Episode 856 - Bassem Youssef / Sam Seder
Marc:all right let's do this how are you what the fuckers what the fuck buddies what the fucking ears what the fuck nicks what's happening i am mark maron this is my podcast wtf got kind of a double header today yeah my old buddy sam cedar from the majority report is going to be here
Marc:Back in the day, we had a show, a streaming internet show before anyone streamed the internet.
Marc:Way ahead of the curve.
Marc:But he's the host of the Majority Report with Sam Seder.
Marc:Airs live Monday through Friday at noon Eastern on Majority.fm.
Marc:It's also available as a podcast.
Marc:Sam Seder will be here shortly.
Marc:It's always nice to see Sam in a difficult way.
Marc:It's difficult and nice to see Sam.
Marc:There's usually some tension, but I don't think it's there as much anymore.
Marc:I think we're both older and maybe a little more humbled by the great wheel.
Marc:The great wheel of time and life.
Marc:Humbled by the wheel.
Marc:Can you dig it?
Marc:My second guest today is Bassem Youssef.
Marc:If you're not familiar with that name, Bassem Youssef, he was a surgeon in Egypt who started doing a YouTube show, and he eventually became the most popular television personality in Egypt, doing what people called the Egyptian Daily Show.
Marc:Eventually, he had to flee the country for speaking out against the government.
Marc:Yep.
Marc:That's where that happened.
Marc:And now he's here in L.A.
Marc:going on auditions.
Marc:Life of a rebel is tough.
Marc:It's tough.
Marc:Doesn't get easier.
Marc:So what else?
Marc:Los Angeles, folks, people here.
Marc:If you want to hear me and Brendan talk about Waiting for the Punch and other inside stuff about the podcast, this is your one chance.
Marc:We're going to be at the Ann and Jerry Moss Theater at the Herb Alpert Educational Village in Santa Monica on Sunday, October 29th at 7 p.m., one night only, Los Angeles.
Marc:Go to LiveTalksLA.org to get tickets or go to the tour page of WTFPod.com.
Marc:You can get a ticket and a book for a bundle price or just get a ticket and bring the copy of the book you already have.
Marc:We'll talk.
Marc:We'll answer questions.
Marc:We'll sign all your stuff.
Marc:We'll hang out.
Marc:That's Sunday, October 29th.
Marc:Go to LiveTalksLA.org or WTFPod.com.
Marc:Can you dig it?
Marc:I don't know why that, you know, why am I doing that?
Marc:Why am I doing that old bit from the movie The Warriors?
Marc:There's no plan to it.
Marc:There's no agenda to it.
Marc:Why am I giddy?
Marc:Terrified and giddy.
Marc:I do have a couple emails I'll read.
Marc:We got a pretty good loaded show.
Marc:I don't need to ramble too long.
Marc:I need to drive this into a ditch or spiral down the hole of self and drag you guys with me.
Marc:I hope you're holding up all right.
Marc:I don't know.
Marc:Either things are going to change in the midterms or we've all got to start learning how to love Jesus.
Marc:All right, two emails.
Marc:I'll read them to you.
Marc:Subject line, your balls.
Marc:How am I not going to open that up?
Marc:How am I not going to pop that open?
Marc:I'm a 49-year-old widow.
Marc:I am training for my second half marathon in Brooklyn, New York.
Marc:Of course, I listen to What the Fuck While I Run because why not?
Marc:I think things which come out of your mouth.
Marc:I vibe with what you have to say as well as your interviews until today.
Marc:In the middle of a six-mile run, in the middle of a very orthodox neighborhood, I listened to your intro to the Tom Colicchio interview.
Marc:The story of you getting attacked by your cat Big Head because you were naked was hilarious.
Marc:Laughed so hard and loudly.
Marc:I truly wish there was a way that my Hasidic brothers knew that I was laughing at your exposed balls when they're not even supposed to make eye contact with me.
Marc:Thank you for always making my run significantly more enjoyable.
Marc:By the way, I included the part being a widow in case any of your male listeners want to date me.
Marc:Lock the gates, Karen.
Marc:I'm not going to tell my male listeners.
Marc:All right, Karen, if they can find you on the information that I have...
Marc:i've shared then maybe either they're they're truly in love they're maybe desperate or they might be quite frightening maybe all of the above here's another email subject line satan
Marc:Hello, Mark, Brendan, WTF people.
Marc:My name is Peyton.
Marc:I'm a 24-year-old musician based out of Florence, Alabama, Muscle Shoals.
Marc:I love your podcast and keep up with everything you do because I identify with you on some deep level, and I love comedy, interviews with people I do and don't know about, and music.
Marc:all of which you seem to enjoy too.
Marc:Anyways, I'm listening to the newest episode now, and I just heard what you said about Trump being Satan and the evangelicals making a deal with him.
Marc:I think you're absolutely right about that.
Marc:I'm a Christian myself.
Marc:I don't really consider myself an evangelical because there are some very negative things that go along with that, but I do consider myself a believer in Jesus Christ.
Marc:That being said, I think old Donnie is a good example of the Dark Lord if I've ever seen one.
Marc:I just wanted to reassure you that not all of us Jesus people support this fool that has somehow become our leader.
Marc:I believe in you and I'm glad you're doing what you're doing.
Marc:I'll continue to support you as long as possible.
Marc:Keep it up, man.
Marc:Peyton.
Marc:Thank you, Peyton.
Marc:Glad to hear from a Jesus believer who sees Satan the way I do.
Marc:Obviously, I'm not a full on Satan guy.
Marc:Obviously, we're talking about comic book land, the sort of illustrated metaphysical, the mythological metaphysical, the ornate and elaborate metaphysical.
Marc:one version of it, but it is compelling.
Marc:It is compelling.
Marc:Making monsters is compelling.
Marc:Identifying monsters is compelling and satisfying.
Marc:Having them reveal themselves to be honest to God, fucking monsters, satisfying and terrifying.
Marc:Fact is, a lot of monsters out.
Marc:A lot of fucking monsters out.
Marc:So Sam Seder, what I already told you a bit about Sammy, the part where we're airing today is all about how to deal with the news every day in this climate.
Marc:And since Sam does political news every day, he was out in L.A.
Marc:and it was a good idea to have him back on.
Marc:And he's a true friend.
Marc:And he I find him very entertaining, even when he's not being intentionally entertaining.
Marc:This is me and Sam Seder.
Marc:Is that too loud?
Marc:You good?
Marc:Yeah, that's pretty good.
Marc:You know how to do it.
Guest:Yeah, I have these exact same distro box.
Marc:You do?
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Is that what you call it?
Marc:A distro box?
Guest:Well, a distribution.
Marc:Oh, I call it a... I thought it was like a... Headphone box.
Marc:Headphone mixer or something.
Marc:That's fine.
Marc:Distro box.
Guest:Well, I don't know if it's called that.
Guest:I may have made it up.
Guest:So, Sam, what are you doing in Los Angeles?
Guest:I'm actually out here for a surprise birthday party for a friend of mine.
Marc:Oh, really?
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:And is that, did it happen yet?
Marc:No.
Marc:But I guess he's not live, so he's not going to, he's going to find out tonight.
Marc:No, he's not going to.
Marc:I'm sure he doesn't.
Marc:Charlie.
Marc:Oh, Charlie Fisher?
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:He's turning 53?
Marc:No, 50.
Marc:50.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:How old are you now?
Marc:I'm just 50.
Marc:You're just 50?
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Really?
Marc:I'm a little younger than you.
Marc:Is that not apparent?
Yeah.
Marc:When did you turn 50?
Marc:Last year.
Marc:Oh, how do you feel?
Marc:Old.
Marc:Yeah?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Well, let's get some of the... I had one of the best softball games of my life the other day, though.
Guest:You didn't hurt yourself?
Guest:No, I haven't been able to play for two weeks.
Guest:I talked to another friend by my old friend Lance, and he keeps injuring himself at softball, and I'm like, maybe it's over.
Guest:I can't even walk anymore.
Guest:Maybe it's over.
Guest:I was done in by my own success.
Guest:I had like two home runs, and now I can't walk anymore because I had to run around the bases.
Marc:But you're a hero to many.
Guest:I mean, I had my day, and I haven't been able to come back.
Guest:Who do you play with?
Guest:Just guys in Brooklyn.
Guest:Oh, in Brooklyn?
Guest:Yeah, in Prospect Park.
Marc:So, wait, so you got the place in Brooklyn and you got the farm up there?
Guest:Yeah, more or less.
Marc:And you go up there on weekends?
Guest:Yeah, not as much as we used to.
Marc:And how are the children?
Marc:How's Saul and- Myla?
Guest:Myla's 11, but I mean, going on 16, which is classic.
Guest:Do you speak to her?
Guest:She will complain to me when I cut off her access, her data.
Guest:Oh, really?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:It's at 11?
Guest:Oh, dude.
Guest:It's such a nightmare.
Guest:What did you let them do?
Guest:Well, you know, she walks 20 minutes to school.
Marc:Right.
Guest:And so we gave her a phone.
Guest:Should have been a flip phone.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:But you can't do that, right?
Marc:Because she'll get there and the other kids will have the other phone and then you're... It's a different world.
Guest:I mean, you know, she spends a lot of time on it, but she still does her homework and, you know, I don't know.
Guest:My parents told me don't watch so much TV and just about every dollar I've made was a function...
Guest:just about everything i've done yeah is in some way related to tv right so i'm not gonna you think you're creating a tech genius is that is that was that the logic that like letter on the phone i'm just saying like you know i i if she does what she's supposed to do yeah then it's okay if you know it's it's a social thing but right but but it's just texting usually and like what snapchat or whatever
Guest:snapchat instagram i don't know you don't know all those well i do know i think she tried to follow me on instagram yeah she may have yeah i i i didn't i didn't do it well she's probably decided like what's the point yeah well i don't barely use she wasn't that impressed and i there's nothing impressive but but she listened to a couple of your podcasts and was like man i'm gonna listen to joe rogan are you still doing one
Guest:Yeah, I still, every day, actually.
