Comedian and podcaster Ari Aster joins Jemele to talk about the perils of working non-stop, and why it s okay to take a break from social media for a while. Plus, we talk about what it s like to travel the world on a plane, and how to deal with the anxiety that comes with it. And, of course, there's a little bit of Star Trek: Into the Spider-Verse thrown in for good measure. It's a good one, and we're glad you're here to hear it. Thanks to our sponsor, VaynerSpeakers! We're part of the Gimlet Media Podcast Network. See all the great network shows at gimlet.media/OurStory Subscribe to Our Podcasts! Subscribe on iTunes and leave us a review on Apple Podcasts or wherever else you re listening. Thanks for listening and Good Luck Out There! Timestamps: 3:00 - Ari Aster (The Daily Show) 6:30 - The Daily Show 7:00 8:30 9:15 - What's up with Ari Aster? 11:40 - How to be a responsible adult 12:00 | What s the worst thing you can do on the road 16:00- What s your biggest pet peeve 17:15 18:20 - What are you looking forward to in the next episode? 19:40 21: What s going to happen next? 22: Is it okay to miss it? 23:00 / 22: What do you want to do in the future? 25: How do you need to do more? 26: What can you do more than that you re going to do? 27:00 + 27:10 29:30 | What's your favorite thing you re you want? 32:30 + 33:00? 35:00/35? 36:30/36: What would you like to see me do with your phone? 37:00+ 39:30 / 40:00 & 39: What are your biggest takeaway from this? 40: How can I do better than that? 41: Can I do it better? 45:00 What s a good day? 44:00 Do you have a question for me? 47:00 Can I get a hold of him?
00:00:11.000I just want to give you props for that.
00:00:13.000You took your phone, you shut that bitch off, and you put it aside.
00:00:15.000Well, it's a big thing for me, also, just as a comedian in comedy clubs, you start seeing the comedy store become popular, and I started noticing a bunch of chicks in there just looking at their phones nonstop.
00:00:27.000And I even put this thing on my phone.
00:00:29.000It's an app called Moment that tracks how long I'm using it and what I'm using.
00:00:33.000So if I get over a certain amount, I'm like, I gotta fucking put this thing down.
00:01:17.000He stepped away from the whole fucking smartphone completely.
00:01:20.000Just had a full conversation with him about it yesterday because I said you had three things happen that allowed you to completely check out and go on this trip of yours.
00:02:36.000And then he has financial freedom, because he's got the show on Comedy Central, he's got a great podcast, he's got all that kind of shit going on.
00:03:00.000Like, if I'm not working non-stop, I feel crazy.
00:03:04.000You should tell people what you're talking about, because a lot of people that are tuning into this podcast probably don't realize that Ari, our good friend, checked out of Civilization for three solid months at least, right?
00:03:16.000First of all, he's rocking a flip phone.
00:03:18.000He doesn't have any apps, so he doesn't...
00:03:21.000He has no smartphone, but then he just decides to go away and Check out he no one's communicated with him, you know, we're sort of in business together on this all things comedy thing and He's on our board of directors and I need to tell him about shit and didn't even buy like he we did a Skype and he's like I'm gone and then people on his show The Comedy Central show,
00:04:43.000This guy, Lee Child, created the perfect character.
00:04:45.000So I read all those books, but I have to force myself to read those books so I can chill the fuck out because, again, and this is something that people of other comics have pointed out, I can't be alone with my own thoughts.
00:06:27.000And then there was gatekeeper Tommy there for a while, who wouldn't pass, like, was holding a torch for Mitzi and what her, you know, when he had a weird thing with black eyes.
00:06:55.000They made this, if you guys don't know what we're talking about, they made this video room that was just a room in the back behind the kitchen.
00:07:03.000And they said, the comics love hanging out here.
00:07:05.000Let's create a special little back bar just for the comedians and their friends.
00:07:11.000And we get to have conversations in there.
00:08:18.000It is also, there's a bunch of hot spots there where you get stuck.
00:08:23.000Like, if you're trying to do your set, and you're leaving the back bar, and you're trying to get to the OR, and you're going through that hallway, you'll just get stuck by people with cameras.
