you meet him?
Guest:On the Paramount lot here in L.A.
Guest:at his offices and stuff.
Guest:But he... It was good.
Guest:I remember I walked in and...
Guest:It's interesting, like with somebody, I'm curious what your experience, not just with Lauren, I know that, but I just mean like with people you- Oh yeah, where'd you hear about that?
Guest:With people that like, I have this, something happens where when I meet somebody who I really, really admire and respect, it's when I can most become myself because I have such admiration for them that I think-
Guest:Their bullshit meter is so high and so attuned that if I'm not who I really am, then they're gonna hate me or it's not gonna go well.
Marc:That's a pretty good weird application of some Catholic garbage.
Marc:But some sort of weird inverted, you know, shame guard.
Guest:But it's weird because I can't do it with somebody else like that.
Guest:Like, most times a mask does come up where I go, oh, I got to be somebody else for somebody else.
Marc:Well, that's a very, like, it's a very sort of...
Marc:great um default that you seem to have uh figured out in retroactively in the sense that like i imagine you had to notice you were doing that it wasn't a plan like i'm going to meet or michaels i'm just going to be me it's just something you do yeah like you're like this guy's going to see right through me right if i if i don't just show up for this
Guest:yeah so that's good yeah i remember talking to him he was like what do you think got into comedy i was like i was you know raised catholic and the youngest and i was just like open i treated like therapy you know yeah and at the end of it he was like hey would you like to come out to new york and test and i did feel like we had a uh i'm talking like a guy who went on a first date but i was like i i feel like we had a connection and it's the same thing like uh
Guest:I'm not, I'll try not to pick up all the names off the ground here, but it was the same, like when I met, I got to meet Gary Shanley once and that was the same.
Guest:You're right, you don't plan it, but like midway through the conversation, you're like, oh, I'm being myself here.
Guest:That's good.
Guest:And speaking candidly because.
Marc:Well, I think that's a good thing to show up for yourself, you know, because you don't have a choice really in those moments.
Marc:You're like, Gary Shanley's going to fucking see through this.
Marc:I don't ever think that though, but I do think there are those moments where you want to be seen by this person as who you are.
Marc:And it's not even a matter of meeting them as equals, but it's a matter of like, I think our assumption is, is that how are they going to see me at all?
Guest:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:And so maybe there's more care about how you want to be seen as who you are.
Guest:Sure, I think so.
Marc:So that's interesting.
Marc:Wow.
Marc:But you didn't get SNL.
Guest:No, I went out and tested, but that was the year Bobby Moynihan got on, and he's hilarious, and it was like, people knew when we were testing, I'm like, oh, Bobby's gonna get this.
Marc:But they don't always just have one spot.
Guest:Yeah, I mean, there was, but that's...
Guest:Who was?
Guest:I mean, it's interesting though, like the other people who tested that year, they all went on to do like their own amazing thing like Kroll or Jordan Peele.
Guest:I saw Get Out last night and it's amazing.
Guest:I was just like breathtaking how like, what a great movie that was.
Guest:I got to see it.
Guest:And it's interesting because I feel like, yeah, like you work to get to test.
Guest:And then if you don't get it, you go, oh, okay, I'm going to do my own thing.
Marc:But I think what's more telling is that the number of avenues to actually do and succeed at your own thing are vast now.
Marc:That there was a time where if you didn't get SNL, it's sort of like, all right, back to anonymity.
Marc:Right, right, yeah.
Marc:And now you're like, I've got a whole network of people I'm gonna work with and I'm already working and I can do this.
Guest:Yeah, well, when you first meet, or when I first came to LA in 2005, there were zero, not zero, three comedy writing jobs in town.
Guest:And it was like,
Marc:No YouTube, there was no special, what do you call it, Will Ferrell site?
Marc:Oh, Funny or Dog.
Guest:Yeah, there was none of that.
Guest:Yeah, no, no, no, no.
Guest:So it was really the only writing job that I could imagine that would be cool to have was like, Everybody Loves Raymond.
Marc:Right.
Guest:And that's, you know, I love that show, but it's still mainstream.
Marc:Yeah, what's weird is it was that short a time ago that everything blew up.
Guest:Yeah, and now a decade later, you know, I don't want to...
Guest:say this too confidently, but I feel like there's, like, 1,000 more comedy writing jobs now in town that you could get if you're a young, hungry writer.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Which, it just wasn't the case.
Guest:But, yeah, new avenues came, and I remember when the Funny or Die...
Guest:like super deluxe YouTube world.
Guest:It felt like the comparison I remember thinking it was like when Nirvana broke and all these major labels now wanna like sign garage bands.
Guest:So like Lonely Island was the nirvana.
Guest:They broke.