Guest:In fact, even from out here, I called into my own show today.
Guest:Do you have a co-host that works with you?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I mean, he fills in for me once a week, more or less.
Guest:And I do like a free half and then a member half.
Guest:And the member half tends to be funnier.
Guest:And he's very funny.
Guest:I mean, he's also very knowledgeable of politics, but he's also very funny, Michael Brooks.
Marc:But I have to assume that now that there's seemingly almost no way out of the shit we're in now, that this must be just incredibly rich for you.
Guest:If you know what, it's actually the, there's a lot more people listening.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And it's activated a lot of people, but it was honestly the last thing.
Guest:Well, aside from obviously from, for the country.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:It's not what I wanted to do.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:You know, to go back to where we were.
Guest:you know in 1968 no but i mean i'm talking about professionally speaking in terms of the show to where it's just like talking about how bad donald trump is and the republicans and the conspiracies and the you know the yeah and i don't even go through that so much it's just like it was getting there was a very there's the the left has is is different than it was 15 years ago
Marc:In a better way or worse?
Guest:In a better way.
Guest:In most ways, better.
Guest:In some ways, not so great.
Guest:There was a lot of ideas that were starting to develop, and they're still going on now.
Guest:It's just that the debate about a UBI, which is a universal basic income versus a job guarantee, is...
Guest:sort of been sidelined a little bit it still exists but right but that's not what there's bigger problems yeah and but you know i was gearing up prior to the election for like okay there's going to be a huge antitrust push and and and no monopolize you know we're going to attack monopolies and this is going to be another fight between sort of like the the center center left and the left yeah and um now it's just a fight for the actual democracy
Guest:Well, I mean, the funny thing is that it's still going on.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:And it's just, in some ways, just as intense.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And it's a fight for, and part of it,
Guest:intersects with like should you be talking you know this the the russia stuff or whatever it is and so it's it's it's interesting but it's also just very difficult to sort of navigate from my perspective because i don't they you mean the the the arguments within the left as to what to prioritize that's what i wanted to talk about right
Guest:But now it's sort of like, oh, I'm going to ignore the fact that the head of the FBI just got fired because he's been investigating.
Guest:Well, I don't think I can avoid talking about that.
Guest:That would be weird.
Guest:That would be weird.
Guest:That's a smoke screen.
Guest:Don't get distracted by the fact that the president's under investigation.
Guest:Or don't get distracted by the fact that like...
Guest:He's going to NATO and literally acting like a child, like a toddler.
Guest:I didn't watch that video where he pushed some guy aside.
Guest:Yeah, he pushed, well, there's two elements to it.
Guest:One is he's so, well, everybody knows this.
Guest:He's insane.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:But he pushed aside the, I think it's the prime minister of Montenegro.
Marc:Right, yeah.
Guest:like shoved him out of the way.
Marc:He's a new guy.
Marc:Shoved the new guy out of the way.
Guest:So that he could be out in front of the group that is there.
Guest:And it's funny just from like an interpersonal thing, like the Prime Minister Montenegro sort of like turned and thought like it was like a joke.
Guest:And he tried to put his arm around him and he realized like, oh my God, this guy's gunning for the front.
Guest:But then there's also this other, like sort of the next level is, and I don't know if I buy into this because I just don't think that Trump has this level of situational awareness.
Guest:That this prime minister of Montenegro was supposedly the, I believe it's something to the effect of a target of a coup that was supposedly orchestrated by Putin.
Marc:Yeah, and he fought Putin.
Guest:And so I don't know if Donald Trump is like, I'm going to shove him out of the way.
Guest:Right.
Marc:That's the weird thing is that like both on the left and the right have their own sort of conspiratorial analysis of things.
Marc:And he puts out so much information, so much contradictory information, so much insanity that like there's enough there for you to connect dots that may not be there.
Marc:But it's sort of like, oh, it's like.
Guest:And this is a normal tendency.
Guest:I mean, I think you know this, your dad, and I had a little bit of this with my dad a little bit, and I don't... The narcissism?
Guest:No, where you try and rationalize stuff that is just not necessarily rational.
Guest:Right.
Guest:But you, as not a crazy person, just try and put it in some type of order.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Like, there has to be some reason why this is happening.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And it's possible that it's just...
Guest:There is no reason why it's happening.
Guest:It's just that the guy, you know, it's untreated syphilis.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And who knows?
Guest:Which has actually been a- Is that one of them going around?
Guest:There was a piece by a doctor in the New Republic.
Marc:Really?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:A guy named Boitler, who was a journalist father, who just said, basically the piece is like, and this was like in January.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Listen, I'm not a partisan-
Guest:It's very important that his doctor check him for syphilis because it can apparently go away and lie dormant for like 20 years and come back and give you some type of neuropathy.
Marc:Yeah, yeah.
Marc:And that's his theory.
Marc:But you were saying that you talk to your child like you would talk to Trump?
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:The Montenegro thing, like you see, when I go and drop Saul off at preschool, like you see them like, okay, it's lineup time.
Guest:And you see them shove each other and do that exact same thing.
Guest:You just say like, Saul, it's okay.
Guest:You can be number three.
Guest:How does he take it?
Guest:I mean, pretty well for, you know, like a three or four-year-old.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:But like on a day-to-day basis, like you're in it and like, you know, I, you know, to my fault have, was pretty detached throughout the Obama years and, you know, kind of like doing what, you know, one of the reasons- I'm fascinated by how you still are sort of like defensive and are project on some measure of judgment onto-
Guest:me the world that you're not doing enough in terms of politics yeah oh yeah i still do yeah yeah i'm fascinated by that why i just find it fascinating yeah because like i was like it was not really my forte to begin with but like i still feel guilty every day yeah i'm impressed by that
Marc:Yeah, it's gotten harder because I don't think I was ever very good at talking about it.
Marc:I think that I came into it as a novice and not very savvy, and I reacted.
Marc:I'm a good reactor, and if you load me up, I can certainly be compelling.
Marc:But I feel like you're better at it.
Marc:I think Rachel's better.
Marc:There's plenty of people who are better at it and more knowledgeable than me.
Marc:And I immediately get to a tone that is completely repelling to almost everybody.
Marc:So that's one of the reasons.
Marc:That was one of the big decisions.
Marc:So now I just sit in a certain amount of kind of terrified paralysis and
Guest:Well, I mean, I think everybody is.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I mean, it's, people are, my sense is that there are people who are sort of like taking a step back now and they're not as the same level of intensity.
Marc:Brendan literally had to draw a line at some point because I was like texting him and like needing explanation for everything.
Marc:He's like, hey man, everyone's going through this.
Marc:I can't.
Guest:Oh, I hear from people.
Guest:I get texts a lot from people who like, I don't even think knew six months ago that I did a daily political talk show for 10 years.
Yeah.
Guest:And now, like, I get, like, literally, like, a text every half an hour.
Guest:What's going to happen now?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Or just like, did you see this latest?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I mean, now, like, I have.
Guest:I mean, what's weird is that when we were on Air America.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I would go to parties.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Not many, but like a dinner party or something.
Guest:And I would know so much more about what was going on politically.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Everybody at that table.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:To the point where it was just, it was weird.
Guest:What are you guys doing?
Guest:Now, it feels like- Everyone's on our- Everyone has, is like completely as immersed.
Guest:And- That's a good thing.
Guest:I think that's a good thing.
Guest:You know, I think some people, I would prefer that people are more interested in-
Guest:stuff that is like the politics versus the intrigue.
Marc:And also versus sort of like damage control.
Marc:Like what do we do to fix it as opposed to like, you know, what ideas need to move forward?
Guest:I mean, damage and control is important, but there's a big fight right now on the left is like, how do you fight Donald Trump?
Guest:Do you fight Donald Trump by saying that he's,
Guest:horrible human being and and that he's bringing about a fascist America or do you also need to sort of say like hey here's a different vision for what America can be and you know in terms of like right single-payer health care where do you stand
Guest:i mean i think both are effective from an electoral standpoint yeah and and and uh it depends on who the constituency is and but it's a hard thing to not slide into one or the other what do you do like do you know how you're 50 but you have two kids so it's different than me do you know how to um do you do do you enjoy things no
Guest:I don't.
Guest:I spend... I am particularly like, you know, I think I was starting to look forward to that.
Guest:Like I wanted to branch out.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:But the whole Trump thing really has made my life so narrow now that I'm constantly updating because I feel like...
Guest:people, I take my job very seriously.
Guest:And I feel like I've got to know about what's going on.
Guest:And so much of it is stuff that I'm not terribly keyed into, but like, you know,
Guest:To read now about what's going on with the FCC, like with Sinclair Media.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Stuff that is like, nobody hearing this knows what I'm talking about.
Marc:I do, because I have been keeping up more.
Marc:I still have the weird...
Marc:Like I can get in back into the narrative pretty easily from being at Air America at the beginning for so long.
Marc:Like and I know like I can keep these different trajectories sort of going.
Marc:So I know the impact of that and how horrible it could be.
Marc:But like then I don't know where to go with that other than just paralysis and terror.
Marc:So like for me, what's happening is like you have no outlet for it.
Marc:Well, I mean, I could, but what am I going to say?
Guest:You don't have an outlet.
Guest:I don't think you'd want to do this show.
Guest:No, I don't.
Guest:Of course not.
Guest:And frankly, neither would your audience.
Marc:No, but also there's the fact that I don't have any answers.
Marc:What am I going to tell people to do?
Marc:Make some phone calls.
Marc:Maybe write a senator.
Marc:I mean, other than be aware...
Guest:What do you do?
Guest:Well, I mean, awareness is, is, uh, important.
Guest:And I mean, you can go and, and sort of get activated.
Guest:There's a lot of like grassroots stuff that's, that's developing now, but yeah, no, there's not, there's no, there's no silver bullet.
Marc:I mean, no, no, you know, um, you need a lot of them.
Marc:You need like a, like a full magazine.