00:08:52.000The Comedy Cellar in New York and the Comedy Store in Los Angeles are the best comedy clubs in the country, and if you're a comedy fan listening to this, you've got to make the trip.
00:11:24.000I'm just gonna live in weird spots and by myself.
00:11:28.000So that's another reason why I'm working my ass off is I want that I'm done fuck you money and I want to be able to chill out.
00:11:35.000I got kids on the back end of this thing where they're almost out of the house.
00:11:39.000I'm looking forward to that where they're both gonna be in college.
00:11:42.000I'm trying to get these little fuckers ready for life to the point where they don't need to come back because you hear a lot of people are living in their homes with their parents until they're 30. And later?
00:13:39.000My mom eventually has this great rags-to-riches story where...
00:13:42.000She was working at this company, and then she became an account rep, and then she became the head account rep, then she became the vice president, then she bought the company and quadrupled the company in size.
00:15:30.000So I would do shows on the weekend, host at Cobbs or the Punchline, and go right back to work.
00:15:36.000And at one point, I think I remember the world started to collide, like I'm doing stand-up and I look out and everybody's laughing except like three dudes with their arms crossed.
00:19:15.000I saw him one night at the comedy store when he hadn't done stand-up in forever, and he came back, and he was doing a joke about his Ferrari breaking down.
00:19:24.000Yeah, a lot of stuff people can relate to.
00:19:25.000And I wanted to pull him aside and go, listen, man, don't do that.
00:19:30.000I don't care if it's about a Ferrari breaking down.
00:19:33.000Don't tell everybody you have a $250,000 car.
00:19:36.000Well, that's a big George Carlin thing is that when he got so wealthy and he had people going to the post office for him, he's like, I can't do the post office bit now because I don't even go to the fucking post office and I can't talk about the bank because I never go to the bank for myself.
00:20:22.000But, you know, arguably Dana Gould should have been a huge superstar as a stand-up comedian.
00:20:27.000He was a San Francisco guy who was like, I listened to, if you guys know who that comic is, I mean, again, go find it because so good, so many voices, so many characters, so smart stories, like...
00:20:39.000Well, I met him in Boston in 88. Holy shit.
00:21:52.000Well, there was a kid on The Daily Show that him and his wife auditioned for The Daily Show at the same time, and he got it, and she didn't.
00:22:15.000And that's also been a difficult thing with me.
00:22:17.000So back to what we were talking about, it's like, so now I leave this parent's family business and I come to L.A., I could have, again, I could have been up there and miserable, fucking with, you know, firing people nonstop and, like, taking on other people's problems.
00:22:32.000Because that's what I did is, like, if you have a business or you work somewhere, we'd employ everybody working there so you didn't have to deal with any of the headaches.
00:22:42.000Like, I had a guy who was a Taiwanese, like, he was sick, this bad, he was working in a doctor's office, but on the weekends we found out he was pretending he was the doctor.
00:22:55.000So he was seeing patients, booking his own patients, but he was a physical therapist in an orthopedist's office.
00:23:03.000So I go in there, and I've been doing this a while.
00:23:06.000And again, I've been in so many awkward situations.
00:23:08.000Now I'm doing stand-up, and I'm even in more awkward situations, and I just go up, and I go, hey, Twan.
00:24:59.000And I fucking run down the hallway after her, and she goes into a patient room, and then she locks the door, and then I get the door open, and she's in there, and she's talking to her husband on the phone, and she goes, Andrew, there is a man here who's telling me lies.
00:27:48.000I would be eight years old on my bike and I'd ride down the block and Monty Hoffman and Mike Pritchard used to put their t-shirts over their heads.
00:28:39.000And, you know, if your stand-up career, like, you're in a good, amazing spot because people come to see you.
00:28:45.000Like I'm still at the stage where I go out and 40% of the people there come to see me and it's a weird cross-section of people who love stand-up or you know heard me you know heard me on Burt's podcast or your podcast you know whatever and then it's a weird cross-section of daily show people and then sitcom people and then you know what I mean it's like this weird crowd coming together and And then it's people who like comedy.
00:29:25.000And so for me to do a corporate gig and get paid a gazillion, you know, like a lot of money is fucking tempting to switch over to that side.