Guest:They were like, oh, internet videos.
Guest:The kids like them.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And then you could just feel the corporate tentacles just come down and like start reaching in every open mic and every UCB and being like, okay.
Marc:Maybe this is the new people.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:We don't know.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:We're old guys, but this seems to be popular.
Marc:Let's see if any of this sticks.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I mean, that's what's, and then awesome about the UCB is they're actually really great at like,
Guest:I wouldn't say keeping toxins at bay, but they're basically creating a farm where you're going to succeed if you really hone in on your own specific point of view and you're not pandering.
Marc:But I think also what happens is that it became very clear through the evolution of what you experienced in the arc of your life here that you could find an audience.
Marc:Is that there was a time where it's like the audience was this one thing.
Marc:It was just this mainstream blob that you had to somehow figure out how to crack.
Marc:And then all of a sudden, like with a special thing and with Funny or Die, there was always something like, and as the networks lost their power to keep that as many eyes as possible and all these other...
Marc:Netflix and other entities started to show up.
Marc:It was like, well, maybe you don't need to do that.
Marc:Maybe you don't need to please everybody.
Marc:It seems to be the model.
Marc:I mean, if you can find a reasonable number of people that dig what you do, that's the best.
Marc:That's what you're hoping for.
Guest:Yeah, I mean...
Guest:It's interesting.
Guest:Like, definitely, I feel like, you know, Scott and Kulop and the UCB are the people who I like most, like, owe anything I have to, you know?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:But, like...
Guest:It is something that, right, I guess 20 years ago wouldn't have existed.
Guest:No, it was all Everybody Loves Ray.
Marc:That was what you were gunning for.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Or a late night show.
Guest:Well, that was the thing when you're in LA, you're always like, oh, the coolest writing jobs are in New York.
Guest:You'd be like, oh, you'd be on SNL or Letterman.
Marc:That's interesting.
Marc:That shit's over.
Yeah.
Guest:It really is.
Guest:Well, definitely now in LA, you can find cool writing jobs.
Marc:Well, no, there's just a lot of interesting things happening and a lot of things you can self-generate.
Marc:So how did the relationship with Judd happen?
Guest:That was, I, through the UCB, met Charlene Yee, extraordinarily talented.
Guest:And I were, we do shows together and write songs together and perform.
Guest:And we were in this Will Ferrell movie, Semi Pro.
Guest:And we were these two kids in wheelchairs on the side of the court.
Guest:And all our scenes got cut.
Guest:But because we were basically had to be in the background of a lot of shots, we were just there for a month.
Guest:And so we'd go into our trailer and write songs.
Guest:And then she was like,
Guest:Hey, I started writing this movie script, Cheese Pizza.
Guest:Give it a read.
Guest:Let me know what you think.
Guest:And it was about halfway done.
Guest:And I loved it.
Guest:And I mean, Charlene's so funny and talented.
Guest:And I was like, oh, well, I like this and I like that.
Guest:And she was like, well, would you want to write it with me?
Guest:And then around that time, Knocked Up had came out and really had bowled Judd over.
Guest:Charlene had bowled Judd over and he was like, hey, if you ever have an idea for a movie, come in and pitch it.
Guest:And Charlene, who I, you know, I'll to my grave be indebted to her for this.
Guest:She brought me in to pitch the movie to Judd.
Guest:And it was the first thing we, you know, we went and sold it at Universal and got a year working on this movie and never got made.
Guest:how I met Judd and that script I remember, he was like, oh, I can tell that this is the work of somebody who's writing their first script, which sounds like maybe I didn't tell, but he meant it as like, there's so many ideas here and you can just tell there's so much enthusiasm about.
Guest:And so when he went to produce this new Pee Wee Herman movie, Judd had asked me if I wanted to co-write it with Paul Rubens, who was the first person I loved in comedy.
Guest:he put us together and I think that was partly because the script Charlene and I wrote was like a hard PG and I think he was like oh this tone we could fit with this peewee thing we're doing so so was that amazing working with him
Guest:Yeah, I mean, he's like the most beautiful hearted person in the world.
Guest:He's really, I mean, it was, it truly was.
Guest:I mean, like when I was first growing up, I'm not saying this, people say this, you know, like, they'll be like, I was a big fan.
Guest:It's like, you know, convenient, you're working on their project.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I truly, like he was the beginning, middle and end of like comedy for me.
Guest:I loved him so much.
Guest:So getting to work with him was really awesome because in addition to him being just a sweetheart and fun to work with and hang out and have laughs and we've become friends now, he's also like...
Guest:really more an artist than a comedian.
Guest:And so I would, you know, before I met him, I once tried to write like a Pee Wee-esque script for myself.
Guest:And it was really, it's not good.