Guest:If somebody has a hotline to the guy who gives out heart attacks.
Yeah.
Marc:But do you like, because I'm finding that with me, like I really feel an urgency to all of a sudden like, you know, enjoy things.
Marc:Which is no way to enjoy things with a sort of desperation, a panic.
Guest:Well, I feel like I'm drinking more and I'm just coming back to the place where I say to my kids, like, no, you can't have candy for breakfast.
Guest:Because at first you're just like, whatever, just eat whatever you want.
I mean...
Guest:In the first few months of his presidency, you're like, where do you want to go out by yourself?
Guest:How old are you?
Guest:Six?
Guest:Go ahead.
Guest:You'll be all right.
Guest:Do you remember where we live?
Guest:We do more comedy now on the show.
Marc:Do you have funny people come on?
Guest:On Fridays, I have Kindler come on to rail on stuff, and Judy Gold sometimes comes on, and I have comedians come on.
Guest:I've asked you.
Guest:You have not responded to my text.
Marc:I didn't?
Guest:No, I don't think so.
Guest:I think I did.
Marc:I've been busy.
Marc:In the summer, I'll come on Friday.
Marc:No?
Marc:You're pulling the offer?
Guest:Well, it's not an open offer.
Guest:It was a specific Friday that someone had canceled.
Okay.
Guest:Yeah, that's good.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:But it's interesting because in this space now, there's a lot more political podcasts than there were six months ago.
Marc:I like that use of the word space, in the space that we occupy.
Marc:Well-
Marc:The podcast space?
Marc:The political podcast space is getting glutted?
Marc:It's glutted?
Guest:No, I don't know that it's glutted, but it's a bunch of different ones.
Guest:Do you have any respect for any of them?
Guest:Really, the only other podcast I listen to that is about politics is Chapo Trap House.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And they're, I think they perceive themselves as more comedy, supposedly more comedy maybe than, but it's political comedy.
Guest:Yeah, right.
Guest:And it's, they're younger.
Guest:I mean, they're, you know, that's the thing.
Guest:It's like, you see all this technology and I...
Guest:I think it's much harder to be younger now, to be honest with you, in many respects.
Guest:But I'm envious of that YouTube exists and that podcasts exist at the beginning of their careers on some level.
Guest:Because, you know, if I didn't do a daily show in 2010 or 11 when I started mine, it wouldn't have worked.
Guest:Because that's what my audience expectations were.
Guest:Right.
Guest:to do like two shows a week that i actually produce and plan right right and um is something like oh i would like to do that but i don't know that my audience is interested in that i mean i and and and and i don't know if i could get into that rhythm again
Guest:You know, to circle it back, I think like the idea that people are presented with a vision of what government and society should be like.
Guest:I mean, there's a lot of, I think a lot of like the data shit that you see with younger people.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I mean, just in general.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:is a function of we have to raise our productivity because uh we're falling behind here so i have to figure out how to make every moment i have in my day um function towards my maintenance of my lifestyle or you know just make sure that i can afford to to get sick yeah that's a good way to end yeah yeah do you want to eat i do um what what are you eating
Marc:I don't know, lunch?
Marc:Right, but like, are you healthy?
Marc:Are you not healthy?
Marc:You want Mexican or you want kind of- Oh, bourbon.
Marc:Bourbon.
Marc:We'll go find you some bourbon.
Marc:Good talking to you, buddy.
Guest:Nice talk to you.
Marc:That was me and old Sammy.
Marc:As I said, you can hear Sammy on the Majority Report.
Marc:You can get it at majority.fm.
Marc:Okay, it's on at noon every day, live, noon Eastern.
Marc:It's also available as a podcast.
Marc:That was Sam Seder.
Marc:The lovely Sam Seder.
Marc:Bassem Youssef.
Marc:It's the first time I've met the guy.
Marc:There's a documentary about him called Tickling Giants.
Marc:It's available on iTunes and Amazon as well as at TicklingGiants.com.
Marc:It premieres on Starz December 18th.
Marc:He stopped by.
Marc:Interesting story.
Marc:When a surgeon becomes a comedian.
Marc:Always surprising.
Marc:But his story is definitely unique.
Marc:This is me and Bassem Youssef.
Marc:So you're living here now.
Marc:Yes.
Marc:Full time.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:It seems at the end of the documentary that you were in Harvard Square.
Guest:I was at Harvard University.
Guest:I was actually there as an associate.
Guest:I was teaching there for a semester.
Marc:Oh, really?
Marc:So that was your first stop?
Marc:I mean, when you... No, so at that moment... Fleed, you fleed.
Guest:I did flee, but I fleed to Dubai.
Marc:Okay.
Guest:And then I stayed there for a year and three months.
Guest:Within this year and three months, I went to Harvard.
Guest:Okay.
Guest:And I thought that I would stay in Dubai.
Guest:And then I found out that like to stay in the Middle East, there is no way for me to express what I want to say because everything was off the table politically.
Guest:And I would only stay there.
Guest:I have to do...
Guest:mindless comedy that doesn't actually talk about issues.
Guest:Or medicine.
Guest:Or medicine, of course.
Marc:There's always the heart surgeon thing.
Guest:Yeah, I always have that.
Guest:But then I left, so I decided to, a year and a half ago, I decided to leave the Middle East altogether and just come here.
Marc:Now, what's your status?
Guest:Oh, I'm a green card.
Marc:Green card.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:So it's sort of interesting.
Marc:I mean, I wasn't familiar completely with the story.
Marc:I remember hearing about it.
Marc:Obviously, I know Jon Stewart.
Marc:Personally, we're not great, but I started out with him in New York.
Marc:So I know all that, what the show is modeled on.
Marc:But I think what fascinated me, outside of whatever's going on with you now, which I'm curious about,
Marc:And was, you know, right at the beginning of the story, you know, you kind of make a point to tell us that, you know, Mubarak was in power most of your life.
Guest:Absolutely.
Guest:30 years.
Marc:Now, what fascinated me, only because we have an attempted authoritarian government happening here, what sort of fascinated me was that you seem like a sophisticated, well-rounded person, and it seems like people living under Mubarak, that there was a cultural problem.
Marc:community in egypt it was it was fairly uh there you know outside of politics it seemed like everything was functioning you know in terms of arts and things like that yeah i mean like dictators are everywhere i mean oh i know yeah you're just like it's because you guys are not used to that because you started as a republic it's new
Guest:So, for example, if you are a European, it's like, oh, yeah, yeah, we know how is this.
Guest:That's right.
Guest:In our history, we had, I mean, like, look under Hitler.
Guest:Sure, Mussolini, Franco.
Guest:Industry, arts, amazing.
Guest:I mean, of course, some of the arts had to be censored.
Guest:Or politically propagandized.
Guest:But dictatorships are generally pretty much functioning.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Not like the way that you want them functioning.
Guest:But for many, it is functioning.
Guest:And for many, you will be allowed to have arts and you'll be allowed to have some sort of freedom of expression within the realms of what the state would consider acceptable.
Guest:And for us, I mean, what should we do?
Guest:Should we live our lives and our livelihood and just go into the streets and revolt?
Guest:We never thought that is possible until 2011.
Marc:Right.
Marc:But when you were a kid and when you went into your successful heart surgeon, yes?
Marc:Yep.
Marc:Like you know how to do that.
Guest:To what?
Guest:To go to the streets?
Guest:No, to be a heart surgeon.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I mean, yeah.
Guest:I mean, because I'm a nerd.
Marc:I am a freaking nerd.
Marc:This is what we do.
Marc:Yeah, I know.
Marc:But you committed to like, you went through a lot of years of medical school.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:And you did now in Egypt.
Guest:Because in Egypt, if you're not an engineer or a medical doctor, you don't count.
Guest:Really?
Guest:For your parents.
Guest:Oh, for your parents.
Guest:So it was pressure.
Guest:Absolutely.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And you have a... You think I went to medicine because of passion?
Guest:Fuck that.
Marc:Well, come on.
Marc:I mean, it is important.
Marc:I mean, you know, saving lives is not a bad thing.
Guest:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Marc:You really resent medicine.
Guest:No, I don't resent medicine.
Guest:I resent the lifestyle.
Marc:But as a practice, as a doctor, how did it work in Egypt?
Marc:Were you able to make a lot of money?
Marc:Is it the same here?
Guest:No, in Egypt, to make a lot of money as a doctor, especially in heart surgery, you don't really see any money until your 40s.
Guest:Uh-huh.
Guest:And it's a very long path.
Guest:And it's not... And the system is just horrible.
Guest:The health system?
Guest:The health system.
Guest:The health system, how it works.
Guest:And it is basically a no system.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:What does that mean?
Guest:I mean, here in the United States, there is a path.
Guest:You know that you're going to be a resident, then you're going to be an attending, then you're going to be there.
Guest:And you know that if you're good, you know that you'll find somewhere to host you as a doctor, and you can totally depend on your work in the hospital, and that will provide for you.
Guest:There, you have to hustle.
Guest:Yeah, you have to.
Guest:It's all about it's more of a business more than actually a practice.
Guest:It is.
Guest:We have to hustle your private practices and you have to a portion of your life.
Guest:You'll have to be like doing in your clinic and then you go to this hospital and do to that hospital.
Guest:You have to work three, four or five hospitals in the same time in order to provide.
Marc:Oh, man.
Marc:So now, okay, so you're just going along your life.
Marc:You have one child at that time, it seemed.
Marc:No, my child came 2012.
Marc:Oh, okay.
Marc:So...
Marc:And you guys were just living under Mubarak, and that was just the way things were.
Marc:Wasn't great, but you knew what was up.
Guest:It was a very slow, painful decay, but it was okay.
Marc:What compelled the initial riots?
Marc:Was it economically?
Marc:Was Egypt faltering?
Marc:I don't know the history.
Guest:Well, the thing is, well, everybody was inspired by what happened in Tunisia.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:They revolted against Ben Ali, Ben Ali, their dictator, and fled and kind of like it made everybody hungry.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:But even after that, the demonstrations in Egypt didn't start as we want to get rid of Mubarak.