00:29:45.000He had a Showtime special that he did that I saw in the 90s, and I'm pretty sure, other than his Tonight Show monologues, which of course is numerous, I think that's the last stand-up that he ever put out as far as a full act.
00:30:17.000Jimmy Fallon, Seth Meyers, like crazy people, you know, Wanda Sykes, you know, I had no business being there, Chelsea Handler, whatever, just like all stars, and I'd never met them before.
00:30:30.000And I think they just wanted to color it up.
00:30:33.000But I'm going to say yes, because it's fucking Kennedy Center and super, super cool.
00:30:38.000And I go there, and I meet them for the first time.
00:30:42.000And then my act was like, what are you doing?
00:30:46.000Like, you have $250 million or something like that, and you steal every Sunday.
00:34:35.000I stopped to watch features that were better than the headliner and the feature, you know, the conversation over in the corner and fucking just watching it all.
00:34:44.000And again, you see what people are doing and how much work people put into this.
00:35:30.000You're saying a bunch of pop culture references and a bunch of shit, but there's no like...
00:35:36.000It's so hard to be judgmental about someone else's craft or art, but there's times when you know whether someone or not is actually trying to work something out or whether they're trying to trick the audience.
00:36:54.000The only time you should talk shit is when someone's doing something I mean, we've all been there before where you see someone go up and you go, okay, that's not even your act.
00:37:10.000Don't you think this is like the cleanest time for comedy as far as like...
00:37:14.000You still hear little stories pop up here and there, but I think it's also now it's like subjective and there's a lot, there's so much stand-up.
00:37:22.000I was thinking like I have this hour special coming out and This weekend on Showtime.
00:37:28.000And I was talking to somebody about it.
00:37:31.000And there's a special coming out like every fucking two days.
00:37:35.000Yeah, they're not that special anymore.
00:38:23.000Again, and it's like next level shit that I hope people can really appreciate the callbacks and the intricacies of this whole thing and the story and somebody who's working on something and saying something.
00:38:37.000Well, Doug did two of them in his hometown.
00:39:00.000And then eventually his town stopped being the town it was, and there's a bunch of people who move there because they know Doug lives there.
00:40:22.000To get those guys together, and Bert is one of those, you know, where it's like you have a couple kids, and like get the kids and the wives.
00:41:44.000And then you can still Well, there's this company called, fuck, what is this company called?
00:41:49.000There's an expedition vehicle that they take, and they take like a Ford F-250, and then they put this thing on top of the roof, like above the front cab.
00:42:00.000It goes up and then back, and the whole thing.
00:42:03.000It's got solar power and a generator, and you can live in those fucking things.
00:42:08.000It's like there's the rock climber guys.
00:42:19.000They take vans, and there's a company called U-Joint Off-Road.
00:42:24.000They take a van like that, they remove the natural suspension, or the suspension that comes with it, and put a full-on, dual, solid axle, four-wheel drive suspension set up in it, and you could just drive that motherfucker.
00:42:38.000Go to sportsmobile.com and take a look at this now, because this is what they used to do, and they're still doing with some of these.
00:42:45.000The vans will do this with Chevy vans.
00:43:05.000But I do go on these trips for hunting where I go out, you know, I'm in the woods five, six days at a time, and most of the time there's no cell phone service.
00:43:13.000I just did Bourdain with the crew that you guys shot with in Montana.
00:45:46.000I go to the gym like every morning, but I don't like I need to meditate and People have talked to me about Transcendental Meditation and stuff like that that I need to settle the fuck down Yeah, but you know that you have this thing and you're not doing anything.
00:46:00.000I'm not doing anything about it and the doctor said that this is good that now you're finally being compelled to talk about it with somebody that this is a problem and you feel like you're angry at yourself for being so anxious.
00:46:13.000Because if I go to the airport with my wife and kids, I can feel it.
00:46:53.000And then the desire for success, like, to be a successful comic is a lot of hustling, and there's a lot of, like, you gotta fucking, you gotta be on your point.
00:48:00.000Me and Bill, Burr first comes to Comedy Store, sees me, we become friendly, then sees me on stage, did some bit about how my wife's half Korean, half Greek, and I go,
00:48:15.000this Korean mother-in-law, and I don't do any jokes about her because then I'd be doing Margaret Cho's act in Who Wants That?