Guest:And I remember reading and being like, this sucks.
Guest:And Pee Wee's Big Adventure is so good.
Guest:I mean, it's my favorite comedy.
Guest:And I'm like, it's so good.
Guest:How?
Guest:How would somebody even make that?
Guest:And then getting to work with him, I was like, oh, it's because he's a genius.
Guest:That's the how.
Guest:You got to be a genius.
Guest:But the thing that was really cool with him is like he, going back to the artist thing, is like he's really about minimalism.
Guest:So it's about like, this line doesn't need, says too much and you can pull this out.
Guest:And I would overwrite, you know, I would have like a really hacky setup punchline joke.
Guest:And he was like, you know, if I just like laugh here, that's like, we'll be funnier.
Guest:If I just go, ha ha, you know, like, okay.
Guest:And I type in ha ha and it would be funnier.
Guest:And
Guest:So the thing that I learned from him was about stripping stuff away and making it just this sort of beautiful polished jewel.
Guest:Right, right.
Marc:It's important to learn that.
Guest:Yeah, but it's interesting because the thing that I've learned from Judd is going as deep as possible with stuff too, like emotionally or just depth of ideas.
Guest:Like, okay, this person's in this situation.
Guest:What could happen here?
Guest:to do ever is just do one of those kind of like, um, blitz idea blitzes where you're just like, okay, from the next 10 minutes, I just have to like come up with every idea I possibly can for this situation.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And, um, and so working with Judd and Paul was interesting cause it was like two good flavors going together, which was like Judd's depth and like Paul's like minimalism or like simplicity and goofiness.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:There's a sincerity like there's a sincerity in the peewee goofiness.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And then there's also a sincerity, obviously, and like Judd stuff of like, hey, I'm not I'm going to this is going to be about feelings and emotions.
Guest:Right.
Guest:And I'm I'm willing to stick my chin out and be emotional in this scene.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:And I think that in love, you definitely do that.
Guest:Yeah, well, that's Judd's, you know, guiding hand.
Guest:Yeah, yeah, big time.
Marc:And how much did you write?
Marc:How many people were involved in the writing of it?
Guest:Well, my wife, Leslie Arfin, and I, we co-created it with Judd.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And, oh, P.S., when Leslie and I were first dating and she found out I took a shit on stage, she was like, that's when I fell in love with you.
Guest:Mm-hmm.
Guest:They're paid off.
Marc:It's all about the women, isn't it?
Marc:Well, I think for her it was also like- You knew in your heart that that's, I'm doing this for the chicks.
Guest:Well, I'm married now, so I'm like way past this point, but I remember, oh man, like seven, eight years ago when a show's about to start and you look through the curtain and you're like-
Guest:who am I trying to impress this show?
Guest:And it would be the little boost to get you to do a good show.
Marc:It's so sad.
Marc:I never had that sadly.
Marc:I was like, this is not gonna work.
Marc:No, I was always like, this is gonna be terrible.
Marc:It never paid off.
Guest:But I remember I was looking through the curtain.
Guest:This was like eight or nine years ago.
Marc:I'm gonna charm that one.
Marc:Yes, yes.
Guest:And essentially irritate them.
Marc:So you guys all created it and you all, who writes all the scripts?
Guest:Oh, well, we all do, and then we have a staff of great writers.
Marc:Judd's a good support.
Guest:Oh, of course.
Guest:I mean, that's the reason it's on.
Guest:And Judd's like, you know, I first saw Freaks and Geeks in college, and for the next four years, I just wrote plays and stuff that was just a ripoff of Freaks and Geeks.
Guest:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:Not necessarily about high school, but just the, oh, you can do this sort of sad, funny thing.
Guest:And then at the end of college, I looked back on everything I wrote, and I was so embarrassed by how much I revealed and said.
Guest:And then so for the next 10 years of my life, it was all like...
Guest:Goofball, absurdist, sketch comedy stuff, because I was like, I never want to go back to the point where I reread something and I'm embarrassed.
Marc:Well, then you're lucky you didn't drink.
Marc:See, there's the other silver lining about not being a part of you.
Marc:You can be embarrassed without drinking, apparently.
Guest:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:Embarrassment and shame can take any form.
Marc:Yeah, it seems like that's one of the exercises you do now that the OCD is over and you've learned how to write.
Marc:It's like, all right, this is an embarrassing and shameful thing that happened in my life.
Marc:Let's work it.
Marc:How many different things can happen that'll make me feel embarrassed and ashamed?
Marc:That's the new exercise.
Guest:Well, that's what's awesome about Judd now is he's able to... I'm now finally going back to that place of writing that I... Whatever...
Guest:Roll your eyes, but like scared to write because I'm just like, oh, I don't want in five years to look back on it.