Guest:It was they wanted to get rid of the minister of police because of police brutality.
Guest:And when the first wave in 25th of January was oppressed by the police and by the bullets and by the gas, it turned automatically to, all right, we want Mubarak down.
Guest:So as the regime was slow to respond, the expectations of the protesters increased.
Guest:And then it became a sit-in and became like, all right, no Mubarak or bust, basically.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And Mubarak had to step down after 18 days.
Marc:But not before shooting people.
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Guest:Maybe 1,000 people were killed.
Marc:In the streets.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:Just gunned down by Mubarak's police.
Guest:Less than 1,000.
Guest:Maybe 400.
Guest:I can't remember the numbers of the 18 days.
Guest:But a lot of people were gunned down.
Marc:And the gassing and the beating, but it was not stoppable.
Marc:It's not stoppable, no.
Marc:And when that happened for you as a doctor, what was your first impulse?
Marc:Because you were okay.
Marc:You were set, you were working.
Guest:Many of the people who actually led the demonstrations were okay.
Guest:They were financially very independent.
Guest:They were more educated than others.
Guest:They had more awareness than others.
Guest:And this is why when people say, why do you want to revolt?
Guest:You're doing okay.
Guest:It's like, yeah, but the country was not doing okay.
Guest:And this is why change has to come from people who are aware and can provide for themselves because they go for the ideology of things, not because of the necessity of having more food.
Guest:Not desperation, right.
Guest:Because if that was the thing, I'll give you more food and it's done.
Guest:Problem solved.
Guest:So as a doctor, I mean, under Mubarak, everybody kind of like accepted it as like a matter of fact.
Guest:But when you see, oh my God, can we actually live without Mubarak?
Guest:So we got excited.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:During the 18 days, my role was just limited to being a guy who would go to the makeshift clinic in Tahrir Square and try to fix the wounds and just stitch people up.
Guest:I was not a guy who was in the front lines throwing rocks because I have a very bad aim.
Marc:Was that it?
Marc:But you had a purpose and you were helping people.
Marc:So when Mubarak did resign,
Marc:People were ecstatic.
Guest:Oh yeah, absolutely.
Marc:But they didn't really know what would happen next.
Guest:There was no manual.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:There was no manual for what would happen next.
Guest:And because of for 30 years, the political life was basically at standstill.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:There was no dynamic of what does it mean to be political.
Guest:So the only people who were ready were the Muslim Brotherhood.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And the Muslim Brotherhood were a very good pick for the military, who basically ran everything, because both of them are on the conservative side.
Guest:So there was as if there was some sort of an unwritten agreement between them.
Guest:It's like, you know what?
Guest:You do whatever you want as military.
Guest:Still control yourself.
Guest:You have your autonomy.
Guest:Nobody will come close to you.
Guest:And we can control the people, which is pretty much like Pakistan.
Guest:Uh-huh.
Guest:And this is what we were worried about, that we were turned into a Pakistan.
Marc:Which means what specifically?
Guest:Which means that the military ruled the country and the Islamists ruled the streets.
Guest:Right.
Guest:And then a couple of years under the Islamists, a year in the parliament and a year in presidency.
Guest:Of Morsi?
Guest:Of Morsi.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:People were fed up with the Islamists because they were just pushing their conservative agenda more and more.
Guest:I know that when Americans hear about Islamist rule, the first thing that comes to them is Sharia law.
Guest:Right.
Guest:It's not like that.
Guest:It is creating the atmosphere of we are, because we are Islamists, we're better than you.
Guest:And because we are Islamists, we are going to crack down of the secular values that many people want.
Marc:Oh, so they're righteous and they have a moral code that is Islam.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:They will never come to you.
Guest:I mean, to be fair, the Muslim brotherhood will never say, oh, we're going to go and behead people in the streets.
Guest:They're not going to say this.
Guest:It just sort of happens.
Guest:What?
Guest:It just sort of starts happening.
Guest:No, no, they will never say that.
Guest:But the thing is, again, it is about like what is right and what is right.
Guest:And the fact that they would unite with the more radical people, which is the Salafis, which is the pretty much the uber Muslims.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And the thing, I mean, my own interpretation is that the army was happy with that.
Guest:It's like, you know what?
Guest:Like, yeah, I mean, like as if we're getting our thing.
Guest:But I think what happened is that I think the army and the Muslim Brotherhood started to have their differences on who to run the country economically.
Marc:Right.
Marc:And the weird thing is that, like, you know, I kept watching this in light of, you know, what's happening in America and also having, you know, been through Bush and the power of the sort of Christian right.
Marc:I mean, there is a faction within this country that believes in the same sort of righteousness.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:And that it must be applied to culture.
Guest:But for here, they will stop short at abortion and gay rights.
Guest:in egypt or in the arab world in general it will be more than this yeah it will be the the minimum age of marriage it will be uh what is forbidden or not it will be cracking down on freedom of expression however to complete the story because like if you're talking about this about the islamists
Guest:Is the military a better option?
Guest:So the military took over and the military is still a very conservative institution.
Guest:It's right and wrong by the gun.
Guest:Right and wrong by the gun and still using religious justifications.
Guest:Right, right.
Guest:But it's just like, oh, our Islam is better than their Islam.
Guest:Right.
Guest:uh during under even under mubarak the supposedly secular leader and under sisi the supposedly secular military dictator there are so many people who've been jailed and persecuted because they tried to uh in spread religious reforms there are so many people who spoke
Guest:in order to reform the radical narratives, and they were either being sent to exile or jailed, persecuted.
Guest:It was not the people with the beard and the religious cloth that were doing that.
Guest:It was the military and the police.
Marc:Because they saw that the Islamists had a structure through which to keep the people in line.
Guest:No, it's simply because if I'm a military dictator and you come and start to question things in religion, oh, so today you're going to start to question religion, tomorrow you're going to question me.
Guest:Right.
Guest:So for them, religion is always a first line of defense.
Guest:And this, if you look...
Guest:to the arc of military dictatorships in the Arab world, even the Islamic world, that's not new.
Guest:Sadat, who was like America's best friend, 1980s, he was the one who actually put in Sharia law
Guest:not sharia sharia as the source of legislation in the egyptian constitution 1980 in order to have unlimited times of re-election it was jia al-haq in pakistan who turned the constitution in an islamic constitution in order to to get the the to be on the good side of the radicals in the streets in pakistan to protect him against the army and still didn't protect him it was jaffer nimmeri in 1988 i guess i guess
Guest:who after a long-failed policies of military dictatorship couldn't find anything that works other than turning the whole country into a Sharia-abiding Islamic republic.
Guest:It is always the religious narrative and the religious enforcement is what dictatorship always do.
Guest:To protect themselves.
Guest:To protect themselves.
Marc:This is good information for us in America right now.
Guest:So it's always people think, oh, we are afraid of those like religious fanatics.
Guest:We're going to go to the military because they have to be secular.
Guest:They're not.
Guest:Saddam Hussein and Qaddafi, who are supposedly secular, they use religion big time.
Guest:And they always use that to protect the regime.
Guest:So are you Muslim?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Are you religious?
Guest:I prefer to keep that to myself.
Guest:Out of fear of who?
Guest:Not out of fear because I, this is something that started with me in Egypt.
Guest:Whenever people start to ask me, are you Muslim?
Guest:Like, why do you ask?
Guest:Why the fuck do you care?
Guest:And because I, it's a little bit sensitive back there because people want to see where are you, how are you affiliated to us in order so we can speak to you.
Guest:It's like, you should speak to me as a human being.
Guest:oh the reason i ask yes is that you know there's this belief that there are no moderate muslims in america oh i can speak to that uh so the idea of no moderate muslim could be easily believed because what do you see in the news yeah and and i will be even more forward like well maybe the vast majority are not
Guest:And maybe you have statistics that would support the narrative that most Muslims in the world are pretty much radicalized.
Guest:And I would partly agree with this narrative.
Guest:Because...
Guest:But the problem with Islam is not a problem with Islamic ideology or dogmatic problem.
Guest:It is a problem of free expression and free speech.
Guest:Because many of the free expression, because many of the ideas that are more forward are oppressed not by the Islamic authorities but more by governments.
Guest:You do not have this kind of conversation.
Guest:The conservative radical Islam is protected by the state.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:So you don't have this kind of conversation.
Marc:You can't be critical.
Marc:There's no talk of reform or anything.
Guest:So that kind of a radicalized thought is protected.
Right.
Guest:So when you look at the Muslims outside, because they live in secular societies, you have a totally different picture.
Guest:You will find people who can speak freely.
Guest:I mean, like in Germany, just like in the past three months, there was a liberal mosque that was open in Berlin.
Guest:And the imams are women and gays.
Mm-hmm.
Marc:And that's in Germany, which is like... So you're saying that once the individual is removed from the oppressive Islamist situation... No, not the oppressive Islamist, the oppressive political situation in general.
Marc:Right, okay, right.
Guest:Because that will bring up because... Which sometimes are the same.
Guest:Sometimes they are and sometimes they're not.
Guest:But it's always the military regime is always protecting itself with the Islamic because it's easier to say, like, how come you speak against God and...
Guest:How can you speak against me?
Guest:So when you have that, you have now an array of ideas that they can compete in a free market.
Guest:Right.
Guest:And they will still be
Guest:uh rejected by the mainstream and this is any generational issue mainstream islam yeah and this is why you have right now in in america and in europe yeah look at the second generation the younger muslims they are like totally different than their parents yeah there is a big um generational divide
Marc:In terms of how they handled their religion.
Guest:And to bring that to the comparison between Christianity, oh, but Christianity got reformed.
Guest:I'm sorry, Christianity was never reformed.
Guest:For Christianity, it's the same Bible.
Guest:The same Bible, the same Old Testament, New Testament, with all of the controversial verses of how you treat women, how you beat women, how you kill women if they don't obey their husbands.