00:49:30.000So I go up in between these sets and I look at them and I go, Hey, do you know if they're going to show another video or are they going to bring me up?
00:51:31.000Yeah, so Willie Barsena had those stories about, like, head-butting somebody in the hallway because they brought up Charles Fleischer instead of him, you know?
00:52:35.000There's a feeling, especially like the anxiety before you're performing, you're ready to go, and then you feel like someone's fucking with you, and you're like, oh, okay.
00:52:43.000I've had that happen before, where a host will purposely say some dicky things about you, thinking they're going to chop down your set.
00:54:32.000You know, the belly room is a totally different experience than the OR, which is a totally different experience than the main room.
00:54:37.000It's one of the beautiful things about doing the hat trick at the comedy store.
00:54:40.000If you do all three rooms in a night, you get to feel the different, like, the belly room is so much more intimate and so much more intense because there's only 70 people in the room.
00:55:38.000Like, you're doing stand-up on stage, you know, a waitress would come in and go, the Thompson's here, and then the Thompson's are sitting in the front, and they just get up and walk out.
00:55:46.000And go to see Richard Pryor in the main room.
00:56:22.000Sort of like a little sketch routine, like a comedy routine, and then he would do a few minutes on his own, just doing kind of stand-up, like telling his story.
00:56:47.000You gotta go out and do those shows that I was saying, like, when you start doing stand-up comedy, you invite all your friends out, and it takes you three sets to figure out, oh, shit, I better stop inviting my friends out.
00:57:58.000Like, so-and-so stole this joke and stole that joke.
00:58:02.000And I go, I just got to come to grips with the fact that what I feel like is my life's calling is somebody else's last resort.
00:58:10.000And then, because I talk about like Dustin Diamond does stand-up, I go fucking, you know, Skippy from Family Times does stand-up, like, and then...
00:58:20.000People don't even know what that is anymore.
00:58:29.000Well, Skippy was doing stand-up, like, when Family Ties sort of ended, he was doing stand-up...
00:58:38.000When I was an open-miker, I was just starting out, and he was headlining these places, and he had this big smile, Skippy from Family Ties, and he just would go on the road.
01:01:18.000And Sawyer had him in that small room, and we watched tourist after tourist walk away, and Tom Sawyer looked at me and the rest of the comics, again, or just hunched over on the floor, and he goes...
01:01:30.000I'm losing money this weekend, guys, but this is for us.
01:08:26.000Again, if you have people coming out that know you and you're going out to see something and you collectively are a group of people that love an individual comic, it's a great place to be.
01:08:38.000But again, if you're up there winning over 60% of the audience, it's not good.
01:08:45.000I'd rather just go hang out at the store.
01:08:47.000Well, it's good to do the road, though, because, like, you can...
01:08:50.000I think, like, every time you do a set in a new place, you get a new experience, a new vibe, a new feel, new crowds, new...
01:08:58.000And I think places also have, like, a different personality.
01:09:01.000Like, I feel like Portland, Oregon has a different personality than a lot of places.
01:09:06.000Like, you go up to Portland, it feels different.
01:14:49.000Well, I went to dinner with my wife and one of her friends, her friend's husband, and we went in Beverly Hills, and this guy pulled up in a million dollar car.
01:15:30.000Like, you remember that one guy that was like some sort of a foreign dignitary guy and he was banging his maids or like forcing him to suck his dick or something like that and they called the cops on him and they arrested him and then, you know, they were gonna process him and, you know, charge him with rape and he just fucking hopped in a private jet and flew out of the country.
01:17:14.000We were playing this youth basketball league when my son was maybe like a fifth grader, and the nicest man in the world who ran the basketball league just got hit by a bullet in the head and fucking dead.
01:21:55.000Or I'll order myself a full entree and then somebody will have half a chicken parmesan or something over on it because my son and daughter insist on ordering off the kids menu.
01:22:05.000And so now I got somebody eating a full chicken parmesan, but they'll only eat half of it, and I'm not going to let that go to waste, and so I'll start digging into that, and then there's pasta there, and I'm like, let me just try one of those raviolis.