Guest:And I'm sure I will.
Guest:I'm sure I'll look back on this interview in five years and go like, I can't believe I had that philosophy.
Marc:I don't know that's true.
Marc:I think as you get older and you get more accustomed to seeing your work done and doing your work is like you may say, you know, that's not where I'm at now, but that was me then.
Marc:And that's better than like, ugh.
Marc:Yeah, that's nice to hear.
Marc:Yeah, I mean.
Marc:Yeah, give yourself a break.
Marc:You're doing good.
Guest:But I mean, I think, yeah, somebody said to me once, they were like, oh, if you weren't embarrassed by it, that would be bad because then you wouldn't have grown.
Guest:And it's a side of growth.
Marc:I think in the series, there's a lot of, you know, and I think it all plays in what we talked about in terms of,
Marc:the risks you've taken on stage and the shame that drives you or whatever is that you do in the series, you make yourself very vulnerable and you are able to stay in that.
Marc:It's right for the character to have these, to be whatever, it's not nerdy, it's a sort of like, you're not a guy that's sure of yourself.
Marc:Yeah, and... You definitely had the obsessive nature, but fortunately for you, it was just on, you know, shame and how to avoid it.
Guest:Well, you know, and Judd's really great at guiding that.
Guest:Like, we were writing, like, a month or so ago, and we were talking, it was like, we had to come up with an ex-character on the show, and he was like, well, why do you think you've been broken up with before?
Guest:You think it's, like, probably they thought you were a loser.
Guest:It was like...
Guest:You got to go in there and like it becomes, I mean, especially since the character is some degrees away.
Guest:I mean, I'm sure you've had this experience with your show too.
Guest:I'm curious.
Guest:Like when you go into the writer's room and people are pitching ideas and they'll be like, well, Gus would do this because he's a huge pussy.
Guest:And I'd be like, well, he's got his reasons like everybody.
Guest:He's not exactly that.
Guest:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:No, yeah, I definitely had that moment.
Guest:It's tough.
Guest:You have to be like, you know, I've been in therapy for...
Guest:eight or nine years now, like heavy duty, love therapy, but the show sometimes does feel like an extension of that.
Marc:Well, yeah, but also after you do a season or two, you start to realize that there is a part of you that is characterized.
Marc:It is not all of you.
Marc:And you are able to get a little distance from the character of you in the show and you.
Guest:And maybe that's like what's fun about it.
Marc:Well, yeah.
Marc:Once you figure that out after the first season, you're like, you can write to that guy without that weird fear.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I mean, it's interesting because like if you're a person who wants to be liked and who don't, you know, like sometimes that's not going to be the most interesting thing for the show.
Guest:I mean, I'll get hurt sometimes when people are like...
Guest:oh, my character's unlikable, or when people say nasty things about my looks in relation to Gillian Jacobs' character, it hurts me so bad.
Guest:It cuts so deep.
Marc:Well, here, try this.
Guest:Don't read that.
Guest:But there's some times where you can't.
Guest:It penetrates the bubble in a way that you can't.
Guest:And the thing that's complicated about it is like,
Guest:well, if I made this show to be a 10-episode commercial for why you should think I'm a great guy, I would hate it, you know?
Marc:No, and they would hate you more.
Marc:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Marc:Well, no, you did a good thing.
Marc:Oh, well.
Marc:And I'm like, you know, I didn't know how you would be, and this is a very enjoyable talk, and I'm happy for you.
Guest:I'm happy for you, Mark.
Marc:And I can't, you know, I'm not gonna be able to say anything that's gonna stop you from beating the shit out of yourself, so.
Guest:Well, believe me, there is like, you know, being such a big fan of the podcast and stuff, there's always like this like, I hope I don't blow this WTF in your, you know.
Marc:No, no, it was great.
Marc:I thought we were going to do 20 minutes and we did an hour and a half.
Marc:Really?
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:Aw, that's nice.
Guest:Thanks for coming.
Guest:Aw, thanks for having me.
Marc:I feel like I could have talked longer even with that fella.
Marc:That Paul Russ fella.
Marc:You can go to WTFpod.com slash tour for my upcoming tour dates.
Marc:This weekend I'm in Oakland.
Marc:That show at the Fox is close to selling out.
Marc:If you want to get those tickets, I'll be in Seattle.
Marc:I think there's a few tickets for that.
Marc:I'll be at the Vogue in Vancouver on the 26th.
Marc:Those are the dates coming up this weekend.
Marc:Again, go to WTFpod.com slash tour for those.
Marc:i'll play i'll play a little i'll play on my new guitar with the tone with the tone i found pretty organically
.
.
.
Marc:Boomer lives!