Guest:But the difference was that the Christian societies evolved.
Guest:Right.
Guest:But the scripture stayed the same.
Guest:So you can have the same thing.
Guest:The whole thing about like Islam could not be reformed is you don't need to reform Islam.
Guest:The scripture will always be there.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:It is just like how societies would choose how to deal with the scripture.
Marc:So now when did you...
Guest:get compelled at what point in the political narrative of egypt did you feel like you had to you know speak out or that you took the opportunity to do the show well uh six weeks after mubarak stepped down i had a friend of mine who was a youtube uh partner and who started he wanted to start uh it was an ongoing conversation even a year before the revolution he wanted to have original arabic content for youtube which at that time was not non-existent really okay
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:So we would start to talk about other project, but it didn't like actually go through.
Guest:But like when the revolution happened, kind of the opportunity like deliverance of like, why don't you do something political?
Guest:It's like, I want to do Jon Stewart because like I was a big fan of The Daily Show.
Guest:And I started to do that show in my apartment once a week in the weekend after I come back from hospital, I would do like these like YouTube segments.
Guest:yeah so like five minutes videos i didn't expect that they will have any traction maybe 10 000 views will be a wonderful number and then two four five few weeks later i had like five million and what was the tone of them was it was it just sarcasm was it was making fun of how the media brainwashed the people during the 18 days it was like reminding people this is the kind of media that was playing on television while you guys and were in the streets
Marc:It was sort of insane to see how crazy Egyptian television was.
Marc:Oh, yeah, absolutely.
Marc:Because I didn't know what they were saying, but it seemed... Was it political, all the fighting, or was it... 100% political.
Marc:I mean, like, literally, physical confrontations... People throwing chairs... And apparently it's okay to say fuck a lot on television...
Guest:It's never okay It's always beep But the thing is But what the documentary didn't show Is the kind of material that I used Because the kind of material that I used Might not be translated easily Right To English It was whatever it takes for the media To convince people that this was a conspiracy For the media in Egypt This was not a revolution It was a conspiracy that was carried by the CIA The Mossad, Iran, Hezbollah and Hamas all together
Marc:The protests.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:All of this.
Guest:They are like, all of these people are paid operatives.
Marc:Sure.
Marc:They try that here too.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Yes.
Marc:So there's a playbook for this shit.
Guest:It is.
Guest:They say the playbook of dictatorship is very slim.
Guest:They, it is the same thing.
Guest:It's fear mongering.
Guest:It's, it's, it's, it's, it's, if you want to summarize the whole, the playbook of dictatorships and authoritarians everywhere.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Whether religious or military or, or stupid ass motherfuckers, orange heads.
Guest:It all comes down to one thing, fear from the other.
Guest:I'll create an enemy.
Guest:I'll make you afraid of it.
Guest:I'm going to make you afraid shitless of that enemy.
Guest:And I'm going to push legislation and policies based on that fear.
Guest:And you're going to accept it.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:and eventually through repetition people start to believe it because they're scared absolutely they're scared of other things absolutely i mean they should be scared of the person pushing that yeah no no no i mean so i was in politicon just a few days ago and i was in a room where a lot of like red caps were just like emerging of make america great again yeah
Guest:And people's like, oh, Islam!
Guest:Hello, you're all coming into it.
Guest:I was like, guys, I mean, just like, you know, yeah, all right.
Guest:Guys, by the way, we're on the same side.
Guest:Like all of these images that you see in the media, I mean, those people, if they see me, they kill me too.
Guest:But like, you are just like, what really bugs me.
Guest:It's like, guys, you are here.
Guest:in america where you idealize individuality everybody's an individual it's like the individual you guys worship the individual how everybody is different and how everybody should be treated different because of his own merits but you come to us and you group us we are just like the exception of the rule
Guest:where everything that's happening back there, and I don't even like to say, well, we are 1.7 billion people, and if we want to kill you, we're only going to be killed, and the vast majority of Muslims are peace-loving.
Guest:You know what?
Guest:99% of Muslims want to kill you, but you should actually deal us as if you're dealing with the 1%.
Guest:Because I really don't have to respond or have held accountable
Guest:to whoever is doing that shit.
Guest:So when you have like refugee problems, you already having one of the most toughest vetting processes in the world.
Guest:But the other side want to tell you that the system is broken.
Guest:The system is not fucking broken.
Marc:No, they just don't want any more Muslims here.
Marc:Brown people in general are not there.
Guest:Yeah, I mean, whether it's Muslims or Mexicans or whatever.
Guest:And I tell them like, guys, discrimination does not discriminate.
Guest:Because, all right, so let's say we're just like all pieces of shit Muslims.
Guest:All of those Muslims are a clear and present danger.
Guest:What about those three Indians that were killed in the middle of America?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:They were Indian Sikhs.
Guest:They're not Middle Easterners.
Guest:They're not Muslim.
Guest:They're just brown.
Guest:What about this?
Guest:Do you have these conversations with these guys?
Guest:Oh, yeah, absolutely.
Guest:What about like the Lebanese Christian guy who were killed in the portion of his house because the guy's like, go back to your country.
Guest:He's Lebanese.
Guest:He's Christian.
Guest:So, I mean.
Guest:How do they respond?
Guest:They, I mean, they don't respond.
Guest:Because they have nothing to say.
Guest:They just, oh, but Islam, all the kills.
Guest:It's just like the same broken record.
Guest:Sure.
Guest:I mean, as a matter of fact, the first victim of hate crimes after 9-11.
Guest:Was a Sikh, right?
Guest:No, was an Egyptian Christian copt.
Guest:Cop?
Guest:A cop is like an orthodox Christian.
Guest:Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Guest:Yeah, and he was having a convenience store and he was shot in his store.
Guest:So it doesn't stop that because like, spoiler alert, we pretty much look the same.
Marc:Yeah, and when you, okay, so you're doing the YouTube videos in your house.
Marc:or your partner's house, what was his name, Tariq?
Marc:Tariq, it was in my house.
Marc:Yeah, it was your house.
Marc:And you start to see the popularity.
Marc:You start to see that at least a good portion, or a lot of people are responding, and they see what you're talking about.
Marc:So how does it move from there?
Guest:Well, at that time I was waiting to go to Cleveland because I was having, I was actually applied and I was accepted in a pediatric heart surgery fellowship.
Guest:And I was waiting for the H1 visas, which will be something that we don't have anymore soon.
Guest:And then the- Was it the Mayo Clinic?
Guest:No, no, no.
Guest:It was the children's hospital in Cleveland.
Guest:Rainbow Children's Hospital.
Guest:Very prestigious children's hospital there.
Guest:And when I was waiting for the H1 visa, for the papers to come, and I was waiting for that, I was just doing the show, and then I started to have offers from networks in Egypt.
Guest:And then the same day I was signing the contract for an Egyptian network there, the visa papers arrived.
Guest:And I just, it was a choice.
Guest:Was that a tough conversation with your wife?
Guest:My wife is the most supportive woman.
Guest:It was a tough conversation with my mom.
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Guest:But as a matter of fact, it was not as tough as I imagined it would be because as any other Middle Eastern woman is like, oh, you know, better have my friends closer, my enemy closer.
Guest:That means that she needs her.
Guest:son's closer to her so uh she said fine uh let's give it a try and for her just to be around her and the same country is better for her yeah so i said like all right let's uh postpone this medicine thing for a year
Guest:And let's take a shot.
Marc:It's so funny.
Marc:As a comic, I've known plenty of lawyers that have gone into comedy.
Marc:I don't think I've known many doctors.
Marc:I know.
Marc:It's a rare, and I guess you feel like you did the right thing.
Marc:You're still doing it.
Marc:So I get it.
Marc:But okay, so it's a big risk on a lot of levels.
Marc:And you take this gig.
Marc:Now, there's no real precedent for a political comedy show or
Marc:In Egypt, but you seem to from the documentary, it seems like you amassed a bunch of very energetic, focused and funny people to do this thing.
Marc:How did you find them?
Guest:It was tough because first I started to hire people who were already in the business.
Marc:And what was that business like there?
Marc:There were comedy shows in Egypt?
Marc:What were they?
Marc:They were, but like- Very broad.
Guest:Just like very boring.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And I started to hire the best in the business and I fired them after eight weeks.
Guest:Because they didn't have the guts or they just couldn't do it?
Guest:Because the business as usual in Egypt, the idea of hiring someone to write full time for a show was unheard of.
Guest:Most of the late night shows there were just conversational talk show, very boring,
Guest:Where like a journalist who would just work part-time or work full-time in a newspaper and come at the end of the night as a part-time to work in the talk show.
Guest:Okay.
Guest:I demanded absolute dedication to the show.
Marc:And you're using The Daily Show as your template, as your inspiration, as the way it's supposed to be done.
Guest:Exactly.
Guest:And people didn't understand that.
Marc:Why?
Marc:You'd show them The Daily Show and they didn't get it?
Guest:They got it, but it's like it's not gonna be done in Egypt.
Guest:Everybody, just like everybody was putting me down.
Guest:It's just too Americanized.
Guest:Dude, whatever happens in America cannot be replicated in Egypt.
Marc:But was it about the content?
Marc:Was it about fear of the government?
Guest:Or was it just about- No, no, no, no, no.
Guest:It was- Wouldn't be funny.
Guest:No, it's two things.
Guest:So on the level of the staff- Yeah.
Guest:uh oh nobody will just work full time for a show uh and uh and for the level of the networks it's like i nobody will watch this yeah and uh when i said they hired you yeah they did but when i was started to demand bigger amount of money to do the daily show the the the live show people said like oh this is too much money no the the size of advert tv advertisement the egypt cannot support this thing when he brought the
Guest:audience yeah and I was like you're having all of this money for a weekly show nobody will come nobody will watch it and then I said if you create content you will create market yeah and nobody believed it so you do the first season at which network
Guest:On TV, which is the small TV network.
Guest:And it was called The Show.
Guest:Yes.