01:22:15.000And then all of a sudden, I ate, like, fucking three dinners.
01:22:19.000I weigh more than I ever have weighed in my entire life right now.
01:22:43.000You know, one of the things we were talking about that I think is kind of important, like when you're talking about immigration and like bad apples and stuff like that, I look at immigration the same way I look at gun control.
01:22:53.000Like most people that have guns are law-abiding citizens and it's not going to be a problem.
01:27:25.000So, yeah, I want the gun badly, but I feel like with an AK-47, and maybe, you know, people can write, like, only bad things have happened with people, you know, sure, there's responsible gun owners, but you look at Dylann Roof and you look at,
01:27:40.000you know, Columbine, you look at all these, you know, people getting shot up everywhere and Sandy Hook.
01:29:13.000But I think also the unfortunate reality now is that you could have somebody walking around undetected and fucking shooting people in a college, in a community college.
01:29:24.000I was on KCRW and walking around the Santa Monica campus, and I really did think.
01:29:45.000You know, and that's the other thing that doesn't come up when you're talking about mass shootings is whenever you hear about it in the news, nobody makes the correlation, the inescapable correlation between psychoactive drugs and And mass shootings, because there's a lot of fucking mass shooters,
01:30:01.000like almost all of them, that are either on pharmaceutical drugs, like SSRIs, disassociative drugs, or they're getting off of them, antipsychotic drugs.
01:30:12.000Is there, like, there is no common ground?
01:30:14.000You start having people make, we live in this country where you should be able to do whatever you want and have whatever you want, but then who gets to decide who gets what guns?
01:33:31.000The idea of taking all those guns away.
01:33:32.000I think what you're getting at with the mental health stuff is there, I'm not opposed to there being a screening process and seeing if you have a history of violence.
01:33:40.000And if you show up on a terrorist watch list, and that's where I I think the NRA goes overboard.
01:33:47.000If you're on a fucking terrorist watch list, who doesn't agree with that?
01:33:51.000Well, the only problem with that is who gets to decide who's on that terrorist watch list.
01:33:55.000Because there was people that were from the Green Party that were put on terrorist watch lists after 9-11 because they were anti-war protesters.
01:36:25.000So they have to contact the FBI. Federal law does not require dealers to conduct a background check if a firearm purchaser presents a state permit to purchase or possess firearms that meet certain conditions.
01:36:37.000So it seems like there's definitely some wiggle room.
01:36:41.000And then, you know, that's what he was talking about, these gun shows where you can just go gobble up a bunch of firearms, and then you can bring them into...
01:36:48.000That's what they just transport them across state lines and...
01:36:51.000It's one of those things like many human issues where there's not a whole lot of like clear paths.
01:36:57.000It's like there's so many guns, you're never going to take them all away from people.
01:37:01.000And should you take them all away from them?
01:37:02.000Like if a guy like you has a gun, I don't feel like you're a danger or a threat unless you get in one of your goddamn tirades.
01:37:22.000Carlos Mencia was on Joey Diaz's show saying he thought about bringing a gun around and going to the comedy store and shooting people and he was carrying a gun in his car.
01:37:36.000That's where I started thinking about Ojai, which brings me back and then I started thinking about, you know, I look at Redfin or I look at Trulia.
01:40:52.000I went to a party, and I've talked about this on the podcast before, this one little kid was just running around hitting everybody and doing...
01:42:16.000You know, he fucked with the wrong guy in Tate.
01:42:20.000First of all, a guy who's been arrested, been around bad people his whole life, been in numerous street fights, was a professional fighter, was on the Ultimate Fighter, was a black belt in Jiu Jitsu.
01:43:33.000He kicks his leg, grabs him, and pulls him on top of him, and pulls him into what's called a guard, you know, like in jiu-jitsu, and then wraps him up in something called an omoplata, which is a shoulder lock.
01:43:44.000So he throws, I mean, this is all instantaneous.
01:45:03.000So they're laughing and everyone's laughing.
01:45:05.000We took a couple pictures together, went back in the room, got some dinner, and we were laughing.
01:45:10.000Yeah, but when that dad is in your face at the party, that exercise that calm, that's again, that's the thing that I struggle with.
01:45:21.000When Mike Costa is on stage, and I'm being completely honest, again, this is how I feel, and it's just something that takes over, and I can't help but say, hey, your son is hitting that guy.
01:46:04.000And they just are not disciplining him, paying attention.
01:46:08.000He literally went out and talked to the kid and there was some commotion going on where people complained about the kid hitting somebody.
01:46:14.000He talked to the kid and then he high-fived him.
01:46:16.000And then the kid went back to doing it again.
01:46:18.000I mean literally he went back inside to drink the kid went back outside again So at the end of the night when this guy apologized to me Like it the kid was doing it all night.
01:46:35.000I saw him push a kid and call him a loser I go he said fucking six and he's doing this he goes that never happened I'm like I understand consequences.
01:46:48.000I understand the actual consequences of smacking this guy in his fucking mouth, which is what I wanted to do.
01:46:54.000Of course, if there was no consequences to doing anything, and I didn't think of him as a person, I didn't think of him as a guy who just never raised a kid before, hasn't really thought about it well, has a big career, probably busy all the time, wife's busy all the time, just not doing a good job,
01:47:16.000Drinking because he doesn't like being married, drinking because he doesn't like being a dad, drinking because he doesn't like being sober.
01:49:12.000And then the waitress, the waitress, the stewardess comes by and she looks at these three kids and looks around for who they're with and the one that was...
01:51:12.000Full circle to my dad passing away is that every single weekend, and this is why I bought that FJ-62 Land Cruiser, because every single weekend we went on a little family trip.
01:51:24.000And I looked at myself, and we'd go on family vacations and stuff, but the amount of time that my family really spent together...
01:51:32.000Like, a mom and a dad, like, he would take us to Yosemite.
01:51:35.000He would take us up the coast to Mendocino.
01:51:37.000We'd go to Marin or Stinson Beach and all these places.
01:53:35.000And I just think I could staff up and do all that shit.
01:53:37.000So I could see myself splitting my time, keeping a little house in L.A. And then having a place in Cambria or Santa Barbara and just fucking...
01:55:23.000Right, but you know that when you work on a show, you're working 16-hour days.
01:55:27.000Like, if you want to be a showrunner for a successful show, the amount of time that's required to actually make something take off is massive.
01:55:34.000And you have to manage a bunch of different people and expectations.
01:56:12.000So I'm just trying to map out, and I don't have the answer.
01:56:15.000I'm thinking, and this is certainly not something I'm doing right now, but again, when you work seasonally, then you can really take some time to just hang out and read on a deck and make dinner.
01:56:26.000And that's your go shop for an individual meal every day or go and fish and do shit like that.
01:56:32.000Yeah, you seem like you're longing for this idealistic view of peace and quiet while pursuing chaos.
01:58:25.000Like I really want to just, and I'm overcomplicating my life.
01:58:29.000But I am, and you see me, I'm a happy guy, but I just, when you're waking up in the middle of the night at 2 o'clock in the morning, thinking about all the shit that you have to do, you have to pare some stuff down.
01:59:11.000Sit back for a year and live the way I'm living, I'd have no problem paying my bills.
01:59:15.000And, uh, it was a very tangible feeling, like, okay.
01:59:20.000Now that I have this momentum, I've got to keep this going because I don't ever want to go back to that feeling of not being able to pay my bills.
01:59:28.000The real struggle is like financial independence.
01:59:31.000Once you become financially independent, then there's levels to it.
01:59:35.000You know, like you want to have one of those Montecito houses or have a fucking private jet or you want to get crazier and crazier and crazier.
01:59:41.000You're just overly complicating yourself.
02:02:34.000Oh, so then they go out, they take trips to places?
02:02:37.000Yeah, they'll go out and they'll go to the Sierra and...
02:02:39.000I was in Bozeman this summer, Bozeman, Montana, and we went by this place where all these people were fly fishing, and it made me so excited.
02:02:48.000I'm like, God, I want to go back and do that.
02:02:49.000But it was weird because they catch and release.
02:02:53.000And I was like, okay, now you're weirding me out.
02:02:55.000Because you're just putting a hole in that fish's face, and you're letting them back.