Guest:And I continued with the second season with the live show.
Guest:And which was like, that was something that really disrupted the scene there.
Marc:But when you get... Okay, so you're on TV.
Marc:You're in the... This is when it's before... Is it after Morsi or...
Guest:No, I started before Morsi.
Marc:Right, so it was that weird area where no one knew what was gonna happen, just the military.
Guest:Exactly, yes.
Guest:And you get on- But it was the military, but with the obvious rise of the Islamic movement in the parliament.
Marc:Right, so you get on TV, and it's an immediate success?
Guest:Yes.
Guest:It was an immediate, it was the first, a slow success because it was a small network and the budget was small.
Guest:Right.
Guest:And that was the first season.
Marc:How many networks are there there?
Guest:Oh, I can't.
Guest:Maybe eight or nine.
Marc:Okay.
Guest:And, no, there were many, but the ones that were watched were eight and nine.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:But, and then I started to do the second season, which I started to want to look for financing and people would just think, that's too much money.
Guest:You want to rent a theater?
Guest:yeah seriously you want to get like real audience yeah nobody can be behind that we actually got it like a totally like uh a piece of piece of like uh theater that was like abandoned for 15 years and we spent so much money renovating it and doing so that's so much money why are you doing that and this is the second season uh that was the second season yes
Marc:So after the first season, now you're a huge celebrity.
Marc:Yep.
Marc:In Egypt.
Marc:Yep.
Marc:Everybody knows who you are.
Marc:Yes.
Marc:No one's ever done what you've done before.
Marc:No.
Marc:But are you nervous yet?
Guest:Oh, I'm very nervous all the time.
Marc:About what could happen to you?
Marc:Yes.
Marc:Because you knew that maybe I'm borrowed time.
Guest:Yes, exactly.
Guest:I was expecting, when will this round end?
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:Okay, so you do the first season successfully, you renovate the theater, you go into the second season, you've got a live audience now.
Marc:And at what point is Marcy elected?
Marc:Marcy is elected before my second season launches.
Marc:So now you've got a whole new set of issues.
Guest:Yes.
Marc:Before you were talking about the media, you were talking about the military and the Muslim Brotherhood and a broad way, but now you've got a guy.
Marc:I've got a president.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:So now the stakes are higher.
Marc:The stakes are much higher.
Guest:And now it is now a show and the size of audience is increasing.
Guest:And I ended up after the 10th week having 30 to 40 million people watching the show.
Guest:So that's not just Egypt.
Guest:No, that's Egypt.
Guest:That's all just Egypt.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And outside there were even more.
Marc:That's what I mean.
Guest:Oh, really?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:So the Arab world.
Guest:The Arab world was watching.
Guest:Everybody in the Arab world.
Marc:And I imagine they're entertained, their minds are blown, but some of them are like, he's gonna get killed, this guy.
Guest:Yeah, people are just like, oh my God, I mean, we never had something like this.
Guest:We took something that was unheard of and made it mainstream.
Marc:And you really did what John does in the sense that you really were taking shots at Morsi day in, every week.
Guest:But not just Morsi.
Guest:Morsi was just a representative.
Guest:I took shots of the whole Islamic regime.
Guest:and their media, mostly their media.
Guest:Because for me, I'm always like, all right, Morsi is Morsi.
Guest:And the Islamic regime is Islamic regime.
Guest:But what about their mouthpieces?
Guest:What about their Breitbarts?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:What about their Fox News?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:What about their... Were they state-owned there?
Guest:Those networks?
Marc:The religious?
Marc:No, like the network, the media that you're talking about.
Guest:No, they're privately owned.
Guest:Okay.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:But you find out that... But later, all of them are now acquired by the state with shell companies.
Marc:Oh, that's the way it is now?
Marc:Or was it always that way?
Guest:It's the way it is now.
Marc:Okay, so now this is where things start to get hotter.
Marc:Now you've got an enemy who is the president.
Marc:Yep.
Marc:And now during the first year, at what point did you start actively fearing for your life in the sense of being disappeared or imprisoned?
Marc:I never had this fear.
Marc:Because I noticed that in the documentary when it shows you reacting to criticism and the anger in the streets that you seem to be kind of detached from it.
Marc:I didn't know if that was real or not.
Guest:It was actually quite real.
Guest:And what is good about Sarah and how she captured this because Sarah Taxler, the director of the movie, is that I watched this movie for the first time ever on the premiere of the movie in Tribeca Film Festival last year.
Guest:I never saw any... The documentary.
Marc:What's the full name of the documentary?
Guest:Tickling Giants.
Marc:Yeah, Tickling Giants.
Guest:And I was... I didn't have any expectations.
Guest:I just watched there.
Guest:I watched it as any other part of the audience.
Guest:And when I saw the footage...
Guest:of me, as you said, pretty much detached.
Guest:It's like, my God, this is what I really felt.
Guest:I didn't really care about what would happen to me because if you die, you die.
Guest:If you're killed, you're killed, right?
Marc:Is that something you always felt or is that something you learned from being a heart surgeon?
Guest:No, it is in the media.
Guest:Because in the media, you're very exposed.
Guest:Everything that you say is out there.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I was more concerned.
Guest:I was more terrified about giving a bad show.
Marc:And I imagine for your staff to some degree.
Yeah.
Guest:Yeah, for us, because we were just raising the bar higher and higher and higher.
Guest:And you cannot drop from that.
Marc:So when did the states start coming down on you?
Marc:At what point?
Guest:Well, there were many points.
Guest:There were during the Muslim Brotherhood when there was a warrant for my arrest.
Guest:Before Morsi.
Guest:No, within Morsi.
Guest:Like actually towards the end of his presidency.
Guest:The second season.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And when I went to the general prosecutor and I had six hours interrogation.
Guest:And it was funny because...
Guest:I felt that as if they were like asking, why is this funny?
Guest:Which is the worst thing they can tell for a comedian.
Guest:Sure.
Guest:And then there was like, the tension was rising in the streets.
Guest:Wait, they would hold bits up?
Marc:They would show you bits?
Marc:Yeah, exactly.
Marc:It's like Lenny Bruce when they were reading his bits.
Marc:Exactly.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:That was it, exactly.
Guest:But they had a TV in the courtroom?
Guest:No, it's not a courtroom.
Guest:So it was the office, in his office.
Guest:And this is a funny story because they had the stuff on CDs, and they tried to play the CDs on a very outdated 1995 Windows computer, and they couldn't work the CDs.
Guest:And I said, like...
Guest:guys, can you let me help you?
Guest:And then it didn't work and then, all right, we're just gonna read the transcript.
Marc:So that was- And how did you answer those questions?
Marc:Why is this funny?
Guest:I mean, they were, no, the question was basically, what did you mean by this?
Guest:I said like, and I said, well, I mean, I meant it exactly as it is.
Guest:And because of my satire was basically double meaning.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:So if you read it out, it's like, oh, it's so innocent.
Guest:And I said like, well, if that's the case, why are people laughing?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And I said like, I don't know.
Guest:Why don't you ask them?
Marc:So it's basic sarcasm.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:So you say it in a tone.
Guest:Yeah.
Yeah.
Marc:So they hadn't watched the show.
Guest:No, they do.
Guest:Well, the thing is, the general prosecutor was doing his job.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:But in the room, there were other lawyers from the general prosecutor's office, and all of them were fans of the show, and they were laughing their asses off during the investigation.
Guest:And it was like surreal, like having actually to go there as someone who is under arrest.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And having all of these police officers and lawyers having pictures with me.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:It was really insane.
Guest:That's funny.
Yeah.
Marc:Because then you really see that the streets are with you.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:So you got off on that one.
Guest:Yeah, I got off on bail, but the pressure from the Islamic government continued, and we started to have warnings.
Guest:If you make fun of the president, we're going to close down the show.
Guest:But then fast forward a few weeks after we had the 30th of June where the military took over,
Guest:After Morsi?
Guest:Yeah, basically they removed Morsi.
Guest:And then the Islamists were on the weaker side now, and they got killed in the streets.
Guest:And they were, in one day, 800 people got killed by the military.
Guest:Islamists?
Guest:Yes.
Guest:and it was a big massacre.
Guest:And now I have a new power, which is the military.
Guest:And I was popular.
Guest:I was the national hero who took down the Muslim Brotherhood, the one who made fun of the president of the Islamists.
Marc:So now a lot of people are dead, and they haven't shut you down yet, and you've got a new foil.
Guest:Yeah, and I did one episode, and that was enough to shut me down by the military.
Marc:So you're off the air?
Guest:I'm off the air after one episode under the military rule.
Guest:And it was funny because all of those people who were cheering me up, oh, he had it coming, you shouldn't make fun of the military.
Guest:The people who were applauding me for making fun of the Islamists couldn't get a single word of criticism or joke against the military.
Guest:including people from my own family.
Guest:That was an Egyptian network who shut me down after one episode.
Guest:And then I stayed unemployed for four months.
Guest:And then I went to a regional network, Saudi-owned.
Guest:And I told them, I know that you're Saudi-owned, but I will not have anybody interfering in my content.
Guest:And they had an Egyptian channel.
Guest:Where I worked in that Egyptian channel and I continued for that season for 11 weeks and I was shut down again indefinitely.
Marc:After the move to the Saudi network with the Egyptian channel.
Marc:Yes.
Marc:And that was the end.
Marc:That was the end.
Marc:so okay so i'm just trying to you know connect it to what i saw in the documentary so now you go back on the air after your shutdown with the with the the new regional network uh you've you've held your line on being able to say what you want to say there was that episode where they scrambled your signal two episodes and that was you know after you signed with that is on the regional end yes
Marc:so and it's pretty clear that that was done intentionally by absolutely the military uh and then you're so now you you're you're dealing with protesters out front right yeah people coming and they're all stage protests
Guest:They are like stuff that are pushed by the military intelligence.
Guest:It's a very old technique that they always use.
Guest:It's just like fake protests that go in to show that the people are against what I'm saying.