02:03:11.000Well, if you can do like a place where you can catch the fish and eat it, god damn, on the shore, if you have a little cast iron frying pan, make a little campfire and have some shore lunch, oh, it's so delicious.
02:03:22.000See, for me, that is the sort of ultimate, hanging out with my wife, having a glass of wine, doing that, reading, and then going to bed.
02:03:31.000But do you really want to do it, or do you like the romantic idea of doing it?
02:03:40.000Yeah, but I do like going, we've gone away in a couple times, like, my kids are just at the point where they went away for a sleepover, and this only happened one time.
02:03:48.000And me and my wife drove up into Altadena and heard about this hike that people do and took the dogs and went on this hike and we had a blast.
02:03:57.000And I know that if I can mix in the proper amount of work and the proper amount of just chilling out, I'll love it.
02:04:05.000I have three hammocks in my backyard that I don't use.
02:04:20.000But meanwhile, you're also planning on doing a bunch of shows and being an executive producer and a showrunner and a writer and a stand-up performer and you're acting and...
02:05:12.000Me and Bill came up with the idea that comedians should own and distribute all of their own content.
02:05:19.000When I first showed up in LA, I worked on a TV show with Cheech from Cheech and Chong, who told me to do two things.
02:05:27.000He goes, be nice to every single person you meet out in the public.
02:05:31.000Every busboy who's going to have the Cheech is an asshole story if you're a dick to anybody, so try to be nice to as many people as you can.
02:05:38.000And then he goes, also, you want to own every single piece of content you ever put out there.
02:05:44.000And he goes, I owned all the movies and I owned all the albums.
02:05:48.000So every single day there's all this mailbox money.
02:05:52.000But as comedians, everybody's starting all these podcasts.
02:05:55.000And this is 2010. So we do all the paperwork.
02:06:01.000And we take a big chunk of the company.
02:06:03.000And we say, okay, everyone that participates in this network, this is the board of directors, Tom Segura, Bert Kreischer, Hari Shafir, Dave Anthony, myself, Bill Burr.
02:06:16.000And we help guide this place in the right direction.
02:06:20.000So when a new comic wants to come on, all of us sort of go, do we want this person on now?
02:06:25.000For example, John Reap and Sarah Tiana are going to start a podcast.
02:08:56.000So the idea behind it is you're kind of acting as a network.
02:09:00.000We're going to turn it into our own network.
02:09:02.000It's going to be like United Artists, and when the shows sell, it's going to be full transparency.
02:09:09.000When, let's say, something's burning, goes up, and people start buying it, Bert is going to look at his back end and know exactly, you know, the money has to be recouped, and then, you know...
02:09:51.000This is an association of comics working together to promote each other.
02:09:58.000And so, like, if you guys have a podcast on the All Things Comedy label, everyone knows, well, this is going to be pretty high quality because a bunch of comedians are...
02:11:16.000Do branded content, integrated marketing and all that shit and have the comedians own the company that does that.
02:11:21.000Comedians are responsible for so much fucking content.
02:11:24.000It's books, it's TV shows, it's movies.
02:11:27.000It's just like you think about these comics are producing so much great shit that why shouldn't all the comics have a company that distributes all that stuff?
02:11:36.000Well, it's interesting because there's a bunch of groups that are coming along right now that are trying to capitalize on podcasting.
02:11:41.000And one of the things that's fascinating, I had a conversation with A friend of ours who's got a podcast and his agency or his management company that suck.
02:11:50.000Now are telling him they want a piece of the podcast.
02:12:22.000There's no sense, and you're doing it.
02:12:26.000It's like, this is something, just like your stand-up career, that you really don't, now because of the technology, you don't need an intro to the establishment.
02:12:36.000When you're a young stand-up comedian, you need a manager and an agent to usher you into the established group of people.
02:12:48.000When you're a podcaster and your podcast becomes popular, it's you and a room and that microphone and the people that listen.
02:12:56.000And there's really, because you're putting out a good product, you don't need somebody to tell you, like, it's okay to do it or you're going to be on this network.
02:13:57.000The people that we get to associate with and the people we get to meet and what happens when you do something you love, it all just sort of comes together.
02:14:05.000So, I feel very fortunate that way that I get to do all this shit.
02:14:09.000And even though I need to say no and I need to pare it down, I'm still having a fucking blast.
02:14:14.000Well, it's good that you're having a blast, but my advice to you is just do all those things that you're talking about.
02:14:19.000Like, especially do all those things as far as, like, meditation.
02:14:22.000Do all those things, like, whatever the cognitive therapy issue that you have to deal with.
02:17:07.000Again, I can't stress enough to people listening and just finding that thing that you really like to do and doing it is so fucking important.
02:17:18.000I don't know what it is, but if you've had something itching at you, because that's the thing with my parents' family business and even knowing I wanted...
02:17:25.000I knew I wanted to be a stand-up comic forever.
02:17:28.000And it took me a while to figure it out.
02:17:31.000So that's when I come down here and I'm racing around like really trying to cram it all in or whatever is behind it.
02:17:37.000But I just wish that's a regret I do have.
02:18:39.000Because that's the thing, as a stand-up comic, we just always have this, the skills to go out, earn a living.
02:18:46.000For all Jay Leno's faults, he has said some pretty great stuff about...
02:18:51.000There's a book called Comic Insights by Franklin Ajay, where he used to teach this at UCLA. And if you go through his interviews with Richard Jenny and Chris Rock and Jay Leno, and Jay Leno says it takes you seven years...
02:20:31.000And then I knew if I turned 30 and I didn't try stand-up, because it had always been itching at me and people always told me I should do it, then I would never be able to live with myself.
02:20:41.000So I forced myself to do it, even though I was sort of uncomfortable.
02:20:46.000Well, this life is like this weird quick blip and it seems long when you're young.
02:20:51.000But as you get older, I'm pushing 50. I'll be 50 this year.
02:21:04.000We all know that one person that's not doing what they want to do and it eats away at them all the time.
02:21:09.000Instead of the people that you know that are fulfilled, that are doing things they enjoy, and they're working hard and they're pushing, but they get that good feeling out of it.
02:21:16.000They're actually pursuing what they love.
02:21:18.000They actually feel like they're making a difference in their life.
02:21:20.000They're actually creating something or accomplishing something.
02:21:26.000That's the key to getting those good brain chemicals, those good feelings.
02:21:30.000Having good people in your life, having good friends, being kind to people, enjoying your time in this life, and then doing that thing that is actually interesting to your personality and your mind.
02:23:01.000And the more you look into it and the more you really contemplate the absolute Just massive scale of this universe that we live in, the more it seems ridiculous.
02:23:14.000And the little things that are keeping you up at night and waking you up at 2 o'clock in the morning, the anxiety.
02:25:49.000Well, this is a consequence of all your ambition.
02:25:51.000I mean, that's where all the stress is coming from.
02:25:52.000It's a consequence of you, and it's also one of the reasons why you've been so successful, that you're constantly pushing and making things happen and getting things done.
02:25:59.000But occasionally, you're going to spin your wheels.
02:29:24.000Well, news radio went to syndication, but news radio was never the kind of commercial success that any of these other shows were.
02:29:30.000It actually became a success in syndication.
02:29:33.000When news radio was on television, this is when there was not a lot of shows on TV, by the way.
02:29:39.000There was one time where my friend Lou Morton's one of the writers he would Lou would wear a t-shirt that had the number that we were ranked for the week You know like our Ratings and he came in with the number 88 on his shirt.
02:30:00.000And the only time we got cancelled is when I didn't think we were gonna get cancelled which is crazy but I don't remember what my point was.
02:30:08.000No, it's just you're working on all these shows and you're not doing ideally what you want.
02:30:13.000But then, you know, you have a wife and kids and the money is so good.
02:30:17.000I was thinking for the longest time that I wanted to be like an ethnic lab rat on one of those NCIS shows.
02:31:27.000The network rigmarole that was like a real...
02:31:30.000There was that option at one point in time that you thought that there was going to be a pot of gold at the end of the rainbow, like a syndication deal.
02:31:36.000And now that stuff is almost non-existent.
02:33:06.000When I started doing stand-up, and I still have all these deals, that's what's been happening with CBS. I've had my own family sitcom script seven times.
02:33:19.000And so, like, are they development deals?