Guest:Of course, a lot of people kind of hated me for what I'm saying now, but they wouldn't just go in and burn it.
Marc:I was surprised at how many older women yelling and screaming and throwing a finger.
Guest:They're all paid by the government.
Guest:All of them are paid.
Guest:And we had footage of them appearing in similar protests to kind of like push a certain agenda or narrative.
Marc:Oh, so they've got a whole crew.
Marc:They are like professionals.
Marc:Yeah, they're angry extras.
Yeah, exactly.
Guest:I think the military could be the best casting agencies out there.
Marc:What was profound to me is that despite the propaganda and these paid extras, it did seem like a lot of people, I don't know if it was out of fear or just the lack of stability or whether it was because it was Egypt, that there seemed to be a lot of people that wanted to be under authoritarian.
Guest:Well, you cannot really look at Egypt in a vacuum.
Guest:I mean, so here's the media narrative.
Guest:If we don't do this, look to what happened to Iraq, Syria, and Libya.
Guest:Look to the countries around us.
Guest:We are the last standing Arab army.
Guest:They are coming for us.
Guest:Look at what's happening in Syria.
Guest:Look to ISIS.
Guest:Look to Libya.
Guest:Do you want your country ruled by militias?
Guest:Democracy means chaos.
Guest:Right.
Guest:So they already have pretty much a good point.
Guest:I mean, look to the other countries around us.
Guest:This is how the Arab Spring are spoiling the people around us.
Marc:I know, but those were all dictatorships.
Marc:I know.
Marc:So they're still vulnerable, even if they say, look what happened.
Marc:It doesn't matter.
Marc:Right.
Marc:It doesn't matter.
Guest:To the people that are scared, they'll be like that.
Guest:It doesn't matter.
Guest:I mean, are you talking logic now?
Guest:Right.
Guest:I mean, are you trying to be logical?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:It doesn't work.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I mean, under fear, logic, let alone satire, is not accepted.
Marc:Right.
Marc:So your fight to continue to say what you wanted to say and do it the way you wanted to do it, which was not – the funny thing is it wasn't angry.
Marc:It wasn't violent.
Marc:It was satire.
Marc:And it was – I think that in some ways it's harder for them to deal with that.
Marc:Right.
Marc:Because they actually don't always know why people are laughing.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I mean, because here's the thing.
Guest:Laughter is the greatest threat to them because these authoritarian regimes build their legitimacy on two major things.
Guest:respect and fear.
Guest:And this is why someone like Donald Trump doesn't like to be laughed at.
Marc:I know, I know.
Guest:There's a lot of reasons, but yeah.
Guest:Because if you laugh at him, you're undermining his authority, his respect.
Guest:but he was always a clown before he was like you know he it doesn't matter but even when he was a clown he was the clown in control right and he's the guy who's firing people on his show right so you cannot you can make fun of me you cannot really make fun of me i'm the president i mean he doesn't have the idea or the um the concept of what does it mean to be a public servant sure
Guest:And this is why that was very apparent.
Guest:He was the only president to break in tradition to say, all right, I'm not going to come to the correspondence dinner.
Guest:Good luck.
Guest:Have fun.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:No, I know.
Marc:I believe me.
Marc:I, you know, I feel it every day.
Marc:It's driving me nuts.
Marc:But when, when someone like CC comes in, we didn't really talk about cause he, he was during your last season.
Marc:That was when he came to power.
Marc:Correct.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:And you know, the, it was interesting that the, the theatrics of him, uh,
Marc:It's almost a farce.
Marc:The sunglasses, the whole business.
Marc:When you look at it, it's like people really believe that that means something.
Guest:Yeah, this is what powers mean to them.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:So did you feel at that time that your life was in danger?
Guest:I think the whole time I was in denial.
Guest:Post-traumatic stress or denial?
Guest:I was in denial to actually believe that my life would be in danger.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:Because I couldn't function.
Guest:If you felt that.
Guest:I couldn't function.
Guest:I couldn't write jokes.
Guest:I couldn't be on the show.
Marc:I mean...
Marc:Because, I mean, despite, you know, your chipper disposition and the detachment, I mean, I found it kind of, you know, impressive and, you know, it seemed very courageous that, you know, you continue to do a show at all.
Guest:Yes.
Guest:I mean, it was funny.
Guest:We were doing the show and we were betting which show will be the last one.
Guest:We were being in a nihilistic state of mind.
Marc:But when they put your partner, your producer's father in prison for no reason, did you see that as a signal to you?
Guest:Oh yeah, absolutely a signal.
Guest:And I thought that if I continue doing a good show, having a high rating, that would somehow protect me.
Guest:Protect you.
Marc:And what about your family?
Marc:Were there threats?
Guest:No, but they were always worried.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I mean, okay, you really have to define what threats mean.
Guest:Are you talking about online threats?
Marc:No.
Guest:Are you talking about Twitter or whatever?
Guest:Because I have that all the time.
Marc:No, of course.
Marc:No, I'm talking about being visited by the military.
Guest:No, I was visited in the theater by a friend.
Guest:I had a friendly visit by someone from the intelligence.
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Guest:Offering his help.
Guest:Uh-huh.
Guest:And that was kind of like, ah, we were watching you.
Guest:Yeah, hi, how are you?
Marc:Yeah, yeah.
Marc:So now, when the show goes down, when you're done, and now, was there public outcry?
Marc:Or were they not able to do that, really?
Marc:Not able.
Guest:It's basically on the internet.
Guest:Okay, so.
Guest:As a matter of fact, many of them were angry at me.
Guest:You pussy, come back and fight.
Guest:Seriously, what are you going to do for me?
Guest:You're just like there on Twitter and Facebook, you're not doing anything.
Marc:Yeah, there was some pushback in the sense that once you were off the air, what were you supposed to do?
Marc:Hit the streets?
Marc:I mean, what did they expect from you?
Marc:You had no control over the outlet.
Guest:I mean, it's just like as if you're saying like, oh, as if you are coming back to the age of Hitler and Mussolini.
Guest:It's like, why did you stop making fun of the Fuhrer or Mussolini?
Guest:Go back.
Guest:Go back, make fun of il Duce.
Guest:It's like, what are you going to do if something happened to me?
Yeah.
Guest:I'm just going to write angry tweets.
Marc:Yeah, yeah.
Marc:Supporting you.
Marc:That was bound to happen.
Marc:I mean, you just say... But you did not want to stay engaged with any sort of resistance.
Marc:I mean, there was other ways, I imagine.
Marc:Or you're telling me there's no resistance at all.
Guest:But, I mean, the resistance are... I mean, I have to be very realistic here and say the resistance is crushed.
Guest:And you can't...
Guest:At the end of the day, you have a critical mass.
Guest:But the critical mass of people, if they're not supported by the people, they will be squashed.
Guest:And the thing is, if you just have the same 10, 12 people moving masses and they're getting crushed and the people just don't move a finger and they're just like behind their computer screens, so basically fuck them.
Guest:I'll be very honest.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I mean, the fact is that you just can't.
Guest:And I mean, I never posed my I never posed or never like presented myself as a political activist.
Guest:But like you try to resist with the tools that you have, which is political satire.
Guest:And if you end up being crushed every time and people just sitting there asking you to do more and when you go into the street, when you get imprisoned, you just like they have like a whole kind of hashtag supporting you.
Guest:Fuck that.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:There are so many people that I know who have their family destroyed, they are in prison, and the hashtag didn't do anything to them.
Guest:And of course people, so why don't you continue doing it from YouTube from outside?
Guest:So while I was doing it from a TV show from inside, what happened?
Guest:Did it change anything?
Guest:Nothing.
Guest:You just want someone to be your catharsis, your outlet to just like laugh your ass off, hoping that this will change the regime.
Guest:It will not.
Guest:Right.
Guest:You got to get into the streets.
Guest:I mean, I can't ask them to do that.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Because it's too dangerous to them too.
Guest:I mean, I don't have a solution.
Guest:I don't have an answer.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I'm just a guy.
Guest:I'm just a guy who does joke.
Guest:I am not a fucking Nelson Mandela.
Marc:Right.
Marc:I understand.
Marc:So you saw the lawsuit as that was how they were going to punish you.
Guest:Yeah, because the lawsuit is just like a way, an indirect way to put you down without- And that was your second network suing you for content they couldn't- No, no, that's the network that shut me down after one episode.
Guest:That's my second season.
Guest:But not the regional network, not the Saudi- No, the Egyptian one.
Marc:And what was the lawsuit specifically?
Guest:Oh my God, they shut me down and then we went to arbitration.
Guest:And there is no way that I would lose the arbitration because they wanted to shut me down.
Guest:And yet the arbitration find a way to hold me responsible.
Guest:And I found myself like owning them a hundred million pounds, which is like at that time, $50 million.
Marc:$50 million?
Marc:$15.
Marc:Oh, $15 million.
Marc:It's a lot.
Marc:Oh yeah, it's a lot.
Marc:For a season that you couldn't do.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:Yeah, because I left them and I went to another episode.
Guest:I was just like, because to go to another network, I had to get out of that contract.
Guest:So I made all of the legal steps.
Guest:I thought we were right, and then they just like, I was screwed.
Marc:Okay, so it comes down, so that's in court, and then you're told that you lose, and you're on the hook for $15 million.
Marc:Yes.
Marc:And you just leave?
Guest:I escaped, yeah.
Guest:The verdict was at 12 noon, and I escaped at 5.
Marc:Were you prepared for that?
Guest:No.
Guest:I just took two food suitcases and head to the airport.
Marc:Really?
Marc:In your mind, you're like, well, if this comes down this way, I'm going to go?
Marc:You decided that day?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I didn't decide that day.
Guest:I mean, the lawyer said, like, you have to leave fucking now, because this is a way they're going to use to either put you on a no-fly list, so you better go out before that door is shut, or it's a way for them to put you in prison.
Marc:And you took your family?
Guest:No, I traveled alone and then they followed after a few weeks.
Marc:They didn't hold them?
Marc:No.
Marc:So they kind of wanted you out?
Marc:Maybe.
Marc:Maybe.
Marc:Or they would have made it hard for your family, I would have thought.
Guest:Maybe.
Guest:I don't know.
Guest:I don't know how these regimes work.
Guest:We need to talk to the guy who was giving the orders.
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Marc:They're always very forthcoming.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:So you come here.
Marc:You do the thing at Harvard.
Marc:You're in Dubai.
Marc:You think you're going to stay in Dubai, but you still want to do comedy.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And then you do the... But the only comedy that's offered to me is social comedy, like late night, stupid stuff.
Guest:Right.
Guest:And I couldn't do that.
Guest:I was offered a shitload of money to do it.
Guest:And then I just like, I couldn't.
Guest:And then I left.
Marc:And so now you end up here in Los Angeles to home a show business with your wife and now two children.
Marc:Do you have two children?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:One of them is five years and the other one is five days.
Marc:Oh, you must be tired.
Guest:Yes.
Marc:And what have you been doing in the States?
Marc:I mean, what are you just kicking around?
Guest:Well, I have my own one-man show that I take it around and it kind of chronicles the Egyptian revolution through the eyes of the media.
Guest:Mm-hmm.
Guest:It's a fun show.
Guest:Where do you do that generally?
Guest:It depends.
Guest:So I do it in university campuses.
Guest:I'm performing arts theaters.
Marc:Oh, yeah?
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:You doing okay with that?
Guest:Oh, yeah, I'm doing okay.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And I wrote the book and then we had the- Is the book out?
Guest:The book is out since March.
Guest:It's called Revolution for Dummies.
Guest:And so I'm doing that, which is putting food on the table, which is great.
Guest:But like in the meantime, I'm doing what every Hollywood resident is doing, waiting for the big break.
Guest:So we're working on projects, writing scripts, pitching ideas, pitching, attending meetings, which is like, you know, Hollywood is a life of rejection until something big happens.
Guest:But you were a national hero.
Guest:I know.
Guest:And I could actually stayed and use that for my, I could have actually stayed and do a shitload of money there.
Guest:But I chose to come here and start from zero.
Marc:So, well, that's the odd thing.
Marc:Did that play into it?
Marc:That if you would have stayed and you would have had a television show, whether it was out of Dubai or on a regional network that went into Egypt and you were neutered, you could no longer do political satire, that's almost like a different type of prison.
Guest:Yeah, I would still earn a shitload of money.
Marc:But people who thought... The ones that said, you pussy, why are you leaving?
Marc:Then if you were on TV doing nothing, that would have been almost like watching a brainwashed person.
Guest:Absolutely.
Guest:As you said, neutered, as you said.
Guest:But it's not...
Guest:And I don't do that out of like patriotic beliefs or anything.
Guest:It's just like this is not how satire works.
Guest:Right.
Guest:It's going to be something different.
Guest:It is like having, it is something also I couldn't do.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:It is like having LeBron James, all right, why don't you play football?
Guest:It's like I can't.
Guest:Right.
Guest:That's not my thing.
Marc:Now when you perform here, do you get a good reaction?
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:I mean, they're very successful, almost sold out theaters, mixed audience of Arab and non-Arabs, which is great.
Marc:And what's your experience with American Egyptians in terms of, you know?
Guest:Well, most of the people I met here are wonderful people.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And very, very good people.
Guest:And I'm blessed to have met amazing friends here in Los Angeles.
Marc:Are there any Egyptian Americans that are pro-Sisi?
Guest:There are many.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:There are many.
Guest:And there are many Egyptian Americans who are pro-Muslim Brotherhood.
Guest:Uh-huh.
Guest:And hopefully I will stay away from both of these circles.
Guest:Do they heckle you?
Guest:No, but I was heckled twice in London and in New York.
Guest:And it was, these were people who were paid by the Egyptian consulate to come and actually heckle me.
Guest:And this is like, there is, and I know that sounds a little bit made up, but there was an article in the New Yorker.
Guest:It's called Heckling the John Seward of Egypt.
Guest:And I would like you to look it up.
Guest:And there was like a reporter who followed me in one of my shows in New York.
Guest:and he saw it firsthand.
Marc:How do you know they were shills?
Guest:So I got a tip from... Or stooges, I guess is the right word, not shills.
Marc:Exactly, stooges, yeah.
Guest:And I got a tip from some of my fans, and they sent me screenshots of the Facebook conversation that was happening.
Guest:that how they received orders to come and actually come and heckle me.
Marc:And how did they interrupt?
Marc:What did they say?
Guest:Every time I mentioned Sisi, they would like boo me or heckle me and whatever.
Guest:And at a certain point started to- Men or women?
Guest:Both.
Guest:Older men and women.
Guest:And at a certain point, they started to sing the Egyptian anthem.
Guest:And the whole point of doing that-
Guest:was to take a clip of me losing my cool or take a kind of a 30 seconds video by their phone for people heckling me.
Guest:And then they send it to the Egyptian state media and they played it.
Guest:And it was played the next day.
Guest:It was played in Egyptian day as a proof that how I am rejected by the patriotic Egyptians abroad.
Guest:Did you lose your cool?
I didn't.
Guest:I actually made fun of them.
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Marc:You don't seem like a guy who loses his cool.
Guest:Sometimes I do.
Guest:On stage.
Guest:I mean, one of them like in London, like a woman, and they had some camera.
Guest:And as a matter of fact, it actually turned against them.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:So it's like, so a woman's going, you're a faggot.
Guest:She just like shouted at me.
Guest:And in fact, it's like, so I stopped the show.
Guest:It's like, excuse me, did you just call me a faggot?
Guest:And it's like, yes, I did.
Guest:It's like, ah, that's so lovely of you.
Guest:You actually paid 50 sterlings to call me a faggot?
Guest:It's like, yes.
Guest:It's like, that is the most expensive faggot word I've ever heard of.
Guest:And people just like laughed.
Guest:And it was like something that- It backfired.
Guest:Backfired at them.
Marc:Well, she copped her being paid.
Marc:She admitted it.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:All right, so you're out doing the thing that we all do here, trying to get a show on the air, coming up with ideas.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:What about, but it never occurred to you to go back to medicine?
Guest:No.
Marc:That's amazing.
Guest:It's behind me now.
Guest:It's just like when at the age of 43, if you want to go back, you have to just like go back where you left off.
Guest:So I have to go back seven years in time and do stuff that I stopped doing when I was 30.
Guest:So much.
Guest:You mean if you wanted to practice here?
Guest:Yeah, it's just like I have to start from all over again.
Guest:It's just like I can't.
Guest:I'm too old for this shit.
Guest:Really?
Guest:Yeah, I'm still too old for the thing I do now in entertainment.
Guest:So I go to acting classes, writing classes, improv classes.
Guest:And I'm always the oldest guy in the room.
Guest:But at least it's much more fun.
Marc:But does your ego miss national hero status?
Guest:No.
Guest:No?
Marc:No.
Guest:You can't.
Guest:You can't let your ego stand in the way of this.
Guest:Because if you let your ego stand in the way, it will hinder you from learning.
Guest:And I'm here learning everything from the beginning.
Marc:Now, it would seem to me that there would be a place for you on American television with your experience of authoritarian... You think?
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:I don't know.
Marc:Talk to studio executives.
Marc:Those assholes, they need to hire me.
Guest:But even as a correspondent, The Daily Show never reached out?
Guest:Well, I mean, The Daily Show, it's already stacked.
Guest:And I want to do... I want to have my own voice.
Marc:What's the angle?
Guest:Well, I mean, maybe bringing international perspective to what's happening, not just in America, but in the world.
Guest:Even when people talk in America, when they talk about what's happening in the world, they talk about it from an American perspective.
Guest:American point of view, yeah.
Guest:Maybe they need an international perspective to talk about international issues to American people.
Marc:In a comedic way?
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:I think that's a good idea.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:And that's the idea that I'm pitching.
Marc:There's a huge international community as well.
Guest:Exactly.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:And have you had any bites, any interest?
Guest:Well, we are sitting in rooms having wonderful meetings.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And it's summer, so half of the executives are on vacation.
Guest:So this is Hollywood.
Guest:This is television, and you just have to play the game.
Marc:You miss Egypt?
Guest:The Egypt I miss is not there anymore.
Mm-hmm.
Marc:Do you find a good restaurant here?
Guest:Oh, absolutely.
Guest:I'm vegan, so this is heaven for me.
Guest:Oh, yeah?
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:Are there good Egyptian restaurants here?
Guest:A couple.
Marc:Yeah?
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Like what?
Guest:I mean, the thing is, I'm not looking at Egyptian food as much as vegan food.
Guest:No, I get it.
Guest:I get it.
Guest:But like, you know, good hummus is good hummus.
Guest:Why are you guys so focused on hummus?
Guest:You can get hummus from Whole Foods.
Marc:No, I know, but I'm trying to think if I know any really good Middle Eastern food restaurants.
Marc:Mostly we go to Lebanese.
Marc:Lebanese cuisine is the best.
Marc:Yeah, okay.
Marc:All right, I'll keep it in mind.
Marc:I'll keep it in mind.
Marc:Congratulations on the new child.
Guest:Thank you so much.
Guest:It was good talking to you.
Guest:Yeah, his name is Adam, which is a TSA-friendly name.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:There you go.
Marc:Working the bits.
Marc:Yes.
Marc:Thanks, pal.
Marc:Thank you.
Marc:All right, that was me and Bassem Yousef.
Marc:Check out the documentary Tickling Giants.
Marc:And remember, LA people, Sunday, October 29th at 7 p.m.
Marc:Come see me and Brendan do our thing and sign your books at the Ann and Jerry Moss Theater in Santa Monica.
Marc:Go to LiveTalksLA.org to get tickets or go to the tour page of WTFPod.com.
Marc:Fuck it.
Marc:I'll play some guitar.
Guest:guitar solo
Guest:Boomer lives.